Trash Tuesday w/ Esther Povitsky & Khalyla Kuhn - Soul (Boom) Searching w/ Rainn Wilson
Episode Date: July 23, 2024The delightful Rainn Wilson comes into the stu & everything suddenly feels like it’s going to be OK. He regails us with past stories about life, love & a horrifying testical surgery to keep ...things on brand. Rainn tells us why he prefers Gen Z over Millennials, thoughts on the new Office Reboot (CLIP) and why everyone should cuddle a donkey. THIS EPISODE IS SPONSORED BY: *DRAFTKINGS - New players, start playing with just FIVE BUCKS and get ONE HUNDRED BACK INSTANTLY in Casino Credits. Download the app and use code TRASHTUESDAY to book your one-way ticket to fun with DraftKings Casino! The crown is yours. More Rainn Wilson Soul Boom YouTube: ‪@SoulBoom‬ Instagram:  / rainnwilson   00:00 Welcome Rainn Wilson to Trash Tuesday! 01:00 Rainn Wilson is Here & Talks About The Office! 04:00 Rainn Understands Trash Tuesday is Not High Brow 05:00 Rainn’s Sweet Farm & Sweet Animals 10:30 Rainn Wilson’s Testicical Surgery (in Detail) 15:00 Rainn & His Wife Growing Together, Not Apart 25:00 Is There Something to be Said for Just Accepting Life? 36:00 Khalyla Tells Dwight Schrute about Her Murderous Uncle(s) 42:00 Rainn & The Midwest 45:00 We Discuss Malls 50:00 Rainn Wilson’s Feelngs About Millennials 57:30 Maybe We Should Be Watching & Learning from Gen Z FOLLOW US: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/itstrashtuesday Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@itstrashtuesday  Listen to Trash: Trash Tuesday Podcast iTunes Audio Feed: https://bit.ly/TrashTuesdayPod Trash Tuesday Podcast Spotify Audio Feed: https://bit.ly/TTPodAudio  More Esther: Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@esthermonster Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/esthermonster More Khalyla: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/khalamityk Tigerbelly Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@TigerBelly  Production: Stella Young: https://www.instagram.com/estellayoung Tiny Legends, LLC: https://www.instagram.com/tinylegends.prod  Shot and Edited By: Guy Robinson: https://www.instagram.com/grobfps Sean Wanless: https://www.instagram.com/soundandshutter  Art Direction and Social Media: Ariel Moreno: https://www.instagram.com/jade.rabbit.cce  Branding & Music: Branding & Logo: https://www.instagram.com/jason_cryer Theme Song: https://www.instagram.com/bobbyleelive Banana Break Song by: Can Nguyen: https://www.candyedits.com
Transcript
Discussion (0)
After years of fine print contracts and getting ripped off by overpriced wireless providers,
if we've learned anything, it's that there's always a catch. So when I heard that for a
limited time all Mint Mobile wireless plans are $15 a month when you purchase a three-month plan,
I thought, where's the catch? But after talking to them, it all made sense. There isn't one.
Mint Mobile's secret sauce is that they sell wireless services online. They don't have retail
stores or salespeople. Instead, they deliver premium phone plans directly to you.
As you guys know, our friend Rick Glassman, he uses Mint Mobile.
I learned about Mint Mobile through George Kimmel.
George is a busy guy.
He takes the most business calls.
And the fact that not a single call is ever dropped.
And you can use your own phone with any Mint Mobile plan
and bring your phone number along with all of your existing contacts.
Say goodbye to your overpriced wireless plans. Mint Mobile is here to rescue you with plans
starting at $15 a month. And all plans come with high-speed data and unlimited talk and text
delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. That is such a steal. To get this new customer
offer and your new three-month unlimited wireless plan for just $15 a month, go to mintmobile.com slash Tuesday. That's mintmobile.com slash Tuesday. Cut your wireless bill to $15 a month at mintmobile.com slash Tuesday.
$45 upfront payment required equivalent to $15 a month. New customers on first three month plan only. Speed slower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Additional taxes, fees and restrictions apply statement mobile for details
it's fine it's trash tuesday we can talk about whatever we want you want to talk about like
i want to talk about cysts or noodles or yes that that i know whatever you know we'll get
we'll get to the cysts but i wanted to ask you about your animals because i'm really
i'm kind of we can talk about my ball operation. Oh yeah, let's talk about your ball operation.
Say more.
Today's guest is the host of the Soul Boom podcast, the writer of the Soul Boom book.
And you may know him from The Office and many other hilarious TV and film projects.
We welcome Rainn Wilson.
I feel welcome. I feel welcome.
Do you have any hot thoughts on the Office reboot?
Yeah, I do, and this is what you're gonna clip.
And this will get like 17 million views
because I'm talking about the Office.
I did not mean that.
Yeah, I think it's awesome.
I think it's awesome.
I think that, listen, Greg Daniels, who created The Office, he's like as big a mensch as you'll ever want to meet.
Like just nicest guy, always reachable, no ego, you know, really creative, collaborative.
And, you know, they, yes, we stumbled onto something with The Amazing Cast and Dunder Mifflin and stuff like that. But the idea of doing comedy in that way where it's a mockumentary, which has been done before.
There's plenty of mockumentaries like Spinal Tap and, you know, so many other shows.
But the idea of doing a workplace mockumentary and at a different kind of workplace
with a different cast with the same tone.
Yeah.
I think it's great.
Like what, there's no harm in it.
And why not have five different workplaces
that you're documenting and the dysfunction
and the awkward silences and the lunacy,
but it also kind of reflects contemporary culture in a way.
So I'm a fan.
I think it's great.
I don't think that Dwight Schrute
would ever show up to this.
I think they're talking about a paper company
in the Midwest.
Like, why would he go?
Like part of the office is like,
it's really like we try and keep it
like as much like the real world as possible. Some zany things's really like we try and keep it like as much like the
real world as possible as some zany things happen but we you know try and keep it like grounded
grounded yeah exactly so dwight showing up to the midwest doesn't really doesn't make sense but
no i'm excited for it though i i feel like it'll be exciting to see
a new version but from that taste and that tone, like you said.
Yeah.
And I think they'll have a lot of comparisons to The Office.
Oh, it's not as funny as The Office.
That's okay.
It doesn't have to be.
If it's two thirds as funny as The Office, it's still going to be funnier than anything
else on TV.
Sorry.
I agree.
Sorry.
I agree.
Sorry.
Rain, you're a very profound human being and you have a lot of deep, amazing, wonderful thoughts about the world and spirituality.
But this show, we're a little bit dumb.
It's trash Tuesday.
We can talk about whatever we want.
Do you want to talk about like cysts or noodles or whatever?
We'll get to the cysts.
But I wanted to ask you about your animals because I'm really, I'm kind of.
We can talk about my ball operation.
Oh, yeah.
Let's talk about your ball operation.
Say more.
I had an operation on my balls once.
And I don't know why that came to mind.
I'm just sitting here.
You're being it's trash Tuesday. We're not going to mind. I'm just sitting here. Just us.
You're being, it's trash Tuesday.
We're not going to be profound.
You want to ask about my pigs.
I do.
I love pot-bellied pigs is why.
We have two pot-bellied pigs.
That's what I heard, yeah.
My wife is really super into animals, and it's just been her dream to have a menagerie.
