The One You Feed - Rainn Wilson

Episode Date: February 1, 2016

This week we talk to Rainn Wilson about the courage to be hopefulRainn Wilson is best known for his Emmy-nominated role as Dwight Schrute on NBC’s The Office. Wilson also voiced the alien villain Gallaxhar in Monsters vs. Aliens (2009) and starred in the police procedural BackstromToday he’s equally well-known for his millions of Twitter followers and the philosophy website he founded, SoulPancake, which creates media about life's big questions. and wrote a New York Times bestselling book of the same name.He just released a memoir called The Bassoon King: My Life in Art, Faith, and Idiocy. Our Sponsor this Week is Spirituality and Health Magazine. Click here for your free trial issue and special offer. In This Interview Rainn Wilson and I Discuss...The One You Feed parableHis new book The Bassoon KingHow spirituality got a bad nameHow spirituality is everything that we don't have in common with the monkeysHow happiness is not an if then propositionThe difference between happiness and joyThe balance between ambition and acceptanceHow cynicism robs us of the gift of joyHow much easier it is to be cynical than to be hopefulBombing on BroadwayHow success doesn't mean the end of the difficulties of lifeThe Baha'i faithHow the Baha'i faith encourages equality between women and menThomas MertonReconciling a loving God with the terrible things that happen in the worldSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We're all going to die. We're all going to experience pain. We're all going to suffer. What we have to do as humanity is decrease that suffering that we can control. Welcome to The One You Feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes 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 really know really.com and register to win $500 a guest spot on our podcast or a limited edition sign. Jason bobblehead. The really know really podcast. Follow us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Rainn Wilson, best known for his Emmy-nominated role as Dwight Schrute on NBC's The Office. Wilson also voiced the alien villain in Monsters vs. Aliens and starred in the police procedural Backstrom.

But today he's equally well-known for the philosophy website he founded called Soul Pancake, which creates media about life's big questions, including a New York Times bestselling book of the same name. He just released a memoir called The Bassoon King, My Life in Art, Faith, and Idiocy. Hey everybody, it's Eric. And before we get started, I wanted to let everyone know that there is space in the One You Feed coaching program. This is about the time of year that everybody starts realizing that their resolutions or the goals they set for the year aren't working out so great. So if you meet that description, go to oneyoufeed.net slash coaching to learn more about the program, and I would love to work with you. And now for the interview with Rainn Wilson. Hi, Rainn. welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me on your show. It's a pleasure to get you on. Obviously, I loved your character Dwight on The Office, which is where I got to know you. But as I explored some of your other work, Soul Pancake and your latest book, The Bassoon King, I'm excited to explore those. Great. Yeah, it seems that way. It seems like there's a lot of alignment here. Yep. So our podcast is called The One You Feed, and it's based on the parable of two wolves where there's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson. And he 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 grandson stops, he thinks about it for a second, and he looks up at his grandfather and he says, well, grandfather, which one wins? And the grandfather 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? I love the parable. One of my very favorites. I spent a lot of years of my life feeding the wrong wolf, and that really dragged me down. And I wasted a good decade or more. And also, you know, the parable goes right to the center of spiritual discourse since the dawn of man. Not to sound too pretentious, but really, it has to do with ourself, overcoming ourself, because it's really not. These wolves are a part of us. They're not something outside of us or something even inside of us. They are a part of us. They're not something outside of us

or something even inside of us. They're a part of us. And there is a part of me that is ego-driven, that wants accolades, status, material comfort, praise, power. And I want to do all of that effortlessly and not have to work for any of it and have everything that I ever want to be given to me. And so when I've been in that pursuit of myself, of the ego, the illusion of self, rather, I should say, I've been just really unhappy, just by and large, unhappy, destructive behaviors, and haven't contributed positively to either the world or to my own spiritual growth. You talk about spirituality a lot. You're, you formed the, oh, hang on a second, dogs, sorry. You, I don't know if you can hear that. Yeah, if we have dogs barking in the background,

it's fine, because I think it's New Morning, Bob Dylan's album from 74. You can hear dogs barking in the background because he's recording it in Woodstock, New York. So you talk about spirituality a lot. You've formed the new media company, Soul Pancake, to really focus on. I think the tagline is to chew on life's big questions. What does the word spirituality mean to you? It's obviously much maligned in today's world. So help me understand what that word means in your life. Thanks. I think that it is much maligned. It's been maligned by either being associated with kind of born-again religious kind of fundamentalism, or kind of associated with something that, kind of hippy-dippy, kind of very general kind of feeling that

doesn't really have any specificity to it, something having to do with crystals and yoga pants and incense, stuff like that. And so it turns a lot of people off for that. But for me, spirituality is a huge part of just who we are as a human being, different aspects of us, and the spiritual is part of that aspect. I say in the book, there's a little analogy I came up with that I'm really kind of proud of, Eric, and that is spirituality is everything that we don't have in common with monkeys. So we have a ton of stuff in common with monkeys. You know, we like to groom ourselves.

