The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 437: Ryan Holiday - Fortune Favors The Brave (Courage Is Calling)

Episode Date: September 19, 2021

Text LEARNERS to 44222 for more... Full show notes at www.LearningLeader.com Twitter/IG: @RyanHawk12    https://twitter.com/RyanHawk12 Ryan Holiday is the best-selling author of more than 10 books including The Obstacle Is The Way, Ego Is The Enemy, and most recently, Courage Is Calling. He's sold millions of copies and his work impacts leaders all over the world. Notes: A philosophy of offense. General James Mattis was once asked by a tv reporter, "what keeps you up at night?" And he said, "I keep people up at night." Captured his philosophy of offense (a bias for action… People who make it happen) Preparation makes you brave. —- the Army life handbook that was handed out to millions of soldiers in the Second World War. All about preparation. As Epictetus says the goal when we experience adversity is to be able to say, "this is what I've trained for, for this is my discipline." Never question another man's courage. "It's very easy to judge. It's very hard to know." Waste not a second questioning another man's courage. Put that scrutiny solely on your own. Be strong and of good courage. We hear in the book of Joshua. William Faulkner said  "be scared. You can't help that. But don't be afraid." You can't spend all day in deliberation — the story of a Spartan king who was marching across Greece. As he entered each new country, he sent envoys to ask whether he should be prepared to treat them as friends or enemies. Most of the nations decided quickly and chose friendship. But one king wanted to think about his options. So he thought and thought and thought until it was chosen for him. "Let him consider it then," the frustrated Spartan General said as he fixed his jaw. "Which we March on." Even if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice. You are voting to let them decide. The power of poise — in the year 175, Marcus Aurelius was betrayed by his general Avidius Cassius in an attempted coup. He could have been scared. He could have been furious. He could have exploded. But this would not happen. He said, "the nearer a man is to a calm mind, the closer he is to strength." Ernest Shackleton — Arctic expedition got stuck in the ice. His motto —fortitudine vincimus — By endurance we conquer The courage to care — General Mattis said "cynicism is cowardice, it takes courage to care." Only the brave believe, especially when everyone else is full of doubt. the story of Theodore Roosevelt the biographer Herman Hagedorn wrote "is the story of a small boy who read about great men and decided he wanted to be like them." Ryan shared a personal story about his experience working for American Apparel and his relationship with founder/CEO, Dov Charney. He was asked to do something immoral and he declined... But, he didn't stop Dov from doing it. "It doesn't age well to just be scared in the moment. All that's left is what you didn't do." When you earn some power or develop a platform, how will you use it? When Lyndon Johnson became President, he said, "What the hell is the presidency for if not to do big things?" Consistency -- How does Ryan produce so much work (publishing lots of books) on a consistent basis? You have to show up every day. Tackle the smallest component part of the project for that day. Do what's in front of you. Why does Ryan work out every day? "I like to think, 'who's in charge?' I'm in charge." Excellence = All leaders are readers Curiosity is a must Desire for knowledge Self-discipline An element of service - it's not just about you How does Ryan define success? Autonomy. "The power of my own life, who I spend time with, and what I'm doing. I don't want to be a slave to the system."

The act of being courageous is not simply an individual act. The choice to be courageous or cowardly has a contagious effect on the people around you. So showing up, doing your job, not being rattled, this is more important than it might feel. I think this is true as a parent. This is true as an owner of a business. This is true as a citizen. Welcome to The Learning Leaders Show, presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk.

Thank you so much for being here. Text learners to 44222 to become part of Mindful Monday. You, along with tens of thousands of other learning leaders from all over the world, will receive a carefully curated email from me each Monday morning to help you start your week off right. And now new, you'll also receive the tales. on my latest book, my new one coming out at the beginning of 2022, and you'll get an opportunity to read it early if you are a part of Mindful Monday. So text learners to 4-4-222. Now on to tonight's

featured leader. My friend Ryan Holiday is back, best-selling author of more than 10 books, including The Obstacle is the Way. Ego is the enemy, and most recently, courage is calling. He's sold millions of copies in his work impacts leaders all over the world. During this conversation we discuss, the relationship between preparation and bravery, then the power of toys, having the courage to care, and an example of great leaders having a philosophy of offense. Ladies and gentlemen, this one is so good. It is Ryan Holiday.

Ryan, this is number six, man. How crazy is that? You're sixth time. I can't believe it. That's crazy. I know. But I'm glad you're here, man. It's good to see you.

Yeah, it's good to see you too. So I want to start. Your latest book is called Courage's Calling. And I actually turned to the back of the book this morning. And you wrote a story from the first person in the afterward that I think it was kind of personal. to, we're definitely personal to you and you had to show some courage and I think you did some good and maybe not so good throughout as far as the strength you had to stand up to a really powerful person. And so maybe I can set the stage and I'd love for you to tell that story as a way for us

to get started. You were working at American Apparel and there is a leader there named, I believe he's this founder, CEO named Dove Charnie. Did I pronounce that right? Yeah. And Dove had asked you to do something that quite frankly is, I think kind of illegal and certain morally wrong. Maybe you can take it from there and share what you learn from that story. So I was the director of marketing at this company called American Apparel, which was at one point one of the fastest and hottest fashion brands in the world. And I started there when I was like 20 or 21.

