With tonight’s clock change, you’ll lose an hour you’ll never get back. And while most will simply move their clocks forward, what if you could use this moment to move your life forward?

Refocus on what matters most, refresh your routines, renew your motivation, and make room to reach your potential this season with our 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge.

Walk away with tools to achieve your goals, create better systems for yourself, accomplish what you’ve been putting off, and clear out what’s weighing you down.

​Reset your 2026 and sign up for the Spring Forward Challenge today!​

PASSAGE OF THE WEEK:

YOUTUBE TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

​The Complete Stoic Playbook to MASTER Your Emotions​

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Do your emotions ever get you in trouble? This week on the Daily Stoic YouTube channel, Ryan shares Stoic advice for mastering them.

Subscribe to Daily Stoic YouTube

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PODCAST TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

​Jordan Klepper on How to Talk to People You Disagree With (Without Losing It)​

This week on the podcast, Jordan Klepper, correspondent and host at The Daily Show, sits down with Ryan to explain why arguing almost never works, how silence can be more powerful than a comeback, and what most of us misunderstand about why people believe what they believe.

🎙️ Listen now on Apple Podcasts & Spotify​

Subscribe to Daily Stoic Podcast

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Support the podcast and go deeper into Stoicism by subscribing to The Daily Stoic Premium—unlock ad-free listening, early access, and bonus content coming soon at dailystoic.com/premium​

WHAT RYAN HOLIDAY IS READING:

— What You’re Made For: Powerful Life Lessons from My Career in Sports by George Raveling and Ryan Holiday

​SOCIAL MEDIA POST OF THE WEEK:

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Refresh your life. Renew your motivation. Refocus on improving yourself and the world around you.

Join us for the 2026 Spring Forward Challenge, designed to help you reset your physical spaces, your mind, and your routines.

Head to dailystoic.com/spring to sign up and learn more today!

PASSAGE OF THE WEEK:

Read: You’ll Think This Later; Might As Well Feel It Now​

YOUTUBE TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

​

This week on Ryan Holiday’s YouTube channel, he shares his recommended books for honing your persuasion skills.

PODCAST TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

This week on The Daily Dad Podcast, learn why spring brings an important reminder:

Subscribe to Daily Dad Podcast

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WHAT RYAN HOLIDAY IS READING:

— What You’re Made For: Powerful Life Lessons from My Career in Sports by George Raveling and Ryan Holiday

​SOCIAL MEDIA POST OF THE WEEK:

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Thank you for being a Daily Dad reader. If any of our newsletters have helped you to become a better parent, please consider spreading the word or forwarding to other parents!

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It’s probably not going to be what they hope. It’s not going to feel as they dreamed. It’s not going to make them happy. It’s not going to satisfy them.

It rarely does, right? Historically, that is. Has any conqueror ever been satisfied? Has any conquest ever not been a little bittersweet, a little underwhelming? How often do any of the things people dream of and lust for and fight over end up producing happiness?

The Stoics knew this. And deep down, we do too, even if we lose sight of it again and again.

So we step back and let people choose for themselves. We should repeat to ourselves, as Taylor Swift says, “And they should have what they want / They deserve what they want / Hope they get what they want.” Because it’s not our place to ‘yuck’ other people’s ‘yums.’ It’s not our place to judge. It’s not our place to interfere.

What we should focus on is where we are lusting and dreaming and fighting for so-called “externals.” We should think about where we have made our happiness conditional on this or that achievement, on this or that identity which lies outside our control. We should remind ourselves that we have plenty right now, that we can feel good—feel enough—right now.

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It’s been a long winter. There was that ice storm. There was that week of sub-zero wind chill. There were those days when you were tired of being stuck inside. Those nights when it got dark so early. It has felt, like the song goes, like a lot of Monday mornings in an endless February.

So naturally, you were not at your best. You were a little depressed. You were tired. You had a hard time getting momentum. You were jarred, as Marcus Aurelius said, by circumstances outside your control.

But now? Now you can feel something is in the air. It’s those early signs of Spring. A little warmth. A little green. A little blue sky. Wonderful!

Do not waste it. Take this as a sign. Use it as a chance, to finish that Marcus Aurelius quote, to revert back to yourself. Grab the rhythm again. Clean up your act. Get after it.

Now is the time.

That’s really what the 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge is all about.

In January, thousands of Stoics got together to do the Daily Stoic New Year, New You Challenge. Maybe you set some resolutions or goals…and then what happened? Life happened.

Well, the 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge will help you reset your life, renew your motivation, and refocus on what you can do to improve yourself and your life—and by extension, the world around you.

