How to Uncover What's Actually Holding You Back | Gary John Bishop on Impact Theory

Everybody, welcome to another episode of Impact Theory. I am here today with Gary Bishop. Gary, welcome to the show, man. Awesome. Thanks for having me. Dude, I'm excited. I love the way that you think about the world. I love the sort of brash aggression that you come at things with, the sort of no [ __ ] approach. So, I'm very excited to dive into that. Now, you you have several books. The most recent being about amazing [ __ ] wisdom, living a life, a wise life, if you will. One thing you said that really blew me away is this notion that we are both the the agent in the matrix and the rebels, as you call it, or you know, Neo, Trinity, and the group. What do you mean by that? To what extent do you see that we're sort of creating our own reality, and how do we develop the wisdom to navigate that well? Yeah. So, there's a there's a lot there's a lot about that that we that seems so unreal to us when you think I create my own reality, okay? And because, you know, you reach out and you touch the table, right? It's not like you're imagining some hologram or something, right? But but you are you are creating your own experience of being alive, and your actions are coming very much coming from your experiences. So, when I talked about you're both the matrix and you're the rebels, um all of us, all human beings, are constantly setting up the game, setting up the game subconsciously. So, you're setting up the game of relationships, you're setting up the game of finances, you're setting up the of body, you're setting up And so, you're kind of following predictable pathways. And then and but you're also struggling with some of these things, right? Like, for instance, I'll give you a really simple example. If I'm somebody who struggle with money, and I know that saving money is really good for me, why would I spend my last 100 bucks at the mall? Like, why would I do that? Right? Until you start to consider, well, maybe what I'm doing is I'm setting up the struggle. Maybe that's the game for me subconsciously. But if you take that same principle with your body, with your love life, with your career, see, how you fundamentally relate to yourself is very deep, very profound. But you're so wrapped up in the surface issues of your life, you can't really see what's driving it at all. Like, how come I turned out this way? If you get set If you set aside the kind of psychological explanations, how come I turned out this way? And where am I headed? Where's this going for me? How does this keep unfolding for me? And the surprising thing for a lot of people is whatever you're struggling with today, until you finally understand what's driving it, you'll continue to wrestle with that until you die. Talk to me about that process. So, one thing that I find really interesting in your story is how late you came to the game of sort of self-help. What What was that process like for you? How do we develop the self-awareness to have these kind of moments that you're talking about? Yeah. One of One of the One of the interesting aspects of what When people talk about awareness these days, what I feel is after mostly talking about is being aware of others. So, they're talking about how others speak and others listen and others behave. And real awareness is is actually starting to get aware of oneself. And And I think if you ask most people, they'll say they are pretty aware. Um but, you know, give me 10 minutes with them and they'll see how blind and deaf they've been, you know, like they just can't They just They aren't connected to their own wiring in many ways, you know. Do you have like a series of questions that you ask people to to help them see that they aren't as aware as they might think they are? Yeah. Well, you know, basically I get people just to tell me about themselves, right? You'll you'll hear you'll hear the you'll hear and see the blind spots everywhere. They're all over their conversations. So, when somebody talks, they're in fact speaking from the world that they're in. But, people don't experience themselves as being in a world. We experience ourselves as being in the world. But, you're not. You're in a very biased a very kind of slanted a very kind of weighted place in life. You're you're not interacting with life. You're interacting with you interacting with life. And that's a very that's a very kind of nuanced thing. And when you start to point to some of those things with people, you start to see like, well, well, how come this is something that you get hooked by or how come this is a strength of yours, but also a weakness of yours? Um that's when people start to join the dots up for themselves. It's really not about telling people. It's really about asking the right kind of questions and engaging in the right kind of conversation with somebody that you you'll watch them. You'll see people joining the dots up for themselves like, "Oh my gosh, yeah, that that." And then, my in my view, a human being starts to really get empowered with themselves when they start to make sense to themselves. Like, your own actions, your own thoughts, your own emotional when all that starts to kind of logically click for you, to me, those are the beginnings of of true awareness. So, by way of example, walk me through what happened to you. So, I know your brother-in-law had suggested that you go to self-improvement seminar of some kind. Thought it was [ __ ] but you ultimately end up going cuz he's footing the bill. Um Right. And you walked away sort of thinking very differently about that. And I think it will help people to to begin to connect those dots if they understand sort of what some of those dots are using just your own story as an example I think would be super enlightening. Well, it was the first It was the first time in my life that I ever realized I had that perspective. And did you know you were struggling with something at that point? Um I like everybody else, you know, it was like, well, you know, it's tough to start a business and it's tough being married and you know, all the same things that we had all kind of like making okay in our lives, you know? And sometimes it goes too far like our you know, our our relationships break down or our businesses go down or but it seemed to me like I'm just wrestling with the same stuff as everybody else, you