Let's get the chat going here. So welcome to Recovery Monday, episode number 57. This is the 50, has this started? Yes, this has started. Welcome, welcome UK. Happy new year everybody. We'll wait for everybody to show up. This is episode 57 of Recovery Monday. Just give me an okay and let me know that you can hear me. I will put the chat overlay over up as I always do so you guys can talk to each other like you always do. Today we're talking about the idea of having choice and power and agency and all of those good things, but also how those things are tied to courage which is the shitty part of that. But it is what it is. Hey, Becky, what up? Here we are, hello y'all. So everybody let me know where you're coming from. Hello B, what's up? Yeah, let me know where you're coming from. Let me know how everybody's doing today. We are at the end of the Christmas break. Let's see, 28 people. Anybody who is struggling today at the first day back after break, I know it's kind of a tough day for a lot of folks. It was this was one of the toughest days of the year for me.  Hang out here for a little while and we will talk about some good stuff, hopefully. So Northwestern Nevada, White Mountains of Arizona, the UK is here, the UK. Hey, Lindsay, how you doing? Croatia is here, always such a diverse crowd. I appreciate that you guys come from all over the world, it's really great. So anybody have any questions? We'll pop them in the comments. So the way we usually do this is I'll talk for a little while. Shouldn't be too long today, but I feel like I say that every week. I've probably said that 57 times and it's never been short ever. So I should just stop saying that because I'm obviously clearly lying. Although I say it with the best of intentions, I think I'm gonna be short, but then I'm not. So we'll get into it a little bit and then hello, New York. Welcome, fellow New Yorker. Hey, GBG, what up? Jim is here, struggling day five. Some people start struggling before the break is over. I know that was me. It's always funny, because I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday about this and when the holiday break for me, when the holiday break starts, the break is like a shiny new Ferrari and it's awesome. And then by the end of the break, it's like the planes, trains and automobiles car with John Candy and Steve Martin and they just burnt out. It's just a frame, there's nothing left of it. That's how I always felt. And honestly, like at this point, the Christmas decorations are just bothering me. They're mocking me. It's sad.  Anyway, so hey, Munich is here. Welcome, Germany. Hello, Christina, happy new year. We don't want it to be brief. Jason is here. Hey, James. So let's get into this. Today we're gonna talk a little bit about the idea that there is in fact choice, which means that we have, when we have choice, it means we have some power, some agency and some influence in the process. Now, before I get started in this, I just wanna confirm here that the choice that I'm talking about today are, these are tiny choices like micro choices. So in the recovery process, we have choices at multiple levels, right?  But there are other moments of choice too. There are bigger moments. Do I even wanna do this work? Do I wanna change my life? Like, so there's choice all over the place, right? But in the hardest moments, we do have choice. There are little micro choices. They are hard choices, but we really have to acknowledge that choice exists. And this is an outgrowth of the idea that people say, when I get in the thick of it, I forget what to do or I've been doing really well and then I forgot how to accept or I forgot how to surrender. And in those situations, it's always helpful to say in my view, when you are experiencing that sort of setback thing or what people will call a setback and they say, oh, suddenly I've forgotten how to do this, you didn't really forget, you just have decided that resistance is a better idea again. And that's important because, does anyone wanna get out? Marvel fan. Before we get started, does anyone want to get out? Marvel fan, I'm curious about that. Is there a new Marvel movie coming out that I'm not aware of possibly? Anyway, so it's important to recognize that it doesn't, that we don't wanna get in the trap of thinking like, well, this thing is completely beyond my control. It's a thing outside of me that comes and gets me. It wipes away my skills. It makes me forget stuff. Well, it makes you feel stuff. It makes you feel really scared. It makes you feel unsure. And we don't make, it's hard to make good decisions when we are really scared and vulnerable and unsure and like kind of in the thick of it. So it is difficult to do this. There's no doubt about that. I don't wanna make it sound super easy here, but it's really helpful to remember that at any given moment, I can choose to follow the fear or I can choose to let go in a way. And I can choose to accept this and I can choose to sort of do the opposite. Again, little tiny micro choices that happen from moment to moment. And when the shit is hitting the fan and you find that you are like, oh no, I forgot how to accept or I forgot how to surrender or I forgot how to float, it's one of the situations where you can say, okay, well in the middle of that, if I discover, oh, wait a minute, I'm doing the old things again. I'm resisting again. Well, you have a moment of micro choice again where you keep an adjust in that moment. So in any given moment of say high anxiety or panic or discomfort, even if you discover that like, oh, I'm falling back into the other habits, I'm choosing resistance, I can change direction even in the middle of this one particular instance, right? So I think it's important to recognize that because when we recognize that there are moments of choice and they come and go, they were presented with choice and then choice and then choice and then choice, at any given moment, we can pick a different direction, even though that's really difficult to do. And when we understand that we have that choice and this goes, a lot of other really smart people say this, I didn't invent this by the way, but it applies in our circumstances for sure. So when we recognize that there is a moment where I have a choice to make and I can, what am I gonna do with this anxiety or this fear that I'm experiencing right now, then we also understand that, oh, there is some power here, I'm not necessarily being swamped, I'm not being attacked, I'm not being overwhelmed by some sort of outside force, I get a chance to do this the way I want to do it to a certain extent. So it's super important to recognize that. And when people say, oh, I forgot what to do or I've been listening to the podcast, I've read your books true, or I follow all the other people that sound like me and I get it, but then when I'm really afraid, it all goes out the window. And I'm not gonna necessarily go along with that, that it all goes out the window, it's hard to make choices, but in that situation, you're confronted with a moment of choice where you say, what am I gonna do with this now? I'm going to fight it to try to protect myself the old way, or I'm going to let go this time and let it come and get me the new way. So at every given moment, when we get into those tight spots, we are confronted with those choices. So if I go back probably, I don't even know when this was. This is probably now four years ago, I don't know, three, four years ago. And I made two really popular podcast episodes, one of which I made while I was sitting in a park. I don't know if you guys are familiar with that. I don't know the episode number that is, but it was a critical moment of decision. So if you go to my website, theAnxiousTruth.com and search for critical moment in the search tool, you'll find this podcast episode and I walked you through what happened to me when I was out, I was actually on my mountain bike and I was working out on my bicycle and I had a panic attack while I was riding. And at this stage of the game, even though it was four years ago, well into being a recovered person, I was able to look back at that and say, okay, let me walk you through when I hit that critical moment of decision or choice, when I could have chose to follow the panic and fight it and try to protect myself against it or let go and just let it run its course. And, but I can recognize that moment because I've had so many, I've had a lot of practice at this. And that's what happens. We need to practice, but in the beginning of my recovery, I was really making a huge leap of faith there that like, okay, I got some of my fingers here, I will let go, I hope this is gonna work. So I kind of get that, I kind of get that. So in that moment of decision, that's where you find your power. That's where you discover that you have agency in this process, not because you have the ability to like superhero, just, you know, Hulk smash the panic when it goes away. That's not how this works, unfortunately. In the case of panic, when it's happening, it's happening, it has to just peek and run its course. You can't just stop it dead in its tracks. However, when that experience ends, and you've made that different choice, and you've recognized that moment of decision, that moment of choice, and you've made the choice to let go. As crazy as it sounds, when you make the choice to let go, surrender, float through it, except, I don't care what words you like to use, but if you give up the resistance amazingly, when it's over, that's when you feel like a superhero. So it's really the opposite. So if you say, well, everything goes out the window, so I'm gonna fight it, I'm gonna resist it, it'll end anyway, it'll probably take longer to end, in the end it's gonna end, but you will feel like, oh my God, it happened again, this is the worst, I don't know what's going on, I made it, I can't believe it, like I thought I was gonna die. When you fully let go in that moment of decision, and you exercise your right to choose, and your power in that moment, as crazy as it sounds, even though you're not fighting, at the end, then you feel like you won, which makes no sense whatsoever. If you don't fight, you end the episode feeling like you won a battle. When you do fight, the battle ends anyway, and you feel like you lost the battle. So it makes no sense, it's completely counterintuitive, those of you who are new to this community watching today are like, what the hell is this guy talking about? Aren't I supposed to learn how to ground myself, and stop it, and manage it, and activate my vagus nerve like, no, like no, actually in the end, if we just let it happen, run its course and end, there's no fight in that, there's no resistance in that, there's making a different choice in how you're going to respond, but you end that feeling like you won a war, which again, is completely ridiculous. But, and the reason why, one of the reasons why it's so difficult to first of all acknowledge the choice, I know many of you watching are probably saying, no, this is automatic, you don't understand, I don't have a choice, but you actually do. If you break this down into tiny little slices of time, you know, we're gonna go all physics here a little bit, but the smaller the slice of time, the more you begin to recognize, oh, in this particular moment, I can measure it in a minute, I can measure it in 30 seconds, I can measure it in 20 seconds, I can measure it in a second, I can measure it in a half a second. But in that half second little slice of time, you have a decision to make. And when you choose non-resistance, and you choose to surrender and not throw punches at it, not put your shield up, that's when you come out feeling like you won, which is kind of weird. But it makes it so hard because that decision happens in tiny little slices of time, it's completely counterintuitive, especially if you're new to this. And this is the third part that I put in here, power choice and courage, excuse me, making that different choice in that moment is a function of courage. This is where it goes off the rails for so many people, and people won't know, how, but how, what are the steps in that half a second moment of decision? And unfortunately, when we break it