Jordan (00:01.848)
Doing it live.
Curt Cronin (00:05.836)
Jordan, I'm so elated, honored, ecstatic, blown away to be able to do this podcast with you at this time, at this moment, and it's such an incredible gift. I am going against all of my known rational, logical fears to do this podcast, because I do feel like it is a, this moment and portion of it feels more called than anything I've done in terms of being able to.
My highest hope is I have had humans show up for me in the darkest depths of despair, some that I didn't even know that I was in, and grab my hand and pull me out. And so part of the title is I'm hoping that someone at some point Googles impossible when they feel like they're in an impossible situation. And they'll get to hear the stories of the people that have shared their life experiences on this podcast and go, well, if those people can do it, I can do it. And so if
if I can see other humans and I'm from a tiny farm town in the middle of nowhere. And if we can have this conversation, then ideally that time capsule goes to wherever it needs to be at the moment that needs to be there. So super excited and elated to have you here and to share your story, which to me is unbelievably impossible and now unbelievably inevitable and really get some of your context and perspective that is unique to you.
Jordan (01:26.158)
Hmm. Also, by the way, from a small town, but it used to be more in the middle of nowhere. It's called Holodis, Texas. It's much less in the middle of nowhere now, but still small town in Texas, not quite a farm boy, but I get it.
Curt Cronin (01:39.756)
So in the ever present now, if you look back in the past, what is something that in your past felt deeply impossible to you? And to the greatest extent possible, bring us back to kind of the difficulty and how impossible it felt. And then I'd love in any way you want to share, what path did you go, who did you reach out to, what was your...
nonlinear process for finding a way to get to it now being inevitable and something deep in your past that's now, you could look back and say it's easy, but at the time I'm sure that at the moment it was not.
Jordan (02:13.11)
Yeah, that's the hard part because, you really do have to run the back of the clock because once you've kind of, I guess the exact point is gone through the transformation of self that is precisely the point. All right. The, let me say something the other way. When we say that something is impossible, when we feel that something is impossible, we obviously mean impossible for, right? It is, it is impossible for, my dog to fly, but it's not impossible for a bird to fly.
So when something is impossible for me, what that means is the only thing left is for me to become someone else. And so of course, once you become someone else, it's a little bit more difficult to go back and feel the place where, or the identity where the impossibility was so present and so heavy. And I will sort of preemptively.
Actually, literally, I will beg forgiveness for the fact that I am aware of the degree to which I'm not, let's just say normal, a normal person. So some of the things that I might say will seem absurd to most people. Like most people are be like, that was impossible? You're out of your mind. What are you talking about, loser? And point of fact, yeah, exactly. That's the point. Now there are things that I've always been able to do. This is the other part of it. I've always been able to do that many other people found to be difficult or impossible.
Curt Cronin (03:31.04)
It is.
Jordan (03:37.742)
And so in many cases for me, a lot of the stuff that was actually, I'll give you an example. So 1999, uh, me and, and four of my friends, most of whom were my college friends with effectively no business experience and effectively no relationships or contacts decided to go to war with the two biggest tech companies in the world at the time, Microsoft and Apple. Um,
Curt Cronin (04:02.762)
Makes sense?
Jordan (04:03.938)
Yeah, of course, it's wisdom, the wisdom of a 29 year old. And in the context of trying to shape, change the trajectory of how video was rolling out on the internet, which we felt was actually important and fun. And we did it, right? We were successful. We were able to out-compete those companies and all lots of other big companies in the meantime, and did meaningfully change the shape of video on the internet. But the thing is that wasn't of the same category.
That was hard for sure, but it felt quite doable. By contrast, let me think, how far out is this? Like seven years later?
And even that four, four five years later, sitting in a place of being sort of an embryonic master of the universe in the techie world, having to come to terms with the fact that I didn't really know how to have the full or even a reasonable fraction of the human experience. I mean, literally down to the notion that I had to have a conversation with somebody about
Curt Cronin (05:11.958)
Mm.
Jordan (05:14.766)
What does it mean to feel like? What is a feeling now? Now in some sense, obviously I could, you know, I could taste bitterness and I could see the light. So I had sensoria, but, um, the portfolio of sophistication and nuance that I had for being able to understand and distinguish between say anger and frustration was shockingly limited. And I'm not kidding. And I'm talking about a, again, a 35 year old parent, um, who has successfully gone through a lot of
strategically challenging environments. But the thing that turned out to be impossible was actually just being able to be in a loving relationship with the people who I love.
Curt Cronin (05:56.78)
And my four prayers and meditations right now are on for awareness, discernment, wisdom and grace. And so how did you come upon that awareness that that was even important? Because it sounds like that was a new distinction for you. Like how did that even show up as something that needed to be pursued?
Jordan (06:18.69)
Yeah, that's a good question because we're kind of zooming in on the notion of...
even work. If you haven't got eyes, how do you know that you're blind? Something like that. So in my case, it was just a profound level of frustration and sadness and coming to the end of my rope. Right. So this is one of the great problems of actually having competence that you try to, if you, if you're really good with a hammer, you really try to think that everything's a nail. and then you just go.
Curt Cronin (06:31.02)
Mm-hmm.
Curt Cronin (06:50.654)
You just nailed the SEAL philosophy.
Jordan (06:52.398)
Yeah, there we go. This is such a funny juxtaposition. I'm going to be shocked to see how this plays out. Yeah, it nailed the SEAL philosophy. So I was really, really good at some stuff and shockingly utterly completely absent a bunch of other stuff. And so of course, like many, I tried to figure out how to solve, let think, what's a good, the saw problem with a hammer, which, you you could, you can
hammer a board in half if you really, really want to. But it's quite ragged. It's not a very, very clean cut. And so what happened was that my relationships were just terrible. My relationships with the people who I had really intended and committed to being in forever, like literally being in relationship with them forever, particularly my kids, just were not anywhere near where they wanted to be. And my awareness of that, my awareness of the lack was quite clean.
this is not good, this is not working, I'm not feeling positive, I am not feeling kind, I'm not feeling, I'm feeling sort of frustrated and angry all too often. And self-recriminatory, starting to get engaging in sort of identity, what's that called?
I can't remember what it's called. Basically establishing that my identity was the problem. I literally was not worthy, which in some sense was actually true in a very profound way.
Curt Cronin (08:18.014)
And in fascinating is often a cop out because as soon as you can say that it's just me, then you don't have to work on it. So that's to me, your courage to say, I would like it to be just me, but I'm not settled. I will not live in this depraved state anymore. It sounds like you hit a moment of no more, never again.
Jordan (08:32.526)
Hmm.
Jordan (08:37.548)
Yeah, yeah. the weird thing is, man, this is this is theologically true. The weird thing is then at that point, surrender to actually be able to say, I need help. I don't know how to do this. And it's so far beyond my capacity. There's no way I'm going to get there on my own. So I actually just need help. And so in this case, I remember actually having conversations with the gentleman, Sebastian, who was willing to help, willing to say, hey, why don't you just like,
read this book, think about this for a little while. And we had probably five or six conversations at a certain point he said, you're not going to be able to think your way out of this.
