Better Off Alone: Can Enneagram 5s really live with other people?

Introduction: Living Alone in a Cabin

[00:00:30] Josiah: So

[00:00:31]

[00:00:32] Cody: Yeah.

[00:00:33] Josiah: How would you feel if you had to live alone in the cabin, in the woods?

[00:00:38] Cody: For how long?

[00:00:39] Josiah: Indefinitely. I can see you're calculating, weighing the pros and cons. Yeah.

[00:00:46] Cody: I think I'd like it. 

[00:00:49] Yep.

[00:00:54] Depends on what's in the cabin. 

[00:00:56] Josiah: I guess that that would play into the decision

[00:00:58] Cody: 'cause I'm a self pres five, so

[00:01:00] Josiah: Right, right,

[00:01:01] Cody: Does it have like the most. So soft and lovely couch with a big TV and a nice surround system. Low lighting, a recording studio.

[00:01:13] Josiah: It's your dream cabin.

[00:01:14] Cody: If it's my dream cabin, then everybody can fuck off.

[00:01:20] Leave

[00:01:21] me alone. I will cease to exist to the world. I'm okay with that.

[00:01:25] Josiah: There we go. yeah.

[00:02:02] Okay. Um, Uh, I guess. 

The Episode We Need to Do

[00:02:10] Josiah: I guess I will start off by saying, I don't wanna do this episode

[00:02:12] Cody: I,

[00:02:13] Josiah: even 

[00:02:13] though it's my idea. And we're doing it because we've been talking around this for like, all year, pretty much, like since 

[00:02:21] the summer.

[00:02:22] Cody: Yeah.

[00:02:22] Josiah: Yeah.

[00:02:23] Cody: And

[00:02:24] Josiah: And I keep mentioning it and then I keep talking about how I don't wanna talk about it.

[00:02:28] Yeah. And so I figured I just needed to pull the bandaid off.

[00:02:30] Cody: So this is finally the episode you've been saying we have to do eventually.

[00:02:34] Josiah: right? Yeah.

[00:02:35] Cody: And in the last like seven episodes. Yeah.

[00:02:39] Josiah: And there are a lot of reasons why one is because it, it basically asks a question that I don't have an answer to, but not in like a fun way, not in like a, you know, meaning of the universe kind of way.

[00:02:51] Right. And like, uh, I can't figure this out and I desperately need to figure it out sort of way.

[00:02:56] Cody: Yeah.

Marriage Challenges and Personal Growth

[00:02:57] Josiah: probably also, this is a continuation of the conversation from like last, like summer of last year, the convenience versus connection episode, and also the getting older episode that we did this year. Okay. Um, 'Cause this is, basically following up on those conversations and everything that has transpired.

[00:03:17] And

[00:03:18] I also wanna say that, we're gonna go through this and I, one, one of the reasons why I've been avoiding this too, and that's hard, is that it's hard for me to tell this story without. Sharing stuff about my marriage

[00:03:33] and.

[00:03:34] knowing exactly what to share and what not to share is, uh, is challenging and

[00:03:40] Cody: what you have permission to share.

[00:03:41] Josiah: Well, yeah, I mean, and, and I talked to Amy and she was basically like, okay. So I will just say the thing, which is that uh, this summer, it seemed like it was the beginning of the end of my marriage.

[00:03:54] Cody: mm. I,

[00:03:55] Josiah: And I, I also feel like I need to, I feel like I'm doing a lot of preamble here.

[00:04:01] Uh, I feel like I need to preface this too with Amy is amazing and I love her dearly,

[00:04:07] Cody: Mm-hmm.

[00:04:08] Josiah: and I don't want anyone to get a negative impression of her in this. Because you knew what I know about her, everything would make a lot more sense. But that is not my story to share. Right. And so, like, that's the challenging part of this is like, it feels like a one-sided conversation and I'm definitely not gonna like, make her come on the show.

[00:04:24] Cody: Right.

[00:04:25] Yeah. That,

[00:04:26] Josiah: that's not what we're doing here. Uh, so, so yes, please keep that in mind. But this goes back kind of before the summer for sure. and. Just so you know, my approach to this is gonna be, I'm just gonna kind of get everything out and then you can pick up where you think is relevant and like where we need to, to, to dig in more.

[00:04:45] Uh, and we'll see how it goes. I don't know what the structure of this conversation is gonna be like, 

[00:04:49] so I'm, I'm probably gonna stumble through it a lot.

[00:04:51] So if you haven't listened to convenience versus connection and the getting older episode, I definitely recommend and you do that, but you don't have to stop and do that right now. Uh, I can give you a brief recap in that the summer of 2023, I guess it was two years ago. Oh my God,

[00:05:06] Cody: Whoa.

[00:05:07] Josiah: wow. Okay.

[00:05:08] I don't think we released it until, until last summer.

[00:05:12] Cody: I don't know. Maybe. I don't

[00:05:13] Josiah: We were sitting on it for a while. I felt like

[00:05:14] Cody: Yeah. It's back when we still did seasons. Right?

[00:05:17] Josiah: Okay. 

The Turning Point: A Night of Realization

[00:05:18] Josiah: So I basically had this night where my reality distortion field popped, and I finally felt like I, I'd fully finally opened up to Amy with a bunch of stuff that I had been, that had been weighing on me.

[00:05:32] And I kind of kept a part of myself sequestered, corded off, you know? Um, in that realizing. Kind of how much of an asshole I had been without necessarily realizing it. and it was because I had a, a bunch of trauma from childhood that I thought that I had addressed, but I definitely did not address 'cause it was coming out.

[00:05:52] And I was, I was running from that trauma

[00:05:55] Cody: yeah.

[00:05:56] Josiah: and since then I've done a shit ton of work and went through that process of, of healing and reconnecting with myself and kind of rediscovering who I am without all of the coping mechanisms that I had put in place as a protection system. Right.

[00:06:12] Cody: Right.

[00:06:13] Josiah: And that, that process is ongoing,

[00:06:16] you know, 

[00:06:17] turns out there are many, many, many layers.

[00:06:19] And every time I think I've gotten to the end, I realize I'm just beginning.

[00:06:24] Cody: Mm.

[00:06:25] Josiah: And I think that that is life.

[00:06:27] Cody: Yeah.

[00:06:27] Josiah: the other part of this too is we had a lot of contention in our marriage, and it was weird because I had this unconscious adversarial outlook on my relationship with her, like, feeling like she was always standing in my way of what I was trying to do, or like we couldn't do certain things because whatever reason that she had.

[00:06:48] and so I wasn't like living the life that I wanted to live, and I viewed it very as, as a sort of adversarial. But I, but I also hated that I did that. Like I didn't wanna feel that way. And like logically I didn't feel that way. But it was like this unconscious sort of like, thing that was under the surface.

[00:07:02] and

[00:07:02] when this night happened, like it was really for the first time that I, I really felt like we were on the same wavelength and that we were.

[00:07:13] It changed the relationship in that way.

[00:07:15] And as I started to unpack all of that, I realized much later on, a big part of that is because I had kind of just knocked myself down and really well mean it was an ego death for sure. 

[00:07:29] But I 

[00:07:29] also did not have a good view of myself after that.

[00:07:32] it was a gratitude that I was, I was grateful for her. I,

[00:07:35] but it, I don't think it was the right kind of gratitude. It was more like the gratitude of, of like, I'm grateful for someone who is with me, uh, in recovery. You know, kind of a, kind of a thing.

[00:07:46] Yeah. And, and then I feel. because there's all this guilt associated with it. There's all this guilt from the, the way that I had treated her. And, uh, and, and so that's where it was, it was coming from. And this was just sort of me. I mean, I think this is just like a, it's this evolution of this process and,

[00:08:03] And,

[00:08:04] things were really great for a while.

[00:08:05] And then the more work I did to start reconnecting with myself and healing those wounds realizing that so much of my life I have not been making decisions because it, what, it's what aligns with me and what I actually want, but it's because it's what I think I'm supposed to do. And then that gets us to the getting older episode.

[00:08:29] Yeah. 

[00:08:29] and

[00:08:29] that is a really hard realization. When you're about to turn 40 and you have a wife and three kids, you know, and you're like, how, you know, it's 'cause it's really hard to reconcile 'cause I love them more than anything. Yeah. And it's like, there's so much about our life that I love and, and still there's this whole part of me that's like, trying to decipher how much of this is, is what I have chosen and am choosing and how much of it is because it's what I would've thought I was supposed to do.

[00:09:01] And that's really uncomfortable to ask you just even ask the question is really, is really challenging, let alone try to figure out the answer to that.

[00:09:08] Cody: Yeah 

[00:09:09] Josiah: but it makes it way more challenging when you have this constant voice under the surface no matter what you do. Telling you that you're better off alone.

[00:09:21] And

[00:09:22] that is the basis of this conversation.

[00:09:27] Cody: It was like a 20 minute intro.

[00:09:30] Josiah: I

[00:09:30] Cody: How long

[00:09:31] Josiah: it? There's, there's a, there's a preamble, 

[00:09:34] Cody: so buckle up listeners. Settle in for the long winter.

[00:09:40] Josiah: winter is coming. Okay. 

Struggles with Career and Self-Discovery

[00:09:45] Josiah: So, This goes back many years. But you know, we, we've talked a bit about this before where a job hopped a lot

[00:09:52] Cody: Yep.

