Episode 15. Learn, Dammit!
What Tania find most frustrating when it comes to talking politics, and so much more!
Transcript
Scroll down for the transcript.
Tania: Welcome to Ready To Be Strong. I’m Tania Israel.
Pema: And I’m Pema Rocker
Tania: Together we’re broadening our minds, opening our hearts.
Pema: and strengthening connections to face the challenge of and strengthening connections to face the challenges of living in a divided world.
Tania: In the last episode, we checked in on where folks were after the election, and today we’re continuing to process where we are.
Pema: So Tania, I know that there has been a multitude of reactions and responses and feeling states since the election that folks have been having. I myself. The day before the election started a major transition in my life and I have not had the time or the bandwidth to even listen to the news. And, when I have had time to kind of come down in a break, like a break time in the day, and maybe listen to some news, usually I will try to catch up with the news a little bit during a break.
I don’t have the mental or emotional space to hear what’s going on. Since the election, I’ve picked up little bits, but I, I can’t, I, I just don’t have the time or the bandwidth right now, the emotional bandwidth I will have, but I don’t have. Now I’m wondering for you, you sound like you’ve been writing some articles and talking to a lot of different folks in a lot of different forums.
What have you been hearing from people? Since the election, how people are feeling
Tania: Sure. Thanks for that question. I feel like I have been working very hard to try to understand things and so part of what I’ve been doing is anytime I see a friend, I’m like, how are you making sense of the election results? Like what do you think happened? The question I was asking for a while is, who are you most mad at? Because I felt like people were kind of in that particular stage of grief where a lot of people were. And I heard a lot of things, you know, some people were most mad and, okay, so for context in case anybody doesn’t know this by now about me, I am very much on the liberal side, so I’m, I’m a Democrat and I’m on the left, and most of the people around me, almost everybody is also, and so that’s who I’ve been talking to and, you know, so people have sort of the feeling level of what’s going on. But in terms of how people are making sense of things, I heard, you know, a lot of people talking about things that were part of the narrative before and just kind of, yep. Looks like it’s misogyny and racism or it’s hate, and these are the things that ended up winning out.
I’ve also heard, you know, people who are mad at the Democratic party, people who are mad at at, I don’t know, somebody I was asking and they’re like, I’m mad at Putin. And I’m like, okay, great choice. Like there are no wrong answers here. You know, people had a lot of places where they were putting their energy around this and, and I think a lot of it was like, whose fault was this? How could this have happened? And you know, and people were mad at, you know, people who sat out the election or voted for third party candidates or were mad at people who were so self-righteous that it drove other people away. People were mad at joy because they were like, that’s just not where a lot of people in this country are. So wow, there were just a lot of different places I saw people placing that blame and anger.
Pema: You mean joy he feeling, joy, the expression. People were mad at joy. There is a media figure named Joy. She does have a last name, but just, just saying.
Tania: And it was all her fault.
Pema: I’m sure that she feels it mightily when people say they’re mad at joy. So, I mean, I love that question. Who are you mad at? It seems like it makes a, I, I kind of wanna ask. I actually, I wanna take that home and ask it when I am frustrated at something, when I’m frustrated in a relationship circumstance, or what if I can’t find parking and I’m running late? Like, okay, well who, what am I most mad at? I feel like I just trivialized that, but I guess that I’m just looking at it on a lot of different levels. ’cause if I just trivialized it by talking about a parking spot while I’m late, if I take that trivia all the way to the top of my rage, it might give me some information about what I’m actually mad at.
Tania: Oh, it might give you information about your tendencies of who you tend to be mad at. So I tend to be mad at people who want the same thing that I want, but who I feel like are not going about it effectively. And so. So that’s, you know, so my, my frustration has been primarily with people who are basically on my side. And, and you know, you know, where I’ve been is just wanting people to gain more insight. ‘Cause when I’ve heard people who are just doubling down on the narratives that we’ve always had, it’s like, it’s hate, it’s. misogyny, it’s racism. I’m like, okay. There’s, there’s all of those. I’m not questioning that those things exist and that they had an impact on the election, but there’s something more here that we have to learn probably, you know, that there’s there’s things that we, there’s sort of the analysis that we always have about things on the left. But it seems like there’s some opportunity here to understand something that we have not yet grasped. And that’s where I have been putting my energy and where I have been trying to figure out how to get other people to also do that.