know? And and I'm working my tail off at that time in my life in a very specific thing that I thought would answer a lot of these questions that were kind of ruminating in my life, right? Like I really I really did believe that one day this was all going to turn out. Right? Which was one of the illusions that I had to really confront that it was never turning out. would automatically become what you wanted it to become? Is that what you mean? Yeah, yeah, there'd be one day when all of this work I would wake up and the birds would be singing, right? And that sun would be shining and all is good in my world. And I realized that I'd never had that day in my life. Like I I'd been working towards it. I've been trying to make this happen. But when you but you know, that's perspective is a word that gets thrown around a lot. Like what is your perspective? It's such a thin word to deal with this really kind of voluminous thing. It's just a It's a Your perspective is is in everything you hear, everything you see, everything you say, everything you experience, every feeling, every emotion. You know, all of it. That's your perspective and it's hard to see it because you're in it. So, you can't really witness it. So, when I started to do work on myself I'd and and it was in a specific area actually, it was in my relationship with my parents. Which at the time in my life I would have said was fine. Like it's okay, you know, it's fine. But I but I never realized that fine was [ __ ] you know. I thought fine was just fine. No one had ever said but why not amazing? And once I started to dig down in that, then I could see well because of this and because of that and because of this and because of that. And it was the first time in my life that I'd ever really confronted that that was just a point of view. Like my entire past is only a perspective. It's not it's not the actuality of my past. It's the past of the eyes and the ears of the person who was in it. But there was a lot of people in that past with their own eyes and ears, with a whole different takeaway from it than I had. But I lived like what I took away was now what is like the firm foundation under my feet. So I questioned everything. It was very unsettling at the beginning. Actually question what like the narrative. And I'd never questioned the narrative, like truly questioned it because I'd never seen it. Cuz to me it was the truth. And that's the problem. People spend their adult life overcoming a truth that they made up. Dude, that that to me is one of the most important things that I've heard you talk about is that notion that people confuse what they have chosen to believe with objective truth. And that that sort of becomes that first aha moment of wait a second, I'm living a collection of beliefs that have formed a perspective. I'm living from that perspective. Um how do you help people see that? Do you get pushback cuz you've talked about how people will fight for um their [ __ ] I think was one of your exact quotes. Like they they have all these dysfunctional things in their life and they're they're just utterly committed to keeping them in a way. Yeah, well, let me let me kind of shine a little bit of light on that. So, a lot a lot of what we're we're kind of hooked by as an adult is from whatever we took away from our childhood, right? So, in my second book I talked about this like what are the elements that you took away? What have you built your life upon? Of all the things that you could have taken, what did you take? Right? And so, when you question that with somebody and somebody says, you know, like "My mother was controlling." Okay? Which is a descriptive term of things you saw. Okay? When I say my mother was controlling, that's not just a a phrase. I'm knowing a world that exists now between her and I. Right? And in this world that I'm in with her is not my perspective. I'm actually watching her do things that confirm what I've come to believe. I mean, I completely ignored all the other stuff, but I want to focus on this [ __ ] right? Cuz this to me is the big deal. And so, when I say to somebody, "But what if your mom isn't controlling?" And they say, "Well, she is." And I say, "I know, but what if she's not? What if you just let go of the notion that she's controlling?" Well, I have I'm not going to let go of that. Why? She's ruined my life. I say, "No, you've ruined your own life." And then people start to fight for the narrative. Why? Because they've built their life upon it, and you've told other people about it, and you've got a consensus around them. And so, they've filled their life with these people that are like, "Yeah, your mother's controlling." And you're like, "Yeah, that's right, she is." And then when I go into my relationships as an adult, this person's not going to control me. And even if that person is controlling me or not controlling me, I'm going to point to all the ways that I think they are. And then IT'S LIKE I'VE MARRIED MY MOTHER. NO. You're indulging your perspective. And you never get to see anyone beyond your own perspective. And that's very confronting for someone because if you've spent 10, 20, 30, 40 years, there's a carnage. There might be divorces. There might be bankruptcies built on the illusion of control. And and then it's like then you start to see like I've I haven't been interacting with life. I've been interacting with my my my view of it, my judgment of it, my opinion of it. And that's sometimes really challenging for somebody to stomach. You've said that for you it was a multiple-year journey to begin to extricate yourself from that, to begin to make some forward momentum. How much of that was, okay, now I recognize that I I am sort of the matrix itself. I have created this illusion to some extent, but it's tied enough to reality that I can reach out and touch it and everything is sort of reconfirming back to me. Um once you realize that, how did you begin that work of recrafting the narrative or or to you is it it's not a recrafting of the narrative, it's it's a disillusionment of all narrative in totality? Like what what is that next step? That's a great question. No one's ever asked me that question again, so and I've done a lot of these things, so that's a great question. Um So ultimately what it comes down to is See, once you discover something, right? And it's like a true discovery. It's a