Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.23

As you yourself are a component part of a social system, so let every act of yours be a component part of social life.

Whatever act of yours then has no reference either immediately or remotely to a social end, this tears asunder your life, and does not allow it to be one, and it is of the nature of a mutiny, just as when in a popular assembly a man acting by himself stands apart from the general agreement.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.23 (tr Long)

When I first began to take an interest in Stoicism many years ago, I mistakenly assumed that it would only make me be even more alone. I was already quite awkward and uncomfortable around people, and the fact that I was now interested in an odd philosophy that went against the grain of all that was popular was hardly going to make me any new friends. So I figured that being a loner was the price I needed to pay for some peace of mind, that self-sufficiency meant coming to terms with greater isolation.

Yet quite contrary to my expectations, something very different happened. No, I didn’t gain any new friends, or suddenly become more admired, but I did begin to understand what it actually meant to be social, that it was always right and necessary to live and work with others, and I became more content to do my own part, without demanding something further in return.

It is through the power of reason that we can understand one another, and it is through such an understanding that we can choose to cooperate for the sake of our common end. I may see other people treat social relations as a means for personal gain at the expense of others, and as a place of constant competition and conflict, but I do not need to act contrary to any man. I can hardly claim to live a life with my neighbors, if I am constantly working against them.

This may seem to be asking too much, and I may think I cannot help but have enemies. I remind myself simply that because another tries to take advantage of me does not require me to take advantage of him. The Golden Rule, however we may choose to express it, does not admit of conditions or exceptions.

When we treat life as a game of manipulation, we are separating ourselves from others, not bonding with them at all, and we are thereby removing our own nature from the whole of which it is a part. I am no longer even myself when I am no longer for others. Instead of saying “ If I want it, I’ll take it from you!” I should rather say “If we both need it, I can share it with you!”

I may still feel discouraged that being social in this way isn’t making me any richer, or winning me honor, or improving my influence and position. Yet taking a properly Stoic view of things will only remind me that none of that is the point at all, that being social isn’t about gaining greater popularity or importance. To be a social creature is in what I give to others, to act well for them, and that is itself the greatest reward, the building of my own character.

I do not need to receive anything else to be happy for having treated my neighbor with justice and compassion. My actions may be small, they may be unnoticed, or they may even lower my place in the pecking order. I can smile and move on, satisfied with my contribution.

If what I am doing can help others to live well, in whatever manner, then I am also living well, and there can be no opposition here. A social creature fulfills itself by contribution, not by domination.

No man who chooses to love is ever really alone. 

Written in 11/2008

Tao Te Ching 27

The skillful traveler leaves no traces of his wheels or footsteps; the skillful speaker says nothing that can be found fault with or blamed; the skillful reckoner uses no tallies; the skillful closer needs no bolts or bars, while to open what he has shut will be impossible; the skillful binder uses no strings or knots, while to unloose what he has bound will be impossible. 

In the same way the sage is always skillful at saving men, and so he does not cast away any man; he is always skillful at saving things, and so he does not cast away anything. This is called 'Hiding the light of his procedure.'

Therefore the man of skill is a master to be looked up to by him who has not the skill; and he who has not the skill is the helper of the reputation of him who has the skill. If the one did not honor his master, and the other did not rejoice in his helper, an observer, though intelligent, might greatly err about them. This is called 'The utmost degree of mystery.'

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.22

Hasten to examine your own ruling faculty, and that of the Universe, and that of your neighbor.

Your own, that you may make it just; and that of the Universe, that you may remember of what you are a part; and that of your neighbor, that you may know whether he has acted ignorantly or with knowledge, and that you may also consider that his ruling faculty is akin to yours.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.22 (tr Long)

The most essential aspect of our nature, and that of all of Nature, is consciousness, the power of reason, by which all things are ordered and ruled.

If we can only attend to the understanding within ourselves, we will discover our purpose. If we can only attend to the understanding in others, we will learn how we share that purpose with them. If we can only attend to the Understanding as the power that moves everything, we will begin to glimpse the purpose of the whole.

Putting this task above all others is the key to embracing meaning and finding peace, for then our choices and actions are informed by truth. Yet this is too often the part of ourselves we neglect the most, replacing it with the pursuit of feeding our passions, accumulating wealth, and increasing our fame. Concerned so much with everything outside of us, we abandon the dignity of what is within us.

