 Though radical, fundamental principles help rebuild rational self-interest and individual rights. This is the Iran Brookshow. All right, everybody, welcome to Iran Brookshow on this Thursday, November 16th, our second show today. And today is an interview, is our interview day, and I'm really happy to have Jean Moroni with me. I think this is our second or third, I can't keep track, interview. So this is, I know this is going to be fun because it has been in the past. And we've already got DWLogic, who's already come in, and E. Jones has already come in. They've both, and another, yeah, third Jean Moroni fan, we've got a lot of Jean Moroni fans on. E. Jones says, I and all three of my kids have been helped by you in your thinking directions work. I know you live by the best premises. Thank you. So yeah, this is great. Hey, Jean. Hey, hey, Yaron, thanks for having me. This is always fun for me to be back to. Yeah, good, good. So today we're going to focus on, I think something that we often get questions on the chat about, and that is, I think the frustration we all have when we get into conversations with people, and either it's like, this is hopeless, there's no way I'm going to convince this person, and when do I stop, or it's a family member, and I want to have a cordial relationship, but I hate what he stands for, and I want to have some influence. So today we're going to talk about having worthwhile conversations one-on-one with people, and when to have them, whether to have them, and how to structure them in ways that are going to maximize productivity, maximize the benefit we get from the conversations. So maybe we should start with just how you think people should approach the idea of even approaching the conversation, who should we have conversation with, and why should we have them? Right. I mean, I do actually think that that is part of the problem. The intention that you bring to a conversation makes a big difference in whether it's going to be successful, and there's some very rational things that you could choose to do, like you could choose to try to connect with someone and just get to know them better, or you could choose to try to communicate something, which means you both actually get to understand the point, or you could choose to be trying to work together to achieve some mutual goal. Those are all very rational things, but sometimes we forget that the other person is also a human being with his own values, his own knowledge, his own goals, and we start treating the other person as a means to our end instead of an individual who also needs to be aligned with us in the conversation. So in other words, the conversation is two ways, and we may have a goal, but they might have a different goal, and part of what we want is to align those two goals, or at least take into account what the other person is intending here. And I do think one of the problems, I mean, I've had this problem, and I have to say that on the real persuasion side, I don't consider myself an expert, because I tend to fall into the error of trying to straighten the person out, and that is not, you need some kind of a mutual goal, and there are very few people who will go into the conversation if your goal is to straighten them out. Sometimes you can get that when you have a teacher-student situation, but even then, it actually doesn't go over very well. So how should people approach most conversations? So let's say it's somebody you know, you know they have ideas you don't like, you know, there's a certain disagreement, but you also share some values, family members comes to mind, how should people approach even thinking about what kind of relationship do I have with this person, how to approach all that? Right. Well, I think you need to really think about what is your selfish interest, and the first part of that is figuring out what is the value of this person to you. So what do you get out of this relationship, and what do you want to preserve? And if it's like a family member, I mean, there's so many benefits, siblings. Siblings have seen your whole life, and they have a context which no one else has. And so there's a certain kind of connection you can get with a sibling that you literally can't get with anyone else, and that's a value, and it's good to hold the perspective of what the values are that you want to share. And then, of course, if there are things that you disagree with, then the question is, is this someone that you think is a candidate for talking about it? Or is this really an issue that you need to actually assess the person about, assess whether you think you have a selfish interest in trying to talk with them about it? And if you do, what do you think their interest in it would be? And sometimes, you don't have to know that in advance. You can try to find that out in the conversation. But you do need to go into it with the idea of looking for what's in it for them also. Yeah, I know. So I mean, I have lots of relatives who I disagree with thoroughly. Now, luckily for me, to some extent, I don't meet them very often. But when I do, they usually want to get into a fight with me. I mean, that's typically the dynamics, right? They will purposefully kind of try to poke me to try to get a response. And I used to be very eager to be baited, right? And go into it with them. And over time, I've come to the conclusion of why, right? It's just painful in the end for everybody. I'm not convincing anybody. I'm not going to. And it's not helping any relationship that is of value here. So I just try to walk away, but it's not always easy to do so. Well, you know, I think in that situation, something that can be very helpful is to name what's going on and what's going on for you. So when you're feeling that frustration, what are you wishing for? Are you wishing for some respect for them? Or are you wishing for just to be let alone or wishing for camaraderie? What are you wishing for in that moment, your own? What do you think? I think, I think just, I mean, in the sense to be left alone, that is for us to have, you know, granted, the shallow, small talk conversation we're probably going to have, which is fine for me because that's about the level of value I want with some of these people. So I don't need more than that. Just just just to low, how are you and a little bit about family and stuff like that and leave me alone with everything else. OK, great. So, you know, one of the things that I like to talk about is how to keep a value orientation when something like this happens because one of the problems with will leave me alone. That's basically trying to avoid a negative and it's completely understandable that that is the way that it would occur to you. But part of the thing that can help is if you can swap it to, well, what's the value you're after? And if you can say something to them like, you know, I'm a little frustrated and I'd really like to be able to have goodwill in this conversation here. And I'm wondering if we could find a topic where we're more aligned. You know, one thing that does is it names what you actually really want. And you don't always know what the other person is going to say. Sometimes it might actually be interesting to find out. Why are they talking about this? Why are you know, if they are? So that would be an alternative you could do is like, you know, I'm here, you're very passionate and. You know, disagree. Why are you bringing this up? Right. Seems like you're eager to express yourself. Is that are you trying to get me to agree with you? And, you know, sometimes again, naming what they're trying to do, asking them if they're trying to get you to agree with them is not the same as agreeing with them. Yet sometimes just saying what it is that they're trying to do will get them to stop doing it because they feel heard in a certain way until you acknowledge what they say all the way, they don't feel heard and they're in some kind of a uncomfortable situation, shall we say? Yeah. But once they've been heard, they may be a little more interested in hearing from you too. So those two things that you can do, one of them is self expression. The other is it's empathy, basically, generously giving them empathy. Those are the two basic conversation tactics that I teach in the rationally connected conversations work that I do. And it's not that this actually helps persuade someone. What it does is it helps lower the temperature. It helps you keep emotionally grounded. And it also helps to kind of switch the conversation away from whatever rut it's getting into to something that's a little bit more fundamental and it can get to deeper values. An idea here is to be purposeful in your conversations and to pursue those values. Yes. First, that you have a intention in the first place and you know why you want to be in the conversation. And even if it is, you just want to have good will with these relationships and you know, maybe you just want to know what they've been up to for the last five years because you haven't seen them in five years. And that may not be a huge value, but knowing that that's your value is actually helpful in doing this. And then the second part of it is when someone gets triggered. You or another person, that is a problem. That is an objective problem in a conversation. You know, to have communication, both both people need to be able to think on their feet and if one person is triggered, they're actually emotionally overloaded and they can't think clearly. And that's you or them. And so it's actually very important if it's you, it's very important to be able to calm yourself down quickly and get back where you're clear on what your selfish interest is. And if it's them, there are things that you can do but like this, you know, naming what they're doing in rational terms. I think that's very important. If you say, you're trying to manipulate me into agreeing with you, that is going to fan the flames. But if you say, you know, I'm guessing you're really trying to communicate your position and get me to agree, which is not irrational on the face of it, then they feel appreciated and they feel heard. And that ability to translate what you initially analyze as something irrational into a rational element and an irrational part that we're going to sidestep here and focus on the rational element, that actually is really helpful to grease a conversation. Yeah, that that that that makes sense. What do you if you feel yourself. Getting triggered, so so you're you're becoming emotional, you're getting upset or you're getting overly passionate, given given the topic of the conversation or the or the goals that you have. What what are what are your suggestions? And so as a how how you should handle that? Mm hmm. Well, you know, there's the small, medium and large interventions at that point and the small one, I'm sure you know, because because you've heard it from every communication person. It's take a breath. Right. Yeah. And the that pause, the silence that you get when you take a breath, the physical relaxation that you get when you take a breath. This all puts you a little bit more into control from where you were before. And you're then actually in a position to judge whether you need a bigger intervention, because if you take a breath and you get perspective and you know what to do, no problem. If you don't, the there are real time tactics that you can use. And they're basically what I call emergency introspection. What you need to do at this moment, you're having some emotional reaction. An emotion is just an alert to some value that's at stake. But it's not always the thing that seems most obvious, particularly if it's a threat or an emotion. Like if you're feeling anger at a person, you're seeing them as a threat to figure out what the value is actually takes a couple of steps. And if you want to do this very quickly, the naming the feeling is one step. But the more important step is getting to the value at stake. And