Their Hearts Were Touched By Fire | 12 Valuable Stoic Truths

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1:04Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we read a passage of ancient wisdom designed to help you in your everyday life. On Tuesdays, we take a closer look at these Stoic ideas, how we can apply them in our actual lives. Thanks for listening, and I hope you enjoy.

1:30Their hearts were touched by fire. For Zeno, it happened at his lowest ebb, washed up in Athens from a shipwreck. Cato and Seneca both found it through their tutors. For Portia, Cato came from her father and his example. Epictetus discovered it as a young slave, listening to Musonius Rufus. For Marcus Aurelius, it was Epictetus, or rather the lectures of Epictetus, which made its way to him through his teacher, Rusticus. Through our great good fortune in our youth, our hearts were touched with fire, the great Oliver Wendell Holmes once said. So it went for these Stoics who were touched by the power of philosophy at a young age.

2:08It inspired them, charged them, challenged them. What Stoicism did was it gave them a compass, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom, something around which they could direct their lives. They didn't always live up to it, and they certainly weren't perfect. Neither was Oliver Wendell Holmes, but they lived extraordinary lives. They did extraordinary things. They made the world a better place for having lived in it. And you, whatever your age, you too have been touched by this fire. You wouldn't be listening to this right now. You have the example of Marcus and Portia and Epictetus and Zeno and Cato before you.

2:42You also have their torch to carry forward as you do extraordinary things, as you try to make the world better for you having lived in it. Part two of Right Thing Right Now, which is about the Stoic virtue of justice. I quote this old World War I poem about how, to you with failing hands we throw the torch. The idea of like, we've all been touched by this fire, but it's like someone who had the fire touched us, and then we touched someone. that it's this kind of procession of generations trying to bring this stuff into the world, trying to do good, trying to live with virtue, trying to bring virtue into the world.

3:19That's sort of how I see this Stoic notion of virtue, especially when the beginning of Meditations Marx really lays out this sort of vision of a government that respects the liberty of its people, that treats people as equals. You know, he says he learns this from Cato and Thracian and Helvidius and a bunch of the early Stoics. And yet, of course, I mean, he lived as an emperor. He didn't fully bring this into reality. Neither did Thomas Jefferson or George Washington and their understanding of Stokes. It's this thing. We're always closer to it in the ideal than in reality, but we're trying to get those two closer to each other.

3:54That's, to me, what virtue is about. That's what the new book, Right Thing Right Now, is about good values, good character, and good deeds. You can grab that anywhere books are sold. We've got copies at store.dailystoke.com. I believe we still have some signed copies as well. And if you want a reminder of these stoic virtues, the virtue medallion, I have the image tattooed here on my left wrist. I'm touching it right now. I see it every day when I'm typing, writing, thinking, and recording. You can grab that at store.dailystoic.com as well.

4:29When you're reading a book or listening to a podcast or watching a video, there's a lot being thrown at you, right? and you've got trying to follow all of it. You're trying to make sense of all of it. I kind of have a simple rule that's worked well for me over the years, which is I just try to find one thing. I've interviewed hundreds of guests from all over the world, done over 150 million downloads. It's been this incredible experience. And in today's episode, I wanted to give you some of the stuff that I've taken out of it from some of the stoic guests and not so stoic guests that I've been lucky enough to interview on the Daily Stoic Podcast.

4:58And I hope all of them do as much for you as they did for me.

5:04I thought it was interesting. You're saying you see people in the gym and they're like, I just want to get in shape. And you say, but sort of for what or how? You're forcing them to be specific. But how do we channel that or how does a person find their reason or their canvas to be useful? Well, I think the first or the most important thing is what you just said, to have a clear vision and a clear goal. OK, you want to be in shape. What is the reason why you want to be in shape? Because being in shape, it's just very broad. What does that mean? how do you get motivated if you don't have a specific goal?

5:35And some people say, well, the doctor told me that I'm now 55 years old, my cholesterol is high, my blood pressure is high, and they thought instead of just going on drugs and prescribing me medication, I should try vigorous exercising every day for a little bit, not too long, but just every day something. But I always tell them, I said, look, if there's a specific goal that you have, where you say, okay, by Christmas, I want to have 20 pounds less. Now you're shooting for a specific goal.

