The Myth of Simplicity and the Joy of Failing Forward

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John Larson is a revolutionary.

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He's a philosopher, a farmer, a podcaster,

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and he happens to be a

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former member of the Church

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of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

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When he was finally leaving post-Mormonism,

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I caught up with him on his

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last episode at the Mormon

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Stories podcast,

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where he told a story that

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I found to be really interesting.

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Here's what he had to say.

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How would you live today?

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And then suppose that I said,

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I'll give you a choice right now.

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Over here on the back of

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this property is a small

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kind of simple house.

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It's got a wood-fired fireplace,

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plenty of firewood.

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You'll always be warm.

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It's got a cooling system.

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It stays cool in the summer.

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There's plenty of basic staples around.

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There is just enough to eat.

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You have to put things together,

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but you'll never be hungry.

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There's a coat to keep you warm.

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There's a shade tree to keep you cool.

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There's some of your

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favorite books on the bookshelf.

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Nothing excessive.

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You really won't get to travel.

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but your needs will be met.

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And you can choose right now

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to go live in that shack.

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I think a surprising number

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of us would consider it and

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a surprising number of us

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would take it and say, you know,

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you're just going to fill

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out your days in simplicity

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and just do what you want

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to do through the day.

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You know,

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the chores will take you two

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hours a day and the rest of

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the time is yours.

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And I think many of us would choose that

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But of course the irony,

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and if you see where I'm

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going is you could choose that right now.

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There's nothing,

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the complexity of your life

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and the complexity of your

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relationships and the

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complexity of what you engage,

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what you read, what you listen to,

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what you think about is to a degree,

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your own choice.

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The,

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that the ideal life that we want to

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live is right there in front of us.

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We just refuse to pick it up.

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Um,

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There is a quote by John

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Steinbeck that says,

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now that you don't have to be perfect,

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you can be good.

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And I've applied this in my

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life to having left

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Mormonism where there is a

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strive to be this model of perfection.

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And for me,

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unshackled from that meant I

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could just pursue good in my life.

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And I have.

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And it makes me happy.

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It's almost the old atheist joke.

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which is how much rape do

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you engage in if God isn't

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going to stop you?

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And the answer is engage in

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all the rape that I want to,

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which is none.

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That I choose to do good

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things in the world because I like them.

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I like the result.

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I like how it makes me feel.

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So after hearing this little

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anecdote from John Larson,

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I decided to invite him on

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to the Midlife Revolution

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podcast to have a

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conversation about the simple life,

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the myths that exist there,

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and how we can achieve some

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simplicity by making some small changes.

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Welcome to the Midlife Revolution.

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hello beautiful human beings

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welcome to the midlife

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revolution i'm your host

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megan connor and today i am

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joined by the famous and

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illustrious and inimitable

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john larson thank you so

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much for joining me john

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hey you're welcome fame

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fame is it all right famous

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in the right places for the right reasons

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I think I'm more infamous.

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I think there's more people

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who would consider me to be

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a villain than a hero.

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You know, that's really possible,

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although we are all the

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villain in someone's story.

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If you're doing it right, you are a deed.

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You're not pissing somebody off.

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You're not trying hard enough.

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Exactly, exactly.

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And I would say that the

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more people who consider you a villain,

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I think the better,

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because then it means

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you're making people think.

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I hope so.

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Well, John,

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I will let you go ahead and

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introduce yourself.

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I know some things about you,

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but I certainly don't know

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everything about you.

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And I don't know the most

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interesting things, probably.

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So please tell us all about you.

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The most interesting things I never reveal,

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right?

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You never find those out.

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Let's see.

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How to introduce myself.

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I...

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My name's John.

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I live in the Pacific Northwest.

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I live in Willamette Valley,

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which is sort of halfway

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between Portland and Eugene

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and sandwiched between the

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Pacific Coast Mountains and

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the Cascade Mountains.

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We've been here for coming

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up on three years.

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We, my family and I,

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we lived in Salt Lake City

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in the suburbs of Salt Lake

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City for a long time.

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And when our youngest,

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my partner Kimmy and I have

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four children betwixt and

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amongst the two of us.

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And when the youngest was

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finishing high school,

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we had long decided that we

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didn't really like living

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in giant cities.

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And we also wanted to take a

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different approach to life.

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You talked about midlife crises,

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and we were talking about

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it a little bit before we started.

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Sometimes you look and say, wow,

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I looked at the path I've been on,

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what I was told to go on,

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what I thought I should be doing,

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and it ain't doing it so

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much for me anymore.

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Maybe it's time to look at something new.

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We did that,

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so we bought a small farm out here.

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Saturday, today, I was just out there.

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We harvested turnips this

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morning and strawberries

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and peas and radishes,

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which I fed to the bunny rabbits.

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You talked about fame.

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I'm most known for the podcast,

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Mormon Expression,

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and ran until 2014.

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It was popular in the ex-Mormon world,

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and there were a lot of

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Mormons who listened to it too,

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but they didn't like to admit it.

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And in 2014, I kind of stepped back.

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Well, I no longer hosted the show,

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but I would appear at

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conferences and blah, blah, blah, blah.

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And then this year in January,

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I was appearing on the big

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podcast in the ex-Mormon world,

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the disenfranchised Mormon world,

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the Mormon Stories podcast.

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I was a monthly contributor.

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And I announced,

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I told them that I was

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retiring from Mormonism.

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So I spent, I was a faithful Mormon, um,

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um,

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until about 2003 when I lost my faith

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in God first, actually.

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And then I kind of limped

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along for a couple of years,

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just trying to make it work.

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And then I went church last time, 2005.

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And then I became sort of a

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participant in the

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communities that form that

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help people transition out of, um,

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out of faith or in faith crises,

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did the podcasting and did all that.

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So that's the phase.

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And now I've kind of moved on.

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I'll talk to people about Mormonism.

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I don't follow it anymore

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and I don't research it.

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So I was really retiring

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from doing research that I said enough.

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So I'm in my post-

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post-Mormon phase.

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Actually,

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I did a podcast in 2014 about

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becoming a post-Mormon.

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So I think I'm in the post, post,

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post phase, let's say.

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Mormonism three times removed.

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Yes.

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Which is not quite enough.

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Well,

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there needs to be a couple more removes,

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but we'll get there.

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No, it's good.

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The longer I studied it,

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the longer I've been out

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and talking to other people in the world,

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the more Mormonism is just

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not unique to me.

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It was my experience,

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my lived experience where I

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spent a lot of energy.

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But unfortunately or unfortunately,

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the experience of Mormonism

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is quite common.

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um, as,

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as one of high demand religions

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kind of have cults, um,

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on the one end and cult, you know,

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you really don't believe anything.

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You just kind of believe

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whatever the leader tells you to.

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So it's very controlling.

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And then,

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then there's a continuum from

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that all the way down to, I don't know,

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um, your neighborhood watch.

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Um, and then, and,

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and so high demand

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religions are sort of

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cultured being cults.

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Uh, but they,

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they take a lot out of people and, um,

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and mess with their psychology,

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as it were.

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Is that the introduction you

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were looking for?

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Is there anything else you

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want me to talk about?

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No, that's excellent.

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That's great.

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And it gives me sort of an

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opening to what we're going

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to talk about today.

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So I found you, John Larson,

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listening to Mormon Stories podcast.

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I left the church

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For all of us,

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I think it's a gradual sort of thing,

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or most of us it is.

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For me,

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that process started in 2015 with

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the November exclusion policy.

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But I didn't really allow

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myself to look at truth

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claims until January of last year.

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And once I did that,

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it took me three days.

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I was done.

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Yeah.

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So I found you at Mormon

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Stories when I was going

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through my faith deconstruction.

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And I decided to start with the Mormon,

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I think it's called Mormon Discussions,

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that series that John

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Dillon does with Mike and some other,

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and Nemo and some various assorted.

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But I decided for me,

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being an analytical person,

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I wanted to pick apart

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every single truth claim

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from the beginning to the end.

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And I so I binged all of

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those episodes over the

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course of a few weeks and

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completely deconstructed

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all the way down to

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nihilism and then started

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to sort of basically build

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back some spirituality.

00:10:18.506 --> 00:10:20.347

Then I started thinking

00:10:20.387 --> 00:10:22.308

about doing a podcast.

00:10:23.808 --> 00:10:26.330

And I was trying to figure

00:10:26.370 --> 00:10:27.751

out what I wanted to focus on.

00:10:28.901 --> 00:10:31.162

And some of the people I talked to said,

00:10:31.382 --> 00:10:31.702

you know,

00:10:32.122 --> 00:10:33.802

your story of exiting Mormonism

00:10:33.822 --> 00:10:35.363

might be valuable in the space.

00:10:35.443 --> 00:10:36.123

And there aren't enough

00:10:36.263 --> 00:10:38.923

people talking about how

00:10:38.983 --> 00:10:40.704

hard it is to leave and how

00:10:40.764 --> 00:10:42.804

to rebuild spirituality after that.

00:10:43.805 --> 00:10:45.845

And I thought about that for

00:10:45.905 --> 00:10:46.585

several weeks.

00:10:46.965 --> 00:10:48.866

And then I thought, you know,

00:10:48.926 --> 00:10:50.326

I don't want to live there.

00:10:50.686 --> 00:10:52.487

That's not where I want to be.

00:10:54.347 --> 00:10:55.768

And I came to the conclusion

00:10:55.849 --> 00:10:58.511

that Mormons and ex-Mormons

00:10:58.571 --> 00:11:00.052

are on the same path.

00:11:00.573 --> 00:11:01.934

It's just a parallel path,

00:11:02.254 --> 00:11:03.095

and they're both going in

00:11:03.135 --> 00:11:04.056

the same direction.