And, you know, when you make a lot of money in TV, you get to buy your wife a menagerie of animals oh that's so sweet that's like the best use of tv money i've ever heard
so we have two pigs um the baron von snortington and amy okay and they're both about 200 pound
vietnamese pot-bellied pigs so they're they're pretty big. Amy is like exactly like her name sounds.
She's sweet and adorable.
And she comes up and she kind of prances.
And she's dainty.
And you can pet her.
And she lies down.
And like you could tie ribbons in her hair and it would work.
And Snorty is just like his name sounds.
He's just like a bull in a china shop.
And he'll charge you sometimes.
And he'll like snort.
And he does this thing where he clicks.
If he doesn't like something, he goes.
And I'm like, snorty, stop snarfing at me.
And then they live with a little peahen, a female peacock that my wife rescued that was just showed up living at her horse barn.
And so she brought it over.
So the pigs and then she bullies the pigs.
So Alma, the peahen, will land and like take their food.
And if they go, if Snorty goes like that,
then she'll just like poke at his eyes.
Okay, now I have to ask, what came first?
Like you being a farmer or Schrute Farms?
Was that written based on your interests?
No, when I was cast on The Office,
I think I was living in Van Nuys.
Okay, okay, okay.
The mattress capital of the world.
Yeah, yeah, the auto mattress capital of the world. Yeah, yeah.
The auto glass capital of the world.
If you need your window changed out
and you need a futon,
head to scenic Van Nuys, California.
No, there wasn't a zero farming going on.
I had some farmers in my background.
So when I first met with Greg
and the writers of The Office,
we just keep bringing it back to The Office, don't you?
I didn't mean to, but you're doing it.
Then I brought in all these photos of like my family
and I had a lot of my Norwegian immigrant families
from Wisconsin and Minnesota
and showed them pictures of them and stuff like that.
Wait, I have family.
My family is all from Minnesota too.
We're Finnish.
Oh yeah?
Yeah.
Okay, so you brought in
pictures of your norwegian family and they're farmers yeah and they were farmers and that got
that kind of triggered the idea of maybe dwight having a farming background greg's great
grandparents were farmers in poland and actually grew beets so he brought that in and um but then
this was later my wife has always loved animals and we have a little bit of land out in our kind of little town in California where we live.
And she also rides horses.
But then the big surprise is that we also have a rescued donkey named Chili Beans.
I've been going down a donkey rabbit hole.
You mean a donkey
hole a donkey hole and i have not my entire algorithm right now is just pure donkey dude
dude i'm with you donkeys are precious they're like proof of the existence of god because they
are so adorable they're loyal loyal. They're smart.
And they're emotional too.
Yeah.
You just kind of hug the out of them.
They're the best. You can cuddle a donkey.
Oh, you can cuddle a donkey.
And after they tell you how they feel.
What?
Yeah.
It's like they have, it's just, it's just, I, please get on the donkey algorithm.
Like it'll change your life.
So chili beans, braids for for my wife like my wife pulls up
it's like and then my wife is leaving and then he she braise till that she's leaving like mournful
like she cries yeah oh that's so cute and they have the big pot belly they They got like the round pot belly. You just go. Just their proportions are like comical and so endearing.
Just donkeys are everything.
They're really good.
Yeah, they're really good.
I think Shrek gave them a bad rap.
You think?
In all the Prospector movies.
But the, yeah.
So, and then we also have a zonkey, which is a half zebra, half donkey.
You can do that.
Are they sterile too? Is that legal? legal you can do that they're sterile yeah
they can't breed other zonkeys because they were manufactured in a zonkey lab are all hybrid
animals sterile typically like i think so i think mules are too yeah yeah well i should announce
that um my well last week i had a i was rehab a raven, my second raven that I was rehabbing and he flew away.
This week I had a song sparrow and sad news, he passed this morning.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
That's okay.
That's really hard.
I know.
Is it one that had like flown into your window and then you took him in a shoebox and fed him milk or something?
Bobby called me frantically three days ago and was like, there's a dead bird in the back.
I was like, if it's dead, you know, do something about it.
Give it a funeral.
He did.
And he was like, no, you have to come collect a dead body for me.
And got there.
It wasn't dead.
And so.
Why would Bobby call you to collect a dead body?
Because that's what Bobby does.
That's literally all I know.
It sounds like that's what you do.
You collect dead bodies.
But I feel like that's my only use in this life right now
is just collecting, you know, scraps.
Is your farm like only for purposes
of just loving and appreciating animals?
Are you like growing food?
Is there any sort of...
We have an orchard and we have macadamia nut trees on it.
We didn't plant it.
We bought this place about four years ago.
And then for some reason,
they didn't produce any nuts last year.
So, but then we,
they're really hard to process macadamia nuts.
So we just give them to friends.
You know, we just give bags
of nuts to friends yeah because what do you if you process them that would mean what you'd have
to take them to a processing facility cracking a macadamia nut is like impossible and then you
have to like dry roast them and all that stuff so we're not we're not really uh doing that okay so
we can get to the deeper stuff now i had some we real questions for him. We don't have to get deep.
We really don't.
We can't stick with donkeys and macadamia all day.
We didn't even go to my ball operation.
We just completely skipped by that.
Balls, balls, balls, balls.
Was this young?
What age was this?
Recent?
Young.
So I was out of acting school,
and I was doing this Shakespeare bus and truck tour.
And it was when I first got together with my wife and I was 24 at the time.
And I noticed that one of my scrotal spheres was slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly, ever, ever, ever, ever ever ever so slowly growing in size just one
of the two scrotals because there's two oh okay so testicles are what's in the scrotal sack right
one of my scrotal sacks was just getting ever so slightly
bigger larger yeah yeah and and i'm like oh, what's going on? And then like,
we're doing this bus and truck tour. So we're always changing costumes and stuff. And a couple
of the guys in the cast like saw my ball and they're like, you've got one big ball. It wasn't
like that big. It was like, you know, one was like normal size and one was bigger than normal
size. They have that natural appearance of like hanging, like kind of one lower than normal size. But don't they have that natural appearance of like hanging like kind of one lower
than the other anyway?
So you would.
I mean, you're really.
I mean, that's how I've seen them hang.
One was like,
usually one hangs a little lower for guys.
But one was like a golf ball
and one was like a wiffle ball.
Oh.
Size.
So twice it had, no, very, very slowly.
So that's the weird thing.
You're kind of like, is that getting bigger?
And like, yeah, it is.
So I go into the urologist and like,
you have this thing called a hydroseal,
which is this membrane inside the scrotum sac is leaky.
It's just leaky and water's coming in and not going out.
So I had to, they took a needle and he's like, I can drain it, but it's just going to fill up again.
And I was like, well, let's go ahead and drain it.
And he took this needle and put it in and went like that and took out this liquid that had been in there.
Oh, this is satisfying for me to hear.
Is it?
Yeah, I got my titty drained.
I'll tell you about draining my titties in a bit.
Okay.
This is trashy.
And then he put it like, he had like a bedpan and he like went like,
and it like,
I never forget the sound of like my scrotal fluid echoing in this bedpan
how much did they take out i forget how many it was like eight ounces or something like that
it was a lot it was like a beer yeah it was and and then um they uh um and then they uh
took it away and then i saw two of the nurses talk and they were like you could tell they were going like
that was so disgusting
I could see them like whispering like kind of
pointing at me and like I'm like
I'm 24 really self conscious
and like just had a needle in my balls
and I was like
and anyways I had to it filled up
again I'm like oh shit so I had to schedule
a surgery I had ball surgery it's awful
is it like a cyst where you actually have to remove this, the whole sack then?
