Russell Brand

[0] Welcome, welcome, welcome to armchair expert.

[1] I'm Dach Shepard.

[2] I'm joined by Monica Padman.

[3] Hello.

[4] Okay, so people like Duchess of Duluth, they wanted to be minister of mice instead of secretary of mice, which I understand why they think that.

[5] They don't know yet.

[6] They don't know yet.

[7] Earmark that for the listeners.

[8] That it'll feel better at some point.

[9] Soon.

[10] Yeah.

[11] Russell Brand.

[12] What an incredibly well -spoken human being.

[13] Oh, my God.

[14] His brain is moving so fast.

[15] It's very admirable.

[16] Maybe the fastest.

[17] I'll say the fastest.

[18] I've never heard anyone speak with such command, articulate and brilliant at times as we discuss in the fact check, almost impossible for us to keep up.

[19] Yeah, but it's funny because it's not just that he's like saying random words and it all makes perfect sense.

[20] It's very cohesive.

[21] The clarity is impeccable.

[22] I just, like, can't relate at all to having that ability and not make any mistakes.

[23] He never, like, gets lost.

[24] No, no. It's amazing.

[25] He always finds his way right back to that cookie chrome trail.

[26] Ooh, I love cookies.

[27] Yeah, you do.

[28] I've never recommended that people listen to this podcast at a different speed.

[29] I want them to listen to it at 1 .0.

[30] Right.

[31] If you want to back it down to 0 .75 or 0 .5 on this one.

[32] Can you do that?

[33] Yeah, yeah.

[34] You can go slower.

[35] Oh, no, we're going to sound awful.

[36] Yeah, we'll sound terrible, but our guests will really be shining.

[37] I bet at half speedy's talking about what we speak at our quickest.

[38] Yeah, but also you want to hear him as he is.

[39] That's true.

[40] It's something to behold.

[41] Now, of course, Russell Brand came to my attention from forgetting Sarah Marshall.

[42] He was made love to my wife in a very elegant fashion, a really respectable way.

[43] And he was also in, of course, get him to the Greek, Arthur Hop.

[44] He has a new audiobook available only on Audible called Rural.

[45] Revelation.

[46] And just a reminder, our podcast is only on Spotify starting July 1st.

[47] And join us there, please.

[48] Get that app.

[49] It's free.

[50] Don't wait till June 31st, if there's even 31 days in June.

[51] I'm not sure.

[52] But don't wait or the morning up.

[53] You're going to be on your commute.

[54] You're going to have things to do.

[55] That's right.

[56] Let's get that app downloaded.

[57] And let's be ready to hit play on July 1st.

[58] got a biggie for you.

[59] Yeah, that's right.

[60] That's right.

[61] And we have a biggie for you today.

[62] Russell Brand.

[63] Please enjoy.

[64] Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and add free right now.

[65] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts.

[66] Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts.

[67] I'm good, man. I'm good.

[68] Thank you.

[69] Yeah, how about you?

[70] Good.

[71] Can I full disclosure with you?

[72] I have an expectation, which is a resentment waiting to happen, as we know, that either this will be brilliant or you and I are so similar, it'll just completely crash and burn.

[73] Have you had any similar thoughts, or is that just my racket?

[74] Well, I have kind of those sorts of thoughts generally.

[75] But, you know, when people tell me, oh, you're going to love this person, I often think, oh, I bet I don't.

[76] You've not accounted how petty and insecure and competitive I am.

[77] When I feel like now, like trying my best to sort of operate on the level of recovery and surrender and being sort of watchful and vigilant, and also I feel generally warm to you.

[78] Same, same, same, same.

[79] I feel outside of an outright attack, I think.

[80] Well, so just like you said, I can relate so much to people going like, oh my God, you're going to love this guy.

[81] And what I've come to find out is, no, that person's like me, and me and me don't get along that well.

[82] I hate me. Yes, I hate me, too.

[83] I try to numb me in my head.

[84] But my wife loves you.

[85] She's like, oh, my God, you're going to love Russell.

[86] He is the greatest guy.

[87] I love working with him.

[88] He's so respectful.

[89] He's so funny and sharp and he's sober like you.

[90] Again, I'm inclined to like you, but then that sometimes, too, can go the wrong way when a loved one loves someone else.

[91] We're famous people, aren't we?

[92] Like, you know, to a lesser or greater.

[93] extent, I'm like, thankfully, less inclined and defined by that world as I once was.

[94] And, like, you know, the work I have to do in my ego to live without that sort of artificial stimulation is paying off.

[95] In any event, like, when people that you don't know, know you, you have to in newer yourself.

[96] A lot of my, because I'm so down to earth and so real, a lot of my friends aren't in show business, yeah?

[97] I'm just slipping that in.

[98] I'm not trying to cultivate a particular impression of myself here but those people that don't know the protocols of like celebrity who go oh I'll tell you what right I was in a meeting the other day and like that was all just saying like you're what wanker you are yeah thanks thanks thanks for telling me they don't they've not been schooled but protect me from that shit right but I've had to over the years it's been a while now really practice letting go even when we're working on a sort of a significant character defect or a significant flaw or something about ourselves we really want to change.

[99] I am heartened by the words of this Swami man that I know, rather not Swami, sort of a right up there kind of Swami, he's got his own like temple out in Mumbai, he's a serious dude, shaved head, the works, all of that.

[100] And like we asked him, me and my mate, do you feel jealousy and lust and things like that still?

[101] And he said, yes I do.

[102] I thought that was in a sense sort of kind of encouraging.

[103] We go, what do you do with that.

[104] He says, it reminds me I need to move closer to God.

[105] I've got to move closer to God.

[106] And so, like, any time that I feel envy, I was, what was I taught, envy is your own unfulfilled potential projected onto another.

[107] As long as I'm living by my program and I'm trying to do what's right.

[108] And I live by pretty much Sesame Street ethics these days.

[109] Like, be nice, be kind, don't hurt people's feelings, don't think you're better than anybody, all that stuff.

[110] I'm trying to The simple, simple stuff.

[111] So I feel like if someone don't like me, that's on them.

[112] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[113] I feel a lot more at ease with that now.

[114] Having said that, I recently watched you in that film that I can't remember the name of, but it's got all good people in it, Fonda, Baitman, that film.

[115] And I thought, oh, yeah, I exist in the same casting basket.

[116] Sure, sure, sure.

[117] Nothing else.

[118] Oh, you would have been brilliant in that.

[119] You would have been better than me in that because it was a fast -talking.

[120] No, you were brilliant.

[121] I'm playing all the moral ambiguity, lack of self -reproach.

[122] I'm too tender to have done that.

[123] I've never known less about what I was doing in a...

[124] Wait, what movie?

[125] This is where I leave you.

[126] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[127] Yeah, and the director, he wasn't sure whether he wanted this guy to be likable or detestable.

[128] And I didn't know one way or another.

[129] I don't have great instinct.

[130] So that's the only movie I've ever been in where I gave three completely different characters.

[131] Like, we would do this take.

[132] I'm like, all right, now I'm going to be.

[133] be a dick that you hate and I'm going to give that take and now I'm going to try to like be real and blah blah blah I think they landed on kind of the real one but it was a very interesting experience I'm like let me just give you three options later you can decide I've had one experience making a film like that and it was sort of it really introduced me to the rooflessness of the machine by the way and you and I speak the same language I actually came to see it as a real statement of confidence because like when I'm in situations where I'm nervous people don't think I know what I'm doing.

[134] Of course, I overcompensate, and I have a definitive opinion about every fucking thing.

[135] But I saw this is a real state of confidence from this director to go, like, I'm not sure which one's going to play best or help the story ultimately.

[136] Like, I'd love to tell you that I know, but I don't know yet.

[137] And I was like, I envy that self -assuredness to just say, man, I don't know.

[138] Yeah.

[139] Thinking about it, when, like, the film that I did it on, it was a director as a pretty talented person, actually.

[140] So, yeah, what do I know?

[141] Yeah, it seems like it, and it seems like it worked out ultimately.

[142] Hello, both of you.

[143] Sorry for the technical complications.

[144] I think it was our fault.

[145] I'm grateful and happy to be here.

[146] Are you in England right now?

[147] Yeah, I live in the English countryside.

[148] It's pretty quiet.

[149] It's rural.

[150] It's sort of amplified domesticity.

[151] Like a friend of mine, like the comedian, Steve Coogan, when he saw my house, goes, that's like a sarcastically nice house.

[152] sarcastically nice like gingerbread house I live a very quiet easy simple life other than what goes under my head I don't know I'm a real bad projector let me own that just right out of the gates I'm a big projector but the similarities we're born in 75 single mother boyfriends around fucking hated that dad in and out a bit both drug addicts both start as reality TV show personalities these get to act.

[153] I had a chip on my shoulder about that.

[154] I can't wait to hear if you did.

[155] Seems like we both had some sex addiction.

[156] Seems like we both have come to terms with some of the misogynistic implications of our past behavior.

[157] Like, I'm just everything I'm reading about you, I'm like, oh my God, I think we were like living mirrored lives, but separated by the Atlantic.

[158] We're twins across time, you and I, Dax.

[159] Now we get to live this next part of our life as a saccharine spiritual pseudo gurus podcasting to a world, uncertain even of the next word that we're about to speak.

[160] I guess the funnest version of this for me would be, what was it like, what happened and what's it like now?

[161] That would be fun for me, and I can join you if you're up for that.

