45 Lessons From a 90-Year-Old (Part Two) with Alyssa + Geoff

Play Video
ABOUT THE EPISODE

In last week’s episode, Geoff and I brought you along as we went through a list of 45 life lessons written by now 90-year-old Regina Brett. When we left off, we had 18 more to go. This is part two of Geoff and I diving into the wisdom of Regina’s list. Join us as we explore what each lesson means to us—what we love, what we’d edit, and how we’re integrating these into our lives.

Which lesson resonates with you the most? What would you add? Join the conversation in the comments.

Other episodes mentioned:

  • Episode 16 “Should it be this hard?”

Never miss an episode.

Alyssa Patmos 0:04

This is Make It Mentionable. I’m Alyssa Patmos and this is the show about being human in a world that encourages us to be robots. I invite you to join me as we journey through the mess, the magic and the mania in between. Because what we can talk about, we can manage. This honest conversation extravaganza includes free flowing conversations and high doses of vulnerability to remind you that you aren’t alone. No topic is off limits, and episodes are designed to leave you smarter, aka more self aware than when you came. I am so glad you’re here.

Welcome back to another episode of Make It Mentionable. I’m your host, Alyssa Patmos and Geoff is here with me on the couch. And this is part two. This is a continuation of last week’s episode where Geoff and I were breaking down and reading through a list of 45 life lessons or lessons that life taught a 90 year old Regina Brett. So she wrote this list when she turned 90 years old. And Geoff found it a few weeks ago. And we were at a bar when we started talking through it. And then we were like, this would be a great episode. And so we started last week. And although we had the intention of getting through all of them, we didn’t. So I think today we are on number 29 is where we’re kicking it off. Last week, some of the things that were covered. Your favorite, “Forgive everyone everything”.

Geoff 1:45
Mmhm [affirmative]

Alyssa Patmos 1:46
Ah, let’s see: “When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.” I mean, that’s just common sense. “Don’t compare your life to others, you have no idea what their journey is all about.” So if you want to hear the first 28, catch last week’s episode, and you can jump in with us. Right now we’re at 29. Are you ready?

Geoff 2:08
I’m ready.

Alyssa Patmos 2:08
Okay. I love this one. We ended – I don’t think we did. Oh, do we get through this one? No, I don’t think we did. But this is actually my favorite one on the list. This is like the last one that we’ve seen. So after this, I have no idea what’s coming. This one though, is: “What other people think of you is none of your business.”

Geoff 2:29
Yes. And the way that’s written is so great.

Alyssa Patmos 2:33
Why – do you think?

Geoff 2:35
Because it’s kind of shock- like, I almost have to reread it for me like I’m expecting something else. It’s not what I’m expecting. And it makes me really think. And it takes you further than don’t worry about what other people think of you. It goes to an extreme of it’s none of your business as in like to do not not only you know, hear it and don’t care. It’s like it’s none of your business. Don’t even go there from the start, like live your life. Don’t worry about what other people think. But taking even that, that extra step.

Alyssa Patmos 3:13
The thing I like about it is when people say you know, like don’t worry about what other people think it’s very much like okay, well, what am I supposed to do instead? Or how do you not do that? It can be a very ambiguous thing to say because then you’re left figuring out like, okay, great, but like, how? And so I love this one because it’s more instructive. Like it sort of gives the answer how because it’s very definitive in you know, what other people think is none of your business so you don’t even think about it in the first place. Exactly. Yeah. Which I love.

Geoff 3:50
Like, like train yourself to not even think about it in the first place like hey, that’s that’s none of my business. I’m over here I’m living my life, but I judge what I do and that’s enough.

Alyssa Patmos 4:03
Yeah. The next one, 30: “Time heals almost everything. Give time time.” I I understand what this one is trying to say we talk about you know, a lot of people say time heals all wounds. And I just don’t agree. Time is beneficial. You know, things need space at times. But time alone for me doesn’t heal things. Awareness like holding awareness holding the space for something across a period of time can help heal wounds. It doesn’t need to be this like oil powered effort of intention all the time. But I’m not sure that time itself or time alone, um, heals everything. In fact, I don’t, I don’t think it does.

Geoff 4:55
Right. I’m glad she wrote this the way she did and I we’ve talked about this like we didn’t read this but we Talking about so that other saying, No, it doesn’t. Yeah, I used to think it did. This is another one of my growth areas of like give give things time times heal heals all wounds and it does heal many wounds and a lot of wounds we need to just give time to and a lot of physical wounds you can apply that to and some emotional wounds. But I’ve definitely evolved to a point of knowing that the wounds that we repress don’t heal without potential. And so it isn’t a matter of just give it time. If we never do the healing, if we never shine a light on them, and apply something to heal. Wounds can stick with us forever.

Alyssa Patmos 5:45
Yes, I agree. And it’s like airing out, airing out a cut that you get is not just giving that time even either you know your body is going through a bunch of active process that we’re not consciously aware of, or know exactly the fine tunings of it, unless you’re a doctor, then you might, but even that isn’t just Oh, yeah, give it time. And it will he’ll know like your body is going through something active inflammation is a sign that your body knows something is there and it’s sending resources there.

Geoff 6:19
Yeah, well, I had, you’re talking about physical, yeah, ailments.

Alyssa Patmos 6:23
Your knee –

Geoff 6:23
But I’ve had knee surgery on both knees. And the first one, I did what I thought was right, and it took longer to heal and it atrophied more like I, I didn’t use it. I didn’t apply as much healing activity as I did the second one, which killed more quickly. So I think that applies. And, you know, if we repress something or we try to ignore it, we don’t do what needs to be done to actively heal it. It can last a lot longer.

Alyssa Patmos 6:52
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so 31: However good or bad a situation is, it will change.” I agree with this. I someone recently, this has been said in many different ways. But I think, um, I don’t remember who I saw this from in a conversation recently. But they were talking about how change is inevitable. Which Yes, I agree with across the board. Transformation, though, is a choice. And I always like that, because change is happening moment by moment. We can’t control it, it’s inevitable, it’s gonna happen. What we choose to do about that is a very, it’s a very different thing and opens up a lot of potential for liberation and freedom. But in general, yeah, like I said, it’s something is always going to change.

Geoff 7:45
Yeah. And this ties in the one above, I think, in some sense, like, especially if we’re in a bad situation, or something seems so negative, we can lose perspective and lose knowledge of the fact that, hey, it’s not always gonna be this way, it’s always gonna be that bad. And likewise, it’s not always going to be that good. In what I do for a living, I can have pretty extremes I can have runs of doing really, really well with my predictions and really, really poor and what I’ve had to learn over time, it’s just like, hey, neither of those is going to stick around forever. Don’t get too high. Don’t get too low. Things will change.

Alyssa Patmos 8:23
Yes, yes. Okay. 32: “Don’t take yourself so seriously, no one else does.” [Both laugh] Love it. For those of you tuning in, Geoff just turned himself into a moose and stuck out his tongue.

Geoff 8:41
Mhmm [affirmative], it was cute.

