A Journey Towards Enlightenment, Amidst The Chaos || Rick Sharbau

[00:00:04] Take the gin to Conic Logway down past Whiskey Boulevard, Or ride a draft horse with no saddle, I be wading in the yard, Quit your whining, we can't lose, We got us ace in the hole, Raise a toast to the universal soul.

[00:00:19] It's good to be back. I hope everything's on the gravy with you all. This is Giants Amongst Us, where we share in the unique human experience and where you're going to hear real stories that are told by real people, people just like yourself.

[00:00:59] This is about the relatable ones, the giants that are amongst us, the idea, the concept, the giants that is amongst us.

[00:01:09] It's about breathing life into that giant that's living inside of you. It may be dormant, but it's there in that giant that's residing inside of me.

[00:01:20] That means the resilient spirit that's inside of us, that's able to help us and assist us with being able to transcend any trauma, any struggles, anything that has happened or happening to us that may be hindering, blocking, or stagnating any kind of growth in our life.

[00:01:43] Upstairs, upstairs, downstairs, inside, outside, whatever it may be.

[00:01:49] From within, so without. It's about transcending these struggles, these challenges, moving beyond it, moving past it.

[00:01:57] And if you want to say it as such, we'll go ahead and say it's about moving towards greener pastures.

[00:02:04] In order to enjoy that sunlight and that sunshine, sometimes you've got to go through the rain.

[00:02:10] And you've got to withstand a storm.

[00:02:13] Those beautiful sequoia trees or those redwood oaks, they don't grow to be such overnight.

[00:02:20] It takes a seed planted.

[00:02:22] It takes that root getting deep, deep, deep, deep down into the soil.

[00:02:28] Underground, deep, where there's no sunlight, where there's no sunshine.

[00:02:32] Those dark times, those hard times, but laying down that foundation with the right sunlight, some good water.

[00:02:40] Some nurturing love from nature.

[00:02:43] That little seed turns into something magnificent, something glorious that people from all over the world go travel just so they can stand underneath it and look up in amazement while this sequoia tree is towering over them.

[00:02:57] So Giants Amongst Us is about waking that giant that's living inside of us.

[00:03:03] These stories and these testimonies are examples of that to show you that they're not the exception that these people from different walks of life with their own struggles and challenges.

[00:03:13] Sometimes it looks like abuse, child abuse, substance abuse, addictions, handicaps.

[00:03:20] But how these people were able to find change, were able to be changed, were able to create change and enjoy change.

[00:03:28] To remind you right now, if you're in a dark spot, that the same can be had by you.

[00:03:34] But like that oak tree doesn't grow to be an oak tree overnight.

[00:03:37] It's going to take some time.

[00:03:39] It's going to take some effort and it's going to take some doing, but it can be had.

[00:03:43] Change can be had.

[00:03:45] It's possible, but it's really up to you.

[00:03:47] You've got to do the work and you've got to realize and find that potential within you.

[00:03:54] Start working at it day by day.

[00:03:56] So if you're listening for the first time and you're curious and want to hear more stories, you'd like to check out the archives.

[00:04:02] You can always go to the website, giantsamongstus.org.

[00:04:07] That's giantsamongstus.org.

[00:04:10] There you can find past stories and experiences and any of them in any way resonate with you.

[00:04:17] You can find ways to contact and reach out to the guests or see what they've been up to, what they've put out,

[00:04:23] any kind of work or projects that they're involved with.

[00:04:27] You'll also find out information on what's going on with the show.

[00:04:32] You can get updates on the show.

[00:04:33] You can have early access to some of the conversations that already have been had and waiting to be published.

[00:04:40] You can send out a message via email, through voicemail.

[00:04:45] Let me know how you feel about the show.

[00:04:47] If there's anything in particular that kind of struck a chord with you or if you just like to say what's up and let me know where you're listening from,

[00:04:56] how you're listening to the show.

[00:04:57] Cool.

[00:04:58] That's appreciated.

[00:04:59] Look forward to hearing from you all.

[00:05:01] So, yeah, let's just continue to push our lives, to push ourselves in a much more promising direction.

[00:05:07] So, with all that being said, I'm pleased to have another sit down to share with you all today because Rick joins us.

[00:05:16] Rick Sharbaugh.

[00:05:17] And he's got a story to tell.

[00:05:20] My experience is weird because I'll just say it.

[00:05:23] I went a little crazy.

[00:05:24] I mean, what do you call mad from like the Mad Hatter and Alice in Wonderland a little bit because I stayed awake for five days straight and I was diagnosed bipolar and stuff like that.

[00:05:32] I went to the doctors, went on antipsychotics, got put on all the antidepressants and everything like that.

[00:05:39] But it was when I hit rock bottom is when I moved out later on.

[00:05:44] I was probably 25.

[00:05:45] I had a college inheritance.

[00:05:47] I got out of high school and stuff like that.

[00:05:49] Of course, I didn't use it wisely.

[00:05:51] I didn't even graduate college.

[00:05:52] I ended up just using drugs the entire time while pretending to live in a house.

[00:05:57] It was the rock bottom for me as 26 is when I showed up at my mom's doorstep and asked for help

[00:06:01] because I had pissed all my money away and I had nothing to show for it.

[00:06:05] And you kind of realize, like, what am I doing with my life?

[00:06:08] Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, this is Rick and his story.

[00:06:16] This is Giants Amongst Us where we share in the unique human experience.

[00:06:22] And I'm excited to bring on another guest.

[00:06:25] We have Rick with us today.

[00:06:27] Rick, thank you so much for taking time out of your day.

[00:06:31] You could have been doing anything.

[00:06:32] You could have been anywhere.

[00:06:34] But we're having a little sit down.

[00:06:36] We had a very long winded and a great conversation before we started recording.

[00:06:42] So, yeah, I look forward to hearing a bit of your story and you opening up a few pages with us to share.

[00:06:52] So welcome aboard.

[00:06:53] Pleased to have you on.

[00:06:54] Oh, thank you for having me.

[00:06:55] It's a pleasure.

[00:06:56] Can you hear me OK?

[00:06:57] Yeah.

[00:06:58] Yeah, you're all good.

[00:06:59] We're all set.

[00:07:00] Perfect.

[00:07:01] No, yeah, exactly.

[00:07:02] It's been a pleasure meeting and talking.

[00:07:04] We've been talking.

[00:07:04] I already can tell we already have a lot in common.

[00:07:07] It's been fun talking about the differences in America and Germany and stuff.

[00:07:11] We could have went for days.

[00:07:12] So it was like, OK, let's go ahead and get some of this on tape right now.

[00:07:15] And let's you share some of your piece with this.

[00:07:21] So, yeah, just for starters, you know, to let everybody know a bit of your backstory.

[00:07:25] You mind sharing where you come from and a bit of how it was for you coming up?

[00:07:31] OK, that bellow backstory.

[00:07:34] My name is Rick Charbeau.

[00:07:35] I'm 38 years old.

[00:07:37] I live north of Seattle.

[00:07:38] I've lived here my whole life.

[00:07:40] So I'm born and raised in the Pacific Northwest, rainy Seattle.

[00:07:46] You get used to the rain sometimes.

[00:07:48] But then, like we talked about, you enjoy the summers a lot more.

[00:07:51] Or you enjoy the summer that comes around after you've had three months of clouds.

[00:07:53] It changes the seasons.

[00:07:54] Right.

[00:07:56] You enjoy the summers a lot more when you've had a terrible winter.

[00:07:59] That's all I'm going to say.

[00:08:02] So and then I was raised here, born and raised.

[00:08:06] I had a really good childhood growing up, I would say.

[00:08:11] I guess that's a part of my story because I just wrote a personal memoir that I released.

[00:08:15] And I went through kind of a spiritual awakening is what you would call it.

[00:08:19] I don't know how to explain it unless you say satori or enlightenment

[00:08:22] or some other way of seeing beyond more of your own mind type of a way.

[00:08:27] And it was my experience is weird because I'll just say it.

[00:08:31] I went a little crazy.

[00:08:32] I mean, what do you call mad from like the Mad Hatter and Alice in Wonderland a little bit

[00:08:35] because I stayed awake for five days straight and I was diagnosed bipolar and stuff like that.

[00:08:40] I went to the doctors, went on antipsychotics, got put on all the antidepressants and everything

[00:08:46] like that.

[00:08:49] And my story or I guess background, I kind of skipped forward to that.

[00:08:53] But back to my childhood, it was a good childhood growing up.

[00:08:57] And I had everything wanted like you talked about.

[00:09:00] We had all the things that we saw between me and you, our childhoods.

[00:09:04] We had more freedom.

[00:09:05] We could run around.

[00:09:07] We could be out until it was dark.

[00:09:08] We didn't have to worry about all the stranger danger that we do now with being stolen and stuff

[00:09:13] like that.

[00:09:14] So I'd say my childhood is fantastic.

[00:09:18] Honestly, if I could have a different childhood, I haven't found a different childhood I would

[00:09:22] rather have, which is an odd statement to say because I also had a lot of childhood trauma

[00:09:27] growing up and nightmares and things like that that I had to overcome as well.

[00:09:31] So I guess with a lot of freedom, I guess comes a lot of other things like that too.

[00:09:37] Because I don't want to say the, I hate the Hansel and Gretel situation.

[00:09:42] It's like that, can you, can someone be loved enough and not disciplined enough?

[00:09:47] And then it's like, I don't want to say I wasn't disciplined enough, but it's just,

[00:09:53] I fell into the drugs at 14.

[00:09:56] Like you said, I got depressed.

[00:09:57] I was, I played soccer all the time growing up and I ended up still falling into the drugs.

[00:10:03] I had friends in high school.

[00:10:05] I ended up selling weed out of a minivan instead.

[00:10:07] And it's just like, I never felt like I always fit in, in a weird way.

[00:10:11] I don't know if you can relate to that because you used to be a drug addict.

[00:10:15] It's hard to tell a drug addict.

[00:10:17] Why did you become the way you are?

[00:10:19] You know, why did we start coping in the first place with needing to take sleeping medications

[00:10:24] and then getting high all the time and starting to mask life instead of wanting to actually

[00:10:28] make a friendship?

[00:10:29] Yeah.

[00:10:30] And that's tricky when you're 14, you know, I don't know when you started and I started

[00:10:33] getting miserable, probably like 13 or 14 years old.

[00:10:36] And it's hard at that age to try to go back and understand that.

[00:10:39] You said that, that the discipline part wasn't there.

[00:10:43] So you pretty much were allowed to just do as you please.

[00:10:46] There was nobody around trying to put you in line.

[00:10:49] It felt a lot like, cause I had my mom and my dad who raised me, I would say they raised

[00:10:55] me well and stuff like that.

[00:10:56] I had a very strict household when it came to like, just, you need to be a certain time

[00:11:01] for dinner and bedtime was a certain way like that.

[00:11:05] So I still had to do certain things and don't get me wrong.

[00:11:09] You had to go to every family event and there were certain things you needed to be at and

[00:11:13] going to school.

[00:11:15] You better be at school.

[00:11:16] And if you're sick, here's a Tylenol, still get your ass to school.

[00:11:20] So, you know, there don't get me wrong.

[00:11:22] It wasn't the lack of discipline because there are times when I would just be hammered to

[00:11:27] do things, to go to school and all that stuff.

[00:11:29] So it's not that my parents didn't discipline me.

[00:11:33] That's a hard, hard thing is like, like I said, why does he still, even after you've

[00:11:37] been disciplined, you still get lost or you still find drugs, a more appealing choice

[00:11:43] than life itself?

[00:11:43] Yeah, there's other people there or there's other children, even with, let's just say

[00:11:48] a lack of authority or anybody behind them or over them to keep them in line.

[00:11:56] They still take it upon themselves to hit the books or they do the extra studies or they

[00:12:05] walk a straight line.

[00:12:06] But then there's those of us who, you know, get lost in the weeds, so to speak.

[00:12:12] Yeah, exactly.

[00:12:13] We don't find ourselves.

[00:12:14] And I don't want to say school is always easy for me.

[00:12:17] This is a weird thing for me to say because I never had to do any homework.

[00:12:20] All right.

[00:12:21] I don't even have memory of me doing homework in my house because I was always able to do

[00:12:27] homework at school.

[00:12:27] And then all the homework assignments that was given were so easy to a certain extent.

[00:12:32] I could just bust them out within five minutes whenever I wanted to, probably in the last

[00:12:36] minute is what I did anyways.

[00:12:39] So it's crunch time.

[00:12:41] Exactly.

[00:12:41] And I have ADHD and, you know, they call it procrastination.

[00:12:44] But it's like, man, if I can just get it done in five minutes at the end, why am I going

[00:12:48] to waste my time on it before that?

[00:12:49] And then I guess that's where that procrastination that comes along with that addiction and just

[00:12:53] being miserable because you just put everything off to the last minute too.

[00:12:57] When do you think for you, it started to feel like it was really getting out of control with

[00:13:04] the drugs and the drink and everything else?

[00:13:07] Okay.

[00:13:07] I would say there's a couple of different stages to it.

[00:13:10] First started delving into it.

[00:13:11] The first is when I was 14, 15 and the sleeping pills and all that stuff.

[00:13:14] That's just kind of getting into it.

[00:13:16] Then in high school, it took the form of, I was just, my nickname in high school was Cheech.

[00:13:21] And I sold weed out of my 95 Dodge Caravan.

[00:13:25] So it, and it was like, that's the persona I took.

[00:13:28] I didn't want to do homework.

[00:13:29] And so of course, when you watch Days and Confused and things like that, it's like, yeah, man,

[00:13:34] homework sucks.

[00:13:35] One of my friends in high school, he counted on both of his hands, how many times he was

[00:13:40] sober throughout the entire year, senior year, rather than how many times he was like high.

[00:13:45] He's like, oh, I was only sober eight days this year.

[00:13:47] I'm like, whoa, Jesus.

[00:13:50] That was also the environment I grew up in too.

[00:13:54] And it's kind of like when you talk about your social pressure, your peer pressure,

[00:13:57] what you grow up around, it's like the environments you're around too is kind of what you're involved

[00:14:01] in.

[00:14:01] And I think to your point, you get into the environments as addicts.

[00:14:05] By the time you know it, you're in an environment that you're just like, oh shit, I might as well

[00:14:08] just do it.

[00:14:09] Yeah.

[00:14:10] I might as well do it.

[00:14:11] And that's a hard situation because then you and your friends start delving into it.

[00:14:16] I started smoking weed and doing a lot and stuff in senior high school.

[00:14:18] But it was when I hit rock bottom is when I moved out later on.

[00:14:23] I was probably 25.

[00:14:24] I had a college inheritance.

[00:14:26] I got out of high school and stuff like that.

[00:14:28] Of course, I didn't use it wisely.

[00:14:30] I didn't even graduate college.

[00:14:31] I ended up just using drugs the entire time while pretending to live in a house.

[00:14:36] But and then at 25 is when I probably it was the rock bottom for me is 26 is when I showed up

[00:14:42] at my mom's doorstep and asked for help because I had pissed all my money away and I had nothing

[00:14:46] to show for it.

[00:14:47] And you kind of realize like, well, what am I doing with my life?

[00:14:50] And I was just, you know, I was living in a house depressed, miserable, suicidal, just,

[00:14:55] you know, binges of cocaine.

[00:14:56] Like you said, and it's like, I wasn't really sure what I was doing with my life.

[00:15:00] And so that was a pretty big turning point for me at 26.

[00:15:04] Now, the funny thing is when it comes to prescriptions, I've been on like Neurontin and Gabapentin

[00:15:09] and there's, you know, sleeping pills, but they allowed me to have that when I went to rehab.

[00:15:14] So I ended up abusing the medications to get high and rehab as well.

[00:15:18] So I felt like I also cheated even that system.

[00:15:20] In my book, I wrote, I felt like the Picasso of drug addicts.

[00:15:23] Because trust me, when you're an addict in rehab and you're still able to get high while

[00:15:27] you're watching people get kicked out for getting high, it's a very weird feeling.

[00:15:31] You're really just like, oh, I'm glad I'm not that person, but I am that person.

[00:15:36] I'm the one who should be getting kicked out, not you.

[00:15:39] It's like, ah, it's like, you want to talk about living a lie or living like you're just

[00:15:43] Yeah, double life.

[00:15:45] That was a weird one.

[00:15:47] Yeah, double life always.

[00:15:48] And I always felt like I could, and it's a weird thing.

[00:15:50] You kind of feel like you can just get away with everything.

[00:15:53] Everything's just like, oh, it doesn't matter.

[00:15:55] Nothing matters.

[00:15:55] So you're just like, I can get away with it as long as nobody sees what I'm doing.

[00:15:58] And you just kind of build that reputation and move on.

