Skip to content 
How to deprogram cultural messages and transform your mindset
Cultural Programming
In so many ways, throughout years of personal discovery, I have reclaimed a greater sense of sovereignty, strength, and resilience.
But recently I went through a series of traumatic events that shook me to my core and left me questioning everything I thought I knew about myself.
Over the course of about a month, my father had a massive stroke, my beloved dog was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer, and I went through a very difficult breakup with my partner who I’d been living with.
In addition, I found myself in an intense conflict with my two best friends.
Are you too hard on yourself?
Learn how therapy can help turn your inner critic into your biggest fan.
Learn More Here
Want to talk?
At My LA Therapy, our warm and experienced anxiety therapy experts offer research-based, personalized care.
Wake up
Until we begin to wake up to this constructed reality, in a sense, we will always be puppets of our cultural forces.
We are bottle-fed advertisements from birth—programmed to see material goods as the ticket to joy and salvation. This is the byproduct of a society that deifies consumerism and worships economic gain as the summum bonum: the highest good and ultimate goal.
The messages are both subtle and overt, both subliminal and explicit. They are enshrined in billboards, movies, and the daily actions, values, and attitudes of those around us.
We are indoctrinated to believe our self-worth and identity are based primarily on our productivity, achievements, and possessions. We have been taught to commodify ourselves and others as though we were products to be bought and sold.
This strips us and those around us of our humanity, robbing us of the sacred joy of being. In this “human consumerism,” we lose touch with our inherent preciousness.
What is required to undo this conditioning is a complete paradigm shift in the way we see the world, ourselves, and each other.
When we dismantle our inherited perceptions and deprogram our indoctrinated views, we change our habituated roles within this system. This is essential to genuine personal and collective healing and awakening.
By and large, the process of deprogramming is a deep reexamination of all that was previously left unquestioned.
Share this post
Research-based, personalized therapy.
At My LA Therapy, our warm and experienced therapists specialize in anxiety, depression, trauma, & relationships.
The big picture
Seeing the frame in the first place is half the battle. This makes what was invisible visible so we can bring it into our conscious awareness and choose how we relate to it.
The other half of the battle is fearlessly and continuously examining how to break out of our roles in the system and help others do the same.
Our wounds are collective, and so is our healing. Individual and societal awakening requires us to create collective agreements based on equity, human dignity, and protection of our most vulnerable.
Free Resource for Anxiety & Depression
Use our free tool to learn scientifically proven Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) techniques to overcome irrational thoughts and see yourself in more empowering, peaceful, and realistic ways.
In this week’s episode of Waking Up with Brooke Sprowl, my guest and dear friend Alex Federici and I discuss how to dismantle these inherited perceptions, deprogram our cultural messages, and imagine new ways of being and relating.
Want to talk?
At My LA Therapy, our warm and experienced anxiety therapy experts offer research-based, personalized care.
Check out the episode here:
Listen to this podcast on:
TRANSCRIPT
0:00
foreign [Music]
0:06
living my name is Brooke Sproul and I have on the show today my dear friend Alex federici Alex and I Alex and I have
0:14
known each other since we were a tender age of 18. children yeah what 20 years
0:20
now and Alex has been hugely instrumental in my own personal journey of kind of
0:28
personal development self-awareness learning and growing in my relationships
0:35
um and my ability to kind of understand and communicate more effectively understand boundaries and consent as
0:41
well as more recently conversations about how the personal is political and how our internalized systems of
0:48
Oppression in our households can map onto our political views and sort of the feedback loop between those two things
0:55
and I’ve had sort of a profound Awakening in this regard which I credit largely to Alex and our ongoing
1:02
conversations and I thought this would be a really important conversation to have and invite others into so welcome
1:10
Alex and thank you it was an incredibly kind way of welcoming onto your podcast thank you so
1:16
very much Brooke I’m super happy to be here yeah so uh we’ve had this conversation I
1:22
mean we’ve been I mean if we really Trace back the roots it’s been a few years now um and and it really started with you
1:29
know conversations about how in a particular relationship I was in
1:35
um ways in which my value as a woman was perceived in relationship to physical
1:40
