Relief Project #8: Blair Hodges

Summary

Conspirituality Podcast Episode Summary

Title: Relief Project #8: Blair Hodges
Hosts/Authors: Derek Beres, Matthew Rebsky, Julian Walker
Release Date: February 18, 2025

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Introduction

In this episode of Conspirituality, host Matthew Rebsky engages in a profound conversation with Blair Hodges, a recurring guest known for his insightful perspectives on dismantling New Age cults and conspiracy-driven ideologies. The discussion delves into Blair's personal journey from his Mormon upbringing to his current endeavors in community building and social justice. Recorded before a significant election, the episode captures Blair's fears, hopes, and strategies for fostering resilient communities in turbulent times.

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1. Personal Fears in Contemporary Times

The conversation kicks off with Blair addressing his deepest fears in the current sociopolitical climate.

• Election Concerns: Blair expresses anxiety about the impending presidential election, emphasizing the potential catastrophic impact of a particular administration.

  Blair Hodges [04:05]: "Immediate policies that pertain to me are things like regarding trans issues, trans rights, ongoing racism in America and how to reckon with that..."

• Trans Rights and Racism: He highlights fears surrounding the erosion of trans rights and the persistent racism in predominantly white communities like Utah.

  Blair Hodges [04:49]: "We're seeing an uptick in legislation and attacks on gender non-conforming people. And it's really scary."

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2. Sources of Wisdom and Relief

Blair shares the foundational principles that anchor him amidst chaos, drawing from his Mormon background.

• The Four Rs of Repentance: Recognition, Remorse, Restitution, and Renewal serve as a framework for personal and societal transformation.

  Blair Hodges [05:50]: "Recognition, remorse, restitution, and renewal... It's been a really helpful concept to think about."

• Evolving Understanding: Initially, Blair applied repentance to personal misdemeanors but has since expanded its scope to address systemic injustices.

  Blair Hodges [07:01]: "I didn't have much in the way of forcing a recognition of that fact... It brings recognition to me that there are these other perspectives..."

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3. Overcoming Obstacles to Community Building

The dialogue shifts to the challenges Blair faces in fostering community relationships.

• Time Constraints: Balancing a 40-hour workweek, parenting, and other responsibilities makes community engagement daunting.

  Blair Hodges [11:04]: "It really boils down to time. We have kids and we're both working. ... There's just so many hours in the day."

• Post-Pandemic Disconnection: The aftermath of COVID-19 has led to the weakening of previously strong community ties.

  Blair Hodges [11:54]: "Coming out of COVID when things got so disconnected for so many people... those connections atrophied."

• Strategies for Engagement: Blair advocates for starting small with manageable volunteer opportunities and strengthening immediate family bonds.

  Blair Hodges [12:18]: "Find an easy volunteer opportunity... Spend more time with the kids or get away from social media more often."

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4. Guiding Children Through Climate Anxiety

Blair offers a compassionate approach to comforting children distressed by climate change fears.

• Active Listening: He emphasizes the importance of allowing children to voice their fears and validating their emotions.

  Blair Hodges [15:31]: "The first thing I would do is ask them what they think about it and really plug into what they're saying."

• Empowering Solutions: Encouraging children to participate in actionable steps fosters a sense of control and agency.

  Blair Hodges [16:19]: "What can we do, my little friend? What's within our power that we can do now?"

• Balancing Hope and Realism: Blair navigates the delicate balance between offering hope through individual actions and educating children about broader systemic issues.

  Blair Hodges [18:10]: "We can only do so much... we're engaged civically. That's why we vote."

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5. Wisdom from Ancestors and Responsibility

The conversation culminates with Blair reflecting on the advice of James Baldwin and the concept of enduring responsibility.

• James Baldwin's Influence: Baldwin's assertion that "Responsibility cannot be lost. Responsibility can only be abdicated," resonates deeply with Blair.

  Blair Hodges [20:37]: "Responsibility cannot be lost. Responsibility can only be abdicated. And if one refuses abdication, one begins again."

• Commitment to Learning and Action: Blair acknowledges his privilege and the importance of learning from marginalized voices without positioning himself as a savior.

  Blair Hodges [22:36]: "I'm here to learn and to help. We're not here to save."

