Duncan Trussell Family Hour - 469: Connor Franta

Episode Date: October 21, 2021

Connor Franta, great author and super-famous influencer, joins the DTFH! Check out Connor's new book, House Fires, now available everywhere! Original music by Aaron Michael Goldberg. This episode is brought to you by: Babbel - Sign up for a 3-month subscription with promo code DUNCAN to get an extra 3 months FREE! Squarespace - Use offer code: DUNCAN to save 10% on your first site. BetterHelp - Visit betterhealth.com/duncan to find a great counselor and get 10% off of your first month of counseling!

Ghost Towns, Dirty Angel, out now. You can get Dirty Angel anywhere you get your music. Ghost Towns, Dirty Angel, out now. New album and tour date coming this summer. Greetings to you, my loves. This is the Ducatressel Family Hour podcast, and we've got a great episode for you today with the brilliant Connor Franta.

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since the Knights Templar. Today's guest is a really great writer. He's written three books, most recently House Fires, which is fucking great, but being a great author wasn't enough for him. He also happens to be a super famous influencer, but all of that bullshit aside,

he's an incredible human being, and I'm excited to introduce you to him. Everybody, welcome to the DTFH, Connor Franta. Welcome to the DTFH. Connor, welcome to the DTFH. It is so great to meet you. Great to meet you too. Man, you are brilliant.

Your third book House Fires just came out. It is so fucking good, man. It is so good. Thank you. Why do you get to be in your twenties writing like this? That's so sweet of you. I don't know. I yeah, I would have never foreseen that this is what I would be doing.

But I guess that's the beauty of life, isn't it? But we don't know what's coming and we just take it with grace. Yeah, yeah. I think so. I mean, do you think pre-YouTube, pre-Internet, you that probably you just would have been a writer, you know, you it's like the is it the, you know, having these two was like one of them completely new to the entire universe. Whatever the fucking influencer is, you know, this new kind of super celebrity,

global celebrity that comes from YouTube. Then it's like somehow like crossing what I would consider to be like pretty like classic, beautiful writing, you know, like timeless writing. Is that what is that why it's so strange? Because you feel like when people are talking to you, you have to like like sort of hope they understand. Look, I don't know what I am. Yeah.

First of all, I mean, like when you any being like the grassroots of an influencer and then having to do something in the traditional realms, you do always feel this level of defensiveness of like, no, but I'm different. No, it's good. It's actually good or even like bare bones. I have to explain to people. No, I actually did write my own book. I didn't have someone write it for me and I'm pretending like I wrote it.

So there is this level of explanation and defensiveness right off the bat that I wish didn't have to be a part of my storytelling, but it sadly is for most conversations. There's a level of like justifying what I've been working on for three years. I bet I can feel in the book. Honestly, I am a little disappointed to hear it's not a ghost writer because I'm trying to write a book right now and I would be like, let me hire this person. Whoever they are, they're a great fucking writer.

Hire me. All right for you. Done. Done. I'm sure you have the time. Um, when you, so when you're, when you were like conceiving house fires, did you know it was like upfront when you were talking about it? Did you know it was going to be a combination of poetry and photographs?

Did you, did you know in the beginning this is what it was going to look like or did it evolve into that? So, uh, my second book is very similar in terms of style. It was kind of, you know, like a scrapbook, a collection of this, that and the other, you know, short stories, long form poetry, thoughts, photos, you know, just like a really, it's like an autopsy of my mind put on paper and I personally found that format so freeing because no matter what I wrote, it didn't have to fit within some sort of box of like, this is how you write a book.

This is how a book has to be. It has to be this many words. Each chapter has to have this many pages because that's just how we've always done it. So for me, it just was liberating that no matter what I was writing on any given day, it could be part of the book, even if it was just a few sentences. And that just helped me, I guess, continue the creative process to be free with what I was doing.

Yeah. It's, yes. It, you know, it, the format, it produces this kind of like wonderful lightness to the whole thing. But some of these essays, wow, heavy, like really deep existential questions. And I love that a lot of those questions don't have answers. You're not trying to solve the problems that you're bringing up in the book. And that adds, that somehow resonates with the form of the book.

It's, it's, it's like listening to these like, it's, it's these, it's like listening to like pebbles drop into some like beautiful still well and just ripple out. It's so good. And it sounds, you know, it sounds like you right now are really like wrestling with some tremendously impossible problems that humanity faces. Can you talk, can we talk about those a little bit? It's my favorite thing to talk about.

I find that like people are so just like skittish and anxious around talking about death and the meaning of life and what happens before and after. And like all these questions that I find so deeply fascinating. So although the book does come across as existential, I think it comes from a place of just pure curiosity about the world around us and the older I get, the more like ravenous I am for not even for like the definitive answer because I think a lot of life's greatest questions don't have answers. I don't think there is one meaning to life.