attraction and how I was objectifying myself and like therefore perceiving it
1:46
as normal and okay to be objectified by others or to have my value perceived in
1:52
relation to this kind of cultural standard of what is agreed on as Beauty
1:58
and so that was really the beginning of some very long conversations that have evolved significantly but um just sort
2:06
of curious if you wanted to share anything about about that topic because I think that has some really important
2:13
you know ramifications um and and things to explore it’s interesting because it when it came to
2:20
your sense of self-worth and I feel this way too because it’s it’s different for a hetero or hetero representing men in
2:25
our society but there’s like a strain of it that’s similar of uh what we have
2:31
been told our value is based in um and then we know to some large degree
2:38
that there’s a desire for perfect expression of that thing that is not possible right so like you’re not going
2:45
to be I mean this in the in the most chauvinist the gross sense like attend right like nobody is a 10 everybody has
2:50
faults and so then you’re looking for people to validate that you are worthwhile as opposed to recognizing
2:57
yourself as being perfect in your own imperfect Humanity from the get-go and so you then subconsciously start
3:05
looking for partners who will tell you things like you being perfect in not an imperfect way but in the like no no
3:11
you’re this thing or oh my God I get attention from this person and if this person is giving me attention I must be
3:17
worthwhile and now you’re seeking validation externally and it’s not even like
3:22
you know there are times in my life where I’ve wanted to be around people that are most certainly smarter than I am and there is certainly a feeling of
3:28
like oh I’m like in a conversation with a very smart person and there’s something there’s a type of validity
3:34
that’s occurring in there but there’s I think relationship where
3:40
uh it isn’t actually about the way that the two of you are dancing and it is about what the person is
3:47
willing to give to you and what the person can take away from you and so then you end up in relationships with the other person holds the keys to your
3:53
self-worth because you perceive yourself as I’m only beautiful because this person says that I’m beautiful they can
3:59
take away that at any time they can revoke that sense of self-worth and whenever they mistreat me they can give
4:06
it back to me as a way to allow for the mistreatment um yeah really well said and the framing
4:13
that I use to think about some of those Concepts is a little different maybe than yours you know um I think about you
4:19
know my frame of kind of the spectrum of narcissism and the ways in which we appeal to things outside of us for worth
4:25
it as a compensation for our internal sense of unworthiness or internal
4:31
traumas that we experience we then compensate by seeking external validation and that creates a
4:36
transaction transactional and consumeristic approach to relationships in which we commodify ourselves and then
4:43
as you’re saying we’re looking to others how good how how um I had a friend who we used to talk
4:49
about this a lot and I think it’s a really damaging framework but it’s the thing we’re trying to dismantle so I
4:55
think it’s important that we talk about it like how valuable are you in the sexual Marketplace like where do you
5:00
fall in that like as you said kind of deliberately chauvinistic like that that framing like where do I fall in that one
5:07
to ten where am I on that and then we’re constantly looking for people and things and trying to present ourselves to raise
5:13
our status as opposed to seeing ourselves as intrinsically valuable in our unique expression and seeing
5:20
relationships as you said as a dance that is co-created and emergent between
5:26
two people that’s less about any particular characteristics and how we live up to certain standards and more
5:32
about kind of the way you particularly connect with the given you know with the way in which two individuals connect and
5:39
relate and what they bring out in each other and what emerges in that dance and so I’ve had you know I’ve gone through a
5:46
huge shift in my relationships but it’s still ongoing I mean I still feel like I’m dismantling a lot of these
5:52
transactional kind of consumeristic ways of viewing myself and others and what’s
5:57
really beautiful though that we’ve we’ve talked about is you know as we dismantle this internalized oppression and
6:03
commodification like what opens up in terms of possibilities to connect with
6:09
people is so nourishing and Soulful it’s like you’re no longer sort of
6:16
um in this constant state of judging and evaluating and seeking seeing others as
6:22
instrumental or um uh you’re you’re kind of just you get
6:27
into this experience of just connection and kindness and um and seeing the beauty like the beauty
6:34
in the uniqueness the beauty not in the you’re a 10 but in the actual kind of
6:40
genuine soulfulness of another human being and it’s quite like it’s quite
6:46
