THE ED MYLETT SHOW - Ryan Holiday on How Stoic Principles Can Help You Thrive in Modern Society

Episode Date: October 8, 2024

"How Do You Master Stillness in a World of Chaos?" In this inspiring episode, I sit down with one of the brightest minds in modern-day philosophy, Ryan Holiday. Together, we explore the wisdom behind Stoicism and how its timeless principles can help us navigate through the chaos of today's world. Ryan unpacks the ideas behind his bestselling book "Stillness Is the Key" and shares the strategies that high performers use to cultivate peace and clarity amidst constant pressure. We get into the real stuff—like how to manage your mind, how to control your emotions, and why mastering stillness can be your ultimate advantage. Whether you're an entrepreneur, athlete, parent, teacher, or simply someone trying to find balance, Ryan’s insights will give you the tools to not just survive but THRIVE in the midst of adversity. This conversation will challenge you to rethink how you approach your life and elevate your performance, all while finding that crucial stillness in your day-to-day. Key takeaways from this episode: The power of stillness and how to cultivate it in a world full of distractions Practical Stoic practices to enhance your mental toughness and resilience How controlling your emotions can make you a better leader and performer Ryan’s personal rituals for maintaining focus and balance Why slowing down can actually speed up your success Whether you're battling constant distractions, struggling with stress, or seeking more clarity in your daily grind, this episode delivers actionable wisdom you can apply immediately. From harnessing ancient Stoic practices to controlling your inner dialogue, this is a blueprint for finding calm amidst the chaos and sharpening your mental edge. Get ready to unlock the power of stillness to transform how you perform, lead, and live! This conversation will inspire you to slow down, focus, and ultimately accelerate your success. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So hey guys, listen, we're all trying to get more productive and the question is, how do you find a way to get an edge? I'm a big believer that if you're getting mentoring or you're in an environment that causes growth, a growth based environment, that you're much more likely to grow and you're going to grow faster. And that's why I love Growth Day. Growth Day is an app that my friend Brendan Burchard has created that I'm a big fan of. Write this down, growthday.com forward slash ed. So if you want to be more productive, by the way the way he's asked me I post videos in there every single Monday that gets your day off to the right start he's got about five thousand ten thousand dollars worth of courses that are in there that come with the app also some of the top influencers in the world are all posting content and they're

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Shop now at dell.com forward slash deals. This show is sponsored by Airbnb. So you guys know I travel a lot and I gotta tell you, I've been having a hard time staying in hotels because frankly of the noise. So I've been staying at Airbnbs when I go and it's a much better experience. So the last time I'm staying in one, I'm like, wait a minute, this is a great deal for me, but it's a great deal for who owns this place.

And it occurred to me, I had to turn my homes into Airbnbs and now it's generating me revenue when I'm not there. Your home may be worth more than you think. Find out how much more at airbnb.ca slash host. So hey, welcome back to the show today everybody. This guest that's coming back on, I just enjoyed, I was just telling him, our first conversation immensely. I just, I really think very highly of this man and his work. By the

way before we get started let me say one thing. This is for men and women. Oftentimes when you have Ryan on I think people think about dudes and Ryan's work is as gender non-specific as you could possibly imagine yet usually the work will say man this or men that but this is for everybody and in fact I know my audience really well. The ladies in this audience will get as much if not more out of today's Program then then the men will and and that's because of this man. He's like a modern-day Philosopher I would say And he's actually shifted culture a little bit and the more and more he writes he's gonna shift culture even more

He's that influential sold over 10 million books. His books are just incredible. He's obviously known for his work with stoic type work. His new book is called Right Thing Right Now. Good values, good character, good deeds. And I'd say he embodies a whole bunch of that himself. So Ryan Holiday, welcome back, sir. Well, thank you. That's very, very nice. And I appreciate you saying that thing at the beginning, because I do think when people hear stoic philosophy, they think masculine or they think men or they think the military, or they maybe even think of a bunch of negative traits, sort of emotionlessness, invulnerability, suppression. And that's that I don't think that's helping. And I don't think that's what stoicism as a philosophy is supposed to be. So I appreciate you calling that out. It's true. By the way, people think of being Stoic and Stoicism is the same thing, and that's not the case whatsoever, correct? That's exactly right. There's lowercase Stoic, that's the word in English, and then there's Stoicism, this philosophy that's built around these four virtues of courage, self-discipline, but also justice and

wisdom. And these four ideas balance each other out and you can't have one without the other. Too much self-discipline becomes a vice, too much courage, but in pursuit of the wrong cause or something that is unjust is also not virtue. And so so, yeah, it's it's it's not what people think necessarily. Yeah. Well, by the way, courage, temperance, justice, wisdom, I think Marcus Aurelius called them the touchstones of goodness. Right. Yes. They're what you want to build your life around.

