Emerson Dameron's Medicated Minutes
LA’s #1 avant-garde personal development program. I'm Emerson Dameron. I love you, personally. Levity saves lives.
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Regularly scheduled episodes premiere on the first Wednesday of the month on KCHUNG Los Angeles.
Emerson Dameron's Medicated Minutes
Commit to the Bit
It's better to double down on a bad idea than to half-ass a good one. Because it's not a bad idea if you fully commit to it.
It's a new season of Emerson Dameron's Medicated Minutes, LA's #1 avant-garde personal development program.
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Most people are tragically lazy. They're not strategic, they're not in the arena, they're not in the moment, they're not even really here. They're aspiring manipulators, but they don't have that razzle-dazzle factor. In most of your interactions, you should set the terms and the parameters and dominate the hell out of your interlocutors. Don't be a fool. Know the context, use your alley cat awareness and ask yourself does this person know what they're doing? The answer is probably no Steamroll that person. You're doing them a favor. Most people are waiting for someone to tell them what to do. Don't keep them waiting. Get them to do things for you and make them feel great about it. They'll feel special. You'll get free groceries Everybody wins. Your wife should be a series of win-wins. You got it like that. Make people feel seen and appreciated. They'll be dwelling and you'll be watching them mow your lawn, but naked, everybody wins. K-chung, los Angeles 1630 AM. Kchungradioorg.
Emerson Dameron:This is Emerson Dameron, with Emerson Dameron's Medicated Minutes medicated-minutescom, la's number one avant-garde personal development program, reminding you there's only one thing that you have to do your purpose in life insofar as you can consider yourself and your life to have purposes and that's to commit to the bit. Whatever it is, do something, go all in and all out Balls not only out, but to the wall, lean into it. Make it happen. Make it so that no one can say you didn't try. There's no objective good or evil. There's no right or wrong. Ultimately, you are at liberty to do what's right for you. You don't have to do what your parents think is a good idea or what anyone else wants you to do. You can. If that's what you want to commit to, you're free to do that. But you're also free to collect rubber ducks if that's what you would rather do.
Emerson Dameron:Right Aurea's about Watergate. I don't know if anyone's doing that. That might be a job opening a gap in the market. That's the kind of thing you got to get on it. That's a good idea that deserves thorough, committed execution with a full vim and vigor and burning desire at the back of all worthwhile human endeavors, which is any of them. As long as you commit to the bit.
Emerson Dameron:Ideas are like Slim Jim rappers. It is better to double down on a bad idea than to half-ass a good idea, because it becomes a good idea when you commit to it. That's why I got my bachelor's degree. That and also Spite. That's why I got married. It was a challenging marriage but it lasted for eight years because I committed to the bit. I was in character bringing it. I left it all on the field or the stage, the trading floor, whatever your highly aggressive metaphorical language for your projects might be. That is beside the point.
Emerson Dameron:The point is at what point do you make a commitment? And if you decide to commit to a bad idea, how do you turn it into a good one? Just by committing to it? But how does that happen? It's fair to ask.
Emerson Dameron:So let's go through some of the most common regrets that people have in life. When they're dying and well before, even when they're still able to do these things, but they don't allow themselves the freedom to do it. They made a trade-off and decided to do something else and maybe they fully committed to raw-dogging it and they had a child. And that's a full commitment right there. If you're not all in, you should probably not even bother. You should let it be raised by a family of rabbits if there's one around Raccoons, there you go. That will make the kid industrious, feral. That kid's gonna have no problems. Let the raccoons handle it. They know what they're doing.
Emerson Dameron:Regrets and, of course, as we've learned in AA and through acquaintanceships with vegans over the years. What really matters is what you don't do. If you commit really hard to not doing something, that's a commitment of its own, and many regrets fall into this negative category. For instance, not pursuing your passions. Well, that could be a bummer All the passions unpursued. You always will wonder if I just stuck with Taekwondo and the saxophone, I could combine those things. You hit the road and have fans, people who love my work because it speaks to them in ways that only I can.
Emerson Dameron:Here's the thing If you are able to pursue something, that's a big advantage. A lot of people don't pursue anything because they don't know how they forgot, they've lost touch with the creativity that they had when they were children. They don't know how to unlearn what they've learned and untangle the poisonous vines that have wrapped around their imagination, intellect, in many cases their libidos and hearts and souls. And it's sad business. But you're able to pursue something because you are thinking about pursuing your passions. You're wondering why you haven't done it with more gusto. If you can pursue something, one of the last things that you should pursue in my reading is your passions.
Emerson Dameron:People need help. People are being crushed by capitalism, by debt, by depression, anxiety, awful psychological problems, physical health issues. They have kids that they don't know what to do with. They keep giving them to the raccoons, but the raccoons keep bringing them back. If you're able to pursue something and really get into it, find someone you can help.
