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Sept. 18, 2022 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:09:29
MY FRIEND ENDED EVERYTHING! Freedomain Call In
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Time Text
Hey, Steph.
Hi, how's it going? How's it going?
Good, go ahead. Yeah, doing alright.
Yeah, I just had a kind of quick question.
Any advice you had for somebody getting over the death of a friend and more specifically the suicide of a friend?
Oh gosh, I'm sorry to hear that.
I'm sorry to hear that. Do you want to tell me a little bit about the friendship and the circumstances?
Yeah, so, I mean, it was a friend that I had met in college, and yeah, we were good buddies.
We were good buddies.
Yeah, we'd hang out.
He loved history, loved telling stories, loved all that sort of stuff.
So we had very boisterous attitudes together and, you know, brothership, bond sort of thing.
And then I had then gone on to...
I'm out of out of college and more into film school and he had stayed and did college and then our relationship had kind of fallen a little bit but a little bit later I moved back into the area and he was he was still there we reconnected got to hang out a bunch and yeah really kind of rekindled things and then Brought me into a friend group,
and then after that, yeah, I find out kind of in the middle of the night that one of the people from the friend group was going over to visit him, and he decided to figure out what a six-shooter tastes like.
Wow. Yeah.
Was he married, kids, or anything like that?
No, not married.
No kids.
He lived in the apartment above his parents' place.
And, like, the thing is, it felt like he had so much potential, like, potential prospect.
His current situation was a little bleak of just he wasn't really satisfied where he was working.
However, his dad had a trade in doing...
Like, clear bras and, you know, the, like, vehicle wrap, stuff like that.
And so, like, he had a potential to, a potential skill that he could, you know, start to make a good living and start to learn how to do that.
And, yeah, there was a lot of potential that I guess the rest of us could see.
But, yeah, he...
I don't know. It was one of those out of the blue that, because, you know, there's sometimes in friend groups, there's kind of the gallows joking where, yeah, people will, you know, will joke about dark stuff, but at the same time, you know, we're all, I guess, not serious, but potentially he was.
What sort of jokes would he make?
Well, I guess that's another one of the weird things.
He wouldn't really make jokes about suicide.
He would always talk about, you know, I want to go live in the woods.
Everything is fucked.
It's all terrible.
You know, kind of bemoaning a little bit at our situations.
And yeah, just saying that, you know, society's kind of going in a dark direction.
And so he wanted to, yeah, wanted to just, you know, move away, move into the forest.
um kind of uh create like a small commune compound type thing of just all right you know all of us guys will you know buy some land we'll build on it and we'll just create our own little thing and you know just be away from people and all that sort of stuff but yeah there wasn't really talks of his expiration And did he...
Oh, sorry. What was his age range?
And did he have anything going on, like career-wise or relationship-wise or anything like that?
So he was 25.
Or, yeah, mid-20s.
Yeah. Yeah, he was in his mid-twenties, and I mean, he was working as a salesman, just at a, probably like a, or before that he had worked as an air vac guy.
So essentially, even though he had a college degree, he was working a lot of different trades, jobs, and kind of just whatever he could get.
But And then, yeah, he was essentially just doing Tinder and doing well.
Tinder, you mean like he was in hookup culture?
Yeah. Yeah, very much so.
And what were your thoughts about that for him?
Oh, I ribbed him every single time that topic came up because I was like, dude, what you're looking for, you're not going to find it there.
This is something that, yeah, essentially saying that if you're wanting a wife, if you're wanting kids, if you're wanting this sort of lifestyle, you're not moving in the right direction You know, through this lifestyle.
And so, I mean, yeah, I spoke to him about it and was vocal.
Yeah, I was vocal about it.
And did he have any substance abuse issues?
I'd probably say drinking.
So, I mean, yeah, basically drinking, weed, and And sometimes mushrooms.
But... Yeah.
Yeah, he did all that stuff.
Yeah, I mean, weed can be pretty bad.
There's some new data out that...
I think it's new. One out of 20 habitual...
Weed users will develop schizophrenia, which is a pretty horrifying condition, I believe.
Now, did he use these substances once a month or once a week or a couple of times a week?
Do you know? Beer was a pretty regular thing.
It was one of the reasons why...
I wasn't able to, or didn't want to hang out excessively, was that every time we would hang out, it's, alright, we're going drinking, and it's like, guys, can we do something else besides drinking, you know, when we're hanging out, when we're doing stuff?
Yeah, so yeah, it was a lot of drinking.
I wasn't really around for the weed, because I can't handle the smell, and so it's like, Yeah, keep it away.
And then, yeah, it wasn't there for the mushrooms or anything like that.
Yeah, so basically when I was around, it was just a whole lot of drinking.
And do you know anything about, you said he was living over his parents' place, do you know anything about his relationship with his parents?
It was okay.
So, first off, his dad's divorced.
And, yeah, he was very heavy into the, like, biker heavy metal culture and kind of all the stuff that goes along with that.
So, you know, he... Wears his leather and battle vest and all that stuff, rides his motorcycle.
So it was a very tumultuous relationship with his parents.
