Philosophies for Life

Homer's Odyssey - 3 Mistakes That Are Silently Destroying Your Potential. In this podcast we will be talking about 3 Mistakes That Are Silently Destroying Your Potential from the philosophy of Homer’s Odyssey.Unlike other ancient heroes like Achilles or Hercules, who relied on god-like strength or invulnerability, Odysseus was just a man. He was mortal, he was flawed, and he suffered. He didn't survive because he could punch harder than everyone else; he survived because he mastered his own mind.We are talking about this text today because the monsters Odysseus faced - seduction, ego, laziness, and despair - are just as relevant today as they were then. Human technology may have changed, but human nature certainly hasn’t. So, if you feel like you are drifting, or that you are capable of more but can't seem to unlock it, it’s possible you are falling into the same psychological traps that nearly killed Odysseus 3,000 years ago.So with that in mind, here are 3 Mistakes That Are Silently Destroying Your Potential, and how to fix them, all from the Philosophy of Homer’s Odyssey - 00:00 - 01:47 - Introduction to Odyssey01:47 - 05:42 - Mistake 1 - The Lie of Willpower05:42 - 09:58 - Mistake 2 - The Curse of Visibility09:58 - 15:41 - Mistake 3 - The Golden HandcuffsI hope you enjoyed listening to these 3 Mistakes That Are Silently Destroying Your Potential from the Philosophy of Homer’s Odyssey.In the 8th century BC a blind poet composed a poem that would become the foundation of Western literature. That poet’s name was Homer, and that poem? The Odyssey. On the surface, it is an adventure story about Odysseus, a veteran of the Trojan War, trying to navigate a chaotic ocean to return to his family in Ithaca. But if you look a little closer, you’ll start to realize that Homer wasn't just writing fiction; he was writing a psychological manual on how to survive the human condition.

Why You Feel Guilty When You Rest - The Logic of Total Work. In today’s Philosophies For Life, we are going to be taking a look at exactly why you feel guilty when you rest, and how to reclaim your right to simply exist.It is Sunday afternoon. Your chores are done. Your laundry is folded. The inbox is—miraculously—empty. You finally have permission to relax. But... you can't. Instead of peace, you feel a phantom vibration in your pocket. A tightening in your chest. A voice in the back of your head starts whispering: "You should be doing something. You are wasting time. You are falling behind." This has a name: 'Leisure Sickness.' It is when you actually feel sick the moment you stop working." Now, you might tell yourself: "I’m just Type A" or "It’s just my personality." Indeed, we use these labels to convince ourselves that this anxiety is a genetic quirk—that we were simply born this way.But that is a lie. You were not born unable to sit still. You were trained to be unable to sit still. You are the victim of a specific, invisible philosophical architecture designed to make you impossible to satisfy. You have been infected by what the German philosopher Josef Pieper, in his famous book Leisure: The Basis of Culture, called "The Logic of Total Work."It is the belief that a human being is nothing more than a worker, and that any moment not spent producing value is a moment wasted.Topics covered - Introduction - 00:00 - 01:47 Act I: The Internalized Panopticon - 01:47 - 06:09 Act II: The Addiction to Cortisol - 06:09 - 08:29Act III: The Fear of Being Nobody - 08:29 - 11:54Act IV: The Theft of Leisure - 11:54 - 14:39 Act V: The Great Refusal - 14:39 - 20:09 Act VI: The Right to Be Useless - 20:09 - 21:21 I hope you enjoyed listening to this audio - Why You Feel Guilty When You Rest and hope you reclaim your right to simply exist.