down to that one second, two second, half a second moment of decision, there is no steps, it's just courage. I'm going to let go of the rope now. So I'm pulling on the rope, I'm trying to get my way here, I'm gonna let go. In that moment I'm gonna let go. There's no step other than let go and let the chips fall where they may, which is counterintuitive, so it makes it difficult. It doesn't make any sort of sense, it's not what anybody seems to think they should do, makes it difficult, and it requires courage. You are doing something that seems inherently dangerous and reckless and wrong and fraught with danger and how can I possibly take a chance on letting go here? I understand all that, but sooner or later we get to the point where we have to say, I can keep declaring that I forget or I keep declaring that it goes out the window or I can recognize the courage part of this equation and what I'm really probably saying is, I'm not saying you're thinking clearly in those moments, you're not, I get that, but you can't completely just throw your hands in the air and say, I have no control over this, I'm just overwhelmed, I forget everything, give me steps to not forget. Like factor in the courage there and instead think of it as, well I'm missing my opportunity to make a different choice and exercise my power because I'm afraid and I'm acting toward the fear. That's all that is. And that's not a crime, that's a normal human response that in no way is failure, that's not a crime, it doesn't mean you're doing it wrong, it just means you got to get to that point where you recognize, oh, this is that moment when I have to plug the courage variable into this equation and decide I'm gonna use it or not. That's all. So I know I try, I make it sound simple and easy and it's not, it's complicated because some of the things in those critical moments of decision there are so many things that you are factoring in. Even though you're not consciously thinking very clearly and you feel like you can't make good decisions at that moment, you are making decisions based on survival and amazingly, the fear center in your brain has the ability to factor in all the bad past experiences. That it will do. That it seems to be really good at doing like I'm gonna run through all of the nightmare scenarios and make a decision based on that.  So it's really ridiculous. Like, I keep saying that at some point maybe this part of the human brain will change and evolve, who knows? I understand why it's like that but it makes it sometimes really annoying and I'm not gonna lie.  So the survival mechanism, the amygdala will factor in will plug in all kinds of catastrophe variables and do a lot of math on those but it will completely ignore all the success variables and the reality variables.  So in a way in those moments of decision you're really kind of, I always say you don't push through, I didn't really think about that. This is never pushing through, it's letting go but you're actually, there's a barrier. What's the best way for me to say this? So here's letting go, here's you. There's a barrier between that and you have to push through that barrier. When you push through the barrier to letting go then you let go and then there's no more pushing then there's just floating and just let whatever happens happens then they're surfing. So hopefully you shed a little light on this maybe give you something to think about maybe understand that like, oh, I guess maybe I do have some say in this because in the end, anybody who has come down the road and is a little further down the road to recovery and seems to have built the ability to relate to this in a different way. And we see people like in the chat right now Bethany is here, Jason is here, Grease Bell garage. I know there's people here that are further down the road to recovery and almost every one of them will without exception say, well, at one point I thought that it was out of my control also. So it's just a little incremental change, change, change, change. And the next thing you know, you understand and you're feeling that like, oh, I'm driving the car here, man, I could do this. So hopefully that helps. Let's pop through some of the comments and questions here. I will take the ones that I can close this. Again, I have to remind you guys that if you're coming from the Facebook group I can't see your name unfortunately, but that's okay. Let's see what everybody has to say. This is the part where you watch me scroll through the comments, which is always exciting. I'm facing fears and sitting at all the anxiety but not sure how to, okay, so I'll put this up on the screen again. I'm sorry, I can't see your name. I don't know, but you're clearly coming from the Facebook group, so hello. I'm facing fears and sitting at all the anxiety but not sure how to keep going like this. So in this situation, my best advice is, first of all, let's acknowledge that, yeah, that's a really difficult thing to do. It will wear you down, without a doubt, it is very difficult to do what it is you're doing. So good job on doing something that's really hard. Sometimes it's the expectation of what's supposed to happen when I sit with this, so what is the story afterward? So I'm sitting through this, I'm sitting through this. At some point, what is the story that you tell yourself? Because that does start to matter. That story really does start to matter. It becomes, hey, this is really horrible. It's never ending and acceptance clearly doesn't work. Sitting with it doesn't work. I'm not saying that's what you're asserting here but that's the most common train of thought that leads to this. I don't know how much longer I can do this as opposed to, oh, look, I'm doing it. I'm actually doing the thing and no harm is coming of me except I feel really uncomfortable right now. But I'm sitting with it now instead of running from it. So what else can I do while I sit with it? What can I do with my life while I'm feeling this way? So it's really kind of important to really take the feedback loop matters a lot. So what is the feedback that you're putting back down the chain? Is it, this is horrible, this is horrible. When's it gonna end? I'm sitting, when is it gonna end? I'm sitting with it, I'm not running. When's it gonna end? It's not gonna end anytime soon if that's the way you're doing it. If instead the feedback is, look, we're doing this, what else can we do while we're uncomfortable because it keeps failing to take me down? That's very different, okay? That's very different. So that's the best advice I can give you on that without knowing specifically what's going on. Let's see here. Let's put Yvonne, hello Yvonne, happy new year to you too. Did that get cut off? Happy new year, feeling the pressure of having to do and knowing I need to, but my mind, okay, I kind of get that. I'm guessing that you probably finished that comment later on. That's that thing, that's why I said it really makes it difficult because it's super, super, oh yeah, new video background by the way. Do you notice my stars? I just literally downloaded that like two seconds before I went live. I was tired of the Eiffel Tower thing and whatever else I had. But the reason why you will say, well logically I know what to do, I know what I have to do, but it's so hard to do, that's correct. If we could just act on our logical brains and what we knew we had to do, none of you guys would be watching this video right now. I would not have written any books. I wouldn't have to do any of this. Nobody would know who I am and I wouldn't know who you are. And that's probably a good thing. Like I wish it was that way. But since you can't, logically what you know to be true and what you know you need to get done is helps for sure. Like when you adopt that and say, well okay, I'm gonna try it this way and I know what to do, you're still going against the grain in terms of the lower part of your brain, the part that's supposed to keep you alive. So recognize that when you're saying that, I know what I'm supposed to do, my mind wants no part of that, that's normal, you and everybody else. It's you're in the same boat that everybody else is because you're human, right? So it's gonna be hard. It's gonna be hard. Let's keep going here. Choo, choo, choo, choo. Oh, you know what Becky? I'm hiring you to be my Christmas consultant next year, no one in my house want that to decorate. Instead we decided to do festive things rather than look at festive things. I guess I'm okay with the decorations, but it is true that by the time we would get to like New Year's Day, I'm literally like enough of this now. Like now you're mocking me. Is that ridiculous? I don't know if anybody can relate to that. It feels like it's now the Christmas decoration just mocking me. Anyway, how lucky was that lady bumping into me? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that was great. I actually got to meet a member of the Facebook group over Christmas. It was a random thing, it was not planned, it just sort of happened, but yeah, that was great to get to meet somebody, very cool. We're loving the podcast, thank you, Christina. I hope they're helpful for you. Let's see, let's pop this one up. Have good and bad days with anxiety. I can't even enjoy the good days because I'm always fearing when the anxiety will creep back in, which then triggers my anxiety. Okay, so what you're describing here is literally the definition of things like panic disorder. So panic disorder is when you are afraid of the next panic attack. So the anxiety itself drives the anxiety. So literally what you're describing is exactly what everything I write about and talk about is aimed directly at. So the good news here is that you're not describing anything strange or out of the ordinary, or you're not describing a special obstacle or a special kind of stuck. It's exactly what creates the position that you're in and what keeps you in a position that you're in. So remember that the thing that you are afraid of is not, it's the anxiety itself generates the next bout with anxiety. So that's normal, recognize that. Like, oh, I'm looking for the next one here. Okay, I might do that automatically, but what else can I do while I am doing this, while I am scanning, while I'm trying to protect myself? I have to be able to live myself my life also, which is a gross simplification, but that's what we're talking about here. Instead of just sitting passively and wringing your hands and shaking over like, when's it gonna, oh no, oh no, now I'm triggered again. Okay, I'm worried about how I feel. I'm afraid of how I feel. I'm afraid of my own body and thoughts. What can I do while I'm afraid to show my brain that it doesn't have to keep doing this? So you're describing incredibly almost textbook situation. Let's see here. My husband and I needed to see a doctor over the long weekend, glad it's over. Me too, no fun. Hope you guys are okay, Carol. Let's see, Captain America Winter Soldier. You know, I don't think I've ever seen that one. Okay, let's see here. Hey, Robbie, what does Robbie have to say? This year it's taking so much away from me. I feel like more, okay, this is good. So let's put Robbie's comment up. Hey, Robbie, this past year it's taking so much away from me. I can feel me being more angry with it. That's not a bad thing in my view. I'm certain maybe this is how I change the relationship with it. I am of the mindset that says that getting angry at it, not angry yet at you, we have to be really careful here. And it brings up a good point. When we talk about this stuff, I almost want to separate like what I'm talking to your anxiety and what I'm talking to you. And the same thing for yourself. When am I talking to my anxiety? When am I talking to myself as a person? So being angry at it can be really productive and can actually be motivating and can inform different actions and change of direction. I remember getting to that point where it's like, I'm done, I'm not doing this anymore. This is an unacceptable way to live. So before I did the critical moment of decision episode of my podcast, I did one either before or right after that where I talked about that.  