The Daily Stoic - We Are What We Repeatedly Do

Episode Date: April 21, 2020

Arete.That’s a powerful word. To the Greeks, it meant excellence. It was the ultimate expression of human greatness—moral, physical, spiritual. It’s what the Stoics were chasing. It’s what you’re chasing today. But how do we get there?Ryan discusses how we can achieve arete through the power of habits, and introduces the Daily Stoics's newest online course: Habits for Success, Habits for Happiness. It's six weeks of emails designed to completely rework your relationship with your habits—and make them the best they can be.Purchase it here: dailystoic.com/habits***If you enjoyed this week’s podcast, we’d love for you to leave a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps with our visibility, and the more people listen to the podcast, the more we can invest into it and make it even better.Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: DailyStoic.com/signupFollow @DailyStoic:Twitter: https://twitter.com/ryanholidayInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/ryanholiday/Facebook: http://facebook.com/ryanholidayYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/dailystoicSee 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 the Daily Stoic. For each day we read a short passage designed to help you cultivate the strength, insight, wisdom necessary for living good life. Each one of these passages is based on the 2000-year-old philosophy

that has guided some of history's greatest men and women. For more, you can visit us at dailystowach.com. We are what we repeatedly do. Arate, that's a powerful word. To the Greeks, it meant excellence. It was the ultimate expression of human greatness, moral, physical, spiritual. It's what the Stoics were chasing.

It's what you're chasing today. But how do we get there? Well, Arate requires a certain philosophical approach, because brilliance and inspiration and skill are not enough. We are what we repeatedly do, Aristotle said. Therefore, excellence is not an act, but a habit. In other words, excellence isn't this thing you do one time. It's a way of living.

It's foundational. It's like an operating system, and the code this system operates on is habit. As Epic Titus would later say, capability is confirmed and grows in its corresponding actions, walking by walking and running by running. Therefore, if you want to do something, make a habit of it. So, if we want to be happy, if we want to be successful, if we want to be great, we have to develop the capability. We have to develop the day-to-day habits that allow this to ensue. And that's great news because it means that impressive results and enormous changes are

possible without herculean effort or magical formulas. Small adjustments, good systems, the right processes, that's what it takes. Things like when we wake up, what we study and practice, who we have in our lives as influences, where we go and how we spend our time. There is nothing more powerful than a good habit. Nothing that holds us back quite like a bad habit. We are what we do, what we do determines who we can be. You know this, you've seen the forces at work in your own life for better and frustratingly all too often for worse. Today is the day to start harnessing these powers and wielding them properly, to stop being jerked around by our habits, to no longer be a passive observer of our own virtues and vices. It won't be easy, but it will be transformational.

For the last six months, Daily Stoke has been developing the Daily Stoic Habits Challenge, Habits for Success, Habits for Happiness. We've sifted through the greatest Stoic wisdom and aimed it at one of the most challenging parts of life, habit formation and growth. These are difficult times where in economic uncertainty, personal adversity, these things can sink you or they can be opportunities to improve They can be obstacles you triumph over or setbacks that bring you to your knees What will it be habits answer that question if you can cultivate good habits you can survive

Even thrive what lies ahead if you relapse and fall to the level of your worst habits These hard times will only be harder. We're inviting you to spend the next six weeks challenging yourself to change what you repeatedly do. And we are promising that if you can do that, you can achieve arate, personally and professionally. If you want to do or be something, Epitita said, make a habit of it. So let's make a habit of arate. And let's remember his habit of Arate. And let's remember his most urgent and challenging question.

How much longer are you gonna wait to demand the best of yourself? How about not one second longer? Let's start today. If you wanna join us in this challenge, I'll be doing it alongside you. It's six weeks of really awesome life altering habits based on Stoke Wisdom.

You can check that out at dailystoke.com slash habits dailystoke.com slash habits. Can't wait to see you. Let's change and improve together. 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. Raising kids can be one of the greatest rewards of a parent's life. But come on, some days's parenting is unbearable.

I love my kid, but is a new parenting podcast from Wondry that shares of our freshly honest and insightful take on parenting. Hosted by myself, Megan Galey, Chris Garcia, and Kurt Brown all our, we will be your resident not so expert experts. Each week we'll share a parenting story that'll have you laughing, nodding, and thinking, oh yeah, I have absolutely been there. We'll talk about what went right and wrong, what would we do differently? And the next time you step on yet another stray Lego in the middle of the night, you'll feel less alone. So if you like to laugh with us as we talk about the hardest job in the world, listen to, I love my kid,

but wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad-free on the Amazon Music or Wondery app.