What If You Died Today? (And Got A Second Chance)If the Angel of Death appeared tonight and asked "Why do you want to live?", what would you say?Most of us live as if we have infinite time. We stay in jobs we hate, we hide our true feelings, and we wait for "someday" to start living. In this video, we follow the story of Adam - a man who felt dead inside until he met Death face-to-face. He was given a second chance, but it came with one terrifying condition: His life would grow when he acted honestly, and shrink when he lied to himself.Through Adam’s journey, we explore powerful ideas from - 01.Viktor Frankl -  Logotherpy02. Alfred Adler -  Individual Psychology03. Albert Camus - Absurdism04. Jean-Paul Sartre - Existentialism05. The Buddha - Buddhism06. Marcus Aurelius - Stoicism07. Ubuntu08. Understanding deathI hope you enjoyed listening to this video.

In this podcast we will be talking about 5 buddhist ways of dealing with difficult people from the wisdom of  Buddha. Gautama Buddha was a philosopher, meditator, spiritual teacher, and religious leader who is credited as the founder of Buddhism.So with that in mind, here are 5 buddhist ways of dealing with difficult people from Gautama Buddha -01. Acknowledge There Are difficult People Around You02. Practice Restraint03. Practice Clearing Your Mind04. Practice Compassion05. Practice Right SpeechI hope you enjoyed watching the video and hope these 5 buddhist ways of dealing with difficult people from Gautama Buddha will add value to your life.The Buddha was a philosopher, meditator, spiritual teacher, and religious leader who is credited as the founder of Buddhism. He was born as Siddhartha Gautama in India in 566 BC into an aristocratic family and when he was twenty-nine years old, he left the comforts of his home to seek the meaning of the suffering he saw around him. After six years of arduous yogic training, he abandoned the way of self-mortification and instead sat in mindful meditation beneath a bodhi tree. On the full moon of May, with the rising of the morning star, Siddhartha Gautama became the Buddha, the awakened one. The Buddha wandered the plains of northeastern India for 45 years more, teaching the path or Dharma he had realized in that moment. Around him developed a community of people, drawn from every tribe and caste, devoted to practicing this path.Nowadays, he is worshiped by most Buddhist schools as the enlightened one who has escaped the cycle of birth and rebirth, transcending Karma. Their main teachings focus on their insight into duhkha meaning “suffering” and into Nirvana, which means the end of suffering. 

In this audio we will be talking about 4 ways to unlock your inner freedom from the philosophy of Epictetus. Epictetus was one of the most influential teachers of the later years of the school of Stoicism. So with that in mind, here are 4 ways to unlock your inner freedom from the wisdom of Epictetus -01. Free your mind02. Train your habits03. Control your desires04. Love your FateWe hope you enjoyed listening to this podcast and hope this video will help you to unlock your inner freedom. Epictetus was a Greek/Roman philosopher of the Hellenistic period. He managed to overcome huge obstacles in developing from a crippled Roman slave to become one of the most popular and sought after philosophers of his time. Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium in Athens in the early 3rd century BC. Even though it is over 2000 years old, more and more people are discovering how Stoicism is not only relevant to modern times, but can be applied in very simple, yet strong ways. 

In this audio we will be talking about how to be in flow with your life from the wisdom of Miyamoto Musashi. Miyamoto Musashi is considered to be the greatest swordsman ever in the history of Japan, in large part due to his almost surreal discipline. So here are 5 ways to be in flow with your life from Miyamoto Musashi - 01. Accept death and take risks02. Train intensively03. Cultivate your intuition04. Accept the Way of Nature05. Embrace simplicityI hope you enjoyed listening to this podcast and hope these insights form Miyamoto Musashi help you to be in flow with your life.. A samurai at first, and then a Ronin, Miyamoto Musashi is considered to be the greatest swordsman ever in the history of Japan, in large part due to his almost surreal discipline. Indeed It is being said that he fought 60 duels, and never lost one. He fought for the first time when he was 13 against an experienced Samurai, and came out victorious. He took down the greatest swordsman at that time, one by one, until the throne was his, and his alone. However, Miyamoto was more than that. Not only was he a master of his craft, but he was also an artist, a cerebral philosopher and a buddhist. He sought meaning, wrote war and philosophy books, and his work became a blueprint for people who want to live a disciplined life. A week before he died in 1645, Miyamoto Musashi wrote 21 principles called “Dokkodo '' by which he expresses a stringent, honest, and ascetic or strongly self-disciplined view of life. 