I don't think there is one answer to what happens after we die. But I think hearing all of the answers is the best part. I love hearing a completely different perspective on an answer or on a question that I thought I already knew the answer to. So that's kind of what I dive into with the book is it's just a lot of me contemplating human existence from the perspective of like a 29 year old in a global pandemic. Although I think I only use the word pandemic once in the book

because I didn't want it to be about that necessarily. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, you actually that was something that I thought was really graceful about about it is that yeah, you didn't mention the pandemic a lot, but you did manage to work in them like we're wearing masks now so that so it does it would be and that's a wonderful thing because I don't think you want something to be fully anchored in

the pandemic necessarily, you know, it would tie it down. I want to thank Babel for supporting this episode of the DTFH and for being part of my dream to one day return to Paris, not as a Luddite, not as someone completely incapable of speaking their beautiful language, but as someone fluent or at least fluent enough to order a baguette or get in a taxi and not seem like a complete asshole tourist. I want to go to the catacombs and I want to speak French with my wife. C'est tomes et devolions, which means that man is trying to steal a bone

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It's rude. They're really good. You will get addicted to learning another language. And then the next thing you know, you'll experience neurogenesis. Your brain will actually improve. That's coming from me, not from Babel, but I'm guessing it makes you grow new neurons right now. When you purchase a three month Babel subscription, you'll get an

additional three months for free. That's six months for the price of three. Just go to Babel.com use promo code Duncan. That's B-A-B-B-E-L.com code Duncan Babel language for life. Are you familiar with Japanese death poetry? I am a little bit. Not fully, but enough that if you talk about it, I'm sure I can catch on. It's just rude.

That had to me. It felt a little bit like that too. Just because, you know, the finality of death when it meets someone like writing their final poem or something like that. And generally these poems, they don't answer any questions. They just float there. You know, the person's gone and this thing is floating there. And it's like, holy shit, you died and you didn't.

Like you were writing about the way a willow tree looks in the wind. You know what I mean about the way a drop of rain is landing on your house. You know, like, where's the fucking answer, man? And that God, that is such a, um, it feels like, you know, human existence is something that you are putting into italics. And I think that's a really curious thing to be doing, um, in a difficult thing to just sit with that, that kind of insecurity. And, you know, your most recent YouTube video, and I saw you online tweeting

about this, like you're dealing with becoming a 30 year old. And, um, you know, it's like, you know, it's like, you know, it's like, and, um, feeling all of the feelings wrapped up in that shift. I'm 47. So I've, thank God, I've died many times as far as like the age thing goes. Like, you know what I mean? I've had to surrender over and over and over again to like, ah, fuck, I'm old.

But I wanted to ask you this, if you knew for certain that you were going to live and all of humanity was going to live to be a thousand years old, that that was the new human life span via who knows what, some biotechnology or something. How would that change the way that you're currently interacting with reality? Oh gosh, isn't it like, it wouldn't that be because you do, you do feel the sense of finiteness, the older you get, and you never like, you never want to be that, that person, you hear it.

It's such a cliche of getting older and feeling like your time, time is slipping away from you, it's like a quarter falling out a hole in your pocket. And, and you never want to be that person. But I think that is because you have this truly like ticking clock and you can see it ticking in front of you. But if it were a thousand years, yeah, you know, that would be, I just feel like there would be such a sense of ease and their anxiety wouldn't exist within me because that's such a long time versus a hundred or even, I mean,

one of the biggest crisis I had like a few years ago was when I realized I wasn't having a quarter life crisis. I was having a third life because I was like 25 and I'm like, oh no, the average American lives to like 75 and I'm like, this is a quarter life crisis. You have a second crisis on top of the crisis. Yeah, I just, yeah, I think I would just be more relaxed to keep it really simple. I think I think it is this this ticking clock that makes everyone so stressed and so anxious of I'm not doing enough with the time that I have.

Yeah, it's like almost like a curse has been cast on the entirety of the species. The curse, of course, being based on this generally accepted life span thing, which, by the way, is pretty fucking optimistic. It's like everyone assumes they're going to live to be like their life span, please, like falling dead left and right throughout not just the pandemic, but generally in history, you know, someone just like some people don't wake up. Some people don't get to go to bed again. Some people have like aneurysms.

I'm not trying to freak anybody out here, by the way. But it's like I've always found the lifespan thing to be a little bit like, oh, yeah, really? Well, it didn't work out for my mom or my dad or like lots of other people. I know maybe you'll get the lifespan. But then by the time you get to that lifespan, come on, let's face it. By the time you're 80 or 90, you don't know what the fuck's going on anymore. You're confused. And that is such, yeah, that part is really stressful, too.

Because so my dad's a doctor. So I hear about everything that you just described all the time. You know, he's telling me he's like, oh, this person, this person died today or this I met a 20 year old that did this today. And it's just like I'm constantly aware of how fragile life is or how quickly people can be like given or taken something somewhere. So it's just like it's always been a thought in my head in that sense. But it also has made me appreciate

living in this moment right now and not like saving for a moment 20 years from now because of how how many people don't even make it to 20 years from now by accounts completely outside of their own control, which I guess I do I read about that a lot in the book as well. But it's like just trying to enjoy this moment and not make it some sort of tally on a board that has to count later on. Oh, and and and and and yet it seems like the way that you are at least articulating your experience is not to try to like flower it up.

You know, that that's another thing I like about it is you're not like you're and forgive me if this offends you, you seem to be a teacher of sorts. Like you your intent in some of these and a lot of the content you're creating, it feels really good. And it feels like you're either just trying to like work, work it out yourself publicly, which is naturally comforting for all of us. Or you're like, understand how freaked out people are and are just trying to help in some way.

