S.1 Ep.13: Q & A

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
hello and welcome to episode 13 of dualistic unity today is going to be a q a episode and i'm andrew
i'm ray and uh we're going to be doing our best to provide some perspective on some of
these questions and uh i hate to say we're going to give answers because of course answers aren't
necessarily what we're looking for but we're definitely going to look at it from as many

(00:23):
different angles as we can kind of give you our perspective on it and then of course hopefully
that will encourage you to submit more questions for next season's q a episode so we can go into
greater depth or even cover it in a future episode in season two so we're gonna start here um the
first question comes from one of our supporters on patreon and of course i'm excited to ask this

(00:43):
question because it was part of our foundational discussion when we first started this podcast i'm
curious to know about you and andrew's thoughts on bad trips on mushrooms or other psychedelics
could you uh describe how you would deal with that and what a bad trip would feel like so i'd like to
let andrew go first on this one all right um so in my understanding and things that i've

(01:08):
read i haven't personally had a bad trip and i i don't even like using the word bad because
they're all just individual perceptions of how things are but i think when people describe
having bad trips it's very much a resistance versus acceptance type situation or you know

(01:31):
resisting versus surrendering to what you're feeling and accepting what you're feeling or like
going down this path of not wanting to feel what you feel so in my situation
i've you know only tripped on higher doses of mushrooms a handful of times but
the first few times especially the first and second time i did a higher dose there was a

(01:53):
point i remember on the come up where i started just really it started hitting me pretty strongly
and there was a split second where i was like oh boy this is kind of kind of a lot right now and
then i immediately told myself this is okay it's okay i'm supposed to be feeling this it's okay
surrender accept and those sorts of things just kept going through my head so i think

(02:16):
in a situation where i may have continued on that like whoa i don't like this i i changed my mind i
changed my mind i don't want to go down this path like that can lead to a situation where you are
resistant to it and potentially what someone would label as a bad trip but i think the thing that

(02:38):
through the act of tripping or taking mushrooms or anything like that you know you you are able to
see things more clearly but also the act in itself is sort of a not like a meditation but a practice
in acceptance because the experience of it in itself like you feel differently you are existing

(02:59):
in a slightly altered state of being than you typically are it's different it's uncertain
it's unknown so in itself it's a practice in this acceptance of uncertainty so i don't know you know
good bad all just perceptions right um but that is my take in my experience where i think there

(03:20):
were points where if i had resisted as opposed to surrendered or accepted it would have potentially
gone down a route that could have been considered you know a bad trip um but that yeah that's that's
my take that's good that it it is in fact um i i used to refer to it as a symbolic leap of faith

(03:41):
like you're you're surrendering control you're surrendering it up to this this substance that
you're taking and you're just waiting to see what's going to happen and so there's
your mind is always wanting to do the same thing that it's always doing i've always found that on
on psychedelics or hallucinogenics regardless of what they might be what happens is the the
state of mind that we're always in or or rather the mentality that we're always experiencing

(04:05):
all of a sudden just becomes more pronounced it's all of a sudden like our sensitivity to our own
mind becomes increased so anything that we've that that comes through our mind is so raw and
in our face that we don't have our our identity and we don't have the task list of tomorrow and
we don't have our ambitions and our worries about what people think of us to block us from having

(04:26):
those thoughts to have that experience right so i know in my experience when i was much much younger
i've been in a number of situations where the situation went bad and had i not been able to
relax myself through it it would have been been a very different experience for me experiences where
i've been say at somebody else's house and then all of a sudden something in a different part of

(04:49):
the house went bad and suddenly there were police there and there was a fight that broke out and all
of this and meanwhile i was in the basement you know just blessing out on life having a
great conversation about the philosophy of god and being and then suddenly we come upstairs
and there's cops outside and there's all kinds of stuff happening we're like what is happening here
and of course at that point you can panic and one of our friends did and so we just kind of

(05:13):
walked him through the same lessons that we walk ourselves through all the time every day which is
you don't know why they're here you don't know that they're here for you you don't know what's
happening so don't assume anything right and so all of a sudden after about five ten minutes of
doing that with him and just walking and walking removing ourselves from the narrative and all our
assumptions of what it might be he was doing just fine and so it's very much the same thing that

(05:36):
we do in our in our waking life except that it it's so much more important that we take it as a
priority on hallucinogenics or in psychedelics or in older states of consciousness because of that
sensitivity because of that that particular well just how much of a hair trigger your mind can
be in that state because if you decide i don't like this you're going to get about a thousand

(05:57):
reasons that you don't like this and they're all going to come at once where if you go i
don't know what's happening you're going to come up with a thousand reasons to not care
right and it's just it's that simple it's because your brain is working so much faster
in those states of mind it's not resorting to the same structure it's used to it's it's
relying on all of your senses not just the ones that you're focusing on there's so much happening

(06:18):
so often a bad trip is the is the trip that we just don't we don't allow to happen on its own
it's kind of the point it's the same thing we do in life we don't allow life to happen on its own
we're constantly micromanaging our role within it we're constantly micromanaging and analyzing
everything that we do from moment to moment to moment and so we don't allow the here and now

(06:40):
to be what it is we're always superimposing distortion over top of it so just as we
do that in our waking life we do that on hallucinogenics except on again a hallucinogenics
it just happens that much faster so it becomes the practice like andrew said of letting go it becomes
a day-to-day practice if you practice it in your waking life then on hallucinogenics you won't have

(07:01):
any problems at all but if you practice it on a psychedelic experience and not in your waking life
then you're going to assume it's the psychedelics that are giving you those insights when it's not
it was the choice that you were making in the moment regardless of the conscious environment
yeah what i've found too with um you know just recently getting into you know mushroom

(07:22):
psychedelic realm is that it it very much like i i fully remember how i felt on them when i
was peeled back like that and it like it very much has meshed into my sober existence like i
wake up and walking around like how i felt micro dosing you know two months ago i feel like that

(07:46):
not my crossing now and even i found which has been kind of interesting i took uh
what was it like one and a half grams last like a week and a half ago and i i was fully
hallucinating and i i don't think i did that uh like two months ago like it's become stronger

(08:08):
in the sense that like i get there quicker because i remember you said that you take half a gram now
and you get to a place that you used to get on like seven or eight grams is that like is that
do you think because you begin incorporating it more into your own life so there's already so like
an example i just sort of thought of was like because when you take mushrooms you it kind of

(08:33):
peels you back more so like there's you know there's all these layers say with someone who
is very sure of things and then you know mushrooms peel those back and they may peel a few back and
then you know a higher dose may peel more back but then if you live in existence where there's
fewer layers to begin with then it peels you back to the point that like there's just one
peeling so like for you half a gram that's all you need and all of a sudden you're fully peeled

(08:58):
back whereas you know someone else it may change so like for me taking one and a half grams could
be the equivalent of taking like two and a half grams two months ago but i found that to be very
interesting because i always tell people like oh yeah you start hallucinating around you know
between two and three grams totally depends on people and i took a gram and a half and i'm like

(09:19):
wow i'm very much like tripping right now i was not really expecting this but all right cool
saving money but no it really is that it's uh you described it really well it's like there are
so many layers there's that gap between who we are in sobriety and then who we are in the psychedelic
experience right and if if it is a very wide gap if the rest of the time you're always thinking

(09:43):
you are something and then all of a sudden you end up in this place where you're not thinking about
anything it takes you a while to just get used to that state of being and so you kind of ease
yourself into it which is often why we resist on a trip it's all of a sudden it becomes a
little bit too much to let go of we're like oh i don't like how that feels and we resist and that
that's when things kind of go sideways which is why we answered somebody else on our live stream

(10:06):
last week on patreon that if you're going to look into doing this as an experience
start very small start very small allow yourself to kind of peel the layers back
gradually allow yourself to get used to the idea that you don't always have to be thinking about
yourself so that way when you get to that place it's not such a contrast between one and the other

(10:26):
it's not so jarring because that that's very much what it is but and i want to make this point again
this is the same the same thing is true for every single moment we're always avoiding the intensity
of being present right it doesn't matter on psychedelics or not because there's nothing
that psychedelics can do to your brain that your brain can't do to itself right and so in each

(10:49):
and every moment we have the same opportunity to just let go and allow ourselves to experience you
know what it is to be high which is again just synonymous with an extreme state of relaxation
that's all that is right but yeah i find it really interesting that it's always the same
choice it's just how quickly our mind reacts to that choice how quickly our mind is is

(11:12):
willing to go in the direction that we want it to go and that's always based on what we do
day to day moment to moment it's it's based on our priorities so as you are more and more
um abandoning your perspective that you are andrew there's just less andrew to let go of
right so all of a sudden they're you're like wee i'm i'm back to being who i am

(11:33):
wow i really got caught up in that fiction for a bit right whereas before it was like
oh my god it's all fiction and it's this massive astonishing insight and then after a while you're
just like yeah i remember that i'm good to go and it's not this big jarring experience because
you've been there and this is often why meditation can be useful to people if they have a very busy

(11:53):
lifestyle is that it provides you that north star it reminds you of what it is
you can experience it reminds you there's other options rather than just the hectic pace that
you're on and that's the whole point of those experiences is to give yourself some context
right if you're always running if you're always thinking you are an identity
the idea that you can live free of that doesn't make any sense until you've experienced it to

(12:18):
some degree which is why i always recommend people go for walks or people question their
narratives or question who they think they are because at least then they'll have a moment of
oh that's not real and then that leads them to want to experience that more but without
the experience it's all conceptual which is often questions that that i get from people when we'll

(12:38):
get to that next i've asked my question it's your turn um this is from a instagram
q a this is in regards to enlightenment and i'm not 100 sure uh but i'll just read the question
how much enlightenment coaching do you need before you can go on your own so i think there's a lot to

(13:02):
unpack in this question quite frankly so how much enlightenment coaching do you need to go
on your own so like there's so many parts to this i think enlightenment in itself talking about that
enlightenment coaching whatever that is and going out on your own to be an enlightenment coach or to

(13:23):
become enlightened on your own without a coach but we can just talk about it because i think we could
probably spend a whole episode talking about this question but um yeah i mean this goes we've talked
about this many times the idea of enlightenment of being this sort of destination this future place

(13:44):
that you know you have to put work in and you have to get coached on to get there and there's people
out there who you know they're enlightened so they can teach you how to be enlightened and at the end
but uh yeah that charged 500 an hour and you know but anyway um yeah so to start the idea

(14:08):
of enlightenment is nothing more than a concept that we have created and you know there are
i think there's understandings people equate to that but it's this sort of journey that people
think of that they you know go through spiritual practices and eventually they end up one day at

(14:34):
enlightenment like they're on this rainbow and it's like yeah it's like the pot of gold do i take
a right or a left at this street and it's like enlightenment's that way and it's like
so at the end of the day i don't even like using the word enlightenment but
it's i think it's the understanding

(14:55):
understanding that there is nowhere to get there is no
destination to achieve and as long as you think there is a destination to achieve you will always
miss it because the idea of having a destination goes directly against the way that people explain

(15:20):
you know this made-up idea of enlightenment to be understanding that it's here now always it's just
i think if if it's anything it's the understanding that there is nothing outside of here and now
and it's the understanding that there is no place to get to and there is no enlightenment
and there is no you know peak that you need to continue working towards or get

(15:45):
coached on in any way and that it is here and now always so if you go on this massive journey
to get to a point where you find enlightenment become enlightened
it's it's you can't even describe it even if that were the case that there was a journey and there
was a point it's a moment also like so like that idea of enlightenment is one moment you're like oh

(16:13):
you know my ego is dead and i am enlightened and then it's like so three seconds ago your ego was
dead and you were enlightened but what about now it's like well now i'm going to hold on to that
idea for the rest of my life and i'm going to say that i had an ego death and that i am enlightened
and i'm going to work to get back to that point for the rest of my life and it's like that point
is here now it isn't a point that you reached at one point it's always now and that's the simple

(16:39):
beauty of it that again we've talked about you know 10 to 20 times is that it is always here now
you can never miss it because it's always where you are it's what you are at the end of the day
so that's my initial spiel but that's really good i i love that it's funny i had a i had
somebody respond to me recently i did a video about ego deaths just saying that it's kind of

(17:03):
an inaccurate description because it implies finality that all of a sudden your ego is just
gone because you've made this one choice to kill it and then that's it you're good for the rest
of your life and that's not how it goes because of course your ego is the perception of division it's
just how much you commit to that perception as truth that causes all of your distortion
so i just thought it was really interesting that basically the person was saying that um

(17:28):
try dmt and then tell me there's no ego death
and that's the danger of having that one moment where your ego slips aside and then assuming
you're good so my response was i'm assuming you're not on it when you're writing this comment
because everything you just said was egotistical right i achieved it in the past all of that is ego

(17:52):
right and then that's the point is it's not the concept it's not the final end end result
it's not an achievement that you can put up on your wall right it's none of that and i i just
want to share two stories in response to you into the question and your answer that i've
always felt to be very useful um one is there was well they're both about students who were you know

(18:14):
fairly um smart and intelligent and got the concepts but we're having problems letting go
enough to realize the truth and one one student goes to his end master and says you know
i've studied everything i've read through all of the scrolls i've read through all i've studied
under multiple masters i'm just not getting it what is the secret to enlightenment and rather
than respond the master just turns around and on a piece of paper on the wall writes attention

(18:41):
student says that's it that's all you're gonna give me what is that
what does that mean what does attention mean teacher writes attention attention
students doesn't understand he's like this isn't saying anything to me and he writes it again
attention attention attention he's like what does that mean he's like attention is attention

(19:03):
there's nothing else to say pay attention right because in paying attention you're not thinking
about yourself you're in the moment it's what's real right so on the one hand how much coaching
do you need to achieve enlightenment not at all right some would say all you need to meet
an enlightened master but they're forgetting that the first enlightened master didn't have a master

(19:24):
to work from right so if that's possible for them it's possible for you it really just comes down
to attention and secondly priority which is why i want to touch on the second story which i'm
pretty sure i've told before but i'm going to say it again because it's important there was another
student also very talented went to another master and said the same thing i don't get it i'm not

(19:46):
understanding this i study all the time you know i talk to other students i talk to other masters
i'm just not getting it show me the secrets to enlightenment teach me the final lesson as it were
so the master says well let's go for a walk brings him down to the river and he says
look there there through the water at the bottom of the river look at the rocks student student
leans down it's like yeah he's like look closer he gets down to the water master takes his head

(20:10):
and pushes it underneath the water and he holds him there dude's just frantically sputtering
and trying to get up out of the water finally he lets him up hey breath and breathe for air
and the master says when you want enlightenment as much as you wanted that breath you'll have it
and that's it it's attention and priority how much are you tired of your conflict how much

(20:33):
are you tired of suffering how much you tired of the world you know and the things that you
think you know and all of the over commitment that goes with that that's really all it comes
down to there is nothing else everything else is just pageantry it's all just it's just a show all
the enlightened like the bells and the robes and the and the incense and all that it's all
for nothing it comes from within it comes from you if you're tired of experiencing

(20:59):
the division that you perpetuate that's where it starts because then it comes from you it's
attention right and it's priority everything else just peels away over time just keep going
but yeah and if you can find people to talk about it will help but be careful who you lean
on for answers because the answers that they give you are theirs they won't work the same for you

(21:22):
yeah certainly i like the uh part about priorities that's interesting because i think it was the last
podcast episode i made back in july before i had that realization that i'm not andrew and i
called it um it was something that was sort of you know helping me cope with stuff was using

