The Daily Stoic - MLB’s Eric Byrnes - How to Keep Going When Your Body Wants to Quit

Episode Date: October 14, 2020

On today’s Daily Stoic Podcast, Ryan speaks with Eric Byrnes, a former professional baseball player, analyst, and endurance athlete. They talk about willpower, what it takes to succeed when times get tough, and more.Eric Byrnes played in Major League Baseball for over 10 years, in a career that took him from the Oakland A’s and Arizona Diamondbacks to the Seattle Mariners. In 2019, Eric ran, swam, and biked across the United States in support of his Let Them Play Foundation. Eric also hosts a podcast and has written a book, The F*It List: Life Lessons from a Human Crash Test Dummy.This episode is brought to you by the Theragun. The new Gen 4 Theragun is perfect for easing muscle aches and tightness, helping you recover from physical exertion, long periods of sitting down, and more—and its new motor makes it as quiet as an electric toothbrush. Try the Theragun risk-free for 30 days, starting at just $199.This episode is brought to you by Amazon Alexa. Amazon Alexa is the perfect system to use to set up your house with Smart Home functionality—and with the new Amazon Smart Lighting Bundle, it’s easy to get started. Just connect your Amazon Echo Dot with your first Sengled color changing light bulb and you’re on your way. Visit Amazon.com/dailystoic to get 20% off the bundle.***If you enjoyed this week’s podcast, we’d love for you to leave a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps with our visibility, and the more people listen to the podcast, the more we can invest into it and make it even better.Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: http://DailyStoic.com/signupFollow @DailyStoic:Twitter: https://twitter.com/dailystoicInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoic/Facebook: http://facebook.com/dailystoicYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/dailystoicFollow Eric Byrnes:  Homepage: https://www.ericbyrnes.com/Twitter: https://twitter.com/byrnes22Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ebyrnes22Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/byrnes22/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 Stoke Podcast early and add free on Amazon Music. Download the app today. Hi, I'm David Brown, the host of Wondery'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. music or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the Daily Stoic. For each day, we read a short passage designed to help you cultivate the strength, insight, wisdom necessary for living good life.

Each one of these passages is based on the 2000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and women. For more, you can visit us at dailystowach.com. Hey, it's Ryan Holiday. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stowach Podcast. I guess it was two, maybe almost three years ago now. I was flying back from Istanbul in coach. It was a brutal, incredibly long flight.

Who knows what happened, but almost the evening I got home, I wasn't feeling well, and a couple days later, I really wasn't feeling well. I had super bad food poisoning, and then it just like, it never went away. And like the feeling not good went away, and I went to a doctor and they said, oh, this is nothing. And so they would probably just have the flu. So then I came home and still feeling sick. I went to another doctor, finally, I was feeling so terrible.

I ended up going to an urgent care and they said, look, there's nothing wrong with you. And I don't know why my wife had tossed it out. She was like, ask them if you have mono. So I did and they were like, fine. I guess we can give you a mono test as it happens. That is what I had. It was brutal. I was out for like almost three months.

It took forever to recover from. Anyways, the two morals of the story, one, is why I am taking the COVID-19 very seriously. You know, for most people viruses are nothing, but you never know where you're gonna end up falling on the spectrum and it was brutal recovering from mono, you know, it sounds like this cheesy thing, it's like, isn't that what you get

making out with the football team or whatever, but no, it really knocked me on my ass. And the consequences of getting knocked on my ass was that I had been planning on doing the Leadville Marathon with Lance Armstrong and my guest today on the podcast Eric Burns. The Leadville Marathon is like a apparently notoriously brutal marathon, you hit a high like 13,000 feet. But anyways, it was for a sort of like a war, to a vets charity and it was supposed to be really cool.

I was really looking forward to it. And I just like, I hadn't been able to run in months. I was just not able to do it. And so that was supposed to be my chance to meet today's guests in person, we've never actually met. But we talk quite a bit. He's a fan of the Stoics and just an all-around incredible athlete, Eric played in professional baseball

for 10 years. He was a star for the A's, the Rockies, the Diamondbacks. He ended his career with the Mariners. If that was not enough, is an incredible endurance athlete in support of his foundation, let them play. He did a triathlon across the United States a couple years ago, which is insane. I follow him on Instagram and it's like this unreal spectacle.

The other day, he did like a 60 mile run on a treadmill in his house. Clearly, as you'll tell from the interview, just an absolute intense guy, tons of energy. I wanted to talk to him in part because of that. I mean, I think we have this idea of the stoics being sort of boring and low energy, or just sort of stoically enduring adversity, but Eric is much more passionate than that.

And I think that's an important side of the philosophy to illustrate. Great dude, I think you'll really like this interview. Eric is not just energetic when it comes to athletics. He hosts the Daily Hustle, which is a Daily Podcast. Eric wrote a book called The Fuck It List, Life Lessons from a Human Crash Test dummy, which you can check out. And of course, he's also an analyst for the MLB Network. You can follow him on Twitter at Burns22. You can go to EricBerns.com to sign up for the Daily H network, you can follow them on Twitter at Burns22.

