Speaker 1: God doesn't show, and that's why the quieting of the
Speaker 1: mind is so important. And it's also why the cacophony
Speaker 1: of the modern world is so dangerous. Welcome to the
Speaker 1: one you feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the
Speaker 1: importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes like garbage in,
Speaker 1: garbage out, or you are what you think ring true.
Speaker 1: And yet for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen
Speaker 1: or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy,
Speaker 1: or fear. We see what we don't have instead of
Speaker 1: what we do. We think things that hold us back
Speaker 1: and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking.
Speaker 1: Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort
Speaker 1: to make a life worth living. This podcast is about
Speaker 1: how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction,
Speaker 1: how they feed their good wolf. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 1: Our guest on this episode is marian Williamson, an internationally
Speaker 1: claimed author and lecturer. For the last thirty five years,
Speaker 1: Marianne has been one of America's most known public voices,
Speaker 1: having been a popular guest on television programs such as Oprah,
Speaker 1: Larry King Live, Bill Maher, and The list goes on
Speaker 1: from there. Oh, and don't let me forget that. Marianne
Speaker 1: was also a presidential candidate. Seven of her twelve published
Speaker 1: books have been New York Times bestsellers, and today her
Speaker 1: and Eric discussed her new book, A Return to Love,
Speaker 1: Reflections on the Principles of a Course in Miracles. Hi, Marianne,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. Thank you so much, glad to
Speaker 1: be here. It's such an honor to have you on.
Speaker 1: I don't think we've ever had a presidential candidate on
Speaker 1: the show before. And you have a long history of
Speaker 1: writing wonderful books or that, so it's great. And we're
Speaker 1: going to talk a little bit about your latest book,
Speaker 1: called The Politics of Love, a Handbook for a New
Speaker 1: American Revolution. But before we do that will start like
Speaker 1: we always do, with the parable. There's a grandmother who's
Speaker 1: talking with her granddaughter and she says, in life, there
Speaker 1: are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle.
Speaker 1: One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness
Speaker 1: and bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf,
Speaker 1: which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And
Speaker 1: the granddaughter stops. She thinks about it for a second.
Speaker 1: She looks up at her grandmother. She says, well, grandmother,
Speaker 1: which one wins, and the grandmother says, the one you feed.
Speaker 1: So I'd like to start off by asking you what
Speaker 1: that parable means to you in your life and in
Speaker 1: the work that you do. There are two parts of
Speaker 1: the mind. One is the spirit and one is what
Speaker 1: some called the ego. And I don't think that they battle.
Speaker 1: I think the ego battles and the spirit does not
Speaker 1: battle back. I think the spirit is who we are,
Speaker 1: and the ego screams. The ego speaks first, and the
Speaker 1: eco speaks loudest, and the spirit is fostered. Our conscious
Speaker 1: contact with spirit is fed, as the Parable says, by prayer,
Speaker 1: by meditation, by a disciplined spiritual practice, where we are
Speaker 1: seeking consciously and proactively to counter the false teachings of
Speaker 1: the world. We're taught to be afraid of each other
Speaker 1: more than we taught to love each other. We're taught
Speaker 1: to seek to get more than we're taught to give.
Speaker 1: We're taught to think of ourselves and act as that
Speaker 1: we're isolated beings rather than one with each other and
Speaker 1: with the universe. This is the teaching of a thought
Speaker 1: system that dominates the planet, and it gets fed plenty.
Speaker 1: It gets fed by almost all of the stimulus that
Speaker 1: comes at us. And a spiritual practice is where you're
Speaker 1: feeding the spirit. You're feeding the other part of the mind.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's what is going on in
Speaker 1: the world. You see it in the world, and you
Speaker 1: see it in yourself, that part of you that is
Speaker 1: not the best you. And then there's that part of
Speaker 1: you which is kind and generous and there for the
Speaker 1: right reasons and showing up for life and not making
Speaker 1: yourself be a victim. We all see those two parts
Speaker 1: in ourselves if we are willing to look in the mirror,
Speaker 1: and we all know that the part of you that
Speaker 1: you feed is the part of you that becomes the
Speaker 1: personality that lives in the world. Yeah, And it is
Speaker 1: interesting the way the ego is so loud and the
Speaker 1: spirit is so quiet. In both Christianity and Judaism, there's
Speaker 1: a phrase the small still voice for God. God doesn't shout,
Speaker 1: and that's why the quieting of the mind is so important,
Speaker 1: and it's also why the cacophony of the modern world
Speaker 1: is so dangerous. I think that it's very interesting. One
Speaker 1: of the effects of the COVID pandemic, not that you
Speaker 1: in any way would say the pandemic is good. But
Speaker 1: there are gifts in every experience, and in a way,
Speaker 1: the very fact that it has slowed us down might
Speaker 1: be ultimate lee, a gift to the society at large,
Speaker 1: because when we are so taken in by all the
Speaker 1: superficial stimulus of the world, it becomes very easy to
Speaker 1: stay shallow. It becomes easy to stay superficial. It becomes
Speaker 1: easy to be so distracted on a daily basis by
Speaker 1: things that do not ultimately matter, that nothing compels you
Speaker 1: to sit down quietly and think about things. I mean,
Speaker 1: how many times said we I know I have, I
Speaker 1: don't know anyone who hasn't made mistakes. And then later
Speaker 1: you say, what was I thinking? What was I thinking? Well,
Speaker 1: you weren't thinking. You didn't really sit down and think
Speaker 1: about it and reflect, pray, meditate, really go deep. You
Speaker 1: acted impulsively, you acted thoughtlessly, and then later you go,
Speaker 1: I can't believe it. There you go right with the parable.
