Full Transcript for S01E09: Mind Games

able to use your mind as a tool rather than be used by your mind, caught up in all of your own bullshit, consuming substances, alternating between tranquilizers and stimulants and overworking, to guilt and shame ourselves and others, of course, and just all of this other stuff that we do in place of acting on our ⁓ sexual that might be more taboo. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah, I mean, I don't know one way or another, I wonder, just imagine specialists in this field like pulling their hair out, ⁓ to that. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. And I don't know, you know, I'm like not informed enough about that stuff so ⁓ all of those things that, that people take on, ⁓ in order to ⁓ avoid the, ⁓ you know, the stuff that they're sexually the eating, the overworking, ⁓ taking drugs of different whatever it might be, all of those actions are to avoid, there's ⁓ some value in taking on I might benefit from not trusting my mind so much. But that's also a really great way to be overpowered by others, ⁓ like, ⁓ don't trust your mind about what it's telling you now. Don't trust you've held as your morals and values and principles, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I'm gonna get it. Indeed. Lindsay: let's do some new thing here. Yeah, can also can also be really dangerous. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Amen. Lindsay: feeling what's happening for us in our bodies, he specifically says, like, I'm feeling this thing in my genitals. Like, I'm gonna do all other things to ⁓ avoid noticing that or to try to... Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Indeed, you and I have been around the block in spiritual communities for a number of years and over and over how this principle of ⁓ trust your own mind because your mind is bullshit, but do trust mine. whoever sets up as the leader of the pack, your mind is not trustworthy, but mine is. ⁓ If we broaden that a little bit, I would say that yes, a whole lot of our neurotic behaviors ⁓ from an unwillingness to feel uncomfortable sensations in the body or something ⁓ we're avoiding feeling. But to make it specific to repressed sexual desires and feelings seems like a step too far. Lindsay: Right. Right, because this is one of those things where I think, I don't just automatically assume Brad set this up this way because he wants to manipulate and control people. However, it can have that effect, ⁓ you know, ⁓ and has, you know, certainly. well he begins with sexuality, but ⁓ whole chapter is about taboos against excitement of any kind. So he starts from ⁓ sexuality place, but he does go on to talk about ⁓ and joy as well. So mostly focuses on those three things. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: OK. indeed. it's very difficult to not end up in that dynamic, but by mere virtue of putting yourself in the position of a teacher that then invites students to learn from you and telling them that their mind is bullshit, danger is innate Okay, so he's not saying that like all of these things stem back from repressed sexual desire. He's just saying sexual, repressed sexual desire is one type

of repressed feeling or emotional experience that can lead to certain whatevers. Lindsay: Yeah, but he does start with that and he does place a lot of emphasis on that, on the sexuality part. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Okay. a solid ethical system and a team of people supervising and helping keep you ⁓ on track that can bad real Lindsay: in Brad's thinking. We're repressing all of these things to protect ourselves. from feeling the things that we're going to feel if we are upfront about whatever it in our sexuality, about anger, about ⁓ the joy that we feel, even the joy that we feel. And, you ⁓ in work this I think maybe even just your first impression of Brad, which I think is similar to the impression that many others have when they first go to workshop with him, is like, whoa, this guy is magical. There's wizardry happening here with how he understands me or understands these other people. He's seeing what's really happening for me. He's knowing what I'm thinking. He's seeing the emotions that I have before I even do, can be something that we want, that ⁓ some of us want to protect ourselves from. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: well yeah, I mean, a lot of us learned at a young age that it's shameful or not allowed to be joyous, to be too excited. Lindsay: Yeah. And even that like, there's something foolish about being happy in this moment because something bad just happened, or I can predict that other bad things are going to happen and that I'm going to feel worse when those bad things happen if I let myself go into feeling the joy in this moment. And so reasons ⁓ that might need to ourselves from these different things. ⁓ And you just mentioned ⁓ and I'm going to you a little something to read. ⁓ It can be easy when that's the perception you're having or that's then be like, oh, okay, I guess I should listen to this guy when he's telling me trust my mind, but trust his. And I don't want to I know that he would also say like, I'm full of bullshit. Like he would say about himself, I'm also full of shit don't trust my bullshit. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Lindsay: But like, you can trust me when I tell you don't trust your mind, because you're full of shit. You know, like, so I don't want to make it sound like he would say like, trust any shitty thing I tell you, but Mak & Lindsay Podcast: and he would come back with things like, well yeah, I've got bullshit, you got bullshit, but some bullshit is better than others. Lindsay: I don't know, there's something about this part too that's like little bit romantic. When someone speaks the truth, everyone around them is touched and there's hardly anything to say back except, ain't it the truth? It's like, definitely yes in some circumstances, but obviously there are like a million other examples of people not being touched when others tell the truth about things Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Thank you. Lindsay: just want to point that out. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: this is a little bit of Brad's hillbilly poetry,

