0:00 - Welcome to the Show
21:28 - Truth and Clarity in Relationships
22:46 - Technology Woes and Life Lessons
27:39 - Exploring Nostalgia and Emotional Readiness
33:35 - Taking Responsibility in Relationships
37:49 - Parenting Approaches and Emotional Intelligence
49:09 - The Importance of Names and Quality
50:20 - Celebrating Life and Connection
59:26 - Transition to Supporter-Only Content
This episode dives into a variety of candid and humorous discussions, reflecting my current state—fairly hot shirtless with a lot on my mind. I share my sentiments about various life situations that listeners experience, kicking off with an interaction from a listener who faced a physical altercation with his brother. In parsing through this tough moment, I highlight the importance of clarity and confronting uncomfortable truths that ultimately lead to growth. I draw comparisons about truth's impact on our lives, whether it be sudden realizations or the slow burn of passive aggression, underlining the idea that clarity, although painful, is a necessity in moving forward.
As we navigate through listener questions and topics ranging from fitness and nutrition to philosophical musings, I touch on personal anecdotes—including my time with technology and encountering obstacles like malfunctioning printers. Despite veering off into light-hearted ramblings about pizza being a salad and the practicality of wearing shirts while enjoying food, my core aim remains grounded in promoting self-awareness and understanding of human relationships. This correlates well with reflections on gentle parenting, where I express skepticism over the vagueness of definitions and encourage examples that truly capture the essence of this style.
Nostalgia threads through our conversations as a powerful theme, which I suggest is often rooted in missed opportunities. I discuss how memories from our past affect our present emotional state and relationships, leading to contemplation about our longings and regrets. By drawing on personal experiences, I emphasize the necessity to learn from the past to enrich our current lives—encouraging the audience to actively engage with their feelings and decisions.
Delving deeper, I explore the notions of personal responsibility post-breakup. I assert that the readiness to enter new relationships relies heavily on our ability to acknowledge our own choices rather than placing blame on previous partners. Using the metaphor of inviting someone to a celebration of life, I emphasize the importance of genuine self-contentment before seeking the company of another, fostering a mindset where one’s own happiness is at the forefront.
Closing the episode, we pivot to practical advice on navigating interpersonal relationships, emotional readiness, and why ultimately embracing responsibility for our lives is crucial for our growth. Each segment intertwines humor and philosophy, with a keen focus on authenticity, making for both an entertaining and thought-provoking experience.
[0:00] Good morning, everybody. 25th of August, 2024. Hope you're doing well. I am hot. Yes, you have wandered into the corner of the internet known as the Stef-only fans. So yes, we are shirtless. I haven't even worked out today, but I just did a show outside answering questions. I'm sweating like, I don't know, Albert Brooks in that movie. So hope you're doing well. I'm sure I will get my shirt on at some point, but it's a reality, man. I'm just, I'm hot. I'm so hot in my shorts, you could cook things in them. There you go. All right. Let me get to your questions, comments, issues, challenges. Challenges if you know me i don't like just the tip so but if there is a tip to be had you can tip on the app and all kinds of wonderful stuff can be happening thank you so much i can think clearly now the rain has gone thank you think clearly i appreciate that let's get this uh this show never fails to teach me something new about the world that's right philosophers have nipples yet we We can breastfeed the planet on our sludgy wisdom. Thank you, Stef. You were a gift. Thank you for sharing your talents with the world. Hopefully I can jump on with everyone at 11. Well, thank you. I appreciate that. That's very, very kind.
[1:27] All right. Hidden Drangon says, had an awful night last night. I got into a physical fight with my brother. On the bright side, I now have the motivation to move out and grow up. I've been enjoying a comfortable life for too long. And now that I have come to pay the price, it really was not worth it. Yeah. You know, it's really sad. 50% of sibling relationships are abusive, considered abusive, even by mainstream standards, right? So like 50%. So yeah, it's terrible. So his closest brothers, this is a line from one of my novels. Yeah, his closest brothers seem to be until memories of early treachery arise.
[2:05] So I'm sorry to hear that. But it is absolutely worth it to get la clarity. La clarity is all you need. And this is all I ever drive for to people. Just get to the truth. That's all we want. Just get through to the truth. Get through to the truth. And now, your brother has revealed to you the truth. And that is what you want to have. The truth can hurt, but you know what? It's a direct hurt that, you know this thing about, it's not, it's a myth, but it's a good analogy, like, if you throw a pot, if you throw a frog into a pot of hot water, it'll jump back out, but if you put a pot into lukewarm water and slowly raise the temperature, it just sticks there. So that's the problem. I want you to have the vivid experience of the sudden unleashing of mammoth, ballsy truth. That's what I want for you, because that's where clarity comes from. If there's just a little passive aggression and digs and maybe and jokes at your expense and all that girly estrogen drowning nonsense, a quicksand of femininity.
[3:13] Well, that's not good. But if you get into a physical fight or you yell at each other or call each other names, it's like revealed. You know, they say the mask is off. The mask is off. Revealed. Oh, what a glorious thing that is. It hurts, but it hurts a lot less to have that kind of sudden sunburst of ice water clarity, to mix my metaphors, than it does to have the drip drip of, oh, it's kind of comfortable and nobody's really pushing me on to do anything and blah, blah, blah, right?