And getting to the point where you get angry at it can really be a game changer sometimes. So tap into that, but just be careful about turning the anger on yourself. Like now I'm angry at me. You don't have to be angry at you, be angry at it. Now I always say like, we oversimplify things. Like your anxiety is not sentient. It's not a separate person. It's part of you, but sometimes it helps to separate that out. I'm really, I'm just angry at this disorder now. I'm not angry at me.  Why can't I get this?  No, no, no, no, that's not fair to yourself. Like take that anger and direct it at the disorder, the disordered state and try and use that. But angry yourself, you can't help it. We can't decide what emotions to have. Just notice when you're doing that. Are you angry at you or are you angry at it? Try to be angry at it. And it might change the way you see it. Because when you get really angry at it, it seems like a little bit less of a monster if that helps. Good question, Robbie, or good comment. I've noticed the power of my thoughts since journaling announced I've got 80% recovery. I'm letting go, this is good. Again, sorry, can't see your name. The power of my thoughts since journaling, and I'd say now that I'm about 80% recovered. I'm letting go every day now and it's resulting in fewer symptoms. I wish I knew who this was. Thank you so much for saying that because that's kind of how this works. Now, for this person, journaling became a way to put space between thoughts and between themselves and their thoughts. Like we're always trying to put space between us there. And that seems to have done the job there. I'm a fan of journaling and recovery in so much as it helps us do that. So instead of journaling like, oh my God, it was terrible another day. When is this gonna end? I felt dizzy. I was nauseous. I thought I was gonna die. My legs were shaking. Nobody knows. That's a, in my opinion, that's not a productive journal. Now everybody needs a place to vent. So that's fine, but that can't be the only way you're right about this. I am a huge fan of calling it out in your journal, right? So today I felt all the things that I'm afraid of and I didn't try to save myself and they didn't kill me again. Day 32 of not dying. Day 74 of not going crazy. Like call out the irrationality in your journal. Use it to let reality be your guide so that when you get into tricky spots, you can go back to the journal and look and say, oh, look at that. I used to think this all the time.  I used to think I would never get better and I feel like I'm getting better. So look at all these wrong thoughts. Look at all these inaccurate thoughts. Look at all these wrong predictions. Look at all the times that my heartbeat and my breathing didn't mean anything. Really good. That was a great comment. Thank you so much. I appreciate you sharing. So what time is it? Okay, we're good on time. I think it's hard to understand that this is a repetitive thing. It's going, it's not finished. Never have to use it. This is good. Let's put this up. Is it a big comment? I must have to look over it, but I think it's hard to truly understand that this is a repetitive thing. It's ongoing. It's not finished. Never have to do this again. Please listen to Bethany when she says this because that is 100% true. Like these are things that you will return to again and again and again. I joke about this all the time. I don't know a person more recovered than me walking this planet. I'm proud of that, but there are times that I do have to return to recovery principles. So if I get super anxious for whatever reason, or I wrote, I don't know, a few weeks ago, I had a problem with vertigo and it did kind of tip me into a panic zone that I haven't been in a long time. I still use these tools all the time. And then I also use them outside of anxious situations, just as life tools. And they're really worthwhile. So don't think of this as something that like, oh, I can't wait for my recovery to end and I'm never gonna have to do this ever again. That's probably not accurate and it's gonna set you up for some disappointment. So thank you, Bethany. I appreciate that. My success journal has been so important. Huge fan of this. I've written about the success journal. Give it a try. Give it a try. Sometimes I get in arguments over this though because when I say I'm not a fan of journaling, what I mean is I'm just not a fan of writing down how you felt all day long, another day of nausea, another day of jelly legs. Not helpful, like not helpful, but a success journal, hmm. Oh, this is good. Hello, Amanda. Good to see you. I'd like to say that I've taken my eyes off the tools and resources. So I guess I'm kidding myself that I can do it by determination. Okay. This is a really strong comment by Amanda. Thank you for sharing Amanda. I appreciate it. This is a strong comment because she's right. Like it's not enough to just say you're doing it. It's not enough to just want to do it. We actually have to do things. So I can want to play like David Gilmore. I would like to play that Stratocaster just like he does. And I could be so determined. But if I do not actually practice, well, you know what? If I practiced every day until I die, it still wouldn't sound like David Gilmore. But the point is, I know that me playing the guitar is not the same as you overcoming anxiety disorder, but being determined alone is not going to get the job done. So as much as we want it, if we start to slack off a little bit, things get a little tough. Anyway, hello London. Good to see you. Let's see, that is a great explanation. You're welcome. I don't know what I explained, but I'm behind on the comments. Sarasota, this is cool. All right, Carol. Good to see this. I managed to do a short meditation this morning. Felt calmer than I have in ages. That's excellent. So the path to that, because a lot of people want to meditate, but are you either afraid? Because when they do that, they hear their brain racing and they hear their thoughts or they feel their sensations. This coming Saturday in my Instagram subscriber group, we'll get back to Surrender Saturday.  So I do talk about this a lot. I have some meditations that are free on the Insight Timer app if you wanna check them out. But the path to what Carol's talking about here isn't necessarily a calming path. So we have to be careful that we don't look to meditation as a calming tool. But in the end, when we practice it and we practice just letting those sensations and those thoughts come and go, we wind up in a calmer state. So again, like so much of this stuff that we're talking about, this crap that we have to deal with, it's a happy secondary effect. I'm really happy to hear that, Carol. You deserve a break. Let's see here. Happy holidays. Hello, Julie. Good to see you. I start courageous, but the letting go seems so difficult for me. Okay. So Ian, this is where, let's see here. I start courageous, but the letting go and floating with it seems so difficult. Dude, it's difficult for everybody, man.  This is not easy for anybody. It wasn't easy for me. I know that sometimes when I write about it and I'm so far removed from it, it sounds like I just ran this over. Like I just decided to accept and surrender, but it was hard for me too. It's hard for everybody. For all those reasons, it's counterintuitive, requires a leap of faith, it requires courage, all of those things. So I get it. And at some point, I think it's okay. Just don't get into the trap of beating yourself up. I don't know why I can't let go. Everybody has to reach a point where they're ready to let go. Everybody has to get to that point. And you can't just be at that point if you're not at that point. So think about that a little bit. Let's see here. Courage seems to get beat up. So this is one of those things that people talk about all the time. Now, driving anxiety, that was my jam, 100%. And I am of the mindset that says, listen, you get to choose whatever you wanna do. Pull over and panic if you have to. If that feels safer, that's totally, totally fine. But I am always gonna push back on the argument that says, but you don't understand driving is special because that really is dangerous. But when people say that to me, I always will say, okay, well, think of the last time that you were in a driving situation where you felt like you were losing control because this fear was at such a high level. What did you do? And nine times out of 10, they will either say, well, I had to stop driving. Okay, and what happened? Well, then I got myself home. Okay, how did you get yourself home? Because it hit a peak and it came down to the point where you can navigate the car safely. Perfectly acceptable way to end that.  Or the other thing that they say is, well, I went home right away. Okay, well, how did you get home? Oh, so fast. I couldn't get home fast enough. So your assertion is that you will lose control of the car, but you were always in control enough to drive home like a Formula One driver that you could do. How is that possible? Or you had the presence of mind to say, I don't feel competent behind the wheel. Let me pull over and then felt competent enough to drive but to home or wherever your safe place is. So the driving thing I'm always gonna push back on because if I had continued to say, no, long and expressway, no way. Midtown tunnel can't drive in the Midtown tunnel because what if I have a panic attack in the Midtown tunnel? I would still be where I was. So we have to challenge some of that belief. And on a practical level, you did one of two things that was safe and you made safe, good choices because I will tell you that almost does not count. So I never liked it. The word almost should be like stricken from every vocabulary as a group. Well, I almost passed out. How do you know you almost? You can't almost passed out. You either did or you didn't. And what did you do to stop yourself from passing out? Well, I pulled over. Well, okay, but how did that make you not pass out? I don't understand. Oh, I took a glass of, I was drinking my water. I took my mints, I called my wife. How did that stop you from passing out? Like is your phone magic and it can somehow stop that physiological process? So it's so important that we attack those irrational choices. But everybody also has a right to make whatever choice they want. If you feel that driving is just too dangerous, then you don't have to. That's okay. I saw a woman from the UK. I don't remember her name.  