WEBVTT - Baratunde Thurston (Part 1) 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:02.160 When Black Panther came out, I was like, I should 0:00:02.160 --> 0:00:03.800 have been in this. I'm not even like an actor. 0:00:03.840 --> 0:00:06.680 I'm like, I'm black. I should have been in this. 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:10.680 It's like my reparations request. I have met Ryan Coogler 0:00:10.800 --> 0:00:13.280 a few times in different ways. I let it be known. 0:00:13.280 --> 0:00:15.800 It's like I'll do anything for Black Panther too, like 0:00:15.800 --> 0:00:18.840 wakandans a janitor just like in the background, like a 0:00:18.880 --> 0:00:22.000 squeaky wheel in the background. It's just more about being 0:00:22.000 --> 0:00:25.079 a part of the universe, you know, this idea that 0:00:25.360 --> 0:00:27.280 you know, I'm feeling you're going to have to run 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:31.280 with this of curated reparation. I feel like this is 0:00:31.320 --> 0:00:33.559 some interesting I'd like to get the tea way and 0:00:33.800 --> 0:00:37.280 Jeremy Harris have to say about the Geese reparation. I 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:39.120 want to be a Black Panther movie. Yeah, like I 0:00:39.159 --> 0:00:43.320 want massages on a weekly basis to work out the 0:00:43.360 --> 0:00:45.760 knots of races. Did that reside within my body? So 0:00:45.840 --> 0:00:49.080 it's very related, you know. And it's like a job creator. 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:51.640 You know, that's like a real that's a skill, and 0:00:51.680 --> 0:00:56.640 I'm rewarding that skill with tax per Hello, I'm mini driver, 0:00:57.160 --> 0:01:01.160 I'm welcome to many questions. I've always loved to prous questionnaire. 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:04.360 It was originally an eighteenth century parlor game meant to 0:01:04.400 --> 0:01:08.160 reveal an individual's true nature. But with so many questions, 0:01:08.560 --> 0:01:11.560 there wasn't really an opportunity to expand on anything. So 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:14.679 I took the format of Pruce's questionnaire and adapted what 0:01:14.760 --> 0:01:17.319 I think are seven of the most important questions you 0:01:17.360 --> 0:01:21.319 could ever ask someone. They are when and where were 0:01:21.319 --> 0:01:25.720 you happiest? What is the quality you like least about yourself? 0:01:26.800 --> 0:01:31.760 What relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you? What 0:01:31.959 --> 0:01:36.440 question would you most like answered, What person, place, or 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:40.560 experience has shaped you the most? What would be your 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:44.480 last meal? And can you tell me something in your 0:01:44.520 --> 0:01:48.440 life that has grown out of a personal disaster. The 0:01:48.480 --> 0:01:51.320 more people we ask, the more we begin to see 0:01:51.360 --> 0:01:55.520 what makes us similar and what makes us individual. I've 0:01:55.520 --> 0:01:58.240 gathered a group of really remarkable people who I am 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:00.840 honored and humbled to have had a asked to engage with. 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:08.400 My guest today is Barrett Tunday Thurston. Now, as you know, 0:02:08.600 --> 0:02:11.440 I ask all of my guests the same seven questions, 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:13.640 and I choose to share with you some of my 0:02:13.720 --> 0:02:18.760 favorite conversations that emerge from those questions. However, there have 0:02:18.800 --> 0:02:23.680 been conversations where each answer provides a thread that just 0:02:23.919 --> 0:02:26.920 cannot be cut, or helps paint some new version of 0:02:26.960 --> 0:02:30.880 a larger picture. My interview with Barrett tun Day was 0:02:31.360 --> 0:02:36.000 one of those conversations, and with every single question, I 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:38.840 just wanted to share more and more of our discussion. 