Our Phone Odyssey Begins

0:00This ain't anything like a normal episode. Because this episode has... Wait for it... No guest! That's okay. It feels a bit arrogant to me. Presented in three vulnerable parts... Like something has to give. I hope it all comes out right. Shit, man. We begin a phone odyssey... To break free from our screens... So when do we start? Like, are we starting now? We start right now. Josh and Hugh have a pretty big brotherly conversation they've never had before.

0:30I'm really glad that we could talk about this. And Ryan... That's me. ...shares a new hair growth solution... I feel like I've almost got too much hair. ...with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. So, Josh, would you like to turn around and show us your... No guests, just us. Welcome to our trilogy of imperfection. All in one episode. Well, this is shocking. Absolutely shocking episode that we're about to do. Completely different. We're switching things up a little bit.

1:07That's okay. You won't believe what happens in a couple of minutes. So that's some clickbait. So today it's just the three of us for a little bit. And then we're going to play some other stuff. So for those who don't know, yes, we have this podcast, The Imperfects. But over on Patreon and you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, we have another show that we also do fortnightly called A Little More Imperfects. And it's just the three of us. Usually, sometimes we have Dr. M, sometimes we have Bridge as well.

1:40There's lots going on over there. So much going on. It's a great place. So good that we wanted to share it with everyone, or not all of it, but share a little bit of it with everyone. And this episode that we're going to get to in a minute, we've got a little book club called A Bit From A Book That Changed My Life A Bit. I'm going to be reading a little bit from that book. And it actually evolved into a discussion that is – One of the most important I think I've ever had on this show with anyone, it was with you, Hugh.

2:06And I think our relationship is better for that conversation. Yeah, it was so good. And hopefully it's helpful for other people because it was very moving for me. And also, Ryan, you have a bit of a hair update. Well, long-time listeners of the podcast may remember or know that Hugh and I have for a long time been taking hair pingers. Yeah, and they work for one of us. Well, we spoke about it in the live show a couple of years ago if you came and saw that.

2:36But, yeah, finasteride is like a tablet that Hugh and I have been taking for a while to try and reverse the hair loss that was drastically happening. And I bumped into a friend the other day and he said, Oh, have you stopped taking the tablets? Oh, no. Is that the male version of saying to a woman, are you pregnant? Yeah. In my view. Can I actually, can I go one better than that? Then are you pregnant? I think I discovered a worse one yesterday than that.

3:01I did a worse one. Is it worse? Listeners can decide. Okay. I was at a play centre yesterday with my kids. Yeah. And there was a lady helping me. It was like you had to jump off these, like, doesn't matter what it was, but there was a lady helping kids in a play centre. And this child fell and she caught the child and put him back up on the... And I looked at her and I wanted to say, well done. And I looked at her and I went, that's the grandma. And I said, well done, grandma.

3:30Why would you do that? Because I was 100% sure. Well done. Even if it was the grandma, it's such a weird thing to say. Well, I think about... Well done, grandma. Well done. Well, I feel like our mum loves being a grandma and I feel like when people call her that, she loves that. So I thought this lady who wasn't the grandma, she was the mum who was helping the child. I said, no, I said, good save. I said, good save, grandma. And she said. Oh, my God.

3:58She said. It's such a weird thing to say. She said thank you straight away. And then as she was saying thank you, she realised she'd been called. She went, thank you. What? And I said, no, it was a great save. Well done, you old hag. Yeah. It was so bad. Those brittle bones. Yeah. It was so bad. Are you all right, old lady? It was so bad. Oh, God. And I just wonder, is that worse than pregnant? It was just... I don't know if it is worse, but it's up there.

4:26We were there for another hour and a half, and every time I looked at her, she looked so sad. I mean, technically, in your favor, she had aged every time you looked at her. You're like, she was getting older. No, not to the point that I actually needed to be... Yeah. Her child hadn't had a child in that time, so technically you hadn't become correct. Yeah. Okay, so we want to... Thank you, Hugh. Incredible chair. What a strange man you are. To all of our benefits, really?

4:55Yeah. Except for that lady. So we'll play this in a moment. Before we play this section of this episode, which was... Oh, yeah. So there is an update on the hair thing. Did I finish that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there'll be an update on the finasteride situation. There will be an update on the finasteride situation. There's a very exciting update, which leads to a very exciting moment. Probably one of my favourite moments we've ever had on A Little More Imperfects.

5:19Actually, probably one of the funniest things. It was pretty amazing. Yeah, it was great. Okay, so before we get there, so The Odyssey, the film, is out now. Are we doing an ad? No, this is not an ad actually. It should be. This would have been an incredible ad, but it's not. The only reason I bring it up is because I saw a little clip of an interview with Christopher Nolan, who's the director of The Odyssey and also directed The Dark Knight and Inception and really great films.

5:48Yeah. he seems like such a distinguished gentleman from what I, he's always wearing a three piece suit. He's an Englishman. He's just, what a wonderful man. He doesn't add for Christopher Nolan. Well, he should be, he should be. But in this clip, in this interview, he, the interview on 60 minutes in the States asked him about the fact that he's never had a smartphone. And this is the crazy part has never had an email. Yeah. What? We've got a clip here.

6:17George, I think if you could play it, this is what I'm talking about. You don't do email? I do not. I never have. And why not? Oh, no interest. Do you get letters? I mean, postal letters with stamps on them? I get a lot of printed emails where people are like, you've got to take a look at this. All right. But no, I've just never been particularly interested in that as a form of communication. No smartphone? No. No, I've never had a smartphone. It's getting harder and harder.

6:49The return of the QR code has been quite tricky. I carry a flip phone when I travel. Is this a way, and I don't mean this in a pejorative sense of any kind, actually in a very complimentary sense, is this a way of keeping the world at an appropriate distance and not letting it cave in on you like the rest of us do in the digital world? I mean, I think it's more a thing of, I haven't let the rest of the world cave in on me. I'm just living the same way that we all used to.

7:23So, you know, to me, it's just life as normal. And I envy you deeply. Most people do, which says something about where this has all gone, which is not good. You know, yeah, it's, no, I feel very fortunate to not be wearing the digital shackles, you know, but such is life. Also, every day he rides a penny farthing to work. Actually not. Bit of a joke. But it did remind me because, again, for people who've listened for a while, some people may remember that a couple of years ago, I went on a bit of a phone journey myself on a phone odyssey.

8:07I got rid of my smartphone for it ended up being like 220 days or something and replaced it with a flip phone, which I called my smug phone because every time I was using the flip phone in public, I felt extremely smug. And so that lasted for a while and I ended up going back to the iPhone, but with like restrictions and blocks on it, which is working fine. Now, what I thought we could do, if you guys are up for it, and I think you are because we have talked about this before the episode, but we could go on our own phone odyssey to try and deal with whatever our weak points are, our vulnerable points of our phone experience, try and commit to something for a month and see how we all do it together.

8:54I think that's the length of the original Odyssey, one month. Yeah. So if we can do that and we all choose like one thing or even two things, whatever you want, something that we're going to commit to and then people listening can go on their own phone Odyssey, could do it at the same time. It can all be on an Odyssey together. Oh, God, we need this. Everyone, we need this. Let's all do it. Hugh, have you thought about what you want to – Yeah, so mine is inspired by the events of this morning, a terrible, just bad morning this morning.

