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July 18, 2014 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

02:36:27

2750 Lizard Brain with Post Monkey Beta Expansion Pack - Wednesday Call In Show July 16th, 2014

Violent dreams, insomnia, perfectionism as abuse, pain is not about the past, father-son roleplay, taming your inner Goebbels, a father separated from his son through the court system, a speech to a son you cannot see and a message for those who deny their co-parent visitation.

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	Good evening, everybody.
	Stefan Molyneux from Freedom Main Radio.
	Hope you're doing well.
	Just wanted to remind everyone, we have added employee number three.
	His name is Stoyan.
	Stoyan, which is Eastern European for he who brings devil data to the masses.
	And he has joined us as a researcher, and he's fantastic.
	He really is turning me from somebody who used to think into his data-driven sock puppet talking head.
	And I've never been happier.
	So thanks so much to Stoyan for joining us.
	I promise I will not mock his name too much longer.
	But it feels like we have some hair on our chest with a name like that.
	And he is going to be obviously the bodyguard.
	So, Mike, who do we have up first?
	Alright, up next is Ricardo.
	Ricardo wrote in and said, I also feel completely paranoid that my father or mother may appear at my doorstep.
	Every time I picture this in my head, I immediately hear my father's raging voice.
	Needless to say, it's incredibly frightening.
	How can I prevent these nightmares and stop this anxiety?
	That's a very, very tough situation.
	Yeah, I feel for you, man.
	That's an incredibly tough situation to be in.
	The insomnia, I had it for like 18 months prior to and during therapy.
	It's actually what caused me to go into therapy was just insomnia.
	I remember being incredibly relieved after like a month of insomnia that I had a cold so I could take some of that NyQuil stuff and actually get some sleep.
	And I remember my unconscious sort of winking at me saying, okay, fine, you can submerge us in this shit, but we'll be waking up again tomorrow with exactly the same message.
	So I am incredibly sorry and I really...
	Understand that.
	I played Macbeth in theatre once and there's some great quotes about insomnia.
	I'm sure Shakespeare had it because Macbeth's description of sleep, sleep which knits up the raveled sleeve of care.
	It's just a wonderful description of the benefits of sleep.
	And if you're denied them, I mean, it can really start to feel like you're going crazy after a while, right?
	Yeah, especially like, I mean, I just defude my parents like one, exactly one month ago.
	And after that, I basically immediately moved into a different country and immediately started working with a startup.
	I immediately started my own company.
	And I don't really have any sleep schedule at the moment anymore.
	Because I literally just worked at 5 a.m.
	I went home.
	I slept for like one to three hours.
	Then I went immediately back to work.
	And I can really feel the impact, just in the way I'm thinking.
	And I also had one day that I was really depressed again.
	I needed one day to recover.
	So, it is totally troublesome.
	Right, right.
	Yeah, and now, so for those, I have to sort of remember about the number of new listeners, so DFUD is taking a break, or either temporarily or permanently, from your family of origin.
	I guess a fairly well-known term in psychological circles for family of origin, right?
	So that's for like a middle-aged person who's got a wife and kids.
	When he talks about my family in therapy, that could be really confusing whether he means his family of origin, his parents or his current family.
	So Fu is a term and D-Fu is just, you know, D is a negative, right?
	So D-Fu is...
	So for people who don't know what the term means, that's what it means.
	And for...
	I guess the translation would be, I guess, trial separation would probably be the closest term for it.
	So, you know, if people...
	There's a few people out there, I think, who think that the term is somehow this magic Thor hammer, sky-splitting, family-destroying double syllable, you know?
	Like the word gets said and suddenly families are blowing up like apple-faced little boys running with guns in the First World War.
	And...
	So, when people invent the word divorce, it doesn't cause people to get divorced.
	It's just a – and I don't think I even created the term as far as I remember.
	But anyway, so just think of sort of – it would be like you calling in and saying, I have – I'm engaged in a trial separation from my abusive wife or whatever.
	So I just want to put that in context for other people.
	You talked mostly about fear of your father, but I don't think you mentioned much about your mother.
	No.
	I mean my mom, she was also way abusive.
	Unfortunately, I first noticed that like the last couple of months when I was still back in Germany, still back with the family.
	So she basically, like my father, he always used to yell at me.
	He never spanked me, but he did very well hit me, if I correctly remember, two or three times.
	Once for a bad grade, I was sleeping, and he just woke me up in the night, just pulled me out, and just slapped me in the face.
	And my mom, she basically just never told anyone else.
	She never told the family about anything like that.
	Sorry, anything like that?
	She always tried to hide it.
	Hide what?
	The abuse.
	My father was also yelling at her.
	Sorry, so your father yelling at her and at you, is that right?
	Yes, that is correct.
	So he only hit you once or twice.
	I think it's important that it happened while you were sleeping?
	Yes, it happened while I was sleeping.
	Because now you're not sleeping, right?
	And now you're concerned at nighttime.
	Okay.
	And your mother, she was abusive, I think, if I remember right, you said that as well.
	But in what way?
	By not telling anyone.
	At the end, when I was close to leaving, I told everyone about their views.
	In the school that I still went to, family, I told everyone.
	And they just asked why nobody ever told them.
	And my mom, she was always making excuses like, my father drank too much, or my father, he had much stress, or something like that.
	Yeah, no, that works in cars, right?
	You can say, well, it's okay, officer.
	I'm sorry that I plowed into this other car, but my excuse is I was drinking too much.
	I mean, it's so mad that people actually use this as an excuse.
	It's worse if you've been drinking.
	It's not better.
	Parenting is more important than driving a car, because you can drive a car drunk, And still get home alive and not kill anyone, but you really can't parent if you're drinking.
	You just can't do it.
	And I don't mean like a glass of wine, a dinner or whatever, but if you're drinking to excess, you can't be a parent.
	He was really drinking in excess, especially with beer.
	Like he would drink sometimes, especially during summer, it was incredibly bad.
	He drank like 6 to 12 beers.
	I mean, it was really awful.
	And everyone knew that he had a real drinking problem.
	And I also confronted all of these, like my family, I confronted them on this matter that, why didn't you guys kept me a wife?
	I'm an alcoholic.
	And they just said, well, they thought it was like a one-time thing, or they all gave me just excuses.
	Right.
	Right.
	Okay.
	And why do you think you're having these visions and these nightmares?
	That's a good point.
	For one, I... It's only one month ago since I actually left.
	I don't think I really...
	Well, I never really talked to anyone about this.
	Like, really about...
	Like, emotionally connected about debuts.
	If I can put it that way.
	Sorry, I'm not sure what that means.
	Like, I had nobody in my life with whom I was emotionally connected with whom I actually could talk about this.
	So you didn't go see a therapist, I assume, right?
	No, I have not.
	So that's naughty.
	Right?
	I mean, it's certainly always been my suggestion that families separate.
	I mean, I think it's true of people who are contemplating divorce.
	Or even a trial separation, you know, go see a good marriage counselor, go see a good relationship counselor, again, assuming you're not in sort of physical danger.
	But I think that it's always best to give relationships as good a shot as humanly possible, really just to avoid regret or if you separate or to heal what can be healed if you can stay.
	So did you not hear that part of what I was saying or you just decided against it?
	With the therapist?
	Well, the thing is, I just...
	Left one month ago.
	I'm still setting up quite a bit of things.
	That's not what I say, right?
	Damn it.
	No, look, and please understand, I'm not saying it's the right thing to do.
	I'm just saying this is what I recommend.
	Yes.
	So it's totally fine if you've decided not to follow my advice.
	My question was, had you heard it, but you decided not to do it, or had you not heard it?
	I heard it, but I decided not to do it.
	Okay, and that's fine.
	I just wanted to know because if you didn't know it, that's sort of important.
	It's recommended by me at least that, right?
	And also in particular because not seeing a family of origin is something that's hard to talk about with people.
	You know, if you...
	And it's just a...
	It's this terrible, horrible, double, triple, quadruple standard, right?
	Like, if you were married and your wife was abusive and you said, oh, man, I just...
	I'm separating from my wife, you know, trans separation from my wife because she's just abusive, people are going to say, oh, man, that's tough.
	I sympathize, right?
	Yeah.
	But if you say, well, I'm not seeing my parents at the moment because they're abusive, it's like, oh!
	You know?
	People, like, the capacity for...
	Sympathy and empathy for adult victims of abusive parents.
	People's capacity for this is stone cold.
	Yeah, people around here, they were just telling me to forgive.
	That I just need to let go.
	Yeah, yeah.
	Yeah, I don't think a huge amount of advice should come from Disney theme songs, but no, it's not.
	I mean, and do they say that?
	Like, so if a woman is being abused by her husband?
	You know, it's funny.
	So Erin Pizzi was talking at the Toronto Domestic Violence Conference, and she was talking about how when she set up the first women's shelter for domestic violence, the women would come in like black and blue, beaten up, beaten up, beaten up.
	And swarming around them like fetid, dried-out bloodworms were the priests and the rabbis and all of that, and they were all like, you have to go back.
	You have to go back.
	You made a vow in the eyes of God.
	You have to go back, right?
	Forgive.
	Forgive your husband.
	He's fallible.
	He was tempted.
	He did the wrong thing, but you must forgive.
	You must be bigger than him.
	You must seek out, do what Jesus did, whatever, right?
	And now, what do we think of these people now?
	These priests and these rabbis who were counseling all these women to go back into unrepentantly abusive marriages.
	What do we think of these people now?
	That's totally barbaric.
	They're fucking hideous.
	Fucking hideous human beings.
	Like manipulative, deceitful, colluding with the abusers, punishing the victims.
	They are interstellar cosmic assholes.
	And the forgive, let it go people, I mean, in less than a generation, they'll be viewed exactly the same way.
	Because the women at least chose to get married.
	We did not choose our parents.
	So this idea of like, well, you know, suck it up.
	Too bad.
	They're abusive.
	Forgive them.
	They did the best they could, but the knowledge they had, right?
	I remember the last time that was applied to An abusive husband, right?
	You know, I mean, Sean Penn tied Madonna, when he was married to her, tied her to a chair and tortured her for hours.
	I don't remember a lot of feminists or anyone, for that matter, saying to Madonna, hey, you know, you really should forgive him and get back into that marriage there, young lady.
	Go have sex with him.
	Go be with him.
	He needs you.
	He did the best he could with the knowledge he had, right?
	Yeah, I mean, if people would be so good at forgiving, then they wouldn't even spank their kids because they could just forgive them.
	Yeah, if forgiveness is a virtue, then what do we do with people who don't forgive, right?
	Well, if you don't forgive your parents, then you are disapproved of, right?
	But where's the disapproval for parents who are hitting their children?
	They're not complying with the forgiveness.
	Anyway, I mean, it's all crazy.
	And I'm incredibly sorry that you're caught up in this kind of evil-serving conformity at the moment.
	I'm incredibly sorry.
	I'm sorry that I was caught up in it.
	I'm just very sorry that this is where the world is.
	Oscar Wilde, when he was going to be thrown in jail because he apparently liked it.
	Kind of rough with the sailors down at the docks because he was gay, right?
	And he was convicted for homosexuality.
	Crazy.
	And he was sent to Reading Jail and he wrote this terrifying poem called The Ballad of Reading Jail.
	And it broke his health.
	I mean, you can imagine what the jails were like in 19th century.
	England.
	It broke his health and he did not live for a huge amount of time after he was released and he broke his finances.
	This is one of the most successful playwrights of the 19th century and an incredibly witty and enjoyable playwright.
	And he had a speech where he said, you know, this is just one of those times in history when homosexuality is attacked.
	In the ancient world, it was no big deal.
	The ancient world is full of philosophers and thinkers and politicians and statesmen, and they were gay, and it was no big deal.
	But this is just one of these times in history where homosexuality is viciously attacked and basically murdered in jail.
	And not seeing abusive parents, I don't know of any time in history where Because all the power structures sell themselves to parents by compelling obedience among the children, right?
	You give us your children to tax through some sort of religious tithe for the rest of their lives, and we will tell them that they have to obey their parents at all times, right?
	It's the same deal with the kings, right?
	You give us an exclusive monopoly on the religion of the kingdom, and we'll tell every ignorant serf that your authority is given by God and to disobey God.
	You is to disobey God and we'll create this imagination.
	So there's this deal where parents are sold the obedience of their children without actually having to be good parents.
	And they're sold that in exchange for being allowed to indoctrinate the children.
	You bring your child in to be baptized.
	You bring your child in for Sunday school.
	And we'll tell them that they've got to pay money to the priest for the rest of their lives, the imaginary disease called sin.
	But mixed in with that, we will also tell them that they must love, honor, and obey their parents.
	And that's the deal, right?
	And this is the unholy deal that is so costly and destructive to children, to humanity as a whole, and is likely to repeat.
	So that's sort of the very sort of quick nutshell of how that works.
	And we're just sort of poised on the edge of moral understanding of these issues.
	And I'm sorry that We're still a bit shy of actually having compassion for the adult victims of child abuse.
	And I'm sorry that you're not getting really much sympathy extended to you.
	You will certainly get it here.
	You will certainly get it from me because I understand these issues not culturally, not religiously, not historically, not emotionally.
	I understand these issues morally and philosophically.
	And the moral and philosophical argument is absolutely ironclad.
	If women should be praised for their courage in leaving abusive relationships, then so should adult children.
