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The Masonic Roundtable - 0575 - Emblems of Death · The Masonic Roundtable - Freemasonry Today for Today's Freemasons

• 0:10
  Speaker: Welcome back to the Masonic Roundtable, a weekly program
• 0:13
  Speaker: where Masons from around the world get together to talk about
• 0:16
  Speaker: Masonic news and opinions in a friendly and social manner.
• 0:19
  Speaker: As a reminder, any thoughts and opinions expressed here are
• 0:22
  Speaker: solely the opinions of the participants and do not
• 0:24
  Speaker: represent any Grand Lodge statements or positions.
• 0:27
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• 0:27
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• 0:29
  Speaker: and on the level to interact
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  Speaker: with us.
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  Speaker: show.
• 0:38
  Speaker: And um, what else?
• 0:40
  Speaker: Oh, and as always, if you can't
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  Speaker: catch us live, catch us in the
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  Speaker: replay or in your favorite
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• 0:45
  Speaker: You know me, John T Ruark, past
• 0:48
  Speaker: master of the Patriot Lodge,
• 0:49
  Speaker: number nineteen fifty seven in
• 0:51
  Speaker: Fairfax, Virginia.
• 0:52
  Speaker: Next up, Joe Martinez.
• 0:54
  Speaker: Hello and good evening.
• 0:56
  Speaker: Hello and good evening.
• 0:58
  Speaker: Um, I'm just watching you chew
• 1:00
  Speaker: up the English language with
• 1:01
  Speaker: words.
• 1:02
  Speaker: But I know you're tired, so
• 1:03
  Speaker: we're gonna automate this one
• 1:04
  Speaker: day.
• 1:05
  Speaker: I'll be gentle.
• 1:05
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 1:06
  Speaker: AI can do it for us.
• 1:07
  Speaker: Yes.
• 1:08
  Speaker: Joe Martinez.
• 1:09
  Speaker: Uh, let's see, past master of Manasseh Lodge number one eighty
• 1:12
  Speaker: two in Manassas, Virginia.
• 1:13
  Speaker: And as always, I'm glad to be here.
• 1:17
  Speaker: Awesome.
• 1:18
  Speaker: Um. Above average.
• 1:20
  Speaker: Happy that you're here with us.
• 1:22
  Speaker: Noted.
• 1:22
  Speaker: That's good.
• 1:23
  Speaker: And last but not least for tonight, Robert Johnson.
• 1:26
  Speaker: Hello and good evening.
• 1:29
  Speaker: Hello and good evening.
• 1:30
  Speaker: I got my orange blossom hat on from Kissimmee, Florida.
• 1:34
  Speaker: Thank you to the brethren of
• 1:35
  Speaker: Orange Blossom Lodge for this
• 1:37
  Speaker: awesome hat.
• 1:38
  Speaker: Anyway, great lodge, cool place to go out.
• 1:40
  Speaker: Had to give him a shout out real quick.
• 1:41
  Speaker: Robert Johnson, past Master Waukegan, seventy eight and
• 1:44
  Speaker: Spice Novum eleven eighty three.
• 1:46
  Speaker: Uh and secretary of pretty.
• 1:50
  Speaker: Lots of things.
• 1:52
  Speaker: Lots of things.
• 1:52
  Speaker: In fact, I just I just took on the job of the secretary of the
• 1:56
  Speaker: Illinois Lodge of Research.
• 1:57
  Speaker: So one more.
• 2:00
  Speaker: Of course I did.
• 2:01
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:02
  Speaker: It's a big, big shoes to fill.
• 2:04
  Speaker: Yeah, we'll try it.
• 2:05
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 2:05
  Speaker: That's your surprised face.
• 2:07
  Speaker: The one that says hustle.
• 2:09
  Speaker: Hustle.
• 2:11
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 2:11
  Speaker: I got that Masonic hustle, dude.
• 2:13
  Speaker: Secretary of of all things.
• 2:15
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 2:15
  Speaker: Memento.
• 2:16
  Speaker: Hustle.
• 2:20
  Speaker: Oh, man.
• 2:22
  Speaker: Well, let's thank the patrons who support the show.
• 2:25
  Speaker: You guys are amazing.
• 2:27
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• 2:28
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• 2:30
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• 2:32
  Speaker: whichever comes last, because
• 2:33
  Speaker: we're gonna, we're gonna
• 2:35
  Speaker: outlive, uh, organized,
• 2:38
  Speaker: speculative, organized,
• 2:40
  Speaker: speculative masonry.
• 2:41
  Speaker: But until then, thank you for helping us support hosting costs
• 2:46
  Speaker: and all the cool stuff.
• 2:47
  Speaker: So you guys rock.
• 2:48
  Speaker: Head over to patreon dot com slash Masonic roundtable.
• 2:53
  Speaker: Hurry up.
• 2:55
  Speaker: Now's the time.
• 2:56
  Speaker: Now's the time to get in there.
• 2:58
  Speaker: Get in there.
• 2:59
  Speaker: Uh, because again, it's coming close to Secret Santa time.
• 3:04
  Speaker: Oh, yeah.
• 3:05
  Speaker: It's so fun and fit and fantastic.
• 3:08
  Speaker: And knights and squires.
• 3:09
  Speaker: Get a little extra bonus, too.
• 3:10
  Speaker: So that'll be fun.
• 3:11
  Speaker: So join and be the change.
• 3:14
  Speaker: And it's only gotten bigger and bigger every year.
• 3:16
  Speaker: Yes.
• 3:17
  Speaker: That we've done it like almost.
• 3:19
  Speaker: I don't think I've had any
• 3:21
  Speaker: instance or even heard of any in
• 3:22
  Speaker: the last year or so where people
• 3:24
  Speaker: didn't come through on their
• 3:25
  Speaker: end.
• 3:26
  Speaker: Um, everybody, it's been really
• 3:28
  Speaker: cool and people got some awesome
• 3:30
  Speaker: stuff.
• 3:31
  Speaker: Um, so it's cool and pretty chill.
• 3:35
  Speaker: We like good game.
• 3:37
  Speaker: All right.
• 3:37
  Speaker: Um, let's head over to Joe's favorite segment of the show.
• 3:42
  Speaker: That's right.
• 3:42
  Speaker: You know it as tarot card of the week, right, Waite.
• 3:50
  Speaker: Tarot card of the week.
• 3:59
  Speaker: Jazz hands.
• 4:01
  Speaker: Jazz hands.
• 4:03
  Speaker: Uh. So this week, Jason's out, so I'm going to come up.
• 4:06
  Speaker: We tried to figure something out maybe a little bit.
• 4:09
  Speaker: Halloweeny.
• 4:10
  Speaker: Um, and of course, I've got stuff like, you know, the horror
• 4:16
  Speaker: Oracle and things, but I wanted to stick with tarot.
• 4:19
  Speaker: And so this is one of my favorite decks.
• 4:20
  Speaker: It's by an artist named Winslow
• 4:22
  Speaker: Dumain and he shows up a lot at
• 4:24
  Speaker: um, um, like comic cons and
• 4:28
  Speaker: things.
• 4:29
  Speaker: So it's a lot of fun, uh, really cool tarot deck.
• 4:33
  Speaker: Um, backs of the cards all look like this.
• 4:37
  Speaker: Use your imagination.
• 4:39
  Speaker: Um, this particular card is one of my favorites.
• 4:42
  Speaker: It's called the degenerate.
• 4:46
  Speaker: Oh, okay.
• 4:50
  Speaker: Number fifteen.
• 4:52
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 4:53
  Speaker: Uh, so card number fifteen.
• 4:56
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 4:56
  Speaker: So the the devil.
• 4:57
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 4:58
  Speaker: The devil card.
• 4:58
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 4:59
  Speaker: So let me just go ahead and mix these bad boys in.
• 5:04
  Speaker: Oh, I thought that was the card I started.
• 5:06
  Speaker: No, no, no, he just I just wanted to show you the art.
• 5:09
  Speaker: I just liked that card.
• 5:10
  Speaker: We're gonna get the thrall of stars.
• 5:17
  Speaker: What the f is a thrall?
• 5:19
  Speaker: What's a thrall?
• 5:20
  Speaker: It's it's it's the page of Pentacles.
• 5:23
  Speaker: Oh, okay.
• 5:24
  Speaker: I'll just say that.
• 5:26
  Speaker: Well, you know, I mean, it's a thrall.
• 5:28
  Speaker: Like, you gotta you gotta know the D and D language or, you
• 5:33
  Speaker: know, weird language.
• 5:35
  Speaker: So.
• 5:36
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 5:36
  Speaker: Page of Pentacles, you know, that's that card seems to pop up
• 5:41
  Speaker: quite a bit.
• 5:42
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 5:43
  Speaker: Manifestation opportunities and skills.
• 5:46
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
• 5:48
  Speaker: New material beginnings.
• 5:50
  Speaker: Yeah yeah yeah.
• 5:52
  Speaker: Um, I'm trying to think.
• 5:55
  Speaker: This particular deck, uh, his in his the.
• 6:00
  Speaker: Let me just check it.
• 6:01
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 6:01
  Speaker: Thrall of stars says, uh, departures, reconfigurations,
• 6:08
  Speaker: endings of old orders.
• 6:10
  Speaker: And if it's inverted, he says
• 6:11
  Speaker: rules, strictures, rigidity, and
• 6:15
  Speaker: familiar faces.
• 6:16
  Speaker: Um, it's a, it's a pretty unique deck, different sort of take on
• 6:19
  Speaker: things, but, uh, sticking with those classic Smith.
• 6:24
  Speaker: Wait.
• 6:25
  Speaker: Yeah, I like it.
• 6:27
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 6:28
  Speaker: Very cool.
• 6:29
  Speaker: It's a manifest that new beginning as we talk about
• 6:33
  Speaker: emblems of death.
• 6:34
  Speaker: Done done done done.
• 6:38
  Speaker: Okay, so it's spooky season, right?
• 6:41
  Speaker: A couple more days till Halloween.
• 6:43
  Speaker: Uh, I know our family goes all out.
• 6:45
  Speaker: I know Robert's family goes all out.
• 6:48
  Speaker: Um, well, we're kind of Halloween all year, And just
• 6:52
  Speaker: like this year, it kind of turned into we really didn't
• 6:55
  Speaker: decorate because we realized it was already done.
• 7:00
  Speaker: So there you go.
• 7:01
  Speaker: Nice.
