Have You Ever Had A Motionless Moment?

“We are so busy. We think we’re supposed to be. We think that’s how we get better. We think that moving is the only way to move forward.”Ryan discusses why you must strive for moments of stillness, 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/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.

• 0:04Ryan 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 at DailyStoic.com.

• 0:26Ryan Holiday?

  Have you ever had a motionless moment? We are so busy, we think we're supposed to be. We think that's how we get better. We think that moving is the only way forward. And you might think that Marcus Aurelius could relate. After all, he headed an entire empire. He had books to read, writing to do, laws to pass, cases to hear, troops to lead. So yes, he was a busy man. He, like us, was pulled in many directions. He had ambitions, worries, hopes, dreams. And yet, when he speaks most beautifully, it's of moments of quiet and calm. "If you can cut free of impressions that cling to the mind," he said, "free of the future and the past,

• 1:09Ryan Holiday?

  and can make yourself," as Empedocles says, "a sphere rejoicing in its perfect stillness." Have you ever had a moment like that? If you have, you know how special it is. You know what kind of insights you were able to access, what kind of happiness crept in, what kind of peace you were able to feel. Marcus wrote that having that stillness allows us to concentrate on what living can be lived, the present moment. Only then, he said, "Could you spend the time you have left in tranquility and in kindness and at peace with the spirit within you?" You deserve moments like that. Moments where you watch the snow fall, moments when you sit quietly with a book, moments when you look out the train window,

• 1:54Ryan Holiday?

  not on a conference call, not checking email, not wondering how long until you arrive in the city, but a moment to check in with yourself, to think about your life and what you want to do with it. Moments with loved ones, moments when you are grateful, connected, happy, creative. In the zone, doing whatever it is that you do best. When the Stoics talk about stillness, they're not talking about some abstract notion. They're talking about maybe the most important thing you can be doing in your life. They are saying that all the work you are doing, all the thoughts you're expending, trying to get ahead, trying to force as a breakthrough are pointless. The real way to charge ahead is to slow down, to clear your mind, to rejoice in perfect stillness,

• 2:39Ryan Holiday?

  free of the future and the past, fully present and locked in. You can do it. You deserve that. Like, I know for me, one of the, one of the things I was really thinking about when I wrote Stillness is the Key was the idea that all the special moments in my life came not when I was doing stuff, but when I was not doing stuff. It was when I was looking out the train window. It was when I was reading a book at my kitchen table in my college apartment. Marcus really sort of fell on me like a ton of bricks. It was, it's moments now with my kids, or it's moments in a run through a forest when I didn't hear anything but this buzzing sound and I couldn't figure out what this buzzing sound was. And I realized all I could hear were bugs. The bugs were so loud, it sounded like a chainsaw. That's how quiet it was where I was.

• 3:23Ryan Holiday?

  And, and so like, these are the moments that I think we know our life is about. And we've talked before about how, how easy it is to become a slave to your stuff and how success can take you further from where you want to go. I think we know that what we want in life, where we're trying to go is moments of stillness and peace and tranquility and reflection and, and happiness. And yet, we make decisions that take us away from that thing. And so, when, when the Stoics are asking if you've had a motionless moment, they're asking, how are you spending your life? Are you getting the one thing that's supposed to make your life worth living? Are you doing what you need to be doing? Are you getting what you deserve? Are you living what can be lived, as Marcus said? Are you experiencing the present moment? The present moment is, can be all that you need if you. So choose.

• 4:08Ryan Holiday?

  And so these motionless moments, to me, are the greatest moments. It's sitting on a porch swing. It's, you know, it's sitting in an airplane cabin when everyone has fallen asleep and you're not watching a movie, you're not doing anything. You're just there with yourself. It's moments with the journal in the morning. It's moments with a book. It's a quiet dinner with people you love, or it's a loud dinner with people you love. It doesn't have to literally be still, but it's moments when you've tuned out the inessential, you've focused on what really matters, and you're there and happy and present and full. And that is what the Stoics would define joy as. And that's what the Stoics would say we're doing this work for.