That's a brilliant evil question.

It's evil. I've asked so many people

this question. No one's ever wanted to

answer it.

Well, here I am. [laughter]

Russell Brand is one of the most famous

comedians in the world.

Actor and Arthur.

He's one of the most unmissable

performers on the planet. You don't want

to be around when the laughter stops.

Your earliest years are particularly

hard to read.

Drugs and self harm, your mother's

illnesses. How do we go on the journey

of changing?

Wow. This is proper diary of a CEO

stuff. There is deep spiritual appetite

within all of us for connection. But we

have a culture that is predicated upon

individualism and materialism. My

initial solution to feeling disconnected

[music] and lonely was to try and become

famous. If you are using impermanent

means to achieve a permanent solution,

you can only fail. But what I would say

is is in that loneliness, in that sense

of I'm not [music] good enough, I'm

worthless, are all the ingredients of

success, because it is sadly a gift to

you.

What could I have added to 10-year-old

Russell's life do you think that would

have made him feel valued? [sighs]

You are enough. You are sufficient.

[music]

We are going to be okay.

What told you otherwise?

Russell Brand is one of the most

fascinating individuals I have ever

spoken to. a former self-harming heroin

addict, self-confessed narcissist,

bulimic that craved fame and attention,

and was so addicted to sex that he slept

with five women a day, that married Katy

Perry 3 months after meeting her and

then divorced her with a text message.

Have you ever felt that subtle feeling

that the way you're living is not quite

right? that something somewhere is out

of balance, that you're not living your

life as that human somewhere inside you

should be living their life. The Russell

Brand that sits before me today can

relate. And he's found a new cure for

that feeling, a better way to handle

pain, a new blueprint to live by, which

he believes that you and me and all of

us will eventually realize through

failure and frustration. We are all

addicts searching for ways to feel less

pain through porn and screens and sugar

and addiction and drugs and whatever our

vices might be. But maybe, just maybe,

maybe Russell is right. And maybe there

is a simple cure for all of us right

there in plain sight.

[music]

Russell, I read a comment at the top of

a YouTube video that um of an interview

you did, and this was the comment. This

man is a hero. He's truly an example of

transcendence across the spectrum from

the archetype of selfishness, enthralled

by addiction to complete selflessness

and self-awareness. I love this man with

all of my heart.

Wow.

That was a comment left regarding you on

a recent interview you've done. Now, I'm

gonna be completely honest with you.

I should admit that I wrote that

comment. [laughter]

I Sometimes I do. Even though I know

I've written it, when I read it back, it

still gives me a boost.

Um, I said to you before we started

talking, I wanted to talk about

disconnection.

Yeah.

Disconnection for me in my life started

early.

Disconnection for me was coming to the

UK from Africa as the only black kid.

Went to Plymouth. Everyone's richer than

me. Everyone's white. Um, and that

pursuit of filling that void of whatever

it was, that shame, that insecurity,

which is very clearly the reason I'm sat

here.

Yeah.

What do we need to know about your

childhood? How did it shape the man that

sits in front of me today?

I have had a life that is being defined

by addiction.

And that addiction and in particular the

models of recovery that are available

for addiction is a convenient framework

for addressing the problems we have in

our age that are expressed extensively

and identifiably through materialism and

attachment.

I get attached to stuff. I was when I

was a little boy I grew up in a single

parent family just me and my mom. I come

from an ordinary background in ethics.

Grace,

ordinariness,

normaly.

These can be terms that are difficult to

define.

But I think we all know what we mean

when we say a normal, ordinary, modest,

blue collar background, low expectation,

state, schools. We know what images that

conjures. My mom was sick a lot when I

was a kid and my mom was and was the

defining influence in my life. All of us

that are lucky enough to have mothers

are going to be defined by that

relationship as well as the other

parental relationship.

I feel like real early on something in

me which I would now because it's almost

impossible Steven not to reverse

engineer these narratives isn't it and

to thread it through with newly acred

and acquired wisdom

but I feel that I was looking for

something I feel that there is a deep

spiritual appetite within all of us for

connection the subject that you have

identified as our framing for this

conversation that we are having.

But we do not have a culture that

presents us a discourse around

connection. We we have a culture that is

predicated upon individualism and

materialism. Your value and this is I

think across the political spectrum and

even in more compassionate narratives

around identity, individualism is still

enshrined as the centrifugal point. So I

felt like that I was in a state of lack.

I don't know what it is to be a man. I

don't know what it is to be a success. I

don't know what it is to have power. I

don't know what it is I recognize now.

Even to feel at ease, even to feel

serene, even to feel relaxed. is

probably only by the time I got clean

from crack and heroin and alcohol that

I'd noticed that I'd been in having an

anxiety attack for basically my entire

life. When I first told my life story in

which is an ordinary exercise at

treatment centers that help people to

get rehabilitated from chemical

dependency and I was fortunate enough to

go to one when the fella read it Chip

Summers one of the first people in

recovery I ever met when he read it he

went ah poor lonely little boy and I was

27 then so I suppose my life has been

defined by addiction and addiction is in

part a lack of connection, an attempt to

synthesize the connection to self, other

and God. God of your own understanding

perhaps understood as a a totality, a

sense of unity, a unity of force, a

highest principle, when it says in the

Old Testament, worship no other gods

than me, the implication I offer is that

we are a species that worships. And if

you do not access the divine, you will

worship the mandial. You will worship

the profane. You will worship your own

identity. You will worship your

belongings. You will worship the

template lane before you by a culture

that wants you wants you but gets you

distracted and relatively dumb. [gasps]

So my initial solution to feeling weak

and disconnected and lonely and somehow

silently brilliant was to try and become

successful, was to try and become

famous, was to try and have resources,

to try and address all of the problems

of my original condition. My original

condition culturally and socially as I

saw it was lack of power, lack of value,

lack of connection, lack of influence.

And what does our culture tell us is the

solution to this? Be somebody. And my

god, I'm talking about a long time ago

now. I'm talking about in the 80s and

the '9s. Now the culture it is

amplifying that message 100fold with a

million screens in every direction 50

lenses like the eyes of on the inside of

a fly rather than the almost 2D

experience of lenses that I grew up

with.

What could I have added to 10-year-old

Russell's life? Do you think that would

have made him feel valued?

10-year-old.

I reckon, mate, now that I'm a dad and

you can't be a father to anyone else

until you're a father to yourself,

is a sense that who you are is all

right. You're all right. You don't need

to worry. That you are enough. You are

sufficient. We are going to be okay.

What told you otherwise?

All conditions. don't it isn't the broad

cultural message you are insufficient

you will not be sufficient until you

acquire this body these objects this

approval these affiliations I don't even

think it's personal to me like whilst

like you know necessarily our

conversation has to be framed by sort of

biographical detail that's particular to

me don't you find that when you know

anyone's story really that the universal

was there waiting for you that there is

a ubiquity of this message. How many

times have you heard people that are

hugely successful say, "I felt inferior.

I didn't feel good enough. I wanted to

achieve this. I didn't have this or

that." It's a like it's awesome.

