Overcoming Insecurities & Cultivating Self-Awareness w/ Jay Carpenter

In this episode, I interview my cousin-in-law, Jay Carpenter, who is currently a registered behavior technician working with autistic children while pursuing a graduate degree in clinical mental health. We dive into many great subjects such as cultivating self-awareness, self-esteem and social positioning, overcoming perfectionism, and the continuous path to self improvement. Jay's story is a powerful reminder that growth and self-improvement are ongoing processes requiring effort and momentum. Whether it's enhancing social skills in high school or taking actionable steps toward acceptance, Jay's experiences demonstrate that true change is possible.

Transcript

0:00:12
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Unterned Stones. For today's episode, my guest is Jay Carpenter. Jay is my cousin-in-law. He is my wife's cousin through her dad's side. So I've known him for -- complicated. -- does that sound Yeah. That sound I think it sounds I think it sounds correct. But yeah. It was correct, but sounded worse than it needed to sound. Yeah. But so I've known Jay for a few years now, and Jay is currently working with kids with mental health. He's been doing some real world experience. Does this pursuing his degree in psychology for post grads.

0:00:47
So just to start off the podcast, can you kind of talk about yourself a little bit? Talk about some of your experience right now currently would work as well as a little bit about your childhood and family life. Sure. Right now, I am a registered behavior technician. So I work with autistic children. We do ABA therapy, which is like just a branch of behaviorism that still exists. So it's it's not overly concerned with, you know, what someone's thinking just about what they're doing, which, you know, you always end up incorporating what they're thinking, but it works pretty well with kids because they don't necessarily think through that, oh, I know you're trying to trick me into doing the right thing. I've been doing that for about two, two and a half years now. And I'm currently going to grad school for clinical mental health. So that will let me get a, you know, licensed professional counselor certification and then I'll be able to work with people. Right. So that's that's the goal. Yeah. So still kind of at the beginning end of that that grad program.

0:01:55
I did a bunch of shifts in my career. So, you know, I've got a psych undergrad, but I I also have English and computer science, which I did first. But that's a a particularly soul crushing career. Both of them really. So, you know, I kind of shifted into something that both feels meaningful and you can make money off of it as well. Okay. So you kinda like you had a journey that developed into this eventually I got to you here. Oh, yeah. So yeah. So we'll kinda have to we'll we'll touch on what made you choose to end up your journey on this path here. So -- Yeah. -- so like your childhood family life, you -- Yeah.

0:02:33
-- kind of talk about where you grew up, maybe a little bit more about, like, your mom and dad, your brother. Yeah. So I was born in Florida, but I grew up. Here in Wisconsin. Where in Florida where are you born? I think Coral Springs. Okay. Like, I I spent all of, like, a week there. So it's not the It's right now long ago. Okay. Yeah. Well, I was yeah. I spent probably about a month in a preemie ward. But, you know, once once they decided I wasn't gonna die there, they were like, okay, get out. Now we went back to Wisconsin. But I grew up in the Fox Point suburbs and It was technically I grew up in Grafton, but as most of my childhood was spent in in Fox Point. And Let's see.

0:03:20
When it comes to family, my dad works from home. He does a lot of stock market stuff. My mom was a realtor when I was a little kid, and then she shifted into doing training development. So right now, she works for an insurance company. So there's a lot of rants every time I I talked to her about work. Because she was much happier being a contractor. She's not happy being a wage slave.

0:03:47
And my little brother is an artist. Where he's I mean, he's got a YouTube channel. Who knows? Maybe we can throw a link in below the video. Yeah. But we're not we're not marketing for him right now. But nor did I have the followers to be marketing? Well, yeah. Who knows? Maybe we should throw his link on his videos. Yeah. But he does miniature artwork and a lot of three d printing. He's a very, very skilled guy. He's kind of done the exact same thing I have where we just have a bunch of skills. He's done computer science, digital art, three d printing. He's worked on a video game. He's got a bunch of different things he's doing, and it's nice that he's finally kind of getting some following.

0:04:32
But like, we grew up, you know, growing up, I would not have been able to tell you if my family was poor or not. Which obviously you know the answer to that question. But I was going to University School of Milwaukee when I was a kid. And Yeah. There's people there from multi million dollar companies and You've got, oh, yeah. No. That's that guy's, you know, last name is Cannon. Oh, yeah. No. His family owns Cannon cameras. Like, they're they're very wealthy. You're going to when you're hanging out with people, you're going to big mansions. And my family are a little bit of packed rats. And so you go home and it's like, yeah, we're not. We're not part of this social class. So I I grew up thinking I was poor back then. And then we went to Brookfield Academy for, like, middle school. And then you've got families that are doctors on both sides. And so I was like, yeah, No. We're still poor. And then I finally got to college and I was like, oh, okay. We're actually like Pretty pretty do a pretty goddamn well.

0:05:43
So it very much was, I would say, eye opening, but at the same time, probably good to have had somewhat of a humble thought process about yourself. Okay. So do you feel like that that misunderstanding there if you'd like, you didn't know where your family was fiscally when, like, grumpy. Yeah. Was did that come from, like, a was it like a lack of communication of, like, maybe openness with your parents about stuff. You know, that that they that they kinda keeping a bubble of your children. You don't hear about anything else besides what I would say partly that and also that my dad does investment stuff. So it's like how much money do we have? Well, the stock markets down.

0:06:25
And, you know, I distinctly remember him saying immediately after the trade towers went down. You know, Jay, the best time to buy is when there's blood on the streets. And I was like sitting there and there was there was a period there afterwards where we were eating ramen unironically. Because it was just like, okay, we sunk everything into the market while it is down, and we are just going to hope that nothing, like, blows up in the meantime. So, like, we there were there were times where we very much were like paying attention to everything we were eating, and there were other times where it's, you know, you can do whatever you want. I mean, combined with the fact that my dad would never ask our grandfather for help ever -- Yeah. -- because they're never going to happen. So, you know, we we we had a lot of different experiences growing up whether or not we were doing well or poorly. And it was always ambiguous. It wasn't something that they wanted to talk to us about.

0:07:24
And then you go to school and if anyone's ever gone by university school, I recommend it because it looks like someone took a little bit of like Marquette's campus and stuffed it on a little backwoods road, except it's nicer. And I was like, okay. Right. You know, you go there and you could you could be somebody who has, you know, twenty million dollars to your name, and you'd still be going, oh, man. I'm I'm pretty poor compared to all these people. So it, you know, I I just kind of stopped worrying about it to a degree. It was just like, I don't know, I'll I'll figure it out at some point.

0:08:00
So do you feel like like do you have a lot of fun memories of being a kid? I mean, I was a pretty because it almost sounds like you're very aware as a kid. You kinda pay attention a lot. Yeah. Like, I was a pretty shy kid. So, like, when it I mean, less so than we we changed schools and then, you know, lost most of my original friend groups. So, a little bit shire after that.