Or so that it doesn't like refill up?
Yeah, they had to, they had to slice it open and take, take out the membrane itself.
The casing of it.
Yes, the casing of it, the inner membrane.
And then after that, everything has been a hundred percent fine.
No problem.
But boy, going out of the hospitals, because they've operated on there,
it was like grapefruits.
And I had to walk like this out of,
now you can use the wide shot,
out of the hospital into a wheelchair
and get wheeled out.
And I had to sleep like this and for a couple days it was
it was awful and my wife who's still with me and went through this with me was at my side and
bringing me soup and this is early this is the early 90s yeah this is when we first got together
you guys have been together so long so long before you were born absolutely 100. A hundred percent, 29, 34 years we've been together. What is that?
Like, how do you do that? What's your advice on that? Well, it's, it hasn't been easy and it's
been very challenging. I would say it's the most challenging thing I've ever done in my life is
try and keep a marriage together. Really? That's actually, I'm so delighted to hear that
because it, I don't know,
it's just nice that you can make it happen
and it's not like, oh, it's perfect.
It's like, no, it takes work.
Yeah.
That's inspiring.
Yeah, it's super hard.
You know, you change, they change,
circumstances change.
You know, one of the hardest times we went through as a couple was uh you know we had in close succession i booked the
office and like a year before the office like i don't know if you remember this but back this was
like 20 years ago when you got your
credit card bill, they would enclose a check so you could write a check and it would go
onto your credit card.
Oh, so I was paying my rent and putting my rent on credit cards because I was so broke.
Like that's so, I feel like that's so dangerous.
I think they did make it illegal or something because I haven't seen those since. But I, you know, thankfully, my wife is very she's very into
we're both into improving ourselves and into therapy. We're both deeply curious about how we
tick. We're we're curious about spirituality. And, you know, we connect on a lot of different
levels. We don't just play with animals together. We, we meditate together and we work on a nonprofit together and we travel together and,
you know, it's a real, it's a real partnership. And I'm so, I'm so grateful for that. But,
you know, it, every, every couple of years, there's going to be a new set of hurdles for
not just you as a person, but the relationship, you know? I can really relate to this. I mean, I wasn't with Bobby for 34 years, but we were together
for an entire decade. And when we first met, we were living in a two bedroom apartment.
We had six animals. Everything was crowded, very uncomfortable. And I, and I remember the moment when he was like, oh, I've now made enough for
us to move and buy this great home.
And I, I think both of us were under this delusion that somehow like the little like
fragmented parts or fractured parts of our relationship would improve by the time we
moved into this new space.
Now the animals had a yard.
Now we weren't in this cramped area and the podcast was doing better and we were actually
making money and his career was going where he wanted it to go.
And that's honestly where the beginning, that's where it started to end for us.
It was, it was almost as if like the smallness of our lives sort of kept us really
close emotionally and always interacting and engaging and the bigness of the new house like
there was more of like this i don't know this distance and kind of this like cold draft that
kind of entered our relationship there's a whole new set of pressures too, isn't there? Like he's touring more, there's more endorsements,
more is being asked of him and asked of you
and you become more famous as well.
And then, yeah.
And by the way, for the listeners,
like I'm not complaining about fame or money.
It's just a reality that it has its own pressures.
It's a change.
It's just a change. More than pressures. I think it's like, reality that it has its own pressures. It's a change. It's just a change.
I think it's like,
I,
okay.
I'm not going to pretend like,
Oh,
I don't want to be rich and famous and like hot.
But I also think that those things are a little bit of a curse.
They come with problems.
You know,
like we've talked before about like the girl who's just always been really
beautiful it's like well then that that has problems too yeah then like every guy wants you
and like wow that sucks no but like it just comes with its own problems and I think it wasn't until
being in this business that I realized like oh I mean this is the most cliche thing but it's like
oh I always thought that like success would solve all my problems and then you like get the things you wanted and then you realize
you're still you and you still have all the same problems and so that is like a whole explosion
that you have to realize and deal with like that's you know that was more like a solo
thing for me not within my relationship but and also just to hear like that you guys have been
together so long and there's you change and you grow and that makes things harder here and easier here and whatever.
Like, I think that's so cool because a lot of the conversation is if it's not working, move on or like if it doesn't serve you.
Yeah, that's and that is that is a really dangerous way of thinking about a relationship. Like if you're in, it's, it's so, it's such a tricky balance, right? Cause if you're in a toxic relationship and it's really holding you down and
making adversely affecting you and your self esteem and your health, like of course get out of it.
But there is a kind of a contemporary kind of thing like, Hey, it's not working for me. I'm
not feeling this right now. You've got a kid or two, you've been together five or six years.
There's been a death in the family.
There's some financial difficulties and people just, it's easy to bail.
But guess what?
You'll just get in another relationship and then you're going to meet Matt with the same
set of circumstances.
So you might as well work through it the first time, you know?
Yeah, I absolutely.
Like, I feel like I saw a lot of people in COVID break up and then I saw them get back together, which I thought was sort of sweet.
Like, oh, I'm glad to see people go out and realize, like you said, it's like, I don't know, your problems follow you everywhere.
I also love the idea, though, that like I think there, you know, it is threatening when people grow and change and you're like, who did I marry? And I like this idea of like, okay, if you live this lifelong thing with someone, you can be six different versions of yourself, this ever evolving thing. And to sort of like accept that change without feeling so threatened about this like new version of your partner. Yeah. Well change every, every two, three, four years we go through different shifts,
right? Like you're probably very different now than you were three or four years ago. And then
three or four years before that you were kind of different. So how do you do that in a coupleship,
in a partnership? And how do you continue to stay curious and get, continue to want to get to know
your partner? Well, that's a great question. And it's, in fact, I was just
talking to my friend Mark about that this morning. I was like, and, and realize, cause you know,
part of, part of what I, is a benefit for me is I'm in 12 steps and that kind of forces you to
dig a little bit deeper about maybe why you do the things you do and how things, what things trigger you and what things have traumatized you.
And, and, but I've just always had this really deep curiosity about like rain.
Why do you do the things you do?
Like, why are you doing that?
Why do you always do this?
Why are these patterns happening?
How did your mom leaving, you know you doing that? Why do you always do this? Why are these patterns happening?
How did your mom leaving, you know, when you were to affect you, how did your relationship with your dad? Like, well, you know, I just have this like hunger to excavate that stuff. Some people are
very content to just not dig deep and, and that's great, but I've always been in, in, I haven't always been in therapy,
but I've, especially the last like 15, 18 years been really digging in therapy. I've done
intensives and retreats and, and 12 step. And I just, I just really want to, I want to improve
myself and I want to get to know myself better. Um, not improve myself in like a,
you know, uh, what's that guy, David Goggins, who's like runs 47 miles every morning.
Um, what is it?
Kill your inner bitch guy.
