Podcast appearances and mentions of Ryan Holiday

Most people remember exactly where they were the week of March 11, 2020. Life suddenly stopped. The world went quiet. And for a brief moment, everything about our routines, priorities, and pace of life was thrown into question. Six years later, the world is loud and fast again. But the real question is: what were we supposed to learn from the moment when everything slowed down?In this episode, Ryan talks with award-winning author Chloe Dalton about the strange stillness of those early pandemic months and how one unexpected encounter with a wild hare during lockdown completely changed the way she thought about time, work, and the life she was building. Later in the episode, novelist Susan Straight joins the conversation to reflect on why it's important that we don't rush to forget that time and what remembering the pandemic can still teach us.

There is beauty and peace in noticing. The world is filled with things to see and hear.

You will get knocked off course. You will fall off the wagon. You will get out of sorts. That's unavoidable. What matters is how quickly you return.SPECIAL OFFER | Go to dailystoic.com/spring and enter code DSPOD20 at checkout to get 20% off the Spring Forward Challenge! Challenge yourself to spring forward and become the person you aspire to be. The Spring Forward Challenge starts March 20, 2026.

We should think about where we have made our happiness conditional on this or that achievement, on this or that identity which lies outside our control.SPECIAL OFFER exclusively for podcast listeners

There's a reason we don't always say what we think. There's a reason we keep our feelings hidden away.SPECIAL OFFER exclusively for podcast listeners

After their conversation for The Daily Stoic Podcast, Ryan gave Jordan Klepper, comedian, writer, and correspondent on The Daily Show, a few book recommendations at The Painted Porch.Follow Jordan on Instagram @JordanKlepper and check out his upcoming live show dates on his website https://www.officialjordanklepper.com/

Do your emotions ever get the best of you? Someone says one thing and it ruins your whole day. A small frustration turns into a big deal. Travel anxiety spirals. Jealousy or irritation shows up before you even realize it. In this episode, you will learn the complete Stoic playbook for mastering your emotions so they don't end up mastering you.SPECIAL OFFER exclusively for podcast listeners

Ever wake up already feeling behind, before the emails, before school drop-off, before anything has actually gone wrong? In this episode, Ryan talks with Oliver Burkeman, bestselling author of 4,000 Weeks and Meditations for Mortals, about that “back foot” feeling so many parents live in. Ryan and Oliver talk about why we give our best energy to trivial things, why we say yes when we mean no, and how a small shift in how we think about time and trade-offs can change the tone of an entire day.Oliver Burkeman is the author of the New York Times bestseller Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals, The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking, and Meditations for Mortals. Follow Oliver on Instagram and X @OliverBurkeman

When does belonging start to matter more than being right? In Part 2 of Ryan's conversation with Jordan Klepper, they dive into how mob thinking takes over, how cultural permission shifts what feels acceptable, why people double down even when the facts are clear, and how leaders shape the tone of an entire country.Jordan Klepper is a comedian, writer, and correspondent on The Daily Show. You can follow him on Instagram @JordanKlepper and check out his upcoming live show dates on his website https://www.officialjordanklepper.com/

Even though we can't control time or slow it down, even though we can't control external forces and external events—we can control ourselves, so we can control how we use our time. SPECIAL OFFER exclusively for podcast listeners

Just as the flowers bloom and trees grow, our children are growing, too. SPECIAL OFFER exclusively for podcast listeners

Get your reps in…because none of us have any idea what life has in store for us in the future.SPECIAL OFFER exclusively for podcast listeners

Stop worrying what random strangers think. Worry what your kids will think.

What do you do when someone says something you completely disagree with or something that sounds totally detached from reality? Jordan Klepper, correspondent and host at The Daily Show, is known for walking into political rallies and calmly interviewing the most passionate people in the crowd. In this episode, he sits down with Ryan to explain why arguing almost never works, how silence can be more powerful than a comeback, and what most of us misunderstand about why people believe what they believe.Jordan Klepper is a comedian, writer, and correspondent on The Daily Show. You can follow him on Instagram @JordanKlepper and check out his upcoming live show dates on his website https://www.officialjordanklepper.com/

It's been a long winter. But now? Now you can feel something is in the air.

In this episode, Emily and Jason sit down with Ryan Holiday's “22 Rules for Reading” and put them to the test. As two people who genuinely love books but approach reading very differently, they talk through which rules they wholeheartedly agree with, which ones feel unrealistic for busy parents, and which ones might be a little too rigid for real life. Emily's Book: Really Very Crunchy https://amzn.to/4cX9JmH Little Helper Big Imagination https://amzn.to/4lbNufe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

They've literally never done this before. This is their first time on the planet.

We plan to do it. We mean to do it. We just tell ourselves that we'll do it tomorrow. The problem, as the Stoics remind us, is that we don't control tomorrow.

This stuff is not that serious. None of it is.

Haven't you been wrong before? Haven't you done stuff that in retrospect seems dumb or weird? Of course you have.

It's kind of crazy how crazy things are right now. All that you have going on. All the stress that raising a family entails.

Meditating on death isn't depressing, it's clarifying. In this episode, Ryan explains how the Stoic practice of Memento Mori will sharpen your priorities, push you to stop wasting time, and remind you to live with character now, not later.

The greatness of Antoninus and Marcus Aurelius was not perfection but progress. They were imperfect men committed to self-discipline and self-correction. Today's episode explores how Antoninus shaped Marcus through steady example and daily discipline, and what their lives reveal about the kind of character a person chooses to build.

