Your nutritional value to the world, "No Real Person Involved", and the effect of the corporate culture on creativity.

This episode is a discussion surrounding the importance of results versus self-image in both professional and personal contexts. The conversation branches from the struggle for balance in an organization, where results matter but should be an expression of the employee's humanity instead of at its expense. They also discuss the role of self-awareness, the effect of the corporate culture on creativity, and the importance of the individual's contribution to the collective. Mentioned examples cover for-profit and non-profit companies, as well as artistic institutions like theater companies. This eventually evolves into a dialogue about societal emphasis on image and the importance of self-realization.

You can find a.m. on Instagram and TikTok at @absurdwisdom. We are produced and distributed by DAE Presents, the production arm of DAE (@dae.community on Instagram and online at mydae.org).

The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities they represent. While we make every effort to ensure that the information shared is accurate, we welcome any comments, suggestions, or correction of errors.

You can contact us at daepresents@mydae.org.

Transcript

a.m.: 1:49

Well, we don't have a topic, which in and of itself is a topic. I actually have a similar kind of theme. Yeah. Yeah. What's really on my mind, and it has been for a year but it just, you know, it ebbs and flows, but each it's sort of like this, you know. It ebbs and flows, but the trend line is ever increasing in terms of my, my, my concern about it and, and sort of, you know, the topic is sustaining results. Yeah. I've talked a lot I think in the very first episodes, we talked about kind of how this place is different. I talk about it a lot in general. The problem with for profit businesses is that they have no meaningful infrastructure incentive or regulation to do good. And so the best intentions, genuine intentions of employees aren't enough. And so they're really good at sustainable results. And completely unreliable for maintaining humane processes or outcomes. Through nobody's fault other than design, right? And non profits. have a high premium on humane results. In fact, it's their whole mission. And they've got almost no relationship with sustainable results, which is why they're always on the edge of survival and and the regulatory structures and incentives actually. Just as corporations are disincented from being humane, non profits are actively disincented from being responsible businesses, actually. They're not allowed to make extra money that they then can invest to keep the thing sustained. And then the whole narrative's around it, right? And I can't stand either model. And, and, you know what we keep trying to navigate is how do you maintain a nonprofit ethos with a for profit business rigor. And I think it's, it's not, I think, I know it's, it's, it's identical to a challenge in artistic work, which is, you know, how do I maintain a free flow and actual creative expression that isn't about manufacturing something while still hitting my release date for my album or my book or my, you know, whatever, right? Because the reality of that is. Publishers have a release date. They publish books in September and in February or whatever that cycle is. And your book better be ready or you're losing that contract. And so how do you live in that world while still maintaining creative expression? Right? How do you meet your film deadline? How do you meet your album release schedule? Whatever that is. I think it's a parallel. And we do a shitty job in that world as well of educating artists on how to be good business people. And of course, educating business people on how to. Freeform create and it's, you know, 28 years of my career of, you know, bashing my head against the wall, trying to help corporate folks be quote unquote innovative when everything in their environment argues against it. So anyway, anyway, it's a long winded that is always on my mind and it ebbs and flows. And currently it is a sort of a cute thing for me is are we sustainable? Do we have enough relationship with results that we're going to be sustainable absent ongoing cycles of fixing? And so that's the broader topic. We don't talk about us on a podcast, but that's the broader territory.

Kyley: 4:59

I mean, that, it's a similar thought that I'm having, or it's like, how do you like as a, like just thinking about the education team as a whole, how do you understand the impact of rigor longterm and also maintain presence in the moment in time? And understanding. that what you're doing now reverberates off into infinity in the rest of this organization. So even as silly as like, grammar and content or, you know, like following a process and making sure this thing is done, like that, that reverberates into who we are, how we engage with students and all of this stuff.

a.m.: 5:33

The little details matter kind of thing. Yeah.