Curt Cronin (09:19.658)
You can't use your current superpower. You're going to have to evolve and get a new one.
Jordan (09:19.842)
Right. Which is that's right. You got to have a new whole new superpower. And I just, I was far enough down the path of just being at the end of my rope that is actually willing to put down that superpower and be, back to complete vulnerability, complete infancy. So, okay, what now? And it's funny, I'm not kidding at all. He says, okay, what are you feeling right now? I'm like, I don't even know exactly what you mean.
Like honestly, I'm not quite sure exactly what you mean by that. And it's beautiful how kind he was like, well, let's make it simple. Do you have any physical sensations? Right? Cause if you don't, they were really gonna have to get really, really detailed. like, yeah, okay. could feel the, there's cold air. I'm sitting on a chair. could feel like my lower back. I got kind of this warm feeling in my chest. He's like, you have a warm feeling in the center of your chest, huh? Like, yeah, I can feel it. What's that? hmm.
Curt Cronin (09:58.742)
you
Jordan (10:15.832)
No, no, no, I don't know what that is. That might be a feeling. So just kind of like for the next few days, just keep your eye on that. Just pay attention to what sensations you're having and notice if any of those sensations aren't obviously sort of directly, purely obviously physical. that, and again, I am, I have already preemptively confessed that is the beginning of a journey of becoming a completely different kind of person, which enabled me to.
do things, in this case to truly love another human being well, which is not a small thing with significant effort. So it's weird to be having that be the example, but that's the example. That's the actual reality. I was able to go through that journey and come out the other side in a way that I can say, one, I am a profoundly different person who suffers a lot more in a very particular quality. And
Holy smokes, was that a good idea? That was so unspeakably worthy.
Curt Cronin (11:20.532)
I mean, just for everyone that doesn't know Jordan, because I realized I was so excited to drop in, didn't properly introduce him. Probably the most brilliant human I have met, an incredible thought leader, unparalleled at all forms of pattern recognition in an intellectual concept. so to me, what he's sharing is deep and inspiring beyond because of who you are, that that challenge is even more insurmountable to lay down that incredible gift, that incredible intellectual knowledge that that
and pattern recognition is, that's part of why you're shaping how the future looks, because you have the capacity to look, hey, here's what 10 years in the future could look and can hold that in a brilliant space, and to say, I'm going to surrender all of that out of my deepest desire to be able to commit fully to relationships in a way that I have not is extraordinary and unbelievably courageous.
Jordan (12:13.656)
Hmm. Hmm.
Yeah, man, I love the fact that we're in some very distinct sense, like our backgrounds are so distinct. Because we're going to share a lot of similar sensibilities on the stuff that matters. And yet, the world that's going to look at you and say, that's the guy who's got competence, in many cases is going to say, my competence is irrelevant. And to be perfectly frank, probably vice versa. So right now what we're doing is we're pointing to the people who would think that our superpowers are really needed and saying,
Okay. I'm going to, I'm going to say, listen, I'm going to say, listen to Curt. Curt has a wisdom that is coming from a very different place and I'm vouching for it as a kind of critical wisdom. And you just did the same thing in my direction. So there's something going on. The merges emerges betwixt, right? Emerges between something that can only emerge between and only when you're able to bridge the gap of being very different.
that allows that emergence to come forward and to be very, very rich. So, I mean, you just mentioned that you've been through some pretty serious journeys yourself and it's, you know, it's so crazy. Remember, it's funny. We connected over that essay I wrote on infinitesimal courage. Like you're actually the poster child. Maybe I wrote that essay specifically and exclusively for you.
Curt Cronin (13:35.252)
I've quoted you like a thousand times on that. To me it's the most powerful because what Jordan's referencing is in combat, I found heroic courage was actually much more present than infinitesimal courage. It is actually much easier to be in surrender to a thing and say I'll give up my life when it is a very clear delineation between one is right and one is wrong.
And the greatest challenge in my life and greatest setbacks have been when I have compromised myself in an infinitesimal way, right? And like, did I have the conversation? My term right now is to the hundred percent. Did I fully express it all the way or did I leave gaps that would allow for misinterpretation that would allow for everything Jordan shared with the degradation of relationship that would prevent me from doing the thing I actually want to do because I slowly degraded it over a series of
iterative devastating cuts that at the time none of them felt the frog boiling in water. None of them felt sufficient. But in the end, I ended up facing 180 degrees out from where I ever wanted to be or wherever I imagined I could be.
Jordan (14:35.202)
Yeah. Yeah. So this is the, that's such a huge, I'm glad we're talking about that.
So if we're speaking maybe for example to Gen Z, which both of us have a relationship with Gen Z, and we love and care for and our hearts are just shattered by the difficulty that that generation has been handed. The image I frequently have is this image of the boys, and they are in fact boys, coming out of the landing craft, charging machine guns on the beaches of Normandy. And the terror of that.
Curt Cronin (14:50.262)
Deep relationship.
Jordan (15:12.118)
and the heroic courage that is necessary to chase that down, which broadly speaking, were our grandparents, my grandfather, your grandfather. And to be perfectly frank, my recognition of the distinct lack of infinitesimal courage that those same boys had for the rest of their lives. And the war, and I really do think it is properly understood as a profound war that is present to us now.
is one where heroic courage will be necessary, but infinitesimal courage is also now central. It is the core virtue. And so being able to have that 100%, being able to just stand in these very subtle places where your heart, like your child's heart is not willing to step into the light, where you're not willing to
put down your superpower and assume profound vulnerability where you're not willing to just be wounded in your core. Like that's where all of it's gonna be left right now. And it's a tricky business.
Curt Cronin (16:27.148)
Well, and then the courageousness of the vulnerability that's required in that infinitesimal courage space. Like, I don't understand what you're saying, which means I actually want to connect with you. So I'm going to ask again, because I'm not going to pretend and not, even though I didn't understand it, I'm not going to pretend I'm in agreement because I'd rather avoid a conflict. My deep passes of people, please, are an end to the end.
that riff grows for a long period of time, right? Because of my fear of not going to be loved if I speak who I am, therefore I'm going to pretend to be someone I'm not, which means I can't, which means over in the end, I've just delayed and made more catastrophic the inevitable collapse.
Jordan (17:04.173)
Yep, yep, yep. it's, I mean, for me, it tends to be in the direction of a distraction into something where my feeling of competence is higher. You know, I'll just route, I'll route the conversation towards something where I can feel I can get a win.
Curt Cronin (17:23.318)
So much more fun to go, you know what, we could use a hammer for this. No, that's absolutely.
Jordan (17:26.126)
Exactly. that's that. I mean, just to kind of put it in a sociological experience, right now, I don't know how much attention is focused on the culture war or the political conflicts, but it's a lot. A lot of attention right now is focused on big political conflicts and people kind of lining up on one side or the other. And they're in some sense trying to replicate the storming of the beaches of Normandy.
