On Purpose with Jay Shetty - Ryan Holiday ON: Eliminating Fear From Your Life & Push Past Them This Year

Episode Date: January 24, 2022

Do you want to meditate daily with me? Go to go.calm.com/onpurpose to get 40% off a Calm Premium Membership. That's only $42 for the whole year! Experience the Daily Jay. Only on CalmJay Shetty talks to Ryan Holiday about why being too comfortable won’t help you grow. When you take risks, you prepare yourself to be mentally and emotionally present and be ready for what may happen. Taking risks without fearing what might happen is the foundation that allows us to evolve for better even when constraints are present and some things are just out of our control.  Ryan is a Wall Street Journal bestselling author, book store owner, public-relations strategist, and host of the podcast The Daily Stoic. Some of his best selling books are The Obstacle Is The Way, Ego Is the Enemy, Stillness is the Key, and The Daily Stoic. He owns and operates Painted Porch Bookshop, an independent bookstore in Bastrop, Texas. He lives on a 40-acre ranch in Bastrop County, Texas with his wife and two sons.What to Listen For:00:00 Intro04:42 It takes 10,000 hours to get to mastery05:45 Opening a bookstore during the pandemic10:27 How do you know which books to read?17:36 What courage truly means20:37 We’re all self-interested people but we value other people’s opinion26:17 If you’re in a place where you identify with external results, you become vulnerable30:34 Cultivating the ability to push through your fear33:55 Being too comfortable makes you afraid to take risks40:25 Deciding not to see the world as a zero sum place45:00 When you make trade offs that aren’t worth it46:07 Just how much is out of your control?48:54 Positive changes out of situational constraints51:17 What is heroism?55:58 Ryan on Fast FiveEpisode ResourcesRyan Holiday | WebsiteRyan Holiday | TwitterRyan Holiday | FacebookRyan Holiday | InstagramRyan Holiday | BooksSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm Jay Shetty and on my podcast on purpose, I've had the honor to sit down with some of the most incredible hearts and minds on the planet. Oprah, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Hart, Louis Hamilton, and many, many more. On this podcast, you get to hear the raw real-life stories behind their journeys and the tools they used, the books they read, and the people that made a difference in their lives so that they can make a difference in hours. Listen to on purpose with Jay Shetty on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Join the journey soon. What if you could tell the whole truth about your life, including all those tender and visible things we don't usually talk about?

I'm Megan Devine. Host of the podcast, it's okay that you're not okay. Look everyone's at least a little bit not okay these days, and all those things we don't usually talk about, maybe we should. This season, I'm joined by stellar guests like Abbermote, Rachel Cargol, and so many more. It's okay that you're not okay. New episodes each and every Monday, available on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you listen to podcasts. I am Jan Levan Zant, and I'll be your host for The R-Spot.

Each week listeners will call me live to discuss their relationship issues. Nothing will tear a relationship down faster than two people with no vision. There's y'all are just floppin' around like fish out of water. Mommy, daddy, your ex, I'll be talking about those things and so much more. Check out the art spot on the iHeart Video app Apple Podcast or whatever you listen to podcasts. And I think if you can get to a place where you're not identifying with the love or the mistreatment, you're just like, here's who I am.

Here's the intention, the motivation that I know I'm acting on, and that I know that's coming from a good place. And so whether they're saying, Jay, you're amazing, or they're saying, Jay, you're awful, you're screwing this up, you suck. You're just like, I'm gonna do what I have to do as long as I'm able to do it. Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world. Thanks to each and every single one of you that come back every week to listen, learn and grow.

Now today's guest is someone that I've interviewed not once, not twice, not three times, but this is the fourth time we're sitting down together. The first time was at Huff Post back in like 2016 when I was just starting a lot of my online work. Then we did a Nasdaq reads probably around 2017, maybe 2018. And then I got to sit down with him on the podcast. You've already loved him on the show just last year. I think it was just before the pandemic.

And then now we are having our fourth ever interview. I'm talking about the one and only Ryan Holiday. Ryan Holiday is one of the world's best selling living philosophers. His books like The Obstacle is the Way, Ego is the Enemy, The Daily Stoic have all reached number one New York Times best seller status. And stillness is the key appears in more than 40 languages. And all of his books have sold more than four million copies. Together they've spent over 300 weeks, 300 weeks on the best seller lists.

He lives outside Austin with his wife and two boys and a small herd of cows and donkeys and goats. And he also opened up his own bookstore, which I love, the painted porch and sits on the historic Main Street in Bastrop, Texas. And his new book, The Courage is Calling, Already in New York Times, Best Seller. If you haven't read it, I highly recommend that you go and grab it. Ryan, like you did for so many others, you opened up our minds and lives to the teachings of the Stoics, which I am eternally grateful for because I think you've brought so much wisdom through that we would have missed out on. And you're also in many ways inspired me to think about how I could do something similar for Vedic philosophers

and thoughts. So, thank you from a personal level, a collective level, societal level. Well, I've seen you do a lot of activism work too, but Ryan, welcome back to the show. No, thanks for having me. It's crazy. We do go way back. And I think both of us had somewhat circuitous journeys to where we are now. Like, you interviewed me on two different shows before you had your own show.

I did a bunch of stuff before I was a writer. To me, I, in case people don't pick up on what that means, is like just because you're not like very rarely does anyone just get to start like by having their own platform or putting out their own thing. And you have to take jobs or do things you have to work your way there. And I think people who are in the middle of that, sometimes you don't know where it's gonna end up,

you can kind of lose faith. But I think in both of our cases, like we put in the work, paid our dues, and we did get there. And I hope that's encouraging to people. Because it's amazing. It always takes longer than you think it should, but eventually you get there.

Absolutely. I remember talking to you about, you started in marketing, and you talk about your time at American Apparel, and then I also remember talking to you about how you're the Leonardo DiCaprio of writers, where you'd written all these amazing books that were epic, and you were waiting for this, you know,

the arbitrary idea of ranking on the list. And I, you know, I think we were talking about that last time when we were messaging. And I was like, you know, Leonardo Capri has been nominated for an Oscar seven times and only one once. And that's pretty much the same as you. And it's just one of those amazing things that all your journey has brought you to this pace.

And now when you look back at your beautiful portfolio of books, and I know that courage is calling is the part of a new set of four books, I really like that you started with that point that we've known each other through a lot of different faces, a lot of different names, a lot of different banners. And today it's beautiful to sit with you and do this again, but it started very differently.

