Stoic philosophy is something I keep coming back to over and over. Ryan Holiday is the author who makes it approachable, adapting the ancient ideas to our time and keeping them digestible for an attempted practitioner like me.
The book takes its title from Marcus Aurelius (“what stands in the way becomes the way”) and distills the Stoic response to adversity into three disciplines: Perception, Action, and Will.
It’s the Will section that stays with me, the chapters on perseverance and building your inner citadel. You strengthen yourself in the good times so you can lean on it in the hard ones:
During the good times, we strengthen ourselves and our bodies so that during the difficult times, we can depend on it. We protect our inner fortress so it may protect us.
And anyone can persist; only some persevere, day in and day out:
Persistence is an action. Perseverance is a matter of will. One is energy. The other, endurance.
The lesson I keep relearning: don’t run from challenges, use them as practice. Persist and resist.
Read it if you want to turn adversity into a way to improve yourself. The obstacle is the way.