0:08:25
But starting out, like, I wasn't the most social person, but I spent a lot of time just paying attention to people. And it was very interesting to, like, just pay attention to people on all the I know people like vying for social positioning. I've I've always been somebody where it's like, Jay, do you wanna do this? And like, no, everyone else is doing Okay? So What do you so does that kinda make you like, when you notice people buying for that social positioning, did it make you wanna push away from buying for that social positioning more? Or are you saying like you kinda just felt like that was already so ingrained in you that when you notice people buying for social positioning, you were just so distinctly aware of that. Wow, I never had that desire. It's So I think a lot of that and not having the desire I think is is a major aspect of it.

0:09:17
Because when I think of the way my dad relates to people, very much he's the kind of person who's always polite, always respectful and he doesn't really care. Like if you sit there and you walk away from that, you don't like him, he's gonna go home and sleep just fine. And if you're sitting there like trying to play social games, he's not gonna care. Like, he's just gonna be like, okay. Well, this is what I this is what I did. Everything that I'm actually using to, like, show that I've done stuff is purely objective. So you can't really say, no, you didn't do that. And it's just not gonna be professional the entire time. Just kind of bludgeoning through it. So it's kind of how I've always taken to it.

0:10:03
It's like Am I popular? Or am I trying to, you know, improve my social position? I mean, if I'm gonna do that, it's gonna be because I sit there and I'm like, You know what? You're a good person and I could introduce you to somebody else. It's not Oh, I'm gonna start trying to make myself look better. It's like, alright. Here's something I can do for you and I'm doing this because I think you're valuable, that that sort of thing. Right.

0:10:29
So do you feel like I feel a lot of times more if people don't care about social positioning or if they care you know, they they really care about their social status. Yeah. A lot of times I could be so tied in with self esteem. So would you say you didn't ever have self esteem issues then since you never really felt like you're vying for all the people's attention or for people to to, you know, give your recognition for something because you you you, you know, possibly had enough self esteem that you didn't desire that? Or would you say there was something about that. See, I would say it's almost the opposite, at least at first. Because, like, my little brother needed a lot more help.

0:11:05
Growing up. Like, I was always good at school. You just kind of leave me be, and I'll I'll do fine. Very independent. Except for math. But, you know, it's, you know, which I regret because I feel like I probably would have ended up being an engineer. If you really happy doing that, if I had just liked math.

0:11:21
But Yeah. Apart from math. Apart from math. Good at school.

0:11:27
But, you know, Thai always struggled a little bit more. So I just got very used to that whenever I did poorly, it was a problem that was worth, you know, addressing. Whenever I did well, it was expected. So, you know, just don't worry about it. Whereas there was always a lot of fussing over him, which, you know, looking back, I can see, okay, they probably fuss over me a lot too. But definitely was very obvious when they were fussing over him. So I just kind of got used to that idea of just like, alright, you know, that's that's kind of something other people do. I just need to make sure that I do the best I can at all times because that's that's the baseline. While everyone else is off doing this, it's like, alright, but I'm still gonna be getting above a ninety on everything that I do. So, like, would you, like, she she had enough confidence. She had, like, enough, like, self confidence.

0:12:20
As a kid, when it comes to things like that, You don't compartmentalize your confidence and what aspect it was being applied to. Oh, yeah. Okay. Like, when it comes to social stuff, like, I don't know of anybody in my family who has a large social group. So when it comes to like making friends, dealing with that, I was better before I changed schools. And then afterwards, it was like, alright, I made all these friends when I was like, in second grade. How did I do that again? And so I I had a couple friends, but I never really and it was like a forty minute drive to get to that school. So I was like, you know, I'm I'm not really gonna bother to hang out with a whole bunch of people after school because it's just a pain to drive all the way out there. And I get really car sick when I'm not the one driving. So I was just like, wow, it's fine. So I just I wasn't very social, really throughout all of, like, middle and high school.

0:13:18
If there's any place where I don't have a bunch of confidence, that's probably there. Which is a weird thing to then decide, I'm gonna be a therapist. And it's, like, social skills are, like, the the big thing. I don't know. I don't necessarily think that you have to correlate. Well, yeah. I mean, it's And I mean, that's kinda why I was like, oh, I like this. Because it's it's very different when it's one on one. Like, throw me in a a room with five people and I'm probably gonna talk significantly less, or I'm comfortable with everyone and you're gonna want me to shut up. But and mostly I would say that if there's an area where like academic tasks, I'm really good at. That's one of those things where I know I've got that.

0:14:01
When it comes to, like, being hardworking, things like that. Yeah. No. I I can do that. That's the grind is one of the things that was like, no, you you do that.

0:14:12
When it comes to maybe planning out a course for my life or, you know, social interaction, a little bit less confident with that. Okay. But that's also in large part because my parents are very much the kind of people who are like, you can do whatever you want. You can do whatever you want. You wanna start a business. We can probably, like, figure out how to like help you fund that or introduce you to the people who could, you know, help you fund that. Oh, you want to, you know, bring a girlfriend home. It's okay if her parents call. We'll say that you're still here. You guys can go out on a walk if you want. And I was like, fuck you mom and dad. I'm gonna stay at home and play video games.

0:14:55
But, you know, it's it's very much given all there was never anything, like, pushing me towards a particular thing. Never any any restraints on that that it I mean, that's why I've I've got an English into computer science degree that I do not use because it was like I got to college, it was expected for me to go to college, and it was like, what do I wanna do here? You can do anything you want. So I picked two things that I was good at. But, yeah, you didn't necessarily -- Yeah. -- pick them where you had planned. I wanna do this career by Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because it's like, well, what what would I think through with a career? The only thing anybody ever told me is you can do whatever you want. I was like, Okay. But that's a that's a lot of choices.

0:15:39
Like, it's in project management, you hear this a lot. Not that I was a project manager, but project managers would talk about this. Like, you wanna give or or a boss or manager in general. If you give somebody a blank piece of paper and you tell them, come up with an idea for me. Oh, yes. And here's a blank piece of paper. Start writing. Yep. People will freeze. But if you give them like an outline or something and they're like, hey, can you figure out how we can maybe pivot this idea? Here's the idea. Here's one idea. Can you pivot into something else? People are significantly better and will work much faster at that than -- Oh, yeah. -- a blank slate.

0:16:10
So this idea of, like, you're trying to pick out your future, and you're trying to pick out what what you wanna do with yourself. That is it's intimidating, it's hard, and you're trying to make a decision for what could possibly be the rest of your life, which inevitably is because if you hit a career, you can always change it. But when you're a kid, you don't know that. Oh, yeah. You think if I get a four year degree in this, and I don't use that four year degree -- Yeah. -- then I just wasted all this money and it was such a bad decision. And nowadays, too, how colleges become such a colleges and the always the best decision financially now with student loans being what they are and -- Yep. -- the amount that college tuition is going up compared to income for kids post college is not, you know, not correlating very well. So, yeah, it is Yep. Well, to be fair, a lot of people do get stuff like English degrees. They do. And there's nothing there's nothing more fun than getting paid, not all that much to write someone else's idea. Like, that was worse than programming. That was that was soul crushing. Yeah. Yeah. That one could be bad. Yeah.

