TrueLife - Tommy Carrigan - Life

Episode Date: June 30, 2022

Today we talk w/Tommy Carrigan. Life, Lessons, & the road less traveled. Check him out on rumble: https://rumble.com/c/TPC Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4bIuk6mPLtjggUUGi9CRPQ?si=BYUZsitgQU6kxsuEkLEtwg

Darkness struck, a gut-punched theft, Sun ripped away, her health bereft. I roar at the void. This ain't just fate, a cosmic scam I spit my hate. The games rigged tight, shadows deal, blood on their hands, I'll never kneel. Yet in the rage, a crack ignites, occulted sparks cut through the nights. The scars my key, hermetic and stark. To see, to rise, I hunt in the dark, fumbling, fear, Hears through ruins maze, lights my war cry, born from the blaze.

The poem is Angels with Rifles. The track, I Am Sorrow, I Am Lust by Kodak Serafini. Check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the True Life podcast. We are here with the one and only Tommy Kerrigan of the TPC podcast, potentially the hardest working man in podcasting, doing three. Three shows a day. He's talked to bankers.

He has talked to Delta Force. He has talked to some of the best authors in the world. And he is still 31 years old. He's made some big changes in his life. Tommy introduced yourself a little bit. Thank you so much, man. Tommy Kerrigan. I'm 31 years old.

And I have a podcast, Tommy's podcast. That's the shortest possible answer. I started kind of on a whim in December 2019. and really have just let my OCD, psychopathic, work ethic take over. It's in middle school, it was basketball, in high school it was weightlifting. In college, it was pre-med.

A little bit after college, it was Photoshop. And then I guess one day in 2019, I was like, fuck it, I'm going to start talking. And I just haven't shut up since. That's what I do. I'm glad you do it, man. And I think that you've gone out of your way to show people who you are. I like that you don't hide stuff, man.

come out and you talk about things that you think are important regardless of what other people think. You're not afraid to, hey, say what you think. And that's a very important issue. In the beginning, one of the things that really got me listening to your podcast was a story about how you started your podcast. It seems like you had this path that you were on. You were doing weightlifting. You went to Georgia. You graduated Kumaui. You were going to med school. You had this preconceived notion of what your life was going to be. And then be it a mushroom trip or graduation or pressure something changed can you share people what happened there yeah so um i was dead set on getting into medical school uh that's all i did i mean studied around when i say

that's all i did i mean you think i work hard at the podcast jesus christ in heaven you should have seen me in college trying to get into medical school studying around the clock it's just so i really can't emphasize that enough that's just all i did but i don't want to go into that because it's boring. It's all I did. All I did. And, um, you know, I liked the idea of it. I was terrified my freshman year. I kind of party. It almost failed out. It was just kind of an idiot. And my sophomore year, I got way too high, like my first night of my sophomore year was like had just moved into the frat house. And I was like, oh my God, I need to get my life together. And it's kind of like a joke, you know, when people are like, hold my beer. But I mean, I was literally like, hold my beer.

I'm going to bed. And then I was wrong. I was like, I need to go to the library tomorrow. I was like, the fuck so i went to the library then classes hadn't even started like that was weird and then i did it like the next day my friends like that was kind of weird too then i did it all week and then all next week and then all month and then next month and then the whole semester and then the next semester and then i transferred to the university of georgia and kind of like reunited with all my buddies from high school and i did it again they're like what the fuck so that's all i was doing and it was a lot of it was from fear but it was also out of like a genuine desire to help people and And I think I liked the idea of Dr. Carrigan being in a white coat, always have a job.

Doesn't matter what war there is. Doesn't matter if the country dissolves. People need doctors. And I was like, I'll just have to learn. So just live anywhere you want. Every town needs a doctor. But also it's just like, I'll always have enough money. I'll be respected.

Because I was never a good student before this. Never. so there's a little bit of a chip on my shoulder and it was also just like I never want the fear of like things just not going well and so there was some love but there was a ton

of fear and that's not really a fear can get you a good ways fear's not bad. Hunterst Thompson said that fear is like an animal have it pull your chariot but keep it in front of you and keep a 12 gauge trained on the back of its head let it pull you places

but if it turns on you blow its fucking head off fear's good i'm a big proponent of fear and but as someone that was meditating every day you can't and mind you i was not even meditating for the right reasons you know it's like you take mushrooms and it's like oh you open up to the world and you find out like the viking berserkers were taking mushrooms so they can kill more and you're like that no wrong uh-uh it's discovering nuclear energy and going like we can power

the world and it's like oh we're so close I was meditating. I started in high school kind of just like on a whim, not really meaning to, but in college I had this realization. I was like, wait, or I like meditate. I'm really focused for like 90 minutes afterwards.

No internal monologue, no. And as anybody that's ADD can kind of relate to it. There's no. I was like, oh, so I could like study for 90 minutes. And then I can meditate for 20 minutes. Then I could study for another 90 minutes. And I could just,

do this for 14 hours a day. And that's how I got in a medical school. So it's like so close. You're discovering the self. But I was like, let's use it as a weapon. And like, that's what I did. And I did use it as a weapon. And I'm still proud of it.

I fucked up everybody. I destroyed the curve. A lot of people failed out because of me. I will never apologize for that. Fuck get some. But what you, you can't do it forever without also meditation sort of taking a toll on you in the most positive way.

you start to become sort of not to sound like some enlightened hippie douche because I'm not but you do you sit alone with your thoughts you're not hiding on you're scrolling through it's like that meme why do you always scroll through Reddit so I don't have to

look at so I don't have to face my own thoughts and there's some truth to that but when you sit with them every day including like your anxiety is near this and you're that you get really in tuned with also like

fuck do I want to do this forever once the anxiety of can I do this goes away first semester I got 4.0 I'd never done that before second third fourth now the fear's gone that you know well never be able to ace okem but then you ace o'am well never be able to ace physics and then you ace so the fear goes away you now know you can

do I want to do this well I have to do this you have to be a doctor I don't want to do It's a tough world out there. You know, dad grew up in poverty, climbed his way out. I'm like, no, no, no, work harder. All right. And then, you know, another month would go by. And then start to just creep up again.

This is really what I want to do. I started to notice that when I would go out, I'd go out like once a month with my friends. That sure, the partying was fun. But even the next day, just laying around, hung over, not doing anything, I was just grinning like an idiot. And I remember one of my roommates, he was this big fat redneck. I remember he looked at me and goes, Tommy, the fact that you have so much fun on an off day going to Walmart, maybe you're not happy with what you're doing.

And it was wildly profound. And I was like, that I shouldn't be this happy hungover just because I'm not studying. But, you know, like a good angle of Saxon, you suppress those feelings, like a good Irish pig, you say, fuck off and you keep working harder, right? Because life is suffering. but every once in a while I would also just like smoke a little pot by myself which I always love doing by myself and it would just come in and it'd be like dude is this really what you want to do is this really what you want to do I can't I don't know what else I could do no I just got to keep

working got to keep working and it would it started to creep in more and more and I don't remember what the flipping point was it was I had already gotten in and And it was the day after I graduated. I was just like, I was like, I got to go. And, you know, they always say when, you know, doing psychedelics for the first time, make sure you're in a good place mentally. I was like, I met like the, had just graduated, had just starting dating a girl a couple months apart. First serious girlfriend on my life. You knew my older brother was suffering from depression for years.

He lived in Atlanta. I was in Athens. Other brother lived in North Carolina. Other brother lived in Maryland. Parents were in Maryland moving in New Hampshire. I'm from New Hampshire. All my friends here in Georgia are going to got in a medical school in Miami. Everything's talking at me.

And instead of being in a good place, I was like, well, let's dump acid onto my brain, not acid mushrooms. And I went and did that with my, with my, one of my best friends. I went and sat and just kind of like a field of grass. It was like a December day up in his lakehouse. December and Georgia is not cold. It's kind of cold. But when you're the sun, it's still beautiful. We went up on a weekday, so there's no one there.

We're on just kind of this mountain side at his lakehouse. And we just sat in a field for like seven hours. And I mean, all cliches aside, you know, giggling, we're funny. And then, of course, you know, you see the trees breathing and all that good shit. And that's, all right, that's how well, good. But I remember, like, the overwhelming thought I had. So mind you, that first day, my sophomore year of college, when I got way too high and realized I was fucked, hold my beer i got to be a doctor and then i just did it for four years i had that's almost like

a deja vu of that but this time it was the opposite it wasn't out of fear there was this thing that was like i just remember like the overwhelming feeling i didn't hear a voice but it was like a voice was telling me like life can be love and it's not some idyllic let's all hold hands in a field and, you know, form a cult and fuck each other. Like, that's not realistic. Those always turn into communes, which turn into communisms, or they turn into mass suicide cults.

