Ryan Holiday - A Stoic Life & Death

We can’t control what happens to us, but we can control how we respond. At least, that’s what the Stoic’s say. 💌Join 7,500+ people getting our takeaways and favourite moments from this episode in our weekly newsletter - http://bit.ly/45NyQDy Today we are joined (deep breath Hugh) by Stoic philosopher Ryan Holiday. Using the wisdom of the past to appreciate the present, Ryan’s work is dedicated to communicating how the practicalities of stoic philosophy can help us lead more present, mindful and resilient lives today. In this incredible chat, Hugh, Josh and Ryan (our Ryan), each present Ryan Holiday with something they have been struggling with in their own lives. Through the lens of Stoic philosophers Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Epictetus, Ryan Holiday talks to how stoicism can really help us to live into our values, prioritise presence, and deal with existential dread. We discuss with Ryan the importance of understanding what will actually make you happy (spoiler: it’s not a billion dollars), and how to reframe death as a reminder that we must appreciate every moment (or not waste anymore with shame and guilt). This episode, and its practical take-aways (which you can find listed in our newsletter), has been a long time coming. Ryan, what an absolute honour. 0:00 – What is Stoicism? 13:26 – For the Josh’s of the world 17:07 – Time and Energy of Worrying 27:01 – The illusion of freedom 33:50 – Am I a bad friend? 38:58 – Practicing what you preach ft. presence 45:42 – If today was your last day 50:22 – 5 quotes for a Stoic life If you’d like to watch this full episode on YouTube, follow this link - 🫖 Imperfects episodes mentioned in this episode Pat Cummins - Love, Loss & Life - https://bit.ly/4dHKR2F Maria Ruberto - Sleep Your Way To Your Top - https://bit.ly/4dHKPYB 📖 Things to read Letter’s from a Stoic by Seneca - https://bit.ly/49WVNqB ALL of Ryan’s books - https://bit.ly/43uHsxZ ✍️Journals to journal The Daily Stoic - https://bit.ly/49qJ6Em My Imperfect Life - https://bit.ly/4tZ8qJ6 🎟️ Things to get tickets to Daily Stoic Live with Ryan Holiday - https://bit.ly/4uK72Lt 💻Things to check out Ryan’s website - https://bit.ly/4v3Vh24 The Resilience Project - https://bit.ly/3Q4LOc4 🩷To host your own Vulnerabilitea House, purchase here - http://bit.ly/4lyuuWz 🩵To purchase our journal (or your novel) My Imperfect Life, click here - http://bit.ly/4lyuuW 🩵To join our subscriber community, A Little More Imperfects, follow this link - http://bit.ly/4mqunxu 🩷 AND you can subscribe to A Little More Imperfects through Apple Podcasts too, here - http://apple.co/theimperfects The Imperfects is not a licensed mental health service and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice, treatment or assessment. The advice given in this episode is general in nature, but if you’re struggling, please see a healthcare professional, or call lifeline on 13 11 14. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Before we get into the show, you may have heard that the Imperfects are going back on the road for one night only.

• 0:06Speaker 01

  It's our first ever A Little More Imperfects Live, which is our subscriber show. And guess who's gonna be there?

• 0:12Speaker 00

  Schwarzenegger.

• 0:14Speaker 01

  Better.

• 0:15Speaker 00

  Yeah?

• 0:15Speaker 01

  Dr Emily.

• 0:16Speaker 00

  Dr Emily, live, answering our questions, your questions.

• 0:21Speaker 01

  And where is it, Hugh?

• 0:22Speaker 02

  The Bourne Cinema.

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  Oh, God.

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  So the event's on August 19th. Tickets will go on sale on June 8th for subscribers only, but if you're a subscriber, you can also enter a very special competition.

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• 1:07Speaker 01

  And winners will also get a night at a lovely hotel near the Bourne Cinema. So anyone from Australia and New Zealand could win that.

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  Yep.

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  As long as they're a subscriber.

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  And just a heads up, I will be taking my job extremely seriously because it's a very serious job.

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• 1:19Speaker 01

  So to enter the competition, go to the show notes on the Patreon episode, or if you're an Apple Podcast subscriber, you'll see the show notes in the latest subscriber only, A Little More Imperfects show. And you'll need a code word. And how do they get the code word?

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• 1:47Speaker 00

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• 2:02Speaker 03

  Stoicism is this idea that we don't control what happens, we control how we respond to what happens. The idea for the Stoics is that, you know, we should always try to respond with virtue.

• 2:12Speaker 02

  In 2014, Ryan published The Obstacle is the Way, his first exploration into Stoic philosophy. Since then, Ryan has published more books on Stoicism. Ryan has spent his life searching for wisdom in the words of others, and in doing so, has quietly helped millions of people feel less lost on their own.

• 2:28Speaker 03

  When you're dealing with a jerk, that's an opportunity, right? Like, they don't only cause problems, they are also presenting you a chance, you know, to be patient, to be considerate, to be creative. That's kind of the mentality of the Stoics. Again, you don't control so much of the interactions that we have in life. Those are the kinds of things the Stoics want us to focus on. It's wrong to think of death as something that happens at the end of your life. Death is behind us. Every minute that passes is dead to you. How do you spend your time accordingly? If you know, hey, I'm paying for this with a day of my life. Often, the things that we chase, that we think are going to make us happy, have the exact opposite effect. This is something we

• 3:12Speaker 03

  see happening in the US right now, where you have these like tech billionaires who have to stay on the administration's good side. You would like to think like, hey, if I ever had $100 billion, no one could tell me what to do. No, actually, I'd have to go to the fucking Melania premiere.

• 3:31Speaker 00

  No spoilers, please, Ryan. I haven't seen them in a while.

• 3:39Speaker 02

  So we are about to chat to Ryan Holiday, who is just, I can't believe this is happening.

• 3:44Speaker 00

  I can't believe it either. It feels like, like we get to speak to lots of interesting people, but this is someone who is, has really affected, well, at least, definitely your life in a huge way. Mine in a, in a, in a way. Josh couldn't give a shit. No, no, but it is. He's one of the, he's one of the big wigs.

• 4:03Speaker 02

  He's huge. And so we chat to him in a second, but after we have that conversation, we're going to come back and we don't often do this after academies, but I've just got a little quick reflection I want to share with people around, we'll be talking about Stoicism and I'm going to chat about five Stoic quotes that have had a huge impact on my life, especially through some of the challenging stuff we've been through as a family with neurodiverse parenting and then my burnout last year and unexpected diagnoses along the way. The stuff that Ryan, and I can't wait to tell him this in a second, but the stuff that I've discovered that he has looked into has been life changing for me.

• 4:45Speaker 00

  Let's transition to Ryan Holiday. This is so exciting, very, very exciting. Many people will recognize the name of the man that we have on today. So we want to get straight into it. So please get so excited for the man himself, Marcus Aurelius. It's an absolute pleasure, absolute pleasure to have you here.

• 5:09Speaker 03

  He's actually, he is here behind me.

• 5:11Speaker 00

  He is.

• 5:12Speaker 02

  For those of you who are listening and you're not watching, there is a Marcus Aurelius's head is on a shelf behind, behind Ryan Holiday. So that's what's happening now.

• 5:22Speaker 00

  Well, a statue of the head.

• 5:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, sorry.

• 5:26Speaker 00

  I mean, we know you're a collector, Ryan, but not to that extent.

• 5:29Speaker 03

  Exactly.

• 5:31Speaker 02

  Ryan, we're so thrilled to have you with us here today. I'm going to read a bio on you in a second, but before we do that, I just want to, I just want to show you something. Are you, do you know much about our national sport cricket?

• 5:44Speaker 03

  I know a little bit about cricket and then I did see a video once of somebody reading one of my books, like during the middle of a cricket match, which like, like some, some athlete was, what other sport can you read during the middle of it? I guess it's only cricket, but.

• 6:03Speaker 00

  It's a great tool for writing.

• 6:06Speaker 03

  Yeah. But some star cricket player was seeing, like sitting on the bench, reading, reading my book on stillness, which I thought was hilarious.

• 6:15Speaker 02

  Well, I just want to show you something very quickly. So, well, I've got a photo here of someone. It is Pat Cummins, who's the captain of the Australian cricket team. I don't know if you can see that there, but.

• 6:26Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. Do we look alike?

• 6:29Speaker 02

  Yes. I mean, well, two things. The answer is yes. And the second thing to say is he might be the most handsome man I've ever met in the flesh. So just, just.

• 6:38Speaker 03

  I'll take the compliment. Sure.

• 6:40Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, I feel like you should know that. There he is.