And of course it's beautiful that no matter what happens, I'm on the good side and they're on the bad side. But that's not actually where any of the real action is. all the things that are happening at that level, and I mean this apropos of your previous point. I mean this from the point of view of like pattern recognition. The things that are happening at the ostensibly big, know, political, cultural moments, pick your poison, all the things that people have signs and...
You know, protest and argue about get on TV and talking heads and all that. That's all. Ephemeral and I mean, what I mean is. The forest is on fire, the force is going to burn. It doesn't quite matter exactly which tree burns first or whether the wind blows one way or the other. At a macro level. There's something going on right now in history and.
a very large fraction of what's playing out is going to go in a certain direction and the details while we will get worked up by them and by those details, and I don't mean it all to play this out, include people being harmed, like there will be suffering, but that suffering is not something that we're going to be able to exit from the story.
And for almost everybody and maybe for everybody, but for almost everybody, it is a complete distraction and the profound work of actually just settling into meaningfulness, settling into what is a meaningful life actually look like? How do I get myself in a context where I'm actually just in real relationships with real people who I have the capacity to love. And I mean this by the way, very concretely, we can double click on that if you'd like.
Jordan (19:41.518)
The last two weeks thinking very closely about that. And when we're, the way, I'm also being loved and we're supporting each other and we know each other and we can trust each other. We've worked on this question of trust and trustworthiness. Like that's where all the action actually is. And yet, because that requires infinitesimal courage, it's all too easy just to stretch yourself up into what is effectively the Super Bowl or the NBA game of politics.
and culture were up here.
Curt Cronin (20:12.908)
That's why I definitely want to double click on love, both of our favorite topic, I believe. But first I wanted to make sure we capture it because I think all those distractions are the desire to pull it into the known universe of, you what I heard you say is you had this known universe of pattern recognition and you transcended into the unknown universe or descended. went, you know, you went through that valley of despair. If I'm going into the unknown and that courage you had because of your incredible intellect was extreme. And so I loved it.
did you have any sense of, I'm jumping off a cliff. Like for me, every time I go through one of those portals, feel almost like, I'm going to die if I go through this portal. On the other side, it's always, well that was easy, but it requires full commitment to step through. And so if you said, what is one of the greatest challenges I've seen in the world today, the greatest challenge of anything that has been impossible to me is because I was not willing to surrender to that which I don't know.
Jordan (20:48.462)
totally.
Curt Cronin (21:08.236)
I wasn't willing to be vulnerable. I wasn't willing to open up and say, can you help? The hardest question for someone that struggles with their identity and their worth. And I thought I was a human being, therefore only valued for what I'm doing instead of a, or man, I thought I was a human doer instead of a human being, where I'm valued for existing. So I'd love any other context you have on that, which then leads to your journey to love and anything you want to say on that.
Jordan (21:26.808)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan (21:35.672)
Well, this, yeah, just to maybe even just continue to use the phrase, the frame of heroic courage and infinitesimal courage, the frame of I'm going to die or I'm willing to die. And the thing that's crazy is that you're dying all the time. And when you transition from one moment to another moment, or more specifically from one identity to another identity, some significant part of you, particularly a part that really, really wants to be the whole of you.
is in fact dying. That's really the case. And so one of the reasons why you avoid going through those portals is because that fear of death is before you. And you actually have to take the heroic sensibility of I'm going to surrender that fear of death and put that aside and step into the thing that I now know is necessary in spite of it. Irrelevant. I can rendering that no longer the thing. and as you said, you step through that portal and then you go through the, and by the way, the reality is that some part of it does die, but the one who's on the other side of the portal is okay with that.
It's like, huh, okay, that was a, yes, thank heavens. That was a proper choice. And now I'm somebody where a lot of things that had seemed utterly impossible are now just part of reality. you're not even easy, but just are what is. And this is, that's a serious thing. a serious challenge is to be able to surrender your fear of death and be able to step through the portals that are
Curt Cronin (22:36.042)
Thank heavens.
Jordan (23:04.182)
afforded you and just continue to go through this process of self-transformation and self-transformation. I can make it – there's a subtle point here that's very, very delicate and it's not necessarily everybody's, there are some people of which I'm a member who say, well, that's okay. I will now craft an identity around
surrendering my fear of death before portals and going through portals. Do you get that? What happens there? can, I Yeah, so like level one, I am, I'm a reasonable, rational, competent person. I lay that down, I surrender that identity. I go through the portal, I grow into a deeper, richer person. Fair enough. level 12.
Curt Cronin (23:36.588)
Play it again so I can fully crack it.
Jordan (23:56.63)
Not that I'm a reasonable, rational person, but I'm in fact a person who surrenders his identity, lays it down and goes through the portal. Well, how can you surrender that? Cause that's already who you have identified as. That's a very tricky trap. So we'll leave that to the side, but this exactly. So there's a handful of people who we know for whom that is the place they're stuck as really, really tough one to get out of.
Curt Cronin (24:12.308)
And it almost becomes significance logic on its own.
Jordan (24:23.374)
For most zoomers, they haven't gone there yet. And in that case, I would just recommend humility. Just take the humility of being who you actually are and don't worry about trying to formulate an identity. Just have a character and have relationships.
Curt Cronin (24:38.102)
And my guess is anyone that's listening will know this from your presence. But do you mind sharing what it's like going from the slight warm feeling in your chest to the explosion of what you feel now?
Jordan (24:50.99)
What is it like?
Well, actually, so first order, it's really hard. It's really hard. would imagine it's like trying to re like if you got into an accident and you've lost, you know, say the ability to walk and you're, going through physical therapy and having to regrow nerves and have to rebuild muscles. mean, it's, it's, it's excruciating to be perfectly honest. Um, particularly when you, when you, the proper time to do that is when you're two, two, three, four, somewhere in there. And so when you're doing it when you're 50 or whatever, 42, it's a,
Curt Cronin (25:26.208)
Second best time is now.
Jordan (25:27.616)
Yeah, exactly. That's a good time. It's now, but you get very well acquainted with grief and you get very well acquainted with the fact that suffering is not just not to be avoided, but is intrinsic to growth. Meaningless suffering is a totally different kind of thing than suffering. That distinction is important when to land. But then of course you begin to realize that there's the scope of relationships that you can get into.
Like the quality, the intensity is, it actually is the fabric out of which meaning is made. So to live a meaningful life is to be able to enter into love, right? Loving relationships, meaningful relationships with people, persons. And so what it feels like is that life is worth living.
Curt Cronin (26:21.674)
Aliveness.
Jordan (26:23.854)
That's intense by the way. Like it's weird. So when I, when I moved here to black mountain, uh, about two years ago, about six months in, I'm sitting there talking to my wife and I'm like, I, there's a weird experience I'm having. And I think I finally figured it out. I think this is what it means to be home. Like I've lived 52 years and I've never actually felt what it feels like to be home. And now I feel it, uh, 10 years ago, 11 years ago,
more or less the same thing. actually had to like go stand out on the deck and stare at the ocean for like two hours. like, I actually know what it feels like that life is actually worth living as opposed to I'm just surviving and surviving is just the nature of how reality is. And I've chosen not to turn that off. It's like, no, no, life is actually worth living. Like the feeling of that is a qualitative thing.
