If You Can Do This, Every Moment Will Be Wonderful

Ryan explains why you should meditate on your mortality. Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: http://DailyStoic.com/signupFollow 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.

• 0:04Ryan 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?

  If you can do this, every moment will be wonderful. A little while back, we talked about that famous scene in Fight Club where Tyler Durden, Brad Pitt's character, drags a cashier named Raymond Hessel behind the convenience store where he works and puts a gun to his head. Raymond had given up on his dream of becoming a veterinarian because it was too hard. So here Raymond is, working minimum wage as a cashier. Tyler takes his license, puts it in his pocket, and promises Raymond he will be back checking in on him. "If you're not on your way to becoming a veterinarian in six weeks," Tyler says, "you will be dead." "That wasn't funny," Edward Norton's character says. "What was the point of that?"

• 1:09Ryan Holiday?

  "Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of Raymond K. Hessel's life," Tyler explains. "His breakfast will taste better than any meal you and I have ever tasted." Tyler's point in this scene, believe it or not, bears a striking resemblance to a point of a similar story in Seneca's writing. "We should go to bed as if we are going to our death," Seneca said, "as if our life is ending. When a man has said, 'I have lived,' he wrote, "then every morning he arises is a bonus." Indeed, this is the whole point of the memento mori exercise we've talked about so many times. If you want tomorrow to be the most beautiful day of your life, then spend some time today thinking about the end. Think about life as if it was over, as if someone had a gun to your head, because time does.

• 1:53Ryan Holiday?

  When you awake tomorrow, you will feel grateful. You have been given a reprieve. You will live as if you are on borrowed time, because you are. Every day is a bonus. Now go treat it as such. And that's the idea of Memento Mori. Of course, I've talked a million times about the Memento Mori coin that I carry in my left pocket everywhere I go. People have loved these. It's been crazy to see, as I've traveled all over the world, people showing me theirs. It's funny, as a writer, you'd think I'd be most proud of coming up with my books, but this thing is one of the proudest things I've ever created because I know what a difference it's made for people. And you can check it out at store.dailystoic.com.