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The Daily Stoic

This Is How The Weak Beat The Strong | Ask Daily Stoic

The Daily Stoic

Daily Stoic | Backyard Ventures

Education, 694393, Daily Stoic, Society & Culture, Stoic, Stoicism, Self-improvement, Business, Stoic Philosophy, Philosophy, Ryan Holiday

4.64.7K Ratings

🗓️ 18 September 2025

⏱️ 19 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

You may not have a lot of money. Or powerful connections. Or even superior genetics. Does this mean you’re at a disadvantage?


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Transcript

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0:00.0

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

0:11.7

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

0:18.8

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

0:24.2

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

0:33.0

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

0:40.3

For more, visit Dailystoic.com.

0:59.3

This is how the weak beat the strong.

1:04.5

You may not have a lot of money or powerful connections or even superior genetics.

1:08.9

Does this mean you're at a disadvantage that you're screwed?

1:12.9

Maybe that you're at a disadvantage? Yes. Does it mean you're screwed? No, because there is a great leveler out there. The famous Princeton basketball coach,

1:19.9

Pete Carroll, would tell his young athletes that his father came from a province in Spain and worked

1:25.1

for years in the open hearth the Bethlehem Steel Company.

1:30.1

Every day before he left for work, Carol would say he would remind my sister and I how important

1:35.1

it was to be smart. In this life, he would say, the big, strong guys are always taking from the

1:42.0

smaller, weaker guys. But he said, the smart take from the strong.

1:48.6

It's simple fatherly wisdom. You've got to use your brain. It is the secret weapon of underdogs

1:54.3

everywhere, always available and always free. Think of David deciding to use his sling in the fight against Goliath. Think of the

2:04.2

stoic opposition outmatched and outgunned by the many tyrants of their time, and yet they managed to get

2:10.3

inside the heads of these tyrants. They managed to win in the long battle history.

2:18.4

Think of the wealthiest and most powerful people of antiquities sitting at the feet of Epictetus, former slave.

2:24.6

Think of Stockdale and the Hanoi Hilton getting into long debates with his captors about Marxism and winning.

2:30.6

Life is a thinking person's game.

...

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