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Aug. 3, 2008 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:13:01
1120 Sunday Call In Show Aug 3 2008

The FDR wiki, why do you want to change others, and trusting your instincts in a job interview.

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All right. Well, it looks like we're on.
Thank you, everybody, so much for joining us Sunday, August 3rd, 2008, 4.09 p.m.
So thank you so much for joining.
Just a short little introductory thing, and then we will get straight to the most important aspect of the show, which is your genius questions and comments.
Well, first of all, The executive command decision has been sent to me down through the oracles of Delphi from the literary gods themselves, and I have decided on their instructions to release my novel, novel The God of Atheists, to you, the public, for, gosh darn it, completely free.
And this, I think, is pretty cool.
The book has been called a tour de force, and it has also been called The Great Canadian Novel.
I think it is a wonderful and beautiful novel that remains not so mysteriously unpublished by a central publishing house, for reasons that I'm sure will be fairly clear if and when you read it or listen to it.
So the audiobook's available for free.
It's a fairly hefty download, but well worth it, I think.
Sorry about the audio quality just a little bit at the beginning.
But it's well worth listening to.
The audio quality does improve as you go forward.
Unfortunately, during a hard drive crash, I lost some of the source files and just do not have the energy to re-record it because it was pretty grueling.
But I hope that you will have a listen to it.
It is a little bit of the softer side of FDR. And I think that it is a great book that you will really enjoy.
You can, of course, pick up a print copy if you ever wanted a more permanent one at stores.lulu.com forward slash free domain radio.
But go to freedomainradio.com forward slash free for the PDF. And for the audiobook, which I had quite an entertaining time reading, I can tell you.
It certainly is one of the funniest. It's one of the funnier novels that I've done and has some, honest to goodness, red cheek, embarrassing naughty bits.
So, I hope that you will pick up a copy of that and spread it around to everyone that you know of.
And I would be more than happy to hear your feedback.
And of course, if you likey the book, you could donate.
Donations at a rather exciting level at the moment.
It's not actually that uncommon because people go on holidays.
I've also been producing a little bit less material lately because I've been helping Christina get herself set up outside so that she can leave me when the baby comes.
So, if you do feel like donating, it would always be more than appreciated.
It is always exciting during the summers.
So, if you can dig down a little bit into your ice cream jar and throw a few buck arunis my way, I would hugely appreciate it.
As with the baby who, if my reading is correctly, also likes to eat.
So, thank you so much.
I appreciate that.
I have another topic, but nothing particularly that can't wait for a podcast or a video.
I'm going to turn it over to you, the listeners.
If you have any questions or issues up front, let's go straight to it.
Cue listeners.
All yours. Okay, well, while you're warming up your questions, I will continue with...
Oh, did somebody just pop in?
Hello, can you hear me? I sure can.
Thank you very much. I had the input said wrong.
This is less of a question and more of kind of a suggestion idea I've been brewing in the back of my head for about a week now.
I was DDFM on the forums for a little bit.
I kind of fell out of it when summer school started.
But looking at what we do on the forums, just produce so much persuasive material for people that show up, I kind of feel like it's not a shame that it's not saved more.
So I spent about an hour or two last night looking at different Wikipedia softwares, and I wanted to propose this to the group, us starting a Wikipedia, so individual issues and individual questions could be tackled in a discussion page, and then as people come forward, and we could address those in a permanent, public, almost anarchic way, where anyone can come forward and fine tune the arguments.
Yeah, I mean, I think that would be fine.
I think that would be great. I certainly want to encourage people to look upon this as a community.
Which is open to, in fact, more than open to, entirely welcome to, and I think actually essentially in the long run dependent upon, people's contributions in this kind of way.
So I think that what you're talking about is wonderful.
You could set that up. There's a blog aspect to the software as well, which might be helpful in this area.
And if you wanted to play around with it, I'd be happy to give you access.
I don't think it's being used for anything at the moment, but...
Yeah, a wiki or a blog or something like that would be fantastic for people to be able to answer these kinds of questions that we get quite a bit of.
So yeah, I think that would be great.
If you wanted to take that on, I would certainly be thrilled.
Okay. And this is kind of an odd question to ask.
But just to kind of start things up and get people to a place to start, could I go through the practical anarchy and I guess copy and paste text and put it in?
No, that would be copyright infringement.
Absolutely. I appreciate that.
I've actually sent a chapter of it to strike the root because I'm hoping to get some of the chapters published there.
Just for those who are interested, since the books went out, I guess it would be three and a half months ago.
There have been over 13,000 downloads or reviews of the books, which I think is pretty good.
I'm actually quite pleased.
And that's without any real advertising other than the show itself.
And when you think about a sort of 13,000 people, that's like a rock concert.
So just think of it as the dullest rock concert in history, but one that is fairly well attended and with no particular mosh pit.
And that, of course... If I knew how to whistle.
I'm sorry? If I knew how to whistle, I'd whistle in amazement.
Right. So that's good and that is fairly substantial.
The other thing, if somebody said, will you go and talk for a couple of hours to 13,000 people, I would say absolutely and with great thrill and with great aplomb.
But that request doesn't seem to be coming in.
But the amount of interest that's in there is quite considerable.
This doesn't count the 11,000 views of the intro video to Everyday Anarchy.
Everyday Anarchy is by far the most popular, though the other ones are beginning to creep up.
Quite a bit. So, yeah, so whatever.
And this is, you know, people aren't using too much the referral tool, but I strongly recommend and invite you to take a hold of that a couple hours, you know, an hour a week kind of thing.
Just grab some people, some emails from the web, send them some invites, and help spread the word.
So whatever you can do to set up a wiki, I would be happy to set anything up on the server that you feel would be helpful.
Feel free to pillage anything that I've written.
There's, of course, freedomain.blogspot.com.
It has hard text of 130 articles that I've written over the past few years.
Any of the books that you like, I would be absolutely thrilled if people would spend time doing that kind of stuff.
There's not too much that I can do in terms of publicizing simply because I'm busy producing and managing.
So anything that people can do to extend the reach of the community, I would just be thrilled with.
So I think it's a wonderful idea.
All right. Thank you very much.
No, no. Nice to have your blessing. Thank you.
So yeah, just give me a ping.
Give me a call. Whatever it is that you feel I can do for you in terms of resources, I would absolutely be happy to.
So just my Skype name, of course, is Stefan Underbar Molyneux.
Or you can email me at host at freedomainradio.com.
We could have a chat about how to get this done.
