Here's here's another reason we're able to do what we do, right. Is I've described you as my laughing friend. We're Uhhuh. We're gonna live to be a hundred years old because I don't know anybody who laughs as much as you and I do, especially yes. When we get to go with each other. So that's, I think having that humor, which we should all have humor, right. That love is the universal language. Well humor and probably music. You gotta be right behind it. Exactly. Yeah. Um, and I think having. You know, doesn't allow us to stray too far. I've I've never been mad at more, you know, mad at you for longer about 48 hours. Hello and welcome to hi, the hello we friends podcast. This is your host, Tommy Jones. And today I got with me one of the. Special people that I know in his name is Joe Manahan. How's it going, Joe? I, I was waiting for you to say somebody else's name when you said most special. I'm like, well, there must be somebody else on here, man. Cause I know he not talking about me like that, but I am doing so well, man. Thank you so much for having me. I know we've been trying to do this for a little while and here it is coming to fruition. It is. And man, one of the, the biggest reasons and what makes this episode so special, Joe was actually one of the biggest catalysts to, to making me think of this idea for this podcast. And this podcast is called, how the hell are we friends? And one of the biggest reasons it's called that is because me and Joe, we are. One of the, one of the most different type of friendships you can see. I am African American grew up in, uh, you know, a little bit rough neighborhood and Joe is, um, Caucasian and, you know, grew up near a farm and we just have so many differences. Uh, the list can just go on and on, but one of the most special things about our friendship is. No matter how different we, of experiences we had, we come together and have conversations about things we disagree about all the time, but at the end of those conversations, we come out with it with a lot of respect. We learned a lot from each other and we're not willing to die on the sword of any topic that we think we're right in because we understand. It's all about learning perspective, growing our understanding of so many different things, because there's no way that we can experience everything. So that's one of the biggest reasons, uh, we're here today. Love it. I, I couldn't have said that better myself, man. I, I wanted, I wanna jump right in. I wanna jump right in because of a conversation that I had yesterday with my girl about this. And I think one of the reasons that we are such good of friends is that we're on the same page when it comes to, you know, what do I want from my, my friendship with you or, or any of my friends really? I'm not looking to win. I'm looking to grow mm-hmm okay. And we could get into the nature of a zero sum game or an infinite game, as opposed to an, an, an ending game, right? Simon Sinek talks about those kind of concepts. Where are you playing to play and, and, uh, and for longevity, or are you playing to win? Which implies somebody else has to lose mm-hmm but I digress. What, what my girl and I were talking about is in relationships, which is not UN unlike friendships. Are you winning the battle? At the expense of winning the war mm-hmm So every time you get into an argument with your girl or a friend, and you're not willing to concede or see the other side, Hey, congratulations. You want an argument? Mm-hmm but you win enough of those little arguments and you make the other first person feel like crap, and you're gonna lose the war. You're not gonna have a friend anymore. You're not gonna have your, a healthy relationship. One of the most enlightening things I heard about that was when you have an argument, especially with a significant other even, or a friend, it's not always about you versus them. It's you two versus the problem. So if you guys have an issue is like, let's figure out what brought us here. We're in disagreement, it's us against the problem. And I think we take that same approach to many of the conversations that we have if we disagree. And we, ah, dude, what are you talking about? There's no way. And we're talking about the problem at hand. We're not judging each other of like, oh, you're incompetent. How the, how the hell could you think something like this is more along lines of, why do you think this where'd you get. Data from where'd you get your information from, I wanna know and go look that article up and read it so I can, uh, educate myself on what you know, and then, Hey, sometimes I change my perspective of like, oh wow, you showed me something. And other times I get it the, uh, chance to do that for you, you know, a hundred percent. And I think it, I think. What we're seeing a lot of today is people's refusal to OB accept objective reality. Uh, it's been skewed a little bit. You and I do a very good job of accepting objective reality. There's been several instances where, you know, you produced evidence, uh, statistical evidence, analytical evidence. Otherwise it's kind of. Impossible to ignore now. So many issues, societal issues that our society faces today, they don't, they don't have a black and white answer. They don't have a left to right answer. Um, and, and there's so many things that are involved in them and that's why we're able to have such good discourse is because it's not so easy and simple. But when you are able to identify a couple of, you know, objective reality, if you can present enough empirical evidence to somebody and say, look, this is the way that it. Even if you do that, the person that you're speaking to has to be listening. Yes. If you're arguing with a wall, I mean, you could be telling them, you could be telling'em