Pity vs Sympathy

Ali

My name is Ali. I'm a doctor and Youtuber.

Taimur

I'm Taimur. I'm a data scientist and writer.

Ali

And you're listening to Not Overthinking.

Taimur

The weekly podcast where we think about happiness, creativity and the human condition.

Ali

Hello, everyone and welcome back to Not Overthinking. Taimur, how are you doing today?

Taimur

I'm doing all right, I spent a morning of lots of chores, I had to order some furniture over the past week or two. And it comes in these massive cardboard boxes. And it's not just that you have to flatten the cardboard boxes, you also then have to cut them down in size so that they can fit inside the stupid recycling bins. And so I spent about half an hour, like with my Naruto letter opener knife, like cutting down these couple of boxes to fit in the recycling bin. And then we had to go to Kwik Fit to get a tire replacement for the car, which I'm going to have to fit after this. Yeah, made lots of chores today. Lots of chores. How about you?

Ali

Yeah, man, things are pretty good. Things are picking up. I think the last weeks I've been very, things haven't been the best in terms of feeling optimistic about the book. But now I'm feeling a lot more optimistic about the book. And, yeah, we've just launched..

Taimur

What's changed?

Ali

I've now decided that I'm probably going to go with a literary agent. And so I've been speaking to a few and shortlisting a few. And that like feels like a load off my shoulders. And I think we have also got another kind of framing of the book that might work nicely.

Taimur

Okay. So you feel like you're making some progress.

Ali

Feel like yeah, I feel it feels like kind of last week. Oh, it feels like maybe two weeks ago was like the oldest last moment. And now it's like, okay, cool. Now it's all picking up. You certainly didn't present it as an all is lost moment, last week or two weeks ago. No, you were like I bet I'm really relieved. I think relieved was the term you used.

Taimur

Yeah, I mean, I'm saying all it all is lost moment as in. You know, it's like a standard part of like, any kind of storytelling, their narrative where it's the work you've done up until this point is awful. And now. So that's like the oldest last moment. And now it's like we're rebuilding from the ground up, and it feels good. Got it. [...] That sounds good.

Ali

Yes. In [...] news, so you know, last week we were talking about this, this thread on Tattle.

Taimur

Yes.

Ali

At the time, it was seven pages long. Now it's nine pages long because people have realized that we posted this on the podcast YouTube channel. By the way, if you don't realize we have a podcast YouTube channel now where we have video version of these podcasts, so check it out link in the show notes. And someone's posted a link, saying he says the ones that did make him feel something or comments on disability as a doctor based on his YouTube content and comments from old patients of his made him think about real life repercussions of his social media presence.

Taimur

Just to recap for people who didn't listen, last week, at the end of last week's episode, Ali read out a bunch of that there is a website called Tattle, an online forum where people basically gossip about, you know, celebrities and influencers and things like that. And there was a seven page thread about Ollie, where people were broadly posting mean comments. there's a there's a YouTube clip from last week's episode, which you can check out if you missed it. We're just the mean comments section. But it looks like there's been some developments since.

Ali

Hmm. All right. So we have a comment, saying his brother came across as really kind, which I think he did. I'm curious what brought a Ali to the thread and encouraged him to discuss it in a video, Ali, if you're reading. None of us know you in real life. This thread isn't gospel, it's gossip and opinions. You're the authority on yourself. If you're affected by reading here, then please don't do so. People are saying that this is quite a reasonable. This is quite a Taim thread. All things considered.

Taimur

Sounds more like an Ali thread. To be honest,

Ali

Everything is likely to be productive. How is that healthy or unproblematic? He's doing exactly the same as other influencers by promoting something that is so unobtainable. Sometimes it's okay not to do anything and simply enjoy life's small pleasures like having a piss without taking your iPad with you in the guise of being productive. What the fuck is a productive Valentine's Day? His Ads are also becoming worse.

Taimur

Are we going to read all the comments like? Surely not.

Ali

I'm just thinking as any particularly mean ones? Yeah, his brother was pretty cute.

Taimur

I'll take that. It seems like a couple of the newer comments on the thread are trying to, like, reassure you that it's okay or something like that kind of like Ali don't listen to these comments or something. And I think a lot of the I thought it was interesting that a lot of the YouTube comments on last week's episode, and on the clip from last week's episode, where we just talked about the mean comments, it seems like most of them are trying to reassure you and say like, oh, Ali, don't listen to it. Don't listen to the haters, Ali, I think you're really inspirational and all of this kind of stuff. I thought that was really interesting. And I wanted to sort of kick off this episode by talking a little bit, a little bit about that phenomenon. And actually, I had, having a sort of like a phone call with a couple of friends two days ago or something. And, you know, while we were catching up one of them, you know, kind of told us about some something bad that recently happened to him or something. And the other friend's response to this was similar to the YouTube comments of like, Oh, don't worry about it, you know, just be patient, you know, that kind of thing. And yeah, with these friends, but we then had a chat about, like, you know, why you saying that, basically. And I'm curious, like, what do you think when people comment on like the YouTube video saying, like, Ali, you know, we love you, Ali. Don't listen to the haters. Like they're just jealous, you know, all this kind of stuff.

Ali

I think it's just people, people being nice and genuinely, genuinely feeling that way. Like for example, I have watched videos of YouTubers that I like, and YouTubers that I'm friends with, where they talk about mean comments that they've got. And I feel like a feeling of feeling compelled to comment something just to be like, you know, screw the haters, mate. And I think it's similar to, I feel it's like, if someone you know, a YouTuber friend of mine posted a video a few months ago about how he's got cancer and talking about his struggles with that. And that was like an outpouring of love and support being like, Oh, my God, that's so terrible. You're such a great guy. I hope you get through it. You know, we're here for you, you know, that kind of stuff. It's like a generally nice thing to do. I don't think there's anything particularly I don't know, nefarious about it, or I'm not I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. I feel like this is just decent, like human human decency. If someone is feeling bad about something, you try and reassure them that it's gonna be okay. You know, like the equivalent of Sheldon Cooper saying they're there and patting the shoulder.

Taimur

I'm not trying to say there's anything nefarious to prepare, I didn't make any suggestion.

Ali

No, of course, I agree.

Taimur

So if someone, if something bad happens to one of your friends, like, what's like your response? How do you react in those situations?

Ali

Um, recently, I would, I would, I would feel like, Oh, I'm so sorry. That kind of thing. That sounds really hard. You know, the usual. The usual just being nice to someone and saying, saying that you're there for them type thing. If you need if you need anything, give me a shout or, you know, it obviously depends on the context depends on what the bad thing is, and whether I can work whether this person is close enough to warrant something more active in terms of outreach, but generally, it's like, I'm really sorry. It's, it's like if someone has a death in the family, like, it's just polite to be like, I'm really sorry, that you guys must be going through a tough time, etc, etc. I think that's kind of the equivalent of what's going on here. People are feeling yeah. Wanting what wanting to show support, which is kind of nice.

Taimur

So when you read those comments, you feel kind of nice?

Ali

Yeah, yeah. It feels good to read those comments.