Nietzsche - Why You Actually Fear AI (It’s Not Poverty) (Existentialism). In this podcast we will talk about Why You Actually Fear AI from the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. Friedrich Nietzsche was one of the main precursors of existentialism.In 1882, German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche published The Gay Science, which features a famous scene called 'The Parable of the Madman.' In the story, a man runs into a busy marketplace in broad daylight, holding a lantern, shouting, “I seek God! I seek God!” People laugh at him. They tease him: “Did God get lost? Is he hiding?” They treat it like a joke. But the madman stops, stares at them, and finally says: “God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.” Nietzsche didn’t mean we literally killed a god. He meant that science and reason replaced our need for God. We swapped mystery for facts, the cathedral for the lab, and made the divine unnecessary. Nietzsche was warning us. Removing God also removes the sense of security people relied on. For thousands of years, religion told people who they were, why they suffered, and what their lives meant. When that sun disappeared, Nietzsche predicted that the West would face a crisis of meaning. We would lose our center of gravity. So what did we do? We replaced the old structure with a new one. In the 20th century, we built society around utility. We decided that meaning comes from being useful. You’re a writer. A coder. A doctor. An analyst. Your identity is your competence. Your value is your output. “I am useful, therefore I matter.” And that brings us to today. Right now, that entire structure is collapsing. We’ve created machines that can imitate the very bilities we’ve built our identities on - logic, creativity, analysis, language. If you’re a writer and the machine writes faster… If you’re a coder and the machine codes better… If you’re an analyst and the machine sees what you can’t…The real fear isn’t, “Will I lose my job?” It’s the same fear the madman felt: We’re facing the “Death of Human Utility.” And just like in Nietzsche’s time, we’re not prepared for the psychological weight that comes with it. In this video, I want to look at AI through Nietzsche’s eyes. I want to explore the danger of becoming what he called “The Last Man”- a passive, comfort-addicted observer. And I want to talk about the solution he offered. Because if we’re losing our utility, we need something else to keep us from falling into the dark.Topics covered - Introduction - 00:00 – 03:12 Act 1: The Idol of Utility – 03:12 – 06:28Act 2: The Abyss and the Last Man – 06:28 – 11:35Act 3: The Crisis of Mediocrity – 11:35 – 17:10Act 4: The Solution – 17:10 – 24:16Act 5: The Bridge – 24:16 – 26:22Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher, poet, essayist, and cultural critic. He is considered to be one of the most daring and greatest thinkers of all time. His writings on truth, morality, language, aesthetics, cultural theory, history, nihilism, power, consciousness, and the meaning of existence have exerted an enormous influence on Western philosophy and intellectual history. He was one of the biggest precursors of existentialism, which emphasizes the existence of the individual person as a free and responsible agent, determining their own development through acts of will. By his famous words “God is dead!”, Nietzsche moved the focus of philosophy from metaphysics to the material world and to the individual as a responsible person for his own life. Friedrich Nietzsche wrote several books like The Birth of a Tragedy,  Human, All Too Human, The Dawn, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Beyond Good and Evil, Twilight of the Idols, The Will to Power, The Antichrist, and many more. His teachings have shaped the lives of many people; from psychologists to poets, dancers to social revolutionaries.

