Letting Go Of Clutter In Your Life Podcast

This is a podcast about how to kindly and gently let go of the clutter in your life. It's about becoming aware that you are sacred and your things are not. The outside world is constantly telling us what is right for us, but when we take the time to curiously and tenderly look into our hearts, we can sense and know what truly serves us and what doesn't.

This podcast encourages you to take that look. You are worth it!

Brooks Palmer, professional clutter buster and bestselling author of Clutter Busting: Letting Go of What's Holding You Back, is joined in this podcast by his co-host and good friend, Gregory Gardner

Transcript

Welcome to the first podcast.

Welcome to the first podcast of Letting Go of What's Holding You Back.

Clutterbusting.

It's something like that or,

You know,

A different name if we come up with it as we go along.

And I'm here with my really good friend Gregory Gardner,

Who I've known since I was 16.

And this is officially the first show.

And hello,

Gregory.

Welcome.

Thank you,

Brooks.

Thanks for having me.

And,

You know,

Am I a guest or am I a regular on this show?

That's,

You know,

I'm feeling like I want to be a regular on this show.

Well,

You know what,

We're going to send out to test market.

See how that goes.

Focus group type of thing.

Yeah,

Yeah.

Okay.

We have 125 people that are actually watching this right now listening to it.

And they're all like pressing yes or no every 10 seconds.

No,

I would love to have you on regularly.

Oh,

That would be nice.

You know,

Until of course,

I spin off and get my own show.

Yeah,

When you become a hit.

Which,

Well,

You know,

Which,

Which I'm looking forward to doing.

But tonight,

I'm really excited.

You know,

This is a date I've been looking forward to for a long time.

This is the first podcast that I've done.

And I think that you're going to be a wonderful podcast host.

I think that the things that you have to say,

You know,

And have been saying for many,

Many years,

Is very healing,

Very helpful,

And uplifting.

And the books that you've written,

The shows that you've acted on and produced,

You do Fred,

You put out record albums.

And this is another outlet for you.

But you're just a creative genius,

In my opinion,

A wonderful painter.

And I think that this is just perfect for you.

So I'm excited to be a part of it.

Oh,

Thank you.

That's very kind.

I was on the verge of firing myself.

But now that you said all that,

I feel like I'm going to keep myself as the host.

Well,

You can keep yourself as the host,

I would certainly do that.

I might fire you as the technical advisor.

But,

You know,

We,

You know,

We do what we do.

We're using some wonderful software.

And I think that after our first pilot episode,

Things will get really smooth.

Yeah,

Yeah.

So we'll see.

We'll see how it goes.

And anyway,

Clutter,

Right?

Clutterbusting is something I used to do full time.

Actually,

I don't do it anymore.

But I do give talks about it.

Because the work itself actually got me really sick.

The nature of going into people's homes,

Sometimes places can be really toxic.

So I decided,

After having actually a double lung transplant,

As a result of what happened,

My lungs getting really sick.

I decided for my well being to just give talks.

I think that's because I want to be around,

You know,

Like,

I like being around,

I like,

I like being alive.

But I also like talking about letting go of what doesn't serve you anymore.

And if you go out into the world,

There's a million voices telling you what you should do.

And from so many different sources.

And it's,

It's actually rarely ever and probably never hear encouragement to ask yourself,

What do you like?

What don't you like?

Does something serve you or not?

And that's the whole point of this is just to get you to take a look inward.

You know,

To turn off the voices around you,

You know,

Step away from that,

And listen to what you feel.

You know,

You mentioned that clutter was very toxic to you.

Isn't that the nature of clutter?

Can you talk about that a little bit?

Well,

Toxic?

Yeah,

I mean,

It can be physically toxic,

Which it was to me,

Because I breathed in a lot of mold and,

You know,

Old,

Rancid food and animal,

You know,

Feces and urine,

And just mildew and stuff over a period of time.

So there's the physical aspect,

Plus the dust is really bad.

There's something about clutter that amasses dust,

It's like a magnet for dust.

And so it starts to pile up,

And then you're,

You know,

Circulates into the air and you're breathing it.

So there's that.

But there's also the psychological and the spiritual aspect,

Which is how things affect you just by their presence.

You know what I mean?

Like,

You know how it is,

If you,

If you're listening to some music,

Of a band that you really like,

And it feels great.

It's like,

I feel really happy.

And then you hear a song from a band that you don't like at all,

That really bothers you.

And it's like,

Oh,

Your whole body tenses up,

You feel very uncomfortable.

And that's how it is with things that don't serve us.

But thing is,

We can get so overwhelmed in life that we don't even notice that anymore,

Because we just feel tense all the time.

And then we get used to it.

And we suffer as a result.

And we think,

What's wrong with me,

You know,

And we try to find all these different solutions.

But it's really like the thorn in the paw.

Until the thorn gets removed,

It's gonna hurt to hold on to anything,

To do anything.

So clutter can be more than just,

Say,

Old newspapers lying in the corner or bags of old clothes that are sitting around.

What other kinds of things can clutter be that people don't even think about?

Well,

Yeah,

What you're saying before,

Those are like the cliche things that people think of.

And they often tell me,

Like,

Did you ever hear that story about that person who they found,

Like,

Dead amongst their stuff,

And there was piles of newspapers everywhere,

You know,

And old magazines.

