July 24, 2025 • 55 mins
Air Date - 23 July 2025
James Twyman, a spiritual teacher and international peace activist known as “The Peace Troubadour,” is a brave leader who steps into war-torn countries with a guitar, song, and prayers to unite people around the world and calm the waters. He has written 24 powerful New York Times bestselling books on inner peace and self-development. His latest book is I Don’t Know, Maybe, I Love You: How to De-Polarize Your Family, Business, Country, and the World. James, an Episcopal Franciscan priest and follower of St. Francis, wrote this book as a pause button, an opportunity to hold still and look at the big picture, what we want in our lives and the world. His goal is to have people step up, become de-polarizing agents, and change the world one conversation at a time during the pandemic of being right.
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James Twyman, a spiritual teacher and international peace activist known as “The Peace Troubadour,” is a brave leader who steps into war-torn countries with a guitar, song, and prayers to unite people around the world and calm the waters. He has written 24 powerful New York Times bestselling books on inner peace and self-development. His latest book is I Don’t Know, Maybe, I Love You: How to De-Polarize Your Family, Business, Country, and the World. James, an Episcopal Franciscan priest and follower of St. Francis, wrote this book as a pause button, an opportunity to hold still and look at the big picture, what we want in our lives and the world. His goal is to have people step up, become de-polarizing agents, and change the world one conversation at a time during the pandemic of being right.
https://www.worldpeacepulse.com/
#JamesTwyman #RoyceMorales #PerfectLifeAwakening #Empowerment #Spirituality #Consciousness #PersonalGrowth #Transformation
Connect with Royce Morales at https://www.roycemorales.com/
Visit the Perfect Life Awakening Show Page https://omtimes.com/iom/shows/perfect-life-awakening-show
Subscribe to our Newsletter https://omtimes.com/subscribe-omtimes-magazine/
Connect with OMTimes on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/Omtimes.Magazine/ and OMTimes Radio https://www.facebook.com/ConsciousRadiowebtv.OMTimes/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OmTimes/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/omtimes/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/OMTimesTV
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/2798417/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/omtimes/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome to the Perfect Life Awakening Show hosted by Royce Morales.
Royce has been a transformational facilitator, teaching groundbreaking spiritually based
courses for more than four decades. She is the author
of three books about her teachings. Join Royce as she
takes you on a journey into how to live your
best life and find your true purpose through discovering the
(00:31):
origins of subconscious, disempowering notions and releasing them. She talks
with experts and inspiring people just like you who learned
to trust their intuitive inner wisdom, which led to life
changing shifts. Today, her guests live in empowered existence and
are helping change the world to a higher consciousness place
(00:52):
based on truth and love. You deserve to awaken to
align with and embody your true self and live a
life life filled with love. Transform yourself from triggered to
empowered and create your perfect life. Here is your host,
Royce Morales.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Hello, Welcome everyone. I am more than excited. I know
I always say I'm excited when I start my show,
but I'm more than excited today to have somebody really
special who's doing so much incredible work for and on
this planet. And before I even introduce him. I just
(01:33):
want to remind everybody that I am leading a panel
discussion on August eighth. It's all about awakening. We're calling
it awakening or remembering. Have we done this already? So
set aside August eighth. It's going to be on ten
am Pacific time, and I'll be sending out information about it.
(01:55):
But make sure to reserve that spot because it's going
to be fascinating. The three women that I have with
me are they all present a different, different perspective on
awakening what does it really mean? So keep that in mind.
So let me introduce James Twiman, my guest today. There's
so much that I want to say about him, but
(02:16):
let me just kind of boil it down that James
Twiman is an international piece Troubadour, which means that he
has gone into war torn nations with his guitar and
his amazing songs and tries to generate peace and understanding
(02:37):
and connection and depolarization, which is what he's going to
be talking about today, which is a sign of the
times that we need to understand depolarization. Why are we
so polarized? It's just crazy to me. It's like, hey,
we're all humans. We can get along anyway. So for
(02:57):
three decades he has been a global force for peace,
leading millions of people in synchronized meditation around the world.
He's a New York Times best selling author. He's written
twenty four books amazing, and he's recorded twenty two music albums.
(03:18):
And he's all about understanding why we're polarized and what
we can do about it, which is his newest book.
I just finished reading it and it blew my mind
because he traveled across the United States and the world
actually and talked to various people about, you know, what's
going on, why can't we connect? And he ended up
(03:42):
being connected with some really amazing stories that he shared
very openly. So he is turning his focus to the
challenges of our time, which, if anybody has been following
the news, there are some big challenges going on on
our time. So let me introduce you, James. Welcome to
(04:06):
my show. I'm so glad you're here.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Thank you, Royce. It's great to be here. I'm excited
to talk about this important topic.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yes, yeah, I don't think there's anything more important actually,
you know, and it's not just politically, it's personally it's
our relationships, our families, our children. So yeah, I'm glad
you're going to get into that. But first of all,
tell us how you got started.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
In all of this.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
What inspired you to take this route in your life.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
This particular route that I write about in the new book,
or in general in general. Yeah, well, let me look back. Gosh,
it's so hard after so much time has gone by
to pinpoint. But there are certain moments, I would say,
where we make resolute decisions. And I think the most
(05:02):
important was when a friend of mine gave me a
sheet of paper. It all started with a sheet of
paper that had on the twelve piece prayers from the
twelve major religions of the world. These were prayers that
had been prayed in my favorite town in the world, Assizi, Italy,
the home of Saint Francis, in nineteen eighty six, when
(05:25):
Pope Jumpaul the second called the leaders of the twelve
major religions of the world to a Sizi, not to
discuss or talk, or just to pray together, and each
one brought the peace prayer from their tradition, and there
was a big, beautiful ceremony at the Basilica of Santa Francesco,
and each one beginning with the Dalai Lama for Buddhism,
(05:47):
and all the different leaders prayed the peace prayer from
their tradition to show that we are all really pointed
in the same direction, and that is toward peace. So
a few years later, a friend of mine gave me
that sheet of paper, and I don't know why she
felt inspired to do that, but as I read it
(06:07):
later that day, I began to hear music, and because
I've been in Mussial most of my life, I picked
up my guitar and just began to play along, and
within one hour I had put all twelve of these
prayers to music. Wow, it was like a miracle and
they were beautiful. So I decided that I wasn't given
(06:29):
this just for me, This was something to share. People
began calling me the peace troubadour, as you mentioned, and
at one point, that was in nineteen ninety four, at
one point I felt, well, a peace troubadour should be
willing to go to where peace is needed. So I
got myself invited to Croatia and Bosnia during the Bulkan War,
(06:52):
and then many other examples followed, including being invited to Iraq,
by Saddam Hussein and many other countries, and I realized
that in the end, in the beginning, middle end, and
we're all focused on what we really want, which is peace. Now,
(07:12):
the way we go about getting that maybe dysfunctional, but
in the end, when we really come down to it,
that is what we all want. So when I put
those prayers to music and began sharing them around the world,
I realized this is what my life calling was. Of course,
many other things have happened, many books, movies, music, but
(07:34):
it really does keep coming back to that original call
to be like Saint Francis of as Easy and to
be a tribadoor of peace.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Wow, I'm just blown away that you So you literally
went into these countries and gathered people and started singing.
How did that? What did that look like?
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Every situation was different. One example, well, let's begin with
when I went to Croatia and then Bosnia in nineteen
ninety five. As I said, I just felt like I
should be willing to do this, so I sent out
I was about ninety letters to all the peace and
humanitarian organizations that I could find in that whole region.
(08:19):
Of course, you know, I think email did exist, but
not very many people really had email at that time,
so I was literally sending physical letters out and I
got one response, and it was from an organization in
a town called Rieka, Croatia, And before I knew it,
I was on my way and I performed and shared
(08:40):
the peace concert and talked about peace for several weeks
all throughout the entire Bulkan region. So that's one example.
I did write my first book, which was called Emissary
of Light, from a beautiful, amazing experience that I had
when I was there at that time, and I was
on a book tour. I was picked up by a
(09:02):
major company. I was in the UK on a book
tour and I was on a radio program, and I
found out that this particular interviewer, very much unlike you,
liked to push and needle his guests and get them
to say things that they didn't want to say. I
remember sitting in the waiting room and the people who
(09:23):
were on air right before me it stormed out of
the studio very upset. So I thought, Okay, well here
comes this nice little peace troubadour. What happens? And this
was at a time when the US and Iraq and
all of the US Allies were right on the verge
of another war in This was nineteen ninety eight, and
(09:48):
I went into the interview and at one point this
man whose name was James Whale, I still remember his name.
He said, Okay, mister peace Troubadour, where does this really
hit the road and become real or is it just
a bunch of airy, fairy New Age nonsense? And I
said something that just kind of came out of my mouth.
I don't really know why, but I said, what I'd
(10:10):
like to do is to go to Iraq and sing
the Muslim prayer of peace to Saddam Hussein. Maybe if
we pray together, something will happen. What I didn't realize
was that the Iraqi ambassador to Great Britain was listening
to that interview, and next thing I know, I was
(10:31):
on an airplane to Amman, Jordan, and then had to
take a twelve hour taxi drive through the desert to
get to Baghdad. In fact, I'll tell you the first story,
the story of my first footsteps in Iraq. The cab
pulls up to this beautiful hotel where they were welcoming me,
called the El Rashid Hotel, and as I get out,
(10:54):
I'm walking through the main entrance and I noticed a
huge mosaic on the ground, and in the center of
this mosaic there is the face of a man with
a big snarl on his face. And I look and
I think that looks a lot like George Bush scene.
