Exploring Kodawari

This episode is another attempt to keep the podcast on life support. Like last year, our busy musician schedules (and lack of proper planning) made it difficult to publish several episodes throughout the year. With a few free days left in 2025 before some traveling, I gathered my thoughts and reflections from the year 2025 and tried to make them into this stream of consciousness style of episode.

The first topic I talked about was my musical reflections from the year, with one of the primary ones being my thoughts about how psychological flow works, aka, that "being in the zone" feeling. I reflected on the following quote, which I love:

“Flow is found at the intersection of discipline and surrender”

On the theme of surrender, I also explored the topic of duende, a concept my wife Yankı read about in the Edward Hirsch book linked below on artistic inspiration. Duende introduces a mischievous, mysterious, and almost demonic force behind artistry. A quote referenced in this book is another one that stuck with me in my performances this past year:

“All truly profound art requires its creator to abandon himself to certain powers which he invokes but cannot altogether control.” —ANDRÉ MALRAUX, "GOYA"

Carl Jung

I really want to devote a whole episode series to what we've been reading and thinking about regarding Carl Jung over the past year. Perhaps that will happen. However, for this 2025 reflection episode, I introduced some of my favorite concepts that I've learned from reading Jung or reading about him.

I covered what Jungian synchronicity is and a few possible examples that happened to us this past year. I also talked about coincidentia oppositorum, the coincidence of opposites, a mystical and philosophical concept crucial to Jungian psychology and also something I've wrestled with over the past year.

I gave several Jung quotes throughout the episode, with this one probably being my favorite:

“The meaning of my existence is that life has addressed a question to me. Or, conversely, I myself am a question which is addressed to the world, and I must communicate my answer, for otherwise I am dependent upon the world’s answer.”

The Problem With Skepticism

Lastly, after probably getting a bit too wiggly in my thinking, I closed the episode with some thoughts about skepticism and how it can go too far. Being completely naive is bad, but it is also sad to have your skepticism dial turned up too much and miss out on some of the magic and "wiggles" that make life meaningful. Maybe the point is to find a balance between skepticism and the instinct to believe and to play.

Timestamps:

1. [02:55]Musical Lessons & Reflections
2. [10:07]Carl Jung, Symbols, & Syncronicity
3. [25:37]Carl Jung and Coincidence of Opposites
4. [39:13]The Problem with Skepticism

Links:

1. Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (Affiliate Link)
2. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's TED Talk
3. The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World by Iain McGilchrist (Affiliate Link)
4. Man and His Symbols by Carl Jung (Affiliate Link)
5. The Demon and the Angel: Searching for the Source of Artistic Inspiration by Edward Hirsch (Affiliate Link)

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

1. Our Website/Blog
2. Newsletter
3. Twitter: @EKodawari
4. Instagram: @exploringkodawari
5. Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

Well, it's been over a year since our last episode! As a COVID-19 pandemic project, sticking to a consistent publishing schedule for this podcast has been tough. But we've always said that even if our focus on it fades and drifts, we'll continue putting out content as long as we have something to say.

So, we threw this episode together on New Year's Eve to at least say that we put out one episode in 2024. Enjoy our lessons, observations, and reflections on 2024, which includes topics we hope to cover over a few episodes in 2025.

We talk about the value of simplicity, gratitude prayers, learning to surrender, knowledge vs wisdom, and the meaning crisis in our culture and why there are so many zombie movies/TV shows.

2024 Quote

"It is very simple to be happy, but it is very difficult to be simple." —Rabindranath Tagore

Timestamps:

• [01:48] Gratitude practice/prayer
• [06:16] Earning your simplicity
• [08:52] The value of surrender
• [18:04] What is wisdom?
• [22:03] Meaning of life vs. meaning in life
• [39:24] The Greek word tonos and embracing healthy tension
• [45:19] Thoughts on toxic compassion

Links:

• Overcoming Nihilism (My 2022 article)
• Zombies in Western Culture A Twenty-First Century Crisis by John Vervaeke, Christopher Mastropietro, and Filip Miscevic

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

• Our Website/Blog
• Newsletter
• Twitter: @EKodawari
• Instagram: @exploringkodawari
• Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

In this episode—especially since it has been so long since our last one—we decided to revisit the concept of kodawari and how it has changed for us over the three years of doing this podcast/blog.

