The Daily Stoic - How Much Longer Are You Going To Wait? | Turn Words Into Works

Episode Date: December 26, 2022

This is that weird time of year where we start to think about how we want the following year to go. We start thinking about what we call “resolutions”—the promises we make to ourselves about what we’re going to do in the next 12 months. The habits we’re going to quit, the skills we’re going to learn, the standards we’re going to hold ourselves to.Here you are today, staring down the barrel of 2023. And while the best time to demand the best for and of yourself was years ago, the second best time is right now.🎓 Sign up for the Daily Stoic New Year, New You Challenge to create better habits in 2023: https://dailystoic.com/challenge✉️ 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.

Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoic podcast early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today. Welcome to the Daily Stoic podcast. Each day we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics illustrated with stories from history, current events and literature to help you be better at what you do. And at the beginning of the week, we try to do a deeper dive, setting a kind of stoic intention for the week, something to meditate on, something to think on, something to leave you with, to journal about, whatever it is you're happy to be doing. So let's get into it.

Hi, I'm David Brown, the host of Wunderree's podcast business wars. And in our new season, Walmart must fight off target, the new discounter that's both savvy and fashion forward. Listen to business wars on Amazon music or wherever you get your podcasts. How much longer are you going to wait? This is that weird time of year where we start to think about how we want the following year to go. We start thinking about what we call resolutions.

The promises we make to ourselves about what we're going to do in the next 12 months. The habits we're going to quit, the skills we're going to learn, the standards we're going to hold ourselves to. On the one hand, it's wonderful and inspiring, with the whole world comes together to try to do this at the same time, and it's excellent that everyone has finally decided to get in shape to stop smoking, to try to give back more, to commit to being a better friend or relative to read a certain number of books. But it's also strange that everyone puts it off for so long. We treat our self-improvement like it's a school project, we hope might just complete itself, praying that maybe our parents or a teacher will handle it for us. Well, they won't. Epic Titus asked, why is it that we wait to demand the best for and of ourselves?

It's crazy. Here you are staring down the barrel of a new year, 2023. And while the best time to demand the best for and of yourself was years ago And while the best time to demand the best for and of yourself was years ago, the second best time is right now. Put the missed opportunity behind you and repeat this passage from Epic Titus. He said, from now on, then resolve to live as a grownup who is making progress

and make whatever you think best a law that you never set aside. And whenever you encounter anything that is difficult or pleasurable or highly or lowly regarded, remember that the contest is now you are at the Olympic Games and you cannot wait any longer and that your progress is wrecked and preserved by a single day, a single night, and a single event. Can you do that? Can you start right now? No more putting stuff off, no more, I'll start Monday, no more. In the future, I'll do and expect better, no, demand the best for yourself now. It's what a grown-up does.

For the last five years, we've been doing what we call the Daily Stoic New Year, New U Challenge, a set of 21 actionable challenges presented one per day, built around the best, most timeless wisdom, Stoic philosophy, including that idea from Epipetus. How much longer are you going to wait? When are you going to show up be the Olympic athlete that you're meant to be? Well, if you're serious about that, this challenge is, I think, one way to get started right now. There's just a few more days left to register. Don't put it off. Sign up. Listen to Epictetus.

And join us in the Daily Stoke. New Year, New Year Challenge. It's going to help you stop procrastinating, gain clarity, learn new skills, quit bad habits, make amends, be courageous, break destructive, thought patterns, and a bunch more. 21 custom challenges, one per day, over the next three weeks. Almost a book's worth of content.

Three live Q&As with me, a printable 21 day calendar, track your progress of group discord channel for accountability and community, and so much more to learn more or more importantly, reserve your spot in the 2023 new year new year challenge, head over dailystoke.com.

Slash challenge, join me, join us, join thousands of stokes all over the world. We're excited and Let's get after it Hey, it's Ryan welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoke podcast. This is the last of these entries of the year the last as we pull from the Daily Stoke Journal 366 meditations of writing and reflection on the art of living, I think ultimately the most important, it's about turning words into works.

