#321 Ryan Holiday - The Stoic Survival Guide

Ryan Holiday is a bestselling author and one of the most influential modern voices on Stoicism. His 12 books, including The Obstacle Is the Way, Ego Is the Enemy, and Stillness Is the Key, have sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. He's also the founder of Daily Stoic, a media company that reaches millions through books, podcasts, newsletters, and YouTube. In 2025, Ryan completed his four-book Stoic Virtues series and followed it with a sold-out international speaking tour. Shawn Ryan Show Sponsors: Sheath. The underwear of legends. Go to ⁠https://www.sheath.com/SRS⁠ and use code SRS for 20% off. Visit ⁠https://drinkag1.com/SRS⁠ to get a free AG1 Travel Case with 7 free AG1 Travel Packs in your Welcome Kit with your first AG1 subscription order while supplies last. Control Body Odor ANYWHERE with @shop.mando and get 20% off with promo code SRS at ⁠https://shopmando.com⁠! #mandopod For problems worth solving — get started with Claude at — ⁠https://Claude.ai/srs⁠ Ready to upgrade your eyewear? Check them out at ⁠https://roka.com⁠ and use code SRS for 20% off sitewide. Ryan Holiday Links: Website - ⁠https://ryanholiday.net⁠ Daily Stoic - ⁠https://dailystoic.com⁠ Ryan Holiday IG - ⁠https://www.instagram.com/ryanholiday⁠ Daily Stoic IG - ⁠https://www.instagram.com/dailystoic⁠ Painted Porch Bookshop IG - ⁠https://www.instagram.com/paintedporchbookshop⁠ X - ⁠https://x.com/dailystoic⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Mr. President, my company told me of the explosion on our rig.

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  On October 2nd.

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• 0:59Shawn Ryan?

  Ryan Holiday. Welcome to the show, man.

• 1:02Speaker 05

  Yeah, thanks for having me.

• 1:03Shawn Ryan?

  It's an honor to have you.

• 1:04Speaker 05

  Likewise.

• 1:05Shawn Ryan?

  So, uh, yeah, this year, one of my goals is to become a little more stoic as the political and world current events just continue to spiral out of control.

• 1:18Shawn Ryan?

  That's been one of my goals, primarily for my family, you know, it's just, uh.

• 1:22Speaker 05

  You seem stoic, though, lowercase stoic. You seem, are you not?

• 1:28Shawn Ryan?

  I tend to lose my shit every once in a while, but, um, as we all do.

• 1:32Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:33Shawn Ryan?

  But, uh, but yeah, I just, I want to be a little more stoic primarily for my, my family, my kids.

• 1:41Speaker 05

  Yeah, I'm the same way. I mean, I think there's some people who are sort of naturally there and then, then you have kids and then you realize you're not there at all.

• 1:48Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah. But, um, and actually several, my wife's been wanting me to do this for a while. And I'll bet it five, six years ago, uh, she gave me one of your books.

• 2:01Speaker 05

  Really?

• 2:01Shawn Ryan?

  First heard about you and read it, uh, it was like a daily.

• 2:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:05Shawn Ryan?

  It was a daily stoic.

• 2:06Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:07Shawn Ryan?

  And, um, read through that and then this year got, uh, Marcus Aurelius's book on stoicism. And, and so this is perfect. Now you're here.

• 2:18Speaker 05

  All right. Well, I brought, I brought you a good edition of Marcus Aurelius. I don't know which one you have. This is my favorite translation. So I think what's cool about this is like, am I on the right? Here you have the, the private thoughts of the most powerful person in the world. And, and, um, almost certainly not intended for publication. Like he might be mortified that we're holding this right now. So, you know, most books are written for the audience, right? But this is a book for the author, like, like that it's a book is the byproduct of the philosophical process, which is like, he's, has a temper, he has anxiety, he has

• 2:57Speaker 05

  a shitty job with, uh, people he can't trust and an empire that's coming apart. And he has health problems, he has marital problems, he has a plague, there's floods, it's a series of endless wars. And what he's doing is sitting down and writing to himself, trying to get back to center, right?

• 3:23Shawn Ryan?

  Interesting.

• 3:24Speaker 05

  And, and it just wasn't burned upon his death or, or it wasn't destroyed when he died. And so it's, it doesn't, it doesn't read like a typical book. I mean, it's, it's, it's 12 books, each passage is numbered, but it's really like, almost like journal or diary entries, because that's what stoicism is, is like this. You know how you're trying to be and then you're here? There's a great line in Meditations where he's saying like, fight to be the person that philosophy tried to make you. And that's what he's doing in.

• 3:56Shawn Ryan?

  Can you say that again?

• 3:57Speaker 05

  Says, fight to be the person that philosophy tried to make you, or fight to be the person that philosophy wants you to be, right? It's like, we all know the idea, the ideal, like what our best self is. And then we're dysregulated or we're tired or we're hungry or somebody's being really awful and annoying or, and, and we're, we're struggling to be, to get from the lower self to the higher self.

• 4:22Shawn Ryan?

  Gotcha.

• 4:23Speaker 05

  Right? And that's what, that's what this is. So I got this, uh, and then this, this one will hopefully, like, Meditations should be, thank you, it should be a book that you, like most books you read, right? This meditation should be a book that you are reading. Like it should sit on the nightstand and you pick it up and you read it throughout your life, because it was written throughout someone's life. But the idea is that you don't know what passage you're gonna need until you're flipping through the book and it jumps out at you. That's, that's the idea of Meditations.

• 4:57Shawn Ryan?

  Roger that, thank you.

• 4:59Speaker 05

  All right, I got, I got a bunch more. I'll burn, I won't take so much time, but I know you got, I know you got young kids. Do you know Steve Rinella?

• 5:05Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:05Speaker 05

  Meat Eater? This is, I think this is, he wrote an amazing book about hunting called The, uh, American Buffalo, which is like one of my favorite books. He gets a buffalo tag in Alaska and he goes to hunt, uh, the American bison and it's all about that. That's my favorite Steve Rinella book, but as a parent, this is inside, or outside kids in an inside world. I think that's what every parent is struggling with right now, because screens are so addictive.

• 5:29Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:30Speaker 05

  And, uh, video games are so exciting and we're all glued to our devices, right? I mean, people are probably listening to this, almost certainly listening to this on a device right now. So, but the, but the point is you want to raise outdoor kids, right? Kids, he says, um, you want to raise kids that don't say ew a lot, because they're good being outside, getting dirty, doing nonsense. I love that book. I think it's amazing.

• 5:56Shawn Ryan?

  Do you, you spend a lot of time outdoors with your kids?

• 5:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, we live on a ranch in Texas, so.

• 6:00Shawn Ryan?

  Saw that.

• 6:01Speaker 05

  So we're, we're, we're pretty outdoorsy, but you know, it's a constant fight. It's like, it's like, um, they love it when they're out there, but they hate the process of getting out there.

• 6:10Shawn Ryan?

  Really?

• 6:11Speaker 05

  Do you know what, like, like, it's like when we, we were, yesterday we went on a hike, they did not want to get out of the car, they did not want to go on it. And then as soon as they, we were in it, they loved it, right? And that's like, I think the struggle, uh, is the, is the, is the starting. You know what I mean?

• 6:28Shawn Ryan?

  Yep.

• 6:29Speaker 05

  All right, so we got that. Oh, this is another interesting parenting one. This is about Churchill and his son. So Churchill has a horrible father and horrible mother, basically neglect him, becomes a great man, and he tries to do better with his son, but he doesn't do a great job. And I think, um, I think that's another thing that keeps us up at night as parents is like, if you're successful, how do you not raise spoiled, entitled kid? You don't, they have comforts and security and love that maybe we didn't get, but how do you make sure that that works to their advantage, not that they're, to their disadvantage, right? And so I thought it's, it's a, it's a really interesting sort of, because it looks at three generations, right?

• 7:13Speaker 05

  It looks like Churchill and his father, and then obviously Churchill and then Churchill and his son. It's a great book. I thought you might like that one. Have you read any Stockdale?

• 7:22Shawn Ryan?

  No, I haven't.

• 7:23Speaker 05

  All right, so this is Thoughts of a Philosophical Fighter Pilot. So Stockdale, uh, goes to the, the Naval Academy in 43, uh, graduates, uh, becomes a pilot, um, and it's not until, he spends 20 years as a, as a pilot, it's not until the Navy sends him to Stanford where he gets a graduate degree, that he's introduced to stoic philosophy. On his last day at Stanford, his philosophy professor goes, hey, I think you might like this book. He gives him a copy of Epictetus, the stoic philosopher. And he does two more deployments there before he gets shot down. And that's his sort of, he, he's every, every night in his bunk on the, on the, uh, on

• 8:08Speaker 05

  the Ticonderoga and then the constellation and a little bit on the, on the, on the Ariscony, he's reading stoic philosophy. So when he gets shot down in 65, he says, he famously says to himself, I am leaving the world of technology and entering the world of Epictetus. And it's in the Hanoi Hilton that he basically takes stoic philosophy as a, which was a sort of, um, you know, a theoretical thing, and he applies it in this, what he calls the, the laboratory of human behavior.

• 8:38Shawn Ryan?

  Holy shit. Did you get to meet him? I see.

• 8:41Speaker 05

  I never got to meet him. He died, yeah, I think he died in 2008 or six? What does it say?

• 8:45Shawn Ryan?

  He died in 2006 at the age of 81.

• 8:48Speaker 05

  Yeah, no, I know, I met his children and, uh, met a lot of people that have met him, but just, I mean, one of the greatest Americans ever.

• 8:55Shawn Ryan?

  Man.

• 8:56Speaker 05

  Incredible book, you'll love that. I was just, I'm, I'm doing, I'm actually doing a book on Stockdale right now. And this is, um, do you ever read the Wright stuff? Tom Wolfe book?

• 9:05Shawn Ryan?

  No.

• 9:06Speaker 05

  Oh, you would like that too. So that's about test pilots who become the first astronauts. So it's about John Glenn and Chuck Yeager, really good. But this is, um, this is about, there's a little Stockdale in there too. This is like, uh, about, uh, carrier pilots in Vietnam.

• 9:25Speaker 05

  Not enough people know about this book, it's incredible. It's called Over the Beach. It was Stockdale's favorite book about, um, about the air war in Vietnam.

• 9:34Speaker 05

  And then the guys that get shot down. So I just read that, I think you would like that. If you don't read a lot, I think you would like that book.

• 9:40Shawn Ryan?

  Perfect.

• 9:41Speaker 05

  And then the last one, uh, you ever read any Hunter S. Thompson?

• 9:44Shawn Ryan?

  Yes.

• 9:45Speaker 05

  Okay, so Hunter S. Thompson, we think of as the badass, wild man, crazy guy. You think Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is a book about drugs and alcohol, which it is, but it's, the subtitle of that book is, is about the American dream. Cause he's also one of our most astute sort of cultural and political writers. And so this is Freak Kingdom, um, and it's about, uh, Hunter S. Thompson as a political thinker and critic, because he covers Nixon, he covers Carter, he covers like every presidential candidate between, you know, sort of the, the late 60s and, and then his death. And, uh, I don't know, I got this in, I think it would line up with where, because you're kind of like a man without a party.

• 10:29Speaker 05

  You're, you're politically engaged, you have, but you're not like Democrat, Republican. I think you'd, I think you'd like that book. It's, he, what he's primarily is anti-fascist, not like Antifa, but anti-fascist, like doesn't like fascism, doesn't like people telling him what to do, doesn't like liars, doesn't like hypocrites, uh, doesn't like corruption and, uh.

• 10:52Shawn Ryan?

  I'm just not gonna met this guy.

• 10:53Speaker 05

  I think you're gonna like it.

• 10:55Shawn Ryan?

  Man, thank you.

• 10:55Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 10:56Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you. Well, so keep it busy.

• 10:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think so.

• 10:59Shawn Ryan?

  I appreciate it.

• 11:00Speaker 05

  I could have brought more, so I, my wife and I have a bookstore in, outside Austin. And so, uh, my, my favorite thing is when I'm gonna meet someone or someone comes in, like what, what books would I think they like? That's my, that's my, that's what gets me excited. So those are the ones I thought you'd like.

• 11:15Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you. I really appreciate that. I'm actually, I want to talk about this one later.

• 11:21Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 11:22Shawn Ryan?

  Fatherhood segment.

• 11:23Speaker 05

  Done.

• 11:24Shawn Ryan?

  This is something I talk about all the time.

• 11:28Shawn Ryan?

  With a lot of, lot of different people, how they do it. But, uh, well, my gift is not as exciting.

• 11:35Speaker 05

  Is this the gummies?

• 11:36Shawn Ryan?

  The Vigilance League gummy bears, legal in all 50 states, made in the USA.

• 11:41Speaker 05

  Alright.

• 11:41Shawn Ryan?

  Horrible for you, but they taste amazing. So. But, uh, let me, let me give you an introduction here real quick. Ryan Holiday, author of 12 books on Stoicism with more than 10 million copies sold, including The Obstacle is the Way, Ego is the Enemy, and Stillness is the Key. You're the founder of Daily Stoic, reaching millions through books, podcasts, newsletters, and YouTube. Your work is read in NFL locker rooms, special operations units, I can attest to that, and Silicon Valley boardrooms. In 2025, you completed your four-book Stoic Virtues series and launched a sold-out world tour across Australia, Ireland, and beyond.

• 12:26Shawn Ryan?

  Welcome to the show.

• 12:27Speaker 05

  Yeah, thanks.

• 12:29Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, so we have a Patreon account.

• 12:31Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 12:32Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, it's turned into quite the community. And to be honest, they're the reason I get to sit down here with you today.

• 12:38Speaker 05

  Alright.

• 12:39Shawn Ryan?

  Um, so they get the opportunity to ask every single guest a question. This is from Corey Smith. Ryan, for people battling anxiety, depression, or the long recovery from a brain injury, when the brain can feel like the obstacle, how can Stoic principles be applied most effectively?

• 12:59Speaker 05

  Ooh, I mean, I can speak more to the first two than the, than the brain injury. That's not something I have direct experience with. But I think, basically, what Stoicism is at its core is this kind of distance between you and your thoughts, right? This is similar to Eastern philosophy, but it's the idea that you have the opinion, you have the feeling, you have the dread, or the anxiety, or the worry, or the frustration, or the anger. And you're trying to take a second and ask yourself, is this true? Right? Like, um, you're worried about this thing happening. And what you're not stopping and thinking is like, hey, is my worrying about this affecting the outcome in any way?

• 13:43Speaker 05

  Or am I just torturing myself? Right?

• 13:47Speaker 05

  You're not asking yourself, hey, let's say it does happen. What then? Right? Because oftentimes, what we're torturing ourself with is this kind of vague idea that like, oh, if this happens, that will be bad, and I won't be able to handle it. But the truth is, we handle stuff all the time. We've handled everything in our lives up until this point, or we wouldn't be here. We survived everything in our lives up until this point, or we wouldn't be here. And so Stoicism is the, is, it's funny, he said, he or she said about, you know, your brain is the obstacle. Sometimes the brain is the obstacle, injury or not. Like, we have biases, we have patterns, we have things that we make up, and they're

• 14:30Speaker 05

  not true. Right? It's, it's based on things that we haven't really worked through. And Stoicism is the idea of kind of working through that. And that's, again, what Marcus Truist is doing in the Meditations. It's not like this magical formula, as soon as you hear it, you don't have that problem anymore. It's the, hey, I'm gonna pause and think about this, and work through it, and decide whether I'm going to, uh, assent to it or not. Epictetus is one of the Stoic philosophers, he would talk about how, like, he says, a good money changer, like a person you would get money from in the ancient world. You know, he, he said, they, they know how to tell a counterfeit coin from a real coin

• 15:12Speaker 05

  by the, by banging it on the table. Like, they don't have to melt it down to test them out. They just know, right? You have that intuition, you just know. And I think what Stoicism is, whether you're doing journaling, whether you're taking a few minutes, whether you take a long walk, or you're just talking through it with someone you know, Stoicism is about asking yourself, hey, is this real or not? Is this true or not? Is this productive or not? Is this helpful or not? Again, this is all very easy to say. But that, that's what it is as a process, is, is to deal with precisely those feelings, which every person ever, whoever lived, has struggled with in some way or another.

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• 17:08Shawn Ryan?

  You know, when I research, when I, and I haven't gone that too far into my research in Stoicism, but, you know, when I first left, uh, contracting for the agency, I was at social anxiety. A lot of people thought I was stoic. I just didn't like, you know, I just didn't like being in public, talking to new people. And so I bottled everything up. And, you know, when I read some of these books, and, uh, and start digging in, it kind of feels like I would go back into bottling it back up. So I want, I just want to ask, you know, what's it, where's the release valve in Stoicism?

• 17:47Speaker 05

  Yeah. It, it's not bottling it up. I think, I think, obviously, the word stoic in English, like, so Stoicism comes, uh, about the 4th century B.C. This, this guy named Zeno founds this school of philosophy. Um, he's inspired by the cynics, another word that we don't do great justice to in the English language. We think cynics, or cynicism, means sort of negative, or skeptical, or, um, you know, uh, doesn't believe in anything, um, not what it is at all. And Stoicism, um, is called Stoicism because Zeno sets up his school

• 18:27Speaker 05

  on the stoa poeile, the painted porch in Athens. Stoic just means porch. These were guys hanging out on this porch, talking about these ideas. Now, flash forward 2,500 years later, when we go, oh, that guy is really stoic, we, we take that to mean, like, he doesn't feel anything. He's a robot. He stuffs it down. And that's not what it is at all. Um, to me, it's about processing that emotion, asking yourself, hey, is this productive or not productive? Like, is, is losing my shit about this? Is that, um, helping anything? Uh, or is it in fact hurting myself, other people, making the situation worse? So it's

• 19:11Speaker 05

  not like, hey, I'm feeling an emotion, emotions are not okay, let me, let me white knuckle it. To me, it's about asking yourself, working through it. Hey, why am I feeling this way? What is this doing for me?

• 19:27Speaker 05

  And then I think your question about, like, where's the release valve is a good one, because to me, I, I find that release valve in the work, and usually in some kind of physical activity. Like, I, I think you gotta have outlets for it. Um, but the idea of just getting to a place where you're pretending it's not happening, like grief, you know, if you just go, oh, uh, I don't feel that, that's not real. We have multiple stories about Marcus Aurelius crying, right? The most famous stoic in the world, that we don't have that much, like, the historical record is relatively thin on this person. Like, we don't have that many stories about him, right? And I think there's four about him

• 20:09Speaker 05

  crying. One is over the loss of a tutor, uh, like, one of his favorite teachers dies. Another is when he told, when he's told he's going to become emperor. He's just, like, so overwhelmed at the, at the weight of the job. He doesn't think he can do it. Uh, and then two others are about the, uh, the victims of the plague. Marcus Aurelius is the emperor of Rome during what's called the Antonine Plague, which is this devastating pandemic that kills millions and millions of people. And then another is when he's told, uh, that an earthquake has flattened this Roman city. And so, like, in, in all these cases, he's not stuffing his emotions down. In fact, in the, the first story about it, the beloved,

• 20:53Speaker 05

  the beloved teacher, um, you know, he's trying to not feel the emotion. He's like a young kid. And, you know, he probably, some of the ideas of masculinity that we all know, you know, like, boys don't cry, don't be a little bitch, right? Like, he's, he's not, he's, he's, he's clearly upset by, that the fact that, that this person he loves has died. And, um, one of his philosophy teachers goes to him and, and tries to tell him, like, like, you know, let's keep it under wraps, kid. And his stepfather, who's the emperor of Rome, Antoninus Pius, he, he, he sees this, and he goes, no, no, no, no, no. He says, let the boy be human. And so I, Stoicism to me is not, you never have the emotion,

• 21:37Speaker 05

  or that you stuff it down. I think it's more like, okay, look, if you're still paralyzed by this grief a year later, you can't get out of bed, you know, that's a problem, right? To me, it's the, it's the, the, the processing, the passing of the emotion, and then it's getting back to center as quickly as possible. That, that to me is what the philosophy is.