• 6:43Speaker 03

  I'd love to find out that I have relatives in Australia because when it all goes to shit in America, that's, that's sort of where I'd like to end up. So it would be good, it'd be good to have somebody I'm related to there.

• 6:55Speaker 00

  Well, there is, and he's, he's, he's got really nice houses, I'm sure. So he's probably got lots of room for you.

• 7:03Speaker 02

  Well, it could actually work. When everything goes to shit in America, it might be, I mean, you're coming to Australia in October and New Zealand in October to do some live shows. So maybe you might stay or maybe might be, you might be coming out before then, the way things are going.

• 7:16Speaker 03

  Yeah, that, that's when I was planning on declaring asylum when I, when I get there in October before the shows.

• 7:24Speaker 02

  Well, for those of you who don't know, Ryan, I'll just, I'll just give a quick bio for you here. Ryan Holiday uses the past to help us appreciate the present. Dropping out of college at 19 to become an apprentice under prolific American author, Robert Greene, Ryan began to grow his knowledge of the intersection between power, psychology and strategy. Ryan worked as a director of marketing at American Apparel before founding his own marketing agency, Brass Check, which advised clients such as Google, Neil Strauss and Tim Ferriss. Ryan has published 12 bestselling books, which have collectively sold over, I have seen so many different accounts of this, Ryan, but I'm going to go with 3 million here. I read 10 million somewhere, I read 14 million somewhere else, but.

• 8:06Speaker 03

  You decided to round down to the lowest number?

• 8:09Speaker 01

  Oh, nice.

• 8:12Speaker 02

  Well, I went with the one that I saw most often, which was three million. But there are so many different accounts out there, but let's just say lots. In 2014, Ryan published The Obstacle is the Way, his first exploration into Stoic philosophy. Since then, Ryan has published more books on Stoicism, including the very popular Ego is the Enemy, The Daily Stoic and Stillness is the Key. Ryan also hosts the podcast The Daily Stoic as well as creating videos for his 2 million subscribers on YouTube. Ryan has spent his life searching for wisdom in the words of others and in doing so has quietly helped millions of people feel less lost on their own. And for a lot of people, that hasn't just been helpful, it's been deeply and quietly life changing. I am one of those people, Ryan, just background for you, my life has been researching and working in resilience.

• 8:56Speaker 02

  I run a resilience program in schools, which is quite big here in Australia. But when things got quite difficult for me in my life, which our audience know about, I've been through a little bit of life. I found you and I found your stuff and I discovered Stoicism and it was absolutely life changing to me. I did your, I've got it here, The Daily Stoic Journal. I pretty much, I pretty much filled it out every day for the whole 366 days. Huge for me. I think what would be really helpful for people to start, just in case they're not on this journey and, and, and I'm sure they've probably heard the word Stoic before. Before I discovered you and Stoicism, if someone said Stoic, I would have thought of Josh and my grandpa,

• 9:39Speaker 02

  who was a man who really just kind of.

• 9:44Speaker 01

  Never showed an emotion externally.

• 9:46Speaker 02

  He never showed emotion externally. He, I'm sure, yeah, I'm sure he'd been through a lot, but his response was just to never talk about it, to never be vulnerable ever and just continue on sort of with minimal warmth. And actually I will stop there because he doesn't come across too well. But that was my sort of thought on what being Stoic was. Before we get into this conversation, which I can't wait for, could you give a quick overview of what Stoicism really is?

• 10:19Speaker 03

  Well, it's not that, right? We sort of call, we tend to call that lowercase stoicism, right? That's having no emotions, sort of being invulnerable, stuffing it down, you know, maybe keep calm, carry on, that kind of thing. Not that being in command of your emotions isn't part of stoicism, but, but as an ancient philosophy which dates back almost 2,500 years, it's, it's something quite, quite more than that. I sometimes define it as, stoicism is this idea that we don't control what happens, we control how we respond to what happens. And the idea for the stoics is that, you know, we should always try to respond with virtue. That isn't to say that we, we respond impassively in all moments.

• 11:04Speaker 03

  I think it's saying that we try to respond to the best of our ability, you know, with positively, productively, resiliently, all, all these things that we sort of celebrate as, as being part of the toolkit of, you know, a person who's got life under control. But what it's not is just unfeeling and unmoved and disinterested and resigned. That's what the word stoic sometimes means in the English language, but, but that's sort of a perversion of what this philosophy that, that, that dates back all the way to the days of ancient Greece is, is actually about.

• 11:40Speaker 02

  And so who are the key stoics? Who are the, who are the, who are the best ones?

• 11:47Speaker 03

  The, the, the big, the big three that we call them are Marcus really is the emperor of Rome. Then we have Epictetus, who's a slave in, in Rome, roughly a generation before Marcus. So in these two, you have sort of incredible power and incredible powerlessness. Epictetus being the favorite philosopher of Marcus really is. And then kind of in between, we have another famous stoic, probably the best writer and the most. Sort of prolific of the Stoics, which is this guy named Seneca, who lives in the time of Nero, about a, you know, 100 plus years before the two of them.

• 12:30Speaker 03

  And he's a famous playwright and a political power broker and investor, just sort of one of Rome's sort of leading intellectuals and thinkers. And so these three are sort of the best known Stoics. And they're, they're kind of the only ones whose complete works or a chunk of their complete works survive to us.

• 12:55Speaker 00

  What drew you to Stoicism and the Stoics? Like, what was there something that happened in your life or a shift that happened that woke you up to it?

• 13:05Speaker 03

  There wasn't like some crisis or, you know, major setback, although that tends to be where a lot of people find Stoicism. I was going through something much more normal and yet I think destabilizing and disorienting for, for people, you know, in time immemorial. I was, you know, 18, 19 years old and I'd just gone away to college and I was just trying to figure out life. I felt like I had a, a real absence of role models and guidance. I just didn't know, you know, who I was, what I wanted to do, where I wanted to go. And to be introduced, Marx realist was the first Stoic that I read. You know, to read the private thoughts of the most powerful man in the world from almost

• 13:50Speaker 03

  20 centuries ago, as this sort of looking at the self-talk of somebody who's really working on themselves, I just found incredibly inspiring and eye-opening. I just didn't know that's what philosophy was. Like, if you'd asked me to say what philosophy was, I would say it was, you know, impractical and theoretical that it, it didn't, it might be fun for a, a class in university, but, but it couldn't actually help me like. Be a person that I wanted to be. It couldn't help me navigate life. And then when you read the Stoics, you go, oh, this is what philosophy is. It's not these complicated questions or, you know, impossible riddles.

• 14:31Speaker 03

  It's, it's really sort of wrestling with the day to day realities of life, which is like so much is outside of our control. Other people, world events, you know, when we were born, what our parents are like, you know, what's going on in the economy? All these things are outside of our control. And, and here you have even an emperor trying to make sense of that reality and navigate it. I just found that incredibly fascinating and helpful.

• 15:01Speaker 00

  Yeah. Well, then, I mean, it obviously became helpful to so many more people. I remember when I first got told about obstacle is the way, which was one of your books. It was, it was just a phrase that I just said over and I was always saying it. Whenever anything bad happened, I would just say obstacle is the way. Almost like use as an excuse. Obstacle is the way. But it was very genuinely helpful. Yeah.

• 15:26Speaker 03

  Well, it's, it's funny that, that quote, uh, obviously I built that book around sort of what the Stoics had to say about obstacles, difficulties, problems, adversity, and sort of their, their framework for, for turning that around. But the, the funny thing is, um, what Marcus Lewis is talking about specifically in that passage is he's, he's just talking about like annoying and obnoxious and difficult people. He's saying that like, like when you're dealing with a jerk or an asshole, that's an opportunity, right? Like you are being challenged by the frustrating or difficult or dishonest nature of this person. And he's saying they don't only cause problems. They are also presenting you a chance, you know, to be patient, to be considerate,

• 16:10Speaker 03

  to be creative, forgiving, uh, to, to, to, to problem solve. And so that's kind of the mentality of the Stoics. Again, you don't control that this person is yelling at you. You don't control that that person just stole from you. You don't control that this person is incompetent. And you don't control so much of the interactions that we have in life. But you, we do control, you know, whether we let that upset us, we control whether we let that make us angry. We control whether we let that make us give up on other people, whether we make it, we let it make us bitter. Those are the kinds of things the Stoics want us to focus on.

• 16:49Speaker 00

  Brilliant.

• 16:50Speaker 01

  I, I think I'm, of the three of us, I think I'm by far the newest to this, to Stoicism. And I think I

• 16:58Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 16:58Speaker 01

  am guilty of, to my own detriment, of ignoring or not going down the path of looking into this area. Because I have been, I've spent a lot of my life, I've, I've had many struggles throughout my life. But I'm also a person that is, I think, inherently incredibly emotional. Like I cry very easily.