We’re just a few months into the year and already so much has been thrown at us: war, political instability, civil unrest, financial turbulence, AI uncertainties, rising global tensions.

Differentiating between what we can change and what we can’t—what we have influence over and what we do not—is the single most important practice in Stoic philosophy. There are many external things happening in the world right now that we have no control over.

So what can we control? Ourselves.

In the 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge, you’ll gain practical tools to:

• Clear your space and your mind
• Create better systems for yourself
• Accomplish what you’ve been putting off
• Focus on what’s important to you
• Initiate your goals
• Abandon what drains you
• Reclaim valuable time for yourself

Each morning, you’ll receive one actionable Stoic-inspired challenge—a clear exercise or method that you can put to use in your life right away. (And for those who choose to delve deeper into the foundational wisdom and modern research behind the challenges, a compendium of further reading is provided.)

As a participant, you’ll receive:

• 10 days of personal challenges
• Invites to 2 LIVE Q&As with Ryan Holiday
• Exclusive access to a members-only platform
• Printable progress tracker

Join us, and thousands of Stoics around the world, as we spring forward into a season of fresh starts.

Sign up for the Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge now!

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Only 10 DAYS LEFT to sign up for the Spring Forward Challenge. Don't miss this chance to reset your life for 2026.

Here’s a great passage from the Gregory Hays translation of Meditations:

In his great annotated edition of Meditations, Robin Waterfield translated that same passage like this:

The same passage in George William Chrystal’s 1902 translation:

Maxwell Staniforth’s 1964 translation:

And for The Daily Stoic, Stephen Hanselman translated it like this:

Five different translators. Five different ways of saying it.

And yet the core message rings through every version: You will get knocked off course. You will lapse on a resolution. You will fall off the wagon. You will get out of sorts. That’s unavoidable. What matters is how quickly you return. How fast you find the rhythm again.

It’s worth thinking about this passage right now, because this is exactly the time of year when most of us begin feeling like we’ve lost the rhythm.

Think about where you were in January. The slate was clean. You had goals, intentions, energy. You were going to read more, eat better, get organized, and be more present.

But then life happened. The clutter crept back in. The calendar filled up. The inbox overflowed. The habits you meant to build quietly fell away, replaced by the ones you meant to break. The things you were putting off kept getting put off. The messes—physical, digital, emotional—piled up.

And now here we are, already a couple of months into 2026, and if you’re honest with yourself, you’re a little more cluttered than you’d like. A little more scattered. A little more stressed.

Marcus would tell you: that’s fine. That’s life. The important thing is, will you get back on track? Will you return to the rhythm?

That’s what spring is for. Cleaning things up. Paring things down. Getting back into the rhythm.

And that’s what the 2026 Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge is for. It’s a series of actionable challenges intended to help you clean up, reset your life, and refocus on what matters. We start March 20th—and we hope you’ll join us.

You’ll gain practical tools to:

• Clear your space and your mind
• Create better systems for yourself
• Accomplish what you’ve been putting off
• Map and initiate your goals
• Abandon what drains you
• Reclaim valuable time for yourself

Each morning for 10 days, you’ll receive a different Stoic-inspired challenge—a clear exercise or method that you can put to use in your life right away to tackle the physical and mental clutter that’s weighing you down, like:

• Doom boxes—those containers where we stash things we don’t know what to do with, creating black holes of clutter
• Digital distractions—inputs that constantly pull us away from what matters
• Commitment overload—saying yes to everything and spreading ourselves too thin
• Mental baggage—unfinished business, unspoken apologies, and unrealized truths

Head over to dailystoic.com/springforward to learn more and sign up for the Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge now!

To experience all of our Stoic self-improvement courses—and to learn to live with clarity, purpose, and resilience—join us at Daily Stoic Life, a global community of people working to put Stoicism into daily practice. Your yearly membership unlocks FREE access to every course we offer, as well as exclusive content and members-only perks.

Learn more and sign up at dailystoiclife.com.

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​Daily Stoic LIVE with Ryan Holiday is coming to your city! Tour dates for summer and fall include cities across the US, Australia, and New Zealand.

Head to dailystoiclive.com for details and to purchase tickets.

For years, the seasons passed Chloe Dalton by in a blur—like they do for most of us. Travel, deadlines, work, the constant churn of ambition and obligation.

Then, during the pandemic, she spends lockdown in an old house in the English countryside. On a walk one day, she comes across a leveret (a baby wild hare) and nurses it back to life. What ensues is a surreal and moving friendship, as the hare becomes a free-range companion, hopping around the house, snoozing quietly by Dalton’s side as she writes, running in from the fields when called, drumming softly on the duvet to get Dalton’s attention, even giving birth and raising babies inside the house. Spending hundreds of lonely, quiet hours with the leveret—which she never named—Dalton learned to understand its habits and needs, seeing the world from its point of view.