Taimur

Wow. Where is that from?

Ali

Kevin Hart.

Taimur

Kevin Hart.

Ali

Yes. (laughs) Okay, No.

Taimur

Dude.

Ali

I was doing a bit fair. I'm doing Kevin Hart. Well, the Chris Rock, Kevin Hart.

Taimur

I think it's probably Chris. I mean, Chris Rock has lots of bits about black women more so than I think Kevin Hart does.

Ali

Okay. Apologies to Kevin.

Taimur

Okay, that is interesting. Okay, I think it's worth separating different things here. So I think, I think there are, there are certainly some things which are just like masses of etiquettes. Like, you know, if someone has a death in the family, even though you have nothing to really apologize for it is polite to say I'm sorry, I'm sorry to hear that, you know, that kind of stuff. I think there's there's matters of pure etiquette, which I think that comes under, also like saying hello to someone when you see them, you know, this is just sort of matters of pure etiquette. And then I think, a bunch of, there's a bunch of stuff that falls outside of that, where, you know, someone is kind of making the choice to say some stuff. And so, you know, like a common thing. You know, if a friend is sort of, you know, breaks up with their, you know, romantic partner, then people will typically say, Oh, you know, this, yeah, don't worry about it, you'll find someone else, plenty more fish in the sea, all of this kind of stuff. And I think that falls outside of the realm of just pure etiquette. And that's like an intentional thing that someone is saying. So I think I disagree with you. When you characterize these YouTube comments as like pure etiquette in the same way that saying I'm sorry, is etiquette when there's a death. I don't think..

Ali

Yeah, I agree. It's, it's not quite it goes slightly, slightly beyond the etiquette more of a like, there's no social etiquette here. Like, if I was saying it's someone in real life, it would be social etiquette with them. Like I'm really sorry. Don't listen to haters, like that's just do you agree that that would be social etiquette, rather than than just I'm really sorry.

Taimur

Sorry, what? Okay.. Let's set up the situation a bit more precisely.

Ali

So I say to someone in real life that hey, so I saw some mean comments about me on the Internet and that made me feel bad. It would be social etiquette for that person to be like, Oh, I'm sorry to hear that, like, don't worry about it, you know, you've got all these good comments as well, and you make such a big impact on people. And obviously, there's going to be some haters.

Taimur

Okay, I got it. I understand.

Ali

I'm saying in real life that social etiquette, I'm saying I'm sorry to hear that would be considered rude if not elaborated on in that context, in a one to one situation.

Taimur

Okay. I agree, it would be weird to just say, I'm sorry to hear that, and then move on to the weather or something. I agree, that would be weird. But I think there is a spectrum of elaboration that can occur. And there are choices that people make as to what that looks like. I agree. You know, if you say that to someone, I agree that they're basically obliged to say, I'm sorry to hear that. Or, you know, maybe, you know, how are you feeling? Basically that much, but then whatever routes they decide to go out and go down in terms of elaborating on it, I think comes down to choice. And that's really what I'm trying to try to get out here. So I think, you know, so one, or one possible route, right to elaborate is to then go down this angle. Which I think a lot of the YouTube comments did, and which you just did in your example, as well, where you then try and yeah, I guess trying to get to the mean and comments and say, Oh, you know, there's lots of you know, there's lots of

Ali

No. good comments about you, as well. And I think your x, y and z you know, that is one of many possible routes of elaboration. Are you in? Are you personally inclined to go down that route when you're when you're sort of talking to your own friends? Like if something bad happens to them, you will, like, try and convince them.

Taimur

Okay, got it. Also, I really hate. I've started to really hate the way I talk.

Ali

I'm really sorry to hear that. For the record, lots of people love the way you talk, and especially love your laugh. And we've had some YouTube comments on the last one saying that your life should be turned into its own. I mean, why do you feel that way?

Taimur

I think I just don't get a really obtuse way. I think I turned out like,

Ali

What does obtuse mean?

Taimur

Exactly.

Ali

We're talking about the angle? And so I think of two angles. You're the mathematician.

Taimur

That is the thing in maths. Yeah. But like, Yeah, I don't know, whenever I whenever I hear myself talk, especially on the podcast, I think I make an effort to just be really precise with my language. And I think it just sounds just sounds stupid me routes of elaboration. What the hell am I talking about? Why is that how I phrased it? What a ridiculous way to phrase that. Why is that what comes to my mind to have this conversation.

Ali

What you're trying to say is people can respond differently, depending on who they are. And one way of responding is x. And there might be another way of responding. But because you're a Twitter think boy, you have decided to go that you've decided to call it root of elaboration.

Taimur

It's not a decision, right? You choose what words come out of your mouth, they just come out of your mouth. And increasingly, I'm finding the words that come out of my mouth to be pretty annoying.

Ali

I don't know. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with routes of elaboration.

Taimur

Okay, yeah, I don't know, just sounds a bit of obtuse to me. Anyway. Let's get back to them.

Ali

Because you're thinking of it in terms of like a decision tree almost. Or in terms of a you go so far. And then there is literally like different roads that you could go down.

Taimur

Yeah, exactly. Yeah,

Ali

I think it's reasonable to call those routes of elaboration. This is not me doing the first route of elaboration. This is me genuinely telling you that. I think that's reasonable. I wouldn't worry about it.

Taimur

Okay, fine. Right, let's unwind this particular route of elaboration and go back to the crossroads. So what are we talking about? So, yes, I think the thing you had just said is that, you know, okay, I think we're agreed that there is a basically obligatory response of like, I'm sorry to hear that, you know, hope you're okay, whatever, which just is just social etiquette, and you just have to do it. And then there's like a bunch of, you know, there's a bunch of options you have of like, how you want to carry on the conversation. One of those options is to try and sort of convince the other person that these mean comments in this instance, are actually wrong. And like, Oh, you know, there's also good comments, and the main comments are wrong, because you're actually a great person, all this kind of stuff. That's, that's one route and you said, you typically don't go down that route yourself with friends. Why not?

Ali

I typically go down the routes. I mean, it It depends on the context. The first, the primary route of elaboration is very easy and very, like, non socially threatening, and it's like a pretty normal/normy thing to say. And so if I'm in it, I if I'm in an environment where, you know, let's say there's like a group of 10 people who I don't know particularly well at that point I'm not going to put on my, I don't know, Freudian hat and start to sort of psychoanalyzing the person. Whereas if it's a more one to one situation, if you were to tell me that, for example, hey, I've had some mean comments on the internet, I would be like, Oh, that's interesting. How do you feel about that? Which was kind of what you asked last time, as opposed to Oh, don't worry about it, mate. It's all good. Like you're a great guy, and your laugh is infectious. And people think you're very attractive and handsome and stuff. I wouldn't go down that road. I won't go down to how are you feeling route..

Taimur

You think the how are you feeling route would be weird if it's like people you don't know as well?

Ali

How are you feeling then with which would then be followed up with the Why do you think that why do you think you're feeling that way. Or just trying to get to the bottom of really exploring the feeling and exploring like the thought process behind the feeling. Generally, not a, I mean, it doesn't work in 100% of social situations.