[00:09:52] Josiah: and you know, it was for the reasons that we've talked about 

[00:09:56] And

[00:09:56] Cody: And 

[00:09:56] Josiah: Another reason that we haven't talked about, which is I was always trying to feel better and so I'd be in a job and I would just, at first it would be good, and then I would just as start hating life and, and I would think, oh, well, it's just not the right job.

[00:10:16] And then I got into a job where it's like, I'm actually really good at this. and then, you know, and, and I'm using a lot of my talents and, and gifts and I feel competent, you know, and, but it's also still interesting, you know, I'm not, I'm not getting bored, which is great. And then the company was having some.

[00:10:37] Financial troubles. 'cause we've, you know, been going through a recession that nobody wants to admit is a recession. And 

[00:10:44] like, 

[00:10:45] and so then it got super stressful and it's, and I got miserable again. And it's like, I, must just need a different job that has a better situation. And so I found another job that was like the ideal fit and it's more aligned with like, what I was wanting to do.

[00:11:01] And they were in great financial situation. And I, you know, when I was going into that job, I'm like, okay, finally this is gonna be it. Like this is gonna be the one where I feel really good. And, and I didn't even have like that energy in the beginning. I'm like, what is happening? I'm not, I don't even have that initial oomph, you know, and I'm already like not wanting to be here, but there's nothing wrong with it.

[00:11:20] That's the thing. It's like I can't find anything wrong with it.

[00:11:23] And

[00:11:24] then.

[00:11:24] Cody: then

[00:11:25] Josiah: I got laid off in February, 

[00:11:28] and, you know, and what I, what I told myself was like, okay, well it must just because I'm not doing the thing that I actually want to do on my own right. I'm, it's not a job. It's the thing that I wanna do.

[00:11:38] Right. And so I got laid off and then I, I'm like, okay, well this is the time. This is the universe telling me like this, this is finally it, and I'm finally going to do the thing that aligns with me and everything's gonna be amazing. I'm gonna feel really good. And that was true for the first couple of months.

[00:11:55] And then that dread set in again, and I'm like, what the fuck is happening?

[00:12:02] Cody: Yeah.

[00:12:02] Josiah: and,

[00:12:03] then I had this,

[00:12:05] interaction with Amy that basically. Made me not want to live anymore. it was our 15 year anniversary and we went out on a date and, we did not do that a lot 

[00:12:17] for various 

[00:12:17] reasons.

[00:12:18] And we, you know, we're finally out and it, it actually felt really good and like really easy and, and, you know, chill. And we had a lot of fun. We went bowling and, and it was all good. And like I was really enjoying it and it was, I was starting to feel lighter again. Yeah. and

[00:12:37] you know, realizing that like I really wanted to connect.

[00:12:39] so on the way home this song came on and it reminded me that, you know, part of this whole process of me going through and connecting with. younger Josiah has been music and playing music again, and like going back and listening to music that I like technically wasn't allowed to listen to in high school and just all this stuff, you know?

[00:13:00] And, uh, and so I had been, every once in a while I'd turn on, uh, Ms. Jackson by Outkast in the car. Mm-hmm. And I had ended up memorizing the whole thing, 

[00:13:11] and I was able to 

[00:13:12] do the whole rap. And, and so I, and I hadn't, I hadn't done it for anyone, but I had this image, you know, in this, in my head that one day, you know, when Amy was ready, I would do this and she would think it was hilarious, you know, or at the very least.

[00:13:26] And, uh, you know, and then, or at the most, you would think I was the most talented person on the face of the earth, you know? 

[00:13:31] And, uh,

[00:13:33] Cody: But I could see how that played out in your head.

[00:13:37] Josiah: I was impressed with myself, okay? And, uh, this white boy has no business doing that.

[00:13:46] Cody: And

[00:13:46] Josiah: I, I am like, oh, you gotta hear this. And I put it on and I did the thing and I looked over and she was just cringing in her seat. And she made kind of this, offhand comment. That hurt. And we got home pulled into the driveway.

[00:14:04] And in the past I would have just not said anything. Gone inside and like going in my room by myself for the rest of the night 

[00:14:12] and just isolated, But I, because I've been doing all this work and really practicing expressing myself at my most vulnerable moments, I spoke up and I said, I get that you didn't realize this was a big deal for me.

[00:14:24] Mm-hmm.

[00:14:25] Cody: mm-hmm.

[00:14:26] Josiah: How could you have, 

[00:14:27] you know? Right. Yeah. 

[00:14:28] But I was actually sharing a part of myself that was really important to me, and I felt deeply rejected by that. Mm-hmm. And. Instead

[00:14:35] of hearing me in that moment she unfortunately was not in a state where she could hear me and. Turned it around on herself and started beating herself up and told me that, she would never be fun the way that I wanted to be fun and, and things like that. And it took me back to the beginning of our marriage and I realized that we have been dealing with this sort of thing for the last 15 years, 

[00:15:00] and 

[00:15:00] I can't do another 15 years.

[00:15:03] I can't do another five years. I can't, you know, I'm 

[00:15:05] not gonna spend 

[00:15:07] my forties the same way that I spent my twenties and thirties.

[00:15:10] Cody: Yeah.

[00:15:11] Josiah: Yeah. And it was heartbreaking. And, in that moment I'm like, I just, I just can't do it anymore. And so the, you know, the very unfortunate part of this was just the week before I had set the date for launching the beta of my program. And so I had to go through that and launch that and show up. In that way, in like the hardest way I've ever shown up at like, one of the deepest, darkest times in my life. And I still fucking did it. And, and so I was like, this, this is who I am and I am now I could show up mm-hmm. In the hard times and still be there.

[00:15:50] And, and so that part was amazing. But also like, I'm like, okay, well I'm probably just gonna have to go get a job 'cause I'm gonna need to get my own place and I gotta figure that out financially. And started thinking through all the logistics of this. And then I'm like, oh God, does that mean at some point in the future I'm gonna have to reenter the dating pool?

[00:16:07] And I started researching what that's like. And I'm like, oh God. I'm like, 

[00:16:11] no. You know, like, 

[00:16:12] and, 

[00:16:13] and, uh, like again would much rather be alone than having to do deal with that. Mm-hmm. 

The Voice of Isolation and Childhood Trauma

[00:16:22] Josiah: and what I had, what I had, the realization that I had come to was that. All this time,

[00:16:27] I thought that I was depressed for years and years and years, and it turned out I was just deeply unhappy.

[00:16:34] Cody: deeply

[00:16:34] Josiah: And, the job was just like masking the layer of unhappiness in my marriage, which then I found out was unha.

[00:16:45] I was masking like the unhappiness generally in my life and my choices and how I was going about living my life because I was not, I was not living my life for me. and the, challenge is like, how do I figure that, how out, how to do that? And.

[00:17:04] be a husband and a good dad and you know, sure.

[00:17:08] And all this, and run a business and, you know, be a,

[00:17:12] Cody: uh,

[00:17:13] Josiah: content creator who is out with their face all over Instagram. That makes me uncomfortable enough in like normal times. But how do I do it when I'm, you know, feeling so vulnerable and so just untethered. And I didn't know how I was gonna do it. But I knew that, you know, I had, I had, something had to change. Yeah.

[00:17:32] Something did

[00:17:34] change, which is we were able to finally, after many, many years of searching on and off, we found a marriage counselor therapist who was actually really good. And so we started that in the summer. But what I had realized from that was one of the things that, one of my kind of coping strategies was there are just certain, there are certain things in our relationship that I did not know how to navigate.

[00:18:05] And every time I started to like, go in that direction, 'cause I'm like, we need to figure this out. It was a disaster and I did not know how to deal with it. Yeah. I just did not have the skills and so I, I, in my head, I filed that away as this is a conversation to have when we have a therapist.

[00:18:22] But like, that was just, that just kept getting pushed back and pushed

[00:18:26] Cody: Sure. Yeah.

[00:18:27] Josiah: Yeah.

[00:18:28] And

[00:18:28] then, so finally when we had. You know that, that professional relationship, right. Uh, I had a huge backlog of things

[00:18:38] Cody: Oh yeah.

[00:18:39] Josiah: and, and you know, one of the first things you do is you go through like kind of an oral history of your relationship and I did not hold back. Yeah. And I, I mean it took two full sessions to get through, through full hour and a half sessions to get through all of that. Yeah.

[00:18:55] Cody: Yeah.

[00:18:56] Josiah: And I said things that I knew was going to be really, really hard for Amy to hear, and Amy said things too, that was really hard for me to hear too, like from her perspective as well. Yeah. And, and so, I realized in that, yeah, we had the, the, the hard conversations and yeah, there's still a lot that is unresolved, but just in expressing myself in that way, like fully. Sitting in those difficult emotions. where I know that what I'm feeling is going to hurt the other person.

[00:19:27] And then still, still saying it. 'cause I need to, be true to myself. Right. And, practicing that for really the first time fully that I can probably ever, that I can remember at least fully at that capacity. I feel like I, I get the, where I'm doing it fully, but it's just 'cause I'm just not, I'm unaware of more layers down that I'm still kind of

[00:19:48] Cody: Yeah. As full as you can be aware, right? Yeah. Ass

[00:19:50] Josiah: That's fully as yeah, my capacity for awareness. And so

[00:19:53] in

[00:19:54] that I realized I created sort of my own reality distortion field for Amy too because I, because I was not expressing what I really felt. Then she didn't have the opportunity to opt in or opt out.

