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Is Agenda 2030 Inevitable? Derrick Broze on Digital Control and How to Opt Out. · Radically Genuine

• 00:00:00:00 - 00:00:03:09 Speaker 3 Do you believe agenda 2030 is inevitable? 00:00:03:11 - 00:00:05:07 Speaker 2 well, I see that there are 00:00:05:07 - 00:00:07:17 Speaker 2 trillions of dollars invested in to bring it to life. 00:00:07:17 - 00:00:11:10 Speaker 2 probably every government on the planet working towards it in some capacity or another. 00:00:11:10 - 00:00:13:22 Speaker 2 And if we recognize we don't want to be a part of this system that 00:00:13:22 - 00:00:20:18 Speaker 2 some other folk have planned and that would like to see the world go in, that those of us who want a different vision, we just become more coordinated and more networked 00:00:20:20 - 00:00:23:15 Speaker 1 when we do manage to come together 00:00:23:17 - 00:00:25:14 Speaker 1 work towards solutions 00:00:25:14 - 00:00:27:03 Speaker 1 as groups of people 00:00:27:07 - 00:00:28:15 Speaker 1 Is it not better that we. 00:00:28:15 - 00:00:32:22 Speaker 1 find some way to take our attention and our energy and put it toward a solution. 00:00:32:22 - 00:00:39:08 Speaker 2 we don't have that with the current governmental system. You know, you consent to what they say. You don't like it. Well, they'll take you away eventually. 00:00:39:10 - 00:00:44:21 Speaker 2 many anarchists are just people working in their gardens and homeschooling their kids and, you know, living peaceful lives. 00:00:45:01 - 00:00:46:18 Speaker 2 I think in order for there to ever be 00:00:46:18 - 00:00:50:13 Speaker 2 real mass resistance, because I don't think voting is going to focus, you know, fix anything, 00:00:50:18 - 00:01:00:14 Speaker 2 would need to be a high level of coordination. 00:01:00:16 - 00:01:02:21 Speaker 1 Derrick Rose. Welcome to Radically Genuine. 00:01:02:21 - 00:01:05:18 Speaker 2 Thank you guys for having me. Excited to be here. 00:01:05:19 - 00:01:12:01 Speaker 1 So tell me about Christmas when you were 14. 00:01:12:03 - 00:01:39:12 Speaker 2 Well, you want a key right in on the the important memories, Christmas, 14 years old. I think it was 1998. I was kind of hanging in the balance of my teenage sanity. Whatever I had left at that time. Been struggling with a lot of, depression for a few years at that point, and was just starting to get into some trouble in school. 00:01:39:14 - 00:02:05:11 Speaker 2 You know, in terms of getting in fights and stuff like that. But this particular Christmas, my family goes to my, my grandma's every year for Christmas Eve. And this is my on my father's side. And my father and my grandparents hadn't been in a good place. And since at least that before I was born. You know, and this particular Christmas, my father was getting released from prison, and he'd been out for about a week as far as I knew. 00:02:05:17 - 00:02:24:18 Speaker 2 And my grandfather was willing to let him come for Christmas Eve. Apparently, he had stolen an engagement ring a few decades earlier when he was going through his addictions. And my grandfather had, you know, never wanted to talk about it or deal with him. And this was sort of a big change. So everybody in the family knew, like, Troy's coming home for Christmas. 00:02:24:19 - 00:02:51:16 Speaker 2 And of course, we, myself and my brothers and sisters, we knew. So we were all kind of anticipating this. A lot of anxiety and everything showing up at grandma's house for that Christmas Eve. And, I, you know, when we opened the door and my grandmother answered it, I was immediately surprised not to see my father just standing there waiting because I figured, you know, if this is what we're expecting it to be, he would be there waiting to greet us. 00:02:51:19 - 00:03:21:16 Speaker 2 Fresh out of prison. We hadn't seen him in a while. So that was sort of my first moment of pause, like, okay, why is he not at the door? And then I remember coming in to the house, seeing my grandma's big tree and seeing all the younger. Family members getting their presence ready. And I'm just sort of nervously scanning the room, you know, looking around, still not seeing him, you know, but also sort of trying to mask my, rising anxiety at the same time and, search around the kitchen. 00:03:21:16 - 00:03:49:06 Speaker 2 Didn't see him there. And I started making my way to the bathroom, and I walked past my grandmother's room and I could hear her over telling my mother, like, he's already he's already been locked up again. He's on the way back to prison, which was kind of a pattern that I'd become very used to. My father, I think, was institutionalized from having spent so much of his young life starting at 17, all the way to the end of his life, in and out of prisons and rehabs and facilities. 00:03:49:06 - 00:04:19:04 Speaker 2 And I think he didn't really know how to handle being out, because I'd never seen anybody get locked back up so quickly and so easily every single time. And, as I overheard that, I went into the bathroom, the, you know, went ahead into the bathroom, I'm slamming the door, staring at the mirror. Just tears, you know, rushing down my 14 year old face and just kind of accepting, like, yeah, it's it's it's happening again, you know, and it was at that moment, I mean, I, I remember it clear as day. 00:04:19:06 - 00:04:37:18 Speaker 2 That was really the moment where I think I kind of started to harden my heart. And sometimes I joke about like, you know, in terms of Star Wars, like going over the dark side because I felt this immense pain and intensity, of course. But I remember staring into the mirror after crying for a few moments and saying, fuck this. 00:04:37:22 - 00:04:53:14 Speaker 2 I'm never going to let anybody hurt me again, you know? And, that was really I mean, I think the as I said, I was kind of already starting to slip into getting into some destructive behaviors, which were definitely now I can see related to things I was dealing with, with my father being in and out of my life. 00:04:53:18 - 00:05:10:10 Speaker 2 But that was definitely the moment where not only did I swear off, like wanting nothing to do with him for at least another decade, it would be another decade before we talked and but also that I yeah, I was just ready to to just not feel that pain anymore. And so I started covering it up with just being angry and destructive. 00:05:10:10 - 00:05:11:17 Speaker 2 And so. 00:05:11:17 - 00:05:31:01 Speaker 3 That closing of the heart and 14 is kind of a critical period of time for a boy. I remember that time in my life. What did you transform into after, like, I think, consciously hardening yourself. 00:05:31:03 - 00:05:57:03 Speaker 2 Yeah. You know, it's interesting. I, I tend to see life in chapters and for one reason or another, chapters of seven has been pretty, you know, important in my life like that, that memory that we just described at 14, I have another memory of being seven years old and him coming home and, you know, or supposed to be coming home while I'm waiting and my young little baseball uniform waiting for him to come home to a game he never showed up to. 00:05:57:05 - 00:06:17:09 Speaker 2 And then 21 when I got arrested. And so there was that memory of 14 pretty much began this next seven year chapter of just being completely closed off, as I said, really destructive. And, I mean, increasingly violent. I would say like, I mean, I was just a young, confused 14 year old. And I had my mother was there and she had remarried. 00:06:17:09 - 00:06:34:19 Speaker 2 I'd have stepdad, but they really didn't, I think, understand, as I can imagine, I'm not a parent yet myself, but I can only imagine, like how to trying to navigate having three young children who are all dealing with in different ways the absence of their father, and not just absence, but the back and forth, the false prompt, broken promises and things like that. 00:06:34:19 - 00:07:05:06 Speaker 2 That was one of many memories that, you know, up until that point. And then we all individually kind of started to say, never mind, I don't want anything to do with him. And that was my moment for that. And so, yeah, I mean, it really translated into that was that same year, 14 years old would have been, I think eighth grade also happened to coincide with the first ticket I got at school, because I was getting in trouble for one thing or another, and I was leaving the principal's office and I very frustrated. 00:07:05:06 - 00:07:24:18 Speaker 2 The angrily said, I swear to God, I'm going to burn this school down. And somebody overheard me. And this was also the year that Columbine happened. So things like that were being taken very seriously. And the following year, as I entered high school, I had said something similar. You know, I started to have a habit of saying, like, I'm going to do something crazy. 00:07:24:19 - 00:07:49:01 Speaker 2 And that was taken serious enough that I remember at least one meeting where I'm being, you know, called to the principal's office, which was not an unusual occasion. It was an increasing occasion. But this particular visit was not only the ninth grade principal, but all the principals from the entire high school to sit down with me, to basically say that they've been hearing me say this and that about, you know, fantasies I was having. 00:07:49:02 - 00:08:04:21 Speaker 2 I mean, I, I, I think that there was a part of me that I would have never shot up a school or anything like that, but I was a part of me that was angry enough to that believe that I was capable of something like that, you know, or that I had that kind of anger in me, you know, it was never something I ever planned out or anything that. 00:08:04:21 - 00:08:27:11 Speaker 2 But that's sort of how they were treating me as like, this kid is like very volatile. And he's, I was also in all advanced classes, though, so it was also sort of a Jekyll and Hyde thing. And also some teachers I remember would say, like, you're so bright, you're so, you know, kind in my class. But then we have these meetings about you and they tell me that you're throwing chairs at teachers and, you know, you're getting in fights and, and, yeah. 00:08:27:12 - 00:08:48:01 Speaker 2 And I to some degree, I would say I, I credit my mother for telling me that, basically instilling to me that all people deserve respect, no matter their age or background. And there were some people just to be, you know, not to go off on a tangent, but to be quite honest, that I teachers and principals who were miserable, and it was obvious to me even as a 15 year old kid. 00:08:48:06 - 00:09:04:10 Speaker 2 And so when they would treat me not so kind. I didn't have this sort of sense of like, oh, you're a teacher, so I'm supposed to take it? I would just, okay, you want to talk to me crazy. I'm going to talk to you crazy back. And obviously that was not what they expect out of a kid, but that was sort of just where my mind was. 00:09:04:10 - 00:09:26:09 Speaker 2 But this led to just getting into fistfights that led to getting arrested at school, led to getting tickets and, you know, getting into relationships in high school that I thought were based around love, which were really, I think, looking back, just based around like, definitely trauma bonding and like, you know, I was dating other young, young ladies who were missing fathers in their lives and who had their own kind of family trauma and stuff. 00:09:26:09 - 00:09:53:06 Speaker 2 And that was, you know, what I was attracting and what what we were bonding around, which I think at the time probably was somewhat helpful, obviously, to not feel alone at such a young age. And this is also around the time when I did start cutting myself. And, you know, I still wear those scars from, from cutting myself with class and razors and things like that, as I think a way to just sort of feel something, you know, because I also started to numb myself with a lot of that. 00:09:53:06 - 00:10:11:03 Speaker 2 I wasn't yet using drugs or any of that. That would come later after high school. But I started to just, yeah, numb myself in other ways and, and just felt very empty. And, I think the, the cutting was kind of a way to feel something or sort of some sort of release. The best way I could describe it. 00:10:11:05 - 00:10:28:07 Speaker 2 But yeah. And then just as, as high school in that time period went on that those that chapter of seven, I mean, I basically got to the point where I was ready to drop out of high school my senior year. I had just kind of given up on everything. And again, I had I literally had a teacher tell me that I think it was algebra or something along those lines. 00:10:28:07 - 00:10:42:12 Speaker 2 And she's like, you're not very good at this. You should just give up. And so my solution was like, all right, I'm going to take a nap every day. And then it became a daily battle for telling me, wake up, wake up. And but I was just like, well, you told me I should just give up. So I'm that wasn't going to motivate me to like, okay, I'm going to prove her wrong. 00:10:42:12 - 00:11:02:03 Speaker 2 I was just like, well, I guess I'll just give up then. And point being that I just continued to become more and more destructive in these different ways, mostly to myself, but, you know, harming myself but also outwardly. And. Yeah, and then by time high school came to an end, I, I just sort of jumped right into, you know, to drinking and everything. 00:11:02:04 - 00:11:29:13 Speaker 2 I actually did graduate early in my senior year while my friends were finishing high school. I actually graduated at the end of the first semester because I was still, you know, excelling in all those other ways besides everything else somehow. So I the, the second semester of my high school senior year, my friends were finishing senior year, I was starting my first semester of community college and moved into an apartment and got my first full time job and was kind of doing that, but also was overwhelmed because that's when I started drinking. 00:11:29:13 - 00:11:42:05 Speaker 2 And you can't really juggle all those things for very long before, you know, something, something crashes. And I crashed pretty hard. And so it began like a two year period of just drinking and eventually much harder drugs. 00:11:42:07 - 00:12:09:05 Speaker 1 In your book, a man of your were a man of my word. You talk about that period, I think it's probably closer to when you're 20, but where you're, you know, you're moving into a place where you're you're really free of most of the outside controls. But a friend I, a friend actually talks, you know, confronts you about whether or not you're experiencing happiness. 00:12:09:07 - 00:12:24:16 Speaker 1 And it was just it was such a, such a moment you captured there. And I'm curious how you how you feel now about how you saw freedom at the time, how you saw authority at the time and and how it impacted you. 00:12:24:21 - 00:12:52:11 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, that moment that you're describing was a couple years into my, alcohol and drug use and, you know, just to, to paint a picture. I mean, when I talk about drug use and, and I and alcohol use, I was not having a couple of beers with friends. I was doing, I think my record was 25 beer bongs in one night or 20 shots of tequila, like, you know, like wasted on the ground puking everywhere, sort of destructive, like, thing. 00:12:52:13 - 00:13:18:02 Speaker 2 And when it became pills, it was, how much Xanax can I take? And how many days can I black out for, you know, and and I'm one of the people who doesn't fall asleep on those on on particular. So I might be sitting here having a conversation with you and not remember any of it, you know. And so that can lead to, as you can imagine, some very dangerous situations, especially when you add driving and, functioning, going to work and things like that, and losing days and time and. 00:13:18:04 - 00:13:36:07 Speaker 2 Yeah, and, and I started to ask myself if I was happy and if I was really enjoying whatever I was doing with and I, I, I knew some part of me knew that I wasn't. And I don't think, you know, when you ask about freedom, I don't think that I was free at that time. I mean, sure, I had I wasn't in prison. 00:13:36:08 - 00:13:56:19 Speaker 2 I had all the things that we tend to think of being a free person. But this was one of the experiences that showed me how even though I had physical freedom, it was very easy to become trapped in mental cages as well. You know? I mean, my my anxiety, my, my depression, all those things were other forms of mental prisons that I had dealt with so long. 00:13:56:19 - 00:14:22:01 Speaker 2 I mean, the the insecurities that I dealt with growing up with. I remember being aware, even as a young boy, that it was like a mental prison, that it felt like just paralyzing, you know, was one way to describe it. So yeah, even though I was physically free dealing with these addictions and dealing with the roots of those addictions, the traumas and everything was very much something that had me feeling, you know, unfree and in a cage. 00:14:22:01 - 00:14:47:07 Speaker 2 And later on I would I would experience that physically. But I didn't have any kind of deeper philosophical conception of freedom as I do today. I mean, I've kind of generally always been skeptical of government. You could say, but it wasn't something that was a prominent sort of philosophy in my life. It was just, I think in the background there a mistrust of authority for one reason or another. 00:14:47:09 - 00:15:04:20 Speaker 2 But no, I mean, I, I think that ultimately I was those days probably were the seeds of what I would later come to realize that you can be free in your mind, even if your body is caged, and vice versa. You can be physically free, but not free in your mind, which I think is where a lot of people probably are. 00:15:05:02 - 00:15:27:14 Speaker 2 And it sort of took for me to experience both of those extremes, to be physically caged as well as mentally caged, you know, and, and, opposite situations in order to really, I think, have this full scope of understanding of, of freedom and liberty for me at least, because I do think I do think there's something to be said, not that I want people to experience losing their physical freedom because it is a horrible experience. 00:15:27:14 - 00:15:50:15 Speaker 2 But I will say that I think that experience that came to me shortly after the time you're asking about, it really showed me just the value of freedom. Like I came to understand it on a completely different level. When you hit a bottom and you feel completely powerless and you there's nothing or no one you can call to get you out of a situation, you know, it feels there's something else there. 00:15:50:15 - 00:15:54:23 Speaker 2 You learn a little bit deeper about what freedom actually means once you lose it all. 00:15:55:01 - 00:16:18:15 Speaker 3 This idea of mental freedom has me thinking about Viktor Frankl, who wrote Man's Search for Meaning. And so we don't often get our access to a person's inner world. What was that time of your life like? Before we get into your prison story, what were you experiencing internally about who you were, about how you saw your life? 00:16:18:17 - 00:16:37:06 Speaker 2 Yeah, it's a great question. I mean, I don't think I really had a sense of self too much at that time. I don't think I had fully developed it and whatever, you know, whoever that I was then, it was definitely buried under so much that it felt like wherever I was, it was it was hard to even find myself, you know, if that makes sense. 00:16:37:08 - 00:17:06:18 Speaker 2 Yeah. I don't think I really was able to fully come to some sort of conception of myself until later events, because all I can think of like, if I put myself back to 17 year old me, 18 year old me, 19, it was like a feeling of searching, constantly searching, you know what I mean? And for me, that search led me to, to a lot of meaningless relationships, you know? 00:17:06:19 - 00:17:27:13 Speaker 2 And I mean, like, romantic relationships, sexual relationships, and then eventually drugs. It was so it was felt like a constant search. Like I was looking for something outside of myself is really. I didn't I don't think I had a sense of self because my father's absence, I can see now, like so much of what happened to me at a young age, because he was never he was never there from the beginning. 