Hey there, folks. Welcome to episode two of a Pebble in a Pond podcast. I appreciate you listening.
We're going to start this episode a little differently than the previous one, and probably
a lot differently than the ones to come. We're going to do a little scenario. We're going to do
a little questionnaire, if you'd like. I'd like you to imagine for just a moment that you're just
sitting somewhere on a park bench or somewhere, you know, in a public place. Just sitting, having
a quiet time, lunch, whatever. And up out of nowhere comes a stranger, a person you've never
seen before, man, woman, doesn't matter. And they sit down on the bench next to you. After, you know,
exchanging a polite smile, you go back to whatever it is you're doing, looking at your phone or,
you know, just looking off in the distance at the people. And this person that sits next to you
seems to grab your attention. They want to say something to you. And they go on to explain
briefly about how, you know, they'd like to ask you a question, and you say, okay. And they say,
well, my life has been troubling lately. I've been having a lot of problems with people in my life.
And one of my closest friends recently told me that I am not a good person. And so now I sit here
in a park with a bunch of strangers. And I wonder what that means. I wonder what it means to be a
good person. And this stranger looks at you and they say, what does it mean to you to be a good
person? Now in this hypothetical, I want you to imagine that what just happened, and just to give
it some fair rules, I want you to think of the top three things that you can imagine or that you
think of as the most important traits of a good person. Now I don't want to skew your answer. I
don't want to give examples of what I mean, because part of the question is for you to
tell me whatever you think. Just tell me what you think. Obviously, I'm not going to hear your
answer since this is a podcast and there's not a lot of interaction. But I would be interested if
you wanted to post on one of the TikToks or even on the comments for this episode. Just let me know
what your initial reaction was, what you initially thought of as the three most important traits
of a good person. I've been asking quite a few people and when I tell you that it has been
astounding the answers that I've gotten and just how different they are, and also how similar some
of them are, it really is eye-opening. Because there doesn't seem to be, outside of three basic
traits, any real consensus. So many people have so many different ideas of what that means and
what it means to them. Like I said, I'm not trying to skew your answers. Just whatever your first
thought is, that should be what you hold on to. Because at the end of the day, what you think
makes a good person is what makes a good person. Now, I'm going to go ahead and give you the three
answers that were the most popular, or so far have been the most popular. Number one answer
for most people was kindness. And I think that that seems to be pretty universal. People had
different ways of answering. They used different words. Some people would say compassion. Some
people would say they would get a little wordy and say things like being kind to others or being nice
and being polite and things like that. But generally, for the most part, they could all
kind of fit under the umbrella of kindness. The second most popular was the idea of empathy or
understanding. And I think that that seems to be a pretty popular one because it's kind of a walk a
mile in someone else's shoes kind of scenario. Like you really can't necessarily be a good person
if you can't understand the people around you and how to communicate and how to understand what
they're going through. Really, empathy is a word that some people find a little distasteful for
some reason. I still don't quite understand that, but I have heard that from some people.
So we'll go with understanding. And for the purposes of this podcast, when we talk about empathy,
we're talking about the feelings, the emotions that come with relating to someone. If someone is
happy, then you can kind of feel that happiness. If someone is upset, then you can feel that. If
someone is angry, you can feel that. If someone is sad, you can feel that. It's not necessarily on a
intellectual level. And we're going to use the term understanding to basically mean the same thing,
but on an intellectual level. You're not feeling it as much as you're just understanding it. You're
getting it from a study or a understanding of what goes into that emotion. I wanted to clear that up
before we continued into the podcast, because I may use those terms and I want to make sure that
everybody really understands that empathy is... I'm using it to mean emotion and understanding.
I will often use to mean the mental, the intellectual understanding of it. They are interchangeable for
most people. Most people that are empaths also view it as an intellectual process. But there are
people out there that do not understand or do not feel empathy. And so for them to relate to others,
they do so with understanding. So with that out of the way, we'll move on to the third trait.
