Episode 110 - Pete Holmes Returns

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i'm the only one in here michael's gone searching for pete and they told me to hit record before he walks in you made it weird style so that's what we're doing [Music] [Music] i swam with my t-shirt until i was 18 years old wow did you yeah and i and it always the kids still do it they're quoting their mothers or their fathers or somebody but you say you're sensitive to the sun which is true but you go i am very sensitive to the sun but i would blame it on that and it was really this isn't i actually don't think this is as sad i'll raise my left hand when i'm trying to be sad this is not you know what i mean like there are things that i think are tragic about my upbringing this is mild i really mean that but i did swim with the t-shirt on but i feel sad when people swim yeah t-shirts on i just told this story i mean one of the great things about comedy for me is that it teaches you to own yourself and to lean into things jesus i'm going to get into jesus jesus talks about letting the weeds grow with the wheat it's one of my favorite things that he said and i think like a an imperfect feeling about your body is like a weed or or a weird psychology or a an addiction or a compulsion or a narcissistic tendency or whatever it might be those are your weeds and he says that if you try and yank those up you'll also pull out the wheat so what is that he's he's very flatly saying oh don't get me preaching whenever i'm talking about peter we're already here and formerly christian i love that so much but i mean there's so many cues i think not even clues like cues he's just laying it out and saying it's not about um being good or being perfect or being even about being ethical i think the the ethics and the good behavior that christ embodied was because he had undergone a transformation and a lot of us i've said this a million times are trying to imitate that transformation cart before the horse style so in my church we would be like hey miami and then we'd get in our cars and be like you fucking bitch you know like because it hadn't happened you know what i mean it hadn't happened but when you're i know all three of you know when you're in that place and the three of us visit from time to time and we're just trying to get our percentages up you know like i want i want 100 that place in that place of of unitive consciousness and reality you happen to be kind you are kind but you're not doing it because you're afraid so anyway i like uh using every part of myself yeah including the imperfect parts to get to god it's not a mistake it's not a mistake yeah if you try to shut it out and and disavow parts of your real lived experience then it just ends up repressing it and projecting it and it's still in there yeah that's that's exactly i i tried for a long time to do a bit about how i don't i some people this is not going to be funny and some people are going to be offended it's one of the reasons i stopped doing it because it kind of offends me so just know that i understand but i had a joke where i would go i think people can fuse nice with stupid right away it's already kind of mean it's already kind of mean meaning if there's just like a gentle guy downtown at the coffee shop and he's just kind of slow i'm not judging it he's just not like a sharp mind he's probably brilliant in other ways i'm just saying he's not linguistically sharp so he sees me in my stupid shirt and i look like a trader joe's checkout person but he's not quick enough to say you look like a just so he's just kind of simple so he's just kind of like hello and you go like wow jim what a what a guy what a nice guy and the point of the bit is i'm nice because i see your shirt and i think of 30 things i could make fun of about it and i don't that's nice i would actually disagree with myself true niceness is realizing that that's not what's really going on at all you know what i mean like we can make fun of each other's shirts and be so what's true niceness true niceness is is his love is seeing yourself and somebody else and then taking that moment to go like i've worn stupid shirts you know what i mean like i love being made fun of and being seen and stuff so like to me being nice is when you make fun of me sometimes yeah if it's done in the right way this is what i think is so trippy man is we're always putting on to god ultimate let's just say ultimate reality the values of the day you know what i mean is fucking crazy like we have this god that's that seems to be on the side of what's happening now which is insane like you go to other cultures and their values are different what's nice is different even in the subculture of comedians i'm telling you if you want to show me love show me blunt honesty that's different from how you would show my mother love you know what i'm saying so how can it be about polity it can't it can't i'm not saying don't be nice be nice but don't confuse that i'm gonna preach for one second one more and then i'm gonna throw it to you guys people always say to me you're gonna love this though i really think you're gonna love this this is my hot point right i'm so excited and ask me about the garden of eden later this is my hot point people say to me all the time because i am i'm very into christ and buddha and krishna and all of that and they say i get it religion boils down to just be a good person they're like it's a good thing be a good person and i and i i always sort of politely say i don't think that's what's going on here we wouldn't still be talking about it do you think jesus was the only nazarene that that had the idea to be nice to people or be a good person like don't steal and like be charitable do you think that was what started a revolution that that got him killed that guy that keeps saying be a good person let's kill him he was saying wake up it's a dream wake up we're all equal wake up you think i'm your king i'm also this homeless person which isn't a guilt trip he's saying like we're all we're all together we're all in one thing together there's no separation it's one thing that threatens power structures power is saying i'm over here i'm at the four seasons you you guys are at the hotel eight jesus comes in and goes like will you fucking get off it like what are you talking about you've gotten lost in your mind your dualistic thinking better worse good bad important unimportant able-bodied not able-bodied able-minded not able whatever it is and he's just like jesus christ we're literally we're just under water we're under water and you think you're separate you're soaking in in this and uh and that is not what gets you like it's not sexy vibrant electric interesting for someone to say just be a good person if i want that i'll talk to any of my relatives that's what jesus was about about being a good person was he was he you really think people called him the goddamn king of kings because he was like be decent you think that was a new idea and when he did the whip in the temple and when he said i've come to divide mother from yeah brother against brother i didn't come to bring a piece but a sword was just kind of a pissy day he's anti-family and i say that because it's beautiful he's doing it in a beautiful way he's saying you think you're your family this is why i won't put my baby in a red sox onesie you think you're from boston you think you're from america you think you're from earth get the fuck out of my face that's that's what scares power but the christ obviously that we the jesus not the christ the jesus that we have also happens to be pro-capitalist pro everything that we're he loves kicking ass the worst side jesus says he is so brilliantly called what is it supply-side jesus supply sciences in the don't even yeah i don't want to talk too much i do get excited when i talk to people that are from my tradition and i want to i get more passionate than i get about anything else in my life i just did the bible for normal people podcasts as an hour podcast i talked the whole time i didn't stop talking because they were like we only have the title of the podcast exactly we only have 45 minutes and michael i quoted you basically i'm always quoting oh that's nice but i was talking about your yahweh podcast and i think it's so interesting that obviously that is like a cheeky podcast like it's not it's not it's not like status quo but any people would so much the saint muji talks about like the ego given the choice between a journey and the destination will always choose the journey because it exists on the journey and it evaporates at the destination so here you're saying like uh the idea our our understanding of god is here with us and it's it's being made by us in the moment in the eternal moment which it fucking is if you quiet down for a second and let go of your labels and your games and your buildings and your books it's right the fuck here it's right here this is the good news it's right here but we would always go let's defend a book let's debate the literal interpretation of a few key passages let's talk about this instead of what is causing your heart to beat what's causing your lungs to breathe and as i always say what's looking out your eyes right now it's here and now and that's what jesus is going around saying rich poor good bad in out it's here it's here it's here look to the birds the birds are just doing what we should be doing which is soaring in here that's what we should be doing a bird and a flower those are our role models not the winners and the losers and the people that can embarrass the lutherans and shame the mormons and prove the scientologists or fools and say that buddha never resurrected get at it guys please what is debating what is debating what is debating not not let's be good who is it that's being good who is watching the thing and saying i'm being good right now or i'm being bad right now is there a part of you when you're quiet that is always good that is always good that has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not i say fuck or not geez we've lost it we've lost it yeah i'm trying to hear you through other people's ears and see if you sound like a lunatic i don't care i know i no because i it breaks my heart that people don't understand the sweet gungis i call vishnu gungis and i hear that you kick up some dust on the liturgist and to me you are just a great teacher and a brother and a friend and and a spiritual you know uh what's the word comrade or i don't know i ally and and when i hear that and the liturgist i just go like it's for you guys i'm talking to the people listening it's for you it's for you it's for you it's not he's not a crazy i know his hair is a little messy [Laughter] you know what i mean go ahead no i mean i was just i i love it i love everything you're saying so much but jesus is saying it too i totally agree jesus when uh here let's take this one and i really will put it i'm not gonna talk this whole time i'm giving myself a note i'm gonna give you guys this jesus when i was a kid uh you know they would tell us that christ said um what you do for the least of these you do unto me so i would see a homeless person i'd be coming off my shift at bennigan's i'd be wearing my green shirt with the tan stripe across the chest and i would give my employee meal to a homeless person tool it was not a tokyo tool wow only the kids menu was free to the employees so we could get the kids burgers no turkey or tools but it was on the same bun as the tokyo tool which was a pretzel bowl yeah which is the best part really tasty it's the best part uh and you can get as much honey mustard dressing on the side as you want uh which is also the best part so i would give the wings to a homeless person on the way home now why did i do that so we're kind of back to where we started which is i was doing it to win favor with a lifeguard god who i was afraid was going to kick me out of the pool for you