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One of the deepest things that motivates me is high level, big picture understanding. And at this point, I've spent so much time studying various kinds of models of how life works, how mankind works, how society works, how consciousness works in all of this, that I have a lot of different maps and models. And I've shared many of those with you like spiral dynamics, for example. But sometimes it just gets a little bit too complicated. And you kind of get lost in the, in the weeds in the minutiae of it in all the details. And sometimes what we need is we can kind of zoom out, and just have a nutshell encapsulation of what we're trying to understand. And in this case, I was really trying to crack this nut of what is mankind about as a whole? What's really going on with mankind? How do we explain what mankind is doing, what society is doing what most of human life is about. And so I sat down one day, on my living room floor, just thinking about this. And then suddenly, it just popped into my mind as if out of nowhere, a little epiphany. And it was very profound and very illuminating, and very explanatory. And what struck me about this insight was that it was so simple, just like so simple, but its explanatory power is enormous. And so I want to share that insight with you here. But before I do, let me just issue a little disclaimer here. I'm gonna use the vulgar language. And I might go into a bit of a rant. And don't get distracted by this. Because what's being said here is not just a rant, it's not just me venting, and being vulgar. Something very profound and powerful is being said here, and actually, you're gonna have to listen to it several times to fully understand the profundity of this very simple insight. And the simple insight is that mankind is basically full of shit. That's what's really going on everywhere. And this pretty much explains everything. But we need to elaborate. We need to expand upon this, because it's too simple for you to be able to use it. So what I mean is, religion is full of shit. Churches are full of shit. Holy Books are full of shit. Christians are full of shit. Muslims are full of shit. Jews are full of shit. Hindus are full of shit. Buddhists are full of shit. Mormons are full of shit. People who pray are full of shit. Preachers and priests are full of shit. theologians are full of shit. moralists are full of shit. creationists are full of shit. Darwinists are full of shit. Academics are full of shit. PhDs are full of shit. Scientists are full of shit. Professors are full of shit. public intellectuals are full of shit. rationalists are full of shit. Skeptics are full of shit. debunkers are full of shit. Atheists are full of shit. materialists are full of shit. Reductionists are full of shit. Positive is so full of shit. agnostics are full of shit. nihilists are full of shit. Cynics are full of shit. misanthropes are full of shit. Reason is full of shit. Logic is full of shit. Evidence is full of shit. Debates are full of shit. Proofs are full of shit. Statistics are full of shit. Researchers are full of shit. Physicists are full of shit. Teachers are full of shit. Historians are full of shit. philosophers are full of shit. Psychologists are full of shit. psychiatrists and therapists are full of shit. Mathematicians are full of shit. logicians are full of shit. Scientific theories are full of shit. Research studies are full of shit. Neuroscience is full of shit. Economists are full of shit. Textbooks are full of shit. Schools are full of shit. Universities are full of shit. The Ivy League is full of shit. IQ tests and SATs tests and other assessments are full of shit. Books are full of shit. Conspiracy theorists are full of shit. Flat Earthers are full of shit. cults are full of shit. Government is full of shit. dictators are full of shit. Presidents are full of shit. bureaucrats are full of shit. Politicians are full of shit. Political parties are full of shit. extremists are full of shit. Moderates are full of shit. The establishment is full of shit. The military is full of shit. Law enforcement is full of shit. intelligence agencies are full of shit. socialists are full of shit. Patriots are full of shit. nationalists are full of shit. Anarchists are full of shit. Libertarians are full of shit. Conservatives are full of shit. Liberals are full of shit. capitalists are full of shit. Communists are full of shit. Free Speech defenders are full of shit. revolutionaries are full of shit. Terrorists are full of shit. Anti terrorists are full of shit. Pundits are full of shit. Think tanks are full of shit. Lobbyists groups are full of shit. Journalists are full of shit. News anchors are full of shit. talk show hosts are full of shit. The legal system is full of shit. courtrooms are full of shit. Judges are full of shit. Lawyers are full of shit. Plaintiffs are full of shit. defendants are full of shit. The constitution is full of shit. The war on drugs is full of shit. Corporations are full of shit. Business people are full of shit. executives and CEOs are full of shit. Entrepreneurs are full of shit. Venture capitalists are full of shit. millionaires are full of shit. billionaires are full of shit. The entire economy is filled with shit. Sales and marketing and advertising is full of shit. Salespeople are full of shit. HR people are full of shit. receptionists are full of shit. phone operators are full of shit. billboards are full of shit. Commercials are filled full of shit. Contracts are full of shit. Pricing is full of shit. credit card offers are full of shit. stockbrokers are full of shit. Wall Street is full of shit. Bankers are full of shit. Landlords are full of shit. philanthropists are full of shit. Email is full of shit. Coupons are full of shit. Newsletters are full of shit. Press releases are full of shit. Terms of Service are full of shit. disclaimers are full of shit. Doctors are full of shit. Hospitals are full of