The Bonsai Tree - On Nature and How We Grow

 Bonsai trees are intended to bring the core aspects of nature: balance harmony, and simplicity. It's said that when we consider the natural flow of the environment, these three characteristics, should anything occur to disrupt it (nature) will always restore itself. There is always a natural harmonic balance to things.

In looking at the trees and their scale, on so many levels we can realized how much bigger the trees are than manmade structures. And if you look at it, a tree (nature), is way, way, more massive than anything that we make.

The act of caring for bonsai trees is nurturing in its profound sense. And when giving from the heart, the giver benefits as much as the receiver. By bonding through nature, the Bonzai plant's meaning is enriched and it becomes our teacher. I thought that was beautiful. And it calls to friendship too; all relationships, by bonding, by bonds, things are enriched and it's a teaching moment. We teach each other. The more we provide and nurture for one, the other also reciprocate, not always in the sense that we expect, but it is going back to that circle. When you care, you are cared for. What you seek is seeking you.

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TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Fawn: Hello, we are here. So are the birds. Can you hear him?

[00:00:05] Matt: That's like a Yodel bird.

[00:00:06] Fawn: I know there are all kinds of wildlife outside

[00:00:12] Matt: and, but we actually have our windows open because it's actually not

[00:00:14] Fawn: boiling hot out. Right. I want to say there has been a moving a migration , if you will, of all kinds of wildlife coming to the tree right outside our window, because.

The food, the bird seeds, we have chosen. It's a whole new community out there. It's wild.

[00:00:34] Matt: And it's waking you up first thing in the morning, isn't it?

[00:00:37] Fawn: Well, yeah, I've been having insomnia again, so like right when I go to sleep, then it feels like the birds are like, hello, all kinds. And I don't know what they're saying.

They're shouting all kinds of stuff. Speaking of nature, are you ready for today's episode? I'm never ready. Hello friends. Hello everybody. Today, we are talking about how we [00:01:00] grow and the bonsai tree. Are you ready? All right, here we go. So bonsai trees are intended to bring the core aspects of nature and there's three.

We have balance harmony. And simplicity. It's said that when we consider the natural flow of the environment, these three characteristics; balance, harmony and simplicity are always present. And if anything occurs to disrupt nature, it will always restore itself. You can take that however way. You know, we talk about how we're messing up the environment or big, so filthy, dirty, irresponsible, best believe nature will take care of itself.

The earth will still be here, but it doesn't mean whoever's polluting it will, right. I mean, it can be really, it can really smack you, but it will, [00:02:00] but isn't that the law. Everything that everything will restore itself.

[00:02:08] Matt: There is I think a natural harmonic balance to things, but that doesn't mean that that harmonic balance won't completely get flipped on its, butt supposedly and God knows it hasn't happened certainly in our lifetimes.

And it probably won't in subsequent lifetimes, but magnetic north sometimes flips to the south pole. Yes. What the heck? Well, that seems very out of bounds.

[00:02:32] Fawn: But things move right? You need to flip and move, but then there's no harmony, but isn't that the whole cycle of the circle, we talk about it with Aikido it's a circle, right?

So the north turning into the south of south turning into the north, wouldn't that be part of that circular pattern? Why are you quiet? Why are you looking at me like that? Did I get you? Yeah, I got you. [00:03:00] So let me go on with what I was saying.

So things will restore themselves. Everything will restore itself. Everything will restore itself. Now, when we're going through the thick of things does not seem that way, especially when we're in the middle of it. Right. Depending on if you're feeling pessimistic or not, it may feel like when the bad things, are happening, it's not good or bad, but it feels bad to us.

Or like when we're experiencing the challenge of things, it feels like that will be the way it is FOREVER. If you look at things pessimistically, it feels like whatever's happening will be static. And it's just going to be that way forever. But if you're more optimistic, you know, that nothing lasts forever.

That there's always a change. Things always evolve. [00:04:00] Things always restore themselves. I know you want to say something. Can you hold your thought? Okay. Yeah, no. Do you want to go ahead?

[00:04:09] Matt: I'm still

[00:04:09] Fawn: formulating can you just note it down because you always say that I derail you and you don't get to say, say whatever you want to say.

So by all means, hold on to your thought. So what I'm talking about here is how trees in particular, because we're talking about the bonsai tree, they show the cycles of life trees show the cycles of life. That's their major lesson. Aside from the health lesson of, you know, they are a vital force that brings life, food, air, oxygen, the cleaning of the environment.

