Go Out And Do This Today | A Strong Soul Is Better Than Good Luck

In the movie Gladiator, Maximus, the protege of Marcus Aurelius, says famously, “What we do in life, echoes in eternity.” It’s a powerful, inspiring line, (also tattooed on Lebron James’s arm) one the average viewer might assume that Marcus Aurelius agreed with.Funnily enough, in his actual writings, Marcus Aurelius could not have come out more strongly against this idea. He says at one point, in Meditations, that “People out for posthumous fame forget that the Generations to Come will be the same annoying people they know now. And just as mortal." But even if they weren’t, he asks:“What good would it do you?...You're out of step—neglecting the gifts of nature to hang on someone's words in the future."Indeed, not only do people deprive themselves of the wonder of the present in order to hopefully be remembered in the future, far too many people—especially leaders—do themselves and those they serve a disservice by “performing for history.” Instead of focusing on what they can do right now, what little progress or improvements they can make, they get caught up in the idea of a grand, sweeping legacy. Or they play things safe, not wanting to take risks that could turn out badly...at the expense of possible opportunities they’ll never even know they missed.We should want to do the right thing, today, because it’s the right thing. We should pursue excellence because excellence is intrinsically valuable, not because we want to be admired after we’re dead and gone. Forget echoing in eternity—just speak loudly enough to be heard right now.Or better yet, let your actions do the talking.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

31 Dec 20183min

This is that weird time of year where we start to think about how we want the following year to go. We call them “resolutions” and they are the promises we make to ourselves about what we’re going to do in the next twelve months. The habits we’re going to quit, the skills we’re going to learn, the standards we’re going to hold ourselves to.On the one hand, it’s a wonderful and inspiring bit of reflection that the whole world basically comes together to do this at the same time. It’s excellent that everyone has finally decided to get in shape, to stop smoking, to try to give back more, to commit to being a better friend or relative, to read a certain number of books. But it’s strange that everyone puts it off for so long—we treat our self improvement like it’s a school project we hope might just complete itself, praying that maybe our parents or teacher will handle it for us.Well, they won’t.Epictetus asked why it is that we wait to demand the best for and of ourselves. It’s pretty crazy. But no matter, because here we are today, staring down the barrel of 2019 and while it would have been better to get started earlier, the second best time to improve is right now. We can put that missed opportunity behind us and repeat this passage from Epictetus,"From now on, then, resolve to live as a grown-up who is making progress, and make whatever you think best a law that you never set aside. And whenever you encounter anything that is difficult or pleasurable, or highly or lowly regarded, remember that the contest is now: you are at the Olympic Games, you cannot wait any longer, and that your progress is wrecked or preserved by a single day and a single event."Can you do that? Can you start right now? No more putting stuff off. No more, “I’ll start on Monday.” No more “in the future, I’ll do better and expect better.” No. Demand the best for yourself now.It’s what a grown up does.If you want to join us on the 14 Day Stoic Challenge: New Year, New You, you have 3 more days to sign up. Registration closes December 31st at 11:59pm. Click here to sign up.Thousands of people joined us for the challenge we did in October and found it life-changing. Here are a few testimonials:“The challenge was awesome. One of the things that really blew me away was just the interaction with the group. The overwhelming support in the Slack channel was amazing, and I feel like it was a ‘quake’ towards sympatheia.” — Daniel Hebb"I loved the fact that the daily challenges engage not only your mind, but your body and spirit. I’d highly recommend the Challenge to others who are interested in deepening their understanding of Stoic writings, but most importantly how stoic principles can be meaningfully applied to our daily lives." — Mark Clayton“The 30 Day Stoic Challenge really helped push me deeper into actual practice of Stoic principles, aside from just doing daily readings and some journaling. I still have the 30 day challenge hanging on my fridge.  It serves as a daily reminder of simple, relevant tasks that can be performed to keep this alive in my life.” — Shawn Sarazin“The 30 Day Stoic Challenge kicked off an avalanche of change in my life. A wall of resistance crumbled during the Challenge. Over and over and over again I've heard that I can control the quality of my days, and my life is in my hands, and every other buzz phrase that's floating around out there. I've also done some other challenges and taken classes, but the 30 Day Stoic Challenge let me experience what those words meant.  This was a unique experience and has probably saved me a ton of money that would have gone to a shrink.” — Mary MadsenIf that sounds like somethSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

28 Dec 20184min

Nearly two thousand years before Rudolph Clausius and Lord Kelvin first expressed the second law of thermodynamics (although there is debate on whether or not the French physicist Sadi Carnot discovered it earlier), Marcus Aurelius was musing on it. “Bear in mind,” he wrote, “that everything that exists is already fraying at the edges and in transition, subject to fragmentation and to rot. Or that everything was born to die.”That is to say: We are all subject to entropy. Science has since confirmed it into immutable law. We cannot eliminate disorder from the system, no matter how much we try. Everything we build, including ourselves, is constantly breaking down. What does this mean for us? First, it should bake in humility. We are building sand castles. Even our real castles eventually fall into the sea or crumble into dust. Second, it demands presence. This moment is all we have. So enjoy it. Drink it in. Appreciate it.But also be prepared to let it all go. Because it’s going, whether we like it or not. That’s the law. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