shit. Insurance companies are full of shit. Media is full of shit. TV is full of shit. Radio is full of shit. Entertainment is full of shit. Celebrities are full of shit. Actors are full of shit. Musicians are full of shit. Rock stars are full of shit. Comedians are full of shit. The internet is full of shit. Twitter is full of shit. Facebook is full of shit. Instagram is full of shit. YouTube is full of shit. YouTube comments are full of shit. online forums are full of shit. Bloggers are full of shit. Amazon reviews are full of shit. Magazines are full of shit. Pop culture is full of shit. Fashion is full of shit. Sports teams are full of shit. Sports fans are full of shit. Athletes are full of shit weightlifters are full of shit. Language is full of shit. Small talk is full of shit. public speakers are full of shit. TED talks are full of shit. Leaders are full of shit. Followers are full of shit. Bosses are full of shit. Employees are full of shit. Restaurants are full of shit. Food is full of shit. Water is full of shit. Food packaging is full of shit. Young people are full of shit. Old people are full of shit. Modern people are full of shit. Ancient people are full of shit. first world countries are full of shit. Third World countries are full of shit. Men are full of shit. Women are full of shit. Dating is full of shit. pickup is full of shit. Relationships are full of shit. Marriage is full of shit. monogamous people are full of shit. polyamorous people are full of shit. polygamous people are full of shit. Family is full of shit. Friendships are full of shit. social gatherings are full of shit. Parties are full of shit. nightclubs are full of shit. Weddings are full of shit. Funerals are full of shit. Family and high school reunions are full of shit. graduation ceremonies are full of shit. ceremonies of all kinds, and any kinds are full of shit. National Anthems are full of shit. Holidays are full of shit. Support groups are full of shit. fraternities are full of shit. sororities are full of shit. country clubs are especially full of shit. And golfers are full of shit. Awards, trophies and medals are full of shit. Tradition and customs are full of shit. Charities are full of shit. Nonprofit organizations are full of shit. Apologies are full of shit. Conversations are full of shit. The poor is full of shit. The rich is full of shit. The middle class is full of shit. Successful people are full of shit. losers are full of shit. Mothers are full of shit. Fathers are full of shit. Sisters and brothers are full of shit. Children are full of shit. Teenagers are full of shit. Adults are full of shit. aunts and uncles are full of shit. Grandparents are full of shit. Seniors are full of shit. City People are full of shit. country people are full of shit. White people are full of shit. Black people are full of shit. Brown people are full of shit. Asian people are full of shit. Bad people are full of shit. Good people are full of shit. Criminals are full of shit. law abiding people are full of shit. People who say they love you are full of shit. Critics are full of shit. Victims are full of shit. Judgmental people are full of shit. angry people are full of shit. violent people are full of shit. Depressed people are full of shit. suicidal people are full of shit. Fearful people are full of shit. Arrogant people are full of shit. Outraged and offended. People are full of shit. Introverts are full of shit. Extroverts are full of shit. Honest people are full of shit. optimists are full of shit. pessimists are full of shit. New Age people are full of shit. Communes are full of shit. meditators are full of shit. Yogi's are full of shit. gurus are full of shit. Neo Advaita is full of shit. life coaches are full of shit. The entire self help industry is full of shit. Artists are full of shit. hippies are full of shit. People who dress their dogs are especially full of shit. Straight people are full of shit. Gay people are full of shit. Trans people are full of shit. Thoughts are full of shit, emotions are full of shit. Every identity, every culture, and every subculture is full of shit. And every institution that has ever existed is full of shit. And all of human history is full of shit. And you are full of shit. And of course, I am full of shit. And of course, anyone who insists that they are not full of shit is especially full of shit. Now, that's some insight. That's a profound insight is to see this to understand this. And to understand how this game of bullshit is played. This is a very sophisticated game. We're saying something very precise here. We're not just bad mouthing people in general. We're saying something very precise. And the trouble with this game is the way that it's played is like this. Everyone sees the bullshit of everyone else except the bullshit that they themselves spin. And then they make exceptions and excuses for their own bullshit. And it goes something like this. Leo. Okay. I agree with you. You said a lot of stuff that I agree with. I agree with some of the things you said about religion, or some of the things you said about business people, or about the insurance industry or about stockbrokers. But Leo this thing here, my thing, the thing that I like that thing that's not full of shit. And what I want to tell you is that thing right there is especially full of shit. You see, this is how the bullshit game is played. Everyone denies their own bullshit. In the same way that it's hard to smell your own farts. And then we all act surprised when we look around the world and we see all this chaos, and all this bullshit floating around out there. Well, why do you think it's there? Where do you think it came from? It came from people just like you denying that they're full of shit. This is not just a mindless rant. This is a deep explanation of all of human existence. All of society, all of culture, all of business, all of religion, all of spirituality, all of science, all of language. Everything. Everything