0:17:04
So for you then, do you feel like there was a was there a point for you in your childhood that mental health kind of became more of an apparent thing and became more of a forefront issue? Or was it maybe like more in your adult life that became more of a forefront. So I would say it was always kind of a little bit of a through line. I mean, in part, there was always so much pressure to do well combined with the fact that, like, my friend group got broken up by changing schools and things like that and I just wasn't really interacting with people. All I can say is staying home and playing video games all day is not conducive to good mental health. But, you know, I I would never say it was incredibly bad in in the sense of, like, there are people who are definitely much worse off. Right? But definitely, overall, my mental health was, like, below the board. If that makes sense for a very long time.

0:18:02
But do you remember when that became like a thought? Like, was it a middle school that you really became aware of that? Like, oh, man. Like, I look at other kids, I see in them what I think might be better mental health than myself. And you kinda because at one point, you obviously, labels yourself as the low board mental health wise. So what do you kind of remember when that happened? Probably late high school. Okay. Mostly because high school was a mess and not a ton of people were were at a point where I would say they were above board, you know, before then. But I would say probably it was when other people started like figuring out their life, you know, dating, doing more stuff like that where it was like, alright. I still don't have a bunch of close friends and I don't know what I want to do. So sitting there and I was like, alright, why is why is that happening? And I I could recognize that, yeah, my social skills were not great. Definitely not great. But at the same time, it was like, alright. That's not good. What do I do about this? Was it like a were you playing a game in comparison a lot in high school then? Yeah, I would say so. Okay. I mean, part of it was that, like, my little brother is, like, six one. So And one of the things, like, being a little bit self conscious about yourself is is, you know, another thing.

0:19:27
I mean, everybody is. But very much like, well, I suppose everybody is or they're they've got an unrealistic picture of themselves. But I think everybody's self conscious. I think -- Yeah. Some people are self conscious about things that are more are more apparent to others. Yeah. You know, like, a a height discrepancy -- Yeah. -- is something that people can see. Some people are self conscious about things that nobody will see them walking around. Yeah. Maybe wants to get to know them, but so I I I think that's a good point. And even with, like, that sort of self conscious business. It it's never been about necessarily what other people think. Okay.

0:20:00
But it's more about, like, my own perfectionism. Where it's like and I mean, part of it also is that ties like six one. My mom's entire side of the family is like super tall. And thankfully, I I inherited my grandfather's hair on that side of the family, which is nice. But you know, so hopefully I'll just, you know, get salt and pepper soon. But on the other hand, on the other hand, I am not six one. And my parents were convinced that I was going to be because, you know, if I was shooting up and generally they would grow later in childhood, So I can still wear clothes they bought me from middle school. Like I was running around with very large clothes. It looked like hand hand me downs despite the fact that I'm the oldest.

0:20:50
So it it always kind of built the impression that I should be taller. And that it was like, this isn't good. How do I improve my grade on this? So it wasn't that you cared what other people thought just that you felt like you weren't hitting a mark that you thought you should be hitting. Oh, absolutely. Not based on others' assumptions. Yeah. But you still got this thought that you should be taller from somewhere. Yeah. Well, it's it's I mean, for that, it was kind of the they they explicitly told me that I was gonna tall. Like, it's like Okay. Yeah. I'm gonna give you the hope. Yeah. I'm like six. And they're like, well, we should get him big clothes because he's gonna end up growing into them. And it was like, okay. Well, I can still wear middle school clothes. I think I still got like an old shirt around somewhere and it's like, oh, this is kind of baggy on me. So it's like, okay. I I understand why this is here.

0:21:43
But I I very much if there's any issue that I have when it comes to like self confidence, it's that I very much people will say, Jay, you're great. And I'm like, but I could I could be better. I can see I can see places where I could improve. And that's great when it's something that you can't improve. When it's like, could I eat enough steaks to grow other. And then it's like, mm-mm, you can grow wider by eating steaks. But So have you, like, learned to deal, like, live deal with that better as you got older? Or, like, maybe it sounds like in high school you you would think I can What can I do to be taller? Is that something like nowadays you look at and you're like, well, my height is my height. Or who I am. It's not like it's something like, or do you still kinda look at it something like, I can't change, but it's still kinda it definitely shows up sometimes. Okay.

0:22:27
But for me a large amount of, I mean, really everything is, okay, cool. You're depressed. You're not, you know, doing well. You're not happy with with what you're doing. Okay. But what are what are you gonna do about that? So in in this case, it's like, alright, might be self conscious about my height. Alright. What's something else you can improve? It's okay that you feel that way, but what's something else you can do in the meantime? Just not being static because they very much spent a lot of time in high school just being static and playing video games and that's not a place I want to go back to. So you know, I can feel how I want about something, but what am I doing in the meantime? And that has been very useful for actually making those things not be as as much of a thing.

0:23:16
So you don't do you find yourself if you're in a situation and you this is this is an issue. I recognize a problem. It is a problem. You more often than not will take action. I would say so. Okay. Like, you They're not somebody to complain and then not take action. At the very least no. Okay. Yeah. Okay.

0:23:32
So you've progressed into Yeah. It took a long time. But very I mean, you know, I'm here at the gym. I've been going to the gym for, like, two years now, three years now. I don't know exactly how long it's been. Well, like, I spent a long time wanting to be, you know, more muscular and stronger. And, you know, it's just at some point, I was just like, alright, you know what? Ian keeps talking about this gym, but I'm just gonna go in. And I think that was like, immediately after COVID lockdown or maybe slightly before. Anyway, but, you know, it was it was around then and it was just like, alright, I'm I've already started at that point, I'd already gone back to get my psych degree. And I was like, alright. Let's just keep going. Let's just find something else to do. And I've just tried to not let that momentum slide the sense. Okay.

0:24:28
So from high school, like post high school, then you kinda had that some recognition of mental health. Mhmm. Oh, what are, like, some big events or big, like, turning points for you as you kinda develop more and more of that awareness and, you know, you're perfectionist. I'm assuming you kinda have an idea, like, This is where some mental health ideal that I'm trying to work towards some day so that, you know, when a bad situation happens, I know I'm gonna always mentally handle the same because I had my mental health under control, but I know I'm not on the wrong stressful day. I'm gonna lose my shit when something snaps. I said I know that even on the worst day, I have enough control to not let myself snap and to let myself stay in an emotionally stable place to make logical decisions and reasonable decisions on things.