Gestalt moment. It's like it's like getting the black cat. You're like, oh, you know, what? What am I in? You know, how did I because you can see the tentacles. And you can see how it spread through your life and you can see how when you're being given by this thing, why you would take the pathway you would take. Like I said earlier, suddenly I made sense. And when I can see the pathway, I don't even have to avoid the pathway. There's just no way I'm going down there because I see the carnage. I get what this has done in my life, right? Now, I don't blame myself. I'm not in the world of like, "Oh, you idiot. Why didn't you?" No, we're all wired as human beings to create our own reality. The only problem is we have no sense of creating it. Right? But there's no experience of like, "Yeah, I'm putting this world together for myself so that I can survive in life." Your brain is putting the building blocks together. It's like, "Yeah, people are this way. Yeah, I'm this way. Yeah, the world is this way." And so I'm just building evidence for it. So, I would say that was really the first time that I I started to get a sense of an awareness of self, of a self, right? And And And then it then it kind of got like it really was this very, kind of existentialist, you know, kind of thing going down with me. It was like it was like who I knew myself as wasn't really me anymore. It was it was who I'd become. But I started to explore this kind of greater self, like that that was there, but it was only a small part. And that became the big choice in life, like starting to see like I could pursue all of those brain patterns and all of those automatic behaviors. I could pursue that. Or I could recognize when it's at play. And when I can recognize when, if you want to call it, my default self, I believe that's what Heidegger called it, your default self, if I can recognize my default self, I'm suddenly at choice. Right? Like so if I use that example of maybe my relationship to somebody in my past was that they were controlling, I could notice all those patterns, all those triggers, all those emotions as only that. Patterns, triggers, and emotions. And then I could start to explore life and set them aside. Like I'm not going to indulge them cuz it it starts to show up for me like a personal indulgence. Like I'm checked out. I'm in my head. I'm You know, whatever my thing has got me hooked. Um but then suddenly as a human being there's like this growing sense of like there's way more to me that I had forgotten. And I'd literally forgotten it. Forgotten that when I was a kid I was so loving as a kid. I was like this huggy, loving little kid. And I'd become this [ __ ] of a man. And that was my choice in many ways, you know? It was like Oh yeah, I can keep going with that and single-minded and da da da da da da. Or I could just start giving a damn. And I could start getting interested in other people and and the people in my life and and it exploded. My life became like a whole a playground for me to explore my relationships with people. And and and the thing that I loved about it most was that they didn't have to do [ __ ] You know, they didn't. They could just sit around and be themselves and I would be like, "Oh, this is me. I'm going to try I'm going to I want to discover you from the perspective of love." Like how Yeah, I think you got to tell the story of your mom. This is such a powerful moment and if you would touch on the moment where you hadn't seen your mom in 2 years and you showed up at the door. Um I thought the the sort of way you said I in the past I would have reacted one way and now I just had this totally different perspective. Um I think it's an amazing story. Well, that's that's perspective was I'd seen that I'd created this dynamic between my mom and I. There was I had a relationship with her but there was always something in the middle. So it wasn't free. I I Let me put it this way. I wasn't free. When I was around her I had to be a certain way. And the way that I was was disconnected. All right, like you're there, I'm here. And what was in between us was all of that narrative that I'd built up over the years. And and in many ways, you know, and I and I remember saying this to myself as a teenager, like 16, 17, like I've turned out as a victory over her. All right, this is my victory, right? Not like I've turned out from what she did. And what she gave me. I've actually just turned out, you know, as a as a reaction to all the mistakes that she made. And so as a man, when I started to do this this work, I realized that I'd spent most of my childhood in judgment of her, like how she was doing with me. And and mostly, it was like a scorecard, you know. Now you screwed that up. Now you [ __ ] that up. Now you screwed that up. Yeah, you So, my I had this like case, like if we went to court, I could have threw a bunch of paperwork down and said, you know, read that, you know. This is how she messed me up and this is why I'm a champion now because I've come victorious. And there's a big conversation in society for that, like being victorious over something you made up. All right? But but it's not They don't say it's being victorious over something you made up. They say it's being victorious over what they did to you, right? It's what you made up about what they did to you. Or as Sartre would have said, what you made it mean. So, I had this realization that I'd that I'd that I'd really just blamed her. And so when it hit me like a ton of bricks, and I went through all the spaces, blame, guilt, fault, you know, all that [ __ ] Called it up. And I I used to call my mom my mom up all the time then. But we only ever talked about the weather and the neighbor's dog and stuff. And that was connection, you know. Like that was us being connected. So, I called her up and she said, "Hello." And I just said, you know, "I'm sorry." That was the first thing I said. I said, "I'm sorry." And she's like, "For what?" And I said, "I just never knew what it was like for you to raise a family almost on your own. And I just blamed you. And I, you know, I've been judging you and you know, I just want you to know I'm just really sorry for making you wrong for all that you did and didn't do." And there was a silence. And I said, "I love you." And she said, "I love you, too, baby." And I I had it in that moment like it was a it was like, "Oh my