[00:20:10] Uh, and so, you know, it wa and so the things that she was opting into a lot of it wasn't really what I wanted and, and I couldn't express that. And so in that I finally felt like we had at the very least,

[00:20:28] I

[00:20:28] got to experience what it really feels like to show up that way. Yeah. And, and now I kind of have that as a North star. and so we went, through a lot, uh, difficult conversations. One thing that was really good that I learned from all this, so.

[00:20:43] We, our therapists use the, the Gottman method, which I'm not at all a fan of the Gottman's themselves, but the, uh, yeah, they're super cringey boomer. Like, just not like the, the examples that they come up with are so, uh, like, like TV tropes 

[00:21:03] from like

[00:21:04] Cody: dated Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:21:07] Josiah: Uh,

[00:21:07] but they, they do have some useful tools and vocabulary.

[00:21:11] One of the things that,

[00:21:12] was a big eyeopener for me was this idea of positive and and negative sentiment override, and that's what I was experiencing before. So it's this it's almost like a, a switch that flips where it doesn't really matter what Amy did because I had a negative sentiment override.

[00:21:28] It was hard for me to view things positively and. And then I felt like shit about that. And then when we started going through this and I started actually opening up and expressing myself, that changed into positive sentiment override. And the, the difference in this for me like a, a tangible example over here is, you know, we, we bought this van a few years ago 'cause, you know, we have three kids

[00:21:54] Cody: Yeah.

[00:21:55] Josiah: and, uh, you know, the SUV wasn't cutting it.

[00:21:58] Uh, and we couldn't put three car seats across the middle and, you know, and they wouldn't fit in the back. And so we, we got this van a few years ago and like, and because I, you know, I, I got a new, I had a new job at the time and I'm like, you know, I'm gonna get the top trim level and it has all the bells and whistles and, you know, I'm, was super into, you know, the gadgets and it has, you know, the climbing control.

[00:22:19] Then all this like automatic stuff where you don't have to think about it. You just get in and 

[00:22:22] you push the button 

[00:22:23] and everything's the way that you want it. Right? 

[00:22:25] Yeah. 

[00:22:25] And that is not how Amy rolls. And, uh, I will get into the car after she has been driving it and everything is set to manual. The air is all the way up, but the vents are like pushed to the side and down.

[00:22:41] Yeah. And, and like nothing is the way that I let, and it's like we're not using it to its full capacity. Like, you know,

[00:22:48] Cody: Yeah. We have these two presets. Right. We could just hit the button and it could be exactly how you want. I get that.

[00:22:54] Josiah: Yeah. 

[00:22:54] And so before, when I'm in negative sentiment override, it's, it's the difference between getting in and, and just being like, you know, oh Amy, this is like a quirky thing that happens.

[00:23:05] And then getting in and being like, what the fuck? And just being really frustrated like that. It's the same, it's exact same scenario. Yeah. But it's just my, my energy coming into that. And uh, and when I realized that, I'm like, okay, how do I figure out. How to stay in positive sentiment, override as much as humanly possible, 

[00:23:25] right?

[00:23:25] Yeah. 

Navigating Relationships and Vulnerability

[00:23:26] Josiah: As I'm going through trying to figure all this stuff out, what I'm realizing is it's not just that I hadn't been expressing things, it was also that I

[00:23:38] had

[00:23:39] this feeling that

[00:23:41] the

[00:23:41] way that I am is not okay. And that's really what was at the base of me not expressing this stuff. And this isn't just about Amy, like this goes back, you know, into my childhood, I'm sure.

[00:23:53] Yeah. And it's this idea that, I need too much alone time, Yeah. And other people need me and, and so it's not okay for me to express how much alone time I actually need.

[00:24:05] Cody: me. Mm-hmm.

[00:24:05] Josiah: You know, I am, I'm not emotionally sensitive enough. Right. I am, when I'm in task mode, it's like, get the fuck outta my way.

[00:24:14] I have, I'm in task 

[00:24:15] mode bull, right? 

[00:24:16] Cody: You just, you have like one focus

[00:24:19] Josiah: Because it takes all of my brain like processing power 

[00:24:22] to do the thing, 

[00:24:24] but, and so there's nothing left for sugarcoating words to make sure I'm not hurting people's feelings. Yeah. Right. And, and it's, it's with Amy, it's with the kids. It's with other people in my life it's probably done it to you, but 

[00:24:36] you probably don't care as 

[00:24:37] much. And, and it's just, you know, it's, it, it's that I am, you know, and then, and then when I, I get these constant reinforcements that it's not okay, and then I isolate and then that puts me into this anxious state and this sort of, uh, emotionally heightened state, which makes it even. more likely that I'm going to explode and hurt someone.

[00:25:06] So then I just sequester myself, you know, into a room because I'm afraid that if anyone sees me in this state, I'm gonna blow up and I'm, and there's gonna be a bunch of collateral damage.

[00:25:17] Cody: Yeah.

[00:25:17] Josiah: And, and so then I just go and I try to process on my own 

[00:25:22] right.

[00:25:23] Cody: Hoping that the recharge somehow makes it better.

[00:25:25] Josiah: right. 

[00:25:27] And

[00:25:28] then of course, I'm not using actual things that do help me recharge.

[00:25:32] I'm just trying to numb out and distract myself and, uh, make it go away. 

[00:25:38] Yeah. 

[00:25:39] And you know, when I'm at my best, I can implement, you know, the things that I've been learning and, and, but when I am, especially at certain points this summer, it was as I was learning how to do it at this level of intensity, like it was really hard for me to do that.

[00:25:54] So all that does is it just reinforces this idea that I'm better off alone. Mm-hmm. If I have my own space, my own environment, my own routine, I can then choose when I can show up and for people at my best. 

[00:26:14] Right? 

[00:26:15] and so

[00:26:16] that

[00:26:17] is the story that I've been trying to work through. And the problem is I don't have an answer for that because logically I know that I need connection.

[00:26:28] I need, and I love my family. I don't wanna leave my family. Right. And I, you know, I, I wanna be there for my kids. I wanna be there for Amy. And then especially like when it's good with me and Amy, it's really, really good. And and like, so how do we get there? But

[00:26:41] every

[00:26:41] time. I run up against a wall, that voice comes back and it's just like, you would be better off by yourself 

[00:26:47]

[00:26:47] Josiah: and you would hurt less people and you'd be able to, you know, create your environment where, you know, I, it's like, it's like everything that I try to do to help myself is like the opposite of what Amy needs.

[00:26:59] Um, Like I've been doing the, like trying to do red lights at night to 

[00:27:03] Cody: yeah.

[00:27:04] Josiah: eliminate all blue light in the evenings and like, she literally can't see. Yeah, because she has really bad, like night vision 

[00:27:12] and uh, and it does something weird with her. He like, you know, it makes it really difficult for her and, you know, it's just, it's things like that.

[00:27:20] Like I, I love to turn on white noise machines 'cause it helps me like quiet myself down and block out all the stuff that's setting off my nervous system. And that like ramps her nervous system up.

[00:27:31] Cody: And,

[00:27:32] so

[00:27:32] Josiah: if like, and then that story comes as like, everything that you need is just hurting someone else. 

[00:27:37] So you need to go away.

[00:27:39] Cody: Yeah.

[00:27:39] Josiah: You 

[00:27:39] just need to go away. Right. And maybe at some point in your life when you're doing much better and you figured out all your shit, then maybe you can come back and be with the rest of us. But you know, right. Oh God, this is probably the story that was told to me when I was a kid. I'm just realizing,

[00:27:54] Cody: Oh shit. See the whole, this entire time I've been thinking like, okay, but where's the voice coming from that's telling you you're better off alone? 'cause this sounds like a childhood trauma. I was thinking this whole time, it sounds like, I thought that's where you were going with it. You just had this realization.

[00:28:12] Wow. Yeah, no, for sure. Childhood trauma. Yeah. As so many of our things happen, you know?

[00:28:18] Josiah: Yeah. And, and I think, you know, our different personalities interpret differently and use different coping mechanisms and, and, and, but this is, but this is the problem.

[00:28:28] It's like I want to be able to say that I

[00:28:32] the voice has no power over me. Right. I want to be able to say that I've worked through it. Yeah. But I haven't. And there is a part of me that will always believe that is the way it feels right now. Yeah. And, and that was a big part of why I, it was so hard for me to have this conversation.

[00:28:47] I was reminded, I was on a call with, uh, with a five in the community last week, and she told me that, the, I don't remember where she got it from, but the difference between, uh, transparency and vulnerability and she said like, transparency is talking about things that you've already gone through. Mm. and vulnerability is talking about the things that you're in right now. Yeah. But, uh, I also in that same week, was watching a marketing video and was reminded of the, uh, the term that they say, show your scars, not your wounds. Because you want to be able to, as you're helping people and like, you know, attracting your target audience, you want to be able to, you know, be seen as the expert and that you've, you know, you've learned the lessons, you've gone through this and you can help them through this too, and

[00:29:33] Cody: a guru right. To call back our last episode. This

[00:29:37] Josiah: is, but this, this is the story, right? That

[00:29:40] Cody: the narrative that you have to like live by

[00:29:41] Josiah: right? 