radical how it shifts your perspective and I’m not suggesting that I have that lens all the time or that it’s been sort
6:52
of a linear right yeah right it’s like I never want to present like when we have these
6:58
glimpses of a more awakened State of Consciousness I never want to present that like I’m now enlightened and that’s
7:04
just a fixed State and you know by you know and we’ve expressed this before that I
7:09
think for what for the two of us it comes from the opposite directions but for me you know the whole that I’m trying to fill and and the
7:16
commodification of other people the perception of other people as being in this Marketplace which whenever I see
7:22
the dating or the sexual Marketplace my body like does one of these like you
7:27
um that for me there is still a desire to prove to myself that I am worthy that I
7:33
am and so in that way it’s like am I a good instrument would someone want to purchase me even if that purchasing is with their time
7:40
and I can know which I do that I have intrinsic value that far outweighs that
7:46
that that that the intrinsic value that I have gets diminished the moment I try to put a monetary or temporal value on
7:53
who I am and what I am you know but I am uh if we look at it from a religious
7:59
perspective like I am a child of God that the thing that created all things has gained for me to exist in this
8:04
moment and that there is no amount of money that can supersede that understanding about the world or I am
8:10
the the entail of 13 billion years of uh astronomical atomical biological
8:18
evolution that has led to this place that this like blip of thing called Alex federici gets to exist and like any
8:24
other way of viewing you diminishes the reality of the situation because the
8:29
reality of the situation are those two things however you want to view in your Paradigm of the world and to see
8:35
yourself as um a thing to be bought and sold to see yourself as
8:41
um am I good enough to be around other people am I a cool kid whatever the story is that you have that story is so
8:49
it pales in comparison to what the reality is and then when you see other people
8:56
because then the next step is like oh if that is true for me that’s true for everyone that everyone I interact with
9:01
is a child of God who was created and put here because they have intrinsic
9:07
value every individual I meet here is the long tail of billions of years of striving and trying and loving and being
9:14
and this is a special moment when me and they get to share space whatever the
9:19
hell that is for this brief period of time whatever the hell that is that like that that moment has value and that
9:26
value supersedes any way in which it validates me that
9:35
like this on my deathbed is going to be a moment in time that I got and there is no amount of money or perception that is
9:41
going to change that oh my God me and Brooke are having this conversation right now right it reminds me of the
9:47
kind of ego being uh the Hungry Ghost right it’s like I mean sure you know my
9:53
anytime I feel that brief relief of you know that ego boost that gives me this
9:58
momentary fleeting sense that I’m okay it’s gone immediately and there’s a way
10:04
in which it’s never filled and I think only by kind of discovering how empty the Paradigm is or failing at it in some
10:12
way do we actually have the invitation to just to die to that Paradigm and to discover this this new way of being and
10:18
the preciousness that you’re speaking to this this preciousness and gift that we miss because we are taught to commodify
10:26
ourselves and others and to take such an instrumental approach to people to time
10:31
I’ve been thinking a lot about what I’ve been calling in my own mind temporal instrumentality like time is a means to
10:38
an end as opposed to like time as intrinsically worthy and it’s almost analogous to what we’re talking about as
10:45
you know us as human beings being intrinsically worthy and precious like when I slow down enough and when I’m
10:51
present I can find the preciousness In the Still Moments each day but because I
10:57
take such an instrumental and really capitalistic approach to I mean it’s all what’s really interesting for me because
11:04
some of the political conversations and ideas are a lot newer for me is how so
11:10
much of our approach to ourselves uh others and time is capitalist is is like
11:16
a conditioning and a programming that is capitalistic that I didn’t realize like
11:22
I thought that this is just the way things are I had no idea how much the culture and the the political system and
11:29
just kind of American cultural value you are a part of the way I live my really
11:35
daily life and I think that brings us to some of the larger conversations that we were wanting to have around kind of
11:42
systemic change and uh how cultural beliefs are such a
11:50
well I think the major breakthrough and realization that I had recently was
11:56
that these political issues are not logistical issues they’re spiritual
12:02
issues they are they are not um I have for a long time thought that
12:09
