ALL EPISODES

t seems like men, in particular, me included, really like to think of things in terms of conquering and mastering. As unlikely as it is that any of us will conquer the world, it seems to reflect our desire to achieve. Conquering the world, of course, is the ultimate achievement. And so, I think that's what draws us to the idea.But for normal people, I think what's truly relevant is learning how to conquer our own time in order to conquer anything, whether that be the world or

What in life deserves our time and attention and what things don't. I hope that as we consider that question along with other topics on this show, that we can all learn to live our lives just a little more intentionally. This is Seth Roberts. Thanks for joining me on Skipping Stones - “Big Improvements Are Made of Small Ones.” Sometimes the difference between those that have everything and those that don't is a lot less than we might think. The more successful people that I m

 I found myself reading an autobiography of Benjamin Franklin recently. Now, I love biographies, especially autobiographies. It makes me feel like I've had an opportunity and A small way to live another person's life. And in a metaphorical way, I aspire to be able to say someday that I've lived a thousand lives.

Porcupines seem to be a good example of this. Porcupines, to my knowledge, are not terribly aggressive animals. There are not very many predators willing to try to take them on. If a porcupine did have to face a predator, I don't think the porcupine would win very often. But the cost to any predator wanting to eat it is not going to be cheap.

Not crossing the road until the crossing light says go. Doesn't always benefit the individual, but it does make for a more predictable world that everyone else can rely on. I've had enough close calls with Jay Walkers that I think there may actually be some benefit to that one. Now in the United States and more broadly throughout Western civilization, we value independence above most things, and it seems to work well enough, but the concept that one should strive towards maki

We become afraid to try things unless we think we can do it perfectly the first time. And it isn't even the parent's fault half the time because we put this pressure on ourselves just as much as anyone else.  One of my children tends to panic really easily if something doesn't go right, or they mess something up.

So, I want to talk about something near and dear to my heart. And just a warning, there are some religious themes in this, not because this is intended to be a necessarily a religious podcast, but you know, religion is part of my life. And so I discuss it a fair amount in here. Anyways, the thing I want to talk about is, is Beliefs, you know, there's been a lot of times in my life when something I believed was challenged leaving me uncomfortable, the very possibility of chall

I hate the sensation of falling. I've never gone skydiving, and I have absolutely no interest in trying it. When I was young, I remember pleading with my parents not to go on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. because of the very brief moment in the ride where you drop down a steep slide. I may have been like 10 feet down, and it was still on an angle, but it scared me to death. Regardless, I was made to go on the rides with the rest of the family. It's not l

Sometimes the easiest way to figure out the things that  you should be doing is to figure out the things you shouldn't be doing. For some reason, it's a lot easier for our little minds to focus on things that we don't like. So I put together a list of 10 ways to be a disappointment to someone to help narrow down our options. I focus more specifically on. How to be a disappointment to your friends and family. So, by no means is this list conclusive, but at the very least, I

Almost my entire childhood, I was indoctrinated by school propaganda and child programming into thinking that to be valuable in society, you had to be a good leader. We were told that we were all leaders and that we needed to lead the people around us. We were pumped up with motivational stories and told how special we were, but if everyone is meant to grow up to be a leader. Then who's going to be left to follow?

Journaling is less so a process of writing and more so a very active way of thinking. At the end, you have a very coherent, thought out piece of writing that has just organized your thoughts internally as well. I don't know that we are really capable of thinking without bouncing our thoughts off of other people. Without other people to balance out our views, we can really spiral into crazy. But writing has the magical effect of allowing us to see our own thoughts as an out

Carl Jung once said, we are not what happens to  us. We are what we choose to become. I think people have a lot of voices in their head trying to tell them who they are. Some voices are louder than others, and for a lot of us, the voice that is the loudest is the one that tries to tell you that you can never be better than your worst moments. On the other hand, some of us like to succumb to the voice that says we are God's gift to humanity.  But I believe there is a voice

There are few easier ways to shoot yourself in the foot than to get hung up on what's fair. Bad people deserve bad things to happen to them, but the efforts we make to try to make them pay don't always serve us. Maybe someone wronged you, maybe they stole money from you and got away with it, but in our attempts to seek out justice, maybe we're just causing more harm to ourselves.

What in life deserves our time and attention and what things don't? I hope that as we consider that question, along with other topics on this show, that we can all learn to live our lives just a little more intentionally. This is Seth Roberts. Thanks for joining me on Skipping Stones - “We Are All Just a Little Delusional.” There have been a few times in my life where I found myself briefly thinking or believing something that upon further reflection was absolutely ridiculous

Sometimes the loudest person in the room is actually hiding in plain sight. I think everyone knows that person that walks in and kind of imposes their voice on the group. When you find yourself in a room with this person, you'll notice that pretty much all the talking being done is coming from that one person, and the conversation doesn't veer from where they want it to go.

I worry about having nice things sometimes. Not because I don't want them, but because I worry that I won't be able to stand living without them. Why is the pain of losing something so much greater and long lasting than the satisfaction we get from first acquiring a thing? The saddest thing about having nice things is that they become commonplace over time.

For some of us, it's hard to see our peers surpassing us in the world. We want to believe that none of our friends are superior to us in any way. So, we sometimes get into the bad habit of tearing down people that aspire for more than we do. For some reason, seeing our friends pass us up, threatens our egos.

To win at something is a concept that is really not that simple. In the context of a game or a battle, the idea is fairly clear. But in the grander scheme of things, winning a battle often doesn't win the war. And sometimes a battle won under the wrong circumstances, might even speed up the ultimate loss of a war.

Humanity is inherently gullible. We imagine ourselves to be these independently thinking entities when in reality we're so easily shaped by the people around us and by the people that know how gullible we actually are. Our pension for belief and what the people around us are saying makes sense. It keeps us safe.

You are not just you, but rather you are the culmination of hundreds of lives that came before you. Your past is more than just a short life that you've lived because of your past. It's also made up of all the pasts of the people that made you who you are, as well as all the past of the people that made them who they were.