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May 22, 2008 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:01:49
1073 Fierce Joy versus Depression

How to recover from depression - FIGHT for your joy!

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So, these past few weeks, I've been feeling, like, really depressed.
Okay, I don't know where to start.
Maybe from the latest thing that happened.
So... Yesterday...
I was having lunch with my father and after that he went to talk about our relationship.
So he told me that he felt like our relationship has been Like, going really, really bad lately.
That he felt, like, sad for that, and he wanted to talk with me about it.
So, okay, so I've been feeling this way about our relationship a long time ago, probably.
Six years or so.
And lately, since I joined the FDR conversation, I've been having some trouble with this whole thing because, I mean, like a week ago or something, I heard a calling show probably two weeks ago when you talk about someone's father.
And that someone has, like, you called it the fantasy of the father being the good cop in the relationship.
And probably I had the...
I mean, I have the same fantasy, but it's kind of hard for me to get off that idea because, I don't know, I feel that like in some ways he was the one that protected me from my mother because my mother is like a The bad cop.
She was really stressed all the time and yelling and yelling at me and my brother.
He would step up and fight with my mother or something for me because he felt like that wasn't the way that she would have to do it.
And I really shared time with him when I was young.
I played a lot with him.
And I felt like he was a good father.
But later on, I don't know, something happened.
And I began to feel like there was some stuff that really didn't connect with that idea, if that makes sense.
Yeah. Yeah, so, I mean, for example, on Christmas, I mean, I'm very open with my atheism and things, but my parents were Christians, and so...
I'm sorry, I just interrupted.
You said your parents were or are Christians?
I mean, are. Are, okay.
Okay, I don't know.
I'll get to that. At least my mother is, but my father, I don't know.
So, before Christmas, you know, this whole time, I've been very open with my atheism thing.
And my brother, he's nine.
I'm 21. So, my brother always saw these kind of things, but I really never talked to him about this God issue.
But, you know, kids pick up things quite easily, so we were on Christmas with My whole family and then my brother said that he didn't believe in God anymore.
So that was like a big issue and my parents were quite mad at me because they thought that I had done it or that I had persuaded my brother in some way.
I really never talked to him about that but I guess that he realized that there was no No reason to believe that other than my parents telling him that God existed and God loved him and all of that.
So it was a really big issue and I kind of fight with my father about that.
But okay, so that was on Christmas and probably One month, one month and a half, I don't know, my father, like, I always thought that he was a closet,
you know, an atheist in the closet, but he couldn't say it, or at least agnostic, but he didn't believe all the stuff that he told me, and I was sure of it, but it I mean, he told me that probably a month ago.
So, I didn't say anything to him, but I was thinking like, okay, so you told me all the things that you never really believed in.
I'm sorry, I just wanted to make sure I'm staying apparent.
Your father told you that he was an atheist about a month ago?
Well, yeah, at least at a Gnostic.
Agnostic, okay. Yeah.
He don't believe in all the stuff that he told me to believe in.
So, yeah, I thought about it and I was like, okay, so you told me...
Why would you tell your son that God exists and all of that and he's watching you and he loves you and heaven and hell and all that stuff if you don't believe in it?
I'm sorry, is that a genuine question for you, or is that rhetorical?
Like, did you not know? Well, I think I know why.
Because of my mother, he was...
I mean, he's always been the kind of, you know, the father that always...
I didn't get attacked by my mother for everything that goes wrong about anything.
And he's the one that tries to cancel things when things get ugly and all that kind of stuff.
But I felt that when I was young, he really defended me.
So I don't know how to put those two ideas together.
I mean, because...
of what I heard in the in the past conversation that you had with this guy you said that okay there's this guy meaning my father who chooses to marry a kind of bitchy woman and then decides to have a son with her for and and he later on don't defend him so he he doesn't have to put up with the With her crap and her anger and all of that.
But I don't know how that would work in my case because I felt like he kind of protected me in some ways.
Can you give me some examples of the protection that you're talking about?
Okay, so every time I told, for example, something to my parents, for example, I have a problem at school with a teacher or something, and I come home and I talk to my father, to my parents, and I tell them that probably it wasn't my fault or, you know, The real explication, the honest one.
And my mother wouldn't believe me.
She would say, no, you're lying.
You just don't want to get the punishment that you should receive or something like that.
And my father would believe me and say that I don't lie and I was being honest.
She would choose to believe me over my teacher or something.
Sorry, let me just make sure that I understand.
So, what would happen then?
