From Ryan Holiday’s excellent book, The Obstacle is the Way I was introduced to Meditations, an ancient text written by Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius.
Meditations wasn’t written to be published. It was private a journal. Marcus would sit down and put his thoughts to paper, reminding himself of truths he wanted to guide his daily actions and behavior.
Have a look at what one of the most legendary people in history, who is considered to have been a remarkable, good and accomplished leader, wrote to himself about focus and concentration:
Concentrate every minute like a Roman – like a man – on doing what’s in front of you with precise and genuine seriousness, tenderly, willingly, with justice.
And on freeing yourself from all distractions. Yes, you can – if you do everything as if it were the last thing you were doing in your life, and stop being aimless, stop letting your emotions override what your mind tells you, stop being hypocritical, self-centered, irritable.
You see how few things you have to do to live a satisfying and reverent life? If you can manage this, that’s all even the gods can ask of you.
— from the translation by Gregory Hays
If Meditations had been written for publication, it would be easy to dismiss this as good advice, but from from someone who’s better off. “Someone who doesn’t understand what I’ve got to deal with.”
Which is why it’s so remarkable to know that Marcus wrote this to himself.
One of the greatest deceptions your brain will play on you is to tell you that others have it better and that there’s something wrong with you. You’re missing something that he or she has.
You struggle to stay focused? To harness the power of concentration?
Fair enough.
Everyone does.
But some will work hard to overcome these natural limitations.
And others will feel sorry for themselves that they were not born with superhuman powers.
We all have limitations. And while we can’t overcome them all, we can do so much better than we are doing today.
If we just clearly see that we do already have everything we need to be who we want to be.
You know what I mean?
Dov Gordon
PS – We’ve got ONE spot left for Wednesday’s “Your Marketing Helium” live web-workshop.
Immediately before the quote above, Marcus Aurelius wrote this:
At some point you have to recognize what world it is that you belong to; what power rules it and from what source you spring; that there is a limited to the time assigned you, and if you don’t use it to free yourself it will be gone and will never return.
Life is short. If you’re on the fence, leap while you still can and join Wednesday’s “Your Marketing Helium” live web-workshop. Details and registration here.
