 Hello, I'm Zan Perion and I just got finished speaking here at the 21 convention in Miami, Florida You're about to watch it an episode of the video series that I created Called in search of the alabaster girl and it's about a book I wrote called the alabaster girl and the video series is it is an in-depth commentary in a round table discussion About the themes and the concepts of the book. So I hope you enjoy what you're about to watch. Let's begin First of all, I want to say I'm absolutely thrilled that you guys are here to join me in this little project this Experiment coffee conversation around the book the alabaster girl Kind of a running Commentary like behind the DVD movie It's a behind-the-scenes commentary about why and what and in a deeper exploration of themes here And I can't think of a better group of guys to share this with I've got rich here Jordan oh one all the way from Australia, and I'm very happy to Begin this conversation, and it's going to be long and it's gonna be deep So let's stop right at the very beginning Why did you write this book your book the alabaster girl? Okay, well, I've been thinking about I've been wanting to write a book about my Knowledge or my my learnings With women for many years. I've been wanting to Capture some of the moments and capture some of the things I've tried to understand and as you guys know I've done a lot of public speaking. I've done a lot of You know coaching and seminars and stuff I had around that but the book really is the whole the whole knowledge or the whole culmination of everything I've known in all my years to this point and So I've been wanting to write this book for probably Over 20 years, and I'm thinking about for a long time and there's pieces in this book that were written More than 10 years ago There's some like pieces that are written more than 10 years ago So it was a long drawing out process and it's it's something I wanted to say that I Wish that I would have had when I was young when I was 1920 trying to figure things out and I was Insecure and trying to you know be interesting and be cool, and I had no answers So this is kind of my legacy back to myself. I guess you could say well I've been wondering who the book was for Because I've heard you say that before but it also seems like large parts of the book are written to a woman Yeah, and Also, you mentioned that actually these are memories that you want to keep yourself when you were an old man Yeah Yeah, it's kind of like what Kassan over did when he got old he wrote down his memories And so he could relive them and it's kind of I understand that a bit um Yeah, I started to write this book as a kind of a How-to I guess you could say or an instruction e-type book, you know, like you see them The general way that books are written today in this genre, which is okay guys Here's something I've learned and you could incorporate this and here's three steps to X Y Z and but it didn't feel right and I could have put this book out Five years ago and took me ten years to write it. I could put it out five years ago But then it wouldn't have been an honest book It would have been a cool book And guys would say hey, I like that book from San Perry. I learned this and I learned this and would have good information in it but it had to have some kind of Vulnerability in it deeper questions deeper exploration To be authentic I guess or to be to make it a real I don't know to make it real and make it a real reflection of the man that you you've become yes And not and not make it not to be cool They could write a book that makes me look cool It says all the cool things and all the right answers and all that but there's a bit more in in my mind There's more mystery in this book and more questions in this book than there are answers That's how I see it so so You said you've ended up with a book that has three different parts. Yeah, and it seems like some of it is instructional Okay, let me in a way. Let me talk about that the flow of this book. I Said it took me ten years to write it and it wasn't because I Was blocked or I didn't know what to put next right? You know, I had volumes of things in my mind that I could put down on paper In fact, I would say you know what I think about I would say that 80% of this book was written five years ago Wow In fact, I went Maybe you guys already know this but I went four years ago Maybe a little bit longer than that. I went to Nicaragua. I was traveling. I was doing talks I was doing this kind of stuff and I was working on the book But not really concentrating on it and you know that that well I have this thought all the time or not all the time I mean that man if you ever got stuck in prison for six months or got on a deserted island You could sure get a lot done like writing right? Yeah, and I thought how can I artificially create this for myself? So I took off I had this travel schedule I was doing the seminars of that and I took off to Nicaragua Just to work on the book just to fight for something just to say okay, it's 80% done. Let's go sit somewhere where it's quiet where there's no distractions