So, your mother would say, you're lying to avoid punishment and your father would say, no, he doesn't lie.
What would happen as a result of that?
What would happen then? Okay, so I guess he would try to argue in my favor until, I don't know, if my mother couldn't handle it, then she wouldn't She wouldn't be involved in the school situation and my father would respond to the teacher with a letter or something telling her that she would need to have some evidence or proof that she was right because he chooses to trust his son.
But I don't want to put words in your mouth and you can tell me if this is not true, of course, but my experience has been that if you have your father comes to your defense with regards to your mother and pushes her back, right, pushes that kind of crazy accusation stuff back, Doesn't it kind of do the reach around?
Doesn't it kind of come around and bite you in the butt in some other way?
Like, doesn't your mother then get angry about something else because she's thwarted in this way?
Yeah, yeah. I mean, she's always hungry, or at least was.
I think it's less now than before.
Well, but sorry, so in terms of protection, all that you got was a temporary respite with increased problems later on, right?
Yeah. I mean, if that wasn't the case, then let me know, but that's how I would imagine that it would play out.
Yeah, I guess that's true.
So it's not really protection, right?
Right. There's always the problem with – to take a parallel example, if you're getting bullied at school and your dad comes along and wags his finger in the face of the bully, all that happens is that the bully is going to get you or a friend of his is going to get you in some other way, right? Yeah.
So, if you genuinely felt protected, then what would have happened is the amount of hostility or verbal abuse or mistrust that you were experiencing from your mother would have diminished over time.
But all that would happen is she'd say, fine, you know, you can thwart me on this, but I'm just going to pick at him for something else now.
His room's not clean enough. He didn't take the garbage out.
He's not, whatever, he's not showing the proper respect.
He didn't finish his food. It's going to be something else, right?
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, is that, was that the case?
Yeah, yeah. Alright.
Now, I'd like to, I don't know if you've listened to the last show, but I'll just give a very brief explication of another metaphor, I guess a more in-depth metaphor about this question of the parent who gets away, like the parent who ends up getting off the hook with regards to family dysfunction.
You can let me know if you think it applies.
So, if I drive to where you are and I seize you on the street and I throw you into the back of a van and I drive you over to a guy from the mafia who wants to torture you and I deliver you to this guy and then I say to this guy, well, take it easy on him.
Can it be really said that I'm protecting you?
No. If I deliver you to the mafia guy and then tell the mafia guy to take it easy on you or not to hurt you too badly or whatever, it's sort of after the fact, right?
Because I've already delivered you to the mafia guy, right?
Right. And this is the reality of parenting, right?
That if one parent, as you say, chooses...
If dad chooses a bitchy wife, gives her children and continues to allow the children to be frightened or abused or terrorized or whatever, then he really has created the situation.
If I deliver you to the Mafia, particularly, of course, if you're completely innocent of any wrongdoing of any kind, not that any wrongdoing would justify that, but it would be even worse if you'd never been involved with the Mafia at all.
And children, of course, are always completely innocent.
If I deliver you to the Mafia to be tortured, then I am creating the situation.
If I then say, well, but I think that, you know, the Mafia guy should have been nicer to you, I was the victim, this and that.
Well, I mean, that just doesn't stand logically or emotionally, right?
Right. And I would suggest that one of the reasons that you're feeling so sad...
Jonathan, is that your emotional experience of your parents is at war with your father's story about what happened, right?
Because your father believes that he was a victim of a bad situation who tried to protect you, right?
Yeah. I mean, isn't that his perception?
Isn't that his story? Yeah, yeah.
But your experience of that is that that's not the case, right?
Yeah. Because your father was not a victim and he was not helpless, right?
Yeah, yeah, he could.
I mean, it wasn't an arranged marriage, right?
He wasn't going to get shot if he didn't marry your mom.
He wasn't going to get shot if he left your mom, right?
He wasn't going to get shot if he didn't send you guys to Sunday school, right?
So there were choices that he had that you didn't have, right?
Yes. And the choices that he refused to make.
And we can, look, I mean, intellectually and as adults, we can have some sympathy for the cultural pressures, the religious pressures, the romantic pressures, the sentimentality pressures.
But we're talking about your experience as a child, which is not that your father failed to protect you, but that he actually brought you into and sustained a situation that was dangerous and destructive for you.
And so you have your experience, but you have your family's mythology that is at war with that, right?
Particularly your father's.
Yes. When you're a child, you never perceive your father as a victim.
You never perceive your parent as a victim.
