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How to Be an Adult: The Untold Lesson (Ep. 2) · How to Be an Adult

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You have some of the prerequisites
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Mhmm.
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To happiness.
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Mhmm. Actually, there is an inherent
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value in the act of living. For aliveness
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itself has value that needs to be honored.
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Somehow
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we make exceptions for ourselves where we treat
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ourselves not like a fellow human being, nor
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even like life.
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Welcome to How to Be an Adult, a
0:24
podcast by the practitioners
0:26
at the Morpheus Clinic For Hypnosis in Toronto,
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Canada.
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It's a show for people like you who've
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inadvertently become adults,
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and don't know what to do about it.
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I'm Luke Chao. And I'm Pascal Langdell. Whether
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you're 18 or 80, this show is the
0:42
trail guide that nobody gave you when you
0:45
gained equality with your parents.
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In this episode, we're gonna start to describe
0:50
in more depth the principles we outlined in
0:52
the first episode.
0:54
The first one being the captain of your
0:57
ship.
0:58
If there's one metaphor
1:01
that
1:02
encapsulates
1:03
in so many different ways
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not just the responsibilities
1:07
of adulthood
1:09
but the empowerment
1:10
that one has as an adult to determine
1:13
their course and therefore their future. It's that
1:16
in the open ocean,
1:18
you're the captain of your ship.
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No one else is.
1:23
And the other good news in this is
1:25
that you're not the captain of any other
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adults
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ship.
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There are many ways we can take the
1:31
metaphor,
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but that's essentially it. So you're captain of
1:35
your ship,
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that means that you have authority over,
1:40
your direction, your course,
1:42
360 degree potential,
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and what is your what is the correct
1:46
attitude to the open ocean?
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Well,
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often people feel that because there are 360
1:52
degrees of freedom and you could choose any
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city in the world to live in if
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you apply through the right channels.
1:58
You you can choose any university,
2:01
to attend if they'll accept you.
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Because there's so much freedom, often people feel
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overwhelmed even paralyzed by this freedom.
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What I want to point out is that
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the ship
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can only
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sail in one direction at a time,
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and that makes
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irrelevant
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the 359
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degrees of freedom
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that
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are not the direction you want your life
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to go in.
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It is not irresponsible
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if you've surveyed
2:35
every possibility
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and you're choosing only one future,
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when you try to go in two directions
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at once.
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Let's say I'm trying to please everyone.
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Let's say I'm trying to be everything to
2:49
everyone and I'm going in not just two
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directions, I'm going in multiple directions,
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that ensures that your ship at best will
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zigzag
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or at worst
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go in circles.
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And that's where I think a lot of
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our listeners might have found themselves in adulthood
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where your life doesn't seem to be going
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anywhere.
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If you feel your place at the helm
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as your proper place, if you feel that
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you've got your hands on the wheel and
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you can chart your course and stay the
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course until you reach each destination
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and you're choosing one direction of 360.
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This is how it's it's done.
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It's not by zigzag. Mhmm. And and with
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that self authority,
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does that also
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come with a sense of self respect, self
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esteem, self love? Is is it possible to
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captain a ship without that?
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Well, yeah.
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I've talked, so far only about where you're
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going in life. So where are you gonna
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place the
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vessel next
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but then there's the vessel itself
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which is yours
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There's the saying that the captain goes down
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with the ship. Mhmm. Right? So
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this metaphor holds when you imagine that your
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life and your body your your health your
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relationships your values that
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this all comprises the the ship
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so the self caring and the self loving
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and the self respecting
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is
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to ensure that the faithful vessel you're on
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will continue to serve you. Mhmm. So if
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you're gonna live
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a 100 years or you take the attitude
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that you're,
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a living being that deserves a good shot
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at it, let's put it that way.
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There's
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the next axiom which is to,
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it's important to take care of yourself as
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a human life which is under your care.
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Expand on that a little. If we imagine
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a house plant, right?
4:45
If we imagine that someone's gifted you just
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even like a little cactus,
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you'll give it enough but not too much
4:52
water
4:53
you'll give it enough sunlight and for a
4:55
cactus it's going to need more sunlight
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than some other species
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and you're going to give it enough fertilizer
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in the soil and you might even take
5:03
care to make sure it's specific for cactuses
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It's a very loved cactus. It's a very,
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I would say not over loved cactus. No.
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That's a problem. If you do too much,
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then you rot its roots after all. If
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you water tanks too much.
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But but proper cares not to give it
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too much. Mhmm. Proper cares to give it
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what it needs.
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Enough but not too much.