She writes in her lovely book, Raising Hare:

It’s reminiscent of Marcus Aurelius noticing, as he does in a moving passage in Meditations (our favorite translation here) “The way loaves of bread split open on top in the oven…Or how ripe figs begin to burst. And olives on the point of falling: the shadow of decay gives them a peculiar beauty. Stalks of wheat bending under their own weight. The furrowed brow of the lion. Flecks of foam on the boar’s mouth.”

There is beauty and peace in noticing. The small, daily transformations. The subtle shifts of light through the windows. The cracks on the sidewalk. The sounds of birds. The world is filled with things to see and hear.

Are you cultivating the stillness to notice them? To appreciate them? To let them into your life?

This Week On The Daily Stoic Podcast:

​The Day Control Was Taken From Us​

Six years after the COVID-19 pandemic, the world is loud and fast again. But the real question is: what were we supposed to learn from the moment when everything slowed down?

In this episode, Ryan talks with award-winning author Chloe Dalton about the strange stillness of those early pandemic months and how one unexpected encounter with a wild hare during lockdown completely changed the way she thought about time, work, and the life she was building.

🎙️ Listen now on Apple Podcasts or Spotify​

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—Today’s newsletter is sponsored by Hume Health.

The Stoics believed that knowledge is the foundation of improvement.

But when it comes to our health, most people are still guessing.

The Hume Health Pod gives you a clear picture of what’s happening beneath the surface by measuring muscle mass, body fat, visceral fat, metabolic health, hydration, and more.

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​You Slipped Up. Here’s How To Get Back On Track​

It was a long winter.

You got sick. You lapsed on a resolution. You slipped up. You’re tired, distracted, out of sorts.

So you’re going to write off the rest of 2026?

That’s crazy.

In one of my favorite passages in Meditations, Marcus Aurelius writes, “When jarred, unavoidably, by circumstances, revert at once to yourself, and don't lose the rhythm more than you can help.”

I think that word “unavoidably” is key. Slipping up, getting knocked off course, falling off the wagon—it happens.

And that’s what I want to talk about in today’s email: some rules for a reset. Here—already a couple of months into 2026—is the perfect time. For getting back to first principles, to the things that you said you were going to do, to the person that you know you want to be.

(And by the way, I’m getting together with thousands of Stoics from around the world to do a reset as part of ​The Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge​ on March 20. It’s a set of 10 daily, actionable challenges designed to help you clean up your life and spring forward without the weight of bad habits and vices. ​You can learn more and sign up here​. I hope to see you there!)

Focus on what you can control. You’re rattled by what’s going on in the world. The economy. The news. The possibility of AI taking your job. Whatever outrage is dominating the social media feeds this week. In short, you’re spending enormous amounts of time and energy on things you cannot control. Revert to what Epictetus described as our “chief task in life”—getting real clear about what’s up to us and what isn’t. Our actions, our thoughts, our feelings—these are up to us. Other people, the weather, external events, these are not. But here’s the thing: our responses to other people, the weather, external events are in our control. To reset your life, the best place to start is with making this distinction and then choosing to focus on the things that are in your control. If only because it concentrates your resources in the places where they matter.

Wake up early. No one likes getting up early in the winter. Because it's cold. It’s dark. That's the famous passage from Meditations: he knows he has to get out of bed, but so desperately wants to remain under the warm covers. “Is this what I was created for?” he asks himself. “To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?” No, it’s not what we were created for. We were made to be up and “doing things and experiencing them.” So we must reclaim the morning hours, the most productive hours in the day. Hemingway would talk about how he’d get up early because early, there was, “no one to disturb you.” Toni Morrison found she was just more confident in the morning, before the day had exacted its toll and the mind was fresh. Like most of us, she realized she was just “not very bright or very witty or very inventive after the sun goes down.” Who can be? After a day of banal conversations, frustrations, mistakes, and exhaustion. If you want to get back on track, if you want to start executing at a higher level, then you have to get in the habit of waking up early.

