The Loneliness You Keep Avoiding

Life can feel like it’s been chopped into competing categories: church or secular, left or right, friends or enemies, work or rest. We start from that tension and then zoom in on a quieter divide most of us live with every day: the gap between how busy we claim to be and how distracted we actually are. We talk honestly about American hustle culture, why “I’m slammed” can become a badge of worth, and how that mindset quietly devalues leisure, stillness, and even relationships. 

From there, we explore Sabbath rest as something deeper than self-care or a political posture. We trade ideas about what real rest looks like in a screen-saturated world: limiting phones, choosing presence with family, grounding practices like walking barefoot in the yard, and building rhythms that protect mental health. Along the way we name the temptation to turn anything good into a status game and how sanctimony can feel like the coziest blanket in the house. 

Then the conversation turns toward solitude, loneliness, and growth. Being alone isn’t the same as being with yourself, and loneliness shows up when you finally stop running long enough to confront what you already know. We connect that inner confrontation to a spiritual and philosophical “pattern” of transformation: wilderness, temptation, surrender, and the hard work of accepting uncertainty. That lands in midlife and parenting, where mortality gets louder and the urge to control outcomes for our kids can start to drive the whole story. 

If you’ve been craving common ground and a more honest inner life, press play. Subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway: what would change if you stopped performing “busy” and started practicing real rest?

©NoahHeldmanMusic

https://livingoncommonground.buzzsprout.com

Transcript

A Divided World And Friendship

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Does it feel like every part of your life is divided? Every scenario, every environment, your church, your school, your work, your friends, left, right, conservative, liberal, religious, secular. It seems you always have to take a side. This is a conversation between a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who happen to be great friends. Welcome to Living on Common Ground.

SPEAKER_06 0:28

Do you think if we met today, we would still be friends? But we're friends.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

Y'all fools think that's something? Man, it ain't nothing, y'all. And you know what else? We ain't nothing either. Yeah, we came together in camp. Cool. But then we're right back here, and the world tells us that they don't want us to be together. We fall apart like we ain't a damn bit of nothing, man.

SPEAKER_07 1:16

How you doing? I am great.

SPEAKER_05 1:20

Are you? I feel like, I don't know, for some reason, every time you say that, I feel like you're lying to me. Oh. I don't know. That uh I don't know. I'm glad you're a lot about uh something. It says more about me than it does you.

SPEAKER_07 1:36

It says something about something.

SPEAKER_05 1:37

I'm glad you're doing great. And I'm gonna just take that at face value. So I know you're a busy man. Maybe that maybe maybe I am misinterpreting the sense of busyness with a sense of um distraught.

SPEAKER_07 1:53

I'm not that busy. I'm not that busy

Busyness As American Status

SPEAKER_07 1:55

of a man. I am um You seem like a busy man to me. I well, I like to put that uh image out there because then you know it makes me valuable. Makes me feel well, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 2:05

Because as an American, I I can only speak like I don't know if other cultures are do this too, but as an American, what makes you valuable is how busy you are.

SPEAKER_06 2:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 2:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:16

Because if we're like, no man, I haven't been doing anything, we're like Well, that is that's kind of I kind of think that's true, though.

SPEAKER_05 2:24

You think it's true? Yeah. I don't know. I think that we, I think Come on, get up, do something. I think that we um I think that we have uh we're missing out. I'm gonna use a good Christian term.

SPEAKER_07 2:36

I'm sorry, you not a Christian term.

SPEAKER_05 2:38

I'm I'm gonna use a religious term. Okay, it's not Christian, it's actually I we get it from the Jewish concept. Sabbath. I think that Sabbath, the idea uh the value of rest has become to the point where we actually devalue it.

SPEAKER_07 2:54

Okay. You think when you look out into our society, that the main problem is everyone's working too hard.

SPEAKER_05 3:03

No, that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that we we don't have enough leisure, we don't have enough distraction. Boy, you're doing you know, you you know you're doing a good job of twisting everything I just said. No, I think that I think that we lie and we we present a very I my God, look how busy I am. Because we we've we believe that what makes us valuable, what makes us important, is how busy we are. And so even though our busyness might be, I am trying so hard to finish this show that I've been binge watching, we still present it as, God, I am covered up. I am, you know, what do you got going on today? I am, I am, I'm slammed.