• 21:58Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. Yeah, I think this book here, Meditations, is gonna be very interesting.

• 22:05Speaker 05

  I think you'll like it.

• 22:06Shawn Ryan?

  Cause I, I just, it, it, it does seem, it does feel like kind of stuffing your emotions, what you're saying, thinking before acting. But really, you know what really got me into it is I've started bitching all the time.

• 22:23Speaker 05

  About what?

• 22:24Shawn Ryan?

  Bitch, just bitching about, I mean, I'll just be honest, I haven't been happy with the last two administrations.

• 22:29Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 22:30Shawn Ryan?

  At all. And, um, I feel like I really got duped on this one. And, um,

• 22:38Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and so I want to be more solutions based and focus on actual solutions than just do what everybody else does.

• 22:46Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 22:46Shawn Ryan?

  Let's bitch about all the problems. Let's bitch about the Epstein files. Let's bitch about the wars. There has to be, let's bitch about the stuff that we've been bitching about for, you know, ever.

• 22:56Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 22:56Shawn Ryan?

  And at least as long as I've been around and, and it, there's just very few people that take the time

• 23:05Shawn Ryan?

  to take the things that make them angry and, and, and come up with real focused potential solutions.

• 23:13Speaker 05

  Well, and it's important. One of the things you hear the Stoics talk about is like getting some perspective, right? Like, none of this is new. So Seneca is one of the famous Stoics. Do you know who his boss was? It was Nero. Like, his boss is the worst leader maybe of all time, right? And I got to imagine this is stressful. I imagine it's demoralizing. I imagine there's a lot to bitch about. Like, in a way, none of this is new, right? Corruption's not new. Hypocrisy's not new. Declining empire is not new. Um, the only thing that's new about any of this is that we have a lot more information in real time about what's happening, right?

• 23:53Speaker 05

  Like, um, it was possible to get away from it in the past in ways that we can't. Now, it's also worse in the past in other ways, right? Like, um, you know, no one's being forced to, to, to, to fight for their life in the Colosseum, let's say, right? Um, there, there's, there's definitely some things that are better, but like, I think about even Socrates, right? Socrates, you, you, you think, oh, that was that guy. He wore the toga. He walked around Athens. He asked those questions, you know, must've been pretty chill. And it's like, Socrates lives through the Peloponnesian War. Like Athens fights, uh, like a generationally long war against Sparta

• 24:36Speaker 05

  and loses. Like his country, like, loses a world war effectively. And then Athens is ruled by thirty tyrants. That literally, it's known as the time of the thirty tyrants. I mean, like, the world must've felt like it was falling apart, and it was falling apart. And so I think one of the things you, you can take from the study of history, and I think,

• 24:58Speaker 05

  I think we all need to study history more, right? Like, people think, like,

• 25:02Speaker 05

  people watch too much news and don't read enough history. And the reason for this is like, they think that being, that their job is to be an informed citizen. And it is, your job is to be an informed citizen in America, in any democracy. The problem is watching news in real time is not necessarily the best way to be informed. And so I urge people to read more history, not because it takes anything away from the moral calamities that are happening in this moment, but it allows you to understand them in context. It allows you to understand which ones are really important and which ones are kind of par for the course, right? And, and it allows you to also remember that, like, no one has lived in a perfect society

• 25:46Speaker 05

  and that most of the people that you admired were looking around at the world and going, what the fuck are we doing? This is insane, you know, like, um, and, and, and that actually the job is to not despair, not to get into like bitterness and anger, not to, um, not to, uh, like, one of the things Mark Schuris talks about in Meditations, he has, he talks about revenge a lot. You can imagine the most powerful man in the world, if he wants to get revenge on someone, he can, he can do some pretty heinous things to people. But he, he says, you know, he tries to remind himself, the best revenge is to not be like your enemy. And one of the things I, I look out at the world and I go, I don't like the corruption.

• 26:28Speaker 05

  I don't like the cruelty. I don't like the dishonesty. I don't like the pettiness. I don't like the crassness. I don't like any of this. Now, obviously, as a citizen, my job is to vote against those things, speak out against those things. But my main job as a person philosophically is to not be those things, right? Like, i- if, if what you allow is the shittiness of what's happening around you to make you feel shitty and worse, to be shitty, like, they're winning. And, and so I think that's, to me, that's where Stoicism, uh, really has a lot to offer because we are living in disorienting, disappointing, disillusioning times.

• 27:14Speaker 05

  But if you allow that to strip from you, your happiness at home, your productivity at work, your, you know, your decency, your kindness, your connection to other people, like, it is winning. And that, that's, that's kind of how I think about it.

• 27:31Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, how do you, I'm, I'm curious too, because I mean, it's, it's, you know, I brought up, I brought up politics.

• 27:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 27:37Shawn Ryan?

  But it, there's, there's just so many other, and I think that's something that everybody can relate to one way or another, right?

• 27:43Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 27:44Shawn Ryan?

  But, I, I mean, we're going to talk about this, you know?

• 27:47Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 27:49Shawn Ryan?

  Towards the end of the interview. And I guess we'll talk about it a little bit right now, but, you know, as, as you find success, uh, you also find very disingenuous people that start to come around. They want to take advantage of you.

• 28:04Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 28:04Shawn Ryan?

  They want to take advantage of your kids to get to you. They want to take advantage of your wife to get to you. They are not honest people, you know, and, and you threw out the word revenge.

• 28:15Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 28:15Shawn Ryan?

  And that's,

• 28:19Shawn Ryan?

  in my mind, I mean, revenge used to be something that, I mean, I would waste an entire day planning all the things that I could do to somebody that took advantage of me or wronged me or, or fucked over my family or myself or whatever, right? Whatever the circumstances are. And then I, you know, back in the, a long time ago, I would act on that. I'd be like, this is the best plan. Let's, we're going to do this. And then I, you know, and then I realized this is just a total fucking waste of energy.

• 28:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 28:50Shawn Ryan?

  And it just makes you look like an asshole, I think. And so now I'll, I can't help myself a lot of times and I will still go through the planning phase on what I could, what can I do to get back at this person? And then I've developed one where somehow I've developed enough discipline to never act on it.

• 29:10Speaker 05

  That's a good first step.

• 29:11Shawn Ryan?

  Just to let it go.

• 29:12Speaker 05

  I imagine it, it, there's an extra level of, uh, not temptation, but where you're like, I could break this person in half. You know, like, I, I don't, that, that's not a thought that enters my head, but I, I imagine when you are trained to do what you are trained to do and at different points in your life, that has been unleashed, that just for, just the restraint of going, hey, that's not the, that's not the, the rules of engagement in, in the world that I'm in now. That would be like a, a level of like restraint that you would have to practice. But one of the things I think about is like, okay, if somebody tried to control my thoughts

• 29:52Speaker 05

  or controlled what I said, controlled what I did, I'd like, I'd resist that, like, just instinctively, I, I'm, that's, no, I get to decide, I'm in charge. And yet, we kind of hand our minds over to people all the time. Like, we let them, we let them just take up like inordinate amounts of time and space in our life. I was talking to this, talking to this writer I know, and she was saying, you know, she really didn't like what was happening politically, and she was saying that she was having trouble. She's like, I just can't, I can't work right now. Like, she's like, I'm so outraged, I'm so upset, so pissed off that like, I just, I can't, I can't do it. And I was saying like, okay, but like, if this administration came to you and was like,

• 30:38Speaker 05

  hey, if you keep doing your work, we're going to throw you in prison, you'd be like, like, you would, that would be so immediately galvanizing, that, that it would fire you up, right? You would never allow a government of, of any persuasion to tell you what you can and can't say. Like, that's the job of an artist, right? And, and that's what it means to be an American. That's what's all right there in the First Amendment. And I was like, but here voluntarily, you're doing precisely that because you don't like what's happening in the world because it's dark or pissing you off or whatever. You're allowing it to consume so much of your mental bandwidth and your motivation

• 31:19Speaker 05

  that's having the same effect. Like, they might as well be putting a gun to your head and saying you can't do this. But it's actually worse because they're not doing that. And so I, I do think it's really important that we, we, you got to have some mechanism by which you put up some walls and boundaries and then you protect the thing that,

• 31:43Speaker 05

  that is yours. Like you, like the, the Stoics would say the greatest empire is like command of yourself, right? Your sovereignty as a, as an individual. And the problem is, we give that up all the time because somebody cut us off in traffic, you know, like, because we opened up our phone and the news was bad, because our parents are visiting or, you know, what, like, we just let these things get inside us and then determine our mood, determine our, our, you know, our focus, determine what we think about, determine our behavior. And, I mean, it's not easy. It's a lot of work and I, I fall down this, you know, sort of into these traps all the time. But I, I am trying to go, hey, like, I'm, I gotta, I gotta protect this.

• 32:26Speaker 05

  Even, even if it feels good or it, it, it, it feels natural. I can't allow that.

• 32:38Shawn Ryan?

  Have you ever done psychedelics?

• 32:40Speaker 05

  No.

• 32:40Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. Well, the reason I'm asking, yeah, I have. Um, I did, uh, I did a I begane treatment in Mexico four years ago. I haven't had a drop of booze since. Been a lot more in the moment. Um, it was very, uh, it was a life-changing experience for me.

• 32:59Shawn Ryan?

  Anyways, the reason I bring it up is it's, it's, there's been very few times in my life where I've been able to completely separate myself from, I guess, maybe my ego and look at things uh, from a, just a detached point of view, that's maybe a different perspective than what I'm feeling in the moment.

• 33:23Speaker 05

  One of the things that I, I, I did this like really intense therapy thing and I was, I was, um, you know, sort of like just vomiting all this anger and resentment I had at these, this group of people. And, um, the therapist was like, um, you know, they're not thinking about you at all, right? And,

• 33:47Speaker 05

  and he was like, they, they're just doing their thing. That's who they are.

• 33:54Speaker 05

  They, they have no awareness of, not only are they not doing it on purpose,

• 34:01Speaker 05

  but like they're utterly unconcerned and disinterested of its effect on you. Like they're not waking up and thinking about torturing you in this way. They're not waking up and thinking about abusing you in this way. They're not waking up and trying to make you miserable. They're inherently selfish narcissistic people. Like they're waking up and thinking about them. He's not saying it's awesome to be them. He's just saying like, they're not thinking about you at all. And it's like, we can see this, I think, much more clearly in other stuff, like the economy is not thinking about you. Like a hurricane is not thinking about you. That truck barreling towards you on the freeway is not thinking about you.

• 34:43Speaker 05

  But then for some reason, because people do have intentions and, and obviously we have to be aware of them, we do, I think, project a lot more um, intentionality on other people than is actually happening. And I think when you have someone who's like, like way inside your head, reminding yourself that you're not inside their head is really important. And then I, I like you all, sometimes I'll be like, I just planned out like a whole operation in my head of what I'm gonna do if they do this. And it's like, this is a hypothetical. Like I just, I just, uh, my whole run,

• 35:26Speaker 05

  I was thinking about what I'm gonna say, if they say this, and then I'm gonna say this, and then, and it's like, this conversation might not even happen.

• 35:33Shawn Ryan?

  Contingency planning.

• 35:34Speaker 05

  Yeah, for, for, for a made up scenario about a person that again, if you ask them, you're like, they'd be like, who? Like they wouldn't think about me at all. And so it's like, you're not the center of the universe and almost certainly you're not the center of whatever the situation that you're making all about you is.

• 35:55Shawn Ryan?

  Makes sense. Also, where I was going with that is, is Stoicism the ability to kind of, uh, view things not as a participant of what's happening? It's just strictly in observation or observing a situation?

• 36:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's like, sometimes it's really helpful to zoom way in and then sometimes it's helpful to zoom way out. But it's like, a lot of times it's like, how do I take myself out of this equation?

• 36:22Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 36:23Speaker 05

  And that, I, that's what ego does, right? Ego makes it all about you. It makes you at the center of things. And even just remembering that like everyone is the center of their situation. And that like, you're not the main character in all these other people's stories. You're the, uh, a tangential character at best. Is, is helpful. He's like, yeah, why, why am I making this all about? Like this was not, whatever this was, was not specifically chosen to drive you nuts. Like, like, um, and, um, that again, it's, it's, it's totally indifferent to you. Like one of the ideas for the Stoics is events are objective, are opinions about them or not. Like the situation is what it is. And then we say like,

• 37:09Speaker 05

  this is good or bad. I don't mean morally like positive or negative. We say like, this is fair or unfair. We say this is like mean or cruel. We say this was, you know, targeted. We say like, we've been harmed by, like the thing is, and then we decide what it means. And a lot of times the stories we tell ourselves about stuff are pretty self-absorbed, pretty distorted and, um, like pretty emotional. And I think, how do you get better at going, what if I could see this from another perspective or another way? Or what if I told myself a different story about this event?

• 37:50Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 37:52Shawn Ryan?

  Wha- what happens? I mean, what goes through your, when I told you, you know, oh, I'll spend an entire day planning revenge or vengeance. What happens in your head when you're wronged, when you think you've been wronged, when somebody's?

• 38:07Speaker 05

  Well, oftentimes I go, okay, um, let's say I, I pull this revenge off.

• 38:15Speaker 05

  In all the times in my life when I have done it, how did I feel after?

• 38:19Shawn Ryan?

  Pretty shitty.

• 38:20Speaker 05

  Yeah, shitty or at best disappointed, you know? And why am I telling myself it's gonna be different this time?

• 38:31Speaker 05

  And I, the idea of thinking about what you're gonna think after is like a really powerful way. Do you know, you know the word Epicurean?

• 38:39Shawn Ryan?

  I don't.

• 38:39Speaker 05

  That's, that, that was the rival school to the Stoics. There was the Stoics and the Epicureans. And Epicurean also in English tends to mean like loves pleasure, um, you know, indulges every whim.

• 38:53Speaker 05

  And that's not really what they thought at all. But Epicurus, what he would say, he, he was, let's say, more pleasure-seeking than the Stoics. He would say that like, if you're gonna, you're like, hey, let's have, let's share this bottle of wine. He's like, you can't think about just how it's gonna feel on the way down. You have to think about how you're gonna feel after. And that, that part of the,

• 39:18Speaker 05

  uh, the experience has to be put into the calculation.

• 39:21Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 39:22Speaker 05

  But humans are bad at this, right? Like we, we tell ourselves, oh, if I make this amount of money, then I'll feel secure and good. If I get with this person, then I'll feel, it'll be amazing and, and then I'll feel good. And people will look, if I get this car, we, if I, if I win this office, if I, you know, hit this number on the chart, like we, we just, we tell ourselves this lie that like, this thing will do something for us. Now, the first time, or when you're younger, we can excuse this because like we don't have, although there's all sorts of wisdom out there telling us that it's not gonna do what we think it's gonna do for us. We don't, we haven't directly tested the hypothesis ourselves.

• 40:06Speaker 05

  But I think as you get older, to still be falling for that lie is a problem, right? You know, like, you know how you feel when you have a hangover. You gotta take, like, that should change the drinking that you do. You know, uh, that, um, I don't know, your marriage is incredibly important to you, um, and certainly not worth a few minutes of pleasure. And yet you, in the moment, are considering doing something that, you know, would, would blow that up. Or you know, all your other accomplishments have never made you feel secure or like you've arrived, that there's an emptiness or a hollowness to them. And yet,

• 40:50Speaker 05

  you go, it's different this time.

• 40:52Shawn Ryan?

  Why do we, I mean, yeah.

• 40:54Speaker 05

  Well, I think from an evolutionary standpoint, it makes total sense, right? Like, um, if, if humans were good at being like, I'm good. I don't need anymore. Like enoughness is not a great evolutionary feeling. But like insatiability makes you go on to the next and the next and the next thing. And so that can be good for the species as a whole, but really bad for the individual. I think, I, I think it's, we're not.

• 41:28Speaker 05

  We are not designed to, our biology is not inclined to make us feel content and happy and secure. And it takes a lot of work, like to counteract that, that impulse.

• 41:48Shawn Ryan?

  How have you done it?

• 41:50Speaker 05

  Um, I mean, I, I, I, I struggle with it like everybody else. I, I, I, I try to walk through this process. Like, how am I gonna, like, am I, uh, it's not that, to me, like, going like, okay, hey, if I get on the other side of this, this accomplishment, this achievement, whatever, it's not gonna make me feel, so it's not gonna magically fill some hole in my soul. That doesn't mean it's not worth doing. I can find other reasons to do it, like, it's challenging, it's interesting. Um, you know, it's, it's beneficial to people around me. Like, there's other reasons to do it. So I, I, and then, what I find is that if I'm doing it for those different reasons,

• 42:32Speaker 05

  the outcome, if I'm lucky enough to get it, I, uh, I feel differently about it, too, because there's not, there's not a false expectation that was impossible to meet. But I, I think I, I, I mean, I, I'm constantly trying to, to stop and go, why do I, why do I keep binding myself in this same, why don't, you know, and the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. Like, that's, that's like the, kind of the human condition. And I'm like, why, why do I keep sort of backing myself into this corner, finding myself going down this lane? And then I'm like, I know better than this.

• 43:14Speaker 05

  I'm doing it, I think I'm doing it better than I was when I was 19, but like, I'm still doing some version of it. And I think that's kind of, we're all battling these kind of scripts or these patterns that we picked up on in our lives, and we're, we're trying to get a little, trying to get a little better at it as we go.

• 43:35Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, it's, uh, reminds me of the saying, nothing, nothing's what it's cracked up to be.

• 43:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 43:41Shawn Ryan?

  But, well, how did you get into this?

• 43:44Speaker 05

  I was.

• 43:44Shawn Ryan?

  Stoicism.

• 43:45Speaker 05

  I was.

• 43:45Shawn Ryan?

  What got your interest?

• 43:46Speaker 05

  Yeah, uh, it's funny, I was in college, I was taking a philosophy class, and then I went to this, uh, I went to this conference, I was, I was, I wrote for the college newspaper. And, um, I asked the, the guy who's speaking, I said, like, hey, you got any book recommendations? And he was like, you know, I'm reading this guy Epictetus, I think you would like it. And I ended up getting, somehow, I, I, I forget how, but I ended up with Marcus Aurelius instead, probably because I saw the movie Gladiator. And, and, uh, and I just, I opened this book, and I go, what the fuck has this been? You know, like, um, this is what, like, this exists? Like, this, this advice is there?