Right. And they're really powerful. Just the other day. I saw some footage of Chernobyl present day [00:05:00] and all these tress have overtaken the buildings that were evacuated. Have you seen that map? Nope. Take a look. It's on the internet. Well, I mean, you know, I think, I think it's true, but, it shows that truly nature cannot be destroyed, but it doesn't mean that we as human beings are not destroying each other.

But yeah, I saw these images. I hope they're real, but everything, you know, I just don't know anymore. You kind of have to go with your gut. You know how everyone had to evacuate their homes. Right, right. But nature it's like turning green and trees are just overtaking all these things.

Plants overtaking all these manmade structures. It's like nature is coming back. It's amazing. Right? It gives you hope that if we let it be, if we just [00:06:00] let it be and be open and open-hearted, we'll see the natural flow of things, the natural health of things to return. So I have a nugget of wisdom. From Santa Monica.

This one is brought to you by our friend in Santa Monica, who we have not spoken to in a very long time. But do you remember Marissa Marissa Hall? Yes, of course my neighbor. So one day she comes to me, she's like, oh my God. I just had a realization. I was looking at the trees outside

[00:06:33] Matt: I'm trying to think of which tree she's

[00:06:34] Fawn: probably talking about. She was talking about all the trees. She went on the roof and, and she was looking out from, do you know, I

[00:06:40] Matt: never went on the roof? No, I didn't even think about it.

[00:06:44] Fawn: Hmm. So, well, like you take the. You know, the fire escape, the stairs, we would go to, to put our trash in the shoot.

Like if you keep going up, like anyway, [00:07:00] so, so she was looking at the trees and she's like, oh, I just realized, like I was looking at the trees and I realized how much bigger the trees are than manmade structures. And if you look at them, they are way, way more massive than anything that we make. And it's funny.

Cause I was like, yeah, because I had that same thought too, but I had never expressed that out loud and Marissa did that day and I'm so glad she did because another thing she was expressing was that, these trees are witnesses to time and everything, all the happenings that have occurred. In the neighborhood, right?

Like they have been there. And I remember we used to go to, what was that place called? I can't, I can never pronounce it. Muir woods, Muir woods. Remember, and they would show us the [00:08:00] rings. They would have charts on the trail. Right. And it would show the rings and it would have dates on it like this ring predates, when Jesus Christ walked on the earth.

Right. So this tree is older and it's like, oh my God, this tree has been the witness of every crazy thing that humans have been up to. I don't

[00:08:23] Matt: know, humans have been pretty much crazy before JC,

[00:08:27] Fawn: but do you understand what I'm saying? I mean, that's a lot, that's a, that's a long time. There was a solemness

[00:08:33] Matt: to it, for sure.

[00:08:34] Fawn: For one tree to be looking at all this commotion. So going back to the bonsai tree, here is something that I've found from the meaning and benefits of a bonsai tree. And I got this from karma and luck.com and this is what they say. Caring for bonsai trees is nurturing and it's pro pull-out.

Let me start over.[00:09:00]

Caring, caring, caring for bonsai trees is nurturing in it's profound sense. And when giving from the heart, the giver benefits as much as the receiver. By bonding through nature, the Bonzai plant's meaning is enriched and it becomes our teacher. I thought that was beautiful. And it calls to friendship too; all relationships, by bonding, by bonds, things are enriched and it's a teaching moment. We teach each other. The more we provide and nurture for one, the other also reciprocates, not always in the sense that we expect, but it is going back to that circle. Whatever you take care, we'll take care of you.

[00:09:52] Matt: Right. Absolutely.

[00:09:53] Fawn: That's my take on the Bonzai. Now we started this conversation this morning because a [00:10:00] friend of ours brought up the bonsai tree.

Well, I brought up karate kid and I went to you. I'm like honey, because I wanted her to look at the movie. Cause they were, it was about the bonsai tree. I'm like, which one of the karate kids, the original ones, not the one with Jaden Smith, but like which one, which one was it where it was the bonsai tree.

And they, they had to go. Th w it revolved around the bonsai tree, that particular one. And you said it was number three. It was number three. And then you said don't no, no, no, no. Don't have her watch that one. So explain.

[00:10:37] Matt: So "Karate Kid I" with, you know, Ralph Macchio and Pat Morita and yeah. Nice. Simple. Kind of pre-adolescent adolescent type movie, very simple, very kind of nice romantic aspect, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Number two, kind of continue. The theme took us to Japan. It was kind of nice. [00:11:00] Then number three hits number three. Yes, it does have that romance. There is a romance going on, but it isn't really a romance and the story is

[00:11:08] Fawn: messed up. It's kind of like toy story. The, the one that was all weird. I don't watch toy story movies.