SPEAKER_07 3:52

I do, uh, I do know that rhetorically we do that.

SPEAKER_05 3:55

There is a uh, well, at least there's some because nobody wants to be perceived as not being busy.

SPEAKER_07 4:00

Yeah, there's some subsect of uh of our culture that is very intent on making sure that people know that we're busy. That's true. But what I'm saying is I think that we're not. I think that we're just just I think that we're just distracted and leisure. We are the most uh Oh, I I don't doubt that. I think that we have so much leisure and rest.

SPEAKER_05 4:22

But I do like the actually the Sabbath thing. But we can but we slam our but we completely fill our schedule with leisure and call it busy.

SPEAKER_07 4:32

Yeah, I uh I have no argument with that. Yeah, and then we fill every single we, I fill every single crack of my crack and crevice of my day with um, I mean, almost entirely phone distraction. Everything you said that because I just lifted up my phone is filled up. Yeah, I'm mostly talking about you and judging you. Yes. Because I definitely don't do that.

SPEAKER_05 5:01

Well, I'm I'm opening up my phone because there's a couple of quotes I wanted to share with you. But go ahead. What were you gonna say?

SPEAKER_07 5:06

No, I did you um I I

Sabbath Rest Versus Screen Distraction

SPEAKER_07 5:10

do agree about the Sabbath thing. I think that the Sabbath thing, um, but I don't I think that this is uh I I've heard people talk about how like um rest is health and like like the politics of rest. And I don't know if you've ever heard this, but this is like a trend.

SPEAKER_05 5:28

Do you do you hear the tone that you just started using? I did it on purpose. Oh, I know. That's like the that's the audible eye roll.

SPEAKER_07 5:35

So it's well, this is an audio medium, so I gotta make sure everyone hears hears my eye roll. For rest. But I yes, because because it's because it has to be a thing. It becomes like a th, it becomes like it, it's like a pol it's like a political position. And it's it defines it defines who you're not and the the meanies who are always trying to hustle and whatever, you know. It's exactly what I mean. Yeah. Um Corporate Corporate America, greed. I'm not talking about you. Wolves of Wall Street. Yeah. Um Yeah, greed is good. But uh Gordon Gecko. Yeah, I well, I mean, you know, dedicated my life to it, I guess. Um But I I do think that the I think that the Sabbath thing is a very um uh that's a that's a really important thing to to study and to try and to try to to do. But I don't know that it means necessarily, oh I just need to sit and not work and not you know what I mean. Like I like the idea of like it means it means I don't I don't do my work. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_05 6:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 6:52

But I also like the idea some people have taken uh like taken this position of like it means no screens, for instance. It means presence with my family and meditation or prayer, whatever you think, you know, whatever you want to do, or whatever, you know, and grounding. Yeah, yeah. I I think I I do think that there is a lot of wisdom in that and that um it's not something I do. I don't have to do that about that.

SPEAKER_05 7:24

Yeah, I have a uh it's funny because I do it for my emotional and mental health. I gr I and you know, I I I also can roll my eyes whenever we want to name things, you know, and start making it like a trendy thing. Yeah, so like ground, like grounding, sure, right? Okay, but everybody knows what I mean when I say it, so I'm gonna use the term. But there's oh I've always enjoyed before it became a thing of taking my shoes off, walking out into the yard, laying in the grass. I'm I'm very fortunate. I know a lot of people get itchy when they lay in the grass. I have no reaction to it at all. I, you know, um, and it's just there's just this soothing calming, and I have this, and I think part of it too, though, for me is uh yes, sir, I you know, I my uh I have friends that talk about the the the um the benefit of having your feet in touch with the ground and the negative energy and the positive energy and all that kind of stuff. I think for part of it for me too though is um there's a there is a um an emotional mental walk back. And what I mean by that is it re it brings me back to when I was a child, when I was a kid, when I was growing up, and I there was a lot less stress in my life anyway, uh-huh. Even though you know, now that I know what the 70s were like, I'm not saying that the times were simpler, they were just as complex. Your life, but my life was so much simpler, yeah, right. And so, and that's the other reason, too. Like I have this pair of jeans that I need

Grounding, Memory, And Calm

SPEAKER_05 8:50

to probably throw away, but I will never throw them away. I'll continue to put patches on them because patches and torn jeans also bring me back to that place.