that Mannheim mankind has created is filled with bullshit. Have you noticed this? I mean, like, you got to notice that you got to see it. And it's easy to see it in certain circumstances. Like, you probably know that Wall Street's full of shit. You probably know the doctors are full of shit. And the lawyers are full of shit and this sort of stuff. But But do you see like the ubiquity of this, do you see the larger dynamic? So this should make you start to think of like, well, why would this be the case? Why would there be so much bullshit? And why would it be so omnipresent? And that's because mankind is the bullshitting animal. That's our forte. That's what we're the best at out of all the species were the ones who figured out how to bullshit each other. And upon this, all of human society is built. The human mind itself is a bullshit machine. And that's because the ego is full of shit fundamentally, existentially. And anything that the ego comes into contact with gets corrupted and turned into bullshit. And if you notice, corruption is not just something that happens within politics. Corruption is omnipresent. There is not a single domain of human endeavor, which is not tainted with corruption and bullshit. And that's fundamentally what corruption is, is its egos bullshit in whatever domain. And in fact, the more important the domain, the greater the amount of bullshit you will find in that domain. This is like a general principle of how humans operate. Now, why would that be the case? Well, maybe there's a correlation and deep connection between importance and bullshit. And in fact, there is, because what does importance mean? Really, importance isn't some absolute standard. A thing or a domain is important, only to the extent that it serves your survival. That's really what the word importance means. That means it's important to your living. If it doesn't affect your life, it ain't important, by definition. See, and of course, that means that importance is a relative notion. Because what's important to you might not be what's important to me, because what helps me live my life might actually hurt you living yours, and vice versa. So, the reason we bullshit so much is because fundamentally, what we're all concerned about is our own survival. And we will bullshit our way through any situation, which is fundamental and integral to our survival, the more impact it has on my survival, the more likely I am to bullshit about it. Precisely because if I don't, I have too much to lose. See, this is the egos game, this is all that the ego cares about is survival. Survival in all the different ways that survival happens, that doesn't just mean having a shelter, and having food and water, it means everything. It means sex, it means reproduction. It means status. It means celebrity, it means fame. It means money. It means all of that all of that is just a function of your survival. That's why you pursue any of that stuff. That's why that stuff has any importance to you if it does. Every human institution is a house of cards glued together with bullshit. And if you were to stop bullshitting, this house of cards would collapse. And that would tangibly affect your survival. Now, it's important you don't misunderstand what I'm saying here. Very easy to misinterpret what I'm saying here. I am not saying that you should be cynical and nihilistic and disillusioned with life. It might sound that way. Because you hear this and you say, Oh, well, Leo. So yeah, so I mean, I guess you're right, I guess everyone is full of shit. And so what am I going to do about it? I guess I'm I got nothing to do, but just to be sitting around and being depressed about it for the rest of my life. No, that's not what's being said here. All we're saying here is we're just making an accurate assessment of mankind's condition. We're not trying to judge it. We're not trying to say if it's good or bad, we're just making an accurate observational statement. Mankind is full of shit. And if you disagree with me, or even if you want to tend to agree with me, and just to believe me, because this sounds appealing to you. Actually, what I would encourage you is I would encourage you to actually empirically validate this, in your own experience. Don't just believe what I'm saying. Go out there and check. Check if what I'm saying is true. Is it true that courtrooms are full of shit? Go look, is it true that celebrities are full of shit? Go look, is it true that scientists are foolish? Go look, go investigate. You see, this is this is an empirical inquiry. This is not just a rant. This is not just some philosophy that I came up with because it sounded interesting to me. This is something that comes from carefully observing how people and how institutions work. And it's an important to see how and why this idea that mankind is full of shit, how its true in in all of its details and all the different domains where it applies. Because we don't want to just paint stuff with a broad brush, we need to really sit down and double check. And that's what I did when I came up with this list as I sat down and I double checked and asked myself, is it true that advertising is full of shit? Yes, okay, then it belongs on this list. Is it true that doctors are full of shit? Absolutely, than it belongs on this list. And so that's something I encourage you to do with this list. Listen to it again. And really think about what's being said here, don't just nod your head and agree, as if something minor was being something very major as being said, here. Right. So appreciate what's being said. Also, don't make the mistake of thinking that what I'm saying is that everyone is equally full of shit. I did not say that. There is a whole spectrum, many degrees of bullshitty that mankind is capable of some folks are relatively decent on this scale. And some folks are really terrible. So again, it would be a big mistake to say that well, Leo fine, everyone is just full of shit. The problem