The Daily Stoic - This Is The Only Way To See Life | Don’t Look For The Third Thing

Episode Date: July 11, 2022

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Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoke Podcast early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today. Welcome to the Daily Stoke Podcast. Each day we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stokes illustrated with stories from history, current events, and literature to help you be better at what you do. And at the beginning of the week, we try to do a deeper dive, setting a kind of stoke, intention for the week, something to meditate on, something to think on, something to leave you with, to journal about whatever it is you happen to be doing.

So let's get into it. Hi, I'm David Brown, the host of Wunderree'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. I've raved about my wife Samantha many times here on the podcast and I came up with this picture that I wanted to get framed for her and that's why I thought of today's sponsor Framebridge.

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shipping is free. Plus listeners to this podcast will get 15% off their first order at frameridge.com and they use the code Stoic. Order online at frameridge.com or stop by a frameridge store to work with a designer in person if you're in New York, DC, Atlanta, Philly Boston, or Chicago. I highly recommend and thank you to frameridge for helping me set up gift for my white. I thank you to Frame Bridge for helping me set up gift for my wife. This is the only way to see life. Marcus obviously didn't want his most trusted general of videos Cassius to attempt a coup. It was quite literally a life-threatening betrayal, and Marcus could have been angry.

He could have demanded all the sadistic revenge possible to a man of his unlimited power. Instead, he saw it as a chance to practice virtue. It was a chance he said to forgive a man who has wronged one, to remain a friend to one who has transgressed friendship, to continue faithful to one who has broken faith. James Stockton obviously didn't want his A4E skyhawk to be shot down over Vietnam. As he parachuted down to his capture, he could have been scared, he could have cried and cursed the skies. Instead, he famously said to himself, I am leaving the world of technology and entering the world of epipetus. He saw an

opportunity to work on his courage, his wisdom, his self-discipline, his sense of justice. He saw that he could turn the experience into the defining event of his life, which he said in retrospect I would not trade. Zelinsky obviously didn't want Ukraine to be brutally and capriciously invaded. He could have fled, he could have taken the ride

that his allies offered, could have taken the opportunities to be rescued. Instead, a man of grim determination and resilience emerged, Zelensky became a pivot point in world history, and the moment he met adversity with virtue, met the crisis with courage and justice. May you never face such a serious and deadly crisis, but you will face adversity. It is your fate as a human being. How will you respond? How will you decide to see hardship? Let virtue lead the way," Seneca said, and every step will be safe.

Perhaps safe is the wrong word as the suffering and danger that Marcus and Stokdole and Zelensky have faced has demonstrated, but it will be the right path. And as we've been saying over and over again, let the four virtues guide you like the cardinal directions of the compass. Let them help you see hardship in life as an opportunity as grist for the mill, as a chance to prove your medal, as an opportunity to practice one or more of the four virtues courage, temperance, justice, wisdom. And as I think we can use examples like Salinsky and Stockdale and Marcus

to help guide us to be North stars as far as virtue in these crises go, I think just keeping those four virtues top of mind, having some totem or token of them can be really helpful too. And that's the idea behind the daily stoke for virtues pendant. We've had the challenge coin for a long time. Actually, here's mine right here on my desk,

but I also have the new daily stoke for virtues pendant. That's it here. Here on my desk, Acta nonverba, Deeds not words. The front of the pendant features a custom designed seal, right? Lion, that's courage. A man sprinkling water into a jug of wine that's this ancient symbol for temperance, set of scales, justice, and owl, the symbol of wisdom. And on the back, it says, acta nonverba, which is Latin for actions, not words, or deeds,

not words. I would love for you to check this out. We worked with this awesome jeweler in Brooklyn to make these new pendants. I'm always trying to improve what we do at Daily Stoke. And I really re-imagined what the pendants we have at Daily Stoke look like here. There's a new chain, a new pendant, new sterling silver. And it's really great. You can check it out at dailystoke.com slash virtues pendant, or even though store.dailystoke.com. virtues pendant or even though store.dailysteak.com.