Kyley: 5:37

So I think it aligns. Let me know if it doesn't align.

a.m.: 5:39

Yeah, you know, it's a conversation, so we're not necessarily trying to solve anything. I mean, I can see the connection there, right? It is this balance of, you know, how do you keep the thing fluid and open, because we don't know what the play is going to look like next year, because we're going to have a whole new cast of students, while still maintaining And again, I go back again, I think art for me is a perfect, a play is perfect metaphor for this. Like, you know, King Lear is King Lear is King Lear. You're not changing the word. You're not changing the bard's words, man, though, that like they are gold and yet every production has to get approached with, okay, what's our production. Yeah. Right. And that's kind of what I hear you pointing to. It's like, like. How do we have the words that are phenomenal for all time, you know, metaphorically the words while still making sure that the people. Who are, you know, here, you know, the, the, the stage manager and the lighting director and all that, don't

Kyley: 6:39

Someone has to remember to turn the lights on.

a.m.: 6:41

Yeah, yeah, but, but, but also that they don't lose that every time we're doing a production of Lear, it's gotta be that production of Lear. Yeah. And can't be, like, repeating the past. Yeah, I think it's, it's an identical challenge.

Angel: 6:54

I want to say that It's one thing that humanity lack is being on one accord and especially when it comes up to, you know, what you brought up nonprofit organizations and Kyley brought up, you know, The success is being as an education team and what we do for the students, but I feel that that's something that there's a lack in that. And it's always a question that's behind my mind is if everyone wants to do their part and we're all unique in different ways, but all that uniqueness that we bring can work. Right. That's part of what I wanted to respond to. Maybe Kyley's question. And what I wanted to say is responding to what you said am is that as everything around us is like evolving. I feel like society is so caught up in trying to stay on top of. You know, what's evolving, like being, you know, caught up with today's I don't know how to describe it. And I feel that that kind of loses. Like if I can say going back 10 years ago. So I wish things could be that way now because people were more intentional, like I was more intentional about things and my creativity was just amazing and not saying that it ain't, but like I will, I try to bring my creativity that I still hold on to, to today's generation. And sometimes it can work, sometimes it doesn't. So, that's like a lingering question for me. How, how can I bring my creativity to this generation today? And still impact them? In a major way that will help them. Motivate them to be creative in whatever they're doing.

a.m.: 9:09

Yeah, I mean, you know, my sort of initial reaction to that is, is like a, you know, so you're talking in the context of dance, right? And, and so there's a, there's a difference between my creative expression, my, the thing that I access to, to create. And that's what I want to impart or use and my moves, and I want you to learn my moves. Somewhere in there, and yet learning some of my moves are important. But again, like, like Lear, like, you know, again, like learning the lines critical. And so how do I teach you the lines? How do I teach you the beats of the play? While not suppressing what this version of Lear is going to be. Because of this collection of people, right? That's, again, I don't think there's a linear answer to that, but I think that's the territories, right? It's like my creativity as a dancer versus my moves as a dancer. What's the balance between, you know, which of those I push when or, you know, which one I sort of loosen up on when. But at a practical level. I want to get back to my, my grounded kind of concern or my grounded inquiry at a practical level. They need to learn moves three months in. There's a result that's got to get achieved, right? Otherwise we're all just hanging out like having an aerobics class. We're not actually engaged in developing our capabilities as dancers. We're getting exercise. We're moving our bodies. Cool. But nothing actually happened. Right? And so the results got to get hit. But it can't get hit in a mechanical way. Or we become corporate dance teachers. And we've squashed the human spirit.

Kyley: 10:42

I don't know where this is going to go when I start it.

a.m.: 10:44

Cool.

Kyley: 10:45

There was a long time where I thought I was a robot. Not a literal robot. But my, I had zero emotions. I could just grind and grind and grind and grind and grind and grind and grind. There was a time in my life when I recognized that maybe that wasn't healthy, and I probably had emotions, that they may have been mistreated for a period of time, right? For a long time, grinding became harder. And I'm getting to a place where that's a better balance, but it's taken me a long period of time. Where I can recognize emotions and things that are going on, decide what needs to be paid attention to, let the other stuff go and get back to doing the things that are important. I don't call it a grind as much anymore, but like, the, the rigor of continually moving in a direction of a thing that you are committed to, right? And I wonder both organizationally and like how we approach students, how is that communicated? to them because it's very easy to be like, yo, school is hard and you're tired and we're the people who like you enough to let you sleep in a corner. You know what I mean? And we have to get stuff done. Like we are rigorously here to do things that matter to us. And I don't, I don't know how to it's hard to balance that conversation.

