April 13, 2026 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
02:20:37
Can My Father Ever CHANGE? CALL IN SHOW
Stefan Molyneux analyzes a caller's failed relationships, exposing how his father's refusal to accept full responsibility for emotional bullying prevents genuine change. The host critiques the caller's dating failures, noting he prioritized lust over virtue by sleeping with a leftist woman without vetting her character or discussing commitment. Ultimately, Molyneux argues that treating philosophy as mere entertainment rather than a strict standard for love leaves the caller in a destructive "null zone," unable to form authentic connections without either fully embracing virtue or abandoning reason entirely. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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Why We Left Google00:05:59
All right.
So we're doing a public call.
So just remember, as of course, I'm sure you know the drill.
If you can stay off names and places, that would be excellent.
And I'm all ears, brother.
How can I best help?
Great.
Do you want me to read out the note that I sent?
You can do that, or you can just tell me.
Either one is fine with me.
Okay.
Cool.
So we talked last May.
And after that conversation, About a month later, I crashed out, as the kids these days said.
Like, still kind of kept work in motion, like, did some social things, but spent a lot of my weekends just staying inside, watching TV, eating junk food, playing video games, playing video games in my apartment for the first time in a long time, many years.
Downloaded Warcraft 3 on my laptop and started playing that.
And.
The so that was like kind of last sorry, can you just remind the listeners and me to some degree what we talked about last May?
Yeah, um, yeah, so the note from last May was uh, the title was something about I keep playing musical chairs, but I think it was about um, being stuck in life, uh, with uh, particularly with like friendships and dating, um, but also at the time a bit with work as well, um, and not.
Really being kind of sure where I was missing and what I wasn't seeing on the personal relationships front.
And the two things that I don't know if they were the crux listening back to that episode, if they were actually the crux, but the two things that really stood out to me were one, you mentioning like being more emotionally expressive and that resonated with me.
And then the other thing too was like, I forget the full context, but you said something about you just like.
The stuff that I've been avoiding with behaviors like watching TV and porn and junk food.
You just got to sit, feel it.
And I think that kind of resonated with me, but part of me wasn't, still didn't want to just make the decision of like that, that just is what it is.
There's not any, there's no magic words, there's no secret formula, there's not a, well, you just haven't tried this thing, this tactic yet, or been to this sporting event to meet people yet.
It was just, I think.
Having to let go of those coping mechanisms, those avoidance mechanisms that I'd been using, engaging with since I was a kid, and feel some things that I had been avoided feeling until they kind of worked through and I could be better oriented towards other people.
Okay.
And what happened in the week between our talk and crashing it?
Yeah.
In that month, it's a year ago, eight months ago now.
And I don't have the best episodic recall.
Um, the, the pivot point that I kind of remember was a couple of weeks after that, I went to a work conference and the, the conference was fine.
It wasn't necessarily good or bad, but, um, I did, I did like kind of after going out to events and meeting people and working on that sort of thing all day, would like come back and like I bought some donuts at a donut shop or some ice cream or things like that.
So I think that was a bit of a going off the rails moment in kind of triggering, engaging this sort of binge eating coping mechanism that I've done for most of my life.
And then when I got back from that, I don't remember because these kinds of ebbs and flows and falling back into those patterns.
Is sort of a slide.
So I don't remember there being a particular thought or trigger point of like this happened and then I went off the rails.
But I think that sort of opened up the floodgates and I was looking towards the rest of the year.
Work was fine, just kind of getting by, but not something that I would in the past put more time and effort in when I kind of didn't know what to do and I felt like I was crashing out a bit and then.
I'd been able a few times to like kind of level up there.
And last year, that wasn't really happening.
I just go work for 10 hours and end up not really making any progress in a meaningful sense.
And so I think that was a bit disheartening.
Since I moved to this new city over a year ago now, I'd like gotten out and met people and been social, but I hadn't really made that many friends.
Like, hey, we know each other from this one thing, but now we like hang out or like, Get dinner with, or go to each other's houses or that sort of thing.
So I think I also felt some level of disheartening at, like my fault, but just not really leaning into it, pressing into, okay, like it's good to go out and meet people at things and then you have to ask for their phone numbers and you have to invite them to other things and you have to chat with them.
And that's how you make real friendships.
It doesn't just happen, I think, at my age and maybe for this generation in this city, if you just kind of show up repeatedly.
And so I think part of me was just like looking at the situation I'd been in and the dating situation, friendship situation, work situation, and nothing looked like there were bright stars on the horizon.
And I kind of collapsed into that instead of working to look and find the next thing.
Family Tension and Avoidance00:06:30
Well, that's a lot of words that have parted like a river around a rock around a central question, which is what was your relationship like with your family over that month?
I didn't talk to them.
Okay, so just refresh me on your family history.
Yeah, parents are still together.
They were together the whole time I was growing up.
And when I don't remember, when I was little, just being a kid that loved my parents, sometime maybe five to seven, I started getting into arguments with my dad.
And we would still.
Have like good times and do fun things.
But I definitely started kind of going to battle with him over preferences and needs and things that I wanted, and him being kind of him not really listening very well and just deciding this is what is the case or what he wants to do.
But he would argue with me.
Never got hit, never got spanked.
Mom was kind of just a normie, like nice enough person.
Can kind of engage with things of depth a little bit, but not necessarily super curious or doesn't like get deep into certain topics.
Talks a lot about what her life was like in high school or just been how things had worked.
So she was like caring, caring in some ways, but if things got hard, she would like get upset and kind of start wailing and run out of the room or.
Start wailing and expect somebody else to change their behavior.
And then in high school, I remember there being a moment after always having some tension with my dad.
I started listening to you and Free Talk Live and got into libertarianism.
And it was like a couple years where we didn't really argue about much and we were pretty aligned.
And that was nice.
And then after high school, I decided not to go to college.
And I also had started smoking weed at that time and didn't know how to navigate that, didn't have good resources from my parents or other people to sort that out.
And so the tension kind of rose again.
Started talking to them about the things that I didn't like about our relationship and wanted to change.
And that started battles and tension and things like that again.
Moved out.
For a year or so, moved back in, moved out when I was 23 for the last time, and I've lived on my own since then.
While I was still living in the state that I grew up in, I would see them once a month, a couple times a month, talk to them fairly regularly.
And then four years ago, I moved to a different state and maybe called my mom once a month.
And then after a year or two of that, I. Still, after years of like asking them to have the important conversations that I wanted to have and then somewhat engaging, but also avoiding quite a bit, I got to a point where I felt like I don't feel confident and completely comfortable with like these just aren't people that I want in my life anymore.
But I also didn't feel like I felt like I'd done enough work of trying to connect with them and trying to have deeper conversations that I felt I needed to have that I just.
Stopped calling every month.
And since then, it's been sort of sporadic communication.
They'll reach out every once in a while, just whenever the dogs did this, the friend did that kind of stuff.
Dad'll send me news articles about things.
Still no addressing any of the elephants in the room.
And then I've also.
Still, up until this point, gone down to the family condo for Christmas vacation for a couple weeks for you.
Oh, so you saw them at Christmas for a couple of weeks, is that right?
I did this past Christmas, yeah.
And how was that?
It was the usual pattern it's been for years of I mostly just play video games and go to the beach and talk to them a bit, have dinner together.
I did make more of an intentional effort to hang out with them like we went on.
We did some ocean stuff and some tours and things like that to, like, I don't know, spend time at least around each other instead of I'm in one room.
Sorry, they're in another room.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
What's the right level of detail?
No, no, it's fine.
Do you mean like a.
I'm not sure what tours means.
So, like, a little history tour of the town that.
Oh, I see.
You're right.
Got it.
Got it.
Okay.
All right.
All right.
Okay.
And so it was relatively conflict free.
Is that right?
There was one moment somewhat early on where I forget the specific topic, but I like intentionally kind of poked at my dad a little bit and he started raising his voice and getting agitated.
And then he did the thing where I called out him raising his voice and he said, No, I'm not in a raised voice.
And that was like, Okay, this is still exactly in the state that it's been in pretty much my whole life.
And there's, I'm not like, I don't care.
I don't need to.
Get into a fight with him, but I have tested the waters to see that, yes, this is in fact not any different than before.
And so after that, I just was like, okay, there's no important conversations to be had here unless I really want to have whatever, a couple uncomfortable weeks.
Okay.
The Gym and Muscle Expectations00:02:40
On what basis or grounds would you have expected your father to be different?
And this is not a criticism, I'm just curious.
In what way would you have expected your father to be different?
Sorry, I was being unclear.
Sorry about that.
What I mean is, I mean, obviously, you wanted him to be able to have a reasonable conversation, to experience some criticism or negative feedback, getting aggressive.
So I get all of that.
But why would you think he would have changed?
The first thought that comes to mind is I don't know that I had that expectation.
I think part of me is still just somewhat hopeful.
Like I'm in a vastly different stage of my life than they are.
But I've seen myself change intentionally in plenty of ways, but also unintentionally in some ways.
And so there's maybe still part of me, again, that doesn't fully want to let it go for various reasons.
And then also is with that still maybe hopeful, like, well, I don't know.
It's been more time, and maybe he thought about something or did something, or no, no, because I can tell you.
So, do you work out at all?
I do.
Okay.
So, do you do weights?
Okay.
And how often do you do weights?
Two or three times a week.
Fantastic.
Okay.
Good for you.
All right.
So, does your father do weights?
Not anymore.
Okay.
So, to the gym, and he's soft and flabby, right?
Because he hasn't done weights, and he can't do weights.
Any real weights, right?
And he's very sore and so on, right?
And he didn't do any weights for six months.
Would you expect him to have muscles if he hadn't done the weights for six months?
No.
So if your father said, I'm not going to the gym, would it be reasonable to return to see your father after six months in person, let's say?
And, you know, the whole time, six months, you've been like, hey, have you been going to the gym?
No, I'm not going to the gym.
And it's ridiculous, waste of time.
Who cares, right?
I don't need muscles.
I'm married or something like that, right?
So I'm trying to figure out why you would expect muscles to be on your father if he'd never gone to the gym.
And you're like, well, I kind of hoped they'd grown on their own.
Or I kind of hoped maybe he'd be doing secret weights or something like that.
Grasping at Straws for Self-Knowledge00:03:32
So help me understand.
It's not a criticism, obviously.
I'm just curious.
But help me understand why you would think that your father would have changed his entire personality without doing any work.
Isn't that waiting for giant muscles to grow on his body with no effort?
It is similar.
The counter argument that comes to mind is he is very verbally intelligent and he does have a decent grasp of making logical connections.
And he's not super self aware, but I've seen bits and pieces of that.
Like if he's calm and we're not arguing about something contentious, he can self reflect and notice, oh, yeah, I've seen that I do that.
Or when I think about it, How I've interacted with people.
This is what I think was going on.
And so it's definitely magical thinking and a leap to presume that seeing bits of that capability could meet some thing in reality that triggers a more reflective kind of moment, especially in somebody who's as old as he is.
But I think that's.
Sorry, how old is he?
He's in his 60s.
Okay, got it.
I remember when that seemed old.
Hey, you know, we're all good to get there.
All right.
Yeah.
Hopefully.
Okay.
So he's very verbally intelligent.
And do you think that verbal intelligence inevitably leads to self knowledge?
No.
And do you think sometimes it's a barrier to self knowledge because people can talk themselves in and out of anything and justify anything in their own mind, right?
Absolutely.
I do that to myself all the time.
Sure.
Okay.
So the verbal intelligence is not.
So this is something that leads directly to self knowledge.
Is that fair to say?
Okay.
It does not.
Okay.
But you did put it forward as a reason as to why you thought he might have developed self knowledge.
And this is where it's, I admittedly, this is grasping at straws because there's a personal connection in history with this man, but I've seen him be able to also be self reflective.
So, somebody who's just a sociopath, very high IQ person, they're not necessarily going to become a good person just because they are very intelligent.
They're just going to direct that towards being manipulative and getting what they want at others' expense.
But the bits of ability to reflect on Himself and his relationship with other people, it's very tenuous.
And I'm not going to be on this call and say that this is a solid justification, but I think that's the bit that part of me still clings to.
Okay.
And I appreciate that.
So, can you give me an example of something that he had achieved or communicated in terms of self knowledge?
I think.
I don't remember the content of this anymore because it was a very long time ago, but I'm also helping you make the case in giving this example as well.
I went to Catholic grade school and Catholic high school.
My dad wanted me to go to an all boys high school because that was where the doctor's kids went, and that was a nice pepper in his cap of his smart son going to the smart kid school.
Written Apologies vs Eye Contact00:03:59
I didn't want to go to an all boys school.
I wanted to go to the Co ed Catholic school.
