Latest / The Junto Podcast / E27: Applications of Stoic Philosophies in Daily Life

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E27: Applications of Stoic Philosophies in Daily Life · The Junto Podcast

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  Music.
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  Hello, America. Welcome to the Junto Podcast, where we promote the practical
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  applications of critical thinking and bold creativity.
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  I am your host, Edgar Mills. Thanks for joining us.
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  Music.
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  Hey, America. Welcome back to the Junto Podcast.
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  Thanks for staying with me. Every time I sit down to record an episode, I'm reminded of a quote,
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  and that quote is it's better to remain silent
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  and be thought a fool than to speak and remove
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  all doubt now that quote may or may not be attributed to Abraham Lincoln or
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  Mark Twain or from a book from an author named Maurice Schweitzer I'm not sure
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  the actual origin of it But there's a lot of wisdom in that.
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  So what I hope here is that by speaking, I do not confirm that I am a fool.
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  And I'm going to share some things with you that I've been looking at to try
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  to keep from being a fool.
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  Today, we are talking about the application of Stoic philosophy to our everyday life.
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  Well into politics and to business we're
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  going to we're going to talk about those those philosophies
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  that well and specifically we're going to focus on epictetus marcus aurelius
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  and seneca and then the philosophies they espoused and they are known as the
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  great stoics and there's several others but these three are of the most famous
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  and then the philosophies that they espoused,
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  I think we forget modern day,
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  especially the hyper-partisan politics and things like that that we see today.
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  We kind of forget the foundations of some of the way we think and why we think the things we do.
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  And I talk a lot about Christianity and libertarianism a lot,
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  but a lot of the libertarian foundation is composed of Stoic philosophy.
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  So here we go. We're going to see how we can improve ourselves by maybe applying some of these.
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  Stoicism focuses on virtue.
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  Focuses on self-control and reason.
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  And just these three things alone align with libertarian principles for sure
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  that promote autonomy, personal accountability, and those kinds of things.
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  The things we need, the things that we should have to be productive members of society.
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  So we're going to talk about these core principles from these three guys that I just mentioned.
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  And Epictetus, the sort of epitome of what he, his philosophy is control what
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  you can and accept what you cannot.
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  So we don't have control over many things in our lives.
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  And we do have control over many things. But the things you have control over,
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  that's what you focus on.
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  The things that you can't control, the things that you have no sway over.
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  You have to accept it to a degree or at least tolerate it.
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  And you can think, oh, well, there is a way to control it. Maybe there is, maybe there isn't.
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  But one of the key quotes from Epictetus was, and this was in Discourses.
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  Now, Epictetus didn't write Discourses. He had a scribe or an apprentice who
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  wrote everything down that he said.
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  So I think it's understood that Epictetus didn't actually write this,
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  but he did actually say it.
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  You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize this and you will find strength.
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  I know that's kind of vague, but it's also very specific.
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  Responsible for how you respond to things, how you react to things.
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  And ultimately everything even how you respond to a thing is a choice that you have control over,
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  so focus on what's within your control your
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  thoughts and your actions your attitude yeah i said in the last episode that
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  i have a very optimistic attitude these days i look at things in a very positive
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  can-do light because i i want good things to happen and i've made a choice,
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  to change my attitude to believe and make good things happen.
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  The things that are out of your control, let go of them.
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  External events, other people's opinions, other people's actions.
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  Yeah, we can't control other people's actions. We can't control...
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  For something in modern day, I mean, we can't control the price of frigging eggs, man.
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  We can stop buying eggs from Publix and go buy some hens, right?
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  So if it's a thing that, if it affects you enough, you know,
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  change what you can change.
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  Because again, I don't think there's anything we can do to control the price
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  of eggs, right? Or the price of gas.
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  And now we can take that a couple of steps out and go well we can vote and try
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  to get somebody in who will affect that yeah maybe maybe not it's relevant to
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  our our daily lives today,
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  because even that quote alone just control what you can accept what you cannot
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  have power over your mind you have power over your mind not outside events realize
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  this and you'll find strength.
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  This pushes personal responsibility, which everybody should strive for that.
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  You should take responsibility for your actions, for your choices. You absolutely should.
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  And well, that personal responsibility and accountability is kind of the cornerstone
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  of libertarian thought process because it emphasizes individual agency over
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  these external circumstances.
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  Again, I can't control your opinion of me. I can just control the way I present myself.
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  Marcus Aurelius, he saw virtue as like the highest form of goodness.
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  And a quote from Meditations, which he did write, if it's not right, don't do it.
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  If it's not true, don't say it.
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  Good people that's about as no frills as it gets right there if it's not right
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  don't do it if it's not true don't say it man i love that it's so this is ancient
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  philosophy here folks that applies,
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  exactly to today it didn't there wasn't just context right it wasn't just in
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  the context of you know whatever was going on in 500 bc.
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  Live according to reason and virtue. And this virtue, you know,
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  we're talking about justice, courage, wisdom, temperance, all the good things
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  that everybody knows to be virtuous, traits, regardless of external pressures.
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  Don't let social pressure or political pressure or whatever your little echo
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  chamber, whatever the voices in there are, or even carnal pressure.
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  Yeah don't don't give into that stuff don't let that don't let that sway your ability to reason,
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  and your integrity and your virtue that's easier said than done i know it is
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  especially the carnal bit that'll that'll get some of us but these days you
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  see it more the social media man it's just It's having such an influence on
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  young minds And older minds for that matter.
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  There's baby boomers And Gen Xers who are As addicted to social media as any
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  millennial Or Gen Z or whatever How is it relevant to our life today?
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  Well, clearly that promotes integrity And
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  rational decision making and in
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  a very libertarian way it it is counter
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  to the the mob mentality or the collective and
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  it's counter to coercive systems if every
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  individual follows that key quote right there if it's not right don't do it
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  if it's not true don't say it if every individual followed that philosophy then
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  the collective and your little mob mentality everybody everybody would be reasonable,
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  And it would just be a social club at that point instead of an angry mob.
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  Integrity, and rational decision-making. I think we need some of that.
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  And then Seneca, embrace adversity and practice self-discipline.
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  That was his thing.
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  What's a quote from Seneca's letters from a stoic?
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  We are more often frightened than hurt. We suffer more from imagination than reality.
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  I think we can apply that today, big style.
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  Yeah, I think that applies big style.
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  Adversity is an opportunity for growth. Practice self-discipline to overcome fear and desire.
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  Now, adversity as an opportunity. I talked about that on the last episode on
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  this paradox of constraints, right?
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  Use obstacles as guides.
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  Don't look at it as an obstacle. Look at it as a guide. Look at it as an opportunity.
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  And that's exactly what Seneca is saying right here.
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  And how is it relevant today is that it also encourages resilience,
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  like being tough against against these obstacles not just crumbling under the
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  first sign of of resistance and and this kind of helps us be avoid relying on
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  on systems right on these big systems.
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  And helps us escape that sort of safety blanket of of any sort of built-in security
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  that we get from other sources other than ourselves. Yeah?
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  Don't rely on the government. Don't rely on outside sources for your well-being.
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  Practice self-discipline to overcome fear and desire and roadblocks and whatever
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  adversity may come your way.
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  So what's the libertarian connection to all the
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  these these stoic quotes i
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  just threw out there it very much stoicism very much focuses on being the master
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  of yourself and making rational choices
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  and and those things are are very libertarian and and in practice yeah.
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  Minimal external interference, and I say external not just to mean minimal government
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  interference, but that's the libertarian idea.
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  And maximum personal accountability.
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  Yep, maximum personal accountability.
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  So, Stoicism and Libertarianism are very, very complementary.
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  Well, in fact, I think Libertarianism is largely built off of the Stoic philosophy.
