Tim Grimes, Stop Thinking So Much, It Really Is an Option |482|

Tim Grimes advice about not thinking is deeply spiritual and profoundly practical.

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Audio Clip: [00:00:00] You’re it , you’re it , you’re it! Quitsies , any quitsies , you’re it , quitsies, no any quitsies no startsies you can’t do that, can too ,standard, double standards no erasies, cannot, triple standard, no earasies, Oh..

Alex Tsakiris:[00:00:13] Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels know all about not being too serious. That of course is a clip from Dumb and Dumber. Today’s guest is awesome. He’s taking the idea of not being serious, and not thinking too much, and brought it to next level spirituality.

Audio Clip: [00:00:37] And that’s the truth I’m a mystic and I believe in nothing because when you have an experience like this, even if it’s just for a split second, it just, you don’t look at things the same way ever again. And there’s all and I’m you know, now years later, I’ve just encountered teachers and teachings talking about this from different angles again and again saying the same thing in different words. We get lost in our head, and we get really serious about our spiritual journey. So this is what happened to me in my, my 20s basically, like after I had this experience, and then I had other, you know, quote unquote, mystical things that happened to me or whatever little strange experiences but you know, I lived, I went to Zen centers, I lived at a Zen center, you know, I got really into different self improvement teachings, all these things, you know, wasn’t till I was almost 30 before I realized, I’m so full of shit. So what I would say is this, you can do these exercises and they’ll make you feel better no matter what. But when I do them, what they’re coming out of is like, alright, like now, like this is, let’s see, like Gods here. So like physiological, oh you’ll feel better and masturbate, have fun with that. It’s like the law of attraction people. How do I get a bigger house? How do I make more money? I don’t know. Shut up, stop thinking. Like I love you, you know, shut up and stop thinking.

Alex Tsakiris:[00:02:07] Stick around for my interview with Tim Grimes. Welcome to Skeptiko, where we explore controversial science and spirituality, with leading researchers, thinkers and their critics. I’m your host, Alex Tsakiris and today we welcome Tim Grimes to Skeptiko. Tim is the author of a best selling book, it was the number one in its category. When I first found it on Amazon, the title is The Joy of Not Thinking, a radical approach to happiness. You know it was still number one when I went back and bought a copy for everybody in my family and sent it to them. And I honestly cannot tell you the last time that I did that with a book, if ever, but it’s it’s just short, succinct and it’s amazing and it’s great to have you here with us, Tim, thanks so much for joining me.

Tim Grimes: [00:03:05] Thank you Alex and thank you for the kind words, it’s so nice to hear how much you, you know appreciate the book and also the fact that you gave the family members that always makes me feel good when people share this information because I think it’s nice, nice for people to hear it and they don’t get to hear stuff like that often.

Alex Tsakiris: [00:03:25] Yeah, yeah. You know, as we were chatting about just a second ago, you know, it’s like, there’s so many things I want to talk to you about from such a straightforward, kind of intentionally simplified book, you know and like, I want to say Tim, do you realize that this is a radical condemnation of scientism? And, you know, this consciousness is an illusion, and you’re nothing more than a biological robot and meaningless universe. That is not what the book is about. The book starts out beautifully as a teenage Tim, sitting on a beach and experiencing something that I think a lot of us experience not only as teenagers but throughout our life, when particularly you know what’s interesting, I’d like to hear that, what you slip into that point of this very kind of troubling feeling, oppressive feeling that you’re in is that it’s triggered by a Zen kind of experience, which is supposed to be the opposite of that. So I’ve kind of laid a lot on the table. Tell us a little bit about who you are and then the, I love the origin of this book, the way you open it up.