Taimur

Yeah, for sure. Okay, that's interesting.

Ali

That was me being precise with my language. It's not working 100%. Like, there we go.

Taimur

Sounds more like hedging to me, mate. That's fine. Okay, so, you don't Okay, let's just give it a name. Let's call it the reassurance route, where you tell the person Oh, you know, there's lots of good things about you, [...], you didn't personally go down the reassurance route in general. But it felt nice to you when the YouTube comments were along the reassurance route.

Ali

It felt nice in a way.

Taimur

Okay, basically, right. Do you have to say it felt nice, because it would be a dick move on this podcast for you to say, oh, man, all these people came out and supported me. But actually, I don't give a rat's ass. Like, do you? Are you obliged to say, it felt nice? You can say yes. It still leaves room and there's still like 50/50

Ali

There are elements of obligation here. Like when if like, if you know, someone, basically how celebrities are obligated to be very thankful, thankful to their fans for the things that their fans do. This is something that Darren Brown, interestingly explores in his book "Happy" where he talks about what it feels like to be a celebrity and to be someone famous, and how you can't really say anything against it. Because, you know, then you come across as a dick, you have obviously, you know, be acknowledged at every moment that your fans are the ones that got you there, and because you don't want to come across as a dick and you don't want them to not like you. And there's all this baggage associated with other stuff publicly.

Taimur

Yeah, you can't talk about publicly. So maybe I can, I can throw my hat into the rig.

Ali

By all means, please do. And that will neither confirm nor deny the allegations.

Taimur

If I were you, and I, you know, there are mean comments about me on the internet, and we'd made that video podcast wherever you wanna call it. And then in the comments, you know, everyone was like, ah Taimur don't don't listen to the comments. You know, don't listen to the haters. They're just jealous. You know, you have all these nice qualities about you. I think your great. You know, if that was the response, not only would I not, not only would I not feel nice about it, I would actually feel again, like, I would feel positively towards the response. But, I wouldn't even feel neutral towards the response, I'd feel slightly negative towards the response. Like, I would actively not want that to be the response.

Ali

Why?

Taimur

I think I personally, I think I'm, from what I've seen, from chatting to friends about this. I think I'm pretty weird in this regard. And I don't think you're quite as weird on this along this dimension. But I'm very sensitive to feeling sort of patronized or pitied or sort of condescended to like, that is literally I think we've talked about this on the podcast before. Like, that is literally the worst thing imaginable to me, like, literally, the worst possible thing is for someone to pity me, and I think, I think I'm, like, so sensitive to that. That, you know, yeah, I wouldn't want any I wouldn't want sort of anyone's pity, really. And I think that's also the reason why I never go down the reassurance route myself, because I, you know, I don't pity anyone, you know, regardless of like the circumstance, I think it's like, and look, I think I'm being weird here by calling this pity. I think there's more that I think there is yeah, I think there's a meaningful difference between like, you know, pity and like sympathy or something you know, there's like there's different things going on, which are related, but I'm like so sensitive to the pity thing that I just like, completely steer clear from it. And so.. Sorry?

Ali

Surprisingly self aware coming from you.

Taimur

I don't need your, these compliments. don't pity me. Yeah, so I just like completely steer clear from it. And I think we talked about this a couple of few weeks ago as well. where I thought like, have I given you the whole praises problematic spiel?

Ali

Many times.

Taimur

Yeah, I think praise comes into the same like realm of borderline pity. And so like, I don't want people to praise and I don't praise people. I know it's weird. I know, it's probably wrong.

Ali

Let's unpack this.

Taimur

Okay, let's not go down the praise angle. We could talk about that another day. Let's stick to like the sort of pity sympathy angle,

Ali

You kind of saying that praising someone is equivalent to putting them there for the bad.

Taimur

Hey look I'm putting my hands up. I'm saying that I'm probably wrong about this. But this is just how I'm wired at the moment. All right. Well, we can talk about praise another day, or maybe at the end of this podcast, but yeah, just on the on this sort of pity versus sympathy front. I think like, I didn't want anyone to feel sorry for me. And if Okay, here's the reason why. The reassuring comments, you know, would be, there'd be a danger of me feeling pitied, or felt sorry for, can we. Are these interchangeable? feeling sorry for someone and pitying them?

Ali

No, I don't think so. I think I mean, I might feel sorry for you if some close family member died. But I wouldn't pity you if a close family family member like pity implies, pity implies some level of..

Taimur

Some level of dehumanizing.

Ali

Yeah, like you would pity a dog being like, like, you know, he doesn't have an owner and he's starving, oh poor dog I pity them. You would also feel sorry for the dog, but the feeling sorry, would it would come under pissy. Whereas if, for example, I don't know, you apply to university and you didn't, you didn't get into the one that you wanted? I feel sorry for you. Because I'm like, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you didn't get what you wanted. But I wouldn't, it wouldn't. I wouldn't describe that as pity.

Taimur

Okay, let's see what the dictionary say about this. And like, I don't think we need to be slaves to the dictionary categories of things. By the way, I think like,

Ali

Yeah, in this post truth world that we live in, am I right?

Taimur

Exactly.

Ali

Who cares about what the actual definition of things is? What matters is how we feel about those definitions.

Taimur

I think that is actually true. In this case.

Ali

It's like one of the left wing things. (laughs)

Taimur

Have you seen that Twitter account?

Ali

Yeah, it's good.

Taimur

It's really good.

Ali

So you're saying that we should just abolish the military and like defund the police and then just let people do what they what? Well, yes.

Taimur

The other topic of accidentally left-wing there was a, there was Anyway.. a tweet, which was accidentally Christian. Let me find it. Oh, my God, it was so funny. This is worth the diversion. Did I posted on the last group chat. Oh, I think I did. Let me scroll up. Man, there's got to be a better way to manage like the different memes that you send to different people across different p atforms. This is a mess.

Ali

If Causal fails, you've got your next idea right there.

Taimur

Exactly. Pretty sure I posted as an Instagram story. Let's find out. How the hell do I find this? Okay, archive. Does this have my historical stories? I think I sent it to one particular friend on Twitter, DMS. Oh, my God. All right. Just give me a sec. This will be worth it.

Ali

Okay, I'm not sure if you realize but given that I tell this up to you every time given that we caught out pauses it's actively unhelpful for you to start saying v to hedge by saying, just give me a sec. I think I sent it to one Twitter friend. No way. It was on Instagram. No, wait, it was on Snapchat. Like that's actively unhelpful, but I'm gonna be editing this episode.

Taimur

I'm sorry.

Ali

Suffer in silence. And then you can bring up the tweet.

Taimur

Oh, here it is. Okay, this is the accidentally Christian tweet, someone tweeted, we should just pin all the debt in the world to one guy and then kill him. And then someone quoted that said, I'm a pastor and pal have I got some good news for you?

Ali

I thought that was very good.

Taimur

Oh my god. So funny. The joke is that Christians believe that Jesus was pinned to the cross and died for all of our sins. So it's very, very similar to what this guy is proposing that we pin all the debt in the world to one guy and then this guy..

