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Jeff Ross (2026) - Cancer & Comedy Roasts · The Joe Rogan Recap

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Welcome to the Joe Rogan Recap and before we get going, please
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follow us right here on Spotify to make sure you get sight of
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our latest episodes in your feed.
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Yeah, definitely hit that follow button.
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So imagine for a second that you're standing on a Broadway
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stage, right? OK, I'm picturing it.
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The lights are just blinding. You've got thousands of people
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staring at you, waiting for a punchline, but hidden like right
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under your shirt is a chemotherapy port plugged
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directly into your chest. Wow, yeah, that is that is
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heavy. Right.
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And you're wearing it like a war medal just to prove to yourself
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that you were, you know, still alive.
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It's a stunning visual and it really it sets the stakes
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perfectly for what we're looking at today.
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Exactly because today's mission for this deep dive is to unpack
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this massive, winding conversation between Joe Rogan
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and the Roastmaster general himself, Jeff Ross.
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And if you just glance at the source material, you might
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think, oh, it's just two veteran comedians trading stand up war
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stories, right? Yeah, like typical shop talk.
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Exactly. But we're going into this
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material to extract the actual wisdom hidden beneath those
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jokes, because it transitions into these deeply profound
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reflections on the grounding power of routine, the weight of
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public scrutiny, and facing down mortality.
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And ultimately, like, how to find your tribe when the whole
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world just feels like it's spinning totally out of control.
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Yeah, what makes the specific deck dive so rich is the
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contrast. You've got two men who make
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their living observing society, but they're at very different
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points in their physical and emotional lives.
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They really are. But to understand how they
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survive the heavy stuff, the cancer and the cancel culture,
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we kind of have to look at how they.
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OK, let's unpack this because before we dive into the
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incredibly heavy themes of, you know, fame and Internet mobs, it
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was just fascinating to me that both of these guys anchor their
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entire existence with the exact same thing.
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Yes, they're dogs. It sounds so simple, but it's
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actually really profound when you look at the mechanics of it.
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It's the ultimate psychological anchor.
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I mean, if you think about it, when you're a highly successful
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public figure, you're constantly surrounded by people who react
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to your status, right? Your manager, your audience,
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your critics. But a dog?
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A dog doesn't care about your Netflix special.
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Not at all. A dog just cares if you're going
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to open the back door. It forces these these highly
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stressed guys to step entirely outside of their own egos.
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Totally. Like Jeff talks about his rescue
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German Shepherd Nippy. He got her during the pandemic
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from this sketchy breeder in Reno, OH.
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Right, the Reno story. Yeah, and she has so much
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intense energy that she literally needs a job or she
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just loses her mind. So what does Jeff do?
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He actually puts her to work on Broadway.
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Which is crazy. I know Nippy had her own
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dressing room and Jeff trained her to hit her mark on stage and
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like how long queue with the audience.
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Which is just such an incredible management of energy.
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And then, you know, you look at Joe's dog, Marshall.
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Oh man, Marshall, the golden retriever.
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Joe describes him as this giant love sponge.
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Yeah. Love sponge.
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Yeah. And Marshall requires this very
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specific, like non negotiable morning ritual.
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Joe basically has to hold the dogs legs and rub his belly like
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he's strumming a guitar. It's mandatory euphoria to start
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the day. Literally mandatory.
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But here is where the conversation takes a really
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interesting turn regarding how they actually care for these
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animals, specifically their diets.
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Right, because they both had this realization that mirrors a
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lot of the dietary awakenings people are having for themselves
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right now. Yeah, they look at that shelf
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stable dry kibble that just sits in a bag for six months and they
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both completely abandoned it for fresh human grade food.
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Joe uses farmer's dog, I think. Yeah, Farmer's dog, and Jeff
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talks about adding raw meat and real Turkey to Nippy's bowl, and
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Joe makes a point that's really hard to argue with.
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He asks. You know you wouldn't eat it, so
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why are they eating it? Exactly, and they both noted
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that the moment they switched from highly processed kibble to
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real food, their dogs coats change, their energy stabilized.
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Their overall health just transformed.
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Right. And if we look at the
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neurobiology of routine here, this is really about
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establishing a locus of control. Caring for an animal forces you
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to adhere to a healthy grounding schedule.
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You have to wake up. You have to provide high quality
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fuel. Exercise them.
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Exactly. I mean, think about a high
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energy working dog living in a tiny studio apartment.
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If you don't give a smart dog or honestly a highly creative
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person a job to do, what happens?
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They tear the place apart. Exactly.
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They're going to start digging up the backyard, chewing through
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the drywall, just destroying the furniture.