Speaker 1: You didn't feed the best in you. And when you
Speaker 1: don't listen, if the lights not put on in the room,
Speaker 1: the darkness is there. But all the darkness is is
Speaker 1: the absence of the light. So I think that many
Speaker 1: people realize this and are in their own way, our
Speaker 1: own way, seeking through spiritual practice, meditation, yoga, whatever it is,
Speaker 1: to find that deeper quiet within ourselves, in the absence
Speaker 1: of which we have no impulse control. We do stupid things,
Speaker 1: We undermine situations with self sabotage, and ultimately we participate
Speaker 1: in the world that obviously has gone here wire. You've
Speaker 1: been writing about spiritual ideas for a long time, and
Speaker 1: you've gotten much busier. Maybe maybe I'm making an assumption
Speaker 1: you've gotten busier in recent years, but running for president
Speaker 1: must keep you very busy, really forces you into the
Speaker 1: public eye. How is your spiritual practice changed over the
Speaker 1: last several years as you've moved into a more public role,
Speaker 1: and what is your current spiritual practice look like today. Well,
Speaker 1: I've been in a public role within a particular counterculture
Speaker 1: for many years, so form changes, but content doesn't. But
Speaker 1: I have lived enough, and I think this has less
Speaker 1: to do with public versus private and more to do
Speaker 1: with just the accumulation of life experience. I have lived
Speaker 1: enough to know how much harm I can do myself
Speaker 1: when I'm not aligned with my better self. I mean,
Speaker 1: look at what's happening in the culture today. Look at
Speaker 1: what's happening, for instance, with Biden's domination of Nero Tandon.
Speaker 1: She's been brought down by tweets. Look at how many
Speaker 1: people are being brought down these days because of something
Speaker 1: that emailed, something they said, something they tweeted. We're not aligned.
Speaker 1: We're paying the price for moments when we simply were
Speaker 1: not our best. And so I think what has occurred
Speaker 1: in my life is that there have been enough experiences
Speaker 1: where I see, you know, I I've lived long enough
Speaker 1: that I really get that. As many times as my
Speaker 1: life experience has been like being thrown against the rocks
Speaker 1: over and over and over again, I came to realize
Speaker 1: that more often than not, I was the wind, that
Speaker 1: no one had ever hurt me as much as I'd
Speaker 1: hurt myself. Once you see that, your motivation to pray
Speaker 1: and meditate in the morning becomes very strong. Once you
Speaker 1: really know how powerful thought is, you become very motivated
Speaker 1: to align yours to the best of your ability with
Speaker 1: the Angel of your better and nature every morning, because
Speaker 1: you know, and sometimes those moments that tempt us into
Speaker 1: things that could be problems and mistakes that we will
Speaker 1: be regretting for years come out of left field sometimes.
Speaker 1: So my practice is serious for that reason as much
Speaker 1: as anything else. Life is serious. I think one of
Speaker 1: the things that is a common mistake that we make
Speaker 1: when we're younger is we don't take ourselves serious. Now,
Speaker 1: we don't take life seriously enough. And as you get older,
Speaker 1: you get this is a very serious thing going on here.
Speaker 1: Human life is a very serious thing. Relationships a very
Speaker 1: serious thing. Child it is a very serious thing. Marriage
Speaker 1: is a very serious thing. Intimacy is a very serious thing.
Speaker 1: Politics is a very serious thing. Ethics is a very
Speaker 1: serious thing. The more you know that life is serious,
Speaker 1: the more inspired and motivated you are to take your
Speaker 1: spiritual practice very seriously, because it is that which determines
Speaker 1: how you participate in the world one way or the other.
Speaker 1: Right right, It really is a foundation that that everything
Speaker 1: moves from. You say in your latest book that a
Speaker 1: belief in separation is always at the root of a problem,
Speaker 1: and a realization of our oneness is always at the
Speaker 1: root of its solution. Say more about that. If I
Speaker 1: realize that obviously on the level of the body were separate,
Speaker 1: you know you're in Atlanta, I'm in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: Even if you were standing in front of me, you're
Speaker 1: in your body and I'm in mind. But on the
Speaker 1: level of spirit, there's really no place where I stop
Speaker 1: and you start. It's like we live in two parallel universes.
Speaker 1: So my eco mind says that what I give to
Speaker 1: you is no longer mine, and that what I withhold
Speaker 1: from you is nothing I have to worry about. But
Speaker 1: on the level of spirit, well, don't you understand how
Speaker 1: the law of cause and effect operates? You know that
Speaker 1: what I give to you, as the course of miracle
Speaker 1: says an idea doesn't leave its source. The course of
Speaker 1: miracle says that if I have an attack thought or
Speaker 1: judgmental thought towards you, that I should imagine a sword
Speaker 1: falling down on your head. But actually it's falling online.
