The One You Feed - Marianne Williamson on a New Revolution

Episode Date: April 20, 2021

Marianne Williamson is an internationally acclaimed author and lecturer. For the last 35 years, Marianne has been one of America’s most known public voices having been a popular guest on television programs such as Oprah, Larry King Live, Bill Maher, and many others. She was also a presidential candidate in the most recent election. Seven of her 12 published books have been New York Times Bestsellers and today she talks about her book, A Politics of Love: A Handbook for a New American Revolution.In this episode, Eric and Marianne Williamson discuss the ways forward to create positive change in our society and our world, in the midst of all the difficulties that surround us. But wait – there’s more! The episode is not quite over!! We continue the conversation and you can access this exclusive content right in your podcast player feed. Head over to our Patreon page and pledge to donate just $10 a month. It’s that simple and we’ll give you good stuff as a thank you!In This Interview, Marianne Williamson and I Discuss A New Revolution and…Her book, A Politics of Love: A Handbook for a New American RevolutionHow the ego is so loud and the spirit is quietThat a common mistake we make when we’re younger is that we don’t take life seriously enoughThe path forward from where we find ourselves todayWhat to do when you encounter someone of a different point of view That once you start asking the deeper questions, the deeper answers will comeThe starting point for getting involved in creating changeHow to remain involved in actively changing the broken parts of the systemThat we need to display as much conviction behind our love as some display behind their hateThe invitation to rise to the challenges before usHealing the polarization of today’s political climateMarianne Williamson Links:Marianne’s WebsiteTwitterInstagramFacebookFeals: Premium CBD delivered to your doorstep to help you manage stress, anxiety, pain, and sleeplessness. Feals CBD is food-grade and every batch is tested so you know you are getting a truly premium grade product. Get 50% off your first order with free shipping by becoming a member at www.feals.com/wolfTalkspace is the online therapy company that lets you connect with a licensed therapist from anywhere at any time at a fraction of the cost of traditional therapy. It’s therapy on demand. Visit www.talkspace.com or download the app and enter Promo Code: WOLF to get $100 off your first month.If you enjoyed this conversation with Marianne Williamson on a New Revolution, you might also enjoy these other episodes:Deep Transformation with Spring WashamImprovising in Life with Stephen NachmanovitchSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

God doesn't shout, and that's why the quieting of the mind is so important, and it's also why the cacophony of the modern world is so dangerous. Welcome to The One You Feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes like like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think ring true. And yet for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter.

It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction. How they feed their good wolf. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together, our mission on the Really Know Really podcast is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why the bathroom door doesn't go all the way to the floor, what's in the museum of failure, and does your dog truly love you? We have the answer. Go to

reallynoreally.com and register to win $500, a guest spot on our podcast or a limited edition signed Jason bobblehead. The Really No Really podcast. Follow us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Decisions Decisions, the podcast where boundaries are pushed and conversations get candid. Join your favorite hosts, me, Weezy WTF, and me, Mandy B, as we dive deep into the world of non-traditional relationships and explore the often taboo topics surrounding dating, sex, and love. Every Monday and Wednesday, we both invite you to unlearn the outdated narratives dictated by traditional

patriarchal norms. Tune in and join in the conversation. Listen to Decisions Decisions on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Marianne Williamson, an internationally acclaimed author and lecturer. For the last 35 years, Marianne has been one of America's most known public voices, having been a popular guest on television programs such as Oprah, Larry King Live, Bill Maher, and the list goes on from there. Oh, and don't let me forget that Marianne was also a presidential candidate. Seven of her 12 published books have been New York Times times bestsellers and today her

and eric discuss her new book a return to love reflections on the principles of a course in miracles hi marianne welcome to the show thank you so much glad to be here it's such an honor to have you on i don't think we've ever had a presidential candidate on the show before and you have a long history of writing wonderful books before that, so it's great. And we're going to talk a little bit about your latest book called A Politics of Love, a handbook for a new American revolution. But before we do that, we'll start like we always do with the parable. There's a grandmother who's talking with her granddaughter, and she says, in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf,

