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July 13, 2019 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:13:21
1 Secret to Unlocking Ambition
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Good evening!
Hope you're doing well.
It's Stefan Molyneux.
Welcome to your Saturday Night Mashup Philosophy Borg Brain Conversation.
Hope you're doing well.
Nothing major to report.
Thank you to the Bitcoin Conference who had me in yelling at their audience.
They decided to have me in remotely because halitosis.
I can't remember what they meant.
But anyway, so that'll be up soon.
And I don't have a huge amount of news and weather to report other than the show is doing well and now is the time To support your friendly neighborhood local philosophy show, you know, at the rate we're doing shows, we might do 70 million shows a year.
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So I hope that you will do what you can to help spread the value of critical thinking forehead worship and allegiance to the mothership.
So hope you're having a wonderful week.
Let's move straight on to the callers.
Oh, that's right.
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Let's move on to the callers.
All right, up first today is Presley.
And Presley wrote in and said, I suffered through an abusive childhood and feel very angry at my stepfather for what I endured, but not my mother.
Why do I have a problem placing the same level of responsibility for my childhood on my mother as I do my stepfather?
Ah, the answer would be ovaries!
The answer would be ovaries.
Listen, let me first of all say I'm incredibly sorry for your I want to sort of say that in all seriousness up front.
But I also want to tell you, you are not the only man who has trouble pinning moral responsibility on a woman.
Sometimes it's like pin the tail on the donkey when the donkey is actually orbiting a suborbital moon on Alpha Centauri.
So, you are not the only person who has trouble pinning moral responsibility on women.
Women can get away with claiming that they got pregnant and had a child, and it wasn't their fault.
Other than one M Magdalene, I'm not sure that that can really be conceived of as plausible by anyone.
But women can claim to be victims of actions they themselves take.
And for various biological reasons, we've gone into a number of times in the show that they get away with it.
So do you want to give me a little bit more Details about what happened, what you're angry about?
Well, you know, growing up, my stepdad, he was an explosive yeller and he really, I never really got to speak to him very much growing up.
You know, it was kind of crazy how I lived in the same house with him, but we would literally go months and he wouldn't say a word to me.
And the only time I would ever really hear from him was if I got a bad report card, which I got often, or if I did something and I got in trouble, he would get really angry with me and I'd get either a spanking or yelled at or something like that.
And I remember just growing up and being very afraid of him.
really afraid to go down the hallway and go to my room.
I would be really trying to, trying to look and see if he'd be looking my way down the hallway and see me.
I would try to avoid him and, you know, duck him to see if I can run past his room and get to my room because I would be so afraid of him.
And, you know, I just, you know, I never really had a close relationship with him.
Apparently I had, you know, they tell me that, you know, I was really kind of close to him when I was I was really, really young before I remember much, but I guess that's just kind of, you know, the innocence of a child not knowing, you know, what's coming.
And then the longer the relationship goes on with the getting only upset at you when you're mad, the more you're exposed to that, the less of a bond you have.
And then, yeah, so, you know, a lot of that happened and, you know, most of the The spanking and the yelling came from him.
It didn't happen very often for my mother, but it did happen sometimes.
Sorry, can I just interrupt for a second?
Go ahead.
You were hit with implements, right?
I was hit with a belt.
That was it.
Yeah.
I'm sorry, that was it?
You mean that's... You're not minimizing that, right?
You know this is not the show to minimize that on, right?
Right.
Right.
It's not that... That's not... Yeah, I shouldn't be doing that, but it's... Okay, so let's... Don't give me your script, right?
Because we all have a script that we talk about with people we're not that close to.
Now, I know that you and I, we're not like best buds or anything, but this is not the conversation for that, okay?
Right.
So people say it's a spanking when they hit with their hands.
Right.
It is not a... I mean, even people who are spanking advocates would not call it spanking if you're hit with a belt.
That's called a beating.
And in rational, moral, philosophical terms, that's called child assault.
So being hit with a belt is terrifying.
It's incredibly dangerous.
Was it buckle side down or buckle side away?
The buckle side was away.
Okay.
It can hit your genitals.
It can be, it can wrap around.
It can... That happened once.
He actually hit me in my genitals once when I was a kid.
That can torque your testicles.
That can do some serious damage.
Yeah.
So You were assaulted by a giant with a strip of leather.
And I bet you it hurt like hell, right?
Yeah.
Listen, man, you gotta not... I'm not trying to be critical here.
I'm just really trying to be straight with you.
You gotta not say insane things to me like we weren't that close.
Yeah.
Like, I get it.
If he assaults you and beats you, Guess fucking what?
You're not going to be that close.
Why?
Because he's beating you.
Right.
He doesn't talk to you except to verbally abuse you and beat you.
I get, I get that you're not going to be that close.
You don't need to tell that to me, right?
Right.
In fact, if you were close, that would be seriously disturbing, right?
Right.
I really bonded with the guy who never talked to me except to verbally abuse me and beat me with implements.
Then I never felt closer to him.
That would be really fucked up, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So let's, let's keep going, but you're in a different space with me, right?
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You're right.
Okay.
So keep going.
I, to this day, you know, when I hear the sound of a belt buckle, I automatically think of, you know, a belt coming for me and, you know, him about to spank me.
It just reminds me.
I'm sorry.
What was that?
About to what you?
About to beat me.
I'm sorry.
No problem.
Hey, don't apologize to me.
I'm just reminding you of the reality of the situation.
Like if somebody's standing in the desert and says, This is a nice jungle, I say.
Sorry, it's a desert, right?
Yeah.
You know, it's really, it's really crazy in my family.
I'm, you know, I'm black and my entire family, obviously, we're all black and it's really insane now that I know about all these things.
I, and I go to like a, if I go to a family gathering, everybody just talks about the way that they abuse their children and, you know, I, you know, give them a good beating or whatever and it's just kind of, everybody just laughs and chuckles it off and it's just, It's really crazy.
And it's just, you don't even have to be part of the family.
Just, it's just all black people seem to think that this is just okay.
And it's just, it's not.
No, no, no, not that it's okay.
That it's good.
That it's necessary.
Right.
And isn't, isn't the theory that, that beating your kids protects them from white people?
Is that some of the theory?
I don't know if I've heard that one before.
Um, like it's a belt to the ass is better than a white cop's bullet to the brain.
Yeah, yeah, definitely, yeah.
But what do they talk about?
How do they frame this conversation?