• 17:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 17:20Speaker 01

  I engage with the world in a very sort of emotive way. And I, I think I believed the wrong press for way too long. That like, I don't know if, if a philosophy that is going to be like, just, you know, to, to use a pretty bad phrase, kind of man up about the world is going to be for me.

• 17:39Speaker 03

  You know, it's funny, like, so you were talking about, was it your father or your grandfather earlier?

• 17:43Speaker 01

  Grandfather, yeah.

• 17:44Speaker 03

  Yeah. So it's like, when you have someone that's sort of naturally contained and circumspect and sort of doesn't like to get emotional, doesn't let things bother them. You know, that's probably not a person that you would go, hey, let me tell you about this Stoicism thing. You really, you really gotta ratchet it down another couple notches, right? It's, I, I, I actually think like, it's when we wear our hearts, for people who do wear their hearts on their sleeves or, or who, who do get frustrated easily, or, or maybe are sort of very, very creative and open and vulnerable. Like, you kind of need it because that's something you're not sort of naturally inclined to.

• 18:27Speaker 03

  My, my wife likes to joke that, that one of us is Stoic and the other writes about Stoicism.

• 18:34Speaker 03

  I write and think a lot about it because it's not, I do tend to get bothered by things or I take things personally or I get upset or I get really excited. And so that's not to say I'm trying to to sort of crush that within me. I just know that when I look back at, you know, scrapes I got into or, you know, foolhardy things that I participated in or, you know, times I was really hurt. Like, I brought a lot of that to the table and I could have used a little bit more reflection, a little bit more self-control. I could have used it maybe a slightly better pause there. And so, you know, I think Stoicism is something that some people kind of intuitively have.

• 19:17Speaker 03

  And then for the rest of us, it's something we we sort of need to work on. And, you know, different times, different societies kind of are more in line with the ideas than others. But I would also say, you know, in a time that is sort of very driven by social media, that's very interconnected, that's very sort of follow your passion, follow your dreams, do what feels good. You know, this is a kind of actually where we need these ideas because, you know, culturally, you know, every image you're seeing in the media, every, you know, every part of you that's being stimulated is designed to kind of make you not those things.

• 20:00Speaker 02

  What we thought we would do today is the three of us have thought about an issue or something we're struggling with in our own lives. We'd love to share that with you and just get your thoughts from a Stoic point of view and how and how maybe Marcus and his mates would have, you know, would respond to the issues we had if we were able to take them to them. I don't know, Josh, if you want to go first, maybe?

• 20:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, yeah, all right. I'll start with something small. So you sort of alluded, there's been a bit of alluding to it today already, but I find myself. Really struggling with the reality. This is broad, big stuff actually, but the, the reality of the world. There, there's so much to be.

• 20:54Speaker 03

  Go.

• 20:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's more. I'll extrapolate more. I, on a day to day basis, I, I get by pretty well. I've got two kids. I love them. I've got a wonderful wife and things are good. But I find that if I open myself up to the reality of the compounding existential threats in the world. So global warming, uh, nuclear annihilation, um, AI. And I, I, I don't want to be, I, I find myself thinking, am I getting sort of drawn into the sort of moral panic that comes along with any new technology with AI? Or is this genuinely a threat? And I feel like if I'm not, I haven't slept perfectly.

• 21:35Speaker 01

  If I haven't eaten well, if I, if I, if anything has pushed up against my day, that's made my mental capacity a little under. And I look at this stuff, I'm bogged down and overwhelmed. And overcome with, uh, dread. And then that pulls me out of my life, um, and the life that I want to live. Unable to be the dad I want to be. I'm unable to be the partner I want to be. And I think most permanently for me, I think the thing I, um, feel most precious about in the world is time.

• 22:10Speaker 01

  And I feel like I'm wasting it.

• 22:14Speaker 03

  Yeah. I mean, look, if you're worried about what's happening in the world, I guess as an American, I'm obligated to say sorry because we're responsible for like half of it right now. And, uh, when I, when I was in Australia last, I guess this was like maybe 18, 19 months ago. One of the, one of the interesting things was like, it was so, it was so different to be in another country and watch your guys' news. Because like, unfortunately, a lot of it still was American news. It's like inescapable. It was sort of run up to the 2024 election here, but. But it was, you know, from the distance of a different country thousands of miles away, it did feel less like hair on fire. And I think it's, it's just a reminder that like,

• 22:59Speaker 03

  sort of, the inputs often determine sort of how we feel and think about these things, right? And if you're sort of mainlining disaster porn and, you know, sort of worrisome horrible information all the time, like, the human brain is just not designed for that. Like, I think about, so Marx realized he's the most powerful man in the world. And basically, everything that could go wrong goes wrong during his reign. There's a famine, there's floods, there's a plague, there's wars, there's a coup. It's like terrible stuff all the time. But he probably got less bad news over the course of his reign than like we get in a week or a month. Just because like, you know, he gets like a scroll with like some information

• 23:43Speaker 03

  on it. Meanwhile, this is like mainlining it directly into our brain, you know? It's just not, it's just not, our information diets are just as unhealthy, if not more unhealthy, than most people's like, actual diet in the modern world, right? Like, if there's, if there's, you know, sort of literal obesity, there's also kind of informational obesity, and then there's also like, sort of anxiety, obesity, like, you're just consuming information that's just impossibly bad and designed to sort of put you in that catatonic state, because then you'll keep watching, right? Like, you'll, you'll, you'll, you'll refresh

• 24:25Speaker 03

  it again, and you'll check it again. So this isn't to say that, that we don't have an obligation to be informed, and we shouldn't know, you know, the broad strokes of what's happening in the world. But I try to remind people, like, unless you're like, working for a hedge fund, or you are literally working in, you know, The highest levels of government, you probably do not need to follow things as closely as you are. Like, I always, you were saying you're worried about AI. Like, I would ask, like, you know, so how's that worrying helped the global AI situation so far? Like, you feel like it's making a difference, you know? Are they like, oh, well, with those three guys in Australia, they're putting a lot of brain power on it, too. And, you know, we can feel

• 25:08Speaker 03

  it's making a difference. Like, I, we tend to monitor situations in real time as a kind of substitute for action, as a, as a, as a sort of, I don't know, like, like a junkie, basically, of just getting our fix. And I try to remind myself, like, from my study of history, that there's not a single time in human history when existential dread was not a pretty pervasive emotion. And obviously, we wouldn't be here if, if that had come true. But, but that the, the feeling of the existential dread, like, okay, nuclear annihilation is a, like, I would say that we are probably closer right now to nuclear

• 25:50Speaker 03

  war than we have been in a very long time. Again, largely because of America's totally incompetent and, you know, irrational leadership. But unless, unless I'm going to channel this energy into building a bunker in my backyard, like, me thinking about it is not really doing anything.

• 26:12Speaker 01

  What do, do the Stoics have, I'm sure they do, insight into why it's more alluring to worry than to act?

• 26:22Speaker 03

  Yeah. I mean, the, the worry kind of puffs you up, right? The worry is like, well, I'm the center of the universe, and obviously, this affects me. And obviously, I have a better version of how this should go, blah, blah, blah. And then the doing, the doing it, you know, hey, I'm going to vote. Hey, I'm going to donate to this campaign. Hey, I'm going to go to this protest. In that, we're, we're sort of reminded of how little impact we actually have. I do think there's part of it there. Just the, you know, do you want to think about it and feel fully engaged? Or do you want to? Do your little part and then go back to your life. So I think that's part of it, but, but you know, negative emotions tend to linger and be felt

• 27:06Speaker 03

  more profoundly than positive emotions. Like they find like, for instance, in news articles, like negative articles have a higher virality potential than positive articles. And certainly, you know, that's, that's just the extreme between like negative and positive. Like nobody shares, hey, things are pretty okay. It wasn't as bad as we thought, you know, like that obviously is super not spreadable. Right? You do want to share something about the latest outrage, about something that's incredibly scary, about something that, that is uncertain because you can speculate about it. But like, okay, hey, they, um, they caught the guy and, uh, you know, now the law is going to take its course.

• 27:51Speaker 03

  You know, that's not super interesting, but like fugitive at large in your neighborhood, you know, is incredibly activating. And so I think that's part of it.

• 28:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's a, it's sort of at a place where like the news is a genre of entertainment now. And it's, it's, and news, not even just news organizations, but I think any media publisher, including us, it's like you, you have to put everything through the filter of like, well, we want as many people to see this as possible. And so this is like a thing that we struggle with all the time, especially on like YouTube, where it's like, we know the tricks that we've been told that we have to use in order to get more people to see this, but it just feels at odds with our.

