MBA2389 Must Read: On the Shortness of Life by Seneca

0:08Heyo! Welcome to the$100 MBA show, powerful business lessons you can count on. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher, Omar Zinhome. I'm also the co-founder of Webinar Ninja, an independent software company I started back in 2014. And today's episode is a must-read episode. On our must-read episodes, I share with you a book that has influenced me, has impacted me as an entrepreneur. I share with you its takeaways, its insights, and why you should read it too. Today's must-read is On the Shortness of Life by Seneca. Seneca, full name Lucius Aeneas Seneca, was a prominent Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and playwright.

0:46He was born in 4 BC or BCE and died in 65 AD or CE. And yet, we read his work today. It's that timeless. Now, what does a book titled On the Shortness of Life have to do with you and your business? Well, for most entrepreneurs, our business takes a big part of our life. We spend most of our wakeful hours trying to make it a success. And this book explores the idea that life is long if you know how to use it. He argues that most people waste their time in trivial pursuits, emphasizing the importance of living in the present moment and cultivating wisdom. Well, what's that all about? Well, that's what I'll be talking about in today's episode.

1:27I'm going to break it down and make sure you know how to apply it to your own life, your own business, and your own time. This work is profound, and it lasted the test of time for a reason. Let's get into it. Let's get down to business. On the Shortest of Life is a book that delves into the concept of time and how we as individuals often squander our time, our most valuable asset, on unimportant matters. In the book, Seneca underscores the significance of living with purpose, focusing on self-improvement, getting better every day, and making the most of each moment. This book, in my opinion, offers some really good insights on how to live a more meaningful life, a more fulfilling life by prioritizing what truly matters.

2:09Listen, there's a lot of noise out there in our world, in our business world, in our life, online, social media. There's so much going on. There's so much distraction. It's so hard to focus. It's so hard to not get anxiety, not feel unsettled. This book re-centers you. Best of all, it's a short read. It's a small book, 106 pages. You can read it in a couple of sittings. I want to begin by talking about one of the biggest ideas in this book. And it's the idea that time for everybody is different. Seneca argues that life is not actually short, but people often waste their time on trivial matters.

2:45Meaning that if you spend your life doing meaningful things, useful things, enriching things, life will feel long. I know this from experience because if you've ever had a year where you've done so much, you've accomplished so much, you've done a lot, you traveled, you worked, you spoke on stages, you cut deals, you've grown your business, you got in shape, you did a whole bunch of stuff that really leveled up your life in one year, that year feels like 10 years. Let me give you another example. Have you ever been on a holiday where you did so many activities? One time, Nicole and I went to Costa Rica, and it was one of those vacations where we decided we're going to go all in on all the activities.

3:25Do the nature walks, go jet skiing, ziplining. I mean, we did two or three activities a day. That week, maybe it wasn't even a week, it was like five days, felt like a month because we did so much. So time is really relative to what you actually do with your time. Now, what do you do with your time? Well, he gets into that in the book as well. The second takeaway I want to share with you is in the book, he emphasizes the importance of living in the present and making the most of each moment. I'm talking about every moment. Even if you're waiting for a bus, waiting for a plane, take a moment to appreciate the fact that you have the privilege to travel.

4:05You have the privilege to be waiting for this plane where you're in the position right now where you can do things like this. Even me right now recording this podcast is good to have a moment in my mind that says, hey, this is actually pretty great. I get to share what I've learned along the way in the last 20 years of business. I have a project that allows me to be creative and I could do something useful with what I've experienced in my life. I get to be useful to others by sharing this knowledge. By prescribing meaning and really taking a moment to be grateful, it allows you to enjoy your life more.

4:40I forgot where I've heard this, but I heard the thief of joy is always looking into the future and into the past, but never the present. Meaning a lot of us were always thinking about what's the next thing? What are we going to do tomorrow? What are we going to do next week, next month? What about our holiday we have planned in six months? And we're not really enjoying right now. Life is now. And if you enjoy every moment and you appreciate it, it has more meaning. It has more of an experience for you. And therefore, life feels longer. Now, in the book, Seneca also criticizes the pursuit of wealth and fame and sees them as empty endeavors.

5:14Listen, we all have to earn money. We have to eat. We have to feed our families. We need to put a roof over our head. We want to have a comfortable lifestyle so that we can be creative and we can create great work. No question about it. But this is the reality about making money. When you are going after something and you're trying to make money just to make money, just for wealth's sake, it's very hard to create the kind of work that gets you that money. Isn't that funny? The focus can't be just making money. The focus has to be creating something of value. And when you do that, the money does come.

5:47Same thing with fame. Think about the people that you admire that might be wealthy or famous. whether they're entrepreneurs, whether they're rock stars or musicians, whether they're actors, performers, athletes. The reason why they're wealthy and famous is because they worked on their craft. It's because what they produce is remarkable. They didn't go after the money and therefore become good at their craft. They got good at what they do and what they produce and therefore the money followed. Another huge takeaway from the book and one of my favorites is the idea of focusing on self-improvement and personal development.

