1.5 Meaningful relationships and meaningful work are mutually reinforcing, especially when supported by radical truth and radical transparency.
The most meaningful relationships are achieved when you and others can speak openly to each other about everything that’s important, learn together, and understand the need to hold each other accountable to be as excellent as you can be. When you have such relationships with those you work with, you pull each other through challenging times; at the same time, sharing challenging work draws you closer and strengthens your relationships. This self-reinforcing cycle creates the success that allows you to pursue more and more ambitious goals.
If you agree that a real idea meritocracy is an extremely powerful thing, it should not be a great leap for you to see that giving people the right to see things for themselves is better than forcing them to rely on information processed for them by others. Radical transparency forces issues to the surface—most importantly (and most uncomfortably) the problems that people are dealing with and how they’re dealing with them—and it allows the organization to draw on the talents and insights of all its members to solve them. Eventually, for people who get used to it, living in a culture of radical transparency is more comfortable than living in the fog of not knowing what’s going on and not knowing what people really think. And it is incredibly effective. But, to be clear, like most great things it also has drawbacks. Its biggest drawback is that it is initially very difficult for most people to deal with uncomfortable realities. If unmanaged, it can lead to people getting involved with more things than they should, and can lead people who aren’t able to weigh all the information to draw the wrong conclusions.
I have learned that the people whose opinions matter most are those who know us best—our clients and our employees—and that our radical transparency serves us well with them. Not only has it led to our producing better results, but it also builds trust with our employees and clients so that mischaracterizations in the press roll off their backs. When we discuss such situations with them, they say that for us to not operate transparently would scare them much more.
1.3 Create an environment in which everyone has the right to understand what makes sense and no one has the right to hold a critical opinion without speaking up.
Whether people have the independence and character to fight for the best answers will depend upon their nature, but you can encourage them by creating an atmosphere in which everyone’s first thought is to ask: “Is it true?”
a. Speak up, own it, or get out.
In an idea meritocracy, openness is a responsibility; you not only have the privilege to speak up and “fight for right” but are obliged to do so. This extends especially to principles. Just like everything else, principles need to be questioned and debated. What you’re not allowed to do is complain and criticize privately—either to others or in your own head. If you can’t fulfill this obligation, then you must go.
Of course open-mindedly exploring what’s true with others is not the same thing as stubbornly insisting that only you are right, even after the decision-making machine has settle an issue and moved on. There will inevitably be cases where you must abide by some policy or decision that you disagree with.
Aligning what you say with what you think and what you think with what you feel will make you much happier and much more successful. Thinking solely about what’s accurate instead of how it is perceived pushes you to focus on the most important things. It helps you sort through people and places because you’ll be drawn to people and places that are open and honest. It’s also fairer to those around you: Making judgments about people so that they are tried and sentenced in your head, without asking for their perspective, is both unethical and unproductive. Having nothing to hide relieves stress and builds trust.
a. Never say anything about someone that you wouldn’t say to them directly and don’t try people without accusing them to their faces.
Criticism is welcomed and encouraged at Bridgewater, but there is never a good reason to bad-mouth people behind their backs. It is counterproductive and shows a serious lack of integrity, it doesn’t yield any beneficial change, and it subverts both the person being bad-mouthed and the environment as a whole. Next to being dishonest, it is the worst thing you can do in our community.
Managers should not talk about people who work for them if they are not in the room. If someone is not present at a meeting where something relevant to them is discussed, we always make sure to send them a recording of the meeting and other relevant information.
1.1 Realize that you have nothing to fear from knowing the truth.
If you’re like most people, the idea of facing the unvarnished truth makes you anxious. To get over that, you need to understand intellectually why untruths are scarier than truths and then, through practice, get accustomed to living with them.
If you’re sick, it’s natural to fear your doctor’s diagnosis—what if it’s cancer or some other deadly disease? As scary as the truth may turn out to be, you will be better off knowing it in the long run because it will allow you to seek the most appropriate treatment. The same holds for learning painful truths about your own strengths and weaknesses. Knowing and acting on the truth is what we call the “big deal” at Bridgewater. It’s important not to get hung up on all those emotion- and ego-laden “little deals” that can distract you from the overall mission.
366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living Ryan Holiday 20161018
Of all people only those are at leisure who make time for philosophy, only they truly live. Not satisfied to merely keep good watch over their own days, they annex every age to their own. All the harvest of the past is added to their store. Only an ingrate would fail to see that these great architects of venerable thoughts were born for us and have designed a way of life for us. —Seneca
About This Book
A PHILOSOPHICAL BOOK FOR THE PHILOSOPHICAL LIFE
Some of us are stressed. Others are overworked. Perhaps you’re struggling with the new responsibilities of parenthood. Or the chaos of a new venture. Or are you already successful and grappling with the duties of power or influence? Wrestling with an addiction? Deeply in love? Or moving from one flawed relationship to another? Are you approaching your golden years? Or enjoying the spoils of youth? Busy and active? Or bored out of your mind?
Whatever it is, whatever you’re going through, there is wisdom from the Stoics that can help. In fact, in many cases they have addressed it explicitly in terms that feel shockingly modern. That’s what we’re going to focus on in this book.
Drawing directly from the Stoic canon, we present a selection of original translations of the greatest passages from the three major figures of late Stoicism—Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius—along with a few assorted sayings from their Stoic predecessors. Accompanying each quotation is our attempt to tell a story, provide context, ask a question, prompt an exercise, or explain the perspective of the Stoic who said it so that you may find deeper understanding of whatever answers you are seeking.
Stop wandering about! You aren’t likely to read your own notebooks, or ancient histories, or the anthologies you’ve collected to enjoy in your old age. Get busy with life’s purpose, toss aside empty hopes, get active in your own rescue—if you care for yourself at all—and do it while you can.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 3.14
The purpose of all our reading and studying is to aid us in the pursuit of the good life (and death). At some point, we must put our books aside and take action. So that, as Seneca put it, the “words become works.” There is an old saying that a “scholar made is a soldier spoiled.” We want to be both scholars and soldiers—soldiers in the good fight.
That’s what’s next for you. Move forward, move onward. Another book isn’t the answer. The right choices and decisions are. Who knows how much time you have left, or what awaits us tomorrow?
* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman
To bear trials with a calm mind
robs misfortune of its strength and burden.
—Seneca, Hercules Oetaeus, 231-232
The people you admire, the ones who seem to be able to successfully handle and deal with adversity and difficulty, what do they have in common? Their sense of equilibrium, their orderly discipline. On the one-yard line, in the midst of criticism, after a heartbreaking tragedy, during a stressful period, they keep going.
Not because they’re better than you. Not because they’re smarter. But because they have learned a little secret. You can take the bite out of any tough situation by bringing a calm mind to it. By considering it and meditating on it in advance.
And this is true not just for our day-to-day adversities but for the greatest and most unavoidable trial of all: our own eventual death. It could come tomorrow, it could come in forty years. It could be quick and painless, or it could be excruciating. Our greatest asset in that ordeal will not be religion, it will not even be the wise words of the philosophers. It will be, simply, our calm and reasoned mind.
* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman
