October 29, 2025 • 41 mins
In this episode, Pete interviews Kurt Warner, a licensed clinical social worker and author, who shares his journey of overcoming significant adversity, including a traumatic brain injury and OCD. Kurt discusses the core messages of his book, 'Victory in Every Fall,' which focuses on resilience and the paradox of suffering. He emphasizes the importance of changing our mindset towards adversity and the need to break the stigma surrounding mental health, particularly among men. The conversation also touches on the impact of COVID-19 on mental health and the necessity of open discussions about mental health issues.
https://kurtwarnerbooks.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Hello, Welcome to Oxidy gumsidd to peak for as anxiety.
My guest today is a licensed clinical social worker and therapist.
He's also practicing for eighteen years. He is the Eric
Hoffer Award winning author for his book Victory in Every Fall,
The Antists Approach to Overcoming Disability and false titles. He
also is the author of How Diversion is a Destroying
Democracy and the utopia Realized in search of a Just Society.
(00:45):
Please welcome to one the Only Kurt Warner. How are
you doing today, Kurt?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Or Okay, how are you doing?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Great? Man? Wants you tell Abode a little bit more
about yourself? I know you've been doing it for eighteen years?
What got you into it?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Well? At first, I just want to know it. In
terms of the introduction, I didn't win. You have an
arakoft for award. I won an award in the subcast
category in their offer. I don't want to confuse that.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
But no, you're good. Thank you for tearing that up
for me.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
But yeah, no, no problem. So a little bit about myself.
I've been practicing social work for about eighteen years. I've
been a therapist and a licensed clinical social worker. That's
what I am currently. I work with people of all
walks of life and in all realms of issues that
they're experiencing, suffering someone, and so forth. And I've experienced
a great deal of suffering myself. And that's I'm also
(01:29):
after you noted, I'm an author and I've written about
a wide variety of things. One of them is trying
to codify a method or an approach to overcoming suffering
in our lives, which is what the Victory in Every
Fall is about.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, no, I agree.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Man.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
It's hard when you have suffering though, because you don't
know what to do, and you know, loss is hard
for people and how you know, how they deal with
all that kind of stuff, you know. So what got
you to write the book though? What was that inspirational
moment You're like, you know what, I need to write
a book about this.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
I think the inspirational moment was when I would research it,
when I would look at severe bipolar one I have.
That's about two point eight percent of the population OCD
I have had. That's my first memory on this earth
is OCD. That was two point that's about two point
three percent of the population. And in terms of a
(02:18):
severe traumatic brain injury. I have a large part of
my brain cut out, and yeah I have. That's statistically
about fourteen out of one hundred thousand people, so it's
not a big number. Then I have, you know, back pain,
which is certainly a much more common one. I talked
about death in the book from Grief. I have both
my parents die in a year. The reason I wrote
(02:38):
the book was because when I quantify it, it seems
very unlikely to it seems very difficult to have to
overcome all these and I know we all have a
version of this in our lives in one way or
the other. And I wanted to codify or try to
help my entire purpose and meaning in life since actually
the brain injury became to do good, for to do
something that would ameliorate lives in all ways. And that's
(03:01):
that's that's the origin of the book.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
So let me ask you fast, what what happened with
you that you had to have part of your brain
room you might let's just you guys want to cover
it really fast for us, Well.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yeah, I'll cover it. So in a nutshell, I was
in my first semester of college. I was hanging out
with the wrong group of people, assaulted. They had a
we were at a we were at a party. Everybody
I was assaulted and I was left for dead. My
left roal tibero artic, I was putting my left for
seeble artery was broken and from uh and uh it was.
(03:34):
I was left That's one of the four main arteries
in the brain, and I was left to They dragged
me on a mat. They left me there, and then
all night the left that ROTI bulottery, blood all over
my brain, filling all the maningjas and other parts of
my brain. I was in. I went into I had
a coma, I was in grandma seizures. My left side
side of my cerebellum got cut out when my dad
found me something like ten hours later. When I you know,
(03:58):
everybody went home from instead have helped me at the time.
So there was a lot of trauma from that. They
all could have, you know, obviously done something, but nobody
did anything. And so I had to relearn how to walk.
I had to relearn how to talk. I had to
relearn how to function in almost every level I was
given the last rites. I wasn't supposed to be alive
and never mind function. I mean, you know, and if
I was going to live, it would be very moderately functional.
(04:19):
If I was told by one doctor a box factory,
you know, the best you'd ever probably hoped for is
probably a box factory. You know, it's something like a
very menial type of job, where like a Celtic workshop.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
And yeah, that was.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
So that actually gave me a fuel to fight even more.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
That's that's amazing, Kurt. Let me tell you, man, look
at where you're at now, from where where that situation is.
So now you're you're a published author, you win in
awards and categories for you know, well known awards and
things like that too. You know, look at you go, man,
Nothing more than a pure active god saved it right there, man,
Like it was just like you hear, human will made
you keep going, man, and all these people trying to
tell you you can't. You know, it's not the first
(04:57):
time you've heard that, though a lot of authors. Larry
Foltz a first so that comes to mind, was like
that too. They told him he'd be completely paralyzed, but
he started moving his finger, you know, and then he
started moving on hand, you know what I mean. And
they told him the same thing like, oh, You're gonna
be paralyzed rightcial life. And he's like, no, I don't
think so, man. So that's that's awesome though. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
No. Paradoxically, which is a big part of the concept
of the book, it gave me fuel. Hearing that made
me fight a lot harder than You're not going to
tell me what I'm going to be. It was that
became and I'm not saying there were other many of
the doctors are absolutely wonderful. I'm not suggesting it. But
what you know that I did hear that.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
You know, it's just a possibility of things. You never
know when it comes to those things, what can happen
or the outcome. You know, they're just telling you worst
case in Aaron A lot of times I list may
be real to you. I don't. I don't know what's
going to happen for me. You may not be able
to do anything more. But you had to relearn how
to walk, talk, all these things, dude. That's that's amazing.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Well on the brain and the traumatic brain injury. Note,
So the shah bellum governs balance and coordinations, so I
had none after and that's where the rewalking it was
sort of I was spinning in the way that an
inebriated person to For a common person to understand the
drunk it was like spin like that because that's what
And they slur their words. That the cerebellum governs the
(06:05):
muscles of the mouth, so speech therapy. There were all
kinds of things like that. If I tried to grab
a cup that was in front of me, I would
grab over here like I had. I had no ability.
I played sports all my life. When I tried to
swing about it about no way I could get it
in the beginning. Now I can. But you know it
took that relearning and falling down endlessly to do it.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Yeah, well I believe it. Man, that's just holy crap.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Dude.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
Your life's like a like a movie unless you think
about it. That's you know, that inspirational scene where you
know you can't walk, and then it's like you start
learning how to walk and you start achieving these small
little tasks and look at you now, man, you're just
still thriving. You're just killing it. Now you got a
couple of books published, you know, and all that kind
of stuff. It's like, this is man, I'm so happy
for you. Man, that's awesome your book Victory in Every Fall?
(06:48):
What do we cover in this book exactly? I know
you touched a little bit on it, but what is
it so people know what they're checking out?
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Well, what I cover is it's it's meant to be
sort of a basic guide the concept of how to
overcome adversity, and I use the adversities I have as
a way of showing that in any situation, no matter
how impossible, one can overcome it. And each chapter in
many of the chapters encompass. I don't know if you've
ever read the Odyssey, but I wrote it after the
(07:13):
ad in the form of the Odyssey, so Odysseus has
all these different adversity to overcome throughout it, and use
Greek myth a lot throughout the book because Antius is
a major message in the book. It's called the Victory
in Every Fall, the Antius approach to overcome disabilities, because
I think that the past could be a guide in
a lot of ways, and I've always gotten a lot
(07:34):
of inspiration from that on the Roman but Greek myth
another one of the books I have, uses Roman a
lot of Roman concepts in that way. But either way,
the conceptence it's how we think about our suffering that
often time dictates how severe it can be in the
mental realm. I mean in the physical too, I would suppose,
but it's not. I'm more targeting the mental realm. But yeah, no,
(07:54):
it's a way of it's a way of changing the
way we think about it.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, definitely change your mindset how you look at things.
I mean, this is man, You're living proof right there.
The book alone is your own journey. People are going
to see this and be like, oh Jesus, Kirk can
do it? Why can't I do it? You know what
I mean? A lot of people are gonna be like whoa.
You know a lot of times. That's a great thing
about storytelling. Memoirs are really great. That's why memoirs do
really well because people read the story and go, oh shit,
I've been in that same situation. If they can do it,
why can't I do it? And it's inspirational to people
(08:19):
because people are always being told, you know, with disabilities,
that they they're limited to what they can do. But
you're proving that there's no limit to anything you can do.
Is you just got to have the will and the
mindset to go for you, you know what I mean, don't
don't let anybody ever limit you.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Absolutely, And I'm also not a unique snowflake in that regard.
If I can do it, anybody, I'm arguing, on one
level or another can utilize these principles to make it
happen for them, no matter what the adversity they're facing.
And I sincerely believe that and I do that in
my therapy every day because I will watch it, you know.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Yeah, yeah, So listen, let me ask you some questions
about the book, Looad, Like, what are some takeaways people
can get from this book? Like you, let's let's get
them really excited to go check this book out for sure,
you know, let's sell it to them. Kair, what do you think?
What what are the takeaways they're going to get from
the book alone, besides the fact we're going to help
them alter their the way they look at things.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Well, one of the takeaways from the book that I
think that they can get is that any in any
situation and any given realm of suffering that they that
they're going through or adversity that they're going through, most
of us can most of us tend to see only
the suffering that exists in front of us, it becomes
you can't see the forest through the trees sort of
scenario where you know you're not saying the bigger picture
becomes almost a possiblisity. And I think that can be
(09:27):
proven from a brain standpoint the amigndalum. When we get upset,
it's just the upset that we could see. It's just
the horror when we get the end, when the fight
or flight. But what I'm arguing, if we're able to
sort of face it in a way that is without
the emergent panic that often accompanies that we can find
there's usually betterment around it. And Peter, I know, I
don't want to be vague about it, because I mean
(09:49):
I could certainly talk about some of the ways it's
done in my own but each adversity is going to
have a different way of looking at it that you
could find betterment in it embedded in there. It makes us.
