
The Obstacle Is the Way
đ§ą The obstacle is the way - Every obstacle is a hidden opportunity. What blocks your path becomes your path.
đ§ Perception is power - You canât control eventsâbut you can control how you interpret and respond to them. Stay calm. Stay rational.
đĽ Action conquers fear - Take small steps. Keep moving. Focus only on whatâs in front of you. Action builds momentum and courage.
đ§ Accept and endure - Not all battles are won through force. Sometimes the best strategy is patience, acceptance, and inner strength.
đŻ Amor fati: love your fate - Donât just tolerate adversityâembrace it. Everything that happens can be used to make you stronger, wiser, better.
đ Persist. Persevere. Repeat - Obstacles donât disappearâthey multiply. Your job is to keep showing up, adapting, and enduring.
âł Memento mori - Remember death. It gives life urgency and clarity. Use it to sharpen your focus and elevate your purpose.
đď¸ Stoic strength = self-mastery - Master your mind, your choices, your reactions. Thatâs all you ever truly controlâand thatâs enough.
- 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. The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.
âThe obstacle in the path becomes the path. Never forget, within every obstacle is an opportunity to improve our condition.â
- When you have a goal, obstacles are actually teaching you how to get where you want to goâcarving you a path.
Objective judgment, now at this very moment. Unselfish action, now at this very moment. Willing acceptanceânow at this very momentâof all external events. Thatâs all you need. âMARCUS AURELIUS
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These obstacles are actually opportunities to test ourselves, to try new things, and, ultimately, to triumph. The Obstacle Is the Way.
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What matters most is not what these obstacles are but how we see them, how we react to them, and whether we keep our composure. You will learn that this reaction determines how successful we will be in overcomingâor possibly thriving because ofâthem.
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Outward appearances are deceptive. Whatâs within them, beneath them, is what matters.
Choose not to be harmedâand you wonât feel harmed. Donât feel harmedâand you havenât been. âMARCUS AURELIUS
- To one person a situation may be negative. To another, that same situation may be positive.
âNothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so,â âShakespeare
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There is no good or bad without us, there is only perception.
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A mistake becomes training.
What such a man needs is not courage but nerve control, cool headedness. This he can get only by practice. âTHEODORE ROOSEVELT
- If your nerve holds, then nothing really did âhappenââour perception made sure it was nothing of consequence.
Would you have a great empire? Rule over yourself. âPUBLIUS SYRUS
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Subconsciously, we should be constantly asking ourselves this question: Do I need to freak out about this?
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No, because I practiced for this situation and I can control myself. Or, No, because I caught myself and Iâm able to realize that that doesnât add anything constructive.
Donât let the force of an impression when it first hit you knock you off your feet; just say to it: Hold on a moment; let me see who you are and what you represent. Let me put you to the test. âEPICTETUS
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Itâs so much better to see things as they truly, actually are, not as weâve made them in our minds.
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Take your situation and pretend it is not happening to you. Pretend it is not important, that it doesnât matter. How much easier would it be for you to know what to do? How much more quickly and dispassionately could you size up the scenario and its options? You could write it off, greet it calmly.
Man does not simply exist but always decides what his existence will be, what he will become the next moment. By the same token, every human being has the freedom to change at any instant. âVIKTOR FRANKL
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That is, when you can break apart something, or look at it from some new angle, it loses its power over you.
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Fear is debilitating, distracting, tiring, and often irrational.
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We canât change the obstacles themselvesâthat part of the equation is setâbut the power of perspective can change how the obstacles appear.
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How we approach, view, and contextualize an obstacle, and what we tell ourselves it means, determines how daunting and trying it will be to overcome.
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Where the head goes, the body follows. Perception precedes action. Right action follows the right perspective.
In life our first job is this, to divide and distinguish things into two categories: externals I cannot control, but the choices I make with regard to them I do control. Where will I find good and bad? In me, in my choices. âEPICTETUS
The trick to forgetting the big picture is to look at everything close up. âCHUCK PALAHNIUK
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Focus on the moment, not the monsters that may or may not be up ahead.
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The implications of our obstacle are theoreticalâthey exist in the past and the future. We live in the moment. And the more we embrace that, the easier the obstacle will be to face and move.
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Remember that this moment is not your life, itâs just a moment in your life. Focus on what is in front of you, right now. Ignore what it ârepresentsâ or it âmeansâ or âwhy it happened to you.â
Genius is the ability to put into effect what is in your mind. Thereâs no other definition of it. âF. SCOTT FITZGERALD
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To aim low meant to accept mediocre accomplishment. But a high aim could, if things went right, create something extraordinary.
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It is often in that desperate nothing-to-lose state that we are our most creative.
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Our best ideas come from there, where obstacles illuminate new options.
A good person dyes events with his own color . . . and turns whatever happens to his own benefit. âSENECA
âThere is good in everything, if only we look for it.â â Laura Ingalls Wilder
Then imitate the action of the tiger; stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood. âSHAKESPEARE
- Each obstacle we overcome makes us stronger for the next one.
