1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:19,080 (Auto-generated)Hey all you wonderful people that matter so very, very much, whether you see it or not. 2 00:00:19,080 --> 00:00:23,240 So I'm WSWalker, also known as Will Help. 3 00:00:23,240 --> 00:00:25,720 And this is the Laughing Matters podcast. 4 00:00:25,720 --> 00:00:30,800 Not simply, it's a show that can help you improve your life. 5 00:00:30,800 --> 00:00:36,040 Primarily in ways you didn't know it could be improved. 6 00:00:36,040 --> 00:00:41,920 So I will be reading from my book, The Laughing Matters, and make no mistake. 7 00:00:41,920 --> 00:00:47,720 This is absolutely a podcast that needs to be listened to in order. 8 00:00:47,720 --> 00:00:54,040 I spent like 10 years organizing this jumble of interconnected concepts so that it can 9 00:00:54,040 --> 00:00:56,960 be done in a linear narrative. 10 00:00:56,960 --> 00:01:01,560 A straight line from beginning to end. 11 00:01:01,560 --> 00:01:08,000 And there's going to be constant references made to what we went over in the last episodes. 12 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:13,960 There's a fair amount of twists and surprises that will fizzle if you don't understand what 13 00:01:13,960 --> 00:01:16,800 came before them. 14 00:01:16,800 --> 00:01:22,720 In this particular ride, it's not one that you want to accidentally ruin for yourself. 15 00:01:22,720 --> 00:01:29,600 Trust me, to use the clinical terminology, there's some doozies up ahead, so don't cheat 16 00:01:29,600 --> 00:01:31,640 yourself out of what's coming. 17 00:01:31,640 --> 00:01:40,080 So that being said, good people of this good earth, please empty your cups before stepping 18 00:01:40,080 --> 00:01:44,560 aboard and let's begin. 19 00:01:44,560 --> 00:01:47,400 Chapter 1. 20 00:01:47,400 --> 00:01:49,000 Shared. 21 00:01:49,000 --> 00:01:54,600 There are a great many things that human beings excel at, but one of the most fascinating 22 00:01:54,600 --> 00:02:00,600 ones for me has always been our obsessive desire and compulsion to share that which 23 00:02:00,600 --> 00:02:06,320 we've learned, discovered, created, or thought, and the cleverness that comes by way of that 24 00:02:06,320 --> 00:02:07,320 need. 25 00:02:07,320 --> 00:02:14,420 I mean, when you make something brilliantly, write a song that's amazing, or find a clever 26 00:02:14,420 --> 00:02:20,880 workaround, or gain profound wisdom, there's this very strong basic need that arises and 27 00:02:20,880 --> 00:02:24,140 demands that it be passed on. 28 00:02:24,140 --> 00:02:30,040 You want someone to hear that song, to see your art, to read your words, to learn from 29 00:02:30,040 --> 00:02:37,600 you, and the biggest payoff is seeing the way that it affected them. 30 00:02:37,600 --> 00:02:41,920 There's this connection there, and we do thrive on it. 31 00:02:41,920 --> 00:02:46,920 We're compelled to share what we know, and what we feel, and what we've found to be good, 32 00:02:46,920 --> 00:02:52,200 and we've created a multitude of ways to do so on our relatively small planet. 33 00:02:52,200 --> 00:02:57,840 We shape our internal wind with specific movements of our lips, tongues, and mouths, all while 34 00:02:57,840 --> 00:03:04,960 carefully pitching the chords that the wind passes through so that we can speak in a language. 35 00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:10,160 We literally created a spoken language out of the sounds we could make, so that we could 36 00:03:10,160 --> 00:03:14,320 share what we found to be good with others. 37 00:03:14,320 --> 00:03:19,240 Then we figured out how to make these words heard after the speaker had left, and started 38 00:03:19,240 --> 00:03:22,960 bringing those words into more permanent form. 39 00:03:22,960 --> 00:03:25,240 Written language. 