She doesn't really focus on anxiety. This is going back a few years. Somebody sent me a link to a video that she did when she told the zillions of people to follow her, maybe you're just not meant to drive. And I saw red. I'm like, how could you effing say this to those people? But honestly, three years later, okay, I might say the same thing. You can choose to not drive if you want to, but you can't choose to not drive because you insist that it is unsafe and also lament that you can't drive. You have to pick one, pick a lane, pardon the pun. Anyway, so Jim, I hope that helps. I will throw this out. Hello, Sue, good to see you. What is my thought on EMDR in addition to exposure therapy? So EMDR is the therapy du jour, right? Right now it is a very popular therapy and everybody, and so, okay, let me be professional about this and not ruffle any feathers. EMDR is specifically indicated in the case of trauma resolution. Like that seems to be where most of the research is headed with the use of EMDR. EMDR is used as a way to help you sort of re-experience and go through those sort of flashback things while staying in the present and not re-experiencing like as time travel. I'm super oversimplifying it, right? But there is also a fair amount of research that says, okay, well, EMDR seems to be pretty effective in that situation. It helps people get through those painful memories. Cool, if that helps, I'm a big fan. But EMDR is not a treatment for an anxiety disorder. It's simply not. It was not designed to be that. There's no empirical evidence that says it is for that. It does not appear to be effective for that, but it doesn't stop the mental health community from latching on to the popular concept and trying to shoehorn it into every possible thing. So I do not believe that EMDR has a place as a treatment for anxiety disorders like panic disorder or OCD. There is a fair amount of research that shows that even without that bilateral activation thing that EMDR claims, there is still effectiveness. So even if you don't do that magic eye thing, it sort of works. So there's a reasonable amount of empirical data that says, well, wait a minute, why does it work? What's so special about that eye movement thing? Because that bilateral stimulation, which is supposed to be the secret sauce, even if you take that away, there's really good success in using like whatever you might call them grounding or staying present techniques when re-experiencing those painful memories. So I know one therapist that I work with all the time and I respect, she calls it sprinkles. And I'm not sure that I disagree with that. So, but again, if you're dealing with trauma resolution or you're working through some painful stuff and EMDR helps you get through that painful stuff, huge fan, huge fan. So I do not agree with that. I respect Dr. Kiran, but I do not think that EMDR is a gold standard when treating health. I don't understand how that would work. So EMDR somehow is going to change your tolerance. I know I'm jumping to the last comment, but I just saw Christina say that. I don't know what the mechanism was supposed to be there. My conceptualization of health anxiety is an intolerance of risk, plain and simple. Like you refuse to tolerate anything that isn't 0% risk. So I'm not sure how EMDR changes that in some way. Now I understand if there are some experiences in your past that are holding you back in some ways, it could be a tool in the toolkit, but I would disagree that EMDR has somehow become the gold standard in treating health anxiety. In fact, she's the only person I've ever heard of that has said that. Again, full respect to Dr. Kiran and her credentials, but we are allowed to disagree. She would disagree with me, I'm quite sure. So if somebody said drew from the anxious truth, doesn't believe you, she would, I'm sure say that I'm wrong. And that's okay. Let's keep going here. How are we doing here? Okay, we'll do another five minutes or so. Hopefully get to the end. Not sure what to do when anxiety makes me feel like I can't work, but I need to work to survive right now. Well, okay. So this is a pretty big deal. Not sure what to do when anxiety makes it feel. The key words is makes it feel like. So I'm not telling you that you can go from homebound. I don't know who you are, I'm sorry, but I don't know your specific situation, but I don't know if you've been trapped in your home for whatever, however long amount of time, and you wanna go back to work, I get that. You're not gonna go from homebound to back to work in a day. So it doesn't work that way. So there is a systematic process here for sure. And I think what winds up happening here is you have to start to look at dismantling the belief that what it feels like is how you make your decisions. If you make all your decisions based on what anxiety feels like, then you get stuck, you get dug into the hole, and then you stay there. So this process on the whole is based on discovering through experience that what it feels like isn't a thing to base everything on because what it feels like is invariably always wrong. I'm not saying it doesn't feel that way, it totally feels that way.  But just because it really feels that way doesn't mean it's true. We have to learn to challenge that, all right? So the toughest part is hearing my trigger words and not reacting. I did better today when I heard it just to not react to them. Excellent. So what I would say here, that's difficult. I understand for many people, they don't want to hear words. I couldn't, the word death, death, dying and dead. Three words were absolutely off limits to me and they would send me into a good spiral for days. But that got better. Just remember that you will have the initial reaction. Do not beat yourself over that. People tend to make the mistake of thinking I turn off the reaction, you don't. You turn down the volume on the maladaptive reaction over time little by little. But the initial, like when you hear those trigger words you're going to get startled. You're going to have that flash of adrenaline. You're going to get really uncomfortable. That's normal. It's the reaction to that reaction that you care about. So keep that in mind. Good job today. Very good. Kill this, I cannot take this call right now. What you're saying is exactly what's taught him at ERP therapy. Yep. I find that even if I let a little bit of resistance go it makes a difference. Very good. A good comment there for sure. It does make a difference. And that's why you let go a little, little, little, little, little. Sooner or later you have to fully let go. Sooner or later, like one of the coolest things and it might have been in one of these videos. I'm not sure I was on an Instagram live. I heard somebody say my therapist keeps telling me that my acceptance knob only goes to nine. And I refuse to turn it all the way up to 10. So sooner or later you got to go away to 10.  Let's see here.  Okay, I'll throw that up on real quick.  We can choose to think things. We cannot choose to not think things. So the quick reaction I'll give you to this comment is remember that you don't get to choose what you think. You do get to actively decide to think about a thing. If I want to think about an ice cream cone right now. Okay, I did it. I thought about an ice cream cone. If I want to really try hard to think, to not think about a thing, I can't do that. There's a metacognitive process that kicks in, that checks to see if I was successful in not thinking it. And then as soon as I checked to see if I'm not thinking it, I'm thinking it. So it's pretty well documented. Just be careful about thinking that you have to stop the thoughts. You don't. And if they live in your head all day long right now because this is new to you, that's okay. Your job is to learn how to let them be there without trying to fight them off and argue with them all day long. Believe me, that is exhausting work. It totally is. And depending on what your particular situation is, you may look at working with a therapist who's gonna do ERP work with you. I don't know your specific situation, but I get that. Just understand that the thoughts are there, that's okay. That's okay. Hello, Dana. Nice to see you here. Let's see. I've been learning to not care, but I've had to learn to not care. I'm always angry at myself. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Christina Sun is happy to be going back to school. I get that. You know, on the flip side of that, I will say that after this break, which I really needed, like I did a lot of nothing for the past 10 days, I was kind of sick at the beginning of the break too. I'm not only, like Christmas is mocking me now and it's like, ah, the break is over and you get sad because the break is over, but I feel like, oh God, I cannot be like a lump anymore. So I kind of get that.  Let me scroll down to the bottom here. I'm sorry, I'm not gonna get to every one of the comments here. I wish I could. Can I watch this back? Yes, this will stay on my YouTube channel. It will stay in the Facebook group.  If you want to watch these things back, the best way to do it will be to subscribe to my YouTube channel because they're just in a playlist. So it makes it super easy to go back and find all of these. Let's see here. Did I overcome agoraphobia? Yes, I'll answer the question quickly. The answer to that is yes. And that's all I will say. I did three podcast episodes about my use of medication. You can go back and listen to those if you want to hear the whole story. But yes, I did. Might be easier to play while I kill more. Let's see here. Stop being so logical. My wife's driving ramps up my anxiety. She has a hemi now. All right, good job, dude. Let's see here. How do you let go of the fear of fearing symptoms? You have to let the fear be there and let them do what they do. Short answer because I'm now just trying to get through them to the bottom here. Gee, Wilbur. Anyway, all right, let me scroll down to the bottom here. My son wants to say, hi, hello, Leo. Can you explain how you managed to stop rumination? So rumination, a lot of people would call rumination a mental compulsion, right? So in the OCD world, they would say, well, rumination is a... People will say the rumination is a choice. I don't necessarily disagree with that. There's a choice that goes into ruminating and also that rumination is a mental compulsion. So the way you would stop dealing with rumination is you have to start to let the questions that you are trying to answer remain unanswered and you'll only be able to do that for short amounts of time before, oh my God, no, no, no, that's not right. I have to go back to thinking again. I have to think about this. I can't, that's too important to not think about. So over time, when you can disengage a little bit more and a little bit more for longer and longer periods of time and discover that like, oh, my relationship with this thinking habit isn't helping me at all, then that starts to change that. That's a very short, simplified answer to that. Not even close to covering all the bases, but there are a lot of people who do a lot of good work on rumination. So a lot of times with rumination, it's the idea that like, well, what else can I do besides just thinking now? Now, if it's part of OCD and there's an OCD thing going on, it's a little bit different, so similar, but not exactly the same. Again, I can't answer it in a quick comment. Les G. Hang in there, Les, this is hard work, but good job getting started here. Have you ever set yourself a daily routine? All right, two more minutes. Yes, I did, almost like a workout. I will tell you that when I wrote, when I wrote The Anxious Truth, you would think that if I was better at this, I would have a copy of my books in my hands, but I don't. But I talk about a thing called The Morning Effect and The Anxious Truth when I wrote that book because I built my recovery on a morning routine. I built my recovery on a morning routine. I would wake up in the morning, I was a morning anxiety person. If you're a night anxiety person, you might have to modify this, but instead of opening my eyes and then laying in bed and ruminating and thinking about how I felt and dreading the day, I immediately got up, put my feet on the floor, brushed my teeth, got dressed, combed my hair, took care of myself, had something to drink, got out the door, did my exposures, no matter how I felt. That was really, really hard to adopt. But without that, I would literally wait around to see how I was feeling before I decided what I would do and that was a bad place to be. So yes, I built a daily routine and I used it religiously during the bulk of my recovery. Would that 100% work for everybody? No, because everybody's a little bit different and I hated it, hated, hated, hated because I do not like routines and schedules even to this day. But I learned a lot about the value of a routine and schedule while doing that and I still use some routine for it now, in my life now, for sure, it does help. Program software, this is Restream, Restream.io for anybody who cares. Somebody asked what program this is, just Restream, it's just a streaming service. Being home alone has been challenged the past couple of months, I'm getting better, very good. All right, guys, I think we're done. 249, we did pretty good. Try doing that at 5 a.m. when it's below freezing. I did. As it turns out, when I was doing that work, that's exactly the winter that we had in New York. It was a brutally cold, ridiculously snowy and icy winter. It was one of those winters that we can have now and then and we had one. So, oh man, and I don't mind the cold, I actually like the snow, but getting up in the morning and just everything was crunchy and icy and freezing and it was no fun. But it started, became my friend after a while because when I started to see that this was working for me, I started to mind the cold a little less for what it's worth, but yeah, it sucked. It sucked doing it in the middle of winter, but just happened to be that way. Anyway, guys, thanks a lot for coming by here. I will say that we'll be back again next week. Don't know what we're gonna talk about. I kind of decide the day before sometimes if anybody has any topic suggestions, if you're in the Facebook group, you wanna hit me up on YouTube in the comments, whatever. For those of you who are commenting on my YouTube videos, I promise this week I will get back and catch up with them. I have not looked at comments for like a week and a half, I'm very sorry. But yeah, we'll be back again next week. What else can I tell you? All the stuff that you want from me is on my website at the anxioustruth.com. All of the stuff, the books and everything are all there, so go check it out. For those of you who are interested in learning more about the art of distress tolerance, which is in fact a big part of this equation, Joanna Hardison, I do a webinar on that every month. I don't know when the January one is usually the middle of the month. I think we're doing an evening one again so that anybody who needs evening hours in the US can see it. You can check that out, that's on my website too. And that's it, we'll be back next week. Thanks guys, appreciate it.


