345- Why Mystical Experience Slips Through Organized Religion with John Bliss

We push past easy takes on faith and atheism and ask what gets lost when spiritual experience turns into an institution. We also explore a bigger frame for meaning where the goal is not self-importance but contributing to humanity and practicing love as something real. 
• John’s origin story as a skeptic focused on fundamentals and “what’s most important” 
• Conformity, money, and why most people follow the default life script 
• Organized religion as a net positive that can still miss the mystical core 
• Maslow’s “peakers” vs “non-peakers” and why peak experiences are hard to translate 
• The problem of evil, hell theology, and internal contradictions in doctrine 
• Bible canon, missing texts, early church politics, and curiosity about Enoch 
• Swedenborg’s spirit world, influence on thoughts, and character-based heaven and hell 
• Humanity as a superorganism and why tragedy can look different at different scales 
• Practical meaning: become great at your gifts and help others become great 
• Love as currency and selfishness as a root of suffering 
 Go to skepticapress.com, go there, go support him. 
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Transcript

No Safe Space Opening

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome everyone to Politically High Tech with your host, Elias Martin. I have a new guest here. This is gonna be a very interesting conversation. This is not for the weak-minded. That's what I'm gonna tell you. This is not for the sheep. And look, I know my listeners, I know you're great, you're great listeners, and some of you even challenge me, which I like because I don't like echo chambers. Echo chambers are boring, they're for the weak, and both religious atheists, left and right. You love your echo chambers because you you love to please the idiots and just say yes to anything, even jumping over the cliff. No, not here. This is not a safe space, and I'm happy not to be a safe space for you elder babies. Yep. For those of you, if you love your little space, I'm gonna call you elder babies. I could that could be much worse, but we'll we'll we'll get there. I have a very interesting guest here. Um we're gonna learn. Is he a heathen? Does he hate everything religious and everything spiritual? Or there's something you want? There's something to think about. Regardless of your bias or your preconceived thinking, we are going to find out. We're gonna find out for sure. So let me just give you a little introduction about this guess. Ironically, his name is John Bliss, so he's probably happy to troll you. Probably. That's just an accusation, by the way. I can't prove that. He's a writer and a thinker, passionate about unraveling the mystery of our lives. Some people may call that being crazy. Okay, but I can like crazy. Crazy is interesting. He is at heart a skeptic and an individualist. Oh, so he hates conformity. Oh, a lot of people don't like that, especially authoritarians. He distrusts groups and authorities of all kinds. I mean, a real American should. As it is that clear that human humanity, even the brightest minds, is susceptible to deep folly. Yeah, unfortunately, if you don't have an ego, you could agree with that. But if you do, you think you think you're beyond that. To help people break free from the hidden social biases and tackle life's big questions. Who the heck are we? What's truly important? And how should we live our lives? Is organized religion or any other religion or any other belief is the right way? Or something deeper? Much deeper than that. Maybe something universal. Well, regardless, we're gonna find out. Let's welcome John Bliss. And I always ask this corny question, the corniest one of them all. What do you want the viewers and listeners to know about you?

SPEAKER_00 2:59

Oh,

John Bliss On What Matters

SPEAKER_00 3:00

god, that's an awful question. Just another dude. Sorry, I'm a dude, but I wrote a book. That's it. I'm sorry, that's all I got.

SPEAKER_02 3:11

Yep, I know that was gonna be the lamest question, but that's how we start. But now we are getting now, it's gonna get interesting from here. That I could promise you. At least the second one starts things off really. So you know, that might be the reward for the shortest, most plainest intro in this podcast this time. So there you go. There's a medal on that.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Yeah, I guess I guess I've listened to a bunch of other podcasts, and people are pretty interesting when you listen to them, all the things they've done and all that stuff. Okay, let me let me redo it. I'll redo it. Who am I? I'm I was always an odd duck when I was in high school and college, and really all I really cared about is what's most important. What's most important? And I'd ask people, and they, you know, that kind of relegated me to the absolute minority or to the outside of any group. I was just a weirdo, that's all. It's just a weird dude. And I just always felt like you have to put fundamentals first. You have to know what's most important. If you know what's most important, then you can make a plan. Well, first, no, then you can make a goal. And once you have a goal, then you can make a plan. This is how I'm gonna live. This is what I'm gonna spend all my time doing because I know what's most important, because I know I yeah, and but most folks, they don't really know. And so they're just kind of following this conformity thing. It's like, when I was in college, I remember looking around and seeing, you know, well, what's going on? All the kids are like, they're good students, they're gonna get good jobs, they're gonna get married, they're gonna have children, they're going to get a mortgage, and they'll retire and then they're gonna die. That's it. And and when I looked at the generation before me, my parents' generation, they were doing that trick, you know, that whole plan, and and I didn't think they were happy. So it made me think, you know what? This probably isn't right. I don't think they've got it right. That's not how I'm gonna do it. I want to do it right. So that's who I am. A guy who was basically interested in the fundamentals of what's really most important. I want to know. And that's driven me for years. I ended up conforming to society after a while. I was a I was an artist, I guess you could say an artist fuck up for quite a while. I did a lot of painting. I played music and read books. And when I realized that I saw some dude, I was in San Francisco, I saw some dude who was older than me, maybe 20 years older, and he looked really poor. And I thought, you know what? That's what I'm gonna be if I keep doing this. And I realized I needed to kind of get on the bus and join the system, and I did, and I did really well. I started a business, had 20, 25 people working for me, I sold it, did good. And now I'm back to being a dude again. But during all that time, I was writing this book. It took me 13 years to write and took a whole year to edit it. That was crazy. My editor read it three times and I rewrote it three times. There, that's your that's your introduction. How's that?

SPEAKER_02 6:08

Definitely a much better one, and interesting. And actually, interesting. Yeah, no, this with this podcast, we allow the bragging. Some of them all frown upon and say, Oh, I said, Oh, shut up. This is you know, this audio visual, this is this is audio visual entertainment for for some people, okay? Just just, you know, people just want to be entertained, you know. And I don't know, I'm more of a pragma, I'm more of a pragmatic person. The morality thing, and it constrains me too much. But that's my little opinion. It's not gonna be about me speaking about morality and all that, even though it might be included in this conversation. Just saying, might be included. I'm not gonna make that promise. So that's actually a very good introduction. So yeah, I know you had more interesting things, that's why I left some of the things out the intro. I know you had more interesting things than that. So, alrighty, let's have uh so next question is, and this is I always had the skepticism, even though I learned sadly to conform much earlier, but now it looks like I'm I'm just dabbling between the two. Half conform, and I'm just embracing my own hidge odd oddity. That's where I'm at my journey. Will it work out? Probably not, but we'll see.

SPEAKER_00 7:17

So you have to conform to make money. You have to. Not not everyone, but most of us have to.