• 7:02
  Speaker: Yeah, I guess just left all the cobwebs up in spider webs from
• 7:07
  Speaker: all summer long.
• 7:10
  Speaker: Just don't even dust them off.
• 7:11
  Speaker: Yeah, I just leave them.
• 7:13
  Speaker: Nice.
• 7:14
  Speaker: Uh. Let's see.
• 7:16
  Speaker: Um, for our Halloween episode for TMR.
• 7:19
  Speaker: We've done lots of good ones.
• 7:21
  Speaker: We've done some monster stuff.
• 7:22
  Speaker: We've done some memento mori stuff.
• 7:25
  Speaker: Skulls and masonry.
• 7:28
  Speaker: Oh, yeah.
• 7:28
  Speaker: You're sitting down just so you
• 7:30
  Speaker: know, there are skulls in
• 7:31
  Speaker: masonry.
• 7:34
  Speaker: And look, there's there's a few
• 7:37
  Speaker: Joe's collected all the skulls
• 7:38
  Speaker: in masonry.
• 7:39
  Speaker: So if you need one, you know how to kick them off.
• 7:44
  Speaker: Yep.
• 7:44
  Speaker: Like Pokemon before twenty forty pokey skulls.
• 7:49
  Speaker: So tonight we will discuss other, maybe less impactful, but
• 7:55
  Speaker: still, um, death related emblems that we find in the craft and
• 8:01
  Speaker: discuss what their meanings are, what it means to the modern
• 8:05
  Speaker: mason, as well as its relevance in today's society.
• 8:10
  Speaker: So it'll be kind of a grab bag,
• 8:11
  Speaker: a little potpourri of death
• 8:14
  Speaker: emblems.
• 8:15
  Speaker: So without further ado, let's jump in.
• 8:18
  Speaker: Do we just want to start like round robin calling one out and
• 8:21
  Speaker: then start discuss?
• 8:23
  Speaker: Yes.
• 8:23
  Speaker: So, Joe.
• 8:24
  Speaker: Yeah, pick our first one.
• 8:26
  Speaker: Okay.
• 8:27
  Speaker: So we're we're skipping, we're
• 8:28
  Speaker: skipping the obvious, the
• 8:29
  Speaker: obvious ones.
• 8:30
  Speaker: Right.
• 8:30
  Speaker: Cut, cut have done the obvious ones, but if it comes up, we'll
• 8:33
  Speaker: still talk about it.
• 8:34
  Speaker: Okay.
• 8:35
  Speaker: I would like to start with something that's not too obvious
• 8:38
  Speaker: is one of my favorites.
• 8:40
  Speaker: Um, and it's often overlooked.
• 8:42
  Speaker: Um. The scythe.
• 8:45
  Speaker: Ooh.
• 8:46
  Speaker: Oh, yeah.
• 8:48
  Speaker: All right.
• 8:49
  Speaker: What's a scythe?
• 8:50
  Speaker: Uh, well, a scythe is a long, uh, harvesting tool with a very
• 8:56
  Speaker: long curved knife.
• 8:58
  Speaker: Um, you should find a picture of it so we can show it.
• 9:00
  Speaker: And that people use to cut wheat and grass and things like that
• 9:05
  Speaker: in a long, sweeping motion.
• 9:07
  Speaker: If you've seen the Grim Reaper,
• 9:09
  Speaker: he is normally carrying a
• 9:10
  Speaker: scythe.
• 9:11
  Speaker: But our Masonic symbolism does not have a a hooded, uh, thrall
• 9:16
  Speaker: with a skull.
• 9:20
  Speaker: One of my if I don't know if we'll be able to find it.
• 9:23
  Speaker: Um, it was actually the first
• 9:24
  Speaker: time I ever saw the depiction
• 9:26
  Speaker: painting.
• 9:26
  Speaker: I'm not sure what it was.
• 9:28
  Speaker: Um. It's okay.
• 9:32
  Speaker: Safe place.
• 9:33
  Speaker: Ancient aliens episode was talking about, um, the use of
• 9:39
  Speaker: the scythe by, uh, sort of.
• 9:42
  Speaker: They were talking about the plague, and it was this really
• 9:45
  Speaker: awesome, uh, painting.
• 9:47
  Speaker: If I can find it, I will throw it into the chat with the
• 9:50
  Speaker: knights and Squires.
• 9:51
  Speaker: But it's the Grim Reaper, essentially like waving the
• 9:57
  Speaker: scythe out in the fields coming toward the village.
• 10:00
  Speaker: Um, and it's just, it is such an iconic emblem.
• 10:05
  Speaker: Uh, even if the.
• 10:09
  Speaker: The, the caricature of death isn't wielding it.
• 10:12
  Speaker: Right?
• 10:12
  Speaker: Like it's I've been, and I've seen some Masonic, um, solemn
• 10:17
  Speaker: prep rooms in the jurisdictions that allow that.
• 10:20
  Speaker: Or if you have a chamber or
• 10:21
  Speaker: whatever, where there's not a
• 10:23
  Speaker: skeleton or like, you know, a, a
• 10:27
  Speaker: grim reaper holding it, it's
• 10:29
  Speaker: just there.
• 10:30
  Speaker: And I always kind of think about it in this way.
• 10:33
  Speaker: That's.
• 10:36
  Speaker: Yeah, it's a thing and it represents death, but it's not
• 10:39
  Speaker: always, you know, this grim monster that's going to take you
• 10:42
  Speaker: either, you know, the absence of the reaper in itself sort of,
• 10:48
  Speaker: you know, lends itself to the idea that we don't know when.
• 10:51
  Speaker: The Masonic ritual, it says, you
• 10:53
  Speaker: know, uh, um, at the height of
• 10:57
  Speaker: your greatness, you get cut
• 10:58
  Speaker: down.
• 10:59
  Speaker: You know, you just don't know when, when, when your greatness
• 11:02
  Speaker: is just aspiring.
• 11:03
  Speaker: Yes, we must soon be cut down by
• 11:05
  Speaker: the all devouring scythe of
• 11:06
  Speaker: time.
• 11:08
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 11:09
  Speaker: No, I, I love, I love.
• 11:10
  Speaker: See, I, I actually find it, it's it for me.
• 11:13
  Speaker: It's a much more stark indicator that that death comes for all.
• 11:20
  Speaker: Right.
• 11:21
  Speaker: It's not like you know, it, it
• 11:23
  Speaker: doesn't have to do with whether
• 11:24
  Speaker: you're young or old or fit or
• 11:27
  Speaker: not.
• 11:27
  Speaker: Um, you know, when that scythe cuts down grain or grass or
• 11:32
  Speaker: wheat, um, you know, when the, when the, the.
• 11:36
  Speaker: Person holding the scythe runs
• 11:38
  Speaker: it across, it cuts down
• 11:39
  Speaker: everything you know, and it is
• 11:42
  Speaker: indiscriminate with.
• 11:43
  Speaker: With how it does.
• 11:44
  Speaker: so. So have you guys ever used a knife?
• 11:47
  Speaker: I have, yeah.
• 11:49
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 11:50
  Speaker: That's pretty amazing.
• 11:51
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 11:51
  Speaker: Yes it is.
• 11:54
  Speaker: If you have a really sharp edged knife.
• 11:57
  Speaker: Man, that thing is amazing.
• 11:59
  Speaker: And like, just with one swipe
• 12:01
  Speaker: watch the quantity that you can
• 12:03
  Speaker: cut down.
• 12:04
  Speaker: It's wild.
• 12:05
  Speaker: Watch.
• 12:05
  Speaker: Watch a video of some some kid and he'll show like one field
• 12:12
  Speaker: where the grass is granted.
• 12:14
  Speaker: The grass got to be tall, tall grass.
• 12:15
  Speaker: You know you're talking two,
• 12:16
  Speaker: three feet, four feet in the
• 12:18
  Speaker: air.
• 12:19
  Speaker: And he's like riding mower versus the scythe.
• 12:24
  Speaker: Not even a challenge like three passes of the scythe.
• 12:27
  Speaker: And it's done.
• 12:27
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 12:28
  Speaker: He's done.
• 12:28
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 12:29
  Speaker: And the riding lawnmower is like, chugging along like.
• 12:33
  Speaker: I can't do it, pop. Yeah.
• 12:37
  Speaker: But but again, once you see it
• 12:39
  Speaker: in action like that, I think you
• 12:41
  Speaker: can appreciate the symbol more
• 12:44
  Speaker: or what it stands for, what it
• 12:45
  Speaker: represents.
• 12:46
  Speaker: Right.
• 12:47
  Speaker: Um, one for the quantity again, because it's, it's going to cut
• 12:50
  Speaker: us all down.
• 12:51
  Speaker: So it's, it takes death from being like an individual like,
• 12:56
  Speaker: yeah, yeah, yeah, we're all going to die.
• 12:57
  Speaker: But like the swiftness and the
• 13:01
  Speaker: quantity and the, uh, you know,
• 13:05
  Speaker: just the motion of that seems to
• 13:07
  Speaker: be a little bit more evocative
• 13:09
  Speaker: than, you know, other other
• 13:11
  Speaker: envelopes.
• 13:12
  Speaker: So. Well, I, I think to your
• 13:13
  Speaker: point, I think it also removes
• 13:15
  Speaker: this.
• 13:17
  Speaker: And I think some of us still have it.
• 13:18
  Speaker: And, you know, especially when
• 13:20
  Speaker: we were younger, we certainly
• 13:21
  Speaker: did.
• 13:21
  Speaker: I think it removes this, this
• 13:23
  Speaker: comfortable assumption that we
• 13:25
  Speaker: all have, that death is
• 13:26
  Speaker: something that only comes to the
• 13:29
  Speaker: sick or the elderly or the
• 13:32
  Speaker: unlucky, for lack of a better
• 13:33
  Speaker: term, you know, and it, it comes
• 13:35
  Speaker: for all.
• 13:36
  Speaker: And it's I think it's a really powerful symbol.
• 13:39
  Speaker: Um, you know, and I wish we just talked more about our symbols.
• 13:45
  Speaker: Um, and the reason why they're
• 13:46
  Speaker: so important because this is one
• 13:48
  Speaker: like for, for, for me, um, it
• 13:51
  Speaker: comes up once it comes up during
• 13:52
  Speaker: a lecture and then you never
• 13:54
  Speaker: really see it brought up again,
• 13:55
  Speaker: you know, it's like, oh, here's
• 13:56
  Speaker: a slide from the nineteen
• 13:57
  Speaker: sixties.