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:42.240 So I will be sharing that conversation I had with 0:02:42.320 --> 0:02:46.480 him with you over the course of two episodes today 0:02:46.680 --> 0:02:57.440 and next week. I am talking to Barrettunday Thurston. All right, 0:02:57.600 --> 0:03:02.440 when and where were you happyest? I you just you 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:04.960 just jump right in there. Oh yeah, I'm not like 0:03:05.040 --> 0:03:12.320 we did, I thought, Okay, let the trials begin. When 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:20.360 and where? It was the summer. I was standing on 0:03:20.400 --> 0:03:27.160 a beach facing west That beach was in Senegal, facing Westman, 0:03:27.360 --> 0:03:30.760 looking across the Atlantic Ocean back towards the United States. 0:03:31.560 --> 0:03:35.560 This was my first time having flown across any ocean, 0:03:36.280 --> 0:03:39.960 my first time having been anywhere on the continent of Africa. 0:03:40.480 --> 0:03:43.960 I had graduated high school a few weeks earlier. I 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:47.160 was on a trip with fellow students from my high school, 0:03:47.520 --> 0:03:54.160 all black, chaperoned by our black Senegalese French teacher who 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:56.720 was not my French teacher because I didn't study French. 0:03:56.760 --> 0:03:59.440 I studied Spanish. But he was offering trips to Africa, 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:03.360 and we were like, we're going, And most of us 0:04:03.400 --> 0:04:05.280 were not in his French class, but we were all 0:04:05.320 --> 0:04:08.880 in in the class of black stuff. So standing on 0:04:08.920 --> 0:04:16.760 that beach, I felt grateful and overwhelmed and at significant peace. 0:04:17.240 --> 0:04:19.400 I hadn't felt that way up until that point in 0:04:19.440 --> 0:04:23.160 my life. All in one moment, and the waves were big, 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:26.200 there was this like pacing in between them, and I 0:04:26.279 --> 0:04:29.600 walked out into the ocean and I had I had 0:04:29.600 --> 0:04:33.640 a thought that well, not sound exciting, but it was 0:04:33.720 --> 0:04:39.480 so profoundly happy. I thought if I died right here, 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:42.800 I'd be Okay. I've had a really good life and 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:45.480 I got to come back here and not want to die. 0:04:45.720 --> 0:04:49.359 But if something should happen, I don't think I would 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:55.160 have massive regrets. At seventeen, I thought this to myself, 0:04:55.400 --> 0:04:58.279 and I felt happy in that place at that time 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:00.360 in a way that still stands out to me at 0:05:00.400 --> 0:05:04.400 forty three years old. Wow, that's pretty young to really 0:05:04.680 --> 0:05:08.160 let happiness in one and have the acceptance of it 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:11.640 being enough. Because I feel like happiness is so often 0:05:11.720 --> 0:05:14.440 quantified by that there are aspects that aren't enough. If 0:05:14.440 --> 0:05:16.360 I had more of this thing, I would be happy. Yeah, 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:21.760 happiness as more, yes, exactly. So at seventeen, to have 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:24.720 that and also to have awareness of that is amazing. 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:29.800 I mean, Senegal's powerful place, I guess you know apparently. Yeah, 0:05:30.040 --> 0:05:35.239 it was facing west on the western shore. Yeah, looking 0:05:35.360 --> 0:05:38.880 back here, and I think I've never had that level 0:05:38.880 --> 0:05:44.080 of distance from America. I had been to Canada, just 0:05:44.279 --> 0:05:47.320 barely slipped across the Nova Scotia on a trip with 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:51.479 my mother. I had been to Mexico by training. Again 0:05:51.520 --> 0:05:54.560 with with my mother, we did some traveling, hit almost 0:05:54.600 --> 0:05:58.599 every national park in the United States. But to look 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:03.040 