[1]This Timeless And Boldly Optimistic Idea Could Change Your Life:

    "Our actions may be impeded…but there can be no impeding our
    intentions or dispositions. Because we can accommodate and adapt.
    The mind adapts and converts to its own purposes the obstacle to our
    acting.

    And then [Marcus Aurelius, in Mediations] concluded with powerful
    words destined for a maxim.

    "The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way
    becomes the way."

    These words were scrawled by Marcus Aurelius himself, to himself,
    likely on the battlefront as he lead the Roman Army against
    barbarian tribes or possibly at the palace amongst the intrigue and
    pressure. Not exactly a happy or encouraging place to be.

    Yet in the years since I first read it, I've started to understand
    is that this little paragraph is the perspective for a special kind
    of optimism. Stoic optimism.

    I'm sure that sounds like an oxymoron, but stoicism gets a bad-and
    unfair-rap.

    What Marcus was writing - reminding himself - is one of the core
    tenets of Stoicism. What it is prescribing is essentially this: in
    any and every situation - no matter how bad or seemingly undesirable
    it is - we have the opportunity to practice a virtue.

  (Via Ryan Holiday)

  It's a long-ish but worthwhile read regardless of your view on
  Stoicism. Ryan cites specific examples of this view in his pleasantly
  digestible way.

    In our daily lives we forget that the things that seem to be
    blocking us are small and that the obstacles blocking us are
    actually providing us answers for where to go next. It's a timeless
    formula that can be revisited again and again.

    All I can say is that this attitude is something I try to think of
    always. I try to envision these people facing much more significant
    problems than me, and seeing it not only as not bad but as an
    opportunity.

    We all face tough situations on a regular basis. But behind the
    circumstances and events that provoke an immediate negative reaction
    is something good - some exposed benefit that we can seize mentally
    and then act upon.We blame outside forces or other people and we
    write ourselves off as failures or our goals as impossible. But
    there is only one thing we really control: our attitude and approach

    Which is why the Stoics say that [2]what blocks the path is the
    path. That what seems to impede action can actually advance it. And
    that everything is a chance to practice some virtue or something
    different than originally intended. And you never know what good
    will come of that.

    The obstacle is the way.

  Indeed.
  [3]35° 41.876 N 139° 42.726 E
  Also on:

  [4]Twitter
    __________________________________________________________________

  My original entry is here: [5]Stoic Optimism. It posted Sat, 06 Oct
  2018 12:00:00 +0000.
  Filed under: personal,

References

  1. https://medium.com/thrive-global/this-timeless-and-boldy-optimistic-idea-could-change-your-life-5c9cffe17214
  2. http://thoughtcatalog.com/ryan-holiday/2014/12/disadvantage-advantage/
  3. https://maps.wikimedia.org/#/14/35.6979357/139.7120997
  4. https://twitter.com/prjorgensen/status/1048544231579705344
  5. https://www.prjorgensen.com/?p=2098