Finished Reading “Heretics”

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  "G. K. Chesterton, the "Prince of Paradox," is at his witty best in this collection of twenty essays and articles from the turn of the twentieth century. Focusing on  "heretics" - those who pride themselves on their superiority to Christian views - Chesterton appraises prominent figures who fall into that category from the literary and art worlds... those who hold incomplete and inadequate views about "life, the universe, and everything." He is, in short, criticizing all that host of non-Christian views of reality, as he demonstrated in his follow-up book Orthodoxy. The book is both an easy read and a difficult read. But he manages to demonstrate, among other things, that our new 21st century heresies are really not new because he himself deals with most of them." (Goodreads)

Highway Don't Care

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“You shouldn’t give circumstances the power to rouse anger, for they don’t care at all.” —Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 7.38

Ryan Holiday writes in "The Daily Stoic": 

"Why bother getting mad at causes and forces far bigger than us? Why do we take these things personally? After all, external events are not sentient beings--they cannot respond to our shouts and cries . . .

. . . circumstances are incapable of considering or caring for your feelings, your anxiety or your excitement. They don't care about your reaction. They are not people. So stop acting like getting worked up is having an impact on a given situation. Situations don't care at all." (p. 63)

Meditating on this truth and on these questions, one remembers a song that came out a few years ago that contains this principle at it's very core. We need to be mindful of both circumstances and our reaction to them for (as the song expresses) a simple distraction might lead to a certain end. Don't be driven by desperation because the circumstance does not care. Don't let anger sit or dispair sit in your driver's seat.

Situations do not control us. Neither do people.
The source of any response is ourselves whether sad, mad or glad.
Agitated or exhilarated--it's all on us. 

Circumstances don't care.
They don't need us.
The highway don't care either.
So be careful, be mindful. 

And fer Pete's sake, don't text and drive!

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