0:15 The Stoics didn't dance around the
0:18 truth. In fact, Marcus really hated
0:20 people who said, "Let me be honest with
0:23 you." He said, "No, I it should be
0:25 written on your forehead that what you
0:28 say is what you mean. If it's not true,
0:30 don't say it." But conversely, I think
0:33 also if it is true, you have to say it.
0:36 And sometimes those truths can be hard
0:39 to hear. Sometimes those truths make us
0:41 uncomfortable. Nobody said the truth
0:43 would be easy, but that doesn't make it
0:46 any less essential. So, here are some
0:48 hard-hitting, brutally honest reminders
0:51 from Marcus Aurelius. The people you
0:53 meet are going to suck. This is the
0:55 harsh truth that Marcus Aurelius opens
0:58 meditations with. says they're going to
1:00 be jealous and annoying and difficult
1:02 and stupid. They're going to be all
1:04 these things. We know they're going to
1:06 be these things. We have to go into the
1:09 day with our eyes wide open. That's the
1:11 harsh truth part of it. But the
1:14 uplifting part, the happy part of it is
1:16 the second part. He says, "But they
1:19 can't implicate you in ugliness." And he
1:21 says, "More importantly, remember that
1:24 you're made to work together. that life
1:26 is incomplete without those kinds of
1:28 people and that we're related and that
1:30 where we share an affinity and a bond
1:33 for each other. We can't be surprised by
1:35 it. We can't let it suck us down and we
1:37 can't let it change us for the negative.
1:40 We still have to be good. We still have
1:42 to do our job. We still have to play our
1:45 part. You think you're a good person,
1:47 but you're hurting people. Marcus
1:50 reminds himself in meditations. He says
1:52 remember you can commit an injustice by
1:54 doing nothing also. And you know there's
1:57 the things that we turn away from the
1:59 things we don't want to think about. The
2:01 things that we say are someone else's
2:04 problems. The things we say we can't do
2:07 anything about. And those are injustices
2:10 that we are allowing to be perpetrated.
2:12 We're complicit in that unless we try to
2:15 do something about them. Most of what
2:18 you do is totally inessential. Marcus
2:20 really says that that's a question we
2:22 have to ask ourselves in everything we
2:26 do. We have to ask ourselves is this
2:28 essential because so much of it is
2:32 trivial, so much of it is unnecessary.
2:34 So much of it is inefficient. When you
2:37 eliminate the inessential, what you get
2:39 is the double benefit of doing the
2:42 essential things better. So, you want to
2:44 constantly be eliminating, constantly
2:47 pairing things down, constantly asking
2:50 yourselves, do I really need to be doing
2:52 this? Is it important? Is it going to
2:56 move the needle? Why am I doing it? How
2:58 could I do it better? You eliminate the
3:01 inessential. And you do the essential
3:03 better. Whenever you're anxious,
3:05 whenever you're worried, whenever you're
3:08 stressed out, whenever you're doubting,
3:10 you know what you're doing. you're
3:12 extrapolating. And the ancient stoics
3:14 would say that extrapolation is the
3:16 enemy. Marcus really tried to remind
3:19 himself when his kids got sick. He said,
3:22 "My kid is sick. I don't need to tell
3:25 myself they're going to die from it." He
3:27 says, "You can't let your life be
3:29 crushed by your imagination as a whole.
3:31 You can't picture every bad thing that
3:34 could possibly happen. You have to stick
3:37 with what's in front of you. You have to
3:39 stick with what is in your control." The
3:41 anxiety is not being caused by the
3:43 external thing. The Stoics would say the
3:46 anxiety is within us. We are the common
3:48 variable between all the things that
3:51 worry us, between all the things that
3:53 upset us, between all the things that
3:56 convince us the world is ending. We are
3:58 the common variable. We are bringing
4:01 ourselves, our opinions. We are
4:04 projecting our feelings onto objective
4:06 events. So stop doing that. Stop
4:09 extrapolating. Focus on what's in front
4:12 of you. Stick with idea and action and
4:15 utterance. The Stoics say that is plenty
4:18 to keep you busy. It's not unfortunate
4:20 that this happened to you. Mark writes
4:23 this to himself in meditations. He says
4:25 it's fortunate that this happened to
4:28 you. He says cuz I've remained unharmed
4:31 by it. He was saying that, you know, his
4:33 character hadn't been affected. But I
4:35 think more importantly, he's saying,
4:38 "Now I get to do something with it."