Don't look for the third thing. The Stoics teaches that doing well is its own reward, to do the right thing, to see someone helped by it. This is enough. To go around expecting thanks, what Marcus Aurelis describes is the third thing. That is to miss the point it's being greedy. Keeping score not only misses the purposes of being good, it's foolish. Sets you up for disappointment. If you're going to do some accounting, look at it from the other direction. How many people have helped us? What do we owe them in return? How many people have helped us? What do we owe them in return? Think about clearing some debts this week

and consider forgetting any notion of others, owing you. This is from this week's entry in the Daily Stoke Journal 366 days of writing and reflection on the art of living together by myself. And the wonderful Steve Hanselman. You can buy this anywhere, books are sold. I sell a bunch of signed copies, personalized it, usually right, prepare and reflect in the Daily Stoke story. You can buy

that at store, that DailyStoke.com. And we've got two quotes from Marcus to think about today. One person on doing well by others immediately accounts the expected favor in return. Another is not so quick, but still considers the person a debtor and knows the favor. A third kind of person acts as if not conscious of the deed, rather like a vine producing a cluster of grapes without making further demands, like a horse after its race, or a dog after its walk, or a bee after making its honey. Such a person having done a good deed won't go shouting from rooftops, but simply moves on to the next deed just like the vine produces another bunch of grapes in the right season. It's Mark's Reliasis Meditations 5.6. That's just a beautiful image. Plants produce fruit. They don't

even reap the benefits of that fruit. They just do it because that's their nature. That's their job. And then we have one more. When you've done well and another has benefited by it, why like a fool, do you look for the third thing on top credit for the good deed or favor in return? That's Marx realizes meditations, seven, seven, three. Anytime Marx is repeating himself in meditation, I think it's illustrative. And I think he is doing what we all do, right? He did something good. Then he was disappointed that it either wasn't recognized or he was frustrated that it was actually interpreted incorrectly or maybe he saw, like imagine your marks to realize you're trying not to be corrected by power.

You've seen what your horrible predecessors have done and you're being attacked for it. He said that the rewards of being a leader is to do good things and earn a bad reputation. You still get attacked. And then, not only that, you see, as we're seeing now politically, right, you see one side attempting to be bipartisan and the other side not being bipartisan. In fact, taking advantage of even the impulse to be bipartisan, right?

So there's a, if you're going through life looking for this third thing, and I do this all the time myself, if you're going through life looking for that third thing, you're gonna be disappointed all the time. And you're gonna question why you were doing the good thing, because if you're doing it in this quid pro quo, one hand washes the other, you do a thing,

they do a thing. You start to go, this is a suckers payoff. Like I'm doing the right thing and I'm not getting anything for it. I'm going to stop doing the right thing. No, the stokes want you to think, no, the right thing is your job. You do the right thing because it produces pleasure for you. You do the right thing because that's what you were put here on this planet. You do the right thing because it's the right thing.

Everything else is extra. I've talked about this a bunch of times, but it's just sort of like a top of my an example because I was just doing it this morning. We pick up trash on this walk that we go on in the mornings. And, you know, I remember we, there was so much trash, I think I was telling you this, there's so much trash in the day that we had to get the ATV out and go out and pick it. We pick up this huge trash bag full of trash. And the next morning I go for a walk and, you know, I somewhat expect people to throw some trash out of their car on the next day or whatever.

It's actually worse than that. Someone threw a fucking dead dog on the side of my road, right? So I can get upset by this, I can get disgusted by this, or I can just deal with it, right? I say, my job is, I have given myself this job of keeping this thing clean because it gives me pleasure knowing I took this trash out of the environment, it's not clogging up river streams, it's not getting any animals, bellies. I'm doing that because I think it's the right thing to do.

I don't wanna be thanked, I don't want credit for it. I don't need everyone to follow suit, I'm just gonna do it. But I have to remind myself, again, no one's on the same page as you. There's still gonna be some crazy person discarding dead animal car. I don't even wanna know why this is happening. It's insane.

It's actually been a thing that's happened like since I've lived out in the country. I don't know if people, they can't be hitting them with their cars because like, I mean, you just leave it there. I don't know if there's a dog fighting ring out here or if it's a cultural thing, I don't, I don't, it's crazy. And so I just, I had, I called a different neighbor and I said, hey, can you get your tractor, scoop this thing up, dispose of it, and we'll move on, go about our days, and try to keep doing the right thing, and not let the bastards bring us down.

Don't look for the third thing, do the right thing because it's the right thing. That's this week's lesson. And as we said in the little meditations, forgive the debts that others owe you and be very diligent about paying your debts to all the people who have selflessly done good things for you in this world over the years. Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us and it would really help the show. We appreciate it, and I'll see you next episode. Hey, Prime Members, you can listen to the Daily Stoic early and ad-free on Amazon Music,

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