I'm not, I don't have any, I don't have any false notions about those, right? But it was just like, like, and by the way, cut me off at any point if, if I'm boring you.

Not at all, man. This is, it's awesome. Thank you for sharing. Yeah. So, it was like, life just doesn't have to be this, this, like,

nonstop. grind where you're in the gym when the workout gets easy it's time to dial up the weights like the gym is supposed to be hard that's why you're going but if i would study all day and still have straight a's i'd be like something's wrong because i should be studying until exhaustion like no you you studied to you're finished now go have fun no i need to keep working and i kind of had that realization that life can be love and so unlike college where it got way too high and was like I want to be a doctor. There was actually a path, right?

You go out, you go to your advisor, take the classes you got to take, and you can study nonstop. There is an end point. You can see it on the horizons three years away. I got to do X, Y, and Z to get it. And it's difficult, but I can do it. You can climb Mount Everest, but there is a sum. There is a path. Cool.

I didn't even have a goal. I was just sitting there and I was like, I want to be my own boss. Still work hard. But be happy. And so with that, I sent a letter to the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine for 15,000 students applied and 100 got in. And I said, hey, thanks, but no thanks. I told my mom, dad, and girlfriend, they're all like, the fuck. And, you know, and then a couple months later, my older brother took his life.

So it's like, that was really, now is at that point, I was like, well, I just don't. I'm not in a mental place to go to medical school. So that was great. That was all well and good. So my first thought was like, I think I want to go to pharmacy school. Because when I want to go to medical school, I want to be an anesthesiologist. And I was like, oh, I can still go study drugs. That's cool.

Got in a pharmacy school. And I was like, hey, thanks, but no thanks. I think I want to go to online pharmacy school. So now another year passed, got an online pharmacy school. And I was like, yeah, I just don't want to do this. Thank you. So now everyone's kind of like, what the fuck? At this point, I've been kind of been doing a lot of drugs, clonazepam,

taking tons of like night well at night drinking uh just did stimulants during the day gained a lot of weight really not taking care of myself doing like delivery jobs like all i wanted to do is just like sit in a bed with a bong like and so i was going farther and farther down and then like i kind of broke off the path of like life can be love and i was just like fuck it self-medication and fell way down into the slog became very suicidal in summer 2016 moved home to my parents house in Maryland and that was like a five year long

rebirth like not long after that girlfriend broke up with me don't blame her at all I was a piece of shit all my friends lived in Georgia kind of lost touch with all of them really just lived with my parents at 26 like a fucking loser doing therapy, living sober

exercising and like an absolute arrogant piece of shit at the bottom of the bottom when that fear should kick in you go like i should just go back to medical school i was like no i still want to be my own boss you know Jesus christ and so like i just i was like i want to do writing and then like i did that for like six months i was like i want to do comedy and did that for like six months like i want to do video editing i want to i tried to make my own like the onion i tried to make like my own onion kind of like satirical news like site that didn't work picked up Photoshop

up and actually stuck with that for like three years got really good self-taught but it just wasn't panning out and I don't remember exactly what was the catalyst for starting the podcast but it wasn't the first time that thought had popped up it had come up before like years prior I want to do it with some friends but you know they didn't have they don't want to do okay I don't want to do it And at that point, I had sort of started to, I was very hesitant of going balls deep into anything because I didn't want to go. Even though it was in a bad spot, I also didn't want to go back to where I was as pre-med because I was miserable. That work ethic, that psychopathic OCD work ethic was miserable. And so it was kind of like Pavlovian.

Like I had almost associated that with negativity. It's not that I wasn't capable of it, as I clearly show. it was just like I don't want to go down that and then I kind of it just it kind of dawned on me it was like like there are things as Ram Dass would say he's like you can be meditating and be a spirit of light and communing with the gods there's no reason to not know your zip code like you live in reality and uh I always love that because it's like like mushrooms great meditation love earth everything how you pay in rent dipshit right and I had been avoiding that for a while I was like it'll just work out.

No, it did not. It didn't just work out. The narrator, it did not. And I don't know if it's maturity, if it was just trial and failure. And I'm glossing over this, but mind you, like, I was at home for five years,

five fucking years. No friends, of no partying, no social life, no sex, of nothing. Just fucking living with your parents, love my parents to death.

Go try living with your parents from 26 to 31. You'll blow your fucking hell. Right? All the while, having no prospect. It wasn't even like, but I'm going, I had no idea when anything was going to work out.

And so starting the podcast, I don't remember what the catalyst was. I just had a MacBook. I'm really trying to remember. I mean, I always joke and say I'd started watching Rogan when he first started in 2011. And I love Rogan. And I was like, oh, I'm smarter than him. I could do this. Like I joke about it.

I fucking love Rogan. He helped me so much in college. but I just remember kind of like I remember it was December 12th 2019 and I was like yeah I'm just gonna I kind of want to just like talk to people I know I can talk to people how hard could this be

and I just started and I did like at first I was like let's take it easy I did one episode a week and after like five episodes I was like oh wait I'm in charge I can interview any of you can interview any go to have wine. So I was just go and read it and like find a guest.

Like, oh, wait. I started working harder and harder and harder. I remember what started. Sorry. Thanksgiving, 2019. I was with my cousin Chris up at my, my aunt's house. My family is all together. And he was just drinking and he and I were sitting on like a couch. We were joking about, we were joking about like, what if we just went and hijacked a cruise ship? and where we hijacked the cruise ship

and we drove it into like an island like out in the middle of the Pacific and we would just create our own society would be warlords we'd be arriving with food and water and medicine we would take over the local peoples but we'd be too small on the map for the U.S. to really care

and we would just kind of become warlords and I was sober and he was shit-faced and we had this conversation for like an hour and a half and his fiance say it was on like speakerphone just kind of listening to us and at the end of it and like her new york accent she was like that was fantastic you guys should do a podcast and so me and my cousin person him we started a podcast called warlords we did like five episodes and naturally i was like let's do two episodes a day and they're like yo let's do one episode a week and i was like i was like we should

interview this guy and they're like now let's just have fun and so after like five episodes i was like hey love y'all i'm going to start my own and just was off to the races and i mean from there till now it's kind of just been like one like just blur just working harder getting guests improving the audio the camera the visual the lighting uploading to multiple platforms trying to fine hone my mess not even message my ability to talk more know when to cuss when to not when to have this when is it a very serious when can you dick around when he just all these things and then starting to do like almost like news things because there are topical things

but you don't want to just do news because then there's no relisten value right you can't go back and listen to a newscast from a year ago it's old you know what happens so like sure you can cover things happening in ukraine but you also want to like have on authors who they're what they're talking about like that episode holds up five years from now because you're talking about like history of war war two or something and it's just been this spiraling, maniacal. I'm just allowed to dump all of my

work into it. There's nothing worse than when you beat a video game. Because you're like, fuck. I maxed out my character. Like, just ghost recon. I'm playing Wildlands again. My guy is a demigod. He is maxed out.

He has an optical camouflage, a suit on. He has a sniper rifle that can one-shot helicopters. He can call in Rebel, support. He can call on mortars. All my weapons are maxed out, silenced, high speed. I'm spawning a mile above enemy bases. I'm scanning shit and thermal. I'm knocking out motherfuckers. I'm EMPing the generators, taking down the alarms, blocking off the entrances, mortar fire here, hop on a minigun there, eat a dick. Like, it's great, but I beat the game. There's nothing else to

fucking do. I can't level anything else up. I can't call in missiles. There are no missiles in the I maxed out. So I have to go to another game. And then you do that. And you play Just Cause and you unlock everything or Ace Combat to the point where you've got like the Area 51 DARPA, the Hypersonic Strike Aircraft. It's great and it's fun. But then you beat the game on expert. You get every achievement.

You unlock every skin. Now what? Nothing. There's nothing to do now. And so you have to move on in the next game. You know what you do right there? Like right when you beat the game, you, write a letter to the medical school and say, I'm not going to do it. I'm going to move home with my parents.

Yeah, that's what you fucking do. You say, yeah, I don't want, I'm done. Does that like, that's a full pattern right there, though, right? Can you see that as a pattern? You're like, I beat the fucking game right when I went to college. Why should I keep playing? I can do it online. Why should I keep playing? That one's a little different than that medical school is, is premed on steroids. So you could have kept going. And then after medical school, there's residency, which is medical school on steroids. And after residency is fellowship and then after that is becoming like a practicing doc so like that game could have kept going i just wasn't happy at that one but what i love about this and it probably speaks more than anything is i don't think there's a ceiling on this i can work you know one of the great

a great book that also led to me not going to medical school is called house of god by samuel shem it's a pen name but it's a guy that was in harvard medical school in harvard residency in the 70s and it's just the abject depravity. There was no rules back then. They could work residents like 120 hours. They were smoking meth in closets. They're fucking the nurses. They're all on volume and like amphetamines.

