The Daily Stoic - You Just Keep Going | Hero or Nero

Episode Date: February 11, 2021

“It has been a series of body blows, hasn’t it? The economy. Politics. Our health. Maybe you lost your job. Maybe you’ve lost your hope. All of us are concerned. Each of us is unsure of lays in the future, and what kind of shape we’ll be in when it comes.”Ryan discusses the Stoic’s formula for endurance, and reads The Daily Stoic’s entry of the day, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast.This episode is brought to you by Beekeeper’s Naturals, the company that’s reinventing your medicine with clean, effective products that actually work. Beekeepers Naturals has great products like Propolis Spray and B.LXR. Beekeeper’s Naturals created a whole hive of products packed with immune-loving essentials so you can feel your best all day, every day.As a listener of the Daily Stoic Podcast you can receive 15% off your first order. Just go to beekeepersnaturals.com/STOIC or use code STOIC at checkout to claim this deal.***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: http://DailyStoic.com/signupFollow Daily Stoic:Twitter: https://twitter.com/dailystoicInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoic/Facebook: http://facebook.com/dailystoicYouTube: 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 Wondery'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. on music or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast. On Thursdays, we do double duty not just reading our daily meditation, but also reading a passage from the book The Daily Stoic, 366 meditations on wisdom, perseverance, and the art of living, which I wrote,

my wonderful co-author and collaborator, Steve Enhancelman. And so today, we'll give you a quick meditation from one of the stoics, from Epictetus Markis Relius, Seneca, and some analysis for me. And then we send you out into the world to do your best to turn these words into works. You just keep going. It has been a series of body blows, hasn't it? The economy, politics, our health, maybe lost your job,

maybe you've lost your hope, all of us are concerned, each of us is unsure what lays in the future and what kind of shape will be in when it comes. The stoics who endured some 15 years of the plague in Marcus' reign cannot offer us much guidance there. They can't tell us how to solve this. They can't tell us when this will end. So what do we do? We keep going. The Stoics were at least pretty sure about that. You keep going

step-by-step action-by-action. You don't need hope. You don't need fear either," Senika said. You just keep going, taking it day by day. In Cormick McCarthy's haunting novel, The Road, the man believed that everything depended on reaching the coast, yet waking in the night, he knew that all of this was empty and had no substance to it. The coast was just an idea, a distant point on the horizon

that served as something to measure progress against. No more, no less. So the man kept going. He pushed his car. He protected his son. He carried the fire. He tried to do what was right. Tried not to be broken down by all that was happening. Tried not to be corrupted by it. All we can do is keep going. We keep buggering on as as Churchill did. We fight on, we stick to it, we endure, we survive. Maybe things will get better soon, maybe they won't, but we'll definitely keep moving. We'll carry the fire, we'll do what's right, we won't be broken down. We'll make it where we need to go.

Hero or Neuro. Our soul is sometimes a king and sometimes a tyrant. A king by attending to what is honorable, protects the good health of the body and its care, and gives it no base or sort of command, but an uncontrolled desire, fuel, and over-indulge soul is turned from a king into the most fear and indetested thing, a tyrant. That's Seneca's moral letters, letter 114. There is that saying that absolute power corrupts absolutely, and at first glance that's true. Senaqas pupil Nero and his litany of crimes and murders is a perfect example.

Another emperor, Domitian, arbitrarily banished all philosophers from Rome, and Epictetus was forced to flee as a result. Many of Rome's emperors were tyrants. Yet, not many years later, Epic Titus would become a close friend of another emperor, Hadrian, who would help Marcus Aurelius to the throne, one of the truest examples of a wise philosopher king. So it's not clear that power always corrupts.

In fact, it looks like it comes down to, in many ways, the inner strength and self-awareness of the individuals, what they value, the desires they keep in check, whether they're understanding the fairness and justice can counteract the temptations of unlimited wealth and deference. And the same is true for you. Both personally and professionally, tyrant or king, hero or ne'ero, which, will you be, Robert Carros says that it's not the power corrupt.

He says that's too simple. He says power reveals. I think that's an interesting way to think about it. Marcus's case, power was what made him great, made him better. It showed who he really was underneath. In Nero's case, the exact opposite was true, and that was true for a lot of emperors. So the question for you as you go through life is, are the things you experience, the stresses and the successes, the temptations and the challenges? Are they going to make you better or worse? Are they going to reveal the good stuff underneath or are they going to show how rotten you

are to the core? And February and the Daily Stoke, the month is about passions and emotions. It's not that the Stoke's believed we shouldn't have any emotions. That's ridiculous. But they wanted us to be in control of them, rather than our emotions being in control of us. So it's okay to have the ambition. We have a good video on this in the day of Stoic,

but it's not good for your ambition to determine your worth as a human being, to be in charge of you. So you have to figure out a way that you are, your ruling reason is in charge of you. So you have to figure out a way that you are your ruling reason is in charge, your ethics are in charge, your purpose is in charge, not your passions, not your urges, not all these other things. And so I think we can take a minute today and that question here or a narrow, am I the good guy here? Am I the bad guy here? Am I, is what

I'm experiencing making me better or worse? That's a really, it's a really good question. I think about this as a parent, you know, the stresses and the difficulties of this, are they, they're making me better or they're making me worse? Is the responsibilities and, and rewards of being a writer is it making me a better human or a worse human? And I always, obviously, I obviously, you want it to be the better part. It's making more generous, more kind, more disciplined.

You know, Eisenhower's line about how freedom is the opportunity for discipline. Success is that way, power is that way. Stress and challenges are that way too. And they make you better. What are they revealing? Only you can answer that question. And let's just try our best today to have a good answer.

Thanks so much for listening. If you could leave a review for the podcast we'd really appreciate it. Did the reviews make a difference and of course every nice review from a nice person helps balance out. The crazy people who get triggered and angry anytime we say something they disagree with. So if you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us. It would really help the show. We appreciate it. I'll see you next episode.

Hey, Prime Members. You can listen to the Daily Stoic 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. Celebrity feuds are high stakes. You never know if you're just gonna end up on Page Six

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The first season is packed with some pretty messy pop culture drama, but none is drawn out in personal as Brittany and Jamie Lynn Spears. When Brittany's fans form the free Brittany movement dedicated to fraying her from the infamous conservatorship. Jamie Lynn's lack of public support. It angered some fans. A lot of them.

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