[00:16:00] And it's funny because you think about it.

[00:16:03] We like, let's just say, for instance, if you're doing it behind closed doors or you

[00:16:07] feel like you're doing it under the radar and not too many people are catching on or they

[00:16:12] don't know you're using the way that you're using.

[00:16:15] Now, you might be getting away from it or getting away with it in that sense, but you're still

[00:16:24] dealing with all of the poison, the toxic, the trauma that you're causing to yourself.

[00:16:32] So you're not really getting away with anything.

[00:16:34] You're taking that on and it's slowly just eating at you.

[00:16:40] It's tearing you apart.

[00:16:42] And it gets to the point where, like you said, you just hit what feels like or what could be rock bottom.

[00:16:51] Yep.

[00:16:52] It's almost like the drug itself becomes your best friend.

[00:16:54] Nothing else makes you happy.

[00:16:56] Now, how long were you involved in the treatment?

[00:16:58] How many months or what was that program like?

[00:17:01] I went to a month.

[00:17:02] It was a month.

[00:17:03] I just went into inpatient treatment at Lakeside Myelom.

[00:17:06] And that was interesting.

[00:17:08] You know, it was, you know, because it went to a place where they don't even allow you

[00:17:11] to have sugar.

[00:17:12] And so, you know, and what's funny is there was like an underground ring for candy and

[00:17:17] stuff like that.

[00:17:18] People would hide Red Bulls and like have, you know, Sour Patch Kids and people throw candy

[00:17:22] over the fence when they get out for other people and stuff.

[00:17:25] So it's funny when you have a hold of the addicts.

[00:17:28] Well, we're all still being criminals to maintain our sugar intake now instead of our drug intake.

[00:17:34] So they can take a whole bunch of drug addicts and put them into a system where they can't

[00:17:37] have sugar.

[00:17:37] The next thing you know, they're running around scrambling, acting like drug addicts with

[00:17:41] sugar instead, like Red Bull.

[00:17:43] Training Red Bull and Sour Patch Kids like it's a bag of drugs.

[00:17:48] But it's because it's against the rules.

[00:17:50] And we had to.

[00:17:51] It was against the rules.

[00:17:52] If they just would have let us have candy, we would have had candy.

[00:17:55] But I guess they didn't want that.

[00:17:56] But they allowed the sleeping pills.

[00:18:00] Well, yeah, they allowed medication because it was my medication I got from a doctor.

[00:18:04] And that's, I think, the tricky thing is when it's a medication from a doctor, I knew

[00:18:08] they had to give it to me.

[00:18:09] And so I knew I abused my pills a lot.

[00:18:12] And I ran out really fast one of the times.

[00:18:14] And I knew I walking up to the nurse and I'm like, oh, I got to explain myself why I ran

[00:18:18] out twice as fast.

[00:18:20] And even though I took them all myself, I just walked up or shrugged my shoulders and

[00:18:24] just went, I don't know what happened.

[00:18:26] Yeah, I didn't even give her an answer.

[00:18:28] I literally just because I'm in a rehab facility and I know ignorance is bliss.

[00:18:31] All I had to do is walk up to her, shrug my shoulders and say, I don't know what

[00:18:34] happened, even though I know exactly what happened.

[00:18:38] But as a doctor, what does she have to do?

[00:18:40] She has to abide by the law and she has to fill my prescription and give me more.

[00:18:43] And that's what she did.

[00:18:45] And so it's a weird thing because I know a lot of people are thinking that the medication

[00:18:49] I was on was Gabapentin and it was a Neurontin and it's a sleeping medication.

[00:18:52] But what happens for me, like I could take enough of it to where it would give me that

[00:18:56] type of mild cocaine high for like six hours where I would take it with a whole bunch

[00:19:00] of sugar and stuff like that.

[00:19:01] And I could actually, I could impair my judgment on enough for like six to eight hours at a

[00:19:05] time and I knew how.

[00:19:07] And as a drug addict, when you know how to get high, you know how to get high to make

[00:19:10] yourself feel better.

[00:19:11] And so that's why it was a very weird thing for me to be in rehab doing all that stuff.

[00:19:17] Because not only that, did I get out of rehab?

[00:19:19] I went to an Oxford house and then I became a chapter chair of an Oxford house and was preaching,

[00:19:24] you know, sober people and still piss testing people and kicking people out.

[00:19:28] But in the back of my head, I'm just like, I'm not doing cocaine.

[00:19:32] I'm not doing oxys.

[00:19:33] I'm not doing any of the other bad stuff.

[00:19:35] But hey, I'm just abusing my legal prescriptions from a doctor.

[00:19:38] Don't look at me.

[00:19:40] Okay.

[00:19:40] So you found a way to justify it and you were also able to believe that for as long as you

[00:19:48] were in that position?

[00:19:49] You know, don't get me wrong.

[00:19:50] I looked at all the people who are sober and it's like, I just wanted to be that.

[00:19:53] But it's like, as an addict, if there's a way to maintain your addiction, I mean, I did

[00:19:58] it, I guess it's hard because it's like, if I knew I could get away with it, I wasn't

[00:20:04] ready to just willingly myself put it off to the side.

[00:20:07] And that's a weird thing because you take a cocaine addict and say, you know, give somebody

[00:20:11] who's an addict, give them a whole bunch of money and they say, quit.

[00:20:15] It's like, wait a minute.

[00:20:16] You're giving me all the opportunity in the world to have everything I want right now.

[00:20:20] And now's the time in which you expect me to quit.

[00:20:22] It's that weird, like, whoa, opportunities are a weird thing too.

[00:20:28] Yeah.

[00:20:28] How do you feel about, I've asked a few people that, and then I guess I probably have my own

[00:20:34] feelings about it, but do you feel like it really comes down to when somebody wants to

[00:20:38] do it?

[00:20:38] Or do you feel like somebody is, you're able to beat the sobriety into somebody to show

[00:20:46] them the light, show them the way.

[00:20:49] Right.

[00:20:49] And that's a hard one because, you know, I don't want to say, and I've watched a lot

[00:20:53] of those addiction shows.

[00:20:54] And from my understanding, whenever somebody tried to get me to sober up, I ran the other

[00:20:57] way.

[00:20:58] So I understand why people say it feels like beating a dead horse when you're trying to

[00:21:03] get somebody who's an addict to just get sober because it just doesn't make sense to them.

[00:21:07] And I get it.

[00:21:08] And yes, I'm going to agree with you 100%.

[00:21:10] If the individual themselves does not want to change, I don't know if there's a person on

[00:21:15] the planet who can change that person because the change has to come from within them to

[00:21:20] want to do better.

[00:21:21] Now, I know we can make situations around them better.

[00:21:24] We can put them in a rehab facility, give them all the food and the comfort, the necessities,

[00:21:29] like everything they need.

[00:21:30] But that's why I think rehab facilities, like they can set you up with all that luxury

[00:21:35] and success and they go back to the real life and they're like, well, this sucks.

[00:21:38] And it's like, they almost feel like rehab facility was better than real life.

[00:21:42] Yeah.

[00:21:43] And then there's even those that they have the perfect scenario, everything set up and

[00:21:50] everything rolled out for them.

[00:21:52] And they end up finding a way how to get the hell out of there and back to the street

[00:21:58] so they can get that higher, that fix and, you know, get back to what they know, what

[00:22:04] they feel that they need and what they don't want to completely let go of.

[00:22:09] Right.

[00:22:09] And it's sad when you hear those stories about people that's like, I just want to get better.

[00:22:13] And then you hear about them like overdosing or something.

[00:22:15] It's like, we all like an underdog story.

[00:22:17] We all want people to just heal and get better.

[00:22:19] And it's sad because that's what addiction will do.

[00:22:22] Addiction will literally say, I will have somebody screaming, I want to heal.

[00:22:25] I want to get better and then kill themselves the next day doing the same thing.

[00:22:29] And that's a weird thing because we, you know, I've been an addict.

[00:22:33] You've been an addict.

[00:22:33] We can't explain why we became one.

[00:22:35] We just know we are miserable going into it.

[00:22:38] And that's a hard thing to say.

[00:22:39] Yeah.

[00:22:41] It's a coping mechanism because, and that's a weird thing to say too, because a lot of

[00:22:44] people say, well, if it wasn't fun, why'd you do it?

[00:22:47] You know, as well as I do, it was a lot of fun getting into it.

[00:22:50] And I think that's the devil's temptation.

[00:22:52] People are going to go, well, there's no fun behind it.

[00:22:54] I'm going to say, no, I had a lot of fun getting into it.

[00:22:57] Don't get me wrong.

[00:22:58] The parties, the bags of cocaine, all the drugs.

[00:23:01] I hate to say it.

[00:23:02] It comes with some type of ecstatic fun, but that's just that ecstatic drug fun that you're

[00:23:08] getting.

[00:23:10] And that's the false temptation of fun.

[00:23:12] Because now if you offered any of that to me now, I would say no with a 10 foot pole,

[00:23:16] because I know that is just a near sighted fun.

[00:23:20] And it's not like anything I want long term.

[00:23:24] And I'm sure I was just going to get into the fact that, like you were speaking about,

[00:23:29] I'm sure you had a ton of fun.

[00:23:33] But there had to be throughout those hazy days, those high times and floating on cloud

[00:23:39] nine, there had to have been a time or there was a time where it's something just wasn't,

[00:23:46] it wasn't hitting right anymore.

[00:23:49] And you started to think about, is there a possibility that I can live life or enjoy

[00:23:57] life away from all of this?

[00:23:59] People just say, I want to be better.

[00:24:00] I want to live.

[00:24:01] But then they also, as an addict, you know, as well as I do what it feels like to not be

[00:24:05] able to live with a chemical.

[00:24:06] To literally just think, well, I can't live life if I don't have this tomorrow.

[00:24:11] And we know that's the ego, that's the addiction.

[00:24:14] Because in reality, if we locked that person in a room with just some water and said, live,

[00:24:19] they would live, you know?

[00:24:21] And it's what comes down to the fundamental of what, you know, a human being is, we think

[00:24:26] we want and we get into that fight or flight mode of just wanting to mask and be comfortable.

[00:24:34] But as an addict, and you just go down in that hellish spiral and then addiction comes

[00:24:39] into it, suicide, depression.

[00:24:42] I mean, I've never seen somebody become an addict and then all of a sudden become the

[00:24:45] happiest and joyful person in the entire world.

[00:24:47] And then go write a book and become like the best novelist.

[00:24:50] It's like, that doesn't happen for a reason.

[00:24:52] Everybody who goes into drugs goes down dark rabbit holes or they go down different rabbit

[00:24:58] holes because you start with weed.

[00:25:00] And then next thing you know, you're doing cocaine or you start with one.

[00:25:03] I hate to use weed.

[00:25:05] I never like dare in a weird sense because I always said weed was a gateway drug.

[00:25:09] And I understand why it was labeled as one because it's like, yeah, if you start weed and

[00:25:15] then you're open to drugs, you might try another one.

[00:25:17] But it's because of the fact that everything's labeled as a drug too.

[00:25:20] If you thought weed was a plant and it was a healing medicine, you wouldn't treat it the

[00:25:24] same as cocaine.

[00:25:26] So that's a different perspective too, because I still smoke weed and stuff like that.

[00:25:30] And I have my different natural remedies when it comes to what's okay and stuff like that.

[00:25:38] Cause you know, I don't take any pills anymore.

[00:25:40] I don't take any antipsychotics or antidepressants and stuff like that.

[00:25:44] Wow.

[00:25:44] How long has it been?

[00:25:47] That's been a couple of two years.

[00:25:50] Okay.

[00:25:50] You did you, did you just cold turkey say, you know, I don't need it.

[00:25:55] I'm going to try to go a day or a week without it.

[00:25:57] And that turned into two years.

[00:25:59] Actually, it was cold turkey.

[00:26:01] I was going through one of my spiritual moments in the bathroom and I was having issues with

[00:26:05] my doctor, having prescription refills and stuff.

[00:26:08] And I remember there's just like this one time when I told her and she was like, oh,

[00:26:12] we don't need to see next month.

[00:26:14] And then I went to get the prescription of IVANCE or whatever it was.

[00:26:17] And since it's a controlled substance, it's like, oh, well, you can't get a refill this time.

[00:26:21] So it turned out to be a very weird situation where I was going to run out of medications.

[00:26:25] I was going to be running out of my Vyvanse unless I like bent over on my knees and like,

[00:26:29] you know, went the whole 10 miles to bed for my own prescriptions that I knew I was going

[00:26:34] to be running out of.

[00:26:36] And something in that time came over me where I had the thought, you know, as an addict

[00:26:40] where you have the thought, like, oh, I need it.

[00:26:42] Or it's like, what am I going to do without it?

[00:26:44] But it was the first time in my life where I had the thought, what am I going to do without

[00:26:49] it?

[00:26:49] And then something in my head was like, do it, like, go for it.

[00:26:52] You're you.

[00:26:53] It was like a, it was like for once in my life, I was able to screw it.

[00:26:57] So what I did was I just threw the medications down the toilet.

[00:27:00] I never even made a follow-up appointment with my doctor and just ghosted her and just

[00:27:04] literally said, do you know what?

[00:27:05] Life's mine.

[00:27:06] I threw the medications down the toilet and said, if I'm going to be bipolar or whatever

[00:27:10] this world wants to label me as, that's what I'm going to be.

[00:27:14] And it has a weird concept too, because it's a little scary at first.

[00:27:17] But what I realized afterwards is nothing changed.

[00:27:20] I didn't turn into some bipolar, manic, crazy guy.

[00:27:23] I didn't start staying awake for two months at a time.

[00:27:27] It's like all this stigma we talk about, about bipolar.

[00:27:30] I still have yet to have another manic experience like I had, where I stayed awake for five days

[00:27:35] straight.

[00:27:35] And I remember I told my doctor, I was like, hey, I understand math.

[00:27:38] If something happens once, couldn't it just be an anomaly?

[00:27:41] Like, can we just see if it happens again?

[00:27:43] And that's when I started having a conversation with my doctor and she was, she didn't want

[00:27:48] to take me off the medication because she was so afraid of another manic episode.

[00:27:53] And that's when I got a little taken back.

[00:27:55] And I was really taken back after I had that appointment with her.

[00:27:58] And I'm like, well, whose health?

[00:28:00] Like, I'm literally telling my doctor I'm struggling.

[00:28:03] I want to do other things.

[00:28:04] And she's just like, oh, I can't even let you try something yourself because I'm afraid

[00:28:08] of something.

[00:28:09] And that's hard because I, and you know, who's right and who's wrong because in my heart,

[00:28:14] I knew I wanted to try something different.

[00:28:17] And so I started doing a whole bunch of research on psilocybin and stuff like that, near death

[00:28:21] experiences.

[00:28:22] And that's when I got into the mushrooms and that the psilocybin and how psychedelics can

[00:28:28] get people who are suffering or who just don't have a good view on life to get them to see

[00:28:33] a different way.

[00:28:35] So I went back to her and talked about getting taken off the antidepressants because I did

[00:28:39] my research on the SSR, the serotonin syndrome.

[00:28:43] So I went to her and told her I'd like to go off the antidepressants because I want to

[00:28:46] try mushrooms.

[00:28:48] And that's what I did.

[00:28:50] And so after that first mushroom experience, I have to tell you that because that's when

[00:28:54] it gave me the strength to be able to throw all the medications away and try life on my

[00:28:57] own.

[00:28:58] Man, you know, what I can dig right off the top is that you were one for taking control

[00:29:08] of yourself.

[00:29:09] I love those stories because that's really what I hope comes across with the podcast is

[00:29:18] that the possibilities that are out there for someone when they start taking accountability

[00:29:22] and responsibility for their own experience.

[00:29:25] And with you, there were certain things that weren't working.

[00:29:27] And just because this is a doctor, just because this is a professional, I'm supposed to listen

[00:29:32] to him.

[00:29:32] But wait a minute.

[00:29:33] This is my life.

[00:29:34] This is how I feel.

[00:29:35] This is my own intuition telling me this or my own body telling me this, my own psychology

[00:29:42] telling me this.

[00:29:43] And why not try this or try that?

[00:29:44] And you were willing to go against what would be called the authority figure because this

[00:29:51] is your own body, your own experience.

[00:29:54] And you felt it otherwise.

[00:29:58] And you were willing to experiment and to do things to shake it up a little bit, to try

[00:30:03] to get better or to try to get to the source or the root of some of the things you were

[00:30:08] dealing with.

[00:30:09] And that's a great thing.

[00:30:12] And I think a lot of people, they need to trust themselves a bit more.

[00:30:16] And they need to look inward at times and not just expect anybody else, no matter what kind

[00:30:25] of PhD they have.

