We Always Lose When We Lose Our Tempers

Something happened. You got pissed. Now two bad things have happened. That’s just a fact. Because getting angry rarely makes things better—even if it helps you get what you thought you wanted. It taxes your heart. It causes you to be mean to other people. To “win” you had to lose your self-control. This is not to say you should merely accept everything in life. The Stoics were not passive weaklings. It’s that they preferred persuasion, patience, and persistence to yelling. They focused on addressing root causes, not catharsis. How much worse getting mad is than the things that caused it, Seneca said. “Anger always outlasts hurt,” he advised. “Best to take the opposite course. Would anyone think it normal to return a kick to a mule or a bite to a dog?”So if you want to win—at life, at philosophy, at accomplishing what you have set out to accomplish—you’ll need to rein in your temper. You’ll need to figure out the opposite course, develop more than one kind of response to things you don’t like. It’s easy to get angry, but it’s more effective to remain calm and come up with solutions. Tame your temper. Don’t make problems worse by getting angry. 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.

• 0:06Ryan Holiday?

  Welcome to The Daily Stoic, where each day we read a short passage designed to help you cultivate the strength, insight, wisdom necessary for living the good 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. We always lose when we lose our tempers. Something happened, you got pissed. Now two bad things have happened. That's just a fact. Because getting angry rarely makes things better, even if it helps you get what you thought you wanted. It taxes your heart. It causes you to be mean to other people. To win, you had to lose your self-control.

• 0:51Ryan Holiday?

  That is not to say you should merely accept everything in life. The Stoics were not passive weaklings. It's that they preferred persuasion, patience, and persistence to yelling. They focused on addressing the root causes, not catharsis. "How much worse getting mad is than the things that caused it?" Seneca said. "Anger always outlasts hurt," he advised. "Best to take the opposite course. Would anyone think it normal to return a kick to a mule or a bite to a dog?" So if you want to win at life, at philosophy, at accomplishing what you set out to accomplish, then you need to rein in your temper. You'll need to figure out the opposite course to develop more than one kind of response to things

• 1:35Ryan Holiday?

  you don't like. It's easy to get angry, but it's more effective to remain calm and come up with solutions. Tame your temper. Don't make problems worse by getting angry. Anger is a problem that faces us all. We don't all have anger problems, but anger is a problem for everyone. You can learn how to control your temper with Daily Stoic's new course, Taming Your Temper: The 10-Day Stoic Guide to Controlling Your Anger. Stoics recognized anger as a weakness to be mastered. They knew that anger left unchecked would consume you and take over your life. We can help you. I hope you check it out. Go to DailyStoic.com/anger.