a.m.: 11:53

The only solution I've ever found on this, or you know, solution, the only thing to work on I've ever found on this, policies don't cut it, incentives don't cut it, they underscore it or mine it. It's, it's people doing individual work. Yeah, you can do this for other exactly what you just said, right? Like you can do this with others and you can do this in your work if you can do it with yourself. Yeah. If you can cultivate a relationship with yourself, whereas like I'm hitting the fucking result that I said I'm going to hit and I'm going to take care of myself in the process, I'm going to leave the channel open in the process, right? That balance individually is what creates an environment where that balance can kind of live. Yeah. Again, like a theater company, a healthy theater company, a healthy dance troupe, where it's like, you know, yeah, man, we're, we're, we got a show Saturday, this, this piece is going to be set and I'm going to pay attention. Like I'm, I'm cramping up, but I'm still doing it, but I'm going to pay attention to make sure I'm not tearing something that I'm not, you know, and if I'm at that point, I'm going to say, okay, I got it. I know Saturday. I need half an hour to go, you know, whatever, I don't know what you do, ice up or heat up or whatever, you know. And so it's that awareness of yourself of, I need to take care of the instrument, but I can't coddle the instrument. Because I got a performance Saturday and this piece ain't set. That's the only thing I've ever found. But again, I'm, I'm sort of a one trick pony on some of these things. Like self awareness for me is like almost everything. You know, it's one of the two or three things I always come back to. Is what's your relationship with yourself? And are you willing to do this internally?

Kyley: 13:24

But even, even rigor from the people involved to do that similar kind of focus. Yep. And I mean, we, we work with people that I'm sure are going to be interested in that at some point. And this may not be their day. Like this, like, like it takes time to even get to that conversation, let alone start having to start practicing or giving them the choice to practice or everyone to language that.

a.m.: 13:47

Yeah. And so I think that's what happens organizationally, Kyley is, is, is you got to understand again, going back to the theater company that the ushers don't need to engage this way. Yeah. It's phenomenal if they do and you want to give them as much opportunity to as possible, but they don't need to. Yeah. They need to make sure they got enough programs, they need to know where the seating is, they need to know how to move people from the lobby to the seat, et cetera, right? And they don't need to operate. They're just pure results, but they're constantly exposed to the other thing. And if they want to kind of start engaging in how do I do both and how do I, you know, great. Yeah. But some roles are just about just pure results. Similarly, there may be some roles, much fewer usually, because you try to sustain an organization, right? Whether again, it's a theater company or a school or whatever. There may be some roles that are never about results. At least not as an emphasis. Those are again, those, those are tougher to justify when you got a, you know, when you got a a business, a thing that's got to have some business rigor to it. But there are cases I think where it's, you know, yeah, you're pure exploration mode for the most part. Like, if we evolved to a point where, you know like we had Rory in here, right? If we could afford to have kept him on, or, or, you know, we could have Ben, who, you know, I do some of these conversations with, and kind of structure having him hanging out in here. Ben hangs out in here, it's co working and is a resource to students. He's never gonna have results. Yep. He is pure possibility. He's pure, just, you know, oh, here's a situation where you can open something up for a student, right? So there are situations where you could have folks who have zero results just keep the other side going. In, in the sort of far edge of it. So I think that, that's, that's one of the things you gotta do when you're collective again, dance company, theater company, organization, is understand, you know what, these roles are purely about results. And they keep getting invited to the other thing, but they're pure about results. Most of the folks though, in the core, The stage manager and the, you know, et cetera, et cetera. The core, we have to help figure out how they balance both for themselves internally so that they can operate like that collectively. And then there might be one or two floating out on the other end of the spectrum that are just like, yeah, don't worry about it. You got no, you got no target to hit. Something interesting occurs to you, say it. Yeah. Yeah. I like that third gig. That third gig is deeply stressful to me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. It's like everything else. It's like, you know, it's what your disposition is. But again, when, when, when it's, when it's a business, yeah. Dance company, theater company, that third gig is so, it's nearly impossible to justify other than in the ways I just said it, volunteers. Right? Like Ben's never going to collect a check from here. He's going to be a volunteer because he believes in the mission. So you can justify it there. But I think a lot of non profits, possibly most non profits don't work on this kind of employee development, organizational development. You either get a, you know, a mindset of You know, we're, we're a business now, you know, the Red Cross or the whatever, like I don't know the Red Cross. I'm just using as an example of a large number where it's basically a business and everyone's going to be treated that way and there's not a lot of, you know, the mission's there, but it's not a creative mission anymore. They're not actually expanding per se. Yeah, that's perfect. Yeah, exactly. Their service organization, their nonprofit. But they're serving, but it's a business or they go in the other direction and they're constantly on the, you know, brink of, of collapse. And, and often they just then collapse and, and very few nonprofits. In my experience at least, you know, kind of do the work of trying to balance these emphases. Corporations are constantly trying to, you know, do the other side of it and completely blind to the fact that it will never work. You're never going to get your employees satisfied, folks. I say this to my grad students and my IIS students. Employee satisfaction in organizations is such bullshit. That's not what the design of the thing is, man. It's like going to a gym, and they promise you, you're gonna, like, just be relaxed, and, kind of in like like a sleep state. You're gonna come in here, and it's gonna be refre Bullshit! That's not what a gym's for! You know? So, anyway. Both sides of the equation miss it.