it can be helpful to know a whole lot of like deep rational values that you can pick from. And so like there's this connection, cooperation, communication. Those are three social ones, clarity, a great cognitive one, direction, important for action and thinking, efficacy, important all around the virtues. You know, I'm really I really want an integrity here. That can happen with us when we're having a political conversation. And it's awkward to point tell your point of view, but you're really wanting to have integrity in which case you want to say something. Or or there can be other things like you're just antsy and you want to move or you're really wanting to relax or to play. And there's I have a list of you can actually get this on my website at thinkingdirections.com. I have a the thinking the thinking direction starter kit. And in that is a list of what's called deep rational values. It's very helpful to have a list of these that you've sort of semi memorized. And when you're trying to think when you're trying to think, OK, I'm feeling angry, what am I really wishing for here? Have one of those words come up? Yeah. So how do you how do you manage to introspect while you engage in a conversation? That's why you need to know the words because you need to be able to do this in. You need to be able to say, I'm feeling angry. What am I wishing for? You need to be able to, you know, just with that be able to just would feel it will feed you that. Often, I mean, it depends, right? It depends on how difficult the situation is in an even bigger situation when when actually you can't figure out what it is. Then the most helpful thing to do is to say that, say, you know, I'm feeling angry and I'm really needing clarity about what's going on with me right now. Would it be OK if I took a little break and sorted this out and naming what's going on and being vulnerable, actually, when you say something like that is very helpful to the conversation because you come across as completely authentic and it again, it puts you in the driver's seat. I think agency, the problem we have in conversations is you feel like you become at the mercy of the other person. And with some tools, you can feel that you always can be be able to be behaving and acting and talking the way that you want to talk. Mm hmm. So a lot of people have problem. I mean, a challenge with introspection. Mm hmm. To begin with, I think we talked about this last time you were on, but we should talk about it some more because it always comes up. It's a big topic. Yeah. Yeah. So give us a little bit of the tools, because my guess is the more you practice introspection when you're calm and collect and at your desk, the easier it's going to be when you're doing it on the fly and trying to trying to access your values on the fly. So so give us a few of the kind of the tools that people should do when they're not in the midst of an emotion, but when they are, but they have the time to really introspect and really get to it. It's just how to do it and practice so that when they need it quickly, it's it's available to them. Yes. And and let me just say there's both things you can do. You can do a preview of a conversation. If you are expecting the conversation to be difficult, you can do it at your desk and figure out all the things you're going to feel and why and guess what they're going to do. Very helpful. You can also do this as a do-over. Like if you have a fight with your husband or your wife, and that's very upsetting and nobody likes to be, you know, fighting with their husband or wife, you can go and do it at your desk and then ask for a do-over. And that always goes over very well. If you've actually got to fight with this process. Oh, oh, oh, that's right. We weren't supposed to mention that. We're not supposed to admit that. Yeah. So so let me give you that the absolute intro introspection class. So the first thing you need to do is you need to you need to actually learn. Eight families of emotions. OK, the first ones are easy. Desire and its opposite aversion. That's the first family. So desire, you all know, love, you all know. Joy, you all know the opposite of them are indifference and grief. So we've got desire, love and joy, three great emotions and their three opposites. And then let's do three negative ones. Fear, the opposite is relief, anger, the opposite is gratitude and despair, the opposite is hope. So that's six. And there are two more that are personal guilt. The opposite is pride and frustration. The opposite is confidence. So I have everybody in the thinking lab memorized eight families of emotions, 16 emotions, you know, eight positive, eight negative. It really helps to memorize them because then when you ask, what do I feel one of those words will come up and an emotion and emotion, those basic emotions, you know what they mean? I mean, what is fear? There's something bad coming at me, right? There's a threat. What is anger? That person done me no good, right? They're very simple evaluations that go with these basic families and knowing that these actually cover the waterfront. I mean, there are a lot of complicated emotions like jealousy, very complicated emotion involves hatred, involves love, involves anger, involves despair, you know, involves aversion. It's a very complicated emotion, but those are the building block of it. Hatred wasn't on the list. Hatred is a complicated emotion. Hatred involves anger and love. I think usually usually there's some value there that's involved. Otherwise, it doesn't rise to the level of hatred. If you don't care about it, you just have contempt or disgust. It's, you know, there has to be some reason why you think this should be you wish it were better. And so they're complicated emotions. But if you know that they're actually building blocks, that helps a lot. And so that's the first level of introspection is what emotion, what am I feeling and why do I feel it? And now sometimes when you ask what am I feeling, you get something like I'm tired. I'm overloaded. That's me. Right. Now, those are a little different. Those aren't emotions. Those are states of the organism. But they tell you exactly what you need to do. If you're overloaded, what do you need to do your own? Slow down, slow down, reduce the load off your load. Yeah, make a list. Yeah, do something. A list list lists are good. I like list lists are like the number one cure to overload me number one cure for overload. Yes. If you're tired, what do you need to do? Take a nap, take a nap, take a walk, have some protein. One of those things is going to help depending on the circumstance. So if you need, if you need a quick up, yeah. Yeah. If sugar, if you need a very short term, quick up and then it's all right if you crash. Yes, exactly. So, you know, so if you have, if it's your state, that's actually sometimes very helpful, like you're in a fight with your spouse. OK, not your spouse. You're you're hot out of the college. You say, how do I feel? I say, God, I'm tired. And you realize, oh, this this is kind of blown everything out of proportion. Affect is additive. If you're feeling bad because you're tired and then someone does something that you're a little irritated about, the total value or, you know, negativity is going to be the total of those two. The most obvious thing is the thing that was irritating. It's like right in your face. And you're going to have what feels like a very disproportionate anger. But really what it is is your nine parts tired and one part, you know, one part angry. And as soon as you ask yourself, how do I feel? And you notice, oh, I'm tired. Suddenly, you have the whole context and sometimes that's all you need. So just identifying your state of being in your emotional state is enormously beneficial to really everything in life. Yes. Yes. Yeah, it's why we need to monitor. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Now it's everything is in levels, right? So sometimes it's easy. If it's a little harder, it's because it's an emotion and it's not exactly clear why you're feeling that. And then you do need to take some initial steps and the you can do this just with thinking on paper. You think, well, why am I so angry about this? You know, what, you know, go over all of the negative things. I don't think it's enough to just stop with that because what can happen, particularly if it's the threat oriented emotions is you can get into a really negative loop and get into a really negative place. And so there's another step that I think you always need to do, which is to go back through and say for every negative thing you write, what is the positive that I was really wanting here? So like let's we need a concrete. Let's I'll just make something up. Yeah. Suppose you had a phone call with, you know, with a customer service place and you got really irritated. And it's because, you know, and it's you had to call three times to get it done. And you're you know, it's like taking over your day that you had to do this and you're now mad that you're mad because there is something else you wanted to do. And it's irritating that you can't seem to get back to work because you're still upset with the customer service place. A great time if you are if you are having an emotion that is getting in the way of doing what you think is actually in your rational self-interest, this is a time to go introspect. Do not stop. Do not pass. Go go introspect. And you'd write about why you're so irritated. And of course, all the first things that will come out will be how the customer service person misbehaved, how this should have been easier, et cetera. But then you need to take another step in and like and say, well, why does this matter to me right now? And often it will be something completely unrelated. So like you you talked you were up. You you decided before you called customer service said, well, I really need to do such and such, but I'm just going to take a minute and take care of this. And then it took 45 minutes. And so part of what's going on is you're kicking yourself that you went down the slippery slope and you didn't get back to whatever it was that you the intention you set was that this would be a five minute thing. And instead it was a 45 minute thing. And it's what happened five minutes before the customer service. This is actually what the real issue is and that you're actually feeling you're kicking yourself for having let this get away from you. So you missed this 45 minutes that you could have, you know, prepared for something or done something or whatever it was. And it's got really almost nothing to do with the customer service people. And that's often the case because the more unpleasant it is to identify what's the real cause, the less likely it will be the superficial obvious cause. And yet the sooner you find that out, the more in control you are. And the next time the more aware you'll be of, gee, maybe I need to actually give myself some extra space for this thing that I wanted to work on. So you can go back and you can kind of deal with the thing that's really the problem rather than kind of the distraction which is causing all the problems. So let's go, if we go back to this idea of one-on-one discussions. You know, so part of what you're saying is you wanna appeal to, you wanna find shade values and work towards that, how do you actually do that? That is part of the challenge with a lot of people, not somebody you know well obviously but with a lot of people is to try to figure out what those shared values are. Well, you know, it depends a little bit on the context but there's usually some context where you know that there's something you have in common. Like if you're at a networking event and you're at a conference together, right? You know this person, let's say is a professional and is moderately successful because they're dressed in nice clothes or whatever. I'm just, it's a little bit stereotyping but good enough. The number one way to