Guide From The Perplexed
Episode 34: With Special Guest Dr. Joseph Hirsch: The Sci-Fi Path to Spirituality … and How to Find Your Spiritual Fuel.
SUMMARY:
On this episode, JD and Mordecai welcome special guest, Dr. Joseph Hirsch as they discuss his experience in the Orthodox community. The conversation touches on themes of self-acceptance, identity, and the relationship between religion and personal beliefs.
SUMMARY:
On this episode, JD and Mordecai welcome special guest, Dr. Joseph Hirsch as they discuss his experience in the Orthodox community. The conversation touches on themes of self-acceptance, identity, and the relationship between religion and personal beliefs.
All right. Good morning, everyone. Welcome back to the Guide From the Perplexed and also for the Perplexed, I think, got my co host and pal Morty, of course. And we have a special guest, my dear, dear friend, Dr. Joseph Hirsch, who is visiting me this week as well. And I've certainly wanted to have them on the, on our show for a while, and at the very least introduce Joey and Morty. Because I think we like to talk about and think about and are drawn to and inspired by and scared by a lot of a lot of similar things. So if nothing else has to be maybe a nice little like, you know, group therapy. Type call. So welcome, Joey and good morning, Morty.
Joseph Hirsch:Thank you so much. JD. Thank you, Morty. Thank you for inviting me to chat. I love talking. I love attention. So this is great.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, I we were talking about before we hit record a bit about AI. And I feel like this would be another sign of the differences between AI and humans is that I don't think I couldn't see two AI computers like just scheduling time to just talk about the meaning of life and spirituality and is there a God and free choice. It's like, you know, for what, you know, it's yes, I feel like this is also a celebration of our of our humanity. Yeah, through this conversation.
JD Stettin:Yeah, like you said earlier morning, one of her maybe defining human features and our stupidity, you know, to be, to be to be shared. So yeah, we were having a fun, wide ranging conversation earlier between AI and some sci fi authors and things that that bring us meaning and something. Joey said, that feels like a fun place to start from because it felt very alive. To me. It's about a particular short story by Ted Chang, that and I may be misquoting you, so you can please correct me, but it makes you feel closer to God and love God and maybe love yourself and love your husband better or more. So yeah, it's turn it over to you, Joey if you take us away?
Joseph Hirsch:Oh, yeah, I mean, I, I feel reluctant to talk about that story too much. I just think if you haven't read the Merchant and the Alchemist skate by Ted Chang, and you'd like to read, please go read it. If you don't like to read, you want someone else to read it to you. Oh my gosh. LeVar Burton has a podcast where he will read you the budget and the optimum escape. And he does a great job as always so but it's Yeah, I mean...
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. And maybe you can also join like talking about just your your path to Ted Chang so to speak, you know, and like this your, as far as like, just the idea of seeking things out that are more spiritual nature, having resonance with it, like what's kind of your, what was your Do you have an early memory of to think more, you know, then just, you know, your next math tests coming up or kind of, you know, just your we're just what's the what would you say like the beginning of your spiritual path that led you to lead you down that road?
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah. So when I was very young, I can't remember the exact order but I feel like, like, I was ambitious, but also very, like interested in esoterica. So I was like, I wanted to be like, a rabbi. Or maybe first I wanted to be a wizard. And then I found out that's not a real thing. So I was like, okay, then I want to be a rabbi. And I was kind of like, maybe I found out that's not very special or something. There's a lot of rabbis. And I was like, Okay, I'll just aim for like Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. And, you know, I found out you have to, like work really hard to do that. And also, even though it's like, very, I feel always attracted to sort of esoteric stuff. I somehow also have like a threat of practicality, like very famous person who wants some election has to pick you to be on that job. I was like, that's not going to happen for me. So, you know, kind of like shifted gears a few times over. I did a lot of reading when I was younger, and I found it very interesting and enlightening, and I think I was very lonely. So I think those things together kind of made me interested in or esoteric sort of things. Yeah, I mean, the like, the path to Ted Chang is a long and winding one. But the last few steps of it were that my advisor for my mathematics PhD thesis, just gave it to me at some I think we there we had it used to have a tradition before COVID like a bunch of us in grad school would meet every year to play games, like long board games for a week called a Games Week. If we didn't have ChatGPT, to name things for us back then, and, and yeah, jet John just gave it to me. One on one of the teams weeks and said I think like he was like this is a book for you. And he was so right. Yeah.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. Do you remember any early books that were that were particularly eye opening that you came across?
Joseph Hirsch:In my youth or before Ted Chaing youth?
Mordecai Rosenberg:Your youth?
Joseph Hirsch:I loved.. Yeah, Khalil Gibran. Yeah, I love that book, when I was in high school actually just ate that up. And I read a lot of science fiction and fantasy. And some of that stuff is so lyrical. And I was actually at my mom's house last week, and I was reading some of the old sci fi I had on a shelf and, you know, a lot of good and evil, which maybe doesn't resonate so much for me these days, but a lot of like, just lyrical seeking kind of, like, desire to understand mysterious world and I, you know, not too much visual descriptions, which is also Yeah, yeah. Well, I think all of that was part of it. For me.