00:17:27:13 - 00:17:47:05 Speaker 2 So, I mean, I started toying with self-harm at like seven years old, you know, my first sort of playing with knives and starting to hurt myself. In some ways, I think that the absence of him being there created so many questions in my mind. And also I sort of internalized it, you know, each me and my siblings, we all dealt with it in a different way. 00:17:47:07 - 00:18:04:18 Speaker 2 My older brother, who knew him a little better, I think, turned that into anger, and he was always kind of on like, I'm not going to let anything hurt me. My mom always used to say that I was the middle child, and I was the emotional one. I was the one who felt everything. My little sister was a little too young to even have any understanding of him. 00:18:04:19 - 00:18:25:09 Speaker 2 And I think I internalized all that to sort of feel like it was my fault, you know, that there must have been something wrong with me. There must have been some reason that he chose drugs over his family, or he chose to leave or whatever. You know, things are going through my head. And so for a long time, I mean, I think that's I have clear memories of being as young as first grade. 00:18:25:09 - 00:18:40:18 Speaker 2 And I used to write letters all the time to friends or just journal, and my mom would find these journals, and I think this is what sort of freaked her out a little bit is like, she could see that I was like having some very mature thoughts even at a young age. And they weren't very bright. They were very, you know, depressed and, and sad. 00:18:40:18 - 00:18:56:04 Speaker 2 And I think that's just sort of what was happening is that I was trying to navigate again. My mother was doing the best she could. But I, I just don't think we had the tools, the resources we needed to, like, have a conversation about here's what's taking place and here this might this might make you feel a certain way. 00:18:56:04 - 00:19:14:23 Speaker 2 And so I was just kind of taking all that in. And a big part of me did put it all on my shoulders, I think, and feel like this is some there must be something wrong with me. There must be a reason he doesn't want to see me. And so those first seven, up until that point in 14 that we described were very depressed and very sad and very heavy. 00:19:14:23 - 00:19:18:01 Speaker 2 And I don't think there was much of a sense of self in there. 00:19:18:03 - 00:19:40:14 Speaker 3 I imagine that also came out in these romantic relationships that you were in, that you said a trauma bond that often comes as a very intense attachment to someone else who is also seeking that love. But those beliefs that you know that you had, that there must be something wrong with you and that you're going to be left because your dad wasn't there, must rise to the surface. 00:19:40:16 - 00:20:01:11 Speaker 2 I think I described this in my memoir, but absolutely. I mean, you're spot on. I had a huge fear of abandonment and every relationship I was in, which was quite a few. And so, of course, I mean, I'm young, so these aren't like sexual relationships, but they're like, you know, I was my girlfriend or whatever. And I thought I was in love with every single one of them and that I was going to die if I lost them, you know, from a very young age. 00:20:01:11 - 00:20:27:01 Speaker 2 And so, yeah, it took me years to really see this, like, wow, I, I can get attached pretty, easily, particularly in my younger years. And that, that then the fear of losing that person is a whole nother thing. And so that especially as that translated into self-harm and then later suicide attempts, you know, it was sort of like, if I lose this relationship or whatever this thing is that I'm holding on to, like, everything's gone, you know, and that's my whole existence. 00:20:27:01 - 00:20:33:07 Speaker 2 And so I definitely you're spot on. Like, there was a lot of attachment related to that fear of abandonment. Yeah, yeah. 00:20:33:09 - 00:20:37:01 Speaker 1 How did you land up incarcerated the first time. 00:20:37:03 - 00:21:18:16 Speaker 2 So I had been addicted to crystal meth for about nine months. January 2005 I, I, I tried it for the first time. I had actually started to try to get myself and and was succeeding, getting myself sober prior to this, that period I described post-high school drinking, Xanax, ecstasy. I was just in a blackout stage for quite a while, and, I managed to somehow get myself a job and and find a nice young lady and get a new apartment, all while sort of under the influence of Xanax and not remembering much of how I made it happen, but then sober enough to like, hey, I think I got myself somewhere good. 00:21:18:16 - 00:21:43:13 Speaker 2 Let me, let me just like, let me see where this goes. And I was starting to to get out of that, that situation. And really things were starting to look bright, a little bit brighter. And I ran into some old friends from high school who I always knew liked to party. You know, we we'd smoked some weed back in the day and stuff like that, but in the couple of years that we'd been apart, they'd got into a lot harder drugs, particularly cocaine and eventually crystal. 00:21:43:13 - 00:22:00:02 Speaker 2 And so when they came over to visit, you know, check out my new apartment one day, they mentioned that, hey, you know, we like to party with this. And I was like, hey, you guys do your thing. I'm not going to partake. I got to go to work in the morning. You know, you guys see yourselves out. And that was sort of, you know, I never really had a much of a judgment towards how people party. 00:22:00:04 - 00:22:14:09 Speaker 2 You do your thing doesn't phase me. You know, nobody's pushing anything on me. So it didn't really offend me in any way. And basically, eventually I had a couple of days off and they asked again if I'd like to try it, and I said I'd give it a shot, and that was it. I mean, that was pretty much it. 00:22:14:15 - 00:22:32:10 Speaker 2 Crystal meth doesn't have a physical addiction in the way that opiates do. Or, you know, your body is gonna give you withdrawals if you don't have it. It's more on the mental side of things of sort of, you know, thinking you needed and just kind of getting in the habit of doing it. For me, it was very much a ritual thing. 00:22:32:12 - 00:22:50:02 Speaker 2 And that began this, this, you know, race to the bottom. I lost the apartment within a matter of two months, got evicted. You know, I lost my job after a week of doing Crystal because I became too weak to. I was at that time working at a restaurant and doing a lot of heavy lifting and unloading of trucks and stuff like that. 00:22:50:04 - 00:23:08:10 Speaker 2 And after about a week, I couldn't even. I was starting to lose weight pretty rapidly and lose muscle, which is what happens when you and because again, as I said, this was not some occasional use. This was, you know, big plates of lines of cocaine and crystal. And let's stay up all night and let's sleep for a couple of hours and wake up and do it again. 00:23:08:12 - 00:23:30:19 Speaker 2 And the body can only take so much of that. And, so, yeah, you know, they they said, oh, well, okay, you don't have a job. Why don't we move in with you and we'll also drugs here and we'll help you pay rent. And so the house became, you know, a spot that became the drug house. And I very quickly felt like I lost control of what I was in the process of building, lost the job, lost the relationship, and then soon lost the apartment and was homeless. 00:23:30:19 - 00:23:53:18 Speaker 2 And, yeah, I just got kind of pulled under the the wing of a couple people who were career criminals and who had no intentions of trying to better themselves. I see that now. But, you know, the interesting thing about when you get pulled into this sort of drug world the way that there still is, I would say genuine love and care, even among, you know, these are human beings, of course, even if they're lost in addiction. 00:23:53:19 - 00:24:10:08 Speaker 2 But as you get pulled into this world, the people that you that have known and loved you, your friends and close family and friends, they see the changes. And so there was only a matter of time before certain friends who I'd who would come around my apartment once they saw harder drugs getting introduced or just like, I'll see you around, man, you know? 00:24:10:09 - 00:24:23:10 Speaker 2 And like, they didn't they knew that this was going away, that they didn't want to be involved in. And I couldn't see it, you know, until much later. And so you end up only surrounded by other people who are using hard drugs, other people who are also trying to escape their own things, also trying to get away from. 00:24:23:10 - 00:24:42:04 Speaker 2 And and so you're kind of commiserating around like, oh, yeah, my mom won't stop bugging me. She thinks I'm doing this. And like, oh, you're, you know, you're sort of commiserating around those people who won't leave you alone, even though they're just trying to help you. And in that world, one of the ways that people believe they show love and affection is, well, here's here's a little more drugs. 00:24:42:04 - 00:25:02:11 Speaker 2 Here's a, you know, try this, you know, have this, enjoy this. You know, this is my gift to you. And so that sort of ended up happening a few times. And, you know, it's it's in the book. But long story short, I got pulled into under the wing of a of a of a well known drug dealer in the west side of Houston who had been in and out of prison, and he had recently got out and went back to doing what he did. 00:25:02:12 - 00:25:24:23 Speaker 2 He did. And he was a very well connected drug dealer. And I became just another name on his list of, of basically dealers for him. And that ended up, you know, it ended up consuming my life until, you know, as well as being addicted the whole time and, basically, I, I was able to I ended up living in a crack meth house by the end of this, this particular journey. 00:25:24:23 - 00:25:48:16 Speaker 2 And that was enough for me. Once things started to shift towards crack, it felt like that was like that was a that was a line I wasn't willing to cross. And also, again, it was another attempt to try to start fresh. When I moved into this apartment, it wasn't a crack house at first. It was one of my friends who convinced me that he was also trying to get to a better life, and that was not true. 00:25:48:16 - 00:26:06:04 Speaker 2 And so we, you know, we said like, all right, let's get an apartment. Come on. Let's, let's we've been doing this for 7 or 8 months. Like, let's get that out of this. Let's get our stuff together. And then I quickly found out that the apartment was filled with crackheads and meth heads and that he had paid the first six months rent in crack to the managers. 00:26:06:05 - 00:26:29:17 Speaker 2 And he, you know, I thought that was a weird way to start a fresh start. But I'll go with it. But within a couple of days, it was really clear that that was not his intentions. And then here I am again. Now I'm surrounded by meth heads and crackheads and I basically I mean, as crazy as it sounds, I, I, I started to just live in the little closet under the stairs of this, this little condo and just locked myself away. 00:26:29:17 - 00:26:51:17 Speaker 2 And this is also one of the times where I was really starting to explore psychedelics. And I will credit some of my experiences with acid and mushrooms to encouraging me to get out of that world. You know, I literally would take some doses of those psychedelics and lock myself in the closet under the stairs and listen to Pink Floyd and just sort of zone out. 00:26:51:17 - 00:27:09:15 Speaker 2 And but also at the same time, just every day it became more clear, like, this is not what I need. And it got to the point where I said, look, I really want to get out of here. Please don't offer me anything anymore. And they were at least kind enough to respect that. And then again, I will credit cannabis to helping me get off of meth because my anxiety and everything was so shot. 00:27:09:16 - 00:27:28:18 Speaker 2 I mean, I couldn't. My hands were shaking like everything was just. Whatever anxiety I had before had only been, you know, worsened by this. All this meth I was putting in my body. And so it was a one day, no crystal today, two days, no crystal. Today, I'm just sitting in a chair like this, surrounded by all this insanity. 00:27:28:19 - 00:27:45:08 Speaker 2 Cannabis was helping me get sober. And then I basically, after seven days, got in the car and left and never looked back. The next day after I left, somebody got shot outside the apartment and I got myself sober. But I still continued to, you know, deal drugs because it was just for the main ways I knew how to make money at the time. 00:27:45:08 - 00:27:59:21 Speaker 2 And I was just I couldn't pass a drug test to go get any other job. And I decided I was going to do one more deal to make some money that I owed somebody. I was sober, but I was like, all right, let me I know I can go do that real quick and I'll buy a little bit of this and I'll flip into this and I'll pay off my debts and that'll be it. 00:27:59:23 - 00:28:07:14 Speaker 2 Fresh start, you know? And, that was the day I got pulled over. I got pulled over and got arrested. 00:28:07:16 - 00:28:12:19 Speaker 1 So, you know, you find yourself locked up, is it? It's about a year over year. 00:28:12:20 - 00:28:16:05 Speaker 2 The first first time I got locked up was 11.5 months. Yeah. 00:28:16:10 - 00:28:22:01 Speaker 1 What was that experience and how did it change you? 00:28:22:03 - 00:28:40:01 Speaker 2 Yeah, it was I think probably in some ways there's probably a part of me, as weird as it sounds, that was relieved to kind of be at like, like I said, this was a, you know, from the end of high school and to the the beginning of the drinking. It was a two year, two and a half year period of just chaos. 00:28:40:01 - 00:28:57:19 Speaker 2 It just intense on my body, my mind, my spirit and everything. And of course, you know, along that way I'm not only hurting myself, I'm hurting other people in terms of relationships, family and friends because I was just such a ball of chaos, you know? And so I think a part of me was relieved to just be away from that for a moment. 00:28:57:19 - 00:29:20:18 Speaker 2 And but of course, nobody wants to be behind bars. So, it was horrifying. It was, you know, I got arrested and my mother, I tried to basically keep it secret for the first couple of days because I thought, like, okay, I've never been in major trouble. I had a couple of public intoxication. I, you know, I started to get arrested here and there, but nothing major that I thought was like going to stay in my record. 00:29:20:18 - 00:29:36:23 Speaker 2 Too bad. But I realized, like, okay, getting arrested with crystal meth, not only did I get arrested with Crystal, I also had like bags and scales and like, you know, it was clear I was dealing. I got, I guess you could say lucky that they didn't charge me in that sense. I didn't get charged with possession or intention to distribute or with just, you know, selling. 00:29:36:23 - 00:30:01:10 Speaker 2 It was just possession, which is a lesser charge. But I was still trying to figure out if I could just. Maybe I'll get probation and get out of here before anybody notices. And that's basically what I did. I went to go see the judge, and I still was holding on to hope that I could get out. And in fact, this is, I think, ultimately why why I didn't get out is because I was already scheming on how I could. 00:30:01:15 - 00:30:16:20 Speaker 2 Okay, they took that crystal, but I got a little bit money at home. I could go home, I could still get some more. And then I was already starting to scheme again. I was kind of like in very much in this, hustle mentality, which now these days I see more as like that was my entrepreneurial spirit, just a little bit lost back then. 00:30:17:02 - 00:30:29:02 Speaker 2 But I was already kind of like, okay, well, I can get out, I can go buy some more, I can do this. I can still pay off the debts and then nobody will know I'll be on. You know, I was just still trying to figure it all out. And I signed the papers for two year felony possession charges. 00:30:29:02 - 00:30:46:00 Speaker 2 The judge told me that I would get out after the weekend, which was a lie. They they did lie to me. And then I sat the whole weekend and something didn't feel right. The Monday morning I went to go see the judge and sure enough, she said, she's like, you know, we're giving you two years felony probation, but we're also giving you a concurrent sentence, which is kind of unusual. 00:30:46:01 - 00:31:15:19 Speaker 2 You know, usually you get probation. That means you get out. You have to do some meetings and tests and stuff like that. But I was given that plus time behind bars. And so, yeah, once I had to accept that, like, all right, I'm really not going anywhere. Then at that point I had to let my family know, like, and my girlfriend at the time know, like, hey, I'm not like, I'm, I'm here and I don't know when I'm, you know, and I was being told by some other people in jail who are waiting to go to their prisons and their, their destinations, who had more experience than myself, like, you're not going home, you 00:31:15:19 - 00:31:36:00 Speaker 2 know, for a while, like they knew the place I was being sent was going to take at least a year, about a year to get out of. And that was such a feeling of powerlessness, you know, and you can get on the phone, call, girlfriend, call mom, call lawyer, call whoever, and cry and scream. You can get angry. 00:31:36:00 - 00:31:52:17 Speaker 2 You can blame the world, which is what a lot of people do. You can do any of the things you want and none of it makes a difference. You're not leaving those four walls until they call your name. Whenever they decide that is, and they let you leave so you can cry and scream and complain and be angry. 00:31:52:18 - 00:32:16:20 Speaker 2 Do whatever you want. It doesn't matter. And that feeling, that's sort of what I meant earlier about, like finding that feeling of powerlessness. As much as I don't want it to be seen as me saying that, that's something people need to experience. Maybe so sometimes, because when you hit that bottom, when you do feel powerlessness, at least for me, that's where I really started to find my power because I had to accept, like, okay, there's there's nothing I can do. 00:32:16:20 - 00:32:37:15 Speaker 2 So then what can I do at this time? You know, I've been gifted this time of a a break from the chaos. Not only was my mind and body continuing to get sober now because I'm just totally away from everything, and but I'm also away from all the distractions, the things that I thought I needed, that I was attached to that were probably preventing me from actually doing the healing that I needed. 00:32:37:15 - 00:32:56:16 Speaker 2 And so I don't credit the criminal justice system in any way for helping me, because it's a horrible place with lots of brilliant people locked up for just insane things. But I know that I needed that time. I know that I needed some kind of break. And the interesting thing is, I do remember weeks before. 00:32:56:18 - 00:33:08:12 Speaker 2 About a maybe even just a week before I was at my mother's house, after I'd come back from this crack house, I basically went back to my parents. And, you know, they'd already known I was on drugs and I just had to beg, like, can I please come home? Like, I'm really trying to I don't I'm tired of going to bed. 00:33:08:12 - 00:33:25:16 Speaker 2 Hearing people smoke crack all night. Can I please just come home? I'm trying to get everything together. They accepted me back, but I was still just, you know, a ball of chaos and mess. And I remember my mother found me about a week before I got arrested in the closet of the bedroom that they were letting me stay in, and I was just on my knees, and I was just so distraught, and I was just crying. 00:33:25:16 - 00:33:41:14 Speaker 2 I was just like, you know, she's like, what is wrong? How can I help? You know, she just, you know, trying, desperate to try to figure out something for me. And I said to her, I almost forgot about this. I don't even think I included this in the book. I, I told her, like, I, I feel like I need a pause, like I just need everything to slow down. 00:33:41:14 - 00:33:57:16 Speaker 2 Like everything is just going to fast. Which I clearly remember that feeling. And it never really dawned on me at the time that maybe putting all these drugs in my body and mind was contributing to the chaos, you know? But of course, amidst all the emotional castles already dealing with it, that's just the feeling. It's like I just need everything to stop, just like, give me a moment. 