You're listening to a Complexly Podcast. I mean, we had an amazing bit about Joe Rogan's 16 feet and how Joe Rogan is just two spiders and how Hank and I are trying to grow more feet. Listen, we're not going to be two spiders. We're not going to have 16 feet, but we'll each have eight.
And then we will be able to compete with Joe Rogan in the very competitive podcast space. But Hank, there is no way that we can recreate the magic that was the conversation that we just had. And that is the point to me. That's why I'm giggling and laughing.
Because Hank and I spent all this time talking about my mental health journey. And then Hank was talking about how he doesn't have the same challenges that I have. But the big challenge that he does have is he doesn't feel like something is valuable or worthwhile unless he is working. Working, working, working.
Little worker be Hank Green trying to make as many things as possible before the sweet embrace of death comes for him. And it was the most lovely conversation. I'm very sorry that y'all don't get to hear it. But it is more magical to me precisely because it is a conversation that turned out to be a private conversation with my brother where he thought he was working.
And so he was bringing his very best self to it. You know how rarely in a conversation with Hank Green he's not on Twitter? I was getting full 100% Hank Green, okay? I was getting everything that Hank has to offer because he thought he was working.
And then the moment when he found out he wasn't working, he immediately got so mad at himself. He was like, I'm not valuable. If I'm not working, I'm so mad. And I was just giggling because I was like, that's just what we were talking about, man.
I know that you're on a journey of meaning. Maybe I haven't gotten this far. But what if the universe, Hank, what if the universe was just telling you, giving you a physical example of what it's like to make something that's not for the world, that's just for your brother? But it's my job to push record.
Well, that is true. The other reason it's funny to me is because it's not my job to push record. And so I'm not in trouble. And I like it when I'm not in trouble.
Oh, my God. Hank, let's talk about our mental health right now in this moment. So I've been taking some time off. I have what used to be called a nervous breakdown, smidge of a mental health crisis, big bout of depression.
And then, like, for the first, like, seven to ten days, it was sort of like being institutionalized, but sleeping at home, like, all day meeting with psychologists and my psychiatrist and, like, you know, crisis management kind of stuff. And I'm okay. But also the kinds of stuff that they do when you're in a place like, you've got to go make pottery now. Yeah, yeah.
Like, I was making pottery, like, six hours a day, you know, just to have something to do. Make sure you sleep a lot. Play a little ping pong. Take naps.
You know, all that jazz. And that was, like, it was helpful. Look, it's just helpful not to be on the Internet, I'll be honest with you. Like, being a little distance from the Internet turns out to be pretty good for my mental health.
I'm not sure quite what to do with that yet, but, like, that's just a broad observation, and I don't think it's only true for me. I think there's a reason that people are advised to touch grass. One of the vlogger videos ideas I've had is a challenge. I've gotten interested in challenge videos, and I was thinking that it'd be fun to make a video that was called I Spent 24 Hours Touching Grass.
Wow. You have to be touching grass at all times. That's easy for me. I got you.
I'll get some grass, and I'll put it in my sock. Boom, done. I win. Get on Twitter.
And I'll be right there on Twitter. I'll be like, what's up, Elon? How's it going? I got some thoughts about your thoughts.
And don't tell me to touch grass, because it's in my sock right now, and I'm the sock guy. Speaking of which, this is sock month. Good Duff Store. Good Duff Store.
We've got kid socks now. We have kid socks. Yeah. And all the profit goes to charity.
Yeah. And you can wear the same socks as your kids, which is super fun. And then you can also talk to them about how the socks helped people in Sierra Leone who otherwise wouldn't have a hospital to go to when they have babies. Yeah.
It allows for safe births and more healthy mothers and more healthy kids. It's a pretty beautiful story, and it's already raised over $8 million for charity and special in Good Duff Store. But anyway, back to my story, because this is about me. This podcast is not about socks.
It's not about Joe Rogan. It's not about Hank Green. It's about me. Okay.
I think that you have held as a core belief for a long time that you are not very valuable to the world unless you are working. That is where I feel as if my value comes from. Yes. And you are consciously aware that this is wrong.