• 13:57
  Speaker: It looks like crap.
• 13:58
  Speaker: And oh, let's move on to something else.
• 14:00
  Speaker: You know, um, we just, we talk about it in passing.
• 14:04
  Speaker: But I mean, there's so there's so much richness to that, you
• 14:08
  Speaker: know, this idea of the scythe as a symbol, basically, uh,
• 14:13
  Speaker: accepting that there are things beyond your control, you know,
• 14:16
  Speaker: like, like death, you know, and I know that I think we're going
• 14:20
  Speaker: to get to this at some point, but, um, you know, for all the
• 14:23
  Speaker: Pooh Pooh ers that are out there, it's like, oh, masonry
• 14:25
  Speaker: doesn't have anything to do with this or that or the other thing.
• 14:28
  Speaker: It's look at all the symbols
• 14:30
  Speaker: that we have and we gloss over
• 14:32
  Speaker: and we talk about, we're
• 14:33
  Speaker: literally talking about one
• 14:35
  Speaker: thing.
• 14:35
  Speaker: And it's not what, what most people think it is, right?
• 14:37
  Speaker: Like, you know, the skull and crossbones, right?
• 14:40
  Speaker: You know, we know that's a symbol.
• 14:41
  Speaker: It's it's hidden and it's obfuscated.
• 14:43
  Speaker: And, you know, it's, it's not, uh, promoted as much anymore,
• 14:47
  Speaker: but none of the things that we learn or we talk about or all
• 14:50
  Speaker: the symbols, especially the Sith, um, really have to do
• 14:54
  Speaker: with, with death.
• 14:55
  Speaker: It's, it's teaching us to be cognizant that we're here and
• 14:59
  Speaker: that we're alive, you know, and, and we seem to forget that, you
• 15:03
  Speaker: know, we either get stuck in the, the mystery of it and, you
• 15:07
  Speaker: know, it's it's death, death, death, and, you know, memento
• 15:09
  Speaker: mori and it stops there, right?
• 15:11
  Speaker: Like, hey, you're going to die.
• 15:12
  Speaker: Cool.
• 15:12
  Speaker: Um, we don't, we don't think about the obverse of that, which
• 15:15
  Speaker: is, I think where some of these symbols have, have their
• 15:19
  Speaker: greatest meaning, you know?
• 15:20
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
• 15:22
  Speaker: But to, to jump on your soapbox, um, I will, I mean, I will not
• 15:28
  Speaker: forget some grumpy past masters that were like, yeah, well, you
• 15:32
  Speaker: know, you just think that it's cool because it's edgy and it's
• 15:36
  Speaker: like goth and all that.
• 15:38
  Speaker: I'm like, like, no, like
• 15:40
  Speaker: there's, there's an actual
• 15:41
  Speaker: meaning that we're taught in the
• 15:43
  Speaker: ritual and applying it to make
• 15:46
  Speaker: yourself.
• 15:46
  Speaker: I don't know.
• 15:47
  Speaker: Take good men and make them better.
• 15:48
  Speaker: Novel idea is actually a pretty valuable lesson.
• 15:53
  Speaker: And sorry that you didn't pick up on that.
• 15:55
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 15:56
  Speaker: Um, but that's just because.
• 15:58
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 15:59
  Speaker: Now, if you were having that
• 16:00
  Speaker: conversation, if you were having
• 16:01
  Speaker: that conversation inside of a
• 16:02
  Speaker: hot topic, I would, I would see
• 16:04
  Speaker: his point.
• 16:04
  Speaker: But you know, it was a spirit Halloween.
• 16:07
  Speaker: Now that you think about it, when I was talking to the guy.
• 16:09
  Speaker: So I don't know if that has anything to do with it.
• 16:12
  Speaker: Well, you got those little sides
• 16:13
  Speaker: and the nipple piercings, you
• 16:15
  Speaker: know, in that same kind of
• 16:16
  Speaker: thing.
• 16:17
  Speaker: Yeah, I totally get it.
• 16:18
  Speaker: But yeah, like I said, from here up.
• 16:20
  Speaker: Yes, always.
• 16:22
  Speaker: Except for the New Year's Eve show.
• 16:24
  Speaker: Um, then we'll bare all.
• 16:26
  Speaker: But, uh.
• 16:29
  Speaker: No, I, I, like I said, I think it's just, it's so funny how
• 16:33
  Speaker: certain masons just get hung up in the hey, that's there and we
• 16:37
  Speaker: need to hide away from it and shy away from it.
• 16:39
  Speaker: It's like you're missing the point.
• 16:41
  Speaker: It is an interesting.
• 16:42
  Speaker: There's that juxtapose where I
• 16:44
  Speaker: mean, just recently I was at a,
• 16:47
  Speaker: a lodge where Jason gave his
• 16:50
  Speaker: talk, um, and talk the death
• 16:54
  Speaker: talk.
• 16:54
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 16:54
  Speaker: And one of the people who had a comment about it, um, didn't
• 17:00
  Speaker: have a question.
• 17:02
  Speaker: It was a general comment and like it was given.
• 17:09
  Speaker: And it wasn't until like moments later you kind of realized what
• 17:12
  Speaker: the guy was saying.
• 17:14
  Speaker: And it really was kind of a. You know, I think your presentation
• 17:22
  Speaker: isn't good type of a comment.
• 17:25
  Speaker: It was, uh, the gentleman had
• 17:27
  Speaker: talked about, he had some health
• 17:29
  Speaker: scares and some struggles and he
• 17:31
  Speaker: surpassed them.
• 17:32
  Speaker: And he's like, so I just live my life and I don't even think
• 17:36
  Speaker: about that stuff anymore.
• 17:38
  Speaker: Um, and and I don't, you know, know why we would ever want to
• 17:43
  Speaker: focus on this.
• 17:45
  Speaker: And it was like, okay, I see your point.
• 17:49
  Speaker: Um, but you're kind of, you're kind of missing the point.
• 17:54
  Speaker: And also.
• 17:57
  Speaker: What you're describing is a sort
• 17:59
  Speaker: of dissonance that comes after
• 18:03
  Speaker: detachment.
• 18:04
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 18:04
  Speaker: Like after confronting death.
• 18:10
  Speaker: So it's almost like what Jason was talking about.
• 18:15
  Speaker: This guy went through all of that and almost doesn't think it
• 18:20
  Speaker: was special, which, I mean, I guess in a, in a way.
• 18:24
  Speaker: Like that's his lived experience.
• 18:26
  Speaker: Sure.
• 18:26
  Speaker: Cool.
• 18:27
  Speaker: For you.
• 18:27
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 18:28
  Speaker: That's awesome.
• 18:29
  Speaker: You know, but this is right.
• 18:32
  Speaker: It's the great, the great leveler.
• 18:34
  Speaker: Uh, was it?
• 18:36
  Speaker: They use that cool phrase in National treasure.
• 18:38
  Speaker: The debt all men pay.
• 18:40
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 18:41
  Speaker: Nice.
• 18:43
  Speaker: Boom!
• 18:44
  Speaker: The Sith, the Sith.
• 18:46
  Speaker: All right, how about you, Robert?
• 18:49
  Speaker: At the risk.
• 18:52
  Speaker: I guess we'll have.
• 18:53
  Speaker: Maybe we'll have to talk around it a little bit.
• 18:56
  Speaker: But the setting maul.
• 18:58
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 18:59
  Speaker: I think the setting maul for me is one that is.
• 19:05
  Speaker: Continually being employed in
• 19:08
  Speaker: lodges and we don't even think
• 19:09
  Speaker: about it.
• 19:10
  Speaker: I mean some lodges have setting malls as their gavels, you know,
• 19:13
  Speaker: like little decorative setting malls and things.
• 19:16
  Speaker: Um, it is the instrument that begins the change, right?
• 19:26
  Speaker: It is, uh, the final setting, if you will.
• 19:30
  Speaker: Um, and I just think that for me.
• 19:35
  Speaker: It's, uh.
• 19:36
  Speaker: Not only does it represent this sort of, uh.
• 19:42
  Speaker: The idea, like the thing that we
• 19:44
  Speaker: work with throughout our lives,
• 19:47
  Speaker: the idea that, that we are
• 19:50
  Speaker: exhibiting this sort of
• 19:51
  Speaker: conscious moral discipline,
• 19:55
  Speaker: right?
• 19:55
  Speaker: We're chipping away and we're
• 19:57
  Speaker: using the setting maul with the,
• 19:59
  Speaker: you know, the chisel or whatever
• 20:00
  Speaker: you want to call it, um, to make
• 20:04
  Speaker: ourselves better.
• 20:04
  Speaker: But it's also by that same tool
• 20:07
  Speaker: that this transitory, uh, thing
• 20:13
  Speaker: happens.
• 20:14
  Speaker: Um.
• 20:15
  Speaker: Right.
• 20:16
  Speaker: And it is.
• 20:22
  Speaker: It's just a, an item that stands out.
• 20:26
  Speaker: And even in like the slides for lectures or the, the, uh,
• 20:31
  Speaker: carpets for the third degree.
• 20:34
  Speaker: You see it there and it's just
• 20:35
  Speaker: this unassuming workers tool and
• 20:39
  Speaker: it's just hanging out in the
• 20:40
  Speaker: corner.
• 20:41
  Speaker: This benevolent fraternity that that we have.
• 20:44
  Speaker: And like the scythe is immediately recognizable, I
• 20:48
  Speaker: would say to probably everybody mostly, but the setting maul
• 20:54
  Speaker: sits there and you, you don't know unless you know.
• 20:59
  Speaker: And so it's maybe just that next layer deep.
• 21:03
  Speaker: Um, you know, for the mason
• 21:05
  Speaker: who's, who's thinking about
• 21:06
  Speaker: these things.
• 21:07
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 21:08
  Speaker: Well, I'll add that.
• 21:10
  Speaker: Okay.
• 21:11
  Speaker: Let's, uh, let's talk about it.
• 21:13
  Speaker: Operatively.
• 21:14
  Speaker: So those who can interpret it
• 21:16
  Speaker: speculatively get it a setting
• 21:17
  Speaker: maul is usually a heavy wooden
• 21:20
  Speaker: hammer or stone hammer, um,
• 21:23
  Speaker: originally used by operative
• 21:25
  Speaker: masons to set and knock polished
• 21:28
  Speaker: stones into proper alignment
• 21:30
  Speaker: within mortar.
• 21:33
  Speaker: So pile of stones, meaning that you're probably.