Protect the best part of your day. Waking up early is critical, but even more so is what we do in those early hours. Waking up early just to get straight into scrolling social media, checking email, watching the news—this is not a reset. You’ve handed the best part of your day to other people’s emergencies, other people’s opinions, other people’s agendas. The novelist Philipp Meyer​ (whose book ​​The Son​​ is an incredible read) told me on the Daily Stoic podcast, “You have to be very careful about to what (and to whom) you’re giving the best part of your day.” Well-intentioned plans fall apart as the day progresses. Our willpower evaporates. The world makes its demands. So it’s key that we prioritize the important things and that we habitualize doing them early. Personally, I fiercely protect my mornings—family first, then writing. My assistant knows not to schedule anything before mid-morning because early calls and meetings don’t just take time—they sap the energy needed for the essential work. I want to give my best self to my most important things. Everything else can come after.

Do less, better. Your calendar is filled up. Your inbox is flooded. Your to-do list is overflowing. You’re doing too much. When I talked to the great Matthew McConaughey on the Daily Stoic podcast, he told me the story about a moment a few years ago when he realized he was doing too much. “I had five proverbial campfires on my desk,” he said. He had a production company, a music label, a foundation, his acting career, and his family. “What I did was I got rid of two of the campfires.” He called his lawyer and shut down the production company and the music label. “I was left with the three things that were most important to me. And those three campfires turned into bonfires…I had been making C’s in five things, but when I concentrated on three things, I started making A’s.” A reset requires concentration. It requires elimination, Seneca said: “He who is everywhere is nowhere.” Remember: Everything you say yes to means saying no to something else. And conversely, everything you say no to means saying yes to something else. When you say no, when you cut out the inessential, the Stoics say, it allows you to double down on what is truly essential.

Just make a little progress every day. For a long time, my writing habit was all-or-nothing—either I wrote a lot of words or I didn’t. Over time, I’ve lowered the stakes: now the question is simply, “Did I make a positive contribution to my writing today?” Sometimes that means writing, sometimes editing, adding, deleting. Sometimes I’m home and it’s in my office, sometimes I’m on the road and it’s on a plane or in a hotel room. Sometimes it’s a big contribution, sometimes it’s a little contribution. “Well-being is realized by small steps,” Zeno would say looking back on his life, “but is truly no small thing.” Focus on that—just making a little progress each day.

Focus on process, not goals. When most people think about resetting their life, they think about setting a goal—lose 20 pounds, read 30 books, write a book. But goals are just finish lines—they’re about achieving something specific, often external, and usually out of your control. A better approach is to focus on the process: the daily work and the practices that will move you forward, regardless of the outcome. As I wrote about recently, I don’t have goals. When I write, I don’t focus on finishing books—that would be overwhelming. Instead, I focus on my notecard system and writing for a couple hours every day. The books emerge from that process naturally, over time. Any time you want to reset things in your life, instead of fixating on specific outcomes, focus on the process that will guide you. The results will take care of themselves.

Make amends. This is actually one of the challenges in the upcoming ​Spring Forward​: to apologize or make amends with someone. Years ago, there was someone I got into a big fight with over one of my books. I eventually emailed them, saying, “Hey, here’s what I’ve been carrying, and I wish I’d done it differently. I feel bad about the consequences for you. I’m sorry.” I’d love to say we became friends afterward, but they didn’t accept my apology—instead, they hurled more anger at me. It was obvious they still carried a lot of resentment, but making amends is also a gift you give yourself. I said what I needed to say, so I’m no longer ruminating or carrying it around. I owned my role in it. I tried to be who I want to be. If they aren’t there yet, that’s okay—I did what I could. As Marcus Aurelius said, the best revenge is not being like the person who wronged you. Maybe they’ll never see your side, but at least you won’t turn into them. We can’t change the past, but we can take responsibility: acknowledge our mistakes, own the pain we caused, learn from it, practice empathy, and try to repair it. This is a kind of deep clean for your life, allowing you to start fresh and move forward without the weight of that emotional clutter.

Discard anxiety. You’re anxious about politics. About flying. About the state of the world. About your kids. The one thing all causes of anxiety have in common? US! The airport is not making you anxious. You are making yourself anxious in the airport! Marcus Aurelius talks about this in ​Meditations​. “Today I escaped from anxiety,” he says. “Or no, I discarded it, because it was within me, in my own perceptions—not outside.” It’s a little frustrating, but it’s also freeing. Because it means you can stop it! You can choose to discard it.

Find a scene. You’re hanging out with the same people you’ve always hung out with. The same circle, the same conversations, the same comfortable group that never quite challenges you or pushes you or expects anything different from you. And then you wonder why you keep ending up in the same place. “Tell me who you consort with,” Goethe said, “and I will tell you who you are.” You need to find a scene that challenges you, inspires you, exposes you to new ideas, holds you accountable, and pushes you beyond your limits. The Spartan lawgiver Lycurgus introduced the common mess hall and required that all citizens eat together. It was harder to eat more than your fair share, more than your healthy share, when you were surrounded by your comrades in battle.

