Ryan Holiday

So we do have to actively kind of go and remind ourselves of how things actually were, what we didn't know.

We have to kind of repeatedly insist on the truth, maybe even a bit cynically, just to make sure we're not getting puffed up by things.

I think that's really, really important.

People around you who can tell you the truth is so important.

This is Elon Musk's big problem.

These companies all have all these hand-picked board of directors who are all very indebted to him and nobody tells them, like, you're being crazy, this is insane, don't do this.

I think his second wife, the one he married twice, she said her job was to keep him from going king crazy, like the way that a king goes crazy.

Well, they're obviously not together anymore.

I think we've seen the results of that.

But in meditations, he explicitly talks about this.

He says, you have to be careful not to be Caesarified or dyed purple.

The emperor of Rome would have a purple cloak

And we can all be Caesarified.

We can all be changed.

They say power corrupts having people tell you what you want to hear, not getting feedback, not having people who can deliver truth to you, hearing the stories of your greatness and success.

Imagine you're Mark Sibelius and there is a hundred plus meter tall marble monument that

you know, detailing your genius and accomplishments, right?

There's a triumphal arch of your greatness that you go under every day.

Caesarification was a real thing.

People are worshiping you as a god.