27 Dec 20182min

The actor Josh Peck recently had Robert Greene on his podcast to discuss the book, The Laws of Human Nature. It’s a fascinating interview, but one of the most revealing parts is when Josh asks Robert about how Robert squares his interest in Stoicism with the rather ruthless and Machiavellian messages of his books.  As Robert explains, we need to understand how the world works, especially if we intend to stick to a path of virtue.  “Marcus Aurelius had a quote, I can't say it exactly, but he says, when a boxer gets in the ring with another boxer and he gets punched, he doesn't complain and go, ‘god dammit, you hit me. I don't deserve to be hit.’ He accepts that. That's the game of life. Well, we should see that in life in general: when people hit us, that's just who they are. People are who they are. We shouldn't judge them. We should just accept them like we accept a rock or a stone or that boxer. That's what people are like, that's what we’re going to get. And the Stoic attitude of accepting the world as it is and working with how things are permeates the 48 Laws Of Power. It’s very much like Marcus Aurelius—advocating that you feel a level of detachment. In fact, I believe I use that quote from him. So it's not far off from Stoicism. But the latest book is more in that Stoic spirit than the 48 Laws. It's more about accepting that this is nature. The Stoics have a word, logos. This is the way that the universe is, this is what permeates the laws that govern all behavior. And so I'm very much in that spirit of kind of looking at people with some distance, but all my books are approaching life with a little bit of detachment because I feel like that's what will make you happier and also more successful in general.”What Robert is really saying is that although each of us should commit to being good and honest and fair, it’s naive to assume that everyone else has made a similar promise to themselves. In fact, we know from the opening of Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations that most people are greedy and selfish and rude and short-sighted. It’s essential that we understand these forces and the effects they have on the world. Not only to prepare for them and defend ourselves against them, but to remember that when we have important work to do or changes we are trying to bring about in the world, these same forces will be there as a kind of headwind. We can’t take this personally. We can’t let it upset or discourage us. We’ll need to know how to slip past this resistance, how to use its momentum against itself, how to turn that negative energy around and convince those small-minded people to side with us, against their immediate impulses. That’s what a true amoral study of history helps us do. Virtue may be the highest good to the Stoics, but not everyone else agrees. In fact, the people that don’t outnumber the people who do. And if we don’t understand how power and persuasion work, they will win. Today and forever. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

26 Dec 20184min

On December 25th, people all over the world celebrate Christmas, a holiday which marks the birth of Jesus Christ, one of the greatest philosophers who ever lived. This was a man who lived two thousand years ago, taught timeless lessons about kindness, mercy, forgiveness, on doing one’s duty, on the dangers of money and the redemptive power of poverty and adversity.It’s pretty remarkable to think that in that same year as Jesus, another philosopher was born, one who taught more or less the same lessons, one who for at least a century was far more famous and influential than Jesus was. That man’s name was Seneca.No one can confirm for certain the exact birth date for either, but it is indisputable that Seneca and Jesus walked the earth at the same time and lived roughly parallel lives. Indeed, they are both written about by Tacitus, and Seneca’s brother even appears briefly in the Bible! Again, it’s incredible.Ultimately, the two men met very similar ends, killed by the long reach of Nero’s tyranny. Both have lived on far beyond their deaths—Jesus it was claimed, rose from the dead after three days, and Seneca, through his writings, feels as alive to us as he would have to many Romans.What’s lovely too is that there is much to be learned from the teachings of both, whether you’re a believer or an atheist.“Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness." Seneca"Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." Jesus“It is a petty and sorry person who will bite back when he is bitten.” Seneca“If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” Jesus“You look at the pimples of others when you yourselves are covered with a mass of sores.” Seneca“And why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?” Jesus“If my wealth should melt away it would deprive me of nothing but itself, but if yours were to depart you would be stunned and feel you were deprived of what makes you yourself. With me, wealth has a certain place; in your case it has the highest place. In short, I own my wealth, your wealth owns you.” Seneca“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal...No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” JesusSeneca was simply a man, a rather flawed one in fact. Jesus—depending on your beliefs—was much more than a man. In a way, this makes Seneca much more interesting and relatable because he was just like us. Seneca was no prophet. He was a person trying to do the best he could. He struggled like us. Jesus was supposedly a carpenter, but Seneca really did have to work for a living. Jesus couldn’t have liked being crucified, but he knew that God was looking out for him. Seneca, like us, had to wrestle with the uncertainty of mortality.On this day right here, on Christmas Day, we should take a minute to simply marvel at this near-miracle—that two wise men were alive at the same time, and through their suffering and teachings, a great legacy has been passed down to us. While we don’t know what Jesus would have said about Seneca’s teachings, we know what Seneca would have told the Stoics about Jesus’s, because he saidSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

