Safety FIRST? Should it be THIRD?

Vince Kern  
Welcome to another episode of Friends in wonder, a place where we invite you to explore meaningful topics without judgment or limits,

brought to you by two lifelong friends, sharing their insights, while wondering, how can this help. I'm Joe Luther.

And I'm Vince Kern, and we've got great topics lined up for you each week. So be sure to subscribe, like and even share with your friends.

Now let's wander and wander. You know, Vince, I think today, I'd like to start our episode out by talking about some of the feedback we've been getting. 

Yeah, that that's a great idea, Joe, you know, now that we've gotten a few podcast episodes out there, and delved into a big range or a great range of different topics. It's been interesting, we've been getting a wide range of feedback as well. And I for 1am, very grateful for it. Yeah,

really grateful for those of you that have chimed in, at talk at friends and wonder.com. And it helps us grow and helps us find our voice. It helps us know what you're interested in hearing about,

right, because we're still just very newbie at this. And, you know, obviously you and I've been wandering together for our whole lives, but wandering with a microphone in front of our face. And with a bit of a topic agenda a little bit different. Yeah, it's a little different. And so we'd really be grateful if more people would reach out and give even even more feedback.

Yes. And thank you for those who have and thank you for those who will.

Yes. So don't forget https://friendsinwonder.com. And, hey, I'm really excited about today's episode as well. Yeah. And what kind of sparked it off for us is that we had done this once before. It's it's an episode on safety and the really the growing obsession that society and culture has had with putting safety above all other concerns. And in fact, we recorded an episode, probably one of our first ones maybe 668 weeks ago, and didn't feel like we quite did it justice. And so we kind of let it sit in the editor's room for a while. And in the other day, Vince was on his way out for a trip to California. And when I was saying goodbye to him for a week or whatever. Right out of my mouth came Safe travels. And and when I said that, I said wait a minute. No, that's not the point of travel isn't Vince.

Right? And so many emails and so many salutations, don't use that word in there. Start that way these days, right? Yeah, I hope you're safe. I hope everything is going smoothly, right. It's a common salutation.

Well, and it's not something that just happened overnight in the wake of the pandemic. But clearly, Captain Obvious here, clearly the pandemic has made our obsession with safety. Even even greater. And I think that's why it's such an important topic to talk about today. And, and while it's a it's a big one, and one that could probably have really multiple episodes or even a separate podcast. I thought it would be fun to try again today. And and do it with a little bit more focus. And we did the last time.

All right, let's put the rollerskates back on and get going.

Yeah, so the way I really wanted to start the topic is whatever happened to the phrase, Happy Trails, when people go traveling, it used to be betrayals, to you, yeah. That everyone was excited about traveling. And somewhere. I don't know if I want to say a divorce. But it certainly evolved into this concept of, of safety being the salutation instead of happiness. Yeah.

You know, it's safety first has is become something that we're becoming more and more accustomed to. And it does seem to have diminished the sort of the camaraderie or the communal thing when you're traveling because everything is so regimented and oriented towards safety first, and now. This is a this isn't a black and white issue. There's a lot of complexity, right,

right, because it doesn't mean we think you should throw safety out the window. Right, but should it always be first. And in fact, this concept of safety first is one that you and I are familiar with, because we both love a modern day philosopher, Charles Eisenstein, and he certainly is. I think he's got it his own podcast, he's written multiple books. I know some some of which we both read. Yeah. And

the more beautiful world our hearts know as possible...

that that's his seminal book. And he's written a couple of others. Well, actually, I think he's written like five or six. Most recently. He's written one on really the, I guess the lessons we can learn from the Coronavirus. It's called the coronation. But he also writes a lot of essays. And you can find him, you know, in substack, and on his website, and certainly, he's done a lot of podcasts. And one of the topics that he loves to talk about is this one, this concept of when did we, as a society become so obsessed with safety? Where we're always always putting it first. And, and so we wanted to focus our topic, kind of in a in a streamlined way to call light to this topic and and ask the question from our lens of wonder and awe is whether whether safety should always be first or or what are we giving up? When we put safety first,

right? It wasn't always that way. It seems like it's been a progressive implementation, I guess I don't want to say intrusion because in some cases, safety first is very relevant. Right? We're talking about 911. Earlier, and, and the need and how we, how we, you know, all adapted to those changes, after after 911. And how everyone was willing to do it. Right. So the benefits there seem obvious,