know i don't know peeing or dunking or horseplay or whatever it is so i was trying to go like look i'm good jesus said whatever i do to homeless people i'm doing for him so i took it as a guilt trip he was saying you want to love me feed my sheep right that's what he's saying now i look at it differently now that i've had certain mystical experiences now that i've explored other traditions now that even more importantly than other books and other faiths i know we can sometimes be guilty of like thinking other faiths have it figured out as if they're not full of people that are flawed as well of course they are but my own intuition in my own quiet space that i've inhabited and embodied where i've been with it right i now look at that passage as jesus is saying it's not me it's not this don't confuse this don't confuse the bible with this don't confuse my words with this how can you take ultimate reality and squish it like through a play-doh play to a fun factory filter of language and think we're anywhere close to it so he's just going stop it stop it stop he's just trying to give you the tools to get it to to it yourself right so now i see him saying not just the homeless person is me the homeless person is you and you're me christ is a word for what's consciousness for it for this richard rory says the big bang erupted into the christ and jesus as he always says his last name is not christ he realized his interconnectivity with everything on in a fundamental visceral trans-rational beyond thinking beyond explanation way and he's saying come and do the same jesus said you'll do far greater things than these right we never look at that phrase you'll do far greater things than these and we're all just like yup what are you saying homosexual first of all he didn't and also well how about that one can we talk about that one you'll do better things than these he's like get off it rob bella is always saying christ would be mortified that we made a religion about this is this is reza ocelon taught this to me jesus came to reform judaism buddha came to reform uh hinduism and muhammad came to reform there was a another religion that i forget the name of it was basically a group so these people are always homes came to reform scientology i came to reform the people who think that you're crazy that's a science like because it breaks my heart because what what you know what it's tricky is you're selling sometimes gunkies and i talk about this we're selling death we're selling death before you die it's a wonder anyone listens to us it really is you're going i'd like you to drop the label christian i'd like you to drop the label human i'd like you to drop the ability to label i think i think for our people that first one very easy drop the label christian most have yeah human that's where it's like whoa well this is where we this is where we can get fun right but i do i was reflecting like listening you talk how like you're a better liturgist host than either of us at this moment no i'm just excited although you're excited but it's like very exciting how often you and i use like christology language to describe unity of oneness not a lot not a lot i'm always like here's some science right and i've like i've i've bought the death plan yeah but i never talk about it publicly like he does i'm like people don't hear this shit yeah like just because i've enjoyed the annihilation of self well christ is modeling that yeah you know when when you start looking at things as myths and metaphors you and by the way i'm completely open yeah i'd to quote rhomdus i'd turn your hair white with what i'm open to believing literally so let's not get lost in that debate but if something is to be ingested metaphorically christ is modeling what we are all to do this is a big part of my book he's not just dying and resurrecting so that we can go like look one guy beat death let's put him on a pedestal and and and even though we'll die like you know he's singing songs about it for the rest of the rest of our days he it's something i say in my book over and over is go and do likewise you are to die to your false self as richard rohr and thomas burton will call the small self and resurrect your true self which is what christians would call your soul why not to think about yourself as a soul and think the same as a group of people that join together every sunday nothing wrong with that but having the right and the same thoughts as a group is not the point the way the vantage point or the lack of vantage point from which you view reality is where peace is is where joy is and is where anxiety dissolves and fear of death dissolves this i don't care how you phrase it or what symbol system you phrase it so people are listening and they'd like to hold on to a certain label or a certain story or whatever i don't care i don't care i don't want you to go okay pete i dropped what you did i took mushrooms and now i meditate and this and that and i listen to richard rohr and blah blah i don't get out of here you can get at god is seducing you like a lover like a lover that's my favorite image of god he or she or whatever the force wants you as badly as you want it and it is sex it is life it is love and it it's putting the good sheets on the bed it's cooking you dinner it's it's it wants you to smell it and it wants you by any means necessary you want to believe the bible literally and believe that it's the only way fine there's lots of people i'm sure that have gotten there in in maybe even in a fundamentalist way i don't care i want you to get there i need expansion i need freedom i need room to move i need to believe that six million jews that died in the holocaust didn't get sucked into eternal living torment that's me i need to believe that my gay atheist jewish muslim hindu whatever friends are not in trouble because they're not carbon copies of me because that is hell on earth it's hell all the way to hell it's heaven all the way to heaven and that is hell i've been talking about that on stage walking around meeting somebody and being like what's your name ira who are you going to burn that's that's a type of hell that's that is the most abusive thing that the church did to me was made me think that every one of my friends who i cared about and who we were you remember how close you are to somebody in junior high you are like you are like lovers you're so close there's an intimacy there sleeping in the same bed at a sleepover i'm not it's not sexual that's this isn't code i'm saying you are so close and my church is telling me that that person is going to hell because they don't think about things in the way that i think about them and push come to shove do i even really believe it in my book i say that like a belief was just a thought that i forced myself to have every day is that a belief is that transformation is that conversion we say are you saved and we're like yes because i prayed a prayer you think jesus came to add one more note to the endless jazz cacophony of never-ending bullshit that is your thinking mind he was like as long as you think this note every day when you die i'll crack your brain open and scan it find that note and let you in because that's the kind of mystery i am what are you my drunk uncle god damn get some scotch or something holy shit you want to talk about the garden of eden i i wrote it down i was i before we left believe me i would have said so pete what about the garden of eden i keep saying that i'm going to put it to you guys so i at this i will i'm going to take a break you're on a roll i i can't honestly val has started teaching people dance and she comes home just like full like full of life and i have stand up and i have a lot of different things and then like the fact that i found another thing which is whatever it is we're doing now that like feeds me more than anything like i'm a little bit depressed today i'm a little bit existential and like lonely today so i was like really happy to come talk to you guys because talking about it helps me get there isn't that like a fun mutually beneficial like maybe someone listening is like holy shit this this feels right and it reminds me too like let's wake each other up you know what i'm saying it's super fun garden of eden it's straight gungi's it sounds like an episode of loving this podcast which is a multiple listen podcast for me every episode multiple really oh my god love it love it the three in me is like why isn't he monetizing this but other than that we're working on it yeah i'm over here like guys we gotta we gotta get some sponsors yeah we're we're we wanna just the whole network real bad at the monetizing oh i know and then in walks hold petey come on pete we need your help no you don't need my help i need your help we need each other's up anyway garden of eden i believe is a metaphor for um so it's important to say i don't think it we used to think where in africa is it uh that's fine i forgot about that yeah the euphrates the tigers the searching the maps would look for it as if you could find it like the fountain of youth mesopotamia isn't it funny actually when you think about it the fountain of youth is realizing that you are awareness itself and you can go nowhere that's never-ending life you know what i'm saying cheers right it's now so it's these story exactly where else could you be but eternity i always thought eternity began when you died it's what do you think this is because we have like what and a rock moving around another rock a space rock a burning space rack mike helped me out you know what i'm saying a 365 degree rotation and the and decay because decay happens an entropy happens like we're like well that must be time it's eternity you're in it right now this is it right now it's happening right now anyway and to think of it as a sequence of time is only a human construct in relative your position and speed of and whatever is perceiving whatever is constricting into thinking of itself as this guy so eternity is not a sequence it's a it's a beautiful story that you're telling yourself we're meaning making machines and that's a great one um garden of eden is in my opinion not about sin entering the world it's about duality entering the world so god the character of god adam and eve are hanging out in a garden a garden is love is yes it's life it's undulating growing organic naked and they're naked but gunkies they're not fucking no kids that's don't you think that's just religious shame later on hear me out or people who remember what it was like to not have kids no michael if i were to write paradise it would be definitely me and jenny no kids yet just but no fucking and boning of course but listen boning's fine i guess but listen listen you're gonna i think you're gonna like this i am not anti-sex i'm pro-sex but what is sex sex is trying to come home sex is the key to becoming one if you're in the garden and god is there and there's no duality there's no need for sex because you are sex adam and eve never stopped having sex there was no need to get their bodies involved but they were one they were under water they saw the thickness of the molecules between them and they were one with everything they were one with god god was there and then they didn't eat of the the sin tree this is right in front of our faces they ate of the knowledge of good and evil that's the knowledge of yes and no of one and zero of male and female of naked and clothed of animal and man of god and man of up and down left right black white duality so we had a hand in it which is a stroke of genius of this incredibly old story that we elected i think this is what b of was what izness did elected to play a game eat the apple trick itself what else could the snake be but itself it's talking to itself talking to itself talking the girl version of itself telling the guy and eats the thing realizes they're naked so now they know they know the difference then they go out then they start having kids there's