Three marble busts of ancient philosophers, Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, and Seneca, are displayed side by side, with bold text overlay: "What Stoicism Teaches About Legendary Living." The scene has a classical, dramatic lighting style.

Book Review

110| How Stoic Principles Can Transform Your Path to Becoming Legendary

By The Social Chameleon Show

May 30, 2025

How Stoic Principles Can

What Stoicism Teaches About Legendary Living and Lasting Resilience

In this episode, I dive deep into the transformative world of Stoicism. Instead of focusing on a single book, I’ll take you on an engaging journey through the foundations of Stoicism, sharing its timeless wisdom and how its principles have shaped not only my life, the cornerstone of this podcast, but also everything I do in business and life.

You’ll learn about the origins of Stoicism, how a shipwrecked merchant named Zeno sparked a movement that has influenced figures from emperors to everyday people. I break down the philosophy’s key thinkers like Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus, and highlight why their approach to virtue, self-mastery, and resilience can help anyone navigate today’s challenges with clarity and purpose.

This episode isn’t just a history lesson; it’s packed with practical Stoic exercises and actionable insights for mastering your mind, managing emotions, and living a life of intention. I also share a range of modern resources, book recommendations, and even personal anecdotes about how Stoicism’s principles have helped him embrace adversity, build discipline, and focus on what truly matters.

Whether you’re new to Stoicism or looking to deepen your understanding, this episode is your invitation to learn, grow, and transform. Stick around for a thoughtful discussion that just might change the way you approach life’s obstacles-and help you step closer to Becoming Legendary.

Enjoy the episode!

Episode Highlights:

Action Steps-Your Weekly Challenge: Pick ONE Stoic principle and spend the week embodying it. Whether it’s focusing on what’s in your control, acting with courage, or practicing moderation, lean into the philosophy and watch how your perspective shifts.

Book List & Resources: Tyson shares his favorite beginner books, carefully selected for their accessibility and depth. Find the full reading list and recommendations below.

Final Reflection: What does becoming legendary mean to you? For Tyson, it’s about owning every choice and living a life designed by intention, not default. It’s about mastering yourself rather than seeking validation, and choosing purpose over comfort.

In a world obsessed with control, it’s easy to get caught up in stressing over things we can’t change-traffic jams, what others think, or that surprise curveball life throws you. The truth? Real peace comes from letting go of what’s outside our control and focusing on who we are and how we respond.

Meet The “Big Three” Roman Stoics

These individuals came from vastly different walks of life, facing immense challenges, yet they all found wisdom in Stoicism, illustrating its broad applicability.

Weekly Challenge Trophy Weekly Challenge

Pick one of these Stoic principles and spend the week embodying the philosophy. Reorient yourself and your mind. Don’t play a victim. Don’t blame things that are out of your control. Master one principle and start on the next. A Legendary life awaits you, the path is seeking you, now step on it and live with intention.

Episode Transcriptions

Show notes and transcripts powered with the help of Castmagic. Episode Transcriptions Unedited, Auto-Generated.

Tyson Gaylord [00:00:05]:Welcome to the Social Chameleon Show where our mission is to help you learn, grow, and transform on your path to becoming legendary. Today, I wanna talk about stoicism, timeless wisdom for modern life. This is a little different of a of a book review episode. I wanna kinda go over, I’ve been kind of trying to figure out a way to do a stoicism episode, and I thought what a great way to do my normal book review episodes but on stoicism. So this is gonna be a bit of overarching thing and then I’m gonna recommend books to read. So it’s not not gonna go over one book in particular. I’m gonna go over the overarching theme of stoicism. And then at the end here, I’m gonna give you guys a bunch of books and resources and things to kinda dive into this topic.

Tyson Gaylord [00:00:50]:I think, you know, the the mission and the basis of the show is built on these stoicism principles. I base my life on these principles. I think this is one of the most monumental things in my life that I learned. It brought together a lot of different things, and I I wanna introduce this to you guys that don’t know and some of you guys that do know. Maybe we can, you know, learn a little bit more, find some references, get in the comments if you’re into this, if you if you’re just starting to dabble or you’ve been in for a while, you know, bring the conversation along, introduce people to your favorite, you know, maybe books or references. I mean, there’s been a definite resurgence in stoicism, maybe over the past, let’s say, maybe ten years or so, give or take. So I know a lot of you probably are into different groups and communities. I doing research for this episode, I found a lot of different things I wasn’t familiar with.

Tyson Gaylord [00:01:45]:So without further ado, let’s kinda go into this here. I’m gonna go through a whole bunch of different things, kinda talk around stoicism, talk about it. And then like I said at the end here, we’ll get into both recommendations. Introduction here. Stoicism is an ancient philosophy. It’s around 2,300 years old from a Greek philosophy. Its core premise is simply is simple yet powerful. By focusing solely on what we can control and living with virtue, we can achieve inner peace and resilience no matter what life throws our way.

Tyson Gaylord [00:02:18]:And that, I think, is the is the power and the core of this thing here is understanding all these things. I’m sure you guys have been around for a while. If you’re not new to the channel, new to the podcast, I talk a lot about these things. I talk a lot about this stuff. I’ve got tons of things. If you on video here behind me, this is Marcus Aurelius’ quote. Stop wasting time arguing about being a waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.

Tyson Gaylord [00:02:46]:I have a Epictetus poster over here. He was definitely my favorite. Coincidentally, as I started learning about this, I found a lot of stoic people kind of around my house. I didn’t know that. I’ve got a bunch of coins here on my desk that goes through all the different things from Ryan Holiday. He did a great job making all these different coins. There’s just so much great core principles here that are really when I come to find out here, there’s a lot of basis in in psychology, modern day things, a lot of different thought leaders and stuff like that. A lot of these guys are gonna come from these points.

Tyson Gaylord [00:03:23]:This this concept of understanding what we can and can’t control and living with virtue, This is what I love about it, and this is how I’ve kinda started to base I base my life around this for the years now. What we can expect here to learn today, I’m gonna introduce sources and origins, key figures, or major thinkers like Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, and Seneca to modern advocates like Ryan Holiday and Massimo Pigliucci. Excuse me. I’ll break down stoicism’s core principles. It’s focused on logic, virtue, and understanding one’s mind, and share practical stoic exercises you can try each day. Stoicism isn’t about suppressing emotions, which is a common thing, people think, or being apathetic. By the end, you’ll see how this philosophy’s combination of rational and compassion offers timeless guidance for handling adversity, managing emotions, and pursuing what really matters. And I think this is why this has stood the test of time because it is just so kind of intuitive.

Tyson Gaylord [00:04:26]:I don’t like the word common sense, but I think we all kinda can grasp the meaning of that. I I there’s no such thing as common sense. What’s common to you isn’t common to somebody else. But if we can just maybe use that word for now, I think this is why this has stuck around for well over two thousand years, and it constantly comes up and comes up. The sad thing I think though is, like, it tends to seem as us as humans is we have a hard time learning from history and learning from the past. If we would have embodied these principles two thousand years ago, I think the world would be a very much different place today. Because as you can as you’re gonna come to find out and you’re gonna understand, like, there’s a lot of stuff could be written in modern day things, and I think this is why, some modern people in this space like Ryan Holiday and the one that have had a flourishing career because these things are timeless and they hold it to the test of time. What we we need to do here is I think what I’d like to hopefully get across to you is if we can take these things and learn from the history, learn from these guys, we can really have a, you know, step change forward and not regressing so much back to old different old and different things.

Tyson Gaylord [00:05:36]:So here, section one here, part one, origins and key figures of stoicism, founded on a porch in Athens. Stoicism began around 300 BCE with Zeno of Sieteum. Sorry. I might mispronounce things. I just however I know how to say them. We started teaching philosophy in Athens at the store, Oiki, which means painted porch, which is how the school got its name. And the origin is, if English legend says, Xenon was a merchant who survived the shipwreck then discovered philosophy by accident in a bookstore store. He later joked that he made a precarious voyage losing all his wealth because the disaster led him to wisdom.

Tyson Gaylord [00:06:21]:From the start, stoicism was about using reasoning reason to guide life, not just abstract thought. Zeno established that stoic philosophy would would have three, areas of study, logic, physics, and ethics. I think this is what makes this, so appealing to people is the fact that it’s not philosophical. It’s not the trolley problem. It’s not these esoteric things. It’s not these abstract one off things that don’t really have a a basis in life or, really a good framework, whatever, like, a lot of philosophy seems to do sometimes. Is this all about, you know, practical things that help bring your life along, help guide you, like they’re saying with virtue. Right? This is kind of the major thing.

Tyson Gaylord [00:07:12]:Logic, the way they talk about the logos, you know, this is how they talk about these things. And and a lot of modern psychologists is based off of these principles, which is very, very interesting. It’s just so funny how, you know, this guy shipwrecked loses all his fortune and then starts this, you know, basically worldwide phenomenon in a way, right, of stoicism. So we have here from slaves to emperors. Stoicism later first flourished in ancient Rome, proving its appeal to people from all walks of life. The Roman state statesman, Seneca, used stoicism while advising Emperor Nero, which I I believe he from my understanding, he was kind of a not a good emperor. He was a kind of a horrible person, and, Seneca tried his best to use stoicism to help kinda lessen the burden, lessen the impact of his craziness. It kinda if you’re familiar with Jocko, he kinda talks about this is what it reminds me of.

Tyson Gaylord [00:08:08]:When Jocko’s like, you know, you you gotta be in there. You gotta influence the game. You can’t, you know, try and talk crap from the outside or whatever. You gotta be in there, and and you gotta influence from the inside, and you gotta slowly kinda work these things in there. I think this feels like this is what Seneca was trying to do. And Epictetus was a former slave, turned revered stoic teacher. And I believe that’s not even his name. I believe, from my understanding, Epictetus actually means slave.

Tyson Gaylord [00:08:34]:So I don’t know what his real name is, but this is what he’s who he’s referred to. And I think he’s one of the more famous ones. This was, Emperor Marcus Aurelius’s from my understanding, his favorite stoic philosopher was Epictetus. And then we have, probably the most famous person, and this is was Marcus Aurelius, practiced stoicism in the bodily while ruling the Roman emperor. Each of these figures left behind writings that illustrate stoicism, Seneca’s letters and essays, Epictetus’s discourses and handbook, and Marcus Aurelius’s private meditations, a diary of historic reflections. These works remarkably were not textbooks, but personal exercise in philosophy showing stoicism was meant to be lived. Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, for example, was never intended for publication. It was his way to remind himself to be patient, virtuous, and mentally strong each day.

Tyson Gaylord [00:09:26]:Such Stoics writings are still widely read because they speak to perennial human struggles, how to face fear, anger, success, and failure with clarity and compassion. Now that’s the thing that I kinda thought was just the most amazing part about Stoicism. When you hear about Marcus Aurelius, the emperor, at the time, he was the most powerful person on the planet. He could just do anything or whatever. And his meditations was his was his journal. His as he if you if you do read it or you you hear about it or whatever, it’s him reflecting on his dates, him going through these things. And, a lot of this a lot of stuff he he seems quote Epictetus the most, and that seems where he draws a lot of his things from. So that’s the fun thing about this is you’re just taking a peek into these people’s things.

Tyson Gaylord [00:10:09]:They were just they they were just telling people, you know, giving people ideas and giving philosophies and stuff, especially Marcus Aurelius. He’s just talking to himself. And from that, we can glean how he was thinking about things and how he was trying to live and how he was trying to be. There’s tons of fun, you know, different stories about about all that. And then we have here what common you know, what I like to refer to as the big three, Rhomoses, Epictetus, the former slave. His main focus was on what is within within our control. And then Seneca, he was a playwright, statesman, and adviser to Nero. He he mostly wrote on ethics, anger, grief, and the good life.

Tyson Gaylord [00:10:47]:I feel like Seneca’s a little bit, maybe a little bit on the darker side, maybe a little bit maybe more pessimistic or whatever. And definitely people gravitate to him because of kind of that style. And then, of course, we have Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor, maybe considered the philosopher king, his reflections on meditations, duty, resilience, and cosmic perspective. And then I think, maybe one of the more overlooked ones I really have found to be really good was Masonius Rufus. I really liked his book. It has, like, a maybe Epictetus vibe, maybe which is why, like, Epictetus is my favorite. I wonder if I knew about Epictetus when my son was born, if I would have named him that. But I just I I really I really enjoy him.

Tyson Gaylord [00:11:34]:He is he is definitely my favorite, and I can see why Marcus Aurelius also seems like he was his favorite as well even though they never met, but he read, Epictetus’s work. And then Epictetus, he didn’t write anything down. I’m not sure if he knew how to write or not. So all the he just taught classes, basically. And so all the writings and things of Epictetus is from I believe it’s just one of his students or several students. It’s their notes on what he wrote down. So that’s the only surviving work of him versus Seneca and Marcus Aurelius. The writings we have are their actual writings, their actual work.

Tyson Gaylord [00:12:11]:And so as like I said, we talked about, you know, earlier here, these individuals came from a very vast and different walks of life facing immense challenges, yet they all found wisdom and stoicism, illustrating its broad applicability. Like I said, this is the fun thing about this, and I think I’m probably gonna read this 10,000 times. This is what makes this so appealing. Is it you can come at it from so many angles, so many different people from so many walks of lives. Part two here, the core principles of stoic philosophy. Bear in mind that the measure of a man is the worth is the worth of the things he cares about. Marcus Aurelius, Meditations. Let me say that again.

Tyson Gaylord [00:12:55]:Bear in mind that the measure of a man is the worth of the things he cares about. Right? Reflecting this reflecting the stoic focus on values. The first thing here, we have virtue is the greatest good. Living with excellence at the heart of stoicism is the conviction that living virtuously is the only true requirement for a good life. Think about how we we think about that nowadays. Right? Possessions, different things like that. We’re gonna get kinda get into that a little bit when you think what a good life really is. And sometimes it’s hard.

Tyson Gaylord [00:13:28]:I you know, I’ve talked about this, and I know people talked about this. And I also remember back when I was younger, I didn’t understand this where you we we think that money and possessions and things are gonna solve our problems or make our like this. And it’s hard to understand that it’s not the case unless you’ve kinda gone through it. Right? That’s the thing saying, you know, I’ve been, you know, I grew up middle class or so. And I thought that too, you’re getting younger. It’s about collecting things. It’s about grabbing the, you know, the the Jordans, the grabbing the fit, the grabbing the the Rolex in the cars, getting the house. Right.

Tyson Gaylord [00:14:03]:Having the money, making a certain amount of money. And the funny thing is, unless you do that, you don’t realize how unimportant it really is, how much it really doesn’t change your life. If anything, you just get different problems. I really all that has there’s always struggle. There’s always problems. Right? There’s always things. It’s just different. So, unfortunately, I think it’s just one of the things most people have to go through in order to understand that it’s kind of unimportant.

Tyson Gaylord [00:14:26]:But maybe through this, we don’t have to do that. We can, kinda skip that step and understand that these things actually don’t matter, and we’ll kinda talk more about that. The stoics thought that external success or failures, wealth, health, fame, etcetera, aren’t what makes us genuinely happy or fulfilled. Only our character can. And then we have the four stored virtues. We have wisdom, practical judgment, the ability to navigate life rationally and to know what is and isn’t good. As Cicero put it, the man who has virtue is in need of nothing whatever for the purpose of living well. Wisdom helps us choose our actions and attitudes well, disguising what truly matters.

Tyson Gaylord [00:15:17]:Wisdom helps us choose our actions and attitudes well, disguising what truly matters. This is where our stuff gets very interesting, very thought provoking. And we have courage, not just physical bravery, but mental resilience. And that’s key here, right? This is courage is thrown a lot around, and it’s I feel like it’s lost its meaning. I mean, we need to go back to what’s truly there, right? It’s not just physical bravery, but mental resilience. Facing fear, pain, and adversity with strength. Estelle tries to transform obstacles into opportunities for growth. The impediment to action advances action.

Tyson Gaylord [00:15:55]:What stands in the way becomes the way, wrote Marcus Aurelius. Ryan Holiday is kinda sort of set up to a little bit saying here, he he’s got a great coin with this here. And for those who could see, the obstacle is the way. Right? And there’s some other things, like, you know, in in, you know, in I think there’s these things kinda come up in, other different, philosophies and religion. Right? You know, all things and through the way or something along those lines. Right? But that’s the thing. Right? The impediment to action advances action. Your obstacle is the reason you’re moving forward.

Tyson Gaylord [00:16:32]:That’s the advanced action. When when you come up against something, right, this is what gets you thinking, gets your gets your brain moving. Right? That advances the action. What stands in the way becomes the way. Right? What struggles are what are you struggling? What are are we doing? What are we scared of? What are whatever the things a lot of times, these are just stories in our heads. These are beliefs, whether you made them yourself or unintentionally or intentionally someone that loved you or cared about you or thought they were doing the right thing. Put these in our in our head. Right? What stands in a way becomes the way.

Tyson Gaylord [00:17:03]:Right? How can we get through this? How can we push through? How can we jump in the ice bath? How can we jump in the sauna? How can we eat better? How can we exercise? Right? These are things that stand in the way. But if you understand, the impediment to action advances the action. These things do not become your obstacles. Right? They become the the pull and the gravity and and maybe the motivation of the discipline to move forward. And we have justice, Doing the right thing by others, being fair, benevolent, and honest. Stoic saw all humans as equal citizens of a common world deserving of respect. Marcus Aurelius himself worked for the common good even when others were difficult. I believe Seneca talks about this.

