Modern Wisdom: w/ Joe Hudson on Living with an Open Heart (Transcript)

It’s to do with it being unfamiliar. It’s to do with a level of transparency and openness that you’re not used to.

And it must be like being a, for want of a better example, like a mistreated puppy or something. And this puppy has been taught that every time somebody raises a hand at it, it should cower away because it’s going to get hit. But this time, the hand gets raised and it gets a pat on the head. And it needs to learn over time, it cowers less and less and less. And then it actually learns to love the hand that comes down toward it.

JOE HUDSON: Yes, that’s exactly what it is. That’s so cool.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: De-patterning that response takes time. So that’s the daunting side. The daunting and intense side.

The reason that I said “the real world”—there was a story the first day that we came out. Me and one of the other guys went for a massage. You said bodywork would be a really good idea. This beautiful, peaceful, very calm reception waiting area of the Thai massage parlor in a sleepy village in Sonoma County was too intense that we had to leave and go outside.

Like this is, you know, there’s like a little USB plugged-in waterfall and plink-plonk music playing in the background. Like, we’re going to go stand in the courtyard. Cause, like, I kind of, I don’t know what the f* is going on. What did you call it? Not spirit sick. Not dope sick. Like something hangover.

JOE HUDSON: Spirit hangover. Oh, vulnerability hangover.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Maybe. I feel it was something else sick as well.

JOE HUDSON: I use that word a lot.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Anyway, we go outside. What it made me realize is that there’s one level of difficulty which is within a safe container, learning that the hand is going to come and pat you, not beat you.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The next one is now going out into a world filled with hands.

JOE HUDSON: Yes.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And those are two different skills. It’s the same skill, but a very different kind of skill set. Does this make sense?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, it totally makes sense.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Okay, dig into that.

How We Hold Patterns in Our Lives

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So there’s so much there. If I look at a pattern that I’m holding in my life, I have three ways that I hold that pattern in my life.

One of the ways is that I attract it. So let’s say I have a pattern of feeling highly criticized. One of the ways that I’m going to attract it is I’m going to be attracted to and want critical women in my life or critical bosses in my life. So I’m just going to notice, wow, all my girlfriends criticize me all the time, just like my mom did or some version of that. But I’m attracted to it.

One way is that I manipulate people into doing it. Right. So some way in which somebody’s not criticizing me, I am going to fish for the criticism, or I’m going to do something that I know is going to make them criticize me, or I’m going to be a little needy about something that’s going to make them push me away and criticize it.

And then the last one is, I’m going to prove somebody’s criticizing me even when I’m not being criticized. Right. So you might say, “Oh, hey, you’re not parked straight,” but for me, that means I parked all f*ed up and you criticize me.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’ve never been a good parker.

JOE HUDSON: Exactly. Like, I’m going to make meaning out of that. I call that mapping. So you’re manipulating people to do it, you’re attracting it, and you are proving it. So you’re looking at the cases where it’s true. You’re not looking at the cases that aren’t true.

And so we go out into the world, and you go in for a week long with us, and all of a sudden the patterns don’t work anymore. And then you go out into the world, but you’re used to doing a particular thing in the world, which is mapping this pattern. And so all of a sudden you’re like, wait, how do I interact with the world?

And so we’ve had people come out, like you said, I have a hard time sitting in this massage parlor. We’ve had people come out and literally call us from a grocery store and say, “I don’t know what to buy anymore.”

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Whole Foods was the tip of the spear of difficulty for people.

JOE HUDSON: Exactly. And so it’s just like, oh, I’m not in my pattern, so how do I operate anymore?

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: It’s a little bit like shaking the Etch A Sketch, I think. And it’s more blank.

JOE HUDSON: One of the other things I noticed that I’m thinking about your audience for a minute, and I’m thinking they might have no idea what we’re talking about, because there’s not a lot of experience of, oh, I saw the world one way, and a week later, I see the world a different way.

It’s like, you have to assume that to understand the conversation that we’re having, that all of a sudden, I thought that I had to be protected, but I realized that life is a lot better if I’m not protected. Now I have to learn how to do that in the real world.

The Transformation

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That’s it. That’s it. That’s it right there. And yeah, it’s so funny when you hear people talk about a religious experience or a transformational experience or a near-death experience or, you know, whatever it is that they’ve done. And from the outside, because you don’t have that frame of reference, it’s confusing. It’s easy to mock. It’s like, what the f* is this person talking about? I have no frame or context or whatever.

There’s a bit of me that, because I’m inside of that, I’m taking for granted. I’m like, I might just sound so mental. And this is, you know, relatively mild. I think in the world of like, I saw a thing and this thing and whatever.

It’s like I realized that I didn’t need to be as stiff and spiky as I used to and that the sensitivity that is always inside of me is something that I don’t need to necessarily hide and actually might make my world and other people’s worlds a better place. And the very thing I wanted, which was for people to like me, might occur more the more that I show that. So I wanted to show you this.

JOE HUDSON: I just got total tingles in my whole body because I’m like, that’s why I love my work, is to hear that exact thing. So thanks for sharing that.

A Song About Living with an Open Heart

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Okay. So I have this episode that I recorded in New York a couple of weeks ago. A guy called Jon Bellion, one of the most legendary producers of our era. He’s done billions of streams. Justin Bieber, Ed Sheeran, also he’s a solo artist himself.

JOE HUDSON: Okay.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: He released an album called “Father Figure.” It’s about him becoming a dad. It’s about his reflections on his relationship with his dad, who was a super father. This sort of very strange, almost role model. You know, people talk about, I have a super successful father and I need to be as powerful as him. This was different. This was, I had a really amazing dad, and I have to live up to being as attuned and supportive and this sort of other type of intimidation, I suppose.

And I was in the shower this morning. I played this song in the car yesterday, but I didn’t listen to the lyrics. And it’s a song that just passed me by when I was doing my prep for the episode. And I knew I wanted to talk about living with an open heart.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

The Power of Heartbreak

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And in this song. So I’m in the shower this morning. I cried at this. I cried at this song every single time I’ve heard it. So we’ll see if it happens again now. Okay, But I wanted you to. I’m going to spin the lyrics around and we’ll play the song. It’s also going to get us popped on YouTube, but I don’t give a f*. Because it’s sufficiently important that I think it matters.

I’m scared to meet you. Cause then I might know you and once I know you I might fall.

JOE HUDSON: In love.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Once I’m in love and my heart is wide open for you could walk in, Drop a bomb, Blow it up so why love anything?

JOE HUDSON: Anything? Anything at all?

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why love anything at all? It’s the higher I fly Is the.

JOE HUDSON: Further I fall.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Then wilder Anything at.

JOE HUDSON: All.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Stressed and strong out of my thing that could happen I can move mountains with worry I’ve done.

JOE HUDSON: So I.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Called my father and he started laughing. Think it’s bad now until you have.

JOE HUDSON: Oh yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: So I love anything, anything, Anything at.

JOE HUDSON: All.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why love anything at all? If the higher I fly Is the farther I fall My love anything at all. Give me your thoughts on that.

JOE HUDSON: Well, yeah, my thoughts are that somehow or another the heartbreak is bad. That’s the assumption in the song that, like, somehow the heartbreak is bad, but, like, heartbreak is something I look forward to.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: It’s a bold claim.

JOE HUDSON: It is. Until you realize that every time your heart breaks open, it increases your capacity to love.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Do people not get their hearts broken so badly that they close off? Is that not what trauma is?

Going Into the Pain

JOE HUDSON: People get their hearts broken so badly that they. Yes, that happens, but I think that’s more because they’re avoiding the pain, not because their heart’s broken. Like we’re wired. There’s some pretty good studies about this. We’re wired to find awakening for lack of a better word or enlightenment or peace through going into the pain.

So if you look at what we did through in the week long, we’re constantly going into the thing that we think that we’re scared of, that is the pain, the thing that we’ve been avoiding. And the more you go into it, the better you feel, the more open you are, the less weight you’re carrying around with you, the less worry you have, the less anxiety, the less anger. That’s what we’re wired for.

And if you look at the studies on people who go into their depression instead of avoiding it and make through, they’re far less likely to ever get depressed again. And so we’re designed for that. That’s how human beings operate. If you go into the pain, it’s the same as if you’re working out. To me, the question is like, why work out? Why work out? Why work out at all? It hurts when I work out. Why work out at all? Like, that’s what I’m hearing when I see that thing. It makes no sense.

Once you realize that that pain is the most direct path to your freedom. When it’s accepted and loved, when it’s avoided, it’s absolute hell. When it’s resisted, it’s absolute hell. So I get it. Like, I get why people are like, I don’t want to feel that. And then they can avoid it. And then it just sits in the background and rips you apart. So that’s how I think about it.

And it’s, by the way, for that man. It’s the same thing for parenting. The thing about parenting that’s really cool for me is it’s a deep tissue massage. Parenting is like a deep tissue massage. If you resist, you’re f*ed. Right? It teaches you you do not have control. The thing that you think you are is not what you are. Your sense of identity is going to be crushed.

That’s like, that’s the good news about parenting. That’s the thing I’m so incredibly grateful for as my kids now are 16 and 20. I’m just like, oh yeah, I got crushed. That’s the amazing thing. All that stuff that I thought I was, that was actually just this cause of pain, long term pain, just got annihilated so that I could find out what I truly am. The thing that couldn’t be annihilated.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The word resistance is sort of coming up for me like that. The pain is in the resistance of that, the fleeing of it. You said somebody that goes into their depression as opposed to away from it.

JOE HUDSON: Yes.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Can you talk about the distinction between the two approaches there? The going into versus the going away from or the resisting versus the.

Understanding Depression

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So like when I like I hit my depression, I think it was like in around 35 or something like that. And the way I think about depression is on the intellectual level it’s just extreme negative self talk. And on an emotional level it’s repression of anger and sadness, typically a lot of it anger. And then there’s a lack of connection that’s happening. And like with interpersonal connection that happens. Like you don’t feel that depth of connection that occurs.

And on a nervous system level you’re just constantly underestimate attack. And so eventually your adrenal glands give up and the attack is coming from within. So when that happens for a prolonged period of time, that’s the way I see depression.