Speaker 1: So let's take this moment. I can either be thinking,
Speaker 1: I don't know what this is some podcasts that have
Speaker 1: to do, but I really have more important things to do,
Speaker 1: and I don't know what I could be thinking but
Speaker 1: not really deeply showing up for this experience, keeping myself
Speaker 1: separate from it. That is the source of my life
Speaker 1: not working. I won't realize it. But any time I
Speaker 1: show up separating myself from what could be my sincere
Speaker 1: desire to be there in generosity, in giving and love,
Speaker 1: and whatever I can do that's best is a gift
Speaker 1: to myself. When I realized that you're good and my
Speaker 1: good in this moment are the same versus seeing my
Speaker 1: interests is separate from yours. And this is what's happening
Speaker 1: in every single encounter, in every single situation. Either I'm
Speaker 1: separating myself from the good of the encounter and the
Speaker 1: good of the situation and thinking it's all about me,
Speaker 1: or I am seeing myself as one and doing what
Speaker 1: I can to participate in the betterment of everyone concerned.
Speaker 1: And you go on from there to say that this
Speaker 1: is really the root of our political challenges? Is this
Speaker 1: belief in separation? Well, the Course of Miracle says that
Speaker 1: this is the original quote unquote sin. The sin isn't said.
Speaker 1: The word is an archery tournament means we missed the
Speaker 1: mark the original moment that the course of miracles has
Speaker 1: ocurved millions of years ago in time as we know it,
Speaker 1: when we began to think of ourselves as separate from
Speaker 1: God or separate from love, and all that's happening in
Speaker 1: the world is that we are reenacting in our individual
Speaker 1: lives as well as in our collective experience, this original
Speaker 1: mistake of separating ourselves from others. I mean, even what
Speaker 1: you see politically right now, when you think of the
Speaker 1: millions of Americans right now, even before the pandemic, of
Speaker 1: all Americans could not handle a four hundred dollar unexpected expenditure.
Speaker 1: That was, even before the pandemic, forty percent of Americans
Speaker 1: could not absorb a four hundred unexpected expenditure. Where do
Speaker 1: you think those people are now? We already had, even
Speaker 1: before the pandemic, forty three million hungry Americans. Something is
Speaker 1: very wrong that we are not recognizing this and treating
Speaker 1: this with a level of urgency that would just played
Speaker 1: deep humanity and deep empathy and deep appreciation for the
Speaker 1: suffering of other people. Something is so almost sociopathic about
Speaker 1: the basic cultural, political, and economic tenure of our times.
Speaker 1: Do you think that there were times that that was different? Yes,
Speaker 1: I did, I actually do. When you read about the
Speaker 1: Great Depression, I mean one thing that was nobody disagreed about.
Speaker 1: You look, when you know Franklin, Thosevelt became president. One
Speaker 1: thing there was no question about was the level of deep, deep, deep,
Speaker 1: deep crisis, and that something had to be done. Now
Speaker 1: there are people we're not we're not facing it. People
Speaker 1: don't want to talk about it. But there are people
Speaker 1: today who and millions of people whose economic conditions today
Speaker 1: are as desperate as people were experiencing during the Great Depression.
Speaker 1: But somehow we have a read we're we're subconsciously conspiring
Speaker 1: to separate ourselves from a deep recognition that this is so,
Speaker 1: because if if we did, there would be far more
Speaker 1: of a political impulse do something. Now we're having conversations
Speaker 1: that are stuck on a level that is so disregarding
Speaker 1: of the level of dis chronic despair being faced by
Speaker 1: so many millions of people right now. And I fear
Speaker 1: from my country because we will be paying for this
Speaker 1: for many, many years. You say that any person, economic system,
Speaker 1: or political establishment that fails to concern itself with the
Speaker 1: pain of others is out of alignment with spiritual truth.
Speaker 1: And where there is a lack of spiritual alignment, chaos
Speaker 1: is inevitable. And I wrote that before the pandemic. That
Speaker 1: was true even before the pandemic, and the same economic
Speaker 1: and political system I was describing there is now responding
Speaker 1: to the pandemic in the same way it responded to
Speaker 1: the situation before. This is bad. This is bad. What
Speaker 1: is a path forward here? Because you talk about how
Speaker 1: important it is that we learned to listen to each
Speaker 1: other more than our ability to yell at each other.
Speaker 1: You say that hate anywhere is a toxin everywhere, and
Speaker 1: if we demonize each other personally, then we're wrong, even
Speaker 1: if we're right. You also say we all have our
Speaker 1: fingers pointing at someone today, you know, but in a
Speaker 1: spiritual sense, the pointed finger is the problem, which I
Speaker 1: deeply believe. And boy, is it hard not to get
Speaker 1: really frustrated with people who see the world differently, and
Speaker 1: in some cases it seems very callous and cold. You
Speaker 1: mentioned in the book that you wrestle with us a
Speaker 1: little bit, but I'd like to know a little bit
Speaker 1: more about how you make that actually happen, because I
Speaker 1: think there's a lot of really good people in the
Speaker 1: world to who say, I don't want to be hateful,
Speaker 1: I don't want to be angry, I don't want to
Speaker 1: demonize other people. But boy, I'm having a hard time.