Emerson Dameron:I don't think that you're in any way obligated to do that. I have depression, which makes me very selfish. You cover all the bases of being insufferable. I'm just so small and irrelevant that nothing I do could possibly help anyone. And it is so hard for me to make myself happy that my first duty is to do that so that I don't completely fall apart and lose my will to live. So I don't have to help people very much. I do every now and then as a lark. But at least consider that I've heard it's wonderful. It does amazing things for your self-image and your sense of purpose, meaning you build community through doing these things, and karma is something that no one understands, but reciprocity is obviously a real force in the universe that starts working in your favor if you help people.
Emerson Dameron:Maybe do that. Forget about your passions. Do that later. Nobody wants to watch taekwondo, saxophone music while they're starving to death. Grow some corn. Help somebody who needs it, even if you are going to be entirely selfish. Pursuing your passions is going to be a lot more fun and interesting if you first get rich. That makes it easier. Before you pursue your passions, pursue something that makes money, get real paid. As Tony Montana said, first you get the money, then you get the power, then you pursue your passions. In his case, michelle Pfeiffer is his mentor's wife and also his business. Perhaps work is your passion.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret that people have is working too much. Unfortunately, there's work to be done. I encourage hard work. In fact, I encourage you to romanticize it because somebody's got to do it. I'm more of an ideas guy. I need someone pushing the lawnmower. I'm holding the clipboard or the iPad. That's also important. Here's the thing we are being worked to death by black-hearted bastards who, as Noam Chomsky points out, have names and addresses. We know who they are. All you have to do is read the Wall Street Journal or Fortune or any business magazine and they're right there. It's going to take a lot of work to shake that regime. It is in its decadent phase and shows no signs of stopping. Somebody has to do the hard work of building the guillotines, so it's not working too much. Perhaps you are just working on the wrong things working too much. Perhaps you are just working on the wrong things, and when what you're working on is cutting the heads of plutocrats and myopic shareholders, that's more like playtime. That's fun.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret not taking risks Sounds like a bummer, and yet if you really commit to not taking risks, if you absolutely minimize your exposure to risk in every meaningful area of your life, you will outlast others. You will be the tortoise. The hares will be hit by cars and you will stick around. You'll have a boring life, which will probably make you a boring tortoise, but just by virtue of longevity you may become respectable and influential. You may just be left alone. You have some credibility and you're also boring Overwhelmingly so and so people will let you mind your own business, which is a wonderful way to exist that you can pull off if you fully commit to not taking risks Because it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Not traveling Another regret. If you fully commit to not traveling, you can become essentially the king, the queen, the big player, the mac daddy, the ace. The old mother goose of your town, henry David Thoreau, was asked why he was not interested in traveling abroad or even around the then newer Republic of America. And he said I have traveled extensively in Concord. I live in Los Angeles and I could not in many lifetimes see and do and smell and experience everything that there is to ingest here. Not traveling Pretty cool if you really commit to it, because it's not a bad idea if you commit to the bit.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret not spending enough time with loved ones. Well, that's also kind of a bummer. Presumably that means you're spending time with people you don't love, which there might be less pressure involved with that. You don't have to impress them or feel like you owe them anything, and your attitude could be I don't chase, I attract. I invest so heavily in myself because I'm fully committed to not spending time with loved ones that they will pick locks, break down walls like the Kool-Aid mascot, just to spend time with me in my milieu where I'm doing what I want to do because I'm fully committed to not spending time with my loved ones, which sounds like a bad idea, but it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret not expressing feelings. You know, there's a reason why people like people who work on themselves. And that means working with your feelings so that you can manage them. Your feelings are not wrong. They're 100% correct, just like everyone else's. However, if you have the agency to work with your feelings and hash them out and keep your own counsel as much as possible while you're doing that, you can, of course, consult trained professionals or particularly hot amateur Reiki healers in that process. But if you keep them out of the atmosphere people who love you, who would do anything to spend time with you and they don't really want to spend it watching you have a nervous breakdown, because they want to have nervous breakdowns they would love that more than anything else and they would love for you to catch them when they fall. And you can do that if you work out your own feelings rather than just expressing them as they come up, work through them, manage them and keep them to yourself. You can develop compassion when you know, like that, how hard everyone is trying and mostly failing. Nobody really wants your vulnerability. They want to be the ones with the feelings and if you can facilitate that, they'll love you for it and that's gonna feel good because you fully committed to not expressing your feelings but rather working through them, not just pushing them down or denying them or acting out like a child. You took it seriously and hash them out like an adult with some self-awareness, because you fully committed to not expressing your feelings. And it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Not finishing education. Go back to college, stay there long enough to learn what the sunk cost fallacy is. You've got to know when to hold them, fold them, walk away and run. Often it is the case that walking away from higher education is the thing to do. That will stop the bleeding and cut your losses and put you in a position