And and these are these are known as the cardinal virtues. And I think because those are also the cardinal virtues of Catholicism and Christianity, sometimes people think that cardinal has a religious connotation, the word cardinal, but cardinal comes from the Latin cardos, which just means hinge. So basically these are like pivotal things

that you're supposed to sort of hang. You could say that the door to the good life hangs on. So yeah, a lot of these, a lot of these words, because of their history, can sort of connotate something to some people that maybe have an immediate bit of resistance to or skepticism about. But I promise when you dig in, you find, oh yeah, I totally agree with that. Even though even the word justice, I think when people hear the word justice, they think the legal system, they think judges and juries, which of course, that is based around the idea of justice. But justice as a virtue is really the standards

that we hold ourselves to. So your word in a contract is a legal matter. Your word between you and I as human beings is also a matter of justice but there's no enforcement mechanism here. It's just whether we're the kind of person who can be counted on and does what they say or not. The reason I love Ryan's work is that it's kind of counterculture in this sense, and it shouldn't be. And here we go, everybody. This is why I say it's gender neutral. You ladies ask yourself this question. Do you want friends that have courage, temperance, are just and have some wisdom to bring to the table? Of course you do. Right. And it's counterculture in the sense that it's really old principles.

I would call them. And yet in a culture today that everything's a hack, everything's a routine, everything's a, hey, there's the new way to hack your neurochemistry, you know, and it's this work that's dominated culture that's from another time that is so fitting today. And it's odd, it's the stuff my dad raised me with to some extent, or the men and women I've admired in my life, yet no one writes about this stuff anymore

and talks about it. So let's start, let's pick apart the new book because it's outstanding. It's called Right Thing Right Now, you guys. Let's start with a premise of the book because it's really broken down into three sections. I loved it. But like this North Star thing to begin with. So what is having a North Star? Why does it matter?

What's the concept? I worked for this entrepreneur for a long time and I remember this very pivotal conversation where someone was trying to tell him, Hey, and this is a complicated guy, so we don't need to get into him. I'll just take this this story, this this little part of it. He was saying, you know, someone was suggesting that, you know, if you move the factories overseas, the whole business will be more profitable, we'll make a bunch more money. And he sort of looked at them and he said something like, look, if all I cared about was profit, I would have just become a drug dealer.

And basically what he was saying is that, like, look, but by definition of what we chose, we already said raw profitability is not what we're after. If it is, we'd all be working for a hedge fund, right? We became a personal trainer, or in my case, write about ancient philosophy, or you joined the armed forces, or you became a science teacher. You chose what you chose because it was important and meaningful to you. And you understood when you were choosing it that money wasn't the main reason that you chose this thing.

Right. But what happens is then we get in that thing and then we go, well, how can I make the most money possible? We try to sort of have our cake and eat it too. I guess what I'm saying is if you don't know why you do what you do and what's most important to you, sort of what your North Star is, you're going to come to decision points or you're going to get offers or you're going to have opportunities, some of which are going to pay better but going to take you contrary to your values, some of which are going to

be interesting but not that important to you. The point is you have to know why you're doing what you do and why it's important to you so that you can navigate around that North Star. Otherwise, you just end up doing what everyone else is doing, or you do what's easiest, or you do what's most profitable.

And so in this case, the guy was basically saying, look, I got into this business because I like making clothes and I like working with people who make clothes. I didn't get into this as a means to an end to squeeze every penny out of the process. And so in this case, like there were plenty of things he would do to try to make the business efficient,

but running a sweatshop in Guatemala was contrary to his values and to the whole reason that he got into the business in the first place. True, and by the way everybody, this North Star concept, some of you that have been doing something a while, it's worth revisiting conceptually because maybe this lack of passion you're feeling or juice for what you do is that you haven't really revisited why you did this in the first place or why you would do it going forward. Maybe it's shifted slightly, but without knowing that he's right because we're going to talk about the next thing in a minute. Not only do you probably not make decisions that are best for you in the long term. And the reason I also say about Ryan's work is these aren't like hacks.

These are enduring principles that long-term you'll last at something. That's how you sell 10 million books. That's why I've been an entrepreneur for 30 years and not 13 years, like so many, right? Because these concepts, I'm not saying I lived by all of them. I haven't. I wish I had lived by more of them, but many of them I have. And I've paid the price in such situations, by the way, when I didn't. One of the things I feel like I've done a good job of, and you actually basically start the book with this, if you know your true North, your North star, it's difficult to

keep your word. Yes. Here I am 53 years old, and I got to tell you, I can name on one, maybe one and a half hands, the people I've known in my life that long, that have consistently kept their word to me, like when it got uncomfortable, like, yes, like when they had outs, they could have taken, they had legitimate excuses not to keep their word, nobody would have blamed them for not keeping their word. them for not keeping their word. But 30 years later, the people that are close to me, and by the way, the most successful people and happiest people I know have kept their word. I'm so thrilled you started basically the book with it's a 24th page basically. It's a it's an interesting thing, right? I would say discipline is keeping our word to ourself, right? So you say, Hey, I'm going to go for a run this morning. I'm going to lift this weight. I'm going to eat this diet. You know, we see discipline as keeping word our word to ourselves. But then we

say, Oh, yeah, I'll be there at this time. And then you know, that's inconvenient. So we don't want to do it or we agreed to attend an event and now we've got a better offer. Or in business, right, you agreed to a price and then information comes to light. And now you want to get out of that price because it's bad for you or you think you have more leverage now. You know, the decision to say, hey, look, this is what I agreed to. So I'm going to stick with it. to say, hey, look, this is what I agreed to, so I'm going to stick with it. It's not just that it's the right thing to do,

but it's also part and parcel of just being the kind of person who does what you say. So if you're a person who, I think it's very hard to be a flake to other people, but be committed to yourself. You know what I mean? So I see it as, I try to just be someone who does what they say when I say I'm

going to work out and when I say, yeah, I'll come to your thing. I'm not going to look for some excuse later now that I don't want to do it. So good. I was just thinking of something small, everybody. Just, you know, my show, we go back and forth a little bit. I was thinking of my son, I think he was eight and he sort of reluctantly signed up to play on this baseball team. I remember this and the coach was kind of a jerk and mean to him. Yeah, and Max wasn't very good and there were a lot of good players. Then some of the other players were mean to him, you know, when he couldn't get a hit. And I remember it breaking my heart because he came home one day very upset.