So I think that anything can be clutter.

Anything,

And actually any activity.

And it could be a person.

It could be something that is in great working order,

That,

You know,

The New York Times says this is the best thing in the world,

Or somebody,

You know,

Like,

It's on the bestseller list,

You have to read this book,

Or,

You know,

It can come from,

Like,

The popularity of this thing can make you think like,

Oh,

It's going to be good for me.

But everybody has a different nature.

Advertising is constantly telling us that there's something wrong with us,

That we're not okay as we are.

So we need something to make ourselves better.

So we just bring these things in because we're,

We get tricked into thinking that.

And then we don't question our things,

We question ourselves.

Again,

It comes back to,

This is all about coming back to yourself.

And,

And the willingness,

The compassion,

The kindness,

To begin to listen to your,

Your own pulse,

Rather than the world's pulse.

And it,

I've seen it happen numerous times.

When I used to go in to help people,

I'd start asking them questions about their things.

At first,

They were all stressed,

And it was really hard for them to even consider that because it seemed sacrilege to question their stuff.

But then to,

To actually,

You know,

Hand someone their jacket,

And I said,

Do you like wearing this jacket?

Does it feel good to you today?

You know,

And,

And then and then once starts to narrow down one thing at a time,

People actually,

That,

That discrimination,

Discriminating ability kicks in again.

And,

And they come back to themselves.

It's very fast,

You know,

Once you take,

Once you look in that direction.

So the clutter isn't necessarily perhaps the actual stuff.

Perhaps it's the thoughts and the feelings that people have about the stuff.

What's your relationship with this stuff?

You know,

And at some point,

You know,

It was like,

Like,

When I was a kid,

I had friends that we used to go play in the playground,

It was like,

We had a great time.

And here I am all these years later.

And I don't know any of those people when I was like in elementary school,

You know,

But they were like really good friends back then.

I have really good friends now,

You know,

So things come and go.

And,

You know,

Of what,

What serves you,

And what serves you in the past,

Oftentimes won't serve you in the future,

For most cases.

So it's really requesting your relationship with everything,

But not as a whole,

Like,

Okay,

I'm gonna,

It's really just one thing at a time.

Thinking about it all at one time,

It's overwhelming.

One thing at a time is doable.

So you really just,

You know,

It's like if they gave you a plate of food,

And I said,

Here,

Taste this and see if you want to eat it.

And it's like,

Oh,

Yeah,

This is good.

Or like,

Oh,

I hate this.

You're looking at how you feel about things today.

And that's,

This is all this is,

Is an encouragement to take a look.

And it doesn't have to all be taken care of,

All gone through to feel better.

You know,

I look around my house,

And I see so many different things,

Wherever I look,

Things that I purchased,

Or found or been given,

But mostly purchased over the years with the idea that it would fix me,

That it would bring me some kind of joy.

But more than just joy,

That it would fix something inside of me that felt broken or felt less than I needed to add that to myself to my being in order to be a better person.

And yet,

None of it,

You know,

That feeling of longing to find something outside of myself to fix me is still there.

All this stuff didn't do the trick.

Yeah,

Because it won't.

Because it's not you.

I mean,

What's sacred is you,

Your stuff isn't.

That doesn't mean you can't enjoy your stuff,

Or it can't be useful to you.

But your stuff comes and goes.

You're what's always here.

So the stuff is temporary.

I mean,

It may be with you for 30 years,

But it's still temporary.

And it's really hard to get past that initially,

Because we've all been tricked as a society to believe that we're not enough.

I mean,

Advertising is really powerful.

They use the top understandings of psychology,

They spend millions and millions of dollars to understand how to use psychology to make you feel bad about yourself.

You know,

I saw a commercial once for it was like,

Some kind of soda,

I think was Sprite.

And this guy was sitting in a room and he was all dark in the room.

And he was obviously depressed,

You could tell by the actor,

You know,

He's just,

And the music was low and stuff.

And these three young people came in,

And they had light around them,

You know,

They're all glowing.

And they came in,

And they gave him the Sprite that was lit from within.

It was like some kind of fountain of youth,

You know,

And he drank it.

And all of a sudden,

He had the lights emanating out of him.

And there was this joy and the music picked up,

You know,

And the actor's smiling.

I really think that's how advertising is presented to us.

You're not enough,

This will do it.

You know,

And,

And it's,

It's,

It's everywhere.

I mean,

It's the latest iPhone,

It's social media with likes and dislikes.

It's everywhere you look,

There's this feeling of,

If you if you just do this,

This will,

You'll finally be fulfilled,

You know.

And it's a lie,

Because otherwise,

We wouldn't,

We wouldn't have the clutter situation.

And we feel like content with ourselves,

You know,

Naturally.

And it causes actual physical sickness,

Not to mention spiritual and emotional sickness.

But that translates to physical sickness.

Sometimes.

I know that you've helped a lot of people over the years that once they got rid of,

You know,

Whatever physical outlays they thought were the symptom of their problems,

Some of their physical bodily symptoms went away as well.

Can you talk about that?

Yeah,

Well,

There's the thing about clutter is it has a stagnant quality to it.