There'd be a couple times that he'd get angry and cuss his dad out.
Yeah, kind of just very upset with a lot of stuff.
So, what was in it for you, this relationship?
As you said, it went back to many years in the past.
What was the benefit?
I mean, if he's an alcoholic and drug addict or whatever he was doing, if he was a social alcoholic at least, right?
And his life's going nowhere.
He's living over his biker dad's place and no particular future and he's kind of blackpilled and nihilistic and no hope and like...
What's your hygiene for having this kind of person around?
Tell me the pluses of this guy for you.
I mean, yeah, so there's definitely writing off of the time that we had before, you know, kind of remembering stuff in college.
He was very encouraging of me, of essentially just like, hey, here's You know, essentially saying, like, hey, you need to, since I'm into film and that sort of thing, pursue more, you know,
pursue more film. Hey, you should, like, start doing, like, movie reviews or, you know, essentially suggesting different creative projects and, yeah, really kind of being an encouragement in that aspect of my life of, like, hey, I want to... I mean, did you grow up with an under-functioning parent and that was your job, was to help fix the parent?
or were there people in your life when you were younger that you tried to help and failed?
Yeah, I mean, yes.
So my...
My dad was, yeah, essentially not there, just in the sense of he was a doctor and he was really busy and so he was, yeah, spent a significant amount of time away from the house because he was working.
Well, but that's, I mean, so he was functional.
I mean, he was a workaholic maybe, but he was functional.
This guy wasn't functional.
I mean, was there anyone in your life who just was under functioning when you were younger?
Not any that comes to mind.
So where's your susceptibility?
Because you would give good advice to this guy, and he wouldn't listen, right?
Yeah. Okay, so what do you do in a relationship where somebody's on a self-destructive path and won't change?
What do you do? I mean, you kind of just got to let them go.
You get out, right? Yeah.
So, what does it...
And for how many years did you consider that he was on a not great path and you were giving him better advice?
Um... Well, so the time that we had spent in college, I felt he was on a lot better of a path.
It was more just, hey, here's an interesting guy.
He wasn't an alcoholic then, and a lot of those problems hadn't manifested.
And so, yeah, that was the initial draw.
And then when we reconnected a bunch of years later, yeah, I mean, I definitely feel there's probably just an amount of, you know, You know, I'm thinking that the person that was there, you know, in the college years, I don't know.
Are you distracted by something at the moment?
I feel like your conversation is stalling out here.
No, I'm just trying to think.
No, no, don't.
Just think with me.
I'm not asking you to present some final thesis here.
Just think out loud. Was the person who he was gone?
So, the person who he was gone is someone who is...
Yeah.
History buff. Really enjoys stories.
He was writing...
You know, working on a novel.
Has a lot of...
Yeah, vivid imagination.
We're able to have, you know, grand conversations.
We're able to get along and make jokes with each other.
Okay, sorry. I mean, the historicals, yeah.
I mean, I'm sure there was value in him historically, which is not why I asked about the past.
I'm sort of asking about the present.
So, do you have any idea why he had this failure to launch?
I feel like he was more blaming the world around him than himself for the necessary change needed to be able to succeed and get ahead.
Right. Okay.
And he also was self-medicating with a variety of mind-altering substances, right?
Yes. And was he paying rent to his parents?
I believe so.
I'm not sure about that.
Probably not much, right? Yeah.
Now, his parents obviously knew about his substance abuse issues, right?
Yes. And what did they do about it that you knew of?
I mean, it was basically kind of...
Slap on the wrist, like shake their finger, like, oh, like, hey, well, yeah, like, cool down, buddy.
Like, maybe don't go as hard, but at the same time, you know, no real, yeah, no real parental guidance or no real stopping of it.
Right. Okay. So, you know, it's very unhealthy.
To care about people more than they care about themselves.
It's a hole with no bottom.
It's a black hole. It's a drowning person pulls you under.
It sounds like you cared about him more than he cared about himself, right?
Yeah. Very much so.
So, you know, I obviously can't help you with what happened with your friend, but I think that, you know, people's real question to me is not how do I process what happened.
People's real question to me is how the hell do I not have this happen again?
Yeah. So, what were the warning signs?
I don't mean about the suicide, but what were the warning signs that he wasn't going to get better?
Yeah. Yeah, plenty.
I feel that, let's see, there are signs that, yeah, basically ignoring my advice.
A lot of victimhood status where Yeah, he would essentially, when people were trying to correct him or anything like that, he'd get defensive and kind of lash out, lash back at people. What do you mean by lash out?
Just, like, out them or curse them out or something.
You mean he was verbally abusive?
Yeah. Dude.
Dude, what are you doing with a verbal abuser in your life?
Well... Trying to...
Foolishly trying to play the role of savior, but...
But not...
And so why?
Why were you trying to play the role of savior?
Um... I guess they're, yeah, I mean, they're definitely...
I mean, sorry, let me just be clear, because let's say that you have a friend who is overweight and flabby.
Look at me, I'm a pear, right?
And he wants to go to the gym and, you know, every now and then he's like crabby about going to the gym, but you say, come on, man, you know you'll feel better when you get there.