I mean, even recently, like a few, maybe a couple months ago or so, I was in the room with my mom and my mom would talk about how she said something like how she has to... One of my cousins, he wasn't doing well in school and she was just saying, oh, he just needs a good beating.
Um, and, uh, you know, and then he'll do good.
Or, you know, I have another cousin who said that, you know, I just need to be, I just need to beat her one good time and then she'll learn, you know, not to do that anymore.
And it's just kind of like, you know, it's just so casual.
Like it's just normal.
And it's just now it blows my mind before I would have been right along with them.
Kind of like, yeah, you know, that makes sense.
Cause you know, and before I started listening to you, I would have done that to my children and I would have thought that that was a good thing to do.
Um, It's just so natural and, not natural, but it's so universally accepted and just everywhere in the family gatherings, the community, it's just, I don't know, it's really crazy.
And what, look, I'm not saying you should, but I mean, if you can imagine or if you have talked about this with You know, in the family gatherings, in the black family gatherings, what would you hear?
What would be the comeback?
I mean, they would, they would just think I was, it's some white thing or it's, um, Oh, like only, yeah.
White people don't hit their kids.
I've heard people say that before.
Like, uh, the Asians yell at and hit their kids and the blacks yell at and hit their kids, but white people don't.
Right.
Is that sort of the general, like it's, You like an Oreo if you don't want to hit your kids?
Yeah, pretty much.
I wish people would act a little more white this way!
I'm not saying you've got to wear suspenders, I'm not saying you've got to dance badly, I'm not saying you've got to drive way below the speed limit, I'm just saying don't hit your kids!
I remember the first time I heard about the whole concept of not smacking your children, Because I have one of my best friends, he's Spanish and he had asthma and a lot of health issues and so he was spanked one time and then he started having an asthma attack and then his mother started learning about alternative ways to raise the children because obviously she didn't want to kill him.
But, and then so she, I remember him telling me that she learned that, you know, you shouldn't do it that way, you should try to talk to them or discipline them in another way other than spanking.
And I remember thinking at the time, I was just like, That's really crazy.
Like, you know, if you, if you do something bad, you should get spanked, you know, kind of thing.
And it was, you know, and obviously I had everybody around me reinforcing that idea, but, uh, yeah.
Now, um, your biological dad, what was the story with that?
Honestly, um, I've only heard pits and pieces.
I haven't had the courage to ask him directly, but when I heard I have two, um, full sisters and they, um, After my youngest full sister was born, apparently, like when my mother found out at the doctor's office that he just said he can't deal with this and he just kind of left.
And apparently he was physically abusive to my mother, but that's about as much as I know.
Wait, wait, wait.
And did your mother not like being physically abused?
No.
She didn't like it.
Did she not feel that he was correcting her in some manner?
No, I don't think so.
Well, no, she must have done something wrong.
He must have been unhappy.
He must have been disciplining her in some manner.
Isn't that how you deal with disagreements in relationships?
You beat the other person until they conform to your expectations.
Why would she be complaining about that?
Right.
Yeah.
Yes.
And also, I mean, if beating works, then shouldn't black kids be doing better?
Yeah.
I mean, black kids, you know, you sound like a great guy, but man alive, you know, black youths, particularly black male youths, they're not doing so hot, right?
No, they're not.
So where's the biofeedback?
Where's the empiricism?
I mean, whatever the black community is doing, not working that well, right?
No, it's not.
I mean, what is it black families have on average?
5% of the wealth of white families?
Yeah.
Black youths committing crimes?
Many, many times that of whites.
If it's any consolation, whites do it more than Asians.
But anyway, if this was such a great plan, hit them till they break into virtue.
Smash them until the art comes out.
I mean, ah yes, but of course the black community can say, But it's white racism, right?
Right.
It's nothing we as a community are doing.
It's not the rampant illegitimacy.
Right?
It's not the absent fatherhood.
Nothing like that.
It's white people.
Boy, when you have a scapegoat, you just don't have a mirror, right?
Right.
Which is not to say, you know, and you always have to put these caveats in, of course, there's racism.
But I'll tell you, brother, and I mean, brother, because we're brothers in thought.
Holy crap.
I mean, Have a stroll over to my videos on Nelson Mandela.
Have a stroll over to my videos on Martin Luther King Jr.
Oh my god!
Oh my god!
I mean, I don't think I've been called that vile names from my real white haters!
Although, I still like Hunky.
Still a big fan of that.
But this racism, I don't think it's endemic.
I think there's definitely racism in the world.
I don't think it's endemic.
But, um, and look, I don't mean to get on a big sort of black, white racism thing, but as a child advocate, um, you know, the firefighters go to where the fire is.
And I've certainly tried to aim stuff at the black community by putting the anti-spanking message into the Zimmerman video and so on.
And, uh, holy, I mean, at some point, at some point, you know, the, and I know that there's efforts, but the system, I'm sorry, movement and all that there's efforts within the black community to, to deal with this stuff.
But man, Oh man, trying to find some way to, to not be as aggressive with the kids.
Uh, boy, that would be, I mean, that would be magic.
Yeah.
I mean, one of the, one of the places I donate to, even though they do some religious teachings, one of the places I donate to is a group exactly focused on teaching black moms, peaceful parenting techniques, because that's where the fire is.
By and large in society.
If you're going to go someplace, that's where you want to go.
So anyway, listen, I don't mean to blow past this, and I'm going to go right back to the emotional stuff you're talking about.
I just wanted to get that off my chest.
I just want to say something about the racism thing.
Honestly, I never met a racist white person ever in my life.
I don't even think it exists, honestly.
Everybody else, all the other black people think that there's so much white racism in the world.
I don't see it.
I really don't.
The only racism I see is from black people.
I mean, it's crazy rampant racism from black people, but I never see any racism from white people ever.
It just doesn't happen.
I don't know.
Okay, so give me a look behind the curtain.
So what sort of racist stuff do you see from black people?
I know, look, I mean, I'm fairly aware that the blacks and Hispanics are not exactly a morning children's cartoon of extra hugging.
Right.
But what do you see in the black community?
Oh, it's just kind of like, you know, a lot of, you know, A lot of white people are crazy and they just think, oh, they just think differently or they just, they, there's really this kind of attitude that just white people are just different.
They're just really different, uh, as far as their thought process.
And they think that they have this idea that white people just hate black people.
They just don't like them.
Like this is just something that, uh, white people are out to get them, you know, the whole, the man keeping you down kind of thing.
And it's just like, I don't know.
Like I said, I've never seen it before.
I don't think that it really is a thing.
And it's just a really, a really fundamental belief that it seems like a lot of black people have.