You can go to Eric Burns.com to sign up for the Daily Hustle there. I think I really like this interview and I hope to one day run the lead bill marathon and see Eric in person next time. All right, enjoy. The weirdest thing I found about it is the things that people apparently deem as essential. Do you know what I mean?

Like, why do you need to be, it's like people are like, oh, you know, I'm social distancing, I'm being smart, but you know, I am going to Costco a couple times a week and it's like a couple times a week. Why, I wouldn't even go to Costco two times a week in a regular week because that's just like a bad use of your time.

Like it's weird, the situations where things that people don't seem to be able to prioritize. Like school, it's like why are schools considered like schooling is important, but why did we open up bars and restaurants before we open schools? If you clubs, bars, and restaurants, transmission would be lower, and then you could send kids to school safely. It's crazy. Yeah, so check this one out. So we were signed up for a baseball tournament,

this 10U team, in sparks the battle. And the tournament was postponed from June to July to August. And eventually the last one, which we thought was gonna happen, what shut down in August. Now, gorgeous, complex, golden eagle park, it is incredible. I mean, probably 10 to 15 fields, at least, that couldn't really be more spread out, right?

It's just this amazing place. And so if you think of what would have gone down there, had they run this baseball tournament, you have, yeah, you have kids out there, the route side, social distancing, pretty much as much as you can in sports. And then I went down the street five miles from where that baseball complex was and the tournament got shut down for the third time

and basically just canceled. And there's a water park with no less than a thousand people stacked on top of each other. And it's just like, man, I mean, the water park's a cesspool anyway. And then you're running this thing in the middle of COVID, yet five miles down the road, you're telling me, you can't get these kids outside in plain?

That bothers me. Like, there's something very skewed right there and why that would be allowed, yet the other thing isn't. Well, I think that's a, I was thinking about this from the still perspective. Like, you would think that as adults, we're pretty good at going like, here's what I think, here's what's right,

here's what I'm comfortable with. So like that's my line. But I think what's really been interesting about the virus is revealing just how difficult it is for people to make sort of independent decisions. So I don't even think we need to get into the mass thing because that starts to open up, you know, little pockets for crazy people to rationalize things. I'm we're talking about, you know, how have people been unable to go

just because my neighbor is being an idiot does not mean I should lessen my standard. So yeah, like people see the, they're going, oh, well, you know, I'm lessen my standard. So yeah, like people see the, the, they're going, oh, well, you know, I'm already sending my kid to school. So I might as well do X. And it's like, no, you can take calculated, deliberate risks without saying, fuck it. Let's just do everything. I think that, that, that's been really hard for people to manage and, and to stay in their lane despite what other people are doing. Yeah, you're right, man. It's really just a matter of figuring out what we're all in this together.

And we figure out how to get rid of it. And what's the most efficient and effective way. Now, I do believe the residual effects of the shutdown potentially could be worse than the actual virus itself. And that's where we got to look at it and figure out, look, what do we need to do? Now, first and foremost, to get rid of it, but secondly, is to make sure that all of these other factors that are happening because of the shutdown don't end up being worse than the actual virus itself. And, you know, where that threshold is, I don't know. That's another good example I think of where people struggle, right?

It's like people are like, Oh, the shutdowns are so costly. It's gone on so long. And it's like, yeah, it's gone. And to me, this is a very stoic concept. They've gone on longer in the United States and been more costly because we, we only kind of did it halfway. Like the lowest we ever got cases that the peak was like, you know like 20,000 cases nationwide like we never like you were saying this before we started recording But like if you shut down and you really shut down the thing can go away very quickly It's this weird kind of like half shut down You can go you you shouldn't leave your house, but of course you can leave your house. And don't do anything that's not essential,

but of course, your mental health is really important too. Blab, blab, blab, blab. The United States has done this sort of worst of both worlds approach. And it's like avoiding the hard thing, and I think you know this in your life. It's like if you avoid the hard thing, or you only go halfway,

it's often worse than doing nothing at all. But that's not an excuse. You just have to do the hard thing or you only go halfway, it's often worse than doing nothing at all. But that's not an excuse. You just have to do the hard fucking thing and get over it. Yeah, and do it and do it. And that was a problem. It's like from the get-go, okay, literally should have been martial law declared. Nobody leaves the house for fucking 14 days done.

But that didn't happen. If you look at the countries who have been successful in getting rid of the virus, and at least making great leaps towards doing so, that's exactly what they did. But then we have astus saying, and it's perfectly just like you said, man. Like, you can't have astus.