Speaker 1: President Eisenhower, who was a Republican president, of course, said
Speaker 1: that the American mind at its best is both liberal
Speaker 1: and conservative. There are high minded liberal principles, and there
Speaker 1: are high minded conservative principles, and at our best we're
Speaker 1: kind of yen and young. Now, what started happening about
Speaker 1: the nineties there was originally show called Crossfire. The media
Speaker 1: began to realize in the United States that there was
Speaker 1: more money to be made by making it like the
Speaker 1: conservatives were fighting the liberals. A whole generation got raised
Speaker 1: thinking that's what politics was. There was not as high
Speaker 1: ratings for a deeper, more considered conversation where you could
Speaker 1: really see the respectful dialogue between the two and then
Speaker 1: you connect that. Then another parallel phenomenon at the same
Speaker 1: time was a diminishment of resources in our public education
Speaker 1: system teaching American children. You have eleven states that don't
Speaker 1: even require half a year of American history, civic or government. Now,
Speaker 1: the first principle of one of the first principles is
Speaker 1: out of many one. In a democracy, not everyone agrees.
Speaker 1: We don't have to agree. Nobody has a monopoly on truth.
Speaker 1: Part of what makes democracy gloriously messy is that everybody everybody,
Speaker 1: I got my view, you got your view, but out
Speaker 1: of many one means but we're united in our filthy
Speaker 1: to these common principles. We have kids growing up today,
Speaker 1: they don't even know what the common principles are. Then,
Speaker 1: in addition to that, compounding all of those, you had
Speaker 1: Roger Ailes and Fox News that decided, wow, we can
Speaker 1: have a real money maker just making a whole news
Speaker 1: department strictly far right. And then the left of the
Speaker 1: same thing. MSNBC is really the same thing, not that
Speaker 1: I really see it as left, if not left, but
Speaker 1: it is a particular view right. So what happened to
Speaker 1: Walter Cronkie, what happened to the days when we could
Speaker 1: really look to the media. So what has happened is
Speaker 1: that there's no center that holds and so now it's
Speaker 1: the shadow side of this part of the political spectrum
Speaker 1: and the shadow side of that part of the political spectrum.
Speaker 1: Now in the midst of all this, and largely because
Speaker 1: we were not cleaving to the larger yen and young
Speaker 1: of American high minded principles on both left and right,
Speaker 1: a terrible, terrible disregard based on neoliberalism in general that
Speaker 1: had its both Democratic and Republican roots. Unfortunately started with
Speaker 1: the Republicans, but the democratic presidents didn't stop. It was
Speaker 1: a massive transfer of wealth into the hands of one
Speaker 1: percent of our people. And we should see large groups
Speaker 1: of desperate people as a national security risk. Anytime you
Speaker 1: have desperate people, what happens large groups of desperate people,
Speaker 1: it's a petri dish out of which arises all manner
Speaker 1: of societal dysfunction, including vulnerability to authoritarian leaders. So now
Speaker 1: you have, in the midst of everything I just said
Speaker 1: in strides, a neo fascist would be dictator. So now
Speaker 1: here you've got the liberals and the conservatives fighting each other,
Speaker 1: when what we really should be concerned about is neither one.
Speaker 1: A high minded conservative is not the enemy of the
Speaker 1: high monded liberal, and the high mounded liberal is not
Speaker 1: the enemy of the high minded conservative. But we have
Speaker 1: some neo fascist elements that are enemies of democracy and
Speaker 1: our enemies of both. So now we are in a
Speaker 1: place where all of us, I think, need to step back.
Speaker 1: We have to remember on a personal level what your
Speaker 1: parable says as who have I become. There's this viciencist
Speaker 1: on the right, But let me tell you that the
Speaker 1: viciousists on the left as well. There certainly we all
Speaker 1: have to stop and remember, you know, in the philosophy
Speaker 1: of non violence, Gandhi says, the end is inherent in
Speaker 1: the means we we ourselves have to become purified of
Speaker 1: the kind of self righteousness and arrogance and mean spiritedness.
Speaker 1: I do believe there's a yearning for this. I do
Speaker 1: believe there's an aspiration for it. I think the very
Speaker 1: fact that you and I are talking about it, these
Speaker 1: conversations like you and I are having, people are having
Speaker 1: them everywhere. People know this has just got to stop.
Speaker 1: So I think people are reaching for a greater ability
Speaker 1: to speak with honor and without disrespect, even with those
Speaker 1: with whom we disagree, And we must claim that space
Speaker 1: or we will not be able to solve our problems.
Speaker 1: What worries me more than any of the short term
Speaker 1: political things that we see is the overall tenor the
Speaker 1: overall way. And it's tough. It's like I see a
Speaker 1: pandemic happening, and I go out somewhere and I see
Speaker 1: somebody not wearing a mask, and I just get really angry.
Speaker 1: Then I'm like, well, all right, let me try and
Speaker 1: put myself in this person's understand you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: just really challenging. I don't think that you have to
Speaker 1: try to put yourself in their head. You can just
Speaker 1: bless them and move on and work hard at organizing.
Speaker 1: You know, they're going to be midterms in two you know,
Speaker 1: I know a lot of people who are so upset
Speaker 1: about the direction that the government has taken over the
Speaker 1: forty years. But who they themselves did not participate in
Speaker 1: the political process. You know, they themselves were very distracted,
Speaker 1: They were not voting. Democracy is not that way. There's
Speaker 1: an old French saying, you don't do politics, and politics
Speaker 1: will do you. So I think that one of the
Speaker 1: things that Trump president and see has demonstrated to everybody,
Speaker 1: millions of people, is that we really do care about democracy.
