The Daily Stoic - This Isn’t How You’ll Be Measured | Ask DS

Episode Date: August 29, 2024

We know that ultimately lives are not measured by superficial or materialistic things…yet we spend so much of our lives focused solely on that. Ask DS: How can we move past feeling guilt or shame?What did the Stoics say about losing loved ones?How can we get better at saying no? + More! 📚 Grab a copy of Die With Zero by Bill Perkins | https://www.thepaintedporch.com/🎙️ Listen to Bill Perkins' interview | Apple Podcasts, Spotify, & Wondery🎟 Ryan Holiday is going on tour! Grab tickets for London, Rotterdam, Dublin, Vancouver, and Toronto at ryanholiday.net/tour💡 The Wealthy Stoic: A Daily Stoic Guide to Being Rich, Happy, and Free explores how stoic ideas can be applied to personal finance, wealth-building, financial mindset, and how it can help you overcome common financial obstacles and challengesGet The Wealthy Stoic: A Daily Stoic Guide to Being Rich, Happy, and Free & all other Daily Stoic courses for FREE when you join Daily Stoic Life | dailystoic.com/life✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/📱 Follow 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.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to the daily Stoic early and ad free right now. Just join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. We've got a bit of a commute now with the kids and their new school. And so one of the things we've been doing as a family is listening to audiobooks in the car. Instead of having that be dead time, we want to use it to have a live time. We really want to help their imagination soar. And listening to Audible helps you do precisely that. Whether you listen to short stories,

self-development, fantasy, expert advice, really any genre that you love, maybe you're into stoicism. And there's some books there that I might recommend by this one guy named Ryan. Audible has the best selection of audio books without exception and exclusive Audible originals all in one easy app.

And as an Audible member, you choose one title a month to keep from their entire catalog. By the way, you can grab Right Thing right Now on Audible. You can sign up right now for a free 30-day Audible trial and try your first audiobook for free. You'll get Right Thing Right Now totally for free. Visit audible.ca to sign up. Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we read a passage of ancient wisdom designed to help you in your everyday life. Well on Thursdays, we not only read the daily meditation, but we answer some questions from

listeners and fellow Stoics who are trying to apply this philosophy just as you are. Some of these come from my talks, some of these come from Zoom sessions that we do with Daily Stoic Life members or as part of the challenges. Some of them are from interactions I have on the street when there happened to be someone there recording. But thank you for listening and we hope this is of use to you. This isn't how you'll be measured. Seneca was a very rich man.

Marcus Aurelius was too. Cicero's family made a fortune in business and he made a fortune in law. We know this from the historical record, of course, but to the vast majority of people who even know the names of these men, their financial success is but a footnote. Instead, we admire Seneca for the incredible philosophy he wrote. We admire Marcus Aurelius for how he lived and who he was as a person. Cicero's inspiring speeches against tyranny and his defense of the Republic, this is his legacy. And what mattered far more to the people who knew and loved them in life was something entirely different

and far more personal. We know that's how it works. We know that ultimately our lives are not measured by superficial or materialistic things, yet we spend so much of our lives focused solely on that. Look, if all you want to have is a pile of money at the end, well, I guess that's your choice, Bill Perkins writes in his fascinating book, Die Was Zero.

But bear in mind, he adds, that I have never seen somebody's total net worth posted on their tombstone. When we launched the Wealthy Stoic a couple of months back, our course on what the Stoics taught and thought about money, people assumed we were selling Stoicism as a success strategy. We were, just not like they were thinking. Because Stoicism is a philosophy designed to help you become wealthy and successful, just not like that.

It's a different kind of success, a different definition of wealth. Yes, it's a matter of fact that many of the Stoics were literally wealthy, but much more importantly, they were figuratively wealthy. They understood the value of wealth. Yes, it's a matter of fact that many of the stoics were literally wealthy, but much more importantly, they were figuratively wealthy. They understood the value of things, what should be prized and what shouldn't be prized, and they knew how little they actually needed. They lived wealthy lives because they knew what was enough and they were empowered because they could provide

for themselves and their families. But most of all, they were wealthy because their lives were full of purpose and meaning. Wealth consists not in having great possessions but in having few wants. Petita says that's what it means to be a wealthy stoic and that's what we get into in the Wealthy Stoic Course. How to be truly rich. How to get out from under the thumb of money and how to be happy with enough. How to thrive and succeed and live a good and happy life. If that's the kind of life you want, head over to Daily dailystoic.com slash wealthy.

You can sign up today. And remember, if you're a Daily Stoic Life member, you get this course and all our courses for free. So you can sign up for that over at dailystoiclife.com. And do read Die with Zero. It's a great book. We had Bill on the podcast recently. I thought it was a great interview

and I'll link to that in today's show notes too. ["Dying with Zero"] and I'll link to that in today's show notes too. Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome to another Thursday episode of the Daily Stove Podcast, where I answer your questions as you know, and I've been bringing you some little snippets from the Q and A's that I did in Sydney and Melbourne. As you know, I'm on tour. I'm gonna be in a bunch of different cities in Europe

and two in Canada in November. You can grab tickets for London, Rotterdam, Dublin, Vancouver, and Toronto at RyanHoliday.net. But in today's episode, I wanted to bring you some of the questions that the folks asked me in Sydney. I hope you enjoy. Thanks to everyone that came out and it's always a pleasure.

