• Psychological Science: The Lost Art of the Unsent Angry Letter
• American Spectator: The Salt That Has Lost Its Savor: The Woke Church and the Undoing of America

Transcript:

Rusty Puttfark
Welcome to another episode of the free thinkers podcast. The show that believes in in free speech, original thought and desire for truth. Hope everyone has having a great week. Back here with Del Murphy. Del, how was your week? How was your trip? It was a West. Yep,

Del Murphy
went out west went out Arizona visited some friends. It wasn’t as hot as it’s going to be. So that was nice. It was nice to not sweat, like whenever you just walked outside for two or three minutes. So that part was nice. But yeah, had a really good time. Enjoy the weekend went out over on one of the lakes they have they’re in the middle of the canyons, and, you know, went out there and just voted around with some people and ate and just had a good time and, and happy to be back in Florida

Rusty Puttfark
Are the lakes low?

Del Murphy
They actually they were they were a lot. So there’s I guess they said there’s some places where they’re a lot lower than where they were at because they have a lot of runoff from the mountains that’s still going on. So, you know, they would look like maybe they were six to eight inches low. But it wasn’t like, like me. Yeah, it’s not as if you could still everybody was out there skiing and you know, had jet skis and all kinds of stuff out there. So wasn’t as bad as what I thought it was gonna be. So what about you? What do you end up doing?

Rusty Puttfark
Just doing a lot of work. And I am trying to discipline myself. I’ve been on this carnivore diet. Oh, I was gonna announce it last week. But I didn’t think I could make it. Yeah. So I just fell back. Yeah. So but yeah, had been doing a lot of that food prepping and just kind of cleaning up around the house and all that other stuff. So in 10 days, man, I’ve lost 10 pounds. So it’s pretty. It’s pretty awesome.

Del Murphy
How difficult is it? It’s not hard. Yeah.

Rusty Puttfark
And I have more mental clarity and energy than I’ve ever had. cutting out sugar and carbs is one of the greatest things. And there’s a lot of crazy, crazy, insightful information, I guess you’d say, talking about how plants have all these phyto toxins and a lot of stuff in them that really cause issues for people. And yeah, of course, some people are a lot more sensitive to than others. So but I think we’ll have a whole podcast on that. Because that’s that just blows my mind because it turned everything that I’ve ever thought about this completely on its head. And it’s just, it’s crazy. It’s absolutely crazy to think that just eating all meat, you get all the nutrition that you can of course I supplement, you know, right? A little bit more. Because you know, you just want to make sure get potassium and all that stuff with your heart and all that other good stuff. But it’s been wild. Like I said, it’s been, it’s been really, really awesome to have that energy again. Because once you get older, when you start eating bad once you start falling in bad habits, your energy just goes zap Oh yeah, so many people that I’ve talked to about that. They’re like, Man, I need to do that. Because my energy is gone. And I’m like, trust me, comes back. I mean, I’ve I’ve lifted weights on it, I’ve ran on it, you know, cardio type stuff, walked, I’m still I’m on the 27th day of meeting all my goals. So hit him yet today. So when we get done with this, I could go home and walk those two dogs and make it happen. But those steps and yeah, it’s awesome.

Del Murphy
Really cool, man. Well, yeah, keep us posted on on how that goes. So doubt,

Rusty Puttfark
no doubt. We’re gonna talk about something other than politics tonight.

Del Murphy
Yeah, I’m excited about this one. I mean, I’m gonna I’m always excited to be here. But yeah, I’m really looking forward to, you know, we get the notes that we share with each other and, you know, just kind of going over it. And, you know, really excited to what I think you know, the stuff that people need to hear, especially where we’re at right now. Yeah, you know, in society, and just with everything going on.

Rusty Puttfark
And this is something that I’m learning and trying to apply just as much as we’re going to share this because I’m not I’m not sharing this, like I’m, I’ve got this all together, right? I probably struggle more than 95% of the people that are watching this with a lot of these things. But I had a friend send me this in a text and I’m gonna read this and this is the story we’re gonna talk about the eagle and the crow. Okay, okay, the lesson of the eagle in the crow. So it says the only bird that dares to peck an eagle is the crow. The crows sits on the Eagles back and bites his neck. The Eagles does not respond nor fights with the crow. He doesn’t spend time or energy on the crow. Instead, he just opens his wings and begins to rise higher in the heavens. The higher the flight, the harder it is for the crow to breathe. And eventually the crows falls off due to lack of oxygen. Learn from the ego and don’t fight the crows. Just keep ascending. They might be along for the ride but the soon fall off. Do not allow yourself to succumb to the distractions. Keep your focus on the things above and continue rising. And I remember reading that and thinking, wow, that’s so I mean, that’s so exactly what I need to do, because there’s so much there’s so many crows in life. Oh yeah. All these little distractions. And, of course, once I read that article, I started doing research on Chrome Isn’t eagles, other stuff? And, you know, there’s a lot that you have to use as an analogy to life because crows are always in packs. They’re scavengers they steal things. They they’re just kind of annoying birds. There’s there’s not they do have an ecological purpose. We can’t eat them. Right. I mean, they’re just they make noise. Yeah, they’re annoying. They’re just, they’re all. I mean, they’re all over the place, you know. And they disrupt other birds. And they, they, you know, pick on eagles and that kind of thing I saw. It’s a matter of fact, this weekend, I saw one chasing a falcon around my neighborhood. A really? Yeah, it was wild. I might. And you know, we’re talking about this on Tuesday. Get away from here, man. Yeah. But, yeah, and our life. I think we just have so many crows. And we turn and we focus on those, instead of focusing and moving forward and being like that eagle, and just not even worrying about it. rise high. Crow can’t live at that altitude. Yeah, you’ll fall off. And you’ll be where you’re creating designed to be, which are eagles designed to soar? You know, and crows design, you know, scavenge and annoy. Yeah, yeah. For all those people that love crows out there.