[3:43] Looking like the reflection of perfection, Mr. Molyneux. Why, thank you. I do appreciate that. A hat and glasses. That's right. Impressive trapezius, to be honest. Ugh! All right. Thank you. All right. Impressive neck muscles. Yes. Well, I have to have the giant neck muscles to hold up the galaxy brain. Just having this head, which is a giant head. Every time I go to a place and they have to measure my head for a hat, it's not that common, but it does happen. They're like, whoa, check this out. Maybe I have that. Ivan Turgenev, a famous Russian writer, had the largest brain weight on record after he died. He died in a horrible fashion from a spinal tumor or something, a month of agony and all of that. But after he was exhumed and dissected, or just dissected, he had the largest brain mass. And I always wonder what's going to happen when they carve open my brain at the end of all of this and find not the illusory evil, but the giant language center. I mean, it's just going to, I would love to see it. But for reasons that are fairly obvious, I probably wouldn't. All right.
[5:01] Let's see here. What do we got? I would love your opinion on juicing with those guns. Ah, the juice question.
[5:12] So, I don't, obviously, what do I take? I take a little bit of creatine, and I take some protein. That's about it. And honestly, I am not a big muscle guy. I mean, you know, I've got some okay, this and that and the other. I'm not some, I can't get the post-it note off my back kind of muscle guy. So, I would not say that. All right, I suppose seeing Stef shirtless is a small price to pay for a small window of bothering him with banal politics questions. Well, you know, if the muscles are too maximus, you can always just minimus the screen.
[5:47] Shirtless Stef is a bonus, bro. Big question, is pizza salad? Is it bread, veggies, and meat, just like a Caesar salad? And should you wear a shirt while eating one? Is pizza salad? I do not think so because it has too much fat. Now, a Caesar salad is Caesar's revenge. So what happened was that Caesar was betrayed and stabbed, and so he came back to life thousands of years later in a chef's brain and created a salad that is murderous. A Caesar salad will kill you in your fucking sleep. A Caesar salad will creep up behind you and you'll say, Et tu, brute? as it stabs you. With its fat and bacon and gooey activation of the Widowmaker evil. So, yes, a Caesar salad is not a salad. It is something that will slay you like Brutus. All right. I thought those guns were banned in Canada. Well, they can't detach these as yet.
[6:48] All right, let's get to your questions, comments. Oh, it's actually kind of nice in here. Here i had um uh the the studio that was built here a friend of mine's uh wife built it uh and it actually taught me quite a lot because she was like really into handy stuff and she came and built me the studio and then she couldn't do anything physical for a year because it was very tough on her hands i felt really bad about that but um she put in a a fan like ventilation right because i keep the door closed but the ventilation my last mic was so sensitive it picked up the ventilation and as you know i am absolutely anal about sound quality absolutely anal about sound quality and uh.
[7:31] Now, I'm using the fan again because I can easily, like we've got AI for the sound cleanup, so it takes it out. But it's nice having a little bit of a breeze why I can't use the color back there anymore. Although that light used to go brighter and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to make it go brighter again. I hit something, you know, when you hit something in tech and it just kind of goes dark. It's like, you know, if you have a wireless printer, it is a simple fact that you simply must uninstall and reinstall it every single time you want to fucking print. I don't know why that is. I've even gone into the Wi-Fi router and made sure that the printer gets the same IP address no matter what. It will get the same IP address in the next iteration of the physical universe. It is that bolted in. And it's not even wireless. I've actually moved it to the router and connected it with an Ethernet cable directly to the router. But no. What I can get it to do, I've got a remote control little light switch, because what I can do is when I print something, as I was doing this morning, When I print something, what happens is the little control window lights up. You know, that little window that says, I'm not going to print for you.
[8:42] So I've got this tiny little flashlight that points to nowhere. And I'm like, you know, this was a fairly expensive printer. Is there any chance I could get you to do more than just light up your LED thing? And there's no message. It's not like, nope, X, Y, and Z is wrong. It's like, print, light up, nothing. Thing and now when i double print on the when i double click on the print queue it opens windows explorer sure dora the explorer that's what i want i don't want to see what's uh queuing or jamming up the printer i don't want to see what's giving constipation to the printer as is always the case i just want to feed it some indian food have it blurp go into orbit and get it over with but no and every now and then i'm like i should just print light up can i get more than light wait, can I actually get a printer? No. But if you uninstall and reinstall, there's a 50-50 chance that you might actually get to print something. Amazing.
[9:38] Amazing. All right. Should you wear a shirt while eating pizza? Well, I would say if you're on a date, absolutely not. Because what you want is for the pizza oil to slowly drip down your manly chest. That's what you want, my friends. You do not want it staining your clothing, because when a woman sees a man on a date who stains his clothing, she sees a lifetime, in fact several lifetimes, of incipient laundry forever and ever. Amen.
[10:12] Alright, do you think gentle parenting is controlled opposition to peaceful parenting to discredit it by similarity slash association, or is it simply the inevitable result of radical subjectivity in psychological circles? Uh, yeah, I mean, give me a summary. You can use AI, I don't care. Give me a summary of gentle parenting. So. I, uh, I want to make sure I'm not strawmanning. All right, so let me get to, thank you for the tip I give in return, a nipple tip, so I appreciate that. I got a nice apology email from the guy who I was calling out for his typos a week or two ago, and that was very nice. And honestly, I can't tell you how much I respect the people who apologize. I really, I, it is something that makes someone so trustworthy to me, I can't even explain the depth of my respect for people who apologize.
