Trudging Through Your Own Life? Here's the Stoic Fix | Maria Semple

25:50Cause wisdom really is about just separating what you can control from what you can control. And then justice is about, there's a lot of kind of meta in that friendliness, benevolence. It's not about like being a justice warrior. It's about just like being a good human being to others. Then there's courage, which is like about work and it's like love of work. There's a lot about like not falling in with the mob, you know, about like moral courage, about endurance. And then under temperance, it's about kind of discipline, patience, speaking less, speaking kindly I kind of pick little subcategories of virtues that I need to work on that day and then I journal all this out I journal it out and then it's like clarify my purpose I figure out what my purpose is that day and then there's like a list of prompts I think today I did I get to do this that's what I did I was like I get to go and talk about my book with Dan.

27:00Like, this is really amazing that I get to do this. You know, like, I love Dan. Like, there's a podcast studio down the street in my publisher's house that's all set up. You know, that's like, all this good stuff is happening. And it's about not like, oh, fuck, I gotta go do this thing with Dan. And I was like, you know, it's like, cause it could, I love you, but you know what I'm saying? We all can just slide into that. So it's basically just like reframing it. So it's really positive. And then I'll read the Stoics and then I read other philosophy. I'm reading some Rousseau now. I'm trying to, I'm not trying to, but I enjoy branching out a bit.

27:35And then I'm like ready to write. This is so interesting. I just want to, for anybody who wants to do a bootleg version of this for themselves, it sounds like, roughly speaking, the exercise begins by restating what your life philosophy is. And then the next click deeper is how does that apply to what you're going to do today? And then you do some reading, what might be a cheesily called inspirational reading of Stoic philosophers, etc., etc. And then it culminates in some sort of journal prompt around how am I going to back to today? How am I going to apply one aspect of this very rich philosophical tradition to what's on my docket for today?

28:25Did I roughly restate that correctly? Yeah, no, that's exactly it. And then you're like, let's go. Let's go do this thing. You know, here's the important thing is that I've set it up so that every single thing that I set out to do is 100 % of my control. For instance, when I was coming down here, it wasn't like what I wanted to do today. It wasn't like I want Dan to love me. I want to sell a million books on the podcast. I want to become like an influencer. It was like, I want to be on time. I don't want to interrupt. I feel like I have. So I'm going to go into a shame spiral, but try not to interrupt.

29:02Try not to swear. and those were like the only three things I really intended to do today was to write were those three things and I'm like maybe b-plus or something but it was like I wanted to be professional like love of work I wanted to show up with my full self and so that's what's really fun about it it's not like you set out for the day to like write a best-selling novel it's because you can't control that. You set out for the day to do like a good day of work and to focus and to concentrate and not to just like waste your time on the internet and take naps and things like that. That's what's kind of so fun about it.

29:43And that it's like, you only desire what's in your control. That's like a really big thing. And that's like actually quite radical is to shift. And that's why in my top half of my philosophy of life is it's like to line up my desires, thoughts, and actions. Those are the three disciplines, I think, of stoicism. It's thoughts, desire, and action. But desire is really the big one, which would be a very good segue to my book and my character. But I feel like you want to keep talking about stoicism so we can put a pin in the segue. No, no, no. I want to follow your lead here. Okay. Because actually, I think it doesn't take us far afield from stoicism because your protagonist starts the book in act one in this state of feeling like she's got it all figured out.

30:34And in many ways, she does. Right. And she's and I just interrupted. There we go. So it's like now I just OK. But that's see, you're a friend. That's the problem is I feel like I didn't know you. Friends, apparently I steamroll over and I don't even care. That's like what it is to be a friend of mine. But so she basically has figured out that the key to life is to desire only what she has. Her name is Adora Hazard. She's a recently divorced woman who's moved to New York with her teenage daughter, very similar to my story, lives on the Upper West Side. And she has kind of figured out that if you desire what you have, then you're happy.