I can't it's too. It's not Fawn friendly for me. But it's kind of like that, right? It gets, I mean, it gets really

[00:11:21] Matt: dark. It gets really dark. And, if you're in the wrong head space and you watch it, you can get taken to a very challenging place. Now you look at the movie itself and if you're like in a good mood, et cetera, et cetera, everything's cool.

No problem. Um, fairly enjoyable. It's a much better story, honestly, then. And even the next karate kid and even the Jaden Smith karate kid, and even, even Cobra, Kai, I'll even say that, oh my God. Anyways. Um, not that I'm a huge "Karate Kid" fanatic or anything. Dope. My secrets out anyways. No, it's just the movies.

Movies are much darker and you know, pat Morita is [00:12:00] always Mr. Miyagi's always taking care of ponds eyes and they start, you know, Mr. Miyagi's a little trees, little company that they start and everything, but yeah,

[00:12:08] Fawn: go, go to the whole point. So I don't remember much about it, but doesn't. Steal the Bonzai.

Well,

[00:12:17] Matt: okay. So the bad guys, blah, blah, blah, do bad things to the business. They don't have any money then Daniel's like, I can sell this because it's an original Bonzai, whatever the heck that is. I don't even know if that's a thing.

[00:12:29] Fawn: Yeah, no. It came from like the original source, whatever,

[00:12:33] Matt: whatever that means.

And this could be fantasy and this could be reality. I don't know.

[00:12:36] Fawn: It just explained it for friends who have not watched the "Karate Kid"

[00:12:40] Matt: stuff. Well, this is one of the things Pat Morita, Mr. Miyagi originally teaches Daniel, which is, bonsai trees teach again the things you mentioned, balance harmony simplicity.

It's, it's about visualization. It's about a bunch of other things. And so you take this tree and like you use wires and you use Clippers and you cut it and shape it [00:13:00] into the desired. And if your heart is pure, then you see the tree for what it's supposed to be, and you can make it become that, which is a little sinister.

If you think

[00:13:11] Fawn: about it, it's very egotistical. Once again, the patriarchy comes in and tries to take mother nature and I'm getting angry. So here comes the man taking nature with all of its beauty and grace and wisdom,

[00:13:28] Matt: power

[00:13:28] Fawn: thinking. I'm just going to take some wire and twist you into the shape I want you to be

[00:13:35] Matt: Yeah, and then I got to cut you too, but yes.

Yeah, it's really messed up. It's a reasonably violent activity and not tremendously dissimilar from, and

[00:13:44] Fawn: yet it's seen as so peaceful.

[00:13:46] Matt: Well, yes, well, there's, there's an undercurrent that I think is very comfortable for people to ignore that kind of runs through dare I say Japanese society,

[00:13:55] Fawn: but it, it, it started from Chinese.

The Bonzai originally came from [00:14:00] China, right? The bonsai tree.

[00:14:02] Matt: I don't think there's as much of an undercurrent in China as there is in Japan of just difference if you will, or, you know, um, I don't know, what's a word for it, but like they made these amazing swords, folded them over 500 times, Japan, Japan in Japan.

And in order to make sure your sword was any good, you gave it to somebody who killed somebody with it. (Sarcastically said) Brilliant. I, and the same way you look at it, you look at bonsai and if you know, it came from China. So does it come from the same school of thought that said, women have to have their feet bound. So they're nice and tiny and fit and tiny shoes, regardless of whether or not they can walk and seem similar

[00:14:47] Fawn: enough, doesn't it?

I think we're going to destroy the whole concept of the beautiful bonsai tree for everybody. Well, well, but you know what? That's what we do at our kitchen table. Isn't it?

[00:14:58] Matt: Well, we, we, we certainly take a hard look [00:15:00] at things for

[00:15:00] Fawn: sure. Yeah. Where does that really come from? What does it really mean? This simple gesture that we are not really thinking of too deeply?

Like where did it really come from? What does it really mean? Yeah, you're right. The binding and the binding of the female form. I mean, from shoes, feet to corsets lungs, like my God, right. Bra. I mean, I appreciate the bra. I sorry, but, but I do, you know, it's all binding. How are we going to bind this particular life force, right.

To the way we want it to be. And it's not just how women are treated. It's how we treat our own lives. How are we binding our own selves? Are our hearts bound. Because we aspire for a particular way. And that way it could be something society [00:16:00] expects of us, not what your true heart is supposed to be. What your true heart, your true spirit is supposed to grow into.

[00:16:08] Matt: Exactly because it doesn't fit. It doesn't, it isn't acceptable. It's not a comfortable place to go.

[00:16:16] Fawn: And God forbid like you get Unbound. Then you're seen as

[00:16:22] Matt: you better find yourself, some like-minded individuals quickly, otherwise you're going to feel very isolated. Oh my

[00:16:27] Fawn: God. Yeah. You get talked about, you get ridiculed, like, Ooh, God forbid you grow your hair this way naturally, or to all my sisters and brothers out there, you know, like, oh my goodness.

To the way we think. God forbid, you're going to go over here and have your own free thoughts and explore something that's different from what most people are talking about.

[00:16:53] Matt: And the only way you can make it acceptable, if you continue down that path is by making lots of money. That becomes [00:17:00] literally the only way that that becomes then acceptable inside of society.

Right.

[00:17:05] Fawn: That's yeah. So basically if you abide. Then you will be successful in these ways. You'll have the relationships you want. You will have the money you want. You will have the house, you want the neighborhood you want

[00:17:21] Matt: respect. You want,

[00:17:23] Fawn: if you fit, if you fit within that binding curriculum. Right. But if you don't.

Then you got to totally create your own thing, right. Your own community.

[00:17:35] Matt: Right? Right. Exactly. And you have to almost be hyper aggressive when you're out in the quote unquote, real world, because people are gonna come at you and question it and look at you and judge you and all the rest of it. For sure. So I

[00:17:48] Fawn: feel like I cut you off.

So you were talking about how we manipulate the bonsai tree. I feel like we totally went off. On a, on a tangent, which is actually a very [00:18:00] important topic. I'm glad we did, but yeah, you're right. It is the binding and it's quite violent. It

[00:18:06] Matt: can be for sure. And, and, you know, um, if you want to say plants feel, I can't imagine that pleased with that.

[00:18:13] Fawn: They do feel, remember we have this book, I got this book like 30 years ago. No, maybe less than that. Sorry. I exaggerate, I think it's called "The Secret Life of Cells" . It talks about the scientist was I had plants in his, in his apartment.

 And this was way back when, so he decided to hookup the, what do you call them? Electrodes the little wires to the plants, to his lie detecting machine. One day by accident, he spilled boiling, hot water up, uh, and it spilled on a plant on one of the plants and the plant that had the wires connected to it, to the lie detecting machine.

[00:19:00] It went nuts. So the plant bore witness to what happened, right? Bore witness. Am I saying that right? So the plant saw what happened it was, it fell to the other plant getting hurt and it, the, you know, how the drawings go up and down really high,

[00:19:19] Matt: right. When someone's telling you a lie, it's basically a heightened, emotional state is what they're

[00:19:23] Fawn: checking.

So the plant had a severely heightened emotional state. And so he noticed that. So what he did was he said, okay, I'm going to do it again. But, but in the book it said, but I was, I didn't, I was not going to actually do it because I don't want to inflict harm on the plant. But what he did was he took another pot of boiling water, had the plants still attached to the lie detecting machine thing.

And then he took another plant to be presented in front of the plant. That's connected to the detecting machine. Right. [00:20:00] And he went to pour the boiling water on this plant, knowing he wasn't going to actually go through with it. But he was just going to go through all the gestures, like make it look like he is in fact, going to pour more boiling water on.

And this time the plant had no reaction and he thought that's weird. So he looked into it long story short guys, read the book, but long story short, the plant knew his intention. I mean that's wild. So he really got into the whole concept of how we can feel each other. He continued this whole experiment on so many levels.

Like, um, you know, how dogs can sense if something's wrong or they can sense you coming home. Long before you actually get there. Like they know you're where you are. Do you know what I mean? They pace back and forth. Right. And so he's logging this plant. He's logging the [00:21:00] time. He's logging when this plant has emotions, heightened emotions, flat emotions, all of this.

One day he gets into a uh,fender bender out there in the world, he gets into a car accident. he noted the time. Of course, he came home and he looked at the paperwork for the lie detecting machine. That's connected to the plant and he saw that this plant had a high emotion at that same time.

This plant was bonded with this man and this plant could sense him out there in the world, outside of here.

[00:21:36] Matt: Which is interesting for sure. And they do talk about things like twins, being aware of what happens with the other twin and things like that. And sometimes like you just get a feeling of, and yeah, sometimes it seems like nine times out of 10, you're wacky for having it.

But that one time out of 10, something, something weird. Well,

[00:21:55] Fawn: because we're always looking for fact-based proof, right? We're looking for [00:22:00] evidence and sometimes. It may not show up the way we think, you know, so, and I bet you more times than not. It does show up to say, Hey, this is what happened, but we're not aware of the signs.

