The Devil You Don’t Know
In The Devil You Don’t Know, Lindsay, Cleveland, and their guests discuss personal growth and development by taking chances and getting out of your comfort zone. Topics range from whimsical to serious and everything in between but are always relevant to growth and development.
The Devil You Don’t Know
I Don't Have A Point to Prove: Why Every Argument Isn't Worth the Fight
In this engaging episode, we explore the ramifications of fighting over every point and why it often leads to unnecessary stress and emotional exhaustion. Through candid discussions, we share personal anecdotes that shed light on how the need to be right in our current divisive climate impacts our relationships and overall well-being. This episode uniquely draws on the reasons why politeness and effective communication are not just desirable, but essential in a time when political polarization can quickly spiral into personal conflict.
Please email us at Gettoknowthedevil@gmail.com
After a long, long absence. We missed all of Black History Month, but that's because I'm black and so I was celebrating. Maybe we have returned. This is Cleveland and Lindsay, and this is another episode of the Devil.
Speaker 1:You Don't Know, lindsay, what are we going to be talking about today? I don't have a point to prove, but I always do. You know. It's funny because in this episode, what we're going to talk about is we're going to explore the idea that every battle is not worth fighting. I know, for many of you out there, especially those of you who are keyboard warriors on the Internet, you do believe that every battle is worth fighting. You do, Especially right now. Especially right now it's, and we'll get into that, from a workplace dispute to tragic real world consequences. In today's episode, we are going to discuss how the need to prove a point often leads to stress, to division and even violence. We will also look at how political polarization is especially making people sick, literally Right, literally right now. People sick literally Right, literally right now. I think I read an article like two weeks ago on MSN that was talking about the amount of people who are going to the doctor because they're reading stories about Donald Trump and Elon Musk and it's physically making them ill.
Speaker 2:I don't read anything. Yeah Well, that's not true. I don't read the news. I do read a lot of other things that I find interesting. I do not read or watch the news.
Speaker 1:How about this? You don't read things that activate you and aggravate you.
Speaker 2:Correct Anything that's going to possibly activate my nervous system. I try not to bring on to myself also things I can't control. Why am I going to get aggravated and anxious over things that I have no control over?
Speaker 1:A hundred, a hundred percent, and so, instead of engaging in endless arguments, we are going to talk about today the power of choosing peace and letting go before. Before we get into that, it's been about we had. The last time we recorded was January, and I know we keep on promising every month for those of you who who listen to us regularly, and thank you for those of us who continue to download us even when we're delinquent and skip a month of episodes. We've just been busy as hell.
Speaker 2:It's really, really been busy and we've got well, we've got the 20 year old living home again and we've got the queen mom getting ready to go off to college. So that's all this. Last weekend trips to check out schools and see what's going on. We went to Vermont yeah, it was great, snowmobiling Well it was great for you.
Speaker 1:No, it was good for you. It was a little bit of experience. I think you would try it again on a better day.
Speaker 2:Uh, not in that path though. No, that wide open field, sure. First of all, I'm usually a warm weather vacation person, and we decided to go up there and visit our friend who moved, and it was really beautiful, but there was a lot of snow. There was a lot of snow, good Lord. There was like four feet of snow on the ground and it kept coming and coming. Every night it would snow more, and he lived a way up in the mountain. But we went on this snowmobile trip and I made it about five minutes in. When I fell off the snowmobile it was a little longer than that, it was about 12. I can't oh yeah, it was 12 minutes.
Speaker 2:I was probably the longest 12 minutes of your life riding behind me, while I was going about a half a mile an hour.
Speaker 1:Well, here's the thing that I've learned and I'm gonna let you finish is I was thinking about things that I did wrong in my first marriage and there was a time that that you would have done that and had that freak out that you had, that. I would not have been patient, but I realized that this was a very stressful thing to you. I'm not going to lie. When they showed us that video the video did me in yeah, the video. I think the video did you in the safety video.
Speaker 2:I would have rather just like gone out there and winged it, winged it, winged it, winged it. I don't know, yeah, yeah, wung it, wung it, wung it. I don't know, but I fell off the snowmobile into four feet of snow, and I'm only five feet too, so only the top of my head was showing yeah, yeah. And then I was afraid to hold on to the machine because I thought I'd bring it down on top of me, so I just let go yeah, but it was fun it was.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it was fun it was. And then I went back and I sat at the in the office with all the folks who worked there and watched as they critiqued every family and person who came through, and I let you guys go out and have your fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was a wonderful time. I won't lie, the. I am glad that you went back, because we got deep in and the weather was so inclement that day that even the the guide was like hey, hey guys, we got to stop, cause he was like if I can't see, I know you can't see. And then he spent about 10, uh, I would say I want to say it felt like 10 minutes, but he actually spent about four to five minutes. Actually, he had a little his little thing on his glove and he scrubbed the ice off my visor because my visor and my glasses were completely iced.
Speaker 2:Well there, was an ice storm going on while we were there, remember yeah, it was that it was right before the next two feet of snow came in that day, so, but it was, it was lovely, it was really really lovely and, um, what a beautiful place, very rural.
Speaker 1:Yeah, very rural, really really nice and rural, and that was the kind of place that I think when I first met you eight years ago nine years ago.
Speaker 2:I said that while we were there that I would have gone.
Speaker 1:Oh, I would never gone. But now it was like, oh, this is great, you know, this is good, this is a wonderful time. I you know what? You know what's wonderful about living in a state with uh, with guns even though guns listen this is a whole different topic because people with guns actually do kill people. But living in some place like Vermont, you know, everybody's got a gun Correct, so there are no break-ins. And now that I realize that about so many places outside of New York, I don't worry about it, because anybody who's going to come to your remote ski lodge where our friend lives is taking a chance that you might kill them just as much as they might kill you His driveway was so long that, like, nobody's going to waste their time coming down there, it's going to be easier to rob somebody right out on the street.
Speaker 2:I mean he has this massive house on five acres of property up in the mountain overlooking a lake. It's absolutely beautiful, but I mean I didn't feel unsafe?
Speaker 1:No, I didn't feel unsafe at all.
Speaker 2:I mean you could go out. The nearest town was 45 minutes away, Everything was like 45 minutes away.
Speaker 1:I was actually worried about him at one point because Doing the snow blowing, doing the snow blowing, Because he was like, you know, he was gone for hours and it was like because he broke his. He had a, he had a sit down like kind of tractor thing that he he being a Bronx boy that moved to Vermont, he was a little too and he was a little too enthusiastic about using it, but at least he didn't run himself over like Jeremy Renner.
Speaker 2:Well, he fell off of it though.
Speaker 1:He fell off of it like Jeremy Renner but and broke the thing and broke it, but thank God he didn't run himself over. So now he's got this massive push thing that he's got a blower.