9:24I think anyone who has neurodivergent kids knows that like your life is about trying to make their world easier and you spend so much time trying to set up experiences so that they can succeed and it's very, very difficult to do. And our child wanted to do a Lego camp, a day of a Lego camp on the school holidays, which I'm so supportive of, but also know that a lot of work has to go into making sure it's successful. So speaking to the organisers and making sure they understand what our child's like, and then also preparing them with photos of what's going to happen and the structure of the day, getting a friend to go along.

10:03that is really good with them and getting their parents to book them in on the same day, all that kind of stuff. So I did all that and it was for Friday and this coming Friday, so two days' time. I'd said to them the day before, we're going to spend half an hour together going through all the photos of what's going to happen when you're there. I'll tell you who the teacher is, I'll tell you what's going to happen, all this planning and... And I just got a 10 o'clock this morning, I got a message from the other dad who I'd booked it in with just saying, where's your child?

10:33And it was for today. So I just, because I'm useless at admin, I'd got the wrong day. And then had to tell our child it was that missed. Well, it was, do you want to go? And it was, of course, but where is it? Who's going to be there? Like there was no preparation, which is an absolute nightmare for a child on the spectrum to have no they need like a full 24 hours to prepare themselves once they've learned what's happening and it was just we're going to take you there now I'd left I'd already left to go to work so it fell on penny to deal with I could just hear tears in the background screaming I don't want to go but I have to go is my friend there do they need me there it was horrific and I just like I was just so disappointed I just so upset at myself and so upset at with the position I put our child in through my ordinary admin skills.

11:26And I was like sitting in the car and I was just like something has to – I can't keep – like I do this kind of stuff all the time. Despite how hard I'm trying, I just – I continually stuff things up for people in my life. I feel like I'm continually letting people down in so many areas. And I just had this feeling this morning of like something has to give. And then I was looking at all the things in my life like nothing. There's nothing that can give.

11:50And then I was literally, as I was thinking that, I was scrolling. Like I was on Instagram just half thinking something has to give but also just watching the demise of England cricket on Instagram. Then I was like, no, well, this is what has to give. Like this is it. This is the thing. What, the phone? My phone has to fuck off. I just – The whole thing. Well, as far as my kids are concerned, yeah. Because I think the thing that, like I get down to myself if I let the team down here, the podcast or the Resilience Project, but when I really, really, really struggle is when I let my family down, which I did this morning so bad.

12:24I put Penny in such a bad position, put my child in such a vulnerable position. They're there now. I don't know what the experience is like. I'm checking my phone every two seconds, waiting for a phone call because – They are not prepared psychologically for this camp. They're now on for a day. And I was thinking back to the episode we had with Joe Brum when Hamish was on and we were talking about the fact that I was just thinking like every single time your child looks at you and you're on your phone, the message they get is whatever's on your phone is more important than I am.

12:56That's what they say. And I would say honestly – That's never, ever been the case. There's never, ever been anything on my phone that I can honestly say, yeah, that's more important than my kids ever. And yet they had that experience hundreds of times a day. They would get the message that that's more important than me. Whatever's happening is more important than me. You just wonder whether or not when humanity looks back on this era, of time, like the smartphone era that will end at some point, you just wonder whether or not we'll look back and go like, what were we doing?

13:29It's like the photo of cigarettes, like parents smoking cigarettes when they're breastfeeding. Like it's just to me, but anyway, I'm letting my kids down at the moment. I'm making bad mistakes and I'm not saying it's all because of my phone, but my phone is something that can give. I can say- It's sucking up a bit of time and distraction. So for the next month, my pledge to everyone, mainly to my kids. Mainly to my kids. In Sinema's now. Here's Odyssey.

13:56Yeah. Not an ad. My pledge is that my kids will not see me on my phone for the next month. Oh, wow. They will not see me on my phone. That's amazing. That is... I'm already nervous about a few things. I've been going on holiday and I feel like catching a plane, like my admin's weakness and now I have to print out all these things in advance. Oh, but that's great. So this is the incredible thing. This is what I remember from when I did my smug phone thing is that you're bound to come up against an obstacle and you'll always find a reason why it's like, oh, actually I can't because I need my phone for this thing.

14:31But the best way to imagine it is like, it's like some weird genie's come to you and said like, you're not allowed to use your phone anymore. And then you're like, but, but, and then the genie's like, nah, figure out a solution. And so you just got to figure out a solution. And this is wildly challenging for me because it's school holidays. Yeah. They're on school holidays. It's not like if it was school, I could go without my phone until 9 in the morning and then go without it until 9 o'clock at night when I get home.

14:57Yeah, it's a challenge. This is going to be really hard. But if I need to run my phone, I can go on my phone. I just have to make sure that I will literally go in the car and I'll do something in the car or I'll go to my bedroom and they will not see me with my phone. And I'm going to tell them and I need them to think of some kind of penalty. I don't know what it will be. Shame. Shame is always good. Yeah. If it's anything I've learned from this show, shame is a good one.

15:23Yeah. Hit him with some shame. So that's my pleasure. That's incredible. And what beautifully shared here. That's heartbreaking. That's awful. That's just awful. I feel very distracted today because I'm just thinking about my child there and I just – because they felt like they couldn't let their friend down by not going. But for them it was just their worst nightmare to go to something. They don't know what it is. They don't know what's happening.

15:42So, yeah. Okay. That's mine. Great. Josh? Well, I was thinking that I will – I mean, it was – last night, it's nowhere near as emotional as what you said, but when we were at your house last night and I was playing with my youngest and he was bringing all these Transformers into – I was sitting on a couch in one room, he was going into another room and bringing them out to show me. Every time he left the room, I'd get on my phone and then he'd run back in and see me on my phone and I'd put it away.

16:10It happened about five times. And I'm like, I'm not playing. Like I'm not engaging in this activity. And I was realising it was wrong, but then I was like, I'll just put it in and just make sure when I hear him coming, I'll put it away so he doesn't see me, which I was okay at. But it still means that I'm not actually evolving the game. He's not getting a proper response from me. There's just I'm trying to – it's like I'm trying to be his dad with like one hand tied behind my back.

16:37Yep. And there's got to be a cost there. So – That was a pretty obvious example of why I can't have a phone on me when I'm around my kids. So my plan is to leave my phone at the office for a month. Wow. So I can use it during the day. That's more extreme than mine, really, because... I'm a bit nervous. I haven't told Soph yet. And I just don't want it to become a mental load thing where a lot of the admin and stuff gets passed on to her. I have to say, well, can you be the contact for all this?

17:09Yes, yeah. Well, actually, you know, because you mentioned yesterday when you said that you're going to do that and you said you're going to get a home phone, a landline. What you can do, get the landline, but then there's a feature on your iPhone you can call forward. So you can forward all calls to the landline. So anyone who calls you on your mobile when you're not at work, it'll just go straight to the landline. Well, definitely do that. And I think logistically I will have my laptop.