where you're exposed to the realness of the world and then perhaps you will want to go back. Don't force yourself to finish your education just because you think you have to Be a lifelong learner. Your education is never done. Be fully committed to not finishing your education and it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret is not saving money. If you really commit to that, if you spend every dime that you get like it's burning a hole in your pants and not in a fun way, you just want to get rid of it you won't have a lot of money around that you have to worry about. You won't have people trying to claw it away from you. You will have less money and therefore fewer problems. And they say nothing is more expensive than poverty. In my experience, that is very much the case. Nothing brings out the beast in you quite like a lifestyle that you can't afford. A beast in you quite like a lifestyle that you can't afford. So if you're burning through your money, your imagination, your survival instinct will kick in and you will find ways to make money. You'll find hustles that were not seen before, because you have a beast within you that represents not the best, but some of the most brutal. It wants to keep you around and help you thrive, and that's something you can cultivate, which could be interesting, at least for a certain slice of time in your life, when you fully commit to not saving money. Wasting money very stupid, but not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Burning bridges Bummer, you've lost another friend. It looks like this time it's for good. There will be no reconciliation. Too much damage has been done. There's not much to talk about. Too much hurting on both sides. That means you're not a sucker. You're not going to get hurt more. You've had enough. You're foreclosing on the possibility of being hurt more in the exact same way or even similar ways, predictable ways, by that person. And now that they are banished from your life, you could probably see the good in them. You don't have to deal with them on a moment-to-moment basis. Now you can appreciate how in some ways they weren't the absolute living worst, or even if they were, that was sometimes good for a chuckle and you've made room in your life for new people and you can eventually fall out with them. Keep the party going.
Emerson Dameron:Burning bridges Could be self-destructive, regrettable. You can sell on possibilities of some long-term friendships with people that you can't fully trust, but not a bad idea. If you get a can of gasoline and some long matches and fully commit to it, torch that bridge. You never dare put another bridge over. Whatever that gap is, you taught them a lesson you fully committed.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret not taking care of your health. The problem in there comes from abusing your health in ways that are boring. If you sit around and watch television and smoke cigarettes and eat hostess products not bad-mouthing hostess and you eat handfuls of sugar, you pour sugar on your sugar cereal and then you scrape it off the bottom of the bowl with the spoon and it's kind of silvery because that's what happens when it gets involved with the milk. You threw your health away for nothing. You could have done something majestic, something that would involve calling an ambulance. You could have gone down to New Orleans, gone on a bender for months and months, fully committed to not taking care of your health, thereby leading a fascinating life, because it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret not standing up for yourself. Okay, that can be a problem, but maybe you're a pacifist in the truest sense of the word. You don't just not want to fight, you really don't want any kind of conflict. You're fully committed to that. It's not cowardice. You really believe in not sowing bad vibes in a world that already has too many of them. You turn the other cheek and follow the other teachings of Christ and other martyrs that I personally stay far away from. I recommend not giving up your agency like that. But if you fully commit to it, you will have supporters. You will have people who stand up for you. They will do your dirty work. You will keep your hands clean. If you're a pacifist, be a really good pacifist. Commit to that. Some really tough mothers will take your side. You'll be representing alienated potential in their own psyches and they will support you in your martyrdom. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Not learning new skills. There are some skills you could learn and that's more stuff you got to do. A new skill brings a sense of obligation to help out people who need that skill. Limit the skills that you acquire. If you learn a lot of new skills and you hone them and you're super good, be very careful with whom you share that information. It's like having a van in a college town. Every band is going to buddy up to you and you're not going to have weekends free. You're not going to have that van when you need it. You're going to get pushed around all because you have something that people need. Refuse to learn new skills and you will keep your weekends free. Not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Not forgiving that's similar to burning bridges If you can't forgive but you like the idea of forgiving, don't forgive, but say that you did Commit to not forgiving to the point where you're okay with lying about it and saying I forgive you and then get credit for forgiveness for being the grown-up and keep in your back pocket an option to later on take revenge, and they will not see it coming. They thought they were forgiven. Jokes on them, slow burn not a bad idea if you commit to it not seizing opportunities. There are nearly infinite opportunities that go unseized in this life. We can only pick one at a time in this dimension, in this experience, and that leaves a bunch of other opportunities Nearly all of them, all except one, essentially infinite. We'll never know. We don't get to experience those things, we don't get to take those opportunities. There will always be unseized opportunities and you always regret them because you didn't have a chance to get disappointed. If you stay uncommitted and keep your options open as much as possible, you won't have to worry so much about the missed opportunities, because the thing that you care about the most is keeping your opportunities open, which many times means not seizing them. It's a bit paradoxical, but if you're really uncommitted and you want to stay that way, commit to that. You can turn it around and make it a good idea.
