One of the things that really helps me in my life and kind of gives me the right mindset
on how to approach challenges, how to approach goals, how to just approach life in general is
stoic philosophy. You have stoic philosophers such as Marcus Aurelius who is one of probably
the most well-known stoic philosophers. But stoic philosophy has a lot of guiding principles
that can really help you look at things and shape things in your life. And in this video, I'm going
to give you my top 10 favorite stoic quotes. Number one, it's by Marcus Aurelius, and the
quote says this, "You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize this and you will find
strength." I love that quote. I love that quote. And the reason that I love that quote is so often
in life we find ourself worried about things that we cannot control. We get worried about
and we focus so much energy on stuff we have no control over. Do you have control over what goes
on in someone else's mind? No. But how often do you stress out about things that are going
on in someone else's mind? Realize the things that you have control over. As a memory expert,
as somebody who sells memory courses, do I have any control over someone else creating
a memory course? No, but I can focus on the things that I have control over.
When I went and competed in the USA Memory Championship, if I was focused on, "Oh, I
wonder how good he is at memorizing a deck of cards. I wonder how good he is at memorizing.
I wonder how he good is at this." I mean, it's good to take a scope of the atmosphere
and know where your opponents are, but to obsess over things that you have no control
over is worthless. Focus on you. Focus on your game. Focus on hitting your marks. Focus on what
you have control over and you will find strength. That's Marcus Aurelius in the first stoic quote.
Number two, my second favorite stoic quote or one of my favorite quotes is also by Marcus Aurelius,
and he says, "The best revenge is to not be like your enemy." Sometimes in life we find it that
when we are opposed to something so strongly, we are focused all our negative energy on that person
or that idea or whatever it is, and you know what happens when you focus all on something
all the time? You run the risk of becoming like your enemy because that's what you're focusing on
all the time. The best revenge is not to be like your enemy. So stop focusing all your negative
attention there. Don't become like your enemy. Don't become like the people that you despise or
the ideas or the things that you don't like. Focus your enemy on the pauses. Focus on you. The best
revenge is not to be like your enemy. It's not to stoop to the levels that perhaps they stoop to.
Seneca is also a great stoic philosopher and he said, "He who fears death will never do
anything worth of a man who is alive." Fear holds so many people back. I mean,
it has held me back in my life. What did Franklin to Eleanor Roosevelt say? We have nothing to fear
but fear itself. It's been said that worry is like a rocking chair. You're making movement,
but you're not going anywhere. The person who fears death will never do anything worthy of
a man who is alive. I served in the war in Afghanistan and I did nothing heroic. I was
in a combat zone, but I'm not a combat veteran. But when I think about the heroism of some of
those men and some of those women who ran towards the bullet fire and I just think, "Wow, man,
they were not thinking about death in that moment. They were thinking about their mission or their
goal," and it's just such a powerful way to live. And most of us, the things that we are fearing
are not bullets flying to our face. We're fearing rejection. We're fearing what our friends think.
We're fearing if we are going to look stupid or silly, or if we're going to waste our time.
Those things are so silly to fear, especially when the reward is so great. So make sure you
don't have your fear outside of what it should be. A healthy fear is good. I'm not going to
prop a piece of wood between two buildings in downtown Fort Worth on the high level and walk
across of it. That is a healthy fear and that's a common sense that's going to keep me alive. But
don't let ordinary normal fear hold you back. Seneca has another great quote and it says,
"Difficulty strengthen the mind, as does labor the body." In my twenties and thirties,
I used to exercise a little bit more than I do now in my fifties. But in my twenties and thirties,
I would always remember when I was doing the bench press or something, my friend would say,
"One more. Come on, you got to get one more." And I would be like, "Oh, that was the last one." And
then he would say, "One more." And that one more is often where so much growth took place where I
was stretching myself. Joe Rogan put it this way, and he said something to the effect of
the interesting thing about life is that the challenging times and the difficult times, we
are going to often look back as the good times. We all want to be at the top of the mountain. We all
want to be at the top of the mountain. But I think you're going to find when you look back on your
life, the happiest times were not necessarily when you were standing on the top of the mountain.
The happiest times were in the process of you climbing up that mountain and the difficulties
you had to go through and the changes that you had to go through. And then you do get the reward
of being on the top of the mountain. But don't fear those difficulties because I think you're
going to look back on them as some of the best times of your life, but also they are good. They
strengthen your mind just as lifting weights strengthens the body. Difficulties are good.