That's like trying to perceive God or George Bush as a victim, right?
Because when you're a child, your parents have so much power relative to you, right?
They're bigger.
They have jobs.
They can do whatever they want.
They can stay up late. Your parents have so much power relative to you as a child that the idea, the very thought, the very concept that they're helpless is incomprehensible.
It's unfathomable for a child, right?
Right. So, when we get older and we start to question our parents, what we hear, endlessly, what we hear is, well, son, it was a tough situation, but I did the best I could, right? Yes.
But that's not at all how we experienced it as a child, right?
As a child, we imagine that the son doesn't come up until our dad gives it a nudge, right?
Yes. So for your dad to go from an all-powerful guy to some mealy-mouthed, whipped victim is not rational.
For you, right? I mean, that wasn't your experience as a child.
Yeah, yeah. So these two...
Your actual experience and your father's story about what happened are fighting.
They're at war in your soul, right?
Yes. But that's enough for me.
I don't want to run over what it is that you're thinking and feeling.
I mean, I'm getting a near-bottomless sense of sadness from you when you speak, right?
Yes, yes, I am.
And that is only a step, right?
I think that you may feel...
Happier, in a sense, this sounds weird.
You may feel happier about feeling sad than feeling the alternative to sad.
Yeah, yeah, I know that's the case.
And what is the alternative to sad in this case?
Like... Probably to think that there's nothing wrong with my family, that my father is still a good guy, and he...
You know, to believe what he says, it would be...
Yeah, but you can't do that.
If you could do that, you'd feel nothing rather than sad, right?
Yeah, yeah. So if you accept...
that your father was not helpless in the past, then what is the alternative or what is actually underneath the sadness?
If he could have saved you from this at any time, at any time, then what is underneath the sadness?
I guess I guess, be some...
Some...
Some anger.
Some anger? Yeah.
Well, sure. I mean, again, this is not to put the same moral category on it, but metaphorically, if some guy delivers me to the mafia and then claims that he was a victim, how am I going to feel towards him?
Right. Right.
I'm sorry? Right, right.
I mean... Right, what?
What am I going to feel towards him?
Hunger. Yeah.
Right. And do you know why the anger is so hard to get a hold of in the present?
Is that there is still a, quote, crime being committed against you by your father in the present.
Right? Right now.
Not about 10 years or 20 years ago, but now.
Right. Okay, so what would it be?
Well, the crime that is being committed against you right now is that your father is still manipulating you for his own immediate comfort.
Because by telling you that he's helpless, by telling you that there was nothing that he could do, by telling you that he protected you, by telling you that he did the best he could.
He's now manipulating you rather than manipulating his wife or manipulating you as a child, right?
It hasn't stopped, right?
Right. Yeah.
And why do you think he told you he was an atheist or an agnostic or lacked faith, let's say?
Okay, I'll tell you what I first thought, to see if it makes any sense.
So when he told me that, I felt like...
I don't know, like, I've made a good job with my atheism, so I tried to argue with him about the whole religious thing, and he would, you know,
not have any other argument, and I would tell him that being an atheist doesn't mean that you have to Like living in solitude or anything like that.
So at first I thought that it was like I've done something for him to realize that you don't have to be religious to be good or something to put up with the society.
Something like that. That was my first thought that I felt like he had some Like, he could use his rationality and get over that religious thing.
But... Yeah, that was what I thought.
Well, how did you... But the question is...
Well, there are two questions, but let's ask the second one first.
How did you feel when he confessed this?
Well... It was kind of mixed, because I felt like...
Of course, I felt like what I told you first, like, so why would you tell me all of this when I was a kid as truth?
But on the other hand, I was feeling like, okay, so my brother won't have to put up with this whole nonsense.
Well, why do you think that your brother won't have to put up with it?
Because I can't imagine that my father will tell him that God loves him after this.
I mean, that would be...
Why?
I mean, do you feel that your father lives with great integrity and has for the majority of his life?
Right.
Okay. I mean, if you fail, if you bring your child into an emotionally destructive situation where he's being bullied and maybe verbally abused and so on by someone, if you do that, then what are you not capable of morally, right? I mean, if you bring your child into a dangerous situation and then attempt to, quote, manage it, which means that your child continues to get abused in one way or another...
What crime would we then put past someone like that?
I mean, are we going to say, well, yes, he will create and participate in a situation of child abuse, but, by God, he wouldn't lie.
Yeah. Right.
And let me ask you this.
There's a very, very simple test for this, right?
Okay. Are you at all in contact with your mother anymore?