But I have to be honest, I've had fun with you since day one. So I'm expecting this to be no different. Well, you know, people talk about like 10,000 hours, right? They take 10,000 hours to get to mastery. I think two things are easy to miss there. Number one, it's not 10,000 hours of terrible grinding labor. It should be fun. And I had a ton of fun along the way.

And two, just because it might take 10,000 hours or it could take 20,000 hours or 100,000 hours to actually get to the place where you've really, truly mastered it, that doesn't mean that you can't make a great living between now and then and that you can't do work that you're proud of that stands up. Like, I'm, this is my, I think, 12th book. Wow. I'm proud of all the books in between, but the 12th book is only possible because of the 11th and the 10th and the 9th and the 8th. The idea should be that you're on this journey and that you're getting better as you go, even though you are not ideally where you want to be, but you're having fun along the way, as you said. Absolutely.

And I wanted to start off somewhere before we dive into all the wisdom and the insight and the practices. I wanted to know what does it feel like as an author during the pandemic to have opened your own bookstore called the Painted Port? It seems like that. It seems like a really, it's like being an artist and then opening your own art gallery,

right? And with other people's art in it as well as yours, of course, tell what does that feel like? Well, it was very exciting at first. Well, I think right around the time I saw you last, that was when I was thinking about doing it and we sort of made some of the initial decisions to do it. And then I believe we'd hired our first employee in February of 2020. So it was all very exciting and then it got very terrifying and very real and very overwhelming quickly because the whole world shut down.

And I think we thought it would be a project that would take a year, and it took two years. And that was obviously more expensive than intended and scarier than intended. But it also was an opportunity to take it slow to do it right, to really think about why we were doing it and how we wanted to do it. And then it gave us a whole other sense of what the meaning of it was, right? So, you know, you're thinking, hey, bookstores are important because it's a place people go. You can be around other people. You can talk about things. And then when you, when we were looking at a world where that was not possible, you suddenly

realized what those things mean to you and you don't take them so much for granted anymore. So it was really, it was a very trying and challenging experience to be sure, but the upside was it made the rewards of it so far, much more compelling and meaningful, I think. Yeah, I love that. It's wonderful, it's wonderful hearing that, you know, you've got through

and you've figured it out, and I'm sure it's been harder than it needed to be, but it sounds wonderful. And I hope I get a visit. So I really look forward to actually going there. I've never been able to go to a bookstore and say my friend owns this and he's a writer. It's cool. So I really look forward to it. No, I mean, books are such an amazing thing. Like, if you think about what a book is, right? Like, a book is 10 years or a lifetime of work and understanding bound between two covers for like $20. Like, it's this incredible piece of technology

that's now endured for thousands of years. That I just, books have been so important in my life. Obviously, there's different businesses I would open if what I was interested in is making more money, a bookstore in 2021, let alone during a pandemic is not the best. But I think I have a podcast too, and there's something amazing about reaching millions

of people at scale, digitally throughout the world, but there is also something special about holding things and having a space. And so my wife and I were just thinking, like, we've been so blessed, we've got to do so many cool things. What is something that could be fun?

Could also be a business opportunity, but I think improve the community in which we live. And that's kind of what I've just been thinking about more lately is not everything has to be like, how do I reach as many people as possible? It can also be like, how do you really reach the smaller amount of people that you are reaching? Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more.

For me, as well, it's always been about scale and depth, scale and depth. And it's like, you know, you have scale, but how can you go deep with that scale? But then also, how can you scale down and take people even on a more meaningful and deeper journey, more personally? And I was able to do that even digitally during the pandemic. We, a lot of me and my private coaching clients, people that I work with one on one, we started this like small meditation communities for them and their families or them and their friends on Zoom.

And I was teaching, I'm used to teaching in, you know, meditation on Instagram live to, you know, hundreds of thousands or millions of people after people watch it on the replay. And to actually just sit on a Zoom with just 10 faces every single week. It was beautiful. It's been some of the most meaningful work I've ever done and you're spot on. So I get that. Now I want to start, I've got so many questions to ask you right. And we've just been chatting. So I need to like actually everyone's going to be like,

what are you guys doing? Just having a conversation, which is partly what I'm doing. But I wanna find out, you introduced stoicism to the world in a huge way massively, like, you know, really brought it out beyond where I think it had been, at least from my knowledge, at least for me, definitely. And I wanted to understand, like, can you tell us the story of how you discovered stoicism and how that first moment made you feel and why you felt compelled to share with the rest of the world?

I think a lot of what we're doing, you and I are doing, is sort of paying it forward, right? Somebody introduced you to the ideas and they hit you and you had this amazing sort of life-changing transformation because of that. And then there's this kind of moment where you go, could I do that for someone else? And then we're talking about scale earlier, how could I do that like even better? How could I do that to how could I take what I experienced and not just do it to the people that I physically interact with, but millions of people. So I was in college and I went to this conference

in West Hollywood and the speaker was Dr. Drew from HLN and from Love Line. Now he has a wonderful podcast as well. And he was speaking and I had grown up listening to Love Line. And so I remember at that age, whenever I would meet smart people that I admired or that I had some random circumstances, I'd be like, what books do you recommend? Because I was just thinking there's so many books

out in the world, how do you know which ones to read? And I was thinking if I just read the ones that really smart people that I admire have read, I'll be like skipping all the stuff that, it'll be like skipping all the stuff that, you know, it'll be like it's like getting, you know, notes from people ahead of you. And so I asked him and he told me he was reading the writings of Epic Titus, who is this Roman slave.

And I went back to my hotel room and I bought Epic Titus and I bought Marcus Aurelius because I'd seen the movie Gladiator. And these two books arrived, and they hit me. I read Marcus Aurelius first, actually here. I mean, grab. This is my now 15 year old copy of meditations. I've had to retape the cover on because I've read it so many times. But you read meditations, and, it hit me like a million

bricks. I mean, in the, in the first line of meditations, he says, and this is like one of my, he says, when you wake in the morning, tell yourself the people I will deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, and surly. And he says, they're like this because they can't tell good from evil. But he goes, but they can't implicate me in ugliness nor can I feel angry at my relative or hate him. We were born to work together like feet and hands and eyes to feel angry at someone to turn your back on him. These are obstructions. And I just I just remember being hit by that going like obstructions. And I just, I just remember being hit by that going like the emperor of Rome wrote this, like he just wrote a note to himself about how frustrating and annoying people are going to be, but that he couldn't let this change him or make him angry. And

that he had this obligation to work together with them. And, and I remember I was taking philosophy classes at the time, but it was nothing like this. Like when you read Aristotle, I mean, there's definitely good parts in it, but you're also like, what is he talking about? Right? He's explaining the universe or something.

