W

August 1st

DON’T GO EXPECTING PERFECTION

“That cucumber is bitter, so toss it out! There are thorns on the

path, then keep away! Enough said. Why ponder the existence of

nuisance? Such thinking would make you a laughing-stock to the

true student of Nature, just as a carpenter or cobbler would laugh

if you pointed out the sawdust and chips on the floors of their

shops. Yet while those shopkeepers have dustbins for disposal,

Nature has no need of them.”

—MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 8.50

e want things to go perfectly, so we tell ourselves that we’ll get
started once the conditions are right, or once we have our bearings.
When, really, it’d be better to focus on making do with how things actually
are.
Marcus reminded himself: “Don’t await the perfection of Plato’s
Republic.” He wasn’t expecting the world to be exactly the way he wanted
it to be, but Marcus knew instinctively, as the Catholic philosopher Josef
Pieper would later write, that “he alone can do good who knows what
things are like and what their situation is.”
Today, we won’t let our honest understanding of the world stop us from
trying to make the best of it. Nor will we let petty annoyances and minor
obstacles get in the way of the important job we have to do.