Stoicism, Think Differently About Success And Failure
“Most people don’t wake up daily and say, ‘I need philosophy,’” Ryan Holiday told me in a recent interview. “They say, ‘I have a problem I need to solve.’” But he came to believe philosophy was exactly what they needed.
Long a fan of Stoicism, Holiday – best known for his successful books on marketing and his role as a wunderkind Director of Marketing for American Apparel – leveraged that political capital to write his newest book, The Obstacle Is the Way.
“Stoicism is what I’ve always wanted to write about,” he says. “The week [his marketing book] Trust Me, I’m Lying came out and was on the bestseller list, I turned in the proposal for The Obstacle Is the Way.”
He accepted “significantly less money” upfront for the latter because the potential audience seemed unclear to his publisher.
But, in keeping with Stoic philosophy, Holiday felt those doubts liberated him. “Doing something outside the box allowed me to explore something I’m passionate about,” he says.
“If it had sold for a lot of money, many demands would have been hard to refuse, and conservative impulses could have sent the book in the wrong direction.”
“Doing something outside the box allowed me to explore something I’m passionate about,” he says. “If it had sold for a lot of money, a lot of demands would have been hard to refuse, and conservative impulses could have sent the book in the wrong direction.”.
Instead, it’s sold better than even his previous bestseller. Why success? First, Holiday believes, “Stoicism is supposed to be a practical, day-to-day philosophy for dealing with a world we don’t control. I think that’s why it tends to be enduring and find resonance with entrepreneurs and artists and creative types.”