• 44:27Speaker 05

  Like, and it kind of just, it kind of just turned my world upside down.

• 44:32Shawn Ryan?

  How so?

• 44:33Speaker 05

  Just, just that, I think, I think all young people, anyone coming of age, but, but, but men especially in this world are looking for, like, the path. Like, what should you do? What should you not do? And they're looking for it in a way that, like, school doesn't address, they're looking for it in a way that the church doesn't address. I mean, especially, I think, I think in some ways, like, uh, uh, you know, some sports programs, and definitely maybe like a military tradition, it is based on certain values

• 45:16Speaker 05

  and, uh, you're, you're being inducted into a way of life, right? But if you don't have that, um, you know, you go away to college, and they're like, you can do whatever you want. Like, you can be whoever you want, you can do whatever you want, if it feels good, it's right, you know? Um, you just have effectively unlimited choice, right? We, like, we live in a world, like, religion used to go like, hey, don't do these things or you'll go to hell. And I think, obviously, that puts a lot of fear and shame and control on people, that's not good. Um, but the problem is when you, when you say, hey, do whatever you want, nothing's

• 46:01Speaker 05

  wrong, everything's right, trust your gut, you know, like, the last thing a 19-year-old should be doing is trusting their gut. Like, you're an idiot, you know? Especially like a tw- uh, especially a 19-year-old dude, you know, like, um, and so I, I think what struck me about Stoicism was like, oh, this is a, this is a 2,500-year tradition. This is a tradition that's been followed by the most powerful people in the world, some of the most powerless people in the world. Epictetus is a slave. And these are people that were, were dealing with uncertainty and chaos and disorder and dysfunction, they were dealing with temptation, they were dealing with adversity,

• 46:44Speaker 05

  they were dealing with loss and pain. And, hey, they, they wrote some of their experiences down, and they, they put it into a framework that, that is actually strikingly modern, let's just say it's timeless. And I think that's what, like, sitting at the, the, the table in my college apartment, I was like, oh, okay, like, this makes sense to me.

• 47:13Shawn Ryan?

  And at, at 21, you were the director of marketing for American Apparel?

• 47:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 47:19Shawn Ryan?

  How did that happen?

• 47:20Speaker 05

  Uh, an insane, I mean, it says more about the company than it does about me, you know, it was a dysfunctional, crazy, uh, you know, uh, shit show, really. Um, but, uh, yeah.

• 47:37Shawn Ryan?

  It got to be a huge company.

• 47:38Speaker 05

  It was. I mean, it was a huge company when I, when I started there. I, I, I had nothing to do with it becoming what it became. Um, but I got sort of thrown into the deep end. Um, and, and yeah, it was, uh, yeah, my 20s were nuts. But I, I, I watched a, you know, a guy create a billion-dollar company and then destroy a billion-dollar company. And, um, I watched people get caught up in it, I watched people get sort of spun sideways by it, um, I watched people enable it, you know? Um, I enabled it.

• 48:22Speaker 05

  And so I, you know, in a way, it was like, it was, um, it was quite an education in, I mean, it was like, it was like a king's court, like, he was the sort of king and everyone was, uh, you know, currying favor and wanted something and, you know? It, it was, it was a, it, it certainly informed like what I ended up writing about a lot.

• 48:54Shawn Ryan?

  And at 25, you wrote, Trust Me, I'm Lying.

• 48:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 48:58Shawn Ryan?

  Where did that come from?

• 48:59Speaker 05

  Um, it was also, you know, American Apparel was one of the sort of most controversial companies in the world at that time. And so, you know, I, I, I had sort of a window seat to how the media environment worked. And then I worked with a number of other sort of controversial clients and stuff over the years. So I, I wrote an exposé on, on sort of the media system and, and marketing and PR. I mean, I basically wrote a book on fake news in 2011.

• 49:26Shawn Ryan?

  That's what it seems like.

• 49:27Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. I think, the funny thing is, I thought, I thought, um, I remember trying to get the book out as quickly as possible, going like, like, this is right now. And, you know, and if anything, I was probably 10 years early. Um, but I was, I was watching how, like, the sausage got made, right? Like, how true stories got distorted and how made-up stories became true. And how people could get attention, what attention would do to people, um, the incentives of the media system. And so, the book was me kind of trying to rip back the curtain on, on what that was and how it worked.

• 50:11Shawn Ryan?

  Can you go into it a little bit?

• 50:14Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, it's, it's funny, because I, I mean, I wrote that book.

• 50:16Shawn Ryan?

  Because it is, it's now.

• 50:19Speaker 05

  Yeah, but it's funny, it's like, you know, I wrote that book before TikTok existed, before, um, before, I think maybe Instagram had just come, come out. Um, I was writing mostly about a world of blogs and, you know, sort of, not traditional media, but like, traditional media as it was being intersected by social media. And I mean, if anything, just all those trends have accelerated now. Um, but it was, ultimately, the, what I am trying to say in the book is like, you have to think about the incentives operating on both sides of the equation. The people that are trying to get messages out, and then the people who are communicating those messages, and that.

• 51:03Speaker 05

  Everyone is effectively competing for attention in this enormous ecosystem or this marketplace. And so in a world where it used to be, okay, half the world, half the country subscribes to the New York Times, half subscribes to Washington Post. Now, both these papers have an agenda. There's a bias, but like mostly they're trying to deliver value for the subscribers of the of this paid product. And they're putting out a, you know, a 40-page newspaper where, once you buy it, all the information is there, right? Like, if you

• 51:44Speaker 05

  look at like, the headline in the New York Times for the Pentagon Papers, it's like, there's no sensationalism in it, there's no crazy, because like, you're not buying the New York Times in Grand Central Station with a newsboy like shouting like, extra, extra, read all about it, right? Which was the media environment in the late 1800s and early 1900s. And so basically, what the internet did is it broke all that apart, and it made it so every story, every headline, every article, every clip is competing with everything else out there, right? So it's like, what's the craziest? What tells people

• 52:28Speaker 05

  what they want to hear? What pisses people off, right? What offers the most certainty? That's what dropped, like, an analogous way, like, what happened in the early to mid 2000s is akin to what's happening now with podcasts, like, which I'm sure you've experienced, which is like, there was this period where podcasts were long-form interviews that subscribers of that podcast listened to, right? So you have all the subscribers to this show, and you think about like, delivering high-quality guests who you have a long-form conversation with, and people listen to the whole thing. And then, what's been happening in the last,

• 53:11Speaker 05

  I don't know, two years, is like, the sort of the clip economy, right? Where now, it's like, about the most sensational clip, like, so that two-hour conversation is distilled down into a 20-second clip or whatever. And what that's doing is creating, and I'm sure you're seeing it with peers of yours, is like, a lot of competition for like, the craziest clips, like, gotcha moments, or, or conversely, like, you're just having the same conversation, but then people are coming and cutting out those clips and spreading them. And so it's create, it's now, it's creating a lot of pressure and a lot of noise, and changing the incentives of the medium. And so what I was writing about in Trust Me,

• 53:52Speaker 05

  I'm Lying, was that sort of first wave of that happening, where, like, now you don't read a website, you read articles from that website, and you only read them because it's showing up in your Facebook feed, or it's showing up in Twitter, or it's because somebody emailed it to you, right? And that's creating an incentive, a bias, towards certain kinds of emotion. Like, for instance, they, they found that, like, the valence of the extremeness of the emotion is like, the number one predictor of virality. So like, something that makes you feel pretty good is not going to be shared as something that makes you extremely angry. Or something that makes you kind of angry is not going to spread as well as something

• 54:35Speaker 05

  that makes you laugh really hard. And so it's creating this incentive for extremes, right? So everything becomes an exaggerated, you know, distorted version of itself to meet that. And then, you layer on top of that, like, this is the first, in the sort of blog world, one of the first kind of big breakthroughs was like, reporters, or influencers, or what, you, you were, you were, your job performance was like, how much traffic your article got, or how many views your video got, right? Which is different than how journalists had basically been paid for the entirety of the institution. And so, in the same way that you wouldn't want a journalist to own like, shares in a stock that they were reporting

• 55:20Speaker 05

  on, now they own stock in the story. Like, they want, instead of being like, hey, it's complicated, and we don't know, which isn't going to do well, they're like, it, it, it shapes the story that they're writing. And I think what we're seeing now, now that people are working for outlets less and less, and working for themselves more and more, like, are you going to tell your Substack audience what they don't want to hear? Are you going to have a guest on, like, not you, but like, you can imagine someone in a different financial position, you're like, hey, when I, when I have these kind of guests, my Patreon numbers

• 56:01Speaker 05

  go down. And when I have these kind of guests, my Patreon numbers go up. Or, you know, donations go up when I do this, and they go down when I do this. And so now, again, these financial incentives are acting on the information that people are getting. And people are not good at evaluating the reliability of the person they're getting information on. We're just really bad at it.

• 56:36Shawn Ryan?

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• 57:47Shawn Ryan?

  I think we've lost that, because I think, I think that the thirst for real information has significantly, significantly diminished, because now people are more concerned with confirming their opinions and their own thoughts. And so, rather than actually search for some kind of truth, or really try to figure out what the hell is going on, what's at the bottom of this, instead of doing that, and spending the time to research and hear other opinions and perspectives, they, they immediately sift through everything they possibly can to find the one person that is going to tell them everything that they're thinking is

• 58:32Shawn Ryan?

  correct, and they should, and then it turns into, they tell them how to think. And it's, it's become like this lazy search for, for just confirming your own biases, opinions, and thoughts.

• 58:45Speaker 05

  Yeah. And, and there's always going to be someone who will fill that need. So, like, we saw this, like, in the aftermath of the 2020 election, right? It's like, oh, if you're not gonna, if you're not gonna tell the audience what they want to hear, then they're just gonna go watch this channel. And if that channel isn't gonna do it, they're gonna watch this channel. And so, it's, it's hard, like, choice is good, but the problem with choice, when it comes to information, is that you're creating a market incentive for people to lie to you. And typically, that incentive is mitigated, or by the fact

• 59:30Speaker 05

  that the media outlet is owned by a big company, or the reporter themselves is a salaried employee who identifies as a journalist, or a writer, or whatever, they're, it's different when it's like, no, no, no, like, I write for Substack, and I am directly dependent on how many subscribers I have, paying subscri, so like, audience capture, there's fewer intermediaries between the creator and the, the sort of payment structure. Now, in many ways, it's great for creators, because there's fewer people taking, you know, picking their

• 1:00:08Speaker 05

  pocket along the way, but it also means that they are directly exposed to some perverse incentives. Like, audience capture is right there.

• 1:00:19Shawn Ryan?

  There's an influence.

• 1:00:20Speaker 05

  Yeah. And, and like, it takes a person, it takes, it takes some character, and some self-control, and some ideals, to be like, no, no, no, no, I, I, I have an audience, the audience doesn't have me. Like, I say what I think needs to be said, not what's gonna do well.

• 1:00:48Shawn Ryan?

  That's what I try to do. I think that's what you do too.

• 1:00:52Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:00:53Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, do you think that because I've always been more of a long game person than than a short game? And so I see exactly what you're talking about all the time. But I would say that the majority of those people don't last very long. Eventually, it patters out. And but by being

• 1:01:16Shawn Ryan?

  being true to yourself and not being beholden to an audience or financial incentive or whatever. I mean, you're you're gonna do this and it's a fucking roller coaster.

• 1:01:26Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, they're they're outraged about this. And then, oh, no, no, we're not outraged about that anymore. Now we're outraged about this. And no, no, actually, I never said that. Like, they're they're you're you're surfing, you're surfing the audience. And it's both exhausting and also it just doesn't feel like success to me, right? Like, if if success is like, I have to tell you what you want to hear, then like, I work for you.

• 1:01:54Shawn Ryan?

  It's boring. I mean, just to to sit in here, I mean, I get a lot of people pissed at me right now because I've leaned across the aisle because I like I like new perspectives. That's how shit gets done, you know, and and but I just don't, I just don't fucking care. You know, it's I'm like, this is, this is what I'm gonna do. I'm just, I'm not gonna be beholden to anybody on who I talk to and do not talk to.

• 1:02:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:02:18Shawn Ryan?

  And and I it's boring to me to sit there and talk to somebody that has the exact same opinion to me over and over just to confirm to each other that we're the we're in the right way of thinking. But I I'm I'm curious how you navigate it because I've you know, when I started this thing, it was, uh, just military guys and, you know, intelligence folks and people that I'd worked with in the past. And I really just wanted to kind of correct the record and and and actually have people that had been in the events that these reporters were talking about. Like, well, actually, here's what actually happened from a guy that was there, you know? And um, and then we started talking about

• 1:03:04Shawn Ryan?

  political issues, issues with kids, like lots of different problems that society faces. And it would be a discussion inside one of those.

• 1:03:12Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:03:13Shawn Ryan?

  And then, uh, to make a bigger impact, I actually started going to the to the to the lawmakers, you know, to the people in charge, people that can make a difference. And um, and then I realized they all just lie to you, you know, and they use the platform to to advance themselves. And so now, now I'm extremely particular, even have friends that are running for Senate, for Congress, for whatever places in the administration, doesn't matter, you know, and um,

• 1:03:47Shawn Ryan?

  I won't have them on.

• 1:03:48Speaker 05

  Interesting.

• 1:03:48Shawn Ryan?

  Because I just, you're just gonna tell me what you think I want to hear and what I think my audience, what you think my audience wants to hear.

• 1:03:58Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:03:58Shawn Ryan?

  And then, even if you do have great intentions, I've seen it too many times, you're gonna get in there. You're not gonna make an impact. You're not going to. They're gonna own your ass. You're not gonna be put on committees if you go against the grain. And you're just gonna turn into the same shit that we see every every single time.

• 1:04:15Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:04:16Shawn Ryan?

  But if you do hold true to your word, I'll help you with your reelection.

• 1:04:20Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:04:20Shawn Ryan?

  You know?

• 1:04:21Speaker 05

  That's interesting. Yeah, I think deciding

• 1:04:27Speaker 05

  deciding what you're gonna be a part of and not be a part of, to me, is like what it's kind of all about. And um, I think

• 1:04:39Speaker 05

  I've been amazed at the degree to which um, people I know don't think about like, hey, is this a good person? Do I agree with them? And not just agree with them, but like, are they a bad actor? Or, you know, uh, someone at least operating from good faith, wherever? And they just think about, like, how's this gonna do?

• 1:05:01Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:05:02Speaker 05

  You know, and like,

• 1:05:07Speaker 05

  to me, success and a platform comes with responsibilities. Not not just like, hey, how do you look yourself in the mirror? But like, like, people are, if they see you have someone on, or they see you writing about something or talking about something, like, they assume that it's not a cosign, but you're you're you're

• 1:05:31Speaker 05

  you're participating, right? You're like, you're they go, oh, they wouldn't have this person on if they were a psychopath or a lot. Like, people like, I I just think there's a responsibility that comes from having a platform or having influence. And to huge responsibility.

• 1:05:48Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. And people make decisions based off what what's said in this room.

• 1:05:53Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:05:54Shawn Ryan?

  Like, life-changing decisions.

• 1:05:56Speaker 05

  Yeah. Yeah, there's um, there was, I I remember finding it when I was writing, trust me, I'm lying. There were some, some, and it's funny, none of this stuff is new. There was this media critic, and he was writing in like the late 1800s, early 1900s. And he says, you know, American, uh, America is a country ruled by public opinion. That's what a democracy is. And he says, therefore, what determines public opinion rules America? And so the people that own newspapers, yeah, sure, it's a for-profit business. But like, they are responsible for something that in a way affects like the whole country. And that there has to be a response, he was saying there has to be a responsibility, that these things are kind of public trusts.

• 1:06:41Speaker 05

  And look, I I'm again, I think you get in a real problem territory when the government is deciding, you know, like, I'm not saying it should be like, this, this isn't something that should be legally policed. But like, if the people with the platforms are not policing themselves, that's a problem, right? Because then, basically, people without character, people with um, agendas, they can take advantage of that, you know, they take advantage of that. And and I we're so consumed in America by like our political disagreements

• 1:07:23Speaker 05

  that we forget that there's, there's people outside America that are also trying to steer and navigate this discourse, right? And just as, by the way, historically, we have done that in other countries. But like, we seem to think that like, the only agenda someone could have is like, left or right, not like Russian, Chinese, Iranian, like, like, our our enemies see these gaping holes in our media system. They see these people who are basically uh, available to the highest bidder. And they're like, do I want to go to a war with America? Or do I want to make America go to war with itself?

• 1:08:07Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:08:07Speaker 05

  And I think one of the things I was trying to write in, trust me, I'm lying, is is like, hey, look, here's how I'm getting you to buy T-shirts or getting you to follow this brand or this person or whatever. But like, real bad people can do these same things and in fact are doing these same things. And I think that, to me, though, that even the craziest part of our system isn't just like that bad actors can do, but also like the system can manipulate itself, just like, like, it's so primed for for like, going to where the energy, the action is, that sometimes things that start as jokes become real things.

• 1:08:49Speaker 05

  Or things that start as the most harebrained conspiracy theory that you could imagine, like, becomes real. Like, I I live in in this town called Bastrop, Texas. And one of the first ones that really caught my eye on this, do you remember the Jade Helm conspiracy?

• 1:09:06Shawn Ryan?

  No.

• 1:09:06Speaker 05

  There was this conspiracy that, like, this is during, this is 2015, so it's during the Obama administration. They were doing like these big training exercises in like the South and the Southwest. Um, and uh, this conspiracy theory comes out that like, it's actually this false, it's like this crazy operation where they're gonna like, um, I don't know, the federal government was gonna like occupy the southern states. It was like the faux military training exercise as a pretext to like, start a civil war or something. It was this conspiracy theory that starts online, starts on Facebook. And and one of the exercises was happening in where I live.

• 1:09:46Speaker 05

  And um, and like, the governor of Texas ends up sending the National Guard to observe the exercises to make sure this didn't happen as if, as if uh,

• 1:09:59Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:00Speaker 05

  that could do anything. Uh, but but but anyways, the point was, it it came out in the years after that this was mostly like a a foreign sort of propagated theory, like, that like this thing, some crazy person online said this, and then

• 1:10:18Shawn Ryan?

  It was injected from a foreign influence.

• 1:10:20Speaker 05

  And then, yeah, exactly, they went and they put, they put energy behind, they put spend behind it and spread it and whatever. And so it was like, oh, okay, so again, we're so consumed with like what we're doing to each other that we don't think about the fact that other people have an even bigger incentive to get us really focused on this or that. And so, again, you know, countries that are real close to Russia, like Finland, they spend a lot of time teaching media literacy to their kids because they know that it's real. And they know that these operations and this agenda is right there all the time.

• 1:11:03Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:11:03Speaker 05

  And I think we, we live in a bubble uh, because we've so often been the exporter of culture that we don't think about the ways that,

• 1:11:16Speaker 05

  you know, different uh, nations, causes, et cetera, have a vested interest in directing that culture in certain ways.

• 1:11:28Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:11:29Speaker 05

  And so that's one of the things I was talking about in the book, too.