[00:30:27] I'm not saying that these professional people, they do have a place.

[00:30:31] But when you're, like we talked about this before we started recording, when you're outsourcing

[00:30:37] all of your intellectual capabilities, your intuition, your emotional intelligence, when

[00:30:44] you're outsourcing it to other people, into a device and everything.

[00:30:48] And so you're giving your power away.

[00:30:50] You're limiting yourself.

[00:30:52] And that can be detrimental for our health.

[00:30:56] And you see it with the anxieties, with the addictions that continue, with the depressions.

[00:31:03] And you see that cycle that continues because people are not allowing themselves that time

[00:31:11] and that space to look inward and to trust themselves and to get to the root cause of who they are

[00:31:19] and their true essence and what works for them and what doesn't work for them.

[00:31:23] And to experiment with it and just take control of your own life's experience.

[00:31:29] That's a good way to put it too.

[00:31:31] Because I know when I was on the antipsychotics, I don't know if you've ever taken anything

[00:31:35] like that.

[00:31:35] I'm not a drug addict too.

[00:31:36] And it's weird because antipsychotics to me didn't really even affect me like any other

[00:31:40] drug.

[00:31:41] I was expecting antipsychotics to like at least get me high or do something to my brain or

[00:31:46] something.

[00:31:47] The only thing it did was make me, it drained my energy.

[00:31:50] It literally made me feel like a zombie.

[00:31:53] And it was, I was missing work.

[00:31:57] I was two hours late all the time.

[00:31:59] I couldn't wake up from my alarm clock.

[00:32:01] It made my mornings absolutely miserable.

[00:32:05] And I knew it was the medication's fault and stuff like that.

[00:32:08] It had to be because it got worse right after I started doing all of it.

[00:32:10] And I remember having arguments, not arguments, but conversation with my wife.

[00:32:14] And it's just like, she's like, oh, you're so tired all the time.

[00:32:16] I'm like, I know I got to miss work again.

[00:32:18] I can't make it in.

[00:32:19] And I felt like a lazy piece of shit because I couldn't get my literally physical body out

[00:32:24] of bed just to make it to work on time at 530 in the morning when I worked at Boeing.

[00:32:29] And that was, that was a hard one because I had to go to work.

[00:32:32] I only had a certain amount of PTO.

[00:32:33] I was at, you know, I worked at Boeing, you know, as a SPIA analyst and stuff like that

[00:32:38] at responsibilities.

[00:32:39] And I had things to do and that was hard.

[00:32:42] Yeah.

[00:32:42] From what I hear it.

[00:32:44] Okay.

[00:32:44] Now for some of that stuff, like it does, maybe it, it, it eases you psychologically to where

[00:32:50] maybe some of the, the, uh, the trauma, the stresses of whatever it is that's tormenting

[00:32:56] you, but it just flatlines you all across the board where there's no emotion.

[00:33:01] There's no drive.

[00:33:03] There's no motivation, everything.

[00:33:05] It just numbs you, indulge you.

[00:33:07] And I've seen a lot of those movies where you hear about those people on bipolar medications,

[00:33:11] where they don't want to go back on the medications because it numbs them.

[00:33:14] It turns into a zombie.

[00:33:16] I used to always hear those and be like, I don't understand.

[00:33:18] But now after going through this experience, I completely understand why somebody would

[00:33:23] get put on a medication that, Oh, it's supposed to make you better.

[00:33:26] But then all of a sudden it just makes them feel like a zombie because it zonks them out.

[00:33:30] It literally will just take their energy away.

[00:33:32] And to me, it's like, I like waking up in the morning with energy.

[00:33:35] Why not?

[00:33:35] Who doesn't?

[00:33:37] And it's a weird point to say, I didn't see any benefits after a while taking antipsychotics.

[00:33:42] I was like, what am I even taking them for?

[00:33:44] Because just to let you know, I didn't want to go on antidepressants.

[00:33:46] I even said, I wasn't depressed.

[00:33:48] I don't need antidepressants.

[00:33:49] And the doctor said, well, if you're on antipsychotics, these come along with it.

[00:33:53] So here's antidepressants.

[00:33:54] And I literally had to just accept that.

[00:33:56] So here I am taking antidepressants, even though I claim to my doctor, I was not even,

[00:34:01] I'm not depressed.

[00:34:02] I just stayed awake for five days straight.

[00:34:05] And that's another weird one.

[00:34:06] That's another weird one.

[00:34:07] How did that?

[00:34:09] And then I felt like I put all of my mental health into a doctor's hands.

[00:34:13] It's like, like you said, I wanted to start challenging things, but I couldn't work with

[00:34:16] her.

[00:34:17] It was like, I had to just take it back in my own hands.

[00:34:19] The only way I knew how was cold turkey.

[00:34:21] It got to that.

[00:34:22] How did that whole scenario work itself out?

[00:34:26] Were you staying up for five days?

[00:34:29] Now, this was natural.

[00:34:30] You just couldn't sleep.

[00:34:32] Okay.

[00:34:32] This is going to get even weirder.

[00:34:35] It was, yes, it was off of my wife told me she cheated on me.

[00:34:39] All right.

[00:34:39] And this is a weird truth I have.

[00:34:41] Okay.

[00:34:41] That's a big trigger.

[00:34:44] You talk about enlightenment and stuff like that.

[00:34:45] What happened was we were at the kitchen table.

[00:34:48] My cat passed away, like I want to say in October.

[00:34:50] And I remember it was like January, a couple months later, and I was just depressed from

[00:34:55] my cat dying.

[00:34:56] So I was just trying to march around and be really happy.

[00:34:59] And then it was at that moment in time when my wife looked at me and was like, I have something

[00:35:03] I need to tell you.

[00:35:04] I'm like, oh, sure.

[00:35:05] And I remember being like the happiest I could have.

[00:35:07] I was just marching around in my little happy self.

[00:35:09] She looked at me and was like, you know, five years ago when I went to the ocean, I

[00:35:13] was like, yeah.

[00:35:13] And she's like, well, I actually, I flew to Alaska and stayed with a boyfriend the whole

[00:35:17] time instead of going to the ocean.

[00:35:19] And I was just like, I remember like looking at her and trying to analyze it.

[00:35:23] And I thought it was all just a joke.

[00:35:24] And then I remember once she locked eyes with me and I looked at her and I realized it wasn't

[00:35:30] a joke.

[00:35:31] It's like something triggered in my brain.

[00:35:33] It just like clicked.

[00:35:34] And it's like something, it's like time froze in a weird way.

[00:35:37] And that, that was the moment I started staying awake for five days straight.

[00:35:41] That triggered something in me because I remember being really angry.

[00:35:45] Obviously I became pissed off at the world for like two days straight after that.

[00:35:50] All I remember is marching around for the first like day or two, just being angry about

[00:35:54] everything.

[00:35:55] I was like, ah, best way to say something upstairs just popped.

[00:35:59] I was like, all right, here it is anger.

[00:36:00] It's like a Jackal and Hyde situation.

[00:36:02] And then, so after the third is about the third day is when I sat down with all this

[00:36:08] anger and something changed in me on the third day.

[00:36:12] It was very bizarre.

[00:36:13] All the anger like subdued.

[00:36:15] And it was like, something else came over me.

[00:36:16] I was like, what are you so angry about?

[00:36:19] And then I started looking at life in a different way.

[00:36:21] And I started like accepting what it was.

[00:36:24] And I like really started to look at life in a different way.

[00:36:27] I remember even on the third day, I went back to my wife and said, you know what?

[00:36:30] I probably would have cheated on myself too.

[00:36:32] If I was in your shoes, we're all good.

[00:36:34] And I was like, when it was like revelations, like three days after she told me she had cheated

[00:36:37] on me as I was already comfortable knowing how much of a monster I was.

[00:36:41] And maybe I had played a part of why she had done it.

[00:36:44] And that was what I was willing to dig into because that's a weird point to be cheated

[00:36:49] on in any relationship is any, is it ever one-sided?

[00:36:53] And I shoot, I'm the one that got cheated on.

[00:36:56] And I don't want to say it wasn't, it was my fault, but there's a reason why I got cheated

[00:37:01] on.

[00:37:01] And that's what I wanted to look into and kind of dive into.

[00:37:04] And so on the third day, I typed my thoughts out while I was closing my eyes on the bed,

[00:37:12] just to try to like find what was happening upstairs.

[00:37:15] Cause my mind was going crazy.

[00:37:17] And I, and to your point, you've been a drug addict.

[00:37:20] You'll understand this was very weird because I had been awake.

[00:37:23] This was three days after feeling this way without taking a chemical, because I remember

[00:37:29] at times when I had been awake for on day three and day four thinking, this is so alien.

[00:37:35] Like I didn't even do anything to get this.

[00:37:37] It was like, almost like somebody had injected me with a adrenaline that was going to last

[00:37:42] five days, but I, it never happened.

[00:37:44] All of a sudden it just happened from my wife told me she cheated on me.

[00:37:47] And that, that was a very weird thing to try to grasp.

[00:37:51] And so on day three, I just started typing out all my thoughts and I had the most introspective

[00:37:57] moment when I did, where I got projected like outside of my body.

[00:38:01] And I like literally felt like I was connected to like a consciousness and type of the source.

[00:38:06] I'm going to say, whatever you want to call it.

[00:38:07] Yeah.

[00:38:08] The collective unconscious.

[00:38:09] Cause I went to a place while I was typing and I saw a brain floating shape thing off the

[00:38:14] ground. It was geometric and it was moving with like a fluid motion type thing.

[00:38:19] And it was, it felt like it was my whole world.

[00:38:22] But what happened was I saw that.

[00:38:25] And then I got astonished.

[00:38:26] I was like, what am I looking at?

[00:38:28] And then I saw a green tint and then I looked down at my feet.

[00:38:32] And I remember seeing a green plexiglass wall of glass in front of me.

[00:38:36] And then I was astonished at that.

[00:38:38] And I thought, what am I looking at?

[00:38:40] Thinking this was my entire consciousness.

[00:38:41] So I knew while I was there, for some reason, I was looking at my entire consciousness.

[00:38:46] That's the only thing I could grasp.

[00:38:48] And then I saw something sitting next to me, cross-legged.

[00:38:51] It looked like an entity or like a silver figure, almost like the silver surfer is the

[00:38:55] best way to put it.

[00:38:55] But it was like cross-legged, like a more like a Shiva looking figure, but it had the

[00:38:59] looked like the silver surfer, but it was on the same side of the glass as me.

[00:39:04] And that was very, very weird.

[00:39:06] And I remember being shocked once I saw something sitting there.

[00:39:09] First of all, I'm not, I was just typing my thoughts out in my head.

[00:39:14] I closed my eyes and I started typing my thoughts out.

[00:39:17] And then all this happened.

[00:39:18] And that's very weird for me because it's like, oh, how does that?

[00:39:22] I used to be an atheist too.

[00:39:24] You know, being a drug addict, the world is, the curtains close.

[00:39:27] There's nothing else than matter.

[00:39:30] And I think that's the atheistic view is matter is all there is.

[00:39:34] We die.

[00:39:35] That's it.

[00:39:36] Curtain closes.

[00:39:37] But now after these experiences and having these moments, I believe energy is more and

[00:39:44] there's more to life than we know.

[00:39:46] You know, what do we want to talk about?

[00:39:48] Souls and essences move on or our, you know, karmic energy passes through each other and we're

[00:39:53] all connected in a way that we don't understand yet.

[00:39:56] I would believe more of that to be true now than atheism.

[00:40:00] I don't even believe atheism and nihilism is a terrible way to look at the world.

[00:40:03] And I am against that.

[00:40:06] It's so dark.

[00:40:07] And that's where depression, suicide comes from.

[00:40:09] It's like, well, if the world is dark, you might as well just treat it dark.

[00:40:12] It's like, well, man, then you're going to see dark a lot.

[00:40:14] It's about trying to find the beauty in it too and stuff like that.

[00:40:18] And finding, I guess you can say, I feel like in a weird way, I went a little crazy and

[00:40:24] went mad because looking at my, even my own experience, why did I forgive my wife?

[00:40:29] And why did I not go crazy?

[00:40:31] And why did I even react the way I did?

[00:40:34] And that was a weird concept for me as well.

[00:40:37] Wow.

[00:40:37] You even were put in a place where you were able to self-reflect because that takes a lot

[00:40:44] in itself and say, well, maybe it also, and not saying that you forced anybody to do anything,

[00:40:52] but the way I was acting, the way I was behaving, the way I was living, my goodness, it can almost

[00:40:59] drive somebody to do something like that.

[00:41:01] But the self-reflection, be able to do that and to look at both sides of it.

[00:41:06] How many of us would just, it would be firing brimstones on the one who committed the crime?

[00:41:12] You know, there's always two sides to a coin.

[00:41:14] Like you said, there's how was I acting?

[00:41:16] How was I, how was I behaving?

[00:41:18] And who was I as a person to live with?

[00:41:20] Boom.

[00:41:21] Exactly.

[00:41:21] And let's see, I have the book in front of me right now.

[00:41:25] And if you want to go to the point, let's see, it's like, because I just let you know,

[00:41:31] the book is authentic.

[00:41:32] So I literally interjected and copy and pasted my document.

[00:41:35] It says from January 26th, 2021 at 1227 AM.

[00:41:40] That was the exact time I wrote this document and it happened.

[00:41:43] So if you want to say when I wrote...

[00:41:45] Okay, are you talking about the image, the vision?

[00:41:49] Yes, my vision.

[00:41:49] Yeah.

[00:41:50] When this all started, the five days I stayed awake, when my wife told me she cheated on

[00:41:53] me, that was the whole pinnacle of when it started.

[00:41:56] That was January 26th of 2021.

[00:41:59] Wow.

[00:41:59] That was fairly recent.

[00:42:01] That was three years ago.

[00:42:02] Three years ago, and this was on the third or fourth day that you were awake and hadn't

[00:42:07] slept.

[00:42:08] Correct.

[00:42:09] So I remember and stuff like that.

[00:42:11] So I wrote this page out and this was when I wrote it with my eyes closed.

[00:42:14] So obviously people who read my memoir, please know there's going to be spelling errors, but

[00:42:18] I kept it authentic because then you can see exactly the errors in all of my typing and

[00:42:23] stuff.

[00:42:23] So it's fun for me to see because I wanted to copy and paste it, but I didn't.

[00:42:27] So what I was going to say is like, I go into, I'm not going to go into the details,

[00:42:31] but what I say is like, my thoughts are every time my mind wanders to a dark place, I just,

[00:42:36] I just start to let myself go.

[00:42:38] I try to breathe and relax before a few weeks ago, my head was filled with lies and deceit,

[00:42:43] disloyalty, not being okay in your own skin or whatever the fuck you want to call it.

[00:42:47] Now I am awake right now with three things that only give me comfort and happiness.

[00:42:52] And I tried to give my comfort and happiness.

[00:42:53] I even said my wife, Jessica, Nolan, video games, movies, like sex.

[00:42:57] And then I started going into like, I'll leave a couple of those parts out for the readers.

[00:43:01] And then it says, now I want to start to wonder what is wrong.

[00:43:05] What is wrong with having just thoughts?

[00:43:07] Should we punish ourself for just having simple thoughts?

[00:43:11] Can a dream that means nothing destroy an entire person in itself and cause them only to

[00:43:17] do harm when in reality, good was right there.

[00:43:20] And that's when I talk about behind a glass way, always keeping my distance, always having

[00:43:25] some guard up, never giving a hundred percent of yourself to anything other than sports.

[00:43:29] And so it kind of goes into me, like going into my mind about how I was a monster.

[00:43:34] What was I really doing with my life?

[00:43:37] And what was I putting my stuff in?

[00:43:38] Cause I felt like I wasn't being my authentic self.

[00:43:41] It's that living a best reference.

[00:43:43] We talked about it earlier was living in a shell.

[00:43:45] It's like, and people just want to be able to speak their voice and be truthful.

[00:43:49] And then they don't, they want to also be able to speak it without feeling regret

[00:43:53] or worry or judgment of what other people thought of what they said too.

[00:43:56] So that's a hard one as well.

[00:43:58] And so my, I went into just the thoughts of everything.

[00:44:02] And what's funny is you'll look at it.

[00:44:04] I'm no psychologist, but I know I've heard Jordan Peterson say things like when you start

[00:44:09] looking, when you start looking into the eye and looking at yourself, you become more depressed.

[00:44:13] It's like you become, when you start questioning yourself on everything you do, it becomes actually

[00:44:18] kind of scary in a weird way because people don't actually know how to question themselves

[00:44:22] on what they're doing.

[00:44:23] We just become zombie pilots and just walk around the weird way.

[00:44:26] Or as an addict, we just go for our next fix.

[00:44:29] And that's how we move about.

