The Daily Stoic - We Are Free…and Not Free | Ask Daily Stoic

Episode Date: July 29, 2022

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Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoic Podcast early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today. Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we read a passage of ancient wisdom designed to help you in your everyday life. But on Fridays, we not only read this daily meditation, but I try to answer some questions from listeners and fellow stoics who are trying to apply this philosophy, whatever it is they happen to do. Sometimes these are from talks. Sometimes these are people who come up to talk to me on the street.

Sometimes these are written in or emailed from listeners. But I hope in answering their questions, I can answer your questions, give a little more guidance on this philosophy we're all trying to follow. 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.

We are free and not free. One of the most difficult concepts in Stoicism indeed in many philosophical and religious traditions is this idea that we're not in control, not in the little things nor the big things. Whether you call that God's will or the logos as the Stoics did, it's difficult to accept that free will is more circumscribed than we'd like to admit. The Stoics once compared human beings as a dog tied to a cart, and while we might have some slack in the line for the most part, we have little say over where life is going.

Does this mean that life is predetermined that our thoughts and choices are totally chosen for us, or are utterly meaningless? Far from it. As brand-blanchored, one of Marcus Aurelius' most eloquent biographers explained, constraints do not deprive us of our agency. They merely direct it. When a mathematician is making his deductions, he writes, and his thought is caught up and carried along by the logical necessity to a valid conclusion, is he thinking freely? Yes, again, though he is under the constraint of the necessity he is following. The Stokes believe that we could resist this logical necessity, or we could go with it.

The dog can lay down and be dragged if it likes. But what's the point? We can see our fate and chance in the direction of the universe as an oppressive force or as a guide. That is our call. That's our choice. But the constraint of necessity is always there, the cart is always moving,

and the world is much more powerful than we ever will be. I'm Mike Depp. Hi, how are you? I'm the product leader on Dave's team. Red obstacles away, fantastic, but I'm listening to courage is calling. Oh, thank you. With my son on the way home from soccer practice.

And so we pause in the scus, but I heard you mention that you have children. So what I'm interested in is, are there any points that you leverage that you're teaching others through your books with your children that maybe I should be aware of and leverage as well? How old are your kids? Three boys, 10, 9, and 6. So they're all clustered together.

So I have a five year old and a two year old. So they're a little younger. But one of the things I did during the pandemic is I wrote a kid's book about Marcus Aurelius, which is really supposed to be kind of a parable of leadership. What I think is so fascinating about Marcus Aurelius is his father was an emperor.

He was just chosen. He's one of the only times in history that just like a random person is just chosen to be emperor. And so he knows from a relatively young age that he will someday be king, but he doesn't know when. And he doesn't feel like that it's in his blood. He feels like it's this thing he has to earn. Which to me is such an interesting parallel to leadership.

We feel called to do something we have talent or acumen, but then we have to figure it out. How do we do it? And there's this moment in Marcus' life, so I think there's two interesting stories. We were told that he begins to cry when he's told that he's going to be a king because he knows how many bad kings there have been. He's thinking about all the ones that have been corrupted by power You know, he says Caesar of five like stained by the the cloak that they wear So he's he's aware that it's possible to do it bad and that there's like a real responsibility in it

And he wonders if he could measure up to the task And this is this is all of which is of which is the story I talked to my son about many times and did in the early days of the pandemic as I worked on this book. But he has this dream the night before he's supposed to ascend to the throne. And he dreams that his shoulders are made of ivory. So to me, the doubts, this imposter syndrome

that we all have, like, do I have what it takes? Am I capable? Am I gonna measure up? Am I gonna let people down? But this dream is that he has stronger shoulders than he knows, that he is capable of it and that he can do it. And he obviously goes out and does his best ultimately.

But I just think Marcus is this fascinating example. I was just writing about this recently. There's this the best presidents they've found have not wanted to be president. Right? It's the people who sought the office who very badly wanted power tend to be in it for the wrong reasons. And there was this great expression I read it said, be in it for the wrong reasons and there was this great expression I read it said, um, uh, happy to serve, reluctant to lead, right? But that, that set of attributes actually makes really great leaders because they're not in it for, like, they're like, I want to contribute. However, I can contribute, let me know. And then it, but they're like, they're not like, but the only way I'll contribute is if I get to boss everyone around, right? And so I think Marcus is this remarkable,

parable, and story about what that kind of leadership looks like. And it's something I'm working on, obviously, with my kids that they are more capable than they think. But again, the world doesn't revolve around them. And this is something we sort of have to earn and be worthy of is something I've been thinking a lot about. You're right.