And he's like, yeah, yeah, you're right, let's go to the gym.
And then he's like, hey, man, thanks for encouraging me to go to the gym or whatever, right?
So, you know, we can all use a little bit of prop up from time to time along these lines.
So, I mean, there's nothing wrong with that.
It's like you can't help people or whatever, right?
But if you say to your overweight and flabby friend, you know, we really should go to the gym and he just swears at you and verbally abuses you for doing that.
It's like, dude, like what was up with that?
I mean, if you try to help him when you see him verbally abusing other people, maybe he did it to you too, and he's continuing to be a multi-substance addict and not doing anything with his life and spreading all this negativity and being hostile to people and so on.
It's like you need to have a parachute, right?
You need to have the planes going down, I'm jumping with my shoe.
Like, you've got to have a standard for getting out of these kinds of things, right?
Yeah. I mean, imagine you start dating some great girl, right?
Some really nice woman, smart and wise, and she comes over and she's like, hey, let me introduce you to my friend.
Yeah. Right?
There's a cost to these things, man, that the cost is the progress in your life.
You know, if you reach down to pull someone up, one of two things is going to happen.
Either you pull them up or they pull you down.
There's nothing in between. You've got to have a standard by which you say, hey, if you're not coming up, I'm sure as hell not going to let you drag me down, so I'm out of here.
And that is actually the most helpful thing you can do.
Like, if you really want to help people, letting them drag you down or watching them circle the drain or showing the impotence of good advice by continuing to hang out with them where they don't listen to you, that's all terrible.
It's terrible for the person.
Yeah. You know, it's like giving everyone an A, no matter how well they did on the test.
That doesn't do any good for anyone.
It doesn't do good for the people who studied.
It doesn't do any good for the people who didn't study.
It gives people a false sense of achievement.
It's just diluted. If he's not earning your friendship through at least a commitment to virtuous actions and some manifestation to those, what are you doing?
It's not about helping him.
Just please help me.
Like, you've got to understand that.
It's not about helping him.
Yeah. Not engaging with people who are self-destructive is a clear signal that they need to change.
But continuing to hover around and give them good advice and nag them and this, that, and the other, well, that's not helping them.
Yeah. I mean, you've heard me in debates, right?
So in debates, I generally start off pretty friendly.
Yeah. And...
I try to, through that friendliness, treat people the best you can, and after that, treat them as they treat you.
So I start off pretty friendly.
And I try to figure out whether the person is debating in good faith.
So you've heard the debates where it's pretty clear the person is not debating in good faith.
Debates where it's pretty clear that the person is debating in good faith.
And you've got to be clear about that kind of stuff.
Okay, so another question that I would have is, were there other people in your life who were warning you about this dangerous situation?
Not fully.
Mainly because, yeah, there wasn't really anyone that I would give the full rundown of how things were happening.
Yeah, so I wouldn't really give the full rundown of how things are happening to anyone else.
But I assume it was on your mind.
I mean, this guy was putting off some danger signals, not necessarily suicidal danger signals, but it was on your mind, right?
Yes, it was something that after reconnecting with him and after getting back in touch, yeah, there was a part of like, I don't know how much longer I want to be Yeah, you know, be his friend, continue to hang out, stuff like that, which, I mean, yeah, that's also one of the reasons why I had ended up later in that year moving, you know, moving away.
And yeah, so it means that we couldn't hang out.
So essentially, I was using the distance as an excuse of like, okay, now I can kind of be free of this social connection.
Okay, so why were you not asking for advice from people in your life?
I mean, you have parents or family or whoever, right?
Or friends, right?
So, I mean, better friends, I hope.
So, do you try and solve everything yourself?
Are you like a hoarder of issues or problems?
Or do you lean on people and ask for feedback?
I mean, I know you're doing that now, but I mean before.
Yeah, so typically before...
Yeah, I would essentially try to do a lot of internal thought, internal processing, working through the situation on my own.
And where do you think you developed these habits of solitary problem-solving?
I mean...
I feel there probably was an aspect of it coming from my years as the youngest of three kids where there was a significant age gap between myself and my next oldest sibling to the point where they would hang out together and Kind of leave me off.
And so, yeah, it was essentially a lot of kind of going off on my own, figuring out my own thing.
Yeah, doing my own thing.
Right, okay. Now, would you say that your friend was trying to solve, your dead friend, was he trying to solve his issues on his own?
No, I feel that it was more of just commiserating.
Kind of complaining? Well, no, because he blames society, right?
That's externalizing.
Look, I get societies messed up and all of that.
I get all of that, for sure, but not to the point of killing yourself.
We still have vastly more freedoms than 99.999% of human beings throughout history and so on, right?
We have this conversation. Yeah.
So was he trying to wrestle with his suicidality on his own?
It seems to me that he was because he wasn't, I mean, he wasn't in treatment, I assume.
He wasn't reaching out to friends and saying, you know, I really feel like I'm going to do this or whatever, right?
I mean, was he trying to wrestle with that issue on his own?
Yes. Right.