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Without a constructive outlet for that kinetic energy, it
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immediately turns destructive. And you know, that concept of
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feeling trapped in an apartment with no outlet perfectly bridges
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into the next major theme of their talk.
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Oh, absolutely. Because it isn't just dogs that
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feel caged, we are all living in a modern panopticon and it's
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driving society a little bit crazy.
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I'm going to need you to unpack that word for me, OK?
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Because I feel like I just walked into a sociology seminar.
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Yeah. What exactly is a panopticon?
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Fair enough. So the Panopticon is an
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architectural concept. It was created by this 18th
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century philosopher named Jeremy Bentham.
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He designed a circular prison where the guard tower is in the
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very center and all the cells face inward.
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Oh, I've seen pictures of this. Right.
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And the trick is the guards can see into every cell, but the
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prisoners can't see into the tower.
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So the prisoners never know exactly when they're being
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watched. Oh wow, so they just have to
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assume they're always being watched.
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Exactly. They have to constantly police
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their own behavior. And today, the Internet and
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smartphones have basically turned the entire world into a
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digital panopticon. We're under constant,
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unforgiving public scrutiny. Yes, that makes total sense.
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Yes. And it maps perfectly onto the
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visceral examples they bring up. Like they talk about the release
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of the Justin Timberlake DUI video, right?
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Right. They point out that there was
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nothing outrageous in the footage.
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Like he wasn't acting crazy, he wasn't belligerent.
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But society just rabidly demanded to see the tape.
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Yeah. Or that viral video of the actor
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from Reacher, Alan Richardson. Oh yeah, where he got into that
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altercation with a neighbor. Yeah, the neighbor who was
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allegedly driving dirt bikes erratically in front of kids.
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The underlying psychology they identify here is Schottenfreude.
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People seem to genuinely enjoy the cruelty of watching
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successful people stumble. It's like when you're crapped in
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the panopticon yourself, feeling powerless.
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There's a dark thrill in seeing someone higher up get dragged
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down into the mud with you. Precisely.
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But the crazy thing is, it isn't just a list celebrities dealing
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with this, no. Joe shares his own personal
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battle with his homeowners association, which is honestly
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the ultimate relatable nightmare.
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The HOA is the worst. If you've ever owned a home in a
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strict neighborhood, you know this pain.
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Joe repaired his wrought iron fence with brand new wrought
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iron and the HOA tried to force him to tear it down.
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Just because they suddenly wanted equestrian fences?
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Right. Yes, he literally had to
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threaten them with a massive lawsuit just to keep his
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beautiful new fence. The HOA is the perfect microcosm
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for the societal issue. Joe describes them as the hall
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monitors of the neighborhood. Hall monitors exactly.
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They're people with very little actual power in their daily
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lives who suddenly get put on a board and get to dictate, you
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know how tall your grass is allowed to be?
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He. Even had a neighbor who demanded
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Joe chopped down 50 year old trees on his property just so
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the neighbor could have a slightly better view of the city
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lights. It's just wild entitlement.
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It really is. So if we're surrounded by this
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forced scrutiny, the Internet commenters waiting for a
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mistake, the HOA Hall monitors measuring your fence, how do you
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survive it? Right.
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What's the fix? The antidote they discuss is
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actually counterintuitive. It's voluntary scrutiny.
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The roast. The comedy roast, right?
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Jeff and Joe talk extensively about Charlie Sheen's Torpedo of
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Truth tour. Oh man, after his massive
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meltdown. Yeah, right after that, the
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early solo shows of that tour were a total disaster.
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But when Sheen leaned into the chaos and let comedians like
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Jeff roast him mercilessly on stage, it suddenly worked.
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Because he wasn't apologizing. Right.
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He wasn't on an apology tour, he was taking ownership of his
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absolute mess. But wait, let me challenge that
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for a second. Doesn't a roast just normalize
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the exact kind of cruelty they're complaining about with
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the Internet trolls? Like if society's too mean, how
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does putting someone on stage and brutally insulting them fix
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anything? That is a great question and the
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distinction really lies in consent.
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The Internet cancel culture is non consensual destruction.
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OK, but a roast is consensual comedic combat.
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When you volunteer to be roasted, you're stepping into
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the ring and saying I know exactly how flawed I am and I'm
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going to let my friends say the worst possible things about me
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to my face. Oh, it's like Eminem in the
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movie Eight Mile. Yes, in that final rap battle he
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basically lists out every single terrible, embarrassing fact
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about his own life first, so by the time he hands the mic to his
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opponent, the guy has absolutely no ammunition left.
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Exactly. The hall monitors have nothing
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to say because you've already laughed at yourself harder than
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they ever could that. Makes so much sense and it
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explains why they bring up the recent Tom Brady Netflix roast.
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Which was an absolute cultural phenomenon.