00:33:57:19 - 00:34:22:13 Speaker 2 Well, I got my pause. Not in the way I really expected or wanted. It ended up being, you know, this whole year. Pause. But yeah, that, that, that was really when I started to kind of start to find my power, having to accept that, like, I'm not going home, not going anywhere. There's nothing I can do. And not only that, but the other real kick in the, you know, chest was that the week I was getting arrested, my father was getting out of prison, and I'd been mad at this guy my entire life, you know, blaming him for this or that. 00:34:22:13 - 00:34:35:20 Speaker 2 And just why isn't he there? And and here I am, continuing the family tradition, as was me and my brother used to call it, and getting arrested for drugs and going to prison. And, you know, thankfully, I didn't have any children, but I did have a younger brother who was six years old at the time, who I loved very dearly. 00:34:35:20 - 00:34:54:23 Speaker 2 And I felt that pain of like leaving him behind, you know. So it was a it was it was multi-layered emotions, you know, from just the accepting, like, here I am, I'm not going home to the compounded feelings of what I'm experiencing related to my father and then having to, you know, tell my girlfriend at the time, like, I'm, I'm not going to see you for a while. 00:34:54:23 - 00:35:03:02 Speaker 2 And, and my mom, you know, tell her the truth. Like, I got arrested for drugs and, you know, and, you know, all those emotions. Yeah. Just at once. 00:35:03:04 - 00:35:29:06 Speaker 3 Okay, so we're there. We're at the end of the seven year chapter, and you're entering jail. Yeah, but boy, when you say that, you asked for a pause and then you find yourself in a physical prison, but now you have this opportunity to free yourself from the mental prison. Yeah. Do you believe that you created this experience? 00:35:29:08 - 00:35:55:00 Speaker 2 I definitely think it's highly likely. I mean, if it wasn't me, then it was. It was a crater that was looking out for me. I mean, I think I called it in, because I, I think I shared this with you guys last night at dinner that I, I had other experiences. I won't tell the whole story here, but related to psychedelics and things where I was having visions of what I was headed towards, and I felt like some of those medicines were warning me like that this was coming. 00:35:55:00 - 00:36:14:18 Speaker 2 And there was even one where I did take the warning, and I went and threw away a couple of thousand dollars worth of drugs and a dumpster, because I had just woke up after this really intense trip where I visioned myself as a homeless person and just on the streets, and just like I saw one particular, one potential path, and that caused me to, you know, react in the sense of like, I'm just getting rid of these drugs. 00:36:14:18 - 00:36:39:20 Speaker 2 Obviously, I ended up going back later and continuing on that path, but there's incidents like that where I think I was kind of being given some mornings or some, you know, heads up, this is what's coming in. And yeah, maybe, maybe in the sense that I felt like that was the only way that I would get it, because as I said, even though I was getting sober and I had full intentions coming back to my mother's house of getting sober, I was still kind of in a certain mentality. 00:36:39:21 - 00:36:57:15 Speaker 2 I mean, even after I got out for the first year, the reason I went back later is because I fell right back into some of the same habits. I started to do the healing process, but I still hadn't let go of some of the behaviors. And so maybe that was my way of trying to will change into being, you know, and it needed to be a little traumatic for me. 00:36:57:16 - 00:37:00:22 Speaker 2 You know, I'm kind of a slow learner sometimes. 00:37:01:00 - 00:37:29:07 Speaker 1 So there were there were two things that stuck out to me in the the portion of your book about your, your prison experience. And it was, the, the books your grandmother sent you and the influence of your grandmother and your spiritual life and how you chose to utilize the pores of prison. And then the, the safe program, this this, addiction accountability program. 00:37:29:09 - 00:37:43:23 Speaker 1 And how on the surface, you one could say it was trying to accomplish the same thing, but it was attempting to do so through coercion. Yeah. And I found the juxtaposition of those to be really interesting. 00:37:44:01 - 00:38:14:15 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, my on my grandmother, my granny, Rory Bros. She was such a impactful person in my life. And she, she unfortunately passed away just a couple of years ago. I remember going to visit her even as a kid. And, before I was old enough to kind of really understand who she was. All I knew was that granny was a chiropractor that lived in Austin, Texas, and every time we would go visit her, we would lay on her bed and she would adjust us. 00:38:14:17 - 00:38:43:04 Speaker 2 And, it was only as I got older that I realized that my granny was a healer, and that chiropractor was sort of her public facing, way of doing that. And she ran this business out of her home for 30 years in Austin until pretty much until the time of her death. And, yeah, the older I got and I started to check out her amazing library of books, I sort of started to see that she was, kind of a, you know, esoteric Christian, you know, that she did believe in Christ. 00:38:43:04 - 00:39:10:02 Speaker 2 She went, for example, the church she went to was called the Church of Conscious Harmony. And, you know, she sent me some sermons occasionally. I was like, I think you'd really enjoy this one. And after it was actually after I got out that we got even closer. But it was when I was locked up that she started to send me material and and yeah, as I said, I as I got older, and particularly with the prison situation, as we started to write each other, I started to see her as an adult, you know, meeting each other for the first time. 00:39:10:03 - 00:39:32:02 Speaker 2 Like, you know, I'm not just her little grandson anymore. And I could go I could go on about just how how impactful she was. Because I remember growing up, my family did not understand her, and she was judged by almost every member of my not just my immediate family, but the, you know, the broader family. And I think they didn't understand her. 00:39:32:02 - 00:39:52:07 Speaker 2 They didn't understand where she was coming from. They didn't understand her healing. I believe she had some psychic abilities and, you know, things like that that none of them wanted to understand. And my aunts, her daughters were also and are also like kind of Christian fundamentalists. So they sort of rejected anything that she, you know, that mom was into this weird whatever stuff. 00:39:52:10 - 00:40:10:01 Speaker 2 But it was something that her and I really bonded over, you know, later on. But she reached out to me, you know, her grandson now repeating the mistakes of her son. And she said that she wanted to send me some, some material. She knew that, you know, there's not a lot to do when you're in there. I wrote a lot. 00:40:10:02 - 00:40:24:13 Speaker 2 I journaled a lot. That's pretty much what saved my life. But beyond that, beyond working out, you know, reading books is a great way to pass the time and again, I wanted to take the most, make the most of this time, and to just fill my head with as much good stuff as possible. And so granny was a big part of that. 00:40:24:13 - 00:40:44:20 Speaker 2 She sent me a book by Father Thomas Keating on Centering Prayer, which is kind of a form of Christian meditation. It's about like contemplation and reflecting on the Word of God. And so that was totally new to me. She sent me a, a book on Zen Buddhism, on Zen meditation, zazen. And that was also mostly new to me. 00:40:44:21 - 00:41:09:03 Speaker 2 I mean, I had some curiosities about Buddhism and meditation, maybe a little bit of introduction here and there, reading in high school, but nothing on a deep level and definitely nothing that I've ever I had tried to explore up to that point, because prior to those books and getting to prison, I had pretty much turned my back on anything that would relate to God or the spiritual world or anything of that sort. 00:41:09:04 - 00:41:24:13 Speaker 2 I mean, I was I was a kid that was drawing upside down crosses and pentagrams, not because I was satanic, but because I enjoyed how it triggered religious people, because I just, I, I just, I and I to this day, I still have a lot of problems with religious institutions, but at that time it was very much like I wanted to provoke people. 00:41:24:14 - 00:41:45:17 Speaker 2 You know, I enjoyed getting a reaction out of people. I grew up in a Christian family, forced to go to church up to a certain point till, you know, I rebelled and it was like, this is I don't want to do this. So I had no interest in spiritual matters at the time. But I also had had a few psychedelic experiences that made me curious that maybe there's something beyond the five senses. 00:41:45:17 - 00:42:05:17 Speaker 2 Maybe there's something I'm not fully privy to. So when granny sent me these books and I'm at my lowest low and I'm also, you know, got nothing but time, and I committed to myself that if I'm not going home till next year, I need to make the most out of this time. And so let me dive in. Let me dive in headfirst, you know, with an open mind, with an open heart. 00:42:05:17 - 00:42:22:22 Speaker 2 And that was totally new to me. But it was also such a such a healing experience to, again, I think being in a space where I wasn't, where I was surrounded by, I didn't know anybody. You know, obviously I'm just in a prison with a bunch of jails and prisons and facilities with a bunch of random people who I don't know from my daily life. 00:42:23:00 - 00:42:38:06 Speaker 2 So in some ways it kind of felt like a little bit of liberation in that sense that, like, I'm not going to be judged by because none of these people don't know me from anybody. So I can just embrace becoming a new person here. You know, I can start fresh because I'm in a place where I have that time to, to sort of rebuild myself. 00:42:38:12 - 00:43:00:20 Speaker 2 And these books were a big part of that. I was in, in the county jail and then in prison and in the facility, the different addiction facilities I went to over the next few years that I would start developing my meditation practice, just from originally just reading this book, and sort of the book did have some guides on how to get yourself started, and it was super basic and beginner, but it was enough for me to just find that quiet space and that contemplation. 00:43:00:20 - 00:43:23:02 Speaker 2 And then a place like prison, which is a place filled with ego and fear. I think it all comes back to fear, really, but there's a lot of ego, and particularly in men's prison, a lot of machismo. And, you know, there's also this whole other element that was completely foreign to me about race, you know, and people tend to gravitate towards, well, you're the same skin color as me. 00:43:23:02 - 00:43:38:09 Speaker 2 So you need to be with me. And I'm kind of a mutt coming from a multiple different backgrounds, but my skin is a little brown. So at one point I was approached by basically a Mexican gang, told me that I couldn't talk to this black gentleman that I'd been chatting with and, you know, like, you need to stay away from him. 00:43:38:09 - 00:43:51:09 Speaker 2 And they use certain choice words to, to tell me that. And, I let them know, like, hey, I'm just here to do my time. I, you know, I, I don't I'm not aligning with anybody. I'm just doing my thing here. And all of that was totally foreign to me, because that's not sort of the way I viewed the world. 00:43:51:09 - 00:44:07:12 Speaker 2 And my friendships aren't based on that. And there's there's all these different kind of components going on at the same time that I'm just like, all right. Every night and every morning when I get up before I get out of this bunk, I'm going to sit and meditate for at least 15 minutes. And and it became my pattern. 00:44:07:12 - 00:44:21:22 Speaker 2 And as I'm doing that, I could hear the whispers of like, what the heck is that guy doing over there? What is it? You know, and just, you know, people make no shame of talking crap to you if they want to, you know, like, what are you doing over there, weirdo or whatever, you know, and in that space, just like this is for me, this is none of these people. 00:44:21:22 - 00:44:47:21 Speaker 2 It has nothing to do with them. I need to get the healing that I came to get. And, Yeah, the beginning of opening up to prayer, the beginning of open Up to meditation. And it was a big healing experience. And as you said, sort of the juxtaposition of that, which was a really beautiful time, or at least the opening to that with this other place, which I'm happy to get into, which was kind of a in the book, I call it a mind fuck because it felt that way, like they call it a treatment center. 00:44:47:21 - 00:45:09:05 Speaker 2 But, I hesitate to even give it that, you know, that title, because it was it was a little bit more, a little bit more complex than that. But as you said, based on largely on coercion and trying to force people to live a certain way. And, yeah, it I don't think I took much out of that place. 00:45:09:06 - 00:45:31:20 Speaker 2 Other other than meeting a few good people who I held on to through my life and some who, unfortunately, were not able to make it through their addictions. But prison itself, jail itself, and these types of what they call treatment centers, which are still around. Personally, I do not think are the best avenue for trying to reach people who are in my situation. 00:45:31:22 - 00:45:58:03 Speaker 2 You know, most people, they're just treat it as a joke or as like a summer camp or just what they're just doing, what they have to do to get out, to get to the next place or to get back home. And for many of those people to get back to whatever they were doing before. So ultimately, you have as an individual, I had to choose to make the most of the time, you know, it's like and that's one thing I did learn from, from my granny as well, like when it comes to spirituality and many other things that she told me just to take what works, you know, to not get, you know, that 00:45:58:03 - 00:46:13:09 Speaker 2 she took pieces from Christianity, she took pieces from different things and would use what worked. And so even though I felt like, all right, I'm in this horrible jail surrounded by people who I would not normally chores choose to be around. What can I glean from this experience? You know, what can I take with me and then go to this treatment facility? 00:46:13:09 - 00:46:27:11 Speaker 2 Where are they treating you? Like children and and just all kinds of insane ways. What is the wisdom I can still take from that? You know, that was definitely something I took from my granny as well. Just trying to make the most out of those experiences. 00:46:27:13 - 00:46:37:19 Speaker 3 For people who are caught up in addiction. What do you believe does ultimately work? What does help people? What have you seen? 00:46:37:21 - 00:46:58:08 Speaker 2 I wish I had the perfect answer. I mean, I have some some theories and I guess in some ways I might be a little qualified to speak about it, not only because of my own experience with addiction, but being the son of an addict and having several family members who have experienced addiction and both sides of my family. 00:46:58:10 - 00:47:25:05 Speaker 2 I lost my father to addiction in 2018. He unfortunately never found his way and he overdosed in Houston in 2018. Lost one of my good friends in 2013, another 1 in 2021 2022. Addictions and I tend to believe that it's all related to trauma that hasn't been dealt with, that hasn't been processed. You know, I personally do not buy into the addiction as a disease model. 00:47:25:07 - 00:47:46:03 Speaker 2 You know, I want to couch that was saying that for those who find value in that, that's wonderful. I'm not trying to demean anybody else's experience because I have friends who feel who are, you know, struggling with alcoholism and they found their way to AA and sort of that model, and that's helpful for them. But it always felt to me. 00:47:46:05 - 00:48:06:09 Speaker 2 Just not the right kind of message, that it wasn't helpful for me to hear, you're an addict, you're going to be this way for the rest of your life. So you need to find a way to just navigate that. And if that means go to a meetings two times a week and or just what they call cross addiction, just smoke cigarettes all the time or just replace it with coffee or whatever, you know, like some sort of more acceptable addiction, because you're always going to be this way. 00:48:06:09 - 00:48:24:06 Speaker 2 And the best you can hope for is to just navigate that. So you need to constantly be on edge. You know that if any. If something bad happens, you might crack and you might fall into your old ways. And again, I, I can't speak for other people's experience, but I mean, I hit some pretty low lows and found myself addicted to things for a couple of years. 00:48:24:06 - 00:48:42:08 Speaker 2 And and not only when it came to drugs, because even after the drugs, it took me a while to realize that I that the addictive behavior shows up in other manners. My. I continued to sell drugs even after I got off drugs, because I realized that I was addicted to the lifestyle I was addicted to. Not even I was making a lot of money. 00:48:42:08 - 00:48:59:01 Speaker 2 It was just like the business aspect of it, which, as I said later, I realized, oh, maybe it's just entrepreneurship I'm looking for, but I was I found myself addicted to that or addicted to, I think there's probably a period of time where I was a sex addict too, as well. I mean, I was cheating, I was just it just kept showing up in different ways. 00:48:59:01 - 00:49:13:19 Speaker 2 And ultimately, for me, the root cause that I found was impulse control, that I lacked impulse control in so many different ways, that I was just rushing headfirst into situations, whether it was like, oh, here's this attractive woman, let me go, you know, do whatever. And then later on I have this guilt about it. Now I feel like crap. 00:49:13:19 - 00:49:32:22 Speaker 2 Now I need to use drugs to try to match that or to, you know, cover it up and so on and so forth. And it for me, it largely came down to impulse control. I think that's a big part of it. And people seeking, seeking ways to satisfy that. But ultimately, I do think it comes down to individual and collective trauma as well. 00:49:33:00 - 00:49:57:19 Speaker 2 For me, I think some of my trauma, besides the obvious things I've mentioned about my father, I, I believe that my family and probably many families have multigenerational, intergenerational trauma that just keeps getting passed down. I shared with you guys before my father. He was obviously addicted and he was introduced to drugs through his father, you know, at a very young age, and he never was able my grandpa, you know, ended up getting his self straight, became a successful person. 00:49:57:19 - 00:50:18:01 Speaker 2 But he's the one who introduced my father to drugs. My great grandfather apparently also struggled and ended up, you know, committing suicide and jail in prison. My mother's side of the family, both, you know, uncles alcohol like this was all very prevalent in my young life growing up. And it took me, I think, to get locked up, to start to realize like, wow, this is a cycle. 00:50:18:05 - 00:50:34:03 Speaker 2 And there was something that I became very committed to breaking, that I wanted to be the one to break the family tradition. As I said, my brother and I and my older brother, we would call it that. Like it's just the family tradition, you know, we all go to prison, we all go to jail. We all, you know, that's just something that was there and which is such a sad thing to think about. 00:50:34:04 - 00:50:58:01 Speaker 2 Like as a young child, sort of seeing that as your family's claim to fame. So I think it does have to do with like I was holding on to this individual trauma, but also I think there is this bigger spiritual wound in our particular lineage that I'm doing my best to heal, you know, on, on as much as I can in my part and trying to be trying to be that in my family as well. 00:50:58:02 - 00:51:12:20 Speaker 2 I mean, part of me writing this book has been to like, share the, you know, obviously share the story with the greater world, but to share it with my family, you know, and get them to say like this, you know, you all have a they're all in the book, you know, from my perspective, of course, but it's like you probably remember these times and maybe there's some things you haven't dealt with. 00:51:12:20 - 00:51:36:08 Speaker 2 And, that's still a journey that we're on, you know. But I do think that trauma is is the root of so much of people's addictions. I don't think that a person who has dealt with their stuff and is working towards wholeness seeks out escapism, which was basically what I was doing or tries to drink, to drown or tries to avoid those things, you know? 00:51:36:10 - 00:51:55:05 Speaker 2 And of course, it doesn't always show up as hard drugs. In my case, it's a little bit more extreme. I definitely think there's plenty of people who are addicted to other substances that are much more accepted in society, like alcohol and others, and even cigarettes and things like that, that might be using those things in the same way, obviously, as stress relief and stuff like that. 00:51:55:05 - 00:52:18:13 Speaker 2 But we don't notice it so much because, you know, it's not as destructive when not when you're on crystal meth. You lose a lot of weight. You, you know, your cheeks and you look obviously not too good, right? Things are more obvious. But if somebody is a functioning member of society while masking their pain with other types of addictions or, and traumas, you know that they're they're covering up with different behaviors, it's a lot harder to see. 00:52:18:15 - 00:52:36:18 Speaker 3 I think this is an opportunity for us to pause on, on something, because I would hate for us to brush over something that you're saying that's so important. And we live in a culture right now where that word trauma tends to get very much overused, and sometimes people even identify with it and it just becomes their entire experience. 00:52:36:18 - 00:52:59:12 Speaker 3 And it is used as a justification for almost every challenge that exists in their own life. And so if we can, within the own depths of this, understand, because we started this episode around age 14 and you're dealing with this tremendous amount of pain, there's a father that is not in your life. The loss of a parent is traumatic. 00:52:59:14 - 00:53:16:02 Speaker 3 And although you are anxious about his arrival, right, there was a part of you. There was a spirit in you, which was probably really hopeful that you can have a man in your life, a father in your life, that he's going to learn from his mistakes and he's going to be present, and you can have him back in your life. 00:53:16:04 - 00:53:36:20 Speaker 3 And when you found out that he is back in jail, that pain is so intense, it's so strong that we have to learn to do something with that. And what you did is what a lot of people say. You're like, no more. I'm not going to be hurt anymore. And you kind of put a prison around your, your heart. 00:53:36:22 - 00:54:02:23 Speaker 3 But we know that's impossible. That's impossible for human beings to do because that emotion is an energy, as is every thought, as is every feeling that we have. It's an energy. I'm a personal believer in that energy is supposed to be experienced and moved into transformation. So you take pain and you transform it into creation in some way. 00:54:03:01 - 00:54:23:17 Speaker 3 And what happens when you develop this relationship to your pain that you don't want to feel it? You do exactly what you did, and so many people do is you look to numb yourself from it and the self-injury that exists, just cutting yourself. There's an energy that comes up, there's an emotion, there's a thought, and it's not acceptable. 00:54:23:18 - 00:54:49:12 Speaker 3 Right. You can't be there. And then you do something to stop that experience. And I'm so with you on the dangers of any deterministic model, like a disease model, because it's saying this is who you are. And when you have a father who had addictions, that's a very dangerous belief system to tie to. Right? Because now you're saying this is who I am. 00:54:49:12 - 00:55:20:21 Speaker 3 I am my father. My life is playing out exactly the same way that his dead. Yeah. And what makes your story beautiful and your memoirs so beautiful is there's you're able to humanize this experience, right? You're able to see an outside action and behavior that we so easily can other. And you take us inside, you know, into your inner world and why you respond the way you do. 00:55:20:23 - 00:55:25:08 Speaker 3 But it does start with pain and how to deal with pain. 00:55:25:10 - 00:55:47:06 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, I think thank you for sharing that. I think that, yeah, as you said, in terms of you can't really can't really mask and hide those things. I mean, the trying to put a cage around my heart, was an attempt to not feel those things, but obviously I was still feeling them. It was just in my own, in my quietest spaces. 00:55:47:07 - 00:56:07:07 Speaker 2 I mean, when I'm describing cutting myself and things of that, I mean, this is locked away in my room when no one's home and, you know, kind of just sitting in my misery and depression and, and, you know, grabbing a piece of glass or a razor or something. And whether it's cutting my arm, I also cut my stomach and chest quite a bit when I was younger. 00:56:07:13 - 00:56:25:01 Speaker 2 Those were just I think, as you said, there's, there's, you know, there's a biochemical reaction as well going on. I think it was just there was multiple layers of me sort of feeling something, but also trying to stop and suppress things at the same time. And, and. Yeah, yeah, it was a, it was a lot to take on at that time. 00:56:25:01 - 00:56:46:19 Speaker 2 But I think that ultimately the reason I want I brought people into my inner world is you're describing there is because I do want that story to be useful to other people in some ways. And also, one of the things that I've learned over the years to is that statistically, you know, according to some studies, men are less likely to be, self-harming than women. 00:56:46:20 - 00:57:06:03 Speaker 2 I would imagine that's probably true. But I also think the numbers have been are probably much higher than admit to it, because I don't think most men want to discuss those things. I also talk in the book about like my struggles with like body issues, and some of that was related to the self-harm to as well. And I don't think those are topics that typically men feel comfortable broaching and and admitting to. 00:57:06:05 - 00:57:17:10 Speaker 2 So that was another reason why I wanted to just be transparent about that in case there's any, whether men or women, whoever, that might relate to that and understand that experience felt important to me. 00:57:17:12 - 00:57:44:10 Speaker 3 And I think self-harm comes in so many different categories. Yeah, right. I think men generally tend to be externalized more so than, than women. But and what I mean by that is, you know, act out violently, enter into the drug trade. Yeah. Sexualize, you know, become over sexualized like all those externalized behaviors were traditionally I think, a, you know, women are more likely to internalize that. 00:57:44:10 - 00:58:01:18 Speaker 3 That's that's why cutting tends to be much more much seen in adolescent females than any other population. But you're describing a range of self-harming behaviors and you're also describing internally self-harming thoughts. Right. Something that's a creation in you about who you are. 00:58:01:23 - 00:58:34:03 Speaker 2 I mean, that's really where it ultimately came from. You know, I, I mentioned just briefly about insecurities. Like I had a, a mental conversation, a self-talk that was so unhealthy, you know, and that up until my early 20s, even after I got out of prison, was when I really felt like I got a handle of it. And what I mean by that is that every time I would meet somebody or potentially start a new relationship, for example, there's this voice telling me how they're going to fuck me over, they're going to screw me over. 00:58:34:03 - 00:58:56:07 Speaker 2 They're lying to me. They're, you know, they maybe they're going to do this. And a lot of it, I think, is because I've just picked up that like, well, my dad writes these letters, he says these things and then he does the exact opposite. So I guess that's just what people do. You just say whatever you want. There's no, you know, there's nothing bounding you to truth into your word, which is, of course, where the title comes from, because I think I inherited that behavior and I became pathological liar. 00:58:56:07 - 00:59:12:19 Speaker 2 I became a cheater and these sorts of things. And I think part of it was like, well, I need to get over on people before they, you know, hurt me as well. And so I had this self-talk. I had this voice that was, you know, my narration was just on guard. I think it was part of a sense of trying to protect myself in some ways. 00:59:12:19 - 00:59:32:06 Speaker 2 But it was in this very perverse way of just assuming the worst of other people and constantly second guessing whether I was being, you know, where I was being lied to or whether I was being cheated on. Then, of course, as I'm doing these things myself, it's creating this other cycle of like, well, dang, I'm accusing people of things that I'm doing myself, and now I'm kind of lost in this whole other thing. 00:59:32:06 - 00:59:55:18 Speaker 2 But it really did spring from having such strong, really, it's all about a lack of self. I didn't know who I was, I didn't feel good about whoever I was, and because of that, I assumed the outside world seed me, saw me the same way that I did. And so there was, you know, there was this sense that everywhere I went, people were judging me or people had these negative views or whatever it may have been. 00:59:55:18 - 01:00:12:01 Speaker 2 And I was just carrying that with me all the time. And then, yeah, that negative self-talk just translated into just assuming the worst about other people. And so I might as well get what I can get. And, you know, who cares what happens in the meantime? A lot of it stemmed from that. 01:00:12:03 - 01:00:41:20 Speaker 1 How did you get into political activism and develop the philosophy that you're now known for? Because, of course, you know, I'll say I, I your memoir is new. It's a side of you that most people didn't know about. Most people who know you, including me, are people who know you as as this amazing journalist, investigative reporter who digs into the stories of government overreach, of corruption and courageously, fearlessly puts these out there. 01:00:42:00 - 01:00:49:11 Speaker 1 But that came along a little later for you. How did you get into, into your political philosophy? 01:00:49:12 - 01:01:08:13 Speaker 2 Sure. The only so I didn't grow up in a political home in any way. Like, as I said, my family was busy dealing with other things. I don't think I ever heard my my stepdad or my mother or any family members ever talk about voting or politics, which on pond reflection, I kind of prefer because they're not sort of hard left or hard right or anything. 01:01:08:14 - 01:01:29:17 Speaker 2 So there's no political debates in my family. It just wasn't a thing. So I, I never really had any sort of yeah, any of that kind of political growing up around, you know, political philosophers or anybody debating political science or any intentions of that. I guess my very first introduction to politics in general would have been through music. 01:01:29:18 - 01:01:49:22 Speaker 2 I mean, I, I largely grew up in, like, the metal and punk music community. And so obviously there's a lot of political messages in some of those bands and artists. And so that was probably the first thing that creeped in my mind, which was just a general, more like suspicion of a government question authority sort of thing, but not any deep political philosophy. 01:01:49:22 - 01:02:12:08 Speaker 2 And it wasn't until and actually, the only time I've ever voted in my life was when I was 18. I witnessed the nine over 11 attacks in my junior year at high school. You know, we're passing the 25th anniversary here, and I was in high school. I watched that happen. And and then, you know, the next year when I'm graduating high school and going into college, I'm watching the Iraq bombings in March 2003. 01:02:12:08 - 01:02:29:21 Speaker 2 That was right as I was my first semester of community college. And at first I, you know, I didn't know anything about geopolitics or any of this. And I remember clearly watching that and having that initial feeling of like, wow, we're getting the bad guys, you know, sort of thing that I would come to later, have a little bit more nuanced view on. 01:02:29:23 - 01:02:49:18 Speaker 2 And so the only time I voted was to vote against George Bush, and I mean that very specifically because I did not like that guy. I was a, you know, as a young person growing up there and witnessing the marches against the Iraq War, again, still not really understanding the full breadth of it, but knowing like this is bad, like people are starting to die, like the bombs are taking place. 01:02:49:18 - 01:03:09:09 Speaker 2 And so I was in a band that was very much anti George Bush. We used to bring on stage a cardboard cutout of George Bush and like throw it to the crowd so they could tear it apart and things like that. But I was still kind of yeah, I think a naive in the sense of I just like I said, I didn't know any much about John Kerry or and I wasn't really supporting the Democratic Party. 01:03:09:09 - 01:03:29:07 Speaker 2 I just didn't like this guy, which I think, unfortunately, how a lot of people vote. So it was much later, after I went through this struggle we just described in getting going to prison and getting out as a felon in October 2008, that I started to get more political. It started first with me just questioning the drug war. 01:03:29:09 - 01:03:49:01 Speaker 2 Largely because obviously I had just gotten out. I had this drug charge. Now I have a felony, and I'm I'm back in Houston. I can't get rented certain areas of town. I can't get jobs in certain areas of town. People tend to judge you when they hear that you're a felony, you know, and the felon community, people like to say you have a bull's eye on your back because, you know, you've just got even more challenges than the average person. 01:03:49:03 - 01:04:08:02 Speaker 2 And so I, was starting to kind of question that and what that really meant. Obviously I didn't think crystal meth was helpful or good for anybody, but I did start to question, like if it was even right for people, for me to be locked up because of my personal choices. You know, these days I don't think that's, that's really the best path. 01:04:08:02 - 01:04:34:21 Speaker 2 But, yeah, it was the beginning of that. I started to research the origins of the United States drug laws, Harrison Act of 1914, and so on and so forth, learning about the origins of these drug laws being largely related to racism against black jazz musicians and Chinese migrant workers and Mexican migrant workers. I learned about the industry really trying to lobby against hemp because hemp was being promoted as a fuel, and how those things played into some of the first drug laws. 01:04:34:21 - 01:05:08:09 Speaker 2 So that was kind of a light bulb moment for me, where I started to think, well, maybe there's other things that I haven't quite been taught about the world. You know, at least not the version of events I picked up in school. And so that would have been going into 2009. And then also just kind of around this time, I'm, just, you know, some synchronous events, like where I'm riding the bus through the city of Houston, going from my crappy job, I managed to get as a felony, as a felon, and I happened to see some people wearing these weird masks, which I later learned were, you know, the anonymous mask, Guy Fawkes 01:05:08:09 - 01:05:24:19 Speaker 2 mask. You know, at the time, I just like what is going on here, and I happen to just jump off the bus just to kind of check out the scene. And that was a protest back in 2009 or 2010. Anonymous hacking Scientology or something like, you know, I didn't know anything about it, but it was like my mind was being piqued with this idea of like people standing up. 01:05:24:19 - 01:05:45:02 Speaker 2 And I started to, you know, eventually I heard Ron Paul speak at the University of Houston in 2010. I think it would have been and, you know, started to read some conspiracy books and things of that sort, but it was kind of a combination of like my background in punk music. That got me a little bit into politics. 01:05:45:04 - 01:06:03:04 Speaker 2 Ron Paul libertarianism, you know, some conspiracy books. And then also, as I was after I got out of prison, I was moving into the city. I started to kind of get really plugged into, anarchist bookstores and sort of, you know, community spaces, which tended to be more left leaning, but also kind of informed me in a different way. 01:06:03:04 - 01:06:32:19 Speaker 2 And it was kind of the convergence of these different strands that really got me activated to like, want to do something. And so in 2010, May, March 2010, I started a group called the Houston Free Thinkers. And at first it was just a blog that I could just post my, you know, fresh ideas as I was starting to question the world around me, and then eventually by May, by later that summer, it evolved into a real world group that me and some friends started, and we just started having meetings and from 2010 to 2017. 01:06:33:00 - 01:06:50:02 Speaker 2 This was my daily life. I mean, we organized, marches and rallies and street actions, those usual things. But we also had a community house that we ended up living in where we had a community garden. We did documentary screenings. We did Skillshare, teaching people how to make their own soap, how to make their own bread, like whatever it may be. 01:06:50:02 - 01:07:19:17 Speaker 2 So we sort of were doing the more, you know, typical activism as people think about it, but also very much community oriented things. My mind was always like, what can we do about it in our backyard? You know, these problems are big, but what can we do here? And yeah, and that that sort of became my life for those first 7 or 8 years, a couple of years after I got out and then a couple of years into that, I started picking up a camera and putting it in the face of the local mayor and going to press conferences and questioning the police chief, and got a job at the local radio station. 01:07:19:17 - 01:07:38:15 Speaker 2 And, you know, I didn't go to school for journalism. I really never had that wasn't on my horizon. It just kind of through the activism, as I started to see some of the limitations and the flaws and the corporate media, I started thinking maybe I could do better than them, and I'm just going to show up with my little handheld camera at these press conferences and be the one asking the question, hard questions. 01:07:38:15 - 01:07:49:19 Speaker 2 And yeah, and then, you know, that sort of has become my life. It allowed me to eventually get paid gigs writing for the independent alternative media and launching my own website and everything else like that. 01:07:49:21 - 01:08:13:10 Speaker 3 I tend to look at life a little from a mystical perspective sometimes, that we're all on our own hero's journey, and we go through the dark night of the soul, and often what we look back on a one point of our, our, our lifetimes as a traumatic and painful is often transformative into something much greater like for much bigger purpose. 01:08:13:12 - 01:08:34:13 Speaker 3 And so, reflecting on your story. With your experience, with authority. So really, the loss very early on of an authority figure was never, ever really able to meet your needs. He could not be what you needed as a as a young boy. And you go into the school systems and you see these miserable teachers who are doing anything but loving and guiding you. 01:08:34:13 - 01:08:49:16 Speaker 3 In fact, they're beating you down even further. How did those experiences end up fueling a transformation? What what do you now, you know, believe that that served for you becoming an investigative journalist? 01:08:49:18 - 01:09:08:19 Speaker 2 Well, I like your analysis there. I think that's, probably spot on there. You know, part of it, I think, was those different experiences you just described their. And also, I do credit my mother. And it's funny because I tell her this and sometimes I think she regrets this, but she told me at a very young age. 01:09:08:20 - 01:09:26:19 Speaker 2 And she didn't say question authority, but she told me in her own way that if I am ever told to do the wrong thing, something that I know is wrong, and it's a teacher, a pastor, a principal, an adult, don't do it and I won't be mad at you. You won't get in trouble. You know, that was like the way she told me. 01:09:26:19 - 01:10:00:14 Speaker 2 It was like if anybody. If any adult ever tells you to do something that you know is wrong, I don't care what they say. When you come home, you won't be in trouble. And so I told her I was like, you kind of instilled this sense of questioning authority in me, because the way that I came to understand that and, and as well as in the experiences that you described there that obviously influenced me was that when adults would speak in ways that didn't sort of comport with my sense of justice, which I think is something else that's also been a part of me even at a young age. 01:10:00:14 - 01:10:18:00 Speaker 2 It was just, you know, even though I was struggling with my own ways, like doing what was right or seeing something right in the world, you know, that's like watching the bombings and stuff like that. Even though I was struggling in my own ways to live, you know, just in my own life, I could sense that there was injustices in the world, and I just wasn't at a place really to do anything about it yet. 01:10:18:02 - 01:10:32:04 Speaker 2 But I think I always had that sense of questioning largely from my mother. And that's kind of what I'm saying with like the, the teachers that were not really treating me so well or would talk to me in a way that I didn't think was respectful, and then tell me, well, I'm an adult, you need to show me respect. 