Ocean Voyage

January 28, 2025

It isn’t easy to combine and reconcile the two—the carefulness of a person devoted to externals and the dignity of one who’s detached—but it’s not impossible. Otherwise, happiness would be impossible.

It’s something like going on an ocean voyage. What can I do? Pick the captain, the boat, the date, and the best time to sail. But then a storm hits. Well, it’s no longer my business; I have done everything I could. It’s somebody else’s problem now—namely, the captain’s. But the boat actually sinks. What are my options? I do the only thing I am in a position to do: drown—but fearlessly, without bawling or crying out to God, because I know that what is born must also die. I am no Father Time; I’m a human being, a part of the whole, like an hour in a day. Like the hour, I must abide my time, and like the hour, pass. What difference does it make whether I go by drowning or disease? I have to go somehow.

~ Epictetus, Book II