Stillness is the Key

by Ryan Holiday

In English: stillness. To be steady while the world spins around you. To act without frenzy. To hear only what needs to be heard. To possess quietude—exterior and interior—on command.

“To hold the mind still is an enormous discipline,”

Keep strong, if possible. In any case, keep cool. Have unlimited patience. Never corner an opponent, and always assist him to save face. Put yourself in his shoes—so as to see things through his eyes. Avoid self-righteousness like the devil—nothing is so self-blinding.

Tolstoy observed that love can’t exist off in the future. Love is only real if it’s happening right now.

The less energy we waste regretting the past or worrying about the future, the more energy we will have for what’s in front of us.

Don’t reject a difficult or boring moment because it is not exactly what you want. Don’t waste a beautiful moment because you are insecure or shy.

“Wherever we are, what we hear is mostly noise,” he would say. “When we ignore it, it disturbs us. When we listen to it, we find it fascinating.”

They don’t boast or lie to get ahead (and then struggle to deliver). Confidence is the freedom to set your own standards and unshackle yourself from the need to prove yourself. A confident person doesn’t fear disagreement and doesn’t see change—swapping an incorrect opinion for a correct one—as an admission of inferiority.

Confidence is what determines whether this will be a source of anguish or an enjoyable challenge. If you’re miserable every time things are not going your way, if you cannot enjoy it when things are going your way because you undermine it with doubts and insecurity, life will be hell.

Set thy heart upon thy work, but never on its reward. Work not for the reward; but never cease to do thy work.

If the mind is disciplined, the heart turns quickly from fear to love.

“gentleman is self-possessed and relaxed, while the petty man is perpetually full of worry.”

To have an impulse and to resist it, to sit with it and examine it, to let it pass by like a bad smell—this is how we develop spiritual strength. This is how we become who we want to be in this world.

“I think I understand now that the restlessness we feel as we make our plans and chase our ambitions is not the effect of their importance to our happiness and our eagerness to attain them. We are restless because deep in our hearts we know now that our happiness is found elsewhere, and our work, no matter how valuable it is to us or to others, cannot take its place. But we hurry on anyway, and attend to our business because we need to matter, and we don’t always realize we already do.”

Xhat Rubio said after he found his kid in the swimming pool, about to die. He realises how much he worked

exstasis—a heavenly experience that lets us step outside ourselves.

admitting that there is something bigger than you out there is an important breakthrough. It means an addict finally understands that they are not God, that they are not in control, and really never have been. By the way, none of us are.

if God exists, why would they possibly want you to be afraid of them? And why would they care what clothes you wear or how many times you pay obeisance to them per day? What interest would they have in monuments or in fearful pleas for forgiveness? At the purest level, the only thing that matters to any father or mother—or any creator—is that their children find peace, find meaning, find purpose. They certainly did not put us on this planet so we could judge, control, or kill each other.

There is no enjoying the possession of anything valuable unless one has someone to share it with. —SENECA

Tout comprendre c’est tout pardonner.

Peace is when we realize that victory and defeat are almost identical spots on one long spectrum. Peace is what allows us to take joy in the success of others and to let them take joy in our own. Peace is what motivates a person to be good, to treat every other living thing well, because they understand that it is a way to treat themselves well. We are

The truth is that a good routine is not only a source of great comfort and stability, it’s the platform from which stimulating and fulfilling work is possible.

great players nap more than lesser ones.

“Nowhere you can go is more peaceful—more free of interruptions,” he said, “than your own soul.”

Anne had spoken often of risk—saying that it was impossible to live life without risk and that in fact, life is risk.