hello and welcome to season 6 episode 40 of Dualistic Unity I am in the room in my chair got a microphone in front of me because not because of anything but these are the things that are actually here next to two people here and what I mean by that is it's not in my head you know that's not the first thing that I'm looking everything through it's like this is a device that allows me to communicate with something else but it's not anything on top of that and I'm not
I don't have to show up as something on top of what I'm showing up as and if I can be cool with that honestly cool with how I show up then that's my bar I don't have to live up to something beyond that or expect myself to to be more moment to moment I can be here actually in the world and see where it goes because I'm not sure that's right seeing where it goes and it's it's always here life is all is life is happening right here right now and it doesn't change locations which
makes it a lot easier to remind ourselves of you know you know because it's very easy to get caught up in the there and it's very easy to forget the feeling of being caught up when you're having that Moment of clarity and it's very easy to forget Clarity when you are in the midst of being caught up and yet both are available and both mean nothing about you and both have so much within them they have each other and so they kind of remind me of that Yin Yan symbol where
you know there's that little white dot in the black um side of it and there's the little black dot on the white side of it because within one is the other there there is no separation but there is an appreciation for the experience of both sides because they're here and available so why not why not experience both when you don't judge yourself for being on one side versus the other and so I'm very happy to be sitting on a chair with you guys and if at the beginning of this episode I was playing
uh hideand-seek with restream with the eye I was like peek of it and it happened at the same time where I opened it I was like H restream just wants to play a little bit because play is also available but so is appreciating the depth of of life when it does feel painful or or unpleasant because pain is not something that has to be avoided it's just another layer to this infinitely a inspiring experience I wanted to go somewhere there we were talking about it's okay to
look at both sides right of both sides of the coin I would say that that's absolutely where you're going to find ongoing growth and awareness and empathy and experiences that that aren't necessarily in the physical world but by virtue of them being real to you they are in fact real and so we get so caught up in like one side of the coin and then it's it's important to look at the other side of the coin like I've said in I think one of my ebooks that I wrote once
upon a time I think this one's available on patreon uh the importance of balancing your perspective and what I mean is if you tend to lean on the I'm useless I can't do enough I'm a piece of [ __ ] side it's really important to recognize that the other side of that coin is equally valid if you're on that side of it if you're looking at it from that perspective so if you were to let go of the story that you were holding on to there is another story that seems equally as valid when you're in the
mentality that's willing to believe it that's willing to hold on to it in the same way that you are willing to hold on to the darker side of the story so you see there's value there but there's also something to be learned there because you start looking at all dualistic perspectives like the teacher and the student for example and you start to look at those very superficial Concepts and you start to realize that any teacher who isn't an ongoing student who
really no teacher at all and so student and teacher starts to fade away but you have to play the part of both student and teacher to recognize that they are not separate despite seeming separate during the time that you identify as one or the other and I guess what I'm saying is that the farther down that path you go the more you are willing to look at opposing and yet complimentary perspectives because they match one another they play a part with one another eventually you end up at the God
versus Man duality and that is where you start to really become informed in terms of the relationship between the Observer and The observed in terms of the relationship between the individual and the collective what it means in terms of predeterminism or free will these are all dualistic perspectives of what is including human or God they are perspectives and they are valid points of view when you're in those points of view but when we say valid points of view in terms of being God you have to
remember that's an idea so now we're talking about valid egotistical points of view because now you're identifying as God rather than just a mere mortal or sinner if you really want to drag yourself down into the [ __ ] swamp but it's the recognition that while both are true while you are the awareness of the universe and have Limitless potential that does not give you control that does not make you more valuable and so while you are both God and man you are neither it's not either perspective
that's really the truth but it's it's in exploring both perspectives that you see the massive Spectrum in between and you grow accordingly yeah and I I think if you kind of hold on to that perspective of like being God and like expressing it like you know you're God I'm God even like using the word to some degree like even if you're pointing it at everyone else no you're God too if you're seeing yourself as the one expressing that it's like there there can be this sense of