And sort of that's where I started. Dove was a mentor of mine, sort of discovered me. It was really cool. It was certainly a controversial company, not without its critics. and he was very much a, let's just say nicely, a very flawed person, certainly not a person who would have their job in the Me Too era today for good reason. And I had kind of a strange relationship with the company that I sort of started there and was discovered there, but I'd sort of had one foot on a path towards becoming a writer. And towards the end of what was going to be my time there anyway, Dove came to me. He was being sued for sexual harassment by three women. And I don't know the specifics of the case exactly. He was certainly not the first time this had happened. And there's definitely a case of where there's smoke, there's fire. But in any case, he had been in a relationship with these women. And, and, and, uh, he believed that they were taking advantage of him, that they had had a consensual sexual

relationship and then now they were sort of making it seem like they were the victims. And he believed he had proof of this in the form of pictures and text messages between him and the people. Now, I had actually warned him that he had to stop doing this. Like, it didn't matter if they were consensual relationships or not. It was not a good idea to have relationships with your employees, but more importantly, if you've already been in trouble for it before, whether you were falsely accused or not, you're setting yourself up for this to happen again if you continue to put yourself in the position. So anyways, it comes to me one day, and he says, you know, I have sort of this proof of this stuff. And I was the, not just the director of marketing, but the

company's spokesperson. So it was always my response. to respond to media inquiries, to put out the company's sort of point of view, and in many cases to defend him. So anyways, he came to me with these photos, which he showed me, and they were photos that made it seem like it was a consensual relationship, and certainly it was a sexual relationship between the two of them. And he asked me to leak these photos to Gawker and a bunch of other websites. And I said, this is a horrible idea.

You do not want to do this, nor should you do this, nor do I think, can you do this? And on top of all that, I'm definitely not going to do it. And so, you know, I sort of patting myself on the back at the moment, like, hey, this is where I'm drawing the line. Should I have drawn the line much earlier? Yes, of course. But that was where I drew the line. And it was not, that was not a thing that you did at that company if you wanted to keep your job. I mean, the point of working for a person is that they get to tell you what to do, right?

So it was not a not unconsiderable amount of risk to do this. I mean, there were no immediate consequences for me, but it was very clear that our relationship would be different going forward for having made this decision. And so I sort of patting myself on the back for doing this. And yet, a few weeks later, as I walk into his office or walk by his office or something, he calls me in and he's in the middle of a conference call, like a conference call, like a Zoom call or something with a bunch of different reporters on different outlets, different media outlets sort of off the record where he is just leaking the photos himself directly.

So I didn't do it, but I didn't stop it from being done. And it struck me then that, you know, sort of courage to just draw your own personal line was not sufficient. I probably should have done something about it. It was also a strange experience for me in that, you know, I watched these media outlets published this story as if there wasn't a problem with what was happening. Same media outlet two years later would criticize people for enabling Dove or that he's sort of presenting them as this monster as if it wasn't a symbiotic relationship between a lot of different parties. But anyways,

the point is I tell the story in the back of the book because it's a book about courage, about doing the right thing. There's multiple forms of courage, physical and moral. But I felt like it would be very dishonest to write a book about courage and then pretend as if, you know, one, having never served in the armed forces or sort of had to in, in, undergo any real sort of physical danger, it would still be dishonest for me to act as if I have always been in, always been courageous in my own life. So I wanted to tell a story not about courage, but about, I don't want to say cowardice, but I would say where courage failed, right, failed me in that moment.

I feel like as I've obviously followed you for a while, we've got to know each other a bit. And I feel like you're almost stepping into your own about not having as much fear or not being afraid to upset people, to take a stand for things that you believe in publicly. You own a bookstore now and you've faced controversy. You've had people write you mean letters. You've had people criticize you. You publish these things for all of us to see. on social media and areas.

You've got certainly your share of haters now. You definitely have people who love you, but you become, I feel like maybe as you've gotten a little bit more famous, more polarizing, which I guess happens if you're willing to kind of stand up. How do you feel about that? And how do you feel about growing into this,

I feel? Because I don't know if the first time we talked to you were at the place that then, and that was what five years ago, that you are now. And I sense like I'm just like witnessing you kind of coming into this. Well, that's very kind. I mean, I think part of it is rooted in confidence and security and sort of who I am and what I've done. There's a great anecdote about Lyndon Johnson. This is after

Kennedy's assassination. He begins to ram through the civil rights legislation that Kennedy had been unable to do, but that as a Southern Democrat, you'd think Lyndon Johnson would have been particularly unable to do or perhaps resistant to do. But he sort of sensed. is that this is a moment and he pushes it through. And some advisor says, you know, you shouldn't do this. There's going to be the following consequences or whatever. And he says, oh, what the hell is the presidency for? Right. And his point was, what is the point of becoming successful at whatever you do or amassing the power that you told yourself? And this is what we do. We tell ourselves, when I'm in a position of influence or power or I cross off certain boxes, then I will be willing to do X, Y, or Z.

The problem is we never actually feel like we've arrived. And then once we have those things, then we're actually perversely afraid of losing them. So we're actually more risk-averse than we were before. So, I mean, this is something I think about. I mean, I've definitely written things and said things that I know over the last year that I deeply believe in, whether it's for the pandemic or certain causes, that certainly have cost me either audience or goodwill or at the end of the day, all this

comes down, eventually gets translated into financial terms. Definitely be better for me financially to walk more of a middle path and not say things that are polarizing or whatever. But I go back to that idea of like, what is this for? Like, what is, I sometimes I say that to people and they send me sort of nasty emails or whatever about like, you know, I'm unsubscribing. Why did you have to say this or that? And I go, look, I didn't build this platform. I didn't work really hard to become a writer to then not say what I think, right? And then this comes back to courage, to not say what I think for fear of pissing a random person I don't care about off. Right. Like, obviously, you care about your audience, but the point is like, I, I did not

build the things that I've built and do the things that I've done to then censor myself in advance out of fear of negative consequences. And who better to bear those negative consequences than someone who can actually afford to do it, right? Like there were points in my career where, and this is the tension to go back to what we're talking about in American Carell. You're always telling yourself, oh, when I get here, I'll be able to do it. But, you know, you did, there were points in my career where, you know, you, something you can't rock the boat, but like you just, you, you have more to lose. And so, so I just feel like, if not now, when, as the famous question goes.