And he ended up being very upset about that and not talking to me for like a month or two over the summer, which is not good.
And then, of his own accord, he ended up writing me a letter apologizing, explaining how he has mixed emotions and he really wanted me to go and get a high quality education and get ahead because of that.
And then we started talking after that.
Okay, so I appreciate that.
I don't know, it's maybe tough to remember, but yeah, apologies are very interesting because, I mean, did he apologize?
He did in so many words.
But he didn't do the, I'm sorry, I'll never do that.
Don't play with me.
What do you mean in so many words?
Did he apologize?
Did he say, I'm sorry, I was wrong?
Yes.
Why is the poor, sorry, I'm a little confused.
It seemed it was on the page.
I actually do still have the letter in a storage space somewhere, but it's not in front of me.
And it was over a decade and a half ago now.
Yeah, I mean, his apology was like what I just did to you, where it was like reading between the lines, there's an apology and things went back to normal.
Like he started talking to me again.
So there's some level of it's not restitution, but not continuing to do the harmful thing.
But I don't remember whether or not he specifically looked me in the eye and said, I'm sorry.
Well, I mean, not from the letter, right?
You can't look you in the eye from the letter.
No.
And why did he write it down rather than look you in the eye and apologize?
I mean, you were still living in proximity, right?
Yeah, we had a travel trailer RV sort of thing.
And he, outside of this going silent on me thing, he took to hanging out out there.
No, but you were still on the same property, right?
Yes, yeah.
Okay, so why would he write down this rather than talk to you?
He shuts down pretty quickly when I try to dig into his childhood.
But from what I gather, his mom was pretty aggressive and overbearing.
And his dad.
Oh, good.
So he knows how bad it is.
Yeah.
Okay.
So he should never do that.
Yeah.
Okay.
So I can tell you why he wrote the note down.
Please do.
Yeah, because he's in control of the communication.
He doesn't get to be questioned.
He doesn't get to be cross examined.
So he writes something down.
Did you ever discuss with him the contents of the letter?
Yes.
Okay.
And what did he say?
That's too.
I don't remember that anymore.
Okay.
So, yeah, the reason people write things down is so they get to shape the entire narrative and there's no feedback in the moment.
People don't get to argue with them and they're in control of the conversation.
It's not a conversation, it's a monologue.
A letter is a monologue that can't be questioned or cross examined, at least when you're reading it, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
Now, when people.
Apologize, let's say, or when they say, maybe I shouldn't have done something, or maybe.
So I always look for this in apologies, and I look for this in myself because we all have a tendency to say, I did this bad thing because of good intentions.
Or I did this bad thing because you frustrated me.
I did this bad thing because I was ill.
I did this bad thing because I had a headache.
I did this bad thing because you provoked me.
I did this bad thing because I was.
Blaming Good Intentions00:05:29
Frustrated at work.
You know what I mean?
Like, there's all these reasons, if that makes sense.
Externalized as well.
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're always externalized.
Right.
Nobody ever says, or almost never, they say, I did.
What was the most honest thing your father could have said to you about why he froze you out when you wanted to be around girls as a teenage boy, which is the most natural thing for a teenage boy to want?
I, for my own purposes of vanity, wanted you to go to the.
Smart all boys school.
And when you didn't want to do that, instead of listening and discussing with you, I tried to be manipulative and just withdrew myself from your life.
Right.
Okay.
What's even more honest?
I don't know how to have honest conversations.
No.
That's claiming ignorance.
I don't know how to speak Japanese.
Can easily be an excuse, right?
I don't.
Respect you enough to have a conversation?
No, that's kind of an insult to you.
Those are my two best guesses.
My guess, and again, it's only a guess, you know your father, I don't, would be to say.
I have refused to develop honest negotiation.
So I have let this terrible muscle of bullying grow within me.
It's not your fault.
It comes from my childhood, but it's my responsibility that I still have it.
I'm so sorry.
I really, really am going to work on this.
And I beg your forgiveness because I was too lazy and selfish and vain to humble myself and learn how to negotiate like an empathetic human being.
Now, if you got an apology like that, what would you think?
There might be some real hope that this person would change.
How would you feel?
I feel.
I felt like a bit of relief and just a little bit of tearing up.
Right.
Do you know why you feel relief, as we all do, when somebody takes full responsibility?
And I'm talking in particular as a parent who gets to define the entire relationship.
Your parent gets to choose your mother.
Well, your father gets to choose your mother.
He gets to choose with your mother where you live, the neighborhood, the country.
He gets to choose the language that you speak.
He gets to choose the school you go to, at least when you're young.
He gets to choose the food you eat.
He gets to choose how you interact.
So, your father gets to choose everything regarding you.
So, why do you think if he took full responsibility for the dysfunction in your relationship, why do you think that would give you relief?
And some tears.
Because it wasn't something that I could bear the burden of, especially as a kid, as his son.
Right.
Because the dysfunction in your father, in his relationship with you, he blames on circumstances or you, but not his own bad choices, if I understand this correctly.
Yeah, I think that's correct.
Son, I was this way because I'm so desperate for you to get a great education.
And that's still kind of blaming you.
Like, son, you just don't want a great education.
It's like you want another candy bar, and I'm saying maybe have some fruit or vegetables.
I'm still trying to do the best.
I was so desperate to do the best thing for you that this is what I had to do.
This is what I felt I had to do.
But it didn't work.
So I guess I'll change my approach, you know, that kind of thing, right?
Sorry, I'm not sure what is.
I mean, is it a yes or a no or a maybe or a.
That was me thinking about something else and just.
Okay, so that's fine.
Tell me what else you were thinking because that's fine.
I mean, we all have multiple thoughts going on at a time.
So, what else were you thinking about?
The thought that I was having was it's really easy for me to let other people go down their rails.
And I'm not sure how to bring up what I'm about to say, which is I think this is good.
And obviously, the parents, it's like these relationships are always at play and especially our relationship failures in life.
But I didn't, I don't know if you reread my.
Note this morning or not, but the thing I reached out for was about particularly a dating situation recently, which the crash out in the last half of last year is definitely a part of.
But I just wanted to check in on this.
The reason why, and I appreciate that and thank you for bringing that up, but the reason why I'm focusing on the past is did you listen back to the show we did last May?
I did a week and a half ago.
And what did you think of your vocal intonation?
How do you think you came across?
When you were speaking, it was very monotone and guarded.
And do you think that's much different now?
I, it, no, not on this call.
Okay.
So, your vocal tone is kind of like a mating cry for depressed women.
Emotional Brutality as a Threat00:14:42
You are carrying a burden.
And that's what I'm focusing on.
Because if you continue to carry that burden, you will only be able to date burdened women.
And then you've got two people carrying heavy burdens and things collapse.
So, that's why I'm focusing on this.
Listen, if you want to jump out of this, it's your call.
So, if you want to talk about the dating stuff, which we will do for sure, but my concern is that you are carrying a burden, which is your father's refusal to take responsibility for his actions.
Why did your father not talk to you for a month?
Because he was bullying you.
He wouldn't negotiate with you, he wouldn't listen to you, he wouldn't make his case.
He was simply applying negative pressure, which is a form of emotional warfare.
He was simply applying negative pressure to get you to conform to what he wanted.
And if he's a person of high intelligence and high verbal intelligence, then that's really terrible.
It's really terrible.
That is intense, petty, vicious, emotional bullying to not talk to your child for a month.
A little psycho in my term.
To not talk to you.
I mean, if I have a problem with my daughter, I'll sit down and say, I have a problem.
I'm not saying it's you.
You know, here's what's going on.
It's pretty rare, but it happens, right?
And same thing with me.
She says to me, right?
I mean, that's basic, decent, honest communication.
And I'm sure your father, when you were a child, wanted you to tell the truth, right?
Just tell the truth.
You should tell the truth.
I won't get too mad.
I'll only get mad if you lie to me.
Just whatever you, something like that, right?
I don't think he ever said that.
And there's definitely a habit that I developed of hiding things to avoid him retaliating without saying anything to me.
Okay.
So he never put forward truth as a value for you.
So if he found you to be lying or something like that, he didn't have any problem with it.
Is that right?
He would just, he sometimes he would, Confront and directly and yell or argue, or I'm grounded or something like that.
But he would also do things like just I was supposed to do my homework when I got home.
I knew he would make me do my homework when he got home.
So I would just watch cartoons and he would walk in.
He wouldn't say anything.
He would just turn the TV off and then I would go do my homework.
Okay.
So he would sometimes yell at you if you lied?
Sometimes, yes.
Okay.
So I asked you, did he want you to tell the truth?
Did he hold truth as a value?
And you said no.
And then you said, but he would yell at me when I lied.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
I don't remember him explicitly having that conversation, but that was implied.
No, no, but I mean, if you lie.
Yeah, if you lie and he.
So, anyway, so my point is that he wants you to tell him the truth or he wants you to not lie to him, but he's not honest with you and have a conversation about what he thinks and feels about you wanting to go to a co ed school.
So, we'll get to the dating in a sec, but I think this is important because I'm always trying to puzzle out when I get, and there's a lot of people I talk to who have this kind of monotone and they're, You know, there's a burden, there's a heaviness, there's no particular intonation, and the words are just kind of going off a cliff like lemmings, right?
So I'm always trying to figure out what burden people are carrying.
Why is there no lightness?
Why is there no enthusiasm?
Why is there no fun?
Why is there no energy?
Why is there no pep or vigor or vim?
So I'm trying to figure out what burden you're carrying.
And I think, I mean, one of the central burdens, which is why I told you what your father should have said if he was really honest, is that your father is blaming you.
For his negative behavior, I got angry because you said X, you did X, something happened.
Now, when people say, I got angry because I wanted the best for you or I punished you by not talking to you for a month.
Sorry, how old were you again?
15?
14.
That's lunatic, man.
I'm telling you, that's deranged beyond words.
So, your father said, I ostracized you.
And of course, you didn't know it was going to be a month, right?
It just went on and on.
And, you know, just for those of you who don't remember what it's like to be 14, a month when you're 14 is like six to 12 months when you're older.
So that was, and you didn't know when it was going to end.
And did your mother intervene at all that you know of?
I think they had conversations, but that didn't lead to him not, that didn't lead to him talking to me anytime soon.
Did your mother ever talk to you and say, I'm sorry, your father's not talking to you.
I'm going to try and talk to him or this is something we need to solve?
No, she also would just abandon responsibility, like, quote unquote, this is the way he is kind of language.
Got it.
All right.
So your father said in the letter something like, I didn't talk to you because I wanted the best for you.
I wanted you to have a really good education, and that's why I did what I did, right?
Or something like that.
Yeah.
Okay.
So what that means is that your father can brutalize you emotionally, and ostracism from a parent is like a death threat to a child.
I'm not kidding about this.
Because you can't survive.
I mean, by 14, it's marginal, right?
Maybe.
But you can't survive as a child if your parent abandons you.
So parental abandonment is like a death threat.
That's why I'm saying it's like so elevated.
It's such an elevated threat.
It's a more elevated threat than getting angry at you.
And so, because at least if your parent is angry at you, they still care about something.
There's still some sort of bond, some sort of connection.
You have an impact on them.
If your parent ostracizes you, that's a death threat.
Or genetically, it's a death threat for sure.
Because in a small village, who's going to mate with and join into a family where the parents have ostracized the children?
So it's a hugely elevated threat.
And so if your father says, I brutalized you emotionally in this way because I want the best for you, does that give you any trust or peace in the future?
No.
Why not?
Because he didn't ask or negotiate around what's best for me to get my perspective, and then also is willing to escalate to death threats when he didn't get what he wanted.
I agree with those, and I would put that little maybe a cherry on the side, which is to say that he has given himself permission to be emotionally brutalizing anytime he wants the best for you.
And you don't wholly agree.
So, what he's doing is he's promising in the future to do the same.
So, that kind of apology I didn't talk to you for a month because I wanted the best for you and you didn't agree.
If he doesn't say, this was absolutely the wrong approach and I'm responsible 100%, I was cruel, I was domineering, I was vicious, I was brutal, and that's entirely on me.
So, when someone says that, they're saying, I'm really not going to do it again.
And if I do start to do it again, you can call me out on it.
Right.
Because that's when you say, I'm 100% responsible for the wrong that I've done, which is particularly, again, as I say, true as a parent.
If you say, I'm 100% wrong for what I did, you're saying, I'm not going to do it again.
And also, if I do start to do it again, you can call me out and I will change.
Right.
So if someone says, I'm an alcoholic because.
I didn't deal with childhood trauma and I got lazy and I preferred self medication to dealing with difficult emotions and I'm stopping drinking and blah, Then they have committed to not drinking.
And so what do you do or say if they reach for a drink?
