Philosophy

We tend to think of tranquility as idleness.

We picture an undisturbed monk sitting cross-legged on a mountaintop somewhere, free from the stressors the rest of us face. Or maybe we imagine a woman doing yoga on a beach, smiling as the sun rises and the sound of the waves hush her worries and cares. Courtney likes to “joke” that if we had kids she would end up faking her own death and moving to Costa Rica. And really, all of us think this way sometimes. That we have to “get away from it all” to have some peace.

But that’s not what tranquility is. At least that’s not how the Stoics saw it.

For them, tranquility was something inside us, independent from what was going on around us. The world can go to pieces, but that doesn’t mean we have to. A barking dog doesn’t have to grate your nerves. A song can be awful…or interesting.

According to Seneca, there are two reasons why people lack tranquility: they cannot adapt and they cannot endure.

A tranquil person adapts. They know that one of the easiest ways to ease anxiety is to let go of a fixed idea of how they want things to be and instead embrace them as they are. They endure. They know that staying the course—past the pain, past the boredom, past the uncertainty—puts them in control of themselves and, therefore, calms them.

One of my favorite stories from one of my favorite books, The Obstacle is the Way (see below), is about boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, who, in the mid-1960s and at the height of his career and fame, was charged with a crime he did not commit: triple homicide. The verdict: three life sentences.

Carter had entered prison with a $5,000 diamond ring, a gold watch, and a tailored suit. Now, waiting in line to be booked into the general population as an inmate, he asked to speak to someone in charge. “Looking the warden in the eye,” Ryan Holiday writes, “Carter proceeded to inform him and the guards that he was not giving up the last thing he controlled: himself.” Yes, he knew the guards were just doing their jobs, and this injustice was not their fault. And yes, he knew he would be there for some time. But he wanted to be clear: even though he was a prisoner, he would not be treated like one—because he wasn’t powerless.

Of course he was furious. Who wouldn’t be? His situation was grim, cruel, and unfair (to say the absolute least). But instead of giving into despair—something most people would have done—he poured his energy into getting out. He would not act like a prisoner just because he was in prison. He would not do what other inmates did. He would not attend parole hearings or work in the commissary to lighten his sentence.

No, every minute would be spent working towards his freedom. Every second would be for reading books—the law, philosophy, history. He refused to buy into the idea that they had ruined his life; they had just temporarily put him somewhere he didn’t want to be. He decided “he would leave prison not only a free and innocent man, but a better and improved one.” 

Nineteen years and two trials later, his verdict was overturned and he walked out of prison a free man. Did he file a lawsuit? Did he seek an apology? No and no. That would have implied that something had been taken from him, that someone owed him something. “That had never been his view, even in the dark depths of solitary confinement. He had made his choice: This can’t harm me—I might not have wanted it to happen, but I decide how it will affect me. No one else has the right.”

This can’t harm me. I decide how it will affect me.

To me, this is the essence of tranquility, the serenity prayer embodied. Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change and the courage to change the things I can…

Seneca said tranquility was the ultimate good for a human being. A tranquil person is not quick to anger. They have a clear head. They have a clear conscience. They take the right action. They are unruffled, undisturbed, unperturbed.

Further, a tranquil person will find the good in every situation. (Otherwise, they wouldn’t be tranquil.) And what more can be asked of us than to find the good in every situation, in every person?

Carter didn’t think, What if? Or Why me? Or They’ll all be sorry one day. Those thoughts would have upset his tranquility and clouded his judgment. By accepting his situation, he allowed room in his mind for better ideas to sprout, one of which bloomed into the foresight to begin a program of reading and studying, which would eventually lead to his freedom. And because his efforts were self-directed and in his control, each action propelled him forward and gave him the energy to endure.

I think of Socrates in jail in his final moments. When the prison guard brought him the glass of hemlock, Socrates apologized to him! He felt bad for his executioner, that he had such an unpleasant duty. Was Socrates afraid in his last moments? Maybe. Probably. Would it have mattered if he was? No, it wouldn’t have. He knew that fighting the inevitable was to hand over his tranquility, something no one would do on purpose.

Like Socrates, Carter had decided he would not “surrender the freedoms that were innately his: his attitude, his beliefs, his choices. . . . choices that could not be taken from him even though his physical freedom had been,” Ryan writes. “We don’t control the barriers or the people who put them there. But we control ourselves—and this is sufficient.”

—

Carter’s perseverance made me think of a story I recently read from the wonderful book Big Magic (my favorite book about creativity I read this year) by Elizabeth Gilbert. Distinguished writer Richard Ford was giving a talk at a bookstore in Washington, D.C., and it was time for Q&As. A middle-aged man stood up. He said he had a lot in common with Ford: they were about the same age, they started writing short stories and novels around the same time, they had similar backgrounds, and they wrote about similar themes. The only difference is that Ford was considered a man of letters, and he, the man in the audience, had yet to be published. He told Ford that all the rejection letters had crushed his spirit. “I wonder if you have any advice for me,”  the man said. “But please, sir, whatever you do, don’t tell me to persevere, because that’s the only thing people ever tell me to do, and hearing that only makes me feel worse.” 

