You Can Get Away From It All Anytime You Like | 12 Stoic Ways to Quiet Your Mind

The Daily Stoic

In this episode of The Daily Stoic, Ryan Holiday explores the concept of achieving mental stillness and tranquility through Stoic practices.

Key takeaways

• True tranquility is achieved internally; Marcus Aurelius noted that nowhere is more peaceful than one's own soul.
• Stillness is not a lack of action but requires immense discipline and self-control, as practiced by Seneca.

Main topics

• Stoic principles of stillness
• The psychological impact of news media

Notable quotes

Nowhere you can go is more peaceful, more free of interruptions than your own soul.

Conclusion

The episode provides actionable Stoic wisdom for finding mental clarit

Transcript preview

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It automatically surfaces custom insights throughout your day. AI agents work alongside to help you solve problems and handle routine work. And anytime you have a question, you just ask, just like having a conversation with a colleague. NetSuite is customized for a wide variety of industries, so it supports the way your business truly works. Whether that company earns millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars, it's time for NetSuite Next. For the first time ever, you can try NetSuite Next for free. If your revenues are at least in the seven figures, go to netsuite.ai. slash stoic. It's built for every industry, ready for every boardroom, netsuite.ai slash Speaker 2 (1:30) stoic. Speaker 3 (1:31) Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world. Speaker 3 (1:46) You can get away from it all any time you like. It would certainly be nicer, it would be quieter, it would be an escape from all this, the work, the annoying people, the noise, the heat, the responsibilities. This is why we dream of vacations, of the open road, of getting out into the woods or to the ocean. People try to get away from it all, to the country, to the beach, to the mountains, Mark Shreilis writes in Meditations. You always wish that you could do that too. Of course the emperor of Rome wished for all that. We all do. The thing is, he said, we can, and he could, any time he liked, in fact. Not by traveling, but by going within, he said. Nowhere you can go is more peaceful, more free of interruptions than your own soul. An instant's recollection, and there it is, complete tranquility. And by tranquility, he said, he meant a kind of harmony. So keep getting away from it all like that. Renew yourself, but keep it brief and basic. A quick visit should be enough and send you back ready to face what awaits you. Speaker 2 (2:55) We all want to get away Speaker 3 (2:57) from time to time, and too often we imagine that peace is somewhere else, somewhere that requires time, money, or distance to reach. But Marcus reminds us that stillness doesn't depend on where we are. You don't have to escape your life to get away from it for a moment. You just have to retreat into yourself, and then return, renewed, to whatever is waiting for you. Speaker 3 (3:29) This moment is enough. I don't need to be anywhere. I don't need to do anything. I don't need to become anything other than I am at this very moment, at this very place that I am in this very instant. That's it. It's enough. Speaker 3 (3:47) Stillness, it seems easy. It seems like the absence of action or discipline, but it really requires an immense amount of discipline and self-control. That's what Seneca was practicing there. in that busy, noisy environment trying to focus. In fact, Seneca said there is no greatness without stillness. Someone who's successful, but they're frenzied and busy and chaotic. Nobody wants to be that person. In fact, that's a horrible person to be. It's what Marcus Aurelius had to practice amidst the stresses and distractions of his job. And it's what we all have to practice in the chaos and busyness of modern life. I'm Ryan Holiday. I've written books about stoic philosophy. I've been lucky enough to speak about it to the NBA and the NFL. And one of those books I wrote is called Stillness is the Key. And it's about how Stillness unlocks our potential, not just for professional success, but for personal happiness and contentment. And that's what we're going to talk about in today's episode. Stoic secrets, stoic strategies about achieving this stillness, which unlocks so much of what we need in life. Nietzsche said that only ideas had while walking have any worth. I don't know if that's strictly true, but I do know I've had a lot of really good ideas walking. And that's just like an extra benefit. I mean, you're outside, you're active. Ideally, you're not on the phone. Maybe you're with people that you care about. You're present. Doing what human beings were evolved to do over thousands and thousands of years. So I try not to let a single day go by without walking. It rests. It relaxes the mind. It centers me. I try to start the day with the walk. I try to end the day with the walk. The mind must be given over to relaxation to take wandering walks. It's part of the philosophical process. It's part of my daily routine. Speaker 2 (5:25) And it should be part of your daily Speaker 3