Mordecai Rosenberg:I was not a big sci fi person, as a kid, you know, I tried to read it, but just never took, but like, I think even more to it over the last couple years still, rather lighten it, but like, Dune, I thought was, you mean, that's like, a rant that was like, wow, this is a spiritual work like this is, you know, there's a lot more than the surface, you know, of that story. I wonder about that drive, like, because it's interesting about science fiction and being drawn toward other worlds. And also, you've mentioned, like being lonely. I also, as a kid, I remember, like, just hearing about the occult, like, I remember, I don't know, third grade, getting some book about going into a bathroom, and like looking into the mirror, and like you could see on turning the lights off and just chanting something, and then you can maybe you'll see some other beings and like, there was just some idea of like, maybe there's another use, I think I probably was also, I wouldn't have described myself as lonely. But I just would have described myself as a loner, you know, but I wonder if there is something about that initial path, which is like, maybe there's like another world that I could escape to, like, maybe there's just more than this? I don't know. I mean, JT, what do you what do you think?
JD Stettin:Yeah, I wonder if whether we want to call it a loner, loneliness, or even simply time alone, allows for create space for this stuff to exist. And I'm thinking of it in so far as just the other week when I was in New York, we had a death in the family and I spent a week kind of embedded in family and culture and community. And I noticed in myself, as someone who hasn't lived in such a kind of close family, communal people all day life, and very, very long time, maybe ever in my adult life. I don't know. There wasn't, I didn't have very much time to think ponder things. It really felt like for the 12 or so hours a day I was among people, I was doing things and checking in and doing work and getting food and seeing people and emotional stuff. And then I would I would get home I was actually staying at Joey's Joey's mom's, I would get to her house at the end of a long day. You know, 930 10 o'clock, and I'd just be like, Man, I am ready for like some trash TV and sleep, you know, and wake up workout and start the day again. And in the week or so that I was there. There wasn't much for me spiritual philosophical, musing. There just wasn't room for existentialism to exist, if you will. So, so yeah, I do think and that resonates for me too. As a kid that when there's time or space or difference, I think it gives rise or time for the mind or space for the mind to wander they explore question and the shape or the direction that takes that's so interesting and feels like such a cool weirdo accident of whatever particular family culture, society history, you know, we we have like it's interesting that Joey kind of fell into sci fi maybe Mordy, you didn't I did and then didn't you know, and the influences around us the cultures the subcultures the community, that's what helps maybe give give features some features to that landscape that space that we have.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, did he you were too busy reading Jewish self-help books about what you have to know all the ways that you had to improve.
JD Stettin:Yeah, that's right. Those are my formative years that reading is reading master books. It's true that took up took up a lot of my, yeah, psychic, space and energy.
Joseph Hirsch:And I did think of a specific author that that I came to mind. And then I thought, Oh, I shouldn't say that. So I was like, Oh, I better say that. Yeah, I really loved Orson Scott Card growing up. I felt like really, like, kinship, like an understanding from this writer, all the look, not every character was my favorite, but they all it was just like a, like beautiful world building lots of love in lots of ways, and I guess the reason why I'm not supposed to say I like him is because I'm a an out gay man who's like, totally happy with my life. And he's a famous now I think for, you know, being against certain kinds of gay rights legally, or socially, or culturally, I don't really pay attention to people's mistakes all the time. But, but yeah, I feel like for some people that was like, Oh, he's done. But for me, I'm like, Oh, that explains a lot. Explains like, you know, like, we both were kind of, like interested in the same topics came to different conclusions. But you know, yeah, totally. Right. That Orson Scott Card, you also look him up as well. You wrote Ender's Game. Oh, Ender' Game. Okay. Yeah, so that book is fun. And it has two, like two branches of like sequels. And the sequels that came from Ender's Game that are like, geopolitical, those are still fun, but there's one, the branch starting with Speaker for the Dead. That was very spiritually, formative. For me, I think, the idea that like, rather than speaking well of people who die, you speak truthfully. And like, if you speak truthfully enough, it will be loving whether or not you mentioned all of the violence or all of the horrible and the good. And, you know, it's like to Yeah, and so it's like a, that was very formative for me for sure.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. And Joey, where did you go to high school?
Joseph Hirsch:I went to the Drs. Shiva High School for Boys. A branch of help the Hebrew Academy of Long Beach.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah,
Joseph Hirsch:That's Jewish.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, totally. Yeah. So the Yeah, so similar backgrounds as JD and me.
Joseph Hirsch:l've heard in fact that we I might have heard about him before. I had friends who went to me who were at how to switch to MTA. So
Mordecai Rosenberg:yeah. Did you enjoy Marsac cola.
Joseph Hirsch:At the time, I loved it. The first summer, I really loved it. I was like, becoming very, I was like, sort of becoming really fundamentalist in a lot of ways. And it was like a really good outlet for me. And then the second summer, I was like, sort of coming off of that fundamentalist journey, but I had a big crush on someone in the Kola. So it was still fun. Yeah.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. Yeah. That must have been scandalous.