which represents things like kindness and bravery and love. And the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the granddaughter stops. She thinks about it for a second. She looks up at her grandmother. She says, well, grandmother, which one wins? And the grandmother says, the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do. There are two parts of the mind. One is the spirit and one is what some call the ego. And I don't think that they battle. I think the ego battles and the spirit does not battle back. I think the spirit is who we are. And the ego screams, the ego speaks first, and the ego speaks loudest. And the spirit is fostered, our conscious contact with spirit is fed, as the parable says, by prayer, by meditation,

by a disciplined spiritual practice, where we are seeking consciously and proactively to counter the false teachings of the world. We're taught to be afraid of each other more than we're taught to love each other. We're taught to seek to get more than we're taught to give. We're taught to think of ourselves and act as though we're isolated beings rather than one with each other and with the universe. This is the teaching of a thought system that dominates the planet. And it gets fed plenty. It gets fed by

almost all of the stimulus that comes at us. And a spiritual practice is where you're feeding the spirit. You're feeding the other part of the mind. And I think that that's what is going on in the world. You see it in the world and you see it in yourself. That part of you that is not the best you. And then there's that part of you which is kind and generous and there for the right reasons and showing up for life and not making yourself be a victim. We all see those two parts in ourselves if we are willing to look in the mirror. And we all know that the part of you that you feed is the part of you that becomes the personality that lives in the world.

Yeah, and it is interesting the way the ego is so loud and the spirit is so quiet. In both Christianity and Judaism, there is a phrase, the small, still voice for God. God doesn't shout. And that's why the quieting of the mind is so important. And it's also why the cacophony of the modern world is so dangerous. I think that it's very interesting, one of the effects of the COVID pandemic, not that you in any way would say the pandemic is good, but there are gifts in every experience. And in a way, the very fact that it has slowed us down might be ultimately a gift to the society at large.

Because when we are so taken in by all the superficial stimulus of the world, it becomes very easy to stay shallow. It becomes easy to stay superficial. It becomes easy to be so distracted on a daily basis by things that do not ultimately matter that nothing compels you to sit down quietly and think about things. I mean, how many times have we, I know I have, I don't know anyone who hasn't, made mistakes. And then later you say, what was I thinking? What was I thinking? Well, you weren't thinking.

You didn't really sit down and think about it and reflect, pray, meditate, really go deep. You acted impulsively, you acted thoughtlessly, and then later you go, I can't believe it. There you go, right with the parable. You didn't feed the best in you. And when you don't listen, if the light's not put on in the room, the darkness is there. But all the darkness is, is the absence of the light. So I think that many people realize this and are in their own way, our own way, seeking through spiritual practice, meditation, yoga, whatever it is, to find that deeper quiet within ourselves in the absence of which we have no impulse control, we do stupid things, we undermine situations, we self-sabotage, and ultimately we

participate in a world that obviously has gone haywire. You've been writing about spiritual ideas for a long time, and you've gotten much busier, maybe, maybe I'm making an assumption you've gotten busier in recent years, but running for president must keep you very busy, really forces you into the public eye. How has your spiritual practice changed over the last several years as you've moved into a more public role? And what does your current spiritual practice look like today?

Well, I've been in a public role within a particular counterculture for many years. That's true. So form changes, but content doesn't. But I have lived enough, and I think this has less to do with public versus private and more to do with just the accumulation of life experience. I have lived enough to know how much harm I can do myself when I'm not aligned with my better self. I mean, look at what's happening in the culture today. Look at what's happening, for instance, with Biden's nomination of Neera Tanden. She's being brought down by tweets. Look at how many people are being brought down these days because of something they emailed, something they said, something they tweeted. We're not aligned. We're paying the price for moments when we simply were

not our best. And so I think what has occurred in my life is that there have been enough experiences where I see, you know, I've lived long enough that I really get that as many times as my life experience has been like being thrown against the rocks over and over and over again, I came to realize that more often than not, I was the wind, that no one had ever hurt me as much as I'd hurt myself. Once you see that, your motivation to pray and meditate in the morning becomes very strong. Once you really know how powerful thought is, you become very motivated to align yours to the best of your ability with the angel of your better nature every morning because you know. And sometimes those moments that tempt us into things that could be problems and mistakes that we will be regretting for years come out of left

