[Music] Hey fellow GNTers, those of us who like our spirituality with a twist. So Daniel and I are back um just based on like events in the world at large. We made the decision to do some episodes where we're going to talk about the psychology of cults. And this is the second one that Danny and I recorded. though Daniel Daniel you know you did another one where you were talking about people's experiences within this and so you had conversation with that too. So you know we're not a political podcast you know but um you know we're trying to respond to the events in the world and present things that maybe help make sense of things for people. So that's our Yeah. And uh so we started off really talking about the psychology of cults and we're going to try to talk through it in kind of three big ideas. you know, we like to do these little series trying to make this a little educational. So, um, we're really under the subject matter of conformity and looking at conformity as kind of a part of like Halt psychology and going deep into sort of like the psychology of conformity. Um, and then the other big idea that comes up is social co cohesion, which is sort of like a sociology term we're going to do. And then eventually we're going to talk about the charismatic power of the divine leader, which just makes one laugh given the present circumstances. But um, we're doing uh, you know, the psychology of conformity part now. Um, just as a disclos full disclosure, I am like full COVID positive, so you'll be able to get to enjoy my COVID voice throughout the this episode. It's sexy though. You gotta be honest. You know what I'm saying? I figured like I had to record while co voice was going. Not only are you you're sex positive and co positive right now, Eric. So, yes, I got all the positives. You got all the positives, man. You're I got the negative positives and the positive positives. Take a take a while. Get it while it's hot. Yes. And while your temperature is up. while your temperature is up and everything else. Yes, that's right. Before the barriers go up, everything might close off. Get everything while the getting's good. Who the [...] Grab everything you can. Um, so to speak. All right. Um, so we're talking about the next big Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The usuals. The usuals. So, um, at the beginning of every episode, it's my responsibility now. Thanks to Daniel reminding me that we gota remind you to like do all the things everyone always asks you to do. Like, subscribe, and uh helps everybody out with the algorithm, including us. And we're definitely trying to break out of the conformity of the algorithm to escape the cult uh to get our G&T stuff out there. So, if you can do that, that would be greatly appreciated. And without further ado, I guess we're talking about the wise and types of conformity. Okay. So, this is, you know, kind of an interesting little subp part of this whole thing. It has to do with like trying to understand like why people conform and there's like kind of two big ideas here that come up. Um and I don't know what I think about I certainly don't know what I think about one of them. So I'll be curious to hear your opinion Daniel. So the one thing is this idea of what they call umformational influence and conformity or sometimes they'll call itformational social conformity. Um the idea that people conform because they want to feel like they're correct. M and it's one of the pressures and this one gets presented in kind of a like a mixed way. In some ways it's presented like a little bit positive almost like well isn't that a reasonable thing to do that you want to go through and you know con you know confide with others that's the right word or at least you know kind of share your opinions with others maybe come to a more joint shared opinion that might be more accurate. This gets a little bit more TLC as being positive. I'm not sure what I think about that, but the stuff that we looked at last episode, we had talked about um this uh really interesting Turkish social psychologist. Yes. This uh Mutafer Sharief. And they were looking at this sort of kind of visual illusion effect where the dots still but just because of the way the eye works, it kind of creates this idea that the dots moving around. And they were asking people to kind of say how much they thought the dot was moving. And everyone had their own answers until eventually every everyone coalesed on this answer they agreed upon. The irony being that there's no accurate accurate information to get out of that. Right. It's all they're all wrong. Not ain't moving at all. It's all an illusion. That's the most Buddhist [...] ever by the way. It's an illusurary dot moving and we all eventually decide that it's moving a certain way and it was kind of fascinating. So you can check out more of that episode if you want to hear more about that. But by the end of it, what's so interesting is that, and this has to do with like establishing social norms within a group with conformity too, which was once people started to agree on this, even when they showed people the optical illusion a year later, they still saw it the same way, which was the closure of last episode. And you I both agree it's like that's kind of trippy and kind of genius. So, thank you, Professor Share. So I guess that's the part that I'm not sure about you know uh again a lot