Ask Daily Stoic: Ryan and Jocko Willink On How to Thrive in Challenging Times

The more you help your kids, the more you're hurting your kids ... If you do everything for your kids and you spoon-feed them, they're never going to know how to fend for themselves, and that's not going to be a good thing.

We can curl up in a ball and get under the covers on the couch & hide, or we can go on the attack. So, what do you want to do? You want to go on the attack, or do you want to curl up in a ball and let the world fall apart around you? I say we go on the attack.

It's a scary thing when you think you have the best idea ever, and then you realize that maybe it wasn't the best idea ever. It's hard to admit that to yourself, and it's hard not to blame the world for not understanding your idea and not appreciating your brilliance, but sometimes, that's the way it works out.

We think philosophy is this abstract turtleneck university professor talking about big words; but really, the great philosophers—whether they were Zen Buddhists, samurai warriors, or Marcus Aurelius leading troops into battle—were warriors or at the very least people struggling with real problems in the real world.