0:25:11
When you do you do you feel like there was, like, more events and things that happened in, like, say, like, early twenties that kinda defined that more for you and taught you more? Yeah, definitely. I mean, I made some good friends in college, and that was very helpful for just starting to get the ball rolling on everything? Because as soon as there is some improvement, even just going out, talking to people, hanging out with people regularly. That was I mean, once once you've got momentum, you wanna keep moving. And in terms of, like, specific events. I mean, I feel like everyone finds it motivating to try to impress a girl. Right? Yeah. And so that was a, you know, another big thing get into the gym and and things like that to just try to improve yourself.

0:25:57
In terms of like mental health goals, I don't know if I say I have goals necessarily for my mental health so much as I have goals for how I handle things. Because, like, I don't know I don't know what I don't know what I should feel like when I'm, you know, doing fine. And I don't really know if I want to focus on how I feel, how I should feel. Because I I know that perfectionism is attempting Yeah. And I don't really want to, like, be sitting there being a perfectionist for, like, I need to be happy at all times because this is oh, no. No. No. No. I'm not going there. I know where this ends, but I'd much rather sit there and it's like, alright, if something goes wrong, how do I handle it? Is there a, you know, kind of mindset that I can adopt that will help me deal with things? And just trying to be constructive about that. So it's I'm not necessarily tracking how I'm feeling, so much is how I'm responding to things. And that's definitely helped.

0:27:05
Like, again, I work with autistic kids. There was a lot that will challenge you. Doing that and there's a lot that will test your patience. And I mean, one that's been very good for practicing skills. But I've also never really gotten angry at a client. That's always been something very good at handling just being like, alright, not relevant. Let's stick it in the little nothing box and we'll just keep moving because it's like, okay, this this person's not deliberately taking actions. Against you. And that's generally how I approach people being inconvenient. It's like, alright. If somebody is deliberately lying to me, I I feel totally justified being as angry and, you know, I wouldn't say spiteful. But, you know, I'm definitely not gonna be sympathetic to a lot of your, you know, excuses if you were deliberately lying to me. If can sit there and be like, alright, I understand why this is happening. Even even if you're aligned to me deliberately because it's like you're ashamed of this or something like that. It's like, okay, I I get that. Yeah, it might be irritated. But being irritated is very different from being angry if that makes sense. It does.

0:28:19
Do you find Like, are you generally an empathetic person? Like, you you you find it easy to maybe see people's emotions or no? Because, like, it's one thing to identify emotions. Yeah. Even just leave, like, from a political point of view, you can see somebody say they're anxious to depressed. Yeah. Maybe it's a little different to say, like, I can almost feel the emotion when I see like, look at somebody. Yeah. Do you feel like you get that at all or no? So I feel like I need to split that into two different things. Okay. Like that statement of I can feel the emotion when I look at somebody? No, not at all. I can sit there and work with people who are utterly miserable and I can want to help them and I can spend a lot of time helping them and really like, give my own with that, and then I'll go home and make a pizza. And it's just like, okay, it's fine. I'm I can see the emotions and other people, but that's, like, I did not have good social skills growing up.

0:29:13
Like, I always I always tell people, I learned social skills by watching castle. And that explains a hell of a lot about how I interact with people. But, you know, I very much am like, okay, I know I'm bad at social skills. So let's look at people. Like, what's going on? And I'm sure there's a lot of people at the gym who know that as soon as I'm distracted and talking about something, a lot of the paying attention to social cues goes out the window. But when I'm actually talking to someone when I'm one and it's, you know, a conversation, not me ranting about some sort of a hobby I have.

0:29:52
I'm very deliberately trying to pay attention to things because I know that other it's not my natural inclination to do. So, am I an empathetic person, I wouldn't say naturally. But, I mean, you can make your empathy a skill just like anything else. Yeah. I feel like to a degree. If you're somebody who works in any field that involves dealing with other people and you say, well, I'm just not in aesthetic person. It's like, alright, but then you're not you're not really doing your due diligence here to actually gain the skills for your job. I mean, you might still make it work. You don't need to have empathy. I mean But you can argue that it helps. Yeah. Alfred Ellis proved that you don't need empathy or, you know, you don't need that sort of emotional empathy to be a therapist, but it may help people not stand up and walk out of your clinic when you tell them.

0:30:48
Why do you think that? Yeah. Yeah. You gotta understand a little bit more about how their words are coming from an emotion -- Yeah. -- not a logical place. Yep. Feelings don't care about your facts. So do you feel like some of this stuff came from obviously, every kid is literally a reflection their mom and dad -- Yeah. -- their mom and dad's behavior is just some limit as well as societal and, like, what they've picked up in other ways. But a lot of our underlying things really come down to what we saw our parents do it. Especially, you know, first at zero or three years and how much their nervous system kinda gets imprinted on you. Yeah. So, like, how much you see yourself relating to your mom and dad? I mean, I can obviously, I know your dad. Yeah. And I know you. So I can I can see somebody in relation to your dad -- Yeah? -- and how you guys are similar. I like you to talk about that. Yeah. Similar. Not similar at all. No. But You know, I definitely can see that.

0:31:43
I know some things are maybe the result of when I was born, I don't know how much they'd interacted with children. And I don't know if they see this video, maybe they'll they'll say whether or not they'd ever babysit it or anything like that. But apparently, they'd play a game called j the ticking time bomb. Where they would take me as a baby and put me next to whichever one of them was sleeping. And then my mom had a little sock. That. And I was I was sitting there and I was like, you what what game would you play? She went through the entire little song. It lasted about sixty seconds. And I was like, you remember this. So how many times did you do this? And then I'd start crying and wake up the person I'd be like, oh, no, gee, it's okay. You can sleep. It's like, this may have been important for my development.

0:32:35
But, you know, apart from the amount of experiment I mean, first point, you know, the amount of experimentation is always there. But I also definitely have observed people being very technically oriented, very detail oriented. Not necessarily super outwardly emotive. I mean, yeah, I mean, my my family is not the most emotive unless we're in a one on one. You know, scale. Yeah. Like, you could elicit emotion out of anybody in your family from what they're gonna talk to him long enough for without a doubt. Yeah. When we all sit in a room to get around each other on a Christmas day, oh, yes. Nobody's overly emotive in their -- Yeah. -- how they're acting or being dramatic about anything or like being extra happy and extra oh my god. Yes. You know, everybody's very kind of even feel level Oh, yeah. Level headed. Oh, man. Yeah.

0:33:25
Every time that happens, when I'm around people, I'm always like, What what what's going on? I I don't where did that come from? When I came to your like, when I started coming to family stuff and I started force people to hug me. Like your family didn't know what to do. Yep. Only I'm giving you a hug. I'm giving everybody a hug. I don't care. Yep. My mom's side of the family hugs.