which I think is really, ⁓ really lovely, if it's taken as poetry. Lindsay: Right. And I mean, I know what he's talking about. you know, I recall is him talking about how by the end this eight day intensive. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: we Lindsay: we're all gonna be in love with each other. Not in some romantic or sexy way, you know, but like we're all gonna just love each other because we will have gone through all of this, we will have shared ourselves with each other, we will have shown up as real human beings with anger and joy and we just will fall in love with each other So in that setting, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: a ⁓ neurotic. Thus, neurosis is a name for consistently denying sexuality, joy, grief, love, and other feelings. The key to the cure for neurosis is not only the identification of the feelings being denied, but the person's acknowledgement of those feelings. Lindsay: You tell the truth, you speak the truth, and basically everyone appreciates it. everybody's been primed you know? And then you step out into the real after one of the workshops ⁓ and you try to be really like boldly honest and transparent and it doesn't always go the way it did in the workshop. ⁓ Take some practice. I mean, I'm not saying it can't, but yeah, I think often we leave, participants leave a workshop with this sort of glowy feeling of like... Mak & Lindsay Podcast: We get lost in our minds and lose touch with our experience when we begin to feel something that we are afraid is too much for us to feel or something we think we are not supposed to feel. We are all afraid of having our excitement run away with us, of losing control. sensation or emotion, we get trapped in the frenetic babbling of our minds. Lindsay: wow, I'm gonna just go out and be honest with everybody and everybody's gonna appreciate me for it. not necessarily the case Mak & Lindsay Podcast: This thing about the truth makes people fall in love with each other I've seen this happen. The kind of connection that happens in that setting ⁓ is a false kind of depth because you can just have had an uncomfortable encounter with someone in which you didn't fully express how you felt at the time, your mind talks to you incessantly. It keeps reviewing the conversation, trying to insert things you wish you had said. sit in front of a complete stranger and look deeply into their eyes for just a moment. You can ⁓ fall in love with that, ⁓ or it's something that feels like falling in love with that person in the moment. And then you step outside of Indeed. I have noticed that, yes. Lindsay: Great. Anything else you want to say about any of that? Mak & Lindsay Podcast: No, I think that's all pretty Lindsay: or, yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: dynamic and have an actual conversation and get to know them and all of that stuff fades really quickly because it's not an actual real kind of depth that's happening I don't know what it exactly but there's like an intense kind of experience that happens when you're ⁓ when you're just so naked intent with another person Lindsay: yes, totally And I also don't want to 100 % diminish the connections that happen between people in settings like that. would you claim that like it's just completely, it's all just completely false connection ⁓ next little section is called Refocusing Our Awareness. ⁓ Brad says, a human being can only be aware of three things. ⁓ ⁓ happening in the immediate environment. Two, feelings and sensations inside the body. And three, thoughts and fantasies. Most of us spend most of our time paying attention to the third category, the mind stream, ⁓ have lost touch with what is actually happening inside our skin and right in front of us. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: wouldn't so far as to say that but there something that is little bit Manufactured in those settings in the workshop space You're there to connect you're there to drop your in a way that don't in real life real life is dangerous You need to have your walls up Lindsay: So obviously this is something we were taught to talk about in the workshops that we facilitate. I still talk about the awareness continuum. you, is that something you still? Mak & Lindsay Podcast: You need to be on guard because you don't know who might want to take advantage of you or whatever. So the way that we normally build depth is little by little. You know, we let our guard down we see others doing the same and it's reciprocal. And that takes time. Yeah, this is pretty solid. A lot of people have trouble with this or push back against this. I think it's much better presented not as an absolute truth, but just a useful heuristic. This is model that most people can grab onto pretty easily and it can be, for those people, can be really useful to do so. And for some people, they just don't like it for whatever reason. And in those cases, I think, okay, fine. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah, surely. Absolutely. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Drop it. If that doesn't work for you, we'll find something else. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah, take it or leave it. on experience helps the person in denial to feel what is going on inside him and begin to tell the truth to cure himself. He may learn that the source of his bodily sensations are his beliefs and fears based on earlier incomplete and unpleasant experiences where he made a moral resolve never to let anything like that happen again. Once a person comes to his senses, he can learn to rely less and less on his minds, ideas, and beliefs and really know from moment to moment how he feels. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: No, it's true. And so ⁓ lot of people are so out of touch with their physical experience that they aren't quite aware ⁓ ⁓ they feel in the moment or what their emotional response is to any given situation. And it's difficult to find. And most of that ⁓ trauma, it's trauma response. It was not safe to be connected your body some way. It wasn't safe to... be fully aware of what was going on so you develop all kinds of strategies to go numb or pretend

