The Man Who Overcame Tourette's: Marc Elliot | This Past Weekend
Theo Von sits down with Marc Elliot to talk about living with Tourette’s and ultimately overcoming it. This episode brought to you by… MNML Case http://mnmlcase.com Use Code Theo for 20% off MeUndies http://meundies.com/weekend 15% off your first pair Grey Block Pizza 1811 Pico Blvd. Santa Monica, CA http://bit.ly/GreyBlock Music “Shine” - Bishop Gunn http://bit.ly/Shine_BishopGunn Gunt Squad Aaron Jones Aaron Rasche Aaron Stein Adriana Hernandez Aidan Duffy Alaskan Rock Vodka Alex Hitchins Alex Person Alex Sideris Alexander Contreras Amanda Sherman Andrea Gagliani Andrew Valish Andy Mac Angelo Raygun Angie Angeles Anna Winther Anthony Schultz Arielle Nicole Ashley Konicki Audrey Harlan Ayako Akiyama Bad Boi Benny Baltimore Ben Beau Adams Yoga Ben Deignan Ben in thar.. Ben Limes Benjamin Streit Big Easy Brian Martinez Brian Szilagyi Bryan Reinholdt Bubba Hodge cal ector California Outlaw Campbell Hile Carla Huffman Casey Roberts Casey Rudesill Cassandra Miller Chad Saltzman Charley Dunham Christian from Bakersfield christian prado Christopher Becking Christopher Stath Clint Lytle Cody Cummings Cody Kenyon Cody Marsh Cory Alvarez Dan Draper Dan Ray Dave Engelman David Christopher david r prins David Smith David Wyrick deadpieface Deanna Smith Dirty Steve Domonic DoMoreKid Donald blackwell Doug Chee Dwehji Majd Dylan Clune Felicity Black Felix Theo Wren Fernando Takeshi Sato Gabriel Almeda Garrett Blankenship General Moose Ginger Levesque Grant Stonex Greg H Gunt Squad Gary Haley Brown J Garcia J.T. Hosack Jacob Ortega Jacob Rice James banks James Bown James Hunter Jameson Flood Jason Bragg Jason Haley Jeffrey Lusero Jenna Sunde Jeremy Johnson Jeremy West Jerry Zhang Jesse Witham Joaquin Rodriguez Joe Dunn Joey Desrosiers Joey Piemonte John Bowles John Kutch John Slade Johnathan Jensen Jon Ross Josh Cowger Justin L justin marcoux justin shuy Karen Sullivan Katy Doyle Kelly Elliott Ken Comstock Ken Melvin Kennedy Kenton call Kevin Best Kevin Fleury Kevtron Kiera Parr Kigabo Kirk Cahill Kishalin kristen rogers Kyle Baker Lacey Briesemeister Laura Williams Lauren Cribb Leighton Fields Linsey Logan Yakemchuk Lorell “Loretta” Ray Luke Danton Mark Glassy Matt Eckenrode Matt Holland Matt Kaman Matt Leftwich Matthew Azzam Matthew Price Matthew Sizemore Matthew Snow Max Bowden MEDICATED VETERAN Megan Andersen-Hall Megan Daily megan Wrynn Meghan LaCasse Michael E. Ganzermiller Michael polcaro Michael Senkpiel Micky Maddux Mike montague Mike Poe Mike Sarno Mike Vo Mitchell Watson Mona McCune Ned Arick Nick Butcher Niko Ferrandino Nikolas Koob Nyx Ballaine Alta Old McTronald Old Scroat Mccrackin Owen Lide Paddy jay Passenger Shaming Patrick Gries Paul Flores Paul Lococo Peter Craig Peter Shea Philip James Qie Jenkins Ranger Rick Rashelle Raymond Renee Nicol RinDee Roar Hanasand Robert Doucette Robert Mitchell Robyn Tatu Ryan Crafts Ryan Forrest Ryan Garcia Ryan Jordan Ryan Walsh Ryan Wolfe Sam Illgen Sarah Anderson Scott Scott Lucy Scott Swain Sean Scott Season Vaughan Shane Pacheco Shannon Schulte Shawn-Leigh henry Sonja Prazic Stacy Blessing Stahn Johnson Stepfan Jefferies Stephanie Claire Steve Corlew Steven Stoody Sungmin Choe Suzanne O'Reilly Taylor Beall thatdudewiththepaperbag The Asian Hamster Thee shitfaced chef TheGremlin Cafe Tim Bonventre Tim Greener Tim Ozcelik Timothy Eyerman todd vesterse Tom in Rural NC Tom Kostya Tom Reichardt Tommy From England Tommy Redditt Travis Simpson Travis Vowell Trevor Fatheree Troy Ty Oliver Tyler Harrington Tyler Shaver Victor Montano Victoria Adams William Morris William Reid Peters xTaCx Stretch Zech JohnsonSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Today's episode is a young man who, I'll be honest with you, I don't know if he had Tourette's or not, if I'm being totally frank.
We were looking for a Tourette's guy, someone who had Tourette's or has had Tourette's.
A lot of our listeners know I beat Down syndrome when I was young.
You know, the doctor said 95% chance that he has it, and then eventually said 40% chance.
And by the time I was like 11 years old, they're like 0% chance, maybe 5% chance.
So I understand people overcoming afflictions and rare diseases, but this guy, we wanted to have somebody in who had Tourette's.
And Tourette's is a French disease that made its way to America and afflicts millions of people, maybe even hundreds of millions.
And we had a fascinating conversation.
He was very kind to come in.
He's given TED talks on the subject.
And this is a man who found a way to master those, one of the Lord's most dangerous and wild gifts, which is Tourette's.
Ladies and gentlemen, our guest today is Ted Talker, author, and Tourette's defeater, Mr. Mark Elliott.
Shine that light on me I'll sit and tell you my stories I'll sit and tell you my stories I'm sitting here, Mark Elliott.
Thanks for joining us today, brother.
Thanks for having me for you.
Yeah, I appreciate it, man.
And I was like, because you, you know, I was looking at some of your videos, looking at your TED Talk, and I was like, wow, this guy, you know, at first I was like, because it's about Tourette's, mostly about Tourette's syndrome, you know?
It's about a lot of things.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, okay, so then, well, tell me what Tourette's is, man.
So if somebody doesn't know Tourette, you know, like, what is it?
Okay, so when I grew up.
Yeah.
Let me start there because I think it's a little bit easier.
Okay.
The way that I understood Tourette's syndrome is that it's a neurological genetic disorder that's involuntary and has no cure.
Yeah.
It's like just somebody working freelance really on their own.
You know, it's somebody just the Lord.
I feel like it's just remixing somebody and they're just kind of shook.
Well, you know, some people, I mean, it's sort of, I mean, it's bizarre when you see somebody ticking because it's obviously if you know it, it's not as bizarre.
Yeah.
But, you know, just from, you know, if you're just walking or you're at McDonald's or you're walking somewhere and you just start seeing someone bark like a dog.
Yeah.
Doing things uncontrollably, that, it's...
And I don't use the N-word unless you do.
You know what I'm saying?
But he was this white guy and he would just, and so a lot of times people would just take him over and like set him in like the black area of like the schoolyard, you know, and just run off and like just wait for him to go off, you know?
And then, and that was kind of wild.
I mean, you know, like, so you have, I mean, I guess kids can be more cruel about it.
But yeah, I guess for most people, if they think about it, like if I think about it, I don't know about most people, but it's like, yeah, it's a disease or it's a syndrome or it's a thing where you are like involuntary.
It's almost like somebody is like, you're a puppet of, you know, some dark lord or something.
Of a dark lord, yes.
I mean, some people did, I think some people believe that you actually are possessed by the devil kind of thing.
It looks, it looks, it's just intense when you're watching it.
Yeah.
But let me just explain a little bit of how I actually experienced it because it's sort of evolved over the years.
Okay.
But you had it.
You still have it or you have it?
You had it.
I don't have it anymore.
You beat it.
I beat it.
Hell yeah, dude.
Hell yeah.
Wow, you beat it, man.
So, and I don't say that I cured it.
I mean, it was a journey.
Okay.
And we can talk, and I'm sure we'll talk about it more.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But basically, you know, I even posted some videos about this.
But basically, the way that I experience Tourette's is that there's a very uncomfortable feeling on the inside.
Yes.
Okay.
So I always would tell people, you know, think of an itch.
Right.
You know, so if you think of an itch right now, you'll probably just get one.
Right.
Just how it works.
I don't know how that works with the mind.
Yeah.
Itchcraft.
That's called itchcraft.
Itchcraft.
Yes.
So there's, see, exactly.
But yeah, you can start itching.
You think it, you get it.
You start thinking about it.
Okay.
So there's this uncomfortable feeling in my body.
Okay.
And when I was a kid, the only way I knew how to get rid of that feeling was to or to say a word or to hump My thrust, my hips, whatever it was.
Okay.
And as soon as I ticked, that itch went away.
Okay.
And it felt amazing.
Right.
You just feel so much better because that discomfort, whatever that itch is, it was gone.
Now, of course, when I was a kid, I didn't have that type of understanding about it, though.
I just was...
There was...
So you're just living it.
I'm just living it.
And I wasn't like, oh, I have this itch.
It always one big mesh kind of ball of Tourette's, you know?
Yeah.
And the thing is when you use that analogy, though, you have to be careful because people could then, you know, say, well, why'd you just not scratch it?
Just don't, don't scratch it.
And that's a great question, but it's tough.
You know, imagine having 10, like instead of just that one itch that you might be feeling on your leg, imagine now having 10, 15, 20 itches all in one spot.
Yeah.
Oh, well, then if somebody looks at you and says, I have an itch right now and I'm not scratching it, that person is usually, you know, that person's with Satan or that person is like, that's a sociopath.
You know what I'm saying?
Imagine somebody leaning over to you and be like, hey, man, I have the biggest itch.
I'm like, you know, my leg is, my arm is itching so bad, but guess what?
I'm not going to scratch it.
You're like, what a psychopath, you know?
So yeah, wanting to scratch an itch, that's totally normal.
You can't not, it's like you would do it no matter what.
Yes.
And growing up, I didn't know of any other way it could be.
Right.
That was just the way it was.
Right.
And so my definition of Tourette's now has sort of evolved over time, but this is kind of interesting.
For me, and this is just my opinion.
Yeah.
That itch that I described, to me, that's Tourette syndrome.
Okay.
That feeling, whatever that is.
And then when you see somebody tick or somebody would see me tick, that was actually me, in a sense, coping with my Tourette's.
Okay.
Does that make sense?
Yes, it makes sense.
So the itch is the Tourette's, the uncomfortability, the, you know, the, you know, the baffling uncomfortability, the need to do something, the uncontrollable desire to act.
Yes.
That is the itch.
That's the Tourette's.
And then your reaction, your tick is a.
It's the release.
It's the way that I can get rid of that uncomfortable feeling.
Because as soon as that feeling goes away, you feel you're normal.
But with Tourette's syndrome, it's difficult because that feeling comes right back.
Okay.
Yeah.
It starts to build up again.
Now, is there special ways?
Like, I remember this one kid, like the same kid, this boy Jim Wager at school, they would put like, you know, if they laid him on the, no joke, they'd lay him on the ground sometime and put like cement on his back, cement pieces, and he would not get it for a while.
And it would like calm him down.
Just like, you know, blocks, not cinder blocks, but thick kind of chunks of cement, you know?
So, and it would like, I don't know if there was the weight of it or something, it would kind of like, you know, it would exacerbate the desire or the buildup, I guess, of the Tourette's in him, you know?
I mean, it was also kind of old school, you know, not doctor, you know.
You do whatever you can.
I mean, yeah.
But I remember, yeah, at one point they were stacking and then it got a little bit weird because people were just stacking pieces of cement on him, you know, like, and at one point he was basically in like a, I mean, it looked like he was in his own little 9-11 there, you know, he was just like in a big pile of rubble.
But he wasn't karate chopping up or something.
It almost seemed like, dude, did you ever have that teacher that would come to school?
It was always like this weird teacher, and he would come to school and do like the karate presentation for the student body.