Adversity cannot only make us stronger, but it can make
us better in most ways. And I would argue that paradoxically,
which is a big theme in the book, the concept
of paradox were better for it in some ways, and
(10:10):
that's a big statement, you know to say.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
But let me ask you this though, can you explain
to somebody with the paradox paradoxally is all that you know,
maybe break it down for somebodyho may not understand what
you're referring to this so they have a better idea.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
Well, a paradox any kind of self contradictory statement or
a proposition that when it's really investigated, can be seen
to be true. You know, So anything that the concept
like true lies would be a paradox because you could
have somebody who's lying by their intent, but something could
be true, so it could be a true lie that
(10:44):
would be in other words, it's it's something that seems
that it's had to be completely false, but when you
really investigate it because it's contradictory, But when you really investigate,
it's true. That you could benefit from your suffering as
a paradox, and that that's the concept that underlies all
of the sufferings. I discussed in the book somehow that
I could be suicidal for nine months of the year
or a large part of the year, that for fifteen
(11:07):
years that I could have I could lose anywhere from
you know, let's say thirty to sixty pounds at times
due to the depressions and so on and so forth,
and call that a benefit, and call that something that
could it's certainly not a benefit when you're doing it
and when you're in it. I'm not trying to suggest that,
but no, I'll get you. Yeah, but I learned a
great deal from it, And if I'm the character and
(11:30):
who I am and how I can face the world today,
is greatly benefited from experiences that made me deprive, that
made that I had to go through like that. And
that's and I'm arguing in every way from OCD. Paradoxically,
OCD is a horrible scourge of a mental disorder that
never ever leaves. And it sort of seems to effect
every thought I have in a lot in one way
(11:53):
or another much of my life. But without it, I
don't know if I would have been able to transcend
the TBI the way I would CD had. With it,
there was a perfect there's a perfectionism of striving, a
desire of pushing against oh city. Generally, there's a lot
of contradictory, you know, pushing against you generally can't tell
an o CDP person as someone with OCD not to
(12:14):
do something, uh, you know, in that way because there's
usually a contradictory essence to them that that or at
least to me. I won't speak to everybody uh in
that way. Yeah, but but that exactness that that it
also OCD helps me unjust rebel against unjust authority constantly
because it's always telling me something that's just bold, that's
(12:35):
not true, and that that you I talk about that doctor, uh,
unjust authority. And I'm not gonna listen to you know,
I'm you're not gonna tell me. I'm not going to
get better.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Right, tell them, yeah right, tell them, Kurt. I'm not
gonna let you peat me down. Heck no. So let
me ask you because you're the first guest I've had
on the show that's had o c D. So do
you have any tips for anybody that has O c D?
Like you know, maybe someone you know baby? How about this?
How about maybe some tiss for people that have it?
And then people that deal with some of them may
have it. That way, it's a better interaction for them
because you know a lot of people don't understand OCD.
(13:06):
A lot they just know what they see it as
you know, what I mean, like we're TV and movies
depict it as you know, like maybe break it down
from and let them know, and they probably give them
some really good tips for somebody that may have OCD
that may help them better function that way that you know,
it doesn't drive them crazy trying to you know, figure
this thing out as they go.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Well, it's a great question, and Pete and and the
fact of the matter is, I think that, like most things,
OCD is depicted in the popular mindset completely falsely. I
don't think the caricature of OCD has much to do
with actual OCD. I could think of very few exceptions,
like Howard Hughes the Aviator that was done well in
terms of OCD and the magnitude that could have. But
(13:45):
other than that, it's oftentimes very hard to characterize it.
In characterizing it, I would say one of the ways
I've wrote I've written about it is characterizing it as
sort of a dictator in your mind, Like it's like
a little dictator who tells you what to do and
how to do it all the time, and if you don't,
you're going to suffer great despair or anguish guilt. It
has all kinds of feelings that it can unleash in
(14:06):
order to make you to subdue you, which I mean,
after all, what motivates that's more than our feelings look
at love alone. In that way, so OCD has this
incredible mechanism and it takes any form. It's a chameleon
in that whatever you put into my existence one way
or another, it'll, like ivy, wrap itself around it. And
when it wraps itself around it, and it'll compile a
(14:29):
compulsion that's specific to that concept. The pandemic brought germs,
you know, because obviously there's germs there and that concept,
so the fear of getting sick. Fear of getting sick
brought the compulsion to stop with with germs and so
on and so forth. This is something I would argue
that it's very likely that people with obsessive compulsive disorder
across all spheres during the pandemic, it's spiked in terms
(14:52):
of contamination. It certainly did for me. It can wrap
itself around anything in any way. In that way, there's
certainly perfectionism, which is what would help actually with the
traumatic brain injury, but it really hurts with everything else.
There's religious compulsions and concepts. There's in terms of basic obsessions, contamination,
there's generally general intrusive thoughts, symmetry of everything. You'll notice
(15:15):
behind me the picture. They're also that they will be
perfectly symmetrical in terms of they're measured to the I
cannot tell you how specifically milime in that way, and
it will anything in its atmosphere. I can remember as
a as a as a kid repeating things. In other words, Pete,
(15:35):
if I was talking to you in one of these
and I said a word that I would not normally
have said, I would have to find a way to
say that word not only two times, but sometimes four times,
six times, because it always has to be an even
you know these things. But all I'm trying to suggest
another one that's biggest hoarding, not getting rid of things,
can you know? Because you feel like yeah, And I
could go into each one of them much further, But
(15:56):
I look around at my family, and my family has
I see this manifestation in my family. For some people
it stays won their whole lives. For me, it goes
everywhere I go, and I would argue, you know, and
it becomes hard. Everything I get into it finds a
way to mess itself with.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
So have you always had OCD even as a kid.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
It's my first memory I could remember in Florida, And.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Because my question that it would be is like, do
you have any brothers or sisters? I bet they started
trying to move things just once they figured out it
drove you crazy doing that. They kind of just start
doing things to message.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Ever, Yeah, easily quicked on I I without a doubt.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
No, poor kirk kre. I can just imagine your brother
or sister moving something, just like moving out a place
and watching just go back and moving just keep going.
I thought I just moved that back.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Yeah, in many more ways than than that. Yes, it
can be. It can be easily once it's figured out.
The issue is when I was a kid, I grew
up during the eighties. I don't want to they to
be self here, but I grew up during the eighties.
It wasn't really well. I had a family member who
wore gloves all the time and it couldn't be touched,
and nobody could go in her car or apartment or
(16:59):
anything else. And we just considered her the uh eccentric
family member. And then I had another one who brushed
his teeth off of his gums, and we just considered
him another eccentric. I had another one who couldn't get
rid of a dollar that he had, you know, very
hoarding with money, and he couldn't get and there was
no such there was. I mean, OCD obviously existed, but
it didn't wasn't known in the way it is now popular.
(17:20):
So yeah, for sure I was considered that as well.
I was just an eccentric person. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
I couldn't even imagine when in the eighties they would
classify that as though, because like the if you look
at the history of mental health, it was the eighties
were kind of like, you know, a lot of it
was like throwing drugs and things and trying to fix
them that way, and then you had the nineties and
it just gets a little bit weirder, and then when
we finally get to where we're now, we know a
lot more than we did. It's like, if you compare
the two, it's like they did with what they had
(17:46):
with information they had then, you know, And I couldn't
even imagine, like, you know, because he used to call
PTSD used to be shell shock, and you know, then
it evolved just like you know, what was it. Multipersonality
sort of evolved too, the d id now instead of
just saying multipersonalities, you know, and things like that too.
So it's it's always interesting to look back and see
what it was like then versus now, because people, you know,
(18:06):
don't realize how good they have it now. But if
you look back then, when you know, in the eighties
and everything like, like, look at what they didn't know anything,
man like, they were just still trying to figure a
lot of this stuff out back then, You're exactly right.
And like I say, with the ID or anything that
with a lot of disorders, it was. It was certainly
like that, and it's evolved in a much more compassionate
and understanding way, and I'm certainly very grateful for that.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
But I didn't I didn't even tell anyone I had
until I couldn't take it anymore, because I didn't that
this was going on until I couldn't take it, because
I thought everybody went through it for a long time.
My first psychiatrist's visit was when I was eighteen years old. Yeah,
so you know, all throughout that grew up mostly during
the nineties, but I was a kid in the eighties
and as these things, I just knew that if I
(18:46):
stepped on a crack at Epcot Center for I was
five years old. This was in eighty seven or eighty
eight or something like that, and I just knew if
I stepped on a crack, my mom would it would
my mom would die. And that was enough for me
to never step on a crack my mom. And you know,
it took them, hostage, took everything, hostage still does.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I believe it. I believe it though. You know, you
could tell, you know when you were mentioning it, because
it's like, you know, then your fear of stepping in
the cracks, it's gonna kill your mom. Because I've had
something on the show. She said it was there was
a jacket on the back of her door. She freaked out.
She's like, I'm not gonna move it because if it did,
it killed my kid. And I was like, huh, you know,
and it was my first experience with that on the show.
When someone had started mentioning that, I was like, that's
(19:24):
kind of interesting to hear, you know, because she was
obsessed with it. She's like, I sit in bed and
look at the back of the door. I'm looking at
that jacket the whole time, and I'm like, okay, you know,
And it was like early on, it was just like
I've had so many interesting conversations. Like the first season
in the show, I did like two hundred different interviews.
In all those two hundred interviews, I've had some interesting conversations.
That was one of the things that stuck out to
(19:45):
me was like when you started mentioning the cracks, because
that's the first thing I thought of. Because she was like, yeah,
I'm staring at the jacket. I was afraid if I
took the jacket off the door then had killed my
kid or something. I'm like, okay, you know. It's like
all right, well, you know, these are these are things
people deal with though, you know. And it's it's to
bring the line that these are some of the things
that people don't realize that people struggle with when it
comes to o CD like that.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
And I would argue, I mean, I don't know her
in particular the whole story, but when that jacket's on
the door, when everything when anything's not in place in mind,
there's this flood of a feeling that gives you this
signal that something is going to happen that is not
logically based. There's no logical connection whatsoever, right, And the
task becomes to start to recognize that and overcome it
despite the feeling, which is overwhelming, because the feeling persists.
(20:28):
It doesn't I mean, it doesn't back down unless it's
pushed down and knocked down over and over. And that's
what I learned to do, disobey it constantly. And that's
why I say, in terms of the rebelling against unjust authority,
that is something that I'm adamantly I'm very grateful for
because I think it's merited in terms of all things.
Yeah to do so, So Kurt.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Let me ask you what do you specialize in? You know,
sometimes when people looking for you know, psychiatrists, different people like,
what are your areas of expertise that that you would
say you cover the most.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
I would say that area of expertise that I would
cover the most. I mean, obviously you have obsessive compuls
OCD reight polar and certainly TBI, but I would argue
any any existential issue. I love existential literature, I love philosophy,
I love Kirker Guard, Sartra Camu, and anybody who is
experiencing doubts of what their purpose is on this earth
(21:22):
or meaning and what they want to make themselves. Concepts
of identity. I relish all of these. I love working
with anyone toward that end. I find them all very enthralling.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Also, yeah, well I believe it, trust me. That's the
same way I'm too when I pick people for the show.
