GT Radio - The Geek Therapy Podcast

#362: The crew discusses Baldur’s Gate 3 and The Dark Urge origin character, how they can be used as a metaphor for intrusive thoughts, and the severe lack of therapists and social workers in Faerûn.

Josué (00:01.95)
Welcome to GT Radio on the Geek Therapy Network. Here at Geek Therapy, we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. My name is Josué Cardona and I am joined by Marc Cuiriz Link Keller, and Lara Taylor. Everybody, what y’all playing lately?

Marc (00:12.497)
Hello?

Link Keller (00:14.667)
Yo.

Lara (00:16.879)
Hey!

Josué (00:23.242)
Anything? Anything good? Anything near? Tears of the Kingdom? Yeah? Pardon, Marc, what are you playing?

Lara (00:24.903)
Tears of the kingdom.

Marc (00:28.428)
Kitty Collector.

Link Keller (00:28.834)
Oh, I’ve been…

Marc (00:31.581)
I’m playing kitty collector.

Josué (00:33.09)
Kitty Collector Link?

Link Keller (00:35.63)
I’ve just been putting just, you know, a couple of hours into a little indie game that I’m sure none of you guys have heard of. It is a sequel. It is part of a series. Just a small, small little game nobody knows about called Baldur’s Gate 3 and… Whoaaaaa!

Link Keller (01:00.748)
Yeah.

Lara (01:00.899)
I mean, that’s also what I’m playing.

Josué (01:00.994)
I thought you were going to say moving out too. Yeah, but yeah, Baldur’s Gate 3. I think, have we all been playing it? Marc, are you playing? Yeah, for sure.

Marc (01:03.156)
Yeah.

Marc (01:08.32)
I am looking at my steam right now. I have played it for a solid 84 minutes because I literally bought it two days ago.

Lara (01:15.995)
I’m sorry.

Link Keller (01:17.01)
84 minutes that’s pretty close to the amount of time that I’ve put into the game which if I pull if I pull open My steam right now it says No, it says 227.9 hours

Josué (01:17.186)
That’s a bet.

Marc (01:21.605)
Oh yeah, I-

73.1

Marc (01:30.252)
Oh wait, hold on, I’m sorry, that says 73.1 hours played recently.

Link Keller (01:35.75)
Yes, because I had already put over 100 hours into this game when it was in early access and one might suspect that maybe I would chill out about it. No, not even a little bit. I’m going harder than ever. I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m constantly thinking about it. Right now I am thinking about it. Are we actually done? Can I go play?

Lara (01:43.21)
Mm-hmm.

Josué (01:44.081)
Oh.

Link Keller (02:04.043)
My babies.

Josué (02:04.214)
Before you go, can you tell us what the game is and what it’s about?

Link Keller (02:08.658)
It is a RPG. The first one came out in, I wanna say 96, 98 maybe? Late 90s, early 2000s. And I played those games, Baldur’s Gate 1 and Baldur’s Gate 2 a shit ton in my youth. And I have been excited for more Baldur’s Gate since 2007.

Josué (02:27.822)
same.

Lara (02:28.646)
Mm-hmm.

Link Keller (02:37.494)
when they started promoting Dragon Age Origins as the spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate. I’ve been craving it. It did not hit that mark for me, but Baldur’s Gate 3, it is more Baldur’s Gate. It is a different game. It plays a little bit different. It plays a little bit more similarly to Larian Studios’ other games, Divinity, Original Sin, and that sequel, but it is still in its heart.

Baldur’s Gate game and so I am having so much fun playing. You get to make your little character. It is in the Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition rule set. So most of the basic Dungeons and Dragons stuff is in the game. And yeah, I made my little character and I collect my little friends and we go on little adventures and then we do mass murder and stealing and…

Kissing? Mmm!

Lara (03:41.187)
Mass murder and stealing? I haven’t done any of that. Well, maybe mass murder. Of goblins.

Josué (03:48.142)
So many goblins.

Link Keller (03:48.248)
Just a little light murder. So anyways, I’m having an absolute blast with this game. It’s been something I’ve been excited about for years. And it’s fantastic. I’m enjoying it so much.

Josué (04:04.138)
Well, I too have been playing Baldur’s Gate 3 and that’s not really what I want to talk about today. I picked the topic, it’s not really about Baldur’s Gate 3, but there is a character in Baldur’s Gate 3 that you can choose that I want to talk about and just to kind of set off the conversation. But I will say that Baldur’s Gate 3 more than any other game that I’ve played… maybe ever?

But you can tell me what other games do this. And I recently played Divinity Originals sin two. I’ve played, I think I’ve played, you know, a variety of RPGs. But this game feels like it has, it almost feels like anything is possible in the sense that you have many different, like you meet somebody and you’re like, oh, I could befriend this person or I could kill them or I could kiss them. Like, I don’t know, like, anything feels possible.

And so I’m very hesitant at some things because there are some games where you’re like, I’m just gonna say this to see what happens, but I don’t really expect there to be a consequence. And in this game, I’m like, attack? No, I’m not gonna attack because if I attack, I’m gonna end up killing them. Or I might die, yeah, yeah. It’s gonna be a whole thing. And so the game is a lot of fun and it feels like there’s high stakes because I know an epi-

Link Keller (05:08.89)
Heheheheheheheheheheheheheh

Lara (05:13.629)
Mm-hmm. You might die or you might die. Yeah.

Josué (05:27.978)
character can die and then that’s it. Like their whole storyline, they could have been on your party, in your party for 207 hours or however many.

Link Keller (05:37.53)
Hahaha

Lara (05:38.231)
and the one wrong statement and that person dies in a battle.

Josué (05:41.006)
Or you could have killed them at the beginning. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that I find impressive about the game. And I think that’s one of the reasons why right now it is beloved and getting very, very high scores in reviews. And so you can create your own character. How many of you created your own characters? All of you? Same. So I created a character of my own.

Lara (06:00.771)
I’m excited.

Link Keller (06:02.913)
Yes.

Josué (06:08.182)
Which is almost identical to yours, Lara, not surprisingly. Hahahaha

Link Keller (06:12.193)
Wow.

Lara (06:12.907)
Look, I’ve never played a Dragonborn. I wanted to play Dragonborn. I love Rangers. I want to be a Ranger. Yeah.

Josué (06:15.99)
Mine was a Dragonborn. Yep, yep. Yeah, yep, yep. So I created a character and then I saw, it wasn’t a review, there’s this YouTube channel called Fextralife where he does a whole bunch of coverage of the games and in a very technical way. Like this is one of those games that I’ve been studying. Like I watch hour long videos on every class before I decided what I wanted to do. And he made a video on this, one of them,

Link Keller (06:17.455)
Hehehehehehe

Josué (06:44.914)
Origin characters that you can choose. I think there’s 12, right, that are actual characters in the game that you can pick. And 12, is that too many? I think there’s 12 characters throughout.

Link Keller (06:54.362)
12? That’s way too many. There’s six companions which you can pla...

#361: The crew discusses the Barbie movie!

Marc Cuiriz 0:11
Hello everybody, and welcome to this Barbie tastic episode of GT radio. Where we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about

Josué Cardona 0:26
the barbies you care about

Marc Cuiriz 0:29
the Barbies you care about. I am one of the Barbies here tonight. Marc Cuiriz, and joined with me is Josué Barbie.

Josué Cardona 0:42
Yep, yep, that’s me.

Marc Cuiriz 0:44
Lara Barbie.

Lara Taylor 0:46
Hey.

Marc Cuiriz 0:48
And Link Barbie.

Link Keller 0:51
Hey,

Marc Cuiriz 0:53
how we doing Barbies.

Link Keller 0:55
Hi Barbie

Marc Cuiriz 1:01
how’s everybody?

Link Keller 1:01
Really? Nobody’s gonna say it back? Wow betrayed immediately. I think the patriarchy is in here you guys I’m worried

Lara Taylor 1:12
it might be

Josué Cardona 1:12
Who’s a Ken in here?

Lara Taylor 1:14
listen,

Marc Cuiriz 1:14
I’m actually an Allan

Lara Taylor 1:15
I am Kenough, okay?