Did you ever have that?
Oh, you're bringing back some memory.
I mean, yes, a vague memory of like, you know, sort of like a 50-year-old man in the huge, you know, in the white karate jersey or whatever you call it.
Yeah.
The ghee.
The ghee, thank you.
Yeah, that was a big thing in the South where every like other year or something, one teacher would put on like a skill they had.
And this one dude had numb chucks, I guess, you know, and he had an assistant.
And he literally, they started it.
And he hit this girl right in the neck so hard and then they just shut it down.
No one with numb chucks knows how to use them.
Yeah, thank you.
Thank you, dude.
Is she okay?
And that should be a crime.
Oh, who knows?
I mean, this was a different time where they didn't care if everybody was okay, you know.
But anyway, so yeah, not trying to, you know, but I would see, I saw this, the only experience I had with being around somebody with Tourette's when I was young, and this isn't about me, but it was just, you know, this boy that had it and how people would react to him.
And then, you know, people would do things like, I remember a lot of people would like kind of hug him or push on him sometimes, and it would make him kind of feel okay or comfortable for a little bit.
Did you find ways that made the Tourette's feel more comfortable to you or to kind of like quell it so that it didn't build up so fast?
Because like you said, you relieved it with a tick.
Yes.
You would release it or relieve it and then it would start to build up again.
I tried so many different things.
Okay.
I mean, I did medications.
Okay.
Well, the cool thing is with that analogy that I was describing with the itch and the scratch, now sort of looking back, I see that, and again, I'm not a doctor.
This is my diagnosis of how I saw it.
When you take medication, in a sense, that numbs the itch.
So now if the itch is numbed, you have less of a desire to want to scratch that itch because you don't feel it as much.
So for a lot of people with Tourette's or sort of other neurological disorders like that, I think that's so beneficial and helpful to them because they don't have that desire.
Like you're not ticking as much.
For me, though, the consequence and the ramifications were the side effects from the medication.
Oh, really?
Basically, like I got wild ones?
What is it?
Say that again?
What is some of the side effects?
Oh, some of the side.
It was, I mean, I had sedation.
I mean, I just was sleeping all the time.
Even one time I had really suicidal thoughts.
Yeah.
And I wasn't a really depressed person.
Right.
But it just messes with you.
Yeah.
And you're not the same.
It's sort of like there's this kind of wall or this sort of like buffer between you and the world.
Yeah.
A little bit.
Or you and yourself almost a little bit.
This must be a medication.
I'm more what it's like, you know?
That was my experience with it.
I mean, that's a very accurate experience.
I've found that with antidepressants, it's like, yeah, I don't feel depressed, but I also don't know if I'm 100% and I'm just sort of separated from my feelings overall.
So I don't feel as much of whatever my feelings are.
Yes.
And for somebody, that might be worth the trade.
Right.
But for you, that wasn't.
It was not worth it.
No.
It wasn't worth it.
I mean, I was, yeah, I mean, it's, and it's just tough.
I mean, you're in such a difficult position already, you know.
I mean, to be, for a lot of people in my situation, your ticks are that bad, you're trying to do whatever you can to end this.
You just, I just remember a lot of times crying because it was just so bad.
And it was like...
And, you know, I was an interesting person.
And you got diagnosed with it.
I was diagnosed.
I mean, I had.
It's not self-diagnosement.
This is not.
Yeah, I didn't have a self-diagnosis.
I mean, I started when I was real little.
So I had, you know, like little things like sniffing.
And my brother even put like a contraption on my nose when I was a kid because I was just like, like imagine, it wasn't sniffing.
It was like an outward sniff.
So imagine like your little brother like constantly sniffing on your face.
So he'll tip something on me.
Yeah, I could see it being alarming after a while.
Alarming for, you know, just, it's not even alarming, like maybe something's wrong.
It's like, what's happening?
You know, it's like, this is weird.
Yeah, my brother's a French bulldog all of a sudden, you know, or something, you know?
So I kept doing stuff like that.
And then supposedly the way it goes down is my dad was reading Anne Landers, which was, I don't know if it's still around, but it's like a medical column or something on the newspaper.
Yeah, was she medical?
Was it medical Anne Landers?
Because I know that they have Dear Abby was self-something like that.
With some sort of self-help, yeah.
She was like a grandma that gave you good advice.
Okay.
So he was reading the article.
And so the way I kind of imagine it, you know, he's reading the article and sees me and reads the article and sees me.
And eventually he goes, you know, maybe he's got Tourette's.
Right.
It was an article about Tourette's and the Anlanders.
And we went to a neurologist, and there's no blood tests or anything like this.
So there's nothing like that.
There's nothing like that.
This is a behavioral thing.
And I think in order to be diagnosed with Tourette's, you need to have both motor and vocal ticks.
I had both at the time.
You had both.
I had both.
I mean, you were making the joke about the friend that you knew.
I used to tick the N-word as well.
Oh, yeah.
Well, if you're going to do it, do it.
You know what I'm saying?
It's got to go all out.
And at least if I get busted saying it, dude, I don't have Tourette's, you know, or I might.
I'm going to put that out there.
Yeah, I'm going to put that out there right now.
But yeah, it's like if somebody, you know, so you would say that.
You'd say you said them all.
I mean, it would get.
Did you have control?
Like, did you know if an N-word was coming?
You're like, oh, shit, I got to get to a white area of town.
I mean, that's pretty much how it was.
Well, the thing is, with the analogy that I was describing to you.
So, first off, I wasn't saying the N-word when I was, you know, in fourth grade.
Right.
But, you know, I've heard of some cases where, you know, you hear some kids are saying just inappropriate things when they're young.
Not even that they have a, they're not even cognitive to understand what they're saying.
I don't even think, you know, it's just maybe they know it's not a good word.
Right.
You know, or something like that.
But as I got older, I also had pretty serious OCD.
And the OCD was based, you know, obsessive compulsive disorder.
And it was basically the same thing as the Tourette's in the sense of there's this uncomfortable feeling and I have to do something to get rid of this.
Okay.
So the way that it manifested for me was I would, I used to think of what's the riskiest thing I could do.
And whatever the hell that was, that became my itch.
So I used to think.
Okay, so give me an example of that.
You're about to, I guess.
So I used to stick my hand down the garber disposal.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, my mob was, when she heard that I was doing that, that was, that did go over well.
And it's not, it's not that I don't like my fingers.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm so grateful to have my fingers, but there was just this.
You want to ride the darkness.
You want to ride the darkness, yeah.
And sometimes I would lift myself over the ledge of a, if I'm on a, on a building or, you know, at a friend's patio or something.
And then when you're around people, I used to think of what's the riskiest thing I could say.
And this isn't, you know, rocket science.
Right.
Think about anytime you meet somebody.
Oh, yeah.
Within a half a second, you know three risky things you could say to that person that would either offend them or would be about their insecurity.
Yeah.
Within a half a second.
Oh, definitely, dude.
So instantly I would see someone.
if I saw you know a really fat person what would you say about Theo what would you say I maybe would say it's okay Yeah.
For us, you know, I would maybe tick like Hoosier.
Right.
Or mullet.
I would maybe start ticking mullet.
Oh, just start saying something.
So it's like something that feels forbidden that you maybe wouldn't say.
Yes.
That thing starts to bubble up in the background.
Yeah.
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Don't laugh.
All right, my bad.
So hold on.
No, no, I'm curious about this because you know what to so like say if I looked at you, right?
And I would think like, you know, I would think this, you know, the first thing I would think would be, what's that store that's in all the malls?
You know, what's that.
You know, that one.
I know the one that goes.
The one that goes, that's in every mall where people buy like nice clothes, but it's even in like smaller malls too.
Banana Republic.
So I would think like Banana Republic, like right when I saw you, you know, or like J. Crew or something, you know, like kind of like a put together kind of, you know, men's shop, right?
Okay.
And not, and so, but like, yeah, I might not just say that right when I saw you.
You know, like I wouldn't think of that as even as a bad thing, but just like, oh, you know, you see, the guy's nice, he's put together.
So I think, oh, that might be something popping in my head, Banana Republic, you know, J. Crew, you know, Wells Fargo, something in my head that pops up.
So then if I was just sitting there, now, is that an idea that comes to you?
Here's what I'm asking.
Sorry.
Is it an idea that comes to you of something negative to say?
Yes.
Okay.
So it's an idea.
I'm literally thinking, what's the worst thing I could say right now?
Okay.
And whatever that was, that became the itch.
I don't know the physics behind that, like the mechanics of how that worked.
Especially then, but it was just until I then said that word.
So if I was with you, oh my God, I got to say mullet.
I got to say mullet.
And this dialogue is going on in my head.
Right.
And what was also hard about it.
But is it just being an asshole?
I mean, it's to some people, it's just they're just being an asshole.
If they have that.
What's the difference between somebody who's just an asshole and somebody who has Tourette's, then I guess?
That's a good question.
The thing is, is that I don't think I think it's more about the person's intent.
Okay.
You know, so where there's a lot of, you know, there's people who say a lot of mean things to people.
Right.
And they are purposely trying to hurt the person.
Correct.
Meaning, you know, trying to degrade, trying to do something to take him down.
Yeah.
Where with me with the Tourette syndrome, and I think, you know, most people with Tourette syndrome, that wasn't what I ultimately was trying to do, even though it seemed from the outside, dude, you're just saying, you're just saying really offensive things.
And you mentioned that you were going to, I don't know if we were going to watch it later or not, but there's a clip from South Park.
Yeah.
I don't know if that's one of the ones that you saw.
Yeah, it is.
Yeah.
We have some.
You want to pop in on now, Nate?
Sure.
Tourette's is like a cough or a sneeze.
It isn't contagious like some people think.
A lot of people with Tourette's have different tics.
My tick is that I have to bend my neck and set my fingers, but a lot of people don't even notice it.
This really isn't all that fun.
Ah, shit!
Pierce coming from my ass!
Ooh, is that Nick Swartzen?
I think the last one was actually Nick Schwartzen.
Maybe Nick Schwartzon has directed.
Yeah, dude.
He might, bro.
He told me the other day he was going to shit out of his armpits.
And that was in a Christmas card.
So he certainly may have it.
Okay, so we see a clip like that, right?
I mean, first off, I'm laughing because I haven't seen that in a long time.
Right, right, right.
I mean, South Park is brilliant.
I mean, I think just them in general, I think they have a certain brilliance of how they do things.
Yes.
Undeniable.
I really had a belief growing up that you have to make light of things.
And I also, I had an amazing support system with my family.
And I had a belief that if I wanted people to be tolerant of me, I also needed to be tolerant of people.
Okay.
And when I see that now, it's a little bit different from when I had it, but it also was, I mean, it's really funny.
I mean, it's, oh, yeah.
I mean, when he sees it, when the very first scene when Cartman finds it, he learns about Teretrum for us.
He goes, I found the golden ticket.
And he sings this whole song.
And, you know, to the...
To say whatever he wants to say, yes.
And that's why I was thinking of, I thought of this clip because when you were asking about, you know, what's the difference between somebody who's just a jerk.
Right.
And it's, you know, I don't think most people with Tourette's view it that way.
I don't think that they're the kind of person or I know.
I think they know, agreed.
You know, it's like it's, you know, because, and this is the other thing to it.
So there's funny parts to it and it's great.
And then there's also all the other times you don't, it's not funny.
Right.
You know, like I was, you know, I had an older brother that liked men and was gay.
Right.
That's tough to, you know, constantly be around your brother and say and tick really offensive things for gay people.
Right, right.
So yes, it is funny.
And then there's also the pain of what it's like to be in front of people.
I mean, I had black friends.
Yeah.
I had great black friends ticking the N-word right in front of their face.
But then also, like, you're like a lesson for everybody in, you know, since it's involuntary, you have the ability to be a way that everybody can kind of just learn about, you know, tolerance, really.
You know, it's almost like you're just like kind of like this tutorial, kind of this bootleg tutorial that's kind of floating around the universe when you have it of, you know, be tolerant, you know, because it's not, it's coming from another realm, really.