I'm always looking for the most interesting things I can
find out because I'm like, you know, what's the takeaway
I get from this? Well, I can learn new things
as I go, you know, in the engaging conversations you
have with people. It's just it's great, you know. And
I can email us all the time where people be
on this show all the time, you know, and even
I got an inbox full and I actually start to
(21:52):
go through. But you know, it's it's so interesting because
you're looking for, you know, different things to kind of
highlight and learn as I go. So it's great when
I get to engaging in conversation to be the authors,
especially man, because like the steps it takes to write
these books. You know, some of these people like, oh,
I've worked on it for ten years, and I'm like,
oh God, like I'm planning right in my own memoir.
It's gonna I think I change the title. Well, it's
going to be Voice of the Poislets. Now it's gonna
(22:13):
be like uugh, or we know what it's gonna be. Man,
this feels like high school is what the title is
gonna because I thought it just be hilarious. Me and
somebody else had a conversation and that came up as
a conversation. I was like, yeah, this just feels like
too much like high school, you know what I mean.
And we were referencing like social media and things like
that too, you know. And with that being said, you know,
social media, I feel like there's a lot of misinformation
that goes on out there, man, like too much, especially
(22:35):
when it can be mentioned. COVID though too. I could
not even believe what it would be like for you, man,
because you're getting all this different information coming in and
you're like, well, what the hell am I supposed to
believe at this point, I'm gonna walk around in the
damn bubble. But I could almost see you being walking
around in a bubble at some point, not to make
fun of it, but you know, I'm saying like I
could see that though with you know, with your OCD,
you'd be freaking out because you don't know what to believe.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Well, you're exactly right, because the misinformation and everything else
on social media blasting at all, you didn't know what
to believe and you didn't know where it could come from,
so you started to protect yourself. Now, I had that
sort of contamination issue when I was young, and I
didn't have it for most of my life. Then after that,
I you know, I can remember when I was a kid,
there was a lot of germ issues in that way,
and then I was able to cognitively processing and get
(23:17):
past it check, which is what you know, I've learned
to do with all of them. And then this came
and it became it was most of them have a
legitimate impetus to start it going. And then that legitimate
emphasis becomes this ridiculous in touch with reality type of notion,
that concept of germs and how you get it, and
there was the uncertainty around it that made it so
(23:39):
that since I don't know how to get it, anything
could be infected and before so.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
Yeah, I just feel like you'd be in public something
coffee and you start freaking out, like just feel like
that's it had me interesting though, because you know, especially
OCD clients and during COVID years, like you're coming in
and you're like try to reassure them everything will be okay,
but just like at the same time, it's like I
don't know as much as you do. I don't know anything,
Like all this misinformation, all this different information floating around
(24:06):
of how it is, you know, mass no mask, all
this stuff is just coming at you at such a
rapid pace, you know, and with what the nineties introducing
the Internet to everybody AOL being the beginner, you know,
and to where we're now that you got God, I
couldn't even listen. You got like ten thousand different places
you can go and get information from. It just had
to be overload for people because you know, you're over
there trying to search and see what information's real, which
(24:28):
is coming from what I do about this And then
you know, it was so early on when it started
just taking out so many people. Unfortunately, because we didn't
know enough of the information on what it was. We
just knew what it was doing to people and how
people were coming in contact with it, and then it
was you know, the whole thing we've got to separate
from family. So it's like you got to start measuring
six feet away from everybody you know, and it's just
like it it had to be a nightmare. Man. I couldn't,
(24:50):
Like I said, I couldn't even begin to understand the
level of things that those the poor people of OCD
had because of the fact of all the misinformation they
were getting and the fact that you know, like it's like, oh,
say six feet away from everybody. I could just imagine
some of those guys out there with measuring tapes holding
it at a six feet mark or get a six
foot long ruler and just like, yeah, you got to
stay away from me kind of thing, you know. I
can just see it happen. It's not to make fun
(25:10):
of anybody, but it's just like I felt bad for
it because it's just like you think about it, man,
it's just like then then you get all this misservation
feed it, so then you don't know what to believe,
and then your brain's overloading and you're just like, well,
what the hell? Man? You know, some of those people
I could just see just having a meltdown in public
to everybody else will say they're going crazy to them.
They're just overloaded with information because they're only doing what
they're told. Okay, I weant so say six feet away.
This person will say six feet away, and then one
(25:31):
of them start freaking out and then they're perceived as
the crazy person. But it's really just their brain how
it's reacting to this. They're freaking out because they're like, listen,
I was told six feet away, you need to say
six feet away from me? And not knowing these people
have OCD, you know what I'm saying, Like they're just
like paranoid looking at people you know, and then you
add in anxiety, you probably send it to overdrive, overdrive.
Speaker 2 (25:49):
You have one of the big concepts you talk about
other gifts. I'm thinking about it as you're saying that,
I'm always having to filter out what's the feeling and
what's the reality, and by doing that, I'm always OCD
is one of the things that I get it in battling.
It is a great gift that you get is critically thinking.
You learn how to critically think because you have to
sift out what information is right, So the social media
(26:10):
information is usually not and what's the credible source here?
And who can I trust? Then how can I go
about it?
Speaker 1 (26:16):
I think you know, what's the incredible source? Curd. I
think that's the right question you should be asking. And
these people are telling you things, what is your credible
source for this information?
Speaker 2 (26:24):
Because it's it's oftentimes very hard to identify. I mean,
you had public officials who are saying things that were
not true at times during that it became very difficult
to understand who who you want to go? And it
becomes this is where from the OCD standpoint, it jumps
on the concept of since there's so much uncertainty, because
OCD is the disease of uncertainty, and it prais on that,
and you've got to do all of it. Nothing you
(26:45):
can do, but all of it. You got to. You
got to make sure you keep yourself away from all
of it, and then you isolate yourself, and the isolation
becomes a self fulfilling is because isolation becomes a horrible
thing for OCD, because yeah, it just thrives on. And I,
you know, did that very thing. I isolated during that
period in that way, and it grew just like that,
and I had to spend all kinds of time beating
(27:06):
it back and reasoning and getting that right information.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Yeah, yeah, I can only I could only imagine, man,
because you weren't allowed to be in person anymore, so
you had do like telehealth with a lot of people,
which I mean turned into something really great though, if
you think about it, because now you can connect over
the internet, you don't have to physically be in an
office for people that are not comfortable with doing that setting,
you know, which opened up great avenue at the same time.
But like I just dode and then you're moan by yourself.
(27:28):
Your thoughts are starting to pick up and they know,
as we all know when when COVID hit, mental health
shot up, because now all of a sudden, now it's
a big conversation to talk about. Even though this has
been here for a lot of time, you know, and
we still hear about it these days too, like these
school shootings, Well maybe had mental healthy is okay, So
then what are you doing about the problem? Nothing. You're
just sitting here avoiding it completely. It's like it's like
the ugly kid in the room. You just want to
avoid it. For some reason, you just don't want to
(27:50):
talk about it. I don't know what. People are so
worried about it. I feel like a lot of people
it should be like going to the doctor, basically, just
something normal that we all talk about. But it's like
it's not it's it's insane. It's creaty how much people
don't talk about it. Then all these people, like all
these awareness months, Okay, this is the thing that pisses
me off with these awareness months, Like I love the
fact we're bringing light to these things, with these videos
of these people just dropping these things in there, and
(28:11):
then it's like, Okay, the month's over, so we're then
talking about it. No, no, see, it doesn't end there.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
With last month being suicide Awareness month, I did a
whole series of videos on suicide awareness. But one woman
and I had a real interesting conversation. But it's just
so funny because once you mention those words, people start panicking.
Oh god, God's sales going across you know. It's like
just start freaking out completely because we're having a normalized
conversation about somebody who's having these thoughts and they're thinking about,
you know, harming themselves instead of us worrying about Okay,
(28:37):
what do we do, Like we're battling cancer. Okay, well
we got to do something, we run away from it,
like you know, it's like a good COVID situation. It's like,
oh god, you got to say six feet away from
you just said them. You just said that word, like
you know, like Harry Potter, like Lord Voldemort can't say
the name, you know, you can't say that name or
else you already's gonna start panicking, you know what I mean.
It just doesn't make any sense why it's so hard
to normalize these things, you know, and then as men,
(28:57):
you know, us having this conversation, we're already winning the
bat because we don't even talk about it at this point,
you know, like we're losing eighty percent of men the
suicide is like okay, so what is it gonna take
eighty one to eighty two percent of bit to be
that number? For you to finally stop and say something,
They're like, hey, listen, maybe we should start talking about
this more often, you know, have more regular conversations. You know.
It's it's crazy because I've had guests on before they've
(29:18):
had the same thing. They were talking about. They had
a group of six friends and he said, I said something,
and then everyone else started unloading it together. It's like
they're waiting for that one person to say it so
everybody can just start dumping it all together like oh yeah, man,
you know, I'm right there with you, you know, and
it's like, well, what is that gonna be at this point?
You know? And it's the most frustrating thing ever. It's
because you know, it doesn't matter if you're rich, you're famous,
doesn't mean to I mean poor. Whatever. It takes everybody.
(29:41):
It doesn't care, It doesn't have a choice, doesn't like
certain people. It just likes everybody. And it's a scary
thing that's going on. And it's like, you know, what
are we telling our younger men now two in this
conversation as well, it's like like we're afraid to talk
about these things. Why because we're losing eighty percent fifty
percent of the population's men. Like, let's look at the
number statistically, Like you're you're looking at the numbers, like,
out of five friends, possibly four of them are coming,
(30:02):
you're gonna lose four of them right there. You don't
know that fourth one's an optional one, but three of
them at least aren't going to be there for the
rest of the conversation.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
When you say three three of them are going to
be there for the rest of what population, which disorder?
What population are you saying is we're.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Just saying men in general. I'm talking about men and general.
If you think about it, like you know, eighty percent
of them, if eighty percent of suicides are all men.
