Tag: Ryan Holiday

Shameless People

“When you are offended by someone’s shameless behavior, ask yourself, ‘Can there be a world without shameless people?’ No, it is not possible.” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 9.42

People will always hate.

They will always try to knock you down to make themselves feel or look better.

Whether it is out of anger, jealousy, or fear.

“I have often wondered how it is that every man loves himself more than all the rest of men, but yet sets less value on his own opinion of himself than on the opinion of others.” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 12.4

It is your choice to be offended or not. If you take it personally you are complicit in their behavior .

Don’t want to be offended by it, don’t be.

You have to have the courage to be you. Sometimes that’s hard.

“‘What will happen to me?’ No one can tell you that. But with courage, you can say yourself, ‘I’m not sure, but I will get through it with my soul intact. I will make the best of it. I will not be afraid.’” RyanHoliday, Courage is Calling

As the old saying goes, sometimes you have to make chicken salad out of chicken shit.

You need to have an undying belief in yourself.

That doesn’t mean arrogance. It means that you know you can make it out the other side of any situation.

People will turn on you. Decisions that looked good in the moment will go south. What will you do?

“Fall down seven times, get up eight.” – Japanese proverb

Don’t let anyone tell you, you are done. A setback is just the next move in a game of chess.

Are you willing to make the next move?

Rest

I have a hard time resting. I have a hard time sitting still.

I have monkey mind.

When I get a quiet moment, my mind jumps from past mistakes to future headaches.

I have a hard time being present.

“But sometimes, the harder choice, the greater exercise in restraint, is to rest. It’s to manage the load instead of throw it on your shoulders (or knees) without thinking.” – Ryan Holiday, Discipline Is Destiny, p. 76-77

Distractions are everywhere. Email, text messages, phone calls, and social media posts. All vying for our attention.

In a world with so many distractions, how do we find a quiet moment to rest?

First put your phone down, that text, email, Tweet can wait.

The Stoics didn’t believe that you should do nothing.

The Stoics felt that your leisure time should be filled by reading and learning.

I enjoy filling my mind with new ideas. It excites me. It gets my mind off of the troubles in this world.

It also reminds you that what is going on today is no different than what has gone on for centuries.

We all need to take a minute to just let our minds and bodies rest. The world will still be out there after you do.

It’s a Phase

I was listening to Ryan Holiday’s Daily Stoic podcast from May 25. It began with Ryan talking about everything in life is a phase.

Good, bad, or indifferent. Whatever you are going through will end eventually. Even if it means the end of you.

“Everything that happens is either endurable or not. If it’s endurable then endure it. Stop complaining. If it’s unendurable… then stop complaining. Your will mean it’s end as well. Just remember: you can endure anything your mind can make endurable, by treating it as in your best interest to do so.” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book X.3

When you are going through something it may seem unbearable at the time. Then years later you look back, and you made it through and learned something from it.

What if you had that perspective when you were going through it?

Everything that happens to you is endurable. It may not seem like it in the moment. It may be painful but as I said in an earlier blog post: Pain = Growth.

Don’t get caught complaining even to yourself. What you are going through is hard enough. Don’t make it harder by feeling sorry for yourself.

There is always something to learn and something positive to take away from every situation. No matter how hard or painful.

The most painful experiences make us better.

“It’s not what happens to you but how you react that matters.” – Epictetus

Placeholder

Remember when your ego begins to takeover no matter your station in life or position in the hierarchy you are just a placeholder. Everyone is replaceable. Someone is always ready to fill your shoes.

“Knowing that he was only a placeholder helped Marcus [Aurelius] prevent his position from going to his head.” -Ryan Holiday, Lives of the Stoics, p. 291.

Does that mean we shouldn’t take our positions seriously? No. It means like Marcus Aurelius we shouldn’t let it go to our head.

We should do our job to the best of our ability, not for recognition but because it is our duty. We should be humble. It is humbling to realize, if we leave, someone will be right behind you to fill your role.

When it is time to leave, and there will always be a time to leave, you should leave your position better off than when you arrived.

Disappointment

I have been told no, more than I have been told yes. Job interview after job interview. “No. I am sorry. We have someone else in mind.” Discouraging doesn’t even scratch the surface at times.