[162] Yeah, let's do it that way then.

[163] Okay, let's do it as a sort of chair duet in a 12 -step sense.

[164] I feel like my life has been governed by and defined by addiction, or rather the set of impulses and appetites that underwrite addiction.

[165] Now that I'm a person in recovery, I recognize that those appetites can be directed positively.

[166] It seems like such a simple thing.

[167] But the sort of combination of animal instincts and a culture that stimulates and directs and affixes those instincts to certain cultural artefacts and behaviours, I think creates addiction.

[168] And I also think addiction is just amplified attachment.

[169] Most people have things that are holding their life together, things that are external to them, that they are unconsciously devoted to or dedicated to, that are perhaps ultimately harmful for them.

[170] And if they try and change that behaviour, they find it challenging.

[171] And I suppose those of us that have had like real root one obvious, kind of bovine, dunderheaded, idiot addictions, like crack and heroin and alcohol, great big daub of red paint across the face addictions.

[172] At least what you get to learn then is what the principles are.

[173] And in my case, what I would say that is, is that I have a tendency to try to use material means to resolve a spiritual issue.

[174] And in case spiritual is too wishy -washy a word.

[175] I mean self -esteem, feeling okay, feeling connected.

[176] Well -being.

[177] Yeah, well -being, yes.

[178] So one that interested me, because it seems to be one of the only ones I haven't had that you have had, but I would correlate it with something else I've come to realize I had, which was I had OCD, right?

[179] So I had tons of ticks.

[180] I did all kinds of bizarre stuff.

[181] I had to do everything twice.

[182] I had to take a dump naked.

[183] I had to take the toilet paper out of the bathroom and touch it on the wall, but I had to do that twice.

[184] Then I had all this toilet the paper and I was nude and I was afraid of my family, you know, that was my way of controlling things.

[185] But you early on had bulimia at a young age?

[186] Like, what age?

[187] Yeah, early adolescence, 12, 13.

[188] It's sort of like, I think it started off as binging and eating a lot.

[189] And then I was ashamed of my body.

[190] So, like, the purging side of it, I think, like, a lot of people that are bulimic think that they invented it.

[191] In fact, a lot of my addiction, like, with pornography, I I felt like it was the bedsy scrolls that I dug up from my dad's bed at the week.

[192] Oh, my God, look at these.

[193] And the same with drugs.

[194] I remember my mates that were further down the line with their own particular drug addictions, like being sort of really gould and put off by my evangelism as an early drug addict.

[195] This is excellent.

[196] Everyone should be doing this.

[197] The whole society needs to be taking acid.

[198] Everyone would chill out, man, if they just smoked weed and heroin as well.

[199] That's a good relaxant.

[200] You know, like, I had, like, such devotion and enthusiasm for it, all of which, oh, let's face it, spiritual ideas, spiritual practices, spiritual solution.

[201] So for me, like, when I started to understand that the very thing that made me into a drug addict would make it possible for me to be in recovery, that was a significant point when I had that explained, even though it's a pretty basic and obvious point.

[202] 2002?

[203] Is that when you hung it up?

[204] Yes, it was.

[205] I had been 2004.

[206] I now, in retrospect, feel like 29 was pretty young.

[207] Like, as I see people come in and get sober, I recognize, oh, I guess I was on the path pretty early.

[208] And then you then would have been on it even two years before.

[209] So 27?

[210] Yes, that's right.

[211] I was pretty reluctant about recovery.

[212] It's not something that I was enthusiastic about when I was first shown it.

[213] I really felt it would be something I did for a short while in order to get some sort of handle on my life and get things back together.

[214] But I came to understand, I was shown that there could never be an answer for me in drinking and using it.

[215] And like, I'm not complacent about my recovery.

[216] I know that, you know, men like you get to 16.

[217] And I've got lots of friends and people I respect that have, you know, that have gone out.

[218] Yeah, I suppose the only salve against that, I suppose, can be just simple things for me. One day at a time, keeping it very, very simple because of my tendency towards complexity, because of my tendency to rumination and reflection, it was young.

[219] I'm thinking about it, like, when the first person I spoke to about recovery said, like, you know, if you don't stop now in six months, you'll be in prison, a lunatic asylum or dead, that sort of just seemed like a kind of maxim to me. I didn't see the resonance of that, and I certainly didn't know that it's a sort of a familiar trope to people that know the language of the 12 steps, you know, Jow's institutions, death.

[220] But, like, thinking about it as an older man now, I can see that a lot of things I was doing It was getting worse, fast.

[221] And, you know, like a lot of us, like now, I can be very easily hurt if someone looks to me the wrong way.

[222] So the idea that I'd take like a combination of mind -altering drugs and go into dangerous situations, this was not prudent for a fragile person or to sort of cause fights and the kind of things I did when actually, really, I'm a pretty peaceful man. Yeah, but also some great attraction to chaos and disorder.

[223] So I'm wondering, like, what your relationship is with your mom and with women.

[224] And I just wonder if there's any parallel there.

[225] That became a source of esteem for you.

[226] I think so, Dax.

[227] I grew up, like, whilst I was in contact with my dad and I still have a relationship with my dad, and it's a good relationship.

[228] You know, I know he's tried his best, and you know how it is in recovery.

[229] It doesn't do to speak badly of people, and I love my mom and my dad.

[230] But I was sort of mostly surrounded by women when I was a kid.

[231] I probably didn't get enough role modelling from older males.

[232] I also may I say adolescent as a child and even as a young man, I was very, very sort of neurotic about my body.

[233] I'm kind of ashamed around my body.

[234] So I wasn't super like fly, as it were.

[235] One of the things that's been very invaluable in later recovery is that I've formed a lot of strong, honest, open relationships with men that are, I hope, an expression of great respect for women and females, because my whole life still is determined by married, I have daughters, my mother, and I want to live a life of service around all genders.

[236] But like, look, you think about this.

[237] If you've been in the recovery community for a while, think about how many fatherless men you're dealing with.

[238] Now I have older male mentors that I have very open and honest relationships.

[239] I have a peer group that like a recovery peer group that is male, I sponsor, a lot of men.

[240] Because I want to have relationships now that are based on service, I've kind of fortified myself.

[241] And I just really didn't take up Buddhism the other day, man, but I think you would like, this interpretation of Buddhism saying that perhaps even the four noble truths could have been misinterpreted for linguistic reasons.

[242] And a different interpretation that's offered by this person is like, you know, instead of suffering, what we're talking about with the first noble truth is affliction.

[243] Instead of desire with the second noble truth, a word that you've already said in our chat, mate, expectation that we have an expectation that life will somehow be different.

[244] There's attention.

[245] The inclusion of the word noble is to suggest that both the suffering and the desire can themselves be somehow noble.

[246] The third word, and I can't remember the sort of literal word for it.

[247] We have this fire in us, the fire of appetite, the fire of rejection of suffering.

[248] This fire can be cultivated and directed.

[249] If the winds of desire take us towards pleasure, that's going to be a problem.

[250] If they take us towards oblivion, that's going to be a problem.

[251] If they take us towards hate in our own life, resent in our own life, that's going to be a problem.

[252] I think if anything defines addicts, and I'd love to hear what you both think about this, is that we somehow have some DNA helix of all three.

[253] Like I simultaneously want oblivion, pleasure to be somebody else.

[254] And once that thing kicks in, man, I can't take it.

[255] I can't take it.

[256] I also think that in the addiction lie the seeds of this rather esoteric aspect of recovery.

[257] We wanted to not be ourselves.

[258] We wanted to destroy everything.

[259] We wanted to destroy everything.

[260] We wanted the ego, but we didn't know that.

[261] The culture doesn't give you a template.

[262] The culture doesn't tell you like you're a person that's never going to be at ease with your own ego.

[263] That's going to be your biggest battle is going to be against yourself.

[264] Here are some simple principles.

[265] I think we should have been selected like little Dalai Lamas plucked out like they do when they're three or four years old and gone, uh -oh, not for you.

[266] Don't tell this kid they're going to be fine if they go through college or get a good job or everyone finds them attractive or they're really good at sport or anything.

[267] Don't tell them that.

[268] Tell this kid, you have to get in touch with the infinite, with the eternal, that your temporary nature is unwritten by something that may seem like chaos, but is actually limitlessness.

[269] You might start to find chaos appealing because somewhere in you there's this resonance, this memory, that chaos is not the order, the reductiveness of the self, the static, turgid self, being this person that sometimes you fortify and bolster with fruigoic means, but ultimately it repels you.

[270] You're revolted by it and you have to get away from it.

[271] But chaos, we can't ride that chaos in and out of everyone else's lives, and we don't ride it that well, even if we think we can, even if we've had glorious moments stood on top of vehicles naked, arms stretched wide or powerful.

[272] You know, like, you know, the classic lion at night mouse in the morning.

[273] So for me, like, I feel that there are perennial truths found in many, many scriptural theologies, ideologies, well -being techniques that are speaking to something in us.

[274] I think if addiction is anything, it's that we have all three of these Buddhist tendencies.

[275] And I'm sure that if we were to look at other doctrines or systems of analysis, we would find correlatives there too.

[276] Because I think everyone's on the spectrum and the addict is just the person that pushed it too far in one of those directions.