Good afternoon, good to have you back. It's lovely to hear you describe your time here in the country with your family, which leads me to ask, you didn't mention the day of the day, which as a father and a stepfather, I find enormously valuable. You've given us the example of people who aren't doing this work in the public eye.

Who in your mind is doing this work so well as a father and perhaps even a leader of either a company or a country? That's a great question. You know, I got so much out of writing the Daily Stoke that everyday thinking about these things and being forced to think about them from these different angles,

to repeat these kind of timeless principles over and over again, has been so valuable to me personally. I believe I started daily, yeah, was to force myself through that process as a parent. What's important, what actually matters, what's easy to miss, what are the values that I want to parent by. So we started daily, yeah, around that idea. I think I started it when my I was maybe two or three,

so I've been at it quite a while. And I think it's going to be better. By no means perfect, I'm struggling with it every day. I lose my temper every single day. I lose my shit every single day, is probably what I would say. I wonder if you're any good at this. I wonder if you're doing this well. I think these are all important questions to be asking,

but I've been doing Daily Guest for that reason, and I've gotten a lot out of it. You can sign up if anyone wants to get it. It's just dailyguest.com. It's not for badasses. It's time again. It's one piece of parent-oriented advice every day. But I wish I could say that these people are great parents. Unfortunately, most people in the public eye are not.

We find that out in retrospect. And I'll leave it to their kids to decide whether they're good or not. But I do try to learn little things here and there. Are there some other interesting way to think about it? Or conversely, here's a colossal tragic mistake that this person made that we can learn from. What do the parents who lost children have to tell us?

What do the parents who lost touch with their children, what do they have to tell us? What do parents who look further along wish they'd done differently? That's what I've tried to build it around, and it's just my favorite thing to do. So thank you for the chrabbit. Is there anyone who's not a do-in-some

that we can talk to? No thanks. Hi. Hi. I think a lot of people in this room would be in a similar boat where you may have invested time to become more self-aware or conscious of your ego, which also catalyzes you to reflect on your own life and things you may have done in your life. And I've personally experienced moments of reflection or maybe guilt or shame of previous actions which may have been as a result of your ego and

They are no longer within your control So wondering how you navigate those experiences where you feel like you're not in control anymore and moving forward with those feelings of guilt or shame Santa said when I think of all the things I have said, I end in the mute. As someone who's had a deeply unpleasant experience of editing my own books that have come out, I can relate to that. Nothing gets you cringe more than having to see things that you put out in print for millions of people and now you go, what was I talking about? How did I possibly feel qualified to say that? So yeah, if you look back on things you have done

and said ways to treat people and you never think, wow, I was an enormous idiot, you are probably in the sway of ego, you're either a saint, which you are almost certainly not, or you're delusional. This sort of cringe and pain that you feel, I mean, a positive way to think about it is we feel that because we've changed and evolved.

And it would be strange if we look back at who we were when we were younger, when we knew less, when we experienced less. when we experienced less, and we're just like, yeah, I got it totally right. Everything that's happened subsequently is at zero new information or perspective, right? So it's good to have this, but the ability to make amends, to own mistakes, to be responsible,

the thing that this is a key, a key thing, it's certainly key as a parent. I know, I don't remember my parents ever apologizing for much, I try to apologize, I apologize every day for something I said when I was frustrated. I try to hone what I've done, I try to get the honesty in the mirror.

Sometimes that's really painful, sometimes it's, you look at it so, you can't look at it straight on. You gotta see it from an angle and you're working on it. But to me that's a sign of progress. And I'm trying to get better at making amends and I see that as part of that self-increment process. That's why we're doing the work, to learn things, to be better,

and not being who we used to be. Such a big fan of yours. Oh, thank you. I have your books here. I wanted to ask you about the daily story of today. Today's one is about not letting your career, you know, be your life's sentence and eventually letting it go. Since your career and wake life is stoicism,

what is your succession plan? How do you plan to see that? What are you trying to say? No, look, I have a thing I do. I go into music book stores, and I'm always struck by the large piles they have of books that were once popular and then people gathered them. They don't want them anymore. No one cares anymore. And you can see, you know, no one's moment in the spotlight is forever. We'd say that everyone has their 15 minutes of fame. You know, no one's career goes on indefinitely. So I try to remind myself of this, because there's at some point you reach the peak

and it's all downhill from there, it might be slow, it might be steady, but at some point you have done your best work and everything else is an echo or a shadow of that. And I try to be honest about the fact that that will happen to me. Maybe it's already happened to me. But in the meantime, I'm gonna keep doing my best. I'm gonna keep showing up. And I generally, though, try not to think that much about how things are selling or how they're doing.