What advice would you give to somebody, let's say they work at a, they have a really good job, work at a big company and like a VP of something role, right? They have a team. They report up to somebody. There's a board, right? Multi-billion dollar company, whatever. Like kind of the avatar for the show. And they're like, you know, I got a family.

I got mortgage. I got a great job. And it might be a pain to kind of replace this. I don't want to get fired. So I just kind of, you know, and I empathize with this. I feel this. I get this. And they can say, well, it's easy for you to say, Ryan.

You can just keep. writing books, probably making millions in advances alone. And I can't do that. And so what do you say to that person? Yeah. Well, I don't know about the exact financial figures you quoted, but there's a great, there's a great F Scott Fitzgerald story called the Four Fists. And it's about this guy who sort of says whatever he thinks and is willing, the four fists. Yeah, like their fist. And I was going to include it in the book. I ended up cutting in some of the later edits. But he talks about this exact thing where basically this guy is this successful business. He's sent to negotiate some deal.

And it's like one of those things where it's sort of like good for the company, but bad for this small town. Right. He's sort of like trying to trick people into selling their land or something like this. And he eventually realizes what the company is trying to do. And instead of deceiving the people in a way that would be good for them, he tells them like what's really going on, which of course, you know, runs the risk of costing him at his job. And he says, if Scott Fitzgerald says something like, in these moments of righteousness or doing the right thing, there's also kind of a perverse selfishness because the consequences of this are born not just by you, but by your family. I had Alexander Vindman on my podcast recently. The episode hasn't run yet, but he's the whistleblower who not only takes on. on Trump, but as a result, loses his job and his brother loses his job at the White House.

And I talked to him about this and I said, you know, did you think about that? Because not only did these other people, but it's hard to, you know, tell your daughter that you can't pay for college because you lost your job, you know, speaking up about X, Y, or Z. And I think, I like to think about people like that who sort of actually did it with real stuff on the line. You know, like losing Twitter followers or email subscribers, these are, these are not that significant in the, in the long run of things. But the way I kind of think about it is like the alternative isn't tenable either. To not say what you think, to not offend someone who's offended by something that's clearly wrong or incorrect or contrary to your values is not a tenable status quo or

a sustainable status quo. So it does feel selfish, but it's also reckless to think that you can walk this tightrope forever, you know. And so I don't know, I guess I guess I, I just, I try not to think about it, honestly. I just try to default to what I think I should say and not let my, not let my sort of, what they call it, the counsel of your fears, not let those weigh in. And then I try not to think about, I've had to work more in the last year. It's actually been an attention for me. So, like, I kind of thought for a long time that I was, like, on the same page with my audience, on most things. And, you know, the last couple years, like, my stuff has really taken off at a level that I don't think I had fully comprehended. And it was only maybe a few months ago that it

occurred to me, oh, as I was kind of depressed and frustrated with, like, what people would say on social media or emails I would get. And then I realized like, oh, you know, these aren't my people. These are just people who have heard of my stuff and come, but they don't actually know what it's about or I'm about. So losing them isn't actually losing, you know, it's not that they don't matter, but it's not, I'm not alienating the core base. I'm alienating people who were only temporarily and incorrectly sort of on the bus because they thought we were going in one direction, but actually we've always been going in this direction. Does that make sense? It does. It actually makes me think of my friend Brooke Cups, who I've had on the show.

He's a basketball coach, just one of state championship. He's one of the most impressive people, I know. And I asked him, like, when you go to interview for a job to be a coach somewhere, like, what do you do? Because he's really, he's really sure of himself, super confident, it really quiet though like doesn't need his voice to be heard which is rare for a coach and he's like and I said so like what do you say like how do you impress him in the interview and he goes well I have my my core values and I talk about how I live my core values and I talk about how my team will live our core values and I and then I say well what if they're not into that and he goes well good I'm not going to work there right I don't I don't want to work there and

I and he's like I'd rather find that out now and it was just so simplistic it was so to the point it was so direct, it was so confident. And I thought, yes, that's how I want to be. Like, I really like that outlook of like, well, then that's good. I don't want to work there. I don't want to, those are not my people, right? Like, that's the thing. I feel like that's the sense I hear from you.

Well, and that's where like sort of looking back at this American Apparel thing, why, I say this in the after, why was I afraid of losing a job over a thing that if you lost your job over that, it's not a place that you should work. you know, like it shouldn't have been happening to begin with. But to lose your job over that, and I think with a little bit of distance, you'd feel grateful. You'd feel like you dodged a bullet, right? Yeah.

And so I think the tension is, and I thought about this during the beginning of the pandemic, remember there was the aircraft carrier that pulls into, in New York City, it was the USS Deodor Roosevelt. the guy in charge of that ship, Captain Brett Crozier, I think. Basically, there's a COVID outbreak on the ship, and he's trying to sort of get people to, this is like the first time this has happened, he's trying to get people to take it seriously, and nobody is. And finally, he sort of goes public with it in a way that sort of breaks the chain of command

and ultimately costs him command of an aircraft carrier and essentially his career. And I think people go, oh, that's obviously what you would do if, you know, people's lives are on the line. That's what you should do. But it's not obvious for one reason. You don't get in command of an aircraft carrier by always doing the selfless thing, right? Like, we think about this with CEOs. Like the CEO gets the top of this company and then we're like, why are they so conservative?