	And anyone who says otherwise is one of those fucking priests in Erin Pizzi's noble house of rescue for victimized women saying, God demands you go back to the man who beats you.
	So...
	I'm sorry.
	So let's sort of move on.
	So you were saying that you had some theory, and the theory is that perhaps you don't have a support network around at the moment?
	Yes.
	Right.
	Well, get one.
	Get one.
	Even if it's online, right?
	Even if it's an FDR meetup or any other group that you find sympathetic or – right?
	That can be, I mean, incredibly helpful.
	Abusers isolate, particularly in the act of escaping abusers.
	Because the whole world is set up to...
	It's a complicated topic, so I'll just touch on it briefly, but we're social animals, right?
	And the best way to guarantee compliance is through ostracism.
	I've said that about society as a whole, and we all understand that, right?
	And so, for people who try to flee the tribe, ostracism is the greatest punishment.
	Because, you know, we're dogs, not cats, right?
	We are social animals, and we require...
	The support of society to breed, to survive nighttime animals, whatever, right?
	And so those who try to flee without a support system fall prey to the hypervigilance that's necessary when you are alone, right?
	So if you have 20 people around you in the jungle, you can get a fairly decent night's sleep, right?
	How well are you going to sleep if you're alone in the jungle?
	Probably not at all.
	Yeah, not much, right?
	Not much.
	I remember when I was working up in way, way northern Ontario, I was in a tent, and I thought I heard a bear snuffling around on the outside of the tent, and it was not particularly relaxing, to say the least.
	So anyway...
	So I think a support network is really, really important.
	And even if – I'm sure there will be people – if you go into the chat window, I'm sure there will be people who will offer to help chat with you about things and help you gain some perspective.
	If you can get a hold of a good therapist who isn't going to be one of these forgive-and-forget-much-right-back-to-your-abusers people, then I think that's very, very essential.
	Okay.
	The main reason why I did not really look into getting a therapist yet is I really worry financially about it.
	In the mid-June, I defued my pants and flew into a different country.
	So I'm still worrying a little bit about that, if not completely.
	Just getting on my feet here in the US. Well, look, if you can't get a hold of any money for therapy, let us know and I will – we, the show, the donors, will pay?
	Well, I would rather exchange work for that.
	Yeah.
	Well, look, that's fine.
	It sounds like you're busy in a startup.
	Yeah.
	So, focus on your startup.
	I'm sure that's, you know...
	I mean, if you make a million bucks, you can pay us back.
	If you don't, that's fine.
	Right?
	But you need to get a support system.
	And if you can't afford therapy and you don't have friends around you you can talk to about this stuff, then I will pay.
	I will pay for your therapy.
	Thank you.
	Oh, no.
	Listen, you're welcome.
	I mean, this is...
	This is very important stuff to talk about.
	I mean, I can tell you why I think that you're having this anxiety.
	More than anxiety, this terror.
	This terror.
	I don't know, right?
	You understand I can't answer this, but I can give you what I think is happening and you can tell me if it resonates with you in any way.
	And resonates doesn't mean true, right?
	Okay, so I assume that you normalized your families.
	So your parents abused to some degree or another, right?
	Yes.
	Okay.
	So when you normalize things, the reason that you normalize things is so that you can survive in a situation you cannot escape, right?
	Yes, that's true.
	Okay.
	Now...
	Once you can escape a situation, and the reason you desire to escape a situation is because you have denormalized what is happening, right?
	Now, philosophy is fantastic at denormalizing crazy stuff because philosophy has these principles, right?
	It has the principles of the non-aggression principle.
	It has the principles of respect for property.
	And it has the principles of voluntary relationships, right?
	It is a true statement to say to adults, you do not have to see abusive people, whether they're your priest, whether they're your parents, whether they're your cousin, or the guy down the road, or your husband, or your wife, or whatever.
	You do not have to spend time with abusive people.
	That is obviously a factual statement.
	I'm not making any of that stuff up.
	So, when you denormalize something, Then you wake up to the historical horror of that which you had to normalize.
	Yeah.
	Does it make any sense?
	It does.
	It definitely does.
	Because the first time when I actually started waking up, I immediately got...
	I'm not sure if this is exactly what you were talking about.
	I got into depressions, but really bad ones.
	Sure.
	Along with two suicide attempts.
	You had two suicide attempts at home?
	At home.
	Right.
	And it was needless to say, it was the most horrifying part of my entire life.
	Of course.
	And of course then I was getting deeper and deeper into all of this knowledge and I realized the abuse around me.
	Here I am now.
	I don't have any depressions at the moment.
	I got rid of them, luckily.
	Just the nightmares at the moment.
	I actually have...
	I'm not sure if this is another question, but I have not really a good idea of where I'm going to go in my life.
	I know that I'm working for the startup.
	I also have my own company.
	But I have no idea where to go, really.
	I'm Okay, well, first of all, take pride in what you've been able to achieve, right?
	I mean, you've got your own company and you're in a startup.
	So right now, I would not overly focus on where you're going to go in your life, in my opinion, right?
	I mean, this is not a significant issue for you right now.
	A significant issue for you right now is getting more than an hour to three hours of sleep a night, right?
	Yes, that's true.
	Okay.
	Okay.
	I'm completely underachieving.
	That's always the feeling I have.
	Yeah, that's not true.
	I mean, I'm going to tell you straight up, that is not true.
	You are not underachieving.
	I talked to a guy a little while back on the show who was in his late 40s or early 50s and living in his brother's garage.
	Now that guy, it could be said, was a little on the underachieving side, right?
	Yeah.
	I would not focus on that right now.
	There's no empirical evidence for that in what you've told me, right?
	And I think if you were hearing this story from someone else, you know, I fled the country, I left these abusive relationships, I've got my own company, I'm doing a startup, but I'm underachieving, what would you say?
	Take a break.
	Pull the other one, right?
	Are you kidding?
	What are you supposed to be doing?
	Traveling through time and healing the seas and bringing dead people back to life?
	I mean, what the hell is your standard here for achievement, right?
	Yeah.
	I think mainly why I feel like underachieving is that my father, he would yell at me for not being perfect on all of this other stuff.
	He always expected me to Be physically active like people in a movie.
	You always wanted only really good grades.
	Like living in some kind of imaginary world or something like that and I just never, I'm not sure if this is realistic, but I just never really found, I just never had any guidelines what is achievable, what is not achievable, all three things.
	Does that make any sense?
	Well, okay.
	But, I mean, see, this is...
	I'm sorry.
	No, no, no.
	It's perfectly fine what you're saying.
	But I'm going to, you know, I'm laughing a little because I just am getting ready to blow your mind, right?
	And you may have heard this argument before.
	Please do.
	I've been waiting for that.
	All right.
	And then I'll tell you about the three layers of horror rescue, or the three layers of surviving horror.
	But first, let's start with this.
	So your father, he thought it was essential that you do a really, really good job, right?
	Yes.
	So you could say he was kind of a perfectionist, right?
	Yes, exactly.
	Right.
	Now, what is more important, being a good parent or getting an A on some tests in grade five?
	Well, being a good parent.
	I would say so.
	I would say that's really the most important thing.
	So how hard did your father work at being a good parent?
	Not at all.
	Well, let me ask you, how many books did he read?
	How many experts did he consult?
	In order to find out what was...
	The best practices, scientifically supported, psychologically verified, the best practices for raising children.
	How many people did he consult?
	How many books did he read?
	How many parenting seminars did he go to?
	He'd done nothing of that.
	Okay, so if you were to say to your dad, Dad, I got a test on Friday.
	Fuck it.
	I'm not going to study.
	What would he say?
	He would first put me into a timeout, yell at me for probably one or two hours, get really mad.
	It's horrifying.
	And this is not a hyperbole.
	Your timeouts literally did last one or two hours, right?
	Yes, they did.
	So what fucking expert did your dad consult that said, you know what's really great?
	Put kids in timeouts for an hour or two.
	You never consulted anyone.
	I don't agree with timeouts, but it's two minutes per year of age.
	So unless you're actually 30 or 60 years old when he's putting you in the fucking timeout, he's doing it completely wrong and being destructive, right?
	Yes.
	So if your dad is such a perfectionist and it's like, well, you've got an important job to do, son.
	It's really important that you study.
	It's really important that you do a great job.
	Where was his perfectionism when it came to parenting a little bit more important than your grade 4 spelling bee, right?
	How good was your father when it came to perfectionism about parenting?
	Was a fucking loser.
	That's what he was.
	Right.
	Right.
	So your father was not a perfectionist, right?
	Not at all.
	No.
	Right.
	Your father used high standards not because he had high standards...
	But because by using high standards, he could appeal to your desire for excellence and use it to harm you.
	He used that which was good and noble and virtuous about you, i.e.
	a desire for excellence, and he used that to hurt you, saying that a perfectionist, abusive parent is a perfectionist.
	It's like saying that a torturer who really knows how to hurt you is a doctor.
	The torturer only studies anatomy in order to harm people, in order to find out where their ganglia are and where their nerve centers are and how much damage to do to someone before they die and make sure they don't die and He knows exactly how much electricity to make you scream in agony, but not so much so that your heart will stop.
	He studies a lot.
	He studies human anatomy a lot, and he learns in particular what is hurtful to you, but he's not a doctor, right?
	Certainly not.
	So, when you feel like you're underachieving, it's because your dad felt that you were underachieving at times, right?
	Yes.
	Which means that he underachieved as a father.
	So this is my way of trying to offer you the gift of relief or release from feelings of underachievement.
	And, you know, do you want to do a role play?
	Maybe you be your dad and I'll ask about excellence in parenting?
	Sure, let's do it.
	All right.
	So, Dad, I wanted to talk to you about something because I remember as a kid...
	You often got really upset if I did less than perfectly in some area or some test or some thing, right?
	Do you remember that at all?
	Yes, well I do.
	Education is very important.
	School is very important.
	Without that, you won't get a job out there.
	I worked so hard to give you everything I could.
	I never had a little father and I am working my ass off for your education.
	And what are you telling me with this?
	What are you trying to achieve with this?
	I'm not sure what you mean by what am I trying to achieve.
	You mean by talking to you about what I remember?
	Yes.
	I don't know what achievement means.
	I'd like to ask you though, since you say that education is very important, Dad, how did you educate yourself On becoming a good parent, right?
	So you said you didn't have a father around.
	Is that right?
	Yes.
	Okay.
	So you didn't know much about how to be a father.
	And I guess my question is, because I don't really understand some of the things that you did, you know, the yelling, the hour or two timeouts, the, you know, whatever, waking me up in the middle of the night once or twice to slap me in the face for doing badly.
	Which books or experts did you consult or read that That said this is a good idea.
	I did not agree with anything.
	You know what?
	This is complete bullshit.
	I don't need this.
	I don't need to hear this from you.
	Wait, wait, wait.
	Hang on, hang on, hang on.
	You just told me that education was very important.
	And I'm just curious how you educated yourself on how to be a good parent, particularly since you didn't have an example of your own.
	I already got a job.
	Is education not important for parenting?
	Hang on.
	Hang on.
	Are you saying that education is not important for parenting, but it is important for children?
	To break out of the role, he would have probably left by now.
	Which would show you the ego fragility of his position, right?
	Yeah.
	It would mean that this guy who was incredibly critical of you doesn't have the balls to even be asked a question about his own competence, right?
	Right.
	You know, there's something that says – I remember this from when I was a kid.
	It says, you know, don't dish it out if you can't take it, right?
	Yeah.
	And now people who are hypercritical, what they're saying is criticism is really good, really good for getting better at stuff, right?
	You criticize the crap out of your kids and they'll get really good at stuff, right?
	I can only voice that.
	And how would he respond?
	I mean, in the roleplay, I wasn't actually even criticizing.
	I was just asking a question.
	I didn't criticize him.
	I didn't speak of him negatively.
	I didn't attack him.
	I didn't call him names, right?
	I was simply asking for patient, calm, Socratic explanations, right?
	And how did Mr.
	Criticism is really good for excellence, how did he appreciate even a mild potential criticism?
	He did not appreciate it.
	He aged completely.
	He ran away like a little girl guide in front of a giant grizzly, right?
	This big He-Man who's so great at criticizing children, right?
	What happened when he got even a whiff of potential criticism?
	He lost it.
	He ran away because it's scary!
	I mean, you get what complete assholery that is, right?
	Like, what a complete asshole you'd have to be to criticize, criticize, criticize, criticize, and then the moment anyone has even a potential criticism of you, to just be like, oh, this is bullshit, and hang up, right?
	Yeah.
	I don't think you get it yet.
	I do get it.
	I mean, I know that he's like a complete narcissist.
	I know that as well.
	Yeah.
	No, you don't.
	No, listen, because he just visited us prior to the roleplay when you said you feel like you're underachieving.
	If you knew that, he wouldn't be in your head saying that, right?
	Right.
	Oh, okay.
	And he wouldn't be in your dreams.
	So let me give you the three...
	I get a bit frightened whenever I talk about him.
	Of course you do.
	Even if I just write into my journal about him or something like that, I get really reluctant about writing something bad or something like that.
	It's incredibly scary.
	Of course.
	Now, you know that it's very healthy to internalize your father when you're a child, right?
	Yes.
	And why?
	Why is that?
	Why is it healthy?
	By channelizing, you mean that I notice?
	Think like him.
	Instead of him attacking you, you attack yourself?
	Yeah.