• Integrating Historical Wisdom: He encourages engaging with historical narratives and voices, such as those of Baldwin and Audre Lorde, to inform present-day community efforts.

  Blair Hodges [24:35]: "Visit your civil rights museum... listen to the voices of people who have been feared."

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Conclusion

Blair Hodges provides a nuanced perspective on navigating personal fears, building resilient communities, and fostering meaningful dialogues with the younger generation. By integrating his religious upbringing with contemporary social justice principles, Blair exemplifies a path of continuous learning, responsibility, and compassionate action. This episode of Conspirituality offers listeners valuable insights into combating the corrosive effects of conspiracy-mad ideologies through grounded, empathetic community engagement.

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Notable Quotes:

• Blair Hodges [05:51]: "Recognition, remorse, restitution, and renewal... It's been a really helpful concept to think about."
• Blair Hodges [16:20]: "That is scary."
• Blair Hodges [20:37]: "Responsibility cannot be lost. Responsibility can only be abdicated."
• Blair Hodges [22:36]: "I'm here to learn and to help."
• Blair Hodges [24:35]: "Visit your civil rights museum... listen to the voices of people who have been feared."

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This summary encapsulates the essence of the Relief Project #8: Blair Hodges episode, providing an informative and engaging overview for those who haven't tuned in.

Transcript

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[Matthew Rebsky]

Hello, everyone.

[Blair Hodges]

Welcome to the Conspirituality Relief Project. This is your regular timeline cleanser featuring interviews with folks reflecting on hope, faith, resilience, and building community in hard times. You know, all of the things that spirituality itself cannot do or doesn't want to do. So these are short personal visits in which I ask my guests the same five questions about their life wisdom, at least as it is in this moment, because everything changes. My name is Matthew Rebsky. My guest today is friend of the pod and my friend Blair Hodges, who is you've heard on here, helping me understand the thought of James Karse and the tech bro Mormonism of Brian Johnson, the dude who wants to live forever. Blair joins me today to talk about what he's brought with him on his journey, but also transformed from his Mormon upbringing and how he grapples with the limits of the nuclear family as he thinks about community building and why James Baldwin is so important to him. Now, two notes before we begin. We recorded this before the election, and so his answer about what he fears most off the top of the show is now sadly validated. Secondly, and completely unrelated to that, Blair got me to start watching Severance. And that incredible show is providing some diversion or relief, I guess you could say. So. Thank you, Blair.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And here's our conversation, everyone. Blair Hodges, welcome to the Conspirituality Relief Project.

[Blair Hodges]

Thanks, Matthew. It's good to be here.

[Matthew Rebsky]

So I sent you the same five questions that I've been sending around to everyone. You know, my job is just to really ask them and mostly stay out of your way. There might be a few follow ups, who knows? But I'll try to keep that to a minimum, because it's really about your, you know, your life's wisdom. The first question is the grim one, but I think it sets the stage for the relief part. So here it is. What terrifies you most in this time?

[Blair Hodges]

What terrifies me most? There are many things that terrify me most.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

And I thought about sitting down and trying to rank them and I. It actually just sent me down a.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Rabbit hole of despairs.

[Blair Hodges]

And so that's kind of what I was thinking about. But the things that came to mind with this question right now in this moment center around the upcoming presidential election. And it's issues like if one administration gets in, it could be catastrophic. If another administration gets in, there's still going to be some issues, but it's, it's something I can work with. So immediate policies that pertain to me are things like regarding trans issues, trans rights, ongoing racism in America and how to reckon with that, especially living in.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Utah, where I live, which is predominantly.

[Blair Hodges]

White, and witnessing that racism and having that be a part of my own upbringing and reckoning with it in myself. So the things that, that really keep me up at night are just worrying about practical things like are trans kids going to be able to access health care? Will bullying increase the more that trans kids are part of the culture war discourse about ginning up voters and using them as societal scapegoats? Right around gender issues. Yeah. So I think those issues in particular keep me up, especially gender identity issues. It's really difficult right now. We're seeing an uptick in legislation and attacks on gender non conforming people. And it's really scary.

[Matthew Rebsky]

In light of that, what is the most meaningful and supportive idea or story that you return to for reliable wisdom and relief?

