What's the value?

Understanding where you came from, how you became the person you are, and why you value the things you value--those are all reasons my guest Patrica would say it is important to understand your family history. The concept of history is so fickle in a world that changes so rapidly. Perspectives disappear and it is usually a subjective decision on what stories are told. That is the exact reason Patricia values preserving and telling her family's story so much (as she is doing through her work and podcast- Charity's Children).

Her story is particularly interesting because it is told through the lens of a matriarchy. It is a story centered around the women in of one of the oldest African American families in Dayton, Ohio. Hearing about the courage, conviction, and character of these black women dating back to the 1800's is really powerful. But when you get to hear it through Patricia's poetic and thoughtful narrative, it becomes something even more special.

We covered a good bit in this one, starting with the importance of preserving history, what it does for the individual, and what it does for society. We discussed what made Patricia's ancestors, starting with her 4th great grandmother Charity, so unique for their time. We also dove into the philosophical aspect her story and if we should focus more on the anger, frustration and disappointment of what her family had to go through (as black people living in America) or the beauty, courage, and inspiration that resulted from them going through it.

Patricia doesn't have grandkids yet but we explored how she intends to pass down the story to them as well. What are the things she would want the story to say about her? How can she teach children the importance of knowing their history (something it took her a long time to realize herself)? Through all of the discussion, I couldn't help but notice the overlap between Patricia's value and what I am trying to do with this podcast. It comes back to the same concepts of trying to be curious, to understand why you are who you are, and to remain humble by appreciating all the people who paved the way in front of you.

Rich wants to make the world a better place for his family and for society at large. He was a philosophy major, has a masters in psychology, spent years as a futures broker/floor trader, and now has developed a program to help business leaders increase their personal effectiveness. He believes his experiences, including his time as a child when he was constantly seeking ways to make his depressive mother feel better, have given him insight into the human psyche. Rich created his "Mind Muscles" model (https://conversations.money/) to teach his clients mental models they can use to catch themselves when their mind breaks bad (e.g., biases, irrational insecurities, ego issues, etc.).

The concept that came through most in this discussion is "chipping away." From the prior paragraph you might assume Rich is another quick-fix self improvement guy; coming up with some gimmicky model or program to help you be successful, happy, and fulfilled. But that is not what I got from this discussion. Rich has a deep appreciation for how hard it is to deal with our inherent mental flaws. He makes no promises of a quick fix. But he does believe with consistent work and effort you can find better, healthier ways to deal with your mental baggage.

I'm on board with all of that, so we spent a good bit of the discussion exploring if it is actually doable. Given how hard it is to challenge our own ego and address our own mental flaws, do we really think we can pull it off? And even if we can, what does it say about humanity that we have to work so hard to be the best version of ourselves? This all led us to some interesting discussions about the value of money in our society, religion, liberalism, and the right approach to raising a well adjusted child. We took that "chipping away" approach to these questions, not claiming to have any definitive answers, but trying to do the work to understand them a little bit better and improve the quality of our lives and the lives of those around us.

As always, for those interested in getting more philosophy in their lives or just want to support the cause, please check out my Patreon page- patreon.com/whatsthevalue

In this episode I go solo to "play with philosophy." As you will hear me to talk about, I think playing in philosophy is super important. We have to be willing to explore some of these big, messy topics with a mindset of play. We need to be open, free flowing, curious, and willing to look at things from all different angles. That freedom and openness allows us to explore these topics in a way that helps lead to more learning and insights.

So for this session I played with the question: does any of it really matter if we can't enjoy life? By that I meant, does anything else in life matter more than our own enjoyment of life? Can we ever care about other people, their needs, their suffering, if we don't find any net positive enjoyment in life? Can we truly believe (and furthermore should we truly believe) that there is something bigger and more important than our own happiness?

When you play, it is messy and unpolished. You follow the logical thread where ever it takes you; so that is what you will hear in this episode. I hope it makes you think.

Byron came to the show saying one of the most provocative and intriguing things someone can say to me. He said he knew the real answer to one life's important questions. More specifically, he said he could tell me "the real reason negative emotions exist." I geek out on those type of statements, because firstly, negative emotions often suck. Fear, anger, sadness, shame, guilt--they do not feel nice, so having a true understanding of them seems pretty useful. Secondly, I don't believe anyone has the "real answer" about anything, so this made my Socrates spidey sense tingle.

Fortunately, Byron (who is a mindset coach and psychotherapist- https://www.byronathene.com/) is a pretty reasonable person. He quickly hedged to say it is possible he is wrong, but based on his analysis, he believes he has the answer. Good enough for me, so we dove in and started exploring his theory. 

