It’s sort of strange—if you think back to when you were a kid, what appeared to you to be the best part about being an adult? No more school. Because that’s the example adults by and large set: that education stops. That adulthood is like one long summer break. That graduation is the final destination of learning and studying and investing in your education.

This is a relatively recent phenomenon. Not that long ago, adults prioritized their own education as much as their kids. There’s the story of Epictetus teaching one day when a student’s arrival caused a commotion in the back of the room. Who was it? Hadrian, the emperor. Hadrian’s example clearly had an impact on his successor and adopted grandson, Marcus Aurelius. Late in his reign, a friend spotted Marcus heading out, carrying a stack of books. Where are you going? he asked. Marcus was on his way to a lecture on Stoicism, he said, for “learning is a good thing, even for one who is growing old. I am now on my way to Sextus the philosopher to learn what I do not yet know.” In adulthood, Cato had the Stoic philosopher Athenodorus Cordylion come live with him so he could continue his studies. Thrasea, one of the Stoics who challenged Nero, continued his studies up until his last breath. In fact, he was discoursing and studying with Demetrius the Cynic when his death sentence from Nero arrived.

This is what it means to be a Stoic. To be a Stoic is to be a lifelong student. It’s to follow in the footsteps of Hadrian and Marcus and Cato and Thrasea. It’s to know that wisdom is an endless pursuit, to believe one never graduates, one never arrives at some final destination of education.