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Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we bring you a passage of ancient

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

Each one of these passages is based on the

2,000-year-old philosophy that has guided some of history's greatest men and

women. For more you can visit us at daily stoic.com.

It's very easy to be jaded, it's very easy to be cynical. The system is as it was in Rome hopelessly broken.

Corruption, dishonesty, and stupidity are all widespread. The odds are impossible. The

problems enormous.

So why care?

Why even try?

The answer the Stoics would say is because you matter, because an individual can make a difference.

Imagine if Epictetus had told himself that all was hopeless and that Rome was impossible to change or correct.

Not only would his life have been different, but so too would Marcus Aurelius and millions of other Romans. General James Mattis reminds us that

cynicism is a form of cowardice. It's also a self-fulfilling prophecy. If we tell ourselves that

it's pointless, that we can't make a difference, that we don't matter, we're right. But it's pointless that we can't make a difference that we don't matter we're right but it's

worse than that because someone will step in to fill that void and it's likely that this

person who you will be deferring to is allied with the people and the forces that made you cynical in the first place.

A writer recently wrote a piece in the New York Times about his decision to vote in a primary in his state in the deep south,

even though his political preferences were not even close to being represented.

As it happens in choosing between the lesser of two evils, the man cast the deciding vote in the election.

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