• 21:38
  Speaker: You've achieved some polish in
• 21:40
  Speaker: your life and now you're, you're
• 21:42
  Speaker: actually getting knocked into
• 21:44
  Speaker: place, you're getting set down,
• 21:47
  Speaker: you're getting into your final
• 21:48
  Speaker: place, you're getting aligned
• 21:49
  Speaker: and, you know, kind of your work
• 21:51
  Speaker: is done.
• 21:53
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 21:54
  Speaker: And I'm sorry.
• 21:55
  Speaker: Go ahead.
• 21:56
  Speaker: Joe.
• 21:56
  Speaker: No, I was just going to say I was, I was trying to think of a,
• 21:59
  Speaker: I see where you guys are going.
• 22:01
  Speaker: And I was trying to think of a
• 22:02
  Speaker: thread for, for me, it's um,
• 22:04
  Speaker: it's a deceptive kind of symbol,
• 22:07
  Speaker: right?
• 22:07
  Speaker: Because to your point, it is an instrument that we use to build
• 22:11
  Speaker: and construct and, and, you know, to your point, operatively
• 22:15
  Speaker: and use those tools, but, but, you know, for those who know, it
• 22:20
  Speaker: is completely the opposite of some of the, like the, the site
• 22:26
  Speaker: and the coffin and stuff, right?
• 22:27
  Speaker: Because we're not talking about
• 22:29
  Speaker: the passage of time having to do
• 22:31
  Speaker: with something, you know,
• 22:32
  Speaker: natural causes or the passage of
• 22:34
  Speaker: time.
• 22:34
  Speaker: For us now we're talking about direct human intervention.
• 22:38
  Speaker: It's an active tool.
• 22:39
  Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
• 22:41
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 22:41
  Speaker: It's not a passive tool.
• 22:42
  Speaker: It's not something that happens.
• 22:44
  Speaker: It's a weapon, you know, a weapon of transition.
• 22:47
  Speaker: You you can look at any number
• 22:49
  Speaker: of builders from, you know,
• 22:52
  Speaker: different mythologies and
• 22:53
  Speaker: religions.
• 22:54
  Speaker: You can look at, um.
• 22:58
  Speaker: Regardless of the tool, uh, like
• 23:01
  Speaker: you think about Osiris who is
• 23:02
  Speaker: suddenly stopped, um, Tammuz,
• 23:06
  Speaker: Adonis, um, these people,
• 23:09
  Speaker: they're like immediately stopped
• 23:11
  Speaker: in their progress by an outside
• 23:15
  Speaker: intervention.
• 23:16
  Speaker: Uh, and they're sort of, you
• 23:18
  Speaker: know, it's a tragedy because
• 23:19
  Speaker: they're cut down in a prime
• 23:21
  Speaker: rather than, uh, you know,
• 23:24
  Speaker: letting old age or as Joe was
• 23:27
  Speaker: saying, you know, decay, take
• 23:28
  Speaker: them on.
• 23:32
  Speaker: Nice.
• 23:33
  Speaker: All right.
• 23:34
  Speaker: I'm going to go next.
• 23:37
  Speaker: Symbol I chose for now is the hourglass.
• 23:41
  Speaker: Me gusta.
• 23:42
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 23:44
  Speaker: Mucho.
• 23:45
  Speaker: So definitely worth having an
• 23:46
  Speaker: hourglass in your your little,
• 23:49
  Speaker: uh, contemplative corner in your
• 23:52
  Speaker: office or, or area of your home
• 23:56
  Speaker: because it is a constant
• 23:58
  Speaker: reminder that that time will
• 24:00
  Speaker: slip away like sands in the
• 24:02
  Speaker: hourglass.
• 24:02
  Speaker: And we don't always have the
• 24:04
  Speaker: luxury of, um, resetting that,
• 24:08
  Speaker: right?
• 24:08
  Speaker: So once it's done, it's done.
• 24:10
  Speaker: Time is pretty much the only asset that you cannot get back.
• 24:15
  Speaker: And that's something that's
• 24:17
  Speaker: really hard to yeah, to think
• 24:18
  Speaker: about economically.
• 24:19
  Speaker: There's things you can rebuild.
• 24:20
  Speaker: There's, you know, your house
• 24:21
  Speaker: burns down, you can eventually
• 24:23
  Speaker: rebuild, but you can't get time
• 24:25
  Speaker: back.
• 24:26
  Speaker: Joe.
• 24:27
  Speaker: No, I mean, it's yeah, it's your point for, for me, it's and you
• 24:31
  Speaker: gotta remember how many people outside of masonry actually sit
• 24:35
  Speaker: and and know what an hourglass actually looks like, right?
• 24:39
  Speaker: Like you may have some little weird egg timer that your mom
• 24:42
  Speaker: left at the house, you know, a tiny little plastic crap, but,
• 24:45
  Speaker: you know, like a real hourglass, you know, kind of like the
• 24:48
  Speaker: Wizard of Oz type thing.
• 24:49
  Speaker: A big old thing.
• 24:50
  Speaker: It's gorgeous.
• 24:51
  Speaker: It's made of polished wood, and it's got beautiful sand.
• 24:54
  Speaker: And how many of us have actually
• 24:55
  Speaker: looked at that and realized that
• 24:57
  Speaker: it only ever flows relentlessly
• 25:00
  Speaker: in one single direction, you
• 25:02
  Speaker: know?
• 25:02
  Speaker: And that's such a powerful
• 25:04
  Speaker: metaphor, you know, and but, you
• 25:06
  Speaker: know, we don't think about that
• 25:07
  Speaker: because we, we, we do now tell
• 25:09
  Speaker: time with our Apple Watches and
• 25:11
  Speaker: stuff like that, which, you
• 25:13
  Speaker: know, there's, there's a
• 25:14
  Speaker: symbolism lost.
• 25:15
  Speaker: I think I would almost, we could probably dissect it, but, you
• 25:20
  Speaker: know, the, the, uh, idea of the hourglass in and of itself is a
• 25:25
  Speaker: symbol of time.
• 25:26
  Speaker: It's just, it's more than just the passage of time, right?
• 25:30
  Speaker: We have the the grains on the top, which are it's like the
• 25:35
  Speaker: future representative of the manifestations yet to come.
• 25:38
  Speaker: You can see that.
• 25:40
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 25:40
  Speaker: You then you've got everything
• 25:41
  Speaker: at the bottom, which is what's
• 25:44
  Speaker: been done.
• 25:45
  Speaker: It's gone.
• 25:46
  Speaker: Wasted maybe.
• 25:48
  Speaker: And then there's the small
• 25:49
  Speaker: aperture, which represents like
• 25:52
  Speaker: right now.
• 25:54
  Speaker: And it's that constant reminder of this is this is the now.
• 26:00
  Speaker: And you can kind of think about
• 26:02
  Speaker: it in this way, but, you know,
• 26:04
  Speaker: with a regular wristwatch or an
• 26:06
  Speaker: Apple Watch, I'm not sure we
• 26:08
  Speaker: have those, those same symbolic
• 26:10
  Speaker: elements.
• 26:11
  Speaker: Maybe we could.
• 26:12
  Speaker: I'm glad, but I'm glad you brought that up, because I tend
• 26:17
  Speaker: to think back to actually, one of the first quotes that got me
• 26:19
  Speaker: into stoicism was from Seneca.
• 26:22
  Speaker: He actually wrote a small up on the shortness of life.
• 26:25
  Speaker: And he says, it's not that we have a short life, it's that we
• 26:32
  Speaker: waste so much of it.
• 26:33
  Speaker: We make it short.
• 26:34
  Speaker: Right?
• 26:35
  Speaker: And, um, one productivity hack
• 26:39
  Speaker: that I use quite a bit is
• 26:40
  Speaker: timers.
• 26:42
  Speaker: Um, we, uh, we use timers at work for like we do fifteen
• 26:47
  Speaker: minute daily tag ups and, and we set, we set the clock.
• 26:51
  Speaker: So that way it's not one of these long drawn out meetings.
• 26:54
  Speaker: It's like fifteen minutes and it's like, and if you need to go
• 26:57
  Speaker: get out of here.
• 26:57
  Speaker: Like, you know, it's, it's efficient because we don't want
• 26:59
  Speaker: to waste time in meetings.
• 27:01
  Speaker: And, um, another thing that I'm really into is Pomodoro timers
• 27:07
  Speaker: where you basically set a twenty five minute timer, just stay
• 27:11
  Speaker: locked in to whatever work you're doing and then take a
• 27:14
  Speaker: five minute break and repeat.
• 27:15
  Speaker: And one, it's amazing because it keeps me focused.
• 27:19
  Speaker: But having the, the threat of,
• 27:23
  Speaker: of this timer ticking away is a
• 27:26
  Speaker: little bit more interactive
• 27:29
  Speaker: than, like you say, your watch
• 27:31
  Speaker: or your watch face or something
• 27:32
  Speaker: like that.
• 27:33
  Speaker: Just, it's, it's, it's this
• 27:34
  Speaker: looming, ticking, um, motivator
• 27:40
  Speaker: to, to really help move things
• 27:42
  Speaker: along.
• 27:42
  Speaker: And for me, it works.
• 27:44
  Speaker: The timers work well for me.
• 27:46
  Speaker: And I think that's, that's why
• 27:48
  Speaker: is that it is a constant
• 27:49
  Speaker: reminder of the, the, the limits
• 27:53
  Speaker: that we need to set, uh, because
• 27:55
  Speaker: otherwise, you know, life is not
• 27:58
  Speaker: limitless.
• 27:58
  Speaker: There are limits to all of our activities.
• 28:01
  Speaker: Did you see there was the movie with, uh, Justin Timberlake?
• 28:05
  Speaker: Yes.
• 28:06
  Speaker: Uh, was it about time or something like that?
• 28:08
  Speaker: Something like that where they,
• 28:10
  Speaker: they basically time is like
• 28:12
  Speaker: currency.
• 28:12
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 28:13
  Speaker: People can like virtually live forever, but at the cost of
• 28:18
  Speaker: someone else's time.
• 28:19
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 28:20
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 28:20
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 28:21
  Speaker: Pretty pretty, pretty cool movie.
• 28:24
  Speaker: Anyway.
• 28:25
  Speaker: It's a time travel movie.
• 28:26
  Speaker: Of course I've seen it.
• 28:27
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 28:28
  Speaker: I love it.
• 28:31
  Speaker: Awesome.
• 28:32
  Speaker: Um, okay.