create some connection and I think that is the first step if it's to create some connection is to ask the person about themselves and actually listen. And it's very easy to draw people out about themselves. And it's actually pretty easy to find out things that they're passionate about and then draw them out about that and they immediately become interesting and you find out about their best selves. Because I think that's it, I like to think of it as being a rationality magnet. That you are, if everything they say, you take in and you look at the most rational aspect and pursue the most rational aspect of it which you wind up doing is finding the best part of them. Like if you ask them about their career and how did they get into it? And they have any kind of a firsthand career. They will start talking about that and then you can find out about where they're purposeful. You can find out about where they have firsthand knowledge and firsthand values and they become interesting. And if they are firsthand in that area that also gives you then a bridge to other things because if for example, you wanna talk economics with them you can connect to their firsthand understanding of their career and their business and their decisions. Say, well, you know how important it is for you to be able to make the decisions and this kind of thing? Well, that's why we need a free market because actually the person on the spot is the best person to decide. You know, I'm just making that up but that's the kind of thing that you can do if you're willing to draw out the person first. Do you find you ever get into conversations where you do that and you get a lot of input but they never ask about you? Yeah, basically they won't. That's true. And so you need to also be able to be assertive because at a certain point you start feeling completely invisible if you just draw people out. Yeah. And so, but you can also- What motivates them not to do it because they're not aware or they're not conscious of what's going on? Yeah, well, so it's a little bit speculation but I'm happy to speculate. I give three possible reasons. The first is they're really enjoying having you draw them out. That's really fun. Getting somebody to listen to you. This is great. Everybody loves having a good listener, right? Yeah. The second reason is that they're oblivious, right? That, I mean, how many... I mean, before I learned these skills you'd go to a networking event, people would stand around kind of look at each other and not know what to say. It does take initiative to get a decent conversation going and not everybody either has... Some people are too shy. They don't have the initiative and some people don't realize that they don't realize how helpful it is to have this mutuality, right? There's the kind of people who actually just try to pigeonhole you and talk about themselves. So the other thing that you need to be able to do is, so that's the third case, right? So the first case is they're just enjoying themselves. Second case, they really don't know how to do their oblivious. And the third case is they actually are... The kind of person that actually is trying to find someone that they want an audience and they want to change your mind or do whatever. So you definitely need the... You need like interruption skills. This is something we do... I run these four-day communication intensives and sometimes we include a segment on interruption skills, which you can do politely. And the person who taught this to me, his name is Jeff Brown, I said, the second that you stop feeling the connection, you should interrupt. Because really there's no... What's the point of talking with someone if you aren't creating that shared value, right? If you're losing interest, you need to be selfish in this case. I think that's something that is not well understood. How can you be selfish and also benevolent in the situation? But if you say, hold on, I'm actually kind of losing the track of this or whatever it is, you say, what's going on? And I'm really wanting to have... I really want to go back and actually talk about something you just said before, because that interested me. Can we go back and talk about that? You're basically asserting yourself, it's called honest expression. But you're asserting yourself in a value-oriented way. Again, you're saying what you're seeing, so that's objective. You're saying what you're feeling in just a very one word. And then you're naming the value that you're after. Like you really like to communicate about this other issue. And you name that again in irrational terms. So it's never an issue of blaming them to say, you shouldn't be doing this. It's always positive. This is the value I'm after. So when you're receiving, you're feeding back the values you're seeing in them. And when you're offering, you're putting forward the values you're wanting. And that's the grease that then gets you to have a normal conversation. And so a lot of people are shy. Yes. I find myself, this suddenly used to be the case. You know, going to these cocktail type places, you don't know anybody in the room. You've done exactly what to say to them. Or you know what to say to them, but there's a certain resistance. There's like a wall in front of you. You don't want to do it. Yeah. What's the psychology going on there? And how do you overcome that tendency not to want to engage? Well, you know, there's probably some kind of threat orientation there. Either some like self-doubt. I mean, I'm not saying in your case self-doubt, but sometimes people feel social self-doubt and social anxiety in these situations. Like I'm not going to be interesting enough. You know, we can just make up a list. I'm not going to be interesting enough. They're not going to want to talk to me. I don't have anything to say. You know, you can just, if you've got any of that negativity going, you have activated a threat-oriented context from which you are just looking at the world and seeing threats instead of values. And so every one of those people, instead of being someone who is potentially interesting, they are someone who is potentially going to be mean to you. And of course, this does not encourage you to connect. But the same thing is true if you go to your desk and you start thinking, oh yeah, there's that and that's going to be hard and that's going to be hard. That's going to be hard. Believe it or not, you're not going to want to go to your desk. So the solution is the same in both cases, which is notice, okay, yeah, I'm like totally focused on threats. Life is about gaining values. So okay, what are the potential values here? And on your desk, you probably have some work that you'd actually like to get done or there's something positive there. In the room, you need to think about, well, what is in my selfish interest here? This is years ago, before I was dating my husband who happens to be Harry Benzwanger, I had philosophical consulting with him and I asked him this question because we had, this was at the time, this was a long time ago when you used to get together to listen to Leonard Peekoff lecture classes, you had to rent them and a group would be more. And I said, you know, when I go into that room, I look around and I don't know who to sit with and I'm feeling like, oh, I get very second-handed. It's like I'm concerned about what they're going to think about where I sit and I'm sure that's second-handed but where's reality there? That's what I asked Harry, where's reality? And he said, go to your feelings. What do you want here? And the next time I went in, I thought, well, what do I want? I want to sit with Jim. I went and sat with Jim. I had a perfectly happy time. Your emotions, particularly your value-oriented emotions are alerts to values at stake. So what are you wanting right now is a very helpful question. And, you know, if you're single and you're wanting to meet someone of the opposite sex, that's a good thing to know. Well, look around for someone to introduce yourself to. If you're wanting to meet people, look for the most gregarious or maybe the person who's alone who looks interesting. I don't know. But you see, as soon as you figure out what you want and then you can move forward. But it doesn't happen automatically. If the context that's activated immediately is that self-doubt context, it takes a conscious choice to say, oh, yeah, I'm totally focused on threats. Okay. Take a breath. What do I really want here? You need to intervene and literally activate a different context and the emotions will follow. And it can be fast. What's that? But that can be fast. Yes, I think the more, it's actually the more you're used to doing that in your, you know, by yourself, in a sense, the more you, then the faster it'll become. Then it almost becomes like a nature to do that when you have strong emotions in a social context. Yes. Somebody who's not used to respecting is going to have a hard time. Well, the thing that, the one part is true. So both, one thing's true. The idea that you need to do that, you can definitely learn that and you get an alert, oh, I need to intervene here and you can get fast at that. And that definitely is a learned skill. But I guarantee, even if you aren't very good at introspecting, if you notice that you're in a weird state and you say, oh yeah, God, I'm totally focused on, what do I really wish could happen here? If you can get an answer to that, your emotions will change. That's good, yeah. Cause you, yeah, okay. So, so you go up, you're having a conversation and, and you know, some people are boring. Yes. Do you have any advice on how to disconnect and again, be selfish about it because sometimes it really is a dead end and there's no point. Yeah. Well, so, you know, Pat, lines are helpful, but again, being selfish matters. Right? There's no benefit to you or the other person to have you stand there being bored. Right. So takes a little bit of courage to interrupt and say, you know, I mean, you need to do it politely too, but you can say something like, well, I appreciate getting to know you. I need to go get, I need, I'm gonna go to the bathroom, right, and you just say what you're gonna do. Yeah. You do not need to get permission. You do not need to have them agree to close the conversation. And if you say, I'm gonna go, you just go, right? And if they say, you know, you need to be knowing that you get to be in control of yourself. And I think that part of this is, how do I say this? If you can continue to be focusing on, if you're seeing them, let me start over again. It's impossible to do this if you're thinking, this person is a loser and I have to get out of here, right? Again, the issue of having a value orientation makes a difference, because if you're thinking, you know, I'm not really connected here and I wanna find, I wanna actually make some space for something else to happen. Yep. You have a completely different energy when you bring that conversation to a close and you're not feeling like a victim. You're feeling like a person who is in charge of his or her destiny. So your attitude toward the fact that this is boring, in fact, makes a difference in how you show up and even whether the person will be offended or not. Because if you are thinking, you know, all kinds of critical things like, oh my God, what is this? They can read that, they can sense that, right? That people are very good at reading, at least whether they're threat oriented or positive value oriented emotions. And so it's, there's no good way out of that if that's what's going through your mind. But if you are, but that doesn't have to be what's going through your mind. You can say, you can have that negative thought and then turn it around to say, okay, I think we've reached a natural completion point. I'm going on, right? Yep, yeah. No, I think the key here is, it's what you said in the beginning. You have to be selfish and unfortunately, that's not something we're taught to be. It's, we're taught