Marc Cuiriz 1:23
we’re all kenough

Josué Cardona 1:25
what a movie what a movie.

Link Keller 1:26
What a movie. That’s cinemaaa

Marc Cuiriz 1:32
I yeah, I was not expecting to Well, I was kind of expecting to like go into it with like, walking away with like, things to think about right? Because of like everything I saw on social media because I was kind of late to seeing the movie. But I was still thoroughly surprised as to how much this movie actually made me like, Huh. This is this is something I didn’t, like, I didn’t think about it. In in the way that it was being presented in the movie. Like, patriarchy.

Josué Cardona 2:04
Please elaborate.

Marc Cuiriz 2:05
So obviously, like I understood, like a lot of the themes, I saw a lot of things on Tik Tok on Facebook and just social media in general of like, how Barbie was a really a movie that got you to like, think about things and sort of view things in a different way. And so I was like, okay, like, I get it. This movie is more catered towards adults kind of with the messages that it’s presenting things like that. And as I was sitting there watching it, and listening to kind of what was going on. I was like, Huh, that’s really interesting. I didn’t really think about it this way. And that, it almost seemed like every, I shouldn’t say almost it was in the sense, like everything was reversed in Barbie land, where Barbies ran everything. And the Kens were just like, essentially the eye candy. But we’re also like, dismissed. Like they weren’t really, they didn’t, no one really paid much attention to them. And then there’s Allan Ken’s best friend that was even more so ignored. And then they go into the real world. And then Ken sort of sort of starts learning about patriarchy, and then he’s talking to other dudes, and they’re like, No, the patriarchy still very much alive. We’re just really good at hiding it now. Like, we just have all these fancy words to kind of sprinkle things over and I’m like, Huh, that like that makes a lot of sense. Like, it’s stuff like I already knew, but to have it just kind of be outright and just kind of like spoken in that way. I was like, yeah, like, wow, that’s, that is that is nothing but hard facts that they are spitting right now.

Josué Cardona 3:56
And how Ken’s like, your whole patriarchy is awesome. Like, it really benefits us. We should, we should we should do more of that we should bring that home. We should just embrace it. It’s all about horses.

Lara Taylor 4:10
Ken is just a horse girl Ken really just wanted to be a horse girl and the patriarchy kind of ruined that. There are so many wonderful things about this movie, but we’re on the topic of the patriarchy piece. And what I think is what the movie does really well is it shows how toxic masculinity and patriarchy also doesn’t work for men either. And how it puts them in boxes. And literally puts Barbie in a box like but I thought they did that beautifully. Most of the people that I know, present company excluded are that have seen the movie are like queer people, trans people, women and so it’s nice to hear Are somebody thinking about things differently? It’s good.

Marc Cuiriz 5:06
Yeah, I was honestly thoroughly surprised to like the patriarchy isn’t about horses? you know what? Screw the patriarchy it’s not about horses. I’m not into it. Let’s let’s just get rid of it altogether

Josué Cardona 5:24
funniest thing was to me that they call that the ken called his place exactly what you call your house. Mojo Dojo Casa House. That was such a coincidence.

Marc Cuiriz 5:34
Listen, I told you that in confidence Okay. Now I gotta change the name.

Josué Cardona 5:39
Oh, sorry.

Lara Taylor 5:42
Listen, Ken is such a horse girl that he put on his Mojo Dojo Casa house, he has a saloon the saloon doors and it’s like, Ken saloon or something like that on the front?

Josué Cardona 6:00
I am interested in hearing from you, Lara, you said that some of your clients brought up the movie. Very curious, in what context

Lara Taylor 6:11
so. And it’s not just clients that have brought this up to me. But I’m friends who and these are mostly trans friends. Talking about it brought up feelings of a lost childhood, especially trans women. And this feeling these feelings of like, I wish I could have played with Barbies like this. And also feelings of like, damn, the patriarchy sucks. But I’ve known that for a really long time. And I’ve been on multiple sides of this and it sucks for everybody. But it’s led to some good conversations about well, you can you can still have these things if you want. I mean, if you feel like you’re past the Barbie stage, that’s fine. You can still play with your video games and your other things. But yeah, it’s been it’s been good to talk about toxic masculinity, patriarchy. Things that I have talked about with clients before. But through this lens, I think it may it brought things up to the forefront that just didn’t naturally come to them as often. So yeah. Plus, we talked a lot about how Ken is a horse girl, and that we are Kenough

Josué Cardona 7:45
do you really think he’s a horse girl. I’m just I just wasn’t sure if

Lara Taylor 7:47
yes, I really believe that. That’s that he wanted to be a horse girl. Yeah.

Josué Cardona 7:56
Um, the toy thing is really interesting to me, because I hadn’t thought about that. I’m, I play more with toys now than I ever have before. Also, I had a Ken doll. By the way, there’s a story I don’t know if I’m just sorry, my sister. It was her birthday. And someone came over. She didn’t know us very well. I believe this is my how I remember it. And so she had a pilot Ken and stewardess Barbie for for my sister. Once you realize that she had that my sister had a brother. She kind of split the present into and then gave me the Ken. and gave my sister the Barbie. When I was a kid, we like my action figures and my sister’s Barbies. It was kind of like in Toy Story, right where they were like, the toys are all mixed up

Link Keller 8:45
they play together.

Josué Cardona 8:47
Yeah. Yeah. Like Bruce Wayne used to ride in that pink Ferrari. Because it was cooler than whatever. Like, there wasn’t a Ferrari that you could buy for Bruce Wayne, and he needed one. You know

Lara Taylor 8:58
he did

Link Keller 8:58
plus, if you’re in th...

#360: Josué, Kayla, and Link discuss using pieces of media to explain our own lived experiences. From extremely specific details to vague emotional similarities, we’re all shouting out “It me!!”

Josué Cardona 0:12
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network, here at Geek Therapy, we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. My name is Josué Cardona. And I am joined by link Keller.

Link Keller 0:21
Yo! What’s up?

Josué Cardona 0:23
And for the first time ever on the show with me, I think?

Kayla Devorak 0:26
I don’t think that’s true

Josué Cardona 0:27
with us together. together really?

Kayla Devorak 0:29
been together before. Yeah,

Josué Cardona 0:31
I don’t know, Kayla Devorak

Kayla Devorak 0:35
Hello.

Josué Cardona 0:37
I think it’s just us today.

Link Keller 0:39
Yeah.

Josué Cardona 0:41
So today’s topic is something that we talk about often, like we allude to it, but we don’t, we haven’t spent time talking about it for for a long time. And that is using media, specifically to say something that you feel like you’re unable to say, we often talk about how we, you know, different ways that we can use media to identify and to relate. But there’s so many examples that I have of being able to, like my whole start with this with this concept was me feeling like I didn’t have the words to express myself. And then to be able to just point to a reference or to a show or to a game was invaluable for me. And to know that, you know, we’ve helped a whole bunch of people do that, as therapists, as teachers, just being open to that is really cool. So that’s what I want to talk about today. And I figured I would, I’d start with an example that I just just read like an hour ago. So I’m reading a novel called tomorrow, tomorrow and tomorrow. And it at the beginning, it has, it has a meta example of this, which is even, which I like even more, where it’s these two kids at a hospital and one of them is is sick, because he was in an accident. And the girl that he’s talking to has a sister who has cancer. But like she doesn’t want to talk about the fact that her sister has cancer. So when the kid asked her, the boy asks her how, like, why she’s there, what’s wrong with this sister? And she just says, you know, she has dysentery. And she kind of just makes that makes a gaming reference and doesn’t actually, you know, talk about what it is. And I think he gets it. It’s like, okay, you’re not, you’re not going to really tell me what it is. But I get it. And they just keep talking and playing. And that’s an example of like, oh, you know, like, it’s something serious, but maybe I don’t want to talk about it. Maybe I don’t want to say the word cancer. But here’s a reference that you would understand. People can die from this, people can die from dysentery. And it’s a good reference. So that one just came up that one’s fresh in my mind. So, curious. Kayla? what do you what comes to mind when we when we talk about this any examples that you can think of, or the you’ve you’ve experienced back in the day, or even now with your students?