Curt Cronin (27:13.516)
To me, you just described the most unbelievable journey. And I always say it's the furthest 12 inches in the universe or from head center to heart center, right? From logic into heart center. And to me, you just beautifully described that transition.
Jordan (27:22.093)
Hmm.
Jordan (27:29.964)
Yeah, yeah. So let's go the opposite direction for a second, because I think I want to spend a little time building some tools for love, because I think it's...
say, well, no, I'll just do it. There was a kerfuffle in the social field, I think about two weeks ago, about this term that I had never heard before. I think it was called orders of love or amoris ordani, something like that. think medieval was his name. Thomas Aquinas wrote it down. And it's basically how do you properly order your loves? Like what's the right kind of priorities to set? And there's a big fight about it.
Because broadly speaking, as our culture tends to do, ended up getting polarized into what is Team Red's version and what is Team Blue's version? How do they throw shit at each other over the wall? So.
Here's the thing that came from me thinking about this pretty deeply, actually.
Jordan (28:35.406)
We, and by we I mean, most people alive today, like even business, whether West or East, but most people alive today really don't have any idea how to love. It's like we're, and this is why, this is what I mean.
Jordan (28:55.298)
Love requires intimacy and intimacy requires vulnerability.
And to be able to achieve both vulnerability and intimacy, but I mean, skillfulness, being able to actually be intimate, not to be invited into intimacy, but to actually be able to participate in it. Funny, my daughter does not like as much when I rub her back, and she likes it when her mom rubs her back. Because I have calloused rough hands, and my mom has gentle soft hands. My mom, my mom, my wife, her mom, has the capacity to be intimate.
in the category of rubbing her back that is greater than mine, but the sheer fact of the physicality of my hands.
Just imagine this scene. So you're born as an infant, you're born. And you're born into a context where every human being you know and every human being you ever will know is capable of profound intimacy and profound vulnerability with each other. And that's been the case for all of them as well. So it is rare beyond comprehension to encounter anyone for whom love is not a primary, fundamental, unconscious
capacity of profound skill. And so as you're growing up, every encounter you have, you're encountering with somebody else who A, has an open, rich, tender heart and cares for you utterly deeply. Everybody you've ever met in your entire life, that is the primary tone of your experience. And so therefore, as you're going out into the world and suffering the ordinary suffering of being a human, you're held in that envelope, which means that you're able to drink in
Jordan (30:38.734)
the fullest possibility of the suffering that you're encountering to develop an even richer capacity to be in a relationship with other people. That's like, that's the base case for being able to love other people. Now compare that to our lives. In our lives, we're at the receiving end of 10, 20,000 years of not having anybody have that as their experience. We're in the receiving end of people being forced
Curt Cronin (30:59.03)
Thanks
Jordan (31:09.518)
2000 generations to give up almost everything about their capacity to love in order to be able to survive. And this, sorry, focused specifically on your cast. There was a terrible moment in human history when it became discovered that if you convert boys into killers, you can kill your neighbors.
And by the way, take their women and turn their children into your children. And about three seconds later, if you don't convert your boys into killers, you will be killed by your neighbors and your line extinguished. And a bomb went off where that became that fated decision propagated out through the entire human species with very limited exceptions, those who were protected by vast oceans.
And of course, right, if that is the one of the core elements of your cultural code at the very bottom, then love is now pushed very much to the margins. So it's important for us to actually accept the reality, like really understand the reality that we are something like one one thousandth the instrument of ordered loves. That is in fact our actual proper inheritance.
and then begin the process of swimming back towards that 100 % that is the absolute bottom of infinitesimal courage.
Okay, so given that, as a friend.
Jordan (32:48.204)
The point that I actually really want to make is like, look.
Jordan (32:54.37)
Love requires intimacy and vulnerability. I can achieve intimacy and vulnerability with a very small number of human beings. I cannot actually love literally my neighbor. I can be kind to my neighbor. I can hold my neighbor in a place of deep affection and endeavor very much to care for my neighbor's wellbeing and to listen to my neighbor. But I don't know my neighbor well enough to love my neighbor.
I haven't actually have the capacity of myself and certainly at the time on the ground to have been invited into a level of intimacy to actually be able to deliver anything that would properly be called love. So, okay, that's just a concrete reality. So we need to be able to understand that there's a distinction between an image of love, let's say,
presenting a sensibility of caring for someone else. What does he call it? Benevolence. Just being benevolent, which you can be benevolent to everybody and should, by the way, even to your greatest enemies you should be benevolent to, which may be, by the way, removing them from the earth. But you can't love, right? You can't actually do that thing. And so to find those rare circumstances and those beautiful possibilities where love can be made available.
And by the way, sometimes your neighbor will be in a circumstance. I had this in, in the, in the flood and we had this big flood in Western North Carolina. And suddenly because we had to depend on each other, the circumstances put people together where vulnerability was just present because people were actually deeply needing help. that afforded a real possibility of intimacy, which then afforded a real possibility of love. And I need to, I want, I want to kind of, what that means is this. I've got food. I've got water.
I'm driving around trying to figure out how help my neighbors. go up to a neighbor. My neighbor needs help.
Jordan (34:53.89)
First order, I'll be benevolent. will offer food and water. My neighbor doesn't want food and water. My neighbor wants to feel like she's being taken care of. My neighbor wants to feel like she has a safety net. She wants to feel like she's seen and heard and understood. That's what she wants. And until I actually am able to slow down and open myself up to being able to perceive what she actually is showing me, I'm not loving her. I'm almost...
using her as an instrument of my own desire to feel like I'm doing a good job. Yeah, that's a totally different, I totally blew by. I was like doing benevolence, trading in benevolence, but without intimacy, it's not actually love. And so to slow down and be there, okay, I'm just gonna sit with you. I'm gonna let you talk at me for two hours because frankly, it's gonna take hours before your heart is prepared to even begin the process.
Curt Cronin (35:25.046)
feel like I'm contributing because I'm so transactional. missed her. Yep.
Jordan (35:49.868)
of entering into anything like a real relationship, certainly with me and frankly with anybody, because you're in a state of real crisis. and then the point is that that's, that's not that, that's an example where, love is a small tiny little kernel of love was actually possible because the circumstances forced us to need each other. But obviously in our contemporary world, we almost, we actually do desperately need each other like crazy, but without infinite test of courage, we'll never cross that chasm. We tend to be in this.
transactional mode of mutually shared benevolence and a simulation of love where I create an identity structure. I load the appropriate behaviors associated with that identity structure. I see if it fits you adequately. And then once it does, I project those, benevolent architectures on top of you, whether or not they map you at all. I'm just giving you food and water thinking that's exactly what you need because I've identified you as a person in need of X, Y, or Z.
