| Life was just one thing after another for Marcus Aurelius. The plague. The flooding. The wars. He did not meet with, "the good fortune he deserved," one ancient historian noted, "as his whole reign was a series of troubles." Anyone who has had a run of bad luck knows the feeling. It's frustrating and annoying and sometimes deeply unfair, but there is also something freeing about it. Because after a certain point, you stop fighting and start accepting. We can imagine Marcus, after the 50th piece of bad news just saying, "alright just put it on my tab." What was one more thing at that point? What did it even matter? He knew there was no use resenting, no use wishing it was otherwise, no escaping, no denying. He just had to add it to the list. He had to accept it was pouring and he was in for a long, wet night. He had to focus on a plan for what was to come next. It would do us good to borrow this attitude, particularly lately. We've had our own plague, civil unrest, wars, economic downturns. And this is on top of our own personal issues–perhaps a divorce, young children, trouble at work, an injury or a diagnosis. While we should never accept injustice or give up hope, we do need to accept that it's time to buckle up. It's not going to be an easy ride. The bill is not going to be cheap. Somebody is going to have to pay it…and like Marcus Aurelius, in our own lives, that person is us. So tell 'em to put it on your tab. And start getting to work on it.
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