Hi, I'm Zor. Welcome to Unisor Education. I would like to continue solving relatively simple problems related to gravitational potential. So today we will talk about the ring and the disc as the sources of gravitation. Now, this lecture is part of the course called Physics for Teen, presented on Unisor.com. I suggest you to watch this lecture and all others which are presented on this website, from the website itself. Because it's a course, which means there are prerequisites, there are certain logical order between the lectures, obviously I'm using in any subsequent lecture, whatever I was using before. Also, on the same website, there is a course called Math for Teen, which you really have to know whatever is in that course to understand the physics for teen, especially the calculus, because the whole physics is based on the calculus. Alright, so, going back to gravity integration 2, and again, two problems. They will be by themselves in this lecture, but obviously I'm doing it for the purpose. And my purpose is the next lecture, where I will use the solid objects as the source of gravitation. So, right now we will talk about, first is about the ring. So, let's consider we have a ring, which has certain mass m, it's infinitely thin, it's radius r, and on the perpendicular line through the center perpendicular to the plane where the ring is actually located. I will have certain point of interest, which is on the height h above this ring. Now, obviously I will introduce the system of coordinates, which is such that the disk is in the x, y plane, and obviously the z axis is the one which contains the point p on the height h above the x, y, z plane. Now, I'm interested in the gravitational potential at point p. So, point p coordinates are 0, 0, h. Now, as we know, the gravitational potential is an additive function, which depends obviously on the gravitational field. What it means is, if you have two sources of gravitational fields, and basically they are combined, and in any particular point we can measure the gravitational potential, and it will be equal to the sum of gravitational potential of this field alone plus this field alone. I have proven this in one of the previous lectures. So, we will use this additive function of the gravitational potential to derive the total gravitational potential of the ring. Now, the obvious way how we do it in this and in any other case similar, we will divide actually the ring into small pieces. So, this is an infinitesimal piece, let's say it's length dL. I will measure the potential from this piece at this point, and then I will integrate along this circumference of the ring. Okay, now, what's simplification of, what is a very simple property, simple characteristic of this problem is that all these little dLs are on the same distance from the point of interest. Now, we know the general formula that for a point mass, the gravitation depends on gravitational constant, mass of this point mass, and divided by distance to point of interest from this point of mass. Now, it actually seems natural that in this particular case, since every little infinitesimal piece is on the same distance, and then when we will summarize this, we will probably have to summarize and get the total mass, basically. So, most likely I will have formula similar to this, where r is the distance from the point on the ring to a point of interest on the line, on the z line, which is actually square root of r squared plus h squared, right? So, intuitively thinking, I think I have to have this formula, g times mass of the ring divided by this square root of r squared plus h squared, that's obviously the hypotenuse, and this is right triangle. However, let's just not rely on our intuition, let's try to derive it strictly mathematically. Okay, so I'm going to basically have the same formula, let me put it here, in this form, and we will see how it's derived in a relatively rigorous way. So, what I will do is I will have the central angle from the horizontal axis to a radius on the ring. Again, the ring is in the x-y plane. So, let's have it as phi, it's a variable. And I will increment phi to phi plus d phi. So, this is my segment, so this is phi, and the dotted line is phi plus d phi. Now, that actually cuts this infinitesimal, this is infinitesimal increment of the angle, this will be infinitesimal increment of the length of the arc, right, which is equal to, dL is equal to radius times angle, we know that, right, from geometry. So, the line, the lengths of the arc depends on the angle using this formula. Well, again, that's actually why I was saying that the mass for teens is a prerequisite, you have to know all these little things. Alright, so we have the dL, now, we need the mass. Now, we have the total mass of the ring is m, so the density of the mass, rho, is equal to m divided by the length, so this is 2 pi r. So, 2 pi r is the length of the ring, and if I divide mass by the total length, I will have the density per unit of length. Now, if I have the density, and now I have the length, dL, my dm, which is infinitesimal mass of this little piece, is equal to rho density times dL, which is m r d phi divided by 2 pi r, and r is out, so we have m d phi divided by 2 pi. Okay, so this is the mass. Now, if I know the mass of this, and I know the distance, distance is equal to square root of h squared plus r squared, right? I can determine the gravitational potential of this point, at this point, from this infinitesimal piece of my ring. So, it's dv, d is gravitational potential, and dv is an increment of the gravitational potential from this infinitesimal piece of the ring. It's equal to g mass of this divided by distance r, which is, which is g, dm is this, and divided by r, and again r is square root of r squared plus h squared. Now, what do I have to do to determine the total gravitational potential of an entire ring? Well, obviously I have to integrate my dv, well, v is actually a function of phi, right? We all know that. So, that's why dv is actually this. From 0 to 2 pi, right? My angle should be rotating entire circle, which is equal to integral from 0 to 2 pi. Instead of dv, we will put this, gm d phi divided by 2 pi square root of r squared plus h squared. What's interesting is that these are all constants. So, we can go outside of the integral, and what will be the integral itself? Integral from 0 to 2 pi of d phi, which is actually equal to 1, right? It's equal to phi from gm 2 pi square root of r squared plus h squared. The indefinite integral is phi, right? Because the derivative from the phi will be, the differential from the phi will be d phi from 0 to 2 pi. So, if we will substitute formula, Newton-Leibnitz formula, we will substitute from the phi we will have 2 pi minus 0, which is 2 pi, and we will cancel 2 pi, and we will have gm and square root, which is exactly what we have to prove. So, our intuition is right, basically. Now, this is extremely simple case of, well, relatively complicated object, the ring. But why is it simple? All the distances are exactly the same. And that's my first problem, which I wanted to present today. My second problem would be slightly more complicated. It will be a disc instead of a ring. So, let me wipe out this. Now, my drawing will be probably more or less the same, except now, again, now this is x, mass is m, and this is y. But now, this is a solid, although infinitely thin, disc. So, mass is now distributed along a disc, not along the ring, right? Which means my density is equal to mass divided by pr squared. Right? Because this is the error. So, my mass is distributed not along the circumference of the ring, but along the entire surface of the disc. So, this is, now, how do I approach this problem? In exactly the same fashion. When I had a ring, I divided by little segments of the ring, little arches, right? Now, if I have a disc, what I will divide it into, I will divide it into concentric rings. Now, each one will be very, very thin. So, my variable, which I'm going to use, will be r, which will be from 0 to capital R, capital R is the radius of the entire disc. Now, r is the radius of one of the infinite number of the concentric rings. Right? Now, my widths of the ring will be infinitesimal. It will be from r to r plus dr. So, it will be a very, very thin ring. And I would like, actually, to use the formula which I have derived before. Now, remember for the ring, it was mass G, mass divided by square root of h square plus r square. Now, in this case, my ring is r square, because there are many rings. I'm talking about any ring on a distance, on a radius r. And instead of m, I will have, basically, the dm, because it's an infinitesimal widths of the ring. Right? Now, how can I find out dm? r, basically, I understand what r is. Now, h is also not exactly h. h would be my... Now, h would be the same h. Sorry. h would be the same h. It's r which is different. r is changing. So, what's my mass of the ring? Well, if I know the density, I have to just know the area of the ring. So, what is the area of the ring? If this is r, and this is r plus dr. Now, my area of the ring is pi r plus dr, square minus pi r square, right? The total area of the circumference of the incremented ring minus this one, which is equal to pi times r square plus 2 r dr plus dr square minus pi r square, which is equal to 2 pi r dr plus something which we can actually ignore because it's an infinitesimal of the higher order. See this square? So, whenever we integrate it, it will just disappear. Basically, my area is this, and since I know the density, I can calculate the mass. So, dm, which is mass of the ring, which is equal to m divided by pi r square times 2 pi r dr. So, I have the mass. Well, pi obviously goes out. So, we have m r dr 2 divided by r square. Now, that's my m. Now, my dv, which is differential of gravitational potential of the ring only. I will use this formula. It would be g. Now, dm, so it's 2m r dr divided by r square and divided by square root of h square plus r square. All I have to do now is to integrate it by r. This is all function of r. r is my radius of variable radius of the small ring. So, r is changing from 0 to capital R of dv. That's my potential. All right, let's do this. So, now it's just technicality. And as you see, physics is a lot of mass. Now, here is very simplifying, basically, consideration. You see, this is r square and this is 2r dr. Now, we know that r square derivative is equal to 2r. So, basically, we can consider this, this and this as differential of r square. Differential of r square would be derivative, which is 2r times differential of r dr. However, I will do it even better since I can always add the constant to a function without changing derivative. I can say that this is equal to 2r dr, right? Because, you know, the derivative of sum is sum of derivative, so I still have 2r and this is 0 because it's a constant. What my integral now becomes is from 0 to r of gm divided by r square should be outside of the integral because they are constants. Now, inside, I will have d of r square plus h square divided