Do you know what I mean? We're not aware of the proof, right? Because we're so busy, we're so busy and we're so preoccupied. Our focus is scattered right now. We don't see that. Anyways, this is getting too esoteric, whatever, but it's true. This is real world. I, from my perspective, what do you think?

[00:22:40] Matt: Come we come.

It's almost like we come straight back to visualization in my mind. You know, uh, what you see happens, what you look for is, you know, if you go looking for heaven or you go looking for hell, you will find it. I think that's a very true saying. Setting intention. I think it's about being open for

[00:22:58] Fawn: sure. Okay.

I [00:23:00] understand what you're saying, but it also sounds like we can make this stuff up, but that's reality that this is like, this is for real, this stuff happens. We are connected like that. Do you know what I mean? It's not it doesn't, it's not about you visualizing it to happen. This is how life is.

[00:23:20] Matt: Sometimes it can be, I think, confusing and complicated. And sometimes I think you don't necessarily visualize, it's not putting your will against the universes. It's about being receptive to the good, which it is, which is slightly different.

 It seems like we'd taken it to a dark place, so we need to take it back to a circular place and get away from bonzais.

[00:23:44] Fawn: Why? No, the whole concept of is the Bonzai. That's the example. So

[00:23:49] Matt: how I just thrashed we've thrashed the poor little bonsai,

[00:23:54] Fawn: but it's true. So you want to just ignore it and go to another topic?

[00:24:00] Mother nature. We've thrashed women in our society. You want to just ignore that? I don't know if

[00:24:04] Matt: we thrash mother nature inside of this particular episode, and I don't think we've thrashed women in this poor

[00:24:09] Fawn: episode, not us in this episode, but I'm talking about in our world. I know, but I'm trying

[00:24:15] Matt: to keep the context inside of the

[00:24:16] Fawn: episode.

Okay. Well, that's, that's my context is what do we do? This is how we've treated things. This is how we've treated them. The world that this is how we've treated nature. This is how we have treated our relationships. So where do we go from here now that we've like seen, okay. Wow. Am I binding you with Clippers and clipping you and cutting you and making you like twist and turn this way.

So you're more aesthetically pleasing. What do we do when we realize? Wow. Okay. What do we do? So let's get back to that karate kid thing. So, okay. So Daniel steals the plant. He does little

[00:24:56] Matt: fiend

[00:24:56] Fawn: from where it was. He clips

[00:24:59] Matt: it it's, [00:25:00] it actually, it's an awesome place. God knows where it was, but it was like right next to the ocean and it was this big kind of a cliff, but it was a tunnel down.

And like, it was like, it was like a big hole, basically that went all the way down to water

[00:25:14] Fawn: and it's like, and here grows his bonsai tree. It was planted.

[00:25:19] Matt: It was planted there originally. Well, this was Mr. Miyagi, special tree for him from his house. So he planted it there to the, let it grow naturally. Right.

[00:25:28] Fawn: And so here comes Daniel. He, he clips it. He takes it. Well, he takes a yes, so they can sell it so they

[00:25:34] Matt: can make money. He can sell it and he can give Mr.

[00:25:37] Fawn: Miyagi the money. And he thought Mr. Miyagi would be like, oh my God, thank you. Save my business. And what did Mr. Miyagi do? You don't really remember.

[00:25:45] Matt: Okay.

So he got pissed. And he was like, you got to put it back. But unfortunately, in the process of him, getting the tree and bringing it to the little shop that they had, and he was going to show it to him, then he gets attacked by the bad guys. And the bad guy shred the tree a [00:26:00] little more than a little.

And so it was unsellable anyways, but yeah, that's what that's what bad guys do they kind of, yeah, ruin the, they can ruin the protagonist story. They

[00:26:09] Fawn: killed them. The life

[00:26:11] Matt: force. No, they, they, they certainly interrupt your plans. Right.

[00:26:15] Fawn: So, so now here's the messed up Bonzai. And so what happens? Well, they mend it, they amend it, but then, so Mr.

Miyagi does what he says, Daniel, we got to put this thing back where it came from. Yes, absolutely. And can you explain what the theory was? How did he explain to Daniel that you have to let this grow on its own? There is a message we're missing here. What was the final message? Let it grow on its own.

[00:26:43] Matt: Yes, no, no, no, no. And that certainly was the message , that Mr. Miyagi was trying to teach Daniel that, at some point the tree is going to be the tree and you need to let it be and grow. And this was a quote, unquote, original bonzai and so it wasn't like wired and [00:27:00] twisted and everything else.

