Are Your Excuses Any Better? | Made For Working Together

0:00I'm recording this on a Monday, and Monday is our grocery store day in our family. I usually pick my kids up from school and we go over to Whole Foods, get all our groceries for the week. Although here very shortly, we're going to go over there to get our Thanksgiving turkey because they've got a bunch of great options. Turkeys start at$1.49 a pound if you have Prime with organic birds at$2.99 a pound. And they only carry no antibiotic ever turkeys that will bring quality to your table at a great price. Whole Foods has great everyday prices on all your Thanksgiving essentials, whether you celebrate with a massive family or just a few close friends.

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1:21Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we bring you a Stoic-inspired meditation designed to help you find strength and insight and wisdom into everyday life. Each one of these episodes is based on the 2 ,000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and women to help you learn from them, to follow in their example, and to start your day off with a little dose of courage and discipline and justice and wisdom. For more, visit dailystoic.com.

2:25houses to various offices to represent us, to fight for us, to solve problems, to protect us, to protect our rights. And they don't do this because of a million reasons, because there's too much money in politics, because the news media incentivizes the opposite, because term limits, because who wants to risk their salary? We condemn this because it's frustrating. It's also convenient. Are your excuses any better than your senators? The killers sang on Run for Cover. The point is, when was the last time you were courageous? Aren't you a hypocrite? Are you really doing your job? Which Marcus Aurelius reminds us is to be good, no matter what anyone else says or does.

3:11So yeah, let's call out the cowards and the corrupt, but let's also hold up a mirror. Let's make sure we're not just shouting at the world to change while quietly avoiding the work of changing ourselves. Because if we want better leaders, a better system, a better world, well, it starts with us.

3:38Thanks to Toyota Trucks for sponsoring this episode. When I bought my ranch in 2015 out here in Bastro County, I drove my car about halfway down the dirt road that we live on, thought, this isn't going to work, stopped, parked it, walked the rest of the way home, borrowed my wife's car, drove into Austin, and bought a truck. What I bought was a Toyota Tacoma. And this truck wasn't just transportation getting me to and from my house. It unlocked a whole different style of living for us, not just on the ranch, but in our little Texas towns. There were places I could go now that I couldn't go before, especially out here in the piney forests, through the fields and on the unpaved roads like the one that I lived in.

4:23We got to go deep into the hill country's wild beauty. We've driven all the way out to East Texas. We've driven it across the country. And by we, I mean not just my wife, but both my kids who I drove home from the hospital in that truck. Toyota trucks are built for those who understand that the best adventures happen when you're willing to veer off course because you never know when you'll end up on a Toyota adventure detour. And of course, this is stoicism, too, because every detour, every obstacle is an opportunity. But it's helpful if you can handle the difficulty inherent in that. If you've got the resilience and the right companion to make it wherever the road takes you, discover your uncharted territory.

5:05Learn more at toyota.com slash trucks slash adventure dash detours. We just took our kids to an outdoor performance at the Nutcracker. They had a snow cone and then they went insane in the car ride home. And one of the things I try to remind myself when that's happening is that I don't control my kids' behavior, especially when they're too far gone like that, but I do control how I respond, right? That's stoicism, but it's also what Dr. Becky talks about. Dr. Becky is a clinical psychologist and a best-selling author, and she founded Good Inside, which is there to give parents practical, actionable tools for handling those everyday challenges with confidence.

5:46My wife introduced me to Dr. Becky's books. I love them. I've recommended them a million times. I've had her on the podcast. And as it happens, Dr. Becky is hosting two live Q &A events for Good Inside members. I am one of them. She signed me up for it about a year and a half ago. I've loved it ever since. On December 1st, you can join Dr. Becky for her How Not to Raise Assholes event, which is about avoiding entitlement and raising kind, empathetic kids. And on December 15th, she's hosting her How Not to Lose It over the holidays event, which I'm sure we could all use. As I said, I'm a big fan of Dr.

