One of the wonderful perks of having a platform is getting to share stuff that has improved your life with other people—knowing that it may well improve theirs. In fact, pretty early on in my writing career, I decided I wasn’t going to be precious about my own work but instead be an active cheerleader for stuff that I loved. 

Who cares who made it? 

If something is good, it deserves an audience. 

Anyway, I decided to put together a list of recommendations that hopefully answers some of the most common questions I get about the best books, podcasts, products, etc. 

– I can’t tell you how hooked I am on Ramit Sethi’s podcast about couples and their financial issues. Sometimes it’s a couple crawling out of debt, sometimes it’s a couple worth $8M who comparison shops for deals on strawberries. It’s riveting and also super educational—because we all have scripts about money (usually not helpful or healthy ones) and seeing other people wrestle with theirs helps us with our. I find pretty much every episode is, in the end, about communication…Highly recommend this show!

– I’m going to give you three narrative non-fiction books that will rip your face off. The first is The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival by John Vaillant. Every person I have told about this book has loved it. If you haven’t read Empire of the Summer Moon by S.C. Gwynne (a gripping, unbelievable story about the clash between Comanche Indians and white settlers in the late 1800s over an empire of millions of square miles) then you are punishing yourself. It is SO good (we also have some signed copies at the Painted Porch). I also love, love, love The River of Doubt by Candice Millard (Teddy Roosevelt’s insane exploration of an Amazon river after his presidency) and interviewed her about it a while back. 

– The daily read/daily devotional genre was a game changer for me. It’s just something to chew on in the morning, an intention, an inspiration. Three favorites I pick up every day: A Calendar of Wisdom by Leo Tolstoy. A Poem For Every Day of the Year by Allie Esiri (we read this one as a family). The Daily Laws by Robert Greene. People ask me all the time, Where should I start with Robert Greene? This book is where. 

– Another everyday favorite—my wife and I take a scoop of AG1 by Athletic Greens in the morning. It’s got a ton of vitamins and minerals and other good stuff (it’s basically a multivitamin, multimineral, probiotic, and greens superfood blend). I first met Chris the founder like 11 years ago? It’s been a part of the routine for a long time. I reached out and they said they’d offer a FREE 1 year supply of immune-supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE travel packs with your first purchase.

– There is no blog I have read longer or more consistently than Marginal Revolution. Tyler Cowen is one of the G.O.A.Ts. If he’s not in your life, you’re missing out. 

– To me, Meditations by Marcus Aurelius is the greatest book ever written. I’ve read it a couple hundred times. For me, it was what Tyler Cowen calls a “quake book”—shaking everything I thought I knew about the world. It is the definitive text on self-discipline, personal ethics, humility, self-actualization and strength. Usually I introduce people to Marcus through Gregory Hays’ translation, which I think is lyrical and beautiful, but a recent annotated edition by Robin Waterfield is right up there. With almost every passage, Robin provides the necessary context, gives insight into what Marcus was referencing, draws connections to other passages, etc. If you have not read Meditations, Robin’s translation might be the one to start with.

– Speaking of Marcus, in my left pocket, I carry a coin that says Memento Mori, which is Latin for ”remember you will die.” On the back, it has one of my favorite quotes from Marcus: “You could leave life right now.” I firmly believe the thought of our mortality should shadow everything that we do.

– In my other pocket, I carry a medallion with a custom-designed seal with four elements representing the four Stoic virtues: Courage, Temperance, Justice, and Wisdom. 

– My three favorite novels of all time: What Makes Sammy Run? by Budd Schulberg, Ask the Dust by John Fante, and The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. If you don’t read a lot of fiction, these three are the place to start. They teach you just as much as any non-fiction book.

– Another “book” I pick up each day is a journal. It’s a small blue gold leafed notebook called the One Line a Day journal, and it has spots for five years. I’m four years into the journal, where I write about what happened yesterday, so I can see what’s been going on for four years. It’s great. After, I pick up The Daily Stoic Journal, where I prepare for the day ahead by meditating on a short prompt, then set an intention or a goal for the day—just something to give myself something I can review at the end of the day, that I can evaluate myself against.

– With two young boys, I also pick up a kids book every night. Our favorites: What Does It Mean to Be an American?, Her Right Foot, The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, Most People, and Here We Are. And it was one night as we were getting ready for bed that my oldest asked me to tell him the story of Marcus Aurelius. This is something I had been thinking about for a long time because a lot of people ask me how they should teach Stoicism to their kids. I started to tell my son a story that we came to call, The Boy Who Would Be King. 