Tyson Gaylord [00:17:52]:You know, when there’s a human being, isn’t this is an opportunity for good. You know, these are the things, I think this this is a powerful message nowadays. Right? And it’s not just justice maybe in in necessarily the the legal or technical term of how we maybe think about this as, you know, justice for something. Right? Well, what’s how can we do right by other human beings? Right? How can we do right by other things? How can we be the change we wanna see? How can we be the example? How can we be the leader? How can we, you know, be the example? Right? How can we stop arguing what a good man should be and just be one? Show everybody. Show them the way. And have temperance, self control, moderation, and self mastery. The discipline to control impulses and appetites. This means enjoying life’s pleasures in balance and not being ruled by cravings or fear.

Tyson Gaylord [00:18:51]:If you seek tranquility, do less. Do only what matters essentially, Marcus advised, linking simplicity to peace. I’ve been I’ve been kinda mulling around with this a little bit. There’s moderation. I think I’m gonna do an episode on this later on. This is what I’ve kinda come come come around to. It seems like there’s two different kinds of people. There’s those that can exercise in what the classical maybe thought and definition around moderation is, where you just have a couple of things here and there.

Tyson Gaylord [00:19:20]:You you have, you know, a a drink once in a while. You have, a piece of cake once in a while. You know? You you do these pleasurable things seldomly. And then there’s people like me where I can’t well, I just wanna say I can’t. I’m not good or I haven’t learned, too moderate myself. If I got a pack of Oreos and whatever I never eat any Oreos, but I got I got a pack of, Reese’s peanut butter cups. I just can’t eat one of those. I’m gonna eat the whole thing.

Tyson Gaylord [00:19:50]:So my philosophy or my way of of implying implementing disciplines on myself is I don’t buy those things. I don’t do those things. I’m not the kind of person that can go out and just have a drink, whatever. I wanna have a good time. I’m a have a lot. So the way I practice moderation is I don’t do these things at all because, I guess I just must have not maybe I have an identity personality or something like that or whatever. I don’t I don’t like leaning on those types of reasons or excuses. I just probably need to work on more of the the discipline side of things.

Tyson Gaylord [00:20:22]:But to me, my discipline for that is I’m just not gonna I’m just gonna stay altogether, and that works great for me. And it seems like from the research and the different things that people have talked to and and the things as I think through these this thing about moderation, it seems like there’s two types of people. Those that can, you you know, adhere to moderation, the classical thing with way we think about it, and the other extreme of moderation is abstain. And that’s how that’s the camp. I I think I I like to fall I fall into, and I just it’s easier for me. My sister, she’s really good at it. She can have a box of chocolates, and she’ll have one, and she’ll put it away, whatever. I’ll eat the whole box.

Tyson Gaylord [00:20:57]:I’m a fatty. But that’s how I I think about things. And this is what when we’re introduced to these ideas, we’ve got to see what how am I? You know? How am I now? What are my goals? What are my intentions? And then how do I set up my environment? How do I set up my life? How do I make discipline automatic? How do I make these things better? You know, how do I do these things? Right? And that’s where you figure these things out. When you have when you get you introduce these ideas and you internalize them and you start to design your life the way you want it, this is when you you understand yourself, what you need to do, how you need to motivate yourself, how to you need to set up yourself for moderation, how you need to set up yourself for discipline, how you need to set yourself up for all these different areas of life. Why virtue? For stoics, cultivating these virtues is both necessary and sufficient for happiness. Interesting. Right? Cultivating these virtues is both necessary and sufficient for happiness. External outcomes aren’t entirely up to us, but our intentions and actions are.

Tyson Gaylord [00:22:09]:External outcomes aren’t up to us. We’re looking for external validation. We’re looking for praise. We’re looking for attaboy. We’re looking for a good job. Those aren’t up to us. Right? But our intern our intentions and actions are. This is what I love about stoicism.

Tyson Gaylord [00:22:30]:Right? Accountability. Understanding where where you are in this in this cycle, where where you, you know, where you sit in the world, where you sit in things. External outcomes aren’t up to us, but our intentions and actions are. By making by making those as noble as possible, we live with integrity and inner freedom. Even if fortune turns against us, a virtuous person person can maintain dignity and calm. This idea this idea was radical. It meant that a poor sick individual could still lead a flourishing life by fulfilling excuse me. Still lead a flourishing life of fulfillment by executing in virtue.

Tyson Gaylord [00:23:27]:Epictetus boldly said, no one can truly harm you by hurting your body or possessions. Only you can harm yourself by acting against virtue. Socialism’s first left lesson is ethical. Focus on becoming a purse a good person, and happiness will follow because happiness is internal. Is it it it is you. It’s within your control. I believe there’s another thing. I’m not sure if it’s Epictetus or Seneca or somebody said something along the lines of, you know, you can never imprison me.

Tyson Gaylord [00:24:05]:You may you may imprison my body. You you may you may shackle me and consume, but you never you can never, you know, take my mind. You can never imprison my mind. Right? This is what this is what we’re talking about here. You can you can be sick. You can have these things happen to you. You can be born with these different things. But if you don’t allow yourself to fall into these traps, fall into this victim status, this victim mentality, and understand no one can truly harm you by hurting your body or possessions.

Tyson Gaylord [00:24:39]:Only you can harm yourself by acting against virtue. Right? Nobody can do anything to you. It’s your interpretation of what happened or what is said. A lot of times, like we’re saying, this is because of your belief system. Right? So this is when you have to understand happiness and all these things are internal. Right? Things on the outside can contribute to these things. You can set yourself up to do these things. But Like we said in the beginning here, right, cultivating these virtues is both necessary and sufficient for happiness.

Tyson Gaylord [00:25:17]:K? And then number two here, the dichotomy of control. And this is probably my favorite part of stoicism, what we can versus what we can’t control. Perhaps the most famous stoic teaching and the foundation of their philosophy is to distinguish between what is up to us and what is not. I think kind of a common way we talk about this now is it is what it is, Even though that can be that can feel a little bit dismissive, that is kind of the core of this. And we’ll we’ll get into some more of these things around this topic a little bit later on here. Epictetus in his handbook, and secure purity on. I’m not hard to say that. I will link to this book.

Tyson Gaylord [00:25:59]:It’s really good. With this stark reminder, some things are in our control, others are not. He lists. Things in our control are opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion, in short, whatever are are our own actions. Things not in our control include body, property, reputation, command, and, in a word, whatever are not our own actions. That’s funny. Right? He says body. Right? A lot of times we think, you know, our body is in our control.

Tyson Gaylord [00:26:32]:A lot of times it’s not. Right? It’s like we’re like I said earlier. Right? I could be imprisoned. Right or wrong doesn’t matter. I can be, kidnapped. I can be detained. Right? But if I understand that that is not in my control, I don’t necessarily have to worry about that thing. I have to worry about what is in my control to get me out of that or to to help me through this.

Tyson Gaylord [00:26:58]:Right? And we’ll talk about I’ll recommend this book again later on. But courage under fire, is, I think it was a navy pilot. He was shot down in I’m not sure if it’s Korea or Vietnam. It’s been a bit since I read the book. He had read Epictetus, and he he had a copy with him. And this is how he got through that, understanding they, they may have control over my body, but they will not take control over my mind. And it’s a great little short little read, maybe twenty, thirty minutes, definitely an hour. And he talks about how he got through that.

Tyson Gaylord [00:27:28]:And this is the pioneer’s principle he used from Epictetus. And then Stoic teaches that suffering often comes from misidentifying these. We get upset by external things we never truly controlled in the first place. Say that again. We get upset by external things we never truly controlled in the first place. Esto tries to consistently remind himself, is this within my power? If not, let me accept it calmly. If yes, let me do my best with it. This mindset called an economy of control is incredibly empowering.

Tyson Gaylord [00:28:09]:It doesn’t mean passively. Instead, it refocuses your energy on where you can make a difference, your own attitudes and actions, and helps you re release worry about the rest. I’m gonna I’ll link to this, my research document here. My, research assistant, Chad, also known as Chad GPT. The research, is it’ll go through all this in in a lot more detail, and I have footnotes and links to different things for you guys if you’re interested in digging down more into these things, finding the references and whatnot, I’ll link to this to this, document for you guys. And you can you can dig through this and really dig down into this. And then we have serenity and freedom. As Apatita said, if you stop demanding that uncontrolled events conform to your will and instead embrace whatever actually happens, nothing can ever truly disturb you.