You said you weren't going to drink anymore.
Right.
They've made that commitment.
And so if your father says, I have a terrible habit of emotionally destructive escalation that's 100% on me.
Because I'm a hypocrite and I'm lazy and I've reproduced the habits from my own parents rather than realize how much they hurt me and commit to not reproducing them.
Instead, what I've done is I've done all the brutal things to you that my parents did to me, and that's really lazy and destructive.
And I know better.
Of all the people in this family, I know better.
So if he says something like that, he's saying, I'm really going to work to commit not to do it again.
And if he tries doing the silent treatment, you would say, What?
Hey, you said you wouldn't do this again.
Yeah, you remember?
Like, whatever you need to do, like, don't do this.
So, when people say, hey, man, I was only emotionally brutal to you because I wanted the best for you, well, is this the last time your father's going to want the best for you?
Probably not.
Well, of course not.
Is this the last time your father's going to want the best for you and you don't fully agree?
Definitely not.
Of course not.
Of course not.
If he wants the best for you, he should never ostracize you because that's bad for you.
So, when people in my life, and there aren't anybody, any people like this left, but if people in the past in my life gave me apologies with excuses, excuses are just promises of repetition.
If somebody says, Well, I yelled at you because I was stressed.
Okay.
Is this the last time that person is going to be stressed?
Nope.
No.
So, all they're doing is they're saying, Hey, man, when I get stressed, I yell at you.
And why would I want someone in my life who's an NPC, who's just programmed by stress to yell at people?
Because they're giving themselves the excuse.
Also, I know that when people treat others badly, they tend to get more stressed over time because they're isolated and they're out of control.
When you treat people badly, people tend to drift away from you and you can't control that.
And so you end up kind of out of control in your life.
If you yell at people when you're stressed, your life will become more stressful.
Plus, you have the bad conscience of making excuses and yelling at people.
So when people.
Say, and this is a billion times true of parents when people say, I acted badly because of circumstances or good intentions, they're saying, I'm doing this again whenever I want.
And that's one of the reasons why I was asking why you thought your father would magically change when he already promised not to.
Yeah.
He didn't say, This is 100% on me.
This is not you.
And so the burden, I think, in part that you're carrying.
Is your father's blame for his own bad actions and your mother's blame for her own bad actions?
Your father's being whatever, good intentions or stress or whatever, and your mother's being, well, your father won't change, blah, blah, blah, right?
But of course, if she accepts that people don't change, why would she accept your father trying to change you?
I can't change your father.
It's like, well, I'm my father's son.
Why would you try?
Why would you let my father try to change me?
You'd say to your husband, Hey, you know, people don't change.
I know you don't change.
Our son's not going to change.
Well, she doesn't believe that people don't change.
She just knows that she married a man who won't provide for her if she questions him.
And that's all it is.
She needs to keep the gravy train running.
She needs to keep the income, the status, the house, whatever it is running.
Unless, I mean, did your mother make a lot more money than your father?
Right.
So she's managing.
The livestock.
She's managing the money delivery mechanism.
She's maintaining the workhorse.
Well, your dad gives me $5,000 to $10,000 a month or whatever it is.
And if I question him, he won't do that.
Because, I mean, I saw what he did to you.
So if I question him, he'll divorce me and then the money will stop flowing and my comfort will go down.
So I won't question him because I get paid very well for shutting the fuck up.
I mean, if he's willing to do that to his own son, imagine what he'd do to me.
And you weren't even questioning him.
You just disagreed with him.
You weren't questioning his base character and motives.
You just disagreed with him.
You said, I'm a teenage boy.
I want to be around girls and it looks more fun and I don't want to wear a uniform and I don't want this little Lord Fontenoy nonsense, right?
Okay.
So, I mean, that's a perfectly reasonable position for a 14 year old child to have, a boy, right?
Now, you know, whether it's a right or wrong thing, you know, that would be a lengthy conversation.
I don't know.
I mean, being around girls has its pluses for a teenage boy, it also has its minuses.
Academically, we're all aware of these.
So, you know, but it's an interesting conversation.
You have that conversation.
She says, So, your mom won't try to change him because she's like, okay, if this is how cruel and brutal he is to a teenage boy who has a perfectly reasonable disagreement, imagine what he'll do to me if I question his character.
So, she just needs the money, needs the conveyor belt to be running, right?
So, I personally, myself, I get very angry.
It's one of the things that makes me the angriest.
I get very angry at BNAPs, bullshit non-excuses, or non-apologies.
Bullshit non-apologies.
I'm sorry, but is a horrible manipulation and a promise of future abuses or neglect.
Now, to change that in your father to go from this horrible strategy of trying to bully, manipulate, and control people to having genuine empathy and self-criticism is one of the The longest and most brutal journeys in the world to regrow empathy or to try to achieve empathy is one of the most brutal journeys in the world.
Regret and Future Manipulation00:03:07
And not one person in 10,000 is able to make it.
And I mean, I went from probably not being overly sensitive as I'm saying, maybe from the age of eight to maybe 12 or 13.
And I was able to bring back or reawaken more empathy.
But I also had a very loving relationship with my first caregiver, who was an aunt of mine when my mother was in hospital after giving birth for, I assume, postpartum depression or something like that.
And you had to be pretty depressed to be hospitalized back in the 60s about this sort of stuff.
It wasn't like a known thing.
And so that might have helped.
I assume it did, because I've known a lot of other people who had harsher infancies and were kind of.
Cold hearted, and they were not one of them has ever been able to awaken any kind of empathy.
Empathy development is like a window for most people.
I think with philosophy and self knowledge, I think and therapy, and I think you can definitely work on these muscles.
It's not like losing an arm, but it certainly is like not learning Japanese, right?
If my father didn't speak Japanese and he'd never shown any intention to learn Japanese, and I would visit him six or 12 months later, would I expect him to speak Japanese fluently?
Of course not, because he hadn't learned it.
And your father isn't going to just wake up and know Japanese.
He's going to have to go through a brutal period of self examination, which is going to entirely destabilize his personality.
It's going to threaten his marriage.
It's going to awaken his conscience, and he's going to look back through the tunnel of time and see all the terrible things he did to his child.
And he's going to have deeply self destructive impulses.
He's going to be completely destabilized.
He's going to be unable to function very well at work or socially.
And this is going to go on for months at least.
It's quitting coldness is way worse than quitting heroin.
And if you think that your father can just kind of come around and be better, that's part of your self blame.
Well, my father could just improve and be better.
And therefore, if it's possible to just do it relatively easily, then I'm still somewhat at fault for it not happening because I've been able to do it.
So I've just been unable to, like, if I was able to learn Japanese relatively easily, then.
Gee, I must just not be good at teaching him Japanese or something like that, even though learning Japanese, while it's grueling intellectually, is not destabilizing morally.
But looking back over the course of your life, you see, your parents are in your 60s, looking back over the course of your life and say, oh my God, I was an asshole.
I was cold, manipulative, cruel, domineering, bullying.
I made excuses.
Hitting Close to Home00:04:46
I mean, I honestly don't know.
And can't really conceive of what it would be like to look back in my 60s and say, I was a bad guy.
Because, you know, these habits of your father's, they showed up in his relationships at home, at work, extended family, business, wherever, right?
If he had employees among underlings, to look back and say, I caused a massive amount of suffering over the course of my life.
People can't do that, man.
They can't.
Especially if the sin is vanity.
If the sin is based on vanity, I know right, I'm better, other people need to do what I say, and I'll brutalize them until they do, which is dictatorial.
If the sin is vanity, that's one of the most impenetrable sins of all.
Because to improve, we must criticize ourselves.
And vanity prevents that completely.
Anyway, so I just wanted to mention, I think that's the burden you're carrying.
Thank you for your patience, and I'm certainly happy to talk about the dating stuff.
I appreciate that.
I, um, definitely felt some like emotional weight and brain fog as you were describing all that, which I think means we're, we're hitting somewhere close to home.
And I, it feels to me like there's a connection between that and the, you just gotta feel it and me like putting down my last weapons of avoidance because I don't, Because you've said stuff like that for a long time.
I've listened to you describe things like that to other people tons of times.
And still, there's been this like not wanting, not being willing to let go of my relationship with my parents.
Well, letting go is almost like a form of ostracism.
What I'm saying is that I think, I could be wrong, but I think that there's a lot of anger in you about how you were treated and how you continue to be treated, right?
So, you tried doing a little bit of mild.
Honesty with your father, and he just kind of blew up and started yelling at you, and then denied he was yelling, right?
Or raised his voice.
Yeah.
And you're like, okay, okay, okay, I'll be quiet.
So he's still bullying you, isn't he?
I've noticed it flipping definitely since I moved out.
That's always helpful for reorienting relationships with parents.
But I've noticed it definitely start to flip to like, sometimes it is, as you described, it's like an okay, like kind of shocked, doe eyed kind of reaction and feeling.
But it also.
I'm sorry, I didn't quite catch that last phrase.
Sometimes it is like a shocked, doe eyed, oh, I'm sorry, I touched a landmine.
Oh, you mean a reaction and feeling?
On my part, yeah.
Okay, that's what you mentioned, but sorry, you were referring to, but go ahead.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So sometimes I have that reaction.
I've also sometimes had the like spiteful, makes it sound like I'm being negative, but the kind of angry, like, okay, fuck you.
Like, I see what you're doing here still again.
And that's you being the bad guy, not me.
And sometimes there's an in between, which is what I think I kind of felt this last holiday vacation was like, Yep, like here he is again doing the same old things.
And I just don't need to poke at this anymore because I've literally known this is who he is my whole life.
And I tested it again by just stepping my toes a little bit close to that mine.
And there it goes, like rattling and beeping and threatening to go off.
Okay.
And what does that mean going forward?
I'm not sure where the line is between.
Fixing things and avoiding them by looking at things that are better.
But in my head, the thought, like the last sort of connection thing, and I remember you have said this exact phrase pretty much at some point in the last decade and a half, but like the last sort of thing is like, it's nice to have a place to go for Christmas for a couple of weeks every year.
Okay, I get that.
So we do need to pivot to the dating though, because we need to find out, I think, we need to find out if your relationship with your parents has an effect on your dating life.
So if you can tell me what happened with the dating.
Yeah.
And I think if I had a nice girlfriend, then maybe I wouldn't care to go down to the family condo anymore at Christmas.
Dating Life and Parental Influence00:14:43
All right.
So, yeah, last half of last year, do this crash out on the weekends, like kept it way more together than other times I crashed out, especially when I used to do drugs and that was like.
I'll see humanity in two weeks after I'm done with this bender.
And I, because I've like gone through this before and I've made a lot of progress, and then I sort of a few months in can see what's happening.
I'm not really making any different decision, but I'm watching it and slowly towards the end of last year, I'm like, okay.
Okay, sorry, bro.
This is all very abstract and I get lost in the abstractions.
I don't know what physical thing is being talked about.
So can you just tell me where you met the girl?
Yeah.
I go to this coffee shop to work on Fridays.
And I, on Friday, was there and saw somebody who I did improv class with for a few months.
And he was sitting across the table from this woman and they were on their laptops.
So I noted that and got my work finished up and then ended up walking over there to say hi to him and see what she was about.
Okay.
And you guys clicked.
And did you exchange contact information that day or later?
Yeah.
So it was just went over to say hi to him, ended up talking to the both of them for like two or three hours.
And it was a good, interesting, fun conversation.
Got into a little bit of depth.
They used to work at, they used to work together.
Okay.
And is he in a relationship?
Like, why wouldn't he pursue the girl?
He's gay.
Well, that would certainly explain it.
All right.
Yeah.
Okay.
So you start being in contact with her.
And after you meet her in the coffee shop in exchange for a number, when did you ask her out?
Um, I, within I think a week or so, I invited her to go to a dance thing.
I, it's something that I have done.
Sorry, within a week.
Sorry.
Does that mean you didn't contact her for a week and then asked her, or you contacted her and were chatting back and forth and then asked her?
Yeah.
Sorry.
I messaged her the next day.
We chatted back and forth within like a week or two.
Okay.
Got it.
Um, yeah.
So I've done social dancing for a long time.
That was something that, uh, the three of us talked about.
She mentioned she was getting into that.
So I, Invited her out.
Yeah.
And just for those who are listening to this, if you say you have an interest and a woman says she shares that interest, she's wanting you to ask her out, just so people understand that.
But sorry, go ahead.
Yeah.
And that's definitely a technique I've developed.
Not being on dating apps is do things and then mention them to people.
And then when she says, Oh, yeah, I love dancing.
Great.
Do you want to go dancing?
And they always say yes.
And sometimes they end up going out.
So yeah, I invited her.
I go like regularly on Tuesdays to a place.