Ali

Was that guy actually a pastor or was it a banter? If he's actually a pastor. That's hilarious. I

Taimur

I think he's a pastor. All right, so how do we go into that? Accidentally question. Accidentally leftist.

Ali

The difference between pity and sympathy.

Taimur

Pity and sympathy.

Ali

[...] definitions.

Taimur

Okay, okay. Pity noun, a feeling of sadness or sympathy for someone else's unhappiness or difficult situation. Okay. To take pity on someone is to feel sorry for someone and to do something that shows this. We took pity on a couple of people waiting in the rain for a bus and gave them a lift. So..

Ali

Okay, here we go. I've got a pity versus sympathy psychologytoday.com. The most reputable source on the topic. Pity is a feeling of discomfort and the distress of one or more sentient beings, and often has paternalistic or condescending overtones. Sympathy is a feeling of care and concern for someone, often someone close, accompanied by a wish to see him better off or happier. So I think it's the paternalistic or condescending overtones that at least I certainly feel when which is why I would avoid saying I feel pity for something other than a dog on the street. (laughs)

Taimur

What's wrong with the dog on the street, dude? [...]

Ali

The poor thing I take.. You know, I take pity on that dog.

Taimur

Yeah, I suppose if it's hungry or something. Okay, look, I think we should. All right, let's look up sympathy. Basically, I don't think the dictionary definitions actually get the meaningful difference. I think we should get off piste here a little bit.

Ali

Psychology Today article, which is all about the differences between pity and sympathy and empathy. I think that's probably right, like, pity equals sympathy plus some level of paternalism slash condescension applied to it.

Taimur

Okay, so, sympathy, according to a dictionary is feelings of pity and sorrow for someone else's misfortune. terribly helpful. Sympathy is also understanding between two people common and feeling common feeling. Okay. So, okay, I'd like to, I'd like to make a distinction between like, okay, let's just say that the difference between like, okay, let's say, let's say that the sympathy is kind of like, okay, let's make a distinction between empathy, sympathy and pity, where empathy is like, sort of common common feeding, you know, seeing, seeing through the other person's eyes kind of thing. And then sympathy is the like, kind of like feeling, feeling bad for someone's situation, you know, something like that. And pet pity is like sympathy plus, like, the patronizing sort of aspect of it or something, you know, so what basically like..

Ali

Reassuring comments show sympathy, but not pity. Whereas you seem to think that reassuring comments show pity, which is why you have such a, an adverse reaction to them.

Taimur

Maybe sympathy is problematic. Ever consider that one? No, look, so for example, if someone is if someone is ill, you know, if, if, okay, if like Sheen were unwell, what would you feel towards her? Nothing.

Ali

This is a public forum. So you're putting me on the spot here. I would feel sympathy.

Taimur

What does that mean in that situation?

Ali

And feels like I'm sorry that she's unwell.

Taimur

Would you feel bad that she is, and look in the same way that I try and like sort of dumbed down the feeling of pride to like, if you're proud of someone, you're happy that they're happy or something? Would you have sympathy for Sheen kind of mean that you're sad that she's sad.

Ali

I probably wouldn't actually be sad about it.

Taimur

Yes. But in theory.

Ali

Yeah, in theory yeah, in my sympathy for Sheen, is that I'm sad that she said.

Taimur

Sad that she's sad. Okay. And with a dog on the street? You're so sad that the dog is I mean, you're, you're assuming the dog is sad?

Ali

Yes.

Taimur

And you're sad. You're sad that the dog is sad. But it's more than that. You also think like, something more, right?

Ali

Yeah. about something. Which [...] pity rather than sympathy.

Taimur

So what is the dog? What is the other? Aside from feeling sad that the dog is sad. What else you feeling towards the dog? That is not a life worth living? Something like that?

Ali

We wouldn't go as far as that.

Taimur

You would just run the poor thing over.

Ali

No, probably not. I wouldn't quite go down that route. A feeling of pity towards a dog on the street is I'm sad. That dog is sad. And in a way, listen down on the dog for being in that situation.

Taimur

That wasn't the dog's fault, mate.

Ali

It's not the dog's fault but it's like..

Taimur

What are you looking down on the dog?

Ali

How do you describe paternalism in like, I have a paternal instinct towards the dog. I do not have towards my housemate. And so the paternal instinct.

Taimur

I don't think you have a paternal instinct towards the dog. I don't think that's the case. What do you mean by look down upon the dog for being in such a sorry situation?

Ali

I mean, what do you mean by that?

Taimur

Is it just like a bit of FU to the dog?

Ali

No, it's nothing against a dog. It's like I'm sad that you're sad. And you're helpless. Therefore I feel pity.

Taimur

Right. You haven't told me You haven't told me what mean by the looking down on them. Okay, yeah, if someone is sad and helpless why..

Ali

Rewind the looking down at it, I think it's more of a helpless thing that leads to pity. Like you can't help yourself you dog. I'm so sorry. You know, I feel pity for you.

Taimur

But what? Alright without using the word pity? [...] So you're sad that it's sad.

Ali

Okay, let's give the dog a name. I'm sad that Bongo is said. I'm sad that Bongo sad. And I am also and that sadness is exacerbated by the fact that Bongo cannot help himself. Those two things equals pity.

Taimur

You're sad that is sad. And you're sad that it's it's like, fated to be sad. Forever.

Ali

Yeah. For Yeah, for a while, for some time, [...] owner comes along and gives the dog a food. So I put it out of its misery. Runs it right over. Added trigger warning to the start of this episode.

Taimur

Little piece of trivia. Bongo is close to one a few grants middle name. A few grants. middle names is a mongo.

Ali

Right. Piece of trivia Bongo also sounds like the instrument Banjo. Which is a guitar like instrument that people play. (laughter) Did you see that tweet? That was a really good tweet. I think it was yesterday or the day before? Where if Warren Buffett. Whereas if Warren Buffett had invested his net worth into bitcoin in 2009, he'll be worth like, this many trillions of dollars. Some dude commented thing. If my grandma had wheels [...] Yeah. I love that. That was nice.

Taimur

Okay, no, no, I don't think you've really gotten down to the pity. Right. Like you said, you're sad that the dog is sad. And you're also sad that the dog is helpless? That just sounds like it's sad that the dog is sad.

Ali

I mean, yeah, pity, I think is on the same spectrum of sympathy. But I think it's the helplessness component that makes it pity.

Taimur

Helplessness really like?

Ali

I wouldn't. Like when I said I looked down on the dog there was something there.

Taimur

Yeah, I felt like there was some truth to that like..

Ali

there's some there like, thinking that I am better than the dog. And maybe this ties into your issues with praise where when you praise someone, it's like you're thinking in a way that you're better than them to have the something to pray like this, something around around that, like you're higher up in the hierarchy to be able to give them praise. I definitely feel like I'm a hierarchy in whatever hierarchy we're looking at.

Taimur

To the dog?

Ali

Compared to the dog, yeah.

Taimur

And so you feel like you're in a position to cast judgment.