Joseph Hirsch:I think I think it might have been for other people, I didn't really notice. Like, I just really liked him. And I thought that was like, you know, we didn't do anything that wasn't allowed. So I was like, This surely surely isn't gonna bother anybody. But yeah, maybe other people know this.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. I'm curious, like, in terms of your, your path of your coming out, like in the Orthodox community, you know, now, however, many years later, I guess. I mean, 20, 25, however, many years later, you know, now, it's something that the Orthodox community has to contend with, right? And it's, you know, and it's, you know, my, for my kids who all go to orthodox schools, like, sexuality is just, it just doesn't matter to them. Right. It's just every, you know, every people are more open. Right. But when you were in, in high school, or in college, like it was, it was not the same kind of environment. Yeah. And I'm curious like, you went to an orthodox school orthodox camps, where, in theory, like that was supposed to be like, do you think religious means spiritual, which you realize at some point is not the same thing. But is there a part of is there is there any time where you're like, you know, what the hell with this, like, I'm just gonna forget all of this is like, you know, that tradition and this whole path of, of religion and spirituality is not accepting of me. And so, like, I'm just not gonna I'm just gonna drop that hole. You know? Whole pursuit.
Joseph Hirsch:So I would like to get to your to the like question at the end, but a lot of what you said, leading up to it, like, wrap things up for me. So I'll start with some of that, like, you mentioned college and high school. But I'll say that, you know, I, I realized that I was gay when I was 13, or 14. But it's clear to me that there were lots of things that were going on in my life before then, that were related to the thing I think of as my gay identity. But then I had like, creat like, really like a strong mental wedge driven between, like, those things that I was doing or experiencing and my awareness of or my conscious identity of myself. And in particular, the loneliness we talked about, I think is related just because, again, I was a child, I don't have the most reliable memory, even among humans, you know. But my memories are that like, I would change best friends once or once every year or every two years. And that usually what would happen is like parents would meet me realize that the seven year old is a little weird, or a little gay or a little strange. And like, you know, at some point, bribe, their child should not not be my friend anymore. And so it was like, kind of like a, you know, it impacted my life. Well, before I understood anything about sexuality or, you know, that these things, you know, like people would call me like mean names in elementary school, some had to do with the color of my skin. Some were like, words related. I think at the time, Gaylord was like a slur people were using, and like, to me, it was just a slur with no meaning that and I was like, oh, yeah, people say mean things to me all the time. Like, whatever reminds me of that joke from, JD I forget which, which of those shows it was from, but he's like, why can't I come out? Like, you know, like, I telling my dad, I'm gay by driving past him and shouting out the car window, like everybody does to me, you know? And, yeah, like, so? Yeah. Yeah. So I think I really didn't understand much. But my life was deeply impacted by a lot of these questions before I even knew it. And it by the time I was, like, 13, or 14, I had, I think the internet was like, a reliable place to find pornography. And I was, I had, like, found my way to pornography, like by someone showing me some like pictures of naked women in person once and then I went online and like, searched for that. And I was like, this is pretty good, like looking at these pictures. And then there was like, an ad, on the right hand side that was just like, a torso, a man's torso with like, white underwear, and it was wet. And you could see like, the outline of his penis, and I was like, looked at that look back at the, like, the little JPEGs that were like populating the screen on the left and back at the ad. I was like, Yeah, okay, I clicked on that. But even then, I didn't, didn't connect what the slurs people were saying to me. And this behavior until many, many months later, when I was like, Oh, I am gay. Like, if like there was this kind of like, this dividing wall that broke and suddenly like, like, all these experiences made sense, somehow. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, but actually, like, I feel very grateful. I didn't experience self hatred for for being gay, I think ever. I, it was like, you know, I was pretty clear. From early on, like, I think I didn't mention this, but my mother's take money. And so I think her she's very religious. And her connection to religion is not very hallafa, although she follows along very closely. And she's sincere and pious in that way. But I think her she just has some, I don't know, to call them vibes, you know, some, like spiritual vibes that came from her mom, and the way that they raised, you know, and so, like, she was like, you know, we always had some capitalist or other coming and going from the house and things like that. And she was very, like, so I think of my mom is a source of my own sense of some of these, you know, searchings but so.
Mordecai Rosenberg:When, when did you come out publicly? So you realize that at 13, 14, but when When did you come out more publicly?