Alyssa Patmos 8:42
Just cute incentives of watching it on YouTube. And don’t take yourself so seriously, no one else does. This one is hard, for me has been harder for me to learn throughout the course of my life. I used to get so embarrassed, like, I would turn into a stage five bitch if I got embarrassed, which is not great. But you know, I had to learn through it. And part of it was because I took myself seriously not in the way of like, thinking on this shit but more so like, trying to maintain appearances or keep keep things perfect not wanting to disappoint people like I don’t want to feel embarrassed because that means I’m probably being rejected in some sort. And so all of that like led to this seriousness, which then if if it gets triggered, it’s like a freakin exploding instead of like, you know, just something smaller. So I eventually got over that by forcing myself to do karaoke in a very well known karaoke bar in Austin, which is very fun. And that was a true moment of not taking myself so seriously and it was very liberating.

Geoff 9:55
It is liberating and we lose touch and society tells us and our parents tell us like Be more serious grow up act like an adult. And to the extent we don’t feel like we’re being taken seriously, as a child, or even as an adult, we’re going to do this more, we’re gonna seek to find ways to be taken more seriously. But is that like, what to what am I? That’s why I love comedians, like I am jealous of their jobs, they get to, like, tell jokes for a living and just laugh and make fun of themselves and others. And what a great place to be. And there’s times that we do that, right. I’m in that space. And I love myself more when I’m when I’m not taking myself so seriously.

Alyssa Patmos 10:34
Yeah, and we talk about this, like, whenever you’re uncovering stuff, or you know, just working with human awareness and human behavior, like we’re funny creatures, where you just do weird shit. And we’re not always sure why, like, no one knows, there’s no answer to, to why everything is the way it is, at least that we know of right now. So in that sense, you know that there’s like this surface level humor of poking fun with someone or, you know, laughing at an experience. But then there’s this deeper level of humor that I think carries a lot of lightness and can be the antidote to taking yourself too seriously, which is to accept your humanity, and all that comes with it. And to know like, yeah, shame is part of the human experience. Guilt is part of the human experience, sadness, joy, the whole spectrum. And when we can embrace and allow ourselves to actually be more human, I think we can laugh at ourselves more, and not take ourselves. So damn seriously.

Geoff 11:42
Yeah. And perfectionism is the enemy of this, if you have that plan for listening to that part of ourselves, we, we stumble and fall, we say something stupid, and we feel like we have to defend it. And we feel like we have to avoid looking that way. And when we’re in our healthier place, I think we kind of laugh. Wow, that was stupid.

Alyssa Patmos 12:02
Yeah. And I like the point you made about kids as well, because so many times adults, like, get in their stuff, and they’re busy. And they have responsibility in the demand of the world, like all these things that appear to be this pressure, because they’re taking themselves too seriously. And then a kid comes around in their lighthearted way. And you know, so many times unintentionally, we can shut that down. And, and it’s not to say that one moment changes everything for a kid, it’s a sequence, but those moments become become evidence of, oh, like, I better not do that, like I talked about trapped joy. Like, in a lot of ways. Joy has been a harder emotion for me to express and you’ve experienced this with me. Joy has been a harder emotion for me to express than sadness at times or than frustration. And I don’t know exactly where that comes from. I have guesses. I don’t need to know particularly, but, but in that, I think it’s these moments where we’re taught to value, you know, the seriousness and the practicality. And not always to like pause and just be able to be in the moment with our joy.

Geoff 13:21
Yes. And childrearing like a lifetime of hearing like, you know, “Hey, stop screwing around. Grow up, act like an adult.” These are literally words that come out of yes, all parents mouths. And it’s like, we don’t allow them to be children long enough. And there’s this fear of like, Oh, they’re not going to grow up enough to be proper, they’re not gonna, they’re gonna be a screw up. But as kids they’re supposed to be, and even to some extent later in life, like we’ve got to have that play inside of us. So we need to be careful about what message we’re sending to our kids, and how much of that is for us and our own comfort and anxiety, and what it’s doing to them in general. I think we tell kids too much to stop being a kid.

Alyssa Patmos 14:07
I would agree. But I also think it’s because we don’t let ourselves be kids, which it comes back to this around. Don’t take yourself so seriously. It’s such a gift to kids when we’re not operating out of our fear all the time. Alright, so 33: I think this is something that kids are great at. And this has numerous connotations, so I’m curious what you’re going to think of it, um 33 is, “Believe in miracles.”

Geoff 14:35
Makes me think of the 1980 Olympic hockey team, which may mean nothing to you. That’s what comes to mind for me, but believe in miracles – there’s a lot wrapped up in that. For me, there’s a religious undertone, which of course I have some aversion to. But the idea of amazing things happening and things we couldn’t believe would be possible. Of course course absolutely, that happens. And there’s some balance here to me there’s, there’s a belief or a need for miracles that that some people can hang on to and take anything to either extreme and it can be damaging. And if we’re living our life waiting for a miracle, and needing that, do you see? Successful yes not to take that that’s probably not super healthy. But having a healthy belief and great things happening, and maybe something amazing that I can’t even imagine is going to happen, or the best thing in the world that this is all going to come together. But believing in that in some way, can help those create room for those things to happen.

Alyssa Patmos 15:43
Yeah, I think, to what you were saying, if if we’re using as believing in miracles as an excuse not to take responsibility for something or like to move forward and just waiting for everything that happened, I don’t love it at that extreme. I don’t have as much of a problem with the word miracles. But I think for me, I would change this to believe in magic. Magic is the word that resonates with me more. And I’m the sparkle emoji, you know, like the three little sparkles. That is my favorite emoji, I use it all the time. And so for me, that resonates a little bit more. And to me, that just means, you know, being able to be open to the unseen. And I’m a huge believer in that. Because if you’ve even looked at, you know, how much technology has evolved over the past 100 years, the things that we have now would look like magic to people from 100 years ago. And we just don’t know, we don’t know, the capacity of what is possible, or what new discovery we’re going to have that totally changes the way we think about things. And so for me being open to possibility in any form and being able to embrace things that we can’t see. And trust in Trust in that is really powerful. And it’s like, it’s like so, a week and a half ago, we were on a plane back from Vegas, from the Super Bowl. And well, no, actually, yeah, we were in Vegas. And we rarely fly where there’s a stop in between, but for some reason, we ended up having a layover in LA. And as we were landing there, I had had this random thought I was like, Oh, I didn’t know we were going to be in LA, it kind of would have been fun to be able to stay here for a night, I haven’t spent a bunch of time there. And turns out he had the same thought which I had no idea and neither of us expressed it. So we get off the plane, even though we’re supposed to turn right back around and get on that exact same plane at that same gate 20 minutes from then. And so we get off the plane, and the terminal is insanely busy, because that’s where the Superbowl was, and they overbooked the flight. And all of a sudden they’re asking for volunteers, if you want to fly out later date later that day or the next day. And we both kind of looked at each other. And we were like, Sure. And then it comes out that like both of us had had this thought about staying in LA. And and they’re offering not just like $300 vouchers, they were offering $1,200 vouchers to give up our seat and to fly back. So we made off not having to gamble at all in Vegas with $2,400 for for a trip. And it’s those sorts of things like where it’s just like believe in the magic. Like I wasn’t expecting that to happen. I didn’t need it to happen. But it’s great.

Geoff 18:45
Yes, yes. I’m not sure that’s a miracle but your reframe of magic, yes. And being open to like good things happening and unexpected, positive things. And I totally agree with that. And somehow I feel like we manifested that in some way shape or –

Alyssa Patmos 19:02
And miracles can be more extreme, like miracles can be you know, like believe in. I think a lot of people use the term miracle in terms of like spontaneous healing. And I think there’s a lot of nuance to that. But I’m a fan of believing in magic and miracles because why the hell not? Because we can get help. Why not? Okay. All right. I think Regina was religious. Um, 34: “God loves you because of who God is not because of anything you did or didn’t do.” So for me, I’m going to read this like in terms of the universe, or like universal energy like nature, I can also view this sort of as like, God is nature to me, not in the traditional sense. So however you want to think of God Regina is talking about God loves you because of who God is not because of anything you did or didn’t do. So, for you.

Geoff 19:58
Well, I read that as like I love myself because of who I am or the universe, like you’re saying, like, I am worthy of love because of who I am human, not because of what I do. And so again, yes, we can reframe this, for those that believe in, in religion and God, great. Keep it as is. But however you want to word this, there’s there’s a lot of wisdom. Yeah. And this is something you’ve personally struggled with quite a bit. This distinction of like, Where does my worth lie?

Alyssa Patmos 20:29
Yeah, it is it for me, it does come down to a question of where our worth is. And the world that we live in, especially in Western society, places so much of our work on what we do instead of who we are. If you think about going to a gathering it one of the first questions out of people’s mouths usually is like, Oh, hi, what do you do? And it’s like, okay, I can tell you what I do, which is interesting. But that’s not like the core of my being. That’s not who I am. That’s one of the reasons why on this show, I don’t read official bios, and I have people introduce themselves. And it’s not always about their work. It’s about their experience and things that they’ve learned and making things mentioned was more about who we are as people.

Geoff 21:16
Well, I think our upbringing and back to our parents, like that plays a huge role in this for sure how we raise our kids and what messages we send, and what do we reward them for?

Alyssa Patmos 21:27
I got rewarded for straight A’s. I got dinner out with my grandparents. And have you ever been to Sweet Tomatoes? Yes. Okay, so my grandparents, every time I got an A, I love my grandparents, they’re great people. And every time I got an A, or a report card of all A’s, they would take my brother and I to Sweet Tomatoes. But the best part about Sweet Tomatoes, and this is terrible, was they had a soft serve ice cream machine. So after you eat the delicious bread at the buffet, which I can no longer and would no longer eat, and go around and get all the other things, this officer ice cream machine was there, and you they would have these mini combs. And my brother and I would compete to who could eat the most. So back to the point of our parents or grandparents people we we who are around us raising us, um, you know, foster what we value in a lot of ways and and if they value us for our accomplishments over our imagination, or like just who we are in the world and how we show up it shapes us.

Geoff 22:31
And it’s not that they do like honestly, like I think back to my parenting, and I awarded money for A’s and this and that. And some of that is probably not healthy in that like, my anxiety is reduced or my pride is boosted if my kids are getting great grades, right or accomplishing something on the on the sports field. And there’s some real unhealthiness potentially, in that in terms of how it makes me feel, and I’m using them for that purpose. And I’m manipulating them in terms of incentivizing them for that purpose. There’s something unhealthy, but I also know like I did, and do love my kids for who they are. And I communicated that as well. I think we just need to be careful when you think about the impact. And even if we truly love them for who they are. Are they picking up on that because of how we communicate with them and how often we talk about how great it is that they accomplished something?

Alyssa Patmos 23:26
Well, you know, I’ve worked with one of your sons, and had to have this conversation with him. So even though you know, you might have the best intention, and our parents have the best intention as parents, it doesn’t mean that that’s what this young little thing in front of you is perceiving. And so it takes it takes conscious effort on on both on both parts. So I love how you reframe this to to being something about you because we can we can make a choice devalue ourselves for who we are to. And that changes how we communicate in the world. I think I think anytime we give our power to some other authority outside of ourselves, we risk losing a connection to ourselves.

Geoff 24:13
I think I think we’ve risked everything like like, in terms of we talk a lot about healing and dealing with past things like mostly, at least for me, in my experience, it comes down to one core thing like do you love yourself? Do you unconditionally love yourself? And if you do it kind of almost everything else takes care of itself because you aren’t needing something from someone else to feel good or feel positive or feel loved or lovable. So –

Alyssa Patmos 24:42
We still, we have to add nuance here because there’s, you still need love you still need connection with other people. That is a very human thing.

Geoff 24:50
Yes, yes. I’m like, good point. And I will clarify. I’m not saying we are just solo beings and we can give everything we need to ourselves without others like I fully We believe we need other humans. But when things go wrong when things go south, when our partner breaks up with us when, when someone’s mad at us, how do we react to that? And if we’re coming from a place of self love and self acceptance, that’s much easier to take and get through that difficult period than it is if we if we question how much we love ourselves, or how lovable we are internally, the way there’s difficult times that happen and things we have to get through and how difficult that is, I think, is largely driven by that piece.

Alyssa Patmos 25:34
I agree. Yeah, I’m not yes. I wouldn’t argue with that. 35. Okay. “Don’t audit life, show up and make the most of it now.” Don’t audit life –

Geoff 25:49
What do you think that means?

Alyssa Patmos 25:50
I think that means, I’m not sure. I’m clear. You know, like, I used to brand on it. So I’m trying to think of like, you go through and you like, take an audit event really taking –

Geoff 25:58
Where am I? Like, how, where am I relative to where it should be at this age relative to my peers? Am I as pretty as that person? Am I more successful than these people? Is that what they’re getting at?

Alyssa Patmos 26:11
I have no idea. I’m going to interpret it as I’m not sure what this one is. But I like the message of presence.

Geoff 26:18
Yes. Well, it is what we’re talking about. Yeah. comparing yourself to others, wishing you were at some other point that you’re not, that is taking you out of presence. It’s either ruminating about the past, like I haven’t done enough, or it’s worrying about the future, like I need to catch up or whatever my life isn’t where it should be. Versus like being present. Showing up being happy in the moment you’re in.

Alyssa Patmos 26:44
Yeah, yeah. I’m not sure I would keep that one in my list. I think I would change it some because that one doesn’t inherently make sense to me. If this one inherently makes sense to you, please comment because I want to know, I want to know what it means to you. If this one like is like, Oh, I know exactly what that is. Or you have a strong opinion about what it is. I would love to know, because I don’t get this by entirely. Okay. 36 Growing old beats the alternative dying? Yeah.

Geoff 27:14
That’s like the chocolate one. Hell yes.

Alyssa Patmos 27:17
Yeah, I was really I was, I think there’s something really beautiful about getting older, and I don’t think getting older always has to mean getting weaker, which is what I think a lot of people interpret it as think, again, you know, back to one with change, like, all things are going to change. And the more we can be present and allow that to happen. Like it doesn’t have to it doesn’t have to take anything away. You know, there. There are some –

Geoff 27:49
Well, we have a culture that values youth and undervalues old age. And, and a lot of people understand that that’s misplaced. And, and certainly there are some nice things about our younger years, primarily physically, but in terms of the things that really matter, emotional stability, and intelligence and knowledge and wisdom. And, and honestly, even happiness, like studies show people in their 60s are the happiest, they’re happier than they were in their 50s and 40s, and 30s, and so forth. So there’s things to gain as we get older, and there’s things that get better. And so the concept of like getting old is bad, is something that I wish we could reframe. And –

Alyssa Patmos 28:39
I think I think a lot of times we have a, we don’t value older people as much because the pace is different. And we live in a very fast paced world that prioritizes how productive you can be and how quickly you can move. And one of the realities of getting older is like some things do slow down. It doesn’t mean everything has to pass to get slow it I don’t believe it means that like you’re gonna lose your memory when you get older or anything like that. But in general, the pace of life becomes different in many ways. And I don’t think that we always teach younger people how to be present with older people and value their pace.