In this podcast, we will be talking about The 10 ways to keep our New Year’s Resolutions from the writings of Epictetus. Epictetus was one of the most influential teachers of the later years of the school of Stoicism. So here are 10 ways from Epictetus’s discourses, that will help you in keeping your New Year’s resolutions. So here are 10 ways to keep our New Year’s Resolutions from the writings of Epictetus - 01. Keep your resolutions simple02. Routine is everything03. Replace bad habits04. Don’t Share your resolutions with everyone05. Give no excuses06. Don’t wait for other people’s validation07. Reward yourself08. Review your day09. Never Ever Ever give up10. Always keep evolving Hope you enjoyed listening to this podcast and find these insights on keeping New Year’s resolutions helpful. . Epictetus was a Greek/Roman philosopher of the Hellenistic period. He managed to overcome huge obstacles in developing from a crippled Roman slave to become one of the most popular and sought after philosophers of his time. Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium in Athens in the early 3rd century BC. Even though it is over 2000 years old, more and more people are discovering how Stoicism is not only relevant to modern times, but can be applied in very simple, yet strong ways. 

In this podcast we will be talking about 8 Life Lessons from Jean-Paul Sartre. Sartre was one of the leading philosophers who followed the philosophy of Existentialism. One of Sartre’s key-concepts that is discussed or prevalent in almost all of his existentialist works is the notion of “Bad Faith”, which he uses to describe and critique how most people tend to deny their own freedom. Alongside his notion of Bad Faith, Sartre has discussed many aspects of existentialism and ideas on human life that are extremely helpful.So with that in mind, in this video we bring you 8 important life lessons derived from the works of Sartre. 01. Dare to act02. Face your freedom03. Take responsibility 04. Set an example05. Embrace your fears06. Don’t let others define you07. Don't follow a doctrine 08. Embrace your nothingness I hope you enjoyed watching the video and hope these 8 Life Lessons From Sartre will add value to your life. Jean-Paul Sartre was a French playwright, screenwriter, political activist, literary critic, and one of the leading philosophers who followed the philosophy of Existentialism: the philosophy that says that humans are born a blank slate and are free to determine their own identity, behavior and goals. Sartre was born in Paris at the beginning of the twentieth century and when he was around sixty years old, he was awarded the1964 Nobel Prize in Literature. He however refused the prize, claiming that “a writer should never allow himself to become an institution.” Sartre wrote many fictional and non-fictional books, essays and gave lectures on Existentialism. Some of his noted works are: Nausea, Being and Nothingness, Existentialism is a Humanism, and No Exit. 

Why Modern Dating Feels So Empty (So Choose Yourself First).Do you feel like you’re constantly swiping but never connecting? Modern dating often feels less like romance and more like a marketplace. We have more options than ever, yet we feel more disconnected and lonely. In this video, we explore the deep psychology behind why we keep attracting the wrong people and why "swiping right on yourself" is the only way to break the toxic cycle.Picture this: you open a dating app, and instead of swiping right on someone else, you swipe right on becoming the better version of yourself. How would that change the way you show up?Today, our dating culture runs on quick swipes and fast decisions. We move from one profile to the next, hoping the right match will appear. But in all the searching, we’re so focused on finding the right person that we rarely stop to ask if we’re actually ready to be one.This matters because today we feel more disconnected than ever. Ghosting has become routine. Conversations stay on the surface. And a lot of us leave dates feeling confused or drained instead of understood. The issue isn’t only the apps - it’s the mindset we bring into them. Many of us go in without a clear sense of who we are, what we want, or what we’re ready to give.In this video, we’ll talk about what it really means to choose yourself first in a stronger, healthier way..And just to be clear, we are not against dating apps or modern ways of meeting people. It’s about using them from a place where you’ve already chosen yourself first.Topics covered in this podcast - 00:00 – 02:05 – Introduction02:05 – 05:34 - Why Dating Feels Different Today05:34 – 07:49 - How Dating Apps Changed Us07:49 – 10:09 - The Psychology Behind It10:09 – 15:23 - What Philosophy Teaches Us About Love15:23 – 18:03 - Putting This Into Practice18:03 – 20:48 - The Barriers That Hold You Back20:48 – 22:24 - ConclusionI hope you enjoyed listening to this podcast and hope after watching this, you will start choosing yourself first.