6:06I very intentionally try to make it a part of my brand that nobody's right all the time, including myself. One of the things I repeat to my audience over and over again is you can go through all the research. There's not a single psychological intervention that has a 100 % hit rate. Sure. In fact, almost none of them have a 50 % hit rate. And even if it does hit for somebody, it never solves everything. So all we're talking about here are just tools in a toolbox. Yes. Stoicism, tool in a toolbox. Therapy, tool in a toolbox. Meditation, tool in a toolbox. Let's never lose sight of that because our natural impulse, just as humans, is to find this thing that helped us and turn it into a religion.

6:45Turn it into everything. And that this is gonna, it saved me, it's gonna save the world and everybody needs to hear about it all the time. Whenever you're sitting there and you're going like, man, I need a vacation. Like I just need to be in Mexico right now. I find it so funny because I'm like, do you actually want to be in Mexico right now? Or do you like the person you think you're going to be in Mexico right now? And I think it's kind of the same theme from your book is just you get what you are. So just be the best version of yourself as possible. It's funny. In meditations, there's a passage where Marcus realizes doing exactly that.

7:17I know you think you want to get away from it all in the country or the beach or whatever. And he's like, but actually whatever you need is inside of you right now. You can retreat and go on vacation inside your own soul right now. And I think it's true, right? We think, okay, if I can just get away from all these external things, then I won't feel what I'm feeling. Sometimes that's what we do. And then sometimes we do like a substance or a thought pattern or whatever, the other version of escape. But what we really just have to deal with is whatever that feeling is. If you can deal with that feeling and process it and work on it, that's actually a more sustainable and permanent solution to that thing.

7:53I was thinking of other sort of success problems that socialism helps with, like haters is probably one. or people who don't like you or negative attention on top of? Yeah. I mean, the more, especially if your version of success or what you're pursuing is going to make you more public, you are going to have to deal with all sorts of things. At least at current, you have not faced this magnitude of negative attention. Yes. And I've seen people buckle under that if they don't have the toolkit. And the toolkit doesn't have to be sophisticated, by the way. Like rule number one, don't go looking for it.

8:26Yeah, sure. It's kind of like, all right, if you're going to do shuffle sprints on top of broken floorboards, you're going to stub your toe all the time. I mean, I'll admire you if you have the best stubbed toe fix, but maybe you just shouldn't run across the floorboards barefoot, which is what a lot of folks do when they're kind of hunting for comments, but being human, ending up fixating on the one or two people who are awful. People tend to think stoicism is having no emotions, But the real thing is to be able to understand emotions, process them, and then use them, or at the very least, understand other people's emotions and be able to manipulate the wrong word, but use those emotions to help them or you accomplish what is supposed to be accomplished.

9:14Yeah, I mean, the proper idea to me is sort of a lot of what I meditate about and is in Buddhism, where you don't try to repress your emotions because, first of all, you can't. We are emotional animals. And if ever you have tried to repress your emotions, particularly in the state of meditation, you see you have zero control over them, right? They're popping up. You know, it's the way we're wired. So the proper stance is I'm not going to repress emotions, but I'm going to understand them. I'm going to see them as they occur with a degree of distance. I'm going to see that I'm angry in this moment.

9:51I'm going to almost like have a, I like to imagine it as if I'm like six inches away from myself. I don't know why that metaphor come up. Only six inches? That doesn't seem that far. Well, it's out this side. It's like here. However, that's like a more like a foot, I guess. Right. And I'm looking at what I'm thinking or feeling from that distance, almost from the outside. And I'm still feeling it, but I'm seeing it as if it's from as if I'm another person. And it's a strange concept. Yeah. But you can observe your own emotions while you're feeling them. And then you they don't have power over you.

10:25Then you can say, OK, I'm angry. Why am I angry? So, number one, I recognize the emotion. Number two, why am I angry? Does it stem from something weeks ago, months ago, or earlier today? And then what do I do with my anger? Sometimes you want to use your anger. You want to channel your anger. So when you're in sports, if you don't have that kind of drive and that anger, when you're in a bet, you know, when you're down by 12 points. It's like an extra gear. Yeah. You can pull. There's a little bit of anger and even, I don't know, hatred or something. You just despise the enemy. You're going to crush them, right?