I'm there pretty much every Tuesday anyway.
So that I invited her out as a little bit of a hedge, interesting conversation.
I'll invite her out to a thing that I'm already going to.
So it's not for me emotionally as much pressure as like, come on a date with me.
It's like, I'll be here.
You should come out.
And she ended up showing up.
We danced a little bit.
We talked a little bit.
Didn't really engage with her much because this is my Tuesday night.
And then after that, we kept texting back and forth.
I asked her out once and she was going out of town.
And she asked me out once and I was going out of town.
And then, like a month and a half or so later, she mentioned she was moving.
I said, Great.
Sorry, hang on.
Sorry, I feel we just had a whiplash here.
So you see her on the Tuesday night.
And you said, Did I get this right?
You didn't have a lot of interaction with her on the Tuesday night?
No, danced with her a couple of times.
And so it's not much of a date, which is fine.
I mean, but it's something to do.
And then you didn't see her for six weeks?
Didn't see her for almost two months.
Really?
Was she very far away?
She did live in the same city as I did, and she moved to a whole other state.
Wait, what?
Yeah.
So you meet her, and she moves to another state.
Yeah, I think she met me, and she's like, man, I got to get out of this town.
No, no, I get the joke, but.
So, did she know she was moving away when she expressed interest and wanted to go on a date?
I never asked her that.
Okay.
How long into dating her did you find out that she was moving to another state?
Like six ish weeks.
And did she say something unexpected came up?
My parents are ill or something like that.
I'm being hunted by a werewolf.
Or did she say, Yeah, I'm moving to wherever, right?
I mean, Did you get a sense that it was somewhat surprising and sudden for her, or did you get a sense that it had been in the works for a while?
I got a sense that it had been in the works for a while.
Right.
So that's fucked up, right?
Did you see what I mean?
I can see that perspective.
I'm going to say this knowing that this is a headshot.
No, no, no.
This is not a perspective thing.
This is fucked up.
But sorry, go ahead.
Okay.
But we'll repeat that after I say this.
We.
She showed up on a Tuesday.
We asked each other out, but never met.
And it was mostly just texting.
So there's.
It wasn't dating, as in, hey, we've been going out for three months.
And then all of a sudden you just like said, I'm moving tomorrow.
Okay.
I understand.
I understand.
I mean, you already told me that.
You only took you two months to see her again, right?
But what I'm saying is that you don't flirt and get a guy's interest and hopes up if you're about to move to another state.
You tell him right up front.
It's like, hey, you know, you seem like a great guy.
I'm happy to, you know, hang out a little bit, but just be fully aware like I'm moving in a couple of months to another state, right?
Because that's fair, right?
That's reasonable and that's honest.
Yeah.
And that way, if you choose to pursue it, you have full knowledge, but you don't.
Start flirting with, go on a date with, and express interest and text a lot with a guy when you're about to leave the state.
I mean, that's just not right.
That's not decent.
Because you need to know that.
I mean, if you'd have known, if she'd have said on your first meeting at the coffee shop, if she'd have said, oh, yeah, I'm moving to wherever in like two, three months, would you have pursued a relationship?
So, this is getting into what I did wrong and what I brought to the table that wasn't good.
Hang on, hang on.
I just asked you a question.
I mean, you don't have to answer it, but please don't ignore it.
Yeah.
I think I would have kept texting her.
No, no, but would you have?
I mean, you can text, whatever, right?
It could be a fun thing.
But would you have thought about a relationship if she's about to move away?
So, one detail that came up later was that she still works for a company.
In the city that I live in.
So she comes back regularly.
And that might have come up a lot sooner than it ended up.
Sorry, that might have come up a lot sooner than what?
Yeah.
So if she was like more upfront about her move, I would have been curious and asked about that.
And she might have mentioned at that time, sooner than she did, that she does like come back here fairly regularly.
So how often does she come back and how long does she stay?
Once a month for a week or two.
Okay, my head is spinning here.
Okay, so she's moving away, but she is spending 25 to 50% of her time back in the town you're in.
Yep.
So why would she move away if she's spending a quarter to half her time in the town that you're in?
She later told me that she moved in with her grandparents, who are like an eight hour drive away, seven hour drive away.
So it's another state, but you can drive there and back in the day.
And.
Her sister, she was living with her sister.
I think her sister, I don't know, because again, I didn't ask these questions.
But it sounds like her sister maybe was the one who wanted to move more.
And then the woman that I dated was staying in the apartment that they shared for a while, decided she didn't really want to do that.
And when the lease ran up, she decided to go move in with her sister again and her grandparents.
So it was a logistical piece.
And then she also mentioned to me that she wasn't really happy with the dating scene in Austin and she was kind of burnt out on that.
She mentioned she's like an artistic person, has, does work in design.
And she noted like a lot of her friends are pretty nihilistic, and that's not something that she's comfortable with and just fully bought into.
And a lot of the people who are creative to all sorts of art stuff around the city are, she used the word performative, just kind of play pretending, not actually through and through, like really caring about.
The art and what they're doing.
More so, they're just trying to put on airs to seem cool.
And so it sounded like there was a level of, I'm not happy with where I'm at and looking for a reset.
And there's this logistical thing that's kind of come up and made it easy to make this move.
And she decided to do that.
Okay.
I have so many questions and I appreciate that info.
Great.
So.
She goes to live with her grandmother and her sister, her grandparents and her sister, and then she comes back to your town a week or two a month.
So, where does she stay when she's in town in your town?
At different friends' houses.
Oh, so she's just basically couch surfs or whatever for the week or two that she's in town.
And the rest of the time, does she work remotely, but then sometimes has to come into town?
I don't quite understand how this job works.
If you can drive, if she works remotely, then she can drive seven hours away or she can move seven hours away and just work remotely.
But then if she has to come back into town, so what is it that draws her back into town and how does she make her money when she's not in town?
Like if she has to be in town or not?
Yeah, there are like, we'll just say there's like events that happen and she is responsible for like producing that.
So she can mostly work online on Zoom calls and then there is some like in office time that I'm sure is nice to talk to people face to face.
But there's also this recurring like, okay, we're doing the next thing that I need to actually like be there in person for.
And those are in and around the town that I live in.
Okay.
And those draw her back.
So she sometimes is in town for an event for two weeks, but she's planning it.
At her grandparents' place.
Yeah.
Okay.
Got it.
All right.
I appreciate that.
Very, very, very layered.
Okay.
So you saw her at the dance on the Tuesday and then you didn't see her for two months.
And then you find out that she's moving seven hours away, right?
Yeah.
I didn't see her for maybe two to four weeks after that before she mentioned she was moving.
And then I was just nice about it.
And in my head and in my heart at that time, it's like, well, this, I don't know, this is weird.
This happens though.
Not the first time I, Started texting a woman and then we just didn't see each other anymore.
So I was just friendly about it and we kept texting back and forth.
And then at some point, she mentioned she was coming back into town and asked if I wanted to go get a drink with her.
And she was coming to town for one of these events, right?
And yeah, I didn't know that this was her cadence at that point.
She told me when we met up.
Sorry, you didn't know that this was her what?
Cadence.
So she moves to the new state.
We just keep texting.
She invites me, she says, I'm going to be back in town next week.
She invites me out.
And then when we go out, she mentions, hey, this is like my job situation and why.
I'm sorry, I don't know what the word cadence means in this context.
I mean, I know what the word cadence means, I just don't know what it means.
She's showing up one or two weeks a month consistently.
Okay.
Okay.
Got it.
All right.
And so then what?
So then we go on this like proper date, like we both show up to a place that we wouldn't otherwise be if we weren't showing up to meet each other, like chat for a couple hours.
That went well.
I liked her.
Curious, like able to banter, like can have a good conversation about interesting topics and just like how to dress properly as a man, things like that.
And Then at the end of that date, I like a couple days later go to my family condo for the holidays, keep texting with her back and forth once every day, once every couple of days until I get back and we start coordinating, going on a second date when she's going to be back in town towards the beginning of January.
And what month did you first meet?
First, met like beginning end of September, beginning of October.
Went to that dance, sang on a Tuesday a couple weeks after that.
She moves in like early mid November.
Okay, so hang on.
Sorry.
So I just want to.
So October, November, December, January.
So it's been four months and you've met up twice.
Yeah.
Is that common?
I don't know what the dating scene is like these days.
I don't.
I mean, when I met my wife, we basically spent every day together until we got married, but you know, maybe that's a bit different.
But I was thinking about that.
Like, what does it mean to meet up?
Once every eight weeks.
I don't know.
What are you like, cicadas?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Four Dates in One Week00:03:56
So there, I think there's two things at play.
One, there's this background of me, which is this, particularly coming off of this six month kind of crash out, being less social.
But also, as we talked about last time, like I've not had many, like I've not really had a serious relationship and not had many relationships that lasted months.
And so I think part of me is coming to the table somewhat needy and desperate.
And also, This is kind of a modern dating thing.
Yeah, like I've met a couple women in the last couple weeks, and one of them, who I'm not that interested in romantically, is like texting me every like response within 30 minutes.
And another one, who I think is interesting and maybe a good person, better than this woman I just dated, it's once a day.
Like she'll send me one text once a day.
And so it's like, I think a lot of women in my dating group are just.
They're not eager and ready to like, I want a real relationship and I'm going to invest to find out within a couple of weeks whether or not this is it.
They're, oh, so they do this.
Yeah, it's kind of like a thing to raise their status by saying, I'm so busy.
I have all this stuff going on.
Maybe I can fit you in.
And it's a way of appearing high value and unavailable.
It's that.
And then sometimes I think it is defensive too of, I don't want to open up quickly and get hurt.
Okay.
Okay.
So you've got two dates in four months, and then what happens?
Then in January, call and talk to her for like an hour the first week.
Just, hey, how's it going?
Kind of conversational stuff you might do in person.
Coordinate a date when she gets back.
She gets back into town.
We go to a dance class and dance with each other for the whole class and go out to dinner.
Another good conversation.
Yeah.
Spun in dance class.
Texting back and forth.
Then a few days later, we go out on Saturday morning, like go get brunch and then go to an art museum and go to a coffee shop.
And so we're spending half the day, a good portion of the day together.
She told me she had a really big crush on me, which felt really good.
And she goes and hangs out with friends that evening.
The, I think the next day, I think it was the next day, we go on another date.
It might have been a week later.
I'd have to double check the timeline, but it was either that weekend we like go on two dates in a row, or the next weekend we go on two dates in a row on Saturday and Sunday.
No, I think it was both.
Sorry.
So, second official date, we go dancing on Tuesday.
Third official date, we spend half the day on Saturday together.
Sunday after that, we go on another date, like go to dinner and then hang out and talk.
A week later, we talked on the phone while she was away doing her work.
And then the following Saturday, we go out on another date.
The following Sunday, we go out on another date.
This is like four dates in one week, basically.
Then she goes back home.
We keep texting back and forth, have like roughly one phone call every week.
For a couple weeks until she's done.
The calendar stuff is not particularly philosophical.
Okay.
You had a bunch of dates, and I don't need it every time you got together.
I'm not a travel agent.
Neediness and Moving Too Fast00:15:35
So, how much did you find out about her childhood, her values, her morals, that kind of stuff?
Yep.
Yeah.
So, on that third date, I put in some work to not repeat my past mistakes and ask her what growing up was like for her.
She tells me.
About a relationship with her mother and father.
I mentioned that I definitely want to have kids, and that's like a deal breaker for me.
And she said she also wants to have kids after not being sure about it for a while.
I mentioned that I think there are some worldview differences that might be insurmountable, but I think we can work on that.
Wait, what?
What worldview differences?
She definitely leans left, but her dad is conservative.
And she mentioned that she's definitely gotten into plenty of arguments growing up with him.
And then when she went leftist, definitely had disagreements with him.
But also.
And did she go leftist to a large degree because of university, or was it something else?
Yeah.
Yeah.
At least that's what I was saying.
Okay.
So the father paid for her to get indoctrinated into leftism in university.
Imagine that.
She mentioned that.
So, some worldview differences.
I get that.
So, then what?
So, I mentioned on this third date, hey, like there's some worldview differences here.
I think we need to work on it at some point.
But I asked her, like, how she handles conflicts.
And she mentioned how she cannot agree with her dad, but she can listen to his perspective and appreciates that people who don't agree with her have valuable things to say.
And when she's in a disagreement with people she cares about, she claims she would listen and try to be.
Charitable and not just assume like this is a terrible person.
And so that was for me, like it was a surface level in retrospect, surface level of digging, but was enough for me to say, okay, this between that and other conversations we had, definitely think there are like political and worldview disagreements.
But it sounds like she might be able to.
So tolerance is not negotiation.
Yeah.