[277] I feel like someone who just observed the Tesla electricity thing, you know, that zaps around the Tesla ball and then electricity shoots to like all corners of the cage like think of the first spectator of that thing yeah that was great but i also think it's true i was like listening i was catching a lot of it and i was also just kind of in awe of the way you speak i do tend to think just being around you and addicts via you i think there's a thought that addicts are very base level but actually i think all of you guys are operating on some higher level.

[278] Some freaky shit.

[279] Yeah, exactly.

[280] Some freaky shit.

[281] No, some higher level that's like connected to a place that non -addicts can't really relate to.

[282] And that's good for them in that way.

[283] But it's not good for them.

[284] I think maybe in like the wisdom way.

[285] That was an example of it.

[286] Yeah, yeah.

[287] Well, there's a lot going on here.

[288] Like it's hard to sum up this cake right now.

[289] Like one of the ingredients is addict for sure.

[290] But then there's all this other wonderful stuff happening that's kind of proprietary to Russell.

[291] Really quick.

[292] When did you realize that you were verbally that dexterous?

[293] The first time anyone said anything nice to me around language, I've used the phrase grudgingly trudge in something I'd written at school.

[294] And I think maybe like I grudgingly trudged to school or something like that.

[295] The teacher said, that's good.

[296] And I don't want to sort of paint a picture of a kind of a Dickensian childhood, utterly bereft of kind of.

[297] endless, an endless trawl through misery, staring at a stepdad's shoes by the front door, the horror of the inaccessible remote control, perennially perched on a thigh, never mind, never mind, can't control the frequency, can't control the channel.

[298] But like that little bit of approval, that fed me, that fed me. And then I used to literally look at dictionaries a lot, and I used to write poetry a lot.

[299] And then I went to drama school and to your point earlier about that when you were saying about sort of like how I regard myself as sort of a professional person and that kind of professional pride, I say, I suppose, around actors.

[300] You know, they've got enough populism in me to be okay with the reality thing.

[301] I sort of hosted a show where people talked about a reality TV show.

[302] There was a show called Big Brother that was big over here and never big over there.

[303] And like afterwards, there was a show where you'd analyse it.

[304] And I used to sort of had an analyse it like it was anthropology.

[305] I also have dumb little dumb jokes and a ridiculous haircut and all the things that you would anticipate and expect.

[306] Before that, though, I'd been to a drama school and at that drama school, I, like everyone, wanted to be one of the cool and sexy, brooding actors of the sort of 50s and 60s, Brando, Clift, Jimmy Dean, all of that, like everyone wanted to be.

[307] But people, people were like, when I was just talking and saying stuff, I remember that other people there going, you should do that.

[308] Right.

[309] Which I sort of took as a kind of an insult at the time.

[310] So here's where I thought it could go sideways.

[311] I fancy myself pretty quick with Gab.

[312] So I could have seen myself getting competitive with you, but you're just so far in a way.

[313] It's another level.

[314] Yeah, it's a whole other level that I'm actually just with pleasure conceding your dominance, which is rare and fun for me. It's an armchair expert first, perhaps.

[315] Do you have to police?

[316] I think it might be.

[317] This is the first.

[318] Do you have to police yourself?

[319] And who would be the examples?

[320] I had the pleasure of meeting another actor.

[321] and we got an argument about health care and it went on for four or five hours and then there was a point where we're on an airplane he was still trying to argue with me and I pretended I was asleep and for the first time I realized oh many of the arguments I thought I won people just stopped giving a fuck it was such a gift he gave me because I was like oh in my mind if I go through and I remember all these these verbal battles I've had that I think I've won quite often people got bored or they didn't give a shit I didn't convince them it was helpful to me and also being in relationships that This is like, can be the thing that attracts you to me, and then it can be absolutely insufferable to be around.

[322] So I wonder, do you find that you have to police it, like, give people the pleasurable side and then try to dull the side of the sword that is, it's not fun to debate you?

[323] Firstly, I want to acknowledge you gave me a huge compliment, and I would tell you that I accept that compliment, and I'm grateful for it.

[324] But also, I've got enough flaws, Dax.

[325] There's like, you know, there's any one of a hundred activities you could select for us to do together that, you know, that I would not be.

[326] But I will only focus on the one you're superior to, as you know.

[327] You know that.

[328] That's good.

[329] So keep your attention right there.

[330] That's going to be advantageous to your wellbeing.

[331] But in a sense, bombast and kind of hectoring, those are problems that could easily be applied to someone with a smaller vocabulary.

[332] And definitely, they're things that I'm guilty of.

[333] Definitely, there have been times like you where I thought that I'd been right, but really I'd just been persistent and sort of tedious.

[334] But for me, this is something you will identify with, perhaps both of you, and from what I know of you, Dax, you, certainly.

[335] I have always had two sort of peculiarly compete in drives within me. Take even the career.

[336] Part of me, I love words and language.

[337] I love it.

[338] I love the poetry, the elegance, the possibilities of language, the holiness, the implication that there is something ulterior within our consciousness, expressing itself with the temporary vessel of our persona.

[339] I love that.

[340] I love comedy, the way that comedy can be used to strip away masks and reveal the divine, that it can be a tool for bringing about togetherness, the catharsis of laughter.

[341] But I tell you, too, I wanted to be famous.

[342] I felt insecure and inadequate and inferior, and I wanted something done.

[343] I didn't want to feel that anymore.

[344] I didn't want to feel it.

[345] So those two things, like the kind of worst aspects of fame and celebrity in our culture, Fame for fame's sake.

[346] Fame is a commodity.

[347] Fame disconnected from art. Fame deracinated from values, from beauty.

[348] Fame just as a cudgel for commodification and consumerism to send superficial messaging to everyone to make us all feel inferior.

[349] Both of those things were in me simultaneously.

[350] And what my recovery has been about and perhaps all of our journeys, all of us that say that we're on the path and pray that we're on the path, is about can we continue.

[351] continually select from that super state of limitless potentialities, which we now know to be the basest level of reality that we can understand, perhaps from that super state of potentialities with nothing is certain until it happens.

[352] Whereas that Carlo Revelli told me that at the most basic level, all thing matter is relational.

[353] It can't even be said to be there at all until it's in relationship.

[354] Perhaps we can select to be in positive relationship.

[355] Like that Eckart Toll told me that the moment he comes off state, like he tries not to wed himself to his impressions of himself.

[356] You know, like, we're lucky to be extreme.

[357] We're the animals that fled for the higher ground.

[358] We're the animals that fled for the higher ground in the monsoon and the typhoon.

[359] But everyone in the end is going to have to awaken.

[360] We're all going to have to awaken.

[361] This isn't working.

[362] And it's not just working for people that are desperate, impoverished.

[363] Inequality doesn't work for any of us.

[364] You've been in the condition and position you've been for long enough to have met super powerful, successful people in despair, just despair, broken.

[365] So, like, we're in a position where we can start to let go, or I at least, I'm in a position where I can start to let go of that part of myself that says, I'll be enough if I am in this movie, I'll be enough if these people find me attractive.

[366] Even though the thought still comes, the thought still comes from that super state of potentialities, I can select to not pursue it.

[367] And I've got to tell you, man, I speak it a lot better than I do it, because I find it really, really, really hard, really hard.

[368] Yeah, I totally agree.

[369] Stay tuned for more armchair expert If you dare What's up guys This your girl Kiki And my podcast is back with a new season And let me tell you it's too good And I'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest Okay, every episode I bring on a friend And I don't mean just friends I mean the likes of Amy Polar Kel Mitchell, Vivica Fox The list goes on So follow, watch and listen to baby This is Kiki Palmer on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast.

[370] We've all been there.

[371] Turning to the internet to self -diagnose our inexplicable pains, debilitating body aches, sudden fevers, and strange rashes.

[372] Though our minds tend to spiral to worst -case scenarios, it's usually nothing.

[373] But for an unlucky few, these unsuspecting symptoms can start the clock ticking on a terrifying medical mystery.

[374] Like the unexplainable death of a retired firefighter, whose body was found at home by his son, except it looked like he had been cremated, or the time when an entire town started jumping from buildings and seeing tigers on their ceilings.

[375] Hey, listeners, it's Mr. Ballin here, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast.

[376] It's called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries.

[377] Each terrifying true story will be sure to keep you up at night.

[378] Follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts.

[379] Prime members can listen early and ad -free on Amazon Music.

[380] Have you read Molecule of More?

[381] No. Oh my gosh.

[382] You will love it.

[383] It's about dopamine from a very scientific perspective of all the impacts, dopamine and varying levels of dopamine and what illnesses it caused.

[384] What are the gifts of it?

[385] How populations have higher rates of it, because those are the people that migrated to new lands, how that then correlates with bipolarism on a national level.

[386] It's so fascinating.

[387] You will love it.

[388] Okay, so four days ago, Kristen and the girls and I were driving home from a friend's house.

[389] I needed to stop at 7 -Eleven to get some chewing tobacco.

[390] I was in there.

[391] A gentleman...

[392] Where?

[393] Chewing tobacco?

[394] Who are you?

[395] Chew and chewing?

[396] Chewing tobacco.

[397] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[398] This is a wild west.

[399] So I'm in there and I know the two guys that work behind there pretty well.

[400] A gentleman walks in with no shirt on, no mask.

[401] He's holding a styrofoam container and they immediately start going, no, no, no, no, you get out.

[402] And he goes, look, I'm just in here to get ketchup, asshole!

[403] And he screams asshole in the most amusing way possible.

[404] I am already, like, I'm already enjoying it, and it escalates, and he throws asshole four or five times more out, and they're yelling and everything.