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When we take care of ourselves we're usually
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breathing enough air. We're usually eating, if anything,
5:32
too much food, but we're definitely having enough
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food, we have enough
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available water to drink, though not everyone hydrates
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themselves well enough.
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Where we will, however,
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find a lot of lack
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is in the self caring and the self
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loving and the self respecting. Now, since this
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podcast is called How to be an adult,
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I would add
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that to feel consistently
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loved,
5:59
to feel consistently
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accepted,
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to feel consistently
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validated
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You should take the side of those who
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love and care about and validate you. You
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shouldn't take the side of those who would
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criticize you and harangue
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when you're thinking your own thoughts to yourself.
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Now a lot of people in their own
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heads, they'll take the side of those who
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don't like them or who would criticize them,
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unfairly.
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And they don't take as much the side
6:30
of those who care about them. It's almost
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like we take our loved ones for granted,
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how do we think so much about our
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enemies. Mhmm. But that to me is an
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inversion
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of of the right order
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where we
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can care a lot less about people who
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don't have our best interest in mind
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they care instead about the the those who
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would give us respecting and loving and caring
6:51
and validating. So to take your cactus or
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class analogy is that there's there
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are fundamental human needs that need to be
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addressed,
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self caring being
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being a preeminent one really. Well, it's caring
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that's the need. It's just our modern society
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Yeah. That requires self caring Mhmm. To to
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be
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the the thing that fulfills the need. Yeah.
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But that would include things like if it's
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the the the universals that human
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humans need, you know, the Maslow's hierarchy needs
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you to have,
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you know, shelter, warmth, food. You mentioned, food,
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water, and so on. But there's also,
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you need to exercise as
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well. Right? I mean, that's a need that's
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you could argue that's a need, and I've
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heard you argue this before, and I I
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agree. The emotional support network that you need,
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emotional self regulation as well, it's also a
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form of self care which you've touched on
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there.
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Being that you don't take the side of
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the negative critic which is already is already
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in the background to save you from from
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the, you know, the tigers in the woods.
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But
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there's also what happens when,
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when something goes wrong with your self care.
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Say,
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you break a leg, say, you find your
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your mentally in a in a rough place.
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It's easy to to get re angry and
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annoyed with your, the fact that this misfortune
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struck you.
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What's
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what's the proper attitude as a self caring
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adult that that believes in their self worth
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to deal with that? The question to ask
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yourself
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is, how would I speak to a friend
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or a brother or a sister
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who's in precisely the same situation?
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And let's assume you love your friends and
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your siblings.
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So if if you've broken a leg,
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if you were
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to blame yourself and criticize yourself, that is
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not in line with how you would treat
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a loved one.
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If you would show a loved one
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more love, more care, more positive attention,
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if you'd encourage them not to criticize themselves
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too much,
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then your own conscience
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is telling you that that's the proper attitude.
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It's not even the guy on the Internet
9:09
you're listening to. It's your own conscience is
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telling you that the proper attitude
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is to give yourself that
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level Yeah. Of self loving and self caring.
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I I use that
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when talking to kids, actually, saying, you know,
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when they're they're saying, oh, I can't do
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this. I'm useless. And you say, well, okay.
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What would your best mate say to you
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right now? And often it turns it around
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entirely because they step out themselves.
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And for a moment, they can see themselves
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as their friends might see them. Again, one
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of the questions that might come up,
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and
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I've had this question as well is what's
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the what's the big justification for caring at
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all? I mean, there's a big why about
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why should we care for ourselves? What is
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it
9:52
that means that we
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should actually care for ourselves? What gives us
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the right to believe that's even important in
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an enormous universe, you know?
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Well,
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this
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makes me want even more so to insert
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the word happy in between how to be
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and
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have the word
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adult.
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Because when you are
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well enough fed and well enough rested and
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well enough
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loved,
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you have some of the prerequisites
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to happiness.
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If you're not well enough fed and well
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enough rested and well enough loved, you're missing
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some of the fundamental prerequisites
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for for happiness. Mhmm. Now I am assuming
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almost as axiomatic
10:40
that our listeners want to be happy that
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they don't want to be stuck in their
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misery.
10:45
We understand that the plant's not going to
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be happy
10:49
if you've given it too much water. We
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understand that the dog's not happy if you've
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not walked it enough.
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We understand the friend's not happy if you're
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always critical and you never speak a kind
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word.
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Somehow we make exceptions for ourselves where we
11:03
treat ourselves not like a fellow human being,
11:06
nor even like life.
