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all right good morning it is April 3rd that means it’s Monday and I thought I would respond to a friend uh that was asking a question to this quote so this is a stoicism quote from Marcus Aurelius uh it comes from meditations I don’t know the exact citation but uh it’s a paraphrase that says to love only what happens no greater Harmony uh anyways I think it would be easier to kind of explain it here than another method just simply because there’s a little bit to unpack here on my friend’s question and so I’m moving this around so it’s just a little bit easier so I can track what I’m doing with work and stuff too apologies for all the movements but let’s do this really quick so the question goes this way so I’ll read it my friend knows who he is so I’ll keep it there but he says this he says this is my friend says the first time I came across this quote it invoked the thought that one would require a lack of investment in their own efforts toward a particular goal or objective and their outcomes to be able to love only what happens which is very non a very non-human trait I know he’s meaning Harmony comes from how we mentally process things as they conclude and the inner dialogue there in but I’ve read many other of his thoughts that are much more realistic and inspiring and he goes on hey do you think uh is there a possibility that Through the Ages his quote has lost meaning in the translations and if so how many other famous quotes have been poorly translated Food For Thought I suppose so a couple things to unpack here for example so first of all yeah anything that comes from the ages right translation matters so I will say my general favorite source is uh the way that Ryan holiday does it in fact he’s been promoting and I got to find it and I’ll share it uh not here but I’ll share it directly with my friend and I’ll share it once I find it to you in a different mean but uh anyways uh generally he uses uh his I guess it’s uh his um I forget the guy’s name but it’s his agent who happens to actually be his translator for uh Marcus really is the meditations and they’ve gone all the way back to uh as close as they can to the original text um of course that’s arguable um but Ryan’s been talking about a new res a new source that’s coming out and he’s been pretty hot on it saying that um maybe it’s just a little bit better it could just be it’s the new one so that’s what’s hot um but I I’m sensing uh that Ryan’s excitement’s a little bit more around somebody that has a little bit more skill and adds the capability not to overstate or understate translation bias as it were and that’s one of the issues too so similar to anything that’s canonized uh like in Christian type theology uh if you go back you have to go back to the uh what is it Constantinople and um the council at nicaea that determined what’s in what’s out what got canonized and anyways um so yes 100 I think that some things are very deluded the interesting thing on this because the ellipses is worked is uh used here to love only what happens dot dot dot and then at the end it’s no greater Harmony so this is a citation similar to a citation that a reporter may take currently I also imagine it is more my thought that this is kind of more an off-the-cuff type thing or perhaps towards the end of Marcus the interesting thing about this for example to my friend um I remember when I was a teenager and as I was studying you know philosophy epicureanism the cynics Etc I didn’t realize that there was this whole kind of space in there called stoicism and a lot of people you know my friend that another friend that was kind of kind of took an interpretation of this and it’s not so much that stoics are inhuman ultimately like to me my my take is a stoic typically somebody is following stoicism so back to like you know uh xenos and Cicero and you know anybody from Epictetus uh Seneca all of those kind of um that line and of course Marcus Aurelius is a student of all of that um that
if one first of all there’s this whole concept of you can’t control what happens necessarily there are things that were within your locus of control but there’s a lot of things that happen to you and what you have to learn how to do is as you don’t have control of certain things okay how do you deal with that because the only thing sometimes within the locus of your control there is how do I interact with the things to which are happening to me whether they are of my own accord or another um so it requires me to have effort to um basically I have to go inside myself first I have to internalize things I need to get in front of me in between the stimulus and the response of things that’s where I really gain the ownership of my own agency as it were that may be an action and that may just be an emotion or control around attitude now again stoicism is trying to get you to the point to where you can take action cynics didn’t take action they just got to the point said oh what was me we’re done and then they would go down the rabbit hole of intellectualism and over talking it but never action epicureans would do kind of a little bit different a bit a bit more you know positive but not necessarily get to the taking action so one of the things that was interesting like when Socrates came around for example um Socrates is kind of like a modern day kind of how Ted lasso is doing things you know kind of in that lane of the Walt Whitman um uh quote be curious not judgmental I think that a lot of the times you know another way to spell