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  Stoic philosophy is multiple. All right, so I'm talking about practical application.
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  I'm not just talking about big philosophical ideas. I'm talking about how do
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  we practically apply those in political discourse, modern political discourse.
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  So the current state of politics, we know, because I talk about this a lot,
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  hyper-polarization, hyper-partisan rhetoric, extremes, extremes.
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  I heard, I want to say Barack Obama just said something to the effect,
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  man, damn, I meant to hold on to that quote. He just said it recently.
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  And he referred to something as violence that was clearly just an opposing idea.
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  It wasn't violence at all.
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  Calling everything violence, right?
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  Living in your echo chamber on TikTok or on whatever, and letting your emotions dominate, interact.
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  That's what the political discourse of today is.
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  Even not just amongst the people on the social medias. That's what you see in Congress.
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  Go listen to any 10-minute clip of Cortez, Ocasio-Cortez.
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  Listen to any 10-minute clip of her. It's pure emotion.
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  Yeah, 100%, man. She's so egregious by every single thing.
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  Any idea, any Republican idea whatsoever, she's egregious by it.
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  That's the state of politics today. What else do we see today?
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  It's collectivism versus individualism. The collectivism is rampant. Everybody's on a team.
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  Everybody's on the red and blue team. As opposed to executing and living,
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  you know, sort of as an individual and embracing individualism,
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  we're in this state of identity politics.
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  And any debates, they prioritize some big, what we want to classify as a marginalized
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  group identity and some big federal state solution.
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  Over individual agency and individual accountability.
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  Yeah, we're seeing that in politics. If you disagree with that, please reach out.
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  Even if you are on the other side of the aisle for me, wherever that is,
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  do you disagree that identity politics is prevalent right now?
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  And then another thing we're seeing is this business of cancel culture.
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  If you said something I disagree with, I say that it's violence and then try
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  to get you or your platform or get you de-platformed.
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  Now, cancel culture may be waning. And we see it with this Jimmy Kimmel situation.
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  Now, I think Jimmy Kimmel is an absolute turd. I haven't like,
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  I didn't even like Jimmy Kimmel when he was on the man show in the,
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  in the 90 or early two thousands or whatever.
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  But you know, that he got, his show got canceled and then reinstated.
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  Well, there's two very, there's two very significant points to make here.
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  And none of us know the truth, but if in fact, the administration used the FCC,
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  to pressure a network to cancel Jimmy Kimmel, that is bad. I think we all agree on that.
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  The government should not use its power to suppress free speech and to suppress
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  a company, ABC, from airing whatever it is they want to air.
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  But on the flip side, if ABC simply canceled Jimmy Kimmel because they thought
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  he was an absolute douchebag and his ratings were demonstrably low over X amount
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  of time and he was costing them too much money.
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  And they just used this particular incident with the Charlie Kirk situation
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  as a good time. It just happened to be, okay, well, this is a good time to get rid of Kimmel, right?
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  Then that is perfectly within their right. And that is not cancel culture at all.
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  That is ABC making a strategic decision to cut the dead weight,
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  just like they did with that other, or just like that other dude, Colbert.
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  Yeah. Yeah, bad ratings equal cancellation. That's it's always been a thing.
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  Now, I'm not in the I don't know anything about TV business,
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  but I know if you get bad ratings, you get canceled.
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  They were probably on life support anyway, just for partisan.
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  Now, and we all know that Hollywood is by and large extreme kind of leftists.
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  So the fact that he was on life support for that long is odd enough.
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  The fact that he got canceled is not that odd, but then it was used as a hyper-partisan talking point.
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  Oh my God, we're suppressing free speech because of Jimmy Kimmel. Whatever.
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  Madness. I hate talking about topics of the day. I'm back on cancel culture.
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  What I'm saying here is cancel culture does persist. It's a part of the political environment.
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  Fear of social ostracism persists because if you say the wrong thing on Instagram,
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  then you're going to get the mob at your door.
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  And cancel culture stifles free speech and freedom of expression.
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  Now, that's a gigantic, humongous concern for libertarians who are absolute
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  champions of free speech.
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  If you're a public figure, that should bother you. At some point in time,
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  Mark Ruffalo could be canceled.
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  And then it's going to be, oh my God, the tyranny. Right now,
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  he spouts off communist nonsense on the reg.
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  I don't see him getting canceled, right? So when it works for you,
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  it's good. When it works against you, it's bad.
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  So I wouldn't say Voltaire was a stoic, but he said this.
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  It's a great one. It's dangerous to be right in matters in which the established authorities are wrong.
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  And whether you're right or wrong, it means that the established authorities
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  have too much frigging power to suppress and oppress you.
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  So don't worry about what Jimmy Kimmel said or don't worry about what Alex Jones says.
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  Worry about anyone who would suppress their speech because that is the definition of fascism.
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  Yeah, don't worry about what opinion is being said. take it,
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  process it, and do what you will with it.
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  Be an independent thinker and disregard or adopt.
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  Be worried about the people who would cancel those people, who would suppress
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  them, either one of them, Alex Jones or Jimmy Kimmel. Yeah.
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  So the applications, that's what I started us off with.
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  How do we apply that to our daily life? Well, Epictetus tells us to,
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  well, his His philosophy tells us that we should focus on our own reason and our own reasoning,
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  not the collective reasoning, because collectives don't reason, and selective outrage.
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  That's what collective—that's what the mob mentality does. They have selective outrage.
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  Oh, my God, Jimmy Kimmel. But one mob thinks that the murder of Charlie Kirk
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  was a joyful, gleeful moment. and then Jimmy Kimmel gets canceled and there is absolute.
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  Woe and despair throughout Hollywood and vice versa, vice versa.
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  You got a whole half of the population mourning the loss of just a public figure.
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  Yep. That they agreed with.
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  Whereas anybody who says anything, oh, I didn't agree. Then it's absolute outrage and cancellation.
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  So don't, instead of here, and here's the practical application folks,
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  Instead of reacting to all this inflammatory garbage, evaluate arguments rationally.
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  And then if it comes to debate and that debate is sane and civil, great.
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  If it becomes unproductive and emotionally charged, cut away.
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  You don't lose because you cut away from an irrational debate.
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  Have the debate for sure.
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  But if it's going in circles, you know, give it about one or two laps and then be done with it.
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  Because when it comes to these extremes, by the way, like it's pretty difficult
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  in one single sitting to change someone's mind.
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  I mean, you might be that guy. You might be that charming son of a bitch that
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  is able to, you know, sell somebody beachfront property in frigging Montana.
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  You know what I mean? But generally speaking, that one debate ain't going to
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  change too many people's minds.
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  Now, if that debate is televised or on, on, you know, a viral frigging whatever,
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  and millions of people see it, yeah, you might change some minds.
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  You might, you might get a couple of people, but if you're just sitting in a
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  pub, well, you know what? I'm not even going to say that sitting in a pub. Guess what?
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  People are more apt to be rational sitting in the pub, having a pint.
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  They're more apt to have a rational conversation with somebody they disagree with.
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  Now, five pints into it, that might be a little different, but that's where
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  we have moderation folks and just be reasonable adults.
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  If you're sitting around and you're debating divisive issues,
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  you know, frigging gun rights, illegal immigration,
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  theft, or as it's commonly known, taxation, ask yourself the question,
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  you know, what can I control here?
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  And then ask yourself, how can I respond with objective reason and not emotion?
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  If you're starting to get fired up and you're starting to get emotionally charged,
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  you've already lost the debate. Now it's just a yelling match.
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  So don't even participate in that. And there's your practical advice on dealing with that.
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  Marcus Aurelius, his ideas, his philosophies, just tells us that we need to
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  be just and truthful. Well, almost all zealots believe that they are just and truthful.