It's not, you know, it's not like you're sitting there and you got a 30-second timer and you clock in and then, you know, in 29 seconds, you're going to straight up drop an in-bomb, you know, or, you know, that's crazy.
It's almost like you're like the Bruce Willis of like profanity kind of, I feel like, you know?
Yeah.
I mean, it was a pop quiz hot shot.
I mean, everyone had 10 seconds left on this man.
But it was more than just cuss words.
I mean, I'm taking racialist thirds, cuss words.
You know, if I, you know, walked up to somebody and they had a mole, I would start ticking mole.
You know, and that was right when Austin Powers.
Thank you.
Yes.
Austin Powers came out with the whole moly mole.
Oh, yeah.
The whole scene.
I mean, that was real, though, for me.
The moles were hella popular then, dude.
They've gone back out of style.
I've noticed that, dude.
Along with Fred Savage, that was Fred Savage that had that mole in Austin Powers.
Oh, it's true, huh?
And if you have a mole, dude, I had some moles on growing up, and I, like a normal person, cut them all off one night when I was drunk in high school, which is something I highly recommend to a lot of people, dude.
What happens?
Because I had the same thought a couple times.
Oh, I just took some toenail clippers and just sawed them all off, dude.
Had a couple of drinks.
One of them kept coming back for about six years, and finally I got to the root of it.
You got to get in there.
Get in there.
But you know what I think is fascinating, man, when I hear you talk about this?
And look, we're just, yeah, we're joking about this in some light.
You know, it's like, but we're not, I'm not, you know, discrediting that, that, you know, the disease or people that suffer from it, you know, at all.
And I think it's fascinating, man.
I mean, I couldn't, I'm trying to equate it to like, what does it feel like?
Because I have this feeling inside of me sometimes that makes me want to like do something bad, you know?
It's like a misbehavior almost.
It's like, and for me, sometimes it's like a, you know, some people will call it like an alcoholism or something inside of them that like, it's like a restless, irritable discontent feeling.
And it's almost like when you see a power line and it's cut and it's on the street, but it's still live, you know?
It's like, that's the feeling I get inside of myself sometimes at night.
And it's like, I can't, it's like I want to do something.
It's just like I need to do something right now.
And I don't even know what it is, but it's like I need to do something so I can just, then I'll be okay.
I don't even know what it is.
But when you're talking about Tourette's, it made me think like, man, that's, I, that's something like that I get, but it's in my whole being.
It's like in my, and I guess when you really have Tourette's and you have that, I can't imagine, I have some control of whether or not I do something.
I can't imagine not having control and knowing that whatever this is, like a champagne bubble is just going to bubble up to the surface of you.
Yeah.
I don't, I think it's actually pretty correct what you're saying.
I mean, I, I really believe sort of everybody has Tourette's now.
Yeah.
And again, I won't keep qualifying it, but it's, this is my experience now, you know, of my journey of living with Tourette's for 20 years.
Right.
You know, my friends and I, we think when I wrote my first book, we were estimating, I probably ticked around 25 million times.
You know, that's like, comes out to like over 3,000 times a day.
So, you know, really experiencing Tourette's, knowing what it was like, living with it day in, day out, and then overcoming it and going through that journey.
Yeah.
I just, I think about it and feel about it very differently now.
And I sort of think that in a sense, we all have Tourette's.
Yeah.
And so I think it does make sense that you say that as I'm describing it, you're like, you know, I wonder if I feel, I think I know that feeling or might know that feeling.
Right.
I can relate a little bit to the feeling.
I really can.
And I don't mean that.
I'm not saying that I can relate to having Tourette's, but I can, when you said that, man, it was very specific.
Like, man, that's the feeling that I get.
It's like an uncontrollable thing.
And it's in me.
And I can feel it like, it's almost like an amoeba or something that is like alive.
And it's like, it's not really in a specific spot, but it's like on the edge of my skin.
It's in my throat.
And it makes me want to do something.
You know, it makes me want to, you know, for me, it usually comes out in like a master, like masturbation, smoking cigarettes.
It makes me want to do something bad to myself.
That's what I feel like for me.
But yeah, so I can't imagine if you're just sitting there fucking nine years old and you just feel the dark arts bubbling up.
Well, I don't, what I, what I don't know is why that feeling started for me.
Ah.
You know?
Was there a time before that you didn't have it?
I mean, supposedly, you know, I started ticking when I was around four or five.
Okay.
And so whatever it was, you know, my body, whatever it was, just let's say it is genetic.
Let's just say it is, you know?
I mean, I experience it way less that way, but who knows?
But maybe my, you know, one of my mentors said to me, you know, maybe your body had a genetic predisposition towards feeling that feeling.
Right.
Okay.
So maybe my body was more sensitive in feeling that feeling.
And as I just grew up, you know, as a little kid and you feel that feeling, what do you do as a little kid if you feel uncomfortable?
Yeah.
You do whatever you can to not feel uncomfortable.
Right.
So literally, this is how I hypothesize.
Yeah.
I'm sitting there one day.
I'm making this up.
Yes.
I have a feeling and I go, oh, I don't like that.
Okay, I feel better.
Right.
Done.
And then 20 seconds go by, two minutes, five minutes go by and all of a sudden that feeling comes back again.
And I go, oh, I know how to get rid of that feeling.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it just goes on and on and on.
So the way that I think about my Tourette's is that in a sense that it was a type of positive feedback loop that I just continued to do and I didn't ever learn.
Like a self-soothing type of thing.
Yeah.
And I never learned a different way to deal or cope with that feeling.
Right.
You know, it wasn't.
And who knows if you would have.
This was probably your, because a lot of times naturally you'll do what you need to do.
Yeah.
You know, and some people, I don't know the exact statistic, but, you know, 50, maybe 50% of people grow out of Tourette's, you know, and some people's tics wax and wane and different things.
And so, you know, everyone's got a different body, a different, they relate to their body differently, sensations in their body.
Yeah.
You know, all these different kinds of things.
So.
And do you have to now say if, are there people who are diagnosed with, like, do you, does a doctor diagnose you?
Is it, how does the diagnosis go?
Because when I saw it, when I was like watching some of your technical, I was like, this guy doesn't have any, this guy seems fine, you know?
This guy seems good, you know?
Well, it's, it just depends on what, what, when, what videos you saw and when.
Right.
Now, yes, when you go back to ones from you growing up and different points in your life and showing like, it's like, oh, wow, that would be...
Would we have the ability to play the tick compilation?
Yes, absolutely.
Let's put some ticks out.
No, no, let's put them.
It's Mark Elliott.
Just type in Mark Elliott tick compilation.
Because I'm not sure which one you, yeah, which videos you saw.
And can you put some trap music in the background?
Have you ever done that?
Have you remixed your ticks?
Dude, how have you not remixed your ticks, dude?
We'll have somebody, somebody, a fan of the show, will definitely put some trap music to Tourette's, dude.
How do they not have that?
Well, they have it now.
Yeah, dude.
could have a whole album.
So once I beat it, I used to then play this clip in the beginning of my speeches because no one would believe me that I had Tourette's.
had it Please!
Please!
Fuck!
I have Tourette's, by the way.
throw that out there okay I have the Tourette's and drug.
What is that guy?
We're trying to buy something from you?
No, this was a security guard at the library.
It's called Tourette's.
It's a mechanical sort of involuntary stuff.
He was actually very gracious.
He was.
So is this something that, so you have this bite, it's like a sound and a biting because some people will only be able to hear this.
It's me going like this.
Basically, you're like Peyton Manning.
You're like Drew Brees, basically, but no one's ever snapping the ball, kind of.
I'm living my dream of being a QB, right?
All the time, just nonstop.
It must be an arrowhead of something because they can't see him, so it just keeps yelling hot.
And it's a feeling that's for that, you know, it's a feeling in my teeth.
It's a feeling in my throat.
How does this relate to like a cerebral palsy almost?
Because that, I feel like, are like a, I'm trying to think of something that would be like the deep end of maybe along that same spectrum, you know, where it like gets to so much where you can't even I don't know it enough.
The way that a doctor explained to me pretty early on, they described Tourette's syndrome as the mother disorder to me.
Okay.
Because we're talking in the realm of neurological genetic sort of involuntary disorders.
Because you can't really compare Tourette's to like MS or Parkinson's and things like that in the same way.
Because with my very little knowledge of those kinds of things, like, you know, like a tremor is that's something that's happening truly, not at the will of the person.
Like if you have Parkinson's, I think it's like, you know, their arm is shaking.
It's not just like, oh, I have this itch and I need to keep going like this.
It's like the physiology is doing that.
Okay.
Where with the Tourette's, it's not like my mouth was, it's not that my mouth just did that from a divine.
It's you.
I'm saying, Mark, okay, you need to move your mouth now.
Okay, I feel better.
To get better.
So that's why it's different the way that I understand it.
But it is the mother disorder.
So underneath it, they would describe.
So it's kind of the root of some of those other disorders you're saying when you said the mother disorder.
I don't know if it's the root, but the way he described it is if there's this umbrella and the top is Tourette's, there's a lot of comorbid disorders.
So like ADD, ADHD, social anxiety, anxiety, OCD, those kinds of things.
And oftentimes people that are diagnosed with Tourette's, those other disorders are much more debilitating than the ticking itself.
Right.
You know, because if you've got really bad OCD, I mean, that can really mess with you and limit you in what you can do in life.
Oh, yeah.
We had a dude, I remember in school when he had a, I guess it was like a big bag or something.
And every, I mean, two, three times a day, he'd have to get in this bag.
It was like a huge duffel bag, you know, like a ski equipment bag.
And this dude would just get in.
Yeah, get in it, zip it up, and then get back out, you know?
It was like he was like a magician, like he worked like a magician's assistant, but there was no magician, you know?
You just see this dude just lay his bag down, get in the bag, zip it up from the inside, then unzip it and get back out and just sit back at his desk.
There he goes again.
And it was just like, damn, you know, Lonnie's bagging himself, you know, and everybody was just losing their minds.
But I think it's funny the different, you know, like, man, I can, you know, the more you say some of this stuff, man, and I'm not trying to make this about me at all, but it makes me think a lot about how people describe alcoholism, you know, how they describe it like it is this thing that they just feel like they have to do.
There's something inside of them that is an uncomfort that makes them then feel like they have to engage in drugs, alcohol, illicit activities to quell the uncomfort.
It's not like most of the time, it's not people like, oh, I love the taste of beer all the time.
That's why I drink or that's I love cocaine.
It's like there's an uncomfort and to quell it, these are the things that I'm using, you know?
So it's really fascinating because it sounds in some ways like some of the roots are the same.
There's an uncomfort that builds up and then you are doing you're doing something just to relieve it, just to make it go away.
It's not, and it's going to come back.
Yes.