Kayla Devorak 3:15
Um, you know, I don’t know if I use that as much now. I had been thinking about this a lot. And I was like, I don’t maybe I’ve just been removed from it for so long. But my brain goes to this. This book that I’m obsessed with. I’ve talked about it already. But there’s this like, quote, or this part in the book, where,

Josué Cardona 3:46
what’s the book?

Link Keller 3:46
What book?

Kayla Devorak 3:49
It’s the masquerade series. So I don’t know which book there’s three books currently. But basically, she’s an antihero. So if you want to learn more about that, you can listen to that episode, whatever. Whatever, it’s up on Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. But there’s this quote, like she says something someone says something to her when she’s basically like, she can’t figure out what the truth is. And like has a tendency to really not see like the larger picture with everybody or like everybody else, like she thinks she’s the only one manipulating pieces, but other people have agency. And one character says to her, like, you’re gonna know it’s the truth because the truth hurts. And I think that’s useful. When we think about uncomfortable truth truths. We don’t want to know about ourselves, right? Which oftentimes, we find those things out out in therapy, or as we’re trying to unpack ourselves. That’s what came up for me.

Josué Cardona 5:09
Do you have you? Could you could you see yourself using that that phrase or that quote?

Kayla Devorak 5:15
I could? Yeah, I think I think so. Like, for myself, also, just like for myself, I think I read that. And I was like, yeah, that’s kind of true sometimes. And I think I think definitely, maybe not in those exact words. But I think as therapists you often find yourself saying something similar, right? Yeah.

Josué Cardona 5:45
Link what what does your mind go to?

Link Keller 5:48
Well, when you brought up this topic, idea, my immediate thought was the scene from Schitt’s Creek, where David tells his friends, basically, that he’s pansexual. But in not so many words, it is couched within a wine metaphor. Which for the people who haven’t seen Schitt’s Creek, highly recommend, but I will read this short section to you. So Stevie, David’s friend says, so just to be clear, I’m a red wine drinker. And David says, that’s fine. Stevie says, okay, cool. I only drink red wine. And up until last night, I was the under the impression that you too only drink red wine. But I guess it was wrong. I see where you’re going with this. I do drink red wine. But I also drink white wine. And I’ve been known to sample the occasional Rosé. And a couple of summers back, I tried to merlot that used to be Chardonnay, which kind of bit complicated. Oh, so you’re really just open to all wines. I like the wine and not the label. Does that make sense? Yes, it does. And I think

Kayla Devorak 7:06
that’s perfect

Link Keller 7:07
that scene is so good. Because the it’s not a joke about David’s sexuality. The the funny comes from the metaphor of them being in like a wine aisle in a store having this conversation. And Stevie is a little uncomfortable. And so couching it in that metaphor, but then totally understanding what he’s saying and affirming that, and it’s just really beautiful. And it’s something as I don’t identify as pansexual, I identify as bisexual, but functionally, in this instance, applies the same way. And so it felt very much where I was like, hooting and hollering and pointing at the TV going “it me! it me!!” Yeah. And so I haven’t really had to, like, Come out to anybody in that way. But like, if I was this, I would just send them this scene on YouTube. I have definitely heard from not personal acquaintances, but people online. I have heard them talk about, like, legitimately used this line, use this scene to come out to their family as a way to be all like, I hope I hope having this language will help somebody understand what I am trying to show them about myself. And when it works. It’s beautiful.

Josué Cardona 8:30
I love it. it Me. It me.

Link Keller 8:32
it me!!

Josué Cardona 8:32
That’s it. Yeah. You know, the, I don’t think I’ve ever told this story on the show before. By the way, this is the 300 and 60th episode. So 360.

Link Keller 8:42
Wow,

Josué Cardona 8:43
that’s kind of cool. So for 3...

#359: Lara, Link, and Kayla discuss anti-heroes, what they are, why we find them compelling, and provide a couple of examples of our favorites.

Link Keller 0:11
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network, where we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media that we care about. Also, media we don’t like sometimes that’s a fun way to bond. But we’re not talking about that. Today

Link Keller 0:30
Josué is gone and link goes off the rails.

Link Keller 0:30
Today, we’re gonna be yucking all the yums every yum. No, I’m just kidding. I would never I would never do such a thing. Because I don’t want Josué to be mad at me. Please don’t be mad at me. Just kidding. We are here. Today I am joined by my dear co host, Lara.

Lara Taylor 0:49
Hello,

Link Keller 0:50
and valuable, most valuable guest host Kayla,

Kayla Devorak 0:58
hello. Most Valuable guesthost I’ll take it,

Lara Taylor 1:04
MVGH.

Link Keller 1:06
the P is silent. Today, we are going to be talking about anti heroes, I think this is going to be a fun conversation, I’m excited to talk about some examples of anti heroes that we like and resonate with. But before we do that, let’s let’s sort of suss out and get a working definition for what an antihero is because, you know, not everybody uses words the same way. Which is great, and a lovely thing about humans, but makes for conversations to be a little weird sometimes. So let’s talk about a way what does an antihero mean to you, Lara?

Lara Taylor 1:46
Some typically somebody that is put into a hero role and does not want to be. usually I mean, we’re gonna get into all the characters later. But like somebody who if you’re thinking about hero’s journey, which people have opinions about the hero’s journey, but the person really doesn’t want to hear the call really doesn’t want to they are not the kind of person that you would usually picture as a hero either. So that’s my working definition. There’s probably some more nuance on it. But I’ve been stuck in the therapy office all day.

Link Keller 2:28
You spent all your your nuance points already today. How about you Kayla, what do you think?

Kayla Devorak 2:36
Well, I think for me, when I think about anti heroes, I often think about people who just make such different choices than a traditional hero does. But still gets to kind of the same end place that a hero does. It may be a more interesting way and maybe more challenging to their own internal complexities.

Lara Taylor 3:09
Listen, listeners, Josué abandoned us to go to San Diego Comic Con, and said, You know what, you can bring Kayla on and she can talk about whatever she wants.

Kayla Devorak 3:19
this is true

Lara Taylor 3:19
And so Kayla said anti heroes, because she loves them. So

Kayla Devorak 3:25
I do they are my favorite character trope

Link Keller 3:31
Oh, yeah, so for me, the way I conceptualize an antihero is a character that fulfills the role of a hero in the actions taken within the story, but their motivations are very different. Whether that’s, you know, being greedy or having other you know, value systems that we don’t generally connect to heroism, or if it is that the choices that they make are the outcome is heroic, but the choice is not heroic, that sort of thing. Basically coming down to they are heroes but their their values and their motivations are distinct from the traditional hero. And I think that makes them more interesting.

Kayla Devorak 4:26
They are not a Steve Rogers. Yes,

Lara Taylor 4:29
I do like me some Steve Rogers, but I’ve talked about him on the show a million times one of my favorite

Kayla Devorak 4:36
you have? I am shocked

Lara Taylor 4:38
a million times. Not just but I talk about one of my favorite characters of it. I like villains but I also like villains turned heroes right so like, once upon a time, Regina is one of my favorite characters. Because there’s nuance and like I I’m my nuanced points are gone, but I I love the nuanced characters that like it’s a gray area like nobody is all. Not all good and not all bad. Yeah.

Link Keller 5:19
Okay, is there a specific antihero you would like to start with Kayla?

Kayla Devorak 5:24
I have so many. And when I made my list, I was like, Oh no, I don’t know how many of these are going to be really familiar to the rest of you. And I doubt any of you are going to read any of the books in a day. So

Lara Taylor 5:44
what?!

Kayla Devorak 5:44
But the one that actually kind of led me to being like I really want to talk about anti heroes, mostly because I was really immersed in the book is Baru Cormorant, which is from the the masquerade series, I find her and her choices so fascinating. And obviously, it can’t talk to I don’t know if you guys are going to read those books, I highly recommend them. They’re very distressing, though is,

Link Keller 6:15
is there a way to discuss the antihero-ness without spoiling the plot?