And it's, I don't know, it's strange.
And I know I kind of felt like, not that I was kind of treated in a racial manner, but I did feel when I was in high school that, you know, white people were almost afraid of me in a sense that If I... They weren't sure what kind of black person I would be.
Would I be the kind of black person that... They weren't sure if, okay, am I going to be a nice black person?
Go ahead.
I know what you mean.
Go on.
And so, you know, so until I, like, approach them or talk to them... Excuse me, young man.
Would your last name happen to be a Roman letter?
Is it X by any chance?
I just need to know before we go any further.
That's all right.
Go ahead.
Yeah, so that would be the extent of what, you know, if you would, if you can even call that racism.
But, uh, I mean, given the amount of, you know, You know, stuff that, you know, when you look at the statistics that black people are doing, robberies and rapes and stuff like that, I don't blame them, you know, for being a little bit cautious.
Look, I mean, was it Jesse Jackson who said, I think 20 years ago he said, one of the saddest things that has occurred to me as a black activist is hearing footsteps behind me on a street at night.
They're turning around and being relieved it's a white person.
Yeah.
So if caution around black youths is racist, then it seems some racial leaders in the black community are pretty racist.
And unfortunately, it's just statistics.
It's not fundamentally about it.
It's about markers, right?
I mean, you turn around, you see a black guy walking in a three-piece suit holding a computer magazine.
You're not going to be that freaked out, right?
But you see some white kid with swastikas on his forehead and crap like that.
Well, you're probably going to be kind of nervous.
So there is a kind of display that is alarming to some people.
But anyway, sorry, don't let me tell you about the black experience.
I absolutely feel the same way.
I mean, and all black people feel the same way.
If they are around somebody who looks like that, looks like a thug or whatever, they're going to be more cautious.
But they won't acknowledge that they are just as cautious as a white person would be, and they'll call it racism when a white person does it, but then when they do it, it's just like they don't even see what they're doing.
They can't see that they're contradicting themselves, and it's freaking really frustrating.
Well, and I mean, the blacks suffer at the fists and knives and bullets of blacks.
The most.
Right.
Right.
I mean, I mean, yeah, obviously some white people are scared of, of, of black violence, but my God, I mean, the amount of destruction that occurs within the black community as a result of this kind of violence is absolutely staggering.
And, uh, you know, I, I think, I mean, there's lots of theories floating around, which we don't have to dig into at this point, but you know, the one thing that is clear that can be done is To focus on the peaceful parenting and I don't know if it comes from some people say it comes from slavery some people say it comes from Religiosity some people is I who knows right?
Yeah, but man alive This idea that if white people are doing it, we can't do it Yeah, you know, I mean, yeah, you know, we're not doing that bad white people Everything we do is wrong.
You know, I mean, okay, I agree that our breakdancing quite often is the suckiness of But man, there's some things that aren't too bad.
I look at Asian study habits and say, well, that's pretty damn good.
There's things we can learn from each other.
It's pretty crazy.
I can see the crazy now.
I couldn't see it before.
I'm a pretty oddball in my family.
Now I'm a black atheist anarchist and so it's like... I don't even know what kind of cookie to call you now.
I mean, you're not an Oreo.
I mean, I don't even know.
You're some rainbow cannon shot into the sky.
You're like...
Mr. Christy Fireworks, who knows, right?
There's no confined insult to give you from that perspective from any community.
So we have completely escaped categorization even from a negative standpoint.
Sorry, go ahead.
I was going to say, it's really difficult to talk to anybody in my family about my viewpoint just because of how unique my views are because of, you know, the race that I'm part of.
And it's just like, you know, People are like, man, you have some really wild and extreme ideas.
And it's like, I don't even know what to say to that.
Wait, hang on.
The community that has to some degree embraced Louis Farrakhan is saying that you have some crazy extreme ideas because you're into the non-aggression principle?
Oh yeah, right.
Wow.
All right.
That's not good.
All right.
So let's get, if you don't mind, I mean, I find stuff fascinating, but I do want to make sure that we talk about like the personal issues that you called up about.
All right.
Your bio dad beat your mom.
Obviously, I would assume that was violence towards you kids.
You said you have two full sisters, is that right?
And you got some half-siblings from the second dad?
No, I have some half-siblings from my biological dad.
My stepdad never had any children of his own.
My biological dad had another... Oh, he had another wife or another girlfriend.
He had two extra wives, two other wives.
He had one half-sister from his second wife and another sister from his third wife that he's currently with and hates.
She's a terrible witch lady.
Is there a black cliche that your biological dad did not inhabit?
Right.
I mean, did he walk with a pimp role?
I mean, what?
Did he have like a funny hat to one side?
I mean, what possible?
Oh, God, that's so annoying.
Anyway.
Yeah.
Okay, so your mom, she married your dad.
Did he have already the siblings from or has that been since?
No, the siblings were after.
I'm the oldest and the two, yeah, so those are after his, although it's kind of questionable whether his second, his daughter from his second wife, if she was conceived while they were married or not, so that's kind of, yeah, so that's kind of questionable, but anyways, you know, I don't, There wasn't too much.
Sorry, did he, did he, did he, did he do child support?
Did he do, like, did he keep you guys in, in cash at all?
Well, apparently he put in child support, but a lot of times he didn't pay it.
And my mom told me how he's like, oh, he doesn't pay it.
And all the time and some, he's late and stuff like that.
And you know, my mom was always telling me, she just can't wait until my youngest full sister gets 18.
So she doesn't have to deal with him anymore.
And you know, blah, blah, blah.
He doesn't pay his bills.
Well, there's another check on the black cliche.
Anyway.
Right.
So, was he part of your life at all after he left?
My mom didn't want it apparently but my stepdad said that he should be a part of our lives and I think that was just an attempt to have somebody feel the role of a father since he was so neglectful and he didn't either want to do it or didn't know how to do it or whatever the reason he decided to do that was.
But yeah, apparently he was the advocate to make sure that he was in our lives and he was and I didn't suffer a whole lot of abuse from him.
I remember being spanked by him once.
It's really crazy how your memory works because I remember that entire event, where I was, the couch I was on and everything, even though it only happened once.
I remember the whole thing.
How old were you?
Do you remember?
I was young.
I had to be like seven, something around that age.
Did your mom use corporal punishment at all?
Not as often, but yes.
And how would she do it?
Just through spanking.
She used the belt as well.
Or beating.
God, wow, this is like... I'm sorry.
No, no, listen, you've got nothing to apologize.