– I’m a big fan of newsletters, as well. Here are some that I subscribe to: James Clear’s “3-2-1 Thursday,” Mark Manson’s “Motherfucking Monday,” Tim Ferriss’ “5 Bullet Friday”, Maria Popova’s “The Marginalian”, Emily Oster’s “Parent Data”, Matt Levine’s “Money Stuff”, and Billy Oppenheimer’s “SIX at 6”. 

– Some of my favorite social accounts to follow are: HilariousHumanitarian, TankSinatra, Jessica Yellin, bigtre1000, DailyStoic, DailyDad, and DailyPhilosopher.

– I’m not a big fan of the “solve a device problem with another device” logic, but the Apple Watch has substantially reduced the amount of time I spend on my phone, and helped me curb the desire to always have it near me. Airpods too—they are as magical as anything Apple has ever made.

– MagicSpoon Cereal. LOVE this enough to have invested in it. My favorite dessert is MagicSpoon + wild blackberries we pick on the farm. My father in law is hooked on them too. (use code RYANHOLIDAY at checkout for $5 off).

– Something I use and have used daily and weekly for going on three years: ButcherBox. ButcherBox delivers high quality, grass-fed meat to your doorstep once a month—my wife and I basically haven’t bought meat from the store since we started using it. 

– Sad that I have to put this but…here we are, two years into a pandemic with a new, hyper contagious variant. If you’re still using a cloth mask, you’re doing it wrong. You need an N95 or KN95. You can get them basically anywhere at this point, but it’s good to check the manufacturer with Project95 to make sure you’re not getting scammed. Considering Marcus died of the plague, I think it’s safe to say he’d wear a mask…Also these at-home COVID tests we use when getting our employees together or meeting people who have been traveling, etc. $12 a test roughly…it’s not cheap but if you can afford it, safe is better than sorry (and it helps others too).

– I run just about every day. I have different loops I do depending on where I am and La Sportiva’s have been my main shoe for the last 5-6 years. I usually push the kids in a side by side running roller on our walks and run but even though I have 3 of them…I wouldn’t recommend any enough to give you a name (you’ll see why here). 

– My two favorite charities are Feeding America (we just raised almost $200k for them) and Against Malaria (which can save a life for $3,340). I also love GiveWell, which helps you rate and evaluate the ROI of various causes. Another cause close to my heart is the Uyghur Human Rights Project, which has been at the forefront of drawing both resources and attention to the plight of millions of people in Xinjiang. I had Uyghur activist Ferkat Jawdat on the Daily Stoic podcast—if you don’t know about the horrendous situation in Xinjiang, give that conversation a listen.  

– One decision I’ve eliminated from my life is what to have for lunch. Across the street from The Painted Porch is Base Camp Deli, and if I am not bringing something from home (usually leftovers)I get a Turkey & Havarti sandwich or the Chicken Pesto, and salt & vinegar chips with a Topo Chico.

– Whenever someone visits us in Bastrop, I like to take them to dinner at Store House Market & Eatery, which is just down the street from The Painted Porch. With eighteen 18-wheelers, Chef Sonya Cote and her husband David Barrow moved their Eden East farm from Austin to Bastrop. We love to start with the butternut queso and the pork terrine & pickles, then I always get the Grass Fed Burger or the steak.

– When I find a song I like, I listen to it over and over again. Alone in my office or on my phone, I play songs on repeat over and over and over again. Loudly, as my wife and anyone who works for me can unfortunately attest. Here’s some all-time favorites I picked when I was a guest DJ recently on KUTX. 

– Instapaper is how I save and read articles.

– Being able to wear and dress as I please is important to me—at least the freedom of it is. So I am in a T-shirt most days. I basically live in an American Apparel Power Wash Tee, which is the standard American Apparel T-shirt but treated so it mimics a shirt that has been washed roughly 50 times. If I’m not wearing one, I usually wear vintage concert t-shirts, either that I bought myself or I found on Etsy.

– We shoot everything for Daily Stoic’s YouTube Channel on a Sony A7 III with a Rode VideoMicPro as well as two more Sony a6400’s when recording a video podcast. When I’m traveling I always bring along a couple of the GoPro HERO9’s to shoot b-roll, also most of the clips I record for TikTok are using one of these.

