Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world. Hey, it's Ryan, and welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast. I am still alive, so that's what I do. It was a very, very crazy period for me.
Okay, so I dropped my kids off at school on Thursday morning, did a nice, nice run around to town make. I went to the office, to shower, got ready, did some work, and then I flew to Las Vegas, where I did a talk to a lovely group of business leaders. That was fun. I think I finished at like 830, although actually before that, I guess I'm going to eat.
I was at this steakhouse in the hotel we were in in the casino. It was a, what is my life experience as I waited for a restaurant in a casino to open at 4pm with all the other old people and degenerate gamblers. And then I sat at the bar doing research for the Stockdale book while I waited for my food, and I just thought this is a strange pairing of things. Anyways, I did the talk, got finished at like 815, rushed back to the room, and I had to get in the car, and I had to drive to Phoenix.
It was the only way I could get two Phoenix in time for what I had to do the next morning. They told me it would be like a 4.5 hour drive, it was more like a 5.5 hour drive, and I did not calculate there would be a two hour time change. I wish someone could give me a heads up about that. So I got extremely late, I think I got in like 3 or 3.30, I crashed, and then I got up, and I went and I gave a talk to the Chicago Cubs, which was really cool.
I wasn't expecting that, but it was fun. It's not every day that you get to talk to ancient philosophy to a professional baseball team, but that's what I got to do here. Let me bring you a couple minutes of that. I think you might like it.
The core exercise in stoic philosophy is this exercise called the dichotomy of control. Is this up to me? It's up to me. When we focus our energy on what's not up to us, we're wasting our energy, and we focus our energy on what's up to us.
We have a chance to make a difference to get better. So the stoic's go, look, I don't control the weather. I control how I play and the weather. I don't control the umpires.
I control how I respond to the umpires. I don't control what my coaches are doing. I don't control what the media is saying. I don't control what's going on at home.
You don't control most of what's happening, but you do control your thoughts, your opinions, your reactions, your attitude, your work ethic. You control ultimately how you play. You don't control how they play. You control how you play.
So stoic philosophy is this idea of I want to take this and get better for what I'm having to deal with. I want to use this as practice. I want to use this as reps. So what we do is we're trying to take all that's happening and turn it to our advantage.
I think when people hear this word stoic, I think it has no emotions. That's what lowercase stoic means. It's not that. I do think a stoic is trying to be less emotional because those emotions are probably not going to make the situation better.
The stoic's say the way you turn an obstacle upside down is you. You look first at how you perceive it. What's the story you're telling yourself about it? Then what's the action you're taking about it?
And then what's the attitude and the determination you're bringing to solve it? So the stoics wanted to think about how you can take this. They turn it into something that allows you to grow. I talked to the Seahawks a couple of years ago and I'm talking to John Snyder at the GM.
And he was saying that one of the things that he looks at when he's evaluating players is how have they dealt with adversity in the past? He wants a guy that maybe struggled a little bit in high schools. He got a little bit of trouble in college. Maybe didn't work out on a team.
He's looking for how they downstacked that from something that didn't go their way. Because that's what life is. In a way, that's the ultimate skill. It's how do you deal with situations that are outside your control and how do you get better for having been in those situations?
If you get worse, when things don't go your way, you're not going to do great. If you get better when things don't go your way, if you can play in any and all conditions, then you get better. Okay, so then I went back to the hotel. I went on a run there.
Was it a canal or river or staying near the built more? Not at the built more. Although I have stayed there before actually when I gave a talk to the NFL owners meeting back seven or so years ago, I stayed there. So I sort of suddenly knew where I was.
I went for a nice long run and then I got ready and I went and did another talk. I talked to Arizona Diamondbacks, which was cool. I felt we were giving the same talk like back to back just made me uncomfortable. So I was like, I'm going to do a new talk for each one, which meant I had to come up with a new talk in that very brief interim period.
So I came up with a second. I don't know. Let me bring you a little bit of that. This one, I was like physically in the locker room with the Arizona Diamondbacks were there for spring training.
It's pretty cool. And I wanted to give them like some still classes. So that's what I did. Who here knows what positive visualization is, right?
Imagine things going well. The stoats, that's all well and good. They also do negative visualization, right? So imagining it going quite poorly.
The stoats would say it's better to do a premortum than a post-mortem, right? A post-mortem is great for the doctor. It's not so great for the patient who died. You want to imagine what could go wrong and then you want to prepare for that in advance.
So the stoats are saying that what is unexpected, what we don't want to think about, right? Lands the heaviest on us. So the stoats are always thinking about the worst case scenario, not in a way that makes them anxious, not because they want to suffer in advance, but because they want to be prepared. So the stoats, like the word stoic means sort of, and English means not having a big reaction being calm and under control and not being emotional.
Part of the reason the stoats have this reputation is because they don't get rattled by things because things don't surprise them. Another view is that nothing should ever happen to a wise person that is a surprise. Seneca said the only thing that a leader is not allowed to ever say is, wow, I didn't think that would happen. Like, your job as the leader is to think that could happen.
And what would I do if that happened? Where do I need to be if that happens? What would my plan be if that happens? Now, look, most of the time these negative circumstances won't happen.
That's great. It's better to be pleasantly surprised if they don't happen than unpleasantly surprised if they do happen. Then I went back to my hotel room and immediately crashed. It took about an hour and a half.
I slept through my alarm, which was not good, but that's how tired I was. And then I had to head over to a performing arts center where I was doing a talk to you guys today with Stowe fans. I'm going to announce some more updates of the tour, but this was the last of four shows that I've been doing over the last couple months. And so I went and was doing what was effectively my fourth talk in 24 hours.
Each one of those talks being a different talk this time to about a thousand fans of the day of stokes. So that was a crazy, cool experience. Here's something I shared with them, which I think you might like. That's what I talked to the Cubs and the Diamondbacks about today, right?
How do you in a world where you're going to fail more times than you're going to succeed? Or tons of people are watching you and criticizing you. How do you push all that aside and come fresh to the thing in front of you as you have to be, right? How can you get affordable news and then show up for your kids?
Again, going to the idea of like false evidence appearing real and the discipline, the mental discipline required. It's the ability to know by the sound or the sight or the pattern of things, what they mean, whether they're important or not real or not, whether you should trust them or not. And so this even kill this discipline to be able to stay focused and to stay clear headed in fundamentally disorienting times and situations is like what the work of discipline is. It's not just being strong and fast and working long hours.
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So generally I get to wear whatever I want, which is usually to be semi, it's running shorts and a heavy metal t-shirt. But sometimes we have a fancy guest on, I want to dress up, I'm giving a talk and I've got to dress up, I'm giving a TV and I've got to dress up. And lately I've been wearing a lot of quince. I've loved their sweaters.
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So obviously thanks to everyone that came out. It was really cool to see everyone there in Phoenix. As I said, sold out, I think 950 or 1000 people, my parents were there. It was a lovely, good way to wrap up the tour.
I'm excited for more dates, as I was saying. I'll tell you about those later. Okay, so what does this have to do with me still being alive? None of this seems that crazy.
Well, I went to dinner with my parents after. Okay, totally fine. Not at all why I was in physical danger. And then I went to bed, I had to get up at 4.30 in the morning to get to flight home.
Landed, went home, picked up the kids, and the wife and took them to see Harry Potter with a symphony orchestra at the Bass concert hall. Again, really cool, not dangerous, very lovely. All of this leading up to what I had known for a while was going to happen on Sunday, but I guess I hadn't really thought about what it entailed. We have a friend whose name is Mike Birch.
He's an awesome dude. He is the chief operating officer at Speedweight Motorsports. And every year NASCAR comes and does a race there at the F1 track, Circuit of America's Track, which is not far from my ranch. And the first year he asked if we wanted to come out, and it was really cool, and we've been coming every year.