Awesome, awesome. And of course, that goes off to everyone, too, because that would be a completely collaborative thing.
Yeah, and it's something that I would actually prefer that the community take on horizontally.
I certainly want to disengage myself from being at the center of these kinds of activities because you guys would be much better at organizing it without bossy baldy floating around.
So I'm sure that would be much better.
So yeah, whatever initiative you can do in this area, I would be hugely grateful.
And I'm sure that...
The people who have questions would be very grateful and happy to get those answered.
We could also, of course, as it grows, we could start to index it.
We could get the computer voice to read it in case people wanted the audio or whatever.
So that kind of stuff, I just think, would be fantastic.
So just give me a shout if there's anything I can do, and I'm all yours.
Awesome. All right, that about does it for me.
Thank you very much. Alright, well, if people have had a moment to gather their thoughts and their questions, I would be happy to hear them, or I could ramble on with the oldie, newie topic.
Oh, there's some good podcasts out there, let me tell you.
It turns out that quality is not exactly identical with quality.
So, I'd like to thank Greg for a wonderful, wonderful conversation about...
How he ended up being bullied by three women and a guy in a coffee shop.
It was very interesting and complex how all of this stuff came about.
I really would recommend you have a listen to that one.
That is a podcast, I'm embarrassed to say, 1,119, Falling Asleep from a Nightmare.
Another good one is How to Stay Out of the Army, FDR 1117.
And those are the two ones that are particularly important.
The Families, Abuse and History series, I think, is also very important.
The one where I'm chatting with the gentleman to talk him out of going into the army is also available as a video.
So you can get that at youtube.com forward slash stepbot, I think, S-T-E-F-B-O-T. So I hope that you will have a chance to...
Listen to those in between the book, the novel, which will take quite a bit of your time.
I can't remember how long it is, but it's not the shortest thing I've ever written.
But you will be happy to know that I did actually cut it down by 50% before starting the audiobook, simply because I felt that the internet should have room for something else.
So I just wanted to mention that.
So I'll just open it up again if other people have more topics or questions.
Feel free to speak your brain.
Oh, Practical Anarchy coming out in paperback.
The question just came up. I've done the formatting.
I've done the cover. And I've ordered a copy or two for myself.
I obviously like to thumb through it before I release it just to make sure everything came out all right.
I should have it in about a week.
And assuming all goes well, then it will be out for the low, low price of $12 million!
Sorry? Monopoly money, yeah, right.
So, questions, comments, issues, it is your show, my friends.
Yeah, 12 million, but in Zimbabwean dollars.
Sorry, go ahead. I was going to say, Steph, there was somebody in the chat room a moment ago that was talking about dealing with statist friends, and I wanted to get a little bit more of your input about that.
Sure. I just find you a little bit faint and muffled.
What's going on with your mic? Are you far away?
I'm sorry. I can push it a little bit closer to my mouth.
Otherwise, I'm kind of new, so I don't really know too much about adjusting.
Let's see. Can anybody give me a little guidance to maybe adjust this a little bit?
Are you using a mic that's built into your notebook by chance?
It sounds worse than a cell phone.
I'm just wondering what mic it is. Oh, it's actually part of my headphones.
I apologize. Okay, no problem.
Just if you could keep your questions short because it's a little hard to hear you.
So I'm more than happy to answer whatever you think would be of use, though.
I wanted to chime in with a suggestion here.
Are you using Windows? I guess I am.
Okay, you know the speaker icon in the lower right-hand corner of the screen?
Yes. If you double-click on that, go to Options, and then it's Properties.
Change the little radio button there from Playback to Recording.
Press OK. And do you see where the microphone volume is at right now?
Microphone volume is about midway.
Let me turn that up a bit.
Yeah, that's one way to go ahead and get the volume up on the recording.
Okay, thank you. Is that a little bit better stuff?
Yes, that's great. Thank you so much.
Thank you for jumping in there. I'm going to leave that in the recording just for other people who call it in the future, but sorry, go ahead.
Okay. Well, going back to the question that was brought up earlier, and I'm actually having some similar issues with this myself.
I have a friend who is, well, I guess we would all call him a statist, who I have passing conversations with at times about DROs and about a lot of the issues that we talk about here on FDR. I don't know, in general I don't feel like he's really aggressive, overtly aggressive and so forth, but he definitely has issues with the conversations that we have.
He's uncomfortable with it.
He's a statist, he's Christian and so forth, so he has the standard issues.
And I've considered a number of times actually bringing the friendship to an end simply as a result of just the conflicts that we have, but then sometimes I wonder whether or not I would be Whether or not I would be happy doing that, whether or not it really is a value having him in my life and so forth.
And I don't know, I just kind of wanted to get your opinion about that whole thing.
Well, to me, if you're going to debate...
I'm not a tease, let's put it that way.
I think if you're going to debate virtue and nonviolence...
With people, I think that you've got to go all the way.
This is my opinion, right?
You can do whatever you like, obviously.
What do you care what I think?
But this is just sort of my opinion.
That if you're not going to have conversations with people about virtue and violence and truth and wisdom and ethics and self-knowledge and true self, if you're not going to have conversations like that with people, Then that's fine.
I mean, we had friends for some time and we'd get together, we'd talk about music, we'd go see concerts, we would talk about the events of the day from a non-political standpoint, what was going on at work and so on.
And there was a pleasant friendship and we never dealt with those particular issues.
The friendship did fade away over time.
But to me, there's nothing wrong with that.
Those kinds of pleasant, functional, on-the-surface kind of relationships are fine.
But if you are going to start delving into the question of truth and virtue and violence and so on, then I think that it's wise to go all the way.
And of course by all the way, I mean the argument called against me.
I don't know if you've heard of that approach.
Sounds familiar. I don't have that many details.
I apologize. Oh, no problem.
Well, the against me argument very briefly is, let's say that you're talking to a status friend who supports the use of taxation.
Then you can say to him, can you play your friend for a sec?
Sure. Okay, so your friend says, I'm for taxation, and I would say, do you think that I should be shot for disagreeing with you?
Well, he typically would play the devil's advocate, so he would say something like, well, but it's not violence if you agree to it.
We have a social contract in this society, and therefore, if you agree to that, then there's no issue, and if you don't, then you can just get out of the country.
Well, but let's just forget about the social contract, forget about all these fancy terms, because it does come down to somebody pointing a gun at you, which we can both understand.
Am I allowed to disagree with you?
Without being shot, in your philosophy?
