I sat down with Aryeh Buchsbayew to hear some of his reflections on Shtisel. It quickly escalated into a four hour conversation about Nazi’s, self loathing, self acceptance, The Hero's Journey and a story about his son that left me fighting back tears.
Audio engineered by Paladin Studios:
instagram.com/paladinstudiosnyc
Sponsored by:
Mushie.co
instagram.com/mushie_co
Bumper music:
Shtisel clip
https://youtu.be/Ope1vOwtBk0
Just Dropped In
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgmIdWvHufs&feature=youtu.be
Hotel California
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_epO0-amubA&feature=youtu.be
Referenced:
Joseph Campbell
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27s_journey
Stepping Out of the Abyss
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1937887952/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_7pMeDbSTNT65R
How Does the Czar Drink Tea sung by Paul Robeson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGgFqq1yVe0&feature=youtu.be
Questions/comments & sponsorship:
extrasaucepodcast@gmail.com
I sat down with Aryeh Buchsbayew to hear some of his reflections on Shtisel. It quickly escalated into a four hour conversation about Nazi’s, self loathing, self acceptance, The Hero's Journey and a story about his son that left me fighting back tears.
Audio engineered by Paladin Studios:
instagram.com/paladinstudiosnyc
Sponsored by:
Mushie.co
instagram.com/mushie_co
Bumper music:
Shtisel clip
https://youtu.be/Ope1vOwtBk0
Just Dropped In
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgmIdWvHufs&feature=youtu.be
Hotel California
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_epO0-amubA&feature=youtu.be
Referenced:
Joseph Campbell
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27s_journey
Stepping Out of the Abyss
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1937887952/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_7pMeDbSTNT65R
How Does the Czar Drink Tea sung by Paul Robeson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGgFqq1yVe0&feature=youtu.be
Questions/comments & sponsorship:
extrasaucepodcast@gmail.com
No, we should find time to not do this. Whenever I went to the opening of the Auschwitz exhibit, understanding, you know, ss and Nazis and Hitler, you spoke about understanding Nazis and Hitler. Um, I listened and I stopped him like in like as he's talking about like Twizzlers. I was like, Ellie. Yeah. I'm like, I love you man. I think I was like, I love you so much. And he like looks down. He's like, hi. No,
Speaker 2:Nah ma'am.
Speaker 1:[inaudible]
Speaker 2:hello. Good mom. What's going on? Pleasant. Aveva record.
Speaker 3:[inaudible]
Speaker 2:yeah. Yeah. Can I woke up this mountain? Was The Sunday Shannon and found my mind in a brown paper bag, but then drip down a cloud and fail eight miles tall man on a jacket sky. I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in. Yeah, yeah. Oh yeah. My condition.
Speaker 4:Welcome to extra sauce. My name is Haim Cohn and this is episode five.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 4:Some friends of mine have been asking what the intention of this podcast is and truthfully, I haven't been able to exactly answer that question. Only to say that I'd like to share good conversation and stories from people in my life and some of those conversation might be intense and some I hope will just be interesting and fun. This one I think is all the above.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 4:My guess is Arya books by you.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 4:All right. He's an interesting person. He's a therapist, specializes in DBT and EMDR and trauma work. He serves as clinical supervisor at a Oh hell children's home and family services. He holds a private practice as on the five towns. He's a husband, father, and he's a good friend. I sat down with Ari a few weeks ago at his office and a the intention to start out with to hear some of his thoughts and reflections on the first two seasons of Dessel that he just watched. But I showed up about an hour late and we were both kind of antsy and tired and conversation wasn't really going anywhere. And then I, we were about to call it quits and then I just said, uh, the magic word that is Arias, magic word, Auschwitz. And then it sort of picked up from there. We got into a lot of things. We talked about denial, projection and the insight that is only possible when we aren't afraid to looking at ourselves in the extremes and what might be possible when we see just how we can both devolve as human beings, but at the same time what's precisely possible,
Speaker 3:uh,
Speaker 4:when we rise above that and how that is only possible when we do have the courage to see ourselves as we are. We talked about a lot of other things and uh, I'll just let the conversation speak for itself. My primary takeaway is, and listening to it again, that it isn't just the knowledge or awareness, which is always nice. It's the self acceptance and uh, what we do with that awareness that will ultimately dictate and determine if it will be the same dick to our own children or perhaps be the parent that we all needed. So I hope you enjoy this conversation and I look forward to sharing more of these with you. We'll have another one coming up in about a week and a half. Uh, that one is a kind of a Gimbal Thomas Special. It's a conversation with my friend, has he done a blame small Metzger and birth Taylor that are recorded about two weeks ago am I garage. And that's, that's uh, an interesting heavy one and uh, doing the editing on it now and it should be out next week and then we'll take it from there. And I always appreciate the feedback. So feel free to shoot me a message or an email at, uh, email is extra sauce podcast at Gmail and this episode is sponsored by Mushy once again. And if you'd like to sponsor an episode, you can email me as well. So that's it. Here's rea and look forward to talking to you soon.
Speaker 5:I went to the opening of the Auschwitz exhibit at the Brooklyn Heritage Museum a few weeks ago and of you heard to me, which is something that I think of often, well, a few things, but one in reference to what you're talking about. Half of it's gotta be like, what, 10,000 books on Hitler and then like another, probably a lot more. Yeah, yeah. And then probably another, you know, 20,000 on Nazis and World War II. And how many books I could probably count on. My fingers are about the average German during World War Two in terms of the ones who watched as their neighbors and friends, uh, ransacked Jewish homes. And, oh, there, there, there, there are a few,
Speaker 6:there's the interesting, there was an interesting book where you have like what do you have a German families from different parts of Germany or like, like pen palling each other and you see like the like how present one fam, one person in the family, it's like a, like an ardent Nazi. Any of the supplies like the supporter versus like, right. And then you have like, uh, like we elected him, he's, you know, he's cleaning up the streets and you were the of the person who's like really disgusted with everything that's happening and they're having a whole conversation pen palling back and forth. Uh, there's also a lot of things in regarding that. The, that the, the policeman and um, the book I just read called ordinary people that these, that these soldiers that these policemen were just, they were from like a part of Germany, not really close to like the like the cap from Berlin and they were just ordinary people or like ordinary in quotations.
Speaker 5:They just needed some work. It didn't work. And the these people ended up doing some of the most barbaric yup. Of the, I mean
Speaker 6:they definitely were
Speaker 5:a lot different from the start of the war. Right. To me then that's the point of the book is that ordinary people can be very different if, if it just, when you add time and progression or and,
Speaker 7:okay, this is where I'm getting to know you don't think work. I'm saying people when you asked by like going to a 70 and Nancy's in Germany, I think we're capable of it. That's my point. So
Speaker 5:how many of us are likely to turn into Hitler? Not to save, not to get into the whole thing of can an average guy turning to Hitler and without going into that, the point is,
Speaker 8:yeah,
Speaker 5:as much as we'd like to think we could, most of us won't end up as Hitler or even Hemler, but we very well could end up as the neighbor going to the lift Goldberg's piano because what the hell, why should the other guy get it? And we could turn into even the guy who's like, hey, I don't hate anybody, but you know, I, I just looking out for my family and I don't want anyone thinking that I'm like, you know, a supporter of the, the Union. So, you know, maybe I'll kick a few heads and, or just the guy who's just like, I dunno, I didn't really see anything. My friend went on Nourish Lewis to Jeremy some years ago and they were looking for like a, a synagogue and they had just stopped someone on the street. And, uh, he does a great German accent, but his is, and this woman, older woman, which makes me think like when you go to Jeremy and you meet someone like over 70, it's like they were either, and this is, I mean maybe not now, but like years ago, like they were either a Nazi or looking the other way. Either way. It's like who am I talking too? Anyway, so they're like, they're trying to find that, that this synagogue, they know it's like around there and then they ask her and she's like, okay,
Speaker 9:see Nagel. I know Zillow West something. I don't require it. I, there was some years ago I synagogue, he, yes, I think I record. I just, I don't know what happened, you know?
Speaker 5:MMM.
Speaker 9:They took it. They took the Jews. I don't remember. Oh, it's so interesting.
Speaker 5:So you could just do that, you know, like anyone could've become that is just like, I don't, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. I think there was something going on. So, or you could be like someone hiding Jews in your basement or at, which is a small percentage. Right? But what if like that's the story to be learned, if anyone, if anything, is to be learned, is that we're all that Polish German Lithuanian neighbor who could either hide a Jew or steal Jews
Speaker 4:dishes.