Geoff 29:31
Yes, because there’s somewhat sometimes you can reframe the faster pace is frantic and there’s something calmly as we get older and something where we can take a deep breath more and be more comfort with life’s ups and downs. And also, you know, I think, you know, that I think this way, but like a lot of people take for granted what I believe to be myths about getting older, like no, I’m going to feel worse. I’m going to be Fat, I’m going to not want to move, right? I’m going to be tired all the time, I’m going to lose my, my mental acuity, right? These are these are myths that are perpetuated so much that people tend to believe them. But like, what if you could get older and still feel vibrant and have lots of energy and have sharp, sharp wit? What if, and those things are possible if we’re willing to, to understand what needs to be done to have those things. So in some ways, like my view of it as being older than most of my friends being older than you. But having been through the decades of, obviously, young 20s 30s 40s 50s, or starting my 50s does get better, it does get better with age and, and even along some of the winds that, that people just assume it can’t be as good. Like, physically, I’ve, I’m in physically better shape than I’ve ever been in my life. So it doesn’t know it’s not gonna hold forever. And as I move into 60s and 70s, and 80s, and 90s –

Alyssa Patmos 31:02
60s! You can look awesome, do you know, how old is George Clooney? George Clooney is way older than you. I’m pretty sure he’s in his 60s. 60 is young! Yeah,

Geoff 31:11
Yeah, I’m saying still, but but what I’m saying is, I’m not going to always be able to claim that I’m in the best shape of my life –

Alyssa Patmos 31:17
Right, yes!

Geoff 31:18
Even though I can claim that now. And I’m way better shape than I was in my 30s. So that’s not gonna hold forever, but it doesn’t have to be this drastic decline. It doesn’t even have to be a decline as early as people think it does.

Alyssa Patmos 31:30
Yeah, I agree. And I mean, you know, my, my grandpa is in his mid 80s. And he is so sharp. And so for him, you know, certain things with with getting around might be slower, but his mind is incredibly sharp, because that’s he puts his attention there. And it’s, I think it’s so cute. Like my, my 87 year old grandpa goes to the gym. And I think it’s great. And he has like, a very strong shoe game that I think Kyle would be proud of. So, so there, it still depends on where your attention goes. And there’s a there’s a huge difference between that grandpa and, and my other Grandpa, you know, who lived a more sedentary lifestyle. And my mom and I talked about this a lot like she saw, you know, two lazy boys in the living room for for a large portion of her adult life. And so she, you know, is my mom is has more of social life than, you know, I think I ever have. She loves to dance. And so she’s out dancing all the time. And then when I was a competitive ballroom dancer in high school there, I remember at one competition, there was a 90 year old woman in this sexy Latin dress all in her Swarovski crystals. Her high heeled dance shoes competing. And like for my mom and I, that is just like movement, there’s so much power in movement and keeping energy moving through your so I like that. I like 36 like “Growing old beats the alternative, dying young”, but for me, I would shift it around something with movement, I would make it more I don’t know.

Geoff 33:14
What’s crystallized for me, as we’re having this discussion about this, my initial reaction to this was like, Duh, like, resistance to trauma is futile, though. Move on. Yeah, but but the reason like, we don’t like we don’t agree with the premise that’s implied here. The premise that’s implied here is the growing all this back. And so when someone says this, like some, it’s when someone’s complaining about, oh, God, I’m getting so old, and I can’t move like I used to. And then someone replies, Well, hey, it’s better than the alternative. Right? Haha. That’s the implication here is that growing old is bad. And and if we don’t believe in that we can, it doesn’t necessarily make a lot of sense.

Alyssa Patmos 33:54
Right? I am with you. Yes, sorry. I was looking at the next one, which was not very present of me. But looking –

Geoff 34:05
You are navigating us here andyou are leading this conversation.

Alyssa Patmos 34:08
I don’t normally do that. But this can’t be a three part episode. It’s got to be a two part episode. So I was looking at the next one. And 37 is: “Your children get only one childhood.” And we read a previous one last week, which was and this is what I was looking at, um 19″ “It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else”. And so 19 to me is much more about like our self agency and our choice regardless of what happens to us as kids. And I think this one is more of a message to parents around like where are you spending your time?

Geoff 34:43
This is what we’ve been talking about. Yeah, for this podcast, like asking them to grow up too quick or putting our anxiety on them, asking them to control our fears and deal with our issues and our triggers and things we need healing with. We put so much on our kids and In some ways we’ve robbed them of their –

Alyssa Patmos 35:02
And needing them to be more than where they are in the moment. Yeah,

Geoff 35:07
Instead of meeting them where they are fully accepting where they are, and letting them be kids and letting them have a childhood. Yes, because they have so many years to be an adult, but we, yeah, for our benefit in a lot of cases, or we think it’s in their best interest. But that’s part of like, what we can open minds to, like, why is it better to have your kid grew up so quick, they’re gonna have they’re gonna be an adult.

Alyssa Patmos 35:33
Well, and the power of a kids’ imagination is one of the most magical forces on the planet, like creativity is such a connection to our life force and a kid, because they are not worried about all these other things yet, is so connected to their creativity. And so their essence like, like, I would love if more parents wrote down some of the creative things, or creative, creative things their kid said, or creative things that they did. So that as adults, they could look back at it later, because there’s such a purity there. And the power of imagination that you get will come in and just start telling you a story about a purple dragon, and now it’s flying over and, and who knows where that story is gonna go. But it’s just like, they have this vivid picture of it. And as adults, there’s, you know, we even get so serious in the sense of our reading choices. Most people I know read nonfiction books, and when I first met you, like you hadn’t read a fiction book in years.

Geoff 36:33
I don’t think there’s that long. But I read nine fiction, nonfiction for every fiction.

Alyssa Patmos 36:40
And so generally, we place this emphasis on knowledge and like learning new things in a very intellectual way. But the power of imagination is that like, it can take one story to help you see something in a new way, at times. And I think kids just master that in a different way. If you look at how we teach kids, it’s through storybooks so many times as kids are developing. That’s what that’s how they’re making connections. And that’s what they’re looking forward to. And we lose a piece of that as adults, but I think it’s really powerful. So, yeah, your children only get one childhood. I think I would also add some stuff to this list in general about imagination and creativity, because I haven’t seen it yet. And, you know, I’ll talk about it all day long. Yes. I’m okay. 38: “All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.” I’m gonna jump in here first, because I love how this one’s written. Because so many times people will say, you know, all that matters is that you were loved. But this one is saying all that truly matters in the end is that you have which again, reclaimed your power. And if you can experience and give love that, I think that is that, to me is way more centered on like, your agency in life and how you shape and create your life in so many ways. And there’s nothing better than being able to, to give love to yourself, but and then the ripple effects of then being able to give love to other people.