6:23Becky. She's been a great influence for me as a parent and just as a human being. And Daily Stoic listeners can join for 15 percent off with code STOIC15. You just got to head over to goodinside.com to catch the events.

6:42Made for working together. This is today's entry, July 21st in the Daily Stoic. And the quote comes to us from Marcus Aurelius' Meditations 812. Whenever you have trouble getting up in the morning, remind yourself that you have been made by nature for the purpose of working with others, whereas even unthinking animals share sleeping, and it's our own natural purpose that is more fitting and satisfying. If a dog spends all day in bed, your bed most likely, that's fine. It's just being a dog. It doesn't have anywhere to be, no other obligations other than being itself. But according to the Stoics, we have a higher obligation as humans, not to the gods, but to each other.

7:23What gets us out of bed each morning, even if we fight it like Marcus sometimes did, is to render works held in common. Civilization and country are great projects we build together and have been building together with our ancestors for millennia. We are made for cooperation with each other. So if you need an extra boost to get out of bed this morning, if you need something more than caffeine can offer, use this. People are depending on you. Your purpose is to help us render this great work together. And we're waiting and we're excited for you to show up. Let's look at the Hayes translation of that real quick.

8:01Hayes says, as part of 812, let's see here. Hayes says, so when you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning, remember that what defines a human being is to work with others. Even animals know how to sleep. And it's the characteristic activity that's the more natural one, more innate, and more satisfying. Let's look at the great Robin Waterfield translation in his annotated edition, which I highly recommend and enjoy quite a bit. We pull up 812. He says, whenever you find it difficult to wake up, remind yourself that doing socially useful work is proper to your constitution and your humanity, while sleeping is something you share with irrational animals as well.

8:43and anything that's proper to an individual's nature has a greater affinity to him and is second nature to him and moreover is more refreshing. I love that. I think the idea socially useful work, right? So when the Stoics talk about politics, I don't think they always mean running for office. And when they talk about the common good, I don't think they necessarily always mean charity. They mean socially useful work. Are you contributing to society? Are you making the world a better place? There's a sign over on this track that I like to run on that was put up by Hollywood Henderson. I think I've said this story before, but he put up a sign that says, leave this place better than you found it.

9:26And I think that's a great rule for life. It's interesting though, to me, Marcus talks a lot about struggling to get out of bed in the morning. It's clearly a common theme. And then he also talks a lot about working with difficult people. So maybe the difficult people are like, oh, I got to go do this again. You know, he was an introvert. He preferred philosophy, preferred ideas to people necessarily. But he knew that it was inescapable, that as a human being, as a philosopher, as a leader, as a politician, his job was to work with these difficult people, to find a way to contribute, to find a way to make them better, to find a way to put them to productive or socially useful ends.

10:05And that's what we have to remember today. Obviously, you're up or you wouldn't be listening to this, but how are you going to provide socially useful work today? How are you going to make do with difficult people? How are you going to put up with them? As Marcus really says, we talked about this a couple of weeks ago, that even the famous obstacles away passage is about that, is about dealing with the people who obstruct us and annoy us and frustrate us, and finding a way to make a positive contribution to the world in spite of, with, through, because of them, for them. That's what we're here for.

10:43That's the work that we're here for. That's our purpose. Animals can sleep around. You know, maybe some people aren't going to seize that potential, but that's their call. We're not going to reject the opportunity. We're going to take advantage of it. We're going to make a positive contribution, a socially useful contribution, big or small. You don't have to be Winston Churchill or Gandhi to make the world a little better, to leave this place a little better than you found it. Be nice to someone. Write something. Help someone. Teach your kids something. Pick up trash that you see by the side of the road.

11:20Vote, right? Contribute to a cause. Donate time. Whatever it is. do some socially useful work today, make a positive contribution, and realize that this is what you got out of bed for. This is what you were put here for. This is the work of a human being, the Stoics would say. So go to it, seize it, love it, appreciate it, fucking crush it, man. That's my message for today. I wish you all the best. Talk soon.

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