11:08
We treat ourselves
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almost like we're objects that can be neglected
11:12
or abused because only objects can be neglected
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and abused without consequence
11:17
And a large part of what I end
11:19
up having to communicate to to my clients
11:22
is that you're correctly categorized as life, you're
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correctly categorized as a human being
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and
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When you're over 18, you're correctly categorized as
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an adult
11:35
where your self caring and your fulfillment of
11:40
your
11:41
own needs
11:42
is
11:43
the most reliable way Mhmm.
11:46
To
11:47
have those prerequisites for happiness met. You mentioned
11:51
couple of things. One was the the the
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dog and the plant and whenever you use
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the tree,
11:56
a reference as well. And one of the
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things that I've I've heard you talk about
12:01
was well, well, actually there was a tree
12:03
in the street that I used to live
12:04
that,
12:05
used to pass all the time and and
12:07
they removed it. And there was like a
12:08
local outcry
12:10
about the fact that they've removed it without
12:12
consultation and so on. And this was a
12:14
a tree. It's just
12:15
a maple tree on a corner of an
12:17
average street in an average part of Toronto.
12:20
Right?
12:21
And you mentioned a similar story and it
12:23
just points out
12:24
actually there is an inherent
12:27
value in the act of living. Your aliveness
12:29
itself has value that needs to be honored.
12:31
It's a in one on the one hand,
12:33
the knowledge of your own death is the
12:35
burden, but the gift you get up until
12:37
that point is
12:38
the the living bit. And to me, that's
12:41
I I read some of the the chances
12:42
of you, Luke, existing
12:44
in your current form is something like 1
12:46
in 4 trillion,
12:47
which is those are that's an extraordinary thing,
12:50
just to think that I'm sitting next to
12:51
somebody
12:52
whose chance of existence was about 1 in
12:54
4 trillion.
12:55
I suppose if you wanna talk about fundamental
12:57
axiom, it's not even necessarily
13:00
that perhaps that your purpose for living is
13:03
to be happy. You might say that the
13:05
purpose of life is to honor the life
13:08
by being happy.
13:10
So that wherever you are, that you find
13:12
your way to still honor the honor your
13:15
life. With whatever your circumstance, whether you're in
13:17
your highest, you know, moment or your worst
13:19
moment, that happiness is still available, that joy
13:22
is still available. And I'd even go further
13:24
and say maybe play is still available. Because
13:26
I I I think that that's an awesome
13:28
that if you if you satisfy all your
13:29
basic needs,
13:31
to me, the sort of
13:33
the, of course, I'd say this as an
13:35
actor, but the,
13:36
the sort of the pinnacle of human joy,
13:39
if you like, or the opportunity for joy
13:40
is actually the ability to play and play
13:43
with others.
13:45
This description of of human beings as
13:49
being fully alive and as part of this
13:51
aliveness we do of things like play,
13:54
this I think everyone can resonate with. Yeah.
13:57
Yeah. And and it's an aspiration, I think
14:00
I think a lot of people
14:02
when they think of an ideal in one
14:03
way it fits into this,
14:05
it does fit into some way, some into
14:07
that category.
14:08
Like experiencing joy with your friends,
14:11
experiencing art and culture, or
14:14
sport or whatever it is. There's so much
14:16
built around
14:17
the experience of this
14:20
reciprocal play. But I think I think that
14:22
it's it's and that as a celebration of
14:24
being alive, I think that's a that's no
14:27
small thing. But of course, then it comes
14:29
to the the next point, which is well,
14:32
okay, I've stated that life is worth living
14:34
because it's worth living, which is a circular
14:35
reasoning. Right? So,
14:37
what's your position with somebody who says, well,
14:39
it's all relative. It's,
14:41
things are defined as as words define them
14:43
and that's it.
14:45
The fact that
14:46
we can kind of, you know, sit here
14:49
and say things that are going out to
14:52
potentially 1,000 or even millions of people. Mhmm.
14:56
And at least I have confidence in my
14:57
heart that the things I say here will
15:00
be resonant
15:01
among 1,000 or even 1,000,000 of people.
15:05
That
15:06
speaks to a kind of
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common or
15:12
even universal
15:16
humanity. So I'll use the example of
15:19
a musician Mhmm.
15:21
Playing music,
15:23
let's say in a studio
15:25
and then recording it, releasing it and having
15:28
it be heard by, let's say, a 1000000000
15:31
people,
15:32
probably a 1000000000 hearts and minds have been
15:35
moved by that music,
15:38
not because the musician knew each of those
15:40
people,
15:41
but because the musician
15:42
created something
15:44
that speaks deeply to a common humanity.
