Overview of The Age of Catos is Gone (or Is It?) — Daily Stoic Podcast
This episode (Daily Stoic | Backyard Ventures) is a short, personal reflection on how Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations shaped Ryan Holiday’s life and how Stoic principles remain actionable today. Using literary references (Walker Percy’s The Moviegoer), Stoic teachers (Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca), and concrete anecdotes (Marcus selling imperial goods during the Antonine Plague), the host draws practical lessons about focus, perception, resilience, service, and moral courage.
Key themes
- The myth of a lost moral age (“The age of Cato’s is gone — or is it?”): virtue can be kept alive by individuals’ choices, not by nostalgia for the past.
- Essentialism: do fewer things, do them better — “if you want tranquility, you must do less.”
- Perception over circumstance: external events aren’t inherently upsetting; our judgments about them are.
- Obstacles as opportunities: “What stands in the way is the way” — adversity calls forth growth and virtue.
- Control your imagination: avoid suffering in advance by staying with the situation at hand.
- Internal responsibility for anxiety: you bring anxious reactions to objective events; you can discard them.
- Stoic strength includes vulnerability: asking for help is consistent with resilience.
- Service and leadership: true leadership sacrifices for others (Marcus’s sale during the plague); put the common good first.
- Action as hope: doing good renews hope and sustains moral life.
Main takeaways
- Read Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations. The host recommends it as the single most transformative book he’s ever read and aims to reread it yearly.
- Prioritize essentials: frequently ask “Is this essential?” and remove inessential tasks and commitments.
- Reframe problems as opportunities to practice virtue and grow rather than as purely negative obstacles.
- Keep imagination and anxiety in check by focusing on present realities, not worst‑case extrapolations.
- Recognize internal agency: while you can’t control external events, you can control responses and judgments.
- Be willing to ask for help — it’s an act of persistence, not surrender.
- Serve others; leadership means putting others first and bearing cost for the common good.
- Small hopeful actions (serve, help, give) create momentum: “If you want to feel good, do good.”
Notable quotes & passages referenced
- “The age of Cato’s is gone. Or is it?”
- “If you want tranquility you must do less.”
- “It’s not things that upset us. It’s our judgment about things.” — Epictetus (paraphrased) / Marcus Aurelius (theme)
- “What stands in the way is the way.” — Marcus Aurelius (core Stoic reframing)
- “The call is coming from inside the house.” (on anxiety being internal)
- Story: Marcus Aurelius held a public sale during the Antonine Plague — leader sacrifices to serve the public good.
- Favorite passage quoted/paraphrased (Marcus Aurelius): “Concentrate on what you have to do. Fix your eyes on it. Remind yourself that your task is to be a good human being…speak the truth as you see it, but with kindness, with humility, and without hypocrisy.”
Practical actions / To‑do list
- Read (or re‑read) Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations — aim for a yearly revisit.
- Create an “essentialism” prompt: put a visible reminder to ask “Is this essential?” (the host uses a “NO!” sign with pictures of his kids to represent saying no to inessential things).
- When stressed, pause and ask: “Is this an external fact or my judgment?” Reframe accordingly.
- Turn an obstacle into a practice: identify one current difficulty and list three virtues it could develop (patience, courage, persistence).
- Practice staying with the present: when your mind spirals, note the chain of hypothetical jumps and bring attention back to the immediate facts.
- Normalize asking for help: if stuck, request one concrete favor from a peer or colleague.
- Do one small act of service each day/week to reinforce purpose and hope (donate time, mentor, give feedback, help a neighbor).
- Memorize or post the episode’s favorite Meditations passage as a daily moral prompt.
Who this episode is for
- People seeking practical, time-tested tools for resilience and focus.
- Readers curious about Stoic philosophy applied to modern life.
- Anyone wanting a short, motivational reminder to prioritize virtue, service, and mental discipline.
Final note (host’s personal frame)
Ryan Holiday frames his life and career around Meditations: the book is both the origin story for his values and a practical manual for living. Stoicism, as presented here, is not passive fatalism but active engagement — doing less of the inessential, doing more of what matters, and serving others with humility.