Over time we encounter more knowledge and have more life experiences. And as we attempt to integrate those into a coherent life philosophy, our ideas about life change and update. I believe we have a duty to regularly bring a beginner's mind to our ideas so that we can "rediscover" them with novelty.

There is something cyclic to the way that we descend into a more chaotic state of confusion and then emerge from it by finding once again our deep truths with freshness in the present moment. This cyclic process can subtly or drastically update our ideas, making them more personal, genuine, valuable, and "true".

So since we are very different people than when we started the podcast three years ago, we felt it would be good to revisit the meaning of kodawari with fresh eyes. We especially lean into the uncompromising element of kodawari and why our society needs more "skillful inflexibility" to continue functioning.

Timestamps:

• [04:36] Why are we revisiting the meaning of kodawari?
• [09:09] How has kodawari changed for us?
• [12:12] What are we uncompromising about?
• [20:41] Rethinking how perfection fits into kodawari
• [23:11] Why humility is crucial
• [26:32] Limitations of the intellect and Chekhov’s The Seagull
• [32:59] Our official 2023 definition of kodawari

Links:

• First podcast episode on kodawari
• Article: What is Kodawari?
• Japanese Ramen’s Kodawari
• The Japanese philosophy of "Kodawari"
• Chekhov’s The Seagull
• A Rabbi, a Priest, and an Atheist Smoke Weed Together

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

• Our Website/Blog
• Newsletter
• Twitter: @EKodawari
• Instagram: @exploringkodawari
• Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

“‘I shall take the heart,’ returned the Tin Woodsman; ‘for brains do not make one happy, and happiness is the best thing in the world.’” —L. Frank Baum

The topic of this episode is happiness and hedonic adaptation, otherwise known as the hedonic treadmill. Hedonic adaptation is a phenomenon of our psychology and physiology that keeps us at a stable level of happiness over time. This adaptation is like an immune system that desensitizes us in relation to negative and positive experiences, making us continually find our happiness baseline.

The Hedonic Treadmill

The concept of hedonic adaptation dates back to a 1971 paper by Philip Brickman and Donald T. Campbell called "Hedonic Relativism and Planning the Good Society", and it was made even more famous in a 1978 study called "Lottery Winners and Accident Victims: Is Happiness Relative?" The study compared lottery winners and paraplegics with a control group to show that both groups eventually adjusted and returned to a baseline of happiness.

The hedonic treadmill, or happiness treadmill, is named as such because no matter how much you chase happiness and increase it in the short term, you end up in the same place continually chasing. The hedonic pathways in our brains become desensitized to pleasurable things that we encounter regularly. So after big life events like winning the lottery, getting a job promotion, getting married, etc, we will tend to settle back to our happiness set point.

The Meaning of Happiness

Aside from the science of hedonic adaptation, we also talked about the philosophy of happiness and whether it is a good goal in life. How is happiness different from words like joy, pleasure, tranquility, peacefulness, excitement, satisfaction, content, cheerful, or well-being?

Is happiness something we get from the external world or does it come from within? Do we seek happiness or are we really running away from suffering? And what is the difference between a meaningful life and a happy life?

Solutions to the Hedonic Treadmill“Now and then it’s good to pause in our pursuit of happiness and just be happy.” —Guillaume Apollinaire

Lastly, we talked about ways to overcome hedonic adaptation so that we do not continually get caught in the same traps throughout life. Routines such as a dopamine detox and spiritual practices like gratitude and Beginner's Mind are all ways to avoid getting stuck on the hedonic treadmill.