You can't go halfway in on anything that you do in life because you're not going to be successful. Now, we're at a point where we have to decide, quote, quote, you know, what's essential and what's not. And, you know, to leave that up to political figures to tell you that this is essential, and this isn't essential, it just gets pretty shady, man. Well, let's talk about hard things,

because I mean, that's sort of your life. If playing professional baseball wasn't hard enough, you decided, hey, I also need the challenge of extreme endurance sports. I just blown away. I mean, you ran, swam, and biked across the United States. How do you do something like that? Well, you know what, right, when I got done playing baseball, I think a lot of professional

athletes, I went through a pretty difficult transition period. And you're sort of searching for your meaning. And so often, I associate myself with who I was as a baseball player and then all the sun that's ripped from you and you'd think about this though. So everyone wants to look at me like, okay, did you play Major League Baseball for 10, 11 years, whatever.

That wasn't the case. I'd been playing baseball since I was nine years old. I knew when I was playing for moreies, peninsula billion materials, and I'll find the little league at nine that I want to play in the big leagues. And so this whole lifelong dream that you have and the process and everything that it takes to get there and becoming completely immersed within it.

And then the college and the minor leagues and having to work your way up. And even when you get to the minor leagues, still like the the long odds that you're facing and one in every 10 minor league players. You know I think it's even less than that actually even get to the big leagues and you get to the big leagues it's like it's not just about getting there it's about staying there and since it's constant battle and fighting I wrote something on this daily hustle blog that I do the other day and I was talking about what the Big Leagues was like because now coaching a 10-U team, we got kids all the time going,

you know, coach Burns, coach Burns, but what was the Big Leagues like? And you know, I'll tell them, and I'll break into that bold, durm speech, right? The ball parks are like confedrals, women all have long legs and brains that nobody carries. You know, you all have long legs and brains, that nobody carries your, you know, you never have to carry your luggage, you have white balls for batting practice, and the reality though,

is that yeah, sure, some of those things are what the biglies was like, but the truth, it was a fucking grind. And I loved every single minute of it. So when that was done, the question then became, how am I going to fill that void in my life? And I got dared by a couple of junior high school friends to go do a triathlon. It was a sprint triathlon. I owned a beach

cruiser as a bike that was did. I had a surfing web suit. That was it. And I never run more than four miles in my life. And I went down there and I absolutely got my ass kicked, dude. I almost drowned in the water. I was getting passed by 16 year old girls on the bike. I know that because they write the age on their calf. And then I ran a couple miles and cross a finish line and told my friends I said hey I said that was one of the coolest experiences of my entire life all three kick my ass and I said that's the last time you'll ever beat me and I was able to take that competitive spirit and drive that I had playing baseball and just redirected into the world of culture and dirt sports. Yeah, I wondered if, I mean, obviously,

you're physically gifted and very good at that. Or you wouldn't be able to do what you do. But I had to wonder if you're sort of sheer tenacity and persistence was, and the mental discipline was what made you successful. Because I was watching, this is what I think a month or two ago, but you ran, you did an ultra marathon or the half ultra marathon, like on the treadmill in your house. Like I love running, I run every day, but I can only do like, like if I have to do five

miles on a treadmill, I want to kill myself, not because it's physically hard, but I'm just bored. I need to kill myself, not because it's physically hard, but I'm just bored. I need this stimulation of being outside. So I don't, I don't, I don't almost rather not do it, then subject myself to the monotony of that. You seem to have a remarkable amount of willpower that you, you combine with your physical gifts. And do well, you know, it's one of those things where I just as uncomfortable as you are

when you know the treadmill, but you know, at some point we're all going to hit that roadblock and what's amazing is that when we just keep putting one foot in front of the other, anything is possible. And so the treadmill running you're talking about, it was actually a day at which I was supposed to be doing a double marathon on the back end of an Ultraman triathlon in Arizona, which was a 6.2 mile swim 270 mile bike in a 52 mile run. And instead of just going, I screw it, you know, I'm not going to do it because obviously the race got canceled, I used it as an opportunity to go ahead and challenge myself and do the run on the treadmill. Now, all of these things, Ryan, it's amazing because when I got into it, the triathlon

I described to you, that was a sprint, bro. And so within 11 months, I, and again, when I set almost around on the water, I'm not fucking kidding kidding dude. I'm like, dead. And when I came up on the beach, it was like, I couldn't move. It took five minutes for me to pull my body off of the sand to go and make the transition to the bike.

And so I went and hired a swim coach, a guy by the name of Frank Sol and Scottsdale, Arizona. And Frank asked me, he goes, man, what do you want to do with this? And I go, what do you mean? He goes, well, what the whole slimy thing? Like, what are you looking to accomplish? I'm like, you know what, man?