	And why is that healthy?
	Attacking myself doesn't help me at all.
	Oh, no, it is.
	It certainly is.
	When you were a child?
	No.
	Okay, so this is why he's still in your head.
	I'm sorry, I'm probably a bit dense, something like that.
	No, no, no.
	See, then, did you just criticize yourself again?
	Yes.
	Yeah, well, don't.
	See, easy, I just said don't, so it's fine, right?
	No, the reason why it's very healthy to internalize abusive people when you can't escape them is for the same reason.
	If I said to you, listen, I can hit you or you can hit you, One or the other is going to happen.
	Which would you choose?
	Well, that I hit myself.
	Why is that?
	Because I can control how hard the punch is.
	Right.
	Do you understand?
	Yes.
	So you criticize yourself because you can manage that.
	You can manage your inner critic.
	But if your father starts vomiting all of his neurotic criticisms into you, that might be overwhelming and you might kill yourself, right?
	As you talked about.
	Feeling suicidal in the past, right?
	Yes.
	So I will measure out how much poison I'm going to drink, thank you very much, because you people might overdose me very easily, right?
	Yes.
	Okay.
	You sound very tense at the moment.
	I am.
	I'm sorry.
	No, no, don't apologize.
	I don't want to brush past that.
	No, this is like a complete wave of...
	I feel a bit overwhelmed, which is good.
	Tell me more about what you're feeling.
	I feel like there's some burning sensation inside of me.
	I'm sweating.
	I feel relief.
	Yeah, because you have an ally, not in terms of me, but just in terms of reason, right?
	This is just rational stuff, right?
	This is philosophy.
	Yeah.
	Right.
	And would you like me to go on a little further, or do you want to tell me more about what you're feeling at the moment?
	I would appreciate if you can go a little bit further.
	All right.
	Thank you.
	No, no, my pleasure.
	So, in my opinion, and again this is all just my opinion, but it's with some significant experience, there are three stages to waking up to childhood horror.
	The first is to recognize that there was horror in the past.
	The second is to recognize that there is horror in the present.
	And the third is to recognize that That there will be horror in the future.
	Now, that sounds very corny and all that, but I'll sort of tell you what that means.
	So the first, of course, is to say, when I was a child, things were pretty horrible, right?
	And then what happens is people like me say, well, you know, you should probably chat with your parents about that, right?
	And you probably heard me say that, Ricardo, so then how did you feel when I said that?
	I didn't even...
	The thought of talking to my father was impossible.
	Okay, impossible is not a feeling, so let's try that one again.
	I felt scared, really scared.
	Terrified, right?
	Yes.
	And what that means is that helps you transition from feeling horror in the past to feeling horror in the present, right?
	Yes.
	Right, because if I just said, oh, you know, journal about it and ruminate about it and so on, then it would all keep it safely encapsulated in a cyst called history.
	A sistery, I guess you could say, right?
	Where you would ruminate or think about the horrors of the past, but they would never land in the present, in the moment, right?
	Yes.
	So, you know, if there's horror in the past, then I say, well, go talk about it, we'll be with them.
	And if you talk about it, With people, then you can find out if there's horror in the present, right?
	Yes.
	And there usually is, right?
	So then, maybe like you, you pack your bags and flee, right?
	Yes, exactly.
	Now, was that the end of the horror?
	No, it was not.
	No, it was not.
	Because now, you're afraid that there's horror in the future, too, right?
	That there is no Escape from it, right?
	Yeah, exactly.
	That's exactly how I feel.
	It's really frustrating as hell, right?
	Like I'm in a fucking different country, right?
	Yes.
	Why am I still scared, right?
	Before I left, I was only focusing on actually leaving.
	I never thought, like, well, what's after that?
	Then once I got here, on the first day...
	I had to take a break because I got overwhelmed.
	I immediately noticed that I'm in a different country.
	I'm completely on my own now.
	I'm alone.
	All of that stuff.
	And then I first had to take a little break until it normalized a bit.
	Right.
	And now I'm just worrying really about the present as well as the future.
	A lot about the future.
	Right.
	Now, the reason why I think that there's the third wave of recovery from horror, horror in the past, horror in the present, is horror in the future, and that is because we then begin to recognize, as we try to talk to other people in our life about our histories, what do we find out?
	The only phantom assistance.
	Yeah.
	We find basically collusion with our abusers, right?
	Like the priests in Aaron Pizzi's domestic violence shelter.
	The priests are colluding with the husbands in trying to deliver the victims back to their abusers, right?
	Yeah.
	And you either go back or you break from culture.
	And so what happens is when we begin to process, really process our abuse, we realize that the abuse is not a family problem, essentially.
	Right?
	It's not...
	How is it not a family...
	Like with society as well?
	Yeah.
	Because...
	I mean, speaking for myself, my mother could never have gotten away with what she got away with without the direct collusion of literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people.
	The abuse that I suffered as a child was not primarily a family issue.
	It was primarily A social issue.
	Now, I can get the fuck away from my family, but I cannot get away from society.
	And that's the third stage of processing horror.
	And that's that the horror can also be in the future until it's clear.
	Your father is getting to your dreams through the people around you.
	Your father is haunting you because people are bringing his ghost to you.
	Thank you.
	That actually makes sense, yeah.
	That sounds a bit blasé, a bit flippant.
	And Yeah, no, I'm just processing.
	I'm just trying to figure out how How can I then, like...
	No, no, you're not processing.
	No, no, no, listen.
	I know, I know you, Ricardo.
	You are a very fierce intellect, right?
	You have a very, very strong set of horses right up below the top of your forehead, right?
	Yes.
	So what you're trying to do is you're trying to think your way out of it, right?
	What does this mean?
	What are the implications of this?
	Where did this come from?
	How can I understand this?
	What's the analysis, right?
	Yes, that is true.
	Right.
	That will not save you.
	That will not stop your dreams.
	Your dreams are not coming from your top of the monkey brain.
	It's coming from the bottom of the lizard brain, right?
	The lizard brain?
	Yeah.
	I mean, you know the brain is just like old shit piled on some new shit on top, right?
	Yes, that I know.
	Right.
	So, the stuff that...
	The dreams, this is all, like dogs dream, right?
	Cats dream.
	Mice dream, right?
	So it's real base of the brain stuff that's happening here, and it's not going to listen to your advanced monkey top of the neofrontal cortex brain, right?
	It does not.
	It's like having a meeting of executives and thinking that's going to fix the water gushing in through the basement, right?
	For that shit, you need a plumber, right?
	But does this mean that I need to take action?
	Boy, so you've got thought, you've got action, anything to avoid feeling, right?
	Yes, yes.
	Right?
	What can I do?
	What can I think?
	What can I say?
	Not, how do I feel, right?
	Well, I kind of feel like crying, but I don't know that Would it really help?
	Help?
	How do you know it won't help?
	Because I've cried whenever I was alone and it was a short relief.
	No, but the whole point here, Ricardo, is you're not alone right now.
	We're talking.
	So it's an action of trust to be vulnerable when talking about emotional things with someone.
	It's an action of trust in me.
	I'm not saying you have to cry or anything, but it is an action of trust in me.
	And it is a breaking of the isolation.
	To cry alone about being isolated does not solve the problems of being isolated, right?
	Yes, it's just like when my depression started, I I avoided contact everywhere.
	I did not talk to anyone.
	I only talked whenever I had to.
	I did not even talk a single word to any of my classmates back in school.
	I did not talk to anyone.
	Are you trying to sell me on your isolation when I've just told you that you're isolated?
	I'm sorry.
	That's alright.
	Let's get back to what you just felt in just a second there.
	I don't know how to respond.
	Thank you.
	But I'm not asking you to respond.
	You told me that you were feeling emotional.
	Yes.
	Because to respond is like you're serving the ball back to me, right?
	But you're saying, I've got a ball I want to hit.
	And then you're saying, well, I don't know how to respond.
	And I'm saying, well, you brought up that you were feeling emotional, that you felt teary, right?
	Yes.
	And what are the words behind the tears?
	What are the tears trying to drop onto the ground and make the letters of?
	I want to rage.
	I want to throw in so many things.
	I would go insane.
	Just the rage that I've built inside me, I just want to let out.
	Right.
	And the rage is healthy.
	If you've been seriously harmed By a human being, anger is your defense, right?
	Yes.
	Like, my immune system made a mistake and let cancer cells grow, right?
	So then I had to get external agents to kill the cancer cells.
	Now, those cancer cells are going to come back.
	I mean, most people get cancer a couple of times in their life, but hopefully the immune system recognizes and kills the cancerous cells you don't even know, right?
	Now, I want, the next time cancer shows up in my body, I need to live.
	I need my immune system to take those motherfuckers out back and kill them gangster style, right?
	Yes, of course.
	And hunt down their family, right?
	Yes.
	I mean, a full-on DNA purge of those little bastards, right?
	Yeah, I mean, like, kill them, kill them.
	Yeah, kill, kill, kill, right?
	Now, of course, we're talking about your father, who's, you know, killing is not the appropriate response, right?
	Yeah, I'm aware.
	But the emotions are about the future.
	The emotions, everyone makes this mistake, and I have at times in my life, too.
	We make this mistake, and we think that pain is about the past, right?
	Pain is not about the past, right?
	Sorrow, rage, they're not about the past.
	When my daughter falls and skins her knee, it hurts like hell.
	Why does it hurt like hell?
	What's the point of that pain?
	Well, to tell you that you have been hurt.
	Okay, why?
	What's the point of that?
	She knows she's been hurt.
	She can see it.
	It has to protect you.
	From what?
	Well, from damage.
	No, it can't protect you from damage.
	Her knee is already hurt.
	What's the point of the pain?
	So it doesn't repeat.
	And then you fix it, then you heal it.
	So the pain is not about the past, is it?
	The pain in my daughter's knee, when she skins her knee, is not about the past, right?
	Because the past can't be fixed.
	Right?
	There's no amount of pain that's going to make her not fall or her knee not be hurt, right?
	Yes.
	So...
	Pain is not about the past.
	Pain is about the future.
	Pain is, hey, whatever you did, don't do it again.
	Right?
	I remember when I was a kid in Ireland, I don't know, I was like maybe four or five years old.
	No, no.
	I lie.
	I lie.
	I was in Africa when I was six.
	And people told me there's a stinging leaf.
	And I said, I wonder what that feels like.
	Right?
	And I remember closing my finger over the stinging leaf.
	And I went, oh, that's actually quite unpleasant, right?
	Now, I mean, the discomfort from the stinging leaf was not because I thought I could go back in time and not touch the leaf.
	It was to make sure I didn't touch the leaf again in the future, right?
	Right.
	And so the rage that you feel is...
	Obviously generated from the past, the pain that I felt in my fingertips on touching the stinging leaf was generated from the past, from the immediate past where I just touched that leaf, right?
	Right.
	But what was the pain for?
	It was for the future.
	To keep me safe from those stinging leaves, right?
	Exactly.
	It's the same thing with, you know, you get a vaccine and you're...
	You're like, oh, I killed three smallpox viruses, right?
	Or whatever it is that goes in.
	And then your body, if it ever sees it again, can kill those bastards, right?
	Exactly, yes.
	So, I'm talking about the pain that you're feeling at the moment.
	If we think pain is about the past, we feel helpless, right?
	I felt completely helpless.
	Of course.
	Because if I think that the reason my knee hurts...
	It's because of the past.
	Well, no amount of pain in my knee is going to change the past because the past already happened, right?
	Yes.
	But if I understand that the pain in my knee or in my finger or in your heart is to protect you in the future, then it is not helpless.
	If we think that the pain is simply about the past, which cannot be changed, we're saying to our pain, you're useless.
	You can't change the past.
	What's the point?
	And then we start to jump into, well, what can I think?
	Or what can I do?
	Or what action should I take?
	Because the feelings are kind of useless.
	It's like, well, I know it was shitty.
	I know it hurt.
	But accepting that our feelings of pain, of sorrow, of horror, of rage, frustration, anger, they were generated by the past, but they're pointed at the future.
	They're pointed at the future to keep you safe.
	And if you reject the pain of the past, you surrender to the danger of the future.
	Right?
	Your feelings are trying to keep you safe in the future.
	And if you deny yourself those feelings, they will keep coming back.
	And you are denying those feelings, right?
	Aren't you sort of saying, what's the point?
	Can't do anything about it?
	Can't change?
	Yes.
	I just think if I stop denying them, then I will just keep getting hurt and hurt and hurt.
	No, no, no, no, no.
	If you keep denying them, you will keep getting hurt and hurt and hurt.
	Because I'll tell you this, Ricardo.
	Your feelings...
	When you accept them, we'll constantly be scanning for people like your parents and people like those who collude with your parents and they will identify them with lightning rapidity every single time and they will give you the feelings that you need to steer clear of those people before they've even opened their mouths.
	Right?
	Right.
	That is the benefit of those feelings, right?
	It's not a photo book.
	Your feelings are not a photo book that you can't change.
	They're like sonar for a bat or radar for a ship.
	They're scanning.
	Where are the icebergs?
	Where are the reefs?
	Where are the landmines or the sea mines, right?
	Your feelings are scanning forward and forward and forward all the time.
	Keep me safe.
	Let's keep him safe.
	We know where the predators are.
	We know that the sound of that twig probably means a lion.
	Let's run the other direction.
	We know not to get between the lion and the cubs.