• 28:34
  Speaker: Anything else about the hourglass?
• 28:38
  Speaker: And those are the days of our lives.
• 28:40
  Speaker: Yes, that was almost the reference.
• 28:43
  Speaker: Okay, uh, back to you, Joe.
• 28:47
  Speaker: Oh.
• 28:48
  Speaker: Um. Well, we did, we did my faves.
• 28:52
  Speaker: Let's go with with the obvious one.
• 28:54
  Speaker: The coffin.
• 28:57
  Speaker: Has nothing to do with death.
• 28:59
  Speaker: So why you pick that one?
• 29:00
  Speaker: No, not at all.
• 29:02
  Speaker: Pick a more obvious one, but.
• 29:05
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
• 29:06
  Speaker: Um.
• 29:07
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 29:07
  Speaker: I'm feeling the coffin.
• 29:08
  Speaker: I mean, it really.
• 29:10
  Speaker: I think for most people, it it really grounds us in that
• 29:14
  Speaker: concept of mortality, right?
• 29:16
  Speaker: That, um, in time.
• 29:18
  Speaker: Thank you so much.
• 29:19
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 29:20
  Speaker: That's book Twenty nine twenty one.
• 29:22
  Speaker: Um, but yeah, I, I think it's a, a dramatic symbol and some
• 29:26
  Speaker: lodges and some jurisdictions, like, you know, some of us see
• 29:30
  Speaker: it on a PowerPoint slide or some of us see it on a, on a trestle
• 29:33
  Speaker: board or a carpet.
• 29:34
  Speaker: Um, some of them actually have this as a, a, a real, uh, prop,
• 29:39
  Speaker: I guess you could say.
• 29:40
  Speaker: Right.
• 29:40
  Speaker: And it's, it's striking as hell, right?
• 29:42
  Speaker: When, when you see it there.
• 29:44
  Speaker: Um, but I think that again, it is a, a really stark reminder
• 29:50
  Speaker: of, of mortality.
• 29:51
  Speaker: And, but again, the focus is not
• 29:53
  Speaker: on, hey, you're going to die
• 29:54
  Speaker: because there's more to the
• 29:55
  Speaker: story after you're introduced to
• 29:57
  Speaker: the coffin.
• 29:57
  Speaker: You know, it doesn't end there.
• 29:59
  Speaker: Um, but I think it does help us
• 30:02
  Speaker: as a symbol to show that this
• 30:05
  Speaker: transition is, is dramatic,
• 30:07
  Speaker: right?
• 30:08
  Speaker: It, it is a, it's a really stark
• 30:14
  Speaker: transition point in someone's
• 30:16
  Speaker: existence.
• 30:17
  Speaker: And we're really calling you out
• 30:19
  Speaker: to that to to know it and
• 30:21
  Speaker: understand it and, and to
• 30:23
  Speaker: hopefully be appreciative of it,
• 30:24
  Speaker: you know.
• 30:26
  Speaker: It is such a. It is such an
• 30:31
  Speaker: iconic piece, not only for just
• 30:34
  Speaker: the.
• 30:35
  Speaker: Obviously it's a coffin and death, right?
• 30:37
  Speaker: Like, I mean, the iconography of this is is featured prominently
• 30:42
  Speaker: on Masonic books.
• 30:44
  Speaker: Like if you got this recently
• 30:45
  Speaker: from the Scottish Rite Research
• 30:48
  Speaker: Society, um, there are I mean,
• 30:52
  Speaker: even when you look at the
• 30:55
  Speaker: drawings of modern ritual, this
• 30:59
  Speaker: is a, it's not an optional prop,
• 31:03
  Speaker: right?
• 31:03
  Speaker: This is the central visual anchor on the master's carpet.
• 31:09
  Speaker: It's the thing that your your eyes are drawn to eventually.
• 31:13
  Speaker: Um, I have a book here, the
• 31:15
  Speaker: complete book of
• 31:16
  Speaker: correspondences.
• 31:17
  Speaker: And one of the quotes I pulled out of it were were two, um, the
• 31:21
  Speaker: Greek sarcophagus, uh, which they says translates to the
• 31:26
  Speaker: flesh eater in Hellenistic philosophy, limestone burial
• 31:30
  Speaker: chests were named because they actively dissolved the
• 31:34
  Speaker: perishable body, leaving behind only the indestructible bone.
• 31:39
  Speaker: Symbolically, the Masonic coffin serves as a crucible.
• 31:44
  Speaker: It burns away the temporal mask,
• 31:46
  Speaker: so only the genuine builders
• 31:47
  Speaker: core remains.
• 31:50
  Speaker: And then it has a bit on your fave stoicism and Epictetus on
• 31:55
  Speaker: bodily custody, it says.
• 31:57
  Speaker: Epictetus reminded his students that their physical bodies were
• 32:01
  Speaker: never their property.
• 32:03
  Speaker: It was only a temporary loan of
• 32:05
  Speaker: earth and water returned to the
• 32:08
  Speaker: lender.
• 32:09
  Speaker: And in the same way, the Masonic coffin visually formalizes that
• 32:12
  Speaker: audit, it is the receipt showing the loan has been recalled.
• 32:18
  Speaker: It's the take out bag.
• 32:20
  Speaker: Yep.
• 32:21
  Speaker: Would you like us to go?
• 32:23
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 32:24
  Speaker: Would you like us to go?
• 32:25
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 32:26
  Speaker: Put it in the bag.
• 32:26
  Speaker: Put it in the box.
• 32:28
  Speaker: And, you know, this is what I think.
• 32:30
  Speaker: You know, my wife and I have a, you know, our our last wishes
• 32:35
  Speaker: involve natural burial.
• 32:37
  Speaker: Uh, and in that same respect, not a coffin.
• 32:40
  Speaker: Not a coffin.
• 32:42
  Speaker: The earth is the coffin.
• 32:43
  Speaker: But in that same respect.
• 32:44
  Speaker: Right?
• 32:45
  Speaker: It's just like it's from the Masonic line, from the earth.
• 32:48
  Speaker: We came.
• 32:49
  Speaker: So to what we shall return.
• 32:51
  Speaker: And, um, I don't I don't need
• 32:53
  Speaker: any wood to keep me from being
• 32:55
  Speaker: reabsorbed.
• 32:56
  Speaker: And I don't want any chemicals
• 32:57
  Speaker: in me to stop the local, you
• 33:00
  Speaker: know, biological life from
• 33:01
  Speaker: feeding on me and causing ever,
• 33:03
  Speaker: you know, irreversible damage to
• 33:05
  Speaker: the ecosystem.
• 33:07
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 33:09
  Speaker: But yeah, it, it is so central.
• 33:12
  Speaker: Um, I think about when I look at the, the modern tables that are
• 33:16
  Speaker: in Joe Wage's book.
• 33:18
  Speaker: Uh. Uh, secret school of wisdom toward the back.
• 33:21
  Speaker: There's some, there's some, uh, what do you call it?
• 33:25
  Speaker: Diagrams.
• 33:26
  Speaker: And you can see, you know, the
• 33:27
  Speaker: coffin is set almost directly in
• 33:31
  Speaker: the east where the altar would
• 33:34
  Speaker: be.
• 33:36
  Speaker: MM. Mhm.
• 33:41
  Speaker: Cool.
• 33:43
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 33:44
  Speaker: Awesome.
• 33:44
  Speaker: Um. All right, let's move on.
• 33:48
  Speaker: Uh, next one kind of related.
• 33:51
  Speaker: Kind of.
• 33:51
  Speaker: Not the sprig of acacia itself.
• 33:56
  Speaker: Solid.
• 33:57
  Speaker: Boom.
• 33:58
  Speaker: All right.
• 33:59
  Speaker: So we like gardening in the Blue Lodge so much, in fact, that we
• 34:06
  Speaker: Revere the acacia plant.
• 34:09
  Speaker: We've done a couple episodes on
• 34:11
  Speaker: the Acacia as not only, An
• 34:16
  Speaker: evergreen that reminds us of
• 34:19
  Speaker: eternal life.
• 34:21
  Speaker: Or, you know, the eternal spirit.
• 34:23
  Speaker: But also of a transformative plant as well.
• 34:30
  Speaker: Um, some interpretations have had that, like Noah's Ark was
• 34:35
  Speaker: made out of acacia and the true cross was made out of acacia.
• 34:39
  Speaker: And, uh, you know, so you see, you start to see patterns and
• 34:42
  Speaker: themes symbolically throughout the Bible, um, using Acacia and,
• 34:49
  Speaker: and then, you know, a magical chemical called DMT can be
• 34:54
  Speaker: derived from the acacia plant, which has to deal with, you
• 34:59
  Speaker: know, spiritual transformation.
• 35:00
  Speaker: So, um, it is that transition transition.
• 35:06
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 35:06
  Speaker: Item that helps guide someone from one state to another.
• 35:13
  Speaker: Yeah, it's it's, you know,
• 35:15
  Speaker: without the acacia, the third
• 35:16
  Speaker: degree is just like a murder
• 35:18
  Speaker: mystery, right?
• 35:20
  Speaker: Um, the Acacia whodunit.
• 35:23
  Speaker: It's a real whodunit.
• 35:24
  Speaker: Um, take it out and it falls away.
• 35:27
  Speaker: But no, it's so interesting
• 35:29
  Speaker: because either way, you take it,
• 35:31
  Speaker: whether that is for the
• 35:34
  Speaker: potential botanical
• 35:38
  Speaker: effervescence it offers or, uh,
• 35:43
  Speaker: and in that case, it is a
• 35:45
  Speaker: conductor, if you will, uh,
• 35:48
  Speaker: something that will take you
• 35:49
  Speaker: somewhere.
• 35:50
  Speaker: Um, and even in its most plain
• 35:54
  Speaker: day to day blasé Masonic
• 35:59
  Speaker: explanation, it is indicative of
• 36:03
  Speaker: the world to come that the
• 36:06
  Speaker: spirit is eternal, that you will
• 36:07
  Speaker: come back, that, you know, it's
• 36:09
  Speaker: so cyclical.
• 36:11
  Speaker: Um. Um, it is, you know, it's a symbol of hope, but also, you
• 36:18
  Speaker: know, it is that it's, it's that thing that marks the place, uh,
• 36:24
  Speaker: where we fell.
• 36:25
  Speaker: I think I remember Jason saying this was his favorite emblem.
• 36:30
  Speaker: I don't know if it still is, but
• 36:33
  Speaker: yeah, that was his worshipful
• 36:36
  Speaker: master spin.