They're taking morphine and shit. They were so fucked up. And just like zombies. One guy killed himself. He jumped off the roof. Like this shit was insane. And, um, but there's one guy in the book.

I think they called them fats because it's just a fat guy. But he was like a brilliant, brilliant kid, you know, the kind of kid that could study for an hour and beat everybody. And he asks him, he's like, Fats, why don't you just go become like an investment banker or something? Because he was gunning to be like a surgeon so he can make the most money. They're like, too, fat, you could go be a billionaire. And he was, and his answer was like, I'll never beat medicine. He was like, it's the most advanced Rubik's Cube.

You can never understand it all. You can never understand what every protein is doing, what every cell is. There will always be a disease that evades you. I can sink my teeth into this forever. And that's kind of how I feel about this podcast. Is I have all my own. I've got to break 100 subscribers. Got to break 1,000.

Got to break 10,000. Right now I'm at 10,566. Okay, I got to get to 10,567. 5,080. 5,000. What are the fuck? 10,000, 20,000, 30,000, 50,000, 150,000, 100, 100. thousand million 10 million got to keep going i want to be okay i want to beat rogan okay well who's above

rogan i guess puty pie okay i want to get past pooty pie like i want to get to a billion subscribers well then what i don't know but then you can just keep going higher and higher and there is no ceiling you can get to a point where you start like affecting real change in the world you know like rogan isn't just observing he he changes that people come on and like it changes the narrative well i've already interviewed guys running for congress and stuff and i've helped them like get in touch with other people. So I'm like a very small scale. I'm already kind of poking and prodding the world. I'm like, well, what's the upper limits of this? Of course, my mind isn't like, I just want to like, share and subscribe. I'm like, if I do this for 20 years, can I affect like the geopolitical

arrangement of countries on the plant? It's the best game ever. I think that maybe answers your question. I'll tell you a little bit about myself. That was what, the 25 minute rant? That was awesome, man. That might be one of my favorite brands so far. I think it spoke volumes of your character and your personality and why it is that you do the things you do. And it seems to me that the beginning Photoshop, the comedy, the editing, these are all like your freshman, sophomore and junior year of podcasting. Like you've incorporated all those things into what you do now and probably help accelerate where you're at right now. I also think it's fascinating that, you know, as someone who likes to talk to people and enjoys conversations.

When you're doing what you're doing, you're forced to have multiple conversations in your head while you're talking to someone because you want the content to be well. You want it to be received well. You're watching for pauses and facial, you know, ticks. And oh, my gosh, is the audience going to like that? And that in itself for someone who has ADHD or ADD or bipolar

or any of these things is really fun because you're like, okay, now I can focus because I got, seven things going on and I finally feel comfortable. You know, so it's, it's awesome to hear about that. Let me ask you this one. So you have had so many great guests on your podcast. The first people,

one of the youngest, I think the youngest, Charlie Kirk, was he the youngest man to walk on the moon? Charlie Duke, youngest man to walk on the moon. Charlie Duke, you've had the,

the banker from Switzerland, Brad Birkenfield. Yeah, great podcast. Banker, that book is fucking great, too. It is George Webb, who's,

I think, underrated journalist in the world right now. He's on often. You got Peter Duke. You have so many Mike Ford. I really enjoyed that one yesterday. You have so many great people on there. Have you noticed a difference in who you are, Tommy Kerrigan, since you began talking to these people and having interresting and, you know, some might even say politically changing conversations with people. You've had a lot of in-depth stuff with a lot of professional, intelligent people. can you see the changes in yourself since you started having these conversations?

And myself, it's definitely harder because it's like when you're losing weight or building muscle, you'll hear yourself in mirror every day, you never see the change, but then you look at a picture from yourself six months apart. You're either like, Jesus, I got fat, or you're like, fuck yeah.

You can kind of steal it like my jawbone again. You're like, cool. That's hard. I imagine I could just go back and watch an earlier episode, probably see some glaring differences. in terms of like me in terms of like how I present I try to swear less. I'm much more confident in who I am now.

I have no problem just being like, well, you know, respectfully disagree instead of like, yeah, I'll suck your dick. It's just like, I agree to disagree. Not in a discouraging way. I try to not just come balls out with my opinions right away. It's definitely humbled me in that you can. cannot interview so many intelligent people who hold such wildly different political beliefs than me and not sit there and go, maybe I don't know everything. You know, I'm a conservative guy.

I like Trump. When you interview Richard Rhodes, a Pulitzer Prize winning author in his 80s, and he is the antithesis of that. And he, and he's a liberal-leaning guy, you don't go, this idiot, does nobody's talking about. You go, huh, we both got to the, we both got to the top of the mountain. We took different paths. That doesn't make his path wrong. You know, it's very easy to look at someone that you don't like and don't respect and go, oh, own the lives or, you know, own the conservatards.

But when you interview like a wildly intelligent person, progressive person, and then you find out that they have the exact opposite political views as your own, if you're a retard, you go, dude, that guy's stupid. if you have half a brain cell, you go, maybe we just see the world differently. Maybe he has a piece of information that I don't have, that if I had, I'd see his viewpoint. And then maybe he gives you the information.

You go, oh, we're looking at the same swath of colors. This is one analogy I was used. You know, you're liberal, you're blue, you're conservative, you're red. It is possible that the red guy has never seen the color blue. And if you showed it to him, he might go, oh, that's me, and vice versa. but there's also a point where you both have the full color swath, you know, one of those like Sherman Williams paint things.

And you go, yeah, no, I can see all the colors. Now you see all the colors. I just like red. I just like blue. And if you're a mature adult, you go, oh, we just see the world differently. You know, I'm from New England. I don't really pay attention to sports.

But let's just say, I like the Red Sox. My uncle is a brilliant and very, investor. He's from the Bronx. He likes the Yankees. Is he stupid? I'm sure you can make a little fucky Yankees. Is he objectively stupid? No, he's wildly successful and wildly wealthy and a respectable individual. Am I a bad? I don't think I'm a bad person. Oh, we just like different things. And when you look at it from that place, and this is why I think I get a lot of shit of, you know, fence riding. You try to see both ways.

are you know it's just because there's a point where remember my uncle said my late uncle before he passed he was a surgeon and he goes if you're smart you should be smart enough to know how smart you're not and like

so it's sure when I have on like the Delta Force guys and you know we're all you know making fun of sure that's fun it's goofing it's kind of the equivalent like having a beer all just talking shit but no the reason why I still keep an open mind to the opposite viewpoint of my own is because my personal experiences of 854 episodes you cannot

interview so many different nuclear physicists fictional authors guys that have walked on the fucking moon guys that have been in delta force guys that are in construction or who work on submarines or who or our political pundin or work in an intelligence community or or a professor at yale or harvard you can't talk to them all and then go huh well some of them are smart because they have my beans. The other ones are getting there. No, you got to go, oh, Jesus, it's a big old fucking world out there.

And so to answer your question, how have I changed? On the cursory delivery, I'm more confident and saying, like, well, I agree to disagree, but you probably have a point. Try to swear less, which I'm not doing not at all because, again, kind of read it, you'd be more relaxed.

But I definitely go into everything now, and I'm like, I might be wildly incorrect. And that's, it's not it's not scary it's very you know people said like i you know i don't want to put my opinion out there because in five years i look back and be like oh jesus of christ i was so wrong but to me i'm like dude that's growth why would you not want to grow you don't look back at yourself and go oh i used to be a twig like no you were a twig

and you went to the gym and now you're not a twig like so i'll look back at all the episodes and be like oh god that was so that was so narrow-minded noted don't be that person anymore. That's how I think I have changed. And I can only imagine in a year I'll look back at this episode and just be shaking my head

and be like that fucking moron thinking he knows the whole world. And I can only hope a year after that I'll have this because that means you're growing. So I don't know if that answers your question at all if I even attempted to answer it. How have I changed? Humble. More humble.

Not objectively humble. I'm a cocky arrogant ass. It's hard to be humble when you're the best. You know what I mean? I'm humbly the best. No, it's realizing that you maybe don't have the big picture. Yeah, and that is growth. One thing I've learned in my life that I've made tons of mistakes, just because you're good at one thing, doesn't mean you're good at everything.

And one thing I've found good about podcasting, and I'm curious if you share this, is the ability, to see that thing in the other. Like if you have an opinion or you see that thing you recognize in the other person, and I may not be doing a great job of explaining what that thing is, but it's that ability to be objective for me. It's that ability to see someone handle a conversation in a way that makes me jealous or makes me want to grow like, oh, I see what happened there. This guy tried to corner him in a conversation.