by square root of r square. That would be easier. I changed the order. It doesn't really matter. Equals. Now, what makes sense now is to substitute, let's say, y is equal to r square plus h square. So, I have gm r square. gm is not a general motor. It's the multiplication of a universal gravitational constant by the mass of the disk. Now, integral. Now, if I will replace this, then if r is equal to 0, then y is equal to h square. But if r is equal to r square, that would be r square plus h square. d y divided by square root of y. Now, we are in a familiar territory of a very simple integral. Now, again, square root of y derivative is equal to, this is very familiar. It's y to the power of 1 half, right? It's the derivative is this. So, we can guess that basically our integral is equal to 2 square root of y. Because if I will do the derivative from y, it will be 1 over 2 square root of y. 2 and 2 will cancel. And I will have just 1 over square root of y. So, that's my derivative. So, that's my independent, an infinite integral, which has to be from h square to r square plus h square. And obviously, this multiplier still exists. And the answer is, my potential of the disk is equal to times m divided by r square. So, m is a mass of the disk. r is its radius. Then I have 2. And then in parentheses, I will have square root of r square plus h square minus square root of h square, which is h. And that's the answer. This is a gravitational potential of the disk. Okay, now, before ending this letter on this note, I would like to tell why I'm doing this exercise. Well, first of all, it's obviously useful by itself. It's something which really develops your fluency in using your mathematical apparatus to physical problems. But I also have another goal in mind. On the next lecture, I will consider a solid ball as the source of gravity. And I will divide it into... I will slice it actually into individual disks of infinitesimal widths. And I will use this formula, obviously, for gravitational potential of the disk. And then I will integrate it among all the different disks. So, that would be the next one. And for now, that's it. Thank you very much. And good luck, actually.


The addition of the sportsmax zone by continuing to discuss the fallout from the decision by the Jamaican government not to bid for matches in the 2024 T20 World Cup. This discussion has taken several spins, including the issue of an overall lack of international matches at the country's cricket mecca, Sabina Park. In recent times, the ground has been predominantly used for football matches at the school boy, Premier League and international levels. The last time international cricket was played there was August 2022, the West Indies took on New Zealand. In defending the decision not to bid for the T20 World Cup, Jamaica's Minister of Sport Olivia Grange said her government will invest 100 million Jamaican dollars or just over 646 thousand US dollars into the development of youth cricket. Joining us to weigh in on the discussion are Dean of the Faculty of Sport at the University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, Dr. Akshay Man Singh and Chris Daring, who was the CEO of the 2007 50 over World Cup held in the West Indies. Gentlemen, it's a pleasure to have you on the new look sportsmax zone. It's a pleasure to be here, you've come a long way. We have come a long way indeed. First let me start with you, 2007 you were the CEO of the 50 over World Cup, successfully held in the West Indies, 13, 16 years later, it is that long, we have another World Cup now for the third time actually and for the second time, Jamaica will not be hosting matches. How did that new stake you? How disappointed are you at that? I had two feelings, first very disappointed because of all the work that would have been put in 16 years ago, now is the time to take advantage of that work, whatever mistakes were made in the past, you now have the opportunity to exploit what is a totally new paradigm in the world of cricket. As you said it's 16 years and what has happened with cricket, I mean T20 has been a paradigm shift. I don't even like to talk about cricket in general, T20 as a phenomenon has been an inflection point in the global explosion, the geographic explosion, the commercial explosion in the world of cricket and so we are now looking at an opportunity that everybody else in the world seems to know something that we don't know. I don't know what it is but when you see all those billionaires investing heavily in T20, not just cricket, T20 specifically across the United States, you see the explosion in non-traditional countries like Japan and China and the Netherlands and so on, somebody knows something and it's just a pity that we clearly don't know here in Jamaica and it would have been good to get that experience. I use the example of Mukesh Ambani who is a billionaire who is investing heavily in cricket both in India and the United States. This is the 10th richest man in the world. We could have had the opportunity to invite him here to Jamaica along with Metta and Strenivasa and the other billionaires who are investing in the sport across the United States. Maybe that would have been the opportunity to apply them with some good Jamaica and Roman and Reggae and get them to talk and tell us what is happening, what are we missing, why they are investing millions. Hundreds of millions which makes the potential investment Jamaica was looking at seem paltry. Dr. Mansingh, well it's a bit of a trend which is upsetting because as you mentioned we had the 2007 World Cup, we did not have the T20 World Cup that took place two years later, we did not have the women's World Cup that took place in 2019 or 2018 and this is another World Cup we haven't had coupled with the fact that we don't have CPL, we don't have the big tours in cricket like India and England where you have to bid for, it suggests that there is a tendency to shy away from it but let's just look at this event in itself. It's the second largest sporting event in terms of viewership after World Cup football. So you've got World Cup football, ICC World Cups and then the Olympics. Now we're not going to ever get World Cup football and we're not going to host the Olympics even though we contributed significantly to it. So the only big event that we can actually hold on a world stage is this event and what comes with it is the fact that you get tourism, you get eyes, you get investors as mentioned by Chris, you get that sort of viewership you can sell your country to and Jamaica does need a lot of selling. So we're missing out on massive opportunities outside of cricket along with missing out on the opportunities of cricket. But I was saying though the other side of it is I'm almost relieved that we did not put in a last minute bid because we've had five years knowing we're hosting this event to plan to get to mobilize the kind of resources we need in terms of personnel. People who are experiencing the global and in these types of events. You know you have a Stephen Price from who was the head of commercial operations for the Cricket World Cup who set event records and so on. You have a Don Webby who CEO of Grace Kennedy who's also involved in cricket or fair with all cricket matters and so on served on the cricket West Indies who would have been able to perhaps maybe give us some insight into how we could exploit 30 million cricket fans in the United States with a per capita income of 100,000 U.S. I just think maybe he might have been able to point it a direction to make a return on this event. So I'm relieved we didn't do this last minute thing because this takes planning this to really truly exploit it and with nine months to go before an event clearly we have not thought about it until now and so therefore I'm glad we haven't wasted money. I'm quite happy that you went there because one of the things I wanted to get your expertise on 2007 when the West Indies hosted the 50 over World Cup and Jamaica was one of the territories that hosted. How soon did the planning begin for one the bid itself and by extension how it would be executed? Well remember as I said cricket and back then it was 50 over was a big event. Yes. It's the second largest sport in the world and this was the third largest global sporting event. We had never hosted anything on this magnitude and it's almost impossible to explain to you the magnitude of hosting these events except to say the liabilities of hosting these events are incredible. You do it well, you benefit, you do it badly. Their financial claims are going to be coming at you at rates and these are multimillion dollar claims. So the planning had to be precise. We'd never hosted anything of this magnitude. We never knew the term called ambush marketing before the cricket World Cup. We never understood those sort of commercial liabilities. So it was a preparatory process that started as far back as 1997 when we first pulled together with the governments met with the governments of the region Pat Rousseau of blessed memory pulled the Prime Minister together said this is what we're looking at doing. We had lots of lots of meetings with the Prime Ministers looking at the pros and cons. They decided to go ahead and bid to even host the cricket World Cup. We pulled together that presentation, took it to the ICC and won the rights in 1998. So we didn't host until 2007. To understand the kind of preparatory of that magnitude. But back then we didn't even have a single venue that met international standards. So we had to build all new venues. So it was a much longer planning process. But it just exemplifies the type of planning that has to go into place just to be able to deliver the event and meet the host venue obligations so you don't have financial. I want to make the point though Chris that the bids weren't offered to the Caribbean nations from my understanding until April of this year. Is that something from your perspective that is bad timing? No, look, it's not ideal from the perspective of you having as an individual country to be able to put in the details of your bid. We had five years knowing the T20 cricket World Cup was coming here. You do all the preparatory work knowing that you're going to bid by pulling together the kind of expertise that you need to put together this kind of business case. The research, the data that has to take place. You get the opportunity to look at what T20 World Cups are doing in other countries. Take that information. Take that information, put it into your database to then prepare yourself for when the bid comes. That's how it's done. You mentioned just now when you were speaking about 16 years on and an opportunity if the Jamaican government had taken this one to correct some of the mistakes that may have been made in 2007. Might it be that some of those mistakes could have influenced or flavored the government? Undoubtedly. And especially visible reminders that reverberate like the Trilon in multi-purpose stadium. I just wanted to add that there was some foresight that was missing then too. For example, instead of putting all your resources into Sabina Park, we built the Trilon in multi-mistake stadium. Multi? Sorry, what do you call it? Multi-purpose stadium. But the point is, can you imagine even in 2007, putting a stadium without lights? Only Barbados and Jamaica did so. Barbados learned the mistake they made and rectified it immediately. Could you imagine then putting up a monochrome scoreboard? Which was obsolete when it got here. So a lot of infrastructural changes that you talk about now for this World Cup are because of decisions or bad decisions that were made at that time. So I want to bring that forward. I want to also put on record that remind everybody that Trilon in multi-purpose stadium had nothing to do with the Cricket World Cup. That bid was rejected by Cricket World Cup. Jamaica on their own decided to still build a cricket stadium and then they hosted the opening ceremony there. But that had nothing to do with the Cricket World Cup. So that should have been an entire plan on its own. What you're going to do with the stadium, now and into the future, nothing to do with the Cricket World Cup. But what I'm getting at is that the minister