The Daily Stoic

What makes smart, principled people work for the worst leaders? In this conversation, historian and author James Romm and Ryan dig into the timeless trap that’s snared some of history’s greatest minds, from Plato and Seneca to modern politics. They talk about the seduction of access, the slow erosion of integrity, and why walking away from a tyrant’s court is so much harder than it looks.

James Romm is an author, reviewer, and a Professor of Classics at Bard College in Annandale, NY. He specializes in ancient Greek and Roman culture and civilization. His reviews and essays have appeared in the New Yorker, the Wall Street Journal, the London Review of Books, the Daily Beast, and other venues. He has held the Guggenheim Fellowship (1999-2000), the Birkelund Fellowship at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Writers and Scholars at the New York Public Library (2010-11), and a Biography Fellowship at the Leon Levy Center of the City University of New York (2014-15).

Follow James on Instagram @James.Romm and check out more of his work at his website, www.jamesromm.com

 📚 Get signed copies of James' latest book Plato and the Tyrant, and his other books Dying Every Day, How To Die, and How To Give, at The Painted Porch | https://www.thepaintedporch.com/

🎙️ Listen to James Romm’s first episode on The Daily Stoic Podcast:  https://dailystoic.com/romm/

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

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It's only fools who fly off the handle, it's the immature who say the first thought that pops into their head, it's the irresponsible who act without thinking.

🪙 The Stoics employed a range of techniques to move past their anger. And over the past year, Daily Stoic has been designing a little device to help you apply those techniques to your daily life to help you tame your temper once and for all. | Grab the The Daily Stoic Anger Medallion at dailystoic.com/angercoin

📓 Pick up a signed edition of The Daily Stoic Journal: 366 Days of Writing and Reflection on The Art of Living: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

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Ask yourself today: Where can you be less possessive? Where can you share the load, elevate someone else, or choose principle over pride?

📔 Pick up your own leather bound signed edition of The Daily Stoic! Check it out at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

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Everything went wrong. But Ryan stayed calm. A real-time Stoic stress test, and a reminder that philosophy is for days just like this.

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

📚 The Four Stoic Virtues: Justice, Temperance, Wisdom, Courage, are timeless keys to living your best life. The Daily Stoic is releasing a limited collector’s edition set of all four books signed and numbered, with a title page identifying these books as part of the only printing of this series. PLUS we're including one of the notecards Ryan used while writing the series. Pre-order the Limited Edition Stoic Virtues Series Today! | https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/stoic-virtues

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What happens when politics becomes performance and politicians become influencers? In today’s Part 2 episode, former Marine and NYT bestselling author Elliot Ackerman joins Ryan to talk about the idea that “everything’s a racket,” the collapse of institutional trust, and why restraint used to define real leadership. They talk about how cancel culture morphed into shamelessness as a superpower, why we might be living in a post-shame society, Ambrose Bierce’s wild literary exit, and why modern media feels more like professional wrestling than journalism.

Elliot Ackerman is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels 2054, 2034, Halcyon, Red Dress in Black and White, Waiting for Eden, Dark at the Crossing, and Green on Blue, as well as the memoirs The Fifth Act: America’s End in Afghanistan and Places and Names: On War, Revolution, and Returning. 

Elliot’s books have been nominated for the National Book Award, the Andrew Carnegie Medal in both fiction and nonfiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, among others. He is a contributing writer at The Atlantic, a Senior Fellow at Yale’s Jackson School of Global Affairs, and a veteran of the Marine Corps and CIA special operations, having served five tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, where he received the Silver Star, the Bronze Star for Valor, and the Purple Heart. 

Be sure to check out Elliot’s latest book, SHEEPDOGS. Apple Studios has actually bought the rights to develop the book as a series with Tom Hanks production company.  

Grab signed copies of Elliot’s books 2054 and 2034 at The Painted Porch | https://www.thepaintedporch.com/

Follow Elliot Ackerman on Instagram and X @elliot.ackerman

🎙️ Listen to Elliot Ackerman’s first time on The Daily Stoic Podcast: Elliot Ackerman on Storytelling and the Cyclical Nature of History

🎥 Head to Ryan Holiday’s YouTube channel to see what books he recommends to guests who come on The Daily Stoic Podcast | https://www.youtube.com/@RyanHolidayOfficial

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The right time to do the hard thing, the courageous thing, the right thing? It’s right now. 

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

📚 The Four Stoic Virtues: Justice, Temperance, Wisdom, Courage, are timeless keys to living your best life. The Daily Stoic is releasing a limited collector’s edition set of all four books signed and numbered, with a title page identifying these books as part of the only printing of this series. PLUS we're including one of the notecards Ryan used while writing the series. Pre-order the Limited Edition Stoic Virtues Series Today! | https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/stoic-virtues

💡 We designed our How To Read Epictetus (A Daily Stoic Guide) as a personal field guide —part book club, part masterclass, part daily practice. It’s designed to help you not just read the words of Epictetus, but live them—to turn his timeless wisdom into real change in your own life and the lives of those around you. Head to dailystoic.com/epictetuscourse to learn more!

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Guilt is about the past and the past is the one thing we cannot change. All we can do is do better now. 

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

📚 The Four Stoic Virtues: Justice, Temperance, Wisdom, Courage, are timeless keys to living your best life. The Daily Stoic is releasing a limited collector’s edition set of all four books signed and numbered, with a title page identifying these books as part of the only printing of this series. PLUS we're including one of the notecards Ryan used while writing the series. Pre-order the Limited Edition Stoic Virtues Series Today! | https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/stoic-virtues

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Former Marine turned novelist Elliot Ackerman sits down with Ryan to talk about what discipline really looks like in everyday life. From 100-degree runs to cold plunges and daily writing routines, they discuss what helps them stay steady, focused, and consistent even when it’s hard.

Elliot Ackerman is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels 2054, 2034, Halcyon, Red Dress in Black and White, Waiting for Eden, Dark at the Crossing, and Green on Blue, as well as the memoirs The Fifth Act: America’s End in Afghanistan and Places and Names: On War, Revolution, and Returning. 

Elliot’s books have been nominated for the National Book Award, the Andrew Carnegie Medal in both fiction and nonfiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, among others. He is a contributing writer at The Atlantic, a Senior Fellow at Yale’s Jackson School of Global Affairs, and a veteran of the Marine Corps and CIA special operations, having served five tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, where he received the Silver Star, the Bronze Star for Valor, and the Purple Heart. 

Be sure to check out Elliot’s latest book, SHEEPDOGS. Apple Studios has actually bought the rights to develop the book as a series with Tom Hanks production company.  

Grab signed copies of Elliot’s books 2054 and 2034 at The Painted Porch | https://www.thepaintedporch.com/

Follow Elliot Ackerman on Instagram and X @elliot.ackerman

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Our lives are unpredictable. We are at the mercy of so many forces.

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Education takes time. It takes work. It takes patience. 

📖 Preorder the final book in Ryan Holiday's The Stoic Virtues Series: "Wisdom Takes Work": https://store.dailystoic.com/pages/wisdom-takes-work

📓 Pick up a signed edition of The Daily Stoic Journal: 366 Days of Writing and Reflection on The Art of Living: https://store.dailystoic.com/

🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast

🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast

✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/

📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.