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Huge Jeff said Tom Brady explicitly told him he wanted to
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do the roast to bring comedy back.
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He intentionally wanted to push back against the
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hypersensitivity of modern cancel culture.
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And it became the most watched live event in Netflix history
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precisely because it was raw and unfiltered.
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So is the modern comedy roast actually a societal pressure
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valve? Like in a world where your HOA
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is measuring your grass, is watching Tom Brady get
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brutalized on Netflix, the only place we're allowed to
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experience unfiltered chaos? It really acts as a
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psychological release. But, you know, while public
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scrutiny and Internet mobs are massive psychological threats,
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the conversation takes a very sudden, very sobering turn here.
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Yeah, it does, because Jeff reveals that he recently faced a
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very literal physical threat to his existence.
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Stage 3 colon cancer. Yeah, it completely shifts the
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gravity of the room. Jeff admits that he actually
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caught the cancer late because he initially ignored a
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hypochondriac friend's text messages.
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Friend was urging him to get a colonoscopy.
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Right, exactly. A routine colonoscopy and he
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just brushed it off. Which goes back to that image we
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started with. His resilience through this is
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just astonishing. He talks about going through
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chemotherapy and wearing his chemo port during his Broadway
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run as a war prize. He was processing this
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terrifying human experience right under the stage lights.
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And he only just recently had the port surgically removed.
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But the most interesting part of this segment is how the
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diagnosis forced Jeff to heavily modify his diet.
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Right. He talks about cutting back on
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red meat, eliminating processed foods, eating more lean Turkey
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to help his body heal. And that dietary shift triggers
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a very intense, very passionate response from Joe regarding how
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we view food, inflammation and the entire medical
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establishment. Oh, absolutely.
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Joe strongly pushes back on the conventional wisdom that red
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meat is the enemy. He argues that high quality
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grass fed red meat is actually the most nutrient dense food a
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human being can consume. He.
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Claims the real culprits driving inflammation and disease are
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highly processed foods, chemical preservatives and sugar.
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Massive amounts of sugar. Right Joe's philosophy here is
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built entirely around preventative ancestral
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nutrition. He advocates for intermittent
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fasting, and he explains this concept of running your body on
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ketones. And for you listening who might
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not be familiar, when you drastically reduce your carbon
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sugar intake, your liver starts producing ketones from fat.
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You're essentially shifting your body's engine from burning cheap
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sugar to burning stored fat, which Joe argues drastically
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reduces systemic inflammation. And from there, Joe takes a
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massive swing at the American Medical establishment.
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A huge swing. He argues that doctors receive
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virtually 0 nutritional training in medical school.
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He claims the entire healthcare system relies way too heavily on
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waiting until people are deathly ill and then pushing profitable
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pharmaceuticals instead of fixing the underlying diet.
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And Joe goes deep into some highly controversial territory
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here to back up his distrust of the system.
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He references Robert F Kennedy Junior's critiques of healthcare
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agencies, and he goes into this long history regarding Doctor
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Anthony Fauci. Specifically criticizing Fauci's
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handling of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s, focusing on the drug
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AZT. AZT was the first drug approved
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to treat HIV. Right.
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Yeah. And it was originally developed
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in the 1960s as a failed, highly toxic chemotherapy drug.
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Joe claims it was aggressively pushed on patients and
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ultimately killed many of them due to its toxicity.
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And Joe uses that historical example of AZT to explain his
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modern distrust of Fauci's handling of the COVID-19 origins
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and pandemic protocols. Right.
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And hey, real quick, just to be explicitly clear with you
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listening, our job in this deep dive isn't to take sides or
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endorse any of these politically charged medical opinions.
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Exactly. We're not validating or
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debunking anything here. Right, we're strictly reporting
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on what was said in the source material.
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We are endorsing Joe's takes on RFK Junior or Fauci or AZT or
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COVID. We're just looking at how Joe
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uses these historical touch points to build his broader
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argument against trusting institutional medicine blindly.
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Yeah, What's fascinating here is the stark contrast and how these
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two men approach the concept of survival.
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Yes, you have Jeff, who relied on the blunt force of acute
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modern medicine. He used surgery and highly toxic
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chemotherapy to literally poison a tumor and save his life.
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It was a crisis intervention. While Joe's entire worldview is
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about building a fortress so the crisis never breaches the walls
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in the first place. He wants to eat Whole Foods,
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exercise and keep his inflammation so low that he
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never has to step foot in a hospital.
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It's 2 completely different paradigms of surviving physical
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vulnerability, but here is the bridge.
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Whether you are fighting a tumor with IV chemo or you're fighting
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inflammation with a grass fed rib eye steak, you still have to
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wake up every single morning and face the world.