um you know all of this stuff it’s like it’s just it is systemic but it’s like
12:14
it’s logistical that’s not my strong suit I don’t know how to do that so I can’t I can’t change anything and I felt
12:20
this powerlessness and this defeatism because from a young age I wanted to serve the world I wanted to make a
12:26
difference and I felt like I didn’t have a way to do that and then it was like wait a second this isn’t a logistical
12:33
problem that’s the conditioning that’s the lie that’s the framing that’s been taught to me in order to prevent me from
12:39
changing it so that certain people can stay in power I see that now which I
12:45
didn’t see it and so that the system remains in power right yes you know for the most part
12:51
even even when it is very clear that there are individuals who are intending to uh and I mean it’s in a broader sense
12:58
profit off of the system that the system itself predates them right so that that even those that you could even pinpoint
13:05
say like they are actively making the world the way that it is currently that like the system has existed for so long
13:13
that it’s not a thing that any one or group of individuals have done it is the world that we were born into
13:19
um it was inherited and then right yes it is inherited by all of us the issued under codes when it is a when it is a
13:27
systematic issue that we perceive it as just being an issue of a system and that the system’s not the problem the problem
13:33
are the people in the systems and if only we could either convince the people to act differently or we can change the
13:39
way that the system works we can somehow be what we want to be which is what major makes it feel like it’s a
13:45
logistics issue but the problem is the system is the problem and even working within the system to change the way that
13:51
it works still perpetuates the system’s existence to try to make individuals
13:57
relinquish power within the system only creates power vacuums that other individuals are going to come into
14:02
because those individuals are not the actual issue the system is the issue and so even that Baseline belief like oh if
14:09
we just sat down together and could have rational conversations and figure out what we needed to do within the
14:16
Frameworks of the system we could create eating and like that’s not the way that this is going to work it actually
14:22
necessitates a paradigm change and that Paradigm Change Is A Soulful one because it requires us to view ourselves and the
14:29
world differently than the current system tells us we should see the world in ourselves
14:34
yeah really well said and I think that the the framing that’s been so helpful
14:40
to me is that it’s really our Collective agreements that create the systems in a
14:45
way I mean we’re programmed to you know I mean we’re indoctrinated we’re acculturated to the systems that we
14:51
inherit but the collective agreements maintain the system and so if we can change our Collective agreements about
14:58
humanity and what what uh the intrinsic value of each person and how and our
15:05
understandings of the ways that each of us even those in power right now benefit
15:12
from everyone profiting from everyone having equal opportunity
15:18
um equal like I don’t know I’ve shared this with you before but one of my favorite quotes is Stephen J gold said
15:26
I’m less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s mind than in
15:31
the near certainty that people of equal talent and intelligence have died in Cotton Fields and sweatshops and for me
15:38
it’s so it’s so tragic that there are so many talented people who because they
15:46
just happen to be born to into certain circumstances aren’t able to offer their unique gifts and genius to our culture
15:52
and then not only did they did they as individuals suffer which we care about but also we all suffer we all lose by
16:00
depriving our culture of the richness of this kind of collective intelligence intelligence of each person maximizing
16:07
their human potential like you and I you know we’ve had so many gifts and privileges and that have allowed us to
16:14
you know be kind of trying to pursue our dreams and and actualize ourselves kind
16:20
of individually cycle logically and then now in service you know you with your music and me with my podcasting and
16:27
thought leadership and things and and really to to have this unique potential but how much better would the world be
16:33
for even us and everyone if each person were able to express their uniqueness by
16:38
having the same advantages and I know I personally growing up with a very serious mental illness and having
16:44
overcome that like I know that if I were born into any other circumstances I could be on the street like I don’t
16:50
delude myself into believing that I’m somehow this amazing person as an
16:56
individual that’s just so mentally resilient and so and you know this about me we’re friends like you’re the one I
17:01
called you I am when I’m upset so it’s like I don’t delude myself into believing that it’s really a an
17:07
individual character you know that has allowed me to succeed it is having so