and just see horizon and know that there's this massive 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:05.839 place on the other side that's been the source of 0:06:06.480 --> 0:06:11.560 my identity, a ton of pain, some opportunity, and to 0:06:11.839 --> 0:06:15.200 feel a totally different energy and feel probably at some 0:06:15.360 --> 0:06:20.240 level safe. It's just a relief. Yeah, And having that 0:06:20.839 --> 0:06:24.280 having that perspective quite apart from the fact that I 0:06:24.320 --> 0:06:27.560 don't know what is it. Maybe forty four percent of 0:06:27.600 --> 0:06:32.200 Americans don't have a passport, right and I almost didn't 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:36.360 have my passport. I really dropped the ball. I had 0:06:36.360 --> 0:06:39.960 to do a name chain situation, and there was paperwork stuff. 0:06:40.000 --> 0:06:41.719 I was born with a different name that I had 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:45.560 been using, and there was no This was the mid nineties, 0:06:45.600 --> 0:06:47.919 so it wasn't like just go to this website and 0:06:47.920 --> 0:06:50.240 it's like, no, just go to this building and wait 0:06:50.279 --> 0:06:53.080 in line. And we had to expedite it and it 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:55.520 came in just in time. It's very nerve wracking, but 0:06:55.640 --> 0:06:58.400 you did it and you got that, and then you 0:06:58.480 --> 0:07:02.599 had the awareness you weren't just swelling as Senegalese bear 0:07:02.680 --> 0:07:09.080 on the beach, Like that's an amazing thing. I feel 0:07:09.080 --> 0:07:13.200 like I read that your mother has been extraordinarily influential 0:07:13.880 --> 0:07:17.040 and that like this is apartheid was like the first 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:19.560 book that she gave you or something. She laid really 0:07:19.600 --> 0:07:22.240 good ground for you to be seventeen and to be 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:25.000 able to stand on that beach and have that that 0:07:25.080 --> 0:07:28.800 epiphany or that awareness. Yeah. She she dropped me into 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:31.200 the deep end of the pool. So when I stood 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:37.320 alone in a wavy ocean, I was not afraid. Mm hmm. Wow, Yeah, 0:07:37.920 --> 0:07:41.120 that's my happy place to I don't have the same 0:07:41.200 --> 0:07:44.040 kind of story, but put me in the ocean. Yeah, 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:47.520 water in the ocean and let the waves come. There's 0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:50.480 this rule. If I'm within reach of the ocean, I 0:07:50.560 --> 0:07:54.240 have to touch it. Yes, it's the thing I miss 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:59.160 most about. I'm currently in London. I dream about the ocean. 0:07:59.840 --> 0:08:01.960 I do have run every morning when I wake up 0:08:02.120 --> 0:08:04.520 through the beach where I live, and I touched this 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:06.400 rock at every day, which is the end of my run, 0:08:06.440 --> 0:08:08.840 and then I jump in the sea right afterwards. That's 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:13.360 powerful sea. It comes, but it's like it's so the 0:08:13.360 --> 0:08:15.480 specific and so not a sea like you called the 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:18.800 sea all oceans of seas if you're English, it's weird 0:08:19.800 --> 0:08:22.040 because we're parochial and we have this very small like 0:08:22.160 --> 0:08:27.520 idea the sea. It's a big ocean, Yeah, exactly. Yeah, 0:08:27.560 --> 0:08:31.400 ocean does feel orders of magnitude larger. It's like this 0:08:31.560 --> 0:08:35.400 epic scale thing, whereas the sea is surmountable in my 0:08:35.440 --> 0:08:39.720 mind definitely, But the sea doesn't have surf. To me, oceans, 0:08:41.120 --> 0:08:45.559 the ocean has consequence. The sea is like it's gentler 0:08:45.600 --> 0:08:48.760 and less less aggressive, and they have personalities because it's 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:50.679 like the sea of this and the