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00:00:01
Fuck Around and Find Out
15 Plays3 days ago
Fear is just a hypothesis. The only way to know is to test it—by fucking around and finding out.
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Transcript
Introduction to Philosophony
00:00:01
Wes MacMillan
What's going on everybody and welcome back to Philosophony, the podcast with deep talks and dumb jokes. I'm your host, Wes McMillan.
00:00:12
Wes MacMillan
The topic for today is change slash uncertainty. And I know what you're thinking. Wes, you went on a date with a 25 year old last night?
00:00:23
Wes MacMillan
Guys, relax. I changed my hinge settings. and now I'm the kind of guy that dates older women.
00:00:32
Wes MacMillan
My target audience is women who are afraid they're never gonna get married and they're never gonna have children and I give them false hope.
00:00:42
Wes MacMillan
But that's not what we're talking about to- today, although that is an example of change.
00:00:49
Wes MacMillan
And I'd like to start off with the quote that says, When it feels scary to jump, that is exactly when you jump. Because if not, you'll spend your whole life in the same spot, and that's something I can't do.
The Journey to Sobriety
00:01:05
Wes MacMillan
um About a month ago, a month minus one day, i decided that I was gonna go sober for a year. And I'm one day away from making it to the first month. And I was scared shitless to do this.
00:01:21
Wes MacMillan
I was thinking, will i still have friends? Will my friends think I'm boring?
00:01:28
Wes MacMillan
a million countless things. But i you know what I was more scared of?
00:01:35
Wes MacMillan
not doing it because i felt like alcohol was holding me back and i couldn't live with not knowing if that was true or not all of our fears start with like what if All of our fear fears are like hypotheses about something that we don't know is true.
Exploring Fear and Uncertainty
00:02:00
Wes MacMillan
And that is uncertainty, the second half of the podcast topic for today.
00:02:07
Wes MacMillan
I was scared, what if my friends don't think I'm funny anymore? What if they don't want to hang out with me?
00:02:15
Wes MacMillan
And that's the thing about fear. You can't really think your way out of it. You can think as much as you want. You can come up with the best hypothesis in the world.
00:02:30
Wes MacMillan
But if you don't put it to the test, if you don't do an experiment, if you don't fuck around and find out, you are never going to know.
00:02:40
Wes MacMillan
And I think one thing I'm very good at is saying fuck it and finding out. And I think it's because I spent so much time in the paralysis of fear.
00:02:53
Wes MacMillan
Because not making a decision is a decision.
00:02:58
Wes MacMillan
People get so paralyzed, like which one is the right decision that they end up doing nothing. And that, that is a decision.
00:03:10
Wes MacMillan
It might not feel like it. You might feel like you're dodging it. Although in my experience, it doesn't feel like you're dodging it. I just feel like shit because I know I'm pussying out of making this decision.
00:03:22
Wes MacMillan
And the thing about fucking around and finding out is that I think about the times I've wanted to ask out a Goyle. And I think about the times where I go for it and I know she's not into me. I know it didn't work. And I still walk away with a smile on my face.
00:03:44
Wes MacMillan
And then I think of the times where I look away and I keep walking and I spend the next 10 minutes saying, Wes, you are such a bitch.
00:03:56
Wes MacMillan
And it takes me a while to get over it. Because you know why? I'll never know.
00:04:07
Wes MacMillan
Uncertainty. The bitch of uncertainty.
00:04:13
Wes MacMillan
There's nothing worse than uncertainty.
00:04:16
Wes MacMillan
And I, you know why I felt better when I asked her out, even when she was so clearly not into it? Because it's not about the output It's about the input.
00:04:29
Wes MacMillan
You can, when you give something your best, you can sleep well at night. When you're playing scared and you don't do something, when you pussy out, that's when your head's on the pillow, like I wonder what she would have said.
00:04:46
Wes MacMillan
And that is your punishment. That overthinking and that uncertainty is your punishment.
Existential Reflections on Life's Meaning
00:04:55
Wes MacMillan
being a bitch.
00:04:58
Wes MacMillan
And uncertainty, ah think is so scary. Like i living with uncertainty as we just talked about is awful.
00:05:09
Wes MacMillan
And we have to live with a whole lot of it every day. I've been haunted by the question of what is the meaning of life? What happens when we die since I was a young Massachusetts boy?
00:05:24
Wes MacMillan
And I, I think I have some great hypotheses.
00:05:30
Wes MacMillan
And it kills me that I'll, I probably won't know until I die. Maybe meaning is subjective and it's up to me, but it kills me that I don't know.
00:05:45
Wes MacMillan
And you want to know why uncertainty is so scary?
00:05:49
Wes MacMillan
Because every human ever has been hurt.
00:05:56
Wes MacMillan
You've been rejected by a girl. You've been bullied by a teacher, by a family member.
00:06:05
Wes MacMillan
And that makes uncertainty, especially when it's like consistent,
00:06:11
Wes MacMillan
that like... that trains you and your brain to be like, to not trust uncertainty.
00:06:21
Wes MacMillan
Because when you're in a situation where you've been hurt before, bad, especially if it's repeatedly, you can't relax in uncertainty because at one point you knew something bad was coming.