Ali

Yeah I guess so. I guess it's similar to like, for example, if you see, if you go to like, I don't know, a developing country, and you see these kids playing on the street and rags and no shoes and stuff. It's very easy to have a pity response to that. And I think part of it is that I'm sorry, they're in the situation. But in that context, a bigger part of it is, I feel like I am in a position to pass judgment on them. And Oh, goodness, must, like must not their lives be terrible. And that, I think is the feeling of pity. And which is why I would almost never have a feeling for pity for someone that I know, in real life, because I don't have that thing of, oh, goodness, must that life not be terrible? You know, I'm in a position to cast judgment.

Taimur

Interesting.

Ali

Are there any context in which you would feel pity for someone or something that you have done recently? Even if even if it was like a homeless man on the street? I wouldn't. I wouldn't feel pity. I would feel sorry.

Taimur

Feel sorry. i.e., you are sad because he's sad.

Ali

Yeah, but not pity and they're not like I'm in a position to cast judgment on down upon you.

Taimur

Yeah, no, I just don't think it's, I just don't think it's okay to pity another human being, man. I think. Yeah, I just think it's like really dehumanizing.

Ali

Yeah. It's okay to feel sorry. But the feeling of pity has that. Yeah, that judgmental component looking down on them component.

Taimur

I feel like even feeling I feel like I think sad that someone else is sad is acceptable. [...] I don't know man, I think that's the phrase feeling sorry. I wouldn't want anyone to feel sorry for me. Like that has over that has pity to sort of have rhymes with pity.

Ali

Right.

Taimur

If someone wants to be sad that I'm sad. It's regrettable, but like you know? It wouldn't ruin my life. But if someone feels sorry for me. That would come close. You might as well end it now. Yeah. Just finished me off with a dog. Yeah, let's not say, I think the feeling sorry thing is actually problematic.

Ali

I don't know, I think feeling sorry, is I guess it depends what these what these words mean to us in my head when most people say, I feel

Taimur

like I think the I think these things are tricky because to an extent, like, you can't, you can't try to make too much sense of words or language and stuff like that. And so we should just define our own stuff here. And I think like, I think I'm like, sad, sad that someone else is sad, there's one thing. Let's call that sympathy. I think just like feeling, I accept that doesn't make too much sense to read into, like, the specific words, but like feeling sorry for someone. Sort of like, there's an element of judgment in that like, you know, sorry. Like, it's not cool, basically.

Ali

A way of you saying that you don't want people to feel sorry for you. And so you think going back to our original point, that when people are writing a reassuring, or when people are offering reassurance in any kind of capacity, that feeling sorry, rather than sympathy and feeling sorry, is bad, therefore, the reassurance is bad.

Taimur

Yeah, the reassurance kind of presumes that I need to be reassured, you know?

Ali

I'm not sure that's feeling sorry or pity. I think that's just people, people wanting to provide reassurance whether or not you need it. Like, for example, if there is if something bad happens to someone, and I send them flowers, or, you know, maybe cook for them and give them food. She's not saying that they actually need it, like they have money in their account, they could order from delivery or something, but it's just a nice gesture. And it tells us, it's how we show that we care equally reassurance for when we when we offer reassurance, it's like a relatively easy way of showing that we care.

Taimur

I'm all about the showing that we care. I'm I'm all for that.

Ali

That's all the reassurances, man. That's a nice thing. So you guys are watching this, please do provide reassuring comments. Ignore Taimur, he doesn't know what he's talking about.

Taimur

No, dude, look, here's the thing. Here's the thing. The thing is that, I think it's nice when people can empathize with you, you know, if you're going through some kind of struggle, and someone else truly understands that struggle, it's nice to feel that connection with them on that, you know, feeling like you're not alone. That kind of thing. Okay. And so, I'm all for that. I'm all about that. And so like, I think that's great. But I think, I think going further than that. Okay. So for example. Okay, so in this specific instance, where I was catching up with some friends, the struggle that one of the friends had was that he had recently been rejected by a girl. And yeah, that's something that everyone can sort of empathize with. And, you know, so

Ali

Well, not me.

Taimur

So, you know, what I said was something along the lines of damn, dude, that sucks. That's like, yeah, that's really bad. You know? I'm sorry to hear that sucks. real bad, you know? And I would appreciate it if someone said that to me. If were I in that position. Okay. But then what this other friend did was take it a step further and be like, Oh, you know, just be patient, you know, you'll find the right person, blah, blah, blah, like that kind of those platitudes. And I definitely would not want someone to say that to me. Because, yeah, I guess there's like categories of reassurance there's, like, there's reassurance, which is, like, pure platitudes, where, you know, just like completely generic platitudes, like, you know, there's plenty more fish in the sea, you know, just be patient kind of thing. You know, it'll happen. Right? And then there's reassurance which comes from a place of sort of domain expertise, you know, and I think both of those are very different. Right? Do you agree with that?

Ali

Yeah. So for example, if someone's like, I've just had my first job interview and got rejected. I'm really sorry to hear that. Yeah, that can be really tough. I mean, for the record, I had 85 job interviews before I got accepted. It's an old part of life. That's like a domain, domain expertise, reassurance, on the realm of knowing what it's like to have job interviews, and that it's pretty normal to get rejected from them. Whereas, Oh, don't worry, mate. You know, just be yourself. And I'm sure you'll find someone eventually, is not at all helpful. And pure platitude reassurance.

Taimur

Yeah. So I think the pure platitude reassurance is what I find what I read, wouldn't want someone to say to me, because let me unpack why.

Ali

Is it that you feel like they feel like you don't already know that and therefore, the fact that they would have to say to you don't worry, bro, you'll find someone, it's it feels as if they're sort of it feels as if you're the dog on the street, and they're sort of patting you on the head.

Taimur

Yeah. They're presuming that I'm the dog on the streets. Exactly. Like, what like, why would you presume that you could also, you know,

Ali

Treat me as an intelligent being.

Taimur

Yeah, it's like a sort of secure and autonomous person and yeah, it feels bad to get rejected or whatever, but I wouldn't presume to that. It's sort of ruined my life or anything like that. Like oh, you know, the big existential things as a result of it. Yeah, that's what I think that's why I don't like I think the generic platitudes often presume a lot, which I don't think is really the case. So like in your, okay, like in the in the mean comments example. I mean, the thing you were claiming on the more we talked about it was that you don't actually care too much about the mean comments. And so then like when everyone's like, oh, Ali don't feel bad, blah, blah, blah. Like if you truly actually didn't care about mean comments, surely you'd be a bit annoyed by that, like, screw you, man. Why do you like, why are you assuming that I feel so terrible about the mean comments?

Ali

Okay, no, I wouldn't feel that way at all. Firstly, I think if, if it was really a meme comment, and me being like, cool, I actually don't care, then I don't think many people would have felt compelled to make reassuring comments. But because that whole final 15 minutes where you were pointing out that, hey, you seem a little bit moister, and your voice definitely changed. And I'm sure you don't feel bad about this. Go on. You really feel bad about it, go out and go and say it. Because you were doing that, and I was like, oh my god. Maybe at that point, people feel compelled to reassure that Oh, don't worry. And maybe there is a feeling of people thinking I'm the dog on the street in that situation where they want to pat me on the head.