sea of that is, 0:08:50.679 --> 0:08:53.360 whereas the ocean is just too big to have a 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:57.040 single personality. Yeah, the ocean, sea ocean, which actually makes 0:08:57.040 --> 0:09:00.320 me feel safe. That power makes me feel like that 0:09:00.400 --> 0:09:03.280 notion of something more powerful than me in nature. It's 0:09:03.320 --> 0:09:07.679 always been that feeling. So you, this is your your 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:12.840 unlocking something. I share that with you in that I've 0:09:12.880 --> 0:09:16.520 been drawn always to water, big water, hanging out in waves, 0:09:16.640 --> 0:09:21.559 really fun, big wind, and I loved and storms. I 0:09:21.880 --> 0:09:24.040 will go out into a blizzard. I recently went out 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:29.040 into a sandstorm. I like the feeling of in consequence, 0:09:29.400 --> 0:09:33.520 sometimes not as a permanent state, but the moment of 0:09:33.559 --> 0:09:38.760 feeling small, feeling buffeted, feeling held by this powerful force. 0:09:39.120 --> 0:09:41.439 It's very comforting to me. I wonder if it taps 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:44.800 into like a reptilian brain, of that notion of connection, 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:49.080 that you cannot be anything except completely connected to your 0:09:49.520 --> 0:09:53.680 humanity and therefore your mortality. When you are feeling the 0:09:53.760 --> 0:09:56.800 power of things that could remove you if you didn't 0:09:56.800 --> 0:10:00.480 stay present and focus, or it just feels like the womb, 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:05.679 the womb, the womb. My son said the other day, 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:07.559 why is womb and all the hens? And I was like, 0:10:07.600 --> 0:10:12.040 because uterist just doesn't rhyme with anything. Well, it's true, 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:14.840 and they weren't allowed to say vagina or any other 0:10:14.880 --> 0:10:18.400 part of a woman, only that life giving part of 0:10:18.440 --> 0:10:21.520 quote unquote was it for us? Let's just talk about 0:10:21.520 --> 0:10:26.360 that womb exactly. The thing was finer than the angels. 0:10:27.840 --> 0:10:30.760 Stop stop me, stop me, you stop me. I'm going 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:32.520 to stop you with it. I'm going to stop myself 0:10:32.559 --> 0:10:48.680 with another question. You have a lot of self inquiry 0:10:48.720 --> 0:10:52.120 about you. So what quality do you least like about 0:10:52.120 --> 0:10:59.440 yourself body? Okay? This changes over time. I've gotten to 0:10:59.480 --> 0:11:02.839 know my of better over time. That seventeen year old 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:05.360 thirty knew himself. There was so much that kid didn't 0:11:05.360 --> 0:11:10.760 know so much, And hopefully I'll say something similar about 0:11:10.800 --> 0:11:14.200 my forty three year old self decades from now. The 0:11:14.280 --> 0:11:19.360 quality about me that I like the least is my 0:11:20.120 --> 0:11:28.720 valuing of perfection, my devaluing of mistakes when I make them, 0:11:28.760 --> 0:11:35.520 my association of doing something wrong with being wrong. That's 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:40.120 a really good distinction, by the way, learning doing wrong 0:11:40.160 --> 0:11:43.520 and being wrong. Yeah, why do you think we haven't? 0:11:43.960 --> 0:11:46.520 It comes up a lot like I would say that 0:11:46.600 --> 0:11:48.800 in my life and talking to people and asking this question, 0:11:48.840 --> 0:11:52.079 they would they would say a version of perfectionism and mistakes. 0:11:52.120 --> 0:11:55.360 But why have we not figured out that the mistakes 0:11:55.679 --> 0:11:59.040 are what what makes us grow like we know that 0:11:59.080 --> 0:12:01.560 their mistakes make a scrap. We know that there is 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:06.960 this actually incredible force that making mistakes has, like why 0:12:06.960 --> 0:12:11.360 why do we diss it so much? So there's a difference. 