• 36:36
  Speaker: He had the acacia.
• 36:37
  Speaker: That's correct.
• 36:38
  Speaker: From Acacia Lodge.
• 36:39
  Speaker: That was the name of his lodge.
• 36:41
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 36:42
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 36:45
  Speaker: Cool.
• 36:45
  Speaker: Did I talk yet?
• 36:47
  Speaker: Um, no you didn't.
• 36:48
  Speaker: No I didn't.
• 36:49
  Speaker: Wow.
• 36:49
  Speaker: Okay.
• 36:50
  Speaker: So enraptured.
• 36:51
  Speaker: Make sure what you were saying.
• 36:52
  Speaker: There we go.
• 36:53
  Speaker: Fixed you.
• 36:53
  Speaker: There you go.
• 36:54
  Speaker: You're muted now.
• 36:57
  Speaker: Oh.
• 36:57
  Speaker: Um.
• 36:58
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 36:58
  Speaker: No, all I was going to add was, um.
• 37:00
  Speaker: Because I agree with both of you.
• 37:02
  Speaker: Uh, completely.
• 37:03
  Speaker: The, the sprig of acacia is normally associated with and
• 37:07
  Speaker: presented with the coffin.
• 37:08
  Speaker: Right.
• 37:09
  Speaker: So you've got this dichotomy there of the two for one often.
• 37:13
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
• 37:14
  Speaker: So you gotta use double the smarts to figure it out.
• 37:18
  Speaker: So, um, but yeah, no, I love that it's, it's normally
• 37:21
  Speaker: associated and placed with the coffin when you're talking about
• 37:24
  Speaker: it as a symbol.
• 37:25
  Speaker: Um, you know, I love that that interplay between the two.
• 37:30
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 37:31
  Speaker: Awesome.
• 37:31
  Speaker: Well, uh, do we have any other
• 37:33
  Speaker: other ones off the top of the
• 37:34
  Speaker: head?
• 37:35
  Speaker: Uh, I saw a requested somebody wanted us to talk about, um,
• 37:40
  Speaker: they said, where was it?
• 37:42
  Speaker: Uh, Byron.
• 37:43
  Speaker: Byron Weber wants us to talk
• 37:45
  Speaker: about the, the shovel or the
• 37:46
  Speaker: spade.
• 37:47
  Speaker: Um, so we call it a spade here in Virginia.
• 37:51
  Speaker: I don't know about about Illinois, um, or other places,
• 37:55
  Speaker: but it's called the spade.
• 37:56
  Speaker: Um, and yeah, I think we can talk about it without I dig it.
• 38:00
  Speaker: Let's go.
• 38:01
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 38:01
  Speaker: For sure.
• 38:02
  Speaker: Um, he said, I dig it.
• 38:04
  Speaker: So yeah.
• 38:05
  Speaker: Brother Byron, uh, the spade or
• 38:07
  Speaker: the shovel, I, I think is again,
• 38:09
  Speaker: one of the one of those symbols
• 38:11
  Speaker: that talk about the results of,
• 38:14
  Speaker: of a journey in, in Freemasonry,
• 38:16
  Speaker: right.
• 38:16
  Speaker: Um, you know, different than the hourglass which talks about the,
• 38:20
  Speaker: the passage of time different than the scythe, which
• 38:24
  Speaker: represents that it's inevitable and it, it applies to all, you
• 38:28
  Speaker: know, the spade reminds us of what happens after death, right
• 38:32
  Speaker: where we're returning our meat bags, as, uh, Robert called it
• 38:38
  Speaker: to the earth.
• 38:39
  Speaker: Right.
• 38:40
  Speaker: Um, but that's literally its practical purpose, right?
• 38:42
  Speaker: It's used to dig and move earth from one place to another.
• 38:46
  Speaker: Um, and it's used to prepare a
• 38:47
  Speaker: grave and, and cover the
• 38:49
  Speaker: remains.
• 38:50
  Speaker: Um, you know, it's a reminder, I think for me that no matter how
• 38:55
  Speaker: much someone accomplishes, I guess how rich they are, how
• 39:01
  Speaker: handsome like me they are, uh, or however important they
• 39:04
  Speaker: believe themselves to be, um, Everybody's physical remains are
• 39:10
  Speaker: returned in the same way and and covered with a spade.
• 39:14
  Speaker: So it's a leveler.
• 39:16
  Speaker: One thing that I like to about the spade compared to just a
• 39:19
  Speaker: normal shovel, right?
• 39:21
  Speaker: Shovels rounded, um, the spade has a point, usually has a
• 39:26
  Speaker: sharper edge, and it is explicitly used for digging and
• 39:31
  Speaker: cutting things into the ground.
• 39:34
  Speaker: Right.
• 39:35
  Speaker: So it is, it is clearing the path.
• 39:37
  Speaker: It's not just moving one pile of rocks from here to there.
• 39:41
  Speaker: It's actually actively part of that transition.
• 39:46
  Speaker: Does that make sense?
• 39:46
  Speaker: Right.
• 39:47
  Speaker: So you need the spade to cut through the earth to make way.
• 39:51
  Speaker: So that's um, I see it as a, as a strong symbol that way too.
• 39:56
  Speaker: It's again, helping with the transition.
• 39:58
  Speaker: I'm starting to see a pattern here for a lot of these symbols,
• 40:02
  Speaker: the the interrelationship between them all.
• 40:05
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 40:05
  Speaker: And also I think the the ace of
• 40:08
  Speaker: spades is something that has
• 40:09
  Speaker: entered the profane world in
• 40:12
  Speaker: ways that most people don't
• 40:14
  Speaker: realize.
• 40:15
  Speaker: Um, the iconography of the spade is a symbol of death.
• 40:19
  Speaker: I mean, is it goes, you know, as
• 40:21
  Speaker: lovers of tarot, we can we
• 40:23
  Speaker: already know.
• 40:24
  Speaker: Right?
• 40:24
  Speaker: But tarot is directly
• 40:27
  Speaker: responsible or, or is directly
• 40:29
  Speaker: responsible for the modern
• 40:30
  Speaker: playing card deck in which, you
• 40:32
  Speaker: know, we have, uh, four suits,
• 40:34
  Speaker: one of which is the spade,
• 40:37
  Speaker: right?
• 40:38
  Speaker: So here is an ace of spades.
• 40:42
  Speaker: And this is not your traditional deck of cards.
• 40:44
  Speaker: This is, uh, deck called the
• 40:47
  Speaker: eighteen eighteen
• 40:48
  Speaker: transformation.
• 40:49
  Speaker: Um, but there, if you look, if
• 40:53
  Speaker: anybody out there is, is, you
• 40:54
  Speaker: know, you have a deck of regular
• 40:55
  Speaker: playing cards.
• 40:56
  Speaker: I usually have one somewhere around because I'm flipping
• 40:58
  Speaker: cards all day long.
• 40:59
  Speaker: But, um, you can observe things
• 41:03
  Speaker: that are, uh, that are out there
• 41:05
  Speaker: for the normal person to pick up
• 41:09
  Speaker: on.
• 41:10
  Speaker: Um, at least in a way that's subconscious.
• 41:13
  Speaker: Um, and it, they depict elements of human behavior.
• 41:18
  Speaker: For instance, the spade is a representative of death.
• 41:21
  Speaker: And you will find that the court
• 41:23
  Speaker: cards will never, ever look at
• 41:25
  Speaker: the spade.
• 41:26
  Speaker: They're always looking away from the spade.
• 41:28
  Speaker: Interesting.
• 41:29
  Speaker: They are always looking toward the diamond.
• 41:32
  Speaker: Which or pentacles.
• 41:34
  Speaker: Right.
• 41:34
  Speaker: For richness.
• 41:35
  Speaker: Um, so you.
• 41:36
  Speaker: Yeah, you will find these things
• 41:38
  Speaker: depicted on every standard deck
• 41:41
  Speaker: of cards, regardless of the
• 41:43
  Speaker: theme of the card, with ninety
• 41:46
  Speaker: nine point nine percent most of
• 41:49
  Speaker: the time.
• 41:50
  Speaker: Um, I mean, I collect regular playing cards as well.
• 41:53
  Speaker: And I can tell you I have hundreds of bicycle decks over
• 41:57
  Speaker: the years in American playing card decks over the years.
• 42:00
  Speaker: And maybe one deck out of thirty doesn't apply.
• 42:08
  Speaker: The comic book rules, if you
• 42:09
  Speaker: will, where the good guy has to
• 42:11
  Speaker: win.
• 42:12
  Speaker: License.
• 42:12
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
• 42:14
  Speaker: Uh, one of them that I can think of is like my.
• 42:16
  Speaker: I have a deck that's around the world in eighty days.
• 42:18
  Speaker: That one doesn't adhere all the
• 42:20
  Speaker: artwork's original, but for
• 42:23
  Speaker: every single deck of cards, no
• 42:27
  Speaker: matter what, there's an aversion
• 42:29
  Speaker: to death.
• 42:30
  Speaker: They're always looking away.
• 42:32
  Speaker: And, um, it's just this kind of subconscious thing, you know?
• 42:36
  Speaker: Why do we do that?
• 42:37
  Speaker: If we confront it, life means so much more.
• 42:41
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 42:42
  Speaker: Treat it as an old friend.
• 42:46
  Speaker: Yeah, I'm digging it.
• 42:48
  Speaker: Boom.
• 42:51
  Speaker: Okay, well, who really wants to look at death?
• 42:54
  Speaker: I mean, I don't know.
• 42:57
  Speaker: Have you seen, uh, dude from
• 43:00
  Speaker: Upright Citizens Brigade tick
• 43:02
  Speaker: tock channel where he's death
• 43:03
  Speaker: and he's like the intermediary
• 43:07
  Speaker: to me.
• 43:08
  Speaker: I will send it to you.
• 43:09
  Speaker: I'm going to link it in the Knights and Squires because you
• 43:12
  Speaker: guys will love it.
• 43:13
  Speaker: It's even it's even, uh, sponsored by Liquid Death Water.
• 43:18
  Speaker: That's pretty funny.
• 43:19
  Speaker: It's a good channel.
• 43:20
  Speaker: It's a good channel.
• 43:21
  Speaker: I was actually, I was actually gonna, I was actually going to
• 43:23
  Speaker: give a snarky answer and say basically everybody who was on
• 43:26
  Speaker: the internet from like nineteen ninety nine to two thousand and
• 43:29
  Speaker: three wanted to see death because that's when you had all
• 43:31
  Speaker: those weird ass websites.
