Real People. Real Tests. Real Stoicism.

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1:16Ryan Holiday: We've been using Shopify since the very beginning with Daily Stoic. We sold a print, I think, first, and then shortly thereafter, we came out with the Memento Mori coin. And we've used Shopify because we love it. We even expanded it out to the bookstore when we opened the bookstore. I guess this would have been in 2020, 2021. So we've been using Shopify forever because Shopify is the best and the biggest commerce platform there is. It's behind millions of businesses all around the world. 10 % of all e-commerce in the U.S. is with Shopify. it helps you tackle inventory payments analytics and more you don't have to have multiple websites you don't have to figure out who hosts or you know all this stuff shopify is everything all in one place making your life easier and your business operate smoother they've also got great customer service start your business today with the industry's best business partner shopify and start hearing with shopify today sign up for your one dollar a month trial at shopify.com slash stoic.

2:18Ryan Holiday: Go to shopify.com slash stoic. Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world.

2:37Ryan Holiday: Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast. You know, Daily Stoic is a beast. It is a content machine. There is an insatiable amount that I have to record and write and produce, whether we're talking about the David Stoke email or the YouTube channel or this podcast. It's a lot of me talking. And when people go, I listen to the podcast every day, or I listen to your audio books, or I watch the videos when they come out, I go, it sounds like a lot of me talking. It's also a little exhausting to hear me talk that much. So we're gonna flip it a little bit in today's episode, and I'm gonna share your stories.

3:12Ryan Holiday: I'm gonna share what stoicism has meant to some of our listeners, what they've learned from it, what they've taken from it, how they apply it. And hopefully they can spur something in you. And then maybe you want to share your story with us as well. You can send an audio of what stoicism has meant to you, how you came to it, what resonates with you, what you're struggling with, how you apply it, all that. You can send that audio recording to podcast at dailystoic.com. Higher audio quality is better. If you've got an external mic, that's best. Claire can work A Lot of Magic. She's our producer, but she can't work.

3:45Ryan Holiday: Unlimited magic. And you'll hear in today's episode some audio differences, but I think these are pretty good. And most of all, the stories are what's powerful. And here's our first. Here's Marty. Hi, my name is Marty. My journey into Stoicism began in the summer of 2021. As I read the Daily Stoic, the lessons captivated me. I was astonished how this ancient wisdom could be delivered in such a readable, understandable way. And I questioned why I never came across this before. What initially resonated with me was a passage from Marcus Aurelius that I first read in the Daily Stoic and then reread in meditations.

4:25In the passage, Marcus advises that we do not procrastinate, do not confuse others in conversation, do not allow our thoughts to wander, do not be passive or aggressive, and do not be all business. I thought to myself, if I can follow these rules, it'll be difficult to steer myself in the wrong direction. When the pandemic hit in 2020, I played back and forth with getting sober. I would go weeks or even months at a time without drinking. But then I'd give up and find myself amid another weekend bender. In July of 2021, around the time I began studying Stoic philosophy, I hit my form of rock bottom.

5:11After that, I finally quit drinking. While I can't say for certain that it was Stoicism that got me sober, I can say that Stoicism has helped me stay sober. I started to realize that coping with stress and enjoying life will not come from external pleasures and vices, but from my internal values and living through virtue. I came to Stoicism with the idea that it would help me improve from a performance aspect. As an educator and basketball referee, my goal with Stoicism was to learn how to control my emotions and be self-disciplined while maintaining poise and self-confidence. Stoicism involves so much more.

5:56The afterword in Right Thing Right Now is one of the most powerful chapters I've ever read. Ryan writes,

6:32and the process of acquiring wisdom. But I'm starting to understand the justice side. Doing what's right for those closest to you and for the greater good. Keeping your word to yourself and others, remaining honest and loyal, and showing true empathy. This doesn't mean attempting to save the world, but instead doing your small part each day without excuses. Stoicism has become my guidebook for life, something I did not have before. Trying my best to focus on what I can control and to live through courage, self-discipline, justice, and wisdom has helped me control my emotions and be more intentional in my career and relationships.

7:17I read books, I write a newsletter, and I cherish the simpler parts of life. I am more open-minded and eager to learn, and I am more aware of what's truly important because I realize that our time is finite. I have an entirely different view on how to embrace challenges and obstacles, and I care more about other people knowing that we're all in this together.

7:41Ryan Holiday: It's amazing, Marty, to hear the role stoicism has played in your sobriety. It actually reminded me of something I talked about with Jamie Alexander on the podcast. She was saying that stoicism was a big part of her sobriety journey as well. Here is what she said. I'm almost eight years sober now, God willing. And I think that was by far the best thing that has ever happened to me. So I learned a lot from that. So this is this ties into a higher power thing is like, I really don't know what's good or bad. And I'm holding up air quotes here because I really don't. Yes. You know, something can be, you know, we're not dumb.