Epictetus is one of my favorite stoic philosophers as well, and he has a great quote. "No man is free
who is not a master of himself." Discipline equals freedom. Discipline equals freedom.
That is so powerful. And if I can synopse it in this, discipline equals freedom.
You're going to pay a price. All right? People always will say to me, "Ron, I don't want to
exercise. I don't want to go to the gym tonight," or whatever. I'm just picking an example here.
"Because I don't want to pay that price. I want to just sit at home and watch a movie." Okay, well,
guess what? You didn't pay a price. You didn't go to the gym, but that doesn't mean you're not
going to pay a price. You will pay a price. You're just going to pay the price later. You can't avoid
paying prices in life. A couple of years ago, I went to the Great Wall of China and I went with a
guy who had never been, I had never been, neither one of us had ever seen the Great Wall of China.
I was so excited I ran up the stairs, and I was running all over the Great Wall of China. Do
you know what my friend did who had never been to the Great Wall of China? There was a chair
at the Great Wall of China and he sat in that chair the entire time because at the elevation,
he could not run in that elevation up in the mountains. He couldn't even walk the Great Wall
of China. He paid a price. You will pay a price in life, you're going to pay prices. It's inevitable.
But discipline equals freedom. It opens your life up to so much more later on. Discipline
equals freedom. Or if you want to say it the way Epictetus said it, "No man is free who is not a
master of himself." Another way to look at this is it's been said that we will distract ourselves
with pleasure when we don't have discipline or a direction. You know what? I necessarily
don't want to be in the studio today recording videos, but by having the discipline to do that,
what are my other options? Distract myself with pleasure. Go watch a baseball game, or whatever.
This next one from Seneca is golden. This is a golden one. "We are more often frightened than
hurt, and we suffer more in imagination than in reality." Let me say that again.
We are often more frightened than hurt, and we suffer more in imagination than reality. Guys,
that is a huge one for me. Do you know how often I will just stew about something, about somebody
who said something, they did something, it was so wrong and it irritates me so bad,
and I've worked it all up in my imagination, maybe to even worse than it really is. Or maybe
there's something that hasn't even happened that I am predicting will happen and I'm concerned or
have anxiety about that. We are more hurt in our imagination often than in reality. And that goes
back to the stoic philosophy of controlling what you can control and not concerning
yourself to an extent with outside events. Here's the next one, and this is a quote by
Marcus Aurelius and it says, "If you are pained by an external thing, it is not this thing that
disturbs you, but your own judgment about it. And it is in your power to wipe out this judgment
now." It is our reaction, not the actual events that cause our distress. Two people can experience
the same thing. Two people can look at that same thing two different ways, and those two different
ways are going to determine their response to it, their internal anxiety to it, or how they
feel about it. Great quote by Marcus Aurelius. Next, "Don't explain your philosophy. Embody
it." This is by a Epictetus. There was a quote I memorized years ago that said,
"I'd rather see a sermon than hear one any day. I'd rather you walk with me than merely
show the way." People oftentimes don't want to be lectured to. But if you just live your life
in the way that that lecture would go, their ears are very prone to listen to the example of
your life and the example they see with their eyes more than a sermon on how you should be.
Don't explain your philosophy. Embody it. Here's another one from Epictetus. "It's not
what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters." This is similar to several of the quotes
before, and it all comes down to not events, but how we handle it, how we respond to it.
And finally, this is one that is real good for me to keep in front of my mind. It's by Seneca and it
says, "The whole future lies in uncertainty. Live immediately." Last year I went to four funerals,
four funerals of people close to me. Two were in their seventies, and two were in their fifties.
And I think we always plan, "Oh, I'm going to do this later or do this tomorrow." And surely you
can't do everything today. You have to plan some things for the future, but the entire
future lies in uncertainty. Live immediately. I really love stoic quotes and stoic philosophy,
and these are 10 that have really impacted me. I hope you enjoyed them. Comment down below
with what is your favorite stoic philosophy or your favorite stoic philosopher. Matter of fact,
my Instagram @brainathlete, I have a lot of stoic quotes on that page. You may recognize
some of them from this video. I'll see you guys later on the next video.