Hello and welcome back to The 10, 000 Things.
My name is Sam Ellis.
I'm Joe Loh.
And today we're going to celebrate our return with a reading of Desiderata,
which many will already know.
Yes, maybe they will.
Firstly though, Sam, I just want to say Happy New Year.
Happy New Year, Joe.
It's good to be back in the cave.
Essential and great.
Yeah, lovely to see you.
It was lovely to run into you, uh, very coincidentally.
On the peninsula over summer too, just loping down the street towards
the cafe, looking like someone quite strung out, sort of on edge, in
somewhere I never thought I'd see you.
It was very strange.
All of that true.
Uh, it was a parallel mirror image inverse, you know, was it?
Wacky World.
Cause normally, you might see me in Lorne or somewhere like that, but
there I was in Rye on the Mornington Peninsula and not my usual place at all.
Had a couple of great beach days and it was raining and I was running to
get a coffee and I think I had some other thing on my mind and I can't
remember, but then suddenly you're there.
Pulling up.
Yeah.
Kid in the front.
Yeah, I had the 11 year old and she said, Oh, looks like
we're going on a side quest.
She's on to it.
So we went on a side quest and saw the ocean beach and it was beautiful.
It was very cool.
And you spoke to her like she was an adult, which included quite a lot of
swearing, which I didn't pull you up on.
Oh, yeah.
And, discussions about the difficult nature of adult relationships.
And I think she really appreciated, I think she found it refreshing that she
was involved in an adult conversation.
She had worthwhile things to say.
Yeah, she said, she did remark afterwards that you sound like
you're on a podcast even when you're just in the backseat of a car.
Well, either art imitates life or whatever, but she's just
used to hearing me talk on that.
So that's, that's the context, I guess.
I mean, I was having a similar experience.
She did say it's like having a podcast.
It's like being in, it's like listening to the podcast.
Cause not just me, you were there as well.
Yeah.
And so you told her the origin story, which is of course us being on a
road trip and having a big old chat.
Yeah.
It's very us.
It's very canon.
And then look, I put the ball in your court for us to get together and record.
And here we are, last minute call up I got this morning and it's constantly
fraught whether we can ever actually get in the same shed together.
That's right.
you know, who knows what the frequency will be in 2025, Sam,
but it's nice to have you here.
Well, one of my New Year's resolutions is to just sort of work out the
schedule and have things in places and have some predictable, more
predictability, I think there's way more predictability than there used to be.
So, that's the usual, sort of, unavoidable KPIs, go to work, make sure the kids are
fed and the house is clean and, you know, the clothes are washed and all that.
But there's other key things that I think must be done for, um.
You know, life to have its full meaning and potential and it's things like this.
Everyone gotta have a hobby.
Gotta have a hobby, right?
Yeah, and if you don't sketch it People have been saying this to me
for I mean, my breakup was, my breakup is coming up on nine years now.
Whoa.
And before that, I kind of didn't have the same need for a hobby.
I was living with my partner and children and It was all consuming.
It was kind of, yeah, I had a pretty full life.
If anything, it was like, when do I ever get some time on my own kind of vibes.
Yeah.
And I was drinking, and drinking is a very time consuming and fully involving
hobby if you do it every night.
The time you spend doing it, the time you spend recovering from it.
Drink and listen to music, drink and watch a movie, drink and watch some sport.
You can sort of just drink and so Sobriety gives people a lot of their time back.
Yeah, but I've had it ground into me and it annoys me every single time a
friend usually hears my latest dating fail and then says Bro, you need a hobby.
And dating, having dating fails is considered a hobby
these days, but I don't know.
even I'm sick of my own stories from the dating world.
There's a level of repetition.
There's a feeling that things aren't progressing.
It's just the same.
I'm sick of going into therapy and talking about it too.
So that's a waste of therapy time.
I've sort of stopped doing that.
Yeah.
Probably wise.
It's like, does my therapist really need to get to know this person's name?
Probably not.
Do you really need to discuss this?
Is there a therapeutic?
Yeah, are they going to be, they're being discussed in three to six months time?
Probably not.
And look, if there's something like insightful and
provocative that's going on.
How does it come to you that you realize this?
If I chase this rabbit, I'm going to find something worthwhile.
Well, then that's different.
Then it's not really about the story.
It's about where it leads.
Anyway, the last two years we've had this podcast.
So, it's, uh, it's been good to have a hobby, Sam.
And, and I've had to learn that part of that is, is, is working
with you and understanding your mercurial and unpredictable nature.
Yeah.
Well, my unpredictability was all down to me for a long time, but
now it's down to the unpredictable demands of others as well.
But yeah, there's no point making excuses.
If I want to do something, that's the point about the hobby part is it's a
hobby and you schedule it or it doesn't happen, but you're getting the other
stuff, whether it's your work or family stuff, you're getting that shit done.
Yes.
Before you.
Putting any time into your hobby.
Correct.
It just means that sometimes that means it's quite a while
between when we see each other.
an older version of you might have said, well fuck all of that responsibility,
I need to do my hobby first.
Yeah.
So I respect that it's hard.
Yeah, I probably would have placed a much higher priority on things
like this at another time and then, you know, forgotten all about a work
shift or, you know, stuff like that.
Yeah, that kind of shit, but yeah.
There's absolutely no Nothing to be gained from saying, Oh, I'm too busy in life.
When people say I'm too busy, what they mean is I'm not placing
a high enough priority on this.
So it's just whether there's something else that can, whether something else can
be bumped and there's still, I still end up with I have to accept that you're not
placing as high a priority on it as I am without getting resentful towards you.
Well, and that's kind of what this poem is about among other
things, that sort of stuff.
But so I'll leave it with this, unless you've got more to say,
you're most welcome, but Oh, you know, I'm getting my timetable soon.
I can look at that and then look at the lay of the week, you know,
of the average week and go, well, this day ought to work, put it in.
Everybody else can accommodate that because, you know, I, I moved my things
around to accommodate other people.
So hopefully no one has to move anything.
And it can be a regular thing because back in October 22, November, December,
we were doing One Awake and it was just.
It was just flowing and going and it was a good feeling.
I guess to stay sane I'm at the point where I just have to be grateful if
I'm here in the chair and then I have to be accepting that if I'm not and
without and neither of those things need to have a time frame on them.
That just needs to be my settings.
If I end up here in the chair with the mic on, that's great.
If I don't, then I need to let that go and that's okay too.
But, but it's been very successful because it's not like I haven't built
up some huge resentment against you for being, in my eyes, unreliable
or for, in my eyes, not prioritizing it the way I want to prioritize it.
I haven't built up that resentment.
So when I saw you loping down the street in Rai, I was just happy to see you.
There was nothing getting in the way.
And it was actually nice to do something that wasn't task
focused, to just hang out.
And look at the ocean for a couple of minutes, you know, so anyway,
they're my little musings before we get into the poem, but um, this one
has been floating around addiction recovery circles for a long, long time.
And new age circles.
Yeah, okay.
The hippie movement embraced it.
It was on a lot of toilet doors back in the, in the 70s.
And those posters were still there in the 90s.
I don't want to say anything more about it.
it before you read it, but then we'll spend the episode
on it once you've read it.
Amen.
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what
peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant.
They, too, have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons.
They are vexatious to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter.
For always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble.
It is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is.
Many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself.
Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love.
For in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is
as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully
surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune, but do not
distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars.
You have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe
is unfolding as it should.
Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and
whatever your labours and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life.
Keep peace in your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.
Mmm.
Strive to be happy.
Yeah, oh, if you don't strive, you won't.
Or is striving the problem, would Buddhists say?
There's a lot in there, obviously.
I mean, we could line by line this thing.
I've got thoughts about every last one.
Yeah, we might have to a little bit.
The stuff about the career, when I first read it, really hit me because I was
like, fuck, I haven't done this properly.
Okay, hang on.
Hit you when?
When you read it when?
Oh, all of it hits me in different ways.
I mean, but You came across this years and years ago, so different
things would have struck you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Keep interested in your career, it's a real possession in the
changing fortunes of time.
Because, and it talks about dark imaginings too, because I had all the
dark imaginings, I imagined no future for myself or humanity or whatever.
So I haven't paid enough attention to my own little life, and
now I'm suffering from that.
You were full of big dreams and big nightmares for a long time.
Yeah, that's right.
I thought I was a doomed Doomed alcoholic, like my father.
Or potentially a revolutionary genius, you know, sort of like
all sorts of possibilities.
Whatever.
Like, yeah, it might have depended what substance I was
taking or whatever, but Yeah.
I just didn't, there's a, there's a real humility.
And a paying attention to your own little life in this poem while acknowledging
that the world's kind of a hard place.
That is a, has got some fundamental wisdom that not only I, but I think
a lot of people who ended up In their life with an addiction problem, stumble
across this poem and kind of go, oh.
That's something.
Yeah, that's something.
Now, is it a bit cheesy?
It's a bit cheesy.
Yeah, sure.
I think it's very of our times, if you want my opinion.
Yeah.
This is in fashion right now, it feels to me.
It's written in 1927.
Yeah.
American poet, I believe.
I think he might have written it to his young daughter.
Max Ehrman.
Yeah.
but I posted it years ago when I still had a Facebook account.
I posted it on Facebook and got mostly favorable, favorable reviews.
But one person whose opinion I did hold highly said, you know,
she hates these kinds of lists of things you shouldn't, shouldn't do.
Yeah, I can see that.
Fair enough.
Yeah.
But like, it's hard to argue with any of these though.
Yeah, for me, it's like , like it actually comes through back to the
death of my father because I was 23.
He dies at 50 from alcoholism.
Alcoholism.
Mm-hmm . And I kind of lost my source of wisdom.
One of the main ones.
Yeah.
From then on.
Yeah.
And I felt like I was probably doomed to not live a very long life.
Yeah.
And, so those dark imaginings, and I've had to sort of, in the last few
years, particularly come out of that and be like, well, hang on, like, I need
You're way less of a catastrophist, like whether it's the world or, you know,
this country or your own life, yeah.
Yeah, well, I've found other sources of wisdom in addiction
recovery circles, and some of them being older men, I'll be honest.
Sure.
who around the age my dad would have been if he had a lived.
You know, I'm talking about men in their 70s, 60s and 70s, and they point me
in the direction of a poem like this.
And they say, this is, I think one of them calls it his mental anchors.
A lot of my mental and emotional anchors are in this Poem.
I, I think that this is the, mental and emotional anchors is very striking.
You could say it's a touchstone, you could say it's a prayer, you
could say it's a liturgy of sorts.
You know, I think it's taken on that, I mean it's nearly a hundred years old.
What's, hang on, what's a liturgy?
Uh, literally sort of means the words of the ritual.
Right.
You know, so liturgical, uh, you know, so the things that are said that, you know,
at the Easter Mass or the, this or that.
Well it is like that because it gets printed out with flowery
calligraphy and put on toilet walls.
It's presented as scripture.
Yeah, to be read and re read and Meditated on.
Meditated on.
And recited and celebrated.
And then at the end of course it says no doubt the universe
is unfolding as it should.
Which is, it's the closest, I think that's probably the most
controversial statement in there.
That's right.
Like, from an objective point of view, but yeah, it's interesting, but like,
and it is a metaphysical statement.
So it is, that's.
That's right.
You can't be an atheist.
Well, there's a question for you.
Can you be an atheist, which I was until nine years ago.
Can you be an atheist and believe the universe is unfolding as it should?
Or do you just say, no, no, it's just unfolding randomly and
chaotically and there is no should.
That's right, isn't it?
That's what atheist says.
Well, it depends on the flavor of atheist.
And so, I mean, if you've got one of your sort of, everything is predetermined
because of the nature of science and, you know, everything from biochemistry
to the laws of matter and the properties of nature and blah, blah, blah, blah,
properties of matter and the laws of nature that be owing to all of that
and the way brains work, that we all have this, you illusion of free will
and consciousness, which is Maybe the consciousness part is not an illusion,
but the free will is, and that no matter what you do or think you are doing, and
no matter how much you think you might be in charge, you're absolutely not.
And it's, it's all just unfolding.
It's on rails.
There's nothing you can do.
So there's like a hardcore version of the, there's no free will.
And then that person would actually probably to a degree agree with the
statement, but they might say the universe is unfolding as it must.
As it must.
Hmm.
Say should and must is a different.
They're different things.
So should is a I would argue so should is a normative statement and Must would
also be a normative statement and then there's another kind of atheist who says,
you know Well, there's no God in charge.
There's no greater plan and that there's a level of Chance in
all circumstances, you know, uh, contingency is powerful in history.
I guess that's what I believed before I came into addiction recovery.
Yeah.
And, but then it says, therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you concede him to be.
Conceive him to be.
Yeah, don't be mad at the creator or the, yeah.
Yeah.
And a God of my own understanding is the God that I was, uh,
introduced to, to get sober.
Yes.
Not really the Bible God, a little different, uh Well, kind of explicitly
not the Bible God, but also, if that's what you want, that's okay too.
Yeah, they're not banning you from having a personal conception, in fact,
you kind of have to work out your own conception is sort of the point, right?
Yeah, but those two sentences, if I can believe that the universe is unfolding
as it should, that means I have to accept Untold amount of tragedies.
It does mean that, I guess.
As having some kind of meaning, right?
Ah, do you have to accept there's meaning?
To be unfolding as it should?
Yeah, I mean it's, that's, that's the part of the poem where I kind of
go, No, I can't, I'm not quite ready.
Well, I think they, you know.
I'm not quite ready to accept that, like.
Yeah.
I think the things we're stuck on in this are probably just as
important as the things we agree with.
Yeah.
So you're not quite willing to accept that tragedy has
meaning and you know, it's okay.
And I don't think I am either, to be honest.
Yeah.
But I think that if I could.
There would be a lot of wisdom in that.
I think there, I think there is, I think there's more wisdom in this poem than
there is in my, uh, view of the world.
Your earlier kind of nihilistic view or your I'm heading towards believing that
the universe is unfolding as it should and making my own peace with my own higher
power as I conceive him, her, it to be.
That's kind of where I'm at.
That's kind of where I'm at, you know, and, uh, it really does help me not be
self destructive and pick up a drink and start destroying myself again.
Well, then it's a useful belief or a useful, sort of
normative assumption, an axiom.
There you go.
Yeah.
We assume this to be true.
Yeah.
And then you just practice, you practice your life as if there's a higher power.
In my case, a loving higher power.
Yeah.
I think there's ample evidence that people have changed their lives and,
or done better things than they thought they could by starting with that idea.
I think there's plenty of evidence for that.
I have had strong experiences.
of experiencing this kind of support that I can't quite describe or understand
in any other way than I'm having a relationship with a higher power.