Tim Grimes: [00:04:46] Sure. So first of all, I’m a, I’m primarily a writer and an editor of kind of alternative mind, body material. I’ve always been interested in the mind,body relationship and I usually go about explaining and exploring it in kind of a different fashion than most people do, especially people in kind of like the stress management or counseling field. That’s what I call, I called myself initially a radical counselor because I was basically counseling people on stuff that they probably hadn’t heard about and the way I was going to describe it to them. And so basically, I’ve just always been interested in how our consciousness works and how our consciousness fools us and how we can transcend our rational mind in different ways that we’re not ever really taught in school or in traditional, you know, backgrounds. So that’s a little bit about who I am and I, you know, I still coach people on this stuff and like I said, I write about it a lot. Now, getting back to how this particular guide begins, The Joy of Not Thinking, it’s describing an experience I had on a beach when I was on vacation with my family, when I was 16 years old. And I was at that age, like a lot of teenagers, very inquisitive and curious about, you know, what it all meant. And I was fortunate enough to be exposed to some really good Zen books and Zen material at a young age and kind of just found myself drawn to that stuff immediately. And so what preceded this kind of melt down on the beach that I had was I was reading this famous Zen book, in English I think we usually call it The Transmission of Light. Just old Zen stories about different quote unquote, masters and their enlightenment experiences. And it seemingly triggered something in me and I became, I had been in, you know, many weird situations psychologically leading up to this, because I was seeking something and looking for answers, and I put myself out there to find them. Um, but reading the Zen book, not being on any drugs or anything at the time, just naturally, this fear was provoked by by reading the contents of this book. And I couldn’t get rid of that fear no matter what I did and it was like getting sucked down a black hole and I was just totally scared and terrified. And again, I described at the beginning of this book very briefly. But it was an overwhelming experience, Alex, like you said, I think a lot of us have those kind of experiences. And then what happened is, basically, I don’t know what happened, you know, the bottom fell out. And it just totally unexplicable and changed my life you know, that was almost a quarter century ago, totally changed my life when that happened.

Alex Tsakiris: [00:08:18] Do you describe an almost like some kind of Kundalini experience or kind of this non duality experience where you’re…

Tim Grimes: [00:08:26] In Zen, they call it Satori, usually, you know what I mean? The Satori experience and you know, in retrospect it’s easy to say.Well I was reading about all these Satori type experiences where it’s like, they go through all these mental hardships, and then the bottom basically falls out. So in a way it was almost like, well yeah, you know, that’s what happened, like I was, you know, I would say these days, I manifested that in some way except, honestly I don’t really believe that because whenever something like this happens to us it’s just way too far out there and people aren’t comfortable talking about it,is what it comes down to.

Alex Tsakiris: [00:09:01] You know what it triggered in me a memory that I had long, long since forgotten. About the same age, i’m reading, just kind of obscure, Soren Kierkegaard, fear and trembling come to think.

Tim Grimes: [00:09:16] Yeah.

Alex Tsakiris: [00:09:17] And I freaked,I don’t even know why I freaked I couldn’t possibly understand that book at that age. I don’t want to like front like I was some intellectual or something. It was way past me. But that’s the path of the seeker to open doors that you don’t really know what to do. I wish I would have had or maybe not, because that’s the way it is. But you know, the experience that you had that followed that, but I don’t want to take people too far off the trail because this beautiful little book that you’ve written is a radical ,I don’t want to say radical departure. But you’ve put it together in a way that really is different from what people would expect to hear from someone who had that kind of experience that you just talked to. It’s very straightforward, I want you to talk about the title because I think the title is quite profound and when I tell people, I want you to respond to this, when I tell people, Hey, I just read this amazing book, The joy of Not Thinking, there’s this really strange look on their face that does relate to kind of consciousness is an illusion scientific materialism thing, where they’re not even sure what that would mean, to be not thinking. And I get that again from my personal experience from when I got into yoga and the first time that I did yoga, I did it with this woman on TV , you know, the TV yoga and at the end, she goes, Okay now quiet your mind and Tim for a split second is all, my mind was quiet. But it was a radical event for me because I never knew there was anything to me if that little chatterbox wasn’t going constantly, and I think you’ve captured that moment that I experienced beautifully and in the title of the book I tell you, tell me what you experienced but when you tell people the joy of not thinking, isn’t there this certain, I’m sure there’s this fear, like, what would that even mean to be not thinking?