Speaker 1: We just took it for granted. But once we saw
Speaker 1: it really under assault, we want whoa whoa. You know,
Speaker 1: Churchill said, you can always depend on Americans to do
Speaker 1: the right thing after they have exhausted every other option.
Speaker 1: So often it takes us relate to get it. But
Speaker 1: once we do get it, we slim it like nobody's business.
Speaker 1: That is a historical pattern, and I think that what
Speaker 1: people need now is to realize that citizenship must now
Speaker 1: become a facet of what we consider a meaningful and
Speaker 1: well lived life. You have to start reading your local newspaper.
Speaker 1: You have to know what's going on in your own town,
Speaker 1: in your own city, in your own state. You have
Speaker 1: to be involved in local elections. You have to be
Speaker 1: involved in state elections. You have to be involved in
Speaker 1: federal elections. You have to know that. Every time one
Speaker 1: election ends, just take a nap and then get ready.
Speaker 1: Because the midterms are coming up next and there are
Speaker 1: no short term answers, we probably have a twenty year
Speaker 1: period of course correction ahead of us. Like you said,
Speaker 1: if not just short term, this issue where that right
Speaker 1: now we're just playing walk them all, fix this, fix that.
Speaker 1: It's got to go deeper. But like I said, you
Speaker 1: and I are having a conversation. I think millions of
Speaker 1: people are. Once you start asking the deeper questions, the
Speaker 1: deeper answers will come. The problem goes back to what
Speaker 1: you and I were talking about. We were such a
Speaker 1: superficial culture. We weren't even asking the deeper questions. Now
Speaker 1: we are, And even though it's painful, I think that
Speaker 1: I'm putting my money on the American people. If you
Speaker 1: look at our history, we have been through terrible crises before.
Speaker 1: There have been terrible transgressions against the principles on which
Speaker 1: we purport to stand before. But ultimately, ultimately, our historical
Speaker 1: pattern is that we self correct, and I believe that
Speaker 1: we're going to this time. Yeah. One of the things
Speaker 1: I love about the book is you point us back
Speaker 1: again and again to the work within us that we've
Speaker 1: got to do in order to engage outwardly. Listeners of
Speaker 1: the show, like he talks about the middle Way again,
Speaker 1: I'm going to scream, but I'm a big fan of
Speaker 1: the middle way, and I think there's a middle way
Speaker 1: between action and contemplation that we have to be able
Speaker 1: to find, between an inner spiritual life and an outer
Speaker 1: commitment to the world. And I know you're a fierce
Speaker 1: advocate for that, and I love that in the book
Speaker 1: you're really simultaneously pulling people in both those directions. You're
Speaker 1: sort of saying, hey, make sure you're going within. You've
Speaker 1: gotta be working within, but hey, by the way, don't
Speaker 1: get stuck there. We also need you coming outwards, right,
Speaker 1: We need both those movements. Yeah, it's not either or
Speaker 1: it's both. Am. There are a lot of hours in
Speaker 1: the day. There are a lot of hours in the day.
Speaker 1: You meditate in the morning, and that's going to make
Speaker 1: a tremendous difference, and your behavior will reflect the centeredness
Speaker 1: and the power and the empowerment that that level of
Speaker 1: stillness will give you in the wall. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people might take exception with that idea
Speaker 1: that there's a lot of hours in the day. I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people feel very time crunched, work, kids,
Speaker 1: They feel like it's hard to find ways to get
Speaker 1: involved in a consistent and meaningful way. What what sort
Speaker 1: of things do you think that the average maybe to
Speaker 1: say the average person, I don't really love that word,
Speaker 1: but I'll use it. The average person who works, you know,
Speaker 1: forty fifty hours a week, they've got a family, and
Speaker 1: yet they go, I want to be more involved, I
Speaker 1: want to do more than vote, and yet I am
Speaker 1: somewhat limited in my time. And I see this happen
Speaker 1: a lot. A crisis comes up, Black Lives Matter happens,
Speaker 1: and people get temporarily sort of fired up and involved.
Speaker 1: Or an election like the one we just had, people
Speaker 1: get temporarily fired up and involved and then sort of
Speaker 1: fades back down. And I think what you're really pointing
Speaker 1: to is that this needs to be sort of a consistency.
Speaker 1: We need to remain involved in politics. Again, whatever our
Speaker 1: political leanings, we need to remain involved. But how do
Speaker 1: we do it in a way that feels manageable and consistent.
Speaker 1: First of all, we need to recognize that the system
Speaker 1: is designed to leave you with no bandwidth. The citizenship.
Speaker 1: So in the nineties seventies, the average American worker had
Speaker 1: a decent job, good benefits, could own a home, owned
Speaker 1: the car, one parent could afford to stay home with
Speaker 1: the kids, and they could afford a vacation. And that
Speaker 1: that family could afford to send their kids to college.
Speaker 1: That was the story of the average working American. Now
Speaker 1: that person that I just described had more time to
Speaker 1: go to the PTA meeting. That person I had more
Speaker 1: bandwidth to read kids a story before they went to
Speaker 1: bed at night. That person you just said forty to
Speaker 1: fifty hours. They're not supposed to have to work work
Speaker 1: fifty hours. Excuse me, we now have an economy were
Speaker 1: not only does daddy work fifty Mommy and daddy have
Speaker 1: to work fifty hours, and mommy and daddy are busy
Speaker 1: on weekends because they have to so of course people
Speaker 1: don't have the band work. The last thing they're able
Speaker 1: to do is go to the city council meeting on
Speaker 1: Thursday night. But even there, we have to recognize that's
Speaker 1: why the reading of the system is so dangerous, why
Speaker 1: it absolutely must be repudiated. When a crisis happens in
Speaker 1: anybody's life, it's not convenient, and a crisis like what's
Speaker 1: happening in our country is not convenient. But we're going
Speaker 1: to have to dig deep and recognize that this is
Speaker 1: so dire that if we do not find in ourselves
Speaker 1: the wherewithal to rise up, that the situation will not change.