17:33So like if I need to contact someone, if I need to do something, I can get my laptop out to do it because that's all synced up. But I just won't have a phone in my pocket around my kids for a month because it will be at work. I'm so happy to hear that. I love that because I know that thing of like, well, I could check my phone quickly before they come back in. And then – And even if you do manage to do that, you're not – sorry, I should reference what I was saying before with the episode with Joe Brum and Hamish, but I referenced mum's story about how mum said to me that she saw everything we saw, she smelled everything we smelled, we heard everything we heard because she was properly there with us.

18:09And that to me is like that example you gave. Yeah. That's not saying everything he says. That's like just – yeah, so – Yeah, I'll be interested to see how it goes. And maybe we should do an episode on Patreon or something to report back on our findings and our experience. Yes. But I'm looking forward to it because I think I use it as a distraction, but I'm looking forward to it's not like I'm still going to need a break from parenting. It's not like I can go from like...

18:37No phone to just being 100% present dad because I think we all need breaks from it because it's a big job. But I look forward to saying to them more consciously, like saying, guys, I'm just going to go outside for 10 minutes because I need to – because my brain needs a break, but I'm going to – I don't know, pull out weeds or read a book or do something wholesome and good for my brain. And they'll see me actually taking control of that urge rather than it being controlled by a phone.

19:04I think it'll be a good chance to model to kids that it's okay to say dad needs five minutes to himself. I'll be back in a few minutes. Yeah. And the only thing it does is like we're not far off. And we are, but it's going to come very quickly. It's on the horizon for us, our kids saying, when can we have a phone? Yeah, yeah, exactly. And then us going, no, you can't have one. Or when they have it, trying to put in place guidelines. You are always on your phone.

19:29How can you – so, yeah, just this is – I don't want people thinking, oh, this is just a parent's thing. This is because you're going to talk about yours in a minute, Ryan. It's for all of us. It'll benefit so many people around us. But for us specifically and for any parents out there, I – I urge you to set yourself some kind of odyssey challenge for the next month. Yeah. Okay. So my, my Odyssey, so for people who know when I had my smug phone, my part of the plan of how, how I would sort of like live my life is I would, I bought an iPad mini.

20:02So which people laugh at because it's like, why are you just buying another device to replace the other? But the idea was that I'd carry my smug phone everywhere. And then if I ever was going somewhere where I needed access to something, I would put the iPad mini in my bag. Yeah. Since then, the iPad mini has now become the problem. Like that's now at home and I'm always, because it's small, I can just like take it around with me. It's a big phone.

20:25Need to buy a smart TV. Yeah. And because on my iPhone, I use the brick, you know, that blocks all the apps. So I don't have a problem necessarily scrolling on my iPhone. I'm now scrolling on the iPad mini. So, yeah. So this iPad mini, this will stay at work. The other big thing that I've heard a few people talk about, like experts talk about, and I wish I had like quotes and stats on this, but it makes sense. We're never bored anymore. And as someone with no kids, I do have the opportunity to be bored quite a lot.

21:01You know, I can just sit there and just do nothing. Yeah. And I was thinking about like, when were we bored before smartphones? And it's usually like waiting. Whenever we're waiting for something. So it's like waiting for our coffee. It's walking somewhere or it's like if you're at a restaurant or somewhere and then your person you're there with goes to the bathroom and you're waiting at the table. All those moments. Whenever I sense myself waiting, I'm going to resist the urge to pull out my phone.

21:33So I'm going to use the waiting as an opportunity to be bored more because, and again, I wish I had a stat on this or something or research, but we do know that being bored is so good for our brains because it needs... I have a memory of Maria Roberto, a psychologist when she was on, saying that these days we do way more receiving than reflecting and we should be reflecting more. And so what that means is instead of receiving information on a phone or on a computer or even reading, instead of receiving less information, use that time to reflect on the thing you just did or think about the person you just were with or...

22:14And whenever I do that, I just come up with ideas. I give myself like the space to go like, oh, maybe I'll do that. Or you just think about what do I need to do? And you're just thinking about your life. You're like, oh, that person's birthday is coming up. I might get them a present or whatever. You know, so when you do that. And then the other thing, the third thing I'm going to do is I'm going, instead of having my phone on my person, if I have a bag, the phone lives in the bag.

22:41And where the phone was, I'm going to put a little notebook in there with a pen. So any ideas I have, I write in the notebook as opposed to inputting it into my phone. Yeah. Because the inputting into your phone means that you then you're in. So I'm going to get a, I've looked into this, I'm going to get like a little A6 notebook and I'm going to cut it to the exact size of a phone. So it feels like the same size as a phone. Yeah. And that's going to sit where my phone would normally sit.

23:08So when I habitually go to pick it up, I'll find my notebook in there. Awesome. So the odyssey begins. So when do we start? Like we're starting now? We start right now. I need to organize a home phone. True. But you can go get that today, could you? Possibly, yeah. I was thinking today, we're recording this on a Wednesday. We finish work. We don't work on Fridays. I was thinking of maybe I leave my phone at work on Thursday afternoon. Great. And the weekend's the start for me.

23:36Wow. Let's all start then. Okay. So tomorrow night, Thursday night. Thursday night, what time? Well, I'll be leaving work at probably five. Five? Great. So 5 p.m. Thursday, the Odyssey begins. Yeah. I'm going to start now. Oh, wow. Yeah. What a rebel. It just feels weird to say all that about. Yeah. And then go home and just go, well, I'm going to go nuts for the next 24 hours. That's good. Yeah, good point. Would you, Hugh, out of interest, would you tell your kids that you're doing this?

24:06Yeah, and I'm going to say I'd like to need to... Absolutely. Hold you accountable. Yep. Okay, great. Because they will love doing that. Yeah, that's fine. Okay, cool. They'll do things like grab it and try and push it into my face to try and make me look at it. They'll want me to fail so much. That's an odyssey. You've got to have obstacles in an odyssey. Exactly. Your hero's journey begins Thursday 5pm. Okay, guys, good luck. Well, let's now play the actual – this is part of the episode of A Little More Imperfects.

24:36Yeah. So I just want to add to the reason we're doing this. I didn't say anything before just because I was too distracted by how down I wasn't myself for this morning. But like this Patreon thing we started, like we are genuinely having so much fun doing it and we're so proud of the episodes. And every time we do it, we're like, God, it's a real pity that everyone doesn't get to hear this. And so there's a big part of – us wanting you guys to hear this because we do love these episodes.

24:58They mean a lot to us. We're very proud of them. And so we're just like, well, we can put one on the main feed. It's kind of, yeah, it's trying to find that balance between like, we want everyone to hear it, but at the same time, the people who are like paying money for it, it's unfair to them if we give it all to everyone for free. So this is a taste. I feel like we know them all personally. They're getting in touch with us on Patreon and they're so lovely that they'll be okay.

25:19I reckon they'll be fine with it. They'll be fine? Great. Goodson. Yeah. That's great to know. That's your call, Hugh. Yeah. All right, let's now magically transport ourselves to a little more imperfects. Okay, we move on and we will, Josh, you've got your book and we're going to get to the book really shortly. Before we get to the book, though, just want to take us back to the year 2020. Okay. Now, there was one very significant thing that happened in 2020, but one of the other significant things that happened in the year 2020.