Speaker 6:You've been listening when we were talking. That's exactly, that's the whole reason in terms of studying that is being confronting that deep and dark part of you. Confronting some of the conscious unconscious part where they are, that I am capable on, that I'm capable. I'm human, right? And I'm capable because like I can't put myself in another person's shoes until I stand there and we can feel better. I love this, like the same thing. It was like drug, it's like drug addiction, right? People who are in like people who are on the outside, how could somebody be addicted? I don't understand it as I'm eating like this the eighth piece of cake. I don't understand it when I'm shopping. I don't want to stay here. Can Be Addicted to heroin. Right. You know, like, um, I remember I was having this conversation with somebody. I was having this conversation with somebody. Um, and he was saying he doesn't understand, like he doesn't understand how people could, could go to any length to use heroin. You don't understand it. Then you got surgery and they've got like fentanyl and he got like oxes and it's like, now I get it. Now I now he's like, I get why people would sell their, their bodies to get the hive. That was great. He was beyond just the question is like we don't really understand. I think we like, we don't understand what the polls say, screw the bolts. We don't understand what, you know, these Germans who just suffered, you know, World War One, one of them or when the feed and being like a, uh, depression and the economy going down and then I've always done this guy Condon, he's like, it's obviously like all of a sudden their, their pri there, they have that like national pride and they feel connected to something. Right. And they feel a part of, and like, yeah, like,
Speaker 4:yeah, Jews not so I wish mock and as a scapegoat and everything else. So it isn't really so necessary to go all the way to that extreme to get that insight of maybe I don't really know what it's like and I can't really just assume that I would not do the same. Like there's a lot of degree degrees before then for that point to like gain that insight. No, but I think once you can acknowledge that I'm not better than, and you can see reality as it is, right, then you have a choice to transcend them.
Speaker 6:Right? But once you're operating like, oh, I'll never do that. Right. But then when, when push you, you've never had the imagination to think of like, oh, it's possible that I could do that. Right. And it's also possible that I don't have to do that. Right, right. And again, that's where the ability of this, let me say I, I says like this good and bad, good and bad is based on, is dependent on the one who's deciding it. When we're talking about Nazi Germany Nazis bad, we're saying they're bad. But if we were, if we were transported to Berlin in 1937 Nazis are pretty good. Jews not so much. Right. All depends on the one who's designing it. Right. So forget good. Forget that. Right. Let's come to a place of, of, of a synthesis of the extremes.
Speaker 10:Yeah.
Speaker 6:Let's see if we could understand where everybody's coming from and that's what we're talking about. This, this'll also that, that everybody has, everybody's coming to coming to that point with so much other than beforehand that there's parts that are affective parts are ineffective parts are you schmuck less cause Schumack and all of that makes the human VA, it's just, it's not just this one thing, right? So the point is like it's yard of that balance. It's a, it's a dialectical perspective where you can see like, oh, I could here be if I grew up, if I, if, if I grew up in Nazi Germany and I wanted to be a part of and my, or even think about I was that like, or at a Bagel shop and somebody is like, uh, doing something or getting upset or there's injustice that's done to them. How many people stand up? Nobody. Everybody just looks and local like nobody cares. Right? But once you acknowledge and you do that, then you have the ability to transcend that and go above and beyond and act differently. I
Speaker 5:did, I had that experience at a Fort Lauderdale airport like a year ago. I was like early morning flight and uh, the, uh, bus drive was being extremely cruel. I keep us very, very nasty to a couple who came out with like a baby and I froze. I was about to say something and I started and he got very hostile and hurt. His manager was there and she was backing him up and then she was like, I was like, is this really happening? I had just woken up and like, and I, I started saying something and then I backed down and then um,[inaudible] it was an older woman there and she got really loud and then once she's, then I piped in and then it was like we dealt with it. But when I got there, when I had that recognition that I froze, like that's what went through my mind. I was like, oh like yeah maybe it's not so simple to like stand up in the face of like cruelty.
Speaker 6:Right. And that's why I go to like the nod that's I go to the extreme form. Right? Cause if you go to the extreme from one extreme to the other, then you could go to a place in the middle, right? Not just like you can go in, you would encompass all the other stages that come beforehand. You mean anger, all of that. And then you can rewrite it.
Speaker 5:Yeah. What I find ironic about righteous indignation, let's say in like in Western culture is that the level of indignation that is reserved for like really minor to nothing in terms of offense is almost like a distraction. Like we cannot with any level of authority, point out what is wrong. Like we can't make any, you know, even whisper something problematic with radical Islam blowing up, you know, an entire w you know, building. But like it just, we don't even see it. We don't even know what you're talking about. We don't know. We don't, I don't even know what you're talking about. Like, oh, you mean like religious extremism, like religious extreme, uh, is everywhere. It's like, I don't know what you're talking about. You know, and then there's like micro aggression and we're marching to the streets and burn it down and everything's got to like, you know, come revolt when it's like Whoa, like w and I wonder if the, the easy stuff, the distractions, the distractions become a way to like channel our pseudo righteous indignation and instead of reserving it for like what it really should
Speaker 6:not the flection talking about, talk about defense mechanisms. Right, right. Also want to talk about it like PML league, right? Right. In her police is like people without boundaries
Speaker 5:and, and we've talked about this before. I mean let's just bring this back to me because it feels really good. You know, I couldn't say to the, you know, five people earlier today that I can't talk now I'm at work. And then when you called me to be like, Hey, it's seven 30 you said you'd be here. I was able, cause I can communicate with you to like just be like f off. What's the matter with you? Like I have things right. But like that f off really should have come out in the form of, Hey, I can't talk now, I'm at work. Try me tomorrow for the first four people because the truth is I wanted to be here and not on the phone with them.
Speaker 6:You're operating on a on, on when we do this, right? Like that hour our
Speaker 11:subconscious operates on two different levels. One is like this historical self, right? That we kind of, we kind of based on our history, we kind of respond, respond to that. Like you're responding with all the baggage, you know, with Mommy and daddy all of a sudden until like in this pressure, like, I have to do this because if I'm not, I'm back to, you know, back to the little boy. And I have, we have that also in terms of relationships. Like sometimes, uh, you know, if you're having, if you're, if you're too emotional, it's would be as if you're hysterical is probably from the historical, it's historical whenever the hallmark cliche, but that's exactly, that's 100% on, that's 100% on that as a subconscious, uh, uh, historical self. And then at the same time on the flip side you have life that true south, you have the art of like creativity, the imagination, the what do you like that you know that intuition of like you just naturally know what to do and what you want to do and we tour when we go there all of a sudden we have that other voice in our head and historical self. Like you suck, you're incapable, you're hopeless, you're worthless, don't talk. You have no voice. Go back there. This is what you should be doing. You know tying it and tying it back into[inaudible] right. That's, that's what Akiva struggle is. That's his journey of being his true self. Right and taking off the shackles of of that's been put on him. Right. Versus and then also with that historical self of like this is what you're supposed to be doing. Like fall in line. Right. Be a part like,
Speaker 5:yeah, I to me one of the things that stood out, you mentioned Kiva and I related to it a lot is like for him to go with his, what'd you call you know inner most self calling out for expression and creativity and to follow his, his, his core would not just be difficult and come up against the normal, you know, obstacles of where we are, our own worst enemies and like you know, challenging noise narratives in his head. Like he would have to deal with all of that but he would also have to make like a pretty affirming statement that my father is wrong, my father was wrong in his wrong. He would be dishonoring his father and where he came from would simply listening to himself.
Speaker 12:Okay,
Speaker 5:and how can we expect someone to do that? Meaning a situation like that where there's like there's no two ways about it. I
Speaker 6:can either honor my father in the form of becoming yet another him or listened to myself and say I my father's wrong. Well is what Joseph Campbell would talk about the heroic journey. That's exactly what it is. It's venturing into that unknown. It's, it's, it's a courageous and heroic act to go to transition from historical self and doing what's comfortable. I almost expected, well you should be doing to the unknown part where it like your true transformation, your metamorphosis from being just a one of like and be another, another brick in the wall too. I guess we'll find out. Right? I don't know. We'll see. I have to fashion the grandiosity like, Oh man, let's, let's like, you know like, oh, that's that. That's the unknown. The unknown. We, we often look at the unknown and when we have the, like the greatest fears is the fear of the unknown. And so it's already helpless. Right? But the most beautiful things, if you look into, like if I look into my own, my own story, you know, when I ventured out into the unknown, despite the fear, despite the, the anxiety and when I just walk through fear instead of away from it, something beyond my wildest dreams occurred, something beyond my imagination. Then that's the that's and then that was the, and I was able to, you know, that's a heroic journey of like going through difficulty going through it, transforming and then returning, right? I'm thinking, yeah, Joseph Campbell has a whole light 13 step like cyclical. These guy, he was a big third thing. Stepper 13 no.
Speaker 5:Okay, here, here's, I got three things going through my mind. One is like saying no to the ways of my father, so to speak. Right. Is like, feels like the most sacral adjusts selfish and like, yeah, all around narcissistic thing to do. Right. That's just, that's just the, the, the, the association that the old association, right
Speaker 6:you to do or narcissistic for that to be put on you to do. Oh, that necessarily here. There they are regardless of who was right or wrong. And, but now that it's with me,
Speaker 5:I must fall on the sword and honor my father despite whatever it does to me. Right. Kiva, I'm talking about Cuba, obviously. I am.
Speaker 6:I was, you're talking about true, true. Codependence right. So going back, it's like, yeah, that's, that's I think
Speaker 5:what, whoa. So this, that I'm balancing that out. I mean, I'm, I'm listening to those feelings in myself as we talk about this. And then I'm
Speaker 4:also thinking of like, cause I, I said religious cause like, it's all tied in for me. I mean for our Kiva, uh, which is, there's also less oil. How many arts tell me based on Vsa, like that's, that's right there. Like you can't have a relationship with God or relationship with your soul until you leave your father's house. Yeah.