Tim Grimes: [00: 11:21] Yeah, I love that what you just said, Alex. Yeah, people are totally uncomfortable with it. It’s just, I’ve noticed my whole life, my whole adult life, I should say, because that experience happened when I was 16. It’s hard to bring it up you know, I used to when I was younger, like in college and stuff I was like oh, people kind of get this, you know? You’re naive in the sense that you think people are into things, you know, and then you get old and you realize people aren’t anything. So I used to talk much more openly about these kind of concepts. And the truth matters, not most people aren’t interested because they have no sense that what they are is not what they are that there’s something bigger going on, like you said that split second when you’re watching the yoga video, and your mind really quiets again, it’s like the bottom falls out, and you realize you are not what you think you are. And that’s all this guide is about. That’s all honestly, like, over the years, you know, the stuff I talk to people about and coach people on, it’s changed a little bit, a lot of the, you know, the theory and the approach, but underneath it all it’s always the same. It’s been the same in my life since I was 16 years old. It’s don’t frickin think, stop thinking, stop thinking, stop thinking, that’s it. That’s all I have to share. Really, I mean, I can talk about some other stuff, we can get into intellectual my new show, blah, blah, blah and a lot of it’s very interesting but at the end of the day, I don’t really care. The quote at the beginning of the guide is uhm ,it’s a quote is just that I’m a mystic and I believe in nothing or something along those lines, it’s the quote, the opening of that book and that’s the truth, i’m a mystic and I believe in nothing, because when you have an experience like this even if it’s just for a split second, it just, you don’t look at things the same way ever again. And there’s all and I’m you know, now years later, I’ve just encountered teachers and teachings talking about this from different angles again and again saying the same thing in different words, you know and this guide is hopefully just bringing all those different angles together in very plain language, as you said, because I try to be very direct and plain in how I describe this. But it’s very difficult for people to understand unless they’re really invested in being open with themselves and genuinely curious about what they are and more importantly, what they are not.

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 13:56] You know, it’s beautifully written, it is beautifully written and I, the simplicity of it, the kind of redundancy of it is beautiful, because with a couple of words you talk about what not thinking would even mean and then you’re playful and kind of putting it down and putting down that little monkey mind that we carry all around. But you’re not like denigrating it, you’re engaged. I mean, this is all the things that anyone who’s been on the spiritual path understands, you know, there is no past ,there is no future there’s only now and what are you doing right now? But you know, the other thing I was going to share that, and I think I got this from the book, if not directly in the spirit of it is again, the book has been so profound for me and sharing it with other people has been a real joy and when I get that look on someone’s face, like they’re like, Whoa, you know, what would that even mean not thinking. I go Okay, so you’re not down with the idea that there could be no thinking I get that but what about if there was no thinking for the next five minutes? What if for the next five minutes, you just said, Do you need to think? You don’t need for me to think for the next five minutes, right? Um, you could live with that and then you see the fear rise again, because there’s no way to wiggle out of that, you know, with the program that we have we’re programmed to think, well that’s impossible this Tim guy’s nuts, you know, but when you say, do you really need to think for the next five minutes? And it’s like, a beautiful… Did you have any thoughts or stories on what it’s like for people where the light bulb goes off that there’s something to this not thinking?

Tim Grimes: [00:15:45] Yeah, I mean I have a lot of stories because like I said, I’ve been trying to talk to people about this for a while. And eventually you figure out how to talk to people about it in a more palatable way for them, more of a way where they’re able to actually accept it and digest it. So when I was in college, it was hard for me to describe, you know, if you know, someone was like high on drugs, or something like that, or like you were blasting loud music and explaining it to them, maybe they would kind of get the picture of a little bit. But then, you know, I made a whole video series and that’s what the first part, the second part of the book, I should say is about is just not, you know, stopping being serious for just a couple minutes by basically being playful and I’ve done, I’ve been, you know, I’ve done a lot of work with people now just showing them how they can be playful for a minute or two, and profoundly shut their mind up, you know, and they’re still physiologically responding to stuff, they’re still there. So it’s not like they’re really not thinking at all. I don’t want to get into like, technicality or thinking not thinking whatever the point is your rational thinking has gone out the window for a minute or two if you become playful. And so that’s what I described in the book, I hope pretty thoroughly. But if it’s not thorough enough, you know, you can go to stop being serious.com and there’s videos, there’s three hours of videos of me not being serious, showing you how to be playful for a minute or two. And if you do that, there’s very few guarantees in the spiritual field as far as I’m concerned, but I feel very confident. If you know, if you’re playful for a few minutes, 100% playful, that your thinking is going to significantly lessen. And you’re going to be wondering, Oh, my gosh, this is so obvious, why don’t I take advantage of this more often?

Alex Tsakiris:[00:17:36 ] I did it, I did it, I experienced all the things that you say in the book, you know, you got to get over the embarrassment of it. But I wanted to try it because it’s totally risk free in trying it, you know, it’s free free, it’s risk free, you’ll understand that you’ve done it a million times, you’re not going to harm yourself or anything like that. But I want to draw attention to if we can get a little bit intellectual, which is kind of a contradiction and wait for the term but not really, because you’re built on some very, very deep thinking that has been going on for 1000s of years, you’ve just put it together in a way that is fresh and new and really interesting for our Western Instagram kind of sensibility. But I want to talk about the bridge you make between not thinking in seriousness and not being serious because you just talked about it there but in the book, you very subtly make this transition of Okay, you might not be totally comfortable with the idea of not thinking, but you’re still reading. So I bet you’re intrigued with it. How about we approach it from this angle of what if you where just kind of not quite as serious, you know? So do you want to talk about how you see the serious thing playing into this because again and we were chatting just for a few seconds before and you said, which I totally get without even you saying it but you can tend to be pretty serious, I can tend to be pretty serious so it’s almost like you’re showing other people how you got out of your head by being a little bit less serious.