Angel: 18:00

One thing I was thinking about as you were talking is passion for it. I mean, I know not everybody will have the same drive. And like I say sometimes, again, take time to get there. This is the first time I ever, you know, been part of a non profit. So I see where you're coming from. Me too. I, I, I see where, like, I understand like where you say like results, like being part of a for profit they want results like, I don't care what you do. This is what you have to do. And that's it. But speaking for myself, cause I don't want to speak for anybody, but you know, being in that type of environment compared to this one it's more pressure. And it can be very stressful because, I mean, it can be for both, but if you don't get the job done, you get fired on the spot and they probably won't even think twice about how you feel or an explanation or your reason probably might not matter. But being part of a non profit is like, I don't know, just speaking for me in my position what I have and what I bring is very valuable, you know. And I can say that my passion has grown. And of course, you know. The consistent of evolving and, and just learning how to interact with students especially because they're going through like all these different types of stages of life. And, you know, you want to like, be careful what topics to touch on or how to approach them. To me it's challenging in a good way because it makes me want to progress and get better. So I feel that just that alone will help me like build my creativity and to keep it going. I don't know if that makes sense.

a.m.: 20:02

It makes a lot of sense, Angel, and, and this will show up on somebody's blog. It's another, we're going to do that topic one day of just like the, the, the, the, the kind of skimming that people do for, you know it's a long standing thing with me and Danielle, if you're listening, Danielle, more than anybody knows this conversation for profits. In general, you know, this is a generalization the demand that you achieve results at the sacrifice of your humanity. What the opportunity is in a place like this is to achieve results as an expression of your humanity. Because I think the other part of it, never achieving results is, is very different, but just as oppressive of humanity. As the corporate thing of achieve results at the expense of, I think as human beings, we are sort of inclined to make, to finish a thing that, right. But that result is an expression of your humanity, not a sacrifice of, you know, and, and that's the opportunity in a place like this that again, I think nonprofits lose where results are squishy, you know, and the only way they know to emphasize results is the corporate way to emphasize results. Which is at the sacrifice of and there's a I think a legitimate, you know Work is so like there's a whole nother stream like it's not even a single topic work the Nate the kind of concept of work has been so fucked with In the industrial era, you know, just so absolutely And so in a, in a, in a traditional organization, a for profit, it's, yeah, it's, you know, you're going to hit the result and whatever the cost to you, I don't care for the most part. Right. And we play nice and you have, you know, take the extremes out of it, but it wasn't, you know, it was a minute ago when we didn't care if like it meant your physical death. We actually still don't care if it means your physical death in, in, if we, if we outsource it far enough away where we don't have to look at it, you know,

Kyley: 21:52

just make sure your physical death gets in our product.

