Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoke podcast early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today.

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 DailyStoic.com.

Don't run from pain, embrace it. It makes sense that we avoid pain. We don't want to cause it and we don't want to feel it. We'd rather life be easy. This makes sense, at least in the short term.

But the Stoics knew that in the long term such an attitude made you weak, made you soft. The NASCAR driver and student of Stoicism, Brad Keselowski, recently talked about how Stoicism has taught him to take whatever is hardest and most difficult in his life and double down and appreciate it.

Because it's teaching you something because it's making you stronger. Too many people run from pain, he said, but that's the wrong way to do it. Over time, Brad said, you start to realize that pain is your body flushing out weakness.

In Seneca's writing, we see that theme come up time and time again. Don't be afraid of challenges. They are preparing you for an uncertain future.

In Marcus Aurelius, we see him look even at physical pain. We get the sense that Marcus had some chronic injuries or illnesses.

And he saw this as a kind of crucible that was forging him into being a stronger person. You can endure this, you would say over and over again. You can get through this. You will get through this.

Of course, we should not be glib about pain or misfortune in life, but we can take all these ideas and apply them to what we face today.

There's no need to turn away from what comes our way. Instead, we can embrace it. We can double down and appreciate what we had to do even though it's hard.

We can endure, we can flush, we can miss out, and we can become stronger and better for it, whatever it is.

And related to this idea of embracing challenges, the good news is we've just released our first ever Daily Stoke Challenge Deck.

You've loved our challenges in the past, those digital challenges. This is a physical card challenge. It's 30 different challenges designed to help you test your mind and body and become a better you.

Each challenge card gives you a challenge for the day and illustration and a stoke quote to inspire you. You can get yours now at dailystoke.com slash store.

Hey, prime members, you can listen to the Daily Stoke early and add free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon music app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondering Plus in Apple podcasts.

Free speech is essential to a functioning democracy. Do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle? What should be done? Is a new platform needed? Is Twitter dying?

I'm David Brown, host of the new Wondering Podcast, flipping the bird, Elon versus Twitter. Join us as we unravel the fascinating story of Elon Musk's unexpected bid to buy Twitter and all of the drama that has happened since then.

Those still employed at Twitter soon saw the company and its culture morphed into something they didn't recognize.

He laid off 75% of the Twitter workhorse, reinstated exceedingly problematic and dangerous users, and even encouraged his staff to sleep in the office.

X employees, Elon's critics and fellow CEOs were quick to denounce him as an in-over-his-head rich guy. His Elon all talker are his unruly methods.

Actually the work of a genius. Follow flipping the bird, Elon versus Twitter, wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, prime members, you can listen to episodes and add free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon music app today.

...