The Exchanges

Q Like, because you can say that in your head and be really cerebral, cerebral about it, but do you think that people need to show that they're excited about life?

A I wish people would because right now what people are showing is I'm beaten down by life. And look, there's very real things to be worried about and to feel stress around. There are very real problems that people have. This is not like just smile and your shit goes away. That's not what this is. This is counter-programming to the negative programming that the world is giving you and that you are wired For positivity. You're wired for growth. There's no, it's not a matter of whether or not you are, quote, spiritual, because you are wired for spirituality. They've looked at people's brains, and there's circuitry in your brains, because spirituality, by definition, is this belief and awareness that there is something larger than you to this existence. And that day to day, you have moments where you feel connected to it. Spirituality can mean that you're out sitting in a, uh, like a, a deer stand, and you hear a crack in the woods, and then through the trees, you see a barred owl, and you just have this moment where you connect to something deeper. Spirituality could be, you know, singing a hymn. It could be making love to somebody that you love deeply. It could be being present when somebody dies. It could be just enjoying a cup of tea and taking a deep breath. That there's something larger going on. And so to me, Why would you want to go through life feeling that the only thing a…

AI assessment note: “I wish people would because right now what people are showing is I'm beaten”

Q Do you think that you would, like, can you be really successful without having a massive failure at some point?

A I don't think you can live a life without having a massive failure. You're gonna have a massive failure if you're not successful. That's just life. And it's not about what's going to happen to you, because horrible things will happen to you. Unfair things are going to happen to you. They maybe already have. They're going to be amazing things that happen to you. It took me so long to recognize that while I was so busy trying to manage everything and everybody else, and I had lots of opinions and upsetness about the unfairness of this or that or the other. I was missing The fact that it's not about what's happening out there. The power is in here. Your power is in now. What are you going to do about it? Like through your actions and your attitude, you can make anything better. And that's not toxic positivity. That is the truth. It doesn't remove the very real issues that a lot of people face in, you know, the world today. It doesn't remove historical things that have kept people from, from gaining wealth. Like if you look at the way that black families were discriminated against and unable and discriminated against and not able to buy a house, which is the single biggest form of the way we transfer generational wealth to people. And it is not just impacted their grandparents and their parents, but now the generation that is real. That is not fair. It is a reality. And what are yo…

AI assessment note: “I don't think you can live a life without having a massive failure.”

Q think that, I mean, nobody wants to stay in all the negative states, but could you imagine a person who had never experienced the deepest, darkest parts, that hadn't had the biggest highs, that hadn't been so angry and so sad and so upset? Why do we have to feel like we can't feel them? Why do we have to be happy all the time? Where's the context in that?

A I think everybody just has this It's a wild array of emotions, and that, I think it has a lot to do, if I were to get, like, intellectual about it, it has to do with the fact that we are wired to connect with other people, and when you experience any form of social rejection, whether it's walking down the hallway at middle school, and oh, there's the cool kids, and I'm the weird one, or nobody wants to be the weird one, And the part of the brain that experiences social rejection is the same part of the brain where you experience physical pain, and so you will viscerally move away from any experience where you're the weird one. This is why we're having such a huge problem right now with self-silencing, because especially the younger generation is so worried about feeling cringe, because cringe, oh my god, I don't even feel cringe, and here's the truth, cringe Is actually doing it right. Because if you're gonna do something where you step out of your comfort zone for the first time, you will feel cringy. Yeah. That is what it feels like to do something for the first time. And it also feels like social rejection and pain. And so if you feel cringy, when you put up your first YouTube video, you did it correctly. If you feel cringy, when you go to your first pitch meeting and ask your friends and family for money, and you're like, oh God, what? You did it right. Because your body's …

AI assessment note: “people are uncomfortable, especially sharing the lows. Because they are afraid of being judged”

Q Yeah, your face right now says it all. But some of these modalities you do live from what I can tell from videos that I've seen of other people. What, what do you tell people to do tactically? They want to become more happier. If they want to take more action in their life, and they're going, Mel, boss me around.

A Well, and here's what I'm going to tell you. This isn't just your buddy Mel telling you this. There's Dr. Judith Joseph, who is, uh, she runs, she's a principal investigator, which means she runs a lab as a PhD medical doctor and professor at NYU. Single mom, runs the only all female medical lab, research lab, uh, called the Manhattan Behavioral Institute. And she is actually responsible for getting the research done that got the first postpartum drug passed through the FDA by the, by the FDA. Wow. So they, they do all these clinical research studies. She has all this new research that says a huge research paper out about high functioning depression, which is this, you're getting it done, but the, just the wet blank, you can't feel anything. The prescription from Dr. Judith Joseph is small moments of joy. Small moments where you separate from the heaviness of the world around you, and the burden of caring for aging parents, and the burden of balancing the bank account, and wondering how you're going to get the loan paid, and figuring out how, like, to get the online marketing stuff done, and can I get my cousin's kid in here to run the Instagram account? Like, I hear you. Yes. How do I get the shop pay integrated into this thing? Like, when are we doing this? Somebody do our internet strategy, because I'm running the cash register here.

AI assessment note: “The prescription from Dr. Judith Joseph is small moments of joy.”