gosh." Like the skies opened up. Because all of this that I'd been holding back came out. Right? And I didn't even do it so that she would do anything. I did it because this needed to be said. This needed to get out the way. I was starting to realize how tight I'd become. I wasn't And I And I wanted to be a loving man. I just didn't know how to do it. And now I I remember even saying that to my wife, you know, in my And when I at the time like, "I don't really know how to do love." Which is [ __ ] Everybody knows how to do love. You might have forgotten, but you need to get back in touch with it. So, from that moment I really started to engage you on my from this loving place, you know, like And she didn't have to do anything. I was just going to love her. And then And it wasn't like a test, you know, "If I love you, what do I get back?" What kind of stuff, you know, like like your aunt does when she kisses you, you know, like she's And she says she loves you, she's going to waiting for you to say it, too. I wasn't doing that. So, I had this business trip to to to uh Dublin, actually, in Ireland. And I And I was there for a few days. So, I thought, "I'll just take a quick flight over to Glasgow, my hometown. I'll go see my mom." So, I took this early morning flight and get this car and I drive over there. And it's like 8:00 a.m. And she lived in one of those buildings, you know, you had to press the button at the front to get in. And I thought, "Well, this is going to blow the surprise cuz I'll press and she'll know it's me." But the postman had left the door a little ajar. So, I was able to get in the front door, I go in and I knock on her door, it's like 8:30 on a Monday morning, you know, and I'm like, this is going to be awesome. I haven't seen my mom in 2 years, it's going to be amazing. And then so I knock on the door, she comes to the door, you know, she's looks at me and she goes, "WHAT DO YOU WANT?" IT'S SO GOOD. So I'm having a time like the thought was there like, oh [ __ ] this is where I would usually get really pissed off. Like, see, you don't care about me, right? And I just laughed. I was just like, oh my god, that's what she does, right? That's her thing. She like she gets annoyed, right? I'm like showing up at her door on a Monday morning. It's not like, I haven't seen you for 2 years. It's like, I'm having my tea right now, you know, or something. So I went in and we just had this brilliant conversation. I hugged her, I said, "I love you." And I and I really got I'd spent my whole life waiting for people to love me. And it was really my job to love people, like the way they are. Like it was the whole dynamic changed. Like I would I remember like even my mom passed away earlier this year. I remember I was over there last year and I was hugging her and SHE WAS LIKE, "GET OFF ME." AND I JUST GOT THAT'S HER THING, MAN. IT'S LIKE THAT'S where she's at. And I'd spent so much of my life like blaming where she's at for where I'm at. And when I took that off the table and I took responsibility for being the guy that I say I am, then suddenly people are free to be themselves. I don't need you to change. It's not I don't need you to say or do something to make me feel different. I just need you to be whatever you say you are and then in that space, I get to explore all the paradigms of of who I am. Yeah, dude, the the thing that makes that story so heartwarming and useful is that she didn't need to change. There was nothing that her behavior didn't change. That's why I love the the moment where you come to the door and you have this such a different reaction than you would have had, you know, in years prior. And I There's you have the same skepticism for sort of self-help that I have. And because so often people are promising sort of rainbows and puppies and it doesn't play out like that and the world is still messy and it's still difficult. And so hearing how she it it wasn't like you guys have this phone call and then everything is better and you guys are, you know, you have this easy relationship from from then on. You you still had to confront that moment at the door, but now you're able to laugh at it and sort of enjoy who she really was, not need her to be different, not judge her for it, recognize that you're your own thing, that if you make different choices, you can get a different outcome, um and that she doesn't have any power over you that you don't let her have. Um it's just amazing. I think that's an important part of that and that is um and this was part of my great awakening, if you like. And it was more like the great punch in the mouth, right? It wasn't like, you know, I get hit by a rainbow or something. It was like I got smacked around the face and head and I was like, "Ah!" Right? I'm like, "This is terrible." At the beginning, but I I had to question myself with what would it been like for me to share my life with somebody who wanted me to be different all the time? Like, what would that have been like? What would it been like to share life with somebody who's just like, "I don't like this about you. I don't like that about you. I wish you were more that way and less this way." It would have been exhausting. And and and and even then then then I started to get a respect for her like and she held in with me after all of that. I'd spent so much time just looking and observing and judging what she was doing. I'd I'd forgotten to keep an eye on what I was doing and and who I was becoming. Yeah, you you quoted Heidegger and you sort of referenced it obliquely a minute ago that um freedom is overcoming the default self. Right. And that to me is so powerful. Like recognizing that you use this analogy of a sponge, right? So, we're all like a sponge and you start and you're flexible and you're you're squishy and wonderful and then over time all those things that you pick up it you dry out and they get trapped and and that to me is such a great um way of illustrating what the default self is. Um it isn't you intrinsically, but it is sort of the state of you as you have accidentally become over time. Um and the ability to not react just because that's sort of the accidental way by which you have become, but to say one that's shapeable and then two that even even sort of as I'm in this hardened state that you can transcend that um and realize that you control your reactions. That's really really