I don't mean politically. Why are they so risk-averse? Like, why aren't they doing this or that? Why aren't they speaking up about this or that? It's because they didn't work for 40 years in the bowels of this company working their way up through the ranks because they rock the boat, right? Like, they are by definition risk-averse company men and women. That's how you get that job. And so often it's this paradox where what you have to do to get yourself in a position of leadership or management or power requires you to be risk-averse. I think, you know, this is to me what is, we can get into the details of it if we want, Biden's decision to pull out of Afghanistan, despite a lot of criticism and a lot of

heat and the inevitability of that never going well. A lot of people were very concerned that, and again, I don't think this is political, that a guy who's been in the Senate for 40 years was sort of a creature of the status quo and the institutions and would not make sort of bold, strong, apolitical decisions. And the fact that he did that, that it is extremely, it cannot be understated how overstated, how hard it is to get a, go along to get along for the vast majority of your career and then change. strategies or personalities once you finally have the keys. And that's also what's impressive about Lyndon Johnson. Lyndon Johnson, for the entirety of this political career is a Southern Democrat who does nothing about racial issues, does nothing about discrimination, nothing about segregation. And then suddenly when he's president, I mean, most of his friends thought he was a traitor.

I mean, we don't see that because we know in retrospect it was obviously. the right thing, but to radically change from being a conservative, you know, maintain the present way of things to being a radical, you know, sort of forward-thinking progressive figure in regards to even one specific issue. That just doesn't happen. People don't do that. Yeah. Speaking of another military leader, I love the General Mattis stuff. And I know it seems like, you've built a relationship with him and, and you quote them a few different times. But I want to talk about first one.

We might get to more than one of this. But there's the cool thing about this book, I would say just for anybody, courage is calling is the fact that it's just a bunch of extremely well-researched short stories that have a key theme or point. And you just keep, I think I'll find for the people,

especially listen to this show, you'll find yourself taking a bunch of notes and having like a lot of kind of quips and vignettes to follow that will help you. And it's just bam, bam, bam, bam, nonstop. But anyway, so I'm going to get into Mattis. Okay. My little commercial for your book, but I obviously wouldn't say people know if I don't mean. If there's a book on here that I don't love, I just kind of, you know, we talk about something else.

But anyway, I know that exact dance. Okay, okay. You have to do it out there. So anyway, or I usually don't have them on the show. Okay. So Mattis says, you talk about a philosophy of offense, which, which, yeah, from a sports perspective, I always played often. So I love that. But a TV reporter once asked him, what keeps you up at night? And Mattis goes, I keep people up at night. And I just love that thought process of he's got a bias for action. And I remember Don Miller said this to him show. And Don's a good dude. But he just said, when I think about people who add value to the lives of others, they always have a bias for action. Like they are. going. It doesn't mean not thoughtful. It doesn't mean they don't have a plan, but they are making things happen. And I sense this is, this is a part of courage, is having this philosophy of

offenses, we're going to go. And I think from a leadership perspective, like your default mode being as one that we're going to go, I sense is something that I think people should really think about. That's right. Churchill was talking about a World War I general. I think he encapsulated the man by saying he had a sincere desire. to engage the enemy, right? And unfortunately, that's not the status quo. People are conflict averse, their competition averse, they are challenge averse. So they go towards what's easiest or what is the same. And this holds them back in a lot of ways. But it's the problem with engaging the enemy, to extend the metaphor, is that you could lose. Right. Like so risk aversion is a, is a

real thing, but it's also inherently self-protective. What you don't risk, you cannot lose. And so I think when you look at someone like Mattis, or you look at a lot of great NFL coaches or CEOs or whatever it is, it's a sincere desire to engage, to push the boundaries to step forward, to try. That Theta Roosevelt talks about the man in the arena. It's, are you in the arena or are you waiting for the perfect scenario to enter the arena. So I think that's really important, although I'm just writing about this now. So this book is the first book in a four-book series. The next book is on self-discipline or temperance. Of course, this sincere desire to engage the enemy also has to be balanced out, not with conservatism, but with a sense of limits and

timing and the self-control to not engage when you're unlikely to be successful or you're more likely to be successful at a future date at a future engagement. So, you know, Churchill famously is, as we're saying, a sincere desire to engage the enemy, but two pivotal moments in the Second World War come when Churchill refuses to send the Royal Air Force out into France at when France is overrun by the Nazis, despite many people begging him to do so. He said, no, the decisive moment is going to come later when the Nazis try to invade Germany. And then secondarily, the idea of an invasion, like landing, what we became Normandy, this was something that the Allies talked about doing as early as 1942. Churchill holds off for two years before he gives final approval for

for what becomes D-Day because he believed they weren't ready yet, and he refused to risk men and women and resources that he knew he could not afford to lose at that juncture. So this sincere desire to engage the enemy has to also be balanced out with self-control and discipline. Aristotle famously talks about how courage is on a spectrum. You have cowardice on one end, but then you have recklessness on the other end. So this sincere, your desire to engage the enemy, it actually has to rest as a midpoint between these two extremes. And that's where courage sits. It's not reckless. It's also not risk aversion. I think the power of poise also plays into this. You've also written about in the year 1.

