The Most Critical Lesson I Learned
History has a funny way of telling us that a single human being was not meant to have dominion over all others. The Roman Empire is such a notorious example of this. In its long lineage of absolute rulers, only a few stand out as truly good people. Such that they were conferred the title (in retrospect) The Five Good Emperors.
And even then, that’s debatable. One of these allegedly good emperors, Hadrian, stabbed his secretary in the eye with a pen.
He sought to make amends after, only for the slave to say “all I want back is my eye.” Good luck with that one.
Today, I’m not going to tally up all the sins and kindnesses that these emperors did. I’m just going to single out one of these guys.
Here is the most vital lesson he taught me.
Always be resilient and determined.
Here’s a man that had a completely different view of his job from many of his predecessors. While the idea of being Emperor of the known world sounds like a privilege, to Marcus Aurelius, it was a terrible burden.
In his youth, he despaired when he was appointed the role.
The young boy, as the story goes, dreamed that he had shoulders of ivory, and was told that he could really endure this horrible job.
All the man wanted to do was live a philosophical life and act virtuously. That would be put to the test as Emperor for nearly 20 years.
He endured this harsh reality because he believed it his duty. If you read his journal, Meditations, you’ll get a sense of longing to be relieved from this job. But he knows that if he leaves too early, some bad person will take his place.
And even though Marcus left the world at his appointed time, his son, a far worse person, took over and indulged himself in his most sadistic desires. Imagine if it had been sooner, how much more the Empire would’ve lost.
He’s taught me resilience and determination for this reason. Life is unfair, there are things that spiral out of our control every day, and quite frankly, a plethora of things that we do not want to do.
But some of these things we don’t want to do are necessary. If we want to make a living with our writing, we need to sit our asses down in the chair every day and write.
If we want a better job, we need to update our resume and face constant rejection.
Our condition can change based on our actions, but that requires doing things that we might find ugly, unsexy, and frustrating.
Being able to put up with the hellish tedium of the world is a gift, and it’s acquired by being willing to endure.
To reframe our minds.
To be better people than we were yesterday.