• 28:34Speaker 03

  It's icky.

• 28:35Speaker 00

  It's, it feels icky. And so it's, it's, it's a tricky thing because even, you know, we're so conscious of it, but at the end of the day, it's like, if you want to, if you want to, if you want people to see this really helpful content that we believe is helpful, at a certain point, you have to kind of play the game. And then it just makes, everyone's playing the game, then you're playing at these extremes.

• 28:58Speaker 03

  Yeah, and it's like, I think having some insight into the game, how the game is played, should affect your own habits as far as what you consume, you know? Like, I think it's really important to be informed about what's happening in the world. I would just dispute whether like, refreshing your Twitter feed is the best way to do it. It's like, pick up a book, right? Go travel, talk to an actual expert. You know, there's a lot of things you can do to understand what's happening. And, and a lot of what's happening is not good, and it's going to require action and change and involvement, and creative solutions. It's just, you know, following the news in real time is probably not the way to do it.

• 29:40Speaker 03

  You know, sometimes you hear people and they're like, "Well, I'm just really concerned, you know, what's this going to mean for, for my grandchildren and my great grandchildren?" And it's like, dude, you're going to be dead. Like, they're, like, I'm not saying you shouldn't care, I'm just saying you, you have children in front of you right now that you're neglecting for, for worries about, you know, how they're going to handle something 20, 30, 40 years from now. And that, that's really the thing is like, we sometimes spend a lot of time and energy thinking about what things are going to mean in the future, and what that takes us away from is the things we can and should be doing right now.

• 30:17Speaker 00

  If, I mean, this is a sort of a massive hypothetical question, but if Marcus Aurelius were alive today and were, and was elected into power and was running America, and, you know, or, or maybe like in the not too distant future, we will be able to elect an AI version of Marcus Aurelius to run.

• 30:37Speaker 02

  I was gonna say, strange things have happened.

• 30:39Speaker 00

  To run, to run the country. How do you think he would be, how do you think it would be different? Like, what would he implement? Obviously, there'd be lots of differences, but, but what specifically would change, do you think, that we need?

• 30:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, look, hopefully he wouldn't be, you know, taking billions of dollars from foreign governments, starting stupid wars, you know? Marcus Aurelius is an interesting leader because... He's sort of late in the Roman period. Rome's already having a number of problems. It's sort of falling, coming apart at the seams. He deals with one crisis after another. I do think it's really interesting, you know. Obviously, we went through the pandemic six years ago, almost exactly. You know, Marx realist lived through what's known as the Antonine Plague, one of the worst sort of plagues in human history. And he seems to have done a reasonably good job, you know, listening to the experts.

• 31:34Speaker 03

  He doesn't, he doesn't take rash action. He doesn't run around with his head cut off like he's sort of calm and collected. And he's empathetic and, and, you know, tries to do what he can. So obviously, it was, it was striking the first go around with Trump to just sort of watch what, you know, sort of totally ineffectual leadership looks like in the middle of a crisis. But, um, you know, sometimes philosophers don't make the best, the best rulers. We'd like to think they would, but, but politics is, is kind of a, a tricky, you know, uh, unsexy business of a lot of compromise. So there was another Stoic, um, a few generations before named Cato, who was widely considered, you know, one of the most principled and honest

• 32:18Speaker 03

  and, and, um, you know, sort of towering figures of integrity. And he was just horrible, like he was just really bad at it because he couldn't do the kind of deal making and campaigning and compromise that was required. So it's, it's kind of interesting. I, I, I would like to think that, um, you know, good people can make for good leaders. That's not always the case. But, but I certainly think, uh, you know, you, you want from your heads of state, both sort of competence and cunning as well as, you know, integrity and values. And I think we're seeing in America what happens when you sort of throw all that out

• 33:01Speaker 03

  and replace it with, you know, what's effectively like a cult of personality.

• 33:06Speaker 02

  I'm keen to move to your challenge in a minute, Ryan, but I just have a question for you around, I think I'm particularly interested in maybe Epictetus's, like what his thoughts would have been on empathy, because going into slavery, I feel like empathy can be a double edged sword. It's something we talk a lot about in our school programs. Empathy can often lead you to action that you mentioned before, but it can also be overwhelming and lead you to worry.

• 33:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 33:36Speaker 02

  Stoics in general, but also Epictetus, how would he talk about empathy?

• 33:41Speaker 03

  Well, what's really interesting about Epictetus, so he is a slave, he's not working in the fields, he's owned by a high ranking member of Nero's administration. So he has this interesting life where he is owned by someone else who treats him very poorly, and yet he's surrounded by incredibly wealthy, powerful people who are jockeying, you know, in the king's court. And what he comes to understand is that there are a few different kinds of freedom, right? There's sort of the literal freedom, and then there is sort of emotional freedom, there's spiritual freedom, there's intellectual freedom. And he sort

• 34:22Speaker 03

  of realizes, looking around at Nero's court, that he's actually freer than a lot of these people. He notices at one point, he tells this story about this guy, this sort of powerful Roman who comes in, and he tries buttering up Nero's shoemaker, like Nero's cobbler, because he wants to get in good with Nero, right? And so he's kissing this guy's ass, and Epictetus goes like, oh, I'm more powerful than this guy, like I'm freer than this guy, who because of his business interests, can't tell the truth, can't afford to piss off this person in Nero's administration.

• 35:03Speaker 03

  And, and, and he sort of comes to pity it. And again, this is something we see, you know, we see happening in the US right now, where you have these like tech billionaires who have to stay on the administration's good side. So they make donations to these, you know, silly projects. They say nice things on social media. They have to attend the, like, Tim Cook, worth billions upon billions of dollars, has to go to the White House to watch the premiere of the Melania documentary. Which, which was, which, which, by the way, another billionaire.

• 35:39Speaker 00

  No spoilers, please, Ryan, I haven't seen them.

• 35:41Speaker 03

  Another billionaire, Jeff Bezos, overpaid $25 million for, as a bribe to the administration. So, so you're like, you would like to think like, hey, if I ever had $100 billion, like Jeff Bezos does, or if I was the CEO of Apple, like, that'd be pretty sick, right? Like, like, no one could tell me what to do. I would, I would be the master of my fate. And then you go, no, actually, I'd have to go to the fucking Melania premiere. Because if, if I don't go, and then Trump gets mad at me, he's gonna slap tariffs on Apple products, and then the, the stock price is gonna go down, and then the investors

• 36:26Speaker 03

  are gonna yell at me, and then my own net worth is gonna go down. And so the, the point is, Epictetus is realizing that often power, and Seneca talks about this too, because he's there in some of the same moments, that this power is actually a form of slavery. And this wealth is actually a, like, a, a golden prison. And, and, and so they're, they're just sort of talking about what it actually means to be, you know, sort of free in command of yourself, what, what, what it means to, to, to sort of live your life on your own terms, and like, what we're actually chasing. And it, it's just, it's just a fact that often the things that we chase, that we think are gonna make us happy, or think are gonna make us free, or think were gonna make us

• 37:10Speaker 03

  feel secure, have the exact opposite effect.

• 37:12Speaker 00

  Yeah, so, this is a bit of a, a shift in, shift in, in topic. One of the things that I've struggled with, I think, as long as I can remember, really, is just this fear that I am a bad friend.

• 37:28Speaker 00

  And and it's this and the reason I often think I'm a bad friend is that even the people that I really love so much and I want to see them all the time. And every time I do see them, I leave thinking, why don't I see you more? But even though I have all that, I always forget to message them or to like, say, let's catch up. I'm terrible at the at the whether for want of a better term, the maintenance of a friend. Yeah. And and I just wonder what

• 38:02Speaker 00

  Marky would would say would say about that.

• 38:07Speaker 03

  You know, it's it. I mean, I would just say, first off, practically, like, people who are actually bad friends are not thinking about this at all. Right? Like, they're, they're actually convinced everyone else is the bad friend. And everyone's, you know what I mean? The fact that you're like, I'm not sure I'm being like, considerate and kind enough and checking in enough and and putting myself out there enough like, that's probably a good sign. It's not proof, but it's probably a good sign. The Stoic I would actually point you to is Seneca. Seneca writes his most famous work, which which is often titled, at least in English, Letters from a Stoic. And it's Seneca writing to his friend Lucilius,

• 38:49Speaker 03

  who's a governor in a in a Roman province. And they just sort of go back and forth. And they have this like, kind of multi year exchange of wisdom between each other. But he has this great line, and I think maybe it goes to your, your, your specific struggle. And he's talking to Lucilius, and he says, you know, how do I know I'm making progress as a Stoic? And he says, I know it because I'm starting to become a better friend to myself. And what he's saying, I think, is like, I'm not beating myself up. I'm not criticizing myself. I'm giving myself some grace. That isn't to say you don't also hold yourself accountable and push yourself to be better as friends do. But like, if one of your friends, if

• 39:31Speaker 03

  you found out that one of your friends felt that they were in your shoes, you'd probably be like, dude, no one's thinking about this at all. You're totally fine. Like, we love hearing from you when you reach out. And when you don't, we assume you've got shit going on in your life, you know? So sometimes, these problems that we have are really just like, These kind of rumination traps we get stuck in in our mind. Like imposter syndrome is a great example of this. Everyone's like, you know, I don't think I'm qualified. I think they're, they're, they know I'm a fake. It's like, they're not thinking about you at all. Like, nobody's thinking about you.