8:16We can realize when we're like, oh, you know, like I broke my shoulder. That friggin hurts. That that really sucks. But that could lead to something that, you know, really wonderful. And this has put me, stoicism and my sobriety and the way my life has gone over the last few years, which is not like I thought it would, kind of in, I'm not even going to say in the worst way because I don't believe that now.

8:36Ryan Holiday: Yeah. But it has positioned me in a way, and I'm now in a place where I can be, I think, a lot more useful to a lot more people. Thanks, Marty. I appreciate the kind words about the afterword to right thing right now. That's actually been my favorite part of writing the series. Didn't want the books to feel real preachy, like I was an expert on these things. In fact, no, I'm struggling with them as much as you guys are. And I wanted it to be clear where I was coming from in writing them. Next, we're going to hear from Jordan. My story of stoicism doesn't harbor around a single event, but rather it's the glue that made all of these seemingly disjointed pieces come together in alignment.

9:18Who am I to be submitting to a platform like this? I am not a community leader. I haven't written a book. I'm not a titan of industry or an exceptional athlete. I haven't been subjected to decades of slavery and servitude. I'm one ingredient in the soup of humanity. But I think it's in that being that I feel the call to this. It's in this commonality, this thread that near most can pull, and it will tug somewhere on the fiber of their being. My foundational years were formed by people with severe codependency, chemical imbalances, and intense anger issues. I adopted a learned behavioral pattern.

9:59Trigger, fiery explosion, deep emotional damage, cry, massive guilt trip, hug, sweep it away, and pretend everything is better. Even though I noticed how this destructive behavior pushed people away and affected relationships, I still carried this with me into my early 20s. This behavior played itself out in a toxic long-term relationship, and when it ultimately came to a heinously painful ending, I was struck with an epiphany that was a massive turning point in my life and my behavior. I never want to feel this way ever again, and I never want to be someone who makes someone feel this way ever again.

10:43I knew what I had been doing up to that point in my life had to change. I started caring more about how my actions, my words, and my behaviors affected others. I told myself no more lies, no more half-truths, no more raging anger. I learned that anger is typically a secondary emotion and there is usually something behind it. fear, sadness, guilt, betrayal, or confusion. Very rarely was anger erupting just for the sake of anger itself. It was an indicator that something else was going on behind the scenes. I started to examine places in my life where I felt anger and so much of it sprung from my anger towards my mother.

11:28And after many months of not speaking with help from my partner at the time, I realized there would be a world one day where I wouldn't be able to reach out to my mother. No call, no text, no letter, nothing. And that feeling filled me with grief. She was alive and she was a person, a human, just like me, who was dealt an unfair hand in life. And when I took her off the pedestal of this is what a mom should be and just saw her as a person with an entire life and parent was just one of the roles where she did her best with what she had, it released years of animosity and tension from my mind, my heart, and my body.

12:14Few things have spoken clearer to me than stoicism, and it has been my grounding rod and my guiding star ever since then. When my current partner had a cancerous brain tumor recurrence and I was his caretaker, stoicism guided me. All the times my chemically and balanced mother tested my boundaries and my patience, stoicism guided me. When other family members were held in the strong grip of addiction, stoicism guided me. And when the weight of the world feels overwhelming and uncertain, stoicism guides me. I cannot control the world or the people in it, but I can always put in the effort to be the best version of me I can be at the time and give myself grace in my learning and my becoming.

12:58I always carry my copy of meditations and I have highlights and notes in the margins. I have gifted meditations to friends and family. I've shared the podcast and posts for years because I carry within me a lived truth of its potency. It's a buoy within the sea of chaos. and I am eternally grateful for the moments and chapters and seasons through which it has and continues to keep me afloat and shape my character.

13:26Ryan Holiday: I think a lot of people can relate to that, right? I think we're all a slave to our emotions here or there. That's why stoicism is attractive. Like, if that's a totally foreign idea to you, you're probably not like, oh, I'd like a philosophy that helps me not do that, right? But anger is there for me. I've said this before. I don't think I have an anger problem, but anger is a problem for me. as it is for most people, as it was for Marcus Aurelius, right? He talks about how the consequences of anger are more harmful than whatever the thing we are angry about. So yeah, I appreciate you sharing, and I hope you keep spreading the word and the wisdom of Marcus Aurelius.

