The Daily Stoic - Is it Resilience, or Are You Just Naive? | Ask Daily Stoic

Episode Date: October 14, 2022

We’ve talked before about the so-called Stockdale Paradox—the blazing determination inside Admiral James Stockdale that allowed him to believe that, despite his imprisonment and torture, he would not only survive but thrive because of his experience. There’s something similar in Meditations where Marcus Aurelius, reflecting on the plague and the wars and the troubles that beset his reign, actually says to himself, “It’s fortunate that this happened to me.”📕 Ryan Holiday's new book "Discipline Is Destiny" is out now! We’ve extended the pre-order bonuses for the next week—among them is a signed and numbered page from the original manuscript of the book. You can learn more about those and how to receive them over at Dailystoic.com/preorder. ✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail📱 Follow us: Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook See 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, where each day we read a passage of ancient wisdom designed to help you in your everyday life. But on Fridays, we not only read this daily meditation, but I try to answer some questions from listeners and fellow stoics who are trying to apply this philosophy, whatever it is they happen to do. Sometimes these are from talks.

Sometimes these are people who come up to talk to me on the street. Sometimes these are written in or emailed from listeners. But I hope in answering their questions, I can answer your questions, give a little more guidance on this philosophy. We're all trying to follow. [♪ Music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, Hi, I'm David Brown, the host of Wonderree'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. Is it resilience or are you just naive? We've talked before about the so-called Stockdale Paradox. The blazing determination inside future Admiral James Stockbale that allowed him to believe that despite his imprisonment in torture, he would not only survive but thrive because of his experience. There's something similar in meditations where Marcus Aurelius reflecting on the plague and the

wars and the troubles that beset his reign actually says to himself, it's fortunate that this happened to me. The Stoics always believed they could find a way, but it's important to understand where this is coming from, lest we confuse resilience with naivete or worse. In a recent episode of Remete Sete's wonderful podcast, I will teach you to be rich. One of the guests explained how his father, despite having to raise his kids in a trailer,

while making $30,000 a year, inspired his kids to believe that everything was going to be okay, that they'd get through it, that they would find a way. This is a wonderful and important lesson, except now as an adult working as a mortgage broker, the man seemed remarkably naive about the potential vulnerability of his industry to the turbulence of the economy. What if the market turns he was asked? I trust that my company will take care of me," he said.

Wasn't he concerned that he had so little in the way of savings or emergency funds? Now he said it'll all work out. My company will take care of me. The word for this attitude is not stoic. It's pan-glossian, a term derived from the novel Candide from Voltaire. Yes, a stoic believes they'll find a way through no matter what happens, but they're also realistic. They try not to depend on things outside their control.

When asked who fared worse in the North Vietnamese prison camp, Stockdale singled out one group, the optimists. They were convinced that the army was coming to get them, that the US government would ultimately protect them and bring them home. They were convinced it would happen by a certain date. They were convinced that everything would work out fine. They were convinced it would get resolved soon. We cannot be so naive or excessively optimistic. We cannot be dependent on others, like the Stokes, we must never expect or hope that someone will come to save us,

because ultimately it's our expectations and our entitlements that crush us. Thanks so much for this, Ryan. Yeah. My question is relating to dealing with trauma, right? And times where you need to unpack and also it's somewhere we're dealing with, right, looking forward and how can I deal with,

you know, things currently, but what if, how do you not dwell? And sure, it's stoic. I mean, I'm a believer, a proponent of therapy. I think there's, it's not a coincidence that cognitive behavioral therapy traces its roots back to stoicism. Albert Ellis writes a lot about stoicism and CBT.

So I might point you to his stuff. But I do like to push back against this notion that a stoic sort of only moves forward, stuffs their emotions down, ignores pain, ignores trauma. To me, that's a recipe for the bill coming due in the future with sizeable interest attached. So I think we want to get serious about dealing with stuff, facing demons, getting help with those demons, whether that's a 12-step group or a therapist,

whether it's reading books, whether it's opening up to someone you trust or feel vulnerable around, but I would say that a stoic fearlessly faces everything that life throws at them, including their own past. Let's do Paul. Hi, thank you very much, Ryan. So in my work in palliative care,

I certainly see a great connection between stoicism and how we help people who are going through terminal illness. But when we talk about grief, we often talk about, you know, the grief takes as long as it's going to take. It's okay to feel the way that you're feeling and that everybody does it differently. So I guess I'm wondering how how a stoicism approaches this because grief is our feelings and we're supposed to have control over our feelings. I'm really new to this, so I really appreciate what you have to say. So Paul, Senica writes two essays

in the consolation genre where he's basically writing letters. In one case, I think they're both one is to his mother and one is to a friend who's just lost her father. He's writing the letter to his mother because Senica's just been exiled. So she's essentially grieving the loss of her son. And some context, I believe he just lost his own son. So she may be also grieving the loss of a grandson. So Sennaq writes these very beautiful and moving essays about grief. There's another one So, the renaissance of the renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of

renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of

renaissance of the renaissance of renaissance of the renaissance of grief that I think about, he's talking to this woman who's lost his father and he says, look, we don't know what happens in the afterlife. So he says, either your father is like in a better place, or your father is in no place, or your father is in a worse place, right? But he says like, in any case, would your father want you to feel terrible, right? Like would your father want to look down on you and feel that his absence has added pain to your life, right?

And it's of course not. And so it's kind of, it's as fascinating as I say, where Seneca is just really spending some time sort of breaking down, I don't wanna say some of the illogicalness of grief, but some of the assumptions we take for granted in our grief that makes that grief harder. And they're really quite beautiful, and I think they would be helpful to your work. And when people email me and they go, you know,

I just lost someone, what did the Stoic say about grief? I always point them to these articles. Thanks very much. Actually, sorry, I would say one other thing, there's a great book that I read a few years ago called A Measurer of My Days by Florida Scott Maxwell. And it's sort of a meditation's themed diary of a woman I think at her 90s who's dying. And it's quite beautiful and it feels very stoked to me. Dvoria, did I pronounce that terribly?

