Stillness is the Key

by Ryan Holiday

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.

“like the rock that the waves keep crashing over. It stands, unmoved and the raging of the sea falls still around it.”

In these situations we must: Be fully present. Empty our mind of preconceptions. Take our time. Sit quietly and reflect. Reject distraction. Weigh advice against the counsel of our convictions. Deliberate without being paralyzed.

We must cultivate mental stillness to succeed in life and to successfully navigate the many crises it throws our way.

“People don’t understand that the hardest thing is actually doing something that is close to nothing,”

Being present demands all of us. It’s not nothing. It may be the hardest thing in the world.

Even during a quiet evening at home, all we’re thinking about is the list of improvements that need to be made. There may be a beautiful sunset, but instead of taking it in, we’re taking a picture of it.

Remember, there’s no greatness in the future. Or clarity. Or insight. Or happiness. Or peace. There is only this moment.

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.

We want to learn to see the world like an artist: While other people are oblivious to what surrounds them, the artist really sees. Their mind, fully engaged, notices the way a bird flies or the way a stranger holds their fork or a mother looks at her child. They have no thoughts of the morrow. All they are thinking about is how to capture and communicate this experience. An artist is present. And from this stillness comes brilliance.

This moment we are experiencing right now is a gift (that’s why we call it the present). Even if it is a stressful, trying experience—it could be our last. So let’s develop the ability to be in it, to put everyt...

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

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

In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius says, “Ask yourself at every moment, ‘Is this necessary?’”

Before we can make deep changes in our lives, we have to look into our diet, our way of consuming. We have to live in such a way that we stop consuming the things that poison us and intoxicate us. Then we will have the strength to allow the best in us to arise, and we will no longer be victims of anger, of frustration.

There’s a great saying: Garbage in, garbage out. If you want good output, you have to watch over the inputs.

We’d rather make ourselves miserable than make ourselves a priority, than be our best selves.

“There’s no sense in thinking now.” He cleared his mind, and enjoyed himself like a kid at a Little League game.

That space between your ears—that’s yours. You don’t just have to control what gets in, you also have to control what goes on in there. You have to protect it from yourself, from your own thoughts. Not with sheer force, but rather with a kind of gentle, persistent sweeping.

Keep it clean and clear.

What’s essential is invisible to the eye.

That is: Appearances are misleading. First impressions are too. We are disturbed and deceived by what’s on the surface, by what others see. Then we make bad decisions, miss opportunities, or feel scared or upset. Particularly when we don’t slow down and take the time to really look.

The world is like muddy water. To see through it, we have to let things settle. We can’t be disturbed by initial appearances, and if we are patient and still, the truth will be revealed to us.

Anne used her journal to reflect. “How noble and good everyone could be,” she wrote, “if at the end of the day they were to review their own behavior and weigh up the rights and wrongs. They would automatically try to do better at the start of each new day, and after a while, would certainly accomplish a great deal.” She observed that writing allowed her to watch herself as if she were a stranger.

“I examine my entire day and go back over what I’ve done and said, hiding nothing from myself, passing nothing by.” Then he would go to bed, finding that “the sleep which follows this self-examination” was particularly sweet. Anyone who reads him today can feel him reaching for stillness in these nightly writings.

Take the time to feel wisdom flow through your fingertips and onto the page. This is what the best journals look like. They aren’t for the reader. They are for the writer. To slow the mind down. To wage peace with oneself.

Journaling is a way to ask tough questions: Where am I standing in my own way? What’s the smallest step I can take toward a big thing today? Why am I so worked up about this? What blessings can I count right now? Why do I care so much about impressing people? What is the harder choice I’m avoiding? Do I rule my fears, or do they rule me? How will today’s difficulties reveal my character?*

What you’ll notice when you stop to listen can make all the difference in the world.

David’s confidence arose from experience, not ego. He had been through worse and done it with his bare hands.

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.

Most of us would be seized with fear if our bodies went numb, and would do everything possible to avoid it, yet we take no interest at all in the numbing of our souls. —EPICTETUS

The essence of greatness is the perception that virtue is enough. —RALPH WALDO EMERSON

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

The need for progress can be the enemy of enjoying the process.

“Beauty remains, even in misfortune,” she wrote. “If you just look for it, you discover more and more happiness and regain your balance.”

“Pass through this brief patch of time in harmony with nature. Come to your final resting place gracefully, just as a ripened olive might drop, praising the earth that nourished it and grateful to the tree that gave it growth.”

Don’t let the beauty of life escape you. See the world as the temple that it is. Let every experience be churchlike. Marvel at the fact that any of this exists—that you exist.

Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself. —ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE