https://youtubetranscript.com/?v=tbqlvjW38Ho
Hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of Embodying the Logos. Today, I’m joined by Luke and we’re going to do an exploration about relationships, like what does it mean to be in relation, like what are the options within a relation and we were just talking about the angles from which you can approach that. Luke and I have a different style so that might actually contribute or detract from the conversation. So yeah, Luke, what is a relation? Okay, well, what’s interesting is you, before we started, you said you like to start out with definitions and like one of my shticks is that no one understands anything through definitions. So, but I love it. I’m willing to roll with this. The way I would say it, I don’t know that I can give a clear succinct definition. It takes me a while to work there, but I see relationships as I think one of the best ways to understand them is they are fields of seeming opposites somewhat. I almost think of them as like a Venn diagram. I often think that what relationships are are these different fields of varying degrees of overlapping patterns and so a relationship like your and I relationship to make it more practical and simple would be definitely centered around this little corner, centered around Paul. I’m trying to think, first times I probably interacted with you were bridges of meaning. I don’t know that I interacted with you before bridges of meaning and then everybody gets different little spheres in which they participate. The corners of the corners and so we have a relationship is any degree of time, energy, attention spent engaging and participating in some common love would be maybe the broadest way to define a relationship. So a couple things stood out to me. You were talking about that it’s centered around something. I responded to you in a YouTube comment that the centering around something is what gives to the love. So that’s what unifies and gives shared experience. So I agree with the centering and the center can change. It doesn’t have to be one center because I can play tennis with you and I can have a conversation. They’re not centered around the same thing. Unless we do both of these things in service to something higher. That’s kind of a cheat there. In a friendship there’s probably a there’s many different subspecies of ways that you can participate and interact and there’s probably a common center to all the different subspecies. Hopefully if you’re an integrated person that is true but there’s plenty of people that don’t have that. Yeah, I do think that’s some degree of integration because truly from my perspective that would be actually loving the person of which all the subspecies are participating in rather than using the person in some kind of transactional way. I’m using you for I don’t know. I think of I had a friend. He became a friend but when I was really young Nintendo had just come out. My family would not let us get a Nintendo for the longest time but I had a friend who had a Nintendo and so we became friends because I wanted to go to his house and play Nintendo all the time. But that was a very I think we became friends throughout the entirety of our relationship but that’s an example of a at least to a pretty significant degree transactional thing. Like I want to blaze Nintendo. Does that make it last or like? Well so the way that I would understand even that though is I don’t know I was talking about this recently. I think in any interaction that we have with another person there are areas of overlap and connection and unity in this interaction and there are levels of disunity and disharmony, order and chaos or whatever. And it depends on whatever you want to focus on in that particular interaction will really I’m not saying it’s going to dictate but it will highly influence how both people experience an interaction. So like for example like you I tend to be a lot more disagreeable with people where I have a lot more commonality. Like if we have a ton of overlap I’ll tend to probably lean into the disagreement or the disunity or the distinctions between us rather than all the things we have in common. Because there’s something that can hold the tension? Yeah for sure and to me I’m like we don’t need to work on that we already agree. Like I don’t think we need to go around patting each other on the back about stuff that we agree on. Like let’s work on the stuff that’s… To contrast. Yes. Whereas like because so like a perfect example in this little corner to even make it more practical would be like I think I’ve always gotten along relatively well with you and Mark but you and Mark are very the way that we discuss and the way that we approach things and the way that we think about stuff tends to be pretty different. But I just but I know I well I know I would say no is the right word I know and I have faith that there is common unity in us that you have that I have I mean I just I believe that fundamentally because I don’t believe in because I believe human beings are good I believe we’re made in the image of God. Being is good. Like I would say being is good and human beings participate in being so they inherit the goodness of being. And they can choose not to like that’s the problem. Yes they can choose not to but I have I have a faith that in any person I guess what I’m trying to get at is that anyone that I can relate to anyone who has being anyone who’s participating in being has something that you can connect to if you have eyes to see no matter where they’re at no matter how far gone or however it whatever judgment you want to make of them of how twisted they’ve gotten that being there’s unity there to be had to be agape into existence to lean into to love. And so the further that someone is from me I almost take it as like a challenge personal challenge. Yeah I’m just like we’re gonna like we’ll connect and I have a pretty radical faith that that can happen and I think it’s I don’t know it gets a pretty fundamental assumptions in the way that I see things because it’s you know these little lukeisms I like to quote all the time but it’s Lewis you know what you see in here depends a lot upon where you’re standing and the kind of person you are you can interact with someone who’s very different from you and be the kind of person and be standing in the kind of place where let’s say your enemy is your friend like where there are no more enemies where you can actually love your enemy because you are you are endlessly opening to give of yourself to bridge the gap to mediate the difference I guess is the way that I would say it rather than needing to and this gets into like validation like what you and Mark were talking about the other day rather than this this libidinal need to constantly need and I need I like a lot of affirmation so like this is I do like it but like I don’t um you’re doing well Luke well thank you um I don’t I it almost seems to me to be you’re not a very integrated person if you need the kind of security of having tons of people around you that affirm your self-identity all the time I would distinguish that between validation right because validation is a statement of truth um affirmation which is like reinforcements of an emotional state more so right yeah so I yeah I want to I want to challenge you a little bit because the word that came up for me is is hypocrisy right like so let’s just state that yes because we’re we’re both part of reality right like there’s always something that is shared and that can be appealed to right like I don’t I don’t want to challenge that I assume necessarily right but then the the question at a certain point is right like like it’s it’s the elephant in the room right like at a certain point you’re ignoring the elephant in the room and and that turns into hypocrisy do you would you would you agree with that so what’s what’s the elephant that