00:11:04.977 --> 00:11:06.899

And I decided that I wanted

00:11:06.919 --> 00:11:08.040

to step away from that.

00:11:08.320 --> 00:11:09.901

And while I do still talk

00:11:09.961 --> 00:11:12.384

about my exit from religion and my faith,

00:11:12.544 --> 00:11:13.384

my loss of faith,

00:11:14.265 --> 00:11:15.926

um it's not the content that

00:11:15.946 --> 00:11:17.026

i want to focus on all the

00:11:17.066 --> 00:11:19.087

time and about a week after

00:11:19.147 --> 00:11:20.267

i made that decision i

00:11:20.627 --> 00:11:21.868

turned on mormon stories

00:11:22.028 --> 00:11:23.268

and there you were saying

00:11:23.308 --> 00:11:24.168

that you were done with

00:11:24.209 --> 00:11:29.170

being an ex-mormon so it's

00:11:29.210 --> 00:11:31.151

amazing how these things kind of line up

00:11:31.931 --> 00:11:35.153

And I did a podcast in the

00:11:35.193 --> 00:11:36.714

first season of my podcast

00:11:37.135 --> 00:11:38.836

called Satisfied,

00:11:38.856 --> 00:11:40.617

where I talked about the

00:11:40.677 --> 00:11:43.079

fact that most of us go

00:11:43.119 --> 00:11:44.480

through life never feeling

00:11:44.540 --> 00:11:46.041

satisfied with what we have

00:11:46.641 --> 00:11:47.802

because we've been

00:11:48.042 --> 00:11:49.463

programmed to sort of think

00:11:49.523 --> 00:11:51.904

that there's a scarcity of resources,

00:11:51.964 --> 00:11:54.206

a scarcity of time, a scarcity of people,

00:11:54.246 --> 00:11:54.266

a

00:11:57.191 --> 00:11:58.651

And how do we get to the

00:11:58.711 --> 00:12:00.712

place where we take what we

00:12:00.772 --> 00:12:01.592

have and we say,

00:12:01.632 --> 00:12:04.153

this is enough for me and

00:12:04.173 --> 00:12:05.373

I'm willing to live with

00:12:05.453 --> 00:12:06.833

exactly what I have and

00:12:06.873 --> 00:12:08.114

maybe even a little less.

00:12:09.214 --> 00:12:11.935

And right after that episode,

00:12:12.275 --> 00:12:14.475

I did an episode where I

00:12:15.756 --> 00:12:16.476

went through some of the

00:12:16.496 --> 00:12:18.396

concepts in Marie Kondo's book,

00:12:18.456 --> 00:12:20.597

The Magical Art of Tidying Up.

00:12:21.337 --> 00:12:21.637

Yes.

00:12:21.697 --> 00:12:23.097

Do you say goodnight to your

00:12:23.137 --> 00:12:24.038

bags before you hang them up?

00:12:24.618 --> 00:12:24.838

Yes.

00:12:27.421 --> 00:12:29.283

just completely i i got rid

00:12:29.303 --> 00:12:30.704

of so much stuff and i i

00:12:31.364 --> 00:12:32.585

found a great place to

00:12:32.645 --> 00:12:34.567

donate some some items to a

00:12:34.947 --> 00:12:36.989

women's shelter and i

00:12:37.089 --> 00:12:38.350

probably ended up with

00:12:38.590 --> 00:12:40.191

maybe a quarter of the

00:12:40.231 --> 00:12:41.352

amount of clothing that i

00:12:41.412 --> 00:12:43.734

had and i ended up with

00:12:43.854 --> 00:12:45.496

probably less than a

00:12:45.536 --> 00:12:46.657

quarter of the kitchen

00:12:46.777 --> 00:12:48.778

items that i had and i just

00:12:48.818 --> 00:12:49.939

went through my entire

00:12:49.979 --> 00:12:50.860

house and got rid of

00:12:51.060 --> 00:12:52.742

everything that was unnecessary

00:12:53.602 --> 00:12:56.145

and everything that was

00:12:57.106 --> 00:12:58.248

something I was holding on

00:12:58.288 --> 00:12:59.629

to for some future day.

00:12:59.729 --> 00:13:04.174

And I loved the idea of Marie Kondo saying,

00:13:04.675 --> 00:13:07.338

I thank you for your time in my life,

00:13:07.738 --> 00:13:08.700

purple shirt that I've

00:13:08.760 --> 00:13:10.241

never worn in three months,

00:13:10.502 --> 00:13:12.584

and I'm going to pass you

00:13:12.644 --> 00:13:13.505

on to the next person.

00:13:14.546 --> 00:13:15.667

And also, you know,

00:13:15.787 --> 00:13:16.788

even things that I'd been

00:13:16.848 --> 00:13:18.890

holding on to for sentimental value,

00:13:19.711 --> 00:13:19.971

you know,

00:13:20.031 --> 00:13:21.592

I got to hold the object in my

00:13:21.652 --> 00:13:22.673

hand and say,

00:13:22.693 --> 00:13:24.635

I love the memory of the

00:13:24.675 --> 00:13:26.596

time that my sister gave me this book.

00:13:26.756 --> 00:13:28.158

And I read it one time and I

00:13:28.198 --> 00:13:29.219

will never read it again.

00:13:29.279 --> 00:13:30.259

I'm going to pass it on to

00:13:30.299 --> 00:13:31.020

the next person.

00:13:31.100 --> 00:13:32.301

Thank you and goodbye.

00:13:33.602 --> 00:13:34.804

rather than holding onto it

00:13:34.844 --> 00:13:36.486

just because at the time I read it,

00:13:36.626 --> 00:13:37.668

it meant something to me.

00:13:38.469 --> 00:13:40.932

And that downsizing really

00:13:41.012 --> 00:13:42.134

created this profound

00:13:42.174 --> 00:13:43.976

revolution in me where I thought,

00:13:44.096 --> 00:13:44.997

you know, I don't,

00:13:45.258 --> 00:13:46.960

there are some times when I

00:13:47.000 --> 00:13:48.282

go out into the world

00:13:49.336 --> 00:13:51.557

And I don't particularly need anything,

00:13:51.637 --> 00:13:53.138

but I see something and I go, oh,

00:13:53.178 --> 00:13:53.919

that's kind of cool.

00:13:54.219 --> 00:13:55.480

I might like to take that home.

00:13:55.940 --> 00:13:57.421

And then I end up with more garbage.

00:13:57.921 --> 00:14:00.903

So I've had to shift my mentality from,

00:14:02.044 --> 00:14:02.344

you know,

00:14:02.884 --> 00:14:05.005

the consumerist society that we live in,

00:14:05.446 --> 00:14:06.366

where we just collect

00:14:06.426 --> 00:14:07.467

things for no reason.

00:14:07.607 --> 00:14:08.908

And we spend our resources

00:14:08.988 --> 00:14:09.948

on things that don't bring

00:14:09.988 --> 00:14:11.089

us any value at all.

00:14:12.375 --> 00:14:13.757

and thinking about the idea

00:14:13.797 --> 00:14:15.098

that what is valuable to me?

00:14:15.378 --> 00:14:16.660

The only thing that's really

00:14:16.720 --> 00:14:18.381

valuable to me right now is

00:14:18.441 --> 00:14:19.342

spending time with the

00:14:19.382 --> 00:14:20.203

people that I love.

00:14:20.643 --> 00:14:21.965

And how can I do more of that?

00:14:22.385 --> 00:14:22.565

Well,

00:14:22.625 --> 00:14:24.127

I can spend more of my resources

00:14:24.187 --> 00:14:26.008

doing that than collecting stuff.

00:14:26.789 --> 00:14:29.432

And so when I heard your

00:14:30.012 --> 00:14:31.393

exit from ex-Mormonism,

00:14:32.134 --> 00:14:34.116

And you gave a poignant and

00:14:34.156 --> 00:14:35.037

I think profound

00:14:35.097 --> 00:14:37.379

contemplation about living

00:14:37.459 --> 00:14:39.641

simply that made me really think.

00:14:39.701 --> 00:14:40.762

And that's the conversation

00:14:40.802 --> 00:14:41.583

I want to have today.

00:14:41.643 --> 00:14:42.944

So if you wouldn't mind

00:14:43.144 --> 00:14:44.886

recounting that for us,

00:14:44.946 --> 00:14:45.727

I would appreciate it.

00:14:46.848 --> 00:14:47.248

Sure.

00:14:47.508 --> 00:14:47.849

You know,

00:14:47.869 --> 00:14:50.731

you talk about sort of attachment

00:14:50.771 --> 00:14:52.953

to things and the pursuit of that.

00:14:52.973 --> 00:14:53.153

You know,

00:14:53.193 --> 00:14:55.315

the Buddha has a lot to say on this topic,

00:14:55.335 --> 00:14:55.536

right?

00:14:55.616 --> 00:14:55.796

Yeah.

00:14:56.587 --> 00:14:57.027

You know,

00:14:57.048 --> 00:15:03.551

you mentioned this mindset of scarcity.

00:15:04.091 --> 00:15:04.832

And, you know,

00:15:04.872 --> 00:15:06.713

for most of our evolutionary history,

00:15:06.733 --> 00:15:08.794

we live in a world that has

00:15:08.854 --> 00:15:09.874

changed so quickly.

00:15:09.894 --> 00:15:11.155

Our genetics haven't been

00:15:11.175 --> 00:15:11.975

able to keep up with it.

00:15:12.596 --> 00:15:15.758

And because focusing on that

00:15:15.818 --> 00:15:16.858

for a lot of religious

00:15:16.898 --> 00:15:20.340

people makes them feel like

00:15:20.380 --> 00:15:22.021

you're equating human beings to animals.