Speaker 6:Well, going back is that, uh, that's the whole concept of William on the whole running and returning, you know, going back to, um, you know, with, uh,
Speaker 4:Jacob's ladder with the angels going up and down. That's the stance. The waltz, the waltz of life. It has to be your wall as be your dance. Right. I had a thought recently. Uh, I mean I've thought maybe I keep it had this thought, which is maybe Kiva honors his father by venturing and listening to his soul and his creativity and his and his and walking his, his, his journey, which is one[inaudible] upon a time. My father was also, you know, young and he also wanted to have his journey and he also had his voice and he also has his father pulling him back to wherever his old home was. And if I know anything, I mean, if Keven knows anything, it's that his father did not successfully charter that path for himself. And he went back to his father's home and maybe by lovingly detaching, he honors his father by saying, I'm sorry you couldn't. I'm really sorry and I know you, it's too painful to even probably go back to consider the pain of the fact that you once wanted to and couldn't. And now you built a life around that. I'm sorry, but I'm going to do this for me and I'm also doing it for you. Right. And I'm going to like listen to myself and my voice. And, and walk and lead my father's house.
Speaker 6:Right. That's on point. I think you probably even the father.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's, that's, that's, that's you see, but even towards the end, there was still at that tortured. He's not completely, completely whole with that choice. You do see that in two areas in let's say like the too so vividly in two
Speaker 1:areas. Right? One is with the kivas brother, like instead of our days, man, right. Where he only wants to do like what's pleasers? Huh? I said, well, he only wants to do is please his father and yet wants, he's like, I could've been a contender. I could have been better Than Shwe Aki. I could've been a musician. Right. He's better than the[inaudible]. Right. You see how you have the two brothers are following their path, right? You have a Kiva is following the painting path or, or the podcasting path. And uh, and you had Zev RNA finally like becoming a musician. Right. And before was, I've already, he was always like playing, like the victim could have been cinder, but like, my daddy wanted me to go to coal owl. Like, he's just like this nebby like Woody Allen, Jew. You know what I mean? Like they're like poor me. That's what we, I don't think paying everybody hated Zev already cause he was like, this is whining. He's like this whiny, like playing the victim. And I listen, there's a part of, it was a part of me that is part of, we all did that. Gosh, yeah, we all do that. I think we've done, I think that's a part of Shit we have to see. There were all where everybody, like even the Rochelle or, or even that guy that, that, that, that these are all parts of us. They don't make us who we are. But there are parts of us went back to his, and then when he, then he, there's a lot that whole thing in the bunker. And then the most powerful thing is that he quits the band. Not because he had to, he chose his family. He chose, he chose his life while at that point it wasn't his family, his wife gave him his phone, his wife wanted him to, but he told us he had every right, but I want meaning that at that point the toxicity of the shame or whatever it was, you can't, you dear not had already been completely ingested and was now his own right. So he was saying no to himself at that point. He didn't even have a parent, a wife or anyone doing that. He was playing that role for himself. He was, he was saying yes to himself when he stepped out and quit it you say yes to himself. Was it saying yes to himself or saying yes to like the the uh, how is the saying yes to themselves? Cause it because he realizes it's not what he wanted. It was an illusion. He is, he doesn't like, he's like, you don't want to like we want something so badly he was like this, we get it. We're like, uh, we, we get so caught up in the fantasy of the right. So this was still like his, whatever, 12 year old self idea of what it meant to leave. Now he came face to face with the opportunity and he realized this is not actually what I wanted. I wanted what I had tributed to this accomplishment but does it, I don't know that, I don't remember. Does he actually like go rose? He goes and cons with his wife is the story of the alchemists where the treasure was always like underneath you the whole time. You just had to dig in and own it, take some action towards right. His whole life
Speaker 6:was passive, right. He was doing and like he, when he got married, it was passive. It was going to, the Kollel was passive. There was never a, he wasn't an active participant in his life and the find and then, and then he finally owned it. He owned his life and he, and he chose it where he chose, he chose his life and there was a sense of like you see on his face and he's a different, like he was smiling and,
Speaker 5:and it was only by coming close enough and actually holding that opportunity in the hand and then saying, uh, I don't actually want this study was able to fall in love with the choices that he made. The truth enrages act.
Speaker 6:He, he went into the unknown. He grew, he went through the cycle and he trans even though, even though everything stayed the same.
Speaker 5:Right. Let's see. Ultimate, a story arc of like so many, I mean, the ultimate story, meaning it's a wonderful life. Uh, the Weatherman, is it like all the, so many of those Nicholas cage movies, is it Nicholas cage and the weather and like he's able to meaning or the, I forgot the name of it. Whatever the point is, where he wishes everything wasn't as life and then he has the perfect life and then he realizes he had the perfect life all along.
Speaker 6:Right. But that was that that shows you that these like these, like these art types is a universe is a universal principle or an idea that transcends culture like this principle, right? And it transcends a culture rad life. Like uh, uh, Christianity, Buddhism, all this. It's a human, it's a human idea. So you've been principal,
Speaker 5:so we had a conversation a few weeks ago. You were talking about this movie dude seen life itself.
Speaker 6:Oh, is that the second part? The second person was also the brother in law when he like completely goes off at all and then he comes here he comes, he's different. He comes back because of shame and because of uh, no father, she was abandon their kids. And you see that he eventually comes to the place where he like, like owns fatherhood, that he owns his life. He owns his relationship with his wife saying her heritage. Because I want to ask you a question about their in segment, but like he's like you, you see like that, like once again, a father been in their kids, bad guy, right? Right. We like black and white thinking. We don't know. The whole fact that that's bad. And yet we see that it's complicated and there's a lot of things like you was talking about, he was 19 never having an identity. I never having a life. And then all of a sudden he has a family. It's complicated. And who are we to judge, right? Where are we to judge what he did? Who says that we want to do the exact same based on our upbringing and what we want. Okay.
Speaker 5:Through. So I'll remind me, I want to ask you a question about that. That situation get the in him. But before that, I don't know. You ever see that what you see is walk like they're like they get, he has it now. That is fantastic. I love the way he holds the hat on the winning. They go flash back to his dating her. He's got that like that. Uh, so I was, I was at took a walk with Ellie. Yeah.
Speaker 6:And I was like, I put my hands behind my back and all of a sudden I was like,
Speaker 5:like walking like that. The wattle no auto.
Speaker 6:So this is a fit. This is, this is a fin testic we had a walk.
Speaker 5:Yeah. And it's like, it's, it's amazing in general, you're showing me or otherwise that the Hasidim, uh, I speak speak specifically like the full of Bush them. We tend to think that they're so limited in their, like, you know, they're black and white and quite literally and they have their leg, but there is so much personality and character that can be developed just within those confines and perhaps more so when you're, you're, you're limited to like various specific black and white, you know, you're almost forced to like find your expression and like your, your, your, your pap in like more, you know, original and like creative ways. And it comes out even in like in a walk, like there's this kind of Husted who holds his hands behind his back. And then there's a guy who kind of twiddles his hat and that went on was the one who like tilts it. And it's like you really get to see, you know, individuals, you know, Eh, obviously to be, you know, on familiar, I may all look the same, but when you get closer you start noticing like, okay,
Speaker 6:well it's, it's, I think it's also going back is the ability of finding the beauty in something that seems so ordinary,
Speaker 5:right?
Speaker 6:I think. And that can be done. You know, going back to, you know, we talk, uh, with uh, American beauty with the bag, the bag is in the wind and the guy's like, oh, this is the most beautiful thing. You're like, this is just a bag. But the meaning behind that is the ability, the genuine ability. Now like, you know, like mailing in like, I'm so grateful, like, like the genuine ability to see the beauty and the nuance
Speaker 5:of a plastic bag flying in the wind, right? So here we are observing this story, which is everyone's story, which is the oldest story and you're suggesting what is like really meaningful but also kind of a moral, which is appreciate how we are all Kiva and we are all Shalom and we are all every one of those characters and get the right
Speaker 2:without
Speaker 5:dismissing the pain that could be caused like hurt people hurt people without dismissing that just because it's her under,
Speaker 6:yeah, sorry. This is this that like hurt people hurt people. Yeah. Like that says that's the dumbest thing. I hate these cliches. Hurt people. Hurt people. Yeah. Like, like I, you know, it makes people hurt. People be like, what the like we're all hurting inside of them.
Speaker 5:It's redundant. Fine. Okay, so, but you're under, if I just said people hurt people, you wouldn't understand what I meant.
Speaker 6:No, but that'd be more accurate than hurt people. Hurt people
Speaker 5:because then it's obvious that we're all hurt.
Speaker 6:We're, we're like, we're all hurting as humans. We hurt. But then you didn't say like, oh, we, you know, I, I get what the implication is. I just think like, you know how I feel about cliches?
Speaker 5:Okay. So here's what I'm saying. I think there's a lot of truth is unreliable narrator and that, you know, getting away from the black and white, but how do you do that without starting to like really mess with the foundations of what we internally internally know inherently know to be right and wrong and good and bad thing. But, and it depends on the one who's deciding it. No. Okay. So you're going into this whole like millennial my truth versus
Speaker 1:you might want to make sure though
Speaker 6:Zania is deal. We're going from the org toward transitioning from two dimensional to three,
Speaker 5:the three dimensional, right? So for me, the way I processed that is very simple. I can absolutely understand. I can absolutely connect and appreciate that I may never really understand it without being there. Right. And, and I, I've experienced that and been in that situation. I've been to like prison many, many, many times and saw like real beauty in humanity and at the same time was consciously aware that this person, yeah.
