The Daily Stoic - You Make This For Yourself | Ask Daily Stoic

Episode Date: February 6, 2025

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Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to the daily Stoic early and ad free right now. Just join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. When I travel with my family, I almost always stay in an Airbnb. I want my kids to have their own room. I want my wife and I to have a little privacy. You know, maybe we'll cook or at the very least we'll use a refrigerator. Sometimes I'm bringing my in-laws around with me or I need an extra room just to write in. Airbnbs give you the flavor of actually being in the place you are. I feel like I've lived in all these places that I've stayed for a week or two or even a night or two. There's flexibility in size and location. When you're searching you can

look at guest favorites or even find like historical or really coolest things. It's my choice when we're traveling as a family. Some of my favorite memories are in Airbnb's we've stayed at. I've recorded episodes of a podcast in Airbnb. I've written books. One of the very first Airbnbs I ever stayed in was in Santa Barbara, California while I was finishing up what was my first book, trust me, I'm lying. If you haven't checked it out, I highly recommend you check out Airbnb for your next trip. recommend you check out Airbnb for your next trip. Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we bring you a stoic-inspired meditation

designed to help you find strength and insight and wisdom into everyday life. Each one of these episodes is based on the 2,000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and women to help you learn from them, to follow in their example and to start your day off with a little dose of courage and discipline and justice and wisdom. For more, visit Dailystoic.com. You make this for yourself. Oh, it's been a bad run for you, has it?

Things keep breaking, people keep screwing up. The market isn't cooperating. It's been one disaster after another. It's been one frustration after another. Perhaps you feel a bit like Marcus did when he wrote in Meditations that, I was once a fortunate man, but at some point fortune abandoned me." He had every reason to think that, didn't he? As we've said before, his reign was an unending series of troubles, plagues, floods, wars, coups. Yet Marcus Aurelius didn't actually feel like he'd been abandoned.

"'But true good fortune is what you make for yourself,' he wrote, effectively arguing with himself. Good fortune, as he defined it, was good character, good intentions, and good actions. Life can curse you, but you can still be a blessing. Bad things can happen, but that doesn't stop you from doing good things. You can still be a good person. That's the luck we make for ourselves. That's always in our control. That's always in our control. Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast.

I've been to Europe quite a bit. Not so much with the stoicism stuff. I've been to Europe many times over the years. It's funny, we were walking in Amsterdam with my wife and I said, you know, it feels like it was almost another lifetime that I was here. I think the first talk I gave in Europe was to the next web. They had a conference in Amsterdam.

I remember one year I was in Amsterdam doing a talk with Casey Neistat and I went with him and he went wakeboarding through the canals of Amsterdam. It feels like it happened to another person, but it didn't, it happened to me. And I was back in the Netherlands in November. I did a talk in London, I did a talk in Rotterdam, and then I went over and did a talk in Dublin.

But I was in Rotterdam, which I'd never been to before, only very, very briefly. My best friend growing up, Chris, came out. We got to see each other briefly and then I went and did the talk and then the whole family took a train into Amsterdam for a few hours where my son, my youngest, bumped into a friend from school who was also there. Kind of a crazy, you know, jam packed day. I went and saw the Anne Frank house, got some french fries, saw the canals, and then hopped on an airplane and flew to Dublin

for the last talk. All of which brings us to today's episode because when I was in Rotterdam, speaking at the Ahoy Theater, which was very cool, I took some questions. And that's what I wanted to bring you today. Obviously on these Thursday episodes, we do the Q&A. Here is me taking some questions

from the crowd in Rotterdam. I hope you enjoy. I'm not sure when I'm gonna be doing more of these, but hopefully next time I do, you can come out and I'll see you there. Hi, Ryan. Thank you so much for coming. Yes, of course. Thank you for coming. I had to be here. Great speech. I wanted to ask you, you ready? Yes. Okay. In stoicism and how the world is changing dramatically and progressively over the last few years. How do you see the virtues especially sits in, let's say young leadership who are obviously going to be

leading the next generation? Yeah, I mean, I'd love to be able to say I'm just so inspired by all the virtue that I've seen from leaders across the world these last couple of years, but I don't think anyone would agree with that sentiment. I think we desperately need leaders who are virtuous. I think we are entering a world where everything is becoming a means

of acquiring a social media following or something. Do you know what I mean? Where people are running for office in the United States not because government is a way that we solve people's problems or do things together the way we address collective you know collective action problems but that government is a way to become famous that government is a way to become famous. That government is a way to wield power. That government is a way to make a lot of money, right?