you’re ignoring that then becomes well the disagreement right like yeah I mean you don’t have to I don’t think that it’s necessarily ignoring it like that that would be hypocrisy I think if there’s something so what so what would be the what would be the I’m maybe misunderstanding you but what would be the difference between hypocrisy and self-control because there there may be something that keeps coming up in my consciousness that I’m observing whether it’s that I’m focusing on whether it’s the disagreement and and then you may ignore that that could be self-discipline or it could be hypocrisy yeah but but there’s a distinction between you relating to yourself right because I might ignore things in this conversation yeah yeah and there’s me relating to you right so the the reason why I use the example elephant in the room is is because it’s significant right like the elephant is salient it’s significant right and then when when you don’t recognize the elephant right then you’re in some sense not in reality right like you you’re tolerating the ignorant ignoring of existence um so so I guess what I’m well this I don’t I would say that this gets a discernment because there may be depending on depending on both the personal slash individual I’m meaning just like the the the person which is never by themselves that’s always a hard distinction to make I try to be careful my language between person and individual because uh then whatever I don’t want to go down that road but well this is important I agree it is important but um the so a person may notice something and see something and be focused on something which um may or may not be legitimate like it could be their own weakness or disintegration of why they’re focused on that thing so there’s that component of it where the person I think I think focus actually necessarily has that component right because you you focus on something because you need to deal with it right which means that there’s there’s an insufficiency or lack a problem like unless you worship yes but you could be disintegrated in a way where uh let’s say like you’re a hypochondriac or something you could be hyper focused on something that’s an illusion right or that’s there that you should not be focused on yes that’s most people right and so and there are and there’s the personal component of it and then there’s like cultural components of it because I think like just take America where I am you know there’s there are people that I would say both at the personal level and then at the collective group level that are very focused on things that I think are uh distracting them from their actual problems you know and exacerbating their own problems probably and so I am um all I’m trying to say is that in in any interaction with a person where there are again there’s there’s agreement and disagreement there’s unity and there’s distinction there’s commonality and then there’s things that are different which of those you focus on and why is all um is not is not necessarily something that I think can be uh formalized and prescribed no that that that’s the consequence of failure right and and and what you value is in some sense informed by what you deem possible yeah it’s also a consequence of love and maturity I mean it’s kind of like there’s this um artist that I really like who uh his name is Noah Gunderson and he’s coming to town and so I uh he had this lyric though I was listening to because I’m trying to just listen to a lot of his music before he shows up and uh and he has this line in it that’s something like if I had told you then what you could have been would you even like would you have essentially like would you have listened and it’s this and it’s and it’s very similar to a lot of these um little pithy statements I love all the time like like you can lead a horse to water you can’t make him drink or what you see and hear when the student is ready the teacher will appear and I think a lot of that is is like you can this is where I think wisdom comes in and love and holiness the whole like fruit of the spirit from Galatians 5 I was just looking at this morning because it’s in Paul’s twitter tag line tagline you know equipping people for things against which there is no law the fruit of the spirit love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness self-control those things which are somewhat generic transcendental things they are they are uh transcendent and eminent because they’re real things it’s like love it’s something that we all know and experience and and you can point to particulars of it but it’s also bigger than any of those particulars can can reduce so like when you are interacting with someone all of those all that fruit of the spirit stuff is going to be um it’s going to be bridging the gap for anyone who’s participating in being in a way where because here’s the thing you can sit there my concern this is my concern I’m circling around this thing is that you can someone can be so hyper focused on a mode of disagreement and it’s and it’s kind of like the person you’re interacting with is incapable of seeing the thing that you’re trying to point out so even if you’re right it doesn’t matter right I agree which is the whole like you can be this is why I say you can be right and be wrong or be wrong and be right yeah it doesn’t necessarily matter yeah pearls before swine that’s that’s that right and then they do around and trample you like yeah yes but then there’s also the problem of of this is the thing is most people think the thing that they’re saying is right and then and they resort to the pearls before swine most people don’t have the humility and the impulse to think maybe I’m the swine um um yeah but that would be on a different level then what do you mean different level well I okay like I would I would call a uh a different dimensionality right because because we’re we’re always the swine right like in some way but uh there’s ways right like for example if I if I set the frame and I say one plus one is equals two and you can’t agree with me that’s one one way of being a swine right like when I say abortion is wrong and you can’t agree with me that’s a different way of being a swine because now there’s like way more involved right like it it’s complex and it it’s it’s contingent upon a bunch of assumptions and and spirits that that you’re in right and you’re not maybe not aware of right so so that type of swinery right is um you have you have a different type of responsibility towards that I would argue yeah I don’t so I mean I would I would kind of like you to help me think through this so I had a uh I would categorize it as a conflict the other day with someone where and it was kind of on this point more or less and it’s one of those things that didn’t doesn’t have resolution I hate conflict that doesn’t have some healthy resolution where where it’s like I feel like we’re moving in the right direction like conflict that just gets dropped and then just waits to resurface later where I don’t feel like anything’s being done like both that’s an elephant in the room by the way well right and I hate it like whether whether it’s in my own family my family of origin any of my friendships like I just it drives me crazy I mean almost quite literally because I’m a highly because I’m a highly emotional uh type person and so like I can’t I can’t compartmentalize that in silence so it just like sits with me so I had this conflict with the person and and it was kind of and it was over it was over this topic because it was it was which is probably apropos and and good that we’re having this conversation because when you disagree with someone when you see things differently when communication when communion breaks down what I often see this in in my own conflict and I and I try not to do this but even more broadly is that that that exact dynamic happens where this person sees it this