Daddy, I don't want to do it anymore. And I said, Max, you don't have to do this forever but you gave your word that you would play this season on this team and we keep our word and we follow up with that. Ironically everybody, I tell you that story just to tell you this because it was hard to watch my kid go through that. One of the things I do admire about my son at this time so far is he keeps his word when things are difficult and I think some of those lessons as parents matter too. Hopefully he saw his old man do it. I hope he did anyway because most things as kids are caught

not taught as you and I have talked about Ryan before. So hey guys I want to jump in here for a second and talk about change and growth and you know by the way it's no secret how people get ahead in life or how they grow and also taking a look at the future. If you want to change your future, you've got to change the things you're doing. If you continue to do the same things, you're probably going to produce the same results. But if you get into a new environment where you're learning new things and you're around other people that are growth-oriented, you're much more likely to do that yourself. And that's why I love Growth Day.

Write this down for a second, growthday.com forward slash ed. My friend, Brendal Bruchard has created the most incredible personal development and business app that I've ever seen in my life. Everything from goal setting software to personal accountability, journaling, horses, thousands of dollars worth of courses in there as well. I create content in there on Mondays where I contribute as do a whole bunch of other influences like the Avengers of influencers and business minds in there. It's the Netflix for high achievers or people that want to be high achievers so go check it out. My friend Brennan's made

it very affordable, very easy to get involved. Go to growthday.com forward slash ed. That's growthday.com forward slash ed. This show is sponsored by Airbnb. Ed Mylett here. This year alone I've been in Chicago, Vegas, Orlando, New Orleans, Dallas. I've been in 40 states actually. I mean, just everywhere. Obviously I travel a ton and while I'm away, I host my home on Airbnb. It's a great way for me to make extra income. And I love that I get to share my home with other people.

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This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. So people ask me all the time, of the 800 or so guests you've had on the show, is there one thing they all have in common? I can tell you a thing they all have in common. Most of them have been to therapy or are currently going to therapy. One of the reasons for that is it's just healthy to be able to talk out loud about the problems you have in your life or to work on solutions. Whether or not you've got like trauma from your childhood

that's pretty severe that you need to work through or maybe you're just feeling some emotions that don't serve you right now and you want to change them. Maybe it's none of that stuff You just want to kind of get some more clarity and focus in your life and talk with somebody about where you want to go or What you want to accomplish or even what's holding you back? That's where better help comes in and I love it because all you really got to do first off It's all done entirely online You just fill out a brief questionnaire you get match with a licensed therapist and you can switch therapists if you don't click with them for no

Additional charge I love better help visit better help com slash edge show today a brief questionnaire you get matched with a licensed therapist and you can switch therapists if you don't click with them for no additional charge. I love BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash ed show today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. H-E-L-P dot com slash ed show. Here's a big one. Man this is rare. Take responsibility. Yeah I mean, brother, this is, you know, everybody blames everyone for everything. That's an overstatement, but it is our culture now. That was an overstatement, but not by much. And my favorite thing with a leader, and I know you mean it a little bit differently, but I'll let you talk to it. My favorite thing, and I wish this was in our politics more, where the leader got up and goes, I made a mistake. Yeah, I didn't do it intentionally. I blew the call

on that one. We messed it up. This is where my heart was, but I want to own this. This is my responsibility. The buck stops with me. I called the shot wrong. I'll get it better next time. To me, that's taking complete responsibility for something. How do you mean it in the context of the book? Well, I think just the larger sense of, look, something needs to be done, something needs to be taken care of, I'm going to do it, right? That's what leadership is. But I think what you're talking about is accountability, and that is part and parcel of responsibility. One of my favorite examples of this, If you remember that famous Patriots Seahawks Super Bowl, Pete Carroll and his offensive coordinator make the decision to throw it and not run it on effectively the one yard line. It gets intercepted and the Patriots win that Super Bowl. And I remember

they cut to Pete Carroll right after the game. And, you know, literally the biggest game in front of the biggest audience, and he could have thrown his offensive coordinator under the bus. Like, obviously they make the calls together, but part of the reason that we have staff is to, it seems like part of the reason people have staff is to push responsibility downward.

So they are protected, insulated from criticism, feedback, and then they can survive to fight another day. And I just remember watching that Super Bowl and just how quickly Pete Carroll was like, I made the call. I thought it was the right call for the following reasons. Sometimes it doesn't work out. I'm gonna own it, right? And just the power of that and the rareness of it,

as you said, I think it was Kennedy said something, like success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan. It's when things go sideways, people go, oh, that wasn't me, that was so-and-so. I had nothing to do with it, I wasn't involved. And those are the same people that had it succeeded, they'd be writing books about how essential their role was in the whole thing.