[11:21] See, apologizing is really, really great. Apologizing is great. It says that you have standards above vanity. It says that you have empathy for your facts on the behavior of another person. It says that you take self-ownership. You take responsibility. You're willing to be corrected. you're willing to change course, and you're willing to admit fault. Do you know how beautiful that is in a human being? That is absolutely beautiful. Apologizing to people in your life is fantastic. I've never regretted apologizing to anyone.
[11:54] Because if people take your apology and use it to wield power over you, you can tell them to fuck off. I mean, not literally necessarily. You can tell them to take a long walk off a short pier, to take a Boeing spaceship into orbit, which apparently just leaves you there forever. But I've never regretted apologizing anyone. Why would I? Because if people accept your apology and that gives them permission to apologize, then you have a correcting mechanism in the relationship. It's all good and beautiful and lovely and nice. If they're like, well, I appreciate your apology. And then they lord it over you and bring it up again in the future and never apologize for anything they've done it's like clarity I was talking about the truth clarity all that kind of stuff all right let's get to your question hey Stef I'm having trouble with an action I want to take I want to sell a car of mine and use the money for investments with the goal of benefiting a family I may have in the future I feel an emotional attachment to the vehicle I don't understand.
[12:59] Is this a weird type of fetish like you have described with animals? Thanks. Yeah, I don't quite get the car thing. Now, I get that cars are sexy. My first car was a 98 Volvo S70, red and beautiful and all of that. I'm like, give me the closest color you have to a nipple. Well, we have that right here, sir. It's called Sex Nipple 101. So, I liked that car. I drove it literally into the ground. I remember coming up towards the end with a mental list of everything that was wrong with the car, and it went on to like 15 different items. And I got pity money when I had it. I finally drove it in, and it was like, and it died in the parking lot. And I got pity money. They're like, oh, you've been driving that? Okay, we'll give you some money. I mean, it really was charity. It really was. What is it? $5 trillion has gone to Africa. It's the equivalent of what? 500 Marshall plans. $5 trillion has gone to Africa. We could have.
[14:10] Interstellar travel by now, but no. So I don't quite get the car thing. I do get, like when I I was dating I'd make sure that the car was clean before I'd go and pick up a girl and so on but, the car was sort of a minor lesson as well because I'm cheap so I didn't get the CD option I got just the tape option which turned out to be fantastic because I had a little portable player and I could use there was a we I don't know how it worked I have no idea how it worked but there was something you could get you put it in the tape deck there's a cord that comes out with a three and a half inch three and a half millimeter attachment you could plug it in somewhere so you feel an emotional attachment to the vehicle right and i had a question about nostalgia.
[14:59] And in my view, as he feels the wave of nostalgia creep up from his balls, in my view, nostalgia is about missed opportunities.
[15:15] Nostalgia is about missed opportunities. So sometimes when I look at my teenage years, I missed some opportunities to be happier than I was. I did. I mean, I missed some opportunities. I worried too much. I was too, now I had a tough teenage years, but you know, from the age of 15 onwards, once I kicked my mom out, things were much, much, much better. So I missed, I missed some opportunities to be happier. I worried too much. But it's also tough to say, because if I hadn't worried that much, I may not end up with the life that I have now, which is about as good as, as it can be. You know, I went for a lovely hike, a long, lovely hike with my wife yesterday. We had great conversations and, you know, just had a, and she was like, oh, do you want to travel? I'm like, ah, you know, it's tough, man, because I said, it's tough for me to, think of a way in which a day like today could be improved, right? I woke up, I took my daughter out for brunch, and that was lovely. Then I dropped my daughter off at work and then and went for a long, lovely hike with my wife in the beautiful woods, and I'm like, did a show in the evening, and all of that.
[16:33] And I'm like, okay, well, we could go to, I don't know, X, Y, Z place or whatever, but it's hard for me to know how a day like that can be improved. So if you are extracting rational, objective value, I don't mean like you're happy all the time, because it's not really possible, but if you're if you're extracting maximum value out of your day or reasonable value I don't know maximum value is too high a standard you end up feeling dissatisfied, but if you are extracting reasonable value out of your days it's kind of hard to be nostalgic because nostalgia is saying I missed something back there.
[17:15] Did I drop something did I drop something It was my wallet. Jesus, did I drop something? Like, nostalgia is circling back because you missed something. And nostalgia is about the future. Nostalgia about the past is saying, I missed some significant chances for happiness, which I should learn how to enjoy in the present. So my guess is the car, and you can of course tell me if I'm right or wrong. I don't need to say that, you guys know. But I think that the car represents missed opportunities in some fashion or some manner.
[18:00] Did you miss some opportunities with that car? Was there a road trip you didn't go on? Was there a woman you didn't ask out and pick up at the car? The car represents some kind of freedom you didn't take. The car represents some kind of freedom. You didn't take some kind of opportunity you didn't maximize. And is that the case in the present? What would we go back dewy-eyed to look at? There's a movie called Avalon with a rather older Joanne Woodward and a stagecoach, a couple other actors, Aidan Quinn. And the movie Avalon is very nostalgic, just as the play Tennessee Williams play, The Glass Menagerie, is very nostalgic. And it's because there's a richness and depth in the past that you fail to recognize and are also failing to recognize here and now.