a.m.: 21:55

Yeah, that's it. You know, it's, it's like if you watch Succession, you know, the, the, the, the line from that thing, like the, of all the great, the, the, you know, the sort of entertaining and creative things I took out of that. The one thing that I think is like, just the no real person involved that phrase. I was like, Holy shit, man, you just captured. Such a, like you captured one of the kind of root pieces of DNA of our corporate culture. No real person involved. Right? So, so, so, so even at the sacrifice of bodily harm. We'll tolerate as long as it's far enough away that we don't have to actually acknowledge it as real harm. But certainly you're, you know get the result at, at the expense of your emotional life, of your psychic life, of your creative life. Yeah, man, that's, that's what we're paying you for. But I think, I think, you know, the alternative to that is not, well, let go of results. I think that also destroys a human being. Right. And so the idea is, you know, can you create an environment where where yeah, you know for the usher quote unquote, you know, I don't mean to Create a hierarchy of value. I'm just using it as a transactional example, you know It may be a good result because that that's that's just like your job, but there's an ongoing invitation of Can the result be an expression of your humanity if you want to play that way? There's a theater troupe where you can play that way, you know but I think, I think not holding people accountable for results is actually in a certain way as inhumane as holding them accountable results no matter the cost.

Kyley: 23:19

Because then their work doesn't matter.

a.m.: 23:20

Exactly. That is my point.

Kyley: 23:23

What do we care that you're doing here? You're just showing up and your time is invaluable. Yeah.

a.m.: 23:28

This is what we stripped out of work. Work was not, work was an expression. It was like this is how I feed myself. This is how I feed other people. It matters to my life.

Kyley: 23:38

It's interesting you talk about the consequence of like, working in a corporation, and like, they fire you if you don't get results, right? Here, it's like, something different, and for me, it's like, I worked in corporations. And I think that is, is why, like I was an engineer and like, cool. So I don't get results. You don't make money. I get fired. Big deal. Getting fired here is the least of my worries. If this thing fails, like, my perspective is like, we miss impacting a million people? 5 million people? 100 million people? It's not the, this thing today didn't go well, it's the thing 100 years from now that didn't go well. Every high school student that goes through our program, every single person they engage with differently because they engage with somebody differently here, doesn't happen. That dies. That's the outcome. That's the consequence of me not doing this work. So being fired is problematic. Yeah, but not my concern.

a.m.: 24:44

So you, you know I'll, I'll, I'll get, you know, organizational psychologist wonky because it's one of the, one of the, one of the many things out of, out of the discipline that the people just forgot because it wasn't convenient, you know, for corporate life there's a concept called task significance. It's a degree to which I see how my piece of work. Yeah. That is almost wholly stripped out of most work. Right. And so like, I'm doing this report, this financial analysis, this turning the screws on this assembly line. I got no connection to how it matters in the, in the broader scheme of the world. And more importantly, how it matters to other human beings, like actually. I get at best artificial versions of that, you know, and what you're speaking to is the nth level of task significance, right? Like I know that, that this, you know, today's curricular engagement could have a ripple effect. In fact, we'll have a ripple effect. To untold, you know, hundreds and thousands of my ability to understand because of, of how this person, you know, this student gets influenced, it's going to change how they interact with everybody they encounter, right? Like that's, you know, it's a critical thing. And it's one of the things in a place like this. And if you can help people really connect to frees up this kind of urgency of, of, of results, but not in a press of results way, right? Yeah. I don't have a lot of reference points on, on, on collective creative work other than theater. Like, I've never been in a band and not, you know, in a dance troupe or anything. And so I keep going back to theater, you know, reference points on it. But, but, but if you got, you know, if you got others, I'd love them. Like I can, I can recall some of the, the most frustrating theater experiences being. Where there are actors in the cast, cause you know, some of the stuff I do, most of the stuff I do actually is community theater. It's like, right. And so you get the core usually are people who are taking the thing seriously, the actors, you know, and then you get like, you know, supporting roles and side roles or people like, Oh my God, I'm going to play, you know, some of that sometimes happens, you know? And some of the worst experiences were with folks who didn't understand that this was about the audience. Not about us. Didn't understand the potential impact. And then the ripple of that impact of this thing we're doing. And we're more focused on I'm on stage! This is cool! And then the thing becomes like a play. Like just you know, small p play. Oh, that was entertaining. And even when it's good, it's like, oh yeah, that was entertaining. But nothing got moved. Nothing got shifted. Nobody walked out of there like, oh, wow. I got to reconsider something, even in a humorous way, reconsider something, right? Yeah. And so it just takes, it just takes like one person on stage in a scene of seven, who's like, you know, in essence, winking. In essence, like, is like, Oh, I'm going to play. To just kill the impact.

