It’s very easy to get comfortable. To build up your life exactly how you want it to be. Minimize inconveniences and hand off the stuff you don’t like to do. To find what you enjoy, where you enjoy it, and never leave.

A velvet rut is what it’s called. It’s nice, but the comfort tricks you into thinking that you’re not stuck.

The Stoics knew that this was a kind of death. That as soon as we stop growing, we start dying. Or at least, we become more vulnerable to the swings of Fate and Fortune. Seneca talked over and over again about the importance of adversity, of not only embracing the struggle life throws at us but actively seeking out that difficulty, so you can be stronger and better and more prepared. A person who has never been challenged, he said, who always gets their way, is a tragic figure. They have no idea what they are capable of. They are not even close to fulfilling their potential.

So that leaves you with something to think about today: Are you challenging yourself? Do the choices you make push you or do they help you atrophy? Are you in a velvet rut?

Be honest. And then challenge yourself to do better.

That’s what tens of thousands of people have done in taking on one of our Daily Stoic challenges. And that’s why we’re excited to announce the release of the updated edition of The Daily Stoic Challenge Deck that pushes you to challenge yourself all year round.

The new and improved Challenge Deck features 40 challenge cards categorized into three themes—the three critical disciplines of Stoicism: Perception, Action, Will. Each card includes challenge instructions, a quote from Stoic philosophers like Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus, and a unique and inspiring illustration.

With this deck, every day, you are asked to answer, who is in charge? You are forced to go through the rigor required to remind the mind and body who is in charge. You are pushed in little ways so the big ways stop seeming quite so big, quite so out of character. You minimize fear by making the act of overcoming it routine. You test yourself to prepare for the tests of life. You do something difficult, something scary, something good every day.

Begin today, go get your Daily Stoic Challenge Deck!