And so how do you get from where you were then to where you are now, where now, you know, you don't you are you know recovering you're recovering Tourette's I'm a recovering ticker a recovering tickle no I made the joke a recovering ticker oh yeah yeah you're recovering ticker I just want to say you know I I do understand what you're saying and I don't think it's that far of a stretch right what you're describing yeah which I know is a sensitive issue yeah yeah and
I know it is too yeah and so you know because we also just live in very sensitive times right now yeah that's true you know and so it's it's difficult because some of the things that I'm trying to say it's it's a delicate balance because I'm one I'm sharing my experience right I do believe though that by sharing some of my experience it might shed light into other people's experience of them dealing with Tourette's yeah because growing up I only saw it one way it
was you have Tourette's this neurological genetic disorder that's involuntary and has no cure so uh you know with respect to that feeling this is kind of the way I think about it so if there's that feeling and as I got older I had more of that awareness about okay look I've got this itch and this scratch I don't know how else to change it though this is the this is this is my it's like the itchy and scratchy show from uh simps a little bit but like in one person in one person yeah can you imagine it's basically like tom and jerry constantly all the time yeah and
you're both characters i'm both characters and it's also i'm it was a war zone on the inside wow because not only was i just you know one thing if it was just myself on the planet and there's not a single person it's just me all day scratching right you know but it was you know i i didn't have a lot of self-confidence i'm so i'm thinking about the feeling and then i'm going oh my god i'm about to tick mullet what's theo going to think about me oh my god is he going to be offended oh my god what's going on and all this is going on through my head or
imagine you know you're about to say n-word you know or when i was in an airport i would tick bomb all the time you know things like that so it's you know or i mean more funny ones too where you know when i was with a girl i would tick uh other girls names i would tick the p-word or no you say i would tick p-word everything man it was crazy that would be so crazy imagine if right when you pick a girl up and you're like uh drop off early you just she can tell immediately if you're interested or not the funny thing is one time there was a girl now
there was a at least you get it out of your system the rest of us have to mill around all night you know just bulldidding spending $40 at Chili's and then we got to the chain we're not even interested it's more of a test so if you say you kind of just see where they're at and then but what the funniest thing was the one of the most uncomfortable things wasn't even a sexual term it was i met a girl just i just i was crazy about this we go on the first date and i start ticking i love you oh the first date
i mean that is that was painful in a way oh that's painful i do i've done that over text too where you get a girl's number and then seven minutes later you're like i love you and then you get blocked i think i have text reps but no man uh and i should have made a joke out of that moment that's a real moment man i i can't imagine that dude because then it's like well did that start to show you something like unique about like feelings and stuff though because then it's like you know say you because there is something funny if you meet a girl
and like in your head you know you go off on you know this adventure like oh i'm in love with this girl or something special and and sometimes that happens just immediately out of the gate you know you'll and within two minutes you have all these you know you guys are living in a castle and she's beautiful and there's all these perfect things going on in your head did you start to find that sometimes your torettes was a good like crystal ball of people that were like good people or people that meant something to you i didn't feel it that way you didn't it was just a nightmare it was it was but you know what i'm saying kind of i
know what you're saying but it just was it wasn't that it wasn't that at all man it really was i had no control over my mind yeah no control over my body yeah and that is why though i think it relates to so many things because that feeling whatever it is for people we all have these feelings and and so often don't feel we have control and what makes tourettes unique i think is that and again i haven't been an alcoholic i haven't done these things but for
all of us that have that feeling you know if you have that uncomfortable feeling and you want to get a drink you have to go get a drink or if you want to overeat or you want to just eat to cover that feeling you got to go to the refrigerator whatever it is with tourette syndrome you don't have to go anywhere for it it's just right in your body it's like a one-stop shop it's just a one-stop shop so i you know in some sense i think that's what makes it unique but i think what also then makes it very universal is that we all and i think this you know as a society we
have trouble dealing with those feelings right and i just learned a very specific way to do it genetic or not it doesn't really matter that was just how it went for me um that you learned a very specific way to deal with the feeling and what i think makes it also different is you know when somebody like have you ever you know been uncomfortable and you just go to the refrigerator oh yeah you don't even realize it maybe you just you're just all of a sudden at the refrigerator the thing is we don't call that a medical condition right that's just you
dealing snacking yeah snacking you know um and again it's not like snacking is the same thing the same no no i'm not saying that's okay you can you know for a kid that's ticking our audience isn't a bunch of freaks man our audience is like totally uh you know usually understanding about like you know discussing things but i think it's neat is that for me when i started to shift my perception that way with help everything changed but i want to know what is so that it seemed like you had you started to find some solution for yourself in that moment so
as i was describing with the the metaphor isn't metaphor an analogy i'm not sure it's okay it's okay dude yeah i don't know anything and everybody's been listening for a while now yeah i think well okay so that if i've got that dynamic i got this itch and i got the scratch basically when i was a kid doctors told me hey that itch by the way that's a neurological genetic involuntary thing you go just let it go so imagine as a kid what do you think i do when they tell me that that
just becomes basically the law of gravity like i don't even question that ever you don't even question what the the the the desire to act out or do something or say something strange no because it's they told me that's uh that's just science that's gravity that's your gravity that's tourette right and remember it's no cure this is involuntary this is genetic yeah I mean, think of those words as a child as you're hearing those words.
Like, it's genetic.
It's involved, you know, neurological, you know.
Well, especially yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, I would think it would very much sentence you to a way of thought and belief.
Yeah.
And these were great doctors, by the way.
Yeah.
These were good people.
I even know some of them still, you know, but why then as a child, with respect to this whole itching and scratching and ticking and all this stuff, why would I ever evaluate it again or even know how to evaluate it?
It's just, okay, this whole thing that's going on, this is Tourette's.
It's all just under one big label of Tourette's syndrome.
Okay.
So what took you out of that then?
And I know you're getting there.
So just I wanted to preface that because that helps see.
It's like, why would you ever question that?
Right.
Like if people tell you like, yeah, you'll never bend your leg from a kid and you're a child, then you'll just probably think your whole life you never will.
Exactly.
Yeah.
And rarely would some people even think to go back and think, well, can I bend my leg?
Yes.
And when I speak, oftentimes, you know, I talk about with childhood, like, we're told so many things as a kid.
Oh, yeah.
That some are totally true and some are totally false, though.
Yeah.
So, you know, this is just what you're told.
And the thing is, is the one caveat to that is as a kid, you don't know the difference between what's true and false.
Right.
So you don't know the difference between Santa Claus and eat your veggies.
Yeah.
It's the same thing.
Oh, it's interesting.
I was thinking about that last night that kids believe that Santa Claus exists.
That's fucking baffling, dude.
It's baffling.
Do you believe there's a senior citizen in the sky?
You know what I'm saying?
Traveling like that?
They'd shoot him down over half these countries.
Somalia and age.
Oh, you know how many other small slaves would pull up alongside him in Somalia?
Steal all of his shit?
Pirates.
Yeah, different times, you know?
But yeah, but as a kid, we believe that wholeheartedly.
So it really does take you into the mind of a kid.
It's good to try that on, right?
Right.
So then when I was older, I guess this is now eight years, nine years ago, I met this other speaker and he introduced me to these amazing classes called executive success programs.
And these courses had nothing to do with Tourette's, nothing at zero to do with Tourette's in real life.
These were classes that teach people about emotional intelligence, fears, limiting beliefs, all those sorts of things, things that you don't learn in regular school.
Did he name Gary that did it?
Gary?
Yeah.
That did what?
Told you about the classes.
No, his name was Daniel.
Oh, sorry.
That's so funny.
You're a mind reader as well.
No, I just know a dude named Gary and he sent me some links, but I was just wondering if it was the same guy, Gary Whitehill.
I don't know Gary Whitehill.
Yeah.
Sorry, guy.
The cool thing was, I ended up finally going to the classes.
Again, zero to do with Tourette syndrome.
Okay.
They just teach you about the human psychodynamic.
So I ended up going through the classes.
It's a 16-day course.
And after the first five days, I started to learn so much about myself, of just how I work.
And again, when I say I learned about myself, literally what I'm saying is you go to school to learn about math, arithmetic.
That's math.
Yeah, is it?
But also, you learn about those things, right?
Yeah.
Outdoors.
Those kinds of things.
But when you're an adult, right, there's a bunch of things that school, most schools, general public doesn't teach you about, like, how do you deal with fear?
How do you deal with failure?
Yeah.
Like things that are very real for all of us.
And you just kind of supposed to figure it out when you're older, kind of thing.
Yeah, like how is race relations not a class that they have in elementary school?
All of that stuff.
Yes.
Okay.
Unbelievable.
So teaching kids about a fucking Gerald Ford dude, you know what I'm saying?
Who I think played for the Celtics or was a president?
Who gives a fuck is what I'm saying.
You know what I'm saying?
Yeah, emotional intelligence should be the number one thing we're teaching kids after how to communicate.
He played for the Lions.
Who has he played for the Lions?
He did.
Gerald Ford?
Gerald Ford, I'm pretty sure he's played the day.
Yeah.
Did he?
No.
I did see that, actually.
Is that not true?
Did I make that up?
I didn't see that.
It's okay.
I have no idea.
Go on.
But the point is, I didn't learn about those kinds of things.
And I started going through it.
I started learning about these things.
Right.
And a lot of people.
In the executive, what is this called again?
It's called Executive Success Program.
So I started to learn a lot about the nature of fear as well.
Now, with OCD, remember, I also had really bad OCD.
And I started like starting putting pieces together and go, you know what?
Like maybe that feeling that I've been talking about, I go, maybe there's, I have a bunch of fears around it.
Because there was, you know, remember, it's like you have to do something to feel better.
So if you don't do it, it's not okay.
Right.
And I started realizing like, maybe I have, maybe I have some fears there.
So right after the first five days, I ended up going down to Panama.
I had a bunch of speaking gigs in Panama.
And with my OCD and stuff with the Tourette's, I had a bunch of shit around my face and touching.
You maybe have heard of people like this.
It's like you can't, you know, because germs and all the da-da-da.
Oh, yeah.
I think they're free-tagging themselves all the day.
Yeah.
Fucking some dude just sitting there patty kicking himself and he fucking one dude almost knocked himself out one time dude.
He high-fired himself about 800 times.
You're making, you know, it's funny you're making a joke, but seriously, sometimes if a friend touched my, like, one side of my face, I would go, dude, you got to touch my other side of my face.
Yeah.
Just stuff like that.
Dude, it's so funny.
You say this.
When I used to walk down the street when I was young, I would like bite this side of my mouth and then I would have to bite on this side of my mouth.
Same.
And I would bite on this side of my mouth.
And dude, I did that for probably eight years, man.
Okay.
And when it went away, I never fucking, it was all I would think about when I was walking and biting, making sure I was even.
And then when it finally went away, I never fucking thought about it again.
Ever again.
Until pretty much maybe now and one other time in the past 25 years.
Similar stuff to that.
So basically, I'm at the beach and I go, you know what?
I'm going to start going against this.
And I had, you know, again, all these fears about germs in my face and I go, F this.
And I take all the sand on the beach and I start rubbing it all over my face.
And it was, I really look at that as the beginning of beating my Tourette because it was, it was finally me going, You don't control me.
I'm going to start taking control here.
And that experience was just so emotional and also just eye-opening for me.
Because I, you know, what do you think I said to myself after that?
Like, I'm rubbing this all over, and then I'm there and I go, I'm okay.
Ah, yeah.
I'm okay.
Right.
Like, yeah, the devil didn't come.
A dragon didn't, the earth didn't split open and fire eats.
You know, all the kids from my childhood didn't come back and rip me back into the fucking universe and cut my genitals off.
So I ended up going through more of the classes and the president of the company, her name was Nancy Salzman, and she ended up coming to my training.
And on the sixth day, you start to look at fears.
And it was really cool because I had had enough shifts at this point that I go, you know what?
I might be afraid of losing Tourette's.
You might be afraid of losing it?
Losing it.
Like stopping it.
And again, I know it sounds crazy.
And it was, if you would have, if like I would have known you, Theo, back then, and you would have known me the day before I would have started that training.
Yeah.
And if you would have said, hey, Mark, you might be afraid of losing Tourette's.
I would have been like, what did you just say to me?
Why?
Because it was your identity?
It was so much.
And again, I wouldn't, even if, even if you would have said, Mark, it's part of your identity.
I go, what do you mean it's part of my identity?
Yeah.
I wouldn't even even have known how to talk to you about that.
Oh, yeah.
This is just, I have Tourette's.
That wild boy.
Yeah.
You know?
Wow, that is crazy that somebody would say that because it's the last thing you would think.
But you found that there was truth in it.
For me, there was truth.
And I started to do a bunch of explorations and I finished that course.
And that was really all about the Tourette's.
It was like, you know, looking at the fear, but I just started learning just a lot more about my mind and my thoughts and how a lot about the mind-body connection, about how things are connected.
And so that was September, or excuse me, that was over a summer I took that whole course.
The whole school year went by.
And I'm back on the road speaking.
At the time, I was speaking a lot, high schools and colleges all around the country.
And did no more of the classes.
By the end of that school year, that feeling had gone down so much that literally I started to need to almost like fabricate ticking a little bit.
Oh, wow.
So now you're playing the role of a ticker.
Yes.
To keep up with that.
I still had the urge to tick.
So it wasn't like it was done by any means, but it was, you know, these people were hiring me and I had Tourette's syndrome.