[00:44:31] And then we ask for change and don't know how.

[00:44:35] Yeah.

[00:44:35] And so my typing thoughts was there.

[00:44:37] I actually went into another like 30 pages on Donnie Darko.

[00:44:41] I watched Donnie Darko and did the same thing with my mind.

[00:44:44] And I wrote another 26 pages of Donnie Darko with a ton of thoughts.

[00:44:49] And that is in the book as well.

[00:44:51] Did you have any kind of physical sensations when you were seeing this vision and typing

[00:44:58] these words onto that device?

[00:45:00] Or what were you on?

[00:45:01] Your laptop or your computer?

[00:45:03] Yeah.

[00:45:04] It was just a laptop.

[00:45:05] And I had a Bluetooth keyboard.

[00:45:07] And I laid face down on a bed.

[00:45:09] Luckily, I can type pretty well.

[00:45:11] I played a whole bunch of World of Warcraft growing up.

[00:45:13] So I was able to just lay on a bed with a Bluetooth keyboard above my head with literally

[00:45:18] my eyes closed face down on the bed.

[00:45:20] I had no intent of even writing.

[00:45:22] I didn't.

[00:45:23] I wasn't even looking at the screen when I was writing.

[00:45:25] So that's what's funny about the document.

[00:45:27] You can say like I wasn't even.

[00:45:29] I literally didn't have any care in the world, but except trying to figure out what was going

[00:45:32] on in my head.

[00:45:34] And to say I had feelings, it was very weird because it happened where I got projected

[00:45:39] and I saw the things I just talked about.

[00:45:41] And then I got, it was almost like a DMT trick because it ended as fast as it started because

[00:45:46] all of a sudden I remember seeing the entity sitting next to me.

[00:45:50] And I had the one thought as I looked back through the glass right after I saw the entity,

[00:45:55] it happened so fast.

[00:45:56] I had the one thought, why would somebody be so sad looking at my consciousness?

[00:46:01] And then all of a sudden I got projected to myself back on the bed typing again.

[00:46:05] And I don't even remember if I stopped typing.

[00:46:07] It happened while I was typing my thoughts out.

[00:46:10] No, I didn't.

[00:46:11] It's weird because I can't even say I had a feeling because I wasn't even here.

[00:46:14] It was almost like a DMT.

[00:46:15] It was almost like a psychedelic experience where I wasn't even here.

[00:46:17] I wasn't even in my body.

[00:46:19] I was not in my own body.

[00:46:21] No, I didn't even feel my own feelings at that point.

[00:46:24] It felt like I had gone to like a little part of my head that I could escape to or just like

[00:46:29] got sucked into my own brain at some point.

[00:46:32] At that point, if you would have told me where my body was, I wouldn't have been able to tell you.

[00:46:35] It would have felt like I was just like inside out inside the top of my head.

[00:46:39] It's the best way to describe it.

[00:46:41] So that whole experience was what led to the rest of the book or it just carried on to

[00:46:48] you like a bit of your memoir?

[00:46:50] That's kind of like a catalyst because I was kind of like a, holy crap.

[00:46:53] It started me on writing.

[00:46:54] It started me on getting to trying to get my thoughts out because I wanted to do it in

[00:46:59] a better way.

[00:46:59] Sort your thoughts out.

[00:47:00] Yeah, exactly.

[00:47:01] And that was my first experience because I'm no writer.

[00:47:04] I didn't even, I, English and spelling are my least two favorite subjects.

[00:47:08] Growing up, my mom used to say, where'd you get that one?

[00:47:10] The Rictionary?

[00:47:11] Because I literally cannot spell.

[00:47:12] I have ADHD.

[00:47:15] My reading comprehension is nothing.

[00:47:17] I can, I don't like reading books because I read a page and I forget everything I just

[00:47:21] read.

[00:47:22] And it happens to me all the time.

[00:47:24] So I am not, I hate to say it.

[00:47:26] I'm not a big person that likes to read.

[00:47:28] It's not enjoyable for me because I don't like rereading things.

[00:47:31] Okay.

[00:47:32] Imagine if you had to watch movies twice just to understand, you know, oh, I watched the

[00:47:36] movie.

[00:47:36] I don't remember the movie.

[00:47:37] Now I got to watch the movie again just so I understand it.

[00:47:39] People wouldn't want to watch movies anymore at that point.

[00:47:41] And that's how I feel like it is for reading with me and I'm trying to work on it.

[00:47:46] But that's why writing for me, like you said, that started my writing journey.

[00:47:50] And it's weird because I always told myself I'm not a writer.

[00:47:53] I'm not, I'm no poet.

[00:47:55] I can't write anything.

[00:47:55] I'm not creative, but that's what started me on philosophy.

[00:47:59] So what I started doing after that, before we go into the philosophy, I'm just going to

[00:48:04] finish my story.

[00:48:04] Cause that was, yeah, yeah, please do.

[00:48:06] Cause I started typing that and that was day three of being awake.

[00:48:10] And then I did the whole Donnie Darko bit.

[00:48:12] And what happened was it was Monday and I was, I needed to go back to work and I'd been

[00:48:17] awake for three days and I've been awake all weekend.

[00:48:21] And so I needed to get help.

[00:48:23] So I called some 98.6 that Boeing offers help to, and I ended up going to behavioral hospital

[00:48:30] cause they just, they looked at me or they heard what I'm saying.

[00:48:33] I hadn't slept all weekend.

[00:48:34] They're like, you need to go get help immediately.

[00:48:36] And of course in my head, I'm like, well, no shit.

[00:48:38] Will somebody just give me a fricking like something to sleep?

[00:48:42] Cause that's funny.

[00:48:42] Cause that's all I wanted was all I wanted was sleep at this point.

[00:48:45] So I went to the behavioral hospital after talking to them and I sat down in a doctor's

[00:48:53] office and I poured my heart out to them asking for sleep for an hour.

[00:48:56] They didn't even admit me that next thing I know they're shuffling me out the front door

[00:49:00] and said, we'll call you.

[00:49:02] And I remember being shocked because I went in there thinking I was going to get immediate

[00:49:05] help.

[00:49:06] You're going into behavioral hospital somewhere.

[00:49:08] You're going to go literally, it's my last step to the loony bin.

[00:49:11] I was accepting the fact that if I did this, I was going to be labeled crazy the rest of

[00:49:17] my life.

[00:49:18] And even if I went to any court system after this, I will be labeled as a crazy person.

[00:49:23] And I had to accept that going in there.

[00:49:25] So I remember I was crying.

[00:49:26] I'm like, Holy crap.

[00:49:27] What is crazy?

[00:49:28] I've been awake for three, four going on four days.

[00:49:31] And at that point, you start to believe yourself as being crazy too.

[00:49:36] Although what's weird about it, you talk about feelings and emotions.

[00:49:38] I didn't feel depressed.

[00:49:40] I didn't feel suicidal.

[00:49:41] I didn't feel the darkness.

[00:49:43] You know that when you feel about that dark, ominous feeling, I didn't feel any of that.

[00:49:47] All I did was jacked up and it felt like somebody hit me with an adrenaline shot that wouldn't

[00:49:52] stop.

[00:49:55] So after that, they told me to go to the ER if it got worse.

[00:49:58] Right.

[00:49:58] So they kicked me out and said, go to the ER if it got worse.

[00:50:01] And I remember going the next day, I had a therapist appointment and it was that I had

[00:50:07] my therapist appointment, I believe.

[00:50:09] And then I went to that therapist appointment, nothing got better.

[00:50:12] And so we knew my wife was like, this is day four after everything.

[00:50:16] And I still hadn't gotten sleep.

[00:50:18] So she said, we're done.

[00:50:19] We're going to the ER.

[00:50:20] This is day four.

[00:50:21] I'm like, yes, I'm done.

[00:50:23] I literally said, sign me up.

[00:50:24] You take me wherever I need to go.

[00:50:26] Just put me to sleep.

[00:50:27] I was like, that's how I felt.

[00:50:28] Because after a human being being awake for four days, trust me, elephant tranquilizer

[00:50:33] something.

[00:50:34] Dude, right.

[00:50:35] It's like, just give me anything.

[00:50:37] It's like, but what's weird about it is I didn't want to do it in the wrong way.

[00:50:40] It's like, I knew I could have just drank of myself to sleep.

[00:50:42] And then that, you know, the addictive brain did come in at one point where, yeah, you

[00:50:46] could just medicate yourself to sleep, but that I didn't want to do it that way.

[00:50:51] And that's a weird concept.

[00:50:52] I wanted to, I felt like I wanted to do it the right way.

[00:50:54] I didn't want to go back to my old ways of being an addict and just masking it.

[00:50:58] This was a different type.

[00:50:58] This was a different type of energy.

[00:51:00] I just wanted to go to sleep with it.

[00:51:02] I didn't want it to go away in a weird sense too.

[00:51:05] So my wife took me to the ER and I remember getting taken back there, go to Everett.

[00:51:10] And they literally take me back.

[00:51:12] I wait, do my whole time.

[00:51:14] And they say, well, we can't help you anyways.

[00:51:16] I'm like, what?

[00:51:17] So I get taken to the ER and they can't even help me because the doctor looked at me and

[00:51:21] said, we only assess people to see if they're a threat to yourself or if they're a threat

[00:51:26] to somebody else.

[00:51:27] And you're clearly not a threat to yourself or somebody else.

[00:51:29] So, and it's like, wait a minute.

[00:51:31] And I remember thinking in my head, so if I'm a heroin addict, puke in my brain that you're

[00:51:34] going to put me to sleep up on the third floor.

[00:51:36] But just because I'm not a threat to myself or anybody else means you're not going to help

[00:51:42] me.

[00:51:47] What do you want me to do?

[00:51:48] You're like, you know, do you want to scream?

[00:51:50] My, you know, me, my addict brain's like, fine, get the attention, get taken up to the

[00:51:53] third floor.

[00:51:54] But something said, no, just be patient.

[00:51:56] And I remember just walking, walking out the front door of the ER.

[00:51:59] And that's when I kind of lost it in my mind a little bit where I had the moment where

[00:52:04] I had my headphones on.

[00:52:05] I was listening to music and I literally was going, I felt like I'd gone insane.

[00:52:09] I felt like I had, it was kind of like I had opened my mind.

[00:52:12] Fine.

[00:52:13] I'm crazy.

[00:52:14] Here I am.

[00:52:15] And I just let it all go.

[00:52:17] And a weird concept.

[00:52:18] And it was like, it was very, it's weird because a lot of people don't want to be crazy, but

[00:52:23] then you get to that side of the fence.

[00:52:25] It's like, and then you act like it.

[00:52:26] And it's like, what is crazy?

[00:52:28] What am I actually being crazy for?

[00:52:30] And stuff like that.

[00:52:32] And it was a weird concept because I had been awake for four days without help.

[00:52:35] And I just, I trust me at that point, you feel like you're crazy in your own head.

[00:52:39] You feel like you're losing your mind.

[00:52:40] And that's why it's a lot.

[00:52:42] That's why a part of my journey has been hard for me taking my own health into my hands.

[00:52:47] Like you said, for my doctor later on, because I felt like I was a little bit of the mad

[00:52:51] hatter who I went crazy.

[00:52:53] And I understand why if somebody goes crazy, well, you will just put all of your health

[00:52:57] into somebody else's hands.

[00:52:58] And it's easier just to be a drone at that point.

[00:53:01] But that's why it was very hard for me at that point to take matters in my hand.

[00:53:05] Cause I literally felt like I went crazy after the ER.

[00:53:08] I opened myself up to that side of the fence.

[00:53:10] I'm like a little bit of the Joker.

[00:53:12] I want to say the Joker.

[00:53:12] It's like, you open yourself.

[00:53:13] Fine.

[00:53:14] I'm the Joker.

[00:53:14] Look at me.

[00:53:15] Who cares?

[00:53:17] I accept it.

[00:53:18] I accept.

[00:53:18] I have a dark side too.

[00:53:20] You can laugh at it, but I'll just, you know, it was a point when I just didn't care

[00:53:24] anymore.

[00:53:24] A little, a lot of my care for how other people judged me or viewed me went out the window

[00:53:29] that night.

[00:53:29] Like, it was a sense of like liberation.

[00:53:32] I was like, oh man, fine.

[00:53:33] If nobody's going to help me, the doctors aren't helping me.

[00:53:36] Behavioral hospitals aren't going to help me.

[00:53:38] Nobody's going to help me.

[00:53:39] Fine.

[00:53:39] I looked up in the sky, started singing my songs, started singing Pantera and Bullet

[00:53:44] for my Valentine.

[00:53:45] Like, fine, I'll help myself.

[00:53:46] And it's like, I just felt the music and just started doing with that.

[00:53:50] And then that is when I started getting into the writing.

[00:53:53] But long story short, I finally got sleep.

[00:53:55] To end the story, I did get sleep after the ER told me.

[00:53:59] I needed to go to the behavioral emergency care, but it was eight o'clock at night.

[00:54:03] And I think it was like seven 55 when the doctor looked at his watch.

[00:54:06] Cause he literally looked at his watch and said, you need to go to the emergency behavior

[00:54:10] room, but they close in five minutes.

[00:54:12] It was like out of the movie or something.

[00:54:13] He literally was like, oh, it's going to close in five minutes.

[00:54:15] I'm like, oh, are you shitting me?

[00:54:17] Are you shitting me?

[00:54:19] Yes.

[00:54:19] I'm like, I've been, I've been waiting.

[00:54:20] And not only that, how long was I waiting in the waiting room for them to tell me?

[00:54:24] I'm like, wait, why wouldn't you just put me over where I needed to be?

[00:54:27] And it was like, so I did.

[00:54:29] I had to do a whole nother night after I went out of the ER cause they didn't help.

[00:54:34] And then my wife ended up taking me back at eight in the morning to the behavioral emergency

[00:54:39] care.

[00:54:39] And they ended up getting me onto some strong antihistamines and getting me the help I

[00:54:43] needed, or they at least got me to sleep.

[00:54:46] That puts you out.

[00:54:48] Yes.

[00:54:48] I mean, you can't literally go crazy though.

[00:54:52] If you, you, you lack sleep and you're up for, you know, X amount of days, you can't literally

[00:54:59] lose your mind and go into a psychosis.

[00:55:01] Can't you?

[00:55:02] And that's what I've read too.

[00:55:03] The lack of sleep deprivation.

[00:55:05] They say what in legal terms, if you've been awake for 72 hours, you're legally insane.

[00:55:10] And I knew that.

[00:55:11] So it's like, I'm aware of all this stuff that it's bad for your health.

[00:55:15] You can be insane.

[00:55:16] It's not good for you.

[00:55:17] But here I am, here I am four days awake after doing that after.

[00:55:22] And it's not even for my chemicals for my wife told me she cheated on me.

[00:55:25] So it's not like I knew I just needed to sleep it off.

[00:55:27] I didn't even know how to turn it off.

[00:55:29] Oh, excuse me.

[00:55:30] I didn't know how to turn it off at that point.

[00:55:32] And that's why I was going to doctors for help.

[00:55:34] Because when you go into a mental state that you don't know how to get out of, aren't

[00:55:39] you supposed to trust your doctors to help you?

[00:55:41] That's how, that's how I guess I was kind of stumbling around looking for help and didn't

[00:55:45] know how at that point.

[00:55:46] Because first of all, I didn't know what bipolar was.

[00:55:50] My mom joked when I was growing up as a kid that my dad had bipolar and that he needed

[00:55:55] to get assessed, but he would never go to the doctor because he was always up building sheds

[00:56:00] at four in the morning.

[00:56:01] He was pretty a go-getter guy.

[00:56:03] And then that, yeah, those five days of me staying awake was my, and that happened back

[00:56:08] in the beginning, January, 2021.

[00:56:10] And that, yeah, that started my journal of writing because that got me into filling journals.

[00:56:16] After that, I started, you know, taking, like I said, I had my doctor's visit.

[00:56:19] I started struggling with going to work.

[00:56:21] Then I started taking psychedelics and I just started asking what life was.

[00:56:26] So I started filling journals up with my thoughts as well.

[00:56:29] Kind of like a philosopher.

[00:56:30] I was like, all right, fine.

[00:56:31] If I went mad and everything's crazy, well, what are my terms?

[00:56:35] What's life?

[00:56:36] What's the meaning of life?

[00:56:37] Now that I've gone crazy, what's the meaning of life?

[00:56:40] What's the meaning of this?

[00:56:41] And like, you start to reanalyze everything from your own point of view.

[00:56:45] But the weird part about my transition, it was like, I remember taking philosophy and

[00:56:50] psychology in college.

[00:56:53] And I remember taking classes and not understanding it.

[00:56:56] And I remember, you know, going back to that, I was just smoking weed back then.