But the real message from the movie was something entirely different.

[00:27:04] Fawn: what was the message .

[00:27:05] Matt: It depends on who you are. The message I got from the movie was at, of course, ends at the karate tournament and Daniel's getting his little butt kicked because they brought in this bad boy, black belt and scored a point, lose a point, score a point, lose a point at win and final death was the plan.

So he would score a point and then he'd like, totally thrash. He'd do an illegal move and like tweak his knee, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And to me, the central point of the entire movie was when Dan was like, I'm afraid, I'm afraid. And Mr. Miyagi is like, it's just a fight. It's just a fight. And you can walk away.

It's about emotionally connecting to negativity and you don't have to do that. You can just walk away. If you're working at a job with a [00:28:00] boss who expects you to be there for 200 hours a week and you've got a bully, if you can remove the emotional connection from it, which is incredibly hard to do, and this is why it's good to have a good circle of friends and people who love you around you, who can be more objective.

Oftentimes if you can just remove yourself from the situation and look at it from an emotionless state, not emotionally connected, you realize you can just walk away. So when Daniels I got more afraid I'm afraid. And Mr. Miyagi is like, like, it's just a fight. That was him saying, you know, smacking him and saying, it's just a fight.

It's not a big deal. This isn't, this is not your life. This is just one tiny little portion. And if, if you lose, you lose it. Doesn't. Yeah. You know, you lose, you lose a fight so what who cares. It's not like the end of your life.

[00:28:54] Fawn: So true. I remember Holly being on the phone with me when I got fired from a job.

And [00:29:00] I remember calling her from the job and I told her what had just happened. Right. And she sounded so happy and started clapping and saying, yay. And I got mad at her. Like, what are you doing? Like why you're being really mean? I just lost my job. Right. And she's like, your job is not you this in the grand scheme of things, this job is not important.

[00:29:27] Matt: Oh, do we need to call her Holly Miyagi? Oh,

[00:29:30] Fawn: she is. He is very wise. Like Holly, I swear. Like she's a talented photographer. She's like the most talented if she wanted to be therapist. So, but, but when she was trying to tell me while I was crying, hysterically was, this is not you.

This is only a tiny little tiny, nothing in the grand scheme of your life. These people being mean to you, this job being mean to you, them firing [00:30:00] you. You're so much bigger than that. You're so much bigger than these things. This is not the whole grand meaning of life. Just like how you described Miyagi, talking to him about this is just a fight

[00:30:16] Matt: it's about where you choose to spend your emotional currency, because you've only got so much.

[00:30:22] Fawn: That's exactly how I felt during the SATs. I studied years to have high scores on the SAT and I sat there, I wrote my name and they tell you, you, you automatically get certain points writing your name. I'm like, okay.

I wrote my name. And then all of a sudden I started looking around. And it didn't do the test. I sat there for a long time, too, just watching people and watching the stress and the intensity everyone had their number too pencils and filling the little bubbles as quickly as possible. Absolutely. I was just watching them.[00:31:00]

I'm like, this is not me. This is not my way. And then I just, and then I continued to just color. Cause I liked to color. I just colored BC, BC, BC, all the way down the test got up, turned the test in and walked away. I never looked back, but I also realized where I was headed the essay SATs didn't matter for me, you know, uh, the schools that I was going towards didn't care about the sat.

Right. I get it. That's a really good lesson. Thanks honey. But going back to the bonzai

and so going back to nature, letting things be. Realizing having the wisdom, the foresight to see that what you think is fragile is the most wisest, strongest, most powerful force

[00:31:50] Matt: can be.

[00:31:52] Fawn: And so let it be

[00:31:53] Matt: right. Yeah, we can certainly go right back to the parable of the Willow and the bamboo, right?

The Willow stands [00:32:00] against the storm and the bamboo bends. So once the storm gets bad enough, the Willow breaks and the bamboo still bends. Right. And of course, bamboo reproduces like a mofo. So it's everywhere anyway. And

[00:32:12] Fawn: For thousands of years, that's exactly what has been said. And now the kitschy term for it is resilient.

But that's it. It's basically the same thing. Now, all these people are saying resilience, this resilience that let me teach you my course on resilience. I would say

[00:32:30] Matt: the resilience is how to be the Willow who gets broken and then fixes itself. It's not about the bamboo resilience to me is this is what you do when you get broken.