Tyson Gaylord [00:29:09]:Instead of embrace instead, embrace whatever actually happens, nothing can ever truly disturb you. Imagine we internalize that. Right? And here’s a classic kind of example of this here. The the origin of the of the serenity prayer idea, grab me the serenity to accept the things I can’t control, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. This is the exact same concept, right? In Epictetus’ own words, he says, you will find fault with no one and reproach no one. You will have no enemies and no one will harm you, for you can’t be harmed. How powerful is that? You will have no enemies and no one will harm you, for you can’t be harmed. Do you imagine how much better your relationships and your life would be if no one could harm you, if you weren’t harmed by all the dumb shit on social media, if you weren’t harmed by the dumb shit on the news, if you weren’t harmed by the dumb shit in the world, if you weren’t harmed by the guy cutting you in line, you weren’t harmed by these things because they don’t matter to you because and not in a not in a, you know, passive or dismissive or or maybe even you might even think a weak way.

Tyson Gaylord [00:30:28]:No. It’s strength. It’s power. Understanding. Right? Embrace what ever actually happens. Nothing can truly disturb me. You will find fault with no one and and reproach no one. You have no enemies, and you will and no one will harm you, for you can’t be harmed.

Tyson Gaylord [00:30:48]:Imagine the strength that lies in that. It’s it’s like the epitome of sticks and stones. Right? Doesn’t matter what you say. It doesn’t matter what you do. And they also this reminds you of something else. The the story said talk about I can’t remember exactly what which one it is. But somebody’s talking shit about them, and they’re like, that’s what they said? Now they really don’t know me then. And they could’ve said a whole lot more stuff.

Tyson Gaylord [00:31:12]:Right? Could you just imagine that mindset? The comments don’t bother you. The shit talking don’t bother you. The idiots at work don’t bother you because you can’t be harmed. This is to me this is the power of those in all these these these principles. This sounds almost too ideal. Right? But even practical progress toward this attitude can bring tangible relief from stress. Modern cognitive psychology recognizes the stoic insight as well. It’s not events themselves that upset us, but how we interpret and react to them.

Tyson Gaylord [00:31:55]:How we interpret and react to them. By focusing on what we can control, we avoid wasting energy on futile rage and or anxiety, and we achieve a kind of invincibility of the mind. Would you like to have an invincibility of the mind? Do you disagree with that? You you may fitter my leg, but not even Zeus can bring can break my freedom of choice, as Iktita said. And he actually had a, his leg was all, you know, beat up or whatever it was from being shackled as a slave. From my understanding, not one time did he complain about that. Not one time did he use that as an excuse for anything. And all Epictetus did was classroom or teaching. So just imagine that.

Tyson Gaylord [00:32:58]:This guy is a slave, and he’s the first thing he wants to do is I’m gonna go out there and teach everybody. Even though I was a slave, they never could take my mind, never could do these things to me. Fertiges reflect on his past as an enslaved man. A stoic sees true freedom as a freedom to choose one’s attitude in any situation, a concept that has inspired everyone from prisoners of war to people battling personal adversity. And this is what I talked about. Right? Encourage them to fire. This is where his inspiration was from. From from his teachings.

Tyson Gaylord [00:33:35]:Three, stoic logic in the mind using reason to understand emotions. A philosophy of rational action. The stoics were psychologists ahead of their time. They believe that human emotions largely arise from our judgments, our thoughts, or impressions about events. They place huge emphasis on the training of the mind using logic, reason, and honest honest self reflection to examine whether our beliefs are true. Honest self reflection to examine whether our beliefs are true. Stoic logic is what we call today critical thinking, cognitive science, and even mindfulness. And this is at the top of the show.

Tyson Gaylord [00:34:23]:I start every time. We’re here to train your mind. We’re here to help you train your mind. This is where this comes from. This is where I got these ideas from. This is where I live this year. Our mission is to help you learn, grow, and transform on your path to being legendary. Right? Or this is where this come from comes from.

Tyson Gaylord [00:34:42]:Training your mind. This is the most important thing you can do. If you’re in the gym and you’re eating well and you’re doing things in work, but you’re not training your mind, you’re not delivering the full package. You can’t elevate yourself to that next level, to that what I would like to talk about is to that legendary status, to becoming legendary, whatever legendary means to you. That’s the piece we all need to do. This is the mental reps we need to be doing. We train our mind using logic, reason, and honest self reflection to examine what our beliefs whether our beliefs are true. They taught by examining our automatic impressions, we can catch distortions and avoid hasty irrational reactions.

Tyson Gaylord [00:35:30]:Daniel Kahneman talks about this concept in Thinking Fast and Slow. Right? System one, system two. System one is that quick reactionary things. Not a lot of thinking going on. It’s just, you know, habits, you know, but, you know, all the different kind of cliches. Right? When, you know, all all the experience we’ve had from from life. Right? All these different things where you just make quick quick split reactions, but we take a breath. We take a second to examine automatic impressions maybe and even change them.

Tyson Gaylord [00:35:58]:Right? We can catch distortions and avoid hasty irrational reactions. A stoic would advise pausing to ask, is this really terrible? Is my peace of mind worth giving up to this person’s words? Perhaps the insults say more about them than about me. This kind of kind of rational check can diffuse the surge of anger, taking that breath. What’s happening here? You know, that old kind of saying, you know, hurt people hurt people. Right? Are you letting a hurt person hurt you? And then these silly comments to maybe get attention or make themselves feel better bother you? As Mark Reyes wrote in his journal, your mind would take the shape of what you frequently hold in thought, or the human spirit is colored by such impressions. Another this reminds me of another stoic thing. You know, we if you’re walking down the road and somebody, you know, stole something off of you, so somebody took a hundred bucks from you or whatever it is, you would do everything you can. You would be furious.

Tyson Gaylord [00:37:09]:You’d go after them. You would get that get that money back, but you allow somebody to steal your mind. You allow others to color your thoughts. You allow people in without examination. You allow we all we all and we all do this without training. Right? Without training of the mind, we allow these things in. We allow us to fall victim to these things. We allow these things to distort our light.

Tyson Gaylord [00:37:30]:We allow us to get upset about this. We allow anger. You know? If you spend a lot of time in anger, in stress or, you know, the news seems to do this, and and it’s not just the mainstream news. It could it could be social media news. It could be podcast news or whatever. Right? If you’re constantly in a state of fear, this affects your sleep. And if it affects your sleep, it can lead to depression. Right? It can lead to this low level of of anxiety.

Tyson Gaylord [00:37:52]:It can lead to this low level of stress because you’re allowing others to color your thoughts. Because we’re not protecting our mind like we protect our wallets, like we protect protect our body. Because we need to train our minds. We have to do these things. We have to examine our automatic impressions. It’s not things, but our opinions about things. The stoic view of emotion is nicely captured by Epictetus’ famous statement. People are not disturbed by things, but the view they take of things.

Tyson Gaylord [00:38:23]:Right? In other words, an event like losing your your job or being stuck in traffic has no emotional value by itself. It’s our belief that makes it upsetting. We can change the belief or evaluation. We can change the feeling. How many times have we sat in traffic and just been mad at traffic? What does traffic do to you? It happens. Are you upset because you’re gonna be late, or why are you gonna be late? Because of you. You didn’t plan for the possibility. You didn’t maybe check the traffic.

Tyson Gaylord [00:38:58]:Whatever it is you need to do, would it be better for you to maybe, leave ten or fifteen minutes earlier? Maybe get where you gotta go ten or fifteen minutes early? You know? Or is it better to be like, you know what? I fucked up today, and I didn’t prepare for traffic. I didn’t prepare for a flat tire. I didn’t prepare for these these different things that happened to us. Therefore, I shouldn’t get mad over it. It’s my fault. And either I’ll just continue it being my fault and I’ll just do nothing about it, or I’ll train my mind, train my body, and I’ll discipline myself to put into place contingencies to be better and take responsibility for my actions and not get mad at a line in the store or traffic or a guy cutting you off. Right? This insight is extremely modern as well. It’s the cornerstone of cognitive behavioral therapy, CBT.

Tyson Gaylord [00:40:07]:Doctor Albert Ellis, a pioneer of CBT, openly credited stoicism and Epictetus in particular for this idea. The stoics two thousand years ago, effectively observed the link between thoughts and emotions, and they developed techniques to manage destructive feelings by just putting false beliefs. They didn’t say suppressing your feelings in common misconception of asthoticism, rather, they said emotions follow our judgments, so we must train ourselves to judge wisely. Right? I I, I was just listening to a podcast that just happened to Sam Harris on he had on, shoot, one of these modern stoic writers, and he was he was kinda he was talking about about this, about, you know, the CBT and and these things. I kinda forgot what I was thinking about that. I’ll move on. Marcus Aurelius would remind himself that the wrongdoer does not realize what he’s doing. All men are brothers, so forgive them.

