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A.I.R.RConsciousnessDataset

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Acknowledge the pain but trod onward in your task. Had the war gone on even longer, Lincoln would have lead his people through it. Had the Union lost the Civil War, he'd have known that he'd done everything he could in pursuit of victory.

Providing an example for others, in victory or in defeat—whichever occurred.

One needs only to look at history to see how random and vicious and awful the world can be. The incomprehensible happens all the time.

Certain things in life will cut you open like a knife. When that happens—at that exposing moment—the world gets a glimpse of what's truly inside you.

The will is what prepares us for this, protects us against it, and allows us to thrive and be happy in spite of it. It is also the most difficult of all the disciplines.

It's what allows us to stand undisturbed while others wilt and give in to disorder.

It's much easier to control our perceptions and emotions than it is to give up our desire to control other people and events. It's easier to persist in our efforts and actions than to endure the uncomfortable or the painful. It's easier to think and act than it is to practice wisdom.

These lessons come harder but are, in the end, the most critical to wresting advantage from adversity. In every situation, we can Always prepare ourselves for more difficult times. Always accept what we're unable to change. Always manage our expectations. Always persevere. Always learn to love our fate and what happens to us. Always protect our inner self, retreat into ourselves. Always submit to a greater, larger cause. Always remind ourselves of our own mortality. And, of course, prepare to start the cycle once more.

It's going to be hard drudgery and I think you have the determination to go through with it.

His response, using what would become his trademark cheerful grit, was to look at his father and say with determination: "I'll make my *body.*"

That gym work prepared a physically weak but smart young boy for the uniquely challenging course on which the nation and the world were about to embark. It was the beginning of his preparation for and fulfillment of what he would call "the Strenuous Life."

We craft our spiritual strength through physical exercise, and our physical hardiness through mental practice (mens sana in corpore sano—sound mind in a strong body).

This approach goes back to the ancient philosophers. Every bit of the philosophy they developed was intended to reshape, prepare, and fortify them for the challenges to come.

Many saw themselves as mental athletes—after all, the brain is a muscle like any other active tissue. It can be built up and toned through the right exercises.

This is strikingly similar to what the Stoics called the Inner Citadel, that fortress inside of us that no external adversity can ever break down. An important caveat is that we are not born with such a structure; it must be built and actively reinforced. During the good times, we strengthen ourselves and our bodies so that during the difficult times, we can depend on it. We protect our inner fortress so it may protect us.

You'll have far better luck toughening yourself up than you ever will trying to take the teeth out of a world that is—at best—indifferent to your existence. Whether we were born weak like Roosevelt or we are currently experiencing good times, we should always prepare for things to get tough.

No one is born a gladiator. No one is born with an Inner Citadel. If we're going to succeed in achieving our goals despite the obstacles that may come, this strength in will must be built.

To be great at something takes practice. Obstacles and adversity are no different.

The path of least resistance is a terrible teacher. We can't afford to shy away from the things that intimidate us. We don't need to take our weaknesses for granted.

Because these things *will* happen to you. No one knows when or how, but their appearance is certain. And life will demand an answer. You chose this for yourself, a life of doing things. Now you better be prepared for what it entails.

Far too many ambitious undertakings fail for preventable reasons. Far too many people don't have a backup plan because they refuse to consider that something might not go exactly as they wish.

Your plan and the way things turn out rarely resemble each other.

What you think you deserve is also rarely what you'll get. Yet we constantly deny this fact and are repeatedly shocked by the events of the world as they unfold.

A writer like Seneca would begin by reviewing or rehearsing his plans, say, to take a trip. And then he would go over, in his head (or in writing), the things that could go wrong or prevent it from happening: a storm could arise, the captain could fall ill, the ship could be attacked by pirates.

"Nothing happens to the wise man against his expectation," he wrote to a friend. ". . . nor do all things turn out for him as he wished but as he reckoned—and above all he reckoned that something could block his plans."

Always prepared for disruption, always working that disruption into our plans. Fitted, as they say, for defeat or victory. And let's be honest, a pleasant surprise is a lot better than an unpleasant one.

What if . . . Then I *will* . . . What if . . . Instead I'll *just* . . . What if . . . No problem, we can always . . . And in the case where nothing could be done, the Stoics would use it as an important practice to d

You have to make concessions for the world around you. We are dependent on other people. Not everyone can be counted on like you can (though, let's be honest, we're all our own worst enemy sometimes).