is saying that it's going to cost about $400,000, let's put it in US terms. In fact, she was quoted as saying $1.62 million in infrastructure improvement, $1 million for the bid. But by saying that that's that much amount of money for four matches is not worth it. It's not right because the $1.62 million you're putting in is for infrastructural development to hold events like this and other international events in the future. You're going to have to invest it at some time if you want to have international cricket. So the bid price is actually just a million. The rest of the infrastructure development, which as I said, a lot of it is because of the bad decisions made in 2007 that we're having to rectify that right now. So if we hope to hold international cricket in the future, we still have to put in $1.67 million. Which brings us to a broader issue, doesn't it? Because I listened to you Chris and based on everything that you said in terms of the process and the amount of time that it takes to plan, it seems to me that the idea of hosting the 2024 T20 World Cup caught the government by surprise. I don't blame the government at all. They're partly responsible. Where was the opposition for the last five years? Sure, they're going to jump up now and say, hey, you missed out. Where was the media for the last five years expounding the fact that we're hosting this event and mobilizing people, telling us all the research and data? Where was the private sector who are looking at, hey, this could be an opportunity for us. They're 30 million cricket fans in the United States. Well, let me ask you this. I do not blame the government on its own. It's all of us, collectively as a nation. We need to take responsibility. We've missed this vote. Let's not miss the next one. Cricket is returning. There's so many indicators out there. I don't know what it means. I just know it means something big. All these billionaires are pumping massive amount of money into this T20 sport. Cricket is returning to the Olympics in 2028, first time since 1896. Something is happening. We need to find out what it is. And the Saudis are coming with a massive leap. Saudis, the Qataris are coming. I don't know what's happening. This is way above my pay grade. But we need to, we have an incredible history and still a brand in the world of cricket. We need to make use of it. Whose responsibility is it, though, to lead the process? Because in my opinion, I think we have fallen short because of a lack of quality leadership this time around. And if that leadership doesn't improve, then we're going to be in the same situation in five, six years down the road. So is it the government's responsibility to lead? Is it the Jamaica Cricket Association's responsibility to lead? I believe, like every other industry, the industry leader is who government governments have many things on their plate, many imperatives on any given day. Thankfully, quite frankly, we actually have a minister of sports and culture who is actually one of the few ministers probably in the history of our country whose portfolio is our subject matter expertise. So we should be thankful for that. But the reality is that you have to look out for your industry, your business, and cricket in Jamaica is under the auspices of the Jamaica Cricket Association. So you have to be out there pounding the pavement, just like the various private sector interests are out there with government lobbying for what they need and so on, demonstrating to government with empirical data why they need to be doing what they are asking them to do, what are the benefits for both the sport and the country, and so on. You have to pound the pavement. Does it create a problem in the politically volatile Jamaican situation that the head of a Jamaica Cricket Association may be a supporter of the opposing party? Could that cause problems from the standpoint of discussing a partnership and so on? One beautiful thing about sport, it tends to bring us all together. You'll see GLP and PNP right beside each other in the stands cheering on the reggae boys and so on. When they leave the stadium, they're fighting start again. But sport is that, I think, that unifying, you know. I strongly believe there's no P in Jamaica. No P. When you're dealing with Jamaica, you've got to get beyond P. There's no P in Jamaica, no party. The issue is this. There's a foresight that you have to have. Having an event like this is not just about hosting cricket. It's much like having Olympics. If you have, you know, London Olympics was a transformation for the city of London. It's married with infrastructural development and so on. I was telling Chris off here that every time I go through the airport, I still hold him responsible because normally the airport was upgraded for cricket World Cup. They only got the departure section done and the arrival section was supposed to happen by then. Never did and 16 years on still hasn't, right? So there's massive infrastructural development that took place throughout the Caribbean. As we're speaking behind us, you can see all these stadiums going on the screen, which are brand new. So it's a way of focusing on... Hotels. Hotels were built. Your roadways were fixed. So five years ago when you heard there's a World Cup coming, it's not just about holding crickets. It's about mobilizing the infrastructural plan for developing your country. You're utilizing the event. And that foresight was missing. You're utilizing the event to mobilize your country towards this timeline. That's the beautiful thing about hosting these events. That is governments I wrote to mobilize them. But in terms of brand building, I mean, I hear St. Kitts is up in arms now and I was telling Akshay about a story. When we were hosting our World Cup, I took a delegation. And this is something we took for granted in Jamaica and we take for granted. Everybody knows about Jamaica and our brand and who we are and so on. I took a delegation of the local organizing committees over to South Africa. And when we were entering customs, there are two countries that their customs and immigration had never heard of to the point that it was not even in their system. And it took us hours to get clearance. They had to get clearance all the way up to the national security because nobody had ever heard of those countries, Caribbean countries. And it was not even in their system. Understand that they ended up hosting Cricket World Cup. And so the benefits to those two countries, one of whom the representative was a former test cricketer. So you can imagine the teasing we gave him. But you know, it's something that hosting these events, that's what it does. Hold it right there, Chris. We have to go to a quick break here on the sports mic zone but we'll return with this discussion. And we're talking cricket here and the vexing issue of the Jamaica government and the Cricket Association under some pressure for not bidding for hosting matches at the 2024 T20 World Cup. And one of just a few countries in the region that did not actually bid later in the show. We'll get a St. Kitts and Nevis perspective as well. But at the moment, we have Chris Thering, who was CEO of the Cricket World Cup, 2007 red, held right here in the Caribbean. And Dr. Akshay Man Singh, who is Dean of the Faculty of Sport at UWI Mona. And gentlemen, we discussed in the first segment what's on the table here as far as the non-bid is concerned, where it's left us. And Chris made the point earlier on that given the late staging of the whole issue being put on the table, he's actually happy that the Jamaican government turned it down because it would have been a missed opportunity to maximize on something that would have been good if it was properly planned for. Exactly. You know, one of the things that irks me sometimes when I talk about things like viewership of cricket. And I'll say, hey, you know, it's a two billion viewership in the US, it's 30 million cricket fans.  If it was mainly Americans, what do I care if they have spending power, if they are a large economy? And there's the fifth biggest economy in the world. You know, the third, if you look at the 30 million cricket fans in the United States, let's say it's an average per capita of 60,000, my elementary maths tell me that's 1.6 billion in spending power. What do I care whether it's mainly Indians or Australians and English and West Asia? I don't care. And the digital world and the globalization makes now it much more easy to access and exploit those economies. I don't know how to do it, but we must have those people here in Jamaica who can tell us how. Dr. Mansingh, a point was made a few days ago when we countered the argument of supporting a bid and not supporting a bid, that there are some fans who feel that Jamaica would have just gotten a few matches, probably not having a group that involved the West Indies and as far as they're concerned, we've not missed much by not hosting this. Well, I mean, that's to some extent echoing what Chris said, that if you haven't started working 105 years ago, then maybe it's not worth it. But when you bid, you're not guaranteed to get what you're bidding for. But then it also depends on how the bid goes, what it's about. Just think about it. The hotel rooms we have, the infrastructure we have, even for the last World Cup, West Indies were in Jamaica. That's where they started. The home team was in Jamaica. I don't know what the process of allocating the matches are, but the point is, whatever you have, you've got to make it big. Now, to make it big, you put a party around crickets, so to speak. I mean, the CPL recently, not only did people flood in to watch cricket, but they had Sean Paul. Last year, they had Beres Hammond, now with Marshall Montana, and so on, entertaining people. So you make it an event that people want to go to, whether they're interested in cricket or not. Now, if I happen to get an India, or if you can maximize on West England, all the better. But the event, the value of the event, how you market it should be attractive enough that people say, hey, I want to go to Jamaica. I've always wanted to go to Jamaica. Here's a chance to watch some cricket and so on. Now, the cricket fans, especially in North America, from every country of the world. So no matter who you get, if you target them, you can still make something out of it. But is it that the USA having venues to stage the World Cup would take away some of the prospects of fans traveling from the US to Jamaica? Fair enough. I mean, once again, it depends on what matches they get, what matches we get. But there's the added enchantment of Jamaica that you want to market as well, or any other country for that matter. Our connectivity is better than any other country in the region, but with North America especially. Our proximity is closer than anybody else. The flights are shorter and so on. And there may be somebody in one part of the USA. Than any other cricket playing nation? Yeah, otherwise, because the Bahamas are next to the world. Not all of the bidding nations. Those who are likely to hold the World Cup. Bahamas are part of cricket. But they play cricket. They play ICC qualifying to one of themselves. Yeah, that's Burmese though. Bahamas is also. Yeah, Bahamas, they have played. But that's the point. Just to add to what you're actually saying, though. I'm sorry, I've been involved in the hosting of a global sporting event. Nobody can tell me that Jamaica, that ICC and Cricket West Indies are not bitterly disappointed that Jamaica is not a part of hosting. And Johnny Cree have said this. Because the challenges of hosting and event of this magnitude, Jamaica has the room stock, the airlift, the expertise and personnel. You need resources. Well, Cricket West Indies said that they extended the bidding deadline three times in an effort to get Jamaica to... Not even to mention the proximity. Do not underestimate that proximity to the U.S. Because in logistics, you're trying to move teams in between venues. In all case, those venues happen to be countries. You want the countries to be as close as possible together. You have player issues to deal with, transportation issues to deal with, television equipment to move around the region. But two additional things, Chris. One is the road infrastructure compared to the last World Cup. It's such that you can have people on the North Coast coming in. All the North Coast that has no comment to play. In the perspective that what I would have liked to have seen in 2007, for example, is to have people stationed at Inochirios and the North Coast and told that, listen, we're going for Cricket to Kingston. Don't have breakfast, because on our way, Lin said it's going to get a bus, Jorten's going to get a bus, Bauga's going to get a bus, and they put on a breakfast for the guests. And on the way back, likewise, dinner is put on, and you get the whole country involved.  