He would say yes.
He seems genuinely afraid of losing the conversation, so he would probably say, well, you know, James, I have no issue with anything that you think.
I just, you know, I have a different opinion.
It's like having a different opinion about flavors of ice cream or something like that.
Oh, okay. Well, then we are brothers and we are friends and you are an anarchist because you support my right to disagree with you on how money should be spent for the sake of the social good.
I would prefer to spend it in different areas.
And I think that the money that is being spent for the social good is actually being used to undermine and harm and destroy people.
If you want to spend money on things like public schools, I certainly would not shoot you.
For doing that because we are free and we should all follow our own conscience as far as that or anything else goes.
But if you support my right to disagree with you without being shot, then you are with me as far as the immorality of taxation.
He would probably say something like, well, I disagree that it would actually come to violence.
And I've actually had that conversation with him a few times where he'll say that, you know, I disagree that somebody is just going to come to your house and shoot you or something like that, that, you know, they'll send letters and all that sort of thing.
But how many times have you heard of somebody being thrown in jail for not paying taxes or something like that?
Well, but that's like saying that the slaves want to be on the plantation because how often do they run away?
I mean, if they don't run away, because they'll be shot.
Right. I mean, that doesn't mean any, of course, yeah.
It's like saying that people want to be in the gulags, and they want to be at Treblanca, because by golly, don't you know that they don't leave?
And you see, this is typically the point where he would just sort of blank out.
He would just say, okay, well, let's just agree to disagree and all of that sort of thing.
But there's, you know, always...
Well, hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on.
Sure. See, now, if he says, let's agree to disagree, I would say, well, but that's exactly what I'm suggesting.
We should be free to agree to disagree.
Unfortunately, your philosophy does not allow me to be free to disagree because you support...
That I get shot or thrown in jail if I disagree with you.
So you're not actually giving me the option to agree to disagree, because you want to use force to support your perspective.
It's like the slave owner saying to the slave, well, let's just agree to disagree about slavery.
It's like, but the slave doesn't get to disagree about slavery.
Right, and he usually just backs into a corner and just blanks out and basically it kind of goes into a big circle and we get to that point and I just don't know where to pursue it from there.
Well, I can tell you if you like where to pursue it from there.
Okay. Where you pursue it from there would be, and I'll just play you for a sec, it would be something like this.
Look, I think that you're a good fellow.
And I'm going to assume all of this is true, that you're not friends with a hitman.
I think that you are a good fellow.
I think that you don't like violence.
I think that you prefer open debate and voluntary interaction.
I think you're a really good person.
But I think this makes you, at least I get the sense, that this conversation...
Makes you really emotionally uneasy.
So let's just put the politics aside.
Let's put anarchism and guns and jails and all of that aside.
Because I know that you don't want me to go to jail.
I know that you don't want me to get shot.
I know that you don't want me to be stuffed into a cell with a big bruiser named Bubba.
So let's put all of that aside.
And let's talk about what's really going on here.
Because what's really going on here...
Hmm.
Hmm. Hmm. Yeah, I'm not sure how he would respond to that.
Well, he's either going to tell you the truth or he's going to lie, right?
So he's either going to tell you the truth and he says, you know, I feel like my head is being compressed in a vice when you talk to me about this stuff.
I feel like I'm being backed into a corner and I feel like I'm being made to say stuff I don't really mean.
And I feel mad at you for putting me in the position where I have to look you in the eye and say, yes, you should be shot.
I don't want that for you.
But at the same time, I'm all fucked up about the logic of my position.
Hmm. Or he's going to say, I feel perfectly fine about this, there are no problems whatsoever, and it's all on you.
So he has a tendency to sort of, I guess for fear of having to change his mind about something, to get to the point where he's almost kind of manipulative in his, I guess, lack of willingness to change or to consider an alternate viewpoint.
And he kind of goes in circles and comes up with a lot of random points.
He's sort of a history scholar and so forth, so he has a lot of information about facts that I don't have easy access to.
And of course, I don't want to engage him in the argument from a fact.
I want to keep it to the more moral level, like we're always talking about.
And it just sort of goes nowhere, and it's really frustrating.
Sure, but that's because you're not dealing with the issue that's really there, which is the emotional barrier.
This is all I keep pissing and moaning about on FDR, which is that it's the emotional barrier...
That keeps people from the truth.
Especially a truth as retardedly simple as anarchism.
I mean, it is the simplest thing that you...
A UPB is tough, right?
But violence is a bad way to solve social problems.
It's not a very tough argument, right?
Right. So it's not that people don't have the intellectual ability.
They have emotional defenses.
They have emotional resistances.
I mean, and this is what I talk about in Everyday Anarchy.
No individual wants to shoot people for importing some good that they don't like, but they will support import duties.
No individual wants to shoot a guy for smoking weed, otherwise they'd be like nothing but smoking corpses at a Marley concert.
Right? So, they just drop a bomb, right?
Get everyone. So, nobody wants to do any of this themselves, but when it gets abstracted to a government thing, then they get behind it in some weird, abstract way and so on.
But when you bring the reality of the violence that they support conceptually to them, they don't like it emotionally, not intellectually.
Right? So, the avoidance that people have with regards to the truth, and this is any truth.
Truth about the family, truth about ethics, truth about...
I mean, you see the ridiculous lengths that people go to in an argument about ethics.
You know, where they'll start to talk about, you know, these flagpole arguments and the lifeboat arguments and shit that nobody cares about.
And shit that we can get to in 200 years when we've dealt with murder, rape...
And theft. You know, once we've cleaned up those, it's like saying, well, yes, we have a cure for cancer, but we can't release it until we have a cure for lightning-induced shingles.
Right? It's like, let's just get the cure for cancer out there and worry about the lightning-induced shingles later on that happens once every hundred years to one guy.
Right? Right.
So the resistance that people have to the simple truths...
Of reason and evidence and ethics, UPB ethics and anarchism.
The barrier that people have is not intellectual.
We are trying a set of keys in a fog.
We're inserting keys into a fog saying, I'm sure that this will give me a door through the fog.
We're using entirely the wrong tools.
If we approach things from a merely intellectual standpoint, because people are very much intelligent enough to figure this stuff out in about five seconds, if they want to.
The barrier that has kept people back for thousands of years is the emotional anxiety and fear that will come from being in possession of the truth.
That it will set them against their friends.
It will set them against their family.
It will set them against their God and their priests and their congregation.
That they will be cast out into an isolating wilderness of integrity.