He's not saying like, this is how you deal with a jerk in traffic. Or, you know, this is how you deal with your obnoxious roommate, right? Like, I just love that Marcus Ruse was being so real and so practical, but at the same time, trying to be great, like trying to be decent and good and patient.

And just that was transformative for me and eventually, you know, got to a place where I thought, maybe I could write stuff like this or I could write about stuff like this and That's been the journey for me now for a decade and a half. Yeah, I love that. Thank you for sharing that so much And I love so much about what you just said so first of all I want to point out to everyone who's listening I love that you went up to someone and asked what books do you you recommend? Because that's such a great question, because 99% of people don't go up. And the one percent of people that do go up, they go up and say, how can I spend more time with you or how can I connect with you or how can how can we have dinner or lunch or whatever it may be? And the answer 99% of the time is, I don't think I have time for that. Like, I'm not sure that's going

to happen. I'd love to, but it's not possible. And so by asking them what books they're reading, you're tapping into their mindset for days, weeks, months, years that you would never get time and access to someone that inspires you in that way. And thank you for so much for reading the first one. I mean, anyone who listens to that,

you're just like, I wanna live like that, right? Like that's how you feel straight away. just like, I wanna live like that, right? Like that's how you feel straight away. You go, I wanna live like that. I wanna share with you the biggest news of the year. How many of you want to meditate? I can see your heads nodding, I can see you raising your hands, I can see you saying, yes, Jay, I really want to learn to meditate.

How many of you would like to learn to meditate with me every single day? Now I already know what the answer is because I know how many messages, DMs, reviews, notes that I get saying, Jay, I'd love to meditate with you. Last year we took meditation to Instagram and I meditated for around 40 days live and 20 million of you tuned in. Now I am taking that same focus, that same presence to calm. I've partnered up with calm to release a new series called The Daily J where you can meditate with me every single day for 7 minutes to make it a real habit.

I would love for you to come and join me and take part in building a really powerful meditation practice and guess what, we're going to do it together. Head over right now to calm.com forward slash J to get 40% off a premium membership that's calm.com forward slash J. Well, the crazy thing about the book question is, from forward slash J. Well, the crazy thing about the book question is, so even today, I got a bunch of emails from random people

which saw very nice, I'm not gonna be able to respond to all of them, but somebody was like, hey, I'm struggling with depression, what's a book you would recommend? And I would like to be two seconds to reply, right? And of all the emails today, that's the one that I responded to, because I love books,

and that's an easy way I can help a person. But the crazy thing about the Dr. Drew story was, like three months later, I went to a different conference, and he was there again. I don't know how, I don't know how the odds of it work, but I went up to him and I was like, you probably don't remember me,

but I read those books, right? And he was like, I do remember you, but I did not think you were going to read those books. And he and I are friends now, like 20 years later, 15 years later, we still know each other because I didn't just get the recommendation, but then I actually did the work, like I read the book. And now he and I have this connection forever. And I think the amount of people that like asked me for recommendation versus the amount

of people I hear back from who have actually taken the time to read the book, you know, it's a small percentage of a small percentage. And so these books are out there. These books that have changed people's lives. People have been through the exact same thing that you've been through. They're there, but no one can read them for you. Yeah, no, absolutely. Well said.

And this leads us nicely to courage is calling the, you know, the new book because to me, you know, we have this perception that to have a great life, we need to be brave, we need to be courageous, but you actually start the book at fear. And I think what's fascinating about that is a lot of people have the fear or we think we lack the courage to go up to someone and ask a question. Then we fear taking the step of ordering the books because we're thinking, oh, well, when will I get time to read them and they're just going to become a door stopper? And then maybe I'll feel worse about myself, or maybe we get beyond them. We order them. And then we fear reading them. We go, oh, no, well, that may need me to change or that may need me to shift or

I may have to give up some luxury or some comfort that I'm used to. There's fear at every single step. Walk us through how fear can be something that is necessary, but is also just expected. Well, you make an important point about courage, which I really tried to build the book around, which is that courage is not just running into battle or a burning building or jumping out of an airplane or, you know, it's not just physical danger and it's not always dramatic, right? So there's physical courage and moral courage. Moral courage is also the courage of a whistleblower or a truth teller or a transgressive artist, but it's also just the courage to like walk up and talk to a stranger

or the courage to start your own podcast or the courage to put yourself out there or to you have this, like, I don't know, the decision to cut your hair a certain way and not give a shit what anyone thinks, right? Like there's also this really small day-to-day courage. It doesn't, it's not always this dramatic, glorious thing. And I think you're right. Like a lot of, a lot of really basic things in our life come down to a failure of

courage. Even, even you think about people who are afraid to try something, not because they're afraid of failing, which they probably are, but also just afraid of success, right? Like afraid of what changes would be demanded or what it would mean to then have to wrestle with this thing. And so it's not that we don't know what we should do. It's that we have a million reasons why we shouldn't do it, right? That's what fear is. Fear is the thing that gets in the way, what Stephen Pressfield calls the resistance between what we can be and where we are. So it's not the courageous people

do not feel those fears. It's that they push past them, right? The things we want in life are on the other side of that fear, like all good things in life require courage. I would imagine there's very little that anyone listening could think of in their own life, that they're proud of, that did not require some triumph over fear. Certainly everything that I'm proud of in my life

was something that I had to push myself out of my comfort zone to get. I'm Yvonne Gloria. I'm Eva Longoria. I'm Maite Gomes-Rachon. We're so excited to introduce you to our new podcast, Hungry for History! On every episode, we're exploring some of our favorite dishes, ingredients, beverages, from our Mexican culture.

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the rest of us. When a relationship breaks down, I take copious notes, and I want to share them with you. Anybody with two eyes and a brain knows that too much Alfredo sauce is just no good for you. But if you're going to eat it, they're not going to stop you. So he's going to continue to give you the Alfredo sauce and put it even on your grits if you don't stop him. Listen to the art spot on the I Heart video app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Yeah, absolutely. No, I think you spot on.