SPEAKER_07 8:58

Yeah, no, I totally get that.

SPEAKER_05 9:00

And so I think that there's something to be said for that. Now, the reason I've been thinking about all of this is because of that trip that I, that that backpacking trip that I was supposed to do, and then it kind of morphed into all this other thing. One of the things I noticed is I went out to try to experience solitude and I continued to, I couldn't slow up, I couldn't stop, I couldn't, even though I'm quote unquote scheduled time for Sabbath or or uh renewal leave or whatever you want to call it, I I was I was like rushing and I was doing 15 miles a day for the first few days. It's because I realized um I wanted to be alone, I didn't want to experience loneliness.

SPEAKER_07 9:39

Sure.

SPEAKER_05 9:40

And I think that that has something to do with it.

SPEAKER_07 9:41

I don't think anybody wants to experience loneliness.

SPEAKER_05 9:43

But here's the thing I've come away with now. I think in order to truly grow, you have to go through loneliness. Why? Because I think that loneliness is that moment Well, what do you mean when you're saying loneliness? So I can be alone and be singularly focused on achieving things. Okay. Okay, so like when I'm when I'm hiking and I'm alone in the woods, I don't stop because I can still cover more ground. It's not dark yet. And so being alone, sure, I'm not actually with myself. I think loneliness happens when you realize that you're with yourself. What do you mean when you say with myself? I have I have to confront the things in me. Okay, right? That's that moment of loneliness. That's that okay, that's that darkness.

SPEAKER_07 10:34

When you say loneliness, you mean you're talking about the confrontation of the things you don't want to confront in yourself. Yes. Okay. All right.

SPEAKER_05 10:41

Yeah. And I think that that's where true growth sounds like I think that's where true growth begins to happen in loneliness. Because we can be alone and never spend time with ourselves.

SPEAKER_07 10:50

Okay. I hear I hear what you're saying. You're this is similar to um, you know, someone can most I think most people spend most of their life, and when I say most, I mean like 90% of the population spends 90% of their time unconscious. Yes. With their minds completely in control.

SPEAKER_05 11:13

I can remember asking people, what are you thinking? And they look at me and be like, nothing. And I was like, come on. And now I've realized after 54 years, that's a true answer.

SPEAKER_07 11:23

Well, okay. Yeah, in a sense, yeah. Yeah. What are you thinking about? Nothing. But they're thinking about a ton of things. They're just unconscious about it. And and I think that that's like that's understandable and typical. But what you're talking about is this idea of um of it's like the well, it's like things that um Jordan Peterson talks about, that Nietzsche talks about, that David Goggins talks about, that all these people who they're they're like, you know, you don't ever learn anything until you are willing to sit on the edge of your bed and say to yourself, what are the things that I'm doing that I know I should not be doing? And then not run away from the very first thing that comes up because it's definitely going to be the thing you hope is not the answer.

SPEAKER_05 12:11

Right. Yeah. And so what happened was for the first few days is I was in a I I I wouldn't stop. And it took me a while to realize this. I wouldn't stop because it would mean I would have to experience the loneliness. But now here's the thing. Once I knew where I would be at the end of each day, and that no matter what I did, like

Solitude, Loneliness, And Real Growth

SPEAKER_05 12:35

I didn't have to, like I wasn't trying to achieve a certain destination, that it was just a return, that allowed me to then sit in the loneliness. No, I think that what you're doing. But it was like I knew that there would be the okay.

SPEAKER_06 12:57

The okay?

SPEAKER_05 13:00

I knew that at the end of it I could come through it and it would all be okay.

SPEAKER_06 13:04

All right.