00:15:23.670 --> 00:15:28.092

which I think is a useful construction,

00:15:28.152 --> 00:15:29.872

but a lot of religious

00:15:29.892 --> 00:15:31.093

people find that very offensive,

00:15:31.153 --> 00:15:32.954

so it gets subdued.

00:15:32.974 --> 00:15:35.095

I was just looking at a list

00:15:35.295 --> 00:15:36.395

of the books that are going

00:15:36.415 --> 00:15:39.376

to be banned in Texas right away,

00:15:39.436 --> 00:15:41.217

and the topics, you know,

00:15:41.237 --> 00:15:43.258

as they went and redlined textbooks and

00:15:44.014 --> 00:15:46.315

And it's just the stuff that

00:15:46.395 --> 00:15:47.835

would get us a better

00:15:47.875 --> 00:15:48.635

understanding of what it

00:15:48.735 --> 00:15:49.835

actually means to be human

00:15:50.035 --> 00:15:51.756

is systematically stomped out.

00:15:52.516 --> 00:15:52.776

Well,

00:15:53.376 --> 00:15:58.037

that desire to solve problems and

00:15:58.237 --> 00:16:04.759

fill scarcity is, you know,

00:16:04.799 --> 00:16:05.759

you implied that it's sort

00:16:05.799 --> 00:16:07.119

of like conditioned into us.

00:16:07.159 --> 00:16:08.760

And I think that's true to a degree,

00:16:09.280 --> 00:16:10.820

but it really is us.

00:16:11.060 --> 00:16:12.501

That's what we evolved to do.

00:16:14.203 --> 00:16:14.864

You know,

00:16:15.284 --> 00:16:16.985

most humans through most time

00:16:17.025 --> 00:16:18.686

have suffered from calorie deficiency.

00:16:18.726 --> 00:16:20.808

That was their biggest problem.

00:16:21.568 --> 00:16:22.609

So, you know,

00:16:22.649 --> 00:16:24.310

you have a lot of people walking around.

00:16:24.350 --> 00:16:25.571

I just read recently that

00:16:25.831 --> 00:16:27.312

over 70% of the United

00:16:27.352 --> 00:16:29.574

States would be considered overweight.

00:16:30.454 --> 00:16:31.135

And, of course,

00:16:31.155 --> 00:16:32.736

there's something else going on there,

00:16:33.276 --> 00:16:33.676

clearly,

00:16:33.736 --> 00:16:35.398

because not every country is

00:16:35.438 --> 00:16:36.518

suffering from the same problem,

00:16:36.538 --> 00:16:37.079

the same grief.

00:16:37.859 --> 00:16:38.780

But, you know,

00:16:40.287 --> 00:16:41.710

The people's genetics that

00:16:41.770 --> 00:16:43.813

make them fat are also

00:16:43.874 --> 00:16:44.955

genetics that just mean

00:16:44.975 --> 00:16:49.143

they have an efficient metabolic system,

00:16:49.203 --> 00:16:49.323

right?

00:16:49.836 --> 00:16:50.917

And I'm not excusing any

00:16:50.957 --> 00:16:53.859

kind of bad behavior or not

00:16:53.899 --> 00:16:54.960

taking care of your health or whatever.

00:16:55.300 --> 00:16:56.261

But what I'm saying is

00:16:56.441 --> 00:16:57.341

sometimes there are these

00:16:57.421 --> 00:16:58.702

conditions that push us there.

00:16:58.762 --> 00:16:59.903

It's part of the human condition.

00:17:00.844 --> 00:17:01.985

And the reason I bring that

00:17:02.045 --> 00:17:03.986

up first is that's an

00:17:04.046 --> 00:17:06.828

important thing to understand.

00:17:07.388 --> 00:17:09.250

We read these books about

00:17:09.290 --> 00:17:11.311

minimalism or there's this thing,

00:17:11.331 --> 00:17:13.593

this new diet, this new approach,

00:17:13.853 --> 00:17:15.174

and it's going to save the

00:17:15.194 --> 00:17:16.495

problem and it's going to make us happy.

00:17:17.493 --> 00:17:17.673

And,

00:17:17.853 --> 00:17:19.414

but we weren't necessarily evolved to

00:17:19.474 --> 00:17:20.474

be happy all the time.

00:17:20.515 --> 00:17:20.815

We weren't,

00:17:20.955 --> 00:17:23.016

we were evolved to live in

00:17:23.616 --> 00:17:27.018

places of scarcity and to solve problems.

00:17:27.718 --> 00:17:28.998

And I think human beings,

00:17:29.058 --> 00:17:30.279

when they don't have real problems,

00:17:30.299 --> 00:17:31.279

they just make them because

00:17:31.299 --> 00:17:32.140

they're problem solvers.

00:17:32.180 --> 00:17:33.360

So they just,

00:17:35.061 --> 00:17:38.963

I saw an interview very recently with a,

00:17:39.003 --> 00:17:39.303

with a,

00:17:39.383 --> 00:17:42.224

with a woman who was suggesting that,

00:17:42.605 --> 00:17:43.185

that, that,

00:17:43.815 --> 00:17:45.456

She was kind of doing some

00:17:45.956 --> 00:17:47.216

self-evaluation about how

00:17:47.256 --> 00:17:49.797

she liked chaos in relationships.

00:17:49.997 --> 00:17:51.498

Or no, no, I'm sorry.

00:17:51.518 --> 00:17:52.398

She was a psychologist

00:17:52.438 --> 00:17:53.558

talking about people who

00:17:53.598 --> 00:17:55.019

like chaos in relationships,

00:17:55.059 --> 00:17:55.699

both men and women.

00:17:56.399 --> 00:17:57.100

And, you know,

00:17:57.120 --> 00:17:59.961

they say in part because

00:18:01.261 --> 00:18:02.101

that's where they get their

00:18:02.121 --> 00:18:03.042

emotional peaks.

00:18:03.262 --> 00:18:03.502

You know,

00:18:03.562 --> 00:18:05.382

if you have a fight and then a

00:18:06.463 --> 00:18:07.363

reconciliation,

00:18:07.403 --> 00:18:09.464

you feel these high energy states.

00:18:10.244 --> 00:18:11.625

And when a relationship

00:18:11.705 --> 00:18:13.546

becomes sort of smoothed out,

00:18:14.026 --> 00:18:14.887

the two people kind of

00:18:14.927 --> 00:18:15.907

learn to live together.

00:18:16.667 --> 00:18:17.628

For some people,

00:18:17.648 --> 00:18:18.688

it doesn't feel right

00:18:18.728 --> 00:18:20.169

because there's no drama there.

00:18:20.249 --> 00:18:21.870

It's just peaceful.

00:18:22.370 --> 00:18:23.811

And peace is not happiness.

00:18:25.392 --> 00:18:27.113

Contentment is not happiness.

00:18:27.153 --> 00:18:28.353

Those are different things.

00:18:28.514 --> 00:18:30.014

And I think we're so

00:18:30.134 --> 00:18:31.855

stimulated all the time right now.

00:18:31.895 --> 00:18:33.196

We're just getting dopamine hits.

00:18:33.576 --> 00:18:35.819

like consistently and it's

00:18:35.859 --> 00:18:37.761

just like you know doom

00:18:37.781 --> 00:18:38.982

scrolling is partly just

00:18:39.042 --> 00:18:40.243

looking for that next hit

00:18:40.423 --> 00:18:42.025

right yeah and we're all

00:18:42.085 --> 00:18:43.727

strung out on that crap um

00:18:43.907 --> 00:18:46.570

so is is there a better way

00:18:47.731 --> 00:18:48.472

Well,

00:18:48.532 --> 00:18:50.493

can I inject one thing that this

00:18:50.553 --> 00:18:51.454

makes me think of?

00:18:52.135 --> 00:18:56.218

The saying that hard times

00:18:56.419 --> 00:18:58.240

make strong men and strong

00:18:58.300 --> 00:19:00.682

men make prosperous times

00:19:00.762 --> 00:19:02.064

and prosperous times make

00:19:02.124 --> 00:19:03.825

weak men and weak men make

00:19:03.865 --> 00:19:04.746

difficult times.

00:19:05.707 --> 00:19:08.469

And it's this cycle that continues to go.

00:19:08.489 --> 00:19:10.811

Yeah.

00:19:11.152 --> 00:19:13.293

You see it in people who

00:19:13.334 --> 00:19:14.735

have achieved greatness, right?

00:19:15.610 --> 00:19:18.592

in thought or in action and invention,

00:19:19.312 --> 00:19:20.132

both men and women,

00:19:20.733 --> 00:19:22.674

that oftentimes they came

00:19:22.794 --> 00:19:25.355

from a place of distress or

00:19:25.675 --> 00:19:27.616

pain or overcoming difficulty.

00:19:28.237 --> 00:19:30.898

It is one of the central

00:19:31.018 --> 00:19:32.339

flaws in our psychology

00:19:32.839 --> 00:19:34.360

that we work really hard

00:19:34.700 --> 00:19:38.562

and we accumulate wealth and security,

00:19:39.483 --> 00:19:41.264

and we say ostensibly for our children,

00:19:42.060 --> 00:19:43.581

knowing full well that human

00:19:43.641 --> 00:19:45.542

beings that are born into

00:19:45.942 --> 00:19:46.963

wealth and security

00:19:47.383 --> 00:19:48.184

generally turn out to be

00:19:48.284 --> 00:19:49.845

assholes almost universally.

00:19:50.365 --> 00:19:50.585

Right.