I mean, yeah, I'm thinking about that right now and I hope everyone who's listening or watching is thinking about that too. I can't think of barely thinking of anything if anything at all. And so, you know, that aligns very strongly. And I like, you know, in the book, there's the part that you wrote that says,

and there has never ever been a time when the average opinion of faceless, unaccountable strangers should be valued over our own judgment. And I love that because I think we're living at a time when faceless, unaccountable strangers dictate everything in our lives, whether it's a comment, whether it's a DM, whether it's a message and email,

walk us through, why is it that we take unaccountable faceless strangers so seriously? Now, why does that exist? Look, it's not like this just some modern thing, right? In meditations, Mark Serio says, the crazy thing is, we all love ourselves more than other people. We're all self-interested, selfish people. It's a certain degree, right? And he says, and yet we value other people's opinions more than our own, right? You see the sweatshirt you like and you buy it and then someone's like, what's that? You're like, oh, you don't like it?

I shouldn't let you know, like, or you spend, on the other end of the spectrum, you spend two years writing a book, and then you go, but did the critics accept me? Did the publisher like it? You know, you can even find yourself, is it any good? And it's like, who is this person to decide that it's any good?

You're the one, you know, this is why you do what you do. And yet we hand over approval, success to other people. And like, look, when the obstacle is the way came out, just to sort of illustrate this idea that nobody knows anything. The publisher offered me half what they'd offered me for my first book, for what was my second book. So right out of the gate, I had the idea for the obstacles the way, and the publisher said, that idea is half as good as your last idea.

They did not believe in it. Look, they believed it in enough to purchase it, but they did not have high hopes. A close friend of mine, I found out later, predicted that it would sell 5,000 copies, right? It came out, it didn't hit the best seller list, the week he came out. It sold like maybe 30,000 copies in the first six months,

maybe 60,000 in the first year. Did not hit a best seller list for the first five years of its existence, and then ultimately has gone on to sell, you know, about a million and a half copies. So the success of that book, if I was judging it based on what other people said, would have been a failure, would have been a disappointment, would have been mediocre at best. But what I knew is that it was one, something was really important to me. Two, I knew it was something that because it had been

so important to me that with time, it would resonate with people. And then three, it was pleasurable and exciting and rewarding for me to do. And so kind of everything beyond that was extra. And I moved on to other projects and let it do what it did. So the fact that it's now how all the success is wonderful bonus on top, but that wasn't why I did it, because if it was why I, if that was what had been motivating me from the

beginning, I never would have done it because it would have been killed. The second the offer came back from the publisher and they said, eh, you know, and that is how it works in life. There, you know, people are often worried about somebody stealing your idea and there's a great line from a physicist, his name, I'm forgetting, but he said, don't worry about that. He says, if it's an original idea,

you're gonna have to ram it down people's throats because people aren't gonna get it at first. Everything that's new, exciting, innovative, important was unappreciated or outright despised when it came out. So you have to be able to cultivate this sense of why you're doing what you're doing, why it's valuable, why it's important, what it means to you, and you have to get to a place where you're a little bit indifferent, which is still a term, meaning that if people love

it great, if they hate it, that's okay too, but you have your own sense of it, and that's what allows you to sort of ignore both of those things. Yeah, no, that indifference I find so fascinating because when you first hear it, it sounds like there's no fun and it sounds like there's no joy, but actually when you live it, it's liberating. And I find that there's something really fascinating. I remember first coming across that when I was around probably like 20 years old, I was the president of a youth organization back in London. And I took on this role at about 18 years old,

I was given it, I didn't audition for it, I didn't apply for it, I was given it. And for two years my life was held because everything I did was massively criticized because it wasn't as good as the previous president. And so, and I was, I didn't knew nothing about leadership. I mean, you know, leadership is a really big, complex, conscious, thoughtful thing I was 18 to know anything. Anyway, for two years, everything I did was criticized. It was ridiculed. It was compared.

And I started to feel really bad about myself. But the one thing I held on to was that everyone's criticizing me for my management, but not for who I am. And I held on to that very closely. I was like, okay, I'm a bad manager, I'm a bad leader. I'll take that all day. No one's saying I'm a bad person.

I'm gonna hold on to that. And then something really fascinating happened that we had a fundraiser when I was about 20 years old. And that fundraiser I like outperformed where I've raised lots of money for this really important foundation and all this. And all of a sudden the same people were like, oh my God, Jay, you're like the best thing in the world

and you're incredible. And it was that day that I promised myself that I would remain indifferent. And I promised myself, I remember it's still now a 21, promising myself, going, I am not going to let the opinions of other people make me feel good or bad. And that doesn't stop me from feeling joy because I get to feel good for myself when

I feel like I've done something, right? Does that feel right? Yeah, totally. It's kind of similar to in meditation, right? You have these thoughts and you realize you don't have to identify with the thoughts. They can just exist, right? Like a cloud exists, and it's there in your view, and then it drifts off, and you don't really know what happens to it, right?

And I think this is where we want to get with success as well as criticism or failure or worse, right? Like being attacked undeservedly. Mark Serely's talks about being able to accept success without arrogance and let the rest go with indifference. And I think if you can get to a place where you're not identifying with the love or the mistreatment, you're just like, here's who I am. Here's the intention, the motivation that I know I'm acting on, and that I know that's coming from a good place.

And so whether they're saying, Jay, you're amazing, or they're saying, Jay, you're awful, you're screwing this up, you suck. You're just like, I'm gonna do what I have to do as long as I'm able to do it, and I'm not gonna identify either way. And I think people sort of nod their head along with this. It's easy to identify with the success on the way up.

But then what happens to those people is what happens when you inevitably screw up, run into bad luck or whatever. You think about an athlete. If an athlete is identifying with the hot streak that they're on, well statistically, that's just not going gonna last, right? And so, you have to understand that you're gonna lose,

that you're gonna miss, you're gonna screw up, and if you're in a place where you identify with those external results, you're really, really vulnerable, and you're gonna be really unhappy, especially in those dark, those dark, dark moments. Yeah. So Ryan, then what do we do with fear? If everyone's listening and watching, they're going through the fears that we, we know that they are, what do we do with fear? I feel like

it's such a, we're almost scared of the emotion in and of itself and then we panic. Well, the Stoics obviously believe in the power of reason, right? And a lot of fear, you could say, is unreasonable, right? Like you think about failure, right? Let's say you're putting out a book, I'm putting out a book, and you're like, what if it doesn't do well, right? And you're sort of scared of this. What the Stoics would say is, what if that happens? Like what does it actually mean, right?

Not like, oh, this is vague, unpleasant thing, but what does that look like? Well, you already got paid for it. You already did the thing, right? Like actually it failing is nothing. It doesn't matter at all, right? Like it's not what you would choose, but you're not gonna end up under a bridge.