perfectionism this is what I heard is paralysis and so we got to stay out of that kind of analysis paralysis space or that over intellectual space I do think a lot of you know some quotes aren’t meant to be inspiring to my friend right it really is just supposed to be more an internalization of you know when all things are going on you know I think a lot of people in today’s culture and in today’s society for example we’re always talking about the epic thing and so you know we’re always looking for the the two pointy ends of the maxim you know whether it’s a or Z and then there’s this huge pendulum of going back and forth and one of the things that I find with stoicism is to try to take a more not really moderate is is the word but to be or lukewarm or emotionless it is to take a more logical or you know the approach of here’s something that’s happening what can I do about it can I do anything about it yes or no um and then once you realize what you can do about it that’s where you know you kind of love what happens right like you really are I’m going to use a little Eddie Panero here a lot Eddie Pinero this kind of concept he says this he has said um the present is stuck between two fairy tales one being the past and one being the future and to be able to be in a place to be where your feet currently are so your head is where your feet are your head’s not five minutes ahead or five minutes behind or one minute 30 seconds whatever but your your head is where your feet currently are into love what happens that’s where Harmony for me is found so yes um I do think a lot of things you know and I like the concept again I say this a lot from Ryan holiday where he says um there is no good or bad um there’s the event itself you can call the event truth or fact and then there is the the story that we tell ourselves perception of what it means and I think the farther and farther we get from the actual event or the fact it often gets diluted similar to what my friend is asking in the question there that uh you know
to your point to my friend’s point you know uh is is there an opportunity for the quote to lose yes because kind of like with real estate they say this phrase that three moves as good as a fire so anytime you move for example just to to kind of uh dig into that now the concept is every time you move you’re you know you’re taking things or whatever well if you’ve moved three times you’re pretty much just burning like throw away the stuff that you’re carrying with you stop hoarding it stop bringing it um and I find same thing uh to the point of this like I think to my friend I would say to me this one is a bigger like it this one is not necessarily about the what do you actively go in and do or it’s not an inspirational thing it really is more of like the outcome or it is a check-in or something to help you recalibrate about where you are in your journey it’s not a Eggo Seize the Day type you know Carpe Diem type message and and I think that’s where the real wisdom in getting to Harmony is right like the more I look at my like Triathlon Journey for example um and all things considered right now I’m super frustrated because I tore my groin at the beginning of this year even yesterday while shoveling it flew a fire of wonderful knowing exactly what that full muscle structure of the lower hip abductor adductor is they’re reminding me of a human I am all of that to say that um
when I first got into and reactive in the triathlon thing I started with cycling in 2013 I decided to buy a bike and then I decided to go out and do a grand Fondo the grand Fondo I signed up for was to do 30 miles I think maybe 50. I can’t remember if I did the third I probably did the 50. so anyways while I’m going out there I made a mistake um as I was on the route I saw an arrow sign I turned right and I should have turned left and that was about the 20 20 mile Mark give or take somewhere in there um and you know at the end of the day I rode 107 miles I’ve been training for I think 30 or 50. and uh muscled through it ended up like you know it was an eight hour day it’s pretty hot uh it was it was brutal you know when I got out to Malad in Idaho I’m like oh dad has pictures and I’ve showed some of those pictures and I’m only halfway through and still you know went out to some pretty dark at night it was brutally warm and hot and bright but some pretty dark spaces Within Myself for example to be able to work through that and ride through it and you know I learned very early that that was an epic event and sure you can blast through and you can do those things and but it’s very damaging and like it was nearly you know I wouldn’t say trauma but it was traumatic in the effect that you know that’s not the best way to do it sure we can push through it and it took me you know a bunch of time to to get over and want to get back to things um that was interesting on my computer um I guess it’s like 11 or 11 30. um that was 11 30. anyways that being said um I really think the summation of this quote is more of understanding that for example in that I turned it into this huge oh and I started to beat my chest and everybody had to know that I was a triathlete and I was not in a good space I was becoming very very very uh strong and douchebaggery we’ll say it that way and so you know and nobody cares the only person that really cared was me and I was just beating my chest and bottling up um you know not so horrible that I was doing you know evil things but just it was abrasive and people didn’t care um where I’ve kind of come now to learn