And obviously that didn't work out too well for him, right?
No. And you also have a habit, I think, of trying to wrestle with issues on your own, right?
Yeah. Now, there's a couple of reasons why we wrestle with issues on our own.
And one of the main reasons is that, tell me if this is the one for you, it could be any number of them, but is it because, like, well, I don't want to be a bother?
Yeah. Right.
Which means that you view yourself as a bother.
Right. That your deepest thoughts or feelings or issues or things that you're struggling with or things that you're wrestling with are bothersome to other people?
Yep. Do you think that you can ever feel the experience of love if you feel that you're a bother to people?
Not fully.
Not fully. Well, can someone love you if you kind of disagree with them?
Like if someone thinks you're wonderful, but you think that you're a bother, can you really experience love at all?
Yeah. Not really.
Not in my mind.
Now with this young man who tragically killed himself, is it fair to say that when you were trying to help him, you were somewhat of a bother?
Yeah. So that's a bit of a repetition thing, right?
Yeah. You picked someone...
And your experience of that person was very similar to your experience as a child of not wanting to be a bother to people, but needing to be a bother to people because you're a kid, you've got to survive, you've got to interact with people, right?
Yeah. Right.
So I would, if I were in your shoes, I would directly challenge that.
I'm a bother thing. Am I a bother to people?
Am I bothersome to other people?
Am I annoying to other people?
Can you ask for resources from other people?
This is a fundamental question, right?
The asking of resources from other people, you know, I do this, I haven't done donation pitches in years, but I used to do this on a fairly regular basis to say, you know, can you help support the show?
And, you know, here's a minor one. Can you help support, not you particularly, but can you help support the show at freedomain.com slash donate?
But can you ask for resources?
Yeah. Right?
Because that's kind of like a relationship thing, right?
Can you ask for the division of labor?
Can you ask people to take interest in what's troubling you?
Can you ask people to give you feedback on your thoughts and feelings?
Can you ask for help? And of course, as part of that reciprocal thing, can you offer help to other people when they ask for you or other people's needs always a bother to you or that kind of stuff, right?
So can you ask for help?
Can you... Respect yourself enough to say, there are people in my life who care about me and will actually be annoyed with me if I hoard my problems to myself.
In the same way that you're genuinely upset with your friend who killed himself because he did not share whatever was driving him in that direction.
He did not share it enough with people.
To give them a real chance to help him.
Or he would spray around these issues that were negative but wouldn't ever take any advice to get better.
Yeah. So that's an extreme form, I think, of what you manifest.
Which is, hey, man, I don't want to be a bother.
I don't want to intrude. I don't want to...
It's like, no, we're born to be a bother.
We're born to intrude. That's called having a relationship.
That's being related. It's the exchange of resources and value.
Yeah. So I would challenge that because I don't think you can have a productive, positive, long-lasting, healthy, loving relationship if at some level you feel that you're a bother or that you kind of armadillo yourself up, you kind of hoard and roll yourself up into nothingness and just go away into the woods and lick your wounds every time you get hurt rather than reaching out for people, if that makes sense.
Yeah. And I guess one of the other things that that's brought up is that, yeah, I don't feel that I have people that I can really reach out to.
There's, yeah, yeah, that I don't really feel that I And, yeah, I guess one of the reasons why I don't...
Yeah, maybe this is a continuation of that thought of one of the reasons why I don't go directly to family on that sort of issue is that, yeah, I feel like I don't want to bother my family.
I don't want to... I don't want to be a bother to them, so I don't want to approach them with these sort of issues or things like that.
Okay, so you understand that that's not something that you were born with.
Babies are very bothersome, and they should be, and it's entirely right that they are, and in fact, it's a huge problem if they're not.
You know, if the baby's hungry, then the baby needs food, right?
And you want the baby to cry, and you want the baby to be upset, and all these kinds of good things, right?
Yeah. So you were born being a delightful bother.
And then that got ignored or neglected or knocked out of you at some point.
But being a bother is essential to being in love.
In other words, I mean, can you imagine what kind of show this would be if, because a lot of the show is these kinds of conversations and call-in.
Imagine if, you know, for the last 16 years, every single one of the people who'd wanted to call in and said, well, I don't want to be a bother, right?
Be a whole lot of monologues, right?
Yeah.
And I've consistently praised – I mean I'm very happy.
I'm not happy about the circumstances, of course, of the call-in, but I'm very happy that you called in.
And I have praised the people at freedomain.locals.com for giving me such great questions and so on, right?
And it's like teeing me up the perfect hits, so to speak.
So I'm thrilled that people want to give me feedback and want to tell me about their issues.
I'm very happy that you called in.
Of course, unhappy about the circumstances.
So do you think that you're a bother to me?
I mean there was definitely – there was definitely some bits that were – Yeah, worried about that.
Worried that I'd be a...
It was like, is my question really good enough?
Right. Which is, am I worthy of somebody's attention?
Am I worthy of somebody investing resources in me to help me with something I'm struggling with, right?
Yeah. Right.
Well, you are, but it doesn't help you much if only I say it.