of times in the psych literatur literature it's presented a little bit more positive because you can see it in the context of like the sciences or you know you have like the sa and your spiritual practice and people share ideas and maybe you come to shared understandings and obviously there can be positives around that but even like the study itself like has that weird illusurary quality and I suppose when you get to the problem of like cult psychology which is our interest. But then you have this problem of like okay people want to feel that they're right and they're coalesing their opinions with others. But you know there's it's partially like the Buddhist part of it is it's partially illusurary. The dot isn't moving at all or a lot of the ideas might not really be based on anything. Right. Mhm. Um either in that deeper kind of Buddhist philosophical sense or maybe more in the like it won't hold up but we all want to feel that we're right so we start like coalesing around something. I'm not sure what I think about that. Do you have thoughts about that problem? I don't know. It's a nuance to me. Yeah. I think [Music] um people do that as a as a natural tendency for I mean I know we mentioned it earlier but like social cohesion, right? I know we talk about conformity, but I think they're one of the same. So, you're looking to build consent, you know, I guess consensus building is on on one hand is something that people are looking to do. Generally speaking, it's hard to it's it's almost against one's nature to be uh anti to someone else's beliefs unless you know you're entering into a debate where someone is holding opposite views and you're either trying to oneup them or prove them over to your point. Um uh while we you know while we were kind of talking about this, I I was looking this up and um I I wanted to see what the Bible had to say about this. Um Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so it says it uh in um Galatians 1:10 states that am I now trying to win the approval of human beings or God? Am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ. And I find that interesting because that is that is a direct reference to being authentic. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Which I think at least from an you know from a relative outsider to this like Judeo-Christian culture. I mean I am I am and I'm not. But that that doesn't seem to you know that that's not conformity. That's not preaching conformity. But when you think about something at least in my mind when I think about uh so not sociology but like society Christianity these sort of like monoliths that you it's almost inherent that you have to have conformity you have to have a uni uniform viewpoint on things in order to fit into the group because ultimately what are we talking about I'm going to take the anthropological view as I often do that this is a survival mechanism and that having having a conformed belief would keep you on the in crowd which would keep you and your genetic line of beings safer and not ostracized i.e. not kicked out of the small group or tribe and have to live on your own if you could even do that and therefore make you uh have you give you an opportunity to be more genetically successful, right? Be able to produce offspring and then and then see those offspring grow to produce offspring. An evocation. Yes. Yes. Yes. And so to me that that screams of that right there that you will seed something in order to make nice nice with those around you. Especially when the numbers and we talked about it last episode, but this kind of like tipping point is around 30% 33% or so. Once you start and that kind of yielded itself when you talked about in previous episode the some of the test scores that were coming up. it was right around that 25 30% mark where they started to have um they started people started to change their minds and go against what they had thought previously you know they started right so because they were like oh well all these other people believe this thing I guess I should believe it too and so they would they suspend their own judgment in order to fit in and that is a very detrimental uh from a from today's view or from our view I could say that's a detrimental place to be because you're essentially becoming a martyr really you're not you're not being authentic. You're not being yourself. You're fitting in at the cost of your own self. However, you're martyring your own authenticity or something like that. Exactly. Exactly. But from today's view, if you are trying to fit in because you feel isolated, which more and more people really co co uh accelerated the isolationist experience of modern humans that you want to feel a sense of community. And so what are you willing to do? Well, you are absolutely willing to um adhere things that you might you adhere to things that you might not wholeheartedly believe in order to fit in that group of people who share many views with you but maybe not all of them. And what I will say in conclusion to this is that like sometimes it's those cracks within your um coherence with those around who you are trying to keep around you or you're trying to work to get in that that are not cracks. Those are seeds and those are seeds that are actually wanting to grow that are trying to show you something. And if you don't give them the air that they need because you're worried about