	We know not to get between the mama grizzly and her cubs.
	We know because we saw three people get electrocuted not to stand outside with an umbrella in the lightning storm, right?
	They're constantly scanning.
	Keep you safe.
	Keep yourself.
	Find the crazies.
	Keep the crazies away.
	Recall from the crazies.
	Don't engage with the crazies, right?
	They are your friends.
	Thank you.
	Because they can find your enemies.
	They are here to help.
	They're like, oh shit, are we changing this whole deal?
	Did we leave?
	Nasty tribe for nice tribe?
	Shit.
	Well, Nasty Tribe is everywhere, so we better be able to fight these bastards and keep you safe, right?
	Exactly.
	Exactly.
	Okay.
	I really, really thank you for that.
	Well, you know, this is brutally hard-won knowledge for me, right?
	Because I wanted to be basically the slave driver.
	I wanted to be the dictator of me.
	You feelings are convenient.
	You feelings are inconvenient.
	You people over there are helpful.
	You people over there are not helpful.
	You people are good.
	You people within me are bad.
	These feelings are convenient.
	These feelings are not convenient.
	I know everything, right?
	Yeah, exactly.
	I just try to completely control my feelings.
	Know when it's timing for a certain feeling, when it's not.
	You are a dictator of you, right?
	Yes.
	The self-Stalin, right?
	You people are allowed.
	You people are not allowed.
	You people are approved.
	You people are not approved.
	You people get the microphone.
	You people get the jail cell, right?
	Exactly.
	And how's that working out?
	Not very good.
	It's horrible.
	It's absolutely horrible.
	Yeah, because you have to surrender to the reptile within.
	He's really there to help you, right?
	Yes.
	He knows shit you can't even guess.
	Listen, the reptile brain is the old brain.
	It is the deep brain.
	It knows things we can't even comprehend.
	The reptile brain gives us like dreams and stuff which if you puzzle them out are like holy crap stuff, right?
	And you can read Malcolm Gladwell's Blink for more on this just how much we can process in an instant, in a moment if we trust our instincts.
	Trying to live life through the new monkey brain is like trying to get to China from the North Pole on a bicycle.
	When you've got the teleportation of the underbrain.
	The underbrain is, is this good for me or is this bad for me?
	The deep reptile brain is good for me or bad for me, right?
	Yes.
	And it has evolved over billions of years.
	This new shit we've got bolted on the top, a couple of hundred thousand years, right?
	I mean, it's beta.
	Right?
	I mean, it's buggy as fuck all around.
	It is.
	I mean, tell me I'm wrong.
	It's fantastic, but it's buggy as shit, right?
	Yeah, it definitely is.
	Right, that other stuff?
	Well, that's been honed, man.
	Right?
	That's been beta tested.
	That's solid stuff, right?
	This new stuff, it's fantastic.
	It's why we're talking.
	But it's really new, right?
	What is it they say, don't buy version 1.0 of anything?
	I mean, we're not even at 1.0 as far as the neofrontal cortex goes, right?
	I mean, it's like the iPhone .01, right?
	And again, I'm not saying don't think, obviously, right?
	Yeah.
	But what I'm saying is that this buggy as shit beta spanking new.01 version top of the monkey brain, you can't live your life that way.
	It's tempting, right?
	But you can't.
	First of all, it's not the reason why you're alive.
	It's one of the benefits you have For millions of years or billions of years of evolution, right?
	The top of the monkey brain is not why you're alive.
	You can't live your life that way.
	Icing tastes great, but you can't eat icing all day, right?
	You need cake and vegetables and fruits and proteins and fats and all that kind of good stuff, right?
	Yeah, definitely.
	Yeah, the top of the monkey brain is like icing.
	It's great, tasty, but man, it rots your teeth if that's all you live on, right?
	The deep brain, the reptile brain, that shit has had its kinks worked out over billions of years, right?
	I mean, you know that the neofrontal cortex, this sort of seed of reasoning stuff that we've got, is like a tiny blink in the history of evolution, right?
	I mean, it's so new, it's ridiculous, right?
	You know, to launch the space shuttle, they need to swap out Tiny memory cards of old software that was written and tested because nobody's writing that new software because that old software is just so good and it's so bug-free that no one is willing to rewrite it.
	So these guys have to swap out these, I don't know, 8K memory modules or something like that to get the space shuttle up.
	That's how terrified they are of flying on new software, right?
	Yeah, I could definitely imagine that.
	Especially as...
	Try not to live right up there.
	It will not keep you safe, and it will not give you meaning.
	It will not give you relaxation.
	Because when you've got a brain that's hyperactive, it's because you're using the wrong gear, right?
	Yeah.
	I don't know if people still ride multi-gear bicycles, but like when I was a kid, you go from a 3-speed to a 10-speed or whatever, right?
	I mean, if you try biking up a hill in the lowest gear...
	I mean, you just can't do it, right?
	No, of course not.
	And if you try biking down a hill in the highest gear, I mean, you're just spinning your heels, right?
	Yeah.
	So, you've got to get the right gear for stuff.
	And keeping you safe is the job of the monkey brain.
	Sorry, it's the job of the deep...
	Old reptile brain, right?
	I mean, it keeps reptiles safe, right?
	Try catching a frog.
	I mean, that frog knows what's going on, right?
	Can't move a TCP packet to save its slimy little hide, but it sure knows when there's a threat around, right?
	That's how deep and old that stuff is, right?
	A fetus, when a needle comes into the womb, will try and get away from the needle, right?
	That's long before it knows how to talk, right?
	It's long before it's even born, right?
	And that's, for me, at least what therapy was good at getting me out of my head and getting me into the lizard brain, right?
	The deep, friendly, quality-tested, bug-free lizard brain.
	Abusers want you to stay in your head, because your head can be manipulated, but your lizard brain can't be.
	So lots of people will say that they want you to stay in your head, and they're going to talk you in and out of stuff, right?
	Like your lizard brain is giving you nightmares, right?
	Horrible nightmares.
	Well, they are helpful.
	As long as you get that they're helpful, they'll start to diminish, right?
	I said horrible, but not helpful.
	Oh, you said horrible.
	Horrible, yes, sorry, but helpful too, right?
	Now, if you start listening to those dreams, if you start listening to that horror, then it will start to diminish, right?
	I mean, if you stop drinking some bacteria, then your immune system can start to calm down, right?
	Yeah.
	But your lizard brain is like, we were harmed.
	We were frightened.
	We were brutalized.
	We were yelled at.
	We were scarred.
	We were put in hour to two-hour timeouts.
	We were pulled out of bed and hit in the face.
	We were terrified, right?
	That's what your lizard brain is saying, right?
	Now, you can't argue with the lizard brain because the lizard brain is like, well, that shit happened, right?
	Arguing with the lizard brain is like trying to open your eyes and not see something that's right in front of you.
	You can't do it, right?
	It's a function of the autonomous nervous system.
	That shit just works, right?
	Trying to argue with the lizard brain is like trying to talk a frog out of being scared of you, right?
	Good luck.
	Okay, so...
	But...
	The shitty beta amazing new bolt-on monkey expansion pack, right?
	The neofrontal cortex, you can talk that shit in and out of everything.
	Because that way...
	That way people can say, oh, forgive, right?
	Oh, let it go.
	Oh, move on.
	Oh, don't hang on to the...
	You can talk that crazy motherfucker in and out of everything, right?
	Yeah, of course.
	And that's why manipulators want you to stay in the buggy-as-hell monkey expansion pack, right?
	Yeah.
	So they can talk you in and out of stuff.
	But you sit deep in your lizard brain and you become bulletproof to language alone, right?
	Yes.
	Is this helping at all?
	I'm not sure I'm getting any emotional connection from you.
	I'm concerned that I'm talking to the monkey expansion pack, not the lizard brain.
	I'm sorry.
	No, you're definitely helpful.
	I mean, this is incredible.
	I mean, I've never...
	I've never had any kind, not even near such a discussion or conversation with anyone in my life.
	Okay, good.
	I just want to make sure that I'm not getting a top-level filter, right?
	Okay, no, no.
	It's fine to interrupt.
	It's not supposed to be a monologue.
	I just wanted to check in and make sure this stuff was hitting you where you live, right?
	Because you know we're only here because of balls and eggs, right?
	Like sperm and eggs.
	Yeah, yeah.
	And frogs do that shit too, right?
	Well, yeah, of course.
	So our life fundamentally is way down below the monkey expansion pack, right?
	Yeah, it's just reproduction, nothing else.
	Well, you say just reproduction, that's everything else, right?
	You say just reproduction.
	Hey, how would your brain be doing without the balls?
	It wouldn't even be here, right?
	Yeah, okay, yeah.
	It's a lot more.
	It's everything.
	That's me, a reproduction, nothing else.
	I mean, it's the only reason why we're here and why there's any internet and why there are any computers and why there's any conversation or any language, right?
	That's the whole thing.
	And look, again, I'm not at all trying to say, you know, abandon reason, right?
	I'm not trying to say that.
	What I'm saying is that there's reason in the lizard brain, right?
	That vastly outstrips the susceptible to manipulation monkey expansion pack.
	Right?
	There's an old statement.
	I think it comes from Pascal, Blaise Pascal.
	And I used to dislike it, and I don't anymore.
	And he said, the heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.
	And, I mean, you could read that like, oh, it's, you know, an appeal to faith and abandoned reason and so on.
	It used to bother me, and I've read a lot of what he wrote.
	Pensées is our thoughts.
	It's a great book to read.
	It's great.
	It's stimulating.
	But I think the way that I sort of work on it now, on that statement, is that there is truth in the lizard brain that That the monkey brain forgets.
	Right?
	Ricardo, you were deeply harmed by your parents and by the society that colludes with them.
	That society you have to live in.
	Right?
	I would guarantee you, as far as I'm able, which is not far, but I would guarantee you that the suicidality It was not about the past, but was about living the rest of your life in a world of abusers and colluders.
	Yes.
	The one thing was impulse.
	The other was, I'm never going to get out of here.
	That was the main thought that drove it.
	Yeah.
	One in five, baby.
	Five and one.
	No.
	Five and one, baby.
	One in five.
	No one here gets out alive.
	Yeah, I mean it is this idea that – and it is more than an idea.
	It's a reality that unless we get fully activated lizard brain wisdom, we will never get out of there.
	We will never get out of the world of abusers and colluders.
	I'm out.
	I'm out.
	There is not one single human being anywhere close to my heart in my life who is either an abuser or a colluder.
	I'm out.
	It can be done.
	But I sure as hell didn't get out with the monkey brain.
	The monkey brain was pulling me back in.
	The lizard brain was like, run!
	And the monkey brain was, well, forgiveness is virtue, and I guess they're doing the best they can with the knowledge that they had.
	And it's like, oh my god, shut the fuck up.
	Lizard man speaks.
	Ryan That's actually what it's been telling me all the time along long.
	Even now, like, even with the company I currently work with, it's still telling me to get out of there.
	Well, the monkey, sorry, the lizard brain, you've got to listen, but the lizard brain can't be a dictator any more than the monkey brain is.
	We've got this fascinating ecosystem of personalities and wildly different layers.
	Mm-hmm.
	Of developed brain.
	Right?
	I mean, we're all patched, right?
	I mean, there's no, right?
	It's like, I think, what, Windows 8.1 still has to run DOS 1.0 programs?
	Right?
	It's all a patch, right?
	I mean, you can see this biologically.
	I mentioned this on the show before, but we're one of the few creatures who can move fingers independently of each other, right?
	That's why we can play piano and Type and play guitar and stuff like that.
	We can move fingers independently.
	Do you know how bad that software is?
	It's terrible.
	So all the other creatures move all their fingers together.
	And do you know that that same hardware is in our hands?
	When you just want to lift your pinky finger, do you know what your brain says?
	It says, move all the fingers, right?
	And then a piece of your brain that's layered on top and a piece of your nervous system that's layered on top of the old shit says, oh, well, except for those.
	I mean, it's terrible.
	It's so god-awful.
	This is why there's no divine designer, right?
	It's the worst stuff around.
	It's terrible.
	Right?
	And that's why we have to listen to all of it.
	Right?
	We listen to the monkey brain.
	We listen to the rabbit brain.
	We listen to the salamad.
	Like, we listen to the whole ecosystem, right?
	Balance in the forest It's an ecosystem.
	Right?
	And it is challenging and confusing and frustrating and annoying and all other kinds of things to live with this crazy mishmash of how our brains have developed, right?
	Yes.
	It drives me crazy sometimes.
	Go on.
	Sometimes I listen more to my lizard brain, and then the next day I feel regret for doing that.
	You feel what?
	Regret.
	Why is that?
	Because I think that I've made bad...
	By listening to my lizard brain, I've made bad choices.
	For example, in relationships.
	Maybe I was too emotional, something like that.
	Right.
	And then I basically punish myself with the other brain.
	Right, right, right.
	Lizard, take monkey!
	Monkey, take lizard!
	Really?
	Who wins?
	And that's the challenge, is that all the creatures, all the personalities, all the alter egos within us, all our history, past, future, all has to speak.
	Everyone gets a seat at the table in a healthy personality, right?
	Yes.
	Censorship is even worse internally than it is externally.
	It's even worse in the heart as it is in the body politic.
	And of course the external censorship only arises from the internal censorship, right?
	So – How exactly is it – So listen.
	I mean so if we only listen to the lizard brain, we don't get the internet.
