These Things Happen (And They’ll Happen To You) | Always Ask Yourself This Question

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The Daily Stoic 8 min 1 speaker 3 chapters transcribed 1 month ago
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What stoic virtues does the episode introduce and why are they important?

Ryan Holiday 0:00
Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world. These things happen and they'll happen to you. It seems unimaginable, all the things that happened to Marcus Aurelius: a plague, a flood, a famine, wars, betrayal, a coup, children not surviving to adulthood, health issues. Here's the thing, you don't have to imagine it. It happened. It was real. It's in the historical record. What of Seneca and Epictetus? Slavery, physical disability, exile, a deranged boss, a death sentence. These things happen to them just as they have happened to countless people throughout world history. These things could happen to you too.
Ryan Holiday 0:55
So could the things you've heard happening to friends or people in the news, a mugging on a street corner, a confessed affair, a cancer diagnosis, a layoff, a car accident, a house fire. Debilitating injury. These things might catch you by surprise, but as we said recently, it's not because you weren't warned. You were, not just in this email, but by the Stoics over and over again. What can happen to anyone could happen to you. Fortune behaves as she pleases. It's your job to be ready, to be aware, to fortify yourself.
Ryan Holiday 1:37
Back to School starts now.

How do the ancient hardships of Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus illustrate that any disaster can happen to you?

Ryan Holiday 1:39
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Ryan Holiday 2:30
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Ryan Holiday 3:16
And people selling on Whatnot sell 10 times more than on other major marketplaces. Because you're not just listing products, you're building a real direct connection with buyers. Across Whatnot, the number of sellers making over $1 million a year has doubled. That means it's not just a side hustle, but a real path to building something that lasts. Just search whatnot, W H A T N O T in the App Store, download it, and you can start selling and buying right away. Always ask yourself this question. Much of what we do and say during the course of a week is completely unnecessary. Meetings, material possessions, confrontations, pursuits, pointless distractions and problems, they take us away from tranquility and purpose.
Ryan Holiday 4:07
And a stoic cuts through these temptations and obligations by asking a simple question, a question that should lead you in your journaling and thinking this week. It is this before speaking and acting or buying something, just ask, is this a necessary thing? This is from today's entry in the Daily Stoic Journal. 366 days of writing and reflection on the art of living by yours truly, Ryan Holliday. You can get it anywhere books are sold. I do it every single morning, including this morning. And uh you can also buy a signed copy in the Daily Stoic store. But today's quotes, we have one long quote from Marcus Reelius and one short one from Seneca.

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