Speaker 2:Yes, that's what that's called honey Snow blower. Oh, it blows the snow. Oh, are you serious right now?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I just thought it was like a yeah, that makes sense it's called a snow blower, but it's huge. It's like does that thing look like it caused five, six, seven, okay, I found this on the web.
Speaker 2:Siri, thought you were talking. Thank you, siri. I I finished my year long compassionate inquiry training and I thank you. I started the mentorship program, but I also started my mindfulness meditation teacher certification training, which is amazing. It's so amazing.
Speaker 1:Congrats. I will be going to uh coming up. We will be going to Nevis.
Speaker 2:We will be going about a month and about a month right Spring break with the queen mom.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't work at my old job anymore, but I will probably, just for just to be a piece of crap, I will probably send them a bunch of photos of me in Nevis. I'll just post them all and then send it to the folks I'm still in contact with.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then we have a nice long three week trip to the BVI in the summer, which you know is my favorite place ever.
Speaker 1:I love working for myself, but one of the challenges that I find now about working for myself is these vacations. We go on like you actually don't get paid, oh I actually take time off.
Speaker 2:I don't care. Yeah, but you don't get paid for doing it. I get paid enough in the other months it's fine. Yeah, I don't. I like to go away and really relax and enjoy myself. Yeah, you're right, you're right.
Speaker 1:You're right.
Speaker 2:I really do, I do, I'm going to, I'll, maybe I'll work a couple of days in the middle with my, you know, most necessary cases, but then, other than that, I'm going to be relaxing. I mean, we're also going to this year be in Virgin Gorda and back in Anagata, so I think pretty much both of those are a 50, 50, either have the wifi-Fi or you don't. Well, you either have power or you don't.
Speaker 1:Well, I know Elon is not popular right now with a certain set of people. I don't. I don't even think I don't even think Elon's popular with his in his own home right now. But I was thinking about getting Starlink and I still got to figure it out. I was looking at the pricing of it and we'll figure that. We'll figure that piece out as we, as we travel this year.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, I think so. So let's just jump into it, let's do it. What made you decide to come up with this particular topic? I don't have a point to prove.
Speaker 2:Well, this is something in my own life that came up a while ago when I did some prerequisites for the meditation teacher certification program. They have a number of prerequisite courses and things that you have to do retreats before you're eligible, or if you sign up for the training, you then have to show proof that you completed these prerequisites. And one of the things was in the um. There was like a maybe like a six week program that I did with Jack Kornfield and Tara Brock about how to kind of mentor people in this field, and one of the things that came up in a reading it was in a book by Jack Kornfield, but he talked about being in the ashram. He was in India and he had said to the guru was talking to everybody and somebody had said something completely outrageously false to the guru, and the guru said okay, and Jack Kornfield said to the guru but like, but that's not right.
Speaker 2:That guy's wrong, like you know, why didn't you tell him that he was wrong? And the guru said, oh, I just don't really have a point to prove, and so that's been something that you and I both have been working on in our lives is, you know, you have your process, I have my process, whatever you do. Ok, I don't have a point to prove Right, and that's something that comes up a lot and I think we lately especially, stuff has come up a lot on social media and post-election, where I'm watching people at post-election, where I'm watching people and it's so much fighting and so much arguing and I look at this and I'm like I don't even understand like why you have to have that conversation yeah Right, and one of the people had asked me oh well, how are you handling all of this?
Speaker 2:And I was like I really don't have any control over it, so I kind of put it out of my mind.
Speaker 1:In a recent video that Jason Pargin put out in January I think it was he said, for 2025,. Whenever somebody tries to argue with you or debate you, he's like I want you guys to try something new, which is I do not have enough information to form an opinion on that topic.
Speaker 2:Right, and? And when you don't have any control over something, why are you going to sit there and argue your point about it, right? I mean, listen, there's going to be people who definitely are very unhappy with the outcome of the election, but you can't change it now, right? So it's like you can figure out a way to move forward. Or, like Trish says, right, work on yourself, like, do your own damn work, right, or you could get sucked into the quagmire and allow it to bring you down, and bring you down and bring you down, yeah.
Speaker 1:There's um, there's um I. There's a story. I know sometimes you don't like when I bring in stories, but I'm going to. This is story time with Cleve. This is an actual story, cleve is very good at telling stories.
Speaker 2:I mean he can tell, and he can tell the same one 15 times in a day to you, and he would like you to listen every time.
Speaker 1:Well, I just want to make sure that my story as a public speaker. You can hire me at clevelandspeakscom no, I don't actually. I actually do need to make that a website, clevelandspeakscom. But I do have a website that you can find me on. We have our Embrace Within Counseling website up. It's up and running and then you can find me under Cleveland Oaks Counseling. I don't even know, but I have my own website underneath my own name with some branding.
Speaker 1:But I do like to tell stories and this is a particular story that I call the workplace lesson. That says it all right. So I had a colleague a few years ago who was a, who managed a team of folks and he organized the birthday party for one of his team members. Now, he did this knowing that two of the women on the team the birthday person and the other and another person on the team did not like each other. They had a beef with each other. Right, he knew it, everybody knew it it.
Speaker 1:But for the sake of unity for the team, he asked the person that was beefing with the birthday girl do you want to come to this birthday outing that I'm doing? The person was like you know, I don't like her. You know we don't get along. I have no desire to come. My friend was like okay, bet, fine, are you sure? She's like I don't want to come, I'm good. So he takes everybody out to lunch for the birthday, except for that person who said they did not want to come. And then later on that person changed their mind and took him to hr and said that he excluded them. Oh dear, now hr goes. What is wrong with people? Yeah, now, now HR goes to him.
Speaker 2:She had a point to prove.
Speaker 1:She had a point to prove and that's exactly it. So HR goes to him and asks him did this happen? And then he was like, yes, this happened. And they were like, well, why did you do that? And he was like I asked this individual, did she want to come? She said no and they were like, oh, she never told us that. So they went back and asked her is this true? And she's like, oh, yeah, I left that part out of the story. And they were like, oh, because she had a point to prove. She had a point to prove. And so when he went back and asked her why, he's like hey, we had a whole conversation about this. You told me that you did not want to come. And, as you already said, why did you do this? That you did not want to come.
Speaker 1:And, as you already said, when he, why did you do this? Oh, I had a point to prove. And he was like, oh well, if that's your hill to die on, I'm going to let you die right there. And you know what? A couple of months later, that person no longer worked for him because he did not trust that person's judgment or anymore, and right, and so I'm going to let you talk. Why is it for some people, why do you think it is that some people need to prove a point, even when it contradicts their own actions?
Speaker 2:Well, that's just typically people who are unaware, who have control issues, right, I mean, the biggest one is unawareness, and it's funny because, related to what I was saying earlier, when you do get mad at someone and you start criticizing them, your behavior actually mimics theirs, right? It's that mirroring of the behavior. But people I mean I know people like this and I don't I don't know really fully why, because it would be dependent on what that person's experiences in life were, but I often think it's somebody who never what that person's experiences in life were, but I often think it's somebody who never perceived that they were heard or supported. And so they have to be, they have to be known by everybody and they always have to have a fight because it's more and more attention on them.