31:15And so she set up this really fantastic life for herself. She's single. She assumes that she'll never find love because she's kind of later in life. So she doesn't desire love. She desires the company of her friends, and she lives on the seventh floor of an apartment building, and a lot of other single women live in the other apartments, and they call themselves the coven. It's like the best, smartest people, her favorite people in the world, and they kind of share Netflix passwords and do things, and the idea is when they get old, they'll all just take care of each other. and she's the moral tutor to a very wealthy eccentric family who lives on fifth avenue and particularly to their twin boys and so after they go to their private school and they're wearing their uniforms they come back with all their really terrible like status obsessed values she has to sit there and kind of talk them through it and try to like do moral training for them And so she's quite pleased with herself, I should say, which is kind of one of the digs against philosophers.

32:21It's like the arrogance of the philosopher. It's like the Christians, that's how they, when Christianity came along, they would talk about how philosophers who were kind of running rampant until Christianity believed that reason could solve everything. You know, you didn't need faith. So they got, I guess, a bad rap because they didn't believe in faith. They just thought, no, I have everything I need to solve all the problems. And so there was kind of an arrogance to it. even though Adora is not particularly arrogant, I did just kind of write it just with a little flavor of being pleased with herself.

32:55So then what happens is early on, she meets a handsome stranger at the ballet, a man at the ballet, and he pulls her into this kind of international mystery and Adora kind of realizes that maybe desire, that she hasn't snuffed it out as well as she thought she did. That in fact, there is something like a flame that is burning inside of her. And this guy awakes it, and then this whole plot awakes it, and then we go back and learn about what happened to her and why she turned to stoicism and why character became very important to her and the story she'd been telling herself. And so my books are crazy.

33:34It's a pretty crazy plot, but it's very philosophy-heavy, which is this aspect of exactly how this book is crazy. Is it, in the end, something of a repudiation of stoicism then? You know, it's kind of interesting is that I think that one of the things that's to me interesting is that stoicism doesn't love chaos. And I kind of like chaos, you know, like you say, oh, I love the low road. You don't really love the low road. But I mean, it's like kind of asking you not to be human, to not want to like lust or just like give into your appetites or do the wrong thing and feel good sending a hundred angry texts and becoming completely unhinged in the moment.

34:19Like that is being human, you know? And so I feel like there's certainly a denial of that in stoicism, the stoic sage. And so, and I think love is, especially in the early stages, as I was writing about in my book, it's just by definition chaotic and you're unhinged and you're desiring what you don't have and you'll do anything to get it and to keep it and all of that kind of good, great shit that love is. And so I think at the end, she kind of is still a Stoic and, but maybe has modified it a little bit. Where are you with Stoicism? I love stoicism, but I will say I'm also kind of now getting into Nietzsche, who really hated the Stoics.

35:03He has his own set of problems, but there's something about just the creative will that I think is just really fascinating. But I will always, I don't know that I will ever not do my Stoic practice because it really does make me feel good. It's just now a practice. Do you meditate like every morning, Dan? Do you start out the day? It really depends on the day. Okay. So I feel like I certainly don't feel this when I meditate, which is why I rarely meditate, but I don't feel good when I meditate. You know, like I feel bad when I meditate, I will say. Sorry, I know this is a meditation podcast. It was supposed to be.

35:41But I mean, I just judge myself too much, you know, and it's like when I get anxious, I have all this anxiety. And I think stoicism just at least makes me feel good while I'm doing it. I'm not just sweating with shame while I'm doing it. Sorry, is this not a good thing to say on this podcast? No, no, there's no such thing of bad thing to say on this show. And it's not really, I mean, we talk about meditation and Buddhism a lot, but it's really about, we've done tons on stoicism, we do sleep, and it's all aspects of life. If maybe this is a little bit cute, what I'm going to say, I do want to get back to stoicism and your take on it and what you said about Nietzsche, which I need to learn more about because I don't fully understand, but just to respond to what you said about meditation, which is very common, the experience you're describing.

