Meditations by Marcus Aureliusby Parker on TwosNothing that goes on in anyone else’s mind can harm you.Recognize that the difference between years from now and tomorrow is just as small.Human lives are brief and trivial.It’s unfortunate that this has happened. No. It’s fortunate that this has happened and I’ve remained unharmed by it—not shattered by the present or frightened of the future. It could have happened to anyone. But not everyone could have remained unharmed by it. Why treat the one as a misfortune rather than the other as fortunate? Can you really call something a misfortune that doesn’t violate human nature? Or do you think something that’s not against nature’s will can violate it? But you know what its will is. Does what’s happened keep you from acting with justice, generosity, self-control, sanity, honesty, humility, straightforwardness, and all the other qualities that allow a person’s nature to fulfill itself?The thing itself was no misfortune at all; to endure it and prevail is great good fortune.Take the shortest route, the one that nature planned—to speak and act in the healthiest way. Do that, and be free of pain and stress, free of all calculation and pretension.“I have to go to work—as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for—the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?Don’t you see the plants, the birds, the ants and spiders and bees going about their individual tasks, putting the world in order, as best they can? And you’re not willing to do your job as a human being? Why aren’t you running to do what your nature demands?You don’t love yourself enough. Or you’d love your nature too, and what it demands of you. People who love what they do wear themselves down doing it, they even forget to wash or eat. Do you have less respect for your own nature than the engraver does for engraving, the dancer for the dance, the miser for money or the social climber for status? When they’re really possessed by what they do, they’d rather stop eating and sleeping than give up practicing their arts.Don’t be distracted. Keep walking. Follow your own nature, and follow Nature.What happens to each of us is ordered. It furthers our destiny.Get back up when you fail, to celebrate behaving like a human—however imperfectly—and fully embrace the pursuit that you’ve embarked on.Nothing can happen to me that isn’t natural.I can keep from doing anything that my own spirit don’t approve. No one can force me to.Interrogate yourself, to find out what inhabits your so called mind and what kind of soul you have.The things you think about determine the quality of your mind. Your soul takes on the color of your thoughts.A rational being’s good is unselfishness.Nothing happens to anyone that he can’t endure.In a sense, people are our proper occupation. Our job is to do them good and put up with them.If the community isn’t injured by it, neither am I. And if it is, anger is not the answer.So other people hurt me? That’s their problem. Their character and actions are not mine. What is done to me is ordained by nature, what I do by my own.The mind is the ruler of the soul. It should remain unstirred by agitations of the flesh—gentle and violent ones alike. Not mingling with them, but fencing itself off and keeping those feelings in their place. When they make their way into your thoughts, through the sympathetic link between mind and body, don’t try to resist the sensation. The sensation is natural. But don’t let the mind start in with judgments, calling it “good” or “bad.”Don’t be irritated at people’s smell or bad breath. What’s the point? With that mouth, with those armpits, they’re going to produce that odor. Then use your logic to awaken his. Show him. Make him realize it. If he’ll listen, then you’ll have solved the problem. Without anger.If the smoke makes me cough, I can leave. What’s so hard about that?I’m free. No one can keep me from doing what I want. And I want what is proper to rational beings, living together.Remember, nothing belongs to you but your flesh and blood—and nothing else is under your control.You can lead an untroubled life provided you can grow, can think and act systematically.Not to be overwhelmed by what you imagine, but just do what you can and should.True good fortune is what you make for yourself. Good fortune: good character, good intentions, and good actions.Just that you do the right thing. The rest doesn’t matter.Look inward. Don’t let the true nature or value of anything elude you.To move from one unselfish action to another. Only there, delight and stillness.Pride is a master of deception: when you think you’re occupied in the weightiest business, that’s when he has you in his spell.To do (and not do) what we were designed for. That’s the goal of all trades, all arts, and what each of them aims at: that the thing they create should do what it was designed to do.And if you can’t stop prizing a lot of other things? Then you’ll never be free—independent. Because you’ll always be envious and jealous, afraid that people might come and take it all away from you. Plotting against those who have them—those things you prize. People who need those things are bound to be a mess—and bound to take out their frustrations on the gods. Whereas to respect your own mind—to prize it—will leave you satisfied with your own self, well integrated into your community and in tune with the gods as well—embracing what they allot you, and what they ordain.