That's what they're afraid of.
That they will have to gather their balls in both hands and stand up and be counted for the truth, knowing...
That they will do exactly, sorry, that others will do exactly to the truth what they are doing to the truth right now.
Attack, undermine, fog.
And yet, he also can't leave the argument alone, right?
Right. He's constantly drawn back to it.
Yeah, he's constantly drawn back to this.
He can't leave it alone, right?
It's one of the main topics of conversation for us.
Talk about his feelings.
Talk about his feelings.
Talk about his feelings. That's definitely an approach.
But it's the only approach. I'm sorry to be annoying.
It's the only approach, right?
I meant to say it's an approach that I have never tried with him before, and I am definitely willing to do that.
Well, I can guarantee you, you can have this argument for the next 40 years and you will get absolutely nowhere.
Unless defenses are addressed honestly and directly and with compassion.
I mean, he's scared, right?
Don't you get that feeling of fear coming off him?
And resentment. And resentment.
Like, I don't want to know that there's a red pill.
That's what everyone is saying, right?
Life was fine until you told me I was in a goddamn matrix, right?
Yeah, and I definitely get that impression from him constantly.
Yeah, and yet he can't let it go because people are driven by ethics.
So talk to him. Just say, let's say that you accept, like, what is the emotion that is behind this?
Because I feel, I don't know if it's right, you know, but this is the impression I get is that you're kind of resentful of this.
You can't let it go. You're irritated, but you're fascinated and you're curious, but you resist.
Like, it's really dense and complicated.
Tell me what it is that you feel during these conversations.
Now, he will try, he will try, I'm guessing, and in fact, I can almost guarantee this.
He will try to say, I feel irritated because you just don't listen.
So he will try to sell you a story about his feelings where you are the cause.
Don't buy that for a moment.
And don't let him get away with such a simplistic explanation for a very complex set of feelings.
And I know for a fact that a lot of it is just plain old-fashioned mommy and daddy issues.
I know that he's got a lot of background issues and so forth that are definitely at the root of all of this.
I've never really known how to approach him about all of that stuff.
Yeah. Well, just ask him about his feelings, right?
And if he says, well, but I get irritated because you just don't listen and you keep saying the same things and you do this and you do that and that's why I get frustrated, right?
Yeah. Then, what you can say to him, and I'm sure this is true, is you can say, you know what though, but the first time that we came up with this topic, the first time that we engaged in this discussion, you felt the same thing that you feel now, maybe a little less, right? But the very first time that we had this, I felt this tension and this fear in you.
So it can't be me, because it happened the first time.
It must have been something that you brought into the conversation.
So just don't let him pin it on you, that's all I'm saying.
Okay. Because then you won't get anywhere, right?
And then suddenly the onus upon changing his emotions is now up to you and not to him, right?
Right. Or if he does try and pin it on you, let's say you've been having these conversations for a couple of months or longer, if he does try and pin it on you and you can't dislodge that from him, then you can switch tactics and you can say...
Well, tell me why it is that you've never told me about this fear or this frustration or this whatever, right?
Why do you think we've been focusing just on this abstract philosophical or political or economic realm?
Why do you think – I mean do you have a history of talking about your feelings with people or is that something that you don't like to do or what's your history with that?
I definitely have issues from my own background that have made it difficult, though after being exposed to this forum, it's definitely made things a lot easier for me.
But yeah, it's something that I've had trouble with in the past, so I'm willing to do it now.
I just don't have a lot of practice, in other words.
Well, you don't need a lot of practice, to be honest.
You just need a lot of guts.
You know what you're feeling, and simply saying to someone, this is my experience in the moment, I don't know why I'm feeling this, but this is what I'm feeling, that doesn't take any practice, so to speak.
It just takes a lot of guts, right?
Absolutely. And I have to admit that it is kind of scary.
I mean, you know, dealing not just with friends but with my wife and with my parents and so on.
I definitely get where you're coming from.
It's absolutely a terrifying thing sometimes.
And it's good that it's terrifying because if it wasn't, it would be ridiculous that the world wasn't free, right?
Right. The higher the mountain in the way of the Promised Land, the more it makes sense that we're still on this side of it, right?
Right. I'll tell you just a tiny little secret.
Just a tiny little secret that's sort of been the point of what I've been doing for the past couple of years.
The truth is not communicated in the abstract.
The truth is communicated in the moment, in the eye contact, in the emotional openness, in the vulnerability, in the intimacy, in the curiosity, in the openness.
That is how the truth is communicated.
It is not debated and inflicted upon someone.
It is not cornered and captured.
It does not corner and capture people.
The truth is established and communicated through intimacy and vulnerability and emotional openness and curiosity.
It is not fundamentally transmitted through argument and abstraction.
And we know that because lies are transmitted through pseudo-intimacy, the pseudo-intimacy of religion and the social contract and the cult of the family.
So if all of the bad people in the world use this pseudo-intimacy of God loves you rather than syllogistical argument, and it works!
Imagine how wonderful when we unite that true self, personal intimacy with people.
Together with the truth, those two things together communicated around the world will be absolutely unstoppable.
but what we want to do is we want to hold up the flashcards to hide behind the scrolling text of our intellectual arguments and not open our hearts be curious about people and really connect with them and i i know that all the debate is always going to just compound things and make things more confusing and
And I come from sort of an objectivist background, so I have a tendency to sort of lean in that general direction and use a bunch of big ethereal concepts to explain my position.
And yeah, I'm actually, after having been exposed to a little bit of the RTR, I'm definitely seeing how it opens things up a lot.
And I've really tried to implement it in my life and with my friend.
I just... Yeah, I guess I just have to really try to make it a little bit more direct and, I guess, use some more guts instead of brains, I suppose.
Does that sound about right? Well, I think that's right, and I certainly don't fault you for not having the guts to do it so far, because it is a terrifying thing to do.
And I also would not, just as a minor annoying correction, guts instead of brains, I would say that the guts are the brains in this situation.
What you've been doing has been neither with gut nor with brain, if that makes any sense, but rather with abstract argument, right?
Yes, sir. I definitely see what you mean.
And if your friend would like, I would be happy to listen in and provide a couple of pointers if you guys go through this discussion.
So any way that I can help, because I know that it's unnerving to say the least, and it's easy to go wrong because you've got the undertow of your habits.
And he wants you to avoid the intimacy as well, right?
You know, to gain credibility, we really need to express our excitement and love of the truth.
Not corner people like prize fighters with intellectual arguments.