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  Misguided they may be, left or right.
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  But when you're having a debate with someone at the pub, you know,
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  be honest, be just, and try to see the other side.
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  Avoid your tribalism. Avoid your team talking points. Avoid the echo chamber talking points.
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  And just to have good faith dialogue.
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  And most important, more importantly, refuse to demonize your opponent,
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  your debate mate or their team.
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  Don't lump them in with a team unless that's the, unless that's where they're they're standing on.
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  If they're debating as their team and they're the de facto spokesperson,
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  don't demonize the individual and don't
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  demonize the team however misguided they
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  may be that is the tactic of Saul Alinsky
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  that is the tactic of Joseph Goebbels
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  and every other authoritarian totalitarian fascist dictator or theocratic zealot
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  that that's the tactics of those people and if you're using those tactics but
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  then excusing the use of those tactics because your side's right, you're all fucked up.
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  Don't demonize other people as a course of debate or as an argument.
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  If you're debating over the free market versus regulation, you know,
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  sort of social government regulation, just focus on the principles.
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  Focus on the things that matter, property rights, competition, scarcity, etc. And.
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  Don't throw out cheap attacks. If you just start telling somebody they're a
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  commie, you're losing the fight.
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  You have to have better, you have to speak from some factual and evidential stuff there.
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  Saying you're a commie, don't have any juice. It feels good to you probably,
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  I guess, but just telling somebody they're a commie, don't have any juice.
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  Now, unless you're friends and then it's jokes, you know what I mean?
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  But especially in that particular debate,
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  just calmly compare and define communism and point out the doctrine of communism
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  and how and point out actual instances of how it's incompatible with a constitutional
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  republic and a genuine free market economy.
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  There's enough facts out there, folks.
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  There's enough facts of the failures of communism over and over and over and
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  over and over again that you don't need to resort to attacks, personal attacks.
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  And from Seneca perspective, right? So embrace adversity and political.
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  Yeah, embrace, view your political opponents.
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  I'm not going to say your political enemies, folks. I think we're starting to
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  water down words to the point where they're losing their meaning.
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  Enemy is a strong word. Enemy is a very strong word.
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  View your political opposition and a debate with those folks as a chance to
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  refine your own argument, refine your own views.
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  Yeah, because if you're a rational human and you actually do hear something
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  that makes sense coming out of their mouth, that doesn't mean you're automatically,
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  you got to switch sides, right?
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  That just means you're taking what they're saying, you're processing it and
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  seeing value in that one piece of information and going, oh, yeah, that's correct.
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  How can you, how does that reinforce your views or how does that disprove your
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  views or discount your view?
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  Yeah, maybe. Don't look at it as a threat.
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  And don't look at it as an attack on your personal identity,
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  providing that your personal identity isn't solely based on your flawed political
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  doctrine or your sexual identity or whatever.
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  I talked about this. I talk about this all the time. But, I mean,
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  your kind of identity should probably encompass more than just that one thing.
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  So don't look at political disagreement as a threat on your personal identity.
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  That's what causes the emotion and then the irrational responses and the people
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  yelling in each other's faces and shit like that.
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  If you're out there and you're a public figure or you're on a podcast,
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  you do whatever it is you do and you and you have gotten canceled for a controversial opinion.
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  You know what? Take it for what it is.
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  Accept the external judgment that's outside of your control,
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  because I have no juice with X or Instagram or Facebook.
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  If they cancel my profile or whatever, then that's what's happened.
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  I might be able to work around a little bit. I might be able to rebuild a little bit, whatever.
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  That's how it's outside of my control. But what is it in my control?
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  I'm going to continue to focus on. I'm not going to let that taint my integrity or my purpose.
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  So accept what you can't control.
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  Look for alternatives, but maintain your integrity.
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  Maintain your integrity, folks, and maintain your sense of purpose,
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  because without the sense of purpose, the rest of it's kind of irrelevant.
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  So all these philosophies and examples, I'm getting, how can the Stoic philosophies
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  benefit the political discourse?
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  I've already given you some examples of how to, right, how to apply these in
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  your arguments or whatever.
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  But here's the overall benefits, Right.
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  You take the emotional volatility out of the out of the game and you just have
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  civil, well-mannered debate.
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  That's what Stoic philosophy will do for you.
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  Stoic philosophy encourages independent thought.
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  Ejects collectivist mob pressure and allows you to think independently.
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  And then from a libertarian's perspective and a constitutional perspective,
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  you then are free to associate with other people who share your opinion.
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  Stoic philosophy promotes resilience against the social or political coercions.
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  Resilience against cancel culture and empowers
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  you as an individual to speak freely
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  to think freely and speak freely now you
• 30:31
  may have to defend your opinions it depends on what platforms you're doing this
• 30:35
  in and you may create hard feelings but still as a free individual you can speak
• 30:41
  think and free and speak freely and then from a libertarian perspective on all this political stuff.
• 30:48
  Stoicism counters the victimhood culture and state dependency and state supremacy
• 30:55
  that we see in modern politics.
• 30:58
  And it reinforces self-reliance and rational, well-mannered discourse over mob
• 31:06
  rule or authoritarian solutions. There you go.
• 31:11
  Stoicism and politics.
• 31:15
  All right, moving on, moving on. Let's talk about modern business,
• 31:20
  the current state of modern business.
• 31:22
  And I'm talking general terms here, but really kind of a, well,
• 31:28
  kind of a, from a bigger, you know, overall perspective, corporate perspective,
• 31:33
  right? These behemoths and whatnot.
• 31:34
  But also maybe even these mom and pop shops that feel like they have to conform
• 31:39
  to certain things. the corporate culture, you know, the corporate culture,
• 31:44
  which pressures conformity, like that's what the corporate...
• 31:50
  I'll give you just a little side example here. My daughter works for a mellow mushroom.
• 31:54
  Now I worked for mellow mushroom back in the early nineties and it was still
• 32:00
  a little, little independent shops. And they were just little,
• 32:04
  what you would just call a pizza joint. You know what I'm saying?
• 32:08
  Some of the employees were back in the, in the freezer, smoking weed.
• 32:11
  We played whatever music we wanted. It was just a little, you know.
• 32:17
  Bike messenger, he sort of just a joint, right? Just a pizza joint.
• 32:21
  Well, as you all may know, Mellow Mushroom kind of got big, right?
• 32:27
  They started growing and expanding.
• 32:29
  And then they started exporting their corporate model.
• 32:35
  And every store has to sort of conform, like they've changed their logo.
• 32:40
  And now they got specific shirts that
• 32:43
  the waitresses or the servers are allowed
• 32:46
  to wear and things like that then you
• 32:50
  and then on a bigger level on some of these other things you get all
• 32:53
  these DEI initiatives and these ecological social governance mandates and shit
• 33:01
  like that that you know where you got to do your mandatory training every every
• 33:05
  quarter every six months or whatever and yeah they threat brief you you can't
• 33:11
  say this You can't act like that.
• 33:13
  You're not allowed to, you know, blah, blah, blah.
• 33:16
  And all of those things, all of that conformity and all that forced conformity
• 33:21
  and all of these weird DEI ESG blah,
• 33:28
  blah initiatives are 100% in contrast and counter to individual merit. Yeah.
• 33:38
  Creativity and genuine organic innovation. All of those things stifle those things.
• 33:46
  Individual merit, creativity, organic, genuine, true, ground up innovation.
• 33:55
  All of those weird initiatives in this corporate culture.
• 34:00
  And that's one part of what's going on in business today.
• 34:05
  It probably has been for a long time, just in different ways.
• 34:09
  What's another trait or characteristic of the state of modern business?