field sometimes. So my practice is serious for that reason as much as anything else. Life is serious. I think one of the things that is a common mistake that we make when we're younger is we don't take ourselves seriously enough. We don't take life seriously enough. And as you get older, you get, this is a very serious thing going on here. Human life is a very serious thing. Relationships are a very serious thing. Childhood is a very serious thing. Marriage is a very serious thing. Intimacy is a very serious thing. Relationships are a very serious thing. Childhood is a very serious thing. Marriage is a very serious thing. Intimacy is a very serious

thing. Politics is a very serious thing. Ethics is a very serious thing. The more you know that life is serious, the more inspired and motivated you are to take your spiritual practice very seriously, because it is that which determines how you participate in the world one way or the other. It is that which determines how you participate in the world one way or the other. Right, right. It really is a foundation that everything moves from. You say in your latest book that a belief in separation is always at the root of a problem and a realization of our oneness is always at the root of its solution. Say more about that.

If I realize that obviously on the level of the body, we're separate. You know, you're in Atlanta, I'm in Washington, D.C. Even if you were standing in front of me, you're in your body and I'm in mine. But on the level of spirit, there's really no place where I stop and you start. It's like we live in two parallel universes. So my ego mind says that what I give to you is no longer mine, and that what I withhold from you is nothing I have to worry about. But on the level of spirit, once you understand how the law of cause and effect operates, you know that what I give to you, as the Course in Miracles says,

an idea doesn't leave its source. The Course in Miracles says that if I have to you, as the Course in Miracles says, an idea doesn't leave its source. The Course in Miracles says that if I have an attack thought or judgmental thought towards you, that I should imagine a sword falling down on your head, but actually it's falling on mine. So let's take this moment. I can either be thinking, I don't know what this is, some podcast I have to do, but I really have more important things to do, and I don't know what I could be thinking, but not really deeply showing up for this experience, keeping myself separate from it. That is the source of my life not working. I won't realize it. But anytime I show up, separating myself from what could be my sincere desire to be there

in generosity and giving and love and whatever I can do that's best, is a gift to myself. When I realize that your good and my good in this moment are the same versus seeing my interests as separate from yours. And this is what's happening in every single encounter, in every single situation. Either I'm separating myself from the good of the encounter and the good of the situation and thinking it's all about me, or I'm seeing myself as one and doing what I can to participate in the betterment of everyone

concerned. And you go on from there to say that this is really the root of our political challenges, is this belief in separation? Well, the Course in Miracles says that this is the original, quote-unquote, sin. The word is an archery term. It means we missed the mark. The original moment that the Course in Miracles says occurred millions of years ago in time as we know it, when we began to think of ourselves as separate from God or separate from love. And all that's happening in the world is that we're reenacting in our individual lives, as well as in our collective experience, this original mistake of separating ourselves from others. I mean, even what you see politically right now, when you think of the millions of Americans right now, even before the pandemic, 40% of all Americans could not handle a $400 unexpected expenditure. That was even before the pandemic.

40% of Americans could not absorb a $400 unexpected expenditure. Where do you think those people are now? We already had, even before the pandemic, 43 million hungry Americans. Something is very wrong that we are not recognizing this and treating this with a level of urgency that would display deep humanity and deep empathy and deep appreciation for the suffering of other people. Something is so almost sociopathic about the basic cultural, political, and economic tenor of our times. Do you think that there were times that that was different?

Yes, I do. I actually do. When you read about the Great Depression, I mean, one thing that was nobody disagreed about, you look when Franklin Roosevelt became president, one thing there was no question about was the level of deep, deep, deep, deep crisis and that something had to be done. Now there are people, we're not facing it,

people don't want to talk about it, but there are people today, and millions of people, whose economic conditions today are as desperate as people were experiencing during the Great Depression. But somehow we have agreed, we're subconsciously conspiring to separate ourselves from a deep recognition that this is so. Because if we did, there would be far more of a political impulse. Do something now. political impulse. Do something now. We're having conversations that are stuck on a level that is so disregarding of the level of chronic despair being faced by so many millions of people right now. And I fear for my country because we will be paying for this for many, many years. Yeah, you say that any person, economic system, or political establishment that fails to concern itself with the pain of others