If you think about it, there's a group of five people,
you and your four of the friends, three of them
will probably not be there, honestly if you go based
on the statistics.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Yeah, and there's a very high one. That was a
big issue with the bipolar because I think the latest
statistic guy saw I was up to twenty percent attempt
at least attempt or commit or do commit suicide. And yeah,
it's a remarkable number for a disorder.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Yeah, it's just crazy, you know it is. It's like,
you know, we're afraid to talk about it because we
were pre programmed. Like you and I grew up in
the eighties. Because I'm eighty five, you know, I barely
remember any of the eighties. I was eighty five, so
I don't remember. I remember the nineties. Man, the nineties
are such an interesting time because all the things that
you can do, all the TV shows and all this
stuff they would put on is nowhere near what it
is now. The censor everything now. But it's like, but
(31:09):
back in the nineties, we were okay with all this stuff,
all these crazy shows, like even these Jack in the
Box commercials, and you just go back and watch these
old commercials and you look at some of them. I
think one of them I think caught my mind. I
caught my attention was the one where jacksonside an abortion clinic,
he's selling a sandwich. I'm like, what kind of settings
are we doing here, guys, Like, you know, like all
that stuff is acceptable, Like think about what TV is now, right,
and Stimpy was a kids show for us, but now
(31:31):
it's like TV fourteen. It's like all censored pretty much.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
Do you think it's moving in the wrong direction.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
Yeah, so I think we're in the wrong direction only
because I feel like we're centering mental health as a
topic and we need to talk to some of these
younger guys about it. Because me and another guy's named
mister Whiskey and I were discussing when the Internet was introduced,
like social media was really introduced. He said that the
number shot up to like twenty percent of to twenty
percent for younger men that were committing suicide, and it's like,
you know, like we have to figure out what's going on,
(32:01):
you know, and and a little bit it is you
know now that you're not you don't just have limited
space for them to bully each other. Now you can
bully somebody via the internet. You don't have to be
in the same room with somebody to wrass them. And
then you have, you know, now you're adding in grown
men who just think this is okay to do too,
that predatory to come after the kids and starts like
are just nasty individuals saying nasty things to people, you know,
and it's it's like one thing I'd upset somebody. Here
(32:21):
we go, greve, I start setting them into the fire.
Now everybody's gotta go, you know. And the one thing
that did stick out to me though when that situation
was a young lady that was a big anime fan.
She she couse played as a character. And you know,
mind you they don't they don't, they don't say, they
don't say race to these people. It's just a show,
anime cartoon. People are watching it. They got mad because
she wasn't preferably white or whatever. They were saying that
(32:43):
they were killed this poor girl because they didn't like
the fact that she was Cause playing in somebody like
But they causeplay all the time at all these conventions
and things like that too. But you don't hear them
saying those kinds of things there. It's just because you're
on the internet, you have accessed to everybody, and everybody
and their mother has access now that now you can
say these nasty things to people. You don't have to
be in the same room as them. The scary world
we live in, Kurt Man, it's a scary world we're
living in.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
It certainly, is it? Certainly is? I think there are
certainly steps though, that we could take to ameliorate, make
make it better, and I'm hoping that we do in
the future, and especially around mental health.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
Yeah, exactly, Well, Kurt, we're getting close to the part
of my show where we normally ask the questions. I
have two questions ask everybody. Okay, so the first one
is credit to my good friend Gretchen from the ship
that goes on in her head. So, Kurt, if your
mental health had a song, what would it be? Everybody
loves this question. By the way, this one gets a
lot of responses, people like, yes, I love this.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
I'm gonna have to go with my favorite band, The
End by the Doors. There you go, Okay, Yeah, I
like it. I like it. Yeah. He thinks it's a
sort of a meditation on ending, you know, the end
of pain, the end of suffering, the end of and
we'll just leave it at that. Yeah, the end.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
No, I get you now, it's a great song. Like
I said, it is an interesting question though, because the
responses you get are just it's just hilarious. He does
the same thing it like, damn. That's a good question.
All right. So the other question I have to ask you,
and the reason this whole podcast exists, if you can
break the stigma about mental health. I'm talking anything you
see on a daily basis you just look at and go, yeah,
(34:14):
that's not right. What would you say.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
As far as from a mental health standpoint in general,
I'll tell you. I'll go off of what you said earlier.
In terms of from a male standpoint, I think that
it's so under talked about that from a yeah, it's
not right that culturally in our country and I'm not
going to speak to other cultures, but certainly in the
(34:38):
United states that men don't talk about openly about their
mental health. I never felt at any point and during
my growing up that I could tell my buddy, you know,
what was going on in my head. And I don't
think that's that different today based on all the conversations
that I have. So if there's one thing, because I
think by talking about them, it could be affected. And
(34:58):
there there are interventions that help many things. So I
would I like a brighter light shined on things.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Yeah, no, I agree. I feel like it's just like
I said, that's just men. Having this conversation now is
a powerful conversation because it's two men talking about it,
which you rarely ever see happening. And it's hard. It's
hard to understand why we can't break past this point
of you know, oh we can't talk about our feelings
as men. It's like we all have feelings a lot
of people don't want to deal with them, but they're
(35:24):
still there.
Speaker 2 (35:26):
And you talk about the aids and growing up, I
played every sport in the world, and when I got hurt,
you toughed it out. That was the male that was
the male culture. You just you know, you got up
and I remember getting hit with baseballs in the face
many times. But it doesn't matter. You just keep playing,
you get going, you get tackled, whatever. And that's I
would argue that becomes the mindset from not only physical
(35:47):
but mental from a from a male standpoint, because the
value there in an existential way, the value becomes tough. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
In the role of the coach too, becomes more of
a mentor position too. You think, think about it because
a lot you spent a lot of time with them.
They influenced you a lot of times. The guys got
bigger into sports. Well, you know, coach taught me. This
coach taught me that, you know. And then then it came,
you know, the NFL when they were tackling people, they
had to change how they were tackling things because all
the injuries that were coming and all the different things
they started finding out, like Junior Seau had you know,
he went went berserk and just you know, I mean
(36:18):
like and then you know, if you think you want
to think about it, like, I don't know if you're
a pro wrestler fan at all, but you remember the
Chris ben Wass situation where he unfortunately went completely and
it just went went off and just shot himself and
all the family members and things too. It's it's crazy though,
because everybody wants talks about it for a very brief moment.
Then they're like, oh, well, you know, we don't talk
about why why don't you want to talk about the situation.
This happened. This is something that needs to be addressed.
Why did he go? What happened that? The situation is
(36:40):
why did he got why did he choose to do this?
And all these things that they deal with, And then
you know, if you bring in all the other things,
so like some of those guys, you know, we're doing
steroids and all this stuff, all these roys and anything else,
started playing factors and everything they were doing because you know,
and that's that area. It's like it's an image thing,
like you got to present these images. And then same
thing when you say about baseball players football play, it's
the same thing. Like you see some of these guys
(37:01):
get hit and oh my god, dude, you could hear
them get hit, like the noises and it's like, oh
that hurts, man. They ain't they ain't know, there's a
light tap. You watch these people laid out. It's not fun,
you know, and thenever he gets mad because they're changing
all the rules. I'm like, well, think about where the
rules were before they didn't have helmets, So whether or
now they have better helmets protect these guys from brain injuries,
you know, because Steve Young what we dealt with concussions
all the time too. And now what's the big thing
(37:22):
with him was you know that he eventually retired because
of all the concussions he was having. And then what
was said the guy from Miami Now I can't think
what his name is, Tua whatever his name is, he
has a contract in his contract written if he gets
he can't play because of the hen injuries, he still
gets paid, which was smart you think about it, because
you're taking shots to head and watching these guys hit
each other at like such a hard velocity. It's like
(37:43):
it's hard to watch sometimes, like you know or was
it the reals recent one? I don't know if you
watch football ever? What's his name?
Speaker 2 (37:48):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Tyer Kell? Do you see the wander taker hill We
landed and his leg turned away around. I was like,
and then you just see all these memes like people like, oh,
I guess he's not coming to work tomorrow or something.
I'm like, oh, God, like you know, and it's just
every everybody likes to make jokes about these things. But
it's just like it's it's just that's hard to watch,
you know what I'm saying, Like the guy's whole leg
just turn around.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
I'm like, hm.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
Anyways, with that getting said, we're gonna start wrapping up. Kurt,
Do you want to let me know where they can
find you?
Speaker 2 (38:13):
You know?
Speaker 1 (38:13):
In the book is out now right.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Yeah, the book is out. I I have two others
out as well that you can find me on Kurt
ownerbooks dot com. That would be the easiest.
Speaker 1 (38:25):
Well, if you want to, you want to tell them
about the other two books, go ahead too, Man, now's
the time to plug it for him. Go ahead, buddy,
let me know about the other two.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
The other two books that I have one out right
now called False Idols, How diversion is Destroying Democracy. And
that's a very different subject obviously, but obviously that's the
one that uses the Roman concept and discusses, uh, how're
we're being diverted from doing the common good. Celebrity and
sports and and everything and in our existence and our economics,
everything makes us pulls us away from doing the things
(38:52):
that make the world better for all of us, which
is you know, uh and and utopia realized in search
of a just society. That's about that's a fictional recreation
of the concept of utopia which was by Thomas Moore
in the fifteen Hunt, wherein I build a place that
re examined and reimagines all social systems to make them
(39:13):
better in order for the common good, because we've been
using the same ones forever. They don't work that well.
They don't make sure that everybody has what everybody needs enough.
So that's that's a representation of the systems that that
might work. And you know, ask us to all questions
what might work exactly?
Speaker 1 (39:29):
So Kurt, you want to Liby know where they can
find you? Is the website the best place to reach you?
Do you like them from them to reach out on
social media? So you can plug any of those right
now from let them know where they can find you, Buddy,
Kirt Warner.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
Books be the best place to reach me social media
at her owner books for any of the social media
tags and you know Barnes and Nople and you can
find the books anywhere books are you know you could
find Yeah, in terms of that any kind and you'll
find them easily online and or at the actual physical store.
But that's that's in a nutshell. And and I'm welcome
(40:01):
anybody's comments or females anytime.
Speaker 1 (40:03):
Definitely, that's awesome. Heerre well, Kirk, thanks so much for coming, man,
I appreciate you being here. I had a great time.
I enjoyed having this conversation with you.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
Man.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
I love the little takeaways you gave us for OCD
and all that kind of stuff. Like I said, you
were the first guests on the show that we've had
that's OCD. So this has been really great because we
got to learn some new you know. It's always great
to learn something new for anybody, you know. And like
I said, Man, we're welcome back anytime. By the way, too, Man,
I'd love to have you come back and talk to me.
So you got anything new in the works, anything coming
down the line that's mental health related by chance?
Speaker 2 (40:29):
Well, I'm I'm out. I would argue most of the
things I'm I have wanting one manuscripts, a lot of
them have a mental health concept. I'm always I'm a
zealous writer, so awesome. A lot of them have it.
But so in terms of coming back, I would love
to one day. I'm very grateful that you had me
on PETE and thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Well, you're so welcome, Kirk, thank you for me here.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
Guys.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
With that being said, we're gonna wrap this episode of
Pete for Anxiety. You guys sort of find me. I'm
Pete for so Anxiety. I'm ex all the way down
to TikTok, I'm on Spotify all the way down to
Pandora now and as always say, it costs nothing absolutely
to be kind somebody, one kind act you can do
because say some fly for hell, you can make their day.