being viewed as being different or that you might end up being an outsider, then you're killing your own authenticity. You're killing the thing that you are that is is trying to be heard, if that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I got like a like this kind of sparked different things in my mind. On the one hand, I suppose we probably should do some evocych thing off in the offing because I got to really think what I think about that towards the end personal even. You know what I mean? Yeah. And that might be thoughtprovoking for other people too because I Yeah. That's something that's a homebased place for you and I don't know what I totally think about that in terms of spiritual stuff. So, it's something I have to really think through. Mhm. The Jesus thing is really interesting because we did an episode a bit ago, probably sometime last year where um it's the stuff from I can't remember if it's Luke or whatever it is, but I was we were kind of doing stuff around um similar questions because we talk about these things, but there's a part one of the Japanese um sort of Zen influence philosophers was referencing there's the whole like meeting the Buddha, killing the Buddha, meeting your mother, killing your mother, that whole vibe. Right. Yeah. And there's a part in one of the gospels where Jesus says things like, "Unless you hate your mother, your father, your family, this and that, you're not going to be able to follow me." Yeah. So, I don't know. It raises kind of like for us as a psychosspiritual podcast like you know what, like, you know, we we wrestle with these questions a lot. Yeah. And I'm like, I'm still, you know, they're fascinating to me. I suppose I know what I think in a lot of ways, but maybe I don't know what I think about in every way around this. So now um the uh okay well I guess it leads into if you want to go we can go to the next one of these real quick. Let's do it. So which would be the idea of uh normative influence and conformity. So they kind of try to divide this up. It gets into both the things you're saying about you're talking about Daniel. One side being sort of people you know just want to have feedback to know that they're right but maybe that can go wrong. It can go you can try to be right but go so wrong in you know the ways that we were talking about the other part is the what you were getting to from the side of like people are just afraid and there's a fear around nonconformity. So this is sort of more like normal they call it normative influence and conformity or sometimes normative social influence where it's just kind of acknowledged people fear the negative consequences of not conforming. Mhm. And what's weird in these psych studies, and that was the one where we did the Ash study in the first one we referenced with this, which is just trying to like see if you can get people to say that, you know, you show them a line and you show like three other lines and it's obvious that, you know, two of the lines are the same and the other one two of the lines are the same and the other two and the other group don't match. And you see if you can pressure people into saying something obviously not true, right? And that's what we were doing last time. And that one is, you know, just the fear of having to like step out. And I guess, you know, part of the question that comes up with it that's hitting me now, so co brain, but you know, this idea like do you have to go through and eventually say like, okay, I'm not going to like do what these other folks say to be a spiritual person because there a lot of spirituality like the quote you're having from uh the gospels that talk that way. Yeah. Right. And it's you know what what totally that means is a deep question and we've done obviously Buddhist and tantra questions around this too but you know there's this fear and you know uh and they describe this sort of like fear of rejection on the one hand like what you're talking about from the ego psych perspective you know you're afraid of getting rejected by the group but there might be even some instinctual fear at the core of that right also fits into like sort of our attachment theory episodes in the weird way to my life too because there's fear in that right yep you you know that's deep and then this desire to be liked the other side of this you know so you're in this situation where you know these are the two things that motivate people and in the aftermath of that whole line study thing by this psychologist researcher Ash um that's what people say so there's a certain awareness they have like yeah I knew I wasn't saying [...] that was true you know I knew that on some level I was conforming just to conform when I was cracking just to get along with the rest of the group, you know, who are all again like just the the setup people in the study, right? And uh so people seem to realize that on some level, you know, which is interesting. It's not entirely like something that they're dissonant about. And it's interesting to know what that entirely means too, you know, but that's part of the picture of it. And as I kind of went further, you know, against sort of standard social psych stuff, there's a real problem that people will overrate their individualism. So people will think they're more individualistic than they actually act. It's sort of psych research kind of stuff. That one always