And instead of fighting out of that corner, he just pushed him right aside and helped him. You know, so I'm curious if you see that in the conversations when you talk to people and you can like notice that thing and then incorporate it into your style. Yeah, it's it's very easy to to be that sort of like humble like maybe I don't know everything. When you're talking to someone else who is like, you know, again, Richard Rhodes, he's not stupid. He's watched my other episodes. He knows like I'm a Trump guy.

He still comes on. Yeah. And when you see that maturity in someone else, it rubs off on you. And you're like, oh, we're not doing politics here. We're talking about the history of like, of nuclear weapons. Like that's, it's very easy to be humble and respectful when you're with another humble and respectful person. What's the trick? The trick is when you're with some, some narrow-minded douchebag that goes, no, no, no, no, no.

I am the only right one. We have the whole color swath. There's an objectively best color. that is where it's like your time to really put into practice. And you just, you don't, you don't tell them, hey,

you should be humble and open minded. You just nod. You just nod. And you try to be, you try to be like an open area for them to just, you know, it's like sometimes the best therapist, don't say a word.

They'll just let you say it all and then you realize it on your own. Sometimes there's nothing else to do, but just nod. You can maybe try to gently nudge the conversation one way or another. Sometimes they're really stuck on something. There's nothing else to do, but just, sure. Oh, yeah, no, yeah. I get it.

Yeah, I get that. Yeah. And then sometimes it's even fun to just start agreeing with them. It's like a mental exercise, not even to fuck with them. But, I mean, truly, be like, fuck it. Let's see where they're coming from. Let's see why Biden is the best president ever. Not even ironically.

I'd be like, I'm going to fuck in, I'm going to drink the Kool-A, let's do this. And that's fascinating because when you do that, so if you come on right away clashing, you know, I'm Tommy, I don't like Biden. I'm having on Bob who likes Biden. You've immediately set up a friction, even if you both are going to be very mature and humble about it and respectful. You've immediately set up this dichotomy where the other guys on the defensive. Even though you're being very shaking hands about it,

It's still, you know, you're going at it. And you might go, well, that's the best way to learn about the other guy's viewpoint is by being respectful. It's better than just yelling at them, sure, but it's not the best way. The best way, like the fucking real, like, judo black magic way, is to not let them know that you disagree with them, is to actually agree with them. Because then they think they're just talking to someone that has the same views as them.

And when you're together like that, that's when you open up even more and so you see what they really think as opposed to as opposed to them trying to give you these canned clean answers because we're having this respectful debate no you make them feel comfortable

like you guys are just boys hanging out having a drink and you guys agree with each other you're much more candid with each other and when you're more candid with each other that is when you start to see what they really think and when you get into what they really think sometimes it actually makes sense. You go, oh, this guy isn't just a dumb shit, Lib. Oh, he has like a friend that,

you know, a parent that died of this and they actually, oh, this guy is actually a first generation immigrant. Yeah, okay, it kind of makes sense how he looks at Trump and goes, yeah, you're not fucking deporting my parents. You go, I do get that. If someone tried to deport my parents, oh, and then you start going like, you drank the Kool-Aid as a joke, but now you're going like, I get it. And you're like, fuck. And you're like, you still believe. your initial point, but that's how you start to like see the other person is not just someone you disagree with,

but you actually see like there's like a conscious individual with a life of experience behind the eyes. And you go, the exception is as long as no one's hurting each other. If it's someone looking at me telling me like, why the Jews must die, I'm like, bro, I just can't. I can't.

I can't. Like, see where you're coming from. You're very well spoken. I'm sorry, Mr. Hezbollah. We cannot have this conversation. but as long as no one's hurting each other, sure, I'll lean into it. Tell me why. Tell me why.

Sure. And when you stop trying to beat them, but instead just detach and look at it as like a puzzle, I just want to figure out who they are. And not even in some like, I want to figure out who they are so I can do a gotcha moment. Oh, no, fuck off. Just look at it as like, pretend no one's watching.

That's like one reason why, like, I don't do it. And I'm not shitting on you. I know you're doing it live. That's why I'm not doing it live. Because I always want them. And I always let the person know it's not live. Because I want them to feel like, hey, there is no, there's nobody watching. And there's always the beautiful offer of like, we don't even have to upload this episode.

And when you give them that, and I always tell them, I'm like, hey, record it too. Don't fucking, you know, don't, don't rely on me to be objective. When you do that, that is. That is the beauty in it. And I think for me, sort of answer your question, like, what do I see that in people? What makes me, like, jealous of that? It's episode 82 or 83.

I had on this guy, John Romanello. I don't really know anything about it. He's like an author. He used to be Arnold Schwarzenegger's personal trainer. He's, like, you know, a multi-millionaire, self-made. dude looks like a male model he's built as fuck he's eloquent he's he just look at him you like dude fuck you

and I don't remember how I got in touch with them because he's pretty like well-known name I think I got in touch with him before I even started the podcast I think I might have just like sent him a Photoshop and he was like oh that's cool this guy there couldn't be a more different person politically than he and I

and I remember just bugging him and bugging him and bugging him to come on the podcast and he's probably looking at me and I'm screaming about Trump but I have four subscribers he's probably like what the fuck but it was during COVID and he and his fiance were like they were stuck like quarantining and one day he was just like fuck it

oh come on and that guy having never known me you could just feel it coming off of them truly just like exuded love and in his mind he was probably like this kid's retarded but he sat there and like nodded

and just let me go and we ended up like getting on the topic of my brother and that's the only time I've ever cried on a podcast and it was just like the it's still to this day it's my favorite episode it's I'm in like a shitty orange jacket of above my parents garage it's echoing it's on a MacBook it's like 480p resolution it's horrible the lighting's all fucked up but it's still my favorite episode because that guy was just completely

present in the moment and let me like weave around and just like left on a loving note that's like what I try to aim for yeah because another thing is when you finally acknowledge

that you don't have all the answers and maybe your political view isn't correct you stop looking at yourself as someone who should be responsible for like changing the world you're like, well, why should I? What if I'm incorrect, you know, if I have bad eyesight, like, I shouldn't be the surgeon. You're right.

I shouldn't fly Air Force One. How right you are, you know, like, oh, okay. So you look at it kind of like that. So when you stop, some people say, oh, that's apathy or that's digging your head. No, I don't think I'm apathetic. I think my interviews show very otherwise, very much otherwise. But when you take yourself off the pedestal of like, I know what is correct. It allows you to stop looking at things as adversarial.

And I need to show this guy why he's wrong. I got to own the lips. Now you go, you sort of become detached. But detached in the best way. Because you're just, you're kind of okay with being completely incorrect. And it's a very like, like the first moment of, humility is like after you listen to your first episode. You're like, that's what I sound like.

You know, like you never hear your real voice in real life because you're inside your ears. Everybody else is outside. You're the only person hearing it from an angle that no one else can hear it from between your ears. You know, when you hear your voice for the first time, you go, oh, Jesus, that's what I sound like. And you see yourself, you're like, oh, God. And then like, oh, my thoughts are so stupid.

That's like the, those are like the first hurdles of humility. And then you get over those. And then you get over, like, bad pod. And on it, there's so many hurdles of just like slowly just tearing away the ego that like the closer you get to the center, you're just like, you're like, I kind of want to be proven wrong. Like it's, it's almost fun. You're like, because I'm just trying to get to like the truth of whatever it is, whatever the world is, whatever the universe is. And it's less of like, I have to have the right stamp. Oh, fuck, should I go delete that video from a year ago.

I said there. no you're just like you're just trying to get close when you're playing a video game you keep failing a mission you don't go I can't let anybody see that failure no you're playing with your friends you're like okay we tried that tactic

what if we shifted this one and nobody's like laughing at each other you're just like you're both trying to get to the objective and then when you finally get it you fucking cheer I don't know you have a new friend comes in and plays a video game you don't laugh at them you go oh yeah dude that's a bitch of a fucking level

you figure it out though So you stop trying to feed everybody and put a point in the W column and own somebody and screenshot them and look at this idiot. I proved him. And you just start trying to like get to whatever the core of all of this is. Yeah. I don't know if that answers your question. Yeah, it's perfect, man. I like it.