[19:05] You know, all manner kidding aside, and I know I have no shirt on and this is going to seem ridiculous, but nonetheless. Nevertheless, you know, we in this conversation, we're right down in the meat and muscle at the base of the soul. We're right there in the bone, the marrow, the meat and the muscle at the base of the soul. What could be better than to excavate the meaning of happiness, connection, courage and virtue you in a conversation like we're having. To have fun, to enjoy it, to go deep, to go sideways. Somebody put together a supercut of me making every penis joke known to man. My dick is so big it only plays stadiums. It was funny.
[20:06] I will never regret the time I've spent doing philosophy. I will never regret. I don't look back and say, gee, I did too many live streams. Because we are moving the bar for philosophy forever. This is my constant goal. To move the bar for philosophy forever and ever. Amen. So that it's not academic. It's not about, do nouns exist ontologically? It's about getting to the truth, getting to the meaning, getting to the virtue, getting to the connection, getting to the honesty right now, in your life, when you speak. Because if we avoid the truth, we're avoiding life, we're avoiding connection, we're avoiding love, we're avoiding virtue. And slaves can't tell the truth. Every time we avoid the truth, we reaffirm our enslavement, which is why control over free speech makes people feel like slaves. Just ask Pavel. Joe says the truth is great. I went above and beyond at my previous job, and all I got was the $25 gift card. It was all I needed to jump to a new company with a 20% salary raise. Yeah. Good for you. Good for you. Hmm.
[21:29] Let me just get to your... You shouldn't be taking steroids unless your testicles got destroyed in some horrific accident. It's only going to do damage mentally and physically. I couldn't imagine in a million years taking steroids. Caesar salads are great, though, especially with anchovies. I don't often get the rank stink of deep evil in a call-in show, but I'm afraid that I have found it now. Thank you, David. I mean, don't get me wrong. I do like a good Caesar, but putting stinky saltfish in a salad is like taking a giant pea. in Clam Chowder. All right. Best thing is finding work where you can be appreciated, well compensated, and successful. Yeah. But no. No. The best thing is finding work where you can do good. Appreciated well-compensated and successful how about doing some good in the world.
[22:46] All right. My approach emotionally to dealing with computers echoes the old Garfield poster. He's standing in front of a PC that reads, hit any key to continue, as he holds a mallet over his head. It's funny. Where is the any key? I can't find it. Or back in the day, there was a little program running around. It was a little batch file, and it said, click on this to get a free coffee holder. And if you clicked on it, it would send a signal to the operating system, to the hardware substructure to open the CD tray. There's your coffee holder. That was funny. I think gentle parenting might basically be the sort of free-range let-kids-discover-themselves kind of hippie thing. At least that's the image that is conjured in my mind. The people who weaponize your conscience against you are the worst. Yes, that's right.
[23:39] I've disconnected from my neglectful parents, so I won't replicate their behavior on my own children. Well, I'm sorry, but good for you. They still send birthday gifts and cards to me, my wife and my children, and I do accept them, mainly for my kids, but I'm conflicted. Is it best to just tell them to stop sending the gifts? I mean, I can't tell you what to do, obviously. In my shoes, though, I would view the gift of giving as a periodic reminder as to why I'm not spending time with them, right? Because they're sending you gifts rather than moving heaven and earth to fix the relationship. You know, it's so funny. It's so funny. If you, by tragic comic, right? So you have stopped talking to your parents, so they should move heaven and earth to fix the relationship. They should say, I've gone to therapy, I've listened to this, I've done that, I've accepted the other, I've, you know, whatever, right? They should be moving heaven and earth to fix the relationship.
[24:38] But they're not, they're just sending gifts, which is confirmation that it probably was wise. But if you contact them, see, here's the problem. Let's say that they're cold, intrusive people, right? Let's say they're cold, intrusive people. I was reading this, researcher who was saying that there's about 10% of the population that is pretty, pretty, you know dark triad kind of stuff so let's say they're cold and intrusive people so if you call them up and you say mom and dad really really need you to stop sending presents well you're giving them control over you you're giving them power over you you were exposing a need to someone who's manipulative and in general it's usually not a good idea to show your soft underbelly to the predators.
[25:29] As opposed to those who say, I would gladly apologize for being wrong if I ever would be wrong about anything, but I haven't ever been wrong. Right, right. I'm, uh, now I'm getting cold. I'm so sorry that you were offended by my perfectly rational statement. I'm so sorry that I said something rational and neutral, and you just really got offended. I'm sorry that you're so hypersensitive. I'm so sorry that you just don't know how to react to normal human conversations. I guess I'll have to step around you like you're some crazy cocaine-laced hair-trigger landmine field. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that you don't have the maturity to respond to my obviously positive intentions in the spirit in which they're intended. I'm so sorry that you're so paranoid that you just get jumpy about even goodwill coming your way. I can be very stubborn with admitting I'm wrong. But this show has helped me break down arguments to first principles and setting aside emotion. It's a wrestling match between my reasoning and ego. No, it's not ego, Andrew. It's not ego. It's not ego. It's fear. It's fear. It's fear. The reason you don't apologize is you grew up with people who used it against you. That's all. And they never themselves apologized.
[26:51] Oh, yes. Yes, by the by, don't forget, we're going to go supporters only on the second hour. The second hour. I'm going to give you all a nice linky link with which you can join in case you haven't joined. Shocking, I know. Possible, I suspect. But here you go, here you go. Joiny join. You can go join and you also get some very cool stuff. Hundreds of premium shows. So. All right.