Marcus Aurelius spent a great deal of time on his journals, yet within these pages we find him admonishing himself to throw them away, to never read them. Why? Because he didn't want it to be an excuse from the essential tasks and hand. The art of living will never be found anywhere but in our own efforts to be a good person. Never forget that that is the aim of stoicism, end of your own journals. It's not to fill up pages with pretty thoughts, but inspire you to take action to turn the words, as Seneca said, into works. And in that we have the perfect place to end the year with the ultimate stoic prompt. Get active in your own rescue. And we have two quotes this week from Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and then one from Seneca's Moral Letters. Stop wandering about, Marcus, as you aren't likely to read your own notebooks or ancient histories or

anthologies you've collected to enjoy in your old age. Get busy with life's purpose, toss aside empty hopes. Get active in your own rescue. If you care for yourself at all, do it. While you can, that's Mark Sirrelius 314. You have proof in the extent of your wanderings that you never found the art of living anywhere, not in logic, nor in wealth, nor in fame, or in any indulgence. Nowhere. Where is it then? In doing what human nature demands. And how is a person to do this? By having principles be the source of desire and action. What principles? Those to do with good and evil,

indeed in the belief that there is no good for a human being, except what creates justice, self-control, courage, and freedom. And nothing evil, except what destroys these things. That's Marcus Eurelius' Meditations 8.1. And then ultimately, Seneca in moral letters 108, he says, all study of philosophy and reading should be for the purpose of living a happy life. We should seek precepts to help us noble and courageous words that can become facts.

We should learn them in a way that the words become works. And ultimately, look, that's the journey for me, ironically, as a writer, is that I write them. That's my job. But if I don't listen to them, if I don't get better at it, then I'm, what am I? I'm not, I'm nothing but a softist, right? And what are you? If you read about stoses and if you listen to this podcast if you Follow the quotes on Instagram or watch the videos, but you're not actually getting better day to day You're not getting better at those virtues courage

self-control Justice wisdom, right? You're not focused on applying the ideas. Ultimately, that's what matters. As Mark said, we should waste no more time arguing what a good person is, be one, as Epictetus talks about. Embodied the ideas. Am I as good at that as I want to be?

Are you? Right? All this stuff is pretty straightforward, pretty simple. You find yourself nodding your head to it. But then when you're tired, when you're frustrated, then when you're trying to do something that's really important to you, when things are really going sideways, it's hard to actually stick with them.

It's hard to actually apply them. Right? But that's the whole point. That's the whole actually stick with them. It's hard to actually apply them, right? But that's the whole point. That's the whole point of the philosophy. Look, I take some solace in the fact that clearly, Marcus are really just struggling with that, right? He's saying that even as an old man, right, he's telling himself you got to stop wandering about, right?

He's saying you still haven't figured it out. You got to get active in your rescue now before it's too late. So I take some solace in the fact that one of the greatest docks to ever live is still struggling with that many decades older than I am. But that time is ticking away. And those opportunities are passing this by.

And so the purpose of the daily stroke, general the purpose of the daily stroke, podcast, the purpose of all this by. And so the purpose of the Daily Stoke, general, the purpose of the Daily Stoke, podcast, the purpose of all this content. Obviously, yes, it's compelling to me as a writer. I feel a duty to bring the ideas to other people. But ultimately, what I'm really trying to work on is just be a little bit better at them day to day, my own life. How would I grade myself on that? I don't know, not as high as I'd like, but higher than before. Right? Higher than if the intervention had never happened, which is ultimately right? How we judge a medicine, how we judge anything scientifically. We compare it against a control group, you compare it against a placebo.

And I know how I was before, right? I know what I'm capable of if I don't try, if I just sort of go the path of least resistance, if I think about what I could get away with. That's not enough. We have to be better than that. We have to push ourselves. So that's ultimately the whole purpose of stoicism. That's the thought I want to leave you here with at the end of the year. It's about

turning the words into words. What do you have to show for it? Right? It's not about pretending, it's not about imitating, it's about action, it's about putting up the numbers, putting up the results, It's about putting up the numbers, putting up the results, trying to get a little bit better every single day. I don't expect magical transformation for myself or for you. That's not possible. This isn't about epiphany, but it is about repetition and practice, holding yourself accountable. And with that, I bid you a due to the end of this year. I hope you can look back, reflect here as the year is winding up and see where you could have done better. Hope you can set aside some plans, some goals for the next year.

I hope you can build on the successes that you did have. That's what I'm going to try to do. And we'll be right back at this again again because we don't stop. Talk 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 add free on Amazon Music, download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus in Apple Podcasts. Hey there listeners!

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