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:16.080 There are different levels of knowing. I know that mistakes 0:12:16.120 --> 0:12:21.040 are gifts and opportunities, that they are how I have 0:12:21.200 --> 0:12:25.120 learned some of my most valuable lessons. I know that 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:31.920 perfection is worth pursuit but probably never achieved, and that 0:12:32.080 --> 0:12:34.960 is a feature, not a bug, of that attribute. I 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:38.360 know all this. I know it in physics, I know 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:42.120 it mathematically, I know it mentally. But then there's a 0:12:42.200 --> 0:12:47.720 level of knowing, which is being an existing and feeling 0:12:48.000 --> 0:12:53.360 and embodying. And I think that gap is a consistent 0:12:53.400 --> 0:12:56.800 thing in many forms of knowledge that we experienced. Certainly 0:12:56.800 --> 0:13:01.559 that I do more to a tangible point. I think 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:06.719 that I have had a hard time not judging myself 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:13.280 harshly for all manner of mistakes, because I learned that 0:13:13.360 --> 0:13:17.679 from somewhere the simple answer why don't we do this? 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:20.520 Somebody taught us, And maybe they didn't put it in 0:13:20.559 --> 0:13:23.560 a lesson plan and make us memorize it in drills 0:13:23.559 --> 0:13:26.880 in a classroom, but by some example or by some incentsive. 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:30.120 We learned these things, So what has to happen in 0:13:30.200 --> 0:13:33.439 the unlearning of it? Like when you're a thoughtful person, 0:13:33.760 --> 0:13:36.080 like I pay attention to my life, the lives of 0:13:36.080 --> 0:13:38.760 my community and my friends, and I listen. It's partly 0:13:38.800 --> 0:13:41.000 why I want to do this podcast, because I want 0:13:41.120 --> 0:13:43.600 to ask these questions of people. We know what certain 0:13:43.600 --> 0:13:45.880 things give us, and yet we don't let that change us. 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:48.719 We don't let the unlearning happen. We just, at very best, 0:13:48.800 --> 0:13:51.439 maybe continue to make the mistake and have the awareness 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:55.720 that it's a mistake, which is progress. Awareness is a 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:59.560 great it's a great achievement. So then patients with the 0:13:59.679 --> 0:14:04.640 pro says is perhaps our best ally. And you know, 0:14:04.720 --> 0:14:10.880 we are afraid. Sometimes I'll try to speak first personally. Um, 0:14:10.920 --> 0:14:13.800 I for much of my life wasn't aware that I 0:14:13.920 --> 0:14:17.840 carried this pressure. I felt the pressure, I didn't understand 0:14:17.880 --> 0:14:21.920 its source. And becoming aware of it it's like a 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:24.480 big thing. I think. I'm still becoming aware of how 0:14:24.520 --> 0:14:26.480 many places this shows up and like, oh, I thought 0:14:26.480 --> 0:14:30.760 I just really cared about how to use the spreadsheets, Like, 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:33.600 but why do I care so much about how to 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:36.600 put the stuff into the spreadsheet. Oh there's something going 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:38.600 on here. You don't want to be judge, you don't 0:14:38.640 --> 0:14:42.080 want to be wrong, you don't want to fail someone else. Maybe, 0:14:42.320 --> 0:14:46.520 So even understanding myself and this fear that I have 0:14:46.640 --> 0:14:48.520 in this association with this part of me that I'm 0:14:48.560 --> 0:14:52.280 not excited about, I enjoy that. I'm starting to enjoy that. 0:14:52.320 --> 0:14:55.000 I'm starting to say, like, oh, that's you, though, you 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:58.240 you gotta know yourself. Man. And I love that guy, right. 