[27:40] I love cars for fastness. All right. Is nostalgia wishing you could go back? No. There's nothing about the human brain that is irrational, fundamentally. I mean, unless you're truly deranged, right? I mean, some physical problem. No, nostalgia is not wishing you could go back. So when I'm nostalgic about some of the things in my teens... I'm wishing that I had enjoyed my teens more, and the reason I do that is so that I can give myself permission to enjoy my life more now. Like, you know that there's no later thing, right? There's no later time where everything gets perfect and you get to enjoy everything no matter what, right? That's not a real thing. That doesn't happen. There is no time later where everything's going to be perfect and you get to enjoy everything. There will always be problems. There will always be challenges. There will always be upsets. There will always be negatives. And learning how to enjoy life, not just despite, but because of the negatives. Because then you have problems to be solved.
[28:52] All right. Hi, Stef. I was catching up on Telegram, the Telegram chat after this week's call, and came across a discussion where someone had ended a relationship and was seeking advice. Slash comfort. Wasn't exactly sure, and while it was very enlightening to see firsthand how men deal with each other, glad to be a woman, I did walk away with a question about how to gauge one's emotional readiness to date. Oh, you mean after a breakup? So, you are ready to date after a breakup when you no longer blame your partner for the breakup. That's when you're ready to date. You are ready to date after a breakup when you no longer blame your boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife for the breakup.
[29:39] If you're still mad, if you're still blaming, you're not ready. Because you haven't taken responsibility for the relationship. As an adult, you are responsible, 100%. You are 100% responsible for everyone who is in your life. No excuses. You are 100% responsible for everyone who's in your life as an adult, assuming you are not in prison unjustly you are 100 responsible for everyone who is in your life blaming others is hating yourself, blaming others is saying I had no choice when I had a choice.
[30:38] You know one of the most powerful things that you can do in life is to listen in in a neutral fashion. Right, so here's what happens with most people in conversation. They're trying to enroll you into a morality play of insanity called I'm in the right and everyone else is wrong. I'm perfect and everyone who disagrees with me is a bad person. You know, it's like the people who say everything I don't like is hate speech and must be banned and everything I do like is a human right and must be enforced and subsidized.
[31:17] Most people, you talk to anyone about a breakup, and what are they doing? They're trying to enroll you. They're trying to drag you into a magical mystery tour morality play called, Can You Believe What This Person Did? I'm So Good, They're So Bad. Well, you can't date anyone who's in that state of mind, because they're clearly communicating to you that if there's a problem in the relationship, you're fucked. They are going to blame you and never admit fault. So you are ready to date when you say about a prior relationship, you say, I chose wrong.
[32:06] I made a mistake, I chose wrong. Now, maybe you can say some of the reasons why, I didn't know this about my past and so on, but I chose wrong, it was my fault, it was my fault. That is the kind of pain that liberates you, that is the kind of weight that gives you wings. But beneath the weight of gravity, we stumble then we fly. Right, that is the kind of weight that gives you wings. That is the kind of gravity that gives you propulsion. You are ready to date when you take responsibility and don't make excuses. Why did I spend a good portion of my twenties in a relationship that didn't work out? Because I chose wrong. I chose wrong. It was all on me. Well, she did some things that were wrong. Yes, but she was only in my life. And I only almost married her because I was choosing wrong. Well, but people in my life didn't warn me about her. Yes, but those were also people in my life that, being an adult, I chose to have in my life. The hats are not for sale as yet, but I will figure out a way this week so that you can get them if you want.
[33:36] When you don't blame the other person and you don't make any excuses then you are ready to date again otherwise it's just going to be a repetition, some oh this is the same young lady thank you for being here some of the chat advised the guy to find another woman which to me was questionable advice as my sense was he needed therapy or a call-in, not another relationship, and the lack of consideration for minimizing collateral damage in dating was disappointing to see in the chat. You commented asking him to call in, not sure if he will, but I know in the past I've heard you advise others the same, that is find another woman. No, I'm pretty sure I don't think I've ever said to someone that the solution to a traumatic relationship is to just find another woman. Yeah, I can't picture any scenario under which that could be the case. Because the solution to prior relationship issues is not to copy-paste into the next relationship.
[34:52] You know, it's funny because I've done so many shows, I wouldn't want to say, well, I've never said that under some situation or circumstance or taken out of context or whatever. Maybe I said something like that, but I can't imagine any scenario in which I would say to someone, just go find another woman and you'll be fine. Yeah, so I think you have got that wrong. Hi, Stef, says another young lady. I've just realized that I've been allowing myself to be horrible to my husband when I'm struggling emotionally he pointed this he pointed out this wasn't acceptable and I eventually agreed with him now his point seems so obvious why didn't I see this before I was completely convinced it was reasonable to be thoroughly unpleasant whenever I was stressed or unhappy why didn't you see this before because this is how your parents treated you I don't think of English as English I think of English as language because it's all I know I mean I know it's not but so So this was normalized to you, and this was trained in you, and this is how your parents acted towards each other, towards you, towards others, right? So it's normalized, and to denormalize these things is to say, I'm going to learn morally, not historically. I'm not going to normalize what was. I'm going to compare proposed actions to ideal standards, not do they fit the template of what came before.