36:30And the cute part is I do want to reframe it if I can for you, that maybe this will be helpful. And this is not designed to browbeat you into meditating. It's just to help change the way you and some others think about it. The point of meditation is not to feel any kind of way. The point is to be cool with whatever you're feeling. And that leads to a kind of meta equanimity where you realize that whatever comes up externally or internally, you can handle it because you've sat with it, sat with all the ugliness of your mind. and survived. One of my favorite little aphorisms, it's a coinage of Joseph Goldstein, who I know you're familiar with, my favorite meditation teacher.

37:17And he often tells people it's okay, which does not mean everything's okay. It just means it's okay to feel whatever you're feeling right now. And that creates a kind of equanimity that allows you to navigate all life's ups and downs with more skill. Does that make sense what I'm saying? No, it does. And then you bring that into everything. Then there's just kind of a general benevolence that then you will greet the day and other people with, right? Once you kind of give it to yourself, I can really see that. I have the same issue you have, which is anxiety, is I feel like when I sit to meditate, my heart races.

37:59It feels like it wouldn't be racing if I weren't meditating. So why am I putting myself in this situation? You know, maybe you have an answer for that. I do a two part answer. Two part answer. One is you can think about it like first. Well, before I give you the two part answer, I want to signal again. I know. I know. You've never you've never been the seller, the peddler. I know. Thank you. Two part answer. One is you can think of it as a kind of exposure therapy. The anxiety is a prominent and massively salient feature of your mind and my mind. And whether we meditate or not, it's going to be there.

38:37And so meditation is a way to kind of learn to work with this gnarly, inconvenient psychological feature or bug more skillfully. So there's one answer. The second answer is there are types of meditation that I think go right at anxiety. In particular, you used this word before, meta, not M-E-T-A, like the name of the company that owns Instagram, but M-E-T-T-A, which is a kind of benevolence or friendliness. and that style of meditation where you systematically envision certain people, send them good vibes, including yourself, which can be very cheesy, as you know, it was designed by the Buddha, it is said, as an antidote to fear.

39:22And it makes sense. Love is kind of the opposite of fear. And so if you can just generate that skill of warmth and passion, it pulls you out of spirals of fear and anxiety. So that's my two-part answer. okay so i love the meta practice okay it's like a drug i just feel like a runner's high after i do it so here's my question if like my practice was to sit down in the morning and listen do you have it on your app i'm imagining a meta practice okay so let's say go to your app and i do meta every morning that feels like cheating for me is meditation like i have this idea that i need to sit there and empty my thoughts.

40:03And if something goes by, watch it like a cloud or whatever. And then, but could I just every morning do a meta practice? Like if you guide me or another teacher, I'd like literally listen to a tape, but I'm not alone quietly with my thoughts. Yes. A million percent. You can do exactly what you're describing. And just to say on the clearing your mind thing, that's impossible. And that's a pernicious misconception that people carry into their meditation practice that makes it miserable because they're trying to do an impossible thing. So there's no cheating. Another Josephism is whatever works, do what works.

40:37If doing no meditation is what works for you, I want you to do no meditation. If doing some meditation of a specific variety is what works for you, then do that. Okay. God, you know, I'm actually going to do this. I'm going to do like a 10-day meta practice because I love the meta practice, like I say. So I go into it without dread. I'd be like, oh yeah, I get to sit down and like send good wishes to the stranger, which I love doing. Okay. And I'll report back.

41:10Coming up, Maria talks about the limits of stoicism, the danger of baited bounties. I'll let her explain what that is how to get shit done with non-attachment using fantasy as a coping mechanism and much more

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42:10Plus, you can take home the small stuff that day and get the big stuff shipped fast and free. Shop Wayday from April 25th through 27th at the Wayfair store at Edens Plaza in Wilmette. Wayfair, every style, every home. This kind of brings us back to your character and your story and also your personal story, because we were talking before we went down this little rabbit hole about the limits of stoicism. And I'm wondering if stoicism's reputation, and I'm not an expert in it, Stoicism's reputation as kind of clinical and reasonable is missing the warm and gooey piece that is the inevitable result, I believe, of loving kindness practice.