So the decision to go to see, look, something is happening and I'm going to take responsibility and be involved in it. And then I think the other part of that is, hey, something went poorly and instead of running away from it, I'm gonna step up, I'm gonna explain, I'm gonna take ownership

and then I'm gonna learn from this so that the next time I can do better. I wanna ask you, this is loosely connected to the book. I've been wanting to ask you this for like two months when I knew it, okay? And it's loosely connected to the book and it has to do with receiving criticism and staying calm and staying true to the principles under pressure. So I'm going to tell you a story that you know,

I'm a big Bert Kreischer fan. He's been on my show. I bet you already know what I'm going to ask you. And okay, good. So, uh, this'll be fun then. So I like Bert a know what I'm gonna ask you. I don't. Okay, good. So, this will be fun then. So, I like Burt a lot and I like him a lot more even after meeting him and having him on the show. And I don't listen to a lot of podcasts ironically even though I have one. But I listen to Two Bears from time to time. And there was a show one night, I'm driving back from Boston up here to

Maine and they're talking about your work on the show. And Burt was pretty aggressively like, ah, it's BS, this stuff. I don't know if you know they were doing that, but they were. And then live on the show, maybe you knew and it was all canned, but all live on the show, Segura calls you and says, hey, I'm on with Burt. I'm paraphrasing.

But he basically says you're full of shit, right? Like your work doesn't mean anything. He doesn't get it. And Burt kind of went at you a little bit. And it, and you stayed super calm under that duress. You related to him, you connected, and you made your points. But you stayed true, I guess, to who you were. And I know that you know Burt loves you, but it was criticism live on a really popular show with a dude that you probably wouldn't expect it from. And again, I love Burt, but talk about that for you know what I'm talking about now, right? I do. You know what was a surprise about that? And I think there's maybe some lesson here

in how you respond under pressure. Right. I wasn't aware until most of the way in that it was live on the air. So I thought they were, I thought, you know, sometimes the call is garbled. You don't quite understand what's happening. I remember I was just working in my office and then Tom called me and I don't know about you, but like my phone doesn't ring that much anymore because everyone texts first, right?

Like, like when I'm getting on the phone, I usually know why I'm getting on the phone. And, and when I'm getting on the phone, it's not usually to be live to a large audience. So I didn't really know, I just thought two people were calling and talking. So I was much more relaxed than I think I would have been had I known what I was getting into.

So if they were like, hey, we wanna have you on, there's this big disagreement and it's a debate, I probably would have been tense and maybe over-prepared. So there was something about just the purity of the moment. But one of the things that I've learned, I guess you would just call this confidence. When you know your shit and you know that you've done the work,

it allows you not to be intimidated by the fact that some people disagree. And you just sort of go, okay, why do they think what they think? And maybe what, like, I think what I remember about that encounter is the chance, I remember thinking the chances that he actually disagrees, that he and disagrees,

that he and I actually disagree here are low. I bet what's actually happening is that he has, like we talked about earlier, a perception of what stoicism is, and that's what he disagrees with. So if you can come at these things with more the view that, hey, if we can get on the same page, we probably have more in common than we do difference,

then the job is to just move both of you towards a place where you agree, as opposed to I'm the master of this thing and I'm gonna prove that you're an idiot. You know, and I think that's kind of what happened. I gotta tell you, like, I'm not even being funny here. I listened to that that night. I rewinded it again, just to listen. I went back because, like I'm not even being funny here. I listened to that that night. I rewinded it again just to listen. I went back

because like I wish all debate was that way and again, Burt's a great guy and I know you didn't feel that threatened but having said that, I was like man if this was how everything happened, you didn't try to go I'm this smarter than you guy, you're a comedian, I've been researching this for years of my life, you know, you didn't do any of that. You didn't one-up them, you didn't big time them, you didn't get agitated, you tried to find some common ground. My sense is Bert probably agrees now, but I just got to tell you something. It was like, it was cool to watch someone who teaches these principles, live them actually live and under pressure. It just did. Oh, thank you.

It's true. And let me say this to everybody too. I'm a Gandhi fan. Everybody knows I'm a Christian, but I'm a huge Gandhi fan, done a lot of reading on Gandhi. And I was surprised that you are as well. And so this is something I wanted to ask you about why Gandhi and how's that related to Marcus Aurelius of all people? Well, you know, Gandhi's a big fan of the Christians. I think what's so interesting about Gandhi is that he's basically this student of all the world's religions. He has obviously his faith,

but he was this sort of voracious student of all the religious texts. And what's fascinating is he, you know, he gets the idea for what becomes his campaigns of nonviolence from Tolstoy, who's a Russian, and Thoreau, who's an American. And both of them were drawing, you know, sort of primarily on Christian thinking, as well as ancient Western philosophy. But

but what I so the book is about justice. And I wanted to highlight Gandhi for two reasons. One, I think most people understand the inherent saintliness of a man like that. Here's a person who starves himself, who lives essentially in deliberate poverty, who dedicates his life to alleviating suffering and helping other people. But so that's obviously the pursuit of justice. But what I was fascinated by with Gandhi and I tried to highlight in the book is what a

brilliant strategist Gandhi was. So so so nonviolence is obviously a moral strategy, and it's a morally superior strategy, right? And yet the reason Gandhi chooses to be nonviolent against the British is not solely because it was the moral choice. It was also a brilliant strategic and tactical set of choices. Like when you are fighting the largest empire in the world, the idea that you're going to go toe to toe with them is impossible.