[00:56:59] Now what's weird about my transition is after my situation that happened, I started watching

[00:57:05] Alan Watts videos online and I started doing like research on that.

[00:57:09] I read the definition of Satori and I understood the definition of Satori.

[00:57:13] And I was like, wait a minute.

[00:57:15] I couldn't even understand like one of like Plato's philosophies.

[00:57:19] And now it feels like I watch all these Alan Watts videos and I can watch all these in-depth

[00:57:24] spiritual like Terrence McKenna talks.

[00:57:26] And I understand everything that they're saying now.

[00:57:29] Not to the point of, oh, I think I know what he's talking about.

[00:57:32] To the point of, oh man, I would love to talk to you right now.

[00:57:35] My experience overlaps 20%.

[00:57:37] I want to get your perspective on this.

[00:57:38] It's almost like I feel like my own weird philosopher in my own way, having my own

[00:57:43] existential crisis.

[00:57:44] Yeah.

[00:57:45] I guess that's the best way to put it.

[00:57:48] How are existential crisis of philosophers created unless they have some type of existential

[00:57:52] crisis?

[00:57:53] And that's exactly what that was.

[00:57:54] Wow.

[00:57:55] And that formed into, so would you call it a memoir?

[00:57:58] These are your thoughts, your out-of-body experience and everything in between from that time.

[00:58:05] And I don't know how far of a time period it went on until you condensed the book and finalize

[00:58:13] it to where you said, all right, this is, I'm going to go ahead and publish this thing.

[00:58:17] Yep.

[00:58:17] Because this, just to let you know, yeah, I finished this about a year ago.

[00:58:20] So I know I've been living life.

[00:58:21] A lot's happened in the past year.

[00:58:22] Yeah.

[00:58:23] This is going back a couple of years.

[00:58:25] This timeframe is my five days staying awake.

[00:58:28] My, yeah, everything that's been going on.

[00:58:29] Um, it has the first chapter alone.

[00:58:34] I condensed an entire journal of thoughts I had into one chapter.

[00:58:39] So if you guys think you're going to be able to go and read the first chapter and it's

[00:58:43] going to be a Dr.

[00:58:44] Seuss that you're going to understand right away.

[00:58:45] I'm sorry.

[00:58:46] The first chapter alone is an entire page of my thoughts in philosophical format.

[00:58:51] So it's, it's going to be a hard read for a lot of people too.

[00:58:55] I'm going to say, because it's not one, it's like a, it's like a Frederick Nietzsche

[00:58:59] or meditations and stuff like that, where it one paragraph of my book sometimes will

[00:59:04] make you choke on a lot.

[00:59:05] And it did for me because it took me two years to write it.

[00:59:09] And there were times going back and editing it where I couldn't even edit it because it's

[00:59:14] so personal or I'd be crying or I'd be like having so many emotions going into it.

[00:59:18] And there'd be days where I'd be like, Oh, I need to edit my book.

[00:59:21] And then I'd be like, Oh, I don't want to deal with that right now.

[00:59:23] Nope.

[00:59:24] And I wouldn't do it.

[00:59:25] It was so emotional for me just to even create this book to begin with.

[00:59:29] So this is, this is the personal piece that you're sharing with people.

[00:59:33] Oh, this is very personal.

[00:59:35] It has a lot of my insecurities in here.

[00:59:37] It has a lot of, I mean, my deepest thoughts I put in here and I didn't hold back.

[00:59:41] I left them unauthent, unauthenticated.

[00:59:43] Sorry, I lost my word choice on that one.

[00:59:46] But it was like, I wanted to keep everything raw.

[00:59:49] And to the point, because I had, when I typed out all my Donnie Darko thoughts and everything,

[00:59:53] don't get me wrong.

[00:59:54] I put stuff in there about my mother.

[00:59:56] I said, I have an in, I have a mental health issue.

[01:00:00] What's going on with this?

[01:00:01] My drug addict, my addictions.

[01:00:03] When I was 15 years old, you know, me being confronted when I was, you know, Oh, you need

[01:00:07] to quit smoking weed so you can be assessed for ADHD.

[01:00:10] And I was like, yeah, fucking right.

[01:00:12] Kid who's crushing it on, on weed.

[01:00:14] You tell me to stop it so you can assess me for something.

[01:00:16] And it was like, I started digging into like my whole life and thoughts about everything

[01:00:20] I had had.

[01:00:21] And kind of like, I guess to your point, how did I become so miserable to begin with?

[01:00:26] Yeah, exactly.

[01:00:26] How did I become so miserable?

[01:00:28] And that's a hard, hard.

[01:00:29] If you take anybody who's depressed and give them an empty journal and just say, here,

[01:00:33] start writing.

[01:00:34] How did you become depressed and miserable?

[01:00:36] That that's going to be very, it's going to look different for everybody.

[01:00:39] It's going to be hard.

[01:00:39] And a lot of people aren't going to even want to do it.

[01:00:44] And that's a hard line.

[01:00:45] Cause I didn't even want to write this book half the time.

[01:00:48] And I didn't even want to part of me just between us.

[01:00:52] Did anyone?

[01:00:52] I mean, it's not between us.

[01:00:53] The world's going to hear it.

[01:00:54] I don't care.

[01:00:55] What I'm saying is like, part of me wanted to erase a lot of it.

[01:00:58] I wanted to go in and delete a lot of my insecurities and cover it up and sugarcoat

[01:01:03] it.

[01:01:03] It's part of me.

[01:01:05] And my, my brain kept saying, do you want, they're not, they're not going to like a

[01:01:08] lot of this stuff.

[01:01:08] You need to go edit it because it's way too harsh.

[01:01:11] It's way too, it's way too real.

[01:01:13] You know, there's too many grammatical errors and there'd be times I go back in to edit it.

[01:01:16] And then something would come into my head and say, don't do it.

[01:01:20] Literally, I'd have a voice in my head say, leave it.

[01:01:22] And it was almost like a challenge because I'm going through the Carl Jung phases of your,

[01:01:25] you challenge what you persist, resist.

[01:01:28] It's like what you're afraid of, what you should be your next task.

[01:01:32] And I remember sitting there wanting to delete a lot of my insecurities and a lot of my personal

[01:01:36] things out of the book.

[01:01:37] And it was like a, well, what are you scared of Rick?

[01:01:40] If you leave it in there, who's going to judge you?

[01:01:42] And I was like that.

[01:01:43] Well, you've already gotten mad.

[01:01:45] You're the mad hat or what?

[01:01:46] And I remember starting to write my whole book started with, if I strip off my clothes in

[01:01:51] front of the world, what would I have to lose?

[01:01:53] It's kind of like, what am I afraid of telling people what I thought, what I've been through,

[01:01:58] what I've experienced.

[01:01:59] And it's hard because people have reputations.

[01:02:01] And I think people don't want to kill their reputation.

[01:02:04] Yeah.

[01:02:05] That's like the idolized image that we all have, this mental formation that we have in

[01:02:10] our, in our minds.

[01:02:11] And sometimes that is what helps us appease and to deal with all of the, the things that

[01:02:18] we're dealing with inside.

[01:02:20] And we have this live image.

[01:02:22] So if there's anything that's going to harm it, that's going to tamper with it and anything,

[01:02:26] then that'll ultimately crumble our world as we know it, because that's, that's kind

[01:02:31] of like a coping mechanism or something that we use as a defense to get by into, you know,

[01:02:37] to manage our day-to-day affairs.

[01:02:39] Yes.

[01:02:40] No, that's exactly right.

[01:02:40] You got me thinking about how, like, why do we mask?

[01:02:42] It makes me feel like sometimes we mask because we feel like we need to keep a certain reputation

[01:02:47] or we feel like we need to make people happy or they need to see me as this person.

[01:02:52] You know, I may be having a terrible day, but if everybody always sees me as the happy go

[01:02:57] lucky, cheerful guy, and that's the reputation I tell myself, I need to maintain in a, you

[01:03:02] know, maintain if I'm having a bad day, can I go to all my friends and be sad?

[01:03:07] You know, could you be a scourge for one day or would everybody judge you?

[01:03:11] And they'd think, oh man, he's depressed.

[01:03:13] And then you're starting to think, well, my reputation's all ruined.

[01:03:15] I'm no longer the happy lucky guy.

[01:03:17] People are going to judge me.

[01:03:19] I'm not.

[01:03:19] And a lot of people are going to say, I'm not allowed to be sad.

[01:03:21] I'm not allowed.

[01:03:22] Yeah.

[01:03:23] I'm not allowed to be sad or vulnerable.

[01:03:25] So they crumble.

[01:03:26] It's a good, good point.

[01:03:27] And just think about all of the, I think we talked about earlier where you say, you know,

[01:03:31] some people there, they just have, they, they have no energy.

[01:03:34] They have no drive.

[01:03:35] They have no motivation.

[01:03:36] Now imagine all of us that do that and all of the energy, the resources that we use emotionally,

[01:03:47] spiritually, psychologically to keep this image alive.

[01:03:51] How much of the resources we're being used to keep that image alive.

[01:03:56] And it's draining us in every other ways imaginable where we can, we can be using that energy in a creative way,

[01:04:05] and a way to build, to grow, to learn, to educate ourselves.

[01:04:10] That could be going to so many different things, but there's so much energy that we use to uphold this image

[01:04:16] and do everything we can just to keep this alive because it is pretty much how we just conduct ourselves

[01:04:26] and how we deal with whatever it is that may be affecting us, you know, in our inner world and just inwardly.

[01:04:36] And yeah, there's just a lot of wasted energy going into that.

[01:04:41] And if we just, if we allow ourselves the time to try to get to it, okay, let me strip myself like you did.

[01:04:48] And in a sense, let me strip myself bare and we're going to build this thing back up better and greater than ever.

[01:04:54] And now you, you allow yourself to have all of these resources once again available,

[01:04:59] but to be used in a more constructive fashion.

[01:05:02] And that's to go towards rebuilding yourself, working on yourself, working on your relationships with other people.

[01:05:09] And then just how you, you live your life and experience your life on a holistic level.

[01:05:16] No, I completely agree. Yeah. Cause a part of spiritual awakening, you know, re-evaluation, your relationships, your energy and stuff.

[01:05:22] And yeah, you, you, and that's weird because you, you know, you as an addict, they say,

[01:05:26] I remember being conflicted when they'd say when you first do rehab and they first put you through the stuff

[01:05:32] and they say, it's okay to be selfish. Cause I remember as I was an addict as a people pleaser.

[01:05:36] And it was hard for me to be selfish. And so I remember they're like you, it's okay for you to do stuff for yourself.

[01:05:41] And that was, and that was a hard pill for me to even grasp once I started becoming sober.

[01:05:45] Cause I'm like, wait a minute. I thought we're supposed to be like the helpers, you know, whatever.

[01:05:49] It's like, I'm supposed to be helping everybody. It's like, well, now you're telling me I need to be selfish.

[01:05:54] And I remember that one was, that was a hard one for me to even grasp at 26. Cause I didn't understand what that meant.

[01:06:01] Like you talked about that shell, that people pleasing shell, that reputation you feel like I have to maintain.

[01:06:07] I literally was unable to even comprehend being selfish for a second because I felt like I had to maintain a reputation of being such a people pleaser.

[01:06:15] And, and what's funny is what, how was the label? How was the drug addict labeled?

[01:06:19] They're labeled as the most selfish and irresponsible people to be.

[01:06:22] So when you're a, when you're a people pleasing addict, it really feels like a catch 22 at times.

[01:06:28] You're like, no, man, I have a good heart. I would do good to anybody if they came into my world.

[01:06:33] Unfortunately, I just don't see anybody in my world that's worthwhile.

[01:06:36] And that, that's the hard one where you get depressed and stuff like that, where you feel like you want to do good, but, and a lot of people would do good, but they don't know where to do good or how.

[01:06:45] Yeah. You'd like to do good. And then, and your actions and your behaviors and just the way you're conducting yourself and living, living your life is just,

[01:06:52] you end up isolating yourself from everybody that means anything to you or, or any, any, anybody that's of any significance,

[01:06:59] you end up isolating yourself and your world gets smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller.

[01:07:05] And yeah, that's a scary place to be. And it can feel very, very hopeless.

[01:07:09] And it is because I'm also, you know, I'm starting, I love stoicism and I love that stuff.

[01:07:14] You know, I'm a huge Donnie Darko fan. They say, it's, you gotta be comfortable with being comfortable in yourself too.

[01:07:19] And so that's why it's a hard thing to say. It's like, ah, you know, you don't have any friends, you have lonely days, you have nothing to do, but it's also the fact that you should,

[01:07:26] a lot of people need to be comfortable in their skin as well. And that's something I was not.

[01:07:31] It's like, you put me in a room by myself and just left the house.

[01:07:34] I wouldn't even know what to do with myself or like what would have been enjoyment and stuff. And it's hard.

[01:07:40] Yeah. The self-isolation, that's one thing. And then you have the difference between now people, when you say, oh, you're alone or you're alone.

[01:07:48] Now there's one thing to, to, to, to feel lonely, but then to have an appreciation and allow your time sometimes for that solitude.

[01:08:00] You're alone, you're away, but there's a difference in, in how that, that is used. Like how you said, maybe you, you, you're alone and you don't, you wouldn't know what to do with yourself and everything.

[01:08:09] And I feel lonely. I got to distract myself. Let me pick up this phone. I'll find, I'll find what other people are doing or watch a video or something, or that versus somebody who just during that time, the solitude, you can use it.

[01:08:23] And, and like maybe self-reflection meditation you, you, you, you play a little instrument. You think you, you, you, you look and you just be in the moment and maybe appreciate what's going on around you.

[01:08:35] If you're outside the clouds are moving around or anything like that, but the difference in the loneliness and solitude and being alone.

[01:08:44] That's a good point. You, you, you hit it on the head with, are you either distracting or you're reflecting? Cause that's a good point.

[01:08:50] You know, you're trying to find passion or you're just trying to distract yourself until the day's over. Cause I know when I was depressed, a lot of the times it feels like you're just really good at masking and distracting yourself.

[01:09:01] And then you tell yourself, as long as I can get to the end of the day, tomorrow will somehow be different.

[01:09:06] Yeah.

[01:09:06] Even though tomorrow is different, you just, you tell yourself as long as I can make it to the end of the day, I'll be fine.

[01:09:13] And so you just bite the bullet, trying to make it to the end of the day, distracting yourself.

[01:09:16] But it's just like, you're right. You never reflect on saying like, what am I doing wrong? What do I like? Why aren't I doing more things I like?

[01:09:25] And if you like, you know, start to just find your passion. I think too.

[01:09:29] I think a lot of people get depressed and sad, don't have a passion or they don't have anything else to do.

[01:09:35] Whether it be drumming, you know, like you said, breathwork, yoga, it could be art, painting, guitar, singing, you know, any type of musical or art, I think is a good expression or.

[01:09:47] Or because I grew up on sports a lot. And I'm just gonna say, I think sports will, it kind of inhibits a more of a competitive nature.

[01:09:54] And that's why I think a lot of human beings need a sense of creative outlet and a sense of like art or some type of self expression.

[01:10:03] It could even be dancing or something like that. But I only grew up with sports and I feel like it kind of molded me into being a very competitive person growing up.

[01:10:13] And I just had that like fight where everything was a competition where it's like, there's a first, there's always a first place.

[01:10:18] And I was like, there's always some ranking of something. So it was a lot of its competition.

[01:10:24] And it's hard because I feel like that's a little, it's a negative view on the world.

[01:10:28] When it comes to like, you know, what martial arts and Kung Fu teaches you versus, you know, what sports teaches you.

[01:10:34] Cause I, you know, discipline and what's beneficial to it.

[01:10:36] Yeah. I got what you're saying. Yeah. I played pretty much most of my, my younger years, baseball, a little bit of football.

[01:10:43] But it was mainly baseball. And I guess in, in some sense, it can teach somebody how to accept or better deal with loss or failure.

[01:10:55] But yeah, that competitive nature really is something that can be destructive also.

[01:11:01] It can be because I know you can bring in your anger and there's times that you bring anger and you'd have retaliations and stuff.

[01:11:07] And you just, yeah, bringing all the emotions and things like that.

[01:11:09] But yeah, that's, that's when it becomes a little hard.

[01:11:12] I think as long as you don't have that time, like you said, to reflect and understand what your emotions are doing, but they don't.

[01:11:18] Our generation was not done anything about grounding or how to stay calm or, Hey, what are your emotions to begin with?

[01:11:24] We never had an emotion.

[01:11:27] Oh, I was the worst with it too. I just yell, scream.

[01:11:31] I mean, we just played kick in sports and we just played until it was dark.