Geoff 38:19
Right? There’s so much in this one is the gift, the biggest gift we can give is this. It’s not money, it’s not knowledge to the world. It’s it’s not a contribution of something we did or thought of or said it’s the love we gave to others. So there’s that. But I also resonate with you on the agency part of it like that’s the beauty of this, because this almost sounds like you know, like a universal truth, right? And the way my mind works, I’m very analytical and scientific. And like, this is literally what I did within milliseconds, like, oh, universal truth. Well, that’s true. Let’s test it does it work in all sort of scenarios, because if it doesn’t, if it fails somewhere, then it can’t be a universal truth. And what I love about this, and obviously, I haven’t thought tons about it. But in the few seconds, I did like that we have full control over that. So Nelson Mandela being locked up, can give love to his guards, and he can accomplish this. Someone that just hasn’t found someone to love them. You know, and theoretically, that person gets through life and never does have someone that truly loves them. As sad as that might be like, this still works so –

Alyssa Patmos 39:30
Well, and it’s not just it’s not just romantic relationships. We can share love in many different ways. Like I’m gonna go back to creativity. operating from like your core of creativity is a way of showing love and transmitting things into the world. You know, like artists pour themselves in pouring love into songs that then we embrace and whatnot. So I don’t think it –

Geoff 39:52
No, it doesn’t have to be, it’s any definition. But it’s we every single human being has the opportunity to do that. Which, at least theoretically, in my mind makes it like, that might be a universal truth.

Alyssa Patmos 40:05
Yeah. I struggle with the words “universal truth” –

Geoff 40:10
Because you don’t believe there is one truth.

Alyssa Patmos 40:12
I don’t believe there’s one truth and I just I believe that I’m, I’m constantly seeking for wisdom. I’m constantly seeking truths but to think that there is like, The Truth, I struggle with that or, or –

Geoff 40:29
I resonate with that. I think there’s nuance to that. And there’s certain things where that applies.

Alyssa Patmos 40:34
But I believe in like, universal laws, I believe in like this, this thing of like, okay, yeah, this is like, how it goes, we can see the patterns, it generally applies. And then I’m always open to things changing –

Geoff 40:45
And not a universe not not, right. Like if this is one of several or one of many, in my mind, that kind of works like that. Another being, you know, as a human being, we have a birthright to be loved, and to be worthy of love as a human being like, I believe that to also be at this moment, I made justice, but I believe that to be a universal truth.

Alyssa Patmos 41:07
Yeah. Okay. 39: “Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.”

Geoff 41:17
This is why I have to walk you?

Alyssa Patmos 41:20
Yes, we have this joke, where if I haven’t been walked, if I haven’t gone on a walk or gotten fresh air by three o’clock, I get grumpy. So there’s this joke that I have to be walked. Which is true. And I can also walk myself, thank you very much. Um, but yeah, getting outside. I cannot. But there is something that like, kills my soul when I see huge residential buildings with windows that don’t open. Because being in a box all day long with no fresh air like I, I, I can’t it just hurts my soul. I love being outside. I love fresh air. I love the sounds of nature, even if they’re annoying, even if they’re annoying at time, like having that cut off would slowly kill me.

Geoff 42:09
Yeah, I love it when we can have our patio doors open. Yeah. And I don’t know, just even hearing the sirens go by or something. It’s something outside. It’s noise. I’m not as extreme as you I can go days without being outside it. There’s a point I reach but it’s much later than you. Yeah, like if it’s three o’clock every day. It’s like it’s right now or it’s one degree. I’m okay. I don’t need to be outside today. But there is a point where I need to do that. And what this made me think of is how we met.

Alyssa Patmos 42:39
Yeah. Are you sharing that?

Geoff 42:42
Are we going through that whole story?

Alyssa Patmos 42:44
No, not the whole.

Geoff 42:45
We met in a park. We met outside and we were walking and we view each other as miracles and something we each kind of manifested that seemed impossible on paper, but that we wrote down and asked that we were going to have delivered to us. And then we ran across each other outside walking in the park.

Alyssa Patmos 43:02
Yes. And if you’ve ever heard me talk about that story before the even bigger thing is we kind of screwed it up at first because we walked past each other we smiled walk past neither of us said anything. I went to the store and then on the way back he was still in the park. And then we had like round two of that.

Geoff 43:18
Yes.

Alyssa Patmos 43:18
To be able to happen same day within like 40 minutes.

Geoff 43:21
Yes. Well, the universe was Guess what? No, no, no.

Alyssa Patmos 43:26
Yes. So So yeah, getting outside. I so much opens up for me when I’m outside. And this does not mean you have to be like all wanting to hike all the time.

Geoff 43:39
Balls. No, no, it’s whatever it means to you right now. And of course, if you love hiking, great good for you. I don’t want to do it. But I’ll go throw a frisbee or I’ll play basketball or I’ll walk –

Alyssa Patmos 43:50
I will like go outside today. So it’s like one degree here right now and snowing. But I went outside and grilled lunch and that, for me, like it doesn’t need to be extensive all the time. It’s just like, okay, connection with nature. Here we go. And our house we have a bunch of plants which brings outdoors indoor for me, which I love. Okay, get outside every day. 40: “If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.” Oh, I have never heard anyone say anything like this before.

Geoff 44:28
No, I’m not. I’m not initially Sure.

Alyssa Patmos 44:32
Okay, I’m gonna read it again. I’m gonna read it again. “If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.” The the first thing that comes up for me is around again. Everyone has their own struggles. Everyone has their own journey that are meant for them and and the other one of the other episodes that we’ve done with Geoff or that I’ve done with Geoff is it’s called It was called an unconventional q&a, we answered the question, should it be this hard? And I called it very intentionally a behind closed doors episode. Because I think very often we don’t know what’s going on behind someone’s closed doors, they, they might have it all freakin together on the outside. But internally, it’s a mess or something you know at home is mess. And so for me, it’s the perspective on that I’m not sure about if we saw everyone else’s we’d grab bars back. I’m not, I’m not, that hasn’t –

Geoff 45:33
Been sure about that. I do agree. Part of the message here is that, like, if we saw problems everyone had, we might have, we might realize like ours are so bad, or they were not the only one like this assumption, like, oh, let’s throw them all in. And mine are gonna be worse than yours and more than yours, and so I’m gladly going to take yours because mine have got to be worse. Well, the reality is, everyone’s got their shit that they’re dealing with. And it’s as heavy as ours is. And in some cases, heavier, some cases lighter, but like, on average, we’re not we’re not struggling more than the next person, although it appears that way, certainly, on social media. So yeah, I think a big part of this message is like, if we saw what everyone else is dealing with, we we’d like say, like, oh, okay, I got mine. And I’m okay with that.

Alyssa Patmos 46:25
Yeah, I think, you know, the biggest piece for me here is, is not the second half, like the weed grab bars back, it’s like this, this first part, and it’s part of the reason why this show exists. So you know, if we all throw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we might be way more compassionate human beings, because we would see that everyone else is going through, you know, sometimes similar things, or they’re going through something. And I think there’s so much pressure of perfectionism, or, you know, especially on Instagram, like, you know, Instagram versus reality, um, and, and there’s so much power in knowing one that you’re not alone. But to knowing that your problem isn’t the most unique thing about you, how you overcome it, what you do with it, what you create in your life, despite the problems, those, to me, are the most interesting things, how you perceive it, if we throw everyone’s crap in a pile, if we do everyone’s problems in a pile, we would probably see that we’re more similar than different. And I think that would hold a lot of power.