25:59Yeah. was a moment on the podcast. Longtime listeners may remember this. It became an ongoing thing that we talked about a lot and were questioned about a lot. Let's go back and listen to what happened. And I went to the doctor and he put me on his tablets that stopped your hair falling out. And I didn't really lose hair since then. And then my friends, I can't remember who came up, maybe it was me, I came up with the term hair pingers, these tablets for your hair to stop them falling out.

26:27And ever since I had that like being able to call it hair pingers and tell people I take those tablets, the shame was gone because I got rid of the silence that went with it and the judgment that I gave myself that you're not worthy of connection because you're going bald. You know what is like crazy? Like my heart is racing at the moment because I take those tablets every day. You do? Yeah. Every day. They're working. And I've never spoken about it, ever.

26:56And I had the same, like I've been listening to this whole time and I had the same shame. Like I was losing my hair like years ago and then someone told me and I was so shameful about it and I hated it and I didn't know what to do. I was panicking. Because there's this weird shame around losing hair. My gosh. Well, all I feel like saying is they are definitely working. What I did for such a long time is I would, to get my tablets, my hair pingers, I would go to the same chemist because I, for whatever reason, felt like I could trust that the chemist wouldn't tell anybody.

27:35So, okay, we're back in the room. Yeah. You can sort of hear the nerves in my voice when I was saying it because it was, that was a really, in terms of like moments on the podcast for me, that was enormous because it was like this secret shame that I'd been hiding for years. 10 years probably. So since then, you know, like lots of people have asked, you know, about like the hair pingers and the first live show, we did a whole thing about hair pingers and finasteride are the pingers that Hugh and I have been taking for, what, since we were five, six years old?

28:08And so that's – and they've always like worked. And if you are losing your hair and you're interested in getting finasteride or doing something about it, go to a GP. You have to get a prescription. Because it's a drug. It's a drug. There can be side effects. Yeah, true. So do all the necessary things. So I'd been doing that for a long time. And it was sort of working, but the way that finasteride is designed to work is it's designed to stop – It's designed to sort of stop it where it's at.

28:35So it's to stop the loss. It doesn't promote new growth. Yeah. So anyway, so then I heard about this other product that you could also use that a lot of people use in tandem with finasteride called minoxidil. And Hugh, you do minoxidil. So minoxidil, you can do it a few different ways, but it comes in like a drop form. And every night you're supposed to drop it in the problem areas. And that promotes growth. So a lot of people do both. So I started doing both and shit, man.

29:13This shit's good. Is this an ad for minoxidil? Again, speak to your doctor. Yeah. You know, all the stuff, you've got to be responsible. There are side effects. All of that. Yeah. Definitely. But it works. God does it. I mean, for me, it works. And so for the longest time, up until really only like a couple of weeks, a month ago, for such a long time, even though it looks like I've got lots of hair because I place it very strategically, but whenever my hair gets wet or the wind blows up, I get really self-conscious about it.

29:48But now it's like feeling great to the extent where I feel like I've almost got too much hair. I mean, I've got more than enough hair. More than enough. And so what I thought was like, well, because my heart goes out to guys. May I? Well, to guys who this is like a, like this is a thing that really affects like men's confidence and it's a tough thing to go through. And so there's a part of this which is jokey, but then there's a part of this which is sincere.

30:29Sincere. I truly feel for men. But what I thought I could do was like, Okay, so, you know, never, for the longest time, this has not been the case, but as of now, I got hair to spare. And when you have an abundance of something, it's always good to share. Yeah. So if you are an Almy subscriber or you live, you're an Almy subscriber and live with a man who has similar looking hair to mine and could do with a little bit extra, I'll give you some because hailing is caring.

31:11And this is, I know, like, I'm not kidding myself to think that anyone's going to, like, stick this onto their head or anything. But it's as a gestural token of solidarity. And to say, like, hey, bro, I'm with you. Have some of my hair. So, the logistics of this has yet to be sorted out. But what I'm thinking at this point, if you want to be in the draw to win a little bit of my hair, a little bit, like a lock, like, you know, like a curl. Yeah. A little bit.

31:43Yeah. Then- A little bit more hair. A little bit more. A little more hair. That's great. Okay. So, this is a little more hair. A little more hair. Love it. We're building the story. Yeah. Oh, my God. Why not? So yeah, so A Little More Hair, that's great. That's the title. So if you want A Little More Hair from my head, because I can spare it, things are going great, contact the show. If you're on Patreon, you can comment on Patreon and make sure you include, I could do with a little more hair.

32:18That's the phrase. I could do with a little more hair. And if you're writing an email, make sure the subject heading is, I could do with a little more hair. But I think, yeah, it might not be for you. It could be for your partner who doesn't feel confident. Even still, you could do it just to gift it. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's the phrase that Bella can then search when she's going through the emails. I could do with a little more hair. So this is for Almi listeners who have hair like you.

32:44This is an exclusive offer. What about for Almi hosts who have hair not like you? Can they apply? Yes, they sure can. Oh, good. They sure can. Just go to the website here. Because I would stick it to my head. Would you? Well, great. I mean, if it could help you. I'm into the competition. A little black curl. In the car parks. In the desert up there. It's a bit harsh in the car parks, but yeah. I would look great. Okay. I think it would look great.

33:13I mean, your hair does look great, Hugh. I love your hair. It does. I think it's looking excellent. Yeah. It's looking really good. Would you have it? No, no, no. Sometimes it's nice. You go to an art gallery and you see a piece of art and you're like, that's incredible. Wouldn't have it in my house, but I can appreciate it. It's nice to come and visit it every now and again. Your hair is beautiful. I love looking at it. I have a hair issue at the moment.

33:39Of course. Yeah, my... Oh, my God. I feel slightly vulnerable. Okay, continue for everyone. Oh, my God. So my... This is better, Hugh. Sorry. This has only been happening in the last sort of six months. And I'm a bit concerned that it's going to keep going. I really. Sorry, this is a vulnerable thing to share. This is a vulnerable thing to share. You really fucked it. Yeah. But I think I've got a form of alopecia happening on my eyebrow. So I'm currently, my left eyebrow is kind of disappearing.

34:14Which I didn't notice until you pointed it out to me. I think because you've got blonde hair. Likewise. Yeah, it's kind of light. I've got light-haired eyebrows regardless, but eagle-eyed viewers will be able to see on the camera that this swine is kind of- It's like Louis Theroux. I think Louis Theroux has gone through the same thing. Right. Exact same thing. Okay, yeah. And I'm booked in with a dermatologist to get it checked out and doing that kind of stuff.

34:35But the wait list to get into a dermatologist is monumental. It's like months, so I'm worried I'm not going to have any eyebrows by the time I get in. cancel that appointment I mean for shits and giggles does anyone have any scissors? But actually. All right. We're going to, we've just taken a quick break to go and find some scissors and some sticky tape. Now, this is all done with respect. Yeah. And Josh, you're comfortable with this. Yeah. And this is not to make light of...

35:14Anyone like obviously struggling, alopecia is a really tricky thing and would affect a lot of people. This is something really new to you. We did not plan this, I assure everyone. And yeah, and I feel like at the moment kind of darker eyebrows with lighter hair is kind of cool. It is. It's the Cara Delevingne of it all. Am I right, Belle? Belle? Let's not worry about timelines. It's 2012, 2026, all the same difference. I'm worried about where you want me to cut this hair from.

