{"id":46168,"date":"2026-05-29T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/?p=46168"},"modified":"2026-05-22T10:24:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T17:24:13","slug":"book-freak-211-tolstoys-guide-to-daily-wisdom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/book-freak-211-tolstoys-guide-to-daily-wisdom\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Freak #211: Tolstoy’s Guide to Daily Wisdom"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Get A Calendar of Wisdom<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Calendar of Wisdom<\/em> is a daily reader Tolstoy assembled in the last decade of his life. Each entry pairs several short quotes from someone like Epictetus, Buddha, Marcus Aurelius, or Pascal with a paragraph of Tolstoy\u2019s own commentary. He intended it to be read one page a day, and read repeatedly every year for the rest of the reader\u2019s life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Core Principles<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

1.\u00a0One wise idea a day is enough<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Tolstoy thought one wise idea a day was enough, and he laid the book out to match. You read a quote, you read his short reflection on it, and that\u2019s it for the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. False knowledge is worse than ignorance<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The useful skill is sorting what\u2019s necessary to know from what isn\u2019t. If you don\u2019t know something, you can learn it. If you wrongly think you already know it, you can\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Love is the project worth a whole life<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Tolstoy believed creating more love between people and reducing what divides them was the only project worth a whole life. He put money and status well below it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4. The same problems, two thousand years ago<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The contributors include Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Lao Tzu, the Buddha, Pascal, Emerson, and Tolstoy himself. You\u2019ll realize others have had the same problems you did two thousand years ago and wrote down what they figured out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Try It Now<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

1. Read one entry from A Calendar of Wisdom<\/em> (or any wisdom book) every morning before checking your phone, for a month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. Make a list of what you read, watched, and listened to this week. Cross off everything that was not necessary to know. Look at what\u2019s left.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Think of one person you\u2019ve lost touch with or fallen out with. Send them a message today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4. Pick one of the philosophers Tolstoy quotes (Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Lao Tzu, Pascal, the Buddha) and read one short book by them this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Quote<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

January 23<\/strong><\/p>

Among all sins, there is one which completely opposes the major blessing of human life, which is your love for your brother: there is no worse sin than to destroy this major joy of life, by feeling rage and hatred for your brother.<\/p>

Seneca, a wise man from Rome, said that when you want to escape from your rage, when you feel that it grows, the best thing to do is to stop. Do not do anything: do not walk, do not move, do not speak. If your body or your tongue moves at this moment, then your rage will grow. Rage is very harmful for all people, but it is most harmful for the man who experiences it.<\/p>

\u201cAn evil person damages not only others but himself.\u201d \u2014 After SOCRATES<\/p>

\u201cYour enemy will pay you back with rage, will make you suffer, but the biggest damage to you will be caused by the rage and hatred existing in your heart. Neither your father, nor your mother, nor all your family can make you more good than your heart can when it forgives and forgets its abuse.\u201d \u2014DHAMMAPADA, a book of BUDDHIST WISDOM<\/p>

Your rage cannot be justified by anything. The reason for your rage is always inside you.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Book Freak is published by Cool Tools Lab, a small company of three people. We also run\u00a0Recomendo<\/a>, the\u00a0Cool Tools website<\/a>, a\u00a0YouTube channel<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0podcast<\/a>, and other newsletters, including\u00a0Recomendo Deals<\/a>,\u00a0Gar\u2019s Tips & Tools<\/a>,\u00a0Nomadico<\/a>,\u00a0What\u2019s in my NOW?<\/a>,\u00a0Tools for Possibilities<\/a>,\u00a0Books That Belong On Paper<\/a>, and\u00a0Book Freak<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Leo Tolstoy\u2019s Daily Thoughts to Nourish the Soul<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47588,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[76],"tags":[2384],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46168"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47588"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46168"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46168\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46170,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46168\/revisions\/46170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}