Tim Grimes: [00:19:25] Yeah, I mean, that’s exactly what has happened in my life is i’m a pretty serious dude. And like I think, you know, you gotta go with the Western Canon and be intellectual and a lot of ways because you can, you can learn a lot about yourself by doing that. And the issue that most people have in this; on the spiritual path, is people call it in you know, the modern world, at least, you know, in the Western world is that we get lost in our head and we get really serious about our spiritual journey. So this, what happened to me in my 20s basically, like after I had this experience, and then I had other, you know, quote unquote, mystical things that happened to me or whatever little strange experiences, but you know, I lived it. I went to Zen centers, I lived at a Zen center you know, I got really into different self improvement teachings, all these things and it took about, you know, was until I was almost 30, before I realized, I’m so full of shit. You know, and I was, don’t get me wrong, I always have been a playful person too. Like, I’m a serious dude. But I’m also very, I’ve always been playful. So I always knew that that like that playfulness made me feel better, you know, or that just driving in the car listening to loud music loudly made me feel better, you know, or just like jumping up and down, made me feel better, like…

Alex Tsakiris: [00:20:56] For no reason and just kind of waving your arms around just being really…

Tim Grimes: [00: 21:01] Exactly. But it wasn’t until I became I would say, thoroughly disillusioned with the spiritual culture, I guess you should, like I would call it you know, the Western world like, or at least the United States that I was like, you know what? This, it’s really, I’m just being too serious about it. And what preceded that realization was I got really into Byron Katie I don’t know if you know who she is. But you know, she’s a great spiritual teacher, just a wonderful teacher and she’s very big now. And she’s wonderful but I went to, you know, several workshops with her and I went to this week long thing and leading up to it, I was like, you know, I want to get involved in her organization and learn from her. And I went to this week long workshop with her and it was awesome, it was amazing and she’s just amazing, she’s the best spiritual teacher, I don’t like using that word but she was, she’s the best spiritual teacher I’ve ever met. But at the end of it I was like, I don’t want to deal with any of these fucking people ever again, I hope it’s okay, I used the F word there. But it was, I realized is like, this is total horseshit like this whole organizational thing and then…

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 22:21] The sage on the stage thing as I call it.

Tim Grimes:[00: 22:24] Sage on the stage , yeah, you know, it’s, they have amazing information to offer. But there’s a cult around these people even if they don’t intend there to be a cult around them, you know. And so yeah, I was like you know what so much of this maybe all of it is just me being overly overly serious about it. And if I shut that off, even for just a few minutes a day, I’ll feel a lot better and I really got into that. And most people don’t want to hear it, they still want me, you know, people, when they talk to me, they don’t want to talk about this stuff Alex , they want to talk about, you know, how they can get stuff using the law of attraction, which unfortunately, I know all about. But it’s not really what I’m interested in, you know, I mean I’m interested in the consciousness dynamics of that, that the inner work that is involved in quote unquote, manifesting things that interest me. And that’s why I talk about the last part of The Joy of Not Thinking, but people who want a bigger house or more money. If they’re coming to me for advice, they know, they’re gonna, they’re gonna get lit up because what I have to really say is, isn’t that I don’t know, you know what I mean? Like, what I know is stop being as serious and don’t think as much so.

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 23:3] You know, one other and I wish I would have written down the reference, but I didn’t know that we’re going there. I didn’t follow the reference to Byron Katie. But I found out a couple other ones that I found really interesting in the book that I just found interesting. I think what you’re doing, I’ve read a ton of spiritual books. I’ve been a spiritual journeyer for a lot of years and I so appreciate all the threads that I see in your work. But there were a couple of new ones that were interesting to me. Who is the guy who did the thing with the bush men in…

Tim Grime: [00: 24:18] Bradford Kenealy? That’s the bushmans way of finding God I might have that title that book wrong but it’s something along those lines, you’ll find it if you Google it. But that’s just a, that quote was just from an anth… that’s like an anth, like a modern anthropology book. But he made the connection that we’re you know, we’re all making the obvious connection really that like, you know, in most cultures historically, like, you know, before history, you know, if things weren’t going right, you just danced around some you know what I mean? You didn’t be like, oh, let’s think about this some more and you know, get more and more stressed out about it you know, it’s like no, you they think we’re idiots in a lot of these Indigenous, you know, Aboriginal cultures, you know, the, quote unquote, Primitive cultures, right? Where they often know much more than we do.