(11:14):
And I look at the bottom and it says in
English in the mosaic Bush is a criminal. Oh, you
literally have to walk over George Bush's face to get
into this hotel. And that was the beginning. But I
found something out in the course of that adventure, performing
the Peace concert at the National Theater on National Television. Afterwards,
(11:39):
they had a big party where I was the guest
of honor, where all we did was sit around singing
is Simon and Garfunkel songs. And I realize something very
very important, that we all want the same thing. And
as I said, we have dysfunctional ways of getting about that.
But if we could just go to the core and
(11:59):
remember that that even though we were very I don't know,
it's just very difficult for us to really get what
we want. We do want the same thing. Here I
am in Baghdad with the so called enemy, and all
they really wanted was peace. So there have been many adventures.
(12:20):
Every single one of them was a little different, as
I mentioned, but each one of them was a profound
opportunity not just to talk about peace, but to find
beautiful and creative ways to live into it.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Well, every time you say all we really want is peace,
it kind of leads me into reading your book and
reading the interaction that you had with people that you
found that you completely disagreed with, but you found a
way to bridge that, which hold up your book for
(12:55):
a second, because I adore the title of this book.
Your publicist person sent me a copy of that book,
and it took me quite a while to pick it
up and read it because I thought, oh, this sounds
like it's about relationships. But as I was reading it,
I realized how that title arrived and what it really
(13:17):
means and the depth of it. I mean, it's so simplistic,
but it's so deep at the same time, because if
we can just get to those three places, that's what
when peace will happen. So tell us about that. I
mean I kind of wanted to wait to jump into
your book, But tell us about that title, because it's
so perfect.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Sure, the title came from a conversation, or I should
even say argument that I had with my younger brother. Yeah,
back around the beginning of COVID. I don't remember what
we were even arguing about, but at one point I
realized he was winning. So I said three things to him.
I said, Kenny, I don't know, maybe I love you.
(14:00):
And as soon as I said that, he said, don't
say that, because as soon as you say that, we
can't keep the argument going. He wanted the argument because
it's just part of our relationship, right, And I realize
when he said that, it's true. If there's nothing opposing us,
there's nothing to push against, we can't continue in our argument.
(14:22):
So I began talking about this in many of my lectures,
and I realized that it was very sticky afterwards. I
would hear people using it just in the course of
their daily conversations days later. But I had no intention
of writing a book. I had written twenty three books
at that point, and I figured, I don't really need
to do this anymore. But then many of you make
(14:46):
I remember on own the magazine Home Times, there was
an article written about my musical based on the life
of Saint Francis of ASSISI and I was actually on
tour this past September performing that musical on the east
coast of the US. One of the places where I
was doing it was in north Conway, New Hampshire. My
(15:07):
friend Walt was a sponsor and Walton, his wife Anne
and I went out to dinner the night before and
I found out in the course of the conversation that
Anne owns a publishing company called Summit Publishers. And I
said to her, I'm not going to write any more books,
but if I did, this is the one I would write.
(15:28):
And I told her the story about my brother, and
I told her about this idea, this idea that I had,
and she said, if you write that book, I will
publish it. I said, okay, I guess I'm going to
start writing. And I was traveling in a little camper van,
so I went back to my van that night and
(15:49):
began writing. The next morning, I went into North Conway
to have a cup of coffee. Now this is right
before the presidential election. In the middle of North Conway,
right downtown, there was a man who had a car
filled with Trump stickers and he was carrying a sign
(16:10):
that said vote Trump or else.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
I love this story.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
This is yeah. I wasn't sure what the or else was.
But and I'm looking at him from outside the window
where I was sitting, I thought this is the perfect
place to begin. So I went out and I just
began a conversation. Now, I'm sure that he realized right
away that I was not on the same bandwagon. Many weren't.
(16:38):
People who passed him on the street were either honking
or lifting a finger a middle finger, and so there
was a lot of back and forth going on. He
probably figured I was there to confront him, to argue
with him, to tell him that he was wrong. But
instead of doing that, I just said, tell me more,
(16:59):
why is this important? To why do you think that
Donald Trump is the person for this job? Even though
this is not what I felt, I resisted the urge
to step in and say anything other than tell me more.
And he did. He began to tell me his ideas
why he thought this was important. And I didn't agree
(17:24):
with very much of what he said at all, but
I was able in just asking him that penetrate something
the need to be right. And this is one of
the things I talk about a lot in the book,
what I call the real pandemic, which is the pandemic
of being rights, fiction of being right. And this is
I think the very core of the issue that we
(17:48):
have today. Everybody wants to be right. Everyone thinks they're
right for many reasons. And if we agree with that person,
were okay. But if we don't agree with that person,
were pushed out. And instead of trying to convince this
man that I was right, I listened to him. Here's
the miracle. Because I was willing to do that, he
(18:09):
was willing to listen to me. He asked me what
I felt. That probably wouldn't have happened if I had
not began by listening to him. So this is how
the book started. It was on the course of this
traveling down the East Coast and then finally back to Portland, Oregon,
that I had many many conversations with people who agreed
(18:30):
with me, who disagreed with me. But through it all,
with each person, I was able to find a common
ground that had very little to do with being right,
but being together.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Which is what I love about the title is I
don't know, you know, to have that attitude of tell
me more, you know, why do you feel this way
about Trump? And to come from an attitude of well,
maybe you have something important to say. Maybe to listen.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
Yeah, this is the key. The truth is I don't know,
neither do you. None of us do. We don't know
anything for sure. We have our opinions, we have what
we believe, and that's fine. But maybe if I listen
to you, maybe if I give you the space to share,
(19:22):
maybe I'll learn something. Maybe we'll begin to shape what
I believe. But at the core, at the foundation, we
have to have love and respect, just as I had
in that conversation with my younger brother. You know, my
younger brother and I we love to banter and to
go back and forth. But for many people this is
very serious, and as we know, people are losing relationships
(19:45):
and even in their own families, people are kicking each
other out of their hearts all because they don't agree.
We have to come to the point where this polarization,
the tension decreases. So this is why I say that
what I really want to do is to start a
movement of depolarization, a movement of training people to have
(20:11):
the tools to go into polarized situations and bring calm,
to bring space, to bring love. So one of the
things that we did is we set up a website
which is de dash polarized dot com, so depolarize with
a dash, And of course you can get the book,
you can learn some other tools. There is a one
(20:33):
or two minute survey that we invite people to take
that is helping us to determine the direction that we
should go with this important movement. So I really hope
people will join the movement. At the very least, let's
come together those of us who want to find a
creative solution so we can begin depolarizing our families, our businesses,
(20:58):
our countries, and the entire world.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, it's so fascinating to me because I'm sitting here thinking,
I've always always been a pacifist. I went on you know,
Vietnam War protest marches my whole life, you know, starting
at the age of fifteen, snuck out the door, so
I didn't tell my mom, and you know that kind
of thing. I was that kind of kid. But I'm thinking,
(21:22):
as you're talking that kind of like what mother Teresa said,
she doesn't go on anti war marches, she goes on
peace marches. It's that kind of thing. If we're coming
from I'm going to make those people wrong about war.
It's never going to resolve, you know it. The position
that we take is what is important. And when you
(21:44):
had that talk with your brother and that man at
the coffee shop, and you came from a place of well,
tell me, you know, tell me what this is, you know,
I think that's just so key, you know.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
And it's hard. Yeah, it is hard, especially today because
we are so set in our positions. It would have
been very easy for me, with that man there in
North Conway, to step in and say, dude, what's with
all the signs. Don't you see what you're doing. I
get that you believe in this person, but come on.
(22:17):
That would have been very easy for me to do.
But all it would have done is pushed us further apart.
And that's not the goal today. We have to come
closer together. Another one of my very favorite stories in
the book came at the expense I could say of
probably my dearest friend in the world, and her name
(22:39):
is Vicky. She lives in New Jersey, and I had
a few days off my tour, so I was going
to go spend it with Vicky. And Vicky, by the way,
is someone who anyone who knows her will agree. She's
probably the most loving, deeply spiritual person any of us know.
So it was great with great surprise when I sat
(23:02):
down with her that first day that I realized that
she was a very strong magas supporter. Wow, how is
this possible to be as loving as Vicky and support
Donald Trump? It was beyond me, but I held back.
I took a deep breath, and instead of jumping on
(23:23):
my own opinion, I said, Vicky, tell me more. I
admit this is hard for me to believe, but I
want to hear why. And so she began to share,
and we spent days together talking about this, and with
her open heart and her loving way, she explained many
things to me that I may or may not have
(23:45):
agreed with, but I understood, and it just goes to
show that we can keep our hearts open in the
midst of all of this. It would have been a
shame if I had said to Vicky, someone I've known
for over thirty years, Vicky, I don't want you in
my life anymore. You're totally wrong. Goodbye. But this is
(24:06):
what happens every day. We're pushing people out just because
we don't agree on things. Like politics. Well, this is
what needs to be healed, and we need to begin
first with ourselves. Look at my own prejudices, and that's
exactly what I had to do. I had to look
at the fact that I had a very strong belief
(24:27):
that anyone who's smart, anyone who's loving, would not vote
for Donald Trump. And I'm really glad that I was
confronted with that because it's not true. We all have
our opinions, we all have our way of looking at things,
and we can't villainize or be little people. Because of that,
(24:48):
we need to go deeper. And the deeper we go,
the more we realize once again that we want the
same thing.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Yeah. So after the whole conversation with your friend, did
you were you able to say, okay, well maybe I
could vote for Trump. Well?