Tyson Gaylord [00:41:17]:Right? You can even be all people. Right, are humans, so forgive them. They know not what they do. Now a lot of times, like we’re saying, right, if you’re not training your mind, these are automatic things. These are our habits. These are our beliefs. These are things that just happen. System one.

Tyson Gaylord [00:41:35]:It’s just automatic. You’re not even thinking you don’t even realize you’re doing it. Right? Train your mind. Just forget them. That cut you off? Hey, buddy. Go right ahead. I want to jump in front of your line at the store? Yeah. Go right ahead, Matt.

Tyson Gaylord [00:41:48]:It’s not a big deal. You know? Fear and anxiety, similarly, can be tempered by examining them rationally. Is this in my control? How likely is the worst case scenario? Could I survive it? We suffer more in imagination than in reality, noted Seneca, pointing out that our anxious fantasies usually exaggerate how badly things will be. The Stoats practiced calming their imagination and focusing on facts. I I’ve said this before, and I’ll link to it in this episode as well. Tim Ferriss has got a great little worksheet on fear setting. What are you afraid of? Right? And I know we’ll get to it a little later on here. There’s a stoic exercise for this.

Tyson Gaylord [00:42:32]:What are you afraid of? Let’s let’s go through all the worst case scenarios. Let’s do it. Your brain wants it. Our brains are tuned for finding out dangers, surviving on a savanna. Right? Don’t fall off a cliff. Water’s that way. The cliff’s that way. The edge is over here.

Tyson Gaylord [00:42:50]:You know, all these things. Right? The bad tribe is that way. Like, this is what our minds are are doing. Right? I’ve seen lions over there. The tiger was chasing me. Right? This is how our minds naturally are. And let those thoughts come, and then when you take the breath because you’re training you’re training your mind to say, how likely is this gonna happen? Okay. Let’s say it does.

Tyson Gaylord [00:43:12]:What’s the worst case scenario here? What happens? Will I be okay? Can I survive? Can I make more money? Can I, you know, can I get another job? Can what whatever it is. Right? If I become homeless, what’s the big deal? Like, can I can I do that? Can I stay in my car for two weeks? Can what what are you gonna do? You know, if another natural disaster comes through or maybe some kind of pandemic or something like that, and then, like, food becomes scarce. Right? People start hoarding things like they did during COVID. Right? Well, am I gonna be okay? Can I survive on what I have? Can I can I get myself down to just beans and rice? Can I get myself down to bread and water? Like, what Can I practice, fasting? You know? What’s the big deal? Right? And it’s not to like I said, it’s not to be dismissive. It’s not to be passive. It’s not to be whatever. This is where the strength lies, understanding your power. And when you understand your power and you have the power and you choose to not wield it, that is that is the thing.

Tyson Gaylord [00:44:09]:When you choose not to be angry, when you choose not to be vindictive, that is true power. Right? That that is the things. Like, Jordan Peterson, I think Joe Rogan has talked about these things. Right? You fear the man that doesn’t kick your ass because he can, and he knows he can. But he’s disciplined and self controlled enough to know this is not how I need to conduct myself. This is not the thing. Versus the idiot. I just see red.

Tyson Gaylord [00:44:35]:I just beat everybody. That’s a fool. That’s not strength. That’s not wisdom. That’s not a trained mind. That’s not disciplined. Right? The stoics practice calming their imagination and focusing on facts. Apatheia.

Tyson Gaylord [00:44:55]:The ultimate goal of stoic mind training was apatheia, which is not apathy in the modern sense, but an ongoing state of equanimity or inner peace means being free of path passions that pass around not oh, sorry. That push us around. Things like a frantic greed, greed, blind rage, paralyzing fear, lusting, obsessive lust. A person in apatheia still feels feels things. Stokes are often very empathetic and joyful in their writings, but they don’t slave under those feelings. They experience more stable and internal emotions. The stoics even described good feelings. I’m not sure how to say this Greek word.

Tyson Gaylord [00:45:47]:I’m gonna skip it. The stoics just described good feelings that the wise person enjoys a righteous joy, love, caution, etcetera, aligned with virtue, feeling love and concern for humanity, or joy at doing the right thing, or healthy aversion to vice, these are all encouraged. How true is that? Right? When you help somebody, even if you’re doing it for yourself, it feels good, and it feels good to them. Right? The joy in doing the right things, not being that guy that passes the problem, that passes the rubbish on the ground, or being not being the guy that’s filming instead of helping. These are the good things. Right? The joy in doing the right thing. What Stokes warn against are the wild, ungoverned passions based on false beliefs, like envy born from the false belief that someone’s someone else’s success takes away from mine or spare from the belief that a temporary setback is the end of the world. This is something I think we hear a lot about.

Tyson Gaylord [00:47:02]:Right? We’re complaining about the billionaires. We’re complaining about the 1%. We’re complaining about this class of people. Right? Envy born from the false belief that someone else’s success takes away from mine. It does not. Having that abundant mindset, understanding there is enough to go around. Right? This is not things are not futile. Things are not thing.

Tyson Gaylord [00:47:26]:Having the that mindset of the the long term. Right? The, Simon Sinek talks about the the limitless game or the end end of this game, something like that, whatever that the long term thing. Right? The there is there is no end. There’s no goal. Right? It’s it’s it’s just long term thinking. Someone else’s success doesn’t take away from yours. By using our faculty of reasoning, we can separate back term opinion and thus stay serene. This is why stoicism emphasizes logic so much.

Tyson Gaylord [00:48:08]:Clear reasoning is a defense against panic, self pity, and confusion. Marcus Aurelius often writes like a coach to himself using reason arguments to talk himself into a stoic mindset where he feels discouraged. In one entry, he basically performs a CBT session on himself, reframing a stressful situation. Today, I escaped anxiety or rather I dismissed it because it was within me in my own perceptions, not outside. The reminder allowed him to remain calm. Stochism holds that that our mind is immensely powerful in shaping our experiences. And if we can learn to direct our mind using logic and wisdom, we can we gain a deep form of control and tranquility. And that’s the thing that’s really kind of amazing about his journal is this rich, most powerful man in in arguably the world at the time.

Tyson Gaylord [00:49:07]:He goes through his struggles. He he he talks about where he fucked up today, how he could have been better, and how about and how and about being better, and about doing these things. He’s talking to himself. He’s not writing a self help book. He’s not writing a manual. He’s not teaching a class. He’s not selling a course. It’s the emperor saying, man, I’m glad I’m studying this stuff because these people pissed me off today.

Tyson Gaylord [00:49:30]:This is was bothering me. I was worried about the Antonine Plague. I was worried about the wars I was in. I was worried about the famine of my people. Whatever it was that’s bothering him that day. I was able to take a breath, go in inward, and figure out what was happening. So powerful. And that’s the thing was probably why people love meditations the most is because it’s his journal talking to himself as a powerful, powerful man and humbling himself and understanding his mission, understanding his virtues, understanding what he stood for, what he wanted his kingdom to stand for.

Tyson Gaylord [00:50:05]:And four, here, living in harmony with nature, acceptance, and providence. Cosmic perspective. Socialism is not all about inward focus. It’s also about how we fit into the larger world, what they call nature. The Stokes believed the universe is governed by a rational and providential order. They called it the logos or universal nature. Everything happens according to this nature or fate. And while we can’t change the grand scheme, we can choose to align ourselves with it.

Tyson Gaylord [00:50:42]:Stoic said, living according to nature became a stoic model, meaning living according meaning living in accordance with reason or human nature and with acceptance of the way the world is. In practice, this means accepting reality rather than complaining that it isn’t how we wish. If it rains on your wedding day, the slowest response is it’s foolish to rail against the sky. Better to embrace what happens and make the best of it because the rain follows nature’s law, not our desires. Umor fati, love of fate, is very much a stoic idea. Marcus Aurelius advised himself to see every event, even misfortunes, as the unfolding of a larger rational plan and to say yes to it as necessary and natural. And that’s I have that coin here on my desk. I just absolutely love it.

Tyson Gaylord [00:51:38]:You know, as you you say, not merely to bear what is necessary, but love it. Imagine adopting when you adopt this this mindset. Things happen. Right? And if but if you wanna change things, you know what to do. We don’t complain about it. Right? We work within nature. And we we live in accordance with the way the world works, with the way your country works, the way your government works, with the way your municipality works, whatever it is. And you play the game, and you you do what you gotta do to implement change that you wanna see.

Tyson Gaylord [00:52:18]:Right? You don’t complain about it. Talk shit on the Internet and do nothing. Stokes are heavily into, in this concept of politics and stuff like that or whatever. And, you know, being the change you wanna see. Right? Doing these things. You like Jocko talks about too. Right? You wanna influence the stuff, you gotta get in there, and you gotta influence from the inside. You can’t talk shit.