• 40:08Speaker 00

  I think some people are thinking about me, but yeah.

• 40:13Speaker 00

  I take your point. But no, that's, that's so true. And I do, and I, I feel like I actually tell that to other people when they bring up imposter syndrome to me. Yeah, I mean, I have imposter syndrome and I've had it every new thing I start, I have it. But it's so true. It's just like, whenever I go and see someone's, you know, show or film or whatever, and they've done it for the first time, uh, they might be really worried. But I'm, I haven't thought about it until I'm in there looking at it. And then I was like, oh, this is cool. And then that's it.

• 40:45Speaker 03

  It's like when you go over, when you go over to someone's house, you're like, oh, this is nice, cool house. And then you're like talking to them and then you have people over to your house and you're like, they're judging me, they're gonna think it's a mess. You know, and it's like, you see only the problems, the things that are not taken care of, and nobody, nobody is aware of these things at all. They're busy, they're nervous, you know, they're like, am I dressed okay? Did I bring enough stuff, you know? What's going on with the babysitter? You know, like, everyone's sort of stuck in their own minds, but then we, we get caught up. Like, the other example I sometimes point people to is like, and this is a, another stereotype of stoicism, like, people are afraid to ask for help, right?

• 41:28Speaker 03

  They're afraid to be like, hey, I'm struggling or I'm lonely, or this is hard, or I don't know what to do. And then it's like, okay, but the last time somebody asked you for help, how did you react? Were you like, what a fucking loser? You know? Like, how dare you?

• 41:45Speaker 00

  It's like you're tapping my phone, right?

• 41:49Speaker 03

  You were like, it's like, you're like, oh my gosh, I can't believe you came to me. Like, I'm so thank you. Like, we're almost like excited and grateful when when people come to us with stuff. And then, and then when we have problems, we're like, well, I don't want to impose. And it's like, it's not an imposition. This is like literally what we're here for. And so, so yeah, so much of this is just kind of a

• 42:13Speaker 03

  a figment of our worst assumptions that we make about other people and ourselves.

• 42:19Speaker 00

  Thanks, Ryan. That's really helpful.

• 42:21Speaker 02

  The, the thing I wanted to chat to you about, and I feel like I'm, we're definitely favoring, favoring Marcus here. But I do feel like with what you've spoken about, what he had to deal with, the things he went through in his life, maybe he would be a good philosopher to, to, um, yeah, to get to like to find out how they would feel about this. But I'll leave it up to you, who you want to.

• 42:41Speaker 02

  Like many people in the world, I'm very aware of what I value or what I think to be important. Things like family, um, presence.

• 42:53Speaker 02

  As in being present, not giving good presents, but like, like being present. Being loving, um, being attentive. But where I fall down, and I think a lot of people will probably relate to this, is the actual practice of these things. So the example I'll give is yesterday at work, uh, we had a really, really important meeting. Someone was presenting something that meant a lot to them. And I found myself thinking about an issue with the kids. And I found myself thinking about the kids. And then when I got home, um, my youngest, who is three, wanted to go to the park. So we went to the park together and I was pushing him on the swing. And he was telling me about his day, which for someone who values presence and family,

• 43:36Speaker 02

  that should be, I mean, that right there is everything you could ever want. But if he was to turn around and give me a comprehension test on what he just said, I honestly couldn't tell you what he said because I really wasn't there. I was. Pushing him on the swing, but I was a million miles away thinking about something from work, ironically, where I just come from.

• 43:53Speaker 03

  The thing that you had ignored to think about your kid earlier.

• 43:56Speaker 02

  Yeah. And then, and then, and then, and then that same night I put my daughter to bed and I read her a book and I, she asked me a question about something that happened in the book and I realized I'd read the entire book and not, I'd read the words out loud, but I hadn't thought about what I was actually reading to her. And the reason was I was thinking about something that had nothing to do with where I was. And I guess my question is, how do the Stoics, how did the Stoics go with,

• 44:21Speaker 02

  I think two things, living a life that is where you practice what you really value, but also for anyone who's struggling with being where you want to be or presence. What did the Stoics write about that?

• 44:36Speaker 03

  Yeah. I mean, look, that's the whole game. It's, it's, it's easy to talk about all this stuff and then how do you actually apply it? And can you apply it in the big moments and the little moments alike? That's the, that's the whole challenge and I, I struggle with it as much as anyone.

• 44:50Speaker 03

  I think there's a couple of things here. I mean, look, it is easier to, to focus and to stay on task when you're not doing 50 tasks, 25 of them of, you know, doubtful importance, right? One of the things Mark Schurloes talks about in meditations is like asking yourself, do you really need to be doing this thing? Right? Like, and he says, you know, cause most of what we do and, and say and think about is not that important. And he says, when you eliminate those things, you get the double benefit of doing the important things better. Right? And so, you know, when you agree to be in a meeting that you shouldn't be in, it's, uh, you know, that could have been an email or, uh, that, that could have been nothing at all.

• 45:37Speaker 03

  It, it, it's hard to then kind of lock in and focus on the thing in front of you because deep down, you know, like you probably shouldn't be doing it anyway. So I think part of this, we have to solve upstream by just not agreeing to do much, so much stuff. But then when we are doing this stuff, we, we should ask, we should say to ourselves, okay, if this is worth. Doing, you know, it's worth doing right and it's worth being present for. And that, you know, none of us are as good as multitasking as we'd like to think we are.

• 46:07Speaker 03

  And, and the stoics sort of talk about doing this thing as if it is the last time you get to do it. That's the sort of practice of memento mori, like, hey, I gotta wrap this up because this is the last time I get to, you know, get up here and, you know, give this talk. Or this is the last episode you guys are recording, or it's the last time you get to go surfing, or it's the last time you get to read a book to your kids before bed, you know, how would that change how you do it? To me, that's a really powerful way of just sort of coming in and focusing because, you know, you know, you're doing the dishes. Okay. Are you actually present for doing the dishes? Or are you like, uh, trying to do 10 things at once? You're doing a shitty job. You're resenting getting to do it.

• 46:50Speaker 03

  You know, at some point you're gonna love to be back in this space where your kids are on the couch, you just had dinner together, you know, it's a long summer evening, whatever it is like. There, there is going to be a point at which you miss this or which you would trade anything to get back to this, even something as annoying as a work meeting and, and decide to be there for it is, is I think, you know, a kind of a reframing that can be really helpful.

• 47:18Speaker 00

  It's kind of like our, our brains have been conditioned now and our expectations have been conditioned to all, to never do one thing at a time. Like we,

• 47:27Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 47:27Speaker 00

  we, there's now an assumption that like, okay, well, I'm going to do the dishes. So while I'm doing the dishes, I want to listen to a podcast. And so there's, there's always this sort of want or need or expectation to have multiple things going at once because we can. And as a result, we, it's so hard to focus on just the one thing. Maybe, maybe that's why.

• 47:49Speaker 03

  Yeah. And we tell ourselves, oh, I'm going to get to do this an infinite number of additional times.

• 47:54Speaker 00

  Yeah. So we don't value it.

• 47:58Speaker 03

  Yes. And, and, you know, obviously life expectancy is much longer than it is today than it is, than it was 2000 years ago. But,

• 48:09Speaker 03

  You, that's an average, right? You have, we have no idea what the time span is for each one of us. And one of the things Seneca talks about, which I think is one of his most powerful sort of, sort of flipping of things is he says, you know, it's wrong to think of death as something that happens at the end of your life. He says, actually, death is behind us. Not that it's coming to get you. He means like, every minute that passes is dead to you. And so, how do you spend your time accordingly? If you know, hey, I'm paying for this with a day of my life, or, you know, a 10 year commitment on my life, or whatever it is, like, when that's over,

• 48:51Speaker 03

  you can't get that back. And so to think of time, to think of death as something that's happening to you always, instead of something that happens to you once at the end, is to me, just a totally different way of thinking about it.