Do you know what I mean? I mean, I can hear it in your voice, right?
This is where the real pain is for you.
Yeah. And I'm sorry, you know, you should never have been given the impression as a child that you were a bother.
And there's this horrible thing in parenting, you know, people make these jokes all the time, you know.
Don't be such a bother. Go play outside.
If you can't be nice, be elsewhere.
When I was a kid, it's like children should be seen and not heard.
If I stood in front of the TV, my mom would say, you're a pain, but you're not a windowpane.
And it's just this feeling that, you know, the wine moms do this all the time.
Oh, my kids are driving me crazy.
My kids are such a bother. My kids are always fighting.
My kids are this, that, and the other. You know, that they're just hard done by and they're put upon.
And to me, it's a really pathetic manipulation.
You know, the parents should just say, I was ignored as a child.
I don't have the empathy resources to deal with children who are going through stuff, so I'm just going to pretend that they're bothering me so I never have to deal with the wound of having been ignored when I was suffering.
Yeah. I mean, workaholics always feel like they're not good enough.
And the only way they can even stay in place is to pedal frantically so they don't fall off a cliff or something.
But I'm really sorry that you were not perceived as somebody worthy of interest when you were growing up.
I mean, we all are.
We're all... Interesting and fascinating.
I am fascinated by what's going on in your mind.
Really. And I know that sounds kind of cold, like, ah, fascinating.
But no, genuinely, like at a deep emotional level, I'm rapidly fascinated and curious about what's going on in people's minds.
Because we're all humans.
We're all struggling with very similar issues.
And of course, if we all come together, we have a great deal of strength and power and communion.
And people used to come together in churches and they used to come together in other ways to deal with common issues.
And that's sort of fallen by the wayside and we've kind of atomized and isolated ourselves as a result.
But not to get too abstract, but yeah, listen, I mean, I'm enormously glad that you called in and I'm enormously sad.
I can feel that just in my body, just enormously sad that your existence is a bother to people.
What you care about is annoying to people.
You know, people have a lot of time in this world.
I mean, you've known your parents for decades.
And yet, a half-hour conversation about something really important to you, what are they so busy with?
What are they so busy with?
What are we all so busy with that we can't sit down and listen to what's really important to those around us?
Those we claim to love. Those we claim to care about.
What are we so busy with?
What is so super important that that always takes the back seat and then falls out the trunk?
It just never comes to pass.
I mean, I read about this in my novel, The Future.
You know, where a son says to his father, we knew each other for decades and we couldn't spare 15 minutes for an important conversation.
I mean, I can understand it if you're Currently under gunfire, you know, or planes crashing, or maybe that's a good time to have an important conversation.
But we have a fair amount of leisure time.
We have incredible communications devices.
We can talk to people over video, largely for free, anywhere across the world.
And yet, we can't share what's really important to us.
It's so tragic. That we're all in the same room, all dealing with the same stuff, and all Tommy-style, deaf, dumb, and blind to each other.
How much strength we could have if we simply reached out and said, I understand.
I guarantee you everybody who's ever listened to this, or everybody who will ever listen to this, has tried to pour their heart, mind, and soul into helping somebody Who's really struggling and failed.
Everyone. I've done it.
You've done it. Everyone who's listening has done it.
And if you doubt that, you know, just in the chat.
Push Y. Push Y and hit enter if you've ever really tried to help somebody who's drowning and had it go badly.
I'm throwing mine in because I've done it more than once.
Yeah.
So what you're facing is a common human condition.
We have sympathy, we want to help, and part of why we want to help is we want to be helped.
And I guarantee you, your father has tried to help his patients and has failed completely with some of them, right?
Yeah. And the idea that we try to help people and it goes badly for reasons that are hard to understand, that is an incredibly common human experience.
And it manifested in a very brutal way in your situation.
But you are not a bother.
You were a human being in pain.
And I deeply sympathize with that pain.
And, you know, you might have done the right thing.
Because let's say that you had pulled resources from your friend a month ago and then you found out he killed himself.
What would you say to yourself then?
Yeah. You blame yourself to some degree, I assume, right?
Yeah. So maybe this was just a plane crash you had to ride all the way down so that you wouldn't feel...
That regret or that self-recrimination, if that makes sense?
Yeah. Yeah.
Who in your life would you like to be interested in you?
My dad.
Because he was always too busy and always helping other people, right?
Yep. And have you ever told him that?
No.
And what do you think would happen if you told him that?
I guess there'd be a...
He'd ask...
I would imagine he would ask a question of like, "Well, how do I do that?" Like he needs an example or, you know, something to help him along.
Now, would he need an example of how he'd ignored you, or would he need an example of how to not ignore you?
Yeah.
I guess it would be how not to...
So do you think he would say, yes, I've been distracted by work, or I haven't put as much attention on you as I should have?
Would he say something like that? Yeah.
So at least he would acknowledge it as an issue, right?
Yes. Yeah.
Okay.
But then would he just go kind of rubber bones on you, like I don't know how to fix it?
Yeah.
Right. And so normally I would do a role play at this point to try and sort of understand your dad from your perspective.