I'm beat for his anxiety, saying out saying, don't ask
her your days? Did they say, hey, how's your mental
health today?
Speaker 2 (41:06):
It's so bad? Don't uck right back and the time
to look back there? Then I threda, but that will
dive de prect the projects I got my
Hello, Welcome to Oxidy gumsidd to peak for as anxiety.
My guest today is a licensed clinical social worker and therapist.
He's also practicing for eighteen years. He is the Eric
Hoffer Award winning author for his book Victory in Every Fall,
The Antists Approach to Overcoming Disability and false titles. He
also is the author of How Diversion is a Destroying
Democracy and the utopia Realized in search of a Just Society.
(00:45):
Please welcome to one the Only Kurt Warner. How are
you doing today, Kurt?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Or Okay, how are you doing?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Great? Man? Wants you tell Abode a little bit more
about yourself? I know you've been doing it for eighteen years?
What got you into it?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Well? At first, I just want to know it. In
terms of the introduction, I didn't win. You have an
arakoft for award. I won an award in the subcast
category in their offer. I don't want to confuse that.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
But no, you're good. Thank you for tearing that up
for me.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
But yeah, no, no problem. So a little bit about myself.
I've been practicing social work for about eighteen years. I've
been a therapist and a licensed clinical social worker. That's
what I am currently. I work with people of all
walks of life and in all realms of issues that
they're experiencing, suffering someone, and so forth. And I've experienced
a great deal of suffering myself. And that's I'm also
(01:29):
after you noted, I'm an author and I've written about
a wide variety of things. One of them is trying
to codify a method or an approach to overcoming suffering
in our lives, which is what the Victory in Every
Fall is about.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, no, I agree.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Man.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
It's hard when you have suffering though, because you don't
know what to do, and you know, loss is hard
for people and how you know, how they deal with
all that kind of stuff, you know. So what got
you to write the book though? What was that inspirational
moment You're like, you know what, I need to write
a book about this.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
I think the inspirational moment was when I would research it,
when I would look at severe bipolar one I have.
That's about two point eight percent of the population OCD
I have had. That's my first memory on this earth
is OCD. That was two point that's about two point
three percent of the population. And in terms of a
(02:18):
severe traumatic brain injury. I have a large part of
my brain cut out, and yeah I have. That's statistically
about fourteen out of one hundred thousand people, so it's
not a big number. Then I have, you know, back pain,
which is certainly a much more common one. I talked
about death in the book from Grief. I have both
my parents die in a year. The reason I wrote
(02:38):
the book was because when I quantify it, it seems
very unlikely to it seems very difficult to have to
overcome all these and I know we all have a
version of this in our lives in one way or
the other. And I wanted to codify or try to
help my entire purpose and meaning in life since actually
the brain injury became to do good, for to do
something that would ameliorate lives in all ways. And that's
(03:01):
that's that's the origin of the book.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
So let me ask you fast, what what happened with
you that you had to have part of your brain
room you might let's just you guys want to cover
it really fast for us, Well.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yeah, I'll cover it. So in a nutshell, I was
in my first semester of college. I was hanging out
with the wrong group of people, assaulted. They had a
we were at a we were at a party. Everybody
I was assaulted and I was left for dead. My
left roal tibero artic, I was putting my left for
seeble artery was broken and from uh and uh it was.
(03:34):
I was left That's one of the four main arteries
in the brain, and I was left to They dragged
me on a mat. They left me there, and then
all night the left that ROTI bulottery, blood all over
my brain, filling all the maningjas and other parts of
my brain. I was in. I went into I had
a coma, I was in grandma seizures. My left side
side of my cerebellum got cut out when my dad
found me something like ten hours later. When I you know,
(03:58):
everybody went home from instead have helped me at the time.
So there was a lot of trauma from that. They
all could have, you know, obviously done something, but nobody
did anything. And so I had to relearn how to walk.
I had to relearn how to talk. I had to
relearn how to function in almost every level I was
given the last rites. I wasn't supposed to be alive
and never mind function. I mean, you know, and if
I was going to live, it would be very moderately functional.
(04:19):
If I was told by one doctor a box factory,
you know, the best you'd ever probably hoped for is
probably a box factory. You know, it's something like a
very menial type of job, where like a Celtic workshop.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
And yeah, that was.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
So that actually gave me a fuel to fight even more.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
That's that's amazing, Kurt. Let me tell you, man, look
at where you're at now, from where where that situation is.
So now you're you're a published author, you win in
awards and categories for you know, well known awards and
things like that too. You know, look at you go, man,
Nothing more than a pure active god saved it right there, man,
Like it was just like you hear, human will made
you keep going, man, and all these people trying to
tell you you can't. You know, it's not the first
(04:57):
time you've heard that, though a lot of authors. Larry
Foltz a first so that comes to mind, was like
that too. They told him he'd be completely paralyzed, but
he started moving his finger, you know, and then he
started moving on hand, you know what I mean. And
they told him the same thing like, oh, You're gonna
be paralyzed rightcial life. And he's like, no, I don't
think so, man. So that's that's awesome though. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
No. Paradoxically, which is a big part of the concept
of the book, it gave me fuel. Hearing that made
me fight a lot harder than You're not going to
tell me what I'm going to be. It was that
became and I'm not saying there were other many of
the doctors are absolutely wonderful. I'm not suggesting it. But
what you know that I did hear that.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
You know, it's just a possibility of things. You never
know when it comes to those things, what can happen
or the outcome. You know, they're just telling you worst
case in Aaron A lot of times I list may
be real to you. I don't. I don't know what's
going to happen for me. You may not be able
to do anything more. But you had to relearn how
to walk, talk, all these things, dude. That's that's amazing.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Well on the brain and the traumatic brain injury. Note,
So the shah bellum governs balance and coordinations, so I
had none after and that's where the rewalking it was
sort of I was spinning in the way that an
inebriated person to For a common person to understand the
drunk it was like spin like that because that's what
And they slur their words. That the cerebellum governs the
(06:05):
muscles of the mouth, so speech therapy. There were all
kinds of things like that. If I tried to grab
a cup that was in front of me, I would
grab over here like I had. I had no ability.
I played sports all my life. When I tried to
swing about it about no way I could get it
in the beginning. Now I can. But you know it
took that relearning and falling down endlessly to do it.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Yeah, well I believe it. Man, that's just holy crap.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Dude.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
Your life's like a like a movie unless you think
about it. That's you know, that inspirational scene where you
know you can't walk, and then it's like you start
learning how to walk and you start achieving these small
little tasks and look at you now, man, you're just
still thriving. You're just killing it. Now you got a
couple of books published, you know, and all that kind
of stuff. It's like, this is man, I'm so happy
for you. Man, that's awesome your book Victory in Every Fall?
(06:48):
What do we cover in this book exactly? I know
you touched a little bit on it, but what is
it so people know what they're checking out?
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Well, what I cover is it's it's meant to be
sort of a basic guide the concept of how to
overcome adversity, and I use the adversities I have as
a way of showing that in any situation, no matter
how impossible, one can overcome it. And each chapter in
many of the chapters encompass. I don't know if you've
ever read the Odyssey, but I wrote it after the
(07:13):
ad in the form of the Odyssey, so Odysseus has
all these different adversity to overcome throughout it, and use
Greek myth a lot throughout the book because Antius is
a major message in the book. It's called the Victory
in Every Fall, the Antius approach to overcome disabilities, because
I think that the past could be a guide in
a lot of ways, and I've always gotten a lot
(07:34):
of inspiration from that on the Roman but Greek myth
another one of the books I have, uses Roman a
lot of Roman concepts in that way. But either way,
the conceptence it's how we think about our suffering that
often time dictates how severe it can be in the
mental realm. I mean in the physical too, I would suppose,
but it's not. I'm more targeting the mental realm. But yeah, no,
(07:54):
it's a way of it's a way of changing the
way we think about it.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, definitely change your mindset how you look at things.
I mean, this is man, You're living proof right there.
The book alone is your own journey. People are going
to see this and be like, oh Jesus, Kirk can
do it? Why can't I do it? You know what
I mean? A lot of people are gonna be like whoa.
You know a lot of times. That's a great thing
about storytelling. Memoirs are really great. That's why memoirs do
really well because people read the story and go, oh shit,
I've been in that same situation. If they can do it,
why can't I do it? And it's inspirational to people
(08:19):
because people are always being told, you know, with disabilities,
that they they're limited to what they can do. But
you're proving that there's no limit to anything you can do.
Is you just got to have the will and the
mindset to go for you, you know what I mean, don't
don't let anybody ever limit you.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Absolutely, And I'm also not a unique snowflake in that regard.
If I can do it, anybody, I'm arguing, on one
level or another can utilize these principles to make it
happen for them, no matter what the adversity they're facing.
And I sincerely believe that and I do that in
my therapy every day because I will watch it, you know.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Yeah, yeah, So listen, let me ask you some questions
about the book, Looad, Like, what are some takeaways people
can get from this book? Like you, let's let's get
them really excited to go check this book out for sure,
you know, let's sell it to them. Kair, what do you think?
What what are the takeaways they're going to get from
the book alone, besides the fact we're going to help
them alter their the way they look at things.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Well, one of the takeaways from the book that I
think that they can get is that any in any
situation and any given realm of suffering that they that
they're going through or adversity that they're going through, most
of us can most of us tend to see only
the suffering that exists in front of us, it becomes
you can't see the forest through the trees sort of
scenario where you know you're not saying the bigger picture
becomes almost a possiblisity. And I think that can be
(09:27):
proven from a brain standpoint the amigndalum. When we get upset,
it's just the upset that we could see. It's just
the horror when we get the end, when the fight
or flight. But what I'm arguing, if we're able to
sort of face it in a way that is without
the emergent panic that often accompanies that we can find
there's usually betterment around it. And Peter, I know, I
don't want to be vague about it, because I mean
(09:49):
I could certainly talk about some of the ways it's
done in my own but each adversity is going to
have a different way of looking at it that you
could find betterment in it embedded in there. It makes us.
