Let This Wash Over You | with Build Up, Don't Tear Down

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0:55I'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.

1:32Everything they sell has high standards to help you shop with confidence. Enjoy so many ways to save on your Thanksgiving spread at Whole Foods Market. Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast. Each day we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics, illustrated with stories from history, current events, and literature to help you be better at what you do. And at the beginning of the week, we try to do a deeper dive, setting a kind of stoic intention for the week, something to meditate on, something to think on, something to leave you with, to journal about, whatever it is you happen to be doing.

2:08So let's get into it.

2:22Let this wash over you. As filthy and corrupt as Rome was, we can imagine Marcus Aurelius catching its glint and smiling. As horrific and ugly as Epictetus' life was, we can imagine him finding some solace and beauty in it. As busy and frustrating and exhausting as Seneca's life was, we know he must have enjoyed it on his wandering walks. Golden hour, magic hour, that picture-esque period when the sun's rays hit the earth at an angle and bathe everything and everyone in a soft glow. We know Marcus Aurelius tried to get up for it at dawn, even when he was tired. We know that Seneca said that the world was a temple of the gods.

3:09Could he have perhaps been talking about some particularly wonderful sunset? It would make sense. Look, it doesn't matter what's happening in your life. It doesn't matter what's happening in the world. Golden hour is there. It's there more than once a day, weather permitting. It doesn't fail us, we fail it, because we spend that time indoors. We spend it brooding or preoccupied. Marcus Aurelius said that what doesn't transmit light creates its own darkness. Whoever misses golden hour misses the opportunity to see the world, even just for a moment in its best light, misses what beauty is available to us each and every day.

3:49And not seeing that would lead to a very dark life. Indeed. Caught it here on my farm in Texas. We were jumping in the pool. It's starting to get cold, but we got in there as the sun was setting. I saw it on my bike ride yesterday with my son as the sun was coming up. It's my absolute favorite thing to do. And that's why I wrote today's email.

4:19Build up, don't tear down. And this is from this week's entry in the Daily Stoic Journal, 366 Days of Writing and Reflection on the Art of Living by me, Ryan Holiday, anywhere books are sold, including The Painted Porch, my bookstore at thepaintedporch.com. Is there a worse environment to work in than one where bullying and one-upsmanship are the norm? Sometimes leaders seem to think that this is part of the job description, that they're there to regulate and keep people in line. In truth, tearing people down is incredibly counterproductive. Pete Carroll, coach of the Seattle Seahawks, poses a question.

4:55If self-confidence is so important for players, why would a coach ever risk anything to damage it? Marcus Aurelius, who had the power to take anyone down at will, even kill them, almost never actually did. Instead, he reminded himself that it was better to build up, to be community-minded, modest, prepared, and tolerant of others. We are made for cooperation, the Stoics said, and to render works held in common. Let's think about that going forward. How can we help build self-confidence of others? How can we find some of our own in doing so? We have two quotes from Marcus today. He says, so someone's good at taking down an opponent.

5:32That doesn't make them more community-minded or modest or well-prepared for any circumstances or more tolerant for the faults of others. That's Meditations 7.5.2. And then for Meditations 8.12, he says, whenever you have trouble getting up in the morning, remind yourself that you are made by nature for the purpose of working with others, and that our own natural purpose that is more fitting and more satisfying. When we interviewed Major General Dan Cain in the Leadership Challenge, he was saying that almost never in his career has he ever said, I'm ordering you to do this. I think we have this fantasy that once we really get power, we become head coach, we become a general, then we won't have to ask.

6:17We won't have to persuade. We can just demand. But that's not how it works. Eisenhower famously said, the art of leadership is getting people to do things because they want to do them. Right? Randall Stutman, who I talked about last week in the Leadership Challenge, which I urge you all to check out, talks about how the job of a leader is to make people better. It's not to keep them in line. It's not to break them down. It's not to mold them into who you want them to be. It's to make them the best version of themselves. This is why the stoic virtues of patience and kindness and understanding and empathy are so important.

6:48It's not about brute force. A stoic district, yes, strict with yourself, but we try to be tolerant and kind to others. And I struggle with this. I really struggle. I think a lot of smart, talented people, again, it was a little egotistical to describe myself that way, but you get my point. A lot of people who are good at what they do find it very hard to be patient or tolerant of people who are not good at what they do, especially when those people are getting in the way of what you're trying to do. And I struggle with that. The moments I've lost my temper, moments I regret as a leader, as a boss, almost invariably come from that sense of frustration.

7:23Why? Why? I told you how I wanted this done. I went over it like 15 times. And I have to catch myself and calm myself. And remember, this isn't making anyone better. And it's making me worse. I look like an asshole because I'm being an asshole. And that's not a good way to be. So we have to learn how to keep ourselves in check, how to be strict with what we control, tolerant and understanding and patient with other people and with their actions, because that's not in our control. And this is one of the things that ancient historians credit Marcus Aurelius with, that he was very tolerant of the flaws with others, that he found a way to work with them, that he found a way to get things out of them, that he found a way to put them to good use.

8:04And I think there's not a better endorsement of a leader than that, our ability to not expect perfection of other people. This was something Rick Fox famously said about Kobe Bryant, that Kobe Bryant struggled to realize that not everyone was Kobe Bryant. And in the ancient world, there was an expression, we can't all be Cato's. But no one had to understand this more than Cato, that not everyone was like him. Not everyone was as good as him. Not everyone naturally understood or was committed to these things the way that he was. And so you have to understand that your job is still ideally to get people closer to that ideal to make them better.

8:41But you're not going to do it through force. You're not going to do it through bullying. You're definitely not going to do it through humiliation. You're definitely not going to do it through yelling. And in fact, when you are yelling, you have almost always screwed up as a boss. Is there tactically, sometimes it needs to be done to send a message? Sure, maybe, but this is almost always a rationalization of an impulse that's gotten out of control or struggle we're having. So today and this week, I want you to think about the idea of being calm, being collected, being kind, being a builder, not a destroyer, being an asker, not an orderer, a demander, right?

9:18Convince, persuade, inspire. Don't demand. Don't bully. Don't force. you will get more this way i promise and we have a whole bunch of other thoughts on this in the leadership challenge you can listen to all of the interviews i did with these awesome leadership experts plus nine weeks of content check that out at dailystoic.com leadership challenge and i hope you journal on this in the in the daily stoic journal if you're doing it and uh just a thought to think about build people up make them better you don't need sheer force you don't need anger don't need to order them persuade make them do it because they want to do it.

9:53Make them do it because they've seen the results when you've done it. That's the Stoic way.

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