But the problem is, to me, if somebody says, yeah, I know it's an issue.
I don't focus enough on you and I really haven't, but I just don't know how to.
Then the next question, of course, is, well, what was it like for you as a child?
Did you feel like you were bothered to people when you had pain as a child or as an adult even?
But, you know, generally we start as a child, right?
So if you had pain as a child.
How did you deal with it or what happened, right?
And that would be the question to ask your dad, right?
Thank you.
Yeah. Because once you understand that it's your dad's issue, you don't take it personally.
I mean, it's still painful, but it's not your fault.
I mean, if you were drowning and your dad didn't dive in to save you, but instead a stranger saved you, and then you said to your dad, why didn't you save me?
And your dad said, I can't swim.
It would have been even worse for you, so I went to get help.
You wouldn't sit there and say, oh, my dad doesn't even care about me enough to get wet, right?
Yeah. Whereas if we're drowning and our dad doesn't come to save us, we feel uncared for.
If your dad... Yeah.
Yeah. But it's important to understand why your dad and your mom,
I think it's important to understand why your father ignores you or gave you the impression that you were a bother, that you were in the way, that you were an annoyance, that you were a diversion, that you were some sort of drag or negative or a wind impedance to his racing bicycles or something like that.
Yeah. And it's not to do with you.
I mean, when we were kids, we make everything to do with us.
That's just our way of surviving.
But it's not to do with you.
It's to do with a deficiency in him and in his parents and in his lack of ability or inability or unwillingness to deal with those issues.
But you can't be both loved and be a bother at the same time.
If you feel you have to hide your troubles from those around you, you're not close to them, they're not close to you.
And those habits very quickly turn into habits that keep absolutely everyone at bay.
Did you hear me? Yeah.
You know, I say this from some personal experience, so like we're both in the emotional pit together, right?
right?
But you will keep everyone at bay and you'll go through your whole life being a bother and then you'll go to your grave hoping you won't bother the worms.
But you're never a bother to people who love you.
Thank you.
In fact, they're bothered when you don't share with them.
If you hoard to yourself, you vanish from the emotional radar of other people.
Thank you.
And the reason why your parents gave you the impression or maybe told you directly that you were a bother was your legitimate needs provoked terrible anxiety in them, and they didn't want to deal with that, so they just pushed you away
it's sort of like if I've lied about something and you come along not knowing I've lied about it and you start telling the truth I'm going to get really tense or really anxious right Let's say I'm some doofus who's trying to pick up a girl by saying, I'm an airline pilot, right?
And I'm going to get her a number and we're going to go on a date because she just loves airline pilots or whatever, right?
And you come along and say, hey man, how was your baggage handling shift at the airport?
How am I going to feel? Cut.
I'm going to feel tense and angry at you, right?
Yeah, yes. Yeah.
And I'm going to kind of give you a warning smile and say, oh, he's such a kidder.
Of course, I'm an airline pilot, as he well knows, but he refers to me as a baggage handler because he's kind of competitive, right?
Yeah. I'm going to give you a very clear warning.
Don't go there. Don't tell the truth.
That's the kind of mechanism at play.
If you have legitimate emotional needs and you go to your parents and your parents did not get their legitimate emotional needs met and they haven't empathized with that and they haven't dealt with it, then they're going to want you to shut the hell up because it evokes a lot of pain in them.
You understand?
It's not that you're bothering them.
It's that you're bothering their parents and their parents and their parents.
Who decided to have children and get angry at their children for existing.
Do you see what I'm saying? You decide to create a human being and then you communicate to that fresh, new, beautiful human being.
You're a bother. You're a distraction.
You're an annoyance. You're a body on the train tracks.
You're a log on the highway. You're an impedance.
Get out of the way because I've got a life to live.
So you create a beautiful child who needs you.
And then you scorn and mock that child for needing you.
It's horrible.
It's horrible.
And it's so common.
Thank you.
Yep. Yep.
And when you become a father, which I hope you will.
I hope everyone listening to this becomes a mother or father.
When you become a father and you hold your baby and those clear liquid, limpid eyes are just gazing into yours and the child, the baby can't do anything for himself or herself.
And you realize just how much your child needs you and how beautiful and honorable being needed is.
You've created a life who just needs you for everything.
For life itself. For language.
For thought. For contact.
For caresses. For diaper changes.
Needs you for everything.
And then you realize that to withhold the beauty and honor of that need and to withhold the fulfillment of that need is a terrible, terrible, terrible crime.
And it is really the source of almost every other crime in the world.
To create you, for your parents to create you, to confine you, because they didn't give you up for adoption, to create you and confine you, and then continually and consistently complain that you're a bother to them.
It's a deep cruelty.
And you can say, well, they weren't conscious of it.
It's like, oh, come on.
You go to every parent, right?
You go to any parent and you say, if your child's really unhappy or really upset about something, would you like them to tell you?
What would parents say? Of course, yes, my door's always open.
My heart is always open. I want my children to share with me, right?
So they know the right thing to do.
Yeah.
They know.
I mean, you go to a jailer and you say it's your job to keep the prisoner in jail.