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:01.560 I'm I've been disappointed, I've been harsh with him, but 0:15:01.640 --> 0:15:05.720 also I'm like, that's my dude, that's me, right, Like, 0:15:05.760 --> 0:15:08.240 if there's one person to love in this whole world 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:12.600 is me and and and to get better at that 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:16.200 will help me do that with others. So I know that. Intellectually, 0:15:16.240 --> 0:15:19.160 I'm starting to feel that in my body. The change. 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:23.200 Change is scary. Change is why I've never done this before. 0:15:23.280 --> 0:15:25.440 I've it's been so rare. Can I Can I do 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:28.640 it on demand? Could I become something where something different 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:34.680 is normal? That's that's really scary and it's exciting. And 0:15:35.080 --> 0:15:37.960 I think what you said about patience is a big 0:15:38.040 --> 0:15:40.480 piece of it. And for this particular part of me, 0:15:41.360 --> 0:15:48.520 patience isn't natural because because patience means I'm not yet perfect. Ah, 0:15:48.560 --> 0:15:50.600 so I'm just making mistakes for longer? Is that? What 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:53.720 is that? What patience? Patience is being on the car 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:56.440 Jo and be like, yeah, I long to it there? 0:15:57.080 --> 0:15:59.600 When am I going to get that? These are questions 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:04.400 I'm still answering, practicing answering Can I shift? Can I 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:09.920 enjoy the process that goes from mild discovery of hidden 0:16:10.000 --> 0:16:14.120 part of self to deeper awareness of that self? Two 0:16:14.120 --> 0:16:17.600 attempts to adjust how that self shows up to persistent 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:21.240 love of that self no matter how that self shows up. 0:16:22.080 --> 0:16:25.880 I mean that sounds great, That's very difficult. It's very 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:30.760 difficult because circumstance, like the the wayward wild card in 0:16:30.840 --> 0:16:35.120 the pack of life. Excuse the whole analogy wayward wild 0:16:35.160 --> 0:16:38.560 card in the pack of life, but it is, it's circumstance. 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:41.440 We can get all teed up with self knowledge and 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.960 self love and patience, and then there's this this aspect 0:16:45.000 --> 0:16:47.480 which I don't know if it's spiritual, I don't know 0:16:47.520 --> 0:16:51.000 if it is scientifically based and it's purely energetic, or 0:16:51.040 --> 0:16:54.040 if it's a bittle of both. But that that can 0:16:54.120 --> 0:16:56.480 come in and as I feel like we've seen in 0:16:56.520 --> 0:16:59.360 this past year everything can shift that we have no 0:16:59.440 --> 0:17:01.680 control of her, and in a way, all you then 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:04.359 have is your connection to self and maybe the work 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:09.280 that you've done in order to weather. There's those conditions. 0:17:09.280 --> 0:17:12.200 I mean, you say you love storms like last last 0:17:12.280 --> 0:17:16.760 year was a storm Like it was a quiet, creepy 0:17:16.800 --> 0:17:23.919 storm and sometimes loud and rambunctious, overwhelming storm. It was 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:30.439 many storms. Yeah, convergence of things creating a perfect storm. 