Del Murphy
I wouldn’t think the audience is made up of crow lovers like that you’re gonna get some hate mail. It’s such a powerful story, though. I mean, you know, just like we talked about, just with the different things that you deal with your your focus can get so caught up in so many things. I mean, each and every day, there’s something that whether you’re reading, or you’re watching, or something that you know, happens to you, there’s so many things that can take your focus off of what it truly should be on. And, you know, that’s such such a great story, as a reminder of, you know, what, to remind us what we should be doing and how we should be acting, and how to react to the things that are happening to us. You know, just just powerful stuff there.

Rusty Puttfark
Yeah, and I think I mean, you’ve, you’ve done a lot of goal setting, I know, I’ve done a lot of goal setting, one of the biggest acts of that is to start by writing them down. Like if you write them down, that is 5060 70% of it. I mean, I’ve seen where years and years years ago, I went to a Peter Lowe seminar, back when I was in film school, I believe. And I remember writing all these goals down on a hotel, like note card, right? And I remember finding him 10 years later, and I was hit every single one of them. It was wild, I mean, down to the exact car I wanted to drive. I was driving that exact car at that time. And it was it was it was interesting, but I think I think that’s the great first step to that is because, you know, if you if you’re on, you know, anybody need anything, you hit nothing dead on the head, as I remember Les Brown saying that, you know, and I think it’s so important to do that. And again, I’m speaking to myself, you know, I don’t have an active goal list right now. Right? You know, that I that I revisit on like a weekly or monthly basis, which I think’s important. Yeah, I think that’s something I need to do, I need to get that going. And so you know, the things that I know that I’ve heard, it’s like my, you know, the, the one word for the year action kind of throws that back into it. So I need to take action to write those write those goals down because they’re powerful. And I think when you write them down, when you have goals, then you know, what you can’t be distracted from, right? Because it’s probably easy to get distracted. If everything’s fluid. Yeah, but if there’s some foundational aspects or some goals that you want to hit, those are the things to focus on. So I think that’s a preface and a foundation that we didn’t have in our notes. But I think that’s going to going to lead us out from from the rest of this, because I think there’s, there’s definitely goals, but there’s other activities in life that I think are important that we can’t let the crow’s of life get distracted for, we need to understand what we’re supposed to do. And if we have, you know, something on our back, we rise.

Del Murphy
Yeah. And going back to like, what you’re just saying, I wrote something down in my notes that we didn’t have in here. You know, we all have heard it probably before, on whenever you’re setting goals, like the the way to do it is like the smart way. And so it’s where they’re Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and then time bound. Because there’s so many times like, you know, we can say, oh, I want to lose some weight, you know, or, you know what, I really would love to have that car or you know what, I want to save this amount of money this year, you know, but if you don’t really like you said writing it down is the first thing, but then you’ve also got to make it realistic. You got to make it attainable. It can’t be something where like, Hey, I’m gonna have $30 million here in the next six weeks. You know, you need to make it something that’s going to be attainable, something that’s realistic, and then as well it needs to have some type of a time table on it to where it’s not just, you know, I’m going to lose Is 20 pounds? Well, okay, how are you going to lose 20 pounds? How long? Is it going to take you? What are the steps that you’re going to take to actually get there? And so, you know,

Rusty Puttfark
and what are some of the things you’re gonna give up? To make it? Right? Yeah.

Del Murphy
Because there’s always usually usually almost always in a goal, there’s going to be something that you’ve got to give up in order to attain the goal, because there’s something else whether it’s sitting down to eat that fried chicken and mashed potatoes, that wouldn’t be great. You know. But if you want to lose that weight, then you have to rethink what you’re doing there. So So yeah, I mean, I think there’s just a lot of times that we sit down, and we think about goals, we think about things we want to do in our life, and we just have to be more specific and exactly, we have to know, define what it is exactly what we want. And that’s one thing that I’ve been telling myself lately, is so many times whenever you think about your life, and what you want me to do, so many of us don’t know, what we want, and is defining what is it that you want? What is it that you’re striving for? What is it that you’re trying to obtain? And it doesn’t have to be materialistic things, it could be whether it’s spiritual, or whether it’s friendships or relationships, whatever it may be, what is that and define that, and then set those parameters like we just talked about, in order to try to make that a reality in your life. Yeah,