Quit your vices. There’s a story I tell in ​Discipline is Destiny​ about the physicist Richard Feynman feeling a sudden midday pull to have a drink. On the spot, Feynman gave up drinking right then and there. Nothing, he felt, should have that kind of power over him. Ask yourself: What has control over me? Is it caffeine, social media, Netflix, junk food—something more serious? I once heard addiction described as losing the freedom to abstain. Where have you lost the freedom to say no to? And how can you reclaim your power by refusing to feed that habit? If you want a happier, more fulfilling life, decide which vices you’re no longer willing to let rule you.

Do hard things. Making a life change, adopting new habits, doing anything challenging requires courage. As I write about in Courage is Calling, we can’t just hope to be brave when it counts. Courage has to be cultivated. To do the big things that scare you, start with smaller things—start with developing the ability to push yourself to do stuff you’re reluctant to do. To be able to endure the cold reception of a bold idea, start with enduring a cold shower. To be able to step forward when the stakes are high, regularly do that when the stakes are low. To be able to embrace the discomfort of a major life change, accustom yourself to minor discomforts. We treat the body rigorously, Seneca said, so that it may not be disobedient to the mind. We push ourselves in little ways so the big ways stop seeming quite so big, quite so out of character.

Don’t be ashamed to ask for help. Whenever I speak to military groups, I like to share one of my favorite lines from Meditations: “Don’t be ashamed to need help. Like a soldier storming a wall, you have a mission to accomplish. And if you’ve been wounded and you need a comrade to pull you up? So what?” I love how Marcus Aurelius delivers that line—with a shrug. So what? There’s no shame in needing help. Whether it’s therapy, asking for advice, or hiring someone to support you, seeking help is often the key to breakthroughs, growth, and success. Tim Ferriss has a great question that ties into this: What would this look like if it were easy? Often, the answer involves creating support systems or finding the right kind of help. Resetting your life isn’t something you have to do alone.

Get back up when you fall. It’s wonderfully fitting that in both the Zen tradition and the Bible, we have a version of the proverb about falling down seven times and getting up eight. Marcus Aurelius said it was inevitable to be jarred by circumstances, but the key was to get back the rhythm as quickly as possible, to come back to yourself, rather than giving in.

Be kind to yourself. The Stoic philosopher Cleanthes was once walking through the streets of Athens when he came across a man berating himself for some failure. Seeing how upset he was, Cleanthes—normally one to mind his own business—could not help himself but to stop and say kindly, “Remember, you’re not talking to a bad man.” Often, the desire for a reset comes packaged with self-contempt, with some judgment of the version of us who got off track. But this isn’t about beating yourself up. After a lifetime of study of Stoicism, this is how Seneca came to judge his own growth: “What progress have I made?” he wrote. “I have begun to be a friend to myself.” Be kind to yourself. Celebrate your decision to make a change, to get back on track, to make yourself better. That’s what friends do.

Go the f*ck to sleep. All the other habits and practices listed here become irrelevant if you don’t have the energy and clarity to do them. We have to follow the advice of a book I love to read to my kids: Go the F*ck to Sleep! In the military, they speak of sleep discipline—meaning it’s something you have to be good at, you have to be conscious of, something you can’t let slip. We only have so much energy for our work, for our relationships, for ourselves. A smart person knows this and guards it carefully. A smart person knows that getting their 7-8 hours of sleep every night does not negatively affect their output, it contributes crucially to their best work.

Remember you are going to die. Shakespeare said that every third thought should be of our grave. Perhaps that’s too much. One thought per day is plenty. The point isn’t to be morbid, but to remember that you are mortal. How much time do we waste on things that don’t matter? And why? Because we think we can afford it! Memento Mori. You will die. Live while you can. Live your life as if you have died and come back and all of this is extra. I keep a coin in my pocket to remind me of this and touch it at least once a day. Death doesn’t make life pointless but rather purposeful. And fortunately, we don’t have to nearly die to tap into this.

***

Those are some things I come back to whenever I need a reset.

If you’re ready to take your own efforts to the next level, I’d love for you to join me in the ​Spring Forward Challenge​ from Daily Stoic.

It’s packed with powerful exercises rooted in the best Stoic insights and strategies, and thousands of people around the world will be participating.

Sign up at ​dailystoic.com/spring​—we start on March 20th. I hope to see you there, ready to clear out the clutter and make room for what truly matters.

​

Spring is the most beautiful of the seasons. Suddenly, after a dreary winter, the colors come back. The birds are out. The days last longer. The breeze is light and the air is cool.