Yeah. And then, and like, not in like a Tony Robbins kind of like,
you can use it with your willpower. You can overcome. I'm not talking about that, but
just in, just in a, a deep curiosity to get to know myself and it goes more to uh the soul
boom podcast in the soul boom book which is it was it's always been even bigger for me just for me i
don't know why but i've always been that i've i was the nerdy kid it was like what's the meaning
of life you know like i was the pimply 12 year old, like, is there a God? How do we know?
And, um, you know, um, so I've, I've all always had a, a hunger for digging deeper into just
the human condition as well, um, as, as my own. So I've, I'm fortunate that I found a partner that
shares that same passion in holiday.
This podcast is sponsored by DraftKings.
Kalilah, in a world of slot reels and blackjack deals,
comes the must-play event of the summer from DraftKings Casino,
featuring non-stop action and an all-star cast of games,
including A-Lister, Loki's Luck, the summer blockbuster is one you won't want to miss.
We love DraftKings. Plus, new players can get $100 instantly in casino credits with just a $1
wager and all players get a blockbuster bonus every week. So sign up with code TRASHTUESDAY
and grab your popcorn. It's showtime on DraftKings casino gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER or in West
Virginia visit www.1800gambler.net in Connecticut help is available for problem gambling call
888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org please play responsibly 21 plus physically present in
Connecticut Michigan New Jersey Pennsylvania Westia only void in ontario eligibility and other restrictions apply new customers only one dollar wager to
earn 100 in non-withdrawable casino credits that expire in 168 hours terms at casino.draftkings.com
slash blockbuster i have this question that i don't necessarily know like how to frame because
i grew up in the philippines and you know it's a third world country very much like oppressed by
just colonization for 400 years or so right and there's a specific feeling not to say that the
Philippines doesn't come with its own problems or that but there's a specific feeling of joy
that I kind of see among people there And sometimes I attribute it to the not seeking and the not asking.
I attribute it to a very like simple acceptance, which, by the way, a lot of historical concept,
a lot of the historical context of that is like not good because they see Filipino people
is like, yeah, we accept everything, even like foreign invasion, whatever.
There's a lot of it to that. But there is a simple joy when I see like even their optimism,
even in the face of like abject poverty. A lot of my family still live in abject poverty.
And when I ask them, when they see someone like me who is constantly seeking to be better, who is always full of questions,
they don't understand it and they view me as a very like broken person.
Yeah.
That's a good question.
I think that's,
I think that's a very valid question.
You know,
if you meet people that kind of maybe live a simpler life, they're just content with what they have.
And, you know, and maybe God is large in their life and nature is large in their life and family is large in their life.
And that's enough. It's like God and nature and family.
And, you know, they have enough to eat and, you know, they don't need to kind of maybe maybe my
wiring is a specific cultural Western American thing that I'm kind of like
motivated to excavate and you know I'm sure that there have been and I know
that there have been times in my life that has made me more miserable but I
think I think for me I'm talking about myself a lot,
but you know what?
I'm on a guest on a podcast.
Yeah.
That's the time.
That's the time.
The great thing is, is like, I'm really pretty happy.
And I wasn't happy for most of my life.
But the last like 10 years, 10, 12, 14, 15 years, whatever, I've been really pretty blissfully
happy.
And so something's working, you know?
And yeah.
What does that feel like?
I know.
What is, I'm so curious.
Cause it's like, I feel fleeting moments of like, I like myself.
I like my life.
Yeah.
But then it all comes crashing down the next day.
And I'm having, you know, a very, you know, depressed couple weeks after that.
Like, what does it feel like to live in a sustained, like, feeling of, okay, I like this?
That's a great question.
And I think what you feel is entirely normal.
And I will say that it hasn't been necessarily sustained.
I will say that it's like four or five days out of the week,
but I'll take that.
That's really good.
It's an improvement.
It's a good ratio.
And so like yesterday I woke up and I was just a cranky bitch from the
get go. And I don't know why there was nothing that had come up that had like triggered me. I'm,
I'm healthy. My wife's healthy. My son's healthy. We have a lovely place to live, I've got enough money,
I've got interesting creative projects to work on,
and things are good, and I just,
and this goes back to soul boom a little bit,
and in the book I talk about the Buddha,
one of the, the number one teaching of the Buddha
is that life is suffering,
or that in life there is suffering.
And the word they used, he used for suffering back then of the Buddha is that life is suffering or that in life there is suffering.
And the word he used for suffering back then
was dukkha in the Sanskrit, which basically means
it translates most closely to anxious discontent.
So life is anxious discontent.
And that's what it was.
And so what I got to do is wake up in the morning
and like, God, I'm just so cranky and unhappy and dissatisfied with everything.
You know, I got a really cool acting job.
I'm going away in a few weeks to go do a cool acting job with some really great actors.
And this is awesome.
This is awesome news.
And yet yesterday I'm like, like I'm, I'm just, I'm anxiously discontent.
So what I get to do is notice it and go, oh, OK, there it is.
There it is.
My old friend, anxious, discontent.
There's the Dukkha life.
This is part of life.
Just see it, name it, own it, greet it.
Hi, friend.
How are you?
Anxious, discontent.
And then through that, you know, I I, you know, I went swimming and then I kind of meditated and I read a little bit and then, you know, did some other stuff and it was, and had a very, ultimately had a very positive day.
Um, and that's just, that's part of, that's part of the journey.
Um, but it's, uh, yeah, that's all I got.
Yeah.
I mean, no, that's, that's all I got. Yeah, I mean, no, that's a lot. That's a lot because I think what I'm hearing is that you cannot push away any of these spontaneous moments of feeling pretty cruddy in general, but that you can learn to name it, learn to identify it, and just kind of roll with it and be nice to yourself about it.
I love the ring of that anxious discontent.
I'm like, yeah, that sums up a lot for me.
Not to shout out Woody Allen, but in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, there's this one line
where Penelope Cruz calls it like chronic dissatisfaction.
And yeah, I think that that that is the root cause of a lot of like my younger feeling
of like turmoil where I'm like why can't I just I
have this now why can't I just be like happy with this now the scientist uh a social scientist
happiness expert Arthur Brooks talks about like it's not about like how it's like how can I be
happy how can I find happiness it's like you can have you can be happy seer, you know, you just, you can be a little bit happier. You can
learn about what makes you unhappy and just make little adjustments. And then it's just
incrementally, you can just get a little bit happier here and a little bit happier there.
There isn't kind of a thing of like, can you imagine the human existence where just like
living and like constant, like bliss and joy, like hardship, difficulty, sorrow,
displeasure, discontent, disappointment,
these are a part of the human condition.
And it's only experiencing those that we experience joy.
You know what I mean?
Like it's not about like eliminating dissatisfaction
and disappointment and sorrow and heartbreak,
you know, oh, I'm in sorrow, I'm in heartbreak,
like accept it and then that allows you to, oh, I'm in sorrow, I'm in heartbreak, like accept it.
And then that allows you to feel the joy on the other side.
So part of like living a more blissful life
filled with wellbeing is embracing
both sides of the spectrum.
The more you can embrace the natural difficulty
and heartbreak of just being a human being,
then the more experience with kind of joy and bliss you can have.
I had such a deep, hard lesson in this area, which I'm realizing recently, but basically
three years ago I had a pregnancy loss. And after that, I don't know if it's like my anxious avoidant
attachment manifesting or what it was, but I was like, maybe I don't want kids.
And I was so afraid to ever say out loud that I wanted kids after that.