(21:44):
figuring out your ultimate priority like your priority above all else and i talked for mine
it was being present and uh reducing stress so it was like and i the way i explained it and it
seemed to resonate with a lot of people um was that you know any sort of situation that you may

(22:05):
get stressed and worked up about like there's a reason that you're getting stressed and worked
up about it because you're prioritizing say for example you know you have a interview for a job
coming up so you're prioritizing getting that job over anything else in your life
essentially because you are getting stressed and worked up about it and focusing on that

(22:26):
future sort of result and i was talking about the idea of ultimate priorities being like if your
ultimate priority is staying present your that is your priority over doing well on an interview over
getting a good job over making a lot of money over having you know a successful
career in the eyes of the world like above all of those things so through everything

(22:49):
you do checking that and then when it comes to stress realizing that you know i would rather
live a stress-free life than you know do well on an interview do well on a presentation
because when you do put weight on those things and you do think of those as your sort of priority

(23:12):
you kind of lose that you know those ultimate priorities and you get lost in this idea
of achievement and thinking that that's what you need to accomplish so when you are able to have
those sorts of priorities you know staying present reducing stress then
it's like those are what you focus on and then everything else kind of like drizzles down from

(23:35):
that to a degree and then typically you know you end up doing better on those things because
you are staying present and you're not focused on outcome and going back to you know the analogy and
example that you talk about a lot with the archer you know having one eye on the target and one eye
on you know hitting it or on the shooting of it and it's like when you have one eye on the outcome

(24:00):
you're not able to fully do what you're doing in that moment whether it be a presentation interview
test or anything like that so when you prioritize like you mentioned you know prioritize that
idea of enlightenment whatever even if it is made up when that is your priority it overcomes any
sorts of you know accomplishment of anything and then it's the doing itself it's the here and now

(24:28):
is where you are always and it's like that is as close as you can probably get to any idea
of enlightenment it's just understanding that here and now is is it and it always
has been and always wills be and that's who you are and that's the only thing you'll ever
be and there's nothing more that you have to do like we get caught up in thinking that
we have to do more or be more it's like you can't it's impossible and it's it's futile to even try

(24:56):
yeah absolutely i mean just look at the word enlightenment however you want to take it whether
you want to take it as lightening the load right or brightening up the in the environment either
way you're dispelling confusion which is why anybody who's enlightenment will tell you there
is no such thing as enlightenment right but it's the concept that drives us first like there's a
lot of people who will be like yeah i want to get to enlightenment i want to achieve that and that's

(25:18):
great that's really good in the same way that uh the seat that the sufis want to uh connect
to god through abandoning their want right but there's that catch-22 you have to abandon wanting
to meet god as well right and so it just comes down to eventually chasing enlightenment it's
the story of the satori and the wood cutter that we talked about in a previous episode you have

(25:41):
to stop chasing it right eventually when you get close enough to realizing what it is you're doing
you realize there's nowhere to go there's nothing to chase there is nothing left to attain
but it's one thing to say that and a lot of people do say that and it's another
thing to recognize that genuinely which is ultimately the point of all of this right and
nobody anybody who comes to you and says i am an enlightened master they're not right because

(26:06):
they're still telling you a story they're still telling you the story they need to tell themselves
anybody comes up to you and doesn't tell you anything about themselves at all and they just
want to listen to you as you go through your journey that person's closer to it than any
so-called enlightened master ever right because at least they're paying attention to you even your
friend you mentioned earlier who's an atheist atheists are closer to god than most believers

(26:28):
right because they're not creating a fiction between them and god they just have a fiction
of them to deal with that's pretty much it right it's not like there's two fictions
suddenly having to come together there's just the one that they have to kind of let go of right
so yeah it's it's kind of funny that way i'm going to move on to my next question because
otherwise we're going to keep talking um what do you think about the uprise of veganism and is it

(26:52):
justifiable to eat animal products if it's not a necessity in your individual life so for example
you can healthily and financially afford to consume only plant-based food products
what is your perspective of that should you be a vegan if you can afford to do
so if you can healthily do so or do you think that it's really up to the person

(27:14):
um yeah i mean so i've never really been driven to have any desire
to be vegan or vegetarian or anything like that i think very much is up to the person um
in my opinion and i was actually thinking about this because i want to bring this up again i know
we've talked about like we've touched on this topic before but i do see like the perspective

(27:41):
on the other side of people where it's like if you see yourself as everything then
it's like i i see where that comes from in like not wanting to kill yourself in that sense but

(28:03):
yeah i i don't know if i have like a great reason or argument as to why
i feel like they're just it's like in practice with veganism and and that stuff what i see
is like sort of a high and mighty type attitude in that like you know i'm better because i don't

(28:28):
do that and you do and i always have found that i always find that interesting in everything when
it's like there's a certain situation that plays out in a certain way that it doesn't have to
but it usually does in that way and so i don't know if i have a great

(28:53):
reason as to why i think it doesn't make sense it just never has really occurred to me i don't i
don't know like i don't see an issue with eating food that isn't human but it's also like where
why where is the line then because like i'm not eating humans also so it's like is it

(29:18):
is it like a consciousness thing where if you're if it's not self-conscious then
it should be edible like i don't know i have some questions myself is what i'm trying to say
so i don't know if i have a great answer but i'm very curious of your perspective but long long

(29:39):
story short i've never really thought about like being vegan or vegetarian um i've it's just always
been a part of my life eating meat i don't need as much red meat just because it was hard to digest i
was finding and i would always like not feel great afterwards but yeah i i meet pretty much every day

(30:03):
that's fair i've i've had a great many years to think about this a lot of people have brought this
to my attention and i've went through it numerous times because of course the realization the
genuine recognition that everybody is an extension of you requires you to re-reanalyze the amount of
harm that you're causing to yourself which we've talked about many times i don't see any difference

(30:27):
between humans and animals regardless then again i don't see any difference between humans and plants
except of course how they can biologically express themselves and and the experience that they can
have as a result of the form that they take to me it's all just awareness it's all it's all
life but on that token life has always consumed life in order for life to continue because life

(30:48):
is not separate right so when the lion takes down a gazelle the lion and the gazelle are part of the
same goddamn picture right and they look at the lion king as a part of the circle of life right
i'm not going to break into song but the whole point is that you know as things die they go into
the ground the ground feeds the rest of the things and then those things feed the rest of the things
and it just keeps going circle it full circle and so that's true um usually when we have an aversion

(31:15):
to animals dying that that aversion also comes down to our aversion to us dying
right so the more i'm afraid of death the more i'm afraid of pain the more more opinion i have
about the process of dying or the inevitability the inevitability of me going into the ground
as it were the more issue i'm gonna have with the idea of other beings
dying and going into the ground because i lack that perspective that i'm not me i'm not just the

(31:39):
individual that i'm choosing to attach myself to right so that that changes my perspective slightly
there's also this uh this tendency in the vegan community to think that the way we treat animals
is like the biggest problem that we have on this planet and i'm not going to say it's not a huge
problem if you look at factory farms if you look at the way animals are treated and the

(32:00):
[ __ ] that's pumped into them repeatedly to make them larger products to sell the fact that they're
not allowed to roam live have an existence at all i mean that's that's terrible and it's brutal and
it's the product of a profit-based economy that's always going to cut corners and always going to
sacrifice the integrity and and the dignity of people and animals alike so that is the

(32:20):
problem with that system um that's not a problem with eating meat that's a problem with the way
the production of meat has has been adopted by the society in order to just keep pushing it out as a
product i mean you can tell just by the amount of food if it doesn't get sold it just gets chucked
out that's it and the same is true for meat products right like if they they produce a lot
a large amount of meat for large grocery stores to buy on mass that order is made regardless of

(32:45):
what happens to the meat regardless if people buy it so all of those animals were slaughtered
on the idea that somebody might buy their their dad and their dead bodies that's pointless that
doesn't make any sense because then we're just encouraging people to eat as much as
possible to keep up with the demand to keep the economy going and so now you have people
eating four or five cheeseburgers rather than the one that they might need right so

(33:08):
that all kind of goes into that so for me i i guess the perspective is is that i don't
i don't support factory farms i don't support cruelty to animals for the sake of business but
i grew up around farms i i think i was four years old the first time i saw a chicken have its head
it's neck snapped so that way we could eat that chicken okay so that was my jarring introduction

(33:34):
to the nature of reality and and so i grew up realizing that that's just how life worked but on
the other hand those chickens the cows the animals had a life they lived on a farm where they could
actually try like move around and live and exist and they had a rich full life they weren't just
stuffed into a container and shipped on a truck in the smallest possible space to

(33:57):
save on money right like there was a difference there was some respect given to the animals the
same with uh native american or indigenous uh practices of hunting they would say thank you
after the hunt after killing the animal right it would be thank you for giving your your your soul
your spirit to the rest of us to survive because there was a recognition there is no separation

(34:20):
indigenous belief actually would go so far as to say that you would take on some of the traits
of the animal that you were eating right which they're finding scientifically to not necessarily
be too far off the off the mark because there is in fact a transference of energy there is in fact
a transference that happens there your physiology does get affected though it's not as cut and dry

(34:40):
as the spirit has gone within you but there is some truth to that and so all of that in mind as
with everything everything's gray area i mean i'm not going to say don't eat meat and i'm not going
to say just become a vegan because it's really up to you you can do whatever you want if you
can afford to just be a vegan and you prefer that diet and that is the only way for you to minimize

(35:01):
your use of factory farms or the industry that drives the cruelty of animals do that if you are
in a position like i am where i live on an island that has a great many smaller family farms and and
a local fishing industry you can eat meat if you know where that meat is coming from if
you if you can honestly say that you support the production of that meat or wherever it comes from

(35:26):
you know and the treatment of the animals more importantly and go ahead and do that
there is no there is no right answer one way or another though i will admit i think the funniest
reason i've ever heard uh from a friend for being a vegan wasn't necessarily
because she wanted to save animals but because she really hated plants
that's pretty funny yeah i've never i've never heard that perspective there but yeah it is uh

(35:53):
it is interesting just i don't know in what i see in in reality of it it comes with a lot of
judgment and egotism along with the uh beliefs of it and i i totally understand where people come
from who you know don't because that industry is so [ __ ] up with the factories and i've

(36:13):
you know driven past i've done a lot of road trips through middle america and driven past some of
those and it is a tough tough scene for sure um but yeah so but the act of eating meat in itself
totally different argument and i i will i will die by that i will die on that hill that the cruelty

(36:33):
of animals that is perpetuated by our system is a different argument than whether or not you should
eat meat right there are considerations there i'm all for overthrowing that system not necessarily
down with never eating meat again because i am meat right something's going to eat me or if it
could it would i've often said that right like if if my situation was reversed if i was in nature

(36:58):
and some animal was hungry and i was by myself i wouldn't fault it for wanting to eat me
right that's just its nature that's part of how it lives that that's the existence that it was
born into and so it's important to keep that in mind i i think um your question all right
let's see uh all right this is another a little bit of a open-ended one uh related time greetings

(37:27):
i'm feeling i'm running out of time how can i manage it thanks so i think there is a lot
there that and i i don't think it's uncommon to feel like that i think a lot of that stems
from societal pressures and certain ideals to live up to and the sort of

(37:52):
blueprint that we have for life i'm not sure yeah i've no idea how old i can't tell
you know how old or young this person is but the idea of you know running out of time or feeling
like you need to have certain things accomplished by a certain age i've actually found something
i've been thinking of with the idea of you know like the whole blueprint of graduating school by

(38:17):
22 you know having a family by 30 and whatever and i understand for people who want to have a
family there's certain you know biological clocks involved but outside of that for the most part
i was thinking of it from the sort of flipped perspective of how old people live so if you think
of your life you know someone could live to be 90 versus 70 and potentially someone who has a lot

(38:43):
less stress throughout their 15 20s 30s may have the opportunity to live longer and still be quite
functional at an older age so in that sense if you live to be 90 then when you're 40 you have 50
years left versus if you live to be 70 when you're 20 you have 50 years left and yet we have insane

(39:09):
amount of judgments and perceptions on people who maybe are at a similar stage in life when they're
20 versus 40 someone who you know starts company startup whatever when they're 20 they're like a
kid genius and make a million dollars versus some is like this crazy thing like they've made

(39:30):
it they're successful versus when you're 40 if you do the same thing it's like oh whatever or
just people aren't as patient with things and understand like that everyone tries to have
you know the get rich quick thing and and there are ways if you're more patient it's not nearly
as difficult to you know build some semblance of wealth and you don't and the feeling that you're

(39:56):
running out of time is all just perception of your situation and how other people are perceiving your
situation and i find for the most part people aren't perceiving other people's situations
very much they're not looking at you and being like you're running out of time it's all inside
of your own mind the feelings of running out of time and thinking that you have to you

(40:22):
know accomplish certain things by a certain age like those are all made-up constructs and ideas
that our society has developed and people have bought into and now we sort of have this general
blueprint that i mentioned so i think being able to take a step back and look at your situation

(40:42):
from a third person perspective or just realize that you are the awareness of what is and then
you don't have to worry about the third person perspective but understanding that
you know the things that you're striving for questioning those things as well like the
things that you are running out of time for again it's hard to know exactly what this is whether

(41:07):
you know if they're talking about dying or if they're talking about accomplishing something
but i think understanding that there's nothing to experience beyond right now like there is nothing
to do outside of right now so if there are things you want to work on or do or accomplish like

(41:27):
doing them now is the only time and place you can here and now is the only time and place you
can ever do them so understanding that it's like time sort of gets removed from the equation and
then there's no time to run out of because time isn't there anymore it's an illusion to begin
with and understanding that i think can help at least ease those feelings despite the fact as

(41:52):
i mentioned that they're primarily 99.9 of the time complete if not 100 of the time completely
made up based on societal pressures perceptions and constructs absolutely well
and i think that um our collective belief in science and control uh works against us to some

(42:13):
degree because as we've been able to exercise more control medically over death our lifespan
has increased and now we have this idea that well the average lifespan is you know 70 to 80 years
old and so we have almost this expectation that we're going to live to 70 or 80 years old right
and so it's like oh i feel like i'm running out of time it's like you can die tomorrow

(42:36):
you could leave your house today and die right and so it comes down to if that were to happen
and it may are you good with it and if not that's what you have to work on that should be your
priority because it's all well and good to think when i get to 50 i'm going to have this much money
unless you never get to 50 in which case you just pissed away all of the moments that you did have

(43:00):
for some date that's never going to happen right so it's it's a balance as with everything right
it just comes down to i'm going to plan for the future as best i can but i'm not going to assume
it's going to happen the way i i think it will i'm not going to assume that everything's going to lay
out the way i think it will in my mind or the way other people have told me because nothing in life

(43:20):
does work out that way everything is gray area everything is unknown right so if you think that
you're if you always feel like you're running out of time it's because you're too focused on time
right that's pretty much it you're just dwelling on how much you have left and you're dwelling
on a fiction that you ultimately don't know so as long as you have here and now you still have time

(43:42):
in which case work on that enjoy that to the best of your ability that will ultimately that
practice will help you feel not only like you have more time but like your eternal and and that that
does happen over time but it is over time it does happen now um but it is a process of practicing
being here now to the point where you realize that your perception of time isn't isn't what