Taimur

Did you feel like the dog on the street?

Ali

No, I didn't feel at all like the like the dog on the street. But I think that's, I don't have such a strong if someone feels sorry for me, like, I don't care. Whereas you will be like, it's literally the end of the world. If someone feels sorry for you. Include like, it's been interesting that Sheen for the last couple of weeks, because she keeps on. Like I'd be sitting on the sofa staring into space, and she'll be like, Ali, what's wrong? I'd be like, what? Kind of, you've got the [...] look on your face. For context. [...] means like, helpless, poor, helpless type thing. She was like, why have you your [...] face on be like, Oh, you've got the [...] face on again? What's going on? I think that's and she's, we've sort of unpacked her feelings on this. And she's felt that Oh, I like what she says I can just feel you giving off kind of the fact that you're sad. And that makes me want to kind of, like, tell you that it's all okay. That kind of thing.

Taimur

Oh, nightmare. Exactly. tell you that. It's all okay. Some generic platitudes.

Ali

Yeah. But that's fine. I don't mind it. I feel like you would mind it.

Taimur

Yeah, I'd mind it. I would mind it.

Ali

Great, well..

Taimur

I mean, so why don't you? I mean, it seems like you're on board with the reassuring thing. You don't think it's problematic. So why don't you do it, then, big man.

Ali

The reassuring thing?

Taimur

If you haven't got a problem with it, why don't you do it to other people?

Ali

I do for the domain expertise. I don't do it if it's not non domain expertise. I mean, I don't have a problem with it. But I also don't think it's particularly useful. Like if someone was, you know, I wouldn't say to comment oh mate, don't worry, there's plenty of fish in the sea. But I would say something like, mate, you know what to say you got to get if you want to get over someone you got to get under someone else, which is like domain expertise.

Taimur

Alright.

Ali

That's what I like to think.

Taimur

Yeah, it's interesting to see how people respond to these things. So just to be clear, you didn't feel at all sort of, sort of condescended to by comments. it's so condescending, dude. It's so condescending. how can you not see that they're condescending?

Ali

It's not condescending.

Taimur

Let's read out some of these comments.

Ali

Sure, by all means, read out some of them, but I'll tell you how condescending I feel. Most of them are quite nice. I was like, Oh, this is nice.

Taimur

All right. There we go. Just give me a moment. I will find the condescending comments.

Ali

How many of you scrolling past that aren't condescending?

Taimur

I mean, I would interpret all of this. No, I mean, I'm being I'm sort of joking.

Ali

For the record. I like getting those comments. It makes me feel good. So please keep on doing it. You guys. For the record Taimur doesn't like nice comments. So when you want to tell him he's particularly funny, don't do that. Because he'll feel like oh..

Taimur

No, no, here, okay, look, we get we're getting into the praise angle. And it will talk about this on another podcast, but essentially, certain things in life or group projects where praise is acceptable. And being funny is a group project where the purpose of being funny is for other people to find you funny, if other people laugh at your jokes and so praise in the realm of like, being funny is perfectly fine. And so if you do think I'm funny, I would I would love to know that. Just give me a moment.

Ali

We talked about those, hedging.

Taimur

Okay, here we go. This is condescending. Alright. Alright, so this person says, okay, basically, he's sort of trying to sort of attacking the general concept of like people having hate threads on the internet, he says, don't understand the hate part of the internet. If you don't like something then simply leave why make someone feel bad and waste your time when you have the liberty of doing something better with your time anyway, Ali, ignore them. Wow.

Ali

What's wrong with that?

Taimur

He's telling you to ignore them? How does that make you feel?

Ali

That one makes me feel neutral because there's nothing particularly nice in there. It's not like oh Ali you've actually changed my life and I love you, which is the stuff that makes me feel nice. It's giving me advice on something.

Taimur

It's so paternalistic, ignore them, Ali.

Ali

That's fine.

Taimur

I appreciate that you cannot publicly say.

Ali

No, like, I would say if if it made me feel anything less than any sort of anything less than neutral about it. It makes me feel completely neutral because I couldn't care less if someone has given me unsolicited advice. And I appreciate kind of the sentiment where it comes from the place it's coming from is that this person is, you know, is saying that it's really bad that these people out there exist gone Ali, like, ignore them, don't let them affect you. It's nice. Yes, it's unsolicited advice, but like, whatever. Sounds like you have an issue with unsolicited advice.

Taimur

Yeah, I do.

Ali

And in a way, like, the YouTube comments, thread is not it's not even unsolicited. It's like, you know, we posted a video on a podcast called Ali tries to react to mean in comments, where I'm publicly saying that Oh, these comments make me feel a modicum of something. And you're being like go on. Admit that [...]. That's what you'll take. That's not it will not be argued in the court of law that this is not soliciting some level of commenting.

Taimur

I obviously don't object at all commentary, like, obviously not. Like we said, there's lot of thoughts on the routes of elaboration.

Ali

So I think that's a difference between you and me on this on this front, which is that I feel neutral, if not neutral towards positive about comments like that, whereas you feel definitely negative about comments like that.

Taimur

Yeah, I guess I just find generic platitude type reassurance to be quite patronizing. It is patronizing dude, is so patronizing.

Ali

Patronizing is how you how you interpret it, rather than what the other person said. I don't interpret a comment saying ignore the haters, or, you know, as being a patronizing comment. You might, I don't know why you would. But, sure. I wouldn't interpret a comment saying, keep it up as being a patronizing comment. Then you ,ght be like, oh, keep it up? What's the assumption behind that question? Well, they tell me I need to keep it up. Like as if I'm not gonna do that, anyway. Screw you. I wouldn't respond like that. Call me old fashioned. But I love that phrase. That's a good. [...] different context. I think I think I first realized it's funny this when I heard Adrian say it. Call me old fashioned, but I don't believe that.

Taimur

Adrian's a French friend of ours. Yeah, it's just funny hearing. Adrian use like English idioms in general. Okay, fine, I think yeah, maybe I'm just weird.

Ali

It's like with a on what I lie to you when? It's like when you're in for a penny in for a pound.

Taimur

Yeah. Yeah. (laughter) It's so funny to hear the German accent say it. That's a really good reference.

Ali

Thank you.

Taimur

I'm surprised that you know that reference.

Ali

That's condescending. That's definitely condescending.

Taimur

Good stuff. All right, fine. Look, I'm happy to accept that I'm weird on this front. But I don't think I'm completely off base here. I think there's, there is something to what I am saying.

Ali

[...] on YouTube. Now that we've got these on YouTube, you can leave comments. Don't worry about condescending Taimur he's weird. But I would love to know what you guys think on this pity versus sympathy front. Is it condescending to leave a comment on someone's YouTube video reassuring them to ignore the haters? I personally don't think it is. I think it's quite nice. So please keep doing it. And yeah, keep telling Taimur that he's funny.

