Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 11.35

The unripe grape, the ripe bunch, the dried grape, are all changes, not into nothing, but into something which exists not yet.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 11.35 (tr Long)

I will often find change frightening, because I perceive it as the ending of something, to then be left with nothing. This can be a powerful illusion, built upon an attachment to particular circumstances. Dependent on this state of affairs for my security, I am in dread of any other state of affairs.

The fact, of course, is that change is not a cessation, but a transformation. Things do not simply stop, they rather become something else. This arrangement has passed, and there is now a new arrangement.

The anxiety grows from a sense that there will now be a huge absence in life, and what I am failing to see is that there is always a presence, that any condition at all offers me the opportunity to live well. It may not be what I expect, or what is most convenient, and it hardly should be. It is about moving forward, not standing still.

There are these moments scattered about in my life that may have felt perfect; they often seemed quite rare, or they passed so quickly. So I get nostalgic and melancholic, wondering how I can bring them back. I can’t bring them back, nor should I want to bring them back. Let me keep them in my memory, though not to dwell upon them, but to teach me how to do things right for this moment.

And at this moment, as things move along around me, there will be times when I feel lonely, when I can’t foresee any hope, when it appears to be the end of the road. What possible options could remain, I ask myself? Perhaps just one, but it is more than enough, charged with everything necessary to live in peace: let me do right, whatever I face, and that is a life completely well lived.

It doesn’t matter what stage of life I am in, or what strange new situation may arise. Whatever it may be, I can be certain that it offers everything I need, as there is never a time when a man cannot be kind, and decent, and loving, and just. Success, in the deepest human sense, is always possible, as long as I decide upon it.

This is hardly possible if I define myself by my circumstances, but a Stoic mindset makes it quite possible, where I define myself by my own judgments and actions. “Stop looking out there, that’s not where you’re going to find it!”

The grape grows on the vine, it ripens, it is harvested, it is dried. Perhaps I may now make it a part of my meal, and that meal gives me some strength of body to live another day. In that day I can now act, and as I act I continue to pass myself into yet other things, even if I die, and the chain is never really broken at all.

Written in 7/2009