00:19:51.146 --> 00:19:51.866

And we know that,

00:19:52.567 --> 00:19:54.128

but there's just something

00:19:54.168 --> 00:19:54.708

in our program.

00:19:54.728 --> 00:19:57.350

We can't break the cycle of saying,

00:19:57.510 --> 00:19:58.750

and I think it's justification saying,

00:19:58.790 --> 00:19:58.931

well,

00:19:59.011 --> 00:20:00.391

I'm working and earning all this

00:20:00.572 --> 00:20:02.052

stuff so I can hand it to

00:20:02.173 --> 00:20:03.393

the next generation.

00:20:03.653 --> 00:20:04.654

Those are questions we don't,

00:20:05.194 --> 00:20:07.236

we don't want to question say, well,

00:20:07.336 --> 00:20:07.696

does that,

00:20:08.056 --> 00:20:10.017

really help humanity you

00:20:10.057 --> 00:20:10.918

know you look at the

00:20:10.958 --> 00:20:12.439

history of the aristocracy

00:20:13.059 --> 00:20:14.760

and it is you know it

00:20:14.780 --> 00:20:16.321

starts with one villainous

00:20:16.361 --> 00:20:17.842

tyrant who is bloodthirsty

00:20:17.902 --> 00:20:19.583

and psychopathic and then

00:20:20.223 --> 00:20:21.184

if they're successful then

00:20:21.204 --> 00:20:21.864

there's a couple of good

00:20:21.904 --> 00:20:23.165

governors and then it'll

00:20:23.185 --> 00:20:24.746

descend into madness oh

00:20:24.906 --> 00:20:26.367

always always because

00:20:27.047 --> 00:20:28.628

intergenerational like

00:20:28.928 --> 00:20:31.710

power is not a good model

00:20:31.730 --> 00:20:33.851

for human beings this leads

00:20:33.911 --> 00:20:34.892

to what i was saying

00:20:36.417 --> 00:20:37.237

which in the podcast,

00:20:37.277 --> 00:20:38.898

I was asking the hypothetical question.

00:20:38.978 --> 00:20:42.240

If you, if you knew how much time you had,

00:20:42.320 --> 00:20:42.540

you know,

00:20:42.560 --> 00:20:43.881

you knew you had three years to live,

00:20:44.641 --> 00:20:45.801

but you knew you had five years.

00:20:45.821 --> 00:20:47.943

It would actually be 40 years.

00:20:48.063 --> 00:20:49.863

If you, if you got the date and it was,

00:20:49.883 --> 00:20:52.285

it was way out there, 70 years, 80 years.

00:20:52.805 --> 00:20:53.745

Now you still have a date

00:20:54.446 --> 00:20:55.246

because we always like to

00:20:55.266 --> 00:20:56.246

pretend we're immortal.

00:20:56.707 --> 00:20:58.087

Um, because our psychology,

00:20:58.187 --> 00:20:59.608

I don't think it's fully

00:20:59.688 --> 00:21:00.629

evolved to really

00:21:00.729 --> 00:21:01.749

understand and accept that.

00:21:02.710 --> 00:21:03.450

So, um,

00:21:05.024 --> 00:21:06.304

Yeah, if you knew,

00:21:08.665 --> 00:21:09.686

then for a lot of people,

00:21:09.746 --> 00:21:10.806

they would live their life

00:21:10.846 --> 00:21:11.586

completely different.

00:21:11.626 --> 00:21:12.127

That's what I'm saying.

00:21:12.147 --> 00:21:13.947

They would simplify it.

00:21:14.467 --> 00:21:15.288

But we're going to put an

00:21:15.368 --> 00:21:16.648

asterisk next to that, simplify,

00:21:16.668 --> 00:21:18.149

because it's not as simple as that.

00:21:19.309 --> 00:21:20.109

They would simplify it.

00:21:20.489 --> 00:21:23.050

They would shed all this stuff.

00:21:23.651 --> 00:21:25.851

I've seen things with death doulas,

00:21:26.892 --> 00:21:27.792

people who are there,

00:21:27.972 --> 00:21:28.952

and they talk about the

00:21:29.032 --> 00:21:31.033

things that people say or

00:21:31.113 --> 00:21:31.953

things that people talk

00:21:31.974 --> 00:21:33.074

about in their last days.

00:21:33.863 --> 00:21:35.644

And you hear over and over and over again,

00:21:35.804 --> 00:21:37.426

people say they regret how

00:21:37.466 --> 00:21:38.667

much time they spent at work.

00:21:39.347 --> 00:21:40.728

And I think we get that saying, oh,

00:21:40.748 --> 00:21:41.268

I should have spent more

00:21:41.288 --> 00:21:42.229

time with the family.

00:21:42.329 --> 00:21:42.970

I don't think people are

00:21:42.990 --> 00:21:44.010

really getting what people

00:21:44.030 --> 00:21:45.271

on their deathbed are saying.

00:21:45.792 --> 00:21:46.612

They're looking at their

00:21:46.652 --> 00:21:47.953

life and they're saying, my God,

00:21:47.973 --> 00:21:50.255

I devoted most of my consciousness,

00:21:50.775 --> 00:21:52.116

most of my existence,

00:21:52.376 --> 00:21:54.138

which is now passing like

00:21:54.178 --> 00:21:54.858

sand through a thing,

00:21:55.439 --> 00:21:58.061

to this company for products that

00:21:59.147 --> 00:22:00.428

They just don't care about it anymore.

00:22:00.848 --> 00:22:01.948

It's not the choice in the

00:22:02.008 --> 00:22:03.749

media seat saying I work for my family.

00:22:04.210 --> 00:22:06.011

It's that I devoted the

00:22:06.131 --> 00:22:06.911

precious gift of

00:22:06.971 --> 00:22:09.372

consciousness that I have to this.

00:22:10.473 --> 00:22:12.674

And I think a lot of people

00:22:13.174 --> 00:22:15.395

face disappointment with that.

00:22:15.415 --> 00:22:15.735

Yeah.

00:22:18.617 --> 00:22:18.877

Okay.

00:22:18.997 --> 00:22:20.538

So what does it look like for me?

00:22:21.979 --> 00:22:22.119

Well,

00:22:22.139 --> 00:22:24.040

that's one of the reasons we moved

00:22:24.140 --> 00:22:24.480

out here.

00:22:24.500 --> 00:22:27.101

I realized that I was very fortunate.

00:22:27.181 --> 00:22:28.082

I grew up.

00:22:29.079 --> 00:22:31.480

kind of at a pivot point in time.

00:22:31.500 --> 00:22:33.941

And I don't mean to sound grandiose.

00:22:33.981 --> 00:22:35.382

I was born in the early 70s.

00:22:35.502 --> 00:22:37.063

I was born in 1973.

00:22:38.703 --> 00:22:40.684

So I was the generation of latchkey kids,

00:22:41.545 --> 00:22:43.025

the free-range kids, you know,

00:22:44.266 --> 00:22:47.788

that we... It was... The

00:22:47.888 --> 00:22:49.168

electronics were just

00:22:49.228 --> 00:22:51.469

coming online in the 70s.

00:22:51.489 --> 00:22:52.310

You could play Pong.

00:22:53.295 --> 00:22:54.677

And all that kind of stuff.

00:22:54.917 --> 00:22:56.499

There were three channels, you know,

00:22:56.659 --> 00:22:57.520

and you had to argue with

00:22:57.540 --> 00:22:58.481

your brothers and sisters

00:22:58.501 --> 00:22:59.582

of which one you're going to watch.

00:23:00.543 --> 00:23:02.505

You often had one TV in the

00:23:02.525 --> 00:23:03.887

house and that sort of thing.

00:23:03.907 --> 00:23:05.408

And you had to get up to

00:23:05.448 --> 00:23:06.249

change the channel.

00:23:06.489 --> 00:23:08.251

You had to get up to change the channel.

00:23:08.331 --> 00:23:10.153

You had to watch shows when they were on.

00:23:10.173 --> 00:23:10.754

Yep.

00:23:12.732 --> 00:23:13.212

And so,

00:23:13.773 --> 00:23:16.155

but what I got to do and see and

00:23:16.195 --> 00:23:18.377

meet was the remnants of the other world,

00:23:18.577 --> 00:23:18.858

right?

00:23:19.338 --> 00:23:20.299

My grandparents who had

00:23:20.339 --> 00:23:21.720

driven teams when they were young,

00:23:22.821 --> 00:23:24.503

the people who had lived

00:23:24.523 --> 00:23:26.025

without plumbing and electricity,

00:23:26.325 --> 00:23:26.845

that sort of stuff.

00:23:27.066 --> 00:23:29.047

Not like they're not still around, right?

00:23:29.648 --> 00:23:30.889

I think one of the funnest

00:23:30.929 --> 00:23:32.211

facts I like to pull out is

00:23:32.231 --> 00:23:33.552

there's about 8 billion

00:23:33.592 --> 00:23:34.633

people on this planet.

00:23:35.133 --> 00:23:37.175

And if you shut down all the electricity,

00:23:37.476 --> 00:23:39.418

all the gas, all the coal,

00:23:39.958 --> 00:23:41.540

all the oil and the Internet,

00:23:41.680 --> 00:23:43.361

about a billion people wouldn't notice.

00:23:44.683 --> 00:23:45.864

Which I think is kind of funny.

00:23:46.605 --> 00:23:48.066

We think we have all this

00:23:48.086 --> 00:23:49.147

stuff and it all belongs to

00:23:49.187 --> 00:23:50.248

us and it can't go anywhere.

00:23:50.568 --> 00:23:51.149

But it's not even

00:23:51.289 --> 00:23:53.131

distributed to the entire population.