two plus two is four all day. If the person you're speaking to grew up in a school system that taught'em two plus two is five. Their objective reality is, is, is so different from yours, right? Wrong or indifferent. They're not gonna hear a word that you said. Exactly. Exactly. So I think that we both do a good job, even though we come from such, uh, different backgrounds. Of acknowledging that like, I could be wrong. I could be right. My right might be just as right as, as you are. I wrong could be, uh, you know, to the same degree that your, uh, wrong is. And also that's a, that's probably a terrible illustration cuz a lot of times stuff isn't just right and wrong. Mm-hmm it's just different. It's different. Yeah. And that's the dude. Yeah. And you hit it right on. The head is that's what this show is about is like it's, it's, there's so many different perspectives and I wanna bring on, you know, different people to have conversations out. Yes. Sometimes we're gonna be agreeing on a lot of stuff. Sometimes we may even get those great opportunities where we disagree and people get to hear, you know, that debate going back and forth. But this isn't a debate style podcast where every time we come on, we gotta have this conflict and contention to, to prove someone right or wrong, or even to change someone's perspective. It's like we may talk about something that we work through so many times now that we're on the same page because we work through it all. But that all brings me to actually one of our, uh, conversations. I think, I don't know if this was like the first one, but I think definitely was a pivotal moment of me really understanding how important other people's experiences and perspectives are. Cause I did come from a school of, oh man, if I, if I read something and I am well versed in it I'm right. And I gotta prove everybody that I'm right. And I had not that much interest in hearing other people's experiences and, and anything like that. Cause I thought it was just one objective. And, you know, having conversations with you shed light on no, there's a lot of relative truths and that's what I wanna learn more of. So I can understand my friends, my family, anyone a lot better. And that was the conversation that we had about politics. So we both know friends that completely stop being friends because they found out who the other voted for. And you and I voted for different people. And I remember I was driving in the car and I was like, I had a friend with me and I was like, you know what, I'm gonna call Joe and see why he voted for why he voted for my friend was like, oh my God, this is about to be such an argumentative conversation. And I'm like, no, no, this is Joe. Like, no. And I remember I called you and we had about a two hour long conversation about Joe. Tell me, what, what is, what do you see? Where's the value do you see in your candidate? Why do you think he's the best candidate for the job? Cause everything that I'm seeing and hearing is absolutely diabolical and it makes me angry at you for even considering him as a candidate. Do you remember that conversation? Absolutely. I do. Yeah. And it was a great conversation because at the end of it, I really think that you and I, we, we made it to this spot cuz uh, there's this show on Netflix, social dilemma and it shows how we are on this algorithm and we're getting fed. What we should see, you know, what time of day we should see it and so on and so forth. So we found out by the end of the conversation that you were being fed all of these positive stories about your candidate and all the good things he's done. And then I found out, wow, I've never seen any of those. And you sent me some videos and I started sharing with you. Well, I seen all this stuff he did, and then I sent it to you. And you're like, I never seen all this. Like, I, I can't say anything against that is wrong, but you know, even though you've seen things are wrong and I've seen things that are. We still, you know, had our own minds made up, but it allowed us to see as like, oh man, we can't just take what we see on the internet sometime as the whole truth, nothing but the truth, you know, and we have to even have conversations so that I think led to me being more open-minded and, and wanting to hear people's experiences and perspectives. So I'm not just writing you off as someone. Think is crazy because the reason why I think you're crazy is because you've seen stuff that I haven't seen before. And I think that's all that crazy boils down to. So once you explain to me what you've seen, you, you become less crazier and I'm like, oh, I can empathize a little bit more. Like he's seen this, this and that. And he lived this, this, this, and that. Of course, these priorities that this candidate has is more alluring to him. You. yeah, that was, uh, very, very profound timing. The timing around the election and then that, that documentary, the social dilemma and how it really uncovered, like why we formed the opinions that we formed in addition to the ones. that we had grounded in principle, you know, maybe that we were raised with mm-hmm that could have been a little different, right? A lot of those are the same when, if, when you're talking, uh, morally typically, but, but then when you're talking principles and, and governing principles, how do we navigate this? You know, the, the most successful democracy in the history of humankind and govern each other and those principles are different, right? So we're, we're born with some, um, or I'm sorry, born into environments. Uh, some are reinforced. And then in that time it's like, well, here's this embodiment of my principles in my candidate. And then you ha you might have an embodiment of principles that you disagree with from