Accept What You Cannot Control — The Enchiridion

Epictetus compresses a lifetime of peace work into one line. Do not demand that events happen as you wish. Wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well.

The first half names the trap: treating reality as an employee who owes you cooperation. That demand keeps you at war with weather, budgets, bodies, and other people's choices. Every deviation becomes an insult instead of information.

The second half is the turn. Align your wanting with what actually occurs, not because you approve of everything, but because fighting the fact costs more than using it. "Go on well" is Epictetus's measure: not perfect circumstances, but a mind that stops bleeding energy into demands the world cannot meet.