like I'm God and I know it and you're God and you don't know it and therefore that means something and it doesn't because like it can oh my gosh it can be such a separative idea that that idea if if it is focused on like even focusing on the word very much isn't it's not beneficial to your experience at all like if you if you focus on it too much in yourself as something that's separate from everything else it can make you feel good but it also creates a really
high bar for yourself like a maintenance sort of feeling where it's it isn't letting yourself go at all it's like creating more of uh potential to to fall it's like there's a lot of Pride involved in that without much behind it you know without much backing it up necessarily if it's just focused on as an idea I think and know part of me goes back and forth of this because I look back at times where I've expressed it and like had ideas of myself you know and and look back at things with kind of
like a a negative tone and part of me wonders if that's absolutely even the case we were chatting a little bit this morning about this and how it's it's almost to get focused on that a little too much is like a component of of this because there are we've for so long focused on ourselves as an idea assumed that we are an idea assume that we exist not really in the world but like through a perception of the world and it's not that being in the world makes anything
more certain but it's like just what it is it's like it's what it is instead of it being you know veiled by some opinion or some thought or something that you assume means something about you specifically it's like there there's a lot less weight when it isn't when you're not focusing on that as an idea like a new idea of yourself there's a lot less risk you know because there's there's um you know when you're focused on the idea of you everything is is going through that
filter of that concept so it's you know everyone must be upset with you everyone must be um everyone must like you or hate you everyone must be working to help you or to hurt you some you know it's like you you consider yourself the center of everyone else's experience and and the ironic part about it is that you don't even really make your experience the center of your of your focus because it's your idea of how you you assume people feel about you that you
prioritize and so many times I would you know get to work early or stay late or take an extra class or pick up or you know pick up another shift because I was trying to control the opinion that I assumed other people would have so I wasn't even working tirelessly to for others it was for how I thought other people viewed me which is insane you know that I even tried to credit other people for why I was doing the things I was doing and it wasn't even that it was
what I assumed they were thinking and so my experience wasn't even my priority it was my the P it it was my assumption about my experience that I prioritize and that was really relieving to some degree you know that it wasn't you know that I as much as I wanted to blame people it was it was me that created that experience and in creating it I could recreate it and I really appreciate having that realization because I was a big reader when I was younger and I have fallen
back into reading and I've been loving it so side note I love reading reading is fantastic because it gives you an opportunity to change your perspective with within seconds right because when you're in the midst of a book you're you're changing the perspective of the characters you're changing the perspective of the writing is it first person or second or third person are we are we taking the role of the narrator are we looking from the perspective of the lead character are we looking from
the perspective of a background character you know are you seeing the development of the story and when you are reading you're able to change perspectives seamlessly because someone is guiding you through those different perspectives and so when I'm in my quote on quote my life it's a lot easier for me to take the perspective of my friend Andrew or my friend Ry or someone in the audience because I very much remember being holding that perspective and so I can hold multiple perspectives at once
and a great way that I was able to practice that is through a love of reading for no other reason than just to enjoy a story you know not to learn something not to be able to bring that up later and like well you know I read this story about philosophy and so you know I am that much wiser you know it was just reading for the sake of reading and in that I just got to see that stories can easily be written and Rewritten and so it doesn't matter that for a good chunk of my life I was living
for the Assumption of what I assumed was people's perspective it's that I was like okay well we did that and now we can start over going a new Direction just like that just like you would in a book you know and then to some degree you are the author and the main character and every background character in your story and you can always just start over yeah well and that's so I guess that's the thing right is that that's what we're so used to doing I mean that's
your typical midlife crisis right is that somebody's invested in a story their whole life and then all of a sudden they've invested so much that the consequences and the conflict and and all of the the repression is so obvious that they're like I need a new story and they do a massive reset maybe they leave their family I must have the wrong story right and and then it becomes a new story and it's not that it's bad to explore a new story as I was saying earlier it's kind of necessary you know