We like to collect shiny objects. We like social status. We like to eat. We like to poop. We like to fornicate. But spirituality is really anything that is not that. So anything having to do with self-improvement, altruism, creation of art, trying to improve the world, make ourselves better or the world better, being of service, an act of selflessness. All of these things, an appreciation of beauty, pondering our existence, being still, meditating, praying, devotion.

our existence, being still, meditating, praying, devotion, all of these aspects that make us separate from monkeys, to me, I would classify as spirituality. Yep, that's a great way to put it. I really like that. I think I often talk about spirituality being the recognition that it's not this, you know, that there's an inner life, there's something that happens inside of us beyond just what's out there. But I like your definition a little bit better, I think. So I have heard you talk about happiness. You're not a huge fan of the word happiness. But you say something that I really like, and I think it's something we focus on here a lot. But you say happiness is not an if-then proposition. Can you expound on that a little bit? Yeah, I think that the way, I'll put it in terms of a personal story. I talk about this in my book, The Bassoon King. For myself, my entire

dream was to have a beautiful girlfriend and wife and to be living in New York and be a professional actor. And that was my dream. And that's what I'd wanted since I was a teenager. I worked super hard for it. I went to acting training school and paid my dues and et cetera. And I found myself in New York City with my now wife. We've been together 25 years.

And I was working professionally as an actor and I wasn't happy. And it didn't make any sense to me because I kind of felt like culturally and societally, I was given this proposition, which was, if you do X, Y, and Z, and you work hard for it, and you arrive at Z, then you will be happy. You're not going to be happy now. You're not going to be happy in high school. You're not going to be happy working hard in college.

You're not going to be happy early on in your career. But once you get to that point, then you're going to be happy. And I wasn't. In fact, I was more unhappy than ever, even though I was working as a professional actor, and it was beyond my wildest dreams. It launched kind of a long spiritual journey for me through my life, artistic journey and spiritual journey. But really, one of the things that I have discovered in my life and in looking at the bigger picture is that happiness is not an if-then proposition. Happiness is not something around the corner. It's not around the bend. It's not over the hill. It's not something that you eventually arrive at. It's a false dichotomy to think that I'm going to put in this terrible, grueling, horrible time so that I can be happy once I make $175,000 a year and I have a wife or have kids or live in this certain neighborhood or have achieved a certain

status. So happiness is really to be found along the journey. And yes, I don't really like the word happiness because I think to me it has to be connotations of, it's not lasting. Like I'll feel a lot of emotions through the day. Happiness is something that I'll feel through the day, maybe four times for about eight seconds. But I do feel a deep, richer contentment, which I prefer to happiness. And sometimes I feel a joyfulness or a gratitude for much longer periods of time. If I can stay in gratitude, then I can kind of align myself with a kind of a deeper, richer joy. align myself with a kind of a deeper, richer joy. Happiness I associate with cotton candy and roller coasters and video games and quick short-tension span bursts or seeing someone you haven't seen in a long time running into a woman at the Starbucks and giving them a hug.

And, you know, you might feel that nice happiness for a minute and a half, and then it goes. But I'm talking about something a little bit deeper. Yeah, I think what's so challenging is that idea of, if I get this, then I'll be happy, is such an illusion. And yet it is one of the most persistent illusions there is, because I think for a lot of time in my life, I would, I would say, well, if I get this, then I'll be happy. And then I would get it and I wouldn't be happy. And instead of questioning the entire thought process behind that, what I would do is just assume that it's the next thing. Well, if it wasn't this job, then it must be the next job. And, and that just goes on and on and on. So how for you, are you able to break that illusion, or is it really one that

you kind of, just like I do, have to keep kind of hacking away at? I wish I had some magic bullet. There's a couple things that I do in my day that help me. So gratitude helps me a lot, staying in gratitude, because I have a tendency to get very native and cynical quickly. Prayer and meditation as a daily part of my day is super important, and it helps align me with what's true and important. And in my faith tradition, as a member of the Baha'i Faith, there's something that we look at called a twofold moral purpose, and that is to make myself a better person and to also try and make the world a better place. But I really believe that all human beings have this obligation to try and improve themselves. I try and make myself work on my character defects, work on things that hold me back, my selfishness, impatience, my pride, and to become more honest and kind and humble and compassionate.