Kayla Devorak 6:22
Yeah, so basically, she got a lot of like, colonization themes. And so she’s basically taken from her home, her home, land, and brought into this larger empire. But she’s like, brilliant, and so she has decided that she’s going to basically destroy the system from within. However, the choices she makes throughout the whole thing is very, very selfish, like so selfish, and also consistently forgets that other people are also playing the game. And so she’s often like, I’ve made this really brilliant move. And then a chapter later, she’s like, Oh, no, I forgot that there’s other pieces on the board. But it makes ultimately, in the first book makes, like the ultimate sacrifice for a relatively good reason. But it really messes her up. And then she just continues to, like use that to leverage her really shitty choices of where she’s like continuing to sacrifice people for this cause, because now she’s so invested in destroying the empire in this way, that if she doesn’t keep moving forward, all of those sacrifices she has made are like for nothing. And then what was it for? And it’s to the point where like, it breaks her psyche at the end of the first book. Like, it’s such a fascinating, like in book two. It’s like she in Book Two, she literally has cannot see out of her one half of one half is completely blind. But there’s like no real connection, like, because people are like, No, you’re moving it. What’s happening here. There’s three books in the series so far. I have not read the third one, which is titled The tyrant Baru Cormorant. And then there’s a fourth book coming, but there’s no release date yet. It’s fantastic. It’s really devastating. But it’s also like a really diverse story. There’s diverse characters. There’s diverse relationships. And there are people who are way more like morally sound, but she consistently makes really fucked up choices. But you know that her ultimate goal is to save her home her homeland and destroy the group that basically destroyed her people and killed her dad. Yeah,

Link Keller 9:10
nice.

Kayla Devorak 9:10
I love her. I appreciate I like love the shit out of her. I’m like, you make such terrible choices. But I really want you to win.

Link Keller 9:19
I think there’s something really validating about reading a story where you get to watch your character. Absolutely fall for the sunk cost fallacy.

Kayla Devorak 9:28
Yes.

Link Keller 9:29
There’s, I get su...

#358: The crew discusses Indiana Jones and getting older. Happy 40th birthday to everyone!

Josué Cardona 0:12
Hit record before Lara falls asleep old lady Lara

Link Keller 0:20
[honk shoo-ing noises]

Lara Taylor 0:23
that’s not me maybe it’s all of us.

Link Keller 0:26
honk shoo honk shoo.

Lara Taylor 0:29
Because we’re all going to be old.

Link Keller 0:32
We’re all having a little midday nap.

Marc Cuiriz 0:36
midday nap sounds fantastic.

Josué Cardona 0:40
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network here Geek Therapy. We believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves through the media we care about with you today in order of oldest to youngest, Lara Taylor.

Lara Taylor 0:55
Hi.

Josué Cardona 0:57
I’m Josué Cardona. Link Keller

Lara Taylor 1:00
he’s only a month younger than me.

Josué Cardona 1:03
Link Keller.

Link Keller 1:04
Hello.

Josué Cardona 1:06
I’m Marc Cuiriz.

Marc Cuiriz 1:08
Hello, everybody.

Josué Cardona 1:11
Age before beauty Lara, what is up? What are we doing? Today? What’s the topic?

Lara Taylor 1:17
Listen, I went to go see the new Indiana Jones movie. And without spoiling anything about the movie, I can tell you that Harrison Ford is old and he’s in the movie. And there’s this theme of like finding your place he’s he’s passing on a torch. We’ve talked about that before with some several other things. But this like, what do I do now? Is obsolescence feeling this feeling old and outdated. It’s funny that I want to bring this up. And I’m like, it’s a way of me processing how old I’m getting because I’m going to be 40 this year. But according to link, we’re all turning 40

Link Keller 2:00
We are all turning, even you dear listener, happy birthday

Lara Taylor 2:04
no matter how old are.

Link Keller 2:05
happy 40th birthday

Josué Cardona 2:07
Lara Sorry, you had to skip your nap to come record? I know.

Lara Taylor 2:10
I know. I know. Listen, listen. Most days, I do take a nap right before we record. I wake up 15 minutes before we record. Today I did not taking that because I was playing tears at the kingdom. But this idea of well, I’m getting older. And the funny thing is, according to people, I am still a young person. I am 39. And then when I hit 40, I will I will be I will no longer be a young person, but doesn’t mean unnecessarily obsolete. But I am feeling like it feels weird to have friends that are a lot younger than me. And I have some friends that are a lot younger than me. I feel like I’m keeping up with things. But you know,I don’t know

Josué Cardona 3:03
We’ll test you in a bit.

Lara Taylor 3:04
We’ll see.

Josué Cardona 3:05
Yeah.

Lara Taylor 3:08
I don’t know, Marc. Also, as our resident young person does not know all the things. I’m just throwing that out there.

Marc Cuiriz 3:16
You know, you’re right. I absolutely don’t. This when you mentioned like friends like being a lot younger than you. That brought me back to when I worked at a trampoline like Park thing. And I was the only employee aside from the the head manager that was over the age of 20. And I was like, I think I was 23. And everyone else was like 15-16. And I felt so old compared to everybody and the things these kids were saying I was like, What? What are you What, what does that mean? And they would just look at me.

Lara Taylor 4:02
Yeah, ya no, last year when I was volunteering at my summer camp, I had the realization that I was I had been going to that summer camp longer than anyone on the staff had been alive. And that was a weird sensation.

Josué Cardona 4:16
can you say that again?

Lara Taylor 4:16
I had been going to that summer camp longer than anyone on the staff had been alive. And I have some friends from who are on the staff. And one of my closest friends now is about to be 23 but this friend is very much into the idea that we’re all turning 40 Because he has a horrible back and it’s just like, You know what? I’m turning 40, too. So, there’s that

Josué Cardona 4:50
42?

Lara Taylor 4:51
40 also 40 also, T O O, not T W O um, but it’s just interesting seeing And we did get, I tried to ignore the fourth Indiana Jones movie. But seeing Indiana Jones who is this, like action hero, and he still is in this movie and the new one, but seeing him go from this younger guy to running next door to the neighbors and telling them to turn them fucking music down. I, I related to that very much, too much a little too much. And it just, it just had me thinking about where I am in my life. And like, I don’t know what it’s like getting old and changing times. And not necessarily being in my 20s anymore, because I haven’t been in my 20s for almost a decade

Josué Cardona 5:55
or more almost two decades.

Lara Taylor 5:57
No, I was in my 20s Literally 10 years ago.

Josué Cardona 6:02
Right? I forgot how

Link Keller 6:04
That’s not how math works, Josué. It’s okay, you’re turning 40.

Lara Taylor 6:07
stop trying to make me be older.

Link Keller 6:10
Math is hard when you become forty, everyone. look out.

Josué Cardona 6:15
Yeah. What was it that you related the most to in the movie? Like that, that part of?

Lara Taylor 6:19
I think, like right now I’m not at the age that he’s at. I’m not at retirement age. I’m not thinking about like, what do I do after my career? Although sometimes I get into this existential brain where I’m like, What am I gonna do after? Am I ever gonna get to retire? Absolutely not, because that’s not how the world works anymore. Um, but I did relate to, like, oh, things are changing. New generations are thinking about things differently. And I’m trying to keep my brain flexible and able to, like, at least see their perspectives. I’m trying to think of a good example of that, and it has escaped me. But I don’t know. I don’t know. I work with a lot of young people. They seem to think I’m young. Literally, I had a client tell me this week, she thought I was 28. So, I don’t know.

Josué Cardona 7:20
But do you how do you feel?

Lara Taylor 7:23
Old? I am tired.

Link Keller 7:24
69!!! NICE!! But really, no, I’m so tired. And my bones hurt

Lara Taylor 7:32
very tired. And my bones hurt. And I work on my house all the time. That feels like an old person thing. Like I’m working on my house all the time. Although, you know, I have

Link Keller 7:47
have your little projects and your HGTV H G TV.

Lara Taylor 7:52
And I sit in front of the TV crocheting,

Link Keller 7:55
and you have your own recliner. That’s your spot.