Most people that sit here have achieved

phenomenal things are it starts with a

story of not being enough. And you often

wonder whether they're driven or

dragged. Driven by their own, you know,

cuz they're framed in books as driven,

but in reality, they're being dragged by

insecurities and shame and

all of these things. That feeling of not

enough.

Um [clears throat]

your your your earliest years are um

particularly particularly um hard to

read. And I I when I I'll be completely

when I when I read about the

circumstances of your earliest years, I

do see a story that is very

unique in in a sense of self harm, your

mother's um sicknesses and her

illnesses. Um [clears throat]

and there's that guy underneath there

that knew he was brilliant, as you say.

Believed he was brilliant.

Brilliant in what way?

Well,

I suppose,

and I find this to be quite common to

addicts and alcoholics,

there's this pre- metabolized quality

that's waiting to be activated.

Now, brilliant is obviously a

comparative and relative term, and the

training I've been fortunate enough to

receive

prohibits me from leaning too heavily

into a framing like that now, like

superior to, better than,

but I feel that there I had a sense of a

resource that was waiting to unfold. I

was had a sense that there would be a

secondary coordinate that might arrive

in the form of a destination.

All energy at the most fundamental level

requires polarity. It requires polarity.

And I suppose that word parenting and

that word parenthesis, another word for

bracketing, suggests that you need to be

held in some way. You need something

that's going to be able to hold you. Now

if like me you believe I believe in God

Steven so the thing that defines me now

is I believe in God and I don't believe

that I have unique access to God or

superior access to God or that there's

this little set of dances or codes or

clothes that need to be worn to access

God more primally or more privately. I

believe that in an absolute loving God

that all of us have the right to be here

that I don't need no special adornments

or epipetts or epilelets or badges or

medallions that it's enough for me to be

one of everybody else. Back then though,

as a little kid, when I felt inferior

and broken, I just wanted to feel a

little bit special. I wanted to feel a

little bit valuable.

And

I suppose the first time that I really

felt that was making people laugh, doing

a school play at my little school, Gray

School, Bugsy Malone, and feeling the

overwhelming,

terrifying adrenaline and the

accompanying

sense of competence

that comes with being able to corral and

direct that energy. when it comes a

sense of purpose, revelation,

when you ask like you know what could

you have added and what do you mean by

silently brilliant

like I don't want to feel better than no

one else no more. I don't want to feel

worse than anyone else and I want to

participate in other people's becoming

who they are intended to be. There's a

beautiful phrase in recovery you may

enjoy. we recover the person we're

intended to be that somehow we can

respect individuality limitless

limitless diversity while somehow

accepting that there is something

unitive among us something collective to

be realized and achieved. So I suppose

it was my own savoring of my

particularness that I was experiencing

even though and this is no fault of uh

my parents although I might analyze my

culture. I felt that that I couldn't

express it and I didn't know what value

it had and what its use was. It was in

util until the culture tells you it can

be monetized or it can be mobilized in

order to. Now that framing isn't

necessarily one that I would ordinarily

gravitate to, but that's the one that is

available to that is the totemism of our

culture. That's the paradigm that we are

offered. So I suppose that's the one

that many of us inevitably pursue.

Do you have any emotional sentiment

towards that young man's circumstances

as you look back on what he the

situation he was in and what he was

experiencing? Do you feel you feel sorry

for him? You know, do you feel happy for

him? What should you feel anything

towards?

Latterly

due to the principles of recovery, due

to the fact that I have mentors, I have

peers, I have people that look to me for

guidance, I have service, I have duty,

responsibility. Latterly, Steven,

I come to feel incorporated with that

little boy. But if you'd have spoke to

me 10 years ago, I doubt I would like to

have heard him referred to. I wouldn't

have liked that spectre to have risen. A

phantom I'd happily put aside. But now,

like that little boy, like hopefully the

little boy that you described down there

in Plymouth of all places,

that famous rock from where they depart

across the oceans, that personal

Mayflower journey. He's with me now. I

love him. And he's like, he is a great

asset when I'm dealing with young,

vulnerable, broken people. When people

tell me that they want to end their own

lives, when people tell me they self

harm, until people tell me they want to

kill themselves, that they can't cope

with life, they don't feel that they're

good enough, I'm not phased, I can stay

100% present with that and that is a

great gift. No.

Was there was there I think about this a

lot with myself. Was there another path

to where you are now?

Yeah, probably, mate. Probably. I mean,

look, you may like, you know, you've met

a lot of people. I know a lot of people.

But for me personally, I just tell you

why I asked that question. I believe

that I had a belief that was ill

informed by the society I lived in and I

believe I had to pursue that belief to

find out that I was wrong and have it

fail me.

Mhm.

Well, it's happened now. Now it has

happened. So the answer is 100% of

course absolutely indefabably. This is

the reality that was designed for you

internally that your consciousness is

creating this reality. This reality is

not coming externally at you. This

consciousness is in unfolding from

within you in the moment. Where else

could it be? Where else could it be? But

potentially limitless alternatives,

potentially unbridled possibility.

And for you, you think you could have

become the man that's sat in front of me

now with via a different pathway.

Yeah. But like or you know also no like

I'm what I suppose I'm saying is I

accept this the the path that I've

walked and that you know that I'm sort

of continuing to walk and I suppose

anyone that's in the engaged in the

process of recovery has to as a part of

that accept the various chapters

episodes that that have led to that. I

mean I think that's part of

self-acceptance. Part of self-acceptance

is to appreciate and understand

the various steps that have led you to

where you are. And just again, I think

to reiterate that that that's why I

mentioned addiction and recovery early

on because it provides you with a a

access to an archetype that this is who

I was. These were this is the way that I

lived. This is the way that I try to

handle the challenges that life gives

you. impermanence, temporality, death,

inequality, hypocrisy, destruction, all

of these things that sort of are

pervasive, whether that's cultural or

simply part of being in an amp in a

temporal and spatial reality.

Recovery gives you a different set of

tools, a different a different way to

deal with those same challenges which

for one of a better word I will call

spiritual a spiritual solution to what I

regard now as a spiritual problem. Once

again tagging that idea of connection

that you've helped us set up this

conversation using

spirituality as a as a as a as a form of

connection. um you know when a lot of

people are put off by the term

spirituality because it sounds a little

bit exclusive and a little bit hoohoo

haha but the the you know I've would

class myself now as being spiritual that

thanks in part I have to say to my my

partner who is a breath work instructor

and I met in you know in Bali and so on

but one of the quotes that I love from

you is like many desperate people I need

spirituality I need God or I cannot cope

in this world I need to believe in the

best in people since I've become

spiritual I have found that it's easier

to be alive.

Spiritual, what is what is that word?

Spiritual literally means not material.

That's what it means. It's not

observable or measurable. The problem

perhaps that we have nowadays is that we

live in a quantitive reality where all

things are measurable where all things

are based predicated on rational

principles. But all of us know what love

is. All of us know what intuition is.