They're not gonna tar and feather you or something, right? Like, there's no consequences. And so this is a really important thing. I remember when I was dropping out of college, I was so scared about it. And I was so convinced that I shouldn't do it because I was afraid of what might happen. And I remember one of my mentors goes,

he says like, when I was in college, I got sick for a year and I spent, he spent a year in the hospital. And I was like, and what happened? And he was like, it's literally not come up once in my life. He's like, I graduated in five years instead of four years. He's like, the worst thing that could happen here is that you just go back to school and you have to make up for the time that you missed. That was really important, right? To break down the thing that you're afraid of, to really think about the worst case scenario. People are afraid of like, I've staged fright, right? I don't like talking in front of crowds.

Literally, what is the worst thing that could happen? A bunch of strangers you'll never meet again. Don't like you. Like, you'll be totally fine. And so part of what we should do with fear is really break it down. Because sometimes, hey, I'm peering over this cliff that someone's telling me to jump off of. Maybe that's a really bad idea, right?

Sometimes you use the power of reason, and it reminds you, oh, this is a bad idea. I can't afford to lose this. But most of the time, we break those fears down and then we're better able to manage that fear because we have a rational understanding of it. Instead of this sort of irrational, emotional understanding of it. Yeah, and it's incredible once you break through that fear, how now you're looking at it and you're like, I can't believe I was ever scared of that, right? Isn't that just such a fascinating trick of the mind that as soon as you break something that felt insurmountable, now when you've overconed,

you're almost laughing at yourself. How was that the thing that helped me back? Well, so each time you do something that you were afraid of, you push through, you have more confidence, right? You have a, like, dropping out of college made it easier for me to then leave my corporate life later to become a writer, right? Because it was like, oh, I could just go get another job or I could get the same job again, right? And so you not only get a certain amount of confidence from it, but you also get a better understanding

of how things work. The problem is when you give into fear, not only do you not do the thing, now you actually have less information about how the world works. And so, you know, there's that sort of cliche about do one thing every day that scares you. It's actually pretty good advice, right? You're sort of building the muscle, you're building that ability to override the, this seems scary, but I'm gonna do it anyway. I think cultivating that ability to sort of push

through that fear is really important. And I think, again, sometimes can be very pedestrian fears. It's like, I remember the decision for Daily Stoic, which is one of the things I do, the decision to like make videos, right? Like, and I remember talking to you about this, it's like, I was very comfortable writing things, I was very comfortable being on stage,

but the idea of making a video, like, I was just scared it would be bad. I think I was really scared of being uncomfortable in a new thing. But pushing past that, it's opened up this whole avenue for us. But then also, the decision to make long-form videos also made it easier to be like, oh, TikTok's this thing. Now, what you're cultivating is the ability to be comfortable, being uncomfortable. And knowing that you'll figure it out and eventually get comfortable again.

Yeah, and what I find so fascinating about what you just said, Ryan, is that even when we make big leaps, or we break through, or we find courage, it's so easy to get comfortable again. Like it's fascinating isn't it? Like I remember when, so when I went off to become a monk, obviously I broke that barrier completely. I was like, I don't care if I get a job, it doesn't matter. So I felt extremely confident and courageous, not that I used those words, but that's what I would have felt at the time. And then when I left being a monk, it was a tough time, but again, that was a tough decision.

So that built more courage and confidence. Then I found a job, but as soon as I left being a monk, it was a tough time, but again, that was a tough decision. So that built more courage and confidence. Then I found a job, but as soon as I got into a job, I remember leaving that job. I mean, I left it within two years, but it's like, there was a moment that that comfort started to feel really safe. And comfort is like really alluring. It's really mesmerizing. And I find that comfort really convinces you that this is it, settle for this, it's safe for its better, it's happier. What are the things that you do to build that courage muscle every day or do something

out of your comfort zone so that you don't get comfortable? Is there something that you've been working on or something that you've seen others do that you've spoken to on your podcast? Well, this is the paradox, right? We tell ourselves like, I can't do it now. I'm in a wait till I'm more financially successful. I'm in a wait till I'm more well-known. I'm in a wait till I put in more years

or then I'll speak up, then I'll put myself out there, then I'll take this risk. It'd be wonderful if it worked that way, but in fact, it's the exact opposite, right? You think, oh, after I've put 10 years into this company, then I'll put out this new idea, then I'll stick. But no, now you don't wanna lose 10 years of work, right? You'd think that financially,

the financially successful people would be the most comfortable taking the risks, but they have the luxury, the privilege, of knowing exactly what it might cost them, right? And they know how hard they had to work to get there. And so this is why people are afraid to be politically active. This is why people are afraid to voice unpopular opinions. I'm sure you and I both know people with platforms that have really strong opinions about things

that are happening in the world, but they just don't want to get involved because they know how hard it was to get where they are and they don't want to lose that And so you do have to cultivate again to go to this kind of indifference like look It's wonderful to have the audience. It's wonderful to have the fancy stuff But you didn't like I say this to people who sometimes get mad about things I say they're like how could you say that didn't you understand you would you know Make me angry or whatever and I could look?

I didn't cultivate this platform to not say what I think. Like the job is not having the platform, the job is not this or that. The job is doing the thing, right? Is the speaking the truth, saying what needs to be said, speaking to what I think is important. And so we can really lie to ourselves. We can tell ourselves later, I'm going to do this, right?

We say, oh, I need to make some money first. And then I'm going to write that screenplay or do that thing or whatever. You're not going to do it. Because then you're going to be too comfortable. And so you kind of have to see that comfort, that like taking it for grantedness as the enemy because it's what makes you afraid. You don't want to lose it. Yeah, I'm so glad you said that.

And I went through something similar recently with some of my team where I was explaining to them, they were saying, Jay, don't you think that's a risk? And I was just like, well, I worked this hard so that I can take more risks. Like, I had to take risks to get here. And I'm only excited if I'm able to take more risks and try new things out. Because what was the point otherwise? I'm already living in bonus land, right? Like I'm already playing with house money.