Geoff 47:36
Yeah, and I do think just to note, again, on what you said, about or you alluded to, are our problems are ours uniquely. And we have them for a reason we are pressing for completion of things. And so the conflicts that I have, the people I choose that bringing those conflicts to the forefront for me, are there for a reason. And so this, this concept of like we would choose ours back is almost a higher level like it, our higher self is choosing the complex we have at our higher self is choosing the pain we’re going through, because we need it, we need it to complete something and to press the things that are pressing for completion for us. And if we if we that’s why we repeat patterns to kind of find the same people that bring up the same issue so that like this part at the end, where initially I’m like, I’m not sure about that piece of it. Like maybe that’s where the wisdom is in this that we pick our battles because we need them –

Alyssa Patmos 48:38
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m also just like having this moment because you when we met, you were already on wanting you. So you know, we all have these four dimensions, we all have material needs and physical needs. We all have an emotional world, we all have a mental world. And we all have a spiritual world and that can mean different things for different people at different times. And so for me, spirituality opened up in a different way once I left religion when I was like in early college or like high school for you, it’s been a it’s been a slightly different journey. And you are kind of on like, the this like interested in spirituality vibe, like when we first met, you’ve been doing some stuff, but now like, when I hear to talk, I’m like, Oh, like this has really come a long way. And also it’s funny when I hear like specific things I say like mirrored back to me but now they’re like, you’ve integrated them so much that it like it’s natural for you but I’m like so fun. And it’s, it’s it’s it’s also what I like about having the show like I’ve said this before, but there are some episodes where I’m having a conversation. And it’s it’s something that like I needed to hear and it just come Thumbs up that way, which isn’t exactly what was happening just now. But there’s so much power in in conversation for that reason. Okay, 41 nd is a waste of time you already have all you need. Um, I think I have mixed thoughts on this. So you already have all you need. I think there’s something about, you know, we live in a world where it’s like, keep up with Joneses. And many times, we just as you build more, you get more money, like you develop more needs, and they’re not needs that you had when you had less money. And so we sometimes like build this, where we keep having to have more and more and more. And so that I’m on board with that, like, yeah, and a lot of times we have, we have what we need, we don’t need this constant like consumption. viewpoint. Envy, is interesting to me, envy is generally like regarded as a terrible emotion and something you don’t want to partake in. I do think envy can be a signifier and be it can be a signal just like any other emotion or, you know, pattern, where it’s like, if you choose to get curious about it, it’s trying to show you something –

Geoff 51:22
It can be a catalyst, I, I want to look up the definition of it if we were still sitting at the bar. Because there’s, there’s different words around this. And there’s different connotations, and I do believe envy has something attached to the definition that is inherently unhealthy. But wanting something, desiring something that you don’t have is not necessarily a bad thing.

Alyssa Patmos 51:44
Right. And I think there’s sort of envy is like envy is there’s jealousy, there’s envy, and then desire is totally separate for me. And B, to me is like being envious, like wanting what someone else has. I don’t know if this is the exact definition, but this is what I’m operating off of. And, and yeah, it there are things in there that are not great. But if you’re in a state where you’re experiencing that frequently, then I think it’s signaling something. And if you look into it, you can get to the light on the other side, you can see what the gift is on the other side of it. I don’t think it I don’t think it’s just a complete waste of time. But I get the message here. And kind of one more thing. Okay, so the other thing that you brought up was desire. And I think desire is massively important. I think a lot of times we’re taught to repress our desire, where it’s just like, be grateful for what you have, like, you don’t need anything else. And it’s like, we’re not in control of our desires, they come up, whether we want them to or not, and we either resist them, or we allow them, we let them have a cycle where we play with the idea of having that thing. And then sometimes we follow through on it. And anytime we try to repress or resist desire, I think we get ourselves in trouble. Yeah.

Geoff 53:05
Choose to not pursue it, but to I think we have to allow for it and say, Yeah, I want I want that desiring that. Yeah. And that’s not unhealthy. And maybe I want to pursue it. And maybe I choose not to –

Alyssa Patmos 53:18
Well, and you know, this comes up a lot of times in relationships where people will have a desire, but because their relationship has been one way or because, you know, so many times partners want their person, their partner to be the same as they always were, it’s not always easy for a partner to hear a new desire from someone. And so we can be we can be vicious in that sense of like, of having someone repressed that then rather than, you know, allowing it to have air and then figuring out what to do with it, just because a desire is expressed doesn’t mean that it has to be acted upon.

Geoff 54:00
Correct, and the ability to express our desires with our partner tends to create safety for the other person to have their desires and for us to have ours and and to have the courage to say those when it could be viewed negatively, for whatever reason, that’s super difficult, but I also think, is super required for a really healthy long term relationship. I think the repressing of that and hiding parts of ourselves, is this very slippery downward slope.

Alyssa Patmos 54:28
I agree. Okay, 42: “The best is yet to come.” So it’s like such a phrase that is so used that it’s like borderline cliche, but cliches are around for a reason. And I’m not sure. Like, what is the point of this one?

Geoff 54:49
I don’t, I don’t like it. I don’t like what it implies. So you’re saying like it’s around. It’s around for a reason. It’s cliche. There’s something nice about it. It’s like hey, Things are going to get better and, and even to some extent I was promoting that earlier when I’m talking about like getting older is better, like your 40s are better than your 30s, etc. And there’s something that feels nice and anxiety reducing and safe about that, like, ah, like, I’m just gonna have faith things, things are gonna get better, my life’s gonna get better. It may or may not. But that’s not the like, I think that’s just not even the point. Like the point is live in the moment, and I have what I need now. And that’s, if we need something to get better if this becomes a knee that needed to be get better in the future, that pulls us out of the present.

Alyssa Patmos 55:38
Puts everything in the future where it’s like the best is yet to come like –

Geoff 55:44
The best moment is the moment we’re in – at the mall.

Alyssa Patmos 55:48
Yes, yeah, I generally believe like, I kind of operate with this mentality of like this or something better. Because I don’t really believe that I’m going to go backwards just with how I live my life with how I perceive things like, I don’t see even in, in phases where on paper, to someone’s perspective, it probably looks like I went backwards, whether that be in terms of success, no, like, we don’t always make the same amount every year. Um, if there’s something on paper where it looks like you’ve gone backwards, I never feel like I’ve like gone backwards. I don’t I don’t live like that it’s this or something better. Like, I just trust this, this or something better. And so but it doesn’t, that doesn’t take me out of the present. Because it doesn’t mean I need something better. I’m good with now. And then if now falls apart if change happens, if if I don’t have control over something and a wrenches thrown like I still believe there’s something –

Geoff 56:52
I think that this or something better as it relates to like you working on a situation and maybe wanting change, or maybe being afraid of the current situation changing like that provides some relief of like, well, it’s this or maybe this has to change because something better is around the corner. Like I believe in that. I don’t believe that we can’t go backwards. And I think –

Alyssa Patmos 57:20
No, we can go backwards. I don’t believe I’m going to go backwards. I from how I live and just what I know about myself and how I value growth. And, and learning from things like I just don’t see myself viewing it in that way. Like I don’t know –

Geoff 57:41
I don’t think of it that way. I guess I disagree a little maybe it maybe it’s just the words we’re using. But I think any of us can go backwards in some objective way. Like Like, it’s never just a pure straight up into the right. It’s it’s yeah, that’s not what I’m saying. And sometimes it’s two steps forward, one step back. And in that moment of the one step back, like maybe it is a little worse, but that’s okay. Like it’s part of the process. It’s and so if we view anyway.