piques my curiosity, too. And you and I have had conversations about this because I think your gut level reaction about American culture is it's very individualistic or at least the idea of individualistic or and that can be multiple things that could mean people are isolated. Yes. Right. In which case you would try to cling to others in a conformity way so you don't feel so alone. Oh that's the other thing I was going to say co brain you know when you were talking earlier there was one of the guys who was talking about breaking out and he called it a cult. So he went, "I broke out of the MAGA cult." And so they have this thing that's I can't remember the name of this whole organization, but it's something like that, breaking out of MAGA or whatever, right? And you know, again, we're just being blunt. A lot of these things are just cults, no matter what your pertilical perspective is. For sure. Yeah. And um so you know, and he was saying like it was, you know, it's that that fear of loneliness and that fear of isolation, right? Those things that you were referencing. So yeah, and so people feel that kind of stuff obviously and uh and so that's kind of the social isolation part maybe of American culture, but I always have a like a gut level sort of thing that American culture has a lot of conformity to it. I tend to see it from that perspective and I don't know what you think about that, but I tend to see it as a very kind of conformist culture and not so individualistic. So but I don't know what you think about that. Well, the idea of put in that way I don't know the idea of individualism is sold as an inherent aspect of this place. I call it a culture. I think it just this area, you know, but I think that's what's being sold. That's what's that's one of the mantras. Uh but I believe that to be a paper tiger, you know. Okay. Okay. We're probably closer than what we think about that. Yeah. Yeah. I I think that's the idea or the ideal perhaps better stated but not in practice not necess not anymore anyways you know maybe it was whatever however long ago but the the sides have really shor up much of the uh sort of juicy middle if you will talk about in the political sense too. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, of course, individuals on a one-on-one basis when you remove them from their setting are going to have different views because they're not going to be around others who are upholding aspects of their ideology for them, you know, where they have to fit in. Uh, so you might find you probably will find more cohesion between people who have different beliefs on a one-on-one level because of this idea of conformity. to be honest, you know, like you're going to look for things that you agree upon when there's nothing else around you. When the structure is is taken away, you will often find and as I do when I have conversations with people, we agree far more than we disagree. Yes, we have some disagreements on how to do this or how to do that, but most people that I talk to are into, you know, we'll say social safety nets and whatever, you know, but then if you look at maybe their what the policies that they back, they're against it, but when you talk to them individually, irony and like that disconnect between those two things, right? Yeah. Totally. So, it's just like it doesn't it doesn't make a lot of sense. So I think what I would you know what I would say on you know as to all of this is like there's two pieces to this one is duality and when someone some it feels better to be right than to be wrong i.e. duality, right? Good and bad, light and dark, right and wrong. It feels better to be right. And when there's other people around you who are right, quote unquote right, you have the sense of wanting to be uh in co in coherence with them. So that's one. I guess I find that to be like the dangerous instinct about thatformational part of this. Yes. Right. You know, there's a like it's presented kind of positive, but I see there's a real danger there because of that desire to want to be right. Yes. you know eventually we all agree on what the dot the illusurary dot is doing right so I it's it go again like this part interests me because again presented kind of positive but there's an underlying danger in that for sure yeah okay cool then the other part is um conditioning you know so we talk about non-dual non-duality and really finding a place of seeing through the illusory nature of reality i.e be the duality of reality, right? On a on a macro level and then moving down to the micro level, it's it's overcoming duality within oneself to be able to say like right, wrong, whatever. There is a path here that that is going to not make either one happy because it's going to challenge their views. Okay, fine. But when you do that, when you when you take that part, the challenging of others views and of your own views, which means you're not going to be a non-conformist, is that you have to then in uh intentionally challenge your conditioning. So what I'm saying in a in a specific sense, not even necessarily in like this esoteric sense, although it is esoteric simultaneously because we could speak both. Um, you have to be willing to say things that might ostracize you or that might bring about the feelings of shame momentarily because your views don't fit with someone else's views. But if you hold them wholeheartedly, even