If you've ever been called “airport dad” or married to one, this episode is for you. From school attendance to airport stress to the worst-case scenarios we play out in our heads, Ryan and Sam talk about the cost of constantly expecting something to go wrong and what might change if you didn't.

Power doesn't wait for the perfect person to raise their hand. Someone will wield it. Someone always does.

Keep in mind how fast things pass by and are gone—those that are now, and those to come.

Is this what we're here for? To be the passions' slave? To be the plaything of emotions and impulses? It can't be!

What if it only took five minutes each morning to feel more in control of your life? In this conversation, Dr. Rangan Chatterjee shares the three daily questions he uses to stay grounded in alignment, contentment, and control.

Take the opportunity. Encourage the interest. Show them that you're interested in what interests them.

How do you hold a country together when it's tearing itself apart? In this episode, Ryan sits down with Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin to talk about Abraham Lincoln's self-education, his emotional discipline, and how he managed anger, ego, and public pressure without losing himself.Doris Kearns Goodwin is a Pulitzer Prize–winning presidential historian and bestselling author. Her latest #1 New York Times bestseller, An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s, is being adapted into a feature film, while her earlier works, Team of Rivals, The Bully Pulpit, and No Ordinary Time, have won some of the nation's highest literary honors and inspired leaders worldwide. She has served as a White House Fellow to President Lyndon Johnson, produced acclaimed docuseries for the HISTORY Channel, and earned countless awards for her contributions to history and leadership.Doris has a new book out called The Leadership Journey: How Four Kids Became Presidents in which she shares the different childhood experiences of Abraham Lincoln. Theodore Roosevelt. Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Lyndon B. Johnson, and how they each found their way to the presidency.

People are the way they are. They will always be this way. We don't control that.

Why is it that so many of us try to impress ambition on our kids? Why are we trying to push them to become famous or powerful? Have we not seen the people who tend to get to these positions? Have we not seen how it works out for them?

The past is gone, and no amount of calculation will bring it back or make it fair. What we do have is agency right now.

Is self-sabotage the result of rejecting one side of your own duality? Josh Trent welcomes Dr. John Demartini to the Wellness + Wisdom Podcast, episode 803, to dismantle the myth of self sabotage, reveal how duality governs perception and destiny, unpack why pride and shame distort authenticity, explore the hidden order behind chaos and so called evil, and show how integrating opposites through the right questions unlocks gratitude, fulfillment, and true self mastery.

What matters is responding with kindness and love. What matters is knowing that they are good and that they are loved and nothing anyone else thinks can change that.

 Pensarlo demasiado te está saliendo carísimo. Tu mente es experta en crear escenarios catastróficos que nunca suceden, convenciéndote de que no hacer nada es la decisión más "lógica" y segura. Pero la realidad es cruda: mientras tú esperas el momento perfecto para actuar, alguien con la mitad de tu talento pero con el doble de agallas te está robando las oportunidades.

We have a duty. Our nature—justice—demands something from us. It demands that we get up, get after it, and wear ourselves down doing it.

You might not be able to keep track of the time zone or the days anymore, but that's not an excuse for forgetting what's going on with them.

Life is a lot. It moves fast. It's easy to feel overwhelmed by what to do, what not to do, and whether you're even focusing on the right things. In today's episode, Ryan shares simple Stoic rules to live by that can help you live with more clarity, purpose, and steadiness right now.

If you think history is boring, irrelevant, or just not your "thing", this episode is for you. In today's episode, Ryan sits down with Kenny Curtis, host of the new podcast History Snacks, to make the case for history. They discuss why history isn't about memorizing dates or dusty textbooks, but a superpower that gives you perspective, clarity, and calm.

It's our job as parents to remind our kids that they're not powerless, that no matter what's happening around them, they can create change in themselves and in their communities. In this episode, Sharon McMahon, author of The Small and the Mighty, joins Ryan to talk about how we instill real, grounded hope in our kids and help them see that making a difference isn't reserved for someone else. It's within their reach.Sharon is known as “America's Government Teacher,” and after years as a high school government teacher, Sharon now runs the non-partisan, fact-based Instagram account @sharonsaysso. Sharon just released her book, The Small and the Mighty, where she proves that the most remarkable Americans are often ordinary people who didn't make it into the textbooks.

It's discouraging. It's distracting. All the stuff that's happening in the world. But you know what you can't do? You can't give up your work, your freedom of thought, your freedom of choice pre-emptively.

There are consequences to our decisions, the decision to work too much, to check out of a marriage, to not deal with our issues. The problem is that we fool ourselves believing that we can live with those consequences.

We should pride ourselves on our ability to put up with these people, to be able to be nice to people who are not nice, to be able to turn the other cheek and not be made bitter and cynical.

No one has ever looked back as their kids grew up or at the end of their own life and thought, “Perfect attendance was worth it.”

Day to day, it's only our individual actions that are up to us: How we treat people, how we run our businesses, what we think about.

The Stoics knew that wanting less increases gratitude, just as wanting more obliterates it. "Freedom isn't secured by filling up on your heart's desire but by removing your desire." - Epictetus

It's not that you should never speak up. It's not that you should never speak truth to power. It's just that you should never do it while you're angry. Do it after you've calmed down. Do it after you've had time to think about it. Do it after you've slept on it.

All that we see must be illuminated by the calm light of mild philosophy. So we can see what it really is. So we don't do anything we regret.

Most people don't read that many books, maybe a few a year at most. So if you're only going to read a couple books this year, the decision of which ones you choose becomes really important.In today's episode, Ryan shares a handful of books he's confident are worth your time. They've changed him, made him better, and he believes they'll make you better too in a lot of different areas of your life.