You Can’t Go Out Like This

Ryan explains why we all need what you have to offer and why you should believe in the value that you bring to the world, on today’s Daily Stoic Podcast. If you or someone you know is in a mental health crisis and you live in the USA, please call 1-800-273-8255 to reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline today. You can also text 741741 for help in a crisis. Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: http://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.

• 0:05Ryan 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. You can't go out like this. There is no more controversial subject in the history of Stoicism than suicide. Cato died at his own hands in defiance of Caesar. His daughter Portia would later swallow hot coals after the death of her husband. Seneca, echoing Cato, committed suicide as Nero descended into brutal insanity, even inviting his wife to join him.

• 0:50Ryan Holiday?

  After he was granted the courtesy to choose the manner of his death, Thrasia, who also committed suicide, echoed Socrates's last words, "Nero can kill me, but he cannot harm me," before he asked companions to open the veins in his arms. The Stoics also wrote of suicide quite regularly, meditating on whether a philosopher had the choice to choose their own end, whether they ought to leave through the open door if life got bad enough, if they were sick enough, if their honor or dignity was compromised. And all of this is difficult to read thousands of years later, especially if you know anyone who has suffered from depression or worse, taken their own life. Here in America, suicides claim

• 1:34Ryan Holiday?

  more than 48,000 lives a year. Globally, some 800,000 people commit suicide each year, one every 40 seconds. It's important to remember, of course, that Rome was a very different place than the modern world. It was more violent. There were fewer options for help. The inner workings of the human mind were, for all the Stoics' brilliant wisdom, much less understood. But even so, we can push back on the Stoics' cavalier attitude about suicide. Yes, Cato made a bold and defiant statement by dying instead of living under Caesar. But what if... Churchill had made a similar gesture when he was forced out of power in 1929. What if de Gaulle had killed himself instead of escaping to England and fighting on?

• 2:19Ryan Holiday?

  By living, by living through immense difficulty and pain, these men saved the nations they cherished as much as Cato did Rome. Cato and Portia could have held on, and things might have turned out very differently if they had. Even Seneca himself talked about how he considered suicide as a young man when he thought his lung condition might kill him. Had he done this, is there a chance that we might not even be talking about Stoicism today? How much beautiful, inspiring, world-changing writing would the world have lost? Today, on Suicide Prevention Day, we remind you that things don't only get worse, they get better too. You can make them better. There will be, no matter what happens, opportunities to make a difference, to be your best self,

• 3:04Ryan Holiday?

  to laugh, to grow, to look back on these darker moments and think, "I'm glad I didn't listen. I'm glad I stuck around." The vast majority of people whose suicide attempts fail come to feel that they were blessed to survive. They are glad that they were saved, and certainly, the people who care about them feel this way too. Many come to realize that they stuck around for a reason, that they were better for it, and the world was better to have them in it. Besides, who is ever to say that they know what the future holds with such certainty that they can make such an irrevocable decision? Life is hard, yes, but a Stoic should stick around for it. But remember, as the great Charlie Mackesy said, and you can listen to our great episode

• 3:45Ryan Holiday?

  with him, that asking for help isn't giving up, it is refusing to give up. And remember, today is World Suicide Prevention Day. If you need to talk to someone, you can call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255. I had Logic on the podcast recently, has a beautiful song with that same title, about the same idea. The Suicide Hotline is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in both English and Spanish. If you're outside the US, just please Google it. And I would add on top of this, if this doesn't apply to you in any way, please reach out to someone who you think it might, so you can help them, because that's what we're doing here, as Stoics.