[00:29:42] And, and that, but, but we are doing something entirely different here, right? Because what we're doing is practicing vulnerability. Yeah. And, and we're trying to do that more and more. And, and that was one of the things from our last conversation that I wanted to, to bring up again because, you know, I think I'd said something along the lines of, you know, I'm, because I have a marketing background, I like to package things.

[00:30:06] But yes, that's true to an extent, but that's actually not, like, that's just kind of one layer when you go a little bit deeper. It's really about me trying to manage the vulnerability.

[00:30:18] Cody: make mm-hmm.

[00:30:18] Josiah: And Yeah. 

[00:30:19] And so the transparency in the form that it comes in for me is around narrative. And, and so it helps me to have a narrative so that I can communicate that shit.

[00:30:28] Yeah. Right. I can communicate what I've gone through and maybe what I'm going through, if I have a narrative, it helps me feel confident enough to share it. Mm-hmm. And so for a little bit, like I kind of beat myself up around, you know, I don't that that feels inauthentic to have to have a narrative in order to share, but I'm realizing that like transparency for me is the bridge to vulnerability.

[00:30:50] It's not like, and because, because I'm in actively, intentionally trying to, to do that. But

[00:30:56] that's

[00:30:57] where I'm, that's where I'm at. I'm in this shit and.

[00:31:00] I'm

[00:31:01] doing this in real time here, as you can tell. 

[00:31:25] 11-23-2025_02-00_msg315: I think I do have a little bit of a belief that I'm better off alone. but it's not necessarily, something that I'm consciously choosing to believe. Most of the time, I know that I want a relationship and I really do value my friendships as well. But there is a part of me that believes that, maybe my needs are too much and that, most people would not be able to meet those needs.

[00:31:55] And that it would be rare to find someone that is able to meet those needs without them feeling like it's some kind of inconvenience. I know it sounds, as I'm saying it out loud, it sounds kind of, like really harsh because I know that if I. Love someone or care about them.

[00:32:14] I do want to know how I can best meet their needs. and I know that I'm not necessarily gonna be able to meet everyone's needs, but for some reason, when I have needs, it just seems like there are very few people in the world that could meet them. Perhaps it's just childhood conditioning that I'm learning to decondition, but because of that, I can think that maybe I'm better off alone.

[00:32:38] it's almost just this thing, this feeling like no one's really out there for me. Um, yeah.

[00:33:00] Josiah: So that's, uh, a lot of what I wanted to say. 

Reflections on Personal Patterns and Relationships

[00:33:03] Josiah: I know I've been talking for, oh geez, like 45 minutes now.

[00:33:06] Yeah. Uh, Cody, thoughts, comments, questions.

[00:33:10] Cody: A lot of it went bye bye many minutes ago. But I mean, I think that I, this is for sure.

[00:33:17] Josiah: somewhat

[00:33:18] Cody: universal. I bet it has to be because I have never not, I've never talked to a five and them not had some relational experience with that feeling of, like, for me, it's, it kinda shows up as like a, like I'm always, you know, how people like use the word other in like a, like a verb, verb tense, like being othered.

[00:33:41] Josiah: othered. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:33:42] Cody: You know, but I feel like I other myself, uhhuh all the time and blamed it on everybody else most of my life.

[00:33:49] Josiah: Mm.

[00:33:50] Cody: you were talking about your job and

[00:33:54] we

[00:33:54] all know I've done some job hopping um, just in this po just as long as this show has existed, I have had

[00:34:02] Josiah: like five or six

[00:34:03] Cody: at least.

[00:34:04] Um, And that's not including like my side hustle jobs. Right. You know? Um, And

[00:34:10] Josiah: I

[00:34:10] Cody: I think that. I, I follow a similar pattern to you and within myself, I follow a similar pattern both professionally and personally in my life, which is that I remember when I was younger and when I was like, you know, dating girls in high school and stuff, and even into my early twenties, like there was a point somewhere in there where I started to realize this pattern that I couldn't stay with somebody longer than like four months tops.

[00:34:37] Mm-hmm. But two, around the two month mark,

[00:34:40] I kind of just started getting bored with them and bored with whatever it was I was doing. And it really had nothing to do with them, but my own complacency that I would allow myself to get in where it's like, oh, okay, well they're actually taking me, they're, because they want attention.

[00:34:56] They're taking away, taking me away from the things that I really wanna do or the things that I'm passionate about or whatever. And that, and. I think constantly drove this kind of wedge in between, like it forced the person I was dating to have to be in that place. If it's like, they're not, whether they're very few actually ever gave me any kind of ultimatum, but it, they, they were put in a position where they almost had to, it's like, it's okay, well it's, you gotta spend time with me.

[00:35:21] You can't always be doing music. You can't always be doing

[00:35:25] Josiah: something.

[00:35:25] Cody: You can't go write a song and not sleep for three days or eat and like, you know what I mean? And so, and, and they were probably just recognizing bad behavior. And also there was a lot of undiagnosed shit in my life that I hadn't acknowledged.

[00:35:39] And I was not even remotely self-aware. And it was really hard. And then just talking about friendships, like I think, I know we've talked about friendship many times in this show. I. it

[00:35:49] wasn't probably until more recently, and I know we've talked about it a little bit on the show and, and off, away from microphones about just, I feel like so often I was doing that to myself.

[00:36:01] All these like projections I would put on other people of like, oh, I just feel like, I don't know, it's like I, I always felt like I wasn't cool enough to be in a certain group or certain, you know, whatever, whatever the thing is. Definitely felt it in churches, but definitely felt othered in churches, but mostly because I didn't wanna play ball the way they wanted me to.

[00:36:21] Right. I didn't wanna play by those games and I didn't know how to filter myself. I, you know, I've talked about that as well. I, constantly have to bring myself, even still, I feel like I understand a little bit better how I would end up there in that place and how I now try to get out of it, which is that I realize.

[00:36:38] it

[00:36:39] was me all along.

[00:36:41] It

[00:36:41] was me doing that. And, and there was that voice in my head saying like, you're, you're, you're not, you're definitely not cool enough for them to like you, you're definitely not interesting enough. They're not into the same things as you, so they're not gonna find anything you say interesting.

[00:36:56] And you're gonna bore them to death. And I know I do that sometimes to people all the time, but does that mean they don't like me? Like, no, of course not. And I think I was the one not opening up, I was the one not sharing my true self and, and trying to hold all of that, trying to hoard my own not resources.

[00:37:18] If I, if, if I think of myself as a resource, you know, then yeah, I was hoarding that, what's that?

[00:37:22] Josiah: Aris, Yeah.

[00:37:23] Yeah. 

[00:37:23] Cody: Yeah. And so common five thing, and I, the thing that helped, at least with friendships, the thing that I. Feel like changed a lot for me was just trying to quiet that voice and, and just knowing that like, if, if somebody rejects me or somebody doesn't want me, that still doesn't give me an excuse to not be vulnerable with people and not open up to people because I'm not, if I don't ever do that, I'm never giving anybody the chance to look to, to be invested in me in any way whatsoever.

[00:37:54] To actually be there past that surface level. And I was doing that in relationships. I was protecting myself from everything and everyone. And I felt like in jobs too, I was doing that because I would always get bored within two to four months, just like you're saying. But a lot of it was because, you know, I, I probably went in with that mindset of like, I'm not supposed to be here.

[00:38:13] Like, I don't, what am I doing? Like what are we even doing? And it just. Yeah. Anytime I've ever had an office job, especially, 'cause I'm just not wired that way. I've never wanted to go live in a cabin more away from everybody. Right. I just, there's nothing about an office corporate job that just appeals to me even a little bit.

[00:38:35] And, and, and if I've never, to my knowledge, I've never been suicidal, but I think I, if I stayed in a corporate setting long enough, I think I would just be like, I don't really know why I'm here anymore. Like, I would be afraid of what it would do to me mentally. This

[00:38:49] Josiah: is the bad place.

[00:38:50] Cody: Yeah.

[00:38:55] Josiah: Uh, yeah.

[00:38:55] Cody: yeah. You spend your entire life with people telling you what you're supposed to do and what, what, what to achieve. And then you get there and you're like, this is hell. Like, why were they, why was everybody talking so highly about this place? But, and even earlier, I'm literally unloading everything that was like coming up in my mind for the last 45 minutes.

[00:39:12] Earlier you said something about what did you call it? Thinking about

[00:39:16] things

[00:39:16] positively versus negatively.

[00:39:18] Josiah: positive versus negative sentiment. override. sentiment over, Yeah. Yeah. I kind of stumbled onto that

[00:39:24] Cody: process.

[00:39:25] I stumbled onto it kind of accidentally and only in the relationship I'm in now. And I've never done it before, this before now.

[00:39:32] And there was some point where, and I think it's because I constantly remind myself and, and or not remind myself, but I'm constantly telling myself in my head, I, I focus on it very intentionally how appreciative and how grateful I am for everything that Madison does for me in every, any day. And constantly try to remember to tell her that and express that gratitude very earnestly.