• 1:11:31Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, I've uh, I mean, I've, like I said, I've changed my tune since the last election. And you know, what I've realized is, I think, I think that the you can have a better, bigger impact in just initiating, in how you initiate certain conversations rather than who you initiate them with.

• 1:11:53Speaker 05

  Hmm.

• 1:11:53Shawn Ryan?

  If you start the conversation properly and plant the seed, then it it will grow. It will grow into what it needs to be.

• 1:12:02Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:12:03Shawn Ryan?

  Instead of trying to hit the head honcho and and and pour your ideas into them and and hold them accountable.

• 1:12:11Speaker 05

  Interesting. What do you mean?

• 1:12:12Shawn Ryan?

  I mean that

• 1:12:15Shawn Ryan?

  What do I mean? I mean that I've just, everybody I've brought on here that, that, that, can make an immediate impact, that is in a position to make an immediate impact, they always fall short.

• 1:12:28Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 1:12:28Shawn Ryan?

  No matter what they tell you. But what I have noticed is the things that, that, that, just in my own personal experience with some of the discussions that I've had in here, the biggest impact that we've made is by starting a conversation and watching the conversation grow through the, through regular people, through the population.

• 1:12:45Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:12:46Shawn Ryan?

  Not, not from getting direct to a president, a congressman, a senator, a CEO of a company, uh, uh, somebody that owns a nonprofit, whatever. It's, it's the conversation that happens that, that engages the population has a much, much bigger impact than going directly to the decision maker.

• 1:13:06Speaker 05

  Have you heard that expression that politics is downstream from culture?

• 1:13:12Shawn Ryan?

  No.

• 1:13:12Speaker 05

  I think that's sort of what you're saying, is like, uh, what matters is the consensus or the idea, like the, the, the energy, the vibe is more important than like a single decision maker, which is by the way, our whole system, like, we have a decentralized system. So where decision making is decentralized and, and widespread because the founders were so concerned about sort of man on horseback.

• 1:13:42Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:42Speaker 05

  And, and so there really isn't one singular person who can make a difference. Now, the problem is, that is also allowed a lot of people who are in positions of power to

• 1:13:59Speaker 05

  abdicate their responsibility to make a difference, right? Like everyone, everyone is trying to save their jobs for some point in the future when they'll be the decision maker, you know? And, um, like, look, you do need those people, but chances are you're not that person.

• 1:14:19Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:20Speaker 05

  Like, chances are you should do the right thing right now.

• 1:14:22Shawn Ryan?

  Yep. It's interesting. It's interesting. I think, what do you think it is? I think it's addiction to power.

• 1:14:27Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:14:28Shawn Ryan?

  But then looking at it from the outside, and it, and it does appear that they have a lot of power. But then when you see it, and you're like, you're, you're fucking completely powerless. Because you're not saying what needs to be said, even though you know exactly what the fuck you need to do, because you want to hang on to the fake power that you think you have. But you're actually powerless because you're not saying what you know needs to be said, because you know you won't have that position anymore, and that position represents your power, your relevance in society.

• 1:15:01Speaker 05

  I think the difference here, there's, there's power and there's status, right?

• 1:15:04Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:15:05Speaker 05

  And so, um, they don't exercise the power because they want to keep the status.

• 1:15:11Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:15:11Speaker 05

  Like, I mean, look, Thomas Massey is, is, is not going to be a congressman much longer.

• 1:15:17Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:15:17Speaker 05

  Um, the irony is when you meet a lot of these politicians, um, privately, not only will they tell you a bunch of things that they won't say in public, but they will also tell you how much they don't like their job. Like, they fucking hate it. Like, it's a miserable job. They don't like their colleagues. They think there's a lot of, you know, performance, and they have to spend all this time fundraising. They don't like the job. And yet, when it comes down to these votes that seem to me to be very clearly conscience-based, or very stark moral choices, um, they're like, well, I gotta do what I know is wrong to keep this job that I don't fucking like. I'm like, I don't get it at all. It doesn't make any

• 1:16:00Speaker 05

  sense to me, right? But the problem is, I, I remember, I was sitting in the Senate dining room, talking to, um, uh, Senator, and, and I was saying like, hey, why don't you guys, uh, you and I, you and I probably have very different politics, but I was like, why don't you, no, this Trump thing is crazy. Like, what are we doing here? And, um, I was like, why don't you speak out about it, you know? And, um, and he goes, see that guy over there? And he's like, I go, yeah. And he's like, that guy was going to be head of the CIA. And he's, and I go, okay. And he's like, and then, uh, I could probably say who it was. He said that, that, uh, the White House was like adult daycare over there. I think it was Senator Corker. And he's like, he's not even going to be a senator anymore. You

• 1:16:45Speaker 05

  know, he was like, that guy was in line for the next office, the next level, and he made a comment, and, uh, it's not happening anymore. And the guy was basically saying like, that's, that's why. And he was laying it out, like, like, it's, it's just, it is crazy, because like, me as a citizen, I'm like, you're one of the, uh, you know, hundred most powerful people in the world.

• 1:17:09Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:17:10Speaker 05

  And that's not how they see themselves. And so, I don't know. Why would you want, I, I, and look, I, I, I write about this, I wrote this book on courage, I, I talk about, I was once, when I was at American Apparel, I was once asked to do this thing that was profoundly wrong and immoral. And, um, and, uh, I didn't do it, but I thought about doing it, and I struggled with doing it. And, and, and the reason that I didn't, I didn't like, challenge my boss about it, was that I didn't want to get fired, right? Now, in retrospect, why would I want to keep a job that speaking up about something that was wrong would get you fired from? That's crazy. It doesn't make any sense. But

• 1:17:53Speaker 05

  this is, these are the equations that we make in our heads. But why would you want to work in an administration where even the slightest criticism gets you on the shit list? It's not going to be a good job. This thi, this job that you dreamed of, of having your whole life, it, it's not what you think it is.

• 1:18:13Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:18:13Speaker 05

  Right? Like, they just showed you it's not what you think it is. But, um, we rationalize, where everybody, everybody is saving themselves for this.

• 1:18:25Shawn Ryan?

  Higher calling?

• 1:18:26Speaker 05

  This higher call, yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, I remember, you know Adam Kinzinger?

• 1:18:30Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:18:30Speaker 05

  I remember he was saying, he, he felt like a lot of, I was talking to him once, and he was telling me that he feel, he, he feels like, um, members of Congress tell themselves there's a super Congress, and their job is like, that super Congress will take care of it. And it's like, no, no, you were elected to take care of this. This is what we sent you to Washington. We didn't send you there to be in your, the job for as long as you could have it. We sent you there to represent our interests and to solve the problems of, uh, governance, right? That's the fucking job. And you think your job is

• 1:19:09Speaker 05

  to continue to be congressman or congresswoman. And, um, you're so afraid of being the former Senator from Massachusetts, or the former congresswoman from California, that you aren't making the tough decisions that you, you have to, you have to make. And, look, one of the things I've been trying to remind myself of, is like, is very easy as citizens to be like, why aren't these people risking their jobs to do what is right? And why aren't they putting themselves out there? And then, it's like you, and by you, I mean like the person listening, you are working a job you fucking hate. And, uh, you know you could

• 1:19:53Speaker 05

  be doing something different or better. You've worked, you're working in an industry that you know is fucked up, like, blah, blah, blah. What was the last risk you took like that?

• 1:20:02Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:20:03Speaker 05

  Like, it's, you know what I mean? It's ve, it's very easy to evaluate the moral choices and the complicity and the contradictions in other people. Um, and of, of course, as citizens, it's our job to do that and to throw those people out. That's, that you cannot, we cannot keep this republic, as Benjamin Franklin said, if we don't do that. However, to me, the main, in, the main purpose of looking at this, the coward, cowardice and the contradictions and the shamelessness and the, the sort of petty turf wars, is, is it, it should, it should be a mirror reflected back at ourselves and go, well, I could be

• 1:20:45Speaker 05

  doing more. Like, I could be, I tell my kids to follow their dreams, and then I'm like, not doing it, you know? And so I, I don't know, I, I just think it, it's really easy to kind of just point this, like, judgment lens at Washington, or the State House, or whatever. But ultimately, you've got to point it at yourself.

• 1:21:10Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. I would, it's interesting you bring that up, because I wanted to talk to you about hypocrisy, being a hypocrite. I'm, I'm sure we all are. I mean, I'm real quick.

• 1:21:20Speaker 05

  Every single one of us, yes.

• 1:21:21Shawn Ryan?

  Real quick to point it out in everybody else. But I do, do a lot of self-reflection, and I talk to a lot, you know, how can I improve? But I'm always thinking about that, whether it's being a dad, being a businessman, being a pod, whatever it is, you know? And, I can't find the...

• 1:21:40Shawn Ryan?

  I can't find my own hypocrisy. Does that make sense?

• 1:21:44Speaker 05

  On, on.

• 1:21:45Shawn Ryan?

  I don't know what it is. I don't know. I mean, now I'm sure it'll show up in the comments.

• 1:21:50Speaker 05

  The comments can be helpful for that.

• 1:21:51Shawn Ryan?

  But, uh, but I don't, I, I can't see it in myself. A lot of times I can't see it in myself right now.

• 1:21:58Speaker 05

  No, no. I mean, look, this is why. This is why a company's got to have a board of directors. This is why a president is supposed to have a cabinet. I think the most alarming thing about where we are politically right now is that not only are a lot of the governmental checks and balances not there. Uh, but a lot of the.

• 1:22:20Speaker 05

  A lot of the cultural checks and balances aren't there. Like the press is supposed to be hostile to power. And the cabinet is like, the, the founders set up a system.

• 1:22:34Speaker 05

  Where ambition was supposed to be a check against ambition, right? The, um. Congress was supposed to zealously enforce its prerogatives. Like part of being a senator, like part of the perk of being a senator and having a six-year term, whereas the president has a four-year term. Is you're supposed to be able to go like this to the president when the president is wrong, right? Like Congress has war making powers, not the president. But if Congress decides that they don't want to enforce that power, then the president has that power, right? And, um, you know, if, if we have a partisan news environment where the left-wing media.

• 1:23:18Speaker 05

  Slobbers all over a left-wing president and the right-wing media slobbers all over, uh, the right-wing president. And then if the president has a cabinet and has been allowed to confirm a cabinet of people who are. Dependent on him and, um, fully bought in on him, then the president's never going to hear no. And never going to hear, uh, that's a dumb fucking idea. Like, uh, what about this? What about that?

• 1:23:52Speaker 05

  And, and so.

• 1:23:55Speaker 05

  I mean, we know historically what happens when people in positions of power are not subject to any checks and balances. And when their information diet is degraded. Like one of the oldest stories that we have about this is that the emperor has no clothes, right? And when everyone says, hey, sir, we love your new outfit and he's walking around naked, that there was a. There was a reason, there's a moral to that story. And it's funny, actually, Mark Serelius, the reason Mark Serelius becomes emperor is actually like 2,000 years earlier. An illustration of that story. So the Hadrian does not have a son.

• 1:24:41Speaker 05

  He's the emperor of Rome, doesn't have a son, so he has to choose his successor. And there's this kid, he's a member of a sort of prestigious Roman family who somehow he meets. That kid is Mark Serelius. And, um. For some reason, Mark Serelius as a young kid just doesn't seem to be intimidated by the emperor at all, and he tells him the truth. And you can imagine that the, the emperor of Rome does not hear the truth very often. It's actually a famous story about Hadrian where. Hadrian is in an argument with one of his advisors who's a philosopher and, uh.

• 1:25:17Speaker 05

  Some, it's like, it's, uh, we don't know exactly what it was about, but it was something where it was like, it's like an objective. You know, like, uh, anyways, the, the philosopher ends up saying, you know what, sir, you're right. You're, I was wrong, you're right. And, um, later one of his friends comes up to him and he says, you know, why did you tell the emperor he was right? Like the, like the math equation is very clear, he's wrong. And the philosopher looks at him and he says, ah, this is what you don't understand. The man who controls 50 legions is always correct. Right? Like.

• 1:25:51Speaker 05

  People don't tell powerful people the truth because they are afraid of powerful people, right? And, um, Mark Serelius supposedly tells the Emperor Hadrian the truth and his, his nickname is Verisimus, like the truest one. Part of what, what makes Hadrian ultimately select Mark Serelius is that he is like the boy in the story. The Emperor has no clothes, who actually says to the emperor, sir, you're naked. What are you talking about? Like, I don't care what these people said. You don't have any fucking clothes on. You got conned, right? And so. You. As you become powerful and important and as you, this is why revenge is bad.

• 1:26:32Speaker 05

  When you get a reputation for punishing your enemies or punishing your perceived enemies, like critics.

• 1:26:42Speaker 05

  It degrades your picture of the world. Because you have just sent a message to everyone around you. Do not challenge that person. Do not tell them the truth. Do not tell them what they don't want to hear. Like, do you think there were many? Advisors who told Putin that invading Ukraine would be a bad idea? Like, do you think anyone laid out like this is how bad it could go?

• 1:27:07Shawn Ryan?

  No.

• 1:27:08Speaker 05

  No, because you don't want to end up fucking in a plane crash, right? Or like, uh, you don't want to fall out of fourth story window. And so. Oftentimes you think you want control, you think you want, uh, people on board. You think you want true believers, um, and you don't. Like the antagonistic.

• 1:27:33Speaker 05

  Uh, hostile, like the, the, the system of government we have is set up there for a reason. Even, even the so-called deep state is also there for, like, you want career governmental employees who are not necessarily political. I mean, there are going to be problems with it too. I'm, I'm not, I don't mean to overstate it, but like you want a bureaucracy that doesn't. Want to swing too far in one direction or the other direction. You want Congress to be oppositional. You want your cabinet to, uh, have their own political ambitions. Like. Lincoln staffs his cabinet with his political rivals because he wants.

• 1:28:20Speaker 05

  He knows that what he has to do is extremely difficult. And if he only has people telling him what he wants to hear, he will not actually be able to do it. And so that to me is what alarms me about where we are.

• 1:28:33Shawn Ryan?

  We're, we're, I'm just, you know, you brought up an interesting point about. I mean, where do you draw the line between? Sending a message, maybe not revenge or vengeance, but sending a mess. Cause I've done this where, where I, I, I will never initiate.

• 1:28:53Shawn Ryan?

  I shouldn't say never. I will not initiate. Arguments, blast people, get in fights on the internet. I just think this shit's stupid and it's a waste of time and causes a lot of stress.

• 1:29:08Shawn Ryan?

  But there have been times where.

• 1:29:11Shawn Ryan?

  Powerful people come after me. And then I think it is that just, I, I think it from, for a variety of reasons, I think it's important to stand up.

• 1:29:22Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:29:22Shawn Ryan?

  And to engage.

• 1:29:26Shawn Ryan?

  One, to set an example to anybody else out there that's planning on coming after me. If you do come after me, this is what the fuck's going to happen if you back me into a corner. I think it also gives other people courage. I just went through one of these at the, at the beginning of the year. A congressman, um, went after me and. I went right back at him and now he's no longer in fucking Congress.

• 1:29:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:29:50Shawn Ryan?

  But, you know, I did that because, uh, I, I, I mean, I started this in my attic, so I still, I, I don't. I'm still coming to the full realization of the magnitude of the shit that can come out of here. Because I still consider myself that guy in the attic that.

• 1:30:06Shawn Ryan?

  Was doing this with my wife.

• 1:30:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:30:08Shawn Ryan?

  It's a small thing and, but. So I'm kind of in the middle of, you know, does that make sense? But I also did that because I wanted to show people like you don't have to get fucking pushed around by these people, man.

• 1:30:22Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:30:23Shawn Ryan?

  They're going to come after you and it is scary to have somebody that high up in government coming after you. But they don't have as much power as you think they do.

• 1:30:33Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:30:33Shawn Ryan?

  And I just proved that.

• 1:30:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:30:36Shawn Ryan?

  And at the same time, I don't want to, you know, for, for, for my immediate team, like I, I ask. Anybody that's been here for a little bit, you know, that's especially the guys that have been here from the beginning, which is only a handful of them.

• 1:30:52Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:30:52Shawn Ryan?

  You know, I'm always asking them like, hey, what do you think of this? Am I off? Am I off on this? You know, and. I think they tell me, you know, especially my top two guys tell me. They tell me.

• 1:31:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:31:05Shawn Ryan?

  But, you know, I don't want to, do you see what I'm getting at?

• 1:31:08Speaker 05

  No, totally. I think, look, sometimes you gotta establish some deterrence or you get, you get pushed around. I think that's important. Um, but yeah, I, I do think what we're talking about culturally is the problem. Like we, we want people to stand up. We want people to, to do the right thing. And then what examples? Do they have of that happening? And I think we're in like a, almost like a cultural death spiral of a lack of those examples. And so I do think it's important, um, but making a martyr of yourself, you know, is, is usually not a great thing to do, but like.

• 1:31:49Speaker 05

  The idea that like, uh, there are more people out there that feel this way than people think is really important. And, cause it's so easy to think like, oh, everyone's going along with this. Everyone's okay with this. Like, this is just, this is just what we have to put up with. And, and I think it's important, like acts of courage, like cowardice is contagious and so is courage.

• 1:32:19Speaker 05

  Moral courage and physical courage. Like if you see someone else do it, it changes your sense of what's possible. And what, um, is sort of, uh, the cultural expectation. And I think when I say we're in a desperate, it's like, it's like everyone is saving themselves for some crisis. And it's like, dude, this is the crisis.

• 1:32:47Shawn Ryan?

  This is it, man.

• 1:32:48Speaker 05

  Um, what are you, how much worse are you expecting it to get?

• 1:32:55Speaker 05

  And, and look like, the Stoics are not exempt from this. As I said, uh, Seneca works for Nero. Now Seneca probably told himself, he was the adult in the room, that he was making Nero less bad. And that he prevented Nero from doing a lot of bad stuff. And he almost certainly did.

• 1:33:15Speaker 05

  But as a result, he also allowed Nero to do a lot of bad stuff. And these are not easy moral choices. Um, and I, the only reason I think like, 2,000 years later, it becomes a little clearer, right? Um, but in the moment, they're, they're vexing, uh, emotional and moral choices. And when you're asking someone to choose, hey, you're going to lose your job over this, you're going to be attacked, maybe your family, uh, will be threatened. These are, there's a lot to ask of people. I get that. Um, but, uh, chances are, when you look back, you're going to wish you did more.

• 1:33:56Speaker 05

  You're going to wish you said more. You're going to wish you, you're not going to be like, I'm so glad I waited. And, uh, because here's the thing about waiting is that you can always tell yourself that this isn't the right time, that like, again, no, no, no, I, I need to be, I need to stay in the room. Till the real crisis happens. And then, and what you've actually done is over and over and over again,

• 1:34:27Speaker 05

  built the habit of not doing the thing, right? And, and, and, um, the idea that suddenly, when you're at the second to the top level, that's when you're going to gamble it all and, and do the hard thing. Like you, you have to build it as a hat, like, Aristotle said that it was wrong to think of virtue as this thing that you have or don't have. Like that people are born courageous or born generous or, um, simply are, uh, you know, smart or, you know, any of the things that we hold up as good. He's like, no, no, no, it's an, it's a verb, not a noun.