[36:22] All right. Gentle parenting is an approach to raising children that emphasizes empathy, respect, understanding, and boundaries. It focuses on fostering a strong emotional connection between the parent and child, encouraging positive behavior. I don't know what that means in practice, so sorry. I know I asked for an AI summary, but it's just a bunch of adjectives and words. This nostalgia thing is hitting me pretty hard right now, so go back and learn the lessons and move forward. Ah, here we go. AI part two. Sorry. I jumped the gun like a teenage boy. All right. Through guidance rather than punishment, instead of using strict discipline and harsh consequences, gentle parenting promotes problem solving, open communication, and teaching children how to manage their emotions and actions in a supportive environment. The goal is to raise confident, independent, and emotionally intelligent individuals. All right. Problem solving, sure. Open communication, not sure what that means, and teaching children how to manage their emotions and actions in a supportive environment. Again, it's just positive adjectives do not a philosophy make. So if you could give me examples, and I'm sorry, I know I asked you to ask the AI to summarize, but the AI is a word guesser, so it didn't summarize very well. If you could give me an example of peaceful parenting.
[37:49] My high school teacher once asked asked for help with her pc saying the whole the thing where i put my coffee broke it was a cd tray i'm not kidding coffee's a little bit heavier than a cd i can't tell you how amazing it was it was like being able to 3d print your own car to be able to make your cd back in the day it's just wild.
[38:17] Let's see here. Out kayaking with a group yesterday. Some guy went off on his own. The guy chastised him, and the dude was like, I'm sorry you were upset. Oh, God. Oh, God. That's sad. It's like the women who you correct them on something, they're like, okay. Oh, oh. That's like bamboo under the fingernails that shit right you correct some woman it's usually a woman although it can happen with men too but quote right you correct someone which is like okay okay okay i concede to your irrational okay fine fine two and two make four okay the earth is not banana shaped okay okay if that's simple if it's that important to you i'll give it to you you take it honey if it's that it's not important to me if the facts and the truth and reality and objectivity and valid. If that's important to you, okay. I can see. Okay.
[39:23] Well, the other thing too, is that there is a lot of people who get mad at the fact that the legal system is a little mental, right? The legal system is a little mental. so i pulled from direct experience the scene in the future where lewis takes his kid, to the petting zoo right and i i took izzy to a petting zoo and we used to be able to play with the animals and this that and the other it was really great you could pick up the baby goats and uh it was just wonderful and then we went there and there's a big sign that says you You can't touch the animals. I said, well, what happened? He's like, oh, well, you know, a kid was holding a baby goat and it kicked and scratched him and we got threatened with a lawsuit.
[40:26] So, the reason why, I mean, these sort of personal injury claims, of course, some of them are valid, some of them are pure nonsense, a lot of them, I think, but because we have a low-trust society where people sue for money rather than for justice, then we end up in these situations where things just get progressively worse. us. So one of the reasons, I don't know, obviously, but one of the reasons I assume that you're not allowed to go off on your own is that the company is held liable if somebody gets injured. And so there's that fear, right? That worry that the business could be destroyed with some lawsuit, right? So, and people, so people get mad, people get mad. It's just like, okay, well then you have to find some way to have a better legal system, right? The sun on the moon makes a mighty night light. All right.
[41:27] No, see, everybody makes mistakes. I don't see how not apologizing follows. Everyone makes mistakes, and they should all apologize for those. So, this is the question of injury, and I find this a really, really fascinating question to me. It's a real edge case for me so do you apologize for mistakes i don't think so, i don't think so when i was a when i was in my early teens i had an atari 800 and there was a game that required for you to run the game that you type in an incredibly complicated series of codes into the because it was a machine language game which ran a lot faster because it didn't have to go through the beginner supplied symbolic instruction code or basic layer of interpretation like java right just makes your computer 90 slower but i had to type in all of this stuff and i tried to run the game when some friends were over and it didn't work and it was like pages and pages and pages of a00f99 like just crazy codes right so anyway um i went back over and found the error now am i going to apologize for fat fingering one of you know 5 000 weird codes notes.
[42:40] No, I'm so if it's a mistake, if it's a mistake, do you apologize for it? Well, you apologize for the effects, but you don't apologize for making the mistake, because then that's having a standard that you need to grovel or in a sense or apologize for an error. Do you apologize for mistakes? It's kind of like injuries. So when you look at injuries, I mean, I'm sure everyone here has been injured at one point or another the worst i ever did really was i cracked a forearm i didn't break it i just got healed with a sling i didn't even need a cast and and why did i crack a forearm i cracked the forearm because i was in a bad relationship or it was towards the end of a bad relationship and i was biking we picked up some roller some blinds and i was biking and the woman was like well that's stupid it's going to go into the spokes and i was like no it won't because i was mad and i was petty and right and I was in my 20s and anyway, so what happened? Well, I had to wobble to avoid sewage grate and the roller blinds went into the spokes and I went over and cracked my arm. Is that an accident? No. That's not an accident. That's not a, oh my gosh, here I was hiking in the woods and I got hit by a meteor, right? I mean, that's not an accident.
[44:04] And so, I don't much believe in accidents. I don't much believe in accidents. If I look at the accidents that I've had, the injuries that I have received, and I trace things back.