I'm Tommy from Singapore. Yes, so we're here before. But I have an old reading of who, not necessarily the reading more obvious religious film meditations. I find that there are many parallels between Swesism, Western philosophy as well as Eastern, or Buddhist kind of philosophy. What I want to sound to, and you used to talk about stillness, how different or similar is stillness, versus mindfulness, you know, being in the moment.

I think they're very similar. And to me, the idea that two independent schools of philosophy and thought and culture, which have almost no overlap until relatively late in history, that they independently come to some of the same conclusions is really exciting and edifying in my view. it's like, it's like convergent evolution. That they adapted similar features or traits, but from independent ancestors.

I find that to be really interesting. I think there's a lot of similarities, like I was saying, I think the Eastern thought may be mindfulness meditation, the Western thought, Marcus, and I think that the Eastern thought is a very important thing. I think that the Eastern thought of similarities, like I was saying, I think the Eastern thought,

maybe mindfulness meditation, the Western thought, Marcus, meditation. He's not actually meditating, but he's meditating through writing. There are different ways of getting to the same place. So I think there's a lot of overlap. To me, the kind of Buddhism I'm most interested in, the kind of stoicism I'm most interested in, the kind of Buddhism I'm most interested in, the kind of stoicism I'm most interested in,

the kind of philosophy I'm most interested in, where I like, in the Western world, the distinction between the Stoics and the Epicureans, are very similar, is that the Stoics were still actively engaged in life, right? So I think often when we look at some of the Buddhist tradition, or there's a sort of a munkish quality to it, with draw from the world quality to it, which I certainly

appreciate and enjoy. But what I like about the Stoics is that Marcus is the Emperor of Rome and Seneca is a playwright and a power broker and a political leader. What I like about the Stoics and where I think they work well, or certainly the sort of Western philosophy works well in the Western world, is that it is designed around this sort of active engagement or connection to the polis or the civic society. I think that's really, really important. There's a way you could become so philosophical that you disengage, which obviously I'm speaking to a for-profit company here, like that's not what

what obviously would make this continue to work. So the idea of that it's possible to be philosophical and it's possible to find stillness that it's possible to get to a place of humility and that you can be resilient. But in the context of being good at your job, I think that's what excites me about Stoicism at least. Hi.

Hi. Hi, nice to meet you. Those things, your comments talking about sort of the way that it reminded him of some of the Eastern boss of feeds, when I read it, I'm not super religious, but it actually reminded me, some of the chapters were writing to me a lot of Christianity in terms of, except what's happening to you.

When you're saying, you know, this, it's almost felt like it's God's way. I know Christianity is a lot about things are gonna happen to you. It's God's bigger plan. So I was kind of struck and I thought of my own life. And I have two grandmother's. One was very Christian, one was not.

And the one that was very Christian, she just had a better attitude and I'm actually a little longer because all these things would happen to her. And she would just be like, oh, it's God's way. And I'm just gonna go through. That's what he's would happen to her. And she would just be like, oh, it's Fad's way. And I'm just going to go through. That's what he's testing me to do.

So I thought that was very interesting. So the Stoics talk about the logos, which is for the Stoics translates as the way. In the Bible, the logos translates as the word. But this idea that there is sort of an out of your control this to everything that's happening, but that someone or something is determining how they go. I think the Stoke certainly overlap there.

In the ancient world, the Stokes and the Christians, they don't get along exactly well, Marx-Ryles, Before Marx-Ryles, through Marx-Ryles, there's a number of persecutions of the Christians in by the Roman state, of course. But what is really interesting to me about the overlap is that the cardinal virtues of Stoicism are the same as the cardinal virtues of Christianity, courage, temperance, justice, wisdom. And how much of that is them coming together? How much of them is like with the Eastern tradition just independently coming to the same ideas.