00:23:54.216 --> 00:23:55.297

So, so, you know,

00:23:55.337 --> 00:23:56.778

we came out here and we started our, our,

00:23:56.998 --> 00:23:58.399

our little farm with, um,

00:23:58.579 --> 00:24:00.040

ostensibly the goal of

00:24:00.460 --> 00:24:01.681

growing as much of our own

00:24:01.741 --> 00:24:02.582

food as we can.

00:24:03.262 --> 00:24:04.864

And I say ostensibly because

00:24:05.484 --> 00:24:07.065

it's almost an impossible goal.

00:24:07.826 --> 00:24:09.167

Um, but the, the,

00:24:09.307 --> 00:24:10.788

the joy and the journey is, is,

00:24:11.008 --> 00:24:12.109

is trying.

00:24:12.709 --> 00:24:13.690

And in that sense,

00:24:14.030 --> 00:24:17.232

living a more simple life

00:24:18.573 --> 00:24:20.314

that only goes from one point of view,

00:24:20.334 --> 00:24:20.374

um,

00:24:22.034 --> 00:24:24.235

Like if I have a dairy goat

00:24:24.295 --> 00:24:26.236

in my backyard and I go

00:24:26.396 --> 00:24:28.657

milk it and I take and I

00:24:28.677 --> 00:24:29.838

bring that milk in and I

00:24:30.038 --> 00:24:31.118

use that to make a cake.

00:24:33.095 --> 00:24:35.176

On the one hand, you can say, well,

00:24:35.196 --> 00:24:36.978

that's simpler because

00:24:37.058 --> 00:24:38.679

otherwise you've got all

00:24:38.739 --> 00:24:41.541

these dairy yards that are

00:24:41.581 --> 00:24:43.102

going to pasteurization,

00:24:43.122 --> 00:24:44.183

that are getting trucked to

00:24:44.223 --> 00:24:45.464

a central storing place,

00:24:45.804 --> 00:24:47.345

but then getting trucked to

00:24:47.905 --> 00:24:49.066

a grocery store and it's

00:24:49.126 --> 00:24:50.407

loaded in the thing and

00:24:50.567 --> 00:24:52.629

it's got put in big plastic

00:24:52.649 --> 00:24:54.770

containers and it's been

00:24:54.810 --> 00:24:57.472

heat pasteurized and this complex thing.

00:24:57.892 --> 00:24:58.753

But from my perspective,

00:24:58.793 --> 00:24:59.653

I just go down to the store

00:24:59.693 --> 00:25:00.454

and get a gallon of milk

00:25:00.474 --> 00:25:01.555

and just walk home, right?

00:25:02.475 --> 00:25:05.436

So which of these two things is simpler,

00:25:06.316 --> 00:25:06.637

right?

00:25:08.097 --> 00:25:09.558

We just harvested garlic.

00:25:10.598 --> 00:25:12.479

And this is our second or

00:25:12.499 --> 00:25:13.499

third year growing garlic.

00:25:13.999 --> 00:25:15.139

You have to harvest it.

00:25:15.179 --> 00:25:16.560

You have to watch for these things.

00:25:17.120 --> 00:25:18.120

It's going to go to flowers.

00:25:18.140 --> 00:25:19.341

You have to trim out the flower.

00:25:19.741 --> 00:25:20.621

And then you have to pull it

00:25:20.701 --> 00:25:22.102

up and you have to let it dry.

00:25:22.522 --> 00:25:23.482

You have to let all the

00:25:23.562 --> 00:25:24.703

energy that's in the stock

00:25:24.863 --> 00:25:27.624

slowly migrate down to the

00:25:27.684 --> 00:25:30.105

bulb and then let it dry up

00:25:30.605 --> 00:25:31.405

and all that kind of stuff.

00:25:32.890 --> 00:25:36.151

So it's a fairly complicated process.

00:25:36.351 --> 00:25:37.972

Well, complicated is not the right word.

00:25:38.052 --> 00:25:39.052

It's stepwise.

00:25:39.292 --> 00:25:39.952

It takes time.

00:25:42.913 --> 00:25:45.794

But, you know, I enjoy that we now,

00:25:46.074 --> 00:25:48.495

this year, we did last year too,

00:25:48.535 --> 00:25:49.375

we will supply all of our

00:25:49.415 --> 00:25:51.616

garlic ourselves and with excess.

00:25:52.316 --> 00:25:54.516

But is that simpler than buying garlic?

00:25:54.977 --> 00:25:56.457

What do we mean when we say a simple life?

00:25:57.097 --> 00:25:57.717

Help me out of this.

00:25:57.757 --> 00:25:59.938

What do we mean when we say simplify it?

00:26:01.417 --> 00:26:01.617

Well,

00:26:01.797 --> 00:26:04.359

I think when you talked about this on

00:26:04.379 --> 00:26:05.180

Mormon Stories,

00:26:05.240 --> 00:26:06.801

you said if we had the

00:26:06.942 --> 00:26:10.444

option to just live in a

00:26:10.605 --> 00:26:12.666

small home that was just

00:26:12.726 --> 00:26:14.768

enough space and we had

00:26:14.848 --> 00:26:17.510

just enough money to cover

00:26:17.690 --> 00:26:19.932

our expenses and no more,

00:26:20.052 --> 00:26:22.774

nothing extra for travel or

00:26:22.875 --> 00:26:23.535

anything like that.

00:26:23.575 --> 00:26:25.136

And we had the clothes that

00:26:25.156 --> 00:26:26.157

were going to last us for

00:26:26.177 --> 00:26:27.178

the rest of our lives and

00:26:27.238 --> 00:26:28.819

didn't need to replenish any of that.

00:26:30.680 --> 00:26:31.321

And then you said the

00:26:31.361 --> 00:26:32.581

reality is that we could do

00:26:32.641 --> 00:26:35.022

it right now if we chose to do that.

00:26:35.422 --> 00:26:36.542

And so I agree with you.

00:26:37.742 --> 00:26:40.523

Complicated and simple are

00:26:40.563 --> 00:26:41.783

the same thing applied to

00:26:41.824 --> 00:26:42.804

different situations.

00:26:42.844 --> 00:26:43.664

There's always going to be

00:26:43.724 --> 00:26:46.345

simple and complicated in our lives.

00:26:47.265 --> 00:26:48.746

um but i think most people

00:26:48.806 --> 00:26:49.646

when they think about

00:26:49.986 --> 00:26:52.767

living more simply um and

00:26:52.807 --> 00:26:54.128

this is the this is exactly

00:26:54.168 --> 00:26:55.028

the reason i want to have

00:26:55.048 --> 00:26:56.229

this conversation because i

00:26:56.269 --> 00:26:57.329

think a lot of people do

00:26:57.409 --> 00:26:58.750

envision what you're saying

00:26:59.150 --> 00:27:00.491

that okay then i'm just

00:27:00.511 --> 00:27:01.791

going to grow my own food

00:27:02.231 --> 00:27:02.732

i'm not going to

00:27:02.792 --> 00:27:04.272

participate in society i'm

00:27:04.312 --> 00:27:05.573

not going to be on the internet

00:27:06.113 --> 00:27:07.174

it's just going to be me and

00:27:07.194 --> 00:27:08.975

the couple of people that I love still,

00:27:09.095 --> 00:27:09.415

you know,

00:27:09.455 --> 00:27:11.037

who are going to stay around me.

00:27:11.397 --> 00:27:12.217

We're going to grow our own

00:27:12.257 --> 00:27:13.458

food and stay right in our

00:27:13.478 --> 00:27:14.479

little homestead and,

00:27:15.019 --> 00:27:16.220

and not have to interact

00:27:16.260 --> 00:27:17.161

with the rest of the world

00:27:17.241 --> 00:27:18.682

and not take any resources

00:27:18.722 --> 00:27:19.542

from the rest of the world.

00:27:19.602 --> 00:27:21.424

And that's just a fallacy, right?

00:27:21.444 --> 00:27:22.925

Is that kind of what you're saying?

00:27:22.945 --> 00:27:23.865

Yeah.

00:27:24.005 --> 00:27:26.147

It's, it's, it's not just a fallacy.

00:27:26.187 --> 00:27:28.088

It's an, it's an absolute impossibility.

00:27:28.108 --> 00:27:28.909

I, I,

00:27:32.017 --> 00:27:37.483

You know, vegetables take organic material,

00:27:37.623 --> 00:27:38.184

right, to grow.

00:27:38.224 --> 00:27:39.826

You have to plant them in the dirt.

00:27:40.867 --> 00:27:42.869

And the dirt needs to be a

00:27:42.969 --> 00:27:43.930

composition of stuff.

00:27:43.990 --> 00:27:45.432

And you keep planting them

00:27:45.512 --> 00:27:47.094

in that over and over again,

00:27:47.134 --> 00:27:47.955

you'll deplete it.

00:27:49.279 --> 00:27:50.940

So you have to bring in

00:27:51.160 --> 00:27:52.921

material from somewhere else.

00:27:53.241 --> 00:27:54.822

Like a garden has to be

00:27:54.882 --> 00:27:57.183

supported with multiple things.

00:27:57.423 --> 00:27:58.884

They could be fields of grass.

00:27:58.904 --> 00:28:00.645

It could be cow manure.

00:28:00.725 --> 00:28:01.986

It could be something.

00:28:02.066 --> 00:28:07.148

But these tendrils go out on long,

00:28:07.249 --> 00:28:07.969

long ways.

00:28:09.276 --> 00:28:10.577

I was watching the Vikings,

00:28:11.057 --> 00:28:13.778

this series on Netflix or something.

