David Block is the consummate artist. He is most known as the musical genius behind The Human Experience and Gone Gone Beyond, but recently he started a hands-on art project called Speaking with Trees. All of which requires not only mastery, but intense creative courage. This podcast covers everything from the impact of psychedelics to the full spectrum consciousness curriculum of being a human being.

AUBREY: David Block, my brother. 

DAVID: We're here. 

AUBREY: We're here. 

DAVID: Arkadia. 

AUBREY: Arkadia, man. How fucking cool and crazy it is that this happened? It's one of those situations that just felt like we said “festival for a more beautiful world.” And then the default world just started kicking my ass, just like to the nuts. To the nuts. I was like one of those Shaolin monks, have you ever seen those videos, where they just stand with their legs open, and somebody just kicks them in the nuts over and over? 

DAVID: You will take it. 

AUBREY: Yeah, exactly. 

DAVID: I don't want to take it. 

AUBREY: So, we ended up doing it. But it's now a fully free festival.

DAVID: I'm super curious about that. Don't totally understand how that works. As someone who loves to think about giving it all away, Ram Dass, my teacher, he’s like, we're always kind of at this battle. The mind wants to control things and rationalize things and reason with things. And your heart's like, I'm going to give it all away. You should just take everything. 

AUBREY: Because that's what we want. We would love to do that but there's a finitude of resources and things. 

DAVID: Yeah. I look forward to that moment where I can do that. 

AUBREY: I'm obviously super blessed with everything that happened with Onnit. So, I'm in a position where I can make a couple moves like this. But it was just one of those moments where we made a claim, a festival for a more beautiful world. And then the way the more beautiful world wanted to be, it wanted to be built on trust, us just saying, we're going to throw this thing and we're going to... Fit For Service's all donation based now. 

DAVID: You switched the whole thing to donation based? 

AUBREY: Yeah, the whole thing. From now forward, donation based. So, we're like, hit us up with whatever you feel like it was worth when it's done. We'll open donations after the festival and if you want to donate, great. Otherwise, just have the fucking best time and allow that vibration to ripple out. And the funny thing is despite it being a massive financial commitment, it's the biggest event we've thrown, and all the changes and everything and artists that couldn't play, but we still had to pay them and all the whole business of music, which was fucking gnarly, actually. It was fucking gnarly. But it's been actually one of the easiest decisions to make, because it felt like I was deciding with God. The divine was like, yeah, good fucking job. And it's been actually one of the easier things to do, despite it being one of the wilder things to do. And it feels really good. Like, I can feel it rippling back from the crowd. And everybody is stoked. 

DAVID: They are very stoked. Night one, so good. You know what's funny, from my first record, all my music has been available by donation. You can buy it if you want, but for most of the time, for the last 12 years or so, I always really pushed, I'm like, if you want it and you don't feel like you're resourced enough for some reason to pay for it, I will never have it be a limiting factor that you had to pay for it to listen to it. Or even you had to listen to a commercial to listen to it. So, I put every record up. Donation, zero is the lowest requirement. And I've had so many people write to me. Actually, they're kind of confused usually. They're like, we don't understand because usually things that you don't have to pay for don't have value. And unfortunately, people are still learning how to wrap their minds around, how can someone give something that has quality that is free or donation based? I think that we're still figuring out how to even understand that—

AUBREY: And people getting trusted. Fundamentally, this is an act of saying no, we trust you. And we've done this with our yoga studios in Austin and Texas. And there's a couple others around Black Swan Yoga, it's all been donation based from the start. 

DAVID: Really? 

AUBREY: Yeah. So, you go in. If there's a suggested donation of 10 bucks or whatever—

DAVID: But if you don't have it, no one's going to be like, it's a suggested donation of $20. 

AUBREY: Actually, the yoga studio's killing it. And our average donation is somewhere around 9 bucks. It's almost what we would be charging for a drop-in class anyways. 

DAVID: But the feeling is different. 

AUBREY: But the feeling's different. 

DAVID: People do buy my music all the time. But the ones that, just that they know, that they know that they can have it is like, I feel like, you know that Buckminster Fuller quote, “if we try to fix the broken system, that's just not how you do it. You have to build a new system that makes the old one obsolete.” And for me, it's hard to say that we're doing that in practice, if we're not really trying things like living from our heart. And the heart does give things away. 

AUBREY: And just trusting in abundance in general. Trusting that the universe through you, actually, is watching as well. That's the thing I think people don't get is when you do that, some part of you feels like you deserve the reciprocity from the universe because they law of Eine, that first principle of reciprocity, Eine being the Quechua word for reciprocity, that lives within us too. So, when we cheat somebody, or we're a little shady, or we overspin the cue ball in our marketing or whatever, we know that, and we feel like maybe we didn't deserve it. And so, we're going to manifest that reality. 

DAVID: That's how it works. You can't escape it. When I resent someone else, I hurt myself. When I cheat someone else, I lie to someone else. I hurt myself. 

AUBREY: And you feel like you deserve the punishment that comes from that action. 

DAVID: Yeah. It's funny, I have been working really, really hard at being impeccable with my words. Which is tough, man. It's tough because our mind rationalizes white lies and little things. You didn't really need that piece of information. I really didn't need that piece of information. But at the end of the day, it comes down to me. And my partner and I were having this discussion the other day, with Genevieve. And we were going through and just going through, we did a lot of clearing. That communication is really the foundation of our relationship. We're doing a little bit of clearing and checking in. If there were any kinks in the rope kind of situation. And there was just one thing that was just sitting, it wasn't a big deal thing, at all. But it was something that was just, I call it, hiding energy. It's like the hiding energy. But that's not good. That's a symptom of something much larger. 

AUBREY: And that's going to be a barrier. It's going to be a little cushion between the intimacy that's possible between you. Because there's a little bit of you that you're holding back. I used to have that practice and I still do with Vy. But I started it with Whitney, my former partner. We called it “bring it to a hundred”. And oftentimes because we're in this polyamorous, wild polyamorous experimentation, it was some heavy shit. 

DAVID: Really don't want to talk about this. Seriously, I don't want to talk about this. 

AUBREY: Oftentimes, we would have to get on some heart medicine to really give ourselves the courage not only to share, but the courage to receive. So, we would drop in with some MDMA and bring it to a hundred. And some of the shit that came out was gnarly. But with our hearts open, we were able to receive it and digest it. But that was the only thing that allowed us to keep going for eight years, is getting—

DAVID: Feels so much better after too. We did this yesterday before we had a long drive. And towards the end of the drive, I was like, let's get to a hundred. We're like 98 right now. You're like, why don't we just live at 98? 98 feels good. 98 feels pretty solid, right? But it's not, though. My vision has never been to be good. And I know it's weird to strive towards being a self-actualized being. I think that that is an inhibitor towards ever getting there. But in terms of North Star, I would like to be truthful in all of my actions. I want to be truthful with all of my speech, not most of it. Even if it feels like it doesn't fit the narrative of, I am a somebody doing something, and I am David Block and I am achieving stuff. And people like me because I do things and I must uphold that narrative because it's important for my somebodyness. I don't know. I don't know if that's really how it works. 