But as Phillip Larkin’s poem reminds us, beneath this turning of the seasons is a bittersweet truth.

The inherent grief is the passage of time. It’s a painful truth, the poem points out, written in the rings of the tree. Winter is dead and over…and all of us a little more so, too.

This notion serves as a gentle nudge, reminding us of the preciousness of every moment. It urges us not merely to exist but to truly live, to seize each season and extract its full potential.

Even though we can’t control time or slow it down, even though we can’t control external forces and external events—we can control ourselves, so we can control how we use our time. We can control what we choose to focus on with our time. We can control who we choose to be with our time.

Maybe 2026 hasn’t gotten off to the start you’d hoped for. Maybe there were things you wanted to change or improve. Maybe there were things you wanted to let go of. Maybe you wanted to clear out the mental and physical clutter you’ve accumulated over the last year.

Don’t write the year off just yet.

It’s not too late to course-correct and reset. Think about how much of a difference the next 10 months could have on your life if you were thriving, not just surviving. If you were fully in control of yourself, instead of letting life and external circumstances control you. If you made intentional choices, instead of letting the chips fall where they may.

​The 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge is designed to bring a fresh sense of clarity and purpose to your life—to help you take back valuable time in your life and refocus on how to use it to improve yourself and the world around you. It’s a 10-day series of actionable challenges you’ll take on one day at a time.

You’ll gain practical tools to:

• Clear your space and your mind
• Create better systems for yourself
• Accomplish what you’ve been putting off
• Focus on what’s important to you
• Abandon what drains you
• Reclaim your valuable time

Each morning, you’ll receive a different Stoic-inspired challenge—a clear exercise or method that you can put to use in your life right away.

As a participant, you’ll receive:

• 10 days of challenges built around Stoic principles
• Invites to 2 LIVE Q&As with Ryan Holiday
• Exclusive access to our members-only platform
• Printable progress tracker

As Seneca reminds us, “We’re tight-fisted with property and money, yet think too little of wasting time, the one thing about which we should all be the toughest.”

The choice is yours:

Will you let another season of growth march forward without you?

Will you let this time be lost to you forever as you stay in the same unfulfilling rut?

Or will you commit to just ten days of self-improvement—a chance to reset, refocus, and renew?

​The 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge starts March 20, 2026. Sign up today!

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Only 8 DAYS LEFT to sign up for the Spring Forward Challenge. Take this chance to reset and refresh your life with us.

Change is hard. That’s why we avoid it.

It’s easier when things stay the same. When we have familiar ways and routines. Our morning coffee. Our job the way we learned it. Where no news is good news.

Change, on the other hand, requires adjustment. It requires acceptance. It requires us to change.

So naturally, yeah, we avoid it. We even fear it. But as Marcus Aurelius points out to those of us who are frightened by change: Nothing could exist without it.

You know what else change is? It’s growth. Or at least, it is the opportunity for it.

Without change, we stagnate. Our minds grow complacent, ignorant to new ideas. Our bodies grow weak from disuse. We remain stuck. We, as part of the world, part of nature, part of the logos, need to change to maintain our well-being.

With the new cycle of spring, of regrowth and renewal, finally upon us, it’s time to change. It’s time to listen to the rhythm of the seasons, to begin afresh, to grow back stronger than before.

That’s why we can’t wait to take on the Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge, and we hope you join us. Designed to help you reset your life, renew your motivation, and refocus on what’s important, it’s a 10-day series of actionable challenges you’ll tackle one day at a time.

Each morning, you’ll receive a different Stoic-inspired challenge—a clear exercise or method that will help you refresh your life effectively and immediately.

Join me and thousands of Stoics all over the world as we take the challenge to clear up, clean out, and change our lives this year.

As a participant, you’ll receive:

• 10 days of challenges built around the most effective Stoic principles
• Invites to 2 LIVE Q&As with Ryan Holiday
• Exclusive access to a members-only platform
• Printable progress tracker

Sign up for the Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge now! We start March 20th—can’t wait to see you in there.

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Only ONE WEEK LEFT to sign up for the Spring Forward Challenge. Don’t miss this chance to renew your motivation, refocus your priorities, and reset your life for a better 2026.

As winter fades and spring emerges, it’s a good time to pause and reflect. Where did the time go? It feels like just yesterday we were bundled up against the cold, digging out of the snow and ice. Now, the days are getting longer, and the air feels warmer.