Pema: And do you mean the individual “we” ? Do you mean the broader “we” of a Democratic party? Do you mean, like which “we” are you talking about?
Tania: Oh, that’s such a good question. I think it’s, yes, it’s all of us. It’s the individual people I’m having conversations with. It’s the people out there who, you know, maybe they’re listening to this podcast, maybe they read something that I write. But I have been wanting to help people, you know, at the same time as I’m acknowledging like, people are in a lot of pain right now. But also, hey, can we learn at the same time? So I think maybe what I need to do is use those same skills that I always recommend using when we are having dialogue across political differences. When I’m communicating with people who are on my side, who I’m hoping will maybe be able to gain some additional insight because if we could all gain some additional insight, maybe we can, I don’t know, be better at this next time.
Pema: I am so curious about that. It seems like the Republican side is pretty great at all voting for in the same block, but it seems like the Liberal side is some folks are not liberal enough. Some people are too progressive. Some people are too independent to go any which way inside the liberal agenda. Why is it so hard for a liberal side to get their votes in one block in comparison to the opposite side?
Pema: So I think maybe what I need to do is use those same skills that I always recommend using when we are having dialogue across political differences. When I’m communicating with people who are on my side, who I’m hoping will maybe be able to gain some additional insight because if we could all gain some additional insight, maybe we can I don’t know, be better at this next time.
Tania: So I feel like we sometimes on the left strive for a moral purity where something has to be, you know, we’re, we’re not willing to make any concessions and so we don’t wanna compromise our values and that sounds like a very good thing on one level. Like, no, I’m not gonna compromise my values. But then when it comes to an actual election, like I, okay, I was talking to somebody and I said, you know, the thing that I am really, this was after the election, but I said the thing I’m really focused on right now is how do we maintain our democracy for the next four years? And this person said, oh, well, a lot of people around me are, you know, sort of saying, yeah, you know, democracy’s kind of a flawed system that doesn’t seem to be working for everybody I care about. And so that wasn’t actually as motivating a factor in the election, as you know, people were trying to make it to be, and I was like, oh, that’s why some people weren’t, you know, weren’t so enthusiastic to vote because we were like democracy’s on the ballot and they’re like, well, democracy is a flawed system. And I was like, of course democracy is a flawed system, but it’s so much better than autocracy. You know, it’s like all of the systems are flawed. But this one, in my view, is the preferable one. And so then on, I was like, okay, well if you think all right, democracy is a flawed system, and you stop your thoughts there and you’re like, I, I don’t want a flawed system. I’m only going to be enthusiastic about something that achieves, you know, what I think of as, as the ideal equality for all people. You know that, that everybody, you know, that seems unrealistic to me. And I will say, I don’t know that that’s only, you know, that’s not only an issue in elections, in any movement, there are people who are more like, I’m gonna work within the system and try to make the change. And there are people who are like, burn it all down. You know, like, the system isn’t working, we’re just gonna start from scratch. It’s okay if, whatever the outcome is, ruins the system because the system wasn’t good.
And so these are people who are aligned in terms of values, but have very different visions of the paths to get there.
Pema: Does it make sense that all of those, I mean, I, I think I’m making I don’t know, I think my question, I feel like, my question is very naive, but I’m like, I’ve heard this before, big tent isn’t, isn’t there’s a big tent party. Does it seem silly that everyone fits under the same tent? You know, like I guess I’m asking that question. Is that silly? I mean, are we asking everybody under that one tent to recognize, Hey folks, it doesn’t have to be perfect, it just has to be fair.
Tania: Yeah, I mean the challenge under the big tent is you’ve got the clowns and you’ve got the lion tamer, and you’ve got the lions. I don’t know, that seems like a recipe for disaster, you know? I guess that that’s the thing. Yes. We probably need a big tent and the big question is what happens under that tent and what happens within that tent and how do we go forward with intent to make it all work within there and all achieve a goal that we feel is valuable, not just for the people under our tent, but actually for everybody. Even the people who aren’t gonna come to our circus.
Pema: I feel like realism keeps kind of poking its head in this conversation for me, in, in this way. I dunno if you’ve ever watched professional soccer but it is drama, drama, drama. Like you know, if you can get a foul called against like somebody running into you and getting a foul called against them, then you’ve got time on your side.
You’ve got like, I don’t know. Some. Some, I don’t know enough about it. I only know that like if somebody steps on a player’s foot, they’re gonna be like on their back and rolling around and grabbing their knee and just wailing like it was the worst thing that could have happened while they’re playing in a soccer game where they’re likely gonna get their footstep on.
