Waste No More Time Doing This | Keeping "The News" In Check

“Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be,” Marcus Aurelius says. “Be one.”Don't follow breaking news. Don't let it change who you are. Don't let it rattle your equilibrium. 📕 Turn off the news and read these books instead:Trust Me I’m Lying by Ryan Holiday Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil PostmanThe Image by Daniel BoorstinThe Brass Check by Upton Sinclair📓 Pick up a signed edition of The Daily Stoic Journal: 366 Days of Writing and Reflection on The Art of Living: https://store.dailystoic.com/🎟 Ryan Holiday is going on tour! Grab tickets at ryanholiday.net/tour💡Take the first step towards a calmer future by signing up for the course: Taming Your Temper: The 11 Day Stoic Guide to Controlling Your Anger at the Daily Stoic Store: https://dailystoic.com/anger✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/📱 Follow 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.

• 0:02Speaker 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.

• 0:42Speaker 00

  Arguments are for losers. The Stoics were smart. They were well-read and well-informed about the issues of the day. They led armies and held public office. They put out great works of literature and art. They had families. They went to the theater. But do you know what they didn't do? They didn't spend a lot of time arguing with other people. Once, when Epictetus was criticized, he didn't even try to defend himself or correct them. "If they really knew me," he joked to himself, "they'd have said something even worse." Actually, though, Epictetus believed that one of the products of an education was learning what was your business and what wasn't, as well as what was up to you and what wasn't. Arguing with other people, trying to change their minds about stuff that didn't matter? That was a losing game.

• 1:27Speaker 00

  That was a waste of time. As we said recently, one of the signs of progress in this journey you're on should be that you're arguing with others less, getting in fights less, wasting time less, because you're focused on yourself and all the work you have to do there, because you care less about what others think, because you accept what's not up to you. Losers get into fights on Twitter. Losers make mountains out of molehills, turn edge cases into culture war battlefields. Losers try to impress other people, try to get them to like them. Do they win these fights sometimes? Sure, but they are pyrrhic victories, costing them far more than they receive in spoils. So what about you? Are you a loser? To me, this is part and parcel of taming your temper.

• 2:12Speaker 00

  One of the best things you can do to get your anger under control is just care less about stuff that doesn't matter. Spend less time getting sucked into fights that escalate and escalate and ratchet and ratchet until you're screaming or yelling or whatever, right? Huge part of it. It's a big part of what we talk about in the tame your temper course. 10 days of challenges, exercises, video lessons and bonus tools based on Stoic philosophy. Materials to help you deal with your anger in a constructive manner. We will give you the tools that you need, not just to manage your anger, but to leave it in the past so you can focus on what's important. Living a virtuous and fulfilling life. You can learn the wisdom of the great thinkers and leaders of history through this course.

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  Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, Abraham Lincoln, even Mr. Rogers and many others. You'll be able to use our unique exercises to break free from the cage that anger has built around you and see the world and yourself in a new light. Each day, you'll be able to watch a new video from me, Ryan Holiday, author of The Obstacle is the Way, Ego is the Enemy, Stillness is the Key, and of course, The Daily Stoic, as I explain the ideas behind the words and shed light on the path that you're on, but that I am also on. Because again, we are all struggling to tame our temper and we will all be better if we can get closer to that. Being able to control your anger is a difficult but worthwhile goal. It will take time and effort, it won't be free, but by changing your perspective and

• 3:38Speaker 00

  developing techniques to control your temper, it will ultimately be achievable and life-changing. So take the first step on the path to a calmer and more fulfilling future. Check out Taming Your Temper, The 10 Day Stoic Guide to Controlling Your Anger. You can click the link below or you can just go to dailystoic.com/anger.

• 4:05Speaker 00

  Keeping the news in check. Even the ancient news felt inundated with gossip in news. This week, you will face a barrage like they couldn't have imagined. From texts, calls, emails, to the incessant grind of the 24/7 news machine. Instead of responding to every status update, every urgent call, or the latest trending incendiary news story, take a moment to remember the three ways that the Stoics used to keep their focus on their purpose and duty in the present moment. Number one, step away from the noise. Two, remember that no news can throw you off the purpose of your present choices. Three, don't add something negative or positive to what's being reported. This is from this week's entry in the Daily Stoic Journal, "366 Days of Writing and