Adversity cannot only make us stronger, but it can make
us better in most ways. And I would argue that paradoxically,
which is a big theme in the book, the concept
of paradox were better for it in some ways, and
(10:10):
that's a big statement, you know to say.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
But let me ask you this though, can you explain
to somebody with the paradox paradoxally is all that you know,
maybe break it down for somebodyho may not understand what
you're referring to this so they have a better idea.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
Well, a paradox any kind of self contradictory statement or
a proposition that when it's really investigated, can be seen
to be true. You know, So anything that the concept
like true lies would be a paradox because you could
have somebody who's lying by their intent, but something could
be true, so it could be a true lie that
(10:44):
would be in other words, it's it's something that seems
that it's had to be completely false, but when you
really investigate it because it's contradictory, But when you really investigate,
it's true. That you could benefit from your suffering as
a paradox, and that that's the concept that underlies all
of the sufferings. I discussed in the book somehow that
I could be suicidal for nine months of the year
or a large part of the year, that for fifteen
(11:07):
years that I could have I could lose anywhere from
you know, let's say thirty to sixty pounds at times
due to the depressions and so on and so forth,
and call that a benefit, and call that something that
could it's certainly not a benefit when you're doing it
and when you're in it. I'm not trying to suggest that,
but no, I'll get you. Yeah, but I learned a
great deal from it, And if I'm the character and
(11:30):
who I am and how I can face the world today,
is greatly benefited from experiences that made me deprive, that
made that I had to go through like that. And
that's and I'm arguing in every way from OCD. Paradoxically,
OCD is a horrible scourge of a mental disorder that
never ever leaves. And it sort of seems to effect
every thought I have in a lot in one way
(11:53):
or another much of my life. But without it, I
don't know if I would have been able to transcend
the TBI the way I would CD had. With it,
there was a perfect there's a perfectionism of striving, a
desire of pushing against oh city. Generally, there's a lot
of contradictory, you know, pushing against you generally can't tell
an o CDP person as someone with OCD not to
(12:14):
do something, uh, you know, in that way because there's
usually a contradictory essence to them that that or at
least to me. I won't speak to everybody uh in
that way. Yeah, but but that exactness that that it
also OCD helps me unjust rebel against unjust authority constantly
because it's always telling me something that's just bold, that's
(12:35):
not true, and that that you I talk about that doctor, uh,
unjust authority. And I'm not gonna listen to you know,
I'm you're not gonna tell me. I'm not going to
get better.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Right, tell them, yeah right, tell them, Kurt. I'm not
gonna let you peat me down. Heck no. So let
me ask you because you're the first guest I've had
on the show that's had o c D. So do
you have any tips for anybody that has O c D?
Like you know, maybe someone you know baby? How about this?
How about maybe some tiss for people that have it?
And then people that deal with some of them may
have it. That way, it's a better interaction for them
because you know a lot of people don't understand OCD.
(13:06):
A lot they just know what they see it as
you know, what I mean, like we're TV and movies
depict it as you know, like maybe break it down
from and let them know, and they probably give them
some really good tips for somebody that may have OCD
that may help them better function that way that you know,
it doesn't drive them crazy trying to you know, figure
this thing out as they go.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Well, it's a great question, and Pete and and the
fact of the matter is, I think that, like most things,
OCD is depicted in the popular mindset completely falsely. I
don't think the caricature of OCD has much to do
with actual OCD. I could think of very few exceptions,
like Howard Hughes the Aviator that was done well in
terms of OCD and the magnitude that could have. But
(13:45):
other than that, it's oftentimes very hard to characterize it.
In characterizing it, I would say one of the ways
I've wrote I've written about it is characterizing it as
sort of a dictator in your mind, Like it's like
a little dictator who tells you what to do and
how to do it all the time, and if you don't,
you're going to suffer great despair or anguish guilt. It
has all kinds of feelings that it can unleash in
(14:06):
order to make you to subdue you, which I mean,
after all, what motivates that's more than our feelings look
at love alone. In that way, so OCD has this
incredible mechanism and it takes any form. It's a chameleon
in that whatever you put into my existence one way
or another, it'll, like ivy, wrap itself around it. And
when it wraps itself around it, and it'll compile a
(14:29):
compulsion that's specific to that concept. The pandemic brought germs,
you know, because obviously there's germs there and that concept,
so the fear of getting sick. Fear of getting sick
brought the compulsion to stop with with germs and so
on and so forth. This is something I would argue
that it's very likely that people with obsessive compulsive disorder
across all spheres during the pandemic, it's spiked in terms
(14:52):
of contamination. It certainly did for me. It can wrap
itself around anything in any way. In that way, there's
certainly perfectionism, which is what would help actually with the
traumatic brain injury, but it really hurts with everything else.
There's religious compulsions and concepts. There's in terms of basic obsessions, contamination,
there's generally general intrusive thoughts, symmetry of everything. You'll notice
(15:15):
behind me the picture. They're also that they will be
perfectly symmetrical in terms of they're measured to the I
cannot tell you how specifically milime in that way, and
it will anything in its atmosphere. I can remember as
a as a as a kid repeating things. In other words, Pete,
(15:35):
if I was talking to you in one of these
and I said a word that I would not normally
have said, I would have to find a way to
say that word not only two times, but sometimes four times,
six times, because it always has to be an even
you know these things. But all I'm trying to suggest
another one that's biggest hoarding, not getting rid of things,
can you know? Because you feel like yeah, And I
could go into each one of them much further, But
(15:56):
I look around at my family, and my family has
I see this manifestation in my family. For some people
it stays won their whole lives. For me, it goes
everywhere I go, and I would argue, you know, and
it becomes hard. Everything I get into it finds a
way to mess itself with.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
So have you always had OCD even as a kid.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
It's my first memory I could remember in Florida, And.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Because my question that it would be is like, do
you have any brothers or sisters? I bet they started
trying to move things just once they figured out it
drove you crazy doing that. They kind of just start
doing things to message.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Ever, Yeah, easily quicked on I I without a doubt.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
No, poor kirk kre. I can just imagine your brother
or sister moving something, just like moving out a place
and watching just go back and moving just keep going.
I thought I just moved that back.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Yeah, in many more ways than than that. Yes, it
can be. It can be easily once it's figured out.
The issue is when I was a kid, I grew
up during the eighties. I don't want to they to
be self here, but I grew up during the eighties.
It wasn't really well. I had a family member who
wore gloves all the time and it couldn't be touched,
and nobody could go in her car or apartment or
(16:59):
anything else. And we just considered her the uh eccentric
family member. And then I had another one who brushed
his teeth off of his gums, and we just considered
him another eccentric. I had another one who couldn't get
rid of a dollar that he had, you know, very
hoarding with money, and he couldn't get and there was
no such there was. I mean, OCD obviously existed, but
it didn't wasn't known in the way it is now popular.
(17:20):
So yeah, for sure I was considered that as well.
I was just an eccentric person. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
I couldn't even imagine when in the eighties they would
classify that as though, because like the if you look
at the history of mental health, it was the eighties
were kind of like, you know, a lot of it
was like throwing drugs and things and trying to fix
them that way, and then you had the nineties and
it just gets a little bit weirder, and then when
we finally get to where we're now, we know a
lot more than we did. It's like, if you compare
the two, it's like they did with what they had
(17:46):
with information they had then, you know, And I couldn't
even imagine, like, you know, because he used to call
PTSD used to be shell shock, and you know, then
it evolved just like you know, what was it. Multipersonality
sort of evolved too, the d id now instead of
just saying multipersonalities, you know, and things like that too.
So it's it's always interesting to look back and see
what it was like then versus now, because people, you know,
(18:06):
don't realize how good they have it now. But if
you look back then, when you know, in the eighties
and everything like, like, look at what they didn't know anything,
man like, they were just still trying to figure a
lot of this stuff out back then, You're exactly right.
And like I say, with the ID or anything that
with a lot of disorders, it was. It was certainly
like that, and it's evolved in a much more compassionate
and understanding way, and I'm certainly very grateful for that.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
But I didn't I didn't even tell anyone I had
until I couldn't take it anymore, because I didn't that
this was going on until I couldn't take it, because
I thought everybody went through it for a long time.
My first psychiatrist's visit was when I was eighteen years old. Yeah,
so you know, all throughout that grew up mostly during
the nineties, but I was a kid in the eighties
and as these things, I just knew that if I
(18:46):
stepped on a crack at Epcot Center for I was
five years old. This was in eighty seven or eighty
eight or something like that, and I just knew if
I stepped on a crack, my mom would it would
my mom would die. And that was enough for me
to never step on a crack my mom. And you know,
it took them, hostage, took everything, hostage still does.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I believe it. I believe it though. You know, you
could tell, you know when you were mentioning it, because
it's like, you know, then your fear of stepping in
the cracks, it's gonna kill your mom. Because I've had
something on the show. She said it was there was
a jacket on the back of her door. She freaked out.
She's like, I'm not gonna move it because if it did,
it killed my kid. And I was like, huh, you know,
and it was my first experience with that on the show.
When someone had started mentioning that, I was like, that's
(19:24):
kind of interesting to hear, you know, because she was
obsessed with it. She's like, I sit in bed and
look at the back of the door. I'm looking at
that jacket the whole time, and I'm like, okay, you know,
And it was like early on, it was just like
I've had so many interesting conversations. Like the first season
in the show, I did like two hundred different interviews.
In all those two hundred interviews, I've had some interesting conversations.
That was one of the things that stuck out to
(19:45):
me was like when you started mentioning the cracks, because
that's the first thing I thought of. Because she was like, yeah,
I'm staring at the jacket. I was afraid if I
took the jacket off the door then had killed my
kid or something. I'm like, okay, you know. It's like
all right, well, you know, these are these are things
people deal with though, you know. And it's it's to
bring the line that these are some of the things
that people don't realize that people struggle with when it
comes to o CD like that.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
And I would argue, I mean, I don't know her
in particular the whole story, but when that jacket's on
the door, when everything when anything's not in place in mind,
there's this flood of a feeling that gives you this
signal that something is going to happen that is not
logically based. There's no logical connection whatsoever, right, And the
task becomes to start to recognize that and overcome it
despite the feeling, which is overwhelming, because the feeling persists.
(20:28):
It doesn't I mean, it doesn't back down unless it's
pushed down and knocked down over and over. And that's
what I learned to do, disobey it constantly. And that's
why I say, in terms of the rebelling against unjust authority,
that is something that I'm adamantly I'm very grateful for
because I think it's merited in terms of all things.
Yeah to do so, So Kurt.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Let me ask you what do you specialize in? You know,
sometimes when people looking for you know, psychiatrists, different people like,
what are your areas of expertise that that you would
say you cover the most.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
I would say that area of expertise that I would
cover the most. I mean, obviously you have obsessive compuls
OCD reight polar and certainly TBI, but I would argue
any any existential issue. I love existential literature, I love philosophy,
I love Kirker Guard, Sartra Camu, and anybody who is
experiencing doubts of what their purpose is on this earth
(21:22):
or meaning and what they want to make themselves. Concepts
of identity. I relish all of these. I love working
with anyone toward that end. I find them all very enthralling.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Also, yeah, well I believe it, trust me. That's the
same way I'm too when I pick people for the show.