And this is, so this is, so first that's trouble. That situation right there is trouble. The fact that love is actually in fact properly ordered by the sheer nature of reality and where intimacy and vulnerability are and how they operate and time on and what it takes for our wildly disordered selves and the tremendous amount of trauma that should have been carved into us for thousands of generations means that we should
recognize that love is extremely scarce, extremely precious, extremely difficult to pull off and is only going to be located in very rare circumstances and is therefore even more critical. I want to say it's like the highest value thing that we can try to participate in.
Curt Cronin (37:36.02)
and has to be sought and cherished. mean, when you were talking about, yes, first we weaponized humans and then quickly the other side had to weaponize. My wife and my four girls, we both have lots of feminine in our life, would say I'm a rookie at intimacy and vulnerability. At the professional level or at the scale level, the crisis of combat operations to me that drove that intimacy and vulnerability at a...
The only rule was it's okay if you have it. It's totally okay if you don't have it. Like that also is 100 % acceptable. The only thing wasn't acceptable is to say you have it and not, right? So you had to be completely open, completely vulnerable, completely naked at all times because it was the only way the collective had a chance of survival. And that was the essence of my favorite moniker from the SEALs team guy, where you become more individual than you've ever been by bringing your superpower into the collective and it compensates for your weaknesses. So the paradox of...
that very environment that was destructive to humanity, destructive, will allow it to, if you're in it, to accelerate the process. then, it becomes, I do it in an infinitesimal way in every single day in my life?
Jordan (38:44.898)
Yeah, ultimately in service to the thing for which it was created. It's wild, this example you're giving, and it is actually profoundly true. It is profoundly true that it is only in this level of intimacy that you can create the capacity to form a fighting group that can have a quality of identity and a fluidity of competence that it can then fight against others effectively.
And what you want is you actually want that in your relationship with your wife and your daughters. That's actual thing that it's for. And that's wildly enough, like that's the actual centerpiece of what it is we are facing is that dichotomy. We don't want to put our love into the things that we have needed to survive. We actually need to go through what's called the big portal and surrender survival so that we can once again live.
Curt Cronin (39:17.44)
Yes.
Curt Cronin (39:49.898)
Yes. And I think you've transitioned as part of it was sharing with the viewers. Here's how you overcame what was impossible to me at the inevitable. The second part is send out the signal of what you're doing now to see who can help you take whatever is impossible for you now and make that inevitable in the future. So my sense because of, because I know you so well is that you just we've inched our way into your current and future calling. But is there anything else that would be useful for
anyone listening to reach out to you to help you pull this into inevitability.
Jordan (40:24.526)
Sure. This is like, mean, we might as well go to go to 11. I remember like, how long ago was this? guess it was late 2020. So golly, five years ago, maybe, maybe four years ago, I was in Hawaii and I was sitting at a table in Hawaii and we were talking with the gentleman and somebody asked me a question and he said, well, given what you're saying and what we're all seeing about the state of the world.
Curt Cronin (40:29.384)
We didn't get all dressed up for nothing.
Jordan (40:53.048)
What do you think the likelihood is that humanity makes it through all this?
So when people ask me a question, I think about it. And so as I go, hmm, I'm actually noticing two different answers to that question.
part of me that addresses a question like that from the point of view of let's say probability.
That part of me actually concludes the answer is zero. It's impossible.
Curt Cronin (41:18.828)
from a logical perspective of the level of consciousness we currently have.
Jordan (41:22.378)
Exactly. You got it. Ain't gonna happen. And that's important, right? Any amount of trying to figure it out from the level of consciousness that we currently have, frankly, is just gonna make matters worse. Definitely isn't gonna solve the problem. Okay. But there's another part of me, another part of me that doesn't even think in probabilities. That's not how it addresses the world.
That part of me is like 100%. It's going to happen. In fact, it already has happened.
Curt Cronin (41:50.485)
Yes.
Jordan (41:52.59)
And it was interesting to me because that, you know, I kind of do everything on the fly noticing, okay, that's a beautiful symmetry because it actually is the part of me that thinks it's impossible is the part that has to surrender the part that has to say, Hey, I'm going to hand this off to you who I don't really, I can't even really understand by definition because it's you're outside of the quality, kinds of things I can understand, but I'm going to surrender to the part of me for whom it is already.
And I mean this individually and corporately. This is like wildly critical. How do we actually put ourselves in context where we can actually start to life from this other part? I've talked the term of like we're post strategy. We're actually in a whole category where the entire category of strategy is nearly at its end. And what that means is what does it mean to live life that is not strategic, that is not transactional, that actually is intimate?
that is truly governed by love and I mean that very, very, very concretely, very practically, right? Not by sentiment, not by benevolence, but actually by the absolutely brutal reality of love.
And that's the thing, like that is in fact my calling and that is the impossibility that I'm living right now. And I've got a lot of examples of where it seems to be showing up, but boy, it is not easy. It's quite a rough, rough thing to go through.
Curt Cronin (43:22.272)
Yeah, dude. To meet you fully, the scariest part of my career in the SEALs was when I realized other heads of state would allow me to go after their countrymen because they loved me.
And so it was the most subtle distortion of the very gift and the very pursuit that you're on. And so it felt like, oh, I'm on the reactive side of infinity right now. I'm on the how to act after something has already happened, right? Now, how do we get to the proactive side of it? How do I get to the creative side? How do we get to recreate so we don't have to go to war? Here, that model, or as soon as people go to scarcity, somebody was telling me I read.
the illusion of separation is the very first piece where now like, now we've become separate, now we are other, and then it provides conflict and all of that comes from there. And so now how do we now build what you and I have talked about is invisible squadron. How do we now build the culture, the environment, the capacity for love at a level where we can get out of that sense of separation?
and get to everything I do to you, I do to me, and then that's how do we now hold each other in a fundamentally different space.
Jordan (44:36.94)
Yeah. It's it's a, hmm. So yeah, maybe say, I want to take a sixties thing and I want to pull it out and say, look, that's a, that's a mistake. We don't want to go there. So.
And in fact, was just at illusion of separation, reality of separation. You and I are in fact separate and that's really, really good because that's how intimacy can occur. You can only occur with an intimate relationship. You can only have relationship with something that is not you. You can have relationship with parts of yourself from the point of view of precisely the fact that they are parts and not you. So what we want is we actually want to have this new mode.
where we are simultaneously maximally separate and maximally intimate. That's what we really want to get to. We want to get to a place where each person's relationship is reinforcing the individuation and the becoming singular that is intrinsic to the soul of the other. And therefore, and by means of coming into completely intimate relationship.
Jordan (45:54.968)
So I got distracted. seems like something's overloaded on the screen. Did we blow up the internet?
Curt Cronin (46:02.208)
Nope, still safe.
Jordan (46:04.046)
On my side, it's like everything is timed to it. So I'll try to ignore what's So as a recapitulating.
Curt Cronin (46:10.412)
That was perfect because you're at the precipice of the polarities that would allow us to be maximally separate and individual and maximally intimate.