This is how to keep yourself from getting broken. Well, yeah, because you don't bend

[00:32:47] Fawn: into. Nope. Well, what I learned from the practice of resilience was before the whole resilience thing came into pop culture. I actually understood it best from Joe Dispenza [00:33:00] and Gregg Braden is when they were talking about centenarian, men and women who live over a hundred years, over a hundred years and they watch their friends die, they watch wars, they watch some terrible stuff that happened, right.

But what makes them so quote unquote resilient it's because they just sway. They just go with it. They don't, you know what I mean? Keep with the flow. And to me, that's the bamboo they bend, but I

[00:33:29] Matt: hold her Harlan Ellison view on the whole Centennial centenarian whatever you want to call it. Well, he says that, uh, people who typically live the longest are.

Arrogant egotistical pricks.

[00:33:42] Fawn: See,

[00:33:44] Matt: who have an incredibly, who are incredibly vain, who are incredibly selfish, who are incredibly greedy, perhaps that's because they have a very strong sense of self. Now, of course, this is very attractive to Harlan Ellison. Cause he was kind of that way too. I was

[00:33:58] Fawn: going to say, is he describing [00:34:00] himself well, but

[00:34:01] Matt: that's just it, there are things like, um, One of the books.

I read had a picture of him and his entire class. Right. And he was always the shortest, et cetera, et cetera. But he was the one in the picture with his hands on his hips, just kind of glaring daring, the camera to take his picture. And everybody else was all demure and everything else. You know, he was, he was not a shrinking violet.

That's cool. And he had a very strong sense of itself, which you would have to in order to he, he's a professional writer. He wrote the greatest star Trek episode ever, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, very prolific. That's not a business you can get into, unless you are a pretty confident person.

It's really hard, I think, to succeed as a professional writer,

[00:34:46] Fawn: but you know what, just going back to the lessons of the tree, right? It's, it's all about the cycles of. And the, the one that bends the bamboo, is it a weed or a tree? [00:35:00] Whatever it's from nature. It bends, right? That's just one take on that's like saying rich people are all are all a-holes, that's just your own stupid perception of what abundance and wealth is, and that can get in the way of things. So you can say to yourself, oh, well only really like the, the gross people with the gross personalities are able to be resilient. So therefore I'm not going to be like that. That's a very dangerous way to look at it. That's his perception of himself.

And he's putting that out there in the world and saying the ones who are resilient, this is their core characteristic. And it's not

[00:35:47] Matt: no, well, I honestly think, okay. Allow me to now reframe or rephase because I, you know, I kind of chose to be a little incendiary. No, I think he's passed. Okay. Um, [00:36:00] but honestly, I think I want to say the key to everything.

And Toto is the inner Popeye really have a clear under, and I'm not supposed to say inner Popeye,

[00:36:14] Fawn: you know what no, I say he's not supposed to say it because it's hard to edit

[00:36:17] Matt: that is having a very clear understanding of who you are and being comfortable inside.

[00:36:24] Fawn: Babe. Can you just write your book on the inner Popeye?

I already, should we just take all the episodes, which is all like 60 something of them and just transcribe all the inner Popeye metaphors. You have and viola, we have a book. No, no,

[00:36:40] Matt: no. It's a good lesson. I know. But what I'm saying is understanding. Being who you are and having a very clear understanding of who you are and not allowing that perception, that reality, honestly, of who you are to be clouded or changed by the world.

[00:37:00] And that's gotta be incredibly difficult, you know, because, because my way of dealing with the world and still maintaining my sense of self is to hide is to.

[00:37:10] Fawn: I mean one way to get around it is not to pay attention to the rest of the world and just do your work. Yes. But, but then if you have to make money and you have to interact with people, it's a problem.

You see? Yeah. It's a problem. Like usually where I am.

[00:37:26] Matt: So you just gotta be the chameleon like me,

[00:37:28] Fawn: we got to find our tribe. And this is why we're having this whole podcast is this

[00:37:34] Matt: is our tribe. So I would say that, you know, things like. Yeah. Uh, Harlan Ellison saying being arrogant, egotistical fits for him because that's kind of his, where he was at.

He was very strong in that and very, just, yeah.

[00:37:48] Fawn: You know what? That's a very patriarchal way. And I feel like that's the old way. I think the new ways to not be like a rigid a hole, [00:38:00] but be a wise female abundant nurturing open-hearted being, which is going back to nature, which is going back to that force that we described at the beginning of the podcast, which is nature the tree with all the lessons and all the fruits for survival.

That is what we need to embrace, rather than that, rather than the old patriarchal, sword wielding yielding. What's the word yielding or wielding, wielding sword wielding thing, and I'm not trying to be extra hippy about it, but I'm saying that never underestimate the power of a man. Yes, but never underestimate the power of the woman.

