Citizens of the World: A Stoic Podcast for Curious Travelers - Are You Choosing Alive Time or Dead Time?

Episode Date: April 25, 2020

We’re living through a global pandemic. It's okay to have down days and to be upset about the way things are. None of us want to be locked up in our house or to lose our job.But if we wallow in that negativity for too long, that doesn't mean we're going to get extra days in our life, right? We're not going to get bonus months at the end of our life because we survived lock down. Author Ryan Holiday has a podcast called the Daily Stoic. Lately, he’s been talking about Alive Time versus Dead Time, something writer Robert Greene told him about. According to him, we can spend our time in one of two ways, passively (Dead Time), where we’re just zoning out and letting life happen to us, and actively (Alive Time), where we’re learning, trying new things, and consciously choosing how to spend our time.As the Stoics taught us, we can't control what's going on in the world, but we can control how we react to it. You’ll never get today again -- will you make it matter?*I’m your host, Sarah Mikutel. Did you know I host another show called Podcasting Step by Step? Check it out if you’ve been wanting to start a podcast. Every week, I break down ‘how to podcast’ with a little loving motivation to give you the skills and confidence you need to finally launch that show of your dreams. Ready to start your podcast right now? Check out Podcast Launch Academy. Ready to travel? Get your free guide to cheap airfare. Thank you so much for listening to this show. I know you’re busy and have many listening options, so it means a lot to me that you’re here. You are the best. This podcast is brought to you by Audible. Not a member yet? Postcard Academy listeners can get a FREE audiobook and a 30-day free trial if you sign up viaaudibletrial.com/postcard This podcast is also brought to you by World Nomads. Need simple and flexible travel insurance? Get a cost estimate from World Nomads using their handy calculator at postcardacademy.co/insurance  Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free Conversation Cheat Sheet with simple formulas you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you’re in a meeting or just talking with friends.Download it at sarahmikutel.com/blanknomore and start feeling more confident in your conversations today.

Welcome to the Postcard Academy, a show about travel, living abroad, and location independence for people seeking a more meaningful freedom-fueled life. I'm your host, Sarah Micatel, an American who first moved abroad on our own at age 18 and who has been permanently enjoying life in Europe since 2010. I am so glad you're here. My guests and I will share with you how we made our travel, living abroad, and location independent dreams come true, and how you can to because you will never have this day again. Make it matter. Hello, hello, I hope you have been enjoying this divine spring however you are able, wherever you are. Over the last few weeks, I have been walking around Fokston and just marveling at how the nature just keeps on going.

The tulips here are so red and lush and full of life and the birds are singing. The sun is shining and the waves keep crashing on the shore, as they always do. They don't pause when there's a pandemic or when there's any other type of crisis and the world. And it feels really good to be in this consistency and in this beauty. I've mentioned before on this podcast, but I'm a history lover, and I have visited some pretty dark places. I think it is important to go. and bear witness to things that have happened in our past that a lot of us don't really want to remember, but we need to remember. So I have been to several concentration camps and death camps in Poland and in Germany. And every single time I've gone to one, the weather has been so perfect,

it almost feels blissful, warm breeze, blue sky, leafy green trees, and the sun is just so bright, it hurts your eyes. But what really sticks with me is the birds, chirping. When you arrive at these camps, before you get there, you kind of imagine that they're going to be almost black and white, bleak and cold places. And then you get there and the weather's perfect and life seems normal. And the birds keep chirping and singing and you're thinking, don't you know what happened here? And I find myself thinking, you know, I wonder if they were still singing during the war during the death marches and forced labor and evil experiments. And then I hope that they did. I hope those birds did sing and give those victims trap behind those fences a little piece of

