The Daily Stoic - Are You Too Much Of A Coward? | Where Philosophy Begins

Episode Date: March 1, 2024

It’s good that you’re tough. It’s good that you’re a fighter—maybe even trained in wrestling, as so many of the Stoics were. It’s good that you’re a risk taker, that you’ve put yourself out there, pushed through fear and doubt to do what others were afraid to do.But it’s important you don’t forget that there is more to the virtue of courage than just this. There’s a great song that talks about “being too much a coward to admit when you’re in need.” Marcus Aurelius makes a similar note to himself in Meditations, reminding himself that even the bravest, toughest soldiers sometimes have to reach a hand up and ask a comrade for help. What of it, he basically says, that’s part of the job too.-In today's Daily Stoic excerpt, Ryan reminds us that philosophy is intimidating, that we begin our journey into philosophy when we become aware of the ability to analyze our own minds. You can grab the leatherbound edition of The Daily Stoic here.✉️ Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail🏛 Check out the Daily Stoic Store for Stoic inspired products, signed books, and more.📱 Follow us: Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, FacebookSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcasts. On Friday, we do double duty, not just reading our daily meditation, but also reading a passage from the Daily Stoic, my book, 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance in the Art of Living, which I wrote with my wonderful collaborator, translator, and literary agent, Stephen Hanselman. So today, we'll give you a quick meditation from the Stoics with some analysis from me, and then we'll send you out into the world to turn these words into works. Are you too much of a coward? It's good that you're tough. It's good that you're tough. It's good that you're a fighter, maybe even trained in wrestling.

There's so many of the Stoics where it's good that you're a risk taker that you've put yourself out there, pushed through fear and doubt to do what others are afraid to do. But it's important that you don't forget that there is much more to the virtue of courage than just this. There's a great song that talks about being too much of a coward to admit when you are in need. Marcus Reelis makes a similar note to himself in meditations, reminding himself

that even the bravest, toughest soldiers sometimes have to reach a hand up and ask a comrade for help. What of it? He basically says that's part of the job too. Stoicism is not just invonerability, if such a thing exists. Stoicism is having the self-awareness to know

when you are struggling. It's having the courage to admit when you could use a hand. It's having the wisdom not to pretend that you know the answer. Can't learn what you think you already know, Epictetus says. It takes daring and toughness to go to therapy, perhaps more than just white-knuckling it does. It's a brave thing to share your struggles with a friend

or hire a coach or an expert to help you get better at something. Takes a confident person to ask a question or admit, I don't know. Don't be like the cowards who are too fragile or fearful to do this. Be truly courageous. That's obviously the idea behind courage is calling.

My book on the first of the Stoic Virtues, which spends a good time talking about courage is not just running into a burning building or betting it all on some crazy idea. It's also asking for help. It's being vulnerable. It's sharing, opening up, all that stuff. So if you haven't read courage, it's calling yet.

I think you'll like it. If you want to focus more on your well-being this year, you should read more and you should give Audible a try. Audible offers an incredible selection of audiobooks focused on wellness from physical, mental, spiritual, social, motivational, occupational, and financial. You can listen to Audible on your daily walks. You can listen to my audiobooks on your daily walks. And still, this is the key. I have a whole chapter on walking, on walking meditations, on getting outside.

And it's one of the things I do when I'm walking. Audible offers a wealth of well-being titles to help you get closer to your best life and the best you. Discover stories to inspire sounds to soothe and voices that can change your life. Wherever you are on your well-being journey, Audible is there for you. Explore bestsellers, new releases and exclusive originals. Listen now on Audible. Where philosophy begins. This is the March 1st entry in the Daily Stoic. Today's quote,

it's from Epictetus' Discourses. This ends our streak of like five weeks of Marcus Aurelius entries in a row. I swear the book actually is a mix of quotes, just a coincidence I guess. But this is from Epictetus' Discourses 126. An important place to begin in philosophy is this, a clear perception of one's own ruling principle. Philosophy is intimidating. Where does one start? With books, with lectures, with the sale of your worldly possessions? None of these things. Epictetus is saying that one becomes a philosopher when they begin to exercise their guiding reason and start to question the emotions and beliefs and even the language that others take for granted.