But it's our love of the truth.
And we also, I think, and this again, this sounds completely cheesy, but I believe that it's absolutely true.
We have to operate out of, if not love, at least affection for the other person.
Tell me, why do you want to convince this guy?
Well, because for the most part we have quite a bit in common, even politically and economically speaking.
I wouldn't exactly call him a minarchist, but he's definitely a little bit more towards the end of free market and whatnot.
He just can't see the whole total abolition of the state and whatnot.
It's kind of like all the debates that we've been having about dealing with scientific skeptics lately on the boards where, you know, these people are so close and it seems like if we could just push them over a little bit more that they would be, you know, a really fantastic ally.
But because they just can't get over that one hurdle, it's just kind of frustrating and maddening, especially when there's somebody that we're close to.
Okay, a fabulous non-answer.
Let me ask the question again.
Why do you want to change this guy's mind?
I suppose that I just want somebody, a friend, who's, I guess, a little bit closer to being on the same page as I am.
And why do you want him to conform to your thinking?
Hmm. Well, I suppose that I can sort of read ahead a little bit and assume that maybe it's something that I need because of, you know, my family background or something like that.
But at the same time, I just, well, I kind of have very few real friends in my life, and I just kind of enjoy the idea that the friends that I do have are, you know, sort of, I guess, on the same page as I am.
Okay, and why do you want them to be on the same page as you are?
I honestly don't have a good answer for that.
I suppose I just...
I desire for as many people to be, I guess, working towards the anarchist future that I suppose we're all working towards, and I think the best place to start is with those that we're closest to, maybe.
Okay. Now, if I were to ask your friend, why does this person want you to change your mind, what would he say?
I honestly don't know. Well, let me ask you this then.
Why do you think that I'm suggesting to you to take this emotionally open approach to your friend?
I guess to increase the amount of honesty that we have between us?
Yeah, well that's a description, but why am I doing it?
Why do I want you to take this emotional approach?
What is my goal in telling you to do this?
I suppose that's where I'm a little bit lost.
I'm really not sure.
Okay. Do you want me to tell you or I can just tell you if you like?
If you don't mind, I'm sorry.
No, no, that's fine. This is a very important question to ask though, which is why am I doing what I'm doing.
I can tell you why I'm telling you to take this emotional approach with your friend because I want you to be happy.
Okay. Because I want you to be close to your friend, and if you can't get close to your friend, if he's evasive and manipulative and you simply can't connect with him, then I want you to find a friend that you can and not get stuck in this null zone of intellectual, frustrating, negative debate, right?
Absolutely. I completely accept that and understand that.
And the reason that you're listening to me, I think, is because you sense I'm not trying to get you to change for my pleasure.
Right? Right.
I think I do understand that, yes.
I'm not trying to get you to buy some junky car so that I can get a commission, right?
Right. In fact, I don't get a commission, right?
But the reason that I'm talking to you about this, I think that you sense unconsciously or perhaps even consciously, Steph is telling me to do this because Steph would like for me to be happier in this circumstance with my friend.
I do definitely sense that.
In seeing your posts on the web and hearing your podcasts and so forth, you're right, I've never really sensed that you're trying to scam anybody or get anything from anybody, that you really do this because it's something that you enjoy and that makes you happy, and I've always appreciated that.
Right. So when I was asking you why do you want your friend to change, what did you not say?
To make me happy?
No. You basically did say to make me happy.
I want my friend to change to make me happy, to conform with what I want the world to be.
And to make him happy as well.
Yeah. If he doesn't think that you're asking him to do this to make him happy, he won't listen.
So in other words, a mutual exchange of value.
No, forget about a mutual exchange of value.
Focus on him being happy.
Okay. And this is why I say the truth is communicated through, if not love, at least affection.
So if you genuinely want your friend to be happier, and you genuinely believe, which of course I also believe, that a dedication to the truth, however difficult it may be in the short run, leads to happiness, reason equals virtue equals happiness.
If you want your friend to be happier and that is your motivation, he will listen.
If you want your friend to listen because you want to be right or you want to feel that there are more things that you have in common or your anxiety will go down if your friend changes his mind, he won't listen.
I see what you mean.
Because he's saying, look, I grew up with my goddamn parents wanting me to change to manage their own anxiety.
I don't want this in an adult relationship too.
Now, of course, he's unconscious about it, so he's drawn to the conversation because all he's doing is recreating his childhood.
Creating a situation where he gets to be the passive and resistant slave with people who are telling him how to think and what to do.
And I'm sure you're doing the same thing in one form or another.
You probably have a history where people weren't listening to you and they fogged out and you got frustrated and felt isolated, right?
Yeah. Absolutely.
So the way to break that cycle is to act out of affection, out of a genuine affection for this will make you happier.
But sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt.
Sorry, go on. No, no, no. Not at all.
Yeah, I can definitely say that now that I think about what you're telling me that I've approached a lot of people in the past – Mostly for the purpose of sort of changing their minds, I guess, for my own benefit without really thinking about their own happiness.
Now that I consider that, that's really kind of a different perspective than I've ever considered.
And that's unfortunately, along with the incredibly wonderful things that came out of objectivism, that is not exactly an approach that is too friendly towards objectivism.
With objectivism, you know, the judgment of truth and error is hanging over your head and you have to conform and blah, blah, blah.
But I never got the sense that...
Ayn Rand was motivated out of a whole deal of love and a desire to make other people happy.
Definitely not. She was a very angry little lady.
She was. A fairly angry and fairly raspy voice little lady.
Having inherited the amazing intellectual gifts that she gave us, I think that we throw a couple of seafuls of love into the mix, and I think that if we act out of genuine affection and a desire for the other person to be happy...
See, if you want someone to change for you, all you do is talk.
If you want someone else to be happy, you'll do a lot more listening.
That absolutely makes sense.
It's the, I guess, similar to the whole Dale Carnegie using honey instead of vinegar concept.
Yes, for sure, but you want the other person to eat the honey.
Right, right.
I mean, you'd be amazed. It's so much more relaxing, it's so much more inviting, and it doesn't mean that you then become a slave to other people, and it's not that kind of altruism that Ayn Rand derided, and rightly so, I think.
It is, to your self-interest, to be heard, but it is exactly the same for him as it is for you, that if somebody wants you to change because they just feel anxious that you disagree with them, you know that it's not about you, and it's not about the truth, and it's not about your happiness.
Right.
Even if somebody had a good family, it's still very damn close to how people are instructed in school, right?