So then you’re there and when you’re there you have some symptoms and the symptoms are this is never going to go away. I’m horrible. Like there’s just all this doom and gloom and why even try and life has no meaning. And all that’s the symptoms of the depression.

And so what some people do is they’re like, how do I avoid myself? And the other way to do it is to say, well, what’s actually really going on here? Who am I really? What’s. What’s what I’m. What. What really makes me depressed? What’s really like what. What are those thoughts really? Are, do they, are they true? Where do they come from? What do they sound like? It’s like a deep wondering, a curiosity.

And so to some degree that depression is. There’s this great saying that I’ve heard recently which is the best gift we can give to our kids is making them safe to be. Making them feel like they’re safe to be themselves. The depression is all the places you weren’t safe to be yourself that you are currently judging.

So what is It. To lean in and understand those things. Those things that you never got to express, that you never got to explore, that you never got to go into that wasn’t safe to be those emotions, those thoughts, and then see what it’s like to actually reparent yourself in that way. That’s what’s going. That’s what I mean by going into it.

Facing the Fear

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Would you say to somebody who thinks, okay, I believe you. I am convinced that this is the route to go into. I’m sick of abandoning myself.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: But I’m scared.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That fear, which I think is much of what we were dealing with.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: In the week that we spent together, which is. You’re scared of doing this thing. And you will find out that if you do it, on the other side of it is nothing to fear. Nothing.

JOE HUDSON: Nothing.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Maybe bliss, maybe no connection. Maybe wonder or maybe actually just. Oh, there was nothing there. Yeah. But even now, having had the week intense 12 hours a day, like, it’s not as if that lesson has been permanently locked into my brain.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That fear is continuing. Every single time to come up, I’m like, f*, I’m going to play this song. It’s going to make me tear up. And they’re like, what are people going to say on the Internet? I’m going to look silly, and it’s going to be blah, blah, and like.

JOE HUDSON: Right. But you’re doing it.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That fear. What would you say to somebody who is currently paralyzed by. By that fear of.

The Journey to Worthiness

JOE HUDSON: I say, of course you’re scared. It’s okay. I’m right here with you. The thing about somebody who’s depressed in that way is they’re constantly being told that they’re not okay the way they are. You know, their friends are coming to them and saying, you should do this and this and this, and you should go. And now you could listen to what I’m saying and say, God damn it, why don’t I just stop avoiding myself? I’m f*ing up, and. But what’s not happening is no one’s just saying you’re cool the way you are. I got you. Like, this is it. I don’t need you to be different.

There’s a really cool story, and I think I shared it at the retreat, but I can’t. I can’t remember. But there is this. There’s this Quaker guy who had this really strong sense of community, went into a depression, and everybody came over to his house because he had this community, and they would just tell him what he should do to get out of the depression, and none of it helped. Because he said they were just agreeing with the voice in my head that there’s something wrong with me.

But one guy came in every Tuesday at noon and washed his feet and he was just giving this expression of like, I will go against the voice in your head. I will go against what you think. And I will show you that you’re worthy just as you are.

And that’s the journey. The journey is going from I have to do something to be worthy and lovable to I am worthy and lovable. And when that journey happens, the weird part is that everything that you tell yourself that you aren’t worthy and lovable for changes when you think you’re worthy and lovable. That’s the weird part. Or at least 95% of it does, you know, because you’re doing all that stuff that makes you unworthy, because you are trying to avoid that feeling in yourself in that moment.

Seeing the Matrix

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Interesting. You had that, I think the first ever episode we did. It was like how to see the Matrix. Look at the things that you don’t want to happen in your life. Realize that all of your patterns are creating that exact thing to occur.

JOE HUDSON: Yes.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The thing that you’re afraid of is the thing that you’re manifesting, basically, literally making happen.

JOE HUDSON: Yes.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And increasingly, when I look at anybody, any, literally anybody, especially people that are proficient or specialized in a particular way, or extraordinary or hard charging in one particular way, and what they are is almost always the inversion of what they fear they’re not.

So like, look at how beautiful this person is. They feel so ugly on the inside.

JOE HUDSON: Right.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Look at how successful this person is. They feel like such a failure. Look at how well known and well renowned this person is. So terrified of being abandoned. Look at how competent this person is. They feel useless. You know, it is just what you are. Not for everybody, but for a lot of people, what you are is this huge, big compensatory mechanism for the lack that you feel on the inside. This person’s really clever or it’s because they feel stupid.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. Yeah. And apparently almost a necessary step. Maybe not to that degree, but almost a necessary step. Right. On some level, the mind starts off with, once you do this, it’ll be, once I make enough money, once I’m powerful enough, once enough people love me, once I’m famous enough, once I’m. And then you get there and there’s no there there. And so for a lot of people, that step is necessary just so that they can actually do the real work.

The Trap of Unteachable Lessons

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: This was this idea, unteachable lessons I mentioned it to you before. Fame won’t fix your self-worth. Money won’t make you happy. You don’t love that hot girl. She’s just good looking and difficult to get. Like, you should see your parents more. You should spend more time in a hammock. You will regret working so much. You can cut toxic people out of your life.

Like, all of these insights are cliche and people roll their eyes at how trite they are. But that doesn’t explain why anybody who’s recently realized them proclaims them with sort of the renewed grandiose ceremony of someone who’s gone through religious revelation. It’s like, if it was so obvious, why does everybody proclaim it so ardently?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And if, unless there is some weird conspiracy to pull the ladder up after yourself, maybe you can make the claim of that around like fame and money, but like around dating the wrong person or around seeing your parents more or something, it just wouldn’t make sense. So I’m kind of fascinated by this question of can you, how much can you speedrun this? How much can you leapfrog going through the, I learned the hard lessons the hard way. Like I disregarded the lessons of previous generations, but actually I’m going to take it this time as opposed to believing you can dance through the minefield without kicking tripwire.

The Power of Unconditional Love

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, that’s a great. I do think there are lessons that you just have to learn yourself. Like you have to go through it for sure. I think about like to some degree when I think about what we’re doing for the week long or really any of our courses that are all equally intense. What we’re doing is we’re showing what true north is. Like, oh, you’ve tasted it now you have the taste. So you know it’s possible.

And we have total faith that you will slowly get there or quickly get there. But once you know it, you’re like, oh, I don’t want to live a different way. Once I see it, I don’t want to live a different way. So to some degree that’s the experience that we’re doing in those. Like we’re giving that experience so people can know that it’s possible for them. But for that, because you can only learn a lesson by actually experiencing it.

At the same time, there is kind of a, there is a weird hack which is if you feel deeply loved and accepted it like you don’t have so many mines in the minefield. Right. Whether you’re loving yourself or you happen to be one of those very lucky people with a great father who showed that unconditional love to the person or you happen to have a friend who gives you unconditional love, like that can speed run a whole bunch of stuff. Because you see, oh, oh, that’s actually what I’m looking for. The other thing I’m not really looking for.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I suppose if you’ve had a belongingness desert, if you’ve been sort of bereft of that.

JOE HUDSON: Correct.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Most people, you have no idea what north looks like.

JOE HUDSON: Correct. Yeah. From my experience, you know, I had a meditation retreat. My wife required us to do a 10 day silent retreat to get married. That was part of her like requirement.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: She just didn’t want a break from you.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, she did it with me, so probably also.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah, I mean I’m with him, but thank God.

JOE HUDSON: Shut up. Shut up. I have a good story about that. I’m going to divert and then I’ll come back. I took my daughter, she wanted to do a meditation retreat and I kind of tried to tell her not to. She was like 9, 10 at the time or something like that. But she really wanted to, three days. So we had a friend who had a retreat center. They agreed, we went and did it and like we finished the whole thing.

And I was like, so what was your favorite part of the retreat? And she said, she said it was the silent, no, it was the fact that you couldn’t tell me what to do for three days.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Unreal.

JOE HUDSON: Yes. Let’s go. But in that retreat, that silent retreat, I had this eight seconds of awareness of who I was. Like the truth of who I was. It took me another 15 years to be living that way on a daily basis to understand that as a way of being rather than an eight second experience. But it was like my North Star and it pulled me through.

One of the things that would have made that a lot more efficient is to have experienced unconditional love. But I had nothing around me that was that. Tara hadn’t learned it, I hadn’t learned it. And so, you know, we just had to learn it step by step. But that does a lot. Because when you have unconditional love for yourself, there’s no compulsion to get wealthy. You might get wealthy, but there’s no compulsion to get wealthy or to get famous.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Because I will. Because all those, they’re all surrogates for.

JOE HUDSON: The thing like that we actually want. Yeah.

John’s Stadium Show Story

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Just talking about stories about parents and kids. John on the episode that we recorded was saying he refused to tour. He doesn’t tour anymore because he just wants to be with his kids. You know, he lives on Long Island and the biggest recording artists in the world come to his house and like sit in the studio and he just loves it.

But he did a couple of shows, two shows sold out back to back. And it was at the stadium. That’s a 15 minute drive from where his house is. You know, he just totally optimized for minimum time away. How can I play the largest show possible with the least amount of time away from my family? He only rehearsed like three days, all this stuff.

One of the shows, his son was backstage and they’d set up this little play pen area for him. And, you know, John is finally performing after a big hiatus. And he gets to bring his son, who is of an age where he can start to work out what the f* is going on. He must be like five, something like that maybe.

And he finishes up and, you know, he’s sort of doing it for his family. He’s done it in the manner that is most apt to facilitate his family. He’s really tried to warp himself to make this as like family friendly as possible. He finishes up and he gets off stage and he says to his son, he’s like, what do you think? What did he think? His son goes, “I didn’t like it.”

JOE HUDSON: And he’s like, that’s why I love kids.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why, why didn’t you, why didn’t you like it? And he’s like, well, the first song was okay, but then you just kept singing and you kept singing, he kept singing. And I just thought, when’s dad going to be done singing so he can come play with me?

I was like, so cool. When’s dad going to be done singing so he can come play with me? Your son, you’ve just played 20,000, 25,000 people sold out. Round the corner from your house, the hometown city, all of the thing. Brought it back home, did the, constructed it, brought the, got the van, brought the kids, do playpen out back, do the thing. Son was just like, dad, when are you going to be done so you can come back and play with me?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, I don’t give a f*.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: 25,000 people couldn’t care less. Orchestra world, billions of streams, no. Like, I got a Power Ranger here and he’s waiting for you.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Ah, that’s unconditional. Yeah, I want you. I want you don’t care about any of this. I want you sick.