way this person sees it this way maybe people are speaking past each other maybe they’re not but you have dive vision right you have dive vision so you know instead of one vision right because that’s what communion is right you know you organize around one vision you get dive vision so you get two visions hopefully still on the same thing yes and so what what what you need to do is you need to reintegrate how these two visions are part of the same reality right yeah because if if there is dive vision and you can’t reintegrate them you’re not looking at the same thing yeah I mean I yes and I right I see your point but so so at the point where you realize maybe either subconsciously or consciously because like that’s something you’re aware of and you can articulate that so you maybe become consciously aware of that and some disagreement and maybe the other person is or is not then um then I feel like then is the next moment where it goes into either probably what I would call a posture of openness and humility or the posture of what I call what I often call the exclusivist religion of the right side of history is I think people I think there there is it there can be a tendency for people to say we’re looking at the wrong thing and then and you’re you it’s more so you’re looking at the wrong thing you’re misunderstanding this correctly you’re not looking at this correctly and I am and it’s wanting to colonize the other person and get them into your mode of thinking the right mode of thinking well can we can we separate those two right because like can we first get agreement whether that’s actually true or not that someone can be on the right side of history well I um I so I would say in a in a static way like somebody because of what I said earlier like you can be right me wrong or be wrong be right this is like almost the vervecian adverbial versus I’m just I’m just trying to limit it to the local space right because there’s there’s there’s your position right or or your observation and then that’s what you do with it yeah right and like I want to have those two separate right because like I think you can be on the right side of history with your judgment right but but you’re not the jury and the execution of that judgment right so if we’re talking about humility or whatever right like you’re allowed to make the judgment and like I would even say that you’re obliged to make the judgment because that’s giving the sermon to other people right but then when you’ve made the judgment like what what are the implications of that that’s a whole different discussion right and now we get into law right because that’s what law is supposed to deal with right like like okay like we’re going to punish people who speed on the highway like okay like maybe but well also that’s not interesting to me right like no like it’s interesting to me whether you can say that it’s bad that people do that right like whether that’s actually a judgment that you can make so tell me if I’m so I will I’m going to give an example of my own life of what I think you’re talking about and tell me this is what you mean so um so throughout the entirety of my life I’ve um I’ve kind of always been a evolving growing I mean this is the way that I would say reading learning changing in my own relationship to my Christianity right so like I haven’t been Orthodox my whole life I’m Orthodox now uh I had a period of being reformed and Calvinist and what you know whatever so that’s always been changing I’ve been reading different things and um and so throughout a lot of that I would my mother is probably the most uh well she she’s the most interested in thinking and talking about and interacting with about her faith but throughout a lot of that I’ve with so much change and so much discussion my mother and I have had a lot of um conversations and disagreements about this whole journey my whole journey with this stuff and something that would always come up with my mom is we when I would say that I was less mature than I am now hopefully God willing and or may that be true uh we would get a disagreement and and and we’d have this thing where it’d be like well you know you just think your opinions are correct and and then it’s just like the retort is like well you just think your opinions are correct and I’m like of course you know like that’s what you’re just saying making the judgment like you have to make the judgment you have to say what you’re thinking is that what you’re talking about well no because like this puts me back into Plato book five actually because they’re talking about truth right and and on knowing right which would be true right knowledge is true right and the truth of the knowledge is as a consequence of that it accords to being right so if I’m in accordance with being I get a participatory knowledge of what it’s like to be like that right whatever that means right because I can’t put words on that like it’s not articulatable right but that’s I inherit the authority of being right through being true to it right like I’m in in a faithful relationship to to being and now I can say something that that’s real right like I I can use that authority to make statements in the world right and then there’s the realm of opinion right and the realm of opinion isn’t in relationship to being right like opinion is in relationship to impressions right like if you like if you would put it in in the cave analogy right like you have an opinion about the shadows on the wall right but the shadows on the wall are not reality right they’re images of of what is real so there’s a distinction between opinions right like like when when you do something right and and it upsets me right I have a negative opinion about what you did but that doesn’t make it bad or evil or anything that just makes it that I’m affected in a negative way so I’m you’re just saying opinion is just like I don’t like that yes effectively it it’s it’s a static judgment so I suppose where I where I would maybe differ in in that framing would be I think the only the only place where we get this truth where you are in accord with being that differs from opinion that is universally applicable to all people would be in uh the highest revelation the high well yeah but the highest way to say that would be love and then and then down to the fruit of the spirit against which things there is no law no law the problem the the difficulty I often have is like you can’t then wield that truth to someone else and tell them what that means for them and how they need to live because then it becomes this colonizing thing that’s power and no longer authority I I agree that you can wield it as a tool but you you you can wield it as a shield or whatever or as as a mirror or like or you can say you can say what you think and then it would be like a mirror I suppose no no no like there’s a no like what what what what do you think Jesus did um I think Jesus Jesus couldn’t save the people from his town right and and why couldn’t he save them not because he he didn’t have the authority or whatever right like because he had right because he’s being granted the authority but the reason that he couldn’t save them is because they didn’t believe and why didn’t they believe because they didn’t believe and why didn’t they believe because they saw the kid that they grew up with they didn’t see him as the son of god they saw him as what their historical interpretation of him and and so he couldn’t get into right relationship right so they couldn’t cooperate with him right they couldn’t he couldn’t have a faithful relationship right so then they couldn’t they couldn’t inherit his authority right like like he couldn’t he couldn’t affect them because they wouldn’t let him but that doesn’t mean that he didn’t have the authority and like he he shouldn’t should not have spoken there like he still should have spoken he still should have given them