AUBREY: Doesn't ever quite work. Another aspect of impeccability with your word, which I think is a seductive, slippery trap that people run into, that actually, Marc Gafni, who you actually met as well. He explains it really well. There's a pseudo interiority of feeling like you're on the inside with somebody by placing somebody else on the outside. So, if two people get together and they just talk a little bit of shit about anybody, just a little bit of shit, all of a sudden, a little circle forms around you and them where it's like, we have a thing that we're saying about this person. So, we're on the inside. 

DAVID: You're in my group now. 

AUBREY: And this person's on the outside. And all of a sudden, it gives this pseudo sense of intimacy between you, but it's false. It's not actual. You're just putting somebody outside to make you feel like you're inside. But ultimately, you keep doing that, and then you're on the outside with everybody. And that's what erodes community in such a strong way. And I think that's what Don Miguel Ruiz really understood as one of the vectors of why impeccability with your word is so important. You just can't do it. Because when you do, if you catch yourself doing it, I think we all do at a certain point. Not even mean things. Just subtle little things. Like the taste, the aftertaste, which is a good sign. It's like ash in your mouth. It's like you picked up the joint and you tried to smoke it from the wrong side. 

DAVID: You smoked the wrong side, bro. 

AUBREY: And I think we've all done that at one point. 

DAVID: We've all done that. I've never done that. 

AUBREY: I did that recently. Oh, God. It was a cigar, too. The worst. 

DAVID: It really is like that, too. Opposed to the opposite of where we're building real intimacy based on shared experiences, and values, and virtues, and those kinds of moments, I feel like we're all trying to find that little bit of safety. And we experience that safety when we have that little inside thing. That person did this to that person. And you're like, “I'm so sorry they did that to you.” And you're like, “we're close now.” You're like, “sure.” But that's that ash. It's not real. Opposed to, when we have shared experiences, of dancing, of celebrating, of singing, of drumming, of praying, of all these, there's so many ways to create real, meaningful, loving—

AUBREY: When you learn the real ways, you can start to dispose of those pseudo ways that you get to these things. And you start to realize the real juice, the real magic, the real sauce is available, you're like, fuck this. 

DAVID: Way more better. 

AUBREY: Way more better. Impeccability is something I've noticed from you. It's a thread that goes beyond your word, though. Because there's like an impeccability that you hold to your artistic expression too and I've really seen that. Your art is sacred. This is like you worshiping at the altar of the divine, is your commitment to art at the highest level. And it's really, really unwavering. And, of course, many of the artists I know have that. But for you particularly, it's a polished diamond. You're there applying your coats of polish to that commitment. And I really appreciate that about you. 

DAVID: Yeah. Thank you for seeing that. I guess I feel like I have a different experience than a lot of different people who are artists and who are exploring the arts professionally. A lot changes when you make your passion your profession. And that is really hard to do and continue to maintain integrity, just because of the way that the system is set up, the world and our monetary system. There are so many different things that are designed that are like, you will ascribe a value to what you do and based on how much you get paid, or how many people like it or share it, it will be meaningful or meaningless. And it's just not how it is when you're using art as a tool for transformation of ourself. And for me, I don't know how I would find, art and music has filled my life with meaning. Not as a meaning just because other people share their experiences with it, but because of the meaning it's given me in terms of exploring my consciousness, exploring my feelings, coping with really challenging times, transmuting and transforming those really challenging experiences into things that have been really meaningful for me, first me, and then sharing it with other people. And I think because, selfish is a weird word. I've always had a weird time with that word, because I was like, shouldn't everyone be just a little bit more selfish? And then maybe it's like, going reverse. 

AUBREY: I think everybody should be absolutely selfish but expand the word self to encompass everything, all the way from you to the whole cosmos. Yes, be fucking selfish, starting with you, then your family, then your people. And then the true self, the full self, which is all of the universe and manifestation, all of the people, So, be 100% selfish. Just expand your definition of self. 

DAVID: And that's my thing. It’s like music was so healing, is so healing for me. And now I've expanded to a lot of visual art, which has been really, really meaningful. Especially because I don't really share it as much with people. I don't have to, which is a blessing for me. Music does great for me. I'm able to simplify my life but continue to grow and expand to a larger audience. And I've been able to find these new mediums, like sculpture, and jewelry, and collage, and painting, and all these other things that I just get to do for their own sake because I feel like doing it. And I feel like when we become passionate about something, like you don't have to tell a kid to get off the playground. You have to drag them off the playground. Like when I find a new medium, you have to drag me away from it. 

AUBREY: There's a word in the Hebrew lineage for doing something for its own sake. And it's interesting that we don't have a word for that. We have to use a bunch of clumsy words to get to that. It's called Lishma. Lishma, for its own sake. And it was just this idea that they had, so clear. And it was so much a part of their practice. Lishma. 

DAVID: Dude, you don't Lishma? 

AUBREY: What are you doing this? Not Lishma? Not for its own sake. You're doing this for a purpose? Some strategy in this? And that's what most of the stuff that we do is. But to really do it for its own sake, that's powerful. That's fulfilling. 

DAVID: I have a slightly intense analogy that I like to use for what I like to think is real art. And that can span everything from, I don't care if you're making Death Metal, or crazy hip, whatever. Anything, any medium, doesn't matter. But there is a pretty distinct difference for me. Feels slightly crude, but one of them is prostitution. I think it's that intense. And one of them is making love. It's the same act. You can buy that. You can buy it in this world. But you can't really buy it. You can't buy making, love, it's not a thing. Art has the opportunity—

AUBREY: The moment it's transactional in any way, money is just one aspect of the transactional nature that could be applied to it, but once it's transactional, once it's not for its own sake, it's not the same thing. 

DAVID: For me, I know it sounds harsh, it's prostituting what is sacred and divine from me. I'm very grateful that people come to my concerts. I'm grateful that I get to be here and play. And I do a lot of thinking on, would I do this if no one listened to it? What are my drivers? Why do I really do this? Am I doing this because people do nice stuff for me? Am I doing it for the validation of people having transformational experiences? Why? Why do I do the things that I do? I think about that all the time. And for me, I've had these moments where I'm alone in my studio and something will happen, and I will just start laughing hysterically. Because I'm like, how is this happening? It fills me with so much joy. And I feel like there's an opportunity there. There's an opportunity for people to dig into that aspect of themselves. I feel like artists are alchemists. Our job is to give a window into the transcendent. That's our job. We have the opportunity to have to be our job. 

