You Can’t Predict the Future, But You Can Predict This | Judge Yourself, Not Others
The Daily Stoic
Daily Stoic | Backyard Ventures
4.5 • 5.3K Ratings
🗓️ 16 November 2020
⏱️ 8 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
"Few saw the pandemic coming. But certainly the woefully inadequate response, at all levels, was predicted by many.
The same is true for most events, in politics, in sports, in business, in life. It’s next to impossible to know what adversity or what good luck will fall in someone’s lap. How they’ll be able to handle this—whether they’ll rise to the occasion, be corrupted or destroyed by it—on the other hand? That’s much easier to see coming.
A simple Stoic maxim guides us: Character is fate."
Ryan shows how character predicts so much about our fate, and also reads over the week's intention from the Daily Stoic Journal, on today's Daily Stoic Podcast.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, prime members. You can listen to the Daily Stoic podcast early and add free on Amazon music download the app today |
| 0:10.4 | Welcome to the Daily Stoic podcast each day. We bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics |
| 0:17.5 | Illustrated with stories from history |
| 0:19.5 | Current events and literature to help you be better at what you do and at the beginning of the week |
| 0:24.3 | We try to do a deeper dive setting a kind of Stoic intention for the week something to meditate on |
| 0:30.0 | Something to think on something to leave you with to journal about whatever it is you happen to be doing |
| 0:35.8 | So let's get into it |
| 0:39.6 | You can't predict the future, but you can predict this few saw the pandemic coming |
| 0:45.5 | But certainly the woefully inadequate response at all levels was predicted by many |
| 0:50.9 | The same is true for most events in politics and sports and business and life |
| 0:55.5 | It's impossible to know what adversity or what good luck will fall in someone's lap |
| 1:00.2 | How they'll be able to handle this whether they'll rise to the occasion be corrupted or destroyed by it on the other hand |
| 1:06.7 | That's much easier to see coming a simple Stoic maximum guides us |
| 1:11.8 | Character is fate if someone is egotistical selfish and capable of processing the information that contradicts what they want to hear |
| 1:19.3 | They will not do well in a crisis if an organization or a person is poorly prepared |
| 1:24.3 | If they are obsessed with distractions if they value ideology over truth posturing over process |
| 1:30.0 | They will not do well either if a sports team suddenly finds itself in a critical game |
| 1:35.0 | But the team's culture is a bad one. It won't matter how talented they are |
| 1:39.4 | Conversely if a person or a team cares about other people if they have put in the work if they know how to learn and grow and adjust |
| 1:45.7 | They will find a way to succeed |
| 1:47.7 | There is also a better chance that they'll remain uncorrupted and spoiled by this success if it occurs |
| 1:53.6 | Look at Marcus Aurelius. He was granted all sorts of incredible power |
... |
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