[01:11:38] Man, Rick, I know we, we, uh, we, uh, had a long, long conversation before we started recording.

[01:11:45] And, um, you have some things going on, going on outside of this that you have to attend to, but man, um, I may, maybe we can, we can, uh, connect again and, and do this again.

[01:11:57] You know, and also before we wrap it up, you mind letting everybody know where they can find your book.

[01:12:04] I know you have it available as published, self-published, but if anybody wants to check out some of your thoughts, your philosophical, uh, point of view.

[01:12:12] Absolutely. It's on Amazon right now. You can get, it's called bipolar enlightenment. It's B Y E polar enlightenment.

[01:12:18] That's my little play on words. Cause you know, they diagnosed me bipolar. And then I said goodbye to it myself.

[01:12:22] So I was kind of having fun when I, I was having fun when I titled it. So I said, flip it around. Yeah.

[01:12:29] Bipolar and we'll see what happens.

[01:12:31] Bipolar. Ah, I like that. Okay. It took a second time for me, for me to say it and get with you. Okay.

[01:12:37] Exactly. I didn't, you know, it can only be bipolar for bipolar, but I literally was, I challenged life myself and I literally said goodbye.

[01:12:44] That was my joke is like, I'm not bipolar or am I whatever your, your take on it. Yes. No, I'd love to come back and talk to you again.

[01:12:52] Like I know you said you're very about to do your Iowa stuff like that. I'm curious. I still haven't done that yet myself, but I'd be curious and love to hear your perspective.

[01:13:03] Yeah. I'm looking forward to it. And yes, we'll definitely keep in touch, connect again. And I'm, I'm interested in, in your book. So I'm, I'm going to check that out myself and I'll leave a reference and a link in the show notes when this episode is published.

[01:13:18] And we'll go ahead and we'll go ahead and do that. But man, it was a pleasure and I really enjoyed it and we'll definitely get together and do this again. And if you have any, any final words or something you want to leave off with before we wrap it up, feel free, my friend.

[01:13:34] Well, I think I could talk for hours, but I'll, I'll keep it brief. I'm not, I'm not guy. I'd go down any rabbit hole, but no, it's been a pleasure. And like you said, I'm excited to talk about my book, share my experience with people, start helping people understand.

[01:13:47] I feel like I've been called to talk about psychedelics in a weird way and somehow heal when it comes to being stigma against big pharma. I believe in medications. Don't get me wrong. Like some type of medications are needed, but I don't think, I think the way the West went was way too overboard and we over medicated our kids. And I think that needs to pull back.

[01:14:07] And I think we need to go more for a natural and holistic approach of healing when it comes to plant medicine and things like that, where we, we need to stop doing research on how to make other chemicals. We need to start doing research on what the actual good our mother earth does to our body still, you know, and we're going to get back to that.

[01:14:25] I know that that's what I preach because I don't take any prescriptions anymore and stuff like that. I'm free on that. I just smoke weed every once in a while. It's fine. Whatever you want to take. I would much rather in my eyes, I'd much rather have a world that people smoke

[01:14:37] weed to counterbalance their ADHD and stuff like that than actually took ADHD medication. That's just my opinion.

[01:14:45] Yeah, I'm right on board with you there. And, you know, Rick, you know, I hope that I still was able to do you justice because like I said, we had, and as you already know, we had a great conversation beforehand and just started recording, man, probably about two hours after the fact, but I still hope you had, or you felt that you had a good enough time.

[01:15:07] And an opportunity to share some of what you had in mind to share.

[01:15:11] Oh, yeah. Oh, yes, absolutely. Like I said, of course, I, of course, I feel like I only shared 10% of my book. But every time I talk about it, I can only share 10% of it. Because it is, I feel like I watched a Keanu Reeves.

[01:15:26] He talked about like, well, how do you explain what the matrix is to somebody?

[01:15:42] The elevator pitch.

[01:15:43] But it's like my book is, it has and contains so much in it. Between it has my personality test in there, I have a whole chapter of my mother in there. When I took mushrooms, and I watched Alice in Wonderland, and I actually saw my own mother as the Red Queen while I was on mushrooms. That's in there as well.

[01:16:01] I even have some personal experiences. My first DMT experiences and my first DMT breakthrough experiences also in the book. That's quite the breakthrough as well. And so yeah, it's quite when you talk about yes, we did justice because I'm only ever going to be able to talk about 10% of it.

[01:16:17] I think that's my point getting this book across my transformation, because I feel a little bit like the Mad Hatter at times, because I did go a little crazy. But I'm reading all these quotes. I'm loving philosophers. And, you know, all the greats will sometimes say like, genius doesn't come without a touch of madness. I read that somewhere. It's like, and that's a weird concept, because it's like, well, okay, now I feel like I'm, I don't want to say I'm smarter, but what does an enlightenment and awakening do?

[01:16:45] Because you can connect more dots in your own head and you can see, and you can understand things more. And, and like I, what Jordan Peterson talks about, like emotional intelligence. And that's what a lot of people don't understand or want to articulate. It's like what emotional intelligence is what I strive for and what I look for in people and stuff like that.

[01:17:04] Because that will be a good tall tale sign of like what, how grounded a human being is of their emotional intelligence, being able to read a room and just not just squander it with negative energies.

[01:17:15] You know, I guess having some type of empathy and also being understanding of your own emotions and how to impact people.

[01:17:23] But yeah, trust me, this is a weird concept for me to say, because I'm literally about to come out to the world and say that I'm enlightened, whatever, you know, whatever enlightenment is. It's a spiritual awakening.

[01:17:33] It's a Satori experiences where you can pull more information out of your brain and be able to speak and act in a different way than most.

[01:17:42] And that's a weird, weird thing for me to say is like, what's enlightenment?

[01:17:46] Yeah, that kind of way.

[01:17:48] That's deep.

[01:17:48] Yeah, that reminds me of this. I was sharing with you a book that I've been reading about the inner work and about the creative imagination and dreams and whatnot.

[01:17:59] But that reminds me of this few lines from one of the chapters when he's talking about that we're not monodimensional creatures.

[01:18:08] And he says, I just wanted to share a little part of it.

[01:18:11] He says that none of us is just one thing.

[01:18:14] This is Robert A. Johnson.

[01:18:16] I believe the author's name is.

[01:18:17] He says, none of us, none of us is just one thing.

[01:18:21] We are not monodimensional creatures.

[01:18:23] We are rich combinations of the infinitely varied archetypes.

[01:18:28] Each of us is part heroine or hero and part coward, part parent and part child, part saint and part thief.

[01:18:37] It is in learning to identify these great archetypal motives within ourselves, learning to honor each one as a legitimate human trait, learning to live out the energy of each in a constructive way that we make inner work a great odyssey of the spirit.

[01:18:57] I like that.

[01:18:59] When you're saying all those things back and forth, maybe think of bipolar.

[01:19:02] You're like, it's always this way or that one way or the other.

[01:19:04] Maybe think of light and shadow.

[01:19:06] It's like you have a dark side and light side.

[01:19:09] One of my writings I was writing about, I literally wrote, does everything have an opposite?

[01:19:14] You talk about bipolar.

[01:19:15] Is there always a good, bad, up, down, left, right?

[01:19:19] It seems like there's always opposites to everything and people don't want to make the wrong choice.

[01:19:23] Yeah.

[01:19:23] And you can even, and I was kind of playing with this idea, but I'm sure it's been out there before and that I read it or I found it somewhere and it just, it just like re-sparked inside of me.

[01:19:37] But even just old stories and old tales, like say, for instance, you have the Garden of Eden.

[01:19:43] You can look at it.

[01:19:43] You can look at it in a, what is the word?

[01:19:46] Is it verbatim and this is actual fact and it happened?

[01:19:49] Or is it a story of, it could be of the conscious and unconscious.

[01:19:53] You have Adam and Eve.

[01:19:55] You have the masculine and feminine.

[01:19:57] You have the yin and the yang.

[01:19:58] You have the good and the bad.

[01:20:00] And so it's just a story of the polarity in humanity or human consciousness, the on and off, the creative and destructive.

[01:20:08] And you can look at it as a factual or you can look at it as these are symbolic of a deeper meaning.

[01:20:13] And so they were written in parables or allegories and different cultures.

[01:20:18] They took it and they put a name to it to fit their culture.

[01:20:21] But this could be esoteric meaning in itself if you look at it in that sense.

[01:20:26] And it could open up like a whole other can of fruit to chew on.

[01:20:34] No, I get it.

[01:20:35] No, I like that.

[01:20:36] You say that, yeah, the Bible and stuff like that.

[01:20:38] Adam and Eve.

[01:20:38] Because I always, you always wonder if a story like that's true.

[01:20:41] Yeah, was there a talking snake?

[01:20:44] Right.

[01:20:44] But, you know, the way I look at it, it's like, man, if Jesus had to have been real at some point.

[01:20:49] There's too many stories and there's too many things about it to not say he wasn't real.

[01:20:54] And it's weird to try to think about it.

[01:20:56] It wasn't metaphorical, like you said.

[01:20:58] It was about the Adam and Eve, the garden and stuff like that.

[01:21:02] Eve was the one who apparently got tempted and stuff like that and swayed by the devil.

[01:21:07] Or she was the one who took the bite off the forbidden fruit.

[01:21:10] And it's a weird concept.

[01:21:13] Yeah.

[01:21:13] You even have like it could be the Garden of Eden.

[01:21:15] That could be just the terrain of the human consciousness.

[01:21:18] And then you have the good and the bad, which is Adam and Eve.

[01:21:21] Or not to say good and bad in a literal sense, but just the polar opposites of each other.

[01:21:26] The feminine and masculine in each one of us.

[01:21:29] In and everything, too.

[01:21:31] There's a feminine and masculine from what some say in just about everything.

[01:21:35] There's going to be the two different sides.

[01:21:37] And that's that could be the coming together.

[01:21:40] Once that marriage is brought back together in human consciousness, when you're able to not just be so one right side or just so left side.

[01:21:49] And you have that perfect balance, that perfect marriage.

[01:21:51] That's when you have a unison and you're able to be a more complete, fulfilled and balanced individual.

[01:21:58] No, that makes sense.

[01:21:59] Because I, you know, masculine.

[01:22:01] Marrying the two.

[01:22:02] I was always like a more, I'd say sensitive because like Disney movies, man, you put on Kung Fu Panda, I'll cry and stuff like that.

[01:22:08] But I know as a guy, I always had a lot of sensitivity when it came to like watching like inspiring movies or inspiring things would always make me tear.

[01:22:18] And I know I would always punish myself for any time I felt those type of emotions as a guy.

[01:22:24] Because it's like, oh, you can't show that vulnerability.

[01:22:26] You can't be that weak male type of person who's going to cry during a Disney movie.

[01:22:31] Hell no.

[01:22:32] It's like, no.

[01:22:32] So I remember you fight those things as a guy and stuff like that.

[01:22:35] You bury it in and you just make fun of everybody else who did cry.

[01:22:38] Even though you're the one that wanted to cry.

[01:22:41] It's like a weird thing where you feel like as a masculine and feminine, it kind of got twisted where people, where guys felt like they had to put on a false masculine presence.

[01:22:50] It's a weird macho standpoint where everybody's got to be an Arnold Schwarzenegger or Bruce Lee or something to be a macho guy.

[01:22:57] It's like, no, you go ask women.

[01:22:59] They're just going to want you to be authentic and be yourself and be true to them.

[01:23:02] Yes, people want it.

[01:23:03] Women want to be protected at some point.

[01:23:05] And I know there's some probably biological feature to where they do want some obviously buffer ripped guy.

[01:23:11] I don't know how that works.

[01:23:12] But when it comes to masculine and feminine, it got so far twisted.

[01:23:16] It's like even tomboys got rejected and vulnerable males got rejected to the point that those are the ones that are probably transitioning to these days.

[01:23:25] In my mind, nobody should be transitioning.

[01:23:28] I think everybody should just accept that I'm a tom girl and then be a more masculine woman.

[01:23:32] Or if you're going to be a vulnerable male, great.

[01:23:36] Stay a male, but just be a vulnerable male.

[01:23:38] Because in my opinion, our bodies don't really need to change to be who we are.

[01:23:42] We're born.

[01:23:43] We're given our God-given rights.

[01:23:44] We're given this one body.

[01:23:46] I don't need to change this body to be happy.

[01:23:49] That's not the way.

[01:23:50] Just like the mind.

[01:23:51] If you look for happiness outside of your mind, no, no, wrong.

[01:23:54] It's kind of like you don't look for a happiness outside of you.

[01:23:58] Well, guess what?

[01:23:58] My body is me.

[01:23:59] So if I try to change myself, it's like to me that's a way of trying to manipulate my own happiness.

[01:24:05] Now I understand getting rid of cancer.

[01:24:07] Like taking cancer out of your body and certain things like that.

[01:24:09] Yeah, but I see kids and stuff like that transitioning and all the stuff going on these days.

[01:24:14] All the identity crisis and things like that.

[01:24:18] It's like, man, schools these days are teaching their kids how to like not lose their mind and teaching sex and stuff like that.

[01:24:24] I don't know about you, but I didn't even watch a sex ed video until I was in fifth grade.

[01:24:27] And it was like some weird video we watched up in the corner of the room.

[01:24:31] We could barely even see about a woman's ovary and how they gave birth.

[01:24:37] Yeah, I think it was like illustrations probably.

[01:24:41] And I don't even remember what grade I was.

[01:24:43] I probably was sixth or seventh.

[01:24:45] Yeah, it was up there.

[01:24:46] It wasn't in second or third grade for sure.

[01:24:49] Right.

[01:24:49] And part of my awakening, my experience was a lot of sexual too.

[01:24:52] Coming into your like realizing what you want and stuff like that.

[01:24:56] It's like fine.

[01:24:57] You're just accepting yourself who you are.

[01:24:59] And I'm going to say to a lot of people, a lot of the kids who are twisted and young,

[01:25:02] it's like you really need to find yourself before you even think about like trying to fix yourself.

[01:25:07] Because if you haven't found yourself, then you can't even identify yourself.

[01:25:10] And that's just like the way that we're doing it now is instead of allowing them that time and encouraging that right away,

[01:25:17] like we're doing with the medication, overly medicated.

[01:25:20] Hey, we got something for you.

[01:25:21] You could take these hormone blockers.

[01:25:23] You can take these whatever testosterone blockers or these hormone enhancers, whatever it is.

[01:25:29] Like the Ritalin burst with ADHD.

[01:25:29] It's like, hey, next thing you know, everybody's on Ritalin.

[01:25:31] It feels like it's kind of like that thing like, oh, everybody do it because it's the right way.

[01:25:36] But it's just, you know, everything's a fad.

[01:25:39] It seems like there's a lot of fad that goes around.

[01:25:40] But people don't realize what's healthy for themselves yet.

[01:25:45] And that's hard because we want to trust our government.

[01:25:47] We want to trust our schools and teachers.

[01:25:49] But from my experience, I couldn't even trust my own doctor.

[01:25:53] And I had to take my life into my own hands.

[01:25:55] And it's weird because you don't want to trust is a weird thing.

[01:25:59] Yes.

[01:25:59] I mean, I always say question everything.

[01:26:03] Critical thinking is frowned upon now.

[01:26:05] Or it's not encouraged in some spaces.

[01:26:08] It's not even really allowed.

[01:26:11] Right.

[01:26:12] And it's hard because parents just want the best for their kids.

[01:26:15] And I read a horrible story the other day about some parent who helped their kid transition.

[01:26:20] And now the kids a year later absolutely like yell like mad at the parents for letting them do it.

[01:26:28] Because the kid was like, well, if you would have pushed me hard, I wouldn't have transitioned.

[01:26:32] And the parents were like, well, I just want to do the right thing for the kids.

[01:26:35] It's like, well, and that's the whole point.

[01:26:37] If you have a human being at 14 years old, leave them alone.

[01:26:41] I don't know.

[01:26:42] Even the parents at that point are thinking they're making the right decision.

[01:26:45] But they're just being a people pleaser.

[01:26:47] It seems like at that point.

[01:26:49] Because now they're stuck with a kid who's mad at them for ruining their body.

[01:26:54] And I would hate to be in that position with my own son.

[01:26:59] Oof.

[01:26:59] Because I have an eight-year-old.

[01:27:00] I have an eight-year-old.

[01:27:01] And I think about this all the time.

[01:27:02] And I just, it's a tricky one.

[01:27:04] Allow them to develop, mature psychologically, physically, emotionally.

[01:27:12] And you can't stunt that or you can't tamper with it.

[01:27:17] You shouldn't manipulate it.

[01:27:19] You shouldn't try to do anything to get in the way of what nature, the great mother nature has already set in place.