AUBREY: And the only way you're really going to reliably get there is if it's transcendent for you. Because if you're trying to imagine what the audience is going to want to hear, and that's why I think a lot of things get fucked up with producers. I've known a good amount of musicians who are really talented, who've had stuff that was raw but it was fire. It was just them and they're figuring that they got a beat, and they were just laying their heart into these tracks. And I was like, this is fucking fire. And then they go into the machine and the machine's like, oh no, you got to do it this way. Instead of hip hop style, rap style, why don't you just go more R&B and—

DAVID: This will be more accessible. More people will listen to this. 

AUBREY: It just turns into dogshit. 

DAVID: Yeah. And that's why also some of the greatest pieces of art were created so quickly, because they're channeled. It's like a moment of emotion that comes through. And when people have access to true artistry, which has nothing to do with theirs like David Block is a great vehicle. I'm like a car. My teacher says I have a car. I'm not in my car. I have a body. I have a body. I'm not this body. I'm not channels one and two. He said, I'm not just my physical characteristics. I'm not just my emotional or psychological characteristics. We're so much more than that. And when we flip the channel to get off of those first two, I am a meat sack, and I identify with my somebodyness. I am David and I make music that you like, and you dance to. As soon as I can get to like, I am a soul having a human experience, and that's where the name came from. I wanted something bigger than me. This is not my music project. This is a music project. Music is happening. There's stuff happening. It might happen with you. It might happen with Vy, might happen with Rising Appalachia. It's more of a happening, more of a verb than a noun. 

AUBREY: And that's not to say that you don't matter because it's happening through you. It is the David expression of the all, manifesting in its very unique way that it will never manifest through another individual who is not David Block. It is the divine through you. And the divine's like, “oh, yeah, fuck yeah. Go get it.” 

DAVID: This is good. This is good. Congratulations. 

AUBREY: This is good. I like this. I like this prism. 

DAVID: Keep going. 

AUBREY: It's just light. It's all light filtering through a very specific prism. And you're the very specific prism. And that's your unique name story is how the light comes through your prism. And our job is just to keep a clear lens on the prism, which is to eliminate the distortion. But within us is the innate uniqueness of our prism. So, it's both. Clear it all away, but know that all of our angles and facets and refractions are ours as well, as the divine light is moving through us. It's both. It's the including and transcending of self. 

DAVID: It's yes and. I have a hard time with value judgment. And I also have a really harsh critic that lives inside of me that we'll look at something compositionally. Danny, my band mate and I talk about objective beauty and subjective beauty a lot in art, and how there is something like the statue of David. I know it's a weird example to use, David. When I saw the statue of David, I cried. It was so overwhelmingly beautiful for me, objectively, that I couldn't even comprehend that a human was involved in its creation. It was so beautiful. Now, I have that in a lot of different mediums. I like a lot of weird art and everything from weird mobiles, like Alexander Calder, where I'm like, it's all about balance and conceptual, to something like a Rembrandt where you're like, it's just perfect. I bring it up just thinking like, I value the unique lens of stuff that comes through David Blockness. I feel like a lot of art is just as much as what you don't do as what you do. And so, I value that the choices that I make are what make my music and my art mine. And you can try to copy it but it would be not the same. It'll be subtly different, whether texture, color, whatever. There's a million variables in the creative process. Where I struggle on it, I'm curious your perspective too is, there's a subtle value judgment when you start to look at things that we call beautiful. Like this piece of art behind us. Is this beautiful? I don't know. I kind of like the colors maybe. I can see it conceptually. It has like a Warhol thing they're going with, with the colors and stuff. Maybe this artist has some deep spiritual connection to this, I have no idea. 

AUBREY: Probably not. 

DAVID: Probably not. 

AUBREY: It's a bunch of UFC gloves. 

DAVID: It's UFC gloves. Okay, it's fair. I'm trying to give it the benefit of the doubt. He's like, fighting is my dharma. I feel sensitive around it also, just in taking credit for the things that I do, versus just spending a lot of time polishing the mirror to get rid of the distortion. Because those distortion fields are usually what are keeping us from our true gift that every single person has. And it's not like every single person can make the same music, or every single person can make that quality of a painting or run in the Olympics. But everyone is really good at something. 

AUBREY: And that's being some aspect of themself. I think that's the difference for me between, that's the objectiveness of art. What is objective is inherently a bit subjective, because we won't be able to know but we can feel it. It's whether it's done from a place of radical truth. It is not particularly the skill and execution, which is beautiful and appreciative. Wow, the skill, the mastery that that person went into, the 40 years of calligraphy that went into doing this one perfect swoosh of paint on a canvas, like—

DAVID: It's such an amazing swoosh. It's one line. 

AUBREY: Yeah. So, there is something to be said for that, the appreciation of that level of mastery, but it has to come from that place of real, real rawness and truth with poetry, with song, with music. And I think people get lost in the artifice, and the skill, and the comparative nature of it, rather than, is this an authentic scream of your soul? And when it's that, it's fucking beautiful. Doesn't matter if a person can't dance, but they're on the dance floor just sending it. I watched somebody yesterday at the festival and he was so fired up, he was dancing, but he couldn't even dance. He started tiptoeing around and running around in little circles and stuff. 

DAVID: You get it. You get it. 

AUBREY: Yeah, exactly. And it was inspiring. Look at this guy fucking go, having the time of his life. And that energy felt really true, uninhibitedly true. And it's not like watching Vylana or Genevieve weave their magic

DAVID: But there's the edge. At what point in time, as we make our passion, whether that's movement or whatever, our profession? I feel like that's where it gets sticky. Someone's like, I'm really passionate about making music. It's my thing. Music is my thing. I'm going to share it now with everyone. And that's where I feel, as we're navigating being a human being on Earth, in real, practical, pragmatic, earthly terms, how we're trying to navigate that space between our bodies on Earth and our divinity, our divinity is being like, I'm going to create. Creation is happening. It's just flowing. I've polished the mirror. I've eliminated the distortion fields. And I'm a musician now. But your pitch is bad. And that's hard. 

AUBREY: Yeah.

DAVID: I feel like I'm constantly navigating that still. 

AUBREY: There's things that are going to be great for your intimate circle in the living room. Like you watch someone who just loves to sing, and they just belt and maybe it's a karaoke thing, it's like, fucking yes. But that doesn't mean that you're a musician as a career. If you want to do that, that's years of singing lessons and sweat and labor. And that's what's going to bring, mix your passion with the skill. That's going to allow it to be something great. Like I can put a thousand effort, I remember, I was always a decent athlete and everything, put a lot of heart into it. I'm never a good soccer player, but we had indoor soccer fraternity league, and I would just fucking send it. But I was terrible. I was terrible. Just terrible. I'm not going to be a professional soccer player. 

DAVID: And that's okay. 

AUBREY: And that's all right. But still, was that experience great for me? And was it fun for my teammates to watch who could play soccer, watching me just flail around? They loved it. 