And at the same time to look at, you know, what's my greater purpose in the world? And when I'm in alignment on both of those things, then I feel a great deal of kind of purpose and contentment and richness in my life. And I think that service is a big part of that. I think that talking about happiness, I think the most satisfying feeling one can get sometimes is being of service to other people. And it's not something that comes naturally to me. I'm very narcissistic and, you know, want to just serve myself and my career and my, you know, my pocketbook and my self-esteem. So, but it's something that I've worked on.

Yeah, and I'd like to come back to the Baha'i faith in a little bit more detail later in the conversation. I want to explore this theme in a slightly different way, because you talk about you've been very successful professionally. You have some ambition in that regard. You talk about the ambition to become a better person, the ambition to improve the world in a positive way. And yet at the same time, you know, a lot of spiritual teachings are about kind of being accepting of, grateful for, and happy with what we have in the moment. And I'm always interested in that balance of, I want the world to be a better place, I want to be a better person, and I'm okay with the way things are.

I'm content in the present moment. How does that contradiction play out in you? That's a great question. I hadn't really thought of it in those terms before. You know, I just think that because I believe in God and I believe in a higher power and I believe that God has a plan for me and for every person and wants us to achieve everything that we can achieve, our maximum potential. Every person is given a potential. Everyone has a different potential. And our kind of our job on this planet is to rise to our highest potential, whatever that is. That doesn't necessarily mean being a celebrity or being a millionaire or achieving greatness on this or winning awards or anything like that. It can just be in one's life. or winning awards or anything like that.

It can just be in one's life. And so acceptance in the spiritual tradition is a tricky thing because oftentimes, like for instance, in the caste system of the Hinduism, the lowest caste, which is like half a billion people, they're taught, well, this was your lot in life. This is what you inherited. And so you should just accept it and be of humble service in that lot of life, and maybe in your next life, you'll come out ahead or be farther. And even in the Christian tradition early on, it was kind of like, well, lower caste people and lower level people are meant to be that way,

and it's God's will. So just you're serving God's will by being a peasant or a serf or a slave or what have you. I think it can be used in a negative sense. I think we can all improve ourselves, and we can always improve the world. But it's a tricky balance. I see what you mean about accepting our given circumstances and where we are and the difficulties of life, realities of life, and at the same time, striving to make things better. Yeah, it's certainly one that I wrestle with, trying to strike that. I guess it's one of those paradoxes that they talk about in spirituality all the time, that there's a little bit of a paradox there and becoming comfortable with those is useful I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together on the Really No Really podcast,

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It's for the voters to decide. Follow the Big Take podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. And here's the rest of the interview with Rainn Wilson. You say that, I heard you say once, something to the extent of that cynicism is the disease that robs people of the gift of life. You know, how easy it is for us to be negative, sarcastic, and cynical than it is to be hopeful.

This is something else that I've learned. Cynicism comes very easily to me. Sarcasm, negativity, it always has. And I had a great acting teacher named Andre Gregory. He's one of the great theater directors and teachers and philosophers of all time, is the subject of that movie, My Dinner with Andre. And he talked about how one of the biggest battles for any young person, I'm no longer young, but at the time I was, is cynicism and that society wants you cynical. he wants you cynical. And he said, you know, the bravest act that one can have in life is to be positive and uplifting and hopeful. And that really stuck with me because I saw so many of my friends sinking into cynicism and despair. And it's such an easy fallback position to kind of cynicism and despair. And it's such an easy fallback position to kind of know better about things and be sure they're all not going to work out and all it's just a pile of shit. And what's

the use? And it's very easy to be that way. And I attempted to try and fight that tendency to try and be more positive and uplifting and speak about my faith and speak about hope and speak about universal education and international development. This is what we do at Soul Pancake. I'm attempting to be brave by being positive. I think it is easier to be cynical. Irony is such a big, big thing seems to be these days. But being hopeful and positive is, I think, A, harder to do. And like you said, I think there is a social risk to it. There is. You get made fun of a lot. I mean, people really don't know what to think about me. And here I am, this comedy character actor, weird looking dude. And at the same time,

my faith is very important to me and service, spirituality, positive, impactful media. And so I participate in that. So people don't know what to think, because especially in the world of Hollywood and in comedy in Hollywood, it's the most cynical place on earth and no one shares their feelings or their hearts or their struggles or wanting to make the world a better place or talks about faith or devotion or God or any of that stuff. a better place or talks about faith or devotion or God or any of that stuff. So it's really the community here in Los Angeles have no idea what to do with me. You know, one of the things as I read your book, that I was struck by was, even in the midst of having success, how many rejections or things that don't go the way you want occur.