Taimur

Okay, so moving on from that stuff. There was another interesting line of commentary.

Ali

Okay, hang on, we've been recording for an hour and six minutes already.

Taimur

This is brief. This is brief. Mate, what the hell? Are you enjoying this conversation?

Ali

No, I am. It's good. But I think you know, I'm also mindful of the audience.

Taimur

Do you pity me?

Ali

I'm pitying, you. Yeah.

Taimur

The audience are fine with it. The audience can leave if they're bored. All right. The other interesting thread of commentary about the thing was that I think there were a couple of people who were interpreting me as being like kind or something like that. And I'm not I'm not really sure what they were getting out there. I don't know. What was especially kind about that. And then there were some people interpreting it as unkind. I think there were a couple of people on the thread, saying that it's like an on the Tattle thread? I think there were, there were one or two comments saying like, I basically kind of implying that, if you're not a professional therapist or something, you should literally not have these conversations with people. And like, it's not like nice, too, it's not like nicer, okay, to, you know, push someone you know about their feelings and stuff on a podcast or something like that. And like, you know, clearly, you know, clearly Ollie has some issues here and like, it's, you know, I don't think it's kind to like, talk about this on a podcast and keep keep, like pushing him on it, when it obviously like makes him uncomfortable or something like that. I thought that was an interesting sort of angle, what's your take on it? Before I tell you, my take, before I bring my take down from the mountain.

Ali

I would agree that it's probably it probably [...] the traditional definitions of kind. And you'd have to justify it as a you have to be cruel to be kind and you know, I'm for that to be interpreted as kinda it has to be like a, I'm kind of doing this for your own good, and I want you to. And I want you to face your feelings. And you know, ultimately, this is, this is a kindness that I'm offering to you. I think I've had it with a few friends, where with most of my friends, they're cool with me pushing them on how they feel about stuff and challenging their feelings to the point where they become uncomfortable. With some they're not. And I think you and I both have friends who are in that position. I think so, in that context, if it's the sort of person who's not used to, and not comfortable with their feelings on something and stuff being challenged, they might think that no one should ever challenge people's feelings on anything. Unless, you know, they're an official therapist, and they've been paid to do so. Yeah, I'm not in that particular viewpoint. But I get that some people, some people are, and that's cool. What's your take on it?

Taimur

Yeah, I think people have different thresholds, like, I think I have a good sense for where you stand on this, and how, how, okay, you would be being like grilled on this. And obviously, like, you know, we record these podcasts beforehand, if we truly get into some weird territory that either of us doesn't want to put on the internet, obviously, we wouldn't put it on the internet, right? Like, we've definitely edited the as the things that the podcast before. Yeah, I think people have different thresholds. But in general, I, I'm starting, I'm starting to notice a bit of like, an over pathologizing of things when it comes to the realm of mental health. And I'm gonna have to caveat this by saying, look, I think mental health is very important. I think, you know, therapists are very useful. You know, I've had therapist in the past myself, like, absolutely nothing against that. But I do, I am starting to notice this, like, slightly dangerous discourse, where basically, the only way you can solve your problems is by going to a professional. And I think, you know, we'd be really missing out if trusted friends cannot, you know, don't feel like they can actually have these conversations with their friends. Like, that's really bad. You know, did you know what I mean?

Ali

Yes. 100%, I'm on board.

Taimur

I think there is a there is a general bias too far in the direction of like, Oh, you know, if you're not a qualified therapist, you know, Sheen doesn't push me on on stuff. you shouldn't try and like, have these conversations with your friends and stuff. You know, they need to get a therapist. Like, I think having to, you know, going too hard on that side of things is bad and weird. And I think in general, like, I feel like in general, I wish my friends would push me on more things. I get the sense that your friends don't particularly push you on a lot of things like they probably all just like take your stoicism bit at face value. Although actually like I didn't like Sheen said she doesn't really buy it. I don't know.

Ali

Yeah, don't push me on things. It takes a certain level of being a certain level of callousness almost to be comfortable with pushing someone to the point where their..

Taimur

Callousness is the wrong way to put. callousness is a very, is like, a misleading way to put it.

Ali

A certain sense of callousness somewhat. But you get what I'm saying?

Taimur

Sorry?

Ali

But you get what I'm getting at, like someone like Sheen, who's like very warm, very caring, very empathetic, is not going to be comfortable pushing someone to the point where they become uncomfortable and talking about something whereas you and I probably would be, and there is a difference there in terms of temperament and in terms of, I think, in terms of just being a general kind person, I don't think it's particularly kind to push someone beyond the point where they're comfortable. You and I still do it anyway, with the friends with with our friends who we know who we know can quote, take it. But if we were kinder, and if more if our operating maxim was more based around kindness, we probably wouldn't do that even with those friends.

Taimur

I don't know, dude, I think there's like short term kindness and long term kindness, I think. And I and I, and I think there's, there's like this narrative around. Yeah, there's like a weird narrative these days where making someone uncomfortable, is like the highest cardinal sin, right? And look in probably In the vast majority of instances, sorry? [...] And the vast majority of instances, it is not a good idea to make someone uncomfortable. I think the exceptions are when it's a group, you know, when it is among trusted friends, and I think it is, I think there is a duty among trusted friends to do that kind of thing to like, to help each other in that way, rather than sort of optimizing for short term kindness of like, you know, I'm just gonna, like, always be supportive or like, you know, whatever.

Ali

That's fine. I'm probably get on board with that. But you can see why people would label it as unkind or at least not as kind of someone who recognizes that, Oh, this is making this person uncomfortable. This is a public podcast recording, you know what, let's take a step back. And maybe we can talk about it of once, you know, in a few days time, like that, that would be another way to approach it. And you and I know that obviously, we can cut out whatever the hell we want from these podcast episodes. But people watching it might feel as if this is like, Oh, you know, was Ali really okay, with doing that? [...] Yes. Which is why it's on the internet. But I wouldn't put those those different points together and have all the context and then describe this as being hide.

Taimur

Yeah, but the point I wanted to make was this sort of strange bias towards like, only if you are a professional therapist, should you be having these conversations.

Ali

[...] Obviously.

Taimur

Yeah. Yeah, that was the main thing I wanted to [...]

Ali

Broadly agreed on that front. It's weird and stupid. With all the caveats that you mentioned earlier.

Taimur

Yeah. Yeah. So I thought that was basically another interesting angle of.

Ali

How do you feel about the fact that you were described as unkind by people on this thread?

Taimur

Sorry?

Ali

You heard me.

Taimur

I did actually hear you. Why did I say sorry?

Ali

You often do that. When I ask you an potentially uncomfortable question. For the last like, four weeks, you've done this where you said, sorry, and I've repeated myself, and [...] and call you out on it?

Taimur

Yeah, I think it's to buy thinking time. [...] Am I gonna answer truthfully or not? I was annoyed by that comment. I'll be honest, I was annoyed by that comment.

Ali

Yeah, annoyed because it fed into this narrative of only licensed professionals have any right to talk to someone about their feelings?

Taimur

Yeah, I thought it was inaccurate and stupid. And I was annoyed by it. If I'm honest with you.