Speaker 3 (25:08):
No, what happened?
Speaker 2 (25:10):
So you still held your notions but.
Speaker 3 (25:15):
It softened.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
Yeah, once again, this is not about us needing to
change or change anyone else. If that happens organically, fine,
But it didn't inspire me to want to vote for
Donald Trump. However, I'll tell you what it did is
that it did allow me to step back and to
just let it be, to let play out whatever needs
(25:40):
to play out. And that is where I find myself today.
When I look at the news, I always feel the
energy of oh no, what's happening now. But as soon
as I catch that, I take a deep breath and
I say, whatever needs to happen now. Maybe this is
(26:03):
the very thing that is going to break us through.
You know, the tension of a rubber band is greatest
right before it breaks, Yes, before it snaps. Maybe there
is an entire thought system that is getting ready to snap.
The idea that we're separated, the concept of being isolated
(26:25):
and alone. That maybe these are the things that maybe
this has to happen. And this is where the maybe
and the title comes in. Maybe if I just allow
whatever is to be, then I'm going to learn something.
So it didn't change my opinion, but it softened by
(26:46):
approach to that opinion.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
I think what you said is really important. I talk
about this a lot in my teachings that on some level,
we've chosen this, you know, we have chosen to go
through eight years of Donald Trump because we need to
wake up to something that he's providing for us, whatever
that is, you know, And that's why I'm doing this
(27:10):
panel discussion called Awakening, because there's so much awakening that's
going on in all of us from all of the
stuff that's going on that we wouldn't have had the
opportunity for. Maybe we would have, but it would have
been a lot more subtle, you know. But we need
to be beaten over the head sometimes we really do.
It just reminds me of a story. I don't remember
(27:32):
who the election was for. It was some presidential election
years ago, several decades ago, and I was standing in
the voting booth, and I was a staunch liberal, progressive Democrat,
and whoever this person was that was running was the
complete opposite of everything I stand for. And I'm standing
there in the voting booth and I'm thinking, you know what,
(27:56):
it doesn't matter who I vote for, because on a
global level, we've already decided who we need on a
spiritual level to wake us up and to get us
moving and to provide something to trigger us so that
you know, we get to, as you say, get to
the point where we know that we all want peace.
(28:17):
So I of course voted for the Democrat and of
course the Republican one. And it was like, okay, well
that's what we need, that's what we've chosen, that's what
we need to go through.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
So there's an interesting chapter that illustrates this. I was
visiting two friends of mine in Maine. As I traveled
leaving North Conway, I went to visit my friends Lisa
Natoli and Bill Free and that evening we were talking
and Bill, who's very insightful, asked a question, how would
(28:49):
a sage vote if they walked into the voting booth
and there it is okay, how would they vote? What
we came to is that they would first enter open
listening for guidance, and then they would follow the guidance
that they received in the moment. They would resist the
(29:12):
need and the urge that we all have to have
preconceived ideas, preconceived judgments of who we support, who we
don't support, who we think is right, who we think
is wrong. They would resist that and they would simply
enter and say, whatever is in the highest good guide me. Now,
this is hard. This is a challenge because when it
(29:36):
comes back to this addiction to being right, we all
want to be right, we all think we're right. Actually,
this is one of the problems, one of the reasons
why we think we're right is because all the evidence
seems to point towards that. For example, in social media YouTube,
most of these things have algorithms that tell us what
(29:58):
we already believe. So if I'm on let's say, YouTube,
and I look up a video on the anti vaccine movement,
it's going to determine, well, this must be what he
believes and wants, so I'm going to give him a
lot more of that. So all the doctors who believe this,
all of the different authorities who support this, it's easy
(30:20):
for me now to say I must be right because
everyone agrees with me. Everyone who's important agrees with me. However,
if I had gone onto YouTube and been pro vaccine,
the same thing would have happened. All of the experts
who believe that this is what we need would have
showed up, and it would have been very easy for
me to say, obviously, I'm right because this is what
(30:42):
everyone says. Everyone that I believe agrees with me. So
it's the agreement that trying to get people on board
with agreement that convinces us that we're right and that
everyone else is wrong. And so this pandemic of being
right is I think the foundation and that's why the
title of the book begins with I don't know. I
(31:06):
don't know if I'm right. For all I know, Donald
Trump is the exact person that we need for whatever reason.
Maybe he's going to do he's going to surprise me
and do great things. Maybe the things that he does
is going to bring down a particular structure that needs
to come down. I don't know, but maybe there's something
(31:26):
happening that I can't understand. But I love you, and
I love Donald Trump, and I love everyone who's involved,
because love and compassion is the only thing that's going
to move us from where we are now to where
we need to be as one.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Yes, well, we need to take a little bit of
a break, and I'm talking to James Twyman and we'll
be back and he's going to talk a little bit
more about how to get there, how to get to
that place of depolarization. Give us some hints. We'll be
right back.
Speaker 3 (32:01):
Home.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
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Speaker 2 (34:28):
Welcome back. I am talking to James Twyman. He is
the author of I Don't Know Maybe I Love You.
I just love that title. I love saying it.
Speaker 3 (34:38):
It's great.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Yeah, So we're talking about depolarizing. I think one of
the thoughts that I had as I was reading your
book is that some of the stuff that's going on.
I keep talking about awakening, but we need to awaken
to our shadows. Our dark sides are the parts of
us that we've suppressed and denied and try to act
(35:01):
like we're all happy in whatever. So how do you
feel about that in terms of your work? Do you
see that that is something that's going on as well?
Speaker 3 (35:13):
Oh, it's essential. Whenever I have a judgment about someone
and see the error, I'm really only projecting an air
that I'm not seen in myself. We could look at
a politician. We could look at our neighbor, our brother,
our sister. But this is a rule that is foundational
(35:34):
in our spiritual journey, and I often go back to
my foundation, my own spiritual hero of Saint Francis of ASSISI.
I am a Franciscan priest, and so Francis has always
been the example for me. And probably the one story
(35:55):
that has influenced me the most was this. I think
it's very similar and important to what we're discussing. When
Francis tried to end the Crusades by going to the
most important Muslim in the world at that time, the
Sultan al Camille of Egypt, and simply sharing with him
(36:18):
his perspective of what Jesus really taught the message of love. Now,
I'll tell you the thing that Francis heard that triggered him.
He heard that the whether I don't think the Sultan
actually said this, but this was the report at the
time that the Sultan had said that he would give
a Byzantine gold coin to any Muslim that brought him
(36:39):
the head of a Christian. When Francis heard that, he
jumped up and said, that's where I need to go.
That's who I need to visit, And of course didn't
seem very logical to go to the man who wants
to cut off his head, but he did. He went.
It took him three different tries. He went with another
one of the brother's name, brother Illuminado, and when they
(37:03):
arrived at the fortress of Damietta. When Francis and Illuminado
first got to the fortress, they thought that they were
Sufis and welcomed them in, only to realize that no,
they were not Sufi's at all, and they were sentenced
to be executed. But the Sultan was so fascinated by
(37:23):
this monk, this friar that had gone against everything that
seemed like common sense, and come to visit him. So
Francis and Illuminado spent two weeks with the Sultan as
well as with the Sultan's teacher, whose name was the
Fakir Aldin al Farsi, who was the most important Sufi
(37:46):
in the world at that time. Francis and the Sufi
leader in particular, had a very very deep connection, and
they shared the foundations of each of their faiths. They
learned from each other, and before were long, the so
called enemies had come together and had united in a vision.
Now what happened next is very interesting. Francis left with
(38:12):
a piece offer from the Sultan, but the cardinal, whose
name was the Cardinal Pelagius, who was in charge of
all the Crusaders, rejected it, and that he saw the
opening and was just determined to crush the Muslim horses.
If the Crusaders were able to cross over the Nile,
(38:34):
that's exactly what would have happened. But the Sultan, being
very smart, when the Crusaders, the entire army, had come
to kind of a low point just before getting to
the Nile, he opened up the floodgates and flooded that
entire region, and the entire army of the Crusaders was
(38:54):
locked in place the mud. They couldn't move, they couldn't
get their horses out, and they were starving. So what
did the Sultan do. He could very easily have sent
to show soldiers in and ended everything right there. But
because I really believe that it was because of the
influence of Saint Francis himself that the Sultan did something
(39:15):
very different. He sent in his soldiers to feed them,
to take care of these starving, sick Crusaders. The enemy.
And when you out Christian the Christians, there's not much
you can do but turn around and go home. And
I think there's an important lesson here that we can
(39:37):
all learn. Whether we're Christian or whatever tradition we follow,
the only real tradition is the tradition of love. And
if we can love our enemies, do good to those
who hate us, bless those who curse us, as Jesus
asked us to do, then the work of depolarization happens
(39:59):
on its own. It's not like we have to do
certain things. We just have to allow a certain being
to take over and to live in a certain way.
And if we do that, this really becomes quite simple.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
Yes, it is quite simple. It really is, Which is
why every time I read the news about some war
or some this or that or the other thing, I
always think, why, you know it's so simple? Anyway, that's
just me.
