Ryan Holiday

Ryan Holiday
Holiday in 2012
Born	June 16, 1987 (1987-06-16) (age 37) Sacramento, California
Occupation	Marketer, author
Education	UC-Riverside (dropped out)
Genre	Self-help, non-fiction
Spouse	Samantha Hoover
Website
ryanholiday.net

Ryan Holiday (born June 16, 1987) is an American author, originally a marketer, who made a name writing books and marketing them in non-traditional ways.

Holiday's debut to writing was in 2012, when he published Trust Me, I'm Lying. Since then he has published a number of other books including The Obstacle Is the Way (2014) and Ego is the Enemy (2016).

Early life and education

Ryan Holiday was on born June 16, 1987 and grew up in Sacramento, California. His father was a police detective and his mother a high school principal. He dropped out of the University of California, Riverside in his sophomore year, at the age of 19 moving to Los Angeles to work at a Hollywood talent agency.

Career

Holiday was a director of marketing for American Apparel. Early on, Holiday "earned a name for himself pranking several media outlets by posing as a fake expert for stories... a suffering insomniac for an ABC News story, an outraged customer... sneezed on at a Burger King for MSNBC[,] and a vinyl record collector for a New York Times piece, just to name a few... Holiday claims he was exposing flaws in journalistic vetting, but his pranks also led to a book deal." Holiday proceeded from that start to a role in helping marketing clients plan advertising campaigns with the aim of their coverage going viral. While at American Apparel, Holiday consulted for author Tucker Max, where he "created a sneaky way to get young men to see the Tucker Max movie, I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, by organizing a campaign against the film's womanizing plot and bait[ing] people to protest it". He said, "we realized... the best way to get these kids to see this movie... is to tell them not to see [it]". Later, he worked with Robert Greene.

While working at American Apparel, Holiday "grew disillusioned with his work as a hype man and decided to write a self-indicting exposé", receiving an advance for a book in 2012. Holiday resigned from American Apparel in October 2014. He runs his own marketing firm, Brass Check, and has written "boastfully" about using tactics such as forging and leaking documents, creating fake social media accounts, and buying web traffic for self-generated blog posts on behalf of his clients.

Writing

Holiday published his first book, Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator, in 2012. It debuted eighth on the Wall Street Journal bestseller list for the hardcover business category. The Financial Times called his revelations in the book "disturbing" and "chilling", and Business Insider published a list of his "biggest lies" while working in PR. Holiday "seemed to revel in his role as the villain."

Holiday's second book, Growth Hacker Marketing, was first published in September 2013 by Profile Books. The book discusses why growth hacking is cheaper and more effective than traditional marketing. The book was named one of Inc. magazine's top 10 marketing books of 2014.

Holiday's third book The Obstacle Is the Way, was published in May 2014, also by Penguin Publishing Group. As of December 2016, the book had sold more than 230,000 copies. In 2014, both Super Bowl teams, the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks, invited the author to visit their headquarters to talk about the ideas in the book, and NBA all-star Chris Bosh listed Obstacle as an item "he couldn't live without", adding that head coach Erik Spoelstra gave Miami Heat players copies of the book.

In 2016, Holiday published his fourth and fifth books, both with Penguin. The first, in June, was Ego Is the Enemy, which uses various historical figures as case studies to illustrate the perils of egotism. The second, published in October, The Daily Stoic, co-authored by Stephen Hanselman, is a daily devotional containing Stoic meditations. The Daily Stoic reached No. 2 on the Wall Street Journal bestseller list in the Hardcover Business category, and by 2019, the e-book version reached No. 7 in that format's Nonfiction category.

In February 2018, Holiday published Conspiracy with Penguin, about the lawsuit between Gawker Media and wrestler Hulk Hogan, and Peter Thiel's involvement in the dispute. It was reviewed by William D. Cohan of The New York Times, who noted, "...incessant name-dropping aside—which tends to detract from his gripping narrative—Holiday has written one helluva page-turner." In October 2019, Holiday published Stillness Is the Key.

In 2020, Hanselman and Holiday co-authored the Lives of the Stoics: The Art of Living from Zeno to Marcus Aurelius. It delves into the lives of famous Stoic philosophers and their teachings. His work, Courage Is Calling: Fortune Favors the Brave (2021) explores the cardinal virtues, focusing on the importance of courage in personal and professional life. Discipline Is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control (2022) examines the role of discipline in achieving success and fulfillment. In 2023, Holiday published The Daily Dad, offering daily Stoic-inspired insights for fathers. His 2024 book, Right Thing, Right Now: Good Values. Good Character. Good Deeds, emphasizes the importance of ethical behavior and integrity. A review by Will Lloyd for The Sunday Times said, "A former PR man has reinvented stoicism for the masses, and created a bestselling business out of his books. It’s a shame they’re so terrible."