15:48
Here with the podcast and in my work
15:50
as a hypnotherapist and I imagine in your
15:51
work as an actor, you're trying to create
15:56
a form of communication
15:58
that speaks
16:00
to that deeper,
16:02
common,
16:04
even universal humanity.
16:06
And it's not just that we're creating work
16:09
that's only for
16:11
one age group or only 1 gender or
16:14
people of a certain social
16:16
class
16:18
Your question is, what do I say to
16:19
the relativists?
16:22
And
16:23
my answer is that if you have arrived
16:26
at a view that
16:29
doesn't generalize
16:31
to 8,000,000,000 human beings, you're not looking at
16:34
human nature.
16:35
You're looking at something that's culturally bound or
16:38
time bound or even just in in one
16:41
individual.
16:42
And that's not where my interest lies. Lies.
16:44
Like the musician who wants to make timeless
16:47
music
16:48
that appeals to all of humanity,
16:50
I want to arrive at principles
16:53
that are timeless and that apply to all
16:56
of humanity. An experience we've all had
17:00
is becoming
17:01
big enough to get our own cup from
17:04
the cupboard and that to reach the faucet
17:06
and turn on the tap and fill it
17:07
up ourselves so that we would never have
17:09
to be thirsty inside our own homes again.
17:11
Because until we became that big,
17:14
we did have to sometimes be thirsty.
17:16
Once we're big enough to get our own
17:18
cup and fill it up, we can kind
17:20
of move on to fulfilling other needs that
17:22
we might have.
17:24
And I would say that
17:26
as we get older, we eventually learn to
17:28
cook for ourselves too. We eventually learn
17:32
how to make a living so that we
17:35
can pay for ourselves.
17:37
We
17:37
also
17:38
need to learn how to validate ourselves, and
17:42
how to love ourselves, and how to
17:45
otherwise care for ourselves for the very same
17:47
reasons.
17:49
We had to learn how to get our
17:51
own cup and fill it up ourselves.
17:53
So
17:54
there's that saying which is biblical,
17:57
My cup runneth over,
18:01
as an image of generosity.
18:04
And if we kind of approach other people
18:07
in the world with an empty cup,
18:09
expecting them to fill it up for us,
18:11
I mean, they might or might not, and
18:13
then we're not not guaranteed of having a
18:15
full cup.
18:16
But if we are in the world
18:19
and we ensure that our cup runneth over,
18:23
that's where we can be generous. That's where
18:27
we can
18:28
be loving. That's where we can set aside
18:31
our own lack or feelings of lack
18:34
to be part of something greater and to
18:37
contribute and to add to the world, as
18:39
I would suggest
18:40
adults must
18:42
do. Why should adults
18:44
care about
18:45
truth at all?
18:47
Well,
18:48
you've noticed that adults do care about truth.
18:51
They don't like it when people lie to
18:52
them.
18:53
And I would suggest that
18:56
this orientation
18:57
toward truth
18:59
is a defining characteristic
19:01
of being an adult
19:03
Where the child gets to be in a
19:05
fantasy play land right No one's gonna ask
19:08
them to design a bridge that stays standing.
19:10
Mhmm. No one's gonna ask them to make
19:11
a spacecraft
19:13
that can safely transport people to the moon
19:15
and back. Particularly off its cardboard box. Well.
19:18
Yes.
19:20
So
19:21
part of our transition to adulthood
19:23
means that we have to acknowledge that there
19:25
is a material
19:26
universe.
19:28
So
19:30
children are allowed a certain latitude when it
19:33
comes to the truth, both in their
19:35
explorative play, but also they have to learn
19:38
the value of telling the truth. It's tough
19:40
because
19:41
kids fear the repercussions
19:44
of doing something wrong. They don't have that
19:46
self assurance yet, so
19:48
sometimes their proclivity is to lie because they
19:51
fear the consequence of being told. Sometimes they
19:53
have absolutely nothing.
19:55
And so it's a process of of learning
19:57
that in fact telling the truth
19:59
means facing perhaps the consequences,
20:02
but then being brave enough to face
20:05
them.
20:06
And then you have to say, and this
20:08
is something that I think,
20:10
is
20:11
again you know, part of being an adult.
20:13
You have to say, well, I'm willing to,
20:18
say what I believe to be true
20:20
to the best of my ability
20:22
and accept the consequences as ultimately being better
20:25
than if I had lied.