Timestamps:

• [06:08] What is happiness?
• [10:05] What is the difference between happiness and well-being?
• [15:28] Dopamine
• [27:57] What is hedonic adaptation?
• [35:14] Hedonic adaptation towards negative phenomena
• [39:23] How to combat the hedonic treadmill
• [50:40] Why negative emotions are necessary

Links:

• A French poet’s beautiful advice on how to be happy (Luke's Medium article)
• Lottery winners and accident victims: is happiness relative? P Brickman, D Coates, R Janoff-Bulman
• Stepping Off the Hedonic Treadmill
• Beyond the Hedonic Treadmill: Revising the Adaptation Theory of Well-Being
• How Does Hedonic Adaptation Affect the Pursuit of Happiness? - with Joe Gladstone

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

• Our Website/Blog
• Newsletter
• Twitter: @EKodawari
• Instagram: @exploringkodawari
• Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

In this episode, we explore the art of orchestral conducting with guest Chad Goodman. Chad is currently the conducting fellow of the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, and he has also had fellowships at Festival Napa Valley and the Atlantic Music Festival. Since 2018, he has served as an assistant conductor to the San Francisco Symphony, and he also founded Elevate Ensemble in the Bay Area.

Chad is also a good friend of ours, and so we used this conversation as an opportunity to get a more personal take on how orchestral conducting works and how a conductor thinks about music and prepares for concerts. We talked about music interpretation, the role of a conductor, communication, and how to unify a large group. We also talked about the beauty of constantly learning and improving and how outside knowledge helps unlock the secrets within a musical score.

And lastly, aside from the more obvious sign language elements to orchestral conducting, we also tried to touch on abstract elements such as body language, eye contact, and energy. Some musical performances capture magical energy, and we wondered how a conductor thinks about that and how they try to cultivate that energy.

Timestamps:

• [05:17] What exactly is orchestral conducting?
• [10:22] At what size does an ensemble need a conductor?
• [15:21] What makes conducting break down /not work?
• [25:05] How is kodawari relevant to conducting and what is perfection?
• [32:29] Why is music meaningful?
• [38:06] How does outside knowledge affect the interpretation/conducting of music?
• [48:52] On why learning never ends
• [56:07] Communication and the sign language of conducting
• [01:02:24] Bonus Questions/Speed Round

Links:

• Chad's website
• Chad's Instagram
• How to enter ‘flow state’ on command | Steven Kotler
• Flow Profile Test from Flow Genome Project
• What is Kodawari?
• Kodawari and Circumambulation

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

• Our Website/Blog
• Newsletter
• Twitter: @EKodawari
• Instagram: @exploringkodawari
• Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

"Written fifteen years ago, in 1940, amid the French and European disaster, this book declares that even within the limits of nihilism it is possible to find the means to proceed beyond nihilism. In all the books I have written since, I have attempted to pursue this direction. Although “The Myth of Sisyphus” poses mortal problems, it sums itself up for me as a lucid invitation to live and to create, in the very midst of the desert." —Albert Camus

This episode is part two of our exploration of nihilism and the search for meaning in life—be sure to check out the previous episode to hear the first half of this conversation. But in this episode, we try to overcome the meaning crisis induced by nihilism to find a more durable sense of meaning in life.

We also try to figure out what meaning even is. Is it possible to define meaning? Or is it something more implicit and instinctual? And finally, we close out the episode by exploring the philosophy of Absurdism as outlined by Camus in The Myth of Sisyphus. As Camus states:

"The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."

For a more thorough exploration of this topic, check out our article below:

Overcoming Nihilism: Why Meaning Matters And How To Find It

Timestamps:

• [04:50] Why you should contend with nihilism and camp in that perspective
• [08:20] What is meaning?
• [12:50] The meaning of the movie It's a Wonderful Life and why it makes people cry
• [19:00] Meaning as service to others and assuming that Being is good
• [21:05] Meaning as a surrender of the intellect
• [26:40] Meaning as pointing (Kevin Simler's A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning)
• [29:19] Albert Camus, Absurdism, and The Myth of Sisyphus
• [39:30] How to bring someone back from a nihilistic place