that same candidate, it was like, well, hang on. How did that happen? And that's what we discovered was clicks, lead to clicks that every time I thumbs up something. That, um, reinforced kind of what I already believed in or what I already had a, had a hunch to believe in, or, or some of those principles that I, um, was surrounded by growing up, it led to more and more and more of those. And conversely, each time you like something or share something that, you know, steers the opposite direction, you're gonna be exposed to more and more and more of those that, that, um, yeah, that documentary was, was pretty profound. Yes. And if you think about. We become what we see and what we believe, cuz those are our experiences. Right? So think about like a lot. I know like the, the age of data right now is amazing because like in a book I read, uh, limitless, they went through this little ex script of saying that we can learn in one single day. All the information that it took a man from the 14 hundreds, his whole life to learn. So we have so much access to data. But the scary thing about it is, is since we are what we consume as in oh, these videos or these, uh, articles, and, and that's who we start to form our opinions around and we will, you know, that becomes our objective truth. And we don't choose that it's chosen for us. So like you said, clicks leads the clicks. The more we watch one video, oh, it's gonna give us more. So it paints us and, and creates us into this person that, you know, how much control did we have over becoming this person? Believe in what we believe, because that's, how many times have you talked to person that. Oh, I read this article this weekend, AKA, I saw a meme with these words under it, about your candidate. That wasn't so nice. You know, it is just like, that's not scholarly source. You're not seeking it out. It was fed to you. So since it was fed to you, you are becoming what you eat and it's just crazy. So now we're at this, this great. Point of divide in society to where you are, who you are, because what you clicked on. And if I am different, if I clicked on different stuff, we, we have to be divided in fight. And I think what's so beautiful about us. We can see through all that rhetoric. And unfortunately, a lot of people don't like you said, they don't even wanna listen to it because they say, oh, I've watched all these videos. I know what I'm talking about. I'm not listening to you because two plus two is five, not four for us to be able to break that wall down and say, okay, is this something. That I think I know the answer to, but go ahead and actually respecting and listen. That is, I think one of the best things in the world that you can do for another person and for yourself. And it's the age of information is a double edge sword, right? Because prior to the advent of social media and the internet, the only news that we were subjected to, well, if you go back far enough was, were newspapers now who controlled? What went in the newspapers? I don't, I don't have that answer off the top of my head. I'm not a historian then after that is the radio. Well, who controlled what went into the radio and after that is TV. Who controlled what you saw on TV. So there was always been this aspect of control mm-hmm and I would argue that it wasn't in the public's hands. And now I would argue that information is in the public's hands. Now, is that, is that dangerous or is it helpful? Ooh, there's a couple, there's a couple podcasts full of content right there, man. I know. Right. But, but at least it's available at at least it's available. So I think there's an argument to be made that, um, and this is the, the, the disinformation misinformation argument. Is that okay? Well, too much information and anybody can just put anything on the internet and of course. This availability has now been kind of eclipsed. If you will, by the ability to misrepresent people, mm-hmm you can type anything and make it appear as though it's a tweet. okay. Mm-hmm but you gotta go to that person's profile and determine did this person actually tweet that. Yep. And, and, and, and that's like, that's scratching the surface when we start talking deep fakes. Oh my gosh. Now the possibilities are endless. You could put words into anybody's mouth. You could take any New York times headline and change it to say whatever you want. And I would venture to say 95% of the people would never even back check Google. The freaking headline to see if there's any truth that I just experienced. This a close family member, uh, sent me an article. It bro. It took me, it took me three minutes to get on YouTube and send it right back to him and go. But stop sharing this because that was crap. What somebody sent you was complete fake nonsense. Here's the real one, you know, and it tells me it's like, how did you not, how do you not do your research guys? Come on. Yeah. You know, I, I, I think you and I have been doing this long enough and I'm sure we have, you know, similar conversations with all types of other people that I'm very careful what I'm going to. you know, mm-hmm, maybe I haven't always been that careful, but cert I have been for a long time. If, if you know, I, I feel as though my social media is an extension of myself. Mm-hmm um, whether people, you know, uh, believe that or go along with it or not. And so I'm gonna make sure that what I put out there, I fact checked it myself to a degree mm-hmm to where, um, I I'm comfortable saying like, look well with the information that I was given and what I've seen and the research that I've done, this, this is it, you know? Yeah. This is, and it's not a fake, you know yeah. At a minimum at a minimum. Yeah. Cuz like to go back to what you just said a few seconds ago, is anyone