I think I once heard a really good quote that said the purpose of an argument is not to win or lose. to solve a problem. Yeah. Right? And like that's such beautiful, like that's really good relationship advice too because when you're in a relationship,

you sometimes you're so heated or the kid's not sleeping or you've got this fucking bills coming and shit's not going the way you want it. And we hurt the people closest to us. But sometimes you find yourself in an argument with somebody you love or even on a podcast or a friend or something

and you're just arguing and all of a sudden you think you have to win. And it's like, wait a minute, this is a person I care about. And if you're on a podcast, with somebody you care about them somewhat so the the objective should be to rise above right and wrong and in i think so many of us get caught right there but yeah i i think that the objective should be to solve a problem or at least shed light on a point that is opposite of yours and i i sometimes

i think that the trump versus Biden a lot of those people are the same people but the mirror image of one another they're the same goddamn people they absolutely what are what are all want. Nobody wants an unarmed black guy to get shot. If there are people that want that, fuck them. Nobody wants to be thrown off health care. Nobody wants America to have a weak military.

Nobody wants the borders to be raped. We just all looking at it in different ways. Some people are going, hey, we got to let them in. Other people are saying, we got to let them in. There's got to be a process. People are going, no, they're suffering. Just let them in. Some people are going, yeah, there's a reason why we need these taxes is so we have better schools.

Other people are saying, no, no, no. We got to have less so we can have private but what do we still want we still want a good school for your kid the police should be more armed they should be less armed well what do we all want we want there to be fucking less crime we're all just trying to get there in a different method that's all it is we're all trying to approach it in a different way they're all the same people and to what you said about shedding light on a problem just yesterday had on uh ron muller and and del comstock two oGA guys like they always say oga they technically have to i can say it's CIA the tip of the spear.

That damn black ops. And they kind of went on this whole thing about like why America's fucked. And although I kind of agreed with them towards the end, I was like, well, I'm going to take the devil's advocate position because otherwise we're all just sitting here jerking each other off. And there's nothing of value there.

Let's say you, let's say you love Tommy's podcast and I love Tommy's podcast. We sit here and go, yeah, it's great, it's perfect. You don't have to watch the episode. because you already know what it is. They're agreeing with you like the color blue? I like the color blue.

The sky is blue. The water's blue. That's what I'm saying. Great. Happy you're happy. There's no point in watching it. Nothing's being tackled. Nothing's being approached.

That's fine. That's fine. But it's nothing worth watching. So they're going on about like why it's all over. And I was like, all right, I'm now going to take a devil's advocate position and explain maybe why it wasn't. but I do that all the time because right you and I are talking about now

to shed light on a problem if you can't solve the problem at least shed light on the problem that's all well and good to say the only way to do it is to lead by example because if you say hey guys let's maybe all like drop our egos and be vulnerable right yeah who's first you go fuck yourself why you have to say hey

I really fucked up here and I don't necessarily believe this But what if XYZ? Normally someone else will go, well, he kind of made the fool of himself first, so fuck it, I'll, you know,

I'll be the next fool. It won't be as bad as the first fool. Because otherwise, what is the, and that's the thing. It's like, every conversation doesn't have to, like,

be a project that has a solution. Like, that's, it's specifically, like, for podcasting. Like, I'm going up to New Hampshire

to, like, visit my family for Fourth of July. Yeah, I'm going to have conversations. with my brother and we're just going to talk about his dog. There's no and that's perfect. It doesn't need to be like, well, what have we concluded today about Southeast? It's okay to it's more than okay.

I have a gaming channel. There's nothing of value on the gaming channel. People are like, you should try to improve it. I'm like, no, I work on TPC. My gaming channel is just, it's the fucking shit on the floor that I sweep up and go, here's another channel. There's nothing of value. The audio's terrible.

there are long breaks. Do you think the P break from TPC are bad? I'll fucking just leave the gaming channel for an hour. It's just rolling. I'll be like, I need to go get food. Just come back an hour and a half later and be like, all right, we're, we're just start playing. And that's also okay, right?

It doesn't have to be, well, let's come at each other with alternative ideas. Like, no, sometimes you can just be like, you know, do you think the ass off battalions fucking each other in the ass? Like, maybe. I mean, I don't know why they wouldn't. Let's start that fake news. I'm doubt that there's nothing of value coming from there and that's fun.

So I also kind of wanted to make that like not every conversation has to be like a because that's the pre-med mindset. Everything has to be work. No, no, no. It's okay to just sit there and just talk nonsense with your friends. What I'm talking about specifically is for the unique position that I'm in relative to all people and that I am a subsectional, of society that specifically has a camera and a microphone to have these conversations, right?

I'm going out to get Dr. Malone because Bob on working at smoothie king doesn't get to ask him these questions and everything you see on the news is canned. So instead you bring him on and you're like, is Fauci a Nazi? You're just like, nobody else is asking him this. They're not asking them that on CNN. Cool. And how many interviews have you seen a guy on the moon there? you're just like, hey, can I just ask you, what?

Do you freak out when you're up there? And he was like, yeah, you're just like, I'm on the moon. And I'm like, I thought that's what it would be like. So like for the very like niche thing that I'm in and where I am producing videos for people to watch, I do think that you have to almost, there is almost sort of like a moral or not to sound some high minded jack off. but there is sort of like a you got to present it a certain way and again

as much as he gets shit on I mean I started watching Joe Rogan in December 2011 like right after he started back when he was just the Fear Factor guy and like the amount I've seen him change and just like allow

other ideas to float out there and not pigeonhole himself into one thing and you can tell when he disagrees or something, they'll just be like, sure, sure. And people are like, yeah, well, he's a fence. I'm like, hey, there's a reason why he's the biggest thing on the planet. It's almost like the free market of the globe has decided we like it when we can

respectfully share ideas. And then on the same term, you can also have an episode where they just get shit-faced and talk bullshit. I really know where I'm going through this. Hey, do you care if I go to the bathroom? Yeah, handle it, brother. Handle it. I was going to say, take it over.

It's your podcast. You know what the fuck you want. Yeah. So there we go, ladies and gentlemen. We've been talking to Tommy Carrigan here. And, you know, there's some parts that we haven't got into yet. He was, for those that don't know, he was censored from YouTube. You know, he was one of the first people to come out with Dr. Malone and talk about the mandates and COVID and all these things that, you know, were kind of taboo to talk about.

And so I think he had, we'll get him to talk about. and he comes back, but I think you had 5,000 subscribers. Does this show that is, you know, one of these things you're not supposed to talk about, lo and behold comes back and ends up, you know, getting the YouTube

email or whatever it is that comes that way and says, hey, we're going to have to let you go. So I think there's something that happens there when you're faced with adversity and potentially even a paycheck or something you're building and you come up against this option,

that says, okay, well, you can't do it from here. So I think that there's a question of integrity and responsibility there. You ever think to yourself, like, what would I do faced in a situation where I don't have, or I have to make a choice? I think when you get to that particular point, you have to make a choice. Am I going to do what they tell me to do? Or am I going to take the paycheck and be censored? You know, and we got them back here.

We'll ask them. Tommy, I was just telling the audience a little bit about, you know, you start. this channel. You've made these moves. All of a sudden, bam, we're smacked with COVID. We've got Dr. Fauci blowing us up. We've got propaganda all over the place. You've got 5,000. Your channels

beginning to blow up and then you get smacked with a sensor notice and told, hey, you've got to shut up about this stuff. We're going to cancel you. I got to think that that is something that changes the way you run your game. What do you think about that? Yeah, absolutely.

And that's a, you know, I always try to, I always try to explain like, like the, kind of like how big that was in my life. I mean, relatively. I mean, you know, most people the world are starving. You don't have access to clean water. I get the relativiveness. But when I tell people, I'm like, yeah, dude, I got censored. They're like, yeah, I mean, it's whatever. But I think maybe you and your listeners can kind of get a grasp for it.

I have now told you from August on my birthday, August 7th, 2010, when I got too high in the frat house till now, you see the immense weight and importance in like dodging suicide and like moving out of my parents' house and reestablishing a life through the podcast. You see that it's not just like, oh, it's just a pet project. It's just a cool thing you're doing. like you chose to get censored like no this was this was you know I'm on an island in the middle of the ocean and for five years I've been

constructing a raft out of bottles and coconuts and shit and it's finally working it's not just a little toy I made it's like I'm going back to the mainland you know I've been stranded at home

it's so beyond important that to then immediately be like, have like a moral stress test. Yeah. Like, I just want to interview these guys. I just want to talk about election fraud. If it did or did not happen.

I just want to talk about COVID, is it or is it not lab made? Are the vaccines good or are they bad or somewhere in between? Are there alternative treatments or are they not? And then not just speculating and be going, okay, let's actually get voices of reason on this because I am not a doctor. As much as I could jerk myself off to the fact that I got in a medical school, I'm not a fucking doctor. So get on doctors.