exactly the opposite. We're taught to suffer. We're taught to sacrifice. We're taught to take other people's emotions into account, but not our own. Not to focus on our own values and own and be value oriented. And that to me, I think is the biggest challenge people face is how to become valueers of their own lifetime and how to pursue values, rigorous. Yes, from all the way from figuring out your central purpose to figuring out how to politely disengage from someone who we don't want to talk to. And at every level, it takes work. It takes knowing your own values and it does take emotional skills too because emotions are alerts to values at stake. And if the values have been repressed, then you don't get the emotions. And if the values have not been conceptualized, then you get confusing emotions. So it does take work to make sure that when you get those alerts, you can actually figure out what they are. And, but every time you do that, you get a higher level of self understanding and you feel more grace and poise in more situations. And all of life gets better. Selfishness is good all the way down. It's selfish all the way down. Yes, no, I think that's right. And again, it's something you're not gonna get out there from the culture. It's something that you have to learn yourself. It's something that you have to really spend some energy and figure out. And can I make a little pitch here? Of course. Is that inappropriate or is that okay? No, no, go ahead. So two things. One is this is the kind of thing that I teach. This is what the Thinking Lab, which is my main, my main product is a membership program called the Thinking Lab, which you can read about on my website, thinkingdirections.com. That's thinking like using your brain directions like North, Southeast and West with an S, thinkingdirections.com. And, you know, right now we're actually on, I think we're gonna do the 12th lecture in a series on all about emotions next week, right? That's, I mean, there's a whole, we go through every family of the motions. Next week, we're gonna be talking about emergency introspection. How do you do that on your feet? And- How long are these workshops? These are Zoom classes that are an hour and 15 minutes. Okay. Twice a month I do them. And so we've been at this for six months or so at this point. And, but there's a series of self-study courses on other topics like self-direction. How do you get yourself to do the thing you think is in your rational self-interest? But it is a learnable skill and having the objectivist framework for this makes all the difference. I mean, cognitive behavioral therapy is helpful, but having the rational egoism as the foundation of how you learn introspection is very helpful. That's what my thinking lab does. The other thing I wanna say is I do run communication workshops. I run a four-day communication intensive where I bring in a certified nonviolent communication trainer. And the nonviolent communication sounds terrible on the surface because- What other communication is there? Yeah, right. Exactly. There's something really wrong about that. In the class, we decided we're gonna do a two-step change from nonviolent communication to non-malevolent communication to benevolent communication. And we're gonna try to find self-benevolent communication. But this psychologist, Marshall Rosenberg, who died about 10 years ago, developed a real-time method for trying to get to the values. And he's had a big influence on my work and I bring in someone who worked with him. She worked with him for 10 years before he died. And she comes in for two days of this four-day training. And it's really amazing. One of the things that we found, we just did one last weekend, actually. And one of the things we found, everybody felt closer to each other by the end. You know, it's this relatively small group, 10 or 12 people. Yeah, yeah. And when you get to the more, the deeper issues and you're able to express them, you instant closeness. And of course, this can help in any close relationship you have. This is a real skill. I mean, I have 200 hours in this and I still feel like I'm learning it. But it's a learnable skill. And to the extent that you can do it, every relationship is better. So if you're interested in that, there's a page on my website, but to find it's hard. So go to rationallyconnected.com. Rationally with a Y, connected.com. And there's a whole description of that. Yeah, if you send me the couple of links, I've got the thinkingdirections.com. I've got on the description under the video. But if you send me the other one, I'll add it. Okay, great. And that means by email later? Yeah, anytime or you can put it in the chat here. I put it in the chat, but I'll send it by email also. Yeah. So these are definitely learnable skills. I guess that's what I wanna say. Yeah, good. Let's see, let's take a few of these questions. So you've got DWNLogic, says, hello, Jean. All of your talks have been enormous value to me. Do you have any advice in getting over a breakup? I ended a five-year relationship today. Yeah, so I'm really sorry to hear that. I mean, that's a big loss with that much investment and that much closest. And I'm sure that optimism about this being the right person and that you lose that, right? So my big piece of advice here is take the time to do the morning. Morning, M-O-U-R-N-I-N-G. This is a really important process that I think sometimes people don't realize how valuable it is. Go through and think about what you've lost. And what did you... Do we think this person is a man or a woman? Or do we not know? DWNLogic, I don't know. We don't know. I mean, I'm guessing it's a man, but I have no idea why I'm guessing that. I'm maybe because of the way it's written anyway. Okay, well, let's just say, think about this person that you have broken up with and think about all of the values that they had. And you've now lost those, right? So you need to think about why they matter to you. So it's what are the value? Why does it matter to you? And actually sit there with the pain of having lost it. Part of the reason you need to do that, that is honoring that value. And it is strengthening that value. Whenever you pay attention that something is important to you, that actually files it as stronger. That makes that value be a stronger value. That is going to help you find other ways to gain that kind of thing. So for example, suppose early in the relationship you felt like you could talk about anything but then that fell apart. One of the things you're mourning is being able to have that closeness and being able to have those conversations, have the deep conversations and thinking about how much that matters to you. Why does that matter to you? Does it matter to have someone who is your, to get the intellectual stimulation? Does it matter to you because you feel close? Is it the closeness you want? Intellectual stimulation and closeness are two different values. You can actually get those in other people, maybe in two other people. Of course, it would be nice to get them in a new romantic partner. But if you think about each part of those individually, then you can find ways to bring them into your life. And that's what the healing process of mourning is. When you get clear about every single thing you lost, you get clear about what you need to know, what you want to look for to add to your life. And it's not just find a new person who has all these things. It's find ways by talking to your friend from high school a little more or chatting people up at some organization you're with. You're going to add additional social connections and knowing what you care about is what's going to make that easier. So that's the main thing that I would say for anyone who's had a breakup. Is mourn and get to fully understand what values this other person represented for you. And this is not a one day process. I mean, if you've ever lost a parent or some other loved one with someone who you're really close to, it can be a year long process. But it's certainly months, I would say. It's certainly at least a couple of months. And it's something to put time in to actually say I'm going to spend a half an hour a day journaling about this. That is what's going to process that faster rather than slower. And do you find that everybody who does this kind of introspection well, does it in writing? I think it does need to be in writing. I think it does need to be in writing. I think some people do it by talking but there's something about being able to reread what you've written. So that you can go back and see, is that really true? Or you write a paragraph about what you've lost and then you reread it. What is the real thing here? Being able to reread is indispensable because when the thoughts are flying through your head, you can talk pretty fast but you can't remember all that stuff. And when you slow it down and write it out, you can reread it. And I think that that is indispensable on any significant issue. So the whole idea of thinking and writing. Yes. Which of course, Ayn Rand did. Yep. Yep. Let's see. Puckett-Watch says, another Gene fan. Thanks, Puckett-Watch. Thank you all. Andrew, what are Gene's thoughts on reacting to insults? Between politicians and Twitter, we're in a culture of insults instead of arguments. What is the standard by which one should ignore or take cognizance of insults? Well, I guess part of my question for that is, do you mean in a public situation or do you mean in a private situation? Because I think if someone insults you one-on-one, like they say, you know, that was a stupid comment. There is a way to handle that using this nonviolent communication or this benevolent method, which is to listen to it from the point of view of what is the value that person is really wanting here that would cause them to say that? And it's, you know, you could say, I heard you say that's a student comment. I'm guessing you're feeling irritated and wanting a more direct answer to your question. Is that what you're wanting? You know, which is a very benevolent way to reply to an insult. Now, why would you do that? You would only do that if you actually respected the person who was doing it and you wanted more connection, right? So this gets to the issue of you always need to judge why would you want to talk with this person? Now, there are other things like when people insult you in public, I think sometimes you make a point of answering back in public. And part of that is because, you know, they do this in your channel, right? And you are, you are asserting yourself and you are, you actually don't, the people who insult you, I'm not sure you want commenting on your channel, right? So it's not like you have to be polite to everybody. But I, yeah. I mean, it very much is value oriented, right? So it depends. So if somebody insults you in person, it really, as you said, it depends on, do I want to have a relationship with this person? Do I care? And if I don't, then it's a completely different response than if I do. And in public, it really depends on what your goal is again, right? And the goal is usually not to appease or to be nice to this person who insulted you. The goal is to, you know, you know, in my case, sometimes it's to entertains, sometimes it's... Yes, right. I mean, there's a whole array of goals that could be happening depending on the context that actually is occurring. Right. And if you were at a public lecture with an audience who didn't know you very well, you might actually want to read that insult with the most benevolent interpretation in order to give information to the audience because someone who had a more benevolent, who had the same question, but would have said it more politely, you want to actually give them the information. So there's no substitute for knowing why you're going to have the conversation. Yeah. And so what value you seeking, again, going back to selfishness, what is the, do you want to get out of this? Yes. And that is