Speaker 2:I think you know we won't say the person's name, but there's somebody that you interact with on a regular basis that constantly screws themselves over trying to prove a point, yeah, and all it's done is cause like a lot of grief and stress because you know now she's got hardly any work and nobody wants to work with her. And it's always because she has some kind of point to prove or she's got to say something, and it's sometimes things just don't need to be said Right?
Speaker 1:You know one of the interesting. I was reading Jack Canfield's success principles and there is a saying I can't remember by who, it is off the top of my head, but it says if one person tells you you're a horse, that person's insane. If three people tell you you're a horse, then it's probably a conspiracy. However, if 10 people tell you that you are a horse, it is time to buy a saddle, Right? And I think what happens with folks is that and Jack goes on to talk about a friend of his who had a point to prove right. His friend went through two marriages, two sets of kids no kids talked to him because he always had a point to prove Two wives that don't talk to him and lost three businesses because it was more important for that person to be right than to be married, to have a relationship with his kids or to have a successful business.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Well, that's yeah, I don't ever have a desire to be right. Well, sometimes, with you, sometimes, but you know?
Speaker 1:Well, that's what wives do, but I don't.
Speaker 2:I just, you know, one rule that I try to live by is I don't want my name coming out of anybody's mouth, especially in a negative way, right, because that's very possible. And when you work with clients, when you do the kind of home care work that I do, that you have to really be culturally sensitive, you need to be empathetic, you need to be compassionate and you always have to really be culturally sensitive. You need to be empathetic, you need to be compassionate and you always have to remind yourself to see the human behind the behaviors and the emotions that are at the forefront.
Speaker 1:Right, right, I agree. What do these stories tell us about? Not only modern workplace culture, but the dynamics of our culture right now, period.
Speaker 2:Well, when it comes to an interaction between people, it's the communication piece, and I don't know why this is, but we well, probably because we were not taught to communicate effectively as children and also we came from. Which one of my clients was saying the other day is that everybody gets a trophy. Generation is after us, right. So it's very hard, but there's no communication. There's no communication because if you can avoid going and tattling on someone, if you just had a set of skills to say, hey, when this happens, I feel a certain way or this is the way I perceive that type of behavior from you, but instead everybody goes to tattle.
Speaker 2:I always say that, and that drives me nuts. That's one of the things. The other thing is is that we don't ever. We don't really, we only focus on the negative, and so when we work in a workplace, we rarely get that positive feedback Like wow, you did great on these last three projects. Here's just like one thing I would say is a way to improve yourself, right, and a focus becomes on telling everybody what's wrong with them instead of giving them any kind of positive, kind of constructive feedback.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know one of the things and we're not. We're not going to talk politics because Lindsay and I well, I do don't mind talking politics. Lindsay is very opposed to talking politics, but one of the things that Lindsay and I do agree with is that the ironic thing today is that people who seem to be very liberal are oftentimes the people who are hardest to talk to. They are like, well, I'm not going to talk to you, you know you have.
Speaker 2:In fact, that's exactly what I was saying earlier is this friend of mine from down South who is, you know, very clear about her political views and she's very liberal and she lives in a very red state and the problem that she's having is that she now cannot interact with anybody. So she said first that well, I can't even go to my therapist anymore.
Speaker 1:And why? And why does she know how her therapist wrote it? Well, that's what I asked.
Speaker 2:I've never. You know, I don't really talk about that at all with my clients. My clients may tell me their opinions because things upset them or trigger them, but I don't ever sit would say I agree, I disagree. This is what you know, side. I'm on Um, I just listened to them, but anyway, so you know it kept going.
Speaker 2:And she was the one that was asking well, how are you guys doing up there, how are you handling this? And so she wouldn't talk to her therapist, she can't talk to any of her coworkers, she can't talk to her parents because they all voted for Trump. And so I said you know, you're a vegan. Would you say to someone I'm not talking to you because you eat meat, right? I said what I say to one of my coworkers I can't work on this case with you because you're Jewish. Right? I said how is that any different than saying I can't talk to you because you voted the opposite from me, right? I said how is that any different than saying I can't talk to you because you voted the opposite from me, right? Or you voted for what I didn't want?
Speaker 2:And she goes. Well, I guess you're just less judgmental than me. That was the response. But being judgmental is wrong, right, well, but everybody judges, right, we all judge. However like, that is so to me.
Speaker 2:So, so crazy, because that's like you know, you're excluding all of these people from your life and just because someone voted a certain way does not mean anything about them. Right, and it's. It's interesting because then she's unfriending people and posting publicly about it and talking about how angry this other person is. And I was like wow, but you're the one who actually sounds angry and ridiculous, like you know. And I said and I was like wow, but you're the one who actually sounds angry and ridiculous, like you know. And I said to her like what do you think you can do? Right, like, and she's just got such a point to prove that she's calling senators, she's calling the government, she's doing all this stuff and she's getting nowhere with it, but she's expending a whole lot of energy on it and probably increasing her anxiety up through, you know, through the roof, all because she's got a point to prove.
Speaker 1:And so Dr Covey talks about the circle of influence in the circle of concern. How is proving a point living the opposite of what Dr Covey talks about in the circle of influence, in the circle of concern?
Speaker 2:Well it just. You know, you get stuck in this loop, right, and you don't make any progress and you don't move forward in any way.
Speaker 1:And so we're not saying that to just so. What we're not saying is that we stand for injustice right, Because if something is unjust, we, as mental health counselors, part of our ethical job is to go out and advocate for things that we see are unjust in the system. So we are not saying that. What we are saying is that communication is the key to solving disputes.
Speaker 2:And tolerance, and tolerance, right, and part of the tolerance is not having the point to prove being oh, all, right, well, that's your point of view, it's not mine, but okay, yeah, right, because it's so it is. People really want to always be right, right, and we just need to communicate things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, when we think about marriage counseling and we think about what goes wrong in relationships. Gottman talks about the four horsemen of the apocalypse in relationships right and having a point to prove in a marriage, ooh what did your professor say?
Speaker 2:Well, you it's like you either want to be right or you want to be married. Right, right, or you want to be with that person, and I talk about that a lot with my clients. Is it more important for you to sit here and prove a point and be right, or is it more important for you to be married or in your relationship? And most of them will be like no, it's more important to be in the relationship.
Speaker 1:You know, uh, Gottman talks about the four horsemen of the apocalypse in a marriage, and you can. We can take this to a broader societal. The four horsemen of the apocalypse in a marriage are criticism, which but you're criticizing the person and not the behavior. It is contempt where you just like, oh, you know, oh, they don't know, Like I can't talk to my husband, I can't talk to my wife because they're just stupid.