You better show up with fucking Tourette's, dude.
Yes.
You know what I'm saying?
If you say you're fucking, you know, running dope, you better show up with a mule, you know.
Like that kind of thing.
Tell me it's milk.
Exactly.
So at that point, I go, you know what, Mark?
You can beat this.
And I ended up going back the following summer and I took some more courses.
Really?
I was there for 17 days.
And now I came with the intention.
And every day I worked on my mind, everything relating to the Tourette's, anything that I could think of that, because basically what I found was that my Tourette's was way more emotional and psychological than it was physiological.
Wow.
Man, I can't even tell you enough.
Like everything you're saying, it's very similar to stuff that you hear in a lot of like 12-step programs.
It's like, it's whatever's behind the behavior.
Yes.
Well, ultimately, and what I talk to people about is that I found, not I found, through the help of some amazing people and tools, I found the cause of your Tourette's.
Of the Tourette's.
And let me clarify.
I don't even know if I found the cause cause of it all, but I found a way to short circuit the whole system.
Yeah.
And I found so much of what was causing that feeling.
So that's what I'm saying.
I don't know what originally caused it, like how that feeling got there.
Right.
Fine.
Maybe it's neurological, genetic.
Who cares?
Right.
Okay, great.
So I had it.
The question is, what can you do now?
Yeah.
And, you know, with the incredible help of these people and ESP, I found a way to begin to undo it.
So those were courses we went to.
Now, what about somebody who doesn't have the money to go to courses or who's not like, what can, you know, somebody that has like a tick even, even if their tick isn't at the level where they would get them, you know, it would be classified as Tourette, you know?
I believe that there is a bigger thing going on in the world where it's like we don't use our human interaction isn't as used as much anymore.
Like we're kind of out of this like colonial survival kind of times and tribal times when we're getting a lot more into like a sedate time.
And so our nerves, which used to be like kind of the leaders of like what was going on, what was over the ledge, if somebody was outside, is my family all in the home.
You know, that system that was always running and it's a security system now has kind of been like idle in us for a long time.
And so it seems like I wouldn't be surprised if there could be things starting to kink in it or, you know, it's settling into its kind of new unnecessary system, you know, unnecessary use.
So I could see like a lot of things like alcoholism, Tourette's, like just malfunctions of it, you know, or errors in the, you know, just from not use, you know, like, because when you think about how much in a couple of generations, we're not using our fight or flight much at all.
And to think such a powerful system sitting inside of us, it's like, what's going on there?
You know, it's almost pretty bizarre.
And I have no proof of that, but when I just think of things on like a more of like a macro level, I could easily see in hearing you say that and seeing how many people are like, you know, struggling with their feelings and stuff these days and feeling like a desire, but not knowing what to do.
I could see a lot of that being a little bit in the same umbrella like you were talking about earlier.
Well, I think it's, but back to the question, what do people do if they don't have that?
They don't have the ability to go to the executive programming and they don't have that.
Well, I think, I mean, one, I hope even just being able to talk about it like this can begin to help somebody see what if there's a different way you can look at it.
Right.
Well, simply even as I've been Describing is when I grew up for 20 years, this is neurological, genetic, involuntary disorder with no cure.
So, the question is: okay, maybe that's true, maybe that's not.
What an individual can start thinking about is what if that's not true?
What if that's not true?
Like, why, I think just in general, what would it mean to be just more curious about yourself and your life?
Let's say you can't go get help, you can't do whatever.
What, you know, can you just start questioning yourself and go, what if it could be different?
Again, I mean, the way that it started was, you know, I did, I went to a class, had really different insights into myself.
And then I went to a beach and I go, I'm going to do something different here.
Yeah.
I'm going to start thinking about this and see what's on the other side.
Contrary action.
You know, because it was just so emotional for me not to do that.
Oh, yeah.
So I think really one of the biggest prerequisites for anything in life, if you want to change, is you have to want to be curious.
Yeah.
And you have to want to change.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, they had a dude.
I remember this dude, Samuel, when I was growing up, they said he couldn't walk, right?
He's in a wheelchair.
It turned out his parents were too lazy.
They never taught him to walk.
So it turns out one day he fucking got up.
You know, a couple buddies helped him in the gym.
And by the afternoon, he's shooting hoops.
This was someone you knew.
Yeah.
And it's like, well, what the fuck, man?
But if he doesn't ever get curious or question that thing, if you just sit in his chair forever thinking like, yeah, this is where I'm going to be.
And man, when you say that, what you were talking about is contrary action.
You're talking about like, man, I don't want germs.
I don't want things in my face.
When things touch my skin, it makes me feel uncomfortable.
I'm going to fucking stick my head into the fucking universe, you know, two handfuls at a time.
Yes.
And go through the looking glass.
I mean, that's next level.
That's next level in that moment for you.
But it's also, it's just contrary action.
It's like, yeah, like I have trouble like, you know, there's a lot of therapist methods where it's like, okay, let's look through your past and think of what happened and try and figure it out.
And then there's a lot more active, proactive therapist methods that I've found from going to therapy where they're like, I don't care what happened in your past.
If you want to have a better sexual relationship with your girlfriend, you need to get in bed with your girlfriend and lay there and start there, as opposed to sitting in a room and wondering, well, I don't know why we have these problems, you know?
But I've definitely started to notice that there's two methods from going to therapist.
And so it's kind of like what you're describing.
It's like you can sit there and know the facts and go through and the file folders and look back through a lot of your history, or you can, like you did, you had a frame of reference, a frame of perspective.
It sounds like in just.
I want to say for me, what was cool is it was really both ways.
Because by going through the class and really what happened is that I was able to proactively lower that feeling.
So that itch within about a year and a half went down 90%.
Wow.
So, and a lot of that feeling I found was through a bunch of triggers throughout my whole life.
So it was this beautiful synergy between going deep in there.
And the other reason I felt lucky is because a lot of people are willing to go deep in there, but they don't have a tool that really can help them find where to go and how to get rid of it.
It ends up that the tool was incredibly sharp.
And so I was able to go in there.
And as I was going through some of these processes, which is just conversations with people, I would have this amazing experience or realization.
And all of a sudden that feeling would go boom, boom.
I mean, I'm going down because the feeling would start going down.
So it wasn't like I, for a way that a lot of people, a way that I think a lot of people try to beat their Tourette's or help their Tourette's, or whether it's alcoholism, OCD, or anything in life where it's a type of challenge like that.
Sometimes you just sort of stick your head down and you just lean right into it and you go.
And that's great.
And that is what some of what I did.
But what's also really nice is what if there's a way that you can make that really uncomfortable feeling diminish?
Yeah.
And so you don't, it's not such a mountain to climb.
Right.
And that's why I feel so grateful because I didn't have to go climb a mountain.
Right.
I had to work my ass off.
Yeah.
And there was something deep inside of me.
Yeah.
Some I also was really sick as a baby for an intestinal thing.
And I think that that played a lot into it.
But I have a really strong will.
Right.
And I was willing to, on that beach, go, you're going in.
Yeah.
And I don't know where that came from.
Yeah.
But I had that in combination with a group of people and tools that made that battle so much easier.
You need help.
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
So it wasn't just like I was like a Spartan going.
Yeah.
It was, I was a Spartan, plus I had, I don't even know what I had.
You had some training wheel humans.
You had partners.
You had people that knew what to do.
Yes.
You had conversations that a lot of time can unlock.
Yes.
Yeah.
That literally unlock my potential.
I mean, literally the way that I connect with it is they helped me in combination with how hard I worked.
I literally became more conscious.
I became more self-aware and that I go, oh, that feeling.
And one metaphor that I tell people as a way to describe this is one way that I got helped is, so there's this feeling and I was a little kid and I go, oh, that's a bad feeling.
That's a shitty, bad feeling.
But what if there was a way when I was a little kid, which was not possible, that I could have decided it was a good feeling?
And the way that I think about it is, do you like massages?
Do you like the kind of massages where it's like super painful?
Like elbow in the back?
Oh, dude, I told him last week we paid a couple Vietnamese dudes to beat us up downtown.
70 bucks.
But you like, you're one of those sickos.
Yeah, you pop rope in air and everything.
He'll come off the ropes.
He'll do whatever you want.
So you like it hard, right?
Yeah, I like some attack in there.
Okay.
Like a little bit of fucking, you know, Vietnam too, if you know what I'm saying.
Yes.
I don't know how that ends, but it'd be, you know.
It ended at 70 bucks.
70 bucks only lasts about a half hour.
The question is, though, do you know people, though, that don't like it hard like that?
Yes.
Okay.
So this is what's so interesting.
Here you have two people getting a massage and one person loves the pain, another person hates the pain.
So what if when I was a kid, I could have changed my perception of that feeling?
Like I had that uncomfortable feeling.
What if I could have loved it?
Right.
Right.
Yeah, what if you'd have been somebody that loved it?
Yeah.
Now, again, there's no way I could have done that.
Right.
But some people get scared and they get excited.
That baffles me sometimes.
Some people like, you know, like evil can evils, they jump off of stuff and they're fired up.
Dude, if I go flying off of something on a motorcycle, not doing well.
Yes.
You know, it's very alarming.
And I wouldn't even try.
I mean, to me, that's like a nightmare.
Yeah, I would think of it as a nightmare.
But it's interesting how some feelings to some people are totally a different feeling.
So what I was able to do with the help of all these people is that I was literally able to manufacture and literally almost rebuild my pathways.
Did you do EMDR?
Did you do any of that or no?
And it was all through just, or a lot of it was through.
I mean, I know it's a lot of work.
That stuff is a lot, you know, it's a lot of work.
If you want to go back and really work on stuff, you know, I know that it is a lot of work.
Yes.
The cool thing was, is that my experience was, is that the way that the process was, it was incredibly formatted?
It was formatted and it was also very simple at the end.
Not as simple, you have to be very skilled to work with somebody, but meaning within 30 minutes, you know, I could talk about an experience and feel very different.
Do you work with this company now?
Is this a company you're partnered with?
So it was really cool is that, so I was going around the country speaking, you know, for years and then, you know, it was an interesting thing.
Like I'm on the stage, you know, in 2011, I was college speaker in the United States by Campus Activities magazine.
Okay.
So I'm sharing.
You went to NACA and did those and all that.
All those things, yeah.
APCA.
All those.
Oh, yeah.
So the reason I'm sharing that is because my whole life was Tourette's, you know, and I'm going around talking about Tourette's and really the whole thing.
Shake you bad boy.
Dude, shake you bad boy.
And my whole thing was really about kindness.
It was really about tolerance and kindness.
And it was an interesting thing, though, because now here I'm trying to help people on stage and yet I'm getting helped in a whole other way.
Like I'm getting penicillin back here and I'm having a 40-minute talk with people.
So when I realized that there was a way that I could help people in this way, that's how I wanted to learn how to help people.
I see.
So you were helping people, you were talking about Tourette's, and then you got involved with the ESP group.
Yes.
Okay.
And so, you know, I was able to do that over the last, you know, five years, and it's been unbelievable.
And one cool thing was after we started, after, you know, what happened to me, and again, ESP had nothing to do with Tourette's.
But once it happened, you know, the founders, they started going, you know, Keith Ranieri and Nancy Salzman, I think they started to go, what if we could replicate this with other people?
And so over the last four years, we've been able to replicate with 10 other people with Tourette's.
Get into the program and get better.
Yes.
Wow.
Well, we created a special thing just for people with Tourette's.
And this is the crazy thing.
So it took me like a year and a half to get down 90%, as I was describing.
Guess how fast it's been replicated?
I don't know.
That one guess.
Seven.
Seven what?
I don't know.
Like seven months?
Yeah, I think so.
Four hours.
Oh, wow.
Jesus, man.
I hate guessing.
People can get rid of using this can get rid of Tourette's and four hours.
So I kid you not, it was probably one.
That sounds like something I would say.
I'm dead serious.
So I want to be really clear.
It's not saying anybody can get rid of their Tourette syndrome.
It's saying people that had severe Tourette syndrome, that had tried tons of different things, that wanted, that deeply wanted to get rid of it and end it for themselves.