 

Links:

• The ending of It's a Wonderful Life
• Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus
• Jordan Peterson: The Meaning of Life

 

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

 

Follow Us:

• Our Website/Blog
• Newsletter
• Twitter: @EKodawari
• Instagram: @exploringkodawari
• Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

“What does nihilism mean? That the highest values devaluate themselves. The aim is lacking; 'why?' finds no answer.”                    —Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power

 

This episode, Part 1 of our exploration of nihilism, gets into the justifications for nihilism and why it's important to give nihilism its due as a philosophy. We discuss Nietzsche and existential nihilism as well as the playful cosmic nihilism of people like Alan Watts or Kurt Vonnegut.

We also explore whether or not nihilism is on the rise, and how it might be influencing political movements around the world. In Part 2, coming out shortly after this, we talk about how to overcome nihilism to find a more durable sense of meaning to life.

For a more thorough exploration of this topic, you can read our article:

Overcoming Nihilism: Why Meaning Matters And How To Find It

 

Timestamps:

[05:15] What is nihilism?

[07:12] Cosmic nihilism and Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot

[11:57] Nietzsche and existential nihilism

[19:30] What is the opposite of being nihilistic?

[22:23] Is nihilism on the rise?

[26:07] Nihilism and moral relativism in social justice movements and "woke" ideology

[34:03] The trap of ideology

What Is Nihilism?

Nihilism is a philosophy that more or less states that human life has no intrinsic meaning or value. There are different forms of nihilism—moral, cosmic, political, existential, etc—that each has interesting details and histories. But since Exploring Kodwari is more about approaching self-development with the kodawari energy, we were less interested in the academic side of nihilism and more interested in the personal/psychological way that we all wrestle with nihilistic thoughts.

Some people are explicitly nihilistic, but it seems more common for people to implicitly/subconsciously succumb to nihilism. Maybe it is a way to cope with the challenges of life or maybe it is a problem of the intellect and rationalism going too far. Probably, each person's struggle with nihilism is slightly different. But our claim in this episode (and Part 2) is that you can find the most durable sense of meaning in life after properly contending with nihilism.

Links:

Nihilism in Rick and Morty and BoJack Horseman

Pale Blue Dot- Carl Sagan

Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning by Kevin Simler

The Master, his Emissary & the Meaning Crisis (Iain McGilchrist & John Vervaeke)

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

Our Website/Blog

Newsletter

Twitter: @EKodawari

Instagram: @exploringkodawari

Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

What is metacognition? Metacognition is a modern term coined in 1979 by the American developmental psychologist John H. Flavell. He defined it as “cognition about cognitive phenomena,” or “thinking about thinking”.

But the concept of metacognition has been around long before that in philosophy. "Meta", meaning beyond or above, signals that metacognition is a form of thinking above our usual cognitive processes. And in this podcast episode, we work through the varying layers of metacognition and meta-awareness and how metacognitive skills can make us better learners and better people.

Timestamps:

[04:45] What is metacognition?

[08:25] Examining how you learn

[12:33] The bird's eye view and how metacognitive therapy can help with depression

[17:07]  Metacogni-ception: the layers of metacognition

[19:27] Mindfulness, Meta-awareness, and mind wandering

[28:00]  What is the difference between meditation and mindfulness?

[30:05] Modular model of the mind and the importance of embracing contradiction

[40:44] Camping and de-camping between viewpoints/opinions

[47:39]  The Elephant in the Brain

What Is Metacognition?

There are multiple levels to understanding what metacognition is. On a basic level, metacognition happens anytime you assess the methods and strategies involved in your thinking processes. These lower-level metacognitive strategies occur anytime you evaluate your particular learning processes—your strengths, weaknesses, and style of learning—and use that knowledge for more successful learning.

But on a deeper level, you can achieve meta-awareness (aka mindfulness), which is a true detachment from the mind. And science is increasingly showing that meta-awareness not only leads to more successful learning but that it also increases our feeling of well-being in the world.

