You Have Time, If You Make It | Focus On The Present Moment

Ryan talks about the importance of finding time to improve yourself, and reads this week’s meditation from The Daily Stoic Journal. Check out the Read To Lead Reading Challenge at: https://dailystoic.com/readSign up for the Daily Stoic email: https://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.

• 0:04Ryan Holiday?

  Bienvenidos al Daily Stoic Podcast. Cada día nos traemos una meditación inspirada por los antiguos estoicos, ilustrada con historias de la historia, eventos actuales y literatura para ayudarte a ser mejor en lo que haces. Y al principio de la semana intentamos hacer un profundísimo descubrimiento, estableciendo una especie de intención estoica para la semana, algo para meditar, algo para pensar, algo para dejarte con, para journalizar, lo que sea que te suceda que estés haciendo. Así que vamos a entrar.

• 0:33Ryan Holiday?

  Tienes tiempo, si lo haces. "Oh, pero estoy demasiado ocupado para leer", nos dicen. "No ahora, no con los niños, no con la forma en que las cosas están en el trabajo, no mientras termino esto". ¿No tienes tiempo, realmente? Como lee Julian Jackson en su increíble biografía del liberador francés Charles de Gaulle, mientras era presidente, de Gaulle leía dos a tres libros por semana, usualmente historia, novelas o poesía, y hizo un valiente intento de mantenerse al día con la literatura contemporánea. Siempre leía los ganadores de los principales premios literarios. La verdad es que no estás haciendo el tiempo para leer. Mientras tanto, el presidente de Francia encontró el tiempo para quedarse atrapado en los grandes trabajos de su día y de todos los tiempos, entre las bajas de la salvación de la democracia en Francia y gobernando el país durante más de una década.

• 1:17Ryan Holiday?

  Te beneficiarías mucho si hicieras el leer una prioridad. Piensa en Marcus Aurelius leyendo filosofía durante su reino, justo como otros jefes de Estado han beneficiado de leer Marcus Aurelius durante sus propios reinos. No solo de Gaulle hizo tiempo para leer, pero como hablamos en nuestro reto de "Read to Lead", incluso se le acercó y habló a los autores que estaba leyendo. Mientras todavía en el cargo, de Gaulle escribía una carta a un joven novelista cuyo trabajo le gustaba. "Tu libro me llevó a otro mundo, probablemente el verdadero", dijo. Como el principal personaje, de Gaulle amaba el novelo porque permitió que lo atravesara en zigazag. Seneca dijo que el cerebro debe ser entregado a la relajación de vez en cuando.

• 2:00Ryan Holiday?

  No puede ser golpeado repetidamente como un anvil. En cambio, necesitamos ser llevados a un mundo diferente de forma regular para que podamos explorar, olvidar zig y zag. Perhaps the greatest portal ever created for entry into such a world. If you're not reading, you're not living. As Seneca said, "It means your life is a tomb for a living person." And books are a key to unlock this tomb and free you into different worlds, this one included. How simple and great is that? And how can you possibly say you don't have time for such a wonderful, wonderful thing? And of course, the Daily Stoic Read to Lead Challenge is about this. Leaders have to be readers. They have to read all sorts of things. They have to read things that make their mind relax. They have to read things that make their mind sharper and wiser.

• 2:46Ryan Holiday?

  So we've built this great challenge. We have exercises about reading more fiction, reading more literature, about keeping a commonplace book, about learning from history, about even connecting with authors, as we're saying. So check it out, dailystoic.com/readtolead. It's one of the best things we've done. I think you'll like it. Check it out.

• 3:05Ryan Holiday?

  Focus on the present moment. And this is from this week's entry in the Daily Stoic Journal, "366 Days of Writing and Reflection on the Art of Living" by yours truly and my co-writer and translator, Stephen Hanselman. I actually do this journal every single day. There's a question in the morning, a question in the afternoon. Then there's these sort of weekly meditations. As Epictetus says, "Every day and night, we keep thoughts like this at hand. Write them, read them aloud, and talk to yourself and others about them." You can check out the Daily Stoic Journal anywhere books are sold. You can also get a signed, personalized copy from me in the Daily Stoic store at store.dailystoic.com. Marcus Aurelius ruled at a particularly turbulent time. Wars erupted on multiple fronts. Terrible plagues ravaged Rome.

• 3:50Ryan Holiday?

