We Are Training For This

When we develop the discipline to prepare our minds and our bodies for hardship, we have the discipline to see the hard times through to the end. Make 2026 the year where you finally bring yourself closer to living your best life. No more waiting. Demand the best for yourself. The Daily Stoic New Year New You https://join.dailystoic.com/nyny26/ challenge begins January 1, 2026. Learn more and sign up today at dailystoic.com/challenge http://dailystoic.com/challenge. 👉 Get The Daily Stoic New Year New You https://join.dailystoic.com/nyny26/ & all other Daily Stoic courses for FREE when you join Daily Stoic Life |dailystoic.com/life https://dailystoic.com/life/ 🎙️ Support the podcast and go deeper into Stoicism by subscribing toThe Daily Stoic Premium https://dailystoic.supercast.com/ - unlock ad-free listening, early access, and bonus content:https://dailystoic.supercast.com/ 🎥 Watch the video episodes onThe Daily Stoic YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@DailyStoic/videos:https://www.youtube.com/@DailyStoic/videos ✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email athttps://dailystoic.com/dailyemail 🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store:https://store.dailystoic.com/ 📱 Follow us: Instagram https://www.instagram.com/dailystoic/,Twitter https://twitter.com/dailystoic,YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@DailyStoic,TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@daily_stoic?lang=en, andFacebook https://www.facebook.com/dailystoic See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:05Ryan Holiday?

  Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we bring you a Stoic-inspired meditation, designed to help you find strength and insight and wisdom into everyday life. Each one of these episodes is based on the 2,000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and women, help you learn from them, to follow in their example, and to start your day off with a little dose of courage and discipline and justice and wisdom. For more, visit DailyStoic.com.

• 0:56Ryan Holiday?

  We are training for this. It's good that you train. It's good that you lift heavy stuff. It's good that you run. It's good that you expose yourself to cold and heat. There are health benefits to all of this, and it's good to go after them. There are mental benefits, too, which is why the Stoics were so active: boxing and wrestling and riding and running. "We treat the body rigorously," Seneca said, "so that it is not disobedient to the mind." But ultimately, the reason to challenge yourself is for the challenging situations of life. "You take care of your body," Socrates said, "so it can be of service to your country or to a stranger.

• 1:38Ryan Holiday?

  You train yourself to deal with stress and fatigue and discomfort, because life is full of stress and discomfort. It demands endurance and tolerance." We're not spending time in the gym so that we can look like a Greek statue. We're spending time in the gym so we can be like the Greeks: party and resilient.

• 2:01Ryan Holiday?

  Capable and strong and confident. As we said recently, this philosophy, this training is about preparing you for historical moments like the one we're in right now. It's for the moments when you want to quit. It's for the moments when you have to pitch in, when you have to do something hard, when you have to endure the unexpected. When we develop the discipline to prepare our minds and bodies for hardship, we have the discipline to see hard times through to the end. As I said in Discipline is Destiny, by being a little hard on ourselves, it makes it harder for others to be hard on us. It makes it harder for moments like these to be so hard to get through.

• 2:43Ryan Holiday?

  Epictetus said that we want to work and prepare so that when life inevitably tests us, we can say to ourselves earnestly and accurately, this is what I trained for. And this is why I do the Daily Stoic New Year, New You Challenge. We're kicking one off on January 1st, as we do each and every year. It's a training ground for the year ahead. I want to spend the first 21 days of the year toughening myself up, getting myself out of my comfort zone, getting ready for what lies ahead. It's 21 daily challenges built around the best and most timeless wisdom in Stoic philosophy. The idea is they'll help you increase your capacity and your confidence for the year ahead.

• 3:26Ryan Holiday?

  It's 21 reps at being uncomfortable, 21 reps at doing what you maybe don't feel like doing, 21 reps at dealing with challenges. Life's going to test us in 2026. That is a given, right? We're going to need you in 2026. That is also a given. And we want you to be able to say that you're prepared, that this is what you trained for, that you can handle this, right? And I would love to have you join us in the Daily Stoic New Year, New You Challenge. You can sign up right now at dailystoic.com/challenge. And remember, if you join Daily Stoic Life, you get this challenge and all our challenges for free. You can click that on the landing page there too, dailystoic.com/challenge. And I will see you on January 1st.