He said, right now, I said, I, you know, I have a vision of doing an Iron Man one day, but it just seems so far, far fenced to, you know, even put that into my mind right now. I said, let's just try getting from one side of the pool to the other. And he goes, you know, even put that into my mind right now, I said, let's just try getting from one side of the pool to the other. And he goes, you know what? He goes, I can get you ready for Iron Man Arizona

in 11 months from now. I'm like, dude, no way. He goes, bro, he's like, not only will I get you ready, I just like, I get you out of the water in under one 18. And it's like, even swimming 2.4 miles at that point, it was not, I could not envision that. It wasn't even a possibility and Sure enough 11 months later

2.4 miles swim got out of the water like one 15 and then within like a I don't know eight year period End up doing 12 different iron man's which led to doing the Western states 100 and then You know this Triathlon across the country, which was basically dreamed up because of a foundation that my wife and I started called Let Them Play, all about kids and youth activity. And then this 24-hour World Record golf challenge that we did last year, which was just an amazing experience and then allowed us obviously to raise some more funds for the foundation and hand them out to different youth

organizations in the Half Moon Bay community. So it's been a wild ride, but all of this stuff starts. It's like, it's so cliche-ish, but dude, it starts. With like, you know, one foot in front of the other, one mile at a time, and all of it sounds corny, but it's true. What do you say to yourself when you're at, like, you know, mile 42 and a 60 mile race, or when you're on that beach and you can barely get up?

Like, what is the self-talk that allows you to sort of push past the physical limitation? So a couple of weeks ago, my my boy Kualsky and I, we decided that we're gonna run 72 miles around Wait Tahu. And took off five in the morning. Really, really nice out at that time. And then obviously, so we started in Kings Beach, as we're going around, you get to Tahu City, into Tahu City. By the time we got then obviously, so we started in Kings Beach, as we're going around, you get

to Tahoe City, into Tahoe City. By the time we got over there, we found this path. Like gorgeous path all along the West Shore, took us to the Emerald Bay. Got an Emerald Bay, met my wife there, she had the fan. I mean, we had all the accoutrements, like everything you could possibly think of, right, the chocolate milk, cogs, pour water, it was still cool, came down in Emmerl Bay, down from Emmerl Bay into South Shore. And for whatever reason we got in a South Shore, it wasn't even a hard section of the run, but it was getting hot. And we pull up and I remember we met my wife at at Freiber, my wife and kids, and ironically you said, what about it, mile 40, 42?

We were at mile 42 at that point, and I'm like, dude, I don't know if I can fucking go on. I was just depleted, everything hurt, I was nauseous. And what's amazing is that there's a line that my dad told me, and he passed away right after I got done playing baseball. But he used to say, don't take your feelings to personal. And I'm like, what are you talking about?

Like my feelings are everything I have. My feelings are who I am. I'm an emotional person. I'm an, what are you talking about? Like, my feelings are everything I have. My feelings are who I am. I'm an emotional person. I'm an emotional baseball player. Like, I love my feelings. And why would I not take them personal? And so that same sort of thing translates into the endurance world.

Because here I am, I feel like shit. And instead of letting that defeat my mind, I try to almost step out of my body and take this third party perspective where I'm looking down on it and going, dude, you're fine, right? Rehydrate, get some sugar in you. You know, just figure it out and go.

And I did. And the other thing is, you know, you've heard the African proverb, you wanna go fast, go alone, you wanna go far, go together. And I've noticed that when I've done these things, dude, to have someone by your side, to have my boy Kowalski there,

every step of the way, he was there for, you know, the 24-hour record golf fin. That was 106 miles, 420 holes. He was running by my side for damn, there 90 miles of it and helping me find the balls and do everything else. The Tri-Cross America, he was by my side for three quarters of the entire thing. So, you know, it's those people that are actually the ones that allow you to push on and then having the support of the family and everything else. So, I know it seems like a very individual sport, very selfish sport too, but, you know,

it doesn't have to be. Yeah, I was thinking about, you know, endurance, I think it's a Miracame who is saying, sort of, running as a writer, is both exercise and a metaphor. I think the value of these endurance sports or these challenges in life is that you then find yourself as we find, you know, both individually and globally right now at the pandemic. You find yourself in these situations where you don't know where they're going to end, where they take way more than you think you have, and you either have the heart to be able to keep going or you don't. I hear people say stuff like, how much longer can this go on?

Or we can't keep living like this. And it's like, reality is completely indifferent to your personal feelings, to your capabilities. You either put up with it or you don't, right? There's not like, you don't get to tap out from life. And I think people who have not trained themselves to be able to go, oh, whether it's lifting weights

or swimming or running or any sort of physical activity. Unless you've trained yourself to realize that that voice in your head that's telling you you have to quit is bullshit. You're really, you know, screwed because you don't understand that the resistance you're feeling is just an illusion and you actually have, you know, quite a bit left in the tank. Yeah, so there's actually a book that I read when I first got into all of this. I was written by Matt Fitzgerald called How Bad You how bad do you want it? And essentially, he laid out the fact that our minds will quit every single time before our bodies.

And it's like even the science behind it is fascinating. So the question becomes, who wants it the most, right? And in baseball, it was real easy to see all of these people. And it's a little obviously different than the endurance world. But you would see these people who would have the most unbelievable talent. I mean, I'm talking, they run like the wind, they have a cannon for an arm. They could hit a ball 500 feet and they got to damn it. They can't make it out of the A ball.

And it's like, what? And every one of those guys, each and every single one of them, dude, they just didn't want it. They didn't have that killer, whatever it is inside, that, and look, I'm not gonna, the idea in fact, and we like to use this all the time as an excuse. It's just like, oh, he was born with it.