And this is the trait that we're going to be talking about today. For me, personally,
this is my number one trait. When I did this test or this scenario, this was the thing that
mattered the most to me. And for at least, I would say 25%, this was the trait that mattered
the most. And people said different things that would fit under the umbrella of this trait. But
the number three trait was honesty, truthfulness. One person said accountability. And we had a bit
of a discussion back and forth over whether or not accountability and honesty could fall in the same
umbrella. And really it came down to if someone isn't honest and you don't trust them, then it
doesn't matter if they take account for something that they've done. It doesn't matter if they, you
know, go ahead and say, oh, this is my bad. I did this because you don't believe them anyway. You
need to have honesty to have accountability. So we put accountability under the honesty umbrella.
And that goes for a lot of these where somebody would say something and we would kind of have to
boil it down and think, well, would that fit under these key words, these key pillars? And usually
most of the answers did. So without further ado, let's go ahead and get it started with the music.
Welcome to episode two about honesty.
Yeah, that's kind of weird to start that in the, uh, the seemingly close to the middle of the
podcast, but I guess it kind of worked. So honesty, I'm going to throw some quotes out,
uh, as we go through this, um, because I think that honesty is one of those traits that
can be summed up in a lot of poetic ways or a lot of ways that, uh, allow you to think of it
differently than maybe you would have. Uh, the first quote I really like that I found here is,
uh, was a quote by Gandhi and he said, to believe in something and not to live it is dishonest.
And that cuts really, really right to the heart of why we're discussing the concept of honesty.
It is impossible for me to sit here and have this podcast and do the Tik Toks and start all these
social media things, talking about being a good person and wanting to be, you know, be a change
in this world and be a positive force and then not live it. And I think that that should go far.
And I think that that should go for most everybody. I mean, the whole point of this is for us to
make changes in our lives, to affect the people around us, to make a larger change with the small
changes that we make among us. And that's a very difficult thing to do if you're not honest. And
if you are not earnest with your attempts and your efforts to make those changes. So if you believe
in the idea of being as good as you possibly can to those around you and being a positive influence
in their life and the lives of others, then you really have to live it. You can't do that
if you're dishonest. And if you don't live it, then you're being dishonest. You don't really want,
you don't really believe in it. So that's the first thing that you really want to stop and think
about in this is how much do you really want to change who you are? How much do you really want to
work towards becoming a better person? Is there work to do? Are you already a saint? I mean,
I know I'm not. I have all sorts of problems. And every single day, I'm struggling to achieve
the things that I'm talking about. It's definitely not an easy process, especially not for me. So I
can't imagine there's too many of us out there that are completely happy with who we are and who
the world sees in us. So that's where the first step is understanding that we all have flaws.
We all have little peccadilloes, as they say. We all have things about us that maybe we don't like
or maybe we're not proud of. And we all have things about us that we know are deficiencies
and that we want to work on. So as long as you can start with being honest to yourself
about where you are and what you're trying to do with your life and what you're trying to do with
the people around you, I think that that is the very first step towards understanding the change
that you want to make and how you go about it. Now you guys are going to hear me say this a lot
as you follow the podcast, but I feel like I need to say it all the time because it is important.
I am not a doctor. I am not a psychologist. I am not a therapist. I am not a professional
helper of sorts. I'm not licensed to do any of this. This is really honestly just my opinion
based on the life that I've led and the studying that I've done. You don't have to listen to me.
You don't have to listen to me. I'm not here to tell you I know everything. This is really
just to get the discussion started for you at an internal level or even with your friends
about making some changes that I am trying to employ and that others I know have employed
to great effect. So just keep that in mind. I'm not here to tell you that I'm an authority on
these topics. I'm here to tell you that I'm with you on these topics. I'm going through this with
you. And if we get enough people listening and we get a big enough community, you'll find that
I hope that we can have a bunch of people, hundreds of people, thousands of people,
all working together to make each other accountable, to make each other better,
so that we all are right rising up together and becoming the change that this world so desperately
needs. So as we talk about honesty, before we get too touchy feely with it, I think it's important
to understand that I'm kind of lumping the concept of truth in with honesty. And while those are
technically a little bit different, I think because everybody has truths, right? Everybody
has a truth that they believe and it's something that they hold as their truth. There's a great
line that I often think about in Jesus Christ Superstar where Pontius Pilate is singing to
Jesus and he says, so you are a king or then you are a king. Jesus says, it's you that say I am,
I look for truth and find that I get damned. Pontius Pilate responds and says, and what is
truth? Is truth unchanging law? We both have truths. Are mine the same as yours? And I think
about that all the time when I think about the concept of truth. It can be changing. Everybody
has their own truth. Everybody has their own belief system and their own things that they hold as true.