0:33:47
And the first time, like, we went out there to because they're out out on the the West Coast. First time, I went out there and met them and they were like, oh, j, and I was like, What's going on? I was like, six. And I was like, what is it? What are you doing? Where in the West Coast? Is your mom? Oregon. Oregon. Okay. Cool. They're just outside of Portland. I don't think I knew that. Yeah. Like Corbilis. Okay. Portland is a weirder than Portland. So, you know, it's But, you know, yeah, we're not the most hourly, emotionally expressive people.

0:34:21
You know. But so, like, you know, I see in you obviously, you very much have this character that no matter what you you kind of look at things as well no matter what as much as I wanna, you know, you could sit there and sit in that emotion. You wanna move forward. You wanna figure out how to move forward. You wanna figure out how to make things better. That seems to be something very much like instinct in you because through this entire conversation, It seems like no matter what, there's been awareness. And then with that awareness, it has come action. You've always tried to take some level of action or eventually, you know, as you've gotten older here in your twenties, you've learned to take more of that action.

0:34:55
What I would say is the the big change because I know we we talked about it was just trying to not be as much of a perfectionist. Okay. Because the thing that always was holding me back beforehand was knowing how to fix it but not knowing the right choice of how to fix it. Mhmm. Because picking out of a vast number of choices has always been a struggle. And so just being like, alright, you know what? I'm going back and getting a site degree. Is this the right thing? Well, no, I don't know. But I almost did this. When I was there the first time.

0:35:33
And I ended up getting talked out of it basically, which for reasons that made sense at the I don't know if it would have been the right field for me to be in when I was like twenty two. You know, I I don't know if I would have had enough life experience, talked to enough people. I don't think I would have had a large enough, like, network to maintain my own philosophy and thought process towards it, which is important. I shouldn't be going to school and becoming a little clone of my professor. They might be a successful therapist, but that's not me. Yeah. Yeah. But And so in a lot of ways, I don't really regret needing to go back to school and everything. But very much just Now there And then everybody has moments where it's like, is this the right thing?

0:36:26
And earlier, I would have not done it. Because it was like, well, that's not the right choice, which means I need to find something else. And it was always kind of presented to me that it's like, you'll know when you find the right thing. But so far out of everybody I've ever talked to, only Kirk has ever sat there and been like, I know what I'm going to do with my life. So I mean, it's awesome that he did that, but I'm just gonna have to fight through not knowing if this is the right choice and just seeing if I can make it work. Which you know, even like Kirk Kirk says he knows and I and I think it's all like, I don't think anybody truly knows.

0:37:06
I think Kirk has been in it long enough that he knows -- Yeah. -- this is like, there's no part of it that he doesn't like or, you know, like -- Yeah. -- say somebody's in their career for twenty years, twenty years, and they're like, I could tolerate my career, but I don't remember necessarily care for it. Where Kirk's like twenty years and he's like, no. I do like it. I still like working with people. But I don't think it was that came from him knowing. Yeah. And that still came from him just kinda taking a bit of a leap. Oh, yeah.

0:37:27
And it's funny because I think, like, this perfectionist thing is one hundred percent something I struggle with. Oh, yeah. And I I mean, I think I struggle with it. I think everybody's troubled with it. I think -- Yeah. -- the issue is some people struggle with it in a way where we truly want to do the things that we're trying to be perfect about. Yeah. And a lot of people maybe if they're perfection about something, they just will not even try it, they'll give up. Yep. I can't do it. I'm a perfectionist. I don't have this skill that I can't I won't even try to learn it and learn and, you know, pick up this new thing because I just don't have this skill where I think it's more important to be a perfectionist and then recognize it like I just have to take the first step. Yeah. And you kind of you learn about like like taking that first step because Even like doing this podcast, like, I was like, I could I could spend so long getting the perfect equipment doing that, like, should I make this Instructure every episode to make this all perfect so that but I was like, no.

0:38:18
I just like, I wanna do these conversations and I it literally took me just being, like, jump just by a goddamn set of mics just sit down with somebody and record a conversation, which is what I did with Justin for the first one. But my mind hated so much of it until I recorded it. Just this idea, like, I should get a better camera. I should get a better setup. I should make sure that we're not into some ram room. I should get a studio. I should I would all these things that I'm like, I wanna be perfection. And -- Yeah. -- I literally never ever would have started this podcast if I didn't just accept. John just buy a set of mic to start recording. See what happens when I post it. But people don't people never get out of that.

0:38:51
So I think it's so important to learn to be a perfect like, to learn that. Like, it's okay to be a perfectionist as long as you can, like, step back. And it sounds like that's something you maybe learned in your twenties more than I mean, it was it was one of the since I knew the entire time but knowing and accepting -- Yeah. -- is not is not the same thing. Yeah. Yeah. Such a yeah. People can tell you all you want. You know, you just have to pick something, and it's like, slug off. I'm doing the perfect thing.

0:39:19
But I was reminded of one other thing, really, to your earlier question about seeing myself and my parents. One of the things that I find the most fascinating about it is that when it comes to, like, relationships and things, My parents don't really talk to one another in front of me or even my brother. I've seen them hug once. That's that's the sort of relationship they have. They do talk a lot because one of the things I did while I was in college was I'd I'd watch like a TV show with my mom or I'd watch a TV show with my dad. Really, that was kind of when I really started getting close to my parents. And we'd watch something, and then the other one would know about it. And I'd never seen them talk, but, you know, then they started going out on dates. They they did a fantastic job just like communicating about, like, their own relationship issues, things like that. They found solutions they, you know, just decided to go out to eat and go on little dates with just them, you know, multiple times a week just because they were like, okay. Well, we we wanna feel closer, but I have never seen them really have an emotional station with one another. They just It's all something that happens behind closed doors. And I can very much see that in terms of I'm a pretty open guy. Put me in a room with four people and I'm not a very open guy. Put me here and I can talk just fine.

0:40:55
Well, so, like, for your parents, your mom came from a family that was a huggard. So, like, oh, yes. What's your opinion about? Obviously your dad's side of family isn't, so your mom's side of family was. Why do you think they kind of didn't? I would I would have guessed your mom would have tried to maybe force more emotional conversations, because I could see your dad not wanting to have an emotional conversation, but your mom being like, you know, I'm like, no. Look. We'll talk about some stuff. Like, we'll bring it up or I mean, I feel like they they compromised by just being like, alright, you don't want to have these conversations in a public place. We have plenty of time to talk in a way that isn't in front of kids. And so they can they can go do that. It's one of those things that I kind of recognize now, not growing up. Growing up, I just was like, okay, these are my parents. I don't I'm really gonna question it. And it'll be weird when you, like, would go over to a friend's house and their parents would, like, Oh, I'm heading out, honey, and she'd give her husband a kiss on the cheek and leave, and I'll be like, I was very open. That's like That's kinda normal.

0:41:57
What do you think like, do you think that people view obviously, people view relationships with the opposite sex based their their own parents' relationship. That's not the first relationship with c, the biggest one that gets him printed on us. Yeah. Do you think people like like, do you think people assume that their parents marriage? Like, do you think everybody wants to have a different marriage than their parents had when they made a significant other? Do you think people Do you think that can vary depending on how what kind of marriage their parents had?