Speaker 1:Murdered someone. Right? So what's this called? What, what's this called?[inaudible] in the geometry world circle. I have a, what's it like when circles and circle, you know, like I don't know anything, right? It's right. You're Kabod right when she went to you went to yeshiva. Yes. I forgot what, um, do you metric please when the two circles are aren't, are intertwined and you have like the space in between them, did they share? That's called life, right? Once again, you have good,
Speaker 2:you bad
Speaker 1:and you have this part where they bull share. That's what it's all about. Hmm. Is that is when we are on going back to that reliable narrator is that it may be possible that our first person account of life might be incomplete and then weed and like, like children, we have an unwavering trust for the narrator. So we then we take a step back and be like, hmm, maybe the narrator like might be speaking in distortions. Is it my, I went back my truth or not my truth, but like let's go into it like a synthesis of two extremes and get to this middle point, that middle point. Right. Which is the balance of two opposite extremes. That's what we call life. Hmm. That's what we call the humans. That's what we're made of.
Speaker 5:I know. Wow. I mean, first of all, this was entirely in keeping with like Kabbalah and like Jews understanding of like the creation of the universe and good and bad forever being mixed after headlights, his ass and everything else.
Speaker 1:[inaudible] it's like going back to a seed, right? Right. Uh, this, uh, a seed has it totally decompose and kill itself in order to grow into something beautiful. Mussels have to destroy itself, which has seemingly bad. Right? And we're at two or something stronger to occur. There is night and there's Day. There are seemingly two polar opposites, both in the two. Polar opposites contain everything as this is the whole thing. The whole concept of the union yet or both? In Yin and Yang, they both lie. That's where the two circles represent. So it's finding the, the, the middle point. We're calm and chaos could coexist. Meaning to say, don't be bad and don't be joker. Both those guys are posers.
Speaker 5:I was at a group thing and I had a like a little insight because the, the subject was like,
Speaker 3:okay,
Speaker 5:acknowledging that reality is what reality is, not my thoughts and feelings about rate. What reality is
Speaker 1:is right, right. Seeing like seeing the world as it is. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And[inaudible]
Speaker 5:there were a few people talking on the topic that gave me this insight and basically there were a few people and they all said that they all shared a similar sentiment, which was, I know we're talking about reality and the reality, not my reality, but I often feel like, and once you're ready to go into that, I feel like you know what you're, where you're headed. And the way there was everyone should have the, those people who share the sentiment of, uh, I feel like sometimes
Speaker 4:my reality is the reality pretty much. Right. So, and then I, then when they share a bit more, it was very clear that if as a child you were not allowed to have your reality and your feelings, then the reality will always turn into your reality. Which is to say, if I was never allowed to have my truth, like yes, I'm six years old and I'm feeling scared, then I'm going to be 26 and now it is not just a cloudy day. It is scary. Meaning I was never allowed to have a my reality and my truth, my feelings. So now everything is my truth and my feelings. Or in this specific story of the guy who comes to the reverend complaints, everyone is stepping on me and he says, well, what do you expect when you just lay down on the ground, right? So people don't have a choice. They're going to, it's nothing do with them, right? Of course you're going to be stepped upon, which is if I am not owning my reality and I was never given the permission to own my reality, well my reality is going to be everywhere,
Speaker 6:right? That's where the balance comes in and going back, is that in one pocket or this is the same as symbolism? A tour or like, I guess every Hasidic rabbi kind of says the same thing is that on one hand you have to believe that the world was created for me. Right? There's like sense of like my reality, like this millennial, right? And, and
Speaker 4:right. And the bridge between the two extremes and,
Speaker 6:and then on the other pocket, I'm not, I'm nothing but dust and, uh,
Speaker 4:maggots, right? Or Moo. What,
Speaker 6:how do I, how do I, how do I come to a place that both are true? They are. Hmm. Is He inu regular into more like a, the iron tower I knew from our member Uber, Uber, I hate those names. Right? It's like, am I a reality exist and I need to respect and appreciate your otherness. Right? And that you do have a reality and not only the Youtube of reality, your reality is beautiful. Magnificent,
Speaker 4:so, and it doesn't need to conform to my reality. Okay. And then, and when we each do that, then we can actually show up, honestly and self sufficiently to be able to have an actual relationship with the objective reality. Correct. Which is, which is different than our own individual reality. Yes. I think
Speaker 1:it's really tie thing gets really hard and really complicated. I think it's taken me a long time to come to this come to this place of, of the balance between willingness and willfulness and, and kind of maturing.
Speaker 5:How do you, how do you see those tied in? What willfulness[inaudible] first of all, explain what you mean by willing versus willful.
Speaker 1:Am I willing to entertain the idea that I have my reality and you have your reality, right? Am I able to, am I willing to entertain the idea that even though I am experiencing pain and difficulty and suffering, it's might be possible that there's like that it will come and go as a way of that it's not the reality that there's, it's possible that there's something greater than myself that's happening, right? Or my willful would be like trying to put my beliefs what I want on to other people, onto myself, right. With this store shins and try limiting myself and being something that I'm not, or having people be something that they're not having my uh, having having my spouse be there, be my mommy, right? Have my troll a dron do x, y have my coworker, you know, uh, do the things that I want them to do. How my clients, right. Right. Like be perfect clients so I could feel good about myself as a therapist. Right?
Speaker 5:Let others be others. So you can, you allow you to be used so others can be,
Speaker 1:well, I'm saying like, am I just with like, or I also am I willing to acknowledge that light that I make mistakes. Huh? I'm willing to acknowledge that like that I'm flawed and then I'm human and I'm doing the best that I can and I could do better or the two could coexist. I hit, I taught, this is like a concept that I like the two don't, don't cancel each other out, but I'm doing the best I can as a, as, as me, as a, as an individual, as a father, as a husband, as a professional, as a friend. Sydney here right now with you and I and, and all those roles I will do better. Oh boy. We always like the end. It doesn't discount. It doesn't invalidate I think, I think that the dialectical perspective has changed my life immensely over the years and he's, it has, I've gone a lot less like bitter and in my, my inner heredity, my inner lid fuck my ear, like Mike in or like the sugars in the and being comfortable with, without being, being comfortable with the idea that I'm not perfect and I have is not being complacent and willing to entertain that. That the journey is a process and it takes time to develop, not, not looking for immediate results. And that's what people like. It's like I want to change right away. It's not happening as fast as like happened. Screw it. Let me continue in dysfunctional behavior and, and, and distorted belief system. And then I wake up again and be like, oh, I need to change. And then it's an immediate is you want, it's, it's the, um, the, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results where I could throw out those, that insanity that though, that belief system then something marvelous and something something spontaneous, which I knew that occur. I make room, I expand for that to exist.
Speaker 5:Hmm. What's, what's amazing is, is that I know people who've discussed this'll and in an effort to like, you know, the, all their anger around it, right? Oh, it's often people who grew up Haredi like, or reminds them of all the dysfunction that they grew up with and how much they hated and they, there's a complete lack of acknowledgement of the degree to they, how they manifest their own inner Haredi around whatever it is. Like Sholom is every parent forcing their children into whoever they are. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, I think as a parent is, it's, it's one of the hardest thing to do is to realize that your, that your children are not like near the properties are, they're not your property.
Speaker 5:Something that really got to me when I was watching this is when get these husband comes back and he so desires to, he so desires to have a like a conversation with her about what happened and she just wants to pretend like nothing ever happened and he keeps like trying to initiate it and she shuts it down and then nothing really happened. Well I don't know what you're talking about while she resents him and hates of, right. And is acting out around that in her own ways and is dealing with it despite realizing it or not. And was, it was twofold. One, it was appreciating like the level to which fry, I mean he's the bad boy and he, he can't live with himself. Not at the very least like having his apology herd or having, he's wanting to be vindicated, vindicated or even, or even like he wanted something he wanted to like even like
Speaker 4:admonish me but like something, at the very least, let's not pretend this wasn't something something happened clearly. So he's a, he's seeking redemption while she's seeking retribution. Yes. Yes. And, and really what they're both really, one is like is one to love each other. Yeah. There's one of the Nice family. Yeah. And it's his, his inability to like speak up for what was wrong and what drove him to need to believe. Right. And her lack of ability to speak up about how hurtful that was as leaving and then not being able to acknowledge that that really did happen. He really did leave. He really did take off his beard and a little of Bush and go live with some Argentinian Shiksa like she couldn't grapple with that. But there's inherent in both. There's hope. Fear, I guess fear. Like if I even say
Speaker 1:start that conversation or go down that road, God knows where it will lead. Fear, the unknown, right. Is talking about it. It's, it's, it's a courageous, active venture into the unknown because look at that when she was able to finally go to that dark place, you know, I like to call it the coders Kardashian of one soul that hopefully you'll be able to enter at least once in their lifetime. Right. Neil's saying once a year like that course Kadesha where nobody goes. Right. Do you know what is right. When she was finally able to do that, she was able to is she found there
Speaker 3:him. Right.