• 34:18
  Consumerism. Well, these corporations push it, man, because the corporations are chasing,
• 34:24
  well, they're really chasing long-term and short-term profit,
• 34:29
  but short-term profit chasing and instant gratification,
• 34:33
  They're playing on the general
• 34:37
  public and the general vibe
• 34:41
  of modern social media and even a modern comedy and things where everything
• 34:49
  is short little bites and you consume and you got about a three-minute attention
• 34:56
  span and then you move on.
• 34:59
  The instant gratification dominates business strategies these days.
• 35:03
  And I talked about this in one of my podcasts, The Disposable Society,
• 35:08
  where everything's, you know, buy, buy, buy, buy.
• 35:12
  It's trashed. You just disregard it and then buy, buy, buy some more instead
• 35:15
  of, well, I'll just say, let's use furniture, for instance.
• 35:20
  You know, everybody goes and buys the $800 whole living room set.
• 35:28
  Two, three years later, you got to go buy a new living room set.
• 35:31
  Whereas you save up, buy some quality,
• 35:36
  maybe hand-built, you know, furniture that, you know, our grandparents,
• 35:42
  think back to our grandparents.
• 35:43
  And if some of you even remember, maybe your great-grandparents,
• 35:46
  think about some of the furniture that they had.
• 35:50
  Like, you know, I bet every one of you out there remembers a damn dresser or
• 35:56
  some kind of kitchen sort of dresser cabinet or whatever that's been around
• 36:04
  since the frigging early 1900s.
• 36:08
  Yeah, quality, longevity. Yeah, man.
• 36:13
  That's not what's going on in the consumerism lifestyle right now.
• 36:19
  What else is prominent in modern business?
• 36:24
  And it's probably always been this way.
• 36:27
  Workplace stress. What do you know about that? Anybody?
• 36:30
  These high-pressure environments, they want you to perform, and they want to
• 36:36
  do DEI hires, but you've got to perform yet conform. them.
• 36:44
  And then some of these businesses use fear, fear tactics that creates more stress.
• 36:52
  You think you may at any moment could lose your job or that if you fail any
• 36:57
  little piece of a task that you're out of there.
• 37:00
  Or if you're a high performer or if you are a high performer surrounded by low
• 37:05
  performers, you might get burnout, man.
• 37:08
  You might get stressed just from burnout, just from picking up the slack,
• 37:12
  but you got these initiatives that did whatever.
• 37:16
  And that's, and that's why those kinds of things don't promote,
• 37:19
  you know, excellence or performance, those, those initiatives.
• 37:24
  If it's not merit-based, then why, why would you put out?
• 37:28
  And in some of these companies, you gotta, you gotta make some ethical compromises.
• 37:32
  All right. I'm going to go ahead and bring up the the covid you
• 37:36
  know friggin era from early 2020
• 37:40
  on through some people are still lingering around this shit get this shot or
• 37:46
  lose your job well it's it's not a mandate but you have a choice you don't have
• 37:52
  to get it but you'll lose your job so and so by default it became a mandate.
• 37:58
  People didn't want to do that, and they shouldn't have to, and they shouldn't have had to.
• 38:02
  Or you lose your job if you don't use the right pronouns on someone.
• 38:07
  Someone you might not know from Adam, et cetera, et cetera.
• 38:12
  So there's that workplace stress from just a bunch of different shit,
• 38:16
  but yeah, that. Or maybe even safety.
• 38:19
  I'm pretty sure Amazon had some, there's a lot of safety issues in these big
• 38:24
  mega, not factories, but mega warehouses That's where they got all this automated shit.
• 38:29
  But then you got humans getting run over by robots and shit.
• 38:33
  Think about that, man. There's all kinds of ways to have workplace stress.
• 38:37
  It ain't just, oh, I don't make enough money and I work too many hours.
• 38:41
  That's just the obvious. There's all kinds of other stuff going on.
• 38:45
  So in light of all that, the consumerism, the corporate culture and the workplace
• 38:50
  stress, How can we apply Stoic philosophy,
• 38:54
  like actually apply it to our daily work life or our corporate work life?
• 39:01
  Well from the from the perspective of epictetus focus on what you control in
• 39:06
  business all right your effort your work ethic you can control your effort right
• 39:12
  and your work ethic and the decisions,
• 39:16
  that you make in a day on whether or not something will be more productive or less,
• 39:23
  that's what you do right no matter what you think if you work for someone else
• 39:27
  and or yourself, put out 100% effort,
• 39:33
  show strong work ethic, i.e.
• 39:37
  The effort, but being on time, being a good steward of your equipment or your
• 39:44
  resources or things in the workplace, and make good decisions that benefit the
• 39:50
  company, not just yourself.
• 39:51
  When you work, Even owning your business or even working for someone else,
• 39:56
  every decision should be, how does this benefit the company?
• 40:02
  Not, oh, how does this benefit me? And then secondary, oh, will this benefit
• 40:08
  the company? I'm not sure. Yeah.
• 40:11
  Focus on things you can't control, market fluctuations or the actions of your competitors,
• 40:19
  or, well, a lot of times local and local regulation, but specifically state
• 40:24
  and federal regulation. It's hard to control that stuff.
• 40:28
  You can be active in your local politics and try to have some influence on things.
• 40:34
  And you should, by the way, I think local politics is important.
• 40:38
  State level yeah that's important for sure that's
• 40:42
  still considered local politics federal regulation
• 40:45
  yeah it's it's kind of hard i
• 40:48
  imagine so focus on what you can control not on what you can't control that's
• 40:53
  from epictetus if you're a small business owner and you're dealing with all
• 40:57
  these regulatory hurdles you know focus on coming up adapting and alternatives
• 41:03
  creative alternatives that you can't control.
• 41:06
  So think to yourself, all right, if they do this, if they come up with this
• 41:11
  regulation, I have a workaround.
• 41:14
  Get ahead of the game. Don't be reactive. You know, be proactive.
• 41:18
  Don't moan and groan and lament the tyrannical government overreach, which we all do, right?
• 41:25
  Do bemoan tyrannical government. Just don't let it hinder your productivity.
• 41:30
  Yeah your forward motion so if
• 41:33
  you're up on what the local politics and you know something's coming down the
• 41:38
  pyre going up for a vote or something anticipate get ahead of it how is this
• 41:43
  going to affect my business will it affect my business if so how and then what
• 41:47
  can i do to get around it you might not it might not cost you any money it might
• 41:51
  not do anything it might just be a simple,
• 41:53
  procedural thing that you can work around yeah it might cost you a freaking arm and leg you know.
• 42:01
  From the perspective of marcus aurelius prioritize virtue over profit yeah that's what i said,
• 42:09
  virtue and integrity over profit now that's going to come to some people's ears
• 42:15
  and bill what do you mean profit profit profit profit make the money make the
• 42:20
  deal take the sponsorship whatever.
• 42:23
  Make your decisions based on your integrity, not external validation or short-term
• 42:32
  wins that can't be sustained as long-term wins.
• 42:38
  And I'll add this emphatically, not at the expense of someone else.
• 42:44
  Don't gain anything off the back of someone else because that's ill-gotten and it will go away.
• 42:53
  If you're a boss of a company and you resist the pressure to take on some trendy,
• 43:00
  you know, sort of DEI, whatever, coercive corporate policy, right,
• 43:04
  and you're rejecting it.
• 43:07
  You know to to be to be really truly fair and to really recognize people's merit
• 43:15
  then that is a good thing that's not a bad thing because by definition true fairness,
• 43:23
  and legitimate merit negate any dei whatever what was the what was it called
• 43:33
  in the 70s affirmative action type stuff where,
• 43:38
  okay, we're hiring.
• 43:39
  We're a fire department and we're hiring.
• 43:42
  And out of the academy, you know, we got five viable candidates.
• 43:47
  Four of these viable candidates were physically superior in every way.