(44:06):
you think it is right and and you're focused on it specifically for a sense of certainty that's it
yeah yeah certainly i think yeah and it's all about balance like that i feel like i get a lot
of questions about you know oh like live present like well i'll just stop saving money and give

(44:26):
all my money away and oh i'm homeless thanks a lot and i'm like give me a break but at the
same time like i understand people like you know taking things to extremes and whatnot and i think
it's important to realize that you can plan here now like you know the difference between worrying
and planning it's like worrying is an action that you're taking here and now and it's not that you

(44:52):
have to put all of your weight on it and think and take it as truth necessarily but through
doing it having some preparation giving yourself a destination or not a destination but a path or
direction through the planning but then not taking it seriously and understanding that the odds of
it actually playing out exactly like you planned are essentially zero and being okay with that and

(45:20):
so between balancing that and then on the worry side of it is like worrying is just you're not
accomplishing it's it's not accomplishing anything and it's all focused on existing
in the future it's not something you're doing well it is something you're doing now but it's not like
the action that planning is necessarily it's like there is a action-oriented aspect to it versus

(45:47):
a i don't know almost mindless passive like i think plan is so like okay so it's like planning
is your mind is the servant and worrying is your mind is the master so like planning you
are using your mind as a tool because as humans it is a incredible tool that we have the ability to

(46:10):
perceive the past and the future it is but it is a tool and most people
that i have interacted with it is their master and the question you have to ask yourself is
if i wanted to stop thinking and worrying could i and if the answer is no then it's your master and

(46:33):
that's where you know your attention should well your attention can just be here now and then it
all you know goes away for the least begins to get better anyway but you know if that is where it is
where you can't necessarily turn it off then that is something to work on now that's interesting

(46:54):
it just dawned on me that it's done on me before because it is a good way to come at it this time
is the more you're focused on your character the more you're focused on on your idea of yourself
the more you're focused on your narrative and the narrative always exists in time yes so the two go

(47:14):
together that was an interesting insight i like that one okay next question of course this one
is one i've been looking forward to getting to because it's another one about religion how does
one get over religious trauma specifically feeling guilty or fearful when leaving a belief system
all right um i feel like my like in my situation which is pretty much all i can speak to um it

(47:44):
wasn't necessarily like an overnight thing it was very much a process and it started with
like i still was nominally catholic and this is it's relatively recent for me it's been
probably progressing since halfway through college so
i don't know five years it's been processing and and i think it started out with i just

(48:09):
you know half of the stuff i was like that doesn't make any sense like i don't believe
that part of it and i was still like the last part was believing in god and like a higher power and
eventually it was just like less and less made any sense and i was like all right i
i believe you know like 10 of what they're talking about like why am i still identified as you know

(48:33):
catholic so then that kind of went away and then i still believed in god but i would question it
like you know what's really going on and then and then i got to a point where i was fully
like sort of out of that and i think in my experience it hasn't been as much where people
tell me that i should think differently or that i should be afraid but it's that

(49:00):
they don't like when i bring it up and i just don't as much because it's quite frankly just not
worth when we're talking about like stress and and stuff like that it's just not worth my energy to
try and convince anyone and we can argue whether that's even possible anyway but um yeah i think

(49:21):
i think i mean having a place like you know our discord and patreon and people that you can
talk to about it places you can go to talk about things like i know
with my situation people close to me still being involved like being able to talk about it
on a podcast every week and kind of talk through belief systems and all of that can

(49:44):
be very helpful so i think having people that you can talk to who are in a similar boat who
kind of have been on the other side and that can be super helpful in and of itself uh in terms of
i don't i don't know if i have a great perspective on if you're in a situation where people are like

(50:06):
more hostile about it i think maybe rey may have a little bit more experience just like just because
you've been through it longer and i don't know but possibly because i feel like i don't have
that much where i i was always growing up in an environment that it was religious but
but it wasn't like crazy religious it was like everyone was kind of like yeah we're gonna like

(50:31):
hold on to it because we're scared of of death but like we're not you know pushing it on anyone we're
you know we used to go to mass like a couple times a year now it's like just christmas and
easter and i was even like do we really like it's the same thing every year like we could just you
know go to dinner a little earlier or something and i didn't actually say that but i was thinking

(50:54):
because i know that wouldn't be received well um but yeah so i'll let ray speak to this as well now
that's kind of funny it's like i'm just going to assume rey has pissed off more people uh
this one um this one actually resonates pretty pretty strongly with me because

(51:14):
growing up i i didn't have uh much of a support i didn't have parents you know i
was always kind of i felt like i didn't have any value or worth and so religion was um my first
life preserver it was the thing that i i reached to for that sense of certainty and security and
it meant a lot to me i was i was what you would would you what you would call a devout christian i

(51:36):
i really was i i read the bible i i pray i prayed i did the rosary i did the whole thing and uh and
it was exactly because of that that my rejection of christianity later on was so strong was because
i was such a devout believer only to find all of those those lessons within christianity while

(51:57):
they sound pleasant and while they offer you some sense of certainty and purpose and an idea of who
you are actually just get you farther and farther from the truth they take you farther farther and
farther down the road of um being self-critical where you're never going to meet god you're never
going to feel worthy you're never going to unless of course you just you know continue to tell

(52:18):
yourself jesus loves me jesus loves me because you you're never going to meet jesus and so
you're never actually going to have him tell you i love you you're doing great so you're always just
telling yourself a narrative right and so i leaned really hard on that and when i came out of it
there was a lot of leftover programming let's just say that and i dealt with that probably

(52:40):
into my late 20s if i'm honest about it and it's just because the idea of god was so um solid for
me it was so pivotal to me everything in my life was was built around this idea that there's a god
and so it took me a while once i realized that oh that god's a concept actually what they're
pointing at is a state of being didn't understand that at all um so i would immediately go

(53:05):
oh maybe i shouldn't be questioning these things i actually had a friend say to me do you think
maybe there are certain things we're not meant to question which just set me off i'm like no
obviously if i'm if i can do it i'm meant to do it right and so that was kind of the point there but
all throughout that process of recognizing that the narrative wasn't the truth that the

(53:26):
religion itself was um the result of people misunderstanding and investing in their ego
more than anything to do with god um the more i started to hear this fear of oh you're gonna go to
hell you know god's judging you what if you're you're leaving the path what if you're wrong
what if when you die earlier and so all of this old programming kept popping up and it sounded

(53:48):
very much just like a horde of screaming demons behind me just wanting my attention just pay
attention to these thoughts right because they had always been there but that's what it is it's
programming it's habitual thought that's all it is it's the fact that it was some of your earliest
programming which is even harder even harder to let go of because you were a child when this stuff
was drilled into you or at least it was in my case and so it becomes foundational to everything else

(54:12):
you perceive just like andrew was saying earlier right it's one of those perspectives that alters
everything else you do the perspective of a division between you and god more importantly
the the perspective of a gatekeeper in jesus or anybody else you know that you have to go through
to get to god like all of these things create a story about you as not being worthy is not um

(54:32):
being capable of connecting to god now that you are a sinner and so as you start to question that
as you start to look more into the bible where the stories came from what actually happened to
the people who first told those stories at the hands of the people who then wrote those stories
down when you start looking into well we have a question here about the book of revelations

(54:55):
when you start looking into the origin of revelation you immediately start having questions
and so as we said before the podcast the reason most christian people the reason most religious
people don't question they don't look into the history they don't look into you know where these
things actually came from they don't they'll just tell you it's the word of god and leave it at that

(55:16):
is because as soon as you do start looking into it as soon as you start questioning it it starts
to fall apart it starts to become harder and harder and harder to give it credibility and
so that's that's part of that process the other part of that process is recognizing it yourself
is is recognizing that the farther you get from the dogma the farther you get away from
the character that they're telling you you are the closer you're getting to the state of mind

(55:38):
of people who actually managed to achieve the experience of god that the bible was based on
you'll have ears to hear you'll have eyes to perceive rather than just looking at other
people's misinterpretations based on their own ego and based on their own need for control that's one
thing i've always found funny about christianity and i've said it before is that christians
more than following jesus follow the apostles that didn't understand jesus i

(56:04):
always find that really interesting it's like oh if we quote matthew it's like right i thought you
were christian aren't we talking about jesus right and if we look at just the things that jesus said
most of christianity doesn't line up with it right so it really just comes down to just
keep questioning and that trauma will start to go away but in the case and as andrew said sometimes

(56:25):
you're in a toxic environment and the people around you are not going to enjoy these questions
choose your battles right on the one hand you don't need to prove anything to them if you're
recognizing it yourself and as you are recognizing it yourself you will find that they are going to
distance themselves from you almost naturally oil and water it's just because you're you're not

(56:45):
you're not in a state of mind that makes them comfortable with their narrative
anymore as soon as you start questioning it you start to exclude yourself from that
that club right which is why it's uh it's often a an aggressive response to questioning it's often
you know a hostile reaction to your questioning and it's not because you shouldn't question it's
because they depend on you not questioning in order for them to sustain the false sense

(57:08):
of security that they have right in which case let those people go doesn't have to and one more
warning and this is super important is that it is just as easy to get caught up in being a christian
as it is to get you to get caught up in being an ex-christian right you can by just identity alone
pitch yourself against the church against religion as a whole and that in itself is its own religion

(57:34):
that is a problem right like i've had numerous people come to one of my videos from back in
2005 they're listening they're listening boom i mentioned jesus once they're like
oh you mentioned jesus i'm out it's like wow i can see christianity really programmed you
right meanwhile they're thinking oh it's just christians that are programmed no you're holding
on to an idea too you are just as stuck on that concept that you can't now look

(57:58):
at the insight behind it right so there is nothing wrong with just not
defining yourself looking at all sources as possible you know ways to find insight but
you don't have to be against something just don't use it just don't do it just don't be a christian
that's enough that's all you have to do right you don't have to try and take down the church

(58:20):
the church is going to fall apart on its own right you know the fruit by the tree that bears it
right and the fruit that comes out of the out of the vatican has always been divisive out
of religion as a whole will always continue to be based on the ego it will always continue to
divide you from the rest of reality so just keep knowing that and the trauma will eventually fade

(58:41):
and you will start causing some trauma for the people who don't want to let that go
you know not intentionally just because you are in fact enjoying your life enjoying the realization
of god which is unfortunately and this is probably one of the saddest parts about being religion
or being religious you can't experience god it's all hearsay right when you're religious
when you're a believer all you've ever done is heard about god heard about the experience of

(59:05):
being connected and you're following hearsay where the alternative is to actually have the experience
and then all of that programming just stops making sense and it becomes easier to shed it
and move on but as with everything else time and attention and priority and it'll eventually change
yeah it's it's uh it's pretty fascinating just how how interesting all that is with with holding

(59:30):
onto it and how quick people are to jump from a belief system to another belief system that
they have just left whether it's anti their past belief system or just you know cycling through
another sort of belief system do you think that's part of like i don't know i don't want to say
human nature but kind of like wanting to hold on to something or do you think there's so much

(59:54):
just fear within us all the time about you know people's fears of of death and they try and
hold on to it or do you think they're just so tied to the idea an illusion of division
that they almost need something to believe in in order to soothe the inevitable fears that come

(01:00:16):
with feeling like you're divided that's a really good question i i um i posted a video about this
earlier last year and it was just something that came to me as i was walking and talking to my wife
and it really i think it comes down to this the human brain evolved over time and created
a frontal cortex which is gives us the ability to look at multiple scenarios it gives us the

(01:00:42):
ability to really conceptualize time right conceptualize what could happen numerous
stages or numerous points down the road but our our reptilian brain doesn't understand that it
doesn't understand that this new part of the brain can perceive things that aren't real right and so
our reptilian brain which is all fight or flight suddenly perceives an identity an idea of ourself

(01:01:08):
and it perceives it in the same way it perceives our body as us so we have an idea of who we are
and our reptilian brain goes oh [ __ ] that's you i gotta keep you alive i gotta keep you safe right
and so now our brain unknowingly is protecting the fiction of our identity because we think it's us
right the brain doesn't understand that it can lie to itself it doesn't understand it

(01:01:28):
has two different two different parts that are working entirely different
and so we have to to kind of train ourselves to recognize that's a product of our brain
right the idea that we are an idea is something that our brain keeps trying to grasp onto and
it's only through recognizing that it's not the truth and i mean this collectively if we
could get this into our schooling system if we could actually make this a part of our culture

(01:01:52):
everything would change everything would change but until we have the conversation that our brain
is fooling us we're going to continue to fall into this trap it doesn't matter what it is
which is why i always find the atheist argument to be so interesting right because
normally the atheist argument is just i don't know if there's a god or not

(01:02:13):
there's no proof i'm gonna leave it at that which is great because it's
kind of open-ended right but sometimes the atheist argument is there is no god
right in which case okay so now you've just you've just identified you just come up with an idea
again that your brain is presenting you because you don't want to believe in that fiction so now
you've created another assumption you created another fiction to balance out that uncertainty

(01:02:34):
just don't commit to it that's all it is that's where agnostics tend to be closer to the point
than than atheists agnostics will just say i don't know could be not even sure i have the right
questions or the right answers for that right it's just just look at it for what it is right but
you know it really just comes down to until we understand that our brain

(01:02:54):
creates a reality that we experience until we can understand that that that our brain will go
oh here's a perception and everything that goes with it and we start to question that we're always
going to end up following into falling into illusions we're always going to end up falling
into into distortion not recognizing that it comes from us and so that's why i've often said that
you know practices like meditation zen even being a jedi i mean it's all really just comes down to

(01:03:21):
self-awareness what are you uh investing in as a thought or as an identity or a narrative about
yourself and what reality is that creating because if you can come to terms with that
like i'll give an example i'll go and i'll have a conversation with religious people
and in that conversation it can get quite heated at no point do i walk away from that going yeah

(01:03:41):
you know that defines me that that that reflects on me as a value it's just a conversation it's
just something that's happening right and the less committed i am to being any particular part
in that conversation the more easily i'm able to move around within that conversation to move
with their perspectives to work with what they're saying and find other insights in that whereas if
i'm just focusing on my perspective there is no there is no god there is no jesus you know blah

(01:04:06):
blah i'm not going to catch anything from that conversation they're not going to catch anything
because i'm just telling them they're wrong and trying to validate myself the entire damn time
right so we're not going to grow as people and so i think that that's probably the biggest thing
it's just recognizing that we are illusion machines right like our brain is incredibly
powerful it's incredibly powerful you can literally think to yourself right now i'm

(01:04:29):
going to go out this afternoon what if i run into somebody on the street who's drunk and aggressive
and then not leave your house because you're afraid of that happening that's incredible if
you think about it the placebo effect likewise is incredible so we're just starting to to scratch
the surface on a conversation about exactly how powerful our consciousness is about exactly

(01:04:50):
how tricky our mind can be but we're not having that conversation yet right now we're talking
about like god and the devil right right now we're talking about you know two different
sides it's like no there is no devil the devil is just the perception that appears to be truth
the master of lies the father of lies right it's just it it the perception is never the truth

(01:05:11):
the perception is always just the perception and it may dictate the experience but only so
long as you're invested in it as truth right and so it really just it's the one step process we
always talk about right self-awareness that's pretty much it um is it your question or mine
uh i believe it's mine right that was that was a patreon question yeah um

(01:05:35):
okay last one from instagram have you met the machine elves so i think this is in relation to
psychedelic a lot of people is that what this talked about typically usually ayahuasca but it's
uh not the only drug for sure yeah i feel like that's i don't know maybe people will perceive
that experience i had when i you know made that video about you know talking to god and i talked