SPEAKER_05 13:05

I could deal with that. Yeah. And I and it would be this moment of okay.

unknown 13:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_07 13:12

Do you have something in your life that you don't? I'm not asking you to reveal it. Because you it really shouldn't. But do you have something in your life that you know that this is something that every time I ask that question, that is the answer that I don't want to be the answer, and I know it's the answer. That I continue to tell myself I should get to that. But I'm not gonna right now. Because I do.

SPEAKER_05 13:52

Yeah, I would imagine I mean I've got a couple things that can be like. So a couple things popped up right into my head. The interesting thing though is, you know, because your mind can work really quick, is uh so something did pop into my head, and it's not something I'd be embarrassed to talk about, but I won't because we're this isn't like Jeff's therapy session. Um however, I immediately also justified it.

SPEAKER_07 14:18

That's I mean, that seems like that I mean if you're if you're justifying it, I mean I just think like we know, we already know. Like nobody's nobody's confused about I know I was gonna say nobody's confused about how to lose weight.

SPEAKER_05 14:39

Yeah, I have written on my board discipline today is showing future self. Right. Love your future self. Yeah, but I mean like literally you know I ate peanut butter crackers last night while I was reading it on my bulletin board. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 14:50

No, I I nobody's confused. Nobody even even back when doctors were um publicly saying that smoking these particular types of cigarettes could be good for you and blah blah blah. You can read people knew smoking was bad for you. Right. Everyone knew it, everyone knows drinking's bad for you.

SPEAKER_05 15:16

I don't inhale it, it's fine.

unknown 15:18

Right.

SPEAKER_07 15:19

But I'm cigar, it's not like it's going into your lungs. Sure, sure. These are all just analogies for I think in our own personal lives, yeah. We all already know we're constantly, automatically, unconsciously running away from the things we already know. That's what I think. That's what I think for myself, at least.

SPEAKER_05 15:43

Yeah. Um, I hijacked I hijacked this conversation right off the bat with wanting to talk about this. But you brought up uh Nietzsche. Yeah. Which um so uh I've uh my son is reading, by the way.

SPEAKER_07 15:59

Good. He's reading uh he got Nietzsche. He got very excited. I don't remember why. Oh, because we watched Five Club, that's why. And he um decided he wanted to read Nietzsche, and so I bought him I think it was Beyond Good and Evil, I think. No, it's some other one of his main works. I don't know, but he's reading it.

SPEAKER_05 16:19

So this goes along a little bit with what I'm talking about and what you just talked about, too. This we already all know. This is Nietzsche. You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame. How could you rise anew if you have not first become ashes? Yeah, that's a good one.

SPEAKER_07 16:35

The son of man must die before he is raised.

SPEAKER_05 16:39

Yes. Okay, so this is also what I've been thinking about. The pattern. Did I talk about the pattern already on here? I don't know. I don't know. See, that's the problem. It's our show, it's talk about it again. But I talk too much because I talk, I talk here, I talk on Sunday mornings, I talk in classes, I talk to people don't want to hear, they can go do something else. Yeah, so um listen to two people. And then I talk to individuals, right? Like I may have talked to you about this, but I don't know if I talked to you about this with a microphone in my face. If it was just like just talking, there's a pattern.

SPEAKER_07 17:09

I don't remember anything you say unless there's a microphone in your face, by the way.

SPEAKER_05 17:13

And then even then you don't. Um, so because you're automatically thinking about your rebuttal. So, all right, here's the thing there's a pattern. You talk about the son of man must die in order to rise again, right? There is a pattern. And I think that we see this, and this is what I'm talking about a little bit, I think. Again, these are all thoughts right now that I'm just still processing. Uh, and and some things I've been processing for over two years now, and um, and I keep writing them down, and all I end up with is uh it's just it just makes no sense eventually to me. And I keep trying to order it, and then the people that like yourself that I talk to about it, you're probably sick of hearing it. Um, because anyway, okay, so that was a that was a lot of a