You know, you tell sort of story after story of a, you have a minor success, you're playing Hamlet at school, and then when it comes for auditions for more of a professional career, you know, no one reaches out to you. You get cast into a movie, and then you get cut out of the movie. You are very successful as Dwight. And then maybe the next spot that you have isn't so successful. It seems like that is a theme that we all wrestle with. And I think it goes back to some of that of, if I get to X point, then I'll be happy. But what I think is really fascinating about it is for most of us, we do look to that, like, if I got that one big thing, like if, you know, you're being Dwight is that one big thing that, you know, everybody looks for

that one big break. But I think what's so fascinating is even after that life just still goes on as it always does, and can still hurt and be challenging in all the same ways. Absolutely. It's a constant struggle. I think even if you looked at people who, you know, from the outside, they look like they've got it made, you know, Brad Pitt or something like that. I'm sure Brad Pitt has his struggles. And he's like, why am I not as respected as Leonardo DiCaprio? You know, and why wasn't I cast in the new Coen Brothers movie or whatever it is? Who knows what that is? But, no, you're absolutely right. And it's been – that was one of the reasons I wrote the book. One of the central lessons that I wanted to dig into in the book was about to really share my failures and my learning experiences as I went through those failures. failures, and my learning experiences as I went through those failures. For instance, the thing you referred to, there's a chapter called I Bombed on Broadway, where I got my first Broadway play, and I thought, oh, this is it. I'm going to get a Tony nomination. I'll get

a new agent. Casting agents will be calling me in, putting in movies. My whole life's going to change. Well, I sucked. I got stuck in the role. I stunk and got bad reviews. But coming out of it, and I had a horrible time doing it. I was in terrible, excruciating pain. I knew I was bad. I was weeping on the phone to my wife. But when I finished it, I felt really free because I was like, you know what? I'm never going to do that again. I'm never going to be this false idea of what I think an actor is or what a Broadway actor is or a theater actor. I just have to be myself. And so ultimately, I never would have gotten Dwight. I never would have played Dwight had I not gone through sheer hell, you know, in my first Broadway play. And I think that's how life experiences can work, is that you learn by going through the fire and hopefully come out the other side wiser. And when you look back on it, I suggest everyone to write a memoir,

because it's fascinating what you learn as you're writing it and kind of looking back on your life. It's very interesting. But even now, you know, yes, I'm well known for playing Dwight. I tried to do another TV show, Backstrom, which bombed. I've done a bunch of movies which bombed. And people don't really know what to do with me as an actor or how to cast me. I do a lot of little indie films that I think are really smart and cool. None of them have really hit yet. Now I'm going to go do a play and I wrote this book and I'll do other pursuits. But it's, you know, it's, I have my own challenges right now. Now, you know, I have the perspective to know, like, look,

I've got a lot of money in the bank and, you know, people know who I am. I'm very lucky and I'm very, I'm super grateful for what I have. But that being said, I still have my challenges professionally, artistically, spiritually, moving forward. Yep. And I there's so many, there's so many points in in what you made there. I think one of them is exactly what you said, like, there are far more actors out there, countless, the vast majority of them would be thrilled to be in the place that you're in. And yet, you can always find somebody that's a little bit further ahead wherever you are in life. And I think it's, I just, I really like that lesson of, because I think so many of us have

this idea that we're going to get to a certain point, and then it's like, it's over. Life becomes easy. Everything is perfect. And it's just, my experience has never been that way. And the experience of people I know who have been successful has not been that way. And then the second piece of it is sort of, I was just talking a little bit, but that idea, I think it was Teddy Roosevelt who said that comparison is the thief of joy, right? If you've got Brad Pitt comparing himself to Leonardo DiCaprio, right? You can always find somebody to sort of look up to or say, I wish I had what that person has. And you can always find someone to look down on and go, well, I'm better than that person. But there's never a connection.