• 43:54
  Two of them were intellectually and academically superior in every way and showed
• 44:01
  excellent leadership potential, but we need a woman.
• 44:06
  And the woman was marginal in this and that. She had extreme weak physical scores
• 44:13
  and then marginal academic scores, but we need a woman.
• 44:17
  So the woman gets hired. And I'm not just hating on women right here.
• 44:20
  I'm just giving you a pretty cut and dry example of affirmative action inaction.
• 44:28
  And I only say those things because, yeah, I've seen that exact situation go down.
• 44:33
  Now, let me caveat, folks, that don't mean there's not physically fit women
• 44:37
  out there who can do the job.
• 44:39
  There are plenty. There are plenty. I can pull up just any number of CrossFit
• 44:48
  competition videos and show you women who will just burn down any firefighter standard that exists,
• 44:57
  any soldier standard that exists.
• 45:00
  There are some highly capable, physically fit women and men out there.
• 45:09
  His perspective. He tells us to use obstacles and setbacks as opportunities.
• 45:17
  Find opportunity in everything. These roadblocks or these outright failures
• 45:22
  even are your economic low tides or you're in a slump.
• 45:27
  Use those as chances to innovate.
• 45:31
  Find creative ways to mitigate the pain of those things.
• 45:35
  And that'll help you get stronger against newly discovered problems.
• 45:40
  Yeah. Once you start getting a whole sort of index of, okay,
• 45:45
  I got this contingency in case of these two things. I got this contingency in case this happened.
• 45:51
  The more contingencies you build up early in the game, the better you're going to be.
• 45:57
  The better you're going to be. And that'll help you bomb proof your contingency
• 46:02
  plans for, for future stuff, for future regulations, for future, you know,
• 46:09
  generational, you know, whatever the generational sort of mood is to where my,
• 46:14
  my son enlightened me to a thing called, I think he called it the millennial stare.
• 46:22
  You walk into a sort of like a maybe a fast food restaurant and there's a there's
• 46:27
  a young dude at the cash register and he's just looking at you with a blank
• 46:32
  stare and you're just looking at him.
• 46:39
  There's no may i help you what do you have what the fuck do you want nah there's
• 46:44
  nothing it's just a blank stare.
• 46:46
  So you stand there for a second, waiting, giving him, giving that young man
• 46:50
  an opportunity to greet you like, like a good customer service representative.
• 46:56
  So you stand there for a second and then you look at him and then you kind of
• 46:59
  go, huh, I guess I'll have two eggs and a side of bacon.
• 47:06
  The millennial stare. I'm going to start using that.
• 47:09
  I like it. It's funny. The goal here, from a cynic perspective,
• 47:16
  use all these negative things as opportunities to what will help you create
• 47:22
  bomb-proof contingencies.
• 47:24
  That's the goal right there, folks, to be able to shake off anything that comes
• 47:32
  your way and keep going forward.
• 47:36
  If you're the brilliant entrepreneur of a failed startup.
• 47:43
  You know, reflect on it. Use the lessons learned. Like, where did it go wrong?
• 47:47
  Get some input from other outside sources and do a little self-reflection.
• 47:52
  But then, like, literally write those lessons learned down.
• 47:56
  Don't spiral into a pity party of despair with yourself because you're the only
• 48:04
  one at that party. You know what I'm saying? man, nobody's feeling sorry for you.
• 48:07
  Everybody will give you, oh man, tough luck. Better luck next time. Yeah.
• 48:11
  Hey, that was a good idea though. Well, maybe it was a grand idea and you just,
• 48:16
  you know, you can go about it right.
• 48:18
  So yeah, lessons learned, man. Just do some reflection, figure it out,
• 48:24
  figure out what went wrong or what few things went wrong.
• 48:29
  Try to conceptualize those, Let's try to put them into words,
• 48:31
  write them down and then use them in your next plant, you know, phase of planning.
• 48:37
  Yeah. Don't, don't go into your own little private pit of despair.
• 48:42
  You know, yeah. Go to the pub, knock out one or two Guinnesses,
• 48:45
  you know, share some, Hey,
• 48:48
  the stranger sitting next to you at the pub may be a complete moron or may have
• 48:53
  been, he may be a retired guy from a business that he ran for 30 years and he's
• 48:59
  retired at the age of, you know,
• 49:00
  60 because he's got all the money
• 49:03
  he needs and he's got the house and the grandkids and he's good to go.
• 49:08
  And he was wildly successful. You don't know who's sitting next to you at the pub, folks.
• 49:12
  Say, yeah, this, this is what happened. Maybe he can help. You don't know.
• 49:17
  So how does this stoic philosophies benefit us in business discourse?
• 49:21
  Well, one, first and foremost, it fosters ethical leadership.
• 49:27
  Yeah, leadership. Lead with integrity.
• 49:32
  It aligns with libertarian emphasis on voluntary exchange, responsibility.
• 49:37
  Yeah, we keep seeing these parallels with stoicism and libertarian values.
• 49:45
  These stoic philosophies encourage long-term thinking over short-term reactive,
• 49:50
  profit-driven decisions.
• 49:52
  I told you, folks, I'm in the game for the long haul on the range.
• 49:58
  I've been in it.
• 50:01
  So my, my, my LLC is we've been up and running since 2017.
• 50:07
  So, well, what is that? Eight years. That's not long-term by any stretch.
• 50:12
  I'd say, I guess you could consider that midterm depending on what business you're in.
• 50:17
  I still feel like it's very short-term. I feel like we just started,
• 50:21
  I don't know. It feels like a lifetime and then it feels like a week ago. You know what I mean?
• 50:25
  But I've never been profit focused. I want to provide and build a reputation
• 50:33
  for quality, delivering quality.
• 50:37
  A lot of people equate price with quality, and sometimes that's true, but sometimes it's not.
• 50:42
  My goal is to build the shooting community, to build a bigger shooting community.
• 50:49
  And that means bringing in people who don't have money falling out of their
• 50:54
  wallets to go buy a staccato, a different model staccato every couple months.
• 50:59
  So yeah, I'm not profit driven. I'm about building a long-term reputation and
• 51:08
  long-term clients. Yeah.
• 51:12
  Stoicism builds resilience in high stakes environments, folks.
• 51:16
  High stakes environments. You can take the hits because you're strong as an individual thinker.
• 51:24
  It gets rid of, it kills any reliance on external validation or any external
• 51:30
  source of government bailouts, for instance.
• 51:33
  Yeah. Or a good review. Like, you know, I don't know.
• 51:37
  Some people put a lot of stake in what people say online or what their little
• 51:45
  comment sections are or whatever. I don't really.
• 51:48
  I'm a face-to-face kind of guy anyway, way, but yeah.
• 51:53
  See me on screen right now. I don't consider screen face-to-face.
• 51:58
  And parallel with libertarianism, stoicism supports free market principles, folks.
• 52:03
  And it pushes self-discipline. It pushes innovation, genuine innovation.
• 52:09
  And it fights against cronyism.
• 52:12
  And it resists the regulatory state because the regulatory state distorts natural
• 52:19
  voluntary business interaction. It distorts the market. Yep.
• 52:26
  Business. Stoic philosophy and how it applies to business.
• 52:30
  All right. Boom. Moving on. Now, how can we apply?
• 52:36
  Well, let's talk about modern daily life. I'm not talking about politics.
• 52:40
  I'm not talking about work. I just mean daily life.
• 52:43
  Some of the challenges that we see, that we face just every single day, all day, every day.
• 52:49
  Number one is God dang information overload.
• 52:54
  And hell, I'm a part of that. I'm trying to give you information.
• 52:56
  I'm just among so much noise.
• 53:01
  But even just constant notifications on your phone.