SPEAKER_02 7:25

Yeah, no, you're right. You're right, because only the very few could be the theme, you know, painter, singer, performer. You know, you know, you're right. You're right about that. I'm definitely not gonna argue with you on that unless I'm on good drugs. Uh so yeah, no, I'm sober, unfortunately. So you want to see me ran, be drunk, that's gonna be the paid version. Once I start doing unleash, trust me, that one's gonna be me being crazier. And yep, that one you're gonna have to pay some money if you want me to say crazy stuff. Stuff that's even pretty cancelable. So, yeah, I don't like both parties, you know where I stayed in that audience, and but I say one party's no better than the other. Don't worry, it won't be too

When Religion Helps But Misses

SPEAKER_02 8:09

political. But organized religion can be pretty political. Now, the simple question I have is, and they are they still exist. I wish they didn't. Why organized religion really doesn't work for the betterment of humanity? I'm gonna frame it like that.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

I'm not gonna say I I disagree with you. I think it does work for the betterment of humanity. Even if you look at Scandinavia, where they don't, they're pretty much non-Christian societies, but they're there's the lowest crime, the lowest murder rates, and all of that stuff. And it's non-Christian, but why? Because they had Christianity for how many centuries that, you know, taught people look, don't kill people, don't steal their stuff, don't be sleeping with, you know, your neighbor's wife. Just don't break the damn rules. Because before that, they were a bunch of Vikings. What'd they do? They go out and they go kill people and steal all their stuff and rape the women. I mean, that's what they used to do. So, you know, the Christianity has done quite a lot of good in the world, I think. I mean, yes, there's a lot of bad. You can talk about the crusades or the, you know, killing heretics and all kinds of stuff like that, sure. But I do think that that that organized religion is a net positive. But what the point I was trying to make is it misses the point. It misses

Maslow And Peak Experiences

SPEAKER_00 9:31

the point. And so I'm going to go back to something we were talking about pre-podcast, and that was a study that, or I guess it's a pamphlet that Maslow put out. So Abraham Maslow, he's most famous for that pyramid of needs. First, you need, what do you need first? I guess water, then you need food, then you need shelter, then you need a community, then you need love, and then you need a vocation or something to live for, and then, you know, so there's this pyramid of needs. And Maslow's the one that came up with that. But he also wrote a really nice pamphlet about religion, and he talked about two kinds of people. There are peekers and non-peakers. Peakers are people who have experienced God. They they have these experiences where, oh boy, it's hard to describe. An experience where you feel indestructible. You feel this incredible sense of love for all people. You it's it's it's like this gift from God that just comes to you and just inhabits you and just it just changes you, it wrenches your life. And very few of us have those. Now, Maslow said that a lot of us, or maybe all of us, could, but that if people do, they just say, ah, no, I was just something was wrong with me that day. And they just kind of deny it and pack it in the closet and pretend that never happened. But but there are some of us who have them and just say, you know, I want more. I want, because that was God. Now, some people, I guess, well, let me say it differently. Now, Maslow didn't say this. This is what I say, but that that when you think of any human quality, there's a a normal distribution or a bell-shaped distribution, right? So when you turn think about in terms of how tall people are, men, yeah, they're usually about 5'11, 6'6, 1. That's most of us. And then you have one or two of them that's 7'5, and a few of them are like two foot tall or something. But you know, it's a it's a bell-shaped curve. And it's the same for intelligence, it's the same for, you know, how fast we can run. Um, but it's also the same for spiritual capacity, or at least that's how I see it. And and most of us, of course, are in the middle. But there are some people that are at the very high end or tail. And that would be someone like Jesus or Krishna or Buddha or something like that, who, you know, they touched God. You know, maybe Moses touched God and and and had these intense, you know, visions or experiences and all. And and religions came from that, you know. And the problem that there's a couple problems. That is that most people are not peakers. Okay, but let me be before we can get to that. The biggest problem is you can't explain a mystical experience. You can't put it into words. You just can't. It's like, yes, I tried. I said, look, I felt invincible, I felt God's love, I loved everyone. But that doesn't describe what I felt. It doesn't. And so so you can't explain explain it. That it's an ineffable experience. That's one thing. But even if these guys could explain it, the guys around them, like Jesus' apostles, they're they're non-peekers. They're not peekers. They can't understand it. So it's like if you tried to explain to a blind man the difference between blue and purple, how are you gonna do that? How are you gonna do that? Didn't have a clue. Well, it's the same with this religious stuff. It's like, look, I don't know what you're talking about. I haven't, you know, gone over there and and and talked to God. I have no idea what you've experienced. I just have these words of yours and and I interpret them differently than you're trying to express them. I don't get it. And that's what happened with the beginning of all religions. I I mean, personally, I think, and I've I've read this, other people think this as well, that all these people who really touched God, you know, they're the founders of all these religions, they all saw the same thing. They all felt the same thing. It's just their cultures and their time in history kind of shaped the way they saw it, you know? And and so they put it in a specific language with you know certain customs, et cetera. And and that's why our religions are different, because they were different people who all saw the different different things. It's like, oh, you you so Elias read several of the essays in my book. And I at one point I wrote about Ramakrishna. And Ramakrishna was the saint who was a he was a Hindu guy. He's actually a total madman, just totally nuts. Just if if anyone saw him on the streets of any U.S. city, we would think that guy should be locked up. He's or he's had too many psych psychological drugs or something like that. Something wrong with this guy. But he was an intense mystic. And and he later went, you know, he was a Hindu. He he was a worshiper of Kali. And then he went and he tried uh Islam, he tried Catholicism, and he also had mystical experiences in these other religions. And he was the one who came up with that whole elephant analogy. You put a bunch of blind men to in the same room with an elephant, and one guy's feeling the tusks, saying, you know, it's hard and it's it's it's not pliable, it's just hard and and smooth, and the other guy's feeling the tail and saying, no, no, it's it feels hairy and it's it's long, and you know, and they all have different descriptions of what this elephant is. That's kind of like us talking about God, that these different mystics have seen it from different perspectives, and but they're all talking about the same thing. Okay, let's get back to the peekers and non-peekers thing. So here we have Christ who experienced God, tries to explain it to all these people around him, they don't get it. So what's he trying to do? He starts telling all these stories about, you know, I don't know, gosh, I can't know. All of a sudden I can't think of any any of his. Oh, yeah, there's like the the bridesmaids and their lamps, and and some of them saved their oils and some didn't, and I don't know. He came up with all these stories to try to express these truths of his, and we don't get it. We don't get it. And there's always different interpretations of what these stories mean. It's lost. It was lost. The magic was lost. And so that's that was the point that I was trying to make in the essay was, you know, that, or one of the points was that that the the magic of of really, you know, touching God, it's kind of not so much in the religions. And and at least for for the Christian religion, you know, you would think Christ would say, okay, this is how you do it. These are the steps. This is what you do. Okay? We need to do this, then we do this, then we do this, and then you could be like me, and you could touch God too. You don't need to talk to me and my apostles. You can just just do these things. Where is it? Never gave us that. And so what do we have? We have this religion that was made by non-peekers who are people in the middle of that bell curve, and it's it applies and works for people in the middle of the bell curve. But the people at the far end, the very spiritual people, it's lost, it's lost on them because you know what? You're so I have these Ten Commandments, I have the seven deadly sins. It's like, really? That's it. That's it. You know, oh yeah, Jesus turned the loaves into, or I don't know, the He multiplied all these loaves and fishes and and He turned the water into wine. Oh, okay. Yeah, okay, that's really neat. You know, that that doesn't do it. I'm sorry that doesn't do it. Love your neighbor. Yes, that's all real true. That's real, that's the essence of all religion. Love, yes, but it sounds so trite. It just don't do it. So that was the point I was trying to make. Go ahead.