powerful. There's something really great about what you're saying because See, I think your personality is little more than a stumble. Right? mean by stumble? So, like you've kind of like fallen through life and ended up this way, right? So, it's kind of like being you've kind of what and then the next thing and then you've did there's been no sense of creating something, you know, like I'm going to create myself with this person. So, if you think about it like this kind of unconscious stumble through life and you're picking up pieces that you have no sense that you've picked that up, right? You don't you don't even realize that this you've just laid a foundation for something that later in life is going to kick your ass, right? You don't realize that you're doing this. And so, I think when I think it does take a little bit of time, that little bit of kind of fermentation. I think it has to kind of form itself. To me, those are the times when it's ripe for you to now do this work on you. To now be like, "Okay." And and it's funny because I I I spoke to someone recently about this and they talked about midlife crisis. And I don't really see it like that. I don't see it like an age thing. I think it can happen in your 20s and I think it can happen in your 60s. And but I describe a little differently. I think what you're witnessing is this kind of bankruptcy of your persona. Like who you've come to know yourself as no longer works. Right? And it's the same [ __ ] and no matter how hard you shake that tree, you're only ever getting one apple. Right? It's not bearing the fruits. Um because your persona your personality has come together over time to allow you to overcome life, to win at it if you like. But the problem is what you're overcoming is what you've picked up and you you think you should overcome. So, you're you're basically spending your life waging a war against an illusion with a persona that is only designed to win that illusion. But so, you're not equipped for the rest of life. You're not equipped for it. And that's to me, that's real personal growth and development when you start to understand that that little hard sponge and what's at the core of it all and then start to then the exploration begins and then you can maybe start engage with something close to the true joy of life, you know, to to get out there and and be someone you've never been before. I want to go deeper on that. So, it'd be interesting to hear your take on what the trajectory of your books has been. Um I was surprised in a great way, by your most recent book where you're dealing with this the self-labeled fundamentals of life. Um, talking about love, talking about loss and grieving. Um, and and the way that I interpreted it was your early books were sort of setting up a worldview, a way to think about things, way to think about yourself and move through the world, how to, you know, deconstruct the matrix and build it back up um, with something more useful. And now this book is, "Hey, all those things that I taught you, I'm going to show you how to point it at these most important, powerful elements of life." Yeah. Um, and done in a really interesting way. Is that fairly accurate to the intention? Yeah. So, when I wrote my first book, um, I mean, you know, you you pointed to it earlier. You said it's kind of you've got this kind of relationship to the self-help industry. It's skeptical, right? I like that it's skeptical and not cynical. You know, it's it's skeptical. It's like, you know, let me question that a bit. What you call the cynic says, "I mean, it's just you're just shutting the door on it, you know?" But So, I love I love the idea of being skeptical. Um, and I'm and I'm very skeptical of the indus- about the industry because I feel as if I don't think it serves the people who want it, right? It's like philosophy, right? I mean, I love philosophy. I'm I'm not a I'm not a student of philosophy, but I I dabble, right? Like I dabble in playing the guitar, right? You were talking about it earlier, so I dabble in philosophy, but my problem with philosophy is it's too interested in itself. So, it's kind of philosophy is fascinated with itself, right? As a subject matter. It's like, "Oh, yeah, let's talk about Schrödinger's [ __ ] cat or something, you know?" Like, "But how does that help me? I just lost my job, you know?" Like, "How do How does this So, um, so when I wrote my first book, it was it was really like a and and a kind of rebellion against the self-help industry. You know, it's got a big curse word in the title. Um You should You should tell people the titles of your books. I think they are My first book was called Unfuck Yourself. And when I wrote that book and when I came up with the title, everybody that I spoke to says change the title. There was There was as I like to call them the [ __ ] books. There was one [ __ ] book out at the time, right? It was Mark Manson's book. And it wasn't really, you know, like shaking the trees or anything yet. And I and I thought well, that's what I want to call my book. And people are you know, I'd written it in late 2015. And my marketing people everybody was like, "No. It's a great title, but don't do it." And I got it. Like, you know, you couldn't advertise it on Amazon. You couldn't post about it on Facebook. Like, nothing. No one would handle it. There's no way to get it out, right? And at the time I had a coaching business. That was it. I wasn't like I had you know, gazillion followers online or something. There's none of that. But I thought, "No, I'm going to call it what I want to call it. That's how I talk, right? That's That's my vernacular, right? I'm So, so when I brought the book out some people were very skeptical about it. Like, they were saying, "Yeah, yeah, this it's just sensationalist. There's been a lot of books have come out with brilliant titles that never sold more than six copies, right? Title is kind of interesting, but there has to be something in there. But what I was committed to do with that book though was packing as much really useful philosophy communicated in a way that there was plenty of room for you to think. Right? So, there was like these big I could make these statements, but you had to kind of dwell on it. You'd be like, "Oh, woah. Let me think about that for a minute, right? From the perspective of my life." And so, there was only, I think, 