So when I kind of merge these two together, I'm going to say that your truth, while being
of utmost importance to the individual and being the center point of how you behave
and how you interact with the world is so damn personal and so ever-changing, depending upon
the person, that I can't really speak to it here. All I can say is that when people use the phrase
find your truth, I couldn't agree more. I could not possibly agree more. Everyone out there
should have things that they hold dear. Now, once again, going back to that line, is truth unchanging
law? Your truths have to be willing, you have to be willing to move off of some of them. Once you
have evidence or proof or understanding of a certain situation, you need to be able to vary
what you hold dear. It is really important that as you are trying to make changes in your life,
that you are not stubborn and rigid and unwilling to yield in certain areas. And your personal truth
could be one of those areas. It is probably the most difficult thing you could do, but it is
important that you are open to that idea. Because there are a lot of things that people believe
that are passed down. They're not inherent beliefs. They're things that they don't have
beliefs. They're things that they've learned from parents or from schools or from whatever it may be.
And it's not a truth that you necessarily, and I'm not judging here, but it's not a truth that you
necessarily need to hold on to. There's a lot of people out there that get really mad about
people saying we shouldn't celebrate Christopher Columbus Day. But if you know anything about
Christopher Columbus and what he actually did, then it's probably pretty easy for you to understand
why people say that you shouldn't celebrate Christopher Columbus. There's just some things.
You know, this is a truth. Some people are brought up in schools and they learn the truth,
quote, truth of Christopher Columbus. And then, you know, when they're 38 years old and
read an article or see a video on it, they're like, holy crap, that dude sucked. And they realize that
that truth that they've not probably at that point instilled in their children that Christopher
Columbus was this great hero, you know, we know now that's not true. And it should be pretty common
knowledge that that guy was a scumbag. And I'm sorry if I'm ruining some truths for anybody that's
hearing this. That dude was a scumbag. Like, let's just say it how it is. So, as a, I'm a little off
where I wanted to be at this point in the podcast, but I think that it's important to make sure that
we understand where truth is. Truth is your compass. It is what you believe in, and it is the
thing that drives you forward. Your truth and what you believe in are sacred to you. But
not so sacred that they can't change when given information, understanding, and evidence.
If at any point in time, you are so dogmatic in your truth that you are unwavering in the face of
true knowledge, then you are no longer open to the idea of change. You are, you are, you are set.
And we're not, that's not, that's not what we're trying to do here. We're trying to keep ourselves
open so that we can let the, the understanding of the world and the people in it guide us.
We're not, we're not here to be dogmatic and, you know, religiously follow some sort of concept.
We're here to say, oh, like, open it up. Like everything's on the table. Let's, let's keep an
open mind and, you know, move forward with that, with, with empathy, understanding, love, and
kindness, being our guiding light, being our compass, being our truth. That's where we're
starting. And then from there, we can start to incorporate the other truths that we have,
one of which should not be the Christopher Columbus was a great guy. So with that out of the
way, let's talk about honesty, because that's what we're here to really discuss. Honesty by
definition, according to dictionary.com is the quality or fact of being honest, uprightness,
and fairness, or truthfulness, sincerity, or frankness. Now there's not a whole lot of
digging you got to do there. There's not a whole lot of, you know, there's not big
words there you got to understand. It's just being honest. That's all it is. Being true,
being honest to yourself and to others. That's all honesty is. Not being a liar. And I know that a
lot of people, when, when somebody says liar, that word cuts, that's, that's a name that hurts
people because they don't want to be called that. And I don't blame them. I wouldn't want to be
called a liar either. But if somebody lies and they lie a lot, they're liars. There's just no
other way around that. Now, do I believe that a liar has to maintain being a liar their whole
life? Do I think that it's a, it's a, you know, they're, they're setting their ways? No, absolutely
not. I think people that lie all the time, they certainly can change if they want to. And I think
they certainly can change if they want to. They need to break the habit and understand what's
causing them to lie. And usually it comes from fear or insecurity. And so there is a, there is
a certain amount of compassion that can be had for a liar, but we're not, we're not dealing with
liars right now. Right? None of, none of, no one here that's listening to this is a liar. Right?