[01:27:28] And when we start getting our hands involved in that and trying to play God or do a quick fix and say, well, just go ahead and cut this off and it's going to make you feel better.

[01:27:37] But there's still something going on deep down in a deeper sense than just cutting off a limb or to get rid of something.

[01:27:44] There's still something there that needs some addressing.

[01:27:48] And until that happens, it isn't going to change anything.

[01:27:51] It might just supplement it for a while.

[01:27:54] But then you hear so many stories of people regretting it and some that are doing it before they've even hit puberty or before their body hasn't even completely developed.

[01:28:05] No, that's a weird concept for me.

[01:28:07] They're literally identifying as a woman before they've even had sex.

[01:28:10] And I don't get that.

[01:28:11] They'll cut off their penis before they've even had sex.

[01:28:14] Yeah.

[01:28:14] I don't understand it from a kid's perspective, but how could you feel like the opposite sex?

[01:28:20] To me, it's just a societal pressure to want to fit into where you get it, where you have those sensitive males who feel like women and they cry during movies.

[01:28:28] Or you have those tomboy of females who are more masculine where they want to play sports and they want to play football.

[01:28:35] And that's fine.

[01:28:36] But it's just like you should not have to change your gender to do it because there's only two.

[01:28:44] I mean, it has to be that way.

[01:28:48] I don't get it.

[01:28:49] I'm just going to say there has to be two genders.

[01:28:51] We have to label it as is.

[01:28:52] And people are going to lose their mind in the LGBTQ or whatever.

[01:28:56] It's just the way I see it.

[01:28:58] If you were to take any other species and go into the animal kingdom and go on to, let's say, like a group of, I don't know, like cockroaches, whatever.

[01:29:07] We go to the cockroach and we start having a conversation with them.

[01:29:09] Like, hey, cockroaches, how are you doing?

[01:29:11] And it's like, well, what are you guys doing?

[01:29:12] They literally started talking to us from the LGBTQ community like, hey, we don't have males and females down in cockroach.

[01:29:18] And we tried to understand their way of living from that perspective of there is no gender.

[01:29:24] So the way I look at it is if aliens came and we had to explain to aliens our gender identities through the LGBTQ, we would be laughed at.

[01:29:33] Our planet would be blown up because we're idiots because we don't even know how to speak truth and stuff like that.

[01:29:39] And that's the way I see it.

[01:29:41] And it's hard because I don't want to say, you know, people are going to be like, oh, feelings are feelings.

[01:29:45] It's like, man, how can we possibly identify what sex we are just by a feeling we have in our head when we don't even know our own identity yet?

[01:29:54] Right.

[01:29:54] Yeah.

[01:29:55] And now we're even putting some children now in a position to where they can't even believe their own eyes because now a child can be just looking at somebody and say like, oh, that's a boy.

[01:30:06] And then if this boy identifies as a girl or whatever, and now you're telling the boy, no, no, no, that's not a boy.

[01:30:13] That's a girl.

[01:30:14] Like, what?

[01:30:15] So he can't even believe his own eyes anymore because now he's looking at someone who is a boy, but you're telling him he's a girl.

[01:30:21] So this child does not know up from down, left from right, blue from red.

[01:30:27] No, my kid, my kid's eight years old and I'm still like back at parenting 101.

[01:30:32] I hear the stories about like 10 year olds and eight year olds transition.

[01:30:35] I'm like, how, how?

[01:30:37] My kid can't even make himself breakfast and like, you know, bathe himself and he can't do a proper bathroom routine by himself yet.

[01:30:45] What in any conscious thought would I ever have that I need to change his body in any way to make him happy right now?

[01:30:51] You're not going to let him drive a car.

[01:30:54] They're not, these children are allowed to buy cigarettes.

[01:30:56] They're not allowed to buy alcohol, but they can go ahead under.

[01:30:59] They don't even, some states are saying you don't even have to allow their parents to know what they're doing.

[01:31:06] It's just between them and the doctor.

[01:31:08] Correct.

[01:31:09] In Canada, I believe that's what they can do.

[01:31:11] From my understanding in Canada, it's like you could have a 16 year old daughter.

[01:31:14] And so against the will of her parents, she could just go to the doctor and get put on all the hormones herself without the parent being able to say, from my understanding, I read a story.

[01:31:24] A dad actually got put in jail because a 16 year old went to the doctors and he tried to stop.

[01:31:29] And the law, the law was the dad couldn't get involved with the whole, no, the 16 year old wants to do it.

[01:31:34] They're going to do it.

[01:31:35] And it's like, oh my gosh.

[01:31:36] Wow.

[01:31:38] That would be heartbreaking.

[01:31:39] My heart sank as a father.

[01:31:41] It's like, I couldn't imagine if I had a 16 year old daughter doing that.

[01:31:44] And you're just trying to do the best thing for your daughter.

[01:31:46] And like I say, all the doctors, everything else is just feels like it's ruining your own daughter.

[01:31:51] Wow, man.

[01:31:53] We, we, uh, yeah, this, we, we kind of went on a good spin with this, this end half of it.

[01:31:59] But, uh, there's, there's, there's been a few, um, there's been a few people that I spoke with that actually the transitioners that wanted to share their story.

[01:32:09] But guess what?

[01:32:10] They were terrified and afraid of the backlash that they would get for speaking out and saying that this was a mistake.

[01:32:19] They jumped the gun.

[01:32:20] They shouldn't have did it.

[01:32:21] And just to warn other people, like, you know, just wait it out a little bit.

[01:32:26] Don't rush into it and, um, don't feel pressured into doing anything and don't get involved in any groups that are going to just echo the, the things that are going to make you feel as if you're doing the right decision.

[01:32:43] And so that's, that's what there, and there's been a few people actually that they were, uh, that I spoke with and they wanted to, but then, um, for reasons having to do with that, just, they, they didn't want to deal with the backlash.

[01:32:56] They didn't want to deal with the negative sayers.

[01:32:58] And, um, they said, you know what, I'll just hold off on it.

[01:33:01] And, um, they chose not to speak their story.

[01:33:04] I get it.

[01:33:05] That's also got to be embarrassment too.

[01:33:07] I mean, there's a lot of, you know, nobody likes to make a mistake.

[01:33:10] And that, and that is a big thing for, you know, even, and that's not the parent coming up and saying we made the mistake.

[01:33:16] That's got to be from the child too.

[01:33:18] So that's hard.

[01:33:18] Like you said, from the child's perspective, a, they have to be the one to stand up first and say, not only did you as parents make a mistake, but I don't like the decision.

[01:33:27] I let you guys make me make.

[01:33:29] And it's like one of those where it's like, oh man, this is going to open up a can of worms of some weird conflict.

[01:33:35] But I think when you feel like you've made a mistake and if you, you got to go with it, like, like you said, when I was going through my doctors and stuff like that, you got to kind of just go with what's your heart and stuff like that.

[01:33:45] And I do a lot of writing in philosophy about the shadow and darkness and how your shadow gets created when you try to ignore signs and you try to like lie or hide, or you're not being the authentic self.

[01:34:00] And that's what's weird about the whole LGBTQ push.

[01:34:02] Cause everybody's like, oh, I am being, I'm being prideful.

[01:34:05] It's like, well, hold on.

[01:34:06] No, that's the whole sham of it.

[01:34:08] People think they're just being so prideful and being so inclusive by jumping the bandwagon and supporting all that.

[01:34:16] But it's like, no, when you go watch the videos behind the scenes of what they're indoctrinating into like the kids and stuff like that, it's terrible.

[01:34:24] And I don't know how it was in Germany and stuff like that.

[01:34:26] There are people that I know that they work with and are around actually psychiatric facilities where people with mental disorders and everything.

[01:34:39] And according to what they're saying, some of the psychologists that work there, they're saying that they're seeing a huge, huge tick with younger people coming in.

[01:34:51] And the reason that they're coming in is because of their confusion over their gender.

[01:34:58] Wow.

[01:34:59] Out of everything, schizophrenia, anxiety disorders.

[01:35:04] That is one of the main issues.

[01:35:07] That's crazy.

[01:35:09] Identity crisis is number one crisis right now.

[01:35:12] It's like, yeah, I guess it's, and it's, but, and, and it is sexual.

[01:35:16] I hate to say it because people are just gonna say, oh, it's an identity crisis, but when it comes down to it, everybody labels it as whether they want to be a boy or girl.

[01:35:22] It is sexual.

[01:35:24] I don't want to say it when you get down to it.

[01:35:25] It's like, fine.

[01:35:27] Maybe you should have trial period.

[01:35:28] Go live as a girl.

[01:35:29] Don't change yourself, but go pretend to be a girl.

[01:35:32] You can still do whatever you want, but just go live like them for a couple of years and go do a trial run.

[01:35:36] But I think people are so quick to jump the gun of, oh, I need to do this because it's going to make me feel good.

[01:35:42] And people are on such a bandwagon to feel good about themselves.

[01:35:46] And that's where they can get sucked into the, oh, well, this is what I need.

[01:35:50] Because I hate to say it, a part of my book, I even wrote in there when I was in high school, I was 130 pounds, six foot as a guy too.

[01:35:57] So I didn't really fit in.

[01:35:58] And I even had the thoughts back in high school of being a girl sometimes because I remember having thoughts like I'd be a better wife than I would be a guy because I was that sensitive guy.

[01:36:08] And I knew I probably would have fit in the female community better than I would have fit in the male community in a weird aspect.

[01:36:15] And I know maybe that's a lot of the twisting that kids are getting their minds into.

[01:36:19] They just have those thoughts that I did thinking, well, hey, I could fit into this one better.

[01:36:24] That doesn't mean that's who you are or that's where you belong.

[01:36:26] Because now I know exactly where I belong as a guy and stuff like that.

[01:36:31] But what's weird thought is if the transitioning was around when I was a kid, would I have transitioned?

[01:36:36] And I think that comes with the peer pressure of family and friends.

[01:36:39] And that's what it comes down to.

[01:36:41] Yeah.

[01:36:41] And then not just even family and friends now, but it's like the society in general.

[01:36:47] You have the schools.

[01:36:48] You have the jobs.

[01:36:50] You have the workforce.

[01:36:52] You're being I remember there was a few times back when I was in California, we would have team meetups and everything.

[01:37:00] And they were breaking it down and letting us know how to conduct ourselves with people who identify as this or identify as that.

[01:37:08] And allowing a man who had broad shoulders, who had a deep voice, who talked about he loved women.

[01:37:17] And so I was like, so does that make you a lesbian then because you say you're a woman?

[01:37:22] Because this man, just because he put a skirt on, but he had pants underneath, he wore makeup.

[01:37:28] And it looked like somebody who was in a Halloween contest or something just put like makeup in the dark and put it on himself.

[01:37:36] And he was allowed to go in the restroom and use the female's restroom.

[01:37:40] And the women could not say anything about it because that was being discriminatory.

[01:37:44] And that wasn't that wasn't respecting his choice of who he said he said he was or who he identified with.

[01:37:51] But these women had to feel uncomfortable going to the restroom because this man who said he's a woman and said he dates women and only likes women was able was allowed to use the restroom with it.

[01:38:05] It was it was unbelievable.

[01:38:10] Making everybody uncomfortable.

[01:38:11] That's what it does.

[01:38:12] And I know I hate they're all like, oh, this is how it needs to be.

[01:38:15] But we shouldn't we shouldn't have to make the world uncomfortable, make one person comfortable.

[01:38:21] And that's kind of what it feels like comes down to that aspect, because I what's been wrong with having guys and girls bathrooms.

[01:38:27] No, I I'm a guy.

[01:38:29] There's no way I would ever go and think of going into the girls bathroom for any reason.

[01:38:33] And just because I put on girls clothes does not make me a girl.

[01:38:37] OK, and that's weird because like you can have those girls who.

[01:38:41] OK, well, bring a girl into the guys room, put jeans on and then go tell her to use a urinal.

[01:38:46] And when she actually transitions, she ain't going to be able to.

[01:38:50] So it's just like biological functions aren't there.

[01:38:52] And it's just and I get that when it comes down to feeling just people wanting to be themselves.

[01:38:57] But it's the scary those scary situations because we want our kids to be safe.

[01:39:02] I want to know my kid can go to the mall without that creepy guy you just talked about going into the restroom.

[01:39:06] I've seen those videos of those guys and girls going into the bathroom and stuff.

[01:39:10] It's just very weird.

[01:39:12] And I don't agree with it.

[01:39:13] It's just not really what it comes down to is when when we're talking about being yourself.

[01:39:19] And they say, yeah, but I am being myself.

[01:39:21] But are we really or are we allowing the pressures from outside?

[01:39:27] Are we allowing this group of people or that group of people to persuade us, to push us, to nudge us, to be a certain way and to feel a certain way?

[01:39:37] And even if it is like how you said.

[01:39:40] And there was a lot of people I remember in school that felt the same way.

[01:39:44] Like, oh, that's a Tom.

[01:39:45] That's a tomboy.

[01:39:46] It was a girl.

[01:39:46] And it's just one of those things that they either outgrew or maybe, you know, they ended up going lesbian or something, you know, something like that.

[01:39:55] But it was never a fact of I am a boy.

[01:39:58] No, they were a girl.

[01:39:59] They just they like to play with the boys and they wore jeans and they rolled around in the mud and played tackle football and stuff and kind of rough around the edges.

[01:40:08] But I guess there was no groups or crowds of people saying, oh, you know why?

[01:40:13] It's because you're a boy or it's because of this or it's because of that.

[01:40:18] And now you have these groups of people in your ear and then you you can identify with this group.

[01:40:23] And then now you start taking on the whole belief and philosophy of this group.

[01:40:29] And whether it's I'm not I'm not in my proper body or I'm non-binary or whatever it is.

[01:40:35] I don't know.

[01:40:36] There's so many things and it's hard to keep up with what it is these days.

[01:40:39] But, yeah, there's there's a lot of outside pressure.

[01:40:44] And if we're not in touch and in tune and getting to know who we really are, then we're subject to fall by the wayside and just get swallowed up by whatever is rubbing us the right way at any particular time.

[01:41:00] Exactly. And I think the kids are lost or depressed and stuff like that are the ones are more susceptible to fall into those peer pressures as fast just to want to fit in or be the life of the party.

[01:41:10] Because I was always more of an introvert and I was always jealous of those people who are the life of the party who could just walk around and just not feel like anybody.

[01:41:17] Not they could literally just not, I guess, a who could be the life of the party and not feel judged from everybody else.

[01:41:24] But I was always like, oh, I wish that was me in a certain aspect.

[01:41:27] And I know that's why I started drinking a lot of the times because drinking does make you more outgoing.

[01:41:32] So that's why I don't that's why I don't drink anymore.

[01:41:34] When you realize the only reason you're drinking is to become outgoing.

[01:41:37] It's like, well, that's not me.

[01:41:40] That was one of the reasons.

[01:41:42] Yeah, I stopped drinking.

[01:41:43] And that's a hard one, too, to come to the terms of, well, it's not about having fun anymore.

[01:41:48] It's about being yourself.

[01:41:49] And I know for you, especially like me being an ex addict and stuff like that, we like our drinks and we like our stuff that keeps going.

[01:41:57] We like our coping mechanisms.

[01:41:59] So it's hard for us to look at a coping mechanism and take self-responsibility and say, you know what?

[01:42:05] This one's not good for me.

[01:42:06] And then throw it off to the side.

[01:42:08] It's a tough pill to swallow.

[01:42:09] Right.

[01:42:10] That is a hard one to swallow.

[01:42:11] But back to the, yeah, back to the transitioning stuff.

[01:42:14] That's a tough one for all those kids.

[01:42:16] Oh, yeah.

[01:42:16] Wow.

[01:42:17] We went on a pretty good rant about that.

[01:42:21] I'm sitting here during like jotting stuff on a piece of paper and I've already filled up two pages already.

[01:42:26] Yeah, I was, it was just, just talking about how it was a great conversation.

[01:42:32] And we're going to catch up and do this again.

[01:42:35] And it went somewhere.

[01:42:37] Always go somewhere.

[01:42:38] It's like, hey.

[01:42:39] We went somewhere around the bend.

[01:42:40] We did.

[01:42:41] Well, hey, you said, did I get enough of my book?

[01:42:43] I appreciate you absolutely having me on here.

[01:42:45] It's a pleasure.

[01:42:46] Like I said, I'm looking forward to talking about my book and speaking about this stuff to people.

[01:42:51] And yeah, spreading the word of just being able to better your own mind in ways, being able to educate.

[01:42:59] And I think the world needs to understand the power of philosophy as well.

[01:43:03] Not only psychedelics, but the power of philosophy and just being able to ask your own questions.

[01:43:08] Because a lot of people are like, oh, philosophers can think for themselves.

[01:43:11] How do I be that?

