032. Daniele Bolelli, Michael Phillip

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I have some bad news.  The kind of bad news you’re actively putting off thinking about at this very moment.  Fear and misfortune are lurking just around the corner.  Something bad can and will happen to you, it’s just a matter of time.  As if that weren’t bad enough, most threats to our well-being are totally beyond our control.  So, now that you’re thinking about it, how will you react?  Put it out of your mind? Curl up into a ball and try to hide from it?  Or think to yourself, why not just leave life’s unpleasantness until the last possible second?

The fact of the matter is that we fortunate first-worlders need a reality check.  The societal armor that surrounds us makes us soft, detached and totally unprepared for life’s inevitable nastiness.  We rarely if ever confront the dead, the suffering or the starving, though we intellectually know the ills of the world are coming for us all sooner or later.

This is one of those moments: will you choose the blue pill or the red pill?  Will you try to suppress the fear by going back to watching ESPN and eating beef jerky until the wheels fall off?  Or will you wake up every morning embracing the risks, thinking about how you can grab your day by the balls and squeeze every last bit of impermanent happiness out of it?

Truth be told, I’m far from an expert. I owe most of this insight to this week’s guest, Daniele Bolleli, who as it turns out, is no stranger to fear (or grabbing life by the balls).  In fact, he’s writing a book about it (fear, not ball-grabbing).  Daniele is the author of several books including Create Your Own Religion and On the Warrior’s Path.  He is also a professor who lectures on history and philosophy.  As if that weren’t enough, he has his own podcast, The Drunken Taoist.  Above all else, he’s unbelievably humble and down to Earth.

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Hokahe!