[405] And I'm, like, middle of it.

[406] I'm doing a voice memo to my friend Nate.

[407] Oh, my God.

[408] My favorite 7 -Eleven, the shit's going down.

[409] So I come back, and the girls have just seen a guy come out shirtless screaming asshole.

[410] And they're like, what happened in it?

[411] And I am elated.

[412] I mean, it's like I just took a fucking hit of the crack pipe.

[413] And I'm like, that's how I am.

[414] I love when the shit's hitting the fan.

[415] And I was curious if you too get agitated in a pleasurable way when that stuff's going on.

[416] Yeah, this impulse to move towards the chaos, I have it very much.

[417] And particularly sort of that format of it, like proper, yeah, the shirtless maniacs.

[418] And I'm guessing you're still living Los Angeles.

[419] from the tombrough of that anecdote.

[420] I like those sort of semi -savage people and I identify with them and I recognise it.

[421] I recognise it.

[422] The only thing I would say was that is like how did you feel after the situation and how did you behave after the situation?

[423] Me now, right, because of recovery, because of the principles of service, I can be so sort of self -conscious about wanting to help people or like kind of like I'm trying to get a gold star of recovery way.

[424] So I would, enjoy the chaos of that guy.

[425] I also wouldn't want people to think I was scared of that.

[426] Like, oh, I'm not a person that's all freaked out by that.

[427] I can handle this.

[428] I live there, man. I'm with you.

[429] I'm crazy like you.

[430] And then I think I sort of want to put my arm around and go, hey, what's going on?

[431] You need some help.

[432] It seems like you really need some ketchup.

[433] This isn't just about the ketchup, is it, buddy.

[434] Yes.

[435] The ketchup is symbolic for something else, I'm guessing.

[436] Well, I get in the car and then, of course, we had a big debrief about it, the whole family.

[437] So I said, look, there's all these different people in the world.

[438] Thank God.

[439] And there are some people that do.

[440] well in that situation because sometimes that situation arises and you want someone there that's kind of calm and level -headed and I think that's when I have a role.

[441] But then if I'm honest, a lot of it is my excitement and anticipation that someone will need me to rescue them.

[442] So like there's some element that this could go sideways and I like the guys behind the counter and I'm happy to step in and get physical with the guy with the catch -up.

[443] So I think, yeah, my identity is someone who like rescues people.

[444] It's like I'm up to bat.

[445] So like there's some, exciting anticipation that I'll get to prove my valour.

[446] And what's wrong with that?

[447] Like, when we're doing this sort of rigorous inventory about numerous defects and flaws, I'm reminded by a lot of people much further down the path than me that we have to make room at the table for these assets.

[448] I think that's cool that you're willing to step up.

[449] I think that's cool.

[450] I think that's of great value.

[451] And, like, if you've had a childhood and it sounds like you have that was comparable to mine, you departed.

[452] there feeling somehow ill -equipped and insufficient.

[453] And if you have somehow found a way to value yourself and aspects of yourself that are positive, bravery, courage, willingness to put yourself in front of a potentially a flying fist or a bottle of ketchup if he does it after it's been served, you know, I think that's laudable.

[454] And like one of the people that really helps me, he says like, for example, when I sort of say, oh, you know, I don't know, I think maybe I only said yes to that a bit of work because of my ego and stuff like that.

[455] and I'm telling myself it's out of alignment with my higher principles because the fact is now that if I'm on a film set I ain't the most important person there I'm way, way down that cool sheet there's no need for a tape measure to see who's got the biggest trailer and maybe part of me can't handle that and I shouldn't dress that up as oh look at me how holy I am I'm too holy to be like the same with all things with addiction it's not that I'm too good for it as I'm too bad for it and like he has to remind me that no you're a good guy you're all right, you know, and I guess, like your marriage is purely conjecture, but I pray and I hope that, you know, your goals have got one parent who can handle that shit.

[456] I can step up and handle the storm because you never know when that might be required.

[457] And another parent that's going to ensure that there is some order and some routine and some structure.

[458] Compassion to the guy that wanted catch up.

[459] Like her voice was very much needed in explaining what that guy was going through.

[460] But there is a problem.

[461] Okay, here's Monica's outside observer.

[462] I think it's great, and I would feel very grateful that you were in the store if I was in the store.

[463] But if you're someone who is super drawn to a situation where you need to rescue someone, you will find it.

[464] Yes.

[465] So you will be in situations that are chaotic because you want to be.

[466] Subconsciously, you're searching for it.

[467] And the people around you who don't want to be in those situations are attached to you and getting dragged on that right.

[468] Like, Kristen is never in a 7 -Eleven and that's happening.

[469] She's never been in that situation.

[470] And either of I. I couldn't agree with you more.

[471] And you're 100 % right.

[472] There's four different 7 -Elevens I could frequent.

[473] I always go to that one because that's where the action's the hottest.

[474] I always see stuff at the 7 -Eleven.

[475] Yeah.

[476] Yeah.

[477] So I agree with it.

[478] It's a tough one.

[479] The point that Monica raises, I think, is a difficult one to deal with entirely because the shadow has to.

[480] to be sort of felt, understood and somewhat lived.

[481] And I really struggle with that to tell you the truth in my own life.

[482] Now that I live the life that I do, which is bounded on all sides by necessary order, whether that's the principles of my recovery or the commitments that I've made to family.

[483] Like I'm friends, for example, with, you know, Wim Hof, of course, the Iceman, the breath guy.

[484] He's like a modern day yogi.

[485] He has that kind of, whoa, has this glorious roar to his whole persona.

[486] It's like he's not stopped at the head of.

[487] He's gone beyond the hedonism to a place of true sort of Viking transcendence.

[488] The glory, the glory of masculinity, the glory of femininity.

[489] Wherever you fall on that spectrum, he's embodying the part of it that he's landed on.

[490] When I'm sort of talking to him and seeing how at ease he is with like primalness, the primordial aspect of his nature, I feel like, wow, man, have I overcorrected with this domesticity, you know?

[491] And like, I'm a person like, I don't want to be sort of seeking it out in 7 -Eleven's.

[492] I'm sort of a retired cop But I remember with me And I've had to sort of calm this down When we would go on walks I would always go, hey, what if we sort of go over this fence or should we go through there?

[493] My wife's a hold on a minute, that's trespass No, we should be doing that.

[494] Yeah, it's so really matter, don't it?

[495] I mean, who won't say?

[496] I can't you own to name?

[497] That's that thing that you were talking about earlier where I could bore someone to sleep.

[498] But what's the real crime here?

[499] Is the crime this trespass or is the real crime that the nature itself has been cut off from mankind?

[500] What about the fences and boundaries in our own mind?

[501] Our own animus cut off.

[502] What are we?

[503] Where is your God now?

[504] One time the person said to us in counselling, the counsellor said to us, you knew what he was like when you married him, right?

[505] And my wife goes, yeah, yeah.

[506] You knew this is Russell you're marrying.

[507] And you, Russell, you knew that this is Laura and you're marrying.

[508] Yeah, yeah.

[509] Right, so there you go.

[510] Session over.

[511] Yeah, yeah.

[512] 200 dollars get out let's talk up really quick about TM you were super into it you were already into it and chris and i got into it and we fucking loved it i loved it and then we had kids and that was eight years ago and i totally stopped because i can't anticipate getting up 20 minutes before they get whatever these are my excuses but i did love it and i even got to see you i attended some david lynch foundation thing and you spoke and you had this great funny runner about about, I think talking to David about getting horny during it.

[513] And he said, yeah, that's fine to get horny during it.

[514] You know, maybe just wait till after.

[515] Then you talked about how great a post -TM masturbation was.

[516] The whole thing was really, really funny.

[517] But I'm curious if you could sum up for people what you get out of it.

[518] The thing I would like to say about it is I was one of the people.

[519] It's like, it can't be not.

[520] My brain's too busy.

[521] I could never achieve a thoughtless 10 minutes.

[522] And it was way, way easier than I could have ever.

[523] expected and totally effective.

[524] So how did you come to find TM and do you still do it?

[525] Yes, I still do it.

[526] I met Bobby Roth, the man who runs the David Lynch Foundation, who's essentially a sort of secular priest, really, just lives to teach people transcendental meditation.

[527] It's for him.

[528] It's the answer.

[529] He loves it.

[530] The same as David Lynch, who like is evangelical about the TM, even as opposed to other forms of meditation.

[531] I've been at a sort of an event with him where someone in the order to do.

[532] What about other types of meditate?

[533] No, make you not work.

[534] Dog back about it.

[535] So like, T .M. Do you now work.

[536] He loves them.

[537] Like, so T .M, how I learned it is that, you know, the repetition of a mantra that they give you silently in your head.

[538] Now, the things that really helped me was how kind of, I don't know, secular, casual they were about it.

[539] Like, you're not going to do it perfectly.

[540] Don't worry about it.

[541] trying to get 10 thoughtless minutes, it's natural for your mind to think, your mind will effortlessly think, just whenever you notice your thinking, return to the mantra.

[542] Now, the same way as drugs of different degrees, I also very much like meditation of different degrees.

[543] I try to do TM at least once a day for my morning session, mantra meditation, simple meditation.

[544] But I tell you, that's, like I also enjoy guided meditations, like from Mugi or Ram Dass has a whole bunch and Titchin at Han and like, you know, I like some of that stuff too.