Jordan (46:23.286)
Yeah, so...
so much here. I'm trying to figure out what's the right level. Okay. Let me just put it this way. What I'm going do is going to preemptively say I'm moving into nerd space for a second and almost even like hat tip to nerd tribe, but a bit of service. Like this is nerd tribe. We've been out in the desert. We found some interesting stuff. We're bringing it back in and we're bringing it was the J2J3. We're bringing it back in. Here's useful intelligence.
Curt Cronin (46:38.378)
Let's go.
Jordan (46:55.766)
Historically, there have been two big basic modes of the relationship between the individual and the group for humans.
In the beginning, the group was extremely dominant and the individual largely gets lost in the group.
Jordan (47:16.94)
Then, particularly most recently, as we began to move into environments that were
less coherent or where love was in fact less available, we became more individual, more separate. So the illusion of separation began to become hardened into a increasingly obvious separation. Not the least of which because you're over there and I'm going to kill you, right? I'm going to take your stuff. And what we did is we began to soften the consequences of that separation through an entire
you know, 10,000 years of civilization to the point where for the most part, we aren't mean to each other in a brutal way, although we still are far too much, but we're more separate now than has ever been the case. Okay.
What we want to do is we want to actually finally move to a third place, like a third way, where the whole, the group...
Pride.
Jordan (48:26.798)
the relationships that are coming between and among are oriented almost exclusively to the individuation and the becoming singular of the individual. And the individual is so fully aware of the centrality and necessity of the governing principles of love that they are not pulling away but are actually coming back in.
to relationality as the output of their individuation. So it becomes an expanding sphere of increasingly beautiful possibility because as each person is differentiated into their singular nature, they become more capable of providing new possibilities of relationship with everyone else. And that right there, that is what some people have called the fifth joint point or
the location and culture space that allows us to actually transcend history for real. And by history, I mean is the story of the movement from the primordial upper Paleolithic period up until now.
Curt Cronin (49:46.432)
So if I'm tracking then if individuals can fully get the option to commit or not, i.e. they can be fully individual and fully separated, only then can they fully surrender into the group. So if I'm half individual and I feel like I have to have the tribe, then I don't get to fully make the decision, therefore it's never a full commitment. I don't ever get to go fully through the portal, only through fully manifesting whom I am individually, then can I step fully back into the community.
Jordan (50:13.25)
Yes. Yeah. For example, like as a critical element, this is absolutely true. yeah, by being perfectly free, only by being actually fully free, can I then choose to come back into full service at a hundred percent. And, and this is not, how do I say zero percent of this is airy fairy. Like zero percent of this is pure affect or, fun words. Like this is the hard.
practicality. And again, from a nerd space perspective, it is the portal. Like it's the thing that allows us to navigate the shift from are we going to make it to, yeah, we already have.
Jordan (51:06.08)
Ooh, yeah, so I'm hearing, I'm feeling with the calling of Invisible Squadron.
What I'm describing is the mission.
Like all these guys who are by nature oriented to be willing to give up their lives and to protect what they love. That's where we are. You and I right now, what we're talking about is this calling into infinitesimal courage, this calling into a new way of doing the thing that is your nature and what you recognize as being most virtuous, most honorable, that...
to be willing to step into the crucible of infinitesimal courage, to be willing to step into the crucible of this quality of love as being the thing that you are actually fighting for and with. It's a hard thing. I get it. if you're if you're a, what's his name? Connor McGregor? Getting into a fist fight, getting punched in the face, that's not gonna slow you down in a little bit. But what I'm talking about, that's a whole other thing.
And if he can step into that, then he deserves full respect.
Curt Cronin (52:25.238)
Well, the only thing that comes for me, the sense is, of course, right, as you speak that, the genius, once it's heard, you can never kind of unhear it. So of course. And then I instantly go into my logic goes, okay, how, how do I do that? What, what are the, what are the protocols that you have established for yourself to be able to continue to follow that path?
Jordan (52:47.768)
Well, I think this is where you and I would just start comparing notes. And so you surfaced several that I think are really powerful. And this one of recognizing precisely where you notice in yourself that which should happen, the conscience, to be able to notice your conscience and notice exactly how you move away from conscience. This conversation, this is what I should be saying, but I avoid it.
It's these very subtle elements of how you avoid doing the thing that your heart knows is right. so how do you bind yourself to actually just doing the thing your heart knows is right, man, ain't that, ain't that tough. But that's it. Like that's, that's the core. That's, that's the central element for me. And I'm now be like wearing, what's his name? Hey, Huberman. I remember talking to him a long time ago. Well, well, just when he first started going first was coming to Stanford.
which is a perfectly good block actually. If all the things that are happening in that block of the internet are turned towards the highest purpose, like how do I create the practices that don't just allow me to have a bunch of, how do I say it? Effectively valueless results, but I actually say, no, no, I'm gonna take all these practices and then harness them and yoke them to the highest purpose. Okay, now we're talking. So here's an example. Practice noticing when
You turn away from that, which feels hard. Like, this is very subtle. You have to take the time to slow down enough to notice, that thing right there. can tell it's hard. can feel the point where my heart is actually feeling afraid of it and I'm avoiding it and notice that. And then just take it as a, as a quick, an equivalent to the cold shower, like the Wim Hof method. This is the spiritual Wim Hof method.
Curt Cronin (54:22.028)
Absolutely
Jordan (54:45.208)
Take it as the mandate. Like I am testing right now a protocol where I'm going to turn towards that, which feels that way. All the things that I have habitually avoided because they have a quality of hardness. I'm going to make it a rule that for the next week, I will just go towards that. I will precisely when it has that feeling, I will step into it with no other objective than just training. So like a spiritual bootcamp. Yeah. Well, yeah. Spiritual bootcamp. So there's a bunch of protocols there.
Curt Cronin (55:09.502)
Only way out is through. Absolutely.
Jordan (55:18.636)
And it's wild. Again, I want to reinforce. Go ahead.
Curt Cronin (55:19.2)
Yeah, the others that came to mind.
Sorry, the other that came to mind for me is I've never experienced more, you know, we talk about head center, heart center, or spirit and flesh. You know, to me, me, the...
the more that I can quiet my crazy roommate, right? My mentor would call it like that, my logic running in my head, the more I can be open to the little voice that can otherwise be drowned out. And so if I get up in the morning and do 30 minutes of physical embodiment, whether it's cardio or strength, any type of physical embodiment, followed by breath work, followed by meditation, the entire day is, it is,
It feels somewhere between 20 and 100, right? Just to try and calibrate it more clear and discerning on this is the path I should be on, or this is the thing I should be doing, or the lack of clarity when there's too much noise, right? It seems to cut through the noise and allow me to have much more clear on this is the thing that should be done.
Jordan (56:19.576)
Yes, absolutely. So this is fun because what we're basically doing is we're capitulating some form of like warrior monk sensibility. We're combining a whole variety of practices, but within a spiritual envelope and pointing them to the highest purposes. So you're not just achieving a spiritual experience to be spiritual and you're not just engaging in a variety of physical practices to achieve, but you're combining
the highest possible purpose with your capacity to actually orient towards them with strength and subtlety. That's the sort of thing that we're talking about. So what does it look like to become a Jedi Knight? What does it look like to actually become a new kind of warrior monk? And so let's try another one.
