Stillness Is the Key

Careful as someone crossing an iced-over stream. Alert as a warrior in enemy territory. Courteous as a guest. Fluid as melting ice. Shapable as a block of wood. Receptive as a valley. Clear as a glass of water.

people can live without communicating with the wisest people who ever lived on earth.” There’s another line, now cliché, that is even more cutting: People who don’t read have no advantage over those who cannot read.

Tolstoy observed that love can’t exist off in the future. Love is only real if it’s happening right now. If you

The point is, it’s very difficult to think or act clearly (to say nothing of being happy) when we are drowning in information. It’s why lawyers attempt to bury the other side in paper.

give things a little space, don’t consume news in real time, be a season or two behind on the latest trend or cultural phenomenon, don’t let your inbox lord over your life.

Marcus Aurelius once wrote about “cutting free of impressions that cling to the mind, free of the future and the past,” to become the “sphere rejoicing in its perfect stillness.”

“If you wish to improve,” Epictetus once said, “be content to appear clueless or stupid in extraneous matters.”

“Always look for the helpers,” he explained to his viewers who were scared or disillusioned by the news. “There’s always someone who is trying to help. . . . The world is full of doctors and nurses, police and firemen, volunteers, neighbors and friends who are ready to jump in to help when things go wrong.”

future, the more energy we will have for what’s in front of us.