DAVID: You know what's interesting, opposed to the people who are sometimes naturally extremely good at that and they're miserable. That's when I really start thinking like, what is the purpose of doing what I'm doing? Is the purpose of what I'm doing to move me forward financially so I can get more things? Are they material based? Or is it something more? And then finding the combination of those ingredients. I do enjoy nice things. I like nice things. I like nice food. I like to be able to take my partner to cool places. I want to be able to go to do nice things with my friends. So, there's an aspect of that. And then there's the aspect of, am I being joy? Am I happy with my life? When I think about you playing soccer, I see you with a big shit eating grin having a blast. And you're like, he's fumbling a little bit, but whatever. 

AUBREY: And the interesting thing that can happen is when your identity gets wrapped up in something, there's an immense amount of pressure. So, actually, I had, consistently, just the most ecstatic experience playing sports that I don't know what the fuck I'm doing, because I have no expectation that I'm going to be good. 

DAVID: You're playing sports. 

AUBREY: But if I play basketball, sometimes I'll have a lot of fun. But sometimes, because a basketball player is part of what Aubrey Marcus is and was, if I'm having a slightly off game, it's not fun. It's miserable. And then I'll be thinking about it. Even with the rec league that I've started recently. I played a bad game, I mean we're talking a two-day hangover of self-condemnation still. And I'm like, come on, man. You're fucking 41—

DAVID: How much ceremony do I have to do to enjoy fucking basketball? I just want to play basketball. 

AUBREY: Exactly. 

DAVID: I know, man. I feel you. I have this experience. I think I've put over a couple hundred pieces of music. I've written 500 plus pieces of music. I've had enough people tell me that my music's impacted their life. You would think at this point, it would be fine. I get great feedback. It’s like I birth my child, I conceived my child. All these magical things. I would say almost every song I make, I have an existential meltdown that I am useless, and that I've lost my touch. I'm never going to make a good song again. That I've already done all the chord progressions that I actually like and that everything just sounds the same and that my music is garbage. All the time. All the time. And I sit there and thank God I have so many interesting other philosophical creative friends where I'm like, do you ever have this? Does this happen to you? And they're like, yeah, all the time. Great. That's really a relief. I thought I was the only one. 

AUBREY: You hear those stories about so many painters. I don't have the names of them fresh. But I've heard the parables and stories many times of painters who would finish their paintings, masters, people we'd call masters, who would want to have to be restrained by the other people in there who they were working with from destroying their art. 

DAVID: I will destroy this. Michelangelo, please don't do that. I gotta say, it's pretty nice. Maybe don't do that. Because your inner torment is... 

AUBREY: It's interesting. 

DAVID: It's tough. 

AUBREY: It's helpful in some regards, because we're striving for something that's impossible. But when the expectation is that the Impossible will actually manifest, that's where we get fucked up. 

DAVID: Yeah. It's constant for me. It's hilarious. I laugh at myself now... Self-awareness is an important part of our journey, our spiritual evolution. For me, it's like the first part, and maybe the last part also. But the first part is, something else is happening. I am not just the meat sack. There's something more than that. Myself is not just David. My self includes Aubrey. If I'm not kind to Aubrey, I'm not kind to myself. That's what we were talking about earlier, that expanded definition of self, which is crucial for me at this point for Humanity to understand. It's really crucial. 

AUBREY: I think it's the most important thing for this time now. There's energy that's pushing people more and more into separateness, into their separate self. Whether it's identity politics, which is narrowing you by this race, and this gender, and this sexual orientation, and this politics. We're forgetting the sameness, which is the essential truth, the thing that is always true. That we're all coming from that same source light, that same star fire that's filling us up and refracting through our own unique prism. And if we could get back to just seeing that, then all of these other differences would seem minor and inconsequential to the real truth of, I see you. That's, I think, what namaste is all about. The divine in me sees the divine in you. And if we could actually get to that, then we could sort out all of these things and celebrate the differences that we have. 

DAVID: Totally. I think of how that would look on a practical level. Because for me, I exist part of the time as I play 100, 220 concerts a year, and I'm traveling constantly. I'm going from here to there, doing all this stuff. It's very human doingness, more than human beingness. And then I have the other side of a passionate practitioner that sits a lot of time in self-reflection and is constantly wondering, contemplating my navel. How did I get here? What came before time? What is the universe expanding into? The void? What's a void? This is how my mind works a lot of the time. It's easy to talk about, if we all treated each other. Like if we just did the golden rule. Just a golden rule. Just pick one. Treat others the way you want to be treated. But if we did that from the lens that like, I actually am you. We are literally the same thing, not just conceptually, literally. The fabric of our being is the same. It looks different but that's an illusion. I think what would happen practically is, it's easy for me to talk about spirituality but when I look at people, 1 in 7 people on planet Earth don't have clean drinking water. So, I should just tell them that, karma. No clean drinking water for you this birth. No. If you look at obesity and starvation in the same country, what? 40% of food grown thrown away? What? 

AUBREY: What I think you're tracking is, you're tracking that the system has forgotten this truth so long ago, that now we're living in the truly, actually unjust manifestations of decisions of generations past that have existed because of the conditioning of the separate self, my tribe versus your tribe. As long as I get mine, we're good. 

DAVID: It’s my food.

AUBREY: Fuck you over there. That idea played out over eons has created the situation that we're in. And then a lot of people will try to reconcile the horror of this fact that, wow, that person with the distended belly and the parasites that can't get clean water is me living a different life and they didn't deserve that. And that's just simply fucked up. In order to reconcile that, they'll play games of karma. In a past life, they must have been someone who did the other thing. Or not. You don't fucking know that. But maybe that makes you—

DAVID: Or just be more mindful with the way you treat other people and don't throw away all your food. 

AUBREY: That may make you sleep better at night to think that this is karma. But maybe not. There are consequences to our actions. And to me, the focus is, we have to correct the upstream problem, the upstream toxicity of the myth of separation, as Charles would call it. We have to address that because there will be perpetually new, starved, war-torn, trafficked people always until-- 

DAVID: Symptoms. They're symptoms 

AUBREY: They’re symptoms of the disease. We have to attack the disease. That doesn't mean that we can't give money or give support or help those that are that are needy. But the amount of need that's there, that's happening is overwhelming. I'm not saying not to do anything. Of course, and our heart wants to do all that. But so much of our effort has to be to correct the source problem. Otherwise, the drinking water from that fountain head is all going to be polluted. And it's just going to create more of the same. 

