This Is How It Will Feel

"Zeno dreamed of following in his father’s footsteps, into the family business. Panaetius did the same, becoming a famous diplomat, just as he was expected to. Cicero strove, as few have ever striven, to cast aside his family’s humble origins and reach the heights of power. Seneca wanted to become the greatest writer of his age. How do you think it felt for these Stoics to achieve what they had worked so long and hard for? To get everything they ever wanted?"Ryan describes the chase for accolades and its ultimate hollowness in 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 @DailyStoic:Twitter: https://twitter.com/dailystoicInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoic/Facebook: http://facebook.com/dailystoicYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/dailystoicSee 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.

• 0:06Speaker 00

  Welcome to The Daily Stoic, where each day we read a short passage designed to help you cultivate the strength, insight, wisdom necessary for living the good 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.

• 0:29Ryan Holiday?

  This is how it will feel. The Stoics were ambitious, as you are ambitious. Zeno dreamed of following in his father's footsteps into the family business. Panathеas did as well, becoming a famous diplomat, just as he was expected to. Cicero strove, as few have ever striven, to cast aside his family's humble origins and reach the heights of power. Seneca wanted to become the greatest writer of his age. How do you think it felt for these Stoics to achieve what they had worked for so long and hard? To get everything they ever wanted, what was it like for Cicero to make it to the top of the successive steps on the ladder of offices of power? It felt, as it feels

• 1:11Ryan Holiday?

  to achieve and grasp all the things that are not actually in our control, it felt strangely anticlimactic. It did not give these men the peace and security and meaning they thought it would, because no external accomplishment can do that, no matter how big or impressive. They found, as their philosophy had long warned them, that to chase approval and validation was an illusion, a shimmera constructed by biology, by culture, by the lies of broken people. That's the real question. How do you think it felt to realize that? How do you think that creeping realization came to Cicero or Seneca in Nero's service? What do you think it was like, as the nameless narrator in Ralph Ellison's

• 1:53Ryan Holiday?

  beautiful book Invisible Man recounts? "And now I looked up through a pain so intense now that the air seemed to roar with the clanging of metal, hearing, how does it feel to be free of illusion? And now I answered, painful and empty."

• 2:09Ryan Holiday?

  You can learn this by experience, or you can learn this from the experience of others. What will it be?

• 2:17Speaker 00

  Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcast app. And if you don't get the Daily Stoic email, go to dailystoic.com/email.