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April 10th

JUDGMENTS CAUSE DISTURBANCE

“It isn’t events themselves that disturb people, but only their

judgments about them.”

—EPICTETUS, ENCHIRIDION, 5

he samurai swordsman Musashi made a distinction between our
“perceiving eye” and our “observing eye.” The observing eye sees
what is. The perceiving eye sees what things supposedly mean. Which one
do you think causes us the most anguish?
An event is inanimate. It’s objective. It simply is what it is. That’s what
our observing eye sees.
This will ruin me. How could this have happened? Ugh! It’s so-and-so’s
fault. That’s our perceiving eye at work. Bringing disturbance with it and
then blaming it on the event.