Early on in my career, as I said, I was like, how do these do? What do they say about it? I would say I was probably 90% focused on that and 10% satisfied with the work that I did. I tried to flip that. The irony has been the less I carried out the external results and the status or the recognition of it, the better I seem to have done.

Right now, maybe the number one in the US in June, which was actually a surprise. It was very cool, but it wasn't what I was thinking about. Now maybe that's the high water mark. And if so, so be it. I'll gladly take that as a high water mark. And in the meantime, I just wanna keep doing what I love doing.

And I keep doing it. The audience was half as big big, 10% as big, 5% as big. Maybe if it got to a certain level I'd stop publishing and just do it for me. But I'd still be doing the thing because I get the value out of doing it. Just remind me of what the Stolwix had to say about navigating profound loss in terms of losing loved ones. Sure. Yeah, this is a timeless part of the human experience, unfortunately. his children. Seneca buries his only child. He writes a series of very beautiful essays. They're a series called Consolations. He writes one to his mother when Seneca is exiled.

He writes another to the daughter of a friend who died. The end given, the stokes for unfeeling, that they were unaffected by loss or pain or grief is totally belied by these beautiful moving essays that I reread when I lose someone, that I pass to people when they ask me this question. There's some of the most beautiful, profound writings that the Stokes have ever produced.

My favorite one in one of the profound writings that the Stokes have ever produced. My favorite one in one of the essays, Erica is writing to this woman who lost her father. She's talking about how the memory of him, every time she thinks of him, she just breaks down a cry and she's so upset she can't function. And he says, look, your father loved you a great deal. Obviously, he wants to be remembered by you. But if you told him, he says, if he's up there somewhere, you could tell him that after he died, that his memory, whatever you thought of him, it brought you crippling gone, but our memories should be something positive, right? And I think if you can, I just think about that all the time.

What would this person want me to think when I think of them? And so, the notes are not saying you feel sadness and loss, stuff it down, don't be weakly. Some of the only stories we have about Marxist, who other historical sources, involve him crying over the loss of people that he loved. The tutor, he leaps over the victims of this play, this devastating pandemic that he experiences. So the students were not unfeeling, they were not loose, but they did try to, when they were overcome by those feelings,

and when they were crippled by them, try to go, okay, let me think through this. Let me question some of these assumptions, and how can that help me move on and process these feelings instead of denying them? Thank you for an amazing talk. My pleasure, thank you for coming. One thing that you talked about was saying no and this is something I struggle with. I was wondering if you could role play. Okay. With that in mind, would you like to go for lunch I'm sure you're very nice and sure you're lovely, I've got other plans.

Some thoughts on saying, you know, first off, something I've learned, you don't have to reply at all, because ignoring it sometimes goes away. Or you can reply after the date, and you be like, sorry I missed this. I've learned a couple things. One, you don't have to say sorry first. It's your time, it's your life. You should spend it properly. We would never let someone build on our property or steal our money, but we let people take our time as if it was, as if we have an unlimited amount of it, but we don't.

The other thing I learned on our way is when you explain, right, when you give reasons, what you're often telling that person is, please try to convince me that I shouldn't do it. And so getting clearer and more straightforward, realizing, as they say, you know is a complete sentence, is a powerful way to think about it. So I appreciate the invite for those of you.

Hey, it's Ryan. Thank you for listening to the Daily Stoic podcast. I just wanted to say we so appreciate it. Ryan. Thank you for listening to the Daily Stoic podcast. I just wanted to say we so appreciate it. We love serving you. It's amazing to us that over 30 million people have downloaded these episodes in the couple years we've been doing it. It's an honor. Please spread the word, tell people about it. And this isn't to sell anything. I just wanted to say thank you. If you like the daily stoic and thanks for listening, you can listen early and ad free right now

by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music. And before you go, would you tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey on wondery.com slash survey. Welcome to the offensive line. You guys on this podcast, we're going to make some picks, talk some and hopefully make you some money in the process. I'm your host, Annie Hagar. So here's how this show is going to work. Okay. We're going to run

through the weekly slate of NFL and college football matchups, breaking them down into very serious categories like no offense, no offense, Travis them down into very serious categories like No Offense. No offense Travis Kelce, but you gotta step up your game if Pat Mahomes is saying the Chiefs need to have more fun this year. We're also handing out a series of awards and making picks for the top storylines surrounding the world of football. Awards like the He May Have a Point award for the wide receiver that's most justifiably bitter.

Is it Brandon Iyuk, T Higgins, or Devontae Adams? Plus on Thursdays we're doing an exclusive bonus episode on Wondery+, where I share my fantasy football picks ahead of Thursday Night Football and the weekend's matchups. Your fantasy league is as good as locked in. Follow the offensive line on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can access bonus episodes and listen ad-free right now by joining Wondery+.