Speaker 1:And she was able to tap into that relationship like[inaudible] you know, like she was like try to shield her daughter from making like the same, right. We love mistake that she made and the she made, but when she was able to like finally opened that place up and let him in, she was able to let herself, she, yeah. Yeah. She was able to train there as she was able to, now she has like a whole different, she was able to, to go up and the level of connection with her husband that was lacking and why and when and when we can't do that. There was, but I was there. We can't let anyone else do that either. It's a wall. Right? Walls are there. Right. The coach that you have these walls, walls or they're told to not allow people from venturing in. I noticed her also doesn't let you venture out. Have you noticed this? Like your therapist and I've noticed just within the small sphere of people I know who are other therapies or other this as well? No, just people I know and it's not like, oh I didn't mean scientific, but you have like 500 friends on Facebook. I know, you know so many, so many people that parents tend to like save their harshest.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 4:For the kids that most remind them of themselves. I mean I guess it's not like it's pretty out there. It's not. But I have observed it in specific situations where they, the be like a mother with daughters or father would sons, the ones that most sometimes even physically resemble them. And certainly like character wise and personality, they tend to be like extremely harsh. Especially when there's unresolved
Speaker 1:self. Yeah, absolutely. I think that the voice that's in our own heads that's reserved to beating, beating us up, right. All of a sudden go transfers onto that particular son or daughter because like, yeah, I could talk bad about that. I could be so harsh to them cause they're me. Right. So like with Sun a who doesn't remind me of me. I can be loving and caring and understanding, but son B, who's like, who's hat is sensitive as I am or who is who, who doesn't play sports or who doesn't do x, y. I could tell him that he, that he's incapable. I can be harsh. I can go from zero to a hundred and be a real dick to him because I am that same dick to myself. I am that same unreliable narrator that's harsh, unpredictable, and not secure. I have not. If I had the reason why I can't parent that child is because I have not yet learned to parent myself. Do I parent myself through a lens of being a critical parent? Distortions, abuse, verbal, or do I shift to overdo or from place of a nurturing parent? Compassionate. Apparently we talk about this, right? It's something that we've spoken about like a in a, in a, in Florida, right, and that hole, but it's like co if you, once you learn how to parent on yourself effectively, then you'll able to,
Speaker 4:but how many times do we hear this? Which sounds like martyr like, and we all know what that's about, but it sounds very, um, altruistic. It sounds noble. Like I'm gonna give my kids everything I didn't have. And sometimes that means like a lot of playstations and stuff, but sometimes it's like, I'm going to love my kids the way my parents never loved me. And it's like, that sounds great.
Speaker 3:Good. But
Speaker 4:you can't really do that if he still don't love yourself
Speaker 1:or you don't really know how to, yeah. You know, our, uh, Ross Greene says, I mean, that's really, this is one of the few things that really impacted my view in therapy and on the world. Right. And he, he, he posits that if a child is struggling academically in English or arithmetic, what do we do know as the school? And the parents will like give him a tutor, be understanding like you, like nurturing, compassionate, right? They'll, they'll take the, uh, the precautionary measures to make sure that he, if he's deficient in a skill than he would be, you know, and he'll be caught up, right? However, if the kid is struggling emotionally, socially, what's wrong with you? Why don't you like, or he's at, he's acting out. You know, children have an innate innately want to do the right thing and they don't want to do it. Just don't know how to do it. And nobody's really telling them how nobody's teaching them. Ha. Nobody's did. Cultivating and developing these skills we just expecting to actively know. So instead of getting them the help, we break them. What's wrong with you for not knowing? And they feel like pretty, they feel if they feel like garbage and if feel less than that same child, it's going to grow up to the adult and as an adult and still and still exhibit the same dysfunctional behaviors only because he was never taught and he's going to be down on themselves for not knowing. And why am I not like everybody else who intuitively, right? Everybody like who just magically knows how to do it right? It were reality as we know that nobody emotional intelligence needs to be taught for some reason. We don't teach emotional intelligence. Now we are a little bit in the Jewish and the Jewish. Um, for sure in the Jewish curriculum is very, it's, we're like 20 years behind, but emotional intelligence needs to be taught. It's nothing. It's nothing to, it's, it's not, it's not intuitive. It's not natural. So the, the same child is all, is going to be continuously repeat the same child and adult is going to continuously repeat dysfunctional behavior at all because he was never taught. So now that he won, now this child, let's say, wants to like give care and compassion and do all the things that he saw on like a full house or seventh heaven to his children as if he could just skip himself in the process. Right. Or remember this, you know, like remember you see hook? No, it was, it was Robin Williams. When Peter Pan Grows up. No, like Peter Pan. He is like the like the quintessential child, right? Who like loves lie. He like that, you know, when he grows up he be, he's a real asshole as a father. He's like this bitter, like, like, like this bit. This guy like hates his life. Hates his family. He doesn't know how to like make his kids like how make life magical cause he was never taught how to be a parent. Right. I'm thinking in the movie it's more complicated but like it's the same thing like unless you like take responsibility and teach yourself the skills. Yes. You weren't taught whatever skills are deficient in, in your life and it's up to you and you're responsible to like learn how to do it and realize sometimes you fall and sometimes you struggle. And being a parent is
Speaker 6:hard. Like how many kids do you have Marie? Three holes. The oldest seven youngest.
Speaker 1:Oh so, so seven, seven, three seven six, seven, six three.
Speaker 6:Okay,
Speaker 4:so you're not just speaking theoretical than you, you, you live this life.
Speaker 1:It like a real example is that my oldest,
Speaker 6:my oldest ICO, lot of here, I see a lot of me and him and my wife can attest. I'm very critical at times. You know, I'm definitely, I'm definitely human. You know, sometimes you know, I try to correct my own mistakes through him. I don't mean I'm a victim to that
Speaker 4:and he doesn't get it. He doesn't get it. You know what I mean? You're like, maybe 70 year olds aren't supposed to get, I don't know, like a seven year roles like aren't like intuitively like be like amazing and like, do you ever notice when you're like, just stop it and you're really saying like stop it through yourself about whatever you just did
Speaker 6:a hundred or a lot more? A lot.
Speaker 1:I, I noticed that like, like my, sometimes my reactions to him, I'm saying I have a lot now. I think a lot of, I have urges to respond and like this like hurry, anyway, you know, this like this insecure like this of like a compensating just like throw shown on him and everything. It's like, it's like you spilled milk, like what's wrong with you? Like we're going to kick you out back. And we were doing around like bee with open fist. Closed fist is a reportable, but it's in New York. We believe in capital punishment and that's with like, uh, whenever it's a joke, like on wild. But like I like we're, I'm human. I'm, once I started to embrace that, that you like that I'm not perfect.
Speaker 6:Right. I, and that I, and I'm sure, I don't know, I like
Speaker 1:parenting is, is also a skill that needs to be learned, but like in a, in a will and a willing way where like the, it's a process. I think I had parents like, until I like you're going to screw up your kids, you want to aim for the 3%, like it's so it's going to happen 30%. Like not screwed up. They, the 30% screw up. You know, it's not based on science, but it's just, if you're so careful not to screw them up, you're going to screw them up. Right, right. But I still, I, I came home from a wedding.
Speaker 4:That sounds great by the way. I'm saying like,
Speaker 6:okay,
Speaker 4:meaning I'll, Avaya was like, even like a thing to like desire not to. So, so that you
Speaker 11:can, I just say embraced in break, uh, the lice for now, I'm going back to late spiritually and perfect. But like going back, it's like you're going to parent and perfectly right and like do the, doing the best you can while continuing to grow. Like I'm or I, I came, I came, I came home from a wedding two weeks ago. Yeah. I, and my oldest son, like, it was like, I came back from like a only a Williamsburg wedding and I was like, oh my son. Um, and I'm like, you know, warming up leftovers. And my son comes downstairs and he's talking to me and talking about urges is the, the, my first response is like, why are you awake? Why aren't you in bed? Why aren't you sleeping? But then I think, and then once I allow those urges and thoughts to pass, then I also think like, oh, like this is a great opportunity to bond with my son. I like him sometimes, you know, I think differently, but like I love my son and you know, this is a great opportunity to not to admonish him for him, not uh, for not hitting, you know, carrying my will of being into bed but to spend time with them and bond with him and he's just talking about other utter nonsense in this day about stuff I don't even know, but I'm just like looking at him and I'm seeing, I'm seeing my son not seeing me seeing my son and for like for all his quirks and for all for him, his personality is like a little cute little freckles and I'm seeing him as not an extension of, of me. I'm seeing it as a separate entity and as a as um, like he's talking. Yeah, I'm thinking like, wow, I really like, I love this kid so much. Like so like more than, it's like I tapped into that for like to that moment as an infant, I'm holding it in my arms. I just like, I'm looking at him like he is, he is, he is worthy of love, security and like looking at him and I, why I live, I'm like filled in my art like with so much emotion. I only, I think I stopped him like in like as he's talking about like Twizzlers, I was like, Ellie, yeah. I'm like, I love you man. I think I was like, I love you so much. And he like looks down. He was like, I know. I was like, am I know, but like I really love you. And he said, you know what? You know, like every time I feel that you don't love me, you always in that part, that part, like at that point that, that, that, that point, I don't feel loved you. You always say I love you. It always reminds me that. And, and I was like, I was like, there's, you know what Ellie, there is nothing you could ever do.
