Exit
this space, he believed, gave him
the freedom to shape his own life
by controlling his thoughts.
LIFE MAY NOT GIVE YOU WHAT
YOU WANT, BUT IT WILL GIVE YOU
WHAT YOU NEED.
Aurelius accepted that trials and
challenges were an unavoidable
part of life, but his belief that life
and the universe were fundamentally good helped him to accept
the tough stuff. The argument
goes like this: Because life as a
whole is as good as it can be, the
parts of life are as good as they
can be, so we should love, or at
least accept, every part of life.
But Aurelius took it even one
step further, arguing that obstacles are actually our greatest
opportunities for growth and advancement. They force us to reexamine our path, find a new way,
and ultimately empower ourselves
by practicing virtues like patience,
generosity and courage.
“The impediment to action advances action,” he wrote. “What
stands in the way becomes the way.”
THERE IS GOOD IN EVERYONE.
Aurelius isn’t expressing blind optimism when he advises his readers to find common ground with
THE THIRD
METRIC
others and seek the good in every
person they encounter. In politics and life, Aurelius had experienced how people could be selfish
and hurtful to others — he lived
through wars and uprisings — and
yet, he chose not to let the actions
of others get to him. Instead, he
always remembered that there is
some of the “divine” in each of us:
When you wake up in the
morning, tell yourself: The
people I deal with today will
be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and
surly. They are like this because they can’t tell good from
evil. But I have seen the beauty
of good, and the ugliness of
evil and have recognized that
the wrongdoer has a nature
related to my own — not of the
same blood or birth, but the
same mind, and possessing
a share of the divine. And so
none of them can hurt me.
Aurelius believed that all men
are made to cooperate with one
another, like the “rows of the upper and lower teeth.”
TRUE PEACE COMES FROM WITHIN.
Many of us live frantic, high-oc-
HUFFINGTON
03.09.14