25 Dec 20185min

We can all remember times when it felt like everything was going our way. We were getting the breaks we wanted and opportunities came easy. It was the opposite of Murphy’s Law: What could go right, did.Perhaps we remember a time when we were younger, when it felt like more people were willing to help and teach us. But as time passes, this passes with it. Lucky breaks seem less common. We become like the man that Marcus Aurelius mimics by saying, “I was once a fortunate man but at some point fortune abandoned me.”This is absolutely the wrong way to look at it.Because, as Marcus continues, “true good fortune is what you make for yourself. Good fortune: good character, good intentions and good actions.”Let us face today with that attitude in mind. Good fortune is not getting lucky. It’s not the ball bouncing your way. It’s not other people doing stuff for you. Because all of those things are out of your control. They are not up to you.True good fortune is you doing stuff for other people. It’s you being a good person, regardless of whether you get cut a break for it. It’s you starting each day with a commitment to be your best, whatever happens.That IS up to you. Always.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

24 Dec 20182min

Just two and a half years ago, General Michael Flynn stood on the stage at the Republican National Convention and led some 20,000 people (and a good many more at home) in an impromptu chant of “Lock Her Up! Lock Her Up!” about his enemy Hillary Clinton. A few months later, he was swept into the White House with the Trump Administration, finding himself now the National Security Advisor to the most powerful man in the world. It was an incredible second act for a man who had been unceremoniously fired by the previous president and whose sanity many had questioned when he had first signed on with the campaign.That’s life. It comes at you fast.But then, just 24 days into his new job. Flynn was fired once more, in this case for lying to the Vice President about conversations he’d had with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States. Soon enough there was a special prosecutor breathing down his neck with criminal charges for lying to the FBI. On December 18th, a grand total of 29 months since his appearance on that stage in Cleveland, Michael Flynn found himself standing before Judge Emmet Sullivan, who had the power to decide whether it was he who would be locked up, and possibly branded as a traitor.Again, life comes at you fast.The purpose of today’s email is not to gloat at the fall of Michael Flynn, a man who in a previous lifetime served his country honorably, but to ring the reminder that all tragedies are supposed to ring: That our fates are always uncertain and that hubris only makes them more precarious.It was ambition of the kind that Flynn had--the desire to get ahead, or to get even, at all costs--that the Stoics warned against time and time again. Indeed, Seneca’s own life was a cautionary tale that Flynn might have done well to study as he greedily gobbled up consulting and speaking fees from foreign entities, and whose painful dance with power might have served as a deterrent to a man considering entering another controversial administration.When we take shortcuts, when we fall in with the wrong crowd, when we act in ways we know run contrary to the principles we believe in...we are chipping away at our own security and our own peace of mind. When we attack the flaws in other people and ignore our own (or, use that as a strategy to obscure our own), we are writing the end of our own tragedy.Life comes at us fast. It is unmerciful and often poetic in the justice that it metes out. Be careful. Be ready. And, more than anything, don’t be your own worst enemy.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

21 Dec 20184min

Yet again, Nick Foles has been called up to start at quarterback for the Eagles. After spending another heartbreaking season on the bench behind first round draft pick and star of the future, Carson Wentz—this time despite having won the Superbowl MVP (and the championship) for the Eagles the previous year—Nick Foles is back due to a surprise, late season injury. How did he respond to this opportunity? The same way he responded to losing the starting job when Wentz returned from injury earlier in the season—with poise and self-control. As Michele Tafoya, NBC’s sideline reporter and also a practicing Stoic, explained on Sunday Night Football, “Last night, Foles told us he had not unexpected to play again with Philadelphia and wanted to finish his time with the Eagles simply being a good teammate and helping out the team in any way he could. But on Friday when he learned for certain that he'd be the starter tonight, he immediately thought about last year and all the emotions that came with it. He said he had to, ‘Fight the human side of it all’ and remind himself, “this is a different team and a very different situation” and after an open, honest conversation with his wife, he re-centered and decided to play with the mentality of not looking at the clock or scoreboard and simply hone in on what he’s supposed to do.” There is a story about Cato being given an army command during the Roman Civil War and then having it stripped from him days later by some backstabbing enemies. It’s the same narrative as Foles, only in reverse, yet they both took the news the same way: By focusing on what they could control, on what was up to them. They didn’t let either the benching or the promotion affect them personally—they just did the best they could with both opportunities. They focused on contributing as much as they could—on being a good teammate—in both circumstances. That’s what an MVP does. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

19 Dec 20183min