Ford told the man he was sorry for his disappointments and that he couldn’t imagine what it was like to receive so many rejection letters. Then Ford said something to the man that made the audience freeze. He told him to quit. “I say this to you only because writing is clearly bringing you no pleasure. It is only bringing you pain. Our time on earth is short and should be enjoyed. You should leave this dream behind and go find something else to do with your life. Travel, take up new hobbies, spend time with your family and friends, relax. But don’t write anymore, because it’s obviously killing you.” 

The room went silent. Then Ford smiled and casually added, “However, I will say this. If you happen to discover, after a few years away from writing, that you have found nothing that takes its place in your life—nothing that fascinates you, or moves you, or inspires you to the same degree that writing once did . . . well, then, sir, I’m afraid you will have no choice but to persevere.”

---

Books Read This Month:

-As many of you know, Ryan Holiday’s The Obstacle is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph has been one of the biggest influences on my life. I read it a handful of times between 2016 and 2017, and uncoincidentally, it was around that time that I made major changes. The main theme, like Carter’s story above, is that inherent in every obstacle is an opportunity. More than just remaining unharmed by obstacles, we can be improved by them. Do the next most necessary thing. No one can stop you from that. So when the 10th Anniversary Edition came out, I pre-ordered it and read it immediately. It’s wild how much I get from this book every time I read it. Seriously, if you read nothing else this year, read this. And if you’ve already read it, read it again!

-Another book of Ryan’s that I finished this month is The Daily Dad. I’ve had this book on my nightstand since last year, reading a few pages every other night or so before bed.It is SO good. I’m aware that giving parenting advice when I’m not a parent myself is ridiculous, but I’m going to give it anyway: if you’re a parent, you need to read this book. You really have to. It will be one of the best things you do. Even if you’re not a parent, read it. Because parenting—as my understanding goes—is mainly about being the best version of yourself for your kids. And this book is about how to be the best version of yourself. Here’s a timely part from the January 14th passage that I highlighted: “The world needs less judgment, less bullying, fewer opinions, period. Can you start this trend at home? Can you teach your kids what that looks like, instead of letting the same old rumor mill spin round and round, grinding their goodness to dust?”

–A Night to Remember by Walter Lord is a concise, suspenseful account of the sinking of the Titanic. What makes it the definitive book on the Titanic’s sinking is that Lord had access to many survivors, a privilege that no one else had or will have again. The book starts with lookout Frederick Fleet spotting the iceberg and advising the ship to turn away. From there, you get the play-by-play from multiple vantage points of its tragic sinking. Really good.

–The Barn: The Secret History of a Murder in Mississippi by Wright Thompson. Wow, I am ashamed that I didn’t know much about Emmett Till before reading this. In Mississippi in 1955, fourteen-year-old Emmett whistled at a white woman—and was mercilessly tortured and killed for it. It’s a gut-wrenching but necessary read. Emmett had been living with his mother, Mamie, in Chicago and he asked her if he could go to Mississippi to visit family. Mamie said no. She knew how dangerous it was for Black people in the South. But Emmett begged her, and she finally relented. You can go, she told him, but you have to be careful—it’s not like it is here in Chicago. Mamie worried as she watched her son board the train bound for Mississippi. She sent away her young, excited boy, and, as Thompson puts it, what she got back was a corpse. A grisly, unrecognizable corpse. What they did to Emmett was beyond words, and at the funeral, Mamie made the choice to keep the casket open. She wanted everyone to see what hatred looked like.

-It took me 3 weeks to read the 992-page 1992 biography of Harry Truman by David McCullough…and it was worth every hour spent. Not only did I learn so much about how the government works, I learned how the press works. How lies are picked up and spread. Like how McCarthy had accused Truman’s administration of communism—a wildly unfounded claim that deeply confused and angered Truman. McCarthy, of course, had no evidence, nor was any evidence ever produced (even after an internal investigation headed by McCarthy’s own party members). But he was adamant and loud, and so most of the country began to believe him because surely no one could be that loud about something that wasn’t true. In another instance, the unhinged General MacArthur (not to be confused with McCarthy) accused Truman of firing him for “telling the truth” about Truman’s administration, sparking public sympathy for MacArthur and fury at Truman. (History really does repeat itself.) It wasn’t until later that the public realized MacArthur was just an egomaniac. Anyway, what I love about Truman—and what made the book worth reading—was his character. He was honest, cheerful, buoyant, committed to world peace and his family, and worked harder than anyone around him. He pushed for things like better education, improved housing conditions, and livable wages. Unfortunately, his plans to improve the average person’s life were repeatedly blocked by the Republican-controlled Congress, which cared mostly for the rights of big businesses. Still, Truman was able to build millions of homes through government financing, double social security benefits, desegregate the armed forces, and increase the minimum wage (to name a few things. Not to mention the formation of NATO and the United Nations). Prices were higher, but “income had risen even more.” Unemployment was almost nonexistent. Dividends on farm and corporate income were at an all-time high. Income gains, education, and standard of living were “unparalleled in American history.” Just such a great biography about one of the greatest presidents we’ve ever had.