if you're quote unquote wrong, if you can work through the layers that got you to that place of uh we'll say incorrectedness in, you know, of non being non-correct, whatever correct is in the case of this study, like these two lines are the same. They're not different. Then you will be able to to at that point if you care to work backwards and learn where your mistake was. And now that has become beneficial for you because you you can show your work like our teacher like our math teachers in high school or grade school wanted us to show your work. Why? So they could so you could find out where you were incorrect and then now you can learn and be correct quote unquote correct moving forward. But if we don't do that, well then a you're stuck in duality. So then either you're right or you're wrong and there's no difference. I.e. you're with us or against us. There is no middle ground number one. So you're you're kind of [...] at this point, right? Right? Cuz you're dealing with deep feelings of being in or out of the tribe in this case and being isolated if you're out and being accepted and loved if you're in, right? Or at least those are our instincts. And then number two, working against the layers of conditioning that teach us that this is the way to be, right? Because independence and individual individuality, even though they are, you know, what I would believe to be like core American ideals or ideas in practice, you have to go against the grain when the grain is at its grainiest in order for you to find out who you are and who is your authentic person. But that is very difficult for people because you're going to have to be you're going to have to confront shame and isolation simultaneously sometimes in order to be able to do that. And you have to stand firm in that and be who you are. And that is not an easy thing to do. It is far easier far easier to say these two lines are the same even though they're blatantly different, you know. And so moving just one macro level to like, you know, the idea of the cults and politics in particular in this in this case, can you agree with some people and then have disagreements disagreements with them and and do that in multiple places? You know, that's that's the hard part. Very difficult, right? very difficult to do. Very difficult to do. And then who you surround yourself with and and how you carry yourself. Can you, you know, can you shake hands with somebody after you have a conversation about things? Can you can you find common grounds, but can you also agree to disagree? And there's nothing wrong with that. This is hard for people to do because in this day and age, you know, especi, you know, not political, but like we're talking kind of politics at the moment. Many many people have a very hard time admitting mistake political or even in in on a normal level. It's very hard. It goes back to the underlying feeling like I want to be right from like the first problem. Correct. Correct. You want to look at the problem with that. There it is. And then I thought I they don't do it all the time, but I'll probably pop some notes down for us show notes on like the whole problem of cognitive dissonance at some point because they didn't in they don't always include it here, but it has to be talked about. But for future Yeah. Well, I mean, as far as the psych research goes, this Ash with the lines study guy eventually got well, okay, is there a legit fear to like uh be out of step psych research wise with the crowd? not too surprising with the answer which is like Yeah. Y so in general, you know, he went further to look into this and he said, "Yeah, people tend to dislike, reject, or laugh at non-conforming people." Yeah. And then it takes a lot to be able to kind of do that. I guess that's the irony. I guess you can't just blame it on Americans or something, but I guess there's the the contrast of the imagery. I know what you're saying. a lot of like the American like uh you know advertising culture and all that you know there's that weird play of like the individualism and then like I don't know there's always these sort of weird dynamics within that I I'm in an independent individual look at me rock and then the other part is like I got my whole tribe around me and we're all going out to the club or something you know it's always like that where we're all fam you know it's like that kind of thing it's like those there's always those tensions in there but again maybe because of, you know, what we're doing in terms of like spiritual stuff underneath the surface like Jesus was talking about or these Zen masters, whoever, there's always this need to like to be able to assert one's own spiritual individuality. So, Eric, so this is there there is one. So, I don't have I've never had a Twitter or whatever it's called now. I don't care. Um, why why is that the case? Because when you go on Twitter or whatever it is called, you know what you're supposed to do? Follow people. Yeah. And you know what I'm not going to do? Follow no [...] body. Nobody. one guy, I remember I was trying to get a job at this at this place and they sold like very high-end medical and fitness equipment and they one of the people who uh I don't know she was a CFO of this company um was a client of mine when I was teaching boot camp and so I would go over there and use their equipment and bring people and and try you know I had