Who really said it

The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way

Q: Did Marcus Aurelius say "The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way"?

Yes. Genuinely from Marcus Aurelius' 'Meditations' (Book 5, section 20). The exact wording here is Gregory Hays' 2002 translation — Marcus wrote in Greek, and older renderings (George Long, 1862) are far less pithy: "that which is an obstacle on the road helps us on this road." The thought is his; this crisp phrasing is the translator's.

Written by Marcus Aurelius 121–180 AD · Roman emperor & Stoic philosopher

Verified In copyright

Genuinely from Marcus Aurelius’ ‘Meditations’ (Book 5, section 20). The exact wording here is Gregory Hays’ 2002 translation ↗ — Marcus wrote in Greek, and older renderings (George Long, 1862) are far less pithy: “that which is an obstacle on the road helps us on this road.” The thought is his; this crisp phrasing is the translator’s.

Last verified 10 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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“The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way” Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 5.20, trans. Gregory Hays (Modern Library, 2002).

Can you use it?

Still under copyright (rights held by Gregory Hays / Modern Library (Penguin Random House)). A short, credited quote is generally fine for talks, teaching, and internal decks; for commercial, published, or large-scale reuse, get permission.

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Provenance

The source

Work: Meditations, Book 5, §20
Author: Marcus Aurelius (written c. 170–180 AD, in Greek)
Translation: Gregory Hays, Modern Library, 2002
Confidence: Verified — genuine passage; wording is Hays’ translation

The mind adapts and converts to its own purposes the obstacle to our acting. The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

Gregory Hays’ 2002 translation of Meditations 5.20. For comparison, George Long’s 1862 public-domain version reads: “the mind converts and changes every hindrance to its activity into an aid … that which is an obstacle on the road helps us on this road.”

Meditations, Book 5 (George Long translation, public domain)

How we verified this

The line is section 20 of Book 5 of Marcus Aurelius’ ‘Meditations’ — the George Long public-domain text renders it as “that which is an obstacle on the road helps us on this road ↗.”
The now-famous crisp wording — “The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way” — comes from Gregory Hays’ 2002 Modern Library translation ↗.
It went viral partly through Ryan Holiday, whose 2014 book ‘The Obstacle Is the Way’ ↗ takes its title directly from this passage.

In copyright

Marcus Aurelius’ original Greek and 19th-century translations (e.g. George Long, 1862) are long in the public domain. But this specific English wording is Gregory Hays’ 2002 translation (Modern Library), first published 2002 — well after 1931 — so this exact phrasing is in copyright to the translator and publisher.

Fact-check

What people get wrong

The attribution to Marcus Aurelius is correct — but people routinely present this exact wording as his own words. It isn’t: he wrote in Greek, and this crisp English phrasing is a modern translator’s.

Gregory Hays (2002 translator) translation, not original

The memorable, aphoristic phrasing — “The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way” — is Gregory Hays’ 2002 translation ↗. Marcus’ Greek, in George Long’s 1862 version, reads “that which is an obstacle on the road helps us on this road ↗” — the same idea, nothing like as quotable.

Often filtered through Ryan Holiday popularizer

Much of the line’s modern fame comes via Ryan Holiday’s 2014 bestseller ‘The Obstacle Is the Way’ ↗, whose title is drawn from this passage — so it is frequently quoted as motivational shorthand rather than cited to Book 5.

Real Marcus Aurelius (Meditations 5.20 ↗) — but the unforgettable wording is Gregory Hays’ 2002 translation, not the emperor’s own words.

Context

Why it mattered

Book 5, section 20 sits in a passage about dealing with difficult people. Marcus argues that although others can obstruct our actions, they cannot touch our intentions or dispositions — because the reasoning mind can turn any hindrance into the next thing to work on.

The thought is quintessentially Stoic: externals are “indifferent,” and virtue lies in how we respond. Hays’ 2002 rendering compressed that idea into two hammer-blow sentences, which is why this passage — and not the wordier 19th-century versions — became a modern motto.

The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

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Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

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Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Meditations, Book 5 (George Long, public domain)standardebooks.org

Full public-domain text of Book 5; section 20 shows the older, less pithy rendering of this passage.

Meditations Book 5 (Internet Classics Archive)classics.mit.edu

George Long translation online; useful to compare the literal wording against the modern Hays phrasing.

Notes on the Gregory Hays translationmichaeldmcgill.com

Reader’s notes quoting the Hays 2002 translation, including the exact 5.20 wording at issue.

Review: ‘The Obstacle Is the Way’ (Donald Robertson)donaldrobertson.name

Stoicism scholar’s review of the book that took its title from this passage and drove its popularity.

Marcus Aurelius (Wikipedia)en.wikipedia.org

Background on the emperor-philosopher and the composition of the Meditations.

The true author

About Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius

121–180 AD · Roman emperor & Stoic philosopher

Marcus Aurelius was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 AD and the last of the “Five Good Emperors.” His private notebook, the Meditations, was written in Greek during his military campaigns and never intended for publication — a working manual of Stoic self-discipline. This line, from Book 5, distils his conviction that obstacles are raw material for right action, not reasons to stop.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source — Chicago

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 5.20, trans. Gregory Hays (New York: Modern Library, 2002). Original Greek composed c. 170–180 AD.

MLA (9th ed.)

Aurelius, Marcus. Meditations. Translated by Gregory Hays, Modern Library, 2002.

APA (7th ed.)

Aurelius, M. (2002). Meditations (G. Hays, Trans.). Modern Library. (Original work composed c. 170–180 AD)

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