42:56Right. I mean, there's a lot to be said here and you can pull quotes and, you know, like I say, justice is really about friendliness and being compassionate and the difficult people that you give love to and all of that, but I don't really think that's what it's about. I think if you really wanted to defend Stoicism that you could say, oh no, it's in there. It's all in there. It is pretty cold. It is pretty purely rational. And I think it is rational to love people and to be kind to people and to embrace difficult people. But in Stoicism, it's like rooted in rationality. They say it's part of being human.

43:42So maybe that gets a little closer, you know, that that's what being a human is and we have to get along with people. And what is it? What's good for the hive is what's good for the bee or what's good for, I don't know, what bee is good for the hive or whatever it is. Like we all have to work together in a system, but no, it's not. And I'm not an expert. I mean, I spend a lot of time on it, but I certainly don't hold myself out an expert. We should get Ryan Holiday on the phone because he would have a good answer for this. But I think that the just about being purely loving, I'm not seeing that in the text of stoicism, you know, just like running around joyfully and giving love.

44:23Yeah. Just to say about Ryan Holiday, he's been on the show several times. I'll put a link to my interview in the show notes. I'll put a link to my interviews with Ryan, and I'm sure he would have a lot to say on this subject, but getting back to you and your main character, Adora, it seems like while you and Adora both continue to love and practice stoicism, there is this addition of a little bit more messiness and warmth and wild love that you're innovating on top of it. Yes, and just allowing that. And, you know, Now, I'll tell you something that I was writing, but was kind of one of the sparks for writing the book, or there's this section in the middle of the book that's going into Adora's past.

45:11And one of the things that I really love about stoicism and what I wanted to write about, and particularly as it pertained to me, is that I realized as I was studying stoicism that I'd never thought about my personal character, which was really horrifying to me that I was raised Catholic, but I feel like they didn't talk about character. They just talked about like miracles that Jesus did. And if you didn't believe it, you'd have to like say more Hail Marys. It was not a good priest I went to apparently. I didn't learn about just being in control of your character and always doing the right thing and having moral courage and separating that out from kind of status seeking and what society is telling you will make you happy.

46:02You know, all the bainted bounties as we've called them before of just success and reputation and money and all that stuff. I realized that as I started getting into stoicism that I was, I just kind of internalized all this garbage without really thinking about it. And so that's really what I wanted to write about was kind of character, that Adora kind of felt like she had bad character because she wanted kind of the wrong things. She was like I was. I conveniently made her a former TV writer in Hollywood as I was. And she was younger when she did it, as was I. She was chasing all these things that society tells you are going to make you happy.

46:47And so I think one of my real turn-ons with stoicism was just kind of separating out all of that stuff, questioning that. The Stoics go really hard at that does not make you happy. You know, that is like the path of suffering, to pursue any of that. Even if you get it, it's going to make you miserable. And so that's just something I hadn't heard. That's like really fresh and new. You know, if you're just sitting around mindlessly munching down, you know, just the messages of society, it's like, oh, wow, there's another way. And I don't have to be a toxic person carrying this stuff around with me.

47:29And so that's kind of a Dora's journey as well, you see. And that was really fun for me to write about. What was the term you used, bainted bounties? I used that, you don't remember, at dinner once a few months ago and you really liked it. So I was giving you another shot at it, Dan. That's so embarrassing. My memory is like a Swiss cheese. No, it doesn't matter. It was so minor. No, no. It's what Seneca calls things that get dangled in front of you. Stoics call them externals, anything that's outside of your control and often you desire them. The baited bounties are basically like riches or something that you think like, oh, it's bountiful, but it's like baited with treachery or with negativity.

48:12And you think you're going for something that's going to make you happy, but it's actually something that you snap at. So that I probably said this at dinner and don't remember that either, but. Right. That's okay. The Buddha talked about the terrible bait of the world. Oh, okay. That's what it is. The baited bounty. Yeah. It's all the same stuff. He also said what the world calls happiness, I call suffering and what the world calls suffering, I call happiness. And so it's all about the downside of desire. He's not anti-pleasure, but he describes it, and this is quite a simile here, as being like licking honey from the edge of a razor.