So if she says, obviously, Hey man, I can tolerate people who disagree with me, and I don't automatically assume that they're bad people.
That's not a way to resolve disputes or disagreements.
You have to have an objective methodology, right?
I mean, if I say two and two make five, and someone says, hey, you know, I don't assume you're a bad person for saying that, that doesn't actually get me to know whether two and two make five or not.
But anyway, go ahead.
Yeah.
And this is so that is correct.
And also, I just wanted to move ahead with it.
It feels really nice to hang out with an attractive woman.
Who says she likes me?
And I am just going to kind of dive into that further after doing some light checks.
Because, yeah, tolerance is definitely different.
And later on in conversations, she used the phrase lived experience, which usually is not a great sign for having an objective.
I get that.
But I mean, how old was she?
She is 30.
Oh, she's 30.
Yeah, just turned.
Oh.
And how old are you?
33.
33.
Okay.
I mean, she has a bit of a chaotic life for 30.
I thought she was in early mid 20s, but okay.
All right.
And okay.
So, what happens then?
So, we have that conversation relatively early on.
And then after that, I kind of really fall into treating this relationship like getting out of drug.
Like, we had some conversations.
We did talk about a work situation where she felt bad that somebody participated in an event and just got paid.
In like free stuff, when if that person was like a professional in the event like industry that she works in, they would have gotten paid more money and cash.
And that was like a conversation we had.
I tried to listen and understand her perspective and shared some of mine about how, like, hey, if adults can make agreements and even if there's maybe a better deal somebody else would have gotten, that doesn't mean that this person was done bad by.
So we didn't.
So we got a little bit more into worldview stuff after that, but not a really direct conversation going after like, okay, cool.
Where do we not agree on something?
And how do we navigate that specifically in a direct conversation versus a phone call where it comes up and I try to find kind of a middle ground?
She came back in like early mid February, and we just do like a co working dinner date kind of thing.
She goes off on a shoot.
I'm sorry, a what?
A co working?
Yeah, like she was doing some freelance work, and I was working on some stuff.
Oh, let's go.
Okay, got it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And then she goes off to do one of her events that week.
It's a little bit radio silent, but it was a big thing and a lot of logistics.
It's also her birthday.
She's still couch surfing for a week or two a month at 30.
That's odd, but okay, go on.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And then she comes back after that event and like Whirlwind comes and like.
Crashes on my couch for a night and is gone like the next morning.
And then after that, the communication started dropping from once every day or so.
When did, sorry to be blunt and don't answer anything you don't want to, but over this relationship, when did sexual activity start?
On the fourth or fifth date.
Okay.
So that's after you knew that she was moving away.
Yeah, we talked about that months ago at that point.
Okay, so she'd already moved away.
And was the sexual activity engaged in with the goal of the relationship moving forward, or was it just more recreational?
That was my twisted idea.
I think from conversations I had with her, she just wasn't clear on that.
She's got way lower standards as far as what's acceptable.
Sexual contact, then.
Sorry, I don't know what that means, way lower standards.
For her.
Meaning, for me, the thought in my head was the feeling was I am really enamored with this person because I quit watching TV and binge eating and playing video games and porn.
So I'm in a month of my physiology and psychology resetting from that.
And here's this one really potent, powerful, positive dopamine and oxytocin thing.
Well, then you said she's a.
Yeah.
Okay.
So, sorry, just to break it down a little more.
So, for you, it was serious, and for her, it was more recreational.
Is that what you mean?
It was more recreational, slash, she was feeling out where we were at and what she was interested in.
Did you have any conversations about being exclusive with each other?
Okay, so you don't even know if your boyfriend or girlfriend, right?
Correct.
Do you know if she was dating anyone else?
She mentioned after we broke up and I asked her, she mentioned after the second time she stayed the night and we had sex, she started going radio silence.
And I also did that as well.
And she mentioned in a couple of weeks that the communication slowed way down that she went on a date with somebody when she was in another city doing work stuff.
So she wasn't dating anyone else while you guys were dating?
Not as far as she told me.
When I asked her specifically if she was dating anybody else, she pretty quickly said, when she was in another city working, that she went on one date with somebody.
So I think that's reasonable to assume it's probably the only one, but I did press.
So after sex, you guys stopped communicating much, right?
Okay.
And why did you stop communicating?
I had started to notice before we had sex that I. Was in this weird spot.
I knew I'd like quit drugs before, so I know what that feels like.
And I like there was one time when I called her and she didn't answer.
And she ended up calling back 15 minutes later.
But during that 15 minutes, I was like emotionally reeling, like I'd lost the most important thing in my life and was never going to get it back.
And I could tell that that's not balanced and something for me to keep working on.
And so then after we had sex and she kind of just bounced in and bounced out, was like in and out of my apartment within 12 hours.
I And sorry, that was before you had sex.
Is that right?
The emotional kind of reeling and recognizing like there's something off with how invested I am in this and how much it hurts when like she doesn't text me back right away and things like that.
That was before we had sex.
Okay.
So you realize that you are getting somewhat addicted to this woman and then you decide to have sex with her.
Okay.
And knowing that that's going to really escalate the addiction, right?
In my addicted state, the thought was.
No, no.
It's a willing relationship.
Hang on.
You were conscious that you were in an addicted state because you just said, you know, when I've quit drugs, I kind of know the signs.
So you were conscious that you were in an addicted state.
And then you also knew that having sex.
When was the last time you had sex with someone else?
A couple of years ago.
Okay.
So the first time you have sex in a couple of years when you're already in an addicted state is going to kind of seal the addiction, if I understand this correctly.
Yeah.
Okay, so you decide to have sex and then you decide not to talk to her as much?
And then I didn't text her the next day.
She didn't text me the next day.
A couple days later, she said.
But why didn't you text her the next day?
I felt like I was overly invested for sure at this point.
You just had sex with her.
Why did you text us the next day?
Because I felt like, oh man, I've like.
This is going too fast, and I don't know how to say that in a way that's not like snipey or needy or mean.
Okay, hang on, hang on, hang on.
This is going too fast.
Yeah.
You were three months and two dates.
What the fuck is slow?
At this point, it's been like six dates.
At this point, it'd been like five or six dates in five weeks.
Okay, five or six dates in five weeks.
And then you decide to have sex, and then you think things are moving too fast.
I think I started to sense how much I was way more invested in this than she was, and how that was a lot of fun.
You had a panic.
You had a panic.
Yeah.
You had a panic.
Yeah.
Okay.
So that can happen, right?
And why did you feel that she was not as invested as you were, other than you got some signs of neediness?
But did she say, hey, it's been fun, sailor, but I'm out of here?
Or, I mean, how were things in the morning after sex?
She was out within a few hours of us waking up and on to go do her nails with one of her friends.
Okay.
That doesn't tell me how it was.
It just tells me what she did afterwards.
How was it when you woke up after you'd had sex?
Well, we woke up and then we had sex, and then she was gone within an hour or two.
And that, I think, was a little bit.
It wasn't unexpected based on me kind of seeing how she'd been in the house.
How was it?
Was it awkward?
Was she distant?
Was she staring off into space?
Was she unresponsive?
I mean, was she vague?
I mean, how was it after you had sex for the hour or two that she was still there?
Yeah, she seemed as warm and friendly and engaged as I'd noticed her being.
Okay, so she wasn't giving you any signs of pulling away after you had sex.
So, why did you text her?
I saw this more clearly ruminating about this after we broke up.
But at the time, I think I had some sense of like, she's sending me two or three texts and I'm sending her five.
She's like responding to what I'm saying and she'd asked a few questions, but she's not really like adding her own things and bringing her own momentum.
And so I think I had this sense.
So, yes, but you're wooing her.
Yeah.
So, when men are wooing women, we put the work in.
Okay.
Yeah, that's what I was.
I mean, am I wrong about that?
I mean, a Cyrano de Bergerac, she's just got to be pretty.
He's got to be poetic and good looking, right?
Men put the work in wooing.
That's why we have poetry.
That's why we have buildings.
That's why we have songs.
That's why people play music, right?
So men woo women, and we put the effort in to prove our courage and our dedication.
And Then the women get swept along in our wooing.
So, of course, you're sending more texts, as far as I understand it.
Yeah.
Okay, so she leaves, and how do you feel when she leaves?
I, that day or so where neither of us texted each other, I don't remember feeling strongly.
I think I was like avoiding really diving into it because I didn't, I don't remember feeling elated.
I don't remember feeling, um, angry or sad.
I was just kind of in a stilted, kind of numb state of that was a kind of quick in and out, um, thing, especially with having kind of a big relationship moment of intimacy.
And I didn't, I didn't feel good about sending her.
A text that would be the kind of text that I wanted.
Like, I could have been sending something needy or aggressive or overly fawning.
Avoiding the Text After Sex00:14:44
And so I waited for her to respond to have some.
Sorry, hang on.
You waited for her to initiate.
To initiate again.
Okay, so you have sex with her and then you ghost her from her perspective.
Yeah.
Okay, and how do you think that's going to play out?
It didn't play out well this time.
Well, it will never play out well.
You don't have sex with a woman and then ghost her.
Yeah.
Okay, so what happened?
So then she texts me something about.
Sorry, when does she text you?
You said it wasn't that day.
Yeah, so like she leaves on Saturday, Monday night, she texts me and says, sorry, she kind of came in and like crashed in and crashed out in between doing work stuff and then going to hang out with friends and basically just like kind of falling asleep.
On my couch and then leave me in the morning.
She said that was because she was really comfortable and not because she doesn't care.
And I just said that.
That's really nice.
That's really nice.
Okay.
Yeah, that felt good.
And I sent her something warm and sweet back.
And then we texted on Tuesday for a bit.
And then I sent a final message and didn't hear back from her until Saturday.
So I sent the last message on Tuesday after we'd gone back and forth a bit.
And then four or five days later, she sends me a message.
On the Saturday, I had invited her.
I went to a work conference and I invited her to come join me because I knew she wasn't going to be doing her in real life work and she could just co work or whatever and we could hang out.
She said she'd think about it.
And so while I'm there in that other city at that conference, she doesn't message me after I send the message.
I didn't double message her.
And yeah, on Saturday, she's like, hey, I hope you're having a great time.
And the place that you mentioned you were being, my sister.
Came in from the city that she lives in, she's visiting me and our grandparents.
And when she sent that, I definitely did not feel good.
It's kind of like a queasy, dizzy, sick to my stomach response.
And that I definitely very clearly was like, I don't trust that whatever message I'm going to send in response is going to be calibrated correctly to who I want to be.
In this moment, calibrated correctly to who I want to be.
That seems very complicated.
Well, could you just say, I'm disappointed you can't get together.
I miss you.
I'm really looking forward to when we can see each other again.
Please let me know.
At this point, I'm like very much in anxious attachment kind of land.
And so the idea of sending, I miss you and I want to see you kind of stuff felt like that's me being needy and that's just going to lead her to further away.
Sorry, I don't know what needy means, but isn't that honest?
I mean, I don't want to mischaracterize what you wanted, but you missed her and you wanted to see her, right?
Part of me did.
And part of me felt queasy and sick to my stomach that it took after the months of relationship building and having sex that she just goes silent for four days.
And I did not feel good about that.
So part of me would have said, like, what the fuck?
But, bro, you went silent for four days.
I didn't double text her for four days.
You did not text her for four days.
I sent the last message and she didn't respond.
I get that.
You didn't text her for four days and she didn't text.
She didn't reply.
So I get that that's a little bit more on her.
But you also didn't text her for four days.
Okay.
So it's not 100% on her.
It's not 100% on her.
And I definitely had.
Brought plenty of things and acted in plenty of ways that make sense.
And you never know.
And responsibility.
Look, you just don't know.
Because when there's miscommunication, if your mind jumps to the worst thing, you really can't have relationships very well because it's too high stakes.
She might have, I mean, we've all done this where, oh, I think there's a message or my phone was on silent because I was at work and then I just missed it.
You know, it could be any number of things.
Yeah.
And she mentioned she has ADHD and.
She takes bets for that.
And all of her friends, she said, have a similar experience where they really have to lead and drive the communications.
Because she kind of, when people are in front of her, she said, she's like, wow, you're one of my great friends.
It's so good to see you.
But then she leaves, and it's like emotionally, they kind of don't exist.
Oh, okay.
All right.
So you were in a long distance relationship with someone who's out of sight, out of mind.
Yeah.
And part of me was hoping that it would be different this time, quote unquote.
I could penetrate with my love through this ag of uncaring.
And she was on psych meds.
Yeah.
Okay.
Psych meds have a big effect on emotions.
Okay.
So she's, her sister's visiting.
She's not able to see you that weekend.
And then what?
So then she sends, Hey, so are my sisters visiting?