• 49:03Speaker 01

  That's brilliant. That's so good.

• 49:05Speaker 02

  I wrote that down in, I had a journal, well, I was writing each morning, at the start of the year, when I was really good at my, really, really good at my news resolutions, and Stoicism was right at the top. One of the, the last thing I wrote every day before I left, before I, before I started the day was, this could be your last day. And it was, had a massive impact on, I guess the issue I brought up with you before was just like being wherever I am, because I wanted, I wanted fully experience, if this is my last day, live the way that you want to live. It very much aligns you with your values very quickly.

• 49:44Speaker 01

  Can I ask something on that? Because one thing that I, I find that to be a useful framing, and I also think that, I remember Hugh telling me about, I think it was a Marcus Aurelius thing to imagine everyone you love dying. Is that, yeah. And one of the, I've realized I do that naturally, unfortunately. And as a, as a way of kind of reminding myself of what's dear to me. But then when I work, then when I live a day where I don't live up to that expectation, like if I set myself the expectation that this is the last day I have with them, and I waste that. I am so down on myself and I find it really hard to apply some of the rules without compassion for myself.

• 50:29Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 50:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. Any help with that?

• 50:32Speaker 03

  It is a challenge, but it's like the irony there. You're like, okay, so I blew it today. Right? Like I was too much on my phone. I was in a shitty mood. I wasn't, you know, we could have done more stuff or, you know, I was selfish. I let work get in the way, whatever it is. So you fucked up and then you're like, okay, so the solution to that is for me to go internal, spiral about this, regret it, you know, feel guilty about it and waste, it's like throwing good money after bad, right? Like you could go like, okay, I'm going to be better starting now. Instead you go, I fucked up and I'm going to keep fucking up and also I suck and I'm worthless.

• 51:14Speaker 03

  Like it's not helping at all. It's just so crazy how we do that. Um, so, so like, I guess I just ask what the, what the productive use of that sort of guilt and shame actually is like it's, it's not only not productive, it's counterproductive. It's more of the thing that you're supposedly feeling guilty and shameful about, which is wasting time and energy.

• 51:38Speaker 01

  It's, yeah, it's definitely a hundred percent agree. It's just something so naturally alluring about it. I think about that spiral. Yeah.

• 51:46Speaker 03

  Well, because I think it's, it's hard to actually do it. Like the being present, uh, bringing your best self, like that requires a lot of concentration and focus and discipline and, you know, all these things. And so you're like, well, you know, it's like, so you slipped up and you ate some, you know, you, you, you, you fell off your diet or whatever. And then you're like, well, I guess that's it for me now, you know, like it's, you get to, you get to keep doing the thing that you were doing. It's just, it's just a trap where we can, we get to, we get to excuse ourselves from doing the actual hard thing that we've been avoiding all along, which is, which is being present, which is bringing our best self to things. And, and so, yeah, we, we just kinda, we just kinda do that. Uh, and.

• 52:33Speaker 03

  You know, look, you screwed up on your diet and you ate something you shouldn't. Are you gonna finish the bag or are you gonna go, hey, I don't need to keep making this worse?

• 52:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, it's great advice.

• 52:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:47Speaker 02

  Well, it's been amazing chatting to you, Ryan. It's um.

• 52:49Speaker 00

  It's kind of like, I mean, like this is an academy of imperfection, but we we could. It could, you could call it the the practicality house. Because it is, this is like one of the most practical, useful, like there's so much to take away from this episode.

• 53:05Speaker 02

  And Ryan will be in Australia and New Zealand in October. We'll put a link if you want to go and see him. Highly recommend. We will definitely be there. Thank you for everything that, just personally, it's a great opportunity for me to thank you for everything you've done. Through a very tough time in my life, you have been incredibly present. So thank you so much, Ryan Holiday.

• 53:24Speaker 03

  Ah, well, I really appreciate it. I um, I'm sort of paying for, I feel like what I'm doing is paying forward what stoicism has done for me. And I'm very excited to get to Australia, which is one of my my favorite places in the world. I'm gonna bring my whole family and uh. We're gonna make a thing of it. So I'm I'm excited to get out there. I'll look forward to meeting you guys.

• 53:42Speaker 00

  Sounds great.

• 53:43Speaker 02

  Thank you, mate. Did you guys love him?

• 53:46Speaker 00

  Absolutely love that man. He is great. And I think before we get into Hugh, your um, your reflections on what's what's helped you and go into more, I think we all just need to acknowledge, now that we have a moment. Properly acknowledge Josh's doom scroll joke, which which Ryan Holiday unfortunately didn't hear because he was talking at the same time. But I think you need to, if you didn't hear it, you need to go back and appreciate what was a fantastic joke. So that's, just want to say that.

• 54:13Speaker 01

  Thank you. That that means a lot.

• 54:15Speaker 00

  It's important. It's important.

• 54:16Speaker 02

  I was so sad he didn't hear it because it would have helped him to like us more.

• 54:21Speaker 00

  I think he liked us.

• 54:21Speaker 01

  I think he liked us.

• 54:22Speaker 02

  No, he would have gone, I like them and they're hysterical.

• 54:25Speaker 00

  Yeah. Yeah. Well, at least Josh was hysterical.

• 54:30Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 54:31Speaker 02

  Okay, so I'm gonna just pretty quickly here, but I want to go through five quotes. And the way that I got into stoicism was like how we discover many things these days was through social media. But it did feel like consuming stoicism through social media was very, um, it was just, it was almost like the reverse. Yeah, it was almost like um. The antithesis of what it is, what the Stoics.

• 54:55Speaker 01

  What it preaches.

• 54:56Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I actually purchased.

• 54:58Speaker 01

  Cause the Stoics were against social media, weren't they?

• 55:00Speaker 02

  I didn't. The first ones to push.

• 55:05Speaker 01

  Yeah. No, I think Marcus Aurelius was on Blogger.

• 55:09Speaker 01

  But he, but he, but he stopped short of MySpace. He just said, no, I can see this is going to go bad.

• 55:14Speaker 02

  He's actually against AI as well. He doesn't think you should use it.

• 55:17Speaker 01

  Well, okay. I trust his opinion.

• 55:19Speaker 02

  So I ordered, I very quickly ordered, um, because I talk about journaling and how important journal is. I very quickly ordered the Daily Stoic Journal. Which I recommend second behind Aaron Perfect, My Perfect Life as a journal.

• 55:33Speaker 02

  But there were, what happens with this journal is it gives you, at the start of every single week. Ryan has his reflection on a topic. So week one, for example, the topic is what's up to us, what's not up to us. And then he'll give you a quote from three of the Stoics and then you'll be asked questions on that topic. And every morning and night, you journal about the question. And so that's how I've sort of discovered these, uh, some of the quotes work for me, others don't have much to do with my life. But here are five that have been so, so powerful for me and the way I've, um, moved through the world. With all the challenges that have come up in the last few years.

• 56:13Speaker 01

  Brilliant. It's such a good setup. And I think a good thing to mention, cause one of the things that you alluded to with the Instagram thing is like, it's so easy to see a surface level. Really powerful quote that like hit you and then forget about it and it never actually does the work.

• 56:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:26Speaker 01

  So I wanted to get to how you actually make these a part of yourself and actually benefit long term. So this is awesome.

• 56:32Speaker 02

  Yep. So some of them I'll go and read the journal entries that I wrote at the back of them. Others I'll just tell you the quote and, um, and then we'll just have a quick discussion after it. But so the first one, which I think probably has had the biggest impact on me. Is this one from Marcus Aurelius, and that is you could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.

• 56:56Speaker 01

  Which is sort of similar to what Ryan sort of touched on, where it's like, imagine this is the last time you're doing something.

• 57:01Speaker 02

  Yep. It is exactly what it is. And what I've found that to do is it's directly, very directly enriched my relationship with my family. Um, and really anyone that I come into contact with, um, it's, it's for some reason I come across this, well, I just thought to myself. The more conversations, the longer my conversations go for with people, the more enriching those relationships are. So even people that I don't know that well, in my head, I just sort of have this thing of like, see if you can extend this conversation beyond two minutes.

• 57:28Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 57:28Speaker 02

  Um, and that because if it is my last day on the earth, um, I would like to engage with people.

• 57:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 57:34Speaker 02

  Uh, other than just beyond surface level. So.