Speaker 1: But we will never get back to an America where,
Speaker 1: while I'm not whitewashing or romanticizing the past, the average
Speaker 1: person did have much more of a shot of making
Speaker 1: it into the system and making it into the economy
Speaker 1: and winning there than the average American does today. And
Speaker 1: I think that there are people and you and I
Speaker 1: both recognized that just out for whom it's almost a
Speaker 1: joke to think that, on top of everything else, they're
Speaker 1: going to have time to go to the city council meeting.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, there are a lot of people
Speaker 1: listening right now who, if they're honest with themselves, have
Speaker 1: absolutely enough time. It's a zoom call, and they could
Speaker 1: if they wanted to. So I think if each of us,
Speaker 1: each of us do what we can, there are enough
Speaker 1: Americans who can who, if we will, will take responsibility
Speaker 1: for doing some. And I agree with what you said.
Speaker 1: I think that's one of the problems is the way
Speaker 1: the system is designed at this point is that it's
Speaker 1: really hard for the average person that's right to get
Speaker 1: real involved. And so this isn't an either or. But
Speaker 1: you've mentioned several times local city council meeting, reading the
Speaker 1: local paper. Do you believe that's the starting point for people,
Speaker 1: is a more local engagement where they are closer to things,
Speaker 1: so to speak. I don't think it's a starting point,
Speaker 1: but I think it is more and more obvious that
Speaker 1: no matter what we change on the level of federal policy,
Speaker 1: for instance, so much of the corruption that we have
Speaker 1: to worry about is closer to home. The voter suppression efforts,
Speaker 1: for instance, are being made on the state level. I
Speaker 1: saw today West Virginia past the bill making work stoppage
Speaker 1: and striking illegal. Well, how long this is America. So
Speaker 1: it's the people of West Virginia, I think with West
Speaker 1: Virginia who are going to have to deal with that.
Speaker 1: You know, Alexander Hamilton said, states are the laboratories of reform.
Speaker 1: So some of the best of what America is capable of,
Speaker 1: and some of the worst of America is capable of,
Speaker 1: starts on a state level. So I wouldn't say at
Speaker 1: the starting point, because the starting point should be whatever
Speaker 1: compels someone's attention. But I do think we should all
Speaker 1: remember that there's a lot more going on to cultural, political,
Speaker 1: and economic change than just what happens at the federal level. Right,
Speaker 1: our voice is louder at a city level and it
Speaker 1: is at a federal level. Right. That is such a
Speaker 1: good point. It seems easier to have impact. You know,
Speaker 1: if you're like really concerned about violence against black people, right,
Speaker 1: your city is the place where that reform starts. You
Speaker 1: saw the movie Aaron Brockovitch. Okay, So I don't know
Speaker 1: if you've had her as a guest on your part.
Speaker 1: I haven't. I saw you did recently, which we have
Speaker 1: not mentioned. You have a new podcast where you're having
Speaker 1: wonderful conversations with people. Thank you well. I I highly
Speaker 1: recommend that you consider Aeron Brokovitch for your podcast as well,
Speaker 1: because she talks about how change starts when one person,
Speaker 1: and she's talking specifically about the issue of water. Now
Speaker 1: we all saw Aaron Brockovitch. We know about the chromium
Speaker 1: six content, the multibillion dollar settlement. Well, the good news
Speaker 1: was the p g n A paid that huge settlement
Speaker 1: in Hinckley, California, all those years ago. The bad news
Speaker 1: is that throughout the country the promium six problem is
Speaker 1: even worse than it was in Hinckley. And I mean,
Speaker 1: the chemicals in our water are enough to frighten anyone
Speaker 1: who looks deeply into it. Today I was reading about
Speaker 1: the indicant disruptors and the children being born with deformed genitalia, etcetera,
Speaker 1: and how the chemicals are companies are fighting against any
Speaker 1: kind of regulation of the indecant. This is horrifying. But
Speaker 1: what this book, what Erin Brockovitch's latest book is about
Speaker 1: is you know, I called the podcast Finding Your Aeron Brockovitch.
Speaker 1: She said, it's just one person who shows up at
Speaker 1: a city council meeting. She talks about how a lot
Speaker 1: of times you'd be surprised your city council members don't
Speaker 1: know these issues until someone goes in and tells them.
Speaker 1: She said, she tells one story of a I can't
Speaker 1: remember where it was. It was a city council meeting
Speaker 1: where they said, well, do you have witnesses? You have
Speaker 1: other people who support you in this position, and she said, oh, yes, sir,
Speaker 1: we do open the doors. That were two thousand people.
Speaker 1: They stayed there until two or three in the morning,
Speaker 1: and the city council made changes and laws and and
Speaker 1: read elation that had to be past the very next morning.
