Greatness is up to You | A New Way To Pray

Every day, you have to do things you’d rather not do. Or maybe you’re early in your career, and you have to do things that you think are beneath you. Maybe you dream of some higher station in life, and you phone it in on the lowly tasks you’re given now. You think, I’m better than this, this is embarrassing, this doesn’t matter. Foolishness.📕Pre-order Ryan Holiday's new book "Discipline Is Destiny" and get exclusive pre-order bonuses at https://dailystoic.com/preorder ✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail📱 Follow us: Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook 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.

• 0:02Ryan Holiday?

  Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast. Each day, we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics, illustrated with stories from history, current events, and literature to help you be better at what you do. And at the beginning of the week, we try to do a deeper dive, setting a kind of Stoic intention for the week, something to meditate on, something to think on, something to leave you with, to journal about, whatever it is you happen to be doing. So let's get into it.

• 0:44Ryan Holiday?

  Greatness is up to you.

• 0:48Ryan Holiday?

  Every day, you have to do things you'd rather not. Or maybe you're early in your career and you have to do things that you think are beneath you. Maybe you dream of some higher station in life and you phone it in on the lowly tasks you're given now. You think, "I'm better than this. This is embarrassing." It doesn't matter. But this is foolishness. Plutarch tells us about a Greek general and statesman who, despite his brilliance on and off the battlefield, was appointed to an insultingly minor office in Thebes, responsible, as it was, for the city's sewers. In fact, it was because of his brilliance that he was put in this role, as a number of jealous and fearful rivals thought it would effectively end his career. But instead of being provoked or despairing at his irrelevance,

• 1:33Ryan Holiday?

  he took fully to this new job, declaring that the distinction of the office isn't brought to the man, the man brings the distinction to the office. And with discipline and earnestness, Plutarch would write, "He proceeded to transform that insignificant office into a great and respected honor, even though previously it had involved nothing more than overseeing the clearing of dung and the diverting of water from the streets." The Stoics believed that in the end, it's not about what we do, it's about who we are when we do it. And so it went for Musonius Rufus in the middle of his horrible exile, digging ditches by order of the empire. "So, does it pain you?" he supposedly said

• 2:15Ryan Holiday?

  to a friend, "If I dig the Isthmus for the sake of Greece, what would you have felt if you'd seen me playing like Nero? That you do anything well is noble, no matter how humble or impressive, as long as it's the right thing. That greatness is up to you, it's what you bring to everything that you do." Temperance, as Cicero claimed, can be the fine polish on top of a great life. Remember, it wasn't the throne that made Marcus Aurelius impressive, it was his kingly behavior, his discipline, his self-control. He wasn't after power or status, he said, "a perfection of character, to live your last day, every day, without frenzy, or sloth, or pretense." He was after becoming

• 3:00Ryan Holiday?

  the best possible version of himself, putting a fine polish on top of everything he did, no matter how humble or impressive. And to me, that's what discipline is really like. I tell that that story about the Greek statesman, at the end of Discipline is Destiny, about the idea of not just doing your best, but being the best, like being best, right? And this is a really important Stoic idea and something I try to practice. I try to do everything with a sense of pride and commitment, and most of all, discipline. And I guess that leads me to telling you about the new book, which I'm sure, if you've listened to the podcast, you've heard, but Discipline is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control

• 3:43Ryan Holiday?

  is out at the end of the month. We have a bunch of awesome pre-orders, which you can get now, including some bonus chapters, the playlist I used to write the book. You can even get signed manuscript pages from the book. I'll sign your copy of the book. All you have to do is go to dailystoic.com/preorder to get those preorder bonuses. You can preorder it on Amazon if you want, you can preorder on Audible if you want, you can preorder it from your local independent bookstore. You just send the receipt over. Instructions are at dailystoic.com/discipline. It would mean so much to me if you could support the book. I tried to approach each day with that idea of greatness, that greatness was what I was putting in. It was my habits, my practices that day, not when it comes out, not if people love it or not, but whether I did my best. And I hope you can see that.

• 4:27Ryan Holiday?

  Check it out, dailystoic.com/preorder. Discipline is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control, the new book from me, Ryan Holiday. Thank you for listening.

• 4:41Ryan Holiday?

  A new way to pray.

• 4:46Ryan Holiday?

