The Stoic Handbook with Jon Brooks

Some mornings, nothing has gone wrong and the day already feels like too much. This guided Stoic morning practice starts from Marcus Aurelius's own argument with the bed in Meditations 5.1. Rather than manufacturing enthusiasm, you will choose one real reason to move and one obstacle to begin. The practice also draws on Meditations 5.20, where Marcus treats an obstruction as material for action. You do not need to feel ready. You need one honest start.
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We usually explain regret as knowing better but lacking discipline. This episode argues something more useful: in a hot state, the values on your internal scoreboard change.

I connect Epictetus with hot-cold empathy gaps, self-control replication research and implementation intentions. Then I give you a four-minute handover note: one specific if-then plan, written while you can still see clearly, for the version of you who will not realise their judgement has changed.

Sources and further reading:

- Epictetus, Discourses 1.28
- Seneca, Letters 76.34-35
- George Loewenstein, “Hot-Cold Empathy Gaps and Medical Decision Making” (2005)
- Hagger et al., “A Multilab Preregistered Replication of the Ego-Depletion Effect” (2016)
- Peter Gollwitzer and Paschal Sheeran, “Implementation Intentions and Goal Achievement” (2006)
- Keith Stanovich, Richard West and Maggie Toplak, work on myside bias and rational thinking
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Stoicism says nobody does wrong on purpose: every bad act begins in a mistaken judgement about what is good. But does that survive contact with clear-eyed cruelty, compulsive habit and modern moral psychology?

I test the claim against Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Medea, research on psychopathy and the Stoics' own internal disagreement. Then I keep the practical part that still works: catching one assent before it hardens into action.

Sources and further reading:

- Epictetus, Discourses 1.28 and 2.17
- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 2.1, 7.26 and 11.18
- Cicero, On Fate 42-43
- Aharoni, Sinnott-Armstrong and Kiehl, “Can Psychopathic Offenders Discern Moral Wrongs?” (2012)
- Aharoni, Sinnott-Armstrong and Kiehl, “What's Wrong? Moral Understanding in Psychopathic Offenders” (2014)
- Kühn and Gallinat, “Brain Structure and Functional Connectivity Associated With Pornography Consumption” (2014)
- Grubbs et al., “Pornography Problems Due to Moral Incongruence” (2019)
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The most feared striker in MMA history spent this conversation talking about calm.

Before his first fight in Japan, Bas Rutten wrote one letter on each fist with a marker: R, for rustig, Dutch for relaxed. He'd found out that morning his opponent was 33 pounds heavier, the round was thirty minutes long, and there were no rules he recognised. Mid-fight he was calm enough to overhear two spectators in the front row discussing a house move, and that was when he noticed the two voices in him. The aggressive one, and the one that kept him still.

He retired without losing any of his last 22 fights and credits the whole run to that discovery.

We talk about why the relaxed fighter beats the aggressive one nine times out of ten, the skin disease and asthma that made him the outcast of his school and which he now calls a blessing, the difference between anger and aggression, the single line that ended his drinking, and where Stoicism and the Catholic faith he returned to line up almost exactly.

He also walks through the practices he runs daily: the pre-fight question "what's the worst thing that can happen?", the friend test for anger, and an evening examination of conscience he has kept for twelve years that Seneca describes almost word for word.

Follow Bas Rutten:
YouTube: youtube.com/user/OfficialBasRutten
Instagram: @basruttenmma
Website: basrutten.com
The O2Trainer, the breathing device he invented: o2trainer.com
His MMA Workout audio, the striking tape I mention my friend Joel wearing out: o2trainer.com/products/bas-rutten-s-mixed-martial-arts-workout-dvd

Companion article and full show notes: stoichandbook.co/bas-rutten-staying-calm
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The Stoic Vault: stoicvault.com

Stoicism is meant to help you master your emotions. There's a version of it that just teaches you to avoid them.

In this conversation I joined Erick Cloward on the Stoic Coffee Break to talk about "stoic bypassing" (Jules Evans' term): using the philosophy to suppress hard feelings instead of feeling them. We both grew up learning to push emotions down, so it got personal.

We cover the difference between suppression and reappraisal, alexithymia, why the Let Them Theory is thinner than it looks, how the manosphere funnels every emotion through anger, the case for voluntary discomfort, and a reframe from Epictetus that means you can never lose a first date.

This first aired on Erick's show, the Stoic Coffee Break. Go and follow him.

Erick Cloward / Stoic Coffee Break
Podcast: https://stoic.coffee
Original episode: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5oBAAeiX5x1aMCqoahP3Dv?si=6av80YqGSmeIMG7wdTjGbg
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stoic.coffee
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