I sometimes wonder what another intelligence might think if it stumbled across our way of doing things, observing how we encourage consumption in our business, sell gratification in our advertising, or gain influence in our politics. Even I will catch myself asking, “What could they possibly be thinking?” The problem, of course, is that there isn’t necessarily much genuine thinking going on at all.

A university administrator once told me that we didn’t need students to figure out who they are, but rather to just train them in what they needed to do. I found this attitude quite dangerous, since it is impossible for there to be worthy action without wisdom, or any doing of what is good without first knowing what is good.

I should hardly believe it is hopeless, however, because I can start with myself, right at this very moment. My blinders can come off, and I can always find the wonderful ways I am able to participate with everyone and everything around me. In discovering something of my own true nature, I might even help others to discover something about their own.

To know myself, as Socrates advised, is to reveal my own virtue as my only real calling. To know others is to think with them, whether they are right or wrong, and thereby to practice respect for them. To know the Reason behind it all is to recognize that whatever happens has its place in Providence, and that no sincere effort is in vain.

Some people will give up on being human, while others will rise to the occasion. A choice is only as good as the judgment that guides it, and nothing of benefit can proceed without a total commitment to awareness. 

Written in 10/2008 

Ecclesiastes 4:7-12

[7] Again, I saw vanity under the sun:
[8] a person who has no one, either son or brother, yet there is no end to all his toil, and his eyes are never satisfied with riches, so that he never asks, "For whom am I toiling and depriving myself of pleasure?" This also is vanity and an unhappy business.
[9] Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil.
[10] For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow; but woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up.
[11] Again, if two lie together, they are warm; but how can one be warm alone?
[12] And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.21

Termination of activity, cessation from movement and opinion, and in a sense their death, is no evil.

Turn your thoughts now to the consideration of your life, your life as a child, as a youth, your manhood, your old age, for in these also every change was a death.

Is this anything to fear? Turn your thoughts now to your life under your grandfather, then to your life under your mother, then to your life under your father; and as you find many other differences and changes and terminations, ask yourself, is this anything to fear?

In like manner, then, neither is the termination and cessation and change of your whole life a thing to be afraid of.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.21 (tr Long)

People have all sorts of ways of showing you that that they no longer care. I have found that simply ignoring a person is the most common, the easiest solution for dealing with someone who is now undesirable or inconvenient; we think that if we look away, it must never have happened.

But the most interesting brush-off I ever received came from someone I thought would never let me down. She fixed her eyes on me quite seriously, and carefully described how she had seen an old man on the subway the previous day.

“He looked just like I know you’ll be one of these days.” Her expression was one of complete horror and disgust.

I didn’t know it at the time, but in hindsight I understood that this was her odd way of telling me that I was no longer interesting to her. The thought of an old version of me, perhaps sick, weak, or broken, was deeply unattractive.

As much as we might vehemently deny it, aging troubles us to the core. Perhaps we cringe at it in others because we know with such certainty that it will come to us as well. So we worship youth, thinking it expresses everything about vitality, and we turn away from old age, shunning it at as a sign of failure.

What we are forgetting is that every passing moment, at any time, is already an ending, a little death. The very fact that this sounds disturbing reveals our deeply rooted fear of transition. If it isn’t permanent, it must be no good. But every act of living is also an act of dying, of changing from one state into another.

The fact that nothing remains constant isn’t just a part of the process, it is the very definition of a process, a continual unfolding of action. This is as true of every part of Nature as it is of the whole of Nature, and it is as true at the beginning of our lives, or in the middle, as it is at the end, in that each and every change is itself a beginning, middle, and an end.

Why will we fear our deathbeds, but not a graduation from school, or a wedding, or the birth of a child? They are really no different at all. Why smile at one passage but cry at another?

Youth and growth are hardly evils, and neither are death and aging. They are necessary aspects of living. We can hardly love one of these and not the other. 

Written in 10/2008 

The Art of Peace 16

Do not fail  
To learn from  
The pure voice of an 
Ever-flowing mountain stream  
Splashing over the rocks.

Fool's Gold

Boethius, The Consolation 3.19

“All pleasures have this way:

those who enjoy them they drive on with stings.

Pleasure, like the winged bee,

scatters its honey sweet, then flies away,

and with a clinging sting it strikes the hearts it touches.”

—from Book 3, Poem 7

I can appreciate the image here, first the sweetness and then the sting. The sweetness is the promise of being gratified, and the sting is then being consumed by the longing.