Speaker 3 (40:33):
I agree. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:36):
So, I know you talk in your book about some
techniques that you can use to depolarize relationships, maybe to
make it easier, let's just talk about interpersonal relationships rather
than global. So what are some of those techniques? How
do you tell people how to do all that? Well?
Speaker 3 (40:53):
The first step is to watch your own mind. In
other words, when you feel something rise that where you
want to correct, you want to help someone see the light,
whatever it is, notice that and take a deep breath.
Don't just jump in, which is what we have a
(41:15):
tendency to do. We see someone, we meet someone who
has a different belief system, a very different way of being,
different politics, whatever it may be, and we want to
immediately jump in with our facts, with our ideas and
correct them. So the first step is to slow down,
(41:38):
take a deep breath, remember that it's not about changing someone.
And then the second step is to be curious. Curiosity
is a powerful tool if we can, as we said before,
begin by asking questions, why do you believe this? Dof
(41:58):
something ever happen in your life that you to believe
that and be honestly curious about that. You're probably gonna
learn things about that person, even if it's someone that
you think you already know, that will surprise you. At
the very least, you're going to realize that the distance
between you is not as great as it seems. I
(42:20):
take my friend Vicky as an example. As I said,
Vicky is my best friend. She's been one of my
dearest friends for so many years, decades, and when I
realize that she was voting in a different way, it
seemed just for a moment that there was a grand
canyon between us. And because I took a pause, that's
the key, the pause. In fact, I'll come back to
(42:42):
that in a moment and then be curious, ask her questions,
find out more. We realize that we're not quite so
far apart as it is. So speaking of the pause,
I'll tell you a story of how someone who did
this literally saved the world. And I mean this in
a very literal way. We would not be here today
(43:04):
if there had not been the man I'm going to
tell you about who, instead of doing what he was
told to do, took a deep breath and paused. Maybe
you've heard this story, and I don't know his name,
but because I read this many years ago, but this
took place in Russia during the Cold War in the
early nineteen eighties. There was a mission a Russian missile silo,
(43:28):
a nuclear missile silo, and there were two Russian soldiers
officers in this silo who each had a job if
word ever came that they were to launch their weapons,
and each one of them would turn a key, and
the war would be on, and as we can surmise,
(43:50):
the world would end because there would be hundreds of
nuclear explosions and that would be the end of all
of us. Well, guess what happened. The order came and
the first man said, okay, he turned his key. And
the second man was trained not to question these things.
When the order comes, you follow, and instead of doing
(44:14):
what he knew he was supposed to do, he took
a breath and he said, hold on, let's just pause.
The other officer said, what are you doing. I think
he held a gun to his head, but he couldn't
shoot him because someone's got to turn the key. And
he said, you've got to turn the key. This is
the order. When the other man said, let's just pause
(44:36):
for a moment. Well, in that pause, however many seconds
it was, the order came that it was a mistake,
that it was a glitch. There was never any reason
stand down. If they had done what they were trained
to do. If that other man had turned that key,
(44:56):
all out nuclear war would have happened. As he had
the insight or the wisdom or the inspiration to just
slow it. Excuse me, I have a cold and it's
just getting into my throat. Because he had that inspiration
to pause, we're all still here. Well, these other examples
(45:18):
aren't as dramatic as that, but they show us the
importance of just slowing everything down and taking a moment
to listen to the other person, to be curious about
why they believe what they believe. And then maybe they're
going to ask us what we believe. That's the beautiful thing.
(45:39):
If we give them the space, good chance they're going
to give us the space. But if we just jump
in and say, you're wrong, this is what you should believe,
we're going to be at battle and we're never gonna
get anywhere. And this is the pandemic of being right,
and this is what we need to address.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
Yeah, yeah, and being right is the core of our
primitive consciousness.
Speaker 3 (46:07):
You know.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
It's like, if we're wrong, it feels like a threat
to our survival.
Speaker 3 (46:12):
So we're a very important point. That's right. If I'm wrong, Well,
guess what, I'm wrong all the time. We all are.
I amaze myself sometimes at how wrong I am. I'll
give you one funny example, and you may have read
this in the book The Very very last part of
(46:32):
the book. I can think this is a lesson in
just laughing at ourselves. So I live in Mexico, and
about an hour and a half from where I live,
I have a small cabin in a town called Mosic
meat Love. And at my cabin there's a very very
large bathtub. And I had been in this bathtub, an
(46:53):
outdoor bathtub, the day before. Everything was working fine. The
next day, I had just finished writing the book. I
was very excited. I was going to get in my bathtub.
I turned on the hot water. I let it run.
Nothing happens. So I went I looked at the at
the propane. I didn't see anything that seemed to be
(47:14):
out of place. I went back once again. Nothing happened.
I called up my manager and she said, well, I
don't know, but I'll send out the gas guy. Maybe
they're just not enough gas. So the propane guy came.
He filled it up. But okay, now I'll turn it on. Nothing.
Remember I had just done this the day before, so
(47:35):
I knew which was the cot, which was the cold.
I for sure have that hot water going. Nothing was happening,
and I called up my manager again. I said, I
don't know what's wrong here, But you need to send
a repairman tomorrow. She said, no problem, I'll do it tomorrow.
I went back and just on an inspiration, I turned
(47:55):
the other faucet hot water. I thought I knew for sure,
I thought I was right and I wasn't, And I
laughed at myself so strong, because that was the perfect
story to end this book with. Just because we think
we're right does not mean that we don't have still
(48:16):
things to learn. And if we laugh at ourselves even
when we realize that we are wrong, then everything gets
a lot smoother and calmer and we get to the
end goal much faster.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
Yeah, definitely, that's a great story. Yes, So what about
I know we only have a few minutes here, I
don't know, five or six minutes. Talk to us about empathy,
because I think that's a really important point in terms
of depolarizing.
Speaker 3 (48:45):
We tend to, once again, only empathize with the people
that we agree with or that we like. What if
we empathize with the people that we don't agree with?
You know, what I suggest for everyone is find someone
that you know you disagree with. Maybe if someone who
voted differently than you or holds a different political or
(49:05):
social opinion than you call them up, sit them down,
whatever it takes, and have empathy for them. Realize that
that just because they don't agree with you does not
mean that they're wrong or a bad person. Like my
friend VICKI, they might be wonderful, giving, loving people, and
if you give them the space to explore that, to
(49:30):
empathize with them, they're going to give you the same
space more than likely, and you're going to come closer
together rather than being pulled further apart. So once again,
this is about depolarizing where we've been polarized enough. I
don't know how much more we can take. And that's
why we need a movement of people who are doing
(49:51):
just this. So I really hope people will come and
join us. Go to the website, get the book, whatever
it takes, let's get this movement off the ground, because
I think this country, in this world need it more
than ever before, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (50:08):
So as you were talking, I'm thinking about a particular
person in my life that sounds a lot like your
friend Vicky. She's very loving, very giving, very compassionate, you know,
you name it anything that is loving and compassionate. She
believes in it, and yet she is a Donald Trump person,
(50:29):
and in order to save our relationship, we've decided to
just never talk about politics. How do you feel about
just taking that route.
Speaker 3 (50:37):
It's a good place to begin. It may evolve from
there where you can begin. Well, when the heat, when
the heat comes off, because that's really what keeps us dancing,
our feet get too hot, right, and there may come
a point when you focus on the things that are
(50:57):
more important and you develop that strong loving care no
matter what those are, the that's the key, no matter what.
Then the heat diminishes, and you might be able to
talk about some of those things, and the need to
be right may not be quite as evident. So until
that time comes, avoiding that the topic is a good idea.
(51:22):
When I was driving out to the East Coast to
begin that tour, I stopped in Minnesota to visit my father,
and my father is about as different from me as
a human being can be, and this is one of
the ways. He is a very very strong supporter of
Donald Trump, a Republican, and he kept saying, I want
(51:44):
to talk about this. I want to know why. I said, Dad,
it's not a good idea. We should I love you,
let's just avoid that topic. And then he would he
would say one thing that would just trigger me, and
I would erupting the topic until the de escalation has happened,
(52:04):
the depolarizing has occurred. Is a good idea. But have compassion,
have love for that person, because it's the compassion and
the love that's going to get us through.
Speaker 2 (52:19):
Yes, even those who don't think you can love because
they trigger. Every ounce of you are just reflections of
something going on in you. And that's what you were
saying before. And that's the core of what I teach.
I call it mirroring. So if we're suppressing or denying
something about ourselves, we see it in somebody else and
(52:39):
it drives us crazy. So yeah, even people.
Speaker 3 (52:43):
That vote for Donald Trump, and there may be a
lot of people watching this right now who vote for
Donald Trump. And it's important to know that we love
each other. I'm not going to throw anyone out of
my life based upon silly things. Let's get to the
important stuff. And if we can just make that the priority,
loving one another, like Saint Francis did with the Sultan,
(53:07):
then the enemy becomes our best friend.
Speaker 2 (53:11):
That's true. That's true. So tell us how people reach you.
What you'd like people to do, how to get your book,
do your little promo here.
Speaker 3 (53:20):
As I mentioned before, join this movement, become a deep polarizer.
It begins by going to de dash polarized dot com,
take the one or two minute long survey, and then
get the book once again. You can get it on Amazon,
or you can get it through the website or anywhere else.