And then last year he said, hey, do you want to drive the pace car? Because I saw they had like a celebrity drive the pace car that gets the car started every year. And I said, I mean, yeah, I would love to, but literally anyone would be a better choice. Not because I'm a bad driver.
I guess I'm OK, but like, don't you guys have like actual famous people do it? But wouldn't there be someone that would be a slightly more exciting draw for the NASCAR fans than a person who writes about an obscure school of ancient philosophy? And he said, no, no, I really want you to do it. And I said, OK, look, I will agree to do it.
But you have to agree to replace me with someone better if the opportunity arises at any point and say, OK. And so I just didn't think about it for several months. And then he followed up a couple weeks ago and said, no, no, no, you're still doing it, right? And I said, yeah, I guess I am.
So that's what I knew was in store for me on Sunday. So I got up, drove down to the track. The funny thing was pulling in. So we were parking in the paddock area, which is where all the drivers and staff and people working on the race were parking.
And we went into park and like all the spots were falling. It was like this whole thing. First thing, like you can't park there, but that we specifically had to park there. And so there was like this radio people going back and forth.
I was thinking of that Randy Blaife thing we talked about when he was on the podcast about like not trying to big time someone with your badge reminding yourself that this person who's stopping you is in fact doing your job. I tried to go, no, no, I totally understand. You're not supposed to let any people in. And you think a lot is full, but they specifically told us to go there.
So let's just get someone on the phone. Let me pull out of the way, but it was a whole thing because that person was stressed. And anyways, finally, we get into the lot through this back windy way that was much more accessible on on Chip's golf cart, but I'm weaving our F-150 through and we finally get there. And the security guard had tried to tell us not to park there.
I've been right. There was basically no spots. And so we were finally this sort of one spot. And let's just say it was a tight parking job.
And it did not do great for my confidence to have to do like a 14 point turn three round go of parking in there. I was just trying to instill as much doubt into myself and much doubt in the people from me as possible, show that I was not great at a vehicle in a tight space while people were watching it. Because then these people came out to help and they were trying to steer me in. And it's like, no, no, I just want to do this practically.
I don't want anyone looking. And I was like, oh, wait, so am I bad at driving when I have an audience? That's not going to be great with 35,000 people watching. And then of course, the whole start of the race on my shoulders.
And they said, we're going to take you around the track first, just so you see what it is. And I've been on that track before in the month of May that you write your bikes on it. And also you can drive around at Christmas lights this way. But I've done it on my bike, the bunch.
And you know, my nine-year-old can handle it. So I didn't think it would be that crazy. But just driving around in a Toyota, which is what they had us drive around. I texted Samantha from the passenger seat.
I said, this is genuinely terrifying. I don't know if I'm going to be able to do this. And then they explained that I had to drive around the track. I had to do three laps at a consistent speed of 40 miles an hour the entire time.
And there's S turns or hairpin turns or a giant hill at the top. And I thought it was like a symbolic thing. But no, no, the cars don't have speedometers in them like the NASCAR cars don't. And so they follow the pace cars to like set their RPMs to get a sense of what speed is what.
And so it actually doesn't matter. Like you can screw it up. And also there's tens of thousands of fans watching, did my training. And then, you know, the moment drew near and near.
And I got to say, there was a pit of dread in my stomach. There was a moment of levity in between, which is they do all the announcements beforehand. And they're like, okay, you're the first one up. And I said, what do you mean?
And like they do this like at this big stage with all this fireworks and it's cloud and there's a DJ and an announcer in there. And I'm standing back behind this banner. It goes, okay, just wait your name. And then I hear, and now one of the world's best-selling living philosophers, Ryan Holiday.
And then the crowd was just like, huh? And then the smoke goes off. I don't think there was fireworks. But I got to say, it was one of the most absurd ways, maybe in all of human history, for somebody who writes about Greek and Roman philosophy to ever be introduced.