The Magic Gets Lost In Words

SPEAKER_00 17:11

What do you got, Elice? Oh, I lost you. I can't hear you now. You're on mute.

SPEAKER_02 17:16

Oh my god, what a rookie mistake. I've been doing yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_00 17:19

I you're the podcaster.

SPEAKER_02 17:21

Now that's something I'm supposed to be doing. Ah, well, this just tells you I'm a flawed human being. So there you go. If you want to roast me commenters, go right ahead. This is your great moment to do so. So, oh, what a boomer. What a boomer. He got it wrong.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

Geez, I don't know who booked me on this one. I shouldn't have done it. I didn't know I was gonna be at the rookie.

SPEAKER_02 17:46

Uh well, that's that's why I get for doing too much stuff in 24 hours. Anyways. No, yeah, no, when I read that, I see pressure that that that I when I read that one, that one I feel like I understood it the most. It's like I think his main point is that the religious essence understanding of it experience is lost because just like you said, the non-peekers just want to come up with uh with the steps and the descriptions, and of course, those who are well put to your point that oh yeah, oh, this is how Jesus does it. Yeah, I mean it I mean it works, and that's I mean it works in that great sense, right? You get a lot of the non-peekers who don't experience them the mythical great spiritual experiences again to the religious, so that's great on that, and many more people are non-peekers. That's you know, I think unless we meditate more often and then until we you know, until we stop getting distracted with all the the phones, the lights, noise, and our busy hectic lives, we would definitely get more peekers. I would say so. Um but yeah, no, that was your point. Yeah, I I know you're not bashing religion, even though it's kind of defame you a little bit jokingly in the intro. Oh, it's okay. That's like I gotta do it.

SPEAKER_00 19:00

I could, huh? I could. I could if you want. I'll I'll bash religion for you.

SPEAKER_02 19:06

Oh, yeah, no, that's fine. Go right ahead. I'm I'm I'm I'm a 1A kind of person, so it's not gonna it's not gonna offend me. I do I do listen, I'm not that I'm not that super devout religious seller that I'm just gonna come and beat you to death with a big old Bible and drown you in holy water for just saying I just dealt with that.

SPEAKER_00 19:24

I just

Hell Theology And The Problem

SPEAKER_00 19:25

dealt that. I went on a canoe trip and and I and I was reading this book by some pastor and I was so offended by it. I just this guy was saying, look, this is the whole basis of Lutheranism, but he's saying, look, all people are evil. We are evil, we're wicked people. It's it's just the way it is, and and we all deserve to go to hell. That's that's the basic fundamental truth. And then based on that, oh, but Jesus in his grace can can can lead us to heaven. Okay. So that's that's the basis of Lutheranism and a lot of Protestantism. I don't think the Catholics talk that way. And so, but here's my question if God is so let's say, so omnipotent, let's say powerful, could do anything, then why would he make flawed creatures? That sounds like incompetence, right? Or how about this? If God was so uh if God was so loving, then why would he make creatures that would fail and then therefore go to hell? Isn't that cruel? So then God is cruel, not loving, because he made us, he knew what was gonna happen, right? Or did he not know? And then maybe he isn't all knowing. It's like there's all these things they say God is, but if he's all these things, then he no, it's impossible. It's impossible. You saw that there was an end there. I mean, Voltaire did a really good job just ripping the church apart, but that was, you know, yeah. So it's so either God is incompetent because he can't make good people, or he's cruel because or no, he's stupid because he doesn't know that we're gonna fail. And he put this this apple in the garden, you know. What a what a dumb mistake putting this apple in the garden and saying, don't go eat it. It's like, okay, so he's either incompetent, stupid, or cruel, knowing we're gonna do all those things, and then we'll take it even further. So then Jesus died for our sins so we can go to heaven, except for, oh, we're all still going to hell. Oh that's the Lutheran part we add on to it. It's like, oh my God, it just it just doesn't make sense. Here's some more. So, you know, in in the first books of the Bible, they list, you know, let's see, there's Adam's son was this guy, and his son was this guy, and then there was Noah, and his son was, it goes all the way down, all the way to Jesus, right? No, it doesn't because. Because who is Jesus' father? It was not Joseph. Mary was pregnant when Joseph married her. Joseph was not his father. So that genealogy doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense at all. It's so silly. But yeah, there's all kinds of things, you know. I mean, you know, you saw this in the book as well, how the the the gospels they were there's no mention of Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John until the late second century. So what you know, so let's say, let's say Jesus, Jesus died maybe in his 30s, right? But let's say his apostles, they were, let's pretend they're the same age and they died at age 80, then 80 years later, that's when their gospel shows up. 80 years after the last apostle died, then we now why do I how do I say that's why the first gospel, when the first gospel showed up? How would I know? Well, if you read all the readings or that the writings of the early church fathers, like, you know, Tertullian or Iranius or those other guys, there's no mention of those gospels until around, I don't know, it's 160 or 18, I think it's around 160 AD or 180 A.D., so much later. We have there was, but there was mention of a lot of other gospels that existed before. A lot of gospels, they're gone. They've been destroyed by the church. But one was like the Gospel of Hebrews, which the the original church, that's what they used, was the gospel of the Hebrews. It's gone. So yeah, there's a there's a lot that's suspect. But you know, basically, I I think that Christianity is an incredible force for the good. I do, I do. I think God is the most important thing we can reach for in our lives. Absolutely. But religion has been created for the most part by men. It has, you know, purgatory, where'd that come from? You know, purgatory is a whole reason. So the the idea of purgatory is look, according to the the old fire brimstone Christianity, you and I have sinned a lot. We've done all sorts of things. We thought the wrong things, we were attracted to people we should have been attracted to. We even probably imagined what they looked like with no clothes on. I bet I bet you did that at least once, Elias. I certainly have. And and you know what? Those are sins. So we need to go. We we can still go to heaven if we've accepted Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior. That's what, that's that's the the line. But first we have to go to purgatory to burn off our sins. And that could be a long, long period. Well, that whole concept of purgatory, Jesus never said that. Jesus never said that. And that didn't show up till, I don't know, it was like a couple hundred, at least a couple hundred years after Jesus died. I think it was, I don't remember, it's in the book. I forgot. Well, Augustine talked about it, a concept like purgatory, but didn't use that word, and that was in the fourth century, I believe. I think it was in the 400s. So I think it was like in the 600s that the word purgatory first showed up. It's like someone invented that. And then there's the idea of limbo, where what happens to babies that die before they're baptized? Do they get to go to heaven? No, they go to limbo. Who came up with that? Well, Jesus didn't say that. And then and then later on, just recently, I think the last 50 years, the Pope said, Oh yeah, limbo, that doesn't exist anymore. Even though we used to believe it existed for like three or four hundred years. That's just the way it is. But Christianity is kick-ass. It is a force for good. I will definitely say that.