Metacognition And Learning Strategies

Metacognition is an amazing tool for both students and teachers. When solving tasks and processing new information, metacognitive knowledge tells us what learning strategies are most likely to work. When teaching, you should encourage students to evaluate how their minds work and explain what learning strategies gave them the best outcomes in the past.

Some people learn best visually, and some people learn best aurally. Others need to physically participate in a task for comprehension to occur. As learners, we should regularly make an evaluation of our cognitive processes, especially our weaknesses, and practice the particular strategies that are most successful.

Whether you are teaching students or a learner yourself, metacognitive strategies give you the ability to control your learning and progress. Throughout the various learning contexts, watch your thinking take place from above it to find out what parts of your cognition lead to the best outcomes.

And remember that metacognition is a skill, which means figuring it out will get easier the more you practice it.

Meta-awareness And Mindfulness

In one sense, the instruction for mindfulness and meta-awareness is pretty simple: sit down and observe your mind from a distance. Jon Kabat-Zinn, who developed mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), defined mindful awareness as the "awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally".

And even though it sounds easy on the surface, avoiding mind wandering for even a few breaths is insanely difficult. Most of the time, we fail to achieve meta-awareness or mindfulness because we are lost in thought. And most students are never even taught this concept or the skills you can practice to develop meta-awareness.

The first layer is to become aware of thoughts, body sensations, and emotions arising in the present moment. But on a deeper level, meta-awareness makes a lower-level object out of awareness itself. You become that which is aware.

When people are taught the appropriate strategies in mindfulness and meta-awareness, they develop the ability to detach from their mental phenomena. Research by John D. Teasdale, linked below, shows that the metacognitive skills discussed in this episode allow patients to switch from thoughts like "I am depressed" to "I am aware of my depressive thoughts".

Conclusion

What is metacognition? Hopefully, after hearing this episode you'll realize that it is much more than a learning strategy or a trick you can use in the classroom. At a deeper level, it will allow you to get to know yourself and become a better person.

Spending time in metacognitive space allows you to detach from opinions and emotions and embrace the contradictions that exist in every single mind. It will make you kinder to yourself and others!

**Click here for our more in-depth article: Metacognition: The Bird's Eye View of the Mind**

Links:

The Modular Mind-Exploring Kodawari

Have Fewer Opinions-Exploring Kodawari

Robin Hanson, Hidden Motives, and The Elephant in the Brain

Agnes Callard on The Portal: Courage and Meta-cognitive Detachment

What is a software sandbox?

Honoro Vera 2019 Garnacha wine

What is Metacognition: Scientific Resources

Meta-Cognition in Mindfulness: A Conceptual Analysis-Dilwar Hussain

Reconstructing and deconstructing the self: cognitive mechanisms in meditation practice-Cortland J. Dahl

Metacognitive model of mindfulness-Jankowski, T

Metacognitive awareness and prevention of relapse in depression: Empirical evidence-Teasdale, J. D

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

Our Website/Blog

Newsletter

Twitter: @EKodawari

Instagram: @exploringkodawari

Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

"Many of us have been persuaded that happiness is something that someone else, a therapist or a politician, must confer on us. Stoicism rejects this notion. It teaches us that we are very much responsible for our happiness as well as our unhappiness. It also teaches us that it is only when we assume responsibility for our happiness that we will have a reasonable chance of gaining it. This, to be sure, is a message that many people, having been indoctrinated by therapists and politicians, don't want to hear." —William Irvine, A Guide to the Good Life

In this episode, we dig deeper into the philosophy of Stoicism and work through some of the specific psychological techniques and exercises that will help you to adopt the Stoic viewpoint.

We also try to connect the growing popularity of Stoicism to the rise of victimhood culture over the last twenty years. As we said in the previous episode, Understanding Stoicism as a Philosophy of Life, much of Stoicism can be summed up by the psychological difference between viewing something as a blessing or as a curse.