[Blair Hodges]

So I was brought up Mormon, Latter Day Saint, and I'm still a member of that church, though I don't participate as much now. But we talked a lot growing up about the idea of repentance. And I think for people who have a religious background, especially a Christian background, the idea of repentance might be triggering. It might be upsetting to think about because it can be associated with really negative memories or really negative self perception or worries or the idea of God as a vengeful person who's going to punish people if they don't, you know, repent or whatever. But the repentance process in Mormonism was pretty straightforward. And it, it was around this idea of the four Rs, the four Rs of repentance, recognition, remorse, restitution and renewal.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Wow.

[Blair Hodges]

And thinking about these in turn. So the first one, recognition, right, Right. This is we first have to recognize our situation or what's going on, what have we done or what are we dealing with? And that means we have to pause and think about it. We have to actually recognize the circumstances.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And for me, growing up like white.

[Blair Hodges]

Heterosexual, cisgendered middle class, the world was kind of built to accommodate me and to even elevate me.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

And so I didn't have much in the way of forcing a recognition of that fact. But the more I started listening to people of color, the more videos I saw on social media of, of people being murdered by police, the more people I, I met in, in my own life that talked about how their experiences are as people of color or as queer people. That brought recognition to me that there are these other perspectives in the world that need my attention and that I've been able to ignore them because of my privilege. So that was step one is like recognizing actually my, my benefit and complicity in those kind of systems. And then remorse, feeling sorry about that.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And then restitution, actually undertaking work to.

[Blair Hodges]

Address that, whether it be through how I vote or how I create my podcasts or the books that I read, the people I listen to, but then also not just about the restitution, it's also the renewal. So finding ways to be able to continue that work, not being burnt out by it, letting it change me, committing to do better, to keep trying, and also learning how to rest in the process. So the idea of repentance for my upbringing has been really valuable in this time. It gives me a sense of a locus of control. What can I do? What am I responsible for? How can I renew myself? So, yeah, it's been a really helpful concept to think about.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And just to be clear, when you grew up, you probably weren't directed to recognize the, I suppose the sinfulness of being engaged in an oppressive social structure. So you have changed the meaning of this over time for yourself, right?

[Blair Hodges]

Oh, yeah. Certainly before I would apply the four Rs to things like did I have lustful thoughts about somebody or did I swear or did I like watch or rated our movie or maybe like drink caffeine.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

And I would have to recognize that, have remorse about it, like make up for or did I steal something from the store or whatever.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

So yeah, like it.

[Matthew Rebsky]

It's come later on that I've started.

[Blair Hodges]

Plugging into social justice conversations that I've seen how this idea of repentance can be applied to societal change. I mean, we can apply this to climate change. We know how to recognize what we've done. We got to feel the pressing nature of it.

[Matthew Rebsky]

We need to start making restitution. We need to resolve to renew things.

[Blair Hodges]

So, yeah, you're right that this concept, I wasn't necessarily directed to apply it in these kind of social justice oriented ways, but it was right there for the taking.

[Matthew Rebsky]

I find it extraordinary that, that a kind of post religious echo like that can take on a new meaning. The way in which that's happened recently for me is just on the verge of sleep. One night, one of the lines of the Our Father popped into my brain and it was, give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses. I think it trailed off after that, but it was very clear to me that what I needed that to mean in that moment, whatever my trespasses were, they weren't about doctrine or dogma or, you know, behavioral teachings. They were about moments in which I am simply less than I could be in terms of interpersonal generosity. Moments in which, I mean moments in which I'm venal or selfish or I can't really, really take ownership of the fact that I feel bad. And so I'm going to spread that around. And I find that extraordinary that, that this echo that used to be applied to a list of sort of naughty things or sinful things that I wasn't meant to do can take on this utterly different meaning.

[Blair Hodges]

This is. And I think this is how when I think of religion more broadly, that everyone lives religiously in the sense of having a value system, in the sense of thinking of stories that make sense of what our lives are like. And so even though my Mormonism has changed over time, it's still definitely informed by those stories and those stories get renewed in my new contexts. And yeah, like that line comes. It's like a mantra for you. It came to mind for you. Yeah, not in that same old way, but it's renewed. And I think there's a lot of power in that for people that, that have left religions or feeling disconnected from religions to bring, bring great stuff with us. Like, let's keep going.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Speaking of post religiousness, the third question is what is the greatest obstacle you face informing community relationships and how do you work to overcome it?