Rusty Puttfark
that’s, that’s definitely true. And, and, like I said, when I when I read that, when I read that text about the, you know, the eagle in the crow, it just, there’s so many things in life, too. I mean, not just goals specific, but daily specific. Yeah, again, we can be working on something and then we’re going to check social media, we’re going to, we see the latest story that pops up on our watch. And then we get diverted and distracted and go down, go down that path or, you know, we get a call and we start talking, you know, on the phone for a long time, and just not focusing on what we need to get focused on. And, you know, I used to work incessantly. I mean, I work a lot, but I used to work like seven days a week. Yeah. And I remember when I bought the place in Georgia, that kind of helped me refocus what I was doing, because I really want i i knew i needed to get out. I mean, I knew I needed to have a different hobby, rather than sitting behind the computer and that kind of thing. And that house needed a lot of work. It needed me as much as I needed it, for sure. And yeah, that was that carpet was pretty bad, you have to refund the thing out. But one of the things that made me do was say, Okay, I’m gonna work as hard as I can Monday through Thursday. And then when I’m done Thursday, I’m going to drive up there. And Friday, Saturday and Sunday, it’s my time. Yeah, it’s my time to do what I can do. And I started doing you know, carpentry stuff, and watch YouTube and learn how to do a lot of stuff. And it’s still hanging up. So it worked for five, six years. But that’s, that’s, that really helped me balance things out. Because I had a goal, I wanted to fix that place up, I wanted to be able to get up there. And so it was it was within the you know, the smart, you know, acronym. Yeah. And it was, you know, definitely attainable and, and measurable. And that was something that really helped kind of refocus and reposition my work ethic in life and, and to know that you have something you can look forward to once you get done with a work, it made me work. It made me eliminate all the the wasted space in my work day, so I could focus and get that stuff done. So I can get up there and make that happen. And that was that was a big deal. for that.

Del Murphy
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So, you know, going back to this, the eagle and the crow thing, what are some things that you find that are distractions? What are some things that act like the crow? You know, besides I know, you mentioned social media, what are some other things that, you know, that can take our attention off of what we’re actually trying to, to obtain in our lives or trying to be the type of person, you know, that God wants us to be? Or that we’re trying to be for our family?

Rusty Puttfark
I think, I think just the news, yeah, a lot. A lot of times that I mean, I think, at least me, I’m passionate about politics and passionate about health, I’m passionate about kind of current events, and, you know, spirituality, you know, looking at those things through the filter, you know, of a, of a, of a Christian lens. Yeah. And I think a lot of times, I’ll listen to podcasts, or I’ll listen to something and it will get me either stirred up about something where I want to fix all the problems, or, you know, I just get distracted with learning all this other stuff that really I don’t really need to go down that wormhole with. And gosh, I mean, there’s there’s a multitude of things. I guess it just depends on what your weaknesses. I mean, some people can probably get distracted with food and just want to eat all day. Yeah, I mean, I’ve been there before, too. I mean, sometimes you see something like man, that looks really good. But yeah, I think There’s there’s a lot of different, you know, distractions in life that can that can easily get you and that you can easily dive into. I mean, some people would be TV TV or binge watching TV shows, or, you know, computer games or some I’ve never played a computer game. I don’t ever think I’ve ever played a computer game since the Atari when they hit the little stick in the world never played

Del Murphy
the Oregon Trail on the computer when you people died of dysentery. No,

Rusty Puttfark
I did not. I did not play River Raid on the Atari man. And that was

Del Murphy
it. It was back in the early 90s. Yeah, I mean, like you said, I think so there’s so many good things that we can focus our attention on. But in I don’t know if you’ve ever read that book by Jim Collins good to great. But it’s like a lot of times those companies that he would go in and look at and do this research, it was like they were, they were good companies. But it was like, their, their focus was, you know, so scattered, it was all over the place. And it was like you said it was like you could be on a mission on one way. And then all of a sudden, you know, something, a text, or whether it’s something you see on the news or this, that maybe it’s something good that, hey, I can dive into here, or hey, I want to change this, I want to help with this. But it’s gotten you off of what you know, you’ve been called to do what you’re great at. And so instead of getting our attention diverted, you know, in all kinds of different ways, sometimes we got to reset and go okay, each day, almost, you know it almost it’s hour by hour of like, okay, what what am I doing? What, what am I trying to accomplish? What is the main thing here today? What What am I trying to be? Who am I trying to be? You know, in trying to bring out greatness and not just okay, I’m accomplishing a lot of good things. But you know, achieving greatness.