It's called public service. And I think people are sort of hacking this system. They're seeing that it's a way to get famous, to get attention, and actually doing the thing is secondary or not that important. And the idea that leadership, that politics, that organization, that these are trades and skills, just like writing is a trade or a skill,

just like plumbing is a trade or a skill, just like managing money is a trader, a skill, just like plumbing is a trader, a skill. It's like managing money is a trader, a skill. And I think we have to understand that that leadership is a thing. And it's a thing that some people are really good at. And we need to find those people and raise them up. There's something in the United States called like the Eisenhower paradox, which is basically the idea that Eisenhower is one of our greatest presidents, and he didn't really want to be president.

He was sort of drawn into it, drafted to it. And many of the best American presidents did not from an early age aspire to the presidency. And often many of the worst ones did. Like there's something crazy about saying there's a most powerful person in the world and I should be that person. There's something fundamentally crazy about that.

Mark Surrealist did not want to be emperor. You can almost read in his writings a kind of a resignation like that he sees it as this burden. Responsibility is a better word, but he's not like loving the attention and the power. He sees it as a great weight. In fact, we're told that when Marcus Aurelius is told he will someday soon become king,

he breaks into tears and he's crying, he says, because his understanding of history teaches him how many bad kings there were. So when you have leaders who not just understand that they're public servants, but also respect like the weight and the danger and the almost corrosive effects of power, you start to get closer to what you want, right? Someone who understands that they are playing with something powerful and important and precious,

and they have to treat it seriously, that it's not simply a means to an end. I think we need more leaders like that. I don't know how to get there, but I can diagnose the problem. Hey Ryan, thanks for the speech. Really enjoyed it. First of all, stoicism is your personal philosophy,

also your business. Do you have a work-life balance that you can define? Second of all, I was lucky to be introduced with meditations in very early age. I always had the trouble to understand the definition of good in that book. Most of the time I associated it with a bit of a utilitarian approach. But what you said today is not really similar to that one. Starts from the individual good and the personal good and origins from your own self outwards. And when it comes to Marco Sorrelius,

he's trying to chase the good, but also he's fighting Marco Maniwors for 14 years. Yeah. I wouldn't say I'm particularly great at work-life balance. I would say I'm better at it than I was before, and I am trying to get better at it still. I think tension is a better word. They're in tension with each other, you know?

You can't have it all, and everything comes with a trade-off. Yeah, stoicism is what I personally try to use and try to live by. It's also what I get to write and talk and speak about. But in writing and talking and speaking about it, it gives me a lot of practice. I get to just sort of internalize these things

in a way that I don't think I would if I was writing about other things, which I did for many years. Sort of been an accidental business direction of my life, and then go, hey, you only have so much time, you only get to spend your life on so many things. Why not spend it on the thing that you both like and need the most as opposed to trying to jam

all these other things in? But, yeah, I would agree. Stoicism is looking at, you know, a more black-and-white view as, like, is looking at, you know, a more black and white view as like, is this right? Is this wrong? What is this taking of you as a person, less so, you know, how does this do the most good

for the most people? And yet even the Stoics were as elected leaders forced to compromise and make the best of bad situations. So I think sometimes the stoic writings can feel very black and white. And what I think is so fascinating about the lives of the stoics is we see them really wrestle with these vexing questions. Cicero said of Cato that Cato's problem was that he sometimes thought he lived in Plato's Republic rather than in

the dregs of Rome. And then you have Mark Shulis in Meditations Reminders. If you like The Daily Stoic and thanks for listening, you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music. And before you go, would you tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey on wondery.com slash survey. On January 5th, 2024, an Alaska Airlines door plug tore away mid-flight, leaving a gaping hole in the side of a plane that carried 171 passengers. This heart-stopping incident was

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