0:17:30.680 --> 0:17:32.200 I don't know. I don't know if I go that far, 0:17:32.280 --> 0:17:33.880 but it's a fun word to use given what we've 0:17:33.960 --> 0:17:36.600 just talked about, I know, and interesting to see where 0:17:36.640 --> 0:17:40.320 it will where it journeys too. But I do think again, 0:17:40.359 --> 0:17:42.560 it's this awareness that you seem to have of your 0:17:42.560 --> 0:17:45.159 process and of your journey and learning to love the 0:17:45.240 --> 0:17:50.680 journey that's the thing. This awareness of self and patients 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:56.400 with self and shifting away from judgment of self are 0:17:56.480 --> 0:18:01.639 things that I preach about our collective self. Everything I 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:05.919 just said about myself is something that I have a 0:18:06.000 --> 0:18:10.400 much easier time acknowledging about the collective me known as 0:18:10.600 --> 0:18:14.080 the member of the United States as a nation. It's like, oh, 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:17.080 this is not a perfect place yeah, it's okay. We 0:18:17.160 --> 0:18:19.320 gotta work on it, though. We gotta work. So I'm like, 0:18:19.480 --> 0:18:23.560 you know, coach when it comes to seeing very clearly 0:18:23.640 --> 0:18:27.399 and trying to be motivational, etcetera. And then when I 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:30.440 shift that grammar a little bit from we to I 0:18:31.200 --> 0:18:34.800 first person collective, first person singular, and it's like, oh, 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:37.560 now it's it's really personal. Now I get it, you 0:18:37.600 --> 0:18:41.520 know a bit more. This is doesn't come naturally to 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:44.360 many of us as individuals or as collectives. I think 0:18:44.400 --> 0:18:47.800 it's work and that deepens my my empathy for the 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:52.000 project yea, of just being for the project of being 0:18:52.040 --> 0:19:13.639 a human, poor sweet humans. And what relationship real or 0:19:13.680 --> 0:19:19.240 fictionalized defines love for you defines love for me. I mean, 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:24.639 it's very present. So my relationship with my wife defines 0:19:25.080 --> 0:19:30.960 love for me. And it does so because Ah, it's 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:36.040 been such a loving lesson and experience. I used to 0:19:36.359 --> 0:19:40.480 imagine um and think of love as this like place 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:44.000 you get to. It's like, oh, we we fall in love. 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:47.439 We're in a state of love. We we've decided I 0:19:47.520 --> 0:19:50.000 choose you, you choose me, and we just kind of 0:19:50.080 --> 0:19:54.480 like coast, you know, at that point. But we're in love. 0:19:54.880 --> 0:19:57.639 Therefore what I don't know. I just that's the only 0:19:57.680 --> 0:20:00.920 part that matters. But what is it? What does it mean? 0:20:01.200 --> 0:20:04.600 How do you experience it? And and what I have learned, 0:20:04.720 --> 0:20:08.040 not through reading anything or someone telling me anything, but 0:20:08.080 --> 0:20:12.000 through being in relationship is that it is an ever 0:20:12.160 --> 0:20:16.920 changing journey. And that kind of like the perfection thing 0:20:16.960 --> 0:20:21.320 we talked about. I think you pursue love and choose 0:20:21.440 --> 0:20:27.280 to commit to relating with another person in love, but 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:29.919 you you don't rest in it. It doesn't you don't 0:20:29.960 --> 0:20:34.000 stop because they don't stop. You know, my wife changes, 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:38.760 she wants this, that or the other. She's learning about herself. 0:20:38.760 --> 0:20:41.400 She's a bit of a different person today than yesterday, 0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:46.280 ever so slightly, sometimes dramatically, but usually usually it's barely noticeable. 