Courtney and I decided to do some gardening in our backyard this month. My mom came over to help. She taught us about tree suckers and Lantanas and directed us as we dug holes, mixed fertilizer into the soil, and laid cedar mulch. As I was pushing in a rod for the drip irrigation, Courtney told me to make sure I was putting it in straight.

“Oh yeah, I know, I am.”

“So the reason I said something was because I’m actively watching you not putting it in straight.”

It was hard work, but I enjoyed every minute of it. We talked and laughed and we were all together.

It reminded me of George Horace Lorimer’s Letters From a Self-Made Merchant To His Son, when John Graham, recounting the early days of his marriage, gives his son this advice:

“Your Ma did the cooking, and I hustled for things to cook. . . .  It was pretty rough sailing, you bet, but one way and another we managed to get a huge deal of satisfaction out of it, because we had made up our minds to take our fun as we went along. With most people happiness is something that is always just a day off. But I have made it a rule never to put off being happy till tomorrow. Don’t accept notes for happiness, because you’ll find that when they’re due they’re never paid, but just renewed for another thirty days.”

I just love that. Don’t accept notes for happiness.

It’s so easy to rush, to see the day as something to get through, to be anxious about what we still have to do, to think something’s lacking. It’s alarming how easy it is to remember to slow down and enjoy it. (On our fridge I wrote a reminder: Are you enjoying the day?)

When my time is up, when the next generation takes over, when the next family moves in with their own dreams and expectations and hopes and gardens, I want to be able to say, Have fun! I sure as hell did. I enjoyed my time here. I enjoyed the shit out of it.

Last month, I finished reading Seneca’s Letters on Ethics, which I’ve been making my way through since April. (See below!) He, of course, had a lot to say about enjoying life. He said that a tranquil mind is the ultimate good for a human being, the ultimate joy. And here’s the kicker: because tranquility is the ultimate good, any further delights are mere seasoning. Once you’ve satisfied hunger, eating more won’t make you more satisfied. What good is more water when your thirst is quenched?

But look at the hell we put ourselves through for what amounts to mere seasoning. We sacrifice time with the people we love, time doing the things we love for…what? The possibility of a slight enhancement? And usually, it’s not even that. Usually, it’s the complete opposite—a diminishment. A person will work a humdrum 9 to 5 to help pay their $600 car note. We stay up late watching TV and then are too tired to rise early and work on something we love. We TikTok without noticing the clock doing the same.

Tranquility. I’ve been thinking about this word nonstop. It’s beautiful. It’s our own inner source of strength and comfort. When everything around us is chaotic, it keeps us at peace. It’s light-hearted and cool-headed in adversity. It’s built on how we view things like happiness, virtue, anxiety, death, desire, and envy. And the best part is that tranquility is something you can have anywhere, anytime.

I found 21 ideas from Seneca’s Letters that have helped me to be more tranquil:

1. All virtue is equal; it can’t be measured in degrees. “Its magnitude is fixed”, it’s complete in itself. And because virtue is the foundation for happiness, happiness cannot be measured in degrees either. To think that you’re “less happy” than someone means you’re not happy at all. In fact, you have the ability to be as happy as the happiest person in the world at this very instant because the happiest person in the world has nothing in terms of goodness—the source of true happiness—that you can’t claim for yourself right now. In a prison or mansion, each moment contains an opportunity to practice a virtue, so each moment is an opportunity for total happiness. “If one is not happy [in every situation] one cannot have attained the highest good.”

2. “The happy life is just one life.” It’s an error to think that someone who lives longer and more far-reaching lives better. The measure of a life is based on its fullness. If you’re fulfilled, what does it matter how someone else is fulfilled? One eats less, the other more. What difference does it make? Both are filled.

3. Death can happen at any time—far into the future or in the next instant. So if we fear death, it follows that we would have to be in constant fear. Same with anxiety. Anything can happen at any moment. If you’re anxious about one thing, what’s stopping you from being anxious about everything else?

4. Do whatever you can to get rid of your vices, even if it means ripping your heart out.

5. The healthier we think our mind, the sicker it is.

6. Suffering is not a good thing. But courageously suffering what we must is a good thing. I used this idea on the treadmill the other day (and have used it since). My legs were in pain and I was out of breath and I still had more to run. I thought about how nice it would be to lie on the couch with a cold bottle of Powerade. But then I thought, wait, Powerade on the couch might sound pleasant but it’s not actually good. My body might feel better on the couch, but it won’t increase my tranquility. If anything, it will diminish my tranquility because I didn’t follow through on something important. At this moment, the ultimate good is to stay on the treadmill.

7. The most dangerous threats are inherently short-lived.

8. What good is it to have done something great but against your will? If you complained while doing it? This is how people tear themselves apart; the body goes one way, the mind another. Reluctance is a foolish way to do anything. Willingness is the key. We should approach each task on our toes, not our heels.