[01:43:12] But it's like a lot of people can't put their, themselves into the mind of a philosopher and literally just start questioning everything.

[01:43:19] Because people want to question everybody else, but they don't want to question themselves.

[01:43:22] And I think that's where a real philosopher starts with questioning themselves.

[01:43:25] Because I could walk around and question everything around me.

[01:43:28] That's great.

[01:43:29] But until you know yourself, like we're talking about, then you can start to open yourself up and question everything else.

[01:43:35] Oh, man.

[01:43:35] That's a hard one right there.

[01:43:37] That hit home.

[01:43:38] Yeah, that just reminds me of where it's really easy to point the finger.

[01:43:42] But when you're pointing the finger out, you have three pointing right back at yourself.

[01:43:46] There you go.

[01:43:47] It's like sometimes you point in.

[01:43:48] After the spiritual awakening, sometimes you still point the finger and you realize it's pointing right back at you.

[01:43:52] And like you said, it's just like, wait a minute.

[01:43:54] Oh, what am I doing?

[01:43:55] And I think that's also the accepting of some of the wrongs you do.

[01:43:58] It's like, oh, I'm not a good person.

[01:44:01] I need to change my ways in some aspects.

[01:44:03] And what does the power of your own thoughts do in staying positive?

[01:44:08] A lot of people, high school, I'll say is trash talking, slanders, reputation, a lot of stuff.

[01:44:14] But from my understanding, it's all about love, positivity, and speaking truth.

[01:44:18] I don't know.

[01:44:19] Good luck trying to incorporate that into high school culture for a while.

[01:44:22] Because it seems like high school.

[01:44:24] I don't know about you.

[01:44:24] You remember high school culture was all about.

[01:44:26] Yeah, you want to fit in.

[01:44:28] Try to go into high school.

[01:44:29] Yeah, and you can't.

[01:44:30] That's why I would really respect like how I'm just thinking back in high school, how hard it was to just stand to try to or to feel like, you know, to be comfortable with yourself.

[01:44:44] Who is at that age, I guess you can say, and be able to just walk your own path and not to feel like you have to act a certain way just to fit in with this group of people and to do everything that's acceptable to them.

[01:44:59] Because you don't want to get kicked out the bunch, you know.

[01:45:03] Right.

[01:45:05] Exactly.

[01:45:06] And that's a weird thing to look at because those are the things.

[01:45:09] It's like how do you create a healthy environment in a high school?

[01:45:12] Because these are the kids in high school that are the ones having identity crises, I'm sure.

[01:45:18] But it's you talk about all those walls being up because they identify and it's like felt like I was a stoner.

[01:45:23] But it's like, I guess, how do you break those walls where you have all the heavy metals and all the nerds and all the jocks and everybody?

[01:45:28] It's hard to break all those barriers and have.

[01:45:32] I don't know.

[01:45:32] It's going to be a weird one.

[01:45:33] I'm curious because they say a lot of these younger generations are smarter than we were.

[01:45:37] So I hope they can figure out high school and cancel all the bowling and start to figure some things out.

[01:45:44] Yeah, we shall see.

[01:45:45] Time will tell.

[01:45:47] Time will tell.

[01:45:48] No, it's been a pleasure.

[01:45:49] Thank you so much for talking.

[01:45:50] I'm going to go get my kid.

[01:45:52] I'm going to go have.

[01:45:53] It is sunny.

[01:45:54] Nice.

[01:45:54] That's good.

[01:45:55] Good.

[01:45:56] You enjoy that.

[01:45:57] And Rick, yeah, we're going to we're going to catch up and do this again.

[01:46:00] And I'll be sure to leave the links in the show notes so people can reach out and get their hands on that book if they so choose to.

[01:46:11] I know I'm interested and curious, so I'll be one of those.

[01:46:14] Please do.

[01:46:15] I'm looking forward to when, you know, some when people start reading it and then we'll have some interesting conversations after.

[01:46:21] That's right.

[01:46:21] So I feel like I'd love to do a follow up with you as well.

[01:46:23] I think the last podcast they did, they said they'd love a follow up after they read it as well.

[01:46:27] Oh, cool.

[01:46:28] All right.

[01:46:28] I think that'd be a fun thing to do is give it a little bit of time and come back and do a follow up with it.

[01:46:32] You know, with you guys after after you've read it.

[01:46:34] Yeah.

[01:46:35] Yeah.

[01:46:35] It sounds like a plan.

[01:46:37] Get a different perspective because I feel like it's hard.

[01:46:40] It's hard for me to just talk about my book because I get I got I get lost on so many rabbit holes.

[01:46:44] I don't explain everything I want to.

[01:46:46] But hey, that's just me.

[01:46:47] So that's why it'll be fun when other people can start talking about their perspectives on it as well.

[01:46:53] Because I have a lot of takes on my own book and how I can say it.

[01:46:57] But yeah, it's going to be fun.

[01:46:58] Because I like I said, I feel like my own alamore.

[01:47:00] It's Terrence McKenna.

[01:47:01] I feel like I'm it's weird.

[01:47:03] I'm just way.

[01:47:04] Yeah.

[01:47:04] It's going to be fun speaking.

[01:47:06] And I know it's going to gain some attention on my books going to get some slander from some people.

[01:47:12] A lot of people aren't going to like it because it's a lot of truth and a lot of statements in there about God and what the meaning of everything is and existential crises and stuff.

[01:47:21] But it's just me speaking a lot of my.

[01:47:24] I'm ready to I'm ready to dive in there and swim around.

[01:47:27] I mean, hey, don't expect to open a philosophy book and have, you know, get a treasure tale story where you're going to feel good afterwards.

[01:47:36] What's funny is I actually just realized I forgot to put page numbers in it.

[01:47:39] I just updated it the other day.

[01:47:40] It's funny.

[01:47:40] So when I really mean I created this book all myself, I mean, yeah.

[01:47:45] The only thing I did was there was one lovely lady.

[01:47:48] I was going to have somebody help me edit.

[01:47:50] But I didn't have the funds because I'm broke and I didn't couldn't hire anybody.

[01:47:55] So she was only to help me the first 14 pages.

[01:47:58] She helped me edit everything else in here is.

[01:48:02] It's crazy.

[01:48:02] All the editing because I didn't have the funds to go out and hire a whole crew of editors or get a publisher.

[01:48:08] And I know I went out for a publisher to get a deal to see if I could go that route.

[01:48:13] But they wanted like a whole bunch.

[01:48:15] They wanted a the audio rights to the book and then they wanted the.

[01:48:20] A percentage of the royalties and stuff like that.

[01:48:22] And it was just like a something told me to do it myself.

[01:48:26] This day and age, it was like a plus.

[01:48:28] I had my father told me to do everything myself anyways.

[01:48:31] And it was like a son was telling me my whole journey with my old doctors and everything was literally write the book, put a new word document, try to do everything yourself.

[01:48:39] Even though.

[01:48:40] Yeah.

[01:48:41] With me not even being a writer and author.

[01:48:43] And I'm curious what kind of depths because if you could rate.

[01:48:47] If you could rate a book on like introspective depth when you come to like philosophy, like, you know, because people go into philosophy books and say which one has the most meaning or which one has depth.

[01:48:57] You know, that's where I strive for.

[01:48:59] And I'm just going to say it has like some type of a Frederick Nietzsche and Albert Camas, those type of existential crisis depths.

[01:49:08] So, yes, I'm ready for the world to change.

[01:49:11] And I have a feeling, yeah, it's going to be fun.

[01:49:13] That's great, man.

[01:49:14] Yeah, I really, I mean, I enjoyed your perspective on this talk that we had.

[01:49:19] And I'm sure it's getting into a lot more depth with this book.

[01:49:23] So, yeah, I'm ready to take that dive with you.

[01:49:26] Oh, awesome.

[01:49:27] I look forward to it.

[01:49:28] And thank you.

[01:49:29] Thank you for having me on here.

[01:49:30] It's been a pleasure.

[01:49:31] You are a wonderful person.

[01:49:32] Yeah, likewise.

[01:49:33] And all the best to you.

[01:49:35] You have a wonderful day and we'll definitely keep in touch.

[01:49:40] Absolutely.

[01:49:41] God bless.

[01:49:41] You have a really good one and just stay positive because, you know, bipolar, it's like, you know,

[01:49:45] the day is what you make it.

[01:49:46] It's good or bad.

[01:49:47] If it's not good, do something that will make it a little bit better.

[01:49:51] That's my suggestion.

[01:49:54] Whatever puts a smile on your face that's not morally wrong.

[01:49:59] There you go.

[01:50:02] I really, really enjoyed that conversation.

[01:50:05] I felt like we could have went another two, three hours.

[01:50:09] As a matter of fact, we did.

[01:50:10] There was two hours that we were talking beforehand.

[01:50:14] None of it was on tape, but we were just, you know, sharing a lot of similar experiences coming up as a child without the smartphone,

[01:50:24] running around, playing outside all day, all night.

[01:50:28] You know, no worries, no stresses, falling out for trees, playing ding dong ditch or hide and go seek or tag.

[01:50:38] You know, being kids, innocently getting into mischief sometimes.

[01:50:42] But Rick, man, thank you once again for opening up your story and sharing some of those pages with us.

[01:50:48] It was vulnerable.

[01:50:49] It was raw.

[01:50:50] It was authentic.

[01:50:51] You stripped it down to the bare bone, talking about your fears, your struggles.

[01:50:56] And even the hard news that shattered your world for some time, flipped it upside down, turned everything on its head.

[01:51:06] Staying up for five straight days.

[01:51:08] That manic episode where it felt like you just were shot with an electric lightning bolt of adrenaline.

[01:51:17] And in that time and in that dark place, you were able to reflect honestly about who you had become,

[01:51:24] the behaviors and the actions that could have possibly helped impact and influence the people that you loved

[01:51:32] and the people that were around you to do certain things.

[01:51:35] Not everybody is responsible for their own actions, but that honest look at yourself and sharing in the responsibility,

[01:51:43] not just pointing the finger.

[01:51:45] Because what happens when we do that?

[01:51:47] There's three fingers pointing right back at ourselves.

[01:51:51] That's a hard, hard pill to swallow.

[01:51:53] And that's tough for a lot of people, myself included, to even do.

[01:51:58] Not just point the blame, but to look at the situation and the circumstance honestly and to see if at all you might be responsible in some way for some of what's been going on.

[01:52:10] Rick shared with us the dynamics of that relationship.

[01:52:14] He shared with us some of the visions that he saw, the out-of-body experience that he experienced.

[01:52:20] And even the dynamics and the relationship that he had with therapists and doctors who were trying to prescribe him this or recommend him that when it wasn't working,

[01:52:30] when he felt like this isn't what I need, they're not listening to me.

[01:52:33] You know what?

[01:52:34] I'm going to take matters into my own hands and do this thing myself.

[01:52:38] They say if you want something done right, sometimes you just got to do it yourself.

[01:52:42] He started to understand and get real with his flaws, with his doubts, with his fears, getting under the hood and looking at how he was wired, conditioned in a way,

[01:52:56] programmed from a young age to behave and act and the habits that were formed, some of them being very bad, the addictions.

[01:53:05] But through all of this self-analysis and this inner conflict that he was dealing with, but facing it head on, dealing with it, not turning from it, facing the shadow, embracing the shadow.

[01:53:20] What did that do for him?

[01:53:22] For him, it said it was a journey towards enlightenment.

[01:53:25] Rick's a prime example of what can be accomplished once you start getting real with yourself.

[01:53:32] Rick, keep shining your light.

[01:53:34] Keep doing you.

[01:53:37] Unapologetically, you are a giant amongst us.

[01:53:42] If you guys are interested in reading about more of his philosophical insights and concepts and ideas and things that came to mind during that time,

[01:53:53] he was in that zone, in a trans-like, automatically writing, being moved by the spirit.

[01:54:00] You can find his book on Amazon, Bipolar Enlightenment, a personal memoir with philosophical depths into the unknown.

[01:54:10] That's by Rick Sharbaugh.

[01:54:12] And his link where you can find his book, where you can pick up his book will be in the show notes.

[01:54:17] And right now, I want to share two different spots that are found in the intro of his book.

[01:54:22] I was able to pick this up because if you go on Amazon and you click on sample read, that intro will come up.

[01:54:30] And there was just a couple of things.

[01:54:32] It was a lot of chunks of some really good information.

[01:54:35] It reminded me a bit of Marcus Aurelius' meditations, the reflections and the thoughts and the different topics and subject matters that have to do with life.

[01:54:44] Living, death, suicide, depression, self-doubt, struggles, different conflicts and things that we have emotionally and psychologically.

[01:54:55] And so these were two things that just stuck out.

[01:54:57] And I wanted to share with you all before we get ready to wrap this thing up.

[01:55:02] One of them starts off with saying,

[01:55:05] It seems we have taken the responsibility away from individuals and placed it in the hands of companies, products and equipment.

[01:55:14] It seems if I buy something nowadays, it better not make me sick, hurt me or do anything than what it was intended to do with zero chance of harm.

[01:55:27] No matter if I use it correctly or read the instructions.

[01:55:30] And so one more piece to kind of piggyback off of the whole concept of taking responsibility for your actions and being accountable for your actions is this other part in Rick's intro where he where he writes,

[01:55:48] We just accept negative emotions as something to deal with rather than identifying and questioning them.

[01:55:55] Like Alcoholics Anonymous, accepting you have a problem is the first step to recovery.

[01:56:02] So what is the first step to becoming yourself?

[01:56:05] Many people are angry their whole lives and just accept that they're angry instead of believing that change is possible.

[01:56:14] Identifying the anger within you and working to identify its grip on you can start to change.

[01:56:21] That's when you start taking a deep, honest look at yourself and seeing why you're behaving a certain way.

[01:56:29] Not just that, oh, I'm just hot headed.

[01:56:32] I'm just hot tempered.

[01:56:33] But why are you?

[01:56:34] What's triggering you?

[01:56:35] What's causing you to be this way?

[01:56:37] But in order to do that, you have to start looking at what's causing you to react this way.

[01:56:44] Why do you feel this way?

[01:56:46] What are the certain trigger points or the buttons pushed to cause you to react this way?

[01:56:52] Then you can start identifying where those problems are and start to look for solutions and ways to correct that behavior or to embrace it and maybe use it in a more constructive manner.

[01:57:05] Not to where it's totally consuming you, but it has its place and it has its moment.

[01:57:10] At times we do need a righteous anger to be able to stand up for something, to be so convicted and so sold for an idea that you're not going to be swayed by opposition or somebody telling you you you should stand down and know, hold your tongue.

[01:57:28] If this is on truth, if this is on moral, if this is on conviction and that righteous anger does have a place.

[01:57:35] If we want to go back to old times, whether you take the book to be literal or just symbolical of a lot of ancient wisdom, Jesus had a righteous anger.

[01:57:46] He was flipping over the tables and the money spenders desk.

[01:57:50] He was going into the temples and talking to the religious people and he was getting at their heads saying you guys are just all show.

[01:57:59] You wear these wonderful robes and these fancy clothes and you adorn yourself with these jewels and everything, but you're dead on the inside.

[01:58:09] That means nothing.

[01:58:10] This harlot on the street has more dignity than you.

[01:58:14] And that can go for anybody.

[01:58:16] Any political figure, someone sitting on the Capitol Hill saying that they know what's best for you.

[01:58:24] And just because they're in a place of position, you automatically think that they have your best interests in heart and willing to be led blindly off that cliff.

[01:58:35] Identifying the problem, the conflict that's within you, that's troubling you, that's been a thorn on your side for years and years.

[01:58:45] Once you get honest, real and allow yourself that time and the space to start identifying those things.

[01:58:54] That is when you can start to create change.

[01:58:59] So you guys stay healthy out there.

[01:59:01] You guys stay sane.

[01:59:03] Hope you guys enjoyed the conversation.

[01:59:06] You know where to reach us.

[01:59:07] You know where to find us.

[01:59:08] Follow the show notes.

[01:59:09] We're at giantsamongstus.org.

[01:59:13] That's O-R-G.

[01:59:15] I'd like to remind you all, if you would like to be a part of the show and share your story or even a story of someone in your life that has impacted you in a positive way,

[01:59:28] you could always reach out to us via email.

[01:59:31] I'd be happy to connect.

[01:59:34] Until next time, and very soon.

[01:59:39] Peace.

[01:59:43] Do-wop, do-wop, do-wop, do-do, do-wop, do-wop.

[01:59:49] I'm looking for a sign to know I'm on the right road.

[01:59:57] Ain't seen no signs since Jerry.

[02:00:01] You Did You Know myätzlich Known?

[02:00:01] Just買 insurance.

[02:00:01] I'm not aestood na喜歡 했 khi wap.