(01:05:59):
about on was the last week last week for the week before's episode um of you know talking to god and
when i got to this place with myself it was i saw these little you know cartoon characters and that
could be i think similar to what people express as the machine elves and and so when i got there um

(01:06:21):
i've already talked about this in a previous episode but i'll just run through it again quick
because it's i think related to the question um i saw them and i was like immediately i i knew
where i was without ever having been there but also having been there um and i was like oh so
there's there's a few of you and that was because that was the first question they immediately

(01:06:41):
turned into one being and it that in itself that experience just made it very clear to me and then
they went from one sort of blob being to you know a tree and then a few other shapes and they're
like we are whatever you perceive us to be we are everything and nothing just based on your

(01:07:02):
perception of of us or me or you know whatever words you want to throw in there but um so yeah
that that was my sort of experience but it's very interesting and i think i don't know i haven't uh
read or looked into the idea of the machine elves as much but do you think that is a sort of realm

(01:07:26):
that's similar to what i experience in a lot of ways that people sort of go through as as a sort
of experience within yourself that's you know that is yourself and it's just a for whatever
reason that's how people perceive them like i'm curious why do you think people call them machine

(01:07:47):
elves that's just the most common way that people experience them okay it is i i've ran across them
a few times it's really interesting because of course we've talked about awareness and all
things within awareness has to exist somewhere at some point right and then that's all one thing so
it's entirely possible that on some planet far far away in a distant time space there are elves that

(01:08:10):
manage to blend with machines and and whatnot but the symbolism is what's interesting to me because
every conversation i've ever had conversation with the machine helps has always been
along the lines of our our potential as a species it's always been this is what you're capable of
it's always been if you can find balance this is something you can become or reflect in yourself

(01:08:35):
and so what i find interesting about the machine l symbolism is that when we think about elves
typically we're looking at um ancient beings with wisdom that live in alignment with nature
that is the entire mythology of ground elves but machine elves have managed to use that knowledge
with technology in balance and so there's the symbolism of what we're capable of doing

(01:09:01):
of finding that balance of in fact being these ancient beings i mean it just it's because of
the mythology of elves and everything that goes into that thanks token um that that that affects a
lot of what we're experiencing for sure because somebody who's never read anything to do with
elves would more than likely see them as something else and which is often why you have people who
have more of a christian background seeing angels right but it's all it's all symbolism

(01:09:25):
it's all symbolism for for our awareness and what's possible and then of course we see
a possibility in our potential and our brain comes up with a symbolic way to represent
that possibility and allow us to communicate with that possibility within ourselves and
of sort of of course based on what what we have experienced what we've looked at in the world what
what we've absorbed as context our brain creates a symbolic representation of that insight and so we

(01:09:52):
interact with that symbolic representation until you start questioning it too far in which case
the symbolism falls apart and you end up talking to something else entirely which is exactly what
happened to you and has happened with me multiple times i mean to anybody who has in fact talked to
the the techno elves as it were just start asking them more questions you know aren't you just me

(01:10:14):
and watch what they've become because it changes it changes the flow but it is it's all symbolism
it's really just all of us um accessing parts of our awareness that we're not necessarily in
a state of mind to understand without something to bridge the gap without something to act as
kind of an intermediary between our state of mind and the state of mind that we're communicating
with and so we come up with characters as a result as a result of that process

(01:10:40):
okay that yeah that makes sense yeah that's something that has become clear with some of my
trips is just the perceptions and just you're able and then just like when i'm when my eyes
aren't closed and i'm seeing things here it's like very much peeled back and able to see things just
more clearly without all of as many of my perceptions but i think it kind of seems like no

(01:11:07):
matter what there's going to be something that's still sort of there as your individual perception
of things and that's why you know people you know when they have experiences like that and they have
sorts of beliefs about things that's what they see they see it based on their perception and i have

(01:11:28):
um when i uh so another interesting story um kind of about this is family related but my little
brother when he was younger um like two likes apparently saw jesus above um our neighbor's house

(01:11:49):
who had just passed away but like we didn't know they had passed away yet they were like 85 or 90
and he was like a little baby so you know my mom thought that was like you know the craziest thing
ever and it kind of like reaffirmed her beliefs and things like that uh because how could you know
a two-year-old say that must've been jesus yeah and so now hearing you know remembering that it's

(01:12:17):
like that's just how it was perceived because of the stories and narratives that you've been
told it's like oh it has to be that what else could it possibly be and it's like there's nothing
saying that it has to be that except for your perceptions and the things that you have been
taught to believe yeah so it comes down to what did he see right and if the only way for him to

(01:12:42):
translate what he was experiencing was the image of jesus which was the closest thing he had been
taught that resembled that kind of energy or that kind of insight makes perfect sense yeah yeah so
yeah so yes i think i don't know exactly what was said my mom would probably tell me but i think it
was something like i see a bearded man above that house or something and it's like oh jesus

(01:13:08):
yeah well and this is it right i mean hallucinations or symbolism or visuals
or whatever you want visions i mean they're always they've always been relied upon by by
mystics as well right because there's symbolism and there's meaning behind that symbolism but then
again you can't take the symbolism at face value because as soon as you do that you've discounted
everything behind it and you're like no no it's just the symbol it's like well whatever that

(01:13:30):
symbol means to you but you're not the person who had that vision so it doesn't really matter
right speaking of symbolism and actually this is a perfect segue into another supporter question
what do you think of the book of revelations
i don't know if i should start this one off i think i may be able to chime in on certain

(01:13:52):
things because i know almost i've not spent very much time looking into it at all like i
was definitely it was part of my teachings growing up i'm sure like we read from a lot of different
books in sunday school and i went to catholic school for from fifth to fifth grade through
high school um but yeah specifically i don't know if i can start this one off

(01:14:19):
that's fair um i think it's important to recognize first that there's a lot of assumptions around
the book of revelation specifically a lot of assumptions around the name john that's
ascribed to the book of revelations most people don't go and look at the fact that that has
nothing to do with john any john that's in the new testament whatsoever actually it's based
on a guy named john the elder uh who lived in asia minor about a hundred years after jesus

(01:14:42):
was killed or rather about 100 years approximately after jesus was killed and so
he never met jesus didn't live anywhere near where jesus was from and at the time was a christian
who was in direct contradiction to rome and the expansion of rome and so the book of revelation
starts off with uh there's like seven letters to the different churches um expressing the need

(01:15:06):
for this this revitalization of christianity essentially expressing that you know there's
this great evil coming and that we need to believe if we're going to stop this and then it goes into
this big symbolic um story of how that evil is going to rise and it goes according to
many different stages and the problem with the symbolism is that if you don't know the history
it all sounds terrifying right like monsters coming out of the sea

(01:15:30):
and and there's trumpets and there's angels and there's all kinds of stuff in here like jesus
what the hell's happening here but if you actually go and you look at the symbolism and
you look at the history at the time specifically about john and his opposition to rome it makes
perfect sense because he's talking specifically about the expansion of rome and their response
to christianity like at one point he talks about uh i wrote this down uh the five fallen

(01:15:56):
right in chris in in revelations they talk about the five fallen what he is talking about are the
five emperors of rome that had died prior to that right that was the point he was talking about the
roman empire that's all he was talking about um he refers to one who has been wounded which was nero
nero was an emperor who had died of a wound right and so he's talking about the roman empire

(01:16:21):
he's talking about um the the beast rising from the sea and the number of the beast and all that
he's talking about the the money that was ascribed to rome right the dollars and error or the coins
that were caesars he's talking about all of that it's all about how if you're if you're a member
of the of the roman empire you're essentially serving the beast that's all revelation was meant

(01:16:42):
to be it was meant to be rhetoric and mythology to scare people into line and get them to to follow
christianity rather than the dominant religion at the time you know it's the same reason that uh
genesis for example uh focuses on a snake and a woman being the biggest problem it just happens
to be that when genesis was written the only other dominant religion in the area worshiped snakes and

(01:17:05):
women as their mythology as their symbolism for their religion and so how do you stomp out another
religion you make their symbolism evil right and so everything just comes back down to marketing
and public relations and that's very much what the book of revelations is it's just it's just
more fear tactic it's just more more rhetoric in order to get people to agree with you and and

(01:17:27):
when you read it if you're not just a devout like oh jesus is coming and i'm righteous and
everything else it's very it's very easy to see that the story is is bunk it doesn't mean anything
it really it's just it's pleasant imagery or it's interesting imagery at the very least but there's
nothing insightful in there there's really nothing of use whatsoever because it's just a fever dream

(01:17:47):
of somebody who is fanatical about their belief and their identity that went with it as they
because they were opposed to some other evil and so there's a lot of ego that goes in that and so
everything in that story kind of reinforces that that's my perspective of revelations at least
out of everything in the new testament it's the first thing that should get tossed on the fire
so was it basically created as so when people read it is it like kind of like a scary story

(01:18:13):
about what's gonna happen if you don't believe essentially is what i'm getting oh no not just if
you don't believe it's a story of the end times it's a story about the apocalypse coming about
what's happening on judgement day like it's it's a story about how the end of the world will come
about how the dead will rise how how it like it's a terrifying story at the end of the day man like

(01:18:34):
you could make a series of movies out of it and people would go that was a bit far-fetched like
it really is it's a hell of a story but none of it's real it's all based on this fear of judgment
and this idea that god judges itself and that some of us are living according to a plan and
others are not and blah blah blah it's it's all just vilification and identity and ego but it's

(01:18:55):
a hell of a story and it'll scare the crap out of anybody who doesn't look into where it came from
okay yeah yeah i will i will uh i don't know would you recommend i uh look into it for the urge
just for shits and giggles maybe yeah i mean like it's just if you're sitting down at home one day
you got a cold beer or something you want to get a good giggle yeah sure crack it open but i mean

(01:19:19):
if you're looking into it for for some some sense of what's coming in the end times don't waste your
time it's really not worth it i mean it's it's really it's just fiction it's by far the least
useful part of the new testament by far and they just included it at the end because it really
seals that deal right like if you think about it it really just hammers the point home like you

(01:19:41):
know jesus jesus jesus love love love end of the world if you don't follow us you're gonna die okay
sold right that's pretty much what it comes down to right um so try and try and consider that if
you're reading revelations that it really is the end of a sales pitch you know always be closing
is is what we were taught in sales and that's exactly what revelations does

(01:20:04):
yeah it's like if the rest of this didn't convince you hopefully this one
drives it home and i really do see that in a lot of ways that it's the fear that keeps people
holding on it's like that fear of like oh what if you're what if you're wrong you know you don't
want all this bad [ __ ] to happen to you and like that's how i see it playing out and people

(01:20:26):
close to me who you know they don't really believe much of it but they still hold on because they're
afraid of what if they're wrong or what if you know what if it is all correct you know you can't
disprove it it's like ah give me a break that's the funny part right it's like we're going to

(01:20:46):
come up with a story that's going to make you feel like you know what's going to happen after death
and just happen to make you afraid that it's not going to happen or that something else is going
to happen instead of just going you know there's no death life is eternal that's why i always find
it really interesting that in in i think it was mark jesus actually scolds his apostles he's like

(01:21:07):
you know you're not listening god is of the living right like there's no afterlife you're not getting
this and and it's true in the new testament jesus never once refers to life after death
like he's never talking about an afterlife what he's saying is that heaven is here now that you
can you know be at the right side of the father as it were as you can be in alignment with with

(01:21:28):
reality right and yet christianity has created this idea of like the afterlife in heaven and
hell and all that based on dante's inferno which was written like a thousand years after the facts
right so it just became this romanticized idea that if you don't believe in us you're going to
burn right there is um oh god there's this great documentary it's called jesus camp i definitely

(01:21:49):
recommend that you watch it and it was back uh in the days when george bush jr was president
but essentially it's about these children that go to this this camp to learn about
jesus and then of course to learn how to support the republican party which is really
really interesting yeah i know um but what i always found funny is just to drive it home

(01:22:11):
jesus camp which is for children is held at the lake of fire campsite i have to say
just to drive it home you're going to hell right but i definitely i encourage you to watch that
documentary and what they do to children it's terrible the children are terrified they're so
scared that they're going to go to hell if they don't pray to jesus i knew that very well you know

(01:22:36):
bless me father for i have sinned you know or go into gym god help me if i die take my soul right
that kind of thing it's always on death always always always and i know when i was going into
church it's like you know oh look the stained glass ah there's a guy bleeding and hanging
on a cross like that's everywhere it's like do you really think that that was the image that
he wanted to leave us with like look at the movie the passion of the christ was just about him dying

(01:23:01):
there was nothing about his passion there was nothing about what he was talking about
it wasn't about the story it was about how he died because christians love to focus on that
they will focus on that rather than how he lived what he said what would jesus do right well let's
talk about that let's not just talk he would die end of story that kind of ruins the story

(01:23:24):
right there's nowhere else to go with that yeah damn yeah i still remember when i was younger
um because i went to uh school i went to from fifth grade to ninth grade was
very very catholic conservative and they would hold confession like monthly and i remember
everyone would like get all nervous going up to it and then ever feel so good afterwards and

(01:23:48):
i remember thinking like oh i could die and i'm going straight to heaven it was like the greatest
feeling ever honestly it was like it was kind of equivalent to like how i feel most of the time now
but it was that sort of feeling of just like relief like i didn't there's not really anything
to be afraid of because you know i have nothing to lose i i'm going straight to heaven if i die

(01:24:10):
right now as long as i don't you know have a you know lustful thought in the meantime or something
yeah which which probably you know happened technically i probably committed some sort
of sin by the end of that day so can't help but really right like that that's the christian thing
i always found kind of funny is like you can't escape being a sinner you can't it doesn't matter

(01:24:34):
how much you believe in jesus it doesn't matter how much you convince other people to believe in
jesus it doesn't matter what you do because you were born of original sin you were born from sex
how do you get out of that one yeah right you can't but that's why i always find the etymology
of sin to be so interesting right it was never a hell-worthy trespass it was just missing the

(01:24:57):
point that's all it means it's missing the mark it's literally the etymology it's an
archery thing just like everything else right but it's just missing the mark which all believers do
they all miss the point so believers are sinners so christianity's got it right very true all right

(01:25:17):
should we move on next question uh let us see all right moving over to tick tock comments
uh oh all right what are your thoughts on having children both personally and for others in general
that is a interesting question um that i i mean do you want to start sure

(01:25:38):
um but i don't think there's anything wrong with having children i have a child
myself but on the other hand i think that it's really important to recognize that it's very easy
to get caught up in in the societal narrative again that you won't be happy until you are
married and have a child or two and a house the white picket fence and the whole thing right

(01:26:00):
um often people who who do have children as a result of checking off the list don't
have much of a relationship with those children as they get older they get put into school and
then you see them for maybe two or three hours in the evening for 12 years of their life and
then they move on they go to university and so on and so forth and so um it's so important if

(01:26:20):
you are in that situation to change and grow as a person with your child right and this is
so important as a parent you can't be a parent and then just look down at your child like you're here
to learn i'm here to teach because then you're not growing and all your child is learning from or is
learning from you is how to not grow they're just learning how to stagnate right and so