no birth control in the garden i mean they didn't fuck because by the way i know this isn't a literal story i'm just saying i think it's interesting no kids and i would argue probably no sex until they left no need this is why richard blew me away when he's like priests don't i understand the complicated issue i'm saying it's supposed to be in a perfect world a priest doesn't have sex not because sex is wrong but because his communion with all things is deeply sexual yeah a tree is sex sex it's all erotic it's it's the people told us that god is love they didn't tell us that that was an erotic love that's why i'm always trying to bring that back into it and be like it is chasing you it wants you it is into you song of songs dude but also the food that you eat becoming cells it's erotic yeah the air going into your nostrils and filling up your body i'm not trying to be crass we are in a process of yes everything is splitting and recreating and growing and that's the undulating fountain of love of yes of being that you are a part of and the christian model that i was handed was that that wasn't the case that this was a waiting room that i was passing through that my ethics and my thinking mind was being analyzed for later instead of seeing this as the fountain as that wow wow as you say in the this in the book this it's the it's the father throwing the daughter up going again again it's just wow wow that's the good news you're already home i was flying home from montreal the flight was delayed six hours and it was the type of flight where we all everybody on the flight didn't go to bed because we our shows end around like two three in the morning just stay up till four or five go to the airport so we're all in zero sleep flight's delayed and it's just like just be home just be home yeah where else gonna be where else could you be home is a story i understand i like seeing valerie i like seeing my baby get out of here your suffering comes from going like i should be home the flight shouldn't be delayed well it is sweetheart be home be home it's like taking a backpack off just be home and it sounds like oh yeah that sounds easy it is easy be home this is what jesus i feel like jesus is going around poking people you're always with me everything i have is yours you never went anywhere the prodigal son didn't go anywhere where could you go that you're not with me always with you to the very end of the age i'm trying to fold in stuff but the problem is is we don't want it that's what's interesting is we don't want it because we cease to exist we don't want it we'd rather be on our way there would rather be earning it it's in the next podcast i listen to it's in the next book i read it's the next conversation it's the next mantra it's the next time i sit with rahm das it's the next time maybe if i go to india val and i were like well let's move to ojai that's where we'll maybe we can have a little garden and maybe get a goat we're in ohio stop it i'm in ohio right now stop it stop it christ is here now it's here now where else could he be later you think he's growing somewhere he's gestating waiting to come back he's in the womb he's waiting for you to realize that he is always with you and everything he has is yours and until you drop family country preferences likes dislikes the desire to be needed the desire to be right the desire to be special that's a big one for me the desire to be important another big one for me he's it's gonna be veiled but as soon as you just go i am home you're home look we're home we're home [Music] [Music] do you do it in a way unlike anybody that i've ever seen read heard of usually this what you're saying is wrapped up in robes and meditation retreats and right and you're doing it with humor and fucks and all kinds of yeah um unconscious the true self is unoffendable don't forget that yeah absolutely so i'm just curious at how people have been responding and what i don't know um [Laughter] okay maybe that's the first answer no no people often i saw some comments i did fortune feamsters podcast in montreal and i was getting into this a lot because you'd be surprised i feel like people want to talk about it or they're curious so it'll come up and i'll i can't help it i go into it and i love getting into it my biggest point is that god said his name was i am so god is i am-ness yeah so then we can stop debating it because emness exists this exists that's why i love the title of your book it's this yeah so don't let's not talk about something somewhere else two pieces of it are debating how to talk about itself and that is a great starting place for everybody and it's in the old testament it sounds new agey you're saying god is is-ness and you're like well that sounds kind of woo-woo and i'm like it's in genesis it's exodus i am moses is in genesis right i know exodus i think yeah okay so it's in exodus yeah genesis is all abraham yeah yeah we're a little rusty we're a little rusty it doesn't it's like i'm almost sure it's sexist but i have some fear of embarrassment and speaking out loud no no bible fluent listeners of the podcast genesis is all abraham isaac and jacob the ten commandments are exodus 20. i know that so that's that's where we're getting that it couldn't have been that long ago that he met god and then started taking notes for him i read them both two months ago and have already forgotten really wow okay so the people so there's so people left comments on that and they like not my cup of tea too heavy so people will say stuff like that okay but you know i'm doing comedy podcast you're doing a christian podcast-ish and then like sharing this sort of message and then it stands to reason that some people would be like this is and it is jesus was threatening yeah he's a threat why they killed him michael gunger is a threat when i met michael gunger i had a dream remember that you were um tearing apart your body like you were bloody and you were kind of playing with your stomach in a way that was killing you and i think that dream was was my ego anxiety that i was dealing with somebody that was really embodying the idea that he's not his body and i'm like well i am my body and is he going to hurt me is he going to hurt himself like how dan that's that's that's when you know you're getting the real juice this dude let's go back to jesus he's a rabble rouser he's going in and you know telling the holy people that they're wrong and telling the sinners that they're right yeah that is iconoclastic oh my god it's his left that was my laptop hilarious i put it on airplane mode and everything i love it but you're you're just so let's go with this richard rord does i'm i'm always borrowing for richard i want to plug his talk on itunes it's called true self false self it's one of the best things i've ever heard and you'll you'll recognize and i'm not ashamed i'm quoting him all the time i always try to say that i'm quoting him but you'll see oh shit pete is a lot of the language for how i feel was found in richard rohr and so when he's talking about your true self your soul your unborn awareness the the christians would call it the indwelling the indwelling of the holy spirit right the light um when you are there and you're identified from there you are unoffendable fucking a richard rohr wearing a kimono karate kicking a board three boards barefoot in his 70s cracking it wide open and addressing something that i deal with in comedy offense yeah and richie says dear richie who i give thanks for every day says when you're offended it's a clue that you're stuck in your false self there he is again doing the ryu spin kick across an ocean and kicking a living bird and it just bursts into feathers cause he's fucking laying it out for us to play it out when you're offended and when you're wrong you're you're you're in you're in the not the truest place you could be because your thoughts and your beliefs and your identity and even your your belief that what i'm saying is real is is off and that's jesus and that it shouldn't be happening that it's not part of it like it's it's this looking for some other this because it's saying by me being offended by something that's happening right i'm like this is not okay this as it is and there can be a of this i think in the internal experience of being okay with like oh i don't like that right but there's a difference between i i feel like offense and just not liking something when it has an emotional center to it well that's that's what ramadas quotes all the time is that i believe it was kabir so do what you have to do with another person just never put them out of your heart so your heart is another place another way of saying your true self right so i can this is a big point jesus never said like your neighbor right if somebody sucks dude i'm a comedian i'll talk about how you suck on stage i'll talk about how you suck to your face in a funny way my wife says she can't bring somebody up without me saying some sort of dig against them it's just sort of how my brain works but underneath it i'm when i'm in that space which i'm not always i'm giggling look at pete go he's a comedian he's always got some sort of gripe he's got some sort of joke i but i don't think that's who i really am now i understand you catch some flack because people are like oh i'm just supposed to say yes to everything and myself dude resist protest march fight fucked up things are happening just where you're doing it from yeah is the whole point jesus said the poor will always be with you that doesn't mean we're not gonna fight he also said i'll only be with you a limited time so that's the game keep your christ that's the game yeah nine times nine points out of ten is keeping your center the rest is just yeah play the game i was it roomy that said i walk through the marketplace but i i'm not a purchaser i'm not i don't buy that's jesus saying be in the world but not of the world so when people are going like but i want my label yes dude motherfucker i am a celebration of ego i am the active ego i get on stage and it says pete holmes eight o'clock and i will go and be the most pete homsey pete holmes you've ever peed that's true i will lay out my wares you can delight in my thoughts and my likes and my dislikes can i do it without getting lost in identification with pete holmes yeah ramdas says can i speak without getting lost in speaking can you listen without getting lost in being the listener it's one fucking thing but it's not an error that we're here so play well gunkies was like i gave you this advice you were like i'm done i've said everything i said i go gunkies say it again [Laughter] he goes my last gunger record i said it i go say it again it's not an error that's right you can figure it out and keep playing you think the sun is like another sunrise do it again the sun [Laughter] do it again and again and again because that's what we're doing we're hide as alan watts says but the very notion that we're hiding and seeking it's a fun game it's a fun game and as far as i can tell the point is to play it without ever to realize that you're the screen the movie is projected on you're not the actions in the movie yeah you're the screen you're not the thoughts the clowns muji said that you're not the clouds you're the sky but be some clouds have some fucking fun clouds clouds are fun you want to comedians and cars with me we can drive around and make fun of everything and it's a delight i don't want to change that but somewhere underneath that we're laughing ramda said he would sit with people dying of aids and it was the most tragic thing in the world and somewhere underneath it all there was a cosmic giggle yeah it was like look at this look at this shit show look at how fucking awful it is now that's a heavy one i understand i i i can't fully get there so people listening being like you can't laugh at that there's something behind all of this that's going like holy shit they think it's real that's the gita