DAVID: It's such a weird time right now. Because, we have access to all these ancient lineages that have told us basically the same thing from, from the Gnostics, to the Kabbalists, to the Sufis, to the indigenous from everywhere. They've all been pointing at this. And on the one hand, we have access. And then on the second hand, we have a crazy division. Even within people within spiritual communities. I laugh at myself, sometimes. Genevieve does a really great job. But sometimes it feels like she's poking me in the stomach, but I'm happy she does it in the end. If I lose my cool or lose my temper at something from a trigger, and I'll start speaking in a way that's not compassionate. And she'll say something like, is that how your teacher would speak up or something? Is that how Ram Dass would speak? And I'm like, “no, fuck you, and no.” There's just so much division. And it's wild. You get so many people that are, And the cancel culture of everything. You have one belief system that's slightly different than someone else's and you're done. Guys, I hate to break this to you, but you don't fight darkness with darkness. Light does that. 

AUBREY: If people were really aware, they would find this pseudo ecstasy in the destruction of another person and the self-righteous feeling of virtue of being the destroyer. You think of the horrific things that happen. Right now, these attacks are happening with pixels, which is very damaging, and actually can cause people to commit suicide. It can be really gnarly the way that social media is attacked with pixels. That's really what it is. It's pixels forming words on a fucking screen that you're reading. And that's the attack. But it has the same energy as the people who were throwing stones. When someone was in a circle who did something that was heretical, or who did something that was against the social norms that were available, those people picking up the stones, there was an ecstasy in that moment of destroying that other person. The feeling of vigor and fire—

DAVID: Self-righteous. I am right and you are wrong. I will destroy you. 

AUBREY: If they're really looking, there is a real darkness, there's a real darkness of that ecstasy of destroying somebody else that is just also a part of the cosmos. And I think part of what needs, it's an invitation to happen at least. I don't think I have any authority to say what anybody or anything needs, is the level of introspection to see where we're getting off on what we're doing. We're getting off on putting somebody in their place, getting off on being better than somebody else, just really getting off on it. Some part of our psyche is just vigorously masturbating, fucking snarl. 

DAVID: I am so much more spiritual than you. 

AUBREY: Yeah, exactly. And that's, that's really what's happening. And then to realize that's what's happening. And then to realize we all have that little fuckin masturbating ecstasy and destruction demon. 

DAVID: I'm valuable and mean something. I'm important. 

AUBREY: That energy is in all of us. So, when we see that energy, see that, an awareness for what it is, but also, tat tvam asi, I'm that too. That's in there in me or hope on opponent. Let me find that little demon in me, and cure that demon in me, and allow that cure to actually affect what's happening externally. 

DAVID: I found this text, it's a Buddhist text by the third patriarch of Zen, it's called "The Great Way." It's like 17 minutes. I recommend YouTube, looking at Ram Dass, he's just reading it, it's like 17 minutes. It's great. And one of them says, There are all these short lines, kind of like the Dao. And it says, to set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind. To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind. That's really tough. That's really tough. Because if you think about it, everything is either I like or I don't like. That's it. Basically, humans just oscillate back and forth between I want more of this, I want less of this. That's desire, desire of suffering, or attachment to the outcomes of our desires is what leads to our suffering. And then to set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind. This guy's a fucking asshole. This guy, Hitler, he's an asshole. I don't like him. It's like, you will be stuck suffering for a long time. And a lot of people were like, no. I use that analogy. I'm Jewish, you're Jewish. I use Hitler as an example because a lot of my family was killed in the Holocaust. It's just unbelievable ways. And my grandfather was blown up by a bomb in World War Two and got a purple heart. Our family felt it for real. And anyone in that time, I can imagine did. 

AUBREY: My lineage was actually persecuted in the pogroms in Russia. Similar idea, less central figure, but that level of people just coming to your house. 

DAVID: How do I have forgiveness for that person? There's so many different levels to our spiritual evolution. My teacher says two things, you only need two things. Really. That feels great. There's only two things I need to do. I need to love everybody and tell the truth. But the truth is, I don't love everybody. And you're like, fuck. 

AUBREY: Start there. Start there. It's important. There's actually an order to it, I think. I think truth and love are actually synonyms. But the pathway to love is through truth. That's what I've really found. If truth, love, God, these are synonyms or something similar, what's the easiest way to get there? For me, it's truth. Because I can really get a handle on that a lot easier than love, I can try but if I'm not being truthful about the love, it's bullshit. It's not real. Truth can be real. Truth can be real. That, for me, is the first pathway. It's the first door. Of course, I love that teaching as well. Love everyone, tell the truth. 

DAVID: But that's really rough. It’s like, that’s not like it.

AUBREY: I think it actually should be reversed. Be in truth and then love everybody. 

DAVID: Because the first part, you're like, this asshole. This fucking asshole? Are you serious? You want me to love this person? How can I love this person? Look at the choices they're making. Until we start to heal and learn this is the power of forgiveness... When I was growing up, I was really challenged as a youth. I was very creative, I was in all the gifted programs, but I had a really hard time focusing. So, I was heavily, heavily medicated for 12 years. Like Ritalin and Pamelor, and all the things that basically tried to take the enormity of my energy which is a lot, I have a lot of energy, and to focus it into a 1920s industrial education model, which was hard for me. So, for a long time, I felt out of place, in a way, trying to find who I was. That my learning disabilities were actually okay. And now I call them my learning superpowers. The way that I thought about things was different than other people. So, I was super challenged. And so, I said just terrible things to my mom growing up. My mom is an unconditionally loving saint of a being. I hope she watches this podcast. Mom, you're fucking awesome. I love you. And I've made my formal apologies to my mom. But my mom never ever, for a single moment, stopped loving me at all. Her love was truly unconditional. She says, I don't have to like the choices you make. In fact, I don't like most of the choices, many of the choices you're making, the words that you're choosing to say, the way you're choosing to treat me. Her embodiment of forgiveness, based on a foundation of unconditional love, because that foundation of unconditional love is the fertile soil for forgiveness. For her to say, I know that you are acting like a hurt person. I know you're acting from your anger. I know that your anger, and your frustration, and your resentment, and all those other qualities, which are hard and are real, she always said, no one's emotions are invalid. My emotions as a kid were real for me. I had a really hard time. Even though I had a beautiful environment and a loving mother and father, it was hard for me. I can't imagine being on the other side and needing to embody forgiveness in the way that my mom did. But because she did do that, because I have an actual example of that, I'm able to be like, forgiveness Is possible. When I choose forgiveness, I'm really choosing love. Because if I'm harboring resentment towards you, and that could be at every level, harboring resentment, you stole my girlfriend, or harboring resentment, you killed my family, harboring resentment, you tried to eliminate my people. It gets harder as you move up the ladder. I've tried this. I've been doing this practice now for almost a decade. I don't know if I've gotten, I've gotten a little bit better, but it's tough. 

AUBREY: It seems to me, because I've meditated on this as well and thrown it into practice, it seems to me that it's necessary to embrace the truth at each aspect of our dimensionality. So, you can't just bypass to the spiritual—

DAVID: Everything's great. There's just another being. 