Never under estimate the power of nature. [00:39:00] Never underestimate the power of your own soul, your own spirit, never underestimate the power that you may not see.

[00:39:12] Matt: I don't think that's in any way in conflict with what I just said. Believe it or not. It

[00:39:17] Fawn: just feels very male. It

[00:39:18] Matt: does. But welcome to the world. I am

[00:39:20] Fawn: male.

Okay. I honor you. I see you. I see you, man. I just would like to. Bring about my side, as well as your strong masculine side. And I want arise and say, yo, pay attention to me because there needs to be that balance, going back to balance harmony simplicity. It's not a big deal. We can have a conversation about this and argue for eons, but really together we have balance harmony simplicity, and let's not , over think it.

 I'm asking you to pay attention to the wise woman.

[00:39:59] Matt: [00:40:00] Of course.

[00:40:01] Fawn: All right. And I'm not saying I'm the wise woman, which I am, I am, I am the wise woman and not saying, but I'm, I'm not trying to make this about me. I'm saying let's give praise to both sides. I mean, our whole logo is that it's the earth, right?

It's a yin yang symbol, but it's really the globe. Balance, of course. Okay. Why are you looking at me like that?

Well, that's all I have to say. Okay. This is how we grow. Can we bring it back before we close up with a pretty little bow on it? So I said, how we grow? This is how we grow is by letting nature be. Letting your body look however way it wants to, in a healthy feeling way. Let your hair grow the way it's intended to. Stop looking like everybody else.

 Become the force. Go with that. Go with the [00:41:00] river. Go with the flow.

[00:41:01] Matt: Right, right. But of course, the first thing you need to do is you need to understand the flow. You need to understand where you're at. You need to understand how you grow and how to grow even in a world that maybe doesn't want you to. Growing in harmony

[00:41:18] Fawn: with yourself.

And usually if you're any kind of a creative type, the world does not want you to grow. They want you to be molded a certain way. This is the reason why they're home. There are so many homeschoolers now is because we're seeing wow, the old way is not working. Folks. Stop trying to mold things a certain way.

 Let's let nature be and see the profoundness of it and nurture that. And that will in turn, nurture everything else. It will have our society grow in the most beautiful way that we can't even imagine with our little selves right here. Indeed. [00:42:00] So that's, that's what I have to say. Should we wrap it up?

Do you wanna put a little pretty

[00:42:04] Matt: bow on it? Yeah. Throw down all the wisdom and now you're like, okay, one more thing. One more thing.

[00:42:09] Fawn: One more thing. I would like a big box of chocolates and I want every piece of chocolate to be delicious. Bite and put back. So yeah, I want more chocolate and Tiramisu. I want to Tiramisu

[00:42:23] Matt: pay attention, pay attention to yourself, pay attention to how others perceive you and pay attention to the ways that you feel you feel is right to grow, but pay attention

[00:42:38] Fawn: to her name, go with your own natural way. What is natural? Cause that is nature. That is the profoundness of how the plan is how that little acorn nut grows into this fabulous tree.

All right, guys, why are you looking at me like that?

[00:42:57] Matt: Because you're taking the last word and you're going to do it again. [00:43:00]

[00:43:01] Fawn: Sorry, man. I am so sorry to like step on the patriarch.

[00:43:08] Matt: Can you wrap it up in a pretty little bow? Wait, no, I'm going to add something to the end.

[00:43:13] Fawn: All right. Repeat what you said. No poor baby.

[00:43:18] Matt: I'm fine, actually.

[00:43:20] Fawn: All right. I didn't hurt your sweet little ego.

[00:43:25] Matt: My ego is far too big to be injured.

[00:43:28] Fawn: Okay. Good. Good Lord men. Love you. All right. I'm just kidding. I'm

[00:43:35] Matt: just kidding. You love

[00:43:36] Fawn: me. No, I love you. Thank you friends for listening. Sorry about the fight. Um, all right, we'll talk to you in a few days.

Love you guys. Take care. Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute, hold up, hold up. Please. Help us grow this thing. Leave a kind review on iTunes. Please tell people about this podcast. There are [00:44:00] amazing things that we're working on right now with friends around the world. There are things once we can all come together, financially health wise, in all ways, we have some amazing things that we're working on to build community around the world.

So please tell everyone about the podcast, sign up, download, please leave reviews write to us. Our friendly world.com or you can go to our friendly world podcast.com please. Okay, love you guys. Talk to you later. Bye. Bye. Bye.