I'm the annoying guy looking for moral precision in the language, so you've got nothing to apologize to me for.
I'm incredibly sorry you went through all of that.
I remember one time in particular, my stepdad, and it was the most vivid spanking I've ever had.
First off, my sisters were being spanked for whatever the same reason, and they were in the room adjacent to mine, so I could hear their shrill screaming, and just, it was horrible screaming sound, and then he burst into my room, and I had a bump bag, and it was in the corner, and I ran into the, tried to run away, But there was a wall there, obviously, but I was so afraid.
I was just trying to get away from him.
And he grabbed me by the leg and picked me up upside down and was beating me with the belt while I was hanging upside down.
And I remember that so vividly.
It was absolutely terrifying.
Yeah, it would be.
Did you know where your mom was at that time?
I think she was in our room, which was right next to my room.
I'm sure she heard the whole thing.
I must tell you, Presley, that I fail fundamentally to comprehend how much the bond between mother and child has been broken when the mother does not throw herself in front of whatever is harming her child.
You know, there are these stories of like the moms who like lift the cars that their kids are trapped under in some accident that they Mother grizzlies, you come and you harm my children.
You know, you snarl and get in front and block.
Right.
I mean, you try getting between a mom ape and her cub, or a mama grizzly, as I said, and her cub.
I mean, they are fierce in the protection of their young.
I can't fathom how a woman can harm the fruit of her loins, but also how she can bring a man into her life who dangles, who beats her daughters and dangles her son upside down and beats him and doesn't like chew his face off.
Right.
Doesn't launch herself at him to protect her children.
I don't, I don't fundamentally even remotely understand that at all.
How you can just sit there and yeah, it seems legit, you know, like it's just discipline.
It's for their own good.
What the hell is wrong with these moms?
And, you know, it's really – I think the part of the difficulty that I have with placing this on her is that when – our relationship is kind of like – we'll laugh and we'll make a lot of jokes and things like that.
and she's very friendly You know and there's really no aggression at all.
Obviously now that I'm older but it's not like I don't feel like I'm like I don't know it's just she doesn't seem very forceful as much anymore and I didn't notice that as I as I grew up it was uh because one thing that really bothered me when I was younger is she always seemed to have the answer.
Anything I said was just wrong and then I started to grow up and get a little bit more intelligent and she couldn't Well, you know why she's nice now, right?
Well, it's not just that.
A. She doesn't have power over you anymore and B. She needs things from you.
Like, you're in the free market now.
We all grow up in a dictatorship and then we suddenly convert to the free market when we become adults and everybody tries to pretend that we're not in the free market and we got to see all these people and no matter what and blah blah blah blah blah.
We try to make parenthood into some sort of public sector union that you can't escape.
But she now has to woo you, whereas before she could beat you, right?
Because now she wants you to come over and you don't have to.
You had to live in her house.
You had to obey her rules because she could hit you.
She had a guy there who could hit you, who she could call for backup when you got too big for her to hit.
She could call him for backup because he's bigger.
So you had to.
Deal with that, right?
You had to put up with that.
You had, you couldn't leave that.
Now you're an adult.
You don't have to go by if you don't want to.
So now she got to be more sugar and spice, right?
Yeah.
And I never understood, like when I went off to college, I didn't understand why I like never wanted to talk to her.
Not like I, it was just, I didn't want her to like call me.
I was like, every time she called me, I rolled my eyes and then like I moved out and it was just kind of like, she wanted to come over and I was just like,
You know I just thought it was kind of a well you know I'm older now and parents just aren't cool and I just don't want to hang around them and you know it was just now I'm seeing more that it's because I know some people actually call their parents and they like go and see how they are stuff like that and like to me that was always really weird I was like why would you want to call your parents like I never understood why people would want to do that and now I'm understanding more that it's because of all the stuff that happened in my childhood that I don't have nearly as close a bond with her that's
Should, under better circumstances.
Well look, I mean, your biological father hit your mother, right?
Right.
Does she want to have anything to do with it?
No.
Not at all.
So what's the principle there?
You hit me, fuck off.
You hit me, I don't want to have anything to do with you.
You beat me, I don't want to have anything to do with you.
So she's very concerned, I would imagine, deep down, that you're going to make that same connection and you're going to Evaluate your relationship with your mother and your stepfather according to the same principles that your mother evaluated her relationship with your biological father.
You hit me.
Don't want to have anything to do with you.
I mean, she can't come.
I'm not saying you should or shouldn't.
I'm just saying that she can't possibly complain if you have problems wanting to go and see her.
Right?
Because she already made that case and lived that case, which is he hit me.
I don't want to have anything to do with him.
Okay.
So she can't say, well, it doesn't matter if people hit you.
You got to go and see him anyway.
It's like, Hey, you didn't have anything to do with dad, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
And you know, another thing that, you know, she did when I was a kid, you know, it was, you know, there was a lot of, I felt, I really felt like when I was a kid that I couldn't really kind of, you know, explore the things that I wanted to explore.
And I know my stepdad, like every time I, like every time I brought a bad report card home, he would call me stupid.
And, um,
And my mom, you know, I was really, I really liked to write music, or not write music, but I really used to like poetry, and I actually have a really good singing voice, and I actually have a range that's really high and can actually go really high and really low, and I wanted to refine that and get better with it, but, and my mom knew I had a really big interest in music, and, you know, she really just was like, no, you need to go to college, you know, and she was really discouraging, and I just really kind of ended up
Dropping the whole music thing.
And I've lost all of my, I haven't lost my, my voice, obviously that's kind of biological, but my ability to control my voice and the sounds has gone away.
Cause you need to practice that.
And wait, you, you know what I'm going to ask next, right?
No.
Are you going to ask?
We've got a guy named Presley on the show who can sing.
Listen, people put up with my yawping from time to time.
You wouldn't give us a bar or two, would you, brother?
Oh, man.
It's been so long since I've sang, but, uh... Okay, well, what was your favorite song to sing?
Oh, man.
Brian McKnight, Back at One.
Alright.
Hey, if you wanna, listen.
Listen.
I mean, here's what I think.
Why the fuck not?
You love to sing.
You know, make a joyful noise.
Share your love with the world.
Okay.
Oh, man.
Alright.
It's undeniable that we should be together.
It's unbelievable how I used to say that I'll fall never.
The basis is need to know if you don't know just how I feel.
Then let me show you now that I'm for real.
If all things and times I will reveal.
Yeah.
Ah!
Beautiful!
Love it!
That's great stuff, man.
Very nice.
I was waiting for you.