Speaker 2:It is defensiveness where somebody goes to talk to you about your point of view, Right, and you start to project everything on them because you can't you know you can't internalize any of it and look at it and then there's stonewalling where you refuse to talk, and what we see.
Speaker 1:I do that sometimes, yeah, but it's fine, I probably deserve it, but what we see, but what we see happening on a societal level, are all those things, all those things, because people would rather be right than communicate.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and communication is hard, and I do think that it's. I don't think I ever learned to communicate in a healthy way. I will say that growing up I'm pretty confident that I didn't, and so going into adulthood I didn't know how to communicate Right, and it took a lot of working on myself to become a better communicator and to be able to have conversations that are uncomfortable too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, one of my favorite stories from the Bible is Jesus, when he had a confrontation with the Pharisees, right, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. And here's the thing is, these people ultimately killed Jesus. Right, they ultimately killed him. They murdered him because they did not like what he had to say. They did not.
Speaker 1:But there's an interaction where the Pharisees come to Jesus and he's hanging out with people that they felt he should not be hanging out with as a rabbi and as a teacher. And he's hanging out with the gay people. He's hanging out with the tax collectors, he's hanging out with the prostitutes, he's hanging out with the Gentiles. And they come to Jesus and they were like hey, man, you're a really smart dude, we know you have sayings of God, but why are you with these people? And Jesus says I am with these people because they need me. And instead of arguing with them about why they should be doing the same, Jesus just says to him he stops the argument dead in his tracks Are you happy where you're?
Speaker 1:At Pharisees? And they were like yeah, so he's like if you're good in the synagogue, don't worry about what I'm doing, Right? Right, he didn't. He didn't chastise him, he didn't say hey, you're going to hell or hey, you're not going to be in King God's kingdom. He asked them are you happy with your worship to God? And those fadges, Sadducees and Pharisees said yes, we are. And he was like fine, Then don't worry about me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, it's so. It's so funny, right, because people do get so concerned with what other people are doing.
Speaker 1:Have you ever been in a situation where someone escalated an issue where they just had to be right, and I want to know how?
Speaker 2:you dealt with it. Well, I mean, yeah, we have one here with the bathroom floor. How about that one? Oh well yeah, well, tell us, tell the story, because I was the wrong. I was in the wrong there. Yes, well, I mean, we probably talked about it before, but you told me you were going to do something, go to either our designer or find another designer, because our tile is back ordered and you were going to take care of it and you were going to bring the tile with you to match it up.
Speaker 1:And you look beautiful now.
Speaker 2:Well, after we fixed your mistake, sure? So you told me that you took care of it while I was working. However, you didn't really take care of it in the way that you told me you were going to take care of it, and you picked out some random tile online that you thought would go fine in the bathroom, and then I didn't see any of it all together and you didn't do what you were supposed to do. And then the tile was laid and later had to be taken up because it was not okay for that room. But you were so horrible to me, you were really horrible to me. You were screaming at me, you were telling me all these horrible things about myself and you were just escalating and escalating, and escalating, just to be right about the tile.
Speaker 1:I'm cutting all of this out of the podcast, by the way, and and then and then once other people were like yeah, no, doesn't go.
Speaker 2:Then you were like oh, yeah, I was wrong.
Speaker 1:It wasn't even other people. I want to give credit to our marriage counselor. His name is Chris. He's from Barbados. He is not really our marriage counselor. He's one of the construction guys that came. He would watch.
Speaker 1:He used to think he thinks that we're so funny and he's like yeah, I know you guys love each other, but whenever I he sees me going back at Lindsay and he sees me proving a point, he's like hey man, hey man, hey man, you just need to shut up. Man, Stop talking. Because who ultimately ripped up the floor for you? He did, he did Cause he was like she's not happy. And when I came home he was like hey man, she wasn't happy, it wasn't worth trying to prove the point. She wasn't happy. And if you want to be happy with your wife, just take it out, Right.
Speaker 1:And and that was a lesson that I had to learn, and I'm glad that I learned that lesson, because now I am so relaxed and I don't have a point to prove. It's like I think what, what happens in this world is like I was talking to Marvin, who my other podcast, Black Daddies in Space, and we were talking about you know how everybody's like hating on movies and this new Captain America movie came out and the critics all hated on it and the people loved it and it was like he's like today. It seems like everybody has an agenda to hate everything.
Speaker 2:There's so much anger in the world. I was saying that to somebody the other day. It might've been in my um, it might've been in in the meditation training. They were talking about how much anger is in the world and how, you know, we all need to be able to become more present and to be able to teach people to become more present.
Speaker 1:Right One. Um, I'm going to move on to our next segment. When proving a point turns deadly. These are two stories that happened recently. One is more recent than the other.
Speaker 1:Several years ago in Brooklyn, not too far from where I used to live in, do or die beds die I do. I used to miss it, but now I don't because it's too busy and trendy over there. There's a cute little bungalow with a bright yellow door and a cute little backyard. Cute little backyard. Uh, there was a woman. I believe it was the home depot in nostron avenue. Uh, she's in the car with her boyfriend. They get into a little bit of altercation in the parking lot with somebody that you know. The guy was waiting for them to come out of the space. They weren't coming out of the the space, you know. Fast enough, they all, they resolved it. They thought it was resolved in the parking lot. Everybody gets out of their car. They go shopping. That fella goes shopping. They come back to their car, they drive off. That guy follows them out of the store and he shoots them up and kills the woman.
Speaker 1:Right Recently. Now you can talk about your story that you know that happened. What, what, maybe like two weeks ago with the guy, and it was maybe three weeks, yeah, yeah, and it was also about a parking dispute. Until let's talk, about.
Speaker 2:That was in the bronx and um, the guy came home from work at like almost two in the morning and someone was parked blocking his driveway. Now if I came home and someone was blocking my driveway, I'd be pretty annoyed too, and it happens a lot here.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I come out and people are parked in our driveway I'm like you do not live here, um, so, but you know he came home he called the police to ticket the car. They ticketed it but they didn't tow it, and then he went to try to find um in a local bar or club uh, whoever's car it was. And when they came out and saw that he had gotten a ticket, the guy shot him right in front of his house. But first they beat his girlfriend to a pulp and then they shot him and killed him over. And it's like this person was illegally parked and then shot someone because he was doing the wrong thing.
Speaker 1:So let me ask you a question as the expert. What is it about these small disputes that people escalate them into life-threatening situations?
Speaker 2:people are angry, people have so much trauma and and it's really comes down to the trauma it does right now that I am really verily very heavily doing the training practice and doing all these recordings and really having to seriously stick to using compassionate inquiry in you know, in my sessions to get my certification, I'm learning how much and how deep people's trauma is and it is just the cause of so much stress in their lives. Right, Because your trauma is not the actual situation that happened. It's your response to the situation and the lasting impact that the session has, the situation has on you.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you a question about ego. Yeah, what is the psychology of an ego battle? And why is it that you know people refuse to back down, even in the face of like you know, this thing, where you know this guy destroys his life because he kills somebody, like in both these cases, these people destroyed their life because it was more important to be right than than to let these people continue to exist. Or even in the case of your friend who was like well, I, you know, I'd rather not work.
