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Mountain Ancestors Grove, ADF

A Year of Contemplation

Pay Your Taxes (Day 105)

4/15/2019

 
Picture
Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay


TAX DAY! Hooray? 

Yes. Hooray! 

Why the hell am I so happy about tax day? Well, to be honest, I’m not. I hate taxes… but, when practicing perspective, I can see their value and benefit. 

How many services are available to society, myself included, that are funded by taxes? Dozens? More? What about the fact that for thousands of years people have complained about their taxes, and to no avail? Now, they’re dead, and still had to pay in one way or another. I’m not special. Finally, if we’re paying taxes, we’re making enough to warrant paying taxes. If we weren’t, we’d be living in a primal anarchy where every basic service and necessity of life would take Herculean effort to acquire. 

Nothing will ever befall me that I will receive with gloom or a bad disposition. I will pay my taxes gladly. Now, all the things which cause complaint or dread are like the taxes of life - things from which, my dear Lucilius, you should never hope for exemption or seek escape.” 
(Seneca, Moral Letters, 96.2)

​If we go by Seneca’s above analogy, we could say that every day is tax day, in its own way. Everything has a price, and every road has a toll. Waiting at layovers and for rides is a sort of travel tax. Rumors and gossip are the tax one pays for having a public persona. Disagreements and frustrations are the taxes of relationships. Stress and problems are success’ taxes. 

Like their financial counterparts, we go through trouble and time trying to avoid them, or reduce their impact. We expend so much energy and intentionality to resist paying. 

Picture
Image Credit: Memegenerator.net & Paramount Domestic Television

​Pay the toll. Move on with life. You’ll thank yourself. 

(See y’all tomorrow) 

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    About the Blog

    Awakening the desire to explore Stoicism, and how it relates to his existing beliefs, Rev. William committed to working through the text, The Daily Stoic, a year-long journey to awaken the Stoic mind. 
    How things are structured can be found in the first post. 

    About the Author

    Born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, Rev. William attended Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado where in 2007 he graduated with a degree in Religious Studies, minoring in Psychology. Currently residing in Longmont, CO, he is one of the Priests and founder of Mountain Ancestors Grove.  He spends his time playing mandolin (and some guitar), writing, engaging in LGBTQIA+ advocacy and education, community service, and sharing a larger vision of how a polytheist perspective can lead to greater human understanding, acceptance, and gods be good, peace. 

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