is out of alignment with spiritual truth. And where there is a lack of spiritual alignment, chaos is inevitable. And I wrote that before the pandemic. That was true even before the pandemic. And the same economic and political system I was describing there is now responding to the pandemic in the same way it responded to the situation before. This is bad. This is bad. about how important it is that we learn to listen to each other more than our ability to yell at each other. You say that hate anywhere is a toxin everywhere. And if we demonize each other personally, then we're wrong, even if we're right. You also say we all have our fingers pointed at someone today, you know, but in a spiritual sense, the pointed finger is the problem, which I deeply believe. And boy, is it hard not to get really frustrated

with people who see the world differently. And in some cases, it seems very callous and cold. You mentioned in the book that you wrestle with this a little bit, but I'd like to know a little bit more about how you make that actually happen. Because I think there's a lot of really good people in the world today who say, I don't want to be hateful. I don't want to be angry. I don't want to demonize other people. But boy, I'm having a hard time. President Eisenhower, who was a Republican president, of course, said that the American mind at its best is both liberal and conservative. There are high-minded liberal principles, and there are high-minded conservative principles. There are high-minded liberal principles and there are high-minded conservative principles.

And at our best, we're kind of yin and yang. Now, what started happening about the 1990s? There was originally a show called Crossfire. The media began to realize in the United States that there was more money to be made by making it like the conservatives were fighting the liberals. A whole generation got raised thinking that's what politics was. There was not as high ratings for a deeper, more considered conversation where you could really see the respectful dialogue between the two. And then you connect that.

Then another parallel phenomenon at the same time was a diminishment of resources in our public education system, teaching American children. You have 11 states that don't even require half a year of American history, civics, or government. Now, the first principle, one of the first principles, is out of many, one. In a democracy, not everyone agrees. We don't have to agree. Nobody has a monopoly on truth. Part of what makes democracy gloriously messy is that everybody, I got my view, you got your view, but out of many, one means, but we're united in our fealty to these common principles. We have kids growing up today, they don't even know what the common principles are.

Then, in addition to that, compounding all of this, you had Roger Ailes and Fox News that decided, wow, we can have a real moneymaker just making a whole news department strictly far right. And then the left did the same thing. MSNBC is really the same thing. Not that I really see it as left. It's not left, but it is a particular view, is really the same thing. Not that I really see it as left. It's not left, but it is a particular view, right? So what happened to Walter Cronkite? What happened to the days when we could really look to the media? So what has happened is that there's no center that holds. And so now it's the shadow side of this part of the political spectrum and the shadow side of that part of the political spectrum. Now, in the midst of all this, and largely because we were not cleaving to the larger yin and yang of American high-minded principles on both left and right, a terrible, terrible

disregard based on neoliberalism in general that had its both Democratic and Republican roots, unfortunately, started with the Republicans, but the Democratic and Republican roots, unfortunately, started with the Republicans, but the Democratic presidents didn't stop it, was a massive transfer of wealth into the hands of 1% of our people. And we should see large groups of desperate people as a national security risk. Anytime you have desperate people, what happens, large groups of desperate people, it's a petri dish out of which arises all manner of societal dysfunction, including vulnerability to authoritarian leaders.

So now you have, in the midst of everything I just said, in strides, a neo-fascist would-be dictator. So now, here you've got the liberals and the conservatives fighting each other, when what we really should be concerned about is neither one. A high-minded conservative is not the enemy of the high-minded liberal, and the high-minded liberal is not the enemy of the high-minded conservative. But we have some neo-fascist elements that are enemies of democracy and are enemies of both. So now, we are in a place where all of us, I think, need to step back. We have to remember on a personal level what your parable says, as who have I become.

There's this viciousness on the right, but let me tell you there's a viciousness on the left as well. There certainly is. We all have to stop. And remember, you know, in the philosophy of nonviolence, Gandhi says the end is inherent in the means. of nonviolence, Gandhi says the end is inherent in the means. We, we ourselves have to become purified of the kind of self-righteousness and arrogance and mean-spiritedness. I do believe there's a yearning for this. I do believe there's an aspiration for it. I think the very fact that

you and I are talking about it, these conversations like you and I are having, people are having them everywhere. People know this has just got to stop. So I think people are reaching for a greater ability to speak with honor and without disrespect, even with those with whom we disagree. And we must reclaim that space or we will not be able to solve our problems. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together on the Really No Really podcast, our mission is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why they refuse to make the bathroom door go all the way to the floor.