To cut to the chase, Byron believes we developed negative emotions as babies because we had no other way to communicate that we had a need (e.g., food, medicine, warmth, etc.). From an evolutionary perspective, we needed these emotions to express our needs, get them met, and continue living. The problem, and the major philosophical insight, that Byron tries to work with his clients on, is that we were never able to turn off this programming. Now as adults, we still implicitly believe that negative emotions will help us get things, but now we use them to try to get things we want/desire vs. things we need.

I am not sure if Byron has THE answer on negative emotions, but we did spend a lot of time examining some competing theories to check. This episode took the pressure testing concept to a whole new level. We talked about negative emotions being functional for motivation and/or being necessary for us to experience positive emotions; and all of this led to some really thought provoking philosophical discussions. What role does suffering play in our lives? Would we better off if we never felt negative emotions, no matter how bad the tragedy? All super interesting things to consider, so a huge thanks to Byron for sharing his views. 

As always, for those interested in getting more philosophy in their lives or just want to support the cause, please check out my Patreon page- patreon.com/whatsthevalue

Roifield is originally from the UK but spends much of his time traveling, most notably in the west coast of the US. He originally did this because of his fascination with American history and its politics and the contrast with his English and Jamaican heritage. Roifield still remembers the first time he saw a globe when he was a young child and being completely mesmerized with all of the countries, the weird shapes of their borders, and imagining what it might be like to travel to all of them.

That is where his value of "family and close bonds" comes in, because he believes the strong foundation he got from his parents allowed him to be fearless and intrepid in his desire to see the world. It was also interesting to hear that Roifield is an only child and that also played into his fascination with observing and understanding the world around him. Sometimes he would even create his own magical worlds, trying to imagine what the vast world around him might be like.

It was really cool to see someone who had all of these dreams as a child actually get to live them out as an adult. It also made for some really interesting discussion about the role of luck in all of it. Roifield was very clear about how lucky he was so to be born into the family he had, at the time and place he lived, and with the opportunities he was presented. This naturally turned into a discussion about free will, the randomness of the universe, and the importance of functionality vs. truth. 

Roifield doesn't want to question everything, because he'd rather let the magical aspects of life stay magical (rather than trying to pick it all apart). But at the same time he does have that natural pull to observe and understand, which made his perspective really interesting. He blends an appreciation for the randomness and fortune in his life, with a keen interest in making sense of the world around him, while at the same time knowing when to stop searching and just enjoying it all. I have to say, if possible to strike that balance, that sounds like a pretty good recipe to live by. 

If you like the show and think philosophy is something we all need more of in our lives, then go check out my Patreon page- patreon.com/whatsthevalue. It has options for whatever level of love you have for philosophy, from just being cool with it, all the way to wanting to to be like a modern day Socrates. 

Lauren is a NYC based entertainment journalist and host, who knew she wanted to write about gossip and entertainment for much of her life. She loves to investigate and write about Hollywood crime and has been featured on Fox News, Sky News Arabia, Elle, Page Six, and many other places. As she stated with her value, she has a deep passion for sharing people's stories and has committed herself to this world.

I found this conversation really interesting because in many ways the world of deep philosophical thinking seems to be very different than the world of entertainment news and gossip. I was very conscious of that during the discussion and wanted to be really careful not to come off judgmental or critical, while at the same time trying to explore Lauren's values/work to understand it better. It's funny because if you think about it, I am also trying to hear people's stories and share them with the with the world, we just have different approaches to it. 

It was cool to hear how she got into this career, the challenges she faces, and the dreams she has. We talked about some of the negative connotations that can be attached to gossip and entertainment, which Lauren acknowledged can be very real. As she said at one point, it is a weird phenomena to get a huge dopamine hit when your post on Tik Tok gets over a million views but at the same time knowing how bad it is for you. We talked about that tension of needing the external validation while also trying to maintain a healthy ego and perspective. 

Maybe the most interesting part of the discussion was about the role bullying plays in her profession. Lauren talked about the degree of bullying she experiences for the views she shares (as you'll hear she also holds some strong political/social views as well). So we talked about the level of trust you have to have in your own judgement to report stories that can have such a negative impact on people's lives. Also the circular nature of bullying, where people may feel like she is bullying or mistreating them, so they return by bullying and mistreating her. As I said it can feel far removed from philosophy, but I actually think there is a ton to learn about human nature in the work Lauren does. A big thanks for her being on and sharing her story.

This episode was a really interesting conversation for a couple of reasons. Firstly and most notably, this was the first episode where I had two guests on at the same time (apologies, at times it caused some minor bandwidth issues you might notice). Jon, my original guest, asked Tyler to join as they are both very committed to the same value and movement to help bring equality to all classes of people. 