Speaker 8:Hmm.
Speaker 11:Never, nothing that will ever take away my love for you. And I'm sorry that I don't like if I don't express it to you enough and I just wanna let you know that like I'm doing the best I can as a father and I'll always be striving to be better. And I know your doing the best you can as a son and, and what unites us is that we both love each other. And he was like, yeah, I know, I love you too. He like, he grabs hold of me and I grabbed hold of him and, and I was like, and I, and I was like, not only do I love you, I always want to make sure that like I always want to make you like happy and go, we weren't, don't want to give to you. He's like, and I'm like, and I'm like, I know at times you only think I can give to you cause I like, like I don't give you candy. He's like, I know, I know even though you don't give me candy, it's because it's for like, cause it's for my health. And we just sat there and held each other. And that was a profound experience of the ability of like owning my own challenges and weaknesses of like being in like a, as being a parent and not trying to, not trying to write the sins of myself, of my, my deficiencies, my defects of my son and allow him to really be himself. And as a result of that, I become my own PR. I become my own self. I become my own parents. I'm not like, like redoing the same thing, the myrcene same patterns as as my father and his father and his father. I create my own story, my own arc, my own path and then only happened that only was able to happen and I was able to venture into that part of myself and look myself in the eye and say like, dude, you're parenting your kid as if you're parenting yourself. You need to love yourself. You need to like love yourself now like this. Like, like you're worthy of love. You are worthy of, of compassion. You are worthy to being nurtured. You have inherent worth. Once I was able to entertain the idea and at that moment except the idea, then I was able to channel that towards buys towards my son. Hmm. That was a profound, profound experience. Wow.
Speaker 4:There's something like circular there that's putting in like the healthiest way, which is I need to love myself enough to be able to not hate this reminder of myself. And then I also need to appreciate that this child is not me. He, he or she or he, he's his own person and doesn't deserve to be like to be projected with all my stuff around myself.
Speaker 11:Right? Altruistic self love.
Speaker 4:Alright. And then once I do that and I, I distinguish, I can, I can disengage and distinguish in order to unite. So like I'm not closer to my son. I'm not closer to myself as a result of distinguishing that they are not me. And I can only do that once I loved myself enough not to be overwhelmed by the feeling of here's this reminder of me and I hate myself and I hate this reminder of that.
Speaker 11:Right. Challenging the unreliable narrator, which is located in your brain. Challenging all those ideas and thoughts that's possible. That all, that's not true. Meaning to say that the more I give to like to go into that parent, the more I give to my son, the more I make him try to be try to correct the sins of our fathers. Right. The more he, he will perpetuate this ends of the fathers, the cycle will continue.
Speaker 2:There's a,
Speaker 4:a resistance to self help were talking to this slow, we're talking about the Haredi community, but there's a resistance to self help that's often rooted in the, in the sentiment of why go back to the past, who needs to go there and trudge up old stuff
Speaker 2:and
Speaker 4:the response often is like, well you have to go there if you're going to, you know, heal that or whatever you would ordinarily say to that kind of fear based
Speaker 2:uh, yeah.
Speaker 4:Justification for not having healthy self reflection. But there is, you often talk about this at the asset and the defect, like the truth in that false hood is that going into the past can sometimes be a misnomer. It can often be feeding into the, the, the, the, the false narrator, the untrust, the WWE had reliable, reliable narrator, right? Because once I'm putting the spotlight on what was, eh, I'm almost, if I don't distinguish what now from then or myself from my child, then then I'm, I'm somewhat doomed to repeat it, right? Where as if I kind of keep the focus on the future, keep, keep the focus on the present and what is now not what was, but at the same time, if I only do that, if I'm not appreciating where I came from, what the finch, what deficiencies make me up. And if I don't check that I'm going to repeat it. So I need both, right? I need the honest self reflection, the honest recognition of what the narrative that already exist. Like it or not, is it going on within between my ears. And then once I do that I could be like, yes, that's what was, but that's not now and my kid isn't me. But yes, there is a potential if I go just to the past to become like further a victim of repeating that. And just doing that with more awareness. I often make the joke like the only thing that like awareness at some point, this is the awareness alone. Like if it's awareness without willingness for, for transcendence or betterment, just awareness. It helps me suffer more sophisticated. Lee. Right. A second. I can suffer with more sophistication though so I can be aware of what's happening while I'm doing it, but I do the same thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I'm saying like that's where I think, I think that's where people get lost in this whole story telling that like this whole story telling, um, movement, which I'm fully supportive of and at the same time it could be very dysfunctional, uh, and, and, and very self righteous. Right? Cause if you continuously, if you, if you're telling your story of this and with distortions and your kind of day rewarded, right.
Speaker 4:Without acknowledging like, Hey, and I'm also my father now against
Speaker 1:my son saying like, you know, like I'm, I just, I just shared with you this like how many people, this is like a, it's like a deep, uh, I don't want to say like, it's part of my story. I'm not going, I'm not going to a sensor, a sensor, my own story. At the same time, my story is not exactly like took it like this truth, this whole like all or nothing truth. My truth, I, it's really has gone to like a level of competitive storytelling. You know, a few years ago it was competitive spirituality. Right now it's like competitive storytelling, which is just, and then if you tell your story in a nice, slow, meaningful, right way, the crowd will love him and will like say like, oh, he's talking slow, which is meaningful, I need meaningful, they're going to love it. And then the guy feels so good about his victim hood story, they keys on it and the cycle continues.
Speaker 4:Yeah. And I wonder if, I mean the the great appeal and, and, and I, I would say like the eating up of it is almost a way of like, let me jump on that bandwagon of pointing out what was wrong and feed off that energy of I was dealt a raw deal
Speaker 1:and people don't realize that it was probably also a lot of, right.
Speaker 4:Yeah. And, and I want to point out, and I had no expectation of this going here. Like you're looking, I have this paper right now and I have, I wrote down like 10 words. One of them was Manhattan teenage years and I only didn't write father and because I didn't want you to be worried. I was going to ask you about like your childhood and I probably would have heard some things that were difficult at best. Traumatic probably
Speaker 1:and obviously traumatic. I'm a therapist, a trauma therapist with only the most wounded because, right.
Speaker 4:But, but somehow instead you told me this story that still has me like sniffling and I'm going to pretend was great audio. You're not seeing this, not leftover, but like, you know, you shared this beautiful story that was packed with responsibilities like honesty and like self reflection. It wasn't it, you know, it's everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 4:A good story. Odd to be with all the lessons that a story should have without the finger pointing. And woe is me. It's, it's, it, it's, it was beautiful and the message was not, I'm so sorry that happened to you to take away was joy like joy for you that you can have that and, and love yourself through your child, but not in a codependent way. Either. Enjoy for your son who has a father who able to be honest enough with themselves.
Speaker 11:And we're back to what you said and, and loving myself for both asset ed defect, right. To love myself for all of me. Both the good and the bad.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Do you want to Fart or something so we can call this a night and we not gonna end up, uh, right.
Speaker 1:You're, you're, you're, you seem like you're not crying. You're crying and you're like,
Speaker 11:it's okay. Strong. Mid. Also cry. It's the story of the big Lebowski. We'd have to like throw that in at some point. Also. Really, she just told us the story of big old basket and pickled Dusky is a storage decile. Are you okay? You want to stop?
Speaker 4:All right. Yeah. How much stuff?
Speaker 1:Thanks for doing this. I bet you didn't see this going in there. I thought we were in talking about comedy and like, I know I have dark humor. They're just, you want to talk about about you don't talking about that. Not that there's any, not that there's any contradiction.
Speaker 4:Yeah, but I don't know. I feel a little, okay. How do dead babies and how does dark humor fit in with this or does it, or is there any harm
Speaker 6:has dark I think. I think I do see a segue. I think it is.
Speaker 5:We just shared something that could have been just a traumatic memory of your own father and instead it turned into probably the most beautiful, joyful story I've heard. I don't know, maybe ever. Right? And that inherently it was the, the, the, the, the pain of recognizing the disdain you had for yourself and where that might have been rooted in your own childhood and born out of that like that plus some courage and challenging, you're unreliable. Narrator equaled something beautiful and joyful, alright. And uniting and empowering for your son. And perhaps in the same way that dialectic provides the, the, the, the fusion of humor and the darkness, something like that's really, really unique that could be born from that.