Alex Tsakiri: [00: 25:11 ] You know, so that was beautiful and I thought that that whole connection between, because I think we can, we can overdo that, you know and the quote unquote noble savage and you know, kind of write things to those people that they don’t deserve but then discount some of the wisdom that they have that they do deserve. And I love people to come along and take a fresh look and just add it to the pile. But the thing I got out of this thing I thought really related to your work in kind of an interesting way so yeah, there’s this thing of yeah, just dance around and shake a little bit and do some music, you know, and it all feels better. But the other thing, they have a major, the Bushmen have a major kind of slow your roll thing. So if you come home with the big kill, what you’re going to encounter is everyone sitting around going yeah, but man that Gazelle don’t look so good man. Just all this kind of really, really sarcasm joking around in order for you to bring your ego down and I thought, Wow, that is like, so genius from all the ways that we’re talking about it here.

Tim Grimes: [00:26:21] Brilliant yeah.

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 26:23] Do you wanna think about all ?

Tim Grimes: [00: 26:24 ] I mean that’s just brilliant, exactly. I mean, like, again, it’s such like, it’s uncommon, common sense, right?

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 26:32] Yeah.

Tim Grimes: [00: 26:32] It’s like, that’s how you keep everybody in line you know, that’s how you become harmonious with other people, you know and like, with my good friends I’ve known for years there’s this kind of, like, immediate irreverence where no one ever, you always have backing each other up, don’t get me wrong, you’re edifying each other in many ways. But if any, you never, I never allow my friends to have, get a big head or for them to allow me to get a big head. And I’m only talking about people I’m very close to and very informal with, you know what I’m saying? But, yeah, I mean, the idea of having a community like that and again, when I was younger, I behaved more that way with other people that I didn’t know as well because I thought they kind of would get it and now I realize, like, holy, you know, holy shit, I was like, crazy, like in my 20s and stuff like that, just how I behaved like, I was coming from a genuine place so like I don’t regret it. But like people probably, I mean, I had no idea what the hell I was doing probably most of the time, you know what I mean? And people still don’t know what I’m doing but I’m more presentable now and how I go about it so…

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 27:38] Yeah, that’s awesome. Hey, so Tim, tell us more about the exercises, the not, the playfulness exercises. And you know you kind of dropped a little hint there that I thought again as we bounce back between the kind of intellectual and dare I say, you know, neuroscience of this to the just kind of practical, fun part of it and that’s that interrupting a pattern that we have in the way we’re organizing our consciousness experience. Psychologists have studied that and say, Wow, that’s can be very efficacious for removing depression and doing all these other things. And you seem to have put that together in this playing kind of therapy. So without being too serious about it, but maybe go into that a little bit more of it, and you do have some videos that are just, you know, you just put yourself out there, I’m playing, you know, kind of speak more to that if you would.

Tim Grimes: [00: 28:41] Sure, yeah, I mean, it’s a great idea if you can do it and if you get comfortable doing it and as you said, Alex, it takes some practice just because we’re not used to being playful even if we’re in a room alone and we know nobody’s watching we’re still not comfortable just being ourselves. But it can be really helpful to do whatever you want physically, to kind of get you out of your head and that is some really basic examples are like jumping up and down ,making funny faces in the mirror like just you know, moving your arms all about you know, barking like a dog or making animal sounds and hopping up and down, really stupid, stupid things, absurd things you know, if you do goofy stuff like that, for just a minute or two and you know, if you do it each day, if you’ll notice it like you just notice it when you do it if you get into it, that it helps you and so if you can manage to do it a couple times a day that might even be better.

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 29:42] It’s immediate.