People will often roll their eyes and snicker when they hear about self-control and moderation regarding pleasures, but they do so thinking that others wish to deny them any enjoyment. What they fail to see is that there is no enjoyment at all when we throw away a mastery over our own choices, and when we allow ourselves to be enslaved by the objects of our desires. Again, pleasures aren’t the problem, but being ruled by them most certainly is.

I have slowly come to understand this in principle, and I have seen it all to vividly in practice. Years of working with addicts, with the dispossessed, and with the abandoned has shown me that people will face all sorts of hardships, obstacles, and inner demons, but the ones that will do the most harm, time and time again, are those that follow from surrendering to gratification.

If everything else is going wrong, we might think, at least this will make us feel right, if only for a moment. It may appear like a blessed relief. By the time we see how thoroughly we have sold our dignity, it may well seem like it is too late to turn back.

The cold and heartless may claim that this is only a problem for the weak, the lazy, or the outcasts. Yet I have found that this curse crosses all lines of class, color, and creed, and it spares no one who allows it to take control of his life. People may have different poisons, but they are poisons nonetheless, whether in a boardroom or a back alley, uptown or downtown.

What all cases will share in common is trying to fill an emptiness on the inside by seeking to consume things on the outside. In the process, we become willing to sell ourselves out, and then to sell others out, just for the sake of some sort of fix. It could be alcohol, or drugs, or sex, or food, or shopping, or any sort of amusement or diversion, and in every case what we think we possess has ultimately come to possess us.

Yes, I have recognized it as a disease, perhaps of the most dangerous sort, because we infect ourselves with our own thinking, and we find it all too easy to insist that we aren’t sick at all. It hardly helps that when others give up on us, we also give up on ourselves.

A big part of a solution is in rethinking priorities, learning that not everything pleasing is good, but that all things that are good should be pleasing. The difference is between lust, bound to receiving, and love, ordered to giving; it is in rediscovering that our lives are measured not by the gratification of what is done to us, but by the merit of what we do.

Written in 9/2015

 

Dhammapada 41

Before long, alas! this body will lie on the earth, despised, without understanding, like a useless log.

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 84

When disease and death overtake me, I would gladly be found engaged in the task of liberating my own Will from the assaults of passion, from hindrance, from resentment, from slavery. 

Thus would I gladly to be found employed, so that I may say to God, "Have I in anything transgressed Your commands? Have I in anything perverted the faculties, the senses, the natural principles that You did give me? Have I ever blamed You or found fault with Your administration? 

"When it was Your good pleasure, I fell sick—and so did other men: by my will I consented. Because it was Your pleasure, I became poor: but my heart rejoiced. No power in the State was mine, because You would not give it: such power I never desired! Have You ever seen me of more doleful countenance on that account? Have I not ever drawn close unto You with a cheerful look, waiting upon Your commands, attentive to Your signals? Do You wish that I now depart from the great Assembly of men? I go. I give You all thanks, You that have deemed me worthy to take part with You in this Assembly: to behold Your works, to comprehend this Your administration." 

Such I hope would be the subject of my thoughts, my pen, my study, when death overtakes me.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.20

It is your duty to leave another man's wrongful act there where it is.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.20 (tr Long)

This is a lesson I need to relearn every day, sometimes many times a day. In the heat of the moment I can forget it completely, because few impressions tug as powerfully as the knee-jerk reaction to want to respond in kind.

It is unpleasant enough to feel wronged, though I still find myself tempted to throw more fuel on the fire, to escalate the conflict. How many times might a situation have been quite bearable, yet I have made it so much harder to face because of my own stubborn refusal to simply let something be?

Over time I have come to expect that people will more often than not act poorly, not because I have some dark or pessimistic view of the world, but because I know from my own experience that it is far easier to act without thought and concern than it is to make an effort to be responsible and caring. To accept this fact is the beginning of my ability to be forgiving instead of resentful, to make it right instead of compounding the wrong. I know how often I will fail, so I can hardly hold it against another.

This will not excuse an evil, or wish it out of existence, but it will put it in its place, keeping it from festering and spreading. I can’t put a stop to what others may think and do, but I can certainly put a stop to what I may think or do. To face a vice with a virtue is to stop it in its tracks, and to transform it into something helpful instead of harmful.

One of my many odd interests in college was reading old Icelandic sagas, where the slightest offense or disagreement would end up bringing ever greater grief and misfortune on the characters. If only someone, somewhere down the line, had turned away from the desire for vengeance, or even avoided some foolish blunder, all would have been well. I appreciated the principle here, but it was quite strange that it took me so much longer to embrace the practice.