  His rule was certainly one of constant, unrelenting pressure. But he never let it overwhelm him. From the Stoics and from the example of his adopted father, the Emperor Antoninus Pius, Marcus found a coping strategy in always sticking close to the present moment and the duties at hand. When our own stress boils over, we can remember his practices and exercises to stick with what is in front of us, not everything that it might mean. At every moment, keep a sturdy mind on the task at hand as a Roman and as a human being. Stick doing it with strict and simple dignity, affection, freedom, and justice, giving yourself a break from all other considerations. You can do this if you approach each task as if it is your last, giving up every distraction,

• 4:34Ryan Holiday?

  emotional subversion of reason, and all drama, vanity, and complaint over your fair share. You can see how a mastery over a few things makes it possible to live an abundant and devout life. That's Marcus really is in Meditations. Were you to live 3,000 years or even a countless multiple of that, keep in mind that no one ever loses a life other than the one they are living, and no one ever lives a life other than the one they are losing. The longest and the shortest life then amount to the same, for the present moment lasts for all and is all anyone possesses. No one can possess either the past or the future, for how can someone be deprived of what is not theirs? And that's Marcus really says Meditations again. And then this is one of my favorite quotes from Marcus. He says, "Don't let your reflection of the whole sweep of life crush you. Don't fill

• 5:18Ryan Holiday?

  your mind with all the bad things that might still happen. Stay focused on the present situation and ask yourself why it is so unbearable and can't be survived." I was sitting on the porch with Richard Overton, who died, you know, almost two years ago now. And he was at that time, one of the oldest men in the world. There's like 112. I remember asking, I said, "Richard, how do you do it? You go day by day?" And he says, "Ah, no, man." He says, "Day by night." You know, for him, if he survived the night, that was a successful day. And, you know, it was, it was touch and go. There's a, there's a great, it's a great poem that says, I'm forgetting who it's by. Oh, Dylan Thomas, he says, you know,

• 5:59Ryan Holiday?

  every night, it's touch and go. Look, the future is uncertain. That's by definition, the future is unknown. It unfolds before us. And, and because of all the directions it could go, some of them are inevitably not what we want. And they're scary and intimidated and worrisome. And, and yeah, Seneca talks about premeditatio malorum, thinking of the evils in advance. I think he means that specifically and generally, but, but that's about being prepared for what might happen. Once you've done that, saying you gotta zoom in and focus on what's in front of you. That's today, right? You know, 2020, as far as what happened in 2020, I mean, there have been decades where fewer things happened, right? Or centuries, in some cases, it feels like.

• 6:43Ryan Holiday?

  But, you know, the way you get through that is you wake up and you do what you gotta do. I think kids have helped me with this, where it's like, "Look, alright, got 'em up, gotta do the morning routine, and I'm gonna go to work, I'm gonna do what I have to do, then I come home, then we're gonna play, then it's dinner, you know, then it's the after-dinner chores, and then it's starting the bedtime routine, and then you get them to bed, and then, you know, everything that happens from there, if you survive, is a bonus." And so, I think just that routine is helpful for focusing on the present moment, but I think Marcus's point of concentrating on the task before you like a Roman, it's just, you know, it's beautifully said. And if we could do that today, who knows what's, what was in the news yesterday, you

• 7:26Ryan Holiday?

  know, what the speculation about what's gonna happen next is, nobody knows. Nobody knows, not even me. And, and you know, as I'm, as I'm recording this a few, you know, weeks in advance, I know even less, but I'm not worried about it. Marcus really has another great quote, he goes, "Yeah, you're worried about the future", he says, "But you'll meet the future with the same weapons that you have now." So, let's focus on what's in front of you right now. Let's use those weapons where they're most effective, let's have the most impact where we can right now, let's tackle this problem, let's not work on this problem with our eye towards the next problem, and the next problem, and the next problem, and then what's gonna happen when that next one doesn't work, and blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, it's so easy to start spiraling, and, and it doesn't help, doesn't make you happier, it doesn't make things better. So, let's zoom in.

• 8:10Ryan Holiday?

  And, and look, do the Stoics sometimes talk about zooming way out and seeing the big picture? Yes. But right now, we're talking about zooming in, because zooming in is an effective tool. That's what I want you to be thinking about today. So, get out there, get after it, but stay focused. Concentrate like a Roman, keep your mind at the task at hand. Do it with strict and simple dignity, affection, freedom, justice. Give yourself a break from all other considerations. As Marcus says, "Approach this task as if it is your last, giving up every distraction, emotional subversion of reason. Give up the drama and the vanity and all the complaints. Master these few things, and that will give you a good life." Talk soon.