some investors and I was trying to make deals happen and whatever and the CEO was like oh yeah you know you should uh follow me on Twitter and I was like I'm not following you anywhere. I I didn't know what it was at the time. And he's like, "No, no, no. It's like an online platform, like whatever. You know, you just you sign up and then you could follow people." And I was like, "I'm not following anybody anywhere." The last person I said that I would follow was my drill sergeant. And I meant that I would follow that person. Other than that, I'm not following anybody anywhere under any circumstances. I don't even like to follow directions. I intentionally make wrong turns when I'm on when when I'm using I can testify that because Daniel and I will like go through some description of something and Daniel like the mic will go on. He'll talk some other [...] has nothing to do I'm teasing it's a joke but you know you like to do things in that independent way. That's your charm, right? Yeah. That's who you are. Yeah. Uh all right. Well, I guess we can go on to the the last piece of this and this episode. Yeah. Um, so there's a the last part is sort of this private and public elements of this and that kind of ends this little section and the next time we're going to talk about the Stanford prison experiment for sure. Oh, that that that is Yes. Yes. I'm familiar. Yeah. So, um, so there's like this is also shown like sometimes they'll say like external conformity versus internalization. So there certainly can be the situation where people will kind of show like a public conformity but hold their own views inside you know and that's something to think about you know what that totally means. I'm still debating that too. I obviously have some notes for myself for like what are the dangers of that somehow, right? Cuz it's like we were saying before, you still won't challenge anything. Mhm. So [...] will still go along. And then there's the whole issue of like private, you know, uh but private conformity, which means that people change their own internal views. So the research around that and that was part of the stuff with the guy with the illusurary dot, our guy, Professor Sharief, you know, basically saying that people were kind of changing their internal norms. They just flipped, right? And they deeply internalized, right? Um the other part, the line experiments were more based on the idea like, yeah, okay, I know on some level that those lines don't match, but I'm going to like show the public face, right? And so, um, you know, that's kind of the idea. I suppose the question that I had with this in terms of like this last little bit of like cult psychology is, you know, what's really happening within those spaces, right? To what extent are these things where people are publicly expressing things that they don't truly believe inside? Right. or to what extent are we talking about things where the internal gears are already sort of reworked, right? And you know, in listening to some people talk about what it's like to be now, we're talking about not cult like the big picture sense, but like cults in the more narrow definition, right? Like I was listening to um Oh, I mentioned her name last week, Professor Stain. Um, she pronounces it stain st i n. But okay, all right. Whatever floats your boat. But because I always say, "Professor Stain, that sounds like a villain from like some old Batman thing or something." Um, but in any case, she was talking about this and this that feeling of like internal tension, right? This idea that, okay, we can talk about two ideas that these experiments try to show. One is this idea of like, okay, I don't really believe this, but I'll do this for the outward face of this. that still may be dangerous because I'm still not willing to challenge things. Okay. But then this idea that okay, maybe my own own internal things are completely changed. But in the cult setting as things start to like become disjointed right all the tension that that creates right that a certain point I suppose there's this experience of like okay you know to what extent am I showing just the public face of something I don't really believe or to what extent do I really make myself believe this somehow which got me to think about the cognitive dissonance dissonance aspect how this starts to crumble and you know we're watching this again we're doing this partially for political reasons we're watching this. We don't know when people are going to be listening this episode and we're not going to tie it up to the local politics of the week or something like that for this. But, you know, we're we're making this in 2025, folks. So, you know, there's a lot of [...] going down where there's going to be a lot of tension for people to have to try to like figure this out again, right? Yeah, for sure. So, I know you got any like other thoughts about any of that kind of stuff, that tension between public and private that you've been talking about that a lot. Yeah, I mean I think if you are doing any kind of regular reflection, self-reflection, it's going to be more difficult the internal cognitive dissonance to how you think and believe internally. And then as that manifests externally into your words and your deeds, they're not, at least for me, I'm just speaking for myself at this point. That's going to be much more difficult. Like things that I don't believe