Tim Grimes: [00: 29:43] Yeah it’s immediate ,exactly. And again, I hate using words like immediate or guaranteed you know, guaranteed to work. But it’s a mind body physiological thing where if you get 100% into physically being playful basically ,you’ll feel better. I’m not saying you’ll feel phenomenally great if you feel like crap before, but at the very least, you’ll feel significantly better than you did a few minutes before and that’s a that’s a profound thing you know so…

Alex Tsakiris:[00: 30:14] It is in particularly when it’s married to the first part of the book because again, to maybe risk over analyzing this stuff but some of the people who do the playfulness stuff, or talk about managing your physiology in order to change your mental state, see it as an end, you know, rather than a means to an end where I think you’re coming at it, which is to say, your mystic thing. I’m a mystic. I’m nothing, you know, there is nothing there’s only this silence that from which emerges all this beautiful profoundness. So that’s what I’m trying to get to. I’m not really trying to get rid of these yucky feelings. That’s just, that’s just kind of what I’ve added to that I need this addition by subtraction of just saying, you know and you’re nodding your head. So do you want to speak to that subtle difference of the means to an end versus kind of an end of itself?

Tim Grimes :[00: 31:17] Yeah, well what did you describe those people like what terms do you use for them? physiological , like experts or something like that? or…

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 31:26 ] Yeah, you know, I mean, because people take that mind body thing and you know exactly what i mean.

Tim Grimes : [00: 31:31] Right of course, yeah. So what I would say is this. When you can do these exercises and they’ll make you feel better no matter what but when I do them, they’re what they’re coming out of is like, alright, like now like, this is let’s see, like Gods here. So like physiological you’ll feel better and masturbate, have fun with that. It’s like the law of attraction people, how do I get a bigger house? How do I make more money? I don’t know. Shut up, stop thinking and like, I love you, you know, shut up and stop thinking you know, that’s we’re talking about God you know, that’s what so that’s where I’ve always come from, with this stuff. Because of this experience on the beach and my background that’s my bet. My background for not being serious is the beach experience. It’s not like how can I become a more productive person and feel better? I mean, emotions are just there and it’s when we have negative emotions, that can be very difficult. There’s no need to deny that and doing this stuff, being playful, managing your physiology will help but what we are talking about is God.

Alex Tsakiris: [00: 32:45 ] So Tim, I do have to drag you into the the muddy, skeptical waters that I’ve waited in way, way too long. But I’ve always had that spiritual sensibility that you’re talking about, but it does fucking piss me off that so much of the messaging in our culture is over intellectualizing this stuff and making it sound so true and legitimate and just unassailable in terms of you know, you are just your brain, your brain, my man you are, there is consciousness. That’s an illusion, as Neil deGrasse Tyson says. You are meaningless in a meaning because the universe it’s not that you are meaningless. Hey, you want to have some social construct meaning that’s fine, but the universe is meaningless. So you’re meaningless if you can’t have any meaning in your life if the universe has meaning, meaning meaningless you get what I’m saying. So I’m not real on that cause I do it way way too much. But it, did you, you must have encountered that experience that in college or whatever what have been your kind of brushing up against some of that materialism you are just your brain stuff?

Tim Grimes:[ 00: 34:12] Well I mean, I just have never fit in. In my adult life, there’s no place for so. I say at the end of The Joy of Not Thinking like, I’ve always considered myself basically a bum. You know, like, I don’t fit in at all. And I always, what I was interested in which is this mind body stuff from a, you know, spiritual or whatever you want to call it, place. I was very, I had a lot of, I was genuine. So I had a lot of integrity about going forward in that path if I was to pursue it, and I found that any traditional model I followed, like, for instance, you know, going to graduate school or getting a PhD about this, what I’m talking about, they would say I’m fucking crazy. And also any spiritual organization basically including, and I had some, you know, I met some great teachers and like I, you know, I’m very grateful for the time I spent like at, you know at the Zen center, those people are just tremendous. But nonetheless that setting even that, what would seem to be a safe spiritual setting, even that was too square for me even like Byron Katie organization, which is, you know, they do really good things. It didn’t it didn’t jibe with what the integrity I had for what I was into and yeah, I mean…

Tim Grime: [00:45:00] We’ll do it someday, Alex, we’ll do it someday. It’s been a pleasure. Thank you so much.

Alex Tsakiris : [00: 45:04] Thanks again to Tim Grimes for joining me today on Skeptiko. The one question I’d have to tee up is, what’s your experience with not being quite so serious? How does that work for you? Let me know your thoughts. I’d love for you to join me on the Skeptiko form. I really would like to connect with you. I’d like to know what you think about the show. And the best place to do it is there Skeptiko dash form, you can find it from the website, i’m there I’ll respond if you join me over there. So do that if you’re interested. I have some good shows coming up. I got a bunch in the hopper and I’m gonna start putting them out faster. I just don’t know there’s so many great conversations and dialogues that I’ve been able to have and going to get them out to you one way or another. Until next time, take care and bye for now.

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