The idea even that you would beat them in a guerrilla style, you know, war of many, many years is extremely unlikely. What Gandhi understood was at the core of The sort of British psyche was a belief in these Christian values even though they were not acting on them and he also understood that in a world Where people find out about what's happening through the newspaper and through the radio and through photographs and then ultimately through, you know, newsreels,

that the spectacle of the world's largest empire bringing its military might down on defenseless people, a man dressed in a loin cloth, would be so visually repulsive that they would have to stop. And of course, this is what Martin Luther King also figures out during the civil rights movement. They were seeking out clashes

so that newspaper photographers and news videographers would capture the horror of what was happening and show it to the North. And eventually the North would solve the problem federally. And so it's not just enough to be right. There also has to be a savviness and an astuteness, a sort of an ability to understand how to wage and win a campaign for the hearts and minds that I think Gandhi just does not get enough credit for. I agree and by the way, speaking of credit, I'm gonna ask you about that next, but that's like such a lesson for all of you entrepreneurs that are listening. My most favorite entrepreneurs don't have the biggest companies and are going against the biggest ones and not trying to beat them at their own game. They're

strategists, they're finding their advantage, they're finding their way of how to get public sentiment on their their side, build their own types of fans and oftentimes it's swimming against the tide, it's it's the it's Coke versus Pepsi, it's becoming the alternative, it's becoming the company people root for. There's so much in that. What does the alternative. It's becoming the company people root for. There's so much in that. What does the future hold for business? Well, let me tell you right now, you can ask nine experts.

You're probably going to get 10 different answers. Bull market, bear market rates are going to get cut. They're going to cut it five times, six times. Inflation is going to go up or down. Who the heck knows? You don't really have a crystal ball. And that's why I love NetSuite because you can get some measure of control and the most important areas possible in your business. So if somebody can get a crystal ball together that

would be great but until then over 38,000 businesses have future proofed their business with NetSuite by Oracle. The number one cloud ERP bringing accounting, financial management, inventory HR into one fluid platform. Easy to use. We've been using them now for over a decade. NetSuite helps you respond to immediate challenges and seize on your biggest opportunities. Speaking of opportunity, download the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning at netsuite.com slash my let. The guide is free to you at netsuite.com slash MyLet. netsuite.com slash MyLet.

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was he didn't want recognition. That he sought to do good and not get recognized for it. These are my favorite people. Like my mom, she just did good and never expected. Think about the people you admire most in your life, everybody. Oftentimes, one of the things you admire about them, ironically, is they actually don't seek recognition for what they do, they just do good, do good.

And how does someone do that, Ryan? It's one of the things that you talk about in the book. How does, that's such a hard question, I don't even know how you're gonna answer this, but how does someone do good yet maintain this, I'm not doing it for the significance or the recognition of doing it. Well, I think first off what you just pointed out there is something we need to add to our

perspective. So look, most the people we hear about the most we hear about in large part because they want us to hear about them, right? So our understanding of reality is not representative, right? Most great artists are not seeking the spotlight. Most great people are not seeking recognition. And so as a result, we don't hear about them. What we hear about are, in some ways, the worst of us, right? We hear about the hungriest, thirstiest, most attention seeking people by definition, right? And most of the great people, most of the successful people,

most of the fundamentally decent people, they don't want you to know about them. And in fact, you know, they're actively seeking that you don't know about them. Right. Their donations are anonymous. They are deferring the credit to other people. They are operating in the background. The Stoics have this idea in Meditations, Mark Zeroulis, he says, be careful not to ask for the third thing. He says, you have done something good

and someone has benefited from that. So that's one and two. And he says, the third thing is asking to be repaid, asking to be recognized, asking to be credited. The third thing is that reciprocation for what you did. I think the idea of seeing, okay, yeah, I did the thing and someone benefited. That's my repayment. The other stuff is extra and in some ways a distraction. And then what you often see, I tell the story in this book,

there's this fascinating article about it that I based the chapter on, but there was this woman who, she donated her kidney to a stranger. And just imagine what an incredible thing that is. And by the way, it happens every day. People's lives are saved by total strangers. And so she donates this kidney and she starts this Facebook group of her friends,

where she's just kind of talking about, you know, the journey that she's on. And she notices that this one woman who she was kind of work acquaintances with isn't really responding. It's almost like a Shakespearean play how the events unfold, but she starts to notice and it starts to eat at her that this woman isn't noticing it isn't congratulating her and isn't saying thank you and appreciating what an incredible sacrifice she went and look long story short, these two women end up clashing. They become enemies. They sue each other. other, they write about each other negatively.

It's this almost comical series of events, but it's just an illustration of like, like look, if you expect to be recognized and appreciated for doing good, sometimes you'll get it, but a lot of times you won't, and it's gonna drive you nuts because you do deserve it. This woman did deserve to be congratulated and thanks, but who knows what was going on in this other woman's life. She didn't care. She was jealous. Maybe it was triggering for her in some

way, but the result is both of them end up wasting incredible amounts of their time in this argument where the facts are indisputed. You know, she did something good, someone benefited from it. That could have been the end of the story, but she needed more. And we all do that to ourselves. You know, we do someone a favor, or we pick up the tab or whatever. And then we're thinking, okay, they understand this, next time it's going to come back my way. And then it doesn't. And then we start to hate that person and we resent that person

and it frees our relationship. And it gets to a point where we might as well have just not done the good thing in the first place because it ends up making us worse as human beings. It's so true. By the way, as someone who has sought recognition for a good part of their lives, it does get you pretty high when you first start getting it.