[44:26] It's almost always a bad decision that was being made. That leads to, now there's a few, I hurt my knee in St. Louis when I was giving a speech many years ago because I was chasing my daughter, I had new sneakers on, I was chasing my daughter down a hallway of a hotel and I didn't realize how incredibly gummy stuck my sneakers were, so I stepped a little too soon, couldn't move forward and fell on my knee. So, okay, that's an accident, right? But when I look back at things that have injured me, it's almost like I mean I used this in a novel as well that when I was in my early to mid teens, there was in Don Mills there was a giant trestle bridge and I was swinging back and forth and I wanted to impress a girl with how strong I was so I swung out three times and on the third times my muscles were like nope and I fell on the rocks now was that an accident no I was trying to impress someone, when I was snorkeling with a girl once I tried to impress her with how deep, I could snorkel and how long I could hold my breath and I got water in my ear that took forever to get out was that an accident? No, I was being an idiot I was being shallow I was doing something retarded.
[45:54] Right trying to look cool I looked like a fool tool.
[46:04] Now, the plus side of that is that I tend not to have many accidents. That's the plus side. The minus side is when I have an accident, I get mad at myself. So it's 50-50, right? I mean, I think over, it's probably 51 benefit, 49 cost. So I generally don't have accidents. incidents, I took my daughter and I, as I mentioned, we like throwing these planes around, especially if it's windy, but obviously not in the backyard because if it's windy, they just go, right? So we drove to a big football field, soccer field, I guess, by a school and we were throwing the planes, throwing the planes. It was great fun. And near this, there is a.
[46:46] Long jump right it's like the the concrete path and then the sand right, now i'm almost 50 i'd be 58 in uh just under a month so for me i used to do these long jumps with her and i probably could i probably could do the long jump i mean i do a lot of leg exercises i do not skip leg day and i play i do a lot of hiking and i i do racket sports so my knees don't give me any problems and all of that but to me i get this what if i really pull something what if i snap something what like because you know flying through the air i'm like 180 something pounds flying through the air and then landing it's a lot of stress on the knees and so on so.
[47:35] The cost benefit because if i put myself out and knee stuff can be really bad right I've put myself out for six months I'm just gonna I'm gonna kick myself as making a bad decision so because I'm gonna kick myself I don't assume that accidents come out of nowhere so I made a compromise in my brain I've been a little leery about doing full sprints ever since I injured my knee and so I made a compromise I said okay well I'm not gonna do the long jump because the benefit of the long jump is well it's kind of cool and I'll feel young and it's gonna need to do something with my daughter the downside is I could put myself out for six months so the cost benefit if it gets kind of complicated. So what I did in my head was I said, okay, I'll tell you what, brain, we won't do the long jump, but I'm going to sprint back to the car, like full sprint, like absolute full sprint. And I did, and it was fine. So there's my balance, right?
[48:32] So do you apologize for mistakes? No. You can apologize for carelessness. You can apologize for a shortcut. You can apologize for a bad decision and so on. But I wouldn't say just mistakes. All right. Stef, you have inspired me to try and slowly get off sugar. I'm Irish, so chocolate is in my veins. Should be an inspiring battle and challenge. Thank you for the inspiration. I appreciate that. I'm glad to help. Because someday never comes. Yeah, yeah. Tomorrow never comes. All right.
[49:09] On several occasions, I have dealt with people who misspell my name, mainly via email and text. It's annoying, especially because my name is in my email. What do you make of these people? Yeah, I mean, there's a certain level of quality that you really do need to expect from people. I think it's fair. It's a certain level of quality you need to expect. How tough is it to just check someone's name? Especially if you have an unusual name, like mine is with an F and a silent X at the end and all of that. So if you have an unusual name, I think it's usually important to check. It just shows a level of carelessness and all of that. That is not, it's a little bit of a red flag, right? Well, it's also really a red flag, says Zimp, if you meet somebody new and they're immediately talking about their exes and if somebody is still resentful over their previous relationships, that's likely to spill over pretty quickly. Oh yeah, do you ever meet these people who was like, they still have the same amount of trapped and constipated emotional energy about a breakup that could have happened a year or two or five or 10 ago. Go right how can you still how can it not have faded how can it not have faded.
[50:21] All right good morning been a while since i've caught one live there you go, okay thank you well i'm a canadian we apologize to the wall for bumping into it says the woman who's 38.
[50:41] My husband says my husband hates it when i say okay in arguments i guess that is why yeah that's why that's why because if a woman says and again it's a bit more of a female thing if you say well but you're wrong about this. And she says, okay. Then she's saying, it's not important when it usually is important. She's just conceding because you're crazy and irrational about it. And it's just an insult. It really is. I like that you call it the legal system and not the justice system. Isn't touching the animals the whole point of a petting zoo? You were allowed to feed them and maybe pat their backs, but you couldn't pick them up and you couldn't, right? All right. A close friend of mine is still struggling with finding a quality woman he explained to me that he finds himself acting out what he thinks how a good boyfriend would behave so much that his real needs and preferences aren't met how could I explain to him where this pattern of behavior comes from thank you for, great guidance in answering my questions yeah.
[51:57] Yeah, mimicking a good person is creepy. Ah, this is what a humanoid empath would do, so I believe I can make myself approximate those facial expressions as he does a crossword with meat and bone in it. So, yeah, I, um... You know, there's no way to be loved without liking yourself first. I like my own brain. I have a lot of fun in here. Sometimes it's a challenge, I'm not gonna lie. But I like my own company. I enjoy spending time on my own. I enjoy thinking my thoughts. I enjoy singing my songs. I enjoy making my little mental observations that bring a smile to my face. I enjoy when I'm chatting with people, bringing a little smile to their face. I enjoy the mechanism of my mind moving through the murk of the world. I enjoy the mechanism of my mind moving through the murk of the world.