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reveals the answer. And you never know who's going to drop by. Mr. Brian Cranston is with us today. How are you, too? Hello, my friend. Wayne Knight about Jurassic Park. Wayne Knight, welcome to Really, No Really, sir. Bless you all. Hello, Newman. And you never know when Howie Mandel

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or a limited edition signed Jason bobblehead. It's called Really No Really, and you can find it on the iHeartRadio app, on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What worries me more than any of the short-term political things that we see is the overall tenor, the overall way. And it's tough. It's like I see a pandemic happening, and I go out somewhere,

and I see somebody not wearing a mask and I just get really angry. Then I'm like, well, all right, let me try and put myself in this person's understanding. You know, it's just really challenging. I don't think that you have to try to put yourself in their head. You can just bless them and move on. Yeah. And work hard at organizing. You know, they're going to be midterms in 2022.

Yeah. organizing, you know, they're going to be midterms in 2022. You know, I know a lot of people who are so upset about the direction that the government has taken over the 40 years, but who they themselves did not participate in the political process. You know, they themselves were very distracted. They were not voting. Democracy is not that way. There's an old French saying, you don't do politics and politics will do you. So I think that one of the things the Trump presidency has demonstrated to everybody, millions of people, is that we really do care about democracy. We just took it for granted. But once we saw it really under assault, we went, whoa, whoa. Churchill said, you can always

depend on Americans to do the right thing after they have exhausted every other option. So often it takes us, we're late to get it, but once we do get it, we slam it like nobody's business. That is a historical pattern. And I think that what people need now is to realize that citizenship must now become a facet of what we consider a meaningful and well-lived life. You have to start reading your local newspaper. You have to know what's going on in your own town, in your own city, in your own state. You have to be involved in local elections. You have to be involved in state elections. You have to be involved in federal elections. You have to know that every time one election ends, just take a nap and then get ready because the midterms are coming up next.

ends, just take a nap and then get ready because the midterms are coming up next. And there are no short-term answers. We probably have a 20-year period of course correction ahead of us. Like you said, it's not just short-term this issue or that. Right now, we're just playing whack-a-mole, fix this, fix that. It's got to go deeper. But like I said, you and I are having the conversation. I think millions of people are. Once you start asking the deeper questions, the deeper answers will come. The problem goes back to what you and I were talking about. We were such a superficial culture, we weren't even asking the deeper questions. Now we are. And even though it's painful, I think that I'm putting my money on the American people. If you look at our history, we have been through terrible crises before. There have been terrible transgressions against the principles on which we purport to stand before. But ultimately, ultimately, our historical pattern is that we self-correct.

And I believe that we're going to this time. Yeah, one of the things I love about the book is you point us back again and again to the work within us that we've got to do in order to engage outwardly. Listeners of the show are like, he talks about the middle way again, I'm going to scream, but I'm a big fan of the middle way. And I think there's a middle way between action and contemplation that we have to be able to find between an inner spiritual life and an outer commitment to the world. And I know you're a fierce advocate for that. And I love that in the book, you're really simultaneously pulling people in both those directions. You're sort of saying, hey, make sure you're going within,

you got to be working within. But oh, hey, by the way, don't get stuck there. We also need you coming outwards, right? We need both those movements. Yeah, it's not either or. It's both and. There are a lot of hours in the day. There are a lot of hours in the day. You meditate in the morning, and that's going to make a tremendous difference. And your behavior will reflect the centeredness and the power and the empowerment that that level of stillness will give you in the world. Yep. I think a lot of people might take exception with that idea that there's a lot of hours in the day. I think a lot of people feel very time crunched work kids. They