Ali

Did you feel bad about? Did you feel bad about it? Did you feel a sense of oh, maybe these guys are right, maybe I shouldn't push [...].

Taimur

If I felt that I would have felt bad about it. But I felt annoyed about it. Yeah. All right. Maybe we should read a review.

Ali

Let's do it. You want to go for it? By the way, guys. If you're watching this on the YouTube, then you might want to subscribe to it on the Spotify or the iTunes or wherever you actually listen to podcasts. Because then you'll get the new episodes automatically downloaded straight to your phone, or feel free to subscribe to the channel on YouTube itself. And maybe the algorithm will notify you when there's a new episode. But hit that notification bell. That'd be the case regardless, or something. I'm now on day 11 of my freestyle rap challenge.

Taimur

Oh, yeah. How's it going? What's the challenge?

Ali

It's really fun. I had like two coaching sessions yesterday. It's good.

Taimur

Where does one find a freestyle rap coach?

Ali

So this is this company called Ultra Speaking was run by these two guys called Michael and Tristan, who I did a livestream with many months ago, a few months ago. And I've been doing one of their public speaking courses. And I mentioned to one of them that I wanted to learn freestyle rap. And he'd actually been doing freestyle rap for like eight years. So he was like, I would love to help you out and help you learn. And he's made some other guy who's like, professional freestyle rap coach, who runs a company called Flow Fam, where they help people get into flow. So he and I had a session yesterday to unlock our emotions and stuff and get into flow. And it was really good.

Taimur

Are there any sort of brief techniques you can describe for other budding freestyle, rappist, rappers? (laughs)

Ali

the main rule is that you're not allowed to stop, you have to just keep on going. And that's like, the single hardest thing because if for example, you were to try to freestyle rap right now. You'd feel a level an element of like self consciousness, and he would just kind of stop because he would. You're sort of cringe. Yeah, yeah. So you have to kind of get over your cringe response. The other thing you can absolutely do is called pattering, which is where you might be like, my name is Ali and I'm a freestyle rapper and better [...] attacker and [...] totally okay, we're doing that. Yeah. Which again, over the cringe response, and that doing that kind of thing helps you and in keeping the flow.

Taimur

Right, right, right. Yeah. That's a that's a great technique.

Ali

I'm glad you like it. Like the dream that I want to get to is where have you seen those freestyle rap performances where they asked the audience to throw out random words. Sringing together and like [...]

Taimur

Yeah, yeah.

Ali

So Michael and I were practicing some of that yesterday. There's this like, on their Ultra Speaking website. They've got the simulator. It's designed for public speaking. It's called Triple Step. Where it gives you a timer, and it gives you a speech title. Like, I don't know, what's in your refrigerator, and you have to make a speech. But then every sort of 10 seconds, a new word comes up, and you have to incorporate the word into your speech.

Taimur

Nice.

Ali

And there's another one called blind slideshow where you get a slide, you have to talk to give a speech about a topic, and you get random slides coming up with random images from Unsplash. And you have to incorporate those into your speech. So we were doing that yesterday with a freestyle rap but it's kind of build a story around it. And then you see an image of a guy with a bandana and you're like, and then my man's wearing a bandana and he's [...] he's a spanner and then one. Yeah, I just say that. I don't know. But I just gotta stay in the flow.

Taimur

Nice.

Ali

I'd like like, Michael is so so so sick. Like, there were just moments where it was just I was just like, How the hell did you do that? He was yeah, practice, man.

Taimur

Do you have to do with an American accent?

Ali

The only raps I've really heard are sort of, I think the American accent makes it easier to emphasize things. And in freestyle rap.

Taimur

It's more flowing in general.

Ali

It's yeah, but in freestyle rap is like the rhymes on real rhymes. It's like if I was rhyming, model three, like the only thing my rhyme has to rhyme with is the sound. [...]

Taimur

Okay. Yeah.

Ali

Probably, destiny, you know that kind of stuff. And that kind of stuff is much easier to emphasize in a sort of American style, where you can elongate hours and you boom, go wild.

Taimur

Yep, probably just sound stupid

Ali

You know, that guy? [...] whatever his name is.

Taimur

Munya Chawawa.

Ali

I sometimes try and wrap in his unknown. My name. And I'm unknown P and I've got my present and a can of B. Yeah. But it's a lot harder than because most of the stuff you hear is American. And so you find yourself imitating the American style.

Taimur

Yeah, fair. Okay, nice. That's pretty interesting. All right. Here's a review. This is entitled, The evolution of this podcast and why I love it from [...] in India. They say Taimur and Ali are amazing thinkers with interesting things going on in their lives. The last episode went really in depth with Tim was Causal spiel. But hey, I liked it. The podcast and its budding stage was really different, unique topics and a few book reviews added to the mix. Now it's more of behind the scenes of Ali's and Taim's life mixed with unique topics as before, which kind of bonds or YouTube audience in a bit more, I think I'd love to see a second episode with Sheen. Yeah, and there's a recommendation for another book. Cool. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks, [...] for the review.

Ali

That's very cool. All righty. What's happening with our community thing? Are we opening it up or what?

Taimur

Yeah, so I actually thought we'd closed off signups like, I don't know, a month ago or something. But there's actually no way for me to just close off new site. I mean, there's no easy way for me to close off new signups while also keeping the existing ones. And so signups have actually been open. And folks have actually just been signing up. And every day or two, I try and go through the new signups and add them to the slack group. So if you have signed up for the sort of the paid members community for Not Overthinking and you haven't received an invite to the slack group, then definitely drop me an email at hi@notoverthinking.com I got a few people have actually emailed in saying like, hey, man, I signed up like where's the invite? So sorry for the delay on some of those.

Ali

Definitely need an automated way of doing it.

Taimur

Yeah, we'll get it we're in the process of setting up like an automated email thing where you get an email with a sort of link and stuff. And yeah, we I mean, we have, we're doing sort of like a weekly-ish members of Zoom call, we have one in 55 minutes, we just kind of hang out. So we just start off by talking about the latest episode. I think there'll be lots of interesting stuff in the last one. So I'm really looking forward to this. And then you just end up chatting and, you know, people stick around for as long as they want. You know, I just stay for an hour or two. I think a couple of weeks ago, I left off for like a couple of hours or something. But like five hours later, a few people were still like hanging out and chatting. So that was pretty cool.

Ali

Nice. Cool. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time. That's it for this week. Thank you for listening.

Taimur

If you liked this episode, please leave us a review on Apple podcasts on the Apple podcast website. If you're not using an iPhone, there's a link in the show notes.

Ali

If you've got any thoughts on this episode, or any ideas for new podcast topics. We'd love to get an audio message from you with your conundrum question or just anything that we could discuss.

Taimur

Yeah, if you're up for having your voice played on the podcast and your question being the springboard for our discussion, email us an audio file mp3 or voice notes to hi@notoverthinking.com.

Ali

If you've got thoughts, but you'd rather not have your voice played publicly, that's fine as well tweet or DM us at @noverthinking on Twitter please.