The book is fun. I like to write books that
(53:43):
keep one engaged. This is a road trip, really and
it's a story that I think you'll really enjoy. More
than anything, I hope it will inspire you to find
the people in your own life who maybe are different
or have a different approach, and find ways to relate
to them, to have compassion for them, to begin to
(54:05):
come together. And if we can begin to do that
in our personal relationships, we can do that in the
whole world. You can also go to my personal website,
which is James Ftwyman dot com and we hope to
see you at another event or an interview sometime in
the future.
Speaker 2 (54:23):
Yes, thank you so much, James. This was just delightful.
Keep up the good work. Go create peace on the planet.
From everybody. Depolarizing from within and we can do it definitely.
Thank you. Yeah, and you guys can follow me on
Royce's ramblings. That's my sub stack article that I put
(54:45):
out every week, and I talk a lot about mirrors
and peace and all kinds of good stuff. And as
I said earlier, make sure to reserve August eighth, at
ten a m. Pacific time, we're going to be doing
a panel discussion with three wonderful, amazing women talking about
what is awakening. Anyway, thank you so much, and we'll
(55:07):
see everybody next Wednesday. Have a great day and a
peaceful life.
Welcome to the Perfect Life Awakening Show hosted by Royce Morales.
Royce has been a transformational facilitator, teaching groundbreaking spiritually based
courses for more than four decades. She is the author
of three books about her teachings. Join Royce as she
takes you on a journey into how to live your
best life and find your true purpose through discovering the
(00:31):
origins of subconscious, disempowering notions and releasing them. She talks
with experts and inspiring people just like you who learned
to trust their intuitive inner wisdom, which led to life
changing shifts. Today, her guests live in empowered existence and
are helping change the world to a higher consciousness place
(00:52):
based on truth and love. You deserve to awaken to
align with and embody your true self and live a
life life filled with love. Transform yourself from triggered to
empowered and create your perfect life. Here is your host,
Royce Morales.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Hello, Welcome everyone. I am more than excited. I know
I always say I'm excited when I start my show,
but I'm more than excited today to have somebody really
special who's doing so much incredible work for and on
this planet. And before I even introduce him. I just
(01:33):
want to remind everybody that I am leading a panel
discussion on August eighth. It's all about awakening. We're calling
it awakening or remembering. Have we done this already? So
set aside August eighth. It's going to be on ten
am Pacific time, and I'll be sending out information about it.
(01:55):
But make sure to reserve that spot because it's going
to be fascinating. The three women that I have with
me are they all present a different, different perspective on
awakening what does it really mean? So keep that in mind.
So let me introduce James Twiman, my guest today. There's
so much that I want to say about him, but
(02:16):
let me just kind of boil it down that James
Twiman is an international piece Troubadour, which means that he
has gone into war torn nations with his guitar and
his amazing songs and tries to generate peace and understanding
(02:37):
and connection and depolarization, which is what he's going to
be talking about today, which is a sign of the
times that we need to understand depolarization. Why are we
so polarized? It's just crazy to me. It's like, hey,
we're all humans. We can get along anyway. So for
(02:57):
three decades he has been a global force for peace,
leading millions of people in synchronized meditation around the world.
He's a New York Times best selling author. He's written
twenty four books amazing, and he's recorded twenty two music albums.
(03:18):
And he's all about understanding why we're polarized and what
we can do about it, which is his newest book.
I just finished reading it and it blew my mind
because he traveled across the United States and the world
actually and talked to various people about, you know, what's
going on, why can't we connect? And he ended up
(03:42):
being connected with some really amazing stories that he shared
very openly. So he is turning his focus to the
challenges of our time, which, if anybody has been following
the news, there are some big challenges going on on
our time. So let me introduce you, James. Welcome to
(04:06):
my show. I'm so glad you're here.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Thank you, Royce. It's great to be here. I'm excited
to talk about this important topic.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yes, yeah, I don't think there's anything more important actually,
you know, and it's not just politically, it's personally it's
our relationships, our families, our children. So yeah, I'm glad
you're going to get into that. But first of all,
tell us how you got started.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
In all of this.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
What inspired you to take this route in your life.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
This particular route that I write about in the new book,
or in general in general. Yeah, well, let me look back. Gosh,
it's so hard after so much time has gone by
to pinpoint. But there are certain moments, I would say,
where we make resolute decisions. And I think the most
(05:02):
important was when a friend of mine gave me a
sheet of paper. It all started with a sheet of
paper that had on the twelve piece prayers from the
twelve major religions of the world. These were prayers that
had been prayed in my favorite town in the world, Assizi, Italy,
the home of Saint Francis, in nineteen eighty six, when
(05:25):
Pope Jumpaul the second called the leaders of the twelve
major religions of the world to a Sizi, not to
discuss or talk, or just to pray together, and each
one brought the peace prayer from their tradition, and there
was a big, beautiful ceremony at the Basilica of Santa Francesco,
and each one beginning with the Dalai Lama for Buddhism,
(05:47):
and all the different leaders prayed the peace prayer from
their tradition to show that we are all really pointed
in the same direction, and that is toward peace. So
a few years later, a friend of mine gave me
that sheet of paper, and I don't know why she
felt inspired to do that, but as I read it
(06:07):
later that day, I began to hear music, and because
I've been in Mussial most of my life, I picked
up my guitar and just began to play along, and
within one hour I had put all twelve of these
prayers to music. Wow, it was like a miracle and
they were beautiful. So I decided that I wasn't given
(06:29):
this just for me, This was something to share. People
began calling me the peace troubadour, as you mentioned, and
at one point, that was in nineteen ninety four, at
one point I felt, well, a peace troubadour should be
willing to go to where peace is needed. So I
got myself invited to Croatia and Bosnia during the Bulkan War,
(06:52):
and then many other examples followed, including being invited to Iraq,
by Saddam Hussein and many other countries, and I realized
that in the end, in the beginning, middle end, and
we're all focused on what we really want, which is peace. Now,
(07:12):
the way we go about getting that maybe dysfunctional, but
in the end, when we really come down to it,
that is what we all want. So when I put
those prayers to music and began sharing them around the world,
I realized this is what my life calling was. Of course,
many other things have happened, many books, movies, music, but
(07:34):
it really does keep coming back to that original call
to be like Saint Francis of as Easy and to
be a tribadoor of peace.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Wow, I'm just blown away that you So you literally
went into these countries and gathered people and started singing.
How did that? What did that look like?
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Every situation was different. One example, well, let's begin with
when I went to Croatia and then Bosnia in nineteen
ninety five. As I said, I just felt like I
should be willing to do this, so I sent out
I was about ninety letters to all the peace and
humanitarian organizations that I could find in that whole region.
(08:19):
Of course, you know, I think email did exist, but
not very many people really had email at that time,
so I was literally sending physical letters out and I
got one response, and it was from an organization in
a town called Rieka, Croatia, And before I knew it,
I was on my way and I performed and shared
(08:40):
the peace concert and talked about peace for several weeks
all throughout the entire Bulkan region. So that's one example.
I did write my first book, which was called Emissary
of Light, from a beautiful, amazing experience that I had
when I was there at that time, and I was
on a book tour. I was picked up by a
(09:02):
major company. I was in the UK on a book
tour and I was on a radio program, and I
found out that this particular interviewer, very much unlike you,
liked to push and needle his guests and get them
to say things that they didn't want to say. I
remember sitting in the waiting room and the people who
(09:23):
were on air right before me it stormed out of
the studio very upset. So I thought, Okay, well here
comes this nice little peace troubadour. What happens? And this
was at a time when the US and Iraq and
all of the US Allies were right on the verge
of another war in This was nineteen ninety eight, and
(09:48):
I went into the interview and at one point this
man whose name was James Whale, I still remember his name.
He said, Okay, mister peace Troubadour, where does this really
hit the road and become real or is it just
a bunch of airy, fairy New Age nonsense? And I
said something that just kind of came out of my mouth.
I don't really know why, but I said, what I'd
(10:10):
like to do is to go to Iraq and sing
the Muslim prayer of peace to Saddam Hussein. Maybe if
we pray together, something will happen. What I didn't realize
was that the Iraqi ambassador to Great Britain was listening
to that interview, and next thing I know, I was
(10:31):
on an airplane to Amman, Jordan, and then had to
take a twelve hour taxi drive through the desert to
get to Baghdad. In fact, I'll tell you the first story,
the story of my first footsteps in Iraq. The cab
pulls up to this beautiful hotel where they were welcoming me,
called the El Rashid Hotel, and as I get out,
(10:54):
I'm walking through the main entrance and I noticed a
huge mosaic on the ground, and in the center of
this mosaic there is the face of a man with
a big snarl on his face. And I look and
I think that looks a lot like George Bush scene.
(11:14):
And I look at the bottom and it says in
English in the mosaic Bush is a criminal. Oh, you
literally have to walk over George Bush's face to get
into this hotel. And that was the beginning. But I
found something out in the course of that adventure, performing
the Peace concert at the National Theater on National Television. Afterwards,
(11:39):
they had a big party where I was the guest
of honor, where all we did was sit around singing
is Simon and Garfunkel songs. And I realize something very
very important, that we all want the same thing. And
as I said, we have dysfunctional ways of getting about that.
But if we could just go to the core and
(11:59):
remember that that even though we were very I don't know,
it's just very difficult for us to really get what
we want. We do want the same thing. Here I
am in Baghdad with the so called enemy, and all
they really wanted was peace. So there have been many adventures.