• 43:33
  Speaker: Oh, yeah.
• 43:34
  Speaker: Oh, yeah.
• 43:35
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 43:36
  Speaker: Lots of dark websites, geocities flavored websites that just had
• 43:40
  Speaker: awful, awful, awful on them.
• 43:42
  Speaker: The one that, um, our dude, we
• 43:45
  Speaker: had this instructor, uh, in, in
• 43:48
  Speaker: a school, uh, that was a medical
• 43:53
  Speaker: type place.
• 43:54
  Speaker: And they encouraged us as
• 43:56
  Speaker: students eighteen years old plus
• 43:59
  Speaker: to look at the website rotten
• 44:03
  Speaker: dot com.
• 44:04
  Speaker: Oops.
• 44:05
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 44:06
  Speaker: On school.
• 44:07
  Speaker: On school computers.
• 44:10
  Speaker: Yes.
• 44:11
  Speaker: Uh, so we got to see first and foremost, right?
• 44:15
  Speaker: The the human fascination with death.
• 44:18
  Speaker: Yes.
• 44:19
  Speaker: Is. It it's, you know, I don't know.
• 44:25
  Speaker: It's the reason for the season.
• 44:27
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 44:28
  Speaker: Apparently it's a good segway, right?
• 44:29
  Speaker: Um, not only Halloween, but Dia de Los Muertos is coming up.
• 44:34
  Speaker: Um, but it started alive.
• 44:36
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 44:37
  Speaker: It's.
• 44:37
  Speaker: Yeah, it's not just one day, man.
• 44:38
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 44:39
  Speaker: My, uh, my wife, her birthday is on the thirtieth, so tomorrow.
• 44:45
  Speaker: And, uh, I built her an ofrenda for, for her birthday.
• 44:49
  Speaker: And, um, like, it's such a cool process to build and it's like a
• 44:56
  Speaker: reflective process too.
• 44:58
  Speaker: And all of the traditions that go along with it are absolutely
• 45:02
  Speaker: amazing and actually weirder than you might think, but they
• 45:08
  Speaker: are really cool.
• 45:09
  Speaker: We. It's really funny.
• 45:10
  Speaker: You said that, uh, we built an ofrenda, uh, two days ago.
• 45:15
  Speaker: Um, because that's the day that your pets return.
• 45:18
  Speaker: Um, the twenty seventh.
• 45:20
  Speaker: So we had an ofrenda for.
• 45:22
  Speaker: And then we realized, Holy crap,
• 45:23
  Speaker: we've had a lot of pets in our
• 45:25
  Speaker: almost twenty five years
• 45:26
  Speaker: together.
• 45:26
  Speaker: Um, there were more there than we have now.
• 45:29
  Speaker: So, um, yeah, so we did that, like I said, two days ago.
• 45:33
  Speaker: And that was kind of neat.
• 45:34
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 45:35
  Speaker: It, it's a special time.
• 45:38
  Speaker: It really is nice.
• 45:40
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 45:41
  Speaker: All right.
• 45:42
  Speaker: Um, so extracting up, going up a little bit.
• 45:48
  Speaker: For those who aren't Masons or
• 45:50
  Speaker: not informed Masons, do you
• 45:54
  Speaker: think that this spooky imagery
• 45:57
  Speaker: and symbolism Does it inspire
• 46:01
  Speaker: curiosity or does it incite or
• 46:04
  Speaker: hurt us as fear or something
• 46:07
  Speaker: else?
• 46:11
  Speaker: Does it help us or hurt us to have these symbols in here in a
• 46:16
  Speaker: twenty first century fraternity?
• 46:19
  Speaker: I gotta hear Joe first.
• 46:20
  Speaker: Joe is the premier student of the mysteries where the central
• 46:25
  Speaker: core was confronting this idea.
• 46:27
  Speaker: So yeah, I think you're kind of hinting at something that we
• 46:32
  Speaker: talked about at the very beginning, like the, the, the
• 46:36
  Speaker: uninitiated or the profane or even the unlearned.
• 46:40
  Speaker: Um, because we have those, we have those in, in, you know,
• 46:43
  Speaker: that's in our lodges.
• 46:44
  Speaker: Um, and I'm just even fifty year
• 46:46
  Speaker: masons all, all the things,
• 46:48
  Speaker: right?
• 46:48
  Speaker: There are people, there are
• 46:49
  Speaker: people that you sit down and
• 46:50
  Speaker: have soggy green beans and, you
• 46:52
  Speaker: know, really wet cordon blue
• 46:54
  Speaker: with um, that don't understand
• 46:58
  Speaker: why there needs to be a I don't
• 47:00
  Speaker: want to say a fixation with
• 47:02
  Speaker: mortality, but an understanding
• 47:04
  Speaker: of it, because otherwise, if you
• 47:09
  Speaker: don't understand what these
• 47:10
  Speaker: symbols mean and you don't
• 47:11
  Speaker: understand why they're placed in
• 47:14
  Speaker: the ritual and through your
• 47:16
  Speaker: journey, then what the hell is
• 47:18
  Speaker: the point of, of, of trying to
• 47:22
  Speaker: pursue the whole goal of it,
• 47:23
  Speaker: which is, you know, to take good
• 47:26
  Speaker: men and make them better, you
• 47:28
  Speaker: know, as, as the bumper sticker
• 47:29
  Speaker: says, but the way you do that,
• 47:31
  Speaker: the way you really, really,
• 47:32
  Speaker: truly do that is by
• 47:34
  Speaker: understanding that you are not
• 47:35
  Speaker: here forever.
• 47:36
  Speaker: You are here for a short span of time, right?
• 47:40
  Speaker: And it really matters.
• 47:42
  Speaker: You need to have this intrinsic understanding that during this
• 47:46
  Speaker: short space of my life, there's got to be something that I do
• 47:52
  Speaker: that improves the condition of all those around you.
• 47:56
  Speaker: write, there has to be, right?
• 47:58
  Speaker: Otherwise, you really should get on that.
• 47:59
  Speaker: Show yourself, you know.
• 48:01
  Speaker: And and clock's ticking, man.
• 48:05
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 48:05
  Speaker: But, um, yeah, like I said, I, I, I think like I said, the
• 48:09
  Speaker: unlearned think that we have this fixation with death and,
• 48:13
  Speaker: and I think those are really understand it, realize that it's
• 48:18
  Speaker: not a fixation with death.
• 48:19
  Speaker: It's an appreciation that we have finite lives because most
• 48:25
  Speaker: people don't think about that.
• 48:27
  Speaker: You know, how often does your average everyday person regular
• 48:30
  Speaker: every day doing the rat race?
• 48:32
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
• 48:33
  Speaker: They don't think about it.
• 48:34
  Speaker: And, and it cheapens the experience of one's life.
• 48:38
  Speaker: If you don't have an understanding that at some point
• 48:40
  Speaker: it is going to end.
• 48:41
  Speaker: It's literally, uh.
• 48:46
  Speaker: Jesse Ventura in Predator.
• 48:48
  Speaker: I ain't got time to bleed.
• 48:50
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 48:51
  Speaker: Right.
• 48:51
  Speaker: Everybody's on there.
• 48:54
  Speaker: They're, They're doing the hustle, bro.
• 48:57
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 48:57
  Speaker: Just like the hat.
• 48:58
  Speaker: They got the hustle.
• 48:59
  Speaker: And the thing is, is we're just so like, go, go go go go.
• 49:04
  Speaker: We never have time to reflect on, on any of this.
• 49:08
  Speaker: There was actually a website.
• 49:09
  Speaker: Yet another thing I think I
• 49:11
  Speaker: will, uh, I will end up sharing,
• 49:12
  Speaker: uh, in the Knights and Squires
• 49:14
  Speaker: group.
• 49:15
  Speaker: Um, it's called I Plan on Dying.
• 49:19
  Speaker: Um, and I actually, um, you know, maybe for funsies, let me
• 49:25
  Speaker: grab the deck and pull one card for you guys to answer.
• 49:32
  Speaker: Uh. So this is a, uh, it's one
• 49:43
  Speaker: hundred card toolkit for, uh,
• 49:49
  Speaker: careers, but it is all about,
• 49:55
  Speaker: um, you know, the planning on
• 49:58
  Speaker: dying.
• 49:58
  Speaker: Like you're, you're the idea that you should plan on it.
• 50:03
  Speaker: Um, and let me pull maybe one of these cards like.
• 50:10
  Speaker: It really helps you think about your entire life.
• 50:12
  Speaker: Not necessarily in the idea of death.
• 50:17
  Speaker: Um. But like, for instance, what people call laziness is most
• 50:25
  Speaker: often just fear.
• 50:27
  Speaker: Have you appeared to the world
• 50:29
  Speaker: like you've been lazy about
• 50:30
  Speaker: something when actually you were
• 50:32
  Speaker: just scared?
• 50:34
  Speaker: Right?
• 50:35
  Speaker: And so there's lots of yeah, there's all kinds of these.
• 50:38
  Speaker: This is, um, from a place called the School of Life.
• 50:43
  Speaker: Um, but I think I'll link this in, in the night squares group.
• 50:47
  Speaker: I'll share that with you guys too.
• 50:48
  Speaker: But, but, um, it's phenomenal.
• 50:51
  Speaker: And it was a really great exercise.
• 50:53
  Speaker: We did it as a sort of a lodge building exercise when we were
• 50:56
  Speaker: starting, um, to, in a way, go, are we all comfortable talking
• 51:04
  Speaker: this deeply about this stuff with each other?
• 51:07
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 51:08
  Speaker: Um, and we found out really quickly that we were, and we got
• 51:11
  Speaker: lucky in that, but nice as we, you know, as, as you discover
• 51:16
  Speaker: the men around you and in your lodges, in your, in your social
• 51:19
  Speaker: groups, how comfortable are we really with that?
• 51:23
  Speaker: Um, I know the insurance game is like crazy out there where
• 51:29
  Speaker: people get life insurance and it's like, oh, have you thought
• 51:31
  Speaker: about the future and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 51:35
  Speaker: Uh, smarmy salesman pitch aside, I don't work in insurance, but
• 51:40
  Speaker: like, they have a point.
• 51:42
  Speaker: We really should plan and you
• 51:44
  Speaker: should plan on the fact that
• 51:45
  Speaker: that we will, you know, have a
• 51:47
  Speaker: demise and that that can come at
• 51:48
  Speaker: any time.