32,000 words in that book. But there's like so much philosophy in that book. Even I was shocked that I managed to get it all in there, you know, but so and and again, it's this kind of phenomenological, ontological, existential perspective. But the book went crazy. I self-published. It went with 30,000 copies in 5 months, you know, it it just spread. It was like wildfire. People like, "Oh my gosh, I love this book." And then so when I got with my publisher, my publisher said, "You know, why don't we do something long-term where you could really get to create with people this kind of bigger picture." And uh that's what we've done. We've It's really been like I'm I'm filling in the gaps for people with every book, but that every book you can stand alone with a book and on its own it's very valuable. You might never read another book of mine. But but if you do read all the books, you'll see how they all come together and they do feed off each other. Um so this book that's that's my next book that's coming out, it's called Wise as [ __ ] and it's simple truths guide you through the shitstorms of life. And and again, you know, like I want everybody to get some of the brilliant philo- philosophical ideas that exist in the world. I want everybody to get them and and so that in that way I speak to people in the way that they talk and the way that you and I would communicate. It's not wrapped up in a strategy or some, you know, some scheme that I might have. It really is a simplistic and powerful way of delivering some of the great distinctions of philosophy that the world has ever produced um and that they're accessible and they're usable and and you can find a way to kind of integrate them into your life. And um and I'm going to continue on that pathway. I've got a lot of things that I want to touch on with people, but this this next piece is a really important piece. You know, it's very important. How do you deal with loss? You know, how do you deal with fear? You know, or what is success as a human being? Like, what you know, what It's like we should know how to handle all that stuff, but we don't. We don't know how to handle it. I mean, when somebody dies, I mean, you know, the best you can hope for is that somebody gives you some words out of a sympathy card that might ring your bell for a few minutes and calm you down. You've talked about confidence being an experience. Yeah. It's not something you don't you aren't sort of permanently confident. It's just something that you experience. It Do you have a similar feeling around grief? Yeah. And if grief is but an experience, how are you placing it somewhere? Yeah. Yeah, I think look like all your experiences in life, you know, um as human beings, we become a little obsessed by the idea of trapping certain experiences that we like and then trying to get rid of the ones that we don't like. So, happiness is an experience, okay? So, I might somebody might present me with an ice cream cone. And I'm like, "Oh, this is amazing. I love ice cream. This is great." And And then so that experience, I'm like, "I I want to get that experience back. Clearly, the key is ice cream. I need to do more ice cream so that I can have this back. And then I visit ice cream 8, 10, 15, 30 times. And I'm enjoying the experience of ice cream, but I'm noticing that I'm blowing up like a balloon here. Then, I'm not enjoying this experience. Now, this is a terrible experience. More ice cream is clearly the answer. Now, that's obviously a very kind of playful way of looking at this, but in a very simple way, that's that is how we do life. We're in the pursuit of experiences. And we think those experiences are given to us by something around us. We don't realize that we are the architect, the creator, and the vehicle in which all of this gets expressed. So, we look for love. We look and we and we literally say, "Pursue happiness." Like it's something out there that I can get, right? And again, this notion that we can somehow trap it with ourselves. But, you know this it's your experience. You might love a human being, but you don't walk around in this constant state of love, right? Because you're working and you're working out and you're reading and you watch TV and all the other stuff. You You have these moments of experiencing love. So, when somebody experiences grief, I say, "You got to let yourself have it because you're more like a conduit than anything." It It arises. It's there. And if you don't resist it, you don't try and change it, you don't try and make it go away, it'll pass. You'll get wrapped up in something else. And that is very much how your brain works. Your brain works in those very kind of like, you know, like bits of string. There's a beginning to the string and an end to the string, but if you start messing with the middle of the string, you never get to the end. It's always just hanging about the same thing. So, I want people to understand like there's nothing wrong with a negative experience. There's nothing wrong with it. If you feel depressed or you experience yourself as depressed, that's right. Like you you experience yourself as weird. There's nothing wrong with that, right? And you don't want to dwell in it. And how we dwell in it is by lamenting it or hating it or wanting it to be different or trying to change it or trying to fix it, right? You you learn to function in and you learn to you start to kind of explore life from that place maybe of talk about depression. If you explore the life from the place of depression, and you start to dare yourself a little to get a little let's say that a bubble tiny little bit all you need to get what are actions that I can take that are more aligned with what inspires me or what I'm interested in. These little pieces you can add them up. You can start to dance with life a little better than maybe you would have done in the past. So, these are all legitimate real experiences of being a human being, but the more you try and trap them or the more you try and change them the less you actually get the favorable ones because it's all chasing. When you sat down to write the book, how did you come up with the fundamentals that you were going to approach? Is it the ones that people sort of most often are trying to trap? Um I'm curious how you selected the ones that you went into. Oh, I And if you would enumerate for people what you consider