We must all either wear out or rust out, every one of us. My choice is to wear out. âTHEODORE ROOSEVELT
He says the best way out is always through And I agree to that, or in so far As I can see no way out but through. âROBERT FROST
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We will not be stopped by failure, we will not be rushed or distracted by external noise. We will chisel and peg away at the obstacle until it is gone. Resistance is futile.
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Stop looking for an epiphany, and start looking for weak points. Stop looking for angels, and start looking for angles. There are options. Settle in for the long haul and then try each and every possibility, and youâll get there.
What is defeat? Nothing but education; nothing but the first steps to something better. âWENDELL PHILLIPS
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When failure does come, ask: What went wrong here? What can be improved? What am I missing? This helps birth alternative ways of doing what needs to be done, ways that are often much better than what we started with. Failure puts you in corners you have to think your way out of. It is a source of breakthroughs.
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Itâs time you understand that the world is telling you something with each and every failure and action. Itâs feedbackâgiving you precise instructions on how to improve, itâs trying to wake you up from your cluelessness. Itâs trying to teach you something. Listen.
Under the comb the tangle and the straight path are the same. âHERACLITUS
- Take your time, donât rush. Some problems are harder than others. Deal with the ones right in front of you first. Come back to the others later. Youâll get there. The process is about doing the right things, right now. Not worrying about what might happen later, or the results, or the whole picture.
Whatever is rightly done, however humble, is noble. (Quidvis recte factum quamvis humile praeclarum.) âSIR HENRY ROYCE
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We tell ourselves that weâll get started once the conditions are right, or once weâre sure we can trust this or that. When, really, itâd be better to focus on making due with what weâve got. On focusing on results instead of pretty methods.
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There are a lot of ways to get from point A to point B. It doesnât have to be a straight line. Itâs just got to get you where you need to go. But so many of us spend so much time looking for the perfect solution that we pass up whatâs right in front of us.
Do the best with what youâve got.
Think progress, not perfection.
Whoever cannot seek the unforeseen sees nothing, for the known way is an impasse. âHERACLITUS
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You donât convince people by challenging their longest and most firmly held opinions. You find common ground and work from there. Or you look for leverage to make them listen. Or you create an alterative with so much support from other people that the opposition voluntarily abandons its views and joins your camp.
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Sometimes the longest way around is the shortest way home.
Wise men are able to make a fitting use even of their enmities. âPLUTARCH
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Sometimes in your life you need to have patienceâwait for temporary obstacles to fizzle out. Let two jousting egos sort themselves out instead of jumping immediately into the fray. Sometimes a problem needs less of youâfewer people periodâand not more.
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We wrongly assume that moving forward is the only way to progress, the only way we can win. Sometimes, staying put, going sideways, or moving backward is actually the best way to eliminate what blocks or impedes your path.
When jarred, unavoidably, by circumstance revert at once to yourself and donât lose the rhythm more than you can help. Youâll have a better grasp of harmony if you keep going back to it. âMARCUS AURELIUS
- Adversity can harden you. Or it can loosen you up and make you betterâif you let it.
The best men are not those who have waited for chances but who have taken them; besieged chance, conquered the chance, and made chance the servitor. âE. H. CHAPIN
- Ordinary people shy away from negative situations, just as they do with failure. They do their best to avoid trouble. What great people do is the opposite. They are their best in these situations. They turn personal tragedy or misfortuneâreally anything, everythingâto their advantage.
In the meantime, cling tooth and nail to the following rule: not to give in to adversity, not to trust prosperity, and always take full note of fortuneâs habit of behaving just as she pleases. âSENECA
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Will is our internal power, which can never be affected by the outside world.
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Certain things in life will cut you open like a knife. When that happensâat that exposing momentâthe world gets a glimpse of whatâs truly inside you.
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Itâs much easier to control our perceptions and emotions than it is to give up our desire to control other people and events. Itâs easier to persist in our efforts and actions than to endure the uncomfortable or the painful. Itâs easier to think and act than it is to practice wisdom.
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Always prepare ourselves for more difficult times. Always accept what weâre unable to change. Always manage our expectations. Always persevere. Always learn to love our fate and what happens to us. Always protect our inner self, retreat into ourselves. Always submit to a greater, larger cause. Always remind ourselves of our own mortality.
If thy faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small. âPROVERBS 24:10
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We take weakness for granted. We assume that the way weâre born is the way we simply are, that our disadvantages are permanent. And then we atrophy from there.
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Nobody is born with a steel backbone. We have to forge that ourselves.
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The path of least resistance is a terrible teacher. We canât afford to shy away from the things that intimidate us. We donât need to take our weaknesses for granted.