Yeah, I mean, there's...
Okay, that's fine. It's just a yes-no, right?
So, have you told...
Right.
So, have you told your mother that your father is an agnostic?
Have I told my mother that my father...
No, I mean, I... All right.
No, no, I'm sorry. I'm just going to keep interrupting because I just want to get the answers to a couple of questions and then we can continue with your thoughts.
Has your father told your mother that he's an agnostic?
I wouldn't know.
I think you would.
I think you would know because it would be all over the family structure, right?
Your mother would be upset.
You would probably hear them.
There would be coldness at dinner for weeks.
She would burst into tears.
There would be big stress and big problems, right?
It wouldn't pass unnoticed, right?
But we have that.
Yes, but about this.
Why has your father not told your mother, if he's so into this truth and confession and honesty thing, why has your father not told your mother about his agnosticism or atheism, but more importantly, why haven't you told your mother?
I'm not saying you should.
The question is why you haven't, right?
Well, for my part, I would say that I try not to talk with her anymore, so I don't feel I would say that I try not to talk with her anymore, So you have a secret to keep now, right?
Which is your father's agnosticism.
You can't bring it up at the dinner table, you can't bring it up in conversation, you can't talk about it with your mother, right?
It has become a secret that you have to keep for your father.
It's a burden. It's a burden, right?
I hadn't thought about it that way.
Okay, let me ask you something first, Steph.
Okay, I'm thinking about something.
When I was young, my...
My parents used to go to church together and we went.
But lately they stopped going to church for a while.
But now my mother is going back like every single weekend.
But my father doesn't come with her.
So I guess there would be a reason for that.
Because if he hadn't told him Well, then it's even weirder, right? Because then it's a big elephant in the room that everyone can see but no one's talking about, right?
Then it's even weirder.
If he's not going to church but he's also not talking about his agnosticism, that's even more stress, right?
Well, yeah. Because at least, I mean, if he went but wasn't agnostic, at least it would be like there wouldn't be the stress of waiting for something to be noticed, right?
Yes. Now, let me, sorry to interrupt you, because I think that I'm missing a picture here.
I'm missing something in the picture.
And that question is, what did your mother do to you?
And what I mean by that is, was, I mean, I'm guessing that there was, I mean, calling your kid stupid and untrustworthy and this and that.
That's verbally abusive, right?
Right. Yeah.
And what about, was there spanking, was there hitting, was there any kind of violence in that way?
No. I remember just one single time that she hit me.
That your mother hit you? Yeah.
And what was that?
I surely can't remember the exact situation, but probably I was around seven years old.
And yeah, I remember that she hit me.
But hit you how?
I don't know what's the word for it.
Let me try this.
You know, like with a shoe or something like that.
With a shoe, okay. And was it like across the legs, across the buttocks?
No. Yeah, it was...
it was yeah, I was laid down without looking downward.
Oh, like across her lap, hit with a shoe?
Yeah.
Now, when your mother would raise her voice, was she a yeller or did she scream or what was it that happened for you when your mother would get angry.
Oh, it was a whole show.
She would start screaming and yelling and...
I remember she, I mean, she had...
I felt this way, probably hasn't, but I felt like she has changed because my brother, I mean, he hadn't lived what I lived.
I mean, when I was a child, my mother used to...
Do you know why she's changed?
No, I mean...
I can tell you why, if you like.
Yeah, yeah, sure.
Well, she's changed because you are a witness, right?
Well, yeah, I mean, that's a good point.
I mean, sorry, but it's not funny, right?
Yeah. Because, I mean, you're the oldest, right?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so when you were being beaten up, or sorry, that's too strong because it happened once, but when you were being screamed at and terrorized and bullied and verbally abused, there was no witness, right?
Other than your dad who placed the victim card, right?
Yeah. But you are the witness for your brother, so she is restraining some of her behavior, right?
Because she can't get away with as much because of you, right?
Yeah, yeah, that's true.
So what that means, and this is the awful part about it, is that when it comes to you, Jonathan, she could have stopped at any time.
She did not have to do it.
She was not compelled to do it.
She was not driven to do it by some sort of mental illness or chemical imbalance or instability.
She chose to do it because she's not doing it as much now, right?
Yeah. Any behavior that can be restrained is a choice, right?
A schizophrenic... Cannot be paid a million dollars to not be schizophrenic for a day, right?
Yeah. That's a genuine mental illness.
This kind of bullying and physical, emotional and verbal abuse is optional because your mother has...