0:42:27
I Part part of me wants to say that I'm, like, I would guess, like, a lot of kids wanna do diff than their parents? Because they think they could do better or whatever. Yeah. So I think so I I mean, I feel like there's two very different sides to that depending on how someone's childhood went. Like, if you had a miserable childhood with parents who, you know, didn't do the things that they needed to do, I can, you know, you probably and you going, I wanna have a different marriage to my parents is probably a good thing. You know, if if they did not fulfill some of the things that they're supposed to be doing. If they did do a good job, I think the healthy thing is to say, I want that. But I wanna polish it up a little bit.

0:43:12
Like, going back to the perfectionism thing, it's it's not about doing perfect. It's about doing better. And so looking there, it's like, alright, if if I was looking at, you know, the kind of the kind of marriage I wanna have, no, I don't wanna be talking about emotional stuff. In front of my kids because I mean I want them to know what's going on and know that see healthy examples of how to navigate it But if it's something that's not gonna be constructive for the kids by all means, have that conversation away from them. It's the same thing as like when you're talking to kids about like what you're going to do and say, I disagree with something that my wife has said, or she disagrees with something. I said, I'm probably not gonna just contradict them in front of the kids. I'm gonna be like, Yeah. Okay. That's an idea, and we'll we'll talk about it later. And when we come back and if we've decided something different, we'll we'll come back and say, oh, you know what? We changed our minds here because it's like, we should be kind of presenting as a united front that talks to one another. That's that sort of thing.

0:44:17
So the I mean, the only thing I'd really add is a little bit more, you know, emotional, obvious emotional intimacy in front of kids. Just so they get more of an example of that. Well, he talked a lot about, like, a lot of things, like, being emotional in front of your kids, like, in a marriage, You don't wanna you obviously don't wanna fight. You obviously don't wanna argue if there's something actually wrong, and it's more of an adult conversation. You know, but you don't wanna have it in front of the kids.

0:44:43
But what do you think about the opposite side of, like, positive emotions? Or do you think, like, your parents, do you do you wish Or do you think at all that? Like, you that you'd add could have showed more positive emotion? Or do you never feel like that was something you you want, like, you desire to see out of him? Like, I mean, it's one of those things where I mean, maybe maybe this is just me, but I feel like I do see a lot of positive emotion about them. But I also, that's just because we're we're all pretty subtle and we're we're not just how we communicate. You understand your dad's. Yeah. You mean your dad is positively emotional. You know it compared to where somebody else might be like, oh, it doesn't seem like he's showing like, no. No. My dad's very happy right now. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

0:45:19
If you're sitting there and you give him a Christmas gift, and he opens it and he's completely silent and he's looking at it and he's like, oh, That is like the best response because it's like, I could I could sit there and be like, thank you. But this is distracting. This is cool. I can I can, like, I can see your dad as a past Christmas is now, like -- Yeah? -- the gift he's like, he's like, oh, oh, wow. This is all. Like, yeah. Yeah. He does show it. Yeah. And it's like, this is this is really open, but, you know, it I mean, it doesn't need to necessarily be loud.

0:45:50
At the same time, like, when it comes to open displays of emotion, I think the the more useful thing is just more of like, showing kids how to interact with other people. Like, I definitely did not learn how to interact with the opposite sex for my parents. Because they handle all of that behind closed doors. Okay. Again, I've seen them hug once. And as soon as I rounded that corner, they immediately let go of one another, and we're now standing like three feet apart again. And I I was amused by it, but, you know, it's that sort of thing. It's like, I've, you know, I've figured out my own strategies, but at the same time, I pretty much figured out my own strategies through trial and and having some degree of a guide here might have been helpful.

0:46:42
Did you watch a lot of TV when you were younger? I watched a decent amount. Okay. Kieranie, that's one thing, like, big difference when we talk about our childhood. She did really didn't sound like she watched much TV. Like they really did not put on the TV very often. They they maybe watched like a movie at night as a family of, you know, but like they she would not watch like sitcoms, like, the way I grew up watching, like, And I I say this because there's so many interactions I think you learn from your parents, but I also feel like anything I didn't see in my parents that I wanted I I I learned to pick up the things I wanted that and see my parents from watching TV.

0:47:17
Yeah. And then almost like learning how maybe I would interact with women or the opposite sex or even with friends or teachers or whatever. I I'd almost like pick up these interactions from watching TV -- Yeah. -- because I didn't see my parents have those direct interactions, especially because if that had, like, a less stereotypical upbringing of, like, not less American upbringing than -- Yeah. -- to try to then interact a little bit at teenage American life I didn't have like this -- Yeah. -- history to pull back on and even questions with my parents to ask them about where I didn't rely on like the signals I watched and the TV I watched and how much that related to the social life I lived around me. Yeah. How was that effect for you? So it's interesting that you say that because I I definitely watched more TV than Kearny. I'm not I'm not a big movie person. So it's Okay. I love movies too. I was like, I watch TV and movies all the time when I was a kid. But I'd never watch sitcoms. Okay.

0:48:07
And, like, to me, I need a plot. And, like, I can watch an episode of Seinfeld, and it's like, cool. That was fun. You wanna watch the next episode? I mean, yeah, I don't know if you wanna watch the next episode. I I can enjoy it, but there's nothing that makes me want to watch. The next episode. So that's why I joke that I learned social skills from Castle.

0:48:28
Like, I watched a lot of cop shows growing up because there was you know, you knew kind of the the arc that each each episode was gonna have a plot that would attract you to it. Like, the most pivotal shows growing up or with things like Justice League and Avatar Last Airbender. Right? Or it's because they had, you know, they had their daily episodes, but then they also had a, you know, a strong plot that made you go, but what happens next? But none of those shows really focus on, like, the simple day to day social dynamics. So I don't think it helped me as much as, like, it might have helped you in terms of just like getting normal examples of what things are kind of supposed to be like. I don't even know if I would say it helped as much as maybe it almost set unrealistic expectations of -- Yeah. -- I need to join the football team to be a football star, to get more girls to talk to me, you know. Yeah. Like, it was almost negative in that sense because I would watch a TV show where the football star got the high school Varsity cheerleader's talk. You know? Yeah. So it was not necessarily a an overly positive example. It was almost some of the negative expectations of society that puts out -- Yeah. -- it got translated through that a lot. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So then Okay.

0:49:42
So, like, you what Castle, you watch that in high school? Or It was, like, high school. I yeah. Late late high school, probably, I'm trying to remember these active years here. The first three seasons, you know, and we don't talk about it after the Ryder strike. But, you know, the you know, those first three seasons, that was probably, like, really when I sat down to like actually going, alright, I have terrible social skills. What can I do about this to improve? Where's where's something that I can start trying to pick things up? Like, I've always taken the the stance of, like, if something's too big of a hill to, you know, climb, what's Let's break it up into smaller chunks. Like just Alright. Here's Castle. Let's just watch it.