Is that what we say, 175? Marcus Aurelius was betrayed by one of his generals of Vidius Cassius. Again, every time I talk to you, I miss Brown's words in an attempted coup. But you write that he could have been scared, he could have been furious, he could have exploded, but this would not happen. He said, quote, the nearer a man is to a calm mind, the closer he is to strength. And I love this story because it reminds me of so many of the impactful leaders in my life where they certainly weren't afraid to go. And they had an offensive mindset, but they also had this poise about him. And the great quarterback plays the same way. There's there's always bullets flying, like metaphorically bullets flying around you. You're in the midst

of chaos and you have to make good decisions with all of everything happening. And I think that's been such good training for life. And this is this story about this. The nearer man is to calm mind. The closer is the strength. I think a lot of us leaders can take so much from studying studying this part of your book to help them be better in their world of leading a team at a business where there's always something. There's always craziness happening. And they have to have to figure out a way to make it happen despite all of that. Well, yeah, to use the quarterback example, you see this with a lot of young quarterbacks, which is that under pressure, when they don't see the options that they like,

they still force the throw anyway. So it takes a certain amount of courage in that situation to either take a sack, which nobody wants to get hit, to throw the ball away, or to, you know, sort of shovel it off in a shorter pass that maybe you don't like. that's not as sexy that no one gets you know no one's going to throw you a parade for um so so the idea of having the discipline again all the virtues are interrelated with each other but to have the discipline to say it's not that i'm afraid uh i will take the shot when it makes sense but but to go i'm actually i have enough confidence and security in myself to say this is not that shop and and

and that I'm going to bear the consequences while I wait for that right shot. And that's extraordinarily difficult to do. Yeah, I also want to talk about the difference between being scared and afraid. Yeah. So that's from Faulkner, actually. Faulkner says, you know, be scared. You can't help that. But don't be afraid.

And I think scared is a temporary state. being afraid is like a state of being. So, you know, you can be scared when something scary happens. But if you carry the effects of that forward, if you're now gun shy or you won't get back up on the horse or whatever, you know, sort of metaphor you want to use, now you've transitioned from that sort of momentary emotional reaction into sort of absorbing it as a trait. And this is where we get into trouble. One of the big things I feel like that's helped with me, Ryan, is I learned in high

school from great coaches about the value of preparation. Sure. And those two coaches in particular that taught me about how preparation could build confidence, how preparation could help with fear. They were always the most prepared people. And them as the leaders made me feel more confident as. a player because I knew my coach was more prepared than anybody. And you write about preparation making you brave. And you said, as Epicetus says, the goal when we experience adversity is to be able to say,

quote, this is what I've trained for, for this is my discipline. And so maybe you can relate some of this preparation talk from history to how that relates to leaders in real life on a day to day to day basis right now. Well, I think there's two parts there. One, what you're talking about with the coaches is this idea that calm is contagious. If the coaches, if the coaches, prepared if the coach knows their shit, that trickles through the organization. And so, and actually, military historians talk about this. The act of being courageous is not simply an individual act. The choice to be courageous or cowardly has a contagious effect on the people around you. So showing up, doing your job, not being rattled, this is more important than it might feel.

I think this is true as a parent. This is true as a owner of a business. This is true as a citizen. You know, you think about in an economic panic. Are you contributing to it by running to the bank, by selling all your stocks, by, you know, by, you know, believing that all is lost? Or are you contributing to the calm by, you know, buying, you know, sticking, you know, carrying on as usual? So I think calm is contagious a really important lesson. But the idea of preparation is part of that.

It's easy to be calm when you've prepared for this specific scenario. If you haven't, it will be scary. People ask me all the time about public speaking. Like, are you scared when you go on stage? If I don't know what I'm talking about, I am, you know, like if this is something I haven't thought about, if I've been distracted or procrastinated and I haven't prepared, then yeah, I am a little scared. because it could go really bad. I mean, I'm generally not scared because I've even done that

enough times that I'm confident in my ability to improvise and, you know, salvage it. But there's always a difference between giving a talk for the first time and giving a talk for the hundredth time or giving a talk on a topic that you feel very confident about and very aligned with who you are in your values and you know sometimes like the ones I've been nervous about have been like where I took somebody's advice about how a change I should make or I'm trying to imitate somebody else or something else when when you're being inauthentic that's scary because you there's you have a secret that you're hiding from the audience which is that this isn't really who you are and you don't really believe this so preparation is a huge part of being calm.

under pressure because it's actually not that scary to you. You've been through this before. And Jim Collins brought this up when we recorded a few times. He said the reason that he isn't over preparer for for everything he does and all the people he works with is, is he related to like an NFL coach who's really good, like a Sean McVeigh or somebody who when you're so prepared and the game plan is so ready and he worked so hard on it when it comes time when the lights are bright, you can let your, instincts take over.

Yeah. You can, you can just go. You can call the game. You can play the game. You could just go. So like speaking wise, I feel that completely. When I am super, super prepared, it, it makes it seem like you're out there just talking and telling stories.

It's like a great stand-up comedian. The great ones who have whittled down their act down to the smallest syllable. They've worked so hard on it so that it looks like they're just having. out there wandering around, just talking, telling random jokes. They make it look easy. And I think from a leadership perspective, this is the key is if you choose and you raise your hand to say, I want to lead, whether it's on the battlefield, on a sports field, in the business world, that's part of the deal. I think that's part of the responsibility of saying, I'm going to do that work. It's hard. It takes more time. It's not for everyone. But I think that's what the great

ones are willing to do. Yeah. And if you're not willing to do it, who do you think is doing it? Right. So if you did raise your hand, you did say, I want to be in charge. And now people are dependent on you or looking to you. And they're going to sense it if you're full of shit. You know, they're going to sense it if you are scared. And I think, you know, it's important to realize that the other person on the other side of that, that's what's the person. they're looking for. They want to see that you don't quite believe that you're prepared, that you don't really have a plan, that you can be rattled. And that's what they, that's what they exploit. I think I've talked about this before, but I think when you spoke, you talked about