Of course, all the little bars and restaurants along the way. What would benefit? So it's a matter of how you do that. Along the way, going on, and even worse, on the way back. But then, listen, my thing is, you get two Bollywood directors into Jamaica. Nowhere is suited to shoot a film in Jamaica. You need to get people to come here and see, because otherwise, like Chris said, people don't know the country. They've heard it. The other thing, you know, actually, 2007 World Cup, we were kind of robbed, because India and Pakistan got eliminated early. So the Caribbean has never seen what we have seen. I worked in the South Africa Cricket World Cup. When India qualified for the final, all the tickets had already been sold out, you know. Jumbo jets, private jets, arrived in, I've never seen anything like this.  I was offered 20,000 US for my ICC pass. I did not sell it, because I could not sell it. But, you know, it was a kind of... I saw that 10 years ago, I went, whoa. Mind-boggling isn't the word. It's mine, yeah, so, but that is 16, that is no, actually that is 20 years ago, South Africa Cricket World Cup. We are cricketers going to know, and all proximity, I just, there's something we just don't know. I just want to make the point as well, because my understanding is that the bid proposal by Jamaica, of course, it never went in, is that they would have one group of matches plus a semifinal, and that there was a specific request to have the group that India would be involved with. So, I just want to put that out there. If you have one India match, one, I don't care against who. But why bid just for the semis? We could have hosted the final. We have that kind of infrastructure, and I know commercially it would, because the final was going to be in the Caribbean, right? Yes. As far as I'm understand. Yes, as far as we understand now, Barbados, Guyana, and Trinidad and Tobago. Also bid for the final. The front runners. But what I'm telling you is that I believe, my opinion, we would have had an excellent chance of the final, because if they're thinking India is going to get to the final, the proximity to the United States, the airlift between Osan and the United States, the number of hotel rooms that we have, all of that would have factored prominently in where the final goes. Know that we have missed this opportunity, gentlemen. Where do we go from here? Let's not miss the next board. We have to start planning. I'm very heartened by the funding that the minister has said that he's going to commit to youth cricket. It needs to be part of our plan. If cricket is part of the policy plan going forward and hosting cricket events, then get the people that you know have experience in it, have all the international collections to find out what's going on. I'm sorry we didn't get the opportunity to invite all those people to Jamaica for this event, to play them and get them to talk. But we need to plan. And we need to plan knowing that cricket is now going to be an Olympic sport. There are 20 teams next year in the T20 World Cup. Yes. Are you telling me that Jamaica wouldn't be good enough to get there at some point in the future? 20, 25 years from now? Are you telling me Jamaica won't be good enough to get to the Olympic Games? Certainly there's not going to be a West Indies at the Olympic Games. There can't be. There can't be. So we have something to look forward to plan towards to explore. I gathered from Dr. Mansingh's previous pronouncements though that he has an overall worry about the current administration's attitude towards cricket. So I had mentioned that it's not just a matter of money. Yes. But you know, the Taluas won last year in the CPL. Yes. The Scorpions won the Super 50. Yes. The Under 19 won the 50 over and the 3D competition. But we didn't hear any congratulatory message or any posting or something about it. So to me it was the attitude. Now on the flip side, we're hearing that there's a hundred million dollars or whatever to go towards youth development. The point is this, that cricket arguably has made more money for an athlete in Jamaica than any other sport. So yes, our top athletes have made a lot of money, but how many of them? Over the years, cricket has sustained many livelihoods. And we have that talent pool, which if we don't invest in, we're gonna lose that livelihood. Number two, half of the West Indies population is in Jamaica. Therefore, it's wrong for the cricket West Indies as well as the Jamaican government to ignore Jamaica because it's half of the population base. But going forward, the development of cricket is towards both things, to promote Jamaica as a cricketing country, but also to provide employment opportunities in the world scene. For our talented Jamaican cricketers, and both of those seem to be diminishing at rapid, rapid rates. And that was my concern. Yeah, that's very worrying because a call was made about, even seeing the current West Indies stars playing in Jamaica, players like Fabian Allen and Robyn Powell, there is a period of this generation of youngsters now that would not have seen these players live. Well, I've said a whole generation of young, well, a whole generation of Jamaicans have not seen 50 over cricket live in Jamaica, the super 50 cricket. I can't remember when last it was held in Jamaica, but it was certainly more than a decade and a half ago or so, right? So I mean that competition, which is a cricket West Indies competition has not come to Jamaica for over a decade. So that's the point that you're not seeing your stars. You're not being able to create that cricket culture. So going back to the statement, one of the things that had sort of made my curiosity arouse was when it was said that stakeholders were consulted and collectively decided that we should not bid for this World Cup. I would really be interested in who these stakeholders are. What was the discussion? When was the discussion? And what were the conclusions? What was presented to the stakeholders? Well, that's the point. You know, because that didn't come when we rejected the bids initially. That's just come out recently. That stakeholders were consulted. Yes, so I want some details. So Ricardo, the information that you've gleaned about the nature of the bid and what it entailed, who would have produced that bid? Well, so initially, the proposal would have come from the Jamaica Cricket Association to the government of Jamaica. So that would be the process. Of course, my concern, and you asked that question at the top of the show in terms of timing, because I wondered if April, for example, when the bid went to the government, would have been enough time to put in place anything substantial to say that we can really benefit from this. But I think Chris has addressed that point in that. That's dotting on the I's and crossing the T's. We've known for five years. We shouldn't have gotten there. Yes, we can do all the planning or run all the numbers. Then when you get the detail, you drop in those two. We should have been ready. In April, we should have been ready for when the official documentation came from Cricket West Indies or came from the JCA. You know, we would have had a policy about whether or not we want to host any major events. You know, what are the parameters of that policy? What do these events have to achieve, meet? You set the objectives. You said something earlier, Chris, recognizing the fact that governments have a lot on their plate. And obviously, government has to consider sport as just one facet of so many things that they have to... And cricket within sport. Okay, yes, that they have to govern for an entire country. So it just leads me to put the question to you, gentlemen, that is there too much pressure on the government, given the fact that they have so much that their response to the fore, that it's hard to be too critical of them if they did not pursue this project as a priority event or as vigorously as we think they could have. Governments have a job to govern. Yes, and they've got to look short-term, mid-term and long-term. So five years ago, it would have been a long-term project. But then, and that's why I'd be interested to know what, for example, happened in cabinet when it was discussed in cabinet. Because you have a tourism budget, you have a tourism marketing budget, but here you're going to get two billion eyes watching Jamaica. How much is tourism going to pay towards that? Because you don't have to put in those many ads necessarily because you're getting free advertising for your country by hosting it. In other words, it has to be a concerted and coordinated government move. So yes, JC has to provide the cricket specifics and so on. But as a country, now to hold an event like this, a mega event, not many countries get that opportunity. So the government, that's why I would like to know what the discussions were at a cabinet level, because of collective decision. So put up your hand and say, yeah, we discussed it and we decided we're not going to host it. That's fine. But let's know the details of what turned you away from it. I think Jamaica has a bit of a disadvantage, actually, and I were talking about it earlier, the fact that we are big and we do have other more pressing matters. And so our leaders tend to be a bit far removed from the execution at the lower levels and so on. You have a St. Lucia, for instance, that the Ernest Hillier, a brilliant gentleman, the kind of intellectual hospital that those countries have that have been involved in cricket, because Ernest was the head of their local organizing committee in cricket workup. And he's now deputy prime minister, virtually the prime minister. You have Mayor Motley. You don't get more intellectual intelligence than that, who was the head of my security operation for cricket workup in 2007, who's now the prime minister. So you had these people who, I think, were sitting right at the top of the pole. Also understanding exactly what the event could bring and how they could try and exploit it. We probably are missing that in our scenario. I don't, as I said, it's difficult for me to simply throw the stones at the government, because when I think about where the media has been, where it's cricket sources, we don't get defensive. No, man, I'm not getting defensive. Leadership is missing somewhere. We don't need to identify where that leadership is missing. I totally agree. And I accept that point.  You cannot tell me that if a proper business case showing the financial, economic returns and plans and how we're going to get there and get them and account for them, the social returns of hosting, the economic returns nationally of hosting, the political returns of hosting, all of which would be done in a normal business case to host these events. If a proper one was put together and put before Prime Minister Holness, Nigel Clark, and Babsie Grinch, that they would have said no. Because it, you know. Except that I just believe that a major role in that is that of the government, to drive that as well. Absolutely. So it is maybe a chicken and egg. But I just believe that, hey, my bottom line, we're missing something big. I don't know what it is. I don't know what, but somebody knows something. And we need to get one of those billionaires here to tell us why they're investing so much money in T20 cricket. Well, gentlemen, we've got to leave it there. Certainly, an engaging discussion that we've just had Dr. Akchai Man Singh and Chris staring. And we will continue this discussion. And we have a lot more to come on the Sportsmax on after this. Thanks, then.