are going to have a harder time leaving my mouth than if I was not if I didn't have a an aspect of myself that was deeply internally reflective because I would be like this is highly inongruent with what I am thinking. And you know maybe people who are listening to this that you know if you say oh I wouldn't I would never give up my principles for X Y or Z. Okay, maybe you wouldn't, but man, lots of people do. I mean, there's a whole study that shows people who do that. And it's like that's the trouble with individualism. People overrate the willingness that they're going to have to do that, right? So, you'd be surprised, but you know, history shows time and time again, citizens of many countries and cultures are willing to accept dastardly things. I mean, you you know, you it's Yeah. I mean, it's it's easy to say on your own, but then once you what when you get around other people who are saying they're shouting the same things, are you going to be the one who is gonna are you willing to to accept shame and potential victimization, you know, because of your beliefs? I I'm not I'm not sure. I think the answer is yeah, you know, like you'll fit in. And in in today's world, there is just I just think that we're so isolated. We're looking for places to plug in and make community and it's harder and harder to do in person. So, we find up more kind of community online and it just easier to uh to be absorbed into those things and then your your internal uh talk changes and then here we are. Yeah. Because you get to the attachment theory part too because the guy was talking about of course you have the public and the private face. These two studies are trying to capture that, right? Yes. uh optical illusion ash a Ash ash uh doc professor uh shafir is that his name I'm forgetting yeah yeah so you know his uh thing of like okay now we've really changed your norms internally right yes you're not going to see this dot the same way again so to reevaluate to re realize that dot still I'm going to have to break something in myself to resee what that thing really is and that's a certain challenge right and then the other part is the public facing part which presumably builds up because you want to like uh conform because of things of fears and and afraid of being disliked and like you're talking about eosych things, attachment issues and so on, you know, and then when you get to the extremes of being imshed in something that eventually you're going to have to see like, oh man, this [...] ain't true. Yeah. It's going to take those I guess you're breaking part of that illusion of the dot, right? Mhm. Then you're also going to have to deal with that other side of this this pressure of like, oh [...] now that I'm thinking this, I'm I'm not going to be able to leave this believe this anymore. Right. Right. Uh now I'm really risking all of this psycho emotional attachment theory [...] Yes. I'm in serious trouble. And you know the guy who was you know sharing his own experience of like again his framing a manga as a cult. Okay. Mhm. And at some point he was saying, you know, that was hard because it was like this was sort of my alternative family, right, in this community and now I'm risking all the it's not even strangers obviously then in those studies with the lines, you don't know those people. They don't mean anything to you, right? You start start raising the ante on these things and all of a sudden you're talking to people that you have these deeper emotional bonds with that you're going to have to challenge. So, all right. Well, to be continued, we'll go through and do Stanford prison stuff, right? Unless you I mean I didn't mean to cut that off, Daniel. I'm sorry. Any more you want to say about that stuff or we can't No, it just it just gets I was just going to say to you know where you were here. It get the stakes raise the stakes get raised when the people around you have more meaning to you than just rando strangers, right? Yeah. Then it's attachment theory stuff, right? Yeah. And now right now you've gone from and that's why the attachment theory stuff is really it's so important. You know it really is because your bonds with one other person you're you know your the the connection to you and your community is just the bonds between you and one other person amplified in all in a 360°ree uh way. And it makes it very difficult for change when you have the pressure of the relationship on top of you because now you have to deal with disappointment of the other person to you. You, you know, then then your own issues are going to come up. Are you abandoning them? Do you feel like you're hurting them? Are you disappointing them? All those things are they put pressure on you to conform, to fit in, to say the right thing, to make it nice, right? To people please essentially. and that there's a lot of pressure on that, you know, to do to be to be the the the right one. And it's not it's not easy. Uh but again, the the the solution because sometimes we don't always give solutions. This this is not the solution. This is a solution is to have, you know, you can call it a moral compass if you want to. I think that's a bit more ambiguous term, but I'm going to say uh a practice of self-reflection, you know, to really have a mechanism of understanding what is coherent within yourself and then be willing to stand on stand on, you know, as as the kids