But I love the way that you're doing that because you're not trying to make it better, you're just being with that reality. And to me, I think that's incredibly powerful, beautiful. Thank you. That's really sweet. I yeah, I think I yeah, I never want to I never want to come across as someone who has all the answers because clearly I don't. And I also never want to come across as preachy because everyone has a completely individual situation with an individual life and individual weights attached to their

ankles. So like, who am I to tell you the one answer to fix something and then lead you on to believe that? And then if it doesn't work for you, feel some sort of responsibility for that. I think like when I started gaining that level of perspective after I came out publicly and after I started meeting people within the queer community and the simple question that people would always ask me is like, how do I come out? And the more you hear stories and the more perspective you gain from people around the world, people even in super liberal bubbles, it's just it's so

difficult for so many reasons for so many people. And who am I to just tell you like, just do it, you'll feel better. It's so easy. It's so fine. I don't know what your situation is. Like, I can't I can't give you one simple piece of advice because there are so many factors involved in your decision that really could in it deeply impact your life. What's that like being Catholic with a dad reminding you of the fragility of life,

a religion reminding you, oh, yeah, not only is life fragile, but when you die, you are fucked if you are not heterosexual. What was did it was were you being were you being steeped in that kind of Catholicism? So like on one side, you have modern medicine. On the other side, you have this archaic interpretation of the Bible. And right in the middle of that, you're this like a handsome gay kid who is pretending that you're straight.

Like how I can't imagine what that felt like. It just felt like a storm brewing beneath the surface because it really you're right. There were so many different elements of me constantly combating each other, but not understanding why or more so not understanding if everyone felt this way, but just wasn't speaking about it. Not just like in terms of identity, but more so just like, does everyone question everything all the time? Does everyone feel like something's telling me one thing and the other

thing's telling me another, or is everyone like constantly overlooking it and letting it go right over their shoulder in one ear out the other? Yeah, I felt that way constantly of just like something's not adding up here. And why is nobody talking about it? I would sit in church just like twiddling my thumbs, being like, why can't I focus on these stories? Because and then like it dawned on me years later of like, oh, I didn't believe them and I also didn't believe half the things that they were

trying to teach us or I didn't necessarily respect the people who were who were telling the stories. Like there were so many things, so many factors there of like, why do I why do I have to sit here in this pew and drink this liquid and eat this cracker and listen to this man and that is like my guaranteed future, my guaranteed acceptance letter into eternal life. Like why is that why is it almost that too simple? Something about that just never added up for me. Yeah, yeah.

Well, that's probably a healthy reaction to have to something like that. I mean, to me, I was raised in the in the Episcopal Church and I've, you know, I think any kid should not feel comfortable at church, not necessarily because of the dogma or the philosophy or whatever, just because the general situation sucks. You're like, Pew's, why? Why not recliners? Wood, just like solid wood, no cushion, no nothing. I get like back in like medieval times or whatever, you know, throw down some logs,

sit down, look at the guy in the road, but like, fuck now. So it's naturally uncomfortable. You know, I was a chubby kid. I'm still a chubby dad, but like I had a, like my belt was always too tight in there. Mine too. OK, the belt pain, like the belt pain of church children completely unacknowledged and then on top of that, you're trying to stay awake because it's the most boring shit you ever heard.

It's Latin half the time. Don't get me started on like a holiday mass that's later in the day, like a midnight Christmas mass, did you have to have to go to those? Oh my God, torture as a child, torture. Torture, it's literal torture. But and then the thing is all they had to do was admit, you know, we're going to a magic ritual, you know, like, you know, you want to believe in wizards and sorcery, Duncan, that's what we're headed to.

We're headed to a really intense occult ritual that happens all over the country every day where people like eat the flesh of a dead God. Then I'd be like, this is fucking cool. Yeah, it's sexy, man. Just cannibalizing the son of God. I'll take it. You get to drink wine as a child. Come on, come on. The best, the best.

But so so in other words, are you saying like the whole hell thing? You just were like, I'm not buying that. It just never seemed real to me. And I think to your point, I almost wish it was it was told from a more fictional perspective, like I almost wish it was fantastical and sensationalized. To me, it was the whole aspect of it all seeming real and definitive and not magical in a strange way, the way that they were told to me. It just it didn't seem appealing.

So therefore, why would I think it's real if I have absolutely no interest in it? And I also hated the aspect of hell. I'm like, some of us are going to go to a bad place for the rest of our existence and be tortured for not doing the perfect thing. That sounds horrible. I don't want to participate in this. I didn't I didn't sign up for this. I didn't ask for this.

What? Wow. This is so somehow you manage your immune system or whatever was strong enough to not get the Catholic guilt that a lot of people I know were infected by. I definitely I mean, I still do have I have I do get some Catholic. I think it's fading very slowly. It's like a drug that's been in my system for for years and it's slowly wearing off. But no, I mean, I didn't have it as much. I would frequently because we were we were serial Catholics.

We would go like every single Sunday to church. Never miss Sunday, Sunday mass and the times that like I couldn't make it to church. We were expected to go to a different service, like a later service. And I frequently just started realizing, oh, I can say, oh, I'm going to sleep in and go to the later service. And then instead of going to the later service, I just go do something else and come back and be like, church was great, love to that service. That mass was great.

And I was just hanging out with friends like in a parking lot somewhere for the hour and that was my act of rebellion in a town of 4,000 people. What? Yeah. Societal pressure. The like just endemic homophobia. All of that aside. What was aside from that, I should say, not all that aside, like I'm rushing it away.

I apologize. But what was the yeah, you know, just that stuff, just that sprinkling of hellish hate. No, what I mean is like, what was what was the personally the if you had to name? And again, I'm sorry, this is a dumb question. If you had to name the one thing, what was the hardest part of coming out? What was the biggest boundary to like letting people know who you actually are? I think an element of it is is accepting being an other. Accepting being different than your perceived peers in a way is that you from

that point on, whether you're aware of it or not, are a minority. You are someone that has a different perspective or cannot relate to many traditional aspects of life and society. Like I'll find myself in groups and be the only queer person in the group. And just so many things I don't actually relate to I probably I can find something that is relatable to it, but it's just not my my life or my lifestyle. And every time I chime in, it's from a different perspective. It may be on the same topic, but it's me saying it from a completely different angle.

