There are some 8 billion people in the world. There are 365 days in a year. It surprises you that some of those people are dumb? That some of those days are not great? It’s amazing the attention (and the hand wringing) paid to the handful of absolutely batshit crazy members of the United States Congress…as if the body of 535 people elected to lead us wasn’t drawn from the same far flung corners of this enormous continent that produce the people in embarrassing viral memes and Worldstar videos. It’s not a surprise that some of them are fools–-it’s a statistical and historical certainty.

It’s a big world out there. A world with mental illnesses, with addiction, with narcissism and sociopathy. Some of the people we meet, some of the people we hear about, some of the people who rise to the top of the heap are going to be those people. It would be wonderful if that weren’t so, if we had developed a system that weeded those people out of important positions, but that simply is not how it is.

Think of the history of the Roman Empire. Rome had approximately 70 emperors during its 500 years of existence. Marcus Aurelius belonged to a group historically referred to as the “five good emperors.” Five. Out of 70! That’s a 7% success rate if we’re measuring for morality and enlightenment. And this surprises you? That the cast majority of those attracted to absolute power turned out to be ruthless and selfish and deranged? In Meditations, Marcus reminds himself that a certain percentage of the population is going to be shameless. He says that when you accept this fact, it makes you more tolerant of the individual representative of this cohort when you meet them.

But tolerant is not the right word. It makes you wiser, less shocked, and less vulnerable to them. Accepting their existence is not the same as accepting or tolerating their behavior. You will still do your best to make sure they are not your congresswoman. You will do your best to educate or correct people. Yet, just as it’s unlikely and unreasonable to expect all your days to be good, you cannot expect all the people in your orbit to be good either. It’s setting yourself up to be miserable if you’re surprised by it, if you fall to pieces everytime the thing that was destined to happen inevitably does happen.

Don’t be surprised. Be aware. Be prepared.