• 4:50Speaker 00

  Reflection on the Art of Living," by yours truly and my colleague Stephen Hanselman, who I also wrote the Daily Stoic with. You can actually get signed copies of the Daily Stoic Journal in the Daily Stoic store at store.dailystoic.com, or we've got copies here at the Painted Porch, my bookstore in Bastrop, Texas. Always popular, people ask me to sign them all the time. Anyways, check out the Daily Stoic Journal. I'm on like my fourth year of doing it. You might like it as well. But here's two quotes from Marcus and one from Epictetus to guide you this week. "Are you distracted by breaking news? Then take some leisure time to learn something good and stop bouncing around. But when you do, keep in mind the other mistake: to be so distracted by getting control

• 5:32Speaker 00

  that you wear yourself out and lose a purpose by which you can direct your thoughts and impulses." That's Meditations 2:7. Epictetus's Discourses 3:8 says, "Whenever disturbing news is delivered to you, bear in mind that no news can be relevant to your reasoned choice. Can anyone break news to you that your assumptions or desires are wrong? No way. But they can tell you someone died. But even so, what is that to you?" And then Marcus really says, Meditations 8:49. He says, "Don't tell yourself anything more than what the initial impressions report. It's been reported to you that someone is speaking badly about you. This is the report. The report wasn't that you've been harmed. I see that my son is sick, but not that his life is at risk.

• 6:14Speaker 00

  So always stay within your first impressions and don't add them to your head. This way, nothing can happen to you." Look, the number one secret to a good productive routine and personal happiness is to limit your news consumption. Obviously, I'm biased as an author, but read books, don't watch the news. Read thoughtful perennial analysis. Don't follow speculative news reports. Limit your news consumption. And like, honestly, if you do feel like you need the distraction, you need like a palate cleanser, don't pull up CNN, pull up ESPN, like read about sports or something, right? Read celebrity gossip. Don't read the latest divisive piece of news.

• 6:57Speaker 00

  I'm not saying that it's not important to be informed. Of course, it's important to be informed. I would just argue that following the infinite news machine is how one becomes informed. I think, as I've said before, The Great Influenza, a book that I read at the beginning of the pandemic, taught me much more about how to spend the last 15 months than, you know, any breaking news story, because the news stories never really changed anything. It's like, hey, this thing is real. Here's the scientific advice. Take it seriously. Wait for it to be over. Right? The latest report is only adding to what we already know for the most part. So step back. Don't consume so much news. Couple of recommendations on the, on this front. Obviously, one, my book, Trust Me, I'm Lying, is about how the

• 7:40Speaker 00

  news manipulates you. But this great book by Daniel Boorstin called The Image that I suggest people read, and there's also Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death. These are two eye-opening books that will give you a sense of why you should consume as little news as possible, and how manipulative it is and how harmful it is. And then the other book, which inspired my book, Trust Me, I'm Lying, if you read The Jungle as a kid in, in high school or whatever, Eppen Sinclair's expose of the meatpacking industry, then I strongly suggest you read his book, The Brass Check, which is actually an expose of the news industry around the same time. And sadly, almost nothing has changed. I'm not saying that reporters aren't good people. I'm not saying that they don't do an important

• 8:24Speaker 00

  public service. I'm not saying I read no news. I'm just saying, look, the most viral emotion is anger. Should it surprise? This that the news perpetually makes us angry. Right. Should it surprise us that news is always breaking, but never fully arrives that they're always speculating? No, it's an enormous beast trying to capture as much attention as possible to then sell that attention to advertisers. You are the product that's being sold when you consume this free news. Got to understand that. Listen to podcasts. Podcasts are great conversations, even this, like I'm recording this, but it has no real date on it. It should be relevant forever. So I'm not as incentivized to rile you

• 9:05Speaker 00

  up the way that your news is. So I think it's interesting that even 2000 years ago, the Stoics were struggling with it. They'd be appalled at what our information diet is today. So step back. Give yourself some space. Don't follow breaking news. Don't let it change who you are. Don't let it rattle your equilibrium. Just keep doing you. Read books, study real wisdom and information that will make you smarter and able to respond to what's happening in the world and make you a better, more informed citizen.

• 9:37Speaker 00

  I'm heading over to Australia in a couple of weeks. I'm going to be in Sydney on July 31. I'm going to be in Melbourne on August 1. Then in November, I'm doing Vancouver and Toronto, London, Dublin, Rotterdam, all awesome cities. I'm really excited to go to. If you want to come to those talks, they're open to the public and you can grab those tickets at RyanHoliday.net/tour.