And also, you know, we went through quite an interview process because we were looking for very specific people that, you know, we thought just met a bunch of different conditions that thought, you know, that they would be a good candidate for this.
For all of those people, I would say seven, seven or eight, two, three out of the 10 are down 70%.
Wow.
And the other six, seven are down 90 plus.
Wow.
And what was so neat is that once this started happening over the last four years, we have this incredible filmmaker who he goes, we got to start filming this.
So we started to film it.
And so what was so neat is that, you know, I would find someone with Tourette's or someone would tell me about somebody with Tourette's.
And we would go through this whole process to see if they would be a good candidate.
And then once we thought if we had, you know, a good candidate, a film crew would go out to their life, film their whole life with Tourette's.
They would come work with us in Albany, beat their Tourette's, and then we would go back into their life and film their life without Tourette's syndrome.
Do you guys, y'all aren't like in the, it's not, you guys can't be like in the Special Olympics or anything.
I feel like you could fucking run that shit if you could Titan.
I can't be in the Special Olympics, no, but I will tell you, I'd much rather just train for the regular Olympics now.
I mean, just because it's, I mean, life is so different now.
Is it really?
What do you miss about having Tourette's, man?
Like, really having it.
You know, the thing that I miss is I miss in some ways.
Let me think about this for one sec.
Trying to think.
I'm not trying to think what I would miss.
The thing is, you...
Yeah.
Oh, you're a rare element, man.
I remember.
You knew me.
People knew you.
So part of what my experience has Been over the years is that I had to start how to learn in a way that I never did before how to relate with people.
I can understand that.
And I think, you know, that's not unique to Tourette's.
I think we all have different things.
You know, you're a, I don't, I don't know a lot of your history, but you know, you were a comedian, or you've been a comedian in a long time.
So now imagine if somebody said, hey, Theo, comedy's done.
Never can make a joke again.
And then think about what it would mean to how every conversation now you had with somebody.
That's a really good correlation, man.
It would be baffling.
You know?
And so that's also what was so neat is that I was going through the classes, I was taking a lot.
I was doing a lot of work to also build a foundation just to learn how to be more me, how to learn how to be with people again, because my whole life, I always had the Tourette's.
I always had this thing.
Yeah.
And that, so it was interesting because, you know, the first whole journey was beating the Tourette's.
Right.
And then there was a whole other journey after that.
Who were you without the Tourette?
Exactly.
It was almost like it was, now you're Clark Kent.
You're like, well, who the fuck is, who am I?
Yes.
Dude, it's funny you say some of that.
When I was in high school, right out of high school, I did reality television.
I worked on MTV for a little while.
And I remember after that, you got real popular and went to school.
And all these kids knew you.
And this was back when they only had, you know, 40 television channels.
But then after that, I didn't know.
I still, it'd been like real formative years.
I didn't really know who I was.
You know, I was just kind of getting out into college into the world.
And then I became, you know, I was this guy that was on this, on television, you know, and it was very uncomfortable to get away from that.
I mean, I remember having visceral reactions.
I remember I'd go to the gym and like I would sweat and without even doing anything, my head would itch.
I'd feel these needles in my neck and head and like extreme uncomfort because I had I was nobody without that thing kind of yes and I didn't want to be that I didn't like that you know and I didn't and I wanted to get away from that but at the same time it was like I had no clue who I was you know because for a couple years this was kind of who I was it just gave me everybody always came and talked about that or that was the thing or something or you know and it was just hard to be it was hard to learn who I was you know yes I can't even fathom that man like
being in this shaky cage and all of a sudden you know you're out of the cage and you're like well fuck it's kind of wild out here it's been wild and you must have felt naked almost in a way absolutely and I absolutely felt naked and I think what's hard for a lot of people that were close to me was growing up I was I was such this gregarious kid and I was outgoing I was you know I was student body president of my high school I did plays and sports I became an inspirational speaker but
how could you do all that with Tourette's I wonder well the thing is I learned to compensate so much right that I did and again I had this incredible support system that I mean and what most people don't have but I I learned to that even because I didn't have that that strong sense of self yeah I just did whatever I could to try to be normal to try to get people to like me because I felt
like I was because I was three I felt like always three steps behind because I had the Tourette's yeah so the moment I start I met you I'm already behind because I got the Tourette's I got to make up for all this stuff so that you go okay well you like me am I okay yeah so that really has been the most profound experience of all this is finally starting just to be more me yeah and just going I mean now I when I talk to friends too like the way that I think about my life is like my whole life I
was in the deep end of the water and I didn't know how to tread well and I'm just you know trying to figure it out get by not offend people what are people thinking you know all that stuff and and really only like the last two years did it feel like I made it to the shallow end and I just started walking out of the pool and then I'm and that it's just like I'm learning how to be normal yeah but just like on the inside it's just so much more quiet now and I can just learn how to be
with somebody and be with me yeah and something that I never imagined I didn't even know that could exist for me like it was just right it's yeah it was like a it was like being another ethnicity almost or being another culture yeah so that's been a it really has been these different journeys but so I'm excited to keep keep going keep finding more of me now and really can it flare back up Tourette's so the thing is I don't I don't think of it in that way or experience it in that way
because I mean the way that I also look at it now is you know I have like a very serious impulse disorder okay but you said but it's still Tourette's though well what I'm saying is is like that feeling that we're gonna call Tourette's okay like it was like I had an extreme impulse disorder okay like any feeling that I felt I indulge in right okay okay now again by no means that maybe that's an involuntary
feeling that I had right and I had no way to do it differently right so over the years I've gone through a lot of with a lot of work on myself and training to really learn how to become less impulsive as well right and so what are the so what are some of those things that people can use even if they're not uh doing Tourette the thing is it's what can people do it's I wish you can't take the course like because the course is where you guys take it where and where I don't know unfortunately the courses don't even exist at the moment right now okay but if they had the courses
like yeah someone can't couldn't afford to go to a school or go to a place or get into a program like that um meditation it sounds like is one good thing i think probably helped i think doing one things like that is meditation of course when i had tourettes and someone said do meditation i said you know go screw yourself right but then you commented yeah but right but then it probably helped huh it helped but it was so hard for me because as i was just describing i had no it wasn't quiet on the inside and it's easy to say to someone just try to be quiet it's like a best buy in there black friday
inside of you it was crazy yeah so you know i think i think the best advice for somebody is try to begin to challenge things if you want that right and i wish that i could say what What do they do in the four hours?
And the four hours with respect to somebody?
Yeah, yeah.
Because you just tell them what you just said for four hours?
No, you don't tell them that for four hours.
So the thing is, I mean, the methodology, it's a profound way to help somebody basically break limiting beliefs and help them become more rational.
So, you know, so it's like if you're trying to help somebody with, like, let's say you're still, you know, an adult and you walk around still believing in Santa Claus, we can work with somebody to start to ask them a bunch of questions where they on their own begin to realize Santa Claus isn't true.
I see.
Okay.
That's a really cool process to take somebody with that you need to be very skilled to do.
Yeah, you got to be skilled.
You have to be skilled to help lead somebody to help them deduce things on their own.
Yes.
That's a valuable skill.
So what made it so powerful and why it could happen in four hours is because somebody wasn't deductively telling me it.
So for instance, it would be insane if somebody goes up to somebody with Tourette's because they've heard this interview and go, don't tick.
Yeah.
That would be, not only would it be insane, it would be pointers for you, Bucko.
Yeah.
I don't even think that would be moral.
It would be, it would, I don't think that would be a good thing.
It'd be old school for sure.
Part of the reason that I was able to, why it's so permanent is because I was able to, as you said, deduce on my own those realizations.
And when you have that type of realization, it's like a perceptual shift.
It's permanent.
Yes.
So does it mean that I have no feelings in my body anymore?
Absolutely not.
Do I still feel that Tourette itch?
Very little.
And I still do things to help change my relationship with it.
But to say that I have Tourette syndrome at this point, I think would be insulting to somebody that really is struggling deeply with it.
So within those four hours, it's trying to help somebody, it's not about reframing or feel the feeling, but don't do it.
It's really helping them have really neat insight into how they relate with that feeling and also figure out what's going on in their life that might be causing that feeling.
And that's how we were able to, how I, not I, how Nancy was able, you know, to help people so quickly.
And the cool thing is, is that this past year, a documentary came out and you can literally see on the screen, you can see this happen.
You can see within four hours, you know.
And it's profound to watch.
And I really believe that one day that this, you know, sort of this methodology and also this movie can really open the eyes for a lot of people because I believe that this can open the doors for Tourette's, for ADD, ADHD, social anxiety, anxiety, OCD.
Yeah, no, I think some of the stuff you're saying, it's like, even if someone had Tourette's, right?
Who knows what other stuff builds around that over time and magnifies it so much more.
Yes.
Whereas even if you can go back through and scrape away some of those things by helping them deduce in their own time, in their own reaction, so it actually, they figure it out, which is such an articulate thing that some therapists and stuff will be able to do because they ask you questions and they help you figure out in a way where you figure it out.
You're not telling somebody something.
Then you can knock away so much of the stuff that makes everything so much tougher.
You know, whether it be Tourette's or I mean, it's some of the stuff they're using in a lot of other programs in some ways.
But I think that's fascinating, man.
You know, and it's just the power of like people helping people.
You know, I always wished I had a stutter.
They had a dude boss named Douglas Huvall, right?
And he was, he might have even had a stutter.
He might have been pretty ignorant, honestly, but he was a nice kid.
But I remember he had a stutter in school and I thought it was the coolest thing ever.
And I'd impersonate him and the teacher would be like, what are you doing?
You're making fun of him.
And I'm like, no, I just, I want that.
I want to be like this.
You know, this guy's so unique.
But yeah, I guess I don't know, man.
It's definitely fascinating and it definitely seems like it's been quite a journey.
I can feel that you're passionate about it.
It's been an incredible journey.
Yeah.
I mean, I've learned just so much about just the human behavior, the way that we interact with each other, the way that we treat people.
And that's really why, you know, when I started speaking 10 years ago, it was all about kindness because basically people were making judgments and assumptions about me without knowing me, which is normal, right?
It's normal.
You see somebody, you think, it's okay to think negative things about people.
The question is, do you really know what's going on?
And so I think it was a neat thing because here it was, I was doing all these crazy things and people were acting on those judgments or acting on those assumptions.
And then they took whatever they saw me doing as if it was truth.
And so really, when I started speaking, the message was about the first phrase that I used was live and let live.
I want to live my life, you live your life.
But really, it's like, look, if you don't like, can you recognize that whatever you're thinking about that person, you don't really know?
Right.
And if you don't really know, no matter how much hate you have towards that person, can we at least be kind?
Right.
Can we at least treat people with kindness, even if we have really negative feelings about them?
Because we don't ultimately know.
Yeah, you don't know if the guy is being rude to you, you know, or is having a tough morning or just cut you off.
You don't know if he, you know, his house just burned down or, you know, he just lost somebody or if he even just killed us.
You know, you don't know if he just killed somebody.
Like, you don't know what he's going through.
You know, like you don't know what somebody's going through sometimes.
But yeah, no, look, I think it's fascinating to hear about.
It's fascinating to hear like, you know, like your respect for the Tourette's condition, you know, like the level that you feel like, you know, you had it, how you envisioned it, how you recognize it inside of yourself and, you know, ways that you use to deteriorate it, you know, or quell it to a place that's more manageable for you and that you're able to be aware of that at the same time so that you can communicate it to other people.
I mean, yeah, I mean, it's definitely, you know, because I was like, does it, I was like, does Mark, it doesn't seem like he has Tourette's, you know?
But then when you get in and you hear about it, it's like, oh, well, this is very relatable, I feel like, you know.
But there's a couple of videos we want to play real quick of a couple of next lead us into that.
Yeah, and we actually had one caller call in with a question, too, about living with it.
But yeah, we can pop that photo on it.
Sure.
And then after that, we'll look at some examples of Tourette's in pop culture and we'll get your grade on how it was depicted.
Sure.
Okay.
It's a great photo there.
It was pretty good, actually.
How's it quite a stencil?