All of us know as CS Lewis beautifully

outlines in mere Christianity when we

have transgressed against some moral

code that appears to have been instilled

in us and in spite of the advocacy and

campaigning of evolutionary biologists

seems to appeal to some numministic

tendency, numministic meaning simply a

sense of awe, a sense of oneness, a

sense of glory. a sense of glory you

might experience at sunrise or sunset or

looking into the eyes of a loved one or

even a stranger and knowing that the

connection is real. Knowing that the

unitive force is real and that somehow

this connection implies a set of ethics,

morals and principles. It's not just oh

wow God is one. Let's lose oursel in

some honistic revalry. That pleasure is

not an end point. that service is our

way of acknowledging this unity.

So spirituality for me is a survival

technique. You won't get very far in

this world without it. And if you don't

have it in a declared explicit and I

don't mean doctrinal way, I mean

personal but somehow connected and

communal way, you will try to create

God. You will try to create spirituality

from your preferences. Your preferences

will become your God. I prefer it when

people talk to me like this. I repel

this kind my aversions and my

preferences will become my religion. And

this is I'm capable of that today. If I

don't I'm lucky to be such a craven mad

smackhead. And it's nice to walk around

the streets of Shaw ditch where I have

used where I've scored where I know the

back streets of Brick Lane where there

are enclaves where they serve up Muslim

men wearing full regalia that would

never deal with that kind of business.

It's against the Quran, but serve it up

to slip down them rat runs to see it

trace across the silver page. To lose

myself in smack world and to come back

here now with a a different way. A

different way. The city has changed and

I've changed and no man crosses the same

river twice and no man visits the same

shore ditch twice cuz the man is

different and Shaw ditch is different. I

was looking for the same thing then. I

was looking for the same thing then.

Like when I was looking around then for

smack and crack and all of that. I was

looking for the things that I'm looking

for now. And if I'm not very rigorous in

my spiritual practices and they're still

sort of simple. I know I can use a lot

of long words. It's a thing I like

doing. I get off on it and stuff, but

spirituality ain't complicated. My nan's

better at it than I am. My mom, my wife,

they're all better at it than I am. They

do it natural cuz they're not like

mobilized by this sort of prim

primordial yearning that can become my

fuel. It ain't no easy task to turn all

that gge, that swamp gge, that Neolithic

jet fuel into love of one another.

There's been there's people now that are

living a life where including me

probably to many many respects that are

using preference as our god.

Yes.

You sniff that strangely.

Well, cuz I thought is there chlorine in

it? [laughter]

Really?

I just wondered

what is it?

Water.

Water. Okay. I don't think there's

chlorine. I hope there's not chlorine.

those people that are choosing

preference as their god now that are

living a life maybe where materialism is

their is their their savior.

Um

what is there's a couple of questions I

have here. You know that the Russell

that was in shortage for other reasons

once upon a time and the Russell that's

in shortage now you said that they were

both looking for the same thing.

What was old Russell finding and why

wasn't the thing he found as good as the

thing he finds now? I.e. What is the

outcome of those that are choosing

preference as their god? Like what why

is that such a bad thing? What is the

what is the long-term or short-term

consequence?

Well, I wouldn't suggest that there is

but one path. As they say, as Krishna

Mertie says, truth is a pathless land.

We got to find it ourselves. But that

said, there are templates, paradigms,

conditions, and practices that might

help us. So I'm not making a judgment on

anyone else's path. My spirituality is

not about you should be doing this and

you should be doing that. My

spirituality is I should be doing this,

I should be doing that. My morality is

about my conduct. If someone else wants

me to judge them or help them or guide

them or aid them and I'm able to, then

it is my duty to do it.

But what I would say is is if you are

using impermanent means to achieve a

permanent solution, you can only fail.

If you are mistaking the vehicle for the

self for the essence of the self, you

can only fail. If you have not

interrogated who is this in here? What

is this subjective experience that only

I am having? How do I deal with the

tension of the paradox? And remember,

all energy comes from polarity. All

energy comes from polarity. That I am

infantisimally small to the point of

being absolutely irrelevant in a cosmic

framing. And yet all reality takes place

solely, as far as I know, within my

consciousness.

Quick one before we get back to this

episode. Just give me 30 seconds of your

time. Two things I wanted to say. The

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to keep doing all of the things you love

about this show. Thank you. Thank you so

much. Back to the episode. One of the

things I've thought a lot about

recently, you mentioned a god in your

belly or that person or that signal in

your belly that's that's trying to tell

you how you feel. And we've all become

so phenomenally good at tuning out of

that and tuning into the kind of

external how how you feel like how you

should feel based on the job or title or

status that you have. And this is a

stronger noise and signal now than this

one. Um your life has been this you

talked about mentors as well. Your life

has been this amazing

journey from chapter to chapter to

chapter as this person described as

transcendence.

The question I'm getting at is like I'm

thinking about someone right now that

sat in the city and they

know they feel like [ __ ] at a deeper

level, but they've gotten so good to

listening to their mother's opinion of

them becoming a stock broker that it's

almost hard to hear that feeling of I

feel like [ __ ] How do we go on the

journey of changing? How do we get

there?

Well, typically Steven, the journey

begins with a departure from home.

Interestingly, whatever home is, you

have to leave. You have to leave the

familiar, the place that you are

familiar with.

Scary.

Often this is induced by crisis. A

crisis that you cannot avoid or delay or

defer. A crisis of some kind may come.

Of course, this can be an inner crisis,

a moment of despair. often a psychic

breakdown can be a can precipitate

change, transition, awakening. I suppose

what you have to one way that you can do

it, this is the way that I would do it,

the way that I have done it,

is firstly to acknowledge the problem of

my condition to admit there is a problem

and that my life has become

unmanageable. These are not my ideas.

What are the signals of that?

unhappiness, sadness. Like in a sense

that's like one one thing that's good

about that is you're trusting your

personal integrity. It's not like oh

you're delirious. Why are you not happy?

Why is this not working for you? Problem

unmanageability. You're sad. I'm using

in fact the example you use. Someone in

a city holed up left with the familial

and cultural conditioning that has left

them at odds maladjusted to a

maladjusted world. One, there is a

problem. Life is unmanageable. Two,

you've got to believe it's possible to

change. If you don't believe it's

possible to change, you will never be

able to marshall your inner resources

towards making that change. One way that

this change can be made is through

mentorship. Even if that mentorship is

in the abstract, even if you've just

chosen, hey, this person seems to be

able to have done that. He says that he

used to feel weak, inferior,

I incompetent, uh, impotent and he says

now that he doesn't feel those feelings.

So maybe if I do what they did, maybe I

can change also.

Mhm.

So this, so this and the third

component, first one, acknowledgement of

powerlessness. Second one, belief change

is possible. Third principle, it will

not come from the same map and rubric

that you've been running on up till now.

You're going to have to import new

ideas. You will need help. That help I

would offer you might be of a divine

nature, prayer, meditation, humility to

ask for something greater than your my

individual wants, my individual

preferences. It's not just some wish

list passed up to the cosmic Santa. It

is an

it is a acknowledgement that there is a

requirement for growth and indeed that

I'm no longer prescribing what outcomes

I want. It's curious. There are often

paradoxes in this. So for me mate, it's

like first you admit the power that the

powerlessness and the nature of the

problem. Second, I believe it's possible

to change and I base that on hang on a

minute. These people used to have that

problem and they've changed. So what if

I do what they did? Then maybe my life

will change. These are all things

derived from 12step ideology. The third

thing is accept someone else's plan.