40 00:03:25,240 --> 00:03:30,480 I don't know what book did it for you, if a book ever did it for you, but I do remember 41 00:03:30,480 --> 00:03:36,560 reading To Kill a Mockingbird when I was in fifth grade, and that was my first real moment 42 00:03:36,560 --> 00:03:39,520 with how amazing reading and writing is. 43 00:03:39,520 --> 00:03:45,520 I got dumbstruck that out of nowhere this author could craft the story from their imagination, 44 00:03:45,520 --> 00:03:50,720 and put down these marks, and they mean something, and the story would ring out to anyone who 45 00:03:50,720 --> 00:03:53,280 picked up the book. 46 00:03:53,280 --> 00:03:57,120 And I'd find out, you know, in the years that followed that Carl Sagan actually said it 47 00:03:57,120 --> 00:04:00,200 far more profoundly. 48 00:04:00,200 --> 00:04:02,720 A book is made from a tree. 49 00:04:02,720 --> 00:04:08,920 It's an assemblage of flat, flexible parts, still called leaves, and printed with dark, 50 00:04:08,920 --> 00:04:11,320 pigmented squiggles. 51 00:04:11,320 --> 00:04:17,960 One glance at it, and you hear the voice of another person, perhaps someone dead for thousands 52 00:04:17,960 --> 00:04:20,360 of years. 53 00:04:20,360 --> 00:04:28,040 Across the millennium, the author is speaking, clearly and silently, inside your head, directly 54 00:04:28,040 --> 00:04:30,280 to you. 55 00:04:30,280 --> 00:04:36,640 Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant 56 00:04:36,640 --> 00:04:40,680 epochs, who never knew one another. 57 00:04:40,680 --> 00:04:47,840 Books break the shackles of time, proof that humans can work magic. 58 00:04:47,840 --> 00:04:56,240 And absolutely insanely great as that is, there were some things we knew or felt that 59 00:04:56,240 --> 00:04:59,840 literal language could not adequately capture. 60 00:04:59,840 --> 00:05:07,840 Some ideas, thoughts, and feelings are too abstract to be put precisely into words. 61 00:05:07,840 --> 00:05:12,160 And so we went the other way, more abstract. 62 00:05:12,160 --> 00:05:20,320 We spoke and wrote poetically, wove epic stories with lessons and wisdom embedded in them, 63 00:05:20,320 --> 00:05:27,520 told fables and analogies and parables and metaphors, or, if one was so inclined, wrote 64 00:05:27,520 --> 00:05:32,440 songs or composed sonic landscapes or symphonies. 65 00:05:32,440 --> 00:05:38,720 They painted, drew, or colored, choreographed, photographed, or danced. 66 00:05:38,720 --> 00:05:47,520 Our need to communicate and convey is so strong that we created art, language, music, and 67 00:05:47,520 --> 00:05:48,520 dance. 68 00:05:48,520 --> 00:05:51,360 And then we mish-mashed a bunch together. 69 00:05:51,360 --> 00:05:59,640 We even merged art, storytelling, photography, language, and music together and created films. 70 00:05:59,640 --> 00:06:06,360 Because that's what human beings do when we cannot inherently do something. 71 00:06:06,360 --> 00:06:09,020 We figure out a way to do it. 72 00:06:09,020 --> 00:06:15,800 We are masters of extending ourselves beyond our physical limitations. 73 00:06:15,800 --> 00:06:21,840 To paraphrase Sigmund Freud from his book Civilization and its Discontents, mankind 74 00:06:21,840 --> 00:06:29,320 replaces his muscles with motors, can now fly or swim hundreds of miles, correct defects 75 00:06:29,320 --> 00:06:35,980 in his eyes with spectacles, see thousands of miles away with telescopes, permanently 76 00:06:35,980 --> 00:06:41,700 capture fleeting images with photograph, and hear through telephones across distances which 77 00:06:41,700 --> 00:06:47,320 would be respected as unattainable in a fairy tale. 78 00:06:47,320 --> 00:06:54,120 But as clever as we are at creating ways to convey our knowledge and thoughts, our main 79 00:06:54,120 --> 00:07:02,480 go-to method of expressing our feelings is our very first language. 80 00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:08,080 Non-verbal sounds, facial expressions, and body language. 81 00:07:08,080 --> 00:07:12,680 It happens so automatically that we rarely even think about it actively. 82 00:07:12,680 --> 00:07:18,280 And that is impressive given the range of subtle changes that can be applied to convey 83 00:07:18,280 --> 00:07:21,720 the subtleties of each emotion. 