The Truth We Keep Dodging

SPEAKER_05 18:00

segue. Um there's a pattern, and and I connect it to the idea of logos, okay, stoic philosophy, early Christianity's concept of the Christ, um, Jewish concept in the Hebrew scriptures of Ruach. Um, this idea that um um Paul Tillich's ground of being, um uh Justin Martyr's idea of spermatikos. There's this idea that there is a re there is an under current of reality um that we as part of this can tap into and um and it reshape it begins to shape the way that you live in the world. Okay. Um and ideally you want to tap into that reality of of the the we if you want to call it divine consciousness, if you want to call it uh collective consciousness, if you want to talk, you know, you want to talk about the idea in in physics, about um energy, um negantropy, um whatever. Um and so the pattern is this, and I think that we see it in the in the story of Jesus, and so just set aside for a moment uh any theological, philosophical, whatever attachments you have to the character of Jesus in the New Testament, right? Uh specifically the gospels. Here's the pattern you you connect to the logos, the spirit. Okay. Uh and when you do that, it's gonna it's gonna force you into a wilderness experience. And in that wilderness experience, you become tempted, you become because you're seeing the world different. And so it's do I move into the new way of understanding reality, or do I continue to live in the old way of understanding reality that I've always had? Do I believe that uh do I believe in power the way I've always believed in power? Do I believe that there's something different? Do I believe that the world actually runs in a different energy than the energy that I have always been taught it runs in? Right. And so there's this temptation, there's this, there's this ballot, there's this battle that begins to take place as you as you begin to try to tap into the greater reality, the the logos, the the spirit, whatever. So in the story of Jesus, the

Logos, Wilderness, And Surrender

SPEAKER_05 20:30

you have his baptism, and then right after his baptism, you have 40 days in the wilderness where he's dealing with all of this. Right. This happens with us as humans. You have an experience, you tap into something greater than yourself, whatever it may be, and it begins to challenge the way you think about things and the way that you deal with things. And then uh what'll often happen is you come out of it and you become singularly focused based on the new understanding of reality that you have, right? And so for Jesus, what that was, and especially in the gospel of Mark, he comes out and he says, the kingdom of God is at hand. And he begins to understand that this is what it means to live in this world is that the bringing in, the breaking in of what he called the kingdom of God. Sometimes we want to talk about the reign of God. Um, you know, I would talk about uh I could talk about it in terms of negantropy, or uh there seems to be a movement towards inclusion, love, compassion, all of these things, right? Um and so uh so then you become singularly focused for that. But if you're not, if you don't remain tapped in, if you don't allow it to be a transformation of you, and you still try to do it through the power of you, you're gonna burn out. You're gonna, after about three years of doing this thing, you're gonna reach the point you're like, I either need to go back out in the wilderness again and become singularly. Focused again, or I need to do something else. And so then you have this garden. How do you choose three years? Jesus was three years. Okay. And it was about three years ago that I was on the Appalachian Trail. Yeah. All right. Um and so because I'm calling myself Jesus. Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_07 22:18

That's how I was getting at.

SPEAKER_05 22:19

Yeah. Uh thank you. And um and so um then you try to recapture that. You try to get away and you try to have this moment again. But what you end up with is not a wilderness moment, but but a Gethsemane moment. And it's like this acceptance of if this if this is really going to change, if I really do believe in this reality that I'm claiming to believe, I have to surrender to it and just let the cards fall wherever they will. Um that's that Gethsemane moment. And then it comes to a realization that um you come face to face with your own mortality. You um and what I'm saying to connect this all is I think that that's the moment of going from alone to lonely. That's the story of Gethsemane. His friends weren't with him. He he he was there by himself. He and finally it ends with not my will but your will be done. And it's a surrender to the pattern, to the reality. But it's also with the but you can do that and at some point though you have to have the okay. But it will be okay. At the end, there's the okay. What it actually is the better way.

SPEAKER_07 23:49

That is really interesting that you say that because that is that last part, that is, I think, uh explicitly what Nietzsche rejected.

SPEAKER_05 23:58

Well, but here's the thing. I would say that you're okay with no happy ending.

SPEAKER_07 24:03

Fine, but that's the point, is that is that the for Nietzsche, and this is this is the I think the difference between Nietzsche and Dostoevsky is that for Nietzsche, um you've you do have to accept that if you don't know the ending, you really don't know the ending. Not you don't know the ending, oh, but there's this trapdoor of it's gonna work out in the end.