going to determine your context. You know, I often say to people, because one of the issues is that people get very upset when they're insulted. No. And that's interesting because to monitor your own emotions, why am I getting so upset because somebody insulted me? And, you know, I've often said to people, and somebody insults me that, you know, there are only two possibilities. One, they're right, I did something wrong, I deserved it. And then I should say, thank you, I learned from that. And the second is they're wrong. And then it's their problem, not mine. And either way, it's not something that should evoke a strong emotion from you. Well, and I would say it's okay if it evokes a strong emotion. And if you have a strong emotion, you have a responsibility to calm down and get your heading gear and decide what's in your rational self-interest, and do if you're triggered from this insult. So there's work to be done. If you're actually a little emotionally overloaded by this, it's very important. Take that breath, calm down, you know, do some emergency introspection before you act because otherwise you are almost certainly going to do something that is not in your rational self-interest. And figure out why you're so triggered because it's, again, it's not that this person is a true, probably a true threat to you. There's something else going on that you want to deal with. Right. And this, you know, this is a great example of the kind of thing where, you know, I mean, I've had to deal with getting rid of second-handedness, which I've gotten rid of a lot. And it still comes around at times. And it's often some social thing where you are more focused on other people than on reality. And it can be very helpful to realize, oh, yeah, I think that that's actually maybe a second-handed thing. And the reason for that is not to beat yourself up. Oh, no, I'm second-handed again. What's wrong with me? The reason is that can actually help you say, oh, okay, let me get grounded. What is in my rational self-interest? Well, it's not that I want their approval, but do I want to connect with them? Connection is completely rational. Desire for approval, and that's not so rational. But sometimes the desire for approval is how it shows up. And you realize, well, I actually really do want to connect with this person. And I'm kind of distressed that they have this attitude. So you then maybe make a vulnerable statement. Wow, I'm really hurt. You said this, I'm a little hurt. And really wanting to understand why you're coming at me this way. So if you can catch that there's a little second-handed element, that can actually help you realize, oh, well, what is the rational thing that I want here? Define for people what second-handedness is, because there's something new, relatively new to objectivism. Right. So that's a, I guess, a slang term for a lack of independence. So one of the virtues in objectivism is independence, which is focusing on a primary focus on reality as opposed to other people. It's not that other people aren't important and that relationships aren't important, but you always want to be focused on reality and what are the values you're creating in reality. And then people are your allies in that. So that would be first-handedness that you have, you see reality through your own eyes, through your own, you create things with your own effort. It's all a direct connection with your reality. Second-handedness is where you try to do it through people. So instead of trying to build the bridge, you try to manipulate someone into building it for you. Or instead of making the point, you try to make someone feel bad so that they'll say the point for you. And you're trying to work through other people in some other way. And so the ways that shows up is wanting their approval. So instead of wanting to actually go after values and find people who have shared values, you kind of want people to make it seem like you have shared values by their approval instead of by your creation of values. There's victim type stuff. Like if you feel like you're the victim of other people, you're acting like you can't act in reality that other people are the ones with the power and you don't have any power. That's not true. But if you let other people manipulate you or you let other people dominate you, then it sure feels like it. But that's your problem, right? That's not their problem. But you're seeing reality through them instead of through your direct efforts. You're trying to control people. That's the opposite, right? There's the victims and the people who try to control. That would be another kind of having people as your intermediary. You don't get anything done. You try to get other people to do it. And I think there's one more which has gone right out of my head. No, maybe three. I think that's maybe it. So second-handedness is where you're going through people instead of going direct to reality. And what matters is their judgment, not yours. Yeah, when you're second-handed, but that's not true. Yeah. Right, exactly. Shazwood asks, has Jean seen the Pixar movie Inside Out? So that's the one about the emotions, right? Yeah, if so, what does she think of the movie's depiction of emotions? I haven't seen it in a long time. And it had some virtues and some things I disagreed with 100%. So I can't give a really coherent answer. It's a fun movie, regardless. It was, okay. Yeah, it was a fun movie, yeah. Pixar movies are fun. On the leeway says, some people are able to talk with others well and a productive in a group setting, but struggle with maintaining focus and productivity when alone. What advice would you have for someone like that? I think that's extravoid by definition, right? Where you're getting your energy from other people. Right. And so there are a couple of things. One is I think actually learning some skill like thinking on paper is very helpful because I think one thing that extroverts do is the talk of other people helps to trigger stuff from their data banks. Right, because that's a big part of thinking is to get data out from your, you know, from squirreled away in your data banks. You want to get that out and into the thought process or into the conversation. And when you have other people to help stimulate that, that's actually a benefit. I mean, there really is a benefit to having a group of knowledgeable people talking together about a problem. So I think that's the thing that's missing, but that's something that can be actually pretty easily learned. With thinking on paper, what you do is you write out your thoughts in full sentences and it's like you're hearing a conversation. You can reread it and you can get more out of your data banks than you would otherwise. So that's one thing I would say. That also helps with concentration because the first thing you do when you think on paper is you write down what your goal is. Now, what's the first thing you do in a meeting? If it's a productive meeting, you guys agree what the goal is and what you're trying to figure out. If you don't have a goal for the meeting, it's probably not going to be very productive. So that's another thing you can do that you can translate into writing down. And I think that is actually quite helpful. That's like the number one thing I would recommend. This is not just for extroverts who are trying to work alone, but also for people of any kind of attention issues. Thinking on paper, write the goal at the top of the page, write out your thoughts in full sentences, try to make it be a little conversation with yourself. And what is it all of kind of asking yourself questions as if you're in a group and people are asking questions? Yes, well, thinking is. What thinking looks like is a purposeful set of asking and answering questions. And the way I like to put it is, sometimes you ask yourself a question, you have a little discussion with yourself. Like where should I go on my next vacation? You like ramble on, well, I really wanted to go to Rome, but I don't think I have enough money to do that right now. So I'm thinking maybe I should do it in the United States and you go on for three paragraphs. And then you say, you know, those are a lot of possibilities and I really don't know. And you got to get to a pause. Well, what you need at that pause is another question. And it's another logical question like, well, which one would be best? You know, you've changed it from whatever it was. You're focusing what the next thing is. And really what the reason you start with a goal, like if the goal is figure out where I'm going to go on vacation, that helps you monitor that the answers to your question are leading you astray. So you need to ask a question that focuses you back toward the goal or it helps you tell when you're done. And it's questions that get you going again, just like if you were in a conversation and you're not quite following it and you're not getting out of the conversation what you want, you ask a question that will bring you back to what you want. So it's all related to having a goal at the beginning. All right, let's see. Danielle Sosa says, thank you. Okay. Thank you, Danielle. That's very generous. Stephen Harper says, thanks, Iran, for having Jean on your show tonight. My pleasure. Justin asks, how do you have a rational conversation between Israel and Hamas? Ah, well. So first of all, those are political entities and they don't have conversations. But, you know, you do, you have to actually believe that it's proper to have a conversation before you have it. So it's not at all clear to me. It's proper for them to talk to each other right now. So let's change this a little bit. How do you have a rational conversation between two people who are hostile to one another or where there has been hostility and let's assume that it's not clear cut like the Israel Hamas situation where there's clearly one evil and one good and there's just, yeah, it'll be wrong for somebody representing Israel to speak to somebody representing Hamas. But how do you get into conversation with somebody you've had a hostile relationship with in the past? Well, let's kind of make it concrete because one of the things that I think is helpful to realize here is that when you're talking about value laden issues, the concretes matter tremendously. Absolutely. Because you're talking about two people with two value hierarchies and that's what's going to determine where there's some connection, some rational connection that can be made and it's not, you know, you can't do this in theory. I mean, I could say, okay, I can do it in one piece. They need to find an area of mutual alignment where they both see values and talk about that. That was not too helpful. But let's try to figure out, okay, like two family members who haven't spoken in a long time. How about that? Yeah. Because we need some context where they would even consider trying to talk. So, okay, I came up with that. You come up with the next part. Why are they considering talking? So we need to fill out some of the details here. We're just making up a story here of your own. Yeah, you know, they're Thanksgiving dinner. And, you know, everybody's happy and there's this benevolence in the air and they're the only ones that are kind of grumpy on the side and not. And then, you know, they like to have, to share in that benevolence, right? Okay. So they both decided to come to Thanksgiving dinner with the extended family because mostly for the other members of the extended family, right? Let's face it. That's the main thing they want. But they don't want to, like, spoil the family dinner by getting into it. That's good. Okay, good. So, and we need to give these guys, these guys or gals names. So, Mary and Todd, how about that? Mary and Todd. And so let's say, let's just make something up for Mary. So Mary is angry about Todd. We got to find a reason for this. Let's stipulate that they are cousins. And Todd was mean to her friend in high school and she hasn't