– When I’m recording for the Daily Stoic Podcast or the Daily Dad Podcast I use a Zoom H6 with a Shure SM7B running through a Cloudlifter for some added gain. When I do virtual podcasts or online talks, I use a Rhode USB mic and Sony MDR7506 Professional Large Diaphragm headphones.

– My kids are obsessed with Brent Underwood’s ghost town YouTube videos and we watch one before bed each night. 

– I don’t drink coffee, soda or energy drinks. Neuro mints are my go-to caffeine substitute. (My wife likes SuperCoffee, I will add). 

– For years, I’ve advocated keeping quotes on your desk. Something to chew on. A thought to guide the day. Now I keep the Daily Stoic page-a-day calendar on my desk, so I can have a new quote for every day of the year. 

– Everything I do, I do on index cards. They are the building blocks for my whole life. Notecards are where I sketch out ideas. They’re where I record quotes that I want to save for later use. It’s how I outline my own writing and where I take notes. They’re where I jot down stories, and where I workshop points I want to make. They’ve helped me create talks and articles. For a while, I used generic ruled 4-by-6 notecards. But now I print my own specific to the project I am working on. 

– I carry books, notecards, and pens everywhere I go. I use this Carhartt bag that is actually a tool bag, but also happens to be perfect for the tools of my craft. 

– Nothing. Is there anything better than sitting down, doing nothing, holding nothing and just being? Sometimes the best things are the things you get rid of or say no to. Remember...the things you own should not own you. 

***

I’ve written before about one of my favorite quotes from Robert Louis Stevenson: To know what you like is the beginning of wisdom. I make a point to find the stuff I like and stuff that lasts (it’s a basic thing you can do to reduce your footprint, if you care about the environment) because when you stock your life with things you can depend on, it frees up precious resources. 

But I also always like to remind myself with all of these things that—much like existence—they are transitory. The Stoics talk a lot about not getting too attached to anything, loosening the hold that possessions have on us, embracing the truth of uncertainty, having the ability to enjoy whatever is in front of you. “He is a great man who uses earthenware dishes as if they were silver,” Seneca wrote, “but he is equally great who uses silver as if it were earthenware.” 

The modern practice of this Thanksgiving holiday here in America is that we are supposed to take the time to think about what we’re grateful for. And the candidates are usually pretty obvious: We should be grateful for our families, for our health (especially through a pandemic), that we live in a time of peace (the first Thanksgiving America has not been at war in 21 years), for the food laid out in front of us. All the usual suspects.

I agree, these are important things to recognize and appreciate. It’s also good to have a specific day dedicated to that occasion. So by all means, celebrate.

But over the last few years, I have come to practice a different form of gratitude. It’s one that is a little harder to do, that goes beyond the cliche and perfunctory acknowledgment of the good things in our lives, but as a result creates a deeper and more profound benefit.

I forget how I came up with it exactly, but I remember feeling particularly upset—rageful, if I am being perfectly honest—about someone in my life. This was someone who had betrayed me and wronged me, and shown themselves to be quite different from the person that I had once so respected and admired. Even though our relationship had soured a few years before and they had been punished by subsequent events, I was still angry, regularly so, and I was disappointed with how much space they took up in my head.

So one morning, as I sat down early with my journal as I do every morning, I started to write about it. Not about the anger that I felt—I had done that too many times—but instead about all the things I was grateful for about this person. I wrote about my gratitude for all sorts of things about them, big and small. It was just a sentence or two at first. Then a few days later, I did it again and then again and again whenever I thought about it, and watched as my anger partly gave way to appreciation. As I said, sometimes it was little things, sometimes big things: Opportunities they had given me. What I had learned. A gift they had given me. What weaknesses they had provided vivid warnings of with their behavior. I had to be creative to come up with stuff, but if I looked, it was there.

In his book, Comedy Sex God (as well as on his wonderful podcast and on his HBO show) the comedian Pete Holmes talks about the aftermath of the dissolution of his marriage. After his wife cheated on him and their subsequent divorce, he was hit with a long developing crisis of faith in the religion he had grown up with. He describes this period as many nights on the road. Lots of work. Lots of drinking. Lots of crying. Lots of Counting Crows songs on repeat. Then he came up with a mantra that lifted him above his pain, that shifted his world view, that restored his hope and happiness. All with just three simple words: “Yes, thank you.” 