9. Feelings cannot exist in the past or future; therefore, pain cannot exist there either.

10. A person’s excellence is found only in what is unique to human beings: sound judgment. It’s what separates us from plants and animals. Dogs can be louder than us. Whales can make a more soothing sound. Our uniqueness lies in our ability to judge properly. Only by sharpening our reasoning can we hope to attain the excellence of a human being.

11. Don’t give your mind over to whoever or whatever happens to be in your vicinity. Whether it’s people or advertisements or something online, keep your mind on the highest things. Have a conversation in your head with a philosopher instead of Joe Schmo you find yourself next to.

12. If you wish to be richer, don’t add to your riches, lessen your desires. If you wish to be more honorable, don’t add to your honors, lessen your desires. If you wish to have more pleasure, don’t add to your pleasures, lessen your desires. If you wish to live a full life into old age, don’t add to your years, lessen your desires.

13. It’s no big deal to shun extravagance—what’s admirable is to shun even necessities. It’s one thing to have contempt for fancy meals. But what about contempt for bread and water, even when you’re hungry and thirsty? ‘But I’ll starve!’ It’s unlikely you’ll actually starve. What’s more likely is that by lacking contempt for your bodily urges, you’ll lose something more important than a meal: you’ll lose command over yourself.

14. It’s rare that a person fears what he should.

15. If all of your actions are directed toward the right things, there is no need to fear anything because everything you do is simply what needs doing. Like the ants who go about their day putting the world in order as best they can, you simply do what you were made to do. What could be scary about that? I used this idea the other day at work, and it boosted my confidence and helped me think on my toes. I was giving a presentation, and a small hint of anxiety started to warm my chest. I thought, oh my gosh, stop being silly and overthinking it. This is my job. It’s no different from eating and sleeping and driving and being myself—I’m just doing what I do. There’s nothing to think about.

16. This led me to another thought. If everything you do is simply what you do, then there’s nothing to calculate, no reason to hesitate. There’s no “being brave”, there’s just being yourself. ‘That was a really brave thing for her to do.’ No, that was a really her thing for her to do. That’s what she does. She moves from one necessary activity to the next and regards the outcome for each as irrelevant.

17. Until you know what to pursue and what to avoid, all your traveling is wandering.

18. Our lifetime is short, a mere blip, the length of a pinprick. There are no vast amounts of time in our lives; how can there be a vast amount of basically nothing? When we say something happened “just now,” that covers a fair portion of our lives, including the past, because our whole lives are so short. So we must be mindful of how we spend even “small” amounts of time—they account for much of our life!

19. Wisdom means always wanting the same things and always rejecting the same things.

20. Not wanting is the same as having; either way, anxiety is relieved.

21. Grateful is the best state of being. It is divine. At the end of my life, I hope to leave grateful and without complaint, as Marcus Aurelius said, “like an olive that ripens and falls. Praising its mother, thanking the tree it grew on.”

---

Books Read This Month:

–Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis is hilarious. The protagonist, George Babbitt, is caricature-like—an outsized image of the American businessperson. Lewis Sinclair is hilarious in the matter-of-factness he describes what makes his characters tick. Like how Babbitt—the ultimate conformist—is proud of his top-of-the-line alarm clock, happy to wake to such a quality piece of equipment. On paper, he has it all. A lucrative job, a loving family, a big house. Still, he dreams of mistresses and is easily annoyed by his wife and kids. He rides high on boisterous small talk and hearty back-pats with people in his community, only to be irritated moments later when an old lady cuts him off in traffic…only to forget all about it when he gets into his office. It made me think about the silly things we get worked up about. Things we won’t remember next week. Things we won’t even remember in the next hour! Why not save ourselves the trouble and just not get worked up in the first place? The other day, I couldn’t find a parking spot at work and I found myself getting annoyed. Then I thought, Really? You’re getting irritated about this? That’s how Babbitt would react. And I immediately smiled and felt grateful that I have a wonderful job and it’s such a beautiful day and I’m so incredibly lucky to be alive and experience it.

-As I mentioned above, I’ve been working through Letters on Ethics: To Lucilius (The Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca) by Seneca since April, and I finished it last month. It’s 124 letters Seneca wrote to his friend Lucilius on things like joy, gratitude, friendship, ambition, tranquility, how to cope with grief, how to think about death, how to spend your time wisely, what’s worth desiring, what’s worth avoiding. You wonder, how can a book contain so much wisdom? How can a person contain so much wisdom? Reading his letters is like having a conversation with him, and who wouldn’t want to converse with one of the wisest people to have lived? There’s a reason his works have endured through time and why people continue to turn to his writings for comfort and guidance.

–So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson is hilarious. And deep and eye-opening. It’s about, well, public shaming—why it’s a problem and its scary, hidden costs. It’s also superentertaining.

-Oh my goodness, I LOVED When I Stop Talking, You’ll Know I’m Dead by Jerry Weintraub and Rich Cohen. I learned so much about how business works and how deals are made. Weintraub shares how he went from an industry nobody to taking Elvis Presley on a national tour—completely changing the touring business model in the process. And that’s just the start. It’s one entertaining story after another from a guy who had all the top celebrities—Sinatra, Elvis—on speed dial. You realize as you read that it’s a masterclass in confidence, coming up with ideas on the fly, building relationships, and getting things done. And that persistence is even more important than intelligence and connections. Above all, enjoy it. At the age of 72, he reflects, “Savor life, don’t press too hard, don’t worry too much.”

–Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert. I LOVED this one too. I’m obsessed. I was hesitant to read it for some reason, but I’m so glad I did. It’s one of the best books on creativity and authenticity I’ve read. Gilbert says the creative life is the best life, how we have treasures buried within us and that hunting for those treasures and bringing them forth is the most fulfilling way to live. I also loved her humility in her personal stories. While working on her memoir Eat, Pray, Love, she asked her then-boyfriend if she could include him in it. “What’s at stake?” he asked. “Nothing,” she replied. “Trust me—nobody reads my books.” To the reader, she continues, “Over twelve million people ended up reading that book.” It’s funny and inspiring. I highly, highly, highly recommend it.

Nature doesn’t ask questions. It just does what it does.

It’s one of my favorite things Marcus Aurelius talks about, how the birds and the ants and the bees and the plants go about their individual tasks, putting the world in order as best they can.

They’re not coerced or incentivized. They don’t rush. They’re not anxious about the future. They do their job, then they do it again the next day.

They do it willingly.

What good is it, Seneca rhetorically asked, to have accomplished something grand but against your will? If you dragged your feet and complained? If “the body went one way, the mind another…”?

The Stoics compared our free will to a dog attached to a wagon. We can run along with events, or we can be dragged by them.

We can approach each moment on our toes or our heels.

We can trot along with the day or fight against it.

We can do things willingly or unwillingly. Which one we choose is, in large part, the difference between enjoying life and just getting through it.

Oh Yeah, I Remember This Guy

Early in his career, Breaking Bad star Bryan Cranston was auditioning all the time. After each audition, he would nervously wait by the phone to hear if he had gotten the part. “And then when I heard I didn’t get the part, I’d marinate in disappointment and introspection. Could I have done something differently?” 

His wife set him up with a self-help guy who told Cranston he needed to focus on the process, not the outcome. That’s when everything changed. He had been attaching himself to the outcome—setting himself up to expect, and therefore fail. He realized auditions weren’t for competing with other guys; they were for giving something. “I wasn’t there to get a job. I was there to do a job. Simple as that. I was there to give a performance.”

From then on, he focused solely on doing his best. He didn’t always get the job, but that wasn’t his concern. Instead of pacing by the phone after each audition, he would throw the script in a basket when he got home and forget about it. “I’d let go. You can’t fake letting go. You have to really genuinely detach from it. If I’d get a callback, I’d fish out the script and say, ‘Oh yeah, I remember this guy.’”

By being willing to keep showing up and giving his all, he freed himself from self-doubt, negativity, and supplication. Auditioning became enjoyable. How could it not? With the outcome irrelevant, with his concern only on what he did—not what anyone else said or did—he was the most powerful person in any room he walked into.

The Carrot Isn’t That Important

In Arbitrary Stupid Goal, Tamaya Shopsin tells the story of a family her father knew named Wolfawitz. They wanted to go on a vacation but didn’t know where to. They decided on a two-week road trip where they would go to as many places as possible that contained their last name: Wolfpoint, Wolfville, Wolf Lake, Wolf anything. On the way to the Wolf places, they looked up stuff to do and found lots of things that were unexpected and fun: “a hotel in a railroad car, an Alpine slide, a pretzel factory, etc.” Afterward, they felt great. They said it was easily the best vacation they’d been on, but they didn’t know why. “My Father says it was because they stopped trying to accomplish anything,” Shopsin writes. “They just put a carrot in front of them and decided the carrot wasn’t that important but chasing it was.”

Whistling Wilbur

On May 29, 1908, Wilbur Wright traveled to Paris to fly his and Orville’s biplane, the Flyer, publicly for the first time. The French reporters were skeptical of the Wright brothers and anxious to see them fly. Wilbur’s business partner, Hart Berg, assured the journalists that the secret trials were over and that Wilbur would fly before the people within two months. Still in the U.S., Orville shipped the parts for the Flyer, and Wilbur received them on June 16.

Eager to begin assembling the plane, he opened the packages—and was shocked by what he saw. The parts were in terrible condition. Large pieces were smashed, essential ones were missing, and everything was a knotted mess. After his initial burst of anger at what he assumed had been a poor packaging job by Orville (the damage had, he discovered later, occurred during shipment), he rolled up his sleeves. He got to work repairing parts and putting things in order. For parts damaged beyond repair, he would create his own, “making a needle if necessary.” Still, even with outside pressure mounting, he refused to overwork himself. He continued his lifelong observance of the Sabbath, using Sundays to sightsee and write letters. Though he had made significant progress, by August 6, the Flyer was still not in the condition he thought it should be.