Emerson Dameron:Another regret is not being present. I guess that means being in your head, not paying attention. Your child is being born or your parents are dying, or your child is dying or your parents are coming back to life. You were thinking about the song Bury my Lovely by the October Project and you just missed it all. It was like you weren't there and I would agree that if you're going to do something, show up for it, commit to the bit. But if you want to not be present, if you're having a good time in your head, if you prefer your own company to that of others who happen to be around, fully commit to being in your head. Don't let anyone shake your resolve to work on those murals and symphonies and glorious novels, picker-esks, jaunty, rebooted Canterbury Tales or epic adventures, rip-roaring comedies, disgusting gonzo pornography, whatever it is that's going on in your head. Get up in it and maybe put it out into the real world. Really, really commit to being in your head and get what's valuable out of your head, which will be a small fraction of what's in there. So you'll have to go through and do some sorting shuffling of ideas, categorizing, killing of darlings, on a regular basis. If you're going to be in your head, embrace and savor and do something with your genius. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Emerson Dameron's Medicated Minutes LA's number one avant-garde personal development program, medicated-minutescom on K-Chung Los Angeles. K-chung Radioorg 16 30 am.
Emerson Dameron:Levity saves lives. If you want to change your life, you've got to change yourself by changing the stories you tell yourself about yourself. You're a storyteller who tells stories all day long and most of them are pointless and miserable. Don't get stuck in a boring, pretentious art film when you can star in an operatic adventure, a rip-roaring comedy or disgusting gonzo pornography. If you tell yourself I have to be perfect, say instead I have one tragic flaw that could be my undoing unless I learn to relax and enjoy life's banjo and saxophone soundtrack. Instead of I feel sorry for myself because I'm a victim, say I'm a warrior who beats up beholders and takes it hard in holes. I didn't know how to be happy to. I spread sunshine and delight when I step on rakes, slip on banana peels or give rusty trombones and get yellow discipline from fraudulent casting directors. You are the auteur of your life, so never hide your bold, sharp, revolting genius. Thank you, remember.
Emerson Dameron:It is better to fully commit to a bad idea than it is to half-ass a good idea Because it's not a bad idea if you commit to it. For example, face tattoos Seems like a bad idea. It would limit your opportunities for employment or to be taken seriously, but it would open some new ones. Those would be much more exciting. Face tattoos not a bad idea if you commit to it, because the only way you're going to get those opportunities is if you're owning the face tattoos. That's your face, this is me, this is who I am. I'd be naked without the tattoos and you're like that. But you're not going to get that Because this is my face and I'm fully committed. I'm all in and all out. Ball to the wall and balls out, because it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Meth sounds like a bad idea. It's got a mixed reputation at best. But if you schedule your meth time ahead of time and come up with all of the things that you've got to do that you've been putting off whether it's cleaning your apartment or going back to college, getting out and socializing more, reconnecting with that old friend that you haven't seen in a while, that you haven't been talking because you're self-conscious, because you don't feel exciting, you don't feel like your life is happening enough, and you can change that with meth. Just structure the time in advance. Not a minute wasted. The entire meth binge should be getting things done time, and then you'll be grateful for that time.
Emerson Dameron:Not knowing what you're talking about, running your mouth, not paying attention to the words that are coming out of it. Just talking trash Sounds like a bad idea unless you fully commit to it. It's much easier to talk trash than it is to effectively rebut it, and if you own all of the trash that you talk, you can go back and work it out later what it all means and then explain it to people. You can do that if you fall in love with the sound of your own voice. You're recording it all day and then you listen to it when you're falling asleep. But you can't sleep because you're in love with the sound of your own voice, so you stay up and listen After a while we are pattern matching creatures. You will find ways in which it makes some kind of sense A good idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Talking all kinds of trash, joining a cult sounds like a bad idea. No one joins a cult. People join affinity groups or they make some new friends who are trying to save the world. They just want to make a lot of new friends wholesale. I live on the west side of Los Angeles. Dabbling in cults is pretty much the only way to make friends here. That's actually an exception to the rule. It's the exception that proves the rule. Joining a cult is a good idea if you don't commit to it. Stay on the periphery, stay on the fringes, come for the refreshments and the hot, gullible people that you can meet, and leave it at that. Join a cult it's not a bad idea if you don't commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Tanking your Hollywood career sounds like a bad idea. You had to get lucky to have a Hollywood career in the first place, which required perhaps some work on your part or not. If you're really in the inner circles, you know that you should only fetishize hard work when you're around the riffraff so that they will do hard work for you, because life isn't about hard work. Hard work is for suckers. But you nevertheless became one of the beautiful people. You have a Hollywood career. Now it's time to tank. It Sounds like a bad idea, but you get a bender out of the deal. You get to alienate a bunch of people you didn't like anyway, and then you get to redeem yourself with a comeback If you fully commit and this is, we're talking, years. This is not going to happen. In a short amount of time you could die, could go over the edge and not be able to come back, but if you really commit to it, it could work out beautifully. Tanking your Hollywood career not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Failing to set boundaries sounds like a bad idea Everybody's talking about. We gotta set boundaries with people to keep them out of the inner realms of our business or keep them from screwing up our own lives. First of all, if you're going through a time of hardship and your identity is in flux, removing your boundaries or not having them in the first place will help you find out who you are, because people will intrude and you'll learn a lot about yourself from how you deal with that and the adventures that you go on, because people that don't have a lot of respect for boundaries will come into your life and change it up and it could be exciting at first and it could be awful, but if you really commit to not having boundaries and you know that's what you're doing, you kind of know what's up. It's like you're having a bad trip. Yeah, this is awful, but I did a lot of drugs and it's not going to last forever, because when the ride comes to an end, you can then set boundaries, but then you have to enforce them, because having boundaries means nothing if you don't enforce them, if you let them collapse when somebody shows up and drives a tank through them. So not enforcing your boundaries sounds like a bad idea, but if you don't enforce your boundaries for a while, you'll get super duper annoyed at all of those tanks coming through, tearing up your grants, and then you'll enforce the hell out of those boundaries.