Rusty Puttfark
Yeah, I think compromise, obviously. Is is one of the one of the things that you have to do with that. There’s, there’s been plenty of times I’ve taken a media fast, just not turned any social media on any news, any anything on most of the time, when I go to Georgia, sometimes I won’t do I won’t even watch anything, we’ll pull the thing up. And it’s the greatest time just sitting on the porch. Don’t even worry about I mean, you have cars coming by. And that’s it. You watch them hit the speed bump, hit the speed bump, watch the train come by. Yeah, absolutely. And so you sometimes you have to do that. I know one of the these productivity books that I’ve read, talked about, when you wake up in the morning, the last thing you want to do, the first thing is to check your email. Yeah, I said, just keep that like Baker make a rule to not check your email till 10 or 11 o’clock, because your brain is most productive and creative and those early hours in the morning. So get all the distractions aside, work on the things and make a list of the things the night before that you want to work on and really accomplish. And then I think towards around three o’clock or so is when your mind is just not in a very creative mode. I mean, it’s it’s been used a lot throughout the day, you’re probably recovering from food and that kind of thing. That’s when you need to start responding to all the emails and doing the meaningless right tasks. But the first part of the day reserved for yourself are reserved for those high creative, thought provoking tasks. And, obviously, way easier said than done. super difficult. Yeah, it’s especially I mean, I think if businesses and corporations would embrace that, and allow that to happen, I think they would be exponentially more productive. Absolutely. But, um, but yeah, sometimes it’s tough sometimes. I mean, we, I mean, a lot of people schedule meetings early in the morning, I try not to do that. Yeah, my earliest meeting I tried to schedule was at 10 o’clock. For that reason, I like to get up, you know, six 630 force myself to eat a little breakfast because I’m not, I’m just not a breakfast person. And, and then I’ll go upstairs and start to work on a project. But for me, I have people in a different timezone that I’m working with, and so I have to catch them before, you know, they go to bed and things like that. So yeah. Anyway, it’s, it’s, it’s an interesting balance. But I think having that focus and knowing what your lifestyle and work schedule and all that will allow you to do. I mean, gosh, who knows?

Del Murphy
Yeah. So we’ve talked about the eagle, and we talked about trying to not focus on the distractions. What about when it’s time to fight back? What about when it’s time for you know, that Hey, enough is enough. The crows not letting up? I’ve tried soaring as high as I can go, he’s still breathing the air here. You know, what, what do we do then? What what what at what point do we go okay. And what do we do? Like how do we how do we fight back in a manner that’s not going to have us lose our minds and you know, have less to lose our, you know, you know, people go oh, my God, what just happened to them, you know, so But yeah, so So what are some ways that you know that we can do that?

Rusty Puttfark
I think that’s the toughest question to be honest with you, because that’s, that’s something that I try to balance all the time. And I sent you a podcast yesterday that Steve days had Yeah. You know, one of the biggest takeaways from that is he, he was talking about kind of what God was revealing to him. And he was, you know, he’s a fighter. And he said, I need more apostles, not assassins. And that kind of hit me because I’m, I’m a person that wants justice for for everything that I see wrong. I mean, you know, you turn on the news. The news, don’t turn on the news, you know, look online at the news. And yesterday, you’ve got, you know, these two kids in Chicago that stole a car, you know, speeding away, they run into the side of this truck, and it kills this, this guy’s six month old baby in the back. And these two kids are only charged with misdemeanor crimes. They’re not gonna spend a day in prison. Yeah, they’re not going to, they’re just gonna be a slap on the wrist go out. Probably do it again, because there’s no consequences for their actions. And here, this guy is having to bury his six month old baby. Yeah. To me, if I was that guy, we go tombstone level, I’d say if the government’s not going to take care of this, I’ll take care of this. Yeah. And I know, there’s some friends of mine that would help me take care of this, right. But that’s what I struggle with. Because that’s me. That’s myself. That’s my flesh. Yeah, I want to I want to take vengeance out. Because I think so much what we’re seeing is an imbalance of justice we’re seeing because of one’s race or something, they’re turning the scales and saying, if this color, does it, it’s okay. But if this color does it, we’re really doing crazy to me, I want to eat. I truly want equality, equal treatment under the law. It’s based on the law. Let’s make that happen. And so to me, that’s where you have to turn back to what God commands you to do. God is definitely one for justice, and fighting in the right time, but he’s also there for grace. Because we’ve been given that I mean, look, look how vile and awful we are in in the eyes of in the eyes of God, and to receive the grace that we have the unspeakable love and compassion. It’s something that we have to you know, turn back because as people, we are those kids that hit that car. We I mean, we’re guilty. I mean, what does Jesus say if you if you think evil thoughts in your mind to get somebody to your murder, right, yeah. So we’re murderer is just within maybe a different context, as far as in the flesh. But to God, it’s not. And so we’re given that we’re given that grace and mercy. And there was an article I saw because, like I said, I struggle with that. There’s a there’s a balance between that there’s a balance between extending Grace walking in love, but fighting back and standing up for for those that can’t stand up for themselves, you know. And so this article, it was it was pretty interesting because it it, it talked about, I think it balanced that out. But it says a generation ago Popstar Bonnie Tyler famously asked the question, Where have all the good men gone? Since then, the situation has only gotten worse. As CS Lewis noted, men in the western world have largely been emasculated. And men in the church are seldom an exception for this decades long trend, to stand strong and one’s faith in Jesus Christ and push back at culture. That in the words of Isaiah 520, calls evil good and good evil, is today seem to be divisive, unloving, bigoted, and intolerant. This is because evangelicals in the English speaking world have confused Christ’s command to love others with being civil, as if that were an attribute of God, which it isn’t. As a consequence of superficial self righteous good for nothing pietism that prefers tone to truth and style to substance and displace Authentic Christianity and many of the roughly 400,000 churches in America, this doctrinal malpractice is giving us a generation of men, Christian and otherwise, who are what CS Lewis called men without chests. Don’t know the sort of Christians I’m talking about. I give you hint. They are the sort who will upon reading this article take great offense at what I’ve written here and waste no time and letting me know, but are not particularly offended at the 61 million children murdered in the Holocaust of abortion since 1973. By universities that are incubators of radicalism by Democrats who are compiling hitless to Trump supporters, or by the godlessness of the Marxism they openly advocate, which is killed no less than 125 million people in the 20th century alone. Too many Christians today are risk adverse they prefer to the safety of family life centers, to engaging in the culture in any way that might cost them something. God forbid they might sacrifice their wealth or comfort. Under the social media mob or be excluded from the neighborhood barbecue. To such Christians the woke messages of Pastor like Tim Keller and John Piper are all a justification to do what they’re inclined to do anyways, nothing. But that doesn’t strike me as a Christian at all CS Lewis call Christianity a fighting religion think on that. These days such a statement strikes a somewhat absurd note, with a generation that has never no more privation or suffering a defensive anything much less of noble ideals. For them, Jesus has been reinterpreted to meet a lifestyle preference. One might wonder if they truly know Him. Because when Jesus said to turn the other cheek, he did not mean to turn a blind eye. And the highest calling of a Christian is not to be civil. It’s to be salt and light. I thought that was pretty. Yeah, pretty powerful. Yeah. Because I mean, I think that there’s I think there is a definite emasculation taking place in the church, when you look back at it, gosh, the founding of this country, the black robe regiment, was one of the most instrumental things in this. I mean, that’s, that’s how we that’s how we won this. I mean, pastors were poor men that I mean, they had to take the fight out to people. Yeah. And, you know, defended the freedom that was under assault from, you know, the British coming, trying to, you know, take rule and authority back, and they were some of the greatest heroes that we don’t talk about anymore. And, and so I think that there’s a balance that we need to have to, to again, stand up for truth, and walk in love and extend grace and mercy where we can,