	You know, we get to squirt or come into a river and hopefully fertilize some eggs that look like tiny eyeballs, but we don't get the internet, right?
	Yeah, that is true.
	But if we only listen to the monkey brain, we get exploited.
	We get talked in and out of shit by sociopaths, and we become serfs to their language, right?
	Right?
	But how exactly is it possible to even remotely balance it?
	You didn't.
	Did you just use the word exactly with me?
	Oh!
	Monkey brain!
	On the loose!
	I'm talking about balance and listening and you're saying, yes, but exactly, right?
	The exactly is...
	The monkey upgrade, right?
	I need precision!
	I need a roadmap.
	GPS! Don't give me any of your analogies, monkey man.
	Lizard man, right?
	What did Jim Morrison say?
	I am the lizard king.
	I can do anything.
	Just how I usually feel with my lizard brain is, it's very abstract, and I can't really tell what it's...
	In some cases, in some cases, I can't really tell what it's trying to tell me.
	Oh my god.
	This is the arrogance of the monkey upgrade, right?
	You know exactly what it's trying to tell you because you called in about just that, right?
	Yes.
	What is it trying to tell you?
	It's not even trying.
	It's telling you.
	You're having terrible dreams.
	You can't sleep.
	You're paranoid.
	What's it telling you?
	It's telling me that I'm completely in danger.
	Yes, it is.
	Yes, it is.
	It's not, well, I just don't know what it's trying to tell me, right?
	Other than rampant fear, terrible dreams, a feeling of paranoia, and constant insecurity, dread, and danger.
	I mean, who's supposed to decipher that?
	Well, right?
	It's saying that you're still in danger.
	Now, this doesn't mean run again, right?
	No, of course not.
	Because that's to promote the lizard brain to dictator.
	And the annoying thing is all the parts of the South must listen to each other for us to be at peace and for us to be safe and for us to be secure, right?
	Yeah.
	Well, if I'm not going to be dictator, who else is going to be dictator?
	No, no, no.
	Who's in charge in the free market?
	No one.
	Right?
	See, this is why the free market is so hard for most people to get.
	It's not intellectually.
	Emotionally.
	Because a free market, no one's in charge.
	Well, Walmart is in charge.
	No, no.
	In a free market, Walmart is dependent on the customers.
	Oh, so you're saying the customer is in charge.
	No, no.
	Because the customer also has his own customers, who is his boss or whoever he's selling his own services to, right?
	And the customer can't order Walmart around, right?
	Everyone's just – it's so annoying to people.
	It's like, well, who's in charge?
	And this is why when you talk about anarchy, who's in charge?
	Who gets the rapist?
	Who's in charge?
	Who's the final lawgiver?
	Who's the final court of appeal after which there is no court of appeal?
	Who's the dictator?
	Who's in charge?
	Who's running things?
	All they're saying is that they do not have any form of democracy in their heart.
	They don't have any form of negotiation in their heart.
	If you say to people there should be no central ruler in society, what they hear is, I can no longer boss around myself.
	If there's no external abuser called the state, people understand that in their heart of hearts to say, I can no longer self-abuse.
	But if I'm not going to self-abuse, what the fuck am I going to do?
	If I'm not ordering myself around, put down that cheesecake.
	Go and exercise.
	Get up.
	Go to work.
	Stop smoking.
	Stop drinking.
	Be attracted to this person.
	Don't be attracted to that person.
	Make more money.
	Be happy.
	Be satisfied.
	Be happy with what you've got.
	Get up.
	Go to work again.
	Get a new car!
	Right?
	People, they don't...
	What does it mean to live if you're not giving orders to yourself?
	Right?
	Yeah.
	It does feel a bit uncontrollable.
	It does feel a bit uncontrollable.
	I'm sorry.
	I don't know what to say sometimes.
	No, it feels like anarchy.
	Yeah, it is.
	Oh my god!
	If I'm not ordering myself around...
	I'm going to go set fire to kittens!
	And I'm going to burn down schools!
	You know, I mean, my God!
	If I'm not just...
	Shut up!
	Do this!
	Do that!
	Get up!
	Go to sleep!
	Get up!
	Stop doing this!
	Stop doing that!
	Go do that!
	You've watched too much TV! Get up!
	Go away!
	I mean, if I'm not ordering myself around, who am I? Right?
	Right.
	Who am I without orders?
	And you...
	Stop giving me bad dreams!
	Let me sleep!
	You're telling me the wrong things!
	This is not helpful!
	I'm free!
	I'm safe!
	I'm here!
	It's a country away!
	It's all in the past!
	Stop it!
	it, right?
	Yeah, I've been Yeah, exactly.
	I've been trying to...
	I used the word again, I'm sorry.
	I've been trying to order myself what to do every day.
	Every day since I came here.
	It never worked out.
	It was more or less the opposite.
	Sure.
	Sure.
	Yeah, because, you know, the war on drugs works out so well, right?
	Remember how we have these rules say, immigrants can't come into the country?
	Yeah.
	I mean, people have the entire example of how the state doesn't work when you order people around.
	And yet, somehow they think it'll work in their own heart.
	People are like, the libertarians do this, right?
	I don't want to take orders from the government.
	I want to take orders from Jesus.
	I don't think you really get this yet, right?
	Who are we if...
	And this is why I keep saying, and I've said this for years, I'm not going to tell people what to do, and philosophy is not about taking orders or obeying abstractions.
	Right?
	Yeah.
	It's about thinking for yourself and listening to all parts of you.
	All parts of you that talk are trying to help.
	And the degree to which they seem discordant is the degree to which they're inconvenient to abusers, right?
	Everything in us, the society as a whole, is generally horribly abusive.
	I mean, lots of bad parents, lots of bad religion, lots of shitty schools, lots of bad peer relationships among kids, lots of bullying, right?
	All that kind of stuff.
	And so every part of us that is discordant is only discordant because it inconveniences the abusers.
	What would it be like to live in a world without orders?
	And that doesn't mean orders external.
	It means orders internal.
	I mean, I had a day off today.
	Shocking.
	You know, for four hours, I was home and nobody was here but me.
	And I was like, man, I should get some work done.
	Oh, I've got this presentation record.
	Oh, I got that.
	And you know what I said?
	Do I want to?
	Do we want to?
	Do we really want to?
	Been parenting pretty much solid for five and a half years, you know, working like crazy on FDR. Fuck, the year I had cancer, I did 300 shows, for Christ's sake.
	In fact, I actually went that far to actually schedule everything into my calendar.
	I actually had a schedule, went to sleep, went to have breakfast, went to get ready, clothes, all of that stuff.
	You're in a Goebbels.
	This is when we arise!
	This is when we brush our teeth for this many minutes and not one minute more!
	Or less!
	I will give you 4.3 minutes to masturbate!
	But I get to watch.
	Through one monocle!
	Do not squirt anything on the monocle.
	Yeah, kind of that way.
	Kind of that way.
	Obviously it didn't work.
	It doesn't.
	No, it doesn't work, of course.
	And today, I did virtually nothing.
	It was lovely.
	Yeah, I should try this myself as well.
	It was lovely.
	You know what I'm going to do tomorrow?
	What?
	I don't know.
	Might be nothing.
	Might be something.
	Right, but I'm...
	I'm not going to do something because I think I must.
	I mean, there are a lot of have-tos.
	You know, I mean, my daughter needs food.
	It's not a, oh, next week.
	She'll be fine, you know.
	So, yeah.
	I think also what the financial work came upon, because if I look actually at my bank account, it's Not really empty.
	I actually also donate to Free Domain Radio.
	So, it is...
	Oh, sorry.
	Did you say you donate to Free Domain Radio?
	Yeah.
	Okay, please stop doing that until you have done lots of therapy.
	No, if you do the favor to me.
	But anyway, go ahead.
	No, I mean, what a way for...
	The financial ways, where they came from.
	Yeah, I had these financial worries.
	Just if I think about it, I do have clients.
	I do have work coming in.
	My bank account is not really that empty.
	So I would actually have money for therapy.
	I appreciate that.
	The offer stands.
	If there's financial concerns between you and therapy, just give us a call.
	We'll pay.
	I just want to reiterate that.
	Don't not go to therapy.
	It would make me extremely happy if you took me up on the offer.
	No, I mean, I will certainly go to therapy.
	I mean, I actually also wanted to help out a bit with Free Domain Radio.
	I'm not sure if my emails ever came on.
	Well, no, I appreciate that.
	I mean, you sound kind of overscheduled at the moment.
	You know, working on your own business.
	You're part of a startup.
	Well, my own business is basically a...
	You're going to be going to therapy and you're going to need time for that.
	So I appreciate that.
	And we'll definitely...
	Look, you're smart enough to do a great job here.
	I have no doubt about that.
	So keep us in mind.
	But right now, I think that trying to get some sleep into your brain would be maybe a little bit more...
	Yeah, I'll go to bed after this call immediately.
	I mean...
	Right.
	Yeah.
	But yeah, listen, I mean, we could talk all night, and I want to get one more call in, but the important thing is you're not alone.
	Like, there are people out here who get it, who understand.
	And I think it's this community, which is, I think, just fantastic stuff.
	But you're not alone.
	Don't isolate yourself.
	There are lots of people here who will help and get into therapy, like tomorrow, call around.
	And tell people you're broke.
	Therapists are pretty understanding.
	They'll cut you a break, and I couldn't urge you to do that more strongly.
	Thank you.
	Thank you very much.
	You're very welcome.
	You'll keep us posted, right?
	Oh, I will.
	I certainly will.
	Fantastic.
	Get some sleep, man, okay?
	Got it.
	Lots of love.
	I mean that.
	Lots of love.
	Good job.
	Good job.
	And we'll talk to you soon, okay?
	Talk to you soon.
	Thanks.
	All right.
	Thanks for coming.
	Mike, you going to follow up with this guy?
	Absolutely.
	Keep on him.
	Expect the emails, Ricardo.
	Expect them.
	Yeah.
	Spam stops us, not at all!
	I will be the external Goebbels.
	No, I'm kidding.
	Alright, up next is Charles.
	And Charles wrote in and said, over the past six months, I've participated in the family court system trying to get custody of my child.
	As of last week, I decided to agree to the demands of the mother and the child we were both responsible for in the original petition and that being primarily sole custody on her behalf.
	Do you have any suggestions about how – Sole custody on the mom's behalf?
	Yes.
	Do you have any suggestions as to how I can still participate in my child's life outside of this process?
	Wow.
	Thank you.
	Well, I'm sorry about this.
	How did it end up, and I know I can imagine it's a pretty lengthy story, but how did it end up with your ex-wife getting sole custody?
	We were never married.
	At the end of this May, I had stood up in court and I said I didn't want to see him anymore to the judge.
	And that was the end of the process.
	And I chose to do that Because I was served a motion for mental health evaluation and I'm a former combat veteran from the Marine Corps and was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder through the military and I was kind of a little spooked out to be evaluated for my mental
	health on Charges that weren't substantiated by any other evidence solely than her requesting a mental health evaluation.
	Right.
	And is it one kid?
	One child.
	He's three years old.
	And what happened with your relationship with the mom?
	We met in...
	Things moved.
	We met in January of 2011.
	We moved in together in August.
	She got pregnant in October and it was a lustful relationship and there was no foundation for any sort of effective negotiating.
	And this is, I feel, the culmination of You know, having a poor relationship foundation.
	Does that answer the question?
	Right.
	So, you know, as they say, young, dumb, and full of cum, right?
	You just wanted to get laid.
	She was, like, sexy and...
	I'm not calling you dumb.
	I'm just saying that's the cliché, right?
	Oh, absolutely.
	Unthinking, I guess you could say, right?
	Absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	I had pride for that.
	I had...
	I was in the military for four years and then I got out in November of 2007 and I went and lived with my sister in Germany.
	She was also in the military while her husband was deployed to help watch their child.
	And then when I finally got home back to the States, I had run into her and she was very alluring and she was somebody outside of social circles I'd normally...
	I'm in, so...
	Yeah, it was very, very lustful.
	It was something very appealing, I guess, something different.
	Not too much thought.
	And how crazy is she, in general?
	She lacks any...
	One example I would give you is that she was driving around her car when I met her.
	Uninsured and had expired plates on it.
	I basically went through that whole process for her.
	I turned into her personal secretary of sorts because she just couldn't do it.
	She just was shut down at the site of the paperwork or something like that.
	Every sort of conversation was very She would just wall off.
	I don't know if that particularly makes sense, but the conversation just wouldn't go anywhere.
	It was absolutely wild.
	I was met with very negativity, bringing up new music.
	We both shared a passion for music.
	Introduction of new music as recent as last year was kind of met with, it's kind of dumb and I don't really want to listen to that.
	We'd kind of be stuck with the classic stuff.
	Never could get out of the classic stuff, really.
	Prisoner to Bob Dylan.
	What happened?
	How long have you been separated?
	Since last February.
	Okay.
	And it's taken that long, right?
	So she's got sole custody now.
	Does that mean you don't have any visitation rights?
	It was at her discretion.
	And that's how the judge had left it after I said I didn't want to see him anymore.
	So he said it was at the plaintiff's discretion.
	And I had asked her if I could see him sometimes.
	And she said, no, not until you see my therapist and get evaluated.
	That was her.
	Right.
	And so when was the last time you saw your son?
	The third week of May.
	Wow.
	And are you scheduled to see him anytime soon?
