August 21st Reading from The Daily Stoic (Round 2) - Don't Be Miserable In Advance

     For about a month now, I've been battling depression. That is not an admission that comes easily to me, but I have to face it. I'm feeling overworked and overwhelmed, and things just keep getting harder. Last night, I resolved to return to my practice of spending some time every day studying Stoic teachings. It has helped tremendously in the past, and I think it is perhaps the best thing I can do for myself now. Today I got some more bad news about some impending difficulties - about 3 months out - and it means I won't be able to visit home in 2 months as I had planned. I've waited about 6 years to visit home, and to have it snatched away now could be very upsetting . . . if it were not a thing indifferent, having no direct part in virtue nor vice. See? It's helping already!
     So, among my resolutions is to return to reading The Daily Stoic every day. Blogging the classical quotations from the core of each daily teaching was my way of keeping myself accountable, so I thought I might return to this as well. It seems a little weird - having already posted the quotations, is there really any point to posting them again? Well, the quotations obviously haven't changed, but my reactions and thoughts will have. So the project has value, if only to me. I hope that anyone who may stumble across this blog may find them valuable as well.
     Today's quote, which was just what I needed to read today:

"It's ruinous for the soul to be anxious about the future and miserable in advance of the misery, engulfed by anxiety that the things it desires might remain until the very end. For such a soul will never be at rest - by longing for things to come it will lose the ability to enjoy present things."

It does me no good to dwell on the things that I have lost, sacrificed, or given up over the last month or so, and no good to dwell upon losing a visit to home that was never mine to begin with, nor still to dwell overmuch on what must be done within the next three months - the matters themselves are things indifferent, though much dispreferred indifferents, and suffering for them now is foolish at any rate. As long as I can focus upon these truths, I do not suffer.