  We often pray for things we desire and in the process, excuse ourselves from the equation. We're hoping that the heavens will magically gift us with the outcome we want, whether it's for a promotion or a speedy recovery of a loved one. The Stoics would urge you to stop doing this. Marcus Aurelius reminded himself not to present the gods with a list of demands for pleasures or comforts, but instead ask for help, not needing those things. In a sense, then, he was really asking for inner strength. He was, in a sense, asking himself. So, think about all the things you want that you're praying or hoping for and try turning them around like this. See what you come up with instead.

• 5:31Ryan Holiday?

  And this is from this week's entry in the Daily Stoic Journal, "366 Days of Writing and Reflection on the Art of Living," by yours truly and my co-writer and translator, Stephen Hanselman. I actually do this journal every single day. There's a question in the morning, a question in the afternoon, then there's these sort of weekly meditations. As Epictetus says, "Every day and night, we keep thoughts like this at hand. Write them, read them aloud, and talk to yourself and others about them." You can check out the Daily Stoic Journal anywhere books are sold. You can also get a signed, personalized copy from me in the Daily Stoic store at store.dailystoic.com. "Try praying differently," Marcus writes in Meditations 940. "See what happens.

• 6:13Ryan Holiday?

  Instead of asking for a way to sleep with her, try asking for a way to stop desiring to sleep with her. Instead of asking for a way to get rid of him, try asking for a way not to crave his demise. Instead of a way not to lose my child, try asking for a way to lose my fear of it." And then Epictetus in Discourses says, "We cry to God Almighty, how can we escape this agony? Don't you have hands? Or could it be that God forgot to give you a pair? Sit and pray your nose doesn't run, or rather just wipe your own nose and stop seeking a scapegoat." And then Epictetus in Discourses 4:1, he says, "But I haven't at any time been hindered in

• 6:53Ryan Holiday?

  my will nor forced against it. How is that possible? I have bound up my choice to act with the will of God. God wills that I be sick, such is my will. He wills that I should choose something, so do I. He wills that I reach for something, or something be given to me, I wish for the same. What God doesn't will, I will not wish for." This idea of blowing your own nose, that's a great expression from Epictetus that I love. I think what the Stoics are talking about here is self-sufficiency. I was just reading a great little biography of Musashi, the samurai swordsman, and I wrote down a line in my commonplace book from him, he says, "Worship the gods and Buddha, but do not rely on them." Right? He didn't want to go into a sword fight hoping that Buddha would bless

• 7:37Ryan Holiday?

  him. He trained for it to make that irrelevant, right? He wanted to rely on his sword and his actions. Remember, the Stoics talk about what's in our control, what's not in our control. I think what the Stoics are talking about is, don't pray for things that are not in your control, that are not up to you. Don't make yourself dependent on getting lucky, on being blessed, on your dreams coming true, on everything going right. Focus on having a plan that, as the Stoics say, is indifferent to all that, right? There's another great line from Epictetus where he says, you know, a student's like, "How should I do this?" But he says, "You're asking me to show you what to do it." And he says, "Wouldn't it

• 8:19Ryan Holiday?

  be better to ask to be adaptable to all circumstances?" And so this is really where we're trying to get, a place where there isn't anything we pray for. I take some pride, you know, every year my wife will go, "What do you want for your birthday?" And I go, "I don't, nothing. I don't want anything. There's nothing I need. There's nothing I want. It's not because I'm a billionaire. It's that I, I spent more time, you know, just getting the things that I did need, the tools I need for my life, or my, you know, my happiness. And then for the most part, being indifferent to all the other things." And not needing to wait for my birthday or Christmas or, you know, a check to come in to be able to afford this thing. It's better to not want it in the first place.

• 9:04Ryan Holiday?

  And I think this is true for all the kinds of luck or, you know, cool experiences or things that we think we want or need.

• 9:13Ryan Holiday?

  No, either get it for yourself if it's possible or write it off. You know, I think that's what the third quote from that, that third quote, the final quote from Epictetus, he's saying is like, "Look, I'll just align my likes with what happens. If God wants me to have it, or the gods want me to have it, or the logos, or whatever." Stoics obviously had complicated, somewhat contradictory views on religion. But what will be, will be. What I get is what I get. I won't throw a fit, right? That's where we're trying to get as Stoics. Trying to get to this place of self-sufficiency where we blow our own nose, where we're good, whatever happens. And I wish that for you. It's not easy. It doesn't just happen. You gotta work for it.

• 9:57Ryan Holiday?

  But that's what we're doing here, these meditations. And I hope this helps and I'll talk to you soon.

• 10:10Ryan Holiday?

  Thanks so much for listening to the Daily Stoic Podcast. If you don't know this, you can get these delivered to you via email every day. Check it out, dailystoic.com/email.