Sean McVeigh, I think when you look at that Jared Goff, Tom Brady Super Bowl, the brilliance of Belichick's game plan there was, we're going to make this really frustrating for Jared golf and he's not going to know he's not going to be resilient enough to bounce back from this. And Tom has been through this enough times. He's played shitty Super Bowls and good Super Bowls and he's come back from things. The game, he doesn't care how the game goes. He just wants to get to the, you know, the finish line, right? Whereas I think they sort of took the offense away from the Rams. And I say this with some sadness. I'm friends with, uh, with, uh, with Sneed and and and and and and actually Sean as well. But I think they took what what what what typically

went well for the Rams away from them and they just didn't there wasn't any there wasn't a plan B you know. And they and knowing that they're knowing that oh that was the like I think they felt that was the only way we could win. And when it wasn't working they they they just they're they didn't believe in it. And so that's where. comes in. It's like, I know, like when, when I sit down on a project, I don't think like, of course this is going to go well. Of course it's going to come easy. Of course it's going to be fun. I know, like, I know I can gut this out. Like, I know I can do this on just sort of raw tenacity alone. I hope I don't have to. I have a plan for why I don't have to. But I go

into it not scared by it because like I've done it 10 or 11 times now. I've. I have to. I have and not worried about whether I have enough gas to finish the marathon. I know I have that. It's really just a question of how it's going to go, not if I'm going to make it. I want to bring up one more Mattis quote, and then I want to dig a little bit into your process because I'm still fascinated by that. We've briefly spoke about. So this is about caring because as I've really been working with leaders recently,

especially my friend Sam Coughman, this comes up with him all the time. he's he's it's like his number one word that he's about and when you ask other people about him they'll say god that guy cares and my dad told me when i took my first leadership job he said let me tell you something man like the first thing that you must do is you've got to care about your people and it's a lot harder when you care and i was like what does that even mean and you really think about like yeah it's easier not to care it's easier just to chill out and mattis said says cynicism is cowardice it takes courage to care, right? Like brave people believe,

especially whenever else is full of doubt. And I think this is critical, though, and it sounds simplistic. Like, well, of course I care. Of course I got to care. But no, like, it's easier to be a cynic. It's easier to be a coward, I think, than it is to actually stand up and say you care,

not only about yourself, but about all the people that you are serving, that you are leading. And I think this is something for leaders to think about is how much do you care? How do you show that you care? Although I would make a distinction. I think obviously it's very important to care about the people who work for you,

but I don't think it's quite that. That's not the care exactly we mean. Okay. Like it's easy to say like it doesn't matter. It's impossible. I think what Mattis is talking about specifically is about believing that an individual can make a difference. Right. So the cynicism is the it's rigged, it's unfair.

the system is broken. None of this matters. I'm just going to get what my what's mine. Obviously, this is related to caring about people, but, but I think it's a larger sense of like, it's easier to be a nihilist than it is to be a believer in something or people or some cause. I actually have a little email that I printed out that I had an email exchange with General Mattis, as you said, I'm a huge fan of. But I was talking about, I forget what I'm, it was. It was earlier this year. Things really look like they were falling to pieces. And I just said, you know, where does this go? It doesn't look like it could go anywhere well. Like is this? I was just, I was depressed and sort of disillusioned. And he said something about how, you know, things,

things always look this bad before they turn around. And, and I said, well, look, you know, you've seen some dark shit, right? If you still have hope, what excuse do I have? And he said, keep, he just replied, he said, keep the faith, Ryan, hold the line. Which I, which is what I very much needed to hear then. And it's something I need a reminder of. So when we're talking about caring, it's not just, hey, I want to make sure these people are okay or I want to pay them well. It's also like not giving up or not saying that it's hopeless or impossible or that it doesn't matter. It's easy to look at everything that's happening in the world and just go, it's a lost cause. But that is a form of cowardice.

The person who says, no, actually, I still have hope. I still believe here's what I think we can do. Here's what I'm going to try to do. That takes an immense amount of courage. You think about, I tell a story towards the back of the book of John Lewis, Congressman John Lewis, who died less than a year ago. you think about what that guy experienced. Like you read some of the stories about, you know, he's nearly beaten to death for trying to use a whites only bathroom,

for trying to sit in a whites only waiting room at a bus station. And I think he was beaten like 36 or 37 times to have any faith at all in human beings after they have literally tried to kill you for asking, not even, like, he wasn't even asking for like the right to vote. He was beaten for like the right to sit on a bench in a shitty gas station, you know, or a shitty bus station. You think about how discouraging that would be and what courage it would take to not give up and to put your heart out there to be broken again and again and again. That's to me not just courageous, but it's heroic.

I mean, that takes almost an inhuman amount of strength and discipline. And when you talk about John Lewis, I also think how that relates to endurance. I mean, that was a long, long fight, man, like longer than we've been alive. And the endurance part of your book, focus on Shackleton. And that's the name of the book, too,

that everybody should read is phenomenal about Shackleton's expedition. But they got some of the end of the book. stuck in the ice and his motto, I'm going to say it wrong, fortitude, then cinemas, but basically it means sure, by endurance, we conquer. And I think of endurance is

almost parallel to consistency. And I certainly identify this doing a podcast shipping every week for six and a half years, never missing. You are one of the most prolific writers in the world if you talk about your shipping schedule when it comes to publishing books. And so can you

talk a little about from a leadership perspective and maybe related to yourself too about the importance of, because I think this isn't very sexy, man, like consistently getting up in writing every day or consistently doing whatever it is you do to ship work all the time. The daily grind of it isn't that sexy to people,

but it's why it's able to happen. And I think leaders, this is critical is to have this skill of endurance and this willingness to be consistent on a daily basis. It's funny, you're talking about process and then the Shackleton chapter, just a sense of how those books come together. That chapter, the Shackleton chapter, I actually ended up cutting from the book. Oh, you did?

