Stop Turning Challenges Into Catastrophes

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.

1:09do 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 bestselling 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. Being a human and stress seem to just go together. Anxiety and concern, they follow too.

2:29There's always something we're worried about. If we didn't perform well on this presentation, it could mean we won't get the promotion. You felt a little tired yesterday and this morning you have a cough. Is this something serious? Oh no, we can't afford to get sick right now. We're juggling multiple responsibilities. We're making sure we take care of our physical and mental health. We're struggling to achieve all of our goals. We have bills to pay and mouths to feed. We are sensitive to the slightest changes in our environment. We are nervous about the slightest clouds on the horizon. It's a modern affliction, but it's also always been this way.

3:01Not that it has to be. I see that my child is ill, that's what I see, but I don't want to see that he's in any danger, Marcus Aurelius writes in Meditations. He was talking about stopping that very human, very natural extrapolation that we all do. And extrapolation is a nice word here because more often than not, it's better described as catastrophizing. His advice to himself as a leader, as a parent, as a philosopher, was to stick with the first impression, adding no commentary of your own from within. Meaning the cough can just be a cough, the subpar presentation can just be a single data point.

3:40Falling short today, it does not have to mean that everything is falling apart. Stop torturing yourself. Be present. Focus primarily on what is in front of you. Resist the impulse to add judgment or speculation on top of what you are dealing with. dealing with it alone is sufficient. You'll do better and be less stressed.

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