The Daily Stoic - What Part Will You Play? | Ask DS

Episode Date: January 11, 2024

Even the people who obstruct us, who fight against progress are playing a role. Certainly every historical period has had those people, so why should our moment be any different? That’s the role the play of life picked out for them, that’s who their character happens to be.When we understand that everyone is playing a part, that we’re all involved in the same big, messy project that is the world, we can be more understanding. We can be more patient. At the very least, we can be more tolerant and accepting and stop expecting the impossible.-And In today's Ask Daily Stoic, Ryan talks Obstacle, Ego, & Stillness to 150 Executives at the Cannonball Leadership Growth Conference with Chad Sanschagrin, a well-known executive leadership and sales coach. He founded Cannonball Moments to empower, motivate, and encourage others to reach their full potential. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail🏛 Check out the Daily Stoic Store for Stoic inspired products, signed books, and more.📱 Follow us: Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, FacebookSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

I remember very specifically, I rented an Airbnb in Santa Barbara. I was driving from San Francisco to Los Angeles. I just sold my first book and I've been working on it and I just needed a break, I needed to get away and I needed to have some quiet time to write. And that was one of the first Airbnb's I ever started with. And then when the book came out and did well, I bought my first house, I would rent that house out during South by Southwest and F1 and other events in Austin. Maybe you've been in a similar place. You've stayed in an Airbnb and you thought yourself, this actually seems pretty doable.

Maybe my place could be an Airbnb. You could rent a spare bedroom, you could rent your whole place when you're away. Maybe you're planning a ski getaway this winter or you're planning on going somewhere warmer while you're away, you could Airbnb your home and make some extra money towards the trip. Whether you use the extra money to cover some bills or for something a little more fun,

your home could be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca slash host. I'm F.O.H.R.T. And I'm Peter Freggepan. And in our new podcast Legacy, we explore the lives of some of the biggest characters in history. This season, we delve into the life of Pablo Picasso, hugely interesting, important influential artist, certainly the greatest of the 20th century, perhaps the greatest of all time, but a man with a complicated, difficult, personal side too that makes us look at his art in a different way.

The ultimate giant of modern art, and someone who everyone has heard of or seen a Picasso work, all the Picasso brand on something. But who was he as a person, as a husband, as a lover? He was a genius and he was very problematic. You can binge entire seasons of Legacy ad-free on Amazon Music, or by subscribing to Wondery Plus on Apple Podcasts or the Wondery app. 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 in fellow Stoics. We're 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 happen to be someone there recording, but thank you for listening. And we hope this is of use to you. What park will you play? Everyone is playing a role in life.

Everyone is playing a part. In Meditations, Mark Sterelyse reminds himself that everyone is working on the same project, even if they don't realize it. In fact, we ourselves sometimes don't realize it. Sure we want to believe that a world without selfish or shameless or dishonest people is possible, but it isn't. Even the people who obstruct us, who fight against progress or playing a role, certainly every historical period has had those people, so why should our moment be any different? That's the role the play of life

picked out for them, that's who their character happens to be. And when we understand that everyone is playing a part that we're all involved in the same big messy project that is the world, we can be more understanding, we can be more patient. The very least, we can be more tolerant and accepting than stop, expecting, the impossible. It's also a reminder to be grateful for the role that we seem to have been assigned. The fact that you're listening to this, the fact that you're even thinking about these things means you've dodge the bullet, you aren't an idiot, you aren't an evil villain, you aren't a fool, and at least right now, right now.

As Marcus really points out, yes, we all have a job, but we should make sure that it's not the job, Chris Sippis speaks of, the bad line in the play, put there for laughs. We all have a role. Let's just make sure. It's a good one. Hey, it's Brian. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stolen Podcast. It's not my main criteria, but it is a really important one. So if you're ever thinking about having me come talk, obviously I think about whether I have the time, I think about what's going on my life,

but I also think about, can I bring my kids? It sucks to be gone and I hate being gone. In any time I can work, but also bring the family along. I'm very excited. And so when I can't ask to do this talk in San Antonio, I was like, it's not at the JW Marriott, is it? And they're like, yeah, it is. And I was like, I'm in, I'm in. Why am I in? Because this hotel has a water park, lazy river, and a bunch of awesome water slides. And I knew my kids would be very excited. And they had an amazing time. The group, the leadership group that I talked to was great. I'm going to bring you a selection of some of the questions they asked me. But the memorable thing to me, as my kids still talk about is we're climbing up the tower to the water slide.

And my son starts talking about this raccoon. And I'm sort of like, uh-huh, sure, sure, there's a raccoon. And there was a raccoon. There was a raccoon living in the water tower. And I was just hanging out. He was blown away by and they talk about it all the time. They go, why do you think that raccoon's doing? I don't know. If anyone listening here knows about the raccoon or what it's up to, I'm sure my kids would appreciate the update. None of this has anything to do with the questions that I was asked by the group. I will say, I gave my normal talk on stoicism. We talked obstacle ego and stillness. Not bringing you that. Not bringing anything about the raccoon. I am going to bring you some of the questions that the folks asked me. I thought they were great. I thought you might like to listen to them.

I wish I could have brought you a recording of the conversation ahead before the talk. My friend, Manujanogli, came out. We talked stosism a little bit before. We just started hung out and chatted. We had lunch actually by the pool. And then I went and did my thing. It was a fun, awesome experience. Thanks to the Cannonball Leadership Growth Conference for having me out. Thank you to you for listening. Here is the Q&A from that talk.