is that when you say everyone is just full of equally full of shit, then you can't really do anything with that insight. See, it's too crude. It's too simplistic to black and white. What you need to do is you need to become a good student of appraising bullshit in others, and of course in yourself. We'll get to that in a minute. But a good steward of appraising bullshit and various degrees of bullshit, because very rarely will you find a person who is completely free of bullshit. But you still have to operate in this environment. It does no good to just be depressed and sit at home and whine and complain how everyone is full of shit that does you no good. What you need to do is you need to develop a very discriminating sort of radar for, for bullshit. And this will serve you very well in life, if you're able to do this. And that means recognizing that not everyone is equally foolish. Some people are a lot more foolish than others. Also, don't make this mistake. Don't think that everything I've said somehow means that you cannot attain truth, goodness, or that development is hopeless. And that the pursuit of truth and goodness is hopeless. Not at all. In fact, to pursue truth, goodness and development. You have to start here, you have to start by honestly appraising the situation that you find yourself in, and that mankind finds itself in. And so that's what we're doing. The number one skill that you need to be successful in human society is the ability to create, tolerate and deny bullshit. The people most full of shit, don't know that they're full of shit. And this is something that I call aggressive ignorance. It's not just that people are ignorant. They're aggressively ignorant. They double down on their ignorance. They're arrogant about their ignorance. They flaunt their ignorance as if it's the ultimate highest truth. This is a tool of the devil, of course. And the way that the devil preserves falsehood, and selfishness, and ignorance is by being bold about it, the devil is not meek, the devil will just come out there and deliver a bold faced lie to you, as if it were the highest truth without an ounce of regret or guilt or remorse or second thought or doubt. And then the devil will defend that ignorant position with aggression with passion. In fact, the higher the ignorance usually, the more the aggression, the more the passion because it's a compensation mechanism. See, in fact, that's what aggressiveness is about. It's about falsehood, and it's about ignorance. We as a species These are collectively drowning in our own bullshit. Have you noticed this? What does this mean? This means that all of our so called problems, war and genocide and abuse and drug addiction and problems in the education systems problems and the political system problems with government problems with environment, pollution, and all what is all this where Where's all this coming from? This is us, collectively drowning in our own bullshit, all of it is coming from bullshit. Fundamentally, of course, the details can vary as to how this bullshit gets manifested, you know, the bullshit gets manifested in the pharmaceutical industry in one way, in the legal system, and another way, in politics and some other way in relationships, and another way in family life and another way, but you got to look past the individual differences and see the commonalities, right, because we're looking for big, big picture patterns here, about how the human mind works and how, as a result, society works. The quality of your life is going to be inversely proportional to the degree to which you are full of shit. Which means that if you want to improve the quality of your life significantly, then you need to start to take bullshit very seriously. And of course, here, what we're talking about is your own bullshit. And so the more you let go of, the more you uncover and surrender your own bullshit, the higher quality your life will get. That's a very general principle of human psychology, and of happiness. So you might say, this is a law of happiness. And the reason that most people are so unhappy, so sad, so depressed and miserable and frustrated, and all this is because their life is based on a big pile of bullshit. It's not grounded, and I think true. And so they're spinning their wheels in this bullshit, and are not able to get any kind of traction in their life, and they're stuck. And they're drowning in it. And it's smelly. But of course, because everyone has become so good at denying their own bullshit, that they don't even realize that this is their fundamental problem. Because they've become blind to their own bullshit. They can't smell it, they can't see it. They think the problem is out there somewhere in the world. So is there anyone who's not full of shit? Actually, there is your cat, your dog. If you go outside and look at the birds, the ants crawling on the ground, the trees. Look at them. They're not full of shit at all. They go about living their life doing their thing without bullshitting. So really, it's mankind who is the bullshitting animal. And also, when you look at these animals, other animals, and plants and so forth, you start to see that, you know, somehow they're surviving without being full of shit. Maybe I can take some lessons from them. Because at least we know, you know, if my cat can do it, if my dog can do it, then then maybe I can do it to maybe I can work towards it. And that's what I'm telling you. I'm not saying that you're doomed to be always full of shit forever. That would be a very hopeless message. Actually, I'm delivering a positive message here. You're not doomed to be full of shit, so long as you're honest about how much you bullshit. And then you decide to actually work to overcome that, then you can seriously improve your situation. Now, I don't know if you'll ever be entirely free of bullshit, but you can certainly make great progress. And the more you do, the better your life will become. So you might wonder at