Right.
So I just wanted – sorry to give you such a long spiel about that.
I just wanted to mention it because I know that there are a lot of people who are getting comfortable enough in the conversation now that want to go out and really talk to people about it.
But, you know, before you do it, you've just got to ask yourself, am I motivated by irritation?
Am I motivated by frustration?
Am I motivated by anxiety?
Is this about me or is it about the other person?
Am I showing off because I want people to say how smart and witty I am?
Do I want to win the argument?
Or do I want to help someone?
If you want to win the argument, you will forever lose.
But if you want to help someone, if you want to make their life better, if you want to open them up to a new possibility, if you want to help them free of the past, then you simply cannot lose.
That's an approach that I've definitely never really considered before.
Right. Well, I would say that you absolutely have considered it in your almost universal rejection of it.
I mean, if you were completely neutral, you would have tried this at some point, right?
Or you would have sat down and said, well, what is it that works well with me?
Well, it works well with me when the other person is positive and engaged and curious, and I get a sense that it's for me that they're interested in talking to philosophy.
I mean, the stuff that you hopefully have heard in my podcast.
And the fact that you've avoided it means that it's a painful subject for you, right?
I think so. We all want that.
And we all wanted that from our own teachers, from our own parents, from the adults who were in our lives when we were growing up.
Because so many of us felt buffeted and claustrophobically enclosed and pulled around according to the anxiety of our parents or our priests or our politicians or our teachers.
And I think that you will find it very moving and emotional for you to take this approach because it's something that we all have wanted so much in our life.
And it seems so alien and strange to me, but it seems like, I mean, I know exactly where you're coming from when it comes to dealing with other people.
I do definitely see what you mean, that when I deal with somebody who's, you know, pleasant and genuinely seems interested in my happiness and my comfort and so forth, that, you know, those are the people that are always the ones that I'm more willing to spend time with and listen to and consider the opinions of.
And I don't think I've ever really been that for the people that I've debated with, and I'm starting to realize that.
And how old are you?
28.
Ah, see, that's good.
You're not like me, finally figured it out in his 30s.
You got like eight years on me, right?
So that's good.
That's good.
That's good.
But yeah, I mean, that would be my approach.
And it doesn't mean that you stay stuck to people till the end of time.
I mean, if you are genuinely open and curious and affectionate in the way that you bring this knowledge to people for their benefit, I mean, if they just smack you down and scorn you and it's like, oh, what are you going to cry about philosophy now?
Then you just say, okay, well, I didn't really like that at all.
That was very unpleasant.
and you will lose the desire to keep going on.
I see what you mean.
That's what they call a closure, right?
Right. I'm sorry.
I know I've given you a lot to chew on, so I have the feeling that it probably would be good for us to stop talking now so that you can mull it over.
That would be fantastic, yes, sir.
And if you do get a chance, please let us know how it goes on the board.
If there's anything I can do just to help, just let me know.
I will, and I appreciate it.
Thank you very much. My pleasure as always.
Thank you. It's a great, great question.
All right. We have a room in the queue, the switchboard.
It is lit up. Let us randomly push a button and see who speaks.
Hello, Western Union.
Hi, Steph. Hello.
Hello. Hi, can you hear me?
Yes. Are you my conscience?
You're giving me too much credit already.
I wanted to talk to you about an interview that I had today.
Today? What are you, paying for a job at the church?
No. I know, it was a very unorthodox interview.
It was really creepy, actually.
It was for like a food festival venue type thing.
So I answered the ad on Craigslist and I went there to check it out.
I'm pretty new to this area and it was far away so that kind of upset me in the beginning.
So I was trying to stay optimistic.
So I went in there and I asked them if I was gonna have to drive the whole distance like every day and they said no and then they told me that it was gonna be like a really interesting opportunity I'd get to travel I would stay in hotels I would I would learn the ropes and move up and everything and it sounded great but then when I went to meet the boss he was like this sick sick guy who just started dialysis and I'm You know,
I have some experience with the whole kidney transplant and dialysis thing.
I don't know if you remember who I am.
Yeah, no, that story is hard to forget.
Let me put it that way.
Right, so when this guy started talking about his experience, I got very emotional.
Sorry, he was talking about his dialysis experience?
Yeah, yeah. In a job interview?
Yes. Okay.
Well, he was in shorts and it was in a weird kind of trailer home type place.
I don't even know why I went inside.
I felt like I had to give it a shot.
I don't know.
It was just very uncomfortable.
Right. I just felt like, why is this about kidney transplants?
Why is this about dialysis?
Like, is this following me?
What is going on here? So, I had the interview and he said that he liked me a lot and he started coming on to me.
Sorry, just a moment. Like, ew!
But sorry, go on. Great.
So I was trying to be courteous and I was trying to leave because I wanted to get back to her by four to listen to your show.
And he was like, well, if you're new to the place, if you're new to this town, you shouldn't have to go anywhere.
Like, he was trying to get me to, like, sit there and talk with him.
Why don't you have a seat right here, little lady?
Right, right. It was gross.
And... Like how Greg was talking about, he was having trouble asserting himself.
I was terrified to assert myself.
I felt like he was going to hurt me.
And so I just called to tell them that another job offer came through.
And the secretary was really sweet to me.
But the guy that I had been talking with, the boss, just called me.
And I didn't answer the phone.
But I feel like I just feel really threatened right now.
Threaten? What do you mean?
I don't know. I feel like this guy is going to try to hurt me or something.
Is that bizarre?
Well, it's not bizarre that you feel it, right?
And I'm sure that there's a reason why you feel it.
I would not say that it is directly, specifically drawn from the situation itself.
Now, tell me what your question is, because I have some of my own, but I don't want to ignore what your question is.
You know, I think my question is, is it normal to get kind of like all personal in a job interview?
Isn't that crossing a boundary?
Well, hang on, hang on, hang on.
Do you really need to ask me that?
What do your feelings say? No, totally.
Like, no, it shouldn't be about that.
No, of course not. I mean, you shouldn't know the inner workings of any internal organs that your employer has at any point.
Like, it shouldn't be spleen.
It shouldn't be left lung.
It shouldn't be testicle. It shouldn't be heel.
There is no inner organ that it is appropriate to talk about during an interview.
Right, right. And this includes eczema and acne and external organs and, I don't know, scratches on your lenses and your eyes.
There is no place that you should be talking about health issues in any way, shape or form during an interview process.
And at which point do you know that you have to just get out of there?