Is it a stencil?
You know, I don't know who did that.
Some man sent that in, probably, honestly.
Some dude.
That's actually really kind of fuck, probably.
So there's a lot of, we get some real lurkers, man.
Beautiful lurkers.
I'm a huge fan.
I have a question for your guest who had Tourette syndrome.
How often did you get late while you had Tourette's syndrome?
And how hard was it to get women or men if you're into that?
I respect that.
And then how often have you gotten late since you stopped your Tourette syndrome?
All right, God bless you.
Good night.
That God bless you came in a little surprising, but I still respect it.
Homeward.
Oh man, it was so uncomfortable with women.
Really?
Oh, man.
Well, partly because how little self-confidence I had.
Again, it's always easy.
When you're looking at someone from the outside, you think you know what's going on.
But on the inside, I did not feel that confident about myself.
It looked like I was super confident because of the level of compensation that I was doing all the time.
Yeah.
Were you doing crazy stuff?
Were you wearing necklaces and stuff like that?
No, it wasn't like I was trying to look like I was super rich, but I was trying to look like I was put together.
And it wasn't a shit show on the inside.
Were you wearing like a tuxedo and stuff like that?
No.
Luckily, no.
I still had some semblance of like, let's try to be.
Oh, good, good, good.
Yeah, you can't be showing up like it's a damn, you know, like you're Joe, you know, Joe Black or something at a rave or something.
It was weird with women.
I mean, it was, I mean, just imagine hooking up with a girl and, yeah.
You just crush it now?
Is it easier now?
It is infinitely easier, but it's also just because I have more confidence with myself.
Yeah.
So after I, you know, I beat the Tourette's syndrome, I mean, just to, I mean, sex for one thing.
Just imagine sitting with a girl and not saying the riskiest thing.
Oh, yeah, I can't.
But I could definitely say this, dude.
Beat Tourette's Let's Fuck would be the best book ever, even though.
That is not what we're talking about.
But I do want to let people know that you have a book.
You have two books now.
What do you have?
Tell me.
No, I have a book that came out about six years ago, and it was called What Makes You Tick.
Okay.
But another book would be, I think, really good at this point, you know, because that book, I had just started ESP and beating like the 90% when that book came out.
And I also just wasn't as open about my participation in ESP at the moment, just because, you know, there was bad stuff about ESP back then.
There's even more bad stuff about ESP now.
Is it like a landmark?
Is that like a group kind of?
No, it's unfortunately, it's, I mean, it's definitely in the same realm, you know, it's in terms of it's a group of people that are trying to help people.
You know, but now it's in the news with a bunch of controversy around it and things like that.
That's not the set.
Did we have, oh, we have Michael Rosenbaum on here?
Yes, unfortunately, yes.
Same group.
Oh, wow.
So it's, you know, it's been a profound journey to a friend said to me recently, so here I used to have Tourette's, and I used to experience so much prejudice because I was taking the N-word in public.
And now that I've beaten Tourette's, and now I'm just a white guy walking around, in a way I'm experiencing more prejudice now.
Wow.
And so.
Yeah, welcome to the club, dude.
You know, at least you got to say it a bunch.
Yeah.
And I know you're not going to get out here on an island.
Well, I hope that made sense.
The reason I said about, and now I'm a white male is because white males in our culture don't experience a lot of prejudice.
Oh.
Relative to a lot of, you know, a white male compared to someone with Tourette's experiences less.
I see what you're saying.
So it's interesting now of still seeing is that even without the Tourette's, I'm still learning so many lessons about prejudice and the nature of how we treat people and how we label people, whether it's a group or a syndrome or whatever it might be.
Yeah.
Yeah, we battle with that too.
Like, you know, in comedy and just talking about stuff, it's like it's different, you know.
I mean, hell, I don't even think you could legally have, you couldn't even have Tourette's today in Los Angeles.
Like, I feel like they'd hang you at the cross if you dropped a couple of bombs out there, you know?
Like when I was growing up, you could have some Tourette's, you know, you'd have a dude, you know, everybody, you know, people could have something, you know, they carried a dude over there in the area and he sets off a couple of M bombs or uses some, but inappropriate terms, people were more understanding.
Can you even have Tourette's nowadays and be accepted?
Well, the thing is, I mean, people were, I was really open and my family really was supportive and we pushed it.
I would always tell people I had Tourette's.
I would make announcements on planes and my classes.
I think in general, most people are, I think at the core, do want to be understanding.
I think what's difficult is that we live in a time where people don't, there's not a lot of critical thinking and people are so quick to just be mean or jump on the bandwagon of being mean with other people and whatever it is.
They don't want to communicate.
It's weird that they would say someone with Tourette's has a problem communicating and now it's like, I'd rather have Tourette's than be, you know, one of these social justice warriors who's just beating everybody, who doesn't want to have a conversation sometimes, you know?
Well, I think, I mean, one of the big things that I, in trying to talk about kindness and stuff is it's interesting how we as a society, we fight bullying with bullying.
Right.
We fight hate with hate.
And the question is, do we want to, do we want to continue to perpetuate that or do we recognize maybe there's other ways that we can treat people?
I love that, man.
I agree with that a bunch.
It's like, even, yeah, it fascinates me sometimes how much people will be hateful and just because it matches their point of view that it's okay to be hateful.
You know, it's like, oh, you can't be hateful, but as long as, but I can't, you know, it's like, how do you not recognize, I mean, being hateful is being hateful, you know?
But go on.
Well, I want to say, it's not like I'm above that.
Right.
I used to so much all the time fight hate with hate.
Yeah.
You know, even when, you know, I was growing up with my older brother who was gay, man.
I was one of those people pioneering, you know, if you didn't like gay marriage, oh, I hated you.
Right.
And then luckily, you know, through a lot of my education and going through some of the classes too, I've started to really want to be different.
Yeah.
And recognize, you know what?
I do, there are things that I really dislike or people that I don't dislike.
And the question is, okay, can I still be different even if I feel that way?
Yeah.
Yes, that's the biggest thing.
It's like, yeah, I know some great people who don't like, who probably would be, who, who would be against gay marriage, right?
And I'm not going to hate those people for that.
They're good people.
Just because their belief system or whoever taught them or something, that's their thing.
Like, it doesn't mean that they would be rude to gay people or that they would treat them differently.
They may have some old, you know, a religious belief and that's their thing.
It's like, or anybody's religious.
That doesn't mean I have to believe it.
It doesn't mean I have to agree with it.
But also doesn't mean I have to shun somebody because their beliefs are different than mine.
It's baffling to me that we do that.
And why would we do it?
Because it's not understanding.
It's not accepting, really.
Well, the reason I think we do it is because I think we're not aware of how we all do do that.
Yeah.
And that was also.
And it's also, you know, it was like part of my journey with the Tourette's syndrome.
It was I couldn't even see the, even just about the fear of losing Tourette's.
I wasn't even willing to look at that.
Maybe not even willing.
I didn't even know.
And so it was with help that I could start to become more aware of that.
And then when you start realizing like, you know what?
I also don't like a lot of people.
Or, you know what, I also feel negative feelings towards people.
That's when you can start to have a little bit more compassion when you see someone else doing it, you know?
But now we live in a time where, you know, someone's caught on video saying some prejudiced thing.
And then what do we do to that person?
Yeah.
We're completely prejudiced to that person.
Yeah.
Instead of offering out, well, how can we, what can we learn from this?
How can this person, you know, how can we accept them into a fold and make them feel comfortable and make them feel like, oh, we all make mistakes, you know?
And that doesn't mean you can't hold them accountable still.
Yeah, agreed, 100%.
But the question is, can you hold someone accountable and still be kind?
Do you think it's the media that's more like that or humanity is more like that?
I struggle with that a lot.
I think the media is just an extension of humanity.
I think it's, you know, it's like, you know, when someone talks about a company, like someone's like, well, this corporation.
And it's like, look, yes, it's a company, but it's just people.
It's just people.
It's people.
It's not a robot.
You know, it's people.
And so I think this is hard for all of us.
But I think it's just really what I've come to learn so much throughout all this journey of, you know, with the Trets, without Trouretz, my experience now in the company experiencing a lot of prejudice of I don't really know a lot.
I do want to stand up for things, but I think there's different ways we can do it.
And I think, you know, when you look at history and you look at someone like Martin Luther King, his whole message of nonviolence, I mean, here, look what he stood up for.
Yeah.
But he did it nonviolently with compassion.
That narrative is basically non-existent right now.
And instead, it's sort of, you know, we live in a time where if you think somebody did something wrong, you point the finger and.
And people will quote Martin Luther King Jr. and then go out and beat somebody's ass too.
It's like, this is insane, you know?
But yeah, look, man, I love some of the ways that you, I love hearing some of this and being reminded of it.
Like, you know, I find every day, like, I'm me, I'll be mean about stuff and then I'll realize that I had a part in something.
I'll have to go back and, you know, apologize or, you know, I mean, it's.
And I'm with you too.
I mean, this is a constant journey for myself.
It's not like I'm above this.
I don't do this.
It's, but it's more of I want to keep becoming a person that's not like that.
Yeah.
I want to become a person who's, you know what, I can feel really negative thoughts about somebody and still be kind.
Yeah.
That's not easy.
Say what you mean, don't say it mean.
My brother always says that to his kids sometimes.
Say what you mean, don't say it mean.
That's what he says.
I mean, it's just one little thing about what you're saying.
But yeah, I agree, man.
It's like I'll get upset at groups of people sometimes and then I'll be like, well, what's really going on here?
But I think we're getting to a place like that inside where people are thinking about those types of things more.
Let's look at a couple more videos real quick so we can shut it down over here.
We got to.
Cool.
This is from the 1970s, Quincy.
Okay.
I don't know if I've seen this.
That's the hell of paranormal, isn't it?
It'll be okay once I get up there concentrated.
I'm going to go see when they want you.
We've got a courtroom here, and the kids got the rets, I guess.
I feel like I just swallowed a butterfly collection.
Oh, you're going to be fine.
I just.
I don't want to scare them.
I feel so small.
I'm just thinking of David and Goliath.
But I don't have a slingshot.
Dr. Quincy, I don't know if I can really go through with this.
Oh, you're going to be fine.
You can do it, Tony.
as hot as you can.
There you go.
And that's Quincy is the movie I've never actually seen that clip before.
Oh, well, there you go.
Nick did some good digging right there.
You put him on a disease at night, and that guy will really show up in the morning with some wild clips.
Yeah, so for the people who are just listening, that guy, he just had like facial tics and stuff.
How did that look?
That looked pretty.
I mean, I think you have a lot of people who do those kinds of ticks that don't have Tourette's syndrome.
I'm sure you've met people that, you know, blink their eyes and stuff.
And also, if someone's listening and you've been blinking your eye, you don't have to freak out.
It's not like you have Tourette's.
You might have dust.
You might need an air purifier.
So that grade for that one.
That was pretty low.
I'm not sure what was...
Not in an intensity, like his depiction.
Yeah, did that actually do a good job?
What are you doing a 1 to 10 of that Tourette?
I actually thought that was a pretty good.
I mean, especially with the eyes.
I mean, that's not.
What do you think?
A seven?
I'll give it a six.
Okay.
Wow, six.
Tough grader.
Wow.
That was lauded at the time when I was doing digging of like just a good depiction and very educational.
I thought it was good.
It's like for a standard, so I could give it an A. No, give it a six, bro.
Fuck it, man.
It's Tourette's.
The guy barely did it.
He did it twice, you know?
I want to shake up.
I want to see it real shake up.
Here we go.
This is Amy Pohler in Deuce Bigelow Mel Gigelo.
Okay.
Hello?
Is this Ruth?
Yeah, I'll be right down.
God damn it!
Nice day, huh?
Yeah.
Shove it off, you're up!
Wow.
Geez, you okay?
I'm sorry.
I have Tourette syndrome, and it causes me to have these uncontrollable outbursts.
It's not so bad.
Yeah, it's okay.
I mean, you get used to it.
Balls, what?
It is.
You know, there are some places I can't go.
Nipple Biter!
Da-da-da-da-da!