What We’re Really Looking For

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. I mean, that’s yeah. And if you feel that from somebody and you let it in, which is also a trick to let that unconditional love in, a lot of the things that we think we want. So I want to be wealthy. Well, what makes you, what’s the need behind being wealthy? Well, it’s security. Well, what’s the need behind security? Oh, it’s so that I can feel safe. What’s the need behind feeling safe?

And if you start just going down all those wants, eventually you’ll start seeing. It’s like, oh, it’s like a, I’m looking for a deep connection with myself and others. That’s what we’re looking for. That we are looking for some sense of meaning, some sense of deep connection from self and others. And neurologically speaking, we also know that to be true. We’re looking for that sense of happiness and that sense of meaning that comes from that feeling of deep acceptance and love and connection.

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The Bathroom Crying Story

Can you tell that story about one of your daughters was crying in the bathroom and you asked if she was pissed off? Oh yeah, yeah, this is, this f*ing blew my head off and I think I really want you to tell it.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So my, so it’s my youngest daughter. She’s in the bathroom, she’s crying. I go in to hang out with her and at some point, I’m like, I don’t think you’re sad. I think you’re pissed. And she goes, I am. I was like, well, how often when you’re sad are you really pissed? She’s like, about half the time. She’s like nine.

And I was like, well, why, what makes you, why don’t you get, why don’t you just be pissed? And she said, “Because if Esme, the older daughter, if I get pissed, she just hits me. But if I get sad, she does what I want her to do.” Bro.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I don’t think I’ve ever heard a better explanation of why people transmute anger into sadness. They don’t get mad, they get sad. They turn this displeasure outward to displeasure inward. Because sadness is pro social and it causes people to come and take care of you, whereas anger is antisocial and it causes people to run away. Yeah, f*ing brilliant.

JOE HUDSON: Which is strange because I think, like, there’s, I’m sure, a lot of your audience, they are or they deal with somebody who is, who is angry, has like a temper on them. And one of the things that I’ve noticed is that when somebody has that temper and then somebody gets scared of the anger, then the anger usually grows.

Because what’s happening there is the person who’s angry is like, I’m out of control. I don’t feel safe. I feel helpless, and I don’t want to feel helpless. And so I’m getting angry, and then they’re getting abandoned, like, oh. And then they get even more angry because they feel even more helpless.

Understanding Different Types of Anger

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I think there’s a difference as well. I was telling you about this conversation I had with Charlie Hubert, and he’s talking about people that move from victimhood status to action agency status to emotionally in tuned status. And it looks like you’re actually going backward because previously you were also kind of ruled by your emotions, but not through transcending and including and alchemizing them, but through them just being the winds of the day that sort of blew you around without you being able to step into them.

And I think maybe sort of raw, unaware anger is not too dissimilar to that.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: You know, somebody who’s raging and breaking things and unable to sort of hold themselves together. I’m interested in that arc between, like, instinctual anger and intuition. Like intuitive anger, perhaps. Maybe that’s the wrong terminology.

Understanding Anger and Boundaries

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So the way I think about it is, like, we have these emoji, let’s call it like a tube of an energy running through us, and we’ll call this one anger. And then if you kind of kink it one way, it’s nice dress. Or if you kink it another way, it’s “I’m going to be late” and I’m going to be passive aggressive. You can’t get another way. It’s yelling, it’s screaming.

But in any of the cases, there’s shame around the anger instead of what the anger actually it is when it starts moving fluidly in your system. It’s a cause for action and a cause for boundaries. So when I notice that I’m angry now, I’m like, oh, I’m angry. I’m like, oh, there’s a boundary that needs to be drawn. I know there’s a boundary that needs to be drawn. Somewhere there’s some way in which I am. There’s something I care about that I’m not standing for, and I need to stand for it.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah, let’s talk about boundaries. Pop psychology. Favorite word of the world. People weaponizing it from their couples counseling. “You’ve crossed a boundary. This is me holding a boundary.” No, it’s not. You being an asshole. What do good, bad boundaries look like? How do slippery, malleable, pliable boundaries turn into anger? Give me the equation.

The Difference Between Boundaries and Power Struggles

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So boundaries. The two easy ones to say for boundaries is the first one is that you’re not ever telling somebody else what they’re supposed to do. That’s a power struggle. It’s not a boundary. It’s you telling them what you’re going to do.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Okay, can you give me an example of the former and the latter?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. I’m going to draw what I would say is a power struggle boundary. Not a real boundary would be, every time you get angry, I’m going to punch you in the face. Or every time you get angry, you need to leave the house. Every time you get angry, you need to apologize to me. You need to stop yelling.

Whereas the other one is, every time you get angry, I’m going to leave the house. Every time you get angry, I’m going to ask you to stop yelling at me. And if you don’t, I’m going to leave the house and I’m going to come back in 20 minutes, and then we can continue the conversation unless you yell at me again, and then I’m going to do the same thing.

So, one is, this is what I’m going to do. I’m the one that gets to choose for me. I’m not choosing for you. So that would be one really good thing about a boundary. If you’re doing anything where you’re telling somebody else what they have to do, it’s not a boundary. It’s a power struggle. And it just shows that you’re in fear and shame. You’re basically passing fear and shame back and forth in the relationship.

The second one is, and this is the one that will bend people’s minds when they try it, is whatever the boundary is, it makes it that I’m more capable of loving you no matter what your response. So it opens my heart to you. A great boundary opens my heart to you. Because it’s very, very hard for us to love anything that we think oppresses us.

So if I draw a boundary that opens my heart, it means that I no longer see you as the oppressor. Oh, I have the capacity to do what I need to do here and take care of myself, which means that you can’t oppress me. So that’s how I teach how to draw boundaries.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And what happens when you don’t enforce the boundaries?

JOE HUDSON: Well, there’s nothing to enforce because it’s just what you’re doing.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Okay, well, what happens if you don’t do what your boundary would suggest that you’re supposed to do? Or don’t say that that’s going to happen. What happens when they’re too pliable? Like, what’s the…

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, so that’s okay. So that’s a cool thing about boundaries. So what happens is, if somebody is scared that they’re not going to maintain their boundary, what typically they’ll do is they’ll either do it really, really harsh. They’ll be like, “This is the… I’m going to leave you every single time you yell at me, I’m good. I’m out of the door.” They’ll do something like that.

Which unfortunately makes it harder for the person who’s hearing the boundary to hear the boundary, and more of a resistance going on. So you’re saying, oh, I’m scared, I’m going to flake, and therefore I have to be really, really strong about this. And then, and so that’s, so that’s typically what’s happening. The reason that people are usually scared…

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Or I’m freezing, okay, so I’m going to put a hoodie on, keep going.

How Boundaries Evolve Over Time

JOE HUDSON: Whereas people are, but if you really look at what the fear is underneath it, the fear is that I’m going to lose connection. The reason that I’m not going to draw the boundary is because I think that you won’t love me if I hold the boundary. And so that’s usually why people are scared of that. They’re or they aren’t consistent with the boundary.

The other thing that happens is that the boundary will change over time, naturally, if you’re doing them right. Because once you realize that you’re not oppressed, you don’t need the same kind of boundaries. So like if I think about my father who was an alcoholic, my first boundary with him was like, I’m not going to be around you if you are drinking. And then it was, I’m not going to be around you if you’re drunk or hungover.

And then it was, oh, I’m not going to be around you if you treat me like this, this or this, whether you’re drunk or hungover or not. And I can be around you if you’re drunk or hungry or hungover. But if you treat me like this, I’m out.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Oh, interesting.

JOE HUDSON: So the, so once you start learning that, oh, I actually am the one, I get to control my own destiny. I get to control whether I’m cared for, I get to control if I’m loving myself, then all of a sudden the boundaries become less necessary or they become softer, more open hearted.

The Fear of Being Seen

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: How much of this is a fear of being seen, being sort of truly say, this is me, this is what I want. This is my desires are legitimate.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. Yes, yes. I think some of it’s maybe more accurately put as a shame of this is who I am, this is what I want and this is how I actually want to live my life. Like I’m not allowed to do that. It’s a weird thing that our mind will do and it’ll be like, no, I actually need to bend to get this kind of love. I need to be different. I need to not want that much attention. I need to not be angry. I need to not…

Like we have this whole list of things that we have to do and it’s a process of realizing that all of those things that are actually okay and we can be loved for them as well.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why are more or why are people more comfortable with silently suffering than being seen? Sometimes.

JOE HUDSON: It’s shame. It’s shame. It’s like it’s the general thought process that there’s something wrong with you. I think that’s the thing. And vulnerability is the cure for that. Whether you think about it as 12 step programs where the whole thing is I’m going to say all the things that I’m ashamed about and I’m going to be able to be loved in that shame.

And I’m going to see that other people are going through that and have done that. And I can see that they’re good, lovely people who’ve made a mistake. And so I can also be a good, lovely person who made a mistake. That’s the antidote for the shame.

So the biggest issue is that when people keep all that to themselves, there’s no real air for the shame to decompose. Right. So it never becomes the compost for a better life. It just becomes this rancid thing that’s…

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Oh, that’s interesting.

JOE HUDSON: Buried deep.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That’s a cool analogy.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

Smoke Signals of Avoiding Emotion

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah, you’ve got this line. The strongest smoke signals that you’re avoiding in emotion. Number one, looping thoughts, endless overthinking. Number two, binary decisions. Feeling stuck between two options. Number three, harsh judgment of others.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Most inner work fails because it’s done from the same self rejection it’s trying to heal. I feel like those are linked together.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. The fear one’s interesting because, well, I said binary thinking there, that you think of things black or white. Buy the car, don’t buy the car, do the podcast, don’t do the podcast, leave the girl, stay with the girl. That’s an immediate. That’s fear. Unexpressed. That’s what that is.

So when we, when we’re scared, we go into binary thinking we, and it’s why fear is really not a great ally for good problem solving or getting the most out of a situation because you start limiting your perspective to binary. And so that one’s particular binary, particularly fear, the binary thinking one, the one on judgment, that’s really. There’s no time that we’re judging somebody when what’s actually happening is there’s emotion we don’t want to feel.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Could you give me an example?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So I am judging somebody for hawking Element on the thing.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Rightly so.