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16:09Ryan Holiday: That's Pesty.com slash Doik for an extra 10 % off. For our final submission, we're going to hear from Herman from Argentina. I think I'm getting it right. G-E-R-M-A with an acento N from Argentina. I'm a school teacher and I wanted to share how I apply stoic ideas in my job. I first came across stoicism about 10 years ago through a YouTube video in Spanish. It was called something like Stoicism, the best mentality you can have. Out of curiosity, I watched it and was introduced to the concept of the dichotomy of control, among other Stoic ideas. And eventually, I found Daily Stoic, and that's where I really started to go deeper into Stoicism.

17:00Now, I've been watching Ryan's videos, listening to his podcasts, and reading his daily emails for a couple of years. One of my favorite daily stoic videos is the one about you control how you play.

17:13Ryan Holiday: If there's one thing that philosophy can teach any athlete, whether you're an amateur, whether you're a collegiate prospect, whether you're a top-ranked recruiter, whether you're making millions of dollars in the pros, it's something that I talked about to the Cleveland Browns this year when they had me talk about stoicism. What I said, I started my talk and I I said, look, everyone in this room controls one thing. They control how they play. You don't control what your teammates do. You control how you play. You don't control what they say about you on Twitter. You control how you play. You don't control the size of your contract.

17:50Ryan Holiday: You control how you play. You don't control what they say about you from the stands. You control how you play. You don't control what the ref says. You control how you play. You don't control whether it's snowing. You don't control whether it's raining. You don't control whether it's 100 degrees. You control how you play. You don't control whether your teammates get hurt. You don't control if your teammates are fair. You don't control if the guy in the position ahead of you wants to groom you and mentor you or not. You control how you play. You don't control whether your opponents cheat. You control how you play.

18:29Ryan Holiday: You don't control if your coach is a bully and he screams at you. You control how you play. You don't control if people are doubting you, if they don't believe in you. You control how you play. You don't control yesterday's game. You control how you play today. You don't control if you've lost to this team a thousand times. You control how you play. You don't control if your team wins. You control how you play. You don't control if you lose. you control how you play. All you control, if it's not clear enough, is how you play right now, right this second. Whether there's doubters, whether you're being adored, all you control is how you play.

19:11Ryan Holiday: The effort that you bring, the decisions you make, the principles by which you operate. And that's ultimately all you can judge yourself on. You don't control the outcome, you don't control the facts, you don't control anything but how you play. But if we can focus Focus on this, the Stoics said. If we can focus exclusively on what we control, not only be happier, we'll have way more energy and way more to focus on what is in front of us while everyone else wastes time whining about, complaining about, worrying about, thinking about, bragging about what they don't control. Thinking about my job as a school teacher and all the setbacks that come with it, mainly students' behavior toward their teachers.

19:55I borrowed this idea of you control how you play and turned it into you control how you teach and I came up with this. Life is like a classroom and you only control one thing. You control how you teach. You don't control whether your students misbehave or not. You control how you teach. You don't control if your students pay attention to you. You control how you teach. You don't control if your students do their homework, study for their tests, or turn in their assignments on time. You control how you teach. Instead of focusing on what your students do or don't do, just make sure you're teaching the best class you can teach, because that's basically the only thing you control, the only thing that is really up to you.

20:48what your students do say and think that's not up to you at the end of the day you shouldn't ask yourself did my students do everything they were supposed to do instead you should ask yourself did I teach the best class I could teach did I respond to my students behavior with courage temperance justice and wisdom or did I just lash out at them like a wild beast because they didn't do what I wanted them to do. In other words, did I just get angry at my students for not behaving the way I wanted them to behave? But students are not the only people school teachers have to deal with. We also have to deal with our own colleagues, students' parents, principals.

21:39Just a few days ago, a principal told me, Germán, you have to make your students respect you. You have to make them be quiet. And I was like, I can't make my students respect me or be quiet. I don't control what they do in the classroom, what they say to me or what they think about me. Whether they respect me or not, that is not up to me, but it's up to them. When I started to become more aware of what was really up to me and what was not, I began to feel a sense of relief because I started saying things to myself like, I don't control whether things go the way I want them to or not, I did the best I could and I can't do more than that.

22:23Because of this and other Stoic ideas like, don't suffer matching troubles, put every impression to the test and don't ask for the third thing, as Marcus Aurelius would say, you can't record something for the daily Stoic podcast without mentioning Marcus Aurelius, so there you go, Ryan.

22:47Ryan Holiday: You know, I love this mantra of I control how I teach. Mantras like that can be really helpful. And it sounds like you're doing the best you can. And you're really thinking about how you apply the virtues, right? Courage, discipline, justice, wisdom to your job, which is a great job and an important job. And we appreciate your service. And I think you're providing a great example. Thanks to everyone for submitting their stories for today's episode. Let us know if you want to share your story, what you think of this episode. If you like this format, I think it's great. And I'd like to do more of it.

23:19Ryan Holiday: As I said, the email there is podcast at dailystoic.com.

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