We all want to win. We all want to succeed. People hate losing. People hate coming up short. So naturally, we’ve come up with some sayings and shorthands to rationalize and justify doing whatever it takes to win.

And the most seductive:

In Montaigne’s time, there was a popular saying that went, It is always glorious to conquer, whether the victory is achieved by chance or skill. But in his Essays, Montaigne rejects the idea, as he would have rejected most of those sports cliches.

“The philosopher Chrysippus would not have been of that opinion, and I just as little,” he writes. “For he used to say that those who run a race should indeed employ their whole powers and strength for speed but that, nevertheless, it was not in the least permissible for them to lay a hand on their adversary to stop him, or to stick out a leg to make him fall.”

Chrysippus was the third leader of the Stoic school and was a talented athlete, competing as a distance runner in the Olympic Games. He once explained—as Montaigne mentions and Ryan Holiday writes about in Right Thing, Right Now—his competitive philosophy: “Runners in a race ought to compete and strive to win as hard as they can, but by no means should they trip their competitors or give them a shove. So too in life; it is not wrong to seek after the things useful in life; but to do so while depriving someone else is not just.”

Without a sense of honor, without a commitment to rules and fairness, you might win…but you’ll always lose (and will be a kind of loser). In sports and in life, a Stoic takes responsibility. They play the ball where it lays. They pay what they owe. We disclose the conflict of interest. They call the penalty on themselves. They help out a competitor. They achieve victory by skill, by employing their whole powers and strength, not by cheating, tripping, or depriving someone else.

This might seem crazy to some people. It may cost us something. And again, we may lose sometimes because of it…but we won’t lose what’s important. We’ll win what really matters. We’ll win our own self-respect. We’ll be able to be proud of ourselves, regardless of the outcome. We may not always get a great reputation, as the Stoics would say, but we’ll deserve one.

P.S. This story was adapted from the “Be Your Own Referee” chapter in Ryan Holiday’s latest book Right Thing, Right Now, which is all about establishing your own standards and holding yourself to them…

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The book has only been out for a couple days now but we’ve been hearing great feedback from readers already (thanks!). The book has also received rave reviews from the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger, who said it’s “a message we all need to hear.” Dr. Edith Eva Eger called the book “a gift to humanity, showing us that each of us can live with a clear sense of justice, both within ourselves and within this planet.”

And as a note of appreciation, we’ve decided to extend our preorder bonuses for another week! That means if you buy a copy now, you can still receive bonus chapters, a signed page from the original manuscript, an exclusive video from Ryan previewing his book on wisdom and more!

There are less than 500 copies left from our initial run of signed, numbered first-editions! Head here TODAY to get yours while you still can (we also have unsigned copies cheaper than Amazon!).

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