The Joyful Podcast

You might have noticed that Wisdom of Crowds got a facelift this week. We touched up our homepage and added two new features: CrowdSource and Provocations (read more about both here). In this spirit of renewal and relaunch, on the podcast we are getting back to our bread and butter with a classic Shadi and Damir episode.

This week’s episode deals with the virtues of resignation. Is giving up ever the right choice to make, either in politics or in one’s personal life? Shadi has been reading a book about “settling” — On Giving Up by Adam Phillips — and he muses on the topic in latest piece in Wisdom of Crowds: “Giving Up is Good for You.” Damir worries that giving up means resignation, a rejection of life, a denial of adventure. He considers Shadi’s mention of the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. Does Shadi understand the full implications of Nietzsche’s philosophy? Damir wonders. In the bonus section for paid subscribers, the talk turns toward war and geopolitics, where Shadi discusses how wars end in" “settlements” — a form of giving up. Finally, the conversation wraps up with a reevaluation of Damir’s personal philosophy, and a look back at last week’s podcast episode with Phil Klay.

Required Reading:

• “Giving Up is Good for You” by Shadi (Wisdom of Crowds).

• Adam Phillips, On Giving Up.

• Friedrich Nietzsche (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy).

• Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

• Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals.

• Friedrich Nietzsche, The Joyful Science.

• Adyashanti official page (YouTube).

• Podcast episode with Phil Klay (Wisdom of Crowds).

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