the fundamentals. All right. So, So, for instance, loss, okay? And loss is one of the fundamentals that I talk about in the book. We all experience loss. When you talk about loss to a human being though, they usually talk about somebody dying, right? But but there's little mic- microcosms of loss scattered throughout your day, right? So, you're like if you go to the store looking for your favorite coconut water and they don't have it. That's a loss for you. What I mean a loss like there's a disappointment. Right? So, you're kind of like, "Ah, that's it's not a big deal." You're like, "Well, whatever, you know." But as an example of like something you had thought would be there or maybe even expected to be there that's suddenly not there. It could go all the way in your relationship when people get divorced for instance. Um there's a A What's the loss? The loss of the future that I thought I had. That's a loss to me. I thought I had that. It's not. Some people are relieved because they saw that future as being very negative, but other people are crushed. So, there's this idea in my head that life and people should be a certain way. So, loss was to me so much a big deal and and we don't know how to deal with loss. We don't. We're not. And you have to learn how to deal with loss. You have to And it's a process of understanding yourself and understanding what loss is for you. Um but but this this notion of if I could pick things that I feel as if if I had some grasp of how to navigate these things when they arise in my life, how much of a difference would that make? If I could If I knew how to navigate loss, like, you know, it doesn't It doesn't spare me from the experience, but I know there's a way that I can get through this and be my most empowered. So, I knew that was a fundamental part. Um another big one for me was success because especially in Western society, we're kind of fed this diet of what it is and what it isn't. And I wanted to blow a bunch of that up, right? Like just And I think I even started that part of the book off by saying, "I'm I'm sick of success." Right? But not sick of like I'm so successful. I'm sick of it. I'm just sick of how it's getting presented to us. Explain how How do you see it it being presented to us and where does that become sort of pathological? Yeah. So, that it's it's mostly presented to us as things. Right? So, it's more Success is things. So, if I get my degree, that's a success. If I if I, you know, get that job, that's a success. That bank balance, that's a success. This body, that's a success. Like, so it's kind of fed to us as things. And it's amazing when you talk to people about their big accomplishments. And And for many people, it's like this these years-long kind of pursuit, if you like, of these things, like going to college, right? If I'm a lot of people like them get so much built into that. And the experience in my head is when I get my degree, this will all be better. Now, anybody who's got a degree, I'll tell you that got blew up for them the day they picked up their freaking diploma, right? They were like, "Oh." That's it, right? And that's very much how success is portrayed for us as human beings, is something to get to. That when you get there, it's not it. And it's never it. You know, every time you get there, you're like, "Ah." I you know, I used to be a musician, you can I mean, I still play, but I'm not It's not what I do. And my lifelong dream was to play the Whisky a Go Go in LA. Like, that was my thing, you know? And so, back in the '90s, I did it. And I headlined there, right, with my band at the time. And it was like the biggest day, I'm playing the Whisky tonight, I can't believe it. And then after the show, I was in the lowest of lows. Because what I was left with is that's it. Like, that's it? Really? All of that for this? You know, like, 11 songs and we're done? You know? Um so, I wanted to burst break that up a little for people and start to get them to see success in a different way and start to engage your life from a more empowering context of success and what success is for you it really isn't something it really isn't something that I'm aiming for. It's it's more like a location that you're coming from. It's more like it's more like an empowering and and powerful context for the way that you do things. Rather than you know, the top of some mountain somewhere that you feel as if eventually be the answer but only to get there and see there's another mountain. Tell me tell me about love. This was this was one of the things in the book that you tackle that I was like I I am very eager to talk about that. You talk a lot about unconditional love that love sort of by its nature is unconditional. Um and I I'd love to hear your thoughts on that because that hit me intuitively um as not being true but your explanation is very interesting. Yeah. So there is only unconditional love. That's the only kind of love that is. What happens when you you love somebody and then they cheat on you and you instantly realize yeah, I got to get a divorce. Ah, that's not love anymore then, now is it? So now I've got something called resentment. So now that's now I'm now does that would that strikes me before I read your book that strikes me as something that truly was just conditional and thusly I went from conditions were met for my love and then conditions were violated and thus my love disappeared. No. No, so like so like there's there are certain like there are there are certain I mean you're going to call it conditions but there's a world in which I express my love, okay? There's a world in which I express my love. Now when they when that person say and you say they cheated on you which is a lie right? That never happened. They did what they did. have to explain that to people. Yeah, yeah. So, you were never cheated on. You have made it about you. What they were doing was about them. Right? I mean, they might even blame you and say this was about you. But even that's about that. Right? So, if I love you and you do something that I feel is if it's no longer acceptable to me, that's on you. And I'm now choosing to take everything, all my expressions of love, somewhere else. There was no cheating on me. Why? Because I'm now the victim to you and I'm unwilling to put myself there as a human being. I will not put myself at the effect of you. You make your own