Offer a guarantee and disaster threatens. âANCIENT INSCRIPTION AT THE ORACLE OF DELPHI
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And in the case where nothing could be done, the Stoics would use it as an important practice to do something the rest of us too often fail to do: manage expectations. Because sometimes the only answer to âWhat if . . .â is, It will suck but weâll be okay.
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Beware the calm before the storm. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. The worst is yet to come. It gets worse before it gets better.
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Anticipation doesnât magically make things easier, of course. But we are prepared for them to be as hard as they need to be, as hard as they actually are.
The Fates guide the person who accepts them and hinder the person who resists them. âCLEANTHES
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Constraints in life are a good thing. Especially if we can accept them and let them direct us. They push us to places and to develop skills that weâd otherwise never have pursued.
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All external events can be equally beneficial to us because we can turn them all upside down and make use of them. They can teach us a lesson we were reluctant to otherwise learn.
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We instinctively think about how much better weâd like any given situation to be. We start thinking about what weâd rather have. Rarely do we consider how much worse things could have been.
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We squirm and complain about what was taken from us. We still canât appreciate what we have.
My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it . . . but love it. âNIETZSCHE
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To do great things, we need to be able to endure tragedy and setbacks. Weâve got to love what we do and all that it entails, good and bad. We have to learn to find joy in every single thing that happens.
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Your obstacle may not be so serious or violent. But they are nevertheless significant and outside your control. They warrant only one response: a smile.
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Learning not to kick and scream about matters we canât control is one thing. Indifference and acceptance are certainly better than disappointment or rage. Very few understand or practice that art. But it is only a first step. Better than all of that is love for all that happens to us, for every situation.
The goal is:
Not: Iâm okay with this.
Not: I think I feel good about this.
But: I feel great about it. Because if it happened, then it was meant to happen, and I am glad that it did when it did. I am meant to make the best of it.
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Donât waste a second looking back at your expectations. Face forward, and face it with a smug little grin.
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Itâs a little unnatural, I know, to feel gratitude for things we never wanted to happen in the first place. But we know, at this point, the opportunities and benefits that lie within adversities. We know that in overcoming them, we emerge stronger, sharper, empowered. There is little reason to delay these feelings. To begrudgingly acknowledge later that it was for the best, when we could have felt that in advance because it was inevitable.
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That is not to say that the good will always outweigh the bad. Or that it comes free and without cost. But there is always some goodâeven if only barely perceptible at firstâcontained within the bad.
âGentleman, I am hardening on this enterprise. I repeat, I am now hardening towards this enterprise.ââWINSTON CHURCHILL
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Life is not about one obstacle, but many. Whatâs required of us is not some shortsighted focus on a single facet of a problem, but simply a determination that we will get to where we need to go, somehow, someway, and nothing will stop us.
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We will overcome every obstacleâand there will be many in lifeâuntil we get there. Persistence is an action. Perseverance is a matter of will. One is energy. The other, endurance.
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The good thing about true perseverance is that it canât be stopped by anything besides death.
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We donât control the barriers or the people who put them there. But we control ourselvesâand that is sufficient.
A manâs job is to make the world a better place to live in, so far as he is ableâalways remembering the results will be infinitesimalâand to attend to his own soul. âLEROY PERCY
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Stop making it harder on yourself by thinking about I, I, I. Stop putting that dangerous âIâ in front of events. I did this. I was so smart. I had that. I deserve better than this. No wonder you take losses personally, no wonder you feel so alone. Youâve inflated your own role and importance.
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Help your fellow humans thrive and survive, contribute your little bit to the universe before it swallows you up, and be happy with that. Lend a hand to others. Be strong for them, and it will make you stronger.
When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully. âDR. JOHNSON
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Death doesnât make life pointless, but rather purposeful. And, fortunately, we donât have to nearly die to tap into this energy.
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Our fear of death is a looming obstacle in our lives. It shapes our decisions, our outlook, and our actions.
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We forget how light our grip on life really is.
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If something is in our control, itâs worth every ounce of our efforts and energy. Death is not one of those thingsâit is not in our control how long we will live or what will come and take us from life.
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Thereâs no question about it: Death is the most universal of our obstacles. Itâs the one we can do the least about. At the very best, we can hope to delay itâand even then, weâll still succumb eventually.
Live on in your blessings, your destinyâs been won. But ours calls us on from one ordeal to the next. âVIRGIL
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The great law of nature is that it never stops. There is no end. Just when you think youâve successfully navigated one obstacle, another emerges. But thatâs what keeps life interesting. And as youâre starting to see, thatâs what creates opportunities.
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Each time, youâll learn something. Each time, youâll develop strength, wisdom, and perspective. Each time, a little more of the competition falls away. Until all that is left is you: the best version of you.
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Knowing that life is a marathon and not a sprint is important. Conserve your energy. Understand that each battle is only one of many and that you can use it to make the next one easier. More important, you must keep them all in real perspective.
To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school . . . it is to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically. âHENRY DAVID THOREAU