it's like it's placed in a war this place like these they're about to do battle and it's like what do you and the guy's like well i can't do violence i'm i'm with you i gotta be holy and i gotta it's and he's he's trying to play that kind of holy card in in the battle yeah and christian's like no this is your station this is what's happening if you think you're doing it if you think you're the one fighting right if you think there's something to be done other than what this is happening right now right you've you're not identifying with me or anything at all sometimes i i'll use that on a smaller scale because i have a hard time with violence and i have a hard time obviously even with war does yeah pete does absolutely and i don't that's what i want to invite the listeners to pete is not enlightened but i am yeah that is a phrase that i think will put some fucking umph in your life yeah i am enlightenment i am underneath it i that's that your great episode that is pure people say how to be more like christ when when you've got the whole thing fired up and running god i have my coffee god i have my bagel and i'm bill and i talk like this well i think you lost it bill if bill can sit down and look at a rippling creek for a fucking second and not as jesus says don't judge and as eckhart tolle interprets that don't label my baby looks at a creak and she doesn't see a creek it actually breaks my heart to think that i'm going to tell her creak because i look at a tree and i go tree and then my brain goes done tree not a threat not important my baby sees a tree it's like five tabs of acid she sees she doesn't even see a tree that's how we're to get to god too don't think about god don't think about trees don't think about sex when you're having it don't think about art when you're in a museum don't think about dancing when you're watching it don't think about music you know what i'm saying and for fuck's sake don't think about god this is ram does he talk about consciousness without an object god as consciousness without an object is-ness no label no separation so when people are talking about well i want i want to use jesus and i want to keep jesus over there because it feels sacrilegious to be like i'm gonna it's not about equality it's about completely dissolved so you can keep your hierarchy now but once you're in it you everything is going to dissolve and you're going to see that better than less than this that god not god is all all goes away all subjectivity goes away and you just become is-ness and your ego can't go there you won't be there going oh shit i've done it it's in be here now romnes is like you can't be john smith and go here i am at the right hand of god you'll burn up you're gone you can only be there when you die the fake you dies and then you and then you you can be there [Music] it's normal at so many different points in our life to feel like something is getting in the way of being present or happy something stopping us from achieving the goals that we have for ourselves or feeling connected to the people that we love better help will assess your needs and match you with your own licensed professional therapist to help you work on all those things you can connect with someone in a safe and private online environment for that reason it's so convenient you don't even have to leave the house you can start working with someone in under 24 hours when working with someone through better help you can send a message to your counselor at any time and get a timely and thoughtful response plus you can schedule weekly video and phone sessions betterhelp has licensed professional counselors who are specialized in treating things like depression anxiety navigating family conflicts and so much more they're committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches so they make it 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anxiety stress and depression anger management sleep issues family conflicts i know so many of us experience those and lgbtqia matters anything you share on betterhelp is confidential because you're working with a licensed professional counselor and there's over three thousand licensed therapists involved and better help in the united states alone although the service is available worldwide better help lets you communicate in a way that's convenient for you using a text message real time chat phone calls and even video calls in a time and place of your choosing i know that one of the big challenges for me in pursuing a therapeutic relationship is just trying to get to the therapist's office with some of the cognitive issues and anxiety issues i face around driving and parking it's actually sometimes more activating for me to go see a therapist than i receive and relief from the session because just getting there is so hard and what i love about betterhelp is the ability to sit here in my office where i'm recording right now and have a conversation with a therapist in a place that feels safe for me perhaps best of all is better help is affordable and available on a sliding scale based on income it's secure it's convenient and it's professional and financial aid is available for those who qualify best of all the liturgist podcast listeners get 10 off their first month with better health by using discount code liturgists so why not start today by filling out a short questionnaire that will help the team that better help assess your needs and get you matched with a counselor you'll love so just head to betterhelp.com slash liturgists i love talking about it so much i feel i've felt the last few years like a baby christian when they become a christian and they're like tell everybody about jesus and i used to be a pot smoker listen to secular music and now i thought you'd be on fire now i'd be on fire so but what i've been this year has been tricky for me to figure out how to speak about it when to speak about it who to speak about it too because of course everybody is this is it is this is is the consciousness and under even if the conscious mind is not aware of itself for me to think that it should be would be a step for me to be moving away from this so it's been tricky to like fully love people's rejection yeah of this or something that's yeah isn't that your karma i mean you're using it as karma you're saying that is a temptation for me to lose my center yeah that these people are getting angry that's the difference is if we can work that's what karma yoga is using whatever's happening yeah to wake up or to stay awake yeah to be including people's resistance to it the thing is is and this is where the comedian's ego serves me is i told you that i do it i'm talking to myself who else could i be talking to but i'm talking to myself so i do it selfishly and if it helps this is alan wants he says he thinks of himself not as a teacher but is a stream going down a mountain he's just do i'm just doing what i do but the very notion that a deer could come and drink from the street the stream does not care your alan watts is my favorite the stream is just streaming and the deer is just deering and if it happens to hydrate that deer that was not the stream's intention that does not mean i was just doing it because it's what i do if you haven't heard alan watts by god pause this what are you doing go get on youtube listen to some aloe watts one because it's great and two so you can appreciate that impersonation no one else likes both are not only is like that i'm glad you like science i think you're the only person on earth that can not only there be people that could do the voice but i don't know of anybody that could do the voice and kind of say what he might say and say what he might say kind of what he might say sometimes when gunkies and i are in the car i'll just i'll do what he might say which is super fun pretty fucking great super fun but i mean so like i love doing it like okay so when we were on fire for christ and i was when i was uh born again and i would go around and i was that person that before you were all born again rather than you actually being bored again that's right yeah when i was a born again very different when i was thinking about my born again instead of transcending thought and just fucking and being born again and not worrying about belonging to a group oh god look at christ in the desert do you see do you see he doesn't care and and what does he tempt him with this is straight richie roar he tempts him with power and importance and and meaning and and he even tempts him to do good you want to be good turn this into bread be good and he's like it's not that it's not that fucking a it's right it's so exciting anyway i love talking about it and if people don't like it the comedian ego helps me in that place where i'm just like this is oh so i was saying when i used to convert people or try to convert them i was doing it because purely out of guilt and now i do it like if you bring up anything else that i love if you want to talk about stand-up theory or how you should get started and stand up that's a big talking point for me but nothing gets me more excited because like it's always here and when we're talking and thinking about it it brings us here so i've done these i've done talks and i go the reason i like this sometimes even more than stand up although then i love it's it's like i go back and forth then i just love pure silliness sometimes but when i'm doing these talks i love it because it's an opportunity to try and share some here with them and you see some people in the crowd some people would walk out and then other people i'd see and they're just like you remember their faces they're looking at you and nodding as if as if what's happening is happening you're recognizing each other you go oh you're in that one this time oh fuck i'm pretending to be a comedian who does this and you're home the flight might be delayed but we're both home right now other people are leaving because you're turning on the furnace i also see people resisting it you start talking about it and people it's different nobody wants to hear you tell them about their lord and savior jesus christ you know what i'm saying that's always awkward when you're growing up and you're like can i tell you about my savior because really what you're saying is like can i get you to be me will you be me but when you're actually saying like i i say yes to you i don't want you to believe or think what i think i want you to be free i'm i want you to be free but what if they don't want to be that's okay yeah but just to be clear that if i'm selling something i'm selling a circle with a thousand arrows pointing in every direction around it that you can move in any direction and you can go anywhere and you can do anything as alan watt says you're under no obligation to be the person you were at 15 seconds ago that is what he's talking about these constructs and these stories that we're telling ourselves and that's that's beneficial not just in a spiritual way but that that manifested in my life when i realized i didn't have to stay in boston that i was allowed to go to chicago to do comedy that i was allowed to go to los angeles and do comedy that i was allowed to listen to alan watts said who are you who ramnas has this great thing where he's like i'm outside and i'm bouncing a ball i love this and i see it the same way every time and so many of you are on are inside this is ramadan speaking it's like you guys are inside and i'm bouncing the ball and i'm saying come out and play not come out and think what i think not come out and agree with me come out and play and so many of you are inside saying we can't come out mother says it's too late mother i love that he uses mother there this archetypal superego voice that's saying well that's not appropriate it's not appropriate for you to have a hindu statue in here it's not appropriate to take mushrooms at bonnaroo and become one with the grass you're not supposed to do that yeah