A piece I am working on for a startup founder community I recently started and also thinking of using in social for audience building. Any and all feedback encouraged! //////// Where my Ernest Hemingway and/or Ryan Holliday fans at? This one is for you. First Ryan Holliday - the man synonymous with Stoicism and an amazing example of Audience Community Product (lmk if interested and I'll do a short teardown on that in another piece). His book "The Obstacle is the Way" is literally in every NFL locker room (and that of many other sports) and he is one of the most sought after speakers by sporting teams to discuss the principles of this book. "The Obstacle Is the Way" draws inspiration from Stoicism, presenting the idea that the challenges and obstacles we face in life are opportunities for growth rather than impediments. Holiday argues that our perception of obstacles, our actions in response to them, and our will to endure are crucial to overcoming difficulties. By embracing obstacles and treating them as opportunities to practice virtue, develop resilience, and adapt, we can find success and inner peace. The book uses historical anecdotes and philosophical teachings to illustrate how to turn obstacles into advantages. So how does a 21st century author who writes a lot about a 2nd century Roman emperor (Marcus Aurelius) tie back to one of the greatest authors of the 20th century (and arguably all time)? Enter Hemingway's Suitcase - one of the wildest stories from Hemingway's life and the stuff of literary legend. One that simultaneously destroyed his first marriage and served as the catalyst to his future fame and success. In December 1922 Hemingway, then an unpublished fictional author living with the Lost Generation artists in Paris, was stationed in Geneva on a journalistic assignment. Hemingway's wife Hadley had stayed behind in Paris to nurse a cold but the couple had plans to meetup in Chambry after the assignment. Hemingway had been urging Hadley to come sooner to meet him and in one of the communiques mentioned meeting a publisher who expressed interest in his works. Hadley, in a very tender act of love, decided to pack all of Hemingway's manuscripts, including the carbon copies, and surprise him in Geneva so he could share his work. In a cruel twist of fate, Hadley left the suitcase full of manuscripts momentarily unattended at the Paris train station and the suitcase vanished. A despondent Hadley boarded the long train ride to Geneva dreading the disastrous news she had to deliver to her husband.

This is something I learned in one of my business groups. Figure out the daily tasks that will get you to your goal, and do them. You have something like this? Mine are: - write (60 mins) - Edit (30 mins) - Revenue Generating activity (60 mins) - Meditate (15 min) - Read (15 min) - Study french (15 min) - Study business (30 min) - Exercise Doesn't seem like much but just a little progress on these things each day over the course of a lifetime is exponential. What do you do daily ?

After studying and applying Stoicism for a couple months, I was and still am quite surprised on its emphasize of virtue (being the highest good), something I believed to already have developed or be in development of through Christianity, stoic literature and wisdom surely finds another method to help the reader develop connections to become and develop virtuous characteristics, something that I struggled significantly in Christian teachings. fun fact: Early Christian thinkers, such as Justin Martyr and Clement of Alexandria, were influenced by Stoic philosophy. They admired the Stoics' ethical teachings and often saw parallels between Stoic morality and Christian ethics. Augustine of Hippo, another influential Christian theologian, also engaged with Stoic ideas.

I'm trying to add more things here and respond to folks but the last few weeks I've been dealing with the loss of a close friend. We found out he was in a coma on life support two weeks ago, and were with him at the hospital until last week when we found out we lost him. Since then I've been helping to organize the funeral, while also processing everything. All the lessons from Stoicism and spirituality have really helped, and I'll make a post specifically on that soon, but for now I'm just a little absent as I help out with this. One thing I can say that is beneficial is to just let the emotions flow when they need to, and carry on when they go. Continuous acceptance of what is; that's been helping a lot.