There is a support there for me and there has been ever since I've been
willing to ask a higher power for help.
Well, then it's entirely compatible with your experience of life and you
don't have any sort of strong evidence.
To take on a contrary belief and you know, what are you going to do?
In any case, you know, decide that it's, you know, not okay to think that way
and then make some effort to change it.
I mean, I don't think there's any purpose in that.
You know, it reminds me of a conversation I had years ago with my
beloved friend Pushka, a very wise and gentle, spiritual sort of person.
Person in his own way as well as, you know, he's hilarious.
He's a, he's a nerd and a, you know, a compulsive hobbyist.
And, you know, he's a cool guy and he's had big struggles over the years, but
he's also shown a lot of compassion to a lot of people in his life.
And one day we were talking about atheism and, uh, you know, the,
the, the horrors of religion.
And I just hit a point where I was starting to get a bit annoyed with the new
atheism, you know, capital N, capital a.
of the early 2000s and I think I'd sort of come out the other side of it and
I had no patience for the sort of smug Ricky Gervais types who would say say
things like there was this one tweet which crystallized the whole thing for me
right so he said and I was those cards on the table agnostic I don't know whether
there's a god or not I can't feel it one statement or the other to be true so it's
kind of it's just based on a feeling more than anything else right and So Pushka
was praising Catherine Devaney, who, you know, had been courageous and taken on the
Catholic Church and, you know, speaking truth to power and all of that, but I
was maybe being, I was a bit pissed and being a bit of a smartass and I said,
yeah, but Catherine Devaney, I mean, kind of, I feel like her shtick is, I'm
atheist, therefore I'm dreadfully smart, and I've seen through the illusions that,
you know, lesser mortals are burdened with, and I'm a higher being because
I've seen through this, you know, it's the smug red pilled vibe, right, which
we can see on all sides of politics and culture, it's not exclusive to any one
belief, and we get smug God believers also, right, who think they've got the
secret sauce and other people are shit.
So I don't think there's any room for this attitude of others are shit.
but he wasn't like that, but he was just kind of just liked
Catherine Devaney's vibe.
And I do too.
I made this point.
I was like, look, I don't think there's any point being self congratulatory.
about being atheist or not.
I don't, I don't think we can really take any pride in that one way or the other.
It just is what it is.
It's like being gay.
It's like you are or you aren't, you know, you've got these attractions or you don't.
Uh, maybe they change over time, but it's kind of like, Hey everyone,
give me a high five because I'm this.
It's like, no, no, no, I'll high five you if you do something cool,
do something good, which she and Catherine Devaney has done for sure.
When I look at a guy like Ricky Gervais, he's done some tremendous work and is
also just an insufferable person in my opinion, as you know, and he posted
when Max Baumgartner jumped from space with a parachute, you remember, right?
And he said, dear religion, today I safely dropped a man from space
and you shot a little girl in the head for wanting to go to school.
Yours, Science.
I'm like, come on dude, this is, this is the nothing burger.
Like, you could just rewrite it like this, which I did.
dear science, today I gave hope and comfort to millions of believers and you
designed an atom bomb or this or that.
So we can just invert the statement and you see, I don't think there's any point.
I mean it talks about aridity in the poem in terms of love, but there's such
an aridity to the whole atheist thing.
Oh yeah, I think it can be.
It was put to me.
When I need to get sober.
So let's just stop and explain that term for a second.
Aridity, like arid as in dry.
Lifeless.
Barren.
Yeah.
Unfruitful.
Hmm.
And that belief sort of has this more juiciness to it, I think.
And that atheism can feel a little dry.
I was an atheist.
Yeah.
I needed to get sober.
I needed help.
It was put to me to ask the question, Who am I to say there is no God?
Sure.
So, Ricky Gervais.
Who am I to say there is?
Yeah.
So, Ricky Gervais or Catherine Devaney, God, I haven't heard
that name in a long time.
Yeah.
would say, well, I am very clever.
That's who I am to say there is no God.
Yeah.
But maybe they were never where I was, have been of destroying myself
with a substance and asking someone for help and being told, Hey, man.
You can't really do this and be an atheist.
So are you willing to be a little bit open minded?
Just a little bit open minded.
Just crack the door ajar of open mindedness towards
some kind of spirituality.
If you can do that, you'll be sweet.
And I, I mean, I've just gone past nine years without having a drop of alcohol.
It's an achievement.
And I've been on a spiritual journey.
That whole time, but still I'm not willing to let go fully to the Desiderata of
saying the universe is unfolding as it should because there are, of course,
there's so many horrors in the world and And all of that, you know, it remains
true and and it's so hard to Um, and that's where, and that's what, uh, Ricky
Gervais would point to just the horrors and say, well, God's responsible for this.
What kind of God is this?
Blah, blah, blah.
Yeah.
He would.
Yeah.
But I've, been on a strong, or he would say God is responsible for the
abuse in the institutional churches.
And I just, I think it's a pointless statement.
Yeah.
In my nine years on a spiritual journey from atheism to spirituality, I've
never once veered towards a church.
Well, and you know, well, Hugh has requested we renew the topic
of spirituality versus religion.
So yeah, we'll do, we'll have to do that one.
Yeah.
I just think whatever you needed in the middle ages to have
Relationship with a higher power.
In the modern era, you can, you know, mine's been fairly eastern flavoured,
although Buddhism doesn't really have a higher power, I have strong experiences
with Buddhist style meditations, but I have a strong experience with a
higher power in addiction recovery, and I'm no longer an atheist, and I'm
not even an agnostic, I believe, I personally believe in a higher power.
It's just that all the wisdom in this poem takes me to this one point, and I'm
like, yes, yes, yes, yes, a little bit cheesy, but I really agree with this,
yes, yeah, and then, ah, the universe is unfolding as it's just, Because the
real answer, of course, at that point, the real answer is, I don't know.
Of course.
And that, the most spiritual statement you can ever make is, I don't know.
It's a mystery.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's right, that's true.
I do wonder what Yuval Noah Harari would make of it, and
he might agree to an extent.
Uh, and, you know, I think anyone who's studied history with any level
of seriousness, You know, once you get past the big man idea that, you know,
a big powerful person came along and changed things and you plug into the
idea of kind of larger trends and forces and, you know, and also random events,
but also people getting together and deliberately trying to do something good
or bad, you plug all that into the model.
And I think what you do arrive at is you can arrive at an idea that, you
know, So, while it appears random, that there is a bit of an order to things,
and whether that order is created by humans and nature working together, well
then some would say that's God then.
Uh, and, you know, also, think about all those people that went to Catholic
schools, sort of the boomer generation of Australian social justice people,
so many of them went to Catholic schools, and had very, very, they
were Very strongly indoctrinated into the social teachings, right?
Justice and charity and, uh, stuff like that, right?
Caritas and, uh, the other one.
And many of them Left the faith and left the church, you know, and didn't, weren't,
you know, even attending even a little bit and were publicly not Christian, but
they carried those principles forward.
And I would argue that they had probably found a higher power in many cases, which
was, you know, the environment movement or socialism or something else, the Labour
Party, you know, whatever it might be.
And, and I think that the higher power can be a variety of things, and
I would argue it's probably anything you're willing to surrender to.
Yeah, and for a lot of people who make a start in addiction recovery,
it's, they surrender to the group.
I think that the The, as in the group of people in the, in the room.
I, and I think that's a very powerful idea.
Yeah.