0:20:46.320 --> 0:20:50.240 But over years a person changes, and lo and behold, 0:20:50.840 --> 0:20:54.280 I changed too. So if we've both locked in and 0:20:54.320 --> 0:20:56.359 said we're in love and then we both change, that, 0:20:56.520 --> 0:20:59.000 what are we now, right unless we're it's a process 0:20:59.080 --> 0:21:01.840 and listening to each each other and adapting, and it's 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:05.040 a shared journey. I just I had the simplest idea 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:08.840 of what love was probably imported from a lot of media, 0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:13.720 you know, painting these pictures and secondhand interpretations of pop 0:21:13.760 --> 0:21:17.000 culture and other people's relationships who I could observe from 0:21:17.000 --> 0:21:19.040 a distance, but if you're not in it, you don't 0:21:19.040 --> 0:21:21.840 really know. It's like a person's mind. You can't really 0:21:21.840 --> 0:21:26.120 know it unless you're inside. And so, yeah, my wife Elizabeth, 0:21:26.760 --> 0:21:31.560 my relationship with her, I should say, defines love most 0:21:32.080 --> 0:21:36.200 of any relationship I've had, which is in part why 0:21:36.240 --> 0:21:40.800 she's my wife. Yeah, it's a beautiful journey, not always 0:21:40.840 --> 0:21:44.040 an easy journey, but that commitment and that then the 0:21:44.119 --> 0:21:47.320 knowledge that we're there for each other and growing with 0:21:47.400 --> 0:21:51.960 each other, giving each other opportunity to become more. That 0:21:52.000 --> 0:21:56.600 feels like love in a much deeper way. Romance is different. 0:21:56.720 --> 0:21:59.399 Romance is fun, that's the thing. But I think it 0:21:59.440 --> 0:22:01.600 supposed to be is we're not. I don't think we're 0:22:01.600 --> 0:22:05.159 ever evolving at the same rate. Like there there's an 0:22:05.160 --> 0:22:09.679 acceleration that can happen in each of a partnership. It's life. 0:22:09.880 --> 0:22:13.240 My boyfriend can be on fire, I mean not literally, 0:22:13.240 --> 0:22:18.400 but you know on fire is just a regular occurrence, 0:22:18.520 --> 0:22:20.800 like you see it, like it happens often. We would 0:22:20.800 --> 0:22:25.240 have all kinds of extinguishing but like he'll raise ahead 0:22:25.240 --> 0:22:29.960 and where he's at and again, whether it's circumstance or 0:22:30.240 --> 0:22:32.800 spiritual or whatever it is that I'm going through, I'm 0:22:32.800 --> 0:22:35.240 not in the same place. But you're right. Love is 0:22:35.280 --> 0:22:38.920 in the accommodation of where people are out in their journey, 0:22:39.080 --> 0:22:42.120 and it is amazing when you see them hang out 0:22:42.200 --> 0:22:44.920 and help lift you up or just hang out and wait. 0:22:45.119 --> 0:22:48.040 It's all a journey. I mean, you and I could 0:22:48.080 --> 0:22:54.040 basically distill all of this into like really cool fridge magnets. 0:22:54.160 --> 0:22:58.520 I was thinking T shirts, but productizing regardless, definitely, but 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:02.560 for sure we could definitely monetize our shared philosophy, which 0:23:02.600 --> 0:23:04.640 is cool. Which is the point of life. I think 0:23:04.640 --> 0:23:08.359 it's the point of philosophy. Yeah, certainly, money is definitely 0:23:08.440 --> 0:23:11.840 the point of philosophy. I think that Plato missed it. 0:23:12.359 --> 0:23:14.680 He is too busy talking about, you know, the tyranny 0:23:14.680 --> 0:23:17.160 of democracy and he really need to be focusing on Like, yo, 0:23:17.240 --> 0:23:19.520 how can I make some T shirts for the promise 0:23:19.600 --> 0:23:24.840 of capitalism? How about that way? Now at the bright side, there, buddy, 0:23:25.640 --> 0:23:32.080 be a human. Don't go into politics. Tune in next 0:23:32.119 --> 0:23:35.520 time for part two of my conversation with Baratunday Thurston 0:23:36.080 --> 0:23:39.680 Baratunday will answer, what question he would most like answered, 0:23:40.280 --> 0:23:44.280 What person, place, or experience most altered his life, and 0:23:44.440 --> 0:23:47.640 what in his life has grown out of a personal disaster. 0:23:50.880 --> 0:23:54.160 Many Questions is hosted and written by Me Mini Driver, 0:23:54.720 --> 0:24:02.359 supervising producer Aaron Kaufman, Producer Morgan Levoy, Research assistant Marissa Brown. 0:24:03.600 --> 0:24:09.280 Original music Sorry Baby by Minni Driver, Additional music by 0:24:09.320 --> 0:24:14.640 Aaron Kaufman. Executive produced by Me Minnie Driver. Special thanks 0:24:14.720 --> 0:24:20.400 to Jim Nikolay, Will Pearson, Addison No Day, Lisa Castella 0:24:20.520 --> 0:24:25.720 and Annicke Oppenheim at w kPr, de La Pescador, Kate 0:24:25.800 --> 0:24:30.320 Driver and Jason Weinberg, and for constantly solicited tech support 0:24:30.760 --> 0:24:31.560 Henry Driver