If you're,

If you have something in your life that doesn't give you pleasure,

That you're not interacting with and enjoying,

It creates a heaviness,

A stagnant feeling.

And the thing is,

We're vitality machines.

We're filled with life.

We're coursing with energy.

You know,

Our nerves are constantly firing,

There's blood circulating like rapids through our entire body,

Our hearts,

Our hearts always beating,

We're constantly breathing in and out.

You know,

We're having thoughts,

We're picking up sensations,

We're like a living thing,

You know,

A true living thing.

And,

And if we're surrounded by things that have dead energy,

Then that has a way of like slowing,

Slowing down our physiology,

Our health,

You know,

It compromises us to be around the presence of that,

You know.

And so just when that when,

When we begin to let those things go,

There's a relief that comes in,

Because it's like we've been buried alive under stuff,

Even though it's not literally on top of us,

Just the presence of it is,

Is debilitating.

And as if,

Like,

Again,

Like we're being held down.

And so as each thing goes,

You get a piece of yourself back,

A weight is removed from you.

And you could,

It could be seen in either better sense of well being or better feeling of like,

Contentment.

Or it could be like,

There's some health issues that were a problem for a while that begin to like,

Abate,

You know,

Begin to find themselves,

You know,

Lessening or removing,

You know,

Possibly.

I say all this as an incentive to take a look,

Because until you take a look,

Nothing happens.

This is all encouragement to begin to look around and begin question.

And again,

Not just stuff,

It could be like,

What are the activities I do in my life?

You know?

And,

You know,

You can ask that about everything that you do.

Do I enjoy what you know,

You look,

You think of the things you do and go,

Do I do I enjoy doing this?

I mean,

Maybe you used to in the past,

But now you don't.

Or maybe you never did,

But you think you should,

Because other people are,

You know?

Like,

I really like rock and roll.

And I like Rolling Stones,

ZZ Top,

But never really been a fan of Led Zeppelin.

But every once in a while I think,

Yeah,

I should give them a try again,

You know,

And then I'll put them on and I'll be like,

That's just,

That's not for me,

You know?

But I still feel that pull to like,

Well,

It seems like a lot of people really love them,

You know?

So you begin to actually be honest with yourself in the questioning,

You know?

Again,

Like if you had a plate of food and you're eating it,

Does this feel good?

I've had people go through their old CDs,

Or even MP3s on their computer or their phone,

And go through all their songs,

Go through their albums.

And people are often surprised,

Like,

Yeah,

I don't really care for that anymore.

They used to really like it,

Or they bought it because they thought they should,

Or someone gave it to them as a gift.

But again,

It's the willingness to question because you're not questioning yourself,

Like,

Should I still be around or not?

It's the things around you,

You know?

And you're allowed to do that.

It's not,

It's not,

Again,

You're more valuable than your things.

So they have to prove their value to you.

Like they're on a witness,

They're on trial,

And the defense attorney is asking them questions,

You know?

That's you.

Yeah,

What if,

You know,

Let's talk about somebody that might have,

Let's just say,

For instance,

A picture of a parent,

Maybe that parent is no longer with them,

Hanging on the wall.

It's not necessarily up because the person misses them and loves them.

And let's look at it could be the opposite.

There could be some real difficulty in that relationship that gets triggered when somebody glances at that picture,

And yet they feel like they need to leave it up out of obligation.

And this goes on every time you pass the picture,

You're triggering something that could be toxic and emotionally or in many ways.

Yeah,

Well,

If it hurts you,

It's toxic.

And a constant repetition of hurt builds up and it's a real wallop on you,

You know,

Really takes its toll.

But again,

You don't,

Relationships are just as much are important to question just as much as your stuff and your activities.

And it doesn't mean,

Like,

Because there's this thing like,

Oh,

We're not supposed to,

You know,

It's hard to find friends,

Or it's hard to find people to be close to,

Or it's family,

We can't,

We have to spend time with them,

Or,

You know,

It's like,

No,

You question everything.

Because you want to find out how it feels,

Like,

You can go through your phone and go through your contacts,

And look at each person go,

Do I enjoy talking to this person or not?

And then take a moment,

How does it feel?

If I was talking to that person right now,

How would it feel?

You might be surprised,

You know?

I've seen a lot of people like go through your phone and eliminate a good amount of context,

Because when you actually take the time to look and see how the relationship with that person,

It's not that the person is bad.

It's just that the relationship doesn't suit you.

That's for you,

You know,

Or it does.

You're looking to see which one it is.

And it's okay to let somebody go that you don't,

That their presence in your life hurts you.

You've written a book that many,

Many people know and love.

Clutter,

Your first book about clutter busting,

The art of letting go of what's holding you back.

Letting go of what's holding you back.

But then you wrote a follow up book about relationships.

Can you talk a little bit about that for people that may not have heard about this book?

Yeah,

It's called Clutter Busting Your Life,

Clearing Physical and Emotional Clutter to Reconnect with Yourself and Others.

And I wrote it because when the first book came out,

I started giving talks at bookstores for book signings.

And people were asking me a lot of questions.

And there were a number of questions that there were things that weren't in the book,

The first book.

And so,

Oftentimes,

They had to do with relationships.

With people.

And so,

It really gets into like,

Looking at how does,

How am I affected by this person being in my life?