Jordan (57:13.524)
I'll do it at a mental level. This is easy. This happens all the time. Read something and pay attention entirely first to your emotional response and second to your unconscious cognitive responses to that emotional response. An easy way to do that is to find somebody on Twitter that you really disagree with and follow them.
then read something that comes up as a result of their feed that you don't agree with, right? You don't like so that you're encountering something that some other human has an opinion that's different than yours, a very unpleasant experience. But the key is to notice, okay, first, yeah, I didn't like that. I actually feel like thems fighting words. And second, okay, what is going on in my mind when I have that experience? Do I denigrate them in my mind? What an asshole. What an idiot.
Curt Cronin (57:44.208)
Hahaha
Jordan (58:13.88)
Do I produce an argument immediately to distance myself from the perspective they're having? I need to defend my territory from what appears to be a threat, like all these things. So this is a becoming sensitive to the double layer. One is the physical that precedes the mental. I'm having a physical response of effectively threat. All right, I'm feeling a threat. And then what is my immediate habitual cognitive response to that threat? And of course, ultimately the intent is can I train myself?
to notice when I'm feeling threatened and then come to a place where I'm responding to that in a way that is coming from the values that I hold the most. Can I actually be first in a place of peace? Which doesn't mean by the way, how do I say capitulating to evil, but it allows you to actually not participate in evil unconsciously. How do you actually settle in strength and respond with maturity and wisdom?
as opposed to just reacting with whatever nonsense happens to have been accumulated on top of you over the past 30 or whatever years. So we can enumerate a very long list of these kinds of things. But the point.
Curt Cronin (59:23.04)
Yeah, that feels so true because that's the essence of my reactions feel like they're from my fear based response. it's an instantaneous reaction. I almost don't process, right? It just happens, right? It's almost a, it's a fight or flight. My reactions, very responses feel like from a centered, like expansion space. So that feels completely coherent, true.
Jordan (59:43.64)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. And that way of describing it. So you've cultivated this for years. And so you're in a position where you could listen to what I'm saying and you can notice in yourself the consequences of your experience. And I we're saying this is part of the, you know, the spiritual warrior among Doja, that, that piece do it. And as you do it become more capable of noticing how these things have distinctions. And again, to reinforce the point, this is the war we're actually fighting.
We are war. It is a spiritual war. This is the war we're actually fighting. Anyone who is a warrior by nature, that is who they are by identity. And I mean like practically, like you've actually gone to physical war. You are called into the spiritual war, but to become capable of fighting in the spiritual war, you must go through the spiritual bootcamp. And it's no joke. Like you're gonna have to confess to the people who you love most because you've been an asshole and you've broken a lot of stuff.
And you're going to have to repent and you're going to have to, by repentance, I don't mean just confess and say, sorry. I mean, actually in your heart, undergo the work necessary to change your heart so that your behavior is now a behavior aligned with your values. have to actually become a virtuous person. I mean, and by the way, I'm not among the class of virtuous people, so I'm not speaking from above. I'm speaking from inside. it's, I'm not sure if you can get out of that, but I know you can make forward progress that much. know.
And know that the more people who make forward progress will begin to notice who are the Spartans. I like that was a distinction used to make, right? Spartans and pirates.
Curt Cronin (01:01:25.8)
Absolutely. Well, that's been one of the distinctions as we are preparing for this, the the sermon for me of, like I am perfectly flawed and and miss and imperfect and I can be called to be virtuous. I can be called and aspirationally follow that call, knowing I will never achieve it. But that's what I love about collective. Right.
Jordan (01:01:26.989)
Yeah.
Curt Cronin (01:01:51.198)
I will do more for others than I will for myself. I will hold myself to a standard differently knowing that I've professed it to you. And there was a situation in December where I ended up, every physical cell in my body did not want to execute on what I knew to be true. But I knew I could no longer hold communitas with people whom I respected if I did not follow the path. I couldn't look at my kids in the eye and say, I want you to do the thing when it's time to do the thing. And so,
the relationships to me, you were saying earlier about relationships generating meaning, the relationships allowed me to have a meaningful life where if it was individual, I would have checked down and accepted death because it seemed safer than going through that path.
Jordan (01:02:34.614)
Nice. Yeah. that word, that notion of communitas. So we can, we can maybe even double click on that. So what happens is
When you become capable of entering into communion with others, and I like the idea of, I'm just going to say the communion is this previous relationship that I was describing, where the whole is canonically pouring itself into each individual, and from a place of profound love and intimacy for the growth of the individuals who then return it as they grow, creating more possibility for the whole. So that's the communion.
when you're in communion, the identity of that whole is now supporting you. And so you can do things that you couldn't have done. You can rest in that strength and be carried through it. And it's powerful because I need you to do the thing that you're afraid to do and I need you to for all of us to survive, for all of us to grow. And I am now committed to giving you whatever I can give you, which is very careful.
Curt Cronin (01:03:20.487)
Absolutely.
Jordan (01:03:41.08)
Like I can't give you something that is not mine to give. But if it is, it is instantaneously necessary that I give it. I see how say that. And this is, you know, you've actually seen it, that that is what happens in the SEAL team on the ground when they're actually in the field. We're just saying that exact same capability needs to be brought into the whole of life.
Curt Cronin (01:04:09.452)
and is required and is full of liveness and is most exhilarating. mean, one of the things that's coming to me as you were sharing was it's the redefinition of experiences that I've had from a fear place as, the thing, right? And so every single time before I go onto a stage, get into a conversation like this, it doesn't look like I feel like tightness across my chest. It's a constriction. It's a fear of.
What if I don't do the thing? What if, know, I can feel that constriction. And now that's also like, this is the thing that's important, right? It is the, this is important. If it wasn't, if it wasn't important to me, it wouldn't matter. So therefore, okay, this is, this is your, to your point about this is what I said surge into. I'm surging into it because now in the consulcation, expansion of like, this is like, you know, a conversation I could have, we've had epic conversations for years, but never at this level of intensity at this moment, at this space, at this time. like,
Jordan (01:04:43.128)
HAHAHAHA
Curt Cronin (01:05:05.158)
It's the understanding of the ego's desire to survive, it's the spirit's desire to surrender, right? Like in almost like a completely reflexive mirror.
Jordan (01:05:18.158)
That was good. That was real good. Underscore. I felt nervous before we had this call. I don't feel nervous very much. At least doing calls. I feel nervous plenty when I'm interacting with my kids. Which is again, but I was like, okay, that's a good sign. That means this is actually meaningful. There's something going on here which a large part of me is trying to muster.
You know, okay, we're going to stay focused. We're going to put it. We're going to put something out there. And it's funny. I can actually see in my mind's eye, cause you're, this is going to be a podcast, right? You're actually beginning a podcast, producing something you're going to be conveying out there. And at some point down the road, you're to be talking to some, yeah, exactly. Episode one. So at some point down the road, you're to be talking to somebody who's actually famous and that's going to bring a whole bunch of people in and they're going to come back and they're going to watch this episode. And many of them are going to really pissed off. Many of them are going to be some combination of triggered.
