The Daily Stoic - It’s Time To Change

Episode Date: December 17, 2023

You could argue that Meditations is Marcus Aurelius’ daily philosophical battle with himself to overcome this natural fear of change, to avoid getting trapped in a velvet rut, to not get co...mplacent. Even into old age, Marcus was talking to himself firmly, pushing himself to do better, to not try to stay the same as he always was. It’s why he was famously seen leaving the palace as an old man, trying to learn, as he said, “that which I do not yet know.”They say that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different outcomes. There's nothing more disheartening than a person who refuses to grow, turn a new leaf, or take a leap of faith into the unknown.Here we are at the end of one year and the beginning of another. Are you going to go in 2024 trying to cling to who you were? Even though it’s stopped working, just because it’s comfortable?Why not start 2024 by actually taking the steps to create a better life? To actively step toward being the person you know you can be?That’s why we created the 2024 New Year New You Challenge. It’s a set of 21 actionable challenges—presented one per day—built around the best, most timeless wisdom in Stoic philosophy. Our goal is to help you make 2024 your best year yet.✉️ 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.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the weekend edition of the Daily Stoic. Each weekday we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics, something to help you live up to those four Stoic virtues of courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. And then here on the weekend we take a deeper dive into those same topics. We interview stoic philosophers, we explore at length how these stoic ideas can be applied to our actual lives and the challenging issues of our time. Here on the weekend when you have a little bit more space when things have slowed down, be sure to take some time to think, to go for a walk, to sit with your journal, and most importantly, to prepare for what the week ahead may bring.
Starting point is 00:00:57 It's time to change. We've been this way for a while. We've been on this path for quite some time. We've become accustomed to our routines. We've been this way for a while. We've been on this path for quite some time. We've become accustomed to our routines. We've gotten comfortable. This is natural. It's what humans, indeed, all systems tend towards. Homostasis, plateau, complacency.
Starting point is 00:01:18 It makes sense, but it's also terribly, terribly sad, because it's a short trip from leveling off to fighting off change to trying to keep Everything the same when deep down we know that challenge and disruption are how we grow and improve frightened of change marks realize asked himself, but what can exist without it? What's closer to nature's heart? Can any vital process take place without something being changed? Can't you see, he said, it's just the same with you and just as vital? You could argue that meditations as Marcus really says daily philosophical battle with himself to overcome this natural fear of change, to avoid getting trapped and avail of it right. It was him telling himself
Starting point is 00:02:05 to not get complacent. And even into old age, Marcus was talking to himself firmly, pushing himself to do better to try not to stay the same as he always was. It's why he was famously seen leaving the palace as an old man, trying to learn, as he said that, which I do not yet know. They say that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different outcomes. There's nothing more disheartening than a person who refuses to grow to turn over a new leaper, take a leap of faith into the unknown. And here we are at the end of one year and the beginning of another. Are you going to go into 2024 trying to cling to who you were?
Starting point is 00:02:47 Even though it stopped working just because it was comfortable? Why not start 2024 by actually taking the steps to create a better life, to actively step towards being the person you know that you can be. And this is what we had in mind as we were creating the 2024 New Year New Year challenge. The idea as I was sitting there with the team trying to come up with these stoic inspired challenges was to set me up to set them up to set you up so that whatever happens in 2024 and beyond, you can say this is precisely what I trained for. And that's what we've been training for, right? For the last five years, thousands and thousands of stokes all over
Starting point is 00:03:32 the world joined me in the new, your new challenge that we do here at Daily Stoic. We started it way back before COVID-19 was the thing before the world was as crazy as it is right now. And the idea was like, how do we set it up to the first three weeks of the year? 21 consecutive challenges. One per day, built around the best and so wisdom could set us up so we could make better decisions next year. So we could be tougher for next year. So we could have plans for the next year. We could have better habit. We could just be who we want to be in the year. And so as we sit here on the eve of this new year, which is going to be here before you know it,
Starting point is 00:04:09 think about the downsides of not taking control of your life. Think about what it would cost you to not live up to your potential next year, by not changing your ways. Think about all the things that are out there that you are not prepared for. And what just a little investment, a little effort towards rectifying that could bring you. Don't let it happen. Run some more games, seek out some challenges, have some fun with me and fellow Stoics, keep growing.
Starting point is 00:04:34 Don't stay the same. Don't portray your potential. Demand more of yourself in 2024. And one of the ways you can do that is by joining me in the Daily Stoic New Year, New You Challenge, and you can head over to dailystoke.com slash challenge. And remember, if you sign up for Daily Stoke Life now at dailystokelife.com, you get this challenge plus all the other challenges we're going to do in the year, plus all our old
Starting point is 00:04:56 ones, plus a bunch of other awesome stuff. You get that totally for free. So I'll see you soon. We're going to start on January 1st. So sign up now, grab your spot dailystone.com slash challenge. 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
Starting point is 00:05:43 ad free on Amazon music, download the Amazon music app today 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.

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