This Is What You Replace Anger With | It Is Well to Be Flexible

“The Stoics weren’t robots. It wasn’t that they stuffed things down, or that they didn’t feel anything. How could that have been true? They were husbands and fathers, wives and daughters. They wrote beautiful works of art. They took principled stands. They told jokes. They worked hard and they sacrificed.”Ryan explains what you should replace anger with, and reads The Daily Stoic’s entry of the day, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast. GiveWell is the best site for figuring out how and where to donate your money to have the greatest impact. If you’ve never donated to GiveWell’s recommended charities before, you can have your donation matched up to $1,000 before the end of June or as long as matching funds last. Just go to GiveWell.org/STOIC and pick podcast and The Daily Stoic at checkout. ***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/dailystoicTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@daily_stoic See 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 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 with my wonderful co-author and collaborator, Stephen Hanselman. And so today, we'll give you a quick meditation from one of the Stoics, from Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, then some analysis from me. And then we send you out into the world to do your best to turn these words into works.

• 0:43Ryan Holiday?

  This is what you replace anger with. The Stoics weren't robots. It wasn't that they stuffed things down or that they didn't feel anything. How could that have been true? They were husbands and fathers and wives and daughters. They wrote beautiful works of art. They took principled stands. They told jokes. They worked hard and they sacrificed. None of these achievements would have been possible for an unfeeling person. Yet it is undeniable that the Stoics talked extensively about the management of one's emotions. They talked about conquering their temper. They talked about overcoming grief. They talked about quenching lust and dispelling fear. It's a paradox, but quite a wonderful one. At least it is in Marcus Aurelius's expression.

• 1:27Ryan Holiday?

  He explains at the opening of Meditations that he learned from Sextus not to display anger or other emotions, to be free of passion yet full of love. So there it is. It's not that the Stoics had no temper and no fear. It's that they controlled these emotions and replaced them with love. They loved their fate, amor fati. They loved other people. They loved every minute they were alive. Indeed, the Stoics were not unfeeling. It's that they felt this love so profoundly that it overwhelmed the other, pettier emotions: the rage, the fear, the pain, the desire. Love, love, love. That's the key. That's what you replace anger with. That's what you replace it all with.

• 2:11Ryan Holiday?

  It is well to be flexible. This is today's entry in the Daily Stoic, 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living. One day a week, I read an entry from the book. I guess slowly but surely over time, I will have reread the entire audiobook. But today, we're just doing the June 3rd entry. I hope everyone is well. Begins with a quote from Seneca on tranquility of mind. "He can't serve in the military, let him seek public office. Must he live in the private sector? Let him be a spokesperson. Is he condemned to silence? Let him aid his fellow citizens by silent public witness. Is it dangerous to enter the

• 2:54Ryan Holiday?

  forum? Let him display himself in private homes, at public events and gatherings, as a good associate, a faithful friend, and a moderate tablemate. Has he lost the duties of a citizen? Let him exercise those of a human being." And then the story. It's one of my all-time favorites. I loved this the first time I heard it. "Shortly before his death, as victory in the Civil War was finally within his grasp, Lincoln told a story to an audience of generals and admirals about a man who had approached him for a high-ranking government appointment. First, the man asked if he might be made a foreign minister. Upon being turned down, the man asked for a more modest position. Upon being turned down again, he asked for a job as a low-level customs officer. Finally,

• 3:38Ryan Holiday?

  he could not even get that. He finally just asked Lincoln for an old pair of trousers." Ah, Lincoln laughed as he concluded the story. "It is well to be humble." This story embodies the flexibility and the determination of Stoicism. If we can't do this, then perhaps we can try that. And if we can't do that, then perhaps we can try some other thing. And if that thing is impossible, then there is always another. Even if that thing is just being a good human being, we always have some opportunity to practice our philosophy, to make some kind of contribution."

• 4:14Ryan Holiday?

  I just, I love this story and I think the lesson that Lincoln was trying to say is that you find your role, you're willing to accept or make whatever works, right? And I think that's what Seneca was saying and I suspect Seneca was also telling this story, you know, near the end of his life as the options in public life were closing to him, you know? Okay, so Nero turned out to be insane, okay, so you pushed, so you're forced into exile. You know, all throughout Seneca's life, in fact, he's forced to adjust, to accommodate, to make the best of a bad situation. And for the Stoics, this was the resignation, not like resignation, like, oh, everything

• 4:59Ryan Holiday?

  sucks, what am I gonna do? But like, oh, this is the role I've been assigned, I'm going to act the hell out of it. And this is something that Epictetus talks about as well, you know, he says that, you know, we're like actors in a play, we're not the author, we're not the playwright, but we have to really embrace the role that we're assigned. And this ability to be flexible, to not go, oh, but I only operate at this level, I'm a Harvard grad, I could not possibly accept X, Y, or Z. This makes us really fragile because life is going to humble us, life is going to put us in unfamiliar situations, but you, the person who can adjust, who can say, yeah,

• 5:39Ryan Holiday?

  I'll start here, I might work my way back up, I might be such a stunning actor in this role that I get promoted or I get noticed, but I'm not gonna put on any airs, I'm not gonna close myself off to anything, I'm going to embrace this, right? And this is something I think about, you know, when I, obviously, when I talk about this idea of the obstacle is the way, it's naive to think, oh, you can turn everything into a wonderful positive, that's not what it is. It's not, oh, this horrible thing happened, but by some magical trick, I turned it into the best thing that ever happened to me, you know, the loss of my father, or the loss of all your money, or the loss-

• 6:24Ryan Holiday?

  Of your job, or the loss of this or that. It's ridiculous and offensive to be glib to say like, oh, just focus on the good. No, what we're saying is that there's some good that can be derived from this. There's something positive we can find. We can move the ball forward in some way because of this. It's not to say we would have chose it to be happy. We can settle for the old pair of trousers. That's Lincoln's joke, right? We can settle for something as opposed to taking our ball and going home, crying about it, feeling persecuted about it, throwing up our hands, giving up because of it. And that's what Seneca ultimately does as well.

• 7:05Ryan Holiday?

  You know, his great writing towards the end of his life comes as these other doors have been shut in his face. And I would argue he makes his largest contribution through this writing, and that's why we're here talking about it today. So be humble, be flexible today. Make the most of it. Talk to you soon. And if you do have an anger problem, as we say, it's not that you have an anger problem, but anger is a problem for everyone. If you want to push anger away so it can be replaced with love, you can check out our tame your temper course, which we've done, which is based on the best thinking from the Stoics about anger, about anger problems, about rage. I think it's one of the better things we've done. You can check that out at dailystoic.com/anger.

• 7:50Ryan Holiday?

  And of course, all the courses are free if you're a Daily Stoic Life member. So if you are a member, you can just grab the course, or you can sign up for Daily Stoic Life at dailystoiclife.com.