or dissociate. Lindsay: Nothing. Yep, I that like when I first went to my first workshops with Brad as a participant, ⁓ there were definitely people in those workshops who, ⁓ when was talking about this kind of thing, know, that they couldn't notice ⁓ any sensations in their body. I don't notice my body. I've even thought to notice. ⁓ what's happening in my body or anything like that. yeah, mean, that's that. Yeah. It makes a lot of sense ⁓ and there can be some real benefit for people in being able to reconnect with their own bodies in a safe environment in safe ways. And Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Mm-hmm. Lindsay: this next section ⁓ is Brad recalling ⁓ conversations that happened in sessions one particular client who he says is named Stephanie and who was 23 years ⁓ old. I don't know how old he was at the time, but I'm wanting to know how old he was. I imagine it being relevant You're saying... ⁓ that true connection isn't happening. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: maximum he would have been 45, right? Lindsay: Okay. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I think my point is that the depth... 50. Lindsay: Yeah, I don't know, I'd have to do the math, but yeah. So he talks about Stephanie who started therapy because she wanted to lose weight. She was 23, had a job she didn't like and wanted to lose 30 pounds. ⁓ She was shy, depressed, unhappy about her, ⁓ her weight. She was very pretty, ⁓ or not. ⁓ And had a voluptuous is forced. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: or false in some way, manufactured. It is very limited to the con. it's a kind of connection that you ⁓ of generate at any moment. But Lindsay: So he shares. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Maybe what I want to get to is that there is a difference between the feeling of connectedness in the moment and an actual depth in the relationship between two people. Lindsay: Again, he says this is just like his memory. So it's not like this is recorded session that he then pulled the transcripts from or something. This is just in his retelling of it. What he says before he shares ⁓ bits of his recollection is, during our first conversation, said, I think you're pretty and or not, your figure is still very sexy. She blushed and thank you. I said, Yes, I Especially because... ⁓ we're sharing real things with each other, but we're not ⁓ doing daily life interactions with each other. You know, we're not building that sort of depth. I imagine that men hit on you and come on to you all the time. She nodded and smiled, then the following dialogue ensued. It's basically just me wanting to read this inappropriate exchange that he has and then how he goes on to describe how it's beneficial to do psychotherapy in this way. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I wonder how much of this kind of stuff it's important for us to point out that this is inappropriate. Or if we should assume that people just get that this is not how a psychotherapist should comport themselves with a client. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Yeah, we agree that there is a difference in that sort of depth that may occur at these workshops and the sort of depth that's created in organic ways with people who are actually in our lives that we spend time with and that sort of thing. Yeah. Right, I mean we definitely want to say that stuff. I guess I'm just not sure how much of this to... Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I that Brad based ⁓ this about it being good for the therapist to share honestly about themselves and their own experience comes from ⁓ old Gestalt therapy. but ⁓ he takes it a little too Lindsay: the reason I'm still harping on this is because I am having the thought of people listening to this who have been to any of our offerings and thinking like... Mak & Lindsay Podcast: The idea is that the client benefits from the therapist sharing openly and honestly about what it's like to be in relationship to the client, assuming that, well, if I feel this certain way about you, then presumably others do as well. So therefore, if I feel or think this certain thing about you or I get this impression, you need to know that. Lindsay: any connection that I feel in this setting can't be real, you know, because even the facilitator of it is saying that it's not a real connection or there can't be any depth to it or Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah, you can see where you could argue framework, for that position. But of course, it takes everything to its logical extreme and then we get ourselves into trouble. You know what I'm wanting to warn against bit is ⁓ workshop ⁓ using those feelings of connection Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: using the high that people get off of the intensity of those connections in order to make more money two aren't necessarily the same. Lindsay: So I ended with... I imagine that men hit on you and come on to you all the time. She nodded and smiled. Then the following dialogue ensued. Brad says, how do you feel about that? She says, well, at first I'm flattered, I guess, but really I don't like it too much. When the men at the office make little wisecracks, I don't say anything, but I don't like it. There was silence for a while. Brad says, I imagine when you start to lose weight, your figure is going to be even more noticeable than it is now. No, and that's perfect. And I'm glad that you brought it around to that warning. I definitely heard participants in these workshops say things like, ⁓ ⁓ I'm back at another one of these workshops because felt so good to be honest in these ways with these people here who want to do this with me. ⁓ And then I went back to regular life. tried to do this with my coworker. I tried to do this with my roommate, whatever, and nobody gets it. ⁓ I really can only get this in this group, You're going to have more of that to deal with. You'll have to create some other way of handling men hitting on you besides getting fat again. She says, yes, I know what you're talking about. I don't know what I'm going to do, but I've quit diets before for that very reason. Brad says, well, what about right now? I'm

attracted to you and I'm telling you. Are you embarrassed? She says, yes, a little, although it isn't as bad as at work. He says, are you attracted to me? She says, a little bit. And then she looked down and blushed. I notice, so now it's just kind of going back and forth. He had it in this like me, Stephanie, whatever, but then he just goes on to make it a conversation rather than like the script. So anyway, ⁓ he says, I noticed that you're looking down and turning red. We both laughed. Sure is a shame we're attracted to each other, isn't it? We laughed again. not going for keep coming back here so you can get that high. mean, sometimes it really feels like I can't get this feeling anywhere else. I can't find this anywhere else sort of thing. ⁓ She said, I don't really think it's shameful, but I do feel embarrassed. I talk to my girlfriend, Shelly, about this all the time. I think it's funny. Yeah, yeah, sorry. So I'm not gonna read all of these parts. she's admitting that at work, she doesn't like this, but she doesn't say it. Now he's saying this stuff to her, and ⁓ ends up responding in the way she has just said she does at work, which is laughing it off and not saying, I don't like it, whatever. So he says, I noticed something else about you. And she says, go ahead, this is interesting. He says, I noticed that you're very quick to smile, even when you talk about being angry or you're embarrassed. I imagine everybody thinks of you as a nice girl. Stephanie laughed. Yeah, I guess so. All the women at the office call me dear. They think I'm sweet. Aren't you? No, it's an act. We both laughed again. She continued. Shelly and I talk about this too. I think I have to be nice all the time or that it isn't right to get angry. I get mad, but I don't show it. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: the dangers of wanting to live too much in a virtual reality. In Burning Man, it's a pretty famous phenomenon where people Lindsay: I think my point of wanting to share all of that was just like, he's sharing this example. I imagine him being so dense. He's sharing this as like, what a shame that we're both attracted to each other. Here we are, these two people on equal footing, attracted to each other, but we can't act on it because whatever. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: They feel so at home for the first time in their life, so high, so alive. And then there's the crash There's been reported suicides that happen afterwards because they just can't replicate the high that they feel in their default life. And this is ⁓ how cults form. So I think that best ⁓ use for any kind of Lindsay: Totally. Once a year. Yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yes. Lindsay: When it's like the very thing that she's sharing about, and who knows, maybe she was totally attracted to Brad and it was a totally healthy whatever and she did, no power dynamics were at play, whatever. Unlikely, obviously. But like the very thing that she's talking about having to do in her life with other men is the thing that they, that he is acting out there and she's responding in that same way, you know? Like, like is she gonna say to you, Brad? Like he's... ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: where you're learning new skills is to think about it in that way. Not, I'm looking for a home, I'm looking for my tribe. parent figure, That's when the kind of ⁓ danger comes in. ⁓ since I've seen this happen a lot, that is a warning that I wanna of cede when we're talking about these Lindsay: He's trusting, like the idea is that this is about honesty. She can say to him, you know, like, ⁓ I don't like this or don't do that or whatever, but like, no, like the very thing they're pointing out in her behavior is that she puts on a smile, acts like it's all okay, and somehow he thinks that that's not what's gonna be occurring in this situation or that it isn't what occurred. perfect. I'm glad I came around to that. he goes on to say, believe her willingness to share these personal feelings with me grew out of the context created by my willingness to tell her what I was feeling and thinking about her and my asking her to do the same. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Another thing is that him pointing out that you are this, you are that, I bet everyone thinks this about you, is reinforcing the power dynamic that he is the one who knows, he is the one who labels. Lindsay: I'm an authority on these things. I can see what's happening for you. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: And I'm the Radical Honesty Guy, just call it like it is. Lindsay: That couple of sessions with Stephanie was done in a context of permission granted by an authority where it was okay to talk about feelings she thought she couldn't talk about while she was having them. That let her give herself permission to experience and acknowledge out loud to a man some of the taboo and uncomfortable feelings she had been avoiding. ⁓ therapist, my willingness to talk about the immediate issue of our attraction to each other and the honest way we talked. Okay, I just sent you a little bit to say a little bit more about being abnormally honest created a context for dealing with the issues of sex and anger out loud. A taboo was violated. Her secret thoughts came out and were expressed in front of a male in a context of no danger. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I speak clearly, I experience and sensation in my body and evoke the same in the body of the person spoken to. When they speak back clearly, ⁓ we both are moved again. Honest are continually surprised by unexpected sensation and movement and have learned not to mind that so much. The time comes when the feeling of insecurity becomes less than a dreaded occurrence. Ha! Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Wow! Lindsay: I'm gonna just keep going. There's a little bit more. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: What an asshole. Lindsay: Ugh, ugh. The more help a therapist gives a client to create that context for herself, the more successfully the client will handle what comes up when the therapist is not around. Mak &

Lindsay Podcast: It becomes a most precious and valued form of excitement, a way of experiencing being alive in a heightened way, a way of getting high. Most of us never overcome the butchering of our upbringing enough to discover how to tolerate the experience of freedom Lindsay: The therapist does this by sharing his or her experience and by the an idea of what the work is all about. ⁓ The purpose is not to scare or warn the client, but rather to encourage right from the start to be willing to experience whatever comes up as part of being a creator of her life ⁓ rather than a victim of previous learned ways of handling life. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: and learn to relish having it. Lindsay: ⁓ so I mean, basically he's talking about what we were just talking about in terms of the high that people feel at the workshop. mean, he, he is basically saying, right. mean, he is saying right here that this way communicating with people, especially when you're new to it, does feel like you're getting high, you know, because. Stephanie has suppressed a lot of resentment toward men about the wisecracks they make about her body. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Like you said already, is perpetuating the same kinds of things that she is revealing him that are problems in her life. He's recreating that in therapy in a different context, in one that he thinks is safe for her. Lindsay: you're being guided to pay attention to the sensations in your body. A lot more sensations come up when we're practicing with speaking to people directly in ways that we aren't used to doing. So all of this stuff is happening. And then you do it, this thing that you're unfamiliar with, this thing that might be scary to you, you say these things out loud to somebody, even when it feels like, my God, I can't believe I'm doing this. And then you come out on the other side like, Okay. No possible danger. Yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: when he at this point in his life, Harriville, is as ⁓ a of predation. Lindsay: You know, which can be awesome and is like good in so many ways. And yes, you can become like a junkie for this kind of sharing and being with people and just like continue. Like I need to go back. Obviously he's not that part in here, ⁓ but, but is like. know, pointing to how it can feel when we first start to communicate with people in these ways. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah, there was survivor from one of the Paris attacks in 2015. She tells the story about how ⁓ was sitting out on the terrace when the shooters came out. A man behind her was shot in the back and fell on top of her and she could hear his last into her ⁓ ear. She could feel terror of his last moments. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Ugh. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: And she says, Lindsay: Stephanie has suppressed a lot of resentment toward men about the wisecracks they make about her body. Perhaps she will find a way to express that resentment effectively. Perhaps not. It is important to realize, however, that anger is not the only excitement she eats to avoid. She must come up with a way to handle the excitement of having men pay attention to her. She handled that excitement before by tranquilizing it with food in the short run and by getting fatter. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: that she had ever experienced and that she will never know his name. Lindsay: you Yeah. And what made you think of that now? Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I want to connect that back to what I was saying about the danger of mistaking the kind of intimacy or connection that you feel when opening yourself up to a stranger for the deeper kind of more hard earned intimacy that happens you don't jump from completely guarded to completely open. Lindsay: By becoming less exciting to others, she eventually resolved the anxiety of being uncomfortably excited herself. If she loses a certain amount of weight, she'll get down to where she is exciting and excited again. have to deal with that excitement another way or gain the weight back. She may have to admit that the excitement she was avoiding was her own. It is partly her own response to the men's attention that scares her or makes her feel uncomfortable. Getting fat allows people who are comfortable about their own sexual excitement to be emotionally intimate with members of the opposite sex while remaining physically isolated from them. In this way, they remain safe from their own sexuality. Like kind of keeping this in and like getting into it is like opening a whole big can, like there's so much that we can talk about in here. Saying no is not a problem when we mean no, it's saying no to wanting to say yes from which Stephanie has protected herself by gaining weight. Mm-hmm. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: but you go slowly, little by little, opening yourself up to someone else who is reciprocating in that way. And that that is the kind of stuff ultimately that the workshop is intended to teach, not to get you to keep coming back to the workshop over and over in order to go from being completely guarded in your default life to being completely open to a room full of strangers. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah. What the fuck? Lindsay: Her weight greatly diminished her opportunities to say no or yes. She will have to confront this choice and make it each time it comes up rather than avoid the experience of lust. So yeah, there's so much in here and I don't know, maybe, I mean, you there's just like so much fat phobia, first of all, but then there's also just like so many assumptions being made like her ⁓ being limited because she's fat, ⁓ know, like just, there's just so much. ⁓ Great. I still just want to ask to be totally clear. that story that you shared ⁓ that is intense and touching, what sort of example do you that as? There's so much, so many assumptions being made from a place of fat phobia, even though he's also makes a point of saying like, I find her attractive as she is and, and yada yada, but. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah, because he doesn't discriminate.

Lindsay: I mean, didn't that person, you know? They were tossed into extreme depth in an instant, an intimacy. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Exactly. You Lindsay: Yeah, it's important that he's attracted, ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah, ⁓ huh. Lindsay: But I mean, talks a lot about this here because thinks, I mean, I think because he thinks he's really onto something, you I think effectiveness in maintaining weight loss is one of the most graphic ways of determining the effectiveness of psychotherapy. When I can support someone in losing weight and keeping it off, I must respectfully request his mind to come up with another answer. so I want you to say more. And so, ⁓ what, that a false sense of intimacy? Mak & Lindsay Podcast: may have set it up wrong when I said that it was false. It's not much that it's false. It's just it's different from ⁓ we are talking about in a relationship in the default world when we talk about intimacy. That that kind of ⁓ intimacy is a more stable. It's built on trust. It's built from actually knowing the person because they're opening up to you. Lindsay: People who successfully lose weight come up with other answers. People who don't lose weight successfully fail to come up with other answers. Only about 12 % of people lose weight, maintain it, yada yada. Because you're saying. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: So all fatness is due to repressed excitement in some way or. as well over a long period of time. It's not something that goes from being a complete stranger to having an intense feeling of intimacy that is fleeting. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And potentially even traumatic. Yeah. I mean, I'm thinking of the experience you're describing with this woman. Like that's, you know, I believe her that that's like an, that that was an intensely intimate experience for her. And also obviously in that case, fucking traumatic and you know, to bring it back around to the workshop experience, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: What the hell? Like that does open up such a can of worms. We almost need to dedicate like a half hour conversation to just dissect all of the messed up stuff that he wrote. Lindsay: the we ended it. Right, and also, I don't imagine that either of us are totally equipped either. I think I would fuck up in a lot of ways in that conversation probably as well. And still, I know that I'm seeing a bunch that Brad didn't see when he wrote that. Yeah. so we just it through chapters five and six, the first two chapters in part three ⁓ of Brad's book, Radical ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: No, I agree. Lindsay: I think there are absolutely times that in workshops like ours, that there are ways that people are sharing in these groups of people they don't know that can end up being traumatic for them. You know, like, ⁓ shit, I've just dumped this whole thing because this is the setting I'm in. This is the flow of the group, whatever. ⁓ like, I was not ready to do that. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Tons of red flags. Yeah. Lindsay: will go on to talk about anger. ⁓ going to wrap it up here for today. ⁓ ⁓ what do you think? Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I'm glad that you bring up this thing about how or having deep moments of intimacy can lead ⁓ a traumatic experience. One the things that happens in lots of different kinds of workshops is that people become uninhibited because they feel high, because they feel a certain intimacy with someone. And so ⁓ they in risky behavior, have sex with people that they wouldn't normally have sex with. My takeaway is that I've done a whole lot of head shaking today in response to the things that we have read. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: wonder ⁓ how I get roped into this? What was it that attracted me to stuff? push themselves to be open to certain experiences that they normally wouldn't do. Lindsay: Yeah. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: And I think that faith facilitators participants can take advantage of that by luring ⁓ people their for example. Lindsay: Me was it. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: That's right, it was you. I'm glad I have a scapegoat. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. That's This is, this is weird and we will cut this part out, but right when you said, I'm glad I had, have a scapegoat, I looked at the word scapegoat on this page. Cause it's like in a quote, right at the top of this thing. ⁓ We driven to fabricate an enemy as a scapegoat to bear the burden. ⁓ That funny. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Hahaha Lindsay: yeah, great. Glad all up. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Whoa, weird. Yeah. Lindsay: at what's next. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: interesting. Lindsay: and there are two more parts to scroll that I just sent to you. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Words labels for pictures and none of them are real. A word is only a label for a picture of something real. is reality. Then is a picture of reality. Then there is a word or words to describe the picture. A word or short phrase is only a caption for a remembered snapshot of a real thing, not the real thing. Real things are here right now and can be pointed to. may seem unimportant or self-evident, but it turns out to make a critical difference in who you think you are. Telling the truth is hard enough if all we mean by it is communicating what events occur without even trying to communicate about our feelings. When we are watching a sunset with another person, We can always just point to the sunset and keep our mouths shut and assume we are communicating both about the experience and our evaluation of the experience. When there is no sunset to point to, one has to be particularly concerned with language. Being descriptive of one's own feelings in so precise a way as to evoke feeling in another is the heart of the creative power of poetry and of honest speech. Telling the truth about events requires some discipline of description and can be hard work, but feelings and thoughts are even more difficult to tell the truth about than events. Lindsay: So he goes on to say, all words are abstractions. Although words that have immediate

reference in the world are abstract than words that cover a lot of territory, speak of general feelings, or make global assessments, they are still not the thing described. Words can point to something in the world like a chair or something in a person like a feeling. When one is totally committed and captivated by pointing to what is so, one finds words to speak the truth regardless of the level of abstraction. Abstractions are a part of what is so. Feelings associated with abstractions are a part of what is so. you can still tell the truth by pointing to an abstraction or of your mind. if your intent is simply to point out your thought rather than to make the other person believe your thought to be the right interpretation of reality. is the difference between sharing and a sales pitch. When thoughts and feelings are shared in this way, you get the benefit of the correction or modification of your mind's view of reality that can only come when you put your thoughts out there in the public domain. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah, so this passage is really at the difference between ⁓ ⁓ imagining, which is one of the ground level distinctions that we are teaching in the workshops. And this is not ⁓ unique to honesty, but it is kind of foundational. Lindsay: definitely. there is a section that gets ⁓ a little more specifically into that, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Language has the power to evoke the being of human beings and rescue them from their own minds. Skill in the use of this kind of language develops through the practice of telling the truth. The clearer I am willing to be about myself, the more clearly I can see others and the more clearly I can speak to them. You too. An honest person prefers language that reveals what is so, whether it's about someone else, the world, or himself. Being fascinated with uncovering the truth from a nest of evaluations is the best game in town. It only becomes fun after meaning becomes less serious and pretending has become boring. Going back to putting on a show is a bigger drag than having be known. Playing in a world where all is known is more challenging and less trivial and less wearing. Letting up on oneself about having to hide and pretend is freeing, and it feels good, like breathing fresh air. Lindsay: Cool. anything more you want to say about all of that? Mak & Lindsay Podcast: There is something powerful about speaking clearly and simply about your experience, not sugarcoating, not fluffing it up, not repeating yourself like I have a tendency to do. but it is powerful in the way that he's describing where when use simple factual ⁓ emotion-based to describe your experience, you do ⁓ evoke a sensate, grounded ⁓ moment for yourself, and you tend to do the same for others. ⁓ Lindsay: maybe should something about the distinction between noticing and imagining and the emphasis placed that? What I was gonna say is he's saying here, ⁓ this is all stuff that I've heard before for years and years, in mind, this is