going to take that time to go and fact check that. If you're scrolling endlessly through, through Instagram, you see something, you take that as gospel because it speaks to the narrative that you already have going in your brain. You're like, Nope, I already thought something. Or I've seen two other articles. I'm not even gonna fact check that. Even if it's something that someone else tweeted, uh, I'm not, I'm not gonna go fact check that. Like I'm just scrolling and then they internalize that information and take it. And what you were saying is like, is that good? That we're able to just go out and do this? And it's just like, Like yes and no, like yes. Freedom of speech. It's great. We're able to go on and say anything, but that I think is, is what our show is steeped in. Period is just like this show is like, yes, go and say anything you want, but also you have to equally have the want to go and understand someone that's trying to argue against something that you read. And I think that is the most valuable. Thing that we're gonna have as this age of just all the misinformation and being able to post whatever you want. I think the distinguishing factor is going to all boil down to the individuals that can actually listen to someone else's point of like, oh, I read this on the internet. I seen this mean. And if someone's like, oh, that's not true because X, Y, and Z, the people that are going to Excel here in their future are the people that are going to be able to stop, listen, and really figure out what's real from what's fake, because it's, it's like you said, it's coming so close to being indistinguishable because no one has the time or even the want to go and do a quick little Google research because they're already scrolling on Instagram and they're not gonna stop watching their, their videos just to go and see if what you said was. Absolutely. And we're about to find out how deep you're trying to take this first podcast, because I'm gonna throw something out there. That's gonna be a bit controversial. Go ahead. Um, but these things that we're talking about, some people's willingness and ability to dive just an inch deep, just an inch deep past the head headline past the meme, pass the caption that they read. You know, fact check the fact check. and do, do, do just a, the quickest, Google search, YouTube search, whatever, um, to determine whether or not something they saw was even real. Now what, what small percent of our population is that then the majority who falls in love with the quick click bait and is way too quick to share and gets caught up in these, um, in these passionate, I, I ideals that go along with all the things that they've been conditioned to believe in. Right. Okay. Those people can vote. Tommy mm-hmm So they are taking things at face value and they're making decisions, very important decisions, AKA who they're voting for mm-hmm and they're taking that to the poll and they're uneducated, unwilling to educate themselves. I wouldn't even call, I don't even call it uneducated sometimes, you know, not being educated is not your, you know, your, uh, your fault. I would also say it. It's also not society's fault maybe, but I. The willingness to be educated, the willingness to, to, to do your own research. Mm-hmm and there's so many people who aren't willing to do that, but their vote counts as much as yours and mine. Mm-hmm and I feel like the longer, this, um, the longer things go on and things progress in our society to, to what I would say in a detrimental way. I think we need to rethink as a country. That right to vote. I don't know if that right to vote should be as universal as that right to free speech is. Ooh. But man, wouldn't that be such a hard thing or aspect to govern, actually going through and trying to ascertain someone's level of education or someone's willingness to go and research what they actually hear. I think that'll be something so hard to deploy and then to actually, you know, continuously monitor to understand of like, oh Joe, you're coming to vote. Okay. Show us your credentials. That you're competent enough to distinguish between fake news and real news. And like how, how would one do that? Wouldn't that just that'd be such a hard undertaking, right? That's an, that's a very difficult, complicated question. And I think it's one that's worth exploring, but here's here's the, the first step is being able, willing and able to have the conversation about it, which we are mm-hmm but a lot of folks are not, you know? Yeah. They just shut it down, turned off by my statement just now. That they would call me a, a, a bigot and a, uh, you know, insensitive and, oh, you know, you're gonna, you're gonna cut so many disenfranchised marginalized groups out of the voting process and you're gonna have their decisions made for them. And I think to a degree, people who are, are, are mentally incapable of, of making healthy decisions for themselves. Well, how on earth are they, are we gonna trust them to make, you know, decisions for. Society. Uh, but just, just being willing to have the conversation is the first step in the right direction. Because so many people, um, with that conversation and many others, they're like, no, we're not even gonna approach that topic. That's crazy. That's absurd, whatever they wanna call it. So you're even your willingness to ask a tough question. All right. How would we go about that? What does that look like? That's a you're you're already light years ahead of a lot of your peers, man. Thank you. Yeah. And I think that's what it's all about. Cuz like you just said, a lot of people will have that perspective of being like, yo, what the hell are you talking about? And they automatically think that your intentions are to strip away or to make