choices. One of my choices, by the way, was to be in a relationship with you. And when you're in a relationship with somebody, you are exposing yourself to the potentiality of someone doing something like that. It would be foolish for you to think that that's never going to happen. It might may well not happen. But it'd be foolish to think that's off the table for you. You should know that that [ __ ] is potentially on the table. So, therefore, your own experience of being alive, the pathways that you take, you're having a big say in it. So, the notion of love when you're fully expressed of your love, right? And that's I I was able to write a lot of this because of what I got from my relationship with my mom. I I really realized like whatever she was going to do was just what she was going to do and it was my choice to love her or not. But if I started to say, "Well, if you do that, then I'm going to be this way." Then it's no longer fully fledged love. It's like a version. In fact, it's even manipulative. Like, I love you, but don't do that. If you do that, I won't. You know what I mean? Like, so at this real like if I want to be a loving mom, I'm just going to have to go for it. And and part of being a loving human being is it what's also on the table is something called disappointment. It's part of the deal. You can't, you know, you can't walk into Starbucks and not smell coffee. Right? You can't It's part of the deal. It's going to be stupid to walk into Starbucks and be like, "Oh my gosh, what's that smell?" Like, you know, it's Starbucks, right? It's coffee. It's not You're not going to go in there and be like, "Oh, I really thought it was going to be like an oil refinery in here." Right? No, it's Starbucks. So love's like that. When you walk in in love, or rather when you express love for a human being, you have to realize part of that is disappointment. Or you might even end up resorting to anger or frustration. But that's only because at some level, if you look, there was something I mean, I think I think it was Well, I mean, there's been some great um quotes about love. Rumi and, you know, Gandhi and like just what it truly is. I I believe I want to say this is like a Japanese proverb, but I can't I'm not going to put any money on it, right? But um when you truly love, you can never be hurt. And that's [ __ ] hard to be with. Like, you're like, "Whoa, what?" But when you And And to me that kind of love is you only ever only ever really hear about it from like, you know, monks or something. Like, they'll love another or they'll they'll give their life for love. And to me that's the all-encompassing nature of love. And that as human beings what we've done is we have brought these things in that focus it and filter it and and many ways block it. And if you really want to have love in your life, you have to realize you're not a receiver of that thing, you're the broadcaster. It's coming out of you. And you get to say. You get to be expressive of your love with another or not. But if you're not being expressive of your love for another, stop leaning on the notion that it's them. And really accept that it's this is me. And you know, one of the things that I'm I'm out to do and I'm I'm really looking at this for a for one of my future books is the notion of loving another is your agreement with yourself. It's not your agreement with that. In fact, when you're buying into the notion of loving another you got to really relate to it like this is what I'm up to as a human being. And I might choose to not love you. You might do things or say things that I feel as if go against what I value you as a human being. But I should also be cognizant of that I could continue to love you. But I'm choosing not to. Like I'm I'm now choosing to this is that I'm going another path. Therefore, I'm not in some world of like you cheated on me. I'm in a world of like this is who I am, this is what I value. You're free to be the whatever way you are. And I know this sounds idealistic and I'll give it to people in a way that's really usable. But that you're free to be who you are. But if there's a point in my life that I'm just like I'm not a match for that then I'm owning my change of direction. I'm not going to blame it and you, I'm saying I'm taking this somewhere else. Love in a relationship is your opportunity to express something, not get something. And I and I and I I love that I'm on the hook for the love in my life. I really [ __ ] do. Like I love it and I love when I'm tested. When I say I'm tested, I mean my bullshit's tested, you know? I love when it gets tested cuz I'm like, oh, I so want to just like, oh, you right? But then I I do, I remind myself that I'm a loving man. I guess it's who I am and and I'm I'm unwilling to change or give up on the integrity of that for some passing emotional quirk. Dude, I love that. That that is uh the perfect place to tap out. Where where can people find more about you and broadcasting love and not self-sabotaging and becoming wise as [ __ ] Yeah, so I mean obviously my books are available everywhere you would find uh books. Um I do all my own audio books. So if you want to sit and listen to somebody mangle that has Scottish and American accent, um you might want to give those a listen. And you can find me on my website uh garyjohnbishop.com. But also, you know, I'm active on Twitter and I'm very active on Instagram. And I'm and I'm even out there, you know, with my new podcast which is out there called Unfuck Nation. And uh and it's it's not an interview platform, it's actually an opportunity for me to just rant once a week. Just rant at people and rant at the world and and and and give people, you know, what I've got to the best of my ability in such a way that it makes a difference for them. I love it. Dude, thank you so much for coming on. This is so much fun. I really enjoyed your book. Um I'm sure other people will. The no [ __ ] style is is a breath of fresh air. Uh so thank you for all of that. Everybody, if you haven't, be sure to dive into his world. And speaking of things that if you haven't done, you should, be sure to subscribe here. And until next time, my friends, be legendary. Take care. All of the experiences that I've had or all the experiences that you have, your idea of Tom is just this vast collection of narratives that you've constructed around your own experiences.