and And and fight for the finishing this book and for four and a half years going I went to Nicaragua I thought I'm here for three or four months. There's there's no reason I can't finish it I'm gonna finish it my goal is to finish the book then four years later Finally finished it and and in Nicaragua was interesting because I had no distractions there. No one spoke English It was a small fishing village on you know on on the surf on the ocean And the woman next door would bring me a fish every day I sat in the same t-shirt shorts every day and just sat there no no real electricity fact no electricity And so at eight o'clock when it gets dark you just Go to bed because there's nothing else to do and you get up and that when the chickens are Clicking and growing and stuff and I would sit down at the book With my writing implements at the desk and I say okay. I'm gonna start full day ahead Nothing to do. No to-do list. No internet. No Facebook. No, right? And so here I am and I would sit down there and I would look at stuff I'd looked at yesterday and I change a word Change it back change a phrase look at it like this write a couple sentences Do another paragraph Think you know maybe that thing I wrote earlier should be here and I go find that try and find that and try and stick It here an hour to go by me just picking away and then I would say you know what I Really need to think about this bit and I go for a walk I walk along the beach and surf and big surf crashes of that And I would walk along thinking and then I'd come back and look at it again for a little bit And I think you know, maybe I'm just tired. I need nap So I'd lay in a hammock and you know just leave and read one of the books I found laying around there and and lay in the hammock for a while and take a nap And then I'd get eat the fish the the lovely woman brought over with the beans and the rice and then Look at the book again And then you get dark And I'm not kidding when I say that I was not productive at all on my deserted island on my prison sense Yeah, you were it's every day. Yeah, I looked at it every day, but more I wandered more I wandered and Looked at this I learned Spanish and you know from from the from the people there were lovely people I looked at the surf you stared at it. I laid on my in my bed I looked up to geckos eating the the moss just watch that and spoke a little Spanish and and what I And I thought why can I am I not productive in in my normal world? I distract myself Yeah, because I'm gonna take a shower I gotta get on Facebook and and no one wants to go for a coffee, you know So there's a million distractions I didn't have any distractions there and I sit and I said to myself Why am I not productive and I was beating myself up? How can I can't finish this book there with no distractions? I'm inventing And I did only realize recently all these years later that and I know I was talking to somebody at Nicaragua that sojourn there that Disappearance into the wilderness for me my 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness was not Even though I thought it was was not At time to finish the book. It was a time to reflect on the deeper questions of the book Mm-hmm, and it's informed throughout the Nicaraguan experience and the things I thought about then are informed in here So it created it as some kind of a depth to it that didn't have before so So I that was the real purpose of it and like and I sat in questions and I sat in confusion the whole time in Nicaragua and And lay in the hammock and take it out. I'm I can't get this going I can't get it, but it was a necessary part of it And it's what and you know and when I came away from there from that culture shock to Amsterdam I went straight from four months of like sitting and sweating, you know bug-scrolling around to Amsterdam and I did a major seminar and With you know, 20 guys who did weekend intensively where they boom and boom and my whole message changed because of Nicaragua Yeah, it came to that You know, that's what I'm wondering because it's bit off the topic of the book How are you different in your seminar after four and a half months in Nicaragua? It's where I it's where I I came up Nicaragua and put in my head this phrase Which I've been saying ever since which is every great life has had in it a great renunciation That that arose from my thinking in an anguish in Nicaragua So so I mean like the book was hard for me to write It's the hardest thing I've ever done and to and I have a lot of respect for people who are writers and can construct a book from Beginning to end because it's the force for the trees. You can't see like I'm looking at this Paragraph here and I'm thinking well, there's another paragraph. I wrote that really should go next year and I kept You know Working on a little iPad and what is my travels and I'm like trying to scroll and find these pieces and yeah It was a hard thing to do structurally content was not so hard But structurally and the flow and to go back to your question Jordan I originally started to write this as a book to my younger self. I guess you