JOE HUDSON: Not we love element. Not at all. Yeah. What’s actually happening there is I, if I sit with it, I’m like, oh, if I couldn’t feel that judgment. That’s the question you ask. If I couldn’t feel that judgment, what would I have to feel?

And what I might feel is jealousy that you have a great sponsor who’s aligned with you. Or I might feel like I might have this idea that anytime I’m trying to sell myself or make money, I’m bad. And since I don’t allow it in myself, I can’t allow it in you. So I’m feeling that because of course we’re all selling ourselves on some level. So of course I feel the shame of selling myself.

So maybe it’s the shame, but there’s always something underneath that, the judgment that we’re not feeling. And if you ask yourself that question, it’s like an immediate resolve of what’s the question again? Yeah, it’s if I couldn’t feel that judgment, what would I have to feel?

So you can literally just go into any judgment that you have and just find it like, and usually they’re best for like moms, dads or girlfriends, but you can say like, or boyfriends. You can say, oh, I judged my girlfriend for this. And then if I couldn’t feel that judgment, what would I have to feel? And it just, you start seeing what the parts of yourself that you’re not allowing.

Breaking the Loop of Rumination

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: What about a practical way to break the loop of rumination? Looping thoughts, endless overthinking.

JOE HUDSON: Express emotions. No. And express them at people. Don’t go yelling at people or being sad at somebody or being scared at somebody, which is typically what humans do, which is why we think that emotions are so bad. It’s like, I’m angry, so I’m going to get angry at you. Or I’m scared, so I’m going to be really scared at you so that you take on my fear. And so nobody wants that.

But we’ve mistaken the emotion for the aggression in the emotion, which is like you’re doing it at somebody instead of just having the emotion. But if you’re overthinking, I’ve seen this. You’ve seen this. Like we do this in that week long that you participated in. And we do it in our other courses too, the longer ones. Somebody has emotional expression and immediate clarity on the other side of it. I know what I need to do.

So that rumination is just, I’m trying, and the way to think about it intellectually is this. I am trying to, I’m trying to solve a problem. The problem I’m trying to solve is I don’t want to feel a certain way. So should I take element or should I not take element as a sponsor? Right? So I’m in binary thing and I’m in fear because of whatever and I’m looping on it over and over and over again.

I don’t want to feel like I’m wrong for having taken it. And I don’t want to feel like I don’t have enough money or poverty if I don’t take it. I have these two feelings that I’m trying to avoid. And so if you are good with any of the feelings because you feel them, you’re like, oh, well, I’m going to feel this, I’m going to feel that, I’m going to feel it all. Then all of a sudden the decision is really easy to make.

Living with an Open Heart in the Real World

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: What is a little deeper about the relationship between making good decisions or making any decision and your relationship to yourself? Voice in the head, your emotions.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So the emotion side of it is the easiest to think about. So we are making decisions to feel a certain way. Where? How do I feel good? How do I feel like a winner? How do I not feel rejected? How do I. This is what makes us make a decision. We want to feel right or like not wrong, whatever it is safe. And so that’s what we’re making decisions for.

And if you think about it in a very minute way. Why am I doom scrolling? Why did I decide to doom scroll down? I decided because I don’t want to feel whatever angst that I’m having. This is going to help me not feel that loneliness, boredom, whatever it is. So we’re making our decisions to feel and to not feel certain ways.

If you start to learn to fall in love with all the emotions, which basically means not resist them, which basically means accept all the parts of yourself that weren’t accepted as a kid so that you can actually be yourself, then decisions are just automatic. They’re just simple. Because this is my truth, I want to do this. I’m okay if it means that I have to mourn something, it’s okay if people get upset at me, it’s okay.

And this is what creates, like, hyper success in people too, which is interesting if you look at the evidence. People who are okay being disagreeable or disagreeable on the ocean scale, meaning that they’re not trying to make sure everybody’s happy, they’re okay if people are upset with them, are far more likely to be successful in a hyper successful way than people who need everybody around them to be happy. They’re also going to get paid more money. There’s a whole bunch of, like, they’ll—

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Ask for the raise. They’ll go up to the person at the meeting.

JOE HUDSON: Exactly. They’ll do all the things because they’re okay with somebody. And so you can either do that by being like a stone cold ahole, or you can do it by. And that works, no doubt. Or you can do it by actually falling in love with all of your emotions. And then you’re like, oh, cool. Like, this is my truth. And I’m okay with whatever emotional consequence there is to it. And you can’t do that without an open heart. So you have a closed heart. You have a closed heart. You’re trying not to feel. Open heart basically just means I’m feeling everything. That’s what it means.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah.

JOE HUDSON: It.

The Challenge of Congruence

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Everybody has a recency bias. I guess it’s strange because my recency bias, the order of things that I’ve learned on the show is not always the order of the way that they’re published.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: F*ing Christopher Nolan’s tenet. And I’m like, you know, looping back on something. But I keep thinking about this Charlie conversation I had, and he talks about congruence, this beautiful idea about congruence. You look at the person that’s the victim. Their sort of head, heart and loins are kind of aligned. Even if they’re miserable and at the mercy of the world because they’re doing the thing that they feel. It’s rough, hewn and uncrafted and unrefined, but it’s happening.

Then you move into action and you’re like, what? Head, heart and loins as well. You would look at like a Trump, a Tate around this and you’d think, say what you want about them. They’re fing fully in congruence. Like, there is no doubt I am doing the thing. I’m the best, the best ever. Like, you know, like fing hardest guy in the plot, whatever it is. Like, they’re in congruence.

But then when you start to move into the open heart thing, the valley of despair, total white belts, like speaking to the, you know, teacher here. But as far as I can see.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: One of the pains that people feel when making that move into living with an open heart.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Is the incongruence starts to come back in. They are uncertain about the stuff that they used to do. And it’s like, I used to get results, right, when I just was the ahole. When I was disagreeable without an open heart or as disagreeable. How do you say? Like from disposition, not from curation or not from awareness, perhaps.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Like, like unconsciously competent as opposed to consciously competent.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: But to go through that, you go through consciously incompetent first because you’re like, oh, God, I used to have these patterns and these ways of operating and now I need to work out how to like integrate, transcend and include all of this stuff.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: To get back to the place that I was. And it’s like, yeah, but it’s not the same as having never left, like, to go on this big f* off journey. This is the story of Paulo Coelho’s the Alchemist.

JOE HUDSON: Right.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Like the gold’s in the backyard, but, like, you got to go on the f off journey to come back around to the same place. But that lack of congruence is where people go, oh, well, this, this is obviously wrong. Like, there’s obviously something wrong because previously I was getting results. Now I’m not even sure if I’m doing the right thing. And I’ve lost the fing results, at least in part, in this little valley bit in the middle before you get back to. It’s started to slot back together and I’ve got something appropriate in competence again.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. I think that there’s a couple things that are missing from that story. The first thing that I think is missing from the story is whatever you were getting wasn’t good enough or you wouldn’t f*ing be on the journey. So, yeah, you were getting results, but the results weren’t what you wanted or there’d be no impetus to go on the journey. There’s something missing. And so, yeah, maybe you’re not getting results like you used to get, but the results you used to get weren’t—

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The results you wanted.

JOE HUDSON: Weren’t the results you wanted. So I think that’s one part that I think is missing the journey.

The other thing that I don’t really see it is you become less capable. That’s not my experience. It sometimes happens, it sometimes doesn’t. But the way I see it is that you no longer can deal with the lack of congruity that’s there, meaning there’s some sort of congruence that happens where the Andrew Tates of the world, they are. There’s a deep authenticity. There just is a deep authenticity. You might not like it, you might not want it, but there’s like this deep authenticity.

But there’s not. I wouldn’t call it a congruence. I wouldn’t call it a deep alignment with. Because there’s still this big war inside of themselves. Like, you’re looking at their war. So to some degree, it’s like, yeah, they can get things done in the world, but the journey is I’m getting something done in the world, but I still feel this war inside of myself. How do I get things done in the world and not be at war with myself? That’s the question.

And what happens on that journey is at some point you’re so sensitive that you know the war is going on in yourself. Like, you’ve gotten to the point where you’re like, I get it, there’s something going on that sucks and I don’t want it. Which is what is the beginning of the journey. So I think the words I would use, but I get Charlie’s words, and I love Charlie, is that I would call that there’s a authenticity, but there’s not that deep alignment. There’s still war. They’re still in war with themselves. They’re still trying to prove something.

Well, I think they’re still trying, like, you’re the most powerful man in the world and you still need X, Y and Z, or you’re the media celebrity, but you still need. Actually, it’s still something you’re trying to prove. And so that’s what drops.

Navigating Different Levels of Awareness

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The thing that it makes me think about is someone who goes from that authenticity to true congruence, right where the heart actually starts to align with the actions and sort of the desires being exposed to some or being seen by somebody who doesn’t have that level of awareness.

I like having to dance around the words a little bit because I don’t want it to sound like a value judgment for people who like don’t feel things so very deeply as if there’s some sort of amount of worth that comes along with that. But there just are, there’s certain people who are going to question things more, feel things more, be more self aware, self reflective, ruminative, do the hyper vigilance, obsessive thing and just like pay attention to what’s going on internally and externally a little bit more.

And I think one of the challenges as avatar for that type of person is you are seen by people for whom that is not going to be their future, that is not going to be their path and they’re just locked in, in authenticity at action, action and results. And like the emotions piece is not going to play a huge role or as huge of a role in their future.

JOE HUDSON: It’s playing a huge role. It’s just they’re not going to be aware.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That might be a better way to put it. And you trying to have that conversation as somebody who’s trying to take that step with somebody who isn’t.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Now or maybe ever results in you looking kind of silly in some ways. It takes a kind of bravery I think to avoid the social judgment of somebody who sees you as not evolving into your emotions but devolving back out of them into like oh my God, you’re just being driven around by your emotions. Like how irrational as opposed to oh how beautiful you’re diving into them and that there’s already enough self doubt and uncertainty and fear and shame around. F*ing hell. Like I’m starting to feel like I just teared up on playing the song. Like how silly.