Joseph Hirsch:You know, I don't know if I ever did a big, you know, like, Here I am, like, yeah, I don't know, I'm very dramatic, but like, I have to do in my own way. I guess. I even in college, like I was very, it probably doesn't didn't look like this to my siblings at the time. I don't know what they perceive. So I'm sure I created havoc for everybody. But for myself, I was very sensitive to the idea that I was at Queen's College, and that there were lots of Jewish people there who knew me and who knew my family and like if I did anything that it would be found out or that it would be hard for my sister to find a (in Hebrew) or this or that, or, I'm not saying that I did like actually do a good job of like protecting them from whatever reputation I developed. But it did weigh on me. And I think all through my college years like I was, and I, you know, I was very, like, stone face, like no personality or not no personality, but no sexuality. No, like I don't, I think I had like, like a couple of very small sexual experiences right after high school, and then nothing until after college. Just sort of like, I just worked all the time. And that was all I did. And it was fun, and I loved it. But I was like, very much like, restrained. And after college, I, I started teaching at the university and going to grad school. And that's sort of even then, like, in the school, like, I remember my friends who I went to Games Week with. You know, I remember they told me afterwards, they were like, Yeah, we thought you were really boring and kind of, like, annoying when we first met you. Because I was just like, oh, just be like, a blank nothing all the time. Until, like, I was felt it just like took a while to like, erode some of those defenses. But I never like, you know, took a hammer to them or like, came out of the closet of sort of, like, you know, I got comfortable. And even now, when I teach, I have to, like I started teaching again recently, for the first time in a while, and some of these habits are still there. This like, you know, I don't mention, I talked about my spouse, I don't call him my husband in my classroom. And I just noticed that I'm like, Oh, that's interesting. I'm sure everybody in the room knows I'm gay. It's like, it's pretty obvious.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. Yeah. Well, that must have been really, I mean, just hearing your stories about when you were seven and eight and just having to, like, switch best friends every year. Like, it's got to be like, that must have been very, it's like, hard to hear. Yeah. The must have been very painful to go through that.
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah, I think I think it was very painful and destabilizing, and I think like, emotionally and like mentally disturbed me. Like, you know, I think I carried a lot of those a lot of the consequences of that for many years, and I still carry them, but they're, they're a lot less heavy now.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Kids are such assholes, but like, parents are also such assholes. Sometimes.
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah, they're just kids with the cars.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. So your mother is T money, right? Very spiritual. And I guess, as far as how your sexuality played his perspective on Judaism, Orthodox Judaism. Yes. So it sounds like she had this spiritual thread, which was, which was independent of, like, the strict legal observance. Wasn't observance of it. And so is that what allowed for more durability and in the connection, or is it or was it challenged? You know, was it like, Alright, these people are really not my people. Because, you know, they're not accepting and so, I'm gonna...
Joseph Hirsch:No. Yeah, yeah. So I remember reading so so my, my fundamentalist phase that I mentioned, actually came after my realization that I was gay. Yeah, I remember reading these, like this Chu was from I think, were Moshe Feinstein might have been somebody else, but I'm pretty sure it was Moshe Feinstein, somebody asks him about, like, something to do with gay people. And I think I might be conflating this with another tool that I hold on to, but I remember basically, the, the premise of the response was, that there's no such thing as a gay person and halacha. And it wasn't, it wasn't an in this article, at least it what didn't wasn't framed as like an attack or, like, you know, I've heard that phrase that there's no such thing as a blank is like, usually it's like a preface to some physical violence. But it wasn't, didn't read like that, to me read like, really just academic. Like, we have Kohana. And we have, you know, this other these other classes of characters and Holika. But there's no such thing as a thief. There's no like, Thief, class and Allah. It's like, there's, you're not supposed to steal, and sometimes people steal. And so like, in this<Hebrew>, I was like, okay, one of the sins is you're not supposed to do this sexual act. Sometimes people do that. But we don't, in halacha have like this class character called gay person who is a sinful person. It was like, there's a commandment. If there was no desire to do it, God wouldn't have mentioned it. So you know, some people have this desire, you don't do it, it's fine. And so like, that was sort of my approach. I like I didn't have this sort of self hatred that a lot of people report after the fact I was kind of like, this is your problem. God's pretty clear about how this goes.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah,
Joseph Hirsch:I was like totally like content to just like never ever satisfy my sexual or romantic desires for the rest of my life in service God. And even after I stopped being religious, I was in my mom actually got me this gift. Well, she doesn't know that story. I think if she knew she would feel bad. I don't think there's a reason for it, but she's good at That so but she, she got me this gift to like, visit my friends in Israel and I think she thought that would like, right all of my friends went to Israel for the for the year after high school and I did not the last minute like a very last minute decision. I was like, oh my god, I can't do this. Like it was sort of like for me not being religious was part of a mental breakdown or identity breakdown. And it was like, we found Queens College. Thank goodness, they accepted me last minute. And so I didn't go to Israel, but she bought me this like, okay, winter vacation trip to Israel was a great time, I saw a lot of my friends, I had a beautiful visit. But I also picked up a book on Bible criticism. It was the first I had taken a class I think in ancient Jewish history maybe and I so I learned about the context of the time. And it was the first time I'd ever encountered like a version of ancient Jewish history that was not like a five year olds reading level story of like geopolitics. You know, like, I think a lot of the tunap stories when I read them, or when I read them, and I'm like, it's like, oh, and then there was a war. And then God came and did this and that and like the woman who taught our class actually, Professor Karl Bosch, I think she's quite famous. And she's actually a very orthodox Jewish woman. And, um, for her, she was like, very academic very, like, good at explaining real geopolitical, like, what was going on at the time and how we know and evidence and you know, comparing it to the Bible, and, like, just one of the best professors I've ever had. And, and for her all that stuff was like part of her belief in God. And for me, it was like the first time I'd ever heard anything that resembled like a scientific kind of explanation for these books that I read or been told about and so it was like that was like an opening for me but then reading some biblical criticism I just remember like, you know, being skeptical, skeptical, skeptical and then suddenly just being like, Oh my God, this feels true. And then the next thought was like, oh my god, I can love a man and like, again, another like wall that had been up for years is like, had been like broken in my mind.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Wow. JD?