And here's what's terrible about this drug. What's terrible about this drug, by the way, I've always wanting, by the way, relate to the picking up the tab, everything you just said, but, um, it stops getting you high after a while. And what's worse is the lack of it does get you down. So when you seek it for a while, it will get you high and then it doesn't. And then when it's not there, I've watched this with so many of my friends, it's a massive withdrawal and very painful for people.

It is a drug I recommend you never get addicted to. Yesterday, just about how many good people in the world, very small microcosm, I donated blood yesterday. I was in there, you know, they figured out that I'm, you know, whatever, that I'm a public person. And so there's about 17 people in there donating blood and everyone's sort of making a bigger deal about me. And she goes, it's just amazing that somebody like you would be in here

and just trying to help other people. And I finally told her at the end, I said, I have to be honest with you. It's actually not why I was donating blood today. I'm doing it because my doctor recommends it and it's therapeutic. And that's actually why I'm here. These 16 other people in here, these beautiful souls, these are the good people in here. And I thought about them all day. Actually, these people got in their car,

drove down to this place, let someone stick a needle in their arm just to give blood so somebody else could live. Those are good people. No one will ever know that about them. Yet they exist in the world every single day. And so there is more good in the world, as you say in the book, if we focus on it, then there is bad if we see the good in people. It's one of the things Ryan recommends in the book is see good in people. You know, it's funny that you mentioned the giving blood thing, because when I was reading this story

about this woman who donated a kidney, I was like, that's incredible. I wanna do that. Like, you know, and my wife goes, don't donate. She's like, you're not gonna donate your kidney. What are you talking about? You know, what if our kids need it? You know, can you really afford to be out for, you know, months recovering from some surgery? She and she

just goes, Have you ever even donated blood before? And I was like, I don't know that I have. And she was like, Why don't you start there? So I have every every, every two months for the last two years, I've gone and done it. And you're right. Not only does it feel good for you, like, you know, you're doing something good, but there's something reaffirming about your view of humanity that happens when you're waiting in line to do this thing. And as you're doing it, people are coming and going and you're just thinking, yeah, some some kids having a surgery and they're benefiting from this somebody just got in a car accident and they're benefiting from this. There's a terrorist attack and they're benefiting from that. Like, just there are these things that you can do. And again, when we think

of justice, we we think such this bit we think these big sweeping things. And the reality is there's a blood bank down the street from you that could use 30 minutes of your time. And you get a cookie at the end of it, you should go do it. Yeah, and you just make a deposit

in the bank account of humanity. And you'll feel good about it. Yeah, I mean, it's called a blood bank. It is a bank. You are depositing something that maybe you will take a withdrawal from at some point, but certainly other people will and that's what it's all about. And that's also why you should see the good in people by the way, which is in the blood. Yes!

I gotta ask you this because we're... by the way, you can tell with Ryan, we're gonna get to an hour so quickly and it sucks because I would go three hours with him like Rogan does but I don't do that on this show so but loyalty again getting a little bit older pretty damn rare brother like uh people seem to want to be loyal to people that they get something reciprocal from when they can't anymore it seems like loyalty not only loyalty to other people loyalty to your your character loyalty to your values I know you mean that in the broader sense too, but talk about why loyalty is such an important virtue. Yeah, loyalty is easy when everything's going well. What about when it's not

going so well? And the other thing I've come to understand about loyalty, there's a quote that struck me that's in the book. Truman was this very loyal guy and he was loyal. And one of his advisors sort of goes, look, you got to break with some of these people that they were in the middle of some crisis. And he said, look, you've been loyal to people who have not been loyal to you, right?

And I thought there was something about that that actually kind of gets to the point of what loyalty is, which is that loyalty is something you give, not something you get. The idea that loyalty is something you ask from others, the Stokes would say, that's not in your control, but are you a loyal person? How do you think about it? Are you loyal

to where you came from, to the people that brought you up, to the causes that you got started with? That's what loyalty is as opposed to this thing that you enforce in your organization or in your family. I think a lot of parents do this. They're like loyalty is something they demand from their children as opposed to something they give to their children. Do you know what I mean? Yeah.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, that's really good, brother. Yeah, I need to even think through that one. Wow, okay, you stopped me on my tracks on that a little bit. Boy, I hope they've seen that in me. Gosh darn it! That's a really good one as a dad. Holy crap! What about practicing pragmatism? I just didn't... I don't think I've ever read any chapter like that before in my life. I mean, it seems like just another chapter of the book, but it's not to me anyway. So go ahead and tell us about that. Well look, obviously justice is about ideas,

right? What is fair? What's the right thing to do? How should the world be? But the reality is the world is not how it should be. And so it can be particularly hard for idealistic, you know, justice oriented people to handle the necessity and and frankly the the the the the rightness of compromise you know if if you or or even just the rightness of of having to be savvy and strategic like we we were talking about you're not going to get everything you want and you're certainly not going gonna get it all right away. And so to operate in the world, one has to figure out how to work. Look, who did we ally with in the Second World War?