20:27
So as an adult, I think
20:30
that
20:31
you have to be in a position where
20:33
you have that self assurance
20:35
to say, to own up when you've done
20:37
something wrong. And in the same way, to
20:40
therefore not be fearful of telling the truth
20:43
and to accept the consequences
20:45
as being either good or bad but accepting
20:48
that ultimately it can only lead to good.
20:51
The analogy that I
20:52
use is the dragon in the kitchen.
20:55
Right?
20:56
So in this story,
20:58
a kid returns home from school and there's
21:00
this small
21:01
dragon sitting on the kitchen table. And the
21:04
kid goes, mom, mom, there's a there's a
21:06
dragon on the table and the mom's too
21:08
busy. He goes, no, there isn't. Don't worry
21:09
about it. Don't worry about it. And then,
21:11
sure enough, the next day,
21:13
kid comes in. Mom, mom, there's a dragon
21:14
on the table. This time, it's bigger. And,
21:17
the mom and dad are in the kitchen.
21:18
They go, don't worry about it. Just imagining
21:20
things, you know.
21:22
And this goes on for some time, and
21:24
then eventually, the the, the child comes back
21:26
from school, and the parents are standing and
21:29
looking at the the house which is completely
21:31
collapsing in its place is this massive dragon
21:34
and the kid goes, I told you there
21:36
was a dragon in the kitchen and the
21:38
parents go, yep,
21:40
yep, there was a dragon in the kitchen.
21:42
And this is to this end, it's sort
21:43
of,
21:45
the moral of that story is that it's
21:46
better to tell the truth while the dragon
21:48
is small.
21:50
Those uncomfortable truths to yourself and to others.
21:53
Because you don't want that
21:56
that, denial to turn into a monster that
21:59
then affects your life to such a bad
22:00
degree. Well, we've we've talked about the
22:04
external consequences
22:06
of lying. Mhmm.
22:08
There are also
22:09
internal consequences.
22:11
Right. To lying.
22:12
Where if you want to see yourself
22:16
as an honest
22:17
person of integrity
22:20
Then every lie you tell
22:22
chips
22:24
away at that self-concept
22:25
until that self-concept
22:27
after enough lies will no longer be able
22:30
to hold. Mhmm. And I would suggest that
22:32
it is a path to happiness
22:35
to have a self-concept that you're a decent
22:38
person.
22:39
But I I I also say that just
22:42
like,
22:44
the kid that's afraid,
22:45
there there's there's you can see that there's
22:47
reasons why people will lie to themselves or
22:50
lie to others either knowingly or unknowingly,
22:53
and that
22:55
humans
22:56
will often fall from their own conscience. You
22:59
know that phrase,
23:00
the softest pillow is an easy conscience.
23:03
That suggests that a lot of people don't
23:05
have soft pillows. You know, so you make
23:07
that a sentence. It suggests that that's not
23:10
not the rule. It might be the exception.
23:13
But as a as a as a general
23:15
rule perhaps and
23:17
something that's axiomatic to
23:19
being an adult is
23:21
facing
23:22
those
23:23
truths early on, knowing that that's actually the
23:26
the best time to face them, however uncomfortable
23:29
it might be.
23:30
And I would add that
23:32
even if there are consequences.
23:35
Externally.
23:36
Right? So someone's angry at you or
23:39
you've got to pay a fine or go
23:41
to jail for a couple years or whatever.
23:42
Or some of his attitude to you is
23:44
utterly changed. Yes. You know that that's a
23:47
consequence. That's a consequence for a lot of
23:49
people. Even then, I would suggest
23:52
that there's gonna be psychological
23:54
relief. Mhmm.
23:56
Because you've spoken the truth,
23:58
you've faced the consequences.
24:00
It's no longer a burden for your conscience
24:04
because whatever proper punishment, even if it's just
24:07
losing, just losing a friend, whatever proper consequence
24:10
has been doled out
24:13
and then you can sleep well at night
24:14
again.
24:15
The Catholics had,
24:17
confession, right?
24:19
Where, you know, you don't have to carry
24:21
it in your own heart if you confess
24:23
it to a priest.
24:25
I mean there are problems with that system.
24:28
But still the concept I think is sound
24:31
that if you tell the truth to a
24:33
priest during the modern world, you tell the
24:34
truth to a therapist,
24:36
then you can sleep a little bit better
24:37
at night because it's not just your burden
24:39
any longer than now you've externalized it. Mhmm.
24:43
Alright. So we we spoke,
24:45
in the last,
24:46
episode about being
24:48
pro social and how how that's that's an
24:51
important
24:52
principle,
24:54
to follow.
24:55
I would even suggest it's it's an expression
24:57
of your humanity.