SPEAKER_02 25:43

Well, you heard it here, even though I was twisting it purposely. Again, I said, I, you know, despite all the criticism and all that, so I I think I think he believes, you know, it's a net positive. Yeah, even though I that you, you know, and you know, I look, I think it's better to have religion rather than none because I tried to live without it and it was a mess, just put it briefly. So I would say my worst day believing and try to follow God as opposed to my best days without Him. Yeah, it's it's so much better. At least, you know, I got some guidance, some structure, so she had to deal with you know, with uh negative emotions, so she wants to feel controllable. Like uh, you know, you just I mean, one one was the urge by um you know undressing the person visually in the mind. I mean, I've done that more than once. Um two times or three times? Two, maybe I will probably say five. There you go. Um hey, I'm just being transparent and honest right there. Uh definitely five. Yep. Well, that one comment, commenters, you're gonna have to dig for that one for those five. You're probably never gonna find them because I was smart enough never to document them. Uh so except for the side. Oh, that's that's your little quest right there, people. But the yeah, but things with all that, with all that, yeah. I think without religion, I think, you know, I think this is why some people go through the the chaos. Look, I believe in you pick, you choose whatever, you choose whatever, right? You follow your your path, whatever. I think some believing the higher power is definitely, I will say that's way better, even despite the flaws that I point out or or I think about. I said, but you know what? It's better than not having it at all.

SPEAKER_00 27:39

Well, that there's something that I think people mix up. There's God and there's religion. They're not the same. Right. God, or at least as I see it, God is. That's that's all there is to it. There's no arguing that. Religions, yeah, people kind of created them. And so so they're different. And there's a lot of people, they they can poke at religion, you know, they could talk about the history of all the bad things that the church has done, and they could say, Yeah, I'm an atheist. Yeah, of course. It's like, you know, what what what God would allow his church to do all these things, right? And I get that, but that's not no, I don't get that. That's a terrible argument. The the conclusion should be the church isn't very good. But that has nothing to do with God. It has nothing to do with God.

SPEAKER_02 28:25

Right. Yeah, God gets blamed for it. Bull Vida critics and uh and the atheists. That's the thing always point out. I said, no, but that's not God. No, that's organized religion. I mean, I used to do the same thing when I used to be angry. I didn't understand it. You know, I was like an angry, angsty teenager who just said, oh, I said to hell with religion. Oh, I try that. Not very good, not very smart people. Don't do it. Just don't do it. It's okay to explore, it's okay to ask questions. You know, don't get me wrong, there's a lot of bad representative of Christianity, and I'm sure in other religions, but don't let that deter you from God. Those are just foolish people, sadly. Some of them have a lot of influence, misplaced influence, but they do. Yeah, no, you're right. And that's one of the many mistakes I made. You know, when I used to be quote unquote agnox, I was just really mad at God for not saving my father. So if you're so great and powerful, you could have just used cancer. So I had that same purpose. But but you know, after I read the Bible and I read it completely twice, because there's so much propaganda, garbage, and deception by the man, not God, my man, that I had to read because I used I used to even fall for them when I didn't have you know the foundation and understanding. I read it twice. I said, okay, all right, that well, I know that person's saying it's not true. And I also, this is another thing that's that now I'm about to go a little off the wall here.

Missing Texts And Early Christianity

SPEAKER_02 29:54

I think there is parts of the Bible missing. You think lots of them. Well, yeah, go ahead. I want I want to hear your.

SPEAKER_00 30:03

No. Well, I mean, it's yeah, I I think it's common knowledge, right? Was it 1948 they found, I think it was 48 they found the Nag Hammurabi library, a bunch of scrolls and geez, what was in there? I now I'm probably mixing it up. Maybe it was in the 50s they found it, because there were 48 uh gospels they found. I don't know. They found a whole ton of gospels that weren't in the original, you know, or in the accepted canon of books that we have. Sure, the church threw out a ton of books, a ton of books, and that's why we don't have the gospel of the Hebrews anymore. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, but you know what? Those books are written by people too. And you know what's what's interesting is like the oldest writings we have is Saint Paul. That's the oldest, and you know, Saint Paul never met Jesus. Saint Paul, let's see, how'd this work? He was a Gentile, he used to, you know, killed Christians and stuff. He he had his conversion experience. He goes and meets with, I think it was James, the the brother of Jesus, who was the head of the church of Jerusalem at the time, and said, Okay, can I go preach the Romans? All these people aren't Jews. And they're like, Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. So he does. Him and Barnabas, they go out and they preach all over and they create all these great Christian communities. They did, they're very successful. They're great speakers. They they did a great job. But but you know, Peter and Paul didn't believe the same thing. So Paul, you know, or let's say Peter was a Jew. Jesus was a Jew, and they believed that, look, you follow the law, the Jewish law, and and we kind of focus on the intent of the law, the whole love and and God and me and stuff, rather than just doing all the formalism and just doing all the, you know, let's just we'll do the law, but really what was it about? And whereas these guys were like, fuck the law, we just want to, you know, do Jesus' stories. And and it was like they they weren't the same. And so we had these different Christian communities in the early days where they didn't get along, they didn't they didn't agree with each other because they were founded by different, you know, apostles or different preachers. So yeah, it's pretty fascinating the story of it. I'm sorry, go back to what you were saying.

SPEAKER_02 32:19

No, no, this no, this is your episode. I will have plenty of time to say what I have to say in other ones, especially my solo ones. But yeah, no, I know I was just you know, and I'm happy I actually read the Bible twice to make sure, and I read and I'm reading different versions of it. Of course, I I was raised Catholic, so that one has a slightly more canon. Uh it was pretty interesting. One was like very weird, but but the one I'm reading now, and I want to make sure, and you I don't care if it's a fraudulent one, that'll be a good example of one out to buy. I'm I think Ethiopian Bible might have some little scrolls today. I'm not sure, but uh that I'm gonna research myself. So don't quote me on that one. And I like to quote me.

SPEAKER_00 33:03

Yeah. I was just reading something, the book of Enoch.