11:02You use that emotion. But as Phil Jackson said, if that emotion controls you throughout 48 minutes of a game, you're useless. You drain yourself. You can't control it. You also make mistakes. You make mistakes. So you need to be focused, but you also need to be able to use those emotions. That's where I use that metaphor of the rider and the horse, which I've repeated many, many times. Maybe that's another medallion that we could manufacture. No, no, that's a great idea.

11:31Thanks to BetterHelp for sponsoring this video and a bunch of our videos that allow us to do what we do. The idea of therapy can seem really intimidating. Even the strongest among us should have the courage to reach out and ask for help and to avail themselves of it. That's one of my favorite ideas from Marcus Rillis. He says, you're like a soldier storming a wall. So what if you've fallen and have to ask a comrade for help? I think about this in my own life, being able to talk to someone about my problems, being able to get feedback and to have a safe space to talk about things. It's not always comfortable.

12:02That's sort of the point. BetterHelp is the world's largest therapy service and it's 100 % online. With BetterHelp, you can tap into a network of over 25 ,000 licensed and experienced therapists who can help you with a wide range of issues. You'll be matched to a therapist usually within 48 hours, so you can get started fast. Let BetterHelp connect you with a therapist who can support you all from the comfort of your own home. Visit betterhelp.com slash Daily Stoic today or choose Daily Stoic during signup and enjoy a special discount for your first month of BetterHelp. It's great to have gratitude.

12:38We need to have respect, but we have to be more than just happy to be here. Yeah. If I have such a reverence for you, if I'm so impressed with talking to Ryan Holiday today right now, oh my gosh, man, this last hour we've talked would have been a hell of a lot more boring if you didn't find it boring. I wouldn't have been here. I'd have been like listening to what you say and then trying to go follow up and add a little thing onto what you said and go, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Doesn't have dynamic. It wouldn't have been real. I wouldn't have really been myself because I'd been so impressed. I would have not been involved.

13:07Going forward with respect and gratitude, but not such a reverence for mortality and mortal things as to not be engaged with them, to be able to give more of ourselves too. We have to be less impressed and more involved to give more of ourselves to our life, to our relationships, to challenges in front of us, to pleasures and promises and wins and losses. Be there with them.

13:34Work without attachment is worship, without attachment to the outcome. There's another principle like that that says intense work, meaning for the higher level, not just digging a ditch is rest. And that's fascinating too. When you're doing that work without attachment or intense work, you're on the soul level instead of the ego level. I have found that starting a book or starting a project is scary and intimidating. Finishing or being finished with a project is a bit bittersweet or empty or even disorienting. But there is this middle period where you're well past having started, you have no idea where you're going to finish, but you're just lost in the day-to-day-ness of it.

14:22You're operating under the momentum of every day stacking on top of itself. That's the most wonderful feeling in the whole world. But see, I've been thinking about that because part of life is pushing through when you don't want to do something and when it doesn't feel like it's coming right you have to like develop this sort of tenacity this stick to it ness and you know you have these days where like it you the resistance is telling you don't do it yep and you have to push through yep and then you have these other days where you're sick or you're tired or you're just not at 100 and what is the lot like what is the line between you're pushing through for the right reasons or you're not doing it for the right reason can I give you a dumber example yeah not being able to tell someone you need to get up and pee yes because like i'm thinking about something else i have to pee i'm all of a sudden suboptimal and what am i embarrassed that i'm human like we've been sitting here for two hours may i get up and use the restroom real quick like that's a harder thing for me to do being sick i kind of am a little more clear on it now like i've sort of figured that stuff out but i mean i remember i went to a workaholics anonymous meeting once everyone was late yeah by like 40 minutes everyone rushed in and we all got in trouble because it was a lot of sort of successful people and you know where I live and everyone was like hey love your work and they're like you can't say that here you know that's like saying you're so entertaining when you drink right yeah and one woman's bottom line was I will get up and go to the bathroom when I need to pee and I used to I used to sit at my computer and think I had achieved something because I had to pee.