They say, yep.
So if they do the opposite, they can't claim to be ignorant of the right thing.
And if you have parents and you have a cluster of siblings and then a sibling who's much younger, you would say, do you need to make sure that that sibling feels included more so because they're later on, maybe a whoopsie, but, you know, a later on.
Of course they'd say, well, yeah, I mean, I can understand.
It's difficult when the siblings are older.
We're older, but we've got to really make sure that kid's included.
And so everybody, it's so weird, you know.
Everybody has the right answers.
Very few people do the right thing.
To me, it's kind of as incomprehensible as someone writing a test for their very life and deliberately putting in the wrong answer.
They know the right answer.
And literally, somebody's given 2 plus 2 equals what?
And the guy who hands the test If you don't answer right, I'm going to pull out a tooth.
Wait, yours or mine? No, yours.
And the person writing the test knows they're going to get a tooth violently pulled out, marathon man style.
If they put down the wrong answer, of course they know the right answer, that two and two is four, and they say two and two is five, or two and two is blue, or two and two is a unicorn, or two and two is question mark.
It's incomprehensible that everyone knows the right answer and everyone does the wrong thing.
If your children are sad or upset about something, would you like them to talk to you about it?
Would you like them to tell you? Yes, absolutely.
And I guarantee you, when you were a baby, well, certainly when you were a baby, when you were a toddler, when you were a little boy, you were sad about things.
And first of all, you waited for your parents to respond, as every child does.
And when your parents didn't respond, you're like, well, maybe they're really distracted, or maybe they don't notice for some reason that I'm really sad or upset about something, so I'll bring it up.
And they'll be like, oh, it'll be fine.
Or they, you know, I can't right now, later, another time.
And then that other time never comes up, and that impatience and that brusqueness is a clear communication that you are a bother.
And listen, that can happen.
That can happen with parenting from time to time.
Your child needs something and you are nose deep in some shit storm.
And you have to defer.
And you say, I'm really sorry. I really have to deal with something right now.
And I'm so sorry.
And then you circle back in Pataki style and you give them the comfort they need.
And of course, when you come to your parents and you ask for help, as you do, as we all did, and they respond with impatience, brusqueness, hostility sometimes, I mean, what do you learn?
What did you learn? Yeah, that I was a bother.
Keep it to yourself, right?
Yeah. You've got to solve everything on your own, my friend.
Sorry, son, you're going to have to reinvent the wheel because daddy's got unprocessed trauma that he won't acknowledge.
That is tough, man.
And that creates a lot of isolation.
You know, a lot of this show is about breaking down those walls, breaking down those barriers, breaking down that isolation.
You know, I genuinely believe, and this may be the case for you, you can tell me whether it is or it isn't.
I genuinely believe that for a lot of the people I talk to, The time that they talk with me is the first time that somebody has really helped them.
Like really listened and really poured heart, mind, and soul into trying to help to whatever degree I can.
I genuinely believe that.
I mean, have you had...
Obviously, it's fine if you have.
It's just a hypothesis. It's not something I'm wedded to.
But as far as issues that you have in your life, have you had a conversation like this before?
Yes, once before.
With you. With me?
Okay, well, I guess the theory took a little bit of a blow, but then it staggered and got back up, Joe Frazier style, right?
So, okay, I'm sorry that I didn't recognize you from a prior conversation.
My apologies. No, it was about a separate thing.
Yeah, no worries.
So that's two, right?
What's your age range? Upper 20s.
Okay, so late 20s.
And you've had two, right?
Yeah. And that's what I do these conversations for, is to be able to offer people a drink.
The endless desert of self-sufficiency is a great honor and a great privilege.
And to also have the honor and privilege to be able to share these conversations with the world so that people understand that you can really listen and care about someone.
And if I'm able to do this as a guy on the internet, surely the people in your life who care about you Say they love you.
Should be able to do something like it.
Not the same, but something like it, right?
Yeah. So I would imagine that if your friend could speak, he would say, well, I kept it all to myself and I didn't want to be a bother and I'm in the dirt now, man.
Don't keep it to yourself.
If your true self is a bother to someone, Find someone to whom you are not a bother.
Having needs around narcissists is always bothersome to them, right?
Because they only care about their own needs and other people's needs that interfere with their own needs is just a bother, right?
But don't let your value be defined by selfish people.
And don't let your sense of self-worth be defined by people who for their own traumas ended up rejecting you.
Not because of anything in you, but because of something missing from them.
Self-knowledge, compassion, wisdom, empathy.
You don't judge the beauty of your paintings by the judgment of a blind man, right?
Yeah. Yeah. And you don't judge your self-worth by people who lack empathy.
In fact, it's incredibly dangerous to do that.
You have value because you're human.
You have value because you have self-knowledge.
You have value because you think and you feel and you speak.
And if people don't see your value...
Believe it or not, there are people not currently listening to this conversation.
I don't know what they're doing. I assume it's some form of emergency.
But there are genuinely people who could be listening to this conversation who aren't.
Well, it's their loss, I would assume, right?
Yeah. You don't play your concerts to deaf people.