You know,

It is if you eat some food,

And,

And you don't feel well afterwards.

It's like,

Oh,

All right.

You know,

It's just,

I don't feel very good.

That's what I was looking at.

It's like,

Yeah,

After I spent time with this person,

How do I feel?

Maybe you feel great,

Buoyant,

You feel good about yourself.

You know,

Or you feel drained,

Tired,

You feel bad about yourself that that's clutter,

You know,

And maybe sometimes there are,

You know,

Perhaps if that's the case,

But you you're still unsure.

We could talk with the person and see if there's something that just needs to be talked about,

You know,

Some discussion that needs to be had.

And if a person is a supportive person,

They'll,

They'll listen to what you have to say.

And then they'll,

They'll have an honest talk with you.

But if they get really angry about it,

Like,

How dare you?

And stuff like that.

And they make you feel bad for asking the question that that's,

Again,

Another sign that this does not support you,

You know?

It's a red flag.

Yeah,

You get to remove anything.

I mean,

If it hurts,

Then that's,

That's the indicator that,

You know,

If we sit on a sit on a chair,

And there's a tack on the chair,

We don't say,

Oh,

That I don't want to hurt the text feelings,

I'm going to stay seated on the tack,

You know,

It's like,

Stand up right away.

But sometimes we,

We don't do that with certain things like people or you know,

Activities,

We can have an activity that we used to be really used to be who we defined ourselves as,

But now we're different.

But it's like,

Boy,

If I let this go,

Who am I going to become?

You know,

But if you hang on to it,

You'll never know,

You know?

Well,

I,

You know,

I like that you said,

If you feel a certain way about somebody,

If there's a negativity in your feelings about the relationship,

Then the first step isn't to discard them.

It's not like an object that you can give to goodwill,

You know,

Question it.

I mean,

Human beings and relationships are very precious.

And Lord knows,

Many of us don't have enough of them,

Of healthy,

Healing,

Wonderful friendships and relationships.

So taking a look at perhaps what can be done to,

You know,

To amend or mend or to,

To make the relationship a little bit better.

Well,

Yeah,

To bring in that vulnerability,

To be able to talk with someone about that.

I mean,

I would only I would avoid it if that person's abusive.

You know,

If they're just verbally or physically abusive,

Then that then that person's gone.

You know,

Mean spirited,

That's not a person that you can have a conversation with,

You know.

But if someone says something that hurts your feelings,

And,

You know,

Maybe it's not the right thing to do.

But if you mention it to them,

And that can fester and cause strain,

And every time you talk to them,

It's like,

That's kind of still in you,

You know.

And again,

If someone's a good friend,

You could say,

Hey,

That thing you said to me,

My feelings got hurt,

You know.

And again,

If it's a good friend,

They're like,

Oh,

I'm really sorry,

I didn't realize that,

You know.

Or if it's something that they repeatedly do,

Maybe a deeper discussion.

Yeah.

People really live in this isolation vacuum sometimes,

Where the people in their lives don't care enough,

Or don't know how to be honest and say,

You know,

This is something that you do.

I love you,

You know,

And I want to be in your life.

But this is something that you do that I feel is perhaps harsh or destructive,

Or,

You know,

Emotionally insensitive,

You know,

Is this something that you'd be willing to talk about?

So,

You know,

That's the delicate part.

It's like,

You say,

Hey,

I just want to talk to you about something that's been bothering me,

Because it makes me really uncomfortable.

So right from that point,

You're vulnerable.

And then the other person,

If they're compatible with you,

Then they become vulnerable,

Too,

Because you've opened up that vulnerability.

But you don't want to like attack someone when you're talking to them,

When you want to find out if you can make some change.

Because people recoil from attack,

You know,

We're built that way.

Got to protect myself,

You know.

So it's,

It takes some courage to say,

Hey,

You know,

I care about you enough to bring this up,

Because it's been bothering me.

And even more courage to be on the receiving end of that,

And to hear it.

Because yeah,

Like you said,

You're going to get defensive,

It's going to be painful.

And there's going to be some reaction coming up from you.

But at the same time,

To breathe through it and to listen and to just try to acknowledge.

And of course,

That person,

You know,

May be projecting a little bit.

Sure.

You know,

But at the same time,

We can all grow from honesty,

Which is vulnerability,

Which is love.

Yeah,

Vulnerability is one of the best feelings in the world.

And that's why I used to love my job.

Because when I went to people's houses,

They were extremely vulnerable.

There's something about a person in their house,

Sitting amongst their stuff.

Because then they want you to be there.

They're,

They're wide open.

And they often cry or they're scared,

You know,

But that to me feels more alive.

Then like,

Hey,

I got all together.

So that vulnerability is beautiful.

And it really,

I think we're all desperate for it.

But there's no vulnerability in social media.

And there's no vulnerability in the news.

And most movies don't have vulnerability.

So,

You know,

There's no vulnerability in schools,

It's really not something that's taught or encouraged.

But it's the way to peace of mind.

And how do you relate vulnerability to intimacy?

They're very similar.

I mean,

Intimacy is like a willingness to be open in a connection with somebody else.

You know,

To have that willingness of that openness.

I mean,

They think they go hand in hand.