And I think that that is enough surrender, honestly.
I, I don't know if it needs to, yeah.
I've wanted to go further, and I've, I didn't have to go on a spiritual journey.
I could have just surrendered the bare minimum, but it was calling to you.
Well, I got curious once I started.
Yeah.
If I'm going to pray, well, I'm going to pray to something and then I want
to have a relationship with that.
But I don't think it was even as intellectual as all that.
I think you just started pulling on the thread and it just went somewhere.
I'm a lot happier for it, man.
You know, I might just throw some little lines at you, just do 30
seconds on a few different chunks.
Okay.
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what
peace there may be in silence.
Oh, and you can't deny this one.
I don't think there's anything controversial here.
I mean, some would say maybe don't go placidly, you know, into
that good night, but, you know.
But you can go placidly, it just, that, to me that just says stop being a cunt.
Yeah, or don't be, you know, yes, like rude and aggressive.
Yes.
And stop getting yourself worked up over things, you know, like
if it's not going to lead to something, then quit doing that.
And the piece there may be in silence, man.
I've, I've, I've avoided silence most of my life.
Till the last couple of years.
It's not a comfortable thing.
I mean, whoever's listening to this, you're avoiding silence.
Switch it off.
Have some silence.
Yes.
You know, and I, I, there is a trick that you're a hundred percent right, Joe.
And you know what?
If you're leaning on pods for mental health, nothing wrong with that, I do
it and have done it for a long time.
But I did, did I, I don't know if I told you this story, that I was walking to
the supermarket, so I told this story in therapy, and You know, my therapist was
very, I think he was very pleased with this, um, because I was pleased with it.
It was a genuine breakthrough.
So I'm walking to the supermarket, not far, and it's kind of a
cool, nice evening, and like, but I'm listening to something.
And then I kept rewinding it, because I kept missing stuff, and I just
had this sudden realisation like, I actually don't want to listen
to anything, there's nothing wrong with this show, I just actually
just want to hear my own thoughts.
And that was a shock.
It wasn't like, Oh, I want to tune into the sound of the breeze and the trees.
No, no, no.
I want to hear my own thoughts because God knows I've spent a lot of my life running
from my own thoughts, trying to block them out and trying to get some silence in my
head unsuccessfully for the most part.
And, before I, maybe before you can get to the silence inside, I think.
It might help to have some comfort and less fear with your own thoughts,
and just to recognize that they arise and go away, and they may
not Oh, they arise and go away!
Like that's, that's the number one thing I've learned in meditation.
You could do, you know, meditation could be simply, good meditation could be
simply summed up as, if I look out this shed door, it's like, my mind is the
vast blue sky, consciousness, awareness is this vast blue sky that's infinite,
and my thoughts are just little clouds.
Yes.
I think Ram Dass says, they come from who knows where, they go who knows where.
And they can seem so big.
Oh, they can man.
They block out the entire sky.
They block out the sun.
Yeah, yeah.
But they only, whatever you think they might think they are, they are just
little clouds passing through your vast, vast, vast, vast, vast, vast,
vast, vast, vast, vast, vast, Awareness.
It's just that you're probably really narrowed down in your focus to some
fucking problem and Yes, thoughts can artificially give you a more expansive
sense of your own And don't get me wrong, I don't walk around expansive,
I walk around narrowed down on No, you have to Problems, particularly financial
ones in the last couple of years.
So, that's why this space is nice too, because I get to expand a little bit.
Alright, I'll hit you with another one.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly.
Yeah, well, I've never been good at that.
Yeah, I've never been good at it.
I always spoke it fairly loudly and arrogantly.
Me too.
Especially once online came into my life 20 years ago.
Spoken it abrasively and pridefully and ostentatiously and, you know,
all the sins, Joe, all the sins.
And here, I've got something.
This is, this is, I just thought about this the other day.
I've kept this for about 30 years.
Okay, so, a friend of mine, Gundiva, I don't know, 21st birthday maybe, he drew
a picture of like this old samurai, right?
And you know, he's got a beard and grey hair and he's, he's stooped a little.
And it says, wise warrior on the back, I salute you, thank
for all your years of fine talk.
I now approach again.
For Pali.
With you, it's a most prized treasure.
Now, this actually took me back a little.
I was like, wait a minute.
I don't feel like a wise warrior.
I actually feel really mixed up and, uh, unwise and foolish, honestly.
Despite saying many fine, wise, and smart sounding things, I'm
actually Probably not that at all.
And I think all the times adults told me I was clever and wise,
I think that was a mistake.
And I think that I believed it too much.
But then he explained, he said, well, yeah, but there's
also another message here.
And I was like, uh huh, what is it?
He said, well, the wise warrior does not take out the weapons, ever really.
Unless it's absolutely necessary, but they'll find some other way.
And you don't need to walk around, you know, guns drawn, ready to
shoot people down at a moment's notice for having the wrong opinion.
And I'm like, Oh, okay.
Oh, I see what you're telling me.
I've thought about this.
Yeah.
I've been bullying people intellectually at times over the
years and you know, it's not okay.
Yeah.
I think we.
Yeah.
We've ended up, I've ended up, I couldn't read this until I was in my 40s.
Yeah.
I wasn't ready to speak my truth quietly and clearly.
No.
So, now I'm ready.
And the other statement that goes right next to it, and listen to others.
Yeah.
That's even more important, I would say.
Wow.
I learnt that in addiction recovery.
Yeah.
Because I had to sit in rooms with people I didn't know and just listen to them.
And some of them, this is the worst part, Sam, weren't even that cool or smart.
No.
Or interesting.
No.
But I still had to listen to them.
Even to the dull and the ignorant.
I had, and I learnt They too have their story.
I learnt to listen.
And I think I've brought that in here, otherwise I probably wouldn't
have been able to do a podcast with anyone the way I was because I was
just waiting for my turn to speak.
So I'm not absorbing information.
well that's a great thing about this hobby here of ours, that it is, like,
we've talked about it as therapy, we've talked about it maybe even as a spiritual
practice, and, uh, You know, there's some, there's some sort of theologians
and kind of justice type Christians I listen to on pods that talk about the
enormous importance of just the company of others in a spirit of equality and
listening and being with one another and how important that is and that they're
absolutely right and This pod has been a really great muscle building exercise
I'm getting better and better and better at catching myself listening to talk,
and I'm getting better and better at just listening within this context, and
whether I've applied that elsewhere.
Well, I'll tell you, so, about January the 6th, no, no, no, yesterday, the day
before, I wrote In my, you know, I got a new journal for Christmas and a set
of pencils from the kids and, uh, and I, just yesterday I wrote, Listening Journal.
The words just came to me and I thought, I would like to make a
habit of writing down things that I heard others say, as, as a way of
honouring things that others have said.
And, I could probably start most of all with feedback I get
from others and respect it and write it down and accept it.
I'm willing to hand it out.
If you don't listen, like, you can't learn.
Yeah, it's been, it's been a hard lesson, but uh, it's a skill that
I've built and I've got, yeah, I'm, I'm, and I'm kind of there now.
I kind of do it with work too and turns out other people are kind of
interesting, like even the ones who on face value aren't that interesting,
or aren't that pretty or whatever.
people have some wild stories, man.
Oh, they do.
Like, the most ordinary, unassuming looking person.
Yeah.
What?
Yeah.
They've done some shit.
You can dig out something crazy if you want to, and it can be amazing.
Taxi drivers, and like People at tram stops, and I've actually done a lot of it.