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Which brings us to a really beautiful question.
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When your body is healed, how do you survive the emotional toll?
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How do you survive the haters, the Hoas, the loss of your
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peers, and just the grueling, relentless nature of life
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itself? You survive it by relying on
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your chosen family. You survive it by trusting the
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process. Jeff talks about getting a new
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cell phone right, transferring his contacts over, and having
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this crushing realization that he has 20 dead friends in his
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phone. The loss of comedy legends over
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the last few years has just been staggering.
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Bob Saget, Gilbert Gottfried, Norm MacDonald, Brody Stevens.
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The psychological weight of outliving your peers is immense,
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but Jeff keeps their memories fiercely alive.
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He actually keeps his old cell phones charged in a drawer just
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so he can go back and read Bob Saget's text messages.
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Or listen to Gilbert Gottfried's ridiculous voicemails.
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There's this famous photograph of Jeff, Norm, Gilbert and Bob
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all sitting together laughing at a restaurant in Hollywood.
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And today, Jeff is the only man in that photo who is still
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alive. It's heartbreaking.
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It really is, but it highlights how the comedy world is deeply
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misunderstood by outsiders. Like if you just watch Roast,
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you might think comedians are these bitter, angry, cynical
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clowns. But Jeff describes them as a
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deeply supportive band of brothers and sisters.
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When they see each other in the dark hallways of the clubs, it's
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all hugs. They're sitting in the back of
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the room, writing down tags for each other's jokes, actively
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supporting the grind. They single out Tony Hinchcliffe
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and his massively successful show Kill Tony as the ultimate
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modern example of this. Tony has built this incredible
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ecosystem in Austin, TX that is entirely dedicated to pulling
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people up. It's a.
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Platform designed to elevate new careers and give open mind
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comedians a shot at changing their lives.
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It's a true community acting as a buffer against the chaos.
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And that community understands something fundamental that the
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rest of us often forget. There is no finish.
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Line Exactly, Joe. Joe and Jeff talk about this
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explicitly. You don't just win an award.
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Put it on your mantle and suddenly your life is complete
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and you're happy forever. You release a massive special,
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you get the applause, and then the very next morning, evening,
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you wake up and you have a blank piece of paper again.
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You have to start writing. It's entirely about the process.
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Jeff actually says he has a neon sign in his house.
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It just says enjoy the process. That's amazing.
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And here's where it gets really interesting.
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Jeff admitted he felt totally lost and depressed after
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finishing his Broadway run. He achieved this massive goal
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and suddenly he didn't know what to do with himself.
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He was a drift. Yeah, and a friend looked at him
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and said, dude, you're just between albums.
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Oh I love that analogy. Think about a musician.
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When a band finishes recording a masterpiece and completes a
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massive world tour, they can't just immediately jump back into
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the studio the next day and record another hit.
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Right. They have nothing left to say.
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They have emptied the tank. You aren't done being a
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musician, but you have to go out and absorb new life experiences
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you. Have to feel some pain.
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You have to feel some joy, get your heart broken, or fall in
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love before you have the material to write the next
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track. You have to download new
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influences, and that profound realization is what brings us to
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the title of Jeff new Netflix special, which really
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encapsulates this entire deep dive.
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Take a banana for the ride. I love this story so much.
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When Jeff was just a broke open mic comedian in New York City,
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grinding it out and feeling constantly.
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He was living with his grandfather, and every single
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night before Jeff would head out into the cold to go bomb at the
17:48
comedy clubs, his grandfather would hand him a few crumpled
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dollars for the bridge toll and a banana.
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It is such a simple, poignant gesture.
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It really is. It was his grandfather's way of
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saying I can't get on the stage with you, I can't write your
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jokes, I can't go with you, but I'm with you on the ride.
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Wow, if we pull all of these threads together for you, the
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core takeaways from this incredible conversation are
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surprisingly grounded. To survive this chaotic, hyper
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scrutinized world, you need to anchor yourself with real
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responsibilities like caring for a dog that pull you out of your
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own ego. You need to be willing to take
18:26
ownership of your flaws and laugh at yourself before the
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hall monitors and Internet trolls can use them against.
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You You must fuel your physical body with intention, whether
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you're relying on acute medicine to recover from an illness or
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ancestral nutrition to prevent one.
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And above all, you have to cherish your tribe because the
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riot is completely unpredictable and the finish line is a myth.
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It's all about the process. Jeff's grandfather gave him a
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banana to show he wasn't alone in the grind.
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There's a tangible piece of proof that someone cared about
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his journey. So in the world full of HOA,
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home monitors, Internet comment section to modern panopticons,
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who was handing you your banana for the ride?
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And perhaps more importantly, who are you handing one too?