Emerson Dameron:You will become bitter, paranoid, mistrustful. You will become a misanthropic nihilist. Misanthropic nihilism sounds like a bad idea unless you fully commit to it, because if you are a leader or a success story in whatever community, on whatever scene you're involved with, that's cool, even if it's nihilism, misanthropic nihilism, which thinks that nothing is cool, and if anything is, it's probably the extinction of the human race. If you get really good at misanthropic nihilism and you bring all the charisma to that that you have, and people see it as like oh, he's taking existentialism one step further because he's more of a badass and he just doesn't care about anything because nothing's worth his attention, that's how bad this person is, and I want to be a little bad like that, or at least get a taste of it, have a little bit of that flavor. You have become the leader of the misanthropic nihilists because you fully committed to it. Now that's a bit of a cul-de-sac, a dead end to mixed metaphors.
Emerson Dameron:You can use your celebrity status as a controversial, nihilistic menace to society to live out your darkest sexual chapter of your life. Living out your darkest sexual chapter sounds like a bad idea. A lot of things could go wrong. You're going to be having sex you might even not really be into, because that's not the point. It's not about pleasure, it's about just pure disgusting decadence. If you really commit to it, you will find some new things that you're into. You'll meet some people with no shame or scruples. If you need them to kill someone for you, you can get it done Because you know their thumbscrews and their weak spots and you got dirt on them because of the orgies in the darkest sexual chapter that you lived out and fully committed to. It's a good idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Losing your mind Sounds like a bad idea, but it's already happening. There's nothing you can do about it. Just relax, breathe. This is what you wanted. You never liked the way it was before. You didn't want to be you. You tried meditation, psychedelics, all kinds of crazy stuff. Your darkest sexual chapter is full of this urge, this burning need to escape from you. And now that emptiness that you feel inside from the sex addiction that you wove into your darkest sexual chapter as part of your full commitment, that emptiness is where you used to be. So where are you? You're no longer with us. You never were. And now it's happening. You can let go. You can lose your mind, ease into the flow of the human experience. It's not a bad idea. Let it happen. Breathe. This is what's supposed to be happening right now. Let go, relax. You're loving, you're loved. You are going to be okay. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:So, fellas, when you work on yourself and learn to live in the moment, you'll find that life without expectations is a permanent vacation filled with casual sex. Get out of your own way and you're free to love, free to let go. And in the interim, you'll alchemize pure passion in a haze of enchantment. As non-violent communication turns into warped, brutal, degrading sex so rough, you'll both forget how time zones work. In therapy, you can develop the presence and poise to care, connect and keep it casual so you can flirt, play, live your liberated desires in the realms of erotic freedom and stick it like a life-size voodoo doll of your worst enemy. So get therapy, take it seriously, do the bare minimum to take care of yourself and be way ahead of most other guys and get buku booty calls and so much casual sex. You need name tags and project management software. Do it, thank you.
Emerson Dameron:I'm a wild card in the deck, I'm the Joker King. I don't cater to you, but I do pay attention, I get to know you, I elicit your values, find your thumbscrew, let you gradually reveal yourself to me and if I like you, I catch you playing games like it's playtime, like that's acceptable. I name the game, but I love the player. You gotta love everybody. Yeah, it's no fun, it's a pain, it's annoying, like most people are, but you gotta love everybody because that's the nicest way to not love anyone In a clingy, attached sense. Love everyone, give them room to breathe.