your brain's always going to perceive some kind of story because it's always trying to perceive this character of you and how Everything's Relative to you and so you could live on one side of the story where you're a piece of [ __ ] or another side of the story where you know you're the most intelligent and wonderful person ever right like you can do those things but see I find it fascinating because in all of the stories in that whole Spectrum there is always going to be frustration a sense
of lack a sense of disappointment a sense of need there's always going to be this sense that you have to get somewhere that you have to be more no matter if you're at the total positive perspective everybody likes me and I'm wonderful now you have something you have to protect now you have something you're afraid of losing there is an emotional spectrum that goes with everything that is based on a character everything that is based on a story and so I find that fascinating because
all of those stories all those perspectives inform us when we don't attach to them yes but that's why Christians for example consider themselves to be Sinners you understand they're thinking about themselves and so there is always the threat of Hell there's always that sense of lack of being Unworthy of not they're looking at the reality of the conscious dualistic experience and going no there's something wrong with that obviously I'm broken instead of learning from it
instead of seeing the common factor which is the fiction of The Sinner itself the fiction of the person that could have sinned and the idea of a sin that's why I like the atmology of sin to miss them to miss the mark to miss the point because it's not you're going to hell outside of you're going to be confused and you're going to suffer accordingly oh yeah that that sense of that sense of that idea in the back and the forth like I think being willing to let yourself get caught up and
like catch yourself almost like not try to avoid all of those things like need judgment assumption false certainty because that can just create this sort of like internal battle where you're like am I holding on to something or am I not and that's what your mind's going to be used on is like figuring out how much or how little you're able to use your mind how well or how poorly you're you're living life how much you're you know letting go of or not letting go of
and then based on that like there will be kind of a compulsive response to life like a obsessive compulsive response to Things based on those focuses or what you think you you have to get rid of or not get rid of or what you are assuming you you should or shouldn't do or go through like a lot of those can be based on that sense of desire you know that sense of desire to be liked or not dislike that that sense of an a need for someone or something else and and like to get a guarantee instead
of like understanding that those are all in there and it can be something that you can kind of focus on but then understanding that like you're going to be seeing things through a veil you know to some degree and so you know the the things that are going on in your head like don't trust them at face value because if you trust it immediately then there's going to be expansion from there like that's where mind's going to go is try to validate whatever assumption
opinion perception you're holding on to and like that's what your mind's going to be used for and the alternative is not using it so much it's like being informed by things being able to use your mind like there is such a stark difference between your mind using you and it's not to say it's using you but like you're just focused on something that isn't happening in the experience that you're having and so your mind is g to go there it's going to be there it's
gonna that's where the whole thing is gonna be utilized as opposed to it being able to be used here which isn't a sure thing but it's like you know thinking back to being in when you were younger in a in a room at you know maybe at school and preschool early early years knocking the door and uh those early years and how there wasn't like you were there you were talking you were interacting with people but you weren't thinking about yourself so so much and it wasn't this because
sometimes when my mind does go quiet like I'll almost have like a fear response instead of it being like no it's still there like it's still accessible it's just I'm not existing in it so much like I'm existing here in the world and able to use it more than something that I'm like sinking into and focused on and staring at and looking at which gives you no sensitivity to the world and I think the strong longer of an idea or more of an idea that you're trying to hold on to and maintain like
the more incentive to you know be in your head you know trying to control what's happening instead of being involved in it which you know there's no guarantee of the future but like when you're involved in it that sense of like not having control isn't as frightening like there's influence here you you're still fully functional it's not like you don't have control of like what direction you're going to take a conversation or what you're going to say and the immedia like yeah to some degree
I have no idea what exact words are going to come out of my mouth but there isn't hesitation when there's the concern that then kind of separates you from just the ability to express something in even like a coherent way right but I mean even when I do feel super clear and concise and I feel like like damn that sounded pretty good you know even when I'm feeling that there's no way to guarantee that someone is understanding me and they agree that I sound very clear to them you know I I