(12:20):
Every single one of them was a little different, as
I mentioned, but each one of them was a profound
opportunity not just to talk about peace, but to find
beautiful and creative ways to live into it.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Well, every time you say all we really want is peace,
it kind of leads me into reading your book and
reading the interaction that you had with people that you
found that you completely disagreed with, but you found a
way to bridge that, which hold up your book for
(12:55):
a second, because I adore the title of this book.
Your publicist person sent me a copy of that book,
and it took me quite a while to pick it
up and read it because I thought, oh, this sounds
like it's about relationships. But as I was reading it,
I realized how that title arrived and what it really
(13:17):
means and the depth of it. I mean, it's so simplistic,
but it's so deep at the same time, because if
we can just get to those three places, that's what
when peace will happen. So tell us about that. I
mean I kind of wanted to wait to jump into
your book, But tell us about that title, because it's
so perfect.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Sure, the title came from a conversation, or I should
even say argument that I had with my younger brother. Yeah,
back around the beginning of COVID. I don't remember what
we were even arguing about, but at one point I
realized he was winning. So I said three things to him.
I said, Kenny, I don't know, maybe I love you.
(14:00):
And as soon as I said that, he said, don't
say that, because as soon as you say that, we
can't keep the argument going. He wanted the argument because
it's just part of our relationship, right, And I realize
when he said that, it's true. If there's nothing opposing us,
there's nothing to push against, we can't continue in our argument.
(14:22):
So I began talking about this in many of my lectures,
and I realized that it was very sticky afterwards. I
would hear people using it just in the course of
their daily conversations days later. But I had no intention
of writing a book. I had written twenty three books
at that point, and I figured, I don't really need
to do this anymore. But then many of you make
(14:46):
I remember on own the magazine Home Times, there was
an article written about my musical based on the life
of Saint Francis of ASSISI and I was actually on
tour this past September performing that musical on the east
coast of the US. One of the places where I
was doing it was in north Conway, New Hampshire. My
(15:07):
friend Walt was a sponsor and Walton, his wife Anne
and I went out to dinner the night before and
I found out in the course of the conversation that
Anne owns a publishing company called Summit Publishers. And I
said to her, I'm not going to write any more books,
but if I did, this is the one I would write.
(15:28):
And I told her the story about my brother, and
I told her about this idea, this idea that I had,
and she said, if you write that book, I will
publish it. I said, okay, I guess I'm going to
start writing. And I was traveling in a little camper van,
so I went back to my van that night and
(15:49):
began writing. The next morning, I went into North Conway
to have a cup of coffee. Now this is right
before the presidential election. In the middle of North Conway,
right downtown, there was a man who had a car
filled with Trump stickers and he was carrying a sign
(16:10):
that said vote Trump or else.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
I love this story.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
This is yeah. I wasn't sure what the or else was.
But and I'm looking at him from outside the window
where I was sitting, I thought this is the perfect
place to begin. So I went out and I just
began a conversation. Now, I'm sure that he realized right
away that I was not on the same bandwagon. Many weren't.
(16:38):
People who passed him on the street were either honking
or lifting a finger a middle finger, and so there
was a lot of back and forth going on. He
probably figured I was there to confront him, to argue
with him, to tell him that he was wrong. But
instead of doing that, I just said, tell me more,
(16:59):
why is this important? To why do you think that
Donald Trump is the person for this job? Even though
this is not what I felt, I resisted the urge
to step in and say anything other than tell me more.
And he did. He began to tell me his ideas
why he thought this was important. And I didn't agree
(17:24):
with very much of what he said at all, but
I was able in just asking him that penetrate something
the need to be right. And this is one of
the things I talk about a lot in the book,
what I call the real pandemic, which is the pandemic
of being rights, fiction of being right. And this is
I think the very core of the issue that we
(17:48):
have today. Everybody wants to be right. Everyone thinks they're
right for many reasons. And if we agree with that person,
were okay. But if we don't agree with that person,
were pushed out. And instead of trying to convince this
man that I was right, I listened to him. Here's
the miracle. Because I was willing to do that, he
(18:09):
was willing to listen to me. He asked me what
I felt. That probably wouldn't have happened if I had
not began by listening to him. So this is how
the book started. It was on the course of this
traveling down the East Coast and then finally back to Portland, Oregon,
that I had many many conversations with people who agreed
(18:30):
with me, who disagreed with me. But through it all,
with each person, I was able to find a common
ground that had very little to do with being right,
but being together.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Which is what I love about the title is I
don't know, you know, to have that attitude of tell
me more, you know, why do you feel this way
about Trump? And to come from an attitude of well,
maybe you have something important to say. Maybe to listen.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
Yeah, this is the key. The truth is I don't know,
neither do you. None of us do. We don't know
anything for sure. We have our opinions, we have what
we believe, and that's fine. But maybe if I listen
to you, maybe if I give you the space to share,
(19:22):
maybe I'll learn something. Maybe we'll begin to shape what
I believe. But at the core, at the foundation, we
have to have love and respect, just as I had
in that conversation with my younger brother. You know, my
younger brother and I we love to banter and to
go back and forth. But for many people this is
very serious, and as we know, people are losing relationships
(19:45):
and even in their own families, people are kicking each
other out of their hearts all because they don't agree.
We have to come to the point where this polarization,
the tension decreases. So this is why I say that
what I really want to do is to start a
movement of depolarization, a movement of training people to have
(20:11):
the tools to go into polarized situations and bring calm,
to bring space, to bring love. So one of the
things that we did is we set up a website
which is de dash polarized dot com, so depolarize with
a dash, And of course you can get the book,
you can learn some other tools. There is a one
(20:33):
or two minute survey that we invite people to take
that is helping us to determine the direction that we
should go with this important movement. So I really hope
people will join the movement. At the very least, let's
come together those of us who want to find a
creative solution so we can begin depolarizing our families, our businesses,
(20:58):
our countries, and the entire world.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, it's so fascinating to me because I'm sitting here thinking,
I've always always been a pacifist. I went on you know,
Vietnam War protest marches my whole life, you know, starting
at the age of fifteen, snuck out the door, so
I didn't tell my mom, and you know that kind
of thing. I was that kind of kid. But I'm thinking,
(21:22):
as you're talking that kind of like what mother Teresa said,
she doesn't go on anti war marches, she goes on
peace marches. It's that kind of thing. If we're coming
from I'm going to make those people wrong about war.
It's never going to resolve, you know it. The position
that we take is what is important. And when you
(21:44):
had that talk with your brother and that man at
the coffee shop, and you came from a place of well,
tell me, you know, tell me what this is, you know,
I think that's just so key, you know.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
And it's hard. Yeah, it is hard, especially today because
we are so set in our positions. It would have
been very easy for me, with that man there in
North Conway, to step in and say, dude, what's with
all the signs. Don't you see what you're doing. I
get that you believe in this person, but come on.
(22:17):
That would have been very easy for me to do.
But all it would have done is pushed us further apart.
And that's not the goal today. We have to come
closer together. Another one of my very favorite stories in
the book came at the expense I could say of
probably my dearest friend in the world, and her name
(22:39):
is Vicky. She lives in New Jersey, and I had
a few days off my tour, so I was going
to go spend it with Vicky. And Vicky, by the way,
is someone who anyone who knows her will agree. She's
probably the most loving, deeply spiritual person any of us know.
So it was great with great surprise when I sat
(23:02):
down with her that first day that I realized that
she was a very strong magas supporter. Wow, how is
this possible to be as loving as Vicky and support
Donald Trump? It was beyond me, but I held back.
I took a deep breath, and instead of jumping on
(23:23):
my own opinion, I said, Vicky, tell me more. I
admit this is hard for me to believe, but I
want to hear why. And so she began to share,
and we spent days together talking about this, and with
her open heart and her loving way, she explained many
things to me that I may or may not have
(23:45):
agreed with, but I understood, and it just goes to
show that we can keep our hearts open in the
midst of all of this. It would have been a
shame if I had said to Vicky, someone I've known
for over thirty years, Vicky, I don't want you in
my life anymore. You're totally wrong. Goodbye. But this is
(24:06):
what happens every day. We're pushing people out just because
we don't agree on things. Like politics. Well, this is
what needs to be healed, and we need to begin
first with ourselves. Look at my own prejudices, and that's
exactly what I had to do. I had to look
at the fact that I had a very strong belief
(24:27):
that anyone who's smart, anyone who's loving, would not vote
for Donald Trump. And I'm really glad that I was
confronted with that because it's not true. We all have
our opinions, we all have our way of looking at things,
and we can't villainize or be little people. Because of that,
(24:48):
we need to go deeper. And the deeper we go,
the more we realize once again that we want the
same thing.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Yeah. So after the whole conversation with your friend, did
you were you able to say, okay, well maybe I
could vote for Trump. Well?
Speaker 3 (25:08):
No, what happened?
Speaker 2 (25:10):
So you still held your notions but.
Speaker 3 (25:15):
It softened.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
Yeah, once again, this is not about us needing to
change or change anyone else. If that happens organically, fine,
But it didn't inspire me to want to vote for
Donald Trump. However, I'll tell you what it did is
that it did allow me to step back and to
just let it be, to let play out whatever needs
(25:40):
to play out. And that is where I find myself today.
When I look at the news, I always feel the
energy of oh no, what's happening now. But as soon
as I catch that, I take a deep breath and
I say, whatever needs to happen now. Maybe this is
(26:03):
the very thing that is going to break us through.