• 1:35:08Speaker 05

  It's a thing you are doing or not doing. Like courage is a muscle you are executing, you are exercising. Like speaking truth to power is a muscle you're exercising. It's a thing you are doing, not a thing you are or aren't. And so the, the, the, the, the good news about that is like, if you want to be generous, if you want to be a generous person, you can start right now. Like start tipping bigger, like tie the percentage of your salary, right? Um, you, you can start doing that right now. The, the, that's the good news. The bad news is

• 1:35:43Speaker 05

  if you are not doing it, you are building the habit and the muscle of not being that person. And it becomes harder and harder to break as the stakes get higher and higher.

• 1:35:57Shawn Ryan?

  That's a damn good point. Ryan, let's take a quick break.

• 1:36:00Speaker 05

  All right.

• 1:36:04Shawn Ryan?

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• 1:36:48Shawn Ryan?

  Want to try America's number one whole body deodorant formula right now? For the best deals, go to shopmando.com and use code SRS for 20% off. S H O P M A N D O dot com. Please support our show and tell them we sent you. Mando's got you covered. With deodorant plus sweat control, say goodbye to sweat stains and hello to long lasting freshness. Again, go to shopmando.com and use code SRS for 20% off. S H O P M A N D O dot com.

• 1:37:29Shawn Ryan?

  Welcome to Hollywood versus reality. Did I do it right?

• 1:37:37Shawn Ryan?

  What does he do in the movies? Tell me if I'm doing this wrong, because I don't watch any of this. A little flick like that, right? Seems pretty cool. It is pretty cool.

• 1:37:48Shawn Ryan?

  Gotta silence it.

• 1:37:55Shawn Ryan?

  In another lifetime, I did gun reviews for a living. Proprietary magazines, supposedly the best engineering in the world. When that breaks, you're

• 1:38:06Shawn Ryan?

  and now we're bringing them back.

• 1:38:13Shawn Ryan?

  It does look pretty fucking cool. I gotta, I gotta admit that.

• 1:38:19Shawn Ryan?

  All right, Ryan, we're back from the break. I want to dive into ego.

• 1:38:23Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 1:38:23Shawn Ryan?

  Ego is the enemy. He wrote a whole book on this. Where do we start?

• 1:38:29Speaker 05

  I mean, is there anyone that thinks ego is good? Like, is there anyone who's like, we need some bigger egos around here? That'll help.

• 1:38:36Shawn Ryan?

  I don't think so.

• 1:38:39Speaker 05

  I like to think of ego as, as being the thing that gets between you and whatever it is that you want to do. So in a way, like, I'm not saying like, oh, be sort of humble, so low to the ground that you don't want anything. You don't try to do anything. Like, I actually think ego is the enemy of the ambition that you have. Like whatever you're trying to do, like, what you need is a sense of reality. You need self-awareness. You need sense of connection. You need truth. Like you, the ingredients to doing what you want to do are for the most part, not delusion and grandiosity and selfishness. Like it's the opposite of that. So when I say ego is the enemy, I'm, I'm not saying like,

• 1:39:22Speaker 05

  think you're a piece of shit. I'm saying just don't think you're God's gift to humanity. Like confidence to me is somewhere in the middle between those two extremes. And, uh, and yeah, cha- chances are ego is causing the problems, not solving the problems and personally or in your organization.

• 1:39:43Shawn Ryan?

  How do you keep yours in check? I bet you're an extremely successful guy.

• 1:39:47Speaker 05

  Well, I mean,

• 1:39:48Shawn Ryan?

  A lot of people that find success and then their ego just fucking explodes.

• 1:39:54Speaker 05

  Yeah. I look, the first, first and foremost, admitting that you have one and that it is a problem is like a critical step. Like, like if I'm sitting here going like, let me tell you how to conquer your ego, because I don't have one, like, be real suspicious. Cause you know, I mean, my ego causes problems for me all the time.

• 1:40:15Speaker 05

  It's something I try to work on. It's something I try to work on and I'd be aware of and, and knowing that, yeah, like success inflates the ego. Success, uh, it not just inflates the ego, but it, it enables people around you to inflate the ego, right? Like in, in a way, you need to be more self-critical and aware, the more successful you are. For the reasons we were just talking about, which is you are, the air is thinner and you get less. Not only do you get less feedback, but you've got this really important piece of feedback that can be really, um, misleading, which is like, you did something that wasn't supposed to be possible. You didn't listen to the critics and doubters and haters.

• 1:41:00Speaker 05

  And so do you take from that, that you know better than everyone else? Right? Like this happens to a lot of entrepreneurs, like everyone said it was a bad idea. Everyone said it didn't work. How do you know when to listen in the future? Like, like when Elon Musk started, uh, SpaceX, which was his second company with the money that he made from his first company, like his friends had like a literal intervention, like you cannot do this. This is a bad, bad idea. You will lose everything. I mean, it's going to go public and be a multi-trillion dollar company, right? So like, they were wrong. So how does he now?

• 1:41:46Speaker 05

  And by the way, this is also true for Tesla. That was supposedly a bad idea, right? Like, how does he? And I think this is again, a sort of larger life story that should help us understand this in our own lives. Like, how, how does he know? In future instances, not to just listen to himself, right? And so, you know, he's done some real dumb stuff too. And that's what ego does, is that sense of, I don't need to listen to you. I know better.

• 1:42:15Shawn Ryan?

  So with that, earlier we were chatting about trusting your gut instinct.

• 1:42:20Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:42:20Shawn Ryan?

  Obviously Elon trusted his gut instinct when it came to SpaceX. It was, it is wildly successful. Maybe the biggest company in the world.

• 1:42:30Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:42:30Shawn Ryan?

  And, you know, and so how, how do you differentiate what to take in from external influences and?

• 1:42:40Shawn Ryan?

  What got instincts to trust?

• 1:42:42Speaker 05

  Well, to me, it comes down to like the story you tell yourself, right? So like, like when I went to my publisher and I was like, hey, I want to write a book about stoic philosophy. They were not like cha-ching, you know, like they were like, what? You know, that sounds like a horrible idea, but literally they were like, uh,

• 1:43:01Speaker 05

  and I think I, I said this before, but I took, I took um, less than half. What I, I took for, for, for the book that became The Obstacles Away, I took less than half what I got for Trust Me, I'm Like. So like, they thought it was going to be less than 50%.

• 1:43:20Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 1:43:20Speaker 05

  Successful, as successful. So what's the lesson that I take from that? Like, I mean, it ended up selling millions of copies and being this big thing. Like, do I take from that, like, those fucking idiots at my publisher don't know shit, right? Do I take from that, like, I'm a genius, that I can see around corners? That I, that like, I know what the people want? Or do I take from this, like, hey, I had what I thought was a pretty good idea? And um, I could see how it wasn't an obvious home run to some other people. And the reason it succeeded is because of, you know, uh, I, I did the work.

• 1:44:05Speaker 05

  I was willing to roll the dice anyway. And also because like, the downsides of being wrong were not that high either, right? Like, I took a risk and it paid off. It wasn't a certainty that I knew, it's I took a risk and it paid off. So do I, so again, you could take, and we have a thousand examples of this, but like you could take from this, hey, I'm a genius, I know better, that's, that's ego. Or you can go, hey, I took a risk and it paid off. That's to me, confidence with some self-awareness in there. And so whatever story you tell yourself about why you are where you are, it uh, it doesn't change what happened.

• 1:44:46Speaker 05

  Like, the event doesn't know that you're telling a story about it, but it does change how you make future decisions. Right? Like, um, if you feel like you're anointed, if you feel like the rules don't apply, if you feel like you can defy gravity, you know? All these things make it really likely that in the future, you're going to overreach.

• 1:45:07Speaker 05

  And that tends to be what successful people do, right? They tend to overreach. And so that's, that's what I think you want to take from, from like, trust your gut, but trust the right part about it, not the delusional part of it.

• 1:45:23Shawn Ryan?

  Do you feel that you have ever overreached?

• 1:45:26Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I, I try to think mostly back around the calls that I made where I was super wrong. Like, I don't think about the fights I had with my publisher where I ended up being right. I think about the times where I insisted on getting my way and in retrospect, they had a point, you know? I try to think about the, the times where, you know, I didn't listen to the feedback. And I would have saved myself a painful bump on the head had I done so. And I think that's healthy. I mean, like, again, like, if you focus on all the things you know, you don't get any better. If you focus on what you don't know, you can get better.

• 1:46:12Speaker 05

  If you focus on where you fell short, you can make improvements. And if you focus on what you got right, you're just jerking yourself off.

• 1:46:23Shawn Ryan?

  How about humility?

• 1:46:25Speaker 05

  I mean, I think humility is important. To me, confidence is, confidence is an awareness of strength and an awareness of weakness. Like, to me, the story of David and Goliath is at its core, uh, about the power of both of those things, right? David doesn't think, oh, I'm anointed by God, therefore I, of course I can defeat Goliath, right? If, if, if he knew that he was preordained to win, he would have just, you know, rushed heedlessly into battle and uh, let God take care of it, right?

• 1:47:05Speaker 05

  Like, the story, to me, the, the, the critical part in the story of David and Goliath is when David tries on the armor of the soldier, his brothers, and it's too big. And he goes, I can't do this, like, this isn't going to work. I'm, I'm, he's like, as a shepherd, he's just not able to operate as a traditional warrior. And that's when he turns to the sling, right? The sling is, hey, he's bigger than me, he's stronger than me, he's better trained than me. I don't have these tools in my toolkit, but I do have this thing, right?

• 1:47:45Speaker 05

  And so humility to me is a key element in matching what we're, what, what every battle, figurative and literal is about, which is about matching strength against weakness. Like, strength against strength is stupid.

• 1:48:05Speaker 05

  It, it usually creates two losers, even if there's one winner, right? Like, the, what a great general does, what a great athlete does, what a great entrepreneur does,

• 1:48:19Speaker 05

  is match strength against weakness, like, and, and by the way, also protects, hides your own weakness, right? Because that's where you don't want their strength to go against yours. So, so to me, this humility is really important, like knowing what you're not that good at, what you need to get better at.

• 1:48:42Speaker 05

  Is uh, yeah, it's like a big part of it.

• 1:48:45Shawn Ryan?

  How do you keep yourself humble?

• 1:48:48Speaker 05

  You know, the kids help, uh, spouse helps, um.

• 1:48:54Speaker 05

  Trying to do hard shit helps. Like, if you are only doing what you're really comfortable with, and you're never in situations that you're outmatched, that you're, um, that you're out of your depth in, you lose that feeling of like, oh shit, I gotta figure this out.

• 1:49:18Speaker 05

  And so, like, when I take on projects, one of the things I think about is like, is this something I've done before? And if, if it's something I've done before, like, it's not that interesting to me. And if it's something where I'm like, oh, I'm gonna have to figure out a lot of different skills to be able to do this. And this can be in, I don't mean like you're reinventing the wheel every time, like, um, I just mean, like, what's the element of your game that you're working on? Like, if you go into the off-season and you're like, I want to practice getting better at what I'm really good at. I think that, that is, you know, not just, not just the gains are going to be less than exciting, but like, it's a sort of a confirmation of ego.

• 1:50:02Speaker 05

  But if you're like, hey, no, no, what I don't, what I'm not good at is this, what I could get better at is this. And that's what you're going to spend your time on? To me, that's, that, that helps with humility because you're waking up every day and it's fucking hard, it sucks.

• 1:50:23Speaker 05

  And it's just, it's uh, you can't, you can't feel, you can't feel great about how you're doing when you're getting your ass kicked. And so how are you seeking out those experiences? I think that's really important.

• 1:50:37Shawn Ryan?

  What about what's just amongst people? I've been somebody as successful as yourself, you've reached millions of people with your books.

• 1:50:46Shawn Ryan?

  Lots of people seek you out, they want to talk to you, they want to meet you, they want to get an autograph, they want to pick your brain, they want to, they just want to be around.

• 1:50:54Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:50:54Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and, and that can really inflate your ego. So how do you navigate that? How do you navigate that around your kids?

• 1:51:03Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, it is, like, when you get recognized around your kids, it's weird, it's a weird thing. My kids are like, they roll their eyes and uh, they uh, they, we, we were in Greece this summer and they started playing this game where they would, they, they wanted to see if they would see more stray cats than I would get recognized. And uh, the fact that they saw like hundreds of more stray cats than I got recognized was like a thing they were just constantly shoving in my face. Which I love, I love. And, you know, so yeah, there is, there is that. I think any, anything you

• 1:51:44Speaker 05

  do in public that has fans or, you know, sort of recognition attached to it can, can sort of puff you up. I have the benefit in what I do in that it's not mine. Like, I write about an ancient philosophy that has been around for 2,500 years. Like, the reason the books work is 90% the philosophy and 10% me. And I try to remind myself of that fact. Like, I'm a conduit for a thing that not only did I not invent and can't be credited with, I'm not even good at. Like, my success in writing about Stoicism is very different than

• 1:52:27Speaker 05

  my individual journey through Stoic philosophy as a human being. And I try to remind myself of that.

• 1:52:34Shawn Ryan?

  Do you consider yourself a Stoic?

• 1:52:36Speaker 05

  Yeah. I mean, if this is the philosophy that I am interested in, that I am trying to apply in my life. Do I call myself a Stoic? I mean, I would say I am an aspiring Stoic. Like, I, I would certainly not claim to have attained any kind of enlightenment or mastery of the stuff. Like, in fact, the reason that I'm so driven to write about it and talk about it is because it's like, it's really hard. And I really struggle with it. So, I try to remind myself that, like, like, when someone, someone comes to me and says, like, hey, your books changed my life. They help, you know, or they say Stoicism changed my life.

• 1:53:19Speaker 05

  It got me through cancer, whatever it is. I go, yeah, it worked for me, too. Like, like, we're, we're on the same journey. Like, what it's, what, what, what they think is, has, is my books is really, like, the philosophy that I am also a student of, if that makes sense.

• 1:53:40Shawn Ryan?

  It does make sense.

• 1:53:41Speaker 05

  But it, it's like, you know, when, when they interview athletes, like, in the, in the locker room after, like, a big game, and they're like, in all glory to God. I think they mean that, and I think that's important. I also think that's like, a really important professional adaptation. Like, if, if LeBron James or Kobe Bryant or, or whoever is like, fuck, yeah, that was all fucking me, you know, like, I'm the greatest. That's bad. Like, that's bad for future performance. It's better, it's better to credit, and I don't just mean, like, from a public relations standpoint. Like, you have to mean it. Like, if it's

• 1:54:22Speaker 05

  false modesty, it's a, it's, you might as well just own it. But if you're like, no, this was the team, this was the training, this is the tradition, like, you are, you are, that is, that is the right and the healthy way to think about it. First off, because it's true. And second, because it's not good for you to put that on and credit yourself for things that.

• 1:54:52Shawn Ryan?

  Why is it not good?

• 1:54:55Speaker 05

  Well, I think, as I said, first off, it's not, it's not good because it's not true, right? Like, everything is a team sport, right? And second, because it breeds complacency and entitlement. And if it, if it's not a little scary to you, and it's not a little hard, and you're not, you're not questioning your ability to do it, you're probably going in the opposite direction. Like, you're, you're, you're, it should be getting, it should always stay challenging and hard. Or, or else, it's like, you know, you're lifting weights.

• 1:55:37Speaker 05

  When it becomes easy, you grew, you grew the muscles and you're, you're, you need to crank the thing up.

• 1:55:44Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm. Makes sense. Let's move into, how do I word this? People that have experienced death, or have been close to death, or, I guess not experienced death, but have been around death. People that have killed, people that have seen war, people that have been around death a lot, and, and kind of knowing when to act, when to let things go, that kind of stuff. I mean, you have a lot to say on that.

• 1:56:15Speaker 05

  I mean, I'd be, I'd be curious to your opinion. I mean, when, when you experience how fragile life is, does it turn down the volume on stuff for you?

• 1:56:28Shawn Ryan?

  For a little bit.

• 1:56:30Speaker 05

  Yeah. And then it creeps back?

• 1:56:32Shawn Ryan?

  And then it creeps back.

• 1:56:33Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:56:36Shawn Ryan?

  I liked everything I was reading, and then I did, I compared it to myself, and I was like, you know, a lot of this stuff bleeds back.

• 1:56:43Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:56:44Shawn Ryan?

  And then, and then you get, you know, in my life journey, in my previous life, it was, you know, there was constant, oh, you're humbled again. Oh, you're humbled again. Oh, you're humbled again. Somebody died. Somebody died. We killed somebody. Somebody, you know, and, and so there's that constant reminder, and you live in that.

• 1:57:03Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:57:03Shawn Ryan?

  Pretty regularly. Then I left, and I'm not around it anymore. And things that maybe don't matter, or shouldn't matter, they creep back in, and they, they, they seem like a bigger deal than they are. And then I go into my revenge planning, or, you know what I mean? And it's just, I'm just being honest. It fucking creeps back in. And it creeps back in faster than you would think.

• 1:57:30Speaker 05

  Yeah. A friend of mine is in martial arts, was telling me that it's like sweeping the floor. You don't sweep it once and it's clean forever. It's a constant process of sweeping. And I think he goes that way. And I think, like, the urgency of life is another one. Like, you go to the doctor, and they're like, oh, check that out. There's that moment where you're like, oh, shit, is this it? You know, is this, did it just get serious? Or, you know, you were talking to a friend on Friday, and then you find out over the weekend they died. Or, you know, natural disaster, you know, whatever. Anything that

• 1:58:09Speaker 05

  happens, and suddenly you're like, oh, I forgot, we're mortal. That's, the Stoic practice is memento mori. Like, remember you are mortal. But it, it has to be an active meditation because, like, we all know objectively that we're all gonna die. Like, every, every person who's ever lived has, has, has eventually died. There's, there's no way out alive. And we know that although on average, you know, this is about how long we have, people die before.

• 1:58:49Shawn Ryan?

  Nothing's promised.

• 1:58:50Speaker 05

  They should all, all the time. The healthiest people in the world drop dead of a heart attack. The greatest people in the world get, you know, murdered for the money in their wallet. Obviously, wars and natural disasters, it happens. But, you know, then you get a little soft, a little entitled. You drift away from that urgency. And, and so, yeah, to me, it's like, it's an active process of reminding yourself that, yeah, tomorrow is, is not certain. The future is, is not yours. One of the, I think the most powerful

• 1:59:31Speaker 05

  ideas from the Stoics, this comes from Seneca, you know, he says, it's wrong to think of death as something that happens in the future. Like, that death is something we're moving towards. He says, actually, death is behind us. He says, like, the time that passes belongs to death. So instead of thinking, like, you live 80 years, he says, like, you've died however many years you're currently old. So, like, like, I'm gonna, I turn 38 next, 38? No, 39 next month? I don't remember. But anyways, like, my birthday, I should

• 2:00:12Speaker 05

  look back and go, this is how many years I have died. What do I have to show for that? Not how many years do I have left, but what have I, what do I have to show for the time? Because, because how we spend our time is how we spend our life, right? And, and so the idea of going like, hey, oh, you know, I'm, I don't like this, but I'm gonna do it until my kids grow up, or I'm gonna do it, you know, for a couple more years. I'm gonna do it till things settle down. Like, you know, we, we tell ourselves, like, we make these assumptions about the future. And really, the only thing that's certain is, is now, the thing you're, you're paying for with your life right now. And so that,

• 2:00:55Speaker 05

  I do try to remind myself of that, that like, we don't, the choices we're making about our time right now are the choices that matter. The idea of working something you don't like, deferring something you don't like, because what you really want to do is play golf in your 70s, is, is, is naive and entitled. And so, by the way, it's just the basic procrastination of like, you know what? I think I'm gonna, I'm gonna start that project next week. Like, if you're gonna do it, you should do it, and you should start right now. That, to me, is the, what you take out of the memento mori practice.