Hope you're having a good time at the conference.
I feel dizzy and queasy and not good, and not like I could send a text that was going to be how I wanted to show up.
So I didn't text her for a few more days until the thought of texting her didn't feel bad.
And had you told her about your limitations in communications that sometimes you freak out and don't know how to communicate?
I hadn't experienced this in a long time.
Okay.
But when you experienced it, did you tell her so that she could put your silence in context?
Because you know why you're silent.
She doesn't.
I did not.
Okay.
All right.
So let's, if we can get to, I want to hit the gas because we've got stuff to talk about still, and we've been chatting for a long time.
So if you could just get me to how it ended, if it ended.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So she sends that.
Sorry.
I hope you're having fun.
A few days later, I send her just a quick.
Hey, I miss you.
Sent pics and she like immediately responds, yes!
And then does not send any photos of her or what she's doing.
And that also didn't feel good.
So then, six days later, after a lot of ruminating, I send a hey, do you want to chat this week?
When you're back in town, I have a date idea.
No response.
Two days later, I send her a message that's like, hey, I haven't been, I feel like maybe I was a little bit cold and distant in the last couple of communications.
But I still care about you as a person.
And this is me thinking about how we just had sex and I didn't text her back the next day.
And then I made some lube jokes right after.
And she told me earlier on that it was really nice.
Lube jokes?
Lube.
Lube.
L-U-B-E.
Lube jokes.
I'm not sure what those are.
I mean, you mean sexual lube?
Yes.
P-Diddy?
Yeah.
It wasn't about P-Diddy, but it was about sexual lube.
Okay.
So I made a couple of jokes and then the send pics.
Thing was like, okay, this maybe comes off as a like, was he wanting me to send nudes kind of thing?
That's one way to read that.
And she'd mentioned earlier on that like she really appreciated me, like talking to her and trying to understand and see her as a person and not just somebody I'm trying to sleep with.
And so then I'm thinking about that communication that she said too.
And now it's like, okay, cool.
I like sleep with her.
I didn't text her back the next day.
I'm a little bit warm.
And then I start making lewd jokes and I say send pics and it's a lot of radio silence.
So this could be her like feeling like, I was just trying to get laid and then stopped caring.
So I send a message.
Or maybe you just want to get laid again and whatever, right?
Okay.
Yeah.
And then I send a message saying, hey, like, you're, I feel like my communication's not been very good recently.
And here are like three inside things that are like signs that I care about you as a person.
She texts back later that day.
Are these like inside things?
Yes.
Like, I won't tell you the details because they're personal between the two of us, but they're like, these are things that aren't just like, I like that you're intelligent.
I like that you're attractive.
It was like, Here's the thing we talked about.
Here's the thing we talked about.
Here's the thing we talked about.
Okay, got it.
And show the human connection.
And then she texted me back later that day Hey, I think you've been really warm and sweet.
I know we've been busy lately.
I tried to FaceTime you last week, and I've been thinking about you and values and worldviews.
I think we should talk about them.
And I said, great.
And a little bit of back and forth.
We schedule a call the following Saturday.
And then on that call, it's a little bit friendly at first.
And then she brings up, she said something about how it feels like I have optimization energy and I haven't tried to get her to science bro improve and optimize her life, but it's been rubbing off.
And she has been not.
You have optimization energy.
And I didn't catch that bit.
And she mentioned she hadn't felt like I'd tried to like put that on her.
Like I was trying to get her to optimize her life.
But that is what I have to understand.
So she's saying, you have optimization energy, but you're not applying it to me.
Is that what she meant?
Yep.
Yeah.
So, for example, we talked about like protein intake.
And I never said, like, you need to be like, wag my finger, you need to be eating more protein.
But I like, ingest made that joke.
And she sent me like a research paper after she thought about it.
I sent her a podcast.
And so that's like one example of, I think about things like how much protein should I intake?
How do I manage the logistics of a situation to.
Okay, sorry, I'm really lost here.
So you said something about her eating more protein, and she sent you an article.
You sent her a podcast, and that's debating how much protein to eat.
Okay.
And so is she happy or not happy that you suggested she eat more protein?
At the time, she said, Well, this hasn't changed my mind, but she didn't express any sort of like, I don't like that you brought this up and it feels like you were trying to put this on me.
Okay.
So when you talk to her and she says, You have optimization energy, but you weren't applying it to me, I'm not sure.
Does she think that you have better ways to live, but you're not encouraging her in those areas?
She thought that I am somebody who looks at the problems and challenges of my life and I tried to solve them.
And she saw some of that and we talked about some of that a little bit.
And she felt that I hadn't tried to fix her or get her to be on that same train.
Okay.
Sorry.
I understand.
I understand.
So then what happened?
So she says that.
And then that's basically her version of an excuse to say that she didn't want to date anymore.
And we had a follow on conversation for a couple hours about that.
Okay.
And when was that?
That was three weeks ago, two weeks ago.
Okay.
And how was the couple of hours?
I mean, that seems odd to have a couple of hours conversation after she's breaking up with you after you slept together maybe a couple of times and have barely seen each other over five months or whatever.
But okay.
So she says, I don't want to date you because you're not trying to optimize me.
Okay.
That's a new one for me.
And then what do you talk about for a couple of hours after that?
I was just trying to figure out.
I also then, because she said it was about worldview, and I said, okay, what about worldview?
Are you feeling like we're not on the same page about as to me an invitation to have a conversation we should have had before that was direct about worldviews?
That's when she says this optimization energy thing.
Like, okay, well, that's fine.
And then she also mentions me saying I'm libertarian and that's not where she's at.
And I've had conversations where she can understand where I'm coming from, but feels like I am not.
Appreciating her lived experience, which is okay, but not necessarily something she wants to debate about with somebody she's dating.
It's more of a I can be friends with people I disagree with thing than I want to hash out worldviews and find middle ground or not with somebody that I'm dating.
Okay, so she's not open to reason and evidence because somehow it contradicts her lived experience.
That's what it sounded like.
Well, no, that's what it is.
That's what it is.
She's saying you have reason and evidence behind your libertarian arguments, but it contradicts with my lived experience.
And again, nobody knows what that means other than vague narcissism.
So she's not open to reason and evidence.
I've never even.
The trick of this for me is that a lot of what she said on that call was the like, this is a woman who's already decided, and women don't look you in the eye and say, I don't want to break up with you.
I guess, sorry, I'm not talking about the breakup.
Hang on.
I'm not talking about the breakup.
I mean, prior to that, I guess you talked about your libertarian arguments, and there's reason and evidence behind libertarian arguments, right?
And there's morals.
We did.
And we didn't get that far into those conversations to really expose whether she was or wasn't open to that.
So, you didn't try to give her any rational or moral arguments in the first couple of months or the five months of the relationship or whatever it was, right?
The two half attempts that I made were one, again, this work situation where somebody got paid in free stuff instead of cash, had a conversation about the ethics of that.
And then the other thing that sort of touches on this realm, which is not a moral thing, but the protein thing, was like, okay, we had a discussion about it where we didn't agree and she thought about it and sent me a research paper.
The Cost of Being Around Parents00:16:47
So, that's like, okay, this is somebody.
Who would care enough to think about it and then also find a research paper?
And research papers are evidence.
So that's like a good sign.
But those are the two.
But the research paper disagreed with what you said.
Is that right?
The research paper was tangentially related.
It was about whether or not the recommended daily allowances were adequate or not based on some research of third world countries and finding that Brazilians don't have protein deficits.
In dozens and dozens of hours of conversation and in hundreds of texts, You never presented a rational or moral argument to her.
And I'm not criticizing, I just want to make sure that's the case.
I made one attempt on one phone call.
And that was the guy who got paid in kind rather than in cash or in merch, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
So, yeah, you need to try reasoning with a woman.
Yeah.
Because if she's not open to reason, you can't have a relationship because we can only meet in reality.
We can only have a relationship in reality.
And reason and evidence is reality.
Yeah.
And I think for me, again, this particular spot where I'm in physiological withdrawal mode from.
Okay.
I can't.
I'm not a doctor.
I'm just a philosopher.
Yeah.
So I can't do anything about the physiological whatever.
Right.
But what I can do is tell you that you need to reason with the woman.
Yeah.
Because I didn't do that.
Hang on.
Because you couldn't reason with your father and you couldn't reason with your mother.
So, your goal is to self erase and provide what is pleasing and not disagree.
Yeah.
And that's, and she knows that.
I assume she knows something about your childhood, maybe not a huge amount, but I assume, oh, does she?
Did she know something about your childhood?
No, this is one of the things that I didn't pick up on at the time.
She did ask some questions, but like when I asked her about her childhood, she didn't reciprocate.
So, I don't know that she actually.
Oh, she hid her childhood from you?
No, I asked her how growing up was, and she.
Describes that her situation, but she didn't ask me a lot of questions.
Like, she didn't ask me how I was growing up for you.
I might have volunteered some things, but she didn't, for sure, ask me that.
And I gave her my relationship with my parents.
Okay.
So she doesn't really understand, I think, the effect that childhood has on adult relationships.
She's been to therapy and she had some self knowledge, but I wouldn't be surprised if she doesn't really.
Oh, she's been to therapy, but she didn't ask you about your childhood.
Okay.
And what evidence of self knowledge did she have?
This is the first thing that comes to mind is an emotional recognition of me.
So it's tangential to self knowledge, but I like made a big moment out of telling her that I wanted to have kids because I wanted to just have a good thing and be nice to people, but I knew I need to stop doing that and dating.
So it felt like a big moment to me.
And then she agreed and it was great.
And afterwards we talked about it.
And I said, Yeah, I was like, Really important.
And so I built it up more than it maybe needed to be.
I could have just been direct and simple.
And she's like, Yeah.
And also, maybe you're just scared.
And that was accurate.
It's like an accurate reader.
What did she say you were scared about?
I was afraid to put a deal breaker on the table that could have ended the burgeoning relationship.
Okay.
All right.
Okay.
So have you had any communication since the breakup?
We.
There were a couple of the things that I wanted to talk about, including asking if she'd gone out with other people while we were dating.
So, two days after the breakup call, we met up because she came back into the town that I live in, and we talked for a couple more hours and nothing since then.
Okay.
All right.
And how can I best help you in the time that we have left?
I. In the time that we have left, I think when I wrote in.
I had a sense of a story that I think was accurate enough about what happened and what I did wrong and how to change in the future.
We've covered some of that, but I think maybe I can run through that quickly and just double check your instincts and takes on it.
Yeah, go ahead.
Yeah, so I think the couple things that came to mind for me are one, I knew I was in a space with relationships and.
With getting rid of my coping mechanisms finally, that I would be pretty sensitive to positive stimulus like an attractive woman being interested in me.
And even knowing that, I leaned in and kind of triggered some of the addiction stuff that I knew was there.
And it was just put way too much emotional weight and invested way too much in a woman who had some warning signs that she was leftist, even if that's not hardcore.
Um, well, then again, because I thought she was younger, that's why I mentioned the college stuff.
But if she's still a leftist at 30, it means she's dug in.
But sorry, go ahead.
Yeah.
And the thing that I used as a justification was like, well, she, she moves back to her grandparents and her father's conservative and she says she still talks to him and loves him and, um, She's shown up with some not just completely scandalous outfits, and she's shown some ability to engage with conversations where she doesn't agree with what I'm saying or other people are saying.
Yeah, so there's like signs enough that she might be dug in and this was never going to work.
But I, again, was looking for how can I do my best painting constellations to justify feeling good about somebody liking me?
And then also, Like, way slower for me to get sexually involved with somebody, but still didn't have a commitment conversation, didn't really dig into the like, okay, what do we disagree with worldview wise, and what does that mean for the potential of this relationship?
And so, I think for me, the lessons for next time are one, don't sleep with a woman if she's not my girlfriend and I don't want to be your boyfriend, even if I'm trying to build towards that.
And Pay a lot more attention to the give and take in a relationship.
It's, I'm fine with being a leader of here's where we're going on a date and initiating conversations and things like that.
But I think part of what happened that she didn't put into words, but it looks like it was at play for me was like I invested a lot in doing things for her and planning and guiding stuff.
And she was just kind of reactive and ended up feeling like, well, I went on a date with somebody else.
I have options.
I'm not that invested in this relationship.
He is.
It's nice when we're hanging out.
But It's not something that I feel great about outside of that.
And so it was easy for her to say, I'm just going to walk away because he seems really invested in this and I'm not so much going to go explore other options.
Okay.
All right.
Is there anything else?
I mean, it sounds like you've got a handle on some of it.
Is there anything else that you would like me to add?
No, I think that's it if you don't have anything else.
Oh, I do.
I was just wondering if you noticed it because I feel like I'm losing my mind on this side of the conversation.