guess what fucking get out of here the funny thing though is that they're playing they're playing too it's just like like adults are playing we play with money cops and robbers play it's but with real cops in real life we have the we play it we put on the badge we're like see now i actually am a police officer well that's what i say in the book is i love when a red sox becomes a yankee but he comes back to fenway park and we all clap so there's johnny damon in a yankee uniform our arch-nemesis and we clamp and that's a temporary elevation in consciousness yeah and that we love movies where a cop is trapped in a situation where they're forced to not be a cop or a road trip where your dad stops being your dad it'll make you cry thinking about this your dad drops the game yeah of dad you've had experiences like that i i'm still looking for that i've point blank said to my dad i don't need you to be my dad anymore like i'm done we're closed and my ego goes i'll dad you like if anything if anybody's gonna get data that's you but i'm looking for that stop the game or play the game with a wink this is why so many of ram duster's stories involve cops involve people in authority positions where there's something where we go ever get a good look at a tsa agent's uniform and just think like the first day they just they just put that on you know what i mean yeah it's just a shirt it's just a shirt this is why we love post-apocalyptic movies where's your shirt now you know what i'm saying what tab's a wafer's events where's your shirt now mine that's true when you take a shirt off on the stage it really actually does change the energy of a room it's like oh where's your shirt is your shirt now well that's also because my raw animal magnetism it's not just the lack of a shirt yeah but the playing thing is also i found it um i'm curious how it relates to suffering for you how this desire to either either play with a wink or to get out of the game uh i think it can sound from from when you're actually in the game deep deep deep that you're being arrogant or um [Music] higher you know higher than everybody else in my experience it's actually kind of a fragility like i suffered so much grasped so much i just can't do it anymore you said that like you broke yeah it was like everybody's playing this game that i i'm afraid to play like i can't do it any i can't hold on to that i think comedy is a good vehicle towards it because comedy is constantly deconstructing things and breaking things down like it's a comedy premise to be like it's just a shirt that's a comedy premise you're a cop you went to a school and now you get to shoot me that's a comedy premise so like at a certain point you see some comedians feeling like carlin really wanted to opt out of it so i understand i'm just hearing you yeah and but it's not arrogance is what you're saying it's not arrogance i think there's actually but i've noticed um it's exhaustion it's exhausting and it's not higher like seeing in from this perspective seeing from the it's a game seeing through the illusion of self as an actual separate object in the universe does it make you better does it make you more more god does it make you i mean it can it can lead to more skillful behavior more connected more loving joyous peaceable shalom creating ways of being but it's not from the perspective of oneness there's nothing happening yeah so there's there's no better or anything right um so i just say that to the to like because i hear what you're saying and i i'm just trying to hear i know that some people hear this the non-dual spirituality thing the as as some kind of arrogant thing it's actually quite the opposite yeah and there's kind of a fragility to it and kind of a well i need it i told you that i was existential and depressed and lonely today yeah exactly so i playing the game of pete is very hard for me so i'm always asking like what does it feel like to be pete and you know what i say i say i am the universe feeling dread you know what i mean that that re that relieves it from me but you're absolutely right it's not i've figured it all out i've climbed the mountain and now that i'm at the top of the mountain i'm gonna shout down to you it's more of a place where i'm like it hurts to keep going yeah i'm pete it hurts to keep trying to like prove your worthiness to your parents and a certain point you just go i'm a grown man you know what i mean like that's a good comparison it hurts to be a grown man yeah exactly you know i was just saying like if we're going with that yeah if you're earning the love of your parents at a certain point i think we can all understand where you go like i'm gonna break away from this and be my own thing and not vie for your attention like i did when i was a child um that it is from a fragile place and i don't think it's better and i see people of different beliefs and i i call them all the time i use the phrase essential energy i hope that doesn't sound condescending i think i'm essential energy too i don't think it's right or better or wronger or true or whatever it when i see it like people say are you going to go on real time and convert bill maher and i was like we need bill and convert them to what yeah and what are you talking about yeah what are you talking about but we need everybody we we fundamentalist matter you know that's a that's a younger lyric but like everybody everybody is sort of that's what we're doing it's like saying i'd like to rewrite this play so everybody just agrees you know what i mean yeah like i'd like all the characters to just sit in the in a victorian living room and just agree with each other i want some juice i want like if i'm being honest i want to feel existential dread sometimes that's what that's what i'm doing i want to i want to be the so when we talk about suffering it's really tricky but like i try let's deal with small suffering because i always say it's a little out of my pay grade to get into real suffering i were true big big suffering but that i went with my baby to eat lunch alone and for some reason psychological reasons circumstantial reasons i was just feeling very sad like it just hit me very sad and what i do so this is obviously a small suffering it's fine but i just go i say yes thank you that is my mantra to everything because the suffering in my experience comes from resisting it and then changing the story the story one is pete is feeling lonely story two is the universe is pretending to be pete and experiencing i couldn't describe it if i was william shakespeare i couldn't describe to you the nuance the wading through a swamp with cold spots and hot spots and a slippery fish goes by and the feel of the mud going between my toes that is not even as complicated as my loneliness felt and i was mainlining it and no one else got to feel that exact loneliness and i can either use it to wake up that's karma yoga i can go wow i forgot myself for a second and then i flip it and i go observe it who is the unchanging presence that's noticing the loneliness that is peace and that is play and that is the game i've told this story many times but when my book came out they printed the wrong version of the galley and they sent it to the the reviewers right i was very upset i had worked for on this book for three years they sent the wrong galley in my mind i'm like they sent it to the new york times i think i'm going to be in the new york times book review they sent the new york times the wrong galley with like notes to myself in it like literally like they're in the book i still have them because i didn't go anywhere they're notes to myself in the book and i'm like how the fuck is this the summation of three years of my life this version goes out and i had to use what i wrote in the book which is when i'm feeling that way i say to it yes thank you i say it from my true place i go this too this as well let it in and your brain has no idea what to do with compliance it it loves for you to kick it yeah and push it and yell at it if you go is your sense of self is that real that's that resistance and this is why couples that are losing touch with each other will fight because they want to show that it still exists right and this is why people who are starting to dissolve they retire they lose their identity next thing you know they're at the supermarket screaming at the checkout girl why because they started to vanish and the ego doesn't like that so it insists it creates a situation where it exists again but if you look richie rohr this is a big passion of mine how you do anything is how you do everything right so how we deal with death which is coming for all of us obviously i know you know that if we can't say yes to a wrong version of a galley how are you going to say yes to letting go of everything you've acquired in this life how are you going to let go of everyone you've ever known how are you going to let go of the the preciousness with which you worship your own hands and your beating heart how are you going to surrender that real capital s christ christ level surrender i can't tell you how i'm gonna die but i can show you how i brush my teeth does that make sense feel the fucking bristles on your teeth don't go when i'm done i'll be in bed i'll be happy brush your teeth you're already home do this it's all this death isn't some event that's going to be different from this conversation it's going to be another moment we think of it in these other terms it's going to be just like this like when we were christians growing up we thought when we had sex the world would be different it turned out it was just here which is here we're only ever here so is so will it be with our deaths so like we can't come back and report my ego wishes more than anything that i wish i could come back as a ghost and be like guys i stayed present i said present through my own i would and michael would be like you did i knew you were more with it than me wow i'm gonna make a trophy but i can show you how i sit in traffic and fuck showing you what's that matter when we were tripping here at your house i was having these incredible thoughts and you came over and i was like oh good someone's here and i laughed someone's here for me to say it to guess what as buddha said it's all on fire it's all going it's all illusion it's all maya and it's scary to drop it but it's freedom to drop it this is why the catholics keep christ on the cross deal with this not the risen christ not the partying on a cloud jesus on roller skates with sparklers jesus on the cross that's your moment that's the rubber meeting the road and rehearse now taoism if he who finds his way in the morning rome does taught me this finds his way in the morning can gladly die in the evening that's the point it's not an error it's not a mistake it wouldn't be better if we were all christian it wouldn't be better if we all lived forever wouldn't be better if we all were just eating fruit in a garden and there would be no suffering this is the dance this is the game your pain is in the system the the rain falls on the just and the unjust to like i used to mean that oh like everybody has shitty days fuck you look at it the other way rain is feeding and nurturing both uh there's a bible verse that's like um i the lord your god like i create just bring destruction job yeah i don't think it's job actually it's another verse i have it opened my phone it doesn't matter you're the bible guy today i am the bible guy i'll drop do you want me to look it up because it's a bible podcast podcast i bet i have it here i have all of these are bible verses colossians 3 11 is open john 8 5 48 through 59 is open these are all just bible verses second corinthians oh here we go isaiah 45 7. i form the light and create darkness i bring prosperity and create disaster and we just overlook that like rolled right by it dude that's this is what i'm saying like the bible we've turned it into like a a a handbook like for the boy scouts