(01:26:44):
if you can continue to question everything you think you are if you can continue to question
everything you think you know if you can set yourself in a state of mind where you're at
least willing to look at things afresh for the sake of sharing an experience with another being
then parenthood's probably going to be really good for you you're going to really enjoy that
right but if you're always just trying to sell validate if you're always just trying
to feel like you're a teacher or you're an authority or anything else then you

(01:27:07):
may as well just become the warden of a prison because you'll get more enjoyment out of that
on the other token we have over 7 billion people on the planet and a huge population problem
and that's not going to go away until we start taking children in the process of
having children slightly more seriously and so from in my case i had one child and then i had a

(01:27:29):
vasectomy that was it i was done no more children and the reason is because i want to put as much
time and attention into the one child that i do have the other point is the fact that
the world is very quickly going to start going through a scarcity issue we're going to start
our children are going to start suffering through certain things that are the result of the way we
live and the way that our parents lived before us that's going to be quite difficult and so

(01:27:53):
i think it's important to keep that in mind when you're considering whether or not to have children
that whether or not it's a good time for you today doesn't mean that it's going to be a good time for
them 20 years from now and so that's something that you should consider if you're going to have
a child have a child if you're going to have two children think about why you're having children
right that's my my only piece of advice and it's not because there's anything wrong with having

(01:28:16):
more than one child but i think it's important to recognize that that that uh habit or that
i guess practice of having numerous numerous children is from a different era of humanity i
mean back when we were clans back when having a large family was necessary to help you till
the farm and help support the the the crop and the uh the town or the village that you lived

(01:28:39):
in the community having large amount of people to help you and grow up that was a big thing
but now that's not the same thing we're not plants anymore and families don't necessarily
stick together where blood is stronger than water anymore because we don't have that familial need
to support one another to stay in constant contact and so things have changed incredibly

(01:29:00):
right so often you have people who have four or five children those four or five children grow up
and never talk to them again right and that wasn't the case two or three hundred years ago when those
four or five children would go on to continue on the family business or continue on um supporting
the community or to continue on on the farm or that kind of thing so it's just important to
recognize you know why are you having children if you're doing it just to make your life better it's

(01:29:22):
probably not the best reason if you're doing it because you are whole and complete in yourself and
you want to share that with another being that's going to contribute to the world awesome have
children yeah it's funny going back to thinking about being at that catholic school like around
middle school for myself there were some families at that school with eight to ten children like it

(01:29:43):
was it was wild and so yeah so my perspective um i don't i'm not having doing that right now i am not
in that mindset i don't think i'm even very close to it at the moment i'm in no rush whatsoever um
i think i'll want to have at least a kid or two but i'm not like it's not this like thing that i

(01:30:10):
have in my mind that i need to you know carry on my legacy through children or whatever the
hell that is and i think a lot of people do as you mentioned get caught up in the societal pressures
of having kids it's like and this question i don't know who asks it who they are what perspective

(01:30:30):
they're coming from but i think a lot of it seems like in my experience a lot of women feel that
pressure and they feel it building as they get to a certain age and i understand you know if
you want to have kids there is a sort of clock involved certainly but at the same time it's like
i think a lot of it's just a lot of like pressure and it's we've talked about so many times like the

(01:30:56):
societal norms and like the the bell curve of society and like most people have kids so if you
do something that's different like whether it's not having kids or dying your hair green like
people because it's not the norm it stands out and it's like or even just like not going to college

(01:31:18):
as a kid like just going to start working and to start making money because you'd rather do that
than go to school for four years like it's not that it's not a crazy thing at all but because
most people go to college most people have children most people don't either green it's
become these sorts of societal expectations where it's almost like you need a reason why you're

(01:31:44):
doing it and so it builds up this immense pressure and it just like doesn't make much sense because
why does it matter to someone else if someone else has children why does it matter to someone else
what someone else's hair color is what doesn't matter to someone else what someone else goes
to school or what their job is or what they do on a day-to-day basis at all or how they live their
life or what they eat or any of these things it just it blows my mind all the time that people

(01:32:10):
have opinions on these things of other people's lives um so yeah long story short for me i'm in
no rush i'm not 100 gonna have a child certainly not anytime soon like i have things that i want
to do with my life and i know that i'm very aware that having a child is a massive responsibility

(01:32:30):
and i can't do some of the things that i want to do i'm not going to be traveling around
europe or southeast asia with a baby on my back like you know it's not something that i am
ready for right now or want and it's also like i think you know at least historically speaking

(01:32:50):
statistically speaking having you know two parents in the home is more of a environment conducive to
being able to raise a child you know in i don't know i don't want to say better or worse but like
in a way that is more beneficial to them if they don't have that in their environment so

(01:33:15):
you know i i don't even have a girlfriend right now like i'm not having a kid before i have
at least a girlfriend or very difficult yeah that i want to you know be with for a long period of
time like i'm going to take the precautions until that day comes and uh and yeah so that's that's
my perspective i agree i think that's a that's a great perspective i mean at least it's honest to

(01:33:40):
to what you want to do and how you see your life and i think that's that's really important and
again it's free of that societal expectation um right but it's funny because our society really
does reject everything that's beyond the norm and even though some movies start to touch on it by
the end of the movie they just do a complete about face and end up going right back in the common

(01:34:01):
narrative there's a christmas movie um i can't stand it i can't stand like the last 10 minutes of
it the rest of the movie is great um it's called four christmases it's with uh reese witherspoon
and um oh god i can't remember his name is from french laws anyway the point is is that
it's called four christmases and it's about this couple who aren't married don't want children

(01:34:22):
and it starts off with them in a ballroom dancing class and everybody who's there taking the class
is getting married and they're like oh what are you getting married they're like we're not
we just enjoy learning how to ballroom dance you know after this we're going to go play some squash
and we're going to do this it's like oh well why aren't you married and so they go through all the
reasons like why would we have to be right we're already together and we're already enjoying this
why would we need to go through all that it makes all the people who are getting married

(01:34:44):
super uncomfortable right it's just because and so the story the movie goes on to show
how they have to visit all of their family members in four different christmases right
in four different situations and the whole movie is showing how this this need to consistently uh
be in the same narrative of people who are your family but are toxic

(01:35:07):
doesn't really serve a purpose it doesn't really have anything it doesn't make a good
christmas let's just put it that way right so the movie is hilarious it goes all the way through to
the last 10 minutes where all of a sudden the main character makes a point well i think we should get
married and i think we should have children and then the other characters like oh i don't think
that's the case and by the end of the movie they do they go right back to the common narrative it

(01:35:27):
just does such a 180 about 10 minutes towards the end of the movie you're just like yeah this hit
the executive's desk and they went we can't have this wrap up in any other way we need to make this
wrap up in the common narrative and it just ruins the movie the movie's just [ __ ] for that reason
like i i this year uh my wife asked me do you want to watch it like no hell no but like it's just

(01:35:48):
because it's such a let down like you're laughing the whole way through and then you're just like oh
you gave in you gave in and then it even wraps up on them still trying to
hide what they're doing from their families despite giving in to the common narrative
so it's like okay you're you're displaying the toxicity but most people who are going
to watch that are going to go aw yeah family right it's just always so funny there's a line

(01:36:10):
in there it's like you can't spell families without lies i always thought that was funny
yeah that's awesome yes they have to you know the common narrative is watching the movie so they're
gonna have to fit it and it's uh vince vaughn is the other one yeah i have i have seen that it's
been it's been a few years but yeah it's it's wild just how much of that we see all the time and and

(01:36:35):
yeah i've just i don't know i i question all those things more and more and just how strange it is
and like that's part of the reason why i want to do some [ __ ] that's like jarring to people
because like you can't there's no good reason to judge someone for doing certain things like so
it's almost like i just want to see what happens because there's no good argument for it it's

(01:36:58):
like you know if i change my hair color for some like whatever reason it's like there are so many
assumptions that go along with having a different color hair and it's so interesting to me and like
the idea that i would you know get judged for it is like it fascinates me it doesn't it's funny
because i'm at the point where it wouldn't make me insecure it would just be like fascinating and

(01:37:22):
it would lead to some conversations that would probably be you know beneficial to some people
where it's like why like what part of this is do you find uncomfortable and why and what
judgments are you seeing in this situation and why and like have you ever questioned that and

(01:37:43):
you know the questions are questioning stuff like that they may start questioning more things but
yeah it's crazy how much of that narrative has infiltrated our existence yeah absolutely
what's normal and what's not right and how do we how do we judge and it's like what would i do
that's basically what the question is what would i do and would everybody agree with me and if that's

(01:38:03):
the case you should be doing that right because that's what makes me feel better next question
this is a good one despite the things you teach resonating with me i still find myself depressed
and struggling to find joy in life now it might be the effects of the pandemic but how
do i stop becoming the victim of a narrative for example i'm depressed because of acts

(01:38:30):
i think with feelings like that there it's almost what what i've found in my life is
there's judgment on top of sort of expectations that you have and and there's when you have sorts
of realizations about things or you start understanding things more you almost like

(01:38:51):
judge yourself for not feeling great all the time and so when it comes to feelings
of feeling depressed and feeling like you shouldn't feel depressed or desiring to feel happy
or seeking happiness and feeling like happiness should be a direct byproduct of understanding

(01:39:12):
these things i think there's a few ways we can go with this question but i think this is
one of them of of having a sort of desire like the desiring for a positive experience is a negative
experience the acceptance of a negative experience is a positive experience that sort of paradox um
i think is applicable here and what i find sometimes is like i don't always feel great like

(01:39:38):
there are times that i get self-judgmental like i i feel anxious i worry about things like and the
improvement that i've had in my life is not judging myself on top of those feelings for
feeling those things and so they happen it's okay i'm a human it's you know part of our existence

(01:40:01):
is feeling all sorts of things but there's nothing saying that all those things that i feel are bad
except for my perception they're just how i am perceiving those things they are just feelings
that i am having and like the improvement that i mentioned is that i don't judge myself on top of

(01:40:22):
feeling those things i think that the judgment of it or the resistance of it
can exacerbate those feelings and kind of blow them out of proportion and then
you know while you're feeling them but also leading up to when you're not feeling them
then all of a sudden you're getting anxious about feeling depressed or anxious about feeling anxious

(01:40:45):
or worried about you know the next time you start feeling that way but if you understand that
it's always okay to feel whatever you feel then there's no you know additional layers on top of it
and it's just a surface level thing that you are able to observe and see it for what it is and

(01:41:05):
you know maybe dig into it a tiny bit and see you know what's sort of causing that what's feelings
of lack do you have what you know identity are you holding on to what perceptions are
you holding on to potentially is that you have given some semblance of truth to like have you
questioned those beliefs as to what's leading to that in itself but i think understanding that no

(01:41:30):
matter what you're feeling it's okay to feel whether it's you know any of the net you know
quote unquote negative emotions that we have stigmatized as being things we shouldn't feel
when you feel those understanding that it's okay to feel them in the moment you know having some
deal of acceptance or surrender to those feelings at least that helps me not like blow them out of

(01:41:51):
proportion and then you know worry about when i'm going to feel them next and things like
that it kind of cuts through that so it's just what it is and i find that those situations and
feelings don't last nearly as long as they used to because i'm accepting of them when they do arise
yeah responsibility right and that actually i would i would say that that might actually help

(01:42:16):
a great deal um in in the case of the example i'm depressed because of x uh i would rephrase
that in my own mind i feel depressed because of my reaction to x um and so all of those things
implies that it's not what it appears to be on face at face value and that it's changeable
which is a very different perspective as opposed to being the victim of x right and so this is

(01:42:42):
super important right now with the pandemic with the um the continued restrictions on our on our
lives and the way that we we live and our freedoms um it's just important to keep in mind that you
can let that get to you you can you can let that depress you you can let that anger you and to some
degree it should do all of those things because this is a really messed up situation that we're in

(01:43:04):
but on the other hand that doesn't limit your ability to change how you respond to it or to
see new things or new opportunities within this this experience right like if you can't go out
and see your friends as often this might be a good opportunity for you to start looking for the value
in hanging out by yourself or in reading or taking up a new craft or taking up

(01:43:26):
something new if you are getting caught up in the narrative of what's happening
in the world especially and this is something a lot of people have been voicing to me about
the pandemic government whatever wherever this is all going one way or another
you can focus on the narrative that you assume is happening which is often the narrative that
you're told is happening by one party or another or many or you can focus on your part in what's

(01:43:48):
happening now which is really what you have that is your power that is where your your potential is
is the part that you you're playing right because everything you do changes that narrative i think
it's so important to recognize that you're not a victim of the narrative you are an equal part
of it that the narrative is just an attempt to describe the changes that are always happening but

(01:44:12):
it's always an inaccurate way of describing that change it's always an assumption of the change
the change is happening so what you get to determine is what part of that change
are you going to be what are you doing here and now because that changes everything that
everything else that's happening but so long as you're committed to a fictional narrative
it will limit the possibilities that are open to you it'll limit the opportunities that you see

(01:44:37):
and so i i would say it's important to remember that the narrative isn't truth your response to
it isn't the only one that's there and as soon as you can recognize that that responsibility
and that uncertainty it will free up some of your potential and you'll have you'll have more options
yeah i've gotten a few questions about just like you know what if you know mandate lockdowns start

(01:44:59):
happening more and more and i think for me it just comes down to you know kind of that idea
of control what you can control which you'll find isn't much but understanding that you know
there are two ways that you can look at it there are multiple you know more than two ways there's
tons of perspectives you can have on that and you can you know focus on all the things that

(01:45:24):
you can't do because of it or you can focus on all the things that you can do and the potential
openings in your life that you have because you can't do those things that you more habitually
do like maybe you habitually spend your weekends doing x y or z but like that's not an option
so like there's now opportunity to not have an excuse to not do these other things that

(01:45:50):
maybe you've been wanting to do for a while and um so i think just you know perspective is important
to keep in mind that there isn't a hard and fast truth even though a lot of people are reacting in
a certain way to a certain situation doesn't mean that you have to react in that way it's
okay to react differently than everyone else is it's okay to not you know feel like everything's

(01:46:18):
like going horribly for you and and see you know some silver linings like it's okay to do
that you're allowed to do that it is your perspective and your prerogative and and
your reactive reaction to the narrative comes down to to you and your responsibility as ray
mentioned next question is it my turn all right i am becoming more present however sometimes i don't

(01:46:45):
answer slash don't know how to deal with people who i know are being run by their pain body
any advice so pain body is for those listening and haven't heard of it is essentially something from
uh i think eckhart tolle is the one who coined it maybe or he got it from somewhere else i don't
know he used it in his books and it's the sort of uh i don't know what the best way to explain it

(01:47:12):
it's kind of like equivalent to a degree to ego it's like the uh conditioning past conditioning
that causes you to uh almost unconsciously react in certain ways yeah yeah to uh yeah to uh relieve

(01:47:33):
your fears in a certain sense but it's sort of like habitual reaction patterns that are
unconscious yeah yeah um do you want to start with that one all right um so in terms of dealing
with people with you know reacting to their pain body so i think i think first of all

(01:47:57):
understanding that it has nothing to do with you like the way that people act towards you
has nothing to do with you as much as it seems like it like if they're directly saying like
[ __ ] you and your name and like you made me do this and this specific thing that you did
caused me this harm it's like still doesn't have anything to do with you still entirely within

(01:48:22):
themselves that they're expressing a certain feeling that they're working through and you know
as mentioned pain body that they have and so i think the first thing you got to understand is it
has nothing to do with you and so that in itself can help a lot it helps me a lot with just dealing
with anyone day-to-day whether it's labeled as them having a pain body or just like a reaction or