[00:39:54] I very much mean it. And, and so when she does things that drive me insane, like a

[00:40:01] good example is she has always, she's a clean freak. Like she's OCD, very clean. And except when it comes to her shoes, she leaves her shoes everywhere. Some, there was, there was a, yeah, it's like a very much a, like a child like toddler thing to do.

[00:40:18] Um, Well not toddler I guess, but

[00:40:21] I

[00:40:21] don't have kids clearly. Um, But like, I remember there was one time I walked in, it was back when we were living in an apartment and I was like, I was like, I'm counting at least four or five pairs of shoes in the kitchen floor.

[00:40:31] Like they just ran. It's like wherever. She got home and decided I no longer want shoes on.

[00:40:36] That's where they came off. And there was, I started to go down that road where like those kinds of things started to annoy the shit outta me. And I'm like, why can't you just put your shoes back where you, and then it hit me in my own mind. I heard my own voice say, how many things do you think she does for you that she.

[00:40:51] Drives her insane and chooses to love you anyway. And it was that, that kind of reflection where I was like, I need to just deal with it and just be like, this is a Madison thing, this is a quirk of hers. And it's one of those things. And you know what? I'm here. 

The Impact of Small Actions

[00:41:06] Cody: I'll pick up those shoes and put 'em where they're supposed to go.

[00:41:09] Crazy. How that tiny of a thing really changed my entire process of how I think about another person and, and, 'cause we all do shit that annoys everybody. It's just how it's gonna be. But it is easy to get it in our heads that we're the problem and we should just remove ourselves from all of it. And, and just be the be be the martyr, right?

[00:41:30] We're saving everybody by taking us out of the situation. Um, But yeah, that's not how it goes.

[00:41:36] Josiah: That's not

[00:41:37] Cody: what happens.

[00:41:39] Josiah: happened. What if it was, 

[00:41:42] but

[00:41:42] Cody: know, it's not like, again, going back to the logical thing, right? 

The Need for Connection

[00:41:46] Cody: Like if I, I, we, you ask me if I wanted to stay in a cabin indefinitely with all my favorite things. Yeah, of course it, it appeals to me and I would, there would be a long period of time where I would love it, you know, but there's a certain point where then you start lying to yourself that you love it because you actually need more than what you, what you have in that regard.

[00:42:05] And you, we do need connection. And that was something that changed for me too. I believed wholeheartedly I didn't need connection for a lot of my life and that my controlled.

[00:42:15] just barely turning the faucet on of my, of myself to everybody else. You know, that was enough, just giving that little trickle of whatever my personality is and whatever my things.

[00:42:27] And there was always people in my life that were really keen on, like, they could just really read people really well, and they just picked up on stuff and they'd be like, immediately be like, I just don't trust you and I don't know why. I just feel like I don't really know you. Like, and they'd see through that facade, they'd see through it, and it made me so uncomfortable.

[00:42:43] I remember there's this one woman I knew back in churches and she said that she, it took her so long to get to know me. I think I've told the story in the show, but she said that it took so long for her to want to trust me because I reminded her of her dad, who was a con artist.

[00:42:58] Josiah: Uh,

[00:42:59] Cody: And I was like, oh shit.

[00:43:00] I mean, there's, there's, you're not wrong. Like I am a little bit of a con artist in that way, but only about myself and. My own personality and honestly, the things that I was hiding from people were so stupid. 

Struggles with Authenticity

[00:43:12] Cody: Like thinking about like, what, what, what, what does authenticity look like? What is showing up authentically to everybody in your life look like?

[00:43:20] It's, to me, it's giving the unfiltered version of you. That's the silly side. The ridiculous side, the super comfortable, the the stupid voices that we do to ourselves, our animals or our spouses in the house. You know, the stuff that's just like super quirky, the things that I would like, you know, do a stupid dance or something across the room to get Madison to laugh.

[00:43:42] No way in fucking hell would I do that in public, right? But like, why not you? I, I don't have a good answer for why I wouldn't be like that around anybody except for that fear of rejection that they wouldn't accept parts of me, therefore, they wouldn't accept any of me because what if those parts are the real parts that I'm showing and then they reject those parts?

[00:44:04] Well then, then what am I left with? I actually. And it's like, okay, well maybe I should should paint myself. You know, what's wrong with me if people don't like me? That kind of stuff went in my head most of my life and was terrifying. Like people were terrifying to me all the time, but I wasn't even remotely self-aware enough to acknowledge that narrative happening in my head enough to like break that pattern.

[00:44:28] It took therapy and a lot more self-awareness and a couple of diagnoses later to go, oh, I'm the problem. And that's actually a good thing.

[00:44:39] Josiah: Mm. 

The Fear of Being Alone

[00:44:47] 11-22-2025_01-07_msg313: Obviously there's a part of me that believes I'd be better off by myself. The part I need to constantly battle with, I suspect it comes from a desire for being self-sufficient, independent, not limited, but also not wanting to be a burden, maybe in a sense that I know how much energy would've cost someone to take care or help me.

[00:45:13] and I think sadly. It comes from an intellectual arrogance as well that all of the above is even possible when it comes up. I remind myself of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which shows that the best predictor of a long, long and happy life are close positive relationships. And if the data doesn't convince me, my actual experience of being utterly miserable went on my own Will.

[00:45:45] Saying all that I do still need a lot of alone time, but now trying to reconcile it with the family life.

[00:45:52]

[00:46:04]

[00:46:04] Josiah: I think one of the reasons why this is hard for me is that there's a fear there

[00:46:10] that

[00:46:11] I'm not, that I'm always gonna have that voice. Mm-hmm. The only way to remedy it is to experience being alone

[00:46:18] Cody: Oh,

[00:46:19] okay.

[00:46:19] Josiah: Because it's

[00:46:20] not something that,

[00:46:20] Cody: You've never had

[00:46:21] Josiah: Right. I've never had it. That's the thing. Yeah. I've never, I've never, had it. in a couple

[00:46:25] I've been

[00:46:26] extremely lonely Sure. But I've never been alone. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:46:30] Cody: And those are very different things.

[00:46:31] Josiah: Yeah.

[00:46:31] Cody: Yeah. 

[00:46:32] Josiah: At

[00:46:32] least for, not like any extended period of time.

[00:46:35] I, you know, I went from my parents' house to the dorm to living with other people in college to finally getting my own place. But Amy and I were already dating at that

[00:46:46] Cody: Mm-hmm.

[00:46:47] Josiah: And getting ready to get married. 

[00:46:49] So Really? Yeah. 

[00:46:51] So I never actually experienced being alone. That's true.

[00:46:55] Cody: That's true. Yeah.

[00:46:56] Josiah: And I

[00:46:56] think that that's, there's like this, that, that's part of the voice that's trying to convince me that like, Oh, but you haven't tried it,

[00:47:02] Cody: grass is

[00:47:03] Josiah: how do, how do you know? Really, you know, 

[00:47:05] that's true. And it's 

[00:47:06] always gonna bug you. It's like a little brain worm that's always gonna be there. Mm-hmm. Like gnawing at you from the inside until you actually experience it.

[00:47:15] But, that's not something I can do without blowing my life up, and I don't wanna blow my life up, you know?

[00:47:19] It's like, this is, you know, I'm actually at a point where I don't, I don't want that. You know? It took me a long time to get to that point.

[00:47:25] Cody: Sure. 

A Rough Time in Nashville

[00:47:26] Cody: I mean, I remember I was so excited to move to Nashville for so many reasons. You know, my wife at the time now, ex-wife, was blowing up my life all over the place.

[00:47:37] You know, I wanted to just get out of town. There was many reasons why I was so excited. But one of the things is I was like, I'm gonna live alone for the first time in my life. I've never done it, and here I'm gonna do it. So I was really excited about it.

[00:47:47] That

[00:47:48] didn't last long. I did not like it. Very, very.

[00:47:50] I made, I think I made it about a month and a half to two months, and I was like, this fucking sucks. Like I don't coming home to nothing every single day, except like my cat that I had at the time and when I was not. You

[00:48:05] Josiah: also had a pretty depressing a apartment

[00:48:07] Cody: I did. It was a very small, what was like 400 square feet

[00:48:11] Josiah: maybe if, if that maybe

[00:48:12] Cody: It was probably smaller. No, it was, think it was like 2

[00:48:15] Josiah: Yeah, it 

[00:48:15] was a tiny studio.

[00:48:17] Cody: very, very small. It was a bathroom and another room and that was it really. 'cause you had the galley kitchen. But yeah, it was depressing. And I, I lived in this city where I really didn't know anybody and I didn't feel like I fit in at work at all.

[00:48:30] And I, I really didn't fit in

[00:48:31] Josiah: You didn't, 

[00:48:32] Cody: No. And they all very openly didn't like me. Like it was, it was such a weird culture that was very, very unhealthy and I never really got a chance to thrive there. And I was in such an unhealthy place. That was a really bad time to start a new job when I was like going through a divorce and my grandmother was sick and like.

[00:48:50] That was a rough year. And so there was a lot of things going on all at once. And then my life imploded, and then I lived alone. And so, you know, that was the time where I was like, I can't, I, there was a point where I was like, I have to stop drinking alcohol. Like there's, there's, there's so many aspects of my life at the time that I, I saw where that road was going and I was like, I can't do this anymore.