spoken with her since. I mean, is this too petty? Probably, but let's go with it. I mean, I don't know what we can come up with that I don't know. Todd didn't come to a daughter's wedding. I don't know who, you know, family things. I, you know, I've moved 5,000 miles away from my family. So I don't have a lot of experience with this. Right. Okay. So, so there are hard feelings. So, so let's actually let's stipulate. Mary has hard feelings toward Todd for something stupid. Yep. And Todd is irritated with Mary for having been stupid about this. Yeah. But Todd is going to be, Todd has decided that it's actually a good thing for there to be benevolence here. And he's, he's, he's actually put it to bed and he is not worried about Mary. Right. So Todd has decided Todd is actually taking action in doing this. That's typically the way it is. It's not typical that both of them are trying to make this better. Typically one has actually decided to put it to bed. And so like one of the things that you can do is there's a process called quote unquote dissolving enemy images where you put to bed. If someone is in your head, like that person is done me wrong and you're like, are still thinking about them. That's actually very bad for you. It's, it's got nothing to do with whether you should ever talk with the person again. You do not want to have your head rolling around. Oh no, is Mary going to be there? Oh, you know, or what am I going to say to her? You don't want to have that in your head. And that can be done. That can actually be put to bed by basically humanizing the person. Now you only do this if you think that this person is not evil incarnate, right? You think Mary is basically a decent person who has misjudged you and misbehaved toward you, but you don't want to have her in your head. And so what you do as part of that process, you come up with one reasonable reason that could explain why she did. It doesn't have to be the right reason. What this does, like let's stipulate that, that silly thing about mean to the friend. So here's a pause, a way that Todd could be interpreting this. Maybe Mary got a story from her friend that really made him out to be a lousin that she, that's why she doesn't trust me. And that could actually explain her behavior. And you do something like this, you don't actually necessarily have to get the right answer. You just need to see that actually there is potentially an explanation for this that would explain her behavior, which makes her not crazy wrong, but not crazy. And so it makes the person be human again, as opposed to what is this person's problem and, you know, that kind of thing. And once that happens, they get out of your head. And so Todd could first of all be comfortable that when he sees Mary, he's not going to be upset. And he could prepare, you know, she may still react that way. But he won't take it personally anymore. So when, if Mary sees him and like turns the shoulder, he could say, he could not get upset about it. Or if he runs right into her, he could say, hi, Mary, I'm glad we could both be here together. Or he could, you know, he could say something that would be neutral in that state. And, but it does take one of the two hostile people to make this thing. I don't think that a third party can do it. Well, actually I trained third party can do it. Yeah. But it takes training because it's, I did a role play on this once at one of the NBC conferences. And I was supposed to be the arbitrator or whatever between two people who were having a divorce. And they started going at it and I like wound up standing between each other. I was like, what do I do here? And the guy who was running the train said, wow, you really needed empathy. Didn't you? Yeah, I did. You need to really be able to hold on to yourself to be able to help two other people at the same time. That's a skill. Yeah. Don't try to home kids. Yeah. Richard does vulnerability make any sense outside of the context of pursuing a value? I think some psychology hacks drop that context. Oh, well, I mean, I think the time to be vulnerable is when you want connection, right? So it's someone that you actually care about. Yes. So I think the answer is right. It has to be in the context of a value. Someone you care about someone who you have, you believe is an ally, right? And you're basically feeding it forward by being vulnerable in that situation. You are revealing your values. You are showing that you you're actually showing that you trust this person. And that builds trust. You know, trust, there's no such thing as non-mutual trust. When you show that you feel trust, the other person that makes them say, oh, this person is being authentic with me. They're being open with me. They gain trust. So that's the reason you would do it. So yeah, I can't imagine. And you absolutely shouldn't do it, for example, with someone who you don't trust. That would be a mistake. That would be unselfish. Unselfish. Sorry, I missed that. No, yeah, that's right. Unselfish. Completely. I was just repeating. All right, Daniel says the last few weeks have been depressing as shit with the Hamas, Osama sympathy. Any advice for staying optimistic and happy in such an irrational world? Well, so I have a lot of advice about how to stay value oriented. I think that it's important not to set your site as to be happy and positive because it is a serious time. But, and it's very sobering, right? But the thing that you, the thing to go for in this situation is when you start feeling the fear or you start feeling the despair, those are emotions. Those are all threat oriented emotions and you want to introspect them. And so let's just concretize some of the things that people might be going through people's heads. Tell you what, I'll give one and then you give one and we'll work through them both. Like, I'm afraid, I'm afraid that, you know, the anti-Semitism is going to actually, you know, result in attacks on, you know, people I know, right? Yeah. And let's process that one, right? So if you're focused on, I mean, it's scary, right? It is scary. Yeah. This is a real, you know, a value orientation does not mean that you ignore threats. It means that you look at threats carefully. On the contrary, right? Because if you're value oriented, you care about your, you value your values, right? Yes. And therefore you want to be able to identify threats in order to preserve your values. Exactly. And so you look with clear, hard eyes as what is the real threat here? And like, if I were one of these kids on campus who are, you know, like literally being threatened as they walk down the cliff, one of the things that they might think about is what is the objective threat? And is it just harassment or is it, do they actually fear bodily injury? And that would be a really important assessment to make because they might conclude that if it's just harassment, they're going to shrug it off and they're just going to go about their day. Now, if they actually think it's bodily injury, then they need to do something to protect themselves. And I think that that's, you know, that's the kind of thing you need to be in the situation to be able to make that judgment. But that puts you in a place of power, of control, of agency, because you see the terrain and you say, look, I want to go to my classes. I want to do my research. I'm not going to let this intimidation stop me. I'm going. Now, and you do that from a state of confidence. Now, that doesn't mean that the threat disappeared. And it doesn't mean that you're, oh, I'm happy. There's nothing to worry about. It means that you're determined and you're serious and you're pursuing your values. And that is a strong position of power that is, you know, it's not, it's not, we're having a great time, but it's a good position. It's a solid, you know, internally strong position that is comfortable and worthwhile and selfish. Now, a lot of people feel like, I don't know, the futures bleak and you can contradictize it in a lot of different ways. The economy won't be well. The, you know, the physical safety might be threatened. Politics will, you know, taxes will go up. And in any respect, they feel threatened by the future. Right. So let's look at that. So despair, our standard of living is going down. I am not going to be able to afford to retire when I wanted to. I'm not going to have, you know, you actually see you're going to have less than what you want to have. And so again, so this is, this is, there is a risk of this. This is, this is again, something to look at straight. And it may be that when you look at that, you say, because what you want, right, the value that you want is you want to have, you want to have a home. You want to be able to, you know, feed yourself. You want to have your kids grow up, you know, appropriately, all these things. And if you look at that seriously, you know, there is a risk that this is going to be curtailed in some way. If that's really true, you may actually want to change the way that you're running your house. And you may want to make some, some financial decisions. Now, again, this is, this is very specific to your particular situation. But it's a real thing. And as soon as you start taking action to secure your future, even if you think it's going to be somewhat worse than you thought, you'll stop worrying about it. And you'll start seeing where the action is. And that's where, that's, that's why I say, emotions are alerts to values at stake. If this emotion is really bothering you, you want to find out what the cause of that is. And there's something there where there's probably some action needed. Now, on the other hand, if, if you think basically the economy is going to fluctuate and you're confident you can get a job pretty much no matter what the economy is, because, you know, you're willing to go work in retail and you can program or whatever it is, I don't know. You could take the opposite attitude, say, yeah, you know, it's going to go up and down. It may not be as bright a future as I thought, but I'm going to be able to handle it. Yep. And then that too puts it to bed. I mean, I had when COVID hit and actually when there were the riots, I don't know if they were riots, but yeah, there were some riots. Some places, they were riots. Yeah. I was worried about the country devolving into anarchy. This is before the lockdowns had been stopped. I was really worried about that. And I sat down and I thought about, well, what am I going to do if it really is anarchy? Yeah. And, yeah, I mean, I'm a wimp to your own. I've never held a gun, you know, no, that's not true. I have gone skeet shooting once. Okay. And, but I say, you know what I'm going to do? If that's the case, I'm going to fight. I don't know what that's going to be like, but I'm going to find people to fight with and I'm going to help organize them and I'm going to do something. I'll probably die trying. Okay. If anarchy comes, I'm in the trenches. Yeah. And I made that decision. I made that decision, whatever it was, four years ago, three years ago, and I stopped worrying about it. And whenever it crosses my mind, oh my God, we're on the brink of anarchy. Okay. Well, I'm going to fight if that's what happens. Yeah. So, you know, this is facing fears is where your strength comes from. Yeah. And some of this is, some of it is, I mean, bad stuff is happening in the world. It's sad and it's depressing. It's probably not going to, some of it, at least, probably not going to affect you. Not in any direct way. It's probably not very much you can do about it in any way. And you have to, you have to accept that and focus on the things you do have control over. Well, and I think in some cases, if you like it for, for objectivists, I think sometimes what this kind of thing is a wake up call for is that you do want to be active in some way. Like one of the things that keeps me calm is I am working like crazy because my work is going to help teach people how to be selfish. And