[Blair Hodges]

I was talking about this with my partner and we both hit the same idea and it really boils down to time. Yeah, time's hard. We, when we live in a capitalistic society that demands a 40 hour workweek and we also have kids and we're both working. The idea that we can like squeeze a family life into that situation is hard enough.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Yeah.

[Blair Hodges]

Let alone an extra. Whether it be church engagement or civic engagement, volunteering. There's just so many hours in the day and, and the other thing is coming out of COVID when things got so disconnected for so many people and some of the old connections that we had atrophied because we weren't getting together anymore, because maybe the libraries closed or.

[Matthew Rebsky]

All of those things.

[Blair Hodges]

So those are the big obstacles for me are having the time to actually do it and then feeling enough energy after having worked all day or dealing with kids or all of that stuff to be able to connect. But it's possible. And I think starting simply is the path forward. Find an easy volunteer opportunity. I work for Ronald McDonald House Charities. People come in and serve meals.

[Matthew Rebsky]

That's easy. Come in for two hours and like.

[Blair Hodges]

Serve people whose kids are in the hospital. Right. Or go down to the food bank on Sunday mornings or, you know, there's a group here in Utah that puts up LGBT flags on people's lawns for folks.

[Matthew Rebsky]

So find, find.

[Blair Hodges]

I think these kind of connections can matter. Find a community choir that practices once a week. Or your, that community can also just be renewing your relationships with your immediate family. Maybe you do need to just spend some more time with the kids or, you know, get away from social media more often or turn, turn the screens off and spend some time together.

[Matthew Rebsky]

I feel there's a strong connection between the oftentimes claustrophobia of the nuclear family and its time constraints and the demands of capitalism and the fact that family often tends to sort of barrier itself and become almost private to the rest of the world. I often feel like I'm crossing over a boundary when I enter into the broader community. I feel like I have to step across a threshold. Now that might be tied into lifelong feelings of introversion that I'm dealing with in all social situations. But I think there's something structural there as well, that what we do with families is often bubbling and, you know, it creates barriers.

[Blair Hodges]

No, I, I completely agree. The invention of the nuclear family I think did, did a lot of damage to the kind of communal engagement with children that society did before or. And that some communities still do. Right. The kind of alloparenting is a.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Is the term that specialists use the.

[Blair Hodges]

Idea that there should be multiple grown up people in kids lives to help mentor them and shape them. And you know, Hillary Clinton's famous it takes a village to raise a child that's absolutely true.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And when we set up this very.

[Blair Hodges]

Cloistered nuclear family unit, it's like, yeah, we're down in our bunker and we're.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Not making these community connections.

[Blair Hodges]

And it not only, I think, harms us as adults, but I don't think it's very healthy for kids either to be. I mean, the more cloistered you are, the less comparison you can make. Like, abuse can flourish in a situation where that's all a kid ever knows.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

And if a kid can know that, oh, actually families don't have to work like this, there's something wrong here. Even if abuse continues, that can give.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Them some kind of hope that life could be different than what it is.

[Blair Hodges]

So, yeah, I think, I think we're really over incentivized to stay isolated in these sort of nuclear family cluster units. And of course it disconnects us from people who don't have kids and from.

[Matthew Rebsky]

People who aren't married or for so.

[Blair Hodges]

Many other people that we have so many great times with and learn so much from. We're just not making those connections as much, I think. At least I'm not.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Question number four. If you were responsible for comforting and guiding an eight year old terrified of climate catastrophe, how would you do it? What would you say?

[Blair Hodges]

I think the first thing I would do is ask them what they think about it and really plug into what they're saying. They could misunderstand the circumstances and we might be able to have conversations about what to expect, or they could have very just vague fears about it and so we can address those. So letting them talk, even just giving kids an opportunity to talk, is a really important first step. And then secondly, before I rush in with, oh, you know, we won't have to worry about that, or instead of trying to make it okay in that moment to just validate the real fear and anxieties that they have and let.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Them know that they're not alone in.