Speaker 2:Right, then just shut my mouth, right? Well, we've been. I've been doing a lot of breath work with Trish lately, which has been really awesome, and we have been talking a lot about the ego, and the ego is the voice in in your head, right, that is kind of constantly giving you a job to do, and so the ego is, like it's a very emotional reaction, right, it's like your inner child, right, and it comes out in all of these emotions, and so it's based on like whatever's happened to you, right, it's like your inner child, right, and it comes out in all of these emotions, and so it's based on like whatever's happened to you, right? Is that you get into this space where it's like you have got to do something and you don't shut the voice up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what are some strategies for deescalating that ego?
Speaker 2:Well, you gotta, you know, you gotta see it and you gotta feel it right, like I always say you gotta. If you gotta feel it, you got to see it and you got to feel it Right. Like I always say, you got to. If you got to feel it, you got to heal it Right. So you see these things happening when you start to get activated, you have to be able to like work with someone to take a deep dive into what is going on inside of me, that this is what is happening in my life right now. Right, that this is the way I react to things.
Speaker 1:I want to make a quick transition to our next topic, which is political divides and mental health, and this is something that we've been talking about recently. A recent study found that 94 million Americans feel that politics is a significant source of stress, with 30 million reporting that it has harmed their physical health. And imagine this 11 million people experiencing suicidal, suicidal thoughts, suicidal thoughts due to political conflicts. Talk to me about that.
Speaker 2:That's really wow, that's a lot. Well, I mean, I think that that's just people who can't detach from you know watching things and from all the programming. I think I've said this before that we have so much programming in our society, right. Like one of the things right that keeps coming up right now are all these like near miss plane accidents and I was just talking to you about this the other day where people are all over oh, I'm not flying until all of this is resolved and people are like there were like more crashes in near misses last year in this window than there are this year and it's amazing how like the media right and can be so influential in people's thinking.
Speaker 1:It's, it's, it's, it's, it's crazy right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so it's. You know it's, it's. You listen and it's like I say, when you listen to things over and over and over again, you start to believe them. When you're in an abusive relationship, for example, and someone tells you horrible things about yourself, you have poor self-esteem, right, because you start to believe those things, you internalize them, they become a part of you, and that's what happens when we listen to this garbage that's put out there over and over and over again. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I'm not saying that Trump and Elon are good guys or that all these things that are going on, but it's not even about them, it's it's all of the programming right right there's, I mean just like things.
Speaker 2:Think about people now that have anxiety and won't get in an airplane, right, right, like, and it's like. So if but if it wasn't on the news, everybody would be just going to the airport and flying like normal and and, and one of the things that I always talk about is you have to question the messenger, right?
Speaker 1:why is the media the media hitting you with Trump and Elon stories like every day? This last weekend, there was a big controversy because President Zelensky and Donald and President Trump got into a huge fight in the Oval Office, right? And here's the thing is was Trump right? Was he wrong? I'm going to do what Jason Pargin said. I do not have enough information on this topic to make an informed decision. However, there are a number of people who, and I, have a master's degree. You have what? Two master's degree, a bachelor's degree. There are a lot of people with high school diplomas, two bachelor's degrees, two bachelor's degrees and one master's Two, two master's, two bachelor's. So I'm going to say that you're infinitely smarter than me, but there are a lot of people out there In some ways. In some ways, you're much smarter than me.
Speaker 1:Well, there's Gardner's eight intelligences, and I'd like to think that everybody. I don't think that there's everybody. I don't think there's anybody who's stupid. I think there are people who are intelligent in different ways, right, and that's one of the and that's how I look at it. But here's the thing I don't know enough about the topic to make an opinion, right, but what I can say is that for conflict to be resolved, people need to talk to each other, right, Right?
Speaker 2:Right, but that's the communication piece.
Speaker 1:So let me ask you a question why do you think people feel and going back to your friend down south that they need to cut off friends and family and other people over these political differences?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, in this case it's just, you know, it's her own feelings of inadequacy and not feeling supported, because I know her and that she doesn't perceive that she's supported. She is the very much like the and I think also she likes the drama. I'll be honest, I really do think she likes the drama because she's always the victim and people who are the victim stay in the victim until they are absolutely desperate to get out of the role of the victim. Is it ever worth being a victim? No, not for me anyway.
Speaker 2:But, I, you know, I, I also, I, I question my own habits too.
Speaker 2:Right To be perfectly transparent, I said to you one thing that I have, um, I joked with you, I did a breathwork workshop and I said I was going to do a round of layoffs in my life and I did it. And so if you haven't heard from me, that's why, um, I ghosted you. But but it's, and I and I had that battle with myself as a clinician and as a person who's you know very spiritual and you know very heavily into, like, meditating and breathwork and other spiritual practices. And I said, you know, I consider myself very compassionate and I often try to see the human behind what's going on. But there's certain people that don't align with you in your life, right, or they're in that victim role and it's almost heavy to be around them. And so I, I, I find this balance between, like, am I lacking compassion If I kind of ghost people or, you know, eliminate people from my life that are not, that are not supportive or not aligned with what I'm aligned with?
Speaker 1:Let me ask you a question Is that contradictory to what we're talking about? Laying people off because they don't align with you, is it or is it not? I want to just ask you to give our audience a clarification.
Speaker 2:No, because that's what I was going to say. Next, I spoke to my own therapist about it and I spoke in the next breathwork workshop about it, and you know both both of them and I didn't say that, I spoke to the other. So it was interesting to see and they both said the same thing that that's having compassion for yourself, right, and and it's not, you know, because the thing is is that people that are kind of vibrating at these emotional, very emotional levels, right, they're not aware, they're not aware of how they're like an emotional vampire or how they're kind of sucking the energy out of a room, and you can't make people be aware. I mean, yes, you can tell people all about themselves, but they actually have to see it themselves. Because when people tell you something about yourself, yeah, you may internalize it, it might bring something up for you, but it doesn't necessarily, you know, it doesn't mean that you're actually going to take that person seriously and say, oh really, I got to check this out, maybe this is how I'm doing things.
Speaker 1:And it goes back to and I just asked you that because I just wanted to give clarification to the audience, not because I disagreed with you, because I tell my clients all the time that you don't have to, you don't have to mess with people that don't, that don't, align with you, right, and that piece is very important. But it goes back to what Jesus said you good over there and you stay over there. It's not that I don't want to talk to you, but you are very opinionated about what I'm doing in my life. I don't need your opinion, bro. So so you go over there and even Gottman talks about that in relationships where he's like it's not not communicating. But let's just agree to disagree on this one. And anything else that we can talk about, let's talk about it, right, but on this thing that we're never going to agree on, let's just not talk about that thing that we're never going to agree on.