• 2:01:33Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, I really struggle with this. And, and just, in my personal experience, every time that I have been around death, thought I was gonna die, there's only one thing that goes through your mind, and that is, that's your family. That's it. That's the, it's not all your shit.

• 2:01:55Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:01:56Shawn Ryan?

  It's not all your accomplishments. It's not what you've done at work. It's not any of that. It's not how much fucking money you have. The only thing is like, shit, you know, who's gonna watch out for my family?

• 2:02:08Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:02:09Shawn Ryan?

  When I'm out of here. And, and then, you know, that, that creates the fight, you know, to stay alive. But what you're, what you're talking about, and I still struggle with this, no matter how many times I thought I was gonna die, or been around it, or been close to it.

• 2:02:27Shawn Ryan?

  It's been, I've had that constant reminder, like, none of this shit matters.

• 2:02:31Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:02:32Shawn Ryan?

  The only thing that matters in my head is my family. And

• 2:02:38Shawn Ryan?

  but then there's the preparation, you know, I have to hit this financial benchmark, I have to hit this, I have to hit all these accomplishments or or goals, or whatever it may be, to make the future of of my life, my wife's life, my kids' life, hopefully easier in the future, which takes away from living in the now because it's all planning, right?

• 2:03:02Speaker 05

  Well, even more insidious, like, at some point, you would give literally all of it back for five more minutes of time with them, right? And then here you are, fucking doom scrolling on Twitter with the five minutes that you have for sure right now. Like, you, you would, you would, you're gonna look back and wish that you could have more of this. And what are you doing with it right now? You're wasting it. And that, that to me is what I take from it is like, I have the thing that in the future will be priceless and unattainable. And I'm so frivolous with it. And I say yes to things because I don't want to be rude to someone.

• 2:03:46Speaker 05

  I get distracted because something's happening in the world. I, you know, I get overwhelmed and I'm like, I'm, I'm gonna take a break, you know, like, like,

• 2:03:59Speaker 05

  and, and you experience it in little, like, already, like, if you have little kids, you're just like, dude, like, a year ago, like, uh, that's gone, right? Like, the, these periods are so fleeting and so short. And in the moment you want it, you want, like, the next thing, you want to get out of it. I can't wait till they walk, I can't wait till they, you know, talk, I can't wait till they drive, whatever it is. And then, actually, when those moments come, all you'll wish for is more of what you wished away in the moment, because you're entitled or short-tempered or frustrated or whatever.

• 2:04:44Shawn Ryan?

  Here at Sean Ryan Show, research is a big part of everything we do. We're constantly digging through articles, reports, timelines, and backgrounds so we can ask better questions and understand the subjects we're covering. And one tool we've been using a lot for that is Claude. Claude has become part of our workflow. We use it for episode research, pressure testing different angles, and even our hot question segment, because it helps us connect ideas and sharpen questions before we get on the air. What stands out is Claude does more than give you a quick answer. It helps organize the information, work through the problem, and get to a clearer way of thinking about it. Claude is the AI for minds that don't stop it good enough.

• 2:05:29Shawn Ryan?

  It's the collaborator that actually understands your entire workflow and thinks with you. Claude extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter. With features like deep research and connectors, Claude can help bring context together from the tools you're already using. Companies like Stripe and Shopify trust Anthropic with the rollout of AI in their businesses. For problems worth solving, get started with Claude at claude.ai slash SRS. That's claude.ai slash SRS. And check out Claude Pro, which includes access to all the features mentioned in today's episode. Claude.ai slash SRS.

• 2:06:13Shawn Ryan?

  How do you reset? Do you find yourself going down those rabbit holes too?

• 2:06:17Speaker 05

  Yeah, of course. I mean, I, I try, uh, I try to...

• 2:06:24Speaker 05

  The good news about the present moment is that you're always getting another one until the moment that you don't. And so, how, to me, how quickly can you get, like,

• 2:06:36Speaker 05

  shit, I'm, I'm throwing the phone down, like, I'm stopping right now. Not like, tomorrow I'll do better, but like, I'm stopping right now. It's like, how fast can you get back to center? Is, is to me like the key, the key skill, both as a parent and as a person in this crazy modern world.

• 2:06:55Speaker 05

  But, you know, today was rough, okay. How do you do better tomorrow? And how do you stop whatever the direction you're going in that you, you know you shouldn't be going in? And how quickly you can do that?

• 2:07:08Shawn Ryan?

  What are your indications? Do they come from you? Do they come from your wife, your kids?

• 2:07:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, I, I mean, I feel like parenting is a lot of, uh, after they go to bed, you're like, what are we doing? Why did it go this way? You know, it's that sort of debrief at night. To me, that's, that's,

• 2:07:27Speaker 05

  you know, and it's very rarely, um, and we crushed it today. Like, it's usually like, why did we try to squeeze one more thing in, you know? Why did, why, why did, why did I? I remember I was putting my son down to bed the other night. And, uh, you know, first I can have a little more iPad time, then I gotta brush my teeth, oh no, now I gotta go to the bathroom again, or oh no, now I'm in water, oh, I'm hungry, even though I had dinner twice, you know, all, all this stuff that is making up for, uh, you know, not going to bed. And then I finally, he's like, all right, we go in his room. And I'm like, all right, let's get in bed. And he's like, no, no, I'm sleeping on the floor. And I go, what? You're not sleeping on the floor, like?

• 2:08:08Speaker 05

  And then we just got in this huge, you know, it's like, what do you mean? You never said I couldn't sleep on the floor. We're getting this whole fucking argument about why I couldn't sleep on the floor. And then I was finally like, I was like, why do I have an opinion about this? You know, like, sleep on the floor, I don't care. I realized, like, I think in the moment, it was like, I didn't want him to sleep on the floor because here's what I knew would happen. He would sleep on the floor until like the middle of the night, and then wake up, and then he'd come in our room. You know, and I was like, I wanted sleep, right? I, I was extrapolating what this means, what, you know, like, instead of like going like, I don't care where you fall asleep. Uh, I was thinking about what it means if you sleep here or there, right? And so anyways, um, finally, I'm like, I just, I realized I'd gotten down that I was in a battle of wills

• 2:08:52Speaker 05

  that like, I had the power to end right then by saying, sleep wherever you want, you know? If you want to sleep on this teddy bear on the floor, like, knock yourself out. So anyways, he lays down and, uh, just when I think he's falling asleep,

• 2:09:09Speaker 05

  I go to leave. He goes, I'm ready to sleep in my bed now. And I go, all right, let's go. And he walks in, he falls asleep in his bed. And it was such an illustrative one for me because it was like, it's like, I know when it started. It started when we walked into his room and he said, I wanted to sleep, uh, on the floor. And I said, no. And then it ended with him realizing that he didn't want to sleep on the floor. And, uh, he'd rather sleep in his bed. And that whole argument, you know, where I argued one thing and then I realized I was wrong, and then I changed, like, that whole thing in the middle, it just didn't fucking need to happen. You know, like, the whole, like, it, it would have worked itself out had I been,

• 2:09:55Speaker 05

  uh, a little more go with the flow about something. And I think, I, what I took from that, what I, as a parent, is just like,

• 2:10:06Speaker 05

  I need, I need to be more in the, like, does this thing actually matter? Like, why am I thinking that this matters? And I'm thinking that it matters because I'm thinking about what it means as opposed to

• 2:10:22Speaker 05

  that it means nothing, right? And that, that I could save us both a lot, like, I could save us both a lot of trouble. And in fact, like, not only did it work itself out, but it worked itself out, except we also had a big argument in the middle, which has a, has a, has a cost to it. Right? And so, like, I'm not saying you do everything your kids want and you let, you know, it's, you got King Baby walking around. But, um, most of this conflict, like, when I think about the things I had conflict with, with my parents, how many of those in retrospect were significant in any way, you know? And how, how many of those things are they glad that they went to the mattresses on?

• 2:11:07Speaker 05

  And, and I, I, I'm trying to, I'm trying to get better at that.

• 2:11:14Shawn Ryan?

  You're saying, pick your battles.

• 2:11:15Speaker 05

  Totally. And, and, and by pick your battles, I mean, avoid 99.9% of the battles because they don't fucking matter.

• 2:11:23Shawn Ryan?

  So how do you guide them then? I mean, now we're moving into fatherhood, so.

• 2:11:27Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:11:28Shawn Ryan?

  How do, I'm just curious, how do you guide them without?

• 2:11:33Shawn Ryan?

  Confrontation without discipline, disciplining them.

• 2:11:37Speaker 05

  Yeah. I mean, yeah, of course, that's the challenge is like, eh, you're not creating this fantasy world where they get to do whatever they want, whenever they want it. But at the same time, like, like, again, why do I care whether you sleep on the floor or their bed? There's no lesson in here. What it, what there actually is, is me wondering about the consequences of this for me. And two, um, my desire for control, right? Like, you want to do this, and I want you to do this, and why am I going to let a six-year-old win? You know, like, most, most, so like, in a way, you think like, oh, I'm giving them discipline. I'm giving them structure. It's very helpful. Actually, you're just showing them like,

• 2:12:17Speaker 05

  authority is arbitrary and pointless and, you know, should be fought against it every, like, you're actually sending the exact opposite lesson you want. And again, I'm saying this all as someone who constantly struggles with this. So I'm not saying this is something I'm good at. It's precisely the opposite. But, um, I mean, look, you teach your kids by example. And you teach your, you, you, you teach your kids often,

• 2:12:48Speaker 05

  in the moments when they are open to being taught because they've experienced some kind of consequence or, uh, uh, for, for a choice, or they have, there is an opening because of something that's happened,

• 2:13:04Speaker 05

  for you to actually insert that thing, that bit of wisdom or experience or lesson or whatever. That's kind of how I think about it.

• 2:13:12Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. I mean, you wrote a whole book on Stoic fatherhood, correct?

• 2:13:16Speaker 05

  Well, I did a book, I did a book called The Daily Dad, which is just sort of, yeah, classical or ancient lessons, like one, one a day. I think the problem with parenting books is like, you're just supposed to read this book and then just be good. Like, like, I'm supposed to read about some, when my kid is 13 months, I'm reading about how you teach things to a 13-year-old. Like, I'm not going to remember any of this. So the idea of, of The Daily Dad is it's, it's an email to you. The, the Daily Dad email is just one thought a day. It's, I think, to me, parenting is like a series of values and lessons that you've got to be reminded of over and over and over again. And that, that's kind of what I've tried to do with it.

• 2:13:54Shawn Ryan?

  What are some of the most important ones that stick out to you?

• 2:13:58Speaker 05

  Um, yeah, I think that the, the most important one, I think, is just how fast this is all going. And that you, uh,

• 2:14:11Speaker 05

  every time I, I cut my kids' fingernails or take them to get a haircut, I go like, that's that much life right there. That's that much, uh, of the brief window that they live in my house. Right? That, uh, that we get to do things together. And I, I try to be always aware, just as like, the, like, memento mori is about your own mortality, realizing that, like, I don't have a two-year-old anymore. I, my three-year-old is dead and gone. My four-year-old is dead and gone. Like, you are cycling through those ages and they will never be that thing again.

• 2:14:50Speaker 05

  To me, that's like one of the ultimate parenting lessons. The other one, uh, my wife and I were related to that, was like, we were like, do we want to, there was like some kids concert or something we were thinking about going. And we're like, but we gotta get in the car. It's like a 30-minute drive. Are they going to appreciate it? And it was just like, how many more times are they going to want to do this? You know, um, probably not that many more. Like, at some point, there's the last time. And are we going to be glad that we stayed at home and didn't do the thing? Or are we going to be glad that we did the thing? So realizing that you only get so many shots of these things, I think is a, is a big one.

• 2:15:27Speaker 05

  That, uh, you are the voice that's going to be in their head. And what is that voice like? Is it a negative voice? Is it a positive voice? Bruce Springsteen talked about how, um, we're going to be either ancestors or ghosts to our children. Like, an ancestor guides and a ghost haunts. And what, what kind of example are you gonna?

• 2:15:50Shawn Ryan?

  Shit, I never thought of it like that.

• 2:15:53Speaker 05

  And it's not just like what you say, but also like, is dad working on his shit? Is mom working on her shit? Or are they just foisting that stuff on you? And so, like, thinking about, getting serious about the stuff that you know you need to address, you know, you need to work on. I think that's one. And then related to that, I think, like, I have, uh, I've never lost my temper at my kids, and then afterward been like, I'm so glad I did that.

• 2:16:24Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:16:25Speaker 05

  Um, one, I have like on my phone, you know, it cycles through like pictures of my kids like as my home screen. And one of the things I'm always struck by is like how little they were. Like, I was real fucking pissed at a very small person. Like, like, it doesn't age well. Like, the things you get upset about, the things that you thought were a big deal, as they get older and you get a little better at this parenting thing, I think that the disparity of them and you becomes more obvious. And, um, I'm like, why did I, like, like, like, what do I give a shit about the backseat of the car so much for?

• 2:17:10Speaker 05

  You know, or like, you know, you walk in and he's drawn on the wall or, you know,

• 2:17:19Speaker 05

  broke something, you know? What, where's, where's the car that my parents were really concerned about me spilling fucking my McDonald's catch-up on? Like, it's in a, it's in a fucking cube somewhere.

• 2:17:36Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:17:37Speaker 05

  Like, it doesn't, like, it did not ultimately affect the resale value of said car. It did not teach me any lessons about cleanly, like, it, it was just like a stupid argument that we had. Right? Like, and I, I try to think about that. Again, not good at it, but I try to go like, where will this thing be in the future? Am I going to care about it?

• 2:18:03Shawn Ryan?

  You don't put importance on any things.

• 2:18:06Speaker 05

  Yeah. Yeah. Well, I, I, I try to get better at not, a human or the thing? What do I care more about? You know, the, the, the marriage advice is like, do you want to be right? You want to be married? You know, um, do you, do you want to have a good relationship with your kids? Or do you want to get your way all the time?

• 2:18:26Shawn Ryan?

  How do you know if you're, I mean, this, this is a really good way to put it, if you're a positive or a negative in your, in your kid's mind. How do you gauge that?

• 2:18:35Speaker 05

  Um, to me, I think

• 2:18:43Speaker 05

  it comes down to, to, like, like, no, no parent is perfect. Every, every, every therapy session ultimately ends up in all the ways that your parents could have done better or whatever, right? But like, you know, people say like, oh, my parents did the best they could. I'm not sure that's always true. And so like, are you actually doing your best? Like, that's, to me, the question is like, like, I go, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm doing my best. And I go, am I? Because I feel like I try a lot harder at other stuff. Like, I'm not saying parenting is easy, but I feel like I do a lot more work evaluating myself professionally. I bring in a lot more help professionally.

• 2:19:26Speaker 05

  I, I measure myself better professionally, and then a lot of times as a parent, I'm just winging it. And then, and then, then I want to, I want them to let me off the hook and go, dad was doing his best. Like, I'm not sure that's true. And so that, that does kind of push me to try to do better.

• 2:19:47Shawn Ryan?

  Damn.

• 2:19:50Shawn Ryan?

  It's like me. I'm like that.

• 2:19:53Speaker 05

  Yeah, because, look, and I think culturally for, for men especially, right? Like, your job was where you were supposed to be like your best, where you prove yourself. And then parenting was like an afterthought. And, um, the expectations were, you know, that expression, the soft bigotry of low expectations? That, that's basically dudes for all of human history when it comes to parenting. Um, and, uh,

• 2:20:30Speaker 05

  like, I don't know. I, I want, I want to do better than that.

• 2:20:35Shawn Ryan?

  What are the, I mean, what are the steps that you're taking, that you're thinking about taking that, that, that, that create a better balance?

• 2:20:43Speaker 05

  Yeah. I mean, I, to me, a big one is like, okay, so you're really good at what you do. You're successful at it. Um, uh, and then, and then you think that that somehow, like, exempts you from having to do shit at home, right? Like, um,

• 2:21:06Speaker 05

  Like, obviously, look, managing your time and delegating where you can, but you're like, why am I assuming that, like, my wife should make the school lunches?

• 2:21:18Speaker 05

  Or, there's this, they did this interesting study of like, schools where like, they needed something at home? Like, like, there's some problem at the school, right? And the, the, the receptionist or the principal or whatever had to call the parent. Like, what percentage of the time do they call the dad?

• 2:21:37Shawn Ryan?

  Probably a very small percentage.

• 2:21:39Speaker 05

  And there, there's, there's the assumption of the person making the call? And then there's also the reality of like, the family. Like, and, um, like, I've worked really hard. And my wife and I, like, whenever we hire, like, an assistant, or we, um, we're like, like, we're like, there's no, we're both the default parent. Like, it's not like, call her if there's anything important. Uh, and then, call Ryan if you can't reach her, you know? Like, I, I wanna, I wanna make this a thing that I value. And that, like, like, I heard someone say, like, your kids are not a distraction from your work. They are your work.

• 2:22:23Speaker 05

  And, that's easy to say, but like, do your, what does your calendar say? You know, what is your division of household labor say?

• 2:22:35Speaker 05

  Like, kid has a birthday. Are you just showing up at the birthday party? Or, did you make planning decisions, you know? Did you make purchase decisions? Did you, did it catch you off guard that it was there? But like, like, there's just, there's just a, uh, an assumption, I think. It's, look, it's obviously better than it's ever been before, but there is like, an assumption that like, that's not, like, the term for this is emotional labor. That's not emotional labor that the father should have to do. Unless they're like, a single parent, or, you know, whatever. Um, and, uh, I'm not saying it came easy, and I'm not saying it came voluntarily.

• 2:23:18Speaker 05

  I'm just saying, like, in my marriage and in my family, my wife and I have tried to not do that. And it's been, like, I've had to learn how to do a bunch of things that I would not,

• 2:23:33Speaker 05

  I would not normally be inclined to do, uh, or be good at. I've had to figure out how to do.

• 2:23:41Shawn Ryan?

  Man, it's, it's just a,

• 2:23:45Shawn Ryan?

  man, it's such a dichotomy, right? I mean, I think about this all the time. I've talked about this several times on the show. I mean, my wife and I have like, this little bitty fucking hunt cabin that's, it is like, looks like you could blow on it and fall over.

• 2:24:03Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:24:04Shawn Ryan?

  You know, it's, it's, it's all one room. You know, the kitchen, the bathroom, it's all one room.