And it wasn't until I just had a baby a few months ago where I'm like, oh, my God, I was able to face the truth, which was I did want to have a baby.
And I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to and so I
didn't let myself want it and my lesson after years of fine print contracts and getting ripped
off by overpriced wireless providers if we've learned anything it's that there's always a catch
so when I heard that for a limited time all mint mobile wireless plans are $15 a month when you
purchase a three-month plan, I thought,
where's the catch? But after talking to them, it all made sense. There isn't one. Mint Mobile's
secret sauce is that they sell wireless services online. They don't have retail stores or sales
people. Instead, they deliver premium phone plans directly to you. As you guys know, our friend Rick
Glassman, he uses Mint Mobile. I learned about Mint Mobile through George Kimmel. George is a
busy guy. he takes the
most business calls and the fact that not a single call is ever dropped and you can use your own phone
with any mint mobile plan and bring your phone number along with all of your existing contacts
say goodbye to your overpriced wireless plans mint mobile is here to rescue you with plans starting
at 15 bucks a month and all plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk and text delivered
on the nation's largest 5g network that is such a steal to get this new customer offer and your
new three-month unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month go to mintmobile.com slash tuesday
that's mintmobile.com slash tuesday cut your wireless bill to 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com
slash tuesday 45 up front payment required equivalent to 15 a month new mintmobile.com slash Tuesday. $45 upfront payment required equivalent to $15 a
month new customers on first three month plan only speed slower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited
plan additional taxes, fees and restrictions apply statement mobile for details. There is,
I think, which I think my lesson is like, hey, Esther, it's okay to want things that you might
not get. It's that's okay. And so I I want to take that with me through my life moving forward.
But I don't know.
It makes me so sad to think that I was so afraid that I couldn't be like,
I want a kid.
Or to even announce it to yourself.
Yeah.
And by the way, having had several friends who've had miscarriages
and had to abort fetuses for various
reasons, like it's something culturally people don't put enough attention to, like how heartbreaking
that is, you know, how difficult that is.
We kind of, we don't, we don't talk about it.
I totally agree.
And I feel like almost I was part of that.
Even when I would talk about it, I was like, it's common.
And so I would try to not poo was like it's common and so I would try
to not poo it or something yeah it's so common you throw the stat of one in four yes yeah and
I thought even the way you described it to me you're like I know it happens to a lot of people
it's like you were already kind of dismissing your own experience yeah because I didn't want to be
I have this thing where I don't want to be a victim I don't want to be the recipient of trauma and so I'll just be like everything's fine this bad thing
happened but so here's why it's totally fine but now I'm like oh no I was really struggling with
that and like what's why why couldn't I just struggle with it I don't know but you are right
that it's not I think a pregnancy loss is harder than I made it out to be. That's,
I guess my statement on it. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like women like suppress a lot of times suffering,
like, and I know we talked about this, like when my mom was pregnant too, like she had to hide her,
she felt like she had to hide it. And it was like this embarrassing thing and didn't talk about the
pain. And I feel like that's changing, but suppress suppressing pain and I feel like that's changing but suppress suppressing
pain I feel like it's just something that culturally we've always done yeah beyond culture
even I think it's just you're programmed from a very young age to just withstand a certain level
of like suffering and be okay with it because if you don't you are just less than. I mean, even in my culture, in Filipino culture and stuff, which I wanted to ask you, you are of the Baha'i faith.
And I know you, it's sort of like, the way I understand Baha'i is that you pick up from a lot of different religions and spiritualities.
a lot of different religions and spiritualities. Um, I grew up, um, in a very, very Catholic household, but that household was also where I endured the most trauma, everything from sexual
trauma to emotional trauma to physical abuse. And, um, what would like, what advice can you
give to someone like me who is so turned off by the idea of spirituality and religion?
And is there a way for me to sort of see the goodness in it without relating it back to like my horrible upbringing?
And to give you an example, my uncle was in the Philippines during like a holy week.
They crucify real people too.
I can't handle this one.
This one I can't.
But in the Philippines during holy week, they pick people in their community.
They don't actually put a nail through their hands.
They do.
They put a nail through their actual hands?
Yeah, yeah.
They don't just like tie them to a cross?
No.
Some they tie.
Some they actually crucify.
And it's a reenactment of, you know, some they actually crucify.
It's a reenactment of,
you know,
Jesus and the whole thing.
My uncle was that guy every year who got crucified,
but he is also a murderer.
So he also killed his brother in broad daylight and like severed his spinal cord with a machete.
You have to tell this to Dwight Schrute.
What camera should I be looking at right now?
I'm just going to be looking deadpan at the camera.
Go ahead.
He has since been released from prison.
I send him money every month because he has a family to support.
It's a whole thing. You send your murderer uncle money every month, and he was crucified.
He was crucified.
He was also Jesus.
Yeah.
Does he have scars on his hands from what he-
He does, yeah.
Yeah.
Does he have-
Okay.
The more you talk to her, the more it's like my childhood was such like a very like giant
contradiction of everything.
And that's where I experienced the most like hurt and pain.
So anytime I hear I almost bristle at the idea.
You've kind of been crucified in the court of social media.
Oh, my God.
Thank you for saying that.
I brought that all together.
Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Wow. how I brought that all together? Yeah.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Wow.
Why is there a woman with three bananas?
We do this thing here called a banana break.
You don't have to eat it, but it's a potassium re-up when emotions get high.
But you totally just, it's too much for him right now.
This is my religion.
Banana is my religion.
It's a little for him right now. This is my religion. Banana is my religion. It's a little bit phallic.
Oh my God.
But thank you for acknowledging that
because I think that, you know,
a lot of my current pain relates.
It feels similar, right?
It's bringing back all of the young stuff
when I am just fucking
just rinsed by the internet right yeah well I have a few things to say number
one religious trauma is very real and a lot of people that recoil from religion
have been traumatized by it in some way even just being made to go to church or
being told that if you masturbate,
you're going to go to hell or, you know, shamed for, for having premarital sex or being gay or
whatever. Like there's a lot of, there's a lot of that. And so culturally we're dealing with a lot
of religious trauma. We had a, someone on the soul boom podcast, Dr. Dima Bryant. And she said,
you know, for a lot of people, spirituality is the
richest, most wonderful thing they'll have, they have in their life. And for a lot of people,
spirituality is the thing that has caused them the most pain in their life. So it's really difficult
to talk about spiritual topics because you don't know where someone stands with that. And that's,
it's, I'm so glad you shared that with me. I think it's really important. Number one, to separate religion from spirituality. Right. So
even if you just look at Jesus and like stories of Jesus, like there's never been like a better
human being than Jesus, like just, just, uh, serving the poor, washing the feet of prostitutes,
like giving everything he owned away,
just teaching, just love, love, love everywhere he went.
And the difference between the reality of Jesus
and what so many sects of Christianity
kind of practice and preach
is just that dichotomy is mind boggling. Um, and
there's, there's an enormous bifurcation, but if you go back to like the life and work and
teachings and sayings of, of Jesus, there's really beautiful and they contain a lot of great
spiritual truths that don't have to do with any kind of church. They don't have to do with
heaven and hell or when you eat a wafer or when you, how you're baptized.
I've had many wafers. They don't taste great.
I always wanted to try the wafer.