And to what crowd I was being introduced to. I just thought it was absolutely amazing. I flashed back to a story actually telling lives of the Stoics where this group of philosophers is sent from Athens to Rome on a diplomatic mission. And philosophy had been then a Greek domain.
And the Romans were sort of the powerful new upstarts. And this is still in Galagines is there, a philosopher named Pernius is there. And some of the people are out. And then other people like Cato, the elder, this is the great grandfather of Cato, the younger, are just horrified.
They're like, what is this shit? And actually Cato, the elder, proposed that all philosophers be banned from Rome forever. Had the south horrified he was. And I just thought, you know, this is a fish out of water moment.
But it was also lovely and fun. And everyone was super nice. Got to spend some time with Brad Kesseloski beforehand. I would write some of the books.
He's been on the podcast. Actually, let me bring a little chunk of that conversation. You might actually get the sense of where they align. This is the reoccurring thing to being a race car driver that makes it difficult.
When you get scared, you have the same reaction over and over again. You're heart rate elevates, you get kind of a spider flight. And more importantly, you hold your breath. And I don't care who you are or how strong you are, that's when the mental side starts to carry over to the physical side.
And if you hold your breath for minutes at a time, you lose your energy and you borderline pass out, which is what I could tell happened to Michael. So the two really connect, they play together. And as I got an older, this has come more naturally to me, especially as a race car driver, but in another area of my life, I've gone to a spot rhyme where I'm kind of able to quote unquote, turn the fear off like a light swish. I'm in the car.
Look, I know something can happen to me. But you know what? I'm okay with that. You know, I'm not afraid of getting hurt.
If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. I'm more afraid of just not performing. And so you literally turn the fear off.
And when you do that, when you can mentally turn those other things off, the physical side gets so much easier. And I tell people all the time that if you have the right mentality, if it's a nice day with respect to not an overly hot day, if your car is handling really well, I am convinced that your average 12 year old could do my job. The problem is those days are very, very seldom. You're almost always fighting something with a car.
I'm always fighting. It's a really hot day. You're almost always fighting, hey, I'm going 200 mile an hour in a pack of cars. And what was that guy doing?
I don't know about him. I'm a little nervous about him. There's some kind of situation I'm not comfortable with. And so there's all these things that play into it.
So when people ask me about the physical and the mental, it's really difficult to create like a percentage base, like 75% mental, 25% physical. Because honestly, if you can't have the right mental mentality, and you have these variables under control externally, the physical side is a very low percentage of what I do. It's just the reality is in very few situations, can you control those variables? You do that so you can control what you can control when you can control it.
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As the ride in the car was coming up, and I just tried to get some deep breaths, call myself down. As Taylor Swift says, you need to calm down. I just knew being freaked out, being worried, being anxious, was not going to make it better. And actually what I needed to do was bring all of my attention and focus to the thing.
And at the same time, one of the reasons you do training is so that in those high stakes situations, the training can take over. When I was talking to baseball teams, I was talking about that famous Yogi Bear line about how you can't think and hit at the same time. I talked about Sean Green's wonderful book, The Way of Baseball, where he talks about how you really have to get out of your head, where you chop wood, carry water. Now, driving a race car was something I'd only trained for a few minutes previously, but I also been driving my whole life, right?
I just drove five hours in one stretch in the dark. I'm decently good at driving, right? And so you know what you're supposed to do. You know how to do the thing.
It's usually what happens is you get in your own head and then you're not able to do the thing that you're actually quite capable of doing. So it's about getting out of your own head and allowing the training and the instinct to take over. I even find when I'm writing, when I'm really consciously thinking about what I'm trying to do, I'm not doing it well, but when I allow the other stuff to melt away and to focus and to log in, you know, engulf the harder you are trying to golf well, the worse you're going to do. So I just tried to get out of the moment, but also get into the moment.