The I’m interested of how people navigate and I think this is what I said about living in the world with an open heart.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Is some of this different level communication thing and you’re speaking in not only different dialects but totally different languages with people.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And that can. It can be easy to be mocked, to feel silly. How do you, how do you think about navigating that? Because it would be lovely to just have a perfect, beautiful, supportive container or your own amount of self beliefs so much that the container no longer matters. But you’re going to, you’re going to interact with that like you know, Alpha Chad or Alpha boss bitch lady or guy at work around the water cooler. Is that gay, that dude, like, whatever.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: How do you think about navigating that spikiness of the world with the sensitivity, open heart, truth, boundary, like, all of that stuff?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So there’s a couple ways I think about. The first. The first way I think about it is imagine you are. I’m going to get in trouble for this. But you’re an ISIS terrorist and you have a whole bunch of ISIS terrorist friends.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: They’re gone. It’s f*ing Hezbollah now, right?

The Ocean vs. The Sword

JOE HUDSON: Hezbollah terrorists or whatever. You’re with a whole bunch of terrorist friends and one day you’re like, oh, I realize I probably shouldn’t be blowing up innocent people. Well, as it turns out. And then you’re asking me, what do I do when all my friends are like, no, you should blow up people. Innocent people.

Yeah, it’s like, yeah, to some degree. What it is is that there’s some people who judge you and who think you’re dumb for working out. There’s some people who judge you who think you’re dumb for needing as much of attention on a podcast. Some people think you’re dumb for being on a reality television show. Some people think you’re dumb for watching.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: It’s the problem with actually bringing someone on who really knows you. Yeah, fine, fine.

JOE HUDSON: Or think you’re dumb for teaching the emotional stuff.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Stigmatizing about.

JOE HUDSON: Blah, blah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Exactly.

JOE HUDSON: So there’s always going to be some people who do that. And so the question is, how do you handle that in all the places that it’s already happening? And what makes this particular place be an emotional, the sensitive place? Because I see you do it and everybody do it on 20 other things. But then there’s this one thing that it’s hard to do it on.

And it’s usually an indication that that’s where you’re judging yourself. If you’re not judging yourself, then they say, that’s like emotional, blah, blah, like you’re just a pansy. And the response is, yeah, yeah, I’m…

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Emotional and I love myself and that’s okay.

Vagal Authority

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, yeah. It’s like there’s this great term I heard recently called vagal authority. Are you familiar with this term, vagal authority?

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Oh, that’s sick.

JOE HUDSON: I like it already. Yeah. So it’s basically my nervous system. The calmness of my nervous system is going to have authority in the room. So in Japan, the police are taught this and they’re taught never to raise their voice.

A way that we learn it in the States is paramedics never run to the body. They always walk to the body because they don’t want to amp up the, they don’t want the other person to feel scared, and then it amps their adrenal system. So it’s like this vagal authority. When somebody says that to you and you’ve maintained vagal authority, it’s over.

And you see this with little kids bullying each other. There’s this great YouTube video, and hopefully I can send you the link about how to stop, if you’re being bullied as a kid, how to stop it. And the whole thing is just maintaining vagal authority. It’s basically not reacting to the bullying. If the bully bullies you and you don’t react to it, they stop. It’s just done.

And you can watch it over and over and over again. It’s just like, “You’re an ahole.” “Yeah, I’m an ahole.” What are you going to do? “You’re a pansy.” “Ah, yeah, I’m a pansy.” There’s no, it’s like the Taoists have this great saying about it. It’s in a fight between the sword and a sword and the ocean, the ocean always wins.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: What’s that mean to you?

JOE HUDSON: You have to have something to hit.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Oh, yeah.

JOE HUDSON: If you attack me and you hit me, I get really excited because it means there’s some part of myself I’m still judging. There’s some part of myself I’m not allowing. That means that there’s more freedom that I get to go and have. Right?

So if I get triggered, I’m excited because I’m like, there’s something in me that is still tight and solid, and that is not true.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That’s not the ocean.

JOE HUDSON: It’s not the ocean. And so for me, what I would say to somebody who is like, yeah, what do I do with the hard person who’s making fun of me for crying? I’d say, great. What’s the part of you that’s still having a problem with you crying? Because that’s where your freedom is.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The every…

JOE HUDSON: Every judgment, every time we’re triggered, every time we get defensive, there is, it is a direct pointer for where we can get more freedom in our life, which is why kids are so awesome. To go back to it, because kids will trigger the st out of you.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That’s another area. That’s…

JOE HUDSON: That’s another area. That’s another area. “Hey, dad, I don’t care about all of your music. I don’t care about all those fans. I don’t care about all those things that you think make you a good person.”

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’ve gotten your Power Ranger and you didn’t get to play with me.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, exactly. Boom. Your identity, just. And then you get to find out what you really are. Because you and I are both at a place where we’re special in society somehow. We’re famous for this or that or we have this perch. But you and I know we’ve interacted with all those people. It’s not who any of us are.

Nobody’s special. Everybody, what they say puts one pants, one leg on at a time. But everybody feels angry and sad and everybody feels angst and it’s happening to all of us. There’s no, and so I can’t remember who it is.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Some medieval philosopher that talks about from the king in his castle to the peasant in the street. Everybody sts.

JOE HUDSON: Everybody sts.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Everybody sts. In other news, I’ve been drinking AG1 every morning for years now. Dude, you tried to fastball me that. That was down the plate and I’ve just, Shohei Ohtani did. I’ve been drinking AG1 for as long as I can remember. It is the best all in one drink that I’ve ever found. And that’s why I’m such a fan of them and that’s why I partnered with them as well.

I have got my mum to start taking it, my dad to start taking it, and all of my friends as well. And if I found anything better, I would switch, but I haven’t. Why do you keep throwing it at the mic? Stop throwing it at the mic. See? Anyway, over 75 vitamins, minerals and whole food source ingredients got probiotics and prebiotics, also NSF certified, meaning that even Olympians can use it.

And in the throat. In the throat. How dare you. I hit the, hit the. Ah. This isn’t even an ad read anymore. It’s just a war zone. Oh, okay. Okay. Anyway, if you too want something to throw at your friends or a tasty blend of 75 vitamins, minerals, probiotics and whole food sourced ingredients designed to drink first thing in the morning in one scoop of tear good at drinkag1.com/ModernWisdom for stuff. Thank you.

Irrational Instinct vs. Cultivated Intuition

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’m interested in the listening to yourself portion of this to just harp a little bit more on the difference between irrational instinct, being at the mercy of and cultivated intuition. Yeah, listening to the fleeting thought, the quiet voice of, because those two things can’t be the same. The person who is swept away by their anger and blows up and does all of this stuff.

JOE HUDSON: Well seen. Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Do you get the tension that I’m talking about?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And again, what I’m really trying to drill into, again, my recency bias with Charlie is the fear. This is my journey. This is my journey right now. My journey right now is I’ve spent a long time in action. I felt helpless for a lot of my life. I then decided to step into no longer feeling helpless.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’m now going from that to, okay, unteachable lessons. You’ve butt fked me enough.

JOE HUDSON: I get it, I got it, I got it.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: There is more, there is deeper to go. What’s the next journey? The next journey is to go into feeling everything as opposed to just acting everything.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Okay. There was a part of being swept away by emotion previously. A lot of it was suppression for me. But for other people there may be tons and tons and tons of emotion. So irrational instinct to sort of cultivated intuition. Talk to me about that.

JOE HUDSON: So it doesn’t really matter in the long run. So long run, if you’re aware and you’re bringing awareness to your actions, you’re going to very quickly realize that when you are swept away by emotions and you’re not, you’re in your pattern, it’s going to be painful. And in the long run, when you listen to that intuition, it’s going to feel right, it’s going to be more right. It’s not going to bring all the drama.

So on some level you can listen to either one of them and do it because you immediately will realize or within a week or two realize that wasn’t that, there’s a big distinction that being swept away by the emotion didn’t actually serve me. And listening to that intuition, deep intuition did, and you’ll start to make a distinction in your body.

So in the long run, it’s like the way I would say it, it’s like if you’re working out wrong, if you’re working out in a way that hurts your body, your body’s going to get hurt and you’re going to realize that and you’re going to then change the way that you work out. As an example, right. But that’s not the most efficient. The most efficient thing is to have someone tell you, okay, here’s how you work that thing out so that you don’t hurt yourself. Right.

And so what I would say is that if you are triggered or in judgment, then it’s not the intuition. If it’s a little bit scary, then it’s far more likely to be the intuition, because if it’s a little scary, it’s out of your pattern.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Oh, that’s cool. That’s cool. That’s cool. Because it’s the path of least resistance is likely to be more reactive. Old pattern.

JOE HUDSON: Exactly.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The one where you go, yeah, oh.

JOE HUDSON: Am I going to do that? And then you want to accelerate the curve, you just go do that immediately. So a lot of times people will say to me, I don’t understand how you just have a realization, and then immediately it’s in your life, immediately act on it. And the answer is probably unrewarding, but it’s exactly that as I act on it.

So recently in business, we were, I had this recognition that I was not asking for what I wanted in a way that was clear. And so I just announced to the whole business, “Hey, here’s this way in which I’m not clear. And what I’m at for the way that I’m asking for what I want, I apologize. I’m sorry that I did that. That’s not fair to any of you. I take full ownership of it and I am going to start doing it more directly. If I mess up, please let me know. Just directly come to me and say, this isn’t working, and I will start making adjustments.”

And then I found six different ways to ask for directly what I wanted, how I wanted it, and I did it. And was it scary? Yeah, of course it was scary, but it’s immediately doing the thing in many reps as I can possibly do it. That’s how you change it.

The Life You Want Is On The Other Side Of Hard Decisions

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Alex Hormozi’s got this idea which I think is on the outside. He might not seem like a compatriot of your world, but he very much is in his own flavor. And he has this idea where the life that you want is on the other side of a few hard decisions. And the reason that you’re not living is because you’re too afraid to have them.

And when you have the first one, what he’s noticed is you got to fire someone. You got to get rid of somebody. And you thought about it and oh, my God, I can’t do it. They’ve been there for six months longer than they should have been, two years longer, five years longer than they should have done. And then finally you do it and you realize, oh, that was okay.