Tyson Gaylord [00:52:40]:You you you can’t sit in the sidelines. You wanna influence things. You wanna do these things. You’ve gotta get in there and do what you gotta do. You gotta play the game, making the best of everything. Importantly, acceptance to the stoics does not mean resignation or fatalism. It means cooperating with what is still with what is while still exercising your will vigorously. As a stoic farmer, for instance, accepts that a sudden frost ruined his crop.

Tyson Gaylord [00:53:12]:No amount of anger could change that fact. But then he rationally pivots to to whatever we can do, maybe planting a new type of seed or tightening his budget. By setting the frost, he avoids wasting energy on why me rage and instead adapts. This mindset was summed up by Aristides’ phrase. Do not seek for events to happen as you wish, but wish for events to happen as they do, and your life will go smoothly. Rather than trying to control the uncontrollable, adjust your wishes to fit reality. This leads to contentment and not in a negative way. Right? If you stop wasting your energy and time on wishing and hoping and praying things are gonna go the way you want them to go, understand they’re gonna go the way they’re gonna go.

Tyson Gaylord [00:54:07]:If you train your mind and you have discipline and you have contingency plans or whatever you need to do, so these things can happen, the weather can be shitty, the fucking freeway can be clogged up, car can break down, whatever. Things are gonna happen. Things happen. Right? Now think about probably think about odds. Right? You know? Oh, it’s 86% that this is gonna happen. Well, guess what? There’s 14% that does 24% whatever is that it’s not gonna happen. Right? But we get it’s sometimes it’s hard for us to think about other things. Right? Right? You know? I think a a good example of this is, you know, watching poker.

Tyson Gaylord [00:54:41]:Right? Like, oh, it’s 76% of this guy chance this guy wins, and the guy loses. You’re like, what the heck? They’re supposed to win. Well, yeah. But there’s another percentage that he doesn’t. Right? And Duke is great explaining this. Right? Backcasting and all these different things. Right? We’re understanding shit’s gonna happen. Can I control it? No.

Tyson Gaylord [00:55:01]:Can I plan for it? Yes. No. Can I influence it? Yes. No. Can I have contingencies? Yes. No. Right? Go through these things, and you don’t have to worry about stuff. Your life will be smooth.

Tyson Gaylord [00:55:14]:Soul acceptance is an active process. You choose to embrace whatever happens. You choose to embrace whatever happens, making it part of your story and responding with your best self. Marcus Aurelius said that a fire turns everything thrown into it into flame. Likewise, Estoah can turn obstacles into fuel for their virtue. What stands in the way becomes the way. Interconnectedness and duty. Living according to nature also has a moral dimension.

Tyson Gaylord [00:55:54]:Stoics saw all humans as part of a greater whole. We are children of the same universe, endowed with reason, and therefore, brothers and sisters. Embody that. Treat everybody. We are all part of the greater whole. We are all children of the same universe. I don’t care what magical border you think you’re on. We are all of this world.

Tyson Gaylord [00:56:27]:We are all the same universe. Therefore, everybody is your brother and sister and treat people so. Marcus often remind himself to work for others. The emperor of Rome the emperor of Rome reminded himself to work for others to forgive flaws and to fulfill his social roles honorably. This man can do this. We all can. Socialism often critiqued as isolated or unemotional. But in truth, many stoics are deeply involved in family and community.

Tyson Gaylord [00:57:14]:To do good for others is to do good for yourself, said Marcus. Even Epictetus, who renounced material attachments, took care to nurture his friends and students. Stoicism encouraged treating others with justice and kindness, not because emotions command it, but out of rational understanding that we are all in this life together. This is why a stoic tries to be patient with difficult people. They are ignorant of good and evil, Marcus says. So it so it’s as natural as they as that a fig tree produces figs. I, who know this, can’t be angry at them. He also has another famous saying along these lines of, I’m gonna wake up this morning, and there’s gonna be I’m gonna paraphrase very liberally here.

Tyson Gaylord [00:58:11]:I’m like, this morning’s gonna be a bunch of assholes and dicks, and people are gonna be rude, and people are gonna do this, and people are gonna whatever. And that’s okay. That’s the way people are. It’s the way of the world. It’s it’s the nature. Right? I’m not gonna get upset about it. I’m not gonna get mad about it. I’m not gonna let it bother me.

Tyson Gaylord [00:58:29]:Fucking Tammy in accounting is an idiot. There’s idiot people. Maybe she’s had a bad day. Whatever it is, maybe she’s just an idiot. Who knows? It doesn’t matter. Right? You know every day you wake up, every time they’re gonna be jackasses for the rest of your life. We can’t let these people take up mental space. We can’t let them color our thoughts.

Tyson Gaylord [00:58:52]:Flexibility and belief. Stoicism has an interesting intellectual flexibility. While they did believe in a providentially providential sorry. Cosmos, later stoics, and modern ones acknowledge you don’t have to accept a literal Zeus or fate to benefit from stolen ethics. Whether or not the universe is objectively just or rational, it’s wise to behave as if it is to play our to play our part the best you can and accept what you can’t change. As modern stoic philosopher, Musomot Pigliucci notes, stoic principles still hold value even if we set aside ancient physics or theology. Stoicism endurance is partly due to this adaptability. It offers more it offers core practical truths about human psychology and virtue that transcends any specific cosmic cosmology.

Tyson Gaylord [00:59:53]:Philosophers through the ages and diverse religions have been have been drawn to stoic ideas because they address universal acceptance of human condition. The stoics believes they’re stoics themselves were open to revising details of their document in light of new knowledge. One attractive feature of stoicism is that it wasn’t dogmatic. They debated and refined their views over centuries. This makes stoicism less a fixed set of commandments and more a living philosophy, a framework that can evolve, but always with the aim of improving human life through reason and virtue. This is what I I remember from that podcast that he was talking about these guys being so advanced in in human psychology two thousand years ago that that these famous psychologists and stuff we we know about Freud and, the Nietzsche or something. I I can’t quite remember the people, but in the fifties, they didn’t even have this figured out. This never came across their minds.

Tyson Gaylord [01:01:05]:They missed out on this stuff. Right? This is how enlightened these people were back then. This is how at and it’s the thing. Right? They were open to changing their mind when when faced with new knowledge. That is the key, right, to being open minded to changing your opinions. Not this bullshit. Oh, you’re flip flopping. Good.

Tyson Gaylord [01:01:26]:This is what we’re supposed to do. We get new information. We update our beliefs. We update our processes. We update ourself. Because why? We are training our mind. When we’re presented with new knowledge, we evaluate it. We even debate it.

Tyson Gaylord [01:01:40]:We talk about it. We implement what makes sense, what is practical, what is in line with our virtue. But you have to have this these principles. You have to have these thoughts. You have to have this foundation. So when new knowledge comes, you can evaluate. This is the craziest thing I ever heard. A friend of mine tell me, which I don’t even understand how you have this thing.

Tyson Gaylord [01:02:02]:He said, I don’t wanna learn about new things. I don’t care what that book said. I don’t I have my opinion already, and I don’t I don’t want new information to to to cloud that. What? That makes zero sense in my brain. Right? So don’t stop learning. Don’t just because you’re done with college, you’re doing it in school, just because maybe you’re mastered your craft, don’t stop learning. When there’s new knowledge, talk about it. See what’s up.

Tyson Gaylord [01:02:33]:They debated and refined their views over centuries. Alright. Section three here, stoic practices and daily applications. Stoics likened philosophy to a gym for the mind. It requires practice and exercise to strengthen our moral and mental muscles. Pre Manatasya Amoram Alorum. The stoics advise consistently visualizing possible challenges and bad things before they happen, not to be pessimistic, but to prepare the mind. I said I got all I got all the coins here.

Tyson Gaylord [01:03:12]:I just love these. Right? Sitting on my desk is constant reminders. The terms of our human lot should be before our eyes. Exile, torture. What’s this say here? No. Shipwreck, war. What are the possible challenges? What are the bad things that can happen? And prepare the mind. Gotta get in the mind gym.

Tyson Gaylord [01:03:44]:Right? So I had a constant reminder sitting in front of me on my desk all day long. I love these coins. Ryan Holiday, what an absolute stud for making these amazing idea. I absolutely love it. And we have mindfulness of the present moment. Confine yourself to the present, wrote Marcus Aurelius. Stoicism teaches that much distress comes from ruminating on the past or the future, which we do not control. Instead of living fully now.

Tyson Gaylord [01:04:19]:By consistently returning attention to right here, right now, we align with reality. How much effort energy and I I do it too. I replay the conversation. I should’ve said this. I should’ve said that. When you’re aware of these things, you can catch yourself. Right? Like meditation, this helps. Catching yourself in a moment.

