The Daily Stoic - Now Is The Time To Be Kind | A Cure For The Self

Episode Date: July 29, 2021

“The thing about stress and stuggle is that it hardens us. It makes us turn inward. With more than expected on our plate we have less time, less patience, less sympathy for others.”Ryan explains that the highest goal is not to be perfect but just to improve, and reads The Daily Stoic’s entry of the day, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast.The Daily Stoic Leadership Challenge is a masterclass in leadership with the cadence and rigor of a boot camp. It is also a live course, which means all participants will join the course together and move through together at the same pace to their own version of the same goal—to be a great leader. Registration is now officially open over at dailystoic.com/leadershipchallenge. Registration will close on Saturday, July 31st at midnight CST.Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: http://DailyStoic.com/signupFollow us: Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and FacebookSee 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 Stoke Podcast early and add free on Amazon Music. Download the app today. Hi, I'm David Brown, the host of Wundery'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. music or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast. On Thursdays, we do double duty, not just reading our daily meditation, but also reading a passage from the book, the Daily Stoic, 366 meditations on wisdom, perseverance, and the

art of living, which I wrote with my wonderful co-author and collaborator, Stephen Hanselman. And so today, we'll give you a quick meditation from one of the stoics, from Epipetus Markis Relius, Seneca, then some analysis for me. And then we send you out into the world

to do your best to turn these words into works. Now is the time to be kind. The thing about stress and struggle is that it hardens us. It makes us turn inward. With more than expected on our plate, we have less time, less patience, less sympathy for others. We're dealing with our own problems, trying to keep those closest to a safe,

just trying to get through it ourselves. While this makes sense from a self-preservation standpoint, it's also a bit self-defeating, because the more we focus on our own problems, the larger they become, the more we think about ourselves, the more pain and anger and despair we can feel. So one of the things you can do today is think about how you can be of use, how you can be of service. Imagine James Stockdale in that prison camp in Vietnam, that real world laboratory of epictetus as he called it, and what was he trying to do there to distract himself from the pain and the worry he was

thinking about his men, he was trying to help. He united them in common cause together. U.S. he liked to say unity over self. That's what Aesthoic does. That's what you need to do. Moe your neighbor's lawn. Call your elderly grandfather. Donate some money. Cheer your kids up.

Pick up some trash you see in the park, respond kindly to that person being negative or partisan on social media. Wherever there is a person, Senika said there is an opportunity for kindness. Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, there is an opportunity to do good, to help others. And it just so happens that that is also a wonderful way to help yourself, especially right now. A cure for the self. A person who has practiced philosophy as a cure for the self becomes great of soul filled with confidence, invincible, and greater as you draw near. This is Seneca's Moral Letters, 111.

From today's entry in the Daily Stoke, 366 meditations on wisdom, perseverance, and the art of living by Ryan Holiday, translated by the wonderful Steve Hanselman. You can get this anywhere, books are sold, there's an audio version, ebook version, physical version, there's even a special premium leather bound edition. to DailyStoke storage. You can check out at store.dailystoke.com. What is a cure for the self? Perhaps Seneca means that through nature and nurture, we develop a unique set of characteristics, some positive and some negative.

When those negative characteristics begin to have consequences in our lives, some of us turn to therapy, psychoanalysis, or the help of a support group, the point to cure certain selfish, destructive parts of ourselves. But of all the avenues for curing our negative characteristics, philosophy has existed the longest and helped the most people. It is concerned not just with mitigating the effects of mental illness or neuroses, but it is designed to encourage human flourishing,

it's designed to help you live the good life. Don't you deserve to flourish? Wouldn't you like to be great of soul-filled with confidence and invincible to external events? Wouldn't you like to be the proverbial onion packed with layers of greatness? Well, then practice philosophy. That's something Senaika says is what is philosophy offers? She says philosophy offers counsel. Marcus really is repeatedly compares philosophy to medicine.

It's like an ointment. It reduces pain and suffering. That's what this philosophy is therefore, as we said a bunch of times, go to therapy, seek medical help, go to recover groups, be religious to, stoicism is not mutually exclusive with anything. But all these things are designed to do what Sennaka is talking about,

which is the cure for the self. The more you work on yourself, the more you address the problems, These things are designed to do what Zeneca is talking about, which is the cure for the self. The more you work on yourself, the more you address the problems, the issues, the childhood wounds that you have, the better you'll be at whatever it is that you're doing. Last year, I've worked on so many issues, issues with my parents, issues with my childhood, issues with compulsions, or I've really found that anxiety was more of a pronounced force in my life than I wanted it to be. And so I dealt with it, and I'm still dealing with it, trying to cure myself and trying

to get better every single day as you're trying to do. That's what we are doing here, trying to get better. If you think you're, that's the problem with ego or delusion. If you think you're perfect, there's nothing you're going to work on. There's no way you're going to get better. If you think you're a piece, if you think you're an irredeemable piece of crap, probably not going to get any better either. But the point is, you're good, but you can be better.

And if you dealt with this, if you faced that, if you explored this, if you opened up about that, what could you be capable of? How much greater could you be? What could you be capable of? How much greater could you be? Who could you be there for? What could you be capable of doing? So the cure for this self, it's not that you're broken, it's not that you're diseased, but we all have issues. And in having the courage and the discipline

and the counsel of philosophy to guide us, we can make real progress at that. And that's what I look at who I was when I first picked up Marcus really said 19. I've cured a lot of things. I wouldn't say they're all in remission. I wouldn't say they're all perfectly gone, but I'm in remission on a lot of them

and now I'm turning to additional things too. So that's what we're doing here. I hope you're making that progress. Hope you're not afraid to ask for help. Hope you're not afraid to look in the mirror. It gets better when you do. Talk soon. Hey, it's Ryan.

There's just a couple more days to sign up for the Daily Stoic Leadership Challenge. It closes here on Saturday, July 31st, at midnight, central time. It's not only our biggest, but it is our best course that we've done. There's the first time we're running it. It's got all sorts of moving pieces

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This is going to be a great course. The Daily Stoke Leadership Challenge, Ancient Wisdom for Modern Leaders is open now. It closes Saturday, July 31st at midnight, Central Time. So do not miss it. The course begins on Sunday, August 1st. Really excited. Can't wait to have you. You can sign up at dailystoke.com slash leadership challenge. And remember daily stoke life, members get this course and all the courses for free. So if you were thinking about signing up for daily

stoke life, this is your chance to basically get all the value. Sign up dailystoke.com slash leadership challenge or of course dailystokelife.com. of course dailystokelife.com. Hey, Prime Members, you can listen to the daily Stoke 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

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