Del Murphy
yeah, absolutely, yeah, that’s, you know, we see throughout the Bible, you know, the grace and mercy that Jesus gives, you know, whether it’s the woman that commits adultery, and you’ve got the guys that want to stone, her, you know, and he says, hey, the one of you, whoever has no sin, go ahead and cast the first stone, you know, but then you also see the side of Jesus, whenever he goes into the temple, and knocks over the tables, you know, and kicks, the kicks the people out that are selling things inside of the, of the temple, you know, so there’s, there’s, there’s a fine line. And I think, like you said, it seems like in a lot of our churches, you know, there’s the the number of men that you see in church is dwindled greatly, you know, and I think, and I think that’s for a multitude of reasons, but I think a lot of it has to do with just like, what you’re saying is, is whether it’s, you know, the emasculation of men, or as well, you know, just thinking that, you know, they don’t have a place in church or the belief systems that are going on today. But yeah, I mean, there’s, I wrote in here, I don’t know, if you saw in the notes I had added about Aaron Tippins, old song that we had, whenever we were growing upset, if you’ve got to stand for something, or you’re fall for anything. And it’s like, you’ve got to have that you’ve got to have that foundation of belief of where it says, you know, what, the buck stops here, like, you know, I’m willing to have grace and mercy and I’m willing to be kind, but at some point, you’ve got to have your truth and your foundation that you stand on and say, You know what, it doesn’t go past here, like this, this is as far as I’m going, and I’m not going any further. And so, you know, we all have to come to that point, we’ve got to define that for ourselves. And we’ve got to, instead of just allowing Christianity at over the years has just gotten more and more just real soft, real with milk toast, like where it’s just watered down, based on what’s going on in society. And it’s like, we’ve got to get back to what is the true Word of God that says, This is what it is? And it’s there’s no more of Well, well, yeah, I can see how you feel that way. So yeah, okay, you know what, let’s what we’re going to everybody’s okay. And instead of being that way, say no, this is what the Bible says, This is what we believe. And this is what we’re going to stand on from here on out.

Rusty Puttfark
Yeah, that’s, I think that needs to happen. I think there needs to be, you know, more involvement with men and a lot of different areas. I mean, I don’t have kids, but I went to the school board meetings about the mass. I was, I was, you know, an advocate, you know, for those that didn’t have an advocate, and at that meeting, very, very few men. I can count on on both fingers. How many there were there? And there were hundreds of people there. Yeah, I mean, probably five 600 people there and I saw 10 men. Wow. So, you know, the moms, and a lot of those instances, especially in church, two, are the leaders in the home now. And I mean, God bless him for it. And when you I mean, you look at look at the Republican Party, how many just complete, strong, strong, strong speakers are women compared to men? There’s a lot of men in the Republican Party, very few stand up and will fight for anything. A lot of the women will write, but very few men will and you You can you can just cascade through society and see when women are actually the more in the Alpha class than a lot of the men. And I think it’s, you know, it’s not to be, you know, chauvinistic or anything like that. But there’s, there’s, there’s naturally created roles. And the role of a man, you know, is to be, you know, to hunt to bring home food to protect, and to be the, you know, the the leader of the home, the spiritual leader, the home, the, the job of the woman for the Bible’s to be a helpmate. And that doesn’t mean she’s any less. It’s that is her natural role that works. So well together,