Angel: 27:31

Would that be considered? The bad apple?

a.m.: 27:34

It's not even bad, it's the unaware apple. Unaware apple. You know what I mean? It's, it's, it's the apple that has no clue that yeah, it's shiny and red, yeah it's sweet but actually the most important thing about it is that it's going to provide nutrition to someone. And that within itself there are these tiny little kernels They're going to give birth to one or two or three giant trees that themselves will produce more apples. It's an apple that's wholly unaware that that's what its presence could be as opposed to look at how shiny I am. Yeah, no blemishes, no worms. So they're not bad. They're just misplaced attention.

Kyley: 28:19

Confused. Yeah. About, like, I see that more as confused. I don't know why. Like, it's un apple.

a.m.: 28:26

One of the things I wrote in my blog in the sub stack was this sort of, you know, fairytale thing, and I used rabbits as the main, you know. And yeah, and I'm referring to their thing, you know. There's a line in there where it's It's sort of about, you know, will this sort of industrialization of the world, that's in the words, but there's the essence, will the industrialization of the world actually lead to more happiness? And it's like, I don't know, you'd have to ask an unrabbit about that. A rabbit can't even engage with the question. And the rabbits are there, you know. Just to round it out, right, a non shiny apple with blemishes and maybe a couple of wormholes Gets hung up on that and loses the, even as an unshiny apple, I have the same nutrition to provide. I have the same seeds to drop that can grow into trees. And it's okay if I'm not a perfected apple with no blemishes. And, you know, and so that's a different way to get lost in the conversation. Not that, Oh, look at me. I'm great. It's like, don't look at me. I'm not great. Like, but both of those lose the. Result opportunity for that apple that they actually can provide nutrition and do contain seeds that could sprout into something in some other soil.

Angel: 29:38

That's a great perspective.

Kyley: 29:39

I think that very much highlights what we're trying to do here. Help students understand their apples, if you want to use the metaphor here. The rest doesn't matter. That's hard to communicate sometimes too, where it's like, I don't actually care about the coding language you learned. It's important. But the most important thing is that you are doing the thing that you're meant to do. How do I help you find that?

a.m.: 30:00

And in the process Don't get hung up on your apple-ness But get more focused on your nutritional value to the world. It's one of the things that in, you know, in, in, in, in the sort of monasteries, it's just so, like, like, right there, and people misunderstand, you know? Like, I've talked about the Zen monasteries, they're like, you know, four in the morning, gong, and it's like, it's like, oh my god, it's like a military. Like, no, actually. I mean, it is. But the purpose of it all is to sort of wake you up to what, you know, your life actually could be. Versus this, you know, chronic obsession with self in the smallest way. I think actual military, you know, could, could, you know, boot camp has that effect on people as well, I think. Right? I think it has some other effects that maybe aren't so positive because the intention there is, A more utilitarian intention.

Angel: 30:50

You know, talking about self, I feel that, not I feel, okay, I'm going to stop using I feel. It's what I see, what I've come to terms, or just what I've questioned myself. But self, I think if we let go of self, And become more selfless will be able to provide that nutrition and those seeds to others. And so what I see in society is a lot of people are for themselves and not being aware or unaware of the possibilities of how they can. Give nutrition, to others or how they can plant seeds. Others. And so I see that that's like a major thing. And I also had to come to terms with that with myself as well is I don't want to just show up like, Hey, look at me. Ooh, I'm a part of, because when you mentioned that, I, that was me at one point and I had to learn, like, no, it's not just about me and what I'm doing and how I could show up, it's how I'm going to impact the other person of what I do. Regardless of however I look, you know? And so When I said, you know, it's a good perspective to see it, and looking at the students now, I mean, I'm going to use that, actually starting today, how I can help them see that for themselves, you know?

