“I look at the Augusteum,and I think that perhaps my life has not actually been so chaotic, after all. It is merely this world that is chaotic, bringing changes to us all that nobody could have anticipated. The Augusteum warns me to not to get attached to any obsolete ideas about who I am, what I represent, whom I belong to, or what function I may once have intended to serve. Yesterday I might have been a glorious monument to somebody, true enough–but tomorrow I could be a fireworks depository. Even in the Eternal City, says the silent Augusteum, one must always be prepared for riotous and endless waves of transformation.”

I reflect on this quote and it reminds me not to get too attached to anything, including my own striving for transformation. We are always changing, our environment continually moves along with the seasons, the cells in our body continually turnover, trees are growing, buildings are decaying, food turns to dirt, and I could keep going…

We need to factor in and accept uncertainty and change as an essential ingredient of our experience. We need to let go of our need to control outcomes in order to allow solutions to spontaneously appear. Let all of your ideas about who you are go and instead use your imagination to think about all you could be. Now let go of that, you are far more than whatever words or ideas you could ever come up with. Instead relax, breathe deep, and get ready for the wave of endless transformation which, whether or not you try to control it, is going to carry you through this life.