Oh, I bet you'd like them. They're very bland.
Oh, thank you. Thank you so much.
Wow. Was that a diss?
It was.
So, but I think it's important to differentiate the two because spirituality is simply
So but I think it's important to differentiate the two because spirituality is simply the real our human reality that isn't part of our physical and material selves.
That's all emotions, heart, feelings, connection, transcendence, art, love.
You know, all of these things are related to the body and we experience them neurochemically, but at the same time, they're, they're what I've called for lack of a better term, like the higher part of ourselves, you know, the more angelic part of ourselves, that's spirituality.
You don't need rituals, you know, to, to be a part of that. And that's something that,
and more and more young people are putting their focus on and the fastest growing religion in the Western world
is spiritual but not religious.
And so I think that's a place to start.
I think from the Baha'i perspective,
it's that all of these wonderful divine teachers,
Jesus, the Buddha, Muhammad,
and Baha'is believe in a new divine teacher called Baha'u'llah
that their message is essentially pure
and it's all about love and connection and unity.
And then humanity creates all of these administrations
and rituals around those teachings
that become more and more corrupt.
Cause that's just who we are.
So for me, I feel really grateful that I get to look at just kind of the spiritual truths of those amazing spiritual teachers.
Yeah.
Have you ever been to the Baha'i Temple in Illinois?
Oh, yeah.
I used to work there.
You did?
I was a security guard there.
Wait, why were you living there?
Because I grew up in
seattle but my last two years of high school we moved to north of chicago because my parents
where i grew up in skokie skokie wow brought to you by hubs of skokie yeah hello hubs um wait
where did you live well met oh my god did you go to newtrier yes oh my god did you go to skokie
west or east i went to niles north niles north across the street from old orchard mall okay but Oh my God. Did you go to New Trier? Yes. Oh my God. Did you go to Skokie West or East?
I went to Niles North.
Niles North?
Across the street from Old Orchard Mall.
Okay.
I used to go to Old Orchard all the time.
I had a feeling.
Yeah.
So I grew up in Skokie, but I danced in Wilmette.
So all my friends went to New Trier.
I didn't go there though.
But yeah.
Oh my God.
That's crazy.
You danced in Wilmette?
Yeah.
You just like went down like Lake Street kind of like frolicking?
No, there was a really good dance studio there, Fisher Dance Center on Ridge, 807 Ridge.
Yeah.
That's right in downtown Womack.
Yes.
Oh, my God.
By the Walker Brothers Pancake House.
Yes.
Oh, my God.
Wait, that's crazy.
You lived there two years?
Two years.
Yeah.
Did your family move there because of the temple?
Yeah.
They moved there not because of the temple, but near the temple is the Baha'i administrative centers and they they both
worked at the Baha'i administrative center they were like super Baha'is and I was I was a nerdy
skinny weird looking big-headed pimply security guard after my senior year of high school walking
around the the the grounds of the Baha'i Temple, you know, kicking skateboarders out.
Oh, no, not the skateboarders.
And drinking Mountain Dew.
Did you go to NYU?
Yeah, after that, I went to college in Boston,
at Tufts for a year.
Then I went to University of Washington in Seattle.
And then I ended up at NYU.
So it was later that I ended up at NYU.
Okay.
I was wondering if there was like Northwestern or something,
because you're right there.
Yeah, I love Northwestern.
But you have the vibes like you went there though
to me for some reason.
Thanks.
Not a compliment.
No, I'm just kidding.
Yeah, yeah.
That's cool.
Wait, yeah, that's crazy.
Do you remember what you did at Old Richard Mall
or where you went?
God, I went there a lot.
I don't remember.
I remember there was a Joseph A. Bank Clothiers,
but I don't know that I ever got something there.
There was a restaurant that had like Irish green
and brass theme.
Okay.
Something like O'Flannery's or O'Flatterhans
or O'Patrick O'Houlihans or something like that.
Houlihands.
Oh my God.
Was it Houlihands?
Yeah.
That's been gone for so long.
Oh my God.
That was so.
That was in the 80s.
So.
No, but that, it was there like in the early 2000s still.
Oh, okay.
They had really good potato soup.
What are the hits of Old Orchard Malls?
It's changed.
It changes so much throughout the years.
I miss malls.
Remember malls?
I know.
Like actual malls.
It's so sad.
Did you see the Brat Pack
documentary? No, I need to.
You have to see it.
You know the Brat Pack, right? Yes.
They just said the documentary. Well, I don't
know, Philippines and you're young. I don't know.
There are a few things that made it to the Philippines.
That and Gary
Shandling. Andrew McCarthy did this
Brat Pack documentary and I'm so glad he did.
It was such an interesting excavation of that time and that very particular set of movie stars.
But Hollywood figured out in the early 80s, like, oh, the biggest audience for our movies are, you know, are young people.
And they want to see other young people on the screen.
They want to see them dating like in 16 Candles.
And they want to see them in college like St. Elmo's
Fire and Risky Business.
Oh, St. Elmo's Fire.
But that
team of actors, a lot of
which got labeled the Brat Pack, then they
really suffered because of it because
they had that label stuck to them that
they're these spoiled Hollywood brats
and not actual actors and it
fucked them up. I did always wonder that about Andrew McCarthy, though, because he was just in every single
he was the hot boy in every single one.
For like six years or something, he was in everything.
So it's really interesting.
But but it also goes with mall culture because kids would go to the mall and they'd go see
a movie and they'd want to go see Pretty in Pink at the mall with their young friends at the mall and they'd go see a movie and they'd want to go see pretty and pink at the mall with
their young friends at the mall. And, and it was something kind of like glorious. And you can go
on YouTube and watch all these videos of, you know, what a mall was like in 1987 and stuff.
And they just kind of carry a camera through and it's like, it was so innocent and kind of fun.
And everyone's going to Orange Julius.
What do you think changed?
Why did, why do we not have that same kind of like warm feeling about the mall anymore? Even the younger generation, it's like, yeah, they will go to the mall, but it is very just,
you're not there to really hang anymore.
Yeah.
I don't know.
I think it's like, it's like internet and retail suffers financially.
It's like all those horrible things.
Is it like the Walmarts and Costcos kind of took over for the actual shopping needs?
Maybe, yeah.
Maybe you're right.
Online shopping started.
That's right.
That's right.
Let's investigate the death of the American mall.
I know.
But beyond that, I mean, there are still-
Also strip malls.
I love strip malls.
See, this is the problem. If you love strip malls, you can't love regular malls. You can. You can also strip malls. Like the idea. See, that's the problem.
If you love strip malls, you can't love regular malls.
No, you can.
You can love all malls.
No, because if it's too easy to get in and there's like seven stores and you go and then you go, it might be convenient.
But the mall was like it was it took commitment.
Like I'm going to park.
Like I'm going to go in.
There's four.
There's Nordstrom's and there's Macy's.
And there you know what I mean?
And yeah, there's a food court.
You get a corn dog.
Do they still have a lot of, do all malls still have a movie theater attached to it?
Or is that something that's sort of like, where do we watch our movies now?
Like I don't go to, when I was younger, it was always at the mall.
Yeah.
But I don't do that anymore.
Maybe Blockbuster was part of it too.
And people like renting videos.
So you wouldn't go to the theater.
You would get a video and go home and watch it.
We can't blame poor Blockbuster for this.