In fact, you've written one of the most beautiful lines ever written on this topic. Yeah. I'm working on it. Yeah.
So one of my very favorite lines on this topic, and one that I was thinking about a lot during the times that I was making pottery. I mean, I'm still making pottery. Who are we kidding? I just made some earlier today.
But one of the things I was thinking about was, you know, you will never be happy until you understand that one of the things you will produce is your own joy. That you need to be able to produce joy in yourself. That's a kind of productivity. That's a kind of productivity.
And that's the kind of productivity I've been really focused on while still doing, you know, a fair amount of work. Like, I'm not working on this book about tuberculosis. I'm doing this podcast, whatever. But, like, I've definitely taken a step back.
I'm working what I would call, like, sort of normal-ish hours. And I'm thinking that maybe that's what I need to do. Like, maybe that's what I need to do in a sort of more permanent way is find ways to work normal-ish hours so that I can focus on producing my own joy. Just as I'm trying to work on my core belief, my negative core belief, I do, which is it's that I'm worthless.
It's that I'm a piece of crap. Yeah, I'm so happy that I don't have that one. I'm glad you don't have it either. But a lot of people do.
I'm not alone in this. I'm thinking that, like, my work is worthless and my life is worthless and everyone would be better off without me and I'm just a piece of crap. Like, it's a pretty common core belief. My psychiatrist actually asked me, he was like, what do you think your core beliefs are?
And I said, well, the first one is that everyone deserves to love and be loved. And he said, respectfully, you're not acting like that's your core belief. And you're like, oh, yeah, everyone else. Everyone else.
There's eight billion people deserve to love and be loved. One person, oh, he's a piece of crap. This guy, he sucks deep down all the way. I hate him.
And everybody who says he's a piece of crap on the internet is right. And everybody who says that he's a nice guy doing his best, they're full of it. Yeah. I mean, I'm the same way where I would never think that somebody else's value is contingent upon their productivity, but I think that about myself.
Yeah, of course. Of course. And you, exactly, you understand intellectually that that's not where value in a human life lies. Right.
I understand intellectually that, like, when somebody comes to me and they say, like, I feel worthless or whatever, or I feel like a piece of crap, I always say, like, well, you're clearly not. And I'm like, oh, I don't make anything. I don't do anything. I don't do this, that.
You know, I don't have a lot of love in my life right now. Whatever they say. And I'm just like, well, but that's not the only way we measure value, right? Like, we also measure value by just being attentive, being in the world.
Yeah. Seeking connection. Seeking meaning. Right.
And I see this all the time among my friends who struggle in various ways. It would be like, like you, one of the most prolific, like, beloved, interesting people who's done a ton of stuff. And they will be in this mind. And we see this all the time with creative people.
They'll be in this mind space of everyone would be better off if I wasn't here. And, like, in those situations, like, I look and I'm like, like, you're so loved, like, internationally. It must be an irrational thing that brains just do. Yeah.
But I think the brain can do it to anyone. The brains can do it to anyone anywhere. It can do it to Robin Williams. It can do it to anyone, you know?
But my point is that, like, people who can tell themselves the story, well, I'm not Robin Williams. I'm not, you know, I'm not John. I'm not whatever. Like, that doesn't mean that they're not valuable.
They're, of course, valuable. Every single person is worthwhile. And nobody is a piece of crap. But it's such a profound core belief that I'm really, so, like, I've got this biological chemical problem, obviously, that I'm dealing with in chemical ways, like, fixing my medication and figuring all that crap.
And, like, that's a lot of work. And it's real. And it's super important. And I don't, like, want to minimize the sort of, like, purely chemical part of it that just has to be dealt with as a chronic illness.
But there's also, like, a framework problem. You know, and I see this with you with ulcerative colitis and with cancer, where, like, you have to find a healthy framework to live with your illness. And you are actually really, really good at that. You're really good at, like, trying on a bunch of frames really fast and figuring out this frame doesn't work, this frame doesn't work, this frame is going to work the best for me for now, this frame stopped working, so I'm going to reframe it a little bit.