right? And I think whenever you're basically putting safety in the forefront, I think it's safe to say that something has got to give right in perfect example is, like you said, 911. And, and it's okay, there's nothing wrong with putting safety. First, it's just that you should do that with your wide eyes wide open. And we certainly did that when it came to air travel, right, I don't think anybody, very few people disagreed with the safety procedures that were put into place by TSA. In the wake of 911, we certainly didn't want to get on airplanes that were vulnerable to being flown into, you know, skyscrapers anymore, or any kind of nefarious activity. So we all understood that that was going to be that there was going to be some give. And that would be that you don't have the option of getting to the airport half an hour before your flight anymore. Now, everyone knows, you got to get there at least an hour, probably an hour and a half some people two hours, depending on your flight. But that's what we gave up. But we did that with our eyes wide open, right, we gave up a little bit of liberty or a little bit of in a freedom to to be loosey goosey with our time. And instead we got safety and return. And I think most people are good with that. But I think, you know, sometimes it can be black and white. Other times, I guess that's what today's topic wants to wants to draw attention to. And that is that too often, especially in light of the pandemic that we came through safety is, is this overriding theme that is getting in the way of Happy Trails, you know, or the concept of just living life freely.

It's becoming more of a source social norm than, you know, in some ways, because we're becoming more and more conditioned to just following the safety first philosophy.

Right, right, right. And you remember, I know we talked about this using this as kind of a segue into this topic. And I remember very clearly in college, studying Maslow's hierarchy of needs. And I know that you and I have talked about it many times since college because too often I think it comes up where it's a it's a shining example of, you know, how we have to put our basic needs first before we can put you know, our more you know, altruistic needs, you know, in the forefront the idea being that Maslow had this hierarchy of needs and we're not here to say I mean, that was 1940s when when he studied it, but you know, it's a really good way to shine a light on this concept of, of human behavior and what we're capable of humans of doing. When we're in fear or when we're when our basic biological needs are in threat,

right? So basically boiling Maslow down a little bit, if your safety needs aren't met, or if you're feeling unsafe, you can't pursue other self fulfillment needs are up at the top of his Yeah, of his, you got to work your way through perfect example would be picture you're in a meditation and you're getting really close to some sort of a great, deep, altruistic state in your meditation, and all sudden you hear a gunshot outside, boom, you can't immediately change, your physiology is changing. Right? Right.

You're no longer in that, that need for self fulfillment, you're back down to the bottom of the pyramid of surveys is surviving and safety.

Right. So the fight or flight mode, right,

right, right. So so and the reason it's important to kind of break it down this way, is I think it even though again, this may seem a little obvious. It's important to point out that when you're in a state of fear, it's hard to be in a state of joy at the same time. In fact, Maslow and biologists in general will tell you that you cannot be in a state of fear and a state of joy at the same time.

Yeah, what's that? What is it the amygdala? Yeah, that will controls that. And well, they

say that's kind of like the most basic function in our brain, maybe the oldest part of our brain, the monkey part of our brain that's at the, at the stem of the, you know, the spinal cord, I guess. And that's this fight or flight mode so that when, when literally a saber toothed Tiger is chasing us, that part of the brain takes over. And and everything else is is irrelevant at that point, because Because adrenaline's pumping, and there's all sorts of various physiological things that are happening to our body, so that we can protect ourselves. And the last thing you're going to be doing when a saber toothed Tiger is chasing you is meditating,

rightfully, hopefully, that's the last thing you're doing. Right.

I know, again, an obvious example. But I think I think it would even be more instructive on this topic to talk about, like, Alright, what's the difference between walking down the street on a beautiful sunny day, and walking down the street, late at night and a dark? When there's a shadowy figure walking behind you? Right?

That's a great example. Right? I

mean, obviously, you can have happy trails, on a beautiful sunny day, you can

see anybody hiding in the bushes, hopefully, you're not in fear, you're in the moment, you're looking at the trees, we're at night, you're in a sort of a constant state of awareness and fear. And that seems to be how we're sort of culturally transitioning, not necessary. This is not a political statement, or anything else. But when the when the policies are made, they're made by people who generally want to control

you're talking about at a government level at a government level doesn't have to be I guess, could policies at work policies, right,

anywhere and so so now you have a lot of things that are sort of coming to play into your daily walk, if you will.