SPEAKER_05 24:28

But what I'm saying is the okay is accepting that. Sure. That you don't know the ending. Yeah, but to me that's the okay.

SPEAKER_07 24:36

But but but there's uh it's it's only okay if if it's actually okay. Like if there's some sort of resolution at the end.

SPEAKER_05 24:50

But if the end is just the end that's okay. Why? Because it's not about the end.

SPEAKER_07 25:00

What are you saying?

SPEAKER_05 25:03

It it's about it's about everything that comes before the end. And if and if and if everything that you've done before the end is makes the end okay. Maybe it it's the it's the um when I say okay, I don't mean like, and in the end, it all everything's a happy ending. That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is the ultimate okay is I'm okay with whatever happens because I'm okay with everything that has.

SPEAKER_07 25:47

All right.

SPEAKER_05 25:48

So if at the end of the day I die, which I will, and that's it, fine. It here's the other thing. This was a hard one for me because I've been here now for 12 years. And I've here at the church. Yes. Well, in Mount Juliet. And I I have I've worked really hard with some wonderful people. You guys have come in, and you're one I I I can't, I I don't think you guys even know how much I love you guys. You you don't you can't even fathom you and Krista, truly. And I'm not just saying that. Like, I don't think, I don't think you even understand. Um wonderful people. And before, like before Easter, if you told me that, Jeff, all the work you're gonna do in three years, all these people are gonna be scattered like the wind. I would have been like, no. Like, I'm gonna buckle down and we're gonna make sure that this does not happen and we're gonna, right, and I'm gonna fight and I'm gonna claw and you're gonna have to drag me away and beat me in bloody now after the loneliness. If you told me, Jeff, three years from now, this entire community is gonna be scattered to the wind. Well, okay.

SPEAKER_07 27:10

Yeah, but it's not gonna.

SPEAKER_05 27:12

We don't know that. We don't

Defining “Okay” Without Guarantees

SPEAKER_05 27:15

know that. And here's the thing. I don't now, I'm not saying I want it to, yeah, but okay. Okay.

SPEAKER_07 27:22

You're just talking about acceptance, acceptance of what is and not trying to hold on to yes, that's what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_05 27:28

The okay is the acceptance of whatever comes because you have a great appreciation for everything that has been and is. So, in order to be able to experience, so in order to be able to for the future, whatever the future holds to be okay, you have to fully appreciate the has been and the now.

SPEAKER_07 27:51

How do you uh relate that to your kids? Is it the same when you think about your kids?

SPEAKER_05 28:00

As far as what? I want them to have that same experience.

SPEAKER_07 28:03

No, no, no, no. I mean for you. Like, oh, if all of a sudden my kids were done, an acceptance of whatever happens with my kids is that's happens.

SPEAKER_05 28:11

That's hard. I'm not gonna lie about that. Like, I woke up on the day of Madison's graduation and I wasn't like worried about her graduation. I had this realization that it was morbid. Like the thoughts were running through my head. I was like, God, the sun's like I gotta get up and I gotta open the blinds because I gotta I need the sun. Because it's interesting. Um, the sun seems to make everything brighter. And I mean that metaphorically. I mean that metaphorically. Yeah. Right? But you know what I mean? Like, yes, I think we're but yeah, I can have some horrible thoughts. Nothing good happens at night. And then in the morning, it it'd be like, well, it's gonna be okay. Yeah. Right. But that that morning before the sun came up, I was laying in bed and I thought to myself, God, what would you do if all of a sudden you lost your entire family? Why am I thinking about that on the morning of my daughter's college graduation? But that on.

