EP152- Fear Never Beginning.

A new week can feel heavy, but sometimes the weight isn’t life—it’s the fear of starting. This episode opens with a simple Monday reminder: attitude is a choice. Then it leans into a line from Marcus Aurelius that cuts straight through comfort—don’t fear death, fear never beginning to live.

This is a real conversation about stepping away from the predictable and into the unknown, and how freedom can expose the ways busyness once hid avoidance. Not romanticizing risk—just telling the truth about what it feels like to choose growth when outcomes aren’t guaranteed.

Stoicism isn’t about cold detachment; it’s about clear action. Fear becomes information. Values become direction. And instead of waiting for certainty, life gets built through small, honest steps—one call, one habit, one choice at a time.

Two paths always exist: play it safe and collect regret, or take smart risks and collect lessons. One hurts quietly. The other builds a life you can respect.

This episode isn’t about quotes—it’s about letting words change the way choices get made. Because living isn’t filling a calendar. It’s having the courage to begin.

So a choice must be made:

Will you fear failure and never take action,

or fear never beginning to live—and take life into your own hands? A choice forever yours. 

Enjoy and as always Thank you for listening. 

Thank You for listening ! follow us on Instagram.
@compoundingdailypodcast
Miguel:@m_sanchezvillafane
Email: Compoundingdailypodcast@gmail.com

