Speaker 3
Like somebody's paying for that, you know, somebody, somebody's making that happen. And so I think so early on, I realized, cause I, I just realized that there, there was a lot of bullshit in there and, um, that, uh, that there's an agenda behind everything. And so that was kind of the first crack in sort of the matrix of what's real and what's not as far as media goes, because I knew that I was being featured or put in certain positions because of things beyond me. This
Speaker 1
is, I think, a very, very stoic idea. And as I've become successful in my career, I think I've appreciated it more in meditations. Marcus Aurelius, when he's writing meditations, is the most famous man in the world. There's literally a cult of the emperor that's worshiping him as a god. There's statues all over him wherever he goes. There's parades. And he writes in meditations all the time you can tell he's trying to sort of sober himself and like one of my favorite scenes he's like clearly at this banquet being thrown in his honor and he sort of breaks it down he's like you know this is a this is a dead pig and you know this is a dead bird and this wine is fermented grapes and he like only the emperor was supposed to wear a purple cloak. And so he's talking about how his purple cloak is exactly the same as everyone else's cloak. It's just dyed with shellfish blood. And then he goes through and talks about how the purple dye is created. And I think he's doing what you're talking about, which is if you peek behind the curtain, that can have two, it should have the effect of making you realize that what's going on back there is not as special as you think it is. And if you don't have that reaction, then being on the cover of the magazine is going to fuel your ego and your self-importance probably in an unhealthy way. That
Speaker 3
is the next question that I was going to ask is what are the repercussions of that? Yeah.
Speaker 1
I mean, he, so my favorite thing is he talks about posthumous fame, which is kind of the thing that I think like a lot of people who are successful and ambitious, you're like, I want to be known. I want, you know, I want to have this or that. And, you know, you want to be on a magazine cover, you want to sell books or something. And then, you know, there's this, you go, but what, what would really like, are people going to remember this? And so we're kind of driven by like, it's not just cool to be famous. You have to be like famous for all of eternity. Like that's really impressive. And his point, he just talks about, he's like, you're going to be dead. So what do you care? And his point is like, also the people who are going to be alive in the future are going to be just as annoying as the people who are alive right now. It's not really any more special to be famous 200 years after your death as it is to be famous right now. That
Speaker 3
leads me, it's like taking a turn a little bit, but it's something that I was going to ask you about when I interviewed you, but we didn't get to. And that's that, you know, you're obviously, you know, wise beyond your ears. We're talking, you're referencing people that were seemingly wise beyond their years. So I have this idea that civilization or culture is progressing in a linear way towards an expanding consciousness and awareness. But in the whole span of time, there have been people that have come in that have spiked to a very high level beyond where we even are now that are here to show us the way. And I wonder if you think that's true, you know, whether it be Marcus Aurelius or Jesus or yourself or Alan Watts or, you know, someone like that, you know, Terrence McKenna, you know, are these people like, do you feel like in all of time, it's not that it's, we're, we're getting, we get delivered these really ancient souls that come here to teach us things? I
Speaker 1
do believe that. I mean, certainly I don't believe that I'm on, you know, in that company, but I believe that there, I believe in energy sort of like you're talking about. And it seems like there are every several generations, there seems to be someone who's kind of tapped into an energy or reached into a place of sort of deeper consciousness that allows them to, you know, do something really magical. And, you know, what I am fascinated with as the Stoics is that Jesus and Seneca are born in the same year, in the same Roman Empire, and are talking about a lot of the same thing. So I don't think it only has to be from a religious context. I just think there's, yeah, we do have the ability to sort of have kind of a fleeting impact like that. And I'm like, you know, there's this, it's sort of not trendy to believe now in what they call the great man of history theory, which is that like an individual can change history. But I actually like sort of profoundly believe in that. And I think it's kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you don't think that a person can make a difference like that, then you're not going to be that person. So
Speaker 1
want to go back to the death thing. I'm curious. So obviously it makes sense why when you're getting in the car, you can't be thinking about, you know, I'm going to crash. This is so scary. I could get hurt. But did doing such a dangerous sport in which I'm sure you knew racers who lost their lives or you were at races where that happened. How did that shape your life off the track? Like, did it make you more present or did it make you, you know, more reckless? Like, how did you think about, like, I got to imagine, like, if you're a police officer or you're in the army, knowing that there is a, that every day there's a risk that you can get shot or hurt or firemen, knowing that risk probably changes, I don't know, like how you are over breakfast in the morning.