35:46Maybe take it from up here. Okay. Josh, how long would you like your... We want a good ringlet though, don't we? Yeah, we want a ring. We want a ring. Here, about this one. You don't want that one? No, I can spare that hair. Yeah, okay, great. So Hugh is currently cutting a little ringlet off my hair because I have hair to spare. Great. Okay. Cool. So let's now, before you do that, Hugh, let's create like a little anchor point for this so to hold it all together.

36:14Just a bit of arts and crafts here at a little more imperfects. Okay, so that's then... So Hugh, if you now stick this... to Josh's eyebrow to fill in the space that he needs hair and bearing in mind that anyone, anyone can write in, I could do with a little more hair. Josh could do with a little more hair and he's bravely, he's taken a bit of mine to see how it looks, see if it helps. It could be the new look for Josh. How's that look, Hugh? I'm pretty happy with it.

36:50So Josh, would you like to turn around and show us your new... It looks good. It looks real. Yeah. I've probably gone a bit high with the placement. He just looks surprised. Unfortunately, the sticky tape is doing a lot of the, it's drawing the eye, and I think he have gone a bit high. Yeah, it just looks like a surprised. Yeah, it's like a surprised. Cartoon eyebrow. Okay, so now that it's. So you too could look like. You too, if you need a little bit of hair, if you need a little bit, a little more hair, I can spare the hair.

37:32Hairing is caring. Contact us and we'll sort you out. I mean, not for everyone. I'm not giving away like hundreds of pieces of hair because then I will need. I've only got a little more hair to spare. And so, yeah, we'll choose one or two people who will be sent some of my hair. Great. Thank you, Josh, so much. And, Josh, that is actually very – that's a big thing for you to talk about. Yeah, it is. I'm sorry. I didn't expect the moment I brought this up on the show.

38:00No. It fixed so quickly, so that's great. Yeah. When you share something vulnerable, sometimes you just need to fix it. And, you know, speak to a dermatologist. Maybe this is a solution. Go in like that and say, do you know what the problem is? Just walk in and go, guess. Okay, let's move on, Josh. Maybe you can remove that now. Thank you. But that is very nice. Wow. Josh, now, for those who remember, a few episodes ago, we launched a new segment that we hope will run for many years, a competitor to Oprah's Book Club, slightly different in the sense that this is a little bit from a book that changed my life a bit club.

38:45Yeah. Correct. And when you shared, you did the Midnight Library last time. Yeah. Matt Haig. Yeah. And it was the premise around when you die, you go to a library and it's got every single other life choice that you could have made and you can go and have the opportunity to live that. I've actually, I was so interested. Actually, I'm nearly finished. Oh, really? I've been reading it. Yeah. Oh, what do you think? Yeah. I love it. Isn't it great? I absolutely love it.

39:07Yeah. Oh, that's cool. So before I go to sleep, I read it and then I lie in bed and think about, I can't help but think about other choices I could have made and what would happen. And you think what I did as well, I thought about that book. I still think about it, but I often look at other people and like observe people who's like, I don't know them, but I just see them in the street doing whatever they're doing, working wherever they're working.

39:25And I can't help but think, I wonder what your other Midnight Library books are. Yeah. Like what led you to here? How would your life be different? Do you hope it actually happens in real life if you died and you ended up in a library of your- Oh yeah, I'd love that. All right, let's get into the segment. Welcome to- A book that changed my life a bit, Clown. Let's revisit that, I thought. I'm thinking if Dracula was our first guest, that would work.

40:01Yeah, I don't really know why, George, why we got to that opener. Okay, Josh, what's the book? Run us through it. The book that I brought is How Proust Can Change Your Life by Alain de Botton. And I'm quite nervous about this segment for a few reasons. One is that I, to be honest, I don't really read that much. Um, and I, it's been a long time since I've like read a book, which is kind of shameful to say. Um, and so this book changed my life quite a long time ago.

40:35Um, and it was really interesting to pick it up and read it because I can't believe what a different person I am now. Hmm. So reading it now, I don't think it would have really any impact on me. But at that point in my life, it was really profound and it really shaped who I was. And now looking back at the lesson I learned, I can see how many things and how many things through this show can be sort of taken back to the point of reading this book and I hadn't even realised.

41:06So it's kind of quite profound for me to see it because I probably read it... 10 to 15 years ago, I think. I mean, you might even say that one of your midnight library books is the version of your life where you didn't read that book. Yeah, true. Yeah, absolutely. And I'm also a bit nervous because a lot of it is about you and me, Hugh. And so in going through this, I hope that it's not... I hope it all comes out right because it feels like some delicate areas to go.

41:40So, yeah, but to give a bit of background, I think, is probably best to start with me and then I can go to the book. Okay. I was shocked rereading. It put me back in a state that I was, and I was really surprised at how low my self-esteem was in my mid to early twenties. And the kind of things I used to say to myself a lot being a sort of a waste of potential talent, a sort of perpetual loser. I wrote down here the other day, one who overthought everything and under committed to everything else.

42:14Wow. And if there was a way to sort of have a go at myself in my 20s, I would find it. Not to say that I didn't have a lot of fun in my 20s as well and had like I met the love of my life. I travelled. I did so many good things and there were some real, there were so much ups but there were also a lot of downs and I think the sort of default state when I was alone was one of low self-esteem to say. Yeah. and in contrast to that, when I looked at Hugh, and I think one of the reasons why I'm nervous to talk about this is because I think I know so much more about you now as an adult human being, but I think at the time, even though we were so close, I held onto this view of you as just perfect in every way, which I developed, I think, when I was...

43:08I've had it in my mind for as long as I can remember. I sort of looked at you as the most impressive person I'd ever met. And I worshipped you. And I still do, but just in, I think, a more realistic way. But, yeah, I can remember this from... Back, God, I have this memory when I was sort of eight, I reckon, eight or nine, maybe even younger, at school telling some kids that you played in the Sheffield Shield cricket, which is the national cricket competition for the best cricketers in the country, sort of top 100 cricketers.

43:45Did you? No, because I remember a kid who knew you saying, no, he doesn't, he plays Dowling Shield, which was like the local cricket, like under 16 comp. It's still hard to get into, but yeah. But I felt I can still remember that anger at you, even though I knew immediately I'd gotten it wrong, but the idea that anyone would shatter this image that I had of Hugh as the perfect person and the most amazing person in the world, I still feel this sort of visceral anger at someone shattering that image even though he was 100% right.

44:17I felt anger at the person who said he doesn't push it. Yeah, because it's like how dare you question his perfection, my brother's perfection. Yeah, okay. And I think as I grew up, when your role model is perfect, you want to emulate that. And I've sort of talked about this a bit on the show, but I made a lot of choices to sort of try and be school captain at the school and try and be really good at cricket. And when the person you're trying to emulate is perfect, in inverted commas, you have no option but to fail every single time.

44:51Yeah. And so it wasn't until I got into my 20s that I started to sort of think, you've got to find yourself here, as I think a lot of people do in their 20s. And I've talked about this a bit on the show and I drank a lot and partied a lot. And I think I spent way too much of my 20s hungover, which meant that I was in a pretty down state trying to work that stuff out. And so that's all kind of background to where I was when I wrote this book. Right.