And you just feel different. You may not be it may not be noticed to other people. There may be absolutely no shame associated with it. But it you can't help but be aware of your otherness when you're speaking about it. And that's, you know, that's like a lasting feeling, even being, you know, I don't know how many years out of the closet now, but like completely comfortable with it. I still every time I chime in, it's like that feeling. There's like a little there's like a little gremlin on your shoulder where just

like being like, you're the different one here, you're the one that is talking about dating a man and not a woman in this group of all men who are dating women. And you just are overwhelmed by that feeling for just a second. And then it goes away. And every time you bring it up again, it's there and then it's gone. It's like how a lot of I guess I'll just speak to like the gay cis male experience. But a lot of us, like when we're even just holding like our partner's hand in public, I still get that feeling of like, is someone going to

call this out, is someone going to to say something from across the street? Like you just have this level of tension always there and this like subtle fear. And whether that's realistic or that's because that's what you've always been told could happen, could be a part of your experience. I don't know, but it but it's definitely there even in the smallest way, which is sad that that even is a thing that just exists. Rationally, irrationally. Yeah, and all an invisible, you know, an invisible suffering for a lot of us, too.

We don't like straight people like one, I think fantasy. A lot of us have is like, oh, I think they worked it all out now. It's fine. The other fantasy, you know, I think a lot of us have not just with that, with a lot of other people who are like, what the fuck? You don't even understand like you go out to brunch with your wife, you know? And it's like there isn't like a quality in there of like, you know, there's some potential probably far away, you know, I'm in a liberal city, but there's some small potential that someone's just going to decide to punch me.

And so I think it's that's something a lot of us forget who who aren't queer or gay. And then but this is the in your book. This is the part that you really hit home. First chapter, this unknown future, like you're pointing out like, yes, there are like there have been shifts for the better, you know, there is the possibility to get married now, which is again, relatively new. But you but what's the what you you made this wonderful point of like,

what's the model for that that you have? You know, I've got generations of suffering married people that I can look at and be like, all right, I know, I know that suffering. But for you, you know, it's different. Like, where is the precedent? You're setting the precedent now. And that is got to be a heavy feeling. You're like the trailblazer in this regard, you know?

I know. And it's it was a strange thought to have. And it was one of the first first it's the first chapter in the book, but it was also one of the first things I wrote for the book. And one of the first, I guess, like the very beginning of me wanting to write another book was this thought of of how strange it is for any any LGBTQ person because there really hasn't been this point in history where a certain level of acceptance is, you know, given at birth for some people.

Yeah. So you you don't have anyone to really look up to because even the people that, you know, even like the gay men that I know that are married and have families, I'm like, but they they're experiencing this for the first time, too. They're just experiencing it at 50. So they don't have anyone that is experienced. I mean, like there is no future to it. We're all experiencing it in the present.

So we're all being the first 29 year old to do this. We're all being the first 37 year old to do this 80 year old. What have you. And that's just a really unique feeling or experience that's so unrelatable or indescribable and it can either be liberating or absolutely existentially daunting and it depends what you want to do with it. Because I I love being the I love being kind of like the black sheep of my family, the only gay kid within my three other siblings and, you know, my parents and what

have you because I do have this this unspoken level of freedom to whatever it is I do because my parents kind of know like, oh, you know, it's it's Connor. He's he's doing his thing. You know, it's it's Connor. He's the artsy one. He's the one who lives in California. He's the gay one.

Like we can't dictate his life because his life is something different than ours. So there is this like freedom. And I think that I I see it as more the liberating than the daunting because the people around me gift me that perspective as well. Right. So it's why I always hope that everyone else can feel the same type of way or have the same type of people around them because both are both are possible and potential. Thank you, Squarespace, for supporting this episode of the DTFH.

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Use offer code Duncan and you'll get 10% off your first order of a website or a domain. Again, it's Squarespace.com forward slash Duncan. Use offer code Duncan. You'll get 10% off your first order of a website or a domain. Thank you, Squarespace. Do you do you first like looking at just over the course of my lifetime, the shift in opinions when it comes to sexuality in the world? It is like the whole thing going to go out the window.

Like it's eventually like the whole idea of like heterosexuality, being gay, being queer, being straight. Is that a good is this going to be looked at as some kind of weird like tribal paint we used to wear? How exciting is it that that's even just a thought? Like, I think it's so cool that when when, you know, more sexual orientations and gender identities and, you know, more of this is discovered or more of this is talked about or experienced or lived.

I'm like, that's so cool that we thought we had it down. We thought we knew what we were talking about. We thought it was just black and white, binary, this and that. And then like it then it just pops out of nowhere that, oh, no, not only is this real, but many people are experiencing this. Many people feel this way and are going to live their lives as this person. And like we had no idea. So I think I think when you when you when you in a weird way, like when you give

people not the option because it's obviously not a choice. But like when it's presented to people and it's it's seen as OK, I think more people are going to take it and run. So I do think that it's going to become much more normal to be anything but straight because, frankly, it's so hard to be anything on the polar end. I don't know many people who are like one hundred percent anything. There's always a little wiggle room. And I feel like sexuality and identity are just inherently fluid in some way.