It is hard to not to think that it’s me. I wasn’t good enough for that job or this job. For some jobs, maybe I wasn’t good enough. It can be demoralizing. Doubts. Second guessing the interviews. What could I have done better? The answer most of the time is nothing.

But look at where I am. I would not be where I am if I hadn’t dusted myself off every time I was told no and kept interviewing. Failure?

“The only failure is not to try.” – George Clooney

“The same thing holds true for a positive outlook, however. Color your mind with the right thoughts, color them with what’s possible, and then whatever you’re trying to do—whether it’s trying to start a company or salvage a relationship or lose twenty pounds or quit drinking or make partner at your law firm—you’ll be able to manage it.” Daily Stoic newsletter, April 26, 2021

I believe I am ready for the next step in my career. It is my job then to keep a positive outlook and to color my mind with what’s possible. Will I continue to be told no? 100%. I will not allow those voices to then become my internal voice.

I will continue to be me. I will continue to let others know what I believe, not what I think they want to hear. One day the right opportunity will come along, and I will be ready.

Anger

I’m no raving lunatic. Don’t get me wrong. Especially in a professional setting I can hold it together. At some point though I can feel IT overtaking me. Once that happens I find it difficult to dial it back.

I don’t know when IT is going to happen. IT just happens. I wouldn’t say there is some special trigger. It can be anything. It can be an innocent comment that just hits me the wrong way.

Unfortunately at that moment I am prone to saying things that I regret. Then, after it’s all over, the guilt washes over me.

“Happiness and freedom begin with a clear understanding of one principle. Some things are within your control. And some things are not.” – Epictetus

How do I do better in the moment between stimulus and response? How do I stop anger from taking over me? Or how do I get better at controlling my anger and using it to my advantage?

Anger is an emotion like any other emotion. It is neither good nor bad. It can be unhealthy. It can also be unhealthy to hold it back and not express it. Anger has its place just like every other emotion.

“If someone succeeds in provoking you, realize that your mind is complicit in the provocation.” – Epictetus

On The Daily Stoic podcast, Ryan Holliday interviewed the author Robert Greene. One of the topics they discussed was harnessing your anger.

Ryan Holliday used the example of coaches who get angry to invigorate their team through a difficult time in a game or season. As a former coach I have seen this done very well, and I have seen it done very poorly.

Robert Greene discussed how whether it goes well or poorly depends on if the coach has self-control and self-awareness. Can they step back and analyze their anger? Can they use it strategically to get the results they are after?

He goes on to say that only those people, that can pause in the moment between stimulus and response to analyze their emotions, are able to get the results they want. Only those that can channel their anger productively after analyzing why they’re angry will get the results they are after.

I am by no means there yet. However this is one of the things that I am really working on. I am sure if you ask my family, friends, and colleagues they may say it is not going so well, but I am a work in progress.

I must be more cognizant of the space between stimulus and response. Not everything needs an immediate reaction. I need to take the time to analyze my anger to see if it is justified and then if it is use it productively.

. . . or worse, the end of the world as they knew it.

That is a line from Ryan Holiday’s book The Obstacle is the Way. How often has that been said throughout history? This statement is heard daily during 2020, but does that mean that “the end of the world as they knew it” is a bad thing?

There are many things in education that can and need to be changed. Fortunately pandemic teaching has brought many of these issues to the forefront. The question is do we have the courage to change them.

Change is never popular and is always difficult. It is especially difficult in “easy” times, times when things are humming along. These times lead us to the mantra “but that’s the way we’ve always done it.”

I don’t think any of us would label the times we are living in as easy. Hopefully educators at all levels have taken, are taking, and will take the time to reflect on what positive changes we can take out of pandemic teaching.

It could be meeting more students where they are rather than where we would like them to be. It could be moving towards standards based grading. It could be empowering students to have more control over what they learn and we teach.

Nothing will ever be the same, but that is just life in general. The changes brought on by the pandemic have been more abrupt than say some in the past, but the world is constantly evolving. We need to take this opportunity to create positive change.

Will we take “the end of the world as they knew it” and make the world better than it was before?

“If You Always Do What You’ve Always Done, You Always Get What You’ve Always Gotten.” – Jessie Potter taken from Robert Glazer’s Friday Forward email newsletter 12/18/2020