It is thought that an animal has self-awareness when it is able to fully recognize itself in a mirror. Perhaps we could say that we begin our own journey into philosophy when we become aware of the ability to analyze our own minds. Can you start with that step today? When you do, you'll find that from it we really come alive, that we live lives to paraphrase Socrates that are actually worth living. You know, it's funny as I was reading this, I was thinking the other thingase Socrates that are actually worth living.

And it was funny as I was reading this, I was thinking the other thing from Socrates. Socrates takes one of, Socrates has two famous encounters with the Oracle of Delphi. The first one says, you know, is there any man wiser than Socrates? And the Delphi says, no,

I was actually just reading Emily Wilson's fascinating little biography of Socrates. And she says, you know, one way to think about this is that actually the Delphi was saying, there's no one wiser than Socrates. Not that Socrates is wiser, that the Delphi was saying basically, or that the Oracle was basically saying, everyone is dumb and not very wise. But that's neither here nor there. The thing that Socrates takes from the Oracle that he basically founds his philosophical

thinking and practice around, which the Stoics love and admire and talk about so much and ultimately sort of trace their lineage back to, Socrates takes his cue from a famous inscription at the Oracle that the one that says, know thyself. And I think that's what Epictetus is saying here. When we have the ability, the philosophy starts at home. It starts by knowing the self, by asking the self questions, by getting in touch with this power we have, which is our rational mind, and also understanding, I think, that we are not always inherently rational. And so, of course, philosophy is also

big theoretical questions, and it requires enormous brain power and study. But it also, I think, starts somewhere much simpler, much more accessible. What we're doing here in this podcast, what we do in the books, what we do, but just thinking about this stuff and asking ourselves questions, questioning what we think, questioning other people, right? That's what Socrates did. He went around and he asked questions. Then he asked questions about those answers and he kept going and going and going. He didn't necessarily get to an answer exactly, but he did somehow get to some clarity in that.

And even, you know, to go back to the thing about is anyone wiser than Socrates, right? Socrates gets this sort of enigmatic answer and he just goes and he asks and he has to think about himself too. He goes, I don't feel wise. I don't think that I'm smarter than other people. So why would I be considered potentially the wisest man in Athens? And that's where he slowly eventually comes to this realization that maybe his wisdom, maybe his superpower is that he knows what he doesn't know, or he knows that he knows little.

And from this place of intellectual humility, but fundamentally from this place of self-awareness, the ability to examine himself, to put himself up to the test, to know himself. That's where his wisdom began. That's what it was all about. And to me, that's such a great entry point in dystoic philosophy and a great entry point in to the month of March. Hopefully the weather is warming up where you are. Hopefully things are getting better. Hopefully you're coming out of maybe

that winter funk a little bit. Knowing that I tend to get a little depressed in the winter, then I get grouchy and that the longer it goes on, like just when I feel like I can't keep doing this, I got to make major changes in my life, you know, the season start to shift. And suddenly I feel better. I got more energy. Like there's light at the end of this and all of that is going, oh, okay. And then it's only somewhat recently after after being alive for three plus decades,

that I have the awareness to go, oh, that's a force that's operating on me here. That's changing and influencing and directing, you know, my opinions, my emotions, my actions, my aversions and desires. And hopefully I'll be a little better at that this year. Talk to you all soon. Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us and it would really help the show. We appreciate it and

I'll see you next episode. Hey, Prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoic early and ad free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus and Apple podcasts. Get ready for Las Vegas style action at Bet MGM, the king of online casinos. Enjoy casino games at your fingertips with the same Vegas strip excitement MGM is famous for when you play classics like MGM Grand Millions or popular games like Blackjack, Bakara, and Roulette. With our ever-growing library of digital slot games, a large selection of online table games,

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