And I remember when I had Patrick Dempsey on the podcast, he talked about how in the race car, that was one of the few places he felt totally present and locked in, not that dissimilar to acting. I did text him for some advice, but I think we were in different time zones. So I had to remember what he'd said on the podcast instead. I'd be curious how different is your getting ready to race sort of protocol to like getting ready to be on camera.
Are they similar, do you get into a similar mental headspace? Yeah, you do. It's like once again, it's preparation, right? If you're coming in and you have another preparation where you know your lines backwards and forwards, and there's a lot of noise offset, you'll go up.
But if you're prepared, you're just like, okay, I noticed that. I'm in the moment, I'm present, I'm in the flow. And it's the same thing when you're in the car. I think the great thing about the acting that's helping in the car is I'm really comfortable being private in a public world.
Yeah. Like I know I got a lot of eyes on me. I know there's a lot of pressure. So I make one mistake, that's what's going to be televised.
I was racing at Le Mans, and there was a lot of media attention, and a lot of people wanted to come up, you know, because they know who I am. And my technique was like, you know, the obstacle is the way, right? And because it then would force me to be in the moment. Right.
So that's how I would say my whole thing. And if I had to go and take care of say my sponsors, Tag Hoyer, they want me to go over and do a press conference or something. Okay, that's what I need to do now. Yeah.
So I need to be aware because situational awareness is so important in racing, because you got all this activity going. So I used all of those moments as a preset. And some people weren't, some people had the headsets on and they would just go for it. For me, I would take the time to breathe, and it would allow me to remember, okay, take a breath, look the person in the eye, connect.
Yeah. Because if I didn't connect, I felt really bad. Yeah. And I was like, I'm thinking about that moment that's just happened.
I'm not thinking about what's happening right now. Yeah. Right. Which ties into all the work that you're talking about, which is what, and I think, was it Seneca about, you know, your mind is what's going to, the stories that are in your mind are not necessarily going to happen.
No. So then you just need to be present and it's the hardest thing to do. So for me, the racing is really the best thing for me. It's like, sort of going to church or temple or wherever you want to worship because it's the spiritual journey of that.
Sometimes when you're intimidated by something or you're scared by something or in your own head about it, one of the things I go is like, is this actually that hard? Like objectively, like people who do things, where do they rank this thing? Now, obviously, racing cars is really, really hard, but I try to think like, who else has done this before me, right? They do these races all over the country, not on this track.
This track is uniquely difficult because it's an F1 track and it's not going around in a circle, but I just try to think like some hangover celebrities have done this. Some actors and actresses, you know, comedians have done this. Like people who are no more or less qualified to do this than me. In fact, I'm sure some really fundamentally unqualified people have done this.
People who are not good at driving have done this. And if it was really, if the stakes really were that high, if it really was that dangerous, they obviously would have done more training and probably had a slightly more rigorous selection process. There's a line in this book I read, it's a novel called Galveston. I wish you carried in the bookstore, but I think about this line in the book all the time.
It's from the guy that wrote True Detective, actually. Anyways, this person's talking about how she needs to get a job or something, and she's a little intimidated by it. And he says, the dumbest people in the world have managed to get jobs. And this is actually a very stoic thing, right?
Sort of walking yourself through. Is this actually that hard? Is it actually that scary? Have other people done it?
And meditation's Mark Stokes talks about it. It's humanly possible, though, that you can do it also. So I thought to myself, this is a process. They put people through this every race.
They've already had two of them this year. They know what they're doing, and it's going to be all right. Again, some other people managed to pull this off. So stressing about worrying about making this thing bigger than it is, that's not helping you or them.
So you go, who's the worst person to do this? Who else has pulled this off? Am I as capable as them? Can I work?
And that's kind of how you walk yourself through that thing that's intimidating, whether it's walking across a bar to go talk to someone, whether it's getting up and doing public speaking, whether it's launching a podcast. Like that imposter syndrome stuff is so often based on just objectively unfair comparisons you're making. Or that imposter syndrome garbage is like so often based on preposterously uncharitable estimations of your own ability. And if you can provide that context, you know, yeah, I think I can do this.