I've done a lot of listening to strangers.
I think I was less good at it with family and friends and, and partners.
I don't like someone who forces their story on me though.
If I don't like a taxi driver who starts telling me their story
and I don't want to hear it.
No, no.
I actually try to draw them out into areas where they wouldn't go normally.
Like, oh, oh, I've heard your bits.
I'll get a sense of what your material is.
Now let's talk to the real person.
You know?
Yeah.
You know, but like, and they, but I think that that quote.
So was there something you wanted to add to about the speak
your truth quietly and clearly?
No, I just want to, I just want to keep throwing them at you.
Well, I think it's a, I just want to say this.
I think if I did a whole lot more speaking my truth quietly and clearly and
concisely, it would be a very good thing.
So.
Yeah.
I mean, pretty hard in a marriage to speak your truth at times, Sam.
Well, yeah.
But when you do not easy to keep the peace well, yeah But that's a false solution
also because if something really does have to be said we have to be careful you have
to think Sort through your own thoughts and whether that's work or a friendship
or, you know, a business partnership or a romantic partnership or with your own
children, that you don't need to say everything that comes to mind, right?
And so that's the first thing.
And then, you know, it's like that impulse purchase you were gonna go for.
That's what I found myself doing in my 40s that I didn't do when I was younger.
Thinking stuff and then not saying it.
And not saying it to anyone.
Like, especially with my kids, I think, Yeah, I could give some advice here,
or I could, I don't, like, yeah, the other day we were down the beach, and my
eldest daughter got into a bikini, and I was like, that is a very small bikini.
Is it a fearful moment?
I just realised.
This old dad phrase popped into my head, which was like You're not
going to wear that dress like that.
No, it was like, so where's the rest of your bikini?
Ah, you forgot the rest.
And then I just had to be like, you know what?
You don't want to be that dad.
No.
So, she knows what she's doing, somewhat.
Yeah.
It's, it's fine.
What harm are you trying to prevent?
And what do I know about bikinis?
I've never worn one.
so, like, I find a lot of moments with a teenager of just, go to say something
and shut the fuck up, and just give them a hug, because that's more useful anyway.
Be available, be someone they can come to you, that's it.
But you still have those, I still have all these old dad
phrases going through my head.
I just, I just try to refrain from using them and then just say bro instead,
you know, bro, just say bro a lot.
Seems to be how they communicate.
Oh, I love it.
It's a good, it's a fun one.
And also, like, the stuff from the ancestors, you know, the inherited
phrases, I've got heaps heaps from my I don't even know where that came from.
It's in the cultural DNA, you know, and it expresses itself.
It is in the That one is, yeah.
You don't know it's there until the context appears, and then you find
yourself saying you'll catch your death of cold, and you're like,
what the, who, what just happened?
And I think it's really cool.
That you find yourself being your mother, find yourself being your father, I mean
it can be alarming and frightening and alienating as well, but it can also
be tremendously comforting because you know that they'll always be there inside
you for better or worse, and you know, and like, also, you know, I think about
this a lot as a teacher and as a, just a Joe citizen, that, you know, I think
every one of us has a duty to consider the things of the past, what is worth
keeping and what isn't, and not to see that through an ideological lens, but
just to ask really simple questions.
Is it useful?
Is it beautiful?
Yeah, and that's why I want to say conservative things about what
my female children are wearing.
I don't want to be that guy.
I think you're just going to make it more fun.
Anyway.
Yeah.
So just don't say anything and it's fine.
Yeah, and I think it can really be a wall with our children if we come at
them with too much advice and wisdom because it can make them hesitate to
bring things forward because they're going to get a lecture and Another older man.
around these addiction recovery circles that I do have to speak in coded
terms about to not Sure, I gotcha.
But he had teenage daughters and he said, you know what, I'll just try and give
them a good firm hug from time to time.
Yeah.
And the rest of it, I can't do much about You don't know what's going on in their
friendship dynamics or boyfriends or like, you don't know what's really going on.
Well, you need to hope, I think, and work towards maintaining an
availability and an approachability.
Like, I think you have to really check in with how comfortable are you with
bringing things to me if you need to?
And are there things you're not sure whether you need to bring to me?
Well, why don't you just do that anyway?
Tell me whether it's anything to worry about or not.
Yeah.
If parents present as too perfect or too invulnerable, if there's no chink in
the armour, if you seem like you've got your shit together too much, kids can
really hesitate to bring things forward.
There's plenty of chinks in my armour and they're very, I'll give you another one.
With a problem and you just pound them with advice and bury them
in an avalanche, that's no good.
They're going to hesitate.
Yeah.
And so like, I think that I've seen old timers just really deal with
situations really concisely, just some brief little pithy saying, and
it's like, that's all that was needed.
Yes.
You know, And one last thing that I have found, I've had some wonderful chats to
recovering addicts because they are good listeners and they, they are very good
at accepting people for who they are.
And that's like, that's one of the good things about it.
Yeah.
It gets onto the next thing.
Avoid loud and vexatious, loud and aggressive persons,
vexatious to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Yeah, I can largely avoid loud and aggressive persons unless
I watch the news, I guess.
Oh, 100%, yeah.
Stay away from the news.
Uh, but, yeah, comparing yourself to others, you know, I'm the
working poor at the moment.
And that might change one day, but for the moment, I make less money
than pretty much everyone I know.
in my peer group, who's got a job.
No one makes less money than me.
and a lot of the things I'm noticing they take for granted, I just can't do.
So Well, that's how I felt for all of my twenties and thirties.
Yeah, I didn't see, I was doing all right.
I was doing all right back then.
Um, I'm sort of having a late stage poverty.
So I might, if you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter.
I mean, you definitely will.
For there will always be.
Be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Yeah.
But again, I think I'm on pretty, I'm doing okay at this one.
Like I'm sort of like, I think the more harmful comparison is like the moral one.
Yeah, I'm a worse person.
I'm a better person.
Yeah, because I do good work.
Like I do, I connect with people with a mental illness sometimes,
at least a couple of times a week during my working week.
I have a good moment and that person says, I'm really glad you came to see me today.
It really helped me.
And they're, and, and, and to be honest, those are the people I work with, uh,
having a harder time in life than I am.
Of course.
So, they're just not my peers, they're just not the people I went to uni with,
or high school with, or hung out with.
But consequently, you could come across someone with similar
demographics in that sense, yeah.
It's the old cliche of compare, despair, just don't compare.
No, don't compare looks, don't compare moral worth, don't compare apparent
success, but a left wing person, uh, must take issue, uh, and you've given
me permission here to bring this up.
I think we ought to.
So, to compare income, despite the fact that it is gross, it is an uncomfortable
topic, and I've avoided thinking and talking about money over the years.
I like it when people are willing to talk about money, because most people aren't.
Yes.
I've spoken to people my age about how they Well, unless they're bragging.
I don't like that either.
No, no, no.
Just a proper honest chat.
This was more like, hey, I know people don't normally talk
about money, but I don't care.
I'll talk about it.
So this is why I own a property in Brunswick.
Well, my dad died.
And I got this chunk of money, and I've worked in the same government
job for 20 years, and guess what?
I own a fucking house in Brunswick, and it's like, yeah,
it was really refreshing, man.
It is, it is.
I'd rather have that conversation to be like, and you know, and then
I can say, well, I sold a house, and yeah, had a breakup, and never really,
never should have, never recovered, shoulda, coulda, woulda done something
else with that money, and it didn't, yeah, and now I'm broke, Or people
saying, you know, I've earned this much average for the last 10 years.