We allied with Stalin, one of the worst human beings who ever lived. But you know what? There was one human being who was worse than Stalin and that was Hitler, right? And so from a purity standpoint, that's not a good place. You don't want to be allied with someone like that. But from a pragmatic place, Hitler, you know, from a pragmatic place, the enemy of your enemy is your friend, right? And so as we bring justice in the world, not only do we have to make compromises like,

hey, you get some of what you want, I get some of what I want, but also we have to compromise sometimes on the purity of our beliefs in order to effectuate change in the real world. I'm just thinking of politics again when you say that, like I wish there was a little bit more of that. Like, let me get you some of what you want. The challenges in our society in the US, like you are just punished for giving the other side anything they want.

And the thing that's contradictory about that, which is part three of the book, is that there are other sides instead of us all being one. If you could actually begin to see things from that perspective. And that's probably like, let's just talk about the third part a little bit because, and again, I keep talking about getting older, I need to stop saying that, but like that's shifted in me. It's not us and them or we and they, or I'm much less that way in my life anymore. And I feel so much better about myself, my life, than I than seeing just differences and distinctions and seeing people as separate. Yeah. As opposed to

like in my case, like some empathy, some understanding. I'm very different man than I was in some cases 20 years ago. And so if I have given myself some grace to change and grow, why can't I give people grace when I meet them where they are now? And so the whole third part of the part three about, you know, all is one and all the different things in there about, you know, be an angel, forgive, make amends, Like just put a bow on all of that. Cause I think this is awesome stuff right here. There's only a handful of people who have ever seen

the earth from space, right? And what they say to a man and woman is that in that instance as you are looking at the earth from beyond the earth is that all the distinctions, all the borders, all the disputes, all the disagreements, all the ideas of race and culture, it just instantly disappears. Because you realize we're all living on this tiny little,

what they call it the blue marble, that we're all living on this tiny blue marble together. And so many of the things that cause disagreement and conflict you realize don't exist. When you look at a map, you see all the different boundaries and borders between countries. When you look at the Earth from space, you barely even see the distinctions of continents, all of what looks like one enormous landmass punctuated by these enormous oceans which dwarf the small pockets of humanity that exist.

And so, yeah, remembering how connected we all are, how much more we have in common than we do different. The Stoics had this image, and it's very powerful. They said, look, we're like this dot, and then there are these concentric circles around us. There's our family, there's our neighborhood, there's our state, our country, the strategic empire that we're a part of, there's human beings, then there's the animal kingdom, then there's all life on earth, there's everyone that's ever gonna be born, right?

And the idea is, they said that the purpose of philosophy was to start to pull some of these outer rings inward. And so that word empathy, you said it's the ability to take people who are different than you, people who are doing things you don't are doing things you don't like, doing things you don't understand, and starting to see what you have in common with them, starting to feel affection and connection with them,

and bringing them inwards as opposed to pushing them out, which is what a lot of us do. We go, they're others, they're different, they're awful. This is what Lincoln did so beautifully during the Civil War. He understood that slavery was an irredeemable evil that needed to be eradicated. But at the same time, he said of the South, we are just what they are just what we would be in their position. His point was, if I had been born in a slave state and grown up owning slaves,

I would have so much trouble seeing what is clear to me from the outside. And so the ability to do that and then work with that person and try to nudge them towards a better place, that's what justice is about. Brah, so good. Like, you know, everyone, I gotta tell you, like, I get credit sometimes, you know, obviously I make lots of mistakes, but like speaking is one of my things that,

you know, I'm pretty good at. And one of the things I always try to picture before I go out and actually feel, this is vibrational frequency is gonna be very different than what Ryan talks about, but I want to merge it. I actually picture us all as one. Yeah. We're all a family. And in my case, all God's children and so when I come out I think I emanate that energy. I think I vibrate on that frequency and there's a connection emotionally that maybe you wouldn't get if someone didn't have that focus. The other day I had you know a meeting that was coming up, very contentious meeting, and everybody around me is like you need to lay into these people.

They are, and everything on paper, Ryan, these people were out to hammer us, right? Like they were, and I had never pictured them before. And so they're coming over to this meeting with me, and man, I'm pretty wound up, right? It's been weeks and it's brewing and brewing, and it's a very, they present a challenge and I've pictured them as these monsters and then they walk up and they're this guy brought his wife

with them. It's this older couple. They seem like very kind people and instantly I literally just said a quick prayer. I just said, peace be with you. I mean, I literally and all I just shifted my energy into we're one. This is my brother or sister. We see these things. And this meeting went incredible. I don't know how it went yet. I don't know the results, but I know this at the end when he shook my hand, he goes, sincerely, I can't believe we had such a beautiful experience. I enjoyed my time with you so much. And I said, so did I. Now I don't know where the meeting is going to go. But I know the percentage chances of it going the way that I would prefer it, it's going to go. It's a whole lot higher. And that's not why I did it. Yeah,

just changed our vibrational frequency by giving empathy to one another and a prayer that we were one. So and even if it doesn't go the way that you even if you don't get the outcome you wanted, wasn't the process better? You know what I mean? The process was at least not torturous correct and by the way I was able to make all the points everybody that I wanted to make that that needed to be made with a different tone a different energy um I frankly I stuck to my virtues and values and being mean or condescending or big timing them or threatening them or bullying them like I probably would have done when I was younger isn't consistent

with who I want to be. And although it might've worked short term when I was younger, I didn't particularly feel very good about myself. And even from a strategic standpoint, as Ryan's talked about. I think this way of going about it requires a little bit more articulation, requires a little bit more thought, a little bit more strategy, but I actually believe is a more effective way. But to your point, I feel better about me going forward and they will as well. It just, man, I just, frankly, I wasn't tired after that meeting like I normally would be, because I would have to exhaust so much of me

that's the bad side. That's beautiful. I love that. Well, it's your work. It's not mine. Hey everyone, Dave Meyer here to tell you about Laurel Road. Laurel Road is a digital banking platform