Did you have something about that that you wanted to add?

Learn how to be more intimate and how to be more vulnerable.

I'm just wondering how we can perhaps work on those kinds of things.

That could be a way for you to like,

To start the vulnerability of intimacy with yourself.

Because that's where this whole clutter busting is,

Is really an intimacy with yourself.

If we're always listening to what other people tell us,

You know,

All we gotta do is turn on the TV,

Or go outside when there's people telling us what to do.

There's no space for vulnerability or intimacy.

Because those two things are very delicate.

It's very,

Very delicate.

So it's like,

You can start practicing with yourself,

You know.

And I like to,

I play guitar.

So what I do is I'll make up songs about the day,

Sometimes,

You know,

Just like,

Oh,

This person did this,

And it really bothered me.

And now I'm just,

You know,

Just make up.

And it's like,

Wow,

I didn't know I was feeling that.

So things come out of me easier when I'm singing about them.

But I also write in a journal.

And sometimes like talking to yourself,

Or you can have like,

I've got this like a polar bear doll that I sleep with.

Sometimes I talk to him.

His name's Polly.

You know,

He'll listen.

And like,

When I go for hikes by myself,

I like talk to the tree.

If nobody's around,

I'll talk to the trees when I'm walking by,

You know,

Because I feel like they're listening.

And stuff comes out that I didn't realize I was feeling.

So I think those are some,

There's a few things I can think of,

You know.

I can certainly,

I've certainly found myself living alone the past seven months.

I've spent most of my life not living alone.

I could probably count the years on one hand,

My long ass life,

How long I have lived alone.

And I'm finding myself recently,

Talking out loud,

Talking to myself talking to objects.

But it's starting to feel like a little bit more intimacy towards myself.

You know,

Like I'm having a conversation with myself,

Like,

You know,

Talking to myself.

I mean,

That's a little cray.

But there's comfort in that.

Well,

You know,

I mean,

Just the whole idea of,

You know,

When we,

You know,

When people,

Including me,

Get to the point where we start talking to ourselves,

Society has a skewed look at that.

Oh,

Yeah.

That's society's viewpoint.

But Greg,

I really think a lot of people talk to themselves.

I talk,

That's another thing.

I talk to myself.

It's like,

I think sometimes we'll put ourselves down for something that feels really private,

You know.

But I think that's beautiful,

Talking to yourself,

You know.

Or to the chair.

Or whatever,

You know,

These are all just suggestions,

You may find something that appeals to you.

But,

You know,

Sometimes we may be resistant to them,

And call them cray.

Like you said,

You called it cray,

Because we're like,

It feels almost wrong to do something vulnerable,

You know.

Because most of the time,

We're like,

Okay,

Stay on the internet,

You can stay on the internet 24 hours a day.

It's an addiction device.

It's built for you.

It's built specifically for addiction.

And phones are built purposefully for addiction.

And this is not like,

Hey,

Let's,

You know,

It's like the people that made cigarettes,

They knew what they were doing,

Right?

It's very similar.

And so it's all out there.

And it's just,

It's like,

It takes some,

Again,

Some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

You know,

And so it's all out there.

And it's just,

It's like,

It takes some,

Again,

Some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

You know,

And so it's all out there.

And it's just,

It's like,

It takes some,

Again,

Some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

You know,

And so it's all out there.

And it's just,

It's like,

It takes some,

Again,

Some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It's like,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It's like,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes some courage to go,

You know,

There's a lot of people out there that are doing everything they can to get you to not put your attention on yourself and put it elsewhere.

And it's just,

It takes like,

You know,

But it,

There's so much,

It's so loud and so pervasive.

And so we're encouraged so much to be participating in these things.

But we really do get left behind.

And there's nobody to speak out for us,

Except for ourselves.

And we get silenced by the din of the loudness of all this stuff.

And,

And everybody,

You know,

Just a lot of people are on their computers or on their phones,

Or so it's,

It's,

We learn from others.

We learn from other,

We're social creatures,

We learn from others behavior.

And that's how we're able to be sold things through commercials,

Because commercials present the idea of,

To me,

This is part of society,

Other people are doing it,

You should do it.

And the thing is,

You,

It's,

That's not true.

And you're in a very,

And I'm not changing the subject.

But you're in a very healthy relationship.

And perhaps it helps that,

You know,

She's one of the top psychiatrists,

Psychologists in the world.

But yeah,

But you two have a very affirming relationship.

With intimacy and respect and vulnerability.

And,

But I think what you're saying is that it comes from a place of having the relationship with yourself first,

Before you can have it with somebody else.

I think that that's,

That's a really good place.

And it's not like that you have to spend three to five years getting close to yourself.

It's just the starting.

Just like with clutter busting.

I can tell you all,

Like,

Here are the 10 steps.

And these are why you got to let go of your clutter.

And this is how you do it.

And you can write them all down.

And like,

I know how to do it.

But until you started nothing,

It means nothing.

And the same with learning to be intimate with yourself.

It's once you start,

A whole world opens up.

Right away.

It's not like,

I have to disappear from everything forever.

Just the starting,

You know,

Maybe put your hands on your heart and close your eyes.

And,

You know,

Just that feeling of,

You know,

There's compassion in that.