Lara Taylor 7:58
I do. It’s on the couch

Josué Cardona 8:00
that’s not true, right?

Lara Taylor 8:01
It’s all these things are true.

Marc Cuiriz 8:04
I wish i had a recliner

Lara Taylor 8:05
HGTV is on. Listen, Nina has the recliner. I’ve got the recliner in the couch. But we’ve had those for quite some time now.

Marc Cuiriz 8:18
I will say my, my mother in law, she had a rocking chair. And the rocking chair was my wife’s. But whenever we would go over there, that was my chair. I always sat in that chair. So now it’s with us. And even though it’s in our bedroom, like when we bring it downstairs really when we need extra chairs or whatever. T...

#357: Marc, Lara, and Josué discuss Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, what canon events are and how we can use them to talk about our own life experiences.

Marc Cuiriz 0:11
Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of Geek Therapy radio where we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. I am one of your wonderful co hosts Marc Cuiriz and joined with me tonight is Lara Taylor.

Lara Taylor 0:30
Hey

Marc Cuiriz 0:32
and Josué Cardona.

Josué Cardona 0:34
What’s up?

Marc Cuiriz 0:35
Hello guys.

Josué Cardona 0:36
Hello.

Marc Cuiriz 0:37
The time has finally come. We we got to we got to talk about across a spider verse. We already knew Spider Man was going to be coming up I talked about it a couple episodes ago briefly. tried really hard to not go too much into it. But now we got to go into it.

Josué Cardona 0:58
i It was my fault. I it took me a while to watch it. Finally. I hadn’t gone to the theater since the last Spider Man movie that came out. That was actually the last time I went to the movies was for no way out. No way. Oh, no way home.

Lara Taylor 1:14
Spider Spider Man book ends on your movie theater experience.

Josué Cardona 1:18
Yep.

Marc Cuiriz 1:21
So I think I just want to know what what were your initial thoughts, feelings, reactions, emotions. All the good stuff. Lara, what do you think of the movie?

Lara Taylor 1:34
It’s been longer since I’ve seen the movie since? Well, since Josué at least cuz I saw it opening weekend. I loved it. I thought there was a lot of good, good meaty, juicy Geek Therapy stuff in there. I cried a lot during the movie. And I have been talking with clients about it a lot. There’s a lot of cool stuff in there. I have a friend who is obsessed, watched it like last week and is like texting me constantly like novels about what his thoughts on this movie are. But again, did not disappoint. My only complaint is that it’s a two parter. And I have to wait for all the things.

Josué Cardona 2:20
spoilers. It’s a part one. I’m glad that they they decided not to call it the cross a spider as part one and two, which was the original.

Lara Taylor 2:32
I liked like into a cross and beyond, like, I like that.

Josué Cardona 2:36
Yeah, it’s cool. I love the first one. So of course, like I had to. I wanted to see this one as soon as possible. There’s a lot of things that I like about this movie. But my overall impression was that I found it overwhelming. Like,

Lara Taylor 2:56
there’s a lot like you have pause to be able to see.

Josué Cardona 3:01
Yeah,

Lara Taylor 3:01
hundreds of hundreds of Spider Men’s

Josué Cardona 3:04
like, like I was telling someone the other day about this. I was like, yeah, if you just want to focus on like, no, like, there’s a lot there’s a lot going on, and then everything that makes it so cool visually, which are the different styles again, like I don’t know why I just came out of theater, like, exhausted. Like, I think part of it is to that for the last few years. I I rarely sit down to watch a movie from beginning to end. At that day, I did a double feature like I went to two movies. And this one

Lara Taylor 3:38
two multiverse movies. Yeah, I think are exhausting too.

Josué Cardona 3:43
Yeah, yeah. But But yeah, by the end of it, I was like, I felt like I like my brain had gotten beat up. It was it was it was a lot. A lot a lot. But did I like it? Oh yeah. Love it. I can’t wait to get into the the be the best reasons why.

Marc Cuiriz 4:05
Yeah, I I’m like Lara, I saw it opening night and I I walked away from that movie. One, just completely taken away. I loved the movie so much. I loved all the different art styles. I really liked how they did like Gwen’s like perspective of things and like how that a lot of it was focused on her development as well. And I also walked away surprised because I know like at the end when they you know, do like, oh, the return or whatever. It’s a 2024 I was like, wow, okay, next year, I’m here for it. And then of course, you know, you hear the news later, they’re like, no, no, we have to push it back to like 2026 which I’m like, okay, that’s totally fine. But

Josué Cardona 4:59
is that true

Marc Cuiriz 4:59
also

Lara Taylor 5:00
That one actually might not be true.

Marc Cuiriz 5:02
Yeah, I mean, either way, I think it’s going to be delayed to

Lara Taylor 5:07
writers strike and all of that can also move things

Marc Cuiriz 5:09
Exactly.

Lara Taylor 5:10
Yeah.

Marc Cuiriz 5:11
But I know they were talking about potentially delaying it to 2026 to make sure everything is flushed out and is the best, you know, and there are words the best it can be. Because if they were to try to pump that movie out by 2024, I have a feeling a lot of people would be disappointed. But,

Lara Taylor 5:33
yeah, I saw I saw the same kind of thing online that said that it was going to be delayed till 2026. And then somebody was like, this is fake and showed like details on why that post was fake. But other people are saying that, that are in that are like animators are saying there’s no way it’s going to be in 2024. But it’s still scheduled to come out March 2024.

Josué Cardona 5:59
Yeah, that’s what that’s what that’s what I still see. Anyway, that’s not what the show is about.

Lara Taylor 6:05
That’s how excited we are about it, we want the next one right now.

Josué Cardona 6:08
So disappointed. Oh, I can’t wait that long.

Lara Taylor 6:13
Yeah.

Marc Cuiriz 6:15
But no, this movie, this, I think this movie was definitely though, is, is very overwhelming. And it’s definitely one where I’m gonna want to watch it back and like, pause it at certain points or like, try to slow it down at certain points, just so that way I can try to take in everything. And because I feel like especially in the moments where it didn’t show like all the Spider Men, I was like, looking around the entire screen trying to find ones that I recognized, but also ones that like I felt like should be in there. Like a one in particular that is just would have just been a funny little like, gag, to me, was the Spooder Man meme. Or it’s like the poorly drawn Spider Man, I was looking all over for it just so I can say like, Yes, I saw it. It’s there. It’s confirmed,

Josué Cardona 7:04
there’s a whole other movie.

Marc Cuiriz 7:06
I know.

Josué Cardona 7:07
Three hours for you.

Marc Cuiriz 7:10
It may or may not make its appearance. But like I just remember I was like looking around everywhere. Just trying to take it all in and like the sequences especially are going by so fast. That it’s it’s impossible without having to like pause it and like taking a look around and like giving yourself a moment to process everything that’s going on. In short scenes.

Lara Taylor 7:33
One of my clients told me, I feel bad for whoever is going to have to do the easter egg videos for for this movie. and I agree.

Josué Cardona 7:44
The easter egg video is coming out in 2026.

Lara Taylor 7:47
That’s the one that’s gonna be delayed

Josué Cardona 7:48
that’s the one delayed yeah yeah, no, no, it was it was a lot. And I think maybe because we’re fans like it was more overwhelming for me, because it wasn’t just noise. I was l...

#356: Link, Lara, and Josué discuss Netflix’s The Ultimatum: Queer Love and the particular enjoyment and disgust of watching reality TV.

Link Keller 0:11
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network, where we believe that the best way to understand ourselves and each other is through the media we care about. I am one of your co hosts, link, and I’m joined by Lara.

Lara Taylor 0:29
Hey,

Link Keller 0:30
and Josué.

Josué Cardona 0:32
Hello.

Link Keller 0:33
Hi, guys.

Josué Cardona 0:35
Hi, Link.