But I'm trying to like tie it through the decades.
I see like chain reactions.
Maybe.
I just feel so bad for Blockbuster.
And it's also though, this is just the sign of like us being old, right?
It's like, oh, the thing we used to have, it was so good. it's gone and everything you are not old you'd be surprised i am i am old
i'm crazy old you're 50 1 52 50 55 no way there's no way there's no way. There's no way. No. Comedy keeps us all young. 58 and a half. You're 58. Yeah. That's crazy. Do we do we seem like babies to you? I'm almost 40.
Change the conversation.
Yeah, your top-notch producer there just Googles things.
The decline of the American mall has left just 700 standing.
Soon there may be just 150 malls left in the United States. Oh, my God.
Oh, down from 2,500 in the 80s.
Well, working in a mall completely shattered my dreams
or my warm feelings towards the mall.
I worked at Abercrombie for a couple years.
Which, by the way, have you heard?
Well, there's a documentary on how toxic Abercrombie is.
I mean, that's the worst of the worst.
You understand, they're like the hottest stock on Wall Street right now.
Abercrombie came back in a way that no one could have ever expected.
Okay, so here's an interesting thing about Abercrombie when I worked there,
is that they didn't have anything
past a size like
six or eight. Someone
would walk in. So no fatties.
No fatties. I noticed you go, someone would
walk in at me.
Someone. And then they would ask
for their size. We would pretend to search for
it in the back and just be like, you know,
because we didn't want to be rude and say, no, we don't carry those
sizes. Also, another thing is they never sold lemon do the same thing no black no nothing
was they never sold anything black right so it was always and even when you work there you so no
goths were welcome no goths no fatties um and when we worked there we couldn't really wear like heavy makeup we had to be sort of like this
like natural looking thing and um it's so brand new before all sizes right they i don't know how
they came back from that one documentary but they did and now they're all into this whole inclusive
thing so and their jeans are good oh they are they are? I think their 90s jeans really made, you know, brought them back, I think.
Yeah.
I also, I feel similar about Gap.
I'm like, okay, Gap, I'll always trust their jeans.
Really?
Yeah.
Yeah, girl.
Oh my God, I almost choked on my banana.
That's what she said.
But speaking of, the Gap at Old Orchard Mall closed recently, and it's been really hard for my family.
I'm sorry.
Thank you.
I knew you'd have compassion for that and understanding.
I did want to ask you a little bit about your young life.
You know that I'm old and a man, right?
I'm so not in your demo of like 32-year 32 old women in Brooklyn who are marketing social media experts.
But you're wise papa.
We need it.
We need the guidance.
Please don't call me wise papa.
It's so degrading.
Oh my God.
I've never been called wise papa before.
No.
Oh, get me out of this.
Get me out of this podcast.
I feel like people must call you for advice.
You seem like an advice guy.
No one calls me advice.
First of all, millennials don't take advice.
That's funny.
They don't.
They don't take advice.
They don't see.
When I was younger, there was a thing of mentors.
And you'd find people that were older and successful.
And you would go to them and say, Hey, I'm struggling with this.
And at this crossroad, what do you think I should do?
But millennials won't do that. And if you try and like talk to a millennial and say, well, in my experience, you might
want to think about X, Y, and Z.
They'll be like, yeah, I don't, I don't know.
I wouldn't do that.
And, and then they'll give you advice.
And this has happened to me with several millennials where they're like giving me advice and I'm like, okay, all right.
I mean, I don't know. And I know I'm grandpa boomer here, but I'm actually not a boomer. I'm
Gen X. I think that Gen Z might be cause Gen Z roasts millennials all day long. Millennials
are the worst. They're worse than Gen Z. You guys all day long. Millennials are the worst.
They're worse than Gen Z.
No.
You think we're worse.
You guys are so much worse.
Why?
What's, what?
Let me count the ways.
Help me out.
What's your name?
Stella.
Stella.
As a millennial, I feel like we hate, we feel that way about Gen Z the way that you feel
about millennials.
Yeah, it's like we all hate you feel about millennials like whenever i tell
them advice they don't listen to me or anything i say that's just part of it's cyclical it happens
with every generation no i do think that millennials got the shit end of everything
though no gen z have a worse shit end of everything than millennials and at least gen z are like
rebellious and are kind of like i'm'm not going to follow in any of the
rules that have been set down.
Like I'm going to question gender and sexuality.
I'm going to question capitalism.
I'm going to question having social media and, and why do we even need it?
I'm going to question everything I've been taught about mental health or getting an education.
Like, why should I go to college?
Although please go to college although please go
to college it's a really good idea but you know i mean like there's a but millennials were just
kind of like i just want my chai latte and my avocado toast and and uh and just leave me alone
and they're not like engaged in like changing the world i'm getting so many hate comments right now in the youtube my um millennial
demographic i think we were put in a very um specific like gen z can live a life of like
not in a shame cycle almost i think with millennial we're we were caught in this kind of get finally understanding
mental health mental illness but not being able to quite like grasp it in the same way that gen z is
as so open about it like they really are talking about this stuff in a way that has no stigma
at all and we were sort of that last group where there was still shame around not being well
needing help needing community all of these things you get that as especially as it concerns mental
health but like which generation is going to change the world because the way things are going
well because the way things are going are is you know we're heading to a shit spiral. Sorry, just climate change, politics, the upcoming election, like economics,
you know, racism, income inequality,
the healthcare system, like stuff is bad
and we can't just kind of like be scrolling
and having chai oat milk lattes all the time.
But can't we place a blame
on the people responsible for that?
Yeah, but they're not going to change it.
I mean, it's kind of like too late.
Yeah.
Yeah, we can blame,
you can, you live your whole,
yeah, it's too late.
You can blame the boomers all you want, but.
I believe in the alphas,
that after Gen Z,
I feel like the alphas are.
Those are people that are like
seven years old right now?
Yeah, I believe in them.
I think they might be able to save the world.
Every Alpha I've met is cool.
I believe in no one, just to be clear.
None of the religions, none of the generations.
I don't believe in any of you.
Wow, you're just a nihilist and a skeptic.
It always repeats, you know?
I just don't think anything ever...
I don't know.
You don't think anything ever can get
better no wow that's so pessimistic thank you so so what's gonna happen like with climate change
what's gonna happen we're just gonna like roast ourselves no i think with that my my personal
hope is that like it will become financially beneficial to whoever can solve it and so then
all the money hungry people will like put money into it and then they'll like try to get rich off
of climate change and then that's how it'll get fixed so you believe that ultimately the the
basest human impulses towards greed and lust and selfishness are just gonna always run humanity
absolutely because those are the ones
that are the most motivated,
the most like go get them tigers.
Like they're the ones, they've always been in control.
Yeah, this is why I have a problem with millennials.
Because they don't have a hope for change.
They've, you've bought them.
But we were like the Obama change.
You drank the Kool-Aid, you drank the Kool-Aid of cynicism of like the world can never change.
Human nature is greedy and selfish.
That's just the way it is and will never get better.
And so you sit on your couch and you don't do anything except drink chai oat milk lattes.
But that is evidence.
Nothing personal.
You are delightful and wonderful.