SPEAKER_02 33:07

Yeah, that's one today. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:10

Okay, so yeah, so that church you're talking about, I don't know if it's Ethiopian or or Coptic or whatever it was, but they've got they've got like 80 Gospels, or some huge number, including that book, which they don't they don't have anymore in in the in in the the Protestant or Roman Catholic canons. But what's interesting, we have the epistle of, oh shoot, now I forgot that verse, Judith. The epistle of Judith, which, or no, of Jude, I'm sorry, of Jude, which I didn't know about. I'm I was raised Catholic also, which I didn't I didn't know about the Epistle of Jude, which actually quotes there's a big quote from the Gospel of Enoch. So, which is interesting. So it's like they're yeah, and and that and so in the Gospel of Enoch, that's where they're talking about. Look, I don't know anything about this stuff. This this was it was a weird time. Jesus' time was weird. At that time, they were way into this apocalyptic literature, you know, that the whole book of Revelations, which I think is garbage. I hate that book. And but there was a lot of books like that back then in in that era. There's just they people were kind of weird. And this book of Enoch talks about, you know, that there was these, they were called the Watchers, and I think they were angels, and they came down and they had sex with the beautiful women, and their children were the Nephilim, whatever, which were I guess giants. I I don't know. That's just what the book says, and and I I don't know what that stuff's about. I I don't. I just I've tried to stay away from it because it's so far out there, but I am reading it now.

SPEAKER_02 34:47

Yeah, to my regrettable curiosity, I'm too curious, so I have to read it. So since I know there are things missing for the Bible for sure, that yeah, I'm gonna read it, even if I might regret it. Oh well. I'm too curious to off the fool, I guess. But but hey, I rather I rather know, because now it's just yeah, really? Really? The the angels were that horny to make these filthy creatures. They took out women, these these angels should be the Epstein files. There you go. Hey you go, let's spice things up a bit. No, it is.

SPEAKER_00 35:31

They taught them science and they taught them astrolog astronomy and and magic and stuff like that. Taught them herb lore. Yeah, and God didn't like that, I guess. I I don't know. I don't buy it. I don't, I don't buy it. I think it was a weird, weird time. I remember, I I don't remember who it was exactly. It was either Titus or Vespasian or one of those guys, or it might have been it's in the early Roman period, the Romans went in, you know, to Jerusalem and and they wanted to put their statue up, right? In in the temple. And the and the Jews were like, no, no, you can't do that. You can't do that. It's like, no, we're gonna do it. And you know how Romans are, they're just gonna kill people and just do what they want, right? And so they said, you know, we're we're gonna kill you guys if if you stand our way. So the Jews, they all like kneeled down and put their necks out like this. Like thousands of them just put their necks out, like, go ahead, kill us. And the Romans backed off. It's like, oh, uh, okay. These people were fanatics. It just it was a different, different time, a different people.

SPEAKER_02 36:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:38

So anyway.

SPEAKER_02 36:39

Yep. I tell you, I hope this episode gets you more curious, listeners and viewers, because I agree. Look, anything written by someone, it's it's always gonna have an inherent bias. No matter how fair you try to be. Look, history is written by the winners, okay? So that's already a bias right there. What about a loser's perspective? How do they lose? Uh no, that don't get recorded as much. Unless the winner wants to brag about, oh yeah, I beat them because they're a bunch of scrawny little whatevers, and they were so stupid with their strategy, we got them drunk and we ambushed them. So you'll learn about the yeah. No, no, and that's inherently true. As to rather you like it or not, look, an Obama memoir. You can love Obama all you want, but it's a very biased material. It's all about Obama. What if you're gonna learn about the other person that's part of Obama's life? Uh well, maybe you get that memoir or something. Oh, right. Buy materials online with that.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

Try looking for a biography of FDR right now. You can't find a negative one. He had a lot of detractors back then. The Republicans hated FDR.

SPEAKER_01 37:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:49

You go on Amazon and look for FDR biographies, you will not find one that is anti-FDR. Doesn't exist. You won't find it. I was looking for one, couldn't find one.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

Hmm. So much for freedom of speech.

SPEAKER_00 38:06

I don't I don't think the censors stopped it.

SPEAKER_02 38:09

I don't know what happened, but I think the channel, I think I I think I I'm gonna now I'm gonna go off a hat. Maybe this is tinfoil here, probably further with conspiracy theory territory. Maybe they secretly threatened the publishers take it down or something.

SPEAKER_00 38:24

I don't think so. Well, you know, during COVID, they would have done that. That's um certainly during COVID. They definitely would have done that. Oh, for sure, yeah. I mean, not for FDR, but if you're trying to publish a book against the shot or something or next scene.

SPEAKER_02 38:37

Yeah, you're the enemy of the state.

SPEAKER_00 38:40

Absolutely. So did you did you read about Swedenborg in my in that book?

Swedenborg And Life Beyond The Veil

SPEAKER_00 38:46

What'd you think of that?

SPEAKER_02 38:47

Swedenborg, that's you know, I try to understand that one. Maybe I shouldn't have read it so late, but uh don't worry about it. Yeah. Let me go into it.

SPEAKER_00 38:58

I think it might be interesting.