01:10:32:04 - 01:10:48:19 Speaker 2 And it just like that, that doesn't comport with me. I could just because I'm smaller than you or you're older than me. If you want to talk to me crazy, I'm expected to just say yes, ma'am, whatever. That didn't line up for me, you know? And and you're right. I didn't have much positive examples of authority in my life. 01:10:48:20 - 01:11:10:15 Speaker 2 I mean, even my stepfather, who now I, you know, we have a loving relationship as adults, but. And I'm so grateful for him. You know, him and my mom are no longer together, but he came into our life when she was 21 years old, with three children and a husband that just went to prison, you know, and I think he probably saved us. 01:11:10:16 - 01:11:29:06 Speaker 2 You know, I don't know what my mother or what we would have done without him. But for my young self who wanted nothing more than my real father to come back, I had, you know, visions and dreams as a young kid of my father showing up and kicking his ass, and then all our family would get back together or something, you know, we were never together, but this sort of vision that I had. 01:11:29:08 - 01:11:53:15 Speaker 2 And so I rejected him as an authority figure. Of course, I didn't want him in my life. And then it didn't take long for me and my brother to get bigger and stronger than him and kind of assert that physically that like, you're not going to tell us what to do. And that prob that definitely played a major role in why him and my mother did end up getting divorced later because we refused to accept his authority and we and he wasn't capable of enforcing anymore. 01:11:53:15 - 01:12:12:18 Speaker 2 We were starting to get big enough. Say, are you going to do something about it? You know, and she didn't know what to do or how to handle that, you know. And so, yeah, I think you're correct that some of those experiences definitely contributed to my questioning of authority. And and that's something that I, you know, psychoanalyze myself as well sometimes like, hey, is this just my life path? 01:12:12:18 - 01:12:32:02 Speaker 2 Because I have, you know, these different experiences. But at the same time, I think, as you said, in terms of, you know, mystical, a mystical worldview, I do think this is exactly, you know, what the cards I was dealt, this is exactly how it was supposed to play out one way or the other, you know, and so I, I don't regret any of it, you know, I don't regret any of it. 01:12:32:02 - 01:12:41:23 Speaker 2 And I don't fall to anybody in my family or anywhere else that, like everything that has happened, led me right here to being here with you, you know, and to doing this. So it's like to me, it's all exactly as it's supposed to be. 01:12:42:03 - 01:13:03:12 Speaker 3 And then, I mean, you, you, you kind of learn radical responsibility and the meaning of being in a any type of authority position. You don't you respect it and you understand that, you might be bigger than somebody or you might have some inherent power right now because you are a a parent or a boss or you have some financial resources. 01:13:03:18 - 01:13:41:15 Speaker 3 But to to to learn that that comes for, for, for anyone who has much has been provided to them, you know, there's even more responsibility than to in ways steward that and make sure that you care for the people that are you're serving. And you learn that through being on the other end of that. And then when you're exposed to a government that is not for the people, and then you begin to do the investigation of yourself, especially, you know, the drug war stands out to me because we intentionally flooded drugs in a specific communities. 01:13:41:15 - 01:14:03:18 Speaker 3 That is a fact. That's a known fact. And it's hard for people to sometimes just sit with that, like, that's that who you vote for or the system that we were taught to believe in these, this constitutional republic that we have, that other human beings that are in a position to serve you are deliberately and intentionally doing harm to our communities. 01:14:03:20 - 01:14:25:02 Speaker 2 Yeah. And, you know, I, we we know that for a fact about the 80s and the crack epidemic. I don't have strong evidence and I haven't looked deeply into it, but I wouldn't be surprised if a similar thing happened with meth in the early 2000, because I can say, and I've talked to many people who had similar stories of mine, that in the early 2000, as I was getting out of high school, meth was everywhere. 01:14:25:05 - 01:14:39:20 Speaker 2 It was just like out of nowhere. It was just in in the city, in the suburbs. It was, you know, I was buying and selling to rich kids in the richest neighborhoods who were hooked on this stuff. I mean, it was so, like I said, I don't have any hard evidence of that, but I wouldn't be surprised. And and you're right. 01:14:39:21 - 01:14:56:12 Speaker 2 I mean, those are the kind of things that the more I learned about these kinds of things and looking back, my own experience is like, wow, okay. And then as I started to get more into a volunteer kind of libertarian perspective and, you know, thinking about the idea of no victim, no crime, and sort of like, who was I harming but myself? 01:14:56:13 - 01:15:12:12 Speaker 2 You know, I knew that I needed help for sure. That was for certain, but was throwing me in a cage. And, you know, for a situation that I clearly needed a deeper level of help than what, you know, because there's no individualized care or anything like that. It's like you're in there with career criminals who committed armed robbery. 01:15:12:12 - 01:15:34:13 Speaker 2 You're in there with some kid who got caught with a pill at school. You know, it's all we're all just mixed together. There's not any specialized, individualized care trying to get to the root of my particular situation of how I got there. So I came to question whether or not, you know, and I to this day, as much as I don't encourage or believe meth has any redeeming value or any of these really hard drugs, I don't think throwing people away in cages is the solution. 01:15:34:15 - 01:15:39:10 Speaker 1 So volunteerism, you mentioned volunteerism. What is that? 01:15:39:12 - 01:16:06:16 Speaker 2 Volunteerism is a political philosophy or some would say maybe anti political philosophy that strives to create a society where all interactions and relationships are voluntary and consensual. I mean, that to me is the most simple way to explain it. And then if you sort of contemplate that and extrapolate it, then you start to think about, okay, what relationships in our lives are not voluntary and consensual, because most people would say, well, yeah, that sounds kind of like the life that I live. 01:16:06:17 - 01:16:42:19 Speaker 2 Like I'm in consensual relationships with my partners or friends and family and things like that. But of course, the big relationship that we all have to some degree or another that is involuntary is the one with government. And so many volunteers kind of see volunteerism as just another name for anarchism. You know, it's maybe a softer way to explain the idea that, if you believe all relationships be volunteering consensual, and you examine their different relationships in your life, you eventually come to a point where you realize that the relationship you have with the government is not one that you're actually choosing to be a part of, but you, as far as they're concerned, they 01:16:42:19 - 01:17:02:05 Speaker 2 don't give you much of a choice if you don't pay their taxes or their fees. If you don't follow the things that they say, whether you think they're moral or not, if it's a law on the books and you choose to not abide by that system, then men with guns will come to enforce it, you know? And so that's, you know, that's sort of, I think, the ultimate conclusion for a lot of volunteers. 01:17:02:06 - 01:17:30:16 Speaker 2 For me, I also just it's just the way that I try to live my life with other people in general. I want to have healthy relationships that are based on some sort of mutual value and exchange of whether it's an exchange of ideas, goods and services. The relationships that I choose to have are ones that are going to be beneficial to both parties, and where there's not going to be any harm involved, where another big part of volunteerism is the belief in the non-aggression principle or, self-ownership. 01:17:30:17 - 01:17:58:04 Speaker 2 You know, you own your body, your own the fruits of your labor, bodily autonomy, these kinds of concepts, which I think especially in the post-Covid world, many people realize do matter to them and are important. And I saw so for me as a volunteer, as somebody who does describe myself that way, I strive to make sure that all the choices I make are not involving or bringing force, coercion, fraud, theft, etc. into whatever interactions I have. 01:17:58:04 - 01:18:18:08 Speaker 2 And again, I think most of us do live that way. But then there's also, you know, there's layers to this. And you kind of talked about the systems that that we're involved in. When you start to also question it on another deeper level of like, maybe I'm not committing force, fraud, coercion, but am I participating in systems that are doing those things? 01:18:18:09 - 01:18:29:08 Speaker 2 You know, sort of am I externalizing that to some by voting or whatever it may be? Right. So there's a lot of, you know, different nuances and debates in there, but ultimately that's what it comes down to is voluntary, consensual relationships. 01:18:29:13 - 01:18:53:07 Speaker 1 So I heard you use the word anarchism. And for most people that word is a very negative one. Sure. It implies a, a world in which there's there is no, no government of any kind and one in which there is violence, lawlessness, chaos, and where the, the most vulnerable people maybe have have no one to protect them. 01:18:53:11 - 01:19:23:04 Speaker 1 You can't call the police. How is a world, a voluntary world possible until people do the work to truly live in a way that stands by that principle, the non-aggression principle, which, of course, is this principle that there is no moral justification for aggression or coercion against another person, that you never aggressive against another. Sure. But how is that possible? 01:19:23:06 - 01:19:26:22 Speaker 1 Until people do that, do the work to be that to each other? 01:19:27:03 - 01:19:52:02 Speaker 2 I don't think it is. I don't think it is. I would say when I first started to get into my activism and, you know, exploring political philosophy and then starting to write books with my own political philosophies, I had much more, optimism that it was possible, I still work towards and believe that we are humanity is evolving as a species mentally, physically, spiritually. 01:19:52:04 - 01:20:24:11 Speaker 2 And I don't put a timeline on that. I don't claim to know, but I don't think it is possible without that. And in fact, that's one of if I feel like I've contributed anything to the field of volunteerism or, modern libertarianism, it is trying to bring in the spiritual component to that message. Because in my early years, as I started to go to libertarian events and conferences and started to get invited to speak at some of these, I saw that there was a large focus on economics, which is obviously important, a large focus on like rational thought logic, which is obviously important too. 01:20:24:13 - 01:20:47:05 Speaker 2 And in my view, there seemed to be this huge gap for like the spiritual side of things, for the internal world. It was like everybody's like, yeah, it's just we got to, you know, fix the economic system. If we can just explain this logically to people, then everything will fix itself. And there wasn't, at least at that time when I was when I was getting into things in the early 20 tens, most of the big libertarians and volunteers I knew were largely atheists. 01:20:47:05 - 01:21:04:03 Speaker 2 And, you know, that's fine for them to do. But it wasn't something I was. I was kind of on my spiritual journey as well after getting out of prison, and it became really clear to me because of the trauma and the things that we've just been discussing, that you until you address those things, and how are people going to be capable of building this better world that we think is possible? 01:21:04:07 - 01:21:20:03 Speaker 2 You know, if you would come to me in 22,005, at any time between 2005 and 2008, and tried to communicate these really beautiful, lofty ideals or talk to me about the corruption in the system or this thing or that thing. I would have heard you, I would have listened to you, and I probably would have read with you. 01:21:20:07 - 01:21:42:00 Speaker 2 But I was so lost in my own emotional, you know, muck to loss to do anything about it. And after I made it through that and then started to get into these ideas, I started to reflect and realize, like, if the world is filled with these different types of traumas, which traumas are different for each person and some are more debilitating than others, and and securities and doubts and fears what I call the internal tyrant. 01:21:42:02 - 01:22:06:16 Speaker 2 Until we really address that, then this other world isn't going to be possible. And so to me, a lot of my work, focuses on sort of bringing together that like the, the, the search for cognitive liberty and spiritual liberty as well as in the physical realm. And that's kind of the way I see my journalism playing a role of like, I'm going to write about the things going on in the world, expose these things to people, try to get them to start questioning those systems. 01:22:06:16 - 01:22:24:17 Speaker 2 But the goal for me has always been, okay, you're questioning that, but don't forget, there's also this internal thing and to me is sort of without bringing those two things together where I don't think we will be able to get to that point. So I, I consider myself an anarchist. But I don't think that I, I'm less optimistic that it's going to happen now. 01:22:24:19 - 01:22:44:12 Speaker 2 And in terms of why people are afraid of that term, part of it is, I think by design, I mean the term in just the original Greek is just without rulers. Anarcho is like, you know, breaking down the term. It doesn't it isn't anything scary. But in the modern parlance and in pop culture, anarchy is typically used as a synonym for chaos. 01:22:44:13 - 01:23:10:16 Speaker 2 That's the main way you hear it used in the mainstream. And I think some people mistakenly use that. And if you look up in the dictionary, sure, it's in there. They equate that. I think that's also by design to convince people that without rulers and without, you know, overarching authorities, that we don't choose n that there would be chaos, that there would, you know, so if we chose to self-organize because ultimately the other thing to without getting lost into anarchism is that it doesn't imply that we can't organize. 01:23:10:16 - 01:23:28:14 Speaker 2 I think some people assume that means. So it's just going to be every man for himself. But all it really means is that if there's going to be some sort of central body or decision making or whatever it may be, that we are all again able to consent to it and to exit, you know, that's an important part. 01:23:28:15 - 01:23:43:06 Speaker 2 But we don't have that with the current governmental system. You know, you consent to what they say. You don't like it. Well, they'll take you away eventually. There's no like no thank you. I'd like to go join this other neighborhood group here Committee. And so there's a lot of theories and ideas on how this would play out in real life. 01:23:43:06 - 01:24:05:13 Speaker 2 But, I think that there's been a purposeful effort to get people to associate anarchism, the philosophy, with violence, and to be sure to be certain, a hundred years ago, there definitely were people who call themselves anarchists, and there's a debate about whether we would qualify that as accurate or not, who did throw bombs at politicians and who did commit political assassinations. 01:24:05:13 - 01:24:27:10 Speaker 2 And they tend to be kind of more left leaning anarchist. And what was often termed insurrectionary anarchist because they did believe in the initiation of violence. That's one major difference between volunteers as well, is that we don't believe the initiation of force and violence is correct. We believe in self-defense. But that's much different than saying, I'm going to go out and assassinate somebody, because I think it's going to serve my political ends. 01:24:27:15 - 01:24:44:01 Speaker 2 So, you know, there's a whole debate, even within anarchism, about whether that's an acceptable tactic. But I think it's because of those sorts of stories as well. And the legacy from that, that a hundred years later, people hear anarchists and they think of like, you know, and especially today they think of Antifa or something like, you know, maybe more aggressive and violent. 01:24:44:01 - 01:24:51:09 Speaker 2 But many anarchists are just people working in their gardens and homeschooling their kids and, you know, living peaceful lives. 01:24:51:11 - 01:25:35:09 Speaker 3 I'm curious to know your role, your belief in the role of, mass resistance. I think if you polled most Americans, let's just stay with this country right now, they would probably agree that the US government acts in ways that they don't agree with morally. So what that means is their hard earned money is being used for war, genocide, even, and a range of other, both domestic and foreign policy initiatives that further create, disease division and loss of human sovereignty. 01:25:35:11 - 01:25:38:21 Speaker 3 So what role is like mass resistance in this? 01:25:38:23 - 01:25:48:01 Speaker 2 Well, when you say resistance, you mean in terms of like people physically trying to fight back or protest or marches or any of those things. 01:25:48:02 - 01:25:57:00 Speaker 3 Just refusing to follow the rules, like so let's say we just we're not going to pay taxes because military disagree with. 01:25:57:00 - 01:26:20:07 Speaker 2 It, which would be great if, yeah, that's some that's one solution I present in the end of my third book where, about this idea and I don't remember the math off the top of my head, but me and my coauthor who wrote that book together, we did the math at the time, back in 2017, of the estimated amount that it would take for American like, how many Americans would it take to actually stop if we just all at the same time, in unison, stop paying taxes? 01:26:20:07 - 01:26:39:01 Speaker 2 How much would it roughly take to stop the war machine? Now, of course, there's the caveat that most of it's just digital numbers on the screen anyways, and they'll just print up money regardless of what we do. At this point, I think people have come to realize that. So I think it's more symbolic, though. And then there's people, other people I've spoke to who believe. 01:26:39:01 - 01:26:57:09 Speaker 2 And I even in my early days, I, I believe something like a general strike, you know, this one day everybody's just going to go on strike or we're going to shut. And this has happened in history in different countries and, and unions and stuff like that. People have tried to shut down industries and like, we'll, we'll make them feel the pain if we all just don't go to work today or do that. 01:26:57:11 - 01:27:18:18 Speaker 2 I think that's something like that could have an impact. The problem always is just getting that many people coordinated on the same page. And then at the same time, I mean, this to me is sort of all built in to the system to keep people on a rat race that, you know, people might be like, well, you might be able to afford a day off of work, but I can't, you know, if I don't go to work today, I'm not going to I'm going to get kicked out of my apartment. 