could say to men It was like a say, you know what? This is what I've learned and I toyed with all kinds of concepts like And the the conversation in the book which ended up being between a man and a woman Could be between an older man and a younger man and all the things I've learned I'm 80 now and I'll teach you but the problem is that 80 year old man came to his dating life at a different era That doesn't apply to the guy the young guy would tinder and Facebook and everything all flowing around now doesn't work So his advice is a Hogwarts church to meet your woman and you know, it's simple sunny Right, but it isn't simple and it's a complex these days much more complex. We've ever had in history. I would say There's too many options. Just like there's too many breakfast cereal options, right? So so so I wrestled with you know, I didn't want to write a how-to book or a self-help book so I wanted to write a kind of a Metaphor I guess you could say and I and I did and ended up that I realized I could write something more Authentic if I'm saying it to women if I wrote a book about women to women That's presumptuous But it's what I attempted to do and so And so I didn't end up being I'll say this because I and I also abstracted it for myself. I Removed it one step removed for myself because it's the guy on the train And people say why you said in the book this is a novel It gives me a little bit of a So I don't know why it had to be that because it couldn't be just Zanperian speaking to women. Yeah, that felt that didn't ring ring true in some way. It had to have this kind of a Journey spirit to it. And as you guys know and ended being a journey on a train Why a train? Where's a train go? It's like Why is it an interview on a train as opposed to a coffee shop? I don't know It just had to be that way and it just evolved that way and the train also has a captive audience for him If he's sitting down for two hour interview at it, you know a table like this Let's do the interview but he's stuck on the train with a woman sitting across from it He can't escape and he says You know what so then he really has to explore He doesn't have to he can still say what she does at the beginning. I Get to your interview. I got good answers. Let's go. I've been here before And she said I don't want that. I want to know the real what you've never said before What really is behind your thought process? What is the good and the bad behind there? And he's never said that before and he says, you know all these years. I Have the answers. I have the pad answers So what is it that I haven't said and so so he's all the whole thing is like Since I'm stuck with you on the train and you see some seems sincere and I've never said it before I'm gonna say it. I'm gonna tell you everything everything you know about women that I've never really said and Then the becomes that becomes the rest of books of the the you know the chapter start with this dialogue of the man and woman on train he's being interviewed because he wrote a book this is the Inception layer type thing. Yeah, you wrote a book called the alabaster girl, which is the book within the book which is a fake book and And so he basically says So the first thing is to interview with them And he says you really want to know the whole truth? I'm gonna brain dump and it becomes this kind of like the monologue where he's like talking to Women in general it expands to the audience of women and interspersed through his monologue His pieces of the fictional book he wrote Which is the very poetic love story that he's had with women that he injects it's injected through the pages So there's actually three different styles of writing here that the the train conversation is very You know kind of rat-a-tat-tat. Yeah, you're right. It's like normal people talk Yeah, and then the monologue gets more into this let me understand and he gets a bit more floored and a bit more Ornamental I guess you could say and then his remembrances are Stream of consciousness and and and impressionist paintings of women that he's known and and it's the fleeting image of this woman as opposed to Hey, I met Rebecca on the corner of you know fifth and vine and We went for a coffee and you know He wanted to write about the feeling of it as an impressionist painter would write about the feeling of The bridge as opposed to just painting the bridge. Is that one of those three layers that is closest to your heart? Yeah Yeah, the alabaster pieces the fictional pieces the essays that are the impressionist ones Yeah, where the easiest one to me to write. Yeah, those are one take I'm not kidding like I like those are one pass through and The conversation on training was the hardest. I changed that for years That doesn't you wouldn't talk like that. She wouldn't say that logically and I didn't want it to be like It was hard. The conversation with the train was the hardest thing for me, right? I rewrote that rewrote it rewrote it rewrote it the alabaster pieces. I'll tell you a little story. I I I made a commitment to publish this on December 14 my birthday My 50th birthday