(01:48:48):
you know whatever it's just you know that's just another label it's just any sort of reaction or
way that people are acting so i think realizing that it has nothing to do with you seeing
where they're coming from can help being able to have that true empathy of realizing that if you
have gone through and had gone through the same things they have you would do that too you know

(01:49:12):
you would have that pain body in whatever way and act towards yourself the way the exact same way
that they are acting towards you so i think these things are a few things that can immediately help
sort of shift a perspective of the situation um is is having realizing it it doesn't have to do with

(01:49:36):
you and and being able to show that true empathy and then just i guess not getting too caught up
in it and sort of catching yourself too because i think a lot of times people can get caught up
in the sort of spiritual ego side of it where they see and i guess if you see yourself in them it's

(01:50:00):
it's may not be as much but if you get caught up in spiritual ego is like you know i have you know
conquered my pain body but then you find yourself reacting to someone else's pain body it's like
have you really conquered anything or like are you in the exact same boat as them and now you're
blaming them for having a pain body and causing you to react in a certain way um so i think

(01:50:22):
understanding those things and then just realizing that yeah you know like you're them there is no
you that's higher and mightier and you know more enlightened than anyone or anything and if you're
struggling with you know reacting or interacting with people like that it's not like i'm not saying

(01:50:44):
you have to seek them out and be like i need to work on these things so i'm gonna go find the you
know toughest pain body out there and and not be reactive towards that and them it's like you don't
have to and you don't even have to keep them in your life necessarily there's nothing telling you
that either you can i think a lot of people will say things with you know a toxic person in their

(01:51:06):
life they're like oh cut them out cold turkey i don't think you have to you know get all dramatic
like that but i think you know distancing yourself you don't have to you know maybe you don't
you know reach out to them you don't if you have a weekly meal with them you know you don't have as
many just sort of slowly separate and if they start asking why and pushing you on that you

(01:51:29):
can be frank with them and say i don't enjoy my interactions with you quite frankly and i'm not
going to spend my life you know dealing with your with your [ __ ] and whatever way that comes to be
but yeah so that's that's a few things that helped me keep in mind that's pretty much it right i mean
you you can deal deal with somebody who's dealing with their pain body by recognizing yours which

(01:51:54):
gives you empathy or you can just work on getting past yours in which case now you're in a state of
clarity right so either way that's the best way to interact with them but if you are getting past
your pain body then chances are you can sit there watching them lash out at you and you can just
watch it happen and then let it pass and it won't bother you at all whereas if you are still looking

(01:52:16):
at your ego if you are still defending yourself and this is a perfect opportunity for you to
get some practice as andrew said and and again you don't have to go looking for those people
and i'll add they will find you they will find you as you start to let go of your triggers as you
stop start to let go of your your narrative things will come along to try and bring those back up and

(01:52:38):
it's not that those things are happening to bring them back up it's just that the habitual reaction
of those things popping up is still there and so you'll always have the opportunity to face that uh
we're just going to take a quick moment here and we'll be back in a second with another question
from another patreon supporter which i have been really looking forward to getting to for the last
week so we'll talk to you in a minute okay and we're back so this question is something that

(01:53:02):
i've actually been asked a number of times over the last year and it's something i typically avoid
and there's a very specific reason that i avoid it and so i just wanted to address this quickly
the question is very much can you give examples of certain situations that you've been in or
would go through and what you would do in those situations using some of the insights that you

(01:53:25):
discuss in your podcast now somebody asked me this in a one-on-one session a little while ago
and i answered it this way because i think it's very important that i explain why i don't do that
i don't ever want people thinking that the way i would deal with things in this incarnation is the
way that they should deal with things there is no right way that that's very much the point is

(01:53:49):
that all of the insights all the lessons all these these um perspectives that we're talking about are
meant to be just absorbed and recognized to the best of your ability and then they will become
embodied and expressed in each and every situation that you're in and so we're recommending things
that you just keep in mind to keep your your state of clarity but if you're ever wondering

(01:54:10):
what i would do in in the situation that you're in the answer is very clearly what you're doing
i am that's exactly what i would do is what you're doing because you're me
right i would do the best i could with what i understood which is exactly what you're doing what
you do with it from there is irrelevant because you're the best one to make that call based on how

(01:54:33):
much you see and how much you understand right so if you're ever wondering what would rey do
just ask yourself what am i doing and there's your answer and that's very much why i don't
give specific instances on on what you should do with certain insights is because what i would do
in that situation based on my life story may not be what makes sense for you it may not be

(01:54:54):
what's best for you to learn the next lesson or to set yourself a little bit more free
yeah yeah that's awesome it kind of reminds me kind of similar to one of our earlier episodes
where um we were talking about the uh perception of division and separation when i was still like
very much working through that idea that you know our awareness is the same like my awareness

(01:55:20):
is your awareness it's not that i am just the awareness of andrew separate from you being the
awareness of ray it's the same awareness and i was like you know well you know why
can i wave my hand right now like you can't wave my hand and you're like well i just did

(01:55:41):
i was like hmm all right it'll come around because it's still not quite there but yeah because i i
rewatched uh some some of our first episode um came up and i was re-watching some parts and
i was like i've kind of come come a ways from that first episode and just like things getting

(01:56:02):
clearer because i was very much still yeah there was a lot that i was you know working through i
guess but yeah there's a lot to work through i mean i've been having those 20 years i'm still
working through it for sure no it's it's it's always interesting right because we assume that
well if it's all me i should have control i say not quite that's not your spleen is also

(01:56:27):
you but you're not running it deliberately right now right so just keep that in mind
uh next question is yours all right
all right any advice on getting out of a funk slash unmotivated state to start
working on your goals um do you wanna do you wanna start this one or do you want me to

(01:56:52):
i i think um as with everything removing some of the weight motivation is one of those funny
things that we always assume that we need a carrot or a stick right we need a carrot to
chase or a stick to run from in order to get momentum and get moving but we don't realize
often that our momentum is very much limited by the weight that we're carrying on the journey
right like we're carrying what we should do what other people have said worked for them and and

(01:57:17):
what might happen when we finally get there and so we have we're way too invested in the goal and
how the goal reflects on our value and everything that's going to go with that to really take the
next step with any degree of clarity right and that's the point is that it's very difficult
to feel enthusiastic for a journey when there's so much riding on that journey

(01:57:40):
and so if you can remove some of that weight if you can look at the journey in terms of it being
about the step you're on because ultimately that's that's the journey is the quality of the step that
you're on right now right then that that pressure will come off and you will start to feel yourself
being more enthusiastic you will start to feel yourself doing it for the sake of doing
it because it feels good to do and that kind of motivation almost never runs drive because it's

(01:58:06):
self-perpetuating you know as somebody asked me um what reasons do you have to be happy
and my response is none that's why i'm so happy it's because i don't need one right
i don't need a reason to be happy in the same way that i don't need a reason to be motivated
it's just will in action right and as long as i'm not doing that action for a particular end

(01:58:28):
result that's going to make me better or make me more fulfilled or make me happy or anything else
there's no weight to that action right there's no danger there's no risk right so i'm not i'm
not just sitting there wondering which way i should go i'm not just sitting there worried
about making the wrong move i'm just going to move and then roll with whatever happens
and because i can adapt because i can change the direction i'm going in any way i want to because

(01:58:51):
i'm not committed to a certain end result nothing it everything is just growth growth and expression
and after a while that is its own motivation it just takes some practice to get there
yeah i think when people get caught up in having an end goal and you know a ends ends to a means

(01:59:14):
mentality and the doing or the uh the outcome makes up for how shitty the doing was it's like
this idea of sort of like the sunk cost fallacy comes into play and it's like you've worked
all these years to you know become a doctor or something you've been in school for five years
and it's like because every thing of your doing was focused on this end result instead of like

(01:59:40):
the action in itself of being and and the doing in itself being that sort of fulfillment it builds
up this this idea that it was just like you know a dead period of your life just life wasted and it's
like it doesn't have to be like that it's kind of like the like the myth of sisyphus um that by uh

(02:00:03):
who albert camus uh where sis fists the uh he got what sentenced to basically by the greek gods or
or some gods to roll a boulder up a mountain for his entire life and then as soon as he gets to
the top it just rolls back down and the book the myth of sisyphus is like that that is it's deemed

(02:00:25):
this horrendous punishment like he's doing this thing that is meaningless his entire life but then
albert camus says he thinks it's you know a myth and it's actually very similar to living life
and it's it's the myth is that sisyphus wasn't happy like what if he was happy the entire time
and he was what if the mountain was beautiful and he was pushing the boulder up the mountain

(02:00:50):
and the doing in itself was enough and it's kind of like how life is like there
you don't when that is the the doing is fulfilling in itself you don't need a meaning to life to work
towards you don't need end goals to achieve in order to find some semblance of value because

(02:01:12):
even if you achieve a goal it's just it's a split second achievement and then it's like
you know it's just one tiny split you know hairline moment um but yeah and then i think
when it comes to feelings of procrastination or motivation just the idea of motivation i think is
is kind of blown out of proportion a little bit like people wait around

(02:01:36):
for a feeling of of motivation and i think you know we talk about this a lot just how action
like nothing can replace action at the end of the day so if you're not feeling motivated
you know just do something and eventually some feelings will arise through that like
as soon as you start doing things you'll start you know building up some momentum where you

(02:02:00):
you know uh i don't know how to accomplish something but get some semblance of results
from the action that you're taking and then you'll feel motivated to continue taking action but like
if you're sitting on the couch eating potato chips waiting to get motivated to go to the gym
like you're it's it's probably not going to come knocking like how about you set a goal of putting

(02:02:24):
down the potato chips set a goal of standing up off the couch and then see where that leads
you instead of sitting there without taking any action completely forcing the responsibility off
onto some external feeling you know on god to like rain down on you to like gift you with motivation
how about you just stand up and go put your gym clothes on and see if that will build

(02:02:46):
some momentum and all of a sudden you're at the gym do something you're not used to doing
right like that's it just just break the cycle it doesn't matter what it is it really doesn't i mean
just put yourself in a situation you're not used to dealing with and you will find energy
you will find that suddenly you have will and it's happening in the moment because of course

(02:03:07):
you have to deal with the situation that you're in and of course that might piss you off that might
might make you self-reflect it might do a number of things but it's going to cause you to use your
energy it's going to cause you to actually move in a way that you're not familiar with
is just going to give you an insight into the value of movement as a whole and then
you'll just start to feel good about moving in general because it feels good now stagnation

(02:03:30):
as much as it's comfortable it's also the path to death right like in stagnation nothing happens
it's just the same thing over and over and over again and so yeah if you want to be
motivated you have to give yourself reasons to be motivated and often that's just discomfort
all right just just get out of your comfort bubble and and you will start to experience momentum

(02:03:50):
do you believe money is crucial for a society to work out you want to start this one off
no that would be my answer um no i don't i don't think that money is crucial for a society to work
i think that money is crucial for an egotistical society to work um if and that really def depends

(02:04:10):
on what you mean by work um i wouldn't say that our current society is really working
uh so much as just continuing to limp on despite the consequences um so i think that
for us to achieve a society that does in fact work or or that is in alignment with what's
in its own best interest that we have to get past the egotistical state of mind that drives the

(02:04:33):
monetary system and the entire need for capitalism to begin with i think we actually have to have
some recognition that we are all in fact in this together that we're all extensions of the earth or
extensions of the same awareness or extensions it doesn't even matter how we come to terms with it
but we have to stop perceiving the division to be so real just because it seems real and and
then once we do that then the entire idea of needing to get mine or trying to profit myself

(02:04:58):
above everybody else stops making sense and as soon as that stops making sense so does money
that would be my answer there nice short one yeah yeah yeah i i'm on the same page i i haven't i
don't think i've spent as much time thinking about you know the world without money or or the ideas
of money or history of money and whatnot but um yeah i think it is just an interesting concept

(02:05:23):
and the whole idea of you know people wanting more money and not even more wealth necessarily
has always been pretty fascinating with me it's something that alan watts talks about a lot that
idea that just people want more money in their bank account it's not even they want you know more
wealth or what that that can give them and you know i think the conversation shifts very rapidly

(02:05:47):
when you see yourself as everything and until then it is i think it's it's tougher to have that sort
of conversation um in the need and whether or not it is actually necessary but yeah i see myself
a lot more just like especially because in my neighborhood there's a lot of like homeless people

(02:06:12):
around and even just like seeing that and seeing them around like want like doing more in the past
couple months to like help them out when i when i can and seeing that because you know although i i
know i can't you know give money to every single homeless person in new york it's like it doesn't

(02:06:34):
hurt to help a few out you know help myself out here and there um when i have the opportunity
um but yeah so i think yeah same same page as ray and i think the conversation is is a different one
and it can be tougher to have when the illusion of division is still very strong

(02:06:58):
in our society absolutely that's definitely something we're working towards which is why these
episodes are so much fun okay so now we'll get into a bit more of the metaphysical stuff because
this is always entertaining to me the idea of reincarnation may pass lives now i don't know
if you've had any experience with past life regression or past life regression therapy

(02:07:20):
i don't know if you've ever had the experience of exploring past lives um but it's something that's
that's documented people do go through these experiences where they perceive themselves to be
in different characters different lives different timelines and then they learn lessons from that
or rather they they assume that there are lessons that they're learning in this in this incarnation

(02:07:40):
that are tying from those past lives often that's misinterpreted as what karma is supposed to mean
um do you think that that's do you think there is a such thing as reincarnation and if not
what do you think is happening there um so no not in the sense of like the
egotistical like i was this person then i was this person that i was this person now i'm andrew

(02:08:08):
it's like if i'm everyone then i was always everyone so i think when past life regression
happens i've i've dug into it a little bit i don't have a ton of experience thinking
about it but you know and we've sort of had conversations about this a little bit but
understanding that i am everyone and everything that means that i'm not just everyone

(02:08:33):
you know in 2021 on earth it's like i'm everyone now which is eternal so when someone does sort of
pass life regression i think it's just tapping into that deeper awareness of being able to
experience a different timeline almost but at the same time if it's all now

(02:08:59):
eternally now then it's just our perception that it was a past life it's just another
awareness that is here now happening and we just perceive it it's kind of
a similar aspect of like you know the beginning of existence is just we have a

(02:09:19):
flawed perception of time thinking that there you know had to have been a beginning and then
it's like well what's before the beginning why couldn't have just always been because of our
you know perception of division and time and the illusion of time seeing it as you know truth it it

(02:09:42):
skews these things but yeah that's my perspective that's awesome that's that's exactly correct i i
i've thought about this for a long time because of course there are there are instances and i
know from clients that i've worked with where they went from past life regression and in doing
so managed to look at a particular version of themselves or another incarnation that led them

(02:10:04):
to an insight that helped them get over something that they were dealing with in this incarnation
right so like for example um one client that i worked with had a history of abuse with every
every spouse that she had had she'd been married like three times and so she went to do past
life regression and tapped into tapped into an incarnation of herself which was an abusive male

(02:10:28):
and so she got to experience things from that perspective and because it allowed her to look
at things without attaching her character to it she managed to gain some context
and it changed her reaction to her own experience it changed her perspective of everything that she
had gone through which i thought was great really cool but as you said there is no past