Emerson Dameron:Breathe that's the important thing, that is crucial to everything else. Continued survival, for one thing, but we're way past that. We're well into thriving, which deep breathing makes all the difference. Your breath is portable. You can breathe anywhere. You damn well. Please, just like you want to most of the time, just breathe deeply, like I do when I feel into my instincts, feel what my body, the actions in my DNA, the wisdom of ages and generations is guiding me to do through. Call it intuition, call it magic, call it Herbert, I don't care. Call it Herbert, I don't care. I know what to do and you know what to do. I know that I know what to do. What's up with you that's a question that occurs to me that I rapidly move on because I got other things to do and to think about. But I don't worry, I always have enough resources. I don't need to worry. That is success.
Emerson Dameron:And I move slowly for a couple of reasons. I'm on his inspiration from the classic movie Goodfellas Pauly. He moves slow because he don't have to move for nobody. I don't move like I'm in a hurry. I don't move like it's not my choice to be going where I'm going. I'm doing someone else's bidding. I move slowly, at a comfortable pace. I start walking quickly, as I want to do, because I'm doing my bidding, the most important bidding of all. I do have things to do. I live at high speed, but I can always slow it down. I always do when I notice that. I can always slow it down. I always do when I notice that. The other reason I walk slowly is that my stance, the rest of my body language, suggests that I am carrying between my legs two large bowling balls. Now, is this something I practiced or is that a matter of necessity? Does it really matter? Body language creates an amazing feedback loop where how you move, how you hold yourself, how you carry yourself, determines the life that you're walking into at your own pace. Nat, thank you.
Emerson Dameron:Embrace your mistakes, boing into your bad ideas, heighten them. Yes, and it's not a bad idea if you commit to it. You may be a seeker of thrills and danger. Put yourself at risk. That is a practice, the practice of looking death in the face and spitting In order to alleviate your fear of death. You must always be dying. Death is nothing to fear if you realize that you're always already doing it. If you do that by dirt biking, if you do that by speedballing, keep doing it, because you will desensitize yourself and you will find it easier to stay cool in a crisis.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you neglect your personal safety. Most behaviors come from the seed of a positive intention. In this case, it is the knowledge that security is a lie, life is cheap. Courage is currency. That is the thing of value. That is your value. Neglecting your personal safety is not the only way to lead a fascinating life, but it's one of the most exciting. Get some adrenaline flowing and get some fascinating stories and very zeitgeisty PTSD.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you use sex as a means of validation. Maybe you're not a sex addict yet, but you're an aspiring sex addict. Lean into it, go all the way, go wild. You might be left feeling empty inside, and that's okay. That emptiness is where your self used to be. You are now intimate with the Buddhist concept of no self, and all you had to do to achieve that was to get laid like A$AP Rocky on tour, which is a pretty good deal. Perhaps you engage in reckless sexual behavior. The party follows you wherever you go. If you fly too close to the sun, you can retire with endless memories that serve as jack-off material. You won't even have to leave the house anymore. You'll be pretty safe then. You're a reasonably close simulacrum of safety.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you engage in destructive romantic relationships or friendships full of intensity and love bombing. Maybe love bombing is the only way to get through to you, or borderline kidnapping. I believe that rough sex will save the world. I think that we're all perverts thirsty for hate sex and that we sublimate those perfectly healthy inclinations into much more disturbing forms of cruelty, like war or the workplace. And if we just all got out of the tanks and into the bedrooms and the dungeons or the alleys behind disgusting dive bars and pounded it out, things would be better. And if you are well-versed in hate sex through this cycle of intense destructive relationships, you're ahead of the game. You have much to teach. You might be shaken, you might be stirred, but you will be downright bubbly when you find that through your experience you can be of service to lesser mortals who've not known the joys of hate sex.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you excessively criticize yourself or go into rumination death spirals. You can beat up on yourself as much as you want. You're at liberty to do that. It will take its toll over time, but you will also be able to beat your critics and haters to the punch. This self-deprecating humor gets really old if you're kidding on the square, and it's also sincere. But you can get a few laughs and you can win rap battles.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you chronically overschedule yourself and subject yourself to unnecessary levels of stress confusion. Perhaps you lose track of your own schedule and you're always excessively busy. This is classic avoidant behavior. It makes perfect sense if you have problems in your life that merit avoidance. People will tell you that you need to get more sleep. Remember that sleep is the cousin of death.
Emerson Dameron:The grind shuts off your mind, which is a great skill to cultivate. Grind shuts off your mind, which is a great skill to cultivate. Meditation is another way to do that, but sleep deprivation and hustling might do it faster and in a more dramatic fashion. You will become a completely different person, perhaps someone that your old friends, loved ones, family associates no longer like. Perhaps you will not like yourself and indulge in excessive self-criticism and rumination. Death spirals and that will bring you back down to earth and you will get off the grind and you will not brag about the hustle anymore. Sometimes, if you have a vice that's killing you, you just need another vice to balance it out.