And that's what I'm really trying hard to do with this feeling of worthlessness, is to understand, like, well, I'm just not a piece of crap. Like, I'm just not worthless. That's just a lie. And, like, if somebody says that on the internet, like, it's as easy to dismiss as the other things that I find it very easy to dismiss when people say things on the internet about me, right?
Like, it should be as easy to dismiss as the nice things. Oh, yeah, forget about those. I wasn't even thinking about those. I was thinking about the negative things that I dismiss all the time.
Like, when people say that I'm a pornographer because of looking for Alaska, I'm like, well, no, I'm not. I know that I'm not. Like, I've read the book. Unlike you, apparently.
I know you've got some, like, weird kinks, which is fine. Like, I'm not here to say. We're not here to judge, but it's unusual. Let's just say that.
It's unusual. If you read that book and you're like, that was so hot, that's unusual. Anyway, but I find that very easy to dismiss, whereas there are other things where I'm like, oh, yeah, that reveals the secret truth about me, which is that I'm worthless. And that, like, I, you know, I'm terrible.
And I'm a deeply bad person. And I'm willing to extend the grace to understand that people are humans even when they act monstrously. You know, like, in fact, like, it doesn't do any good to dehumanize people when they act monstrously. We shouldn't dehumanize them.
We should acknowledge that that's part of humanity. And that's what's so disturbing. And that's, you know, that's precisely why such, why monstrous behavior is so unacceptable is because it's human, not because if it was inhuman somehow, then it would be sort of more acceptable in some ways. But, but, but, but those, but everybody has value.
Everybody, everybody is human. And yeah, it just, it must be extremely hard to have our job in particular and also to be walking around with this core belief that you're trash, because the whole job is, is to, like say things that are useful to people and to, and to like, and to like the people are like, I, I must come and, and like watch these videos or participate in the product for awesome or, you know, et cetera, like whatever, listening to this podcast and be like, at the same time, like, like I must just be fooling all of these people into thinking that I'm good or worthwhile or interesting or have something interesting to say. And also like, do you have to sort of like fake it sometimes when you're thinking like you now, like I now must try and have a thing to say that is valuable despite the fact that I do not bring much to the table here. No, I actually think I do bring something to the table.
It just feels like it's not my true self. You know, it feels like, um, like when somebody says to me, like I was at the Indiana Fever game yesterday as part of my like slow walk out of the, um, house. And I went to the Indiana Fever game yesterday. It was super fun.
Love the WNBA. Love the fever. I love the, I love the fight and fever. I don't know.
I don't know what they say. I don't know what the songs are yet. They don't seem to have songs. They just say let's go fever and defense, defense.
You can do it, John. You can bring songs to these people. Yeah, we're working on it. So anyway, I was at the Fever game and this lovely couple came up to me and they said, you know, we, um, we owe a lot to you because we read Looking for Alaska together when we were first, um, you know, thinking about dating and it really brought us close together.
And it was so easy for me, so incredibly easy for me to be like, they're lying. They're just being polite. They're saying that because they noticed a famous person and they wanted to be nice and they wanted to make that famous person happy. And I've been in that situation before and told somebody I liked their work when I didn't care or think about their work at all.
Yeah. And, um, and anyway, if they did read Looking for Alaska and it did bring them closer together and they're not lying, then they could have just read some other book and had the exact same experience and it would have been something else. If I hadn't written my book, someone else would have been whatever, whatever. There's always a reason why I can tell myself that Crash Course isn't valuable or my books aren't valuable or my work isn't valuable or my love for my children isn't valuable or whatever it is that's valuable.
I can tell myself that it's not. There's a story somewhere that you can find. Absolutely. And I'm not going to fight it with the story.
Like, I'm not going to outthink depression. I'm not going to be able to, you know, I'm not going to be able to fight with reason what is fundamentally irrational. Right. But I think I can reframe things so that I just don't think that I just, I just understand that I'm not a piece of crap.
I'm just not. And, and that, that value is inherent to my life the way that it's inherent to every single human life. And I just had this experience where I was on my bike, I was riding my bike with my buddy, another little, you know, trying to get out there. And I was, I was, he's pretty fit and I'm, I haven't, I haven't been doing a good job of exercising as part of the problem, actually.