And the more we accept that that's an OK thing and that's a normal thing, the more people are going to be willing to, I guess, experience that fluidity or experiment with that fluidity and feel less shame around it. So I just think it's exciting. I'm like, that's so cool that everyone could be so open in the next 10, 20, 30, 50, 100 years that it's anything again, anything is possible, anything can happen. Yeah, well, you know, I can't remember the science fiction writer, but he was writing about some future way down the line.

And in that future, like sexual preference was actually considered a fetish. Like all sexual preference was considered a fetish. You know, I've a fetish for this or that or whatever. And but, you know, again, like this is where. This is this is a point of interest to me. The it's it's not a choice. And I understand that the it's not a choice gets used or that it is a choice. It's used in the most rotten fucking way.

It's produced that conversion therapy. It's like destroyed. It's destroyed people's lives. I mean, yeah, I think even even my one of my teachers, Ramdas, I think, had to go through that like, oh, this is like I'm experiencing some. It was considered a disorder, you know, it was considered a disorder. You know, it was not, you know, and so I but I wonder like. Sometimes I wonder, well, is that

does that create a like unnecessary boundary for people where they're like, well, I like being with women or I like being with guys. But I love to see I love to experience everything, but it's not a choice. So that would be, you know what I'm saying? But I think I think inherently then you're you're like the person, the hypothetical person is making it sound like they get to decide to to want the other gender to want more.

But it's it's, you know, it's chemical. It's baked into them. It's in there. It's in their entire being that that was already a part of them from the very from the very beginning in a way. It wasn't just like one day they were like, you know, might try that today. I think it's always been there. It's more of just when you realize that it's a part of you.

Oh, OK. I see what you say. Yeah, totally. I see what you say. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like somewhere in you, there's a part of you that wants to be with the same sex. That's in you, whether you want to admit or not. I was just there and then you got to a point where like, OK, OK, so you're now. This is interesting, though, because like here we have like a kind of genetic predeterminism, you know what I mean?

And by the way, it's there's something in DNA that is absolutely terrifying as far as like free will goes, you know, because it's like how much of my children like some of their the they it's like my mom looking at me through them, like literally like the expression or my dad, you know, the way that like so. But yeah, it's it's a curious thing. How. How do you what? Do you have any fantasy about maybe having kids one day?

I do. And I it's hard to imagine without, you know, without like having a forever partner, like someone that I'm like, yeah, this is it, found the person, you know, I can I can build my future with them. But no, I definitely do. There's like when I see my brother with my niece or I see my friends with their kids, I just there's something there's something so undescribably beautiful about it of like the connection that they have in the bonds that they have and the idea of like

bringing a little person into this world and teaching them about it and watching them grow and change is just so so magical to me. So yeah, I definitely I fantasize about it a lot. But I also don't think I'm anywhere near ready for it. Oh, you better watch out. That's exactly what I said, Fred. That's exactly what I said. I was on the phone with my brother probably six months before my my wife

became pregnant, we wanted to have kids. But I was on the phone with him saying, I just, you know, Jeff, I just don't think I'm going to reproduce. And now I've got two of them. So you don't. Yeah. You like I know, though, that feeling. I mean, so what's what's going on with that? So you're like here you are like

celebrity brilliant writer and are you just like sort of you just don't have time for a forever partner or is there like what's what's are you running into some some trouble with that? Are you too busy? I mean, I think that's the that's the scapegoat answer in a way or that's like the the answer that I always say, but probably isn't the truth. I don't know. I mean, it's I just find dating in modern times to be absolutely exhausting.

And I also find it even more exhausting in Los Angeles or in any sort of really big city, maybe not all big cities, but it's just it's like a weird time. And it feels like a universal feeling. I've never talked to any person named one person you've heard say, I love dating apps. They're so great. They're so they're so stimulating and positive. I've always had a not one person feels that way. But also what other alternative do we have to find people and partners,

especially again, in the very particular situation we're in over the last two years? Yeah. So I think that it's kind of been built up to more that of maybe I'm not in the right place or maybe it truly just isn't the right time. But I'm really not stressed about it. I think again, I keep thinking if it's going to happen, it's going to happen. And also by all by all means, like I am very young. So plenty of time, plenty of time, plenty of time, plenty of time.

I would love it. Don't get me wrong. Like that sounds great to to meet to meet like a forever partner or whatever you want to call them, but sounds great. Just haven't found it. Yeah. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Is there something interfering with your happiness or is preventing you from

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Check out their website. Everyone loves them. You've got zillions of testimonials. New ones are posted every day. You can go to betterhelp.com forward slash Duncan. That's better H-E-L-P and join the over two million people who have taken charge of their mental health with the help of an experienced professional. In fact, so many people have been using BetterHelp that they are recruiting

additional therapists in all 50 states. Right now, my dear listeners will get 10 percent off your first month. At betterhelp.com forward slash Duncan. Thank you, BetterHelp. Yeah, well, those dating apps, man, they're fucked up. They never work for me. That's for sure. Like, you know, it's just something you do in your horny.

You like pull up the dating app and you're like swiping and swiping and swiping and some weird dream that like, but it's never. It's always right. It's always like at the time you don't expect it late at night and then I'll wake up the next morning and be like, oh, yeah, I was messaging someone last night. I'll look back and be like, who is this person? What were we talking about? And they're being like, yeah, we should get coffee today.