4:40 That's what the obstacle is, the way
4:42 memes. Now I get to do something with
4:44 it. It's good that it happened to me
4:46 instead of someone else cuz I'm the one
4:49 that's uniquely suited, uniquely trained
4:51 to do something with it. You are
4:55 impotent. Your anger is impotent. Marx
4:57 in meditations, he quotes a line from a
5:00 lost play by the playwright Uripides.
5:02 And the line says, "And why should you
5:04 feel anger at the world as if the world
5:07 would notice? Nobody cares. It doesn't
5:10 matter. It doesn't mean anything." Your
5:13 anger, your resentment, your grievance.
5:16 You are shouting into an enormous void.
5:18 You are yelling at an inanimate object.
5:21 You are mad at the weather. You are mad
5:24 at forces that are so enormous, that are
5:26 utterly immoral, completely indifferent
5:29 to you and your existence. So, you might
5:32 as well let it go. The best revenge is
5:35 to not be like that, the Stokes would
5:38 say. And if you think about it, yes,
5:40 people can hurt you. But when you look
5:43 at those people, who they are, why they
5:46 do what they do, it doesn't actually
5:47 feel like they're getting away with
5:51 anything. They're their own worst enemy.
5:54 It sucks to be them. So, the Stoics say
5:57 you give up on revenge. You give up on
6:00 getting even because you already won.
6:02 You are already better by not being that
6:05 person. The best revenge, Marcus really
6:08 says, is to not be like that. You are
6:11 weak if you lose your temper. Stoicism
6:14 was a masculine philosophy, but Marcus
6:16 really pointed out how sort of pathetic
6:19 it is that we get overwhelmed by our
6:22 emotions and we lash out at people. Men
6:25 sometimes judge other men for crying.
6:27 But it's strange that we don't judge
6:29 each other for losing our temper which
6:32 actually does hurt people which is of
6:35 less purpose. So when you feel that sort
6:38 of rage or anger coming on this the sto
6:40 say get control of yourself get command
6:43 of yourself. Say is this who I want to
6:46 be. Is this what being a mature adult
6:49 is? And the answer is almost certainly
6:52 no. You're not going to be remembered.
6:54 You're not that important. Mark
6:58 realized. He says, "Run down the list.
7:00 All the people that came before him." He
7:02 says, "What would happen to all these
7:05 famous names? These names that used to
7:08 sound so familiar. You know what they
7:10 are now? They're they're like what a
7:13 Taylor Swift talks about. Who's who?
7:15 Who's that? We all disappear. We all
7:18 recede into memory. We are all
7:20 forgotten." A very relevant reminder
7:23 from the Stoics in these crazy times.
7:25 You don't have to let this upset you.
7:26 You don't have to turn this into
7:29 something. They're not talking about
7:31 disengaging from the world. They're just
7:33 saying you don't have to let your
7:35 feelings get hurt all the time. You
7:37 don't have to let everything make you
7:40 anxious or worried. You don't have to
7:42 extrapolate this out to what it could
7:44 possibly mean. You don't have to follow
7:47 every news story. You don't have to let
7:50 this upset you. Marcus really says you
7:53 don't have to turn this into something.
7:55 You can just let it be. You can accept
7:58 the information. You can focus on what's
8:00 in your control.
8:02 You can focus on what you need to do.
8:04 You don't have to turn this into
8:06 something. Your problem is that you want
8:10 the third thing. Marcus really says,
8:12 "Okay, you did something good for
8:14 someone. They received that benefit.
8:17 That's awesome. Transaction concluded.
8:19 You don't need the third thing,
8:22 recognition, gratitude, appreciation.
8:24 You don't need the world to throw you a
8:27 parade. You don't need acknowledgement.
8:29 And you didn't even do anything special.
8:32 You did your job, which is to do good,
8:35 to be good, to help people, to be kind.
8:38 You did the right thing. That's enough.
8:40 The obstacle is not the problem. You're
8:43 the problem. Your opinions about it are
8:46 the problem. Your orientation towards it
8:48 is the problem. The Stoics say the
8:51 obstacle is the way, right? The
8:54 impediment to action advances action.
8:57 What stands in the way becomes the way.