And then you start to get censored. And it's like, oh, this sort of abstract idea of free speech. You're like, oh, fuck, I actually have to like, it's just supposed to be this thing that you see like inscribed on old statues under Ben Franklin or some shit. And you're like, oh, fuck, I actually have to like stand up for it. You're like, someone else should stand up for it. And it's like, well, no, that's just like a personal thing. Like, if you want to see change, you have to be it.

You can't fuck off. You can't kick it up to someone higher. That's just, that's pussy shit. It's like, okay. One, it's just like my own sort of hardheadedness. Like, don't tell me I can't do this. I remember when I went and saw my advisor the day after I got too high and she said, maybe you should think about something else because maybe you're not cut out for,

to get in a medical school. I was like, all right. I fucking remember this. This is just how it is. You can't do that. It's like, no, thank you. I will fucking eviscer. I will bulldoze the world.

in your name. Like, he's the first person I'll show. Yeah, I love fucking conk of this person. They don't even know. They don't even know. They're trying to help out the student.

What do they know? Like set out of the bed up. Right. I know that part in your head are like, okay, fuck this person, dude. How dare you?

We're like, you know, but that, so there's like that aspect. Just fuck off. Don't tell me I can't talk about that. Tied in with like a weird thing where I was like,

I also do respect that there are private. This is where, again, we're living like the gray air. I'm not just like, oh, fuck that, but I'm like, it is a private company. Like that is a conservative than me. I'm like, it is a private.

It's very much a private. I still say that. People are like, dude, you're a total cuck for them. I'm like, they are a private goddamn company. I still, whatever, what is it, June 30th, June 30th, June 30th, of 2020, I'll still say, it's been almost a year since I was banned. And they are an evil Marxist piece of shit. But they're a private one, all right?

And they are. And again, that's sort of like a contradiction where, like conservatives will be like they need to be broken up. No, they don't. They're a private fucking company. You just don't like them because they're not on your side now. Just eat a dick. All right?

So in 10 years when Rumble is the biggest and the liberals don't like it, you can still say and earnestly say, hey, it's a private company. If you don't defend it now, you can't defend it in the future or in the past. But that also goes for the value-free speech. So I personally have to go, okay, it is a private company.

I also don't like the idea of censorship, which means I have to keep speaking the truth. And so it was like very, so you know the importance of the podcast to me. It's not just a thing. It's like this is my venue out of my life. And having failed thing after thing after thing after thing, Photoshop, writing, blah, blah, blah. You're always stuck at home, almost moving out, stuck at home just a year after year after year after year.

I mean, year after year after year. You go crazy when you're 18 and you're ready to move out. I was fucking in my 30s. You come to this thing where it's like, you have to see where you stand. And there's, I mean, there's nothing wrong with, maybe you're just a gaming channel. You're like, you don't get a fuck.

That's fine. It's whatever. But you have a temptation to say, I'll bend the knee now because I need to move out. I need to grow the podcast and when I'm bigger and I can fight back.

That's what I'll do it. Okay, yeah, that's a nice little lie you'll tell yourself, right? Yeah, I'm going to get to it tomorrow. We can go to the gym tomorrow. I'm going to stop eating shit tomorrow. Tomorrow we're cleaning the apartment. Tomorrow we're doing this.

Tomorrow we're changing our habits. No, you're fucking not. If you have a New Year's resolution, start today, June 30th. Seriously, if you have a new... Because if you can't do it today, you cannot do it on January 1st. when it's cold and it's right after Christmas and you're hung over.

How the fuck? You have a new year's resolution. Start it today. Not even tomorrow. Start it today. Because if you can't start today, when today comes, you'll never be able to do it.

So go fuck yourself. So I was like, you know, Rogan should do it. Or, you know, well, he did do it because he's signing this,

you know, Spotify deal or Pouti Pooty Pooee should do it. And then you're like, hey, you have to, you have to operate. now. Because if you're making $100 million,

why would you not have the same logic? I'm making fucking killer cash right now. I'll wait till I'm a billionaire. No, you never will. You never will. So it's like laying a foundation. You have to do it correct now. And I just decided I was like,

when I have nothing, and I'm clawing to build this podcast. I still have to stand where I stand, despite as open as I am, about agreeing to disagree, hearing your, blah, blah, blah. It's a very, on the surface appears a very relaxed kind of laissez-faire thing. There is a foundation, and it's one, you can't be hurting anybody, physically hurting.

You're allowed to call someone a retard. I don't give a shit. no physically hurting or calling for violence but also i will never censor anything it will never censor anything and if i'm not going to do that now how in the ever living fuck am i going to do it when all of a sudden i'm having cash dangled over my face so i just kind of was like maybe this sinks the ship but i was like fucking i'm just gonna it really was like some sort of like japanese suicide bomber like I knew I was getting banned.

I got the second suspension. And I was like, I'm not going to stop interviewing these people. I got the third. And I was like, I know the next one's it. I know the next one's it. But it was like, I can't. I was like, I can't not. And I also knew logically,

I was like my first suspension was actually for election fraud. Now they're moving up to COVID. The fact that it went from one thing to two things, when it goes to any topic that allows you to get suspension, you now know censorship's on the table. When they add a second topic, you now know that it's a potentially growing list, which you then have to assume has the potential to go to infinity.

So maybe you're okay with shutting up about election five. Maybe you're okay with shutting up about COVID. It's going to keep going. Now, I've been off YouTube for almost a year, but there are certain Ukrainian war crimes that you will now, I didn't know this, you will get suspended. if you discussed. There are parts of the Ukrainian-Russian war that you can't discuss. So eventually you come to the pass where you're going to have to stand up for it.

And from that point of view, my logic was also, well, let's just get nuked now. It sucks to get nuked at 5,000. Well, what if I'm at 50,000? So a certain point was like, hey, it's like when you start to drive somewhere for vacation, you're about to drive for five hours, and you're a mile down the road. and you realize you forgot something. You're like, just turn around. I know it sucks.

Just turn around and get it because we're going to have to turn around either now or in 100 miles. Just fucking turn around. And you go back and you get whatever the fuck it is. So that was a huge kind of test of who I was to me. And that's really all I gave.

It wasn't about like, everybody else. Look how moral and ethical hell. Like, I don't get me. But. but it was like for me like I did it and I got suspended and I went to rumble and at that point I had like 100 subscribers because I had just been passively uploading

you know part of me wanted to blow my fucking brains out but like the other part of me was like I could sit back on like a Friday and have a beer and be like man at least I'm a real one I've yeah I know I did that I don't give a shit I know I know I know

that I am what I say I am. And now it took a, what, so that was September 1st, 2020, no, 2021. So December 12th, 2019 to September 1st, 2021 is, I mean, was that a year and then in 21 months, 21 months to get the 5,000 subscribers. In, when are we now coming on July, August, September? right now we're coming up on 10 months on rumble 21 months YouTube 5,000 subscribers 21 months on YouTube 5,000 subscribers or 5,000 subscribers and 350,000 views 10 months on rumble

10,500 subscribers 2.9 million views it's also worked out like what normally that doesn't happen you do the right thing you get fucked for it in this case I did the right thing and it's actually worked out wildly in my favor not even because of people are like oh he did the no it's just I went to a place for that I wasn't getting like suspended and then and pressured and censored on so that was a gigantic turning point for me was like oh I'm willing to and maybe that comes back to getting into medical school and then saying it's turning around on the road trip I had gone four years into the road trip I had gone four years into the road trip and said, I don't think I'm happy here. So let's just fucking nix this thing now. And that sucked. But who knows? Maybe that actually helped me let the channel get nuked.

So I was like, what, 21 months? That's nothing. I spent five years at home. I'll fucking do you. It took four years to get a medical school. I fucking get back in this thing. I think the first video I uploaded when I got banned from YouTube was just like a, it's like, I put up boat on like one rumble.

like one rumble video it almost looks like a fucking like was someone been lied message i'm just like staring at the camera i remember saying i like read off the stats before i was at the time i was like i have 109 subscribers i like looked at the camera on i was like youtube i will fucking eviscerate you i will come back 10 times stronger and right now i'm at two times stronger 10 times i'm gonna come back 100 times stronger i don't really know if i answered your question if that really was a question but yeah that was a huge turning point that i really don't think most of the most of you people can understand like the weight of because it wasn't just a a youtube channel it was like dude medical school like heartbreak losing a sibling to suicide like so many things were riding on

this and i can like happily and proudly say like yeah i still was like no fuck censorship so that yeah that's see that's way more than a um um typically everybody listening, I just want to point this out and maybe they'll agree or maybe they won't agree. And maybe you will. I think you will. It's more than a channel and it's more than a piece of work. It's a strategy for life. And I think you're right when you said you were in medical school and you went to five years before you turned around.