the chance to redeem themselves effectively right to get in right relationship with truth and being alive right and and that they they chose to look another way for whatever reason that they they made up in their head yeah well and i think jesus though too was like he i mean he was being i mean i assume he’s being fairly uh selective or discerning of when he speaks when he doesn’t speak what he says and how he says you can see people’s hearts right yes so he has perfect awareness in how to affect people and he couldn’t right so i mean so that’s kind of the problem i mean that’s the difficulty i think that it is as a at least for me is um is somewhat and this is why i like to talk about honesty a lot i mean at least for me with it when within myself is i i am and this is kind of back to the disagreement that i had with the person the other time is i am very i’m very often a person that’s full of self-doubt and so like if i have a disagreement with someone about something i do have my i don’t know i don’t know what you’d say about that i have my thoughts about the truth that i see um and then um but i’m also very uh i’m also very aware that i may be deluded and the other person may be right because i mean that’s happened in my life i’ve had lots of conviction about certain topics and and thought that i was standing on the side of truth and proper authority and that hasn’t been the case and very often i i can interact with people i mean i would i would say our culture is broadly people who are not very open to that side of the thing you know they’re not i i i i agree but like i’m i want to i’m going to get a couple things straight right so if you if you have a drug user and they’re like i’m i’m gonna i’m gonna shoot up some drugs right now like you have the obligation to say like don’t don’t do that that’s not good right like you don’t you don’t have the obligation to physically restrain them and prevent them from doing it um but but you need you need to provide them with the chance for redemption right like you saying that the first like like the hundred times that you say that like it might actually land right like like they might actually at that day for whatever miraculous reason be the soil that that seed get lands yes now now to to push back a little bit and to make it very practical like with my own children very often i’ve i i’m at the place at least in my parenting my kids are you know teenage years basically early teens early mid teens and uh and very often what i find with my wife and our interactions with them is i think as parents we have probably been prone to uh and especially i mean you see these generational differences we’ve been prone to probably lean into talking a lot with our kids through all this and understanding things and having discussions with our kids where we often are with our kids in a conversation conversations as we get into i’ve noticed that we have cultivated and fostered children who like to argue a lot yep because you give them the option right true but but part of that i think is the is the medium that we have cultivated has been talking about things a lot and so where i’m kind of moving in my parenting is uh i often have the impulse to say something because that was the way that i was raised either either in a you know like it i mean it’s not like the kids are drug addicts but like let’s say they’re wanting to watch screens and wanting to justify it or wanting to little rebels right or wanting to eat a bunch of crap they shouldn’t eat and i come in to write is to be like don’t don’t shoot up that black tar heroin son yes you know however like he knows what i think i don’t need to tell him what i think i’ve told him no you do this is why like i’ve told you a thousand i think you do right but here’s what here’s what i would say as a parent i think sometimes you can be damned if you do and damned if you don’t sometimes i think you’re going to create a bigger problem with your verbal intervention than if you didn’t say anything right i i agree that that potential is there um and actually vanderklay pointed it out to me right like um but that that that adds ends up in fatalism because now right like i’m i’m i’m not saying that you can never make that discernment right like there’s definitely cases where like you should just hold your mouth right so when when there’s high emotions right like piling up that one like the strata breaks the camel’s back bad like don’t don’t break the camel’s back right so i agree a lot of proverbs about that actually keeping your mouth closed so so there is wisdom in in what you say right there’s also how you say it right um like like when you say something from a place of authority right like like i the way i think of it is that there’s a bunch of affordances within the other person right so there’s there’s hooks that you can hook into and make an appeal to them right and and the most easy hooks are are emotional right but but when when you’re doing an emotional appeal that’s that’s like functional right so if if i do an emotional appeal on you like oh i feel bad because you haven’t done the dishes right that’s not going to change you right like it’s not going to teach you how to fish right like it’s not going to make you a person that will do the dishes from now on it will maybe make you the dishes to do the dishes right now right so so this manipulation and and you’re also borrowing from from the relationship right borrowing right like because there’s goodwill on your side right and i’m basically i’m withdrawing from the bank of goodwill and if i keep doing that i destroy the relationship right like i can’t make that emotional appeal all the time because then it’s blackmail right yeah like it so so so that like this is why i don’t like emotional anything because like i don’t i don’t think it leads anywhere good and it’s it’s the tool of the ego right like you said you can wield it right like it’s you get to wield something that isn’t yours and it’s like that’s necessary sometimes i agree but not good like it’s not good so what what you’re saying is helpful to me in some ways it’s helping me to see some stuff because i think i often have that i think i often have that pattern in my own life with my kids is very often i’m a very often i struggle with resentment and resentment to my kids because a lot of it a lot of it for me their disobedience bothers me because the way that i often interpret it and see it is that it is a it’s a it’s an inability on their half or a or an apathy on their half to care about how their decisions affect me right yes right or the rest of their family or incapacity like like i don’t because apathy would be a a dilling down of something that’s there or something right but you can also say like they never developed it yeah right and that it varies from person to person um you know how that how that you know whatever capacities they have for that you know whatever capacities they have for that but but it often is like i i want you part of my struggle and again this is this is almost like what i would what what i’m saying is you’re helpful because it’s making me realize that to some degree i take i want my kids to care about the way that their decisions affect other people in the in the same way that i do because i’m this highly emotional person and which the negative side of it tends toward what i’ve come to understand is codependency like i’m so concerned about how my decisions affect other people and i’m basically codependent like it’s hard for me to even know what i think about things often because i i don’t know how to separate what i think about something right and that might be the thing that clouds your relationship to the truth or well i think i think it often your ability to appeal to it because it’s conflicting with with this high value that you have by maintaining the integrity of the relationship like i don’t even want to