JD Stettin:Yeah. It's something that when I was getting back in New York, the other week, I saw an old friend from high school, who similarly is no longer part of the community but was never quite on the Tom Woods scholar rabbinic track that I think all three of us at some point, we're very much riding, riding a train in that in that direction.
Mordecai Rosenberg:I'm still on the track.
JD Stettin:Yeah, Mordy, Mordy, took the slow train to get there.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Exactly. The caboose.
JD Stettin:And something this friend said to me, and he actually just finished his social work degree and is now practicing therapist. And so it's gone through kind of a different level of education and inquiry is he's like, you know, we all whatever, we left the community and obviously, you know, changes challenges, excitement, that's part of that, but something he said, he's like, but I never really thought about what it was like for you or guys like you who were really like, had this like budding young Talmud prodigy, you know, rabbinic aspiration, community leader and, and what that journey was like, personally, and also feelings of maybe some of the weight and responsibility of of your family, or of your community, and all these hopes that people pinned on you. And I think all three of us, I believe, are first born and firstborn sons. So add that to the psychological soup that we're stirring up. And, and he's like, I just, I wonder is like now as an adult, and I was with you through all this. But like, I wonder looking back, like, what was that? Like? What was that experience of feeling like? You were again, you had this communal role, right? We all went to moco. We were sent or seen as something and I was having a conversation earlier this week with Theravada, Buddhist monk from Sri Lanka, who was his, you know, as one as one does?
Mordecai Rosenberg:I mean, on Monday, it was Monday.
JD Stettin:So it's right. I think it was it was a, it was a Monday, and he was explaining that. For him. He at the age of like five or six had this like spiritual calling. And interestingly, I think his mother is, I don't remember who said Catholic, but certainly Christian, his father was Buddhist. And at first they just, you know, whatever is a kid and he was their only son at the time, so absolutely not. They didn't want to lose him to the to the monkhood. And then his baby brother was born and that opened up some space and then in his mid teens, yeah, right exactly right. We have one whatever go do. And, and as a team he like He started running away and threatening all this stuff to, you know, to get them to let him go to the monastery. And finally his parents agreed. And his father explained that his misgivings were around the fact that had his son gone to the monastery and then at some point disrobed, as you know, some people do is very difficult or particular life path. There's great shame that's brought upon the family, and he didn't want his son to become a monk, not because he thought his son would be a successful monk and stay, but because he was afraid that if his son disrobed, the dishonor that would bring upon the family, so when he finally gave His Son permission, because you do have to sign something, legally, I think it sounds like to give your child over to a monastery, your minor over to monastery, his father said, Okay, you do this, but you can never come home again. You leave the monastery, don't don't come here. And of course, to the young, you know, Monk, wannabe, he's like, great. Like, that's, that's exactly what I'm looking for. But just Yeah, hearing that, that story, after my friend asked me this question, I just felt like, oh, I mean, maybe not in so much formality. But in a sense, and at different times in our lives, of course, but to me, it felt like a very familiar experience or story in a certain way. So I just wanted to sort of share that with you too. And I'm curious what your experiences were around that, and what that maybe brings up for you guys.
Mordecai Rosenberg:And just to kind of like, flesh that out a little bit. Sure. I think what I'm yet hearing it more as you're, as you're talking, but framing there's a you can be just right, you can be a let's say, an average student, right? You can be a B student and be in like, your regular classes and not honors classes, right? And then, you know, if you are just a B student, or you end up being like a system, it's like, okay, whatever, it's fine, right? But if you select the honors track, you say, Alright, I'm going to go for honors. And now I'm going to take those higher classes, and I'm going to take the AP classes, right, and then all of a sudden, senior year, you're like, Okay, you know, what, forget this, I'm going back to like, you know, the lower track, that's already a, that's a statement, because you've you've you've, you've created a path where now the expectations are, that you would maintain and now it becomes a thing for you not to do it. Right. So like, with, I think, the path that maybe the three of us took you know, is, and by the way, I still am, like absorbing so I'm not like a you know, so I haven't like, you know, tossed everything like you like like you shake it says, you know, getting but it's it's Yeah, but it is still there is I remember, like, you know, I did put on a black hat at some point, like my third year in Israel, because I couldn't just stay for two years, I'd stay for three, and then I do come back and do another half half a year. Right? And when and then once you decide to put on at Black Hat, when you're when you take it off now at the statement, right? Whereas if you never put it on, no one, no one cares, right? So is that kind of JD, what you're seeing as far as like just this idea of like, you've all kind of hitched your wagon or your hunger out, like at a height at a different level where now there's higher expectations of you and becomes more significant for you to step off of that. Is that that?
