Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast.

Each day we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoic's illustrated with stories

from history, current events, and literature to help you be better at what you do.

And at the beginning of the week, we try to do a deeper dive, setting a kind of Stoic

intention for the week, something to meditate on, something to think on, something to leave

you with, to journal about whatever it is you're happy to be doing.

So let's get into it.

How to achieve things.

It's always been difficult to concentrate.

And one of his letters, Seneca talks about trying to write while Rome resounds beneath

him with noise.

There are street sellers and protesters in a fight in blacksmiths screaming and yelling

and hammering down below.

Now, add to those typical sounds of the outside world, the chaos of our personal world, the

buzzing iPhone and overflowing inbox and endless Zoom meetings.

And you get a daily nightmare.

But if we wish to succeed as Seneca did, we must find a way to tune this all out.

But if we want to achieve great things in our chosen fields, we must figure out this puzzle

just as every great man and woman has in their own pursuit of greatness.

In a hunting metaphor, Oliver Wendell Holmes once explained, if you want to hit a bird

on the wind, you must have all your will and focus.

You must not be thinking about yourself and equally you must not be thinking about your

...