(02:10:49):
and there is no future and everything is now so all she was really doing was allowing herself to
see another version of herself that is in the here and now but often when we do pass life regression
we will immediately assume that we are certain characters that we can relate to that relate to

(02:11:09):
our current perspective of who we are right so a lot of people who do past life regression will
see their ancestors because they can relate to that they can see the narrative how it ties them
together or they'll experience a life of somebody who is from their culture or for somebody who was
in a situation that's similar to the situation they just went through and there's always a

(02:11:30):
point of relation between the two characters between who i see myself to be and who i allow
myself to access right so what's interesting about that is that because it's all now
it means that the more i let go of this character the more i can relate to all the other characters
and that doesn't just mean human because if i'm getting rid of the connection that means i have

(02:11:51):
to relate to something that that's similar to me and i stop seeing myself as something that needs
to be compared to i can relate to dna i can relate to trees i can relate to plant life and from that
i can get insights i can add to my context i can grow so it's not just true metaphysically it's
also true with people we deal with in a day-to-day life right if you were to deal to meet somebody

(02:12:12):
from another country if you were to hold on to the idea of yourself being an american it'd be very
difficult for you to interact with that person and see their cultural history or see what's important
to them whereas if you didn't identify you would immediately have more insights into their way of
life so it's true regardless if it's if it's in this incarnation or if we're tapping into
other incarnations that also exist now it's always the dissolution of the self that allows us to

(02:12:38):
to access all of the other insights within our own singular universal awareness i've always thought
it was really interesting that we almost limit the amount of access we have by calling it past
life regression yeah that's pretty fascinating all right um do you think people would understand you
better if they have done mushrooms or psychedelics i like that question um so we've talked about this

(02:13:04):
in the past the idea of psychedelics being a tool that can sort of clear some of the fog but not a
end in itself and i think that kind of plays into this question of like could people understand
some of the things that i that we talk about if they have done psychedelics well you know a lot of

(02:13:27):
what we talk about is questioning your perceptions of yourself and understanding that no perception
is truth the description is never described the interpretation is never the interpreted and i
think things like mushrooms and psychedelics allow you the opportunity it kind of like opens the door
to be able to maybe get to that understanding more clearly but it's not going to take you all

(02:13:52):
the way exactly like it still comes down to you and insights that you have still are you
like when you're you know high on marijuana or you know psychedelics or anything like it's still you
you're just able to see more clearly and you're there's not as much distortion there's not as much

(02:14:13):
you know perception of division there's not as much self there's not much identity or ego
involved in everything that you're thinking and experiencing so you're able to see things a little
bit more clearly so i think that even with things we talked about like i was just talking about how
on episode one there were things that i was still very much you know not as clear on and

(02:14:39):
i think you know since doing some psychedelics it has helped me see some things more clearly there
have been very distinct times i remember tripping and being like oh that thing ray said that i had
like was not grasping like that i see it now like i get it now so like it does allow you for that

(02:15:02):
opportunity but if you still have like very strong perceptions of the way things are and concrete
beliefs about the way things are it will peel those back for sure but if you're not willing to
you know like look inside the door may be open but if you don't want to look inside it's not gonna
you know it's it comes it comes down to you at the end of the day and it's not gonna

(02:15:25):
you know do any of the work for you but it can certainly be a very helpful tool in that sense
absolutely and i just want to say on on an additional note that it's super important to not
try psychedelics with the intention of becoming enlightened right or or understanding us because

(02:15:48):
immediately you're projecting an idea right it's like um having a psychedelic experience
waiting for a certain feeling right and this happens to so many people it's like i'm not
feeling it yet it's like because you're projecting what you think you should be experiencing
right which is changing the entire experience for you it's limiting it in every way
and so the same is true is it if you are going to try psychedelics or if you're if you are going to

(02:16:13):
to trip out as it were um just keep in mind that the point is to not have a point it's to just be
where you are right and just to to just be in that experience and as you allow that to happen
all of a sudden everything that andrew and i have been talking about will start to fall
together but if you go into it going i'm going to eat these and i'm going to think about what

(02:16:34):
andrew and ray have been talking about you are going to have a very frustrating trip because
you're still thinking about concepts you're not allowing yourself to sink into the reality
which is ultimately what we're trying to describe we're just using concepts to describe the reality
right and so in order to experience that you have to allow yourself to surrender the concept
then you can use the concepts as a tool rather than having them be a master just like your mind

(02:16:59):
right so that's a great question yeah like the pointers to the truth are never the truth so
literally nothing that we say ever is the truth it's just pointers to it so if you have you know
ears to hear then it can make sense but it's it still comes from within your own

(02:17:20):
your awareness your experience that the concepts become you know clearer which you know we can do
our best to drop steeds and and explain things but we we still don't even come close to doing
any of it justice so it's like if you're relying on us you're yeah like gray said you're gonna
have a frustrating trip and i will say the one time that i did have expectations going

(02:17:43):
into a trip taking a higher dose and i had previously thinking it was going to be
you know the same thing but just like going deeper into it it was a very i it's not it wasn't a bad
trip or anything but it was very sobering as yeah as reyes put it and and yeah so that was
the one time and since then i go into it and i'm just you know i'm here now i am awareness

(02:18:09):
experiencing itself and that's all i know is what is here and now and
see what happens and that's pretty much it i go into it you know kind of understanding that it's
uncertain and i have no idea what is gonna happen and that's okay being comfortable in that but
you know the one time i i did a higher dose and i had expectations going into it it was very much

(02:18:31):
sobering and you know not what i expected and because i had expectations of it it wasn't
close to anything that i expected i came out of it kind of like you know not bummed out but just like
understanding that you know that's what happens when you have expectations going into it basically

(02:18:52):
absolutely right everything gets measured according to your expectations and it takes
away the flavor right it's just it's just like it's just like anything else you know
if you if you build it up in your head that's what you're experiencing rather than what's
actually happening right so yeah that's that's that's funny um okay this is my last question
and i figured i'm going to wrap up on this one then you have i'm sure another question but

(02:19:14):
i want to ask you this because we were talking about reincarnation past lives the fact that
all awareness is singular and exists only in the here and now
what do you think that means about lost loved ones do you think do you think we see them again
i mean did they ever exist in the first place and the idea of you know lost loved ones

(02:19:39):
i mean like who was the loved one that wasn't you like that it isn't is it not not just a story
that's been created that the story is born and then the story ends but it was never
anything real to begin with and it was always sort of in the realm of that illusion of duality so

(02:20:08):
now that's difficult though because what we are talking about there is solitude in the extreme
right which isn't necessarily what reality is i mean in reality we have the dualistic
experience like we always are born to parents right we always have some degree of community or
or fam or familial connection whatever that might be so when we lose somebody like for example

(02:20:32):
if a parent passes on or a child passes on or something like that we like to tell ourselves
that you know we'll see them in the afterlife right and and you know to some degree you can see
the reality that that's based on right which is that you're always going to see the same awareness
you're always going to continue seeing because the people that we love aren't the people that we love

(02:20:53):
are there right the the expression that they are isn't the person that they are they're the
awareness that's expressing itself through that person right so when we love somebody we love who
they truly are regardless of their expression regardless of their distortion regardless of
of the character they've they've convinced themselves that they are right so as you said
you know we're ultimately just loving ourselves but if that's the case then everyone is a version

(02:21:19):
of our loved ones as well they're a version of us right so um when a client asked me this recently
what happens to our loved ones do we see them again my answer was i'm talking to one right now
because we're always surrounded by those who are closest to us because they're all us in

(02:21:39):
infinite variations in in every life there's a partner in every life there's a child in every
life there's a family and well not every life but most lives within the dualistic spectrum have that
that situation or rather that dynamic and so you're you're seeing infinite variations and
not just a single person or a single awareness but the relationships that that single awareness
would have with other versions of itself right so it's kind of like that video that you sent

(02:22:04):
me uh the other day and my wife had sent it to me as well about there being this small tribe
of super enlightened beings on another planet who then went and and decided they were going
to come to earth and and save everybody right and they were because they were super enlightened and
they were going to decide to come here and they could go through a big hard journey and and so
on and so forth there's such an ounce of truth to that and at the same on the same token there's so

(02:22:27):
much distortion there because now there's the narrative of this tribe of super enlightened
beings coming to earth and saving us and there's an idea of humanity and and all of that but what
they're really describing is the fact that there is a core group of variations right to awareness
there is the core of there's a me and a you right and there's always a meagan to you in this

(02:22:51):
dualistic experience and so we're always talking to our loved ones they just take different forms
right like i've talked to a version of you that was 70 years old and had lived through the hippie
movement and the differences between you and that person is just the lives you've lived and the way
you perceived yourself right but i can clearly see the same awareness between the two of you

(02:23:13):
right so you are the fact in fact the same awareness it's just that he was never the person
that he identified with and neither are you
yeah um yeah there's a question that i thought of while you're saying that um
with with the the idea that like we are impacting our environment and our environment impacting us

(02:23:36):
people have the idea of you know the identities of people like taking that as truth but it never is
and we impact our environment our environment impacts us that means all of our loved ones
are within our environment and we are within their environment so they are still alive

(02:24:00):
in the sense that they are us like they like my grandpa who passed away when i was younger like
i was pretty close to him and he impacted my life like he is still in existence not you know the
ego identity of him but his awareness expressed through james sweeney is still within because he

(02:24:25):
impacted my entire family and all of his friends and everything so through that they are still
very much there but i am curious um just along these lines with people who pass away and people
will say you know they that someone passed and then they felt you know felt a hug or something

(02:24:48):
like that or some some like supernatural thing happened and it's like oh that's them you know in
heaven telling me that you know they're okay blah blah like what do you think that is when someone
feels something like a hug or a kiss on their cheek or something is it is it that they

(02:25:08):
are kind of superimposing a wish that it happened and then some feeling hits them in a way even if
it's just like you know the wind in a certain way and they perceive it as that and they kind
of attach to it or do you think there is something actually to that that's a really good question it

(02:25:31):
really comes back down to what you were saying about the ripples that that our loved ones make
right like they affect us they change us um and in that way we're not human beings aren't very
different from thoughts within a singular mind right one thought affects another thought and that
creates new thoughts just like when one person affects another person and creates children
right and those children evolve to basically grow beyond the thoughts that were their parents

(02:25:55):
right but as for the experience of like a kiss on the cheek or a hug
in my experience it's because of the ripples because of the influence that person had on us we
there's a part of our awareness that is almost acting out what they would do
in order for us to kind of bridge that gap right because they are us there's no separation so i'm

(02:26:17):
not in any way downplaying the fact that you know it's that person expressing love but it's not
that person expressing love it's the awareness of that person which is you right and so yeah
i think that as with everything there's an ounce of truth to it and i think that there's a certain
amount of wishful thinking that that can go into that i mean george carlin does a great skit on

(02:26:38):
on the absurdity of people who are like you know i'm sure he's all staring down at us right now
and he kind of makes a big joke about this like really you think that's what he's doing with
you know nothing else to do with his life he's just watching you like i'm sure he's got better
things to do so it's kind of funny and and i definitely encourage you to watch that skit but um
there's so much more happening than than we're aware of and as long as we have this perspective

(02:27:03):
that we're bodies for one um two ideas or separate right it becomes very difficult to interact with
the rest of our consciousness with the the rest of our awareness in a way that is as meaningful as it
could be which is the same as very much dreaming when you are in a dream and you have an experience

(02:27:23):
in that dream that experience is very meaningful to you it'll shake you for the rest of the day and
it will change you as a person right and it's largely it has that that deeper impact because
you recognize it's your dream right it's you doing it as opposed to it being done to you and so if we
can get to the point where we actually recognize this is one big dream of a limitless mind

(02:27:46):
then we can actually start getting more meaningful and symbolic lessons out of it such as you know
the communication of of one of our awareness that has passed but still dwells on within us
there's so much there right and so yeah there's a there's a whole other way of of living that
religion and spirituality tries to describe and it tries to practice and it creates a narrative
and it creates these these ceremonies and everything else to try and communicate

(02:28:11):
what could be a beautiful experience but we miss it in the interpretation we miss it
in the translation between you know the insight going through the ego and then it becoming another
part of the play right but um yeah i i think that there is some truth to all of that and i
on the other hand i think that there's great a great amount of illusion that's still based on our

(02:28:32):
perception of ourselves as separate for sure um i was also curious uh going back to that the story
that i sent you and your wife sent you of the intergalactic beings that you know the people
who created that story feel like they probably think they are those things uh for sure which is

(02:28:53):
yeah i watched that i was like uh i know ray's ray's gonna enjoy this one um but with i'm
curious what the ounce of truth you see in that is like what part of that has that sort of ounce
of truth sure in it absolutely um comes back down to the unity and duality thing right like

(02:29:17):
unity is ultimately what is and in unity you have complete solitude there's not even another person
to talk about or think about or conceptualize there's no me in unity because me requires a u
right but as soon as we get past unity as soon as we experience duality or rather the beginning of
duality now you have one goes to two right and then two goes to three and so on and so forth

(02:29:42):
right and so the duality expands the variations expand well what they're talking about in that
video is the variation so off of that first point of me that very small tribe of super
enlightened beings right were the first excerpts of duality still keeping in mind
that their unity expressed his duality without getting lost in all of the dualistic mumbo jumbo

(02:30:03):
of thinking that they actually are separate that's the ounce of truth that that we can
actually get to that point now i've often thought about our history as a species because
the closer we get to the recognition that we are one singular awareness that we are god
the less we invest in the physicality or in the physical story and so if you look at our

(02:30:27):
population which we mentioned earlier is over seven billion people right often people have
children because you know they want to continue their legacy or they they think this is what they
should do and so on and so forth well none of that makes sense when you recognize that you are the
infinite universe or the awareness of the universe none of that makes sense at all so all of a sudden
you wouldn't have as many children you wouldn't have as many fears you wouldn't have us need

(02:30:48):
this need to continue your legacy you wouldn't in any way have the same physical soap opera
that we're having right now and so the closer we get to awareness the more our population drops
right and so that's kind of the point of that video as well is that the closer we get to
evolving as a species or as awareness the less we're going to get involved with things that

(02:31:11):
continue to distort the outcome that continue to cause more consequences we'll have more awareness
of the ripples that we're creating and thus will make different choices and so as much as
it's true at the beginning that there's a small population of us that expand into a bigger one
it's also true at the end where that larger population has to reduce itself back to a
smaller population again to find balance until we do we're in some serious [ __ ] i mean

(02:31:34):
there's only so much food on the planet there's only so many resources on this earth there's only
so much to go around and as long as we avoid alignment with that or the recognition that
we're a part of that we're going to continue to push ourselves into this point of desperation
and uh scarcity as a result so i think that would be the answer truth is that the closer we get to

(02:31:56):
awareness or as they call it enlightenment the closer we get to that small core group
of people who recognize they're all one another but they're not coming to earth yeah
oh man yeah that was such an interesting video and the the someone dm'd it to me and they were like i
absolutely loved this video i think you would love it and i i sent him a decently long response just

(02:32:23):
like i yeah it's an interesting story it's kind of how i started out um but yeah yeah that idea
and it i'm curious to see i guess we'll we'll see but with with going back from you know population
expanding to decreasing if i guess it'll be probably a combination of a multitude of factors

(02:32:46):
but if it's you know natural disasters asteroids or it's it's a more prolonged just understanding
of you know getting closer and closer to awareness and the recognition of unity but it'll probably
be a combination i'm sure it's going to happen one way or another the longer we put it off the