And then I had to get in the car and drive it around the track. Like these Apache helicopters took off beforehand and then get in the car. And it's a fast Toyota Supra, but it's just like a regular car. Like you could plug in your phone to Apple Car put it in there, but you hear the start, your engine's, and then you just got to go.
And there I am driving around this track. I got to say there, it's weird. There's the sort of reactions you have like the subconscious reactions you have. One of which in this case was like, there's so much of really fast cars, aggressive drivers behind you, swerving, testing out their tires, gunning their engines.
And you sort of subconsciously want to just go or you want to get out of the way. But no, you actually have to do a kind of a very stoic thing, which is like maintain your equilibrium, maintain your speed. And most of all, not crash, humiliate yourself or hurt anyone. So I did my first lap around on the second lap.
They go into the pit and you go along outside the pit and you really have to gun it because they've got a shortcut. So you guys speed up. And then on the third one, you pull in. And then turn on my blinker, which was funny.
And then you pull off and you're done. And then they're just like, all right, thanks. And then you're just like, whoa, okay. What next?
And I turn around and you know who's standing there? Michael Jordan because Michael Jordan has the first spot in the pit because his team is doing incredible and is off to hit one their first two races. They ended up winning this race, which was pretty cool. And so I went over and I said hello.
And I thanked him again for writing that forward to the George Traveling book and told him how much it meant to me and to go drive that he did that. And then I went up and saw my family who were up in the booth. My kids had helped themselves to a very big play of food from the buffet. And certainly my kids were surprised I was able to do it.
They were making fun of me pretty hard. They were like, we thought you were going to crash. And I was like, thanks bud. And they were like, that would have been so cool.
You should have crashed. So I'm sorry to disappoint them. We had an amazing time. It was lovely.
It was actually a great reminder. Like in life, you're trying to do your thing. And then there's pressure on you. And to know what you're supposed to be doing and to be able to kind of tune out that other stuff.
Like in running, you learn this. Like you're running at the pace that you set and you can't because you don't know why other people are doing what they're doing and you're only maybe seeing them out of the back of your eye or when you look over your shoulder and once a while, you have to get really good at tuning that out. And I actually think that's like a life skill. Like, no, no, I know this would be not supposed to be going whether that's legal or the mission you're on or the thing you're trying to do or the place you're trying to go.
And you can't let other people rush you, distract you, make you feel self-conscious. Because that's going to, that's really going to screw you up. And then you also have to keep a governor on that impulse to want to like slowly pick up the pace to compete to go, you know, stride for stride with someone or, you know, to sort of keep your position. You don't want to do that.
It gets you into trouble. Mike's had a tough year. He was, I won't share his stuff, but he's had a tough year and then kind of a triumphant year. It was really awesome to see him a year later because we saw him at the race last year, where he was, I was asking, like, could you have imagined at this point last year that you would be here this year?
And he said, no, and I think that's a good reminder. Sometimes as we're going through hard stuff, we can only imagine it getting worse. Like we can't imagine it going well. We can't imagine succeeding.
I don't think stoicism is just about predicting that worst-case scenario. I think you predict the worst-case scenario so you can toughen yourself up. You can be prepared for it. You can not be surprised by it.
But also making room to acknowledge and appreciate that sometimes fortune surprises you in a good way, that there's also outcomes or directions that this could go. That's much better than you expect. Like if you do what you're supposed to do and the things line up the way that they can, things could be awesome. And it was wonderful to see that.
I'm very happy for him. I know Samantha is too. He was a wonderful host. It was cool to kick things around with him in the post after.
Thanks to Mike Birch for inviting me. Thanks to the folks at Speedway Motorsports who were amazingly generous and helpful. Thanks to Chip, who was my sort of handler during the day. He drove me around on Golf Card.
He took me to see Brad Kessolowski. I got to meet Papa Wallace, who also read the books. And I know I was in good hands with him. He also drove us to our car and stuff.