[545] And also I started on, I have a podcast also, which I'm to a degree promoting in this conversation, specifically this bit of this conversation.

[546] I do a conversation, one called under the skin where I chat to people, and I do one called Above the Noise, which is a guided meditation podcast, which is about really talking about meditative techniques in a way that is accessible and ordinary.

[547] One of the things I've started to believe now is that spirituality in a way that would seem quite extreme has to become normalised, that basic principle of we have to start valuing our inner life more than our outer life because I can't see a version of the future where we can continue to consume in the way we do, use energy in the way that we do, organise social and cultural systems in the way that we do.

[548] So people individually need to awaken and collectively need to awaken.

[549] And for me, meditation in conjunction with service so that I don't become so solipsistic and self -regarding and only interest in what I want because I'll happily sit and do nothing all day long except meditate.

[550] I like it.

[551] I spend my whole life trying to get off my head.

[552] For me, it's like I meditate in order that I can be a good husband and a good father and that I can be valuable in the lives of other people.

[553] And whenever I say this, I should offer the qualifier up against some serious internal opposition in the other part of my mind that's going, you're the most important thing in the world.

[554] Who cares about anything else?

[555] You're great.

[556] Carry on.

[557] Yeah, buy Ferrari.

[558] All of that.

[559] Write a book about meditation.

[560] and buy Ferrari with the advance.

[561] So, yes, Revelation is your podcast that we're here to talk about.

[562] And walk us through an episode of Revelation.

[563] Under the Skin is my podcast.

[564] Revelation is an audible original.

[565] It's like a book that only exists on Audible, that platform called Audible, meaning the only person that's read it is people I gave it to written down.

[566] I didn't give it to very many of them for copyright reasons.

[567] So like on Audible, I've got this book, Revelation, which is like a five -hour audio book, although they don't like the word book.

[568] So, but what's a possible synonym?

[569] Manuscript, parchment?

[570] What I'm meant to say?

[571] Anyway, it's like me reading out this book, Revelation, which is about, and I think about it all the time still, the evocation of the sacred in ordinary life, and what Van Dana Shiva would call re -sacralising life, finding the sacred in every moment.

[572] Even, for example, in that moment in the 7 -Eleven there, there's a moment of you that's adrenaline and excitement, But I bet at least a part of it is I recognize this guy.

[573] I am this guy.

[574] I'm the same as this guy.

[575] I can protect these people.

[576] I can protect the guy behind the counter.

[577] These are sacred impulses.

[578] So the book Revelation is about how I in ordinary life try to evoke and appreciate and connect with the sacred all of the time because I think that's what I've been doing my whole life as an addict anyway.

[579] And that's what I think if we were able to do it, it would automatically take care of problems of respect and problems of ecological meltdown on all of those things, because if you deny that there are ulterior, universal, deep principles, then I think we end up in this nihilistic morass where anything is possible.

[580] Anything could be right or wrong or whatever.

[581] So that's what that audible original is about.

[582] If we're kind of try to quantify values, what role does community in your sense play?

[583] Because I feel like I'm assuming we're similar in that I did not want a Christian God.

[584] I didn't want an all -knowing God.

[585] I didn't want a God that said some people go here and some people go there.

[586] I didn't like any of those options.

[587] And then through the program, I was forced to find the value of community that I would have totally missed out on.

[588] And there are definitely moments where I'm in my group of 20 men where I'm like, well, how the hell would I have ended up with 20 men in a room talking about feelings?

[589] It couldn't have existed without this.

[590] And oh, what a shame that the only real option i can see other than that is go to a church on sunday to get that experience and it seems like you must have desired that as well and you've found it in different pockets as well but i guess i'm regularly thinking man we're all missing community in a sense that is is probably vital to us and there's no options out there for people i keep wondering about what are the kind of indigenous qualities and traits that we have that are not being honoured by the way that we organise our social systems.

[591] And with recourse to sort of simple anthropology, the only type I could claim to understand, we are evolved to live in communities of 75 to 150 people, where the community has a common goal of survival and preservation, where we have a sort of an understanding of who we are and how we are in relationship to one another.

[592] Like, I'm not like a mad Luddite person who thinks we should smash these devices that are enabling us to communicate across time and space, certainly at least space.

[593] But, like, I do feel that technology and medicine have operated as false markers in the progress of our kind.

[594] Because we are able to achieve such elegant miracles in the fields of science, we've forgotten that we have not been regarding perhaps our core values, perhaps the essential fire in all of us.

[595] simple ways that we form communities.

[596] There are things that I simply can't do alone, even though there's times in my life where I told myself I'm my only child, I'm a stand -up comedian, I do everything on my own, I'm best off on my own, I don't want people near me. I need to be in communities.

[597] I need to see that even people that are different from me in superficial ways are the same as me in really, really important ways.

[598] I need to recognise in other people that I'm not worthless scum and I'm not like some great super duper deified being.

[599] I'm just one of the them and like you i'm fortunate to belong to communities where that's made clear to me pretty regularly and i think that any spiritual system that works works because it has one way or another aligned with natural tendencies and traits that are evolved with us evolution is appetite meets environment appetites is drives drives is addiction craving these appetites these tendencies sees in everybody have to be guided.

[600] Lots of people, it seems to me, from the outside, have given over their autonomy over their appetites.

[601] They have accepted the placebo's, tropes and notions dealt to them by a culture that sees them mostly as a consumer.

[602] Those of us have been awakened through the pitiful means that we've experienced, we don't have that option anymore.

[603] And the things that we've turned to is a belief in a higher power or higher purpose, service of others, candor and honesty about who we are, a willingness to be taught.

[604] These are, again, like Sesame Street ethics, really, really basic values.

[605] And I think it's no coincidence that they were designed from dealing with people with chronic alcohol problems.

[606] That that fundamental discovery of this program was a kind of a collision between the psychiatrist Carl Jung and Carl Jung's acknowledgement that the only thing to change a chronic addict would be a kind of spiritual awakening and the ongoing support of a community.

[607] The theologian William James, who believed that all of us are separated from limitless consciousness by the thinnest of veils, all these potential universes that I crave, that mad lust I get when I hear about what people are experiencing on an ayahuasca and psilocybin and think, oh, could I do that?

[608] Could you please let me have one hit at a DMT?

[609] But like William James tells us that all those realms, they're existing right now within you, within me, around us.

[610] It's just another frequency that we can access through meditist, means.

[611] I feel like what we ought to be looking to create are communities that we're possible emulate the conditions of our evolution.

[612] For hundreds of thousands of years, we lived in these hunter -gatherer tribes, for over 10 ,000, whatever, we've lived in settled communities post -agriculture.

[613] And as a result of that, society has come structured differently, and there's a huge mental health deficit and a huge emotional loss, and perhaps most of all, spiritual loss.

[614] And perhaps in the final analysis, spirituality is mental.

[615] health.

[616] What else is the point of it?

[617] What else is the point of it, if not that?

[618] The brilliant English philosopher, now dead.

[619] God rest his soul, even though he was an atheist, Mark Fisher, used to say mental health and suicide are social problems.

[620] We package them as individual problems so you don't ever have to go, society's causing this.

[621] Society's causing this opioid crisis.

[622] But what is opioid addiction about?

[623] You can't bear to feel anymore.

[624] You need to be numb.

[625] What kind of culture are you creating?

[626] We know that.

[627] We've seen it in this sort of in the hibernation of the pandemic, which was a perfect opportunity for us to review the way that we create cultures, what did we say?

[628] Let's get back to normal as quickly as possible.

[629] Like normal was ever anything to aspire to.

[630] This was an opportunity to re -evaluate our relationship with nature, inner and outer.

[631] And we're told, we're told by your great Chomsky, that the political discourse is predicated upon lively debate between narrow parameters.

[632] No one ever looks about you, but what about right over here?

[633] What about over here?

[634] What about real new solutions to the way we organize society?

[635] Of course these things are possible.

[636] As David Graver also dead, I'm beginning to think there's some sort of connection in.

[637] David Graber said, all of us complain about society, about the great truth is this.

[638] We made it this way, and we can change it if we want to.

[639] Oh, my God.

[640] You're so fun to listen to.

[641] I mean, I'm so excited for the podcast.

[642] Yeah, so under the skin, I'm going to blame other people.

[643] I only got revelation as a promotional.

[644] It's not your fault, actually, because let me tell you some of the provenance.

[645] of this conversation.

[646] Like I did the audio book with Revelation, great company, lovely people to work with, and I've been for a long time doing Under the Skin, which is a subscription model podcast on Luminary.

[647] This bit of here that you and I are currently engaged in, which hopefully is also a real conversation on some level, monocam, tell me there's some truth, some value that we're not just mandarin's on the stage of commerce right now.

[648] But like I did it for them, but really I would love to talk about, yeah, in a podcast which I talk to like amazing people on.

[649] I'd love to have either or both of you on that podcast at some time.

[650] And that's where I do my guided meditation above the noise.

[651] And also I do revelation is a one -off scripted book.

[652] I mean, it's a book really that I've only exists on that platform because of, well, financial reasons.

[653] That's going to be my brain.

[654] Okay.

[655] So do you ever have the thought I want to?

[656] Sometimes I drive because my daily reprieve involves so many things, right?

[657] And I'll be like driving around in my car and I'm doing that.

