Aurelius!!!! and the power of passivity

I've been regretably inactive on Gaia community this past month, partly because I've been away from home.  While away, though, I read Marcus Aurelius' Mediations. Aurelius was very inspirational for me, causing me to want to read Zeno, Cleanthes, Chrysippus, even Thomas a Kempis.  My interest in Aurelius stemmed from a long desire I've had to develop an ethics (Deleuze-Spinoza ethology vs. prescriptive, regulative rules).  Aurelius helped me to consider whether such an ethics would be centered around certain Stocial philosophical principles: materialism, monism, mutation.  The only way to find out?  Experiment. 

Here are some quotations from the Meditations that inspired me:

--Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart.

--Despise not death, but welcome it, for nature wills it like all else.

--Each day provides its own gifts.

Why did I find these quotations inspirational?  They all lay claim to the power of passivity. 
Passivity's power lies in its capacity to receive.  Reception is a power indeed.  If a body can receive, it can endure, it enables future communication.  Receiving means openness (structural coupling), to flows of matter and energy.