I'll put this much away every month.
And I used this kind of investment vehicle.
Like, I think those are useful conversations.
Oh, and here's some expenses I cut out that I don't miss,
you know, that's all useful.
And I think the most useful stuff to talk about with money is Is the feelings
and, like, beliefs, the kind of magical and cursed beliefs that people have
about it, the, and I think money, sort of like, like sex and other people,
it's a field onto which we project all kinds of stuff, and it's, the way, the
way we think and feel about money is actually very, very complicated and, uh,
a lot of the time needs, Therapising.
It needs to be examined and straightened out.
Look, I've been completely distracted by the thought that it's
a complete illusion based on nothing.
Well, it's a powerful illusion that has leverage in the world.
I think your man, Yo, whatever his name is, Noah Harari, says
it's like a universal language.
It is.
It's more of a language than any other language.
It makes all things translatable and commensurate.
Yeah, so, I've always been, I was like, but if we all just realise,
when it, Even when it was based on gold, it was pretty odd, because
it was based on some shiny rocks.
Well, the conservatives who dream of the gold standard, yeah.
But it was based on something.
Yeah, sure.
Some, some shiny rocks in a building somewhere.
Yeah, yeah.
Now it's based on nothing.
All it takes is for everyone to wake up from the illusion.
Well, there was still speculative bubbles back in the gold days, I
mean, I think I, I think what Yeah.
What makes me realise money is more solid than I think it is, is
to realise that there was money before there was capitalism.
100%.
There was money back in ancient Sumer.
Yes.
And then I've got to get into my head, Joe.
Money?
It's not going away.
It might be based on nothing.
It might be a fiction of the Imagine the collective imagination.
Yeah.
But it is going to dominate your life from now until you die.
Bertol Brecht, the worst kind of illiterate is the political illiterate
who says, I'm not interested in politics, but does not realize
that politics is interested in him.
Yeah.
Whether he wants, yeah.
Money's interested in me, whether I, and that's.
And I'm learning, Sam.
I'm 44 and I'm learning how to watch every dollar for the first time in my
life, because there is no escape anymore.
How many people never think about the idea?
That, oh, I need more money.
Earn more.
Okay.
Also, you might be able to find some savings somewhere.
Like, and it's not a dirty thing to suggest.
Now, having said that.
Yeah, but I've paired all of that.
Anyway.
You've done all that.
Yeah.
I'm on the other side of that.
But what I'll say about this, I think there's an area where we ought to
compare ourselves with others and that, that there's a moral duty to do it,
I would say, which is when we might realize we're in a position to help.
Or that, we're in a position to, to change, we sure ought to
change something we're doing.
But the most important example, don't get mad, class consciousness, and
figuring out who you really have what in common with, and not what you imagine
you have in common with, you know.
See, this poem is about self sufficiency, whereas I was raised
on class consciousness, and class consciousness isn't helping pay
my rent, self sufficiency is going to help me get through.
a sort of a philosophical acceptance is going to help me get through these
tough times much better than imagining the overthrow of capitalism will.
Oh no, I think we can stop short of the overthrow of capitalism and just go with,
for example, every single renter and every single person in this, in anywhere in the
world who has, you know, let's say less than 50 percent equity in their mortgage.
I mean, you're all renters, basically.
So, once you're in that situation, whether it's a mortgage or not, it's
an illusion of ownership ultimately.
It's not actually yours if the payments stop.
It will not be yours for very long if your payments stop.
You are a renter.
And I think that the people with huge mortgages and the people
renting need to realize they have much more in common than they think.
or even just starting with the renters, the amount that can be achieved As
a rugged individual, not very much.
The amount that can be achieved working with other renters in an
advocacy and, you know, union type of situation is vastly greater.
But no one ever cooperated with anyone else until they
recognised common cause first.
Whether that's a bushfire or a flood or the kind of organic solidarity
that comes out of those moments, or a moment of hunger or famine or whatever,
uh, where, you know, Awful, uh, things can happen, but also wonderful
cooperative things can happen, and until you recognize what you have in
common with others, you can't do that.
So, I hope that this poem is not saying, ignore what you've
got in common with others.
I think it's more referring to comparing looks or moral value or,
you know, oh, well your children are better behaved than mine, or, uh.
Hmm.
Your partner's better looking than mine or your boat is bigger than mine.
I think that's pointless.
For me, it's a, it's a simple wisdom replacing a more complex ideological
framework that I was raised with.
And I'm not saying it's right for anyone else, but for me, it helps.
All right, I want to, I want to hit you with another one and then
we can probably start winding up.
take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully
surrendering the things of youth.
I knew you'd bring this one up, and you're right to bring it up.
What things have you let go of, as just, you know, that's in your youth?
Ah, I, I actually reckon I'm turning 45 in a couple of weeks.
I'm, I'm doing pretty good on this front.
Yep.
you're a pretty good Marie Kondo er.
I started wearing bright tracksuits as I got older.
But that's embracing, if you look at 70 year old Italian guys down in Brighton.
They've been doing it for years.
So that's heading towards where I want to be as an older gent.
Yeah.
Is in a bright tracksuit.
So that's, I don't think that's mutton dressed as lamb, quite the opposite.
but everything else, it's like, I've got a boring dad car, I live a boring
dad life, really I'm just trying to get through the day to get a nice early
night in bed, and then I wake up much earlier than I kind of want to, but
I just have to make the most of it.
you know, I, I, I've kind of 100 percent given up on ever being super
fit and, Buff and anything like that.
I'm kind of just accepted that my body is my body and it's not a great one.
It's not a terrible one.
It's just an average one and sure.
I've only ever gotten anywhere with ladies by talking a lot
anyway, so, you know, who cares?
Like, it's so much acceptance, whereas I could be like, all right, now's
the time I get fit or now's the time I blah, blah, and it's like, no, I
just want to have a good sit down.
I don't think you need to do any half marathons or anything.
I don't want to, but like lycra, get on the bike, but I do think I would like
to maintain Like my somewhat limited strength, into aging because it helps
reduce falls and things like that.
Yeah, but what are the things of youth that you've surrendered?
A bit of weights would be, you know, a very good idea.
Oh, I've let go of all kinds of things.
I mean Being famous?
Yeah.
Partying, Well, see, I've let go of all drugs and alcohol.
Yeah.
And that's the one, you know, then people have their trashy fiftieths.
Yeah, and it's like the last Iraq, can we take another acid trip,
can we do another bag of cocaine?
Do you know what a lot of people do instead?
Let's just take a trip to somewhere nice with a mate.
But they do, there are those trashy 50s, where you're kind
of like, well, let it go, guys.
I think it's a great idea to have a dance on any occasion, including the
50s, but you don't need to get on the bags, you just, you just don't.
I don't know, they're coming, that's, that's, that's coming at
us in five years is all the 50s.
I'm trying to remember the last time I had chemicals other than the
ones the bloody doctor gives me.
Oh really?
Ah.
So you haven't ruled it out like me, so you could.
But I.
I could, but I honestly, whenever I think about it, I just go,
you think about the next day?
No.
I think, yes.
So that was the intermediate step, right?
Counting ahead three days from that and going, that'll be a Tuesday.
No.
Yeah.
yeah.
Westgate Wednesdays.
I mean, are we talking, I've got a week off here.
When's that happening?
Yeah.
No.