The only guarantee, ever, is that things **will** go wrong. The only thing we can use to mitigate this is anticipation. Because the only variable we control completely is ourselves.

Common wisdom provides us with the maxims: Beware the calm before the storm. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. The worst is yet to come. It gets worse before it gets better.

The world might call you a pessimist. Who cares? It's far better to seem like a downer than to be blindsided or caught off guard.

Then, the real reason we won't have any problem thinking about bad luck is because we're not afraid of what it portends. We're prepared in advance for adversity—it's other people who are not.

You know what's better than building things up in your imagination? Building things up in real life.

With anticipation, we have time to raise defenses, or even avoid them entirely. We're ready to be driven off course because we've plotted a way back. We can resist going to pieces if things didn't go as planned. With anticipation, we can endure.

Jefferson just wasn't a public speaker—that doesn't make him less of a man for acknowledging it and acting accordingly.

It doesn't always feel that way but constraints in life are a good thing. Especially if we can accept them and let them direct us. They push us to places and to develop skills that we'd otherwise never have pursued.

That channeling requires consent. It requires acceptance. We have to allow some accidents to happen to us.

Yet this is exactly what life is doing to us. It tells us to come to a stop here. Or that some intersection is blocked or that a particular road has been rerouted through an inconvenient detour. We can't argue or yell this problem away. We simply accept it.

When the cause of our problem lies outside of us, we are better for accepting it and moving on. For ceasing to kick and fight against it, and coming to terms with it. The Stoics have a beautiful name for this attitude. They call it the Art of Acquiescence.

It takes toughness, humility, and will to accept them for what they actually are. It takes a real man or woman to face necessity.

All external events can be equally beneficial to us because we can turn them all upside down and make use of them. They can teach us a lesson we were reluctant to otherwise learn.

Think of George Washington, putting everything he had into the American Revolution, and then saying, "The event is in the hand of God." Or Eisenhower, writing to his wife on the eve of the Allied invasion at Sicily: "Everything we could think of have been done, the troops are fit everybody is doing his best. The answer is in the lap of the gods." These were not guys prone to settling or leaving the details up to other people—but they understood ultimately that what happened would happen. And they'd go from there.

It's time to be humble and flexible enough to acknowledge the same in our own lives. That there is always someone or something that could change the plan. And that person is not us. As the saying goes, "Man proposes but God disposes."

Look: If we want to use the metaphor that life is a game, it means playing the dice or the chips or the cards where they fall. Play it where it lies, a golfer would say.

The way life is gives you plenty to work with, plenty to leave your imprint on. Taking people and events as they are is quite enough material already. Follow where the events take you, like water rolling down a hill—it always gets to the bottom eventually, doesn't it?

Because (a) you're robust and resilient enough to handle whatever occurs, (b) you can't do anything about it anyway, and (c

We're indifferent and that's not a weakness. As Francis Bacon once said, nature, in order to be commanded, must be obeyed.

As he told a reporter the next day, he wasn't too old to make a fresh start. "I've been through a lot of things like this. It prevents a man from being afflicted with ennui."

Loving whatever happens to us and facing it with unfailing cheerfulness.

We put our energies and emotions and exertions where they will have real impact.

Should he hate them for hating him? Bitterness was their burden and Johnson refused to pick it up.

As the Stoics commanded themselves: Cheerfulness in all situations, especially the bad ones.

Learning not to kick and scream about matters we can't control is one thing.

Indifference and acceptance are certainly better than disappointment or rage.

Better than all of that is love for all that happens to us

We don't get to choose what happens to us, but we can always choose how we feel about it. And why on earth would you *choose* to feel anything but good? We can choose to render a good account of ourselves. If the event must occur, Amor *fati* (a love of fate) is the response.

It's important to look at Johnson and Edison because they weren't passive. They didn't simply roll over and tolerate adversity. They accepted what happened to them. They *liked* it.

It's a little unnatural, I know, to feel gratitude for things we never wanted to happen in the first place. But we know, at this point, the opportunities and benefits that lie within adversities. We know that in overcoming them, we emerge stronger, sharper, empowered. There is little reason to delay these feelings. To begrudgingly acknowledge later that it was for the best, when we could have felt that in advance because it was inevitable.