[52:56] So if you don't enjoy your own company if you don't like yourself and really you can't really fake that i mean you just have to do the actions that you would like in someone else you just have to do those actions yourself so you end up liking yourself and if you like yourself.
[53:14] See, asking a woman out is asking her to come join the party called you. Come join the dinner party of fun called me. Come and we'll grab life by the horns together and we will milk the marrow of existence together and we will have terrifying fun, exciting, wonderful, appalling, joyful times together. We will milk the Alpha and the Omega together of existence. We would go high, we would go deep, we would go wide, we would go long. And we will not depart this life feeling that we only skimmed the surface and did the bare minimum. We are given this great gift of existence, we will milk every atom of it for as much connection, fun, sexiness, joy, challenge, heartbreak, disaster, and celebration as we can. There is no highs without the lows, we will explore both, to their greatest peaks and deepest valleys. And we will never, on our deathbed, look back and say, It could have been more, it could have been better, it could have been more honest, it could have been deeper, it could have been more real. I wasted, I evaporated, I dissolved. I self-gouled my own potential and had it walk in shambling human skin through a void of connection and virtue. No, thank you.
[54:40] When you ask a woman out, you are asking her to join the celebration of life called your existence. And if you're not celebrating life, you're just lying and defrauding someone and saying, come with me because I'm lonely. Come with me because I don't like sitting alone on the couch. Come with me because I'm horny. Come with me because... No, come with me because we will have a fantastic time together. I'm enjoying my life so much, I want to share it with someone. I have such a great time in life, I can't possibly do it alone. You know when you have, you order some meal.
[55:23] And you're with someone you care about, you order some meal, and the meal is fantastic. I just, the other day, went for lunch with my wife, I had to pick up new glasses in the exciting world of philosophy. Well, clarity is key, right?
[55:48] So, I went for lunch with my wife, and I had a grilled cheese sandwich of the gods. It was so good. And what is your first impulse when you're with someone you care about, out and you take a bite of fantastic food what is your first impulse you say oh you got to try this, oh you got this is so good i'm like weeping it's so good having a really good meal is is tough i don't really like to spend much money eating out so i don't go to nice restaurants in particular it's just fuel for the most part but every now and then you just oh so good so good, it's like one time I went to a rib fest you ever been to one of those a rib fest and you've got I mean it's a whole ecosystem of infinite rib enjoyment people like go insane for this rib stuff, fiery ass blaster Texas roadhouse and I'm like I should pay fairly good money to not eat this oily fatty gristle with, sinus-blasting spike sauce on it. Anyway, so...
[57:07] What's the first thing you want to do when you take a bite of great food, if you're with someone you care about? You've got to try this. This is so good. This is so good. Right? Yeah, that's your life. It's so good, I want to share it. If you don't have a good life, then you're asking for your food to taste better because somebody else is eating it. Nope. Your food has to taste great, and then you share it. First thing I said when I was chatting with my wife-to-be, she said, how was your day? I said, fantastic. I got my first novel published. Got a great life. Want to join it? Got a great life. Want to join it? This meal is fantastic. Try some. As opposed to, my meal is shitty, so you have some. My sandwich tastes like, Klingon ass. Here, have some. How appealing is that? This is the worst food I've ever tasted. I really want you to have some. That's my daughter spent six months trying to smuggle me cinnamon gum because I hate cinnamon gum. And I, oh, can I get some gum? And she'd be like, sure. And I'm like, hey, is that cinnamon? Oh, man.
[58:30] Okay. We're going to switch to donor only. only and then we'll get into the peaceful parenting stuff come on people i'm working my brain, oh yeah still waiting on people to apologize for things said and done during covid, how long will the wait be safe and effective so i was probably i think i got this from a color it was about 20 years for people to realize that washing your hands was a good move and it took It took about 40 years from the beginning of the research that smoking was bad for people to generally recognize it. So we're probably 20% of the way there. We're 10 to 20% of the way there. Yeah. You remember when I was castigated for potentially causing conflict within families? Turns out they don't really care about conflict within families, right?
[59:26] All right. so we are going to go donor only and I really appreciate that come join me and you know some tips would be, muchly appreciated the quality of the show is to some degree based on the quality of the tips because otherwise I have to fight a feeling of why am I here I mean other than to do philosophy which is nice but you know there are people to pay, yeah my apartment smells like feline loneliness care to join me, save me from my terrible life Life is the worst mating call known to man, right?
[1:00:06] All right, so let's get to the right spot here, and we're going to go donor only. Do I remember how to do that? I'm pretty sure I do. All right, local supporters only. Let's update that stream, and we'll get there in 20 seconds. And let me get you to the promo code. It's free to try, man. I can't make it cheaper than free. Free. I cannot make it cheaper than free. And we will get to the parenting stuff and other things. Oh yes, reminds me of the time I said orgasm in class instead of organism. Over 20 years later, I still remember it. Yeah, that happened to a friend of mine. Is that a living orgasm? Well, if it's dead, you're a necrophiliac, and that's a significant minus. All right. And we're going to get to your spicy questions and we're going to do some parenting stuff and I think I'll swap over here. All right. Join me. Freedom and locals.com.
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