24:58
Right. And to be anything other than
25:01
prosocial. This this doesn't mean,
25:04
by the way, it doesn't mean you have
25:06
to go party a lot. It it means
25:08
that you act in ways that are beneficial
25:10
to others and not just yourself. You could
25:12
also take to the other extreme as I
25:14
hang up with the best way I can
25:15
do this is to the only way I
25:16
can do this is to retreat into silence
25:19
for the next 30 years. And I don't
25:20
mean self sacrificing either. Right.
25:23
Because you are a human being. You are
25:25
a member of society.
25:27
Again, I I wasn't I I I wouldn't
25:29
overthink it too much because just hanging out
25:32
out at the park
25:33
and talking to whichever people walk by, it's
25:36
not any formally defined role, but that's a
25:38
very prosocial thing to do in your neighborhood.
25:41
Or just, you know, if you have too
25:44
many cherry tomatoes from your garden,
25:46
just like leaving it on your front yard
25:50
or giving to the neighbors.
25:52
And and it's not specifically transactional. It's more
25:55
generally transactional for
25:57
society as a whole. So if I if
25:58
I leave my cherry tomatoes
26:00
out, it's not for any one person in
26:02
order to have reciprocal. I'm giving it to
26:04
this neighbor in order to get something back
26:07
from them.
26:08
It's more of a general
26:09
a general attitude.
26:11
Correct. And I would point out that, you
26:12
know, the person leaving out the cherry tomatoes
26:15
gets something back through their active generosity.
26:18
Okay. Let's let's say that you are
26:22
you're living in modern society where you have
26:24
a plethora of choices. You're almost paralyzed by
26:27
the potentials that face you in your life.
26:29
Okay? How do you put your priorities in
26:32
place? I say priorities like that's even possible.
26:35
Could it be a sequence of singular priorities
26:37
is probably a better way of putting it.
26:39
You have to use your own judgment
26:41
and your own knowledge and basically too as
26:44
all adults must do Mhmm. Which is to
26:46
sacrifice
26:47
some aspects
26:49
of your life
26:50
in favor of aspects of your life that
26:53
you assign a higher priority to. So I'll
26:56
give you an example.
26:57
There are many people who sacrifice their health.
27:01
So, they don't sleep well,
27:03
they don't eat well, they don't exercise.
27:05
They sacrifice their health
27:08
for money and a career.
27:11
There are other people who will not make
27:13
that sacrifice.
27:14
So they're gonna sacrifice
27:16
their career and their income potential
27:18
Mhmm. In favor of being at the gym
27:20
Mhmm.
27:21
At 5 pm and not staying behind like
27:24
some of the other people at work.
27:26
And because we each have to manage time
27:29
as a scarce resource,
27:32
All of us, by necessity,
27:34
have to choose,
27:35
are we gonna stay behind at 5 o'clock
27:38
and value work, or are we gonna leave
27:40
and
27:41
for one person is to go to the
27:42
gym? For someone else, it's to see their
27:44
girlfriend. For someone else, it's to be with
27:45
their kids.
27:46
For someone else, it's to have a hobby,
27:48
like singing in a choir.
27:51
The reason I say it's it's not for
27:52
me, it's not for you, it's not for
27:54
any outside authority to defund priorities for for
27:56
anyone is that we just don't have the
27:58
information
27:59
that each individual has about themselves.
28:03
So even
28:04
if our listeners feel like
28:06
they can't prioritize or
28:09
they don't know what is important
28:11
I would say that you nonetheless
28:14
still have much better information
28:16
than us guys talking to you through the
28:18
internet.
28:19
So if you want to be unhealthy and
28:22
rich in the future
28:23
that determines your priorities today.
28:26
If you want to be healthy
28:28
and
28:29
to value the simpler things in life in
28:31
the future. Well, that's gonna decide the things
28:33
you do today. Which is not necessary. This
28:36
is just a binary for
28:38
illustration.
28:39
Only for illustration. Obviously, there are priorities other
28:42
than
28:43
health and health. And also streams as well.
28:44
But,
28:45
one, you can be
28:46
healthy and
28:48
be successful in business. It's not to say
28:49
that's impossible. But I think what you're
28:53
saying is that
28:55
a, it should be a discrete choice as
28:57
in I'm
28:58
open eyed
29:00
observing my needs, wants and values and trying
29:02
to make my choices align with those.
29:06
So there's that. And then in doing that
29:08
you are gonna have to pick a course
29:10
for your ship
29:11
and stick to it basically,
29:13
until more information comes.