JD Stettin:Yeah, I think so. And I think especially because of the overall communal and familial implications of those choices, too, and I think your metaphor with like, honors track is, is apt, but I think also, maybe feeling or noticing and trying to communicate to our listeners is, for me, it felt certainly like a step beyond, you know, maybe honors or academic success or being recognized for certain intellectual prowess. It was also sort of a moral spiritual, like, human quality badge of honor almost. And, and because it was so maybe unexpected at such a young age to, you know, like, like this monk to volunteer for sort of the priesthood or the monkhood or the rabbinic path. Like what? How many I mean, I guess we know the answer. They were like What 40 moko boys in a community of like, 5000 I don't know 5000 high school you Shiva modern, or whatever, like, who sells selects to go for your summer break after doing a year of like intense dual curriculum stuff to spend, you know, 12,13 hours, 14 hours a day in in prayer, and study, and it means that you know, the three of us
Mordecai Rosenberg:Total losers.
JD Stettin:And, and I certainly remember the kind of communal and grandparent level like pride and hopes that felt like they were pinned on my chest as I continued down this path and to your point, had we not gone down that path or I've not gone down that path, I don't know that there would have been that expectation that would have been fine. And I think we all have friends and classmates who were, you know, live more normal kind of high school boy lives and then maybe went to Israel and became very alert at some point, etc. But I think we were sort of among the the Vanguard for our age group in this serious, responsible spiritual movement. And so yeah, being public about that being acknowledged for that being recognized for that and then you know, getting various points for each of us, dropping it or letting go of it and moving off of it. You know, there was the internal what does that do for me? qualm? My, my view on the world? Or how do I see life but also like, whoa, what does it feel like to maybe brought shame to myself or my family or my community tough to have disrobed? At this early age?
Joseph Hirsch:I feel curious. Were you ever too from for your families or anything like that? It was it only pride? Or was there also like, Okay, can you? Can you like, hit the brakes? A little like?
JD Stettin:Yes, love that question. Absolutely. I remember my my buddy who came from like a super clarity Lubavitch background, was very was deeply proud. And she would always joke about me, but so they after the war went to Montreal, and I don't know why this happened in some cities in the new world, and not but Montreal had like a Chief Rabbi for a period of years, kind of like the State of Israel does. I don't know that other places, but she her jokes. And he's the new Chief Rabbi of New York. So she was very proud of this. But at the same time, she'd always say, just whatever you do, don't be too <Hebrew> Like, go down this path. But like don't don't be too extreme to to keetsa No need to fundamental in a certain ways. I think she she saw that or had qualms about it. And certainly my mother definitely tried to pump the brakes, or have me pumped the breaks wherever possible. I wanted to go to a much more orthodox, yeshiva High School. I don't even remember the name of it, but like truly kind of hardline and she was just like, Absolutely not, you know, not not in my house. So yeah, there was, there was definitely a little bit of that too, at times.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, I don't remember my parents pumping the brakes. So much. I certainly my mother was like, very proud. And my father, I think, was more just like, Alright, let's see how this all played out. But my siblings, definitely. Because I'm not because my mindset yet was like, Well, I'm gonna suffer through this, like, you guys need to like suffer also. Like, like, like Shabbat afternoon? Yeah, they would want to go to their friends and like, change it to shorts of like, No, you can't wear shorts on on shot, it's like you have two shots close. So guess what they would do is they would like drop their clothes out the window in the back of the house. And then they'd go out like the front door, like in in nicer clothes, and then they would change backwards where they go to their friends. So I was like, Yeah, I would, I would have said that. Like, no, this is like the right thing. And, you know, it's just a little too militant. I think for you know, for my siblings liking.
JD Stettin:I hear that and I feel like that's probably true for my sister, as well.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah.
JD Stettin:I Yeah. Like, I remember that.
Joseph Hirsch:I also feel compelled to share, like, you know, just from that time, like, the things that loomed large in my life, where like, a lot of is like a shutaura, kind of like, you know, like, oh, people who don't want to be religious anymore just being like, bribed by, you know, the ease of a new life or something. And I remember the first time I was McAuliffe Shabbos I like deliberately went to a room where the light was on, I turned it off, and I turned it back on and I that was it. I just like, you know, just to like get no benefit but to like, you know, stand in box with a God that I apparently didn't believe in at the time.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah.
JD Stettin:So, I was just gonna ask about that for you. Joey that experience because I also, I think remember that, that thread that line of thinking that like, oh, you know, you were giving we're giving up we could we couldn't couldn't hang anymore and it was just so much easier to be secular on affiliated and that was not my experience for the first For many years, or even now, I don't think the life I lead is like easier. It's just, it's just different. It's just different. And I'm curious.
Joseph Hirsch:I'm still good at making suffer for sure.
JD Stettin:Yeah totally, in different ways, Yeah.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, different ways. Yeah. Yeah, I was still still hooked on, on on, you're saying that you never felt like the self hatred about sexuality is like, well, what gives you the exception?