SPEAKER_07 29:07

Are you that's not a real question, is it? No. No. This is the epitome of the midlife issues. The midlife, I mean, you waved midlife crisis. By the way, this that's not the point. I blew past that. That's not the point. The the point is not like technical, chronological, it's the midlife of it's the midway point, man. And I get it. I am, you know, about five years behind you. Again, not chronologically, because ten years chronologically. I'm talking about life stages. Yeah, yeah. You're you're kidding. In five years, roughly, my firstborn will be graduating from college, my secondborn will be going into college. It's it's virtually the the same thing, five years behind. And I get it at that point, you know. That's why I I mean, I, you know, I have this feeling of, and I've been talking about it over and over again. Krista and I have been talking to the the kids for years now, trying to um uh subliminally influence them. Um and not too subtly, so I guess it's not subliminal, um, to the idea that we are all going to live on a compound at some point. You know, we're gonna buy land and we're gonna build and we're gonna, we're all they're gonna have their families on there and we're gonna help raise their grandkids and that, you know. And I've been having this feeling of like this idea of we just we just raise kids in a uh from childhood and then at 18, well, now they need to go and build their own house and they need to go and build their own life. And you know what I mean? Like, I've been having this for the last like four or five years. Like, no, I don't want no. We're gonna we're gonna build a castle. That's that what we're gonna do is we're gonna build a castle for them. And yeah, they can go out and have their hero's adventure, they've got to have that. But then

Parenting, Mortality, And Midlife

SPEAKER_07 31:05

they're gonna come back and then we're going to build together.

SPEAKER_05 31:09

Is that why they take their place and stuff like that? So you guys can all have your little compound.

SPEAKER_07 31:13

That's the idea, but it I mean, it won't be a the place that we where we live right now. I mean, like that that doesn't have the obviously needs more, yeah. You need more anchorage, sure. But uh, and I mean, in some ways, like I'm speaking metaphorically, but I guess all of that to say I completely understand the the feeling of of darkness and mortality and and all of that when you're talking about your firstborn.

SPEAKER_01 31:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 31:40

I mean, because for people like you and I, um, kind of in our in our particular culture, we don't have the exact same culture, but we have we have a lot of similarities. I imagine for your kids, it was it was not a question, are you going to go to college? It was just like, oh, we're gonna go to college. And maybe, maybe there is like some like, well, maybe I'll do something different. But that's kind of like a an uh 5% exception in the conversations. Mostly it's like, where are you gonna go? What are you gonna do? So, so that that's really kind of the end of that's the finish line is the end of college for raising your kids. Right. Unless you get to that.

SPEAKER_05 32:22

Stay and then go to law school and yeah, but no, I get your point.

SPEAKER_07 32:26

Yeah, no, I mean, and so it it makes total sense to me that you'd be going through these wilderness periods, and actually, I mean, I th I, you know, the Gethsemane period I think is is probably pretty apt because it has to do with your immortality, you know. Um but I don't know. That's why that's why I'm like I I don't have an answer. I'm not saying that there's a right answer for if this should apply to your family or not. Because I know my instinct is my instinct is at this point is um, no, I'm not going to just accept no. I'll die here trying to control the outcome. No problem. That's my instinct. Right. I'm so grateful that I have a spouse who is very wise and can gently put her hand on my shoulder and remind me that's that's your own whatever you want to, whatever word you want to put on it, your own trauma, your own narrative, your own, you know, we're gonna talk about that. They'll be okay. They need to make their own way just like you did yours, and we'll always be the place where they will be able to come back and be, you know, like we've had lots of conversations, and it's and that's good, but I do know that that my instinct is like if I if you want to hear my real honest internal answer, it's no, I will I will die trying to control this for them. They will not be out on their own trying to figure it out on their own. Absolutely not. That's my instinct, right? Um, and and the funny thing is, I don't in any way think that I am competent or capable of producing a good outcome for them. I don't think that I would do it better. Sure. I just feel like I have to. Did does that make sense? Like I, you know. So um

Disagreement, Sanctimony, And Closing Quotes

SPEAKER_07 34:30

anyway, yeah. I I get it. It's uh I think probably just has a lot more to do with the life stages that we're in.

SPEAKER_05 34:37

Let me give you one real quick, because um oh, while I'm before I read this, I want a little um self-serving promotion. This when this Monday, yeah, at 6 30, I think is when it's officially supposed to start. I would just say six o'clock at um Tailgate Brewery in Nashville. Uh-huh. I'm gonna be speaking. Oh, cool. Yeah, it's hosted by Secular Rising, and I'm gonna be talking about um the art of disagreement is what this is what this presentation is. And um books will be available.