I mean, she didn't do it to you at church either, right?
Yeah, that's right.
Yeah. Now, you have a laugh reaction to this stuff, right?
Yeah. What is that?
It's like the total opposite of funny, right?
It's like laughing about Abu Ghraib, right?
Torture. Yeah, okay.
I have a misperative laugh because when you say it, I immediately remember.
Remember that. Remember what?
Sorry, remember what? That I heard you before saying this, and when I heard it, I thought about it, and I was like, yeah, yeah.
She definitely didn't hit me or scream at me at church because of the people around her.
Yeah, so she was perfectly capable of restraining her temper, right?
Yeah. Yes.
Now, the laugh reaction is going to lead you to the depression.
The two are interlinked.
If you laugh about something, what that means is that somebody in your family has a laugh defense about your history, like, oh, you were a troublesome kid and it was funny and we did this, but we didn't do that and so on.
And what's going to happen is that that laugh reaction is so much the opposite of what you actually experienced as a child, which is livid terror.
I mean, when you're A mother who is, you know, five times your size is screaming at you.
I mean, there's nothing more terrifying as a child.
It's more terrifying than physical assault.
And if you have the laugh reaction, which you do, and I sympathize with it, I really do, but if you have the laugh reaction, then that's going to lead you to feeling sad, depressed, empty, alienated, lifeless in a way, right? Yeah.
Because it's not going to get you through to the anger.
And the anger is going to lead you out of the depression.
And the anger is accepting that they weren't fucking victims.
Parents so often claim to be victimized by things.
By, oh, you were a difficult child.
Oh, you woke up at night.
Oh, this. Oh, that. Right?
Right. Oh, those days you just didn't get divorced and so on, right?
Parents just sit around, I mean, not all parents, but a lot of parents just sit around.
Whenever criticisms about things come up from their children, all you ever hear is how helpless they were, right?
Yeah. But it's not true.
No, it is. It's not true, and it's a further evidence of the continued manipulation of the family structure, of the parent structure, right?
Yeah. When they have all the power in the world, they abuse it.
And then when you point out that they abused their power, the story suddenly switches and they become helpless victims, right?
It's a real sickness.
And it's so fucking manipulative.
But this isn't connecting with you emotionally, right?
No, no, I mean, it is.
I'm thinking a couple questions that I want to ask you, because, okay, I mean, I totally get it.
I was talking to Greg G., probably, a couple weeks ago, and I was...
Okay, so I have these two issues.
First, when I was thinking that probably my father could be saved or something like that.
He's not totally screwed up yet.
When I thought that, I was thinking that Because when we say that there's no restitution for what our parents did, and if there's no restitution there cannot be forgiveness, I was thinking that probably there would be a restitution for me that I would feel like that would be the case with my brother if everything Could be changed for him.
No, no. That's not restitution for you, though.
That's something for your brother.
And the better that your parents treat your brother, the more angry you're going to be.
The less restitution there is for you, the more that your parents treat your brother better.
Because it means that they could have stopped with you at any time, but didn't.
And this doesn't mean, of course, that you should want your brother to be treated badly, but the better that they're able to treat him, the worse your childhood actually was in terms of their responsibility.
Okay, right.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, yeah. But still, wouldn't I choose, if that were the case, I mean, to feel totally angry at my parents, but to choose if that would come with my brother having a better childhood?
If what would come, sorry.
I mean, what you said makes sense, but if that was the case, that I would feel quite anger at my parents if they treat my brother better.
Okay, so I'm angry at them, but I would choose to be totally and more angry at them if my brother would have a better childhood.
You would choose to be more angry at them if your brother had a better childhood, is that right?
Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, just to put it in very short metaphorical terms, if you were, let's put on a dress, if you were a woman and you had a first husband who beat you up, And then he got remarried after you divorced him and he never touched his second wife, would you feel better or worse?
Worse. Of course!
Right, so if they're kinder to your younger brother, we can be very happy for that at an abstract level, but as far as you go, for your genuine emotional experience, I mean, it's worse, right?
It means that they never were helpless.
They could have controlled themselves at any time.
They just didn't want to.
See, now you're a witness and maybe the standards in the community have changed or whatever.
They're restraining their behavior. But it means that their love for you or their consideration or care for you as an innocent, helpless, dependent child was never enough for them to restrain their behavior, right?
Right. It's only if they're going to get caught.
It's only if there's going to be a witness.
That's when they restrain their behavior.
Well, that's vicious and cowardly.
Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree.