Reporters on the scene were growing impatient, calling him stubborn and eccentric and accusing him of being “unnecessarily surly” towards them. Wilbur simply responded, “I did not ask you to come here. I shall [fly] when I’m ready.” Witnesses around that time noted his consistently calm demeanor and the buoyant ease with which he walked to his shed early each day for work, whistling. “The impatience of a hundred thousand persons would not accelerate the rhythm of his stride.” 

Then, on August 8, the weather was right, and Wilbur was ready. People from Le Mans filled the wooden grandstand at the Hunaudieres race course, chatting happily while they waited. Two notable Russian officers were also there: Ernest Archdeacon, a known critic of the Wright brothers, and celebrated French aviator hero Louis Blériot. Still, Wilbur did not appear nervous or excited. He went about inspecting the Flyer from end to end at his own pace. An observer from the press noted, “Neither the impatience of waiting crowds, nor the sneers of rivals, nor the pressure of financial conditions . . . could induce him to hurry. . . .” Then, three hours into the afternoon, Wilbur opened the shed and rolled the Flyer out, “never hurrying in the least.” At 6:30 pm, he took flight. 

The crowd cheered, shouting, “This man has conquered the air!” French Pilot Paul Zens, who had been waiting since morning, told a reporter, “I would have waited ten times as long to have seen what I have seen today.” The enthusiasm was “indescribable”. When he finished his flight, everyone rushed toward him, wanting to shake his hand. Hart Berg “did all he could to keep the men from kissing Wilbur on both cheeks.” Even the typically controlled Wilbur lost his composure around his friend’s ardor. Then, still beaming, “he put his hands in his pockets and walked off whistling,” McCullough writes. “That night, while the normally sleepy town of Le Mans celebrated, the hero retired early to his shed.” Neither criticism nor praise, failure nor success, could keep him from doing his work. Nor could it keep him from whistling while he did it.

---

Books Read This Month:

–Letters From a Self-Made Merchant To His Son by George Horace is excellent. It’s short but packed with tons of wisdom about business and life. Seriously, there’s so much good stuff in here. I highlighted something on almost every other page.

-My dad gave me his copy of The Gospel in Brief by Leo Tolstoy and it’s up there with some of the best books I’ve ever read. Basically, Tolstoy rewrote the Gospel based on what he believed, after years of intense Bible study, were the essential messages of Jesus—the most important being to love all people as you love yourself and to do good for them. Tolstoy said Jesus didn’t care if we went to church. In fact, he discouraged it; rituals and liturgy tend to take our focus away from what’s important. Better to use that time to do good for someone. Tolstoy is refreshingly honest and outspoken about what he saw as evil: the calculated misrepresentation of Jesus’s message. (Also, if you haven’t read A Calendar of Wisdom, you’re in for a treat.)

–High School by Tegan and Sara Quin. I LOVED this book. Literally loved it. It’s one of those books I’m positive will stick with me for the rest of my life. I’m not much younger than Tegan and Sara, so their experiences of life as gay teenagers in the 90s hit close to home. My heart ached for them. I just wanted to hug their teenage selves. I could relate to the sadness and confusion and shame they felt. The dreaded possibility of being a *whisper* lesbian…and the terror of being found out. Their openness and honesty helped me to understand things in myself that I never had before, as if something in me shifted and I’m a little more myself than I was before reading it. If that makes sense. What I found so inspiring about their stories is not that they became world-famous rock stars, which they did, but that they became themselves. I wish more people would read this book. On a side note, I started listening to their music this month for the first time (20 years late to the party, I know), and I currently have their songs on repeat when I run each day.

-I bought The Art of Clear Thinking by Hasard Lee at Changing Hands a few months ago and finally got around to reading it. It’s phenomenal. Lee, a U.S. Air Force stealth fighter pilot who’s flown over eighty combat missions, breaks down how he makes, and how he teaches others to make, split-second life-and-death decisions. (I white-knuckled the first chapter about the 2009 Air France Flight 447 and the human errors that sealed its fate.) This book is super entertaining and teaches how to best make decisions in our own life, however high the stakes.

In May 2014, I flew the nest. Courtney and I found a one-bedroom apartment in the college town of Tempe, Arizona. Rent was $758 per month. Before signing the lease, I called my mom and asked her if she thought I could afford the $379 per month, my half of the rent.

“Well, honey, you have to calculate your monthly expenses. Can you afford it?”

I thought about it. “I don’t know? I think so?”

The day after we moved in, I figured I should get a job. Courtney would appreciate that. The store where I’d been slinging wine and liquor was now an hour’s drive away, so I needed a closer gig.

Around that time, Courtney’s friend from grad school visited. I took it upon myself to show him around his first day here, as Courtney had to work. “Don’t forget, you have to get a job today,” she said as I got in my car. “Oh yeah, thanks for the reminder!”

I wasn’t being sarcastic.

As her friend and I drove around, I looked for jobs. I had experience waitressing, so I stopped in the first sports bar I saw and asked if they were hiring. They were. I could start tomorrow. Sweet. Done with my to-do list for the day!

We drove around some more, and Courtney called. “You won’t believe it,” I told her. “We’re driving by this playground and there’s a rope structure thing that’s, like, three stories high. And kids are climbing to the top. You’d think their parents would be around…” 

“I thought you were getting a job today.”