someone's vote lesser than, or not even. On some specifics, uh, parameters or, or anything like that, that we don't even haven't even defined yet, but they'll automatically define them just based off of what you said. And it's like, no, this is, this is a, a high level, 10,000 foot view of, Hey, could this happen? Like cuz yeah. What if we have a lot of people that, that the America or. Our democracy is not at the forefront of their mind, and they're not even doing the work that they should to understand that both candidates and what information they're taking in about both candidates is reliable or scholarly sourced or not, you know? So like I get that and there is some substance to even having that conversation, but then, yeah, that'll be a. That'd be a long, long conversation. to kinda figure that out. I think it can, you know, a start would be as simple as mental capability and decision making ability. And I, I, and I'm not even talking about, you know, what comes to mind is not excluding 50% of our society. I think that's what, what comes to other people's mind when you start talking about voting rights and, and who, who should have them and who shouldn't is you, they, they assume kinda like you were mentioning that. I'm trying to remove some massive subset of the population. Maybe I'm not, maybe I'm just talking about that. Tiny, tiny, maybe it's a 10th of a percent of our, of the voting age population. Maybe it's a, maybe it's a 20th of a percent, a fifth of a percent, an entire percent. But you know, I think it would be difficult to argue against the fact that there is some small portion, whatever that number is out of the 350 million Americans that have no business going into. Voting booth and making decisions for the rest of society, because they're truly mentally incapable of a lot of things. Yeah. You know, voting is just one of them maybe, maybe mentally incapable of, of, I don't, I don't even wanna use a, uh, I don't wanna use an example cuz it's could, could lead and steer so many different directions. What comes to mind is, you know, um, Yeah. Yeah. It's tough, man. I mean, we're kind. Yeah. So, you know what I mean? Like, it's, it's really hard. Like what I, what are those things, but yeah, we don't. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I get you there. All right, Joe. So give me an example of a time in your life. That was very pivotal. That leads to kind of the thesis of this show of when was a time or an experience that you had that allowed you to actually want to learn and hear about someone's experiences. Unlike what we were talking about earlier, where, you know, sometimes people just stop listening. If someone is, is having an opposing opinion or opposing view, like what made you really drop the preconceived notion? That someone was automatically wrong if they didn't agree with you. And that gave you the patience and the want to, to listen to them, to, you know, gain more perspectives to broaden your own horizon. I think I was, I think I was raised with a level of respect toward other people's opinions. Um, and maybe not even their opinions so much as their various backgrounds, you know, like I, I, I didn't, I wasn't brought up with, uh, any preconceived notion that one group of people was any, any worse than another group of people or. Should Harbor ill will toward anybody, especially if you don't know'em I think you, you never know what somebody's dealing with, uh, or what they've dealt with in the past. So I think you gotta take whatever they are are saying with an understanding, with a level of empathy, which you love to speak about that that permits you to say, okay, I don't know where this person's been. I don't know necessarily know where they're coming from. Unless you've asked all those questions and you have, you've had a lot of those conversations. A stranger or, or someone that even, you know, you just don't know deeply is gonna have such a varied background. And you like, you love to use the example of my brother and I, my brother and I are very, very different people, but we were born and raised in the same house. So somebody who was born in a different house is gonna be even more different. And somebody born in a wildly, you know, different house across the country in a completely different, um, environment with a different, you know, family background and all the above is gonna have a vastly vastly different. Or could have a vastly vastly different opinion based upon their life's experiences. Uh, look, I, I forget who it was, it was either Patrick Henry or Thomas Jefferson, but it was, I may not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death, your right to say it. That's like a hardcore freedom of speech type of quote from our founding fathers that I love, you know, everybody's opinion has some level of value and it's gonna be different based on their experiences. So just having that empathy, that like, this person didn't grow up where I grew up this person. Didn't mm-hmm things I've seen. This person didn't experience the things I've experienced or vice versa. I haven't experienced the things that they've experienced. And who's to say that given those same inputs that they have had, that I wouldn't form the same opinion that they have. Mm. Yeah. There's nothing to suggest. Otherwise, if, if a, um, a doctor based on his experience gives a diagnosis and, and another doctor gives a different one. Well, who's to say that if you had the exact same experiences that you wouldn't come up with the exact same diagnosis, and we really don't have a reason to think otherwise. So we are a product of our environments. And our environments are very different, even in a, even in the same country, you know, di America's the most diverse country in the world. We