8:59 What do they mean by that? Marcus Ree is
9:01 saying that there's something you get to
9:04 do because of this, right? There's
9:06 things that you can do now that you
9:08 couldn't do before. There's an
9:10 opportunity for you to act with courage
9:14 or discipline or justice or wisdom.
9:15 There's something you can do now that
9:18 you couldn't ordinarily do. We can't let
9:21 a crisis go to waste. We have to use
9:23 this thing in front of us. Yeah, it
9:26 seems like an obstacle, but now there's
9:28 something we get to do because of it if
9:31 we do it. Part of the reason your life
9:34 sucks is cuz your thoughts suck. Marcus
9:36 really says that our life is dyed by the
9:39 color of our thoughts. So if we see only
9:42 negative, if we only see the worst in
9:44 people, if we only see what's
9:46 impossible, if we only see how we've
9:49 screwed up, that's going to color our
9:52 perception of reality. Your life is dyed
9:55 by the color of your thought. If your
9:57 life is negative, if you're it's full of
10:00 grievances, well, of course, the world
10:02 is going to look that way to you. Even
10:05 though he was the emperor of Rome, even
10:07 though it was 2,000 years ago, Marcus
10:09 Aurelius still wanted the approval of
10:12 other people. We all do. We want to be
10:15 liked. We want to be respected. We want
10:18 to be admired. But this leads us astray
10:20 because these people, they don't know
10:22 what they're talking about. And that's
10:24 one of the things that Markx really says
10:28 in meditations. He says, "You have to
10:30 look at who they really are. these
10:33 people whose approval you long for. He
10:35 says think about what their mind is
10:38 really like. He says when you can delve
10:40 into this, when you can see who they
10:43 are, it loses its power over you. You
10:45 realize these are not people whose
10:48 respect you need. These are not people
10:51 whose approval you need to crave. You
10:53 just need to do what you know is right.
10:55 You need to focus on what's in your
10:57 control and you leave the rest to
11:01 everyone else. A person can change but
11:04 people don't change. You can change but
11:07 the world abideth forever. It is
11:10 undefeated. It is exactly the same as it
11:13 ever was and ever will be. This is what
11:16 we see in Mark Serillus's
11:18 meditations. His complaints about
11:21 humanity are the exact same complaints
11:24 we have today. People complain. People
11:26 are dishonest. People are jealous.
11:29 People are lazy. People are loud. People
11:32 are people. We've been waiting on the
11:34 world to change for a very long time.
11:37 And it doesn't. This is why Marxist
11:39 reminds himself, don't go around
11:42 expecting Plato's republic. That's not
11:44 where you live. That's not how things
11:47 work. This isn't about being cynical,
11:50 but in deciding not to be naive. We are
11:52 setting ourselves up actually to be less
11:55 cynical. This isn't to say that you
11:57 shouldn't try. This isn't to say that we
12:00 can't make a difference. No, that's
12:03 actually the whole point. Most of all,
12:05 we can't take this personally. Most of
12:07 all, we shouldn't set ourselves up for
12:10 disappointment or disillusionment.
12:12 Don't stay up waiting for the world to
12:15 change. It's not going to. If you want
12:18 to see change, you have to be change.
12:21 You care about yourself more than other
12:24 people. You're self-interested, as all
12:27 people are by definition. And yet, Mark
12:29 points out, we care about other people's
12:32 opinions more than our own. We care if
12:34 they like what we wear, if they like
12:37 what we say, if they think we're good or
12:40 bad or whatever. It's insane. Trust your
12:43 opinion. Develop your own internal
12:45 compass, your own internal sense of
12:48 whether you're doing a good job or a bad
12:50 job, whether you were successful or not.
12:53 You can't outsource it to the crowd.
12:56 Remember, the crowd is the mob. The mob
12:58 is irrational. You can't let them
13:00 determine any of it. It all gets
13:02 rendered very insignificant very
13:06 quickly. There's a great Roman poet and
13:08 he said, you know, in life, Alexander's
13:11 ambition was bigger than the world. The
13:13 world wasn't big enough to contain him.
13:16 And yet, he says, in the end, a coffin
13:19 was sufficient. Marxist would say
13:21 something very similar about Alexander
13:24 the Great. He said, you know, Alexander
13:26 the Great and his mule driver, they both
13:28 died and the same thing happened to
13:31 both. And the same is true for you.
