BONUS: You Know, You Can Do Something

0:05Welcome 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.

1:09but 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. My 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.

1:48On 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. Becky. 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 % off with code STOIC15. You just got to head over to goodinside.com to catch the events. You know, you can do something. It's funny how much Cicero wished someone would do something to curb the lust for power of Caesar and Mark Antony and Octavian.

2:33How Seneca wished that Nero would grow up, how he wished someone would stand in his way, restore him to sanity. They said this privately. Sometimes they even said it publicly or at least alluded in as coded a way as possible to keep their heads. They alluded to their disagreements with these powerful men. There is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do, George Washington said in 1776. to see a plan adopted for the abolition of slavery. And it's a relief to see one of the founders say such a thing. But it also makes you wonder, was there a man living a better position to see about that plan than George Washington?

3:12Who was he waiting for in the nation that he started and led to do something about it exactly? And this is sort of a strange thing that we do. We lament the state of the world. We say we hope someone will do something, anything about a problem. But why does it not occur to us that we could be that person? There is a passage at the beginning of Meditations where Marcus Reus talks about a stoic dream for Rome, a Rome where individual rights are respected, where there is an equality of status and freedom of expression. Again, it's a noble idea. And who better to put it into play than the emperor of Rome?

3:50Yet, like Seneca, who was Nero's closest advisor, like Cicero, like George Washington, Marcus apparently had his reasons why this could not be more than an idea. Just like we have future plans, pipe dreams for how we'd like to run our business, intentions for what we hope to contribute, reasons why we're not able to do that right now, reasons why we are not qualified, reasons why we need others to do something first. This is nonsense. You should do it, and you should do it right now. Of course, this is the idea in Courageous Calling, but also in Right Thing Right Now, which, as it happens, is$2.99 on Amazon right now.

4:31So maybe you were even like, oh, yeah, I want to read that book someday. Well, it will never be cheaper than this. And why don't you grab it? I think it was at like$70 or$80 on Amazon right now, one of the highest ranks it's ever had. So that's pretty cool. People are reading it. And hopefully with this Naval Academy thing, there's a little bit of an urgency to it. certainly I thought about it. It's like, hey, I'm going to draw a line. Am I going to do it later? Am I going to do it now? That's the idea. You've got a bright thing right now. Good character, good values, good deeds for$2.99 on Amazon.

4:59And we do have signed hardcovers at the Painted Porch and the Daily Stokes store. I'll link to that in today's show notes also.

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