Right. Exactly, exactly. That's the that's the analogy. And, you know, and clearly, there is a market for those who would like to have us, I guess, we'd like to control our behavior. And I don't necessarily mean nefariously. In government, this has nothing to do this is not a political discussion. It's not a Democrat Republican discussion. And it's not a government, you know, conspiracy discussion, because this really is something that transcends that this is this whole idea that, you know, human behavior, we're vulnerable as human beings, when we're in fear, and certainly, you know, economic interest, corporate interest, know that. News Media knows that, right? scary news sells, everyone knows, you turn on local news, you're gonna get barraged with a lot of negative things. The Weather Channel, they're not telling you about how sunny it is. They're always showing you where the latest hurricane is, even if it's on the other side of the world. People tune in and they want to know what's going on because for whatever reason, we're drawn To, you know, the state of fear,

and you got this device in your pocket that pings dopamine beeps every time some sort of alert comes. So you're physiologically reacting to that whether it's conscious or subconscious. We're becoming conditioned to having all of this information come in and sort of this, this promotion of, of what we're calling fear. Right, right. And

we're vulnerable. And, and what's happened, though, is, because we're bombarded constantly with these, these fear mongering messages, we're always in a state of alert and state of alert, very similar to back in the day, when we were concerned about a saber toothed Tiger. But now we're on alert for a bunch of other reasons. And this whole idea being what do we give up when we put safety first. And you know, and another thing that I was reminded by is, when Jesus was, I don't know, he was, I think he was with his disciples, and they were children playing, and they were just giddy and enjoying themselves and having a good time. And, and I don't know if maybe somebody thought that they were being annoying, or whatever. But Jesus's remark was, we all need to be more like the children before we can enter the kingdom of God. Yeah. What do you what do you think he meant by that?

Well, I think I think it's good to bring the big guy into here, because the big guy seems to know what he was talking about in a lot of different ways. You know, it's this idea that there is meaning and a purpose or an intelligence in the universe that is greater than man. So, you know, don't be fearful of being who you are. And children are a perfect example. And, you know, to take that from a more of a cultural sort of a timeframe perspective. We all live in a time when we were younger and older. And when we were younger, we used to ride our bikes around 11 years old riding around the city, with other kids being out there sometimes and nobody was worried about our safety, if you will. Well,

yeah, I mean, there may have been some discussion of safety, but it wasn't drilled into our head as the primary ultimate, you know, right. Thinking point.

And, you know, what if if 11 year olds are riding around the same neighborhood today without supervision, some people would probably question their, the what the parenting was doing,

I'm sure there'd be a lot of raised eyebrows. You know, in my neighborhood, I don't see it. Like I told you, I don't. The only time I ever see somebody playing at the baseball field across the street from me is with uniforms at you know, in an organized

situation of sandlot games anymore. Together, kids aren't

out playing unsupervised anymore. Some might say that's good. And I'm not saying it's good or bad. I'm just saying that we need to be conscious of this obsession really, with safety always. And when we put safety first, what are we giving up in return? And like you said, Jesus was was talking about kind of a universal understanding that, you know, if you're going to enter quote, unquote, the kingdom of God, or this idea of, of, of nirvana or experiencing life the way it should be experienced, you need to be more like the children. And what do we know about children? Children playing are probably fear free. You know, it's, it's not until we indoctrinate children that we really, you know, take that carefree attitude away from them,

right? Yeah, that's, and that's what I was getting at. So how what, how do children you know, how do they grow up today as well,

it's funny you say that, my next door neighbor, we have these next door neighbors that have very cute kids. One is a five year old and the other one's a two year old. And I don't have grandchildren yet. But I have siblings that have grandchildren. And so they've kind of become my little surrogate grandchildren, my wife and I get a chance to play with them. But I think of their five year old is like my surrogate daughter and granddaughter. And the other day I was talking to her and asked her about some of her. You know what she did this summer and she told me about a couple of camps you went to one was called safety town. And I I kind of remember that when my kids were growing up too. And I said, Oh, St. Louis town. It was interesting, because we had already been talking about this idea of doing an episode. Yeah, doing an episode on safety. I thought, well, here we go. I don't know Charles Eisenstein would be interested in Yeah. Well, I

remember from from about safety when I was in kindergarten was, you know, getting my hands slapped when I did something, you know, pulled the ponytail or something.

We're definitely I'm positive that there was no safety town when we were growing up. But I think there there were safety town camps when my kids were growing up. So that's been going on for at least 25 years.