sound I feel like sometimes I make no sense and somebody's like no I'm following that makes total sense and I'm like all right I'm give me a second I'm let me catch up to you you know like I just said it but I was still on the fence like whether not that made sense and so it's like you just don't know but um I actually would uh yeah no but I I definitely have felt that where it's just you know you're not you're not so clear um or you don't feel clear but yet someone else
disagrees with you and thinks that you are you can yeah oh for sure like even even that even the all right flying solo for a bit even the expression of like not knowing how someone's going to take something like the only perspective of you know performance or expression or anything you got to be cool with is your own like your expression of yourself because it's it's a question mark when it's when it's out there when it's expressed when you share something as much as you feel like
like no right now I'm not as I don't feel as shaken so much and that sense of like control no control like when I stare at it it gets it can be frightening to think but but it's no control in the sense that I'm saying things and there's no control of like how someone's going to hear it like I'm expressing it in a certain way kind of making jumps assumptions about how I'm expressing it what I'm expressing to some degree and like anyone who hears this is going to hear it differently
they're gonna have a different story that maybe resonates with something else that's shared and so you don't have to hold yourself back so much from assuming that like you know what the best thing to share or Express is but it doesn't mean you're like a bumbling absurd person that doesn't make any sense with no like with no ability to like Express something or share something which isn't control but it's it's different because you can start feeling like you're just a
babbling buffoon when you worry whether or not you know you have control and you're not involved in the situation that you're in yeah well this is it right and it's important to remember you never had control you know we go through this illusion for so long trying to curate what we say and how it's going to come across that we forget in the entire time that we're doing that that doesn't guaranteed [ __ ] but we block that out that's where that cognitive dissonance
comes in right like we've had numerous times in our life where somebody's actually called us out for being inauthentic or they've called us out you know for for bullshitting right straight up and later on we just ignore that [ __ ] like no it always works it always works when I cater I'm a people pleaser you know all that all that [ __ ] and it's just funny because when you recognize it you realize the only reason there's this fear of losing control is because you thought you could
have it to begin with and if you recognize you never had control then this is kind of why I say you've always really just been talking to yourself for yourself all those people that you've been trying to you could say manipulate you could say fit in with you could say try to establish a relationship with whatever it is it really depends on how you want to look at yourself right but all of those people have been interacting with you basically working through your own fears
working through your own needs working through your own desires like when you're talking to somebody and you're being manipulative you're really talking to your own insecurity you're reacting to your own insecurity it is an interaction with your own mind and all your [ __ ] and then you talk accordingly and that's kind of the point you know but when you recognize that this is why you know I say the only person I'm I'm really worried about in terms of like being good with what I do
is me like if I I'm the one who has to go to bed with me at night I'm the one I have to wake up with in the morning you know I need to be able to look at myself and look at my actions and look at my choices and go yeah and I put thought into those and you know I I put awareness into that and I take responsibility for that and my life changes accordingly you know but it's just it's just so easy to to pretend that you're acting for other people when in fact you are acting as a result of
your need for other people or your fear of not being enough right that's really what it is and so again and I I want to make this very clear that's great there's nothing wrong with that like that's the whole point is that that ongoing interaction that ongoing back and forth is how you learn about your insecurity you know it's like when you're talking to somebody at the bar and all of a sudden you say something where you're bragging and it's to try and cover up that insecurity well you
know you just bragged right see that's the thing is Underneath It All you know that you just bragged and you're hoping hoping it lands right but that's a moment of of honesty if you can look at that and go oh [ __ ] I totally just exaggerated that so I could I could look a little bit better right which means I I want to feel better about myself oh am I really still thinking that I lack something see there's so much information in that yeah right that you can learn from but not if
you're resisting it not if you're running away from it and this is why I find it funny because so on social media we post a lot of things and a lot of times the response that we get from people is abrasive not to put too fine a point on it a lot of people like it or they'll go hey that's dope keep it up guys yeah right but the comments the people who actually stop to comment and it's almost always just this massive paragraph are abrasive and angry and of course if you call them on it later