45:19When I read this book... What a reveal. Yeah. I'm actually, yeah, Alanda Baton, which will, I think, explain a bit. But what really surprised me... in rereading this book is the fact that I actually saw myself in Marcel Proust. And I mean that not in a grand way, because the way that I saw myself was all his failings. So Marcel Proust was incredibly, as you learn about in this book, incredibly fragile and neurotic. He was a had sort of perpetual feelings of being misunderstood and a failure whose opinions no one liked.

45:59He had chronic asthma. He could only eat one meal a day, eight hours before bed, or he just couldn't sleep. He had such sensitive skin that he had to use 20 towels after a shower to wash himself, to dry himself. He had fears of mice. He was always cold. He had coughing fits. He had gut issues, sensitivity to any noise. He couldn't leave the house. He had sort of extreme homesickness. Um, fevers, cold, bad eyesight. He was an extraordinary hypochondriac that thought that, um, any of these above ailments could kill him at any, any moment.

46:32He was sort of this incredibly, uh, yeah, fragile neurotic person. Um, and, um, His brother, on the other hand, Robert, was one of the most well-known, famous and loved people in France. He was a cutting-edge surgeon who was writing books about new surgeries, I think, And I'm pretty sure a prostatectomy, which is like a removal of the prostate in France is still a nickname. I think you'd call it the prostate. Well, I think in France they call it a prostatectomy as a joke because his brother, Black, pioneered the surgery.

47:12Oh, whoa. Yeah, I think. I'll have to double check that. But I'm pretty – yeah. He was like a war hero and indestructible. There's a story about him being run over by a five-ton coal wagon and just walking away. When he was operating in Verdun in the First World War, a bomb went off and he was hit by shrapnel, took on the shrapnel himself and single-handedly moved his patient to a safe distance and kept on operating. He was this kind of indestructible, charming person.

47:39I never did anything like that, just for people who – That was school cabin. That was it. Yeah. The question that is asked in this book, in the chapter in the book, is called How to Suffer Successfully. The question that is asked is who would you rather be? The, this person who's had so much success, so much charm seems to travel through life with no, um, no impedance. Everything just seems easy for them or the person that feels like everything is a struggle and everything is hard, uh, and doesn't seem to be able to do things naturally or as well as their, um, brother.

48:18And I, The way that the, the way some of the, I may as well quote a little bit here and sorry, this is a bit all over the place, but, and this is why I don't want, what I think is interesting about this and I think hopefully we can talk about this later is how I think wrong my assessment of you was and also how you've changed and how I've changed since then. But it says here, in Proust's view, we don't really learn anything properly until there's a problem.

48:49and an area in which Robert appeared, the only area in which Robert appeared to trail his brother was his ability to notice things. But it's worth pointing out that feeling things, which usually means feeling things painfully, is at some level linked to the acquisition of knowledge. And it was at that point in reading this that I thought I... I feel things and I notice things and I'm suffering here, but this doesn't have to be a problem. There can be real beauty and learning in this.

49:20And it changed my opinion to, well, maybe Hugh doesn't, maybe Hugh isn't superior to me in every single way in my life. And maybe my, me feeling like this is an opportunity to grow, to learn, to notice more and to lean into it. And it's a tricky area because I don't think you want to be sort of falling into a cult of suffering because I think that's quite easy to be sort of lured into this idea that you have to suffer to create. As he says here, before subscribing uncritically to a romantic cult of suffering, it should be added that suffering has on its own never been quite enough.

49:57Never been quiet enough. Quite enough. Oh, quiet enough, right. In that it's easier to lose a lover than to complete In Search of Lost Time, the book. So you can't just suffer alone. You have to be open to the inquiry that can come with suffering. So he says here, perhaps the greatest claim one can therefore make for suffering is it opens up the possibility for intelligent imaginative inquiry. In terms of like how to get out of the suffering? Yeah.

50:23Or what you can learn from it. So what you can learn from the human experience. He's written here, the stubborn recurrence of misery means that the development of a workable approach to it must surely outstrip the value of any utopian quest for happiness. Which... I've always felt like that my aim in life is not to be happy all the time, but it's to be able to feel properly and to be able to feel in every direction rather than to just feel happy.

50:49Wow. When I was writing about this the other day, trying to prepare for today, I wrote this and I've rereading it before. It's a bit corny, but I think it sort of sums up kind of what I feel. So not to glamorize my suffering, but perhaps the suffering and low self-esteem is a chance to feel more deeply, to try and understand more about the world. Perhaps this could be a gift. And what I've learned to be true over time is that the more I can accurately explore and define my suffering, the more I can remove judgment from it.

51:22The more I see it as a passing cloud from which a greater understanding of life can come down with the rain. And once I'm soaked in that rain, I can more beautifully and more fully enjoy the sunshine too. Yeah. So that's kind of how that book changed my life a bit. I hope I've kind of explained though if that makes sense. And I'm worried that I don't want to be indulged in saying that you have to suffer to learn. No, but people do. You do suffer and life's hard.

51:49And sometimes you can't avoid all those hard things. Sometimes things happen to you that you can't avoid, but sometimes out of nowhere you just find yourself in a darker place. But I think there's hope there too, I think, in those dark places. There's a little bit of light that you can grab onto and you can come out of that. It's also, I think it's really... It's life's a bit easier when the things, especially as teenagers and at school, if the things that you're naturally good at happen to be the things that are celebrated by most people being good at sport or being like a good public speaker or being funny or any of those things that generally, if that's what your gift is, then it's...

52:43that's often valued quite highly. And so that is naturally going to make you more confident. But I think like so many people, their gifts and what is so special about them are often not valued, you know, in a big way. Like being empathetic in high school and feeling a lot and being like kind, it's like it's not going to... You're not necessarily... You're not going to have an assembly with an award for that. No. How did that land for you? My first thought is I actually don't know how much it is about me.

53:21Like I feel like this is a lot about you. That's actually not so much. Like obviously there's the influence... there's an influence there, but I do feel like this is actually more about your journey. And I could be totally wrong, but it feels to me like this is actually more about you. The reason I'm kind of was awkward or nervous about reading this out is that I feel like I'm referring to a myth that I was holding onto. And I think it's so far from my version, my vision of your life, I think that I held on for too long is probably incredibly inaccurate to what your life is really like.

53:58And I think it undermines how, ironically, it actually undermines how brilliant you are in other ways. Right. Like it doesn't give enough respect to how amazing you have, how hard life would have been for you in different spots and how empathetic and how much you notice things and how caring you are and all that kind of stuff. I think it's too much of it. It's a one-dimensional picture of... perfection I think that a child has that actually is not doing justice to the brilliance of the person.

54:31Well, it feels a little bit like your – thank you for that. It's a very nice thing to say. So two things. So I feel like maybe for you, for a lot of your life, your metric of how you're doing was like in all areas you were comparing them to me. Yeah. Potentially you're looking at like – So like when you choose a computer game character, like you've got their strengths and you choose what strengths you want. It's kind of like you're looking at mine and going, well, I'll try and they're the ones I should do.