said I'm gonna I'm gonna publish that book. It's been 10 years since my 40th when I started I want to publish it on my birthday. So I gave myself for the first time a deadline and And on December 12th, I Was in Bucharest gonna go to my to Vancouver to visit my family for my birthday and for the publishing of this book the release of this book and on the plane from from Bucharest to Warsaw and the layover and the and the nine-hour flight from Warsaw to Toronto Or you know or to Vancouver. I came out how exactly was I wrote an alabaster piece, which is the one about Brazil With one take without no editing no one looked at it ever and I just slid it into the book the day before I published it and It's my favorite piece It's the one I didn't review and didn't talk about yeah and didn't agonize and change maybe this word's not I couldn't I had No time to replace the words and it's my favorite piece Wow So I'm wondering You live 40 years of life Yeah, exploration Into women exploration of life. They spend 10 years writing a book about that. What's it like to? Turn 50 and have that massive project Closed and complete. I always said you know when I finish this Years I'm writing this book. I said when I'm finished this book I've been traveling and a little iPad or little netbook I've always been a gamer and a computer And I always like I said when I finish this book I'm gonna go sit somewhere for three months buy a screaming game machine with a video card and the sound card and sit There and then play video games for three months because I haven't done it in a long time to celebrate But what was interesting when I finished this and the day I published it and and and it was very strange me I had no sense of Celebration at all Like you know you score the winning goal and you win the Stanley Cup or the you know and you're like that kind of feeling Yeah, and I talked to Christopher our friend Christopher who just he didn't try to do his his music album for years and And he had the same thing when he finally finished his album. He said like he that's done What's the next project and it's a kind of the same thing people to climb Everest they get up there and they're up there for two Minutes are like what's next after eight years of preparation. You're like, okay? Well, I remember talking with you because we lived together for a little while as you were starting to put things into structure and We're talking about this whole idea of men who build yachts in their yard So yeah So you can get plans off the internet and all the different pieces to make up a sailboat and take it on this Dream trip of a lifetime around the world Be like the independent man who constructs it from start to finish I found on the internet that most people that start that Construction project never actually finish it. There's a sense of attachment to the journey itself and the boat remains three-quarters done in the yard Where they finish the boat and then they they have a heart attack and die. Yeah, right? It's just so Purpose the heart's been taken out. Yeah Yeah, I know I know a guy exactly that he built this boat He's gonna he had this plan to take it down to Costa Rica's of that building it and I think it's Vancouver and When he finished it he died by hand You know So you didn't die. Yeah, I didn't die, but I also had no sense of like intellectually and You know in on that level. I knew that I had Accomplished what I set out to do So I didn't have any bad feeling about it and had a great feeling that it was out there and I got great responses from people and And those landed like strong compliments like this really changed my life. So that it landed with me But it never got a sense of hey, I did something cool for these strange strange sense that I didn't go Get it even though I have a few yes, I can't describe it. It was really strange It's strange that I have it here, but I'd never felt it here that I that I that I accomplished that it's just kind of like Because I got kind of tired of it It's like the castle said you never finish a painting you walk away, right and I could have keep editing since forever and writing and adjusting and and And honestly guys that was a year ago. I published this book. I haven't looked at it since It's except for today. I Have not looked at this book at all. I They want me to do an audio book like people write me say I'm not a book in your voice. I'm like I Can't read that book again like I want to change this and this and this back. They said that Yeah, I read you and so you were working harder and harder and harder right until that final date where you sent it off and Snuck the the Brazil piece in it last minute. Yeah Before we dive into the contents of the book a bit more deeply Is there anything now when you look back on it that you wish you'd changed or that you feel like you missed? You know what's interesting All the years I was writing this book If you guys ever hung out with me at all and you guys did If you saw me just sitting around having a like coffee conversation, which is great that would get the captain on these things I would we would