And I'm like, I don't know you stranger fuck off. Who are you? And I'm like, wow, I'm toxic. Am I like leading people on or are people too eager and willing to go meet up with a stranger after having like a pleasant exchange for two minutes? Like, what's the what's the right thing here? Should you meet up with someone just because you had a good banter for five minutes? Or should you have more self-respect to like chill and meet if you you talk to them for a few days?

I don't know. I don't know what's the right answer. But it's it's it's a difficult one, especially in the gay community. Like we have like dating apps in the gay community or just dating preferences in the gay community are very particular people. Like there are people who have been known to have incredibly toxic preferences. Like what? Well, the age old saying is at like, I don't believe this.

But the age old saying is no fats, no fams, no Asians. And that is like a common occurrence on male dating apps where people have like these strict preferences and they'll actively advertise it in their bios of like who that they're looking for. So specifically particular that it feels it just feels blatantly offensive. No, FIMS. What does that mean? Like no feminine, no feminine men or no feminine. So anyone who's flamboyant or feminine.

I don't like again, like what does that even mean really? Right. To me, it to me, it just I see that and I say insecurity, I wouldn't want to date you even if you were amazing. God, if you are really willing to like X out that many people in society just purely like preferences are so strange. Yeah, preferences are crazy, right? Now, now this is like there's actually one of my favorite and sorry for folks listening, one of my favorite.

Let me find it right now. This is and I can't even pronounce it. It's one of my favorite Buddhist texts speaking of preferences. It's by the third patriarch of Zen. And let's see. Hold on one second. And it begins with the great way is not difficult for they who hold no preference. It's not fucking cool.

It's like preference is the devil. It's the it's the whether it's like dating apps, whether and even worse is like something about the digital reality is that you are forced to squeeze yourself into a clump of preferences. And you know, it starts off where you're like, I'll just write some shit down in my bio or dating apps in particular. The questions they might be asking or the way you're presenting yourself has to fit into these categories that plug into the algorithm.

And I think that's where you run in to something that is really malefic, which is the way that the algorithm is grooming us, bonsai training us, shaping us into all these like forms that if we aren't even we aren't even those things at all. Totally, totally. I know and I've never and maybe maybe this is me like subliminally not participating in that, but I never write bios for anything because I'm like, how am I supposed to describe myself in a sentence?

Like, how could I possibly describe anything about me in a sentence that makes sense of like who I am? So most of the time it's like, I don't know, just ask me, which also is it nice because that doesn't come across as welcoming, does it? So I never know. Like I don't like that either. And yeah, you're so right in that I feel like having strict preferences is just limiting you from experiencing the gradient of the world around us.

Yeah, to think that you could possibly know, again, dating apps is the example of like, this is the only person I am attracted to. This is the only person I want to date. You're you're limiting yourself from so many potential other people and partners and experiences that you could have because you think you don't like someone you've never met. Yeah, yeah, it's just zeros and ones. You're doing it based upon a picture.

You're not even having an in-person interaction with them. How could you possibly know that you're not attracted to them? This brings me to my next question. If you had to describe yourself in one sentence, what would it be? Oh, no, I'm just kidding. That wasn't really about just kidding. That's not my fucking question. I fully believed you to garbage question.

Oh, God, if you had this, you know, I've been asked that, you know, I mean, I'm sure you've been asked that, too, of like to some some boil yourself down into something like that before. It's just OK, you lazy fuck in an interview and someone's like, so what are you? Hey, are you supposed to know that? So what is the book about? So what do you do? I'm like, did you do any?

What am I here for? Am I describing myself? So are you you're human? And I know, I know. But what but what? Like, do you pray? Do you have a connect? Do you what is your connection right now with with the source with God, with the universe?

What do you do? Do you have a spiritual practice right now? I know it's coming across like I'm like a Satan worshiper. But no, I feel like I'm very connected to the universe and to the planet and to living things around me and to life itself. So I feel very like the most free I ever feel or the most peaceful I ever feel is when I'm in in nature or I'm in a natural environment. So if I'm just like standing in the middle of the woods and it's just nothing but

wind in the trees, animals scurrying up a tree, you know, like just natural sounds like I feel so at peace or if I'm standing at the beach here in California and it's like no one to my left, no one to my right and I just hear the ocean crashing, nothing beats that feeling. And I feel like that's how I go about life a lot nowadays. You know, I'm willing for it to grow and change. But at the moment, it's more of like when I go for a run every morning or a walk every night, I don't bring my phone with me.

I just allow myself to hear what's happening around me or to like sit with whatever's happening within me and just be and that's my only time where I feel so grounded, so connected 100 percent there for that moment. And then I go back to the chaos. Oh, my God, that passage in your book about like your phone not working, going off into nature, that was so beautiful. So it was interesting in that you're describing this perfect experience of like being free from technology.

And I'm like, this is how I feel. And then literally the next sentence is like, I know that you're thinking this is how other people say they feel. But I do think you like identified this this growing realization in all of us, which is like this shit is fucking us up. It is devastating our society. It is like roasting us and it's not the fires of hell.

Maybe it's something worse than that. Because like, at least if you're in hell, a blaze screaming into whatever the fuck it is, like a cave or whatever, like, you know, well, at least I'm doing something right, like I'm supposed to be hurting right now. You know, so in some way there's some perfection happening here. But these digital fires, it's like, I don't think people realize how we're getting baked by him. It's the zuck.

It's all the zuck. He's got us wrapped around his finger. I know it's it's I every time I get my like iPhone's screen time, do you have that thing delivered to your phone? Yeah, I turn it off. I need to turn it off because I keep I'll randomly get it every Sunday of like my screen time and I'm reminded of, oh my God, I'm so addicted to this thing that I'm spending this much time on it, doing what for what?