feel like it's hard to find ways to get involved in a consistent and meaningful way. What, what sort of things do you think that the average, maybe to say the average person, I don't really love that word, but I'll use it, the average person who works, you know, 40, 50 hours a week, they've got a family, and yet they go, Black Lives Matter happens, and people get temporarily sort of fired up and involved. Or an election like the one we just had, people get temporarily fired up and involved, and then sort of fades back down. And I think what you're really pointing to is that this needs to be sort of a consistency. We need to remain involved in politics. Again, whatever our political leanings, we need to remain involved. But how do we do it in a way that feels manageable and consistent? First of all, we need to recognize that the system is designed to leave you with no bandwidth for citizenship. So in the 1970s, the average American worker had a decent job, good benefits, could own a home, owned a car, one parent could afford to stay home with the kids, and they could afford a vacation, and that

family could afford to send their kids to college. That was the story of the average working American. Now, that person that I just described had more time to go to the PTA meeting. That person had more bandwidth to read kids a story before they went to bed at night. That person, you just said 40 to 50 hours. They're not supposed to have to work 50 hours. Excuse me. We now have an economy where not only does daddy work 50, mommy and daddy have to work 50 hours. And mommy and daddy are busy on weekends because they have to. So of course people don't have the bandwidth. The last thing they're able to do is go to the city council meeting on Thursday night. But even there, we have to recognize that's why the rigging of the system is so dangerous, why it absolutely must be repudiated.

When a crisis happens in anybody's life, it's not convenient. And a crisis like what's happening in our country is not convenient. But we're going to have to dig deep and recognize that this is so dire that if we do not find in ourselves the wherewithal to rise up, that the situation will not change, we will never get back to an America where, while I'm not whitewashing or romanticizing the past, the average person did have much more of a shot of making it into the system and making it into the economy and winning there than the average American does today. And I think that there are people, and you and I both recognized it just now, for whom it's almost a joke to think that on top of everything else, they're going to have time to go to the city council meeting.

On the other hand, there are a lot of people listening right now who, if they're honest with themselves, have absolutely enough time. It's a Zoom call, and they could if they wanted to. with themselves have absolutely enough time. It's a Zoom call, and they could if they wanted to. So I think if each of us, each of us do what we can, there are enough Americans who can, who if we will, will take responsibility for doing so. And I agree with what you said. I think that's one of the problems is the way the system is designed at this point is it's really hard for the average person to get real involved. And so this isn't an either or, but you've mentioned several times local city council meeting, reading the local paper. Do you believe that's the starting point for people is a

more local engagement where they are closer to things, so to speak? I don't think it's a starting point, but I think it is more and more obvious that no matter what we change on the level of federal policy, for instance, so much of the corruption that we have to worry about is closer to home. The voter suppression efforts, for instance, are being made on the state level. I saw today West Virginia has passed a bill making work stoppage and striking illegal. Well, hello, this is America. So it's the people of West Virginia, I think it was West Virginia, who are going to have to deal with that. You know, Alexander Hamilton said states are the laboratories of reform. So some of the best of what America is capable of and some of the worst that America is capable of starts on a state level.

So I wouldn't say it's the starting point because the starting point should be whatever compels someone's attention. But I do think we should all remember that there's a lot more going on to cultural, political, and economic change than just what happens at the federal level. Right. Our voice is louder at a city level than it is at a federal level, right? That is such a good point. It seems easier to have impact. You know, if you're like really concerned about violence against black people, right? Your city is the place where that reform starts. You saw the movie Erin Brockovich. Okay, so I don't know if you've had her as a guest on your podcast. I haven't. I saw you did recently, which we have not mentioned. You have a new podcast where you're having wonderful conversations with people. Thank you. Well, I highly recommend that you consider Erin Brockovich for your podcast as

well, because she talks about how change starts when one person, and she's talking specifically about the issue of water. Now, we all saw Aaron Brockovich. We know about the chromium-6 content, the multi-billion dollar settlement. Well, the good news was that PG&E paid that huge settlement in Hinkley, California all those years ago, the bad news is that throughout the country, the promium-6 problem is even worse than it was in Hinkley then. I mean, the chemicals in our water are enough to frighten anyone who looks deeply into it. Today, I was reading about the endocrine disruptors and the children being born with deformed genitalia, et cetera, and how the chemicals companies are fighting against any kind of regulation of the endocrine disorder.