Speaker 2:Right, absolutely. But you and I do that with each other too, right it's, but I, you know, I think we also are come from a perspective, the both of us that we don't really have a point to prove.
Speaker 1:And and, and you know, we, we have a dear friend and a lot of our. Well, you know, and this is I find this with a lot of of my friends who are a little more liberal like when you try to talk to them about things that they disagree with they don't, they just immediately shut you down. And it's not that I'm even trying to prove a point. I just want to try, like for me personally, I have no point to prove. In fact, I like it when people prove me wrong because it helps me see where I was. You know where I need to be enlightened at.
Speaker 2:Right, but what? But you're open to that, right. Right, and you are receptive to that. And you have to be receptive, right when you and I argue, like when clients will ask me, for example, when they have relationship troubles, like I will tell them no, we fight, we can get into it over here, right, but you know, I said the, the differences in the way that we resolve it. Yeah, yeah, and sometimes you'll be like you know what? Yeah, I did do it, and you'll try to like, prove a point, or I'll try to prove a point, but then I'm like, yeah, at the end of the day, like both of us are usually like, yeah, I did do that, sorry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and Jack Canfield talks about that in the success principles in a in a in a in a smaller degree when it comes to marriages and relationships is about feedback right when somebody disagrees with you? Do you want to be right or do you want to listen about what makes them unhappy?
Speaker 2:Well, I would like to listen to them, because I would like people to feel that they're heard, right To perceive that I'm hearing them, and I would like people to then, you know, be able to approach me with things, because I don't want people to go and tattle on me because they didn't like something. I'd rather people come to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and as Jack, Canfield said you listen his friend. At the end of the day, no-transcript relationships, as your professor at NYU said with other people. How can we engage in meaningful discussions without sacrificing our mental well-being?
Speaker 2:discussions without sacrificing our mental wellbeing. Well, the biggest thing that I would say to people is that, if it's actually not becoming a meaningful discussion, is to be able to shut it down by saying you know what? Let's pick this up when everyone's less emotional. Yeah, that's a good one. Right, that's what I tell people. But you, you, you can when you don't take on other people's stuff and when you don't feel like you need to be right or you need to get in the last word. It's about understanding versus respecting. You do not need to understand, you do not need to understand why people have the opinions or the points of view that they have, but you know you should just respect that there are points of view besides yours.
Speaker 1:Can you share a grounding exercise or a breathwork exercise that with our audience that they can use when they feel themselves getting activated?
Speaker 2:Yeah well, I mean, the easiest one is to just, you know, to just kind of sit quietly. Usually you sit on your bottom with your feet on the floor, or you can sit in, you know, on the floor and cross your legs, but is to just close your eyes and you know, when you breathe in, say like, breathe in, my mind is calm, and then when you breathe out, breathe out, my body is relaxed, and you can just do that over and over just saying the mantra internally to yourself. Another practice that I do, and that I help with my clients to do, is to bring them into the present moment, is to just kind of feel where are you sitting? What parts of your body are touching furniture or touching the floor? What does it feel like Right, what do you feel? Any tension? Can you just drop your shoulders? Can you feel the breath coming in and out? What do you hear around you? Just to kind of bring yourself into the present sense, so to speak.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think that's really, that's really important. I want to move on to our last segment, which is Jack Canfield's wisdom of energy spent. Complaining is energy wasted. And that goes back to what Trish said on her Instagram, like about, I think about three weeks ago, when she was talking about Trump and Elon and you I want you to quote it because she's your friend and we got to get her on the show eventually. Yes, we will, we will.
Speaker 2:Well, it's what she said was. You know, you can get sucked into the quagmire like you can get sucked into all this. You can watch the news, you can get all activated, get yourself sucked in, or you can work on yourself. You could try to heal, you could look at what's coming up for you and why it's coming up, and you can make your own life better personally by making yourself better and doing that kind of self healing journey.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're thinking about Dr Covey's circle of influence and circle of concern. We should only worry about the things that we can actually influence, and Jack Canfield in the success principles talks about that. Take 100 percent responsibility for the things that you can control.
Speaker 2:And one of the things that that's a big thing we do in breath work too. It's like what can you control? I cannot control anything that any other living being says, does, thinks, how they act. I can't control any of that. None of that is within my control.
Speaker 2:Right, and that was a big thing that I, um was speaking with Trish during the week we were.
Speaker 2:She did a workshop like a Q and a workshop, and that was a big thing that I was speaking with Trish during the week we were. She did a workshop like a Q&A workshop, and she brought me on to talk to the group about some of my experiences, because I was talking about how the like scapegoat in the family becomes the one that everyone projects onto and how the healthiest person in a toxic dynamic causes so much friction, and so we were talking a lot about that and I had said that, you know, with the one that moved just back home with us, I I said you know that the moment my relationship changed with him was the moment that I realized I had not one ounce of control over the choices he makes, right, right, and so we don't, you know, we don't realize that, like we can't control what people do and what people say Right and their own lives are laid out for them, and so they get to make their own choices, and if those choices harm them in any way, I can't control it.
Speaker 1:You know, at a recent public engagement that I did ClevelandOaksSpeakscom doesn't actually exist, but you can hire me to speak At a recent public engagement that I did that we talked about DEI and everyone came up to me and was like wow, that was actually really inspiring and hopeful. Like you weren't angry, I talked about Jack Canfield's principles, which is, if you have time to complain, you have time to make a change. Right, and it goes back to what Trish said If you got, I can't change this, right my old job, who I will, who I did not, I was not happy with. I actually spoke to one of the somebody from there the other day. We chatted and he was like dude, you just weren't happy here anymore. Everybody saw it. Instead of complaining about those folks or even spending energy crapping on them, I realized that I needed to make a change for myself.
Speaker 2:Right and you know I was just thinking before when you talked about that is that in the amount of time that we spend, right, if you look at this person posting on social media, social media, social media all day, every day the amount of time spent complaining could be spent on actually doing some of the work on yourself, right? How much time you sit here watching and reading and listening and instead, instead, like, go out for a walk, put your feet on the earth, meditate, go exercise, have a conversation with somebody right, do something kind for somebody else. You know all that time you can't get back, so it's like you should spend every minute of your life, right, doing things from a place of like kind of mindful awareness.
Speaker 1:Right, and even using my own situation in this example, listen, I was a villain in some of the things that happened at work also, right, I mean, I make mistakes, we all make mistakes, you know. Was I held to a different standard than some other people? Yes, as a black person, 100% I was. I'm fine, and, but I'm fine saying that. Right, I wrote that to a colleague the other day.
