Once there was an old and very wise man. Everyday he would sit outside a gas station in his rocking chair and wait to greet motorists as they passed through his small town. On this day his granddaughter knelt down at the foot of his chair and slowly passed the time with him.
Erase the false impressions from your mind by constantly saying to yourself. I have it in my soul to keep out any evil desire or any kind of disturbance- instead, seeing the true nature of things, I will give them only their due. Always remember this power that nature gave you.
As you gain more and more access to your nature, you will also spontaneously receive creative thoughts because the field of pure potentiality is also the field of infinite creativity and pure knowledge. Franz Kafka, the Austrian philosopher and poet, once said,
"You need not leave your room. Remain sitting on your table and listen. You need not even listen, simply wait. You need not even wait, just learn to become quiet, and still, and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no choice; it will roll ecstasy at your feet."
Ryan Holiday, The 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living
But what is philosophy? Doesn't it simply mean preparing ourselves for what may come? Don't you understand that really amounts to saying that if I would so prepare myself to endure, then let anything happen that will? Otherwise, it would be like the boxer exiting the ring because he took some punches. Actually, you can leave the boxing ring without consequence, but what advantage would come from abandoning the pursuit of wisdom? So, what should each of us say to every trial we face? This is what I've trained for, for this my discipline! ~Epictetus, Discourses, 3.10.6-7
Ryan Holiday, The 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living
We have the power to hold no opinion about a thing and to not let it upset our state of mind- for things have no natural power to shape our judgments.— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 6:52