Or maybe you make yourself a really nice meal,

Something you never thought you'd do.

Something you'd never make for yourself.

Oh,

That's too extravagant,

Or I don't have time for that,

Or whatever.

You know,

Like,

Thinking of things like activity-based things that are sweet for you.

I mean,

For someone else,

They wouldn't be sweet.

So you're looking at,

You're like,

What's my nature?

What do I,

What would I crave from somebody else that could give myself,

You know,

What,

Like,

If someone,

Someone else does this particular thing,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

I will,

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I will,

I will,

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I will I will,

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I will,

I will,

I will,

I will sit in the second row.

There was a ticket in the second row.

And afterwards,

I could do a meet and greet with ZZ Top where I can meet them in person,

You know,

And I was just like,

Oh,

Man,

I got filled with like,

I want that so bad.

And I was talking to my wife,

Julia,

I said like,

Yeah,

But it's it was $500,

You know,

And that's just I'm not gonna spend 500 bucks.

And I just I happen to have a little extra money at that time that that I could do it.

But it was like,

I just thought no,

It just seems so wrong,

You know,

But I was craving it.

Just craving it more than anything.

And she said,

Do you want to go back in time to you know,

When you just got out of your lung transplant,

And you could breathe for the first time and say like,

Hey,

Guess what,

You're alive.

And everything's okay,

Again,

But you can't do this thing that you really want to do.

Like they would just,

It's just brought me back to like,

For some reason that brought me back to what really matters.

And I got the ticket,

You know,

Got the ticket and I was in it was like,

I was I felt so much self love because I did this thing,

You know,

That I really wanted.

That wasn't too crazy,

Like financially.

And I went to the show,

And I loved every single second of it.

And then meeting the band and getting my picture taken with them.

Like I have a picture on the wall,

Like I see it every day.

So it's like,

That's like,

That's an example for me,

You know.

And,

And there was an example for me might be,

You know,

Donuts and ice cream.

Yeah.

But sure.

Yeah.

Just speaking for myself.

Yeah.

I'm sure a lot of us will go to something,

You know,

A six pack,

Cigarettes,

A line of Coke,

I mean,

Whatever.

Something that is not the best for us,

But it's what we do to reward ourselves,

Or to take care of ourselves.

Well,

The thing is,

Like,

To ask,

I mean,

To ask yourself,

How would it feel if I did this?

This thing,

You know?

Like,

How would this make me feel?

And you know,

From experience?

Yeah,

I mean,

You feel really fucking good.

At first.

Yeah,

But that's,

That's something like we're looking to get a feel.

Right.

But I'm not thinking about,

You know,

Three hours later,

I'm just thinking.

A lot of the times those kind of things,

Those kind of answers come from a source of pain.

There's pain there.

And it's like,

It's like this.

It's an easy,

It's a quick bandaid.

It doesn't lacerate.

It's like a band.

Imagine if you put a bandaid on your hand after you got a cut,

And it lasted for like a minute,

And then it dissolved.

And then it infected your cut,

You know,

That's what a lot of those things are like.

There.

And it's that,

Like sometimes things can suck so bad internally,

That one minute a piece is worth,

It seems like it's worth the three hours or the two days of misery,

Or longer,

You know,

But that's because that's the pain.

It's like an unacknowledged pain,

But it's there,

It's in us.

And it's,

It's often,

You know,

It's been there for so long that we're used to it.

And that's a lot of people's lives.

And so advertisers know that,

Too.

They know,

Like,

You know,

Buying something is,

Is a few minutes of joy.

It's excitement,

I bought something.

Oh,

Wow,

It's,

It's,

It's really,

They know that it's the same kind of thing.

And sometimes you buy something at a store.

I've certainly done this,

Bought something on the way home,

I go,

What did I just do?

Yeah,

It wasn't like a conscious thing.

Like,

Oh,

I'm having all this pain.

So if I get this thing,

I'll be fine.

It's just like,

This just seems like a solution,

Because it's presented to us as a solution.

Shopping,

Internet shopping,

Store shopping,

Stores know this,

They hire,

Hire people that are friendly.

So you go in there like,

Hey,

What can I get you?

It's like,

Oh,

Someone's being nice to me.

Because they're being paid to do that.

And the bright lights and the musics.

You know,

Whenever I go to like Whole Foods,

They always have like,

Music playing.

And it's like songs that I like.

And I'm wondering,

Like,

I wonder if I go in and they pick up on my iPhone,

The songs that I like,

And they play them the whole time I'm there.

So I'll buy more stuff,

You know.

But it's like,

It's just,

You know,

It's most of us haven't really been encouraged to take a listen to ourselves just to take a,

You know,

A curious thing.

The donuts and the ice cream is not self care.

Well,

It all depends.

For some people it is for some people it isn't.

Like,

You know,

You have a donut and it's like,

Oh,

That was a nice donut.

Great.

You know.

But,

You know,

You have six donuts,

Whatever.

Or your,

Our sugar doesn't agree with you or whatever.

Or you're,

You have gluten allergies,

And then you're screwed,

You know.

Or like,

You know,

Eat a whole box of ice cream.

It's delicious.

I was like this,

That was my experience of going to movies,

To the movie theater and ordering a bucket of popcorn.