AUBREY: You can get there but you also have to acknowledge all of the different aspects of you, like the separate self-aspect and all of these other very emotional, wounded aspects, and allow them to have their voice, and their cry, and their wail, and their expression, and their emotion of rage that just comes out, okay, that's great. And yes and. This purview is also true, always, at all times. I think, the mastery comes from when you can shift your purview honestly, not by negating anything else, and not by tricking yourself into thinking I'm only this. I always say, it's cool to act like Jesus if you're Jesus. Otherwise, don't fucking try to get there and pretend you're all Jesus when you got some part of you that wants—

DAVID: You're kind of an ass, bro. Seriously. You just did that. You're not Jesus. 

AUBREY: So, embrace the full spectrum of your being and know that all of those things are true. And I think when you actually include all of those, it allows you to actually shift your perspective more towards that divine side. But that's the only chance we got. Because everything has to have its voice. And until we've legitimately shifted our purview to that aspect that can see from the divine perspective, which I think is a very rare percentage of beings who are able to reach that level. 

DAVID: For now. 

AUBREY: Yeah, for sure. Some part of me is also happy with just understanding the broad spectrum of what is possible. So, knowing that I can jump into that identification, or I can just sit in that other one where I want to put on the 300 soundtrack and visualize fucking grabbing my sword and shield and just going to town. I kind of like this aspect of human experience. 

DAVID: We have our humanity and we have our divinity. We have both of them. If we're so focused on killing our ego and getting rid of our humanity, we miss the whole point. We are our humanity and we are our divinity. We're both of those things. There's this great story. Ram Dass had a friend named Emmanuel who didn't have a body, he was a disembodied being. He's talking to Emmanuel and he was saying, just trying to kind of figure out and move with, just how to navigate life. You spent so much time, Emmanuel saying to Ram Dass, he said, you spent so much time on your divinity, but you did take a human birth. Have you ever tried taking the human curriculum? Have you ever tried being human? Lean into that. When I think about that story, there's this one other story that said, he's like, after 20 years, he goes back to Harvard. He's Richard Alpert. He leaves and he goes to India, becomes Ram Dass. Come back. He's meditated in caves for months. Darkness retreats, take it to fucking 50. 

AUBREY: That's where they came from. 

DAVID: Fasting, all the psychedelics for months, to the nth degree. Comes back to Harvard 20 years later and runs into a friend. And he's like, you know, Dick, you haven't changed a bit. That's when he realized, after 20 years of meditating, after 20 years of fasting, I haven't gotten rid of a single one of my neuroses. The only difference is now when they come in, I don't invite them to stay. I invite them in for tea, and it says, oh, hello neurotic OCD. Oh, yes. Good to see you. No, you can't stay. Good to see you. You're a part of me. And keep going is my humanity. Not to say, you're a bad, you're a terrible person, you're having a terrible birth, your karma is shit, you're a bad person, because you have X thought or Y thought. No, you're a human being. And you're a divine being. We're both of those things. 

AUBREY: You know one of the key codes because what you're talking about is setting the good up against the bad. It's really actually just saying preference, fundamentally. Man, it's difficult to get rid of preference. It's really difficult. In the Buddhist way, they say desire is a contract with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want. There's these sayings that go around like this. Fuck. I don't think that's going to work, at least not for me. I understand the message that they're saying, but I want to live a red-blooded, passionate life of desire. But what I realized the key code was and this key code is really, I've been sitting with it, it's recent, and it's changed everything for me because as I've gone deeper and deeper into deep contemplation, psychedelic assisted contemplation, my ketamine, Cannabis, what do I want? What do I want? Finally, what I got to is I want to want. My desire is for desire itself. And so when desire becomes Lishma, for its own sake, when you desire desire, you've actually reached a state where you will be satiated by your own desire because desire is your desire. 

DAVID: It's pretty meta. 

AUBREY: It was fucking cool. Because when I really want something, I'm alive. When you really want something, you're so alive. And that's why Sebastian Junger's book "Tribe," people were the most happy when their situation was difficult and food was scarce, or bombs were dropping, because they wanted something bad and they were so alive. And they'll recount those days as the best times in their life. Why? Because they wanted something. It was the want itself that was satisfying but they were actually focused on the ends of it, something beyond the Lishma, some result. But the result is never going to satisfy you. 

DAVID: Totally. For me, that’s the key.

AUBREY:  So, the Buddhist got that part right. The result will never satisfy like Anthony de Mello fucking eviscerates the idea. I don't know if you've read any of his work. 

DAVID: No. 

AUBREY: Oh, fucking unbelievable. He eviscerates the understanding that what you think you desire will actually bring you happiness. But he goes the Buddhist route. Just get rid of it. And I was like, that fucking can't work for me de Mello. I understand the point you're making is accurate. No matter what I've desired, when I've gotten them, it never filled that thing that I was craving. But if I just shift my perspective to craving craving itself, then at that point, I win. I won. 

DAVID: You're like, I beat the simulation. Sorry, suckers. 

AUBREY: Exactly, I feel you.

DAVID: Gotcha. I feel you. With the desired tip, I agree with you. Feeling alive, taking the human curriculum, it seems that we want things and seem like we don't want things. And we try to figure out how to get more of the things that we want, and get rid of the things that we don't want. And for me, the suffering part that, one of the biggest learnings that happened through Vipassana is pain plus resistance equals suffering. Pain is inevitable. You can't get rid of it. Just get used to it. Life is full of pain. But if you eliminate the resistance to the pain, you end suffering. Pain is still there. But the value of pain, you feel it physically. You're sitting there meditating for 10 hours, and you're like, my back hurts. It feels like someone is smashing me in the back with a bat. Is that bad? Or is it just a sensation? Objectively, it's just a sensation. There's no objective, the pain in your back is bad. Now, I might decide, I want less pain in my back. So, I pushed it away. There's resistance. For me, with suffering, my amendment to the Buddhist lineage of suffering is the cause of desire, and maybe they mean—

AUBREY: Desire's the cause of suffering. 

DAVID: Desire's the cause of suffering, it's the attachment to the outcome. That's the difference. I don't get what I want. Now, I'm pissed. 

AUBREY: I also think that the inverse is not also true. Like aversion. Aversion as a want. I want to not. The inversion of that doesn't actually get you anywhere. That type of want is a dead end. Is a dead end that leads straight to suffering. So, the desire to not, it's actually an aversion, which is usually based in some kind of fear. That is where the application of acceptance, and actually alchemizing and reframing what that thing is as a sensation. That's where that becomes a real virtue. So, I would say that the code that I was sharing only works for the positive application of desire, not the avoiding this. I don't want this. You could say that's a want. You could say that's a desire. I desire to not want this, but it doesn't work if it's that way. 