We're, we're not going to do that. And if we are, if anybody is hearing this and they, they are a
liar, they lie to themselves or they lie to others, then, you know, we gotta, we gotta work on that.
And that starts by being honest. The way you break the cycle of lies is honesty. It's just that simple.
It's like, it really honestly is that simple. It's like turning on a light in a dark room.
All you need to do to start being honest is to be honest once, stop telling the lies, start telling
the truth. And then you have to deal with the repercussions of all the lies that you've told,
of course, and that's painful and that's hard and people will cry and be hurt. And you have to deal
with that because that's what your lies have created. That's, that's what lies do. They create
pain. And that's why we want to impress upon you. You know, we, we, I say the collective, we,
people listening, uh, that's why we need to impress upon people just how important being honest is.
People need to be able to depend on what you're saying. They need to be able to believe in what
you're trying to do. They need to understand that you're not in it for, you know, Instagram fame,
or you're not in it for, uh, you know, just to get a tax write off or whatever, whatever the, the
cheap crappy reason some people may have for being charitable or kind, you can't be in it for that.
You're in it for the change. You're in it to make a difference. You're in it to change the people
around you at first and the world in the longterm. So how do we, how do we go about making this change
towards honesty? But I read a lot. I read a lot coming into this. I studied a lot. I've spent
hours now, uh, reading different, uh, psychologists, papers and books and, uh, just coming through
what a lot of different people say about honesty and how to, how to be more honest in your life.
And, and the best, the best, um, exercise in my opinion that I saw, and this is one that I'm
trying as hard as I can to, uh, employ because I've seen how magical it is and how powerful it is.
And I really, really want to make sure I get this in here because it, if you start doing this,
it, if you start doing this, I promise you it's almost instantaneous. The difference that it
makes in your life and everyone else's life that you come in contact with, it's a practice. It's a,
it's a, I guess I should say it is a, a way of thinking that creates so much positivity
that it is undeniable, the effect that you're having and the more you do it, the easier it gets.
Now, I'm not going to lie. If you have a lot of social anxiety, this makes it, the starting,
this can be difficult. And, and so you need to prepare yourself and really, really steal
yourself for that. If you have, if you're somebody that suffers from a lot of social anxiety,
this exercise may not be easy for you. That being said, once you start it,
you'll find that you won't want to stop it. The exercise is very simple,
whether it be with your friends, your family, or just people at the grocery store, people that you
see on, you know, whether you're walking down the street, spend 30 seconds every day or a minute
every day, consciously, deliberately looking around, whatever the setting may be. Like I said,
it doesn't really matter. It can just be you and your living room with your family or whatever.
Look around the room, find traits of these people that you love or people that you don't know.
Find something that you appreciate, find something that you find beautiful, find something that you
enjoy, whatever it is. It could be the fact that your son is really smart or really athletic. It
could be the fact that your wife or girlfriend is, you know, takes care of you and tells you that
she loves you and dotes on you, whatever it may be. It could be that your mother, you know, makes
the best pasta in the world. It could be that this lady that you see walking down the street has a
really bad-ass tattoo and you really think it's cool. It could be a shirt. It could be a guy's
beard. It could be any of those things. But it has to be something that you genuinely enjoy.