Speaker 1:When a colleague, when a friend of ours, asked me why am I not more upset about everything that's going on in the world, I was like I'm black, I'm expecting, I don't expect the world to be fair, and that is my superpower, and that I have always been in a position where, instead of complaining about it right, I, you know, instead of complaining about it, I have to do something about it, right, right, and that's what Jack Canfield talks about in the success principles the energy that you spend behind a keyboard for writing letters to senators, writing, just wasting a whole bunch of time, driving yourself crazy and making yourself sick. You can be working on things that, really, that you can actually influence, which is yourself.
Speaker 2:Right, and that's why, when Trish says that, right it's, you just work on yourself, just look at your own stuff, right, and we're like, rely on the people around you. You know, one of the things that was so nice about the training when we started it last week is one of the so there's a bunch of instructors in the training and each one of them got a chance to introduce themselves and do an activity. It was an all day, you know like 10 to six kind of thing, and one of the women did this activity. That was just like. You know, whoever you voted for, you're welcome here, right, if you are black, if you are white, if you are Asian, if you are Latino, you are welcome here, Right, and it was just like it was. This gathering of like.
Speaker 1:You accept everybody, right, right, despite these little things about them that you know you may not align with or you might not be able to relate to, is just accepting people for just being a part of the group, and one of the things that Jonathan Haidt talks about in the Anxious Generation is this idea that we are now in a society where we all judge each other, where there's no empathy, where people point fingers instead of being supportive, and when I tried to talk to one of my liberal friends about that, he was like well, you know, jonathan Haidt is just like you know. He's like he's anti-woke and it's like no, he's not anti-woke, he's saying that some of the things that you believe are absolutely wrong and they're detrimental to society. And why don't you listen to what he's saying? Because you are judging. You are doing the same thing that you're accusing these other people of, where you're judging and you're refusing to communicate.
Speaker 2:Right, that was just like what I was talking about earlier. It's it's you know you need to. People just need to look at themselves, right. They just need to have a level of awareness and I think it's you know we have a level of awareness based on what happened to us as children. Right and I said that to you recently is that while you're pretty social and outgoing, I'm the room reader, right, and you always know that with me that if I go somewhere I'm very quiet but I watch, I watch the people.
Speaker 1:Well, gabor would say, in the myth of normal, that my social, that he doesn't. He wouldn't say he does say that people who are charming and people who are usually actors and people who are on news personalities or or do what, what, what I do for a living, are people that have worked, that this is a trauma response. Right, that being charming and being charismatic is is how you've learned to interact with the world, because you had trauma that said that this is how I need to be.
Speaker 2:Well, that's most people, right. We develop our character traits based on our experiences. I've talked about that before. Is we, you know? We, we learn to adapt, to keep ourselves safe? Former children, and then those become our character traits. Right, the child who's abused tries to stay out of trouble. Right, doesn't ever kind of poke back or ever have an opinion. Right, they just kind of you know cower and hide right, and you know cower and hide right. And you know other people are, you know they've only know how to fight and how to scream at each other, right. And so we, we become the, we take those traits and we take them into life. The problem is, as adults, they don't serve us anymore. Yeah.
Speaker 1:When we think about some of those other stories that we talked about earlier and other folks that we talked about, how much of our energy goes into being right instead of being happy With whom, just period, like, how many people have you interacted with that they would rather be?
Speaker 2:Oh, so many people, so many people. I'm just like okay, yeah, right, but, but I mean that's most people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, one of the things that helped me with my work when I decided to leave is I was like ah, you know what? Maybe I'm not right, maybe I am wrong, maybe this job isn't for me, maybe when my boss is writing me up and saying like, hey, these are the things that I'm not happy with that you're doing, I was like.
Speaker 1:Hey, you know what Maybe actually is right, and I didn't have a point to prove and when I went to quit it was like they were like no, no, no, no, no, we didn't mean any of that, we're sorry. And I was like, no, you wrote it, it's okay. Yeah, I think you, you, you actually made me think. I remember my senior vice president sat with me and was like hey, so if this would have never happened, would you have ever left? And I was like probably not Right.
Speaker 2:But you made me realize that this was not valued here and I don't want to be somewhere right that I am not wanted. I want to be somewhere where I'm accepted and I'm treated well and that people can communicate with me. Yeah, right, and I think you know, and the thing is is like look at your life now yeah, oh, I'm much happier, right, you're so much happier money you never would have left yeah, more money, even though we, you know, more money right more money, more flexibility and you're working far less hours than you were working before.
Speaker 2:See, remember when I'm going to go back for a minute. Remember when you were like, oh, you need to work in a school, you need a full time job, you need to be somewhere every day, I don't want to pay all these taxes. And then you came home and you were like, wow, this is pretty nice. Now I see why you don't want to go work for somebody else.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you, donald Trump for firing 7000 people at the IRS. No, and I've not. Actually, honestly, I feel bad for all those folks that got fired, but thank you, donald Trump. But but here's the thing is, I had multiple people had presidents and I was well loved where I worked at Right. I had I had multiple. I had my lawyer told me, my therapist told me one of the presidents at the company told me hey man, you should fight this. And I'm like why I don't want, I really don't care enough to fight this and I would rather be happy and I would rather walk away and let them have that.
Speaker 2:Well, and also, did you want to work there anymore? No, okay. So if you didn't want to work there, why would you want to fight it Like, what do you want from them? Right, it's like just, you know, and it's honestly, it's better. What you did, right Of, like, when they were like, oh, I know you have a lot to do, so we'll let you get to work. And you were like, yeah, no, no, I'm done. Right, because that had to have been very satisfying, because once again, they thought that they won.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I was like, no, I'm done.
Speaker 2:And no, they did win but I didn't care, I'm not. I'm not actually participating in the game, so like you can do whatever you want with that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, many years ago, and I took this from a Jehovah's witness convention that I went to and I talked to my clients about this all the time Clients who have points to prove there was a kid, he was on dad and he said his dad came to him and said son, where there's no wood, the fire goes out, right.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, what I say to my clients is, when they come and they start like trash talking their partner, I'll be like oh, I got a lot of things to say about my husband. I said and I can guarantee you that everything I don't like about him, he could find at least one thing that he doesn't like about me. And they stop and they look at me and I was like so, I was like you could tell me everything about your husband or your wife, but I'm sure that if I called them in here, they could tell me just as many things about you that they don't like. Right, it's, you know, it's. It's so funny because it's like people get into this place of like I have to be this. You know, I think I'm better than everybody else. I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to prove a point and I'm going to be something and it's like if you actually want to help, then like help a cause that you can actually help.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a critical piece of information that was great for me is I spent some time many years ago volunteering at Our Children, which is an organization out in Queens, and I'll just explain. I'll give them a little plug. They are an organization that, if you are an incarcerated woman that has kids, they will keep your kids while you are in jail at a place called my mother's house. And the reason why it's called my mother's house is because the nuns there are considerate enough. If these kids are in school and people ask where they live, they say my mother's house, right. They don't say, hey, I'm living with a bunch of nuns at a shelter. I'm the. You know, I'm in an assisted living.