we've turned it into as i say in my book it's certainty worship and it's membership and richard rory says like it's like worshiping a sign that says this way to detroit go to detroit brothers and sisters that are listening right now i say this all the time just be enlightened right now just do it i promise you can come back i promise everything that you're clinging to will be back when this experiment is over but just for five seconds just be free just be home realize that what in this moment is lacking it's here it's now just do it just as an experiment and then the game is can you take that five second window can you make it five minutes can you make it 15 minutes can you make it an hour can you do it in line at the grocery store when the girl is snapping her gum and on her phone and everything's slow can you realize that you're home can you realize that that discomfort you're feeling in the line is the guru is christ is the mystery giggling going oh you thought you thought you got lost in it didn't you you oh you thought it was serious you thought you had to get home you have to get home for dinner excuse me you have to get home for dinner with your wife with that other piece of everything and you're surrounded by pieces of everything when i was on that delayed flight the guy was like i gotta get home it's my daughter's birthday i wanted to say to him i didn't but i was like how you are right now is how you'll be at your daughter's birthday stressed and yelling and she'll feel that and that's a shitty birthday present but if you can be free here you'll be so free when they're cutting the cake and that i mean everything i read about parenting consciousness is always the answer presence is always the answer honesty is always the answer more honesty is always the answer it's never less honesty you could avoid a fight or avoid a situation but it's so gorgeous to be like val i'm an asshole today i'm selfish today i'm in the weeds and the wheat don't deny it richard calls it willpower christianity pushing away that's why i talk about jerking off to porn so much i'm just like i know you guys are doing it and when i went to church i don't mean you guys i just mean so many of us are doing it it's normal just in the same way it was normal to have a concubine in the old testament it's no different it's just digital concubines nothing's changed used to be that would have wives and would all go to prostitutes just normal now we just do it digitally it's safer std wise pregnancy-wise we're still doing it but all throughout church no one was talking about it the closest they'd come to saying would be lust like can you please just say i i jerk like if my youth pastor was like god damn my wife went out of town i jerked off to porn every day and to say that that's okay and having actual living connection with humans i don't necessarily mean other sex but like finding that connection allowing yourself to be needy allowing yourself to walk with a deficit instead of just feeling horny and pouring water on it but allowing yourself to walk around in faith that you'll find an interaction that you'll be attracted to a moment it doesn't have to be sexual but like you could again be in the grocery store and something happens because you're horny and you didn't jerk off to porn that you could feel that vitality in you and it could lock and sink like a like a fucking tractor being with another person and that is your gift from the universe because you remain vulnerable not because you're a good boy or a bad boy but because life is fucking risky and and shaky and fragile i wish someone had explained that to me not you're going to hell because you looked at the sears catalog the bra section get out of my face man get out of my fucking face [Music] [Music] are you familiar with the idea of spirituality bypass you heard been accused of that i've done it so i'm super familiar with it yeah i i'm i don't ever say oh that person did blank cause how the fuck do i know what somebody else did yeah i can barely figure out what i did yeah but i've become aware of the ways that some of my earlier mysticism led me into an era of spirituality bypass that helped me um escape from trauma that was trying to claw its way out of the basal structures in my brain and so when i'm in the airport and i miss my wife i'm afraid of what people think about me because i have a podcast now that's a whole new level of what do people think about me um i would believe that i was in a state of presence where i'm aware that i'm just this story being told and this feeling that was coming up that's just a story i'm telling so i can let it go and there's there's the kernel of a healthy psychological process there and mindfulness yeah but it can also be um especially for people who have like pretty limited emotional management regulation tool sets from fundamentalist upbringing and significant trauma backgrounds we have this documented thing in psychology where unity of consciousness becomes a mechanism for avoiding emotional work that has pretty positive mental health outcomes in the year years time measurement months certainly years ish but negative mental health outcomes in the decades uh frame um how do you know when you're waking up in the moment and truly waking up versus waking up and just avoiding things you actually need to deal with yeah dude you're right on the money because a lot of times people who are on the same frequency with me bother me you know i'm saying like i talk to them and i'm just like that's why i like to balance it with like some grotesque comedy yeah which is that like let's talk about it let's get into it like let's get let's call each other on our shit like i just did all the all these roasts in montreal and i get roasted and i'm like yeah fucking egg grab grab my shadow by the throat and don't just show me show 300 people wow and have them go like it works so i i like i like both you know what i mean i don't want to just float around and be like yes i'm i'm cheating on my wife but like but i that's not really me you know what i mean like i'm not cheating on my wife but you understand that's not really me that's just a story like fuck you you fucking adulterer you know what i'm saying like i like both i find myself very much at home pete as a comedian when it serves me pete is a mystic when it serves me i find different masks appropriate for different times i think psychological health and exercising psychological issues to be part of it you know what i mean yeah ramdas has this thing where like spiritual people are like somebody died and they're like it's just my karma he's like go grieve go grieve go grave some more even though they're like it's just you know it's the guru trying to wake me up go fucking get muddy he even says he's like go get drunk go get drunk i don't drink but he's like go get drunk just try to be conscious while you're doing it but don't i so i'm into that i like that but uh richie again you can feel that richie is just a great teacher to me he says that the most important things are humility and patience so what i not that you need me to compliment this but i mean like i hear humility there humility is something that's important to me as well as i i write in my book i'm like we're just dogs trying to understand the internet and i and i like that i like it i like saying like dude get oh like when we took lsd on my 40th birthday i would i said to gungis i was like earth pete i separated cosmic pete and earth pete and i was like earth pete even this is him you're talking to him he does his best it's kind of cute because when you're there you're like and that's the best way you can describe it yeah and i don't just mean the feeling of a drug tickling your euphoria i mean an embodiment of knowledge absolutely soaking into your bones and i go i had two epiphanies one was it matters conversations like these matters reading the universal christ matters reading this matters reading finding god in the waves matters like what you put in influences your reality and we're not a sex god and comedy sex god and you're not anywhere close none of us are anywhere close um you're not anywhere close this is why jesus is always talking stories he's like okay that's why i get a lot i get a mythical kick out of watching the avengers i'm like yeah that's what it feels like to fight the the the i am manhattan and a portal opens and demons are attacking and i have to iron man is a good myth you have to go in a cave wounded literally shrapnel in your heart you have to repair yourself build a suit that's like your ego his ego and then you're strong but then at the end of the day you have to realize you're gonna have to sacrifice yourself spoiler you know what i'm saying like that i haven't even seen that movie i just know that happens so it's every story is it there's only one story we don't have to be so precious about it but so humility but then also patience i just like that the spoiler tag was at the at the end of this video that was spoiler i feel i don't care it's so good i don't care i know i don't know i don't take particular joy in this you know who spoiled it for me the preview for spider-man uh abroad yeah spoiled one of the i have a baby i don't have time to go and see the avengers right i was waiting for it to come out yeah but before you release it on itunes you put out a preview that spoils the movie i haven't seen yet that's still in theaters yeah it's pretty ridiculous shame on you so anyway um the other one is patience right so humility we don't know what we're talking about in a beautiful way in a free way in a spacious way not enough putting ourselves down because genghis when i said that to him he was like he's also doing pretty great you know i mean he's doing he's something doing something very beautiful that is true and he ain't shit both can be true it's a paradox it's both then comes in patience and in my tradition and i think this is right in line with the christian tradition is that we're waiting for something that christians would call grace right so with the hindus we're just waiting for grace thomas merton writes extensively about this he's like you can't coax pure freedom to do anything so your soul your light your peace of isness of god you can't persuade it you can't think it out of its box you can't make it a sandwich and lure it out like a bear it will come to you like waves when it's fucking good and ready and that moment has been predetermined and all you can do is tidy up the house because companies are coming that's all that's your business tidy it get right in your speech get right whatever you want to do whatever game you want to play it's all just fucking fine but that it's a gift and it's not earned this is what we used to say that christ's realizing that christ died for you as a gift there i believe in a gift i believe in something coming for us that is greater than our story i think it's our egos that want to know that we know i hear you going i want to know that i know i think when we're there we laugh at the mike or the pete or the michael that wanted to know that he knew it's that's just a cute yeah that's just a cute memory it's interesting hearing it from different framings the spiritual bypass or you know like some of the non-dual communities you talk about like oscillation or um from a different perspective like first of all it's it would be impossible to know whether someone's experiencing actual full surrender and actual unit of consciousness or thinking okay i'm one with everything as a way of coping yeah um because i used to do a lot of that and there'd be like i'm one with this and i look at the trees and look at the sky i'm one with this um and i try to feel it and i tried but there was still a me trying and in that trying to be in unit of consciousness there was a part of my experience that i wasn't surrendering to right um that's the grace you know what i'm saying something something takes over this is what david nixon