You know what I mean? But it’s just such a dramatic response and it feels to me like. A lot of politics is storytelling and story spinning, and it’s like, how dramatic can we be in reaction rather than what’s the response that’s gonna help people the most here? Sometimes as I’m saying that, I’m thinking we get candidates in the door with reactions, and then once folks are in the door, we’ve really got to broker in responses, like how do we actually get policies into place? It’s harder for me to trust politics anymore because it’s constantly reaction, and yet I know there are people who are doing really good with policymaking and looking out for each other, and I, I want, I want those conversations in the tent to influence the other conversations. I want that intent to have a ripple effect.
Tania: Yeah. I mean, I think one of the problems is we are being fed a diet of narratives about what’s going on to try to make sense of things. So I noticed that there started being things in the op-eds and stuff that we’re talking about. Oh, will the, on the right, on the political right, there’s all of this media that spins out all of this misinformation and we don’t have that same kind of left wing like media machine.
And as soon as like that showing up in the Washington Post and New York Times op-Eds, then everyone who I’m talking to is saying the media and the right wing media has all of this. And I’m like, oh my gosh. We picked up, like everybody picked up on that narrative. So it might be important for us to recognize where we are parroting stuff that we have that we have heard. Where we are sort of taking that as a piece of it and trying to digest it a little bit more. I actually ended up like reading an entire book by a sociologist to try to make sense of what was going on.
I was like, I’m not just gonna go in a little bit. I’m gonna go in deep and try to get an analysis. It’s gonna help me understand something here and. What I found is, yeah, okay. That’s a different narrative. It’s a supported narrative in some ways. Like, there were things I wasn’t crazy about, which is why I’m not gonna recommend the book here on the podcast, but I was like, can I do a deeper dive? Then can I take that not as the answer, but as here’s a piece of something to understand and digest that and try to pull in other pieces. I don’t know if that’s the right approach either. You know, where I am right now is I am at the very end of the movie War Games with Matthew Broderick because
Pema: I don’t remember that real. You remind me what happens.
Tania: Many of my cultural references are decades, decades old. So yes, I’ll remind you, but spoiler alert for war games in case anybody hasn’t seen it, but you should. But, there’s this computer that’s about to start World War III and Matthew Broderick is like, I am gonna save us all from World War III by showing this computer that war is not the answer.
That like, if you start a nuclear war, then the other side’s gonna to, you know, there’s just gonna be destruction. It guarantees mutual destruction. And the way I’m gonna teach that is I’m gonna like show at games where there’s just not a winner. And so what Matthew Broderick ends up with quite brilliantly is the game of tic-tac toe. Because if you play tic-tac-toe enough times, you know, there’s just, there’s not a winner. It’s always a draw. And so, so the machine is trying to, it keeps playing tic-tac-toe, like over and over and over again. And meanwhile, like it’s counting down or up Def Con’s, I can’t remember what direction Def Con goes.
And, Matthew Broderick says learn damn it. That’s how I feel right now. I am looking around at myself, at the people I know and that are, and at our society, and I am feeling like learn, damn it. Like what is it that we have to take in and understand about ourselves, about each other, about our country, for us to be able to move forward together toward positive outcomes. That’s where I am.
Pema: I mean, that’s so urgent. It’s like, what else do we have except for this ability to learn right now or this kind of need to learn. That’s that metaphor of Matthew Broderick in War Games. Is really, I don’t know, kind, kind of feels prescient. I also know over here on my side that when I’m full up, when my brain is full, I can’t learn anymore. I have to unplug or have to take a nap. I have to go away and come back refreshed, or I just have to stop talking or stop trying to hear here, here, here, here so much and stop trying to make change. And I, and with all of the pressure and urgency and fear and foot on the gas pedal that led up to the election and all of the reaction and feelings since in the position that we’re in it, it feels like in order to learn, we might need to take a break and we might need to listen to some things that are being said on the other side after all of the. kind of rush and hubbub, like is there anything new coming out over there? Anything we haven’t heard yet? Or, or if I just take a moment to myself, can I come back and can I learn? Is learning available to me now? You know, here’s one last thing. Sometimes it takes a trauma to learn something. And is this a trauma for some where it’s like enough to like. Make me learn.