they' just tell you that you're projecting almost every time but they are and it's because what you've said they don't understand they want to come up with an opinion about it as fast as possible because they feel insecure they feel threatened and they don't like the fact that they feel confused now because it makes them feel like less but there's that opportunity to go oh [ __ ] you know maybe I am confused you know maybe this is something I don't understand and to
actually go all right I don't understand here's a question not you're an idiot this is idiotic and it's like why is it idiotic well then explain your point to me it's like that is not how you get into a conversation but it is an excellent opportunity to look at why you're doing that right and so I will often go okay but you're coming across this like super insecure right now and then they get mad about that why do they get mad about that because nobody wants
to accept that they're insecure but of course we are because I said earlier or as I said earlier the spectrum is a spectrum of identity and your identity your idea of yourself is never the truth it is always going to be suspect it's always going to be threatened it's always going to be a source of doubt and so as long as you're relying on that identity boom boom insecurity is right at your front door and if you don't accept that it's because you don't want to question the
identity and that is where you find Freedom where you're just like oh [ __ ] I'm still defending something that's kind of dumb because it is when you really look at it for what it is you are defending something that you're not you're defending something that you're not you're trying to build something up that you're not somebody uh on Instagram said it the other day I I think it was the bald Sage who we've had on the show early on in in I think it was season three season four but he was
saying you know it helps to remember that the per the person you're thinking about isn't you right and he even said the person that's thinking isn't you and I was like ah it's good you know and it's because your brain's constantly creating this new Point relative to everything else in order to Pro process context but that point isn't fixed it changes across the spectrum of piece of [ __ ] to [ __ ] almighty God right that's the point is to look at that relative point and recognize that
it's always relative it's always relative so it's never the truth but it certainly provides more information and as you explore them all you see even more gray area which is fantastic that's where you become more self-aware in terms of oh yeah you know I can recognize that I'm everything but the everything that I'm looking at isn't everything right at all because that's an important thing it really does help to recognize that but it's it's like the ego's last shot at survival you know no no no
you're everything you're God you're one with all and it's like that's not incorrect except I'm not really talking about anyone the you that's in that sentence doesn't exist no don't don't think about that because shifts almost that sense of being everything like it hit me yesterday how much that can be in your head and you can like think try and think about everything and have that sense of being able to like control everything which is [ __ ] insane and will absolutely [ __ ] your life up so
good no questions asked like that's not a maybe thing it's like if you're trying to control everything your life's going to get [ __ ] up rain in hell my friend rain in hell oh my goodness gracious like it shifts from it being in your head to like everything being you know from the point that you're in like in this chair I can imagine everything expanding from here like across the Earth in a sense like from here where am I right now in Nimo on Vancouver Island you know
whatever that means in a location that's like I'm almost Imagining the surface of the Earth and like expanding from there which is happening like is right now and every everything's unknown there and so then when you see that like you are this here it's not a thought about you necessarily it doesn't mean anything about you but the thought of controlling all of that when you think about it like that instead of in your head is ridiculous and so not having that sense
of control doesn't mean that you know there's no way to have sway it's not like you're someone's going to start moving your arms necessarily and that gets kind of dicey because it's like am I choosing am I not but it's totally different to not imagine everything as something in your head or not imagine you as something in your head but you that's happening happening here and I think the more sure of some you know some idea of yourself like the more distracted you're going to
get from those things like expressing something about yourself in a certain way like like bragging you said for example like if you're super sensitive to how uncertain you are and you know how uncertain you are like and you brag at a bar or something you're G and no matter what the response is you're probably going to feel pretty weird about that like you're going to be hyper aware of it but if you're really trying to prove yourself like verbally you're it may there's going to
be like a like a gap between how much you're expressing trying to you know validate yourself validate your perspect perception and that's going to be you know the lack of sensitivity to a lot of things not just how you fit into the world but you know even what's happening in your environment and having those that ability not to have social cues in the sense of like looking for the right thing to do next but like an awareness that's different from social cues it's like being aware but not