But I like the idea that they're more or less an agreement about the bedrock principles of what the good life is, what we need to focus on on what we should live by. Again, one can base that ethic in the supernatural or in a metaphysical sense, the other can root it in just pure logic and reason, but I think they're coming at it from, they're ultimately getting to a similar place from different reasoning.

And again, to me, that lends an extra layer of credibility to it for sure. I agree. I was thinking about it. It's like, look, you can be a bad person and maybe you will go to hell. But also, bad people tend to live in hell while they are alive, right? You know, no one's more miserable than the disordered, addicted, disconnected, self-absorbs person. And so the stillings, I think, are making a pretty self-interested case, a logical case against many of these same things. And yeah, so I like your distinction as well.

I'm wondering what you talked about about is a marginal personal, right? Yes. Holding a mouth, being stillness and action, how do you take those kind of personal traits and turn that into advice for a leading, especially large team, and start to like the most in the volume? Yeah. I mean, when we think about this culturally, right,

we want a team that's calm. We want a team that's cool under pressure, we want a team that is connected and unified, not a team that's a bunch of sort of egotistical sort of planets in their own orbit. We want a team that's resilient, right? So I think what I like about Stoicism is that it is a somewhat individualistic philosophy in that it's like,

what are you control? You don't really control your people, you control who you are, you control how you hold yourself, you control the standards that you try to live by. At the same time, we can build those things organizationally by modeling them, right, by selecting for people who are in agreement with that, and by, you know, ideally also sort of articulating and speaking about those values.

But I try to think of my role, like for instance, inside my organization as first modeling those traits, but then also keeping the opposite of those traits out of the organization. So, and we can see, I was just watching the new Uber Showtime series. It's like, you can see where a culture that prizes just performance over the opposite of the opposite of those trades can be successful in the short term, but you know, tends to fall apart in the medium to long term.

So I kind of think about my role as the sort of cultural enforcer in the organization to go like, not only have to model this, but like, hey, I'm not gonna tolerate ego or fragility or, you know, busyness. You know, I'm gonna try to select for and support those traits in the people inside the organization, because I find that's not only where the collaboration comes from, but also the sustainable long-term performance from individuals comes from also.

I could call up my loved women's team homework. You talk about the universal being personal, universal being universal. You mentioned a lot of folks, you've been doing a lot of biographies, and then it's sent out to you and useful in some other choreographers. Yeah, for sure.

You know, I just read this biography of Anneli Merkel, which I really enjoyed. I just had her on the podcast. I don't think it's come out, but it's Cady Martin's the chancellor. You know, we tend to, again, think of leaders as this sort of charismatic, bold, visionary, sheer force of personality. And What I thought was fascinating about Merkel is that she's essentially the opposite of

all those things in every way. Yet has this remarkable 16-year tenure, she still lives in the same rent-controlled apartment that she had before she was, you know, before she was chancellor. You know, anyways, I thought that book was really great. And then one book I also read during the beginning of the pandemic was Doris Curran's Good Wins Leadership and Turbulent Times, which is basically a biography of Lincoln both Roosevelt's and then Lyndon Johnson. So not just leadership.

You know, in all moments, but she really focuses on leaders during moments of adversity, which of course the last few years have been defined by. But as we see this sort of trailing logistical nightmare that you guys are in, especially. You know, that's not going away anytime soon, and certainly it doesn't look like the world is getting more stable. So I thought that was a really great book, and I've thought about it quite a bit since I finished it. It's not that life is short,

as Seneca says, is that we waste a lot of it. The practice of Memento Mori, the meditation on death, is one of the most powerful and eye-opening things that there is. You built this Memento Mori calendar for Dio Stoke to illustrate that exact idea that your life in the best-case scenario is 4,000 weeks. Are you going to let those weeks slip by or are you going to seize them? The act of unrolling this calendar, putting it on your wall and every single week that bubble

is filled in, that black mark is marking it off forever. Have something to show, not just for your years, but for every single dot that you filled in that you really lived that week that you made something of it. You can check it out at dailysteadystoke.com slash M-M calendar. 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 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 and ad-free with Wondery Plus in Apple podcasts. 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

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