[00:49:10] and then moving back to Chattanooga, I felt like I had failed. I felt like I was moving home. I, I, like, I had my chance to experience this thing that I thought I wanted and I thought I did it wrong. I thought that's why it was sucked so much. But what it was is that that was probably the first time in my life that I needed somebody in my life more than ever.

[00:49:30] And that's when I pushed everybody away the hardest. And I think about what, how differently that experience could have been had I just been the person I am now, you know, and it's, but maybe it wouldn't be any different. Maybe I would still. Realize that living with just me all the time is not actually that fun

[00:49:52] Because I

[00:49:53] do get a little mad scientist, even in my best and most healthy places.

[00:49:57] I mean, my dream is to have my own like actual recording studio and just write songs and like, and be somewhat involved in music industry. I don't even have the, you know, illusions of grandeur that I wanna be famous. I just want to. Have my bills paid while also doing what I love. That's like, that's like, that's, that's my goal.

[00:50:16] But I also would love to do that in a way where I can get lost in a studio for days at a time and nobody really care and, and they just get it and they understand. Right. And I think that that is an unrealistic expectation, obviously, but, and I wouldn't, I wouldn't even like it. I would exhaust myself, but I do that sometimes I'll just go down this path and I get so hyper-focused and I have to see it through or try or die trying.

[00:50:40] Right. And just, just run outta steam and I'm just, and then I'm done and I'm depleted and I've killed myself trying to do this thing and it was just not for me. It was not all it was cracked up to be, but it was also not the best time to experience or experiment with aloneness in my life. So it can be, I don't, I don't know what it would look like in a healthy context.

[00:51:01] I don't, I think I would like it less now though, because of how much I do appreciate friendships and, and appreciate connection and, and see the value in it and know that that is something that I actually need in my life. And that what I told myself my entire life and what I truly believed, and a lot of that came, come from my childhood.

[00:51:19] My parents for sure were super closed off, little hermits, you know,

[00:51:23] Josiah: so, 

Generational Lessons and Isolation

[00:51:23] Cody: and, you know, I, I think about picture this,

[00:51:28] you've

[00:51:28] seen it, you know, but picture this listener, my parents, my mom thought that she loved a house that was painted dark red. Do you remember the dark red blood walls? You remember those up in the living room?

[00:51:40] It was all the roll walls were red. Oh yeah. With thick. Blackout, like they weren't even made to be blackout curtains. They were just so thick that, that no light is getting through these curtains. She never opened them so much so that they would just collect dust. Nobody ever touched those curtains.

[00:51:56] So

[00:51:57] anytime you're inside this house, you might as well be in a bunker a hundred miles underground.

[00:52:02] It wouldn't mi, it wouldn't matter. It's the same, same difference. And my mom was a night person. My dad went back and forth. Sometimes he worked nights, sometimes he didn't. My mom would move an entire room of furniture at like 2:00 AM because she was bored and thought, oh, maybe it would be better this way.

[00:52:17] And then I would be helping her move furniture. But. She was also the kind of person that if anybody ever came to the door, it was like, run and hide. Don't answer the door. Whoever is behind that door is bad. They're the enemy, you know, and they're trying to get in. And then she wondered why when we were in churches, like pastors never came to check on us or anything.

[00:52:35] Like, I was like, mom, I'm pretty sure we were projecting the most negative. Like, do not, don't even think about coming to our house. Why would we ever let you in? You know, talking

[00:52:44] Josiah: do not disturb sign.

[00:52:45] Cody: Yeah. We treated everybody who came to the front door unannounced as a Jehovah's Witness. That's, and some, a lot of times they were, or Mormons.

[00:52:53] But, uh, but we, everybody might as well have been because we weren't talking to them. And so

[00:52:57] there was this inferred meaning behind that, this inferred lesson that told me everybody in the world is bad and can't be trusted.

[00:53:06] Josiah: Mm. 

[00:53:07] Cody: And it wasn't probably until recently that like, you know, I was talking to my mom about that and she realizes that's something that she's been carrying with her that is unhealthy and is not a good thing, you know, and that comes from her own childhood.

[00:53:17] And it was like, so we're passing on these things generationally, right? That we just do and we everybody does and what a gift it is to be able to talk about it now in a different context and talk about it from a different light, I think. But it does make a lot of sense for me because I, I look back and I was like, I was wired to hate everybody.

[00:53:34] And to some degree, obviously that was not my parents' intent, but like my dad back then, like just was on his computer all the time playing World of Warcraft or whatever. And my mom would have her own space and they. Rarely crossed paths except for maybe dinner time, you know? And so they just always had their own spaces and their own things.

[00:53:52] They, it was a five house, it was an Enneagram five house. This is exactly what it was always. I had my own space downstairs. My brother had one half of the house, my dad had his office, he never left. And my mom would have her space, whatever that is, and

[00:54:05] Josiah: on the back porch. 

[00:54:06] Yeah.

[00:54:07] Cody: Or her craft room. Can't forget the craft room.

[00:54:10] Um, and it would, that's just the, that's the house I grew up in. And so for somebody when I would date people and they would want to be around me all the time and want to be in my space, and I felt like I could never do anything I wanted to do because I wasn't in my own space where I had control over the environment.

[00:54:26] Uh, yeah. It made me feel super depressed and super unhappy, and I just thought, oh, I'm just not made for relationships. Like, you know, it's, it's an easy, it's an easy lie to believe in that context, I think.

[00:54:38] Josiah: I mean, I, I believe that about myself now.

[00:54:42] Cody: Right. Yeah.

[00:54:44] Josiah: Like, or at least I'm, I am,

[00:54:47] struggling to not believe it. 

[00:54:50] Cody: think that's, that's just how I, I feel a lot of the time. 

[00:55:09] 11-23-2025_01-46_msg314: This was all of me, 

[00:55:12] all of me believed that I was better off alone, 

[00:55:15] for most of my life. And it's really only 

Reevaluating Relationships and Vulnerability

[00:55:19] 11-23-2025_01-46_msg314: now in the last few years, and especially since getting into the Enneagram that I've started to reconsider that idea. 

[00:55:25] part of it too, 

[00:55:27] in the last, 

[00:55:28] uh, few years is 

[00:55:29] reconsidering my sexuality.

[00:55:31] that sort of flipped things 

[00:55:33] and now connection in a romantic way is actually something that I actively wanna seek out. 

[00:55:40] What was behind the belief that I was better off alone, 

[00:55:43] getting that message from, 

[00:55:45] my childhood community, 

[00:55:47] getting that message from authority figures, 

[00:55:49] getting the message that 

[00:55:51] groups, 

[00:55:52] peers.

[00:55:53] did not, 

[00:55:54] in many cases, want to have anything to do with me, 

[00:55:57] and feeling like I was very weird, very strange 

[00:56:01] that I didn't really, 

[00:56:03] fit in with the mainstream. 

[00:56:05] How do I respond when it comes up now? 

[00:56:08] Now I'm trying to tell it to kick rocks, but, 

[00:56:10] when I was younger, I would 

[00:56:13] believe it because I thought that was like 

[00:56:16] what my reality was.

[00:56:17] I would just, uh, say, yeah, yeah, that's how it is. Okay. That's, that's what I have to accept in my life. That's how my life is just going to be.

[00:56:27]

[00:56:38]

[00:56:38]

[00:56:39] Josiah: That's,

[00:56:39] Cody: I just say.

[00:56:41] on the same note of what I was just saying,

[00:56:45] when

[00:56:45] we first started this show, that's what I was terrified of was honestly where we are now. I thought, explain, I thought that the show was going to be, we have to show up and be a hundred percent vulnerable the whole time.

[00:56:58] And of

[00:56:59] course that didn't, it isn't what it turned out to be.

[00:57:01] And, and thankfully not because I wouldn't have done it, I would've done one episode and said, we're never releasing this. We'll figure something else out. We're not doing this. But instead it was, and it kind of was that for me, but it was stuff that I'd already gone through. Like you're saying, it was a curated

[00:57:16] conversation to

[00:57:16] some degree.

[00:57:18] Even if I didn't know the topic, it was always my past. It's easy to talk about my childhood for the most part. It's easy to talk about a lot of my areas of my life. And if I can talk about it, it means to some degree I've gone through it and have come out the other side. You know, when, when I first, when we did the religion episode, I was like that.

[00:57:35] I felt like. I was still, some of those things were still vulnerable. If we had the conversation today, it would be a very different conversation. 'cause I feel so, it feels so distant and I don't feel like I have the same triggers that I used to. I can, I can hear, you know, religious jargon like Christian, like evangelical jargon and stuff.

[00:57:53] And it doesn't like trigger something to me that makes me wanna like, throw things and just, and set a house on fire.

[00:57:58] Josiah: Yeah, I've, I've noticed that actually.

[00:57:59] Cody: Yeah. And so I think it's so much so that I'm like, maybe I should go back and be a worship leader in a church. 

The Journey of Self-Discovery

[00:58:05] Cody: Like it, my, I think it would truly be easier to be a worship leader now that I don't believe in God than it was when I did.

[00:58:12] Because it would all just be part of the job and I could just do it, you know, just without any like, emotional attachment to it. And what mean, what, what can mean so much? What, what things should mean so much and what things don't, you know, none of it, none of it means anything. So it'd be easy. Um, But.