	No.
	I recently hired a lawyer and got reopening the case.
	I had originally represented myself pro se in the process.
	Right.
	Right.
	So, I mean, this could take forever and who knows how much money, right?
	Yes.
	And of course, I mean, you know all this, but of course every day that goes by, your son knows you less and less and remembers you maybe a little less.
	I'm so sorry.
	I mean, that's just a horrifying, horrifying situation.
	And I just really want to express incredibly deep sorrow for that, that this is the situation that you're in.
	Thank you.
	Was there any reason that the judge gave as to why he was granting his sole custody?
	Was it based on your evaluation or was it basically just, oh, you know, screw you.
	If you don't want to talk to me, I'm going to punish you for it, right?
	No, I had agreed.
	We had been to court three times and the fourth time I told her I would agree to her wanting sole custody to stop the process.
	However, she turned around and said that I was mentally unstable for granting sole custody and had those motions filed.
	But because I said I didn't want to see them anymore, the judge put those motions away, or I don't know what the proper term is.
	So in order to make the whole thing stop, I said, I'm sorry, I don't know if I answered your question.
	I'm sorry, and I just want to make sure that I understand what you're saying.
	So when you said you didn't want to see him anymore, do you mean – you meant the judge or your son?
	No, no.
	I meant my son, but I – yeah, I said I didn't want to see him anymore in reference to my son.
	I said that in the courtroom.
	And that was so that you would end the process of the family court?
	Yes.
	Right.
	And what was the plan behind that?
	Tell me that thinking process or was that just frustration?
	It was frustration.
	Again, I was really nervous.
	I was absolutely petrified of the motion I received for the mental health evaluation because I didn't know.
	I didn't know what that entailed or what the repercussions or something like that would be.
	So I was like, this is getting pretty serious to where I didn't think it was going to go to.
	I don't know.
	That was the only thing I thought to do.
	It was definitely a poor choice.
	I don't know.
	Yeah, I mean, it sounds to me like, I mean, if you can talk to a lawyer and find any way to sort of reopen that, I don't know if, I mean, are you still paying child support?
	Yes, I'm paying child support.
	It gets garnished.
	Right, so, yeah, I mean, obviously I'm no lawyer, so I don't know, but I mean, if you can get a lawyer to reopen that, I don't know how easy it is to get custody out of A woman's hands in the court system, I don't imagine it's particularly easy, but then what do I know?
	But I certainly think talking to a lawyer, it's tough.
	I mean, if she's dead set on you not seeing the kid, I mean, the stories that I've heard is that even if the judge says, okay, you get her 50% of the time, if the woman doesn't comply, what does anyone do?
	Does they go and arrest the woman?
	I mean, it doesn't seem to happen very much.
	So noncompliance, even with court orders, seems to be not...
	Hugely common.
	So I certainly, of course, wish you the very best, but I mean, how are you doing emotionally with all this stuff?
	Terrible.
	Terrible.
	Tell me about that.
	Just very anxious.
	And just from reading and listening to your shows, just the lack of a father figure in the child's life, the repercussions of that are So detrimental.
	And then Daddy's three.
	He has two more years of developing.
	I didn't want to miss that.
	I had spent quite a bit of time.
	We spent three days a week together every week leading up to that.
	And, you know, I felt exhausted almost.
	Kind of like I was trying to sprint a marathon or those type of things.
	Anything else?
	How's your sleep?
	How's your heart?
	Just frustrated.
	I don't feel overly motivated.
	I feel very easily overwhelmed.
	I don't get much done.
	I feel like I have too much sense of direction.
	I kind of feel lost.
	Yeah, I mean, with such a big question up in the air, it's easy to feel like life's just on hold, right?
	Oh, absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	The other thing, too, was I didn't want to – whatever it was that had me think it was all right to say that in the courtroom, if I do get the opportunity to see him again, I didn't want to imprint that – I want to identify what it is I'm seeing.
	What it is I'm reacting to.
	Because I can't imagine.
	It's got to be some mental error.
	I just don't see the whole thing.
	I feel like I'm trying to look at one piece of a giant picture.
	I just can't see the whole thing.
	Does that make sense at all?
	I think a little bit.
	I mean, what do you think that your son's mom has told him about why you're not there?
	I don't know.
	I don't think she'd say anything.
	Sick or anything.
	I don't think she'd say something like that.
	I don't think she'd say anything derogatory to him.
	I think she'd just say...
	I don't know.
	Dad's not doing too well right now.
	I think she'd leave it at that.
	I don't know.
	That's what I think.
	I'd go with that.
	I think she said Dad isn't doing too well right now.
	What do you think would be the most honest thing she could say?
	That we...
	Can't communicate.
	We need to, you know, we need to work on communication.
	Mom and Dad have to work on their communication so that they don't royally fuck this up as much as they already have.
	No, I don't think that's it.
	No, I think you're being very kind.
	I mean, why did you end up in family court three times?
	Because she didn't want you seeing the kid, right?
	Yeah.
	Right?
	Is that right?
	Yeah, she wanted her original filing was for sole custody.
	Were you violent with her?
	No.
	Verbally abusive?
	We would get into yelling matches.
	Yeah, but I mean, that's That's the two to tango stuff.
	I would say things like, you're an asshole.
	I called a useless one time.
	Things like that.
	I called a useless, though.
	I get frustrated and just thought...
	No, I understand that, but it wasn't like you were beating her with a stick or something, right?
	Not good, right?
	But...
	No, absolutely not.
	So the reason that you were in family court is because she wanted sole custody and she wasn't willing to budge, right?
	It looks that way now, but I just didn't understand it because I had seen him three times a week all the way up until that point.
	Yeah, but what happened at that point?
	Did anything in particular happen at that point to change things?
	Just when I said I didn't want to see him anymore.
	Well, no, no, sorry.
	I'm getting confused here.
	Yeah.
	You were seeing him three days a week?
	Three days a week.
	Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.
	After you split up from the mom?
	After.
	But then why, if that was the arrangement, why were you back in family court?
	She wanted sole custody.
	She filed and got a lawyer because she didn't think we'd agree on schooling and where he would live because she had a Recently picked up a new boyfriend and so because she didn't think we would agree on those things, she hired a lawyer to get sole custody.
	I filed a miscellaneous petition for joint physical in response to that and that was her reasoning because we wouldn't agree on those.
	Okay, so the reason that you were in family court was because The mom wanted sole custody.
	Yes.
	Right.
	And the reason she wanted sole custody, what you're telling me, is because she had a new boyfriend.
	It wasn't anything that changed on your part.
	You didn't set fire to her car or something like that, right?
	No, absolutely not.
	So the only thing that changed was that she had...
	A new boyfriend and the new boyfriend might have wanted to move somewhere or the new boyfriend might have wanted a more integrated family situation for himself.
	Who knows, right?
	I mean, who knows?
	New guy comes into her life and then she now wants sole custody.
	So she basically wants to take your son away from you, right?
	Yeah.
	So isn't that the reason why your son is not in your life?
	Absolutely.
	So that's why I wanted to know, right?
	So when I asked what would be the most honest thing that she could say about why you're not there to her son, it would be like, well, mommy wanted you all to herself.
	You know, mommy took daddy to the police to tell him not to see you again unless it was okay with me or convenient to me, and that's why daddy's not here, right?
	She's saying that.
	Is she saying that?
	Absolutely not.
	I bet she's not.
	Absolutely not.
	I mean, the number of messages I get, and look, I know that there's two sides to every story and all that, but nonetheless, the number of messages I get, which is like, basically the mom chased me out of my kids' lives and then she spent the next five years poisoning them against me.
	Because when you're not in your son's life, he's going to miss you like crazy, right?
	Absolutely.
	And he's going to be saying, where's dad?
	Where's dad?
	Where's dad?
	And he's going to be bawling his eyes out sometimes.
	I mean, I hate to tell you, I'm sure this is not news to you, but this is obviously the situation, right?
	Absolutely.
	So when your son is bawling his eyes out and going to his mom, where's dad?
	I want to see dad.
	Where's dad?
	I want to see dad, right?
	What's the mom going to say?
	Is she going to say, well, I told him to go away?
	Okay.
	She's not going to say that, right?
	No.
	She's got the triple P as the custodial parent, right?
	And the triple P is the prime propaganda position.
	Right?
	Your son's dependent on her.
	She's got him 24-7, and whatever she says, he has to believe, because she's the primary caregiver, so she's in the prime propaganda position, right?
	And I am incredibly sorry for that situation.
	Now, again, I don't know.
	Obviously, I have no idea what she's saying.
	I'm telling you what I think is the most probable situation.
	And so she's basically most likely to be saying to your son either something overtly or covertly negative to you, right?
	Towards you or about you.
	So she's either going to be saying, oh, you know, daddy doesn't want to see you, right?
	She may say that.
	I don't know, right?
	Or she may be saying, you know, this sort of slow drip, softer poison of, well, you see...
	Daddy is going through some extreme difficulties.
	He's having trouble with his thinking.
	He's like, whatever it is, right?
	And that stuff's all pretty shitty for kids to hear too, right?
	But someone has to be responsible, right?
	Yeah.
	And that is a challenge that you're going to face, which I'm incredibly sorry for as well.
	That's a challenge you're going to face, even if you get what you want.
	Absolutely.
	Right?
	Because if you get what you want, let's say some miracle happens, right?
	And you get relatively quick access to your son, right?
	Well, your son's going to say, Dad, why didn't I see you for so long?
	Yeah.
	What are you going to say?
	What would be the most honest thing to say?
	Would be to say, Mom said, no, Mom would have had me thrown in jail if I tried to see you.
	Thank you.
	Right?
	Yeah.
	I mean, am I wrong?
	Isn't that...
	What would have happened?
	I have no idea.
	I have no idea what would have happened.
	Of course you have an idea.
	What happens if you try to see your son when you don't have custody?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, no.
	Just thrown in jail.
	You're a stalker, right?
	Off you go.
	Violating something.
	You know, you're stalking, you're whatever, right?
	You're trespassing, right?
	Absolutely.
	It's the mother of your child, and it's your child.
	But you're trespassing, and you do that one too many times, and you're off to jail, right?
	So the most honest thing is that, well, mommy said that she'd have me thrown in jail if I saw you.
	How's that going to go, Dan?
	Oh, geez.
	Absolutely terrible.
	Right.
	It's going to contradict everything that she told him.
	Right.
	And then you can't ask him to keep a secret, so then he's going to go to his mom and say, well, dad says that you were going to have him thrown in jail if he saw me.
	Right?
	And then what happens?
	Well, the propaganda starts to spin.
	Well, yeah, and, you know, maybe you get a visit from the new boyfriend who might be a rather large individual.
	I mean, obviously you're ex-military, you can take care of yourself, but, you know, the shit hits the fan, right?
	Yeah.
	So, you are then in the situation of, well, do I pretend it was my fault that I haven't seen you?
	Or do I tell the truth?
	Do I say to my son, I was an asshole for not seeing you?
	Or do I say to my son, your mother was a bitch for not letting me see you?
	This is the living hell that...
	Sorry, go ahead.
	Oh, I'm sorry.
	I just...
	I feel like either one of them...
	To...
	To pass that, like, is that...
	That'd be like throwing hot rocks at him, ain't it?
	Oh, yeah.
	Listen, I mean, there's no easy answer to this, right?
	Yeah.
	There's no easy answer to this at all.
	And I'm not trying to make you feel worse, right?
	Oh, no, no.
	I'm trying to just sort of give you the reality, right?
	Absolutely.
	Because what you want so much is to see your son, right?
	I mean, I get that.
	I mean, you'd walk through fire, you'd bear any price, carry any burden to get to see your son, right?
	But I need you to be realistic about what's going on, right?
	Right.
	Because he's now the son who's most likely been lied to about you.
	Right.
	And if you try and set him straight on those lies, your life is going to get pretty complicated pretty quickly, right?
	Absolutely.
	Probably more emotions and more...
	More family court stuff, I'd imagine.
	Well, the person...
	Yeah, if your son has been propagandized, then...
	I mean, this is the kind of living hell that dads get into, and obviously moms sometimes too, but the vast majority of it is dads.
	This is the living hell that dads get into, right?
	This is one of the reasons why I think my dad and I could really never talk.
	You know, I had this basic question, which is, where did you go?
	Why did you go?
	What the hell could he say?
	Would you want to know?
	Either he was fine leaving, or thought that was fine, in which case, well, not good, right?
	Or he wanted to stay, but my mom drove him away.
	Yeah.
	But she's the one I've got to go back and live with, right?
	Right.
	So what then?
	I couldn't ever find a way to sort of solve that or deal with that.
	Right.
	So, I don't know.
	I don't know.
	Do you think, I guess, when did you break up at the moment?
	Was it, I can't remember the exact date.
	Last February.
	Okay, so, yeah, so it's been a while, right?
	It has been.
	And yeah, do you ever think of dating again?
	No, I have to figure this out first before I do anything like that.
	I don't even think I possess enough self-knowledge.
	Oh, hello?
	Yeah.
	Then to find a woman whose desires to participate in that.
	I think I have to repair that relationship with my son first before I do anything like that.
	Yes, but this is what I'm asking, which is how.
	How?
	How?
	How.
	Right?
	Your wife's going in the prime propaganda position.
	Right, right.
	How?
	To be...
	Because, look, one of you has to go under the bus, right?