And there's an example of me not picking up the signals with other people.
Yeah.
No, it's nothing to do with that shit.
Okay.
What is love?
Our involuntary response to virtue if we are virtuous.
Okay.
What virtues did this woman demonstrate?
Some.
The thoughtfulness of thinking about a conversation we had and sending a research paper felt like.
You've got to be shitting somebody, bro.
She sent you something because she disagreed with you.
She didn't tell you she was moving away for the first part of getting involved.
She didn't tell you she was dating another guy or going on a date with another guy.
She's deceptive.
Tell me about her virtues and don't quote some fucking.
Protein paper.
Sorry, I'm not mad at you.
Obviously, it's just, I mean, you've been listening to me.
I've been listening to what I do for how long?
Yeah, decade and a half.
Decade and a half.
Love is our involuntary response to virtue.
If a virtuous.
Now, listen, if you disagree with that, that's totally fine.
You can totally disagree with my definition, but not referencing it is kind of weird to me.
That's why I feel like I'm losing my mind.
I'm like, you're like, you know, I've been listening to this dietician for a decade and a half who says to lose weight, You need to expend more calories than you take in.
So, I'm eating 10,000 calories a day and I'm not losing weight.
Yeah.
So, you haven't referenced, and I even gave you that prompt, right?
The virtues, right?
What virtues, what morals, what integrity, what character, what dedication to the good did she display?
So, this is what I was calling in about because everything I could tell you.
This is not what you were calling in about because we've been talking for two hours and you haven't really mentioned it once.
Yeah.
So, if you have been listening to me for a decade and a half and I say to you, love is our involuntary response to virtue, if we're virtuous, and you're like, she's pretty.
So, I don't give a shit about her virtues.
I mean, that's, listen, that's fine.
I mean, obviously, it's a free will situation, but I don't know what you're calling me for.
Because calling me is saying there's something that I don't understand about what happened.
And I've been telling you for a decade and a half exactly what you need to have love.
And you're like, well, but she's a socialist, but she's pretty.
And again, I'm sort of not sure what the conversation is for because I'm listening to this whole story and you're giving me a bunch of calendar stuff and I texted this and then we didn't see each other for that.
And then we had a dinner here.
And I'm sitting there thinking, okay, well, You got to find out about people's childhoods.
You got to figure out their morals.
And she doesn't ask you about your childhood.
And she doesn't show any morals or any integrity or any dedication to virtue.
And she's a lived experience girl.
And you have optimization energy or whatever mystical weirdness is going on.
And like, honestly, I'm not mad at you, obviously.
I mean, I'm just, but I find the conversation baffling.
It's very dissociating for me.
When I've told you for a year and a half, sorry, I've told you for 15 years, love is virtue.
And then you say, this relationship with a woman who was not virtuous mysteriously didn't go well.
And it has something to do with how the text occurred or what this said.
Do you know what I mean?
Help me understand what I'm missing here.
I think everything you just said is valid.
So why.
Were you conscious of the fact that you were calling me after refusing to vet a woman for virtue because she was hot and then not mentioning any of that and then saying, I would like some help with this relationship?
Lust is no basis for a relationship, say I, and you based a relationship on lust and it didn't work out, and then you don't mention anything to do with that the entire two hour conversation.
And the reason I'm being maybe a little.
Blunt with you is because you're 33 years old and you just wasted five months.
Yeah.
And you say you want kids.
So I don't, if you want kids, you have to vet people pretty quickly, right?
Yeah.
And you had sex with a woman who showed no particular signs of self knowledge, empathy, curiosity, or virtue, and who lied.
I mean, lies by omission, they're some of the worst of all, right?
And this is why I was talking about your parents earlier, because when you're with your parents, I assume you're dissociated because you can't be honest and direct, right?
Because then your dad gets mad and raises his voice.
Or mom starts wailing and leaves the room.
Or mom starts having a hissy fit, a conniption, as we used to call it, and leaves the room, right?
So, I said earlier at the beginning of this conversation about this woman, I said, we need to figure out the cost, if there is one, of being around your parents.
And lo and behold, we found it.
You dissociate with your parents, you dissociate with this woman, and you dissociate with me.
And again, I'm not trying to put you down or anything.
It's just that when I mention this, I mean, am I being too harsh?
Am I being unfair?
I just, you're 33 years old.
You've been listening to me since you were in your teens.
You know my definition of virtue and love.
And it's no part of the conversation.
I think that's the price of spending a couple of weeks with your parents.
I mean, your parents are resolutely opposed to philosophy, right?
Because they won't be honest or curious, and they won't act with integrity or honor.
So your parents are resolutely opposed to philosophy.
So then philosophy disappears from your mind to the point where you talk to a philosopher and never mention philosophy.
You've heard me say we can only pair bond with virtue, and then you sleep with a woman and wonder why you're not pair bonded.
Or why she's not pair bonded.
Again, help me if I'm being too harsh or too blunt.
I know I think this is fine.
And these are the things that nobody else, therapists or podcasters or people who I know would just put directly to me.
So, I mean, the last, I guess, the last question is like, so if you chose to follow lust rather than virtue, that's a choice, right?
Obviously.
And I don't have any particular issue with that choice.
I don't think it's a wise choice, but it's not like you violated the non aggression principle or UPB or anything like that.
Maybe you lied to yourself, but that's not a UPB violation.
So you chose lust over virtue, which is fine.
But why is the result confusing to you?
Honestly, it's like if I say you need to eat 2,000 calories a day to lose weight and you spend six months eating 5,000 calories a day and then you call me up.
With confusion as to why you're gaining weight, I would be a little baffled, right?
I don't know that there's an answer other than you just have to make choices sometimes.
But I think the confusion for me is like, I know this stuff.
And when you say it, it doesn't feel good because you're right.
But I have made these choices continually.
Well, I mean, you choose a woman based on her looks, not on her virtues.
I mean, it's nice if you can get both, but if you have to choose one, you have to choose virtues, right?
Looks are going to fade anyway.
So you chose a woman.
Based on lust.
You chose the woman based on dopamine, based on feelings, based on sex and desire and whatever, right?
Okay, and fine.
Like, whatever.
I mean, if you want to eat 5,000 calories a day, that's your choice.
But it's just odd to have someone call me up in confusion when they've listened to me for 15 years, done the exact opposite, and not got a good outcome.
Yeah, the outcome is not unexpected.
And again, I think I don't know that there's, There's not, there might not stop being it, but then, like, dude, you fucking know, like, if you want to, if you want, I can't let the dissociation spread to the listeners.
Like, I want this to be a call I can actually put out without screwing people up.
So I have to be pretty blunt, right?
Because it's for the listeners, too.
Good News from Failed Relationships00:02:24
So if you'd called me up and you just said, Steph, man, let me tell you, did I ever mess up?
You know, I mean, don't get me wrong.
I got my rocks off a couple of times.
That was great.
But I decided to not do what you suggest.
And I decided to pursue a woman based on lust, not virtue.
And it went very badly.
Okay, I could respect that in that, you know, we've all made mistakes.
All men are subject to the sin of lust, so to speak, because nature is not overly fussy about how we get the next generation, right?
So if you'd have called me up and said, oh, man, you know, I tried living as if philosophy wasn't philosophy.
I tried living as if you, Steph, were completely wrong about everything.
And boy, you know, when you told me to eat 2,000 calories to lose weight and I ate 5,000 calories and gained weight, I just wanted to call you up to tell me.
To tell you and to remind the listeners that you were right.
But there was none of that, not a single solitary reference or shred to that.
You were listing off all your meals, and I had to guess the calories, so to speak, right?
And well, then I felt this, and then I thought that, but you didn't mention that you were doing the opposite of my advice, of my reason and arguments.
And I'm, why would you study something for 15 years and then not put it into practice or notice when you're not?
I mean, this is really good news because if you had filtered for virtue and then things had gone to hell in a handbasket, that would be confusing, right?
And that would be bad news, right?
Like, I mean, if you did eat 2,000 calories a day and continued to gain weight, that would be, I don't even know, that would be a defiance of the law of physics or whatever it is, but it would be an indication of something awry.
So it's good news.
That you didn't do philosophy, but you did base biological lust and it didn't work out because that's exactly what philosophy would predict.
But it's like if you were the president of a country and you'd studied libertarianism and you imposed wage and price controls and then they didn't work out and you had a conversation with your libertarian mentor and didn't ever mention that you'd imposed wage and price controls against all libertarian principles, that would be kind of baffling, right?
Philosophy as Recreation Only00:14:34
So, I mean, and the choice that you have, and it's probably a choice that you should make sooner rather than later, is you know, we talked about sex.
Is it recreational or is it serious, right?
And this is a very big question for you to have, and I don't know the answer.
And there's not any massively objectively right or wrong answer is philosophy recreational or serious?
Is this something that is entertaining and interesting for you?
Oh, cool, call in show.
You know, somebody cried, somebody had a breakthrough.
That's really cool.
That's really interesting.
You know, like all of these neurotic housewives who watch Dr. Phil and never gain a shred of mental health or something like that, right?
So, is philosophy for you, and it's just an important thing to be honest about with yourself.
And I say this with great humility because it was recreational for me for way too long.
So, I'm not trying to put you down or say that I'm superior or better.
I was a little younger than you when I started really taking philosophy seriously.
And so, I'm not trying to put you under the bus or say, oh, this is terrible.
But it is really important to.
Ask yourself, is philosophy recreational or is it serious?
Is it fun or is it a calling?
Is it a side quest or a central mission?
Because if philosophy is not serious for you, and again, I'm not saying that in a negative way, I'm just looking at it from cause and effect.
If philosophy is not serious for you, then you should stop bringing it up with dates.
And you should stop living your life as if it is serious.
Because if philosophy is serious, then you can get to the people who take it seriously.
If philosophy is recreational, but you keep bringing it up with people, you're just going to end up alone.
And that's my concern that there's kind of an isolation that happened in your childhood, that philosophy is kind of helping you reproduce, if that makes some sort of sense.
Like, I'm doomed to be alone.
No one's ever going to understand me.
I'm going to be isolated, blah, blah, blah.
So then what you do is you use philosophy to remain isolated.
Because you take it seriously enough to bring it up in conversations, but not seriously enough to actually judge people by it.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, it's a distancing mechanism if you don't brew.
Yeah, it's like if I move to Japan and I never learn Japanese and then complain that people don't want to talk to me.
It's like that's obviously you want to not be talked to if you move to Japan and don't speak Japanese, right?
So that's my concern is that philosophy may be a mechanism for keeping a moat around you.
And the half thing, right?
One foot on the boat, one foot on the pier, that's kind of like the worst situation is you have enough philosophy to bring it up with people and pretend it's a standard, but not enough to make it actually a standard and get you to the right people in life.
Yeah, I can see that.
And this exact, like, not feeling like I fit in with any one particular group is something that I've been thinking about recently and even.
Talk to this woman about.
And I'm concerned, given that you were home for Christmas and weren't able to be honest with your parents or direct or open, that your parents are using philosophy to punish you for disagreeing with them unconsciously.
That philosophy is serving your parents' need to punish you for disagreeing with them.
In other words, the ostracism that your father inflicted upon you when you were 14 for that month, philosophy is now inflicting that same ostracism on you as an adult.
The pattern is still the same.
It sounds like it's me to whether or not I'm serious about it or not.
Well, what did you?
What did you?
I feel like I just said something and I didn't get any response.
When I said that philosophy might be the tool that you collude with your parents to keep you isolated as a punishment for disagreeing with them, because that seems to be what's happening.
And there's just that possibility.
There's just enough emotional energy behind it to.
Bring it up, but then your mind actually falling through on it.
So, this just is like inner parents kind of keeping me away from other people so I don't leave them behind.
Right.
Because if you're not into philosophy, you should let it go and you should do what most people do, which is to follow impulses and lusts and conformity.
And you should operate on the pleasure pain principle, which is what most people do.
And I'm not going to condemn you for that.
I mean, I'm just saying that you should do philosophy or not do philosophy.
It's like going to the gym once every three months and lifting the maximum weights.
You're just going to get injured.
Like, you either do it consistently or don't do it.
And I'm just, I know it sounds like, well, you've got to do philosophy.
I don't mean it that way.
Genuinely don't mean it that way.
Don't half do it.
Right?
Like, if you've ever done high diving, I did a lot of high diving when I was in my teens.
And if you're going to high dive, you don't half commit to it.
Why not?
Like, if you're going to do an actual individual dive, you don't half commit.
Why not?
Because then you hit the water.
The concrete and break arms.
Well, it's bad, right?
You know, if you want to jump over a chair, like I saw this video of Bill Gates the other day jumping over a chair, apparently that was a thing for him.