It has to be something that you genuinely appreciate. It has to be something that you
appreciate. It has to be something that you can say honestly. And then you tell them.
It doesn't matter if you know them. It doesn't matter how well you know them. None of that
matters. You just tell them something that you appreciate about them. And I don't care what it
is. I don't care what the social status is, where you are. You're not, you're not, there's no ulterior
motive here. There's, you're not trying to get anything from them. You just want to tell them
the truth. And the truth is I appreciate blank. I like blank. I think that this is awesome that you
do blank. Whatever it is, give them that compliment. Give them that reassurance. Give them that
momentum that may carry them over to the next thing. I remember, I was probably like two years
ago now, I was at Epcot with my family. And I had, I had had a lot of doubts about my beard.
It was, it was in a particularly interesting growth pattern, I guess you could say. And so I
was kind of, you know, feeling a little weird about it because it was, it was a little sparse
in places. And I remember, I don't remember exactly where we were in Epcot, but I remember
hearing an Australian guy. He just walked right up to me and in his badass Australian accent,
I'm not even going to try to emulate because I can't. He just said, hey, nice beard. And he,
you know, he pointed right at my beard and it was, it was one of the single most like empowering,
impactful compliments anyone had ever given me in my entire life. I felt so good for basically the
rest of that day. And, and what's funny about it is I felt so good about it that I came home and
wrote about it on Facebook. And now every year since then, that moment pops up in my Facebook
memories, which I'm barely on Facebook that much anymore, but, but it pops up in my memories.
And, you know, it's been two years now and I know that because twice now I've seen that memory and
thought, man, I feel good just reading about that moment. Cause it reminds me and it was such a,
just a great, great moment, a great compliment, but that's what, that's what honesty can do.
I think that guy didn't need to tell me that he could have just walked right by me,
but that's what having that one little moment of honesty can do. If you genuinely think that
somebody is doing something or looks great or whatever it may be, and you're not coming at it
from like a scummy dude trying to hit on a chick kind of way, then it's, it's really,
it's really empowering and beautiful. And what you can do for somebody's day is just jaw dropping.
It just, it can, it does so much when you're able to do this. Like I said, this is an exercise that
you can do to start learning how to be honest, because if you can be honest with just, you know,
start with the people in your living room, start with the people wherever, and then start doing it
with strangers, what you're going to find is that not only are you able to be honest about these
traits that you enjoy, but you'll start to look for those traits that you enjoy. The more you do
this exercise, the more you start to see things in a more positive light, it starts to live in
a positive light, it starts to literally change the way that you're seeing the world. You really
start to see beauty in places that you hadn't before, because you're actively, consciously
trying to see them, things that you normally would have just walked by, things that you normally
wouldn't have said anything about, but you would have thought to yourself, oh, that's cool. And
that, that, that, well, this seems like it's more of a, more of a practice in the kindness aspect.
You're going to find as we move forward that a lot of these, these traits that we talk about,
kindness and empathy and truth and honesty, all of these things, they, they really do go hand in
hand. You can't, you can't do one without the other a lot of times. And it, when you can practice
all of them together, that's, that's why we do that exercise at the start of the podcast,
is to try to impress upon everyone that, you know, these are traits that are, they seemingly
are universal. If you have these traits, if you can exercise these traits in unison,
then you will be a better person and the people around you will be better people.
And it's, it just seems like an inevitability when you think about it. Now let's talk about some of
the, I guess a little, a little bit less, how do I say this? A little less popular ways of using
truth and honesty. I keep on interchanging those words and I really don't mean to,
so you're going to have to excuse me. I'm, I'm, I have a note here that says honesty slash truth,
and I just keep reading it over and over again. So I'm going to say truth, even though I don't,
that's, you know, we've already established that means different things. Now there is, there is a,
an aspect of truth that is painful. Most truth outside of this exercise that I just put forward
is painful. Truth is very hard on the world that we live in. It is very difficult for many people
to believe it or to deal with because they don't want to believe it. They don't want to see it.