• 51:49
  Speaker: Yep.
• 51:50
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 51:50
  Speaker: Good point.
• 51:53
  Speaker: Well, gentlemen, it's time for the final question.
• 51:57
  Speaker: Oh, boy.
• 51:58
  Speaker: It's the final question.
• 52:01
  Speaker: Okay, here we go.
• 52:02
  Speaker: Um, being inspired by the movie in time.
• 52:08
  Speaker: Um, you look down on your arm and you see that, uh, you have
• 52:13
  Speaker: until the end of November.
• 52:15
  Speaker: So thirty one, thirty two days left until your time runs out.
• 52:22
  Speaker: What would you do differently at home, at lodge, at work or
• 52:27
  Speaker: nothing at all?
• 52:31
  Speaker: MM. You have one month.
• 52:34
  Speaker: I have one month and I am.
• 52:38
  Speaker: What is what's the question?
• 52:39
  Speaker: What am I doing?
• 52:40
  Speaker: What would you do differently?
• 52:41
  Speaker: What would you plan for?
• 52:44
  Speaker: Or would you do nothing different at all?
• 52:47
  Speaker: MM. I'm going to start with you, Robert.
• 52:52
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 52:55
  Speaker: Wrong person.
• 52:56
  Speaker: Oh. He left.
• 52:58
  Speaker: Nope.
• 52:58
  Speaker: I'm not doing that.
• 53:01
  Speaker: I think I would do I, I would
• 53:06
  Speaker: love to say I wouldn't do
• 53:07
  Speaker: anything different, but that's
• 53:10
  Speaker: that's wrong.
• 53:11
  Speaker: Uh, in, in, I think just in the, in the way that while I think
• 53:15
  Speaker: that it's not reality, I likely would do all of the things in my
• 53:21
  Speaker: power to ensure that people were taken care of after I was gone.
• 53:26
  Speaker: But in the time I had left to really just throw caution to the
• 53:31
  Speaker: wind, um, not necessarily like safety caution, but like, look,
• 53:37
  Speaker: if I'm gone, I don't need to save this money for anything
• 53:41
  Speaker: other than, you know what?
• 53:43
  Speaker: Uh, me and my wife are going to Cafe Procopio at, you know, the
• 53:48
  Speaker: longest standing coffee standard in the world.
• 53:52
  Speaker: We're going to go get a cup of
• 53:53
  Speaker: coffee and then just come home
• 53:56
  Speaker: like we're going to do those
• 53:57
  Speaker: things.
• 53:58
  Speaker: Um, I really feel like life is the most important thing is
• 54:04
  Speaker: experiencing other people and seeing the world around you and
• 54:08
  Speaker: appreciating those things.
• 54:10
  Speaker: Ram Dass said something about, uh, uh, seeing people as trees
• 54:18
  Speaker: so that you can appreciate them, you know, looking around and
• 54:23
  Speaker: appreciating everything you have in that in just, but how can you
• 54:27
  Speaker: fit it all in the thirty days?
• 54:30
  Speaker: And so I think ultimately, how far you get in that reflective
• 54:35
  Speaker: sort of, I'm going to do all of the, the bucket list stuff.
• 54:38
  Speaker: And it's not necessarily about my experiences.
• 54:42
  Speaker: It's about spending time with others.
• 54:45
  Speaker: You always hear in those.
• 54:49
  Speaker: Obituaries, you know.
• 54:50
  Speaker: So and so passed away, surrounded by his friends and
• 54:53
  Speaker: family at his home.
• 54:54
  Speaker: And I'm like, you don't think
• 54:56
  Speaker: about like, you think that's
• 54:57
  Speaker: pretty anticlimactic.
• 54:59
  Speaker: As a teenager, maybe even a twenties and thirty year old.
• 55:01
  Speaker: But as you grow older, you go, I hope that's the way it is for
• 55:06
  Speaker: all of us.
• 55:08
  Speaker: I mean, it's it's the most intimate experience there is.
• 55:12
  Speaker: Mhm.
• 55:13
  Speaker: Uh, what was the end of, uh, go for a deep cut.
• 55:16
  Speaker: Uh, Conan the Barbarian, right?
• 55:19
  Speaker: When his lady dies, she's like,
• 55:22
  Speaker: let me breathe my last breath
• 55:23
  Speaker: into you.
• 55:24
  Speaker: And she kisses him as she dies.
• 55:27
  Speaker: And you just think, like, damn, it's so powerful, you know?
• 55:34
  Speaker: Anyway.
• 55:38
  Speaker: Well said.
• 55:40
  Speaker: All right.
• 55:41
  Speaker: Was it?
• 55:43
  Speaker: It was was to me.
• 55:47
  Speaker: What I heard RJ saying was he wants someone to kiss him on the
• 55:51
  Speaker: mouth, uh, on his deathbed.
• 55:53
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 55:53
  Speaker: Have you seen Archie?
• 55:55
  Speaker: It's important.
• 55:56
  Speaker: I'm here for you, buddy.
• 55:57
  Speaker: Anyone at all?
• 55:59
  Speaker: I'm there.
• 55:59
  Speaker: You're lucky there's so much oxygen between the two of us.
• 56:04
  Speaker: I'm speaking.
• 56:05
  Speaker: My speaking.
• 56:05
  Speaker: My kind of talk.
• 56:06
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 56:06
  Speaker: I wish I had a phenomenal answer for this.
• 56:09
  Speaker: Um, and, you know, I could give
• 56:11
  Speaker: you something really
• 56:12
  Speaker: platitudinous, but I'm not going
• 56:14
  Speaker: to.
• 56:14
  Speaker: I think.
• 56:18
  Speaker: This is a tough one for me.
• 56:19
  Speaker: Right.
• 56:19
  Speaker: Like you definitely want to kind
• 56:22
  Speaker: of like RJ said, you want to
• 56:24
  Speaker: make sure what you're leaving
• 56:26
  Speaker: behind in these, these five
• 56:27
  Speaker: weeks that you have left are
• 56:31
  Speaker: really awesome memories for the
• 56:32
  Speaker: people that matter to you the
• 56:34
  Speaker: most, right?
• 56:34
  Speaker: Because, you know, I've had, I've seen and experienced quite
• 56:39
  Speaker: a bit of death in my life.
• 56:41
  Speaker: Um, I've been there as people have have left us.
• 56:44
  Speaker: Um, it is one of the most
• 56:45
  Speaker: profound things you could ever
• 56:47
  Speaker: do.
• 56:47
  Speaker: Um, for those of you that have gone through it, um, I would
• 56:51
  Speaker: have to say just leaving the most amazing memories for those
• 56:55
  Speaker: that, that I really care about the most would be the most
• 56:59
  Speaker: important thing now.
• 57:00
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 57:00
  Speaker: AM I gonna, you know, cash the
• 57:03
  Speaker: life insurance policy early,
• 57:04
  Speaker: just get on a Viking cruise and
• 57:06
  Speaker: just get stupid for sure,
• 57:07
  Speaker: because those are great
• 57:08
  Speaker: memories.
• 57:08
  Speaker: So why not?
• 57:10
  Speaker: Um, yeah, but, you know, I think the big takeaway for me is if I
• 57:16
  Speaker: really knew what I change about my life with, with thirty or so
• 57:22
  Speaker: days left, why haven't I made those changes with the forty
• 57:27
  Speaker: plus years that I've lived and the, you know, twenty or thirty
• 57:30
  Speaker: or forty that I have left.
• 57:31
  Speaker: Right.
• 57:31
  Speaker: Um, mhm.
• 57:32
  Speaker: So that that's, that's where I struggle.
• 57:35
  Speaker: But would I, would I be a scammer and do stupid stuff?
• 57:38
  Speaker: Absolutely.
• 57:39
  Speaker: But it's, it's going to be a fun ride along the way.
• 57:42
  Speaker: And, uh, hopefully leave people with with some happy, memorable
• 57:46
  Speaker: thoughts of me.
• 57:47
  Speaker: So.
• 57:48
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 57:50
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 57:51
  Speaker: Um, yeah, I, I want to die
• 57:54
  Speaker: peacefully in my sleep like my
• 57:55
  Speaker: grandfather and not screaming
• 57:57
  Speaker: like the passengers in his back
• 57:59
  Speaker: seat.
• 58:01
  Speaker: And so if, uh, if I wanted to, um, what would I do differently?
• 58:07
  Speaker: I would again, I'd have some fun, but I, I hope that I do
• 58:15
  Speaker: align to like being ready to go at any time.
• 58:20
  Speaker: Um, that, that is one thing that I think about quite a bit.
• 58:23
  Speaker: Um, there's a line from Marcus
• 58:26
  Speaker: Aurelius meditations where he's
• 58:28
  Speaker: like, as you tuck your child in
• 58:30
  Speaker: at night, you know, say to
• 58:32
  Speaker: yourself, he might be dead in
• 58:33
  Speaker: the morning.
• 58:34
  Speaker: And man, that hits like pretty
• 58:38
  Speaker: close to home because, you know,
• 58:39
  Speaker: I'm usually checking the kids in
• 58:41
  Speaker: to bed.
• 58:41
  Speaker: So like, I'm always thinking, okay, I'm tired.
• 58:45
  Speaker: I really don't feel like reading yet another book.
• 58:47
  Speaker: But yes, it's worth it.
• 58:49
  Speaker: It's absolutely worth it.
• 58:51
  Speaker: Right?
• 58:52
  Speaker: Um, and so that's a constant reminder.
• 58:54
  Speaker: Like all these other emblems we've talked about tonight that,
• 58:58
  Speaker: um, you know, life is precious.
• 59:00
  Speaker: You are not guaranteed tomorrow.
• 59:03
  Speaker: So, um, yeah, hopefully I would
• 59:06
  Speaker: continue to do what I'm, what
• 59:07
  Speaker: I'm already doing, uh, to make
• 59:09
  Speaker: sure that, uh, tomorrow is
• 59:11
  Speaker: better for everyone else that I
• 59:13
  Speaker: care about.
• 59:14
  Speaker: And then hopefully that they remember that that's my plan.
• 59:19
  Speaker: So with that, hopefully we'll see you next week and next month
• 59:23
  Speaker: and next year.
• 59:26
  Speaker: But if not, thank you for
• 59:27
  Speaker: watching and keep searching for
• 59:28
  Speaker: more light.
• 59:29
  Speaker: Have a good night.
• 59:33
  Speaker: Wow.
• 59:35
  Speaker: Be the change.