Amor Fati: How Everything Can Be Flipped

Amor Fati is a principle in stoicism I consistently must remind myself of. Amor Fati literally translates to “Love Fate” from Latin and essentially means to love everything that happens to you, whether it seems ‘good’ or ‘bad’. It’s basically the art of flipping life on its head and deciding, “Whatever comes, I’m going to use it”. It is not pretending everything feels good, but choosing to see everything as usable, meaningful raw material instead of pointless suffering or foolish inconveniences. 

It’s the idea that our judgements and our opinions about situations, and not situations themselves are what dictate everything. Two people can live through the same event and walk away with completely different stories about what it “means.” One sees betrayal, the other sees a boundary lesson. One sees humiliation, the other sees humility being built. Someone cancels on you, and in your head it becomes, “They don’t respect me,” or “People are so unreliable,” and now you’re angry—less because of what happened and more because of the story you attached to it. When you remember that it’s your interpretation doing most of the emotional damage, you reclaim power: perhaps you can’t change what they did, but you can control what your response will be like. 

Where this gets really real is with people. People are so freaking exhausting sometimes. They routinely say things they don’t mean, they flake, they choose distractions over growth, and make decisions that block their own blessings. It's far too easy to feel both superior and utterly disappointed. And then the mirror turns, and I realize, I say all these things, and yet I am absolutely no different. I’m sure many of the decisions and actions I take may seem nonsensical to some people, yet perfectly rational to others. That’s why the lesson of not expecting 'you' from other people is so freeing. The things you can shoulder and carry on with might crush them; many of the things they shrug off might bring you to your knees. If you keep that in mind, it becomes easier to swap irritation for curiosity and compassion. Internally switching from the question of  “Why are you like this?” and more of “Why do you feel this way?”

This is where gratitude and Amor Fati intertwine. Every annoyance becomes a tiny training ground for virtue: the rude comment becomes a chance to practice patience, the broken promise becomes a chance to practice forgiveness or clearer boundaries. Someone talks to you sideways? That’s a rep for patience and self-control. Someone ghosts you? A rep for releasing expectations and clarifying what you actually want. You don’t have to pretend it feels good, but you can say, “Since this is already happening, I’m going to use it for my development and progress.”

It may sound a little egotistical and selfish to some, but genuinely, who cares? Life is already hard enough for a young black man like myself anyways, might as well get sum outta this, ya feel me??

In fact, this is Biblically supported, because even GOD almighty himself would make use of every situation in which we would foolishly find ourselves in, and would still use it for our benefit in the end. In the Book of Romans, he writes, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”--Romans 8:28 NKJV.  GOD gave David and Bathsheba an heir like Solomon, despite David committing a huge sin against him. 

Gratitude, then, isn’t just “thanks for the blessings,” but “thank you that nothing is unusable—not even my own impatience and other people’s mess.” Shakespeare’s line about nothing being neither good nor bad, but it is in our thinking that makes it so, comes to mind here. As well as Marcus Aurelius’ call to see everything as a gift. You don’t have to like everything that happens to you, but you can decide nothing will be wasted on you.

"Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love." -- Ephesians 4:2 NLT

“Human beings are social creatures; either teach them or put up with them.”- Marcus Aurelius