And each time, maybe you did writing for six months and then you turn around. But each time you were building muscle, you were building this experience to say, hey, I can't keep getting burned by the same. fucking match. I know it's fucking hot. I can't get burned by that again. And you finally get to a point where you're like, I've had enough, never again. I'm fucking pulling myself out of this goddamn hole and we're going to make it happen. And I think you've told other stories about some huge wins that came from that by maybe seeking out certain guests that you're like, I don't even have a shot at this guest. But because you mentioned to them, hey, I stood up for my values. YouTube, yeah. Yeah. Can you share that story with some people? Well, I mean, that's happened

multiple times. Nice. So like, yeah, this, like, I got talked to Malone the first time I got it was like, just a fluke. But I remember, like, he emailed me back the second time. And I was like, he was like, hey, I was like, would you think about coming out again? He was like, yeah, I can't find the link for the first one. Says the account was terminated. I was like, funny thing about that is it was.

That's the funny thing about the link. It was terminated, right? But I remember he was like, well, that's a badge of honor. He was like, I'd be proud to come out of you. I was like, oh. mind you, this is still six months before Rogan had him on. I had him on four times before Rogan ever had him on.

And the White House never called me out. There's no such thing as bad PR. Rogan, I think he said his subscriber account doubled during the whole like COVID like attack on him. Not for me. I got fucking bad for me too. But no, like that worked.

Steve Kirsch. I'm sure you've heard that name. That guy invented the mouse. He's like a billion. but he's like a huge voice up against this he was on like the OG podcast with dr malone and um brett Weinstein I got him on and the only way I got him on is he was like banned from YouTube he was like this impressive I was like oh fuck that man like now it's becoming more and more a thing where everyone's starting to get banned but I was like one of the like original just like

comacazis was just like like dicks out middle fingers up like Benjamin Franklin like Thomas Jefferson eat a dick I'm out Eagle like you know got banned but that did work some other guys that have come on because of that a big Richard Rhodes he came on he was just like well censorship's

despicable I was like indeed it is um all the really all the doctors Dr. McCullough, Dr. Fareed Dr. Dr. Nass Dr. Perso, Dr. Merrick I mean, Dr. Alibek, head of the Soviet Union BioWebbing program. Well, he came on before I got bad.

But, like, all of these, all of these guys were like, oh, yeah. No, like, you, okay. Yeah, I'll come on. They think censorship's, I mean, like, Yale and Harvard professors who are wildly liberal and don't agree with a goddamn word I said, but they were like, hey, like, you know, as like journalists, they're like, censorship is just deplorable. And they're like, yeah, come on. and I never knew that was going to happen.

I actually in my like template email that I sent a potential guest, there's actually like the second half of it. I got a eyelash in my, the second half of it is like, why is the podcast not on YouTube? Because like you do have to address that. Because it's a, it's a weird,

you know, like star of David you're kind of wearing. You're like, hey, hey, I'm not on YouTube. Like, no,

I wasn't on there for like saying the N word. I wasn't on there for like having a, because people have also asked that like, hey, why aren't you on YouTube? like I what podcast am I thrown my name in with right I wouldn't say who but several people understandably so have been like well how come you're banned like I need to know why you're banned you need to send me that episode of why you're banned which I completely get because who in

the right mind gets banned from YouTube well you send him the episode and they're like that was it and yeah that was it was like Dr. McCullough talking about turmeric like what I'm like I don't know what I can say into that one it's just Dr. Malone talking about peptides And they're all looking like, where's the sick high? I'm like, I don't know, in Germany? Like, but that's the thing is like, it is such like, it was such like a weird weight around my neck that like half of the email. Like it always starts with like, hey, this is who I am. This is why you should come on here.

Some notable guests I have. Then there's like this giant bold disclaimer. Like, why isn't the podcast on YouTube? And you're like, well, I did this and I did this. And you have to like, you tell them your credentials and be like, you know, I got into medical school. I was interviewing these doctors. But now no one really cares about that. Now they're just kind of like, yeah, it's cool that you got banned.

So that's helped. I never, I always suspected, but now I know it wasn't just censorship, but it was also shadow banning and putting their thumb on the scale. It makes no sense that in 21 months you get 350,000 views. And then on Rumble, in a third of the time, on a platform with like 100th of the user base, I get 10 times the views. The math does not add up. One one hundredth of the user base.

One third of the time, 10 times the views. No part of that adds up. Unless, of course, the only other conclusion is, is, oh, you were being shadow band or you were being artificially suppressed. So that's been a huge thing. And that's really helped me. It's like seeing the podcast actually grow. Like seeing like the numbers growing,

in a free kind of market way. It's invigorating and it allows you to work harder. You're really depressed when you're knocking out a podcast left and right and you've been at 1,831 subscribers for 117 straight days. And you're like, how is this even possible? Just like the laws of averages, someone should have unsubscribed, right? Shouldn't someone have stumbled upon it? So that's been a huge thing.

So it's, you know, it's a win for me. like I knew that I stood up for the right thing. It's a win in that I got a lot of guests that I never would have gotten. It's a win for me and that more and more people are getting banned. And now I get to say I was one of the OGs. And it's really helped me in that the podcast is just growing because there is a reciprocal cycle where the podcast grows and you get invigorated to go get bigger guests. And then the podcast grows more and you work harder and, you know, the mornings aren't as tiring. and you work through it.

You know, anyone can work on the podcast when it's just banging left and right, you're getting subscribers, you're having on this guy, that guy, this guy. You don't see like the two years of just crushing nihilism. It's just like, what am I doing?

I'm just fucking like medical school. I got into medical school. I'm like, what am I doing? Why am I interviewing a guy about laser printers on beer box? And you're like, how powered would it be to kill myself in here? I need to start.

But it's sort of, and even now I'm not like happy with where it is because I, you know, want it to be bigger and better. But it's really been nothing but good has come out of it. Yeah. Yeah. It does. That's huge. I think it helps people to hear the story because for everybody that doesn't give up,

there's probably a hundred people that do give up. And if you can maybe reach out and grab three of those people that are talented and be like, look, don't give up here. Because here's what can happen. If you're willing to push through your comfort zone and make things work, then this can't happen. Here's a guy that did it. You know, and I think that younger people seeing this, that'll be bigger and better, hopefully than all of us at some point in time, you know, that's something to think about, too,

Tommy, is doing what you're doing now and podcasting. it kind of gives you a window into the past that's visceral. Like you can see yourself talking to people a year ago or two years ago. And you can see, it's a weird way to notice time. Yeah, who else has video documentation of themselves every day. Yeah. And like you said, it's also, it's a blessing and a curse because you're forced to look back and be like, oh, God, did I really say that? Jesus Christ, what a dummy.

I can't even listen to it. Just turn it off. I don't want to listen to it. Yeah, yeah. You know? And then you, but then on the same token, you're like, okay, here's what I'm going to do moving forward, which gives you this weird window into the future. And here you are right now talking to me, this window like a virtual window right now into your life that people are watching and being part of. So, man, I could talk to you for another two hours, Tommy.

I'm super thankful that you came. I got to go drive a truck right now for a good 10 hours. But I really appreciate it. You're in Hawaii. I am. I am. Oh, wait. I don't know why in my mind

I immediately was like can you drive for 10 hours straight in Hawaii thinking that he was going in a straight line I know you're probably fooling things with the truth Jesus Christ A UPS driver so I'll be driven from packages for this and that Trying to sit here talking about being smart

And then I'm like You can't drive for 10 hours in Hawaii No you can You can drive 10 hours in the town If you just keep going back and forth Come on Tommy baby steps Sometimes the traffic here is Like I was born and raised in California

in the 405, the five can be brutal. But sometimes in Hawaii, it can take you four hours to go 40 miles. You just sit because sometimes there's only a few arteries. And if one of them breaks, everybody uses this one. So the infrastructure here is a very interesting place. I applied to med school in Hawaii, I think in an interview. You should think about moving out here, man. Like, I know it sounds crazy, but it would fundamentally change your life.

That was actually a thing that was like on my mind for several years, actually, moving to Hawaii just say like fuck it yeah but my parents and family live in new england and i kind of want to be near them i don't like the idea of like one day waking up and realizing they're 90 and they're gone but i also kind of want to live in Hawaii like this weird i don't know well i think it goes with some of the goals you were talking to mr ford about yesterday about some of the uh ideas of wanting to have all these things of like oh no No, no. And that's what it, that's honest. No, that's one of the things. It was like, shirking medical school, shirking all this stuff. You start to like get, you're like, as you kind of come to terms with like, we're just going for it. Yeah. Not like, well, I'm going to put one toe in and maybe if the channel works. When you're finally like, fuck it, move home, lose the girlfriend, lose the friends, lose autonomy, get banned from YouTube. You have nothing. I mean, I have no pets. I have no girlfriend. I have no kids. I have no responsibilities. I have a 700 square foot apartment. I am free to do whatever I want

And like a retard I sit in a room next to a You know a mile from a Walmart podcast And that's what I do with my freedom But like there is part of me that's like I have to go just Like what do what do you do? You're like I would go for like fame fortune Where else would you live?