Speaker 1:But one of the things that one day and this is I was complaining about you to this lovely lady, sylvia about oh my, my girlfriend is very fussy and bossy and she's always telling me what to do. And Sylvia looked at me dead in the face and she said Cleveland, you are no prize either. And I laughed my ass off and I was like you're absolutely right, but it was true, I am no prize either, right? So it is all the people that you're complaining about. I'm sure they're complaining about you too.
Speaker 2:Exactly. That's why I'm just like I just all right, whatever, I just sit, I listen, you know, and sometimes I'll say, if they think of negative things, especially with clients, I'll be like, well, what's the positive of that person? Right? If you have relationship issue and complaining so much about your husband, I'm like. But he's like loyal and committed, right, cause he wants to make it work. He said he's a great dad too, right. And so I'm like I get people to look at the other side, because it's so easy to be consumed by the negative no-transcript standing up, and I miss the nineties for that reason, because there was no internet, and there was.
Speaker 1:there was no internet, there wasn't this, this Reddit, and there wasn't all these people that are armed, that are armchair activists, that are getting up and saying their opinion and causing all this division. It is fine to have an opinion.
Speaker 2:Of course, but your opinion doesn't have to be the only opinion. You have to have some flexibility and understanding that other people have an opinion too, and I always say there's more than one way to get to the answer on most things.
Speaker 1:And I think the personal reflection that everyone needs to make is, like Jesus had, that conversation with those Sadducees is hey, are you good over there? Then, if you, were good over there.
Speaker 1:you are fine over there. Don't worry about what I'm doing. Am I committing a crime? No, Am I doing anything wrong? I am associating with people that you don't agree with their lifestyle, but are they committing crimes? No, you just don't agree with their lifestyle. Leave them alone. You know, leave them alone and let me be. And I think, as a personal reflection, it's important and people need to understand this. Is it important to choose peace? Peace over conflict?
Speaker 2:Right, a hundred percent, and you feel better when you don't have a point to prove with someone and you don't have to always have your opinion and have it said.
Speaker 1:You actually feel so much better right when we think about we're closing because we got somebody coming over and I don't want to ring the bell in the next couple I know we really need to just finally finish up the last of the construction? Yeah, I want to. We had to hire somebody else because our construction guy.
Speaker 2:We just need to hang some window blinds now, because I'm tired of feeling like people can just see straight through the house and our construction guy, wonderful guys, um they're the best stoica associates, if you ever use them, that I'm gonna give a plug to them.
Speaker 1:They are out in long island right now and you know he sent me a picture of a house that they're working on and he was like dude, I don't know, and I'm gonna be back because his house is full of termites thank goodness it was not ours oh my god, he said.
Speaker 1:I actually found a house worse than yours. And then he showed me a picture where termites had eaten through the floor, and so we got a contractor coming over he's looking at the to hang up some blinds. But I do want to do some closing thoughts here, and I think the next time you feel yourself getting worked up on an argument, ask yourself is this the hill that I want to die on? And choosing your battles isn't about being passive, because Jesus does say in the Bible. When you think about what Jesus says, if somebody slaps you, he says turn the other cheek, because a slap is just, it's not something it stings, it hurts, but it's not something that's going to end your life, right. So Jesus is not saying do not fight when you need to fight, but if somebody offends you, then turn the other cheek, walk away. If somebody is trying to hurt you, then you fight back, right. But you have to choose your battle, and peace is not about winning the argument. It's about knowing which arguments are not worth your time and your energy. Yeah, right, that's it.
Speaker 1:And the next time you're tempted to fight for a point, I want you all, because this is as chris you don't have chris, but I'll send chris over to your house. Hey, man, is that really a point I want to prove? Right? And so the next time you are tempted to fight for a point in your relationship or your marriage, or some stranger on the street or some road rage or somebody parks in your space, ask yourself what is this really costing you? Right, because a self-defense expert that I listened to many years ago on the Jordan Harbinger show said this right, you may be in a mood to fight that stranger that you don't know. He may be in a mood to kill. Okay, right. And he was like, if you think about that, and there are a lot of people out here in this world who are very angry, who are very mentally disturbed, who have points to prove, and they would rather kill you, literally kill you, than have a conversation with you, right? So the next time you're tempted to fight for a point, consider what you are really losing or what it is costing you to fight for that point.
Speaker 1:That's it for me, lindsay. Do you have any closing words? That's it. I got to make dinner. Wow, great episode.
Speaker 2:I like to say.
Speaker 1:It happens when we don't record for a while. But, guys, we're going to try to be more regular. We were going to record a couple episodes, but we came at our mark on this and we have somebody coming over. But we promise you for our loyal listeners, thank you for continuing to download us. Thank you for continuing to watch us Unless not watch us because we don't have a video podcast yet but thank you for continuing to listen to us and download us, despite the fact that we have not uploaded an episode since January. I'm always surprised when I see 50 downloads or 100 downloads and I'm like, oh snap, somebody's, somebody's actually really listening to us. I just, if this episode was important to you, I ask you, lindsay, and I ask you share it with someone who needs to hear it. Join the conversation with us online. You can email us at get to know the devil at what's what's. What's our email address.
Speaker 2:You tell me the devil at Gmail dot com.
Speaker 1:If you want, if you're in the New York area and you would like to be counseled by myself or coached, or coached, or coached from anywhere, from anywhere, and if you're, if you're, if you want any free, compassionate inquiry certification sessions in exchange for recording, that's an option.
Speaker 1:You can. You can visit us at EmbraceWithInCounselingcom, or you can find me at ClevelandOaksCounselingcom. I think that's my website. I made it back in December. I'm a spaz, but you can find us there, and I think that's it. Lindsay, do you have anything else to add? No, I do not. Okay, and until the next time. Hey, lynn, what do you think you want to talk about next time?
Speaker 2:I'm not sure yet, but I'll let you know, because right now I have to make my clean food dirty, girl, dirty express sesame, soy, curl, orange, vegan chicken thing, if you follow me on Medium or on LinkedIn.
Speaker 1:I recently wrote a blog called Fat, sick and Tired or something like that, about how processed foods affect our mental health. Yeah, I know you're into veganism. We're both into veganism and processed foods. We had a whole conversation about why neither one of us are eating processed foods uh, going forward or trying not to to to cut it down, and maybe we can talk about that, because I think I sometimes sit with clients and one of the things I've learned as I approach licensure thank you for being fully licensed.
Speaker 1:I have my LP um at this point but one of the things that I've learned is that one of the main things that, for people before you assume that you're crazy, assume that something is wrong with you physically, and a lot of folks are eating processed foods and eating sugars and eating the ultra complex process super processed, ultra, ultra processed is what the majority of Americans, and it does impact your mental health. So maybe we'll talk about that next time and throw some statistics out there. For some folks Sounds good and, that being said, this has been Cleveland and Lindsay and this has been another episode of the Devil. You Don't Know.
