[[Notes]] - Topics: [[Perspective]] - People: [[Ryan Holiday]] - Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heh5XLwZVOY --- ## Summary - [[Essentialism]]. Live each day as it were your last. Identify what is most essential. What can make the biggest impact for others. Do that as best you can. - [[Serving others]]. It is about what you do for others. This is what people will feel and remember. - [[The obstacle is the way]]. You will always experience road blocks. This should not stop you from practicing your higher values and crafting a new path forward. - One step at a time ([[Building little bridges]]). It is all about action. [[Do the little things that make a biggest impact]] - Be good today. Act now; however small. - Anxiety is to be discarded. it is an internal manifestation. [[Anxiety is a negative side-effect of poor unpracticed processing]]. - **Self discipline**. [[Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself]]. Be the best you can be. [[Own today, and every tomorrow onward]]. - [[Become a master of yourself; not a master of others]]. - [[Don't resent people. Use them to become better.]] Be more patient. Tolerant. Empathetic. - Know yourself deeply. Have true confidence. [[Be someone others cannot during times of great challenge]]. - **Rise**. - Always question. Learn. Improve. Adapt. **Do**. ## Notes - "Life is too short. Do everything as it were the thought and action of a dying person" - Marcus Aurelius shared power when he didn't have to. ### Put people first - "I'm not going to put myself first, especially when people are struggling" (paraphrasing). - [[Do the little things that make a biggest impact]]. The **impact** is not in the act itself, but rather, the **message** the act sends to others. - Sacrifice (a bit) of your own comfort to enable and empower others. Sacrifice your own **privilege** to create **opportunities** for others. ### Another path is always open - [[The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.]] - It is not that you are physically unstoppable, but that you always have opportunities to **practice** virtue, excellence, adaptiveness and growth within the **context of the situation**. - [[We don't control what is happening. We control how we respond]] - Integrate learned experience to create new paths. - [[The obstacle is the way]]. ### Take it step by step - [[We know what we have to do. The problem is doing it.]] - [[You could be good today. Instead, you choose tomorrow.]] - It is the [[Discipline of action]]. It's not what you say, what you think, it's what you do. - "Just take the first step. No one can stop you from that." ### Discard your anxiety - [[I escaped anxiety. Or no, I discarded it.]] - Very easy to associate stress and anxiety to very real and tangible life circumstances. But it is all internal, not external. - [[Anxiety is a negative side-effect of poor unpracticed processing]] ### Well begun is half done - Marcus makes himself get up early. - "What, were you made to sit here under the covers and keep warm? Or were you meant to go **do the work of a human being**?" - First thing? Journaled (created Meditations, in the process). - "The most private thoughts of the most powerful man." - It made him better. - Start your day with a morning routine that let's you **own the day** from the beginning. ### Be strict with yourself. - **Self discipline**. Learned techniques must first be applied to the self before suggesting to others. - [[Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself]]. - [[Become a master of yourself; not a master of others]]. ### Don't resent people - Be good in spite of other people. Be just in the face of injustice. **Be courageous** when others are being cowardly. - [[Don't resent people. Use them to become better.]] ### Is this essential? (Ask yourself) - We're busy doing mostly unimportant things. - [[You get the benefit of doing fewer things better]]. - Question yourself. Question process. Is this the best way of doing something? Does this need to be done at all? ### Remember the mantras - [[It didn't happen to you. It happened for you.]] - It's about what you do for other people. - Life is short. You can leave life right now. Let that determine what you say and think. ## Original ![[2021-11-14 - 9 stoic rules for a better life - 1-3.jpg]] ![[2021-11-14 - 9 stoic rules for a better life - 2-3.jpg]] ![[2021-11-14 - 9 stoic rules for a better life - 3-3.jpg]]