Timestamps:

• [04:18] Negative visualization: The trick for appreciating what you already have
• [13:07] The Dichotomy of Control and how to more strategically set goals
• [17:44] Trans Life Meditation
• [19:14] The Last Time Meditation
• [22:04] The Storytelling Frame
• [22:59] The Stoic Test
• [25:33] Prospective Retrospection
• [29:41] Summarizing Stoic beliefs and techniques in comparison to today's growing victim culture
• [33:18] "Tranquility in the Storm": Julius Canus and following through on your philosophy of life

Links:

• Stoicism as a Philosophy of Life (Exploring Kodwari's in-depth article)
• Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (translated by Gregory Hays)
• A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William B. Irvine
• Daily Stoic: What is Stoicism?
• Author Terry Tucker—How to Embrace Suffering and Find Purpose in Life

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

• Our Website/Blog
• Newsletter
• Twitter: @EKodawari
• Instagram: @exploringkodawari
• Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari

"Remember: Matter. How tiny your share of it. Time. How brief and fleeting your allotment of it. Fate. How small a role you play in it." —Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Stoicism as a philosophy is not the same as being lowercase s stoical. It is not about blocking our difficult feelings and emotions. Instead, Stoicism is an approach to life that teaches us how to handle our negative emotions in psychologically healthier ways.

Timestamps:

[04:11] What is Stoicism? Zeno of Citium and the beginnings of Stoicism to the Roman Stoicism centuries later

[09:12] What is a philosophy of life?

[16:26] The basic Stoic beliefs and assumptions

[26:00] Definition of Stoicism in relation to the victim culture of today's society

[31:40] Ataraxia/Tranquility: the grand goal of Stoicism

[38:19] Epictetus and the dichotomy of control

[45:13] Epictetus and the art of acquiescence

What is Stoicism?

So what is Stoicism? What are the Stoic beliefs and principles that can lead to a good life?

The meaning of Stoicism can be expressed in many ways, but in essence, it is the difference between viewing something as a blessing or as a curse. It is realizing that the obstacles in life don't obstruct our path—they are the path. Marcus Aurelius, in one of his more famous Stoicism quotes, echoed this by saying the following:

"The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way".

Author and advocate for Stoicism Ryan Holiday, founder of the Daily Stoic, wrote a book centered on this concept called The Obstacle Is the Way. Instead of victimizing ourselves when we have difficulties, we can see it as the very thing that advances us forward and makes us grow. As Marcus Aurelius says, this framing of events is what allows us to logically see challenges as blessings:

We often cannot control external events, but we can always control our internal framing of those events. Stoicism calls this the art of acquiescence, and it is how we bring ourselves into harmony with nature, with what is. While more difficult, this includes accepting the challenges and tragedies of life, even our own death. In fact, Stoic beliefs and techniques centered around learning how to reframe events that happen to you in this more positive framing of a blessing.

Stoicism philosophers (so-called Stoics) include famous Greek names like Zeno, Cleanthes, and Chrysippus as well as even more famous Roman names such Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius. It is the Roman Stoicism, especially the famous Stoicism quotes by Marcus Aurelius, that serve as the foundation for this episode.

For a more in-depth guide to Stoic beliefs, you can read our full article that corresponds to this episode:

**Stoicism as a Philosophy of Life**

And look out for Part 2 for our episode that takes these Stoic beliefs and transforms them into specific techniques.

Links:

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (translated by Gregory Hays)

A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William B. Irvine

Daily Stoic: What is Stoicism?

Author Terry Tucker—How to Embrace Suffering and Find Purpose in Life

Support Us:

You can always support us by leaving a rating or review in your podcasting app. You can also share our episodes with friends on social media.

But it does take a lot of time to put together a podcast, maintain a website, and write new content every week. So if you would like to support us in a more substantial way, consider making a donation through the PayPal buttons on our website:

https://exploringkodawari.blog/donation/

Follow Us:

Our Website/Blog

Newsletter

Twitter: @EKodawari

Instagram: @exploringkodawari

Facebook: facebook.com/ExploringKodawari