And, um, so I was kind of struggling to keep up and he was, he wasn't, you know, pushing me or anything, but I was trying to push myself, you know, and like, whenever I try to push myself, I say the worst things to myself, I say shocking, shocking things to myself. I say things to myself that if I said to another person out loud would be a crime. You're like, I would not, that you should take me away. Like, yes, like this should not, this is, this is not acceptable.
Not, not socially, but legally. Yeah. Oh no, this is, this is whatever the verbal version of assault is, you know? And I'm sure there's a word for that.
It's slander. It's, it's definitely slander. The very least slander, horrific, right? And so I'm like, I'm biking with my buddy saying these terrible things to myself.
And for the first time, really in my whole life, I stop and I'm like, oh, whoa, whoa, good God, man. Take it down a notch. You're a 46 year old guy on a bicycle with your friend in Indianapolis. Like this isn't the tour de France.
You're not going to win or lose anything. You're just doing your best. You're in a decaying bacterial colony. That's thinking.
It's a very delicate situation. Yeah. Of course you're struggling. Yeah.
I mean, I often am comforted and I don't know. You're right that you cannot think it, but I am often comforted by the thought, oh, I am just 30 trillion cells that don't know they exist. Yeah. Somehow knowing it exists.
That is a weird thing. I've never thought about that before. Yeah. The cells don't know they exist, but I, but like when they come together, they make something that does.
It's one of the big mysteries. That is a big mystery. How does that not put you on a journey of meaning? I'm on a journey of meaning.
Okay. All right. I mean, I'm just saying that's, that's a big one. And then the universe coming to you and telling you that you need to have a conversation with your brother that isn't recorded there where you're not on Twitter.
That was another, that was another journey of meaning thing. It was, which reminds me of this podcast is brought to you by my journey of meaning. Hank's journey of meaning. It's probably going to last the whole time.
Also, this podcast is brought to you, and this is a surprise for me by John's journey of meaning. Cool. John's journey of meaning reignited. This podcast is also brought to you by Caitlin Clark.
There it is. There's your song. You have to do it. Oh my God.
That's a really good song. You know who would hate that song? I expect. We had a really good seats.
Thanks to the generous people at the Indiana Chamber of Commerce. And we were, as we were watching this game, I could actually hear Caitlin Clark talking, which is a weird experience. You should not be that close to the basketball. You shouldn't be able to hear Caitlin Clark's conversations with her teammates.
You shouldn't be able to interact with the fact that the referees are human beings. You know, you want to talk about a career where you need a strong sense that you're not worthless no matter what people say about you. I think I have it hard. I think like John Green's citizen of Tumblr has it difficult.
Like what about a WNBA referee? Oh, not a job for me. No, not a job. Not least because I don't know the rules.
And yet that's the biggest problem. And yet I will stand up and yell as if I know the rules. Yeah. That was a travel, which I think is a thing.
Several times as I would stand up and Alice would grab me by the bottom of the shirt and like pull me back down. Like, dad, please don't embarrass us. The hit song Brothers on a Hotel Bed, the original song that launched Brotherhood 2.0 into the hearts of thousands. We have a perfect cross message from Rachel.
