The Best Leaders Are the Reluctant Ones | Try the Other Handle

Ryan talks about the qualities of a great leader, and reads this week’s meditation from The Daily Stoic Journal. The Daily Stoic Leadership Challenge is a 9-week course that was built to mirror the kind of education that produced historically great leaders like Marcus Aurelius. It is now a recorded course, which means all participants will join the course and move through it at their own pace. Sign up at https://dailystoic.com/leadershipchallengeSign up for the Daily Stoic email: https://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.

• 0:04Speaker 00

  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.

• 0:34Speaker 00

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• 2:46Speaker 00

  The best leaders are the reluctant ones. We tend to hear the most about natural leaders. You know, the leaders who are ambitious, who are charismatic. That's who we think about when we think about the famous leaders throughout history. And there's a reason for it. They got the spotlight, in part because the spotlight was exactly what they saw. But the truth is that many of the best leaders wanted nothing to do with leadership. Marcus Aurelius, for example, was not born to power, nor was he drawn to it. In many ways, power repelled him. Yet, as his teacher and advisor, Fronto, reminded him, no matter how much he wished otherwise or lost himself in his books, "Against your will, you must put on the purple cloak, not the philosopher's tunic, of course, wool." Destiny called Marcus to

• 3:29Speaker 00

  something, as I talk about in my book, The Boy Who Would Be King. Marcus could have run from it, but the fact that he did not yearn for command was precisely what made him great. He saw it as a job, not as a chance for personal advancement. He saw it as a duty, not as a fulfillment of ego. And this happened to be a recipe for great leadership. This happened to be a recipe for great leadership. This idea, as the writer Sam Walker puts it, "Being happy to serve, but reluctant to lead." So, the fact that you don't see yourself as great, the fact that you're not the first one to pipe up with a plan, that you don't instinctively assert yourself over other people, this is not a weakness. It may well be your strength. And one day, it might make you as great as Marcus.

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  For the Daily Stoic Leadership Challenge, we interviewed all these great leaders. We did several hours of these in-depth, deep dives with these leaders. Some in the military, some managing NBA teams, some coaching college, some academics, some leadership coaches. And I don't think any of them were like the sort of destined-to-be-leader types. But they became leaders slowly because it's what the world needed. It's what they needed to do to accomplish what they wanted to accomplish, not like instinctively, naturally who they were. And all the leaders that took the course with this, I found that same theme. If that describes you, I think you would learn a lot from the Leadership Challenge, because I think

• 4:58Speaker 00

  once you are called to be a leader in that way, then you then have to become a student of leadership, because these things don't occur to you so naturally. I think the Daily Stoic Leadership Challenge is one of the best challenges we've ever done. It's certainly the most in-depth. It lasts the longest. It's just one of the best challenges. I think you should check it out. There's all sorts of deep dives in here. As I said, the Leadership Deep Dives, plus, you know, six weeks of emails and a bunch of other awesome stuff. I'd love to have you check it out. You can go to dailystoic.com/leadershiplchallenge, or you can sign up for Daily Stoic Life, and you get that challenge, plus all the other ones, basically for the same cost that you get the Leadership Challenge for anyway. So if you're thinking about doing that, now is a good time. Happy to serve, reluctant to lead. That, to me, is such a perfect Stoic encapsulation of this journey that we're on.

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  And I hope you check out the Daily Stoic Leadership Challenge. Try the other handle. 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. Epictetus offered a powerful tool

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  in his handbook, "The Incredian", which the Stoics use as an exercise in decision-making about difficult events. Everything, Epictetus says, has two interpretations or handles by which it can be grabbed. One that will make it harder, one that will make it easier. Do you take offense, or do you focus on a common ground? Do you focus on all that's gone wrong, or what has gone right? Ask yourself these questions about everything you see and feel. Try to always grab the right handle. That's from this week's entry in the Daily Stoic Journal, "366 Days of Writing and Reflection on the Art of Living," which you can get anywhere books are sold, including, of course, my bookstore, The Painted Porch.