have an idea a bounce an idea off of and Owen would say something and say hey That's that's exactly right because this and I'm taking notes on napkins. I have I've been taking notes on napkins for years and years and years and years and little pieces of paper and shredded paper And then I and I worked it into my book too and when I finished the book I stopped taking notes that was remarkable to me like something got out of my system and and on maybe in a little phrase or a turn of phrase or a little Clarification which is what we want to do here in this is great conversation a deep in your clarification But a new concept or a concept that hasn't it there's not I can't think of anything and There's probably a lot. Yeah, but I just my mind kind of shut down from the subject of men women dynamic that polarity which is the whole thing this is about and it kind of just shut down not not stop being interested in it but Started looking for the next The next thing to explore I guess so does that mean you've outgrown your relentless pursuit to understand women from the feminine That's a great question. That's a great question The relentless pursuit that I've had all these years to understand women probably but the feminist spirit and the masculine spirit and the Combining of the two or you know that that further journey. No That's still very much because what my next things and what people have said to me like the next thing We'd love to hear from you is like more of the of that adventure You left home and hearth and you took off into the wild without any safety net And that's kind of where I want to go with the next kind of project. I want to talk about what is that feeling of? You know letting go of the shore Binding yourself to the mast and putting yourself into the elements and and so that it is Still relative to our relationship with women and polarities that have it. It's more of a it becomes more of a An inner quest like I guess I guess you say I don't know. It's a good question Start the hero's journey almost. Yeah, yeah to get that courage to leave home sure that moments like Yeah, and you know and more and more I'm hearing people say We'd like to hear that story not personal story necessary, but that that Explored that kind of a concept like what is it? What is this seeking of adventure? No matter what the cost? Which is this is to but it's very strongly, you know the journey of this man and his life of women so Reminds me of so a lot of a lot of people come and spend time with you spend time with Amarati reminds me of man who's here with us a couple of weeks ago in Bucharest and he was called in dead man because he reminded me of Johnny Depp in that film You know where it starts off with order and it goes into chaos Yeah, see this man at some point gets pushed around and takes a leap into the wildness and the unknown and He's sat on that question of do I stay in my modern rational clear structured life back home? Or do I take off into the elements and it's like Yeah, so many of us that gather around to talk about your book about the themes about the Azamurata On that mode or on that precipice of yeah, do I really do it? Do I actually follow my authentic truth in my heart and take a dive into chaos? That's exactly what it is. I mean I Jordan. I've been saying for years. I've had this notion for years that all the best stores All the best books all the best films to me anyway involved journey and it's not a journey to You know The promised land it's a journey from order to chaos like you said like apocalypse now Sheltering sky dead man Johnny Depp. It's all everything's all buttoned up and normal and then there's a journey into like just Chaos and this very much is the same thing to me is like at the beginning of the book He says strong things confidence and he's he knows the answer say he's been interviewed before he knows what you know I'll tell you what I know about women. I know this and this and this and this and I also know this Right and as he goes in his journey and as the train continues to go and she asked deeper questions of him his Order become goes to chaos and it becomes it goes to mystery the whole book flows outward to mystery And it is a very this feels like maybe when people reading it They don't they don't feel that necessarily and except maybe a train but to me This is a complete journey the book is a journey from order to chaos from knowledge to mystery from from absolute confident things that we know and and the curiosity of the unknown and what what's possible potential It's going to a horizon that you don't know and and to me like I could I could never write another book They doesn't have that same kind of field either has to be like that I Think it's funny that way. We're sorry. That's that's that's the way the tango was described to me as well Yeah, it's a dance into the unknown. Yeah, oh, that's perfect. Mm-hmm. That's great Because that's that's where the you know, I've always had you know, you know We shouldn't be seeking answers. We should be seeking the greater mystery. Yeah small mindset and answers Big mindset and