And then the next thing you do is, oh, what other conversations can I have that are like that. And you’ve got this sniper rifle out, and you turn from being a hitman into a mass shooter. And you’re like, okay, I’m going to, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da. And you’re, holy st, it’s a machine gun. So it’s kind of interesting that when the volume of the lesson gets so loud that you can’t ignore it, you finally do it. But then you kind of go on this run.

JOE HUDSON: Right.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Shohei Ohtani, you just have this absolute streak of…

JOE HUDSON: And that gap that you were saying between what I would call authenticity and that deeper alignment, attunement is Charlie’s word for it, I believe, is the action. It’s like, oh, what are those scary actions that I’m not taking? I’m going to go take them. And if I just line those up and do those reps, that transition is much shorter and you might get rid of a lot of people.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why?

The Lonely Chapter and Resistance to Change

JOE HUDSON: Let’s say one of the pieces of when you get into the attunement is like, oh, I’ve been caretaking a lot of people. Then a whole bunch of people that you stop caretaking might not want to be in the relationship anymore. The ones who stay are going to be great. Or if I’m a terrorist and I want to stop blowing people up, I’m probably going to have to change friend groups.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Have I told you about my lonely chapter idea thing? Basically, when you go from a place that you are to a place that you are that you don’t want to be, to a place that you do want to be, you become so developed you can’t resonate with your old set of friends, but not yet sufficiently developed that you’ve built your new set of friends. And you’re sort of stuck in this zone of uncertainty. It tarnishes the process. You’re permanently in self doubt. You don’t know where you’re going to go.

Yeah, I was thinking about this. I think this was maybe a couple of weeks after we were together, or maybe it was a couple of weeks before. I can’t remember. Anyway, this is the other side of the lonely chapter. So I’ve been talking about this for like three years. I’ll read you a little essay.

You are a different character in the mind of each person who knows you because their impression of you is made of the bare bones of what they’ve seen and fleshed out by their knowledge of themselves. So my friend Gwinda Bogle, the Lonely Chapter, has another perspective to it as you grow, you don’t fit in with your friends, but this means that they don’t fit in with you either. And this causes a reaction from their side, too.

The hardest part of changing yourself isn’t just improving your habits. It’s escaping people who keep handing you your old costume. Others don’t remember who you were. They enforce it, which is why reinvention often feels so much like trying to break out of a prison that you can’t see.

Psychologists call this dynamic an object relation. When people interact with you, they’re not engaging with you in your full living complexity. They’re dealing with the version of you that exists in their head. A simplified character built from fragments of memory and colored by their own projections.

In object relations theory, an object isn’t a thing. It’s the internalized image of another person. We don’t just carry people as they are. We carry a mental sketch. Which is why if you make a radical change, you’ll usually meet resistance. Your transformation destabilizes the representation that the people around you are attached to, so they try to nudge you back into the familiar role that you know.

Charles Horton Cooley called this the looking glass self. We come to know ourselves by seeing our own reflection in other people’s eyes. If these mirrors keep reflecting the old you, it’s hard to step into the new one. In social psychology, self verification theory shows that people prefer interactions that confirm what they already believe about themselves and about you. And if you disrupt this script, you introduce friction.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, so all true, and exactly why, especially the places we judge ourselves is where we feel that pressure from the society. However, it really changes if you’re just conscious about it. Meaning we all want to evolve. There’s like a migrational path that we all have. We all have this. And there’s a lot of human development studies that show that there is a path of development that we want to go down, and maybe it gets stopped because of trauma or life events, but we all want to do it.

So if you sit down with your group of friends and you say, hey, this is who I was and this is who. And this is a transition, and I would love your support in it. And this is where you can see things that are different, which is what I did with the company. Here’s what’s going on. What I notice is at least 80% of the people want to support you in that process. If it’s conscious. If you just go and do it, it’s different.

The Importance of Setting Context

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: So that’s why I had a question I tried to interrupt you with which was, how important is setting the scene? How important is saying, this is a thing that I’ve noticed and blah, blah, blah, because, you know, the ruthless CEO archetype might just be. I’ll just go and do the thing. I’ll just say the way it’s going to be. You went through this unnecessarily superfluous f*ing storytelling thing. Sit everybody down here, come lie in my armpit. Like, let me give you the, you know, how important is this? The scene setting of this is me. I have realized this thing.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So let me, let me answer that as if you were that CEO who just said that to me. I’d be like, yeah, that’s exactly how you should handle explaining the context of your company to your customer. I’m not going to handhold you. I’m not going to put you in my arm and elbow you and rub you and nuzzle you and say, yeah, my company sells really great products. Of course you are. You’re going to set context everywhere.

How do I get somebody on my page as to let them understand how I’m making the decision? As a matter of fact, one of the things I see inside of companies, one of the biggest inefficiencies is that nobody has a shared context. Nobody actually understands all the things that the CEO understands. And therefore the CEO feels like they’re all alone because they don’t actually have the context.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Well, from a decision making perspective, they are. Right. Like a CEO is a complex decision making machine who has a degree of perspective and context that is unreplicable, very difficult to have anywhere else. Which is why this amount of perspective and context gives you the ability to aggregate all of this stuff. And it sounds to me like you’re saying the job of the CEO is to try and make that perspective as widely known as possible, especially within his.

JOE HUDSON: Top six, seven people. Absolutely. I would say that’s a bad CEO. A good CEO is somebody who is sharing his problems with a group of smart people and making a decision with them.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And I assume the same is true in a relationship.

JOE HUDSON: Absolutely. Yeah. So most relationship death comes from not sharing context. So the first thing I would say is it’s very efficient to share the context. You don’t have to do it. It’s just super efficient. A lot less turmoil, a lot less clunk.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I see where they’re coming from.

JOE HUDSON: Say again.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I understand their motivation.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. They’re my friend. I want to support them in their journey. Yeah. And I also feel that same call in me. Somewhere. Somewhere. I feel that same call in me. Like, even if I’m making fun of you for having the emotion, even that reaction tells you that there’s something they’re judging again. Yeah, exactly. They’re judging themselves, and so you know that it’s in there in them.

So give them the opportunity. Open up the door for them as well by sharing your own vulnerability. And again, can’t do that without an open heart. Close your heart down, and you’re not going to share the context. Close your heart down. You’re not going to bring your friends along for the ride.

Balancing Vulnerability and Boundaries

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Let me give you an example. I already told Charlie this story. We filmed this vlog tracking the New York and Toronto shows that we did a couple of weeks ago. It’s beautiful.

JOE HUDSON: I hear they’re going really well, man. Congratulations, man. Thank you. Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: You’ve selfishly decided to put a retreat on, so you can’t hang out with me this Saturday.

JOE HUDSON: But it’s fine.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: We can do it again sometime. Anyway, Max, who you met, videographer, was, you know, turned this edit around in. It was a week of footage turned into an hour of vlog, and it’s beautiful. I f*ing loved it. And I was like, I’m so proud. And it’s real. It’s a real different angle on the way that everything looks.

Anyway, I got all excited about it. There was an error on the upload. It was up for 10 minutes, came back down. That’s like, cancerous to reach because all the notifications have got triggered. And then this thing happens and it pulls back down, and people that were watching it can’t watch it, and then they’re not going to watch it again. And da, da, da.

And in between one of the episodes earlier this week, I come out and I’m like, oh, how’s. Has everything gone up okay on the things. I’m going to the bathroom. And they were like, oh, yeah, there was a little bit of an error. And immediately my response was, well, what happened? Here’s the process. We need to make sure that the thing. I’m so frustrated, and I realized a little bit later when I was talking to Charlie that what I should have done is gone.

JOE HUDSON: Ow.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I really loved that thing, and I really wanted other people to love it too. And I thought it was really special, and maybe they’re not going to get to see it in the same way.

JOE HUDSON: Ow.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Like, I got my hopes up. I should have said that. I didn’t. We must make sure who’s the process. We got to get the thumbnail with the title of it. So that was a. That was very much you ventriloquizing me from wherever the f* you are.

JOE HUDSON: I would say both are really important. Ow, that sucks. So people can see you. So, like, so, so, so that the team can be like, oh, he’s human. And I empathize and yeah, it sucks for me too. And we can be human in this together. And how do we make sure this. How the f* do we make sure this doesn’t happen again? Because that anger that you feel is a boundary. There’s a boundary there of like, oh, hey, like, if we’re going to do this, how do we make sure we’re doing it right?

But I think both are really critical and that. I think that is the integration that you’re talking about from getting from one place to the other. It’s like, because there’s some fear in the system, then it’s like, I either should be open hearted or I should be. Get this done. And ruthless. And it’s like they’re not mutually exclusive. I can be open hearted and be very clear about my vision and what I want to do and how I want to be and the reach that I want to have. Of course.

Like, how could I not think about it like a mom. A mom open hearted. Or a dad, in this case, open hearted to their son. Open hearted. Ruthless. He was ruthless. I am going to do this. 15 minutes from my house. I’m going to do. I’m not going to tour. It was all ruthless and deeply open hearted for his son. And it’s both. And the models that we’re looking for are the people who do both. And we just for a while in the journey get confused that it’s one or the other.

Content Strategy and Reaction Videos

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Mmm, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You’ve mentioned your business too many times for me to not do this. I need to have. I’m going to have an intervention with you. You’ve done enough to me. So I’m going to put the shoe on the other f*ing foot for a second.

JOE HUDSON: Okay.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Have you spoken to your team after the call that me and my YouTube guy had?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, man, we are so grateful. Did you.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Did you listen to a recording or did they give you a full breakdown? Did they talk to you about what I want as your new vertical for content?

JOE HUDSON: We’ve already recorded two.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: How did they go?

JOE HUDSON: We recorded three. That tells you how it went. Two of them are good. Two of them I think are great. One of them was the golf one that I think you recommended that was actually really cool. And then there was one. So context for everybody listening. You wanted me to do reaction videos, too.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’ll give context to your context.

JOE HUDSON: Okay, great.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I had a conversation with Mike Israel about three or four years ago. Who was on that call? Was it Dean?

JOE HUDSON: Me.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And maybe it was just me. Anyway, Mike is probably the fastest growing channel in all of health and fitness. Has been for the last three or four years. I mentioned it on the call with your guys.

JOE HUDSON: He’s like the big guy. Bald.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah, big.