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  You can check out thepaintedporch.com, or come see us on Main Street in Bastrop, Texas. Let's listen to Epictetus drill down on this. "Every event has two handles," he says, "one by which it can be carried and one by which it can't. If your brother does you wrong, don't grab it by its wrongdoing, because this is the handle incapable of lifting it. Instead, use the other, that he is your brother, that you were raised together, and then you have hold of the handle that it carries." This is Epictetus in Coridion 43. And then he says in Discourses 4:1, "No, it is events that give rise to fear, when another has power over them or can prevent it, that a person becomes able to inspire fear. How is the fortress destroyed? Not by iron or fire, but by judgments.

• 7:51Speaker 00

  And it is here that we must begin, and it is from this front that we must seize the fortress and throw out the tyrants." So, this idea of grabbing things by the handle. In fact, there's this interesting list, you can Google it. Thomas Jefferson wrote a bunch of, like, rules for one of his young relatives. And he says, somewhat elusively, he says, you know, "Always grab things by their smooth handle." And I think it was Donald Robertson who pointed out to me that he's referring to Epictetus grabbing by the right handle. Instead of the rough handle, grab the smooth handle. The point being, stuff happens. Are you gonna try to say, "This was done to me," or are you gonna say, "This is done for me?" Are you gonna say, "Look at all I've lost," or are you gonna say, "Look at all I've gained?" As Epictetus says, you're gonna say, "Look at my brother, what did he do? What an asshole."

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  Or are you gonna say, "This is my brother, I love him, he would never hurt me on purpose." You grab the handle that makes you stronger, the one that gives you agency, not the one that strips you of agency. You grab the one that gives you hope, not the one that strips you of hope. You grab the one that gives you a path forward, not the one that freezes you hopelessly in place. What's the right handle? That's what we're thinking about. And every situation has a handle. And are you going to get mad? Are you going to use it as an opportunity? I think about this with my kids. They do something. Am I going to lose my temper? And show them that I lose my temper and that I should be afraid. They should be afraid of me or that they should hide things from me. Or am I going to use it as a chance to talk to them, to teach them something?

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  Famously, the story of George Washington and the cherry trees, teaching this lesson. His father catches him chopping down the cherry tree. He asks who does it? George Washington tells the truth. His father could be angry. He just has a confession from his son that he chopped down a priceless cherry tree. Instead, the moral of the story is, I'm glad that you told me the truth. And you can trust me, I'm not going to punish you for having told me the truth. I'd rather you chop down my trees than tell a lie. Right? What handle are you going to choose as a parent, as a teacher, as a boss? And by grabbing the right handle versus the wrong handle, are you making the relationship stronger, better? Based on trust, based on aligned incentives, based on shared history?

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  Or by grabbing the wrong handle, are you showing them to lie? Are you showing them to hide things? Are you showing them that you should be feared? That you should be ignored? That you can't be taken seriously? That you're not really their ally or friend? Right? The handle we choose matters. Even Epictetus, you've got to imagine, he's trapped in slavery. It's horrible. He spends the first 30 years of his life that way. Does he choose to see this as the worst thing that could have possibly happened? Or does he learn from it? Even the so-called Stockdale paradox. And he says, I knew I would survive. If I did, I would turn this into the very best thing that happened to me. That's choosing to grab the right handle. That's choosing to grab the smooth handle, which is what you must do, which is what we must all do in any and all situations. And that's it for me today. I'm exhausted.

• 10:46Speaker 00

  I've just spent all day recording videos. You can hear my voice going out a little bit. But I'm trying to tell myself, this is one day among many. This is making me stronger. I'm getting better for it. I'm crossing off stuff for my list. And I can focus on what I really need to be doing. I'm going to try to grab the good handle today. So should you. Talk soon.

• 11:07Speaker 00

  Thanks so much for listening to the Daily Stoic Podcast. Again, if you don't know this, you can get these delivered to you via email every day. Just go to dailystoic.com/email. So check it out.