No, you didn't, although I did. All right, Panda. Oh, sorry, I thought it looked like it was. No, I was sitting. I'll put you on the thought anyway. What are you knitting? I'm knitting a sweater. I like to, when I'm listening, on the thought anyway. What are you knitting? I'm knitting a sweater. I like to when I'm listening, I sit in it.

Does it help you concentrate? Yeah, I can't sit and do nothing. I either have to write notes. But what we're listening to now is not the kind of thing where I'm sort of getting a stream of a lecture. So I'd be writing notes. So instead, I'm knitting. We are our book group is reading though, dying every day.

Oh, really? It's a group. What do you think of it so far? Well, we're enjoying it. We're wondering about the whole thing with Seneca like okay How are we supposed to view him is is it the cynical view of Seneca as the hypocrite or the wise Seneca? And I think your your email today around that really shows you can be both and I sometimes we have this purest kind of thought these days, you see a lot on Twitter where people have to be perfect or else we can't learn anything or like them in any way.

So I feel like that you can take from that and yet people can be hypocritical and not necessarily perfect. Yes, I feel like ROM is a bit harsh on Seneca, and there's an interesting thing. So Epic Titus says, until you know someone's reasons, how do you know that they did ROM? Now I think life's a little bit more complicated than that, but it's an interesting question, which is we've heard from, we hear from people who are observing Seneca from a distance. We hear from people who are observing Seneca from a distance.

We hear from people who are observing Seneca after all the events have concluded. What we don't really hear from is Seneca, right? We never get Seneca explaining why he worked for Nero, right? And so perhaps, perhaps if he could explain it, we'd be like, you know what? It was better that you did it than that if you hadn't explain it, we'd be like, you know what, it was better that you did it than that if you hadn't done it, right? Until we know their reasons, we're not quite sure. And so I think, I don't want to say that the jury is still out, but I do try to remind myself that there's a certain unknowaliveness about what Santa Cah experience and what he went through.

But I do try to, when I talk to people who have been in similar positions, I try to ask them, you know, I interviewed HR McMaster on the podcast who is Trump's national security advisor. There's probably not a bigger personality difference on the planet than HR McMaster and Trump. Again, we don't have to get into the politics, but they are very different people with very different

political views. And yet, they found themselves working together. Some would say that McMaster should have resigned in anger or discussed or differences. But his answer was illustrative. I think, and I would point people to that episode as well. It gives you some context of of Sena Sena's ethical dilemma. Let's do Lori

Ryan. Hi, it's great to talk to you because I've been listening to you in my head for like the past two months unaudible Hey, my question is a little bit different Hey, my question is a little bit different. It's actually related to Marcus, right? So we know kind of what a great leader he was, filled with integrity. I'm interested in the fact that he was married to one woman for a few decades. Yes.

And you would think that someone of such great character would be married to someone who's of similar character. But, you know, we don't really hear much about her. So I'm kind of curious just to see, you know, what we do know about her or do we not know much. So we don't know much and what we do know, what we do here is not the most positive. So and historians are sort of split on it. So from the sort of gossip of the time, it was said that she was repeatedly unfaithful, that she had expensive tastes, etc. But mostly what comes down to us is that the claim that she was repeatedly unfaithful. Now, a lot of historians dismiss this as just sort of court gossip of the time and suspect that it's not true. I can't make heads or tails of it. I mean, I could see one argument

where it's true and Marcus sort of stoically endures this humiliation and puts up with it. and puts up with it. I could also see the argument where it's totally not true and Marcus and his wife stoically put up with the insinuations and the rumors, right? And you could probably create a moral lesson from either one. There's probably also a lesson or a moral lesson there that maybe Marcus is pure and good, and, you know, hopes for the best in people, and this leads to a certain naïve té and puts

him in a position to be repeatedly taken advantage of or taken for granted by another person. Again, we don't really know any of it. The only action we really have here, well, I guess sort of two, two interesting pieces of evidence. One, they had something like 12 children together, which is a lot. They're also beset by tragedy. The majority of the children do not survive to adulthood.

So, maybe there's an argument where the relationship starts really good and then just no marriage can survive, you know, the death of a half a dozen infants. I mean, that's just obscene. The other interesting piece of evidence is that after her death, Marcus deifies her, which is sort of the ultimate honor that the Emperor can bestow on, youow on sort of a fallen member of the

Roman House of the royal household. And the fact that he does this, he doesn't have to do it. I've got to imagine if he felt humiliated or betrayed by this person, it probably wouldn't have done that. But again, we don't we don't, we don't know. All right. Well, thanks, appreciate it. Yeah, of course. No, it's a great question. To me, the other question about Marcus is, you know, what does his marriage tell us about us, tell us about him, and then what goes wrong with communist his son, who's about as bad as Joaquin Phoenix, his character plays him in Gladiator. This is again another failing and is relatively accurate. So, you know, there's again another argument where Marcus is a great philosopher and a great

ruler, but something is just horribly wrong at home. And I think that gives us something to think about in chew on. gives us something to think about and chew on. Being able to control your anger is a difficult but worthwhile goal. We'll take time and effort, won't be free, but by changing your perspective and developing techniques to control your temper, we'll ultimately be achievable in life-changing. So take the first step on the path to a calmer and more fulfilling future, check out Taiming Your Tempor, the 10-day Stoic Guide to controlling your anger, you can just go to dailystoic Early and Add Free on Amazon Music,

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