Now, why is it that you're talking to your dad about atheism rather than your feelings?
Well, I guess that's a good question.
I don't know.
I feel like...
A lot of anxiety when I tried to...
I'm sorry, somebody's cell phone is...
They need to turn it off or something like that.
But I'm sorry, please go ahead.
There's a cell phone just close to someone's mic.
It's making a buzzing sound. But I'm sorry, go ahead.
Okay, so...
So talking about your feelings with your father rather than something abstract like the existence of God.
Because the existence or non-existence of God is not the primary issue in your relationship, right?
It's not even close. Right.
Right. Yeah.
His birthday was probably a couple weeks ago.
And having this idea that maybe I could talk to him and have some To make the relationship better or something.
I wrote him a letter on his birthday.
I said a lot of things in that letter that I felt like I didn't love him as much as I did as a child.
Probably not to use the word love anymore.
Something for him like sympathy or something like that and I would put a lot of my feelings in that letter and so I went to the FDR chat before I would deliver it and I started to talk to Greg G and in the end I I didn't.
I kept the letter and I never gave it to him.
But I realized that There would be no point in doing that.
Well, that's what came up with the conversation with Greg.
In the family, we talk about our problems and some way to resolve them.
The thing is that it would work out for a couple weeks, you know?
Everyone would cry and there would be hugs and there would be, I love you a lot, and that whole thing when we talk about it.
But then, probably not one month later, the whole thing would be the same, pretty much.
Okay, I'm going to just stop you for a second here, because let me just tell you my experience of this conversation, because you haven't changed one bit since we started talking.
I mean, we've talked about a lot of stuff, and I don't know if you're intellectualizing it, or I don't know, but your emotional content, and you don't have to change, obviously.
obviously.
I'm just telling you what my experience is because we've talked about a lot of stuff back and forth and I've given you some perspectives which may be useful or may not be useful and so on.
But the monotone of your emotional expression is exactly the same now as when we've started.
And all that means to me is that I don't know what you want out of this conversation.
I don't know what you're looking to achieve.
It's not a criticism.
Like I'm just saying that I now do not know what will constitute success in this conversation, if that makes sense.
Yes, yes. Because you're really closed emotionally, right?
I'm trying not to, but it's...
But I'm not criticizing.
It's not good or bad.
It just is what it is, right?
Yeah, but... Okay, but I realize it would be better.
Well, it's not better or worse.
It's just that if your emotions or your – if your expression is the same at the end of the conversation and we're nearing the end, if it is the same at the end as it is at the beginning, then I feel that I haven't delivered anything of real value to you.
And I'm sorry about that, but I don't know what it is that you're looking for.
Like, what is it that you're looking to achieve out of this conversation?
Yeah. Okay, no.
I want to tell you that what you told me is very valuable for me because, first of all, I realize now that my whole fantasy doesn't stand like the thing about my father, that I'm really glad I put this, like...
I mean, I have...
Sorry, but that knowledge doesn't seem to bring you any relief emotionally?
Okay, I think it does, but the thing is, okay, let me bring this issue before we finish.
And it's probably what has me a lot more worried because, okay, so before I knew that, you know, the wrecked relationship with my father and the horrible thing that happened to me as a child, And I felt like...
Okay, so I know these people were really bad to me.
But I must do something about it.
Because I'm feeling like...
I'm sorry, you said you must do something about it.
What do you mean? Okay, so when I come home, I feel like I'm choking.
Like I can't breathe.
Like there's something in the air.
Like this pressure, this...
I don't know, this environment, I don't want to be here, but...
Sorry, tell me what you're feeling now, because I really get a sense of feeling from you now, but tell me what's going on for you.
Like despair.
Like, yeah, that would be the word.
Right, like you sound on the verge of tears, and you're feeling...
Is it teary?
Is that what you're experiencing?
Okay. Yeah. And the tears or the thoughts behind it is something like, I'll never get out?
No. Okay, then help me understand why.
It's something like, I must put up with this for at least four years more before I have a degree.
Because I...
But why?
I mean, this is just my...
Your country, your culture, the economics, I have no idea.
But I just say from my perspective, like I've been paying my own way since I was 15, and I put myself through school.
Now, I did get a couple of government loans back in my salad days, but I paid those off as well, a couple of grants as well.
But, I mean, I worked two jobs.
I worked two jobs in the summer.
You know, I just – I lived in a room with someone else.
I actually shared a room in my undergraduate and I had a tiny basement apartment in another place with two rooms and no windows.