Speaker 6:I was saying, if you look at it when we talk about polar opposites in nature, a night and day, like going back to cliche is the darkest part of night is, is dawn, right? Before it becomes a slight right, that means that the light and the darkness, the follow each other, they're connected, they're intertwined. You look at the body,
Speaker 13:right? Laughter
Speaker 6:and crying are intertwined just as much. We use the same Bot bodily functions and mechanism as it like when we're like, you know, like quick when we laughed so hard to be crying, right? But think about if a person just like their facial expressions, when they're laughing, they use it. It's the same when they're crying as well. Their body, the diaphragm, the whole, I mean it's intertwined. They're together. They're like, they're there. It's like getting, if we don't laugh, we cry or anything like, uh, like Viktor Frankl talks about that. It's like, he talks about it in two places, like, uh, in his book a few times. Like it's Uma is his soul is, is, is, is, is the soul's weapon for success for herself preservation. And another part he used that humor is the ability is, is, is, is like mastering the art of living. We were able to, to see that, that it's
Speaker 13:to see,
Speaker 6:you know, I, there's also pointed part of the book, he told me, he talks about you like you, like you like gives the example of the humor, the gas, you know, it's kind of, it's kind of ironic that he's giving the humor, the grass Umer to gas while he's sitting Auschwitz. And one thing that's, you know, it also when you're able to take
Speaker 4:Umer Umer is like, is the ability of like, I think Dave Chappelle said is quoting somebody else. It's that, it's the synthesis of the paradox.
Speaker 2:Right
Speaker 4:on the while I was very late to come in here, uh, I was in the bathroom and I watched, I was scrolling through Facebook and they have like one video replays after another and this old clip from the 90s of Chris Farley on the, on, uh, Conan O'Brien. And he says, I want to share something that's like different and out of like character for me. And he shares the song about, it's very weird because it's like he's, he's doing an act, but he's sharing himself and it's the song and he stops halfway, um, about being, being a fat guy and like, you know, eating to manage his emotions. And uh, and the audience is laughing and he's kind of laughing, but he's also crying. It's like very weird. Not Weird. It's, it's like very real. Right. And, and I was thinking on the way over here, like I see a fat guy and I just assume they're funny. I see a skinny fat guy, fat guy go. So I, I see a fat guy and I just assume they have a good sense of humor. Right. And I'm usually surprised when they don't. I'm surprised when they're like, not really nice guys. Also, I'm always like upset. I mean I every once in a while I'd bit a fat guy and he's like not a sweetheart. And I'll be like, what the fuck? You're supposed to be really nice because this is this. Is that a character? Right. And then I'll meet a skinny guy, or even worse, like a skinny good looking guy who's like put together. And besides for wanting to kill them, I'll also, I'll also be like very surprised when they have a sense of humor. It's like that, that's weird. You're not supposed to be funny. You're supposed to like have it all together. So you have no reason to develop any sense of humor, a sense of, uh, a coping mechanism to handling sheets more than a coping mechanism. It's like how else to come to terms with the inherit injustice of being a fat kid in a classroom of over this is one, right? Like laughter. Well it's not, but there's a difference between coping and like coming to terms with the inherent and justice around me inherit coming to terms with, I mean it's a fancier way of saying coping, but coping almost makes it sound like, oh, it's like, you know, I think are as pa, I'm saying that like humor and laughter communicates to you and to others that everything will be okay.
Speaker 1:Right? Like if I like it once again, if my child or let's say we fall right, we simply on the street and somebody falls, right? And they get up and they smile or communicate to you right then and there that everything is okay and that's that. Yes, everything is, everything will be okay. Everything is okay and perhaps even more so that this is not okay, but it's okay because at least it's funny. No, but I think it's okay. You know this, it's funny. That is also an element of that. It relieves some come some stress. It's like all of a sudden the thing that the stressor, the stimuli no longer becomes as scary. It loses its power. One of the greatest things that Charlie Chaplin ever did was play the great dictator, right? Cause then Hitler was like, you know, you ever, when you look at Hitler, he's like this measly five, six, you know, homosexual looking guy who gives like the hi fi like it's right. And I still think they should do that to every one of these guys who go on a shooting rampage selecting their manifesto. It's like creating characters out of them like pooping in their pants and everything, right? So, which is really what's happening if you, if you go just a little further, but like, but my, my, my point is this almost, it's more than that. It's like it's the ability to, this is not okay, but it's almost, it all makes sense in light of the fact that it's funny, right? Umer in dark, I'm a dark, send it like dark and refer me or humor gives, enables me to be resilient in, enables me to rise above any situation. Going back to the store with my child, like dark humor, like, oh, maybe I'm like, you know, like I just need to, you know, a little bit of, uh, you know, mess them up 30%. That's kind of funny. And I, I'm able to give myself permission to not be a perfect parent. I'll be able to rise above the situation. The same thing you want to do with my as a therapy. Like I like when you give yourself permission, obviously not the mess up and not be, I'm not talking about being unprofessional, I'm just, uh, I'm talking about not taking yourself so damn seriously and laughing at yourself when you make mistakes and giving yourself the ability to learn the skills in order to be the best view, but going and going back is not taking yourself too damn seriously. Take yourself seriously. Right? But t oh, not okay. And I had some problems with humor and people take, all of a sudden they, they think of themselves too too seriously. And going back to the Nazi thing, it's directly tied in. There's a great documentary, uh, Gilbert Gottfried and Jeff Ross and some others made about about what the Melbourne about, about, about the other taught. I wonder who told you
Speaker 4:to watch that. Okay. I don't need it to be told about that document. Just got my own anyway, but that's fine. I told you to watch it. I texted you. I was like, Oh, you gotta watch this. Right. But I don't think they say it outright, but I actually met Gilbert Godfrey and I, we had this conversation it anyway, but where do when you, after you play before you plays out of Hitler and Jeff Ross's rose. I didn't see that yet. Oh my gosh. It's on believable. Unbelievable. And see that. Yeah. Then Netflix. All right. But it's almost like someone who hasn't acknowledged how they could be a Nazi is afraid of Nazi jokes. Right, right. But once, going back to what, how do we started this conversation about you sympathizing with Hitler, which is until I recognize how low I can go, I need to put up phony facades of who I am. Right. And I can afford to not just have anyone poke holes or of me, I can't even watch someone tell a joke that might remind me that I have not yet reconciled with who I can possibly be very uncomfortable because you're being used to face with yourself. Right? Like Joseph Campbell says, is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasure of life where you stumble there Lizer treasure, that's an to light. That's the hero's journey. Right? And until I've done that for myself, I can't really allow others to do that around me without yelling
Speaker 6:racist. Right. That's where you go back to before that's suffocating. That's like that righteous indignation of like,
Speaker 4:you know, of. Um, we said when you spoke with like, like a w when we were talking about like two and a half hours ago when it was still like 10 o'clock at night, um, people will come calling out
Speaker 6:for the slightest injustice, right. When there's real injustice. Right. Because it's not coming from a place of courage. Yeah. They had courage. They would, you know, like, where's that Hashtag bring back our girls? Nobody cares. Right, right. It really, if you think about, nobody cares about the me too movement anymore. No. It's like it's a, it's like a Hashtag. It's like it's, it's, it's gone. Were we, they get swept away and then,
Speaker 4:all right. Ernest Kurtz has this great way of putting it. We're going back to the humor a bit, which is like, it doesn't exactly say it this way, but I'm gonna add it. But he like old man walks down the street, slips on a banana peel. Not Funny. All right man. On a way to an important business meeting in a three piece suit and anti Shay case slips on a banana. Hilarious. All depends on the context, right? Which is suffering is not funny. Pain is not funny. But man, taking himself too seriously, avoiding pain, and then they reminded that life is beautiful and sucks. Hilarious. That's the dialectic,
Speaker 6:right? Going back. And so that's where it, that's where the beauty, that's where the answer is, is they're embracing that dial ethical stance of like laughter and tears are the same. Dark and light are the same, are connected. They're part of, they're intertwined. Not the same, but they're intertwined. They're connected and you can't have one without the other. Now only that life really be like, I have clients, I don't want to have any emotions. Right? Yeah. All right. If you're saying, you know what, any emotions and like it means like
Speaker 14:love
Speaker 6:connection, right. You know, serenity, right. All these other, you know, quote unquote positive emotions you won't even have, but even going back, he that even in the sadness, right? You don't have sadness.
Speaker 1:Going back to, um, what was that movie with the cartoons?
Speaker 6:Uh, inside, outside, outside, outside, outside. It. Not for what's inside. What's inside out.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Only through something that's meaningful and like beautiful exists through sadness. It's like when you, when, when Nietzsche says like, you have to be a person as it'd be like a, like a, a Phoenix
Speaker 6:rising through the ashes being reborn from the ashes. Right?
Speaker 1:It's like, it's amazing. People like are so scared of sadness, right? It's pro is our body processing and healing grief and coming to a new understanding. What happens is, is I went back to the sun is I needed sadness to really come to a new understanding. Okay. I've got two questions before we continued to pontificate
Speaker 4:because you're going to go in a minute and I don't want to not ask this. So two things. First of all, I'd be remiss without mentioning that there's a Yiddish song. I'm not going to sing it for you. I know. How much is that excites you sexually?
Speaker 1:Well, no. The only one that really does it for me is like the is the, uh, the Schindler's list one.
Speaker 4:Uh, oh, I am. How's it go? I'm not taking Signifor. You buy the ticket for me. You want me to say, oh, how's that?