Tyson Gaylord [01:04:37]:Oh, I have the thought. Okay. I can’t go back in that conversation. I can learn from it. I can have a postmortem. I can think about what happened. I made this decision. I made this investment.

Tyson Gaylord [01:04:45]:I made that move. I made this thing. I went left. I should’ve went right. I can postmortem think about these things and an ability to train in my mind and to understand what went wrong, what went right, how do I make things better. And we that’s the thing. When things go right, we also have to understand what happened. Did I make the right decision and things went right? Did I make the wrong decision that things went right? That’s equally as important.

Tyson Gaylord [01:05:07]:Right? A lot of times, we we we we chalk up the good to I’m mad. That’s why that happened. A lot of times, that is not the case or cannot be the case. Daily reflection. Reflection, morning, and evening. Self reflection was a cornerstone of stoic training. Stoics would typically begin each morning by preparing their mind and end each evening by reviewing the day, a habit described by both Marcus Aurelius and Seneca. In the morning, you might set intentions.

Tyson Gaylord [01:05:40]:What virtues will I exercise today? What challenges am I likely to face? How will I meet them as a stoic? Marcus, for example, reminded himself each dawn. Today, I will meet busy bodies, ingrts, egotists, liars, and cynics, all due to their ignorance of good and evil. I can’t be hurt by any of them. I will not be angry or look down on them, for we are made to work together. How powerful enlightening is that? I will not be angry and look down at them for we’re made to work together. I know I’m gonna encounter a busy body. Ingrates. I don’t know what that is.

Tyson Gaylord [01:06:26]:Egotistics, liars, cynics, all due to their ignorance of good and evil. It’s okay. You the people that aren’t as far ahead on the journey on the path as you are. That’s okay. But we are all made to work together. We help them out. We work on the community. We help in the community.

Tyson Gaylord [01:06:46]:We help our fellow human being because we are all brothers and sisters in this universe together. And in the evening, the stoics would scrutinize their own behavior. Seneca describes lying in bed and examining his conscience for the day. When the light has been removed and my wife has fallen asleep, I remind I examine my entire day and go back over what I’ve done and said, hiding nothing from myself, passing nothing by. He would ask himself questions like, what did I do well? Where did I slip? Did I let anger and fear get the better of me? How can I improve tomorrow? This nightly audit done calmly and without self flagellation was intended to gradually polish one’s character. This takes five minutes at night. Maybe you go home from work, maybe after dinner, maybe for you a part of your bedtime routine. What did I do well? Where did I slip? Because we all make mistakes.

Tyson Gaylord [01:07:59]:Right? Did I get angry, out of envy, fear, get the better of me today? How can I improve tomorrow? That’s the key question. How can I improve tomorrow? Because you’re polishing your character. You’re working out the mind. Right? This is not crazy, but it’s profoundly impactful. You just imagine if you just took a few minutes every evening to just review your day. And a lot of times, what I what I found is it stops the rumination. It stops this this loop in your head because you’ve you’ve let it out of your brain. Your brain says, okay.

Tyson Gaylord [01:08:42]:It’s handled. Well, we’ve taken care of this. I don’t need to let it go, on and on and on because we’ve taken care of it, and it can release that. And a lot of times, it can help with sleep. You know, if you’re if you’re ruminating with things, if you’re worried about stuff or whatever, this is a great practice for that. Then we have probably one of my favorites, voluntary discomfort, training for adversity. How how we so avoid adversity? How we so so avoid discomfort? But as we learned, right, impediment to action advances action stands in the way, becomes the way. Voluntary discomfort.

Tyson Gaylord [01:09:21]:We’re training for adversity. As the saying goes, I know it from the Navy Seal, so I think that’s how I understand it. We don’t rise to our level of expectation. We default to our level of training. We’ve all had the thought maybe we all still have the thought of when time comes, I know it’s the I’m a step up whatever. Right? I’m a I’m a be the guy. I’m a do the thing. If you’re not training, that’s not the case.

Tyson Gaylord [01:09:51]:We default to whatever the minimum standards, whatever the minimum level in our body is, whatever’s ingrained in there, not what we know, you know, philosophically or theology or from books or from whatever we’ve seen, you know, on on TV or something that we have to train. Not just karma training for adversity. To cultivate courage and nonattachment, stoics sometimes deliberately practice hardship in controlled ways. The idea is by practic practically abstaining from pleasure or enduring something uncomfortable when you don’t have to, you toughen your spirit for times when you have no choice. Seneca faintly advised his friend, Lucius, set aside a certain number of days, during which you shall be content with the scantest and cheapest fare, with coarse and rough dress, saying yourself to yourself the while, is this the condition that I feared? I have practiced this. It’s very enlightening. Right? What are what is it you fear? The scantest and cheapest fare. Or what are you worried about sleeping on the ground? Wearing shitty clothes? You know? Let’s take a couple days out of this.

Tyson Gaylord [01:11:12]:Right? Are you are you worried about eating shitty food? Like, when you practice these things, I what we, we haven’t done in a while. Like everybody’s kinda got the point, but now we did it for a couple years. Every the last Sunday of the month, we ate beans and rice. That’s it. That’s what we’re doing today. We’re not fucking around with all this nonsense, you know? And I did it before COVID. And the funny thing was when COVID came around, you know, kids thought I was crazy. You know? My son kinda liked it.

Tyson Gaylord [01:11:35]:Whatever. My daughter was like, this is ridiculous. I’ll never this will never happen. I’ll never before. I never have to worry about food. That’s ridiculous. We live in America. And when COVID came around, people were, you know, hoarding things and whatnot, this, that, and another.

Tyson Gaylord [01:11:47]:This training came into absolute practice. It’s like, holy shit. I’m not worried about these things because I practiced. I had the things. I wasn’t worried about the scanty tissue. I wasn’t worried about clothes and rough dress. I wasn’t worried about it because I practiced. Right? Simple things.

Tyson Gaylord [01:12:12]:Right? Do you live in a place where there’s natural disasters? Are you prepared? Are you can you go with this? You know, maybe that maybe that’s your training every year. You know, we’re gonna have our gains on. We’re gonna be on pot for four days, and this is the time we’re gonna take our training. We’re prepared. We we know what to do. We’re gonna, you know, sleep on the floor. We’re not gonna have recognition. We’re not gonna have refrigeration.

Tyson Gaylord [01:12:31]:We’re you know? We’re we’re gonna have to, you know, barbecue outside. We’re gonna have to pop open cans and just eat cold food. You know? What, you know, what is your thing? And then I I’ve done an episode on this one because I think it’s just a very powerful thing. Mental mori, I’ll link to an episode if you wanna go back because I talk about the whole concept of that. It’s contemplating mortality. Right? Apart from being morbid, stoics found that regularly reminding themselves of mortality was one of the most life affirming practices. Memento Mori is Latin for remember you must die. Epictetus put it bluntly to his students.

Tyson Gaylord [01:13:03]:Keep death and exile before your eyes every day along with everything that seems terrible. By doing so, you will never have a base thought nor desire beyond anything beyond due measure. Marcus Aurelius wrote often about how his life is but a moment, that we should not put off doing or being virtuous since all we really own is the present moment. He also suggested a specific exercise, which he learned from Epictetus. As you kiss your son good night, your child, like, we could say, whisper to yourself. He may not be alive in the morning. The first time I read that, man, I cried. I was like, I can’t imagine going in my child’s room, kissing them good night, and be like, this this they might not wake up tomorrow.

Tyson Gaylord [01:13:53]:Kissing your spouse, they might not wake up tomorrow. Kissing your parents goodbye, they might not make it home. You might not make it home. But what I learned is and I never I didn’t like thinking about that. I never really like thinking about my own death. But when I started learning about this, I started, okay. Oh, you know? You know, you work out your shit. And you understand.

Tyson Gaylord [01:14:12]:It’s not that bad. It’s not there’s something desirable. But like it says, it becomes life affirming. Right? You understand, as Marcus says here, but the present moment. And then Seneca in his letter also says, let us prepare our minds as if we come to the end of life. Let us postpone nothing. When a man has said, I have lived, every morning he arises is a bonus. Are you thankful and grateful that you woke up today? And I don’t mean that in any kind of way, but have you thought about that? A lot of people don’t wake up every morning.

Tyson Gaylord [01:14:59]:You people go to sleep and never wake up again. Have you contemplated that? You’re shitting order? Are you doing what you need to do today? Are you fucking off? You know? No. Sometimes, fucking off is what you need to do today. But is that a conscious choice? Are you sucked in by Netflix and TikTok and whatever? Right? Are you when you have your audit tonight, are you gonna be satisfied that you lived today? You did what you had to do. You were a kind human being. You lived these virtues. You did these things. I hope so.