(02:33:07):
harder it's going to be i mean the simple fact is i mean like honeybees honey bees are vanishing man
i mean einstein i think said it yeah honeybees disappear we got four years left on this planet
right like you got to consider all that keystone species this all makes a difference i mean as long
as we're putting it off we're going to continue to exacerbate the consequences as long as we're not

(02:33:28):
practicing awareness about what we do and why we do it where we're going right as a result of
what we do and why we do it we're just going to keep putting it off we're going to keep throwing
those snowballs back up the hill trying to ignore the the impending avalanche right but then that
avalanche will happen and we'll one way or another our our population on this planet is going to
decrease one way or another if it's willingly it's going to be a lot easier than if it's not

(02:33:57):
i'm out of questions do you have any more i do i have a couple on instagram back on the
instagram video uh yeah i have three comments here perfect let's wrap them up we promised everybody
we get to their questions and we're doing it yes yeah no this is actually come by quick

(02:34:18):
i'm like i'm so just like relaxed enjoying this conversation it makes it easier to just like
having the questions that it's just like like we i feel like we could do this for like eight hours
one day yeah one day um who or what's keeping you alive

(02:34:39):
so i think that's kind of similar to something we touched on before with like motivation or what's
your why kind of like why continue existing and my response always comes back to like why not um yeah
and i was talking to my friend yesterday um we had yeah i think our conversation about all this stuff

(02:35:02):
just bounced around for probably three hours probably close to this and it was great but uh
he because he has always been you know more on the atheist side of things like very scientific like
he wants to see the logic and the reasoning behind something so that's why he never got
caught up really and religion grew up jewish but he found that to be silly from an early age and um

(02:35:30):
but he uh he was asking about that like when it comes to why and for a while he didn't have like
great reason he thinks about that all the time like why why don't i just stay in bed all day
and like do nothing like why why not and and my response to stuff like that is always like

(02:35:52):
that's still a choice like you're still choosing like even though you've deemed it as in action
like sitting on the couch all day it's still a choice like you can't escape making a choice
in every single situation you're always making a choice in one way or another so
you know why exist why continue existing why not i'm here might as well do something

(02:36:19):
about it you know i i know there are things that i enjoy doing there's stuff i'm enthusiastic
about whether it's you know in part because of my conditioning or just things i like you know not
taking things too seriously helps keeping things light as we've talked about before not getting too
tied to narratives or belief systems all these things help in in the recognition that you know we

(02:36:48):
just are and things just are and and that's not to say i have even recently gotten caught on like the
pessimistic side of nihilism and it's like nothing matters so like why do anything and it's like it
just always comes back to why not i don't really have a great reason why not to i'm here i'm i'm

(02:37:09):
exist i'm here now that's all i know might as well do something with it that's kind of it for me
yeah don't do it i mean i come from uh a slightly more dark and depressing side of things where i i
was i was pretty committed to killing myself for a very long time um and so i thought about that
in great detail for a very long time um and what what stopped it for me was the recognition that

(02:37:33):
it wouldn't do anything that's that's the problem right like i could die i'm not gonna
die right my awareness is gonna continue on and all the other incarnations and so
the why is irrelevant i will always exist i will always exist and so it really just comes down to
what do i want to do with it and and you don't have to do anything you can lay in bed all day

(02:37:57):
by all means but try and keep keep something in mind the energy you get out of your experience
is going to be directly relational to the energy you put into your experience
right so if you're complaining about your existence it's entirely possible
you're not looking at who's responsible for that existence and that's pretty much
it right but as for the what keeps me going i am existence i'm what's going there's nowhere to go

(02:38:28):
yeah i found a few more questions on another page i'm just going to ask you one now all right okay
what do i do with all of this information does it happen automatically
so what do i do with all this information does
what happen automatically insights the insights that we're talking about the transition from

(02:38:51):
living egotistically and within the limits of your narrative to feeling freedom to expressing
yourself and embodying your awareness without the limitations of who you think you are and all the
conflict that goes with that we talk about all this a lot most of my contents about it um but
again there's that there's the conceptual part you can take notes right but then there's the actual

(02:39:13):
application the recognition of what we're talking about the reality below the concepts and so
i think the question here is now that we've talked about all this now that i have all my notes
am i changing automatically is this going to happen on its own now that i have all of this
information right is this just something that i have to wait for it to play out and that's a
really good question there's there's a lot in that question i'm curious to see what you think yeah um

(02:39:37):
yeah well it's playing out right now right and i think i think it happens when you stop holding on
to all of the ideas of the way you think it should be and it happens when you stop trying to make
it happen you know when you're silent it speaks when you speak it's silent so it's basically like

(02:39:58):
when you stop trying to achieve anything and you are just aware here and now of what is without
any of the distortion without any of the uh perceptions of division without all of the belief
systems without all of that those things that take you that you know fog up that sort of clarity or

(02:40:24):
you know the layers that are on top of you know what is here and now all of your perceptions all
of your judgments about what is so i think just when it comes to action it's like you know i guess
questioning anything when it comes up consistently all the time i find myself doing that like
hundreds of times a day when things come up about you know the way i think things to be the way i

(02:40:49):
think someone else is the way i think myself is who i think myself is who i think someone else is
as soon as it starts happening i immediately question it so i get questions like you know
if you would consider like what religion are you closest to do you think you'll ever be religious
ever again and i'm like i i don't know if it would be possible the amount of times i question things

(02:41:13):
every single day like so many times a day like there's just no way a religion could fit into that
amount of questioning because it just wouldn't it wouldn't make it through the day yeah yeah exactly
i was just gonna say it wouldn't survive the gauntlet of my day of questioning like there's no
way so yeah when it comes to application realizing there's nothing you have to apply like when we

(02:41:40):
have these conversations like we have this podcast because we enjoy having this podcast we don't have
you know a a like reason necessarily for each episode it's the doing for the sake of doing
having the conversation for the sake of having the conversation going on a walk for the sake of
going on a walk like you know doing anything just for the sake of doing it so there's no

(02:42:06):
i think as soon as you start getting caught up in thinking there is a right way to apply these
things or a correct way to implement things into your life or a correct way to understand
any of the insights as soon as you get tied to that is you're you're distancing yourself further

(02:42:28):
from it so it's not trying to do anything at all at the end of the day beautifully said that was
perfect because that that's very much it it's just allow it to happen it's already happening it's
so counterintuitive to everything that we've been taught but i love the fact that the questioner is
actually asking do i just let this happen right which is an insight in itself so that that's

(02:42:50):
very inspiring that was a great answer i really enjoyed that um that's it i'm officially out of
questions now except for what questions do i ask myself which you just answered as many as i can
all the time it's like yeah i never i yeah the more i can question things it's just like not

(02:43:11):
letting them slide almost it's like not allowing myself to settle on answers which like some people
would probably say that's got to be exhausting but i think it's the opposite i think it's you know
energizing and it's not like it's not like this obsessive thing also it's not like this discipline
or practice that i feel like i need to be doing and if i don't you know question things then i

(02:43:37):
judge myself and i feel like a failure or whatever it's just like existing here now aware of what is
without the additional distortion and it's not about adding things and i talk about this when i
explain you know mushrooms to people because i get a lot of questions about them with people in in my
closer in my life and whatnot friends and family and i explain i try to explain that

(02:44:02):
it's not like you're adding something you're not adding layers to it that's making you feel
you know a level of highness like other drugs it's it's like you're just getting peeled back so
you know you exist in this state of distortion and very much a fogged perception
of the way things are based on all of your conditioning and experiences and whatnot

(02:44:24):
all that the mushrooms do are help peel those back so you're able to see things more clearly
and appreciate things for what they are which is why people think that it'll be very helpful
for you know the mental health community um but yeah yeah exactly it's actually it's it's
very much like we discussed in our manifestation workshop about the more strings you're attaching

(02:44:45):
to your kite the less the less it's going to fly right and that's very much the case is that you
know take the weight off and you'll be you'll be amazed at what you're capable of right but as long
as you're trying to add weight to find out what you're capable of you're actually just working
against yourself right and so it's it's very much it's like uh one of those finger puzzles right the
more you pull the harder it gets you're gonna push in and do the counter-intuitive thing to actually

(02:45:09):
defeat the puzzle and it's very much the same with our mind yeah certainly all right i got two more
questions here uh do you believe the idea that perception is reality
i feel like we've talked about this quite a bit um yeah so like i've had people comment like

(02:45:31):
what if perception is the only thing that is real or you know your perception
of me is real or like the way you perceive things is reality and it's like
no i mean it's it's not it's your individual perception like if two people can perceive

(02:45:52):
the same thing in two different ways i think that's enough proof in itself that it's not
reality and give me two seconds i'll perceive it in more than one way
yeah yeah exactly one person can perceive it in in essentially an infinite number of ways
so how could that be reality if there are an infinite number of ways to perceive something
absolutely though it does it does influence our experience of what it is that i will admit but i

(02:46:18):
i think that's the danger is that we we assume that because it it influences our experience
that it is the definition of what's real right but it's just the experience right and while that is
the experience of reality it's not reality itself right because if that were the case then i would
never be able to change my experience right and i can i have complete freedom to do that as we

(02:46:40):
just said you know i can find numerous different perspectives of what's happening right now right
each of those perspectives is going to change my experience but that's the point is that none of
those perspectives are actually what's happening right now it's just changing my experience of
what's happening right now so no perception is not reality though perception does in fact influence
our experience of reality that would be my best answer yeah i think that it's now on the head

(02:47:06):
all right last question uh how does someone deal with constant rejection from people you want to
start this one off sure i i'll start this one off um the the simple answer in my opinion is
stop needing people to accept you right and that would be ultimately it is that if you are worried

(02:47:28):
about people's rejection of you it's because you're over committed to their acceptance of
you there's there's a part of you that you're looking to validate that you're looking to add
value to through other people's perspectives and and so if you can get past that or at least you
can recognize that you're doing that then you'll recognize that your value has never been lowered
or or diminished whatsoever by people's rejection of you they're just determining the experience

(02:47:53):
that they're going to have it just doesn't include you but on the on the bright side it's entirely
possible that you're better off for that um i had somebody write to me recently and say
you know i i never had any parents i really grew up identifying with that as not having value and
not being lovable and and i pointed out i'm like we have to understand that because his parents had

(02:48:15):
left him um that it takes a certain type of person in a certain type of mentality and in a certain
emotional state to leave behind a child right so consider the kind of person who left you behind
and then remember that you dodged a bullet it may not always feel that way right but the fact is is
that you're probably better off for not being raised by people who are in that mentality and

(02:48:39):
that's not always easy to to see when you're identifying with what you think it means about
you but as soon as you can start to question them and their intentions and your perspectives
of everything else then it can start to fall together for sure yeah yeah wow that's i've
never thought of that sort of perspective in that sense but it makes a lot of sense certainly um i

(02:49:01):
think yeah i think it comes down to understanding that there is nothing lacking within you that you
need someone to fill that void with like you are perfectly whole and complete exactly as you are
right now even though it may feel not feel like that it doesn't mean that it isn't and that's just
the feeling that you have attached to as the truth based on you know your beliefs about yourself and

(02:49:26):
the way things are and who you are and who other people think you are and and all those things so
i think yeah i can't express that enough habit habit is a huge one our brain is desperately
trying to form cycles of familiarity so if if you are dealing with thoughts over and over and
over again often what you're dealing with is just your brain's mechanism of trying to form habits

(02:49:49):
that's it so it's not something wrong with you just so much as something you have to spend time
deprogramming right that's all it is it's if you're still dealing with it it's entirely
possible that you're not in fact still dealing with it you're just trying to shake off the habit
yeah yeah no our brains are habit-forming machines or they want to be and yeah i think it comes back

(02:50:12):
to similar to other responses just questioning all of it all the time like why you feel
this sense of lack and then getting into digging into that a little bit like why you feel like you
need to be accepted in the first place as ray was saying and digging into that a bit and then
you know when it comes to getting friends and being rejected or accepted or

(02:50:36):
whatnot a lot of times people try and shift who they are to fit into a certain group of people
and it's like i don't i don't ever see a logical rational good reason to do that because either you
know you're a different you know version you're always yourself but if you're trying to be a

(02:50:57):
certain version of yourself that isn't naturally who you are to fit into this group then either you
know there's gonna come a point where you can't keep up the mask anymore and you break and you
know that can lead to some semblance of anxiety and depression or you attract or at the same time

(02:51:19):
you attract people that you don't actually like you have this idea of just like being accepted for
the sake of being accepted because you don't want other groups to perceive you as being
you know like a loner or something but that's just their obsession also or just your perception of
yourself as feeling bad because for some reason it's like if you don't have a lot of friends

(02:51:41):
people see that as negative which i don't know why you know why is that also question that like
i i think it's probably because historically we've grown up in clans and we kind of need a group of
people in order to survive that's why people get very anxious about how other people perceive them
and what other people's opinions about their life is because it's in our dna it's in our evolution

(02:52:05):
to need to be wanted by people it's not relevant anymore so you can question that perception like
you don't need you can fully exist on your own basically nowadays um so yeah just question those
things understand that you're holding complete exactly as you are right now you don't need
to be accepted by anyone and if you're you know trying to be someone that you're not and then you

(02:52:28):
get rejected you know it's like you're probably better off being who you are naturally to begin
with because that's going to kind of suck if if you're trying to be someone else and then you
get rejected so you might as well just be who you are because at the end of the day people are more
attracted to authenticity typically anyway they can feel when you're trying to be someone else to
get accepted by them because at that point you're expecting something out of them if you're trying

(02:52:53):
to act a certain way in order to get accepted so by not expecting anything out of anyone you're
just being yourself more people will probably be more comfortable around you and all of a sudden
you may not be getting rejected as much that's actually kind of the nice thing about being
yourself is that it's an automatic way of weeding out the shitty company right that's pretty much

(02:53:16):
it right because anybody who tells you you need people around you are telling you what
they feel they need right that's all they're telling you and so keep that in mind if that's
if that person is telling you you need people around you wonder why they're hanging out with you
there might be an indication of what's going on there this has been a great episode

(02:53:37):
i've really enjoyed all of these questions uh we did cover as many well we've covered everything
that we've written down but if we did man if we didn't miss any questions whatsoever because we
have a lot of different channels where we're taking these questions from i do encourage
you to join us on patreon patreon supporters can message us directly submit their questions
uh on a post that we do before each and every q a episode and so it's much easier to organize and

(02:54:01):
make sure that you're not forgotten likewise if you'd like to participate in this community
that we're growing and are a part of definitely join us on the dualistic unity community discord
great group of people there we're having a lot of fun in that conversation and it's going to
grow into something epic so we'd love to see you there certainly yeah this has been a ton of fun

(02:54:22):
i always enjoy doing q a episodes they're like you know easy just read through them and you know
especially being able to have a discussion about it so i'm looking forward to doing
more and just you know more live events coming up season two of of everything coming up very soon
and and yeah so if you made it this far in the episode really appreciate it um yeah that's that

(02:54:45):
uh it means a lot that you found yeah exactly yeah hopefully hopefully you enjoyed and um
yeah i i certainly did absolutely likewise thank you everybody we we've been working up to this
all through season one we've mentioned the q a episode numerous times and so we're glad that we
we finally managed to get to it season two starting in january do join us on patreon

(02:55:08):
and aside from that we will see you for uh the last episode of this season next week
all right bye everyone take care

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