You know, the tension of a rubber band is greatest
right before it breaks, Yes, before it snaps. Maybe there
is an entire thought system that is getting ready to snap.
The idea that we're separated, the concept of being isolated
(26:25):
and alone. That maybe these are the things that maybe
this has to happen. And this is where the maybe
and the title comes in. Maybe if I just allow
whatever is to be, then I'm going to learn something.
So it didn't change my opinion, but it softened by
(26:46):
approach to that opinion.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
I think what you said is really important. I talk
about this a lot in my teachings that on some level,
we've chosen this, you know, we have chosen to go
through eight years of Donald Trump because we need to
wake up to something that he's providing for us, whatever
that is, you know, And that's why I'm doing this
(27:10):
panel discussion called Awakening, because there's so much awakening that's
going on in all of us from all of the
stuff that's going on that we wouldn't have had the
opportunity for. Maybe we would have, but it would have
been a lot more subtle, you know. But we need
to be beaten over the head sometimes we really do.
It just reminds me of a story. I don't remember
(27:32):
who the election was for. It was some presidential election
years ago, several decades ago, and I was standing in
the voting booth, and I was a staunch liberal, progressive Democrat,
and whoever this person was that was running was the
complete opposite of everything I stand for. And I'm standing
there in the voting booth and I'm thinking, you know what,
(27:56):
it doesn't matter who I vote for, because on a
global level, we've already decided who we need on a
spiritual level to wake us up and to get us
moving and to provide something to trigger us so that
you know, we get to, as you say, get to
the point where we know that we all want peace.
(28:17):
So I of course voted for the Democrat and of
course the Republican one. And it was like, okay, well
that's what we need, that's what we've chosen, that's what
we need to go through.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
So there's an interesting chapter that illustrates this. I was
visiting two friends of mine in Maine. As I traveled
leaving North Conway, I went to visit my friends Lisa
Natoli and Bill Free and that evening we were talking
and Bill, who's very insightful, asked a question, how would
(28:49):
a sage vote if they walked into the voting booth
and there it is okay, how would they vote? What
we came to is that they would first enter open
listening for guidance, and then they would follow the guidance
that they received in the moment. They would resist the
(29:12):
need and the urge that we all have to have
preconceived ideas, preconceived judgments of who we support, who we
don't support, who we think is right, who we think
is wrong. They would resist that and they would simply
enter and say, whatever is in the highest good guide me. Now,
this is hard. This is a challenge because when it
(29:36):
comes back to this addiction to being right, we all
want to be right, we all think we're right. Actually,
this is one of the problems, one of the reasons
why we think we're right is because all the evidence
seems to point towards that. For example, in social media YouTube,
most of these things have algorithms that tell us what
(29:58):
we already believe. So if I'm on let's say, YouTube,
and I look up a video on the anti vaccine movement,
it's going to determine, well, this must be what he
believes and wants, so I'm going to give him a
lot more of that. So all the doctors who believe this,
all of the different authorities who support this, it's easy
(30:20):
for me now to say I must be right because
everyone agrees with me. Everyone who's important agrees with me. However,
if I had gone onto YouTube and been pro vaccine,
the same thing would have happened. All of the experts
who believe that this is what we need would have
showed up, and it would have been very easy for
me to say, obviously, I'm right because this is what
(30:42):
everyone says. Everyone that I believe agrees with me. So
it's the agreement that trying to get people on board
with agreement that convinces us that we're right and that
everyone else is wrong. And so this pandemic of being
right is I think the foundation and that's why the
title of the book begins with I don't know. I
(31:06):
don't know if I'm right. For all I know, Donald
Trump is the exact person that we need for whatever reason.
Maybe he's going to do he's going to surprise me
and do great things. Maybe the things that he does
is going to bring down a particular structure that needs
to come down. I don't know, but maybe there's something
(31:26):
happening that I can't understand. But I love you, and
I love Donald Trump, and I love everyone who's involved,
because love and compassion is the only thing that's going
to move us from where we are now to where
we need to be as one.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Yes, well, we need to take a little bit of
a break, and I'm talking to James Twyman and we'll
be back and he's going to talk a little bit
more about how to get there, how to get to
that place of depolarization. Give us some hints. We'll be
right back.
Speaker 3 (32:01):
Home.
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Speaker 2 (34:28):
Welcome back. I am talking to James Twyman. He is
the author of I Don't Know Maybe I Love You.
I just love that title. I love saying it.
Speaker 3 (34:38):
It's great.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Yeah, So we're talking about depolarizing. I think one of
the thoughts that I had as I was reading your
book is that some of the stuff that's going on.
I keep talking about awakening, but we need to awaken
to our shadows. Our dark sides are the parts of
us that we've suppressed and denied and try to act
(35:01):
like we're all happy in whatever. So how do you
feel about that in terms of your work? Do you
see that that is something that's going on as well?
Speaker 3 (35:13):
Oh, it's essential. Whenever I have a judgment about someone
and see the error, I'm really only projecting an air
that I'm not seen in myself. We could look at
a politician. We could look at our neighbor, our brother,
our sister. But this is a rule that is foundational
(35:34):
in our spiritual journey, and I often go back to
my foundation, my own spiritual hero of Saint Francis of ASSISI.
I am a Franciscan priest, and so Francis has always
been the example for me. And probably the one story
(35:55):
that has influenced me the most was this. I think
it's very similar and important to what we're discussing. When
Francis tried to end the Crusades by going to the
most important Muslim in the world at that time, the
Sultan al Camille of Egypt, and simply sharing with him
(36:18):
his perspective of what Jesus really taught the message of love. Now,
I'll tell you the thing that Francis heard that triggered him.
He heard that the whether I don't think the Sultan
actually said this, but this was the report at the
time that the Sultan had said that he would give
a Byzantine gold coin to any Muslim that brought him
(36:39):
the head of a Christian. When Francis heard that, he
jumped up and said, that's where I need to go.
That's who I need to visit, And of course didn't
seem very logical to go to the man who wants
to cut off his head, but he did. He went.
It took him three different tries. He went with another
one of the brother's name, brother Illuminado, and when they
(37:03):
arrived at the fortress of Damietta. When Francis and Illuminado
first got to the fortress, they thought that they were
Sufis and welcomed them in, only to realize that no,
they were not Sufi's at all, and they were sentenced
to be executed. But the Sultan was so fascinated by
(37:23):
this monk, this friar that had gone against everything that
seemed like common sense, and come to visit him. So
Francis and Illuminado spent two weeks with the Sultan as
well as with the Sultan's teacher, whose name was the
Fakir Aldin al Farsi, who was the most important Sufi
(37:46):
in the world at that time. Francis and the Sufi
leader in particular, had a very very deep connection, and
they shared the foundations of each of their faiths. They
learned from each other, and before were long, the so
called enemies had come together and had united in a vision.
Now what happened next is very interesting. Francis left with
(38:12):
a piece offer from the Sultan, but the cardinal, whose
name was the Cardinal Pelagius, who was in charge of
all the Crusaders, rejected it, and that he saw the
opening and was just determined to crush the Muslim horses.
If the Crusaders were able to cross over the Nile,
(38:34):
that's exactly what would have happened. But the Sultan, being
very smart, when the Crusaders, the entire army, had come
to kind of a low point just before getting to
the Nile, he opened up the floodgates and flooded that
entire region, and the entire army of the Crusaders was
(38:54):
locked in place the mud. They couldn't move, they couldn't
get their horses out, and they were starving. So what
did the Sultan do. He could very easily have sent
to show soldiers in and ended everything right there. But
because I really believe that it was because of the
influence of Saint Francis himself that the Sultan did something
(39:15):
very different. He sent in his soldiers to feed them,
to take care of these starving, sick Crusaders. The enemy.
And when you out Christian the Christians, there's not much
you can do but turn around and go home. And
I think there's an important lesson here that we can
(39:37):
all learn. Whether we're Christian or whatever tradition we follow,
the only real tradition is the tradition of love. And
if we can love our enemies, do good to those
who hate us, bless those who curse us, as Jesus
asked us to do, then the work of depolarization happens
(39:59):
on its own. It's not like we have to do
certain things. We just have to allow a certain being
to take over and to live in a certain way.
And if we do that, this really becomes quite simple.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
Yes, it is quite simple. It really is, Which is
why every time I read the news about some war
or some this or that or the other thing, I
always think, why, you know it's so simple? Anyway, that's
just me.
Speaker 3 (40:33):
I agree. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:36):
So, I know you talk in your book about some
techniques that you can use to depolarize relationships, maybe to
make it easier, let's just talk about interpersonal relationships rather
than global. So what are some of those techniques? How
do you tell people how to do all that? Well?
Speaker 3 (40:53):
The first step is to watch your own mind. In
other words, when you feel something rise that where you
want to correct, you want to help someone see the light,
whatever it is, notice that and take a deep breath.
Don't just jump in, which is what we have a
(41:15):
tendency to do. We see someone, we meet someone who
has a different belief system, a very different way of being,
different politics, whatever it may be, and we want to
immediately jump in with our facts, with our ideas and
correct them. So the first step is to slow down,
(41:38):
take a deep breath, remember that it's not about changing someone.