00:28:14.398 --> 00:28:15.699

It's mostly dumb,

00:28:15.719 --> 00:28:17.539

but it can be kind of funny.

00:28:17.939 --> 00:28:21.801

But they were starting a little colony in,

00:28:21.901 --> 00:28:22.261

I think,

00:28:22.281 --> 00:28:23.702

in Iceland or something like that

00:28:23.742 --> 00:28:24.302

in the story.

00:28:25.082 --> 00:28:30.904

And then 3,000 more settlers showed up,

00:28:30.904 --> 00:28:31.945

3,000.

00:28:31.945 --> 00:28:34.926

And the comment was, the guy said,

00:28:35.166 --> 00:28:36.447

now we can make it.

00:28:38.792 --> 00:28:39.212

And, you know,

00:28:39.232 --> 00:28:40.793

I thought about that and I

00:28:40.833 --> 00:28:41.733

thought about how true it is.

00:28:41.773 --> 00:28:42.934

And we don't even know what

00:28:42.974 --> 00:28:44.174

the number is of how many

00:28:44.214 --> 00:28:48.176

people it takes to to to to

00:28:48.216 --> 00:28:49.256

make something happen.

00:28:49.276 --> 00:28:50.697

And we're talking on the simple thing.

00:28:51.137 --> 00:28:53.778

But that that goes to to your entire life.

00:28:53.858 --> 00:28:57.260

How many people you you rely

00:28:57.440 --> 00:28:58.820

on and you need?

00:29:01.465 --> 00:29:02.746

There's a game you can play

00:29:02.786 --> 00:29:03.967

to see what class you're in.

00:29:04.027 --> 00:29:04.908

Are you ready for it?

00:29:05.468 --> 00:29:05.669

Yes.

00:29:05.849 --> 00:29:07.090

You have to ask yourself.

00:29:07.670 --> 00:29:08.911

You can go through perfections.

00:29:09.812 --> 00:29:10.793

And you have to ask yourself

00:29:10.873 --> 00:29:13.215

if you know or any of the people,

00:29:13.235 --> 00:29:13.896

let alone friends.

00:29:14.596 --> 00:29:16.058

And if they're doing their

00:29:16.098 --> 00:29:18.420

profession for you, it doesn't count.

00:29:19.160 --> 00:29:21.622

So if I say, do you know any hairdressers?

00:29:22.023 --> 00:29:23.344

Or are you friends with any hair?

00:29:23.384 --> 00:29:24.064

Are there any hairdressers

00:29:24.104 --> 00:29:24.725

in your social circle?

00:29:25.647 --> 00:29:27.308

If you do have a friend who

00:29:27.928 --> 00:29:29.108

cuts your hair or does your hair,

00:29:29.148 --> 00:29:31.589

that doesn't count.

00:29:32.090 --> 00:29:33.590

She doesn't count if she's

00:29:34.050 --> 00:29:35.731

doing that service for you.

00:29:35.871 --> 00:29:36.491

Does that make sense?

00:29:36.531 --> 00:29:38.192

So you can't count anybody

00:29:38.212 --> 00:29:38.912

that you're paying.

00:29:39.893 --> 00:29:41.253

And then you start asking your question,

00:29:41.293 --> 00:29:42.894

well, how many coal miners do I know?

00:29:43.214 --> 00:29:44.975

How many sanitation workers do I know?

00:29:45.575 --> 00:29:46.056

How many?

00:29:46.076 --> 00:29:47.177

And then you can ask the question,

00:29:47.217 --> 00:29:47.757

the other thing,

00:29:47.797 --> 00:29:49.379

how many investment bankers do I know?

00:29:49.399 --> 00:29:50.380

And you can start like

00:29:50.420 --> 00:29:51.781

figuring out where you are

00:29:52.141 --> 00:29:54.423

by just who you envision.

00:29:54.463 --> 00:29:54.603

Well,

00:29:54.643 --> 00:29:55.724

why am I talking about this with

00:29:55.765 --> 00:29:56.265

simplicity?

00:29:56.966 --> 00:29:58.807

Our society is built on the

00:29:58.907 --> 00:30:01.610

work of all those people.

00:30:02.576 --> 00:30:04.717

The people who work every

00:30:04.737 --> 00:30:08.118

day to make your life what it is, again,

00:30:08.419 --> 00:30:09.919

sanitation, water,

00:30:10.079 --> 00:30:11.460

maintaining cell towers,

00:30:12.080 --> 00:30:13.961

pulling out fiber optic cable,

00:30:15.601 --> 00:30:17.822

just taking care of children,

00:30:18.042 --> 00:30:21.764

teaching kids, feeding the elderly.

00:30:22.124 --> 00:30:24.225

There's this whole majority

00:30:24.565 --> 00:30:27.786

of what society does that we just ignore.

00:30:28.507 --> 00:30:31.008

And if you want to live simply,

00:30:31.915 --> 00:30:34.996

You have to start doing those tasks.

00:30:35.697 --> 00:30:37.217

I have a lot of people who

00:30:37.277 --> 00:30:38.578

come through the farm,

00:30:38.598 --> 00:30:39.318

who come talk to me.

00:30:40.699 --> 00:30:42.139

And they're really

00:30:42.219 --> 00:30:43.680

romantically attached to

00:30:44.060 --> 00:30:46.001

the idea of living right

00:30:46.041 --> 00:30:46.801

there next to your food.

00:30:47.802 --> 00:30:49.622

But I would say 98 out of 100 wash out

00:30:52.495 --> 00:30:55.238

Because they don't know how to work.

00:30:55.999 --> 00:30:59.482

And that sounds like they're lazy.

00:31:00.103 --> 00:31:00.724

But, you know,

00:31:00.844 --> 00:31:02.165

if you're going to fertilize

00:31:02.205 --> 00:31:03.086

with natural fertilizer,

00:31:03.106 --> 00:31:04.047

you have to shovel shit.

00:31:04.808 --> 00:31:06.410

And people don't really

00:31:06.650 --> 00:31:08.111

think about what that means.

00:31:08.752 --> 00:31:10.534

When people talk about living off the grid,

00:31:10.594 --> 00:31:11.195

which we are not.

00:31:11.235 --> 00:31:13.277

We're not that type of people.

00:31:13.297 --> 00:31:13.777

For me,

00:31:13.817 --> 00:31:15.279

it's about connection and community.

00:31:15.956 --> 00:31:17.497

But they get bogged down in

00:31:17.577 --> 00:31:20.200

just how many hours a day

00:31:20.240 --> 00:31:21.781

it takes just to maintain

00:31:21.801 --> 00:31:23.223

the systems that you and I

00:31:23.283 --> 00:31:25.905

in society are paying a $60 or $100 bill.

00:31:26.425 --> 00:31:27.627

And then we don't worry about it.

00:31:28.147 --> 00:31:30.089

We throw our trash away, right?

00:31:30.149 --> 00:31:31.770

As if there is an away.

00:31:32.311 --> 00:31:33.572

And that's part of the

00:31:33.652 --> 00:31:35.934

illusion of this society.

00:31:36.555 --> 00:31:38.576

And I'll kind of drive to a point,

00:31:38.616 --> 00:31:39.737

then I'll stop here.

00:31:40.298 --> 00:31:40.798

Because that...

00:31:41.676 --> 00:31:43.197

What that does is it leaves

00:31:43.297 --> 00:31:45.118

us unfulfilled in our time

00:31:45.158 --> 00:31:46.559

because we have no actual

00:31:46.640 --> 00:31:49.301

idea what life is like on this planet.

00:31:49.401 --> 00:31:50.342

We don't even know.

00:31:50.843 --> 00:31:52.504

We've lost what it means to be human.

00:31:52.564 --> 00:31:54.045

We don't understand.

00:31:55.045 --> 00:31:56.967

And to live a simpler life

00:31:57.187 --> 00:32:00.269

like this is to work hard,

00:32:01.670 --> 00:32:03.351

but oftentimes in ways that

00:32:03.371 --> 00:32:06.554

are very satisfying, that are slow.

00:32:07.785 --> 00:32:10.408

that take a long time.

00:32:10.689 --> 00:32:12.631

It takes a long time to grow a cabbage.

00:32:13.512 --> 00:32:16.797

It takes a long time on the calendar.

00:32:17.478 --> 00:32:19.620

And we don't even think about that.

00:32:20.441 --> 00:32:22.184

So that's what I have to say so far.

00:32:22.879 --> 00:32:23.500

Yeah, yeah.

00:32:23.580 --> 00:32:27.302

So I started to have my own

00:32:27.343 --> 00:32:29.784

garden about 10 years ago or so.

00:32:29.804 --> 00:32:30.905

And I live in South Texas.

00:32:31.005 --> 00:32:32.266

And so our growing season is

00:32:32.306 --> 00:32:33.287

a long growing season,

00:32:33.307 --> 00:32:35.369

but it's also complicated.

00:32:35.709 --> 00:32:36.690

You have to plant the right

00:32:36.730 --> 00:32:37.671

things at the right time.

00:32:37.731 --> 00:32:39.432

And you have to be careful

00:32:39.492 --> 00:32:41.073

about too much sun and not

00:32:41.113 --> 00:32:42.394

enough water and all those things,

00:32:42.474 --> 00:32:44.296

which all farmers do, right?

00:32:44.396 --> 00:32:44.536

But

00:32:45.538 --> 00:32:46.659

I think the first year I

00:32:46.939 --> 00:32:49.960

planted beans and squash

00:32:50.400 --> 00:32:52.941

and potatoes and my mother

00:32:52.981 --> 00:32:54.562

who grew up in Idaho said,

00:32:54.642 --> 00:32:56.463

you cannot grow potatoes in Texas.