this point, well, Lee Okay, so, but what do I do with this? It seems very abstract and philosophical. Actually, not at all. Really, what we're saying here is that you need to become a lot more vigilant about your own bullshit. Sit down and investigate just how full of shit you are. And how you point your finger at everyone else except yourself. How you are in denial about your own bullshitting in all the different facets of your life you see you bullshit everywhere you bullshit in your family, you bullshit in your relationships, you bullshit about sex, you bullshit about food, you bullshit about your career. Every year you bullshit about politics and government and gender identity and I mean you bullshit about everything. So there's a lot there to uncover. Don't think that you're just going to sit down and in five minutes, you're going to figure out all the bullshit that you've concocted your whole life. These bullshitting habits are deeply ingrained in you. You see, from a very early age, almost from the point where you were conscious. As a toddler. You started bullshitting. And the reason you did is because it was important to your survival. And those habits, those bullshitting habits have become ingrained now, inside your brain and in your mind. Such that now anytime some situation comes up at work or in your relationship or with your family or whatever, you've just got a knee jerk reaction, bullshit response already queued up. See, so we got to become conscious of those first, then we got to start to unwire them to change them. And that can be tricky, because again, remember, what we said from the beginning is that this affects your survival. That's why you bullshit. So of course, you're not going to want to give up your bullshitting habits. Because certain of those habits, for example, pay your mortgage certain of those habits, get you your girlfriend or your boyfriend and maintain that certain of your habits. maintain all of your friendships, your bullshitting habits, and so forth, right. So for a lot of people whose entire life is built on bullshit, when we start to excavate some of this bullshit and let it go. It's a real problem with letting it go. Because then you say to yourself, well, billy-o, I can't let this go. If I let go of this, my whole life will collapse. Or this giant, important facet of my life looks like like my career will collapse. I won't know how to feed myself and my my children. And that's right, it's a serious problem. I'm not saying this is a light, easy fix. It could take you years, for example, to extricate yourself from the bullshit corner that you've painted yourself in with your career, or with your family or with your wife and your husband or your children or whatever else. See, and you're going to be in denial about it, the more it aids your survival, the more in denial you're going to be. It's not going to seem like bullshit to you. It's going to seem like the truth, it's going to seem good, it's going to seem important can seem like reality, it's going to seem like a fact, it's going to seem like it couldn't be any other way. Like it can't be changed. Like Leo, I can't change this, this part of my life. What are you talking about? That's where the work needs to happen. So, towards that end, I have a little exercise for you several questions, go ahead and write these down. Because you're gonna be working with these over the next week. And beyond that, these are powerful questions that you're going to contemplate and journal about. Using some pen and paper. First question is, how am I full of shit? And if you want you can break that one down. To be more specific about the different categories of your life like how am I full of shit in my spirituality? How am I full of shit when it comes to science? How am I full of shit when it comes to politics? How am I full of shit when it comes to family? How am I full of shit when it comes to sexuality? How am I full of shit when it comes to emotions? How am I full of shit when it comes to health and nutrition and et cetera? Another powerful question is How am I a hypocrite? Hypocrisy is directly linked to bullshitters and make no mistake about it you are a hypocrite. Everyone is a hypocrite in fact anyone who denies that they're a hypocrite is being a hypocrite. Third question for you is how do I make excuses for my bullshit? Because everyone who bullshit makes excuses for their bullshit, so that to them their bullshit doesn't seem like bullshit. Another powerful question is whose bullshit do I complain about to distract from looking at my own bullshit? This is fundamentally why people bitch and moan, complain, Judge criticize and demonize others. This is why the reason is, is because if they weren't busy doing that They would have to contend and become aware of their own bullshit, which is difficult, painful and unpleasant. So instead, what people do is they go find a YouTube channel, that bitches and moans about their favorite enemy, and then they watch that. And that takes up all of their time, so that they never have to self reflect. And the last question for you here is, how am I in denial about my own bullshit. Those are powerful questions, use those for the rest of your life. Don't just do this exercise once. And by the way, you know, the first time you sit down and do this, you might sit down for a whole hour and just come up with list after list page after page after page of bullshit, and all of your excuses. And even when you get done with doing all of that, you still have only scratched the surface. Right? Because the deepest bullshit that you do in your life sits very deep. It happens at a subconscious level, at an automatic habitual level, you don't even know that you do it yet. It might take you five years to realize, Oh my God, that thing Leah was talking about five years ago, oh, it only now clicks three, five years later. That that's what's going on in my relationship here. And that's why my relationship sucks, or that's