	You haven't seen your son for a while, and it's going to be a while until you see him again, right?
	Right.
	So it might be six months, it might be a year, it might be less, it might be more, right?
	Right.
	Someone has to go under the bus.
	Because that's, a kid's not going to, right?
	You understand, right?
	You may have been six to twelve months without seeing your son, if you're lucky, right?
	Right.
	So, the reality is, and this is, I mean, obviously this is important for you, but it's important for other people out there.
	Like, if you're going to break up and you've got kids, right?
	At this point, someone has to go under the bus, right?
	Yeah.
	Now, it probably ain't going to be your wife, right?
	Oh, sorry, the mom of your kid, right?
	Right, right, right.
	And so that means, are you going to take that bullet and say, well, I had confusion, I had whatever, right?
	Are you going to lie?
	And look, there's times when you lie to kids, it's fine, right?
	Stuff they don't want to know about or shouldn't know about.
	But are you going to take that bullet, right?
	Are you going to be like, well, you know, daddy got confused, daddy had some work to do, daddy was right?
	Because if you make it not so bad, then it's going to be confusing to him as to why you didn't see him.
	But if you make it really bad, then it's going to be alarming to him, right?
	Right.
	So, yeah, right.
	If I try to take the blame for it, I'm validating his awareness of me not being there.
	I'm almost making light of it, because he's completely aware of me not being there.
	Yeah, if you say, well, you know...
	Daddy had some hobbies to attend to.
	It'd be like, what, I'm less important than your hobbies?
	Yeah, that's terrible.
	Right, but then if you say, well, you know, I was beamed up by space aliens and probed with flashlights for, you know, six months, he's going to kind of freak out, right?
	So the better reason you have for not seeing him, the more difficult it's going to be for him.
	But then if you don't give him a good reason for not seeing him, it's going to be difficult for him too, right?
	Absolutely.
	Can that reason be constructive?
	Is to throw the mother under the bus almost like pulling the pin on a grenade and sending them back to his mother's house?
	Well, I'm a big one for the truth, which I'm sure is no shock to you.
	No, absolutely.
	So, I mean, when I say someone's got to go under the bus, it's not like equal, right?
	She pulled the pin on the grenade, right?
	The question is who jumps on top of it, right?
	Well, she pulled the pin, right?
	Right.
	She brought in the family court.
	She went for sole custody with no violence, with no abuse to the child, with no, right?
	So she pulled the state into your family, right?
	Absolutely.
	And you were the one who was facing jail time for seeing your son, not her, right?
	That's correct.
	So, in terms of who goes under the bus, well, logically and reasonably it should be the mom, right?
	Because she's the one who pulled the pin on this grenade, right?
	Absolutely.
	However, you know, there's what's true and there's what's ideal, and then there's the reality of the system we live under, right?
	Yes.
	And so, I think that what I would say, I'm trying to sort of think, you know, like a four-year-old boy.
	I can tell you what I think I would say, and hopefully this will be helpful, right?
	Which is something like this.
	You know, Dad, why didn't I see you for so long?
	I would say, it is the biggest heartbreak of my life.
	It is the thing that has made me the saddest.
	I have thought about you morning, noon and night for the last year.
	I wanted to see you morning, noon and night for the last year.
	You were the face I thought of when I went to sleep and the heart I thought of when I woke up.
	I thought of you while I was brushing my teeth.
	I thought of you while I was showering.
	I thought of you while I was vacuuming.
	I thought of you while I was cooking my food.
	Now, I haven't seen you.
	And I don't know what mom has said.
	And I don't want to know.
	Right?
	Because you know me and mom not always getting along so well.
	I will tell you that I really, really wanted to see you.
	I will also tell you There were really good reasons why I couldn't.
	It wasn't because I didn't want to.
	I wanted to so much.
	My eyeballs ached.
	I wanted to see you so much.
	There were important and good reasons why I couldn't see you.
	It wasn't that I didn't want to.
	I couldn't see you.
	And when you get bigger...
	I will explain those to you and I will let you ask every question of me and I will tell you everything as honestly as I can.
	But right now I need to ask you to trust me when I tell you I wanted to, I couldn't.
	And I'm working to fix that as much and as strongly as I possibly can.
	And I'm working night and day to make sure that I can see you.
	I couldn't see you.
	I desperately wanted to see you.
	I'm working my very best to see you as much as we can.
	And I know it's a terrible thing that I can't tell you why.
	Which means you've got to do your best to trust me on this.
	And then I would ask him what he thought of that.
	Absolutely.
	What do you think?
	It's beautiful.
	It's all true, right?
	Yeah.
	Respects where he's at and leaves the door open for further.
	Well, it gets the important information across to him, which is that you really wanted to and you couldn't.
	Right.
	And you could also ask him not to ask his mom why, right?
	Right, right, right.
	And you got this recorded, right?
	You can listen to this again.
	But I think that gets him your love, that gets him why you couldn't get there, but without putting anyone under the bus, even though somebody should be, it's not going to be productive, right?
	Right, right.
	Definitely not.
	Definitely not.
	And all of that's true.
	You can't say why, but I get that you really, really want to see him.
	Yeah, you have to.
	Absolutely.
	But yeah, you don't want to poke the dragon, right?
	No, no.
	As far as that goes, I'm really at a loss as far as how to approach that.
	Because just from trying to play back what I'm saying about Talking about this situation, it really seems like I'm not being realistic about what's going on.
	So I don't think I'm seeing her realistically in my mind.
	I almost feel like my eyes see her as a bent stick in the water, like that optical illusion.
	You mean the mom?
	The mom.
	Yeah.
	So I feel like that's the way I see her.
	Look, moms have no right to keep Right.
	It's incredibly destructive to keep a non-abusive father from children, particularly fathers and sons.
	It is unholy.
	It is incredibly destructive.
	It is selfish.
	It is monstrous.
	And she will pay.
	She will pay for that in the long run.
	Yes.
	And, you know, I'm certainly working my ass off to make sure bad people get theirs, right?
	Absolutely.
	So, it is incredibly destructive, what she has done, and we don't, I mean, nobody knows, except her and maybe her boyfriend and your son, the degree to which she may have poisoned the well with regards to you.
	Yeah.
	But she's given him some reason.
	As to why you're not there, and I would not put one thin dime on her taking any responsibility for that.
	Right.
	Right?
	And, I mean, this just could be my experience of women, so this is all purely subjective, and this is just my thoughts and feelings.
	Right.
	But in my experience, men have a part of themselves that says, wait a minute, what are you doing?
	Not all men, obviously, right?
	Right, right.
	But women have this thing where they get into this mode and no part of them ever jumps them out of that mode.
	No part of them ever says, what am I doing?
	I can understand you get angry.
	You're like, oh, I get so angry.
	I never want to have that guy in my life again, right?
	Right.
	I never want to have that guy.
	I don't want him around my kid, right?
	People get angry.
	They get frustrated or whatever, right?
	And then, you know, you shake your head and you say, well, yeah, but I mean, of course, I voluntarily chose to have sex with the guy.
	We've got a kid.
	I have my issues with him, but the kid needs a father, right?
	Yeah.
	Now, that first part happens to everyone.
	That second part doesn't seem to happen quite as much for women, right?
	Yeah.
	Like they just, yeah, I'm going to take him to court.
	Yeah, I'm in the right.
	Yes, this self-righteousness and this blindness to consequences and this ability to hold on to a grudge, to hold on, to nurse a grudge until it grows a beard and dies of old age, right?
	Yeah.
	And that's something to, again, this is not, you know, my wife is not like that.
	My daughter is not like that.
	My female friends are not like that.
	But it's something that I've noticed that That I sort of caution men about, you know?
	There used to be a statement which said, Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, right?
	Which is, when women get mad, they really tend to stay mad.
	Yeah.
	Like, they don't sort of sit there and, like, I sort of made this joke the other day about a woman apologizing, right?
	In one of my movie reviews.
	And it's really not hugely common.
	Not hugely common.
	And so the female anger becomes like physics.
	It's not like a mood that you sort of, you know, like you wake up the next day and it's like, oh man, what did I say?
	It becomes like physics.
	It's just something you just have to take for granted.
	Absolutely.
	And, you know...
	To be fair, I want to put the caveats in, right?
	I mean, yeah, men are like this too, and we got drunken men and jerky men and abusive men and so on.
	But in my experience, and this is particularly true with the court system, I mean, I heard a few snippets from my dad about what it was like to live with my mom.
	My mom was still trying to sue my dad when I was in my teens.
	And she never, ever wants...
	To my knowledge, and I was around a lot, but she never once sort of shook her head and say, well, wait a minute, this was a long time ago and this kind of stuff, right?
	Yeah.
	A woman just gets into a train track and then it's not even a train track, it's just physics.
	Absolutely.
	Yeah, go ahead.
	No, I thought I was stopping.
	I thought I was putting an end to it when I agreed.
	I thought if I threw my hands up, that'd be, you know, it'd be like, all right, you got what you want, and can we put an end to it?
	And that wasn't enough for it either.
	Right, no, it's not.
	It's not.
	I don't know why, and again, this is just my personal experience, but I think my wife is probably one of the first women I've ever met who apologizes.
	And my daughter is great at apologizing too.
	I'm great at apologizing.
	But it's incredibly rare.
	I mean, it's rare.
	And don't get me wrong.
	Maybe it's 51-49 and maybe it's purely illusory.
	I'm just telling you my sort of thoughts and experience.
	But the relentlessness of a woman's upset is something I can't possibly imagine sustaining for that long.
	I can't stay mad that long.
	I get angry for sure.
	I just, I can't.
	I just – I can't stay angry and I can't stay self-righteous even sort of when I feel like wronged or hard done by and get self-righteous.
	I just can't sustain that and I've just – I've known slightly more women than men who are able to do it.
	In fact, quite a few more women than men who are just like, I'm wronged and I'm angry and it's just – this is the way – and it's just like, fuck, that's it.
	You're fucked now, right?
	It's just not going to change.
	Hmm.
	Is there any-- Oh, sorry.
	No, go ahead.
	No, no, no.
	Is there any way, or I guess, how can I, not how, but I've got to find a way to communicate that model, some sort of, I just don't want to, I don't want to have him Take that as a truth with him.
	Take what as a truth?
	The lack of community, the inability to communicate, the...
	What is a truth?
	Maybe not truth, but give him the tools to understand it.
	With you and his mom?
	Yes.
	What?
	Yeah, you know, honestly, if I were in your shoes, I would not focus on having my son understand my relationship with his mom.
	Right.
	Right.
	Your relationship with your son is the focus.
	Right.
	Right.
	You want to be as present and as connected and as there for your son as you can be.
	And the problem is, of course, if you have a really dysfunctional parent, then the more functional parent...
	Is innately provocative, right?
	So if you're a really great listener and you are a peaceful parent and so on and you don't spank, don't yell, don't whatever, punish kind of stuff, then he's going to be more and more drawn towards you, right?
	And he's going to be more and more recoiling from his mom and her boy toy, right?
	Right.
	So the better parent you are, if there's a dysfunctional parent around, the better parent you are, the more you're going to In sight, the mom, right?
	Right.
	So it gets really complicated.
	Because what if he's crying and says, well, I want to be with dad, or dad doesn't yell at me, or dad doesn't hit me, or dad doesn't make me sit in timeouts for 20 minutes, or, you know, whatever, right?
	Right, right.
	What's the mom going to say?
	How's she going to feel, and what's she going to do?
	Oh my goodness, I can't imagine.
	Is she going to say, wow, I guess I'm going to call them up and learn how to be a better parent?
	Absolutely not.
	No.
	If she's stuck in the resentment train, then that track only goes round and round, right?
	Yes.
	And there's not a lot of people.
	Again, I don't just blame women for this because there's not a lot of people who sit down with a woman and say, okay, lady, come on.
	What are you doing?
	Like, what's the matter with you?
	You sold custody?
	Come on.
	Well, he said he didn't want to see him again.
	Look, you took him to court three times.
	He's a vet.
	He's got stress from combat deployment.
	I mean, give me a break.
	What are you doing?
	You chose to have a child with this guy, right?
	He's paying child support.
	Why is he not in his son's life?
	No, come on.
	You need to stop this, right?
	How many people sit down with women and try to put the brakes on the resentment train, right?
	Try to get them to jump the tracks of self-pity and self-righteousness and anger and all that, right?
	Well, not a lot because a lot of women are the same way and a lot of men were raised by women like that and pretty terrified to do it, right?
	Right.
	Because I think if men were to do that and bring women up short that way – and again, I wish women would have done that to men who were jerks too, right?
	But is she going to have people around who are going to intervene?
	Well, probably not because they're going to get that if they try to intervene, she might just dump them out of their life, her life, right?
	Right.
	Oh, wow.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	And the reason I'm saying all of this is this is all stuff to mull over as you move forward and just don't, you know, when I get my son, everything's going to be, right?
	No, yeah, absolutely no.
	Great, right?
	I mean, it's a real challenge.
	Absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	The work.
	Not the work, but I mean...
	Do you have people you can talk to about all this?
	Um...
	Well, I thought I did, but I asked one of my friends to go with me to meet the core that day, and he said he wouldn't feel comfortable going, but then he kind of made love it, so I kind of crossed him off the close friends list, so as of now, no.
	Can you get any therapy from the VA or anything?
	I can't.
	I had been going.