We talked recently about Phillip Larkin’s beautiful poem about the changing of the seasons and how their circular renewal contains within them a kind of finality. Winter is over—this last winter is over forever. Those cold winter afternoons when you didn’t want to go outside? When you didn’t want to do much of anything? When instead, you waited for the temperature to go up, you binge-watched some shows, you doomscrolled the news or social media? You weren’t killing time…that was time killing you.

Seneca reminded himself that death is not this thing in the future, but something that is happening now. It is always happening. It is the ticking hand of the clock. It is the spring flowers. It is the fall harvest. It is the summer rain. It is the first snow of the year.

This idea is a reminder that each moment is precious. It tells us to wake up and really live, not just watch time go by. To embrace the longer days and make the most of them.

This time of year is when we start to think of spring cleaning, but how many of us get our lives in order? Not just our physical spaces, but our minds, our routines, our time? Think of how you spent the last week. Were those seven days as efficient as they could be? Did you waste time? Were things more complicated than necessary? Did you say “yes” to things you didn’t really want to do?

Were you, like so many people, stuck in the disheartening news cycle, unsure of what you could do, unsure of how to get unstuck and take action?

​The 2026 Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge was created to help you refresh your spirit, refocus on the most important things you can do, and renew your motivation. After a winter like the one we just went through, we all need a little push to take our time back. We all need a little hope and a little momentum to get us going again—towards making every moment count and becoming the version of ourselves we know we can be.

Each morning for 10 days, starting on the first day of Spring (March 20th), you’ll receive a different Stoic-inspired challenge: a clear exercise or method that you can put to use in your life right away to tackle the physical and mental clutter that’s holding you back from your personal goals. You’ll learn how to attack things like:

• Digital distractions—inputs that constantly pull us away from what matters
• Commitment overload—saying “yes” to everything and spreading ourselves too thin
• Making amends—cleaning the slate and mending your important relationships
• Mental baggage—unfinished business, unspoken apologies, and unacknowledged truths

You don’t have to write off 2026 yet. You can walk away from this winter with clarity, with renewed purpose, leaving the physical and mental clutter behind. And you can do it alongside a supportive community that shares your same goals.

Head over to dailystoic.com/spring to learn more and sign yourself up for the 2026 Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge now! We start March 20th.

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The events unfolding around the world this winter have made things feel heavier than usual for all of us.

That’s why we're doing a reset—to refresh our spirit, refocus on what’s most important, and renew our motivation—with the 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge.

There’s just ONE WEEK LEFT to sign up. Join us today at dailystoic.com/spring.

PASSAGE OF THE WEEK:

Read: Are You Modeling This for Them?​

YOUTUBE TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

​

Over on the Daily Dad YouTube channel, Ryan shares the best parenting wisdom shared by podcast guests.

PODCAST TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

This week on The Daily Dad Podcast, a reminder to cherish the present:

Subscribe to Daily Dad Podcast

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WHAT RYAN HOLIDAY IS READING:

— The Barn: The Secret History of a Murder in Mississippi by Wright Thompson

​SOCIAL MEDIA POST OF THE WEEK:

One of the best parenting books available at The Painted Porch.

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Thank you for being a Daily Dad reader. If any of our newsletters have helped you to become a better parent, please consider spreading the word or forwarding to other parents!

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This winter has been challenging. Beyond the icy weather and storms, the events unfolding all over the world have made things feel heavier than usual.

That’s why we’re helping you reset—to refresh your spirit, refocus on what’s most important, and renew your motivation—with the 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge.

There’s just ONE WEEK LEFT to sign up! Join us today at dailystoic.com/spring.

PASSAGE OF THE WEEK:

YOUTUBE TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

​How to Reset Your Life (According to the Stoics)​

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Need a reset? This week on the Daily Stoic YouTube channel, Ryan shares Stoic-inspired ways to get your life back on track.

Subscribe to Daily Stoic YouTube

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PODCAST TAKEAWAY OF THE WEEK:

​Here’s How You Take Back Your Time / Become Dangerously Persuasive with These Books​

Think of how you spent the last week. Were those seven days as efficient or productive as they could be? This week on the podcast, a double feature to help you take back your time and better communicate your great ideas.

🎙️ Listen now on Apple Podcasts & Spotify​

Subscribe to Daily Stoic Podcast

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Support the podcast and go deeper into Stoicism by subscribing to The Daily Stoic Premium—unlock ad-free listening, early access, and bonus content coming soon at dailystoic.com/premium​

WHAT RYAN HOLIDAY IS READING:

— The Barn: The Secret History of a Murder in Mississippi by Wright Thompson

​SOCIAL MEDIA POST OF THE WEEK:

—Today’s newsletter is sponsored by Babbel.