Fucking Hawaii like you know You kind of reach this like almost terminal cancer point of mind Where you're like it's all over tomorrow So do it. Come out here. I hope you don't like hot, aggressive, exotic girls because they're out here. So you probably don't want, you probably don't like that. The thing is I hate the sun and I hate the heat.

So I will be sitting in like an air-conditioned apartment in Hawaii. But there would be a cool flex about being in Hawaii. One of my friends moved out there from college. And I'm fucking jealous. I don't know. There's somewhere in New England. Come visit. You can do your podcast.

You could come out here and do like a visiting podcast. We're like, yeah, I'm on location today for a week. You know what I mean? And then it's over from there. I'll get eaten by a show. shark. Well, you're already messing with all the geese all the time. You might as well start flexing on some sharks.

It's a moose militia, dude. That's the goddamn militia. I keep uploading videos every day on Twitter. Just so I want the FBI to have to constantly be checking it on me because I'm using the term militia. That's why they like goose militia. They see a guy that constantly posts about a militia and it's also interviewing CIA operatives.

I just know that I'm making some interns life hell. They're the goose thing again. there's some guy that's like, what does it mean? This is calm. It's just me walking around, like, waiting for the caffeine to kick in before the gym. Yeah. That's classic. What are the ducks?

What does that stand for? Exactly. He's talking to these OG guys. Did he make any signs? Did he make any signs? You see his hand? Was there a signal in there? What kind of code words are they using? What are they doing?

What do they do? When the geese flies at midnight, what is the game? It means nothing. Growing bread to be used on the way to the gym. Yeah. but I'm going to call it a militia. It's so awesome. Just so it pings their servers.

But yeah, I appreciate it, man. It was a pleasure coming on here. Please send me the link when it's up. Yeah, I'll send you all the stuff. And the way I see it, everything we did on here is as much yours as mine. So I'll give you all this stuff. Feel free to clip it or whatever you want to do. It's yours as much of mine.

And I hope you'll come back again sometime and we can help solve the world's problems. I love to, man. I love to have you on mind. That would be fun as fuck. We shoot the shit. I'd love to. As you can tell, there's truly no agenda. It's just such as life, right?

Just dicks out, just dicks out and just let her on. I have to ask me, what's over your shoulder? Is that a 3D printer? Yeah, it is. It's a 3D printer over there. My daughter is in second grade. And so, you know, what better way to show her the limitless possibilities by, hey, what do you want to print?

You got a project coming up. Let's print this thing. Yeah. And you got the big map. back there, you know, what better way to show a kid like, hey, look at this thing over here. Here's where we live. Here's how far it is over here. Hey, we can draw some boats on here.

I don't know if you can see it, but, you know, I'm a pretty big conspiracy guy. Atlanta's, I like it. Yeah, you know, and you can start doing a little bit of research and, you know, it's super fun. I drew this. There's a, there's an interesting book about this guy, Olaf Johansson, and he took this trip to the center of the earth. But he was this old guy. and on his deathbed, he gave an account of him and his, I believe he was Norwegian and him and his father,

you know, just fishing up in Franz Joseph Lamb, like way at the top. And it's just, it's so beautiful these stories that people tell, B.M. conspiracies or imagination or fiction or nonfiction. Some of them are so beautiful and so elegant. And it's like you can interact with them if you have a map or you, and you can put that in the mind of a child and begin to use her imagination as a springboard. for success later in life. You know what I mean?

And that's my map over there. Yeah, me and my buddy in college, we had this like a table with like a glass top, you know, and we had a huge map. We decided to just put it onto the table. What, it just kind of looked cool. Yeah.

Just over the year, just kind of sitting at the table and like sitting at, you know, different chairs, you're, you never quite realized. Just like, you kind of think you like understand like the world. But as you sort of, start looking more and more at the thing and you're like,

what is this? Yeah, I remember one of the places we looked at was like on the northernmost point of Ellesmere Island above Canada. It's a place called Alert. It's the highest permanently inhabited town

in the world. It's called Alert Canada. And it's actually, ironically enough, where the NSA has had listening posts for like 70 years. It's the, it's because it's like the closest place

to Russia that you can get. But just a little shit like that. Like how a fuck I've got alert Canada. that's what I got on that point. I was building it. I was building it to be some in-depth story. Nope. There's a place called to alert.

But there's so much that comes out of it because, you know, think about maps. It's not just geography, but we have mental maps that we make of the world. We have neural networks that are maps. Like, everything's kind of a map if you think about it. And if you can begin to see this as a foundation, then you can use the world as a map. You can use your actions as a map. You can use your communications as a map. You can map out everything.

map out your future, you map out your path. You can map out where you are right now. You can map out where you want to be. You can map out the person that you wanted to come. And I think that especially, like, I've learned so much from maps. And you know what's amazing? You go back and you look at an old map with like goddamn sea monsters on, like boats and stuff. You know what I mean?

Like here be the mountains of a glory. What's that even? No. What is that? And they're kind of congruent. Old maps are kind of congruent with the way we think. You know, if you look like the Pires map, you have the only discovered this much. You're right, yeah, 15, 13, yeah.

Yeah, and so if that's true, if in the past we had these bad maps, might it also be true that the map we're looking at now is bad? The same way that we thought planets were encased in glass or that we were the center of the universe, if we know that those maps are wrong, isn't it probably true that the mental maps we have right now are wrong? Like, they've always been wrong, so why wouldn't this one be wrong? That's back to the whole, keep your mind open.

Bingo, yeah. How am I certain that I have the correct model? always be questioning your own model. Like, well, this and this and something question the very basis of your model. It's like when people like randomly use a cliche, like a statement as if it's a point. Like, well, you know,

earlier it gets the worm. You're like, that's just because everyone knows what that means, doesn't mean that that's a, that's a point. Yeah. Like reality has a liberal tense. And you'd be like,

okay, cool little like gotcha moment that you see on a postcard. What is your argument? You know, like those are, around comes around. I'm like, sure, everyone has heard that before. That didn't necessarily work out. Like, the top Nazis got to come live in America. It doesn't always go around, come around. You know? What do you think of the... It all comes out in the end. I'm like, it doesn't all come out in the end.

Sometimes the memo gets burned and the secret dies with the agency and no one really knows who killed them. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, that's just one thing. So the model is like, just because it's like a, you know, will you know what they say? A penny found is a penny. That doesn't apply to this. From 2008 are in jail, you know? Well, you know, the left hand doesn't know with the right hand.

It's like, who the, stop fucking. They're beautiful. There's so much there because a little pet peeve in mind when people try to use a well-known phrase as some sort of ending to an argument. I guess sums everything up, right? Yeah, you know, early to bed or early to rise. and it's like,

I wake up at noon every day and I go to bed at 4 a.m. and I work part of anyone I know. Well, you know, really to bed, early or really a wife makes a man healthy, wealthy and what? Fuck off.

Listen, a douchebag. Yeah, dude, I'd love to come on here again. I love to have you on some time. Yeah, that's all I got. My brain's going. Awesome.

I will, I'll reach out to you and I'll shoot you this stuff. Whenever you got an open event, I would be stolen. to come on. And if you ever have some downtime, you know, I'll shoot you some dates in a few months or whatever. And if you ever have downtime, hit me up. We'll do this. Definitely try to come out to Hawaii, man. It'll fundamentally change the way you see the world and those in your life if you come out here. I know that sounds crazy, but I did it. I know a lot of people that have done it. And it will.

It's beautiful here. And if you listen closely, Tommy, Sh, Hawaii's calling your name. Just listen to the wind, man. It's calling your name. I'm telling you. It's that. It's the, it's the Pacific headquarters of the NSA. Come and me, I'll show you where Snowden lived. Yeah. There's actually a really cool place back into maps where the NSA is headquartered there. They have that huge

underground copy. That was originally an underground map making factory in World War II. I had no idea, but write that down. It made maps. They made aircraft, I think, initially, and then maps. And then they stored like armaments there.

Then they turn into a listening post, and then Ed Snowden walked out of there with a Rubik's cube or some shit or whatever. I don't know. Fucking, nothing makes sense. There's no purpose to anything. I have no idea. Fuck censorship. That's all I got.

I'm a man. I got to run. Okay. Handle it, brother. I'll talk to you soon, man. Thank you for everything. Have a good day. Peace.

Take care. Okay. Shoot. See it.