13:34 Look, we we change as we go through
13:36 life. We take on new roles. We
13:39 experience new situations. New things
13:41 happen in the world. If you asked me 10
13:43 years ago if I could deal with what I'm
13:46 dealing with now, I would have said no.
13:48 that I'd have all this stuff going on, I
13:51 probably would have laughed at you. So,
13:54 you have to be open to change, but you
13:56 also have to cultivate the support and
13:59 the resources and the practices that
14:01 allow you to deal with that change to
14:03 handle those curve balls. And that's
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14:53 of therapy. You're being crazy letting
14:55 them determine whether you did a good
14:58 job or not, whether you're happy or not,
15:01 whether you're a success or not. Mark
15:04 says ambition is tying your happiness to
15:07 what other people do and say and think.
15:09 Sanity he says is tying it to your own
15:12 actions. So what part of the process
15:14 like when I work on my books the writing
15:17 of the book is up to me right? How it
15:19 does on the bestseller list what people
15:21 think about it what the reviews say that
15:24 isn't up to me. So my definition of
15:27 success is an internal one. I'm focused
15:30 on the parts of it I control. Do I want
15:32 other people to like it and care about
15:35 it? Sure. I guess it's nice to have, but
15:38 it's extra. It's not why I do it.
15:41 Because to want that, or worse, to need
15:43 it is to be insane and of course
15:46 incredibly vulnerable. Being clapped
15:49 for, being celebrated, all the things
15:51 you think you want, it's worthless. What
15:54 is it? Mark says, "Cheering is a
15:57 clacking of tongues. Clapping is a
15:59 smacking of hands." And by the way,
16:02 who's doing the cheering and clapping?
16:03 Do these people actually know what
16:05 they're talking about? Do they know
16:08 what's good and what's not good? No. So
16:10 stop trying to chase what the crowd
16:12 wants. What the mom wants is not
16:14 important. You're never going to escape
16:18 change. Life is change. Marcus Rice
16:20 reminds us that being born was a change.
16:23 Death is a change. Every good thing in
16:26 your life came from a change. So did bad
16:28 things of course but everything in life
16:31 has changed. You cannot escape it. You
16:34 can only accept it. You can only embrace
16:37 it. You should mind your own business.
16:40 Deal with your own problems. Mark
16:42 reminds us like we should stop trying to
16:45 escape other people's faults. We should
16:48 try to escape our own.
16:50 It's going to take a lot out of you.
16:52 It's going to take more out of you than
16:55 you think you have. Mark says in one
16:57 passage in meditations, he's trying to
17:00 amp himself to get out of bed in the
17:03 morning. He goes, "Ah, it's warmer under
17:04 the covers here. I like being
17:07 comfortable." He says, "You weren't made
17:10 to be comfortable. You weren't made to
17:13 huddle under the covers and be warm." He
17:16 said, "No, people who love what they do,
17:18 they wear themselves down doing it." He
17:20 said, "There's a limit on the eating and
17:23 the sleeping and the fun side. You got
17:26 to get out there. You got to do what
17:28 your nature demands. And you got to
17:30 understand it's going to be hard and
17:32 it's going to take a lot out of you.
17:34 Marcus Aurelius's prescription for these
17:38 crazy times is very simple. He said,
17:40 "You can't be careless in your actions.
17:43 You can't be confusing in your words.
17:45 You can't be imprecise in your thoughts.
17:47 And you can't retreat into your own
17:50 soul. You can't try to escape what's
17:52 happening. You can't be overactive or
17:55 busy. You focus on what's in your
17:57 control, which is you. You try to keep
17:59 an even keel and you say that whatever
18:02 is happening, however it goes. What it
18:05 ultimately is for me is an opportunity
18:08 for me to be my best, to do my best, to
18:10 do good. I'm going to embrace the
18:12 obstacles. I'm going to embrace the
18:14 difficulties. This is going to make me
18:17 better. You got to stop wasting time
18:20 talking about this stuff, arguing what a
18:22 good person is like, what the right
18:24 thing is, these complicated virtue
18:28 ethics. Mark Stew says, "Waste no more
18:30 time arguing what a good person is like.
18:33 Just be one. You're going to die."
18:36 That's the stoic idea of momento. My
18:39 life is very, very short. You could
18:42 leave life right now. Let that determine
18:44 what you do and say and think. You could
18:47 go at any moment and in fact you will go
18:50 at some moment and that moment could be