Alyssa Patmos 58:11
No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. Because I said even during periods where it looks like I have gone backwards, if it’s still at that moment, this or something better.

Geoff 58:24
You can always say that. Yes. Yeah. But something that’s not better, or this may be around the corner. That depends on control.

Alyssa Patmos 58:34
Yeah, but it depends on if you’re comparing it to the past and what you’re comparing it to. I don’t know, I just like, it’s easy for me to say that. And I it’s like, it’s almost like a trust in life thing. Like –

Geoff 58:45
Yes. And that we share, like, Yeah, I think again, we may not be that far off. But like, whatever happened from my perspective is like, whatever happens, it’s okay. And yeah, I might go left and go right and Michael Ford back. But it’s all part of the process. And and it’s okay, and I don’t need to only be moving forward. I don’t need to only be making more this year than I made last year.

Alyssa Patmos 59:06
But then, that’s you’re talking about material things. And that’s not that’s not what I’m saying. Like I’m acknowledging for that they’re like, it’s the it’s, it’s in every moment, we can choose to evolve or devolve. And so I fully acknowledge like, we can go backwards, but generally with how I live my life, I’m always choosing evolution. And that evolution might mean that I do something stupid, or that I get stuck in a pattern for a while, but like it’s still thinking evolving.

Geoff 59:38
Yes. And does it matter if we talk about the timeframe like if we’re talking longer term, like it’s always forward and part of the going backward or having something a struggle is part of that?

Alyssa Patmos 59:49
Is the struggle going backwards? That’s what I don’t agree with like, I don’t even think like, going backward. Like even you know what I’ve gone through further past year, like the past year, in a lot of ways has been very healing for me, in certain things I’ve, I’ve, you know, things that have come up, I still don’t view it as going backwards.

Geoff 1:00:12
But I understand you’re framing it as like, and you’re viewing it. And I believe that on the larger scale, yes, like we’re moving forward, you’re moving forward. If I think about my personal life, there are times where I feel like I’ve gone backwards slightly. And that’s okay. And in that moment, in that very short slice it looking at it, I’m not going to try to convince myself that I didn’t go backwards there. If I if I widen the lens, that was part of my process to moving forward. And in fact, this thing that happened way later, in which I took a huge forward leap, couldn’t have happened without that backward step way back when so like, the over lens, we’re moving, we’re moving forward.

Alyssa Patmos 1:00:51
I believe in general, the wider lenses better approach to take, I believe, too many people use too much of a tight focal lens. And that is also why we get into conflict in relationships. Because we’re using too tight of a lens, we’re only seeing this much of the picture instead of taking into account this much. So in general, I just believe in the wider lens approach. Yes. Okay. This is a very long tangent. By number 42: “The best is yet to come.” Um, okay, 43. We’re moving on now. 43: “No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.” Some of that, like, God, there’s so much like –

Geoff 1:01:35
Ehhh [Makes alarm blaring noise to signify rejecting this lesson]

I don’t like this one!

Alyssa Patmos 1:01:38
It’s so aggressive language.

Geoff 1:01:40
Well, and it’s so, it’s so like, fucking Tony Robbins, like, just just power through and, and just just being lazy. It’s like, Just do it. And just power through and no matter how you feel, which to me says a really negative message, like ignore your feelings or suppress them, and get up and show up.

Alyssa Patmos 1:02:02
There’s an episode that’s gonna come out in the next few weeks, I don’t know the exact date yet. There’s an episode it’s gonna come out. And I get into this conversation in a slightly battle way, as well, because one person, the person who I was in a conversation with, um, has a very willpower approach, like sometimes we’re too complacent, like we do, like, if we just wallow, if we wallow, you know, we’re not, we’re not doing the hard things. And sometimes it does take hard work, like things are not meant to be effortless. We can’t be babies all the time. So I agree with that. Ha, but I’m with you on this, like we do have to take into account how we’re doing not everything is about willpower all the time. And I don’t think we always know how to balance those, right.

Geoff 1:02:49
And some, I believe, sometimes what is called for what we need most is to not get up. And to not dress up.

Alyssa Patmos 1:02:57
And not, not I wouldn’t choose Get up is not –

Geoff 1:03:00
I’m really thinking about staying in bed like they’re going through a massive healing process, really seeing something that we need to finally face that we may have been suppressing for decades. And we need to fucking stay in bed that day and cry and work through this. Now that I would argue that is part of the process of it’s not being lazy or wallowing. It’s, it’s actually the more courageous thing to do to not press that. But sometimes we need to just like retract and get in a corner and lick our wounds and heal. And it’s part of the process of getting up and showing up for the rest of our life.

Alyssa Patmos 1:03:38
I absolutely agree. I think as with anything, the importance is in the nuance, because I think, you know, there are also times when depression kicks in, and the more that we enable that and the more we allow it, it can be harder and harder to get back to our vibrance and get out of it. And so, as with anything, I think there’s nuance to that message, but with what you’re saying around part of the healing process at times can be allowing yourself a day where you don’t have to do anything, allowing yourself time when you can be away from it, or you can you can be processing in in a way that doesn’t feel productive, I think is important.

Geoff 1:04:19
We’re redefining what’s productive.

Alyssa Patmos 1:04:21
Absolutely.

Geoff 1:04:22
So, to the to this extent, this is read like as like, “Get to your job, you know, go work hard and just put your feelings aside to get there.” I hate it. Yeah, to the extent of its like that it gives if this is redefined as like, even like the getting up and dressing up part is like finally facing this thing that you need to face and having the courage to do that and then I applaud it and and I do recognize too that I come from a place this is always from my perspective, I don’t suffer from depression and I and I do think you know for me like more of the challenge is is to take that day off and and feel and don’t be productive on the job. That’s the harder part for me. So I can like promote, like, oh, we need to do that. For someone that suffers from depression and is struggling every day to get up, there’s something to this of like –

Alyssa Patmos 1:05:16
It’s a a different process. There’s different wisdom in there. And for me, like, I like the “dress up” piece, because on days when I feel my worst or when I am down, and it’s I don’t want to get up or I’ve been struggling with something with OCD, like there is something for me in, in dressing up. Like there’s something about that’s a shortcut to feeling good again, like, if I stick around in sweatpants that I don’t really like, and I don’t feel good about myself, like it perpetuates the thoughts that I’m already going through. And so like, I’m the person who on test day, like would always dress up, I wanted to feel my best I would wear heels, I would wear like a pencil skirt. Like I would dress up for test day because I wanted to feel my best and and I believe in that as a shortcut to get us out of our shit at times. But I am 100% with you. I’m also the type of person where I feel so much guilt if I’m not working on something. Even if it’s not like pretty even if it’s not like urge. I don’t know I got I got a huge struggle with this around like, do we actually have to work nine to five? Because I certainly don’t not with the not with this style of work that I built. It doesn’t doesn’t always require that and yet so many times we feel this pressure that it’s like, okay, yes, you have to do it in this way. And we all just become robots. And I don’t agree with that.

