This Is How To Treat Your Brain | The Marks of a Rational Person

“On the one hand, the Stoics were big believers in the power of reason. They believed we were rational creatures, capable of thinking away through all the distractions and impulses and biases of the mind and body. On the other hand, they knew that people were crazy—that our mind, our thoughts were hardly infallible and didn’t always have our best interests at heart. ”Ryan explains the difference between the brain and the mind, and reads The Daily Stoic’s entry of the day, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast. This episode is also brought to you by LMNT, the maker of electrolyte drink mixes that help you stay active at home, work, the gym, or anywhere else. Electrolytes are a key part of a happy, healthy body. Right now you can receive a free LMNT Sample Pack for only $5 for shipping. To claim this exclusive deal you must go to drinkLMNT.com/dailystoic. Get your FREE Sample Pack now. If you don’t love it, they will refund your $5 no questions asked.***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 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. This is how to treat your brain. On the one hand, the Stoics were big believers in the power of reason.

• 0:47Ryan Holiday?

  They believed we were rational creatures capable of thinking through all the distractions and impulses and biases of the mind and body. On the other hand, they knew people were crazy, that our mind, that our thoughts were hardly infallible, and they didn't always have our best interests at heart. So how do you square these two ideas? That Marcus Aurelius is at one point telling himself to trust himself, and just pages later, telling himself to be suspicious of himself. How do you square living in accordance with nature with all the very unnatural habits and systems and self-discipline that the Stoics deliberately practiced? Perhaps an interesting comment from Jerry Seinfeld on the Tim Ferriss Podcast can help us. He says, "You gotta treat your brain like a dog you just got.

• 1:31Ryan Holiday?

  The mind is infinite in wisdom. The brain is stupid. The brain is a stupid little dog that is easily trained. Do not confuse the mind with the brain. The brain is easy to master. You just have to confine it, and that is done through repetition and systemization." The brain versus the mind, perfect. The mind is our nature, our incredible gift we were given at birth. But we are also stuck with our silly brains, our puppy-like brains that mean well, but get into so much trouble and mischief. A puppy you don't train turns into a nightmare, or worse, a liability that can hurt someone. So we train them, we contain them, we watch them, and of course, love and understand and play with them, while always remaining in charge.

• 2:19Ryan Holiday?

  The Marks of a Rational Person. This is the Daily Stoic entry for April 22nd, and it's a short one. "These are the characteristics of the rational soul: self-awareness, self-examination, and self-determination. It reaps its own harvests; it succeeds in its own purpose." Marcus Aurelius's Meditations, 11:1. "To be rational today, we have to do just three things: first, we must look inward; next, we must examine ourselves critically; finally, we must make our own decisions uninhibited by biases or popular notions."

• 3:01Ryan Holiday?

  And I thought I would also read Gregory Hayes's wonderful translation of this same passage, because he seems to do so much so well, and he's always been my favorite. 11:1 from the Daily Stoic. He says, and this is a long one, he says, "Characteristics of the rational soul: self-perception, self-examination, and the power to make of itself whatever it wants. It reaps its own harvest, unlike plants, and in a different way animals," that's a parenthetical, "whose yield is gathered by others." Then he says, "It reaches its intended goal, no matter where the limit of its life is set, not like dancing, or theater, or things like that, where the performance is incomplete if it's broken off in the middle.

• 3:44Ryan Holiday?

  But at any point, no matter which one you pick, it has fulfilled its mission and done its work completely, so it can say, 'I have what I came for.' It surveys the world and the empty space around it and the way it's put together. It delves into the endlessness of time to extend its grasp and comprehension of the periodic bursts and rebirths that the world goes through. It knows that those who come after us will see nothing different, that those who came before us saw no more than we do, and that anyone with forty years behind him and eyes in his head has seen both the past and the future alike." Also, the characteristics of the rational soul: affection for its neighbors, truthfulness,

• 4:24Ryan Holiday?

  humility, not to go any place above itself, which is characteristic of law as well. No difference here between the logos of rationality or that of justice.

• 4:36Ryan Holiday?

  I think what Marcus is really saying here, whether you look at the short one or the long one, I think he's really saying that the rational soul or rationality is intrinsically wonderful. It's done for its own sake. We have self-awareness, we practice self-examination, we seek self-determination. Why? Not because it makes us more successful, not because it makes us happier, but because it is itself a form of human flourishing. To not do these things, although they occasionally cause pain, to not do these things is to punish the self. We are designed for those traits. We are designed for self-examination, self-awareness, and self-determination.

• 5:20Ryan Holiday?

  And that's how we reap our own harvest. That's how we become who we're meant to become. That's how we fulfill our purpose as human beings. That's today's entry. That's the mark of a rational person. I hope you are trying to strive towards that. I know that I am. I don't always get there, but I feel like I'm getting closer. And I hope you are too. And I think this is what we also try to do in the Daily Stoic Habits Challenge. It's habits for success, habits for happiness. What are the habits? What are the practices that we have to put in place to keep our mind under control? It's also what we touch on in the Daily Stoic Slay Your Stress Challenge. You can check both those out, dailystoic.com/habits

• 6:04Ryan Holiday?

  or dailystoic.com/stress. Or you can get both of them totally for free if you sign up for Daily Stoic Life. That's our membership platform program. You get extra episodes from me, a bunch of other cool stuff. Plus, you get all our challenges and courses. Check that out at dailystoiclife.com.