necessarily acting in a specific way because you should it's like being aware and being yourself partially because you're aware of how a raid the world is of being yourself and again not for other people but just for yourself you know so you can relax and breathe and sleep with yourself at night like absolutely I have a real world example that actually happened just the other day when we were in the Nimo Carlos O'Brien's karaoke contest one of the administrators was super uptight they
were very like you could tell they were worried it wasn't going to go well they were going to go over time that they were going to basically have someone [ __ ] on their head from on high because the job wasn't done correctly and so they weren't really having that good of a Time despite how well the show went but there was this declaration that the people participating in the show shouldn't be upfront in the crowd cheering on the people who are also in the show and of course I don't work for
this person and neither do the two of you and so we're backstage thinking to our eles this doesn't feel right like it doesn't feel right to me this doesn't feel right I'm not supporting somebody that I that I know and care about who does something that I also know and care about like in a town that I know and care about like I'm not I'm not in there instead I'm following somebody's rules and that person is ultimately stressed and feeling a a little bit afraid right
and so so often we cater to that and the Ripple carries on accordingly suddenly we're tense suddenly everything that we do from there Echoes that tension and the alternative was for us for all of us to go well [ __ ] it and we went up front and then what was funny is that one of the employees came over and they're like oh dude you know this person really wants you in the back like you better you better get back there and I could feel my old typical someone's upset with me and then it
dawned on me that it doesn't really matter because again I don't work for this person there's no consequence it's not like I'm being inconsiderate but I know very well that it takes two seconds to walk backstage if I'm going to go on stage I don't need to be lingering back there for 5 to 10 minutes just in case because recognizing again this person's hyper sensitive they're afraid of not doing a good job you can see where all of this is coming from and so I just
went okay and then didn't go until the person who was actually on the stage came and indicated like okay you're up next you know now it's relevant it's not just a matter of somebody being afraid or being tense or trying to once again you know cope with something that could possibly go wrong in their head but an actual need and there I felt that it was appropriate to go but do you see at one point I wouldn't have put any of that awareness into any of that I would have
panicked and went along with everybody else's panic and just fallen in line with everybody else's Vibe because I would have been thinking like oh well I got to make sure I don't upset people I got to make sure that they look at me in a certain way I got to make sure I fit in I got to make sure that I'm playing the game I got to make sure that I I I I I I I rather than actually just wiping the slate planlean and going okay but looking at all the considerations what makes sense like
when I'm not panicked because you can't assume the people who are calling the shots or making the rules or asking anything aren't panicking you have to you have to recognize insecurity is always there as long as you are thinking about how you are perceived relatively to everybody else insecurity is always a Temptation and we run from it so if that's the case then everything we've ever been told has to be looked at aresh because it could be coming from a place that is not
authentic it is not genuine it is not actually coming from a place of clarity or intelligence but rather is just a knee-jerk reaction to a panic that exists in a fiction only yeah like mind your fear mind your fear because if you're afraid if you're tense if you're not relaxed like that's G to there's going to be a different set of decisions that kind of make sense based on that and choices that make sense almost to not that make sense in the world in reality but to soothe you
know the fear or that jarring sort of feeling or your opinion to to shift your opinion or validate your opinion in some way shape or form and like if you're tense and Afraid and not relax like there's going to be a totally different bucket that you choose to look at and like you know we see it in Instagram comments when someone just doesn't want to look at a podcast episode despite like being so sure of their thought like that person is is tense it would make sense to you know
maybe check out the episode like only takes about an hour it's not a big part of your day like from a taking a step back rational approach to something like check that out maybe there's something that's there just out of a curiosity thing but if you're trying to prove something if you're trying to hold on to something which you know a big thing can be that sense of self your sense of certainty your sense of you know your opinion and preference being the all and everything absolute like there's a
