I don’t like email. In truth, when I first spun up the Stoic Brekkie newsletter I did so with a significant amount of hesitation. I mean who the hell wants more email?
But then, a few weeks into the project, I got an email from school teacher who said:
“My students love Stoic Brekkie, we even have a wall with Brekkie Man and all the lessons the Students took away from each of your newsletter editions.”
The thought of these editions being printed out, of Brekkie Man being taped onto a wall, I can’t describe how truly excellent this made me feel.
The content was escaping the inbox, a digital domain associated mostly with SPAM and noise and endless sales pitches. Stoicism, and Stoic Brekkie, was crossing the threshold into the real world.
Still, the real life economics of time commitment and intellectual output, lead me to announcing the shutting down of Stoic Brekkie just a few weeks ago.
But then I ran into this guy: https://mythbridger.com/
And, at first, it made me so mad. I thought
“I’m trying to help people become better people, and live more meaningful and fulfilling lives, and I can barely scrape together a living… and this guy is writing a by-post fantasy comic about dragons and wizards and shit. How is this fair? Why is this more important than what I do? How is it more worthy of being valued?”
This was a completely childish and entitled thing to think, of course. But part of Stoic practice is pulling ourselves out of such assent to false impressions — none of us are sages, we’ll falter, we’ll fail to be perfect frequently, and I’m no different.
I said I was upset, but really I was hurt. I felt deeply hurt. It made me so sad to think that the world cares more about nonsense than it does serious things — that escapism is more highly valued than embracing duty, and service to others, and improvement of character.
But that was all bullshit, of course. Two things can be true. A person can value escapism AND be serious about their own personal development and their duty to other human beings. I was just, in the moment, hurt, and even afraid that making a living in my own way just wasn’t ever going to be possible.
It took me a full week to process those impressions and emotions. I knew they were wrong, I knew I needed to be better than that, but Stoicism isn’t always easy (as you already know).
Then my wife, who is a fantastically thoughtful person and who is very outside the bubble of what I do and thus able to see things from angles that are harder for me to realise, said two super obvious things (that were not obvious to me):
Tanner, Stoic Brekkie is smart, and it’s useful, and the images are cute, but it’s not fun. You really struggle with making things fun because you’re too serious with your work… even though, in private, you’re one of the goofiest people I know.
Stoic Brekkie could be exactly like this, if you just stopped thinking philosophy has to be delivered in a serious way all the time. You’ve worked hard to make Stoic Brekkie not as serious as you usually are, but this is an opportunity to take that further. People want you to be less serious without being less smart.
And she’s right. I’m so worried about presenting Stoicism as buttoned up serious philosophy (because of how helpful and important it is and how much I believe it can change the world), that I take none of my own fun into the work. And this works against me, and it works against my readers too.
So Stoic Brekkie is coming back, with a snailmail twist 🐌 📬
First, beginning next week, I’m falling back to once-per-week digital editions. These will be a bit longer, about a 3-minute read, but will maintain the brief demand on your time they already present.
Second, beginning August 1st, Stoic Brekkie by Mail will deliver its first physical edition.
You’ll need to register your interest now if you want to be invited to receive this first edition, which you can do at https://bypost.stoicbrekkie.com.
Each edition (delivered once per month) will include a hand-typed, long-form edition of Stoic Brekkie (exclusive to post subscribers), along with a themed sticker, a short-form journaling prompt, and a special item meant to enrich your Stoic practice.
Register your interest today, so you get the very first edition.
And thank you, ever so much, for being patient with me as I figured this out and for supporting my efforts.
Stay hungry. Stay wise. Eat brekkie.