DAVID: Yeah. I don't think that's how the fundamental framework of the universe works. I love magic. And I love speaking into reality because in the beginning, it was the word. Our words have power, real power. So, Genevieve and I start our day, every day, we first start with gratitudes, our gratitude practice. We do two or three minutes each, and it's everything. I'm grateful for this moment. I'm grateful for clean water. I'm grateful for this comfortable bed. I'm grateful through the dappled sunlight coming through our window. Little things. I'm grateful for the smell of da, da, da, whatever. And the second thing we do is we speak our day as it's done. Today was a beautiful day. I woke up early and I went to the gym and I exercised my body. I got to get this great IV drip and go to this cool vibrating chair for my buddy, and I did this great podcast with Aubrey. And I danced and I celebrated with my friends. My gifts were celebrated and I received so much abundance because people valued my gifts. My music and my art impacted and changed people's lives. And people had a beautiful, joyous day on Earth. Something like that. Whatever it is. I am very mindful because that's magic. That's real magic, by the way, for all the people who want to borrow that practice. That's real magic. It really works. Like what you were talking about, speaking the story of Arkadia. 

AUBREY: Yeah. And the story fundamentally changes your reality. It changes your multiverse. 

DAVID: And if everyone is doing that, if everyone is speaking those new stories of that more beautiful world that we know is possible, we have a higher probability, at least in that kind of pocket of time space, to actually experience that. 

AUBREY: Yeah. Behold, I make all things new. The key to the kingdom, the key to Arkadia, the key to that more beautiful world is actually creating it. There's so much buzz about the multiverse. There's movies coming out about the multiverse, and everybody's acting like they're independent things that are created by some other creator. Well, yeah, maybe. But the multiverse is happening all the time is our multiverse of our own story. Everybody creates their own story. And if story is an aspect of the universe, what I was explaining yesterday. That Kybalion, all is mind, the universe is mental. So, we're in this collective story of the mind of the divine, all the way up, all the way down. We have our own individual story. And so, we're in a multiverse of ourself. We're in one universe that we've created as a fractal of the divine. And we get to decide how that story is. And Yeshua's teaching, Behold, I make all things new, is to see everything in your story differently and then you are in the more beautiful world. If you can do it, you're in it. And you can invite other people into that same default reality where all of the multiverses intersect, to a certain degree, into the one universe, the oneverse, uni-verse, the oneverse of many different songs, many different voices being played in your story, participating in the greater story. But you have autonomy and authority over your story. 

DAVID: And one thing I feel like is important as we were just talking about that piece, what doesn't work is I'm telling the story of Arkadia. I spent the day in Arkadia and everyone wasn't an asshole. That's not how it goes. We need to reframe magic. That's not how it works. The universe doesn't hear, I don't. Everyone was finally not an asshole. And the food wasn't bad. No, no. We have to reframe. Everyone communicated with loving kindness and I was nourished all day. There's a big difference in that. And I think we have to be mindful. I'm trying to do better. Let me rephrase that. I am doing better. 

AUBREY: Good catch. Good catch. 

DAVID: I'm doing better at my reframe, because it's easy to get caught up in the things that we don't want. And it is a subtle but, it's a game changing shift when we say exactly what you said. If your desire's desiring, well, I'm calling in the things that I am. I do want my life. Not calling out the things that I don't want. I see where the logic is there. But no, don't do that. 

AUBREY: Do it the other way. Do it the other way. Going back to what you were saying about pain, one of the other codes that I've gotten, that I'm really working with is to find fearless pain. If you can find fearless pain, because so much of the resistance to pain that creates the suffering that we're talking about typically involves some kind of fear. You feel something. Let's say you think you're getting sick and it's a little uncomfortable. This is a big one for me. I start to feel a little tickle in my sinuses. The tickle in my sinuses is not a fucking big deal. But the fear, I'm going to get sick. Or the fear—

DAVID: Because you're going to get worse. 

AUBREY: Yeah, I feel pain. Is this ever going to go away? Is this going to be a permanent affliction? Is this thing never going to recover? Is this planner’s work going to be here forever on my heel? Every time I step, it's going to be like this. Whereas each little step on your heel on the planet, I haven't got one of those in years, but I used to get those on my heel. Every little step is not a big deal. But the fear that this is going to continue forever and ever and ever. Whatever the story is about, that fear creates so much discomfort, so much suffering. So, if you can actually find fearless pain. And I think that's why I like going into a cold bath and doing some of these things, where you do it in the absence of fear and train yourself to feel pain without fear. We can deal with pain. We can totally deal with pain. 

DAVID: We've been dealing for a long time. 

AUBREY: And we have to. But if you can just extricate, deconflate the fear and the pain, and so you just experience pain, but without the fear, you're on your path to be a real alchemical wizard. 

DAVID: For me, that's the biggest practical takeaway of my Vipassana practice. It's great to be nicer, and more peaceful, and all these. There's a lot of practical benefits of having a meditation practice. And I mean practical in the sense that, yes, it's improving maybe your spiritual karma, depending on what you believe in, and your humanity. I'm less reactive and more responsive. I'm less triggered and more aware of my triggers when they're coming up so I can be more responsive instead of reactive, things like that. But one of the big ones has been the mitigation of pain. I have a really weird, I don't know if it's past life stuff. Maybe I should talk to someone else about this. My creativity can go a little bit awry sometimes. And it will go down this dark rabbit hole of what's happening with humanity. Although I live a great life, as a white male in America with privilege and all these things, I look at the rest of the world sometimes and I'm like, Jesus, this is really not good. And then I spiral into the experiences of torture, and misery, and starvation. I'm an empath so I feel it in my, it hurts physically. It's not very often, but it does happen. 

AUBREY: I think it's important. I think it's really important to actually feel that. We can't hold it at all times because it's debilitating. But I've had some profound experiences where I've stepped into the broadest sense of self that I've ever been able to step into in this spiritual evolution. Again, the medicines have been a huge ally for me in being able to access this. But it'll pop me into the most expanded version of self. And in some of those moments, I've felt the suffering of the collective self, of me as every person who is suffering. And the tears and the sobbing that came, came from such a well of oh my God. I can touch it again. It's so big, man. It's so big. And then you feel that. You can't hold that, I'm not going to bring that into tonight's dancing, whatever. But every once in a while, to know it's important to touch that and just calibrate that and let yourself know that that's real. That's real. And then also, that's what sparks my desire. Because if I don't feel that, then why do I care about this next book that I'm writing or the next thing that I'm doing? I don't care as much. And then my desire is not as strong. And then I'm not as happy. And nothing works. So, occasionally dropping into that deepest level of compassion, where you're feeling the suffering of the world to the maximum degree that you're capable, and hopefully, even expanding your ability to be compassionately empathic, to drop into that and feel that, then that allows a greater fire to go out. And so I think it's so important to touch that and also to be able to let it go. 