This goes back to what we already talked about with liars and lying. There is more people than
you probably believe or understand that refuse to live in honesty. They refuse to live without lies.
The lies that they tell themselves and the lies that they tell others are the skin that they wear,
that they are no longer, they no longer suffer the elements because they wear lies as armor.
These people, the people that live like that, they, they oftentimes don't know. They really
have no idea what they've done and what they're doing to themselves. And a lot of times when you
are somebody who is practicing the concepts of honesty and being honest, you become a threat.
You become a threat to the world that these people have created, to the skin that they wear,
to their very existence is the way that they feel. Now they don't necessarily know that consciously.
They're not aware of that threat, but when somebody has told themselves enough lies,
when people surround themselves with other liars, which is something that is very, very common,
when people have spent too much time inundating themselves with the culture of lying,
any amount of truth is seen as a threat, a threat to their entire worldview.
And so it's important to understand that as you move through the world and you move through
people and you're trying to make changes, that you're going to come across people like this
that have entire worldviews, entire structures built around them that are all lies.
They keep friends around them that are not good for them. They keep belief systems around them
that are actively hindering their growth. They tell themselves lies about what they believe and
what they do. And when that happens, it really is impossible at this point.
It really is impossible at times. It feels impossible to break through that, because if
they're holding on so tightly to these things, what happens when they let go? Who do they become?
How hard is the fall? And so you have to really look at that because we're in the business of
helping people. We're in the business of trying to be compassionate and understanding and helping. And
when you see people like this, and they're a lot more common, like I said, than you think they are,
you have to be careful. Because if you shatter this person's world, if you say these things
that drive them to the point where they don't know what they believe anymore, everything is broken.
They question everything in their lives. If you drive them to that point, then you could end up
doing a lot more harm in the short term than good. Now that is not to say that you just continue to
let people live in the lies that they're living in. You absolutely need to sprinkle some truth on
them, sprinkle some honesty, and make sure that they understand where North is, if you will.
But it's kind of like alcoholism. We'll use that as an example. I have a couple of friends
that are alcoholics, and it's a disease. It's a disease that they are going to fight with their
entire life, much like my depression. And so one of the aspects of alcoholism, and I've seen it
firsthand, my father was an alcoholic, one of the things that I've seen quite often is the desire,
it's not a desire, the need to hold on to the lies that they tell themselves. Now some alcoholics
tell themselves lies in a constructive way to continue being sober. And those people,
you need to leave them the hell alone, because they're trying to beat a disease. And if they
need to tell themselves some lies to do that, then that's what they need to do. But there are a lot
of people out there that continue to tell themselves lies so that they can stay drinking.
And those are the people that you need to help. Those are the people that you need to reach out
to. Those are the people that you need to start dropping some truth on them, because
there's nothing worse. There is nothing worse than watching someone drink themselves to death. That is
probably the scariest and saddest thing that you can watch somebody do while you maybe have a chance
to stop it, or at least help stop it. So with that in mind, going back to the people that build
entire universes of lies, it's really important to be very careful when you are dealing with
an alcoholic, or you're dealing with somebody who's built these worlds of lies around them.
And it's important to remember that while you mean the best, while you're trying to help,
and you're trying to do the most compassionate thing you can, the truth, honesty, these concepts
are foreign to these people, and they can cause a lot of damage. They are very, very powerful.
So you need to wield your power, wield your honest righteousness. That's a horrible way,
wouldn't that? But wield your honesty with a healthy amount of responsibility. You can't
just shatter somebody's world. You have to do it slowly, you have to do it methodically,
and you have to do it with reason and compassion. You can't just go in and be like,
this is how it is, and that's it, it's over. They're just gonna pull away. They're not gonna
listen. Your honesty and your good intentions may as well be worth nothing at that point in time.
Instead, you have to approach it from a, like I said, a compassionate angle. You have to make
sure that they understand that they're safe with you, and that you're not gonna hurt them,
and that they just need to understand blank. You need to start small. Start small with
something that you know they can handle. And I don't really have to be like,
and you know, I don't really have any certain examples for these scenarios. But you know,
like tell people how much you enjoy them. Like if you're dealing with an alcoholic or a substance
abuser or something like that, you tell them how much you enjoy them when they're not using.