SPEAKER_02 38:59

Yep, the gig go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 39:01

So around the time of Benjamin Franklin in Sweden, he's called Swedenborg, but and he actually isn't was in Sweden. There was a man who was like Benjamin Franklin. He was on polymath. He was a guy who was really good at a lot of things. He was really he was famous for math mathematics in Sweden and also for geology. He was really good at meteorology and geology and stuff like that. And yeah, he was very famous. And I think they wanted him to be a professor of a university, or no, the the president of a university at one point, but he turned it down. Okay, well, this guy, he was very Christian. I don't think up in Scandinavia, I don't think they were Catholics, but he was very, very Christian. And he he tried to be good, but you know, he was a man like anyone else. And he started having these, let's say, yeah, mystical experiences, but his were different than any that I've read anywhere else. No, there's one other guy that maybe, but I won't talk about that guy. But but this guy he left his body and he actually ventured beyond the veil, that means into the spiritual world and talked with spirits. Okay. And then he he came back and he wrote about it. Well, he didn't do it once, he did it every night for like I don't I think it was like 40 years or something like that. Every night. And he wrote so many books about what he saw. And yeah, he influenced people like, well, for example, Johnny Appleseed. You know, he was out planting apple trees all over for the for the settlers who were coming out west. Johnny Appleseed was a Swedenborgian. He was a follower of Swedenborg, and he was passing out religious tracts. That was what he was really up to. Ellen Keller, she preached in a Swedenborgian church. It was called the Church of New Jerusalem. The and he he influenced quite a lot of, let's say, very famous people. And actually, the New Age movement, a lot of what you hear in a New Age movement is all based in Swedenborg thinking. So let me give you a couple. So this guy, he just wrote books. He wasn't a good speaker. He didn't want to start a church. He didn't start a church. They never he never preached. That wasn't his deal. He just he just did his thing and wrote books. And and most of them, not most, but a lot were not even published until after he died. So he felt like every moment of the day, so that we're we're surrounded by, let's say, thousands of spirits, tens of thousands of spirits flying in the air all around us. And every moment of the day, there's a fight for our soul. A fight for our soul. He's he's a believes in God. He's actually a Christian still, or he was still, after all these experiences. And so we have these different types of spirits out there. There are there are angels, which are people who were good who then died. And they're in the spirit, they're spirits now, and they're just flying around. And there's people who are nasty who are who died and they are they're imps, or let's say they're demons, or they're they're not as nice. But they're both trying to influence us every moment of the day. Every time you have this impulse to do something rash or stupid, like, you know, just kick his ass or just tell him he's an asshole. You know, that is something that's coming from a demon. And when you hear something saying, no, no, I know he said something bad, but just take a breath. He said it because he's feeling this. Just understand him and let it go. That is the voice of an angel. So every thought or emotion you have actually originates from elsewhere. You are just a receiver. And there's this fight for your soul to direct you, like to, you know, are you going to go to heaven or hell, which I'll talk about in a second. And these these different spiritual entities are all trying to influence you and bring you along. So as Swedenborg saw it, or here's a simplification, I guess, and that is that, you know, we're like MMs in a way that there's chocolate in the middle, and then there's candy on the outside. Okay. And so the chocolate in the middle is your essence of who you are. The candy on the outside is who is the mask that you wear. So you could be a really greedy, selfish, arrogant prick, but you're really good at acting very compassionate, loving, and considerate and kind. But you're not. You're just manipulating people, right? Or you could be a really loving, nice, gentle person, but you have a gruff exterior. And you see those in those TV shows. Every once in a while there's a movie or something. They have some biker dude. He's really big and tough looking, but really he's just a he's just a teddy bear, right? He just loves kitty cats or whatever the hell. You know, there's so there's people that have really beautiful centers and rough exteriors, people with ugly centers and beautiful exteriors, and then there's people that are ugly on the inside and the outside, and beautiful on the inside and the outside. So there's four combinations, right? So when you die, it's the equivalent of having that MM popped into your mouth. After like tens or hundreds of years, that candy shell starts to dissolve. And who you are, your essence, starts to become the whole deal. And you, let's say you're a good person at heart and you're compassionate, you care about people, you will be attracted to other people who are that way. You won't be fooled anymore by those other folks because their candy shells are gone and you'll see that they're evil. And the evil people, they don't like those goody two shoe types. They are attracted to other evil people. And so by this self-selection, we are the final judge of whether we're going to heaven or hell. Heaven is being with all the cool people, hell is being with all these assholes. That's how sweet, that's what they taught Swedenborg. And that's part of what what one of his teachings. It's neat stuff. It's really neat stuff.

SPEAKER_02 45:31

No, it's really neat. I think he knew his lane. Okay, yeah. Someone was coming back to it. Okay, because I remember I've read something about the one that the spirits were fighting for attention, so it was that one. Yeah, okay. It was definitely that one. I was okay, very interesting. So we so we're the physical vessel that the spirits are fighting attention for. Okay. I mean, that was it. I mean, it kind of does feel that way. There's some sense to it. You feel more compelled to do not compel, but you feel the urge, I will say, to do good or do something bad. Um, like I want to just curse out jobless making me feel stupid, for example. That's more the shout-out. How they make me feel bad about my own podcast. Nah, nah. I I'm I'm pretty secured. If I was me, I was uh, you know, I like to do the bad ones, those are more interesting. Believe it or not, I'm not gonna do the good ones. You know what the good ones are, they're boring people. Okay, I'm not gonna do that one. You should know what that one is. If you don't know what good is, God help you. Uh you know, be kind, you know, and say nice things and mean it. That's the key. Mean it. Mean it.

SPEAKER_00 46:38

Mean it. Yes, I know.

SPEAKER_02 46:40

You know, something like you know, something like that. Simple stuff, people. I know some of you don't want to do that. You love to troll and to be contrarians just to get on people's nerves. Don't get me wrong, I have to urge to troll too. Um it's fun, I get it. But you know, but anyway, but sometimes you gotta be kind, just be serious, be an adult. I know the millennials and Gen Z hate that word, they condemn that word like it's a double itself. But that's that's part of life. I don't know if you want to be a favorite child. I mean, I'm happy I'm grown up because the stuff I see now is oh, I'm happy I'm older now because I because the tape they got for kids are junk. So I'm happy I'm growing up on that one. That's just me personally. But uh, but you know, if you want to go back in time, it'll never be the same, people, no matter what. You can be 60-year-old, 60 years old watching, I don't know, Looney Tunes. Yeah, you may feel some similar happy feeling to it, but you know, you know, you might think about the episode differently, you might think deeper about it. Okay? You know, instead of just uh ha ha ha ha, you know, you just whack the guy with a big old oversized hammer, that's ridiculous. I don't know how a skinny person could carry such a super large hammer just hit with it, okay? You know, you might just say, oh, that doesn't make sense, or you might get more critical. It's not gonna be the same. We change two people, you know. We forget that sometimes, but I know I derailed a little bit based on car or cartoons or things like that.

SPEAKER_00 48:11

I derailed too. That's what I do. Yeah, yeah. Hey, can I throw a throw one more concept at you? So, this book that this isn't the concept, but I'm sure we'll talk about it a little bit later. Okay, every author thinks their book is is great. I'm one of them. It's a great book, okay? It's thick, though. And so some people are daunted. It's like, I don't want to read that. It's thick. It's 13 essays. You know, you don't have to read them all in a week. You read one. Might take you a week to read one, it's fine. There's a lot of ideas in there, and people think about them, and you know, they like some, they don't like some, whatever. Well, the I'd say half of the essays kind of point, I don't explicitly say it, especially like I'm going to in a minute, but they kind of point towards this one point and that I wanted the reader to come up with on their own. If you come up with it on your own, it's yours. If I tell it to you, it's not, you know, it's like, ah, he thinks that, whatever. But if you if you come up with it, it's like, yeah, wow, look at that. I figured that out. That's what I tried to do here.

SPEAKER_02 49:17

But I'm gonna before you do, I want to say to for the adults, the real adults here, figure it out, get his dang book, okay? Get it, all right. He's not the most capitalistic person that I've met. He's borderline on the free, you know. Yeah, actually, it's free. Yeah, that's the thing. It's free, free, free. So if you don't want to pay a damn thing except for your time, maybe your brains, you probably pay for your brain cells, but you know, hey.

SPEAKER_00 49:55

This is $26.99. That's not free if you want a real book. And I had someone who who actually she bought an ebook. I think I used to have them at $6.99. Right now they're $2.99. She bought an ebook and she got back to me later and said, you know what, I'm buying this book because I've been underlining so many things. I wanted a real book to underline it in. So, I mean, yeah. So, but yes, I also do have a free PDF on my website, and we'll talk about that later. But I want to get talk about this point. Yeah, and that is okay.