Oh, he was born that way. Oh, you can't teach it. I hear it especially with the kids. You know, now it's like, you can't teach fast twitch. Like, bullshit, you can't teach fast twitch. Bro, I grew up in a household that nobody in my family ever played major league baseball. Nobody, no, never, no, never play baseball for that matter, right?

Not little league, nothing, nothing about it. And here I was where, when I was from my 13th birthday, my parents got me an iron mic machine. I cranked that thing up to 90 miles per hour, went in the backyard and obsessed every single day. Hit off this machine, hit off this machine, hit off this machine, right? At first, a lot of swings of men, swing of men, swing of men, swing of men. It's pretty soon, foul ball, foul ball, foul ball.

Pretty soon, line drive back at the middle, line drive back at the middle. Two, three years later, I'm sophomore in high school, I get called the Borussia, facing Dan Seraphini, number one left-handed pitching prospect in the country, throws 94 miles per hour. I get in there, I hit three balls against Dan Seraphini, then we'll take his head off, one after another. No one else could touch him. It stands packed with scouts. And so here I was, did I need to get out of here of my balls yet? And I just was ripping 94 like it was my job.

After the game, Chris Bradford comes up to me. He had legendary St. Francis head coach, he's like, my day, you can't make three balls. I'm just like, I'm going to get in there. I'm going to get in there. I'm going to get in there. I'm going to get in there. I'm going to get in there. I'm going to get in there. This was ripping 94 like it was my job. After the game, Chris Bradford comes up to me. He had legendary St. Francis head coach. He's like, hey, you can't make free bullets, Dancer, if any? How'd you do it?

I'm like, coach, so I've been hitting off Dancer, if any, my backyard for three years, doing the exact same thing. That's training fast switch. And so it's the same sort of thing where we use that as the excuse. Oh, that's just not me. I wasn't born with it. I can't do that. I can't do this.

It's a fucking bullshit. Just go do it. And the problem is it's a stop that starts us, right? No one wants to get, here it's a start that stops us. No one wants to get going. But once we get going, it's incredible. What's possible? I wasn't made for this and dirt and stuff. I could have taken the easy way out and went and galted every single day and

gotten into whatever it is after baseball. But the idea and thought of challenging myself and becoming a rookie at things is just we don't like that. As human beings, we don't like being rookies, we don't like being uncomfortable, we don't like not being good at something. And especially when you talk about big league players, right? So you're going from the top of the top, you know, in the world of what you're doing. And then all of a sudden, I found myself in the bottom of the barrel and back of the pack and triathlon. So it's a interesting process. Hey. The Bahamas. Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I?

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Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I? Did I? other people's money, but he allegedly stole. Many thought Sam Bankman Fried was changing the game as he graced the pages of Forbes in Vanity Fair. Some involved in crypto saw him as a breath of fresh air, from the usual Wall Street buffs with his casual dress and ability to play League of Legends during boardroom meetings. But in less than a year, his exchange would collapse.

An SPF would find himself in a jail cell, with tens of thousands of investors blaming him for their crypto losses. From Bloomberg and Wondering, comes Spellcaster, a new six-part docu-series about the meteoric rise and spectacular fall of FTX, and its founder, Sam Beckman-Freed. Follow Spellcaster wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, prime members, you can listen to episodes Add Free on Amazon Music, download the Amazon Music app today. What did you realize at the other sort of mental element of sports I'm curious about?

When did it really sort of hit you that sports was a business? I imagine the game broke your heart a couple times. You're a fan favorite in Oakland and then you get traded. You got dropped a couple times. I think the other thing is people, I see this as a writer, it's like you envision or you imagine, once you get there, once you get over the hump, then everyone's your friend, then it's easy, then it works and it's like, no, this too is an industry that doesn't care about you, that will use you up and spit you out two seconds after you wavor or you mess up or that looks like there's something else slightly better

out there. How did that conclusion hit you and then how did you keep going through it? Well, the reality was that probably it wasn't until I got traded. So draft by the age, 1998, and signed went to Medford, Oregon. Medford, Oregon to Viceria, Viceria to Instructionally. Instructionally spring training, then it was Modesto to start the next year, being in Texas, Sacramento, short-stint in Mexico. Oh, the River Cats?

Oh, yeah, baby. I love the River Cats. I grew up in Sacramento. I love it. Yeah, man. So we were, I was there, that inaugural team in 2000, and they got called up to Big Lees.