You don't show your paintings to blind people.
And you don't put your greatest dish in front of someone who's got no smell and taste because COVID. And you don't judge yourself by the rejection from selfish people who have no capacity to accept anyone anyway.
And if you have value, then people who don't listen to your good advice Are not very productive to have around.
Because if somebody doesn't listen to your good advice, and you cared about your friend, I hear that.
You still do, of course.
But if somebody doesn't listen to your good advice, and you continue to hang around and give them good advice as if they were listening and had earned more good advice by listening to the last piece of good advice, Then you're continuing to devalue yourself by saying, well, it doesn't matter whether people listen to me or not.
I'll still hang out with them.
And again, I know you were the distance and you were winding things down and so on, right?
But, I mean, this went on for a while, right?
Yeah. Right.
I mean, it's just a sad and tragic fact in this life that you have to treasure yourself.
You have to. I mean, nobody else will if you don't, guaranteed.
You have to treasure yourself.
You have to feel that you're worthy of love, and you have to be willing to do the actions that will generate love.
But you have to start that, yes, I'm interesting.
Yes, I'm a treasure.
Yes, I'm important.
I matter. Ah, well, I don't feel that way.
Well, too bad, you do matter.
We can't run things based on feelings or we just sit on the couch eating cupcakes and never exercise.
We rarely feel like that, doing anything else.
And is it hard for you if you to say, like, I'm a treasure?
Can you try the words on?
I'm sorry, you're a what?
I didn't quite hear that. I'm a treasure.
And people who don't see it, are they missing out?
Yes. Right.
You are a treasure. I'm a treasure.
Everybody who's listening to this, I guarantee you is a treasure.
To be this interested in philosophy and this honest and open in a conversation is a beautiful thing.
This conversation is a treasure.
And don't sell yourself for nothing.
Don't beg. Don't lower yourself.
Get the price that a treasure is worth.
Bid hard, bid high.
And accept nothing less.
If you know that you're a treasure, other people will automatically increase their estimation of you, which means that you will draw higher quality people around you and lower quality people or negative quality people will escape Like rats off a sinking ship, as the saying goes. Yeah, be a treasure.
You are a treasure. You are a conscious mind with deep thoughts and feelings wandering around this universe because some star decided to spill its guts a billion miles away a billion years ago.
Many billions of miles away.
And you are star vomit up and walking around reasoning and talking and thinking.
You are a treasure. If there's any point to the universe, it's the three pounds of wetware we've got in our skull prison.
And you've got one, man. You've got one.
I can understand a rock not thinking I'm a treasure unless it's gold or diamonds.
I can understand a tree thinking, well, I'm kind of like the other trees and I don't really do much.
I just make more trees and try not to die.
But you and I, of all the things in the universe, we are the greatest treasure the universe has.
We're the sole purpose of the universe because there's no purpose without our minds, because the rest of blind matter has very little purpose, if any.
Yeah. Look at the vast improbability of you being alive and thinking at such a time where a conversation like this is possible.
Yes, you're a treasure.
Of course you are. You're the universe's ultimate diamond.
And yeah, some people spray their diamonds over with matte black paint and pretend it's a piece of gravel or coal.
Yeah, that's a shame.
Some people grind their diamonds into dust.
Some people just throw them away.
But we can polish them, and we can become blindingly bright.
Yeah, of course you're a treasure.
And I'm sorry that people tried to turn you into coal.
And I'm sorry that your friend didn't listen, but by God, is he ever a warning of what happens when you lose sight of the fact that you are a treasure.
Yeah. And for me, it's always like, yeah, I know I'm not a bother.
But if you think I am a bother, I will not bother you.
Right? Yeah, I won't bother you.
Hey, if you think the conversation with me is a bother, I'm not going to inflict it on you.
Honestly, if you think my diamond is a piece of coal, I'm obviously not going to sell it to you.
I know it's a diamond. You think it's a piece of coal, I'm not selling it to you because you don't have any understanding of its value.
And I'm sorry that you also don't feel like a treasure, because if you don't feel like a treasure, you can't recognize another treasure, something else of value.
And you've wandered through this life lonely, isolated, manipulated, and depressed.
It's a pretty terrible way to treat the treasure of life, right?
Yeah. Did we get someplace useful?
We did, Steph. Is there anything else I had?
lengthy speeches.
Is there anything that you wanted to add?
No, nothing particular.
Okay. I would go to your friend's grave and say I'm sorry that you lost sight of the treasure that you are.
I'm sorry I lost sight of the treasure that I was.
But Stand on that grave and say, this is the foundation of my bedrock.
Certainty that I will never be anything less than a treasure in this universe.
And that's the best.
I think that's the very best that you can get out of this kind of situation.
It doesn't make anything about his death anything other than horrible, but it does mean that you've learned the most that can be learned from this kind of tragedy, I think.
All right.
Well, listen, thanks everyone so much for, again, the great and deep honor of these conversations.
I truly appreciate them more than I can ever, ever express.
But thank you everyone so much for dropping by this afternoon.
Have yourself a great weekend. Lots of love from up here.
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