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. You're living in a space that you're just, I'm so much more blessed than I ever thought I would be. And so with that, I feel comes a bit more responsibility, comes a bit more desire for risk, and I'm not just at my risk for personal growth. I mean, to try things that I think are beneficial or to help others, to serve or do things that may be unexpected of me,

because I understand how that leads to more impact or service. Yeah, there's a great story about Lyndon Johnson when he proposes passing the civil rights legislation. And one of his aid says, you know, maybe you should wait till after re-election. They say, this could be bad. You know, it's going to be risky politically. And he says, what the hell is the president see for? Right? And it's important to realize that literally the most powerful man in the world was struggling with. And that's how seductive it is. You get all the way to the top of whatever it is

that you're doing. And then there's reasons that you shouldn't do X, Y, or Z. And at a certain point, you have to say to yourself, what was the point of all of this? If I'm not going to do what I care about, what I like, what I love, what I think needs to be done. And that's really what courage is about. The courage to say, I'm not going to think about those consequences. I'm going to do it because it is the right thing to do, come whatever may. And there's no question that things I've written,

things I've said, things I've said, things I've done have cost me a certain number of followers, let's say, which ultimately can translate financially. But I'm proud of what I said. I'm proud of what I put out. I can look myself in the mirror. And one of the questions I ask myself, and I'd be curious if you think about this too, as someone who didn't create the things that I write about, like, stoicism is this way of thinking that's existed now for 2500 or so years. And I happen to be a well-known sort of representative of that idea, but it's not mine. And so the thing I tell myself is, or the test I have is, am I being a good steward of that philosophy? Yes.

And so if I'm afraid to be the same thing for the presidency, you're not, you don't own the presidency. You're just the guy or woman sitting in that chair right now. And the question is, are you being a good steward of the office of the occupation of the opportunity, or are you just protecting what's good for you in the moment? And so I think about, you know, is this the right thing to do or talk about?

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Yes, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, no, and I think I ask a very similar question. Like for me, it's, you know, it is servitorship, it is figuring out like to what degree, and a big part of that for me has it's, you know, it is servetorship, it is figuring out like to what degree. And a big part of that for me has always been, if I see other people helping the world, how do I view them? And it was really interesting,

I was sitting with my team recently and like, they're, you know, I think, I've always been a fan of yours and you've known that from day one, but, you know, it's like for me, when I see other people who I believed are positively impacting people's minds, I wanna collaborate, connect, do more together

because I feel like we need more of that. And I was speaking to my team recently because I was talking about collaborating with someone and they were saying, well, Jay, you know, like maybe they, you know, like maybe they see as competition. And I was just like, well, why would I compete with someone who has the same goal as me, it seems. And I think that's how I try and measure where my intention is,

because often, you know, if I get lost in that hierarchy myself, that's when you start to recognize that your intention isn't as pure as you think it is. Well, this is another thing I think requires a certain amount of courage as far as one's worldview. What you're talking about is deciding not to see the world as a zero sum place, right? So some people go through the world into like this about my career, this about my success, this is about my family, right? This is about my business. And there's no question that attitude because it's so singularly focused can make you very successful. But I think it's

more enjoyable, ultimately morally rooted to go through the world and thinking about it as how does everyone win? How does everyone get something out of this? And that was something, you know, I started my first email list not talking about my own work, but just recommending books that I've loved. And I've done that now for since I don't know, 12, 13 years. Like, I hear just as often from people who their lives were changed, not by something I wrote, but by a book from someone else that I recommended. And that was a big breakthrough for me realizing,

oh, not only is it not zero sum, but that helping other people just being a resource period also helps you. And so I think, you know, with your podcast, like, look, you could just make your own content every day. But the decision to talk to and share other people's stuff, it benefits you and them. And I think the more the more secure one can be in themselves, the more helpful they can be to other people, and then ultimately the more impact everyone can have together.

Yeah, absolutely. I love that because I was sharing it with someone recently. I was like, one of the, and I feel this is what you've done with the Stoics and what you were sharing for Marcus Arraileus, but for me, I've just always been fascinated by studying people's lives, always been fascinated by studying. And I love studying people and mindsets and decisions and choices. And I was thinking that we all have to look at people and we all have two choices.

You either study people or you envy people. Those are the only practically two choices you have. If you don't deeply study, there will be some comparison, some envy, some criticism, some sort of unhealthy trait that comes out. And if you study someone, then you appreciate you admire you honor. And I know that in my life, I would rather live with admiration, honor, appreciation of others than the other stuff. And so I naturally gravitate towards how can I study someone's life? And when I see you studying the Stoics, that's what you're doing. You're studying their life, sharing your study and your notes with us.

And to me, it's almost like thinking, oh, you know, that person just sold their house on our street for X amount of money. Oh my gosh, that house is not worth that much. It doesn't look that good. You're not realizing that the whole value of the street just went up because of that house. And I think that's where people don't recognize that that collective good is always better than individual success. Yeah, there's a great joke I heard that that envy is the only sin that isn't any fun. Ah, yes. Sex is fun. Even overeating is fun, right? All of the most of the deadly sins are at least fun while you're doing them.

Envy sucks. No one is having less fun than the person who is being eaten up with envy and jealousy. And so the decision, and it does have to be a decision because I think there's probably some evolutionary reasons why we feel envy. The decision to say like, I'm just going to be happy for people. I'm going to help other people. I'm going to help other people and not ask for anything in return.

I'm just going to try to put good stuff out in the world. I'm going to try to use my assets to help other people. And I hope other people do the same, but I'm not going to be pissed off when that doesn't happen. That's a real lifestyle choice. And I've tried both. And the other one is just, it's not fun. And it doesn't get you what you want. Being bitter, being resentful, being closed off or selfish, it's not fun.

Totally. And according to your line of thought, which I like, is that if there's an evolutionary purpose of envy, one of them potentially could be to lead us to study, right? To study what we envy. Like, that's something that could, I have no idea. That's not a factual thought. It's just an idea that I'm having. Yeah, like, envy would make you go, oh, well, let me deeply look at that.

Let me understand how that person got there. Let me, let me actually lead to study through that, right? So it can be healthy and useful. Let's look at the trade-offs, right? I think oftentimes, too, the thing, the person that you're jealous of, if you had to go, but is it actually fun to be them, right? Like, I think oftentimes we'll look at something that someone has and we'll want that thing, so we'll be jealous of them, but we don't understand that it's impossible to separate that thing from all the other parts of them. It may well be that it's a bad bargain. The reason you don't have it is that you understand that those other trade-offs they made aren't worth it or perhaps they're impossible for you.