	I had been seeing a therapist and the week before my court date I had sat down with this gentleman and I was taking my nursing final and I told him that I was going to spend the majority of my time putting together this binder of representation of letters and whatnot that I had to accumulate before this day and he told me that was a good idea so I kind of lost it.
	Faith in him.
	I don't think he saw the panicked look on my face.
	I didn't acknowledge that panicked flight or fight look on my face.
	That overwhelmed television look.
	Right.
	So I got very frustrated with that gentleman, the therapist at the VA. Kind of turned me off to it.
	Well, give it a, you know...
	Yeah, I need to go back to that.
	You know, just one bad Chinese meal, that doesn't mean you never go to another Chinese restaurant, right?
	No, absolutely.
	Yeah, I would definitely – I mean this is going to take some processing, right?
	Because the more you're surprised by this negative stuff which might come out, the more your frustration will boil over, right?
	So the reason why I'm going over all of this stuff with you, my friend, is because your frustration boiled over and you said, well, then I just won't see them, right?
	Right, right.
	Now, if you have this – if you're not aware of the landmines you're stepping into, right, then there's going to be a lot of clicks and you're going to be missing a lot of limbs, right?
	Absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	Because if you have realistic expectations about what you can do and what you can't do and you've prepared and all this going into this thorny situation, then you're going to be less likely to just suddenly boil over with frustration.
	If you know ahead of time, right?
	You don't go into combat saying, wait a minute, where's my fucking ice cream truck?
	You know in combat, not a lot of Mr.
	Freezy's floating around in case you get a little hot, right?
	So you're not pissed off about that, right?
	Wait a minute.
	I'm so sorry.
	The napkin is blowing away from my five-star meal out here in the fucking desert with bullets flying around.
	You have realistic expectations around combat, right?
	So you're not constantly frustrated.
	Well, this is a kind of complicated, could-be-combat-y situation going in.
	I don't want you to be like, oh my god, I'm so focused on getting my son.
	Once I get my son, everything's going to be perfect.
	And it's like, then it's not, and it's difficult, and then you blow up again, right?
	And something bad happens, right?
	Absolutely.
	So that's my, you know, you're not going into ice cream truck territory.
	Bullets, yes.
	You know, shit flying off the walls, yes.
	You know, insurgents dressed as civilians, yes.
	Ice cream trucks, not so much, right?
	So I just, that's my sort of main goal with this conversation.
	Right.
	Have I been presenting it unrealistically?
	No.
	I think because you haven't been talking about...
	You haven't asked me, like, how do I overcome the challenge of what my wife has said about me and why I'm not there?
	Or what do you think she's been saying?
	Like, I think that you...
	I mean, your heart's broken and you want to see your son so bad it smells like cordite off of N16. Ooh, look at me with my butch metaphors.
	Anyway, but...
	Right, no, I get all of that.
	And, you know, I feel for you.
	I think that's...
	Incredibly difficult.
	But given what you were telling me about how you kind of boiled over with frustration and said, that's it, right?
	I just won't see him, right?
	Yeah.
	Then that is sort of my major concern that you go in with a clear-eyed view of what can be achieved but some of the difficulties that you might run into.
	Right, right.
	Wow And if the mom ever listens to this do you mind if I say something to him to her?
	Absolutely not.
	Alright.
	So I get that you're upset.
	I get that you're angry.
	I'm sure he had challenging aspects to be around and to be with.
	But...
	You all did make a kid together, and that kid is a real person.
	And that kid has needs that are much, they transcend, they're much bigger than any upset you might have with the dad, right?
	I mean, the son has needs, and in particular, he has needs for his dad.
	And I don't know if you grew up without a dad, I don't know if you grew up without a mom, but if there's a hole in the family portrait, that makes a hole in the child's heart.
	And the child will try and fill that hole with lots of bad behaviors.
	Like, you can kind of get away with it now, in a way, because he's three.
	But, you know, he's going to be 13 before you know it, and then 16, and then 20.
	And if he's got no dad around, and particularly if you're not telling him exactly why he has no dad around, which has something to do, I'm sure, with the dad being difficult, but mostly to do with you Basically having him thrown in jail if he tries to see his kid because he went for sole custody, right?
	And don't give me this, well, he said he didn't want to see the kid.
	I mean, you know, being on the receiving end of three rounds of family court.
	Like family court is a whole lot different for men than it is for women, right?
	It's a very female-friendly place, which is why, right, 85% of the custody goes...
	To women.
	And of the 15% that goes to men, like 5% or 10% of that is simply because the woman doesn't contest.
	She doesn't even bother, right?
	So basically, 19 out of 20 of the cases go to women.
	And so your experience as a woman, a female, very, very different, right?
	So the fact that he lost it and got upset, look, I mean, cut the guy some slack.
	I mean, he did fight for a cause and he went through a lot of stress and trauma.
	You know, and then stress and trauma with you, stress and trauma with family court, you know, it's okay, right?
	We can enlarge our heart to the point where we can forgive a mistake like that from a guy who's still, obviously, he's not saying, well, screw that family.
	I'm going to go off and make another one out of Play-Doh and electricity, right?
	So, you know, your son, dear lady, needs his father.
	And if you don't believe me, which is fine if you don't, just Google me.
	Fatherlessness, right?
	Effects on children.
	No father.
	Effects on children.
	You will see that you might as well have him start smoking Marlboros at the age of three.
	Like unfiltered Turkish rot your lungs in 12 seconds kind of stuff.
	It is incredibly dangerous and destructive for you to have...
	The father out of the boy's life.
	And you say, well, I've got a new boyfriend.
	Well, you do.
	And maybe he'll stay and maybe he won't.
	The last boyfriend you had an actual kid with, you couldn't hang on to.
	And so your son is going to need a stable caregiver in his life.
	This guy's willing to step up.
	This guy's willing to do that despite all difficulties and despite all obstacles.
	He's willing to pay good money.
	He's willing to spend time.
	He pays his child support.
	He's doing the thing that he needs to do.
	And...
	Yeah, you may be pissed at him.
	You may be frustrated with him.
	You may not want him in your life, right?
	Let's say that you're completely right about that.
	Maybe he's just a completely abrasive guy who regularly wipes his nose on his sleeve and wipes his ass on your best linen.
	I don't know, right?
	Let's just say.
	Okay, but he doesn't have to be in your life, right?
	Because it's not your needs that matter here fundamentally.
	Once you have a kid, you get this great luxury of not having any needs anymore fundamentally for quite a long time.
	And if you don't want to see the guy, right, the father, okay, he was fine to screw, but, you know, don't want to – okay, then you can figure that out, right?
	You can arrange third parties and governments will help you with that.
	Family court will have third parties to pick them off, drop them off.
	You don't even have to see each other, right?
	Hopefully, you can at least be civil for a drop-off and a pick-up.
	But it doesn't matter whether – no matter how mad you are.
	No matter how mad you are at the father of your child, you cannot take it out on the child.
	You cannot deny the child what he needs.
	That's like saying, well, I'm overweight so my child shouldn't eat.
	That makes no sense, right?
	Your child has a need for his father.
	And your frustration, your irritation, your anger...
	You back, Steph?
	You're back, yeah.
	We got Skyped again.
	Are you on, Charles?
	Oh yeah, sorry.
	So, your son's need for a father trumps your irritation at the father seven days a week and twice on Sundays.
	Right?
	To be a good parent, to be a responsible parent, means putting your own needs aside.
	I'm sure when you were breastfeeding, there were times when you really wanted to sleep.
	In fact, it was probably every day that you really wanted to sleep, but your baby needed to feed every three hours.
	So you put your own needs for sleep aside, and you...
	Fed your baby.
	And we all understand that.
	I mean, how do we feel about a mom who says, well, I went to go and spend 12 hours sleeping at a hotel because I just, you know, was feeling a little tired.
	And the baby's, you know, half dehydrated from whatever, right?
	I mean, we'd say that'd be pretty monstrous, right?
	Because the baby's needs trump your need for sleep.
	Baby's need for food trumps your need for sleep.
	Baby's need, child's need, toddler's need, teenager's need for father trumps your irritation.
	At that father.
	It just does.
	You have to act in the best interest of the child.
	That's what family court is supposed to be all about.
	That's a decision that you can make.
	What is in the best interest of the child is the child having a relationship with his father.
	And you may not believe me now and I hope that you will never have to believe me because the child has hit a teenage years and has gone off the rails and doesn't listen to you and doesn't respect you, is hanging with the wrong crowd, is drinking, smoking, doing drugs, having unprotected sex, doing Lord knows what.
	Because that's a pretty likely outcome in this kind of situation.
	Not all of them, but some combination.
	So there are times in life where we absolutely have to overcome our resentments.
	We absolutely have to overcome the stories we tell ourselves that keep us angry.
	And you can indulge your own anger at the father of your son For as long as you want.
	It's not going to do you much good, but it's only yourself that you're harming.
	But just like you didn't smoke when you were pregnant, even though you may have wanted to, just like you didn't drink when you were pregnant, even though you may have wanted to, you have to overcome this emotion and you have to refrain from punishing the son for the sins of the father, even if the sins are real, even if the sins are valid.
	You cannot punish the son for the sins of the father because when the son grows up everything I'm talking about now will be completely common knowledge and he will look at you with very clear and extremely critical eyes just as if you had been smoking and drinking and partying while pregnant with him even when people knew how bad it was he would look at you that way when he grew up and saw pictures of you doing all of that When he grows
	up and he becomes 14, 15, 16, this is more than 10 years away.
	This stuff has now been known for a long time, 20 or 30 years.
	It's really hitting the mainstream.
	And when your son grows up, he will realize the degree of immature harm you put him through in order to indulge your own anger and upset with his father.
	And I'm certainly going to keep pushing that information out.
	There are lots of far more competent people than I pushing this information out.
	And he will know how selfish you were if you don't overcome this.
	He will know the harm that you exposed him to by dragging the dad through family courts and keeping the dad away and maybe even lying about why the dad wasn't there.
	And he will...
	He will see all of that, and it might break his relationship with you, which I don't want.
	He needs his mom his whole life.
	He needs his dad his whole life.
	I mean, you guys got a couple of decades on the kid, and he's going to need you as he goes through life to help keep him safe and to help him make wise decisions.
	And if he grows up and he knows that you knowingly put him through significant harm, exposed him to significant risk, You refuse to rise above your own irritation with his father, and that if he knows that you robbed him of a father because you were upset with the father, that you allowed him to be punished for a choice you made.
	You made the choice to have a baby with this man.
	He did not make a choice to be born to you, that baby, or to his father.
	When he grows up, he's going to look at you and see the choices that you made very clearly.
	And there will be a massive amount of social knowledge and social understanding.
	And people saying, oh really?
	She did that?
	That is terrible.
	That is unforgivable.
	Because it will be.
	Because nobody has a second chance to go back and live life with a father they never had.
	All the developmental things, all the connections, all the conversations.
	Hell, learning how to shave, are you going to teach him that?
	Nobody ever has a chance to go back and live a childhood again.
	Ever.
	And if he grows up without a father, that will be irreparable and most likely unforgivable.
	And then you will look back and you will say, I can't believe I let all of my petty disagreements and frustrations and angers interfere not just with my son's relationship with his father, but my adult son's relationship with me, which might go up in a puff of smoke.
	So, you know what you need to do.
	You just need to do the right thing by your son.
	And you know that, but you probably just don't know it as clearly in this context as you need to.
	That's what I would like to say to her.
	Thank you.
	Thank you.
	All right.
	Is there anything else that's on your mind at the moment?
	Just thinking about how he's going to...
	what he's going to carry from it...
	I guess that's not for me to think about.
	Well, you know, you can have a huge amount of influence on that, right?
	Yeah, you can have a lot of influence on what he's going to carry out of it, for sure.
	Yeah, it'll be a lot of work to do.
	I gotta reset my way I'm seeing it.
	Good.
	Not look for the ice cream truck.
	Well, you know, you're an ex-soldier.
	I mean, when you know you've got stuff to do, what happens?
	You get it done.
	You go and get it done.
	You go and get it done.
	So, will you keep us posted about what happens with this?
	Absolutely.
	And I appreciate your time.
	You're welcome.
	You're welcome.
	And I appreciate your dedication to your son.
	He's a lucky guy.
	Could I just read you something real quick?
	Yeah, of course.
	It's from the Gay Science and Nietzsche's book.
	I just read this last paragraph.
	Thought about it.
	I felt it applied to you specifically, and it goes on.
	I'm still waiting for a philosophical position in the exceptional sense of the word, one who has to pursue the problem of the total health of the people, time racer of humanity, to muster the courage to push my suspicion to its limits and to risk the proposition.
	What was at stake in all this philosophizing?
	Hitherto was not at all truth, but something else.
	Let us say health, future, growth, power, and life.
	And I just want to thank you for everything you do.
	That's beautiful.
	I really appreciate that.
	Thank you so much.
	That's a wonderful, wonderful note to end on.
	And thank you, everybody, of course, so much for calling in.
	Sorry, Bali.
	But we will get to the standby caller next week.
	And have a wonderful week, everyone.
	I just feel incredibly honored.
	Always about the openness of people's hearts to feedback and to curiosity.
	It's a beautiful place to be, to see this gorgeous landscape of well-lit human tapestries of hope and pain and fear and joy.
	And let's keep the conversation going as long as we can.
	This is Stefan Molyneux for Free Domain Radio and FDRURL.com slash donate.

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