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Welcome to the Daily Stoke. For each day, we read a short passage designed to help you cultivate the strength, insight, wisdom necessary for living good life.

Each one of these passages is based on the 2000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and women. For more, you can visit us at DailyStoke.com.

Don't blend in, stand up and stand out. In a famous exchange, which we talked about a while back on this podcast, a grippinous explained why he was spurning an invitation to attend some banquet being put on by Nero.

Not only was he spurning it, he said, but he had not even considered associating with such a madman. A fellow philosopher, the one who had felt inclined to attend asked for an explanation. A grippinous responded with an interesting analogy.

He said that most people see themselves like threads in a garment. They see it as their job to match the other threads in color and style. They want to blend in so the fabric will match.

But a grippinous did not want to blend in. I want to be the red, he said, that small and brilliant portion which causes the rest to appear comely and beautiful. Be like the majority of people.

And if I do that, how shall I any longer be the red? He wanted to be red even if it meant being beheaded or exiled because he felt it was right because he wouldn't be anything other than his true self.

It's like Mark Twins line, when we find ourselves on the side of the majority we should pause and reflect. Because it means we might be going along with the mob.

We might have turned off our own mind. We might have muted our colors. We might be betraying our own truth.

Our job as philosophers, as thinkers, as citizens is not to go along, to get along. We are not just another replaceable thread and an otherwise unremarkable garment.

Our job is to stand up, to stand out, to speak truth, to never blend in. And in doing so, we make the most beautiful contribution of all.

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From Wondery comes a new series, flipping the bird, Elon versus Twitter. A story about what happens when the richest man on the planet decides to acquire a powerful social media company in the name of free speech. But does he have what it takes?

It started off promising. Or is this all just about Elon?

He's essentially mad that his tweets aren't performing as well as he wouldn't expect them to. But really just felt like, okay, this really is just a platform being ruled by a dictator who does things on his own limbs.

And what will be left of Twitter by the time he's done?

Basically, my entire team was gone. By the end of it, infrastructure was just completely gutted. He'll like tweet a thing and then everyone's like, we got a word on that now because he tweeted it.

I'm supposed to believe this man is a genius. It just felt like everything was kind of descending into chaos.

While I'm flipping the bird, wherever you get your podcast, hey, prime members, you can listen episodes at free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon music app today.

The 10% happier podcast hosted by me, Dan Harris, has one overarching message. Happiness is a skill. The mind is trainable. So why not get involved with this?

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