Accept someone else's help. Surrender.

Because in the in the end, this is the I

think perhaps the hardest contradiction.

At least I find it a very hard

contradiction to live with this idea of

activated surrender and a return to the

original condition. Activated surrender.

Russell is no longer in charge. Russell

is no longer in charge. Russell is a

servant. There is a master. I am in the

service of this now. And I recognize

those words are pretty loaded, but I'm

saying that this is if you can envisage

a benign and loving mother or father

rather than authority. And if you do

consider authority to be mostly malign,

I could not identify more strongly. My

distrust and my dislike of authority is

a deep deep fuel in me. I do not like

being told what to do. I do not like it.

It is a big big part of my religion. I

have to stop myself reflexively doing

the opposite of what I'm told. If

someone speaks to me authoratively,

someone asks me to help them, I will do

my level best to help them. If someone

tells me what to do, I find it very,

very difficult indeed not to do the

opposite. Anarchist calisthenics break

rules every day just to remind yourself

that you belong to something higher than

a set of systems potentially imposed by

a malevolent force.

The step three there's you referenced

the first time um was [clears throat]

about running basically a new

instruction manual for your life like

accepting uh because the current

instruction manual is clearly not

producing the results you seek. So a new

instruction manual for your life and um

my my brain went but how do I know which

one to pick? Because there's many

temptations for for a new path forward.

You know, there's the I could join a co

cult in Arizona or I could I could I

might see seek meaning and surrender in

all the in another wrong place

from my preferences to something even

more dructive or um how do we know you

know how do we know what what new

instruction manual to run our lives on

when we find ourselves in such a

situation? I'm thinking again about that

person who finds themselves in a in a

job because their parents have told them

to go and get that job and now or they

they're working any job where they feel

like something is wrong. They admit it.

Step one.

Step two is they seek out mentors to

provide evidence that it's possible to

leave the situation.

And then step three is this idea of

surrendering and running your life on a

new instruction manual.

Where do I find that instruction manual?

Is it from my mentors?

It's interesting, isn't it? Yes,

possibly. Yes, quite quite likely. Yeah,

because I feel we're in a crisis of

authority. Most people don't trust the

government. Most people don't trust the

media. Many people don't trust the

judiciary or state authority and I would

have to confess that I am inclined to

agree that we are in a true crisis of

authority. Who indeed would you trust to

say I will do what is right? I will do

what is right for you. I will do what is

right for the community and trust that

they are speaking on behalf of a set of

principles that would could be somehow

universal and truly valid.

How I have handled this is I've been

fortunate enough through crisis and

despair to find myself primarily

connected to a group of other people the

same as me who cannot cope with reality

unless they drink or use drugs. And

those people provide me with a paradigm

for moving forward and a program. And I

like that word program because it's both

a sort of very old-fashioned word but

also an ultra modern word in terms of

you know software for example. Thanks

mate. Yeah

and

I guess at some point we're going to

have to trust ourselves but when

embarking on this journey it's not easy

to lean into into intuition and it isn't

easy to trust others. I find trust very

very difficult. I don't know about you

mate. I don't know what kind of

experiences you had there as a young man

in [laughter] Plymouth, but for me,

trust ain't my go-to. That's not my

go-to. It takes me a little while. My

strategy is do not put yourself in a

situation where you require trust.

Why?

Because maybe people are going to let

you down bad. Maybe maybe the the

systems of authority, be they

educational, legal, judicial, maybe

they're going to let you down. Maybe

they can't relied on.

I mean, I was kicked out of school, but

for you know, I was expelled from

school. I went to university for one

day, left that.

Oh yeah, I did all these things.

I remember it. I recognize it in your

story, but that that I don't have the

same level of

I I'm skeptical. I require evidence to

accept things, some kind of subjective

or, you know, evidence that I but I'm

not I wouldn't say I'm distrusting

broadly

or maybe I am to some degree. Maybe my

skepticism is is that Yeah,

it's a critique. It's an analytic. It's

a perspective of until you

[clears throat] No. But your problem

with your your your challenges with

authority that are clearing your story

through school and institutions and all

these things, where does that come from

in you that that what is and how would

you describe it? Well, now I would

describe it as a very deep love of God

and a great deal of respect for other

people's individual liberty and freedom.

And the idea that any central authority

would impose that without clear consent

achieved through democracy and community

a community dialogue seems ridiculous to

me. [snorts]

But obviously it's biographical and

interpersonal that the circumstances of

my life have shown me that the people

one way or another that are in positions

of authority on the various scales of

authority that most people encounter

familial social educational have not

been able to fulfill the duties required

of them. Of course, as a person a

certain way down a path now because in

the words of Philip Larkin they in their

turn were [ __ ] up too that we are just

part of a long lineage of people coping

with broken broken systems and I would

say from agriculture onwards systems of

aggregation centralization accumulation

that can't enshrine the rights of the

individual except for a certain set of

individuals that we are living in a

system that's about centralizing or

centralizing power and increasing

authority diminishing individual freedom

using whatever rhetorical tricks are

required safety convenience whatever is

required to achieve this centralized

authority now so I now feel like you

said before how there are other ways

that you could have ended up being this

man in this chair now I am glad that I

have been deeply schooled in mistrust of

authority that it's almost like it burns

in me

I can tell

watch them watch what they're telling

you watch what they're telling you. I

give it to my own children and I hope

I'm not doing them a disservice.

Question authority. Question it.

Question it. And of course, this makes

bedtime difficult because who's the

person telling them bedtime? But it

makes schooling because institutions

have an inertia. Institutions have a

tendency. They might start off with

we're going to educate these kids to be

creative and individuals, but in the end

it's going to be about health and

safety. In the end, it's going to be

about fire drills. In the end, it's

going to be a set of a bureaucratic

imshment and maze that prevents

individual freedom. The great David

Graber, God rest his soul, though he was

a communist, so he maybe wouldn't thank

me for saying that. David Graber says

that one of our great uh dialectics

against Soviet communism, for example,

was that they were bure bureaucracies

that prohibited individual freedom. But

look at the bureaucracies we live within

now. How do they solve the problem of

spying and stealing your data? Just make

someone tap I agree. Don't stop spying.

Continue to spy. Continue to accumulate

the data. Just tap agree. You agreed to

be spied on. [gasps] This is

bureaucracy. This is these are the

observable tendrils and symptoms of a

centralized authority that is not

necessarily sent sentient, occultist or

overtly corrupt but a tendency to

accumulate power to dominate resources

that is plainly observable in the

geopolitical dramas that play out in our

time. the ecological crisis and the

evident mainstream mainstage players

that occupy our current time that many

of whom have not been elected to get

there. I'm talking about unelected

acronym organizations that have a great

deal of influence in the world today.

The reason I don't trust is not you. I

love my mom and dad, Ron Brand, Babs

Brand. If like today sat here in Shaw

ditch as an adult man, I wouldn't just

walk around Essics and go to find some

couple of workingclass kids and say,

"Why don't you and you take

responsibility [laughter] for my

spiritual development? They did their

very best they could and I couldn't love

them more. I couldn't love them more."