SPEAKER_07 35:13

Is that kind of like the talk that you gave at University of Sistanic?

SPEAKER_05 35:17

It's the same one. Okay, yeah, I just went through, and by the way, that talk uh for paid subscribers on the Substack will be available June 1st to watch the entire presentation online. Cool. So um, all right, here's one. Are you do you know Franz Kafka?

SPEAKER_07 35:32

Kafka, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Some of his stuff I'm not super familiar, but I know who Kafka is.

SPEAKER_05 35:36

Yeah, this one made me think of the Dunning Krueger model. Um, it is usually futile to try to talk facts and and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.

SPEAKER_07 35:50

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_05 35:52

I I just think that was good.

SPEAKER_07 35:53

You can't you can't get on top of sanctimony. Man, sanctimony is it is our one of our absolute favorite comforters to pull up around our our chin and just snuggle down in. Ooh, sanctimony feels so good.

SPEAKER_05 36:14

I another quote. I'm just gonna throw out some quotes here um because I've been following some uh um philosophical things online. Uh this one I posted on Facebook today. It is not who is right, but what is right that is important. And that's Tom actually I posted that yesterday, Thomas Huxley.

SPEAKER_07 36:33

Famous atheist.

SPEAKER_05 36:34

It's a great quote. Um, I thought that was good. And then two more. Uh no, three more. Um here's one. This is uh Sai Baba, and the hands that help are holier than the lips that pray.

SPEAKER_07 36:50

That's good. I thought that was a good one. I liked that reminds me of um there's a line in Eat Pray Love uh where the author describes her sister and she says, and I'll probably uh I'll butcher it, but she says something like her sister, um, there was somebody who had lost like somebody had died in their family or something like that. And um, she had said we need to pray for them or whatever. And her sister said, they don't need prayer, they need meals. And they she started bringing them meals or something like that. Which, you know, I don't, at this point in my life, I will tell you, at this point, as the resident atheist, I don't like the binary, right? I don't like the again, I don't like the sanctimony of being like, we don't need to pray for them, we need to feed them. Like, you know, uh settle down. If these people say they need to pray for them, they're gonna pray for fine. That's there's nothing wrong with that. You know what I mean? But like, but I do I understand the point of of um, you know, go do something.

SPEAKER_05 37:52

So we went from an atheist, and then we now I'm switching over to uh a rabbi, Abraham Heschel.

SPEAKER_06 37:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 38:00

When I was young, I used to admire intelligent people. As I grow older, I admire kind people. I thought that was good. All right, one more. Dresden James.

SPEAKER_07 38:14

I don't know from Dresden James.

SPEAKER_05 38:16

When a well-packaged web of lies has been sold gradually to the masses over generations, the truth will seem utterly preposterous and its speaker a raving lunatic.

SPEAKER_07 38:28

Yeah. I mean, that is uh, you know, that is why there are those of us who um proudly take on the the moniker or conspiracy theorists, because that is, I mean, over and over again, it feels like uh you're just uh insane person if you speak about what's actually happening.

SPEAKER_05 38:52

Anyway. All right. So this um episode is coming out later in the day than normal. Normally uh our episodes come out at 7 a.m. This one today. If you were like, oh my gosh, what happened? Uh just know that it's gonna be out uh probably early afternoon. We just got a little behind. A little bit behind, but we're gonna get caught up. And um uh yeah, what do they say? We had none of them in the can. Is that is that the yeah, that's good. Is that the way that is that the way that uh real professionals would speak?

SPEAKER_07 39:26

Yeah, because I I like that because that sounds like uh that sounds like radio. And that was always my dream is to be on talk radio.

SPEAKER_05 39:31

There you go. All right, short episode, but a good one, I think. Talk to you later.

SPEAKER_07 39:36

See ya.

SPEAKER_00 39:39

Thank you for listening to Living on Common Ground. Please follow wherever you listen to your podcasts and share it with your friends. You can also find a link to our social in the description. The more people we have living on common ground, the better the world will be.