Well, you knew before you went in.
Yeah, that's true. You said, I didn't even want to go in, right?
Right. I bet you that you knew when you first talked to them by the phone.
I had a feeling it was different.
I had a different idea of what it would be, but I was correct about my initial feeling on the secretary.
Sorry to interrupt.
But they were telling you, oh, you'll get to travel and live in hotels.
That's kind of like overselling, right?
I don't know.
Or that would just be a good thing.
Well, you see, if they have such a great job, they don't need to oversell it, right?
Right. I mean, it reminds me vaguely, this is going back, oh God, a long time.
1992, I was 24 or 26, and it was a terrible recession.
I graduated with my history degree, and I was going to go and do a master's.
Terrible recession. And I did these jobs that I talked about in a recent podcast, weeding people's gardens and taking their grandmother around to show them the tent.
Yeah, I remember that. And it was terrible, right?
Now, I called one place down by the lake and they said, you know, jobs available.
Right? And then I called them and I said, oh, what are the jobs?
And they're like, don't worry, we have tons of jobs for you, right?
I'm like, well, what are the jobs, right?
Oh, there's tons of them. Come down.
We'll give you a presentation.
You'll learn everything about it, right?
And it's like, well, what experience are you looking for?
It doesn't matter. Just come on down, right?
Oh, boy. It'll be great, right?
So, basically, I'm either going to be a rickshaw puller or a gigolo.
I don't know, right? But...
But the reality is that that was just bullshit.
And even though I was totally desperate for work and needed to pay rent, I didn't go.
Because it's like, it doesn't matter what they're doing, I don't want to do it.
It doesn't matter, right?
Yeah. I just don't have that capability to decipher what is good and what's bad.
No, don't give me that.
You absolutely do.
Because you didn't want to go, right?
Ugh, but what?
I just don't know why I went.
I mean, no, I want to...
Okay, first of all, we have to establish that, yes, you put your hand into a blender, but you knew it was going to hurt.
Now, that's good, right?
It's good, because if you said there was nothing wrong with it, and it took a job being this man's, I don't know, bedside flag dancer or whatever, right?
Right. So you knew that there was something weird.
You knew that there was something creepy.
You knew before you even went down there because you had hesitations about going down there at all.
They give you this ridiculous over-sales job, you know?
We'll fly you to the moon.
All the gold you can eat, right?
And so you had hesitations and concerns about going down.
So that's important to get because that is where you get your self-trust from, that you knew something was wrong before you went down, right?
Mm-hmm. And you knew something was weird when you were there because you didn't want to go into the trailer, right?
Also, the fact that it's a trailer, not usually the best sign, right?
Right. Come into my cave, I will make you lots of money, right?
I mean, these things don't usually go hand in hand, right?
Yeah, if it was such an awesome, if it was such a money-making opportunity, why is it in a trailer?
Ugh. So you knew all of this, right?
You knew all of this. So the important thing to understand about yourself is that you have all of the right instincts.
The problem is, is following them for you, right?
Yeah. So that's good.
Because if you didn't have those instincts at all, well, we wouldn't be talking because you wouldn't have called up because you would be in some horrible situation and not even know it, right?
So you have these instincts.
That's very good. You just have to trust them.
Now that's hard, but it's infinitely better than not having the instincts in the first place, right?
Right. If it feels funny, you've got to write this down.
Put it on the background of your computer.
Put it on your mirror. If it feels weird, it is weird.
Okay. And you'll need this as you go looking for work, right?
Just trust your instincts.
If it feels weird, I'm not going.
And you may say, oh, I'll be there at 3 o'clock, right?
And you may freak out in the moment because you're used to obeying crazy people, right?
Hopefully this isn't what's happening now, but you were definitely used to it in the past, right?
Yeah. So you may choose to get out of the situation by promising an interview, but then just call back and cancel.
So just give yourself the room to both conform and not set your boundaries, but just to breathe.
Keep breathing when you're talking to someone and say, do I feel good or do I feel bad?
Do I feel strong or do I feel weak?
Do I feel better or do I feel worse?
Do I feel comfort or do I feel unease?
You have to monitor yourself.
You're so used to, because of your history, monitoring everyone else, right?
Yeah, that's a big thing.
Well, you've got to throw those lines into the water and just focus on monitoring your experience of the interaction.
Do I feel good? Do I feel bad?
And it's literally, it is that simple and that basic a retraining of yourself.
How do I experience this?
Not what does the other person need.
They want you to come down so they can put some nonsense sales pitch and freak you out, right?
I mean, they want you to come down.
So you're used to, oh, well, they want me to come down while I better because when I was a kid, if I didn't obey crazy, people like I punished, right?
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
There was a couple of times during an interview last week that I had where I felt like I was being really taken advantage of.
So I mean this has happened before.
I really should just take your advice.
Well, I'm not asking you to take my advice.
I'm asking you to take your advice.
Your advice. There's no bracelet that says, what would BCF do, right?
There is one which says, what would LCF do?
And apparently it's ingest food through his stomach and kick.
That's a different situation.
There is no, what would Steph do?
There is no, what would philosophy do?
There is only your advice that I'm asking you to take, your emotional advice, which is, this is not good.
Right. I really strongly wanted to be able to say, I wanted to tell them how I felt, but I didn't.
And I think that was good on my part that I didn't go and open myself up vulnerably.
I mean, why do I have this desire to tell people how I feel?
I can't I have to make sure it's okay with them, that they understand where I'm coming from.
Well, I mean, that's a big complicated question, but you were totally right to not tell these people how you felt.
That would be as inappropriate as this guy talking about his kidneys.
Yeah. Right?
You just met these people.
You should not be telling them how you feel.
You don't know them, except you feel creepy, right?
Yeah. Right.
I shouldn't tell them anything about me.
No, no. I would have introduced myself as Spandex Fun Vixenhead or something.
I guess the professionalism issue is big with me.
I don't know where to...
I don't know where it begins and where it ends.
I just don't know. The what?
Professionalism issue? What? What?
I made that up.
Yeah, okay. Now, why you keep telling me that you don't know these things?
I mean, do you want me to put the broken record on where you say, well, Steph, I don't know these things.
And I say, but you just told me that you did because you felt creepy.
No, I don't know.
Oh, she's doing it again.
Okay, you're not allowed to say that for the rest of this call.
I don't have a lot of rules, but the I don't know defense is definitely one of them.
I just went blank.
I'm sorry.