Your crying baby wakes you up at 3am? Yes, thank you. I know she is alive and now I get to spend time with her, just she and I.

Flight gets delayed? Yes, thank you. Now I can sit and read.

Show gets cancelled? Yes, thank you. Now I can do something else instead. 

It struck me that there was something similar about Pete’s gratitude mantra and the small success I had. It’s easy to think negative thoughts and to get stuck into a pattern with them. But forcing myself to take the time not only to think about something good, but write that thought down longhand was a kind of rewiring of my own opinions. It became easier to see that while there certainly was plenty to be upset about, there was also plenty to be thankful for. Epictetus said that every situation has two handles; which was I going to decide to hold onto? The anger, or the appreciation?

Now in the mornings, when I journal, I try to do this as often as I can. I try to find ways to express gratitude not for the things that are easy to be grateful for, but for what is hard. That nagging pain in my leg—yes, thank you, it’s making me take things slow. That troublesome client—yes, thank you, it’s helping me develop better boundaries. The mistake I made–yes, thank you, for reminding me to be more careful, for teaching me a lesson. That damage from the storm—yes, thank you, the damage exposed a more serious problem that we’re now solving. And on and on.

This is part and parcel of living a life of amor fati. Where instead of fighting and resisting what happens to you, you accept it, you love it all. You’re grateful for it. No matter how tough it is. 

It’s easy to be thankful for family, for health, for life, even if we regularly take these things for granted. It’s easy to express gratitude for someone who has done something kind for you, or whose work you admire. We might not do it often enough, but in a sense, we are obligated to be grateful for such things. 

It is far harder to say thank you to the things we didn’t want to happen. Or to people who have hurt us. Or to having our life disrupted by a pandemic. Or to be out of work. Or to lose money or people we love. Who would choose the events of the last two years? I certainly would not. But they have also not been without their benefits, as I have written. The time with family, the lifestyle changes they forced, the opportunities to do the right thing, to help others–these were things I have incredibly grateful for. 

Even if some situations unconscionably and irredeemably bad—as some events in recent days have been—there remains this advice from the writer Jorge Luis Borges:

A writer — and, I believe, generally all persons — must think that whatever happens to him or her is a resource. All things have been given to us for a purpose, and an artist must feel this more intensely. All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art.

How can we not be grateful for these raw materials? Where would we be without them?

The Stoics saw gratitude as a kind of medicine, that saying “Thank you” for every experience was the key to mental health. “Convince yourself that everything is the gift of the gods,” Marcus Aurelius wrote, “that things are good and always will be.” 

I’m not saying it will be magic but it will help.

So as you gather around your family and friends this Thanksgiving or even an ordinary evening at home, of course, appreciate it and give thanks for all the obvious and bountiful gifts that the moment presents. Just make sure that when the moment passes, as you go back to your everyday, ordinary life that you make gratitude a regular part of it. Again—not simply for what is easy and immediately pleasing.

That comes naturally enough, and may even go without saying. What is in more desperate need of appreciation and perspective are the things you never asked for, the things you worked hard to prevent from happening in the first place. Because that’s where gratitude will make the biggest difference and where we need the most healing.

Whatever it is. However poorly it went. However difficult 2021 has been for you. 

Be grateful for it. Give thanks for it. Say yes, thank you for it. There was good within it.

Write it down. Over and over again. 

Until you believe it.

________

P.S. Daily Stoic is trying to provide 2 million meals for families facing hunger. Did you know that more than 950 million people are food insecure, more than 38 million people in America still face hunger, and some 1.5 million children lost their primary or secondary caregiver from COVID-19 and now, those children don’t know where their next meal is coming from?

Last year, the Daily Stoic community came together and raised over $100,000 together, providing some 1 million meals. This year we’re trying to go twice as big. We donated the first $20,000 and we’d like your help in getting to our goal of $200,000—which would provide over 2 million meals for families across the country! Head over to dailystoic.com/feeding and help us make a small dent in a big problem. Even $1 helps provide at least 10 meals!

When I first moved to Austin in 2013, I went out to lunch—fittingly—with a writer named Austin Kleon. I was a longtime fan of his book Steal Like an Artist (his book Keep Going is a new favorite). After we ate, he drove me around the city, showing me things and giving me advice. 

Austin was a little older than me and was already married with kids. 