There's never a connection with other humans, which is one of the things that you talk about in your book as being one of the key ways to derive satisfaction out of life is the connection that we make with other people. Absolutely well said. Very well said. Really nothing to add to that. And again, that connection that we make is something that monkeys don't do. You know, they have a certain measure of connection in terms of their social hierarchy, but connection with community, a larger sense of purpose and belonging, is part of spirituality. Exactly. Let's talk now a little bit about your faith, the Baha'i faith. I think I said that

correct, right? Yes, you did. So tell us some key things about the Baha'i faith, maybe, you know, just the short two-minute version, where it came from, you know, a couple of the key beliefs. Okay, good. The two-minute version. I'll give you, you can go, you can go three, you can go three minutes. No, I'll do, no, I'm going to do two. All right. Two minutes and ten seconds. Here we go. Go on.

So, the Baha'i faith basically believes that there is only one God, that all humans have always worshipped this one God. He might be called Allah, or or Yahweh or Jehovah or the Great Spirit or whatever, but there's one God. And that how God makes himself or herself or itself known to humanity are through these divine teachers that come down every 500 or 1,000 years or so. And so God's message to humanity is gradually unraveling, is gradually unfolding through these divine teachers. And we know their names as Krishna and the Buddha and Moses and Abraham and Zoroaster and Jesus and Muhammad, that they essentially, when you look

at the essence of their message, it's the same. It's one of love and unity, detachment from the material world, service to others. The golden rule is prevalent in every single faith tradition. And Baha'is are followers of a man named Baha'u'llah, and that name means the glory of God. Baha'is believe that Baha'u'llah, who is a real human being who lived in Iran and Persia in the 1800s, we believe that Baha'u'llah is the return of the Spirit of Christ, that he's the fulfillment of these divine teachers, he's the latest divine messenger or teacher or prophet or manifestation of God for this day and age, and that he brings a message of love and unity and peace for all of humanity. And that's essentially it. Then there's a lot of social

teachings like the harmony of science and religion, the equality of men and women, universal education, the elimination of extremes of wealth and poverty. Baha'is see fighting for social justice as a spiritual act. And there's about 5 million Baha'is all over the world. There are a few things that caught me right away. One was sort of all races equal, men and women equal. So you know, having to honor both science and religion. A couple others that I thought were very struck me was one is there's no priests or whatever, you know, reverends, call it what you want in the faith. Tell me a little bit more about that.

Yeah, so when Baha'u'llah came, he spent his whole life being tortured and persecuted and jailed, and sent from land to land, from jail to jail, exiled. And part of the reason this was is he taught that there's no need for any clergy anymore. We don't need a class of people who've gone to a certain amount of schooling to be able to be intermediaries between humanity and God. The Baha'i Faith is very democratic, so there's no clergy. It's kind of like a 12-step meeting. It's kind of like the inmates are running the asylum, you know. It's, you know, elected positions and without anyone who has any kind of higher status at all, which is super important for me. I think

there are some brilliant and beautiful and effective clergy people, the Pope being one of them. But we can feel the damage that clergy and the power of clergy has done to humanity and to faith traditions throughout history. One of the things I think is interesting when you talk about the idea that God sends these people periodically to teach us things is I'm always struck by how many other people there are who may not be given that designation that are teaching truth and wisdom and guidance all the time, kind of all around us.

There's so much wisdom coming out of human beings. I'm always sort of thinking about like, is it really just these few individuals that we name as these great spiritual teachers, or is it sort of a almost constant flowing forth of wisdom and, I guess wisdom would be the word I would use? I think that that's very true, and I think that the divine, the Holy Spirit, whatever you want to call it, is always speaking to very wise individuals who are sharing that. I mean, whether it's Eckhart Tolle or Pima Chodron or the Pope or the Dalai Lama or whoever you want to turn to, or people even on a smaller level that we've been inspired by.

Certainly, wisdom speaks to all people. In the Baha'i tradition, in the Baha'i way of looking at things, these special divine teachers looking very specifically at Muhammad, Jesus, Moses, Abraham, the Buddha, Krishna, that these, they have a very special higher station, and you can see that whole civilizations have been created based on their message, based on a book, or based on their teachings. So they are, according to Baha'is, they have a kind of higher station than a regular wise person, but that's not to say that the divine doesn't speak through lots of incredibly wise and effective people. And some of the—I'm reading Thomas Merton right now. I love Thomas

Merton. He's a Catholic monk, but he speaks to me so deeply. I spend every morning reading his work. Yeah, he's great. You actually had a quote in your book from him. You were talking about how he said that he described himself as loving God and yet hating him, born to love him, living instead in fear and hopeless self-contradictory hungers, which is such a great phrase. Yeah, I was reading The Seven-Story Mountain by Merton while I was writing my book, and really touched by that, that his battles between faith and, you know, surrender to a spiritual path, which he ultimately did, and the world benefited from it. But I read, there's a beautiful book he wrote called New Seeds of Contemplation.