use integrity but because i think i think you’re you’re confusing integrity of relationship to like purity right because because integrity is something that that that relates relates to the friction and and is ineffective by it right like like like it’s structurally sound while if if you need to prostrate yourself in front of the relationship in in order to maintain it like you in some sense don’t trust the relationship enough to carry that load well i think that’s true or i don’t or i very often don’t um i don’t like going through i mean this is very true for me i don’t like going through the pain especially if i have a history of of a pain of challenging someone in a relationship because if i feel like if they are not if they’re not going to respond to that in a mature way seeing that this is a thing that’s really motivated by love and then i’m not trying to hurt them like granted if i’m doing it well but if they don’t respond to that in a in a healthy way and if they essentially get angry with me at me i like it’s it’s a very difficult thing for my kind of personality and my constitution to to deal with that because it just it it like it ruins my days and weeks like i can’t function very well right and and then there’s two things right like dutch dutch proverb soft healers make stinking wounds right so if you if you don’t heal that you end up with a festering wound that right you end up with the elephant in the room and and so that’s one thing for you to realize right but it’s also important for the other person right so because because how do you commune right like like why why why does why does the relationship conflict because you’re encroaching on their individuality right not on that person you’re encroaching on their individuality yes totally agree with that right and and so their their conception of the relationship that they’re in right is is mis-framed right so then they’re not thinking in how the relationships ship enables them to be right they’re they’re thinking of the relationship as an imposition at least under that content right so if if you can engage the conflict in okay like we’re aimed at this and this tension between us is inhibiting our ability to reach that then we we have a shared interest in resolving this even though it will hurt you yes theoretically but i mean i just think that there are so there are just so few people in the world that are maybe even capable of getting at the level where they have any degree of ability to understand or even be aware of like what you just said no i i think everybody does i think everybody does that everybody i think people people know it like people know it like exactly but but the point is like if they know it right and so this is talking to to the platonic knowing right so they have participated in the being right so they have recognition of of that being true yeah they have to know it because they have some degree of healthy relationships so i mean they know it somehow they have right so so you don’t necessarily need to propositionalize this right but you you do appeal to the to the being that they know and and that being that they know has an authority within them yes right so it’s like appealing to their true self is the way that i would say that yeah i don’t i don’t like that at all what whatever like okay then just say what you just said but no but it’s important it’s not them right like it’s a being that’s outside of them that that has informed them right and it’s also informed you right so you share this right like like like it’s not an individual thing no it’s a shared reality it’s a shared truth it’s the person the divine person the logos whatever yes divine man but that man is present in everyone because that’s the being in which we participate yes but yeah then what does that mean right like i i agree right like like that so that that is the truth right and that that you could use to make an appeal right like that’s the shared reality like that’s the the being that we all participate in but but that doesn’t mean that we we are drawn to that right because because yeah people are are the best like they’re so good at finding reasons not to do the right thing and and all of that right and yeah and the smarter that you are the more reasons that you can find and yeah they are have people overcome that right yes yeah they are and they aren’t and it’s a very i don’t know it’s a it’s a hard thing it one of the hard questions for my life always is is is figuring out when and how hard to press in any relationship that you have right because of because of the because of like what i said before having the the humility to somewhat not not necessarily think that i see everything perfectly because like i’m not a saint so i you know i’m not like of course i assume i’m right about stuff but i don’t that’s why i hold an opinion and that’s why that’s why i think about things the way that i think about them but i could be wrong and then so like and then what is the wisdom and how hard you try to press that upon someone else like somewhat that’s the that’s the relationship i was just talking to somebody about this the other day that’s the relationship of i suppose the masculine the feminine impulse like you you remember tyler anderson he’s not around anymore but early days of bridges of meaning he’s like one of he was in paul’s local jord first jordan peterson meetup like he was really early him and joey i mean he was kind of one of the early bridges of meaning people i think joey mainly did it but anyhow he’s not around anymore um but like if you go to some of the early randos conversations he’s in them tyler was awesome and if you just look back and early early discord days but um he used to say something like uh churches have become or a lot of churches are masculine spaces with feminine language when they should be feminine spaces with masculine language and uh and i think that’s huh i agree yeah and i think that’s very spot on and it was very perceptive early on and i just came back to that the other day and i was talking to someone about it because that’s the that’s kind of my that balance is what we’re talking about like in the context of the relationship that needs it needs to be a womb a welcoming hospitable space where someone where there’s the freedom because it’s freedom and constraint too right that’s masculine and feminine where there’s the freedom for a person to you know this is the true part of safe spaces to say what they really think it’s part of the truth truth of estuaries people have people will not say what they think if they think you’re going to cut their head off they won’t or or a few people will because there’s people that are zealots you know um but so there needs to be that but then we also need to learn how i i personally i’ll just say this i personally really need to learn i’m sorry like you have masculine i don’t i don’t know if i agree with what that that needs to be there the the freedom to for people to say what they think um well like they like they need like i don’t because what okay the objection that i have is is that like people are sometimes just wrong right and entertaining wrongness is bad right so i’m i’m not saying that they shouldn’t be helped or or whatever right like like that’s not the argument that i’m trying to make but no i understand i don’t i don’t think you need to give a stage for false like i think that that’s not good yeah but part of that is but but i mean this gets into like the really practical aspects of this little corner and criticisms that you and mark have had right like that’s your temp like that’s your mode though like you’re you’re much more you are much more prone and comfortable to in a very masculine way just say it like you see it call it out this is what people need like you know and i’m it’s much more ben shapiro facts don’t care about your feelings like that’s much more your mode yeah but