84 00:07:21,720 --> 00:07:26,280 Little tiny shifts and changes can give away so much. 85 00:07:26,280 --> 00:07:32,120 And these basic movements, they're iconic, instantly recognizable to most, and tend to 86 00:07:32,120 --> 00:07:36,240 be pretty universal across our species. 87 00:07:36,240 --> 00:07:41,400 Go ahead, take a moment and think of an emotion and see if you can't immediately picture 88 00:07:41,400 --> 00:07:46,600 the sound and face and body language that goes with it. 89 00:07:46,600 --> 00:07:51,840 Every single emotion, so far as I've been able to discern, has an accompanying sound 90 00:07:51,840 --> 00:07:56,400 or face or body movement to it. 91 00:07:56,400 --> 00:08:00,560 Except for one. 92 00:08:00,560 --> 00:08:07,240 Now this one is fairly alarming because that one emotion is arguably the most important 93 00:08:07,240 --> 00:08:09,280 of all of them. 94 00:08:09,280 --> 00:08:14,240 It's not only been compared to the very air we breathe in terms of necessity, but it's 95 00:08:14,240 --> 00:08:19,920 also been called all you need, and the only thing that's worth both living and dying 96 00:08:19,920 --> 00:08:22,360 for. 97 00:08:22,360 --> 00:08:30,220 So I ask you now, what is the sound we make when we love? 98 00:08:30,220 --> 00:08:35,520 Go ahead and think on it. 99 00:08:35,520 --> 00:08:40,920 What is the social sound, face, and bodily posture we make when we love? 100 00:08:40,920 --> 00:08:42,880 I've asked a lot of people this question. 101 00:08:42,880 --> 00:08:44,360 I've heard a lot of answers. 102 00:08:44,360 --> 00:08:50,240 And I've got to say, my personal favorite was dreamy sigh, though I believe it's more 103 00:08:50,240 --> 00:08:53,680 indicative of crushing or longing. 104 00:08:53,680 --> 00:09:00,320 But every time people offer an answer, it always sounds more like a question, like someone 105 00:09:00,320 --> 00:09:04,720 that doesn't expect their answer to be correct. 106 00:09:04,720 --> 00:09:10,560 And what's funny is I'd imagine some of you have even guessed the correct answer already, 107 00:09:10,560 --> 00:09:12,680 but still aren't sure it's right. 108 00:09:12,680 --> 00:09:15,320 I completely get that. 109 00:09:15,320 --> 00:09:19,100 And it's because it's a bit of a riddle. 110 00:09:19,100 --> 00:09:24,800 The answer is located in a place that you wouldn't think to look, and you know, honestly, 111 00:09:24,800 --> 00:09:31,720 I have to say personally that I would say it seems to be deliberately hidden there, 112 00:09:31,720 --> 00:09:34,960 but you have your own decision to make on that. 113 00:09:34,960 --> 00:09:38,800 Now, I will share that answer with you in this book. 114 00:09:38,800 --> 00:09:42,160 But first, we do need to lay the groundwork. 115 00:09:42,160 --> 00:09:47,760 And in order to understand the answer, we must understand the riddle and what it's using 116 00:09:47,760 --> 00:09:50,360 as its main mechanic. 117 00:09:50,360 --> 00:09:55,320 I want to do the best job I can teaching you these concepts. 118 00:09:55,320 --> 00:09:59,760 And an answer told will always be less than an answer learned. 119 00:09:59,760 --> 00:10:19,360 And that's it for me today. 120 00:10:19,360 --> 00:10:27,060 Next time, Chapter 2, The Cacophony and the Granddaddy Fear. 121 00:10:27,060 --> 00:10:31,320 You can check out the YouTube channel at youtube.com slash could help. 122 00:10:31,320 --> 00:10:36,080 You can contact the podcast at willhelpmail at gmail.com. 123 00:10:36,080 --> 00:10:41,360 And you can stay up to date with the show's Facebook page at facebook.com slash I could 124 00:10:41,360 --> 00:10:42,360 help. 125 00:10:42,360 --> 00:10:48,200 And you know what, see if you can't figure out the riddle of the missing sound before 126 00:10:48,200 --> 00:10:52,160 I tell you what it is, because you already know it. 127 00:10:52,160 --> 00:10:53,920 You already do it. 128 00:10:53,920 --> 00:10:58,680 I'll bet you can do this. 129 00:10:58,680 --> 00:11:07,440 Until then, do yourself a favor, find something good, and find a way to convey it. 130 00:11:07,440 --> 00:11:36,480 Be sweet, and bye everybody.