The Daily Stoic - Perfect Is Not The Goal | No One Has A Gun To Your Head

Episode Date: July 22, 2021

“In martial arts, the black belt is the highest level of the master. In religion, perhaps it’s the priest or even the saint. You can get a doctorate in philosophy, but that’s not really what the Stoics admired.”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.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 Stood 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 Epictetus 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. Perfect is not the goal. In martial arts, the black belt is the highest level of the master.

In religion, perhaps it's the priest or even the saint. You can get a doctorate in philosophy, but that's not really what the Stoics admired. To them, the highest level that one could attain was the sage. Did Epictetus get there? Perhaps according to us he did. But Epictetus was far too humble to ever claim that himself. Yet, while he did say perfection was impossible, he still believed that perfection was something

to which we could be making progress. And that's what we're trying to do here. We're trying to get better. We quoted Longfellow a while back. But to act that each tomorrow find us farther than today, that's the goal, to make improvements, to push ourselves. Senika said the goal was to inquire one thing a day, a quote, an idea, an insight, a story,

something that fortifies you against poverty, against death, against adversity. He didn't say that one thing makes you perfect. He said that one thing makes you better. So we read this email, we crack open the Stoics or the Daily Stoic, we can listen to that podcast, we can ask that question of a mentor or an advisor, we can get feedback from a friend, we're not trying to be perfect. We are trying to get better. No one has a gun to your head. Nothing is noble if it's done unwillingly or under-compulsion. Every noble deed is voluntary. That's Seneca's moral letters, 66.

This is from today's entry in the daily Stoic 366 meditations on wisdom, perseverance, and the art of living featuring new translations of Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius, written by me, Ryan Holliday, and my partner in crime, Steve Hanselman, and get this book anywhere, books are sold, and even get a leather bound edition, the premium edition at store.dailystoke.com. Let's look at today's meditation. You don't have to do the right thing. You always have the option of being selfish, rude, awful, shortsighted, pedantic, evil, or stupid. In fact, sometimes there are incentives to break bad. Certainly not every criminal gets taught. But how does this line of thinking usually work out for people what is their life like? You don't have to do the right thing just as you don't have to do your duty. But you get to and don't you want to. If you

haven't read or maybe watched the movie of East of Eden, this is what Steinbach is saying. Zoom's in on this word. I think it's Tim Schill from the Bible. We think of the commandments. He's saying as commandments, right? Thou shalt not. Thou must not. Thou cannot, right? But he's saying, actually that's a mis-translation.

The word is, is Tim Schill or meist, meaning that you have a choice to honor your mother or father to love thy neighbor, right, to not commit adultery, so on and so forth. That these are choices. And in fact, if they weren't choices, there'd be nothing particularly impressive about them, right? Being good under compulsion, being good with a gun to your head, what does that mean? Right? Nothing.

So it's that it is a choice that makes it meaningful. So what will you choose? That's the question. There's that great Chris Rock joke about, I don't treat my kids well, not do drugs, et cetera, because I want to be a role model. Is that I do those things because it's the right thing, right? I don't treat my kids well, not do drugs, et cetera, because I want to be a role model. I do those things because it's the right thing, right?

You're not doing it to impress people. You're not doing it for the reward as we talked about last week. You're not doing it for the third thing, as Marcus really has talked about. I try to be good because it's the best way to live. I try to choose the right thing. There's a famous story of the choice of Hercules,

which I talk about in my list of the still eggs. I'm also gonna talk about in the new book series on the Four Virtues. But it's the choice, the choice is everything. It's that you mayest, that you have the option not to do it, that you can be a bad person, that a lot of people are bad, that a lot of people are bad, that a lot of people are selfish and shortsighted

and rude, awful, and pedantic, and stupid. It's that you can get away with it that makes choosing the right thing all the more majestic and rare and special. So that's your question today. What are you going to choose? You're gonna choose to be who your capable boy becoming. You're going to fight to be the person philosophy wants you to be as Marcus says. You're going to see what

you can get away with. That's your call. And if you want to get better, I do recommend our stoicism 101 course ancient philosophy for your actual life. Check that out at dailystoke.com slash 101. And if you sign up for daily stoke life at dailystokelife.com, you get that course and all our daily stoke challenges and courses for free, plus in a lot of other awesome stuff. Check that out, dailystoke.com slash 101. Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoic early and ad free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon music app today, or you can listen early and ad free with Wondery

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