What did she have to say about? Well,

I asked her and, and it was interesting, because a five year old is only going to remember so much. For sure her parents chimed in and told me some of what she learned. But, but what was interesting in her physiology was, when I asked her what she learned, you could almost see her stiffen up a little bit when she was talking about Stranger danger, I think there's a number of things that they tell you and in for good reasons. They're trying to teach these kids, you know, at age five, they're going to be going to kindergarten, and they're gonna be away from their parents. I know, their parents told me that one of the things that they taught was safety on a school bus makes complete sense, right? They're getting onto a school bus. Yes, at some point, they should know how to be safe on a school bus. And I think the police and and fire department get involved in these safety town camps. They're all across the country, I think it's a phenomenon. But, but I did notice when when she told me about Stranger danger, she kind of stiffened up a little bit, you know, kind of kind of tensed when she explained it, she also I said, Oh, what else, and she said something about, you know, being careful with playing with matches at home. And, and, you know, the danger of playing with matches. And again, you could see a little bit of, like fear creeping in, in some will say what was she shouldn't be aware of these kinds of dangers. And I don't disagree. But it does go back to this idea of what Jesus was talking about, you know, you've got these carefree children at age two or three, and then you've got, you know, the crusty, old 62 year olds that are staring at each other right now who have had a lifetime of indoctrination to, you know, fear and safety and that kind of thing. In somewhere in between, I think we have to strike a balance of, of when is it better, to, to play in complete joy? And maybe is it always better to be enjoy and

maybe let a child learn some things on their own and make their own judgments?

You know, I'm sure that there's, you know, I'm not like it. I am not saying and I don't think the point of this episode is to say, Forget about safety. I just think it's about putting it in perspective, right. And, you know, and so segue now into where we are today, post, pandemic, and a lot of people are still very much I know I am, I mean, I know personally, that my wife and I, who are very healthy, we both have had COVID. And you know, our antibodies are at a level where we're just not very concerned about our, our health safety right now. And we've been around a lot of people who've, who've tested positive recently, and, and knock on wood, we're doing very well. And we feel pretty good about all the safety methods that we use to keep ourselves healthy. Yet, we're not going out to dinner that much and used to be fact, the house that we're living in right now is is very close to a downtown area where we can walk to dinner, and, you know, we just don't do it anymore. Is that partly because of this idea that, that we still haven't come out of the fog of safety first? And and I think that's a question we all need to ask Have, have we come out of the fog? Or are we getting deeper into it?

Yeah, it's, it's, that's where the rubber hits the road. Right. So you have a lot of things that may be made sense at the time based on the information that was out there. But it's evolved now. And the question is, do we continue to bring those things into our lives in different ways? Or keep them in or keep them in our lives? Yeah. And I think part of the balance is looking at some of the consequences now of some of the things that that did happen. And let's go back to the to the children for instance, there's, there's a lot of recognition now, that perhaps some of the things that were put into place weren't the best for the children psychological masks, yeah, masks, you know, other things not being able to play with each other, right?

All of those things. Well, yeah, school online instead of interaction, right?

So you've got to rise In, you know, depression and anxiety and Agra phobia among killed Oh, agoraphobia. Yeah, yeah, agoraphobia. And so you know, that, that that that is not limited to children, adults go through the same physiological change or conditioning, if you will. So, you know, what is the balance there?

And I don't think there's really a right or wrong answer. And that's not the point of this episode, in this point of the point of this episode is not really to shame ourselves for letting safety get in, you know, in the forefront, because it's, it just happened. And it happened to me, it happened, it happened to everybody. So this isn't an exercise and in trying to say that, that, that we know better, what we're doing, because we're friends and wonder, is we're wondering, have we gone too far with the safety thing? And are we are we being, you know, like, acutely consciously aware of what we're giving up, when we always put safety first. And, you know, like you said, agoraphobia, depression, anxiety, are all examples. And they're all They're all on the rise. They're all examples of, of this idea of us being a little bit more detached. I noticed there are people still, when I'm walking in my neighborhood, I still see people walk running to the other side of the road to stay on the opposite side sidewalk when I'm walking down the street. Now, maybe they're being polite, I don't know. But at some point, I'm not saying I should be hugging people that are walking by, but it's okay. It's like, okay, for us to be in each other's presence, again, into into not fear, being close to other humans. We're just I think, we need to be aware of the fog of safety. And, you know, I like because as Charles Eisenstein talks about, and I encourage people, if they find this topic, interesting to maybe Google some of his episodes on this topic, because it's fascinating. It's a fascinating discussion, and it's really deep. But, you know, his question would be, do we want to live a life in, you know, in fear of, of, of safety or a life that is measured by how safe we could be? And, you know, it's a philosophical question. But I think it's, it's one definitely worth rhetorically asking.