why I can't attract women, or that's why I keep getting into relationships with abusive men over and over again, is my bullshit. But I didn't know it was bullshit until you know, five years later, after a lot of introspection. So keep, keep applying these questions. These are evergreen questions that will work for the rest of your life in many different domains. So don't think of this as just a one time exercise. There cannot be health, happiness, decency or effective governance, without truthfulness, honesty and authenticity. The majority of human history, culture, business and governance has been the manufacture packaging and distribution of bullshit. And also, very importantly, the denial and suppression of anti bullshit. So what is anti bullshit? Anti bullshit, you might call what we're doing here this episode, we're calling out the bullshit, we're trying to shed light on the bullshit. So that very process, of course, must be denied, rejected, suppressed, and avoided at all costs, in order to maintain the bullshit status quo. See, and that's why you see a lot of people who leave comments under my various kinds of episodes, you know, the more advanced the episode, the more controversial the insight. The more bullshit there is around it. The deeper the Insight is, the closer it is to truth. Therefore, of course, the devil needs to heap more and more bullshit on top of that, to mask the truth. So of course, then people get very defensive about various kinds of things that I say about enlightenment or God or about spirituality or about metaphysics or about consciousness or about intelligence or about emotions or any of this kind of stuff. Right? Because only one of two things is going to happen when you when you listen to someone telling you a deep, profound truth about yourself and about life. You'll either hear it and start to agree with it or start to say, oh, yeah, this is a, this is an important insight. And it rings true. Or you're gonna deny it. And when you deny it, you're gonna have to deny it with aggressive ignorance. See, because why the aggressiveness because you have to convince yourself that the truth that was just spoken to you isn't really the truth. So when you get aggressive about something that I say when you get triggered by get emotional about you leave little comment, nasty snarky comment or something like this. All that is, is that's just you convincing yourself, it's not about me, it's not about convincing me convincing other people. It's always about convincing you. That's what you're always doing. When you think you're convincing other people of your position. What you're really doing is you're actually just convincing yourself The reason you want to convince other people of your position of your truth and your ideology of your religion of your scientific principles of evolution of, of logic of reason of of any of whatever. Is because the more people agree with you, the more people you can persuade to agree with your bullshit, the less you will feel like your bullshit is bullshit, and the more you will feel like it's reality. See, this is fundamentally why all religious people be compassionate for the most part. I mean, not not all religious people but but many religious people become very passionate about proselytizing their religion, preaching it, converting others becoming missionaries. And this is one of the, one of the highest ideals of many religions, whether it's, you know, Christian missionaries, evangelicals, Catholics, Mormons. Even certain Buddhist traditions, the Hari Krishna has various kinds of cults and so forth. One of their highest ideals is to be a missionary and to proselytize the the gospel to somebody else. Why? It's just a defense mechanism, it's just projection. You see, it's a smokescreen against having to admit that what you've got is you've got a big steaming pile of shit. Of course, this is true in politics very obviously, as well. The reason people get so animated about politics and want to convince others want to debate others and win debates, decimate people in debates eviscerate people in debates, so So and So eviscerates this person, such and such a liberal eviscerates that conservative this conservative viscera is that liberal, all this what is all this that you see going on on YouTube and in the media. This is all just people creating some smokescreens for their own bullshit. They're really always just trying to convince themselves. Because you know what, when you've got the real solid truth, you have no need to preach it to anyone. It's a very sort of stable, solid thing that actually makes you detached and dispassionate, in a sense, in a good way. The only solution to this bullshit problem is personal direct experience, independent contemplation, lots of diverse research, looking and exploring, looking at and exploring many diverse perspectives, and personal investigation into all of the most important aspects of reality and of life, if something is important to you, whether it's in your career, or with your family, or about your health, and nutrition, are about sexuality are about metaphysics and philosophy and spirituality and religion, if something is truly important to you, then you owe it to yourself to do a deep personal investigation, to contemplate about this subject as independently as possible, free from the influences of other people, and the various kinds of groupthink and social dynamics. If politics is important to you, then you're going to study history, you're going to study human psychology, and not just buy into some ideology that somebody is spewing in some video. See, because it's only through personal independent investigation, that you will be able to weed through the bullshit. If you are too lazy to do personal investigation, then what you will end up with his bullshit bullshit is the default condition, you'd have to work really hard. And you're gonna have to you have to be very discriminating and careful in your study of