I'm always looking for the most interesting things I can
find out because I'm like, you know, what's the takeaway
I get from this? Well, I can learn new things
as I go, you know, in the engaging conversations you
have with people. It's just it's great, you know. And
I can email us all the time where people be
on this show all the time, you know, and even
I got an inbox full and I actually start to
(21:52):
go through. But you know, it's it's so interesting because
you're looking for, you know, different things to kind of
highlight and learn as I go. So it's great when
I get to engaging in conversation to be the authors,
especially man, because like the steps it takes to write
these books. You know, some of these people like, oh,
I've worked on it for ten years, and I'm like,
oh God, like I'm planning right in my own memoir.
It's gonna I think I change the title. Well, it's
going to be Voice of the Poislets. Now it's gonna
(22:13):
be like uugh, or we know what it's gonna be. Man,
this feels like high school is what the title is
gonna because I thought it just be hilarious. Me and
somebody else had a conversation and that came up as
a conversation. I was like, yeah, this just feels like
too much like high school, you know what I mean.
And we were referencing like social media and things like
that too, you know. And with that being said, you know,
social media, I feel like there's a lot of misinformation
that goes on out there, man, like too much, especially
(22:35):
when it can be mentioned. COVID though too. I could
not even believe what it would be like for you, man,
because you're getting all this different information coming in and
you're like, well, what the hell am I supposed to
believe at this point, I'm gonna walk around in the
damn bubble. But I could almost see you being walking
around in a bubble at some point, not to make
fun of it, but you know, I'm saying like I
could see that though with you know, with your OCD,
you'd be freaking out because you don't know what to believe.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Well, you're exactly right, because the misinformation and everything else
on social media blasting at all, you didn't know what
to believe and you didn't know where it could come from,
so you started to protect yourself. Now, I had that
sort of contamination issue when I was young, and I
didn't have it for most of my life. Then after that,
I you know, I can remember when I was a kid,
there was a lot of germ issues in that way,
and then I was able to cognitively processing and get
(23:17):
past it check, which is what you know, I've learned
to do with all of them. And then this came
and it became it was most of them have a
legitimate impetus to start it going. And then that legitimate
emphasis becomes this ridiculous in touch with reality type of notion,
that concept of germs and how you get it, and
there was the uncertainty around it that made it so
(23:39):
that since I don't know how to get it, anything
could be infected and before so.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
Yeah, I just feel like you'd be in public something
coffee and you start freaking out, like just feel like
that's it had me interesting though, because you know, especially
OCD clients and during COVID years, like you're coming in
and you're like try to reassure them everything will be okay,
but just like at the same time, it's like I
don't know as much as you do. I don't know anything,
Like all this misinformation, all this different information floating around
(24:06):
of how it is, you know, mass no mask, all
this stuff is just coming at you at such a
rapid pace, you know, and with what the nineties introducing
the Internet to everybody AOL being the beginner, you know,
and to where we're now that you got God, I
couldn't even listen. You got like ten thousand different places
you can go and get information from. It just had
to be overload for people because you know, you're over
there trying to search and see what information's real, which
(24:28):
is coming from what I do about this And then
you know, it was so early on when it started
just taking out so many people. Unfortunately, because we didn't
know enough of the information on what it was. We
just knew what it was doing to people and how
people were coming in contact with it, and then it
was you know, the whole thing we've got to separate
from family. So it's like you got to start measuring
six feet away from everybody you know, and it's just
like it it had to be a nightmare. Man. I couldn't,
(24:50):
Like I said, I couldn't even begin to understand the
level of things that those the poor people of OCD
had because of the fact of all the misinformation they
were getting and the fact that you know, like it's like, oh,
say six feet away from everybody. I could just imagine
some of those guys out there with measuring tapes holding
it at a six feet mark or get a six
foot long ruler and just like, yeah, you got to
stay away from me kind of thing, you know. I
can just see it happen. It's not to make fun
(25:10):
of anybody, but it's just like I felt bad for
it because it's just like you think about it, man,
it's just like then then you get all this misservation
feed it, so then you don't know what to believe,
and then your brain's overloading and you're just like, well,
what the hell? Man? You know, some of those people
I could just see just having a meltdown in public
to everybody else will say they're going crazy to them.
They're just overloaded with information because they're only doing what
they're told. Okay, I weant so say six feet away.
This person will say six feet away, and then one
(25:31):
of them start freaking out and then they're perceived as
the crazy person. But it's really just their brain how
it's reacting to this. They're freaking out because they're like, listen,
I was told six feet away, you need to say
six feet away from me? And not knowing these people
have OCD, you know what I'm saying, Like they're just
like paranoid looking at people you know, and then you
add in anxiety, you probably send it to overdrive, overdrive.
Speaker 2 (25:49):
You have one of the big concepts you talk about
other gifts. I'm thinking about it as you're saying that,
I'm always having to filter out what's the feeling and
what's the reality, and by doing that, I'm always OCD
is one of the things that I get it in battling.
It is a great gift that you get is critically thinking.
You learn how to critically think because you have to
sift out what information is right, So the social media
(26:10):
information is usually not and what's the credible source here?
And who can I trust? Then how can I go
about it?
Speaker 1 (26:16):
I think you know, what's the incredible source? Curd. I
think that's the right question you should be asking. And
these people are telling you things, what is your credible
source for this information?
Speaker 2 (26:24):
Because it's it's oftentimes very hard to identify. I mean,
you had public officials who are saying things that were
not true at times during that it became very difficult
to understand who who you want to go? And it
becomes this is where from the OCD standpoint, it jumps
on the concept of since there's so much uncertainty, because
OCD is the disease of uncertainty, and it prais on that,
and you've got to do all of it. Nothing you
(26:45):
can do, but all of it. You got to. You
got to make sure you keep yourself away from all
of it, and then you isolate yourself, and the isolation
becomes a self fulfilling is because isolation becomes a horrible
thing for OCD, because yeah, it just thrives on. And I,
you know, did that very thing. I isolated during that
period in that way, and it grew just like that,
and I had to spend all kinds of time beating
(27:06):
it back and reasoning and getting that right information.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Yeah, yeah, I can only I could only imagine, man,
because you weren't allowed to be in person anymore, so
you had do like telehealth with a lot of people,
which I mean turned into something really great though, if
you think about it, because now you can connect over
the internet, you don't have to physically be in an
office for people that are not comfortable with doing that setting,
you know, which opened up great avenue at the same time.
But like I just dode and then you're moan by yourself.
(27:28):
Your thoughts are starting to pick up and they know,
as we all know when when COVID hit, mental health
shot up, because now all of a sudden, now it's
a big conversation to talk about. Even though this has
been here for a lot of time, you know, and
we still hear about it these days too, like these
school shootings, Well maybe had mental healthy is okay, So
then what are you doing about the problem? Nothing. You're
just sitting here avoiding it completely. It's like it's like
the ugly kid in the room. You just want to
avoid it. For some reason, you just don't want to
(27:50):
talk about it. I don't know what. People are so
worried about it. I feel like a lot of people
it should be like going to the doctor, basically, just
something normal that we all talk about. But it's like
it's not it's it's insane. It's creaty how much people
don't talk about it. Then all these people, like all
these awareness months, Okay, this is the thing that pisses
me off with these awareness months, Like I love the
fact we're bringing light to these things, with these videos
of these people just dropping these things in there, and
(28:11):
then it's like, Okay, the month's over, so we're then
talking about it. No, no, see, it doesn't end there.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
With last month being suicide Awareness month, I did a
whole series of videos on suicide awareness. But one woman
and I had a real interesting conversation. But it's just
so funny because once you mention those words, people start panicking.
Oh god, God's sales going across you know. It's like
just start freaking out completely because we're having a normalized
conversation about somebody who's having these thoughts and they're thinking about,
you know, harming themselves instead of us worrying about Okay,
(28:37):
what do we do, Like we're battling cancer. Okay, well
we got to do something, we run away from it,
like you know, it's like a good COVID situation. It's like,
oh god, you got to say six feet away from
you just said them. You just said that word, like
you know, like Harry Potter, like Lord Voldemort can't say
the name, you know, you can't say that name or
else you already's gonna start panicking, you know what I mean.
It just doesn't make any sense why it's so hard
to normalize these things, you know, and then as men,
(28:57):
you know, us having this conversation, we're already winning the
bat because we don't even talk about it at this point,
you know, like we're losing eighty percent of men the
suicide is like okay, so what is it gonna take
eighty one to eighty two percent of bit to be
that number? For you to finally stop and say something,
They're like, hey, listen, maybe we should start talking about
this more often, you know, have more regular conversations. You know.
It's it's crazy because I've had guests on before they've
(29:18):
had the same thing. They were talking about. They had
a group of six friends and he said, I said something,
and then everyone else started unloading it together. It's like
they're waiting for that one person to say it so
everybody can just start dumping it all together like oh yeah, man,
you know, I'm right there with you, you know, and
it's like, well, what is that gonna be at this point?
You know? And it's the most frustrating thing ever. It's
because you know, it doesn't matter if you're rich, you're famous,
doesn't mean to I mean poor. Whatever. It takes everybody.
(29:41):
It doesn't care, It doesn't have a choice, doesn't like
certain people. It just likes everybody. And it's a scary
thing that's going on. And it's like, you know, what
are we telling our younger men now two in this
conversation as well, it's like like we're afraid to talk
about these things. Why because we're losing eighty percent fifty
percent of the population's men. Like, let's look at the
number statistically, Like you're you're looking at the numbers, like,
out of five friends, possibly four of them are coming,
(30:02):
you're gonna lose four of them right there. You don't
know that fourth one's an optional one, but three of
them at least aren't going to be there for the
rest of the conversation.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
When you say three three of them are going to
be there for the rest of what population, which disorder?
What population are you saying is we're.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Just saying men in general. I'm talking about men and general.
If you think about it, like you know, eighty percent
of them, if eighty percent of suicides are all men.