I know full well that lighting a match around a gas leak, or poking a snarling dog with a stick, is not a good idea, and yet I will all too easily offend when I have been offended, seek to hurt when I have been hurt. Blame and bickering only make it worse, while rising above the fray can help to make it better.

The greatest kindnesses I have ever received were never from people helping me to smite my enemies, but from people helping me to move beyond an injustice.

To let it go is not to ignore it, or to wish it away, or to run from a response. It is actually responding with compassion, by limiting the damage and beginning to rebuild. We’ve heard it so many times, but we still don’t seem to get it: two wrongs don’t make a right, and it takes two to fight.

Written in 10/2008

Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ 1.13

Of resisting temptation

1. So long as we live in the world, we cannot be without trouble and trial. Wherefore it is written in Job, The life of man upon the earth is a trial. And therefore ought each of us to give heed concerning trials and temptations, and watch unto prayer, lest the devil find occasion to deceive; for he never sleeps, but goes about seeking whom he may devour. No man is so perfect in holiness that he has never temptations, nor can we ever be wholly free from them.

2. Yet, notwithstanding, temptations turn greatly unto our profit, even though they be great and hard to bear; for through them we are humbled, purified, instructed. All Saints have passed through much tribulation and temptation, and have profited thereby. And they who endured not temptation became reprobate and fell away. There is no position so sacred, no place so secret, that it is without temptations and adversities.

3. There is no man wholly free from temptations so long as he lives, because we have the root of temptation within ourselves, in that we are born in concupiscence. One temptation or sorrow passes, and another comes; and always we shall have somewhat to suffer, for we have fallen from perfect happiness. Many who seek to fly from temptations fall yet more deeply into them. By flight alone we cannot overcome, but by endurance and true humility we are made stronger than all our enemies.

4. He who only resists outwardly and pulls not up by the root, shall profit little; no, rather temptations will return to him the more quickly, and will be the more terrible. Little by little, through patience and long suffering, you shall conquer by the help of God, rather than by violence and your own strength of will. In the midst of temptation often seek counsel; and deal not hardly with one who is tempted, but comfort and strengthen him as you would have done unto yourself.

5. The beginning of all temptations to evil is instability of temper and want of trust in God; for even as a ship without a helm is tossed about by the waves, so is a man who is careless and infirm of purpose tempted, now on this side, now on that. As fire tests iron, so does temptation the upright man. Oftentimes we know not what strength we have; but temptation reveals to us what we are. Nevertheless, we must watch, especially in the beginnings of temptation; for then is the foe the more easily mastered, when he is not suffered to enter within the mind, but is met outside the door as soon as he has knocked. Wherefore one says,

   Check the beginnings; once thou might'st have cured,
   But now 'tis past thy skill, too long hath it endured.

For first comes to the mind the simple suggestion, then the strong imagination, afterwards pleasure, evil affection, assent. And so little by little the enemy enters in altogether, because he was not resisted at the beginning. And the longer a man delays his resistance, the weaker he grows, and the stronger grows the enemy against him.

6. Some men suffer their most grievous temptations in the beginning of their conversion, some at the end. Some are sorely tried their whole life long. Some there are who are tempted but lightly, according to the wisdom and justice of the ordering of God, who knows the character and circumstances of men, and orders all things for the welfare of His elect.

7. Therefore we ought not to despair when we are tempted, but the more fervently should cry unto God, that He will vouchsafe to help us in all our tribulation; and that He will, as St. Paul says, with the temptation make a way to escape that we may be able to bear it. Let us therefore humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God in all temptation and trouble, for He will save and exalt such as are of a humble spirit.

8. In temptations and troubles a man is proved, what progress he has made, and therein is his reward the greater, and his virtue does the more appear. Nor is it a great thing if a man be devout and zealous so long as he suffers no affliction; but if he behave himself patiently in the time of adversity, then is there hope of great progress. Some are kept safe from great temptations, but are overtaken in those which are little and common, that the humiliation may teach them not to trust to themselves in great things, being weak in small things.

Responsibility

Storm

Coveting

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.19

All things are changing: and you yourself are in continuous mutation and in a manner in continuous destruction, and the whole Universe too.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.19 (tr Long)

There are times when I feel like I am hearing the same lesson once to often, though I should hardly be frustrated if I admire its truth, and maybe I am stubbornly uncomfortable with the repetition because I have not yet retained it rightly. Marcus Aurelius on the power of change is precisely one of these lessons.