JOE HUDSON: And you did a workout thing with him.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’ve done a number of those.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah. Cool.

JOE HUDSON: I know who you’re talking about.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: We’re friends. He’s been on the show a bunch. The first time he came on, he was like, the YouTube channel’s kind of floundering a bit. There were maybe a million subs, a little bit less. What do you think that we should do? And I’m by no means like some f*ing supermaster at YouTube, but especially if someone’s super talented and they’re just missing the unlock.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

The Power of Loving the Process

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I was like, okay, here’s a bunch of things. From then until now, they’ve gained 3 million subs in like three years. So like real vertical growth. And the guy’s the same guy. He’s been in the fitness industry for forever.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I was like, huh, that was cool. Like there was something there. And we became really good friends. And he very flatteringly attributes at least some of the growth to some of the sh*t that we got them. Although it’s all his talent, it’s largely that.

And it’s just the same format for you. I’m sorry. It’s the same format. And the reason, I’m sorry, is that one of your fundamental fears is like an increase in exposure for you. Not for the admission, but I know for a fact that if you start to do master coach critiques or master coach assesses or master coach whatevers, it will do to YouTube something that we haven’t seen for quite a while.

Like I’m confident that that’s going to happen. You’ve got the team, you’ve got the way that it’s filmed. You’ve got the edit style. You’ve got as well that Mike didn’t at the time, the roadmap, because you can just go, I’m just going to do the emotion equivalent of what he did for exercise science. And it is.

JOE HUDSON: I’m…

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’m usually not wrong. Okay.

JOE HUDSON: So I was very resistant. I was like…

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I knew you were. I said, I was like, he’s going to fing hate it. And I can’t wait for him to hate it. It’s so good because I get to turn it around after he’s bitched me for an entire week. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. F you, Joe Hudson.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So you know, we have a principle in our company that’s “Everything’s an iteration.” So I was sitting there going, this is, oh, I don’t want to do this. And my team was like, everything’s an iteration. Sit your butt down.

Because for us, like our principles are more important than any one person’s decision. Like this is how we operate. Including mine. Yeah, exactly. And so they just put stuff in front of me and looked at. First of all, we all decided Tara would be far better at reaction videos because she’s so much more expressive than I am.

But there was one that was like a reality television show, and my reaction was, oh God, why does anybody watch this?

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That’s punking the game.

JOE HUDSON: That one didn’t work. That one didn’t work. But there’s a couple that I thought were just like amazing to do. Actually, I again was, I was like, well, I was wrong. That was amazing.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: You had fun.

JOE HUDSON: I had fun. I enjoyed it.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Unrailed.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So I think it’s really critical that we get you know a list of things that I can do that are going to feel good, but there’s some that are just, I’m not going to, I can’t do like pop culture commentary.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Well, you’re going to learn, you know, the bucket of what is and isn’t appropriate. And I’m sure that Mike has been his, Scott, the video guy. His guy RP will have put videos in front of him, and he’s like, ah, no. And they probably never made the channel.

JOE HUDSON: Right.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Or they didn’t, they didn’t perform or whatever.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And over time, the curation in the same way for that vertical of content, the same way as my guest selection is paramount. It’s the most important thing. The most important thing for you guys is what’s the video like? What is it? Or the incident or whatever that I’m responding to? What is that?

Because that’s the well from which you’re drawing all of this stuff out. And as they say in the UK, you can’t polish a turd.

JOE HUDSON: Right.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Some of them may not be turds, but you’re just an incompatible turd with that turd.

JOE HUDSON: The one that I had the most fun with was a fight scene from a comedy from I think it was like the early aughts called “This is 40.” And it had the…

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: You know, Judd Apatow, who was the guy that made it. He was sat in that seat yesterday.

JOE HUDSON: Oh, wow. Yep. Yeah, yep, yep.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: So.

JOE HUDSON: So yeah. So I break down that fight scene, and I’m like, and it was so fun.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I’m so fired up for you to do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

JOE HUDSON: Thank you. Thank you for that.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah, no, no, no. I think title and thumb, keep it master coach something. Master coach critiques, master coach assessors, master coach react, whatever it is.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Super simple. “This is 40” fight scene. Like Scott Schiffler’s golf speech. Like whatever it might be, like you have an infinite amount of growth, like literally a vertical amount of growth to do from that.

The Secret of Success: Loving the Practice

JOE HUDSON: That speech is phenomenal.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Do you want to give a little summary for the people who don’t know what we’re talking about?

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. So it’s this, I’m not a golf follower, but this is the preeminent golf guy now, like just amazing, apparently. And he basically talks about winning and how the feeling of winning lasts about two minutes. And then, then he literally goes, and then you guys are just asking me, he’s talking to a bunch of reporters, you all are just asking me like how am I going to do on the next one?

So like it’s gone. Like all this winning doesn’t mean anything but what he says, which is the secret of it all. And the, and like he says it like three or four times. He just keeps on saying, “I’m just the guy who loves to practice. I’m just the guy who loves to practice.”

And that is the, like what makes him so successful is that he loves the doing of it, not the reward of it. And so many people are sitting in their rooms right now listening to this or doing something and going, I want the reward of fame. I want the reward of money. I want the reward of a great girlfriend. I want the reward of, and it will last two minutes.

You got to love the thing that you’re doing if you’re going to actually have the success and maintain it.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Right.

JOE HUDSON: You love having conversations with people. And actually, when I leave here, I’m going to talk to a woman at UTA who runs the literary department there, and we’re talking about a book. And she asked me, she’s like, well, what do you want from the book? And I said, I won’t do anything for money that I wouldn’t do for free.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: The best story I’ve learned from you around that, I mean, this meme needs to go so much wider than it has with you just like flicking it onto the floor like you’re tossing like a bit of offal into the bin or something.

Your daughter came to you and said, “I’ve got my first billion dollar idea.” And you said, “Oh, wow. It’s an idea that you can sell for a billion dollars.” She says, “No, no, no. It’s an idea that I wouldn’t give away if someone offered me a billion dollars.”

JOE HUDSON: Yes.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Money.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Such money. And that’s what you’re talking about?

JOE HUDSON: That’s what I’m talking about.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: We’re going to talk about the book before you leave as well. Don’t worry. I’ve got things that I need to say.

JOE HUDSON: Okay, James.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Clear. It doesn’t make sense to continue wanting something if you’re not willing to do what it takes to get it. If you want to live the lifestyle, then release yourself from the desire to crave the result, but not the process is to guarantee disappointment. To crave the result, but not the process is to guarantee disappointment.

It doesn’t make sense to continue wanting something if you’re not willing to do what it takes to get it. I want fame. Fame sounds great. I want to be a world touring musician. Okay. Do you want to spend 10 years in your bedroom playing guitar? Because like that, that is the lifestyle, right, that you need in order to be able to get the life.

The Freedom in Feeling Your Wants

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. The only thing I would add is there is a great benefit to just being in the want, but not the want. So let’s say I want to be famous, right? If I just feel the feeling of wanting, even I take the fame out of it, but I just feel that feeling of wanting. There’s a great benefit to that.

Often what’s happening is that we feel the want and then we immediately stop that feeling of wanting and go into, I should do this, I should do this. I should do this, I should do this, I should do this. We’re not actually spending time in that feeling of wanting. And if you spend time in the feeling of wanting, there is often a massive unlock that occurs.

So you want a whole bunch of attention, you want to be liked by people, but what happens is you go, I want to be liked by somebody. You have the thought, maybe you don’t even fully admit that you’ve had the thought to yourself, and then you go, I need to do this, I need to do this. I should have done this. I should have done this. I shouldn’t have done this. Which is basically avoiding the feeling of wanting.

But if you actually go, oh, I want that, and I’m going to stop everything and fully feel what it is to really want somebody’s attention. There is a massive freedom that can be found in that. Because what you find is that want, when it’s unresisted is a lot like love. It’s a lot like love.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why or how, what ways it.

JOE HUDSON: Instead of that, just see what it’s like. Think of something that you want. Want your girlfriend to blah, blah, blah, or your mom or blah, blah, blah, and then just feel the wanting without needing anything to be different. And like, look, your system relaxes and opens.

The Anatomy of Relationship Fights

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: And you mentioned the similarity between telling a company the motivation and the context for why something is about to happen and the importance in relationship. Yeah, this is from you. Every relationship fight boils down to three things. Number one, I don’t feel seen. Number two, I’m trying to change you. Number three, I need to defend myself. Shift any one of those, and the fight will shift too.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. Yeah. So the way I see most fights is I have a theory called the “shame hot potato,” which is basically, I don’t feel good about myself, so I’m going to throw shame at you. And now I don’t feel good about myself, so I’m going to throw shame at you. And then we’re just like passing the shame back and forth.

This person feels like they’re always defending themselves. This person feels like they’re always defending themselves. But my defense feels like an attack to this person, and this defense feels like an attack to this person.

So it’s like, “You never do the dishes.” I am ashamed that I can’t keep up with the housework and that I’m keeping score. You don’t do the dishes. I feel like I’m defending myself. Look at all the things that I’ve done. Why aren’t you, I feel like you attacked me for not doing the dishes. And back and forth, it just goes like that.

And so this person’s response is, “Well, I work all day and you don’t. You only work 35 hours a week.” Oh, I don’t work enough. I’ve been attacked. I’m ashamed of, and off it goes.

And so every single one of those things that you said there, that you read there are an expression of that cycle that’s going on. “I really see that you need more help in the house and you feel overwhelmed, and I don’t want you to feel overwhelmed.” Fight’s gone. That’s the being seen part.

“Oh, you’re right. I don’t do the dishes.” Fight’s gone. I don’t need to defend myself. So every single thing is just basically unlocking that shame hot potato that’s going. Which is basically people feeling unloved for who they are and not being able to love themselves for who they are.

I just love the phrase that it’s like, if you’re trying to change somebody, you’re not loving them. You’re basically saying, you need to be different to get my love. And that usually typically means for the, for yourself. If you’re trying to change somebody is that you’re trying to also, there’s also some part of yourself that you’re not loving.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Why?

The Trap of Trying to Change Others

JOE HUDSON: Let’s say early in the relationship, Tara was very big, and I would get embarrassed. And it was not about Tara being big. It was about me trying to be seen as normal, being fit in everywhere, not stand out. It has nothing to do with her.