But, but then I got one step further than that, which was, Oh,
she don't really feel this burning desire to like get off my head.
I just don't.
I did see a good gag about now I'm in my 40s, 5pm preparing
to wake up the next morning.
Yes.
I can't be doing anything in the evening.
The night before.
Don't touch that coffee after 3 o'clock, like, you know.
I just gotta get this right.
Keep those screens out your eyes.
It's like, I gotta, I gotta wake it up to do tomorrow, you know.
Man, it's so true.
So, how can you live your best life in the spirit of this poem?
That's what I've let go of, Sam.
Yeah.
I want to talk about this.
Yeah, go on.
Hedonism.
Yeah.
I've been thinking, I've been trying to get this thought, it's been coming
to me in the middle of the night and I didn't know who to talk to about
it, but I can talk to you about it.
Bring it here.
Hedonism.
There's nothing wrong with it.
It's one way of life.
It's a way of life.
And for a lot of people, it works for them.
And that's fine.
And I don't have a problem with it.
But we're all hedonists to some degree.
But that's what I've let go of to surrender in my older age
is I've let go of hedonism.
Oh, as a pursuit.
But I don't want to be seen as someone who's anti hedonism.
That's right, the usual solution.
What's the ancient Greeks?
Who were the ones?
The Epicureans?
Well, there was the Epicureans, the Stoics, and the Hedonists.
And the Hedonists were the Epicureans, right?
It's all related.
I can't remember.
No, there was someone else.
Well, the Hedonists, the Epicureans, and the No, he just made up.
There was no ancient Greeks called the Hedonists.
no, but it was a, no, but it was a term to, now you're right, you might
be right, but I actually listened to a bunch of EPs about this recently.
We need the third person here who looks stuff up for us.
Okay.
Anyway, it doesn't matter.
Hedonism's been around a long time.
Yes.
Like, it is a way of life, it was, it was, for all the socialism of
my upbringing, what I was really brought up with was hedonism.
Okay, well so the hedonic principle, I remembered this now, so if you, so you've
heard of hedonic resets and all that, so just to explain, so hedonism is the
pursuit of pleasure, and I've had really good and bad role models in this, right?
And uh, so for me at different times it was drugs, video games,
uh, you know, coffee, Sex and music and you know, stuff like that.
Right.
but I've had really great models who were able to show me.
No, no, it's just as hedonistic to have a great night's sleep and
get up early and go for a walk or a run or dive into a cold ocean.
That's hedonic.
It's going to give you a tremendous pleasure, way more profound, than boozing
on, and meditation could even be deeply pleasurable, and reading a book quietly
in a corner can be a remarkable pleasure.
But it's not what I'm talking about.
No, but You know what I'm talking about.
This is what I'm steering you towards.
That the Epicureans, I had the wrong idea about them, and I listened to
a pod about the, oh, the Cynics.
No, it's not the Cynics.
The Epicureans and the Stoics.
Oh, it's someone else.
So they're all basically discussing they're all approaching the problem
of existence, and the problem of pain, and the problem of joy.
They're all just approaching it from different philosophical schools.
And so the Epicureans are like, you know, embrace life, embrace
its pleasures, and so forth.
Yeah, drink lots of wine.
That's right.
But then they go into serious inquiry and they're like, what will actually
maximize pleasure in the long run?
And it's things, it's all the stuff we're learning about now.
Don't overload on dopamine early in the day.
Don't blow out your dopamine receptors.
They weren't using that language, but what they were saying was
eat plain food sometimes and then you'll enjoy the fancy stuff.
Lay off on the drink.
Have a good night's sleep.
Do the hard work now.
Instead of feeling guilty about avoiding it, that's actually going to give
you more pleasure in the long run.
And so there's a whole school of philosophy that says maximizing pleasure
in life is actually no bad thing.
It can lead to better moral decisions, not worse ones.
You're the same age as me.
Do you feel the need to have a couple of hedonistic blowouts a year still?
You don't mind getting on the beer and the cigs and Oh, it's
an, yeah, no, no, it does happen.
But see it never happens for me.
Yeah, like that that just never happens.
No, not at all But so right and I'm still but you love a walk on the
beach, you know, I would say that's yeah But see that's it's not hedonism.
That's just like healthy Agreed.
Yeah.
But what I'm pointing you to is that it's a, there's a bigger concept, which
is the obvious pleasures give way to the less obvious ones and that that's
actually, that's in the philosophy itself.
I like that.
All right.
I think that's helped me with the thing that keeps coming to me.
All right.
What's the thing that you've woken up thinking about?
I'm done.
I'm done with hedonism.
I want to say something about hedonism, which is, it's a way of life.
Not the only one.
It's not the only one.
Yeah.
Now I'm gonna stop being Epicurean if that is right.
Yeah.
I'm gonna start being a Stoic.
Yeah, or a cynic and you know, Diogenes, living in a battle.
And that's what I'm gonna do.
Yeah, but if everyone, everyone else in the world wants to keep
doing hedonism That's okay, too.
But what I've actually noticed is Yeah, leave the normies alone, Joe.
In the nine years since I completely stopped drinking, what I've
noticed is people my age massively moderating Most of them are.
their booze and drugs.
Yeah, and the ones that aren't Like, occasionally going to music
festivals and taking all the drugs.
Yeah.
and drinking in moderation.
The biggest pissheads I know have really laid off for the most part.
Yeah.
So I don't know if I would have just moderated without being so extreme,
but once I started on the spiritual journey, and the price of entry
was not drinking, then I wanted to keep going on the spiritual.
So without the spiritual journey.
I might just be a moderate drinker now, but it would completely undermine my sense
of self at this point to not be sober.
Oh, no, no.
I agree with you completely.
So, it's fascinating, isn't it?
Like, I think there's far more to be gained by just going all in.
Yeah.
It's given me a way of life.
Yeah.
And honestly, like, I've had some friends my age or a little bit younger who've been
to Meredith or Golden Plains recently and then gone to work on Monday or Tuesday.
No judgment.
I had to, I bit my tongue because what's the point in offering my,
I, I did feel a level of judgment, but then I was like, well, if you
can make it work, that's fine.
But I just am not interested.
Yeah.
I'm just not interested.
I don't want to.
All right.
Last one, Sam, and then we'll wrap it up.
It astonished me.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.
Yep.
See, I have no problem agreeing with that.
And maybe that's the other part of, of the universe is unfolding as it should.
Whether it is or it isn't, it is incredibly beautiful world.
with the struggles of my life now being the working poor.
Yeah I'm a rich man when I'm hanging out with my daughters like I'm the
richest man on earth So that's the beautiful world for me is right there
when I'm having a swim like it was the last few days Michelle de Montaigne
would be nodding along to all of this.
Who's that?
Oh de Montaigne.
You know the French guy with all these essays Yeah, the essay guy.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He'd be into all this.
Yeah, so Uh, it is still a beautiful world.
Strive to be happy.
People don't say that enough.
No.
You know, people just grind out their lives and Do you
know who you hear it from?
Try and survive and try and get ahead a little bit financially and Do you know
who you, you know who you hear this from?
People who've done a lot of therapy, people who've had addictions, people
who've had horrible experiences in their childhood, people who've
survived, crimes and abuse against them.
These are the people you'll hear from saying, strive to be happy.
And sometimes it comes from these kind of twisted teeth, like, I'm
not going to let my abuser win.
I'm going to be happy.
And I'm like, good for you.
And if that's going to get you to that place sooner, then do that.