So it was in a relatively short period of time was right about two years from when I'd gotten drafted. Get to the big leagues, first game, face in Chuck Finley, face hit up the middle, first hit back, that another base hit, got hit by a pitch, almost incited, a bench clean and brawl. Just incredible experience, right? I mean, I'll never forget standing out at Jacobs Field and then like looking around because

I had never been to a big league spring training. I'd never been around any of these guys. I'd obviously, you know, had that dream of playing Major League Baseball since I was nine and I, you know, I get off the plane and end up, like I was late for the game. So it's like, I don't always pro that 645 and I'm standing out in the dugout and I'm looking around. I'm like, holy shit, dude. And so I tried to just, you know, get my composure, sprinting out to center field, sprinting back,

and you know, got out of the game, and it was the most incredible experience. And then two days later, I got sent down. And then after that, over the course of the next, I'd say, you're, yeah, probably next year, I went up and down nine times. And what sucks was that not a lot of it was within my control. So, I was a 25th, 26th guy that was just, you know, shut the line, shut it out. And the most difficult thing was that, just, you know, shut the line, shut the line out. And the most difficult thing was that, you know,

I'd never really got my shot. And it's one thing when you get your shot and you don't perform, that's on you. You know, it's another thing, you get your shot and, you know, you go ahead and run with it and that's obviously on you too. But when you don't get your shot, that becomes difficult. And so that was sort of the first business element

of things that I had to deal with and experience. You know from there it was finally, uh, germane die got hurt and I went into a game and I wasn't supposed to go into the game. The action Adam Pia was the guy that was sort of ahead of me on the depth chart. He would have been the fourth outfield or I would have been the fifth. And it was a, I think maybe a Saturday day game or Sunday day game and just really sort of lackluster day. We were losing and The bench coach who was Terry Francona the manager of the Red Sox and now the Indians Francona's like Pai it grabbed her glove and like Pai it's getting ready to run out the field and Instead Ken Mako who I

like Piaz get ready to run out the field. And instead, Ken Maka, who I did stuff to say, I like, I never thought he was my biggest fan, but he was a manager and he overrided, Frank Hona and he goes, Burns, grab your glove, Piaz sit down. So I'm like, all right, grab my gloves, sprint it out through my field. And the whole reason for him doing that

was that he was looking at a spark. And he knew that some, you know, they were going to get a spark on a lackluster sort of day. I guess I was a guy to do it. So, end up getting a couple hits, got to start the next day, got a couple hits, and I ended up going on to hit in 22 straight games. And the way I looked at it was like, I finally have a chance to hold them hostage with this hit streak that went on. And that's when I'd say, my career really took off and whatnot. But we ended up all the way to 2005,

really kind of established myself as a big leader. And then as soon as you think that everything's just peaches and cranes, I got traded in the Colorado Rockies and just kept blindsided out of nowhere. And then I was there for two weeks and then they traded me to Baltimore. It was there for two months, ended up not playing well. Obviously was dealing with a lot of different things

and ended up getting released and then I ended up signing with Arizona and resurrecting my career out there. But dude, it's yeah, that first getting traded, so what a thing. I'll never frown, I mean, I was in tears, like crying. I'd bawling on my way home, call my mom. Well, that was something I wanted to ask you about

because I think what, and one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you is obviously, I know you're affinity for stoicism, but you are also this sort of, and you can just, I can hear it, you're a deeply sort of passionate, like committed, like high tempo, high energy guy. How do you see those two things balancing out?

When people think stoicism, they often think sort of like in difference or lack of emotion or apathetic, but you have like an intensity to you. Yeah, it's funny because when I tell people how into stoicism, I am, I think there's this common misperception of what it is. You know, at the same time, you know, I think you and I could probably both make the argument that Stoets were incredibly passionate. They loved the life because they appreciated life,

because they understood that each day is a gift. So a lot of this, I think Ryan was implemented in me at a really young age. I wouldn't necessarily say that, you know, it was my parents running around talking about Marcus Aurelius and Seneca and Epic Titus. Sure. Going back into the history books, but my dad was a 4-3 black belt in martial arts in Kemple Karate. And so growing up as a kid with full-blown ADHD,

the really difficult times in still, got kicked out of all my classes, I also knew that I had the ability to focus. And in that, I also knew that, you know, as emotional as I was, my best performances were always when I was able to slow it down as opposed to speed it up. And I think that is a lot of what stoicism is. It's being able to recognize where we are and then slowing it down to appreciate all the little things in life that make up the big things and then ultimately it's just being able to totally be in the here and now in the moment of life because it's the only thing that we have. So, yeah, it's kind of a little weird, I think, you know, just because people would not perceive me as being, you know, this stoic lover.

But it's really, I'd say, reshape my life. And I don't say reshape, but it's helped guide my life. And again, it started at a really young age. And people miss that, like, look, Seneca writes all these plays in addition to being a lawyer, in addition to being a politician, in addition to being an advisor. He's not like the idea that this was a low energy person

is sort of belied by the facts of his life, right? You know Marcus are really like is the emperor of Rome? We know what apathetic sort of indifferent emperors did, right? They retreated to like their pleasure palaces or they they did a crappy job like Marcus really is clearly cared a great deal So I think when you actually look at the lives of the stoics, which is actually what my new book is about, which I need to send you, we actually look at the lives of the stoics. These were people that did stuff

in the real world. So the idea that I think intensity and passion and ambition is sort of, uh, antithetical to stoicism doesn't make sense. And I would actually argue they're probably intuitively all those things are instinctually all those things. But I bet if I could crack open your head and look at your inner voice, your inner voice is probably not Eric. You got to pump up the energy like Eric, you got to care more. You're probably naturally that way. And so the voice in your head, which is what we see, whether it's in Marcus Aurelius or Seneca, that voice in your head is probably like, all right, take a deep breath, calm down, don't get too worked up about this.