just like very simple way to think about. communication with other human beings. Like, I don't know a better way to say it. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Well, we activate different parts of our brains and the brains others when we speak in different ways. when telling a story about something, we're more in the prefrontal cortex and it's just like a, a mind kind of chewing on itself When you speak more ⁓ simply from an emotional place, just your emotional experience, it activates a different part of the brain and you have a different experience. in your body when you speak and presumably you hear other people speaking that way. Lindsay: yeah, that's great information. for a lot of people that's a confusing concept. You know, this, this is hard to understand. Like what's the difference Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Sometimes when I explain the difference between things that you can notice and then everything else, things that you imagine, your stories, your memories, labels and assessments, people will say, okay, but why does that matter? Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: And I honestly have difficulty answering that question sometimes. mean, you could live in reality or at least something that's closer to reality, or you can live in a ⁓ fantasy or from reality. Lindsay: Yeah, you don't even have to agree with their take on that it's like better to live in reality in this way, you know, to be more tuned into our senses and to like be able to say what we notice, you know, with our eyes or with our ears ⁓ versus what we imagine with our minds. But ⁓ just be able to make the distinction between those things. like I there is a way I'm wanting us to be like explicit about what's beneficial about Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I think in practical terms, the clearest benefit is that you're more grounded in reality, and you're less swayed. Lindsay: And it can be a shared reality. obviously so what we talk about ⁓ is like, sentence can be uttered by a person and, you know, 10 different people in the room who heard it can all have a different idea or story about what was said, when in reality, If we played back a recording, here is the sentence that was said, And then to be able to tell ourselves that's a reality. We all know this thing is real. This is true. This is what happened. The imagining part that we're trying to make distinct from the noticing is we all have these ideas about what that meant. We all made up some meaning automatically about the thing that was said. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: I think when you're grounded in reality, and not so lost in your interpretation of that or someone else's interpretation of that reality, you're not swayed to and fro You're more grounded in what is actually happening and more open to things from ⁓ points of view rather than attaching to one point of view and assuming that that point of view is right and that all other points of view are wrong. Lindsay: Right, a million things can go wrong the world because of that, including war you know, ⁓ all kinds of terrible, violent things because of attachment to beliefs Cool, there's actually ⁓ like a ton left. Holy smokes. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: ⁓ Lindsay: ⁓ Okay, I'm gonna read another part here. This part is called telling the truth sucks. Telling the truth means all of the worst things you might imagine it means. It means telling everything you have hidden that you have done in the past to the very people who you think would be most hurt or angry or surprised or embarrassed by the revelations. for example, you've having sex with someone other than your spouse, you have to tell him or her all the details. Who you did it with, how many times, who came first, how many times you came, where it happened. whom you told, what you said to each other. how much fun it was, and so on, and answer all the questions that arise from the telling. Telling the truth means telling all your secrets and your secret feelings to whomever you don't want to tell. Worse yet, it means being expressive of feeling, mad when you express resentment and warm and move when you express appreciation and silent when you don't yet know what you feel. the truth has to do with being expressive of feeling and using descriptive language regardless of ideas about tact or propriety. The first thing you have to get over to tell the truth is politeness. Modification of your report of your experience out of consideration of the other person's feelings. That is, unless your spouse gets a clear feeling from your report of how much fun it was when you fucked his best friend, you haven't told the truth yet. Honest people. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: You gotta stop there, Jesus fucking Christ. Lindsay: There's just one more sentence. Honest people speak simply, using language more to describe than to evaluate. So that gives an example of what he's talking about, descriptive language rather than evaluative language. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Yeah. Lindsay: Go ahead. ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: This is just horrible advice. Lindsay: Tell us why. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: This is horrible advice. there's so much context missing from, that might be advice for some people in some contexts, ⁓ But he often does, he's an extremist and he puts everything in black and white and he says, you ⁓ must do this. ⁓ even his language, have to tell them. It's just a bit absurd. Lindsay: course it is. And yeah, I mean, you just said it, so I probably shouldn't say it again. But for some people who have been living in some ⁓ ways and in a setting that's safe ⁓ can This could amount to having ⁓ a much more intimate, real, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Hahaha! Lindsay: expressive relationship with the person you're sharing with in this way. It does happen. It can happen. And are so many situations in which this would be so dumb your own for other, you know, whatever. There are so many reasons I won't even go into all of them. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: do you that he has a difficulty himself in the shoes of others? It's

