Ryan Holiday Profile picture
Feb 20 9 tweets 3 min read
6 pieces of timeless parenting advice from three great Stoic sages:
1/ We don't control what happens, only how we respond

Circumstances are not up to us, but we always have the ability to control what kind of parent we are.

Parents who only focus on what they can control are much happier than those battling against what they can’t control.
2/ Deeds not words

If you want to teach your kids, it’s not going to be with words. You have to show them that you live according to the rules you set and the values you tell them are important.

“Don’t talk about your philosophy,” Epictetus famously said, “embody it.”
3/ Tame your temper

Anger is “the ugliest and most savage of all emotions,” Seneca once said.

It doesn’t matter how stressed we are or what is happening around us, our anger is our problem. Not theirs.
4/ Memento Mori

“Remember that you will die.”

Life is short. Be present with your kids and love them while you still can.
5/ Learn with them

Seneca famously said that the path to wisdom could be walked by finding just one thing a day.

You don’t have to conduct lectures like Epictetus to be a teacher. Seneca’s teaching came in the form of sharing what he was learning.
6/ Courage. Discipline. Justice. Wisdom.

If you ever find anything better in life than these four virtues, Marcus Aurelius said, it must be an extraordinary thing indeed.

As a parent, you must model these virtues and teach your kids—by example and instruction—how they can too.
That's 6 pieces of timeless parenting advice.

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More from @RyanHoliday

Jan 18
50 (short) rules for a better life:
1/ Wake up early.
2/ Ask: Am I using this technology, or is it using me?
3/ Forget about outcomes—focus on making a little progress every day.
4/ Say no (a lot).
5/ Read something every day.
6/ Don’t watch television news.
7/ Comparison = unhappiness.
8/ Journal.
9/ Strenuous exercise every single day.
10/ Character is fate.
Read 12 tweets
Jan 13
If you only read a few books in 2023, read these:
1/ A Calendar of Wisdom by Leo Tolstoy

“Daily study,” Tolstoy wrote, is “necessary for all people.”

Tolstoy dreamed of creating a book with “a wise thought for every day of the year, from the greatest philosophers of all times and all people.”
As you can imagine, I am a big fan of daily devotionals (@dailystoic and @dailydademail)
Read 11 tweets
Dec 30, 2022
10 ways to create better habits in 2023:
1/ Think small

@jamesclear defines “atomic habits” as small habits that makes an enormous difference in your life.

Repetitive actions, he says, accumulate and add up in a big way over time.

Don’t promise you’re going to read more; instead, commit to reading one page per day.
2/ Lengthen your timeline

The one habit that makes all other habits possible is patience.

It always takes longer than you think it’s going to take. That’s Hofstader’s law.

If you can practice delayed gratification, you’re almost always going to be more successful.
Read 13 tweets
Dec 28, 2022
These Are 11 Things Stoics DON'T Do:
1/ Don't suffer imagined troubles

Seneca said, "we suffer more in imagination than in reality."

“Don’t let your imagination be crushed by life as a whole,” Marcus Aurelius reminded himself.

Focus on the present. Don't think about the monsters that may or may not be up ahead.
2/ Don't always have an opinion

It’s possible, Marcus Aurelius said, to not have an opinion. He said that not everything is asking to be judged by you.

Remember: “You always own the option of having no opinion.”
Read 14 tweets
Dec 8, 2022
The world is complicated, paradoxical, and contradictory.

To make sense of it, to thrive in it, you must cultivate what John Keats called “Negative Capability”—the ability to hold conflicting ideas in your head at the same time.

Here are 8 ways to cultivate Negative Capability:
1/ Read widely & from people you disagree with

Epicurus said, “One sage is no wiser than another.”

The Stoics believed this too—that we should actively engage with anyone who can be a source of wisdom to us, regardless of the school of thought from which that wisdom arose.
2/ Study deeply

Marcus Aurelius chided himself “not to be satisfied with just getting the gist of it.” Instead, go “directly to the seat of knowledge.”

Seek out tutors and mentors. Linger, as Seneca said, on a small number of master thinkers, reading and re-reading their work.
Read 11 tweets
Dec 3, 2022
Procrastinating "is the biggest waste of life," the Stoic philosopher Seneca wrote. "It snatches away each day...and denies us the present by promising the future."

Want to stop wasting your life?

Here are 8 Stoic tactics to beat procrastination:
1. Take it action by action

"Don’t let your imagination be crushed by life as a whole," Marcus Aurelius wrote. Remember, he adds, everything is built action by action. Zeno, the founder of Stoicism, said, “Well-being is realized by small steps, but is truly no small thing.”
2. Create a routine

“Life without a design is erratic,” Seneca wrote, and full of uncertainty. Procrastination feeds on uncertainty. Routine eliminates that uncertainty. We know what we do and when we do it. Procrastination is boxed out—by the order and clarity you built.
Read 10 tweets

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