“Oh! I already got one!”

I was proud of myself. Getting a job could have taken an entire week. And I did it in one day. Before noon!

Fast-forward a few months.

I had become more serious. Responsibility will do that to you. I had a 9 to 5 now. Office job. Sales. The work was stressful and the hours long. But the money was good. If I kept my foot on the gas and kept working harder and faster, I could make more money and buy lots of nice things.

Throughout the next few years, making more money was my only goal. But no matter how much I made or how much I “accomplished,” I was still empty. Was life really just a continuous sprint to acquire bigger commission checks and bigger houses? To go on fancier vacations? That is what I’m spending the majority of my waking hours pursuing? It didn’t make sense to me, but what else was there to aim for? Life started to feel like a sick joke.

One day in 2016, on my way home from work, drained from another day of trying to decipher the meaning of life between an onslaught of phone calls, I was listening to an interview Tim Ferris had with Ryan Holiday, and he said something that shook me. 

Ryan was talking about Marcus Aurelius and how, as emperor of Rome 2,000 years ago, he had been the most powerful man in the world. He could have anything and do anything he wanted. And yet, unlike almost every example I’ve seen of someone with wealth and power, he wasn’t concerned with what he could buy or how many women he could sleep with or how popular he was or any of the other multitude of pleasure traps those with too much time and money ruin themselves in. You know what he was concerned with? How to be a better person. How to control his anxiety and desires. How to do more for people. How to do the right thing.

Whoa. 

It’s one thing to strive to be a better person. It’s another to strive to be a better person while also in a position of absolute power.

Marcus Aurelius, Ryan said, sought something higher than greatness. He sought goodness. And to miss this next point would be to miss the point entirely: it was his goodness that made him great.

Of course, I couldn’t fully grasp the implications at the time. Still, the contours for a different model of success were forming in my mind. Maybe there was nothing inherently good in what I was pursuing. Perhaps that was the problem, the source of my frustration. A meaningful life has a purpose beyond itself. It has a north star, a destination we’ll never quite reach but should always be reaching for. We must pursue something higher, or we’ll walk in circles. Or worse, spiral down.

I immediately devoured everything on Stoicism, though I’m not sure it would have impacted my life as significantly had it not been for Ryan Holiday. He contextualized it. He made it accessible. He championed its validity—something no one was doing with an ancient philosophy—and showed how it’s just as relevant today. 

His advice was pragmatic. He didn’t say, ‘Stay positive and you can do anything you put your mind to!’ He said, “Yeah, things might impede your path, but nothing can impede your will. You can turn any obstacle into an advantage.”

He was explicit. He didn’t say, ‘Humility is good.’ He said, unequivocally, Ego is the Enemy. It was pointed. You couldn’t ignore it. You had to either accept or reject it. (It took me a while to fully accept it, so entrenched was my belief that ego was a good thing.)

When I finally accepted that ego was leading me astray, everything changed. My idea of what was worth pursuing changed. Material things, awards, praise…without ego, what good were they?

When I removed ego from the equation, what I wanted from life became clear: as much time as possible with my wife and family, and a stable job that paid well but left me with enough energy to think and write. I went from trying to decide on a specific career I’d like to have, to thinking about the day-to-day life I wanted to live. I went from thinking about who I wanted to be as a professional to who I wanted to be as a person.

Once I clarified how I wanted to live, I realized my best bet would be to get my degree. It would take years—a fact that had always deterred me. But now I gladly embraced it. Because it was my way forward. It was in my control. Maybe nothing would change once I had my degree, but that wasn’t my concern. I knew I was doing the right thing for the right reasons. Everything else was background noise. My goal was to pass one class, then the next. Learn to write one line of code, then the next. There would be setbacks and obstacles, but I could adjust. I could be patient. And I could be happy all the while.

The Stoics called this euthymia—the tranquility that comes from knowing you’re on the right path. (I’ll never forget where I was when I read one of my favorite lines in The Daily Stoic: “Who cares if someone is bubbly when times are good? What kind of accomplishment is that?”) The Stoics had a sober, constant joy—joy they controlled by doing the right things each day. As Ryan put it, “Here’s how to guarantee you have a good day: do good things.”

Ryan showed me what was worth pursuing and how to build the life I envisioned in 2016: a life of love, service, wisdom, balance, and time. It’s the reason I’m able to write these newsletters.

And it’s the reason I had to go to Texas.

As I shared in May’s email, Courtney and I flew to Austin, Texas last month and then drove down to Bastrop to visit Ryan and Sam Holiday’s bookstore, The Painted Porch. (What’s especially cool about their bookstore is that they only sell books they’ve read and recommend. You can get great recommendations just by browsing their website.) It was surreal being there in person. We browsed for about an hour, bought ~15 books, then went across the street for lunch.