• 57:37Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 57:37Speaker 02

  That's been really big. And it also really helps me with very, very, very direct correlation with the patience levels that I have with my kids when something is not going well for them or they're upset about something or there's a meltdown, um, or they're not doing, they're not, Patrick is not putting on his shoes, uh, like he refuses to put on shoes every morning. I just have more patience. Like, cause if it is the last time, I would like him to have a positive memory of me, not me like storming out and getting angry about the shoes, just sitting with him while he tries to, well, he doesn't try to put his shoes on, but he has a positive memory of me. And that's a, that sounds like quite a morbid thing, but that's what it's helped me do.

• 58:12Speaker 00

  Hmm. Love that one.

• 58:14Speaker 02

  The next one from Epictetus. Um, so this, I mean, I, I have realised, I didn't do this deliberately, but they do, a lot of them relate to gratitude, empathy and mindfulness. But this one's from Epictetus.

• 58:25Speaker 00

  Here we go again. He's always banging on about this. It's like he actually believes it or something.

• 58:32Speaker 02

  Uh, he who is not satisfied with a little is satisfied with nothing.

• 58:38Speaker 02

  Um, and I actually, so this came from, uh, the journal, I will read this here. So this is, um, the competition between the two of you, who's better at Roman numerals. What week is this?

• 58:50Speaker 00

  Right. Yep.

• 58:51Speaker 02

  XXX one, one.

• 58:54Speaker 00

  Thirty three, three, two, thirty two.

• 58:57Speaker 01

  Oh, did you only do two ones?

• 58:59Speaker 00

  Thirty two.

• 59:00Speaker 02

  You're both very quick.

• 59:01Speaker 00

  Yeah, because he only said two ones.

• 59:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:02Speaker 00

  Yeah. If he had have said three, you would have been right.

• 59:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:05Speaker 02

  So.

• 59:05Speaker 00

  Just count, just count.

• 59:08Speaker 01

  It wasn't the trickiest Roman numeral. Be good done.

• 59:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, no Vs. No Vs.

• 59:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:14Speaker 02

  And no numbers before, big numbers to subtract the.

• 59:17Speaker 01

  It was only after and three. Yeah.

• 59:18Speaker 02

  Yeah. Anyway, um, so week thirty two, the theme was what little wins can you find? Um, and. Ryan's reflection here, he says, Stoics would be skeptical of the so-called epic wins and quantum leaps that our culture obsesses over today. Instead, they would urge you to focus on your daily duties, on making incremental progress. Spend your writing time this week thinking about the small wins you can rack up. While little gains can be had from the improve, from this improvement or that one, a decision here or a decision there. Be satisfied with each small step, keep moving and don't give up.

• 59:53Speaker 02

  And so I just, I wrote, I'm right here, there was a, the morning reflection was, so every morning, everybody has a question which you reflect on the morning and night. The question was, what's small, what's small progress can I make today? And my morning reflection was be patient with the kids, give a genuine compliment to Penny, I just wrote training.

• 1:00:14Speaker 02

  Out the door on time, and if not, forgive yourself, no phone until I'm in the office.

• 1:00:22Speaker 02

  Don't look at phone during meeting, listen to music, patient with kids at bedtime. And then, so they're just like little dot points, but the evening reflection I wrote was.

• 1:00:33Speaker 02

  When I did my nightly breath work and the question of gratitude came up. I was asked what made me smile today, and it was all the things that I listed this morning above. I've learnt today that it's so helpful to schedule and plan the little things as they are the most influential in my wellbeing.

• 1:00:53Speaker 00

  Brilliant.

• 1:00:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, so that was a, so that's the second one. Gratitude. So the third one is from Seneca. This is probably, you would argue, this is what I'd argue, this is very much about mindfulness. To be everywhere is to be nowhere.

• 1:01:08Speaker 02

  And I felt like, so to be everywhere is to be nowhere. I feel like that is the experience of so many people, like when you're on social media, when you're on Instagram, for example, you are everywhere.

• 1:01:18Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's true.

• 1:01:19Speaker 02

  In the space of one minute, your brain goes to so many different places, so many different emotions, so many different thoughts and feelings. And I feel like when you put your phone down, your brain doesn't just stop moving at that pace. It continues to want that much stuff, need that much stuff. It has this like, it's like, it's trying to be everywhere still. So I think to be everywhere, to be nowhere is a good, is a, for me is a very. Specific reference to social media and social media use, but I think it really speaks to what I spoke about during that episode was when I'm pushing Patrick on the swing, I was everywhere, which meant I was nowhere and I need to, that's special time. You link it to the first one, you could leave right now, let that determine the way you act and

• 1:02:04Speaker 02

  the way you behave. So that's, you know.

• 1:02:06Speaker 01

  Yeah. Can I add to that? Cause I, I lost, I was just saying to you guys before we started recording, I lost my phone. I'm sorry, I didn't lose my phone. My phone stopped working last week and I didn't want to get a new, brand new phone. And I'm like, I'll get a refurbished one and there's a bit of a wait for that to be delivered. So I've been about four days now without a phone.

• 1:02:26Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:02:27Speaker 01

  And I found that the, the being everywhere thing like that, it sort of relates to that. But I found that on the weekend, it to be quite a painful process of not having the phone to distract me and to take my mind elsewhere.

• 1:02:43Speaker 00

  Well, you're, you're essentially, you've gone cold turkey on an addiction, probably.

• 1:02:47Speaker 01

  It's, it's kind of what it felt like. And I've, I've found myself really sad at the end of every day because I realize how many times not, it's not the knowledge of this, it's the actual experience of it, of how many times I'm using the phone throughout the day to distract myself from boredom or pain.

• 1:03:03Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:03:03Speaker 01

  And so accumulated many moments of pain throughout the day, not big pain, but just little bits of sadness that I would have got a little endorphin hit from.

• 1:03:12Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:03:13Speaker 01

  That put my mind elsewhere. I found myself being quite down at the end of every day and not a pleasant experience at all. And I'm hoping to, but I'm also starting to see, it's about four days in, I'm starting to see glimmers of how great it is.

• 1:03:31Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:03:31Speaker 01

  But also just to acknowledge that the process from having your mind going from everywhere to, to being on a singular task or not distracted can be quite painful and quite hard.

• 1:03:40Speaker 00

  Yeah. Yeah. It is. It's, it's like a crutch.

• 1:03:44Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:03:44Speaker 00

  It's like a thing that we like rely on.

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:47Speaker 00

  To kind of in any silence or moment of discomfort. It's like, it's, you just instantly habitually refer to just looking at your own little world that you can control.

• 1:03:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:58Speaker 00

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 1:03:59Speaker 02

  It's really good. The next one, which is a very specific thing that I've started doing this year is everyone will know because it got a lot of attention when I.

• 1:04:08Speaker 02

  Presented to everyone as a typo that I, for those of you who knew the podcast, I sent a text message to a friend talking about how I, how I walk the dog, but I said that I wank the dog every morning. So this one here.

• 1:04:20Speaker 01

  I'm Seneca who said to wank the dog.

• 1:04:23Speaker 00

  Never has a, never has a moment in our podcast required more context than you saying wank the dog. But yes, it is contextual.

• 1:04:33Speaker 02

  So this one here, I reckon you'll really like this one, right? Because I think this is something you do naturally and you've always understood the beauty of this or the, why there's such an important one. But this is.

• 1:04:44Speaker 00

  I feel sane already.

• 1:04:46Speaker 02

  So this is the theme here. So this is, I won't do that activity again, but this is week 25. And the theme was.

• 1:04:56Speaker 00

  Great. We're all thinking it.

• 1:04:59Speaker 02

  One all.

• 1:04:59Speaker 00

  Some of us don't need to show off.

• 1:05:04Speaker 02

  The theme is take a walk.

• 1:05:06Speaker 00

  Ah, yep.

• 1:05:07Speaker 02

  So the quote that Ryan includes in general here is from Seneca, and that is, we should take walks outdoors so that the mind might be nourished and refreshed.

• 1:05:18Speaker 00

  God, yeah.

• 1:05:19Speaker 02

  We should take walks outdoors so that the mind might be nourished and refreshed. So this year, a very new thing to me, but I, I started off the year taking the dog for a walk in the morning and I always had my phone with me. So I'd listen to, I was like, if I could write emails or it could be a great, why be so productive, write emails, I could, I could listen to podcasts, listen to music.

• 1:05:43Speaker 02

  But when I stopped doing that, I just felt like, in fact, there's a really, as a, can I throw in a bonus quote? Cause it's a long run, but it's a beauty.

• 1:05:49Speaker 00

  Okay. Sorry. I gave him an all clear away too quickly.

• 1:05:55Speaker 02

  This is from Seneca as well. And this is what, this is like, when I read this, I thought about the time without the phone, just going for a walk in nature. The mind must be given relaxation. It will rise improved and sharper after a good break. Just as rich fields must not be forced, for they will quickly lose their fertility and never, if never given a break. So constant work on the anvil will fracture the force of the mind, but it regains its powers if it is set free and relaxed for a while. Constant work gives rise to a certain kind of dullness and feebleness in the rational soul. You love walks.