Link Keller 0:36
I’m so excited to talk about this topic today. I recently watched Netflix’s new season of the ultimatum, colon queer love. It is a reality TV show about relationships. The premise is a couple comes in where one couple, one member of the couple has given a marriage ultimatum to the other proposed to me or I’m leaving. And they go on this show. And they date other couples and pretend to be married for a couple of weeks and then reunite with their original partner who they gave the ultimatum to have a pretend marriage with them for a couple of weeks. And then at the end, they decide if they’re actually going to get married to each other, or breakup, or potentially date one of the other people that they dated. It is as I would academically refer to it as a hot dumpster fire. And I love it. And it was I watched the first season of the ultimatum which was straight couples, but this season is about sapphic couples, so women and non binary people. truly a joy. All of the drama, you’re looking for

Lara Taylor 2:06
the whole first episode, I was screaming like who thinks this is a good idea to solve your fucking problems? who??

Link Keller 2:13
It is truly antithetical to building a healthy relationship to put yourself into a eight to 10 week filming production, that you’re still having to live your regular life. But also, you’re going on extravagant dates and drinking a lot and trying to maybe fall in love or figure out what you’re missing from your relationship and all this introspective work and

Lara Taylor 2:44
and they can’t talk to anybody about what happened on the show for at least a year.

Link Keller 2:49
Yes, the I think that is an important thing to touch on right at the beginning, this show was filmed in the beginning of 2021. And it didn’t come out until two months ago. So there is a fair gap there. They did also record a reunion episode in January of this year. So like two years out from when they did it. They did the reunion episode and then several, six months out from that is when the episode started coming out. So I imagine that was quite the experience for the people who actually were on the show. But yeah, I wanted to talk about reality TV sort of in general. Focusing more on like the romance, love and relationship reality TVs shows not so much the like Survivor ones but or other competition ones but also more specifically on this particular show. One because there is not a lot of queer rep in reality TV. I did watch another show on I think I watched it on Hulu, and it was called Love trip colon Paris. And that one was four American women who were straight bi pansexual and lesbian. And they went to France and moved into a beautiful apartment building and then all these hot French singles moved in and they dated each other. truly wild. The height of that one was one woman got another woman’s name tattooed on her knuckles, and I truly thought I would never recover from that. But then I watched the queer ultimatum reunion episode and I was like no, actually, this is the craziest thing I have ever seen. So yeah, what, let’s start with like, what are your guys’s familiarity with watching like relations Ship reality TV. Have you watched other shows before? Is this absolutely not your bag? Like, where are you guys coming from?

Lara Taylor 5:07
I love reality TV, or I used to watch a lot of it. Nina doesn’t like it. So I don’t watch a lot of it unless she’s not around to watch it. Because it stresses her out. I love it. I’m focusing on other people’s problems, not my own. At least it’s not that bad, like. But I was hooked on the real world, which it’s even though that one is like people living together, it’s all about relationships and who’s hooking up with who and who people are hooking up with outside the house and bring into the house. I watched a lot of the real world back in the day. And mostly a lot of MTV like and VH1 one reality shows like, shot at love with tila tequila.

Link Keller 5:57
Just gonna say I think that was like one of my first ones that I ever watched I was truly sets the scene.

Lara Taylor 6:04
I was obsessed with Danny Campbell, I was obsessed. I have met her twice at different clubs, that she came to do appearances that have a curve magazine, which is a lesbian own magazine, signed by her in it. I have a T shirt. This is Team Danny on it. Still, it’s a relic of the early 2000s. And there was a joke that like with my friends that you know, she was a firefighter in Florida. Still is a firefighter in Florida. We were like let’s find out which firehouse she’s at. And I will just leave a trail of fires from there to California, so that she would meet me. Yeah, so obsessed with reality TV shows. And that was the first time I had someone like me on a reality show. I mean, there were other queer people on the real world. But like, this was like, the focus of the show. Was Was her so and then of course, I watched this. And I am obsessed now with the ultimatum queer love. Yeah, I binged. Like, I rewatched a few episodes, because I had to I miss parts of it, but I binge, like six episodes Monday night, so yeah. I love it. It’s great.

Link Keller 7:33
What about you Josué?

Josué Cardona 7:36
I also watched, like the MTV stuff, right? And like survivor and real world and road rules. He was like, Oh, what’s this? After that I’ve never really watched anything. And I don’t know when this happened. But I also don’t watch sports anymore. Because I don’t like watching people live their lives. Like for me, sports isn’t. For me. Sports is like, Oh, this principle of just doing their job. Plus, you’re getting paid so much money. I mean, whether they’re paying getting paid a lot or not. I’m like, I’m just watching somebody do their job. I love a good what is it? Like slam dunk competition. I like highlight reels. I like admiring superhuman acts of physical activity, but reality TV is very much more like just people living their lives. And I know how produced it is. I know how unrealistic it can be because of how think things are set up. Like, like the setup for the ultimatum is so So absurd, it’s um, I was like you, Lara When I was watching the first time I was like,

Link Keller 8:52
in what way? Does this make sense? What Wait, what? To this?

Lara Taylor 8:57
I can get giving someone an ultimatum. Like there are plenty people on the show in their 30s that want to have kids. Like I get it you it’s the whole thing shit or get off the pot like okay, that makes sense. But like this experience what what is it gonna do?

Josué Cardona 9:13
I even understand that there was like a group of people in a room who you know, with a random number generator came up with an idea for a show or thought that it was a good idea. But the fact that people sign up for it right like I have so many questions like it’s

Link Keller 9:28
a spin off of Netflix’s Love is blind. I don’t know if that

Josué Cardona 9:32
I never watched it

Link Keller 9:33
clarifies anything to y...

#355: Marc, Josué, and Link discuss fitting in, and finding places where you can be your authentic self. We cover several examples of media that conveys the exquisite nuances of navigating real and fictional social spaces.

Marc Cuiriz 0:11
Good evening, everybody. This is one of your wonderful co hosts Marc Cuiriz here on Geek Therapy radio. We’re here at Geek Therapy. We believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. Joining me today on this lovely evening is the illustrious link Keller,

Link Keller 0:33
yo,

Marc Cuiriz 0:34
and the ever inspiring Josué Cardona.

Josué Cardona 0:39
Greetings.

Marc Cuiriz 0:41
How’d you guys like the new intro today?

Link Keller 0:44
It’s good.

Josué Cardona 0:45
You’re leveling up,

Marc Cuiriz 0:46
you know, I

Link Keller 0:47
sultry, even.

Marc Cuiriz 0:49
I noticed that. And this kind of goes in fitting with today’s topic. But I noticed that for a while a lot of a lot of the times my intro would want to mimic Josué and kind of how he does the intro. And I always saw that as my way of trying to sort of blend in with everything kind of kind of fit myself into everything. But today I’m on my drive home. I was like, You know what, I kind of want to give it a Sardonyx kind of vibe, you know, just kind of be really out there and kind of stand out for myself and kind of differentiate my intros from Josué’s from Link’s, has Lara ever done an intro?

Link Keller 1:35
not if she can help it?

Josué Cardona 1:37
I don’t I can’t remember a single time

Link Keller 1:40
once and she she beat us all up afterwards. So never again. I’m just kidding. I think that’s great. You’re, you’re individuating Isn’t that lovely?

Marc Cuiriz 1:53
Exactly. So. So this kind of goes in hand with the topic that I chose for this week. And this, this topic came up. When I saw Spider Man across the spider verse a couple a couple of weeks ago, I’m not going to really get too spoilery I’m going to try and actually avoid all spoilers about it if I can, but really just kind of touch on a major theme with in the movie, which was fitting in and having to find your place in society in the world, in your own social groups and sort of going on that journey and discovering kind of where where does someone like where do you fit in, in your life and things like that? So I’m kind of curious as to sort of what you guys have experienced with when it comes to like, figuring out where you fit in with things or what sort of journeys you guys have gone on. Either in the past or currently things like that.

Josué Cardona 3:06
Link, you fit in everywhere, right? Always.