So that part of her that I’m changing is like the part of me wanting attention that I wasn’t allowing myself to feel or have. So typically, that’s the thing. And it’s also just like that old phrase. My mom actually had this on needlepoint in the wall. I don’t know. She needlepointed this phrase. It’s just something that happened with American moms in the 70s apparently. And it said, “trying to move a mountain or change a man. I’ll move a mountain. It’s easier.”

So it’s also just like, it just hurts a relationship because the person will resist you.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: People don’t respond well to being told you need to change.

JOE HUDSON: Exactly. Including ourselves. And yet we do it to ourselves all the time.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Talk to me about that.

JOE HUDSON: I should work out more. I should stop smoking. I should be more truthful. I should run a bigger business. I should be famous. Like, all those things are the things that you can look back on a decade and haven’t changed. The more we’re forcing ourselves to change, the less that change happens.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Where does change come from if not from motivating ourselves?

Wants vs. Shoulds: The Fuel for Real Change

JOE HUDSON: The same place it comes from when a little kid goes from crawling to walking. It’s our wants. It’s like being able to listen to and fully feel the want that is in our world. Wants are far more efficient fuel than shoulds.

Shoulds is a very dirty fuel. It doesn’t work very well. It’s meant to kind of stop things. Shame and shoulds are like, they’re meant to stop behaviors, and we use them to motivate ourselves, but they don’t work very well.

Whereas wants and desire and natural motivation that just burns. You know, it’s that golf guy. I love to practice. He has a want to practice. He wants to play golf. That’s the thing. He kept his love for playing golf. That’s a more efficient fuel than “I should play golf every day.”

If you want to screw up, like, how many artists do you know who have done this? That they’re loving their art, they’re doing great. They get a job, they start having to do their art, and they’re like, “I should do my art.” And then their love for their art goes away. Anything that you tell yourself you should do, the love of it just starts going away.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: How do you protect yourself? Because there are things that the difference between knowing this is the next area for growth and progress that I could put myself into.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: That is a zone of proximal development. It’s not what I’m doing right now. I don’t even know if I want to do this thing because it’s kind of new. It’s on the outside of the orbit of what I’ve done.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: How do you know the difference between that and this tyrannical should? You know, this is like part of the journey. It’s a good part of progress. It can be the journey to the next want.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah. The crazy thing is that oftentimes, even inside of a should, you can look and find the want in it. Right. So “I should go to the gym.” Well, what’s the want? Well, the want is to feel healthy. The want is to be skinny. The want, there’s some want behind it. Okay.

You can even take that to the next level. What makes you want to be skinny is, oh, I want to be attractive. I want to be loved. Okay, cool. There’s actually a real want there. You can find the want that’s beneath that should, and then you have a lot more options.

Okay, so let’s just say it’s, “I want to feel good.” Well, going to the gym is one way to feel good. Playing pickleball is another way to feel good. Hiking a mountain, being in nature is another way to feel good. Being with friends is another way to feel good. So all of a sudden, I have these options that open up, and typically, when we’re in a should, it’s a very narrow doorway.

So for instance, when I was trying to go from not working out to working out, instead of saying, “I should go to the gym,” I said, “what are 20 things that I really want to experiment with as far as working out goes?” And I want to see what pickleball is like. I want to see what salsa dancing’s like. And I just did all those 20 things inside of a month.

And then I found out, wow, I really like pickleball. I don’t need to be motivated. I’m just calling people, “hey, want to play pickleball?” Oh, cool. Now I’m working out and I’m doing something I want to do. So it’s just finding the want that’s in there and then following it rather than listening to the voice in the head say should and agreeing with it, because then you’re forcing yourself. And we don’t respond well when people are trying to change us. Including us.

Efficiency Without Awareness

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: So much of today’s world is focused on efficiency and optimization, but efficiency without awareness is just a faster way to burn out.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah, that’s coming from Silicon Valley. So what I notice is that people are interested in getting, first of all, efficiency, typically in our society, in work means faster. It doesn’t mean efficient.

So typically, like, if I have a car, there’s a car behind us, the Ferrari, that’s not an efficient car. Nobody would call that an efficient car, but it’s a very fast car. So efficiency, I think is better, is more about how much energy you’re putting into it to get it done than it is about how quickly you’re getting it done. But we really think about it as far as speed goes.

And so if we are trying to become quicker at everything, right, that idea of efficiency without knowing why that’s the case, then you’re just going to burn out.

So I’m talking to a CEO yesterday who’s interested in having me coach him. And we were having the discussion about how it’s one fire to the next fire to the next fire to the next fire and how all this has to get done really quickly. And so we spent some time to talk about hiring people and how if he hired four great people, how many fires would be left?

“What makes you not do it?” “Well, because I have to get this stuff done quickly. I have to be efficient about making sure that we land this contract, we do this thing.” I’m like, so you’re ignoring the thing that makes you more efficient for the immediate efficiency. And that’s what I mean. And he’s going to burn out that way.

Whereas if he looks at the bigger efficiency of hiring those people and so we’re just sitting there basically just getting dopamine fixes. Sent the email, sent the email, sent the email, sent the email. We’re not thinking about, can I send that email so I never have to send another email on that topic again? Can I do this task in such a way that I don’t have to do 10 more steps? I only have to do five?

And I think that’s the difference between mastery and competence. Competence is I can get it done effectively. Mastery is I can get it done with very little effort effectively.

Understanding Overwhelm

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: What are the misconceptions people have about overwhelm? Feel like that’s a pretty endemic sensation.

JOE HUDSON: Yeah.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: A lot of people, typically.

JOE HUDSON: It just means emotions haven’t moved. Oftentimes it also means that there’s something that you know needs to be done that you’re not doing. And those are typically the two things that create that level of overwhelm.

And we think it’s because there’s so much going on. “Oh, my gosh. I got this going on and this going on and this going on.” But what’s typically happening is I’m really excited. I’m not allowing myself to feel it. I’m really scared. I’m not allowed myself to feel it. I’m really angry. I’m not allowing myself to feel it. And so we’re cycling quick. Our minds are cycling quicker and quicker and quicker, as we discussed before.

And then on top of that, there’s things that I know I should be doing that I’m not doing, and that doesn’t mean that could be. I know I should be resting. I know I should be having that hard conversation. I know I should be firing that person. It doesn’t mean always like, I know I should be doing the thing that my voice in my head is saying, “you should do this, you should do this, you should do this.”

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Is that why people always feel like they never have enough time?

JOE HUDSON: Overwhelmed seems to create that as a symptom of lack of time, which is kind of the weirdest thing in the world because we always have the exact amount of time. I was typically, I was just having this realization yesterday, and it kind of flipped me out.

My life has gotten really busy recently. And then there was a moment where I had like three days where something canceled. And so I had free time. And I found myself doing stuff that I haven’t done in months because I. And I was like, “why am I doing this?” Like, I got so busy that there was things that I wasn’t doing. And now I’m realizing I’m doing them, but they’re not necessary because for the last three months I didn’t do them and everything worked out just fine.

And so there’s this weird phenomenon that happens, which is when we have what we think is a compression of time, it just requires you to do the most important things if you’re going to be effective. And so the other way to look at the world is to say, I’m just going to do the most important things all the time, I’m not going to do the little stuff.

So typically, what we’re doing is we’re saying, “I don’t want chaos to reign in my life, so I’m going to do a whole bunch of things, get a lot of dopamine hits of doing those little things so that I don’t have to feel that chaos.” But if you’re okay feeling the chaos, then you can constantly just focus on doing the most important thing.

And one of the things that I’ve noticed of super hyper successful CEOs is that they are really good at focusing on the two or three most important things and letting chaos reign everywhere else, if necessary. They know that’s the thing, that if that domino falls, everything else is taken care of. I am going to spend almost all my time pushing on that domino.

Focusing on the One Thing

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: I suppose that’s a skill to be able to discern.

JOE HUDSON: It’s a skill to discern it. It’s a skill to be able to be okay with the chaos. There’s a book called “The One Thing,” and he talks about this pretty well. He talks about, if you’re going to focus on the one thing, then you have to be okay because some part of your world’s going to go into chaos. And what I notice is when people can’t handle the chaos, they can’t focus on the one thing.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Joe Hudson, ladies and gentlemen. Joe, you’re great. You’re so fantastic in trepidation for what the next few years is going to look like for you, from book to YouTube to the courses to everything else. I’d strap in if I was you.

JOE HUDSON: I think you scared me the other day on that one. You got me really good. You were talking about what it’s like for you as fame has increased and how the Amazon truck guy will come out and be like, “great podcast.” He’s like, but you said to me, “in your world, though, the Amazon truck guy’s going to jump out and say, ‘hey, can you coach me real quick?'”

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Yeah. No one comes up to me expecting anything other than just like, “dude, love that episode with Charlie recently. Oh, so good to see you talking to Huberman again.” Or whatever. Whereas with you, it’s going to be like, “I have this problem, me and my girlfriend. I got this day that ancestral trauma.”

Oh, my God, please go ahead and start praying in front. Well, look, you know, I couldn’t. One of the very good counter signals that you put out as a part of the time that I’ve worked with you and everything else is like a “I am not your guru” type sort of energy, for sure. And I think that’s very important because there are a number of people who are without the legitimacy of you claiming to have it. So to have the legitimacy of you claiming not to have it, I think is good when it comes to the bullseye of focused on the mission, not on the person.

JOE HUDSON: Also super, it just doesn’t work the other way. Meaning, like, if the person isn’t their own authority, it doesn’t work. You can’t, we can for a little while, but it doesn’t sustain to give your authority to somebody else. And so if someone’s trying to take your, trying to be your authority, it’s a really, really, really good sign not to trust them.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Art of accomplishment, YouTube, podcast courses, everything else.

JOE HUDSON: Thank you.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: F* you, Joe Hudson on Twitter. I appreciate you, man. Until next time.

JOE HUDSON: Pleasure. Pleasure.

CHRIS WILLIAMSON: Thank you very much for tuning in. Joe is still an underground hero. He needs to be known by more people. So I really appreciate you watching through all of that.

I think he’s fantastic. I love his work. Someone else whose work I love, John Deloney. Come on, watch him. He’s brilliant.

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