And so I think just really understanding like what you want, what you have, that's another big part of it, the Stokes talk about like how jealous you would be of yourself if you didn't have those things, right? Or how sad you would be if they went away. And so instead of being jealous of other people, just step back and try to practice some gratitude

for what you have, these are all ways, I think of getting to a happier place. Yeah, for sure. I wonder from you, what is something currently that the two questions here, I'm gonna ask both of them now, and then you can take them. What is the thing that you've been

in the last 12 months fearing the most? What has been a fear that you've been tackling with? And then second question to follow that up with is, you know, what do you think's personally the most courageous thing that you've done recently? And it doesn't have to be huge, right? Like that's the point. I think I'm, I have easier time answering the first one,

the second one, but I have two young kids. And so when you go through something like this pandemic, what you really forced to grapple with, and this is a big stoke, concept is like, just how much is out of your control, right? Like, you care about these people, this thing more than anything in the world, and yet you don't control it, right?

It's, they're running around, they're outside. And so I think one of the things I've really had to grapple with over the last 18 months is anxiety, worry, right? A certain amount of powerlessness, a certain amount of frustration, with just that we're in this mess as a society or as a planet. And so I think, you know, when we talk about parenting, I don't think we talk about courage enough, right? So first off, just to be a woman

who brings a child into the world is an insanely courageous thing to do. If you just think about, like, I mean, look, women die in childbirth all the time. And yet women get pregnant all the time. Like I think we've gotten so used to it or perhaps we just don't think about what an insanely courageous act it is.

But then to be a parent in this sort of crazy messed up world, I think about all the parents that I know, I just try to think about all the parents in the world that have had to endure this, you know, insane, disruptive life event that has challenged us in so many different ways. It's been, you know, it's been, it's been a journey. And I think when we think about what Stoicism is or we think about what Buddhism is or, or, or any of these philosophical schools, they were designed precisely for these kinds of events.

Like the ancient world was, you know, people talk about things going back to normal. This is normal. This is what life was in the ancient world. This is what life was like in our grandparents lives. And we're just, we were just really, really spoiled for a long time. And now we're having to wrestle with,

hey, the world doesn't really care about you or your plans, and you're gonna have to figure out how to accommodate yourself to those things and manage to be happy and productive and not a wreck inside of them. Yeah, and do you genuinely believe, and a pandemic inside, of course, because that's a huge, huge, huge thing that obviously affected everyone on the planet, but because that's a huge, huge, huge thing that obviously affected

everyone on the planet. But do you generally believe that a disruption of plans has led to better plans, results, ideas, innovation inventions? Look, no one would say like, hey, in America, you know, 750,000 people have died, that this is a blessing in disguise, right? That would be offensive. But we add on top of the tragedy by refusing to change or be changed by what's happened. Right?

So I don't know about you, but this was an enormous forced lifestyle experiment. We had to reimagine a lot of things. We probably wouldn't be doing this remotely. You know, if it weren't for the pandemic, there's things that you talk about as meditation groups that you made. There's things you've created as a result of the constraints of what was happening in the world that are on net positives for you. And that's certainly been the case for me. It's forced me to reimagine rework a lot of what I sort of took for granted previously. I think coming out of the pandemic, I'm not going to travel nearly as much.

Not for safety reasons, but just realizing, oh, I've been going a mile, you know, a mile a minute for 30 odd years of my life. And I was aware of what I was getting out of it, but I was less aware of what it was costing me or what it was preventing me from doing. And so I think, it's not that the Stoics would say that everything terrible has something wonderful inside of it, but that by wrestling with what's happened, by looking for what we can by wrestling with what's happened, by looking

for what we can do inside of what's happened, we manage to excavate little bits of positivity or opportunity for progress. And that's what the obstacle is the way it's really about. Yeah, beautiful. And so we've talked about Theo, we talked about courage. The third part of the book is the heroic. And I find this, and I love that it's obviously towards the end, but it's, I found this fascinating

because I think everything in society makes us want to be a hero. Like the movies I watched made me want to be like the guy in the movies, the adverts will make me want to be like the guy for me or, you know, for people to girl or that person in the ad, in the movie, in the book, in the story. But, but, you know, you define what it means to be a hero, morally, and physically. I want you to break that down for us. Like, how do you introduce this,

and how do the Stoics think about this? So if we think of courage as the triumph over fear, I, maybe what we're saying is that heroic is something beyond even that. So in the book I'm talking about, Michael Jordan's decision to leave basketball to play baseball. That's an immensely courageous thing, because it's risky people. A critical of it is no idea if you can go

from being the best in the world of one sport to starting at the bottom of another sport. Now that was a courageous thing to do, but I contrast that with Maya Moore's decision equally dominant in the WMBA to walk away from basketball to free a man wrongly convicted in prison. Right? So she's not just doing something courageous, she's doing something heroic because the primary beneficiary of what's happened is not her, right? So heroism to me or the heroic is when we do something courageous that's well beyond our self-interest or perhaps very much at odds with our

self-interest, right? When we talk about the courage to start a business, you know, what we're talking about is pushing past doubts or risk or whatever. But what about the courage to leave a successful business to start a nonprofit, right? You're not putting yourself in physical danger, but you're putting your interests behind the interests of other people. And that's a very scary, difficult thing to do. And it's a road because by putting others above us, we're actually elevating all of us. And so, I wanted to look at that because I'm really, really, really inspired by that. And that ultimately is what I think we need more of in the world.

Obviously, we need courageous entrepreneurs, but we need people who are willing to do something beyond just trying to do something beyond just trying to make something for themselves. Yeah, I deeply appreciate that definition. Thank you for sharing with us because to me, that journey from courage to being heroic, that is that purpose, that service, that extension of oneself for others. And ultimately, I can agree with you more. I genuinely believe that purpose, you know, I was saying, I spoke or speaking to a friend recently,

I was saying how, you know, a dream without service is incomplete. Like the idea is like, you know, you can only build a dream so far with the desire for it to all be about yourself. And then it, it doesn't even do it for you anymore. And I feel like, but you've paved a really good path because also you can't just jump to being heroic,

because there are certain skills and muscles and things that you develop on the way by building courage first. Like there are certain tools and tricks and tips and things that you pick up along the way that make it more powerful to be heroic after. Well, one of the things I was inspired by, it's just something I ran at a small news story many years ago, was the decision, I think, maybe 10 years ago that CVS just decides they're going to stop selling cigarettes. Now, this is bad for CVS, this is bad for the shareholders of CVS, but it's obviously good for the world, right?

