Marcus Aurelius Meditations
Marcus Aurelius: Whatsoever is expedient unto thee, O…
Whatsoever is expedient unto thee, O World, is expedient unto me; nothing can either be 'unseasonable unto me, or out of date, which unto thee is seasonable. Whatsoever thy seasons bear, shall ever by me be esteemed as happy fruit, and increase.
The passage follows a public-domain translation of Meditations. The reading beside it is ours.
There is peace in cooperating with reality rather than demanding that life arrive on your preferred timetable. The season you are in may include work you did not choose, limits you did not expect, or a pace you would not have designed. Marcus’s attitude is not resignation. It is trust that every season contains material for a good response. Winter has its work; harvest has its work; uncertainty has its work too. When we call every unwelcome circumstance a mistake, we add hostility to difficulty. Try a different question: What can this season teach, require, or make possible? Today, identify one condition you cannot change right now and stop treating it as evidence that life has gone wrong. Use it as raw material for patience, skill, or gratitude.
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