This is How To Be Smart (Or At Least Not Dumb) | Following The Doctor's Orders

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.

0:56This is how to be smart, or at least not dumb. Look, some people are just not right. They didn't receive much of an education or they weren't much interested when they were getting one. Some people receive genetic gifts and others don't. Some people get kicked in the head or a worm meets part of their brain. Maybe we ourselves are not exactly geniuses. But you know what? That doesn't really matter. Success and happiness in life doesn't require being a genius. It begins with not being a fool. This is one of the ideas at the center of the new book, Wisdom Takes Work, which is the fourth book in the Stoic Bircher series about wisdom.

1:38In fact, the whole middle of the book is about avoiding the traps that make really smart people really stupid, which, again, is key. For instance, Marcus Aurelius doesn't credit Rusticus, his philosophy teacher, with making him brilliant. He thanks him for two things. For teaching him not to be satisfied with just getting the gist of things, and for showing him how not to fall for every smooth talker. That is to say, he helped him to avoid two timeless pitfalls in life, superficiality and grifters. If we can avoid ego, if we can cultivate a smidge of self-awareness, if we can try not to let our emotions blind us, we have already struck enormous blows against stupidity in life.

2:25We can avoid being swept up in the newest fad or the oldest con, and we can remain ever curious, wanting to actually go deep into things and not just stay on the surface. And if we can do that, we're already winning. By the way, we still have some signed first editions of Wisdom Takes Work. If you're interested, you can grab one right now at dailystoic.com slash wisdom. We will run out. I will stop signing them here very, very shortly. And I would appreciate it if you supported the new book. Thanks to everyone who read it. Thanks to everyone who reviewed it on Amazon. All that It means so much to me.

2:57Thanks for supporting me on this crazy journey the last six years. I really appreciate it. And I hope you like the new book.

3:10We 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.

3:45My 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. 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.

4:22Becky. 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. I'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$149 a pound if you have prime with organic birds at$299 a pound, and they only carry no antibiotic ever turkeys that will bring quality to your table at a great price.

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5:26Following the doctor's orders, this is today's entry in the Daily Stoic. Just as we commonly hear people say that the doctor prescribed someone particular riding exercises or ice baths or walking without shoes. We should, in the same way that nature prescribes someone to be diseased or disabled or to suffer any kind of impairment. In the case of the doctor, prescribed means something ordered to help aid someone's healing. But in the case of nature, it means that what happens to each of us is ordered to help aid our destiny. Marcus Aurelius' Meditations 5.8. It is funny, right, to think about in the Roman days, someone being prescribed to walk without shoes or to ride a horse.

6:11Also, I guess, better than being prescribed bleeding. But we'll get to today's meditation. The Stoics were masters at analogies and used them as a tool to help strengthen their reasoning. Here, Marcus Aurelius observes how willingly we will put up with unpleasantness if commanded by the magic words, doctor's orders. The doctor says that you've got to take this nasty medicine and you'll do it. The doctor tells you that you have to start sleeping hanging upside down like a bat. You'll feel silly, but soon enough you'll get to dangling because you think it will make you better. On the other hand, when it comes to external events, we fight like hell if anything happens contrary to our plans.

6:48But what if, Marcus asked, the doctor had prescribed the exact same thing as a part of our treatment? What if it's as good as taking our medicine? What's so magical about those words the doctor orders is that feel like we don't have a choice. Of course, you don't have to listen to the doctor. I guess some people don't listen to their doctors. But you go, oh, well, they know better. They chose this for me. That's what the treatment of this disease, ailment, sickness is. Who am I to object? I will accept it and I will go along with it because I want to get better. But then when you're stuck in traffic or a job turns out to be harder than you thought, or a relationship turns out to be more difficult than you thought.

7:32You have to do anything that you didn't expect, you didn't want, you don't like, because you feel like you have a choice of the matter, you don't want to do it. But what if, Marcus is saying, actually, this too is chosen to make you better? And in a sense, that's what the obstacle is the way as a philosophy is really about. It's this idea that these things aren't things we have to do their things. We get to do things that were chosen for us. You can see it as some sort of higher power if you want. You can see it as fate if you want. You can just simply see it as a thing, but that it is something that's going to make you better, that it was assigned to you, right?

8:15In meditations, Mark Cerullo talks about how he goes, it's unfortunate that this happened. And then he catches himself, no, it's fortunate that it happened to me, right? He was saying, oh, no, oh, wait, this was chosen for me. I am right for this. This is right for me. So stop fighting. Stop pushing against the thing and see it as a prescription. See it as part of the process. See it as an assignment you've been given. How will you handle it? Are you going to be a good patient or a bad patient, a good student or a bad student? This is everything. These things were chosen for you, and all you have to do in turn is choose them back.

9:21I just wanted to say thank you.

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