Speaker 1: Those members honestly did not know, and it was all
Speaker 1: those people showing up that made the difference. I think
Speaker 1: we too often forget the job that we have as citizens.
Speaker 1: Your elected representatives work for you, and you know, when
Speaker 1: you look at it on the federal level, how can
Speaker 1: it be enough for them to hear from you every
Speaker 1: two years or every four years when they hear from
Speaker 1: multinational corporate lobbyists all day every day. So we have
Speaker 1: to take responsibility for our part. And I agree with you,
Speaker 1: a lot of people just can't even imagine having the bandwidth.
Speaker 1: For those of us who do, it's our responsibility to
Speaker 1: make it happen. There's been such a move forward with
Speaker 1: technology making it so easy these days to like make
Speaker 1: a very quick call to a representative, to send off
Speaker 1: a very quick letter. Like these things have really made
Speaker 1: it possible to engage in those ways with less time. Certainly,
Speaker 1: every innovation has its ups and downs, but I've certainly
Speaker 1: found that to be a really useful one. Like, you know,
Speaker 1: I get a text and it's like, do you want
Speaker 1: to talk to your representative? Hit yes, And the next
Speaker 1: thing I know, it's the phone's ringing me, and you
Speaker 1: know it's connecting me right to the representative's office. And
Speaker 1: I think your point is very well taken. The constituent
Speaker 1: call as opposed to just signing a petition, those constituent
Speaker 1: calls really matter. The organization that sent you the text.
Speaker 1: Another thing to realize is that the charitable donations or
Speaker 1: the political contributions to the organization that sent you that text,
Speaker 1: that's what that money goes for. That kind of texting
Speaker 1: program costs money. Absolutely. Another thing that you say in
Speaker 1: the book is you say hate has shouted well too often,
Speaker 1: love has only whispered. I guess this gets back a
Speaker 1: little bit too when we started, when we said the
Speaker 1: egos really loud and the spirit is quiet. But you
Speaker 1: say we need to display as much conviction behind our
Speaker 1: love as some people have displayed behind their hate. Well,
Speaker 1: conviction is a force multiplier. I think there are a
Speaker 1: lot more loving people, decent people, people who want the
Speaker 1: best for our democracy and for other people in this
Speaker 1: country and in this world. Then there are haters. But
Speaker 1: if you have ten haters acting with deep conviction, and
Speaker 1: then you have a hundred of people who are loving
Speaker 1: and decent. But I don't know, I don't you know.
Speaker 1: I can show up on Thursday, but I can't show
Speaker 1: up any other day. Then the force of the energy
Speaker 1: coming from the convicted ten people will carry more weight,
Speaker 1: you know. I can't imagine a kind of sort of
Speaker 1: sometimes when it's convenient, committed terrorists. But there are a
Speaker 1: lot of people who are sort of you know, when
Speaker 1: it's convenient, committed to justice and to mercy, into compassion
Speaker 1: and to democracy. And I think that this point is
Speaker 1: understood by a lot of people today. I do believe
Speaker 1: there's an awakening. This country did reject policies that were
Speaker 1: so literally assaultive of the basic tenants of democracy. We
Speaker 1: didn't go over the cliff, but we're still only enters
Speaker 1: away from it, and people know that too. But I
Speaker 1: do believe we have been chastened as a country by
Speaker 1: what we just went through. I think we've been humbled.
Speaker 1: I mean, whether you look at nine eleven, or you
Speaker 1: look at the pandemic, or you look at the Mueller Report,
Speaker 1: or you look at what happened on January six, the
Speaker 1: American people are awakened to the fact that so many
Speaker 1: of the ways that we thought, oh, if it gets
Speaker 1: too bad, there are people who will handle that. No,
Speaker 1: there aren't, actually, and we are far more vulnerable than
Speaker 1: we knew. The fact that nobody knows exactly what to
Speaker 1: do about it doesn't mean we're not thinking. Doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that people aren't reflecting. You know, in the book one
Speaker 1: of my favorite books that you probably like to basically
Speaker 1: based on the fact that you love that parable is
Speaker 1: let Us to a Young Poet by Roca, where he says,
Speaker 1: when you don't know the answer, lives the question. And
Speaker 1: like I said before, you don't have deep answers, do
Speaker 1: you start asking some deep questions? So the fact that
Speaker 1: we've been humbled, and we've been Chasen's and we've been disillusioned.
Speaker 1: I mean, what is disillusion then, except getting rid of
Speaker 1: things that only allusions to begin with. We have to
Speaker 1: dig very deep, and all of us have to show
Speaker 1: up personally in ways that are more powerful and empowered
Speaker 1: and decent and dignified than we have ever in our lives.
Speaker 1: But as you know from from reading Politics of Love,
Speaker 1: if you look in the history, we are the errors
Speaker 1: of legacies of greatness. Yes, this country had slavery, but
Speaker 1: we had the abolitionist movement. Yes we had the institutional
Speaker 1: suppression of women, but we also had the women's self
Speaker 1: jet movement and the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. Yes
Speaker 1: we have segregation, but we also have the Civil rights
Speaker 1: movement and the passage of the Civil Rights Act. So,
Speaker 1: as I see it, it's our turn. It's the newest
Speaker 1: generation of that separation that you were talking about. That's
Speaker 1: really a spiritual disconnection from self and our challenge and
Speaker 1: our invitation is to rise to this challenge. Now. I
Speaker 1: also think part of the danger is that there's a
Speaker 1: lot of very naive arrogance on the part of many people.