And as they find, overall cigarette consumption goes down across the entire country because people are just like, it's harder to get cigarettes, they just smoke less, right? And so like, obviously we love ambition, we love creativity, we love people who are trying to be successful. But there is something beyond that. I think we saw it during the pandemic, the people who showed up every day for work, even though it must have been scary and terrifying for them.

But they knew that other people were depending on them, that where would we be without those kind of people? And so, obviously, the pandemic revealed some selfishness and indifference and all sorts of awful parts of modern society, but it also revealed that I think some of the best of our society. And I wanted to celebrate this idea of, yes, pushing through fear is important, but why are you doing it? Right?

Who are you doing it for? That really, really matters. Yeah. I think that's beautiful, man. Ryan, this has been such a wonderful conversation. I highly recommend everyone. If you haven't read Ryan's work, I mean, I would go on by every single book and I'm not kidding. They not only look beautiful, but they are beautiful. And, you know, obstacle is the way is just fantastic. Ego is the enemy. Stillness is the key. We talked about last time. I mean, and this one, obstacle is the way is just fantastic. Ego is the enemy. Stillness is the key. We talked about last time.

I mean, and this one, courage is calling is what we've been talking about today. Ryan, we end every interview with the final five. You've done this before. These are the fast five. So every question needs to be answered in one word to one sentence maximum. You are the writer so you can help me define

what one sentence counts as. Like how many words are in a sentence in a good sentence, Ryan? As many or as few as there should be. Okay, all right, great. I love the vagueness of that. Okay, brilliant. All right, so the first question for you is, what is something you once were attracted to but it's become less important to you? I think money, certainly money, I think money represented something to me early in my life, and the more you get of it, the more you realize that it really doesn't mean anything, and there's less to do with it than you think there is.

Right. And did that come after a certain amount of success? Did that go, where did you feel like, what made you feel like? It doesn't have to be a statistical number, I just mean, like, what was it that made you feel that way? I don't know if there was a specific number, but I remember I had a conversation with Tim Ferris once, and he was like, what do you do with your money?

And he's like, what do you mean? He's like You know, and he's like, what do you mean? He's like, do you have a speedboat? You know, do you invest it? What do you, I don't know. I was like, it just goes in the bank, right? Like, I don't know. And he's like, so it's not important to you really. And I was like, yeah, I guess not.

You know, he was like, his point was, if you don't need the money, just make sure that you're not saying yes to things that you don't really want to do to get more money if you don't really want the money. And that was very helpful to me. Yeah, I love that. Okay, question number two,

what is something you were first uninterested in that has now become something intriguing or a curiosity? I mean, I think I always do I wanted to have kids, but I didn't understand just how much I would love it and how much it would transform my life. And so I would say, you know, sort of family being the sort of big, big thing, especially again during the pandemic,

just it was like, oh, this is all I really care about. This is all I'm gonna focus on. So maybe family would be the big thing. I love that. All right, question number three. What's the most used piece of stoic wisdom that you utilize on a daily or more regular basis? The first stoic exercise is this idea that there's things that are up to us and things that are not up to us. And really all we should focus on is what's not up, is what is up to us. And that's extremely hard to do, and I screwed up all the time,

but I find myself constantly reminding myself, it doesn't matter, no amount of thinking about this will change it. Just focus on what you can do in response to it, or inside of it, that's probably... I love that. Ironically, the most basic thing is the most complex thing.

Absolutely. Well, I was gonna ask you that as an expression, what is a piece of stoic advice that you think you're still wrestling or grappling with that maybe counterintuitive? It may even be off the wall and you may be like, okay, this is one of those things

that you leave out of the book because it's just, it just, you know, and there's plenty of stuff with that in the Vedic tradition too. Like there's some stuff that's just off the wall. Is there something like that from the, that you've been reading recently that? I mean, I think all of it to be perfectly honest, all of it is, it's not a day to day basis, but there is a line in, in the beginning of meditations, Mark surrealists, lists all these

things that he learned from his mentors. And I think it's from sexist or severist, someone early on in his life. He said that I learned how to be free of passion, but full of love. And that doesn't sound very stoic, right? The idea of being full of love. The being free of passions sounds very stoic, but full of love sounds more eastern or Christian, a little bit of both. I find that to be very beautiful and the idea of being like, okay, I'm going to strip out some of the emotion. I'm going to strip out some of the need to control, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but I'm going to replace it with love, empathy, kindness.

That is harder for me to do, but something I'm working on. I love that. That's beautiful answer. Okay, fifth and final question. What are your top favorite? I don't mind how many numbers. You three, four, five books that you've read this year. So more recent. Or that you've read this year, doesn't even have a recent book. Dr. Edith Inger wrote this book called The Choice. She's a Holocaust survivor. I loved that book. I blew me away. Then there's this other little book by Victor Franco that they found recently called Yes to Life. Oh wow. In spite of everything, it's like a collection of some of his lost lectures

that I really, really enjoyed. And then I read this book, it doesn't have a great title, but it's sort of changed. I've been thinking about things lately. It's called Indian Givers. And it's about what Western society owes and has learned from indigenous peoples over the last like five, 600 years.

And it was an incredible book that like, just didn't, I just had no idea, as is unfortunately what we teach in schools. And I've just been thinking about that book so much, I really, really liked it. I love that, beautiful, three that I haven't read. So, producers, Amazon order those books for me right now. I need those books.

And for everyone who's been listening and watching, as you know, I've been talking to Ryan Holiday, I want you to go and grab a copy of Carage's Calling. And like I said, every other book, you can find Ryan on the podcast. He's one of the few guests who've been on the podcast twice. This is a second episode. And of course, Ryan, it's always a joy to have you

on. I hope we get to do many, many more of these. I hope we get to go on many, many more walks. I really do. I hope we can spend a bit more time together. I've never been to Austin. Can you believe it? So I also need to come out to Austin. But thank you for making the time. Thank you for being so generous. Everyone who's been listening and watching, make sure you tag me and Ryan on Instagram, on Twitter, let us know what resonated with you, what connected with you. If you've read one of the books that Ryan recommended, come back and tell them about it. We want to hear that and I love staying connected to this community. So thank you to our on-purpose community, thank you to Ryan Holiday. Appreciate you, man. Thank you

so much. You're the best. What if you could tell the whole truth about your life including all those tender invisible things we don't usually talk about? I'm Megan Devine, host of the podcast It's OK that you're not OK. Look everyone's at least a little bit not okay these days. And all those things we don't usually talk about, maybe we should. This season, I'm joined by Stellar, guests like Abbermote, Rachel Cargol, and so many more.

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