I was like,

Oh,

Man,

That popcorn smells so good.

And I'd buy a bucket of it.

I'm like,

This is going to be great.

And I'm watching the movie.

And after about two minutes,

And I've had like,

A third of the bucket,

I feel like,

Oh,

What did I do?

You know,

And then I'll enjoy the movie.

I don't do that anymore,

Because I got tired of it.

But that's what that was.

Right.

So going back to clutter busting.

Clutter busting can also be,

You know,

Removing things in our lives that we believe to be helpful,

Like,

You know,

The idea that internet shopping or binging on sugar or whatever,

Is rewarding and self care when actually it's,

You know,

It's making it worse for me.

But I think with a lot of these things I've found over the years,

Personally,

My experience is I can't just remove something from my life.

I can't just take it away.

Because then it leaves a hole,

Which for me is worse than having the bad thing.

Having nothing at all is worse than having the thing that's not fitting or not working or killing me perhaps.

So for me,

I can't just clutter bust,

I have to,

I have to switch it out with something that's healthier,

Whether that's harm reduction,

Or if it's something that's indeed,

You know,

Something that makes my life better.

Yeah,

That sounds good.

Yeah,

Yeah,

If it's,

If something if like going cold turkey is gonna,

Because that can be really painful sometimes,

You know.

And if there's,

There's like that pain underneath,

And suddenly,

That's all your face with.

And there's nothing to distract you.

And you're not feeling that strong at the moment.

It can be very overwhelming,

You know.

So it's looking for compassionate ways to do that.

And I sound like you,

You had some there.

You know,

Recently,

I,

You know,

Yeah,

And sugar,

You know,

Has definitely been a bit of an issue.

It's,

You know,

I'm probably pre-diabetic.

I don't think I'm there yet.

But God knows,

I have to see the doctor and ask.

But one thing,

Some advice you gave me just recently,

To go out and walk half an hour a day,

You know,

And do it no matter what.

And,

You know,

I have to confess,

And you told me this a few weeks ago.

And I have to confess that today,

I did not.

But today's been the first day since you told me that,

That I haven't.

And it's added something to my life.

It's added,

You know,

It gives me an opportunity.

And you know,

Granted,

I'm in Northeast Ohio,

And the weather is beautiful.

And we're about to see some leaves changing into something vibrant.

But it's been a wonderful,

Wonderful experience.

And I'm getting the endorphins.

I'm getting the music in my ears while I'm doing it.

You know,

I'm having a really,

Really enjoyable time doing this.

And I want to keep it up.

I want to keep doing it every day.

Other times,

I'll get excited about things.

And they're really going to help my life become better.

And then three weeks later,

I've forgotten completely about it.

Yeah,

That's natural.

I always say like meditation.

Yeah,

Like try this out.

Do it if you can.

You know what I mean?

It's always comes with it.

It's like,

Because I know human nature,

Because I know myself.

There's plenty of times I pledged I was going to do something.

Excuse me.

Oh,

I'm going to do this.

I'm not I'm not going back to whatever.

And that didn't last very long,

You know.

And so there's compassion in that.

There's compassion.

And like,

It's not like there's no perfection in this.

It's like,

I'll give this a try.

And then maybe I stop.

Maybe I stop and maybe I come back to it.

You know,

And it's and it's like,

Okay,

Not not punishing ourselves for that.

Because again,

That's human nature.

Nothing stays the same.

But life is constant change.

So maybe that constant change is we're doing something and then we stopped doing it.

And maybe we come back to it.

Or or not,

You know,

It's like,

I remember this one guy was working with,

And he said,

He was having a really hard time letting go of things.

I've asked him questions,

And I was being really gentle with him,

You know,

And he goes,

I don't know,

I just can't I just,

You know,

And finally,

I said,

Like,

You know what,

If you want,

If you don't want to let go of anything,

That's fine.

I said,

I still like you.

I think you're a good guy.

You know,

If you don't like or anything,

That's fine.

He started crying.

He's like,

Because all of a sudden he was like,

I'm okay as I am.

Yeah,

Because I did.

Whenever I worked with anybody,

I never thought this person is an idiot,

Or what's wrong with them.

And some people were in real bad situations where they were just,

They were like suicidal in their living spaces,

Because it was so overwhelming to them.

But I never thought the person was weak or bad.

But people think that about themselves.

Because we're,

You know,

We're often the first critic to jump in and assail ourselves with really cruel words,

You know.

But that's,

I mean,

It's not like we just came out of nowhere with that.

It's in a lot of ways,

It can be a very cruel world.

It's a very judgmental world.

If you look at the news,

Or you look at social media,

It's an accepted way of living.

You know,

Cruelty in one form or another.

And what I mean by cruelty is like not considering another person's feelings,

And just saying something,

Like some kind of judgment or whatever,

With intent to hurt.

But the thing is,

That comes from pain itself.

Often the biggest inflictors of pain are the people with the greatest amount of pain within themselves.

And there's this feeling that if I inflict pain on another person,

Who regardless of whoever they are,

I'll be getting rid of the pain that I'm feeling inside.

It's not like a conscious thing.

But it feels like this will do it.

And a lot of us have had a lot of pain in our early upbringings.

Sometimes cruelty in our parents or teachers,

Or in school kids or friends or whatever.

