Welcome to the Daily Dad podcast where we provide one lesson every day to help you with your

most important job being a dad. These are lessons inspired by ancient philosophy, by practical

wisdom, and insights from dads all over the world.

Thank you for listening, and we hope this helps.

Be Spartan with your wealth.

The Emperor Hadrian never had a son, so he devised a very specific

succession plan. He adopted a 51-year-old man named Antoninus Pius in the condition that he

adopt Marcus Aurelius. He thought this would provide for five years of training for Marcus,

and instead Antoninus lived and instructed for 23.

You might think that being a prince in waiting for that long, being the heir to the richest

and most powerful man in the world would ruin a person. It ruined Caligula. It ruined Nero.

It's ruined the children of plenty of people in positions of far less privilege.

But biographer Frank

McLean gives some insight into how Marcus became an exception. Antoninus was known for his generosity.

He gifted people, his money, he canceled debt, he lent out his own money at interest below market

rates, and he paid out of pocket to distribute food in times of famine. But in his

private life, he had a Spartan attitude to money, McLean writes. When his wife once scolded him for

his penny pinching within the household, Antoninus replied, now that we have gained an empire, we have

lost even what we had before. Marcus wouldn't be handed anything. He had to

earn his keep. It seemed mean and cruel from the outside looking in, but some 30 years later,

Marcus would write in his journal what he had learned from his adopted father, hard work,

persistence, self-reliance always. So it must go with your kids. Don't spoil them. Keep a Spartan

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