Geoff 1:06:49
And I think we share the aversion, like to the extent that this is the the self help field, the culture of like, hustle, hustle, hustle, show up, work, work all day, you know, seven days a week, you’re not going to get to your goals if you don’t do that it’s only happen if you’re with them. And also the the self help advice of like, positive positivity. Just think like,

Alyssa Patmos 1:07:12
Just, just be positive. Just –

Geoff 1:07:14
Know you can do it, like, just show up. Just know and just like it’s, it’s bullshit. So I felt that when I first heard this, there’s some wisdom in this and there’s some things that make me want to cringe.

Alyssa Patmos 1:07:26
Yes, I’m with you. If you have thoughts on this, please comment. Okay, so 44 is: “Yield.”

Geoff 1:07:36
Hmm. Ooh, I like that one.

Alyssa Patmos 1:07:39
I, Okay, I what, what would you think if it said “pause” instead of “yield”?

Geoff 1:07:44
I think that’s different in my, in my impression, because yield mean something to me, because it’s something personally that like, I’ve had to embrace and I’ve gotten a lot of Okay, so what so for me, is kind of this message of give up the illusion of control. Understand things are the way they are and, and instead of like, my, my natural inclination, my whole life has been to do and control and feel super agency and like, take on responsibility. And I can change this and I can make better and I can, I can affect this. And if it’s something that I really care about, especially with someone else. I’ve spent a lot of time in that mode of like anxiety and stress and trying to change something and feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders. But But putting that on myself and feeling like you can do this and you can suffer your way to affecting something and changing the outcome. And then there’s this other world of ELT of just like, let it go and recognize we don’t have nearly the control. We think we do accept life for what it is. And it’s not bad, and it’s going to work out and it’s going to be okay. And there’s such relief for me in that and it’s something I’ve had to embody embody over the last five, seven years. And I have found a lot of wisdom in that. So that’s what it means to me.

Alyssa Patmos 1:09:17
Yeah, I think there’s, there’s control and then we live in this world, you know, where people want influence. People want power, you know, a lot of times like that, those are the things you’re you’re rewarded for. But there’s a difference between like having authority, like you’re a, you’re a very authoritative person in general with how you live your life. There’s a difference between control and trying to control everything and still maintaining, like, authority like authority over how you do things or like over yourself and, and I think the yield is powerful. They’re someone who’s solely operating out of like needing control may not recognize that you can maintain authority while also yielding. So I like yield yield. The power of the pause is something I talk about all the time. And I think a yield is a temporary pause. And so that’s what resonates with me. In general, when we just react instead of responding, we’re not taking the time for the pause. And in that moment of a pause, whether it’s one second or five minutes or a few days, so much room opens up, and it can be expanded your pauses, like to be longer than what I want at times, especially like if we’re in some sort of conflict. But like, any time, you can pause, even if it’s a second, and just ask yourself a question about what’s going on for the other person or what’s going on internally for you. It opens up the world so much, and there’s so much possibility in there. So the power of the pause, can relate to thing for me. And in that sense, I like it.

Geoff 1:11:00
Can I play this back for you when we’re in the middle of a confrontation?

Alyssa Patmos 1:11:03
Yeah, you can. I embody the power of pause, our pauses, they’re just different time periods at times. But I accept this about you. Do you accept this about me?

Geoff 1:11:15
I do.

Alyssa Patmos 1:11:17
Okay, 45, we have made it to the end.

Geoff 1:11:21
Woohoo!

Alyssa Patmos 1:11:22
“Life isn’t tied with a bow. But it’s still a gift.”

Geoff 1:11:28
It’s not, life isn’t perfect. But it’s still an amazing gift that and – super wise. Yes. Like it, everything isn’t perfect, and it doesn’t look perfect. And it may not even look like a gift. But you know, one of my favorite sayings is what if it’s a gift? It is one of your favorite sayings? Yes, in which case, it’s like something that seems bad or unfortunate, like having to connect through li x. And then having the flight oversold and having to get off the plane when we’re just supposed to get right back on. Like, what if those are gifts and $2,400 later and a nice dinner in LA? It was a gift.

Alyssa Patmos 1:12:10
Yeah. And, and, you know, some of my favorite gifts haven’t been wrapped in a bow. Some of my favorite gifts, you know, come in the form of an experience or a moment that I’ve shared with someone or, or it’s haphazard, like it’s just comes around, and it proves itself as a gift. But it was a very haphazard way of getting there. And I think generally, we need less both, we need to like have less things. But the goal of less things be let’s just have this with a bow on it. Because generally, I think that’s when we get stuck in perfection and all these other things we take ourselves too seriously. Like it doesn’t meet about.

Geoff 1:12:55
Yeah, and look for the gift in the things that are wrapped. Mm hmm. You know, like, that’s the point of this. There’s a lot of gifts that we have presented to us. But if it doesn’t have the bow on it, we don’t see it, we don’t realize it, we don’t view it as a positive and a gift. And so there’s something about appreciation in here.

Alyssa Patmos 1:13:14
Yep. Even in relationships, like sometimes, you know, so many people are like, Oh, the grass is greener on the other side. And like there is something about the grass is greener, where you water it. But the the concept of like looking for the perfect relationship, like this perfect man’s gonna come along, and he’s gonna have a bow and he’s never gonna trigger me. And it’s all going to be great. And he’s going to be exactly who I need him to be at all moments of the day. And it’s like, what, when is there any sense of responsibility, about your influence in the relationship there and in that image, but I think so many people fall into that trap, because it’s half of the messages we see in romantic comedies and any other story about love. When really, I love what you said around like the gift, the look for the gifts and things that aren’t wrapped. And what if you didn’t have to have a bow because if you allow someone else to not have a bow, you’re affording yourself to not have a bow. I think that’s one of the most powerful things that we can do is learn to let ourselves not have to be perfectly wrapped and packaged either because that’s how we get into feeling like we have to fit in this box that can be wrapped up and have a bow around it and presented to someone else and that is a world that is full of pain and not fun to live in. So pop out of the box. I need to be wrapped. Okay, we’ve made it to the end. In this two part episode of the 45 lessons. Regina Brett wrote down when she turned 90. I would love to know which one of these was your favorite, which one jumped out to you ,comment on any of the tangents Geoff and I went on.

Geoff 1:15:00
And which one did she miss? What’s 46?

Alyssa Patmos 1:15:02
Yeah, what else needs to be on here? Geoff and I talked about throughout this some of the ways that we would edit or modify or something we would add in. Um, but yeah, I would love to know what do you think is missing from the list? So, thank you so much for tuning in. This has been another episode of Make It Mentionable and I will catch you next week.

You’ve just finished listening to another episode of Make It Mentionable with me, your host, Alyssa Patmos. If you’re looking for more in between episodes, then sign up for The Peel. It’s my free newsletter that gives tips for how to navigate whatever life dishes and it’s also the place where I share the juiciest of stories. To check it out, head on over to Alyssapatmos.com/thepeel. Thank you so much for tuning in, and I’ll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top