questions And so off to me that's like and this would this had to be a book of questions that if I wrote a five years ago I finished a five years ago be a good book of answers. Yeah. Yeah, that's good but it had to be a book of Let's put these answers aside. Let's mention them. Mm-hmm. Let's put them aside because what else? Where can we possibly go? That's the idea makes me think of interacting with women as well like I experienced there is something much more Seductive romantic about a man who's sat in these questions rather than is a walk-in answer to yeah everything Yeah, because there's We'll touch on that when we get into the book more, but that's You know, that's the essence of what true seduction is which I didn't know for years Seek seduction is like saying things a certain way or Doing things a certain way but seduction is to have that the great confidence of knowing that you are a student of life You don't have all the answers, but but you're okay with that And you're okay with the vulnerability and the mystery of it. And that's what's what is seductive to women We would call authenticity Your authenticity is you good and all you and your bad all together and fully embraced We try to hide our bad points and are high. Yeah, but fully embrace and say this is who I am and I'm learning I can forgive myself everything because I am I'm at least the student. I'm trying to learn. Yeah, right so So before we go into the bigger questions Do you want to say something about the cover? Ah, yeah, I get it's called the alabaster girl. Yes It's a beautiful girl. Yeah, dawned in white smelling flowers And the rest of the covers kind of gray and stormy and Yeah It's interesting darkness to it. It's interesting because I This cover came together about six weeks before publication. It's maybe two months And and my girlfriend Dan and I were look trying to for a couple years were Discussing concepts and maybe I didn't want to have it so obvious that there's a woman on the cover You know like a woman like a romance null or anything And it were or the shape of a woman to obvious. Yeah, or you know or a flame that's in the shape of a what you know I mean, yeah off a candle. Yeah, I don't want to have it so obvious and I said I can't have woman on cover It has to be some kind of abstract Thing so we toyed with the ideas of like a kind of a blue ribbon just kind of like floating in on a black background You know so it doesn't really inform but then and it a Great designer in Romania Andre Kretchen who's did a fantastic job. He came with he came a cell come up some different concepts This is the number one concept concept and he had four other ones, which are brilliant, too And this this is a photograph that's obviously been adjusted by a Ukrainian young guy is about 20 years old and this is a model he uses in his photos and He created this photograph with this background and So we contacted Igor Lako who is the the photographer who is brilliant. He's a brilliant photo photographic artist Got the rights to this picture My designer here in Romania designed the cover and I didn't change a single thing because it was so Landing and perfect and the symbolism is all over the place. Yeah, and and we could speak about it say well this bird represents, you know what I mean, and yes, and But it really is to me. It's a feel You look at that and you get the same feel as when it when I is what I wanted to capture in the conversation In the book itself So it really aligned and really matched up and it was only like two months or a month before and I'm and I kind of like Makes me will shiver a little bit to think what if I didn't get this and I had to like slap something together. Yeah You know what I mean? It just came together. Thank you, Andre Yeah, and Igor great great great designers who have a better eye than me So I remember you playing around with paint for Windows One one other quick thing don't know if you want to talk about this now, but alabaster Like why alabaster and What is an alabaster girl is is that something here? Yeah, because it is a question that arises because alabaster is a soft malleable stone that you know the It's like the the woman with the alabaster box in the Bible It was Mary Magdalene who like you know had oil in the alabaster box and she washed the feet of Jesus or anointed the feet of Jesus with the oil the woman of the alabaster box and That phrase had always been with me and for some reason I was sitting one time working on the book and Trying to get this concept of this Because it isn't this because alabaster the stone alabaster can range anywhere from white to you know To blue to kind of a dark charcoal color But it's predominantly known as being a white color. So I did have some questions. Does this mean a white girl? No Does it mean what does it mean and it means that a woman that is firm? as a beautiful core But it's soft Still has a softness around it. You know what I mean? Like the alabaster stone has its translucent if you they make lampshades out of it because there's a light shines through it You know, you can make a glass out of