Tyson Gaylord [01:15:34]:And if not, it’s okay. Start now. When is now a good time? And then I’d like to touch on, as we come to conclusion here, some of the modern stoic leaders. I think Ryan Holiday is probably, the most famous. He’s got, like, seven or eight books on it. He he did one for each of the stoic virtues. I will link to those things. They’re fantastic.

Tyson Gaylord [01:16:03]:The coins got, he’s got, different stoic, like, challenges and stuff. He’s very prolific in this area. To me, I think he’s the most popular one that’s kinda, maybe spearheaded this resurgence in in stoicism and whatnot. I’ll link to his stuff. You guys check him out. And then, Masacio Iglucci, also very prolific in this area as a as a modern stoic leader, thought leader in the space. They’re great books. I’ll I’ll I’ll talk about in a second here, and I’ll link to those things for you guys.

Tyson Gaylord [01:16:35]:William b Irvine, also fantastic. Tim Ferris, we’re gonna affirm with mister Timothy Ferris. He talks a lot about this. He, he produced the audio book, The cynical one, I can’t you know, top of my my head, but I I will I will link to it. It’s a three part thing. He’s willing to he talks about it, on his, blog. He references it here and there. He talks about it on podcasts and whatnot.

Tyson Gaylord [01:17:01]:And then I think, somebody maybe not wouldn’t be associated with stoicism, but Robert Green. I know he is a fan of it from my understanding. He does talk about it in his books, and he talks about a lot of his historic figures. That’s where a lot of, his books come from. I would highly recommend reading his books, 48 laws of power, seduction, war, laws of human nature, all great things. I think these are, to to me, who, I refer to now in in the modern world for these guys that are kinda continuing this on. Continuing the thought. Right? Continuing the the discussion on this as as we had we had said earlier.

Tyson Gaylord [01:17:42]:Right? So in conclusion here, the time is the appeal of stoicism. Stoicism has survived for centuries, not by chance, but because its core message resonates across time. Every human being, regardless of circumstance, has the power to choose their attitude, to act with virtue, and to find meaning in hardship. Stoicism empowers you to master your inner world. Stoicism helps convert adversity into growth. Stoicism grounds you in value and integrity. Stoicism offers solace without superstition. Stoicism builds community and compassion.

Tyson Gaylord [01:18:22]:Stoicism endures because it inspires action. And then if you wanna dig into these books, I put together a list of what I think are good introductory books. Sometimes the the classics, the right from the horse’s mouth is a little weird. Okay? And that’s fine. It it it makes you think instead of somebody else that kinda thought for you, so that’s kinda cool. I will link to the classics, you know, meditations, from Marcus Aurelius, letters from a stoic from Seneca, the and and should Durian and discourses from Epictetus. And then one of my sleepers, Asunius Rufus, Lectures and Sayings. That’s a real quick little read.

Tyson Gaylord [01:19:10]:But I think some good intro books, if you wanna try to dip your toe into this and kinda get an understanding for this, Breakfast with Seneca, a guide to the art of living. That’s a great little accessible read. I absolutely love it. The Daily Stoic, 366 meditations on wisdom, also with the journal, I think is very powerful. It’s a quick little paragraph. It’s got the stoic thing, and he’s Ryan Holiday writes a little thing about it, and then there’s a journal that accompanies each of those days. And you write a little bit about this is your opportunity to, you know, set your attention for the morning and evaluate yourself in the evening. That’s how that journal is set up.

Tyson Gaylord [01:19:51]:Great way to get into this. And my entry to this, from my recollection, was Ryan Holiday’s. I believe I heard him on, I don’t know if it was Tim Ferris and Noah Kagan or something like that. I heard Ryan Holiday. And then, I think he was just coming out with Eagles the Enemy or maybe. It was out for a little while, but Eagles the Enemy and Obstacle Way, that is was my foundation to getting into this. And the funny thing is when I learned about these people and I started looking around my house, I found Seneca quotes and Epictetus quotes and Marcus Aurelius quotes. So I think that’s why it resonated with me because just in life coming across these guys, and I started reading about them.

Tyson Gaylord [01:20:28]:I’m like, no wonder I like these guys. Right? And no wonder I like those quotes. And then if you want, there’s a a great little box set that comes with that it goes the enemy the opposite way. And, the key so so it’s three is I get I think it’s his first three books, and and it’s kind of a, like, little nice little, set that you can really set you with a good foundation here. Another great one here is, a guide to the good life, the art and the ancient art of so joy, a handbook for new stoics, how to thrive in a world out of our control 52 week by week lessons. That one is is like a journal in a way. You you go through and you do the lessons. Every week, there’s a thing.

Tyson Gaylord [01:21:10]:And you you go through every day of that week, and you have your your lesson, and you go and you practice. It’s a great way to practice like we talked about. Right? It’s all about the practice. It’s all about the implementation. It’s all about getting better every day. This is a fantastic way to do that. Easily go through each of these things, nice digestible things, nice easy easy to work through exercises. It’s absolutely great.

Tyson Gaylord [01:21:34]:And then the practicing stoic, that is something kinda similar where everything’s kinda broken down nice nicely and whatnot. And if you wanna get, I guess, the whole set of Ryan’s books, there’s a five collection set and eight book set, which also includes, the daily dad and and whatnot. So that I’ll link those for you guys. And then some things, like I talked about earlier. Right? Man search for meaning. Viktor Frankl. He’s in the he was a psychologist or psychiatrist or something like that or whatever in in the holocaust. When you read this, it this sounds very similar to stoicism.

Tyson Gaylord [01:22:09]:I don’t remember if that’s where you pull from, but this is something very small, quick read. Definitely within an hour, you can knock through that, and get you kinda set up in this this area. This you can just go understand what this man went through and what he saw and understanding how he he took that. He, you know, he got he understood the meaning you know, life’s meaning and whatnot and different things from that. Amazing. Courage in the fire, like I said, I talked about a few times in the episode. That’s the one about, the the pilot was shot down, and he was a huge fan. He studied Epictetus.

Tyson Gaylord [01:22:47]:And then of course, I’ll link to the classes for you guys. I’ll put a link to my research document. If you guys really wanna dive into all the resources and the kind of the full text of this and whatnot. And then I’ll link to my Goodreads, with all the slow books I’ve read. If you’re interested in picking through and seeing things I didn’t mention here, maybe you’re you’re you’ve you’ve read all these already, and you’re looking for more things. I I’ve I’ve read a bunch. I think there’s there’s over 30. I I don’t think over 40 books, but there’s a lot in there if you’re interested in that, looking for recommendations and things, all all the books I’ve enjoyed.

Tyson Gaylord [01:23:24]:And then this week’s challenge, pick one of these stoke principles and spend the week embodying the philosophy. Reorient yourself and your mind. Don’t play a victim. Don’t blame things that are out of your control. Master one principle and start on the next. A legendary life awaits you. The path is seeking you. Now step on it and live with intention.

Tyson Gaylord [01:23:52]:And closing here, what does becoming legendary mean to you? What does living a legendary life mean to you? Maybe said another way. This is what I’ve come up with. Becoming legendary means living a life of virtue and intention entirely designed and chosen by me. It’s not about status status or validation. It’s about mastering myself, aligning my actions with what I value, and living on my terms. Every choice is deliberate. Every day is mine. Becoming legendary means owning every damn piece of my life.

Tyson Gaylord [01:24:32]:You build it. You choose it. You live it. No excuses. No autopilot. It’s virtue over validation, purpose over comfort. Master yourself or be mastered. That’s the game.

Tyson Gaylord [01:24:45]:I hope you guys enjoy this episode. I really hope you guys if you’re new to philosophy, you know, stoicism, you you you jump in and you check out these things and you really kinda get into it. If you’ve been in surround stoicism for a little while, I hope I found you found something to grab onto, maybe a new read or whatever. And if you’ve been around for a really long time and I missed something, please let me know. Throw down in the comments or wherever you you’re you’re consuming this at. And and there are awesome recommendations. I’d love to hear it. I’d love to keep doing.

Tyson Gaylord [01:25:14]:I I continue to to read and reread and go through all these things. So please please share those things. And as always, there’s no paywall premium contest to subscribe to. We give you everything upfront and only ask if you found value in this episode. Share with these two other people. It’s the best way to support the show. Best way to support the community. Best way to support everybody.

Tyson Gaylord [01:25:33]:Sharing the knowledge, sharing the ins wisdom and insights. And you can connect us with us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, or your favorite podcast player or past episodes and links to everything we discussed here today. Head over to the socialcommunity.show. Also, you can, do the same on Substack. If you if you like that platform, subscribe, get on there, check out all different show notes. No paywall there. No nothing there. Jump in.

Tyson Gaylord [01:25:57]:Check it out. Subscribe. Don’t. It’s there for you to do. Till next time, keep learning, growing, transforming on your path to becoming legendary.

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