[Blair Hodges]

Those and that I even share some of those. So connecting with them, this is a opportunity to bond with them and say, hey, I completely hear you.

[Matthew Rebsky]

That's scary.

[Blair Hodges]

That is scary. And then to talk with them about what kind of solutions they might have. I go back again to this idea of the locus of control. What can we do, my little friend? What's within our power that we can do now? And it could be things like, hey, you know what, let's maybe we'll drive less or maybe we'll start using our bikes more. We're gonna change our consumption habits. Like, you Know, you keep asking me for stuff at the store. Maybe we don't need to buy all this stuff so, you know, we can like tie it to like very real and see if the kid at that point's like, you know what, not so worried about climate change anymore. Actually, like I do need those Legos, but yeah. So hearing them out, validating, it's an interesting line.

[Matthew Rebsky]

It's an interesting line to walk because when you, you know, it, it would seem like it's a very effective almost sleight of hand of the neoliberal green order to focus on those self empowering things which are actually comforting and they might be age appropriate for children. And then there comes the point where you graduate into, well, you know, recycling. Actually. It didn't really do the thing, dad, you told me it would do the thing.

[Blair Hodges]

We're still burning a lot of plastic and sending it to other countries.

[Matthew Rebsky]

I'm concerned about that bridge actually between the, the thing that you say to give hope and the moment that that aspiration inevitably sort of exhausts itself because, you know, it was age appropriate and now something more challenging is probably needed.

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

Yeah. And this is why I will have conversations and I have with my kiddos now they're 9 and 11, but we have been having conversations about political systems with them all along as well.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Yeah.

[Blair Hodges]

So that they know like, hey, we're part of this bigger thing. There's individual things that we can do, but we can only do so much. And that's also why we're engaged civically. That's also why we vote. That's also why we pay attention to the debates or to the, and, and to politics and because yeah, I mean, me not using plastic straws anymore isn't going to really cut it in the face of giant corporations, whatever. So I do like to think about those smaller things, but also leave breadcrumbs.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And leave and also introduce them to.

[Blair Hodges]

That broader context that they're going to grow into as they age. And this has been hard talking about gender identity issues with my kiddos to have it be age appropriate and also kind of a little protective of them. They don't need to know everything that's being said and, and they don't need to live in fear, but they also do need to be aware that, you know, outside of this bubble, this protective home that's accepting there are people that don't. And so it's, it's walking that fine line of keeping it age appropriate.

[Matthew Rebsky]

But yeah, not setting them up for disillusion.

[Blair Hodges]

If you give Them sort of band aid solutions, and they later find out, like, those band aid solutions aren't going to do jack squat. So, yeah, you kind of have to do both.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Yeah. I mean, the tendency, especially in the teenager, is going to be towards disillusionment anyway. And it's like, we don't really want to add fuel to that particular fire.

[Blair Hodges]

Yeah, they'll get cynical plenty. I don't need to, like, tell them.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Yeah. Okay, last question. If your wisest ancestor came in a dream to offer you one piece of advice about living in difficult times, what would that be?

[Blair Hodges]

So with this one, I couldn't. I didn't think of a direct ancestor in terms of, like, some kind of relative of mine, but I did think of someone who has changed my thinking and who I think about fairly regularly. The civil rights activist and writer James Baldwin. And for Baldwin, you know, he. He lived in a similar moment to us. Right. This is after the civil. The civil rights movement has kind of peaked, and things were looking pretty optimistic. And then Dr. King is shot and Malcolm X is murdered, and the wheels start to come off. White America is not buying into the.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Vision that Dr. King was laying out.

[Blair Hodges]

And that other people were striving for.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

And so he had to reflect on what you do when things are falling apart. What do you do in the face of this kind of disillusionment? And one of the things he said was this. He said, not everything is lost. Responsibility cannot be lost. Responsibility can only be abdicated. And if one refuses abdication, one begins again.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Wow.