48:54Oh, okay. Ouch. Okay. So there's, yeah, we need to eat and reproduce and lots of, he's not saying we need a completely monkish, although he was a monk, life. It's that if that's where you're placing all of your hope for happiness and fulfillment, it is unlikely to provide. Right. And that's what this is. The Stoics have one of my favorite terms just because it's so clunky and it's so like such a bad translation, but I don't know how else to do it. So I think it's Seneca mainly who says that you can want money and pleasure and reputation, but that if you get it, you have to get it without attachment.

49:36You know what I'm saying? That you can, like, as long as you're not attached to it, you can have it, which was convenient for him because he was like the richest man in the empire, you know? So we had to like come up with a workaround, right? About like, I'm sitting near my robes, you know, with all of my enslaved people around me. So how do I circle that square. He puts externals, which again is anything that's not your character, into two categories. And he calls externals indifference. I-N-D-I-F-F-E-R-E-N-T-S, right? Indifference. They are like an indifference. And he says that there are preferred indifference, which is like comfort and pleasure and money.

50:16And then there's dispreferred indifference. And I just think that's a really funny term is a disprepared indifference. So when something really bad happens, I'm like, that was a disprepared indifference. That these things that happen, you still can want good things to happen to you. You know what I mean? And I think that that does allow for humanity because we are human. I want my book to do well. And I don't think that that makes me like a shallow bad person, that I want people to read my book. I want it to get out in the world. if my whole sense of tranquility doesn't hinge on that then that's okay it is to go back to the edge of the razor it's a very narrow path that i hear you describing which is you don't want to deny your humanity you're a person who has spent several years working to create this beautiful book so you want it to do well you can't help that you want it to do well and you're doing these morning rituals that help you sanely tune into the fact that if you want things that are beyond your control, that is a reliable wellspring of unhappiness.

51:27Exactly. And so during the day, if I'm writing, I want to focus, I want to just try to do the best work I can. And then at the end of the day, I'm happy. And I guess that it is like a matter of faith or not happy, but it's like I've done what I set out to do. So I don't have this whole extra thing of like being miserable from not achieving that. And then, you know, you put enough of them together and then you've got a product. I guess that's kind of the faith that you have to do, that it's not just about wanting the success of it. I want to finish a book. You know what I'm saying? Like I'm not pretending that I don't want to finish a book.

52:03I am not just like totally floating in non-attachment. I mean, I always find, I'm sure I've talked to you about this is how do you get shit done with non-attachment, right? How do you get through the day? And we both are accomplished people and we obviously value finishing books, right? And having like crazy projects that we see to fruition. And that takes a lot of self-will, right? It takes a lot of determination and desire and a lot of fueled by fantasy, you know, in my case. And that's all like danger zone, danger zone. You do need that. Now, how do you balance that? I don't know. I guess I go back to my practice, but I really believe that fantasy kind of kept me alive when I was a kid.

52:54I was a really lonely, kind of unhappy kid and unpopular, and I was fat and the bullies would beat me up and I would just really prefer my own company and I would just create these really elaborate fantasy scenarios, usually involving celebrities being in love with me. But it was, you know, these like very happy worlds that were just like highly determined. And I would just have to be at school or something, or I would be like in my fantasy world in the middle of like literally dialogue. And then it would be like, hold that thought. I have to go class and then I'd like come back and pick up right where I left off, you know?

53:36And I used to love like being alone. And I grew up in Aspen, Colorado, and I would always like to be the single on the chairlift, you know? Like I always hated it when I'd be in the chairlift line. I'd always like kind of pretend I was with somebody and just like get on the chairlift by myself because it was just so happy for me to sit on this chairlift by myself. I would kind of hope the chairlift would stop. So I could just sit there and just live very intensely in this fantasy world. And so I think that's what made me a novelist. It made me able to sustain my attention over a long time. It made me create scenarios that were extremely pleasurable to me.