different bucket of choices that you make that are way less sensitive to actually what's going on and but just being able to take a step back and and take an assessment for yourself is it takes some Faith to do that like when we were possibly waiting you know back well we were waiting back stage for a little bit like there was no at the karaoke concert there was like we weren't any closer no to the stage being back there it was just like that person knows we're in control but they're
basing that choice off of you know their their fear their opinion their desire to you know look a certain way and so from the other perspective like if you're not so afraid of that person thinking a certain way about you like you kind of have to let go of that being the Forefront like if someone's frustrated or doesn't see you positively like that's okay because there's more considerations there and considering everything like having some people up front dancing like there weren't anyone
there wasn't anyone there so it's like am I pray prioritizing the person who wants us backstage or am I prioritizing the person who's on stage or am I prioritizing the environment am I prioritizing my experience it's like it's not just one thing but it can can become a tunnel vision as soon as someone says something like you should be doing this differently or you're doing something wrong because it there's such a I feel like such a deep sort of response to that feeling like you're
doing something wrong you're doing something incorrectly and if it's someone who you feel in the moment is like an authority figure like you're going to listen to them and if someone's you're trying to please and constantly please like you're going to base decisions off of that and so I think it's really important to look at you know whether you're afraid whether you feel like you need something whether you feel like you're lacking something because if that is the case right now
like there's going to be different decisions and choices that make sense that don't as much when you're not trying to be something more or assuming that you got to like do something that makes you more or maintains your perspective of yourself I mean it's a matter of you know I guess it it comes back to you like your relationship with discomfort you know how how much does being uncomfortable bother you you know what's your relationship with pain you know is it when you feel discomfort you
immediately think I need to get rid of this right now this can't be happening you you know because that that applies in every context you know we're we're talking about this person who was uncomfortable with the possibility that they weren't doing a great job not that anybody walked over to them and I'm assuming that nobody walked over to them to be like you're doing a terrible job everything you're doing is wrong you know I don't think that that happens and
know when you look at people it's like someone did that to them they're acting as if everything that they're doing is wrong and they're desperately trying to do the right thing and no one's actually confirmed that anything is wrong and then when you if you were to say that to someone like Did anyone say that anything is going wrong and they'd almost almost begrudgingly say yes like yeah that's a good point no one's actually told me anything's wrong I'm just acting like things are completely
wrong and it's that copy and paste mentality where this person might have been doing events previously and they're thinking that contestants are not supposed to be in the audience because they've never seen a contestant in the audience but we were cheering from behind the stage which made no sense because it felt like we were louder behind the stage than the people in front of the stage and it's like so would you rather have people in the audience being active and excited or
would you rather have all that excitement sound like it's coming from behind the stage and confusing the audience and the contestants and the MC even more that's right party backstage people start trickling in then she's got to remove them all of a sudden there's like a whole singer just turns around starts singing backwards right that I was just like I don't think that they even realized that us staying behind stage and doing exactly would look more peculiar than us moving in
front of the stage to cheer you know and and it's that [ __ ] right there that you're like I don't think you hear yourself right now I don't think you think the instruction is correct but in this situation applying that instruction would look weirder than you're saying not following the instruction would be and it's that copy and paste because I've always seen contestants in the back they must belong in the back and it's like just because something has been
done that way before doesn't immediately justify it being done in that exact way going forward you know and that you know Traditions mess we we have a tricky relationship with traditions because there's I love history and I love the stories of the past and I love feeling connected to certain you know maybe ceremonies or rituals but not treating them like they're the foundation for everything good going forward you know just because we've done it this way doesn't mean we need to still do it that
way and you know there was a time where I thought you know the best thing you're supposed to do is to find the best way not realizing that that was just the my way and me saying that that's the best way and so now it's like I don't want to do what I think is best I want to pay attention to what seems to make sense you know does this make sense or does it just make me feel better even though as I'm trying to feel better it's looking way more absurd but that copy and paste can seem