0:50:30
And how does the main character, like, talk to people does he tease them? Like, what what sort of things like that? Okay. I'm already kind of sarcastic. I already like to tease people. You know, I'm an older brother. I can pretty savage. So it's like, how can I incorporate this in a way that's useful?

0:50:49
For social interaction. It's not necessarily good for, you know, making friends out of the blue. Although, from my experience, the best way to make friends is just treat people as if they already are. And then you just kind of stack home syndrome into being your friend. But just kind of focusing on that. Like, how do people carry themselves? How do people talk? You know, Do you feel like you're like, this idea that you think like you're you have bad social skills, is that does that just come from you feeling like you were trying to fit into how other people's other people acted because, like, I don't even you know, I don't necessarily think you lack social skills. So so when when you say you lack social skills, I I wonder does that come from a place of, like, it's different than that because you also you don't care what you don't necessarily hear what people think either. Yeah. But then you're kinda maybe putting yourself in a box of I should I should be able to behave this way or I should be able to pick up in this queue that other people picked up on. But it -- Yeah. -- is I don't necessarily miss you lacking on the ability to pick up a queue as much as just your it's personality differences. Right? Yeah.

0:51:58
It is like one of the things that I noticed early on when I was in high school. Was that I got along generally better with the students from, like, India or Pakistan. And the students from, like, the foreign exchange students from Hong Kong. And that just felt like a little bit let me my parents definitely they don't necessarily think about face, but like that that concept of like you kind of representing people and your family was something that just is like, oh, that makes sense. And, you know, having a little bit more of that I don't know, countenance maybe. Was something that fit better, but at the same time, I was also very aware that, like, I didn't When I say I didn't have social skills, I mean, I did not have great social skills at the time. I've I've gotten a lot better and just gotten more used to social interaction. So it was one of those things where it's like Okay.

0:53:02
A personality difference is yes, but, like, I also should try to meet people halfway because I can't expect somebody else just to get my personality. And if a lot of the students that I'm interacting with, think I'm kind of weird and strange. Like, that's Like, I don't care that they think I'm odd, but at the same time, I should try to meet them halfway because this is something that could be a problem later on. Yeah. Because, look, you don't wanna be a long wolf who says, nobody gets along with my personality. I'm never gonna put in an effort to get along with me. Yeah. It's like, cool. I can keep my personality, but, like, Okay. I'd like to have more friends. So what's the first step? Well, I can sit here and be like, well, people need to meet me. And it's like, okay, but I can't demand the people meet me if I'm not going to try to meet them. Right? Yeah.

0:53:59
It's interesting because I think, like, the high school and security that you will have in high school, you basically carry for the rest of your life. Even even if you've dealt with the thing that wasn't secured, it still becomes like a little bit of a crutch. So, you know, for you, like, it sounds like you felt like you had you lacked social skills and even if, like, now now the j a, I know, is the j a, I think your social skills are better. I obviously didn't know you in high school. They're probably much worse. I probably would have told you, oh, yeah. Your Yes. Oh, You believe me. They were worse. But, you know, so, like, now it's obvious it still becomes a thing that's you're gonna always kinda default to or think back on him. Almost, like, your brain wants to think of it as, like, this is a default character train of mind.

0:54:40
I -- Yeah. -- bad social skills. Even as much as you progress and gone through it -- Yeah. What do you think like do you think there's any solution to that? Because I think like you you get so many kids where high school could be, like, a traumatic, like, experience. Not traumatic as I'm, like, it's literally traumatic, but, like -- Yeah. -- it was a struggle. Socially, it was a struggle. They Maybe they wanted more friends and they didn't get more friends. But a lot of people like that, enough honesty doing fine with their adults. It's just -- Yeah.

0:55:06
-- how often those I feel like people in their adults wish they could go back to their high school stuff and be like, dude. Oh, yeah. Like, don't stress about that stuff. I know I can't tell you not to, but at the same time, I wish I could just tell you not to stress about the stuff that you're stressing about because So many things equalize when you're an adult. Oh, yeah. So many things equalize when you're just somebody who walks into a room and nobody knows anybody because there isn't middle school and high school years of experience and social life to talk Yeah. You know, add context to every single thing that's happening. Instead, Nope. I'm just an adult walking into a room with other adults.

0:55:36
I don't give a shit how popular or not popular. We're in high school. Can you do the thing that we're all here to do or Or, you know, do we all get along? Is there a piece between us? Great. That's all that matters. You know? Yeah. What's it like? Kinda what's your opinion on how people, like, deal with that? And Like, would you Your own experience of growing from that? Yeah. I I think that you'll you'll probably always have it there.

0:56:01
But the goals for having it not be impacting your functioning. Like, I can sit there and think I don't have great social And if that motivates me to pay attention to people and that gives me good social skills, then it doesn't really matter if I think that. As long as it's not actually holding me back, and it's not saying it's weighing me down. Okay. Like, I I take a very functional approach it. Yeah. I don't care that this is happening because what is it?

0:56:33
There's an old, like, Buddhist proverb of three monks who all are in chronic pain. One says, you know, I refuse to accept this pain and he's miserable because he's in pain. The other one says, I accept this pain and then he scrapes at the heavens because he's like, I accepted it. Why won't you take it away and he's in pain? And the last month says, I accept this pain and he just was in pain for the rest of his life, but he'd accepted it. And it's like, alright, I don't have social skills. If I can get to the point where I'm like, okay, whatever. I don't have great social skills and here are the things I'm doing to, you know, fix it. It doesn't really matter as long as it's not something that I'm feeling down about and it's not something that actually matters or poses an obstacle in my life.

0:57:18
I'm not going to continue to try to try to strive for perfection, like, even even to an agreementally because it's like, we're gonna be here all day and past a certain point, you just need to live your life. So I don't like I feel like people doing that is how you end up going to the same therapist for like ten years. Because it's like, I, there's always something else that I could do to work on. And it's like, Okay. But are you good enough? Because nobody's nobody's perfect. Are you functional? Are you happy? Not necessarily all the time, but you're happy most of the time. You can still sit there and be like, oh, goddamn. That was so that was some bad social skills right there when you'd like get distracted or something. But is there gonna be something that weighs you down? If it's not something that weighs you down, just move on and it's good.

0:58:07
So a lot of it kind of start started for you and you think it's just started for you with wood acceptance. Like at a certain level there, like, accepting yourself for who you are and the way you are and if you like, you have a fault. Recognize us that fault, but, like, don't don't think I have to I have to change. I can change. I can work to change. Mhmm. But, you know, it's not having to change doesn't become this like -- Yeah. -- I want to change. Yeah. I I don't need to. And that, you know, if I need to change and there's a whole bunch of other stuff that I need to do, well, all of a sudden anytime those things brush up against one another, you're stuck. As opposed to I want to change. I want to have better social skills. What am I willing to give up? Oh, do I sit at home and play video games all the time? Well, can probably get better social skills if I stop doing that. So I don't need to do either one, but I want social skills more. This is now a this is now a thing that I can choose to do. Okay. So kinda like to wrap all this up.