It's just horrifying. But what this book, what Erin Brockovich's latest book is about is, you know, I call the podcast Finding Your Erin Brockovich. She said it's just one person who shows up at a city council meeting. She talks about how a lot of times you'd be surprised your city council members don't know these issues until someone goes in and tells them. She said she tells one story of a, I can't remember where it was, it was a city council meeting where they said, well, do you have witnesses? Do you have other people who support you in this position? And she said, oh, yes, sir,

we do. Opened the doors, there were 2,000 people. They stayed there until two or three in the morning, and the city council made changes and laws and regulations that had to be passed the very next morning. Those members honestly did not know, and it was all those people showing up that made the difference. I think we too often forget the job that we have as citizens. Your elected representatives work for you. And, you know, when you look at it on the federal level, how can it be enough for them to hear from you every two years or every four years when they hear from multinational corporate lobbyists all day, every day? So we have to take responsibility for our part. And I agree with you. A lot of people just can't even imagine having the bandwidth.

For those of us who do, it's our responsibility to make it happen. There's been such a move forward with technology making it so easy these days to like make a very quick call to a representative to send off a very quick letter, like these things have really made it possible to engage in those ways with less time. Certainly every innovation has its ups and downs. But I've certainly found that to be a really useful one. Like, you know, I get a text and it's like, do you want to talk to your representative? Yes. And the next thing I know, it's the phone's ringing me and, you know, it's connecting me right to the representative's office. And I think your point is very well taken. The constituent call, as opposed to just signing a petition. Those constituent calls really matter. The organization that sent you the text. Another thing to realize is that the charitable donations

or the political contributions to the organization that sent you that text, that's what that money goes for. That kind of texting program costs money. Absolutely. Another thing that you say in the book is you say, hate has shouted while too often love has only whispered. I guess this gets back a little bit to when we started when we said the ego is really loud and the spirit is quiet. But you say we need to display as much conviction behind our love as some people have displayed behind their hate. Well, conviction is a force multiplier. I think there are a lot more loving people, decent people, people who want the best for our democracy and for other people in this country and in this world, then there are haters. But if you have 10 haters acting with deep conviction, and then you have 100 people who are loving and decent, but I don't know, I don't,

I can show up on Thursday, but I can't show up any other day, then the force of the energy coming from the convicted 10 people will carry more weight. You know, I can't imagine a kind of sort of sometimes when it's convenient, committed terrorist. But there are a lot of people who are sort of, you know, when it's convenient, committed to justice and to mercy and to compassion and to democracy. And I think that this point is understood by a lot of people today. I do believe there's an awakening. This country did reject policies that were so literally assaultive of the basic tenets of democracy. We didn't go over the cliff, but we're still on the entrance away from it, and people know that too.

But I do believe we have been chastened as a country by what we just went through. I think we've been humbled. I mean, whether you look at 9-11 or you look at the pandemic or you look at the Mueller report or you look at what happened on January 6th, the American people are awakened to the fact that so many of the ways that we thought, oh, if it gets too bad, there are people who will handle that. No, there aren't actually. And we are far more vulnerable than we knew. The fact that nobody knows exactly what to do about it doesn't mean we're not thinking, doesn't mean that people aren't reflecting. You know, in the book, one of my favorite books that

you probably like too, based on the fact that you love that parable, is Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke, where he says, when you don't know the answer, live the question. And like I said before, you don't have deep answers until you start asking some deep questions. So the fact that we've been humbled and we've been chastened and we've been disillusioned, I mean, what is disillusionment except getting rid of things that were only illusions to begin with? We have to dig very deep and all of us have to show up personally in ways that are more powerful and empowered and decent and dignified than we have ever in our lives. But as you know, from reading

Politics of Love, if you look in the history, we are the heirs of legacies of greatness. Yes, this country had slavery, but we... I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together on the Really No Really podcast, our mission is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why they refuse to make the bathroom door go all the way to the floor. We got the answer. Will space junk block your cell signal?

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Hello, my friend. Wayne Knight about Jurassic Park. Wayne Knight, welcome to Really, No Really, sir. Bless you all. Hello, Newman. And you never know when Howie Mandel might just stop by to talk about judging. Really? That's the opening? Really? No, really. Yeah, really. No, really. Go to reallynoreally.com and register to win $500, a guest spot on our podcast, or a limited edition

signed Jason bobblehead. It's called Really? No, Really? And you can find it on the iHeartRadio app on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. We had the abolitionist movement. Yes, we had the institutional suppression of women, but we also had the women's suffragette movement and the passage of the 19th Amendment. Yes, we had segregation, but we also had the civil rights movement and the passage of the Civil Rights Act. So as I see it, it's our turn. It's the newest iteration of that separation that you were talking about.