life, to be able to come out of this thing. Not, you know, chest deep and bullshit. Because you're so much of it. And it's been fed to you from the very beginning, starting with your family, but then, you know, in school and college and at your job and everywhere else. So what's the point of calling everything bullshit? The point is simply to get you to really understand the importance of personal investigation of independent questioning. You see, most people, they don't really question anything. They just take stuff for granted. They just take the distinctions and categories that their teachers give them for granted, or that their politicians or their political leaders give them or that the news gives them right. You just sort of buy into the narrative, whatever the narrative tends to be the prevailing narrative of your culture, you just buy into it, you don't question it. And in fact, of course, what many of these schools of thought try to teach you is not to question religion teaches you not to question. But of course not just religion, politics, culture, language, and even science and rationality. Really, they don't encourage you to question. There's a false fake front that scientifically minded people and rationally minded people like to put up as though they are the ones who have assumed the positions of the ones who are independent thinkers and who question everything for themselves. This is almost never the case. It's complete bullshit. It's just an additional layer of meta bullshit. The scientifically minded people and rationally minded people, the skeptically minded people are the ones who are the most full of shit, sometimes even more so than the religious people. See, so the reason we're talking about this in such great length and detail with such emphasis, is because I really want you to understand the importance of personal investigation, personal questioning. And that's what actualize that org is fundamentally about. This is not an ideology here. We are laying down principles for self experimentation, and personal investigation of reality. With the expectation that if we personally investigate things, this will be highly worthwhile, because it'll allow us to sort through a lot of bullshit. And really, what other options do you have? When you find yourself in this situation that we're in this House of Cards cemented with shit, then your only option is either to buy into it and just to go along with it? Or to start to question because it's only through questioning that you sort the wheat from the chaff, so to speak. Only through exploring lots and lots and lots of diverse perspectives. Will you be able to successfully navigate this maze, which is why I always emphasize exploring, and integrating many diverse perspectives and not getting stuck in any one. Because that's how bullshit gets made. Alright, that's it for me, I'm out of here. Please remember to click that like button if you liked the video, and come check out actualized. org. That's my website. On there, you will find various kinds of exclusive resources. I've been posting a lot of good material on my blog lately, various kinds of exclusive videos, documentaries and miscellaneous insights that I can't really share the other videos. Come check out the actualized forum, where you can talk with people about this stuff like minded people, check out the life purpose course check out my book list. The book list gives you a lot of great book ideas that you won't find almost anywhere else for starting to sort the wheat from the chaff. And stay with me as we explore more diverse perspectives going forward. I really want to warn you not to get stuck on any one perspective. Sometimes people think that well, but surely, Leo yoga, that must be the ultimate or Zen that must be the ultimate, or spiraled out dynamics, that must be the ultimate, they get a good perspective, you know, some of these perspectives, of course, are much better than others, not all perspectives are equal. And the perspectives that I tend to present tend to be the highest quality ones, but even then, it's still only one perspective. And you want to be careful, because if you're just gonna buy in full bore into Zen, or into yoga, or into spiral dynamics, I'm warning you, you're gonna make mistakes, you're gonna get caught up in bullshit. Because that's what a perspective in a sense is, right? A perspective is coming from some kind of like origin point. That's what what it means to be a perspective is to look at something from one point and not another point, which is fundamentally partial, incomplete. And not absolute. It's relative relative to that point of view. And, of course, it's tainted by ego, because usually, the point of view you're looking at is someone's ego, either an individual Eagle, ego or collective ego, which has a hidden agenda. It has survival needs that he's trying to satisfy. So this perspective is, is built from the very beginning to satisfy the very basic survival needs of this point, that the perspective is coming from. See. So the way that we ensure that we don't And delude ourselves in this work is by continually opening ourselves up to new and diverse perspectives. And the with the idea being that by looking at hundreds of perspectives and cross referencing all of them, we get rid of the blind spots, because every perspective has some value to it. But usually not total value. Usually it's just, it's gonna give you a lopsided view of life. So you want to look from that perspective, but you want it you want to take the good stuff, leave the bad stuff, and then do the same with a bunch of other perspectives. And then what you get it you get a sort of a meta perspective. And this is how we ensure that we don't delude ourselves in this work. People sometimes ask me, like, Leo, how do you know psychedelics are true? How do you know that meditation is true? How do you know your enlightened insights are true? Because I cross referenced literally hundreds of