Yeah, maybe like eight weeks ago, nine weeks ago. So I have a copy that. You have the galley, which is like probably the third or fourth pass. But even up until we went to the printers, I was still working on how I could make it tighter and cleaner and stronger. And so I ended up moving endurance to the second book. Okay. But the point is it is a grind.

People think that writing is like sitting down and just pouring your heart out at the keyboard or whatever. First off, it's months and months and months or years of research. Then it's writing, but then it's also grueling edits where you're having to, you know, Stephen King talks about killing your darlings. You have to go, I love this. chapter. But if I had to cut one chapter from this section, what chapter would I cut? Because you're having to think about not, is it how you want it to be necessarily, but how it best make the

argument or provide the experience that you wanted to have. So the ideas, and I forget who said this, but the idea is like, you know, amateurs look for inspiration, professionals show up and get to work. And so it isn't sexy, but it is a process. And I've found that if you commit to the process, work comes out of the other side of that. So I show up every day and I try to make a positive contribution to the project. And I know that if I do that enough times in a row, something publishable comes out of the other side of that. You've proven to yourself that you can do that. What is the process that? I know some of it you've talked about it before about taking your kids on a walk early

morning, not looking at your phone, getting to work as soon as you get back. Is that the process, that's the process for you that you found makes you produce the most excellent work, I assume? That's what the days look like. Yeah. But the process is, you know, sitting down and tackling the smallest component part of the thing that day. So again, in Mark's Reis actually talks about this, is don't discus. despair, don't let your imagination despair at the totality of the project or the tragedy or the crisis. You know, he says, like, focus on what's immediately in front of you. So, like, each day,

like today I was working, we talked about that Churchill thing and the Battle of Britain. Like, I was writing about that today. That's the smallest section that I have today. And that's like seven or 800 words. that, you know, in an 80,000 word book. So, you know, that's, that's what I was working on today. So I'm always, I'm, I have small pieces that I'm working on day in and day out. And I, I don't move on from one piece until I've got it where it needs to be. And then, then they all come together. And then it's a process of reviewing and working on that too. Outside of time with your family, what's your favorite thing to do?

some sort of physical activity or exercise run all that yeah i either run swim or bike uh essentially every day really what why is that that physical practice of moving your body so important for you well first of i think it and you like it's your favorite thing to do so yeah it's it's a metaphor right who's in charge right me or the part of me that doesn't want to do stuff right so part of of it's like, I'm in charge, I decide. But I think a big part of it is it's the opposite of the job, right? Like running is the opposite of sitting in a chair at a computer right. It's outside. It's for a short burst of time. You know, it's physically engaging as opposed to mentally engaging. And yet, it still kind of draws on the same skill set, willpower, fortitude, you know, self-control,

I happen to find it's very adaptive to what I do professionally. But yeah, it's probably my, like if I, it's harder for me to not do those things than it is to do those. Right. You feel terrible if you don't do it. Yes. So there's probably a certain amount of addiction to that as well. But, but yeah, I feel worse not doing it than doing it. And I would have, I'm the same way.

Like if I don't work out in the morning, the people closest to me know this now. It's just not going to be a good day. Or like, I mean, I can do it, but it's not very productive. You know, and so I'm guessing that that is part of the process for you to be such a prolific producer of work that is useful and helpful to others is that you have to, you have to have, that's just got to be a part of what you do. Well, the big thing for me in the pandemic is like, so I, I flew on Thursday for the first time that I have been away from my routine and my house for, I was doing the math, like, 500. 40 consecutive days. I mean, we went places as a family, but I was in like we drove, but I was still the same routine essentially, right? So, but this was like, no, I got on a plane and I slept in a hotel for the first time in 600 days, right? I was previously doing that once to twice per week

on average. And so watching, you know, I was I was under the impression. I was, I was, under the impression. was pretty productive, traveling, you know, doing this schedule, it's been very different to, very illuminating to see the opportunity costs of, you know, so you get a speaking offer and you go, okay, so it's X amount. That's what I'm getting paid. But it's harder to calculate what that costs because you tell yourself, oh, I'm still sleeping in a bed. You know, I'm only gone for this amount. It's only a three hour flight. But it's harder to calculate. let's say you're operating at 70% capacity, three days on the road is a day off.

You know, so I think I've certainly emerged from this with a stronger sort of discipline about what I say yes to and what I say no. I was going to ask you, so how has it changed you? It feels to me like that you're just going to say no a lot more. Hopefully, I mean, this is the struggle.

already, you know, and it's weird how the pandemic has gone, it came to be that, you know, when things, it's been weird, like, what do you say yes to? What do you say no to? Because it was stuff, you have been saying yes to stuff for a year and a half that hasn't happened. It just gets pushed, right? So it came to be that like, I now have some stuff in October that's like, you know, the most I've done in like two years, right? So having to go, oh, I need to cancel. So it's not just like saying no, like what do I get myself out of? But, but yeah, I think it's easy, it was easy to say no to stuff when doing it was illegal or when doing it was, you know, at what risk to one's health. Now, you know, now you actually have to have the self-control to be like,

I don't want to do that. And I've read about this with parents too. I mean, obviously, no one envies a parent of low means, but it's attention when you're telling your kids know about something, not because you can't, but because it's no. You know what I mean? Like, no, just because. There's a great, there's a great letter from the writer E.B. Wright. He was, E.B. White. He was invited to be on a council put together by Eisenhower, some arts counselor or something. just said, I must decline for secret reasons. And, you know, it's like not no because I'm busy, but no, because I don't want to. I don't want, I'm not going to, like, what are you doing instead? Nothing. I'm going to be at home. So that's, that's harder to do, obviously.