Enjoy. First was the, had a marketing career. It was obviously fascinated by and really interested in philosophy. One of the things I took from Robert, actually, Robert was on the board of directors of the company and that's sort of how I ended up

getting introduced to them. But to just talk about the things or just write about the things and not have sort of tangible real world experience with power and influence and people and logistics and all those things, I think it's not the right fit. So I wanted to have sort of real experience doing stuff. So that was why I went through that. And I obviously learned a lot of great lessons

and then a lot of things not to do, which obviously shaped the ego's enemy, which I wrote during the implosion of that company, actually. Thank you, Ryan. This was awesome. If you Ryan. Yes. Awesome. If you were Marcus Aurelius and you were the emperor of the United States. Yeah, 2022.

What change would you make? I mean, I think what's great about America is that we don't have an emperor, right? And this seems to be a thing that a lot of our presidents struggle with, right? The idea that it's three co-equal branches of government and the whole point is the ability to sort of compromise and collaborate between the two, that the president is an executive functionary, not the sort of emperor or sort of dictator of anything. I think a lot of our leaders have struggled to actually fundamentally understand how the system of government that we have even operates. So I don't know if

I would look forward to the position of being emperor at all. Plus, just to sort of digress historically a little bit, when Marcus really is actually thrust in kind of a similar position. So one Roman had been a republic for a long time, but his father is not emperor, Antoninus is his stepfather, who in turn was selected to be emperor. So there's five Roman emperors in row or four in row

who don't have a male heir. So they have to choose their successor. So Marcus is chosen in his teenage years, maybe a little bit younger. He sort of has this potential. The emperor Hadrian sees something in him. And I don't know what it was exactly, but he decides like this kid deserves to be the most powerful person in the world. What would make someone think that? I don't know, but he's too young. And so he chooses, this is the third part of discipline, it's destiny actually, I wrote a lot about it, I'm so fascinated by it. He realizes that he needs someone to teach him and prepare him for this role.

So he chooses his man named Antoninus Pius, who was the most powerful politician in Rome at this time, who's like in his late 50s. And so they think, you know, Hadrian is thinking, so Hadrian adopts Antoninus who in turn adopts Marx's reliance, and they're probably thinking like Antoninus will live for five more years and then Marx will become emperor.

Well, Antoninus lives in rules for two more decades. And, you know, could have gotten rid of Marcus at any time, could have, you know, declared his family. The, you could have done anything, but what he actually did, which was meticulously and selflessly train this person for the job every day for the next two decades. And it's the sort of remarkable never before seen

or to happen again, sort of study of what it takes to be great, which obviously I would not have had. So I don't think I'm ready for the job. But then the other remarkable thing, just again, the idea of what a powerful example can do it. So Marcus is part of this weird succession plan. There's kind of this extra character. There was a previous person that Antoninus had thought

might be a good emperor. That guy has a son. So basically Marcus has a step brother, and he's named emperor, and he has a step brother. And like we know what you're supposed to do when you get power. You seem game of thrones or anything, right? You gotta get rid of this guy.

And Marcus instead, the first thing he does with absolute power is anoint his step brother, co-emperor. So first thing he does is the emperor of Rome is get rid of half of his power and share it. And we think he was trying to set Rome back on the path towards a republic previously that had been ruled by two consoles, two sort of co-equal leaders.

And so I don't know if there's anything to take from Marcus, the first thing you should do with absolute power is give it away, because it's not good for you or for anyone. I'm somewhat personal. Okay. I think for many of us in this room, you've given us so many answers to our problems and our struggles.

And so my question would be is what answers are you struggling for right now and then how do you go about finding them? That's a really good question. Well, so right now in this series I'm doing, so I've done courage, I've done discipline, the book I'm writing about now is Justice. I think Justice, one of the problems with some of these virtues, is what they mean to us,

is not what they were actually talking about. When we think about temperance, when they talk about temperance, but they really mean it's discipline. When they talk about justice, when we hear justice, we think the law law or like whether it's something's legal or illegal, maybe we think about social justice, which is now a sort of political connotation.

But I think the Stokes were talking about like the right thing. They were saying like, you have to do the right thing, which is easy to say, but what is the right thing? And so as I have been thinking about and writing this book, I've really been struggling with that idea. Like, how do you know what the right thing. And so as I have been thinking about and writing this book, I've really been struggling with that idea. How do you know what the right thing is? How do you know what the right thing is right now,

which might not be necessarily, like it might be glib or easy to say you should do X, but does that put you in a position to not be able to do Y late, right? Like when we talk about what the right thing is, this is the million dollar, billion dollar question, what is the right thing? So I'm thinking a lot about that, right?

If you think about these virtues, how related they are, interrelated they all are, like to be courageous, in pursuit of the wrong thing, or the selfish thing, or the destructive thing, obviously isn't right. Or how smart can you be if you don't know, if you don't do it's right or you put that brain power to work on the wrong topics, right? So that's what I'm thinking a lot about now. I don't know if anyone has the answer.

I don't know if I'll have the answer, but I'm thinking a lot about that idea. What is justice? What is the right thing? What's our obligation as human beings, knowing how to get ahead in your career is maybe easier than like that hard right thing with Marshall or the decision to like give the job to someone else. 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, download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and ad-free with Wondery Plus in Apple podcasts. Hey, I'm Michelle Beato. And I'm Peter Rosenberg. Hey, Peter, tell the people about our new podcast.

Right, it's called Over the Top, and we cover the biggest topics in sports and pop culture, using Royal Rumble rules. That means we'll start with two stories. Toss one out on its ass and dive into the other stories with ruthless aggression. Oh, but it never stops because every 90 seconds after that. Oh God, whose music is that? Another story comes down to the ring.

Rinse and repeat until we arrive at the one most important thing on planet Earth that week. Follow over the top on the OneDrew app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to over the top early and add free right now by joining OneDrew Plus. For the record, this is not a wrestling podcast. No, no, but it is inspired by wrestling. Is it everything inspired by wrestling, Beetle? Fair point. Yeah!