[658] analysis of why I just did that thing and oh I owe that person an apology and I was motivated by this and I'm afraid of that right for the most part I think oh this has made me a better person that's easier to live with and I do probably measurably better things as a result of all this my impact is just better because of all this and then I also sometimes have the thought of like am I robbing myself of the experience of just living on this planet as a fucking animal by all of this racket in my head in this in endless pursuit to somehow evolve like do you ever i guess maybe fetishize the notion of being completely on self -aware and not thinking at all about any of this stuff yes i do fetishize that notion i think it would be beautiful i love the idea of oblivion i look at my animals the cats and the dogs i think they're basically the same as me in terms of DNA and in terms of the eventual outcome i ae we're all going to die but here they are just relaxed on the carpet.

[659] I'm fretting and worrying, projecting about the future, worrying about the past, and what does it matter?

[660] I'm just an evolved monkey.

[661] Byron K .E., the great teacher, she says that God is reality.

[662] That's what God is.

[663] Reality.

[664] There may be some facets and aspects of reality that we can't ascertain.

[665] One aspect of reality we can certainly ascertain.

[666] In fact, the only one that we can say for certain is present is our internal life.

[667] And there's no point querying that, Dax.

[668] This is the hand you've been dealt.

[669] You've been put in this exact position.

[670] You are awakened to all those potentials, same as me. I think about it all the time.

[671] And I have to, like my practice, it sounds like yours, is, you know, get up, meditate, breathing exercises, do this, cold plug.

[672] Like, you know, I've got to live like a monk, like a yogi, like as a guy I work with said, in order to feel okay.

[673] Average.

[674] Now I feel all right.

[675] Yeah, for me, I get what you're saying, but I think we have to be particularly careful of any mental avenue that we might consider perusing.

[676] If we were to walk down it, it might lead to behaviors that, you know, that we don't want to engage in.

[677] Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare.

[678] Okay, last question I have for you, because I feel like you would have an interesting take on it.

[679] Monica and I's probably favorite documentary of the last 10 years was Wild Wild Country.

[680] because I'm obsessed with Ma Not Sheila I'm in love with her I want to time travel and marry her What a What an incredibly powerful industrious woman That this, from my perspective Bozo unleashed onto America And she built a city I'm just so blown away with the whole thing But did you watch it and did you love it?

[681] For me, that wild world world country, yeah It's so optimistic isn't it To see at the beginning We're working together We're building a town don't matter what color you are and where you're from.

[682] Let's construct this thing together.

[683] Yeah, who cares, man?

[684] What?

[685] What do we do?

[686] We're putting poison in the salad bar.

[687] Hold on.

[688] Where are all these buttons coming from?

[689] Who are these people?

[690] It's so terrible for a person that could be cynical to see that ideals tend in that direction.

[691] But here's the things I would point out, like, you know, for why it's still okay to maybe start a cult one day.

[692] Can't have a person at the top of that pyramid.

[693] You can't have a person there.

[694] You can't have anyone trying to make money out of it.

[695] I think the only things that can ever work are absolute democracy, absolute democracy.

[696] If in a new culture, if you say, right, I recognise that there are aspects of myself that I don't need to cast onto other people, but that I'll handle, along with you guys, through transparency and clarity, that I have tendency to be greedy and selfish and all these things.

[697] So don't put me in a position of total dominance, but don't put anyone in that position.

[698] Don't put anybody in there.

[699] The position creates it.

[700] position lights it up.

[701] So, like, yeah, I love that Sheenra as well.

[702] But I felt like, if she was working for me, I could probably stop this community.

[703] Like, I said, I was like, Sudo Osho.

[704] But the other thing about the Bagu, a later known as Osho, his ideas are amazing.

[705] Like, he wrote such incredible books.

[706] And then you see, like, hold on a minute.

[707] Yeah, yeah, he's like an amazing sort of, I don't know, a mystic.

[708] But, like, if whatever it is your peddling ain't enough to get you off the Rolexes, then I don't want it man if you still need the Rolls Royces and the Rolexes now a lot of them teachers say oh it doesn't matter the material world ain't ugly that's the whole point Christ was God embodied you're going to have a body there's nothing wrong with that you've got to honour the sacred divine carnality and all that but for me yeah I suppose with dealing with something as pure as trying to create a fair and equal and conscious awakened society it means that everything's got to be declared and the principles have got to be pretty plain you can't have any person who might might sort of in the back of their mind think this is going to be an opportunity to make money or get favors.

[709] Yeah.

[710] My thought was like if it had an AA structure where like that's somehow the magic of AA has somehow been an organization that's existed for 70 years with no hierarchy.

[711] It's incredible.

[712] I feel like it needs to be studied more or something that it's self -perpetuated without any leaders.

[713] Oh man. In the other book I wrote Recovery, I talk about the 12 steps and how like I put them in a kind of, I don't know, modern colloquial language and try to apply the principles beyond chemical dependency.

[714] And then in Revelation, for a bit of it, I talk about the way that the traditions operate.

[715] And as you've said, our leaders are but trusted servants.

[716] They do not govern.

[717] Every group is fully autonomous, except in matters affecting other groups or the organisation as a whole.

[718] I talked about exactly as you just said that, how could this be deployed to organise society differently?

[719] To recognise that if perfection is, the entry price is going to be a dull party.

[720] So I feel that what you do is you don't create those kind of roles anymore, I guess.

[721] You recognize that all of us have got ways of expressing our neurosis and our psychosis.

[722] And like the 12 -step programs, as I tend to call them these days, I like has found a way around that, man, like by preventing any, like, because look at us, it's for lunatics, it's for egomaniacs, me, left of my own devices, I'm a problem and clearly you are too.

[723] But you and me, with that program, with other people, we'd like, hold on a minute.

[724] Oh, this is kicking off in 7 -Eleven.

[725] That's kidding.

[726] To talk for 20 minutes.

[727] Russell, give it a go.

[728] But like if you still think that the people that are fulfilling these roles are also afforded other privileges, I think then there's going to be trouble.

[729] And also, it doesn't work.

[730] It doesn't work.

[731] We've tried it.

[732] We've tried it.

[733] None of it works.

[734] None of it works.

[735] The only things that work are simple things, of service, of awakening, of examining the, this is the thing I learned recently, don't look at the stimulant, look at the stimulation, don't look at the objects that is making you afraid or making you cover it, feel the feeling, feel the feeling.

[736] And this neurologist even said to me, things that we think of as anxiety, might not even be anxiety, what is that tightness in the chest?

[737] What is this disruption in the abdomen?

[738] From a spiritual perspective, I've been taught, bring your attention to it, bring your attention to the tightness in the chest.

[739] And to see that when you're saying you're driving along and you were thinking of all the stuff, it made me feel like I should advocate to you again the importance of meditation as part of your daily routine and in the morning in particular because look, there are sometimes when I meditate and all I've done is sat there thinking.

[740] That's all I've done.

[741] I remember being in a kundalini class in L .A. one time with a beautiful teacher, Tage, and all I was thinking in a meditation is, I wonder if I should get a gun.

[742] I mean, I'm in L .A. I could get a gun.

[743] I was thinking, surely that's not the objective of this whole spiritual thing.

[744] I didn't get it.

[745] I didn't get it.

[746] But like sometimes when I'm meditating, it's like all I'm doing is thinking, thinking, thinking.

[747] Sometimes what I do is I stay there till it's gone.

[748] You know, I don't punish myself for thinking.

[749] Someone said the only time you stop thinking is when you're dead.

[750] But if you've returned to the mantra, return to the breath, or follow the guidance, then there are points, I swear you, when freedom, freedom, all that stuff, all this tangle.

[751] Like his friend of mine called Ed Stafford, he said like one of them survival guys.

[752] He's a bit like bare grills, but imagine the sort of grunge version.

[753] This dude goes out and survives.

[754] He's only, oh, what about the camera?

[755] man. Oh no, he's operating the camera himself.

[756] You know, he's doing his striped it back.

[757] You know, like, and this dude told me in preparation for one of his trips, he hung with his, like, an Aboriginal folk in Australia.

[758] They're in that community.

[759] They have three words for brain.

[760] One is the belly brain.

[761] One is the heart brain.

[762] And the other one, the one that we all live in the whole time, this mind brain, is the same word they use for a tangled fishing net.

[763] It's the same word they use for that.

[764] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[765] We have this intelligence, and this intelligence is fantastic for understanding material, analyzing material, creating technology.

[766] It ain't so good for organizing the ethics and morality that underwrite cultures for deciding what should be the priorities of a culture.

[767] These are, again, Sesame Street ethics, open the heart, feel the belly, only use the mind for the organization, the logistics, necessary evolutionary step.

[768] And at this point, when UFOs are being revealed to be real on by the Pentagon, this is a time, a time to open our minds to new paradigms.

[769] Oh my God.

[770] this was a blast.

[771] Yeah.

[772] Thanks for giving us your time.

[773] Yeah.

[774] Yeah.

[775] So everyone go to Audible.

[776] Please go to Audible and enjoy Revelation, which you, I can only assume, narrate yourself.

[777] We're going to hear you.

[778] Could you imagine?

[779] I'm trying to think of the worst person I could have.

[780] Well, we're both friends with Sam Harris.

[781] It would be really funny to hear Sam Harris narrate your thoughts.

[782] I don't think he would get through one sentence.

[783] Well, that's not true.

[784] That's not true.

[785] It's ridiculous.

[786] He's the slowest talker and you're the fastest talker.

[787] Russell, such a pleasure.

[788] And your podcast and the podcast.

[789] And the podcast under the skin.