Man, you've, you're so, so well read. And I love being a part of your email list to get all of the book recommendations and everything you do. And now you own a bookstore. So you're constantly, thinking about books and inventory and what's going to be on your shelves. What are you selling? What do people like? If you think about like over history and over time of all the incredible people that you've been fortunate to meet, what are a few of the commonalities you've found among people who sustain excellence? Well, speaking of reading, I mean, one of my favorite quotes is that Truman line about how not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are leaders, right? There's been almost no people that I have met who are truly successful at whatever they do, who are not

big readers. And I can think of a few exceptions. I won't blow them up, but they're like people who are like either have severe dyslexia or just massively failed by, you know, the school system to the point where like they're definitely a brilliant person who would read, but like reading is just not how their mind is able to work. Right. So I, I, I think you find an intense curiosity, a desire for knowledge in these people. I do see self-discipline being a huge virtue there as well. The paradox of success is that suddenly, again, it's not that you can't do something, but you have to have the discipline not to do that thing, that you could get away with,

or that you do have the ability to do. And then maybe the third thing is the people that I really admire that I aspire to be like, have some sort of elements of service in what they do. So it's not simply about, you know, their own success or accomplishment, but some sort of larger purpose or mission. And the bookstore for me, I mean, it's a business and it can't lose lots of money. But as I sat down in late 2019, early 2020, and thought about what I wanted to do next, my wife and I were talking about cool stuff.

You know, we weren't thinking of opening a small town bookstore because it was a way to get rich quick. You know, it was a labor of love and a contribution we wanted to make to a community to, you know, a town and that sort of thing. So I think they are. committed to doing something other than just, you know, racking up their own accomplishments. You mentioned success a few times throughout the course of us talking.

I think this is a hard question as I even think about my own answer. Like, how do you define that for yourself now, especially after everything you've done you, I know you wrote a post about when you hit New York Times, I believe for the first time. I think you expected it to be like this moment. And it was kind of like, eh, onto the next, right?

And now you've, you know, you've lived on New York Times bestseller lists. of multiple books, multiple times for years. But like, how do you define success in your life? Yeah. I actually have a good answer to this one. It may be because you already asked me this, but I spell success autonomy. Successes do you have power over your own life, over the way that you spend your time, over who you spend time with, over the things that you spend time working on? Are there times or seasons where, you know, for a greater good or a certain accomplishment, you may have to give up a certain amount of autonomy to accomplish a certain thing. Yes, of course. But I think you and I both know a lot of people who are very, very successful,

but you wouldn't trade places with them for any amount of money because they're not in control of their own life. They're a slave to some system they've set up or thing that they've done, and they can't stop. I know we're talking about me and my, I actually like writing so that that's what I want to be doing. So when I talk about autonomy, I want the autonomy to sit and write. That's what I want to be doing. And read because that obviously makes you wait. You can tell in all of your books, you're like, this dude is so well read.

It's just evident in the stories in the books. You can't have all this stuff if you're not reading constantly. Well, that's one of the sort of canaries in the coal mine for me is like if I know I'm making bad decisions or signing up for things or I've set my schedule up improperly if I'm not reading on a consistent basis. That to me, because that's almost always the first thing that goes because it requires focus and concentration and energy. But yeah, to me, success is being in command of your own life and your own decisions. Love it. Courage is calling is the book. Fortune favors the brave. It's really good. I appreciate you send it to me even if it's not fully accurate. Or maybe I got a

of the next book, I guess. You did. You got multiple chapters of the new book and you got it before anyone else. Thanks, man. I appreciate it and highly, highly encouraged people to get it. It's a cover-to-cover read that you'll, it's one of those ones where I think the author earns the turn of the page, which I like to say, that's what good authors do. You have to earn each turn. And I think you, just like you do in all your work, but definitely this one for sure. So I really appreciate you being here, man. And I encourage people to get it. And, you know, it's number six. I look forward to number seven already, man. It's good to see you. Please. I would love that. Thank you. Awesome. All right, man. We're not likely to have someone on your podcast for the sixth time

if you don't think their work adds value to your life as well as to the lives of you, a person who chooses to invest your time to listen. So I'm certainly a fan of the work that Ryan Holiday produces and I enjoy all of our conversations. I always come way smarter for having done it. And I hope you certainly enjoyed it, enjoyed this one as much as I did. When I take a look at my notes, there's some really good stuff here. One, quote, the choice to be courageous has a contagious effect. And when you think about the leaders that you admire and their courage, their courage likely gives you strength. It gives you confidence. It makes you feel better. It's contagious. And so when you think of yourself,

from a leadership perspective, understand the importance of you showing courage, and how this has a contagious effect to those around you. And then how about General Mattis, a philosophy of offense? When he was asked, what keeps you up at night? He says, I keep people up at night. And while it's funny, I like that thought of his philosophy of offense. And as I mentioned, how Don Miller talks about value-added people have a bias for action. These are the people who make it happen.

They get things done. As leaders, we want to be known as one of those people who has a philosophy for offense. And then preparation makes you brave. As Epictetus says, the goal when we experience adversity is to be able to say, this is what I've trained for, for this is my discipline. Preparation for me is the greatest medicine for fear. It helps alleviate some of that so that it frees me up in the time when I need to perform. And that's what preparation is all about. And I think the same could be said for

for any leader of why preparation is so critical, whether it's for a Monday morning meeting, a quarterly business review, a one-on-one meeting with somebody. Be prepared. That's our job. That's our duty as leaders. Once again, I want to say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling a friend or two, hey, you should listen to the Learning Leader Show. This episode with Ryan Holiday will really help you become a more effective leader. And because you continue to do that and because you continue to write reviews on Apple podcast and rate the show, hopefully five stars, you are giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that, I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talking soon. Can't wait.