[Blair Hodges]

And that phrase begin again. Eddie Glaud, really great American academic, wrote a whole book on Baldwin on this idea of beginning again. I can't recommend it enough. And it talks about this idea of the very last thing we have when everything's falling away is still some kind of responsibility to do something. And we can abdicate that. We can throw our hands up. And I see some people do that. I see some people of color especially. They're just like, I'm done. Like, I. I've been dealing with this for years, and I get that. But I feel like because of my place of privilege, I have more stamina to be like, okay, I'm gonna. I'm gonna still. I'm gonna continue to engage and to. To listen to.

[Matthew Rebsky]

You know, you bring up ancestors.

[Blair Hodges]

For me, all my ancestors are white. And we're participating in these larger systems.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Of power that are super problematic.

[Blair Hodges]

So I'm gonna look to black voices. I'm gonna look to people who have been in this crap for Years.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Right.

[Blair Hodges]

The fact that it took 20, 20 to wake me up to the reality of my own complicity and structures of oppression and to see inequality kind of for the first time, that's an indictment of me. And so that means I'm not going to bring my wisdom to black people and to queer people and say, hey, I've got the answers for you. I'm going to save you. I'm going to come to them and say, how the hell have you still been surviving? I'm, I'm here. What do you need? Like, what can we do? I'm not here to save.

[Matthew Rebsky]

I'm here to learn.

[Blair Hodges]

So I look to voices like people like James Baldwin, people like Audre Lorde and these other incredible figures who have.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Been in this fight for years.

[Blair Hodges]

And the fact that, yeah, that I, I, I'm only realizing now that my despair and worry is fresh and new to me. But I'm only starting now to swim in these waters that people have been.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Drowning in for years. Now the flood's reaching me.

[Blair Hodges]

I'm like, oh, there's a flood.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Oh no.

[Blair Hodges]

So, yeah, I'm going to jump in the water. I'm going to be here and try to learn and not abdicate my responsibility in this moment.

[Matthew Rebsky]

I haven't heard Baldwin's concept of responsibility before as being the last thing that you have left, but it sounds like it has an almost metaphysical quality that I wonder if it displaces for you. You know, as a Mormon, you might have brought, been brought up with the idea that when all else is lost, I have my faith or I have my soul or I have my relationship with God. It sounds about as strong as that, that responsibility is some sort of eternal call.

[Blair Hodges]

Yeah, it doesn't go away. And I think for me, so much of my Mormonism was pointed like to the afterlife, to eternal reward or to like, you know, filling a certain amount of obligations that would then lead to better things, especially in the afterlife. And my religion, much more turned to the everyday, daily things. Like you mentioned the Lord's Prayer. That's a perfect example. Give us this day our daily bread. Like this is.

[Matthew Rebsky]

And what was important about that in my sort of twilight, you know, state was, oh, that's an anti capitalist phrase.

[Blair Hodges]

Yeah.

[Matthew Rebsky]

That phrase is saying you don't store up like, like I, well, first of all, I, I have the dignity to ask to eat, but I also don't have the right to ask to store up goods.

[Blair Hodges]

Yeah. And I want to connect this back to the earlier question about community relationships because you know, we focus mostly on sort of real people in our lives, stuff we can do. For me, I think the community relationships need to involve people from the past, people like Baldwin. So I would recommend to people, go visit your civil rights museum in your city. Go visit the Holocaust museum, the nearby Holocaust museum. Go visit these places and hear the voices and see the artifacts and breathe in the air and look at the stories and don't look away.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Read books on civil rights.

[Blair Hodges]

We need to listen, especially white folks need to listen to the voices of people who have been feared, feeling the press of this battle long before we.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Knew it came to our door and.

[Blair Hodges]

Then realized that we can become part.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Of that beloved community that already exists and has a huge storehouse of wisdom, and we bring our humility to that. Again, we're not here to save.

[Blair Hodges]

We're here to learn and to help. And so, to me, that community that we're seeking, it needs to be real people in our lives, people that we can shake hands with and hug and sit with and talk with. But it also also needs to include these wise folks from the past who.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Have been in the fire for so.

[Blair Hodges]

Long, and they're basically like, hey, well, welcome. Welcome to the fire. Like, we.

[Matthew Rebsky]

We've been here.

[Blair Hodges]

So. Yeah.

[Matthew Rebsky]

Blair Hodges, thank you so much for taking the time.

Thanks, Matthew.