Man!
What are you talking about?
Oh, my God.
I can't believe Rob Schneider.
And Rob Schneider seems like the guy who would try to bang out chicks with Tourette's or different syndromes and stuff.
He's been in some dark stuff.
I would give that one a lower one because that's like, I would give that more, like a three or four.
Okay, and why?
Because one thing is, you know, I was aware that I was saying the bad word.
I would try to muffle it.
Okay.
You know, so I used to like add words even sometimes.
So if I was going to say the N-word, sometimes I would add the word dad.
Oh, yeah.
So I go, and then it would try to muffle it where that one seemed.
Or just start singing a rap song.
Yeah.
Or I would look like chinkopotamus or something like that.
Well, a lot of times I would go, hi, hi.
Even if it wasn't a bad word, like if I felt the tick, I go, hi, hi.
Oh, right on, like you're doing magic.
Yeah.
Like you're starting, like you're introducing people to something.
Hi, hi there.
Yeah.
Wow, bro.
Now that's pretty cool because then you're in like a wild, it's almost like you're in a game with yourself sometimes.
Yeah, it was just a nightmare of a game.
It was.
It's like your move central nervous system, you know?
Yeah.
Let's look at one more and get a rating on this one, man.
So what do you give Amy Poeer got a two on that?
It was a bit outlandish.
I have a three or four.
Three.
Three, yeah.
Small window between Amy Pillar and that guy from Quincy.
Here's our last one from TV's Seventh Heaven.
Oh my God.
Until God said...
God said...
God said...
They're in church, obviously.
Well, I appreciate the help.
The help.
His mother says he has ADD.
My son doesn't have Tourette's syndrome.
Please, don't run away.
Your ADD I could deal with.
But this.
You know.
I just think I can bear it.
Dad's not accepting.
I actually give that one a nine.
I mean, that's pretty.
I think it's a good depiction of the Tourette's of what that's like.
And I think it's also a good depiction of the parents.
think it's really hard yeah I don't it's the the it The whole family had Tourette's.
You know, I would tell people, when I would walk into a room or a restaurant and I'd tick the N-word and I'm with some friends, no one knows who said it.
Right.
Oh, that's fun.
That's not fun.
It's crazy.
Do you know what I'm saying?
Everyone turns and just looks.
Everyone's just as much of a culprit that I am.
Yeah.
Oh, that's true, huh?
You're like, Jesus, everybody's looking at your mom like she says it all the time.
Did you ever pretend it was your mom?
So you weren't going to be able to do it.
I didn't pretend it was my mom.
But it was one of those things where that kind of understanding didn't come until later.
Did you have to dress like a wigger kind of kid just to pull it off?
No.
But I mean, sometimes I would leave.
When I would go to movie theaters, I put washcloth in my mouth.
I had just one time when I was younger.
I had a very serious situation with taking the N-word.
But knock on wood, I was very lucky.
And also, you know, I did whatever I, because I wasn't, I didn't have negative intent to do something.
A lot of times if I did say the N-word and there was a black person that heard me, I would actually just continue on with my day as normal.
Because usually I imagined if you're going to say that to somebody and you're trying to hurt them or, you know, really get their attention, you wouldn't just pretend like it didn't just happen.
Right.
Right.
Yeah.
You need to, yeah, you need to live accordingly with what's actually occurring in your life.
Is that it's something that happened and you're just going on and living your life.
Because if not, you're standing there looking at them, then it's like you're waiting to figure it out.
Yeah.
And it's going to be an interesting conversation.
A lot of, yeah, man.
I mean, I just can't even imagine.
What was like, did you ever get a bonus word that you never got again that kind of popped in?
I mean, I've said everything you can imagine.
I mean, you know.
What was one of your favorites?
It would fucking flare up every now and then, dude.
Anything around the holidays or something?
So hard to say, Theo.
I mean, I had anytime I see someone, the funny thing is they'll go, Mark, do you remember that time when you, you know, this happened?
You ticked.
I'm like, do you understand how many times that I ticked?
How many of those moments I've had with so many people?
One funny one when I was in a fraternity, somebody punched, it was, we had, you know, there was like a drunken night at the house and somebody had punched a wall.
Oh, excuse me, had punched a hole in the wall and the whole pledge glass had to come in front of it.
And I started ticking, I did it.
Oh, yeah.
Even though I didn't do it.
You know, things like that.
You know, sort of just like everyone starts laughing.
You're getting her on trial for murder.
Yeah, you're just saying.
I'm guilty, Roger.
I'm guilty.
Wow.
Mark Elliott, man.
Thank you so much, man, for coming in and spending time with us today, man.
This has been fascinating.
It's been a fun conversation.
And Michael Rosenbaum was in, and that was about the group is called Nexus or something.
Is it a different or actually it's the parent company of a bunch of different companies, but really what's been the most fascinating part about it.
Grab or something?
seen one of them around town before or something or L. No, because it was a different...
It might have been a restaurant.
But it was, you know, it's so interesting because, you know, Keith Reneary and Nancy Salzman who are the ones that created, you know, ESP, which are really responsible for why, you know, I don't have, you know, created the tools that help me beat Tourette's syndrome.
It's just so fascinating of how different they're being portrayed in the media right now.
Oh, because they're the group that those are the same people that got in trouble with the sex cold or whatever.
And all that stuff, yes.
Really?
You know, so it's, it's so interesting for me because same people.
So it's so interesting for me because it's just like as I was describing with the Tourette syndrome, is that here people saw something?
They just saw one moment in time.
And then they make that one moment in time as if that's a truth.
And then they act on those truths.
And so, you know, people that I, you know, that are dear friends that are doing really good things in the world, things that I'm doing in the world that are really good, it's so interesting to see then how people can treat you just when they hear that there's a label.
Wow.
And this is why now really with my speaking, it's cool because 10 years ago I started talking about kindness and it couldn't be more apropos now, but it's not even just about Tourette's syndrome.
It's really looking at the title that I have now is called Guilty Until Proven Innocent.
And really looking at not only just the nature of how we place verdicts on our own life, like with the Tourette's, was really was my own mind placing a verdict, but also the way that we place verdicts on other people's life.
Wow.
Yeah, I could see that being a good turn at like the, you know, as a second half of a speech or if you're giving a, you know, teaching people, you know.
Yeah.
It's perfect.
You know?
So you had experiences with those people.
I mean, they taught you ESP.
They took you through that program.
Of course.
I mean, Keith and Nancy and these are dear friends of mine.
And then the, because we had Michael Rosenbaum in here, and they, did you ever see them as being like cult-like?
No, the thing is, I mean, it's just such a funny thing even, you know, growing up, you know, you hear about cults and all those sorts of things.
Wizardry.
Wizardry.
And then it's just kind of interesting is that once you're on the other side and you see actually how, you know, when you start using words like cult or something like that, like basically it stops people from critically thinking anymore.
That's true.
And, you know, versus, okay, look, you know, maybe someone's doing something that you don't like or you don't know.
But the question is, is like, you know, why is that bad?
You know, if they're just doing something that's different than you.
Right.
So would you say more they were a helpful group of people that just had some maybe wild sexual activities sometimes?
I don't know anything about that stuff.
Oh, so you didn't even know anything about that.
I don't even know about that stuff.
What I just know is that these are people that have done profound things in the world.
Wow.
And, you know, stuff like with the Tourette's project.
Obviously, it's a little bit on hold at the moment.
Right.
But I'm so excited to bring that out into the world.
I mean, I think that we can help millions and millions of people.
It's so fascinating.
It's just because, yeah, like you get labeled involved in a behavior.
Because there's a lot of people out here doing wild sex.
You know what I'm saying?
I get invites to do all kinds of things.
Some fellow almost paid me $10,000 to go and thug out his wife up there at a hostel somewhere outside of San Francisco.
But I'm just saying it's like there's people, and that guy might be a stand-up guy at a Ford dealership or something.
You just never know who's doing what and does it matter.
Well, that's the thing, because not only do I not know about that stuff, is that I think the deeper and the bigger question for our society is more is what I know isn't good is not about a hypothetical, but trial by media.
Oh, yeah, it's what I'm saying.
And things like this, where is that really how we want to be?
Where, you know, you have, you know, and I mentioned sort of it's like, you know, if you point at somebody now, it's, it's, have you ever seen the movie The Crucible?
If you haven't seen the movie, See the Crucible.
So Harriet Beecher Stowe?
Who's in that?
It was a long time ago, but you...
I think it's Harriet.
But how you do that's really important.
Yeah.
And, you know, with respect to the media and how we treat people, whether it's through allegations, whether it's through gossip, whether it's through any of these things, can we still be kind?
Yeah, the media does not set a good example.
Because it's...
If it's just an extension of us, maybe we don't.
But yeah, it's interesting.
They don't put in those articles, this is a group that's helped millions of people or hundreds of thousands of people.
Well, and it's, it's, and it's just saying, you know, these are people being wild and, you know, you know, who knows what else.
Yeah, I think it's really important that we as adults, we have to just be a lot more mindful with respect to those types of communications.
Did you ever get invited anything wild?
Was there ever anything like that you never thought you never thought anything about it?
It could have been pretty cool though, huh?
Yeah.
Oh, dude, definitely.
If you're the Tourette's dude at an origin, straight up crossing guard, bro, just directing traffic, dude.
All aboard.
I never was.
And more than that, though, I've just kind of continued to learn so much.
And so it's been so beautiful of having Tourette's experiencing prejudice, not having experiencing Tourette's and experiencing prejudice.
And I really want to become more of a voice in our country and for the narrative of, can we be kind?
Yeah.
Even if you think, you know, things are bad that are happening.
Is there a chance that what they were doing, like they were doing something like roping young women into this sex thing and it is completely damnable and you just aren't aware of it and you only saw the good?
Like is there, is there ever objective times when people are wrong and you have to be like, no, you can't do that?
The thing is, I don't even want to comment on something that's like crazy hypotheticals like that because then it even validates that to be speaking about that in the way is legitimate.
What I do know is that even if you know somebody did something really bad, what's so cool is that we have gold standards in our society of how to treat people still.
Maybe we can end on this.
You can go in on YouTube and on YouTube, you can find a bunch of videos where someone has murdered somebody's, like someone has murdered someone's son, and you see the mother of that, a child completely treat that murderer with love.
And look, that's someone who's still being held accountable.
But the mother doesn't need to go destroy that person's life.
So I think that's really the bigger thing.
You know, in life, you know, people make mistakes, there's failures, things happen, bad things happen sometimes.
But even with that, can we still treat people with decency?
Yeah.
So it's not really about whether something did or didn't.
It's what I do know is what's happening right now in our culture isn't good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I think a lot of it does come back to how we treat each other.
Yeah, and it's funny when you treat somebody with decency, then they, it really, in the end, leaves them having to think more about what they actually did because they can't use that energy to then be angry back at you.
It's not about you and them.
It's about, you know, then it's just them having a, you know, being set with the thoughts of what they did.
You know, I don't know.
It's fascinating, man.
I mean, we're, you know, we're late bloomers in here, so definitely learning as we go.
But thank you so much for being here, Mark Elliott.
Thanks so much.
Thank you.
Shine that light on me I'll sit and tell you my stories Shine on me you Thank you.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm Jonathan Kite and welcome to Kite Club, a podcast where I'll be sharing thoughts on things like current events, stand-up stories, and seven ways to pleasure your partner.
The answer may shock you.
Sometimes I'll interview my friends.
Sometimes I won't.
And as always, I'll be joined by the voices in my head.
You have three new voice messages.
A lot of people are talking about Kite Club.
I've been talking about Kite Club for so long, longer than anybody else.
So great.
Hi, Sweet.
Is it there?
Anyone who doesn't listen to Kite Club is a dodgy bloody wanker.
John Main.
I'll take a quarter pottle of cheese out of the glory.
Sorry, sir, but our ice cream machine is broken.
I think Tom Hanks just butt-dialed me.
Anyway, first rule of Kite Club is tell everyone about Kite Club.
Second rule of Kite Club is tell everyone about Kai Club.
Third rule, like and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts or watch us on YouTube, yeah?