That was lovely. It was really cool. I had not been into NASCAR previous until I went to my first race. And it's just a crazy sport, a great conversation with Brad about, you know, about like sort of elite performance.
It was really cool. The craziest thing about getting to spend some time with Brad is that he had broke his leg. This is the New York Times article. It's Brad Kessolowski broke his leg 10 weeks ago.
And then he delivered one of NASCAR's gut-seas races. This is what they wrote about after the race. So I didn't know all of this at the time. But the article by Jeff Gluck in the athletic was incredible.
It's the 42-year-old Broke's femur leaving him immobile in what he described as by far the worst pain of his life. It was so agonizing that as Kessolowski was lying on the freezing ground, he'd fallen out of his car, taking his daughter skiing. He told me that. He said, he thought of the Civil War soldiers who had their legs cut off after a severe injury.
He said, I get why they would bring out the hacksaw. He said, there was a part of me that's like, that might actually feel better. And what the article goes on to say is that like an ordinary race, because he'd raced the last week or the week before. This one in Austin is actually even harder to do coming off 10 weeks after breaking your femur, because it's not just going around in a circle.
As I would soon find out driving the pace car, it was a very curvy track where you are constantly switching between the brake and the gas. He says, it's one thing to drive on a super speedway, which is mostly about keeping the gas pedal on the floor. A 17 turn road course that requires the frequent use of three pedals, gas, brake, and clutch. I didn't have to use a clutch.
In addition to G-forces throwing the driver from side to side and slamming the car over all sorts of bumps that chossle the body. Okay, but what was the discomfort actually like? How badly did his leg actually hurt? Kessolowski said he couldn't define it because he blocked it out.
He just turned it off. He said, and you just try to get in the zone and turn all that stuff off. I'm sure it will catch up with me tonight. Kessolowski's favorite author is Ryan Hawley.
That's pretty cool. Who's best selling books on stoicism are popular in circles of high achievers, sports included. Holiday in Austin area local attended the race Sunday and met with Kessolowski beforehand. The driver ditched his cane for their photo together.
It's true he did. Someone while we're talking about Brodemus came because he was struggling a little bit. And then the other crazy thing was when they did the introductions, like I went out on stage first, I said in the night, go down the stairs. Brad came out to the crowd, waved, but did not go down the stairs like the other drivers.
So she does know some limits, but it was fascinating to go like, this guy can't go down a flight of stairs. And then he's about to race in this thing to do what we're just talking about. And then it says, one of Holiday's most prominent books, the obstacle is the way. Reminds readers that they control their emotions and the responses to any situation, no matter how dire.
Obstacles like the one Kessolowski, his face with his leg injury are an opportunity for self-growth, rather than a roadblock to success. So when we asked Kessolowski after climbing from his car, whether he was proud of what he accomplished, his answer was fitting for a student of stoicism. I expect it, he said. I expect to lay it all out on the line.
If I'm going to ask everybody else to give it their all, I've got to give it my all too. Just absolutely insane. The other crazy thing, if you look at the picture from the sneer times piece, he puts that like black, the reflective, like ink or whatever under his eye, like a football player does. And you should just see, it looks like he's been weeping, like from the sweat and the wind and the heat of the car, it's like melted off.
It says, Kessolowski wears eye black under his helmet each week and he sweated enough on Sunday that it was streaming down his face. And yet, after climbing from his car, Kessolowski wiped it away with a towel, put on sunglasses and took a casual sip from a red sports drink. And age returned his black cane, which carries sponsor logo in true NASCAR fashion. Just absolutely incredible.
And just unreal to get to see him do what he does. And then I went home and I crashed because I was exhausted. And now I'm recording this before I get on an airplane to fly and do some more talks. So it has been quite a bit of a grind, but it's all in a day's work.
And I just thought I'd share that. And I will talk to you all very soon. Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us.
And we'd really help the show. We appreciate it. I'll see you next episode.