alabaster and the Romans did that, you know, it's it's very old stone It's not as hard as marble, but it's translucent in it and it lets light through and it's the same thing So it's the alabaster girl Which also, you know, which was was a phrase that I years and years and years ago. They came came up with matched That kind of concept of the spirit of the female ideal, I guess you could say That's the sense I get from it It's like the perfect image in a man's mind of that ideal woman that he yearns to Experience but just remains like slightly out of grasp. Yeah, and he might not know it if you ask an average guy Listen, what's your ideal girl here? It's good breast like this and ass like this and and she looks good on my arm That's why I'm getting rich and buying the yacht so I can have that on my arm That's my ideal girl. I want the girl looks good at bikini, right? But I'm convinced that underneath it all most guys are seeking something different They want a different it's a different conversation with women They they want a girl that looks good in bikini on their arm. Yeah, they want that But they also want to have some a woman that makes them because the good word is yearn yearn for like inspiration yearn for for His personal truth and really feel Really feel Supported I guess you say are in no inspired Looking for the woman that inspires in his muse makes you think wow, you know what no all this troubles of the world But I got that That's where so this is what the alabaster means Yeah, so and it is a poem it arose from a poem Maybe I should just quickly touch on that because it's gonna be a question to the book the poems later in the book I'll say it now. I wrote this poem a long time ago, and it is this Man has only ever searched for three things in this world The source of light the perfect note and alabaster girl That's the poem I wrote and what it means to me very quickly is Mankind us the world has always been trying to find Three things in my mind the source of light, which is why are we here? Does God exist who created us the big bang? What is what is the point of origin in other words? Where does the light come from? Why is there something instead of nothing? The source of light and now that we all atheists Creationists You name it recognize that we are in fact here The source of light the next thing is what is the perfect note? Perfect music and know what is the perfect balance of life to live a life of meaning and value? So the perfect note of the best rhythm to live a life that has makes you full of joy and and and and you know Helps the poor or whatever what is the best way to live that life and the alabaster girl is our is our Other half our polarity that we need So that's where the title came from that's That's that's where the book came from I imagine that these two other questions are About the light and the know the kind that came up in Nicaragua Before that well this poem was written over ten years ago. Yeah Yeah, it's to me. It's like it's a simple poem, but it's like It represents, I guess the kind of things that I'm trying to understand for myself, so Makes sense We've got all deep in it. It's very beginning. Yeah So I think that's an episode. Yeah. Yeah, I think so too. That's good Beautiful. Yeah, I would I would like to know one more question. I would have one more question on the renunciation You had one renunciation before Nicaragua. Yes Yes Yeah, the second one Well, I had one real renunciation where I started my life We'll talk about it later But where I went through this youthful journey and then a career journey of trying to like keep up with the Joneses and be this, you know follow the societal recommended path and I And I removed myself that night I renounced it at some point which informs my next ten years the ten years of the book right around the same time I started Right this book. Mm-hmm. Yeah, but the second one in Nicaragua was the second one in Nicaragua. No, it just made me realize that's the message I see. I had one great renunciation in my life That was to like walk away from society you know hit the road carry on bag and in China, you know China Seek something and then Nicaragua shape the message into a really strong strong message so Yeah, and you say in the books my favorite phrase is your greatest fear in life is mediocrity and this book seems symbolic of Mediocre relationships men have women You you don't just talk about these things you live these things in life and women It's a fight against mediocrity to something more authentic and real. Yeah, I really do think that's that's the ultimate battle It's not a battle against evil. It's a battle against mediocrity. Mm-hmm. You know, it's not good and evil It's good and mediocrity And I said in the book here mediocrity is catching. Yeah You can't look away from it You know, yeah You look at all the reality TV shows and all this and it's so so so surfers a shallow and it's catching The whole world is like caught up in this Yeah, that's a that's for another episode It's great She dive right in Let's cut because I want to see how the test is. Yeah Okay Yeah