00:32:56.503 --> 00:32:57.384

You just can't do it.

00:32:57.964 --> 00:32:59.164

And I said, Oh yeah, watch me.

00:33:01.045 --> 00:33:03.486

And I think my first harvest of potatoes,

00:33:03.867 --> 00:33:04.007

um,

00:33:04.107 --> 00:33:07.508

I did red potatoes and it took me

00:33:07.748 --> 00:33:10.450

about four months to grow some potatoes.

00:33:11.770 --> 00:33:13.251

And I went out and did my harvest.

00:33:14.097 --> 00:33:17.961

And I had an empty dozen egg crate.

00:33:18.242 --> 00:33:19.383

And I filled up the dozen

00:33:19.483 --> 00:33:20.264

egg crate with all the

00:33:20.304 --> 00:33:21.365

potatoes from my garden.

00:33:21.385 --> 00:33:23.507

And that was all I got for my harvest.

00:33:24.168 --> 00:33:25.409

And at the time,

00:33:25.489 --> 00:33:27.211

I had six children at home.

00:33:27.271 --> 00:33:27.852

And I said, well,

00:33:27.872 --> 00:33:29.934

this will make about half a

00:33:29.974 --> 00:33:32.677

dish of mashed potatoes for

00:33:32.817 --> 00:33:34.419

one meal for my family.

00:33:35.319 --> 00:33:37.281

And I grew enough beans to

00:33:37.361 --> 00:33:41.003

make a side dish of sauteed beans twice.

00:33:41.984 --> 00:33:45.726

And I grew about two squash

00:33:46.107 --> 00:33:47.147

and the rest of the squash

00:33:47.207 --> 00:33:48.108

either got eaten by

00:33:48.168 --> 00:33:49.749

squirrels or they rotted or

00:33:49.789 --> 00:33:50.330

they burned up.

00:33:51.570 --> 00:33:52.371

Those two squash,

00:33:52.851 --> 00:33:53.971

I could use for one side

00:33:54.011 --> 00:33:55.492

dish for my family of eight people.

00:33:56.272 --> 00:33:57.772

It took me four or five

00:33:57.832 --> 00:33:59.453

months to get that much of a harvest.

00:34:00.693 --> 00:34:02.654

I think a lot of people have this,

00:34:03.454 --> 00:34:03.995

like you said,

00:34:04.055 --> 00:34:05.895

romantic idea that you're

00:34:05.915 --> 00:34:07.316

going to just plant all

00:34:07.336 --> 00:34:08.376

these different crops and

00:34:08.436 --> 00:34:10.397

it's going to be enough to

00:34:10.457 --> 00:34:12.078

feed your family or even yourself.

00:34:13.318 --> 00:34:14.779

The next spring,

00:34:15.119 --> 00:34:16.539

I decided that I was going

00:34:16.559 --> 00:34:18.600

to plant things that grew more

00:34:19.893 --> 00:34:21.315

in a shorter amount of time

00:34:21.475 --> 00:34:23.298

of things that I actually used every day.

00:34:24.279 --> 00:34:25.321

So I planted some cherry

00:34:25.361 --> 00:34:26.623

tomatoes and I planted some

00:34:26.663 --> 00:34:28.285

lettuce and I planted some peppers.

00:34:29.484 --> 00:34:30.585

And I had a big,

00:34:30.625 --> 00:34:32.106

huge bush of cherry tomatoes.

00:34:32.686 --> 00:34:35.047

And every time I wanted to make a salad,

00:34:35.067 --> 00:34:35.787

I would go out there and

00:34:35.807 --> 00:34:37.268

grab a few cherry tomatoes off of there.

00:34:37.288 --> 00:34:38.649

And that one did pretty well.

00:34:38.689 --> 00:34:39.970

That was pretty sustainable

00:34:40.050 --> 00:34:41.110

as far as a plant goes.

00:34:41.931 --> 00:34:42.831

My pepper plant,

00:34:42.911 --> 00:34:45.213

I think I grew a total of

00:34:45.213 --> 00:34:47.434

12 peppers over the growing season,

00:34:47.834 --> 00:34:49.115

which was enough for me to make...

00:34:50.095 --> 00:34:51.456

salsa twice,

00:34:51.916 --> 00:34:53.437

and to do a couple of marinades.

00:34:53.997 --> 00:34:54.617

That was about it.

00:34:55.278 --> 00:34:57.018

And, and the lettuce, you know,

00:34:57.379 --> 00:34:59.860

I had enough to make a couple of salads,

00:34:59.980 --> 00:35:02.441

but eventually, you know, then it,

00:35:03.141 --> 00:35:04.222

the growing season wasn't

00:35:04.282 --> 00:35:05.462

enough to make more leaves.

00:35:05.522 --> 00:35:06.643

And that was that I ended up

00:35:06.663 --> 00:35:07.583

with a big tall lettuce

00:35:07.603 --> 00:35:08.864

plant with a bunch of

00:35:08.884 --> 00:35:09.884

leaves that I couldn't use.

00:35:10.485 --> 00:35:12.126

So, you know, even when we,

00:35:12.466 --> 00:35:13.546

even when we adjust and

00:35:13.586 --> 00:35:14.287

everything like that,

00:35:14.327 --> 00:35:15.067

I think people don't

00:35:15.127 --> 00:35:19.249

realize how much space, physical space,

00:35:19.927 --> 00:35:21.448

it takes to plant enough

00:35:21.608 --> 00:35:23.630

plants to produce enough

00:35:23.850 --> 00:35:26.031

food to sustain even just a

00:35:26.091 --> 00:35:27.372

couple of people i think

00:35:27.392 --> 00:35:28.313

that's one part of the

00:35:28.353 --> 00:35:29.874

romanticism of like living

00:35:29.914 --> 00:35:31.295

a simpler life or trying to

00:35:31.715 --> 00:35:32.836

eat more sustainably or

00:35:32.896 --> 00:35:34.818

closer to the ground and

00:35:34.858 --> 00:35:36.139

then the other thing is

00:35:36.259 --> 00:35:37.560

that a lot of people talk

00:35:37.620 --> 00:35:39.721

about to me is well if i

00:35:39.741 --> 00:35:41.042

grow some of my own food

00:35:41.162 --> 00:35:43.204

and i have bees and chickens and goats

00:35:43.764 --> 00:35:45.425

Then I'll have some eggs and

00:35:45.465 --> 00:35:46.846

I'll have some pollinators.

00:35:46.926 --> 00:35:47.927

I can have some honey.

00:35:48.528 --> 00:35:49.368

And then, you know,

00:35:49.408 --> 00:35:50.349

the goats will make some

00:35:50.389 --> 00:35:51.750

milk and everything like that.

00:35:51.770 --> 00:35:53.691

Well, you have to realize that, you know,

00:35:53.791 --> 00:35:55.232

goats need a huge amount of

00:35:55.352 --> 00:35:56.774

acreage and they need a lot

00:35:56.814 --> 00:35:57.794

of roughage to eat.

00:35:58.315 --> 00:36:00.036

And that's a huge amount of resources.

00:36:00.096 --> 00:36:01.017

And then, you know, great.

00:36:01.077 --> 00:36:02.097

You want to have some eggs

00:36:02.157 --> 00:36:03.258

and they have this romantic

00:36:03.338 --> 00:36:04.019

idea that they're going to

00:36:04.039 --> 00:36:05.080

go throw some grain on the

00:36:05.120 --> 00:36:06.120

ground once a morning and

00:36:06.140 --> 00:36:07.942

then go collect eggs every night.

00:36:07.982 --> 00:36:08.362

But you don't.

00:36:08.782 --> 00:36:09.763

Think about things like

00:36:09.843 --> 00:36:11.985

worms and mites and all the

00:36:12.025 --> 00:36:13.206

things that happen to chicken.

00:36:13.226 --> 00:36:13.826

And then what are you going

00:36:13.846 --> 00:36:14.867

to do with all the chicken shit?

00:36:16.008 --> 00:36:16.188

Yeah.

00:36:16.662 --> 00:36:19.364

You know, so to your point,

00:36:19.865 --> 00:36:22.067

I think when people want to

00:36:22.187 --> 00:36:23.408

live more simply or they

00:36:23.428 --> 00:36:24.709

start to get this idea that

00:36:24.729 --> 00:36:25.750

maybe I can do things

00:36:25.810 --> 00:36:26.691

differently than they're

00:36:26.711 --> 00:36:27.932

being done now and I can

00:36:27.992 --> 00:36:29.814

live a life that's a little easier.

00:36:29.834 --> 00:36:32.436

And for me, the hard work has never,

00:36:32.556 --> 00:36:33.477

ever been the problem.

00:36:33.577 --> 00:36:34.077

For me,

00:36:34.338 --> 00:36:36.379

it's having the resources where I

00:36:36.600 --> 00:36:38.381

am right now and the

00:36:38.461 --> 00:36:39.963

calculations that we don't

00:36:40.043 --> 00:36:41.804

think to do when we're

00:36:41.824 --> 00:36:43.386

trying to live more simply.

00:36:44.026 --> 00:36:46.887

And so I want to say that it

00:36:47.007 --> 00:36:48.467

starts with a mindset of

00:36:48.567 --> 00:36:50.407

having a desire to do that thing,

00:36:51.127 --> 00:36:53.088

but then taking it all the

00:36:53.128 --> 00:36:54.968

way through to a logical conclusion.