That's really a spiritual disconnection from self. And our challenge and our invitation is to rise to this challenge. Now, I also think part of the danger is that there's a lot of very naive arrogance on the part of many people. Once again, perhaps ignorant of history or willing to distract themselves from its lessons. Great civilizations have fallen before. There is no guarantee that this thing will last. It's up to us. And when you really take that in and you realize that it's each and every one of us asking the God of our own understanding, how can I best show up? It takes you to some really deep places. You know, people say it's really sad when a child doesn't get to have their childhood. I think it's also very sad when people never get around to having an adulthood.

We've had a crisis of adulthood in this country we've had way too many women acting like girls and way too many men acting like boys and there's been a lot of talk about you know this wasn't like the world war ii generation that had this coming of age experience well we have ours now and i think that at the deepest level that's what we yearn for certainly my generation i'm older than you we party but you, even for the best party, there comes a time when, you know, the party's over. Even if you stay overnight, it's time for the morning, it's time for the next session. Americans partied. Now I feel for these young ones who never got to party, but then on the other hand, neither did my mother's generation

when World War II happened. So I think that it's about how seriously we take this moment. And if we take this moment seriously enough, and take personal responsibility for it seriously enough, we're going to be fine. What do you think is the best way to start to heal the polarization? Because I agree with you, I think that I've always had an opinion that the vast majority of people are decent and good. Yeah, I agree. But if we do look at the divide, it's pretty strong and it feels like we're having trouble talking across it. Where does the average person, again, back to don't love that term, but start to

find ways to actually heal the polarization? I think some of it we talked a little bit about. It's about stopping pointing fingers. It's stopping being hateful. It's turning down our rhetoric. What are other active steps that we can do to find common ground? You know, several years ago, somebody came out with that underwater photograph of the iceberg. And we've always heard the phrase tip of the iceberg. But when this photograph heard the phrase tip of the iceberg. But when this photograph came out, we really did get to see it's what's above the water line. It's just the tip of things. It's all underneath. So when we think about healing the divide, it can't all be done on the level of surface. It can't all be done on the level of how we talk to each other.

It can't all be done on the level of how we talk to each other. It can't all be done on the level of the personality. Yes, we can take responsibility for not being hateful online. We can take responsibility for being more respectful, even when we disagree with people online. And there are enough people. There are involved in the kind of dialogue situations and circumstances. There are people trying to do this. But I think at the deepest level, it starts with our own backyards, not where we're necessarily trying to heal a divide,

but just where we're showing up more fully for our own lives and the people in our own lives. I think that, as The Course in Miracles says, each of us has a highly individualized curriculum. If any of us take a good look at ourselves and say, where could I be doing more? Who in my family needs me more? Who needs me to show up for them more? It could be my spouse.

It could be my friends. It could be my children. It could be my parents. Just right around you. I mean, sometimes those of us who are so concerned with what's going on out in the world are tempted, I know I have, to avoid all the gaping holes where someone closest to me would say, well, it's nice she's out there saving the world, but I'm dying here.

What about my tears? Why am I less important than a stranger? I've had that experience. And I think that that deep level, every time you show up with more love, I think that where there is love, there cannot be fear. Just like where there's light, there cannot be darkness. Anything we do to contribute more love into the universe starts healing the divide on a deeper level than we can register with our rational minds. That's, I think, a beautiful place for us to wrap up. I love that because it brings it right back to right where we are, what we can do.

And what you just said is in the realm of everyone. Everyone can act on that now. So thank you so much. It's been such a pleasure to talk to you. I appreciate you taking the time to come on. And I enjoyed it. Thank you. Well, thank you. I enjoyed it as well. And I appreciate it. And good luck with these conversations are meaningful. Thank you for letting me be part of it. Thank you. If what you just heard was helpful to you, please consider making a monthly donation to support the One You Feed podcast. When you join our membership community with this

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