But my mom, she had cancer like eight

times in a few years. My dad, he's got

his own deal. He's got his own deal. And

I recognize what it is to feel strong

individualistic fervor. I love them. I

love them.

When I'm trying to formulate, and I know

I'll make errors as a parent, of course

I will. We all do. And as you will

discover, it is our duty to wound our

children. It is not our duty. It is a

necessity beyond a duty. It is a

tendency. It's just gonna they're going

to end up wounded. They have to. They're

going to have to find a second mother, a

second father. They're going to have to.

they're going to have to.

[sighs and snorts] So,

it's not anybody's fault. It's not even

the system's fault. I'm kind of grateful

to all of it now. I'm grateful to these

institutions. I'm grateful to the

mainstream media. I'm grateful to these

governments. I'm grateful that they have

set out the instruments required for the

change that we will encounter in the

coming few decades.

You you mentioned your mom and your

father again there. um your father what

role what impact was did his departure

have do you think on hindsight on your

relationship with authority if any at

all

I would say fatherless men like I don't

want to be so solopistic as to make this

entirely about me he says 20 years into

a career

but I think and I experience with

fatherless men who I deal with a lot in

my uh what I would say my spiritual life

is to be around men a lot that are in

recovery both being mentored by and

mentoring and recovering mutually in

support communities

broadly fatherless men feel a big burden

and they do not feel safe in this world

a big burden not safe in this world if

they're with the mother I think they

feel it is their duty to look after the

mother if they are without other parents

I mean you know if without either a

parent my god who knows what kind of

chaos and I'm not saying there is only

one way and that there is only template

but one template but I'm because I'm

already talking about a subset. I'm

talking about a subset of people that

have become drug addicts and alcoholics

in order to deal with these kind of

challenges. But also I know people that

don't identify as addicts in exactly

that way and still the absence of the

father and that also by the way you know

could be through death or it could be

could break up of the relationship or it

could be because the father doesn't have

the emotional lexicon to connect.

Yeah.

One way or another because I can think

of examples top of my head of all of

those. I think it feels like you are

prematurely invited to be a man. In

fact, when I was thinking about our

interview, Stephen, because you'll be

glad to know I thought about you before

I

Thank you, Russell. [laughter]

I felt the significance of anthropology,

the significance of what the original

condition might be. I do not use these

terms to suggest there is some one

template that could be imposed and

stamped upon everyone. I would never

take away people's individual rights or

struggles, particularly those connected

to obvious and evident civil rights,

cultural, and identity issues. Those are

their stories for them and I support

them in those stories. [snorts] But when

it comes to how human beings might have

lived for hundreds of thousands of

years, it appears we do well when we are

a connected unit that communicate

together in order to achieve a common

goal. Time and time again when

anthropologists and even uh contemporary

psychologists study these forms of

society they discover that there are

rights of initiation for both males and

females although there often appears

based on what I have heard and as you

know I'm not an expert to be particular

emphasis on male initiation as the body

is not so uniform in the way that it

informs a boy that it is a grown-up now

not a child anymore and that there are

new duties to be undertaken. One of the

best examples I've ever heard and I feel

like this is somewhere in Freud or maybe

in Joseph Campbell is that I feel this

is some Australian Aboriginal tribe that

they what they do and I think they're

doing this now. I figure I don't know.

You know, I'm putting this stuff

together. You know how it goes. That the

boys at a certain age are dragged away

from the mother and they make much of

it. They wear masks the men of the

village. All the men are part father.

All the women are part mother. And of

course there are categories for other

forms of identity too which they honor

and revere often in the form of the

shaman who is beyond gender identity

incorporating both. You see reflections

of this to this day even in monotheistic

faiths where the priest wears what

appears to be neutral or androgynous

attire distinguishing them from the rest

of the community yet honoring them and

revering them.

[clears throat]

And you went through that um initiation

way too early

in your own words. You say there you

were prematurely forced to be a man

because you've got the duty of care over

your over your mother at a young young

age. Your father leaves I think six six

months old. And then the other thing

that happens which feels like a a

horrible turning turn you know a

horrible sense of chance is your mother

has cancer um and she struggles with it

for many many years. So you've got this

young boy and I was thinking about this

when I was doing the research for this

conversation. You've got this very young

young young boy who's struggling with a

lot of things on his own, disconnection

coming from all angles and then the

stability in his life become

gets the the uncertain

um horror of cancer come into her life

and what that does to that young boy

who's already destabilized in sense of

like connection. These are all

interpretations I have from reading a

piece of paper.

Mhm. You know, if I'm just being honest,

they are just I was putting myself in

those shoes and saying, I've got this

stable figure here in my life, my

mother, and I'm dealing with all this

instability over here, and then this

becomes unstable.

Yeah, it's good analysis.

But, you know, really, my mother's

struggles, them is her struggles. She

had to go through that and bravely she's

done it. what life force that woman has

in her.

And to pick up on a point within your

question, you cannot fake being a man or

a woman or adult. Let's say a word that

doesn't have any cultural load to bear.

You can't fake that or you can fake it.

And I did fake it. And that is what

people do. They fake it. They fake it.

But in a sense, maybe you need another

adult to make you that. You need to be

initiated. You need a code. You need to

know that it's about duty and

responsibility. That it's not all just

about swagger and personal achievement.

And like many young men, I joined the

group of lost boys. I found men, young

young men, kids. Kids cuz if I met them

now, that's what they were is kids

couple of years older than me. That be

that that becomes your tribe. Unless you

have hierarchies and systems of

acculturation and inculcation that are

based on higher values. Remember our

earlier point about moral authority and

trust. Who you going to give it over to?

You'll create your own one. You'll

create your own little community without

elders, without elders that are reliable

and trustworthy and dutiful and

understand the nature of sacrifice,

sacrifice of themselves in in order to

perform them duties. So of course yes I

feel like when you feel the incumbency

of adulthood upon you early due to the

conditions of your domestic trial there

you will have to as they say man up or

woman up. You'll have to but it won't be

real cuz it can't be real because it's

not only a set of endocrininal

imperatives. It's also a system of

instruction as laid out in that as laid

out in the previous anecdote uh the

cambellian analysis of the

anthropological conditions of that

aboriginal group there. So really until

you find other adults elders that are

like I'm I know what I'm doing. You

don't need to worry. I'm stronger than

you. It's going to be okay. I'll look

after you. It's all right. Do this. that

a you know a father a father like a

father is you know you're going to

forego this now because in the future

this you know without that you will not

forgo you will consume now you will

consume now you will not understand you

will not understand your role so takes a

long while I I've said it before Stephen

but I'll say it again so it bears

repeating you thou shalt worship no

other gods than me because otherwise you

will worship them gods you will worship

pleasure money fame Them gods are greedy

little gods too. They're easy little

deities to start worshiping. And the

problem with the worship of those gods

is you lose the principle of the divine,

the interconnectivity that pleasure is

not the result. Pleasure is a byproduct.