• 53:05
  As I was saying that, I had a notification on my little Fitbit smartwatch right here.
• 53:12
  I got a package out for delivery. Constant stimulation.
• 53:16
  Constant notifications.
• 53:18
  Yeah for some people that creates
• 53:22
  that creates anxiety well it
• 53:25
  definitely creates distraction 100 i just
• 53:28
  got distracted literally and it and it creates anxiety for some people because
• 53:33
  they're constantly looking for that whatever the next notification is and then
• 53:37
  check this out then the absence of that creates anxiety for some people like
• 53:43
  it's been too silent for too long what's going on.
• 53:48
  We're developing a dependence on this shit.
• 53:52
  So that's a big one. Information overload. That's a big challenge to modern
• 53:56
  life. Then we got materialism and consumerism.
• 53:59
  But the materialism is your sort of social and cultural pressure to equate success
• 54:07
  with just wealth or status.
• 54:09
  You see this in the hip-hop culture.
• 54:13
  Everything's, you know, Bentley. You got to have some big like G-Wagon or a Bentley or whatever.
• 54:20
  And you got all the gold and you got the sneakers that cost 300 bucks.
• 54:24
  And you got all this status. Look at Jay-Z with his status, right? He's the mogul.
• 54:31
  Is that what success means?
• 54:35
  Not for me, man. I mean, yeah, not for me. Not for me.
• 54:39
  What success means for me, well, one is that I'm delivering quality to my clients.
• 54:45
  Because I develop relationships with my clients.
• 54:47
  I mean, I genuinely consider, you know, probably 90% of my clients friends.
• 54:54
  Do you know what I mean? Yeah.
• 54:57
  Mistake. That might be a tactical business mistake, but who knows?
• 55:01
  But what do I equate with success? I mean, the health and welfare of my grandkids, man.
• 55:06
  When I go over to their house and my grandson goes, popo, and comes and runs and gives me a big hug.
• 55:13
  Well, I just had a, that's a big success, isn't it? That's the biggest, that's the best.
• 55:19
  When my wife looks at me all goo goo in the face for no reason and gives me
• 55:24
  a big hug and tells me how much she loves me,
• 55:25
  man that's success right
• 55:28
  there get away from the materialism and then
• 55:32
  social pressure your echo chambers your your team always
• 55:36
  judging right do you have the right opinion about this if
• 55:39
  not oh my god you must be if you're not 100 with us you're you're our enemy
• 55:43
  that the social pressure that are affecting everything from i mean even your
• 55:49
  personal choice even the clothes you wear in high school probably that's a big
• 55:52
  thing right everybody wants to dress cool they want I don't get ripped on.
• 55:56
  I remember when I was in junior high, I went to Forest Park Junior High School.
• 56:02
  And look, man, we were poor. That's it. And my dad would buy me used sneakers from the thrift store.
• 56:11
  And I would go to school wearing these used sneakers from the thrift store.
• 56:16
  And I would get absolutely ripped for being poor, for having secondhand sneakers.
• 56:24
  Did it make me feel bad? Yeah. And I did very much feel like,
• 56:30
  well, it was definitely being judged.
• 56:32
  But when I ran track and I did pole vault and some other things,
• 56:38
  I insisted that my dad buy some Nike track shoes, some proper track shoes.
• 56:44
  Now fortunately back then track shoes didn't cost that much money with the spikes
• 56:50
  and whatnot but i was like and that was strictly because of the the,
• 56:57
  that I got in school daily for my poor kid's sneakers.
• 57:03
  So, yeah, your social group, there's a lot of judgment out there everywhere.
• 57:08
  I think there's a lot of that going on in some of the churches, folks, I think.
• 57:14
  And then if you're, you know, if you are an individual and you're a nonconformist,
• 57:19
  you know, and then you got people looking at you and making snickering and whatnot.
• 57:24
  So, you know what? And F those folks.
• 57:28
  Don't let social pressure shape what and how you do, what you consider your values.
• 57:38
  All right. That was just three sort of things, right?
• 57:42
  Information overload, materialism, and social pressure.
• 57:48
  So what can the stoic applications, how can we rise above that?
• 57:55
  Well, from the Epictetus perspective, you know, you control where you put your attention.
• 58:02
  You control how much someone, how much weight you give someone's comment.
• 58:10
  You control that. How much weight you give to a smart ass comment.
• 58:15
  You can control that. You can also limit your time on some of these frigging platforms.
• 58:22
  Or like me, you know, I'm on the socials a lot, but I might react,
• 58:29
  you know, with a little emoji, a little heart emoji here and there.
• 58:32
  But I don't, I avoid getting into these protracted arguments because you,
• 58:38
  I could spend, you could spend the rest of your life arguing with people on social media.
• 58:43
  There's probably a bot at that. It's probably a bot.
• 58:48
  Don't get out. I scroll social media with no sound on. I don't want to hear it.
• 58:54
  And, and only if it's a very compelling picture, will I even stop to see what's going on.
• 58:59
  I told you folks, you know, guns, motorcycles, Land Rovers, curvy women,
• 59:06
  and then like tiny homes and log cabins. I like those too.
• 59:10
  But very rarely do i stop and get into a not do look at some politics stuff
• 59:15
  but social media is not the place to get your politics good people you need
• 59:19
  you need to go and go above and beyond on that limit your time on the socials
• 59:24
  don't don't get don't get outraged at every single thing,
• 59:29
  folk be more purposeful in and you what where you put your focus yeah like as
• 59:35
  soon as for instance Instead of sitting around, it's real easy to start scrolling.
• 59:40
  And then an hour later, you pop your head up and you're like, geez, man.
• 59:43
  Just like I'm about to do today. As soon as I'm done with this podcast,
• 59:46
  guess what? Go into the gym.
• 59:49
  Make time for the things that matter.
• 59:51
  You know what I mean? Go to the gym instead of doom scrolling.
• 59:55
  I do audible books. I'm reading The Gift of Fear right now by David DeBecker.
• 1:00:03
  It's pretty awesome. You should read it. The Gift of Fear.
• 1:00:06
  Be more purposeful with where you put your time and your focus.
• 1:00:11
  From Marcus Aurelius' perspective, your daily actions should align with the
• 1:00:19
  virtuous characteristics.
• 1:00:21
  Make choices based on reason and integrity and not societal expectations.
• 1:00:27
  Make your choices on your reason and your integrity.
• 1:00:33
  Instead of sitting around doom scrolling all day or instead of playing video game all day.
• 1:00:39
  Go take a walk, go have a conversation with a homeless guy, go take him to lunch.
• 1:00:44
  I mean, there's just so many things you can do in a day.
• 1:00:48
  So many things you can do in a day.
• 1:00:51
  Choose a job or a lifestyle based on your values, not whatever status you're
• 1:00:58
  chasing or your peer pressure.
• 1:01:01
  And my daughter is a prime example of that. She don't quite know what she wants to do with herself.
• 1:01:06
  And she, she's a server at the Mellow Mushroom. She don't quite know what she
• 1:01:09
  wants to do with herself.
• 1:01:11
  And she's not caving to, well, I don't pressure her.
• 1:01:15
  I just want her to be successful in whatever she does. I don't care if she's
• 1:01:18
  the best server on the planet, if she's happy doing it.
• 1:01:21
  But don't, if you're chasing clout and status, you might make yourself all right
• 1:01:26
  with the job you're doing.
• 1:01:28
  But if, as long as, as long as you still feel some genuine happiness.
• 1:01:32
  And for some of you out there, your job may not matter to you whatsoever.
• 1:01:36
  Like it's just a place to give you a paycheck.
• 1:01:38
  And then you go home and live your life. And on the weekend,
• 1:01:42
  you live your life or you have a job to where you can travel because that's what you value.
