Meditations

a life task, which emerges, by definition, from whatever your life circumstances are. It’s what’s being asked of you, with your particular skills, resources and personality traits, in the place where you actually find yourself.

Because the irony, of course, is that just doing something once today, just steering your kayak over the next few inches of water, is the only way you’ll ever become the kind of person who does that sort of thing on a regular basis anyway. Otherwise – and believe me, I’ve been there – you’re merely the kind of person who spends your life drawing up

Marcus Aurelius reassures readers of his Meditations: ‘Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.’

Steve Chandler writes. They don’t see ‘that leaving things unfinished is what’s causing the low levels of energy.’ (He suggests spending one day robotically completing as much unfinished business as you can: ‘Notice at the end of that day how much energy you’ve got. You’ll be amazed.’)

As a counterstrategy, keep a “done list,” which starts empty first thing in the morning, and which you then gradually fill with whatever you accomplish through the day.