Pleasure is an inadvertent byproduct,

please God, of doing the right thing. I

was just thinking then as you're talking

about um

all of that and the gods we choose to to

to worship and young men and

fatherlessness. I was thinking about the

Andrew Tate phenomenon

as a form of he really seems to have

captured a huge amount of young men for

some reason and trying to diagnose why

why that is is a very multifaceted

um process isn't it? because there's

elements of purpose and meaning and um

having a figure in your life that you

can can guide you can initiate you into

what being a man is that it seems that

young men are in search of.

Yes, I agree. I agree. I agree. No

doubt. One of the challenges it feels

like we have culturally Stephen is we

are unable to observe the difference

between symptom and cause.

Yeah.

Symptom and cause. And obviously as with

matters medical, cause is what we must

analyze. Cause is what we must

understand. There's no point saying you

shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do

that. If you have a set of values that

are pretty simple, I call them Sesame

Street values. Kindness, love, service,

that's going to take care of a hell of a

lot. If you have kindness, love,

service, it's going to take care of a

hell of a lot. Are you being kind right

now? No. You have gone off track, mate.

You've gone off track. You're not being

kind. Are you being of service? No.

Then we can maybe sift through different

also with we we live in a such a curated

space that it's difficult to discern

what people are actually angry about

sometimes. What is it? As one of my

great teachers says to me, what is it?

Don't get caught up in the phenomena,

the epiphenomena, the distractions, the

static. What is it that you are trying

to understand? What is it you're trying

to do?

All of these groups then people that are

big fans of an Andrew Tate, people that

are radically left, people that are

radically right, what is it that they

they [laughter] are that they are they

are seeking or that they are getting

from from such a radical pursuit? Well,

a argument might be that we are

recognizing that there is nothing in our

evolution to suggest that we live in

cultures of 300 million people who live

by one ideology. That we have to truly

respect diversity. that we have to

acknowledge that many of our most

influential and powerful systems do not

have our best intentions in mind that

they in fact benefit from ongoing

cultural conflration. If we can do one

great service in this cultural space, I

recognize that part of your goal and

your mission is to awaken latent potency

in individuals in honor of your own

journey. And it is a great mission if I

may say. But part of this mission must

be for us to learn this simple lesson.

We have more in common with one another

than the than divides us. And it is our

duty to reach out in particular to the

people we disagree with in a spirit of

love and good faith. Firstly, then

identify, oh, am I reaching out in good

faith to people I already agree with?

No, no, no, no, no. That's not it.

disagree with I disagree with that on

this important hot but hot button topic

of guns or pro-life pro-choice or

identity or tradition or progression. I

disagree with them and I respect your

right. I respect and I love you and I

know that I do not know what you know

that I am not God. I am not God. I do

not know. I do not have any authority

over you. But I believe that together we

can achieve a consensus. And this

consensus must be founded on good faith.

We must allow one another to communicate

in good grace and openness. We cannot

yield to censorship not because we want

people to fill the air with toxicity and

hate, but because we know that if we try

to control it, who has the right? Who

are we granting the right to? Now, have

you investigated any of these

organizations? Have you investigated

their funding, their affiliations, their

agenda, their imperative? Because to

some degree, I am sorry to report that I

have and I have found them wanting. They

will not be getting my consensus for

authority anytime soon. And I would

offer you this. You have more in common

with the people you are fighting with,

with those you most loathe. whatever

hue, persuasion, or a cultural garment

you've conveniently strewn upon them

than the people that are saying that

they will protect you. The institutions

that are saying they will protect you.

Are you optimistic?

Yes. God is real.

You're optimistic that we'll get to a

place where we're we recognize that our

similarities are greater than our

differences.

Yes. And so if I make Russell Brand, I

know I don't think this is the role you

want, but if I make you prime minister

or president of the world,

how how do you systemically change

things to help us achieve the objectives

you've described in connection,

community, kindness, and togetherness?

What are the things? I've asked so many

people this question. No one's ever

wanted to answer it

because it's so big.

I am. [laughter]

Bring power as close as possible to the

people affected by it.

default to decentralization and

localization wherever possible. Of

course, this will not immediately yield

perfection. But have you looked out of

your window? We are not competing with

perfection. We are competing with

corruption. So what do we want? Most of

all, we want true democracy. All the

values that people espouse are the

values we should be practicing. They say

the world does not need more people to

believe in God. just for those of us

that do to start acting like it to start

acting like you believe God is real.

[sighs]

Redistribute

the control of municipal facilities to

those that are affected by them. do not

have water companies in the United

Kingdom like Temp's Water owned

elsewhere in China or Canada or QA or

Qatar or wherever those facilities are

held have municipal facilities run by

the community that is affected by them.

I'm not talking about reationalization.

I'm talking about community. The

community runs its water wherever

possible. I recognize that there is some

complexity when it comes to electricity,

municipality, running roads, running

hospitals. But who among us has ever

been into a hospital and not marveled at

the beauty, the compassion, the

ingenuity, the commitment, the devotion

of the people that work there? Wouldn't

it be better if the people that clean

the floors in the hospital felt that

they were invested in it, that it was

their hospital, the nurses that work

there, the doctors, that they have real

power, that those are their hospitals?

Wouldn't it be better if both sides of

our political conversation, I'm talking

about the United Kingdom right now,

hadn't agreed already that privatization

is the way to go and they're not going

to do anything about it. I'm not saying

that there's anything wrong with

capitalism in its uh basic format of we

create a product and the people want the

product and look at that, we made a

little bit of money. I'm talking about

this gigantic metastasized

monster devouring everything right down

to spirit. We must recognize where

centralized authority is coalescing

most. And this we must address. This we

must address. Whether it is financial,

corporate or state power, wherever it is

possible. We the people. We the people.

Those three magical constitutional

words. If they were listened to, if they

were lived by, [clears throat] it's

already there. The kingdom of heaven is

spread upon the earth and man sees it

not. It's already here. It comes from

inside your consciousness. You awaken.

You believe it's possible to change. You

act like it's going to happen. That's

how these things unfold. It's happened

again and again. The miracles of

transition and change, the great beauty

of science and medicine and technology.

When it is freed from its tendrils, when

it is untethered from the menacious

objectives of a system that sees all

things as dominion for materialization

and commodity, when it is freed from

that, you will see the true genius of

our scientists, the true genius capable

in technology, if we can just address

the model, if we can just have as an

agenda an awareness that we are just on

one little rock in infinite space right

now, that we're all participating in

this one centralized idea and yet

infinite infite diversity, infinite

individual freedom, infinite ways of

being human. We must all take

responsibility for becoming the person

we're intended to be. And if you don't

know who that is, you find someone who

does and you find a system and a program

that can help you. And we'll all do our

best together. And it's going to be

glorious, glorious, but beyond glorious,

it is necessary. One of the things you

said within there was about empowering

nurses, for example, and cleaners,

cleaners in a hospital. And it reminded

me of a study I read many years ago that

showed nurses that were given ownership

about the decisions within a hospital

had um higher satisfaction. There was

less accidents. There was less um uh

accidents with with misprescribed

medications. There was um higher

retention. And when they they leveled

out the the payment um the remuneration

policy so there was less unfairness in

how people were remunerated. All the

standards of the hospital went through

the roof because people were empowered.