So whatever it took to get myself through school, I was able to do.
And that doesn't mean that it's all replicable in other situations, but I'm not sure why you'd have to sit there for four years.
I just can't quite figure that one out.
Yeah, so... So I had this plan.
I mean, what you're saying now is what I was planning just a couple, three weeks ago.
I had it all figured out.
I mean, I'm studying in a public college, so I figured, okay, so I could...
It's quite cheap for me to pay, and I could work some time to pay for my university, and I... I mean, I had this whole plan, so I would leave probably in less than three months.
But now there's something that happened in my university that I felt like it changed the whole thing.
So, okay, so would you want me to tell you about it, or is it just not...
Well, if you can tell me about it briefly.
It's always interesting. Everybody brings up the most important stuff at the end, but that's fine.
If you can tell me briefly, that would be great.
I'm sorry, Steph. I'm sorry.
I just... No, no, don't worry about it.
Don't worry about it. You're not alone in this phenomenon, but anyway, please go on.
Okay, so... The university in which I am now is one of the two best universities that there is.
I study economics and philosophy both.
The other good university is quite more expensive than this one.
And the one that I'm in now is going to close for about a year because of the strike that went...
Oh, yes. You talked about this in a Sunday show, I remember.
So the strike went too long and they're going to close the university.
So the government is not going to pay for it.
For the stuff that it is supposed to.
Sorry, I understand that.
The thing that pops to my mind is that I'm not sure why that would stop you.
Why don't you just move off, take a year off from home, work two jobs, save up your money, and then go back to school in a year?
Well, yeah. That's an option that I hadn't thought about.
I mean, it doesn't matter what I do, but I took a year off between high school and university and I worked as a gold panner seven days a week in northern Canada to save up for university and that helped out a lot because I couldn't spend any money.
I was living in a tent in the winter.
But I'm not sure why it would be the case that This would interfere with your fundamental plans, right?
It's not like if you take a year off from school, it's not like you're dead, right?
I mean, you can read, you can study, you can learn another language, you can learn more about philosophy, you can ready yourself for whatever you want to do.
It's not like if you're not at school, you're not learning or you're intellectually dead.
In some ways, you could say quite the opposite, but...
You can spend that time hyper-accelerating yourself, if you want, in your study of philosophy and economics, so that when you go back to school, you might be so ready that you can actually get through in three years rather than four.
I mean, there's lots of different things that you can do.
You can take correspondence courses, which might be applicable to your degree.
There's lots of things that you can do in that year, which doesn't mean that you have to put it off for a year, if that makes sense.
Yeah, it does. It does.
Definitely. I mean, there's...
There's things in life which are fixed, and there are things in life which are variable, right?
This is a fundamental thing, right?
I mean, we're going to die, that's fixed.
We're going to age, that's fixed.
You know, we are as tall as we are, that's fixed.
I mean, we are the gender that we are, that's to a large degree fixed.
But my concern is that if you want to move out, that should not be a variable, Jonathan.
That should be an absolute.
And if shit comes up that causes that to be problems, it's like, hey, I'm water going down a hill.
If I hit a boulder, I just go around it, right?
Yeah. But it should not...
I mean, my suggestion is that what keeps you healthy and happy and excited to be alive is what should be fixed for you.
That should be like gravity.
That should be like aging.
That should be an absolute.
Whatever makes you the most vital, happy, and alive...
What is the absolute?
Everything that has to change or adjust to meet that goal, they're all variables, right?
So whether you go to school now or a year from now, but if living where you are, and I can understand why, causes you this much despair...
And sadness and depression and anxiety and you can't breathe and panic attacks, then by God, the house is on fire.
If the house was on fire and the university was closed down, you wouldn't say, well, now I've got to burn alive in this house because the university is closed down, right?
That's the absolute. Get out of the house.
21 is not a bad age to be leaving home, in my opinion, right?
Maybe your parents would give you some money.
Who knows, right? It's not the end of the world if you take that, in my opinion, but...
But just, you know, get out and read and learn and see your friends and have your own space, right?
It could be great for you to have that year where you can study whatever you want, you can work hard at whatever job you want, you can make good contacts, you can pre-study, you can do a correspondence course or two, whatever it is you want to do, that could be a fantastic year for you.
I also took a year off between my undergraduate and my master's degree, which I had to do because I was completely out of money and I had to work again.
Whatever it is that you have to do, your happiness is the fixed thing.
It is the non-variable thing.
Whatever you have to adjust in your life to achieve sustainable happiness for you, everything else is a variable.