enticing when you think that because someone else did it that way maybe they see something I don't but if that's true it's also true that maybe you could see something that the person before you didn't and that's why I appreciate so many different perspectives and having discussions and conversations because even if and that's why I love chatting with people um in any any moment because it's like I may not know about a topic but I'm also really excited to ask questions like oh I don't know about
that like where did you learn about that and you know what what excites you about this topic and what's your perspective or even if I'm holding a stance and I'm like okay I'm not GNA die in this hill but I really like this hill so let me know what's going on in your Hill let me know let me see you know I'd like to take a tour if you'd be so kind as to be my guide and let's see what's you know let's see what led to certain things being held on to because in that we can
see that there's there's more bridges than walls when we're talking about different perspectives and different topics yeah oh yeah because there's a conversation around that that sense of like and that's there oh my gosh there can be such a sensitive avoidance of talking about just being like what hill people are dying on it's like it's a Bel it's a belief like everyone's Hill individually is like their belief the way they see themselves the way they see the world and it's like we don't talk
about that it's just like everyone's got their belief you're Ru believe what I believe it's a nice flag on that hell you it's like this is this is my belief this is my perspective of things and there's all these like individual Hills that everyone's standing on and no one wants to talk about it no one wants to talk about the fact that it's not really they're like they're still here in reality like in you know the room and the situation that they're in no differently than anyone else like their
thoughts about thems and the situation that they're in are entirely relevant but we don't want to talk about that like we don't want to have conversations about that in itself like where it comes from why don't betray your beliefs sir oh my gosh how don't even talk about visiting other Hills couldn't possibly like oh to jump from one to another to this to that to let it all go to walk off the hill like that's but then what would you what would you be what would
you think it's like you you'd be living you'd be living life not in your head you wouldn't be in your head like that it's like we're in this hill like trapped in this hill sort but like not trapped it's just a a soothing sort of thing it's a choice it is a choice and you know there gets to a point where it doesn't make as much sense when you see the payoff like just straight up isn't there when you're being more honest about your experience like it that the payoff it doesn't make as much
sense to keep trying to defend that but you know it's it's can help you to feel better if you're not feeling great about things for the short term for the short term and then that that quickly goes away right but this reminds me of an early discussion that we had in the podcast where we were comparing this hill to a sand castle about how people build sand castles and then they spend all of their time trying to protect it from the waves and protect it from reality and if you weren't so invested
in that castle you'd have and be the whole [ __ ] experience of the beach and that's very much what we're saying in this episode if you weren't so attached to the fiction of you which is a moving point along the spectrum of all fictions of you then you would be everything as you are right now with less conflict in being so you're already there you just keep telling yourself a story about it because you've learned to because we have to at first in order to just start
to get a grasp of how to survive in what is ultimately an incredibly complex experience and universe and as we grow up in that we do everything we can to keep ourselves moving forward and for a little while we need to come up with an idea to feel like we fit in to keep with the group so that way we can move forward in safety and then to have an idea of ourselves that moves us forward to towards something else a carrot and a stick but these are all developmental stages they are not The
Human Condition or if they are they're as much The Human Condition as [ __ ] in your diapers it's something that you can outgrow that said this has been a fantastic episode lot of fun want to remind everybody we only have a few tickets left for our Port Al Bernie Retreat on November 2nd check that out on the website uh likewise we're going to be back for an episode of dualistic Unity raw at 6 p.m eastern time today it's Monday if you're not watching this live and you're free on a Monday at 6 P
p.m. eastern time join us because we record live every Monday and we'd love to see you there cheers to that I really like the uh the San Castle analogy and I got all sorts of things going with that but I'm good with uh with Sharon I'll save some of that for you know raw later patreon maybe later or just yourself or just me because I don't have to express every goddamn thing that pops into my head and that's cool can save some for yourself you know but this has been this has been
a very fun episode appreciate you guys a lot for doing it together here in chatting and uh I look forward to the next episode I know thank you so much everybody for joining us thank you Andrew for holding down the fort as Ray and I exited to take care of an a because life is happening now and sometimes you got to juggle multiple things but we're always doing our best even when our opinion seems to indicate the otherwise so thank you so much everybody for being here and we'll see