They had autonomy and control over their

lives and work. So, I completely relate

to that. My question though is about

step one because it what you described

there sounds like it's at the top of

Everest and sometimes when something

feels it does for even for me it feels

like it's a long way away from where we

are now. So, I'm asking what's the first

pebble? What's the first domino that has

to fall? What's the first thing that I

can do as an individual to help us get

closer to that world?

Well, firstly, Stephen, people climb

Everest every single day.

They have to clear the litter from that

mountain. Now once it was considered

inconceivable and every time there is an

epoal shift every time we say oh it

seems that the sun doesn't go around the

earth it seems like the earth goes

around the sun oh there are things that

are smaller than atoms it appears that

these subp particular phenomena that are

so small it's even difficult to label

them exist in a unified field that they

are emanating but somehow connected to

I'm speaking of course of quantum

entanglement that if you reverse the

charge of a particle thousands of miles

away the partnering the partnering

particle will reverse its charge also

there appears to be some unitive force

what I'm expressing is the most simple

practical effortless achievement that we

will ever yet undertake it is merely the

realization of the truth that we are

individual yes but we are connected also

that There are Goliaths that have

incrementally coalesed due to the

progression of the great sometimes

unacnowledged revolutions. I'm not

saying no one's acknowledged

agriculture, industrial revolution,

technological revolution that all of

these have been undergurded by

principles of dominion that might as

well be feudalism. In a sense, there is

no change at all except for the

individual change that you yourself can

make. This is why I think people get a

lot of traction when they say, you know,

look after yourself. This is part of it.

Eat well, awaken, pray, meditate,

recognize that it is normal to feel

sometimes total despair and total

dispondency. Remember, all of these

great journeys that we're describing

that you're fascinated with began with

exactly that. Exactly that, [gasps] that

the great sages and secular saints that

we have been granted have shown us and

told us, be the change that you want to

see in the world. Whether it's Al Gandhi

or our Malcolm X, people that are

willing to give their life for what they

believe in because what they believe in

is bigger than their life and you're

going to die anyway. You're going to die

anyway. But your principles this is

eternity that we can touch eternity in

the moment. So it's not like woo woo to

say meditate wake up. This is changing

the prima materia. It is the field of

consciousness. This is I suppose what

I'm advancing. Consciousness precedes

matter. You have unique individual

access to consciousness. You are online.

You are on the grid. You are responsible

for whether or not you believe this is

possible. Nobody else can tell you what

to do there. That is your private

kingdom, your private domain where you

can be for now, for now. Whoever you

want to be in there. [snorts] Please do

not relinquish that right by not taking

it now. For I tell you, authoritarian

forces are abundant and abound. They are

looking to colonize the very space of

attention that exists right now. This

moment, this is what is being colonized.

Attention. Data. Data on what? You,

[snorts]

the territory of the self. This is

fertile. This is not nothing. It is not

nothing to awaken to the reality of who

you are in this very moment. That is not

nothing. Stephen,

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Check it out. Find out how much your

home is worth and let me know what you

think. One of my team members had a

question for you. I remember just

chatting to them about about you and

they said, you know, I'd really want to

know how he lives on a day-to-day basis

because I know from your books and

stuff, the the Russell that roamed the

streets of Shortage once upon a time.

The Russell I see now is through the the

lens of YouTube and I see him and looks

like the countryside somewhere with like

some logs in the back.

What is your what how do you live your

life now?

I'm glad you've asked this because this

is proper diary of a CEO stuff because

this is actual scheduling.

I have to live sort of like a monk

basically. I have to be conscious all

the time. I have to be conscious about

what I eat otherwise I'll eat something

stupid. I have to be conscious about

what I say otherwise I'll say something

stupid. I have to be conscious about

what I do. I have to familiarize myself

with extremes continually. So I thank

you God have uh access to hot

temperatures and cold temperatures. I

expose myself to them regularly every

day if possible. I do a lot of cold

therapy. I get right in that cold and

while I'm in that cold I think this

thing taught to me by Michael Singer and

anyone who's willing to watch Michael

Singer stuff. The moment in front of you

is not bothering you. You are bothering

yourself about the moment in front of

you. Then I get in very very hot

temperatures and I think the same thing.

The moment in front of you is not

bothering you. You're bothering yourself

about the moment in front of you. I do

Brazilian jiujitsu because for me it was

not natural to tangle like that and I

love Brazilian jiu-jitsu so much. Ker

Rogan actually was the first person I

sort of talk about all that stuff and I

do that a couple of times a week. I do

why I need more detail of my

Well, you see why like we it's good for

I think people to touch one another in a

way that is playful and absolutely

consensual but sort of assertive. It's

like kind of I heard a YouTuber say like

dance actually and it's very good for

me. It really puts me in my body. It's

not cerebral. I don't know about you

Stephen but I suspect you're the same. I

am very uh intellectually oriented. I

live in here. I'm if I find it very easy

to be self-obsessed and to get just

caught up in all that stuff. So things

that put me in my body, the body. The

body holds the key. The body. The body.

You've got a body is important. The body

of Christ. It's very important to get in

that cold water. It's very important to

get into that yoga. Very important.

These things are important and beautiful

and connecting. So I do a lot of BJJ. I

do a lot of yoga. I do a lot of other

type of exercise, calisthenics, body

weight type stuff to try and stay fit. I

got, you know, I got young children. I

have another child coming. I have to

stay fit. I have to be able to be, God

willing, present for these children

going forward. And I love it. And it's

what we're meant to do. We're animals.

Again, this anthropological idea, how

might we have lived for those hundreds

of thousands of years that predate the

great miracle of agriculture? How might

we have lived? We work, we touch one

another, we are socializing, we groom

and we graze together. It's nice like

the kind of trust you develop with

people in Brazilian jiu-jitsu like that

they'll choke you unc to the point of

unconsciousness but then when you tap

it's over and this is something that you

share between you. It's

there's a trust in that as well, isn't

there?

Ah yes, trust. Good to embody the trust

and experience the trust. As they say,

if you want to know if you can trust

someone, trust someone. and maybe it's

difficult to seek out those kind of

opportunities where it can play out, you

know, so microcosmically and

practically.

I I did a Brazilian jiu-jitsu lesson or

two and that man could have killed me at

any moment. [laughter]

I really knew he could have killed me.

He had me like tied up like a I don't

know like a like a ball of elastic bands

and I knew at any moment he could have

killed me, but I trusted him and I

didn't know this man.

It's lovely, isn't it? There's something

amazing about it and it's an instant

bonding that this man has his life in my

hands yet he's he's teaching me an art

form. He's teaching me a discipline um

and holding my literally my life in his

hands. Um it's funny cuz I didn't know

him but I felt like he was my mentor, my

father, my immediately after.

Yeah.

Because I trusted him with so much my

life. Right. So

absolutely wonderful thing.

Touch very important for us late ape

creatures. That's why hairdressers, you

tell the hairdresser or the barber

staff, this is why like in Strictly Come

Dancing, they can't stop falling in

love. They're performing these rituals

that are designed to elicit a certain

states.