Joseph Hirsch:No, I hate myself for other reasons. Yeah. Yeah, that's yeah, no, definitely like, for many years, like, I, I feel very grateful to Tara brach for, like, showing me the door to like, maybe you don't have to hate yourself, you know, but like, but still like, but not for that. I was just like, I don't know. I mean, I didn't do this like, yeah, like, that seemed clear to me. I don't know. I don't know why, but I feel grateful. Yeah, I mean, you know, like, that feels like a real kind of poison. I mean, maybe I got enough hatred from other people for it. I did have a lot of, you know, I've always had, like, get a little bit brave in the face of like, overwhelming authority. So you know, like, you know, like, my mom tried to help me have friends. She like got, you know, my, she wanted that she wanted to give me like a Tom would tutor because like everyone studied Kimora with their dads and like, my dad didn't grow up from it all. And so he couldn't help with Kamara. And so she was like, Well, I don't want you to fall behind. So she did that. But she also tried to get me like a baseball coach, so I could learn to play baseball, she that if I was good at it, I would want to play and I was like, this game is stupid. I'd rather have no friends when I was like six. So.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, yeah.
Joseph Hirsch:I mean, I think she's she tells that story that I literally said to her mom, I would rather have no friends.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, yeah.
Joseph Hirsch:And I got what I wanted!
Mordecai Rosenberg:Overrated, you know, overrated, yet? You mentioned Tara Brach. And her opening your eyes to the idea that like maybe you don't have to hate yourself. Yeah, I am actually. Just, I listened to radical acceptance recently. And now I'm halfway through reading it. Yeah, I'd like someone to just kind of see it inside. It hasn't been incredible. But what? As far as you know, what you? What was the door that you took from from her? To get that idea? And maybe you don't have to hate yourself?
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah, yeah. So I feel like I experienced a lot of great changes in my life, as like, you know, mental or identity breakdowns that are like painful and difficult. And so one was the end of high school when I was like, not like going from very religious kind of fundamentalist perspective of the world to something else, or I didn't have the something else. Maybe that's what was hard. And another was like, when I left my career in academia, in around 2016, I finished a postdoc where I was like, depressed and anxious and stressed all the time. And my response to that was to do nothing for three years. So I pretend like I say it now as if I had an option to continue. But like, you know, you can't get hired if you've done nothing for three years in a in a post, you know, very nice cushy postdoc. So I guess that's, I mean, anyway, so but at that time, I was very, like I said, anxious, depressed. I mean, I was seeing a therapist twice a week. And God bless her, I look back at myself, and I'm like, I would not have wanted to sit with me twice a week. And, and sometimes I wonder if she did, but she did. You know, like, it was like, one of the first times I felt like I wasn't my therapists favorite patient. I was kind of like a burden. But she was a burden she bore and it was very kind of generous of her. And I might have even started psychiatric medication for the first time, but then not the first time, but for the first time by choice then. And I was very resistant for a long time. And so but I was just like, in a really desperate place, like just desperate enough to try medication, which I had like a strong bias against and desperate enough to maybe like, listen to Tara Brach. And there's an episode I still remember the title healing self doubt. And she just talks about like, basically, everything I was experiencing, just like using all of your powers, to just protect, you know, to like, protect yourself like spacesuit. Right, that spacesuit identity. And she was like, and it's great, you know, but and she just kind of like basically she just said all the things I was feeling and experiencing in my daily life that I didn't feel connected to anything or anyone and I relied solely on achievement and power to like, the things that drove me forward and, and and I just, it was just like a very gentle invitation to be like You know, like, Yeah, you don't have to live that way. And I was like, Okay. I'm game. Let's see what else is there? Yeah, so chase that down.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. So how do you chase that? What have you found to be was helpful in in kind of exiting stage left off on that?
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah, so A lot of help. A lot of like, help from other people from, you know, maybe. Yeah, I mean, I'm reminded of something Alan Watts says, where he like talks about people who are trying to like steer their lives. But like, he's like talking about like steering a car in a parking lot with motor off. You know, he's like, you know, and his metaphor is about love. He's like, people think that there's friend love and lust and all these different cutten, like, the love of a game and the love, but he's like, it's all the same thing. And he's like, whatever you love, even if you think it's bad, if you love it, go there. But do that. And he's like, you know, once the gas is going and the car is moving, you can turn the wheel. And I found that to be just like, really true. And but it requires, like, the thing that we're looking for already, which is like, like, the reason why your foots on the brake is because you hate your you hate something you hate the direction you hate. Or you don't want that car to move. You think, you know, you think that any further is too far. And I was like, alright, well, you know, go that direction.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. Sometimes we think we doubt our ability for Do I even have any gas to give? How do you find that gas? Like, what's the CRM you will love? But I don't know, what do I, you know, what do I love? How do you how do you find the gas?
Joseph Hirsch:So this is not therapeutic advice for any listeners out there. But I would say like, if you have an addiction to something that comes from something good. Maybe it's maybe it's not good for you, in some ways, maybe it's not good for anybody else in your life in a lot of ways. Like even if it's heroin, like, Okay, you love heroin? I don't know. Like, I'm not, I'm not that kind of doctor. I'm not telling you. You know what to do. But I do think that there's, whoever you are, whatever you're doing. Yeah, maybe I'll say it in a way that's more limited. In my experience, everyone I've met, has something that they love. And they might hate themselves for loving it. But there's, there's something there and just just love that. Just one last line rom das says this, too. He always talks about this cycle of shame and addiction, right? Like you have this thing, you're resisting it. You're super spiritual, you don't want it to go there. And then you go there, and then you hate yourself. And he's like, Okay, well, what if you go there, and then you do your spiritual work? You're like, Oh, you're addicted to this drug? And you're trying not to take it and then you took it. Okay, but now can you meditate now? Can you notice? Are you happier now? Like, is your life okay? Is there anything you can do that, you know, is good and kind loving with? Okay, so So you did some heroin and now you're kind and loving? Alright. Like, way better than doing the heroin and hating yourself? You know, and then turn the wheel.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Right. So, surely not recommending that people continue to do heroin?