normalcy by continuing on. I will never forget the Easter that I spent visiting a friend's family in the eastern side of Germany. I had been to Berlin before and enjoyed the city life there, but I hadn't been to the countryside out on the eastern side of Germany where they were under communism for decades. And I can't really remember exactly what I expected her hometown to look like. But I think it was again one of those situations where you're kind of thinking black and white, bleak, I don't know, destroyed maybe. But I didn't expect to find a normal suburb that you would find anywhere. But that is what I found. And, you know, a few decades earlier, this place was on fire being raised to the ground. And now here I arrive and there's tulips in the garden and everything seems normal. And one day when I was there, my friend and I sat down with her grandmother who was 18 when World War II ended. And I was so curious about what life was like back then, but I felt very awkward asking the sweet old lady questions about that time. But I guess I kept hinting my

interest over tea in her kitchen. And so she happily started to share some post-war memories. And I don't think I had ever heard the German perspective from somebody who wasn't a Nazi or a concentration camp survivor. And I don't know if I've ever heard these stories live, you know, from an actual person rather than on TV. And so my friend was translating her grandmother's words. And she told me that, she was a teenager and the war is over and that when they knew that the Russians were coming, she and everyone else in the village packed into a train, destination unknown, to avoid being raped and or burned alive in their houses. And her mother nearly died after the Russians poisoned the water.

So 26 million Russians, more than half civilians, died fighting the Nazis after Hitler betrayed their alliance. And so they wanted blood. Now, I know what you might be thinking because I was thinking the same thing. Serves those Germans right after murdering millions of people. They deserve to suffer. And I felt the same way. The day before I was speaking to my friend's grandmother, I was in museum seeing skeletal Holocaust victims.

And so I at first was struggling to find compassion for these German people who suddenly found themselves on a crowded train. but of course not all Germans were Nazis and I think we all like to imagine that we would have been different from them we would have been the ones risking our lives to save others I mean you hope that's true and especially when we're young we imagine we would have been the heroes but the truth is most of us are just average people trying to live our lives I mean there's a lot of bad things happening out in the world right now and we're not getting involved in all these different injustices. So, but back in 1945, my friend's grandmother, I think, 1945,

1945, 1945, 1946, my friend's grandmother made her way back to her hometown. There wasn't anything there. She was living in a stable and working at a bakery, just getting paid in bread. And it's really funny the things that people remember. So she said that toilets really confused the Russians and that They used them for sinks and to put fish in them. And when a fish disappeared down the drain, the soldiers would shoot up the toilet to try to catch them. And so this story made me laugh. And then she started laughing my friend's grandmother. And she was just so jolly.

And it's, I think she didn't seem as traumatized as I felt for her. And these stories happened so long ago. They must have felt like they belonged to somebody else. or who knows, maybe it feels like they just happened yesterday or maybe both. I think that's, I think that's a common thing for a lot of us as well. It's just amazing to me what people can live through and how fast things can change, right? And I think we're thinking that this right now, like, how long is this going to go on? When is life going to get normal again? And life can get normal pretty quick. But you probably know that after the Allies defeated the Nazis, the world wanted to

prevent Germany from going on another murderous rampage. And so the country was divided into East and West. And the Soviets controlled the German Democratic Republic, the GDR, and France, Great Britain, and the U.S. controlled the Federal Republic of Germany in the West. And many in the East, where my friend's family was. They didn't like being under communist control. And so they fled to the West until 1961, the Soviets pretty much overnight put up the Berlin Wall to prevent that rain drain. And the families from then on who were living in the West, they could visit their Eastern relatives, but they couldn't bring them back. And so they would have a visit with them. And then they had to say goodbye at this train station called the Palace of Tears. And so the Berlin Wall came down in

1989 when my friend and I, my friend and I, we were kids in school and understood the significance of what was happening. But as new generations are born, what happened to their parents and grandparents that already feels like ancient history? It's just so shocking to me how fast things can change and how fast we can bounce back. Look at the children born to the children who survived the Bosnian War in the 90s or the kids in China being raised. with technology in cities where a generation or two ago, their families may have been living in poverty on some rural farm. And they don't relate to the hardship of previous generations. And part of that is good and part of that is bad. But I think one thing that's important to remember