You know, he was a Catholic who really studied the Eastern tradition, so he's very well-versed in Zen Buddhism and Tibetan Buddhism and Sufism and Sikhism and all the more mystical Eastern faiths, and wrote about them and wrote in a Catholic way, but also he was like a Buddhist Catholic. I don't know, a Catholic, a Buddhist. I don't know how to use it. But just fantastic, and a great poet as well. So a question for you about your faith.

You bring up on SoulPancake, you know, chewing on life's hard questions. Here's one that I wrestle with because I think I'm pretty spiritual in the sense of I'm really trying to play to the higher things in life. But the concept of a God that has a plan, I always get stuck. And I get stuck when I look at all the awful things that happen in the world. And I know there's a lot of classic responses to that. But I'd be curious from a Baha'i perspective, how did the Baha'i answer the question of, well, if God's all loving and has a plan, how do we account for just the horrid things that happen in this world?

Well, I think there's two parts to that question. I think it's a great question that's one of my very favorites. I don't have answers. I guess I would just have, in my very limited perspective, I would say there's two parts to that. One is, so a divine teacher like Jesus comes along with a beautiful, pure message. And he sends his, when he has guests, he's got a handful of apostles. And he sends them far and wide and says, you know, preach my gospel. But early on in Christianity, it was the first time in human history where people came together in an open tent, where there were Roman centurions and Jews and Samaritans and slaves and women and regular workers and rich merchants, all praying together, acknowledging the divinity of Christ and the fatherhood.

And this spread of our wide slaves became Christians. That's why they were thrown in front of lions, because it was the state of the slaves and the lower classes and the upper class Romans didn't like it. But then Constantine becomes a Christian and it spreads even more. But then as, you know, a few hundred years into

it, all of a sudden it really gets co-opted by the priests. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together to it, all of a sudden it really gets co spacewalk gives us the answer. We talk with the scientist who figured out if your dog truly loves you. And the one bringing back the woolly mammoth. Plus, does Tom Cruise really do his own stunts? His stuntman reveals the answer. And you never know who's going to drop by. Mr. Bryan 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 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. And the administration. And Christianity loses its purity. And this happens with all the faith traditions.

So they lose their essential message, and it gets mired down in the muck of humanity. they lose their essential message and it gets mired down in the muck of humanity. And so to look at these faith traditions, and it's so hard because they do, they cause so much disunity and pain in the world when you look at them by and large. But if you look at the essential teacher and the message, and you look at maybe the first few hundred years of that faith tradition, maybe the first few hundred years of that faith tradition, you could see what a glorious effect it has on changing the spiritual evolution of humanity. I believe that God wants the spiritual evolution of humanity, and that is His plan, that we either evolve spiritually or we die, we destroy our planet or blow our planet up. You know, the second part of

your question has to do with suffering. Why is there suffering? Why all of a sudden would there be an earthquake in Haiti and, you know, three or four hundred thousand people die in a matter of a minute and a half? You know, what is that about? But, you know, when you look, when you take a step back and you look at life and you see that suffering is a part of life and death is a part of life, these are not nasty, horrible, bad, terrible things. They hurt and they suck, but it's a part of this material plane that we live on. We're all going to die. We're all going to experience pain. We're all going to suffer to some larger extent, some to a lesser extent.

What we have to do as humanity is decrease that suffering that we can control. We can outlaw slavery and child labor. We can bring women up to a standard of equality with men. We can get rid of racial prejudice and classism and the economic disparity that holds, you know, a billion, two billion people down. We can change these things and reduce suffering greatly. And these are spiritual acts in doing that to myself and to Baha'is. Are there still going to be earthquakes? Are there still going to be cancers?

Absolutely. It's unfortunate, but it's part of this world, because if you believe that there are more spiritual worlds after this one, this is our material plane and our eternal self, our soul, whatever you want to call it, we move into another plane of existence that is harmonious and beautiful. There's not a heaven and a hell. We just continue on our spiritual journey towards meeting the Creator. Then, you know, losing, having pain or death or suffering in this world isn't seen as such a, necessarily such a terrible thing. Sorry, I went on a little rant there.