I can understand that everything is subject to change, and that I should resist the temptation to keep everything the same. Yet perhaps I am not applying this insight deeply enough.

I may still be thinking that the default position for anything is to be at rest, and that activity and motion are then somehow added to this static state. It is as if I were first imagining myself sitting there frozen in time, and only later engaged in this or that exercise, like a writer giving life to his character, or an artist animating a cartoon. In other words, though I know I am changing, I impose that change over something that I perceive first as stationary and constant.

I know, that makes your head hurt a bit, but bear with me. I mean that I am not first a man, who changes after that fact, but that my being a man can only be expressed through actions, and cannot exist independently from always being transformed. Nothing is ever fixed at one moment, but is part of a process, necessarily in flux.

To have it any other way would be like trying to stop time itself. I may think of a snapshot, of a photograph, for example, as something that captures a moment forever, yet it too is changing, as is anyone and everything around it.

I learned that once when I opened up my passport after a few years, and then saw that the picture had almost completely faded, or at another time when I looked into a dusty box of drawings I had made as a child, only to find that the paper had become yellow and brittle.

Even my memories, which I think of as being so immovable, will be altered by my experience and perspective. Existence does not stutter along in stops and starts, in a sequence of isolated frames. It passes in a continuous flow.

I am not a creature who changes, but, in a sense, a creature who is change; this is not a further quality, but within my essence itself. There is no “me” without it.

This is why generation and destruction, coming to be and passing away, are not to be feared as something strange or threatening. They are part of my very nature, within the whole of Nature. I should never fear them, but gladly embrace them.

Written in 10/2008

IMAGE: M.C. Escher, Metamorphosis II (1940) 

Tao Te Ching 26

 Gravity is the root of lightness; stillness, the ruler of movement.

Therefore a wise prince, marching the whole day, does not go far from his baggage wagons. Although he may have brilliant prospects to look at, he quietly remains in his proper place, indifferent to them. 

How should the lord of a myriad chariots carry himself lightly before the kingdom? If he does act lightly, he has lost his root of gravity; if he proceed to active movement, he will lose his throne.

Pained

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.18

Penetrate inwards into men's leading principles, and you will see what judges you are afraid of, and what kind of judges they are of themselves.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.18 (tr Long)

Most of the grief I have brought upon myself was the result of my own poor judgment of character. I have been enamored of good looks, mesmerized by class and style, impressed by bookish learning, and amused by wit and charm. As it turns out, I wasn’t judging by character at all.

I can perform a little thought experiment on myself, asking whether what I admire is about who a person truly is on the inside, as opposed to how they choose to appear on the outside. I will still surprise myself by how shallow and gullible I can be.

What am I really so taken in by? Why am I seeking the blessings and approval of certain sorts of people? Am I not actually allowing myself to be intimated by impressions?

Look beneath the surface. Words should match actions. Actions should proceed from convictions. Convictions should be built upon right principles. It only takes an observant attitude and a bit of patience to discern who loves the good, and who loves seeming good. If I pay attention, I will begin to learn about what people truly care about, what informs their judgments, and what motivates their deeds.

The user, the player, and the hypocrite will reveal themselves to me simply by they way they choose to live in the simplest matters; it doesn’t even take some earth-shattering situation to make this clear. I can strip away the trappings to apprehend the real properties.

Informed in this manner, I no longer need to be confused about who I should trust and revere.

If a man’s judgment shows itself to be sound, and he puts his money where his mouth is, I have found someone worthy of considering a friend. He can be an example and an encouragement for me; I, in turn, can be confident that it is right to support him in his endeavors.

If, however, I see that his priorities are misguided, and he talks the talk without walking the walk, I am well advised to view his decisions with suspicion. I owe him the decency, compassion, and concern I owe all my fellows, but I do not need to respect his values. I am called to love him, but I am not called to follow him.

Accordingly I do not need to be influenced by how he judges me, since he is sadly incapable of judging himself. Observe how many people try to stand over us, manipulate our thinking, and increase their importance in our eyes. They operate through fear and power, and by doing so have already disqualified themselves from being worthy of our esteem.