Link Keller 3:08
I’m a social chameleon, which I am learning may also be a sign of autism. But that’s another episode we’ll get into. Yeah, yeah, I’ve had you know, as a as a kid, I moved a lot. So I got really good at making myself socially open to people to make social connections and, and to fit in with groups. Very much in high school. Like I hung out with nerds, but I also hung out with the Goths. And occasionally the stoners and didn’t, you know didn’t quite make the full drift cycle into like the sports and theater side. But yeah, fitting in, it is a great topic for this because there’s so much good media, talking about those kinds of stories because it’s true is like there is skill and effort involved in learning how to connect with people to get that feeling of fitting in and there are times when you do fit in but you don’t feel it. And so that’s I think an important thing to talk about as well.

Josué Cardona 4:31
I think it’s really interesting that you used the words blending in at the beginning marc, because you’re like, oh, you know, I’m gonna do the same thing everybody else does. So I don’t stand out. And it’s like the overlap between like the blending in and the fitting in. Because it’s making me think how I did not want to do anything that would make me stand out. But I did that because I did not want to fit in I didn’t want I wanted to be invisible, I hated everybody, I didn’t want to fit in. I was like, How can I? How can I? How can I blend in the most, so that nobody tries to bring me into their group. I hadn’t hadn’t thought about it when we were that way, as we were, you know, coming up with this. With this, I do, I do have that chameleon aspect, which, which is very unconscious in many ways. Like, I adopt things from different groups, and I completely don’t do it on purpose.

Link Keller 5:40
It’s totally like a human defense mechanism is like we we rely on each other. And so it is like, beneficial to be able to read social cues and then replicate them as a way to be like, see, I’m part of the group, please don’t throw me out into the wilderness.

Josué Cardona 6:01
Again, I may be wrong, but I didn’t. I don’t want to do that. You know, like, if I’m speaking with someone who has a particular accent, my accent starts changing. If I have I started adopting words that I didn’t mean to adopt. At some point, my life changed. And I knew I was like, Oh, shit, I sound just like this other person now laughing How did what? How did that happen? That’s, I don’t know. That is that is a way to fit in. Right? Like, you have people dressing up a particular way or doing something right to fit in with that group right like, I don’t I don’t know, did you? What did you do to fit in with the goths and the stoners at your school? Or were you just yourself? And they were just so accepting.

Link Keller 6:53
I mean, we’re talking about high school. So no, the nobodies that accepting. I not not so much like the the social signifiers like clothes and things like that, mostly because I spent a significant amount of my youth and adulthood uh poor, so I, you know, I buy secondhand clothes, and I prefer comfort over fashion. And so not so much that that social signifier to other people, but you know, my go to move is I sort of I sort of circled group, make a little circle I’m observing, I’m seeing who is talking to who I’m seeing what jokes are being utilized. I’m seeing what media people are talking about. And that was the in. So talking about music with the goth kids, that was the in. I wasn’t playing Pokemon at that time. But Pokemon Pearl and diamond came out while I was in my senior year of high school, and the nerdy kids who hung out next to the library were all on their, you know, on their DSs playing. And I’m just like, tell me all about the new Pokemon. I’m interested in this. And you know, at that point, had actually made some legitimate friends who are like, Okay, I need you to actually get a DS and get Pokemon and play with me. And I’m like, Okay, now I know I’m in because you’re actually asking me to engage more than just talking about the thing. It’s like, No, I want you to play the thing with me. But yeah, I mean, you know, I, we talk all the time about how media helps us understand each other and ourselves better. And, and that has always been my go to have like, you know, Oh, I see that you’re, you know, reading a book or you’re listening to something on your headphones. What are you listening to? And using that away to engage with people or, like, you know, did you see that cool new sci fi movie everybody’s been talking about? Like, what did you think about that, and using that as a way to, if not build, like, deep meaningful friendships than at least creating that social connection where somebody feels as though I’m at least an acquaintance and therefore could potentially make the...

#354: The crew talks about learning new habits and skills, but sliding back into repeating old ones. What’s the deal with that??

Josué Cardona 0:11
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network. Here at Geek Therapy we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. My name is Josué Cardona. And I’m joined today by Lara Taylor.

Lara Taylor 0:22
Hey,

Josué Cardona 0:23
Link Keller.

Link Keller 0:25
Yo,

Josué Cardona 0:26
And Marc Cuiriz

Marc Cuiriz 0:28
Hello.

Josué Cardona 0:29
Hello, Team. It’s my turn again, is it? is it my turn again?.

Lara Taylor 0:34
It is, because you decided to give us a topic.

Josué Cardona 0:38
Because nobody else came up with a topic. So my, my, my topic came to me when we when I was playing, small little, little indie game called Legend of Zelda tears at the kingdom. never and never heard of it. Yeah, no, it’s good. It’s good. So there will be no spoilers here. But I had to kind of what I call this not a, I had a realization. So I’m playing this game. So for context, this is the sequel to breath of the wild and I played, I played about 150 hours a Breath of the Wild through two playthroughs. I liked the game a lot. And one thing that I liked about the game was how you kind of had this very open world and you weren’t sure if you could climb that mountain, or if you could get this far and get to a particular thing. And so I’m playing tears of the kingdom. And I’m doing exactly that, again. It’s like, oh, my god, can I climb the mountain? Can I do this? Can I make it this way, I’m gonna try this. And I’m enjoying it. And after a play session, I stopped. And I thought, wait a minute. This is a sequel. There’s like 100 different ways that I could have done this. Because there there are all these new tools that weren’t available in the first game. And even though the game is teaching me to use them, and sometimes even requiring me to use them, to get from point A to point B, I’m so used to the way I used to do it, that I just did not actually use any of those things. So of course, it got me thinking how, how we do that in real life. That’s like, oh, I go to therapy, or I go to the gym, or I want to go to school, do trainings at work, and you don’t remember the things that you just learned. And you keep doing things. Like you were doing them before. Like you go back to old habits and you start like, why does that happen? What has happened to him? Why am I not using all the new features and Zelda? Why am I not using all of the amazing things that I’ve learned in therapy over the years?

Lara Taylor 2:57
Because new habits are hard to build.

Josué Cardona 3:00
get out of here

Lara Taylor 3:00
And we’d like to be in our comfort zone and do things the way we know.

Josué Cardona 3:05
Oh, explain that to me. I don’t like it. I don’t get it.

Lara Taylor 3:12
I don’t like it either. I can explain it, but I don’t like it. I also I do like some new things in games. I like new games and things like that. And I will get to the real life piece of it. But like I’m playing Jedi survivor and I keep getting new stances and new outfits and things like that. Nope, I want Cal to look the way he was on. Like the first cutscene I changed the color of his outfit to be more colors I like but like I don’t I don’t mess around with all the hair and stuff. I like the the two lightsabers and the double bladed lightsaber. I don’t use the new stances. Yeah, I like to use the things I’m used to. Partially because I know I’m more efficient at it and I know what I’m doing.

Josué Cardona 4:03
But these new tools are we’re more powerful and we can do more.

Lara Taylor 4:07
They are sometimes they are sometimes they’re not right. Like if I were to try and teach myself to type on a keyboard the way you’re supposed to at school. I would be way slower than I am right now with my master typing skills.

Josué Cardona 4:21
but wait, how do you type?

Link Keller 4:25
elaborate,

Lara Taylor 4:26
elaborate, my hands go that place where you’re the starting position you’re supposed to with your pointer finger on the little dots right on the F and the J But my fingers don’t go to the ones that exactly the way that they say whatever. Like I don’t know. I can’t tell you exactly which ones go where but I just type and it’s not the way that they teach you in school. Exactly.

Josué Cardona 4:51
Well this was backwards that this one is like if you learn the right if you the way that you do

Lara Taylor 4:57
the new way is faster.

Josué Cardona 4:58
Yeah, and then you stopped.

Lara Taylor 5:00
they stopped teaching it.

Josué Cardona 5:01
No, but then you stopped. It just started doing the old way. That’s my life.

Lara Taylor 5:07
Okay, I guess that makes sense. But yeah, we like to do the things that we are used to, because we are creatures of habit. And it is really hard to build routines and do new things. Because it’s not what we know, and not what we’re used to. And our brains fall back on those old patterns, because that’s the neural pathways that have been firing, right, and it takes a long time to switch to new pathways. I think I have to say that at least once a day, at my work sometimes five times a day

Josué Cardona 5:39
to yourself?