After we ate, we decided to drive back to Austin, having accomplished our mission of going to The Painted Porch. But as we made our way to the parking lot behind the strip of stores, I felt disappointed. I knew full well before we went to Bastrop that there was less than a 1% chance I’d be able to meet Ryan. But being there, being so close, made me forget about the near-zero odds thing. Knowing I might never be this close again, and knowing, according to his daily schedule posted all over his socials and therefore not creepy for me to know, he’s likely there right now, writing in his second-story office above the bookstore, the guy who almost single-handedly turned my life around…I at least wanted to meet and thank him!

On a whim, I decided to walk to the back of the bookstore. I climbed the ramp to the wooden deck with picnic tables and took a picture of the famous orange wall painted with ancient philosophers.

“I don’t think you’re allowed to be up there,” Courtney said.

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” I sighed, looking around.

Then, in an upper window, I saw a white guy with dark hair taking a swig from a water bottle.

“Holy shit. I think I just saw him.”

I asked Courtney what I should do. Run around to the front of the store and ask if it was okay to say hi to him? Or would I just embarrass myself when they told me no?

Courtney asked, “What will you regret more: trying and failing, or not trying at all?”

“That one.”

Ten seconds later, Ryan zoomed out of the back door, deep in conversation with possibly his assistant, walked past us, and rounded the corner. I looked at Courtney. This was it.

I walked quickly to catch up, and just as he was about to enter an obscure side door, I called out, “Ryan.”

He turned around, and I began to apologize.

“I’m so, so sorry. I know how busy you are.”

“No, no, no, you’re good,” he smiled, walking toward us.

I shook his hand and told him how long I’d been following him and his work, and he seemed genuinely surprised and flattered. He asked us where we were from and what we’d been up to and what books we picked up. Courtney said something that made him laugh, and then she took a picture of us.

I don’t say this lightly when I say he could not have been sweeter to us. Just the nicest guy. I don’t remember much of what I said, but Courtney assured me it was nothing weird. One thing I do remember was tearing up, looking him directly in the eyes, and thanking him for everything he’s taught me. It was an experience I will never, ever forget.

One last thing.

While writing this email, I realized that we met Ryan exactly ten years to the month after moving in together. I really am not trying to be sappy, but I feel something essential would be missing from this newsletter if I didn’t state the obvious: I would never have cared enough to learn philosophy if it wasn’t for Courtney. Not only that, she’s been teaching me Stoicism, unknowingly, this whole time. She’s the one who, after I failed the first test I took in my first week back in school and said I was going to drop the class and try it again next semester, put her foot down and said she wasn’t going to watch me quit every time it got hard. She’s the one who showed me what self-reliance looked like. The one who, after I told her my crazy idea to travel 1,000 miles for a bookstore, took her phone out and booked our flight without a question.

While Ryan’s teachings and Stoic philosophy got me on the right course and guided my sail, it’s been my wife, all along, lighting the way home.

---

Books Read This Month:

-I bought Composed by Rosanne Cash while at The Painted Porch last month. It took a while to get into, but once I did, I thoroughly enjoyed it. One story in particular stuck with me as a beautiful example of kindness. Rosanne was sitting at home and talking with her stepmother, June, when the phone rang. June picked it up, and after a while, Rosanne wandered into a different room—it was obvious June was in a deep conversation. When Rosanne returned to the room 10 or 15 minutes later, June was still fully absorbed in conversation. Finally, about 20 minutes later, June hung up and, with the biggest smile, said what a wonderful conversation she just had. June went on and on about the woman she’d spoken with—how many kids she had, a personal loss she recently experienced, where she lived, etc. Rosanne asked, “Well, June, who was it?” June said, “Why, honey, it was a wrong number.”

–In the Heart of the Sea by Nathaniel Philbrick…wow, this is one of the best real-life thriller/adventure stories I’ve read. An enraged sperm whale sank the Essex whaling ship in the early 1800s. Only 8 out of the 22 on board survived the three months of torture that followed. (Endurance is another shipwreck story I read recently, which was good, but I liked this one more.) I won’t spoil it and give away details, but their ordeal was unimaginable. It reads like a thriller. It’s no surprise it won a National Book Award.

-My friend recommended When the Game Was War by Rich Cohen, and it’s one of the best sports books I’ve read. Cohen brings together the journeys of the NBA’s four most prominent names in the 1980s—Isiah Thomas, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and Michael Jordan. It’s an entertaining read, but there’s also great stuff on leadership, craft, and opening doors for others. On a side note, I think we’re living in another golden era of basketball with Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese. 

-Though I loved Courage is Calling and Discipline is Destiny, Ryan Holiday’s newest book, Right Thing, Right Now, about justice, might be my favorite of his virtue series. It’s about kindness and doing good for others and ourselves. But it goes way beyond that. He shows how idealism and sentiment aren’t enough. If we want to make lasting changes in the world, we need to understand the force that drives it: power. We may not like it, but that’s the way it is. “Anyone who wants to do good in this world,” he writes, “must be a student of power. Anyone who wants to do something other than sit around and wait for change must read Machiavelli and Robert Greene.” It reads as an urgent wake-up call that the world desperately needs.

P.S. If you’re new to Stoicism, there’s no better place to start than with The Daily Stoic.