Del Murphy
you come alongside, not, not behind. Absolutely,

Rusty Puttfark
absolutely. And I think that that, you know, with pushing, you know, women to do certain things, and to elevate that status in society, and for men to be called this, that, and the other one, they tried to stand up to be a man, and then they just back down and don’t claim their position. Again, that society pushing that, like you said, you have to pick where you stop. And I think the church needs to pick that stop of, Okay, we’re gonna teach men how to be men. Instead of we’re not going to teach men how to be nice, because that’s really a lot of these men’s groups in that study, right, you get together and you see how feminine you can be. And I don’t mean that disparagingly like, I’ve been to a couple of these men things. And it’s like, nobody acts this way in real life. Right, you know, they’re all this Kumbaya, and I’m like, no, no, no. Yeah. I mean, let’s go together and fake shoot guns. It’s just like, why? So, again, I think I think there’s real issues that can be addressed. And there’s, you know, one of the, one of the sayings we had during COVID is one by one, we all say no, and I truly believe the power of one. But the power of one not even to say no, but one by one, we’ll say yes. I mean, we can all say yes to embracing certain things and standing up for certain things and, and you don’t think the individual has the power to, to make a real big impact. until an individual does something completely destructive and devastating, then you see the power of one person. But there, you can do the opposite. And one person has the power to do an incredible amount of good, too.

Del Murphy
Yeah, yeah, we and we all just have to realize that that power that we have, and you know, and try to do the best that we can to make that good for, you know, for our country, for ourselves for our family. So well, what else you got?

Rusty Puttfark
We got? I got five little principles. And again, these are things that I’m working on, too. So these are the principles haven’t mastered these. I have not mastered these yet. In fact, I struggle more than anybody with these probably. But it’s five principles, practical principles to stay focused. Okay, and avoid the crows from pulling you off course. Yeah. The first one is to ignore distractions. Sometimes it’s better to ignore distractions and focus on our goals, and aspirations. And I think a lot of times, I mean, I saw this, have you seen the movie The Social Network? Yeah. There’s a war for everyone’s mind. I mean, right now, there’s algorithms that will create content and put it in front of you based on screen time, because the more they can get you to stay on that screen and click, the more ad revenue they can get, the more they learn about you, which they can feed you more content. There’s everything from, you know, government, psychological operations, there’s everything from all the when I say that, it’s just like, you know, planting this, that and the other to kind of keep you distracted or swayed to not look at the real truth. Yeah. There’s so much there’s so much out there. So again, if sometimes, if you if you can’t ignore them, turn them off. Right, you know, I think it’s good to be informed and get nuggets of information, rather than dive in and read the whole thing. Yeah. Or if there’s a podcast you can listen to, to, to pick up, you know, quick segments, or something like that. It’s great. But man, I think so many people just sit around and watch Fox News all day long.

Del Murphy
Yeah, I know, we’re getting older, but I’ve seen it in you know, I’ve seen it in my grandparents, where before, whenever they even my grandparents are actually in their 90s and before, like even in their 60s and 70s. You know, the news was never on, like sports, you know, and like we’re watching the Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy, like, you know, but now, I mean, it is 24/7 your Fox News and it’s just over and over and people hollering at each other and, you know, this is going on and can you believe this? And it’s just, you know, just feeding into you. And you know, whatever side of the aisle you’re on, whether it’s Fox News or MSNBC or CNN or whatever. It’s just it’s all just like you said, it’s, it’s all just trying to get at you, and it’s taking you away from what your true purpose should be, you know, and it’s and you get so riled up, you know, with every story that comes up, it’s like, they’re, it’s a spark that it’s like, they’re just trying to throw, you know, fuel on that flame to just go, Hey, how outrageous can we be about this? You know, what can we do about this to blow this up? And so we’ve just got to be so careful about what we take in. You know, it’s we’re so we’re so as a society, we get, like you said, We’ve got so much coming at us all the time. Now that you’ve got to be really cognizant of what’s you know, what you’re viewing and what you’re listening to, you know, and not just letting anything in and letting anything and just unfiltered you know, if you’re are listening anything, you got to say, Okay, let me filter that through, you know, whether it’s the Bible or whether it’s your reasoning or whatever it is that you’re going to listen to that day, you know, to make the right choices. From there.

Rusty Puttfark
I gotta tell you a funny story about ignoring distractions with incessant news. In my neighborhood, the neighbors across the street, they’ve got like five outside cats. Cats drive me crazy. So