00:06:36
Wes MacMillan
And right now it still feels like something bad is coming
00:06:43
Wes MacMillan
And there's a good word for it, but I can't think of it. The sad fact of the human condition
00:06:53
Wes MacMillan
is that we can't
00:06:55
Wes MacMillan
we can't see that we're not in that situation anymore.
00:07:00
Wes MacMillan
I read a book called Walking yeah walking the Tiger. And it's about the theory um the theory is that Every so humans are animals. We kind of live like we forgot that fact, but humans are animals and like every animal they go through like fight flight or freeze responses. I some say dissociation is just the freeze response and I'd agree.
00:07:29
Wes MacMillan
um and every other animal goes through fight flight or freeze like when they're actually in danger when there is a predator in front of them or they need to escape something also probably a predator um and sometimes they get out of that and sometimes they don't sometimes the gazelle gets eaten by the tiger but for the gazelles who do and humans are kind of the same way
00:08:01
Wes MacMillan
for a while But the gazelles who do who got away from the tiger, they're able to like successfully shake out the remaining like fight or flight or freeze energy that their body flooded them with.
00:08:17
Wes MacMillan
But the theory in this book is that our logical brain, maybe our prefrontal cortex, I could be wrong, but gets in the way of that process.
00:08:29
Wes MacMillan
And it thinks that anxiety and depression is the result of stuck fight, flight, freeze energy in the body.
Understanding Trauma and Anxiety
00:08:41
Wes MacMillan
And the way this makes sense with what we were just talking about is say you were getting bullied. We are like animals. We're still programmed like animals. Your body was probably giving you flight energy. Like, let's get the fuck out of here. And if you're not successfully able to get rid of that, then you're going walk around your whole life with let's get the fuck out of here energy.
00:09:04
Wes MacMillan
energy
00:09:06
Wes MacMillan
And as a therapist who does research, we're getting a whole lot better at getting trauma out of the body.
00:09:13
Wes MacMillan
But we're so far from perfect and we're so far from really knowing what we're doing successfully.
00:09:21
Wes MacMillan
And it takes so much work.
00:09:25
Wes MacMillan
More work than most people are willing to do.
00:09:29
Wes MacMillan
There is a study called the ACEs study that stands for Adverse Childhood Experiences. And it was examples were like, did people swear in your household growing up? Did you have someone who is using substances, like abusing substances in your household growing up? Were you ever...
00:09:50
Wes MacMillan
bullied? um Did you grow up with anyone who was mentally ill in your household? And there's like 10 of those questions. And like each of those are considered trauma, at least in this study. And the higher number you had, so there's 10 total, if you had like a six out of 10, you were so much more likely to not only be anxious and depressed, but also end up in jail, also abuse substances.
00:10:16
Wes MacMillan
And the lower you are, vice versa. And it found that almost everybody had at least one. So more than half of the people have trauma.
00:10:30
Wes MacMillan
And it's so rare for us to be able to get rid of this trauma successfully. And if we don't, it may be leading to anxiety, depression, substance abuse,
00:10:45
Wes MacMillan
making bad decisions, because we still feel like we're in danger.
00:10:51
Wes MacMillan
And if you're going, and if you feel like you're stuck in fight or flight,
00:10:58
Wes MacMillan
I just wanna say I'm so sorry you're going through that.
00:11:01
Wes MacMillan
Because I was stuck in fight or flight for years. I remember this. It was like two years ago. And before that, it like what had probably happened for five plus years.
00:11:15
Wes MacMillan
Every time I had to speak in class, it was like, boom, boom, boomm boom, boom. My mouth was dry as hell. My body was literally like shaking because my body was like, this is dangerous. You got to get the fuck out of here, bro.
00:11:27
Wes MacMillan
And to do the things I wanted to do, like get an education and graduate high school and graduate college, I couldn't.
00:11:36
Wes MacMillan
And this is kind of what makes me mad. And when I say that we're not living like we' we're living like we're forgotten, we're animals, it's because...
00:11:46
Wes MacMillan
It's because our bodies are telling us to get the fuck out of there and we can't. And our bodies are telling us something is extremely dangerous when it's not.
00:11:59
Wes MacMillan
We're working with some outdated software. And every time I would want to like ask a girl, I remember last... Last summer, two summers ago, I wanted to ask out this girl, also another older woman. But I went to go to talk to her and it was bum bum bum bum. And mouth was dry as hell and I was literally like shaking.
00:12:23
Wes MacMillan
You know how bad that sucked?
00:12:25
Wes MacMillan
Because you're when you're asking out a girl, you're trying to come across confident. And I was coming across like, I'm in danger.
00:12:35
Wes MacMillan
And I laugh about it, but it really wasn't funny because I was stuck like that for years.
00:12:40
Wes MacMillan
And that made me way more likely to drink alcohol because alcohol was one of the only things that made me really feel calm. Where I could actually talk to people without being in my fucking flight response. Is that so much to ask?
00:12:59
Wes MacMillan
And what I learned is that it was a temporary solution that did didn't really work. I mean, it worked a little bit, but I i have faith that there's a better way.