DAVID: And that's the other piece, bringing it full circle. As we're learning to navigate pain and not run away from it. That's the thing. On the one hand, I could probably be like, that experience is too painful for me. Push it away. And what happens as a result of that, not good. Opposed to feeling all the feelings, embracing our humanity, and saying, I feel a lot, I cry a lot. I feel the suffering of humanity regularly. I'm a very joyous being, but I am feeling all the feelings all the time. And it's a really intense experience. And that's why art's been so healing for me because I'm able to alchemize those feelings and experiences into something else. But if I push away that pain and I run away from the pain, it's no good. 

AUBREY: No. There's an ecstasy in feeling pain in its pure form. And ecstasy is a strange word. Passion of the Christ for example, which is the suffering. But there's an ecstasy in that. Even just a moment ago where I just, I've forged the pathway for me to feel it and even me getting in there and my eyes getting a little wet and me feeling it, you could say that feeling thing was bad because I'm crying and I'm feeling pain. But there was an ecstasy of aliveness that I even just felt just now. And especially when it was at its strongest point, when I was really in my most expanded self and I was sobbing. I look back at that, and I don't think, man, that was a tough day. I was like, that night was special. There was ecstasy. 

DAVID: Sad is not bad. Sad is sad, not bad. 

AUBREY: Because there's an ecstasy. You take it to its fullest conclusion, there's this sense of radical aliveness that comes, that to me is, I've always identified as a poet, a warrior poet, was some of the first ideas I had of mixing these two ideas. And to be a poet of any sort, you have to be able to feel pain. There's a country song that I like, and the chorus is, how can you sing if you can't cry? 

DAVID: That's a great line. I thought you were going to say, you got to know when to hold them and know when to fold them, which is also a great line from a country song. 

AUBREY: For sure. For sure. So, there's some wisdom in that. I like country music. But how can you sing if you can't cry? And there's something really true about that. 

DAVID: Got to feel all the feelings. I think there's a big, I don't think there is an enormous amount of healing that men need to go for us to rediscover our emotional body. We've been shamed for thousands of years as weakness, the more that we explore our emotional body. And you look at the result of that, it turned out slightly shitty for our world. When people don't express themselves, and it's for men and women, but I guess I can only speak from my own experience. As a man, the healing journey that I've been on to connect with my emotional body, to feel feelings, and not only to feel them, but to allow and accept them as perfect as they are, as real as they are, and to be able to vulnerably communicate them so I can have more connection. And I feel for me, that's actually one of the biggest foundations of building real trust. When people who are coming to Arkadia hear you on stage sharing your heart vulnerably, and vulnerably should not be comfortable. Just because something feels edgy doesn't mean it's vulnerable for you. But when your heart is open and you're sharing vulnerably, and people can feel that, it's a transmission, it's an energy that you're giving out to people, it enables people to soften and to find that place in themselves, because they're like, oh my God, this strong being is being vulnerable, and connected, and authentic. I trust him. I trust them. 

AUBREY: The ability to understand the full spectrum of who you are and not leave things in the shadows is so powerful. You have to be mindful when talking about genders and their own specific challenges. Because everybody of every gender has had different conditioning, and different parents, different ways that they've accessed that. But there are certain patterns that exist. And I think what you describe is one pattern for men that's been hard, the suppression of emotion. Suck it up. Fucking soft cowboy. Rub some dirt on it. Let's fucking go. That aspect of stuffing your feelings. It is universal. But men have had a good portion of that. 

One thing that I've noticed on the other side is men have been given the liberty and the freedom to overtly compete. That's something that men are celebrated for is overt competition. So, we're all competitive. It's the nature of the separate self to know itself in comparison to others. And so the drive of the separate self is going to compete. Try and put yourself in a list of who's better and who's worse. So, me with all my homies, competition is right there on the table. We're shit talking to each other. Most of the conversations we have are competitive shit talking about some trivial thing that we're playing. Doesn't matter what it is. And so, that aspect has been allowed to healthily express. And so, there's less likely for some shadow element of competition to create that passive aggressive expression that can come between men in that circle because the competition is overt. If you want to talk shit to him, you say it right to their face, and you fucking laugh. Even when it's a touchy spot. A touchy spot. Great. I think giving women the same permission too. No, it's okay. Be competitive. But how about bringing it overtly? Bring it to the surface. Allow yourself to have that. And so that way, it doesn't guide this competitive comparison on either side. And again, this applies to both sexes. 

DAVID: Yeah. Plus, full stop. We're in a very interesting time in humanity and things are transitioning very quickly. Let's be straight here. If we rewind 100 years ago, things were in much clearer boxes. They might be really shitty boxes, but they were in boxes. And I think, important for me to highlight, whenever I think of anything of men or women, or whatever gender you'd like to ascribe to, I think it's moving out of these paradigms that we built that had those boxes, that we identified a certain way. And we're moving into a place where actually people get to choose what feels most alive for them, most resonant, which is, I think, incredibly important if we're moving towards this more beautiful world. If you feel somewhere, if it feels authentic and true for you, it's real for you. Who am I to say what I think you should do is the right thing? If you're not harming anybody else, you're not harming anyone else, I think you should do what you do. To do with loving kindness. Wouldn't that be just a beautiful world? 

AUBREY: And that's where we're headed. 

DAVID: You know what I mean? We have a great dance party, baby. 

AUBREY: That's where we're headed. David, I could talk to you for hours and hours, and we do all the time. We got a house full of fucking wizards, and priestesses, and magical beings and people. So, we're going to get back to that now. But anything else you want to share about any projects you're working on, anything you're excited about, anything you want to point people to? 

DAVID: I'm excited about all the stuff with “Gone Gone Beyond” with the music we're doing. I'm excited about “The Human Experience” stuff. I'm working on this project, speaking with trees, which is my sculpture exhibition. We planted 115,000 trees with the sales of three sculptures. I feel really excited in general. Always happy to talk, we can do it forever, literally. And I would say if I wanted to leave people with something is that, I want to, maybe just talk for a moment just about creative courage. I feel like creative courage, this idea for me is that people are going to shit on your dreams. And it requires an enormous amount of courage to move forward from your heart, the thing that wants to give it all the way, battling the mind who's trying to control everything. It takes a lot of courage to show up authentically. My hope is that my art and music gives you a little bit of that courage to dig deeper. To ask those questions of, why do I do the things that I do? Why have I made the choices that I've made? How do I define success? The big questions. And I'm hoping that the music and the art can just be a companion on your journey. That's what I hope. That's my intention that I put into it, is that you listen to it, and you feel something. I don't really care what you feel personally. I just want you to feel deeply, and vulnerably, and authentically. So, if you're unfamiliar with the music and my art, please check it out. And I hope it really inspires you. That's my hope. 

AUBREY: And so it is. So it is. Love you, brother. 

DAVID: Love you too, brother. 

AUBREY: Thanks, everybody. See you next week.