Del Murphy
you haven’t shot them yet? No,

Rusty Puttfark
I let the dogs explore that. But if the cats are too fast, but there’s one cat that’s cool. Yeah, name’s Leo. He’s like a little orange cat. And he goes around the neighborhood. And he’s got like a little routine. And he has three or four people down the street that feed him. I don’t feed him. But he comes over and that’s the one cattle pit. Yeah. And so we started, like, figuring out where Leah would go because he was just like he was he’s a wanderer. Right. And so, you know, he’s, he’s going to see he’s, he’s got he’s, he’s not very he’s not a single cat. Let’s put it this way. Yeah, he’s got a lot of different ladies. Lady friends. Right. So I made him Giglio. So. So I was, I was on Amazon, and I saw this GPS cat tracker. And I thought, Okay, this would be interesting. So, before I bought it, I text my neighbor and my, hey, what if I got a GPS tracker? Who could we put it on Leo? Because it’s her cat. It’s not my cat, right? So she’s like, Yeah, that’d be kind of funny. So I ordered it. And three hours is at my door. They’ve got you know, the warehouses here. And everything’s great. charge that bad boy up, got the subscription, walked it over there. Put it on this cat. Now, they let it out. And at night, I mean, it goes like four or five miles. It’s got like a trail from three neighborhoods goes by the hospital. I mean, this thing. Oh, wow, this thing moves. Right? Yeah. So you can watch real time and figure out where Leo is at any point in time. And then we learned, you can share that with other people. So if they had the link, they could all tune in and watch. Yeah. So I’m on this, this call. And I had my screen up because it’s like the day. And so I’m meeting with some, you know, big realtors and coaches and all that. Yeah. And I won’t go to share my screen for something. I forgot that Leo’s thing. And like, what is this is that you’re running pack? Because it looks like you know, a jogger, like, oh, no, that’s the cat. So they’re like, Oh, we got kids. Let me see this. And anyways, they’re like, Hey, can you share that with us? And then I started sharing it with a couple other people. Well, there’s about five or six older ladies in the neighborhood. And they all like Leah, you know, they. So we were telling her about it. And we’re like, hey, I’ll share this with you. So I shared the link with them. Yeah. So they’re all watching this cat. Right, right. So Friday rolls along. I think this was like Monday or Tuesday, I put this tracker on. So Friday rolls along. And I see all these ladies out walking in the neighborhood going to this one lady’s house. And I’m like, What are y’all doing? And like, Oh, we’re having a wine and watch party tonight for Leo. Oh my god. So they went over there. And they all got together to get together that that night, and they did it for you know, several weeks before. And one of the older ladies said thank you so much for doing that forgetting that tracker because all I was would do all day was watch Fox News. But now I have something to do. I can watch this cat. Watch and welcome. Yeah, but man, I mean, you gotta get away and do something. And that that one lady you see you’re out there. She’s she goes. And when I’m walking, she’s out there all the time now looking for Leo and whatever. And so something that was funny, he turned into something that was beneficial and good because it got him away from the news. I can’t I can’t even watch it. On YouTube it. I can’t I my grandma’s in the hospital and that thing. It was actually the day that Trump was indicted. And I’m like, oh, man, this is driving me nuts. I just don’t like to listen to all this. You know, bah bah, bah. Yes. I just it’s I like to read the condensed version and and move on.

Del Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, cuz they’ll talk about it for hours and hours and you hear the same stuff over and over again and

Rusty Puttfark
or The second thing is prioritize our goals. We already talked about writing goals down but prioritize our time and energy and the things that matter most to us and not let minor setbacks or distractions hinder our progress? I think that’s one of the things that’s the biggest part is minor setbacks will you stop? If you’re not perfectly down that path? It’s over.

Del Murphy
Yeah. So you’re talking about your diet and losing some weight. And man, there’s been so many times where, whether it’s been a workout regimen, or whether it’s a diet that you’re following, and like, you’ll have followed it to the tee, and then you get on that scale. And that scale says you’re either the same weight, or you’re like point two or three point pounds, point three pounds heavier. I’m like, Screw this, I’m out. Like, it hasn’t been worth it for what I’m doing. But it’s like, you know, it’s like you see with, like, whenever you’re doing stocks, or whether you’re when you’re investing, it’s not always going to be like this, there’s always going to be the ups and downs. But over time, you know, hopefully, your investments going up. And it’s the same way with your weight, it’s going to probably be a little up and down to where it’s not just going to be a straight line down. But it’s in our minds, man, it’s so difficult to get that, you know, whenever you get on the scale in the morning, and you feel like you’ve just, you know, starved yourself for the last 24 hours. And your body says, oh, yeah, your point two pounds heavier. Now, you know, that’s where we you got to go, okay, you know what? We’ve got to go? Where do we have a little hiccup here? That doesn’t mean that the party’s over. And you know, I’m going to gain 17 pounds now. It’s okay with that, what do I need to do? Do I need to make any adjustments or is my body now adjusting to what I’m doing? You know, and go from there. And it’s the same thing with with any of our goals, or what we’re doing in life, it’s like, just take a take a breath, just take a step back for a second, take a breath, and realize what’s going on and realize what you’re looking at is a whole book, instead of just this one page, you know, the of the story, because that may be the worst part of the whole book right here. But if you’re able to read the whole story, it’s a beautiful thing if you just continue on. So it’s a whole lot easier said than done, you know, but it’s something that that we probably all know, but we need to hear it, you know, over and over again, just to remind ourselves, and you know, if someone’s going through that right now.

