Welcome to the Daily Dad podcast, where we provide one lesson every single day to help you with your most important job, being a parent.

I'm Ryan Holiday, and I draw these lessons from ancient philosophy, modern psychology, practical wisdom, and

insights from parents just like you all over the world. Thank you for listening, and we hope this helps.

The things you leave behind. Plutarch recorded the story that Socrates went to the fanciest neighborhood in Athens

and called out,

What are you doing, men?

You are giving all possible attention to acquiring money,

but small thought to your sons to whom you are to leave it.

As Socrates pointed out, money is just one piece of a legacy puzzle. Near the end of his

life, President Truman left this note to his daughter. From a financial standpoint, your father has

not been a shining success, he said, but he has tried to leave you something that, as Mr. Shakespeare

says, cannot be stolen, an honorable reputation and a good name.

You must continue that heritage and see not that it is spoiled, he said.

One of Truman's contemporaries, the legendary speaker of the house, Sam Rayburn, once corrected someone

who claimed that Rayburn's father hadn't left him much when he died.

Yes, said Rayburn, my father died poor, but he gave me my untarnished name.

Your legacy is what your children will remember when they think of you.

It is built with the gestures and the habits and the education you share with them,

the books you read together, and the education you share with them, the books

you read together, and the example you set for how you think a good person should live.

But that doesn't mean that one should leave your children unprotected, unprovided for,

as they say, what about someone who can do both, right? And that's what we're talking

...