Speaker 1: Once again perhaps ignoring the history or willing to distract
Speaker 1: themselves from its lessons. Great civilizations have fallen before the
Speaker 1: There is no guarantee that this thing will last. It's
Speaker 1: up to us. And when you really take that in
Speaker 1: and you realize that it's each and every one of
Speaker 1: us asking the God of our own understanding, how can
Speaker 1: I best show up? It takes you to some really
Speaker 1: deep places. You know, people say it's really sad when
Speaker 1: a child doesn't get to have their childhood. I think
Speaker 1: it's also very sad when people never get around having
Speaker 1: an adulthood. We've had a crisis of adulthood in this country.
Speaker 1: We've had way too many women acting like girls and
Speaker 1: way too many men acting like boys. And there's been
Speaker 1: a lot of talk about you know, this wasn't like
Speaker 1: the World War two generation that had this coming of
Speaker 1: age experience where we have ours now. And I think
Speaker 1: that at the deepest level, that's what we are in
Speaker 1: for certainly my generation. You know, I'm older than you.
Speaker 1: We party, but you know, even for the best party,
Speaker 1: there comes a time and you know it's party is over.
Speaker 1: Even if you stay or nights, it's time for the morning.
Speaker 1: It's time for the next session, America is parted. Now.
Speaker 1: I feel for these no ones. We never got the party.
Speaker 1: But then, on the other hand, neither did my mother's
Speaker 1: generation when World War two happened. So I think that
Speaker 1: it's about how seriously we take this moment. And if
Speaker 1: we take this moment seriously enough and take personal responsibility
Speaker 1: for it seriously enough, we're going to be fine. What
Speaker 1: do you think is the best way to start to
Speaker 1: heal the polarization? Because I agree with you. I think
Speaker 1: that I've always had an opinion that the vast majority
Speaker 1: of people are decent and good. Yeah, I agree, but
Speaker 1: but if we do look at the divide, it's pretty strong,
Speaker 1: and it feels like we're having trouble talking across it.
Speaker 1: Where does the average person, again back to don't love
Speaker 1: that term, but start to find ways two actually heal
Speaker 1: the polarization. I think some of it we we talked
Speaker 1: a little bit about it's about stopping pointing fingers, it's
Speaker 1: stopping being hateful, it's turning down our rhetoric. What are
Speaker 1: other active steps that we can do to you find
Speaker 1: common ground? You know, several years ago somebody came out
Speaker 1: with that underwater photograph of the iceberg, and we've always
Speaker 1: heard the phrase tip of the iceberg, but when this
Speaker 1: photograph came out, we really did get to see it's
Speaker 1: what's above the water line. It's just the tip of things.
Speaker 1: It's all underneath. So when we think about healing the divide,
Speaker 1: it can't all be done on the level of surface.
Speaker 1: It can't all be done on the level of how
Speaker 1: we talk to each other. It can't all be done
Speaker 1: on the level of the personality. Yes, we can take
Speaker 1: responsibility for not being hateful online. We can take responsibility
Speaker 1: for being more respectful even when we disagree with people online,
Speaker 1: and there are enough people there are involved in the
Speaker 1: kind of dialogue, situations and circumstances. There are people trying
Speaker 1: to do this. But I think at the deepest level
Speaker 1: it starts with our own backyards, not where we're necessarily
Speaker 1: trying to heal a divide, but just when we're showing
Speaker 1: up more fully for our own lives and the people
Speaker 1: in our own lives. I think that it's, of course,
Speaker 1: the miracle says, each of us has a highly individualized curriculum.
Speaker 1: If any of us take a good look at ourselves
Speaker 1: and say, where could I be doing more? Who in
Speaker 1: my family needs me more. Who needs me to show
Speaker 1: up for them more? It could be my spouse, could be,
Speaker 1: my friends, could be, my children, could be my parents.
Speaker 1: Just right around you. I mean, sometimes those of us
Speaker 1: who are so concerned with what's going on out in
Speaker 1: the world are attempted. I know. I have to avoid
Speaker 1: all the gaping holes where someone closest to me would say, well,
Speaker 1: it's nice she's out there saving the world, but I'm
Speaker 1: dying here. What about my tears? Why am I less
Speaker 1: important than a stranger. I've had that experience, and I
Speaker 1: think that that deep level every time you show up
Speaker 1: with more love, I think that where there is love,
Speaker 1: there cannot be feared, just like where there's light, there
Speaker 1: cannot be darkness. Anything we do to contribute more love
Speaker 1: into the universe starts healing the divide on a deeper
Speaker 1: level than we can register with our rational minds. That's
Speaker 1: I think a beautiful place for us to wrap up.
Speaker 1: I love that because it brings it right back to
Speaker 1: right where we are. What we can do and what
Speaker 1: you just said is in the realm of everyone. Everyone
Speaker 1: can act on that now. So thank you so much.
Speaker 1: It's been such a pleasure to talk to you. I
Speaker 1: appreciate you taking the time to come on and I
Speaker 1: enjoyed it. Thank you well, thank you. I enjoyed it
Speaker 1: as well, and I appreciate it and good luck with
Speaker 1: these conversations are meaningful. Thank you for letting me be
Speaker 1: part of it. Thank you. If what you just heard
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