Stillness is the Key: An Ancient Strategy for Modern Life

by Ryan Holiday

A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention. —HERBERT SIMON

As a general, Napoleon made it his habit to delay responding to the mail. His secretary was instructed to wait three weeks before opening any correspondence. When he finally did hear what was in a letter, Napoleon loved to note how many supposedly “important” issues had simply resolved themselves and no longer required a reply.

he told messengers never to wake him with good news. Bad news, on the other hand—that is to say, an unfolding crisis or an urgent development that negatively impacted his campaign—was to be brought to him immediately. “Rouse me instantly,” he said, “for then there is not a moment to be lost.”

“If you wish to improve,” Epictetus once said, “be content to appear clueless or stupid in extraneous matters.”

The important stuff will still be important by the time you get to it. The unimportant will have made its insignificance obvious (or simply disappeared). Then, with stillness rather than needless urgency or exhaustion, you will be able to sit down and give what deserves consideration your full attention. There is ego in trying to stay up on everything,

Epictetus talked about how the job of a philosopher is to take our impressions—what we see, hear, and think—and put them to the test. He said we needed to hold up our thoughts and examine them, to make sure we weren’t being led astray by appearances or missing what couldn’t be seen by the naked eye.

The world is like muddy water. To see through it, we have to let things settle.

Keep a notebook. Travel with it, eat with it, sleep with it. Slap into it every stray thought that flutters up into your brain. —JACK LONDON

Tolstoy expressed his exasperation at people who didn’t read deeply and regularly. “I cannot understand,” he said, “how some people can live without communicating with the wisest people who ever lived on earth.”

Wrestle with big questions. Wrestle with big ideas. Treat your brain like the muscle that it is. Get stronger through resistance and exposure and training.

As marksmen say these days, “Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.”

Heraclitus said that character was fate. He’s right.

Give more. Give what you didn’t get. Love more. Drop the old story.

He came up with a good test anytime he felt himself being pulled by a strong desire: What will happen to me if I get what I want? How will I feel after?

Vonnegut began to needle his friend. “Joe,” he said, “how does it feel that our host only yesterday may have made more money than your novel has earned in its entire history?” “I’ve got something he can never have,” Heller replied. “And what on earth could that be?” Vonnegut asked. “The knowledge that I’ve got enough.”