I thought you were going to do soar up to give us some Marvin Gaye stratosphere stuff, but that was nice.
Sweet tone.
A nice little vibrato.
Very nice.
Soulful.
Good stuff.
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I appreciate that.
No problem.
I really appreciate that.
Yeah.
Don't let that go, man.
Don't save that for twice a year drunk karaoke.
Do something with that instrument.
It's a beautiful thing.
All right.
So what do you think the effects have been on you, Presley, of this aggression that you experienced, this violence?
It's really hard to say what the violence did for me.
I mean, I really feel like the The discouraging part, which came from my mother, actually had a greater effect on me than the violence.
At least, the effect of the violence is not something that I don't know.
I don't know what effect that had on me, but my job right now is just... I don't know if most people would, but a lot of people I think would think that my job is like a dream job, but I've started to notice recently that it's really a trap.
You know, I get paid for 40 hours and I work like three or four hours a week because I work tech support over the phone and I work the third shift so I get maybe five calls a week and so I don't get very many calls.
I don't do very much and so I sit at home and I play video games for like eight hours on my shift and I have the two days off for the week.
I have no... I just get all this money and I barely work and It's just, it's so comforting to be here in this job, and I've tried to get out and do other things, and it's just really hard to... I have, when I get, when I come across something that's really difficult, I really just kind of tell myself I can't do it, and I kind of really shut down, and you know, like I said... Difficult like what?
Do you mean the music stuff or something else?
No, not the music stuff.
That was really natural for me, but something like programming, because I have an IT degree.
And, you know, when I, um, if I were to try to really try to get a concept and I'd fail a few times, I would really get discouraged and I maybe would, like, put it down and not go back to it for, like, another month or two.
And, you know, I have all of these books.
I have a whole library shelf of books and I'll start reading the books and I won't complete the books.
Or just, I have a really hard time following through with things and getting them done.
And...
I hate it because I have a cousin.
His father really taught him a lot of things about discipline and stuff like that.
He's always posting stuff on Facebook about entrepreneurship and he's topping sales at one of the T-Mobile branches.
He's really doing it big and I'm just kind of looking at him like I wish I had that drive.
I just don't.
I just hate it.
I can't.
Do that.
This is terrible.
Right.
What games do you play?
There's the most popular game in the world called League of Legends.
It has the most players in the world right now and I play that game.
It's sort of a... Is it like a superhero World of Warcraft kind of thing?
It's a 5v5 competitive game where you have a team of four other players and yourself and go up against another team of four other players and you guys have a match and then you basically play and then after the game's over you can just re-cue and go back in the queue and play again.
again.
All right.
I'm going to tell you what's popped into my head, Presley, and And then, you know, just interrupt me, hopefully in song, if it's if it's not a value.
Look, you didn't have a whole lot of fun as a child, right?
No.
I mean, you had a whole lot of not fun, right?
A whole lot of fear, a whole lot of anxiety, a whole lot of not relaxing, not being able to relax, right?
Right.
So one and look, I, I get that.
I get that.
And one of the things that happened to me, because I had such so little fun as a child, is I sort of felt I had a fun deficit.
I was owed fun.
I was owed enjoyment.
I was owed relaxation.
Like I was, it was like, you know, Oh, you're never too old to have a happy childhood.
So I'm just going to have happiness now.
Right?
Right.
But what I found for myself, Presley, was that that was actually a continuation of the dysfunction because it's like, I was hungry all the time as a child.
So I'll eat more food now.
But what happens?
It doesn't make my childhood any less hungry.
It just makes me fat now.
Right?
Right.
And I actually was literally hungry quite a lot in my childhood.
I remember when I was a kid thinking, Oh man, when I get to be an adult, I can literally buy the whole row of chocolate bars and eat them.
And you get to be an adult, it's like cavities and diabetes.
But for me, I had to say, look, I'm not going to get the fun.
That I was supposed to get as a child, I'm never going to get that.
And giving it to myself now is actually a way of just avoiding the grieving.
Right.
Yeah, there's nothing you can do now to make you have a happy childhood, right?
Right.
But don't you feel like you're owed some good times?
Yeah.
Yeah.
My junior year of college, I never drank before then, junior year of college, and then I started drinking, and I drank a lot.
And I drank, like, every weekend, and sometimes on the weekdays, and I got involved with this girl, and it was a really dumb thing to do, and I did a lot of really stupid stuff.
And the thing was, I really like the attention because when I was drunk I was funny.
People laughed at the things I did and I got to be social and that was also another thing.
I was very not social with people because, I don't know, I just always had that problem.
I have that problem now where I still, people that I call friends, I have a hard time seeing them as actual friends.
I feel like at any moment I could just drop them and just never talk to them again and I wouldn't care that much.
Um, and so I had a real difficult time connecting with people.
But when you're in college, you live right next to everybody.
So it's kind of, you're kind of connected by, you know, uh, geography.
And so I would drink and, you know, be the center of attention.
And that was really fun for me.
And then, um, I don't know, I stopped doing it after, um, junior year because I embarrassed myself by I was confessing my love for this girl when I was drunk at a party and it was just really embarrassing.
I've never done anything that embarrassing before and it was really bad.
It wasn't even the thing... Wait, wait, wait.
Was it bad because you were drunk or it was just the wrong girl to declare yourself to?
Oh, it was absolutely the wrong girl and it wasn't even like a relationship.
It was kind of this, I knew what it was, kind of thing.
It wasn't a relationship.
It was just kind of us having sex and...
But I got drunk and it was a big end of the year kind of party thing.
And I really made an ass of myself.
And, uh, yeah, it's tough.
You know, you can't say the, I love you while actually staring at her tits because message, you know, I love you guys.
Can I take a plastic cast of you when I go away?
Right.
And, uh, yeah, that was, that was really, really bad.
And, uh, so I, so, so Presley, what, What goes on in your life if nothing changes five years from now?
If nothing changes, I'll be right here in the same spot.
I'm the best rep that they have.
I'm certainly the most intelligent I can tell.
I've been there for three years now, and I'm definitely not going anywhere.
Actually, since I do know something about programming, I actually help with the building of some of the internal websites that we have.
But that's it.
So I'll still be here, just playing games and taking calls.
I've been a manager and if I had a smart guy who wasn't achieving his potential or whatever, then I'd be sort of swooping in and saying, so what do you want to do that you could do more of that would be more helpful to the company and so on?
Do you think there's a reason that's not happening?
It has happened.
They actually asked me if they wanted to promote me to team lead.