Jon grew up in the 1950's and was instantly attracted to student activism around topics like racism, the Vietnam war, and unions/workers' rights. Among the many things he was involved in, he spent a lot of time trying to jump start a revolution on the shop floor of the American Motors auto company in Wisconsin. His book, Fighting Times: Organizing on the Front Lines of the Class War (available for a 40% discount on www.jonathanmelrod.com w/ code FIGHTING) describes his journey, including his battle with severe pancreatic cancer (which he believes came from his work in the factory).

Tyler, is in many ways the next generation of activists, following Jon, to try to drive the same movement. Tyler is a lawyer by training but has dedicated his time and skills to trying to create a strong labor union at the Starbucks he works at in the Boston area. Tyler has been inspired by people like Jon and has decided to focus his efforts on creating an egalitarian society. 

The other reason this episode was interesting is because Jon and Tyler are both so committed to their values and the movement, yet they were both completely open to exploring and pressure testing some of their beliefs and underlying assumptions. We explored a lot of the philosophical concepts that underpin their views like, is an egalitarian society even possible, are humans inherently selfish, how much ego is involved in their work, and is it possible there is no "right or wrong" way to live so their issues aren't really valid?

A huge thanks to Jon and Tyler both for sharing their perspectives and providing some insight into what it looks like to be an ardent supporter of the working class movement.

I have been talking a lot lately about the way I want to expand the concept of this podcast to work with leaders and those in positions of power. At the root of it is trying to help leaders better understand and control their own ego. That is a trendy phrase these days, so I wanted to really dig into what I mean when I say it, why it seems so impossible to do, and even spend some trying to see if I even have control over my own ego. 

I had the fortune of sitting next to Danelle for most of my first year of business school. It was an interesting time, because I remember being a bit overwhelmed by the experience of business school and trying to figure out who I was and what my place was at the school. I didn't know Danelle that well yet, but I did notice the contrast in how confident and comfortable she seemed to be. Not at all in arrogant way, but there is just that sense you get from someone who is truly at peace with who they are. It came through in how she interacted with others, how she shared her thoughts/insights with the class, and in how she moved through the world in general.

It is awesome to get to connect with old friends like this and have a deep, meaningful conversation to dig deeper into what really makes them who they are. She started with "growth" as her most important value, stating that it is how she judges herself in all aspects of life. Is she growing and improving as a professional/leader, as a mom, as a daughter, as a person, etc.? What is really fascinating is how she pairs this drive to improve and grow with that supreme comfort in who she is already. The phrase she used was that she wants to continue to grow and learn so "I might become the woman I am to be." 

There is something about that phrase I found so beautiful, profound, and symmetrical. It articulates the balance (and at times struggle) so many of us feel to continue to evolve as a person, but also recognizing you are enough exactly as you are. For Danelle much of this is rooted in her faith and relationship with God. The love she feels from God allows her to have that confidence in who she is right now and the desire to grow into who God intends for her to be. 

We talked about a lot in this one, including her growth as a mother and wife, the challenge of being a high achiever who is forced to accept every day that she will never be perfect, and her work in healthcare trying to bring equity to all communities. I'll end with another line that I think encompasses Danelle really well, she said "I think our job is to improve the world within the scope we can touch, aspiring to have a major impact but remaining humble enough to remember we are just a small part of the world."

There was so much of what Bill said that resonated with me. His value was "always coming from a place of loving energy", which can sound abstract but I think is really profound. The idea is that we can't really control anything in our lives and so much of what we experience can be beyond our understanding, but you don't have to worry about all of that. The only thing you have to worry about is the energy you bring to each moment and interaction. Is it rooted in love or in fear? If it's rooted in love then life gets really freeing, exciting, and simple. 

Bill has experienced and lived this for himself. Thirty years ago he literally walked away from everything in his life and decided to start fresh, working on his own personal transformation. Through that work he discovered the importance (and the science) behind the energy of the universe. His view is that since the universe is made up of energy and vibrations, if you choose to focus on the loving energy and vibrations the universe will reward you. He brings this philosophy to his work as a business coach for CEOs and executives, helping them improve themselves and their businesses (https://www.truelifepurposenow.com/).

There was so much in this discussion to explore and try to better understand, like the details behind this loving energy, how it works in horrific situations (abuse, poverty, disease), and how fear impacts our loving energy. What I found most interesting, was the different perspectives Bill and I had on all of this. He's much more pragmatic, where he's not worried how all of this works, where the energy originated from, or the edge cases; he just focuses on the results. I come from the perspective where I need to understand the underlying mechanics and need to pressure test all of the concepts, otherwise it is feels like I'm taking a leap of faith. 

I'm not sure we will ever be able to fully prove or understand exactly how our energy impacts our lives, but I do think there is a lot of power in trying to understand if our actions are rooted in fear or love. For that, I thank Bill and ton for being on and sharing his perspective on life.