00:13:12
Wes MacMillan
The analogy I like to think of is like a lot of the things we do, it's like you're driving super fast and you want to stop. And our solution is to crash the car. Like that does work.
00:13:25
Wes MacMillan
But it's certainly not the best solution. Pump the brakes, my boy, pump the brakes. And the way I'm pumping the brakes is I've decided to go sober for a year because I've I watched podcasts, the Andrew Huberman podcast on alcohol, and it is awful for you.
The Commitment to Sobriety
00:13:48
Wes MacMillan
It is poison. And let me be clear, I wish so bad that I could drink that poison and have fun with everyone else, but I can't.
00:13:59
Wes MacMillan
Because I have to get this fight or flight energy out of my body because it's killing me.
00:14:06
Wes MacMillan
It feels like everyone around me is so focused on girls and like trivial things. Like sports, I care about sports, but I'll tell you, I care way more about getting this fucking trauma out of my body so I can not be depressed.
00:14:25
Wes MacMillan
And the sad truth is i don't know if I'll ever be able to do it. There is the bitch of uncertainty.
00:14:32
Wes MacMillan
But what I do know is I won't be able to live with myself. I won't be able to sleep at night if I don't give it everything I've got.
00:14:42
Wes MacMillan
So I'm in therapy. I'm going sober.
00:14:46
Wes MacMillan
I'm doing i'm work trying to be healthy. I'm eating well. i'm working out. I'm trying to do everything I can
00:14:52
Wes MacMillan
just to be okay.
00:14:55
Wes MacMillan
And I spent a lot of time feeling sorry for myself.
00:14:59
Wes MacMillan
Thinking what the fuck, why do I have to deal with this? What did I do to put myself in this situation?
00:15:08
Wes MacMillan
And you know where that got me?
00:15:10
Wes MacMillan
Nowhere.
00:15:12
Wes MacMillan
And I'm done. I'm done feeling sorry for myself. I'm done wondering what if. And I'm going all in.
00:15:21
Wes MacMillan
And I still am worried about girls. I'm a little less worried about sports because the New England Patriots have Drake May. But I am worried about girls like what if girls don't like that I drink. And the truth is that some will and some won't.
00:15:37
Wes MacMillan
And the ones who don't like that I don't drink probably aren't the girls that I want to be with anyway. My brother once said mustaches, or as we call them, muzzies, keep away the girls you don't want, which I love.
00:15:56
Wes MacMillan
So I'm gonna live true to myself. And if a girl doesn't like that version of me, then good. want that hoe.
00:16:06
Wes MacMillan
And so I'm one day away from making it through my first month completely sober. So tomorrow, by the time you hear this, I don't know, I'm going to release this, but I'll just say by the time you hear this, I'll be either one month sober or I'll be in a ditch.
00:16:25
Wes MacMillan
And the things that I want to talk about, the things that I learned from the first month. and the biggest one is that life
00:16:35
Wes MacMillan
may be about the little things.
00:16:38
Wes MacMillan
I used to like see a sunset or like yesterday at my job, I was playing cards with the kids that I at the hospital I work at. And it was like a 10 out of 10 fun.
00:16:53
Wes MacMillan
And seeing that sunset just like stopped me in my tracks. When normally I would look at that sunset and I would have that moment and I'm like, that was cool, but not as cool as getting fucked up.
Finding Joy in Sobriety
00:17:08
Wes MacMillan
And I don't know if that's a me thing or that's an everyone thing, but I just know my experience. And when I stop using substances and all substances are, are an escape.
00:17:23
Wes MacMillan
They're escaping your life.
00:17:27
Wes MacMillan
And life is hard. I will be the last one to judge you for wanting to escape it or escaping it. I constantly want to escape it.
00:17:37
Wes MacMillan
But one thing you're forced to do when you go sober is to work on your life because you are unable to escape it. You have smaller escapes like food and moments of joy.
00:17:50
Wes MacMillan
But
00:17:51
Wes MacMillan
going sober is kind of going all in.
00:17:55
Wes MacMillan
There's a lot of people, they go through a hard week. That drink is always there for them. That blunt is always there for them. that needle full of heroin is always there for them.
00:18:08
Wes MacMillan
But when you forego all of those,
00:18:12
Wes MacMillan
there's nothing to do but get to work. And I'm excited.
00:18:17
Wes MacMillan
This isn't the life path i wouldn't I would have chose, but I am accepting that it's the life path that I'm on. And I'm going all in.
00:18:28
Wes MacMillan
I don't know what's going to happen. It's uncertain.
00:18:33
Wes MacMillan
But I know I'll sleep well at night knowing that I gave it everything I got.
Conclusion and Gratitude
00:18:39
Wes MacMillan
Thank you for listening. I'm your host, Wes McMillan. Please like, subscribe, rate it five stars on Spotify. If you're on Apple Music, you should probably get Spotify. um And I know this is a tough time for the holidays can be a tough time for people.
00:19:00
Wes MacMillan
And I hope you're doing okay.
00:19:03
Wes MacMillan
I love you all. Thank you for listening. Peace.