say, stand out business, you know, like you really you got to be able to do that [...] you have to keep it 100 like that's you know because if not then you're going to be yielding yourself in the process and over time it's going to be much harder to get those things back because the emotional ties that you're going to have is not going to just be with one person it's going to be with a multitude of people. So breaking out the layers of conditioning is really important which goes back to our you know nine obstacles the one of family and responsibilities and the pressure of breaking out of those things. It's hard. It's a hard [...] thing, but that's the that's part of the left-handed path. I mean, that's this is the the the tantricas. This is the the yogis. This is the, you know, the the the roomies. These are the the people who live kind of like inside and outside of society because they don't necessarily fit in and they're viewed as strange because they don't do all the things everybody else does. But those are the ones who get remembered. Those are the those are the real individuals you know handfuls over billions and billions of people over the last however many thousands of years. So there are more than just what stories are written about. There's many many many free people in the world for sure even today enlightened totally beautiful human beings you know and uh my only thought by doing this by having these conversations is to ignite that [...] in whoever is listening to this. That's it. That's my goal. I got two reactions to it real quick before we pop out. But one is like I think I don't find fault in this part of the psych literature. I it's not like I think there's holes in it, but because that attachment theory part isn't included here. Yeah. That's something that I think is valuable to add, right? Like they have their place, right? Because they're showing human tendencies in these relatively innocuous settings, right? Yeah. But like so there's a neutrality there or something, right? uh you can see the human tendency hidden underneath those things that are still there. But I think that is something that we can add to this conversation or we're adding here. Yeah. You look at social psych books, it's not like they don't recognize that, but they're not necessarily talking about that. But that's a piece for sure. Right. And then the other part, I'm glad you said the things that you said because to me, I think what ends up being important then is to have what's helped me would be like having spiritual paths that I identify with that have that streak in them. Yeah. You know, and for me it started with Zen and it's very like no, you have to establish your own individual cognitive space. This is what has to happen. Yeah. Right. And then you know I think all the ones that ultimately I felt like I identified with whether it was Zen things or Dowist things or ultimately like the tantric things more than is tantra for us but all tantra has this like you have to establish your own internal space. Yeah. Right. And that's like core to the thing and maybe that is like to the extent there's a solution like that's a solution and then you can you can almost like reidentify in a way to say okay no I'm a zen dowist tantrica and this is what we do you know it gives you a different identity and you know maybe in the end you find a different kind of community too. Yes. Yeah. A kind of community that doesn't demand the same things from you. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. kind of community that that supports your individuality. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That it's hard to it's hard to do, but there it's out there and whatever you want is it's all out there. What we're trying to do here. Yeah. You know, I mean, we we did this retreat earlier, you know, and it wasn't like, you know, it's a retreat based on the idea like let's engage oursel in practice. We're all equals. We're all here. You know, we took on the roles of teachers for that retreat. But hey, we've been we've been students on plenty plenty more retreats than we have been teachers on them. Yeah. Well, that's true, too. But also like we're going to enter in this space with a sense of equality. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what we're trying to create like an equal spiritual space. Yeah. All right. Beautiful. I'm I'm in. All right. Sign me up. Let's go. Eric, as always, man, thank you so much for uh for for driving on the ship, man. I appreciate it. Audience, thank you so much for listening. Um you know, hit us up jinnantra@gmail.com. Uh definitely subscribe if you're not. Please. Uh does it does help us out. We do appreciate all those who do. And if you haven't yet, it cost you nothing. Do it. Do it right now or do it in a minute. You know what I'm saying? Share our work if you find it interesting. Uh you can uh slide in our DMs on the Graham at the Jin and Tantra podcast if you you know have any uh comments or anything else that you'd like to share. We always do love to hear from our audience. We've definitely done really some really wonderful episodes based on some questions or suggestions that our audience had. So we're definitely interactive, you know. So, jinantragmail.com or, you know, hit us up on the gram, the jinantra podcast. Uh, for Eric, this is Daniel. We'll catch you guys in the next one. Stay free. Peace. Peace.