• 1:01:49
  So don't just think you have to go do that, that thing that everybody else has
• 1:01:54
  done or, or your parents say, well, I did this and you're doing this.
• 1:01:59
  It doesn't have to be that way.
• 1:02:01
  But there needs to be some personal satisfaction and fulfillment in there with
• 1:02:08
  your career and your lifestyle, the way you live daily.
• 1:02:11
  From Seneca's perspective, we practice sort of negative visualization, right?
• 1:02:19
  To prepare, like to be ready for challenges.
• 1:02:24
  So and it's a you know it's a funny thing and i used i said
• 1:02:27
  this before that you know expect the
• 1:02:30
  worst prepare for the worst and hope for
• 1:02:33
  the best and that's exactly what this means this
• 1:02:36
  negative visualization and i think in latin it's
• 1:02:39
  and i and i put this in latin because it's a
• 1:02:42
  pre meditatio malorum you
• 1:02:46
  know chant that to yourself man be prepared
• 1:02:49
  for the worst but expect the best and
• 1:02:53
  strive for the best aim for the best but
• 1:02:56
  when something side swipes you don't be
• 1:03:00
  surprised don't be like oh my taking a back just throw up your guard boom block
• 1:03:07
  that shit and then and keep punching yeah that way it takes the fear out of
• 1:03:12
  it the fear of the unknown that's a big fear for some people well visualize
• 1:03:17
  the unknown what are the most
• 1:03:19
  most likely challenges to arise?
• 1:03:22
  What's the most, what's the worst possible challenge that could arise? Like.
• 1:03:29
  Thinking about that and then start working up some, some mental sort of alternatives
• 1:03:34
  to that, like figuring where, okay, if this happens, if the worst of all possible
• 1:03:38
  things happens, how can I,
• 1:03:40
  how can we, is there a way to mitigate it or do we need to change direction?
• 1:03:45
  If so, how will that look?
• 1:03:48
  Just think about that stuff for 10 minutes and then drive on with your day.
• 1:03:54
  If you get mentally prepared and even, you know, actually physically prepared
• 1:03:58
  for financial potential setbacks.
• 1:04:01
  And then, you know, you know, I got a couple grand in the bank.
• 1:04:03
  So if my transmission goes out, all right, it won't be that big a deal.
• 1:04:07
  I might have to take a half a day off work to take my car to the shop and then
• 1:04:11
  catch a ride to work and back.
• 1:04:13
  And hopefully in a day or two, my transmission will be done.
• 1:04:16
  You know, so prepare for that. Mentally prepare for it.
• 1:04:20
  And then physically start preparing for it. If
• 1:04:23
  you're not preparing for what you think the worst of all possible scenarios is
• 1:04:26
  you're slipping a little bit and you and a
• 1:04:29
  minimum you should be preparing prepared for what most
• 1:04:32
  likely scenarios right what are some likely things to pop up in daily life how
• 1:04:37
  can i how can i be ready for that that way when shit like that happens folks
• 1:04:41
  you maintain your maintain your composure and if you maintain your calm and
• 1:04:47
  your composure composure then you can maintain some clarity.
• 1:04:51
  Yeah, some clarity. Then you can just solve the problem and drive on or put
• 1:04:58
  a band-aid on the problem at least and drive on. Yeah.
• 1:05:02
  So how does stoicism benefit our daily lives? Out of all those things I just
• 1:05:06
  talked about, I just said it.
• 1:05:09
  The key word here is clarity.
• 1:05:12
  Stoicism enhances our mental clarity and our emotional maturity and resilience,
• 1:05:19
  and it helps us become independent from external systems or external validation. It.
• 1:05:29
  Or dependent on external validation.
• 1:05:32
  And it does feel good when somebody validates you. It feels good.
• 1:05:36
  But it don't build a need for that validation.
• 1:05:40
  Stoicism promotes our intentional living, our purpose. We can intentionally drive for a purpose.
• 1:05:49
  And it very, very clearly aligns with libertarian values of individual freedom
• 1:05:53
  and responsibility, just like all the other things I've said so far.
• 1:05:58
  Stoicism encourages gratitude and contentment folks
• 1:06:01
  it encourages us to be thankful for what we
• 1:06:03
  have and the things we are have we
• 1:06:06
  be content with those things that like yeah yeah maybe we want better but systematically
• 1:06:12
  we can strive to get to do get to get those things but it kind of counters the
• 1:06:18
  consumerism pressure that we talked about or materialism yeah i want a cool motorcycle You know,
• 1:06:24
  I do. I had to sell my cool motorcycle.
• 1:06:28
  But look, I'm grateful to have the vehicle I got. I'm very grateful for it.
• 1:06:34
  I'm grateful that I got a 73 Ford sitting out in the driveway right now with a bad starter.
• 1:06:41
  I'm going to get it fixed. I just ain't there yet.
• 1:06:44
  And obviously, the alignment with libertarian perspective is that the stoicism,
• 1:06:49
  just like every other subject I've talked about so far, empowers individuals
• 1:06:54
  to live authentically without relying on external authority,
• 1:06:58
  without the need for societal validation or approval.
• 1:07:04
  And it truly, truly, truly embraces individual independence.
• 1:07:10
  You can enjoy all those other things, folks, but it's important that you don't
• 1:07:16
  need those other things.
• 1:07:18
  All right. I want to say in closing, but I always say that and then carry on for another half hour.
• 1:07:25
  So Stoicism through Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and Seneca, it is clearly timeless philosophy.
• 1:07:35
  Been around since, I don't know, I don't remember the time of Epictetus.
• 1:07:39
  I want to say 300 and something BC, or sorry, 500 and something BC, maybe. Yeah.
• 1:07:47
  It's a timeless philosophy that has given us the tools, even back then,
• 1:07:53
  to navigate societal challenges, but even specifically modern American challenges.
• 1:08:00
  Those tools are still good tools to navigate modern American challenges.
• 1:08:06
  All the political divisiveness, the business pressures, work pressures,
• 1:08:13
  and all the personal struggles that we go through.
• 1:08:17
  Because Stoicism emphasizes our self-control, our virtue and integrity,
• 1:08:24
  and our resilience, our toughness, our ability to fight through.
• 1:08:31
  And then the libertarian alignment with that, I'm always going to do a libertarian spin.
• 1:08:37
  Stoicism focuses on individual agency and rational choice.
• 1:08:43
  And that's exactly libertarian aligned. and encourages self-reliance and it
• 1:08:50
  encourages absolute resistance to coercive systems,
• 1:08:54
  absolute resistance to coercive systems i'm not saying violent resistance people
• 1:09:00
  there is a time and place for that but this ain't the time and place,
• 1:09:04
  now i want you guys to notice that i haven't mentioned christianity until now
• 1:09:08
  so i'm going to ask the question do the stoic principles and libertarian principles
• 1:09:14
  align with the foundational principles and behaviors that are found in Christianity.
• 1:09:21
  What do you think? You know my answer, right? Yeah, they do.
• 1:09:26
  Of course they do. Absolutely they do.
• 1:09:29
  Because Christianity promotes all of these things. Okay.
• 1:09:34
  The only nuanced difference is, yes, self-control, virtue, resilience,
• 1:09:42
  resistance to coercive systems.
• 1:09:45
  But as opposed to self-reliance, Christianity, first and foremost,
• 1:09:51
  encourages reliance on God and on the words of Jesus.
• 1:09:55
  And then self-reliance.
• 1:09:58
  They are very compatible. So I kept talking about application of stoic philosophy.
• 1:10:04
  What are some actionable things we can do?
• 1:10:11
  Well, daily reflection. If you're not a praying person, then a daily reflection.