01:27:18:18 - 01:27:41:21 Speaker 2 So how do you get unity among the the working class or among the average people? Whatever you want to say when there's some people who literally are living, check the check day to day and that they might not have the privilege of not working, you know, going, not going to work, you really would have to have people united in a way that I don't I've never seen in my lifetime. 01:27:41:23 - 01:27:57:05 Speaker 2 To believe that, like, we can hold out together, we can support each other. And this is another big part of volunteerism and anarchist philosophy, this concept of mutual aid. Because people often say, okay, well, if we don't pay our taxes, if we're not, you know, don't have, well, who's going to take care of the poor, who's going to do these different things? 01:27:57:09 - 01:28:20:20 Speaker 2 And those are real questions that real problems to solve if we ever get to that point. But one major way is through mutual aid. And this is something that we've seen throughout history, from churches, from organizations and from private charities and stuff like that. If we can come together and we could organize enough so that that person who says, I can't survive a day without work, okay, look, we're going to make sure you and your family have food for this day. 01:28:20:20 - 01:28:40:01 Speaker 2 Those of us who are a little better off. But we all got to stick with this. We got to go a week without working, you know, shut everything down. You know, nobody's you know, none of the energy workers are going out of the trains are flowing. If you could have something even I think in just one industry that majorly impacts the country, they would there would be, a response. 01:28:40:01 - 01:29:15:00 Speaker 2 Now, would the response be what we'd want? Would there, would the authorities meet us with, you know, handshakes and open for negotiations or would, as history shows, they come with, you know, armed guards and all the weapons of of essentially war that they have today, you know, surveillance tools and l red sound cannons. Because, I mean, in my career as a journalist, I've been I was at standing Rock watching people try to, you know, come together and organize and shut something down and, and witnessing and, and watched grandmothers being pepper sprayed and watched people being shot with, rubber bullets. 01:29:15:00 - 01:29:32:15 Speaker 2 And I got tased and, you know, just for being there, documenting. So I've seen firsthand as well as the summer 2020 protest I was there documenting, I got arrested with a bunch of other journalists after getting peddled by the police. Like, there's maybe we can go back in history. There's so many examples of how he responds when people try to organize. 01:29:32:15 - 01:29:51:22 Speaker 2 That doesn't mean we shouldn't, but those are real consequences, and those are real concerns that many people aren't willing to to face, you know, and and I understand, like, if you got family, you got kids at home, like the idea of going out to a protest and like laying it all on the line and the potential that maybe you get arrested and you lose your job because you don't get back to work and all these other consequences. 01:29:51:22 - 01:30:01:14 Speaker 2 But I think in order for there to ever be real mass resistance, because I don't think voting is going to focus, you know, fix anything, there would need to be a high level of coordination. 01:30:01:16 - 01:30:24:14 Speaker 3 Isn't this where the spiritual aspect comes in and why it's important you would bring it to like a libertarian platform? Because who's your authority? Who's your ultimate authority? So we're facing situations here in the state of Pennsylvania where they're trying to pass laws that during some health crisis, you know, state authorities would be able to violate your constitutional rights, come into your home without warning. 01:30:24:17 - 01:30:50:04 Speaker 1 Wow. Yeah. Just all they'd have to do is say they were from the public health department. They could come in. Yeah. These same rules would allow them to come into any school to interview any student if they felt there was a potential exposure to some pathogen or even an unusual occurrence, which is broad. Yeah. And, a likely target of this would be the Amish and their little one room schoolhouses. 01:30:50:05 - 01:31:19:15 Speaker 1 You know, you think there's some, you know, you decide that there's maybe there's measles moving through the community as is happening now, authorities showing up at the school, taking the children aside and questioning them without their parents either knowing or present. You know, the state is trying to do this right now. New York, of course, is trying to coerce Amish families, and Amish schools into vaccinating their children, or they have to leave the state in order to attend these one room schoolhouses. 01:31:19:17 - 01:31:51:16 Speaker 1 But one thing that as I was, I was as I was reading your book, you're talking about as you're you're awakening to what's happening in the world. So you're awakening to the darkness that has been around you. You're you're reading Alex Jones, you're taking in all these, you know, or watching him, you're taking in all this stuff. And in a sense, you started to become, not just aware, but obsessed with the what was going wrong and putting a lot of your energy and attention toward it. 01:31:51:18 - 01:32:09:08 Speaker 1 Yeah. And I'm interested now how you view that if you think there's a potential that yes, we need to know these things are going on, but if all our energy and attention then flows toward them, are we by the by the law of energy and attention, right where your attention goes, your energy flows, you create more of that in your life. 01:32:09:09 - 01:32:18:19 Speaker 1 Are we almost then creating more of the thing we don't desire to experience? And. 01:32:18:21 - 01:32:40:23 Speaker 1 Is it not better that we do see what is happening if we don't see it? A lot of people who had their head in the sand got took the vaccine in 2021. Not, you know, not paying attention, didn't did not serve them. Right. But then a lot of other people who were aware spent so much time in fear that it was impacting their health, their well-being, their family life. 01:32:41:04 - 01:32:55:08 Speaker 1 I know people who were obsessively on the computer monitoring everything that was going wrong while their wife and their kids were having dinner in the other room. Right there. Level of fear and obsession went so far that it was actually destroying their family life. 01:32:55:10 - 01:32:56:01 Speaker 2 Absolutely. 01:32:56:05 - 01:33:05:01 Speaker 1 Is it not better that we. Yes. See what's going on, but then find some way to take our attention and our energy and put it toward a solution. 01:33:05:03 - 01:33:32:06 Speaker 2 100%. And it's a balancing act. You know, in the beginning, what you described was absolutely true. And I from from the last 16 years of doing this work and giving talks around the US and other countries, it seems to be a common experience that when people first wake up or however you want to describe that, that they kind of have a freak out moment where for the first week or a couple of weeks or months even, you're obsessively reading or watching or whatever it is, particularly rabbit hole you're going down. 01:33:32:08 - 01:33:49:04 Speaker 2 And I definitely had that experience of just, you know, and and I would contribute. I mean, as you mentioned, Alex Jones, Alex Jones isn't somebody I follow these days or pay much attention to. But, you know, one of his documentaries did play a role in my early years, but it was also, the documentary is called End Game. 01:33:49:04 - 01:34:08:19 Speaker 2 It's also it's also very much like, Do Me like the music sounds like, dude, you know, end game blueprint for Global enslavement. You know, it's like very much not to say there's not factual information, but the presentation is keeping you on edge and is like, oh my God, this. And so I was in that panic mode. I was definitely in the sort of like, it's about to happen. 01:34:08:19 - 01:34:28:08 Speaker 2 The police state is like about to hit us. It's coming tomorrow, you know, and took, I would say, six months or so. Well, really? Yeah, probably that whole first two, 2010 as I started the activist group and got into things, I would say that whole year I was in a not a fool on panic mode, but definitely feeling the intensity of that. 01:34:28:08 - 01:35:01:00 Speaker 2 These, these agendas and things I was learning about were like very present in my life. And I was still, you know, focused on the community side of things. But it would take me leaving Houston and is something else I described in the book, going on a three month bicycle tour, which was a spiritual journey for me to kind of find my equilibrium, to find that balance, because a big part of why I went on the this bicycle tour and I'm talking just taking my bike from Houston, Texas, driving all the way, riding all the way to New Mexico over three months, volunteering on farms and just having this adventure of a lifetime. 01:35:01:02 - 01:35:30:18 Speaker 2 Part of it was like, I'm finally out of prison, I'm off probation and pro. I want to go do something and just celebrate being free. But also, it was motivated by the fact that I felt like I needed to find other people because I was in that state of mind. And the beautiful thing is, every single day when I was on the road and I'm just bike biking along from one city, you know, to to the next and just enjoying myself every single day, someone would pull over and ask if they could pray for me, or ask if they could give me a lift to the next town, or give me some peanut butter, or 01:35:30:18 - 01:35:55:19 Speaker 2 give me some firestarter, or just something like every single day. And that trip restored my faith in humanity. Like, truly like I went on the road and just positive experience after positive experience. And then, yeah, after I came home from that trip, it, I found I started to find more of that balance, and I did also, I describe it in the book as coming like home with like, you know, a fire in my heart, because now it's like I felt like, okay, this stuff is real, this stuff is going on. 01:35:55:21 - 01:36:09:16 Speaker 2 But there are good people out here. There's good people everywhere. The world is not, you know, just bad stuff everywhere. And I think that gave me a bit of that balance, so that when I went back home to Houston and just dove even further, this is 2011 and this is really where my activism started to, to grow. 01:36:09:16 - 01:36:26:03 Speaker 2 And, and we started to be known locally and nationally and everything. It was with that balanced state of mind of like, okay, we need to do we need this is where I said we started doing skill shares and like, let's do community garden. Let's do some more proactive, empowering things. And sure, we'll go do a march when it's necessary and we'll do that sort of stuff. 01:36:26:05 - 01:36:41:20 Speaker 2 But it was coming from that balanced state of mind because I absolutely agree with what you're saying there. And for me, one of the challenges these days, I think it's something I'm able to navigate well, but it is it can be a challenge, is that my job is to write about those things, right. My job is to inform and I love it. 01:36:41:20 - 01:37:01:00 Speaker 2 It's my passion and I'm blessed to be paid anything to do it. I feel honored and grateful for that. But it is that balancing of, as I said a few moments ago, like I'm trying to make articles right, articles, produce documentaries, do podcast interviews, reports and stuff like that with the intention of educating people, showing them, hey, here's some corruption going on. 01:37:01:00 - 01:37:17:13 Speaker 2 Here's an issue I think you should care about and you should know about, but it's never designed with that being the end goal. The idea is then, okay, now you've got this bit of information. What are you going to do about it? And that's where a lot of my work with Freedom Cells and exit and Build and promoting the solutions really comes in, because that is kind of my this. 01:37:17:13 - 01:37:32:06 Speaker 2 I feel like the for the people who are still in that level of they're just trying to learn about the world. I want to hook them in that way. But then I think a lot of the people I know as well, maybe yourselves and some of the, the, this audience included, you get to a point where it's like you get where things are. 01:37:32:07 - 01:37:47:15 Speaker 2 You don't need to know every single minutia of every single detail. And hopefully you get to a point where you're like, okay, I get it. Things are going in a bad direction. Now, what am I going to do for myself? How am I? I don't want their agenda 2030. I like to talk about liberation 2030, abundance 2030. You know okay, so they're going to do their things. 01:37:47:15 - 01:38:08:19 Speaker 2 What am I focused on. And this is something that I've put a lot of effort into, trying to drag as much of the freedom movement as possible, kicking and screaming towards solutions, because I, I do see that many people get stuck in that cycle, and especially now because the podcast space has grown so massive, and particularly conspiracies and things like this, you can just okay, what's Derrick up to? 01:38:08:19 - 01:38:25:10 Speaker 2 Okay, what's this person just watch. You know, it's like maybe they don't I don't watch mainstream TV. I don't watch Netflix. But then they're just consuming podcasts telling them truthful but not so, you know, happy information about the world and that consumes them. And so eventually you got to get to a point of what do we do with that? 01:38:25:11 - 01:38:28:11 Speaker 2 What are we actually going to do? 01:38:28:13 - 01:38:43:22 Speaker 3 Yeah, I'm interested in your thought on conscious creation, because we're kind of dancing around the edges on this. It's like where we focus our attention on kind of just drives everything about our life, and it gets manifested into this physical reality that we see. Do you see this as part of the solution for you? 01:38:44:00 - 01:38:46:09 Speaker 2 Absolutely. Tell me the term you. 01:38:46:09 - 01:38:48:04 Speaker 3 Said conscious creation. 01:38:48:06 - 01:39:19:20 Speaker 2 Yeah. So, if there is three tools that have been the tools that help me get to where I am now and everything I'm doing, obviously one of them would be meditation, which helped me quite a bit when I was in prison. And since the other would be creative visualization, like really understanding the power of imagination of our minds and of, you know, I'm a big fan of, one of the reasons I write as well as tried to crudely draw is to take things out of DIA's out of my mind and to put it down on paper, but also into the real world, to speak it into existence and to see it in my 01:39:19:20 - 01:39:46:04 Speaker 2 mind's eye. Create a visualization. When I started to learn about this idea, played a big role. And then of course, the natural progression for me of that is manifestation. Like is just taking those things, being able to focus, meditate, contemplate on something, see it in my mind's eye and then bring it into existence. You know, I mean, that's I think that's all I've been doing for the last, you know, 16 years is and just taken me a while to kind of realize that what was happening. 01:39:46:04 - 01:40:09:12 Speaker 2 But absolutely. And that is I, I would, I would estimate that's, you know, what you're describing with conscious creation that we are creating the world in front of us. And yeah, that's why I do try to balance that, because my life despite because so much of my work is consumed by these things, people might have the false, impression that all I do is talk about and think about conspiracies all day and do this work, but it's not what I spend a lot of my time doing anymore. 01:40:09:13 - 01:40:25:00 Speaker 2 I mean, I do what is necessary for the work that I love to do, but so much of the rest of my life is spent on creating the world that I want to see in it, and bringing that into an existence not only, as I said, through a meditative state of mind, through visualizing it, but then how do I bring that physically in? 01:40:25:00 - 01:40:44:05 Speaker 2 And for me, conscious creation manifestation is not as woo woo as some people imagine it to be like. To me, it is just as simple as like, I have this idea, I'm going to say it out loud, which is going to speak. You know, those words are going to echo into into this physical reality. Also, in some sense, I'm trying to hold myself accountable. 01:40:44:05 - 01:41:02:18 Speaker 2 I have this new project I'm working on now. I've said it out loud. Now I have to do it now, you know, these sort of things. And then holding myself accountable, putting things out into existence. And then. But it's not just for me at least say the prayer, walk away and then hope it happens. There's also, like I put every physical energy that I can contribute, spiritual energy as well. 01:41:02:18 - 01:41:20:21 Speaker 2 And to bring that thing into being. And I tend to feel like that's working with in tandem with creation, with the creator, with the universe, you know, to bring those things into existence. And, and I mean, that's I think that's really the key to what we're trying to do, which is why, like, yeah, finding that balance of like, look, I want to help people question things. 01:41:20:22 - 01:41:40:19 Speaker 2 I don't want them to get stuck there. You know? I don't want them to get stuck in like that. That rabbit hole of just trying to understand the world. Not that there's any. Of course, knowledge is great and wisdom and trying to pursue these things. I it's one of things I love about life, but balancing that with intuition, balancing that with, you know, conscious creation. 01:41:40:19 - 01:41:42:20 Speaker 2 I think that's really the key here. 01:41:42:22 - 01:42:12:10 Speaker 1 One of the things that I've seen, in the libertarian or, you know, freedom community is often, people having a philosophy of individualism, a belief that you have to do this on your own or that you should do everything on your own. A kind of a randy, an inner and type view of the world. And I'm more and more convinced one can try that. 01:42:12:11 - 01:42:12:21 Speaker 2 Sure. 01:42:13:00 - 01:42:34:07 Speaker 1 But that our best is our best option really is a form of voluntary interdependence. The, moral philosopher Jonathan Haidt uses this example of, you know, if you have one guy in a rowboat going down a river and you have eight people who choose to row together in another boat, the boat being read by eight people is going to zoom past. 01:42:34:08 - 01:43:16:03 Speaker 1 And it's not that either one is making a wrong decision. It's just if these eight people choose to work together, they're going to get there faster and they're going to go further. And I'm feeling more and more that it must be wholly voluntary, but that when we do manage to come together and work towards solutions as groups of people who can anytime choose to opt out and walk away, where it's not in any way coerced, our best chance really does lie in that, and especially when we're facing technocracy, when we're facing the surveillance state, when we're facing all these efforts to fracture us against each other, and the people who do choose to come 01:43:16:03 - 01:43:21:18 Speaker 1 together and create some kind of life outside the system as a group, really do stand the best, the best chance. 01:43:21:19 - 01:43:47:13 Speaker 2 Yeah, I tend to agree. I mean, I'm a I'm a strong, proud individualist in a lot of ways, but I don't think that has to mean we can't work together and collaborate together. I wrote this essay years ago called Are We Really All one collectivism versus individualism and sort of exploring this idea that you're talking about and even the title is, is kind of misleading because it's not it's sort of kind of trying to break that idea that these ideas are opposing instead of that they can coexist. 01:43:47:14 - 01:44:05:13 Speaker 2 Now, in terms of the collective being more important than the individual. That's where I tend to, you know, push back on, because I think that to have a strong, empowered collective, you need strong, empowered individuals, and the individuals can't be lost in that. But as you said, when we voluntarily and consensually choose to come together and collaborate, amazing things can happen. 01:44:05:14 - 01:44:30:19 Speaker 2 I mean, and there's nothing wrong with that. I think that should be encouraged. And, and yeah, I think that really is the solution. We don't have to give up our individuality and our, our identities to be a part of something. And the collective doesn't have to become more important. And, and because that's those are the arguments that have been made, like with the vaccines, things you were talking about, if you won't go, that's what people would say is like, well, I don't care if you're Amish or if you have this religious belief. 