And so it's not,

You know,

We're not strangers to cruelty.

And we learn.

We learn from when we're really young,

We learn from our parents in school and the people we spend time with.

So sometimes this self-cruelty,

It comes because we're taught it.

And it's like,

It's easier to be cruel than to be kind.

And we have to learn,

Really learn how to be kind to each other and to ourselves.

We don't have to learn it.

We just have to,

We just have to begin to move in that direction.

And what we're looking for is just like an acceptance from within ourselves,

Regardless of what we do that we're okay.

Because people know,

A lot of things,

You know,

We know,

Like,

If I do this,

It's going to cause me some grief.

And we'll do it.

It's like human nature.

Sometimes we just do that.

And then,

Okay,

That happened.

I did this thing that I knew was going to cause me some pain.

And it's caused me pain.

And I still want to feel I'm okay.

And what I mean by okay is that I'm alive.

I exist.

Like I'm talking about a basic okayness.

Not like,

You know,

Other people think I'm okay,

You know,

Or according to this book,

I'm okay.

Even my therapist thinks I'm okay.

Or my mom thinks I'm okay.

It's like,

It's a basic okayness.

I am here now.

I exist.

My heart's beating,

My lungs are breathing,

My blood circulating.

I'm hearing things,

I'm seeing things or feeling things.

This is happening right now.

That means I'm okay.

My definition is that's being okay.

You know,

Like,

I mean,

I went through a lung transplant for two and a half years,

I couldn't breathe very well.

It got to a point where I had to breathe out of a machine.

And it was really hard during that time.

It was really,

Really hard to walk two feet without feeling like I was gonna,

I wouldn't have a breath,

Like my lungs were gonna explode.

So what got me through that was just the compassion of this is what's happening.

It's not like this,

You deserved this,

Or it's some retribution from the universe,

Or past life or whatever like that.

This is what's happening.

And what can we do to take care of you,

You know?

So I just be like,

Okay,

This is what's happening.

I still love myself,

You know.

And so it's learning to like,

Okay,

I did this thing.

And I rather than come down on myself,

Go that I did this.

It happened.

You know,

It happened.

I mean,

We're not separate from the world,

And we make our own decisions.

We're influenced by billions of other things.

Everything in the universe influences us.

It's like if we are a wave in the ocean,

And we started to rise up,

And then we crash right down.

And if we had sentience,

We'd go like,

Oh,

That was stupid.

You know,

I look stupid in front of other waves.

I should have just stayed up and,

You know,

Had a current.

And it's just like,

No,

Every other wave in the ocean affects every other wave.

And we don't tangibly see it.

But on a feeling level,

Sometimes we can pick up on it.

But it's true.

There's that feeling.

You know,

And it's learning to recognize,

Is it possible?

Can I see myself as being okay as I am?

Regardless of whatever I've done?

In a sense,

It's a forgiveness,

But you don't even have to add that word.

It's just,

I did that.

It's not feeling guilty.

Yeah,

Or maybe you feel guilty.

Ah,

Such an idiot.

Why would I do that?

I shouldn't have done that.

And then you recognize,

Oh,

I just said that to myself.

That's interesting.

It can be applied to anything.

There's no like,

It has to be like this.

And maybe like for two days,

You berate yourself.

And then you go,

Oh,

Okay.

Yeah.

That was interesting that I did that.

Or maybe ate five,

Like 10 gallons of ice cream,

And bought $10,

000 worth of stuff on the internet.

And got angry,

It kicked your dog.

And then you like,

You're like,

Wow,

Wait a second.

And then you realize,

Well,

What did I just do?

Like,

Oh,

My God.

Okay.

All right.

I still exist.

I'm still alive.

Here.

I regret it,

Baby.

But oh,

Well,

You know,

It's just something to try on.

This is all just suggestions of things to try on.

There's no it has to be like this,

Or I gotta do this,

Or we have to do this.

It's just like,

Let's,

Let's see what happens.

Well,

Thank you so much.

This really helped me tonight.

I was hoping that the pilot episode would go off well.

And I think it's better than I had hoped for anticipated.

I think it went really well.

I mean,

Everybody that's to listen at this point,

If you didn't hear like the hour and a half before of us trying to get our microphones fixed,

We have really nice microphones,

And we just couldn't get them to work.

So we're just operating off our computer mic.

But,

But we still did it.

I'm really glad we did it.

We did it.

And perhaps we can toss in some intro and outro music and upload this puppy.

Yeah,

We'll do that.

And I think we should do some more of these,

You know,

Maybe we can pick a topic or like you can think of things with that you would like to talk about.

And that works really well for me.

And we could talk about things,

And we'll share stuff from our own lives.

And,

And,

And we'll see what happens,

You know.

Yeah,

You know,

I remember sitting in English class in 10th grade,

And I know I've told you this story before.

And we were studying the Simon and Garfunkel song,

Old Friends,

And I,

You know,

And I told you back then in 10th grade,

That I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope that it's you and me,

And I hope

Reviews

Uplifting, honest ✨💕 super great, I feel not so alone with everything while listening 🐯💜

Comforting, soothing, uplifting, enlightening, and encouraging! Thank you so much for sharing this conversation! 🙏🏼🥰