No, no, it's good. That's good. It's something I wrestle with a lot, that idea of why are things the way they are? And if, you know, I think it's another paradox. There's that old Buddhist, there's a Buddhist temple, apparently, where when you approach it, it's got confusion as a guardian on one side and paradox on the other. And those are considered the guardians of truth, which seems pretty apt to me when I look at it, try and sort these things out. One of the things that the Baha'is

talk about that you talk about in your book, and I really like it, is that you talk about morality in the Baha'i faith is a bit different than morality in other faith traditions. Can you explain that a little bit? Yeah, morality is something that's a tough one. People don't like to really hear about morality because it has such a terrible history, you know, of sin. It's incorporated with sin. It's equated with sin. And it's people telling you what to do and what's good and bad. You know, if you don't anoint yourself with water from left to right as opposed to right to left, then you're going to die in hell or whatever, you know, all kinds of different aspects of morality that people find distasteful.

But from a Baha'i perspective, morality—the word sin, by the way, comes from the Greek, I think it's amartia? I'm forgetting it. I need to look it up. And it's from the, it's a word of, it's an archery term, to miss the mark. So to sin is to miss the mark. And I really love that idea. So if you take hell out of the equation, there's not a fiery pit we're going to burn for all eternity. And morality is simply trying to be a better person and actually helps us and is a guidance and protects us from ourselves. Baha'is don't drink or use drugs. There's not any judgment about that. There are some Baha'is who do, probably, you know, no comment, but there's not any judgment about that. It's just simply as a protection to ourselves, because oftentimes alcohol and drugs can lead us down some really bad paths and can dull the spirit and dull the mind and dull the heart and dull the progress of the soul. So from my perspective, we all live in morality.

There are things we will and won't do. Hitler was a vegetarian and didn't want to hurt animals. He did these other horrible things. We all have a series of rights and wrongs. Where do we get that from, though? Are we just going to get it from society? When I was growing up, smoking pot was only the really bad kids did that. Now, everyone does it. It's on every corner. Is that a good thing? When I was growing up, smoking pot was only the really bad kids did that, and the people that were.

Now, everyone does it. It's on every corner. Is that a good thing? I don't know. I'm not going to comment on that. It's like, but why are we deciding in morality what society at large is determining to be what is right and what's wrong? right and what's wrong. In the Baha'i faith, moral guidelines are there as that, as a protection from yourself and a protection in your life to help your soul grow and flourish. And that's really all it is. And if you miss and you sin, it's amartya, you've missed the mark, and you try again, like an archer, to get closer to the target, and you try and just do

better next time. Yeah, I love that concept of morality. The Buddhists talk about things as being skillful or unskillful actions. I also really love that interpretation. It's funny because we do this parable, and I talk about a good and a bad wolf, which sounds very moral, and it's not really the way it's intended, but to talk about a skillful or unskillful wolf sort of takes the teeth out of the parable, so to speak. But I would say, I would go farther. I would say it is moral. It is moral. Like, why can't we be moral? Why can't we decide what is good and what is bad and what is right and what is wrong? Do we put that onto other people? No, but we make those decisions

all the time about what is and what is not acceptable for us. And we all need to go on that journey, our spiritual journey of deciding what's right and wrong and what feeds us and what doesn't feed us. And I think the word morality, and by the way, read the writing, I know you have, and you read the writings of the Buddha and you study Buddhism, you know, you talk about the Eightfold Path, you know, there's a ton of moral writings of the Buddha. pick and choose our Buddhism, and, you know, there's kind of a smorgasbord of Buddhism, but not really diving into the writings of the Buddha himself and the faith tradition of Buddhism. But there's a ton of morality in the writings of the Buddha, of, you know, of right action. You know, right action is a huge part of Buddhism, and that determines that there's wrong action. Yep, and there's the basic precepts, which sound very similar to, you know, some of the Baha'i, no drinking, you know, no drugs. Um, again, because of the reasons you mentioned the, the,

the distance it places it's us from our, our true selves, you know, no, no killing, no murder. Those are all generally pretty, pretty solid ideas. Jack Kornfield has this joke about, you know, they talk about right, right work or right vocation. He's like, oh, it's hard to be spiritual after a day of selling guns and drugs. That's right. That's right. That's well put. Well put. We're getting near the end of the time, but just a couple last small things. One of the things that you talk about that I really love, and I really love and I've always felt as a fundamental truth but never hear articulated very often is the idea that when you create something, you are emulating the creator, that you are doing sort of what is at the heart of the

energy that drives the universe. Yeah, I stumbled in this when I had left my faith for a long time. I left the Baha'i faith and I was on my long kind of spiritual journey, which I talk about in The Bassoon King. When I came back to exploring the Baha'i faith, I found all these quotes that talked about how the act of being an artist is also the act of spirituality. It's an act of devotion.

