Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.41

If gods care not for me and for my children,

There is a reason for it.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

Yet another reference to Euripides. Great wisdom and inspiration are to be found in the works of the Greek tragedians, as their art, however grand in scale, mirrors so much of our daily lives.

Depending on my attitude or mood, I may read this passage in two different ways. Perhaps when life isn’t going my way, the gods are angry with me, and so they are sending me an appropriate punishment for my sins. Then I might need to put my house in order to get back in their good graces.

Now Providence surely offers rewards and punishments in many ways, means of both encouraging us to what is good and discouraging us from what is bad, but I could also understand the principle on a different level. It need not be about whether I am liked or disliked at all, or on the naughty or nice list.

For the Stoic, every condition is an opportunity for living well, and so whatever may happen is there for a perfectly good reason. I may not understand it right now, and maybe I will never understand it completely. Nevertheless, the presence or absence of anything serves a purpose within the whole. It is my job to find the greatest benefit for myself and for others within it.

Whatever my preference may be, the gods will smile or frown as they should. Now what will I make of that, what will I learn from it, how will I use it to improve myself? As Max Ehrmann said it so nicely, “No doubt the Universe is unfolding as it should.”

Some people will question Providence, or God, or Intelligence, or whatever we may wish to call it, because they become frustrated when things seem to go wrong, when their desires are not satisfied, or when their expectations are not met. They may think it unjust, and I understand completely. I have been there many times.

Yet whenever I am pulled in that direction, I try to remember that fairness is not measured by whether the Universe gives me what I want. With apologies to Mick Jagger, it gives me what I need.

If I approach my life thinking that good and bad are in my circumstances, then yes, life seems quite unfair. But if, like a Stoic, I approach my life thinking that the good and bad for me are in my estimation and action, then everything in life is, in this sense, fair. If it pleases, I may embrace it, and if it hurts, I may confront it and transform it.

Things don’t go wrong for me. I choose to go wrong with things.

Consider it as literally or symbolically as you like, but every one of those thunderbolts hurled by Zeus always hits right on the mark, whether it gives or it takes away. 

Written in 12/2007