Stoicism

Holiday, through his books, articles and lectures, has been credited by Alexandra Alter of The New York Times with contributing to the increased popularity of Stoicism; when questioned about his role, he defended it "as a self-help strategy", and Alter notes that Holiday's approach "sound[s] more entrepreneurial than philosophic". Holiday was also described as "leading the charge for Stoicism," which has been noted for gaining traction among Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. However, Zoe Williams, writing for The Guardian says his books " do not so much represent a meaningful through-line of the ancient philosophy, but instead pick up quotes and notions so freely, attach them to modern exemplars so randomly, that it’s like putting stoicism into a Magimix until the only building block of thought you have left is the alphabet" and Alter says, "he translates Stoicism, which had counted emperors and statesmen among its adherents during antiquity, into pithy catchphrases and digestible anecdotes for ambitious, 21st-century life hackers. He boils down the philosophy’s central tenets to inspirational tales from successful people’s lives and recasts its ancient maxims about the pitfalls of pride into breathless clickbait."

In 2016, Holiday spoke at Stoicon, an annual conference for academics and practitioners of Stoicism. The organizer, Massimo Pigliucci, philosophy professor at City College of New York said, "Some of them [attendees] looked at Ryan as a keynote speaker and said, ‘Wait a minute, that’s not Stoicism.’" and Gabriele Galluzzoo, a professor of ancient philosophy at the University of Exeter, said, "There was some skepticism about the personal trajectory of the author, since some of the things in his first book don’t seem to be aligned with the ideals of Stoicism."

Personal life

Holiday is married and has two sons. He lives on a 40-acre ranch (16 ha), outside Austin, Texas, in Bastrop County, where he owns and operates an independent bookstore Painted Porch Bookshop.

Holiday wrote public letters encouraging his father not to vote for Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020. Despite his public opposition to Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, Holiday reported that he was offered a communications director position within the Trump administration and did not accept. Holiday supported Joe Biden in the 2020 United States presidential election.

In September 2020, Holiday contributed $10,000 toward the removal of two Confederate monuments from the Bastrop County Courthouse to an alternative site.

Published works

• Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator. Portfolio-Penguin. 2012. ISBN 978-1-59184-553-9.
• Growth Hacker Marketing: A Primer on the Future of PR, Marketing and Advertising. Profile Books. 2013. ISBN 978-1-78283-019-1.
• The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph. London, England: Penguin Publishing Group. May 1, 2014. ISBN 978-1-59184-635-2.
• Ego Is the Enemy. Penguin. 2016. ISBN 978-1-59184-781-6.
• The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living. Penguin. 2016. ISBN 978-0-7352-1173-5. (with Stephen Hanselman)
• Perennial Seller: The Art of Making and Marketing Work that Lasts. Penguin. 2017. ISBN 978-0-14-310901-3.
• The Daily Stoic Journal: 366 Days of Writing and Reflection on the Art of Living. Penguin. 2017. ISBN 978-0-525-53439-6. (with Stephen Hanselman)
• Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue. Penguin. 2018. ISBN 978-0-7352-1764-5.
• Stillness Is the Key. Penguin. 2019. ISBN 978-0-525-53858-5.
• Lives of the Stoics: The Art of Living from Zeno to Marcus Aurelius. Profile Books. 2020. ISBN 978-1-78816-260-9. (with Stephen Hanselman)
• Courage Is Calling: Fortune Favors the Brave. Penguin. 2021. ISBN 978-0-593-19167-5.
• Discipline Is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control. Penguin. 2022. ISBN 978-0-593-19169-9.
• The Daily Dad: 366 Meditations on Parenting, Love, and Raising Great Kids. Penguin. 2023. ISBN 978-0-593-53905-7.
• Right Thing, Right Now: Good Values. Good Character. Good Deeds. Penguin. 2024. ISBN 978-0-593-19171-2.

See also

• Modern Stoicism

Further reading

• Barry, Aoife (October 21, 2024). "Meet Ryan Holiday: The Marketer Who Became the Modern Godfather of Stoicism". Irish Examiner. Retrieved April 20, 2025.