So you went down with the goal of talking to the sympathetic witness, me or someone on FDR, who would then say, well, yeah, I think you're totally right.
So everything is working according to plan, beautifully.
It is, isn't it?
I think so. Okay.
I'll just take it from here, then.
Thanks. Oh, you're absolutely welcome.
What was your experience at the call?
Hopefully a little different. I don't think I told you anything unpleasant about my internal organs.
No, it was a lot more helpful than...
No, it was...
I guess it was helpful. I don't know exactly what I got from the call.
Just... Do you mean from this call?
Yeah. I mean, you've helped me confirm that I have the instincts and I think I knew that I had the instincts.
I just didn't know what to do with them.
And I guess it's only up to me to figure out what I'm comfortable doing with them.
You know? Well, I mean, you just have to listen to them, right?
I mean, you've got this angel on your shoulder saying, not good, not good, don't go, don't go.
And all you have to do is listen.
And that's not easy, and that's going to be very emotional for you, because it is acting on a kind of self-protection that you were not allowed before in your life, right?
By your parents or by your husband.
Yeah. Could I maybe give you one quick example before we end the call?
Sure. Okay.
When I... When I realized that my job that I was offered here wasn't going to happen, I started looking for jobs and I was trying to imagine myself getting back into waitressing, imagine myself getting back into house cleaning and stuff.
And I kept putting myself in a position in my head and I was wondering, How would I feel in that position?
And every position made me feel like I would feel like crap.
I would just feel so weird.
And I don't know why.
I think, maybe I don't know why, but maybe you could have a little insight on that.
Well, what do you think it is?
Maybe it's a confidence issue.
Like, I'm saying I couldn't possibly be good at that again.
Or, like, I'm really scared of screwing up, you know, with a good thing, with a good job.
So, I have a lot of pressure right now.
So, is it that you feel you would not be good enough for a waitering job?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. And you have waited before, is that right?
Yes. Is it the job or the people that causes you concern?
It's the people. Now, do you mean the employees, the customers, your fellow employees, or the bosses?
Like everyone, even the cooks.
Okay, so you're going through a pretty raw period right now where you don't feel up to much interaction with people, right?
Yeah. I don't want to put words in your mouth.
I'm just trying to understand it.
No, it is.
Because my new way of interacting with people relies on a lot of energy, a lot of thought, and kind of being very self-aware and catching myself when I dissociate.
And that's a little difficult in a working situation, I think it might be for me.
Right. Okay. And yeah, so if you're going through a raw period, then you may feel that interaction with people may not be a huge plus, right?
Yeah. Sorry, go ahead.
I'm just like scared that I might offend somebody or hurt.
Not hurt, just like I might disappoint somebody's faith in me to be good, you know, to be a good worker.
No, I don't think that's it.
No, that's not it. I can't think of anything else.
Well, if you're in a raw situation, then it's kind of like you have a sunburn, and I say, I have a great job for you working outside in Arizona.
Hmm. Right, right, right.
It's the fact that you're feeling in a vulnerable situation more so than you have in the past, which is good, although difficult, but you're afraid of, in your sensitive place at the moment, of being hurt or yelled at or people getting mad at you, right? Yeah, yeah.
It's not that you're afraid that you're going to be a bad worker, you're afraid that other people are going to be mean to you when you're in this vulnerable place, right?
Yeah, yeah. I can hear what they would say, what they would think.
Oh, you're going to burst into tears, or you're going to get mad, or, you know, you're going to feel like a crazy person, right?
Oh, yeah, hey. Can you hold on one sec?
Sure. Oh, no, hey.
What's up? Oh, so you've got something to sleep on.
I've got two needs.
That's fine. I'll hang on.
Yeah, hang on. They just called me back for a while.
Okay. All right, I'll see you.
Okay. Sorry.
Doesn't matter, doesn't matter.
Right, so you're afraid of being in a vulnerable position and other people coming down on you for that, right?
Yeah. Yes, yes.
Right. So, I mean, I don't have any solution to that other than this raw face does not last forever, although sometimes it feels like it's going to.
It doesn't, I promise you. But you need to manage your working situation accordingly and try and find a job where you'll have more isolation than you might otherwise have.
Yeah. So that wouldn't be a bad thing.
It wouldn't be like, kind of, Enabling my...
No, no. You're not avoiding.
What you're doing is giving yourself some space away from potentially difficult people so that you can do a bit of healing.
I mean, when you have a sunburn, you come out of the sun for a while, right?
Right, right. I see.
Okay. I have a little bit more respect for that now.
Yeah, I mean, it's just self-care, right?
If you twist your ankle, you walk on it gently for a while and you have a crutch and you elevate and you take care of it, right?
And when your heart is raw, you stay out of conflict situations, right?
Yeah. Yeah, you should.
It's not avoidance, it's not cowardice, it's just self-care, right?
Mm-hmm. It's protection, right?
It's... Yeah.
Okay. So I can kind of...
I don't know.
No, I know what you mean.
I'm just making stuff up, stuff that I've done.
If you could be a security guard for a while at some place at night, some place where you're going to have some isolation, some time to think, some time to ease back into your own skin, to learn to trust your instincts more, to not be in a situation of high stress and high conflict, which can definitely occur when you're waitering.
These are just possibilities that I think would be good for you for a while because you've obviously had a lot of stress in your life.
Well, since you were born.
And so I think that this would be a sensible precaution to lower that for a while while your heart learns to cool down.
Okay. Alrighty.
Alright. I'll look for those options.
Thanks so much. You're absolutely welcome.
And do keep us posted. And thank you for staying in the conversation.
I know that it's been costly for you in some ways.
And I hugely admire the courage with which you're throwing yourself at this approach to philosophy and self-knowledge.
Hats off to you for that.
I mean, it's truly inspiring to me.
I get goosebumps with your courage.
So I really appreciate that you're sticking with it.
Thank you. And I admire yours as well.
Thanks. Thank you.
All right. And the funny thing is that my courage actually comes from my spleen, so I did get to talk about an internal organ after all.
So it was just good to slip that in at the end, you know, just to break down all the trust we've been building up.
But anyway, I really appreciate that.
Thank you so much. All right.
I guess we have time for another question, maybe even 1.2 questions.
So feel free to bring her up.
Okay, well, we'll have a short show today.
No problem at all. Thank you so much for the listeners for coming by.
I really do appreciate it, and I guess we'll let people get back to talking about the scooter in the chat window.
No, as somebody said to bring up my topic, I will do it in a podcast this week, and I will talk to you guys later.
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