a.m.: 32:23

The self we get focused on just, you know, in the era we kind of grew up in is, is, is a, it's a product, right? We're sort of habituated to think of, of self as product. And and so it's about transactions. It's about utility. It's about like, you know, all these things that are really problematic. And then, and then, you know, we built a society around it that then just reinforces that. That everything you encounter reinforces, you know, your utilitarian product nature. Yeah. It's a pretty dull way to think about from my perspective. Completely left field, you know, just the way my non linear brain works now. What popped my head is that the first of the Shima Sutras is Chaitanyamatma which means, so that's the very first of the, you know, teachings of Shiva, is the way to think about it. What that translates to roughly is consciousness is self. That the body is not self, the personality is not self, the, you know, all that, that's not self. The conscious, the awareness itself. But here, you know, the parallel that might be in reverse translated into Sanskrit, I think image itself is kind of where we find ourselves in the world, image itself. It's not my awareness, it's not the awareness, not even my, it's not my awareness, it's awareness is who I am. But, but, but, Now, in this society, it's how I'm seen. It's a polar opposite of awareness. Right? It's, you know, sort of image itself. For you Enneagram folks out there, I used to, you know in the early part of the century, I used to do a lot of Enneagram work and talks, and we came out of if you don't know Enneagram, I'll just give you a quick short, you know, we spent the last, you know, century in, in heavy Enneagram 5 8. Society. And so I think I'm five or six. Cerebral, intellectual, idea, and eight is authoritarian, solid, powerful. And that's what the last hundred years has been. Powerful men and brilliant men, you know. The big Oscar darling right now, Oppenheimer, right? Like, that's, that's five. That's like the era, you know, coming up. But that the era we're moving into, and, and so it was toxic five and eight. It was this kind of glorification to the point of just, you know, just oppression, you know. And, and we're very clearly moving out of You know that eight world that kind of powerful men were actually actively dismantling powerful men and they're not happy about it You know because it turns out that they're very tiny egos but the toxicity we're entering is Sort of toxic three I mean three is about how do I look It's Don Draper, kind of a phenomenon. And we're very clearly in the early stages, or hopefully, maybe not early stages. We could pass through it quickly, but that's the kind of oppressive narrative in the world. It's how do you look? How do you look? How do you look? It's no longer about the power you wield or the intellect you wield. It's about the image you craft.

Kyley: 35:19

Would you add a 6 in there too? Yeah, 3 6. 3 6, because it's how do I look and look at all I'm doing. Look at all the stuff I'm involved in.

a.m.: 35:26

Well, it, it Or am I misrepresenting 6? It's, it's, I mean, it's connected, it's, it's my, my sort of, my, my clique, my tribe. Yeah. My affiliation. You know. We kind of Dysfunctional. And the unhealthy 6 is not, never sure what to trust. Sure. Yeah. And so that kind of seeps in there as well. Interesting. Yeah. Took it a different way, but I would agree. Yeah. We're just we don't know what to trust, who's, who's my silo. Yeah. And so I constantly ping everything. Yeah. And so it's this, you know, this, this, this, this. Trust a DDI ping here. Oh, are you it? Are you it? Do you have the solution? Is it, you know is it this thought leader? Is it this political party? Is it this thing? Like where is it? Where is it? Where is it? And that's the sort of dysfunction we're in right now. Both of'em are problematic because it attach itself to just personality. Yeah. And so I agree with you that, you know, that's just all we're doing with the kids. Is just that awareness piece, that kind of sense of, you can, you know, well hold yourself accountable for results, but if they're about making yourself look good, eh, or if they're a way to kind of go to the gym, a way to figure out and then expand your nutritional value to the world. It might be something you'll find fulfilling there, you know.

Angel: 36:37

So, I'm a single parent of four, and my oldest is 13. So, it's, it's a challenge. I'd definitely say that. But one thing I said to her the other day you know, cause she's surrounded by, Other teenagers and, you know, all the things they are involved in and it's just unnecessary from a parent's point of view. But what I believe is very important is that I continue to educate her whether she receives what I say or not. And one thing I said to her the other day, I said, looks are impressive. But if our soul, heart, brain is much more prosperous and powerful when they align with one another. So looks can be great, but everything else within you is much more prosperous. Like it can do much more than your looks, you know. So I've been in that stage speaking that to her because It's not really spoken about. It's not, like, that's not a thing anymore. It's not, you know, like you said, like, it's the image, you know, self noun, like, that's what everyone is paying attention to, especially, like, this young generation, so. I think that that's very important that we continue to share with others and educate especially those who are younger than us, just to help them identify themselves in those areas. You know, so.

Kyley: 38:21

We're fortunate to work with the students we work with.