It's the vulnerability, isn't it? That's

the connection.

The vulnerability, the touch, the

awareness of sameness but differentness,

the acknowledgement that we are

creatures, that we are embodied

creatures. All of these things I think

contribute to that. So for me on my day

yes every day prayer and meditation

first thing every day rigorously ensure

that I've done things for other people

preferably without letting other people

find out that I make myself available to

other in my case in particular men that

require help with their issues around

addiction and mental health that I have

checked in with other people that I

consider to be peers around the

challenges that I face psychologically

that I don't spend all my time obsessing

just about what I want like that. I have

to do quite a lot to not be crazy. I

have to do quite a lot to not be crazy.

So, the hot, the cold, the BJJ, the

yoga. Uh there's someone I work with

once who said, "Every day I get up, I

meditate. I pray. I do exercise. I do

green juice. I do hot cold. I attend a

support group and then I feel okay.

Okay. That's what I get to feel. If I do

all that, then I don't feel like a

lunatic, a vacasillating wild glass of

mad vicissitudes that could lash around

anything in its search for connection.

Is there not another way at this point?

This also is attached to another

question I've I've often pondered from

doing what I do here, which is about how

I mean Steve Peters, who's a psych

psychiatrist, I believe, talks about

these goblins and gremlins, and I I

spoke to um Gabel Mate as well.

I know you've interviewed him and I

watched that fantastic, unbelievable

guy. But I wonder if the the traumas,

the things that are hard, I use the word

hardwired tentatively, but the things

that are hardwired into us are ever

overcomeable,

if they if we can ever take them to zero

in terms of the power they have over us

or influence we have over or we will

spend our lives managing. I was taught

from the wound comes the salve. From the

wound comes the salve. The place of the

deepest wounding will provide your

salvation. This is what you must

investigate. It is not when people love

you, we always feel it's because of the

strength or the capacity or the

virtuosity. But often it is the

vulnerability and the fragility because

we all know that this vulnerability and

fragility is something we share. This is

what comedy is to me, Steven, is the

ongoing acknowledgement. Everyone's

running some game. I'm this. I'm doing

this. I've got this going on. You're

going to die. [laughter]

It's all going to fall apart. It's all

going to fall apart except for these

permanent principles and a connection to

the eternal achievable through

consciousness. This is why I need

ceremony. This is why I need practice.

This is why I need peers and mentors and

mentees. And from the wound, from this

place of I'm not good enough. Nobody

loves me. I don't fit in. The only way

that I can achieve trust is through

having some uh authority or value. A

asredited by a culture that I don't even

bloody trust. a a as compared with a

metric that I don't even agree with.

Instead of this now, and again,

continual moment to moment, I'm not

suggesting that I am any better than

anybody else. Just that I'm not any

worse than anybody else. That's the

biggest thing that I'll offer it. It's

ongoing. It's continual. But the the

thing I'm glad of it now. I'm glad of

the wounding. And you will be too,

whoever you are. You will be glad of the

wounding, too. because it is sadly a

gift to you. That doesn't mean it was

right or that that there weren't

perpetrators or that it's not bad or

that the culture doesn't need to change

or any of those things. All those things

are definitely true. But from it you we

how all of the time you see it go great

Orman Street. Go anywhere. Watch the

Parolympics. It's everywhere. It's

everywhere. People overcome.

And I asked that because so many become

frustrated that the the wounding

they haven't been able to overcome it. M

they become frustrated by that because a

lot of the kind of I don't know maybe

spiritual doctrine maybe whatever says

you can take this pill or you can do

this exercise you can do this retreat

and then you won't be a narcissist or

you won't be a whatever right and then

they try it they they buy the course

then they still are they find themselves

reacting in those old ways and being

triggered and the mechan machinery that

you spoke of that comes up when we're

triggered is still there and they go

[ __ ]

I need to buy another course

we do need to be very self-compassionate

and I think we have to perhaps recognize

that it is not a commodity that can be

externally required but an external

coordinate can indeed ignite that which

is already there dormant and latent and

awaiting to be born precisely the

necessity for initiation we return to

here the initiation is to activate

activate that which is already there

activated surrender not passive

surrender but not passive surrender

activated surrender. I'm a vessel. I'm

here for whatever you are. I trust

myself, God. I pray to you, God, not my

limited conception of you, God, with my

tiny little mankind mind. I pray to you,

God, as you know yourself to be. And I

offer myself to you, God, 100% and

totally. Please use me. Please take away

from me everything that is not of use to

you. Put aside all my preconceptions and

use me, God. This this you utilizes the

wound. The wound becomes a portal. You

become a vessel.

I want to stay on how you live. So I

understand your your sort of morning

routine there. But if I zoom out on

where you live, why you choose to live

there, um your relationship with work

now now that you have this I think

greater clarity on institutions and how

you balance that.

Well,

like I have to make a lot of content.

Yeah. Because every day I'm on Rumble.

Every day I make an hour of content.

Every day we make an additional 10 to 15

to 20 minute video on a news subject

that generally encompasses

anti-establishment narratives and a way

of explaining that that is hopefully

inclusive.

Every day we have other social media

content. We have a business like that. I

I'm part of a significant

business endeavor that I regard as a

movement rather than a business. But as

you are all too aware, if it doesn't

function as a business, it will not

function at all. So it has to have good

hygiene and housekeeping.

You're a CEO.

I literally am here not under the

pretense of being a CEO, [laughter] but

because it is part of my job and I do

have a diary, although I don't keep it

myself and I try not to look at it, but

it exists. And so I have to participate

continually with that and ensure that an

organization is around me that is able

to facilitate the things that I'm good

at and accommodate the many things where

I am currently looking to improve.

I have to make all of the content. We

try to do this in three days. That means

a couple of days a week I'm available

for different types of expedition and

adventure such as this one.

This is why for me the spiritual like it

has to come first but not not out of a

sort of an ethical evaluation.

Spirituality in the end is a survival

technique. It's not like esoteric. It's

not like I'm doing this thing like

waving around incense or dressing up in

a robe. I'm trying to not go crazy and

end my life and damage the life of

people around me by devoting myself.

They say only the really crazy people

become saints. Only the really crazy

people would even consider it. You have

to need it. It has to be beyond wanting

because wanting is just here to keep the

blob going.

How does it feel to be in your mind?

Could you describe it to me?

Well, sometimes it's amazing, but

sometimes it's very very Sometimes it's

very very fast. Sometimes it's very

volatile. I feel like it undulates a

lot. This I understand to be very common

to addicts. Experiences of extreme high,

extreme low, fastness, not natural to be

serene, evaluating information very very

quickly. It feels fast sometimes, very

fast. And it has a strong sense of

craving and longing which is a type of

magnetism I suppose and I suppose

magnetism is a longing for unity

connection. It's very difficult to

discern physical forces because they are

by their nature non anthropological and

it's very easy to anthropomorphize

physical phenomena like gravity or

magnetism or whatever. So what it feels

like with me is that there is a great

deal to get done. That's what it feels