but and that’s fine and that’s fine here’s the thing is like but right like like we are still giving the space i agree i agree but people so like people are i think you are too but like there are people who will vary i know i know there are a lot of people and there have been a lot of people who really have um responded negatively to that general yes the spirit of the space that that you and mark present because they’re looking for validation perhaps but like here’s the thing this this going back to the whole like that we are always a combination in any relationship of unities and distinctions right so like this this is where with you like what because i’ve had conversations i’ve had a lot of conversations with people that are just like want to kick mark off the server or like mark and monwell or assholes or whatever and i’m like no and i i don’t like i would never i’m like they are to me part of it is i have a relationship with you guys but also part of it is like no i i’m just not i’m not a fan ever and part of that’s just me of getting rid of anyone like i never want to make that move i’m just like you don’t get to i don’t think that people i don’t think you’re like calling for the banning of anyone maybe you would i don’t know just a different kind of i i would no i i would call for people ban of people right and what what is the type of people that i call for the banal is whether they’re in good faith or bad faith right like if you’re in bad faith right which means that you’re not pointing up right so you’re not looking for cooperation like if you don’t want to cooperate you you shouldn’t participate like there’s no space for people who don’t want to cooperate and like what happens when when you see someone you’re having an interaction with someone where you’re like this person isn’t cooperating and then they say no you’re not cooperating well that’s what they are always going to do that’s that’s all the trouble that i always walk into right but then what happens how does that resolve well that means that well it doesn’t matter like it doesn’t resolve because we can’t cooperate like my that’s already established right like like we can just say yes no yes no yes right like but but it’s like like i i i know whether you’re in good faith or not right because i can state an aim right if if i get agreement on on the aim and now you’re doing things that don’t work towards the aim you’re sabotaging like whether that’s intentional or not it’s not relevant yes oh i agree intentionality is not completely irrelevant but almost close i don’t like to pay a lot of attention to that um i guess like like i we were like i and mark were talking to someone on um uh the awakening from from the meaning crisis discord and he at a certain point he was saying well i i challenge your statement because i think that’s the right thing to do um which i’m sure something you can get behind well let’s just follow it up right now we ask what what about what about your own statement like do you challenge us and it was no and i’m like you’re holding you’re holding two standards in the conversation like like why why aren’t the things that you say undergoing the same scrutiny that as the things that we say like that’s not fair and you can’t you like and then there’s this other thing right like what he’s doing and and he admitted to this right he’s looking for ways to challenge right not because what we say is wrong but because that’s what he wants to do and i don’t i don’t challenge based upon wanting to challenge i challenge because i i see something that’s wrong right like i might be wrong in my observation right but like that that’s something i can’t avoid yeah but but you see that how does how this attitude is just makes cooperation impossible like like we were like okay like you’re in bad faith like someone that is acting in that manner and it is it’s just feels justified in doing that like i can’t i can’t i can’t cooperate like i won’t and and and like there there’s a bunch of other ways right like like we’ve we’ve kind of identified like all these means where where people are just incapable of cooperating right and like it’s all a consequence of this individualism right this individualism is is is disconnecting right like it’s disallowing the intimacy within the relationship and so they can’t share a frame of reference frame of reference well i think that’s yeah that’s another way to say that i think is it’s just a lack of love it’s a lack of self-sacrifice it’s a lack of willingness to reorient see things differently die to be born in the idea that is in conflict with your world because that’s literally what what these people need to do right and and like i get why people don’t like me and mark because we’re basically saying you’re gonna have to die i was like yeah like that that sucks when people say that to you right but but like you you want to go to that place the way that you’re moving isn’t going to get you there you’re going to have to die and you’re going to have to be born in a different world view right like like your spirituality has to change right like just and and that’s the only way that that you’ll get there yeah and that’s just not a nice message part of it tell me what you think of this part of it could be because i know for myself it’s not it’s not so much that i’m opposed to that i mean to me that’s a just a very christian idea not well not even christian to me that’s just a that’s the way reality coheres sacrifice like you got to die you know i mean it’s unless a seed goes in the ground it doesn’t bear much fruit like that’s just part of it i mean that’s part of the natural pattern of reality but not for them huh not for them well part of it is like a and so this would go back to spaces so i would say i am completely open to that idea but something that often opens me up to what you would say is is the is probably aspects of like confession and humility if you lead with example of like where you have done your own self-death or like where you are self-dying like if you lead with that kind of mimetic example i think very often that can lead other other people because sometimes and sometimes you and mark can come across as very like we have this all figured out and let me just didactically let everybody else know how this all works and if you just follow the things that we’re telling you like one wonderful utopia and if you just don’t follow the things we’re telling us it’s because you don’t want to die you know it becomes this very like totalizing tautological uh somewhat if i may say condescending way of approaching it yeah well that’s fair you know and and i think and that’s and when and when that’s the mode you’re not going to get especially someone who’s immature you’re not like if someone has ears to hear they’re going to hear they’re going to have the humility to hear truth wherever it is right i mean they should but if they’re not like they need to be because because somewhat like i don’t i don’t want to sit around picking and choosing and pointing out names of like who is more immature and childlike or whatever but like with my own kids like there’s certain things like i just can’t sit here from on high and tell them just like these straight propositional truths for them and laws for them to cohere their life to but but okay but i’m okay so like this is a method of conversation right because i think what you’re doing is only telling half of the story right me when like well the description about me and mark right i don’t think it’s always like that no no no but like let me let me yeah expand on it right so what what i do right just at at the beginning of of the conversation right i establish a way a frame right a way of looking at reality and in order for you to cooperate with me either you need to accept that frame or you need to provide a frame in which i can cooperate with you right like that’s the two options right