Your happiness is the absolute.
Yeah, well, thanks for that.
Thank you, that's...
It's one hell of a good advice.
And I feel like that's what I should be doing.
You don't have to, right?
You don't have to. There's no shoulds, right?
But if you want to be happy, then everything else is expendable, right?
Yeah, yeah. Yes.
Because your happiness isn't going to come to you.
Happiness is like health. You don't just sit on your couch and get healthy, right?
Happiness is something that you have to work for.
You have to make it a priority.
You have to commit to it.
You have to put it like your northern star when you're navigating through life.
Your happiness has got to be that which you commit to.
Not something which, well, if things go right and if the university doesn't close down for a year and if I get this grant, then maybe I can be happy.
Well, screw that. Your happiness is something that you have to work and forge and create in your life.
And everything else can be an innocent bystander.
Everything else can go by the wayside.
But your happiness, you have to be fierce about pursuing it and achieving it and sustaining it and maintaining it.
You have to be fierce like a dog with a bone with your happiness.
Nothing stands in your way.
Yeah. Yeah, that's right.
Yeah. And if you are fierce in possessing your happiness, your happiness will also be fierce in its possession of you.
Yeah, that sounds good.
But if you betray it, it will betray you.
Right. Right.
Now, there's lots of other people in your life that your pursuit of your happiness is going to be a problem for them, right?
Yeah. And that will be the case not just when you're 21, but when you're 22, 25, 30, 40, 50, 90, 100.
It will be exactly the same thing, that your pursuit of your bliss is going to piss and discomfort a lot of people, right?
Yeah. And it is much better that you make that commitment now that you're going to follow what makes you happy.
It doesn't hurt other people.
You're going to follow what makes you happy, what brings you joy.
And you can make that decision now that the discomfort of other people about your joy is going to make you betray your joy and say, forget it.
Well, if it bothers other people, I'm not going to do it.
In which case, you just live your life as a miserable puppet of other people's emotions, right?
And not good people either.
Or, you can say, I'm going to pursue my bliss.
I'm going to seize and viciously and tenaciously achieve and guard my joy.
Viciously is the wrong way. Ferociously is a better way of putting it.
I'm going to ferociously guard and achieve that which brings me joy in my life.
And if other people are upset by it, that is a really great indication of people that I need to not have in my life.
Yes. Yes, that's true.
If my joy makes other people mad or bitter or upset or frustrated or negative or depressed, those are great indications of people that you don't want in your life.
It's a wonderful, wonderful way to separate the people who will love you and treasure you and the people who will bitch at you and pull you down.
Joy is the great differentiator.
It is the great separator of toxic from benevolent people in your life.
Yeah. And we don't like the clarity.
Joy is like a great bright light which casts everything into light and shadow.
We don't like that clarity in our life because it forces us to make uncomfortable decisions.
That's why we avoid bliss and joy and happiness and compromise ourselves for the sake of other people's discomfort.
But I say, turn up the light.
cue the Sun let's see where people fall when I am happy yes and seize it because you only get one life And every moment that you spend unhappy does not get added to the rest of your life.
And if you spend this year at home miserable and depressed and frustrated and unhappy, you don't get a year back later on.
And if you spend a year...
Doing something that makes you unhappy.
All you've done is lost a year.
Other people have gained maybe some relief from anxiety.
But we're not here to make bad people feel better.
We're here to show what fierce joy can really look like.
So that people can have a beacon and it can arouse them to pursue their own bliss and their own joy.
And in the courage of seizing and maintaining our own joy...
We can help spread that courage to other people and help lift them out of the swamp of compromise and appeasement.
And that is heroic, in my view.
Because that takes the greatest courage that I know of.
And that creates the greatest beacons for other people to rouse themselves from their slumbers.
And that is a life I guarantee you, you can be unbelievably proud of.
Yes, yes.
But you have to fight for it, you have to be fierce for it, you have to pursue it.
It will not come to you.
Yeah. It must be conquered and defended.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
You're completely right.
Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
I feel like this will help.
You're very, very welcome. I will send you a copy of this, of course, and let me know.
I think that it's... I think...
I mean... I appreciate the courage that it takes to talk about these sorts of issues.
I know that you have a great soul that hungers for joy.
Otherwise, you wouldn't have put up with all of this.
So I hugely appreciate that and respect and understand how difficult that is.
But I think it would be helpful for other people to hear this.
So I will send you a copy and you can let me know what you think.
Sure. Thank you very much, Steve.
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