And I've also heard from people who've transitioned from the term uh, victim
to the term survivor, and then there's others who transition from that
term to something else of like, it doesn't even define me at all anymore.
And guess what?
All of those people are right.
And at every stage along the journey, all the people that, you know,
identified as a party animal and then identified as sober, it's, Take your
happiness seriously for God's sake.
I believe this very importantly.
The big thing that that the real realization that had to happen, not
just the guy out looking at the guy outside the TAB and going that's me,
the rock bottom thing, there's the other bit which is I want to get better.
I want to feel better.
I deserve to feel better.
It also says be cheerful and I would say for all your faults Sam, which are many.
Yeah, huge.
You are very cheerful.
You've always been cheerful in the 25 years I've known you.
I guess I'm always happy to see you, so there you go.
Shall we wrap it up?
Well actually, can I make a pitch for wheeling out one more of them?
Okay.
And I'll say just one more thing about Strive to Be Happy, which is, okay, so I
was in a, Panic, I'd, uh, gotten delayed at work and, uh, you know, my wife and son
were having dinner at, we're having early dinner at, you know, Vietnamese place.
And I got there all in my panic, just left work energy and, oh God, I'm so sorry I'm
laid off, missed out, blah, blah, blah.
And my son's just happily eating spring rolls, I haven't
actually missed that much yet.
And, the mother of my child looks at me and says, Oh, be joyful.
And I was like, Oh my God, it just stopped me in my tracks.
And like, I have thought about that so many times.
I was like, it's a choice I can make right now.
And it's like, I'm not going to instantly get there, but
you've got to make the start.
And it's like, Oh, hang on.
I used, I used to get people down a lot, Joe, and I feel a lot of, I feel
a lot of regret about that, of being the party pooper and like, oh look, if
people didn't have a, a grain of salt with the shit that I was saying yeah.
A few years ago, like no one would want to hang out with me.
Oh no.
You could be a, for sure.
A real catastrophes.
A real, yeah, yeah.
Cynic for sure.
So how I was with still a red bowl of red wine next to me was just morose, morose.
Michael, stop.
Everybody hates a sad professor.
And like, it's, it's not like the world's getting better.
It's getting worse, of course, but like, I, I just don't view it in the same way
anymore without the alcohol in my system.
I'm just kind of like, I've got to make the best of what I can.
A hundred percent.
I've got a duty.
As I see it.
You know, before I came here today, I went to a mechanic and
it cost me, I don't know, twice as much as what I thought it would.
Yeah.
And it cleaned out my savings.
It's a huge bummer.
And yeah, I, I can't say I was cheerful in that moment, but it didn't take much, man.
It only took a text from you saying, yeah.
Do you want to come and record?
And I was like, I'm going to get myself together.
Glad I could help.
And, and now I'll probably feel great for the rest of the day because
I've had a good chat with you.
So, I can be cheerful.
I can strive to be happy.
and, It is a beautiful world.
I'll leave it with that.
Oh, 100%.
Like, when I think about the fact that I'm not being bombed or shot at,
I'm not about to get evicted, who the fuck am I to be a miserable prick?
Yeah, but that logic only goes so far, Sam.
Well, no, well, no, that's You could be sitting in a mansion shooting up heroin
right now and kinda, like Well, again, that person Everyone has options and needs
to start thinking about what they are.
And I'm not, I'm not saying we all bootstrap ourselves as a
singular effort, but the whole point of strive to be cheerful or
be cheerful, strive to be happy.
I think that's what really pushed me over the line with that one was seeing it as
a duty to others as well as the self.
Well, the other alternative is what's that line about men living
lives of quiet desperation?
The English in general.
Yeah.
So.
I don't want to live a life of quiet desperation.
I'll live in a land of plenty.
after this I'll drive to the other side of town and I'll have a swim
at the beach and that's free.
Totally.
And the thing that I would have struggled with, with that was, oh, but
there's still injustice in the world.
And it's like, well, you're going to wait till all of that's gone?
To be happy.
That's how I was when I was morose.
I was like, but what about that?
Whatever it was at the time.
What about, or my girlfriend Hannah, she would do this one.
She'd be like, I'd be like doing bummer, bummer Sam.
And she'd be like.
Here's my little parade.
I was having a little parade, and this is the rain, and it's coming from you,
and I'm like, aw, aw, Jesus, sorry dude, pissing on your parade, that's no
good, let people have their parade, man.
Nah, you're a cheerful guy.
Oh, well, I think, well, I've, I've strived to be happy, Joe,
I've worked at it, dammit.
So, well, and then, speaking of which, that brings me to this other
one, which, there are so many ones.
Love is as perennial as the grass, all of that, that's all great stuff.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars.
That's a really wholesome thought and I like it.
Seeing ourselves as part of the ecosystem, not above it.
But that bit about for the world is full of trickery and that's the part I would
concentrate on for a long time, right?
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is.
Many persons strive for high ideals.
It's true.
I can't argue.
Oh, I see them all the time.
Yeah.
And everywhere, life is full of heroism.
It is so true.
Working in mental health, as opposed to the film industry, well, I gotta
say, there's almost zero heroism.
Yeah.
But in mental health, all these people are kind of heroic.
The heroic thing sometimes is to get the shower done.
They are getting paid, but they actually care, and they're I
see Heroism a lot in that field.
Some of my, some of my kids who were up against it to even just get to school.
Like, that's heroism.
Like, then holding their head up.
I agree with that, man.
And that's why I'm ironically much less cynical at 44 than I was at 29.
Much less cynical.
It's true, the young man has this sort of shallow cynicism.
Yeah, yeah.
It's, it's, there's no texture or nuance to it.
It's this But I'd be cynical not just about the world, but
about everything I did too.
Of course.
Yes, all of my efforts are worthless and dull and pointless, like, God.
Like, I remember we had, had this really upbeat friend and there was a film, 24
hour film festival competition coming up, you had to make a film in a weekend.
Oh, I remember those.
And I was planning to stay home, I remember it, and like, Drink
whiskey and take painkillers.
Mmm, great plan.
But I was in my 20s so I thought that was just cool.
Unproblematic.
Yeah, I didn't think it was problematic.
And she convinced me to go and do this thing.
Anyway, we made this film and I wrote the whole thing and, and we won the
competition and next thing I'm up on the stage getting an award and, and all I
needed was one person who wasn't cynical in my life and I only had probably one.
Because you've driven out most of the casual cheerful people, yeah, and it did
this amazing thing that so if I want to, I can access stuff that turns into something
in the world, or I can just stay in my self pity and drink myself to oblivion.
I know that exact choice.
We have those choices.
I'm not saying it's an easy one to make, in fact, it's exquisitely
and painfully difficult to make.
There's a lot of pleasure in, yeah.
But when you get it right, it's amazing.
I've had minor moments of, you know, rising above my own bullshit, which
felt, you know, like heroism at the time.
and then the more you do it, the more ordinary it becomes.
Yeah.
So I'm incredibly grateful to people who hauled me out of my shit in a similar way.
And, hey, I guess if we can manage To just do a little bit of that for someone else.
Yeah, that's cool.
That's something to aim for.
I like that, Sam.
Maybe we can do it for each other.
Well, I'm glad I got in touch to say there's a, you
know, a window has opened up.
Yeah, yeah.
Let's hope the recording worked.
Ha ha ha.
Anyway, we're going to save the thing?
Yes.
That's been another one of the 10, 000 things.
See you, mate.