55:01Like specifically cricket, running fast, school captain, friendship or whatever. Yeah. And then at some point in your life, you're like, actually, I'm going to choose the ones that he's not good at. I'm going to be better at those maybe. Oh, yeah, maybe. Yeah. Potentially, yeah, as a way of finding who I am maybe. Yeah. I don't know. Maybe this is sort of what I'm feeling through that, but I could be wrong. You're like, well... I feel stuff heaps and I can do that.

55:25That's more of it. And I'm, yeah, maybe at a point you're like, actually I'm much smarter than you. It's like, I'm much smarter and I'm much more. And then you're just like, I'm going to really try and focus on those now. Cause I can be better than that, better in that area, as opposed to like, well, I'm just gonna choose my own, which is what you do now. You're like, well, here's my, these are my computer game character strengths. These are mine.

55:47I don't, they're not, they're not influenced at all by you at all. I don't know if that is too simplistic. Yeah, I think it's, well, I think it is simplistic, I think, because I think as a kid and growing up, it's as simple as, well, life looks great for him, so I'll do those things and that will make life easy. It's much harder to work out. It's much harder to, which is one of the things that it doesn't appreciate, is how much harder it is for, say, you because there was no one to follow.

56:18Like you were playing your own field and I had to do that too, but I just did it later in life. Yes. It's quite an irony really that I think I've never been more myself doing something with you, like doing this show together. And that's thanks to everyone who originally Ryan and Hugh, originally you guys and the support that you gave me and the love and appreciation. but also everyone who has then worked at Bridge and Bella and George, allowing me to be myself through this process, and I think being a parent as well, has meant that I'm now, that's why I feel like such a different person.

56:57It's bizarre to me to think, like when I was reading through the other day and reading about Marcel Proust's life and the way he looked at himself, I'm like, okay. I was never like that. Like, why did I ever think that I was that fragile? Because I know Penny's listening to this going, I don't understand Joshua's opinion of himself. Like, what she saw as someone in the year below you was like this person who was up on stage playing music, wooing every single person in the audience with your beautiful voice and your singing, and then you were incredibly good at sport, very handsome, very smart.

57:24Like, I think a lot of people have been like, what? That's not a man who uses 20 towels to dry himself. Yeah, yeah. It's remarkable. But it also shows how bizarre and how disconnected you're – not to say that that portrayal that you just said was 100% true either, but it was probably somewhere in the middle of the two is reality. But it's ridiculous to think that I saw myself. That is the reality of what people saw. Okay, yeah. Red view at school.

57:50Definitely. That's definitely the right one. I don't doubt it. I think that's the – I can so imagine that. It's like the horrible thing about comparison is that like you – if you're putting yourself directly up against someone or an ideal of someone and you're falling short, it's like you're just forgetting about all the things that actually – What's the reality here versus like, what am I telling myself? Which is why I do that thing about the character strengths.

58:13Like you were in year 12, you are marking yourself. You're measuring yourself against me and what my skills were. Yeah. And if you had... And by the way, I'm not saying you should have done it because, God, we're kids and it's like, I have so much empathy for that. Well, I had so much empathy at the time and do now as well for the 17, 18-year-old version of you who was clearly like, I'm not, well, I'm a school captain and, or whatever the things you measured yourself for.

58:40And you weren't able to see the... And I don't know if you – and maybe you aren't able to look back and see the incredible stuff that you did at the time, but it was like – yeah, maybe not, but it was – I think I'm more – yeah, I think I am a bit more now to have a bit of compassion and see that. But I certainly didn't at the time. It was just like, yeah, that's good. I can do those things. But what I really want is the things that you had. Yeah, and I hope nothing I'm saying is coming, I'm not criticising away at all because I totally understand what you're doing.

59:12My story was very different and it's almost what you've just said tells me I was very good at what I thought my job was to do back then and that was to, with the mental illness in our home and the state our home was, it had an impact on the way you were as a person but it also had a very big impact on me and that was My job here is to absolutely bring zero friction at all and bring light and energy and happiness and the image of everything's great at every single possibility.

59:46And that was the performance that I did for so long. And then it sort of became a little bit of who I was, my personality. And in doing that, and it's the work I'm unraveling right now with my psychologist, Anita, and Dr. Edna, my psychiatrist, who's also on board now, is like my actual voice, what I actually think and what I actually want and what I actually need, rarely comes out. And I find it very, very, very hard to say, like Anita would say to me, that voice is so quiet and it's so quiet that you don't even hear it.

1:00:16And it's because for so many years I was trying to project – what you saw and what you I'm not gonna say fell for because it makes it sound like but it's what I did so well so you saw like this very happy person who was succeeding because I thought for me success was like what would make mum and dad really happy and that would distract them from what was happening at home and so I was on a hell-bent mission to succeed um and then when I Yeah, so that's... And you did.

1:00:45Yeah, and so I did that. I think you succeeded in that mission. Yeah, until I didn't understand why when I left school I wasn't succeeding at stuff. That was a... Anyway, that's another story, but I don't want to make this about me. The reason I'm saying this is that... I completely understand why a teenage version of you saw me and went, yeah, I'm going to be like that. Because it was a very good performance of happiness and success and what you should aspire towards.

1:01:14Because I was just doing that for mum and dad, specifically for mum and dad. And also to bring light to your life, because I felt like it was so unfair what was happening to you as a kid. And the same thing was happening to me, but I felt like it was more unfair to happen to a 12-year-old or 13-year-old. So I was just desperate to project joy to everyone to try and for obvious reasons. But I think I was very good at it. And so it makes sense. I understand totally why you saw that as something to copy into full system because you saw how happy it would have made mum and dad as well.

1:01:45And you're like, well. Probably. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, yeah. Hugh achieving in cricket and school captaincy or whatever. Yeah, yeah, it brings joy. That brings joy. So if I can do that, I can. So I get it. I can do it too, yeah. It makes total sense. And I feel I would love to go out in time and like everyone celebrating school captain, I can wink at you and go, this is just a performance, by the way. I'm a dad like this doesn't, this means fuck all.

1:02:10Like I have to, I have to tell you. You've got to try smoking bongs around the back. Yeah, honestly, that would be, yeah, do drugs. That would be so cool. That'd be so much more fun than what I did. I wish I could do that. Yeah. So I just, I just, I guess I'm saying all that to really empathize with your teenage self and to recognize how hard that would have made. I was trying to do it for the opposite reason, but I acknowledge that it absolutely caused problems for you for the next however long in your life.

1:02:37Like it definitely did. There wasn't, obviously it wasn't my intention. It was like to do the opposite. But I think it sent all of us on a trajectory that was, everything's about protection. We're trying to protect ourselves and protect the family. But it obviously has caused, yeah, it's caused friction internally for all of us at some point. Well, yeah, and I think a couple of things to say to that. I think it's really important. I'd like everyone to know, but I know it inherently, but I think it's not maybe obvious that no one in what you're talking about there, you also, there's no one in my life has ever looked out for me more than you at every step of the way.

1:03:21in every point from then till now. And I don't want anyone to miss that part of it because, yeah, you were doing these amazing things but there was, yeah, no one's protected me more or looked out for me more or tried to do more for me than you. And that's pretty, that's incredible. So maybe that's part of why I worshipped you as well and that's a good thing. Um, but also that I think this is just like, I don't think it's, I don't think anyone's at fault here.