You know what I mean? So I think I think the stoicism is about curbing those influences, and that's why the stoics aren't explicitly having to amp people up because that's not the kind of coaching that they need it. Yeah, so there's a line in baseball that we used to toss around and it's basically bee humble or get humble. And I think that baseball was a great, it's an incredible metaphor for life in so many different aspects. But I think that, you know, playing a game that's predicated on so much failure really helped me personally put all of life's happenings in perspective.

And really that's what, I think that's the key to whether we're talking about stoicism or just living your life. I mean, look, the whole idea of being able to realize first and foremost, you're not that fucking important. That is really, is really big. And then that also, too, Ryan, allows you to not give a fuck what anybody says or thinks about you.

And when you're able to get to that place, that's living, that's liberation, that's a special spot because my entire childhood, my entire career, even now in the post-career and broadcasting and getting into, I know, I wrote a book, the effortless life lessons from a human crash test dummy, obviously doing, you know, the endurance stuff, writing the daily hustle, doing a podcast five days a week. I feel like I've obviously put myself out there in everything that I've done with my life, but dealing with

all the ridicule and criticism along the way when I was nine years old and playing in the major, it's been 12 years old, 12 year old kids and just constantly having to fight my way through it. You develop this thick skin and ultimately, when you're able to do it, you develop this thick skin, and ultimately, when you're able to do that, you're able to be yourself. So I'm able to just let the emotion go into everything that I do without giving to Fox

about what anyone else is gonna say or think about it. Because ultimately, the whole concept of, look, leave it better than you found it, right? And that could go to be talking about our carbon footprint on the world and in the environment. But it's also about people and leave people better than you found them.

Every single day in the smallest interactions, we have an opportunity to leave people better than we found them. And it could be as simple as smiling and waving when you're out on a run in the smallest interactions, dude, we have an opportunity to leave people better than we found them. And it could be as simple as smiling and waving when you're out on a run in the morning, or saying good morning, or whatever it is. But so often, we have these reservations because we care so much about what other people think.

And ultimately, so long as we're authentic in what we do, and in our actions, in our words, that's what resonates. That's what matters. But for me, it's always been being emotional. And I'll never compromise that for anything, but being in control of those emotions is also a large part of who I continue to strive to be every single day. Well, this idea of relationships and people that's sort of where I wanted to close, obviously,

we haven't talked about it, but I sense some similarity. One of the weird things about the pandemic, deciding like, hey, look, I'm going to a social distance. I have the luxury of not having to sort of go to work in the sense that most people do. My occupation is not essential. Also wanting to leave the world better than I found it. Wanted to get through this and not feel like I'm hurt anyone else.

I've spent a lot of time at home, a lot of time with family. I've sort of rebuilt my life and schedule to be less work focused and more family focused. It seems like you and your kids, I watch the videos you posted you guys, you know, batting practice in the driveway almost every day. It seems like you guys are having a hell of a lot of fun together. It seems like you guys are having a hell of a lot of fun together. Yeah, well, you know, we're, look, we, everyone, I haven't been to a whole lot on this. And I think letting out every now and again is okay. But the 2020 memes, if I never see another fucking one of those for the rest of my life, I'm good. Like the constant.

Oh, that this is the worst year ever. It's a dumpster fire, that kind of stuff. It's what you're fucking making of it. And you wanna keep reiterating it, and reiterating it, and reiterating it. It's manifesting itself. And all these people who continue to feed it, and feed it, and feed it and feed it.

It's one big gashim excuse, dude. We're all dealt the same shit. We're all dealing with it. Yeah, man, dude, you know, in my individual case, look, I worked for MLB Network. I haven't worked a fucking day back there. This entire summer during this phase of the baseball season because it was just like this 15-day quarantine

process that has to happen before I step back there. It's just not worth it for me when you start looking at all these things. In a lot of ways, dude, my life has been turned upside down just like everybody else is. Right? As we just start this ten-year travel team and we're looking for to play in all these tournaments all summer. And those those all get canceled and everything else you know you have your kids who normally would be going to school and back to school and now they're you know I got a 9 10 and 11 year old that are running around the house like crazy animals and school's supposed to be in the center yeah yeah dude just deal with it

what right like it's all this stuff is happening, but it's how we deal with it. That ultimately decides, you know, if we are able to live this life of enjoyment, I guess, and it's life is what we make of it, right? And that's, I mean, the ultimate stoic philosophy principle is basically, you know, control what is within your control.

