To act, in its most general sense, means to take an initiative, to begin... to set something into motion.
Hannah ArendtThe history of humanity is not a hotel where someone can rent a room whenever it suits him; nor is it a vehicle which we board or get out of at random. Our past will be for us a burden beneath which we can only collapse for as long as we refuse to understand the present and fight for a better future. Only then โ but from that moment on โ will the burden become a blessing, that is, a weapon in the battle for freedom.
Hannah ArendtThe human condition is such that pain and effort are not just symptoms which can be removed without changing life itself; they are the modes in which life itself, together with the necessity to which it is bound, makes itself felt. For mortals, the easy life of the gods would be a lifeless life.
Hannah Arendt