Joseph Hirsch:Well, you know, I'll take responsibility for that.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah.
JD Stettin:Because there's not that kind of a doctor, but that those Alan Watson rom does your thoughts to remind me of course, the famous, you know, Mary Oliver, wild geese, you do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for 100 miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Not really as maybe that's not the end point. But maybe again, in the spirit of these lines and thinking as Joe was sharing that that's it's a place to start, start there. You love something, let the love be and see maybe if that can help or carry you or ignite you or light your fire, start your car, whatever it is.
Mordecai Rosenberg:I think also what's interesting to Tara Brach, I think also is to realize like we're like what's underneath that drive? Right? Do you feel like this addiction? Where's that coming from? What do you desire? Like it's because like you're desiring something, right? Your heart is desiring something. Yeah. And I recently read this in one of Ruth cooks. essays. He says that the the quest for the nearness of God is the essence, the nature, the basis of the existence of the psyche. We experienced the mind is diverse expressions with many endless inclinations yearnings and aspirations under one umbrella, you know, plays some role in life, but life itself all life, the essence of life is this and nothing else. And there cannot be anything else, only the foundation, which is the aspiration for the nearness of God.Right. And so, it's like what I find is like when you're when you actually probe deeply, and you keep going deeper and deeper, and it's like, what are you actually seeking it to realize that there is this idea? I mean, Tara brach says that it's, I don't know if it was her, or it was on an interview with Harris Danna, one of the houses, so that at the end, that what we really want is just love and peace. Yeah, that's when it comes when it comes down to it. But I feel like there's actually something underneath it, which is this, this desire for connection with something greater, you know, maybe kind of coming full circle two, you know, even your job, your initial interest in sci fi, right, there was this, there was something there, there was something that was pulling you. Right? And just, I wonder if you can find gas and just feeling that that bull opens your eyes to like, well, where where else? Do I feel that poll? Like where is where? Maybe it gives you that sensitivity to other sources of gas for you?
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah, totally. I don't I mean, like, I, I feel very ignorant about the ways that I got here. I feel mostly, like if people ask me, like, you know, when I talk about mental illness or talking about like, these other things, it's like, mostly, I'm just like, people gave me more chances than I deserved. And I got very lucky a lot of times. And so yeah, I mean, I don't that strategy sounds sounds good. I can't say that. I've, I can't say that I've done that deliberately, you know, like, it feels like that practice sounds sounds familiar, but I'm not so not so disciplined in that way.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah, well, I mean, we're all kind of playing with barely training wheels, you guys are probably more advanced than, than I am in your, in your year pass.
Joseph Hirsch:But maybe we do more heroin.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Maybe more herroin, or, or less kosher? Yeah. But it's, it's nice to expand our little Sangha, as they say, spiritual group, you know, yeah, we both come from from similar origins. You know, in some ways, in terms of it, you know, there were the community settings, but I think it's amazing to just see the different paths that you can go on and still find your way towards that same desire or path of just I don't know, moving with God, you're trying to move towards towards God and, or whatever you want to call it. Yeah. So it's a beautiful thing.
JD Stettin:Yeah. Well, Joey, thanks so much for spending the morning with us. It was really, really fun to like Marty said expand our Sangha or satsang or community that includes you, you've always been a part of it for me, but it's nice to bring us all together in the same space and, and share some of that space in this morning.
Joseph Hirsch:Totally. And I think that's Mordy I think that's how one of those stories we mentioned earlier ends with like, sort of, like, well, what can we do but, you know, feel close to God and wonder, right? They're just like, yeah,
Mordecai Rosenberg:yeah, that's that's, you know, at the end of Ecclesiastes, right? Go holla at where you're at, where it starts by saying, right, <Hebrew> is nothing is everything is worthless, right. And at the end, Solomon says, well, sift of our accomplishments are at the end of the day by Atilla Kim Tierra right that just just which is understood it as dear God, but it also means that word also means like to see God. Yeah. And so I like to think of it as like I think they just like open your eyes and see God everywhere. Just keep you know, just just just keep playing or just live and and notice, you know, what else what else can you do?
JD Stettin:love so much.
Joseph Hirsch:Yeah, had a great yeah, this is awesome.
Mordecai Rosenberg:All right. Well, we'll do it again.
JD Stettin:Same. Thank you.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Yeah. Thanks for coming on, as I guess it was great to great to hang with you and hopefully we'll be able to do it again. We'll do it in person one day.
Joseph Hirsch:One day.
Mordecai Rosenberg:Awesome.
JD Stettin:Great. Stay perplexed everyone. We will see you next week. Take care