It's as simple as that. So if the pandemic is not in our control, the period, right? And then after that, it's like, okay, well, what are you going to do with your life? How are you going to make the most of this situation? And I did run, I think you traveled a lot and I travel, I was traveling at least two weeks out of every single month. Going back to San Francisco, New York, Lake Tahoe, it was like this triangle that just, it just didn't stop. And immediately when this happened, and this pandemic happened, I'm at home with my wife

and it's like, well, I guess we're about to find out what this relationship's made of. Right, right. And it's just, but it's been a God send man. I like to be able to develop these relationships and get to know my wife a little differently than I did. My kids, it was always easy for me to come in and be the fun dad.

It's like, I'm back from New York, present stories. Let's go out through this. Let's go out through that. But what do you like when you got a face on a daily basis where nothing's, you know, right? It's it's it's it's brown hogs. They're all over again. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. How are you going to react then? That's man, that's that's that's that's the beauty of life. And that's a challenge of life and take it as a challenge. Or you could sit there and bitch and moan and watch your world go to shit, because that's what's going to happen.

So, I don't know. No, look, I mean, obviously, you know, neither of us have to, you know, wait tables at a restaurant being coughed and sneezed on by, you know, like entitled, you know, jerks who don't think they should have to wear a mask and, you know, don't understand that you're there because you don't have a choice to be there, you know, like I think about what it'd be like to work

in one of these Amazon factories or, you know, at a meat-packing plant. Like, there's certainly obviously people have been hit by this, you know, in a level that I can't comprehend. And I think we have to sort of keep that in mind. But yeah, I got hit sideways by this thing too. All this travel that was planned for business, I was in the middle of starting something new

that got knock sideways. And so you can sort of sit there and wallow in that and you can look at what was taken from you. Or I think you can say, hey, and this is what that idea of the obstacle being the way is, you say, hey, okay, I thought what the world needed for me was all this action, all the stuff that you do. But actually know what the world needs for me is

to sort of look inward to focus on my family. And yeah, it's been wonderful. And I totally agree. It's been very eye-opening to sort of see the world through my wife's perspective on a day-to-day basis, too. I think it could be one of those things at ruin your relationship, or it could be one of those things that make sure relationships something that it could have never been otherwise.

And I think ultimately that that choice is ours. Yeah, the one thing about all this is that I think it's forced us to find our purpose. And so often it was like we're out there just we're living our lives and we're doing it. like we're out there just, we're living our lives and we're doing it and it's like we're just constant motion, constant motion, constant motion. And again, when we're able to step back and look inward, then all of a sudden it's like, okay, what really matters to me in my life?

And what I thought mattered, let's just say it matters a lot less than it did. Now know when you talk about the workers and I don't care You know if Amazon factory worker waiting tables or whatever it is like and I was watching these road workers yesterday Right and this one of the guys is holding a home window stop signs and it's like stop slow stop slow as lots of things to mad I was Ten in the morning, it was already 100 degrees. I thought about him. And I was wondering if whether or not he liked his job. And that was something that he wanted to do.

And then I try to put myself in his position and think about maybe what my life would be like if I were him. And then as I'm kind of just sitting there staring I'm waiting to red light. And I watch him and he's kind of twirl it around. And next to you know, he's chucking it up with but his buddy over in the tractor,

and he kind of breaks off his little laughter thing. And I'm like, yeah, man, that's how he do it. And it doesn't matter what you do. Like, I pumped Gasek Chevron when I was a kid. I worked as a stockboy in Malena's, Daley. These were things that I took great pride in. And in that, that was my purpose back then.

Like that was, now, look, it's constantly shifting and we're evolving, but another thing with that, you saw it say, show me how you do anything, I'll show you how you do everything. And so if you're holding like freaking signs to stop and slow and twirling around, this that, how you're going to do that is going to be a reflection on how you everything else in your life. And so whenever I've gone through any sort of difficult times or I want to start feeling sorry for myself or I don't feel like doing this or do like that.

I go back to that and it's something I always tell my kids, right? It's just, you know, trying to explain to my son why he has a Jeremy Ronit Jersey over there and he was wearing it and he took it off because he planned air hockey and he threw it on the ground. And it's like, no, dude, no, no, we pick it up, we take care of it. And it's all these little things that we do that become actually major reflections of who we are. No, and I think like, I'll look obviously I've got a nice house, I make a good living, I got a nice car, but when I think about the things that I actually that make me the happiest that I like the most,

they're not at all dependent on what I do or what's in my bank account. The walk that I went on with my kids and my wife this morning, that was free, not we're gonna have dinner together, that cost, whatever dinner costs. Like those little things, I could be, the writing I did this morning, it was pleasurable,

not because of the building that I did it in, or the quality, the computer that I did it on. I could have done that in my, in a fucking closet somewhere. And so I think it's also just, hopefully what this pandemic does for people is just sort of give you a real sense of what is important and what your life is actually dependent on.

Yeah, man, that's the truth, dude. Dude, you're awesome, I love it. Thanks so much, and we'll talk soon. Yeah, Ryan, thanks. You really appreciate how many men. If you're liking this podcast, we would love for you to subscribe. Please leave us a review on iTunes or any of your favorite podcasts, listening apps. It really helps and tell a friend.

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