• 1:10:19
  Spend five minutes in the morning, whether you pray or whether you journal or whether you meditate,
• 1:10:26
  whatever it is to get yourself right with the day, to get yourself in the right
• 1:10:32
  mindset, to control your actions throughout that day.
• 1:10:37
  And that's in line with Epictetus's control what you can.
• 1:10:42
  Don't worry about what you can't. So if you spend five minutes,
• 1:10:47
  10 minutes, however, however long getting yourself right,
• 1:10:51
  getting your mindset, whether it's just sitting at the table with a cup of coffee
• 1:10:56
  and complete silence before you click the news on. Yeah, whatever it is.
• 1:11:02
  I think that's an actionable thing. That's a thing you can take with you.
• 1:11:06
  After you listen to this, you can go, you know what?
• 1:11:07
  I can spend five minutes with myself in the morning. Yeah.
• 1:11:14
  Do a virtue check every time before making a decision, before actioning a decision.
• 1:11:20
  Hell, before speaking words in a conversation, do a virtue check.
• 1:11:25
  Is it just? Is what I'm about to say or do just? Is what I'm about to say or do true?
• 1:11:32
  That's from Marcus Aurelius. Do a virtue check on yourself.
• 1:11:36
  Is what I'm about to say or do just and true?
• 1:11:40
  If it's not, guess what, folks? don't do it don't say it if it is drive on knowing
• 1:11:47
  that you you have put thought into a thing and it's a very minimum it might
• 1:11:53
  be the shittiest idea on the planet but if it's true and just.
• 1:11:57
  And it doesn't violate anyone else then you're good to go what else make contingency plans,
• 1:12:07
  even on a small scale this doesn't doesn't
• 1:12:10
  mean like if a tornado hits my house yeah you
• 1:12:13
  need a contingency plan for that for sure that's why
• 1:12:16
  people have home insurance and things like that and dudes have generators and
• 1:12:20
  and all this those are obvious things make contingency plans for little things
• 1:12:26
  for projects at work visualize the setbacks that could happen look look at all
• 1:12:32
  the potential contingencies.
• 1:12:34
  If this happens, I'm going to do this. If that happens, I'm going to do this
• 1:12:37
  and make a rational plan.
• 1:12:39
  I don't care how minimal it seems.
• 1:12:42
  Make a rational plan and then think it over in your head.
• 1:12:46
  Visualize it. All right, if this happens, if this bad thing happens,
• 1:12:50
  here's what it might look like. And then here's the actions I might take.
• 1:12:54
  All right, let's move. You.
• 1:12:58
  Plans for everything, no matter how small. Don't dwell in them.
• 1:13:02
  Don't become obsessed. Just do a quick thought, just like I just did.
• 1:13:06
  So far, where are we at? We did daily reflection, right? We did virtue check, contingency plan.
• 1:13:13
  And then finally, make an effort, a deliberate effort to engage with anyone
• 1:13:21
  or everyone rationally,
• 1:13:24
  whether it's politics or business or just daily life. Pause.
• 1:13:30
  Use what we used to call tactical patience.
• 1:13:34
  Take a breath, especially if it's in a heated debate or argument.
• 1:13:39
  Just pause, take a breath, assess your emotions.
• 1:13:42
  Think about a dispassionate reason to answer and then deliver that shit dispassionately.
• 1:13:50
  You will keep the upper hand if you can do that. Good people,
• 1:13:53
  I've lost the upper hand many a time for being angry.
• 1:13:58
  Even if I was absolutely right, technically speaking, I've lost the upper hand many times out of anger.
• 1:14:06
  Engage with everyone and everything rationally, even if it's a political opponent
• 1:14:11
  or even if it's a business competitor.
• 1:14:15
  Hell, even with competitors, you should be friendly. And you should be friends even.
• 1:14:22
  Hell, share business tricks and tips.
• 1:14:28
  You're going to be better for it. Everybody will be better for it.
• 1:14:32
  So engage rationally, folks. Use tactical patience when you're dealing with
• 1:14:36
  folks because I have not done that in my life.
• 1:14:40
  All right, good people. That's what I had for you. We talked about Epictetus.
• 1:14:44
  We talked about Marcus Aurelius.
• 1:14:47
  We And how to apply their philosophies in politics and business and daily life.
• 1:14:55
  And then we talked about the sort of libertarian parallels with Stoicism.
• 1:15:01
  And then even I felt compelled to put a blurb in there. Even the parallels with Christianity.
• 1:15:07
  And then I gave you four practical things that you can apply to daily life.
• 1:15:14
  To be more like the Stoics. Yep.
• 1:15:19
  Do a daily reflection, do a virtue check on everything you're about to do or say,
• 1:15:25
  create a contingency plan for everything you're going to do physically,
• 1:15:29
  and then engage with people, all people, rationally.
• 1:15:35
  And now you can show a little passion here and there. Yeah, for sure.
• 1:15:39
  But when you're explaining your position, deliver it even keeled,
• 1:15:45
  smooth, cool, calm, and collected.
• 1:15:48
  All right, folks, as always, I want you to please share your thoughts with me
• 1:15:53
  specifically on these stoic principles.
• 1:15:55
  I know it's kind of a, I don't know, you see a lot of stoic quotes,
• 1:16:00
  you know, go across the internet, but how many people actually take time to get into those?
• 1:16:05
  I don't know, but share your thoughts with me on these stoic principles and
• 1:16:09
  these things that I talked about, these actionable takeaways I gave you.
• 1:16:14
  Will you, do you think you could or should apply these? Do you apply these things
• 1:16:18
  already? Are these things you know?
• 1:16:21
  And give me your feedback, folks. Genuinely want to hear what you think,
• 1:16:26
  and I genuinely want to hear your ideas on topics and things like that.
• 1:16:32
  Go on whatever your favorite platform is and subscribe or share with your friends
• 1:16:36
  and tell them to subscribe to the podcast and go on the website and all that.
• 1:16:42
  And we got a lot of shooting stuff coming up with OSS folks.
• 1:16:46
  OspreyshootingSolutions.com. We've got a lot of shooting stuff.
• 1:16:50
  The OSS challenge Mogadishu mile is next Saturday, October 4th.
• 1:16:56
  Start time, 10 a.m.
• 1:17:00
  We've got a few people signed up, but not that many. I expect by the end of
• 1:17:03
  the week, we'll probably have 20 folks signed up. That's what I'm shooting for.
• 1:17:08
  So please do that. Go on to teamguys.com. We've got two land navigation courses coming up.
• 1:17:14
  We have a two-day land nav course in November.
• 1:17:18
  And that one is one day in the classroom and one day in the Black's Bluff Preserve.
• 1:17:23
  It's not an overnighter.
• 1:17:24
  And then in December, we have a three-day land nav course.
• 1:17:27
  That's one day in the classroom and then two days in the Talladega National
• 1:17:31
  Forest. And that one is an overnighter.
• 1:17:34
  And then please check out thejuntopodcast.com, not just for the podcast, but also for the blogs.
• 1:17:43
  And again, don't forget, folks, you can write a paper and send it to me.
• 1:17:48
  And I will maintain the integrity of it. I won't change any of the content at all.
• 1:17:55
  And if it's not too inflammatory, I'll go ahead and post that up.
• 1:18:00
  And other than that, folks, I appreciate you all for listening.
• 1:18:03
  Thanks for sticking with me.
• 1:18:05
  We have probably about 7,000 listeners or so right now, and I'm grateful for that, very.
• 1:18:11
  I don't know if that's good or bad or otherwise, but I appreciate you listening.
• 1:18:15
  So while you're out there, folks, stay rational. Be rational.
• 1:18:19
  Stay free, as free as you can. Be free.
• 1:18:24
  Treat each other with respect and have some good manners in your daily interactions
• 1:18:28
  with good people. all right i love you guys.
• 1:18:35
  Music.