perspectives, hundreds of sources, from other people that that I respect and that are credible. But then also with my own direct experiences, and it's through this massive cross referencing project that then we can develop some semblance of, of truthfulness. And even then, it's not guaranteed that you won't make mistakes, right? You always have to be vigilant against your own bullshit against your own biases against your own self deception mechanisms. But, you know, this is my overarching, like meta strategy for how I run actualize that org and for how I gather all of my insights and knowledge, and how I how I make sure that I don't delude myself, I take this very seriously. Some people, they watch my content, and they see me mouthing off or ranting about this topic or that topic. And I think, Oh, well, Leo is just one of these people who just buys into something just buys into spirituality just buys into enlightened just buys into non duality just buys into secular. No, no, no, no, no, you don't understand what goes on behind the scenes. How much i i doubt everything, double, triple, quadruple down everything cross reference everything, check every angle, you know, come back years later, and just rethink about, am I wrong about this? Am I wrong about that? What could I be missing there? You know, that's what the process looks like behind the scenes, you don't really see it so much happening in the material that I teach. Because here I'm just presenting, you know, insights. In a limited amount of time, there's no real purpose for me to start to doubt myself here on camera. But you better believe that I doubt everything I'm the greatest out of there is, there's nobody who doubts more than me. Believe it or not. And that's how you got to approach life too. Right? You got to be so skeptical that you understand that no one perspective is going to solve this epistemic bind that we're in, including skepticism itself. So you can be skeptical at times. But then over time, you have to say, Wait a minute. I've been skeptical for the last two years, why don't I stop being skeptical for for the next year? And why don't I do the opposite and see where I get and then I'll compare my perspectives. I'll look at how, how much progress I got when I was skeptical how much I got when I wasn't skeptical, right? Because even skepticism is still one perspective. It's one method. It's one lens through which to look at the world. And so is rationality. So a science, which is why you can't take them too seriously. You can't take any one perspective too seriously. But to do this to succeed, and in this endeavor, you have to be extremely flexible, extremely open minded, and very good at dealing with contradictions, apparent paradoxes and simply confusion and not knowing what this means is you're gonna have a bunch of different perspectives, a bunch of different lenses and models and maps and, and, and explanations and they won't all fit together perfectly. But that actually shows you the complexity of this thing that we're exploring called life, called the universe, right? So it's a complicated thing. It's not easy to explain, there's no one simple explanation for everything and what I gave you here, this lens of, of bullshit that I gave you, the lens of looking at everything as though it was bullshit, that's just one lens. Right? So again, don't get attached to it. Don't get hooked on it. Don't now go around for the rest of your life saying that everything is bullshit. It's one perspective. And next time, I'll give you some more perspective, and maybe it'll be the opposite perspective of this. And you got to be able to, to deal with that to reconcile that in your mind. Right, like people sometimes criticize me for giving contradictory advice or giving contradictory information. That's just because what we're covering is recovering a very, very wide territory, from a very big picture level perspective, which very few people actually do attempt to do. Therefore, they can get away with very consistent explanations, you see, it's very easy to come up with a consistent explanation of something, when you're covering a little subdomain that that's this small, not when you're explaining all of reality as a whole in all the different domains of reality how they all interconnect, if you want to explain all that, so you're gonna have very messy explanations. And not only that, but you're gonna have different explanations, entirely different maps. It's for like, you can have one map of the United States, which will be a topographical map, it'll show you various like elevation in the terrain, another map is not going to have that information, it's going to be a map of, let's say, the different water, water levels in the in the earth, that's going to be able to kind of map and then a third kind of map might show you where the power grids are, across the US. And then a fourth map will show you where the like where the trees and forests are. And that will be giving you an additional layer of information, he got all these layers, and you got to be able to like sift through these maps and use different maps for different purposes, right. So if you're going to dig a well, you need the water map. And if you're going to like go hiking through a forest, you need the forest map and so forth. And so that's kind of what we're doing. It's a little bit messy. But that's just the nature of the beast. Don't fall for simplistic explanations. But then again, sometimes we can distill something down to just a little nugget, like mankind is full of shit. And that's powerful. It's so simple, it's powerful, so memorable. You can remember that for the rest of your life. You can use that that can help you in business that can help you in relationships that can help you with your own emotions and understanding your own victim mentality and how that's foolish shit and, and so on. I see But again, just don't get hooked on it and stick around and we'll explore more perspectives to come.