and i don’t even and i don’t even necessarily disagree with that and i and i actually think that that’s very um i think i think you guys and what you just said is a very succinct way a very simple way to talk about how people interact through discourse i think that’s true i think what you just said is true however due to either in inability incapacity a lack of because also people to even hear what you just said and recognize the validity of it involves relationality like they’ve had they would have to live within the kind of pattern to even recognize what you’re saying you know yeah but but that’s that’s why i usually don’t state it but i like i do state like this is this is the way these things are right and like i ask for agreement right and if there’s disagreement then we we can figure out like where’s the road right so that’s what i’m trying to say i agree with you i guess what i’m trying to say that’s all cooperative right like i just i just want to point this out like all of this is very cooperative is highly cooperative and then when it gets a frustration there right that’s because they rebel for whatever reason right this is where i would this is where i’d maybe push back on you a little bit with the whole self-death thing because what you’re maybe doing is essentially relationally speaking chinese to someone who doesn’t speak chinese and saying like you just need to speak chinese and if you don’t speak chinese you’re just not willing to die when maybe what you’re called to do is to die and stop okay okay like i’m i’m let’s let’s explore this so what what does that mean uh what i would say is that what you’re maybe doing is being right but being wrong in my own vernacular okay i’ll grant you that okay so what like what what’s the implication you mean what should we then do or what should theoretically like this this is this is my objection with all the people that that have criticism right like like it’s not relevant whether the criticism is right or wrong because you’re not providing a means to resolve it yeah so it’s like okay like i grant you your criticism is right right then provide me the path right and like as long as you can’t say well this is the path you should follow like i’m just gonna have to assume that you’re wrong or it’s impossible so i think so i think what is what i have often found it’s really the thing that i’m talking about as far as like giving giving a giving an all what you’re saying is true like anybody can criticize right then give an alternate proposal like that’s what’s hard to do the problem is is in in the kind of things that we’re talking about the illustration that we just had and when it’s like maybe the call is for me to die what what that is is kind of this ineffable thing because to me what we’re essentially talking about is metanoia it’s repentance so like when i realize that i’m actually wrong and i need to repent and i need to die it’s like this i don’t know how to distill that into something that that i can communicate that’s yeah but outside of my standard like like how do i get the discernment about whether i’m wrong or not i mean that’s that’s that kind of magic thing that’s where like your world turns upside down uh yeah i i get it right like but like like the the way that that my world flips is if i value something else right so like like and like this is my criticism towards all the people that have criticism like you just value relationship over truth like that’s effectively well but even but even that i think for the people that tend to be team winsome or whatever like that’s that’s a false dichotomy like you can’t it’s like freedom of the train or anything you can’t value you can’t you actually can’t value relationship if you don’t value truth and you can’t i i agree that’s why i think it’s hypocritical but it can be it can be like this is and this is so ultimately almost in the end of the day what i what i feel like a lot of it is is is it’s just people disagreeing over temperament it’s like a conservative and a liberal impulse or something all right i agree at the end of the day no no it’s different it’s like it’s the masculine and the feminine or that right but but what’s the the feminine takes care of the babies yeah so the fam well the feminine is a protective nurturing impulse right yes but if we’re talking about being condescending like if if you engage someone with the feminine impulse that is way more condescending than i’ll ever be because i am approaching yes i agree it can be very condescending which honestly like have you ever heard of the book how to win friends and influence people it’s like a you know it’s a really famous american book but it’s actually really good and um trying to blank out on the name of the guy it’s old it was written in the early 1900s uh and i’m so so yeah like yeah make your point okay so but i’m just trying to give a personal anecdote with that because i always used to be i mean throughout the course of my life i would say i’m i’m very not exactly in the same way that you and mark do but like i’m very inclined to tell people what i think and to challenge them on different things and i used to have this friend my buddy ao shout out a who um would always say he would advocate essentially that like because the second chapter of the book is something like that starts off it says one sentence and then it repeats it and it’s basically like no one you will not get anyone to do what you want that what you want them to do until they want to do what you want them to do and it’s basically like unless they want to listen to you they’re not going to i think that’s already bad framing like i i listen to that and i’m like no like i don’t i don’t want people to do anything right like i want people to cooperate like they get to decide how to do that like this is this is again it’s the same thing with with the leading it’s like oh manuel and mark want to lead this little corner like no like i don’t i don’t give a shit what happens as long as it happens like you get to decide how to do the thing as long as you’re doing the thing and you’re not doing the thing and i have my objection is not how you self-actualize my objection is that you’re not doing it right so that like there’s a distinction there like i don’t like this is this is i judge right like i judge what’s going on is wrong i’m not judging what is right right like i’m not saying like this has to happen this way like because i don’t care and this is this is where like relieving the space for these people right like when you when you’re thinking in affordances right like yes people can’t learn unless they have an affordance to grasp what what is being presented so like you need to package whatever you’re delivering in a manner that they can interact with all right so you have to agree for some people agreed but for some people that has to be less explicit and more feminine for them to be able to hear the package that you’re presenting right yeah what okay so to go to go back right so so basically what we’re talking about is people who got stuck in a certain developmental stage right i think some people get stuck in a developmental stage of a three-year-old right and they just never get out of that some people get stuck in a five eight ten-year-old understanding of certain things right and so when when you’re saying if you approach a three-year-old as a ten-year-old that’s wrong right and and that’s morally wrong even right like that you shouldn’t do that right and i think that’s the judgment that i am like a phasing right like you’re you’re engaging um with three-year-olds as as ten-year-olds and i’m like well like first of all i don’t know that the three-year-olds and until i treat them as ten-year-olds and they can’t participate right so that’s that’s one thing like i like they first have to run into the wall to know that the wall is there because like i can’t like i can’t magic