If You Stay Ready, You Don’t Have To Get Ready

Ryan talks about the vitality of always being prepared for what comes your way, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast. Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: http://DailyStoic.com/emailFollow us: Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and FacebookSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. 📢 Share | ⚙️ Manage Subscription

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 passage of ancient wisdom designed to help you find strength, insight, and wisdom in everyday life. Each one of these passages is based on the 2,000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and women. For more, you can visit us at DailyStoic.com.

• 0:27Ryan Holiday?

  If you stay ready, you don't have to get ready. It had been more than two and a half years since Case Keenum had started in an NFL game. Many assumed his career, which was already nine years old and spread across six teams, was over. There could have easily been part of him that thought that too. So people were surprised when he performed so well under pressure in a Thursday night game against the Denver Broncos, throwing for 200 yards and a touchdown without a turnover on the way to a Browns victory in the absence of Baker Mayfield, the team's starting quarterback and former number-one overall draft pick. How did he do it? How did he manage to get prepared on such short notice?

• 1:11Ryan Holiday?

  "You don't have to get ready if you stay ready," he told a reporter after the game. He hadn't needed a flurry of last-minute, late-night film sessions because he'd always been prepared. He didn't need to get in shape because he'd never gotten out of shape. He wasn't surprised. He'd been expecting this exact contingency. In fact, it was his job to be prepared for this contingency. Marcus Aurelius talks about how the fighter is better than the fencer because the fencer has to pick up a weapon. A fighter is the weapon. Seneca reminds us that the blow we are ready for is not much of a blow at all. And Epictetus says that the whole point of philosophy is to be able to reply to adversity with one thing:

• 1:56Ryan Holiday?

  This is what I trained for. Life has twists and turns in store for all of us. Our job is to be ready. Our job is to keep training. It's to anticipate. It's to have a plan, so that when the unexpected comes, it's not unexpected at all. We're ready. We can step up and do our job like a trusted journeyman, like a veteran.

• 2:21Ryan Holiday?

  Thanks so much for listening to the Daily Stoic Podcast. Again, if you don't know this, you can get these delivered to you via email every day. So check it out at dailystoic.com/email.

• 2:36Ryan Holiday?

  You