Curt Cronin (01:05:59.649)
episode one.
Jordan (01:06:15.406)
annoyed, you know, or pissed, you know, they're going to be pissed off and I can see the comments and, you know, the key message is something like, yeah, we probably are doing a mediocre job right now because we're, on the tight rope, right? That we're, we're in it. Like we're trying to figure out how to do this thing. How do we, how do we create the right kind of field? How do we actually demonstrate what it's like to be again, doing that Navy seal thing? Like this is improv. We're improv right now.
in the most meaningful, like we're trying to actually tackle the most meaningful question with the highest degree of particularity. And of course we're both what? 1.1 % qualified for what we're trying to do. And so, so yeah, exactly. And, it is the invitation. If anything that's happened in the last, whatever, 90 minutes has pissed you off, consider that a really, really good sign and a challenge.
Curt Cronin (01:06:58.444)
Generous. Maybe you are.
Jordan (01:07:15.256)
So look at that particular piece and say, okay, that's almost like God tapping you on the shoulder and say, look at that right there. Something really valuable will happen if you just look at that. Man, it's crazy.
Curt Cronin (01:07:31.34)
when you hit, because that's what I said earlier when you were going through, what do I do when I get the most upset and judge others or when I react most heavily? It's something which, and it's a dear friend of my Dwayne Kerrigan's quote, I don't know where he got it, but it's like, hey, that which most upset you about others, the thing you have not yet accepted in yourself. And I was like, that is almost universally true for me. like, why am I so mad at this? I'm like, oh, because I don't want to accept that.
Jordan (01:07:59.758)
Yeah. And yes, this is key. This does not mean that Curt and I are off the hook or that does not mean that we didn't just screw something up. We probably did, but if it pissed you off, that's a different kind of thing. It's a, you know, I see people do stuff that I'm like, eh, let's just think again, just, just, just orient from like parent child. If you watch your child riding a bike and they fall off their bike, that doesn't piss you off. They're making a mistake trying to do something earnest.
That's a totally different kind of thing than when somebody like cuts you off in traffic. And the reason why that pisses you off has nothing to do with the fact that they're an asshole, because they are. It's a different kind of thing that just like, hey, wait a minute, what's going on in me? What's happening in my life that I can't just be at peace with the fact that sometimes there are people, they're assholes in traffic sometimes. Well, the reality is my life is probably extremely agitated. Like I'm actually probably chewing on stuff in the back of my mind constantly.
a basal level of agitation and anxiety and ire. Like I'm actually not at peace in myself, in my body and my ability to actually just process.
of anger coming up without losing my shit. Well, that's where I am, right? And so if you're there, the fact that they cut you off and that caused you to react in a certain way, that's the sign. Say, hey, okay, man, I need to resolve some things so that I can navigate reality in a place of peace, which does not forgive them or excuse them of being assholes, but you're not gonna solve the problem of them being assholes by getting pissed off.
And you're not going to solve the problem of me being incompetent by getting pissed off, but you can solve some problems in yourself if you notice that's the sign.
Curt Cronin (01:09:45.516)
I think you brilliantly brought into brought to life all the concepts that I was hoping to bring into this which is If we perceive it's impossible you said it's for like for a dog or for a person to me to me That's it. It was also a time frame like it's impossible in 1980 or 1990 or you know at the current moment like I'm like the Einstein quote like
the two that I love are like the problem, the level of consciousness that created a problem cannot solve it. And then the other is, you know, one choice in life, either everything's a miracle or nothing's a miracle. And so to me, we've been playing with both of those. And then I think you've given some unbelievably.
guided responses on how to feel into that field, how to to lean into, okay, if I'm agitated, remember my brother told me the first time I think in our entire lives at that point where we had a conflict, he's like, well, I came to everything I want in life and just peace. like, you mean like a motivated peace, right? Cause I was in my full achiever mode and I couldn't understand peace as what you're describing it as aliveness, right? Full integration and aliveness.
Jordan (01:10:52.931)
So.
Curt Cronin (01:10:54.016)
Is there anything else we can do to support you on your quest? Anything that's out there that would be helpful on your epic mission? Mission Impossible, we are all in to help you make inevitable. Yes.
Jordan (01:11:03.008)
Yeah, okay. This is fun. You ready? Well, I would hope so because it's actually everybody's, it's in everybody's interest that we make it through this portal. This is a weird way of saying it, but as I've already mentioned that I'm weird, you're just going to have to live with that. There's a phrase that I've been thinking about. think I've said it a few times called, I call it a
Jordan (01:11:29.647)
And it has to do with actually two very distinct things that I think are beautiful.
One, if you go, I think mostly to Europe and you sit in a cathedral, Notre Dame is a fine example, or the Cologne Cathedral, you're in a place that was built over a timeframe longer than the United States has been around. They started building it hundreds of years before they finished building it, which meant that the people who were in the beginning of building it,
Not only did they not have a notion that they would live in it, they knew for sure that not even their great-great-great grandchildren would actually be in it, which is a long time to be building something for. And yet, they were completely capable. And by the way, not just if like once or twice, you know, two weekends coming out and kind of doing something. We're not talking about planting a tree and then being done planting trees. They dedicated their whole lives to it.
So they were able to dedicate their whole lives to doing something that would not be realized until generations had come that had completely forgotten that they existed. Great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren. Well, that's a whole different kind of capability. You can't have a strategic mindset. That's not transactional. That requires that you're actually just in surrender to something that is greater than yourself and that gives meaning.
to everything you do intrinsically, cathedral consciousness. The second part of that, the second part of it, is that thing that is greater than yourself is greater than yourself. And to surrender to it because you have a feeling of not just that it's greater than you, but also much, much more capable of good, much, much more capable of love than you. That by surrendering to it, you're guided into
Jordan (01:13:29.792)
a higher level of being able to participate in good and beauty and truth than you ever could on your own. There's two distinct and very beautiful things. And this allows a person to live a life that is really pulled forward into incredible capabilities. You can truly do the impossible in a way that that impossible is uniquely tied towards the highest. And so this is a weird thing.
best that anybody can do to support me is to cultivate cathedral consciousness in themselves. And I'm not at all kidding because what will end up happening is somebody somewhere sometime will have exactly the stone that I need to complete the arch that I've been working on and that I can't get. But if they've surrendered to cathedral consciousness, they will know to start walking in my direction. They'll hand it off to their great grandson.
who will hand it off to my great-grandson and he will complete the arch. And that is absolutely exactly what I need.
Curt Cronin (01:14:39.392)
Thank you. Your time is a gift, your message a gift, you are a gift.
Jordan (01:14:46.83)
All right, thank you brother. We're gonna give you a chance to see what happens next.
Curt Cronin (01:14:50.924)
my god, was, you were, that was amazing. full send.
you
Jordan (01:14:59.176)
I'm gonna go take a nap.