29:16
Life can be long. It can also be
29:18
short. Do we ever arrive anywhere? Do we
29:20
ever you said there's a port. Sure. But
29:21
do we ever sort of go, right, that's
29:23
it. I'm an adult now. I don't need
29:24
to learn anymore. Or or is it is
29:26
it
29:27
a or is is it is basically being
29:29
an adult a lifelong learning process?
29:31
I think it was helpful in the prior
29:33
episode to define what is an adult.
29:37
Because it's in that context
29:40
that
29:40
I'm answering the question.
29:42
Someone who is
29:43
20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90,
29:46
a 100,
29:47
they're all legally
29:50
and socially
29:51
defined to be adults.
29:53
But obviously every decade or so,
29:57
you're gonna reassess
29:58
some of the items at the very back
30:01
of your closet.
30:02
You might also benefit from reassessing
30:05
some aspects of your self-concept
30:07
that might be outdated.
30:10
And I would say that everyone has the
30:12
capacity
30:14
to do this kind of reassessment or spring
30:17
cleaning once in a while. So they're keeping
30:19
thoughts about themselves that are current and truthful
30:22
and relevant. Up to date. Up to date.
30:24
And they're letting go of thoughts that are
30:26
no longer current.
30:28
So all your thoughts about you and childhood
30:31
are no
30:32
longer relevant or current
30:34
when you're, say, 40 years old.
30:36
For all of you who are listening, you're
30:38
probably still making new friends, you're reading new
30:41
books, and you're definitely listening to new podcasts.
30:44
So you are already treating yourself
30:47
as a lifelong learner. You are already treating
30:50
yourself as someone who's on a lifelong
30:53
journey to to being the most you can
30:55
be or to being the the best that
30:58
you can be. Mhmm.
31:00
One day, you're gonna face the inevitable. That's
31:03
episode 12, by the way. You're gonna face
31:05
the inevitable, and you're not gonna want to
31:08
be thinking
31:09
that you wasted your adult years not learning
31:12
anything new, not making new friends, not doing
31:15
anything new. You're gonna wanna think that you
31:18
had a full rich life
31:20
and one of the ways to be able
31:22
to look back and
31:23
feel that you've had a full rich fulfilling
31:26
life
31:27
is to always
31:30
be growing. Mhmm. Metaphorically. I think part part
31:32
of that goes back to what we touched
31:34
on perhaps in the first,
31:36
first episode about maintaining those aspects of adolescence
31:40
into your adulthood. Maintaining aspects of curiosity, of
31:43
openness to new experiences.
31:45
Curiosity,
31:46
openness Mhmm. A beginner's mind as the Zen
31:49
Buddhists say. Yeah.
31:51
These are not childish thoughts.
31:53
These are
31:54
our human thoughts.
31:57
A childish thought might be, just to give
31:59
you a preview of the next episode,
32:01
that you've got to
32:04
turn to other people for validation
32:07
in matters pertaining to you personally that's a
32:10
childish thought right that you can abandon at
32:13
18
32:15
but curiosity
32:16
openness to experience
32:18
wanting to learn new things and meet new
32:19
people
32:20
these are not actually in my view
32:23
childish
32:24
thoughts
32:25
or behaviors
32:27
these are human thoughts and behaviors that you
32:29
see in children
32:31
and you only don't see in adults who
32:33
have a very different concept of adulthood.
32:36
In general,
32:37
take
32:39
responsibility.
32:40
They go n. That's it. Cut, we're done.
32:43
Well, responsibility
32:45
like being an adult
32:48
often develops bad connotations
32:50
because
32:51
parents try to make
32:53
sometimes bad parents try to make responsibility
32:57
into this tremendous burden that
33:00
you don't know how to handle and
33:04
it makes adulthood
33:06
awful. Yeah.
33:08
And you've also
33:09
heard me
33:11
recast
33:12
responsibility
33:14
as a most wonderful thing Mhmm. That gives
33:17
me power and prestige in the world. Which
33:20
is exactly when when, you know, my kids
33:23
say, Oh, I'd love to be an adult.
33:24
That's what they're seeing. They're seeing that freedom,
33:27
that agency,
33:28
that,
33:29
the fact that I can
33:31
know what I can take out of the
33:32
fridge, how much chocolate I can eat.
33:36
I know
33:38
that very many adults will go, oh, yeah.
33:39
No. It's hard though. Oh, yeah, you don't
33:41
wanna be an adult. Enjoy your youth while
33:43
you're off. You have no idea, you know,
33:45
how difficult it is.
33:47
And they're just projecting upon the young person
33:50
their own struggles and challenges and limited view.