calls the fourth moment right there's past present future the fourth moment is being here but there's no you trying to be here i can articulate what i was saying better that helps me hit it uh i'm a sexual assault survivor the word surrender is a different thing in my brain so when i go through spiritual bypass yeah uh i am passively allowing myself to be exploited or destructed exploited or destroyed not the kind of poetic and beautiful surrender i think people are talking about so when i'm at the airport and the flight's delayed the psychological mechanisms of surrender i did in that moment was the same i used to survive some really brutal and difficult and terrible moments yeah and when there's when there's emotions that are undealt with repressed unseen because they're so strong so traumatic and and people can use spirituality to feel like they shouldn't or as a coping mechanism of not fully experiencing that i think there is even an unconscious unsurrender that's happening even um and i feel like that's the long work of embodiment like noticing you can find new pockets of things that have been closed down like holy shit i didn't see that and it might be strong enough to get the whole self to collapse back into clinging and suffering um the embodiment stuff is when i realized that i'd been on a spiritual bypass path interesting that's when i got to my body i was like oh shit this hasn't been surrounded i have not surrendered to yeah anything uh i'm not telling i'm sure you have been to therapy for me laying out the contents of my life and my trauma and my issues which it sounds like you have if you can diagnose yourself that clearly you've done that i think that's that's also spiritual work you know you mean like really doing a deep dive into the code and the program not just going like well that's that's paid he gets angry like yeah it's embarrassing how deep of a dive i've done on my stuff you know what i mean i think that's important because i'll i'll tell you about it in this way doing a tv show about myself i actually found being a spiritual practice because i started talking about myself in the third person i started recreating things that had happened to me that were traumatic um again and again and again not just the one time it happened in the show but take after take after take after take of my wife leaving me or my mom's sitting on my lap or whatever it is that that's been traumatic from me obviously those two are different levels of trauma but one is mild and um you know what i always do is i always flip it i go like people always sometimes give me a hard time for me giving my mom a hard time for being a little bit too loving overly loving or overly affectionate or emotional boundarylessness and i'm like what if it was what if i was a woman and it was my dad what if my dad is pulling me onto his lap you know what i mean and everybody's like got it this is weird i've been wanting to say this there's this weird double standard when it's a man yes and they're like that's your ma that's your first love she's always your ma it's like as if a woman has a right to be affectionate but a man is just the hairy stranger that's like can i have a kiss too he's also first of all so i take offense there but i'm also like you're so people are so quick to understand that there's an inappropriate level of affection when it's a man to his daughter but if it's a mother to a son you're like the the boy gets shamed that this is my baggage the boy gets shamed for being like you shouldn't no that's your number one girl people in boston will say that you get married but your mom that's your number one girl and i'm like so i i in a in a subtle way in a psychic way i also feel like i've had that and i have spelunked deep into those caves and i find that helpful so then doing the tv show was helpful reliving it over and over it was very hard for me in between takes just sort of like feeling very dark and feeling very disturbed um and then at the end of it i felt like i was like wow hbo just paid for me to go through some very extensive therapy imagine if i maybe you wouldn't want to and i wouldn't ask you to but if those traumas were like let's cast them does this guy or this woman does that look like who did it let's audition them you read with them you know what i'm saying it's it's a nightmare and at the end of it you're sort of like for me yeah i felt less identified with it again i i sure hope i don't sound like i'm saying you should do that or it would work or anything like that but you're right i can't imagine what that would be like we do these um psychodramas these sculpts that are our retreats we put on uh led by hillary because she's qualified to leave that kind of thing uh i just want to say on the radio that we know that michael and i know we're not uh but hillary is literally trained and clinically qualified and the thing that kind of popped my top off the most was the first one of those and then absolutely so i couldn't imagine like casting and lights yeah doing it over and over and over wow lauren lapis who played my wife saying over and over if i loved you if i loved you more wait what was it there was some line about like it's not this but it's like if i loved you more i i oh i wanted to live in the city and my wife so this was a real line that she said to me my real ex-wife and i was like i wanted to live in city she wanted to live upstate and i wanted to go back and she said when we were breaking up it wasn't a fight it was actually calm and i understand and i i'm not just saying this i actually appreciate that she was honest with me that's real it's also been over 10 years so it's not that impressive that i have perspective she said if i loved if i was in love with you i would live with you anywhere so i the dumbass put that in the script and have lauren say that to me seven times and and like you know real lines this sounds like i'm asking right was crazy or hard for me to watch really because like i'm very sensitive yeah and i imagined i was like he's playing himself yeah and he's going through these things again and sometimes i would have to pause it and just do some breath exercises or walk around because i felt uh my um yeah teddy my heart broke for you yeah because i have great affection for you i appreciate it and um i i could sense i was like boy maybe i'm just especially vulnerable or weak or something but this looks like it would be a hard thing to do yeah and of course the outcome was beautiful because it's a it's a very touching uh series um and it speaks to some major teachings and themes of life but uh i imagined that the there was a non-trivial cost to you on set yeah i appreciate that man and i would use it to make myself a better actor so there would be scenes where i had to cry and i'd tell her to say things that i know would make me cry so obviously show business is weird man it's weird to have people parade out their emotions and like relive i remember that when jim carrey was doing eternal sunshine uh michelle gondry the director said to jim carrey um they had lunch to talk about the movie and the movie wouldn't shoot for six months and jim had just been through a breakup and he was like don't get well and jim carrey was like that's how fucked up show business is he was like there's a sadness in your eyes that i want you to have for the movie so he's like don't get well wow so there's a and okay so i'm not guilty i don't think of spiritual bypassing something that i have to be very aware of is and i i this was in a version of my book and it got taken out but i was like sometimes i'm worried that i'm worshiping my own good mood because i can get manic and i can get very happy and very connected and then also val and i for example notice that like i think it's so funny that comedians can be the mouthpiece for the populace oh absolutely when i i've talked about this before i'm like seinfeld's talking about you know airplane food and i'm like the dude flies private so i'm talking about having a baby and i'm like we have a nanny our nanny comes for four hours every day but even that i say that and i'm like so that's not much a lot of people would love four hours with some help so you see how we get out of touch and i'm not in this life to lie i sometimes want to be like you you might have to consider the source i've had some suffering and that's why i'm always drawing back to it but my life is very very special it's extraordinary let's just say it's extraordinary so that is me calling bullshit on myself as i'm like yeah it's very cute i think about monks and and me have something in common a monk that goes into a cave and is given his meals and has his robe and a place to sleep and doesn't have to work and me who sometimes just has a show and then tomorrow i have nothing i have a lot of what my father would call naval gazing time so it's a privilege so i have a lot of time to think to take acid on my 40th birthday and then take the day after to like journal about it like these are privileged things but what i say maybe to make myself feel better is like who cares let's get it i don't care who's setting the table let's eat you know what i'm saying oh deepak chopra i've heard he's a jerk too is it i don't know if that's true i'm just making some something up just give me the food nobody's gonna be perfect you know what i'm saying it's like we want to vet our spiritual people and and maybe that's appropriate sometimes like we vet uh rappers was he really from a was he from a hard neighborhood you know i mean so maybe maybe some of my truth and it's not my truth maybe some truth is coming through me because i am a successful comedian with a certain schedule a certain life just pass the potatoes just pass the fucking potatoes because i'm hurting and i'm hungry you know what i'm saying i'm working with what i'm working with that's weeds and wheat some of my weeds are successful comedian weeds fucking serve the meal let's let's eat here's a poem by my friend mason smith the sea will not give up her dead seahorses hoist pounds of flesh and flounder in the eddies and the waves though i skim her face in a ship called love i cannot open her azure door and turn her veins inside out to drag the black out of the blue give to caesar what is caesar's give the sharks my friends and foes and i'll skate her shallow blue and furrowed brow find patterns and the ripples and the flow and scoop up the moon in a fishbowl and leave it on my nightstand so even in the deepest hole i see her waves tickling the craters of a holy face crashing and fizzling on the glass [Music] how many of us could ever start where ramdas is right now feeling every constant pain in his body as grace yeah you don't get to start there that's right so starting sometimes the privilege i've been thinking a lot about privilege as it relates to this because a lot of the people that come to me um to talk about this are privileged people and that sometimes i'm like so i've been trying to like find ways of of talking also to people that don't have as much privilege but there is something about privilege that affords a person to deal with needs and desires that are in a different place in mavslav's hierarchy of needs and um you know when you're when when you've got the boot on your neck you don't have a lot of time to be like but whose boot is it you know yeah um so i don't know i just i do i wonder how much the privilege affords like it's like training wheels on some level two of being able to let go being sad at lunch with your baby before the cancer is in your bones you know what i mean yeah uh but that's what i'm saying that's why i'm saying brushing your teeth is death and me being sad at lunch is how you're going to be with that is how you're going to yeah i know that's about the cancer yeah but um and then as life goes on and it gets it's wild to see in in my experience so far like how it's evolved and what what stuff brings up the body wanting to cling down and wanting