Epictetus

Epictetus, a former slave turned Stoic philosopher, came up with the key Stoic concept of focusing only on what one can control and ignoring anything beyond one’s control. You can see how someone who was a slave might become very familiar with the second half of this concept, as slave’s have little control over what befalls them.

Most people are very focused on the first part of this axiom — concentrate on what one can control. But the second part — ignoring what one cannot control — is also very liberating, for why waste any time on things one cannot even influence, and so much of modern life falls into this latter category. Best to just ignore such things entirely, although this can be difficult when they are threatening.

Discipline

Dangerous Foods

What you have to realize is that about 85% of what you find in your local supermarket, even the better supermarkets, is processed foods dangerous to your health. Yes, actually dangerous. And extremely low in real nutrients.

You need to wean yourself off of eating this garbage, and move toward eating real food, which of course is high in nutrients. Start of think of the supermarket as a landmine where you have to step very carefully because that is what it is relative to your health — a landmine.

When you make this sharp change in your diet, you will feel much better and have much more energy because the mitochondria in your cells will be producing much more ATP, which is very energizing. Your overall health will improve significantly in a variety of ways.

Breathe

Complacency

Remarkable, that the market seems to be totally ignoring the threat of escalation in the Ukraine situation with the firing of missiles into Russia.  You would think the market would be plunging, but instead it is going back to the previous high — completely ignoring the situation.  I don’t get it.  I really don’t understand such complacency. 

Must be the notion, which is very false in my opinion, that nuclear war can’t happen because it is too catastrophic.  

Russia/Ukraine

Breathe

Learn how to breathe. That sounds odd but it is true that most people don’t breathe the right way. They just do very shallow breathing.

What is much better is to do deep breathing where you emphasize complete and long exhales. With long exhales, don’t concern yourself with big inhales — they will happen very naturally.

The value of deep breathing is twofold: you get more oxygen, which is so essential for many body functions, including the creation of energy at the level of the cell, and you significantly reduce stress. Deep breathing and stress reduction go hand in hand.

So learn how to breathe. Practice deep breathing throughout the day. The more you practice it, the more it will become a habit.

Protein

Tariffs

What is interesting about tariffs is that the federal government paid all its expenses with tariffs as the sole source of income until the income tax was introduced in 1913.

So Trump’s plan to use it as a source of income for the federal government is a very viable plan, and would allow him to lower taxes on Americans, including or specifically the income tax levied on Social Security payments — without worsening the national debt, which stands at 36 trillion.

So what would be the downside to this scheme? Tariffs lead to inflation because it would cut off inexpensive products from abroad, and replace some of them with more expensive products produced in the US, which is pro-growth for the US.

So there is a downside — there is no free lunch. But on balance, it is not an unreasonable strategy.

Abortion

Abortion

Those who are so adamant about their right to have an abortion rationalize the murder of the fetus. But murder is murder.

For a woman to be pregnant without a reliable husband to pay the bills is clearly a very daunting circumstance, and so you can see why young women in particular want to preserve this “freedom”. And I do think they should have this right and for that reason, but murder is still murder.

One wonders how many women who go ahead and have an abortion live to ultimately regret it, for they may reach the age without children when having one is no longer possible, and yet they now want one?

The abortion issue is probably the most divisive issue in the US with fanatics on both sides of the argument.

Freedom of Speech