It's us, John. Oh, great. We just talked about how we're not great at internalizing positive feedback. so here let's get comfortable with this from rachel rachel says this podcast along with tangents and delete this have been my comfort podcasts throughout the pandemic and especially during this past year and a half since my husband passed in a car accident your humor and genuineness and generosity have been a balm to my soul in some of my darkest moments you will likely would likely continue for quite some time thank you for all that you do okay rachel i believe you i believe you rachel thank you for your message thanks thank you hank's crying hank is such a crier now that he's had cancer i don't want to i can't currently cry because i'm on so many drugs and i'm like uh my highs are not that high but my lows are a little less low and for now that's what it needs to be but um i love that you're crying i feel like i didn't i did all the crying in our family for like 10 years and now you're doing all the crying well i'm on journey of meaning i'll say it's beautiful man it's awesome um but no that means a lot to us and and i'm still accustomed to saying that means a lot to me and not actually letting it mean a lot to me yeah but i'm letting it mean a lot to me rachel and um yeah i'm just really grateful thank you the other thing hank is that while we're talking about that it dishonors people's experiences if you deny them even internally no matter how polite you are if you say thank you that means so much to me thank you thank you it still dishonors their experiences if you don't take it seriously and so when people when someone says that they care about you or they care about your work which are different things hank just so you know um when someone says they care about you or about your work they mean it and it doesn't really honor what they're trying to communicate to you unless you're willing to do the work to internalize that and take it seriously and so that's another thing i've been thinking about is like i'm not doing anyone any favors by denying people's experiences i got a couple of lovely pieces of snail mail i think i'm gonna talk about my first video when i come back is going to be about what helped but a couple of things i've realized is one snail mail helped surprisingly i don't like snail mail and i'm not gonna just be clear not responding to these letters there were too many of them but um they were really helpful they were really useful like they really um they were harder to deny or dismiss somehow because they were physical and another thing that has really helped is my communities rallying around me like my psychiatrist actually reached out to me this is unusual i have a very good psychiatrist but my psychiatrist actually reached out to me because they put an article in the written paper which i'm so annoyed about that made me very mad i did not bring it up with you but i hated it i thought it was inappropriate and it kind of acted like the newspaper article sort of implied that i'd like given an interview when they were just taking quotes from my video wow it really it bummed me out but i don't want to talk about it more because i don't want them to write a newspaper article about my disappointment in the newspaper article it's like if anything i could do to make the indiana newspaper forget that i goddamn exist that'd be oh let's do that well but also like fair enough i made a comment in public and i think of nerdfighteria as being different from the public but of course like the indiana star doesn't know that that's why i feel like it's a violation where i'm like that's not for you i do too but there's no reason the newspaper would know that and so like ultimately if i'm going to talk about something in public i gotta deal with the public public response to that or whatever but anyway there was a newspaper story about how i was depressed and stepping away from the internet for a bit and um my psychiatrist reached out to me and was like um you know i don't like hearing about this in the newspaper which fair enough i mean we had been meeting but he was like obviously like you know i don't think i think we need to be more serious about this and like immediately like you know kind of got me got me in which i appreciated like um a lot and you know not everybody gets to have really high quality mental health care especially in the united states so i'm really grateful for that genuinely but um but yeah it's just that helped like my communities my communities stepping up helped i'm sorry as you can hear my dog potato he's very loud right now he's just turned one he's very enthusiastic about being one years old but um but also like other communities helped like stood up not just nerdfighteria which is obvious and like was always going to happen because it's the best and like you know it's also like kind of our community in a way that you know most people can't have a version of that like most people don't get to have a hundred thousand people rally around them when something bad is happening and i'm just really grateful for that obviously but that's like a insane privilege that very few people get to enjoy but the afc wimbledon fan community i mean i might actually start crying because um those people just like you know just reminded me that i'm cared for you know and like i'm part of something i'm part of something that's not about me and has nothing almost nothing to do with me and um and i'm a valued member of that community even though i'm in america and yeah it really it was incredible actually and the um the guy who designs the kits who is one of the co-founders of the club and has been around from the very beginning and is an amazing amazing person um reached out and just really was very kind and um yeah i guess i can cry oh my gosh john did i forget to record i hope so i hope you did i hope you forgot to record again that would be the best how amazing would that be if we had another experience that was just for us we didn't cry last time no no we didn't uh john thank you for making a podcast with me if you want to send questions we will answer some of them in the future but we have to go i have to email.com john has overstayed by 10 minutes uh which i appreciate to make me feel like i we actually did get the thing done this podcast is edited by linus ovenhouse it was mixed by joseph tunamadish our communications coordinator is brook shotwell and produced by rosianne hall's rojas and handless my executive producer is set radley our editorial assistant is the bookie trapper party the music hearing now and the big and podcast by the big and a roll up and as they say in our hometown don't forget to be awesome