I do think this is, you know, there are a lot of us working to try and change the culture. And I got my little piece of that puzzle and I'm working on it like crazy. And I know this part, this my little piece is important. Your piece is important. We got a lot of pieces. They're all important. And I'm working on my little piece. And if you, if you are really upset by world events and feel like there's no hope for objectivism, find your little piece of that puzzle and start working it and that will really change it. And part of it is part of it can be just a way to check that I know an institute, right? Part of it is just to, just to support, just to support people who are doing that work and who are working to change the world. You're here. Richard says, what does emotional unavailability mean? It mean to you. Is it possible to cover a lack of emotions with spirit such as enthusiasm? Oh, well, I think what you're talking about is repression where you're literally not in touch with some of the more important values. And that can absolutely be covered with, oh, yes, this is, oh, are we having a good time yet? Where you're only focused on superficials and you're having, you know, positives and minuses to just the top thin layer of what's happening without ever actually responding to the deeper issues. That can absolutely happen. So you would see emotional unavailability as repression. Yeah, I'd say that would be the cause of it. Yeah, right. Yeah. I mean, I suppose someone could be just putting up a wall and you could do it deliberately, right? You could put on an artificial. That wouldn't be repression? No, so repression is where you actually aren't in touch with the values. And repression is where it's been automated. It's automated. It's automated and you actually don't know the values. And I think that does happen with, I mean, I think sometimes people were, oh, that is the case. Yeah. But you, you know, you probably could put on a mask, but then it would be conscious. Okay. Proper ask. How do you overcome a second-handed psychology self-esteem? What are some good resources on this topic? Why do some people see being judged as a threat? Okay. So let's start with the first. So I have a somewhat different view on how you deal with something like second-handedness than I think the standard way is because the way it's always been described to me was that you had to root out that premise. And I don't think that's the right way to think about it. I think that it's very helpful to conceptualize to see in what way you think you are second-handedness. So people tend to be either the victim kind or the approval kind or the controlling kind. Very helpful to know which those are and how that shows up so that you can spot it. But the reason for that is not because you're then going to chastise yourself, oh my God, there's my second-handed premise. It's like, oh, this thing here where I'm trying to make this person agree with me, straighten them out and get them to agree. This is on a controlling premise. This is second-handed. The benefit of having that abstraction is that you can quickly see, oh, I'm in one of those situations. This is an opportunity for reprogramming your value hierarchy. I think the thing you need to do here is to reprogram your values. So like if what you're trying to do is you're trying to control other people like say, let's take the talking one where you're trying to basically badger them into agreeing with you. You're really wanting some kind of alignment. Now, alignment is a perfectly rational value, but it is not rational to do it by badgering another person. And if you can in that moment say, oh, what I'm really looking for is alignment and I see, I'm trying to do it through this other person, let me back off, let me first of all apologize for, gee, I feel like I've been badgering you and I didn't really intend that. And let me say what I'm really after, what I'm really looking for is if can we be aligned on this? You can actually find an area of an agreement and then you find out whether this person is a candidate or not. And if they're not, you go look for someone else. Actually intervening at that moment when all of your past value programming was getting you to badger them and stopping and separating out the mistaken part from the rational part and acting appropriately, reprograms those values. It reduces the second handed part. It strengthens the rational part. And it gives you proof of concept that you can behave differently in these situations and recognizing that it's an issue of second handedness, having that concept makes it easier to monitor and notice, hey, this is one of those cases. Now you still need to intervene every single time and there may be skills involved in being able to intervene. Like in this particular case, I used this communication technique, this nonviolent communication technique. And that is, I actually think this, I need to make a clarification. One of the reasons I run my own communication intensives is because on the first day, I interpret the nonviolent communication in a very objectivist way. And I think it bring in a trainer and it's very effective because I've already answered all the objections. And then we have a closeout where we actually talk about it if there are some other objections. If you just go to a straight NVC training, you might, there's a woke element in some of that training and there can be some stuff that won't seem rational. So I just want to clarify that. It's not a full endorsement. It's not a full endorsement. I have a cleaned up version of it that I recommend, but my point is that is a skill that's a learnable skill. And it's the same thing like with if it's approval. If they're typically what it is that you want is connection. You really want to feel closer to this person. Well, approval is a really poor alternative to a more firsthanded type connection. And if you can see that in that moment, you can actually look for, yeah, you know what, we're in disagreement here. And I've made this decision myself. And I'd like you to actually respect my autonomy. You'd actually get more closeness by asserting what you're doing and not wanting their approval than you would from the approval. So that's the general thing that I recommend. So he also asked, why do some people see being judged as a threat? Well, I mean, there are all kinds of possible explanations for that. The simple one is if they have been, if they're afraid to judge themselves, hearing negative judgments that you actually agree with in other people's mouths makes it harder to avoid them. So that's one of the reasons people don't like being judged because it puts right in their face things that they don't want to be thinking about about themselves. The other thing is, I mean, if you have any kind of second-handedness, any kind of desire for approval, you're getting disapproval. I don't know if there's that bigger explanation than that. And of course it's culture-wide because of the altruism and second-handedness in the culture. I mean, this is, judging is supposedly a bad... It's obvious you don't want other people judging you because, I mean, unless the judgment is always positive, it's too risky. Yeah. The hardcore MVCers think you shouldn't judge, even make positive judgments. And the interesting thing about that is, there's a gratitude process in MVC where rather than saying, oh, you were so great, that was wonderful. Oh, I see, I didn't do this for you. You do something like this. Yaron, I heard your show on the war and I felt so educated. I really want to tell you, I appreciate having all that knowledge and feeling like I can be up-to-date on the facts. Interesting. Okay. Right, which is really telling you what I got out of it instead of saying, thank you, Yaron. Yeah. And there's like a big difference. You probably feel more visible as a result of that. Absolutely. Yeah. Because it doesn't matter how I feel. What it matters is the visibility, that's the connection that we can actually get. Yeah. Right, Richard asks, what makes a work of art meaningful? Is it the extent to which it fulfills a person's needs? I bet you're a better person to answer this than I am, Yaron. You're the art enthusiast here. Yeah, I mean, I don't know that a person's needs to phrase it. It certainly is the extent to which, I mean, meaningful to you, right? Because it's not, nothing's meaningful out of context. It's meaningful to you. It has to do with your values and it has to do the extent to which it aligns and reflects back to you, gives you visibility. You can use that, right? Right. In your own values and as a consequence, creates an emotional response in you. If an artwork doesn't create an emotional response in you, it's going to be meaningful to you. That's part of what art does, is it creates an emotional connection. So it needs to give you visibility into your values. And I think that's the philosophical, the cognitive world of art as well as the meaning. Does that make sense? It makes sense to me. I mean, because it's a sense of life response. Yeah. So there's got to be something about your take on the world that's captured in this work of art. And then... And I think it's going back to kind of what you've been talking about. Art can serve as a really powerful tool for self-knowledge, for identifying your values, because we all do respond differently to different works of art. And trying to understand why you respond or where you respond to a particular art of work, work of art, you'll learn about yourself and your own values and what you care about to your powerful self-discovery tool. It is. And that's something that I've noticed is my emotional responses to the characters in Atlas and the Fountainhead have changed over time, particularly the Fountainhead, because I was completely intimidated by Howard Rourke the first time I read it. And someone identified with Peter Keating, which was horrifying to me. I mean, I was really upset. I cried and I cried when I read the Fountainhead. And that has really changed over the years, really changed. And that's actually one of the problems. I actually don't recommend that you set as a goal to change your psychology. I recommend you set as goals to create things out in the world. And on the way you will change your psychology, because it's so difficult to get an objective assessment of have things changed. But when you respond differently to a work of art like that, you actually see, wow, my psychology is actually different than it was 30 years ago. Yep. So Harry's on the chat correcting me as he should. He said it's more than visibility for your values. It's visibility for your metaphysics. And that's right. I mean, it's your metaphysical values, value judgments, right? That's what art is projecting back at you. So it's about your most fundamental views about the world and about life. It's telling you something about that. And that's what gives it meaning. It's when those connect. Thank you, Harry. It's always good to have somebody there that nudges you on the right path. Andrew says, how does one begin to reduce automatized guilt? To reduce automatized guilt from altruism. Ah. Well, so first of all, I don't recommend setting emotions as goals. So it's a guilt. If you feel guilt, let's stipulate it's unearned guilt. You still need to process it. Why do you need to process it? One of two, the only thing that can cause that to come up is something that's a little mis, you know, misorganized say in your subconscious either. You still have a really high value of say, approval or something like that. Or of charity. Right. So I mean, if you're raised a good altruist and I was raised a good altruist, I think we all were giving to other people, you know, that's just, that's just, that's made into being a very high value. And that can still have a lot of strength in your subconscious. And so how do you change that? You change that by a conscious choice. So if you feel guilty and you're saying, wow, I'm