<aside>
This checklist is a companion to ‘The Ultimate Guide to Effective Post-Reading Note-Taking’ , an essay about my workflow once I’m done reading a book.
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<aside>
Read the full essay: The Ultimate Guide to Effective Post-Reading Note-Taking
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Everything that happens is either endurable or not. If it’s endurable, then endure it. Stop complaining. If it’s unendurable . . . then stop complaining. Your destruction will mean its end as well.
Meditations, Marcus Aurelius, Book 10.3
This is a pretty blunt take on how to deal with adversity. Basically, it says: whatever bad thing hits you, you have two options. Either you can handle it, or you can't.
If you can, then suck it up and deal with it. No whining. If you can't handle it, and it's truly going to break you, then... still, no whining. Because your destruction is the end of the problem anyway. So, complaining is pointless either way.
This comes from a Stoic perspective, specifically from Marcus Aurelius's Meditations. The Stoics were all about what you can control and what you can't. They believed you can't control external events, but you can control your reaction to them.
So, this is a classic example of that philosophy in action: focus on what you can do (endure) rather than what you can't (change the unendurable).