16:06Like I would kind of like see how far, it was like edging or something. I wanted to see how far I could take it. And it was like, why? I'm thinking about something else, which means I'm not a hundred percent focused on this, which means this has nothing to do with the work. This is some like self-depriving, masochistic, false sense of pain and gain that is not yielding the best work. Right. It took me a long time like on Rogan to go, hey, can I get up and pee? We've been here for four and a half hours. It'd be weird if I didn't have to pee. Yeah. But then I would find myself getting less interesting, less entertaining, less funny because I was just like, do I ask?

16:39Do I not ask? And who are you impressing? They don't throw you like a parade for having help at the longest. No one gives you a check at the end. It was like, you went four hours and didn't pee. It's like, do you have a UTI? Are you okay? Like you shouldn't need, if you're taking care of your health, you should need to.

16:55What do you find astonishes you? Is it how different people work or what is more what works? Because if someone says, I have an idea, I want to do this. And you hear the idea and it sounds bad. And then they demonstrate it and it's great. That's an example of where the language of explaining things doesn't do it justice. One of the things I talk about in the book is always make a model. Show what it is that you're doing. Don't say the kind of article you want to write. Write the article, show me the article, then we talk about the article. What's great about that also is it takes it out of the personal.

17:28If you have an idea, it's your idea. And then we could argue about your idea. And that's personal. Whereas once it's on paper, it's outside of you. And it's this thing that we're collaborating on together to make it be the best it could be. We're not talking about your idea now. We're talking about, is this sentence the best sentence it could be? That's not a slide against you. That's we're working together to make this sentence the best it could be.

17:58Receiving so much positive feedback on the book has made me realize how fleeting it all is. Hopefully don't think the book will be completely irrelevant in 10 years, but it clearly won't be sitting on the New York Times bestseller list in 10 years. I don't know. I just think I'll be a lot less relevant in 10 years than I am today. And I don't know why, but there's a part of me that both finds that sad if I'm being brutally honest, but there's a part of me that thinks, well, that's good. Like, let's start preparing for that. Let's start preparing for what the next phase of your life looks like.

18:27And what does the next 10 years look like versus what are you going to be like when you're 70 and when you're 80? And as anybody this age knows, when you start to do the math, the next 30 years will go by on a relative basis, much quicker than the last 30 years did. And yet I still remember being 20 like it was yesterday. The last 30 years kind of went by quick too. So to think that the next 30 are going to go by that much quicker. And oh, by the way, before you know it, you'll be dead.

18:56Seneca had this word, Euthymia, which he said is the sense of the path that you're on. And he said, not being distracted by the paths that crisscross yours, especially from those who are hopelessly lost. And that's extremely hard to have at any age. Like, but I think younger, you know, you're like, well, someone's doing this and someone's doing this because you're measuring yourself against all these other people. But then as you, even as you become successful, now all of a sudden, there's all these things that you can do. And it takes an immense amount of discipline. I think also confidence, just like sort of self-awareness and sort of strategy to go like, here's when I'm, here are the things I want to do.

19:37Here's when I want to do them. And like not really paying attention to what other people are doing or everything that's coming, you know, into your inbox it takes all those things right and then because you also that comparison thing it also just shifts you just compare yourself to new people yeah more successful people sure people who are doing incredible things but i also feel like you get this if you're not too caught up in that chase and in your own ego and everything you actually learn to like really settle into the fact that you you intellectually grasp like oh like he's i'm not comparing myself to what ryan's doing whatever he he just did like he's on his own path and you kind of get this thing where you're like you're not you find that it doesn't make you go like what about me like you know like you did i did do that at 25 and like now when i hear about that i don't go like like what am i you know?

20:37For too long, we've been in the cities and cities are designed to mask you from our mortality. Here on the, on the ranch and farm within nature, you are hitting up against that razor's edge. Everything is trying to survive, trying to live. Something dies and something else eats it. You know, the longhorn skulls that are on the wall in the bookstore. So we bought the place and then the neighboring guy had the cows. He was like, do you want to buy my cows? So we got these cows immediately after we got them they all started dying of old age and they're called a vet and the vet's like okay i could come out like next week be like 250 dollars i'll like put it down he's like you have a gun right you should take care of it do i want to let this thing suffer for an additional week while we wait for the vet right not only is being in charge of your choice making about your own life and how you be it's also about what you take responsibility for you took charge of that situation to be a protector, to be compassionate.

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