I remember asking him how he made time for it all. “I don’t,” he told me. “The artist’s life is about tradeoffs.” And then he gave me a little rule that has stuck with me always:

Work, family, scene. Pick two.

Work—that is your creative output.

Family—that’s a spouse, kids, or any close personal relationships. 

Scene—that’s the fun stuff that comes along with success. Parties. Fancy dinners. Important friends. This is the stuff that looks good on Instagram, that you can brag about, that falls into your lap like a wonderful surprise. Offers, invitations, perks. 

It’d be wonderful if you could have it all…but you can’t. 

You can party it up and hang onto a relationship but you won’t have much time left for work. You can grind away at your craft, be the toast of the scene, but what will that leave for your family? Almost certainly it means they will be home, alone. If you’re as committed to the work as you are to a happy home, you can keep both but you will have no room for anything else—certainly late nights or hangovers or exotic trips. And if you try to have it all? Well, you won’t get any of it. 

I emailed Austin about this all recently and he pointed me to a poem by Kenneth Koch from the New Yorker that had inspired it for him. It had a great verse in it:

There isn’t time enough, my friends— 

Though dawn begins, yet midnight ends- 

To find the time to have love, work and friends. 

Pick two. 

I know you think you’re the exception, but you’re not. I wasn’t. I can tell you that from experience. I tried all the different variations. I’ve traveled too much…and family and work suffered. I’ve worked too much and family and connections have suffered. I’ve tried to cram it all in and ended up a burned out mess, as I wrote in the epilogue to Ego is the Enemy. Eventually, you come face to face with that hard choice of that epigram and choose your priorities. That’s just how it goes. 

In the years since that conversation with Austin, I’ve been very productive. I’ve written about a dozen books. I’ve sent out an email and a podcast episode every day for both Daily Stoic and Daily Dad. I’ve filmed over 250 videos for the Daily Stoic YouTube channel. I’ve read and recommended hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of books to my Reading List Email and then opened a bookstore. I’ve also gotten married, had two kids, had wonderful moments with my family. 

I have not been to very many parties. 

I’ve said no to a lot of stuff. As I wrote recently, I’ve passed on everything from trips to the Super Bowl, a vacation on Necker Island, and more than a few different ghostwriting opportunities. A younger me would have thought these things crazy to pass up on. But that’s exactly what I did. 

I said no. 

I say no a lot. Not just to the big things but little things. Coffee, hangouts, a couple of us are going to dinner, group texts… People who know me, especially lately, find it hard to make plans with me. I’m not a jerk about it, but you can usually count on me to count myself out. 

A few years ago, Dr. Jonathan Fader, an elite sports psychologist who spent nearly a decade with the New York Mets, gave me a picture of Oliver Sacks in his office. Behind Sacks, who is speaking on the phone, is a large sign that just says, “NO!” 

I have that photo hanging on the wall in my office now. On either side of it, hang pictures of each of my sons. I can see them—all three photos—out of the corner of my eye even as I am writing this. It’s a sort of embodiment of the options Austin Kleon had laid out. 

I’m working. I have my two kids and my wife. I’m tapped out. 

Does that mean I miss out on stuff? Really cool stuff, in some cases? Sure, I guess. But the person who tries to have it all will always end up with very little. Certainly very little of anything lasting or meaningful. 

The memory of the warm sun from a long weekend on Necker Island won’t last nearly as long nor sink nearly as deep as the hugs I get from my boys each morning. There’s no one I could meet at a party who, in the end, I’d want to spend more time with than my wife. Moving amongst tens of thousands of people during the super exclusive festivities of Super Bowl Week comes with its own kind of invigorating energy, but it pales in comparison to the inspiration and motivation I get from the emails and messages (both positive and negative) sent by the readers of my books. Inspiration and motivation that help bring the next book into being, and the book after that. 

Life is about tradeoffs. 

When we know what to say no to, and we know why, we can say yes with comfort and confidence to the things that matter. To the things that last.

Work, family, scene. 

You can have two if you say no to one. If you can’t, you’ll have none.

P.S. Thank you to everyone who has supported my newest book, Courage is Calling: Fortune Favors the Brave. If you haven’t yet picked up a copy or if there is someone in your life who would benefit from it, you can get signed copies in time for the Holidays over in the Daily Stoic store. Of course, you can also get the book anywhere else books are sold, including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, and Audible.