Speaker 1:I'm not saying that they ever, did they ever tell you the story of my son Yehuda, he was at, he had a kid's graduation at school. All the, all the kids are like marching with her little playgroup, ridiculous crowns, and they sing and they're all, and they're singing the song friction. And there's lists. I'm like the kid and I'm like, holy cow, how could they sing this song? Because I'll phase or doing all phase eyes. They're there, they're singing it. I was like, and I was like, guys, this don't, we shouldn't, there's less so, and nobody was like, what's wrong with my out? I was like, oh, only your head goes to hell. I was like, no, I think, I think Schindler's List kill that song. Right? Well everything
Speaker 4:for you goes back to shins or slips. It's like you see like a teapot and like[inaudible] like just like each other lists. Right. Anytime. I see, right. You Go, oh yeah, that was good. Okay, so there's a huge song though. Alright. Uh, okay. Oh, it's about, it's a humorous song making fun of the, the, the, the czar, how he s he must sip tea and then it goes through like, like eight stances, making fun of how the czar is so wealthy and has everything, but he like, he chokes on his wealth. So it's like we're sitting here are suffering under the tyranny of his like taxation and like all the things he does to us. But what we do have is the ability to make fun of him precisely for his wealth and, and, and, and his power. So it's like the, the, the first one is like a, he, it, the czar wants a cup of tea, but he's the czar so he can't just have a cup of tea. So instead he has like a block of sugar pushed into his mouth and then they stick like drops of teeth through the sugar. Right. Or He wants to go to sleep and he has this humongous bed with like the best plush, you know, pillows and Egyptian cotton and whatever else. And then he has eight guards on each sides of the door screaming, be quiet, be quiet. The czar's leaving. Right. Like the higher song in Yiddish stances. Yeah, but I'm not sure it's song. It's my bowel play it to like and this thing. But the point is, I don't know, it's not like a very like, groovy song, but the lyrics are very funny. And what I remember appreciating it was like, that's what they're doing. Like the czar has all the money, he has all the power, he's throwing them like treating them like garbage, but they have the ability to like laugh at him. I wanted to ask you some even but talked about like you cannot have the joy without the sentence. You don't want that. You want, you don't want that emotion. You're not going to have the others. But how often people stop short of that and they stopped right at the point of sadness or anger before the sadness or or, or whatever the emotion, the uncomfortable emotion is and they numb out or they, they, they, they stopped short instead of going through it and discovering themselves are discovering the joy on the other side and you're in a field and you deal a lot with people who use substances, processes, different things to stop those emotions short from playing out to their fullest. You know that playing out and you co wrote a book about it from a Jewish perspective, right? Talk about going out of the best, right? And they're going out of the business, involves
Speaker 6:stepping into going out of the business revolves exactly. Stepping into the abyss.
Speaker 4:Exactly. And, and so often we think we're avoiding it by just, you know, going further into the abyss. Right. And, and people do that in a myriad of different ways. There are going away. Yeah. Right. Maybe they think are going away from it. They think they're avoiding it in reality, they're just going deeper in it. Right. And not to like get into a whole thing about your book, but there's a lot of, and I suggest you read it. I've read only a few books. That was one of them. I think you have two copies. I have two copies. And, and my question to you is what is one insight or thought based on your years of research and writing that book that you'd like to impart with us? Well, like to call I guess to quote a really
Speaker 6:smart, intelligent, profound woman, a Nancy Reagan. Just say, no,
Speaker 5:you're an asshole. You want me to like, I was like, fuck, I was like seven questions into one. No,
Speaker 4:just my, I just gave you an opportunity to plug your book and say one nice thing about it. Instead you said, like
Speaker 6:the said, well, I struggle with that. I was, I, I, I have struggled with and if I, if I plug my book, I take myself too seriously, which is not true, which is the distortion of false narrative. That one has nothing to do the other as if in one moment if I say something positive or plugging than I am on, um, on, uh, it's not authentic and I'm a fraud and the beauty is, am I could be aware of those distortions and that and that struggle and that, that, that, that, that one hand is this need to being authentic in this fear of being authentic and a fraud.
Speaker 5:Yeah. And maybe maybe I can Arish start to become authentic when I, when I allow myself meaning to say, we're talking about this the other day about making money. I was like, do you think you're more likely to make money when you're entire identity stems from that? Or is that way too much tension and control to be able to actually do something like maybe if you come completely comfortable with who you are without making a dollar your air in a position your first then in a position to actually stop being so damn controlling and, and, and, and able to allow something to happen. Right.
Speaker 6:Exactly. So now am I willing to like advocate
Speaker 4:these two ideas, these two false beliefs about myself? Right. And just what do I want to do is if don't want to, it's like going back. Well the good news is, by the way, I want to talk about my book. Well first of all, I don't want to hear about your book. Well, so there's that. Obviously you read the book. What I've seen even read the book, you just read like the front and back cover that might, I mentioned that I did read it because of the novel, you know the novelty and the fact that I read a book and I was trying to make you feel good that I read Menachem his book and I don't know why you're giving me
Speaker 6:such a hard time about it. You're the play. Part of it is like the real honest truth is that the book was written by, you know, Manasseh and put his hands keen in books by it. But the real truth is that Imra books by F and I also went by a pseudonym called M anassen p lus Dansky and it just so happens to be that there happens to be a real, not c ompose landscape, but he's just, he's just the director o f the living room a nd j ust p ut this often p ose Natzke you w ere o nly a pseudo name, which i s really me. You really s pend a lot of o ur twain not thinking about yourself by thinking about yourself, but not, a nd not only not thinking about myself and how do I be create an alter ego a s I'm v ery, I'm basically like b older more, you know, like coming r elay. L ike
Speaker 4:I, I shared this the other day, but it's like, do you know how much self obsession it takes to be a martyr? Meaning like what? I'm like not getting
Speaker 6:only only if it's like Massada where you're like, oh, there's like, like you, like you have to go tell people like just the three survivors and you have to tell the people about me. Um, but going back to what you said before, how many people like stop before the miracle, before the transformation. It's the equivalent of working out how many people like I like, you know, this past, this past year, I've definitely,
Speaker 4:are you just like really, really? Uh, what's the word? Buff? Is that what they call it? No, uh, ripped. He's very healthy, very rip. I'm trying to try it, get in touch with my, you know, I'm, I'm looking at you and if I didn't know you so well, I would really, really hate you just for being as jacked as you are. But I do love you and I thank you for doing this and staying late. And uh,
Speaker 6:the point I want to make is that, is that, is that how many times people exercise, right? They work out for, they want to exercise and they want to develop and they want to grow. And I, and I followed it. I fell victim to this countless of times, but then they get sore and they're like, oh, this is so painful. I could barely walk, screw it's not worth it. And then they continue their day and their weeks and their years and they get fat or skinny or whatever. And then all of a sudden the idea
Speaker 11:of comms, I was like, oh, I want to get in shape. I want to get healthy. And then they go to the gym and they bind their Nike and their, uh, their new balances and they're all like souped up. And then they start working out and then they wake up and they're so sore and they're like, this isn't, that's just not for me. I can't do this. And then like again, like they stop and they get fatter and score and the days pass and then again the thought comes up, right? But unless they're willing to acknowledge it. If you continue with the exercising despite being uncomfortable, despite like hurting and feeling pain, once you go through it, once you go through this comfort, that pain you, you build a tolerance, you build resilience. Not only is that pain, it's your muscles breaking down, breaking down what used to be, what was there. The weakness, breaking that down and becoming stronger, developing muscle growing is through that pain and what you fear the most it will, that will enable you to get to the place where you crave because the person wants to be healthy. They want me stronger. But going through that pain that this discomfort enables you to get to your destination. The same thing is true with emotional pain. We had this idea of like, I want to become emotionally healthy. I want to go to a gym, right? Like it'd be a therapist, a self help book or just like developing yourself and then it's like, oh this is painful, this is uncomfortable. This is really like, ah. And then we stop until the pain continued and we don't even realize it really. The pain keeps on happening but it's not, it's not conscious. But then we become conscious again and then realize like this has to stop. We try again and then we stopped and let me try again. Or we'll use substances or process to, they get the illusion of being whole, the illusion of being complete, the illusion of being healthy and when that doesn't work or left of the realization of like that is inadequacy, this feeling of disconnected and then we're able to see ourselves as is right as like there were that were that were struggling, they were in pain and we need help and we have to go through the pain with go through the past in order to enable a better future or enable to enable to us have a better now better today despite being uncomfortable, being mindful of like w w what's happening and all of a sudden things like something sprouts out of the ground and then keeps on growing and growing and growing and this is marvelous trip and the reminders like the of like
Speaker 1:she's, I really needed to lose weight or I really need to go to the gym. They often come not from really places of like necessarily new year's resolution. They often come in the form of like rarely dark, uncomfortable slap in the face for nine years. They come from memorably said that the subconscious can be broken down into two parts. Your historical self or your true self. That part is like, hey man, like this is not good. This is not you. You're something more than this. You're at that party that wants to connect to something greater than yourself. That's your true self that's coming out in a whispering into your ear and whisper like that little subconscious giving you that kiss of like, hey, we're telling you, reminding you, you are not this. You can be so much more calm, calm, like he's their inner child. Come and then your historical sal says, no, this is painful. Pain sucks, pain is uncomfortable. I'm feeling it. We can't do this. And then we throw a temper tantrum and then we've done, we continue, you know like living in the, in the, in the um, constantly numb, right is really starting to ability to like to look at yourself and to see yourself both in the, in the, in your historical self and your true self. Looking at books and then that, and then when you're able to see what is, then you could decide and choose. What life do you want to have right now?
Speaker 15:[inaudible].