17:14
many advantages and so much privilege to you know get the mental health care I need get the you know education I need
17:21
and the support that I I need you know have stable housing have stable food if if any of those things you know if I
17:28
didn’t have any of those things I could certainly be on the street I could certainly be houseless I could certainly
17:33
you know be in any sort you know in jail in any sort of different situation and I think a lot
17:40
of people I don’t think have that perspective or I don’t know I think a
17:45
lot of people do have that perspective but I think I think people don’t want to acknowledge how precarious their
17:51
situation is right I also think you know we are indoctrinated
17:56
acculturated into a belief of um what gets flipped and they said like pulling yourself up by your bootstraps
18:03
right and you know as a famous very close at the end of his life uh interview that Martin Luther King
18:08
gave where he is decrying that statement because you’re essentially telling people that don’t have boots let alone
18:16
have straps on their shoes to pull themselves up by it essentially so that you may call them losers and say that no
18:24
you were allowed to play the game and this is your fault that you are in the position that you are in and to allow
18:30
for us to say that to people requires us to believe that we are worthy of the
18:35
advantages that you and I have by birth the Privileges that you and I have by birth and so you have generations of
18:42
people and enclaves of class that I’ve been told that they are worthy that they
18:48
were chosen and as you’ve expressed before in this kind of like moves meanders into another place like you’re raised Desiring to be on the side
18:55
of the bully and there’s a whole group of people in our culture that through
19:01
their own bullying through the way that they were treated when they were younger and that they were acculturated want to
19:07
be on the side of the bully because it makes them feel like No One’s Gonna Knock them off of their pedestal and the
19:12
ultimate fear is if I don’t have this bully the others are going to come due
19:18
to us what we have done to them even if that’s not the lay of the land
19:24
even if that’s not actually what has ever occurred even in fact you look at civil rights gay rights female rights in
19:31
this country over a hundred years of some of those things it is not those disadvantaged individuals coming into
19:37
society being welcome to society and immediately kicking down the people who have been kicking them down for Generations they’re just happy to be
19:44
allowed to be in society and not get killed but there is such a fear that people want to be on the side of bullies
19:50
and those bullies will constantly tell you watch out if you allow for these underclass of people to come up the
19:56
first thing they will do is knock you down and the only person standing in the way of that is me hmm
20:02
yeah and the Paradigm is that like that there’s always going to be a bully so you might as well you know you might as
20:08
well be on that side otherwise it’s like it’s like killer be killed like eat or be eaten you know like there’s this idea
20:14
that like that that’s necessary like there doesn’t we don’t we don’t have to play that game like we don’t we just
20:19
don’t have in some Pockets that was not the way that I was raised and it’s so interesting to me when we had these conversations and you know these things
20:25
was like I want to better understand where you came from because culturally just forget the way that my parents raised me culturally like okay so just
20:32
right now like superheroes are a big thing and like the superhero mindset is like no no like you’re gonna get a
20:38
superpower or you’re gonna like build this incredible thing and then you are gonna go beat up the bullies and it’s
20:44
not about like being on the side of the of the bully it’s not about like making sure that the bad guy that’s in power
20:50
like you can be on their side like the ethos of the culture is no no bad guys lose
20:57
cheaters never Prosper you want to be powerful to make sure that you take care of other people and beat up the bad guys
21:04
so like there is a strain of something that exists in my mind at least under
21:09
the prevailing culture that is not actually the things that I watched or the like the ethos of the
21:15
things that I read when I was younger that there is a thing that we talk about which is like America goes and beats up
21:21
Hitler and then the thing that we don’t want to talk about which is like also while oppressing black people
21:26
um [Music] yeah but the story I think is the right story and so there are there seems are
21:33
to be pockets of society that are telling different stories because it blows my mind when bullies rise to power
21:39
and it’s not very obvious what is going on and the only reason it’s obvious to me I truly believe because the culture I
21:46
grew up in and the stories I was told when I was younger else I wouldn’t realize it right yeah what’s most
21:51