But I do think that if collectively,
if people really believe nothing's ever going to get better
and it's just a, it's a shit storm,
unless we figure out a way to make it profitable,
then that we don't believe in the element of,
we don't believe in human altruism and like,
and self-sacrifice for one's sacrificing one's personal good
for the benefit of others or
for the wellbeing of others. If you don't believe that that exists and that can be
cultivated and nurtured and inspire a revolution, then I feel really sad about, about that. I mean,
I feel sad for you feeling that way because no, because I feel sad about being that cynical.
I really do. And it's very common by do. Well, maybe it's very common, by the way.
It's very, very common.
No, totally.
I mean, I think like I think you're right.
And I do believe in altruism.
I just don't.
But I'm you know what it is.
It's like we've gotten our heart broken so many times where the bad things keep happening.
And I just I always think about like recycling and like I recycle.
But then like everything I hear is like recycling is fake
recycling is bullshit so it's like i do that yeah but i do it we were sold a bill of goods i
i bought into it too the oil companies were really like literally like everyone should recycle and
then we're all busy recycling and meanwhile we're excavating coal and dumping all this like methane
and co2 into the atmosphere and people are like sorting
their yogurt lids yeah yeah rinsing the cup out and there's coal factories going
and you know it's it's bull it's bullshit but i bought it too yeah i played recyclops after all
oh my god yeah and i so i and i also think maybe this is part of like that thing I'm talking about
my own personality earlier, which is like, it's hard for me to want something that I
don't believe can happen.
And maybe I do need to be like, okay, maybe it'll, maybe it's like the baby when, when
you lost the first baby.
I'm so sorry for that.
And then you, you didn't even, you felt like, oh, I can't let myself want another baby.
But then you did and then you have a baby and it's brought you so much joy.
Maybe you can allow yourself to want humanity to thrive and not.
Yeah, we got a chorus of millennials cheering on the change of Esther's heart.
Full Esther.
Yeah, maybe.
I mean, this was one of the reasons, like one of the last guys that I dated,
one of the reasons that I ultimately could not stay with him is because he was really just a cynic.
And I remember initially just being like deeply attracted to him and all the things about him.
But every day it was
this heavy load on me that I wasn't clocking in the beginning that later on, like a couple months
in, I was like, Oh, like this dude is so hopeless about everything that I, it was difficult to be
around. And I don't want to live a life like without hoping that things could, you know,
like, or the next day could be,
or things could generally move in a better direction.
But where does that hopelessness come from?
Because I think it does come from trauma.
It's easier to stay cynical and pessimistic.
And it's like with relationships.
Like if someone has had their heart broken a bunch of times
and they're just like, oh, it'll never work out.
I'll never find a relationship.
Men suck or women suck or, you know,
whatever gender sucks and contemporary dating sucks and I'll never find love.
And it's kind of an easy fallback position, but it usually comes from some kind of pain
that they've gone through. Like with you, I imagine like hoping, like maybe things will
get better and it just gets worse and maybe, and it gets worse and you get your heart broken and
it's, it's easy to, it's easy to to fall into that position so you're saying millennials are just heartbroken
repeatedly heartbroken heartbroken and traumatized and um and they've kind of just
they've bought the party line kind of i think they've just kind of like they accept society the way it is we need to
rebrand millennials yeah we need to do disagree i think no one likes a child milk latte better
than a gen z like i think that's a little like have you seen those macho girls on tiktok like
that's their whole personality which i have been there i there was there was a time where no milk
latte was my entire personality for sure.
But I just want to say, like, I don't think that's, I think everybody's, everybody likes their drinks.
Guilty.
Oh my gosh, Rain, this has been so fun.
Matcha.
Matcha.
Iced tea, green tea.
Yeah.
Iced.
Yeah.
Like, this costs like $17.
You're one of the girlies.
I'm a matcha girl.
And listen,
hi everyone who's watching.
I know that I'm getting,
I'm going to get a lot of hate comments about dissing on millennials.
I'm just,
I'm trying to poke the bee's nest a little bit here.
Like I'm being a little bit,
um,
we're having fun.
No,
this is great to kind of stir things up.
Cause I do think,
I think it's an interesting conversation
and I think the millennial Gen Z battle
is an interesting,
sitting on the sidelines.
Gen X is the one that's been left out.
Everyone hates on boomers
because they are,
they're the worst.
That's so true.
But Gen X kind of just sits
kind of in the middle.
You guys are like the lost generation.
No one talks about you guys.
I know.
You're just quietly existing.
We skirt through, yeah.
This is so true.
They're just quietly acquiring farms
and being happy four out of the seven days of the week.
We just quietly created all of Silicon Valley.
Right.
It was a Gen X kind of thing, you know?
The good and the bad, and it's mostly bad, sorry.
After the promise of good.
Yeah, see we just need those bad guys
to want to solve climate change
and then I swear we'll be looking good.
The bad guys are going to save us.
Eyes are on you, Gen X.
Well, thank you so much, Rain.
I know, this was so much fun.
I'm sorry that was so chaotic for you.
It was good.
The banana break was good. I'm the only one who chaotic for you. It was good. The banana break was good.
I'm the only one who ate my banana.
No, I always eat my banana.
That was a nice idea.
And this was really fun.
And you guys are awesome.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And it's so nice to be here.
And everyone needs to check out Rain's podcast, Soul Boom, which I've been listening to.
I loved the episode with Arthur Brooks.
I love the Neil Brennan episode.
Oh, thanks.
Yeah, it's so good. We have an interesting combination of standups and,
you know,
contemporary youth kind of influencers.
And then we kind of some old school,
uh,
psychologists and spiritual thinkers and authors and stuff like that.
So it's,
we kind of,
it's a little bit schizophrenic cause it's going back and forth between,
you know,
some young comic and then,
you know,
we'll have like Bobby Lee and then we'll have Dr. Joe Dispenza. So, you know, some young comic and then, you know, we'll have like Bobby Lee and then we'll have Dr. Joe Dispenza.
So, you know, it's a good mix for life.
I feel like that's the, that's the best combo.
Cause while a Joe Dispenza is very, you know, knowledgeable, valuable,
I do think Bobby in his chaotic,
in his most chaotic state has the most profound things to say in your hair.
He does, yeah, he is.
And he's a guy who has been out of sobriety.
He's a guy who comes from extreme childhood trauma.
And I do think that even though he front loads
with a lot of funny and a lot of trying to get away
from the serious stuff,
when you do kind of nail him down,
he is so wise and clear and is able to give like really good guidance.
And that's what I've always loved about him.
And I think you really brought that out of him
in that episode.
And I don't think it's easy to do that.
Did you have to add extra therapy
the week you had Rick Glassman on?
That's what I have to do when I'm with Rick.
No, I found Rick to be delightful.
He is delightful.
Maybe because I'm like Grandpa Television, you know,
and he admires The Office and stuff.
I don't know.
But he's the best.
Rick is a regular on this show.
Does he make fun of you guys a lot?
All day.
That's all he does.
Yeah, he just drags us. But? All day. That's all he does. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
He just drags us.
But we love it.
We love Rick for that.
I always say like I never have more fun with anyone than when I'm with Rick.
But when I know I have to see him, I have a migraine.
So I don't know what that means.
But anyways, you guys go check out Soul Boom.
And thank you.
And I know you guys have a new sub stack.
I'm excited to read that.
And yeah, we'll see you guys next week with a brand new episode thank you rain wilson
thanks for having me thank you