1:03:51Like, I don't think you should feel bad or there's any, like you were a kid too, and we're just doing the best we can. That's a pretty blessed thing to have. Um, like I sometimes, I sometimes think that it seems weird to talk on a podcast or talk about how. the problems caused by someone being too great, like my parents love me too much. Or like that kind of sounds a bit ridiculous. So I wouldn't have had it any other way really. But also that the point of the whole chapter in the book is that Um, me having to question all this stuff and noticing all these things about myself, uh, is a gift, I think.

1:04:35Um, and it, and, um, I wouldn't really have it any other way because I think I have learned so much more about life and have a deeper understanding of life. That's made me a better dad, um, and a better partner to safe and a better friend and just a better person because of it. And I think if I hadn't gone through, um, I think if I moments of suffering and internal suffering, I should say, I would be lesser for it. Yeah. So I don't have any regrets about it at all.

1:05:03That's a really nice thing to hear. Yeah. That's a really nice thing to hear you say. And like the way I feel about you is best summarised by – I was talking to Anita about this the other day how like I always mix up you and Benji's name. Like I'm always saying to Benji from when he was a baby, like just like Josh, I mean Benji. And just like the deep love that I have for you is like my brain gets confused with my firstborn. Like that's the level of like intensity of love towards you is like I'm always mixing your names up.

1:05:33They're interchangeable. Have I ever told you – I can't remember if I've told you this or I've just thought I should tell you this – About when Benji was born, I said to Soph that this feels like a strange moment because I feel like this is the first person to get in between you and me in that role. I don't know, but I felt it. I definitely felt it. I remember your response wasn't what I was expecting it to be. and I think we have discussed it. I think you did tell me that.

1:06:02Yeah. I apologise for that. Oh, no. I think it was like in a deep sort of child, it activated something in the child in me to be like, oh, wow, I'm number two now and that's the way it should be and that's fine but it was like I didn't see it coming. Not according to my brain, you're one and the same to my brain. Yeah, true. You and me, Benj, and Elsie and Patrick. Yeah, obviously, Ted, Elsie and Patrick, if you've listened to this one day, you weren't born yet when I was feeling these things.

1:06:30Yeah. Yeah, well, gosh, it feels like a – I feel very lucky to have this podcast because I don't know this conversation is happening without a podcast. I read that. No, I don't think so. Yeah. Because my instinct is to say, like, it's an encouragement to have these conversations, but you're not going to if you don't have a podcast. It's too hard to talk just to bring it up. Let's not kid ourselves. You ain't doing this. No, do do it. I mean, to do it.

1:06:57I know you're not going to. Give it a go. I'm really glad. I feel, to be honest, I feel like I didn't do the book part as well as I could have. But for me, the conversation we've had afterwards was the important bit because I felt like the book bit doesn't apply to me anymore. Yeah. But I was really glad that we could talk about this. Yeah. I think Proust would be happy with that summation. And Alanda Baton, hopefully, as well. I reckon he would.

1:07:22Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. That's amazing. I was able to watch that. I'm just like watching like head to head. It was incredible. One will live, one will die. It's a reference to our lives. There's a secondary question I want to ask, a question that we don't have time for, I don't think, is that I think you've gone through much more hardship and challenges in the last, since I've read that book, in the last sort of 10 or 15 years. And I'd be interested to know if you feel like the idea that you can learn, that you've truly learned about life from suffering resonates with you.

1:08:03Yep. So two things from that. The first one is, the first thoughts that come to mind is, and I think I've always understood why deep down, but... I'm always very forthcoming in telling you about all my struggles and all the things because I constantly want you to know. I constantly want you to know about my imperfections. It's interesting. You hear more than anyone. To sort of undo that work. My fuck-ups, even the small things, but I'm always wanting – there's almost like a relief when I tell you things, like when I tell you – how hard things are.

1:08:30There's part of me that's like, I really want Josh to know this. I want Josh to know this. So I think I've always been, not subconsciously, consciously trying to undo your image of me. Like I've always been, not always, in the last 10 years, um, yeah, I think the episode we did with Bronte Campbell really helped with that. When I understood truly that it wasn't that you didn't like me, you're just trying to forge your own path. Yeah, absolutely. Like she did with Kate Campbell.

1:08:54Yeah. That I became more like, well, I really want Josh to know if he thinks I'm perfect. Not that you did then, but I really am going to. I'm really going to reiterate to you to make the point that things aren't, I'm not perfect. I'm so far from it. Life is very hard. So that's, I'm always probably too keen to share things that are not going well for that reason. Um, On the flip side of that coin, then is it also hard for you to share the good things?

1:09:22Yes. Yep. Definitely. I don't. Yeah, just to me, I feel a bit uncomfortable sharing good stuff. Yeah. Like the one that I really just felt gross about. And it was the main reason I was really hoping it was never a chance. It was fine. The Australian of the Year thing, I was like, fine. Oh, really? I didn't – I did not. I just didn't – I just felt – when we do very similar work, to me it could have been like – It's got real school captain vibes. It does.

1:09:55I was about to say, it's in the same world. It does. And I kept saying I don't want to win it because I don't want the attention, but I really didn't want it for that reason. Really? That was my main reason. Yeah. Wow. God. It's like I felt very uncomfortable. I would feel so uncomfortable – in this relationship if that was, if that, yeah. So I was, to be honest, I was, I felt nothing but pride for you being nominated. Victoria only. Yeah, yeah. And one of four.

1:10:24I was really sad for you when you didn't progress because I'm just so proud of you. And I think you're so amazing. And I think I've just got a much more – for me, I feel like I see it all now. Like I see there are things that you can do that I can't do, that no one I've ever met can do. You do them better than anyone. And there are other areas where you are not so good. And I see all of that. There's plenty of them. Yeah. And I think it's just part of life is sort of giving up on the childhood version of someone or like – having the child's view of the world and a person and developing an adult's view of that person.

1:11:02And it's, um, yeah, I, and I would love you to share it all, share the biggest wins and the biggest losses and everything. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you for that. Um, and to answer your question, um, yes, the pain and struggle and suffering, I wouldn't change it for anything because it's definitely helped me to be a better person. So it'd be good. Imagine if I was doing herring is caring now. If we can just stick a bit of hair to Josh's eyebrow. Has had it all.

1:11:31Has gone for four hours. In hindsight, Belle, good order. Good order. Oh, that's amazing, guys. Wow. All right. God. Okay. Well, I'm here whenever you need any more family therapy. Or hair. Yes. Wow, that's one of my... Separate to the herring is caring. It's one of my favourite moments or episodes I think we've ever done. That was amazing. Really incredible. Well done, you. Yeah. Wow. All right. Well, yeah, if you do want a little more hair. If you want a little more hair.

1:12:10You know what to do, guys. You know what to do. We do need to recap that. So, yeah, comment or email. joking not joking thank you Josh yes exactly alright see you later everyone if you enjoyed Ryan's abundance of hair and hair loss solutions as well as my chat with Hugh there's plenty more like this on our Patreon so you can sign up at patreon.com slash the imperfects or simply just click subscribe on your Apple podcast app