are the melting pot and, you know, being the freest for so long, we have more freedom of ideas. So we're gonna have the most diverse ideas of any population of in human history, which is pretty wild to think about. So in addition to. Clicking down the rabbit hole, just the nature of this country itself, being a diverse, melting pot and being on top of that, a free thinking and free speaking, diverse, melting pot. Well guess what, we're gonna have a bunch of different opinions out there. And so that lends itself to some disagreements discussions and, and discourse. Yeah. No, I love that, man. That's beautifully said. Yeah, that's a, that's a, that's a good story. And. How would you think that this translates into relationships? What are some of the things that you experienced, uh, that you find important even when it comes to like finding someone you like you wanna be with or someone that is your soulmate? When it comes to picking my soulmate and my life partner, I don't need empathy. I need compatibility. Mm-hmm and I would choose compatibility. And a likeminded reasonable, you know, person that has maybe a similar background, similar experiences. I would choose that I am, I am choosing that over, you know, me trying to fix myself and be more empathetic. I think it's important. And I can be empathetic with other people outside of my, like very personal. Partnership like my relationship, my soul mate, who who's going to be my wife, right? Every girl in the world I will attempt to get along with and empathize with. But when it comes to my wife, give me that compatibility, bro. Give me the, keep the, uh, the conflict. Keep the, uh, the difficulties. I don't need'em I don't need to grow that much as a person. I would rather just have somebody that I can grow with, but that we start close to the same page. Yeah. See, this is one that I'm going to contest. I think with my experiences, cuz I hear what you saying is compatibility. And I think I spent a lot of years of my life looking for sad compatibility, right? We have this idea of a person and expectations of what a person should be and, and do and how they should move. And if there is a lot of synchronicities and we have a lot of synergies, I guess you would say, but. Living longer and becoming more and more empathetic. I think the key to pretty much any relationship is empathy because in me and my fiance, we are different. We have completely different backgrounds. I mean, and she grew up with loving, loving parents, both of them, you know, and mine loved me in their own ways, which I am understanding now, but just completely different. And that made us different people. We have different backgrounds and environments that we grew up around and hung out with and, and all of that. And so we're so different on so many levels. Right. So if I looked at, as, as a compatibility, Just based on that. I'm like, ah, man, we just hoof. We came from such a different background and we like some of the different things because of that background and we handled problems so differently because of that background. But the part that I think makes us so strong and grow together to grow together is the fact that I'm empathetic that, okay, you have a different background. You're going to handle this situation differently. Let me understand and empathize where you're coming from, why you feel this way. And. I get, I get to that point and it's like, okay, I understand. I accept you. I get it. And problems are so much more shorter. Arguments are so much more shorter because if you come to the table and you can empathize with each other, no matter how different you are, you are there, you know, fighting towards the same purpose. And then that ultimately brings you together. And I think that's made us stronger than ever is just the ability to see each. And understand each other and then, then move through. Because if I am living with this constant expectation of compatibility, that's always gonna be challenged. That compatibility is going to is going to hit a dead end on so many different avenues. Once you get to know each other better. Because it's just like, I don't wanna date. And that's another thing I don't wanna date myself. So if I'm so compatible, I don't wanna just date someone just like me. That's gonna be a yes, man. Like I ask her to challenge me all the time. I'm like, don't just be, yes, man. I, I need to continuously see where I need to grow. And that's where, yeah. We're not compatible in some areas, but she pushes me to grow in the areas that we're not compatible in. And that is all derived from empathy. So I think that's the only thing I would, I would challenge you on that one to, to hopefully see if you see that differently. Or if you have a, a rebuttal that can put me back into a different lane of perspective. I think that, I think that you're taking for granted that your counterpart or mine was just kind of more, what we're speaking to would have the same empathy. If they don't, I'm in a world of trouble, I'm over here empathizing with their feelings, with their attitude. With their experiences, that crew that have created the person that they are. And in turn, I'm not getting any empathy back and I'm, mm-hmm, just, I'm, I'm bearing the brunt and the weight of this person is who they are. They are, who they've said they are from the get go from the first, first couple of red flags. Mm-hmm um, and they're not empathizing with my mistakes, my little idiosyncrasies that drive'em crazy. And instead of empathizing with me and, and working together to find a solution, which is, sounds like is what you and your fiance do. If only what I'm getting at is if only one person in the party is empathetic and the other person is seeking. Ruthless compatibility and wants you to