is you know like when I did the build up to the Iron Man in California for last October um you know there was a lot of I wouldn’t say self-doubt but just concern and recalibrating and making sure that I’m doing the right things um not overstating what I’m doing sure I let a few people know just so that they kind of know I’m busy I’m doing those things this is the reason why um but not hey look at me I’m doing this because I’m doing this great feat and blah blah blah I really think that’s what this is supposed to be but you know kind of the concept of you know Food For Thought or famous quilts like I don’t even care about the famous quotes anymore like if you really look at like a lot of the stoicism your oriented quotes that I’ve been putting out there from Epictetus or Seneca Marcus of course and then every once in a while I’ll put like a zenos or some of the other lesser-known folks but Epictetus of course Seneca and Marcus Aurelius or the general three in your face kind of guys because they wrote a lot more and Seneca has done a lot of writings too um this one on Grief was pretty interesting and I really appreciated the recent podcast between Zach from Scrubs the actor from Scrubs that just put out the movie a good person which I’d like to go see I haven’t been able to find that close enough to us yet so we can um and Ryan holiday and Ryan’s daily stoic podcast um but uh yeah what I find interesting is I think a lot of people misinterpret stoicism like there’s a lot of things that are going on around masculinity and different things and I so many people are trying to find their voice and instead of you know like I went through it myself and and I get it um and I think as more people internalize things and get to a better space that noise will become less noise and it’ll be more Harmony and people are able to share that story um I saw a Buddhist monk is a pretty cool thing on Tick Tock and he’s like hey we’re here we’re going to come in press lead a little bit through America on it and he’s not wrong and we need it we are lost and
to love what happens you got to be able to say that you’re lost
you’ve got to be able to say that we can not do things abrasively and in order to do that like a Bukowski quote uh Bukowski you have to start with yourself and then it’s a one-to-one thing I mean I can’t convince the world of my faith-based beliefs or my uh practices stoicism I can only do that kind of like this and most of what I record and stuff is really for me it’s to remind me as I go through and I can can document for me and come back and I check in you know every six months to a year look at my blog posts and look at the things that I’m starting to try to get out some audio content or video content like this because it’s a little bit easier to take 15 to 20 minutes and to get that out like that um but anyways um I’m hoping I’m kind of doing this Justice I don’t want to I’m trying to keep this at no more than 20 minutes of course translation is huge things get lost along way things get interpreted that’s why it’s great to go back to the source I want to look a little bit like what’s the difference between the ellipses and the things that are being missed there I gotta go find the citation and meditations I believe this one is from meditations um to find out is there translation type things or other things but uh I don’t think this one was meant to be an inspiring go take down the world you know he was a glad and not Gladiator but he was the emperor he was managing a lot of things um and sometimes we kind of have those off quote or those off moments and I think this is one of those ones where he’s just kind of probably trying to write to Claudius um and I imagine that there was probably an exchange that was not agreeable and um and he’s sitting there and probably having a head scratching moment you know of why is this so problematic to another if you could only just have the lens and probably a younger person right if you think of it this way like wisdom and maturity comes through a lot of personal experience and hindsight being what it is pandemic 2020 that irony that’s there to be able to sit there and look and then go back and go you know what
I fussed a lot about a lot of things but in the end of the day I enjoyed the experience it was tough it was rough and that’s where you find Harmony so I think that’s what he’s really kind of going after here again um really a lot of inner dialogue a little a lot of inner work here a lot of deep kind of things on the last thing I kind of I kind of put this kind of like how I swim right like to me there’s a lot of purpose I put into swimming but the two main things no matter what whatever the focus the goal or the purpose is is I’m swimming Open Water Pool swims Etc two main things matter most everything else is just an accentuation one my stroke that I’m swimming I’m swimming strong I’m keeping you know my arms at about just just beyond shoulder keeping a square box there being purposeful getting my hand out letting it stay I kind of do a Gallop or a modified Gallop then pulling in getting an early vertical pushing back all the way and then repeating it everywhere and the other one is breathing so I reduce everything down to that like forget everything else I’m not thinking too much about everything I’m not trying to solve The World’s problems all I’m trying to do is not drown and to get in a good workout in a good distance and that to me is Harmony and that’s what I try to do and that’s why I generally call swimming My Sanctuary so hopefully that helps man