0:59:09
Accept I really like this idea of acceptance, I think, is so huge in this one. I've talked about in the past, and I feel like there's so much more to talk about with it. But acceptance sounds like a sounds like a verb, right, to accept. Yeah. But how do you attach actionable tips to that? How do you how do you tell somebody like, Well, like, you have to accept this thing, but obviously -- Yeah. -- it's like tough time, like, just do it. Well, you can't just do it. Where where where do you think you would start with telling somebody to learn to accept them. What are actionable steps you think somebody could take or maybe ones that you've taken yourself? I think the biggest thing is to break it down.

0:59:44
So if somebody is sitting there and they're like, I'm not attractive because I'm short or or whatever. Well, probably it's not just that you're sitting there. It's like I'm not attracted because I'm short. Now, you might not be taking any care of your appearance because you feel like you're not attractive, because you're short, but it'd be like, alright, your premise is that you're not attractive. So what are some things that you can do that would increase your attractiveness? And you can sit there and be like, but I'm short and no one cares. And I was like, we'll start moving on that.

1:00:16
On some other aspect because that may still be there. And you might still think, well, I'm short. I mean, I am. But, you know, it's one of those things where, alright, I'll take a little bit more pride in my parents. How am I gonna dress? Well, I can, you know, wear a flannel all the time, like a standard ishi white guy. But, you know, whatever. It looks fine, so I'm not gonna worry about it too much. Besides, it's kind of unique because I don't see anybody doing it. It's too boring and normal for everyone to do. So now it's unique. But like just what looks good? Do a little bit of research into how you can dress? How can you style your beard? How can you, you know, go get a haircut. Just things like that, go to the gym, like, work on your weight, work on, you know, stuff like that.

1:01:08
If you want, like, to be attractive, a lot of people find somebody who's making money and has a career attractive. So make it stable. Like just work on all those other aspects of the things you're worried about. And eventually, you're going to have evidence that's like, okay, maybe this this thing didn't matter as much. I might still worry about it. But I also have direct evidence that it didn't matter. So acceptance is actually what you're saying is not It's not the egg before the chicken. The chicken almost has to come before the egg because you have had to have done some work to learn that maybe I have this one quality that's bad, but I I could put on all this work on the things I can't control. Yeah. And once you learn that there's other things you can't control, that's when the acceptance set in for you?

1:02:02
To me, acceptance is born out of momentum. You can't accept things when you're static. Okay. Sitting down and saying, I've done nothing but I accept this. It's like that's not how it works because you're not changing anything about your life. Like you need to be changing in order to change something about how your views are. Yeah. Yeah. So it's you know, you can you can go on, you know, take talk or whatever and, you know, try to accept stuff about yourself, but I don't think that's going to work. At least not really. You're gonna need to find something to change about your It might not even be something that's like related, but just pick something where you can look at it and say, I improve my life. And I did something that changes, even if it's just a tiny bit, how the thing that I'm self conscious about might be perceived. And that's going to be the big helper, I guess.

1:02:57
Action causes momentum. Momentum will eventually lead to acceptance and -- Yeah. Probably leads in the more momentum and the more acceptance. Yeah. So it's it's very much just, like, active effort. Yeah. Right? That's all. And I'm guessing you would agree it's a nonstop active effort. It doesn't really ever go away. If you wanna continue to accept and learn to continue accepting this thing. Yes. Would you agree that if once that effort goes away, maybe the action stops, your acceptance will probably go back, and you'll, like, unaccept something to, like, You know what I mean? Yeah. I don't know if it would ever go back to where you were, but I could definitely see it becoming a problem again. Like, slip back a little bit at least. Yeah. Yeah. It's Yeah.

1:03:38
I mean, part of it is part of my own philosophy is how I've kind of dealt with my own perfectionism where it's like I no longer aim to do the perfect thing. I aim to do better than the last time, every single time I try. So that, you know, leads to, you know, the acceptance and coming from from movement. Right? Because, you know, if you're trying to do it better than every time you try, that inherently requires you to try again. Yeah. Yeah. But if you are somebody who's like static, that's my thought process there is that's why you need to break down the problem.

1:04:12
If you're sitting there and it's like, I'm not attracted because of my height, Okay. Let's let's break down those two statements because those are two separate things. There's a lot of things people find attractive. So if you're saying a blanket statement, I'm not attractive and your height is a portion of that. It's the part that you're probably focusing on, but that Initial statement might be able to be broken down into five or six different things, and it could be as simple as GoShave. So it's like their realization that how much a statement can over encompass too many things -- Yeah. -- but you attach to it so much. Yep. But you break it apart and you're like, well, okay. There's -- Yeah. -- one little part of it. And, again, it goes back to There's other aspects I can't control and then aspect I can't control.

1:04:56
I can shave my face. I can wear something a little nicer. I can make sure my hair gets done. Yeah. Yeah. But only only shave if your face looks good without a beard. Otherwise, just, you know, style it. Otherwise, this baby face. Yes. Yeah.

1:05:08
On the other hand, we'll be the ones laughing in, like, twenty years. People just be able to take fifteen years off just by shaving. I know. Right? Yeah. Probably not, because then I'm gonna have the funky tagline there in my face too. A little bit. Yeah. A little bit. Yeah. But no.

1:05:23
That's great. I I mean, I think that's great advice. And I think that's advice that a lot of people could use and feed into because acceptance is definitely it's it's a word that could get thrown around, but what does it mean? What does it how do you start to accept? And I think what you just said there is great action leading the momentum and the momentum is that's gonna lead you to lead you to that acceptance ultimately. I think that's such a a great statement. That's such a great thing that a lot of people could really apply to their lives.

1:05:50
Well, thank you so much for being on the episode today, this was a great conversation and it was great to kind of hear a little bit more about your own struggle and your own journeys that you've gone through and obviously, I see it in front of me here, a man who is obviously, like, you've done some work and I see a lot of polished upness about you that obviously I didn't know you in high school. So I I can't compare completely, but it's it's great to hear that you have done a lot of this work. And from what I know about you, you know, I've I've seen you change even just appeared I've seen you. Thank you. I've known you. You've improved and you continue to get better. So, yeah, this is a great journey and thank you again for being on. Yeah. Thank you guys for tuning in to another episode of Unterran Stones. If you enjoyed this episode, please like and subscribe. Otherwise, thank you, and have a great rest of your day. Have a nice day, guys. Awesome. Well, thank you, sir. I appreciate you being on this. Yeah. Yeah.