And I dug deeper and realized, like, yes, God is the creator. Here's this blank canvas of an empty space, and then there's a big bang, and there's all of this incredible beauty with its own set of rules. with its own set of rules. And what greater emulation, what greater devotion to the creative force of the universe than to create ourselves? There's a blank piece of paper, and we make a beautiful picture, or we write a beautiful poem, or there's silence and stillness, and we create a beautiful song in that. And that is one of the teachings of the Baha'i Faith that I find most beautiful, is that art is synonymous with devotion, and it's the same as prayer. The creation is the same as prayer, and I think that's pretty awesome. Yeah, I love that concept, and I think for me that is one of the ways, a lot of times,

spirituality, a lot of these things can be very much a head concept for me. They happen in my head. But creation for me is an absolute, like I get the, I don't know if you want to call it the heart sense of it, the experienced sense of it, but it's a real experience to me of feeling more in touch with the divine or the timeless or the all-powerful. That's one of the places that I feel it more than just sort of think about it or strive towards it. Yeah, then go with that, by all means. You and me both, brother. The last question I'll ask you, and I just thought this was really interesting because

I've been thinking about this lately. I phrased it a little bit differently. I've been contemplating, what if we took 1% of the time that Americans spend on football, just 1%, and spend it on something else? And you say, if 1,100th of the energy that our country spent on entertainment

were focused on service to the planet and or humanity, we could make an incredible difference in the world and be remembered as the greatest, most altruistic culture that the earth has ever produced. Wow, I wrote that? You did. Yeah, that sounds pretty good.

I think that should be your next campaign, because it is staggering when you think about that. I just did some rough, I don't remember how I did the numbers, but I was like, well, just 1%. I'm not trying to be like a fuddy-duddy, right, and take everybody's phone away, right? It's not like you have to devote all of your life. Just give 1% of the time that you spend on that stuff. And the numbers are staggering, the amount of volunteer work that would happen. It truly is, to your point.

It would be transformative in the most unbelievable way. Right. Yeah, absolutely. You spend 100 hours a year watching football. If you spent one hour being of service to other people and spent that one hour not watching the Cleveland Browns game, if everyone did that, we would be in great shape. Now, it's kind of hypocritical coming from me, a TV actor, with a media company that makes YouTube videos, you know, saying, hey, spend less time on entertainment. I do joke about that in the book. Right.

But I'm talking about, all I'm talking about is less. I'm not talking about, I think entertainment is great. I think mindless entertainment can be great, and comedy is great, and looking at your phone is great great and that's all good. But it's just a perspective. I think our culture, like ancient Rome right now, we want diversion and we want to be diverted and entertained all the time. Like children. My son is 11 and he would just love there to always be a video game or a movie playing. He would just be so happy if that was always the case. We just have to slow him down and limit the screen time and have him read and go outside. And I think humanity is in the same state. Humanity just needs a little less

screen time. I agree. It's something I personally try and do. And sometimes I am more successful than others, but I definitely notice a difference in the quality of my life when I am not gazing at some screen all the time. I think about my consumption to creation ratio is a big one for me. I feel like I'm just, you know, even if that creation is just assimilation, right? It doesn't have to be like painting, but like, I just mindlessly gobble all this information all the time, all this stimulus, but very little of it comes into me and transforms me. And, you know,

I think we had a guest on who said, you know, if you spent for every hour you spent reading, if you spend an hour assimilating that you would be a different person in six months. I mean, you would just, you know, because that's where the growth happens. It's taking these ideas, you know, the Great Soul Pancake videos is a great example. Instead of watching 15 of them, you know, like take the gratitude one you guys did. If we all took that and did something with it, that's where so much power would come. Well said. Yes, indeed. Indeed. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show. It means a lot for us to get you on.

And I've really enjoyed the conversation. I really enjoyed your latest book. We'll have links to it in the show notes, as well as the other places people can find you out there and links to Soul Pancake and all that great stuff. So thanks so much, rain. Well, thanks for doing this, this great podcast and for talking about these big questions and big ideas and the stuff. A lot of people are afraid to, to dig into. I really admire that and appreciate it so much. And it's really a pleasure having a conversation with you.

Great. Thanks so much. Okay. Thanks. All right. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

Y'all can learn more about Rainn Wilson and this podcast at oneufeed.net slash Wilson.