6:22This will enrich your life. I'm a big believer that if you're learning and growing, life has a whole new meaning. If you're always improving, if you're looking back at yourself and saying, man, I totally reinvented myself. I'm a totally different person than I was 10 years ago. That's a good feeling. That means that you are upgrading yourself constantly. This keeps things exciting. This keeps things amazing in your life. and you should never stop learning. You should be a lifelong learner and don't be afraid to be a beginner at something again. For example, for the longest time, I want to learn how to play the piano.

6:53I'm an absolute beginner. I'm learning how to play the piano slowly. I'm rubbish, right? But I have to accept the fact that I have to be bad at the beginning if I want to get good at some point. I have to start somewhere and it's okay to be a beginner at something. I was a beginner at everything I'm good at right now at some point, Whether it's basketball or snowboarding or business, right? I was an absolute rookie. I made all the mistakes. I fell on my face figuratively and physically when it came to snowboarding. But that's actually what makes life worth living is achievement is personal achievement is saying to yourself, I can become better.

7:30I can change. And through that change, you have experiences. You go on a journey, an adventure. It's fun. Getting out of your comfort zone and growing is one of the best things you could do to make your life be full and long and, of course, enjoyable. The next takeaway I want to share with you is really profound, and it had me thinking for literally hours after I read it. And it's the idea that a life well spent is one filled with virtue, wisdom, and meaningful experiences. This means how you spend your time is critical. Who do you spend your time with? The parties you go to? How do you spend your weekend?

8:08How you spend your evenings, your free time, your travels, your leisure, all that matters. Are these meaningful experiences or are they just a good time, a way to spend the day? Are you excited? Are you looking forward to these experiences or are they just things you do? Listen, part of growing and changing is also changing the people that are around you, changing the things you do, changing the way you spend your time. Because at the end of the day and at the end of our life, we only have a limited time. I'm 43. That means I have roughly, and who knows when I'll die, but I have roughly 2 ,000 weekends left.

8:42This next weekend, how I spend it matters because it's a limited time. Am I consciously trying to create meaningful experiences? Am I consciously thinking about what's the best way to spend this weekend that will create meaningful memories? Things that I'll never forget, that I can relive into my mind. Or is it just going through the motions? I know that we live busy lives. I know that we have a lot of responsibilities and we have a lot of things to do. and we got to do the shopping, got to do the cleaning, we got to take care of our families. But how can you incorporate meaningful experiences throughout those duties?

9:13If I'm going grocery shopping, why not pop in a great book in my ears and get some new ideas and have a new experience as I'm going through the aisles? If I'm folding laundry, why don't I do it in front of a documentary that's going to allow me to learn a little bit more about the country I'm about to visit so that I have a more of an enriching experience when I get there? Let's infuse meaning in every experience. In this book, he also touches on a big problem a lot of people experience. They procrastinate and delay their pursuit of a purposeful life. They know they want to do something big. They know they want to do something meaningful, but they just kind of put it off.

9:47And in this situation, time is not on your side. You need to take action. If you want to do something in life, just start doing it. And if you don't start doing it, maybe you need to question how much do you really want to do this. Maybe you actually don't care about this because obviously you're not taking any action. Maybe it's not that important to you. Maybe it's just an idea in your head and you're kind of living a dream in your mind. But if it is important to you and you do want to see it become a reality, then take any step forward, even the smallest step, a micro step. You want to start a business?

10:14Buy the domain name this weekend. Start crafting your minimal viable product. Spin up a new website. Do something to move forward. Overall, Seneca's work in this book on the shortness of life is timeless. It's wisdom you can't live without. It's actually really, really amazing that the things he's recommending to us applied in his time well over 2 ,000 years ago and in our time today. In our modern world with all our distractions and all our gadgets and all our innovations and all our smarts, we still haven't figured out the basics. I highly, highly recommend you pick up this small but significantly important book on the shortness of life by Seneca.

10:53Thank you so much for listening to The$100 MBA Show. If you love what you hear, make sure you hit subscribe or follow. It's the best way to support the show. By following the show, you get our next episodes automatically, but also you tell the algorithm, hey, this show's pretty good. And you can do this on whatever podcast player you like to use, whether it's Spotify or Apple Podcasts, Overcast, it doesn't really matter. Just hit follow right now. Thank you in advance for doing that. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. I picked up this book in a random pop-up bookshop that was displayed at a conference South by Southwest.

11:22It's a paperback book published by Penguin Books. You can get this on Kindle. I'm sure there's an audio version as well. But this is one of those books that I probably would not pick up just randomly on Amazon digitally. Because it was in front of me and it was in physical form, I was reminded of the Stoics and their great work. And I was like, OK, I'm going to pick up this book. I've heard some great things about it. Let's check it out. If you have a free hour or two this weekend at the end of your day at any time, just pop into a bookstore and just take a browse. is give yourself a little bit of a budget.

11:5430, 40 bucks. Pick up a couple books. Maybe pick up something that you normally don't read. For example, for me, I don't normally read fiction. Novels. Maybe the next time I pop into a book, I pick up something different and I pick up a novel. Yeah, maybe it won't directly impact my business, but not everything has to improve my business. I can improve myself. I can have a new experience, get a new perspective. Throw yourself a curveball sometimes. It keeps you on your toes and allows you to be well-rounded and well-read. Thanks so much for listening and I'll check you in Wednesday's episode. I'll see you then.

12:26Take care.