Either it is a well-arranged universe or a chaos huddled together, but still a universe. But can a certain order subsist in thee, and disorder in the All? And this too when all things are so separated and diffused and sympathetic.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 4, Chapter 24
The German translation is a little different. I admit, I do not know Latin, so I can’t go into it like I was able to with the Kierkegaard phrase. Especially the last phrase makes a different. Here’s my translation from German to English:
And that given such a harmonic connection of all possible forces, that antagonize each other and are split in many.
In this one, the paradox of life comes out a lot better. Not sure that’s what MA is talking about, to be honest. And yet, I found myself in this quote, in several ways. There’s always that dichotomy between order and chaos, and everything is always in the middle. Nothing is ever fully chaotic, or fully ordered.
Too many layers.
The universe seems to be chaotic, with all them galaxies floating around like crazy. And yet, you can find order in that chaos. A galaxy itself seems chaotic, and yet there’s order in the way the planets turn and circulate. (Except for the Three Body Problem types. That’s a different story. For now.) Depending on the scale of picture you look at, earth is either incredibly chaotic, or very organized. A city from above seems organized, but when you’re inside with all the traffic? Go down to the molecules – pretty organized! But then there are electrons shooting all around. And then quantum physics! Will it find more or less order?
Both.
Depends if you’re looking at it or not. Something like that. So, MA is right about that part. Everything is chaos and order at the same time. But it’s still a universe. It still does, in a way, create a whole. Without us knowing the dimensions, as it all could be the lava lamp of a god or other creature. But the core thought is that everything is whole as it is.
So is life.
It seems incredibly fragmented living it. Chaotic most of the time, butterfly effects all over the place, never knowing what comes next, only hoping and predicting and deducting and calculating probabilities. Based on experiences, education, legal systems – so many laws trying to give us enough guidance to at least be able to be kind of certain that the house on the other side of the road will not suddenly fall down on me. Bam, earthquake.
Life is chaos.
That’s an assumption that one can make. True, we can make certain assumptions, but nothing is ever certain. That uncertainty is on of the many sufferings that humans must cope with. Mostly subconsciously. We’re trained from the very beginning that our lives can end any moment. We train ourselves for that. Like stupidly cutting a tree that feel over without any experience or protective gear.
Not going to do that again.
Because I have experience now. Did it once, survived thanks to guidance of an experienced person, and learned a great deal about it. Doesn’t mean that it will turn out better next time, but the probability is higher. And due to that, it will be less chaotic.
Probabilities measure chaos.
Since you can’t measure entropy, they’re the closest we can get. I’m quite sure that MA wouldn’t approve of that, though. Stoicism is more one the “just accept the chaos, dude” side of the discussion. Can’t change it. Out of your control. Better get yourself in order, arrange that chaos inside yourself, all those contradictions, incoherences, all that lostness and blurry lines.
The rest will follow.
The more ordered my mind is, the easier it is for me to deal with the chaos of life.
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