is, you know, there's resilience and there's hope. Humans are resilient. And, you know, we have hopeful. We're a hopeful species often. But, you know, right now I'm seeing, you know, it's quite common, prevalent even to see people post on social media. It's okay to not be okay. And that's totally true. It's okay to not be okay. It's okay to have it down days and to be upset about the way things are. None of us want to be locked down in our house. So it's okay to not be okay and feel that for a little while. But if we wallow, in that negativity for too long, that doesn't mean that we're going to get extra days in our life, right? We're not going to get these months back. We're not going to get bonus months at the

end of our life because we survived lockdown. I hear some people shouting, there are no silver linings about this. But I just have a friendly reminder for these people that we're not biding our time right now until things get normal. Again, this isn't a dress rehearsal. This is our life. Our life is still happening. And every day that you spend in misery is another day that you're not going to get back. I think this is worth repeating. There are no bonus days. I'm seeing a lot of people saying that everything is on hold right now, but it's not. Life is marching on. Your life is marching on. And you can decide whether this is a live time or dead time. So author, Ryan Holiday, has a podcast called The Daily Stoic, and lately he's been talking about a live time versus

dead time, and this is something that writer Robert Green told him about. So according to Robert Green, we can spend our time in one of two ways, passively, which is dead time where we are just zoning out and letting life happen to us, or actively, which is a live time where we're learning and trying new things and consciously choosing how to spend our time. So, It's okay to be okay. We shouldn't feel guilty for seeking out the positives in a situation. One of my favorite sayings is, don't ask why this is happening to me, but ask why is this happening for me or else we are just letting life happen to us and falling into victimhood. And we have more control over our life than that. At least we have more control over how we

react to things. We can't control what's going on in the world outside, but we can control how we react to it. I've always been interested in stoicism, and I confess, I haven't looked too deeply into this, but I really love the broad concept of it, especially since going to Athens, Greece, which is the birthplace of stoicism. This is something that I'm much more interested in diving deeper into the Stoics, those philosophers, they had emotions, of course. Sometimes, you know, I think people often think that they were just cold and emotionless and tried to completely set themselves apart from the world. But that's not true. They had emotions, of course, but they didn't let them rule their life. They were mindful of the experiences that they were going through and acting

conscientiously. And if anything, I think the Stoics loved and appreciated life more than anyone, because they were especially conscious of our limited time here on Earth and just doing good and feeling good while we're here and present and in the moment. So we can't control the chaos swirling around the pandemic, but what we can do here and now is just to make the most of it. And actually, much more than make the most of it, let's try to enjoy this time, whether we are on our own or in a house full of people running around. We're never going to have this time again. And as I said, we're not going to get extra time later on like, oh, you lived through quarantine. Let me give you an extra two months of living. No, this is your life right now. So make the most of it,

whether that means going for walks, making some new friends online, starting a business, writing a novel. This is your time to do what you want with. My friend Caitlin, is a mom with a really small child, and she doesn't get the chance to go too many conferences. And she was just telling me she has been so thrilled that now the conferences are coming to her online. She can participate in more things and she's loving it. There are plenty of different opportunities, plenty of different ways to get involved in different conversations happening online right now, tons of different courses to do. And it's also time for more real conversations. We've been moving so fast that we've kind of gotten lost touch with what really matters.

I saw a very heartfelt video clip the other day of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo having that realization. He was doing some interview and he said, you know, I realized that the interactions between me and my kids have just become so superficial. It's just, hey, how are you? Doing okay. Do you need money? Like very transactional.

And now that they have more time to speak together, he's getting to know his kids on a much, you know, deeper level. And I just thought that was a beautiful perspective and something that we should all be mindful of. So this is our time to reset, to think about what really matters and how we want to spend the rest of our lives. So I think it's really important that we've gotten this gift of reflection. So life is continuing on. The birds are singing, the flowers are growing, the waves keep crashing, and it's up to you. Do you want to make this a live time or dead time? Whichever you choose, you will never have this day again. So make it matter. That's all for now. Thank you so much for listening and have a beautiful week wherever you are. Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot?

I created a free conversation sheet sheet with simple formulas that you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you're in a meeting or just talking with friends. Download it at sarahmicotel.com slash blank no more.