Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we bring you a stoic-inspired meditation

designed to help you find strength and insight and wisdom into everyday life.

Each one of these episodes is based on the 2,000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of

history's greatest men and women to help you learn from them, to follow in their example,

and to start your day off with a little dose of courage and discipline and justice and wisdom.

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It's always the right time to do the right thing.

He could have waited.

He could have gotten the land cleared.

He could have waited until he was on firm or financial footing.

He could have waited until his children were older.

There were a million reasons that Ulysses S. Grant could have rationalized holding on to the slave that his father-in-law had given him.

His family was in desperate straits.

Could have worked out a deal with William Jones, the slave, to earn his freedom.

He could have told himself that he was one of the kinder owners and that the problem with slavery wasn't people like him but monsters further south.

He could have ruminated on the dilemma for months, turning it over a thousand times in his mind, all the while benefiting from the labor they needed for the farm.

But as we tell the story and right thing right now, Ulysses S. Grant made the expensive decision to do the right thing.

He granted Jones their freedom on March 29, 1859.

He was opposed to slavery. He didn't want to be a part of it, so he decided not to be.

Look, there is always going to be a way for us to delay doing what needs to be

done. There is always an excuse, a rationalization, a reason. We tell ourselves it's not that bad.

We tell ourselves we need to wait until we're more secure. We distract ourselves with busyness,

...