shocking and disturbing to me is what I think of as analogous to gaslighting
21:57
which is the bully is rising and and claiming to be the one being bullied
22:03
like both sides perceive themselves to be you know the ones being bullied
22:10
um even the privileged side that is actually bullying and how do we discern
22:16
those things I mean that was the hardest thing for me Alex that you’ve really helped me you know understand and like
22:22
come to a genuine kind of like self ability to myself now discern and see
22:29
what I believe to be truly there not like Alex told me and now I see it but like actually really understand the
22:34
frame and understand the thing but but like I guess what I want to share with others and I don’t know if this is you
22:40
know if we can even codify this it was such a a long process of so many conversations it’s like how do we know
22:46
like how do we know that we’re not the the person who’s actually the bully like how do we know which which side is which
22:52
how do we know the difference between you know the superheroes and the Hitlers of the world you know because I think
22:58
that’s part of the conundrum right now and again by Design I think it’s intentional but you know like it’s
23:05
really difficult right now in our current culture with our you know all of the ways in which we’re kind of siled by
23:12
social media and Google and and like the content that we’re receiving being curated to our biases and preferences
23:17
like how do we know which world is real this is not new so I do think you know
23:25
there’s a there’s a story of um that the man who created the public
23:31
address system went to his grave believing that he was um
23:36
he was the reason for Hitler’s rise and in a negative way like he carried guilt that were it not for me and the thing
23:43
that I created that this thing would not have been possible right and I think I would hope that the people who created
23:49
the current technologies have some sort of concern for what they’ve done but I’m pretty sure they haven’t they they don’t
23:55
but that uh these things are going to occur regardless I’m not certain that it’s um
24:02
that the media is the message in this instance I think it is about how the message gets that what we allow the
24:09
messages to be and conversations about what sorts of speech are acceptable
24:14
which now becomes a more thorny conversation that you and I have been trying to have for some fun I think it is helpful to to take and say wait this
24:22
is universal this isn’t contextual I mean I do think that there’s a way in which these things are being Amplified
24:27
and accelerated by you know our current technology but you know there’s a way in
24:32
which like you say it’s it’s sort of Universal and you know trans-temporal so
24:39
like for me my framing always comes back to the individual and like the
24:44
individual analogy because that’s my expertise is you know individuals relationships Etc so it’s helpful for me
24:50
to like contextualize it or announce or or use metaphors that are related to individual and relational Dynamics and
24:58
like when I think about children being bullied um it’s extremely traumatic if you teach
25:04
a child not to stand up to a bully like they carry the shame I mean I work with
25:10
people who’ve been bullied and it’s like it doesn’t like the imprint is so deep part of my struggle and you know
25:18
individually when I’ve been in relationships that have abusive elements or bully elements is I almost always
25:26
engage with the bully as though they are um operating in good faith and then I’m
25:33
like very confused by why my good faith like communication like
25:40
I’m using all my communication skills I’m doing all the right things and yet somehow the conversations aren’t
25:46
resulting in the way that they would with any good faith person you know like and so I would be very confused by that
25:54
and I guess I’m just kind of trying to map that on to this political dialogue I
26:00
think that that’s a lot of what is happening too is like we have and I think a lot of people are are Savvy to
26:06
this and they they aren’t engaged in it in this way but for me it was like this feeling that um oh well there’s there’s
26:12
two good faith you know parties there’s two good faith and not that they’re doing that not a political sense yeah I
26:19
mean the parties isn’t like the two American political parties you mean two individuals or two groups having conversation yeah but this transcends a
26:26
political binary yeah right and and you know each of these parties is you know
26:32
operating in good faith but it’s like no a lot of people are not both individuals and you know political groups are not
26:39
operating in good faith so you can’t have a fair fight and you’re never gonna win a a fight if you’re playing by the
26:47
rules and someone else isn’t and so that’s a big part of what I see you know in terms of my individual experience
26:53
where I am or you know I have more expertise awareness experience understanding and I can kind of I could
27:00
see the complexity in it but then it’s like when I try to map that on to you know the larger conversation I’m