feeling like I need to give this kid my candy bar or whatever it is, right? This doesn't quite make sense, but I feel like I need to give this poor person $10. Okay. That is the moment. This is now a choice point where you have a chance to bring in your conscious convictions and reorganize things. And the first thing to do is to actually recognize, oh my God, I'm in this conflict. I feel like I should give this $10 to this, this, you know, poor person. And part of me says, oh my God, that's that old altruism that's wrong. This is like, God, I feel all screwed up. This is a really, when you're in conflict like this, this is not comfortable. Okay. The discomfort is part of the deprogramming process. If you do not let yourself feel the conflict, you cannot reprogram the values. And I think that a lot of times people they go, well, this can't be right because this is uncomfortable. No, if you need to reprogram some values, you do need to work through the conflict. It's uncomfortable. It's not painful. It's just uncomfortable. You can handle it. And so in this moment, you say, well, why do I want to give this guy the $10? And gee, I can't think of any reason except that, you know, my mother would approve. And then you say, well, why do I want to keep the $10? Well, and then, well, what is your reason for wanting to keep the $10? And, you know, and then if you get the context of, well, you know, I earned this money. And, you know, this is something, if I save $10 now at, you know, there's, I've just been listening to this book where they give the number of, you know, you save $10 every day. You know how much money that is in 20 years? It's a lot of money, right? So this is actually money for my future. And if you can make that in that moment and say, look, I can either just expend it on this guy or I can actually invest it in my future. Makes it easy. Yeah. And maybe not easy, but it makes it clear. Yeah. And then actually acting on, you know what? I'm going to go put this in the bank. And if you then toddle off and put it in the bank with the idea of, this is, this is my investment in myself. You are reinforcing your commitment to selfishness. You have decreased the value of charity. You have literally acted on your best judgment. So you have reinforced your sense of yourself is doing the right thing. You, in that one choice. You reorganize some things a bit. Now it doesn't reorganize everything, but it is a material change in the emotions that you're going to feel after that are going to be different. So it's, so it's about, you know, really bringing to consciousness what is, you know, the source of the guilt and what, what the conflict really is and what the selfish, you know, what the, what the selfish choice is. And then, and then committing oneself to that, committing yourself to the egoistic choice. And if you, if you keep doing that, if every time the guilt comes up, you keep doing that, you're in a sense reprogram and the guilt will slowly go away. Yes. And there, let me add two things about that. It's the general point here is give contrary motivation. Excuse me, a fair hearing because you should not assume you know what that guilt means. You should not assume, I know that that guilt is mistaken. Because that is actually treating the guilt as a problem. And if you just try to push away the guilt instead of introspect it, you never actually make the value judgment conscious. And B, you start being afraid of your feelings. So it's really just a disaster if you act as if you know that that feeling is mistaken. So you need to give the contrary motivation of fair hearing. The second thing is if you find that you get yourself into a vicious cycle where you, it's just really difficult to like pull yourself out. Then there are stronger tactics that you can use where, and, but they rely on realizing, oh my God, I've gotten myself in a vicious circle where I'm here like completely focused on what other people think or altruism, whatever. And you need to learn like a wholesale way to cut out of that. And again, it's activating a different context. So, and that you can do at your desk so that you have a tool to break out of it if you find yourself in it. All right. Justin asks, how can one increase one's attention span? Okay. Well, the critical thing for an attention span is to know your purpose. That's come up several times here. And it needs to be a selfish purpose. So, so I guess we need a context here. Attention span in what situation mean like listening to another person. So there, like if it's listening to another person, you need to know that you want to connect with them and you want to understand what they're saying. And that intention then makes you, gives you a reason to take in what they're saying and you can do active listening. If you don't have that intention, you can't do active listening and you'll get bored. Right. Part of the way that you maintain your attention is by actively taking in, relating it to your purpose. And that's part of what the intellectual stimulation is. That's part of why it's not just sitting there looking at something. Cause if you ever get into a staring mode, you're going to go unconscious. Yeah. If you just, or just trying to listen and just trying to take it in. It's the passive that really is the problem. And if you're in a passive mode, you're going to be pulled out of it. So how to be more active. That's something that you, that is a muscle you can practice by being more active, being more purposeful, monitoring your purpose more, that will help. Harry has a comment about the previous one. He says, how about figuring out or finding out what the person would do with the $10. Is he going to use it to better himself or to get a drink? Well, you know, so that's a great example about, you know, if you, if you were a conscious egoist and you were tempted to give this person $10. We need to flesh out the example. Why would you be tempted to give him $10? Now, I actually gave a guy $5. The other, it was six months. I forget when it was six months ago or something. Because he had a whole story with props about groceries. And I didn't really believe the story, but I gave him $5 in payment value. Right. You know, I mean he had, he, you know, it's a whole story about he needed to get these groceries and he had some groceries and it was really, it was quite impressive. I gave $5 for it. I mean, my sense, Harry would be, why would I want to figure it out? That is, I mean, I guess there's certain benevolence there, but for most of the time, when people are just standing there and they want $10, I'm not even tempted. I no longer am I tempted even to give it. And unless there's some reason, like this guy has an interesting story, I'm not really that curious. I guess maybe that's a state of the world that we're in is I'm not really that curious about how they're going to use it. I've got other things to do with the money and I've got other things to do with life. But maybe that is a little, maybe in a better world, that would be more of something that would interest us because it would be rare. Maybe the people are asking for money and just out of benevolence, it would be interesting to find out what they want. I always tend to give money if they're offering a value. So I like the people by the side of street playing a violin or trying to sing. You know, even if they're doing a decent job, right? If they're completely pathetic, then they don't deserve it because they're annoying. But if they're doing a decent job, then I appreciate the effort that they're making. He says only if you attempted and a poll to do it. Right. It didn't happen to me anymore. Maybe a long time ago. Yeah. And that's the whole point. If you're actually in conflict, there is something pulling you to that and so you need to look at that. And that's what, yeah. All right. So we got one last question from Justin. How to get the good, how to get good at resisting urges? For example, avoiding unhealthy food when you're trying to lose weight. So here, I think it's very important to not think of it as resisting. Because one of the things that I teach, I have a whole class on what I call self-direction. And that's in contrast to self-indulgence and self-discipline. Now self-indulgence is you just, you want the cookie and so you eat it, right? And that definitely puts on the weight. The problem with self-discipline, which is where you just resist it and you force yourself and you don't do it. The problem with that is that basically uses threat orientation and deprivation to try to get what is good for you. And over time, you do feel deprived. And that makes it harder to sustain that. So what you actually need is you need some value-oriented way to do the thing that is good for you in that moment. And there's different levels. So like the short version is, you have this temptation and you take a pause and you remind yourself why it is that you're dieting and hopefully you've actually figured out what to do instead in this moment and you do the thing. Now, if you are still like wildly tempted, I have what I call a course correction process. And it starts with a hard stop. You've got to physically get yourself out of that situation because if you're looking at that cookie, the more you look at that cookie, the more the saliva is going. What I do is I take a three-minute walk. Here's how you take a three-minute walk. Sometime when you don't need a three-minute walk, go out with a timer, set a clock for 90 seconds, walk out of your house, take a route, wherever you get to in 90 seconds, turn around and come back. You now know a three-minute walk or you can do it in your office building. Three minutes is enough time to break the context. And walking is very good. It doesn't have to be walking, but walking is very good because it lets you start, you actually see different things and it's helpful to kind of get your brain moving again. And what I do on that three-minute walk is actually I activate a self-esteem context and I have this kind of catchy way of doing it. You're going to have your own back. This means you're not going to run away, right? There's a conflict here. You want the cookie. You want the diet. You're going to deal with this conflict. You're not going to run away from the fact there's a conflict here. You're going to deal with it. You're not going to melt down. So your value is at stake. There's a reason you put yourself on a diet. You're going to remember you're going to adhere to that. You're not going to stab yourself in the back. If you know that you tend to go to emotional eating and that that gets you in a lot of trouble, you say, okay, I'm not going to do emotional eating. I'm going to find some other way. So this is going to be done in less than three minutes. So now you problem solved. So what's the problem? Well, it probably is emotional eating. Well, if that's the case, what's going on that's got you upset that makes you want to cookie to feel better? Go deal with that problem. Right. Or if it's, you know, you're actually genuinely hungry and you don't have a good snack, like you're out of your, you know, carrots. Okay. Go to the grocery store and get carrots. The three minute walk is a, if you can't immediately activate the better context, the three minute walk gives you a chance to marshal your deeper reserves and solve the problem. Good. All right. Mary Ellen added many years ago, I gave a quarter to a guy who signed said, why lie? I need a beer out loud with a quarter for the laugh. All right. Eugene, this has been, this has been amazing. A lot of fun. And I think, I think we got some really good questions. So thank you so much for having me. Absolutely. My pleasure. Thanks. Thanks to you guys. Thanks all the super chat is. Thanks to all the people on the chat with questions. I will see you guys tomorrow for another news roundup. And we've also got a show on Saturday. So I'll see you guys tomorrow. Thank you, Jean. Bye. Thanks. Good night.