And I turned it down just because, I mean, if I become team lead then I have to go into the office and I have to work the day shift and I don't hit the night shift and I have to... There's a lot more work.
Like, would I give up?
I think what you mean to say is you have to work.
I mean, you can just end it there, you know?
It's like, I have to work dot dot dot.
Oh yeah, I got it!
Okay, you gotta work.
That's no good.
Right.
Yeah, so I was like, I don't know about that.
So yeah.
I'm moving up the worldwide rankings.
I mean, I'm really focusing on customer satisfaction.
Right, right.
Okay, so did I mean, we haven't talked much about the verbal abuse other than that you said that your stepdad would call you dumb.
Yeah, every report card he'd be like, what are you stupid?
What are you stupid?
And he wouldn't say, like, you are stupid directly, but, you know, obviously that's how I felt.
He kept saying, what are you stupid?
You know, and so he said that literally every time I brought a report card back, and I didn't have good report cards.
What did your stepdad do that he felt his intellectual superiority was so high?
What was his occupation?
He, like, did something with newspapers, worked in some kind of factory or something like that.
Definitely not the most... Did something with newspapers?
Yeah, definitely.
Are you kidding me?
He made hats out of newspapers.
He covered homeless people with newspapers.
He lined the bottom of bird cages with newspapers.
I don't know what that means, but it's like... Well, let me just say he's definitely not the most intelligent person.
He stopped helping me with my homework at about... Probably around 6th grade math.
When I got around 6th grade, so yeah.
Here's a hint, you know, you know, when evil people call you evil, you're either super evil or super good, right?
You're not anywhere in the middle, right?
When dumb people call you stupid, you're either incredibly dumb or you're really smart.
Right.
I don't think you're dumb.
Nobody, you know, you wouldn't even listen to my, wouldn't be listening to this show.
So the dumb guy calls you dumb, but to what degree do you think that the stupid word?
Um, has, you know, there's an, I don't know if you were raised religious, I'm guessing.
Yes.
Yes.
But yeah, going out on a limb.
Um, so you know, you know the story, right?
Genesis, right?
I mean, God casts Adam and Eve out of the garden of Eden and he puts a flaming sword that bars their way whenever they try to go back in.
It gets big, giant, fiery sword comes at them.
Now we're born supremely self-confident, I believe, and rightly so.
Think of all the things we master in the first two years of our life, you know, rolling, sitting up, uh, retaining urine and feces, uh, uh, walking, uh, dancing, whistling, whatever, right?
All the crap that we, we, we like, we're incredible.
You could keep that progress going throughout your whole life.
You'd be like a deity by the time you were 12.
So we do this incredible, amazing language, uh, drawing, counting.
I mean, the things that we can do in the first couple of years, we are incredibly confident and rightly so.
And if we were insecure, Oh, I don't know if I can walk, you know, that looks complicated.
I mean, these giants can do it, but I'm tiny.
And when my daughter was learning to walk, I mean, I still so vividly remember she had this, this little, um, push cart basically.
And she would go like back and forth, back and forth, back and forth with this pushcart, you know, taking more weight off every single time.
And she was so concentrated, you know, she's, she's a good laugher and very responsive.
But when she was, you could see her laser in, learning to walk, learning to walk.
Can't talk, learning to walk.
Don't, hey, don't distract me.
Don't give me any toys.
Don't turn the lights on.
I'm concentrating on the walking.
And she, she did it.
And she did that because she was confident.
And she was confident because she, was born into confidence and that's how we achieve so much when we're little.
So that to me is like the Garden of Eden.
And then the gods drive us out with words.
You know, God didn't materialize his hand into the Garden of Eden, didn't flick them out like somebody playing subbuteo.
He pushed them out with words.
And then there was a sword that was placed To prevent Adam and Eve from going back to the Garden of Eden, which is confident.
They were naked.
They finally knew they were naked and they were ashamed.
They became ashamed of themselves with the curse of work and of childbirth given to them by the Christian deity.
And I felt that in my life I was very confident when I was a toddler.
My first memory is before I could even walk.
So I'm guessing nine or ten months.
I was very confident when I was younger and then adults just like took a ball-peen hammer to that giant crystal vase of confidence.
Just bang, bang, bang, bang.
I was broken.
You must be broken.
I was smashed.
You must be smashed.
I'm preparing you for a world of smashers by smashing you myself.
You can only be delivered into adulthood in fragments.
So I'm doing you a service.
The wrecking ball of reality is coming in.
I'm going to start off soft and gentle just with the kneecaps, work my way up and you're going to be a fine granulated powder when you get to adulthood.
And there's this ferocity and this sadism in so many instances when dealing with the people say, it's the terrible twos.
No, this is, it's the confident twos being smashed up by adults.
My daughter never went through the terrible twos, never went through the terrible threes.
People go, oh yeah, you think being a father is so easy.
You wait till the twos come along.
I'm like, oh, I guess I'll wait till the twos come along.
Well, it was pretty easy.
Oh, you wait.
And then people say, oh, you wait till she becomes a teenager.
It's like, well, I bet you that's going to be easy too.
All of these curses and how bad and tough.
Ooh, if you had a boy, it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
If you had two.
Anyway, so So I just, like, I'm thinking when you said, well, I could do the coding and so on, and you say you feel this, right?
Right.
So I just wonder the degree to which your stepdad, and to some degree your dad, and to more of a degree your mom, put this flaming sword between you and your early confidence.
Right.
I do.
I do think about that.
And it really is, like I can almost hear the words, not from him, but just, you know, I get my own internal voice saying, you know, you're not going to be able to do this.
And seeing as how I have an IT degree, I happen to know just how vast the world of technology can be and how much, you know, how much I don't know.
And, you know, when it comes to like, you know, I tell myself, you know, if I were to try to build a website and I would try to, you know, develop, you know, this app on the webpage, I would think, you know, if I can't get through this, how am I going to do even greater things with the website?
What do you mean?
Hang on.
We can't get through what?
If I can't get through, one thing that I built was I built a score sheet for the call scoring sheet for the team leads so that they can just click the radio buttons and it adds up the total and then they can get the score of the rep.
And so I built that.
And but during that process it was really difficult for me to do that because during the process I was telling myself, you know, as I ran into problems while trying to code it, I was like, if I can't get through this, how am I going to get through, you know, doing something even more complicated with a website like, I don't know, anything more complicated because, like I said, I know how complicated it can get and that kind of thing really keeps me from being able to do a lot of stuff.
Obviously I finished, I pushed through because everybody was expecting me to do it and I was getting paid for it and so I had to really buckle down.
But it was really difficult.
Okay, here's 101.
And I'm sorry, that sounds condescending.
I don't mean to be that way at all.
But because you didn't grow up with it.
I grew up at least with some artistic background among families.
Anyway, it doesn't matter.
You cannot observe yourself in the act of creation.
To observe yourself in the act of creation is to destroy the act of creation.
So when you are coding, you cannot observe yourself coding.
You cannot say, well, if I can't get through this or what's going to happen if this or what's going to happen with that, right?
You sang earlier beautifully.
Thank you.
And of course, part of you was thinking, Hey, I hope I sound all right.
Right.
But I hope that you were feeling the music, right?
You cannot observe yourself.
And the purpose of abuse is to get you to observe yourself, to push you out of yourself and have you observe yourself.
You know, when people say, look at yourself from the outside, what do they mean?
Complementarily?
No.
They mean get out of your own skin, get out of your own experience, eject yourself from your own body so that it falls away like a downed fighter jet.
Observe yourself means do not be yourself.
And so this is something really, really important to understand because I view programming as art.
Of course, there's technique.
So is there technique in painting and dancing?
There's technique in dancing.
But the whole point of excellence is to practice and practice and practice and then simply be in the moment of creation.
Right?
When I am podcasting, I am not observing myself.
I'm not evaluating myself.
Have I talked about this before?
How does this compare?
Is there inspiration happening?
Was that joke funny?
What are people going to think of this?
Does my voice sound funny?
Is the mic too far away?
I am speaking as vitally and connectedly as I humanly can.
And I don't know what the next words are going to be necessarily.
I don't know if the next metaphor is going to work.
But when you are in pursuit of creation, when you are creating, Observation is like setting fire to a movie screen.
And that's one of the reasons why you prefer video games.
Listen, playing video games is an escape from self-observation, right?
Because you're so absorbed in the video game, you're not sitting there outside of yourself looking at yourself, right?
Right.
Yeah.
So through the immediate and intense stimulation Of your sensory and nervous system?
You escape self-observation, right?
Right.
What did you say about declaring yourself to the woman?
I've never looked so ridiculous, right?
Viewing yourself from the outside, right?
Right.
I bet you the drinking had a lot to do... I shouldn't say I bet.
I would imagine that the drinking had a lot to do with escaping self-observation.
The cold critical eye that can float above us and ridicule us and make us seem ridiculous to ourselves, right?
Right.
And drinking diminishes that.
Yeah, I really felt like I was allowed to be whoever I wanted to be when I was drinking because everybody would accept it because I was drunk.
So it's okay, I can just be who I want to be when I'm drunk.
And I think that vividly.
I remember thinking that.
Yeah, and people will always try to get you to sit outside of yourself and evaluate yourself.
Because if people can get you to observe yourself, then you will paralyze yourself.
Self-observation is self-paralysis.
Right, yeah.
And if you want to...
You can get the same and even greater high from programming than you can from a video game.
And I say this having played my share of video games and having done my damn well share of programming.
You can get the same high and a greater high from programming than you do from video games.
But you have to start to get the discipline together to not observe yourself.
Right.
And this doesn't mean You never do anything wrong.
You can never compare your actions to a higher standard.
It simply means in the moment of creation, fuck observation, fuck evaluation, fuck analysis.
You fucking well create.
Right.
And you align yourself with that creation and you get behind that creation.
And there is nothing that creation can do wrong.
And there's nothing that you can do wrong in the act of creating.
And then after the
Skyfall of the new mountain of what you have created then you can map that piece of shit You can find out if it's good or bad or right or wrong and you can evaluate it all you want But in the moment of creation commit to the creation Not to the observation which brings a hammer down on the delicate crystal of Making something new Right Yeah
I think I can.
I think I can do that.
If you're dancing and you watch yourself from the outside, you fall.
Right.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
Definitely.
I mean, when I write, which I actually dictate, but when I When I'm creating a book or when I'm writing or dictating, it's the ideas, the language and the words.
I'm not thinking, what are people going to think of this?
What's the book cover going to be like?
Does my voice sound funny?
You know, like it's, it's, it's the passionate connection with whatever it is that you're creating.
With all negative language, pushed aside as a stain upon the very act of creation.
Oh, sorry, somebody's asked, how do you avoid viewing yourself in the moment?
Well, anger.
Anger.
Fuck you, critical voices.
Yes.
you Thank you.
Hey, Critical Voices, you feel like taking over here?
Y'all know so much.
Why don't you take over?
Oh, do you not want to take over?
Oh, don't you want to do the writing?
Oh, then maybe you should step the fuck aside and let me get something done here.
Afterwards, I will consult with you.
I'm not calling you an enemy.
Right now, you're in the way.
Right now, you're shouting numbers in my ear while I'm trying to do complex math.
So fuck off with that.
Talk to me later.
Get behind me.
Help me or fuck off for now!
And of course, you're really not talking to your critical voices, are you?
Right.
Who are you talking to?
My parents.
Yeah.
All the people who put that bullshit in your head.
All the people holding you upside down and hitting your tender body, right?
Right.
Back the fuck off.
Give a brother some space to create.
You know, don't criticize my cooking if you're not willing to step into the goddamn kitchen.
Right.
If you can write better in a critics, then take over!
I leave!
The dictation microphone in your hands.
Show me how it's done!
Show me how!
You can create so wonderfully that you can criticize me in the very act of creating.
You're so good at it, you do it!
Oh, don't you want to do it?
Oh, not such a tough talker now, are you?
Then back the fuck off and let me create.
Help me create!
Don't get in my goddamn way.
Between me and creation, Right.
a straight 100-yard track without even air resistance.
You get in the way, you're going to have a step-sized hole right in your ass.
Get behind me and propel me.
Step aside.
Meet me at the end.
We'll talk about it then, but don't get in my fucking way.
Unless you can do it better.
Right.
Right.
Absolutely.
All these people tell me how I should be doing this show.
Call in.
I'm not hard to find.
Right.
Do a better show!
God!
I mean, it's not like the... I don't have a giant mere spaceship worth a trillion dollars floating over the planet, beaming special microwave waves directly into people's brains.
I'm a guy with a mic and an internet plan.
That's it!
You got a cell phone?
You know where the library is?
Go compete!
Don't tell me how to do it better!
Show me how to do it better!
Oh, that Freddie Mercury.
I don't think he was a great singer.
I don't think he was a good frontman.
I could do so much better.
Why are you talking about him?