Humanity As A Living Superorganism

SPEAKER_00 50:30

So there's there's a different way of looking at things. Here, let's let's start with let's start with a bee. So we we look at a bee or a beehive as a collection of bees, a bee colony, I guess is a better word. But there's another way of looking at a bee colony. Look at it as an animal in itself. You get close to it, what's it do? It'll attack you. What happens if you get close to like a mountain lion? It'll probably attack you, right? Oh, that's what beehives do, right? They all kind of act together, they work as one unit. They're they're they're you know, they're they will save things for the winter, you know, they'll get all this honey together in the spring, in the summer, and the fall, and then in the winter they live off the honey. In the in the winter time it gets cold, and so they're all beating their wings to make heat. You know, they they are a creature. Let's think about, or so that's one thing. It's like let's try another one. How about this one? My body or your body. It's they say it's like a trillion cells. You take one cell, let's say from my eyeball, what's it do? It looks at things, I guess. It doesn't know what it sees, it just looks at things. And you take a cell, let's maybe on the heel of my foot, what's it do? Well, it keeps the inside in and the outside out. That's mostly what it does, I think. And it connects to all the other cells around them. Okay. They have totally different functions, right? Well, these trillion cells all have these different functions, but they together make up my body. And I am one creature. Okay. So we have the bees make up one creature, a beehive. My cells make up one creature. Oh, that's me. People make up one creature. Think of that one. That's called humanity. Okay. Now, the cells don't know what I'm talking about right now. They don't know that I'm getting hungry. Some of them know that, but most of them don't know that I'm going to go get a cheeseburger later. They don't know that. They don't know that I like cheeseburgers, right? They don't know that, you know, maybe I want to run a race or something like that. They just know I connect to these other guys and we keep the inside in and the outside out. That's what they, that's what the skin cells know, right? So just like we individuals don't understand what humanity, the creature, is up to. We don't know what it's doing. You can look, we have the history books, and you can look at history and you can see it's actually moved. It's moved. There has been progress in history. You know what? 2,000 years ago there was a king or a bunch of kings, and we all just did whatever they said, right? We had no say. They wanted, you know, it's tax time. What do they do? The soldiers come in, they rummage through all your stuff and take whatever they want. There's no recourse. They just take it, right? So slowly, we, you know, throughout the centuries, we've developed, you know, freedoms. It's like now all of a sudden we have representative government, now we can vote, now we can decide what we want to do for a living. We have time off now. We only work eight hours a day or maybe less in the soon in the near future. And we get to screw around and do other things like watch sports or paint pictures or read books. What kind of that's incredible progress. So you look at humanity, that is the creature. So, okay. So if you think of, let's say, I was pretend I'm a running a marathon, I've never run one, I can't do it. But if I could, I was running a marathon, and I have some cells on the bottom of my foot in the skin cells, and I'm running, and my shoes don't fit right, and I'm starting to get a blister. My cells are getting pissed off. They're getting really pissed off. It's like we're getting squished. That guy won't stop. You know, it's just, or they don't, they don't even know there's a guy. They're just thinking, it's just, it's awful in here. It's hot. You know, it's never hot like this. It's hot. I'm getting squished all the time. It never goes away. Usually we get time to rest. And and and now we have this blister forming. And next thing you know, the rip blister rips off. And all these cells die. They're dead. And the runner is still running. And he, let's say he finishes the marathon. Let's say he comes in second place and he's happier and crap. I came in second place, the Boston Marathon. I'm so happy. It's like all these cells, you know, they all carried around all the way to the to the to the end line, but these ones died, right? Well, that's just like humanity and history, okay? In that civilizations die. People are wiped out. The Tibetans, what happened to Tibetan culture? It was beautiful, it's gone, right? What happened to the Jews in in Poland? Oh, it was beautiful, it's gone. But humanity is still moving forward. And something that at the cell level, the cells don't understand this whole marathon deal, just like we don't understand tragedy when it happens. You know, and these massive social historical tragedies, they don't make any sense at our level. But at humanity's level, that's a different story. We don't even know where it's going. That's really fascinating to me. And that's how I see the world. And one part I forgot to say, but it works is like, you know, I'm gonna die, you're gonna die. A hundred years from now, no one's gonna remember either of us. This book, a hundred years from now, they probably won't remember this. Your podcast, they probably won't remember that, right? Someone might have your name or mine written down on their genealogical table, but maybe not. Maybe your line will die out, you know? And so we die, but humanity continues. It's like just like all the cells in my body, they live, they die, the body continues. And and I, there's not one cell here in my body that was there 20 years ago. Every one of them is new, and it's still me. It's a totally different way of looking at the world.

SPEAKER_02 56:44

Yep. It is both amazing and pretty morbid at the same time, but it's still the truth.

You Are Forgotten So Become Great

SPEAKER_00 56:51

It's yeah, see, that's the thing. Some people say that. So I gave a speech at Toastmasters, and the whole point of the speech was look, you are not important. You are not important. You're gonna die, and everybody's gonna forget everything you ever did. It doesn't matter. But but that's that's not morbid and it's not depressing. What if you have this this this type of of feeling, or at least this this outlook, what does it mean? How do you live? Well, what it means is your job is to become the best at whatever find out what your skill is, your gifts from God, and become the best at it you can. Why? Because let's say I invent some rocket ship that goes to Mars. I do it instead of Elon. I did it. Guess what? Humanity is the better off for it. Or I made this great song, the best song of the year. Humanity will be singing this in a hundred years. It made all of us better, right? Whatever achievements we can do, we are contributing to humanity. And the other thing we can do is we help others around us to become the best they can be. Once you understand that it's not about me, it's not about you, it's about us, then our whole focus in life can change. And it's towards becoming great and helping everyone else get great.

SPEAKER_02 58:19

So correct. That's what the book's about. Right. No, you did say that. You did point that out in the readings that I remember very clearly. So, oh, okay. It's gonna take some time for me to grasp that, but I no, I do get it. I mean, it's not about me, me, me, me, me. It's do the best you can with limited time you have, right?

SPEAKER_00 58:36

Yeah. Do the best you can, become great. Become great.

SPEAKER_02 58:41

You know, and then well, if you're a crappy person, well, that's good news. People forget about you. You know.

SPEAKER_00 58:50

I mean, um, but I do believe all of us can be great at something, and all of us can really contribute. To me, contribute it means that everyone's better as a result of what you've done, right?

SPEAKER_02 59:02

That's true. Yeah, I'm not just built, yeah, do something great that benefits humanity. And humanity can move forward without our limited existence.