54:16And I think that that was a value that I bring to my books that I write. I try to write really nice places for people to go, even though it's like filled with ideas and suffering in some ways. Like generally, I really want to offer someone this very kind of overdetermined, happy world that they can live in for a while. So I'm not going to renounce fantasy, that kind of fantasy life. I think it's good. Well, to my area where you've done this beautiful thing, I think the term for this is sublimation, I think, maybe like of taking this difficult aspect of your childhood, and then you had this survival mechanism of the fantasy, and now you've turned it into art that is a service to the world.

55:06Oh, well, thank you. Yes. I mean, that's a nice way of looking at it. Thank you. One last thing to say as we wind down here about this balance of trying to do big and meaningful and important and beautiful things in the world without being overly attached. One of the biggest sources of wisdom in my life is the CEO of our little company. Her name is Tony. We were at a meeting recently about my next book and planning a bunch of stuff. And I think she could sense that I was getting revved up and crazy. And she said, just keep in mind that But good enough is pretty amazing. And I just I was like, I want to get that tattooed on my forehead.

55:50Like good enough is pretty amazing. If this project is just fine, you know, is good enough. You know, it doesn't have to like put a dent in the universe. It's going to be pretty amazing for the people who read it, for my company, for me, for my family. And that's sanity inducing for me. very much so yeah i totally agree and that something recently that's similar that i think you can definitely relate to because i know you've been working on your book for a while and i haven't written a book for 10 years this is my first book in 10 years so i'd taken a lot of attempts abandoned novels tried this one and it didn't work out and abandoned it tried other things a friend of mine recently is having a book come out at the same time mine is at lunch said to me, what do you want from this book?

56:37We were both like really pre-pub and she's like, what do you want from this book? And I thought about it and I thought, I want to have written this book. Now it's so, I'm really, that's like, I'm so happy I wrote the book that everything else is gravy, you know? And right. I mean, don't you feel so proud, Dan, that you're going to have written this fucking book finally? Yes. I need to do a better job of occupying that space because it's very easy for me to get into the realm of not being indifferent and trying to control things that I can't control. But I don't know, I think by working hard and doing your best work, that does really set you up for being able to let go a little bit.

57:20Yes. You know, it's the only way to do it. Yes. The Buddhists call it non-attachment to results, that you can work incredibly hard on a book or your child, as both of us are parents, or anything, any project. You can work really hard on it. That's what you can control. But then you release it into an entropic universe, and you have to do your best to be non-attached. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Before I let you go, can you just remind everybody of the name of the book, and then also your past books, just for people who want to take a deeper dive? Oh, thank you. So this book is called Go Gentle, it's called.

57:57It's a novel. And the other books that I've written, the one that people would know more than the others is called Where'd You Go, Bernadette. I think that was your gateway book, Dan, into my universe. I wrote a book called Today Will Be Different and one called This One Is Mine. And so Go Gentle is my fourth book. I feel very fortunate to be able to be talking about it. So thank you. Where'd You Go Bernadette was my gateway, but I had met you before that. I met you and didn't know, I didn't know anything really. And I just liked you. And then I was at a book sale at my kid's school and saw that Where'd You Go Bernadette was available.

58:38So I bought it, read it and loved it. And then we stayed being friends. Exactly. No, that was a really awesome text that I still remember getting from you. That was like a year later, like, hey, by the way, I read that book. I was so happy. That was very nice of you. Thank you for texting me. Yeah. Well, I sent a similar text after I read Go Gentle, which in my opinion is even better. Where'd You Go, Bernadette was amazing. This is even better. So you just keep getting better. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Maria, thanks again for coming on. Thank you, Dan. This was fun.

59:19Thanks again to Maria Semple. Don't forget to check out her book, Go Gentle. Also, don't forget to check out my meditation app if you're into that kind of thing. DanHarris.com is the place to get it. There's a 14-day free trial if you want to try before you buy. And if you can't afford it, just let us know and we'll hook you up. Finally, thank you very much to everybody who worked so hard to make this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson and Eleanor Vasili. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is our managing producer. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer, DJ Kashmir is our executive producer, and Nick Thorburn of the band Islands wrote our theme.

1:00:18that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states.