[00:58:27] Josiah: the nihilistic worship pastor,

[00:58:29] Cody: it's not

[00:58:29] even nihilistic to me though. Like it sounds nihilistic, but I don't think of it. It was truly revolutionary for me to realize that nothing really has any meaning except for what we attribute to it. It everything just happens. It just happens. The universe unfolds the way it's going to and we don't have any control over it and our life just happens.

[00:58:46] And if I

[00:58:47] just like

[00:58:48] you were talking about, if you can reprogram your brain to receive that information, the events that happen to you just happen. It isn't because of God hates you or loves you, it's just that things happen. And it was very different for me and I started appreciating life way more than I did before.

[00:59:05] And because then I can just observe, I can, I can take it in. I can feel the things that I need to feel and let them go and move on. I didn't have to like feel like I was having to navigate all of these different roads through life to try to find the right one. You know, try to find the right timeline that I was trying to get on.

[00:59:22] You know, I don't know. It's, it's interesting when I, when you take the meaning out of it, then nothing, you, you, the only thing you have left is to find happiness in the world and try to get through it and hope that by the time you get to the end of it, you look back on your life and go, yeah, it was a great time.

[00:59:37] I had a great time, met a lot of really great people, found love, experienced pain, and I got to experience the extremes of both sides. I have a lot of pain and I have a lot of love,

[00:59:46] Josiah: Yeah. You know, that like

[00:59:48] weirdly

[00:59:49] kind of brings me to where I am right now. Yeah. 

[00:59:52] I, I think the question might be unanswerable for me. 

[00:59:54] Cody: Mm,

[00:59:55] Josiah: I

[00:59:55] think that that's okay. And the reason I say that,

[00:59:57] even though it doesn't feel okay

[00:59:59] Cody: mm-hmm. Yeah.

[01:00:00] Josiah: in, uh, Spider-Man across the spider verse. Mm-hmm.

[01:00:04] One

[01:00:05] of my,

[01:00:06] Cody: I'm listening. 

[01:00:09] Josiah: One

[01:00:10] of my favorite parts in that movie. and it's, man, it like I get so worked up every time I watch it,

[01:00:16] it's the

[01:00:17] part where Vampire Spider-Man guy 

[01:00:20] Yeah. 

[01:00:20] is trying to convince miles that he needs to let the canonical events happen like it's supposed to happen. Like this is, this is how it

[01:00:29] Cody: Yeah. Is how stop trying to fix everything.

[01:00:31] Josiah: You're 

[01:00:31] an archetype. And these are the things that happen to your archetype. Right.

[01:00:35] Cody: Yeah.

[01:00:36] Josiah: Damn, I'm getting choked. I'm just thinking about it now. Uh, and is it, it's Hobie, right? The the anarchist one? 

[01:00:43] Cody: I don't remember. I

[01:00:44] Josiah: that's his name. Hobie.

[01:00:46] Cody: I've,

[01:00:47] I've, only seen it once actually, believe it or not. I know it's crazy.

[01:00:50] Josiah: yeah. I, I

[01:00:51] might even like it better than the first one. Mainly just 'cause the, where I was at, like the place I was in when I watched 

[01:00:57] it and, and what this meant to me.

[01:00:59] But he starts pu like Miles starts pushing back

[01:01:02] and hoy's like, yeah, here we

[01:01:05] Cody: mm-hmm.

[01:01:06] Josiah: You know? miles says, I write my own story. And

[01:01:09] Cody: one 

[01:01:09] Josiah: the things that

[01:01:11] I'd always done as a five

[01:01:12] is

[01:01:13] just churn the problem in my head.

[01:01:16] Cody: mm-hmm.

[01:01:17] Josiah: It's like, I want to see it from all different angles. I want to, you know, and, and, and the, the, the realization that I'd had kind of towards, oh, by the way, uh, our therapist quit.

[01:01:31] Cody: Yeah.

[01:01:32] Josiah: Uh, she quit being a therapist like four months into this whole thing.

[01:01:36] Cody: God, how honest were you? She's

[01:01:39] Josiah: fuck 

[01:01:40] this guy.

[01:01:40] Cody: She's like, I'm actually, I'm done with

[01:01:42] Josiah: I can't do this anymore. 

[01:01:45] Oh, yeah. And, uh, no, she went to be a consultant or something for, I don't know. Yeah. But you

[01:01:51] know, halfway through that I realized that I came into the whole experience really asking the wrong question, or I don't even know if I'd say it's the wrong question. So the way that I had approached it was.

[01:02:03] I need us to go through this because I need to know if there's a way for us to make it work.

[01:02:11] Yeah. And I need to know that so that I can keep going. 

[01:02:14] Mm-hmm. 

[01:02:15] Right.

[01:02:15] Cody: One way or the other.

[01:02:16] Josiah: Right. And, and, and it was, it's very much like I've been churning the problem and trying to see from all angers and trying to like, I'm just like asking my, like obsessing over the question and, and like trying to find an answer and, and doing all the calculations and,

[01:02:32] and

[01:02:32] all of that is what, what I was trying to do in that essentially is mitigate the risk.

[01:02:37] It's like, I 

[01:02:38] want to know if what I'm going to have to do is going to be worth the effort.

[01:02:43] Cody: Yeah. Yeah. And

The Importance of Taking Risks

[01:02:45] Josiah: I, got to this point where I started to feel like I'm just tired of asking the fucking 

[01:02:51] question. Mm-hmm. 

[01:02:52] It's like.

[01:02:53] do

[01:02:53] I really need the answer? Is there an answer?

[01:02:55] why am I looking elsewhere for the answer? Right? Yeah. It's like I write my own fucking story, Yeah. It's like I'm just sick of it.

[01:03:02] I'm sick of asking the question. I'm sick of trying to mitigate all the risk. I'm sick of trying to figure everything out before I go all in and just go all in. I don't know what's gonna happen. I don't know if it's gonna work out, but I, I do know that I've been holding myself back my whole life from this and from so many other things because I'm trying to play it safe.

[01:03:22] I'm trying to make sure that like, I'm protecting my energy. I'm protecting, you know, my resources. I'm, I'm hoarding those 

[01:03:30] resources. Right. And

[01:03:31] I

[01:03:32] gotta let that shit go.

[01:03:33] Cody: Right. 

[01:03:34] Josiah: And I'm kind of realizing this in real time. It's like,

[01:03:37] Oh,

[01:03:37] damn. The reason why I am going through this is 'cause I need to, that's the lesson I need to learn.

[01:03:42] Mm-hmm. Right. It's like I read my own fucking story. Yeah.

[01:03:44] Cody: Yeah. 

[01:03:46] Josiah: Just stop doing the shit and just live. Just, just live and look at like where you're at and look at the things that resonate with you and the things that don't. And, and just take the next step that feels the right direction, like we talked about in intuition.

[01:04:01] It's like, just

[01:04:03] Cody: just

[01:04:03] keep 

[01:04:03] Josiah: going. And that's what I've been doing. And I keep so many things in my life recently, and this is something that I had to

[01:04:11] prove to myself that I could do, which is like, I hit a wall and I feel like I just can't do this anymore. And then I just, for multiple things and then I'm just like, I'll just take one tiny, like the smallest possible step to try to like keep the momentum and then that leads to another small step.

[01:04:28] And then after a few of those, it's like all of a sudden something switches and I start to see an opening that I can slip through and then I can make a little bit more progress. but when I, what I was trying to do before is I was trying to find that opening. Without going through the steps 

[01:04:42] and you can't do that.

[01:04:44] Yeah. You can't see miles ahead. You like, you can only see like, the next step or two. And

[01:04:49] maybe

[01:04:49] that's the lesson. I don't know. Or maybe I don't need to fucking package it up and something nice, but like that's, that's where I'm at right now is and, and it comes and it goes. And I, and I have to remind myself of that.

[01:05:01] I have to remind myself to stop trying to make everything make sense and just go live my life

[01:05:08] Cody: Yeah.

[01:05:08] I think there's a lot to be said about approaching,

[01:05:12] you know, we're talking about loneliness, aloneness, the kind of conversation around those two things. And so naturally I wanna, I gravitate towards the idea of relationships and in different capacities in your life and what that looks like. And I feel like it's so much easier.

[01:05:28] I find that my well is much deeper. When I go into it with less expectations about what I bringing into it and what I expect from other people. Yeah. But also, like, I feel how often I wonder, I ponder to myself how often I tire myself out and think that, and then I, I tire myself out with my own inner voice, my own inner critic, my own inner, all the things before I ever actually get to that place with somebody else.

[01:05:56] Josiah: Like

[01:05:56] Cody: Like

[01:05:56] say in I'm, I'm talking about casual things, a social event, a party, how often have I worked it all up in my head and then I get there and I'm like, I'm exhausted and I don't wanna be. Exactly. And I project that and I blame everybody else for it, but it was me. Yeah. And I think about that's what's that, there's a quote in Buddhism, not, not necessarily a quote, it's an ideal in Buddhism about like.

[01:06:19] things

[01:06:19] don't hap or things, what is like, I can't remember the, I'm obviously, I'm butchering it. I can't even remember it all. Something about the idea that like, life just happens, but it's, it's how we interact with it. It's how we receive it. It's what we do with the, the events in our life and how we respond to them that actually causes the pain in our life that causes all of the, the good or the bad.