01:44:30:20 - 01:44:53:08 Speaker 2 The collective is more important than that individual belief you may hold. Right? So that's going in the wrong direction. But the idea that any of us on our own are going to be able to navigate this, I think is just, is just silly. Even if you're independently wealthy, like, you know, billionaire, it's there's still going to be a need for other people to collaborate, to try to thrive in the face of, many of the things that we're, we're facing right now. 01:44:53:08 - 01:45:24:03 Speaker 2 And that's my goal, is trying to work with as many people coming together in a consensual, voluntary way and collaborating in ways that are both mutually beneficial. It's one of the reasons why, you know, I started to build a community in the first place is because I think that for me, that is at least the key is how do I find other like minded, empowered, you know, individuals who are on the same path and then see where we can balance community with individuality and have the best of both worlds. 01:45:24:05 - 01:45:40:20 Speaker 1 I completely agree with you that nothing can ever override individual sovereignty, ever, like there is. I mean, that is the the North Star, and so anyone should need to be able to have the, the right to at any time say like this. This isn't working for me. I'm getting back in my own rowboat. 01:45:40:22 - 01:45:42:13 Speaker 2 Absolutely. 01:45:42:15 - 01:46:09:06 Speaker 1 But the last night at dinner, you were telling us about the the community that you are, that you are developing, along with other people who are coming forward voluntarily and desiring to be a part of it. And I just I found it so exciting to know that that this is happening and that, you know, when people might primarily know you for your work, uncovering the darkness, most of your energy is going toward building beautiful life. 01:46:09:10 - 01:46:40:03 Speaker 2 Yeah, absolutely. And it's, it's one that's going to become increasingly important in my work. I don't know that I'll ever stop doing journalism because I do love to write. I do love to research. But in terms of what I share with the world, it's going to shift quite a bit both into into both of these areas that we're discussing today, both discussing more of my personal addiction story and kind of trying to help people in that regard, but also in terms of what we're building with the conscience of Ecovillage and trying to be example not, of course, to claim that we've got anything or everything. 01:46:40:03 - 01:47:00:00 Speaker 2 I'll figure it out or anything like that, but to share best practices and lessons learned and, things that we're doing with the bigger, broader picture that the community that we're building in Mexico is going to be one of many other communities across North America. And eventually, I think, around the world that are united in common values and principles. 01:47:00:01 - 01:47:33:21 Speaker 2 And I think in the long term and in terms of building parallel systems will eventually evolve into trade networks of resources and goods and services, that are shared and traded among and sold among these communities that are united by common values. And if we recognize we don't want to be a part of this system that some other folk have planned and that would like to see the world go in, that those of us who want a different vision, we just become more coordinated and more networked on that scale of being able to trade ideas, services, resources and learn from each other. 01:47:33:23 - 01:47:36:00 Speaker 3 What are those common values? 01:47:36:02 - 01:48:08:13 Speaker 2 So the common values that the community that I'm starting that I've been involved in, which is called the Conscious Agora Ecovillage, have been what we've discussed here with volunteerism. And the way I originally framed it was very specific was sovereignty of the individual, which, that term itself, I took inspiration from one of the first intentional communities ever built in the United States, in the United States, by a man named Josiah Warren, who was one of the first individualist anarchists in the United States back in 17. 01:48:08:14 - 01:48:24:08 Speaker 2 I can't remember the exact year he built it, but he built two communities, 1 in 1 in upstate New York, and then the other one, I believe, was in Ohio. And, they were some of the longest existing communities. And so he has his journal still exists today. And there's, you know, books that have kind of elaborated on him. 01:48:24:08 - 01:48:44:13 Speaker 2 So I took a lot of inspiration from reading some of his work, where he describes a community of several hundred families, and every house had a garden in front of it, and they had a community store and just all these different things. And they were existing kind of on their own plot. And it was definitely they didn't use the term volunteerism, but it was definitely with that same ideology and sense of like, people could leave. 01:48:44:13 - 01:49:00:00 Speaker 2 There was nobody confined to staying in this community if they chose, you know, but people bought in and they could leave when they wanted. And there is, according to his, his journals, they had no police there in the community. They, you know, that there was there was no crime in their community and existed for 20 or 30 years. 01:49:00:00 - 01:49:24:21 Speaker 2 It eventually was, you know, sold and moved on. But I took a lot of inspiration from those some of those ideas. And his main core value was sovereignty, the individual that that needs to be at the front and center. And so for me, obviously, those words kind of tell the story. But what we discussed self-ownership, individual liberty, bodily autonomy and our community, that translates to mean you're going to own your plot of the broader community in your home. 01:49:25:00 - 01:49:44:01 Speaker 2 You can eat what you want on your dinner plate. You can build the bill. You know, we're all kind of generally aiming for natural building, for example, but nobody's going to tell you it has to be this specific. You know, you can go do Earthship, you want do Hemp Creek, whatever. Like that's your prerogative. And it's kind of what we were saying a moment ago, balancing that individuality with like the broader community needs. 01:49:44:01 - 01:50:18:10 Speaker 2 We get access to the water, we get all access to the fruit trees. But on your home, on your plot, you design it as you choose. You live how you choose in there. So long as you're not violating my rights, then we're all free to do that. So that was kind of the corner, the the first cornerstone. And, one of the reasons that that was extremely important for me, and I was sharing with you guys this last night, is anybody who's ever visited intentional communities or eco villages, you sometimes come across and realize that many of these communities, their their politics, tend to be more progressive or left leaning and nothing inherently wrong with 01:50:18:10 - 01:50:44:19 Speaker 2 that, if that's what people align with. But along with that, typically is a more of a collectivist belief that the collective what we were just discussing moment, the collective tends to be placed on top of the individual. When it comes down to it, we saw this during Covid, where there was many communities who'd been around for decades, and when Covid was happening, all of a sudden they said, you can't come into our community unless you're vaccinated, which on one hand I think is their freedom to do so with their own private property, to decide who wants to enter. 01:50:44:22 - 01:51:01:14 Speaker 2 But within the communities itself, it became a debate where all of a sudden some people were like, wait, I don't think we need to have that policy. I think people should have the freedom. And so to me, as we as this idea was really coming to fruition, I first wrote about it 2017, but 2020 was really the the, the genesis of it. 01:51:01:19 - 01:51:17:08 Speaker 2 Covid is happening. And I just, you know, it reminded me of like, yeah, this is why this is important. This is why sovereignty, the individual is right there as the cornerstone, so that we don't ever get into a position where people believe that the collective, the, the collective needs of the community become more important than your individual household or family. 01:51:17:14 - 01:51:54:22 Speaker 2 So that's the main, you know, I sort of describe it as this, triangle of liberation. So you have the sovereignty of the individual. The second, cornerstone would be permaculture principles. And permaculture itself is a huge school of thought, but essentially it's a portmanteau of permanent culture, permanent agriculture, you know, different meanings for different people. But the idea was that Bill Moulson, one of the men who first described it in the 70s, was the idea was trying to restructure and redesign the way that we grow our food, the way that we build our buildings, the way we relate to the planet and the animals, and thinking more long term. 01:51:54:22 - 01:52:30:01 Speaker 2 That's where the permanent idea comes in, because, as we know, most of the modern agriculture systems and farms are very destructive to humans, the animals, the planet, etc. and really permaculture, most of the, if not all of the the strategies and the the systems within permaculture are all based on indigenous ways of growing food that have been around for thousands of years because, you know, it, it really wasn't until the 1940s, largely due to the Rockefellers, that places like Mexico and India and others, all of a sudden, we're told the ways you've been growing food for thousands of years are not helpful. 01:52:30:06 - 01:52:48:15 Speaker 2 We need to start spraying pesticides on everything. We need to start using these genetically modified food and stuff like that. And so permaculture is kind of a really just a going back is kind of to its traditional roots. And so that's an important cornerstone for us that we want permaculture to be intrinsic to the way that we design our buildings, the way we build our food systems. 01:52:48:17 - 01:53:15:06 Speaker 2 And then the third cornerstone would just be what I broadly called mindfulness. And that, was not about requiring any specific modalities or specific number of hours of meditation per week or anything like that, although that will be something I'm sure our group will share together. It was more about like wanting to make it clear the people we want to work with are, again, people who want to continue to grow as individuals mentally, physically, spiritually. 01:53:15:07 - 01:53:37:19 Speaker 2 People who are not static, people who have emotional maturity and emotional intelligence. And so for us, that includes things like nonviolent communication practices like that. And so those were sort of the three foundational core principles of our community. And in terms of it being a network, I believe that those principles could be shared by many other communities that I think can align around those things. 01:53:37:19 - 01:53:44:18 Speaker 2 And then from there can be diverse and all sorts of other ways, but can be united by those core principles. 01:53:44:19 - 01:54:09:05 Speaker 3 You said something last night that I found fascinating, because Tracy had been talking a lot about how convenience is the cage, and it's so difficult to kind of break out of a system where things are just so easy. I think things being so easy makes people and making people miserable. That's another podcast for another day. But you said that 90% of intentional communities end up failing. 01:54:09:07 - 01:54:12:05 Speaker 3 How are you going to prevent that for your community? 01:54:12:08 - 01:54:39:19 Speaker 2 Yeah. So that stat comes from a book called Creating a Life Together, where these two women spent, I think, a decade or more, visiting hundreds of intentional communities in eco villages of all types religious, you know, just spiritual, whatever, all different types of communities, studying them, living with them, visiting them, learning about what were their practices, and also interviewing people who had started communities that failed and that fit into that 90%. 01:54:39:21 - 01:55:03:17 Speaker 2 And they they they list out a few different reasons that they believe that these communities fail. I would say the majority is financial. That's always a big hurdle. You know, you can buy land, you can get the right people. And again, unless everybody's independently wealthy, most people still have to work for, you know, an income. And so if everybody in the community is just going out to go, you know, work somewhere else outside of the community, it's hard to maintain the community. 01:55:03:17 - 01:55:19:17 Speaker 2 It's like, well, we're basically just living on land, but we're still living plugged into the matrix, so to speak. Right. So sustaining yourself and finding a business model, that's always a big challenge. One of the other reasons they fail is because they don't get past the planning stages. A lot of people love this idea. They search for land for years. 01:55:19:19 - 01:55:39:09 Speaker 2 They search for the right people, and they never they can't quite get past that, that phase. And then the rest of it, which is probably connected to the other two as well, is interpersonal conflict. You know, people not having the structures in place to deal with conflict. When it inevitably rises, you know, things turn into argument, things get heated, people say things they regret. 01:55:39:09 - 01:55:58:06 Speaker 2 And then before you know it, this beautiful piece of land and this idea you've been working on, nobody wants anything to do with it. You know, you get a bad taste in your mouth and it's just like, that's it. And then lawyers get involved and it gets even more fun. For us, the, the, the way we're trying to approach and avoid those things, which we're six years into this project yet. 01:55:58:06 - 01:56:29:10 Speaker 2 So we're still early on, but it's been a six years of studying, creating a life together, visiting other intentional communities that have existed for decades, getting to interview the founders and pick their brains and ask them, like, what would you change? You know, what is one big mistake you made? You know, things like that. And and so learning from people who've done it and who are still doing it and who are successful using creating life together as a tool and then trying to address those, those reasons that they mention that people fall apart. 01:56:29:11 - 01:56:52:17 Speaker 2 And I think a big part of that is working on the human, the human foundations. Right, because so many people think of what we got to get to land, then we're going to have to build homes and structures. And yes, that's obviously a part of the journey. But if you rush to that, my belief is that if you rush to that part without laying the human foundation, you know, you got to lay your concrete foundation and build buildings, but you also got to lay the human foundation. 01:56:52:19 - 01:57:10:15 Speaker 2 If you don't do that, then when those conflicts do arise, it's sort of just a toss up for like, okay, how do we deal with this? And it's also important to recognize that when people are trying to build new systems or new communities, or we're all bringing our different baggage from our experiences and environments that we grew up in. 01:57:10:16 - 01:57:27:07 Speaker 2 Like, you know, everything that I shared with you guys influences the way that I approach things. Right? And some people, we didn't all grow up in great homes learning how to communicate, you know, healthy ways. Some of us didn't learn to communicate at all. Just put on a smile, pretend like everything's happy. Some of us learn to shout and slam doors and things like that. 01:57:27:08 - 01:57:51:01 Speaker 2 So we're all coming with our own baggage. And, you know, this vision for building a better world and doing something new. But it's not necessarily unless you're really blessed and lucky just going to happen naturally. There's still work to be done, you know? And so we spent the first few years of this community focused on that, laying the human foundation, putting the systems in place so that when we do have an inevitable conflicts, we can refer to. 01:57:51:02 - 01:58:07:08 Speaker 2 Hey, well, here's the documents that we all created. Here's our constitution, for lack of a better word. This is what we all agreed we all signed to. I was sharing with you guys last night that the the book says Good Documents make good friends, which is one of the phrases that has always stuck with us. And the general idea is that right things down. 01:58:07:08 - 01:58:28:11 Speaker 2 It's okay to write things down even if you're, you know, super about freedom and anti bureaucratic or, you know, we're all conscious spiritual people, we don't have to write it down. We'll figure it out. You think so until something goes wrong, you know. So the book really emphasizes that like don't be afraid to put things in writing. In fact, maybe it's a red flag if somebody doesn't want to put anything in writing. 01:58:28:11 - 01:58:44:07 Speaker 2 And because what's wrong with that? Why, you know, why should we be against that? So that's something that we really embraced. We've got lots of documents, you know, documents for people in coming to the group, documents once they join the group, and then our final kind of contract with all of each other, which is it's only five pages. 01:58:44:07 - 01:59:03:09 Speaker 2 It's not like a, you know, a hundred page, you know, a or something like that. This is just but these are the things we all agree about, like the way that we're going to build the home and like what's the timeline and how do we what is our policies on animals? You know, because one of the things that the book talks about is one of the major pinch points and areas of conflict for people are children and animals. 01:59:03:11 - 01:59:23:01 Speaker 2 Your dogs pooping all my lawn, your kid did this thing, whatever, you know. And those are obviously things people feel very, you know, deeply about your children, your pets. Those are often areas of conflict, not only on community, but obviously in the suburbs or anywhere else. Right? But especially on land, those can become really difficult discussions. So we spend a lot of time like discussing that. 01:59:23:01 - 01:59:39:04 Speaker 2 How are we going to, you know, each animal is handled on a case by case basis as somebody joining. And that animal needs to be, also sort of considered in the context of the current members and their animals that they may have. And so we spent a lot of time just discussing these things and playing out different scenarios. 01:59:39:04 - 02:00:01:22 Speaker 2 We've taken trainings on Nonviolent Communication, which is based on a book by Marshall Rosenberg called Nonviolent Communication. And he did a lot of conflict resolution with groups, the, you know, the Bloods and the Crips and even Israelis and Palestinians, and for decades before he passed focused on this. And NVC is based on some of the methodologies that he developed about helping people work through conflicts. 02:00:01:22 - 02:00:26:08 Speaker 2 And it has to do with solving unmet needs and things like that. So spent a lot we read the book together. We did training together. We're using a system called sociology for decision making. So we've found groups that are more versed in this that have been doing it for decades and took trainings with them. There's just been a lot of time trying to lay that structure first so that we can hopefully, in the long term, avoid being part of that 90%. 02:00:26:08 - 02:00:41:03 Speaker 2 And I feel confident about it. I mean, we have taken our time. I'm not a super wealthy guy. I don't have money to blow. So I'm putting everything I got into this so I can't just screw it up and then turn around and do it again, you know? So for me, this is like, this is this is going to be a lifelong project. 02:00:41:04 - 02:01:07:05 Speaker 2 You know, I plan to live and die in this land. And, you know, thankfully, we found a beautiful piece of land. We paid it off. We we own it. Now we're stewarding it. We're putting it into some structures and we're getting ready to the point to start building. But the first six years has really just been putting those systems in place and then developing a vetting process to find the right people and bit by bit, just, you know, taking time, just, you know, making sure that we are taking the time that is necessary. 