Wake Up, You’re Fever Dreaming

“You want it. You want it badly. The promotion. To win that higher office. To get called up. To buy that house. To sleep with that person. To have just one free punch at you-know-who. You want it more than anything and, by god, you’re going to get it. You’re working. You’re scheming. You’re… obsessed. Honestly, what you’re in is a fever dream—a delusion of drive and lust and want. ”Ryan explains the cost of striving for pleasure, and how it will crumble before your eyes, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast.***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. 📢 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, dailystoic.com.

• 0:26Ryan Holiday?

  Wake up, you're fever dreaming. You want it, you want it badly, the promotion, to win that higher office, to get called up, to buy that house, to sleep with that person, to have just one free punch at you-know-who. You want it more than anything, and by God, you are going to get it. You're working, you're scheming, you're obsessed. Honestly, what you're in is a fever dream, a delusion of drive and lust and want. Epicurus, Seneca's old favorite, had a way of shaking us out of that sleep. "What will it actually be like to get what you want?" he asked. "How will you feel after?" He wanted you to think of the refractory period, the guilt after, not just the few seconds of pleasure. He wanted you to think about all the other times you climbed this mountain or that one,

• 1:10Ryan Holiday?

  and how anticlimactic it was. He wanted you to talk and think about other people who have done what you think is going to be so wonderful, and really listen to their experiences. Because what you find, as the Stoics did when they looked at many drives and pleasures rationally, is that like the facts of a dream, it doesn't all add up. It's an illusion. It's based on false assumptions that crumble as soon as you open your eyes. So, wake up.

• 1:37Ryan Holiday?

  Hey, it's Ryan. Thanks so much for listening. If you could leave a review for the podcast, we'd really appreciate it. 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, and it would really help the show. We appreciate it, and I'll see you next episode.