BONUS: You Know, You Can Do Something

If it’s right, if it must be done….do it now.📕 Tomorrow is the LAST DAY you can grab the Right Thing, Right Now ebook for just $2.99! Or if you prefer reading hardcover books, we have signed copies available over at the Daily Stoic Store, too! Head here to get yours today🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://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, 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 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.

• 0:55Ryan Holiday?

  You know, you can do something. It's funny how much Cicero wished someone would do something to curb the lust for power of Caesar and Mark Antony and Octavian, how Seneca wished that Nero would grow up, how he wished someone would stand in his way, restore him to sanity. They said this privately. Sometimes they even said it publicly, or at least alluded in as coded a way as possible to keep their heads. They alluded to their disagreements with these powerful men. "There is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do," George Washington said in 1776, "to see a plan adopted for the abolition of slavery." And it's a relief to see one of the founders say such a thing, but it also makes you wonder,

• 1:39Ryan Holiday?

  was there a man living a better position to see about that plan than George Washington? Who was he waiting for in the nation that he started and led to do something about it exactly? And this is sort of a strange thing that we do. We lament the state of the world. We say we hope someone will do something, anything about a problem. But why does it not occur to us that we could be that person? There is a passage at the beginning of Meditations where Marcus Rilis talks about a stillic dream for Rome, a Rome where individual rights are respected, where there is inequality of status and freedom of expression. Again, it's a noble idea. And who better to put it into play than the emperor of Rome?

• 2:22Ryan Holiday?

  Yet, like Seneca, who was Nero's closest advisor, like Cicero, like George Washington, Marcus apparently had his reasons why this could not be more than an idea. Just like we have future plans, pipe dreams for how we'd like to run our business, intentions for what we hope to contribute, reasons why we're not able to do that right now, reasons why we are not qualified, reasons why we need others to do something first. This is nonsense. You should do it and you should do it right now. Of course, this is the idea in Courage is Calling, but also in Right Thing Right Now, which, as it happens, is $2.99 on Amazon right now. So maybe you were even like, oh yeah, I want to read that book someday.

• 3:05Ryan Holiday?

  Well, it will never be cheaper than this. And why don't you grab it? I think it was at like 70 or 80 on Amazon right now, one of the highest ranks it's ever had. So that's pretty cool. People are reading it. And hopefully with this Naval Academy thing, there's a little bit of an urgency to it. Certainly I thought about it. It's like, hey, I'm going to draw a line. Am I new later? Am I going to do it now? That's the idea. You've got Right Thing Right Now, Good Character, Good Values, Good Deeds for $2.99 on Amazon. And we do have signed hardcovers at the Painted Porch and the Daily Stoic Store. I'll link to that in today's show notes also.