02:01:07:09 - 02:01:24:17 Speaker 2 And, the hope is that in the next year or so, maybe sooner, we have some ideas to put out. I don't know if it'll be a full on book, but maybe some sort of guide or something, a webinar type thing. But it's sharing all this knowledge that we have gleamed and we've gained like, here's what we did. 02:01:24:17 - 02:01:46:07 Speaker 2 Not to say that it'll work perfectly in every situation, but to say, take inspiration from these ideas, mold them to your specific needs and your resources and your environment. Because that's that's how I've learned is best practices from other people. And I think that I've realized that this type of knowledge is really useful for other people, and especially as I've traveled and I talked to more about our community, I realized like, okay, well, we've done some pretty cool things. 02:01:46:07 - 02:01:58:01 Speaker 2 We've put a lot of time into this, sharing these processes, sharing these documents with other, other people so they can take inspiration from them, I believe will contribute to my larger goals of building a network. 02:01:58:03 - 02:02:23:10 Speaker 1 It's fascinating to me to hear you say these things, because I did grow up in intentional community, and I can say firsthand that there it takes courage. It takes courage and consciousness to successfully live in one where it doesn't either become a place that is kind of a decision making by 1 or 2 people, or a small group of people that kind of push on on everyone else. 02:02:23:10 - 02:02:32:09 Speaker 1 And there isn't respect for the sovereignty of the individual or where it becomes, you know, everybody retreating to their foxhole and their ideas and things fall apart. 02:02:32:14 - 02:02:33:09 Speaker 2 I've heard both those. 02:02:33:12 - 02:02:47:14 Speaker 1 And yeah, and so many of them go, go in these directions. I know I grew up around a lot of people who had been in all sorts of different intentional communities. There's a great book in the 70s called Living Together in a World Falling Apart. I don't know if you've ever come across. 02:02:47:14 - 02:02:48:12 Speaker 2 This one. I'm gonna check. 02:02:48:12 - 02:03:09:01 Speaker 1 That out. And it's about all these intentional communities at that time. And so the book you're talking about reminds me of that one. I only exist because my dad was handed that book by somebody, in his Baptist youth group in 1977, I think, who walked up to him and said, The Holy Spirit told me to buy this book and give it to you. 02:03:09:03 - 02:03:32:20 Speaker 1 My dad read it, and one group in there stood out the international community I grew up in. And he went, you know, went there, joined, met my mom, and I was born into it. But it's beautiful to me to hear you deciding to learn from all these other groups and then find a way forward, encourage and love and with deep respect for the sovereignty of the individuals. 02:03:32:23 - 02:03:51:16 Speaker 1 So I can't wait to have you back in a year or two and find out. Where is your community at now? What have you built? Are your houses done? And I can't wait to have you back on as well to once you've got this, this, the seminar or this book done. Because I know there are so many people who are hungry for this. 02:03:51:18 - 02:04:03:05 Speaker 1 There are so many people who desire this, but they just don't know where to start. Sure. Where to start to have that community. So I'm encouraging you and your whole group keep going and I can't wait to see where this goes. 02:04:03:06 - 02:04:33:02 Speaker 2 I'm excited to share it with the world as well. And I definitely think the next couple of years are I mean, it's all been fun and beautiful, but this next couple of years, it feels like now we're really getting started because the building is about to happen. And yeah, we want to share this information with more people. And yeah, I think that what you said there about the traps that can befall certain communities, I mean, I've been accused of being a cult leader of many times already, and we haven't even built anything yet, because that is I think what many people fear is that with this kind of idea is like, oh, we're going to 02:04:33:02 - 02:04:50:19 Speaker 2 go off into the mountains. And somebody, as you said, you know, power can happen naturally. Strong personalities, charismatic personalities. And I was sharing with you guys about this how I've, you know, taken my own steps to empower other people in the group as well because yes, it started as my idea. Then it was myself and my partner leading the way. 02:04:50:19 - 02:05:09:04 Speaker 2 But now it's a body of six households that all make the decisions together. It's not just Derek making the decisions, and I strive to reassert that constantly that like just because this was my initial idea or because I'm kind of the spokesperson for it, just because of the nature of my work, doesn't mean that I have any more say than you, or you or anybody else or any other household. 02:05:09:04 - 02:05:25:19 Speaker 2 And I think that's really important. I have no interest or desire in like using that to, you know, take it in the wrong direction. I want this to be an example of a balanced and multigenerational community. We plan to have more families involved in the community and and yeah, really be a model for what other people are doing. 02:05:25:19 - 02:05:37:00 Speaker 2 And I'm just taking inspiration from people who've done it before. I know we're not reinventing the will that people have tried this, but I do think that some of the principles we're bringing into it make it unique in a way that I haven't personally seen. 02:05:37:02 - 02:05:47:09 Speaker 3 And one of the reasons that people are so interested in this now is just because of where humanity is going. Yeah. Do you believe agenda 2030 is inevitable? 02:05:47:11 - 02:06:13:09 Speaker 2 I don't think it's inevitable. I do think, well, I see that there are trillions of dollars invested in to bring it to life. There's probably every government on the planet working towards it in some capacity or another. multinational corporations, you know, groups like the United Nations World Economic Forum. There's a lot of energy. I mean, this is sort of one of the things I share in my message is like the other side, so to speak, is highly organized. 02:06:13:09 - 02:06:32:11 Speaker 2 And they put out white papers and think tanks and, you know, policy papers, and they've got meetings and they're, you know, they're manifesting. They're doing their best to manifest their reality, to bring it into existence. Our side tends to be a little more disorganized, but that's one of my focus is like, again, like, you know, maybe they've got their agenda 2030. 02:06:32:13 - 02:06:51:08 Speaker 2 I don't I'm not trying to will it into being personally, I don't see it as a, as a world I want to live in. And yet I do recognize that there's a lot of momentum on that side. And so my goal has been to, you know, what we're doing with the Conscious Agora and encouraging other people to exit and build is like, well, let's let's carve our own path. 02:06:51:09 - 02:07:24:03 Speaker 2 You know, I, a lot of my work during Covid and post Covid has been taking these concepts that they use and sort of inverting them or, you know, maybe they inverted them in the first place, but bringing them back to a place of light. So they meet in Davos every January for the World Economic Forum in 2021, we started meeting for the Greater Reset, a five day conference that met at the exact same time as them, but instead it was a bottom up conference talking about privacy, technology and growing your own food and homeschooling and all these kinds of ideas, trying to give people some actual solutions instead of, let's just obsess over them 02:07:24:08 - 02:07:41:12 Speaker 2 for five days. And what did Klaus Schwab say or what? You know, this and that. Why don't we come up with our own ideas? And so that was kind of the original idea with that. And, you know, this liberation 2030 is like taking these concepts that they have, which are memes, essentially, and ideas that are catchy. And, you know, people have gravitated towards them. 02:07:41:14 - 02:08:05:13 Speaker 2 A lot of well-meaning, intentioned people believe in these concepts. They're not necessarily evil people. They just think that this is maybe something else than what they're, you know, they they buy the the euphemistic utopia vision. And so I've taken inspiration from that in the sense of like, all right, well, these people know what they're doing. How about we take some of that energy and some of those ideas, but make it work for us, you know, and that's, I don't think it's inevitable. 02:08:05:18 - 02:08:17:21 Speaker 2 I don't want it to happen personally. But I'm not going to sit still and and and and just, you know, wait to find out. I'm going to focus on what I can create as an alternative. 02:08:17:23 - 02:08:24:12 Speaker 1 What role does forgiveness have in intentional community? 02:08:24:14 - 02:08:55:10 Speaker 2 I think it's huge. I mean, in my personal life, I wouldn't be able to to be where I am right now without forgiveness, you know, forgiveness of myself, of course, like learning to forgive myself for the ways that I had hurt people. And when I was in my, my cycles, forgiveness of my own father, you know, things like that, I don't I don't believe I would feel as at peace right now if I hadn't been able to forgive my father before he passed away, you know, and to tell him to his face, like, whatever you're holding on. 02:08:55:10 - 02:09:19:15 Speaker 2 And he sort of guilt towards me. I'm okay. Everything worked out the way it's supposed to be. You know, we had kind of a weird role reversal where I was sort of in a parenting role with him the last time I saw him. But I know that those conversations and allowing that for myself and really seeking it out, like I went out of my way to go see him to, you know, after I'd gotten out and to have these conversations, I know that that helped the weight lift off me in a lot of different ways. 02:09:19:15 - 02:09:38:06 Speaker 2 And I, I think it's made things more peaceful for me. And in our personal in our community and our personal conversations. You know, of course, the people who've joined at this point, the six households, we're all like family now, so we've got to know each other quite well and learn about each other's families and interpersonal struggles and challenges. 02:09:38:08 - 02:10:01:19 Speaker 2 And yeah, of course, just like any family, the individuals in our in our group have their own people. They need to forgive. And some of them are working on that, and some of them have done that. And I think in terms of each other, when we actually are at the point where we're living on the land together and we're interacting more with each other, and we have the opportunity to get on each other's nerves and find out, you know, all the fun ways that we we might have some conflict. 02:10:01:20 - 02:10:26:13 Speaker 2 Learning to forgive each other is going to be even more important. Right? And and forgiveness doesn't have to mean obviously forgetting and absolving people of whatever they may have done. And, you know, we're best buds now doesn't have to mean that it's about yourself. Ultimately, it's not for anybody else. I mean, that's what I had to come to the conclusion that this wasn't about trying to make my dad feel any kind of better, any better in any particular instance. 02:10:26:13 - 02:10:42:20 Speaker 2 It was about me getting this for myself, you know? And I think that's one thing that many people often forget when it comes to forgiveness, because they think that it's somehow letting the other person off the hook, which it doesn't have to be, but it's just about you, because it'll just eat. Whatever you're holding on to is just going to eat away at you, you know? 02:10:43:01 - 02:11:00:12 Speaker 2 And it's gonna it's a poison, you know? And so ultimately it's it's about letting yourself heal, letting that weight off. And yeah, I think so much of, you know, so much of the healing happens after forgiveness. 02:11:00:14 - 02:11:10:12 Speaker 1 Is there any where people can go who are interested in finding other people who want intentional community and are looking for maybe finding their group? 02:11:10:14 - 02:11:41:03 Speaker 2 Yeah. So there's a few places the Freedom Cells website is a is a place that I helped co-create. Freedom cells.org. Cells.org is a place that people can join who are looking for like minded people who, you know, anyone who's hearing this conversation I would say is would would find some friends among there. The idea originally was just helping people find locals in their own community, that they could meet like minded people and set and accomplished goals, whether that's that's homeschool or kids together. 02:11:41:04 - 02:12:03:05 Speaker 2 Let's grow some food together. Let's, you know, pursue alternative currencies. Let's meditate together, whatever your, your interests are, but with a positive focus. You know, that's not again, let's just not focus on what's going bad in the world. But let's come together, find people in our backyard, and let's meet up in person. You know, the digital stuff's great, but let's connect face to face and let's focus in accomplished goals. 02:12:03:07 - 02:12:28:06 Speaker 2 And the website itself is essentially just a tool to help people find each other. And so people can go to freedom and they can join and for free and just put in what, you know, your interest. What are your goals? What are your, what are your skills? Those sorts of things. And, you add yourself to the map, not your home address, but just the town or something near you, and that allows other people to find you. 02:12:28:07 - 02:12:43:02 Speaker 2 You can also use the maps to search and say, find everybody with near me within ten miles. Find all the groups that exist within 50 miles or whatever you're searching for, however far out you want to go. And again, the idea is then that people use the the the website just as a medium to connecting with each other. 02:12:43:05 - 02:13:01:19 Speaker 2 And I, I ultimately encourage people to not get stuck on the website because some people end up like treating it like it's just another social media platform. They start posting memes on there and this sort of thing, and it's like the goal is solutions. It's not just another place for you to talk about and debate politics. You know, that was exactly pretty much the exact opposite of what we wanted. 02:13:01:19 - 02:13:20:20 Speaker 2 But that's one avenue where people can find like minded people. And I would say the majority, I wouldn't say all, but the majority of people who come to the Freedom Cell network are people who are looking for like minded people, whether that means they want to buy land together or they just want people that they can talk freely and feel sane around in their, you know, in their local community. 02:13:20:20 - 02:13:44:18 Speaker 2 Because that's a big part. I realize that during Covid, I mean, freedom sells. I've been promoting it since 2016, doing videos, doing interviews. We had an early website pre-COVID. We relaunched it late 2019, and then Covid happened and the website, we had about 1500 people on it, which was great. People were navigating using it during Covid, it just exponentially grew to 40,000 people around the world. 02:13:44:18 - 02:14:05:11 Speaker 2 And I still get messages I heard from people just this week and telling me that they used it during Covid in Portugal and Spain and India and Africa and the UK, Canada, the US, Mexico to find like minded people. Because at that time, when people felt threatened and felt insecure about the future, they realized, okay, maybe I need to find, you know, the others and, and start getting organized. 02:14:05:11 - 02:14:22:19 Speaker 2 And so it was really beautiful proof of concept to see like, okay, this idea that's just been out there and I've been kind of telling people here, you could use freedom cells for this, you could use it for this concept. It really blew up and it allowed people. So it, it, it showed itself, actually functioning and working during Covid when people really needed it. 02:14:22:21 - 02:14:41:04 Speaker 2 Unfortunately, I will say a lot of that momentum has sort of, you know, cooled down because people don't feel so threatened. Unfortunately, right now, even though a lot of the agendas are still right here staring us in the face, but the website's still there, the network is still there. We actually recently just rebuilt the website about a month ago, and we're building a new version now. 02:14:41:06 - 02:15:10:05 Speaker 2 I recommend people check out Freedom Dog. Also our friend Alex Zec. He has the way forward, which is a similar kind of concept that helps people find others in their community. So, you know, we're not the only one freedom, the only ones sort of talking about that idea of getting together on the local level. And there are other websites in terms of specifically when it comes to communities like I see, which is for intentional communities, Global Ecovillage Network, those can be great resources. 02:15:10:05 - 02:15:34:20 Speaker 2 The only thing I would caution people, particularly if they're folks who align with the things we've been saying today, that, as I shared earlier, just because somebody has an eco village or a, permaculture community or, you know, intentional community doesn't mean they're awake, so to speak. You know, they might get some of the features of the things we've been talking about, but they might be, you know, people who bought the Covid narrative or what have you. 02:15:34:20 - 02:15:51:19 Speaker 2 So my only caution is just, you know, like with anything, do your vetting, make sure that if you're going to join a community or if you're going to try to get closer to people beyond just meeting up as friends and setting goals, you're going to live together. You're going to buy land together. Do take some time. You know, I've been the things I describe that we've done with our community. 02:15:51:19 - 02:16:08:08 Speaker 2 I'm not saying that's something everybody has to do, but I would say if you're thinking about joining a community on a deeper level that involves money and moving and building homes and things of that sort. Do they have a conflict resolution process? Do they have a decision making process in place? Do they have entry and exit agreements in place of how do you leave? 02:16:08:08 - 02:16:25:09 Speaker 2 How do you come in? And if not not saying run away immediately, but those could be red flags and I would at least say, have you guys talked about any of this yet? And if not, then, you know, if they're just like, no, we'll figure it out. Whenever that happens, I would be hesitant. 02:16:25:11 - 02:16:28:01 Speaker 3 Can you tell us where people can find your book? 02:16:28:07 - 02:16:48:18 Speaker 2 Yeah. So man of my word, full title is how I overcame addiction, depression, and mental and physical prisons. The best place is just a man of my word.com. That's the the landing page that we built for the book. And it leads to, you know, all the usual places people can pick it up. And in the coming months, I'm going to sit down and do the audiobook. 02:16:48:19 - 02:17:08:13 Speaker 2 I, I, I really don't like recording audio because of how tedious it can be, but I feel like my other books have audio books that were read by other people. But I feel like I have to read this one. Of course, it's my story, and I think it'll be best for people to hear it my voice. So the audiobook will be out soon, and I hope that anybody who is struggling or has family members who are struggling will pick up a copy. 02:17:08:13 - 02:17:26:23 Speaker 2 And I have some some plans that I'll be announcing in the coming months to to launch an initiative to try to get this book in as many treatment centers and prisons and, rehabs just anywhere that individuals who are struggling not only with drug addiction, but just with some of the deeper traumas that I went through, might have access to this. 02:17:26:23 - 02:17:30:07 Speaker 2 And so looking to work with other people who care about these topics. 02:17:30:12 - 02:17:34:20 Speaker 1 And where can people find your journalism and where can they where could they follow you online? 02:17:34:22 - 02:17:53:19 Speaker 2 I'm on all the platforms if you search either Derrick Rose, my main website is the Conscious Resistance. That's where that leads to my books, documentaries, podcasts, all the interviews I've done. And that's pretty much where I put out my weekly content. And I'm a contributing writer at the Last American Vagabond. Com and yeah, that's where most of my work set. 02:17:53:20 - 02:17:58:10 Speaker 3 Derrick Rose, I want to thank you for a radically genuine conversation. 02:17:58:10 - 02:18:00:10 Speaker 2 Thank you guys so much for having me. I appreciate you.