to go back to michael gunger's story as the center of reality and uh you talk about grace and it's become kind of a joke with lisa and i'll i'll generally sing some sort of christian song about grace if there's any ever anything if she says something that really gets my goat i'll be like grace like rain um yeah because it is but i do experience it as grace and i see that uh in you as well that's why part of what i love when i get to talk to you and hear from you because i see when when the challenges come when you can experience something when you let go to it and feel the pain of it feel the shittiness of it yeah feel the anger of it feel the full weight of it not repressing it not projecting it somewhere else but really loving it as your whole your mantra of yes thank you um that can lead to some really interesting experiences like yesterday was such a shitty day for me i saw your circumstances um i saw your tweet and did nothing i didn't need anything it was also tremendously blissful which is a weird that was just a roasty like cuts and burn on my leg and stuff no it was letting go to it was very it was like i have no idea what we're talking about huh yesterday i had i was it was a i had my car one car broke down the other one got a flat tire there was a you lost your wallet yeah lost the wall burned got burned lucy was super cranky and like how'd you get through all of it on the muffler of a tow truck oh my god like it's gonna it was just so much pain but it was this vibe it was just so much sensation yeah so much this it was just like you write in this about going into the ocean and you're really experiencing cold instead of wishing instead of wishing cold was warm experiencing the cold yeah but i could not have i could not have experienced that i've been so blessed with good health and with i mean the privilege of not constant pain through my day i couldn't have been abiding in awareness like i have with different circumstances up to this point it's getting more embodied but that's where it's like you can't you can't judge any from this spiritual bypass thing i i am really slow to judge somebody's internal um relationship to what they're experiencing yeah but i am so inspired by you and how you do it and how you respond to the trouble seeing you have your show cancelled and how you moved through that and or maybe you're still moving i'm not sure how you're feeling about all the what's next in your life and what's next with your work and seeing you navigate through all that and seeing you do the corporate gigs and and the and handle the different ebbs and flows um i don't know i just want to say it in the mic that i see pete not just like it's not just bullshit it's not just words um i see pete living this and and and flowing with with it and experiencing it as it comes and it's it's inspiring and it's beautiful i think it's interesting it comes from so obviously i've milked my divorce a lot but my divorce wasn't just my divorce my divorce was my wife leaving and my faith leaving at the same time and something that i really want to get out as much as i can as it it always upset me when people said everything happens for a reason because i i like to point out that my wife could have laughed and my faith could have left and then i could have been hit by a truck so we're always talking from the ego level the idea that everything my father for example not to put my dad down but my dad would be like everything happens for a reason your wife left but then you made a tv show about and then you got to be a famous tv guy ha ha who got the last laugh peter i wonder if she ever saw it you know what i mean that's ego shit when we're talking about everything every feeling as a reminder to bring you into the eternal present which is right now which is all it's the only game in town then you start asking yourself not just your suffering but every single moment can it be the nudge that you need to remember that you're already home yeah that you're already there which is what we're doing here it's fun because we're all diving into our brains and we're looking for interesting things to say at least i you know that's how i feel like i'm using my brain and i'm communicating to you guys so i lose it even sometimes when i'm talking to you but like even the suffering the burn on your leg and the muffler and and me when i was doing that corporate gig and i felt kind of like i felt a little prostituted and i i was texting with gungy's just kind of trying to these are it doesn't matter your shit is your shit what's happening is what's happening and and the destination is always right here because that's where that's where god is and that's where truth is and that's where life is and everything else is just something like i don't believe in a literal devil i believe in things like your mind that are thieves and liars that are telling you that you don't look good with your shirt off mike and that and that you're not enough and that maybe it's maybe it's in the next door maybe the next door that opens jesus will finally hug you [Music] you yeah you're home you're home but yeah suffering is a is a good teacher it can be that's maharaji i love suffering it brings me so close to god yeah somebody said to maharaja my life uh maharishi is rhombus guru he goes my life is so full of suffering uh the woman said to maharaji and he said me too but when he said it he sounded happy it and ramdas was always careful to be like that doesn't mean we ask for it yeah but it's coming like a fresh batch is coming like it's coming and that's why i love the small thing that's why my examples are delayed flights that's why my examples are getting your ego bruised that's why my examples are being exhausted or that that's why i really like my exam my examples are the examples that would speak to me and i've had big suffering here and there and like everybody but like the the sitting at lunch and just feeling really sad if if we're being quiet and listening i think a lot of us can relate to that and you go like it's not an error christ didn't come to sell a quick fix he he was in my opinion he was introducing a shift that's why it doesn't i don't care how you believe or or how you articulate it we're talking about an inner conversion that changes the place or as i said the no place from where you're viewing your reality not to be right or to be in or to agree but to put to take the backpack off that's the truth setting you free that's the kingdom of heaven is here but men do not see it and and it's your birthright you are already at the party that's the prodigal son you're already at the party and the mind is a liar and a thief and and suffering can often be like a thing where it's like but what about this suffering it's like you see beautiful people in the middle of loss a lot of people in india richie rohr talks about people living under a table and they flash up at him a big smile and he's like what are you smiling about that is a conversion that is something that's happening fundamentally different obviously in the west we want to live our lives as individual works of art and we want to be powerful and special but somewhere there's someone under a table and if people want to play the suffering game i'm not going to be the best one but i look to saints like amma who was basically like a sex slave who now goes on tours and she's known as the hugging saint and and gives people hugs and just embodies eminence come on guys whatever it is i don't care if it's your gated community and your margarita maker from sky mall in your kitchen and your 5 000 channels and you can order a pay-per-view and postmates and if it's the banality of of your privilege or if it's the extremity of your real present suffering because if i don't have it it's coming a diagnosis is coming or a car is going to hit me some things we're all in this together let's there's a there's a temptation to to use that to divide it's we're in it together that's what that's why we love stories where people are trapped together road trip or or disaster or something or some sort of journey together that's us we are together and and and if you're using your privilege or your suffering to put more of a divide between us and be like well fuck you kingdom of heaven isn't for me and we're losing it again wake up stop wake up stop wake up that's why i love the koan what in this moment is lacking i said it to jay moore when i did his podcast and he was like i gotta put my kids to bed i'm like the moment i'm talking about has passed so what was wrong in that moment you know what i'm saying that's a real i was gonna say clit rubber i mean your clit your spiritual clitoris is rubbed that's just a good feeling gently and with plenty of lubrication yeah natural fantastic sorry i said clit room why would you be sorry i just there's some guy with the the one-year bible on his desk he's like notes and he was like he had me till women shouldn't have pleasure i thought you're gonna say something else either way dark [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] i just want to be clear when i talk about spirituality bypass um mental health terms get misused whenever they're used to judge people or to project a diagnosis onto someone so i wasn't doing that i was talking about my own personal experience and the reason i would find it useful to talk about spirituality bypass versus enlightenment is for other people like me yeah who may have traumatic experiences and for whom mental health language may aid them in the next step of their journey yeah but i am deeply concerned even when people say donald trump is a narcissist like the question whether donald trump is a narcissist is one for donald trump and mental health professionals who are working with him directly and for no one else the rest of us the concern about mental health is people's actions in shared spaces which we can speak into but we should never speak into the internal mental experiences of another person such a comfort you're such a comforting guy and it sounds like i'm making fun of you but no it's almost like reading code like listening to you talk i'm like yeah i'm gonna execute this program and it's gonna run clean like you just read the code and i'm like yep 10 right please don't misunderstand me 20 go to 10. fill the screen baby it's a basic joke beginner's all-purpose symbolic instruction code i was more of a hyper card guy but thank you uh do you want to obviously buy his book listen to his podcast say this buy this first i mean it buy this you can say that on your podcast christ listen to false self true self listen to the sermon on the mount by richard rohr fantastic he only basically it's six parts and on the sixth he talks about the sermon on the mount so there's just five incredible parts about like myth metaphor and all these incredible ritchie things um and then if you like the way that i go at it oh and ramdas obviously experiments and truth yeah is unbelievable yeah and then if you love experiments and truth and you want the the 12-hour version uh there's something called love service devotion they're both i know it's lsd it's so funny no i just mean your book's fantastic yeah so you could read all those other books and you should but if you're just going to read a book comedy sex god alone is a great choice full of truth and i read it if you want the audiobook written humor i think is very difficult and so even books are supposed to be funny i usually don't laugh very much but i laughed a lot reading comedy sex god it's an lol or coaster it's an lol coastal loller it's a loller coaster well thank you guys you uh thank you you make this world better keep it crispy [Music] thanks again to our guest pete holmes for being on this show your hosts have been science mike and me michael gunger the show was edited by tejas lair hayden a special poem by mason smith thanks so much to our patrons for making what we do possible all the love thanks for listening everybody