SPEAKER_00 59:12

So your podcast may be doing now. I'm I'm here, I'll get all grandiose. Look, I'm just a dude, right? I'm not so some genius, none of that crap, not a saint, nothing, just a guy who wrote a book, okay? But let's pretend I was something special. Your and my message actually resonated with 10 people out there and it changed their lives. Let's pretend that's what your podcast just did. And those 10 people changed their lives, and maybe people around them start changing their lives because they taught them this message. And then all of a sudden, you know, 100 years from now or a thousand years from now, everybody's thinking this way. Right? I don't know. I don't know where it's going. I don't know. We can't know. But that's what I'm saying. So, yes, you you are creating a ripple. You are, I am, which is going to affect all the rest of us.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:05

Yep, no, that's well said. Well said. My head is slowly wrapping around that. But so hey, I'm just being honest, but uh, you're right though. That's that's why it's slowly wrapping around it. It's uncomfortable, but that's like truths. Truths are uncomfortable. But hey, you know, because let's be real. A lot of people are egotistical. You told egomaniac that, you know, let's say, what? Yeah, but I mean I mean, I mean, I mean, let's just use uh I'm just us big picture history for less for a second, right? We only know very few people out of vast time period. Yes, so how many people were forgotten? Oh, countless, countless.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:48

Well, even the ones where you remember forgotten. No one knows what Caligula, you know, what his favorite dish was, if he liked to laugh at jokes or sing songs. We don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:59

True, true, true. Yeah, so like I said, he's right though. You you could argue in the comment section if you want. That's your remark. But um, so it it is it is true though. So I I'm not gonna argue. I feel couple babba but the but I'm not gonna argue because it's it's it's it's it's it's just truth. It's just objective truth.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:22

The basis of all suffering, I believe, and maybe this one I could be wrong, because you never should use the word all, but I'm gonna try it, is selfishness. That's the basis of everything. Everything from selfishness, you get greed, you get you get lust, you get shit. I can't, I'm thinking of the seven deadly sins, I can't think of them all now. But but everything comes from selfishness. Sloth was the next one.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:49

Pride. Oh, pride, pride, that's a big one. Wow, it's all selfishness.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:55

Yes, selfishness. And from all that is what cut is what what causes other people to be unhappy. Is I can make other other people unhappy by doing these seven deadly sins, any of them. That will make other people unhappy, right? And it's all selfishness. And and I'm becoming more and more convinced that the real currency of, let's say, the future, it's all about love. And that's what the Christianity teaches. It teaches that it's all about love. And love is this whole thing about helping each other along. We all help each other, and as a result, we're we're bringing humanity forward. Love is the currency.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:36

Yep. All right. Well, listeners and viewers, I hope you just pay attention to that. I know the framing seems to be the jokey, maybe to some of you more of it, but I really hope you really get the wisdom from it, people. I I asked how you get at least something out of it, some devalue of this, because this this is this is really great stuff. I got like I said, um, the only thing I did to service myself was to like speed research 10 and 11. I should have re-read those a little more slowly. I feel like I didn't understand those tools. But eight and nine, I already had a great grasp on what was going on with those.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:09

Yeah, those are the religion ones, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:10

Yeah, yeah. So, but I'm still about I'm gonna eventually read the whole thing and hope. And all I want to say is I will try. And I was gonna say is try. I want to get this guest back. Yeah, because this is we could definitely do more of this for sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:26

Oh, that's for sure. I could talk forever.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:28

So that's so um all I'm gonna say is I'm gonna start doing a wrap up because you really gave more than enough, I believe. Okay, and then I mean, this this is a great, I think it's a great end right there.

Get The Book And Leave Feedback

SPEAKER_02 1:03:40

Love, people, love. I know, I know some guys, oh that's duty, that's yeah, whatever. It's trite, it's trite. Yeah, yes. So same old thing. Yeah, but people go go to skepticapress.com, go there, go support him. All right, go right there. I'm gonna spell that for you. Oh, yeah, it's spelled funny. Yeah, go ahead. Sure, it is spelled s k e p t i k a p-r-e s dot com.co and the that's one way, and the other way is just to type in John Bliss, and you could probably spell both of those.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:21

John has an H in it, John Bliss essays. Type those three in. You'll find you'll find the book everywhere, and you'll find the website. The website describes all the essays and what what they're about. And you can also get a free PDF there if you're you're if you want to read it in a PDF, or you can it has links where you can go buy it on Amazon or or you could buy it right from the website as well.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:43

Yep. But if you wanted to permeate more in your memory, definitely get the book version because all this digital craziness will, you know, it does message our memories. There's now scientific proof of that, which I already knew that, but science slowly catches up. Okay, let me stop and act like I'm the special thing. I love feedback. I love, okay, okay. I mean, let me humble myself a bit. I'm a little bit opposite, as you can see. I'm a little fueled by ego, yeah, but I mean, I guess it's good in a way because you you're kind of motivated, even though it's limited, but hey, something's better than nothing there. I'm just like organized religion. Something is better than nothing there. You know, but I think people should have an individualized spiritual experience. That's just my personal recommendation. I'm not a priest or anything, I don't got religious authority. Just gonna say that out there, but just yeah, but all services people just just support, yeah, support them. This is a great essays are great read, and they're not they're not dull. They they're not dull at all. They're really not those thought that's thought-provoking, and that's why I love I actually love thought-provoking stuff. And they had challenges me 80 that expands my horizons, it's great. Not you know Nicki Minaj shake her big ass, 80 miles power. It's good eye candy, but after a while, that's just okay, great. I know some of you like that, but you know, if you want to expand your, you know, expand your mind to think differently and destroy your little box, yep, try that. It's a great read. Or go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:17

Or just remember, you're you probably will die when you're in your 80s or 90s. You're gonna be on your deathbed and you're gonna be thinking, I wish I would have. Always keep that in mind. And if you had an idea now of what is most important, then you're least, you're a lot less likely to regret what you didn't do when you were old and dying. Okay? You've got one life, live it, but you gotta know what to do.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:48

Yep. Well said. Well said. So now this is a gutsy question. Anything else you want to add before I really wrap this up? No, I think that's it. That's it. All right. So, my listeners and viewers, if for the review, you you can rate it Apple Podcasts or Spotify. If you're rated with a five-star, give one reason why this episode is great at least. And if it's one to four stars, how can this podcast improve? Okay, you just I don't need one reason. I don't need an empty compliment or insult. I will ignore both. Yes, even empty compliments. I know I'm good. Yes, I'm gonna be the ego one here. Yeah, I'm gonna be the more bad level example here. That was a joke, but no, but just give that because there's feedback I actually do take very seriously. I've improved lighting, I've improved quality, I've improved a bunch of stuff because of feedback. Feedback does matter, people. And one more thing, the most important part. I always have linked to some free materials I think is good for you to be more biased, straight, you don't read instead of just getting slanted news of the left, right, and the center. I always have those links at the bottom, especially the new paper. And I'll be having more. You can start seeing more all sides as well to check how is your source biased? Okay, and I'm kind of linked with them now, so it's it's a great, it's a great source. I think you need to expand more, be a little more aggressive, but hey, something's better than nothing there. So at least it's doing good work right there. So, now for the true finale, and you wish for his host to shut up at this point. Whenever you listen to this podcast, you have a blessed day, afternoon, or night.