• 2:24:10Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:24:11Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, and, and before my kids were born, we would spend weekends down there and just to, we live out in the, we mean, you see, we live out in the woods. You go down there, you're really out in the woods. And that's the, some of the happiest times I've had with my wife is down there. Zero, there's, there's no cell reception, there's no internet, there's nothing. And, um,

• 2:24:36Shawn Ryan?

  and I keep coming back to this, which I love doing this.

• 2:24:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:24:40Shawn Ryan?

  But I'm happier.

• 2:24:41Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:24:42Shawn Ryan?

  There.

• 2:24:43Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:24:43Shawn Ryan?

  No distractions, I'm in the moment.

• 2:24:45Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 2:24:45Shawn Ryan?

  And, you know, and now, uh, that, that's the, I'm close to being able to just, I could do that. I could get rid, I could sell.

• 2:24:55Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 2:24:56Shawn Ryan?

  The studio, I could do every, I could get rid of all of this, sell it, it'd be totally fine financially, and actually live that life where I'm 100% dedicated to my family.

• 2:25:06Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:25:06Shawn Ryan?

  100% of the time.

• 2:25:08Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:25:09Shawn Ryan?

  And, knowing that I would probably be happier.

• 2:25:13Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:25:13Shawn Ryan?

  I'm 99% sure I would be a happier person. You know, if I, if I put all the, even though I love doing this, you know, put all the world's distractions in, it, it, just away from my life. But I still fucking come back to this.

• 2:25:28Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:25:28Shawn Ryan?

  Because I love it. And, and I also think about, you know, well, would, would it be better? Would it, would it, would it, realistically, would it be better for me to be there 100% of the time for my, for my wife and my two kids? And what kind of example is that setting for my son? Because that's not how society is set up.

• 2:25:48Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think it's, it's an interesting question. Is it better for them?

• 2:25:52Shawn Ryan?

  Is it? It's, it's, it's better for them right now? Is it better for their future?

• 2:25:56Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:25:57Shawn Ryan?

  Because they're, they're, they're going to hit a point where they're gonna have to provide for their family. Uh, it's unattract, I personally think it's unattractive for a woman to, whether, whether he is a wealthy, financially wealthy man or not, a trust fund baby, you know? I don't think, I don't think women, I don't think that's a real attraction.

• 2:26:19Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 2:26:20Shawn Ryan?

  You know, um,

• 2:26:21Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:26:21Shawn Ryan?

  To find it in a partner.

• 2:26:23Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 2:26:23Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and, and so if he doesn't, if he doesn't see me providing for the family and, and doing things that, in my opinion, men should be doing, as the, as the leader of the household, then what, what happens to him when, when he comes of age to find a wife and, and have kids and provide?

• 2:26:44Speaker 05

  Well, don't you also think?

• 2:26:45Shawn Ryan?

  That example, then what is that gonna lead to? And he may not ever find somebody if he doesn't, if he doesn't get that example.

• 2:26:53Speaker 05

  I, I remember a couple of weeks into the pandemic, my wife was like, please never be home this much ever again. You know? Um, and like, obviously, I had to do some work on like, being like, okay, I have, I have to be, I have to become a more stable, like, chill person. Because, this, this is it, this is a, currently operating in a way that's only good in small doses, right? And that wasn't good. At the same time, like, to take the energy and the drives and the competence and the mastery, all the stuff that you have, and be like, I'm gonna put all this at home.

• 2:27:35Speaker 05

  You know, I think that's also how you get fucking stage parents and, um, you know, uh, sports parents, like,

• 2:27:44Shawn Ryan?

  What are stage parents?

• 2:27:45Speaker 05

  I just mean like, the parents that make all facets of their existence their family, right? And then, all of a sudden, you're just channeling that energy.

• 2:27:54Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:55Speaker 05

  At home, like, it's, there's an intensity and a, and a, and a, an energy that has to have a release valve. And I think, work and impact, like, eh, that shouldn't all be on your family. Like, there, there's a, we're, we're meant to go, to go out and do things, and to figure things out. And it's like, so you're just gonna drive him to school and then play golf all day? Like, I'm not sure that's, that's not thriving as a human being either. Or, setting a good example either. So there's a tension. But yeah, I think, one of the things that bothers me, and, and I think we all delude ourselves with it, is we go like, I do this all for my family.

• 2:28:40Speaker 05

  It's like, no, you don't. You stopped needing to do this for your family a long time ago. This is about you. Right? And, um, and, that's not to say it's not about them at all, but like,

• 2:28:56Speaker 05

  you're a billionaire, dude. Like, you're not doing this for anybody. You're doing this because there's never enough for you. And so, um, it can be very easy to take something selfish and make it seem like it's selfless.

• 2:29:11Shawn Ryan?

  Justify it.

• 2:29:12Speaker 05

  Yeah. And so, understanding the tension between those two things. And like, what I've tried, uh, I, I've tried to say and work on a way that I can be really good at what I do, and keep it within some reasonable hours, boundaries, and, and, and systems. Like, I, to me, like, what I'm working on, like, my, I'm not trying to be the, sell the most books in the world, have the most impact in the world, or be the most famous, or any of, I'm trying to be really good at what I do, and be a really good parent. And that, in a way, that's actually a more difficult needle to thread than just being

• 2:29:56Speaker 05

  all in one, or all in the other. And I think it's important that we understand that that's possible to do. Like, the athletes that I admire, or the entrepreneurs that I admire, or the leaders that I admire, are not the maniacs, right? It's the ones who seem to be reasonably well-adjusted human beings also. Right? Like, um, sometimes you read about these, like, this is my daily routine, this is my system, this is how so-and-so prepares in the offseason. And you're like, well, I'm sure that's all really easy to do if you don't fucking see your family.

• 2:30:36Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:30:36Speaker 05

  You know? Like, if you're a piece of shit, that's easier.

• 2:30:39Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:30:40Speaker 05

  Um, it's, it's, can you, can you be in great shape? Can you do what you do? Can you perform at a high level? And do school drop off? Or, um, I don't know. Uh, be involved, and be, be present when you're around, you know, like, um, can, can you, like, that's the challenge for me. Like, it used to be, like, when I was working on a book, I was just an all-consuming thing. I don't just mean the hours, I just mean, like, I couldn't turn it off. And now, I try to judge the success on a book on like, how, how, um, how not disruptive it is.

• 2:31:25Shawn Ryan?

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• 2:32:05Shawn Ryan?

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• 2:32:44Shawn Ryan?

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• 2:33:00Shawn Ryan?

  How do you, I mean, what are your indicators for you that tell you if you're leaning?

• 2:33:05Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:33:06Shawn Ryan?

  Talking to you, I doubt you lean too far into family. It seems like you probably lean too far into work.

• 2:33:12Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 2:33:12Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and so what are, what are your indicators that's, that, that let you know? Is it a, is it a personal guilt? Is it a, is it some of the way your kids are acting or communicating to you? Is it your wife? What is, what is, what are your indicators?

• 2:33:25Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, look, just practically, I try to measure like the stuff that I do or I say yes to. I'm, I measure it in bedtimes, like how many bedtimes am I going to miss for this thing? And like, one is a lot, two is usually too many. Right? So I try to, I try to measure it in bedtimes. So that's like, that's kind of my north star. Like how physically is this taking me away? Yes or no? And that's, that's kind of how I judge like the stuff that comes my way. That being said, that can be a way of fooling yourself, which is like, you're there, but you're not really there. So I try to think about like, hey, how, how is my emotional state, my focus?

• 2:34:05Speaker 05

  Like, am I, am I, am I the reason that this is all dysregulated? Or am I the calming presence? Right? And, and I think too often like I'm, it's like, I came home amped. I came home worked up. I'm stressed, I'm distracted. And you can like, I think you can just feel the energy in the family dynamic. And um, I want to be the solution, not the problem. And I think, I know I'm, I'm not taking care of the things I need to be taken care of. And I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing when I am, I'm the problem.

• 2:34:46Speaker 05

  You know, like, like if the three year old is upset because they're a three year old, great. If the three year old is upset because you snapped at them because you were trying to play with them and check your phone at the same time, you're the problem. And so I, I try to think about that, like, how am I fitting into this system? This, this sort of wavelength as opposed to, I want to make it all about me.

• 2:35:11Shawn Ryan?

  Makes a lot of sense. Makes a lot of sense.

• 2:35:14Speaker 05

  And then you should have a, a spouse and a family dynamic, co-parent, whatever it is for you where they're like, dude, what was that? You know, like, like, I think my wife and I talk a lot about like, like, let's back each other up in the moment, you know? Um, let's not throw each other under the bus in front of the kids, but like afterwards, like, yeah, you can't do that. Like, you know, you can't do that. You saw, you saw when you made that choice, right? It goes both directions, but like, I think if, if um,

• 2:35:46Speaker 05

  if, if you're not making each other better as parents, you're not, you're not doing your job.

• 2:35:52Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah. You know, Steve Rinella's book.

• 2:35:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:35:58Shawn Ryan?

  About outdoor kids and then inside world. I mean, there's so many studies that talk about, you know, the more kids are outside, the, the, I mean, the, the percentage of them having depression decreases dramatically. I mean, less screen time, depression decreases dramatically.

• 2:36:19Shawn Ryan?

  You raising your kids on a farm.

• 2:36:20Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:36:21Shawn Ryan?

  Correct?

• 2:36:22Speaker 05

  My, my son's, my youngest is in first grade. And when he started in August, it was the first time he ever sat at a desk. Cause he went, he did kindergarten and pre-K for several years at an outdoor school. Like they would go, there was no buildings and they did it outside, rain or shine. You know, they ate their lunch around a campfire and they did all the stuff outside.

• 2:36:45Shawn Ryan?

  That's awesome.

• 2:36:46Speaker 05

  And it was incredible.

• 2:36:47Shawn Ryan?

  And that kind of education called?

• 2:36:49Speaker 05

  I think it's just called a, it's like a nature school or an outdoor school. I'm guarantee you there's one around here. Um, and it was incredible. And, you know, um, that, that was a big, big choice for us. And then, um, you know, we like, one of our big things is like, okay, sure. Screens are maybe, maybe better parents than us could exist in a screen, screen free household that we didn't, that ship has sailed. But like, we try to use them to like, how is that an entry point into a world?

• 2:37:26Speaker 05

  That we, we are by nature of where we are financially and the freedom we have, like, we, I can show you that world. Right? Like my, my boys got really into this podcast called Greek out. Um, which is, it's all about the Greek myths. It's amazing. Uh, it's like 10 seasons, listen to every episode multiple times. And so like, we went on a road trip across Greece, going to Rome this year. Like you get, if they get interested in a thing, like, cause they watch a video about it, they hear about it. Like, let's go experience that thing in real life.

• 2:38:03Speaker 05

  Um, so to me, like, one of the most important skills you can have in life is, is first curiosity. But then second, the ability to take that curiosity to its natural conclusion. Right? Like if you're interested in something or you don't know about something, do you have the skills to go figure it out? You know, like there are books about that. There are videos about that. There are podcasts about that. There are places we can go, there are experts about this thing. There's AI, right? Like how, how you, to, to, like, to me, I try to see the screen as an entry point into the enormity of the world.

• 2:38:47Speaker 05

  And then it's like the algorithm is exposing themselves to stuff. And then because they're interested in it, like my job as a parent is to take them down that rabbit hole.

• 2:38:57Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 2:38:58Speaker 05

  And so that's kind of how we think about like learning and doing stuff.

• 2:39:01Shawn Ryan?

  I like that.

• 2:39:02Speaker 05

  Like, oh, we're going on this road trip now, I guess, like, you know, um, or, and I'm, I'm showing them stuff, right? Well, it's like, like I showed my son this like Saturday Night Live video. He thought it was hilarious. And then, you know, um, it's like, oh, you want to take an improv class now? Done, you know? Or, oh, did you actually know like Lorne Michaels papers are at a museum in Austin? Let's go do that. So like that, that idea of like, they have that flicker of interest or um, uh, awareness of something. How do you, how do you take them down that rabbit hole?

• 2:39:43Shawn Ryan?

  So they show interest and you immediately act on it.

• 2:39:46Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. And, and like, it's not heavy handed, but it's like, oh, there's so much more of that, you don't even know. And that's like, that gets me excited, right? Because like, sometimes it's something I know a lot about. And I get to show you all the things that I know about it and that I love about it. And then sometimes it's something I know nothing about and we get to go learn about that together.

• 2:40:07Shawn Ryan?

  Do you introduce things to them as well?

• 2:40:09Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. You're, it's like, you're always like, um, what about this? What about that? And you know, you, you don't have a great hit rate, but when you, when, when it, when it, um, when it lights them up, that's like the best.

• 2:40:23Speaker 05

  Like music, movies. Um, yeah.

• 2:40:28Shawn Ryan?

  Nice. Let's talk, I'm dying to talk about this.

• 2:40:32Speaker 05

  All right. Churchill?

• 2:40:34Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:40:34Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 2:40:39Shawn Ryan?

  I didn't grow up with money.

• 2:40:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:40:42Shawn Ryan?

  Was never around it, you know? And uh, now I find myself making a pretty decent amount.

• 2:40:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:40:50Shawn Ryan?

  And.

• 2:40:55Shawn Ryan?

  I don't know where to look to, you know, how do you raise kids with that? Keep them humble, keep them from being entitled, keep them from idolizing shit.

• 2:41:06Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 2:41:06Shawn Ryan?

  Fucking cars, watches, whatever, you know, the, the.

• 2:41:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:41:10Shawn Ryan?

  Luxury items or, you know. How do you do it?

• 2:41:15Speaker 05

  I don't know, and, and you don't know whether.

• 2:41:17Shawn Ryan?

  You see all these people that have grown up with it and

• 2:41:23Shawn Ryan?

  a lot of times I don't like the way they turn out, you know, I, I don't wish that for my kids, I'll say that.

• 2:41:29Speaker 05

  And you don't know if you're doing a good job until it's like too late.

• 2:41:34Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:41:35Speaker 05

  Yeah, no, I think, I think it's the thing that keeps parents up at night. Um, I remember I was talking to Matthew McConaughey one time and he said, you know, there were a lot of things when he was a kid where it was like, we can't.

• 2:41:49Speaker 05

  But then you find yourself in a position as a parent's very different and it's like, we're not going to, like, we don't do that. That, that chat, like in a way, it's not easier because it's, it's hard to not have enough. But it takes the choice out of things, right? Like.

• 2:42:10Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:42:11Speaker 05

  Um,

• 2:42:14Speaker 05

  you know, and I think, I think that not to idealize the past, but like, there used to be

• 2:42:23Speaker 05

  society was the, the, the

• 2:42:29Speaker 05

  the income inequality was less, like we've never existed with this level of income inequality in this sort of stratified world, right? Where it's like, okay, now it used to be there was first class and uh, economy on an airplane. Now, not only are these different levels on an airplane, but there's like private. And um, the people who are flying private are living in a very different world than the people who are not. And how do you? How do you stay in reality? I think is like the first, the first challenge.

• 2:43:10Speaker 05

  Um, especially as, you know, people get to levels where, you know, it's, it's inconsequential to them, like what this costs or that costs. Um,

• 2:43:25Speaker 05

  you, you have to create some artificial boundaries and rules, I think. Um,

• 2:43:33Speaker 05

  I just, I don't know.

• 2:43:34Shawn Ryan?

  It's fucking tough.

• 2:43:35Speaker 05

  It is.

• 2:43:36Shawn Ryan?

  Because they have to, like, you could starve them from all of that.

• 2:43:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:43:40Shawn Ryan?

  As a parent and you can, you, you can start. But then on the other hand, eventually they're going to be in it. And if they don't know how to act and when they're around it,

• 2:43:53Shawn Ryan?

  then I also think you're doing them a disservice. And so they really need to know how to operate in both worlds. In my, in my opinion. And how do you get them to operate in both worlds without becoming a self entitled, selfish piece of shit? I mean, for lack of a better word.

• 2:44:12Speaker 05

  Look, it's, it's a timeless, uh, it's a timeless challenge. Plutarch, one of the great biographers of antiquity was talking about how parents will spend a lot of time on their will, trying to create an estate. Who's going to manage the estate? Who's going to be the guardians? How much money do they get? You know, spend a lot of time thinking about that and not enough time thinking about, how do I raise a person with enough character? That like, they can handle it, right? Like, instead of being like, oh, we're creating a trust fund and the trust fund gives them this much per year, which is just enough and not too many. It's like, you could also just raise, spend your time trying to raise a child who has good values and a good work ethic and is, doesn't

• 2:44:57Speaker 05

  derive their value from luxury goods, right? Um, so I think it's, it's, it's a, it's a challenge. Certainly, again, nothing close to the challenge of being a single mother on food stamps, trying to raise three kids or whatever, but it, it comes with its own challenges. And um, ultimately, I think we have to model it. And then I think we have to

• 2:45:25Speaker 05

  like, the most valuable gift you can give your kid is not, you know, a, a huge estate. It's like the ability to, uh,

• 2:45:40Speaker 05

  like have the thing that lights them up, like that they like doing, that like they want to spend their life doing. Like Robert Greene, my mentor, he calls this your life's task. What is your life's task? Like, what were you put here to do? And I think our job as parents is to help our kids find that thing, to create an environment where they can find that thing and be supported and loved in pursuing that thing. Um, you know, it's not to make them a doctor or a lawyer or to inherit the family business. It's to find the thing that if they didn't do, not only would they be unhappy, but the world would be worse off for them not doing it.

• 2:46:19Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm. I mean, but I, I want to say something too, just for the audience of internet. I don't want to sound like a couple of fucking elitist.

• 2:46:26Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:46:27Shawn Ryan?

  You know, sitting up here talking about this, but this is, this is because we're not even talking about what we have, what we don't have. We're just, anybody who finds themselves in a position

• 2:46:40Shawn Ryan?

  that they are doing better than, than their parents did, this applies to them. Whether, does that, you know what I mean?

• 2:46:48Speaker 05

  Look, your average American has a, a, a level of choice and privilege that a struggling family, almost anywhere else in the world, is not having to think about. So, so this is privileged, but in a, in a way that we're all privileged and there's just different degrees of it. But yeah, how do you, how do you? How do you raise a kid who is resilient? Who is in like, Stoicism to me is about being in control of yourself, being master of yourself. And that's what we're trying, like, you're trying to raise kids who can go through life. Uh, and, and are not going to be, as we said, don't say ew a lot. Don't throw in the towel a lot. Don't expect other people to solve their problems for them.

• 2:47:31Speaker 05

  Um, how do you raise self sufficient, resilient kids? That's the challenge of our time. And yet, it's also the most timeless challenge. Every parent for all time has had to deal with that in some form or another. And I think, um,

• 2:47:50Speaker 05

  I, I don't think there's one thing you do. I think it's a, it's a, it's a handful of things.

• 2:47:54Shawn Ryan?

  Do you think it's how you act? I mean, the, the, the things that I've learned and my kids are very young. But my oldest is uh, close to five. But, you know, I think, I think it is, I really am starting to think it's

• 2:48:11Shawn Ryan?

  the only thing that really matters is the example that you set for them.

• 2:48:15Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:48:15Shawn Ryan?

  So if you idolize your shit, they're going to idolize their shit. If you get pissed because they fucking scratch your car, break a window, um, whatever, break a vase, well, anything, you know, and you, you overreact and idolize the thing, that's going to be passed on.