And then the second step is to be curious. Curiosity
is a powerful tool if we can, as we said before,
begin by asking questions, why do you believe this? Dof
(41:58):
something ever happen in your life that you to believe
that and be honestly curious about that. You're probably gonna
learn things about that person, even if it's someone that
you think you already know, that will surprise you. At
the very least, you're going to realize that the distance
between you is not as great as it seems. I
(42:20):
take my friend Vicky as an example. As I said,
Vicky is my best friend. She's been one of my
dearest friends for so many years, decades, and when I
realize that she was voting in a different way, it
seemed just for a moment that there was a grand
canyon between us. And because I took a pause, that's
the key, the pause. In fact, I'll come back to
(42:42):
that in a moment and then be curious, ask her questions,
find out more. We realize that we're not quite so
far apart as it is. So speaking of the pause,
I'll tell you a story of how someone who did
this literally saved the world. And I mean this in
a very literal way. We would not be here today
(43:04):
if there had not been the man I'm going to
tell you about who, instead of doing what he was
told to do, took a deep breath and paused. Maybe
you've heard this story, and I don't know his name,
but because I read this many years ago, but this
took place in Russia during the Cold War in the
early nineteen eighties. There was a mission a Russian missile silo,
(43:28):
a nuclear missile silo, and there were two Russian soldiers
officers in this silo who each had a job if
word ever came that they were to launch their weapons,
and each one of them would turn a key, and
the war would be on, and as we can surmise,
(43:50):
the world would end because there would be hundreds of
nuclear explosions and that would be the end of all
of us. Well, guess what happened. The order came and
the first man said, okay, he turned his key. And
the second man was trained not to question these things.
When the order comes, you follow, and instead of doing
(44:14):
what he knew he was supposed to do, he took
a breath and he said, hold on, let's just pause.
The other officer said, what are you doing. I think
he held a gun to his head, but he couldn't
shoot him because someone's got to turn the key. And
he said, you've got to turn the key. This is
the order. When the other man said, let's just pause
(44:36):
for a moment. Well, in that pause, however many seconds
it was, the order came that it was a mistake,
that it was a glitch. There was never any reason
stand down. If they had done what they were trained
to do. If that other man had turned that key,
(44:56):
all out nuclear war would have happened. As he had
the insight or the wisdom or the inspiration to just
slow it. Excuse me, I have a cold and it's
just getting into my throat. Because he had that inspiration
to pause, we're all still here. Well, these other examples
(45:18):
aren't as dramatic as that, but they show us the
importance of just slowing everything down and taking a moment
to listen to the other person, to be curious about
why they believe what they believe. And then maybe they're
going to ask us what we believe. That's the beautiful thing.
(45:39):
If we give them the space, good chance they're going
to give us the space. But if we just jump
in and say, you're wrong, this is what you should believe,
we're going to be at battle and we're never gonna
get anywhere. And this is the pandemic of being right,
and this is what we need to address.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
Yeah, yeah, and being right is the core of our
primitive consciousness.
Speaker 3 (46:07):
You know.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
It's like, if we're wrong, it feels like a threat
to our survival.
Speaker 3 (46:12):
So we're a very important point. That's right. If I'm wrong, Well,
guess what, I'm wrong all the time. We all are.
I amaze myself sometimes at how wrong I am. I'll
give you one funny example, and you may have read
this in the book The Very very last part of
(46:32):
the book. I can think this is a lesson in
just laughing at ourselves. So I live in Mexico, and
about an hour and a half from where I live,
I have a small cabin in a town called Mosic
meat Love. And at my cabin there's a very very
large bathtub. And I had been in this bathtub, an
(46:53):
outdoor bathtub, the day before. Everything was working fine. The
next day, I had just finished writing the book. I
was very excited. I was going to get in my bathtub.
I turned on the hot water. I let it run.
Nothing happens. So I went I looked at the at
the propane. I didn't see anything that seemed to be
(47:14):
out of place. I went back once again. Nothing happened.
I called up my manager and she said, well, I
don't know, but I'll send out the gas guy. Maybe
they're just not enough gas. So the propane guy came.
He filled it up. But okay, now I'll turn it on. Nothing.
Remember I had just done this the day before, so
(47:35):
I knew which was the cot, which was the cold.
I for sure have that hot water going. Nothing was happening,
and I called up my manager again. I said, I
don't know what's wrong here, But you need to send
a repairman tomorrow. She said, no problem, I'll do it tomorrow.
I went back and just on an inspiration, I turned
(47:55):
the other faucet hot water. I thought I knew for sure,
I thought I was right and I wasn't, And I
laughed at myself so strong, because that was the perfect
story to end this book with. Just because we think
we're right does not mean that we don't have still
(48:16):
things to learn. And if we laugh at ourselves even
when we realize that we are wrong, then everything gets
a lot smoother and calmer and we get to the
end goal much faster.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
Yeah, definitely, that's a great story. Yes, So what about
I know we only have a few minutes here, I
don't know, five or six minutes. Talk to us about empathy,
because I think that's a really important point in terms
of depolarizing.
Speaker 3 (48:45):
We tend to, once again, only empathize with the people
that we agree with or that we like. What if
we empathize with the people that we don't agree with?
You know, what I suggest for everyone is find someone
that you know you disagree with. Maybe if someone who
voted differently than you or holds a different political or
(49:05):
social opinion than you call them up, sit them down,
whatever it takes, and have empathy for them. Realize that
that just because they don't agree with you does not
mean that they're wrong or a bad person. Like my
friend VICKI, they might be wonderful, giving, loving people, and
if you give them the space to explore that, to
(49:30):
empathize with them, they're going to give you the same
space more than likely, and you're going to come closer
together rather than being pulled further apart. So once again,
this is about depolarizing where we've been polarized enough. I
don't know how much more we can take. And that's
why we need a movement of people who are doing
(49:51):
just this. So I really hope people will come and
join us. Go to the website, get the book, whatever
it takes, let's get this movement off the ground, because
I think this country, in this world need it more
than ever before, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (50:08):
So as you were talking, I'm thinking about a particular
person in my life that sounds a lot like your
friend Vicky. She's very loving, very giving, very compassionate, you know,
you name it anything that is loving and compassionate. She
believes in it, and yet she is a Donald Trump person,
(50:29):
and in order to save our relationship, we've decided to
just never talk about politics. How do you feel about
just taking that route.
Speaker 3 (50:37):
It's a good place to begin. It may evolve from
there where you can begin. Well, when the heat, when
the heat comes off, because that's really what keeps us dancing,
our feet get too hot, right, and there may come
a point when you focus on the things that are
(50:57):
more important and you develop that strong loving care no
matter what those are, the that's the key, no matter what.
Then the heat diminishes, and you might be able to
talk about some of those things, and the need to
be right may not be quite as evident. So until
that time comes, avoiding that the topic is a good idea.
(51:22):
When I was driving out to the East Coast to
begin that tour, I stopped in Minnesota to visit my father,
and my father is about as different from me as
a human being can be, and this is one of
the ways. He is a very very strong supporter of
Donald Trump, a Republican, and he kept saying, I want
(51:44):
to talk about this. I want to know why. I said, Dad,
it's not a good idea. We should I love you,
let's just avoid that topic. And then he would he
would say one thing that would just trigger me, and
I would erupting the topic until the de escalation has happened,
(52:04):
the depolarizing has occurred. Is a good idea. But have compassion,
have love for that person, because it's the compassion and
the love that's going to get us through.
Speaker 2 (52:19):
Yes, even those who don't think you can love because
they trigger. Every ounce of you are just reflections of
something going on in you. And that's what you were
saying before. And that's the core of what I teach.
I call it mirroring. So if we're suppressing or denying
something about ourselves, we see it in somebody else and
(52:39):
it drives us crazy. So yeah, even people.
Speaker 3 (52:43):
That vote for Donald Trump, and there may be a
lot of people watching this right now who vote for
Donald Trump. And it's important to know that we love
each other. I'm not going to throw anyone out of
my life based upon silly things. Let's get to the
important stuff. And if we can just make that the priority,
loving one another, like Saint Francis did with the Sultan,
(53:07):
then the enemy becomes our best friend.
Speaker 2 (53:11):
That's true. That's true. So tell us how people reach you.
What you'd like people to do, how to get your book,
do your little promo here.
Speaker 3 (53:20):
As I mentioned before, join this movement, become a deep polarizer.
It begins by going to de dash polarized dot com,
take the one or two minute long survey, and then
get the book once again. You can get it on Amazon,
or you can get it through the website or anywhere else.
The book is fun. I like to write books that
(53:43):
keep one engaged. This is a road trip, really and
it's a story that I think you'll really enjoy. More
than anything, I hope it will inspire you to find
the people in your own life who maybe are different
or have a different approach, and find ways to relate
to them, to have compassion for them, to begin to
(54:05):
come together. And if we can begin to do that
in our personal relationships, we can do that in the
whole world. You can also go to my personal website,
which is James Ftwyman dot com and we hope to
see you at another event or an interview sometime in
the future.
Speaker 2 (54:23):
Yes, thank you so much, James. This was just delightful.
Keep up the good work. Go create peace on the planet.
From everybody. Depolarizing from within and we can do it definitely.
Thank you. Yeah, and you guys can follow me on
Royce's ramblings. That's my sub stack article that I put
(54:45):
out every week, and I talk a lot about mirrors
and peace and all kinds of good stuff. And as
I said earlier, make sure to reserve August eighth, at
ten a m. Pacific time, we're going to be doing
a panel discussion with three wonderful, amazing women talking about
what is awakening. Anyway, thank you so much, and we'll
(55:07):
see everybody next Wednesday. Have a great day and a
peaceful life.
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