bend to their, to their way of things. Mm-hmm and to their will. You're still gonna have a lot of problems. Yeah, exactly. No. Yeah. Two empathetic people. Sure. You guys are off the races. Yeah. One empathetic person and one person completely stuck in their ways and completely UN uh, unrelenting in their beliefs. Mm, exactly. But that, and that, that you, I think you helped me prove my point, that that would never work. Right. So the thing is, is you either find this anomaly in the world of two people that are just so compatible that don't need to really grow or get out of their comfort zone too much to make a beautiful partnership. And yeah, I'm not saying it's impossible, but the, the probability of it, I think is a little low. Because there is, uh, an infinite amount of variables for experiences, even two people growing up in the same household, like you and your brother, you grew up in the exact same household, probably watched the same movies, you know, had the same, you know, upbringing, but you're two totally different people, right? Yeah. And you had some of the most similar experiences growing up, but every single person can even take an experience completely differently. Like think about a movie you watch 10 times. now the fifth or sixth time, you're probably like, oh my God. I never even noticed that in the movie. Oh, wow. I didn't see that. So your perspective changes each time you watch one exact same thing. So think about how that can vary for another person. So finding someone that you're a hundred percent compatible with is so hard and, and that's what you rely on is that compatibility. Are you, are you saying it's. I didn't say a hundred percent compatible. Oh yeah. Close enough though. I'm talking, I'm talking just a foundation about Tommy. Let me give you another story. Okay. I found, oh no, we gotta, we gotta finish this one though. Cause this, I think this is wildly relevant to what we're talking about. Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. Go ahead. I found, I found compatibility and chemistry on the other side of the world. With a girl who didn't speak English mm-hmm and she, and I got along better than, you know, darn near every girl I've ever dated. And we didn't speak the same language. There was a mutual respect there, you know, her mannerisms loved them. I appreciated them. The way we were able to laugh. The time that we spent together, all I'm saying is that the, in, in the two months that we were together and that amount of time that we get to spend together, there were just rarely an argument. Now you could argue that that's because we didn't speak the same language, but we obviously communicated to a degree. So make no mistake that, you know, she had a couple words in English and I knew just enough words in Japanese. And then we got Google translated. It's 2020 about the time it's 2018, but you know what I mean? I found my, my point is I found compatibility in someone who had a wildly different. Wildly different upbringing and experiences in a different culture. Did she have that different of an, of an upbringing or was she raised similarly to me to, to respect other people and to treat her partner in a way that I appreciated and she appreciated the way that I treated her kind of a thing. You know what I mean? Yeah. So I'm just. There was an example where we were far from a hundred percent compatible. You know, she ate some food that I thought was very questionable um, yeah. but, but we were compatible enough in the things that matter and the things that matter are, are ultimately, you know, how do you treat another person? Are you treating them with. Respect. And are you treating him with love? And that's one of my favorite books. Love and respect by Emerson. Arick I I've told you to read it like a hundred times. If you haven't it's on my list. It's on my list. oh yeah. That list is long. It is so, oh no, I, I get what you're saying and I want, I wanna think about it out. I'm trying to, I'm trying to paint it in a way. So it was. Compatibility in my opinion. And my experiences is yes, it's something to, to attract and to draw another person together because we all like being around like-minded individuals. We all like being in that comfort zone where we feel safe, because if we're extremely respectful and that's how our parents brought us up to be, we would love our significant others to, to bear the same qualities in the attributes. Right. But. In my opinion, that compatibility is almost equated to lust, right? And empathy is equated to love. You can be attracted and lustful for someone that you're compatible with, because those are the initial things that you see like, oh, okay, we have this in common. And we, we must be compatible because we get along and we have the same, you know, morals and the same values. But at the end of the day, Like you said, you're not gonna be a hundred percent compatible. So whenever that other opposing compatibility comes along or rears its ugly head of things that you're not compatible in, how do you handle those situations? Right. Cause it's inevitable. It's going to come up now, if you both don't have empathy towards each other. You're trying to explain, uh, around those things that you're not compatible in. If you don't have empathy, that relationship is gonna become a little bit, you know, tumultuous and argumentative, maybe because you're both not being seen by the other person for things that you're not compatible with. So why it may be amazing to be compatible with someone. I feel like the sustainability comes in. Where empathy comes in. Okay. Two couple things. I think I, I didn't like your, your comparison of compatibility with lust. And I think where you're leading with that, you're mistaking the word compatibility