• 1:06:34Speaker 00

  I love walks. Well, recently, some people know that I did a, I walked from, people in Victoria will understand the gravity of this or the strangeness of this. I walked from Frankston to Fitzroy over two days. And, and I did it for like, just to, I was actually reading a book about philosophers who walked. And it's like, it was a big way of, a big way that philosophers used to think, like the way that they would think they would go for walks. And that was sort of part of why I did it, because I wanted to just go on as a different way of thinking. But on that walk, it's sort of all up was about 10 or 11 hours. And at the start, I would do voice notes and stuff and I would, but at no point did I listen to any podcasts or anything. Most of the time I was just walking in silence.

• 1:07:17Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:07:18Speaker 00

  And it was, it was really amazing. And I kind of, during, during it, I realized, oh, this is, because we're all, you know, we've, we've been heard from so many people how important it is to be bored. But we're not bored anymore. We never get, we never let ourselves get bored. And so I now call that the boardwalk. And so I feel like doing a boardwalk is really, really like clearly so healthy and good for us.

• 1:07:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:44Speaker 00

  Um, which is essentially just to go walking and get bored on purpose.

• 1:07:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:49Speaker 00

  And bored has this negative annotation because like, I'm bored, I'm bored as a kid. You want to be entertained, you want to have a dopamine hit, but, but actually now because of the world, it's like being bored is crucial. I remember as a kid, and it's hard to know whether this is just like as a kid or not, but as a kid, you're often just like, I don't know, staring or just like walking in this. Cause there isn't a solution to being bored or like, you know, this example has been given lots, but it's like when you are, uh, like at a restaurant with someone that the other person goes to the bathroom and you're at the table, you wait for them.

• 1:08:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:24Speaker 00

  You just have to wait. But now we've got a phone, so we bring out our phone. But to not bring out our phone and just sit there, even though it's boring. Is actually from, I mean, I'm not an expert, so I can't explain why scientifically it's good, but it, I just know that every time that I allow myself to be bored, I just feel a little bit, I don't know, lighter or something.

• 1:08:46Speaker 02

  Yeah. You said it's crucial to me. The feeling for me is being bored and I go for a walk with the dog is, it's like plugging my brain into a charger for a bit. Like I feel, it feels like I'm recharging my brain because everything else is draining it.

• 1:08:58Speaker 00

  Well, now, actually, now that you say that, it reminds me of what Maria Ruberto said when she was talking about the importance of, um, what did she say? It's we should reflect, not.

• 1:09:08Speaker 02

  Receive.

• 1:09:09Speaker 00

  Receive. Yeah. More reflection, less reception, because we're spending so much of our time receiving information and content and whatever, and not enough time actually thinking, bored, reflecting on the things that we've seen or talked about.

• 1:09:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:23Speaker 00

  And I know that whenever I spend time just either walking and being, I mean, I say bored, but like.

• 1:09:28Speaker 02

  Reflecting. Yeah.

• 1:09:29Speaker 00

  It turns into reflecting and thinking. Whenever I do that, I always pretty much think of like a good idea or, or I think of something that's actually really important to my life as opposed to just consuming like an article about something or a video about something that really doesn't affect my life that much. There's nothing I can actually do about it. Um, that it's, I always feel like it's really beneficial for me to, to, to just reflect, be bored even for a minute. So boardwalk.

• 1:10:01Speaker 02

  Boardwalk. I love it. And so would Marcus and friends. Um, and the last one, which I think is a really important one for all of us these days with, um, I feel like people's opinions and judgments and weighing in on everything and anything just for attention is just so rife. But, um, Eby Teta says, um, in fact, it came up, uh, this is in week six, um, on, and the theme was suspend your opinions, which is something a lot of people could probably, um, listen to at the moment. But, um, Eby Teta says, throw out your conceited opinions for it is impossible for a person to begin to learn what he thinks he already knows.

• 1:10:41Speaker 02

  And the question that I answered a few days after that, the morning, well, the question for the whole day was, what needless conflict can I avoid? So not exactly around opinions, but it's, it's adjacent. So what needless conflict can I avoid? And I just reflected on this here. So this is like a reflection on something that happened a week before. Last week at Hilltop Cafe, I found myself in what felt like a treasured memory, sitting outside in the sun with my mum and dad at a cafe we used to go to as kids with my youngest son, Patrick. An old lady walked past and smiled at Patrick. It's not a playground, as he climbed all over the chair. I smiled at her and went promptly back to my idyllic

• 1:11:26Speaker 02

  situation. I just, I was very impressed with myself that I didn't seek to like win that argument or win like, I just very quickly went to like, I'm not ruining this moment. This is special.

• 1:11:40Speaker 00

  Yeah. Yeah. Cause the temptation is to kind of like put her in her box and like, yeah, explain to her why she's wrong.

• 1:11:47Speaker 02

  I was gonna say to her, it's not an old person's time either, but you're here.

• 1:11:50Speaker 00

  Oh.

• 1:11:51Speaker 02

  But then, but that came to mind very quickly. I was like, no, no, this is, yeah.

• 1:11:54Speaker 00

  I'll save it for the podcast.

• 1:11:57Speaker 02

  Get way more acknowledgement doing it on there.

• 1:11:59Speaker 00

  Much more people here.

• 1:12:02Speaker 00

  Why would I waste it for just one person?

• 1:12:05Speaker 02

  No, but I, I, um,

• 1:12:10Speaker 02

  I was scared at how quickly I thought of that, but I very quickly went to like, I just smiled at her and let's just.

• 1:12:15Speaker 00

  And then let's save your winners for the biggest audience.

• 1:12:17Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, that evening, the reflection I had that evening, that night before I went to bed was, today in traffic, I attempted a three point turn that turned into a seven point turn. I stopped traffic in both directions. I encountered distinctly opposite reactions on either side. It was an identical inconvenience for the two men that were waiting either side of the car, in their cars. One man smiled and gave me the thumbs up and the other sat on his horn and yelled. One man moved through the interaction, building a connection and was frictionless. The other left angry and resentful. And so I just feel like that one, that quote throughout your considered opinions is.

• 1:13:03Speaker 02

  It's a way of moving through the world with less friction and less conflict

• 1:13:10Speaker 02

  in a more humble and curious way. So you have energy for what really matters. So they're the five quotes. Just if I could just bring the themes very quickly. Having an awareness that it could all end tomorrow has a very positive impact on your day to day encounters. He who is not satisfied with little is satisfied with nothing. Just paying attention to what you have. To be everywhere is to be nowhere, to be present. We should take walks.

• 1:13:40Speaker 02

  It's almost like nourishing your mind, just scheduling time to nourish your mind.

• 1:13:45Speaker 00

  Boardwalks.

• 1:13:46Speaker 02

  Boardwalks.

• 1:13:48Speaker 02

  And yeah, save your good comebacks for when there's an audience.

• 1:13:53Speaker 00

  Absolutely.

• 1:13:56Speaker 02

  No, just be humble and be curious and be frictionless.

• 1:14:02Speaker 00

  Love it, Hugh.

• 1:14:03Speaker 02

  And yeah, so those five had a very impact on me this year especially.

• 1:14:06Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:14:07Speaker 02

  So how wonderful to meet Ryan.

• 1:14:08Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:14:09Speaker 02

  Who knows, maybe he'll reach out to us and say, let's hang out when I'm in Melbourne.

• 1:14:12Speaker 00

  Yeah, who knows?

• 1:14:13Speaker 02

  He might.

• 1:14:14Speaker 00

  Yeah, he might. He might. Yeah. Especially if we send in lots and lots of emails in between now and then.

• 1:14:20Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 1:14:21Speaker 00

  Never know. Thanks to Ryan Holiday. Thanks to you. See you next time, everyone.

• 1:14:26Speaker 02

  Bye.

• 1:14:27Speaker 00

  Ciao.

• 1:14:30Speaker 01

  If you enjoyed this episode and want a little more, you might enjoy our subscriber only apps, available on Patreon and Apple Podcasts. If you want a little more but don't want to pay anymore, then you can join our newsletter at theimperfects.com.au. And while you're there, you'll be able to see the names and faces of all the incredible people who help make this show. A show made on the lands of the Wurundjeri Wurundjeri people, and we pay our respects to elders past and present. The Imperfects is not a licensed mental health service and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice, treatment or assessment. The advice given in this episode is general in nature, but if you're struggling, please see a healthcare professional or call Lifeline on 13 11 14.