How did he get through it? How did the hero make it home despite it all?

But a ten-year voyage of trials and tribulations. Of disappointment and mistakes without giving in.

Life is not about one obstacle, but *many*. What's required of us is not some shortsighted focus on a single facet of a problem, but simply a determination that we *will* get to where we need to go, somehow, someway, and nothing will stop us.

We will overcome every obstacle—and there will be many in lifeuntil we get there. Persistence is an action. Perseverance is a matter of will. One is energy. The other, *endurance*.

Perseverance. Force of purpose. Indomitable will. Those traits were once uniquely part of the American DNA. But they've been weakening for some time.

If our young men miscarry in their first enterprises, they lose all heart. If the young merchant fails, men say he is ruined.

If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges, and is not installed in an office within one year afterwards in the cities or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his friends and to himself that he is right in being disheartened, and in complaining the rest of his life.

We're crushed when what we were "promised" is revoked—as if that's not allowed to happen.

And with it, Emerson said, "with the exercise of self-trust, new powers shall appear."

To quote Beethoven: "The barriers are not erected which can say to aspiring talents and industry, Thus far and no farther."

Our actions can be constrained, but our will can't be.

But belief in ourselves? No matter how many times we are thrown back, we alone retain the power to decide to go once more.

Determination, if you think about it, is invincible. Nothing other than death can prevent us from following Churchill's old acronym: KBO. Keep Buggering On.

Despair? That's on you. No one else is to blame when you throw in the towel.

But we control ourselves—and that is sufficient.

The true threat to determination, then, is not what happens to us, but us ourselves. Why would you be your own worst enemy?

The first thing he did was throw out any idealistic notions about what happens to a soldier when asked to give up information under hours of torture.

He would not disgrace them or their sacrifice by allowing himself to be used as a tool against their common cause.

He could change *that* situation and not let history repeat itself—this would be his cause, and he would help his men and lead them.

We're in this *together,* he told them. He gave them a watchword to remind them: U.S.—Unity over Self.

But their cause was their men. They cared about their fellow prisoners and drew great strength by putting their well-being ahead of their own.

It is in this moment that we must show the true strength of will within us.

When we focus on others, on helping them or simply providing a good example, our own personal fears and troubles will diminish. With fear or heartache no longer our primary concern, we don't have time for it. Shared purpose gives us strength.

If I can't solve this for myself, how can I at least make this better for other people?

Stop making it harder on yourself by thinking about I, I, I. Stop putting that dangerous "I" in front of events. I did this. I was so smart. I had that. I deserve better than this. No wonder you take losses personally, no wonder you feel so alone. You've inflated your own role and importance.

Start thinking: Unity over Self. We're in this *together.* Even if we can't carry the load all the way, we're going to take our crack at picking up the heavy end. We're going to be of service to others. Help ourselves by helping them. Becoming better because of it, drawing purpose from it.

Whatever you're going through, whatever is holding you down or standing in your way, can be turned into a source of strength—by thinking of people other than yourself. You won't have time to think of your own suffering because there are other people suffering and you're too focused on them.

Death doesn't make life pointless, but rather purposeful.

In Montaigne's essays, we see proof of the fact that one can meditate on death—be well aware of our own mortality—without being morbid or a downer.

This is encouraging: It means that embracing the precariousness of our own existence can be exhilarating and empowe

Our fear of death is a looming obstacle in our lives. It shapes our decisions, our outlook, and our actions.

Part of the reason we have so much trouble with acceptance is because our relationship with our own existence is totally messed up.

We may not say it, but deep down we act and behave like we're invincible.

We forget how light our grip on life really is.

But thinking about and being aware of our mortality creates real perspective and urgency. It doesn't need to be depressing. Because it's invigorating.

Reminding ourselves each day that we will die helps us treat our time as a gift. Someone on a deadline doesn't indulge himself with

Life is a process of breaking through these impediments—a series of fortified lines that we must break through.

Each time, you'll learn something. Each time, you'll develop strength, wisdom, and perspective.

As the Haitian proverb puts it: Behind mountains are more mountains.

Elysium is a myth. One does not overcome an obstacle to enter the land of no obstacles.

Knowing that life is a marathon and not a sprint is important.

Passing one obstacle simply says you're worthy of more.