Scrolling on TikToks, watching people like eat fast food and and people dance. And like for what? What is it? What is it doing? What is it adding? It's enjoyable in the moment. But God, it does feel just worthless to a certain extent. Don't you think you in particular and, you know, me, anybody who has jobs like we have, don't you feel like you're a little more imprisoned by it than other people?

I mean, it's not just like you're consuming it for the euphoria of it. Like you have to be engaged with your audience. If you want to continue that, you know, if you want to continue doing what one part of what you're doing, it must be a little claustrophobic. Or just you have to be in tune with the world around you, meaning like you have to know what's what's a trend. You have to know what's in the news to be able to talk about it. Yeah, because I mean, it's I do a lot of live streaming and people are constantly

being like, did you see the new Adele? Did you hear what happened to Justin Bieber? And if you don't know anything, people just aren't like, what do you have to talk about that's current? Everyone at the moment is so addicted to now, now, now, now, immediacy, instant gratification from being a part of exactly what's popular in the second, if you didn't watch Squid Game, the moment it came out, fuck you. You know what I mean?

Like it's like all of that. And you feel you feel that I think as not even just me, like I think everyone feels that to a certain extent of just I have if you don't keep up, you're going to get left behind. I my my siblings don't do what I do, but their jobs are becoming more and more intertwined within immediacy, their email being available 24 seven, even when they're not working in their hours. It's just oh yeah, you have to answer this email. I know you're not working, but you have to answer it or oh, someone's trying to

schedule this, you need to pick up the phone to answer it. And it's like, you're not working. Why are you working? But it's because they figured out figured out a way in this American lifestyle to make us work 24 seven without our permission. Yeah, yeah. And like, but what what is the what is the like? Because I think you're more of a barometer for it than a lot of people.

I know is it just in my mind that there's a growing sense of like, no, this is not the way to live or is it just more like everyone's like, no, we are going to fuse with a machine. We're plunging ahead full steam and this is read. This is just like we're going to like meld with the with technology. What's the general? What's the sense out there, man? Are people few or like people getting sick of this?

I it's so tough because I feel like it's it's polarized like a lot of things right now in that I see people fully embracing it and fully living a tech savvy lifestyle where they have, you know, the Apple Watch, they have the newest computer, they have the newest VR system. They are fully immersed in the digital age and they love it. They love that everything is so convenient, that everything is so futuristic. But then there is this subset of people who are experiencing that as well, but resent it wholeheartedly and then they become in like almost lost in this

cycle of resisting something that's inevitable. I feel like it's almost impossible to not participate like I have. I have cousins that somehow still don't have cell phones in the rural Midwest. And I know and I'm like, I don't know how that's possible. How is it literally possible for you to not have high speed internet in your house in the 21st century? I actually like I can't fathom it because it's so important to what I do in my lifestyle, but I envy it.

But then also I think, do I envy it? Because I kind of like I kind of like everything that's going on here. I kind of like my HD camera. I kind of like my high speed internet. I kind of like that access. But it doesn't make me feel good all the time either. So I don't know, it's it's deep. Can it's deeply conflicting there because I do.

I do think the futuristic element of technology is absolutely amazing. But it does leave me feeling worthless half the time as well. In Tulip. Oh, my God. What a beautiful essay on depression. You wrote. It's like I figured out how to reach out for help. But I still haven't figured out

how to receive the help I asked for. God, this is how I feel about every time I pray, you know, like when I pray, I think I get my prayers answered. But then when they're being answered, I'm like, oh, no, I can't. I don't deserve it. I feel unworthy. This is I can't take this. Do you is that part of your depression, a sense of unworthiness or a feeling like you just don't deserve all of this amazing, like this amazing life

experience and abnormal life experience that you're having? Yeah, I constantly feel like I don't. I don't I don't want any sort of praise or any sort of attention or any sort of just anyone to look at me. It's it's kind of it's completely it's like the antithesis to like what I do. But I it makes me so uncomfortable to be singled out or to be praised or to be looked at in some way.

So when you need advice or you need help from a friend like in Tulip, it's like it's there. It's what I need. I know I need it. I know I've been asking for it, but I have no idea what to do with it now that it's here, I feel completely helpless in that case. And I feel that I think that that could be just it could be in a Midwestern humility where Midwesterners absolutely loathe the spotlight or loathe

in any way making a situation about themselves. So even though it's completely justified and worthy of me wanting someone to pay attention to me, there's something like, oh, it's fine. It's a burden on you to to give this to me. It's I don't want to make you feel uncomfortable making me feel comfortable. There's some sort of like constantly projecting or assuming what the other person is is wanting or feeling or desiring. And it's like this constant string of empathy towards another person

that is like completely there's there's no there's no justification to that process at all. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's I think that's one of the most insidious facets of depression, at least from my own experience with it, is that even if you somehow do manage to muster up the courage to tell someone I'm fucked up right now, the depression, if it lets that slide under the door, it's not going to answer the door when someone comes knocking because it's like,

no, you know, that was just I don't know what I was saying, you know. And that's why I think it's like that's why depression is deadly is because it just it like tries to censor every single possible method of connecting with love. It does. And it's I mean, just you saying that makes me think about so many different times where I've experienced depression and I completely shut out everyone, even though I know that's the wrong thing to do. But at the same time,