Go and do it!
Don't bitch at me!
Beat me!
Go win!
Go take my audience!
Go do what you can do!
That's so fat!
Oh, that's deaf guy!
He doesn't know what he's talking about!
He's an idiot!
He's a... Well, there's obviously a market for philosophy!
If I suck, come and don't suck!
Come and be without the sucking!
Come and be with the brains!
Come and be with the skill!
I don't like the way he talked to that caller!
Get that caller to come on your show!
Show me how it's done!
I'll worry about how I talk to my callers when nobody wants to talk to me anymore.
Anyway.
I just really want to point out to you that these inner critics is a mean.
You don't want to be somebody who doesn't self-analyze and self-criticize, of course, right?
At the same time, the inner critics can't be Air horns to your symphony, right?
Right.
So you've got some stuff to be angry about.
I know we've brushed past your mom, but basically Presley, your stepdad was in your life because your mom wanted him there.
Right.
Right.
She invited him in.
I hate to put it this crudely.
She had sex with him repeatedly, at least three times that we know.
And she cooked for him.
I assume she kept house with him.
She did whatever, right?
Right.
So he was there because she wanted him there.
Yeah.
And the only fundamental reward mechanism that men have is sex.
I mean, I hate to put it that crudely, Because biologically that's the only thing that reinforces whatever genetics we have, right?
If you have some preferences and you don't get any sex, those preferences will not be part of the future gene pool, right?
Right.
So the only positive reinforcement that fundamentally matters to men or to women is sex.
Whoever you're giving sex to is the absolute pinnacle of your life's existence.
Yeah.
So she was like, Hey, that guy who holds my kids upside down and beats them with a belt.
Fuck, he's the best.
Yeah, she, uh, she had already had three kids by the time she met him.
And, uh, you know, I know that a lot of people in my family, like they don't understand why he got with why he got with my mom.
Um, Because, you know, women with three kids and you go off and get married to them and take in all those kids and everybody's like, oh, he's such a great guy for taking in all those kids and stuff like that.
And, you know, the thing that pisses me off is like when I go over there and then they say stuff, you know, I'm so proud of you, you know, we did a good job raising you, you know, you got a job, you got your own place.
And it's just like, you know, you don't have any kids and, you know, you're stable.
And it's just kind of like, you know, I'm thinking like, you know, that had nothing to do with you.
You know, they weren't in class when I was in college.
They didn't go out and get the job and interview and all that.
They didn't do any of that.
And it's just like they're trying to take credit when they did all this shit to me.
And it's just, it really pisses me off.
Well, this is, um, it's like a communist dictatorship taking credit for the remnants of the economy kept alive by the black market.
I mean, not only did they not do the stuff that they claim, but they, interfered with your development significantly.
But now you're part of the propaganda machine, right?
Now you're part of, well, you've got to now believe this.
And now we're rewriting the past and it's all 1984 stuff, right?
Right.
Got to rewrite the past.
No one's allowed to have any dissenting opinions.
We were always a happy and wonderful family.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
And nothing bad happened, and if it did, well, we did the best we could with the knowledge we had at the time, and I was beaten as a kid.
It turned out all right, didn't you?
Yeah.
I like that.
People say, people say, well, your mom just must have done something right, Steph, because look who you are!
Yeah.
No, they say that a lot about a concentration camp victims, too.
You know, a lot of concentration camp victims came out and wrote some amazing plays, amazing poetry.
So, yay Nazis!
Good job provoking all that creativity!
Wow!
Those Nazis must have done something, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, yeah, I mean, I would certainly talk about your issues, but also focus on, you know, your brain's dying on the stem, right?
Yeah.
I mean, video games are fun, but They're fun like candy.
It's tasty, right?
It is.
Yeah.
But it's not going to do you much good in excess, right?
No, it's not.
So I try and cut back on that.
Certainly get involved in some more creative stuff at work and try and work on really pushing aside the inner critics and simply focusing on the very act of creation itself.
And at the same time, I would start to probe.
Your family sounds pretty volatile, so I would just start to probe a little bit.
And you understand, I'm not telling you anything like you should be.
I'm just telling you what my thoughts are.
I just thought to probe a little bit and I think it's gonna have to be pretty delicate because, and I say this with cognizance of that you're talking in a black community where this stuff is so ridiculously normalized.
Yeah.
It's like you're saying, well, maybe there is no moon.
Yeah, exactly.
Well, you can just see it.
It's right there.
Right.
So because you're going to be running, you know, right up against a community standard, that is deeply entrenched, widely shared and considered a virtue.
You know, white people can go in guns blazing, so to speak, but I, you know, I'd go in and lay out the land a little bit first.
And just start to, do they even remember it?
Do they acknowledge it?
You know, do they know that it happened?
Do they know the extent that it happened?
Like, are they willing to admit even like just probe and see what's out there?
Have you ever done any, any therapy or anything like that?
Um, no, not, no, I haven't.
Sounds like you have some time.
Yeah, that's, that's true.
Sounds like you have some money.
So I would definitely look into that.
Now, listen, I got to move on to the next caller.
There's no way, no way that I could get on bended knee and ask you for, for another little song.
Tiny.
Okay.
No, it was beautiful, man.
Listen, It's a lot more melodious than anything I could put out, so... Right.
Well, thanks for the call.
Do you have a second favorite song?
Hold on, let's see.
I'm trying to remember that song, On Bending Knee.
I can't remember how it goes, but I used to love that song as well.
Do you know any Sam Cooke?
No.
Oh, the youth!
Oh, the youth!
Oh, man.
Take your time.
Listen, if you're game, I don't mind if you take some time to think about it.
That's fine.
Okay.
All right.
Give me a second.
Let's see.
What do I have here?
All right.
So, okay.
I remember how this goes.
I'm going to try to sing this on bending knee.
Darling, I can't explain.
Where do we lose our way?
Girl, it's driving me insane.
And I know I just need one more chance to prove my love to you.
If you come back to me, I'll guarantee that I'll never let you go.
I'm not going to go into the chorus.
Can't go that far.
Oh, come on!
Songus interruptus!
Don't ever do that to a woman.
Listen, I'd just like to chat with you for a little bit.
Anyway.
Okay, first of all, nice falsetto, good belting.
I just really want it technically very nice.
So I hope that you'll keep with it.
And anytime you want to come back and do an intro, I'm all over it.
All right.
All right.
Well, thanks man.
Keep us posted and I really, really appreciate your call.
It was a real pleasure to talk with you and I hope we get to talk again.
All right.
All right.
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