[790] That's it, man. Under the skin on Luminary.

[791] Well done.

[792] Thank you.

[793] Yeah.

[794] It's been a pleasure.

[795] My wife says hi.

[796] Give her my love and gratitude and appreciation.

[797] Yeah, she was so fantastic and so cool and so lovely.

[798] Like even all those years ago, I just remember her so positively.

[799] You could have snatched her up.

[800] I got her like hours after that.

[801] Well, I mean, ultimately it seems it worked out for the best.

[802] Yeah, yeah, everyone's happy.

[803] Although I did feel a pang of pain when you announced that.

[804] All right, Russell, what a pleasure, man. Good luck with everything.

[805] Thanks, both of you.

[806] We'll talk to you soon.

[807] I'm very grateful to you both.

[808] Cheers, thanks.

[809] And now my favorite part of the show, the fact check with my soulmate Monica Padman.

[810] I'm eating my breakfast.

[811] This is, wow, this is an in -episode ad because I really literally literally literally Literally, I'm eating Bob's red milk, blueberry, and hazelnut.

[812] You are.

[813] Of course, with my signature scoop of almond butter and my signature two scoops of collagen protein.

[814] Oh, that seems new.

[815] It's about three months old.

[816] That's new.

[817] Three months?

[818] It's new, but it's also a long time for you to have something that I don't know about.

[819] Mm -hmm.

[820] Yeah.

[821] Pretty well -kept secret.

[822] So I guess I'm upset.

[823] Mm -hmm.

[824] Yeah.

[825] I thought you might be.

[826] Yeah.

[827] Cool shoes.

[828] Do you like them?

[829] Yeah.

[830] Instagram gets me. Tell people about them.

[831] They're Adidas.

[832] What's Adidas?

[833] Is that how you pronounce Adidas?

[834] In Germany, yeah.

[835] Oh, Adidas.

[836] They are really cute Adidas, and it's some partnership with the National Park Foundation.

[837] So it has a cute little patch on the tongue that you can remove.

[838] Yeah.

[839] And maybe you trade them with friends.

[840] Oh, my God.

[841] I love trading.

[842] And this cute patch has a...

[843] a little embroidery of Old Faithful, erupting, sprain.

[844] And then it says Yellowstone National Park.

[845] And it's a ding, ding, ding, because you're going to go to Yellowstone sort of soon.

[846] That is a dingles.

[847] Yeah.

[848] They're kind of out of my palate, my normal palette.

[849] They're brown.

[850] Orange, blue, yellow.

[851] And, you know, I've been experimenting with Atumnal this year.

[852] Really falling in love with a tumult.

[853] Anthony and Allison's kids' favorite color is brown.

[854] Oh, really?

[855] Yeah.

[856] Oh my gosh.

[857] And it like really is.

[858] He's obsessed with brown.

[859] Yeah.

[860] He likes brown things and And brown people?

[861] I hope.

[862] And he's, you know, three, I guess.

[863] And he was looking through my purse.

[864] I let him and his sister look through my purse and like pick things out.

[865] You're nice about that.

[866] You've let my children do that as well.

[867] I mean, the worst that can happen, which did is like, you know, the tampon will come out and you have to explain tampons.

[868] Uh -huh.

[869] Yeah.

[870] But he was pretty disappointed that there was nothing.

[871] my purse, I was brown.

[872] Oh, bummer.

[873] He was on the search for brown items.

[874] Yes.

[875] Oh, boy.

[876] I thought that was adorable.

[877] Of course, my brain just went to the gutter.

[878] He likes poop?

[879] Yeah.

[880] Like each morning.

[881] Well, if he's on the search in your purse for something brown, he must be thrilled when he goes, duty in the morning.

[882] And it's inevitably going to be some shade of brown.

[883] And then hopefully novel each morning.

[884] This is my trigger that immediately the color brown is associated with poop.

[885] Right.

[886] Yeah.

[887] Yeah.

[888] But the color white is immediately associated with pus.

[889] No. You're right.

[890] But pus is white.

[891] It is.

[892] It happens to be.

[893] And I agree that it's grosser than poop.

[894] But no one thinks that.

[895] Yeah, they think, ooh, their whiteness is oozing out.

[896] Yeah, no one thinks.

[897] They don't think that.

[898] No one's thinking that.

[899] Oh, okay.

[900] But people do think, Ew, your skin looks like poop.

[901] No one thinks that.

[902] Yes, they do.

[903] Or that's a mean thing kids say.

[904] And no kids say, oh, your skin looks like pus.

[905] I'm going to teach my kids to say your skin looks like pus to even it out.

[906] Okay.

[907] Yeah.

[908] I don't think that we should get rid of all this racial bigotry.

[909] It should be even across the board.

[910] You know, just like everyone, just let it rip for everyone.

[911] You know, Kristen observed that last night, and I thought, It was an astute observation.

[912] So this great, I really recommend Inside by Bo Burnham.

[913] It's his journey through quarantine, but he's a comedian and a musician.

[914] And it's incredible.

[915] Yeah.

[916] But one of the songs is White Woman's Instagram.

[917] Uh -huh.

[918] And it is so good.

[919] And it's so spot on.

[920] Yeah.

[921] Burning them.

[922] So Kristen's like, it's nice now.

[923] There's like really commonly held stereotypes about white people now that are getting made fun of.

[924] And it's about time.

[925] Yeah.

[926] That's true.

[927] Yeah.

[928] I feel like there are updates.

[929] Like, I felt...

[930] You felt that way less fact check.

[931] I know.

[932] But in the shower, I was like, oh, we got to bring that up.

[933] That's housekeeping.

[934] Well, the mystery continues.

[935] I love a mystery.

[936] Yeah.

[937] Maybe you can tease this out over, like, four or five fact checks.

[938] Okay.

[939] Guys, we have something big to reveal that I keep forgetting, but eventually I'll remember.

[940] And it may have passed at the point that you remember it.

[941] Yeah.

[942] And it might be more of a recap.

[943] That was the longest.

[944] Oh, my God.

[945] Sneezus interruptus.

[946] Boy, was I on the verge of a sneeze there.

[947] You look so scared.

[948] Oh.

[949] When your sneeze is about to come.

[950] I've never seen you look like that.

[951] Oh, my God.

[952] Like a Dementor is coming at you.

[953] Oh, my gosh.

[954] And weak.

[955] I look probably weak.

[956] Yeah.

[957] I like it.

[958] It's a new look.

[959] Oh, okay.

[960] All right.

[961] Well, I guess we'll talk about some.

[962] Facts, Russell Brand.

[963] So what a good brand.

[964] Very trusted brand.

[965] Very trusted brand.

[966] I think we should share with people this connection you and I had after we talked to him, which was he is so articulate and so quick that quite often you and I were either sprinting to keep up mentally.

[967] Yes.

[968] And more often not keeping up and then just realizing like he must have been a great point.

[969] If you check out for even half a second, you can't recover.

[970] You can't re -you can't find the path.

[971] You can't re -enter, no. No, because it's moving so fast and so twisting and curvy and curvy and scurvy that he's taken five other exits.

[972] That's right.

[973] You just have to wait for him to finish and then.

[974] Hopefully start a new thing that you can follow.

[975] Yeah, that's right.

[976] And again, that's not a critique or that's a failing on our own mental capacities.

[977] It's so impressive.

[978] the way he can digest information and then repurpose it.

[979] It's so great.

[980] It's incredible.

[981] I really liked him.

[982] Me too.

[983] Yeah, and Kristen always has incredibly nice things to say about him.

[984] But that's, see, that's misleading.

[985] And let's get into that.

[986] Okay.

[987] Kristen generally sees the good and most people.

[988] So she tells you someone's great.

[989] I don't know.

[990] I'm more a positive way to say it would be discerning, but a negative way to say it would be like, I don't trust people.

[991] So I'm more, if I say, say someone's cool odds are no everyone comes in with their own baggage but i would say she casts a wider net of people she likes yeah that's she likes a lot more people it seems where do you think you're at on that spectrum the net yeah well is it that you're on one end and she's on the other because i don't think so no i think she's on one end yeah i think she's like a nine or so okay and then i think I think I'm probably like a six?

[992] I am probably a five.

[993] Okay.

[994] There we go.

[995] Or am I at more of a four?

[996] A four?

[997] That's okay.

[998] It's the only thing you need to feel guilty about it's being dishonest.

[999] As long as you're being honest.

[1000] I'm trying to be honest.

[1001] Yeah, be honest.

[1002] I'm trying, but this is a number scale.

[1003] It's hard.

[1004] Yeah, very arbitrary.

[1005] I'm definitely not someone who just likes everyone.

[1006] Right.

[1007] I'm very discerting.

[1008] I'm sure mine's all fear -related.

[1009] So I'm just scanning who I think's going to trigger me or, or I do a little scan of who's out to get me, I guess.

[1010] Yeah, I know.

[1011] I don't think that's part of mine.

[1012] Yours isn't, no. Yours is more you just don't suffer uninteresting people.

[1013] Or people who I think are trying hard to be something that I find pretty repulsive.

[1014] Repugnant, repulsive.

[1015] I think I just, like, see through people pretty quick.

[1016] Uh -huh.

[1017] So whether that's, then I like the thing that I've seen through.

[1018] I mean, everyone's doing something.

[1019] Yeah, everyone's got a hustle.

[1020] Yeah.

[1021] Subconsciously, I think so.

