This Is Not What We Fight For

0:00I'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. Whole Foods has great everyday prices on all your Thanksgiving essentials, whether you celebrate with a massive family or just a few close friends.

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0:50Welcome 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.

1:40This is not what we fight for. They didn't give up. They defied the odds. They kept going when others were stymied. They did difficult things. They sacrificed. They achieved. They made their mark. Contrary to the stereotype, the Stoics were not passive. They did impressive things. They were impressive people. They were fighters. But you know what? They, like the rest of us, sometimes got carried away, sometimes hung on too long, went after the wrong things. Seneca criticized those thirsty old lawyers and politicians who kept at it, even into old age, terrified of irrelevance and the quiet life.

2:20Yet wasn't it Seneca who stayed too long in Nero's service? Wasn't it Seneca who traded too much of his dignity to get into and then stay at the center of things? And Cicero, didn't he do the same? Fighting for relevance and power in a fallen Rome instead of stepping away, at some point swapping public service for personal glory. In Tennyson's poem about Odysseus, he points out that the man's determination was a double-edged sword. It got him home, but it made it impossible for him to enjoy being home. Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will, Tennyson writes, to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

3:01It's not supposed to be an impressive picture, but a tragic one. These traits were not serving Odysseus, but torturing him. It's good that we are determined. It's good that we fight. It's good that we keep going. But we have to be sure we know when to stop. that we know what is actually worth prizing. We have to remember what Seneca himself pointed out but failed to believe, that poverty isn't just having too little. It is also the insatiable appetite for more, more, more.

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