like he sees ⁓ everything from his own perspective this is exactly he wants ⁓ to be in this kind of like, here's all shit. Lindsay: Right. Right. And when he was younger and when he was, you know, young enough that he wrote this book, I think he was still in that very like provocative antagonistic, like I'll punch you if you know, like, like he's coming from this place of I had to beat up bigger, scarier people in my life to be able to be free and to move forward and yada yada, whatever, you know. So there is, there is a lot of that still this ⁓ advice It's like, go do it because whatever. You'll handle it if you need to. If Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Toughen up, it ain't gonna be that bad. If you need help, bring a friend, Lindsay: whatever comes up, you can probably handle it. ⁓ so little more learning to describe, to speak what is simply true ⁓ requires an unlearning of hard earned preconceptions and a relearning how to perceive with as little preconception as possible. That sounds like a very, very Brad sentence. knowing the difference between Perception and conception and getting good through practice at distinguishing between the two can save your life. Both the quality and length of your life can be increased through learning to focus on making the distinction over and over again between value-laden words and descriptive words. An honest person is concerned foremost with accuracy. Being honest is not for the sake of feeling good about being a virtuous person, it is a vital necessity. That means your life depends on it. Learning how to be honest and being willing to do so is the cure for all non-environmental stress disorders. It is the key to managing the disease of moralism. It is the most worthwhile focus of our attention as humans of this time and the only thing with half a chance to save us from ourselves. This is vital to our life and to the survival of life for all of us. Our problems do not arise from not thinking enough before we speak. Just the opposite is true. The way we learn to think and modify what we have to say before we speak kills millions of us unnecessarily and lays waste most of the cripples left, injured but still alive. So then he does refer to some actual numbers, not just ⁓ sweeping, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: yeah, there's just no, there's no subtlety there. ⁓ just black and white. I have found the one secret and this is it and nothing else works. Lindsay: which is just, you know, when I read it now, like this worked for me when I was younger and first came across this in my late twenties. I'm not surprised by that. And also like, what a bummer. I mean, this is his book. He can write it however he wants to. This is Brad. Good for him, And there's so much good shit here, ⁓ but you have to pick it out. between all of this just like absurd, the sky. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: and this is why he had tough time finding a publisher until it started selling ⁓ well, Lindsay: we're getting the end of this section. There's a little bit

more that I want us to say. ⁓ Okay, I am sending you a little bit more. You Mak & Lindsay Podcast: lot of what I have to say is depressing and negative. Nevertheless, ⁓ invite you to take courage from what I say and begin the work of learning to tell the truth. When I say what people normally do, please take it as a personal invitation to be abnormal. not normal to be honest. What is normal is be concerned foremost with having a good cover story. Normal people are concerned with figuring out the right thing to say that puts them in the best light. An honest person, in contrast, focuses on saying what is so. The person who learns to tell the truth is the most free, most alive kind of adult human being you'll ever see, but is more insecure than normal. The insecurity comes from having fewer beliefs to rely on for security. Although beliefs don't really provide security, they provide an insulation against the world and one feels afraid but protected. Lindsay: so this little section that you just started reading is a section called learning to love insecurity. Like being abnormally honest is a good way to be and you will be more insecure in the world and go ahead and do it anyway. Somehow individually and collectively, we believe security comes from principles from controlling other people. ⁓ But that kind of security simply doesn't exist. The only we have as individuals is in our ability to fly by the seat of our pants. ⁓ The being within which the mind resides yearns for freedom. The mind resists freedom. Freedom is antithetical to mind. mind exists for survival. The mind was built to provide the illusion of security, certainty, prediction, and control. The mind has surpassed its function physical survival to ensure the survival of the sea of suggestions it long ago decided it was. ⁓ The mind is a bullshit machine. The main thing that can free a person from his or her own mind is telling the truth. Telling the truth is always interpreted by the mind as a threat to security. When people think that who they are is their mind, they feel like they are committing suicide when they start telling the truth. It scares the hell out of them and they want the feelings that arise to go away fast. And they are right. It is like committing suicide in a way. What dies in telling the truth is the false self. the image projection we have presented to the world and come to believe as a result of our own press releases. real suicides where people really died were the result of a battle between being in mind. In those cases, the mind won. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Jesus Christ. to even claim something like that. I mean, I get the notion behind it. But just, I I can't stand that. Lindsay: Do you want to say what specifically? Do you want to elaborate on that? ⁓ Mak & Lindsay Podcast: claiming that you know why every single person who has ever committed suicide, why they were motivated to do so. Am I just an uptight asshole? Like let him say whatever bullshit he wants to say. Lindsay: and no, I don't know. That's what Brad would say. That's your mind talking. Mak & Lindsay Podcast: If you don't like what I say, you're an uptight asshole. Lindsay: Yeah, I don't know. Again, I come back around to this like... This is how people write books like this, right? you know? I know this thing and so I'm telling you about it. coming from this framework, I know that all suicides where people really died were the result of a battle between being and mind, Mak & Lindsay Podcast: Thank I I guess I don't read enough self-help books with people talking like this, but I know that actual psychotherapists don't speak this way. They edge what they're saying. They're more scientific Lindsay: i don't know, i- Yeah. Right, and he would say they're full of shit.