If you're going to jump over a chair, is it good to half jump over a chair?
No, it's terrible.
Yeah, I mean, it's terrible, right?
And so, if you're going to do philosophy, you should do philosophy, which means judging people by philosophical standards.
If you're not going to do philosophy, then you shouldn't bring it up because it's just going to alienate people and you should leave it behind.
And again, I know this sounds very prejudicial and I don't mean it at all that way.
I'm not saying, well, it's really bad to leave philosophy behind, blah, because this is the worst situation.
I would prefer you give up philosophy than stay in this limbo where you have just enough philosophy to keep people at a distance, but not enough to get the right people into your life and to judge them ahead of time.
This is the worst place.
This is better.
This is worse than hedonism, is sort of what I'm saying.
And by hedonism, I don't mean just pursuing pleasure for its own sake, but the pleasure pain principle that most people organize their lives by.
The null zone.
I've talked about this, I think, even in my first book, right?
I mean, if there's a city and a desert and a town, then stay in the city, get to the town, don't stay in the desert because you'll die, if that makes sense.
Yeah, I've used that kind of word.
And I don't have the answer to that, but you're living half philosophy because philosophy says, Have honest conversations, tell the truth, and be open and challenge people.
And you go home and you don't do it.
Which means, and again, this is not a criticism.
I really, really want to make sure that you understand this is not a criticism.
I'm just talking about cause and effect because you asked me to explain your last year.
And your last year is you want a place to go for Christmas.
I completely understand that.
I really do.
And I sympathize with that.
And I'm not saying that's a small thing or an unimportant thing.
I get that.
But it's more pleasurable.
For you to go home for Christmas than to be honest, which means you're choosing hedonism or the pleasure-praying principle over philosophy.
Again, that's fine, but just be honest about it with yourself and say philosophy is recreational for me.
I like Seth's calling shows.
I think he's a clever fellow.
I like the way he breaks things down.
It's interesting for me, but it's entertainment.
You know, I can watch a movie about an action hero.
That doesn't mean I'm going to go and become an action hero or join some secret service or something like that.
I can go, I grew up watching Bond films.
That didn't mean I joined.
Her Majesty's Secret Service, right?
It's just entertainment.
It's recreational.
It's interesting.
You know, I will do a lot of combat in video games.
That doesn't mean I go around beating up people in real life.
It's just entertainment.
It's a distraction.
It's a diversion.
It's fun.
And that's where I think your answer needs to be.
And again, I know it sounds like I'm, you know, I dare you to be a bad guy and a hedonist.
I'm not saying that at all.
This is terrible.
Philosophy is good, but the pleasure pain principle is better than this because this is isolating you.
And philosophy should not.
Isolate you and paralyze you.
Philosophy, if it's entertaining, then good.
Return to the pleasure pain principle and don't start talking about libertarianism and virtues and values and worldviews and shit like that, because it's just going to drive people away.
If you say, I need to test for virtue first thing, then that's philosophical.
And then you'll spend a lot of time saying no, and then you'll say yes to some great person.
But this, especially because you're 33 and you don't have time to waste if you want to have kids, go pleasure pain, go philosophy.
My strong suggestion is don't stay here.
And I honestly don't mind which one you choose.
You have to choose what is going to work for you because choosing philosophy violates the pleasure pain principle, like dieting violates the pleasure pain principle, quitting any addiction, whatever it is.
Doing philosophy is going to make you feel bad.
And if for historical reasons and for whatever reasons it's too difficult, I sympathize, and this is no negative judgment whatsoever.
I totally sympathize.
I don't want to be this elitist world philosophy.
I guess it's not for everyone, and blah, blah, blah.
I don't mean that as a genuine, deeply human communication I want to get across here.
You don't have to do it, man.
You don't have to do philosophy.
There are pluses and minuses to both.
And what I would say is that, and again, this sounds like a negative, I genuinely don't mean it that way.
If I've been trying to learn chess for 15 years, And I lose to an amateur, what would you tell me to do?
Either stop playing to Fess or accept that you're not that good.
Well, yeah, I would say.
And if you've been trying to run a business for 15 years, and after 15 years, you're even more in debt than ever, I would say maybe you don't have much of a business mind, which is fine.
I don't have much of a math mind.
That's why I don't make my money.
I mean, you hear me do math live on my streams, it sounds like I'm having a stroke.
So we don't have to be good at everything.
If you've been working on philosophy for 15 years and you still don't really believe in it, which is, again, it's fine because it's entertaining, right?
And it's engaging and it's enjoyable.
Maybe it makes you feel smart or superior.
And that's true for all of us.
So that's a genuine human weakness or strength or whatever you want to call it.
It's a habit.
But if after 15 years of studying philosophy, you don't even know that you're not filtering women for virtue and you have sex and got outplayed by an NPC, so to speak, then I think it's important to recognize that it may not be something you're particularly great at.
I mean, I know that you're skilled in a lot of things, and we don't have to be good at everything, right?
And so maybe it's time to put philosophy aside for a while and say, look, I'm going to date for attraction.
I'm going to date for fun.
I'm going to date for great conversation.
And I'm not going to bring this libertarian childhood self knowledge, UPB, like whatever's going on.
And just, I mean, that's how most people do life, and they get married and they have kids.
I want what's best for you and loneliness is bad for you.
Like, you know, loneliness is like smoking half a pack of cigarettes a day.
Yeah.
Right.
So I want you.
Yeah.
I want you to have a connection.
And if you connect on the realm of what most people connect on, which is compatibility, some fun, some rough patches and so on, right?
You know, there's all these people.
What do they say?
Oh, you know, marriage has its ups and downs.
It has its rough patches.
It's like, no, it doesn't.
I've been married for almost a quarter century.
It doesn't.
I mean, there's difficult things that come in from outside, right?
I get that.
But my marriage is not up and down and rocky and hard work, and I already have a job that's hard work.
So, if philosophy is keeping you isolated, in other words, if you have philosophy, if you have it as a theory but not as a practice, then philosophy is bad for you.
And I mean this completely unironically.
Philosophy is bad for you if it keeps you isolated.
And if you cannot use philosophy to get through to a real connection with someone, then I would argue what's best for you is to.
Say philosophy is a fun, entertaining sideline.
I find it engaging and interesting.
I love mental puzzles.
It's like an escape room, it's an interesting mental puzzle, like a crossword, a Scrabble, a chess, or whatever.
But right now, philosophy is keeping me from connecting with anyone because I'm half doing it.
And if I'm only half doing it after 15 years, I need to put it aside for a while and find some other way to connect with people.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I think so.
And this was something, particularly to dating, that I was recently thinking about along similar lines.
And that's part of the like, don't sleep with somebody who's not my girlfriend things.
Like, I'm not good at putting the right amount of Pressure on it at the beginning because either I just do two minutes of work and say, Okay, great, she sounds good, and I just completely abandon it, or I use it as an excuse to like, Well, you did check these three boxes, so I'm just not even going to try.
And so then I'm not finding people where I get traction with.
Well, no, and I'll tell you, I'm going to just end on this, right?
Because we've been talking for a long time, I've got other calls today, but I will say this.
So you started dating this woman in late September, early October, right?
Or you started getting interested in her.
Okay.
Now, have you ever successfully filtered a woman for virtue?
No.
Okay.
So, why didn't you set up a call with me, which is free?
Lord knows you've got time.
You're a single guy.
Why didn't you set up a call with me to say, Steph, I don't really know how to filter for virtue.
What should I be looking for?
So, you didn't give me any opportunity to prevent a mess.
You simply call up after the mess, which is trying to transfer your helplessness to me.
Why wouldn't you call me before?
Or even during for help.
It's free.
You got time.
Why not?
Because it's frustrating for me when people call after the disaster rather than before.
Impulsivity vs Philosophical Principles00:04:57
Because what if I've always said philosophy is about prevention, not cure?
Sorry, go ahead.
It feels to me like it felt good and I was meant to keep feeling good and it didn't hurt.
And then when it hurt, I wanted to not feel hurt anymore.
Right.
So that's a pleasure pain principle.
And if that's what you're running on, embrace it.
Because right now, you're just getting mostly pain, right?
Because philosophy is keeping you from the pleasure and the hedonism outcomes because you bring just enough philosophy to mess things up with this woman, perhaps.
So, yeah, so you wanted to pursue this.
You didn't want to talk to me because if I had talked to you and I'd have given you how to filter for virtue, would this woman have passed?
Oh, certainly not.
Right.
Right.
So then the question so then you call me up because you feel bad and you don't reference any of the philosophical principles that I've proven for 15 years straight.
And you don't say to me, Steph, I'm sorry I didn't call you before because now I'm dumping this mess on you when philosophy can't fix it.
And it's this level of empathy that you need to work on.
And this is true whether you go philosophy or pleasure pain principle, but you need to figure out how you land for other people.
What do you think it's like for me when I've put out good advice for 15 years, you don't follow it, and then you want me to clean up the mess?
Really frustrating.
Well, right.
And you don't reference that.
And that's the price of being around anti empathetic parents, it strips you of your empathy, and then you do things like this.
And it's bad for you because imagine there's some woman, okay, you're good looking, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
And how tall are you?
Sorry, hello?
5'10, average American height.
Average American height.
And how's your hairline?
Still intact.
Still intact.
All right.
So, and you make some decent money, right?
Okay.
So you're an average height, good looking guy, good hair, good income, and you are calling me because of not applying philosophical principles and you're on a philosophical show.
If you had called me at the beginning and said, I met this woman, I'm kind of, I don't know, I'm really attracted to her, which is a danger sign, right?
Reason is probably out the window.
If you called me up at the beginning and you said, ah, you know, how do I vet for virtue, blah, you know, there's a lot of female listeners to free domain, right?
Heard.
Right.
I mean, they call in, right?
And I don't know if you know this, but a whole bunch of marriages have come out of free domain.
And if you had done that, do you think that women would have contacted me to say, wow, this guy sounds like he's really.
Got it going on.
Like he's smart, he's obviously attractive, and he's philosophical and wise and asking for help ahead of time, right?
So, do you think that women would have contacted me to say, Would you mind if I would be put in contact with him?
In which case, I would ask you, and if you agreed, forward you the email or whatever, right?
Now, if there are quality women, and I know that there are quality women listening to this tale, do you think that they want to be put in touch with you?
It sounds like I still have a lot of work to do.
That's not my question.
It sounds like I'm somebody who has a lot of work to do, and that's not something that a high quality woman would want to mess with.
Well, I mean, it sounds like it would sound to a high quality woman that you act a little impulsively and kind of grab onto people to feel better and then grab onto other people when you feel worse and don't, in particular, think about what it's like for the other person.
What do you think it's like for me?
When you call me and we have a public call and you say, This is where I am after 15 years of listening to you, Steph, do you think that's good or bad for my show?
Feel anger?
Maybe that's what you're feeling?
Well, it's just a little baffling to me.
And listen, I'll put the call out because, you know, facts are facts.
But I don't think you've thought what it's like on my side.
I think I'm kind of like a buoy or a dinghy that you're drowning and you just grab it.
Yeah, I didn't see that.
And I think that's going to keep you to some degree from either connecting on hedonism or pleasure pain or on principles.
Free to Disbelieve My Advice00:02:05
So, yeah, this is why, look, I mean, if you've been working at philosophy for 15 years and you've not been convinced of the value of vetting for virtue, boy, there's a lot of these.
Well, they involve vagina.
So we got to right up.
So, If you've been studying philosophy for 15 years and you don't believe that you need to vet for virtue when falling in love or wanting to fall in love or being attracted to someone, that's fine.
Listen, I could be completely wrong.
I'm always open to that possibility.
But it's my lived experience.
Right.
So I could be completely wrong.
And so if you don't believe me after 15 years, then you should recognize that I am for you merely entertainment.
And again, I know this sounds like negative.
I'm just stating a fact.
I'm not judging it.
You don't believe me.
You don't believe me that you should vet for virtue.
And that's fine.
Everyone is perfectly free to think I'm an idiot and wrong.
Of course, that's free will.
But you should recognize that you don't believe me.
And if you don't believe me, which is fine, again, you're totally free to, then you should not bring up philosophy because it's not something that you believe in.
You should not bring up philosophy and values and virtues with people because it's not something you really believe in.
And again, you're perfectly free.
Again, I want to be really clear about this.
You're perfectly free to think I'm an idiot and wrong and that it's entertainment and it's not serious and it's not something you should really do.
You're totally free to do that.
It's totally fine with me.
That's free will.
The last thing I'd ever want to do is for someone to believe in what I say because I disapprove of disagreeing.
That would be too much like your father, right?
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
So, yeah, that's my major concern.
And is there anything else that you wanted to mention?