I would hope one of the questions that individuals and collectively we would ask as things move forward, is, what types of considerations are the policy makers, bringing into that equation, as we've now experienced some very provable things that this might have made sense at the time, but it had these results? When we make the next policy, because this is going to happen? Again, right? There's always going to be a reason for safety first policymaking? And so I think one of the points is, is just think about it, be aware of it as an individual, and really take a look at what decisions are being made in the future. Yeah. And

demand demand that there be a discussion that doesn't just focus on safety only? What are the unintended consequences? We certainly know now, what the consequences are of masking very young children, there's been learning deprivation and, and all sorts of other things. Well, what about some of the other issues? Like for instance, we talked about 911, everyone agreed to the idea of, of more safety in airports or during air travel. At some point, somewhere along the line, someone agreed to I think it was Congress agreed to allowing monitoring of, of,

I guess, phone calls, and yes,

sir, I have certain people on terror lists or whatnot. And that, of course, quickly devolved into monitoring everybody. And so, you know, the discussion was never had like, is the do we want to give these liberties back to people it's, it's something that once the Liberty is taken in the name of whatever safety, it's usually in the name of safety. It's very rarely given back right. And what do we suffer as a as a, as a human being or as a culture when we allow safety to be the fundamental good that we're seeking

the driving force? Yeah, you know, And so we don't want to live in a totally totalitarian society when nobody says they do. Why right, but when you become conditioned to certain things, but you know, what, what, what what are we willing to give up, you know, to satisfy our fears?

Well, here's the thing, I don't think that there's ever anything wrong, just like we didn't mind giving up an hour of our time in air travel to make sure that, you know, we can do proper screening for safety before people get on planes. So we all do that willingly. Maybe people are willing to have, you know, passports or whatever that describe your current health situation. You know, I don't know

that you get into a lot of stuff with that question. Right.

But when we do that, are we having full informed discussion about it was like our discussion about the digital license plates, you know, on its face, it sounds like something that's all about, you know, convenience and, and cost saving in the long run and that kind of thing. But underneath all of that, you know, there might be something more going on in once. Once a power source has that power? Are they going to give it back?

Google's not gonna give you the data that has on you back?

No, if anything, we're always, you know, unwillingly, or unwittingly, I should say, not unwillingly, but unwittingly sending more and more user agreements that allow them to do more with our data. But

so the question becomes, what's the balance between safety first and a life well lived?

Yeah. I mean, it's rhetorical. Yeah, it's rhetorical. But it's one that I think is worth discussing, and was was worth our time. Today, to just, you know, and again, it's one of those things where I, I'd love to hear audience feedback on this, because I'm sure there's people out there who are just wired more to be cautious, right, and two, into one always put safety first. And that's fine. But there's an awful lot of us who aren't like that, who are more than happy trails, people and in want to want to travel for the joy of travel, not with the purpose of being safe, want to travel through life with with joy? And maybe, maybe less fear? So the rhetorical question, I guess, is, you know, on your deathbed, are you ever going to say, Gosh, I wish I would have been more safe? Maybe Maybe if you got hit by a truck? Say that? But I mean, you know, it's a rhetorical question. I think the idea is, you want to live life with more joy,

right? You want to live life with more joy. And, you know, to find the balance this is it's interesting, because this sets up another sort of divide, which I don't want to go into this rabbit hole. But, you know, there's the divide between people who have a need for safety. And then the people who have maybe a little more flexible level of safety. And unfortunately, what's happened in the last several years is we've been pitted against each other. Yeah. So you know, we

get somehow it does become political, which I don't understand. This is not a political issue. Everything

ultimately becomes political. This is not political. But but but I think the point that I want to make about it is, again, it's the same message we try and give to too. How can this help is to listen to each other's perspectives on safety, different people have different situations where maybe they need to be more, you know, tactical, whether it's a health issue, sure, or a childcare issue, or whatever it is. There's no one size fits all right, sure. It's not a black and white issue. It's another issue that's very complex. We would love to hear what your thoughts are on this topic. And we think that in the future, we're going to be revisiting some of these themes in terms of where are we going? What's happening?

Yeah, so it'd be great to hear again, we're kind of driving this point home. In today's episode, we'd love to hear your input and your thoughts on whether this is the kind of topic that resonates with you and how you feel about it. Like did we get this right? Or should we just No, no, it should always be safety at all costs.

Should we do this podcast again for the third time?

Yeah, really? No, I think this one's ready for for publication with All right, well,

if you say so, Joe, it's always a pleasure to do an episode.

Mine as well and happy trails.

Happy trails to you. Though, so ends another episode of Friends. In wonder, we want to thank you for listening. If you'd like to hear more episodes, provide feedback, ask questions or suggest topics you'd like us to wonder about in future episodes. Be sure to check us out at friends in wonder.com. You can even leave an audio comment with the click of a button and we might use it in an upcoming episode. So please, we'd be grateful if you subscribe, like or share this podcast. Until next time, I'm Joe. And I'm Vince and we're friends in wonder