The Daily Stoic - Daily Stoic Sundays: How a Stoic Deals with Bad News

Episode Date: March 8, 2020

Ryan describes how a Stoic can deal with bad news—and not just move past it, but use it to fuel their success.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stood Podcast early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today. Welcome to the Sunday edition of the Daily Stood Podcast. My name is Ryan Holiday. For over a decade I've been writing and thinking and talking about stilicism and so each Sunday now we're going to be rolling out a special episode that will be either me riffing on a number of topics, maybe me riffing or expanding on an article that I've written or deep diving into an idea that I think's important that I think you'll benefit from. So I hope you like it. Support our sponsors who make this episode possible. And of course, keep studying, keep reading, and thank you. Hi, I'm David Brown, the host of Wonderree's podcast business wars. And in our new season, Walmart must fight off target, the new discounter that's both savvy and fashion forward.

Listen to business wars on Amazon music or wherever you get your podcasts. The inevitable fact of life is that so-called bad news is gonna happen, right? We're gonna hear things that we weren't planning to hear, that we didn't wanna hear, that hurt, that make us sad, that surprised us. That's just life. Be wonderful if everyone we knew stayed together,

it'd be wonderful if everything worked out, it'd be wonderful if there was never a plane delayed, it'd be wonderful if no was never a plane to lay, it'd be wonderful if the film was ever killed or looted, right? It'd be wonderful if there was only good news, but the reality is that everyone has gotten bad news and everyone knows they will continue to get bad news. So I think the question for the Stokes is, how do we respond to that? How do we deal with bad news? So the first thing that Stoke would think about is, let's look at those labels really fast.

The stocks try to be objective as possible. So they go like, why are we calling this bad news? Shakespeare's line was nothing neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so. But I think going back to Epic Titus, there's the idea that things are objective, our judgment about things are not objective. So the stock market drops 100 points, 500 points, we're quick to call that bad, but if we had massively hedged against the market or we had a, we're massively short the market, that would be good. The event is objective, we just have opinions about it. And realizing that we have these opinions, that we have the power to decide what they are and that what's good for us might be bad for others. And vice versa is a, I think an

important way to kind of take the edge off things to go, okay, the event is the event, it's information. And that leads into then, I think one of the most important and it's the stoicism, which is how do we respond to that thing? Donald Robertson, one of the great modern writers about stoicism, he says, you know, the stoic tells themselves

that sure life is frightening, the situation might be frightening, but the truly important thing is how we choose to respond. What are we gonna do with this information? The information is objective, but what will our response be? How do we make this into something? That's where our power is. That's what we can choose to do.

The third part is like accepting that should happen, right, that it's not all good. That sometimes it doesn't go the way we plan that, you know, you win some, you lose some. And I think these three things tied together really great. And this awesome quote from Mark's Relice, I love. No, he says objective judgment now at this very moment, unselfish action now at this very moment, willing acceptance now at this very moment. That's all you need. So that's kind of how, I think the framework for how a stove responds to bad news, that's like the mindset that you want to bring to it.

But really what we're talking is a controlling yourself, not getting too emotional, not immediately reacting, not being too rattled by it, not giving any anxiety or fear or resentment, and then focus on what we're going to do about it, what our response is going to be. And then what's the good in it? How can we use this to serve others? How can we use this to toughen ourselves up? How can we use this as an opportunity to improve? How can we use this as an opportunity to be grateful?

What's a lesson we can learn from it? That's what the Stoics are focusing on. The aesthetic has line is that a wise man dies events to their own color and we turn whatever happens to benefit. That's how we want to respond to bad news. And look, this is easy to do when the news is that this person you were looking forward to meeting

had to cancel or this is news that your friend borrowed your car and scratched up the door. But how do you deal to real bad news, real tragedy? Of course, this is harder. I often think of that great observation from Mr. Rogers who was sort of still in a way, whether you knew it or not. He talked about, I think he said this as long ago

as RFK's assassination. He says, like, look for the helpers. And this sort of news goes viral each time. There's a tragedy, but it's like, you know, onK's assassination, he says, like, look for the helpers. And this sort of news goes viral each time. There's a tragedy, but it's like, you know, on September 11th, it's like, look for the helpers after a terrorist attack. It's like, look for the helpers after a fire or a tragedy or a loss. It's like, look for the people doing good, find reassurance in the fact that we can rush in and help others in the use.

That we have the power to decide, to see the best in people, in humanity, in a situation, we have the power to see the worst, and how we make this choice is gonna determine, you know, whether we are made worse by bad news, whether we are wrecked by bad news, or rather whether we're able to sort of rise above it and be improved by it and persevere through it.

One of the ways we take the edge off bad news, of course, is by not being surprised by it. So when Sennaka talks about pre-meditashiro malorum, when he talks about how nothing happens to the wise man contrary to our expectation that we never utter that phrase, why didn't think that could happen? Because we've thought about it in advance.

As in Stoics, they'd rather be pleasantly surprised that something bad didn't happen than unpleasantly surprised something bad did happen. So that premeditashomalorum is really important and ultimately about preparing for a world in which bad stuff is going to happen. It's a matter of when and not if. When Marcus is talking about how we focus on what we're going to do about it,

the willing acceptance of things that are outside of our control that goes into this stoic idea, we've talked a lot about here, the idea of a morphotty. A love of fate. You know, he says that everything you throw in front of a fire is fuel for the fire, that it turns all of its obstacles into flame and brightness. That's the attitude we want to cultivate towards bad news, which is like, I can deal with this. Actually, not even, I can deal with this, but that I'm going to deal with this. I'm going to make some good out of it. If we have that approach, then we don't walk around

fearful of bad news. We're never going to look forward to bad news, but we're going to embrace it, whatever it is, whatever terms it's been delivered to us because that's really all that we can do. If you're liking this podcast, we would love for you to subscribe. Please leave us a review on iTunes or any of your favorite podcasts, listening apps. It really helps and tell a friend. Hey, Prime Members! You can listen to the Daily Stoic Early and Add Free on Amazon Music, download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus in Apple podcasts. Hey there listeners!

While we take a little break here, I want to tell you about another podcast that I think you'll like. It's called How I Built This, where host Guy Razz talks to founders behind some of the world's biggest and most innovative companies, to learn how they built them from the ground up. Guy has sat down with hundreds of founders behind well-known companies like Headspace, Manduke Yoga Mats, Soul Cycle, and Kodopaxi, as well as entrepreneurs working to solve some of the biggest problems

of our time, like developing technology that pulls energy from the ground to heat in cool homes, or even figuring out how to make drinking water from air and sunlight. Together, they discuss their entire journey from day one, and all the skills they had to learn along the way, like confronting big challenges and how to lead through uncertainty. So if you want to get inspired and learn how to think like an entrepreneur, check out how I built this, wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen early and add free on the Amazon or Wonder yet.