If you think about it, there's a group of five people,
you and your four of the friends, three of them
will probably not be there, honestly if you go based
on the statistics.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Yeah, and there's a very high one. That was a
big issue with the bipolar because I think the latest
statistic guy saw I was up to twenty percent attempt
at least attempt or commit or do commit suicide. And yeah,
it's a remarkable number for a disorder.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Yeah, it's just crazy, you know it is. It's like,
you know, we're afraid to talk about it because we
were pre programmed. Like you and I grew up in
the eighties. Because I'm eighty five, you know, I barely
remember any of the eighties. I was eighty five, so
I don't remember. I remember the nineties. Man, the nineties
are such an interesting time because all the things that
you can do, all the TV shows and all this
stuff they would put on is nowhere near what it
is now. The censor everything now. But it's like, but
(31:09):
back in the nineties, we were okay with all this stuff,
all these crazy shows, like even these Jack in the
Box commercials, and you just go back and watch these
old commercials and you look at some of them. I
think one of them I think caught my mind. I
caught my attention was the one where jacksonside an abortion clinic,
he's selling a sandwich. I'm like, what kind of settings
are we doing here, guys, Like, you know, like all
that stuff is acceptable, Like think about what TV is now, right,
and Stimpy was a kids show for us, but now
(31:31):
it's like TV fourteen. It's like all censored pretty much.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
Do you think it's moving in the wrong direction.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
Yeah, so I think we're in the wrong direction only
because I feel like we're centering mental health as a
topic and we need to talk to some of these
younger guys about it. Because me and another guy's named
mister Whiskey and I were discussing when the Internet was introduced,
like social media was really introduced. He said that the
number shot up to like twenty percent of to twenty
percent for younger men that were committing suicide, and it's like,
you know, like we have to figure out what's going on,
(32:01):
you know, and and a little bit it is you
know now that you're not you don't just have limited
space for them to bully each other. Now you can
bully somebody via the internet. You don't have to be
in the same room with somebody to wrass them. And
then you have, you know, now you're adding in grown
men who just think this is okay to do too,
that predatory to come after the kids and starts like
are just nasty individuals saying nasty things to people, you know,
and it's it's like one thing I'd upset somebody. Here
(32:21):
we go, greve, I start setting them into the fire.
Now everybody's gotta go, you know. And the one thing
that did stick out to me though when that situation
was a young lady that was a big anime fan.
She she couse played as a character. And you know,
mind you they don't they don't, they don't say, they
don't say race to these people. It's just a show,
anime cartoon. People are watching it. They got mad because
she wasn't preferably white or whatever. They were saying that
(32:43):
they were killed this poor girl because they didn't like
the fact that she was Cause playing in somebody like
But they causeplay all the time at all these conventions
and things like that too. But you don't hear them
saying those kinds of things there. It's just because you're
on the internet, you have accessed to everybody, and everybody
and their mother has access now that now you can
say these nasty things to people. You don't have to
be in the same room as them. The scary world
we live in, Kurt Man, it's a scary world we're
living in.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
It certainly, is it? Certainly is? I think there are
certainly steps though, that we could take to ameliorate, make
make it better, and I'm hoping that we do in
the future, and especially around mental health.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
Yeah, exactly, Well, Kurt, we're getting close to the part
of my show where we normally ask the questions. I
have two questions ask everybody. Okay, so the first one
is credit to my good friend Gretchen from the ship
that goes on in her head. So, Kurt, if your
mental health had a song, what would it be? Everybody
loves this question. By the way, this one gets a
lot of responses, people like, yes, I love this.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
I'm gonna have to go with my favorite band, The
End by the Doors. There you go, Okay, Yeah, I
like it. I like it. Yeah. He thinks it's a
sort of a meditation on ending, you know, the end
of pain, the end of suffering, the end of and
we'll just leave it at that. Yeah, the end.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
No, I get you now, it's a great song. Like
I said, it is an interesting question though, because the
responses you get are just it's just hilarious. He does
the same thing it like, damn. That's a good question.
All right. So the other question I have to ask you,
and the reason this whole podcast exists, if you can
break the stigma about mental health. I'm talking anything you
see on a daily basis you just look at and go, yeah,
(34:14):
that's not right. What would you say.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
As far as from a mental health standpoint in general,
I'll tell you. I'll go off of what you said earlier.
In terms of from a male standpoint, I think that
it's so under talked about that from a yeah, it's
not right that culturally in our country and I'm not
going to speak to other cultures, but certainly in the
(34:38):
United states that men don't talk about openly about their
mental health. I never felt at any point and during
my growing up that I could tell my buddy, you know,
what was going on in my head. And I don't
think that's that different today based on all the conversations
that I have. So if there's one thing, because I
think by talking about them, it could be affected. And
(34:58):
there there are interventions that help many things. So I
would I like a brighter light shined on things.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Yeah, no, I agree. I feel like it's just like
I said, that's just men. Having this conversation now is
a powerful conversation because it's two men talking about it,
which you rarely ever see happening. And it's hard. It's
hard to understand why we can't break past this point
of you know, oh we can't talk about our feelings
as men. It's like we all have feelings a lot
of people don't want to deal with them, but they're
(35:24):
still there.
Speaker 2 (35:26):
And you talk about the aids and growing up, I
played every sport in the world, and when I got hurt,
you toughed it out. That was the male that was
the male culture. You just you know, you got up
and I remember getting hit with baseballs in the face
many times. But it doesn't matter. You just keep playing,
you get going, you get tackled, whatever. And that's I
would argue that becomes the mindset from not only physical
(35:47):
but mental from a from a male standpoint, because the
value there in an existential way, the value becomes tough. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
In the role of the coach too, becomes more of
a mentor position too. You think, think about it because
a lot you spent a lot of time with them.
They influenced you a lot of times. The guys got
bigger into sports. Well, you know, coach taught me. This
coach taught me that, you know. And then then it came,
you know, the NFL when they were tackling people, they
had to change how they were tackling things because all
the injuries that were coming and all the different things
they started finding out, like Junior Seau had you know,
he went went berserk and just you know, I mean
(36:18):
like and then you know, if you think you want
to think about it, like, I don't know if you're
a pro wrestler fan at all, but you remember the
Chris ben Wass situation where he unfortunately went completely and
it just went went off and just shot himself and
all the family members and things too. It's it's crazy though,
because everybody wants talks about it for a very brief moment.
Then they're like, oh, well, you know, we don't talk
about why why don't you want to talk about the situation.
This happened. This is something that needs to be addressed.
Why did he go? What happened that? The situation is
(36:40):
why did he got why did he choose to do this?
And all these things that they deal with, And then
you know, if you bring in all the other things,
so like some of those guys, you know, we're doing
steroids and all this stuff, all these roys and anything else,
started playing factors and everything they were doing because you know,
and that's that area. It's like it's an image thing,
like you got to present these images. And then same
thing when you say about baseball players football play, it's
the same thing. Like you see some of these guys
(37:01):
get hit and oh my god, dude, you could hear
them get hit, like the noises and it's like, oh
that hurts, man. They ain't they ain't know, there's a
light tap. You watch these people laid out. It's not fun,
you know, and thenever he gets mad because they're changing
all the rules. I'm like, well, think about where the
rules were before they didn't have helmets, So whether or
now they have better helmets protect these guys from brain injuries,
you know, because Steve Young what we dealt with concussions
all the time too. And now what's the big thing
(37:22):
with him was you know that he eventually retired because
of all the concussions he was having. And then what
was said the guy from Miami Now I can't think
what his name is, Tua whatever his name is, he
has a contract in his contract written if he gets
he can't play because of the hen injuries, he still
gets paid, which was smart you think about it, because
you're taking shots to head and watching these guys hit
each other at like such a hard velocity. It's like
(37:43):
it's hard to watch sometimes, like you know or was
it the reals recent one? I don't know if you
watch football ever? What's his name?
Speaker 2 (37:48):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Tyer Kell? Do you see the wander taker hill We
landed and his leg turned away around. I was like,
and then you just see all these memes like people like, oh,
I guess he's not coming to work tomorrow or something.
I'm like, oh, God, like you know, and it's just
every everybody likes to make jokes about these things. But
it's just like it's it's just that's hard to watch,
you know what I'm saying, Like the guy's whole leg
just turn around.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
I'm like, hm.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
Anyways, with that getting said, we're gonna start wrapping up. Kurt,
Do you want to let me know where they can
find you?
Speaker 2 (38:13):
You know?
Speaker 1 (38:13):
In the book is out now right.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Yeah, the book is out. I I have two others
out as well that you can find me on Kurt
ownerbooks dot com. That would be the easiest.
Speaker 1 (38:25):
Well, if you want to, you want to tell them
about the other two books, go ahead too, Man, now's
the time to plug it for him. Go ahead, buddy,
let me know about the other two.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
The other two books that I have one out right
now called False Idols, How diversion is Destroying Democracy. And
that's a very different subject obviously, but obviously that's the
one that uses the Roman concept and discusses, uh, how're
we're being diverted from doing the common good. Celebrity and
sports and and everything and in our existence and our economics,
everything makes us pulls us away from doing the things
(38:52):
that make the world better for all of us, which
is you know, uh and and utopia realized in search
of a just society. That's about that's a fictional recreation
of the concept of utopia which was by Thomas Moore
in the fifteen Hunt, wherein I build a place that
re examined and reimagines all social systems to make them
(39:13):
better in order for the common good, because we've been
using the same ones forever. They don't work that well.
They don't make sure that everybody has what everybody needs enough.
So that's that's a representation of the systems that that
might work. And you know, ask us to all questions
what might work exactly?
Speaker 1 (39:29):
So Kurt, you want to Liby know where they can
find you? Is the website the best place to reach you?
Do you like them from them to reach out on
social media? So you can plug any of those right
now from let them know where they can find you, Buddy,
Kirt Warner.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
Books be the best place to reach me social media
at her owner books for any of the social media
tags and you know Barnes and Nople and you can
find the books anywhere books are you know you could
find Yeah, in terms of that any kind and you'll
find them easily online and or at the actual physical store.
But that's that's in a nutshell. And and I'm welcome
(40:01):
anybody's comments or females anytime.
Speaker 1 (40:03):
Definitely, that's awesome. Heerre well, Kirk, thanks so much for coming, man,
I appreciate you being here. I had a great time.
I enjoyed having this conversation with you.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
Man.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
I love the little takeaways you gave us for OCD
and all that kind of stuff. Like I said, you
were the first guests on the show that we've had
that's OCD. So this has been really great because we
got to learn some new you know. It's always great
to learn something new for anybody, you know. And like
I said, Man, we're welcome back anytime. By the way, too, Man,
I'd love to have you come back and talk to me.
So you got anything new in the works, anything coming
down the line that's mental health related by chance?
Speaker 2 (40:29):
Well, I'm I'm out. I would argue most of the
things I'm I have wanting one manuscripts, a lot of
them have a mental health concept. I'm always I'm a
zealous writer, so awesome. A lot of them have it.
But so in terms of coming back, I would love
to one day. I'm very grateful that you had me
on PETE and thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Well, you're so welcome, Kirk, thank you for me here.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
Guys.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
With that being said, we're gonna wrap this episode of
Pete for Anxiety. You guys sort of find me. I'm
Pete for so Anxiety. I'm ex all the way down
to TikTok, I'm on Spotify all the way down to
Pandora now and as always say, it costs nothing absolutely
to be kind somebody, one kind act you can do
because say some fly for hell, you can make their day.
I'm beat for his anxiety, saying out saying, don't ask
her your days? Did they say, hey, how's your mental
health today?
Speaker 2 (41:06):
It's so bad? Don't uck right back and the time
to look back there? Then I threda, but that will
dive de prect the projects I got my
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