27:05
starting to see the same principles apply collectively although I am curious then I think to to
27:13
move from the depressing element of it how do you no sincerely how
27:19
how do you think is the best way to begin the dismantling
27:25
of the negative aspects of that upbringing while maintaining community
27:32
family friendship and not throwing the baby out with the bath water but like how do we how do we
27:39
get into those subgroups in our culture to plant seeds to change the way that
27:44
people think from inception what a great question
27:50
you know for me my individual Journey was very much you know around there was
27:56
a lot of what I call transformative destruction right so there was a lot I had to tear down there was a lot of kind
28:01
of death and rebirth but many deaths and rebirths that had to happen and part of
28:07
that was a loss and a grief of that original community and a lot of
28:12
reprogramming and healing and deep internal work and in terms of my own
28:18
Psychotherapy and um self-awareness and and so much that
28:24
needed to happen before I could actually you know reconnect with friends and find
28:30
people that I was connecting with from a more a deeper way I mean I had very deep
28:37
close relationships in the church but I didn’t realize that there was a way in
28:43
which My True Values weren’t reflected in those relationships and it wasn’t
28:48
until I did a lot of internal work and healing that you know you and I reconnected several years ago and some
28:55
some of some older friendships kind of resurfaced as I kind of emerged from the
29:01
old Paradigm and kind of continually grew and left old relationships behind
29:06
that weren’t really in alignment with my values and then um
29:11
you know and then I started to create new friends with like within a new set of values and a new paradigm but it took
29:18
a lot of um it took a lot of Letting Go and it did take some being alone and some grieving
29:24
I mean it took it took a lot of pain um but I think that finding you know
29:30
groups that share your values I mean you have to know what your values are and that’s part of the you know the
29:36
transition time is like to go back to a Biblical metaphor
29:41
um what’s the analogy I heard one time it was like you know the opposite of um slavery isn’t Freedom the opposite of
29:50
slavery is the desert like you know you don’t you don’t exit oppression
29:57
um and just go straight to Freedom you actually go through a period in which there’s kind of a a destitute land that
30:04
you’re wandering and you don’t know if you’re gonna get to Freedom you got out of the oppression but you’re not
30:09
actually clear if you’re gonna get to the promised land and so you know I think that that really for was my
30:16
experience was there was a part of it that was freeing
30:22
um and liberating and healing and then there was a part of it that was I really miss that I’ve got no Bedrock anymore
30:28
there was something familiar there’s a bit of a Stockholm syndrome in that and then over time as you kind of go through
30:35
the desert you you gradually start to really find out who you are I think and
30:43
um and then on that Journey you meet others kind of if we’re on the same path and and I think that’s where you start
30:48
to rebuild a more authentic and enduring community based on your actual values
30:54
but man it’s not it’s not an easy Road that’s I mean it’s not like a a super
30:59
straightforward process I think it’s very iterative I think it’s very kind of long suffering I think it’s it’s there’s
31:05
a lot of very deep work involved in that process what do you think
31:12
yeah and I think for and then I think there’s a way in which
31:18
the necessity is to as uh in ways being
31:24
former Wanderers make sure that you create community on the other side for
31:29
people to come into right because we can start to to just
31:35
murder this metaphor we could start planting villages on the outskirts of that desert that begin to encroach on
31:41
the desert so that in each existing generation that the the journey is actually shorter and shorter and that
31:48
there are established places and people for you to come into that will grab you and take you in right that that in a way
31:55
this is like a cultural Refugee program right that that that and that it
32:01
requires and this gets back to the way our culture is like once you get free there is a feeling if you’re just kind of out for yourself like I’m finally
32:07
free and I just get to go and it’s like no but also perhaps we create a
32:13
community on this side of the spectrum that allows for people to come into our arms afterwards and and and that
32:20
requires us to accept that we have accessed and acceptable amount of
32:26
freedom for ourselves like I don’t need to keep running I’m already here I can make Tamp here and I can be a place for
32:33
people to come and be given love hmm that’s that’s sounds like a really
32:39
wonderful place to to wrap thank you so much Alex I love you thank you for
32:45
having me Brooke thank you so much time [Music]
33:05
thank you