Lara Taylor 5:40
to clients

Link Keller 5:41
three to clients, two to yourself.

Lara Taylor 5:43
And to remind myself both that I also need, I take time to change that my habits, but also that my clients take time to change their habits, and that it is a process.

Josué Cardona 5:56
So even, like that makes sense to me. From a behavioral standpoint, right, for certain things, but what about, Does the same apply to your thoughts? Like to to thinking? Does it does the same? revolve around traumatic responses to, you know, all these things? Does the same apply?

Lara Taylor 6:23
I mean, I feel like it does. I mean, we’re talking behaviorally, but thoughts and thoughts and traumatic responses and all those like anxiety pathways, that’s all going through your brain too. So.

Josué Cardona 6:38
So but so. But what why do we so we develop the new habit?

Lara Taylor 6:47
And it takes time

Josué Cardona 6:49
why doesn’t it stick around? Why does it go away?

Lara Taylor 6:50
it doesn’t stick around because you have to keep doing it to get it to stick around. But then that means you have to keep doing it, even though you want to do the old ones

Josué Cardona 6:58
What if you don’t want to do the old one? That’s the problem. You don’t want to do the old one, you want to do the new one? Why don’t we Why don’t we go back to the old?

Lara Taylor 7:03
See, I want to do the old one.

Link Keller 7:09
It comes down to it’s like neurological resources, right? It costs more energy to do the new thing. Not necessarily because it is more difficult, but because it is new, your brain needs to pay more attention to it.

Lara Taylor 7:25
Right

Link Keller 7:26
I think a great example would be like when you are driving a route to work or school or whatever. And you’re driving the same route all the time, like there comes a point where your brain is not engaging in the drive above the very baseline bottom level, and you just appear in the parking lot where you’re going, you’re like, wow, I don’t remember actually ...

#353: The crew discusses how we got into certain interests and fandoms, who we have passed them on to, and the unique feeling of pride watching someone go farther and deeper into the hobbies and media we love.

Marc Cuiriz 0:11
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network. Here at Geek Therapy. We believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. I am one of your lovely co hosts, Marc Cuiriz and joined with me today is Josué Cardona.

Josué Cardona 0:29
Hello,

Marc Cuiriz 0:31
Lara Taylor.

Lara Taylor 0:32
Hey.

Marc Cuiriz 0:35
And the wonderful link Keller

Link Keller 0:38
ello.

Marc Cuiriz 0:41
So Oh, sway, I believe it is. Your turn this week, you so graciously volunteered

Josué Cardona 0:48
my turn.

Marc Cuiriz 0:48
So please tell us.

Josué Cardona 0:49
Yeah. So So I’ve been thinking about how there’s a story. I had a client once who, you know, with my clients, I would always start asking them, Hey, what are you into? What are your favorite hobbies? What do you what do you like to do? It was part of my intake process. And there was one client. I always remember, he was like, middle school aged. And I asked him, you know, what he enjoyed, what he enjoyed doing what is his favorite thing? And he said, shooting guns. And that kind of, you know, like, put up some red flags for me. But don’t yuck my Yum, you know, being being open, you know, GT model. I was like, oh, cool, like so. So what is it about that, that you like, and so he started telling me, and I find out that he, he loves going to shoot because that’s the only or that’s the primary activity he does with his father, who he rarely gets to see because his parents are divorced. And whatever his father comes to get him they just, like, go out to to a range somewhere and, and fire some guns. And so ever since that, I always, I’ve always thought about how, how important it is, when, like, the meaning behind the why or how we got started into some of our hobbies. My mom passed away recently, and so I I didn’t, I don’t, I don’t like procedurals, like, sure I’ll sit down and watch an episode of Law and Order anytime. No problem. But like with someone else, not not not just me when it come from, for me, but my mom love procedurals. And when she died, there was a particular one that she she just loved so much. He was really into it. And so I still, like, I still I’ll watch an episode, like I have them running. And it’s like my way of kind of like continuing what my mom like to do. But I can’t deny that like, I like it. Like I liked the show. And and I’m I’m pretty invested. And and so watching those shows now has an incredible amount of meaning that goes beyond just enjoying the show. And and like I have, you know, I play video games because of my parents. I like sci fi because of my parents. And sometimes I forget that. But but it was something that was that was passed on. And I don’t know if there’s just that that mean,

Link Keller 1:23
and anime via Astroboy which doesn’t count anime, but it does.

Josué Cardona 3:31
It’s the first anime so it does count. But my dad didn’t know it was anime. So does it count?

Lara Taylor 3:38
They cancel each other out.

Josué Cardona 3:41
Yeah, he’s like, Oh, watch this show. I like like those Japanese cartoons. You like that?

Link Keller 3:47
You gave this to me. You did this. I learned it from watching you.

Josué Cardona 3:53
Well, And this is something I want to get to later on. But like, Yeah, my dad grew up watching Astroboy and then he’s like, Oh, what’s this Japanese cartoons stuff. I’m like, Are you serious? Same with video games. Like at some point, they kind of just fell off. I used to go to the arcade with my dad every weekend. And suddenly, like oh 3d games were too much for him. And my mom didn’t want to play Tetris and Mario anymore. Now that they’re older, they play games on their phones, and it’s the whole thing. But i i There’s something weird about like, almost feel like you’re abandoned. Because you still like this, this particular this particular thing and they they don’t or they don’t as much like with my with my niece who I saw recently she she I got her into Star Wars. Like she really didn’t know what it was I got her into it. And now she has a past me in every single way like in terms of knowledge and just like she will just I don’t know how many times she has rewatched Clone Wars. And like the first time she saw Clone Wars I showed her my spreadsheet with the show in actual chronological order, and not the, not the order in which it was broadcast. And I still haven’t finished watching the show, and she’s watched it like four times. And there’s something, there’s something really, it’s like a weird sense of pride. And, and passing something down with, it’s not really a skill. It’s not, I don’t know, but I and I wonder what it will be like, like, what it means to her to be so into that, like, not just love it, but that it was something that that started with us together. Right, so I found that, you know, with, with a lot of our hobbies, it can go beyond just, I think it’s cool. Right? I think I think that’s a good way to start it. But we love these have connections to to our childhood or to our past or to and Lara, you’ve brought up, you know, your friend who passed away and kind of like, you know, the connection to some of those things. So do you all have examples of like that, you know, where your hobby like this, this passion for this thing started? And how it was connected to something or who or when? your stories?

Marc Cuiriz 6:19
Yeah. So, I mean, I’m kind of was the same way too, when it comes to when it comes to video games. My dad was one, the one that he’s the one who condemned me to this with the original Nintendo system and playing, you know, the original Super Mario Brothers and Duck Hunt, things like that. And then it evolved into Pac Man. So whenever we would go to an arcade, that was the game that my dad and I would take turns playing almost exclusively, we would always be at the Pac Man Machine playing that. And so that became our thing. And then obviously, over time, it, you know, I moved on to sort of the newer games, and then he sort of falling off of it. And then, you know, with the eventual conflicts that my dad and I eventually ran into, obviously, he doesn’t play video games much anymore, except for, you know, stuff on his phone. But I think one of the big things that I still have a pretty huge passion about that he and I still can kind of do together as bowling. That was something that my dad and I and my and my brother, we would do that almost every weekend. And in the town that we were living in, there used to be at a local bowling alley that we would always go to. And I loved that place. That’s also where the Pac Man Machine was. So that was also like a double whammy. But we would pull all the time, we would bowl for hours on end. And even now like, like it’s one of those things where if I could I, I would bowl every weekend. I love it. I know I’m not the best at it. But I still greatly enjoy just being at an alley and playing for a couple hours or just hanging out with people. And my dad and I don’t necessarily do that so much anymore. But when we do it’s, it’s kind of like a nice little, you know, a nice little nostalgia trip for the both of us. And it’s kind of funny, because when I was younger, I used to see how he would bowl. And I always thought it was really weird because he would like throw the ball up and it but it would have the spin o...