[1022] Okay, I don't really have many facts.

[1023] Oh, you don't?

[1024] No. So the Bhagwan has written books.

[1025] He had tarot in the spirit of Zen, the Game of.

[1026] life he had tantric transformation oh that's sexual it sounds like it oh wow oh another one about sex sex sex matters oh from sex to super super sex like a super cell from sex to super consciousness oh my gosh can you well we both watch the all three of us watch the documentary can you imagine sex with the Bhagwan to be revelatory like this?

[1027] Yeah.

[1028] Yes.

[1029] Yes, I can.

[1030] I mean, I feel like it has to have some truth behind it.

[1031] I guess I can't picture him pumping someone.

[1032] Like, I can't picture him.

[1033] Sometimes it's the people you can't picture.

[1034] Well, that's true, but just get your mental image of him.

[1035] He moved like a sloth.

[1036] He was not physically.

[1037] physically active at all.

[1038] Maybe he was reserving all his energy for the bedroom.

[1039] Oh, but can you picture him in the missionary position?

[1040] I can't.

[1041] All I can picture him doing is like seated, maybe laying, and letting the other person do all the work and then telling him how wonderful it was, like brainwashing them into how wonderful it was.

[1042] I guess we got to ask Sheila.

[1043] It's probably more tantric, right?

[1044] Isn't that slower?

[1045] Yeah, yeah.

[1046] But again, I think he just laid there.

[1047] And then the other person gave him tantric sex for a couple hours.

[1048] He just doesn't look like a go -getter.

[1049] Well, I think that's stereotyping.

[1050] In fact, Ma 'Nan and Sheila was probably in the room instructing everyone how to get it done.

[1051] Now, Ma 'an and Sheila was, unquestionably, a firecracker.

[1052] Buckle up.

[1053] But then she wouldn't be cool with just a guy sitting?

[1054] No, she would because she likes to be the boss.

[1055] Well, maybe.

[1056] And, by the way, you're not going to be tantric with Ma 'anat.

[1057] Yes, you all.

[1058] No, you're going to have an explosion very quickly once she takes control.

[1059] When she takes the reins, it's over.

[1060] Well, but maybe that's his skill.

[1061] He's, like, not phased.

[1062] Oh, she's the unstoppable force and he's the immovable object?

[1063] Whoa.

[1064] Wow.

[1065] Okay, now it's starting to make sense.

[1066] Okay, he has a lot of books.

[1067] The Book of Women, oh, boy.

[1068] Oh, Jesus, okay.

[1069] Oh, celebrating the female spirit.

[1070] Tantra.

[1071] Awareness, courage.

[1072] He has a lot.

[1073] Okay.

[1074] He was so young in that documentary.

[1075] Intimacy, creativity, joy.

[1076] Wow.

[1077] He was a lot.

[1078] Remember we learned that he was so young in that documentary?

[1079] He was?

[1080] Yes.

[1081] He died at like 57 or something crazy.

[1082] Oh, my God.

[1083] Yes.

[1084] Years after he left Oregon.

[1085] Let me look up when he died.

[1086] Yeah.

[1087] How old he was.

[1088] Well, you can do some fast math on it.

[1089] Oh, I can't wait.

[1090] Okay.

[1091] He was born in 1931.

[1092] Okay.

[1093] And then he died in 1990.

[1094] Okay, so 59.

[1095] Wow.

[1096] And he had been back in India for a while.

[1097] So that means during that documentary, he's about 50.

[1098] 68.

[1099] 68.

[1100] That happened.

[1101] The poisoning in the...

[1102] The movement.

[1103] Oh, the movement.

[1104] Do you know when he went to Oregon?

[1105] It began in India in 1968.

[1106] Okay, try to find out when he went to Oregon.

[1107] 1981.

[1108] 1981.

[1109] 81.

[1110] Oh, okay.

[1111] I mean, he looks young here.

[1112] The problem is he has so much white beard.

[1113] Mm -hmm.

[1114] Oh, we discussed this the other day.

[1115] People with beards are very serious because you can't really smile with the beard on.

[1116] Well, they have the mask.

[1117] They've been wearing a mask.

[1118] Yeah.

[1119] That's kind of funny, too, because I think if you, well, this is a bad guess, but I'm going to say it anyways.

[1120] I'd imagine if you graft people with beards.

[1121] Yeah.

[1122] against people who didn't want to wear a mask.

[1123] Oh.

[1124] I bet there's a high correlation.

[1125] You think people with beards don't want to?

[1126] Didn't want to wear a mask.

[1127] Really?

[1128] Yeah.

[1129] I would think they would be fine with it because they're used to having stuff all over their face all the time.

[1130] Well, that was the point I was going to make is, really you can't stand a mask?

[1131] You're wearing a mask.

[1132] Oh, okay.

[1133] You've taken it to another level where you're mad at them.

[1134] I went like three or four steps.

[1135] Oh, my God.

[1136] I'm not mad at anyone.

[1137] Just like Russell Brand.

[1138] Oh, no. I lost you.

[1139] I went so fast.

[1140] Well, because I had a face mask on, and it was acting as a beard, and I realized it made me serious.

[1141] You should, do they, they must sell face masks with beard graphics.

[1142] Oh, that'd be cute.

[1143] Yeah, that'd be fun.

[1144] I'm sure that exists.

[1145] Anywho, that's really it.

[1146] Well, the other thing is, I want you to tell me your mantra.

[1147] Oh, of course you do.

[1148] Yeah.

[1149] It kills me that I don't know anyone's mantra.

[1150] Yeah, I did.

[1151] I want to say David Walton and his buddies said, fuck it, and they all told each other.

[1152] They told you.

[1153] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1154] Or he told you because.

[1155] I got suspicious that everyone had the same one.

[1156] Yes.

[1157] Which wasn't the case when he told me. I'm so surprised that you won't say it because it's so unlike you to buy into that.

[1158] that so i agree with you but you can't ignore that i have like the 16 year practice of buying into stuff i don't buy into a but you do buy into a oh there's much of it i don't but i just go along with it because the alternative i buy into even less right so like dying without control is a good enough motivator that i can swallow some shit i totally don't agree with sure yeah but what's so this thing is like meditation works it has worked thus far when i've done it won't work if you say i don't know why it works okay so why would i break one of the cardinal rules have you told anyone that works no i've not told one person yeah man you really now now it's it's so exclusive yeah yeah it's triggering like only one left but you see what i'm saying like i can't explain why it works yeah i enjoy it when it works So why would I fuck with one of their tenants?

[1159] Yeah, I get it.

[1160] I can't imagine they told me that for no reason.

[1161] Well, I think it's so you can feel like it's extra spiritual or it's like yours and yours only.

[1162] And maybe they did do that.

[1163] And maybe I've bought into that.

[1164] And then when I break that, it won't work.

[1165] I don't know.

[1166] Maybe.

[1167] Yeah, maybe.

[1168] Maybe.

[1169] We just don't know.

[1170] I wonder if I told you and then it didn't work if I could get a new one or if they would just be like, no, no second chances in transcendenton meditation.

[1171] Then I don't like them if that's what they're saying.

[1172] Okay.

[1173] Oh, the update.

[1174] Oh, you just remember?

[1175] I remembered.

[1176] Wow.

[1177] Because it's related a little bit.

[1178] And then I want you to do something that you are saying you're not going to do.

[1179] And you wanted me to not wash my legs.

[1180] Oh, uh -huh.

[1181] And I'm trying it out.

[1182] Oh, you are?

[1183] Yeah, I decided to listen to you.

[1184] Oh, my God.

[1185] I'm so flattered.

[1186] Giving it a try.

[1187] Well, no wonder you thought of this in the shower today.

[1188] Yeah, exactly.

[1189] It's all making sense.

[1190] Because you were probably just through muscle memory.

[1191] You're probably on autopilot.

[1192] I have to stop myself.

[1193] Wow.

[1194] And did you feel like, oh, I'm going to be so dirty?

[1195] Well, I'm only doing it for my legs.

[1196] Okay.

[1197] And my arms, I guess.

[1198] I didn't do my arms.

[1199] But I did my armpits and I did all my torso and my private parts.

[1200] Okay.

[1201] And my neck.

[1202] Okay.

[1203] I'm sorry.

[1204] I have to do my neck because I have PTSD.

[1205] That's fine.

[1206] You're convinced, yeah, that you have cheese in there.

[1207] but you know.

[1208] But one of the arm cherries wrote, I'm totally used the same system, tits, pits, and slits, which I thought was really.

[1209] I know.

[1210] And I wanted to add holes and souls.

[1211] Holes and souls.

[1212] So the bottom of your feet?

[1213] Yep.

[1214] Okay.

[1215] Not your S -O -U -L.

[1216] Well, if you need a cleansing, you can do that.

[1217] That's where the mantra comes in.

[1218] Anyway, I just want you to know that I'm trying it for you.

[1219] Oh, well, thank you.

[1220] I hope you benefit and you're rewarded for your experiment.

[1221] I'll keep you updated.

[1222] Also, if you start noticing like, oh, my legs are, they stink so bad, I can smell them from up here.

[1223] Please let me know that too, because I'll want to stand by you and see what kind of smell it is.

[1224] Okay.

[1225] All right.

[1226] All right.

[1227] That's it.

[1228] I love you.

[1229] I love you.

[1230] Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondry app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[1231] You can listen to every episode of Armchair Expert early and ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcast.

[1232] Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondry .com slash survey.