Let’s Talk About Amor Fati (Thanks, White Lotus)

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1:09You're not watching it exactly when it happens. You just kind of you sense the vibes. You sense what people react to. So I know there's a very disturbing scene coming up that I haven't seen. And then somebody messaged me last night and said, I don't know if you've seen the finale of White Lotus yet, but it's called Amor Fati. And Chelsea explains what Amor Fati means to her boyfriend in the thing. I can't give you any spoilers because I haven't watched it yet. But I can tell you quite a bit about Amor Fati because I wrote about Amor Fati in The Obstacle is the Way. I thought I would run that chapter again for you right now.

1:50I just updated this for the 10th anniversary edition of The Obstacle is the Way. It's one of my favorite chapters in the book. I actually found this chapter about Jack Johnson when I was researching for Robert Greene's The 50th Law. Robert's the one who introduced me to Amor Fati. And we actually made this Amor Fati medallion together. It was one of the first products we ever did for Daily Stoic. So I will link to that. You can check it out, though, at just store.dailystoic.com. And then I will watch the new episode of White Lotus and report back once I finish up the show. It would be funny to find out that some of them have been listening to The Daily Stoic or reading one of the books.

2:31Enjoy. 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.

3:07My 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 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.

3:44Becky. 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.

4:08Love everything that happens. Amor fati. My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati, that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity, not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it, but love it. Nietzsche. At age 67, Thomas Edison returned home early one evening from another day at the laboratory. Shortly after dinner, a man came rushing into his house with urgent news. A fire had broken out at Edison's research and production campus a few miles away. Fire engines from eight nearby towns rushed to the scene, but they could not contain the blaze.

4:54Fueled by the strange chemicals in the various buildings, green and yellow flames shot up six and seven stories, threatening to destroy the entire empire that Edison had spent his life building. Edison calmly but quickly made his way to the fire through the now hundreds of onlookers and devastated employees looking for his son. Go get your mother and all her friends, he told his son with what almost seemed like excitement. They'll never see a fire like this again. What? Don't worry, Edison calmed him. It's all right. We've just got rid of a lot of old rubbish. That's a pretty amazing reaction, but when you think about it, there really was no other response.

5:36What should Edison have done? Wept, gotten angry, quit, and gone home? What exactly would that have accomplished? You know the answer now. It's nothing. So he didn't waste time indulging himself. To do great things, we must be able to endure tragedy and setbacks. We've got to love what we do and all that it entails, good and bad. We have to learn to find joy in every single thing that happens. Of course, there was a lot more than a little rubbish in Edison's buildings. Years and years of priceless records, prototypes, and research were turned to ash. The buildings, which had been made of what was supposedly fireproof concrete, had been insured for only a fraction of their worth.

6:17Thinking they were immune to such disasters, Edison and his investors were covered for about a third of the damage. As he looked at the flames, he was reminded of Kipling's line to treat triumph and disaster the same. He had known incredible success. Now he was once again meeting with failure and loss and heartbreak. But he chose to be invigorated by it. As he told a reporter the next day, he wasn't too old to make a fresh start. I've been through a lot of things like this, he said. It prevents a man from being afflicted with ennui. Within about three weeks, the factory was partially back up and running.

6:55Within a month, its men were working two shifts a day, churning out new products the world had never seen. Despite a loss of almost$1 million, more than$31 million in today's money, Edison would marshal enough energy to make nearly$10 million in revenue that year. That's 300 plus million today. He suffered a spectacular disaster, but he turned it into a spectacular final act. The next step after we discard our expectations and accept what happens to us, after understanding that certain things, particularly bad things, are outside of our control, is this, loving what happens to us and facing it with unfailing cheerfulness.

7:37It is the act of turning what we must do into what we get to do. We put our energies and emotions and exertions where they will have real impact. This is that place. We will tell ourselves, this is what I've got to do or put up with? Well, I might as well be happy about it. Here's an image to consider. The great boxer Jack Johnson and his famous 15-round brawl with Jim Jeffries. Jeffries, the great white hope, called out of retirement like some deranged Cincinnatus to defeat the ascendant Black champion. And Johnson, genuinely hated by his opponent in the crowd, still enjoying every minute of it, smiling, joking, playing the whole fight.

8:21Why not? There's no value in any other reaction. Should he hate them for hating him? Bitterness was their burden and Johnson refused to pick it up. Not that he simply took the advice. Instead, Johnson designed his fight plan around it. At every nasty remark from Jeffrey's corner, he'd give his opponent another lacing. At every low trick or rush from Jeffries, Johnson would quip and beat it back, but never lose his cool. And when one well-placed blow opened a cut on Johnson's lip, he kept smiling, a gory, bloody, but nevertheless cheerful smile. Every round, he got happier, friendlier, as his opponent grew enraged and tired, eventually losing the will to fight.

9:05In your worst moments, picture Johnson, always calm, always in control, genuinely loving the opportunity to prove himself, to perform for people, whether they wanted him to succeed or not. Each remark bringing the response it deserved and no more, letting the opponent dig his own grave till the fight ended with Jeffries on the floor and every doubt about Johnson silenced. As Jack London, the famous novelist reported from ringside seats, no one understands him, this man who smiles. Well, the story of the fight is the story of a smile. If ever a man won by nothing more fatiguing than a smile, Johnson won today.

9:43You can't beat a man who doesn't stop smiling, who takes the worst you can throw at him and eats it up. We can strive to be like that, not just gritting our teeth and bearing it, but showing our teeth in a big old grin. Nothing is more frustrating to the people or impediments attempting to frustrate us. As the Stoics commanded themselves cheerful in all situations, especially the bad ones. Who knows where Edison and Johnson learned this, but clearly they did. Learning not to kick and scream about matters we can't control is one thing. Indifference and acceptance are certainly better than disappointment or rage.

10:21Very few understand or practice that art. But it is only the first step. Better than all of that is love for all that happens to us, for every situation. The goal is not I'm okay with this, not I think I feel good about this, but I feel great about it because if it happened, then it was meant to happen. And I am glad that it did when it did. I am meant to make the best of it and then proceed to do exactly that. We don't get to choose what happens to us, but we can always choose how we feel about it. And why on earth would you choose to feel anything but good? We can choose to render a good account of ourselves if the event must occur.

10:58amor fati, a love of fate, is the response. Don't waste a second looking back at your expectations. Face forward and face it with a smug little grin. It's important to look at Johnson and Edison because they weren't passive. They didn't simply roll over and tolerate adversity. They accepted what happened to them. They liked it. It's a little unnatural, sure, to feel gratitude for things we never wanted to happen in the first place. But we know at this point the opportunities and benefits that lie within adversities. We know that in overcoming them, we emerge stronger, sharper, empowered. There's little reason to delay those feelings, to begrudgingly acknowledge later that it was for the best when we could have felt that in advance because it was inevitable.

11:43You love it because it's all fuel and you don't just want fuel. You need it. You can't go anywhere without it. No one or no thing can. So you're grateful for it. That is not to say that the good will always outweigh the bad or that it comes free and without cost. But there is always some good, even if only perceptible at first, contained within the bad. And we can find it and be cheerful because of it.

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