Make sure that you are honest about that. You know, you're telling them honestly how much more
you enjoy them when they're not drinking, when they're not doing whatever. And that will give
them a little bit of confidence to, you know, not feel as bad when they're in those states.
Now obviously, you saying it once isn't gonna move the needle. So it's something that you need to
repeat. And it's something that you can do every time you see them. Every time you can say,
hey, I appreciate the fact that you're, and you don't say it condescendingly. You don't need to
be a jerk about it. You just say, hey, you know, this is really nice. I really appreciate it. I
really, I really enjoy your company when you're not high, when you're not drunk, when you're,
I really like you. You're, you know, we get to do a lot more. We get to see a lot more. We get to
whatever, however you want to do it. You approach it from a, from a position of appreciation and
understanding and compassion. And then you can start to, after, after you've changed, maybe,
maybe, you know, one or two days they show up and they're not in those states. And this goes for the,
the people that are built out of lies as well. You know, just break down the small things first,
make sure that they understand that they're safe and they're appreciated and they're loved, but
some things aren't what they think they are. You know, some, sometimes you got to tweak that
worldview just a little bit so that they're, a window opens up and they can start to understand
the bigger picture. They can start to understand their substance abuse or their, their lies or
their, whatever it may be. You really, you really have to be very careful because the last thing you
want to do is cause more harm than good. And you don't want to drive these people away and you don't
want to send them further into the spiral that they're already in. So always remember, be, be
careful, be cautious, be kind, and understand that while you want to see them happy and you want to
see this change in them, sometimes those people aren't ready for that. Sometimes they're holding
on to these things, to these behaviors for a reason. And that's some deep, that's, you know,
that's when it gets into the deeper stuff. And that's when you really do need to get these people,
they need to get therapists, they need to get into, you know, whatever program they need to,
they need to start dealing with that on their own because that's way outside of mine or your pay
grade. That's just not something that you can do. These people need to make their, make their journey
to wellness a priority. And all you can do is kind of hold their hand a little bit with
earnestness and compassion and say, you know, as, as, as their mind starts to open up a little bit
more, your heart can open up a little bit more and you can give them more and you can let them see
more of the world they've been missing out on. So that got pretty heavy and I didn't, I don't want
to leave it on that note. We don't want to leave it on a really heavy note, but we are running a
little bit over where we want to be as time goes. So I'm going to go ahead and leave this on a quote
with a little bit more on there. And the quote is this, without courage, we cannot practice any other
virtue with consistency. We can't be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest. Maya Angelou said
that, and I can't possibly agree more. So I'm going to leave you with that quote and I just want to
make sure that everybody understands it. Honesty and understanding your truth are the greatest
signs of being courageous. You have to be courageous to be an honest person. You have to be
to tell people the things that they don't want to hear necessarily and to tell people the things
that make them feel better. It takes courage and it takes a level of compassion and understanding,
knowing that one moment of truth may hurt, but a lie will hurt for a lot longer. Every time they
remember it, every time they find out a new one, every moment after that, a lie will hurt you
over and over and over again, but the truth will only hurt you once. So remember that and remember
that the most courageous thing you can do as you move through your journey to become a better person
in this world is to establish honesty with yourself and honesty with those around you.
Help them find their truth, help them lead a life that is dedicated to making the world a better place.
Our next episode we're going to be talking about the concepts of kindness and compassion,
and it should be a pretty fun one. I don't think we're going to get too heavy on that one because
it's really just an uplifting and fun topic to discuss. I thank everybody who's been watching
I thank everybody who's listened this far. I really don't intend to have the episodes run this long
all the time, but you know if they go long they go long. I'm not going to cut myself down just to
fit into a particular time window. Thank you again. I really do appreciate whoever is listening
and we're going to slowly build this community up and we're going to get this message out.
We're going to do it together. Thank you all and have a good day.