Tania: Yeah. You know I did get a little worked up there. I know. And, and that is how I feel sometimes. But I also, you know, on the last episode we were talking about this piece that I wrote. When an election gives you a shellacking make decoupage, like I think the learning doesn’t have to have this, that sense of urgency.
I think learning might be more like taking in pieces of stuff, but what I know isn’t gonna help us to learn is certainty that we already knew everything. And that’s the part where I feel you know, I feel a rub when I hear that. So I, I want us to be able to set down some of our self-righteousness, some of our moral indignation, and recognize that there’s something that we didn’t get. And whether we do that learning now or not. I mean, I think honestly that alone is a learning, like we don’t have to know exactly what it was that we didn’t get. But I think actually just being open to wondering would be like a huge step forward.
Pema: Yeah. Tania, is there anything that you wanna learn in the coming winter season? That’s not related to politics.
Tania: Yes. I don’t even know what, but I feel like I have been very, you know, as many of us have been so caught up in everything going on with the political landscape and honestly. I would, I would very much like to not attend to it so much. You know, I’m always telling people like, you know, limit your media consumption.
And I really do. Like, I don’t, I don’t pay attention to it all the time, but I also, because of the work that I do feel like I need to stay tuned in more than I really want to. And I say this to journalists all the time, like when, when I do an interview at the end I’ll be like you know. I know that I tell people to limit their media consumption.
I know that you’re not able to do that because of your work, and I’m sure it’s really stressing you out. And so I just, you know, I, I just wanna acknowledge that because they can’t do the things that I’m saying, and, you know, to some extent I can, you know, I’m not, I’m not, you know, I’m not Katie Couric.
I don’t, I don’t need to stay as on top of things as people who are reporting it and who are like in the mix politically. So, so, yes. I do want to learn something that is not political. There’s things I want to cook. I feel like that’s something I love doing. I love not just cooking for myself, but I like cooking for other people and it feels creative and calming and nourishing.
And so I think that would be a lovely thing to do. How about you, Pema? Is there anything you wanna learn coming up?
Pema: That sounds lovely. I am in a big learning period right now. Going back to skill up in coaching. And so I have program learning to do. I’ve got the book reading, I’ve got the program calls to be in the learning for, but then afterwards there’s practice and I’ve got to set my business up in a new way.
And, and some of those feel like I’ve got this, like I’ve gotta take on. Here’s what I’m struck with. Learning to do something a prescribed way, which I’m signed up to do in this education right now, keeps showing me that I’m learning other things that feel totally unrelated. So I am learning about myself how much I appreciate being in relationship to develop the business.
Like to me, that seemed like a task list before, but when I realized how much relationship is involved in introducing myself to people who might know clients I can serve or talking to folks at networking events the way that I love to talk to folks, which is one-on-one and getting to know them in seemingly unrelated ways.
Like, what are you gonna cook for dinner? Kind of that’s my favorite question, other than what are you gonna wear to that event? Like I’m set to learn one thing in my program, but in taking those things on, I’m learning things about myself and I so appreciate, I don’t know what you call that meta learning.
There’s like this other level of learning that’s happening that I didn’t know to be prepared for. And to, maybe an easier example of it is a dear friend of mine recently went through a hard time and she took on a project um, a romance novel writing class, and she said, I didn’t know to expect this, but the partnership that I was craving in the loss of my relationship is being met with this creative activity every day. Like I’m writing about romance and romances and it’s filling something up in me in the realm of partnership and intimacy and sweetness and I thought I needed that from someone. And I was like, what a cool thing to recognize and what a cool thing to be exposed to. Like, you’re getting some, some sweetness out of the experience of just writing for your romance novel writing class.
Like I love that there’s this meta learning. There are these levels of learning that happen that are unexpected. And when I go back and think about your answer and your learn, dammit, I think, okay, take a break, go make dinner and see what you are learning from the way that this particular, you know, egg is cooking ’cause I’ve never cooked it this way before. I’m moved by being open to learning when learning is not, when learning that thing was not my focus in the first place.
Tania: And I love what you’re saying also about learning about ourselves and how we learn and how we exist in the world, and there’s always opportunity to deepen that.
Pema: Yeah, I think that also makes us ready to be strong.
Tania: I am Tania Israel, professor, psychologist, and author of Facing the Fracture.
Pema: And I’m Pema Rocker, creative coach and author of Ash and Spirit.
Tania: Make your choice.
Pema: Are you ready to be strong?