and again, I don't know if you or any or who's who's ever listening is has experienced this, but every time like I've had depression for such a long time, I'm not really depressed now in this present year, this present moment. But my depression has evolved to a state of like when I'm feeling it, I start set casting outlines to people and and then it starts getting worse. And when they bite, I almost resent that they're even paying attention to me. It's like I asked for the help and now that they're giving it back, I'm mad that they're responding and it's this strange cycle that I put myself

through of like asking for it because I know before it gets me that that's what I need. And then when when I'm there, I I I react in such a negative way to it. And it's almost impossible for me not to. It's it's just the strange thing. Like I can there are so many times where that happened that happened semi recently as well, or like when I was in my most majorly depressed moments, there was one time that I can think of where I just like just walked. I left my house and I just kept walking for hours because I didn't know what else

to do, but I was texting a friend and he was aware that this was happening, but I wouldn't tell him like where I was. And I'm like, oh my God, I'm so sick for like making my friend worry right now about me. But that's like, but that's also clearly what I want is someone to worry about me, but how sick am I to make him worry about me, but not to give him a way to make it better or to tell him where I am or anything. And it but it's this thing that you're like aware that you're doing the bad thing or you're aware that you're causing someone harm with no solution,

but you can't stop yourself. Yeah. And your old friend depression, what's it going to tell you? You're sick. Look at you. How sick you are walking. It's like, you know what I mean? Like that part that's telling you you're sick. That's not you. That's the depression.

You're not sick. You're you're you're depressed. I mean, I guess we could call it a sickness if you want. But holy shit, man. This this depression and I have been depressed. I have had a problem with depression.

I've been prescribed medication for depression in the past. I've been suicidal before a long time ago. It I just don't know of I have. I have one ball. I had a ball chopped off because of testicular cancer. And I will tell you getting radiation for a month. It's a walk in the fucking park compared to depression, friend. I'll tell you that there is nothing I know of in the world.

There's nothing I know of like that. And like and so I'm interested in what you're currently what you're I mean, you don't have to share everything, but is like you're running regimen part of you like doing self care for the depression? Are you do you take any kind of medication if you're willing to talk about it? Well, how do you treat it? Yeah, I mean, it bites.

It's vicious, isn't it? It's it's again, it's one of those things that you can't describe unless you've felt it yourself. It's it's so painful and just lingers. But no, my current state is very I'm very good. I'm very even. I like you described I for the longest time battled with it and dealt with it myself.

And then I started reaching out for help. So I started getting on some medication. I started going to therapy regularly. And all of that kind of brought me back to a level sense. It kind of I'm trying to remember how my therapist described it, but it was basically just like right now you are so low that you can't get back up to a normal level. We need to get you to that normal level because we you can't do anything from so far down here.

We need to get you back up to where you were just so that you can even like fight because at the moment you're so low that you can't fight for yourself. We just need you need help to get you to that point. So for me, how I do that on a daily basis is that I exercise regularly. I will connect with a family family member regularly. So like when I wake up in the morning and I go for a run, that's my way of being above the above the floor.

So even if I get knocked down a couple hours after that run, I'm still above the floor. I'm not starting off at the floor and getting knocked down below it again. And I can't reach back up to I can't climb up the ladder. So I always set myself up higher than what I would be at without it. So that in case I get knocked down, I don't go back to that place. So it's rare for me to ever spiral anymore because I'm always setting myself up so high that there's like no way for me to get back down there. Wow. Wow.

God, I would have had your discipline in my 20s. I was just laying on a mattress with roaches walking on top of me. I'm serious. I'm not exaggerating. I was just like, maybe I'll kill myself. Yeah, that's the same thing. But look, I'll tell you, though, something like I mean, look, earlier I asked you about your spiritual practice, but I think running is like if that's not a religion, I mean, why not?

Why can't why that's like I've had some of like I would say true connections with the divine just running somehow. What time do you get up? I like to get I'm one of those like sick people that if I have something really early in the morning, I'll get up like two hours before it, even if it's really early, just because I want that moment of peace ahead of time to like really become myself, it takes like a good hour or two for me to wake up, to feel human, to feel relaxed and be present.

So I love that kind of morning silence that I get in that time. So honestly, six between six and seven every morning. And that doesn't mean I'm like out the door running. It's like I'm just sitting, drinking a coffee, kind of meditating in a way, not actively, but in a way it's my meditation. And then go for a run and start the day after that. Connor, I know you got a book tour and you are so generous to have given me this amount of your time.

Thank you so much. It was so nice getting to know you. Thank you for writing this beautiful book. And I can't wait to read your other ones. I'm starting at the end. I guess I'm going to work my way backwards, but it's a real joy to get to know you. Where can people find you? That's so sweet.

Thank you for having me. People can find me at Conor Franta across the entire internet. I'm a lucky one where I got Conor Franta on every social platform. ConorfrantaBooks.com is where you can get any information on the book or on my book tour. It's in every place. You can buy books, so I highly recommend it. And again, I appreciate your kind words. I can tell you are so genuine about everything that I wrote about.

And it was really that's really touching. So thank you for having me and for for listening to me and hearing me. Thank you so much for being here, Connor. And Hare Krishna, thank you. Thank you. That was Conor Franta, everybody. Check out his book House Fires. If you happen to be in the city, he's coming through.

Won't you say hello to him on behalf of our family? And of course, subscribe to all of his stuff. Thank you all for listening. Thank you to our glorious sponsors. I will see you very soon with an incredibly special episode of the DTFH, where I reveal a project that the great Johnny Pemberton and I have been working on for about eight months. I'll see you then.

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