Emerson Dameron:It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Perhaps you're too busy to honor your commitments. You lose track of your promises. You break your promises to others and to yourself. You lose trust in yourself. The good news is you are training others to not expect anything from you and eventually they'll stop leading you on and asking for favors. In the meantime, stop shaming yourself. Give up on your dreams, enjoy your free time. Figure out how to relax. Relax too much, become lazy. It is not a bad idea if you commit to it. Perhaps you refuse to seek help for your problems, which are manageable now but are significantly worsening and may eventually become damaging, perhaps life-threatening. It's always a good idea to try to do it yourself first, before you ask for help. Learn to keep your own counsel. You'll be glad you didn't humiliate yourself by asking for help when you didn't really need it or no one around you was willing or able to offer it. If you're the kind of person that never asks for help, commit to that. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Take pride in that. Benjamin Franklin said that the best way to make friends was to ask them for favors. Maybe the people around you already have too many friends. By withholding your friendship, you're doing them a favor. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you avoid necessary medical care. The word necessary is doing some heavy lifting there. Perhaps you put off going to the doctor, which makes sense. Our healthcare system is terrible. It is both tragedy and farce. We have the most ridiculous healthcare system of any industrialized country in the world. The only other country that does it this way is Switzerland, in which everyone is rich and going to the doctor is infantilizing. You will get paid hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars an hour to treat us like children and make things more confusing than they need to be. Of course you don't want to go to the doctor and you're tougher than you think. Death is no match for you. If death shows up and the Grim Reaper darkens your door, there's a probability greater than zero that you will kill death and if not, you're dead and your problems are over. You are at peace.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you are not good at setting boundaries, or you set boundaries and then you don't defend them. Perhaps people take advantage of you. Give yourself the gifts of distrust and disgust that come from being repeatedly taken advantage of. Sometimes, the only way to change your behavior is to get thoroughly disgusted with it. That's going to happen. If you spend enough time not setting boundaries, the indignities that you suffer will be things that you cannot acclimate to and not tolerate, and then you will reject all of humanity and you'll be cutting your losses because people are awful. Perhaps you avoid facing and dealing with your emotions, and it has been said that if you bring forth what is within you, what is within you will save you, but if you do not bring forth what is within you, what is within you will destroy you. You don't have to deal with your emotions now. You can withhold them, push them down and save them up for a time in the future when you need them, when it's time to make an example of someone. And when you explode, no one will see it coming.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you overspend, perhaps you waste all of your money. You don't check your bank balance because you're afraid. You know it's going to be lower than you think it is and much lower than you want it to be. It's not in the negatives yet because you would have gotten a notification which you haven't turned off yet, which means you're not really overspending. And even if you're really overspending, it's not a bad idea if you commit to it. There was a musician in Chicago named Bobby Kahn who I always went to see live anytime I got the opportunity, because he was a glam rocker deep in his hardwiring and he would often play shows for a couple of dozen people and perform as if he were performing in an arena and it was spectacular to watch. And he had a philosophy around money which was called the continuous cash flow system. The faster you spend money, the faster money comes in. So you should spend money as quickly as possible and it will replenish itself as it does if you have the right money mindset, which is that money is your friend and it's a good time, hard-living, partying friend and it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you have a gambling problem. You gamble excessively, it's not fun anymore. You're hoping to hit the jackpot so that you can pay off your gambling debts. Well, this is foolish on its face. You know that the house always wins. If you've ever flown into McCarran, you know that the gambling industry as it presents itself in Las Vegas is unique among American industries in that it just tells you straight out we're going to take your money and you will get nothing in return and we're going to brag about how you're not going to remember any of this. And you're not gonna remember any of this and you're not going to want to. If you're gonna gamble, gamble on something you can pass off as an investment. But do gamble. If you want it all, you have to be ready to lose it all, which requires risking it all Every day. Always be dying a little bit, and then you won't have to die all at once. No risk, no reward, no fun. Life is a gamble. Safety is a lie, and it's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you have a difficult relationship with substances alcohol and drugs. The best way to do this is to get used to them, so that the remarkable and the shocking become commonplace. So do all the drugs. Find the drugs that you like a little too much and lean into those for a while. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Eventually you will have to get sober and then you will get to go to the AA meetings in Hollywood, which are basically stand-up comedy open mics, just the gnarliest bastards with stories that will curl your hair. They're wildly entertaining. Sobriety is the ultimate high, except for ayahuasca.
Emerson Dameron:I didn't stop drinking for good. Until I did ayahuasca, I still had cravings. Part of me still thought that boozing was the one true, correct way to have fun. After I did ayahuasca, I didn't care anymore. I didn't want to drink, I didn't want to smoke. I made it through COVID, my divorce and a disproportionate number of the worst experiences that I've ever had. Since I quit drinking a number of years ago, I didn't start drinking again. I didn't want to. It never really crossed my mind. I'm thoroughly out of the woods. I never would have gotten here if I hadn't gone all in on drinking to the point where my pancreas exploded. And then I had to go back to the hospital two weeks later because I kept passing out and falling down Because there was a hole in my GI tract from how much I'd been puking. The last time I was in the hospital Didn't get stitched up because our healthcare system doesn't work.