that wall without them running into it and then secondly is like okay and then what right like do i want to spend my time with a three-year-old like is that actually a thing that i want to do because like i don’t like i don’t i don’t want to mommy an adult like yeah well it’s yeah i don’t know it’s a it’s a hard um i’m probably gonna get going here because i need to do some other things but this will be interesting i’d like to know i i’ll be interested to know how people respond to it and what you think about afterwards and where we could go from here because um this it gets into the problem of well what what came to mind it’s not even a problem i guess is just self-curation which is somewhat inevitable right because i often think that like there’s particular people like my buddy cal said once or and sam adams has said this many times but one of the blessings and dangers of this little corner is it’s heavily curated with people who like to have a lot of the conversations i like to have like what we just talked about like i mean there’s like there’s basically nobody in my embodied real life where i live that i can have a conversation like that with um and it’s and it’s very appealing to me i mean most people in my real life just i mean it’s not like i’m unliked but they’re just kind of like loops crazy oh but you are but that’s not unlike this little corner i guess and so um to your point of like not wanting to hang out with three-year-olds yes like there is i suppose it’s like a center and periphery thing that everything has and a person has you know the conversations i like to have there’s a center there’s there’s certain things that i but then again like certain things that i like that i prefer but you need to not harvest the fringe you need to not harvest the three-year-olds or the whatever your year olds or the people that are more masculine in the way that they approach talking about things or the people that are more feminine like we need to keep all those people in there because that’s often my pushback to people i always feel like an outsider well really in everything because like i will critique this is the thing i try to balance these things that we’re talking about really well in my own person so like i will critique you and my well and i have before of the way that conversations have been carried on but then when people on the other side are just like we need to get rid of them or they shouldn’t do this or want to bring in some kind of systemic exclusion of you guys i’m just like no like i i feel like i’m i’m just like i don’t i’m not game for that either so i’m just like i don’t i’m not i don’t know and at the same time like joey has banned people and he thinks like i’m you know uh we listen wussy yeah essentially who who just doesn’t want to get rid of anyone and that’s probably true he’s like it’s if i ran bridges of meaning or any community which i don’t want to um well but that might actually be right like you don’t want to because you don’t think you’re the right person in the job so like in some sense you’re disagreeing with i mean i would i would run it i mean this is why i like paul and this is probably i mean to any degree that i participate in the little corner outside of the particular relationships that i’ve developed because i mean i have my own inner ring my own little corner the corner of people that i know and have known for years more intimately um paul is what keeps me here because like i like john john’s a great guy i think he has a lot of interesting things to say but like i’m i’m i’ve always been more interested in people i’m not really interested in the ideas in and of himself and john is kind of an ideas guy he’s not cultivating a lot of relationships with people i don’t know john like i met him once he knew who i was which surprised the hell out of me and he’s a very nice guy but like i don’t care peugeot’s stuff i don’t really care i don’t know peugeot i know paul but but like like i think i touched on something important right because like paul doesn’t want to lead you don’t want to lead why why don’t you why don’t you want to lead in a structured hyper structured way no no i want to lead by example yeah but but you yeah but you don’t want to lead right because leading leading means to make decisions needs to set the boundaries right like like you you set a container like you you plant the standard and then within the boundaries you can cooperate and then rebuild there right like you have to build and build is a set of constraints which gives new affordances right so and and like i think i think you and paul are just realizing like that’s not your role and like i think that’s correct like i don’t i don’t think it’s my role either because like like i don’t i don’t want to impose my things because like people won’t listen to me like like like so that’s already not working right so like i i shouldn’t lead either but but i think this recognition is also the recognition that you’re wrong like like like i realize that i shouldn’t do the three-year-old thing right and and to go to go back to the three-year-old like i don’t know right like like i agree with you should exemplify things to three-year-olds and you should not propositionalize and and all of that but i don’t i don’t think you can do the magic trick right like i don’t i don’t think this exemplification stuff is is working the way that people pretended us like it like i don’t i don’t say it shouldn’t happen right like it definitely should happen like it has to happen but it’s it’s not a sword right like it’s not a tool like you can’t wield it like exemplification is not wieldable yeah i don’t know so this is well if we have another conversation that’s probably where i’d like to go because i do appreciate the challenge there’s probably some merit to it it’s um but the direction i see it going is the balance of masculine and feminine freedom and constraint what is what is the proper uh what is the proper role of a healthy not malevolent masculine spiritual impulse like what kind of strengths constraints are good and how i yeah i mean i tend to be i’m an anarchist man i tend to be pretty opposed to structure um at least a certain kind of structure i don’t know it would be an interesting uh well it’s more more interesting to see what the value is yes that is moving you there right because because like i i i just i had this realization and it was like i oh yeah i was i was going i was shooting into a defense right like someone said something and i i just jumped out to defend it i was like like do i want to defend this like like is that a good thing and i was like what what the heck is moving me yeah to defend this like like like why can’t it defend itself like why can’t it speak for itself like like why do i need to to white knight this this cause yeah and i was like holy cow like there’s there’s a bunch of stuff in me that i think is good right because like defending something is good that might not be right like like it might actually be whatever or is like compelling me to to keep some some reality instantiated that i should get rid of like that should die yeah perhaps so yeah that’s maybe viewers please that’s your reflection exercise for today like what are you defending and why are you defending so yeah comment i’d love comments don’t just watch don’t just leave some comment and then not watch it punks yeah and uh participate maybe we’ll continue this in a live stream format so that we we can integrate the audience some more uh just yeah like let us know if you want more of this if you want a specific direction of the conversation because i i think i think it was a fruitful exploration luke i did too i enjoyed it actually and so we’ll it would be great to continue it we’ll see my kids are down this week so it makes it easier well everybody thanks for watching and thanks for being my guest luke yeah thanks mo see you later buddy