33:54
In my experience,
33:56
adulthood
33:57
is a lot better Mhmm. Than childhood. Mhmm.
34:01
The part
34:02
that I I wanna put a spotlight on
34:05
is that
34:06
the freedoms of adulthood
34:09
are when you're feeling like the captain of
34:12
your own ship.
34:14
They're
34:15
going to keep you sailing through the difficult
34:18
parts.
34:20
When you were a child and you didn't
34:21
have this freedom, when you went through the
34:24
difficult parts,
34:25
I mean,
34:26
what what what could you do? Mhmm. Unless
34:28
you had really, really good parents. Well, that
34:31
that's what I was gonna say. I was
34:32
gonna say, well,
34:34
you know saying that the adulthood is is
34:36
better than being a kid. Is that that's
34:39
a That maybe a personal experience
34:42
in the sense that if you had a
34:44
fantastic childhood,
34:46
then you could say, well, that period
34:48
I was fit for purpose as a child
34:50
and my parents were fit for purpose as
34:52
parents.
34:53
Now what do I do now I'm an
34:54
adult? Which is,
34:55
sort of a different equation,
34:57
Right? So it's not necessarily that childhood is
35:00
not as good as being an adult. It's
35:01
more like if you've got good parents then
35:04
childhood is a great gestation period
35:06
of
35:07
growth in preparation
35:08
for a lifetime of being an adult. So
35:10
that's probably the proper way of looking at
35:13
it rather than
35:14
one thing being better than the other. Well,
35:16
one one In an ideal world, right? So
35:19
One title I considered for this podcast, cast,
35:22
it's just too long. I think it's a
35:24
good encapsulation
35:25
of what I want to achieve. It's things
35:26
your parents should have told you Mhmm. But
35:29
didn't. Mhmm. A guide for adults. Yeah.
35:32
And it's because only It wouldn't quite fit
35:35
on that. It would not. Yeah.
35:37
It's only very lucky people who have parents
35:40
who set them up so that adulthood is
35:43
gonna be better than Mhmm. The childhood.
35:45
The rest of us have to learn it,
35:47
say, through a podcast,
35:48
But at least now this podcast exists. Yeah.
35:53
Now is your chance to do the,
35:55
the Star Wars quote.
35:58
It's actually Spider Man. It's the second time.
36:01
I'm called Man. It's
36:03
it's Ben Parker,
36:05
says In the comments, I'm gonna be absolutely
36:08
As you demolish for that.
36:10
God.
36:13
So uncle Ben
36:14
says to Peter Parker,
36:16
with great power comes great responsibility.
36:19
Right? And Peter Parker tries to live his
36:21
life
36:22
by that, and it's very truthful. It it,
36:25
you know,
36:26
when you have power,
36:28
without responsibility you're a bull in a china
36:30
shop
36:31
with responsibility
36:33
you can help to shape the world into
36:34
a better shape because you've been elevated to
36:36
that position of power.
36:38
But
36:39
the inverse is also
36:42
true. So when I was a kid,
36:45
I really, really wanted just to get past
36:48
the childhood phase
36:49
to become an adult
36:52
because
36:53
when you take on
36:56
responsibility
36:58
it comes with power. It comes with prestige.
37:01
It's not just that when you're thrust into
37:03
a position where you have power that you
37:05
then must
37:06
perform the duty
37:08
of being responsible with that power.
37:10
It's also that when you claim
37:13
increasing responsibility
37:15
for yourself that there is
37:17
power that comes with that.
37:21
Alright. Well,
37:23
let's wrap this up then. Okay. Yeah. Thanks
37:25
for listening. Pascal and I are both available
37:28
for hire through the Morpheus Clinic for Hypnosis
37:30
in Toronto, Canada,
37:31
and we are seeing clients
37:33
worldwide.
37:34
The website is morpheusclinicdot
37:36
com and there you can ask for a
37:39
free consultation where we can apply some of
37:41
our thought to the concerns that you have.
37:44
The ideas you've heard during this episode are
37:47
some of the ideas that we instill in
37:50
our clients.
37:51
And if you've benefited from what you've heard
37:53
here, feel free to share the podcast with
37:55
anyone who you think might benefit,
37:57
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37:59
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38:02
Hypnosis
38:03
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38:05
Spotify, on Apple Podcasts or wherever it is
38:07
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38:09
your podcasts.
38:10
And watch out for the next episode where
38:12
we dig into another one of these principles
38:15
and talk specifically about your place in the
38:17
world amongst others.
38:19
So press the subscribe button and, keep an
38:21
eye out for the next episode.