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.

We keep this from our kids. We tell them inspiring stories.

We tell them the history we're proud of.

We tell them they can be anything they want to be.

We tell them that everything is going to be okay, that they are safe.

Of course we are lying.

Or at least, we're not being fully honest.

Life is short and the world is at least half terrible, Maggie Smith writes in her beautiful poem,

Good Bones.

And for every kind stranger, there is one who would break you.

Though I keep this from my children.

We keep this from our children, she writes, because we are trying to sell them in the world.

We are trying to paint a picture for them of a world at its best,

a world defined by cooperation and compassion,

not by fractious tribal primates

fighting over resources.

That's the picture we're painting over

because we need our kids to have hope.

We need them to believe in a better future.

We need them to buy in.

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