Chapters

• 0:00 New Week, New Opportunity Mindset
• 1:02 Attitude As A Choice
• 2:29 Why These Reflections Matter
• 2:44 Introducing Marcus Aurelius’s Quote
• 4:12 Startup Fears And Uncertain Days
• 5:04 Redefining What It Means To Live
• 6:21 Sit With Quotes, Take Action
• 7:38 Two Paths: Safety Or Regret
• 8:32 Let Fear Push You Forward
• 9:35 Trusting Intuition And Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Hello and welcome back everybody to compounding daily. I'm your host, Miguel Sanchez, and welcome back to another episode. I hope that you are making progress in this new year. I hope that you didn't just enter the new year hoping for things to work out. I hope that you are making concrete plans, that you are waking up with intention, that you are giving yourself direction. I don't really have a specific topic today in mind. As always, I like to cover the the usual. It's a new year, but there are things that I love to always remind myself of, and especially you who takes time to listen with me and converse here with me. I always love to emphasize on the fact that as you listen to this, if you listen to this when it comes out, it is Monday, the beginning of a brand new week. And always I entertain the perspective of with a brand new week comes brand new opportunities, and with those opportunities, I get to challenge myself, I get to grow, and I get to experience. But that perspective is a choice. It's also easy to wake up on a Monday and convince yourself that it's going to suck, that you're going to be around people you don't want to be. And though that may really be your reality, it doesn't mean that your attitude need to needs to match the environment. You can choose a good attitude, and I believe that is more important uh in the long term when it comes to making personal growth. So, with that being said, um, as I was saying, I don't really have a topic today in mind, but I do want to cover a quote that's been on my mind lately. As I say, as I sit here and share uh these stories with you, or these perspectives, or different ideas with you. I always want you to remember that I'm speaking to you from the perspective of this is what I'm currently going through, these are the difficulties of my life, these are the thoughts that lately have been dominating my mind, and this is how I'm thinking about it, and this is how I'm approaching and all with the goal that you find value in it. That is the goal. I never ask anything from you. I don't sell you merchandise, I don't sell you ebooks that promise fake things. What I'm promising you is if you listen with intention, I'm certain that within one of these episodes, this could be the one you find a good perspective, you find a change of perspective, you find a different idea, you find that you can relate and you understand that you're not alone, you understand that you are a human being and you we all go through the same experiences and we can all benefit from the things that are meant to help us, should we choose the perspectives. So, with that being said, let's get into it because the quote that I have today is from a stoic. I'm sure we've all heard of him, Marcus Aurelius. If you don't know about stoicism, uh I don't really force my beliefs on people, but I find value literally everywhere. Without the the the uh what's the word that I'm looking for? Without attaching myself so much to a belief that I now become an enemy of other things. I I love being curious and I find value in all things really. And um when it comes to Marcus Aurelius and the stoics and stoicism, uh what I find is blissfulness, uh perspectives that allow me as an individual to find strength within myself to do the things that I know I should do, but I'm afraid of doing. And uh with the quote that I'm going to give you, does just that. Um, I'll read it to you, I'll tell you what I think about it, I'll tell you how I find value in it, how it inspires me, and I leave you with that. And you do what you want with that information. As I said here, I'm not here to give you steps to bettering yourself, I'm here just sharing my life with you. Uh knowing that I, from where I was to where I am, have made significant progress. And I always tell myself, if I can do it, anybody can do it. Cause fuck, I'm not, I'm not the sharpest two in the chat, as they say, right? So let's get right into it. The quote goes like this it is not death that you should fear, you should fear never beginning to live. And uh I'm I'll get a little personal here. As of late, um being in the position that I am with uh starting my own business and really just throwing myself headfirst into the world, I'm doing something that is very uncomfortable for me, something that I never thought I would get into, if I'm being honest with you, something that I avoided, um, maybe procrastinated for a while. But as as I as I experienced this and I wake up every single day with fear, anxiety, um, um, confusion, uh a lack of vision because it it's it's all new to me, it's all uh a different perspective. I went from the certainty of Monday through Friday, 40 hours a week, to some days I wake up and there's nothing on the schedule and I don't know what to do with myself, and I find myself with a lot of time to think, and with this freedom to think, I I often reflect on the things that I've been missing out with having too much on my schedule and not giving enough time to just being present, and it's allowed me to start building a different definition for what I defined as living, and I'm very grateful to be able to have such a thought because to go from a position of I am fearful and I I am I'm afraid of a bad outcome to wow, like what an opportunity to grow. How can I find lessons in this? How can I find opportunities in this? It's allowing me to approach a day with the things that every human experiences, which is the anxiety and the uncertainty of the day, and understand that within that day I can find excitement, I can find things that are going to lead me to new outcomes. It is not death that you should fear, you should fear never beginning to live. I feel as if I just started living. I am now I'm gonna be 32 this year, and in the 32 years of life, I feel like it hasn't only been maybe the last two years where my eyes have really been opening to different perspectives, to the the values in life, to how to appreciate more and get the most out of this. And I I intend with these messages to share with you those perspectives, and this quote uh is is like it's like many of the things that I talk about. Many of the things that I talk about are said all the time, tattooed on some people's bodies, right? Because they're quotes, but most people don't sit with them in depth and ponder on them and relate to them and see how such a quote can inspire one to take positive action. Because when you contemplate and think about death, you feel the uncertainty. I don't care what religion you believe in, nothing nobody knows what comes next. So when you sit there and you contemplate that, there's the the the options that lay in front of you. You can live with purpose and make the most out of this gift called life and hope that there is something wonderful after, or waste this life and hope that there is a second chance, which is not a gamble that I want to take. So you can go your life fearing death, playing it safe. I don't want to do this, but what if I fail? What if I'm ridiculed? What if I'm judged? What if I make a fool of myself? I am fearful, so therefore I don't take action. And then you reach the end of your life filled with regret, filled with thoughts of I should have and I could have and I didn't, and here I sit in my own misery. Or you can change that perspective and tell yourself what you should fear is never beginning to live. You're still fearing, but that fear I believe leads you to different outcomes, it leads you to different actions. The fear of never beginning to live reminds you that every day is an opportunity, reminds you that every day you have a choice to move forward despite the obstacles standing in front of you. Because none of what I'm saying is butterflies and rainbows, none of what I'm saying takes away sickness and health and loss of love. Those things are real, they are part of life. But within that chaos, you create peace. Within that chaos, you decide what fear motivates you. And neither fear is gonna motivate you to give up, to never try to quit before you even put real effort into it, or fear will lead you to take action in the form of positive direction. Saying, despite the fear I feel inside, I'd rather feel the outcome of that failure and learn from it instead of allowing fear to keep me safe in the comfort of my home, and I never take action in long-term effect. I just wasted my life. These are the things that are running through my head all the time. For a while I thought it was a curse. But uh I've learned to sit with my thoughts and know that those thoughts are never uh intentionally guiding me to bad. I feel like the the communication I have with myself is understanding that hey, I don't want bad for you. So please just listen to what I'm trying to tell you, and with that good intuition, you will make good decisions. You know what's good for you, you know what a sad life looks like, and you know you don't want that for you. So don't do the things that lead you to that. I'm gonna leave you with that because that's enough, in my own opinion. Ten minutes directly to the point. A beautiful quote to think about. It is not death that you should fear, but you should fear never beginning to live. Marcus Aurelius. Think let's get better, and until next time.