• 2:48:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:48:39Shawn Ryan?

  And

• 2:48:41Shawn Ryan?

  same with people, you know, they're, they're going to look to see how you treat people, all people.

• 2:48:47Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:48:47Shawn Ryan?

  Not people you look up to and people that you think that you're above all people. And you know, that they're going to take that in and in

• 2:48:58Shawn Ryan?

  hopefully the, you know, the, the, the financial aspect, it doesn't have any relevance. If you, if you lead by example.

• 2:49:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, like they, they say your kids, uh, kids don't always listen, but they're always watching. And like a way to think about it is like, let's say you never gave them a single piece of advice. Like you never told your kids, do this, don't do that. This is important, that's not important. This is what we believe, these are our values.

• 2:49:27Speaker 05

  What do you think they would deduce about what you think about those things from the life that you lead? Like, like, if you were tried in court, would you be convicted of those beliefs from your actions? I think that's like, you know, I think about this, it's like, okay, so I write about Stoicism. But if, if I didn't, would my kids say that that's what I believe in or care about? Would that, would that be how they would describe me? You know, and that, that, like, that's the message that ultimately matters. Like, what are you? What are you saying with your, your deeds, not your words? And

• 2:50:11Speaker 05

  you say this matters and this doesn't matter. And then, you know, you're, you're, uh,

• 2:50:20Speaker 05

  Your decisions tell a very different story. Um, I like to say like, you know, your calendar doesn't lie.

• 2:50:27Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:50:28Speaker 05

  Um, and neither, neither ultimately does, uh, does your, you know, your sure behavior at home. Mr. President, my company for me of the explosion on our rig on October 2nd.

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• 2:51:36Shawn Ryan?

  Do you ever ask your kids for input? On how you're doing?

• 2:51:41Speaker 05

  Oh, like, what can I do better? Yeah, all the time.

• 2:51:44Shawn Ryan?

  Do you really?

• 2:51:45Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:51:46Shawn Ryan?

  What do they say?

• 2:51:47Speaker 05

  They're usually like, can I, you should give us our iPads more, stuff like that. Um, I, I, I think it's, it's a lot to ask them to be able to, I think when they're, they're older, they're going to be better at, at being able to verbalize like what, um, what they need more of and what they need less of. Um, but, uh, I do try to think like, hey, like, why isn't this working? You know? Uh, I try to, I like, why, if this isn't having the effect that I want it to have, I need to do something differently instead of insisting over and over again that this is how it should go. This is, you know, this is what I think.

• 2:52:30Speaker 05

  But I don't know, it's, it's, it's, it's a constant fucking challenge.

• 2:52:35Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:52:36Speaker 05

  And one of, one of the, um, one of the things, uh, I heard someone say that was helpful to me is like, like, uh, the bad parents aren't thinking about whether they're doing a good job or not. You know, so the fact that it is a challenge and that you are thinking about it and that you're, you know, how are we doing here? What could we do better? I'm worried about this. Like, that's not, that already puts you in, in somewhat elite, uh, company.

• 2:53:08Shawn Ryan?

  You're a better parent by, yeah, you're, you're in the better parent category.

• 2:53:12Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, look, a lot of people have kids, not everyone's a parent.

• 2:53:16Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:53:17Speaker 05

  And the decision to be like, hey, I'm gonna, I'm gonna take this thing seriously. I'm gonna, it's not this side hustle that I have. It's like my main thing. It's the main reason I'm here.

• 2:53:26Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:53:27Speaker 05

  Um, and, uh, I'm going to, I'm gonna work at this like I work at anything else, which means I'm gonna take it seriously, which means I'm gonna ask for advice, which means I'm gonna actually look at how it's going and the results. Um, and then I'm gonna be willing to change and try, try it differently. I'm not just gonna go, well, my parents did it this way, or, well, this feels right to me.

• 2:53:51Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:53:52Speaker 05

  But actually be willing to change and take feedback is, uh, not just change and take feedback, I think, I think also apologize. Like, there are things that 30 years later, my parents apologized for, it would mean a lot to me, right? Like, uh, I don't know about you, but like, if my parents were like, hey, you know what? When you were a teenager, you really clearly needed this and we didn't do that for you. And I bet that was hard. And like, we thought about it more and like, we wish we'd done it differently. I'd be like, oh my God, right? So it's never too late, right? To apologize. How, how quickly can you do it now, though?

• 2:54:35Speaker 05

  Like, like, can I go, hey, like, the next day, hey, I don't know why I picked this fight with you about you wanted to sleep on the floor. It doesn't matter to me. I just love that you still let me put you down. And, uh, picking a fight was not how I wanted it to go, but I did. And, uh, I don't want to do that. I'm sorry. Um, I mean, I don't know about you, but I didn't get apologized too much when I was a kid. Um, and, and, you know, maybe some people think that's weak or soft or, or whatever. To me, I'm trying to get better.

• 2:55:12Shawn Ryan?

  I do it.

• 2:55:13Speaker 05

  I'm not gonna get better if I'm not taking accountability and responsibility for when I don't do it the way that I want to do it.

• 2:55:20Shawn Ryan?

  I do it, especially about the phone.

• 2:55:23Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:55:24Shawn Ryan?

  I feel so fucking guilty. And I keep doing it over and over and over again.

• 2:55:30Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:55:31Shawn Ryan?

  But I probably, you know, I'm like, I do, I just, I have to do it.

• 2:55:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:55:37Shawn Ryan?

  Cause I think that, once again, a lead by example, because it also teaches them like, they need to be able to do that, too.

• 2:55:44Speaker 05

  Or just to see you struggle with, like, you're like, hey, this is a thing I have to use, but I use it way more than I have to. And I want to use it less. So here's where I want to be and here's where I am. And here's your dad trying to get there. Um, to me, that's a, a much more relatable, a much more inspiring, and ultimately much more practical perception of your parents than mom and dad are perfect, their word is law. Like, cause kids know that's not true. They sense the bullshit.

• 2:56:17Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:56:18Speaker 05

  And they resent it. And it undermines, it undermines their connection and their belief in you. And so, yeah, I try to, I try to, to own that shit when I can. And I try to be, I try to be clear about the stuff that I'm working on and the stuff that I'm trying to get better at.

• 2:56:38Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Yeah, you know, I'm doing a, um, I got so much out of my first psychedelics, uh, Iba Gain treatment. I'm doing it again, um, in the, in the, in the foreseeable future. And what I'm really hoping I get out of it is some kind of perspective of what my kids think of me.

• 2:57:02Speaker 05

  Oh, interesting.

• 2:57:03Shawn Ryan?

  I really want to see what I look like through their lens.

• 2:57:06Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:57:07Shawn Ryan?

  And that's probably gonna be a hard thing to see. But, um, yeah, I, uh, I just want, I want to improve and, uh, I, I really want to see that.

• 2:57:21Speaker 05

  I saw this video of, uh, this billionaire and, uh, someone was like, you know, what's it like to have a billion dollars or what's it like to be rich? And he was like, rich isn't having a billion dollars. Rich is having kids who want to come home for the holidays.

• 2:57:36Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:57:37Speaker 05

  I, I think it's, it's, it's really important that you sort of define what success is, right? Like, people go, oh, you only get 18 summers with your kids. And it's like, legally, but like, you meet families and they spend a lot of time together.

• 2:57:54Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:57:55Speaker 05

  And you're like, oh, that's a whole different thing. I didn't know we could do that. You know, I didn't know that was something we could work towards. And so thinking about like, what the goal is. And so the goal is not to have the shoes nicely lined up by the back door. The shoe, the, the goal is not to have, I remember I was talking to someone once, she was, she was in her 90s and she was like, people used to come over and be like, it doesn't look like you have kids. And she was like, I took that as a compliment. And I, I don't, she's like, I don't know how I could have possibly been so wrong. She was like, your house should look like you have kids. You're like, you have kids, why, what are you doing? So like, the goal is to have, is to not have these people for 18 years and then eject

• 2:58:40Speaker 05

  them and go back to your selfish life. Like, you started a family, the goal is to have the family.

• 2:58:45Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:58:46Speaker 05

  In the future. And so remembering that, running the things through the lens of that. And again, it doesn't mean giving them whatever they want, whenever they want it, because that is also at odds with that. I would also say, though, like, if you're a billionaire, you can go visit your kids for the holidays. You know, they don't need to come home. But the point is, they should want, they should want to come home, right? Like, like, you should, the success here is, uh, that, that when the authority ends, the relationship is still there.

• 2:59:20Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:59:21Speaker 05

  And I think, uh, people lose sight of that.

• 2:59:24Shawn Ryan?

  I've never heard it like that. That's really good. Let's talk about speed reading.

• 2:59:33Speaker 05

  Ooh. Speed reading is a scam.

• 2:59:36Shawn Ryan?

  Well, how do I read faster?

• 2:59:38Speaker 05

  I don't know. It's, I think it's illustrative that that's what you want to do. You're not like, how, how do I eat food faster? Is there a way to have sex faster? Like, the point is, stuff that's good, you want it, you want it to take how long it's supposed to take. So I don't know why we want to read faster. Like, if the question is, how do I read more? I got lots of answers to that question.

• 3:00:02Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 3:00:03Speaker 05

  But I don't think we should try to read faster, right? Like, I would say, I read at a medium speed. I just spend a lot of time reading. And I spend a lot of time reading because it's worth doing, it's enjoyable to do, and also it's magic. The founder, the founding of Stoicism has a story about this. Um, Zeno, founder of Stoicism, he visits the oracle at Delphi, uh, the famous oracle, and, and he asks what the secret to the good life is. And he's told that, um, wisdom comes when we begin to have conversations with the dead. And it's only later at a bookstore that he realizes that, that that's what books are. It's a way to talk to people who are dead.

• 3:00:45Speaker 05

  Um, that we can converse with Marcus Rilis through meditations, that we can read the speeches of Churchill, that we can read, you know, the poems of Emily Dickinson, that, uh, you know, we can read great novels, the campaigns of the greats. Um,

• 3:01:10Speaker 05

  It's magic. It's fucking time travel. Like, here is someone who's no longer with us,

• 3:01:17Speaker 05

  transporting us to them, them to us, breaking down, you know, there's a, there's a famous poem that says, uh, you know, uh, books are door shaped. Like they're, they're portals to another world. And, and so anyways, the, the point is, reading is spectacular. Like, like for $15 or $20 or fucking free at the library that you can have access to the brain of Julius Caesar or Napoleon, you know, you can read from Stockdale, you can read from Marcus Aurelius, you can read from Epictetus, you can read from Frederick Douglass, you can read from Abraham Lincoln, you know,

• 3:01:57Speaker 05

  this is incredible. Like, like the, the amount of wisdom and hard-won experience inside the pages of the book is an incredible thing. And like, most people are like, nah, I'd like to, I'd like to learn by trial and error. Or they're like, eh, I don't know. A lot of good stuff on Instagram too. Uh, right? Like it's, it's ridiculous.

• 3:02:20Speaker 05

  Tolstoy talked about like,

• 3:02:23Speaker 05

  you can, you can

• 3:02:27Speaker 05

  converse with the wisest people who ever lived and, and you choose not to. So I think first and foremost, understanding what reading allows you to do makes the ROI of it much clearer. Is it also entertaining and fun and relaxing? Sure. But it's an incredible thing that we have contained in these pages.

• 3:02:49Speaker 05

  The other thing is, is, um, like you gotta make time for it. Like there's no, there's no shortcut. Like you gotta do it. You gotta make time for it. And if I looked at your screen time app, I promise you I could find the time, you know, like you have the time, you're just not spending it. And this is for all of us. Like I could read more. I just get distracted by things. And so one of the reasons I like carry a physical book with me everywhere is like, when I sit down, cause I'm a little early or someone's late, or I have a few minutes between here or there, like, I want to read a book. I don't want to go into social media. I don't want to go into work. Like I want to read.

• 3:03:27Speaker 05

  And I see that as part of my job. Like it's, it's crazy. Like some of my best ideas, some of the biggest successes I've had as an entrepreneur, but also as an employee, came from things I read in books. But for some reason, if someone had come into my office and I was sitting in a chair like this reading, they'd be like, I don't pay you to do this. Yet if I was sitting at my computer monitor, checking ESPN, they'd have no idea. And so, so it's, it's, I think we, we need to do a better job understanding that reading is not just work, like has a work benefit, but it's like some of the best, single best way you could spend your time. And, uh, I don't know. That's my case for reading.

• 3:04:09Shawn Ryan?

  Right on, man. Well, Ryan, I know you got a flight to catch, but this was

• 3:04:16Shawn Ryan?

  this was an awesome conversation. I'd love to have you back at some point. We

• 3:04:19Speaker 05

  I'd be honored.

• 3:04:19Shawn Ryan?

  We do have a hot question. I almost forgot. One last thing, hot question.

• 3:04:26Shawn Ryan?

  Audie Murphy tried to enlist in the Marines at 17. They rejected him for being too small. The paratroopers rejected him too. He finally got into the army by gaining weight before the physical, five, five, 112 pounds. He went on to win every US combat decoration for valor, including the Medal of Honor. 28 medals total, the most decorated American soldier in history. He came home, became a movie star and was haunted by PTSD for the rest of his life. Slept with a loaded pistol under his pillow, got addicted to sleeping pills, locked himself in a hotel room and kicked a cold turkey. And then he did something nobody at his level was doing in the 1960s.

• 3:05:11Shawn Ryan?

  He went public, talked openly about combat trauma, demanded the VA take it seriously, died in a plane crash at age 45. Here's the question. Tell me about Audie Murphy. What does the smallest, quietest guy in the room, becoming the most decorated soldier in American history? Tell us about what real toughness actually looks like.

• 3:05:35Speaker 05

  Well, they told us quite a bit about Audie Murphy right there. Just an incredible human being, an incredible American. Uh, he has a memoir called To Hell and Back, which, uh, I should have brought you because it's an amazing book, one of the great memoirs of the 20th century. I'll tell you one little story about Audie Murphy that all those accomplishments are incredibly impressive. One of the ones he doesn't get enough credit for, that I think in, in a, in a way is, it's not harder, but it's rare is, um, so he becomes a movie star, country musician, right? And, um, he's asked to do a bunch of endorsements and, uh, he turns down all drug,

• 3:06:14Speaker 05

  uh, sorry, all cigarette and alcohol endorsements because he doesn't want to model that for kids. And so like, I just, I just think like, he did a lot of feats of discipline and a lot of feats of courage. Saying no to money is a thing that a lot of brave and powerful people have found it hard to do. And, uh, I just, I, I, in a way that's like, there's physical courage and then there's moral courage. And the moral courage to say, hey, I'm not going to do that. This doesn't feel right to me is courage that we don't celebrate enough. We don't, we don't give out medals for that kind of courage.

• 3:06:53Speaker 05

  And then the courage to speak out and to, to speak honestly about what you're struggling with, like vulnerability, like, hey, I'm not okay. Hey, even though I've capable of all these things, this thing is kicking my ass. I'm struggling with this thing. Again, that's another form of courage that, that we don't, we don't celebrate enough and we don't hold up enough.

• 3:07:18Speaker 05

  And, and it's, it's, uh,

• 3:07:25Speaker 05

  and we wonder why it's, you know, we wonder why it's rare and, and, um,

• 3:07:32Speaker 05

  it, it, uh, it moves me just, just as much. He's an incredible person and, uh, you, you read some of those Medal of Honor citations for those guys and you're just, it's just absolutely

• 3:07:49Speaker 05

  unreal, right?

• 3:07:49Shawn Ryan?

  Yep. Yep. There's a follow-up here. I think you're gonna like this. What does this story say to every influencer right now selling alpha males, alpha male stoicism?

• 3:08:03Speaker 05

  Yeah. Uh,

• 3:08:06Speaker 05

  I, uh,

• 3:08:09Speaker 05

  Andrew Tate is a fucking abuser of women, a shitty person,

• 3:08:18Speaker 05

  a sex trafficker. And the idea that like, that's who you should be taking life advice from is insane, right? Like stoicism is not a recipe for making you a better sociopath. It is not, um, this pick and choose thing where you take a couple, motivational quotes and then, you know, you put it up next to a AI generation, AI generated, picture of Marcus Aurelius with a 12 pack. And you're like, I get it. Right? It's a, it's a philosophy and it's a philosophy built around virtue. And the, the, the four virtues of stoicism, courage, essential, discipline, essential, wisdom, essential.

• 3:09:00Speaker 05

  But the fourth is justice. That's ethics. That's the standards you hold yourself to. That's your contribution to society, to the world. And, um, you, none of the other virtues are of any worth, if not

• 3:09:19Speaker 05

  balanced out by, or in fact directed at justice, right? Like, um,

• 3:09:28Speaker 05

  courage on the battlefield, sure, very impressive. But what if you're fighting a horrible war? Like I was in, stayed in Franklin, uh, and, you know, walked past the Confederate statue. And, uh, you know, it says, uh, there have never been braver men or a cause more honorable. It's like, I can think of quite a few causes more honorable. Like other than Nazism, it was literally the worst cause. Like literally the worst cause to ever go to war for. Now it's complicated and a lot of the men were drafted. Most of them didn't own slaves. They were told a bunch of lies by the slave powers, but let's not lie to ourselves about what that heroism was used for.

• 3:10:13Speaker 05

  And what, what it would have looked like had it triumphed. Like the world would have been a worse place. Like they, they're, in fact, their virtue, that military valor was weaponized and spent in the wrong way it, for the wrong cause, right? And so there's not like, that's, that's ultimately what philosophy is designed to help us wrestle with. It's like, what's right and wrong? What do we owe other people? Are we making the world a better or a worse place? And, uh, look, if, if the ideas of masculinity and toughness and resilience, if that's what, if that's what initially attracts you to stoicism,

• 3:10:57Speaker 05

  awesome, right? You just, you just can't stop there. And I think probably you see this in your line of work, like the recruiting posters is what gets the people in the door, right? But ultimately you gotta buy into the values and the cause larger than yourself. And that it, if that's not you, that's actually like, like the most dangerous person because,

• 3:11:28Speaker 05

  like the violence and the power and the strength, all that stuff is like, it's dangerous. If, if not, if not moderated by and controlled by this ethical compass.

• 3:11:45Shawn Ryan?

  It can become very addictive.

• 3:11:47Speaker 05

  Yeah. Yeah. That's a good question. Uh, everyone should read, uh, To Hell and Back by Audie Murphy. Just like an incredible, an incredible book.

• 3:11:57Shawn Ryan?

  Right on.

• 3:11:58Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 3:11:58Shawn Ryan?

  Well, Ryan.

• 3:11:59Speaker 05

  Dude, thank you.

• 3:12:01Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you, man. This was awesome. This was awesome. I really appreciate you coming. Had a great time. I hope you come back.

• 3:12:08Speaker 05

  Yeah. Sweet.

• 3:12:22Shawn Ryan?

  No matter where you're watching the Sean Ryan Show from, if you get anything out of this at all, anything, please like, comment and subscribe. And most importantly, share this everywhere you possibly can. And if you're feeling extra generous, head to Apple Podcasts and Spotify and leave us a review.