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This Spring, get 60% off a Lifetime subscription — access to all 14 languages in the app, forever. The best time to start was yesterday. The second best time is now.

​Get 60% Off and Start Learning Now!

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Only FIVE DAYS LEFT to sign up for the 2026 Spring Forward Challenge. Don't miss this chance—sign up now!

It was cold. It was dark. We were sick. We were stuck—stuck inside, stuck in the snow, stuck in a rut. That’s winter…that was this winter. It was a rough one. It was a depressing one.

It threw a lot of us off.

But now, we can feel things shifting.

With the coming of spring, we can feel something moving. We can feel a change—in the wind, in the sun, in the trees and the grass and even the birds. The poet Philip Larkin said that the green and growth of spring was nature’s way of encouraging us to “begin afresh, afresh, afresh.”

That was the great choice of our lives, the Stoics believed: Will we keep being the person we’ve always been? Or will we change?

In this symbolic season, you have a chance to change and reset your life. Think of opening a window, letting fresh air into a stagnant house—the rush of energy, the rush of movement, of sunlight, of scents. It rejuvenates us and freshens our surroundings. Give yourself that breath of fresh air. Shed all the heaviness, all the anxiety, all the mental and physical clutter of this past winter. Abandon what doesn’t work for you. Take control of yourself and your life.

What will you write on this fresh page? What will you do with your new start—this period of growth that nature is giving you?

If you’re serious about wanting a reset, join us for the 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge, starting March 20th (the first day of Spring). It’s 10 days of actionable challenges, inspired by the most effective Stoic principles, intended to help you refresh your life and refocus on what matters.

You’ll learn how to tackle things like:

• Digital distractions—inputs that constantly pull us away from what matters
• Commitment overload—saying yes to everything and spreading ourselves too thin
• Mental baggage—unfinished business, unspoken apologies, and unacknowledged truths

You can walk away from this winter and into a new season with clarity and renewed purpose. And you can do it alongside a supportive community sharing your same goals.

As a participant, you’ll receive:

• 10 days of challenges inspired by practical Stoic wisdom
• Invites to 2 LIVE Q&As with Ryan Holiday
• Exclusive access to a members-only platform
• Printable progress tracker

Each morning, you’ll receive a different Stoic-inspired challenge—a clear exercise or method that will help you refresh your life effectively and immediately.

​Head here to learn more and sign up for the 2026 Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward Challenge now! We start March 20th.

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The 2026 Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge starts in just FOUR DAYS! Join us to reset your life, refocus on what's important, and renew your motivation.
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It’s a timeless problem.

Old or young. Rich or poor. Married or single. Successful or struggling.

Modern or ancient.

What we do as people is accumulate stuff. We accumulate, accumulate, accumulate…until our homes, our cars, our minds, and our schedules are cluttered. In Meditations, Marcus joked about people “whose abundance leaves their owner with ‘… no place to shit.’”

And that’s just the physical stuff! We also accumulate problems and grudges and anxieties and commitments and opinions—piles and piles of them. Our mental load grows and grows. Our to-do list grows and grows. It all builds up slowly, until we feel overwhelmed, stuck, and weighed down.

There’s only one way out of this mess: ruthlessly decluttering. We have to eliminate, eliminate, eliminate. Get rid of stuff. Get rid of baggage. Let go of beliefs…let go of worries. Let go of people. We have to stop buying things. We have to stop saying yes. We must free ourselves from the weight of excess. Shed what’s unnecessary. Clear away what’s holding us down.

Is there a better time to do this than right now? Spring is coming, and it’s the perfect time to clean up and clear out. That’s the beauty of the idea of spring cleaning. We’re only a few months into the year and already, we know we could use a reset, that we’d benefit from wiping the slate clean.

​And that’s what The Daily Stoic Spring Forward Challenge is all about.​

Starting on the first day of Spring, March 20, we’ll take on 10 days of Stoic-inspired challenges. These will help you tackle the physical and mental clutter weighing you down, like:

• Digital distractions—inputs that constantly pull us away from what matters
• Commitment overload—saying yes to everything and spreading ourselves too thin
• Mental baggage—resentments, unfinished business, and unspoken apologies

We spring clean so we can spring forward. We clear the clutter to make room for what truly matters. We eliminate the unnecessary to focus on the essential.

Are you ready?

Then join us for the 2026 Daily Stoic 10-day Spring Forward challenge!

Reset your life. Refocus on what’s important. Renew your motivation and your purpose without all of the things currently holding you back.

Sign up now at dailystoic.com/spring. The Daily Stoic 10-Day Spring Forward challenge begins March 20, 2026.

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