[01:06:42] and of

[01:06:42] course though, I feel like in Buddhism, the conversation is usually around pain and how we experience pain and, and what is pain. And I feel like that's probably, that fits in this conversation to some degree because we, I'm a self-preservation five. I will avoid pain at all costs if I'm not careful.

[01:07:00] Right. Yeah. And I feel like I've learned in the last few years, I, my, my definition of what pain is, emotional pain, physical pain has changed a lot and. I feel like I can definitely tolerate or endure more things that I would've considered very painful before. And I don't necessarily consider them painful now.

[01:07:24] And sometimes those things are something as superficial as just going and hanging out with people. You know, it's like, I think that's sometimes as painful, depends on who it is. But

[01:07:33] I

[01:07:33] was also pretty judgmental back then, and I was, I judged people for, for things. And I, I truly don't feel that way about other people anymore.

[01:07:43] I just don't, I don't care enough to put infor put to put energy into judgment or to put it into jealousy or envy. Those are the things that have ruled my life to some degree in, in different ways. You know, I've, when I was younger, I was always so jealous of my brother because I felt like he was somehow in all of these groups and all of these.

[01:08:03] Things with churches and stuff. He was always in the cool club. Everybody wanted to be with him. Everybody wanted to play music with him 'cause he was an incredible musician and you know, all of these things. And I put him on this pedestal and thought of him that way. And it wasn't until recently that he flipped it on its head and was like, that's funny.

[01:08:19] 'cause I always thought everybody liked you and you were so relational and every and somehow, and I never knew how to do that. And so we both were doing the same thing to each other. And that was such a like a breakthrough moment for me. I was just like, wow, that's so crazy that we've looked at each other the same way and we didn't even know and we, because we'd never talked about it.

[01:08:39] And I think that's something that has been a big change for me when approaching relationships that I want to care about and that I want to mean something in my life is that I try to start from that position of like. Coming into it to be vulnerable on purpose and, and not just vulnerable, but to say the things that I wouldn't have normally said otherwise to say, you know, to tell people that I love them, that I care about them, that I was just talking to my buddy the other day that I've played video games with sometimes, and we'll, we'll go through this times where we'll play a bunch of video games.

[01:09:13] We'll have a really good time. We'll be talking. It's like, oh, it's like we're friends again and we won't talk for two years

[01:09:18] that

[01:09:18] video game fades and now we don't have anything to do. And then he just, we disappear off each other. And I literally texted him the other day and I was like, talking about this other game and that I love to play.

[01:09:27] And he was like, yeah, we're playing a lot of games right now. I only have so much time in the world. And I said, I responded with, I'm actually just trying to make sure you don't leave my life again because I care and I wanna be friends. I would've never said that before, but the fact that I put it out there and put myself out there and with, with the intention that it doesn't matter how he receives that information, he can not, he can, he can disappear again.

[01:09:48] And that is. To me, neutral information that is valuable to me. You know what I mean? Like, okay, cool. So we, that's, that's just the extent of our friendship and that's fine. That's, I have other friendships that are closer and I can get what I need to get out of those friendships and, and be there for those people and show up in the way that I want.

[01:10:05] But if I'm showing up in the way that I want to, in the way that I have always longed to be able to show up in a, in a relationship, if I can do that with every relationship in my life, I just think it'll be better for everybody, including myself, because that's the thing that I've been learning is that it's, a lot of times it's just about just saying the hard thing.

[01:10:25] It's that idea. What is that book about? Like eat that frog you

[01:10:29] Josiah: had this 

[01:10:29] conversation before Eating

[01:10:31] Cody: the frog. It's kind of like that mindset of like, just get the thing over with that you're so afraid of and like what you're saying, like, I've calculated, I've run all these calculations, I've done all these things at some point.

[01:10:42] You gotta, you've gotta try it. You've gotta the calculations, you gotta take all of these equations off of the chalkboard and put it into practice and see if it actually works or doesn't. That's the only way to get the answer. And so, you know, I think that what you're, the place that you're in right now is experiencing that part of it.

[01:10:59] You're actually running the simulation to see if the calculations were right or wrong. But the, the, the, to me, the outcome is not as important as the part where you said, okay, I'm done calculating, I just need to do it and see what happens. Because the outcome either way will be valuable and what you learn from it is gonna be even more valuable,

[01:11:21] Josiah: Maybe.

[01:11:21] maybe.

[01:11:21] Cody: maybe.

[01:11:24] Josiah: Who knows? I guess I'll have to find out.

Reflections on the Podcast Journey

[01:11:27] Cody: yeah, we've officially reached that part in the show. Where we've caught up with our lives. So we have to show up with vulnerability or it's gonna show obviously Yeah. That we're just doing. I don't even know what, you know, I think

[01:11:40] Josiah: Good. Good thing we're taking a break soon.

[01:11:41] Cody: We are taking a break.

[01:11:42] Yeah,

[01:11:42] Josiah: For the holidays.

[01:11:43] We're

[01:11:43] Cody: taking a break for the holidays. Uh, hopefully everybody can be okay with that, considering we've been giving you guys consistent episodes for a while now. That was a big challenge for us, but I'm, and I'm excited about where the show will go because of where we are in, in, in life with each other.

[01:11:57] And

[01:11:58] our, our, our friendship, we a lot of listeners have who have listened from the beginning to now have literally heard the growth of our friendship.

[01:12:06] Josiah: that's true.

[01:12:06] Cody: And, and it taught me vulnerability in so many ways. Without this podcast, I never would've gotten to where I am. And it's, it's been really, really, really helpful in that way because it's its own therapy and it's its own, it's a, it's a safe space. I didn't think it was safe before. For the first three seasons,

[01:12:26] it wasn't until the fourth season. And if you go back and listen, I bet you can hear it. There's, it wasn't until the fourth season that I started actually being myself and trying to like, say things that I was afraid of.

[01:12:37] Josiah: Ah, was that after we did the politics episode.

[01:12:40] Cody: mm, 

[01:12:42] Josiah: was

[01:12:42] it more

[01:12:42] Cody: about I don't, I

[01:12:43] Josiah: podcast 

[01:12:43] itself or was it about our relationship?

[01:12:45] Cody: probably both. Okay. But I mean, but it was a grander thing than just our, our friendship because I, I was like that with everybody before that. And so there was a certain point where I, I myself was like, okay, we're talking about all these things, but I need to try it out.

[01:12:59] I need to, like, I need to put those, put that skin on and see how it feels. Right. And see, and see how I feel in my body to, to be open and to be honest and just see how it goes. And I looked at it the same way. I, regardless of if, if, if everything crashes and burns, if everybody hates me and my life blows up.

[01:13:15] That's valuable intel. I didn't know that. Okay, cool. So whatever I did there, that didn't work. So either we go another way or I'll shut off and go live in a cabin in the woods for the rest of my life. But either way, at least I know. And so, and there's that, it's the same thing that we do in like different, in our relationships, like what you're talking about.

[01:13:33] You know, today with Amy, I just,

[01:13:36] you

[01:13:36] have to just see what happens at some point and you have to go for it and you have to jump out. And I feel like I would never have been able to have this show, this version of the show had we not, like gradually went through that process. And let me get to that place where now I can show up and I never, ever get nervous to sit down and record.

[01:13:57] I'm excited about it actually. 'cause it's like sometimes it's like I got a lot to get out. Like I just, I don't even know what it is yet, but as soon as we start talking, it's gonna prime me and I'm just gonna start saying things, you know? But I'm not afraid of that anymore like I used to be. And a lot of it is too, because.

[01:14:11] We've what a what a what an unexpected great community we've built around the show. That has helped me more than I feel like I've helped them

[01:14:20] in

[01:14:20] some ways because, you know, I, I feel like I don't get in there enough. I definitely don't, and I don't talk to people enough, but I've had some really great conversations with people in the community that have been so aging it, because as much as maybe you guys feel like you're alone, and then this podcast, we've heard a lot of people say, like, it makes you feel less alone.

[01:14:38] And I, I love that. But it, it works both ways. And we did, we needed that too, and didn't even know it. And that was not, the community and all the things that we've done was never the intention we first sat down to do this show. And I think that that's,

[01:14:52] I'm

[01:14:52] excited about where the show is going and what it could be, because I hope it gets sillier.

[01:14:58] I hope it gets um,

[01:15:00] Josiah: oh, it'll definitely get sillier.

[01:15:01] Cody: we got some really fun stuff planned for the, the next year of, of content that we. Had not really planned on until maybe the last episode. I don't know, I don't know how long you've been thinking about it, but the last episode, the, if you were a five or not I think that that show, that episode made me feel like we could do way more like fun, like interesting things and, and still have a good show and also be maybe even more vulnerable and more authentic in our own, in our own ways.

[01:15:27] So that's exciting and hopefully that's how you experience it too. If

[01:15:34] Josiah: you're still listening at this point,

[01:15:36] Cody: I was talking to you, but Yeah. Oh,

[01:15:37] Josiah: Oh. Oh no. I stopped listening to you 

[01:15:39] a while ago.

[01:15:41] Cody: all. Maybe that's a good place to end it. All right.

[01:15:46] Josiah: love you.

[01:15:46] Bye.

[01:15:46] Cody: you. Bye.

[01:15:49]