Emerson Dameron:It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. You can be proudly incurious and ignorant. You can be smart enough to know that you know nothing, that you are an idiot, and you can take pride in your idiocy. You're always right. No one else matters. This makes you intoxicating for people to be around if they themselves are neurotics. It is not without its hazards and limitations. You will be disinterested in things that are out of your existing purview and it will be easy to lawyer your way out of arguments and rationalize it away when you really badly hurt someone because they're not real people that you have disagreements about aesthetics. But it certainly comes with its advantages as well, which see all of the above.
Emerson Dameron:It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Perhaps you refuse to take responsibility for your actions. It's almost always someone else's fault, that's true. There are a lot more people in the group everyone else than the one person that exists in the group you and if you don't take responsibility for things, someone else will handle them. If you don't care, let someone else do it. They're going to do a better job. If you want to see a job done right, do it yourself. If you don't care, let someone else do it. When you don't care, fully commit. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Perhaps you hold on to grudges and resentment. I know what this is like. I have a vast archive of grudges that I let fester. My two-month-old take out in the fridge and when they explode, it's been a while and no one sees it coming. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it, and that means playing the long game, which means holding that grudge for much longer than makes any sense to anyone who does not understand your lust for revenge and how important that is to you and how they would understand if they knew everything that you know and if they're envious of you. They really should. If you want certain parts of someone else's life, you should think about what it would be like to have the whole thing. That you probably don't want, because there's a reason that I want revenge. If you understood where the pain really comes from, you might want revenge as well. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Perhaps you neglect self-care. Let yourself go. This is a good way to find out what really matters. You let everything go. The stuff that you want back is the stuff that really matters Things like food, water, sex. Find out what really matters. In the meantime, practice sexy, kinky self-denial. Be life's bitch and be proud Top from the bottom. Suffer like you mean it. Perpetuate that victim mentality. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it.
Emerson Dameron:Suicide the perennial option C. You've always got that in your back pocket. In my experience, once I started thinking about suicide, which happened when a senator from my home state of North Carolina called John Porter East was facing scandal and disgrace, he went into his garage and killed himself with carbon monoxide and that was why my dad had to explain to me what suicide was. I remember thinking, oh, that's something you could just do. And once that door opens, it never closes all the way.
Emerson Dameron:Existentialists say that the contemplation of suicide is the one meaningful philosophical problem, and it's always salient. Life is a terminal condition. We have assisted suicide for many other terminal conditions and there's the notion that you owe it to people who love you to hang around so that they can feel good because you're still around, even if they probably neglect you, which that sounds very selfish. There's the idea that you'll miss out on something important that happens right after you die, like how the party always seems to get live. As soon as you leave, you hear stories about all the crazy stuff that happened right after you went home. You don't miss what you never know about. You never know about anything that happens after you die. I personally have obviously not hastened my audition for the Choir Invisible. I tried more than once, glad I didn't succeed because I'm here with you now and you smell nice. You don't miss what you never know about. Death will solve a lot of your problems. Perhaps you will come back as a cool bug.
Emerson Dameron:It's not a bad idea if you fully, unconditionally, passionately, while grabbing your crotch and saluting with the other hand and screaming, putting your life on the line in the name of everything that you've ever cared about, everything that you've ever not cared about, every passion in life that you've experienced fully, deeply, with your whole heart, your crotch, your soul, your mind, your being. Commit to it. It's not a bad idea if you commit to it. Maybe it's a good idea anyway, even if you half-ass it. Try that. Do that on a good idea anyway. Even if you half-ass it, try that. Do that on a trial basis. See what happens.
Emerson Dameron:Life is your laboratory. So you can get chemistry without commitment and all the wild sex you thought you'd have to pay for, and you don't have to lie about it. That's the magic of casual sex. Casual sex is a fun, invigorating workout that keeps the noggin jogging as it pumps your bloodstream with some of the best feel-good drugs known to humanity, without making you wait in an alley. Most of the time, with casual sex you'll set boundaries. Let yourself get vulnerable enough and experience yourself from a kaleidoscopic panorama of perspectives as you get some great stories and find someone else who's game for a golden shower but doesn't want to share a regular shower. That's too close for comfort. Cultivate your genius for casual sex. Become the best lover you ever had. Make it your steamy, sloppy mindfulness practice and your great artistic project as you curate your amorous adventures through exuberant celebrations of human creativity and casual, caring, unforgettable connections. Get some casual sex today. You deserve it and the world needs your gift.