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With perks like that, you'll be seeing results and better buying power for your buck in no time. Visit laurelroad.com slash pockets to learn more and see other ways they can benefit you. Tell them bigger pockets in Laurel road, your partner on the road to financial peace of mind, equal housing lender member FDIC. Last question. Yeah. And I'm surprised. I was surprised I was reading this stuff about you're talking about toxic masculinity. And so it's interesting coming from you because you know, sometimes your work, when people don't know it is accused of creating that. Yet when I saw your comments about it, I thought, well, gosh, he's almost on the

other side more than maybe even I am. But if I had to err on the side in the real world, I frankly meet a lot of men in my opinion, who need to be more virtuous and stronger. Yeah. Not less. So why is it, even that term, why is masculinity in your mind even, or maybe it's not, toxic? Because I don't feel like being masculine means anything more than the things

that we're talking about in your writings here. No, that's a good point. Look, I don't have a problem with being strong or being tough. I don't have a problem with being strong or being tough. I don't have a problem with combat sports or driving Lamborghinis or working hard or making a lot. I don't have a problem with any of that. I think what I am especially concerned about and trying to take some very specific efforts is some, but political correctness is annoying and obnoxious.

And sometimes people are too sensitive and the world can be a harsh place. And if you think everyone is gonna love you and be nice to you all the time, you're gonna have a hard time in life. What I don't like though, is this kind of embracing of cruelty and meanness and like intending to be offensive

as if that is itself a virtue. So I'll give you an example. I don't control whether someone, how my words are received by someone else, right? At the same time, I do control whether I go out of my way to be considerate and kind and appreciate somebody else's experience. Does that make sense? And I think there's been an overreaction or overcorrection in our culture that is leaning towards almost the celebration of meanness and cruelty.

To make this precise, look, I guess we can have a variety of opinions on the science behind being trans, its role in society, what we should allow, what treatment should be allowed for children, etc. At the same time, it's obviously very difficult to be trans, right? And so I want to go, I want to think about what it would be like to wake up every day and be under the view that your, your gender, which you were getting to God at birth, doesn't match how you feel inside. And I want to think about what it's like to be that person. And I'm not only not

going to go out of my way to make life hard for that person, I want to think about what I can do and say, and what we can do as a society that makes life bearable for that person. Because that's our job for all people, whether we're talking about someone who's in a wheelchair, whether we're talking about someone who's gay, whether we're talking about someone who's a nerd,

whether we're talking about someone who has come here from another country. To me, what justice is, what being a good person is, is just thinking about what it must be like to have the experiences of another person and to go out of our way to be considerate and conscientious to that experience. And I just think the internet depersonalizing these things

and feeding on conflict and tension and anger has created this environment where, especially for young men, there's almost this performative cruelty and bullying that is not only not good for the victims of that stuff, but they themselves are a victim because it's making them it's it's doing very important and positive traits that men and women both have. But I think women do women's

culture does a better job nurturing and supporting if that makes sense. Yeah, fair enough. I think like anything in society, maybe there's the two extremes. There is that internet version of the cruel version. And then there's the extremes I meet in my life where I'm like, dude, you need to step up and be stronger and stop blaming everybody and get your act together. I see both of those things. And then there's probably a bunch of dudes

that live in the middle, but I don't disagree with you on those things, actually. I'm glad you clarified it. I really do. You know, those of you that are believers, you know, one of our jobs is to love everybody. Yes. And empathy and a little bit less judgment and assessment. And I, yeah, you think about who Jesus was. And I think the thing that jumps out to me most about Jesus was his

willingness, not just his willingness to tolerate the sort of poorest and weakest of society, but that's who he had the most affection and compassion and love for, right? Like, those were the people that lit him up, that he sought out. When he would go into a town or a city, he wasn't like, show me the richest, show me the toughest, show me your most important people. You know, he went to the prostitutes or to the beggars or to the lepers. You know, he had this affinity for not just all human beings, but he had a special affinity for the people whom life was the hardest. We care for them. Yeah, yeah! It's a beautiful thing. It was. This has been a beautiful conversation.

Oh man! We always go a little deep. I love it. I love it too. Well, we'll have to do it in person and you got to tell me when you're in Austin next. I want to have you out. Yeah, I will. Okay. I'll let you know. I'm speaking there three or four times a year, so I'll let you know. I definitely will. Enjoyed today. Guys, Ryan's book, by the way, is right thing right now. Good values, good character, good deeds. You can tell.

His books are not short on content and specifics and neither is Ryan ever. So, very grateful. Go get the book everybody. Ryan, thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you. God bless you everybody. Max out your life. This is the Ed Mylan Show.