Written in 10/2008

Ecclesiastes 4:1-6

[1] Again I saw all the oppressions that are practiced under the sun. And behold, the tears of the oppressed, and they had no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power, and there was no one to comfort them.
[2] And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive;
[3] but better than both is he who has not yet been, and has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun.
[4] Then I saw that all toil and all skill in work come from a man's envy of his neighbor. This also is vanity and a striving after wind.
[5] The fool folds his hands, and eats his own flesh.
[6] Better is a handful of quietness than two hands full of toil and a striving after wind.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.17

For the stone that has been thrown up it is no evil to come down, nor indeed any good to have been carried up.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.17 (tr Long)

All beings in Nature will act according to purpose, as aspects of Providence giving order and fulfillment to everything. Yet here we are, looking at this or that event, and saying that it is somehow “good” or “bad” for it to have happened, relative only to our own preferences.

We see only the parts, neglecting how the parts all work together. We consider only what is immediate, ignoring what is ultimate. We assume that our own desires should determine what is of benefit or of harm, failing to understand how our own moral worth exists within the harmony of the whole.

I suspect that our struggle to think beyond these confines is actually one of the ways we come to participate in unity. 

I should never merely judge any circumstance by how convenient or inconvenient, pleasant or unpleasant it might be to me. It is what it is, in and of itself, and it is so for a reason. What it then is to me, my own relationship to a situation, must go beyond how it may feel, to how it may help me or hinder me in acting with virtue. It is good or bad for me, therefore, because of what I choose to do with it: will I use it to improve or diminish my own nature?

One man may toss aside a rock that is on his lawn, and he may say that this is a good thing. Another man may be struck by the rock, and he may say that this is a bad thing.

For the rock, of course, it is neither, and even for both of the men it may be different than it at first appears. For the one, it might be a reflection of his thoughtlessness, in which case he has done wrong. For the other, it might be an opportunity for forgiveness, in which case he has done right.

How often have I called something good or bad, only to learn that my own estimation could transform it into something else? The intoxication of love or the agony of a broken heart would become what I made of them. The comfort of possessions or the longing of poverty would reveal different paths. The glory of praise or the shame of ridicule would teach me about genuine merit.

Just because it goes up, does not mean it is better. Just because it goes down, does not mean it is worse. One piece of fortune is not a blessing, and another is not a curse. In each is the potential for my own growth or stagnation.

It is common to ask, quite understandably, why bad things happen to good people, and why good things happen to bad people. My own answer, however, is that neither is actually true at all. Things happen, good people do good, and bad people do bad. When another does bad, even that can be turned into something good.

Written in 10/2008

The Art of Peace 15

Create each day anew by clothing yourself with heaven and earth, bathing yourself with wisdom and love, and placing yourself in the heart of Mother Nature.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.16

Not in passivity but in activity lie the evil and the good of the rational social animal, just as his virtue and his vice lie not in passivity but in activity.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.16 (tr Long)

I am a creature made not only to act, but also to act from my own awareness and choice. I am given not only life, but also a life of reason and will. How strange that I still so often choose to define myself by the things that happen to me, not by the things that I do.

I am too accustomed to thinking that a good life is measured by the environment I live in, whether it be how much money I might have, or the home I live in, or those who treat me as a friend.

As a result, I will sit back comfortably when I gain such things, but I will become anxious and despondent when I lose them. So instead of leading myself, I am letting myself be led, dependent upon what is quite often beyond my ability to control.

There is no shame at all in wanting such things and in enjoying their presence. The danger, however, lies in confusing a preference with a necessity, and in mistaking my circumstances for my character. There are many things that will passively come and go in this life, within my choice to like or dislike, though they should always be quite subservient to the virtue I practice actively.

I may still be convinced, however, that the conveniences and luxuries I have, or that I think I should have, are things that I have earned, or things that I deserve; after all, they seem to be the consequence of my own work and effort, the fruits of my labors. Notice how often people are so proud of their honors and possessions, assuming that these prizes on the outside reflect an excellence on the inside.

Yet this isn’t nearly so much the case as I would like to think. Whatever I may have done, for better or for worse, follows from my own actions, while whatever others may choose to give to me, for better or for worse, follows from their actions. The prestige of the degree from a fancy school? The bountiful earnings from a lucrative career? The pleasures of being honored and respected by all the right people? Some of it is just the result of good fortune, and most of the rest is just the result of someone else’s judgment.

If I am still in doubt that these benefits are not completely my own, let me only recognize how easily they can be taken away. What seems so securely within my power is hardly mine at all.

What is still completely mine, whatever the world offers me, is the dignity of my own thoughts and deeds. I need only master myself, and let the rest be what it may, focusing sharply on the merit of how I act, regardless of how I am acted upon.

The measure of a man is what he gives, not what he receives. It is a genuine responsibility for himself.

Written in 10/2008