with chemistry. And I did not mean chemistry. No, no, no, no. At all, those are, those are very different things, but here's what I, here's what I do wanna replace. I wanna replace the word compatibility as the way we've discussed it with respect. And so I think what I was seeking and am seeking is respect. From from the other part, you can't change the word that deepen the argument. Joe cuz respect and compatibility are wildly different. Like respect is like empathy is required for respect. You can't truly respect someone unless you stop. Take a second and be like, okay, I see where they're coming. I respect you. There's no way. Two people, very similar people and very different people. Can often have different definitions for the word respect or not even definitions for the word can have different feelings about how they give an exhibit and show respect. Okay. Mm-hmm so in a social situation, I may think that acting a certain way is respectful. You may think that acting in a slightly different. It's all relative to your experiences as a environment, your experiences. So I just wanted someone who was on the same page when it came to respecting their partner as I was, that's what I was talking about when I was referring to compatibility. Okay. Yeah, no, I get you now and yeah. Yeah. That's sustainable. Yeah. That's sustainable. We're not talking chemistry. We're not talking lust. Yeah, we're talking. Being on the same page. What I think is being respectful is what they think is being respectful. Yeah. That totally makes sense. Because if you think about different cultures, some cultures be like, Hey, that's my bitch. And a woman would love that in other cultures it's like, excuse me. Did, did you just call me a bitch? Like, and it's completely different, but in some cultures that's extremely respectful. They're like, oh, that's my man. He, you know, he's talking about me. I love him, but no, I get that you, so you're on the same wave. But I do challenge you going forward to think about empathy and how it pertains to relationships, because there's going to be so many times that in your relationship that you disagree and you're upset at that person. And all you can think about is I gotta see her to, to understand what this means to me and how I grew up with this problem and how I solved this problem. And you're gonna want that other person. To meet you where you're at and in empathy is to be meeting kind of like more so in the middle of, oh wait, you handled this problem differently in your household. And even starting to ask those questions, I think is initiator of empathy, you know, but that's it. We don't have to talk about empathy no more, but if you had something to say, I'll let you go ahead and go. Oh, no, no, no. We'll be here for another two hours, man. I know. Right. I was like, all right, alright, we gotta get this back on track. Um, but yeah man, I mean, there we go. That's an example of Joseph and Tommy having a conversation. We always don't see eye to eye, but we have a, we have a, a hoop talking about the, I come into these conversations with my eyes closed, so I don't see anything. just kidding. Oh man. But yeah, dude. I mean I think, yeah, this embodied. What I wanted to show everybody. So I really appreciate you being on here with me today. And I really, you know, I want people to see our friendship and say, well damn, yeah, they, they, that we disagreed there, you know, for a lot, we, we got a chance to talk about both of our perspectives and understand each other better for it. And, you know, take a little bit of what you're saying and, and a little bit of what I'm saying, probably home with each other and using that in our day to day lives of just like, yeah, I get, I get what he's saying. You know, that compatibility, that respect. I gotta make sure I see the way that my lady sees respect and ensure that I fulfill that. And hopefully you can go home and say, well, damn, yeah. I need to make sure I see where she's coming from and inquire about her experiences because Tommy's right. I grew up with my brother. We're damn different. So I can imagine how. Different experiences she's had. So I need to learn a little bit of that, so yeah, man, appreciate the time. Uh, thank you. Fine. I'll more empathetic, man. If you want me to be more empathetic, I'll be more empathetic. Goodness. Grace, you could have just said that. Could somebody told me that we just been an hour talking about Joe, you need to be more empathetic. You said here we an hour later and a whole podcast in, I know. My roundabout way of getting my way I had to start a podcast to spread into these uh, love it, man. Well, dude, thanks again so much. This has been, this has been so much fun and I look forward to having you on here with other guests and having these same enticing conversations with them in the future. But, um, but yeah, let people know where they can find you, man. What's your Instagram and, and uh, all that good. Okay. Yeah. It's at Monohan last name, Joe. So at Monohan Joe, last first, couldn't be easier than that. There you go. I'm opinionated on there. So brace yourself. I was described this weekend and somebody said, oh, you're such and such Joe. You're. Yes, I am. Yes, I am that Joe, but he's, he's, he's a great person though. You know, he has opinions, but he's not stuck to those opinions. If you can actually have a, an intelligent conversation with him. And that's what I love about the guy, so, oh yeah, man. This was a good show and this is, uh, Tommy Jones and yeah, you can find me at tank travels too. And at how the hell are we friends? Thank you so much. And I'll talk to you. Beautiful people next week, Joe. I think we did it that wasn't even supposed to be an episode, but I guess I think it was an episode.