00:36:55.088 --> 00:36:57.449

And what practical steps can

00:36:57.489 --> 00:36:59.549

you do right now that are

00:36:59.569 --> 00:37:01.569

going to make your life, quote unquote,

00:37:01.649 --> 00:37:04.510

simpler without necessarily

00:37:04.750 --> 00:37:05.710

trying to abandon

00:37:05.770 --> 00:37:07.570

everything and go into a

00:37:07.630 --> 00:37:08.551

lifestyle that you're not

00:37:08.611 --> 00:37:09.731

prepared to live yet?

00:37:10.571 --> 00:37:10.691

Mm-hmm.

00:37:11.289 --> 00:37:13.111

And I don't know if you have some ideas,

00:37:13.151 --> 00:37:14.372

but I've heard you talk a

00:37:14.432 --> 00:37:15.973

lot about economics and

00:37:17.534 --> 00:37:20.216

sustainability and

00:37:20.256 --> 00:37:21.537

civilization as a whole of

00:37:21.597 --> 00:37:22.698

where we are on the grand

00:37:22.738 --> 00:37:24.059

spectrum of evolution and

00:37:24.300 --> 00:37:25.621

late stage capitalism and

00:37:25.641 --> 00:37:26.481

all that kind of stuff.

00:37:27.543 --> 00:37:30.465

For people who are, you know,

00:37:30.545 --> 00:37:31.745

who are dreaming of a

00:37:31.805 --> 00:37:33.346

lifestyle that is simpler,

00:37:34.127 --> 00:37:35.648

do you have any suggestions

00:37:35.728 --> 00:37:37.849

of mindset changes that we

00:37:37.889 --> 00:37:39.169

can make that will help us

00:37:39.310 --> 00:37:41.711

to be less consumeristic, at least,

00:37:42.471 --> 00:37:43.952

and more focused on using

00:37:44.012 --> 00:37:45.753

our resources for the things that matter?

00:37:48.295 --> 00:37:50.676

Oh, it's a great question.

00:37:50.696 --> 00:37:50.756

For

00:37:53.707 --> 00:37:54.728

I think my journey,

00:37:54.788 --> 00:37:56.029

my most recent journey

00:37:56.089 --> 00:37:57.830

started with coffee creamer.

00:37:58.610 --> 00:38:00.692

So since I, you know,

00:38:00.992 --> 00:38:03.354

I love my morning coffee and I'm ADHD,

00:38:03.434 --> 00:38:04.514

so I don't take Adderall.

00:38:04.875 --> 00:38:06.436

So coffee is very important

00:38:06.476 --> 00:38:08.917

for me to be able to focus.

00:38:09.978 --> 00:38:11.959

So, but I also grew up Mormon,

00:38:12.100 --> 00:38:15.362

which Mormons have an interesting palate.

00:38:15.402 --> 00:38:15.982

It's very limited.

00:38:16.403 --> 00:38:18.344

They don't get very much bitter or

00:38:20.325 --> 00:38:23.909

or dry, um, um, flavors or tastes in, in,

00:38:24.049 --> 00:38:25.110

in their diet.

00:38:25.150 --> 00:38:25.791

It's very sweet.

00:38:26.291 --> 00:38:27.893

So that's just me blaming

00:38:27.933 --> 00:38:28.693

everybody else for the fact

00:38:28.713 --> 00:38:30.796

that I put cream and sugar in my coffee.

00:38:31.416 --> 00:38:32.958

Um, so I would buy, I would buy the,

00:38:32.998 --> 00:38:34.459

you know, industrial creamer.

00:38:34.900 --> 00:38:35.821

Um, and you know,

00:38:35.841 --> 00:38:36.902

I'd buy one of those a week

00:38:37.562 --> 00:38:39.604

and it was kind of

00:38:39.644 --> 00:38:41.526

expensive and came in this big plastic,

00:38:42.287 --> 00:38:43.028

um, um,

00:38:44.180 --> 00:38:46.221

jar whatever thing and you

00:38:46.261 --> 00:38:47.482

read the ingredients and it

00:38:47.522 --> 00:38:49.062

was just full of like lots

00:38:49.102 --> 00:38:50.023

of ingredients so things i

00:38:50.203 --> 00:38:51.043

have no idea what they are

00:38:51.083 --> 00:38:51.924

what they do or anything

00:38:51.944 --> 00:38:54.985

like that and so i was like

00:38:55.025 --> 00:38:55.826

well there's got to be a

00:38:55.986 --> 00:38:59.007

let's start here so i went

00:38:59.087 --> 00:39:00.308

out and i got some like

00:39:00.448 --> 00:39:01.848

cute little quart uh

00:39:02.409 --> 00:39:04.970

bottles and then i figured

00:39:05.010 --> 00:39:06.471

out my perfect ratio i

00:39:06.491 --> 00:39:07.671

would just put half and

00:39:07.731 --> 00:39:08.832

half and then sugar

00:39:09.790 --> 00:39:10.170

in there.

00:39:10.510 --> 00:39:12.732

And I also figured that half

00:39:12.752 --> 00:39:14.813

and half and sugar don't mix very well.

00:39:14.873 --> 00:39:16.353

So I had to shake them three times.

00:39:16.553 --> 00:39:17.254

I had learned that I had to

00:39:17.654 --> 00:39:18.614

shake it and let it sit.

00:39:18.634 --> 00:39:19.555

I had to come back and shake

00:39:19.595 --> 00:39:21.456

it again and let it sit and shake again.

00:39:21.736 --> 00:39:22.456

And then it would hold.

00:39:22.817 --> 00:39:25.078

So I'd have that in the fridge, um,

00:39:25.498 --> 00:39:27.459

to cream my coffee.

00:39:27.559 --> 00:39:28.739

And you can say, well,

00:39:28.760 --> 00:39:29.420

do you still do that?

00:39:29.460 --> 00:39:31.361

And I say, no, I just put, um,

00:39:32.361 --> 00:39:33.902

I just put cream in my cup

00:39:33.962 --> 00:39:34.783

and I put sugar in my cup

00:39:34.823 --> 00:39:35.563

and pour the coffee in.

00:39:36.198 --> 00:39:37.060

Now,

00:39:37.181 --> 00:39:38.785

that's a great example of living simpler.

00:39:39.747 --> 00:39:41.431

If you do that, you don't have to stir.

00:39:42.849 --> 00:39:44.310

you, the coffee,

00:39:44.470 --> 00:39:45.851

the hot coffee just melts

00:39:45.871 --> 00:39:47.792

the sugar and it turns it all up.

00:39:48.332 --> 00:39:49.072

But we all do it.

00:39:49.252 --> 00:39:50.193

We all do it backwards

00:39:50.533 --> 00:39:51.914

because everybody does it backwards.

00:39:51.934 --> 00:39:52.874

You put the coffee and then

00:39:52.914 --> 00:39:53.735

you put the other stuff and

00:39:53.755 --> 00:39:54.875

then you have to stir it.

00:39:55.496 --> 00:39:55.616

So,

00:39:55.676 --> 00:39:56.656

and the reason to bring that up is

00:39:56.696 --> 00:39:57.757

sometimes the simpler way

00:39:57.797 --> 00:39:59.117

of doing things is right in front of us,

00:39:59.177 --> 00:40:00.398

but we just don't, we don't, you know,

00:40:00.438 --> 00:40:01.038

grab onto that.

00:40:01.619 --> 00:40:02.159

So that,

00:40:02.279 --> 00:40:03.680

that opened a floodgate for me

00:40:03.740 --> 00:40:05.341

because I started, it was first of all,

00:40:05.401 --> 00:40:06.661

interesting to see how things,

00:40:06.741 --> 00:40:08.082

I like to pull things apart

00:40:08.122 --> 00:40:09.463

and see how they're, they're connected.

00:40:10.183 --> 00:40:11.223

and how they're put together.

00:40:11.403 --> 00:40:11.523

And,

00:40:11.623 --> 00:40:12.684

and there's been a lot of different

00:40:12.704 --> 00:40:13.764

things that I've tried, um,

00:40:13.924 --> 00:40:16.804

to sort of do home crafty,

00:40:17.345 --> 00:40:18.585

like let's start this from

00:40:18.665 --> 00:40:20.645

scratch that I've done.

00:40:20.665 --> 00:40:22.706

And I'm like, okay, I got that.

00:40:22.806 --> 00:40:23.566

That's not worth it.

00:40:24.246 --> 00:40:24.486

You know,

00:40:25.226 --> 00:40:26.246

it's not worth it to make

00:40:26.326 --> 00:40:27.947

mayonnaise in my, in my mind,

00:40:29.087 --> 00:40:30.167

but I make my mustard.

00:40:30.227 --> 00:40:30.467

I don't,

00:40:30.587 --> 00:40:32.848

I don't buy mustard partly because

00:40:32.908 --> 00:40:34.208

it has yellow number five in it,

00:40:34.228 --> 00:40:35.308

which is like illegal

00:40:35.368 --> 00:40:36.028

everywhere in the world,

00:40:36.068 --> 00:40:37.049

except the United States.

00:40:37.089 --> 00:40:37.789

Cause it's poisonous.

00:40:38.549 --> 00:40:38.629

Um,

00:40:39.119 --> 00:40:42.203

So but but but making

00:40:42.243 --> 00:40:43.844

mayonnaise is just it's

00:40:43.864 --> 00:40:45.446

just a lot of work and it

00:40:45.526 --> 00:40:46.868

only lasts for a couple of days.

00:40:47.108 --> 00:40:48.830

But the mustard will last for six months.

00:40:48.930 --> 00:40:50.512

So I use that as an example

00:40:50.632 --> 00:40:52.975

of you can find things that you say, OK,

00:40:53.295 --> 00:40:54.477

that's meaningful to me.

00:40:55.778 --> 00:40:56.939

But that that process.

00:40:57.800 --> 00:41:00.161

of making the mustard is, is, is,