Rusty Puttfark
Yeah, I think discouragement is one of the biggest things that throw us off. I I remember I was on the Bible app. It tells you how many consecutive days you did it. Yeah. And I remember I was almost a 90. And I forgot a day or was traveling or something like that and didn’t do it. The next day. I logged in, and except back to one. I’m like, Man, I don’t read this thing anymore. I was so mad at that thing. Yeah, but I’m almost a 90 again, and I make sure I do it every morning. But yeah, I think a lot of times if you if you have a cheat meal, it’s just easier to keep cheating and go back if you if you miss an exercise or if you miss you know something. It’s just like you said, it’s it’s it’s the average of the mean, right? Instead of, you know, judging the individual, but I think we all want to judge the individual thing like this morning, like I since last Sunday. You know, I mean, it was it was it was steady or even. I mean, it all went down and today I was point two pounds heavier. Yeah. So I mean, I’m like, man, what, what in the world but it’s alright, because yesterday, I was really hungry and I ate a little bit more but gaming point two pounds, that’s fine when you’re down. 10. Right. So you know what? As fun I’ll, I’ll just walk extra workout extra do what I need to do extra. It’s, it’s it? It’s, I have an overall plan. If 30 days I’m trying to do this. And then we’ll see where it’s out. But here’s the thing. I also took into consideration. The real reason I was doing this I wanted more energy. I wanted more focus. You know, I wanted to be healthier. If I’m point two pounds more, maybe that means I just gain more 2.2 pounds. Yeah, always take it to the gun show. Which weighs the weight room. Exactly. So yeah, I mean, just you always have to have that redemptive perspective. Like we talked about that. You know what? Take what could be bad information and turn it around to what potentially be good?

Del Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, so number three says to choose your battles wisely. Be wise, don’t let pride or anger dictate our actions.

Rusty Puttfark
So I didn’t read that because I was having a hard time reading that because I’m anger dictates my actions. Way too much. Just to be completely and not a people. Right, like one on one. Well, a little bit but yeah, I just get like I get I’ll get real mad at the stuff i i see in the news. Like I’ll get real mad about it. Yeah. And I don’t need to do that because I can’t change it.

Del Murphy
Yeah, that’s something that my dad has taught me and it’s something again Just like you said, I have definitely not gotten really good at whenever I was younger man, because I’ve, I’ve always loved college football. But whenever my team would lose, man, I remember I threw something in the house. And so of course, my dad got upset with me. But then he sat me down. And he taught me he said, you’re looking at things wrong. You know, you have to look at what you can control, because there’s things that you can control. And there’s things that are outside of your circle of control. And what is it what what sense does it make if you’re all upset about these things that are outside of your control? What does it matter, you’re not going to be able to change it and not that again, not that we don’t want to help change the world or you know, make a difference. But there’s a lot of things in life, whether it’s the news, or different things that go on that we have no control over, like somebody else, say there’s something that they don’t like you for some reason, and it’s something that you did nothing wrong, you can’t control the way they feel about you. So whether instead of getting down and mopey, and you know, think, Oh, I’m a loser because of that. So you know what, I can control who I am, I can control my emotions and my response and reaction to that, and I’m just gonna be a better person. And you know, like the eagle just continue to soar and go higher. So, again, really easy to say real hard to do.

Rusty Puttfark
Yeah, with pride. I hate losing. hate losing. Yeah. I mean, I will do whatever I can to not lose. But I gotta I gotta deal with it. Because like you said, out of out of control, it should be, you know, not making it a situation where it affects you and your health and your life. I’m the same way about sports, too. I mean, I college football. Oh, yeah, man. I mean, we I know, we’ve been in the same house where I think if we had stuff to throw, throw it, but I mean, that that is good advice. Because it’s, it’s one of those things that you know, there’s just a lot that I mean, the people that just let that you know, waterfall off a duck’s back. I mean, it’s like, man, yeah, I envy those type of noble No kidding. I mean, I don’t know, I think you, you definitely want to win. But you have to understand that even if you lose, to learn from from the loss, what you can do to get better. And again, there’s a lot of things you can’t control. You know, yeah. Other people. Right. And that’s, that’s where it kind of comes out. But yeah, I think I think that’s a big, big area that I I definitely am probably going to work on the rest of my life. Yeah, you and me both

Del Murphy
brother, for sure.

Rusty Puttfark
And then this is interesting. Number four, take the high road not engaging in conflict can be the best option. Even if we have the power to do so. There are so many times I want to respond to every single thing I see that people say that stupid or they’re uneducated, or any of that stuff. But there’s so many times you just have to keep scrolling on by and say, You know what, I’m not gonna engage in that. There’s an interesting, interesting article I found and I remember hearing this about Abraham Lincoln about how he would just write the most ridiculous letters. Read that. And there’s an article here the lost art of the unsent angry letter. Whenever Abraham Lincoln felt the urge to tell someone off, he would compose what he called a hot letter. He’d pile all his anger into a note, put it aside until his emotions cooled down and then write never sent never signed, which meant that General George G. Meade for one, whenever hear his commander in chief that Lincoln blamed him for letting Robert Lee Lee escape after Gettysburg, Lincoln was hardly unique among public figures who needed to think twice about their choice words. The unsent angry letter has a venerable tradition. Its purpose is twofold. It serves as type of emotional catharsis, a way to let it all out without the repercussions of true engagement. And it acts as a strategic catharsis and exercise and saying what you really think which Mark Twain himself a notable non sender, of course, believe provided unallowable frankness and freedom. Yeah, so I think sometimes we need to write it out, instead of tweeted or whatever. And that’s an area where I just like I said, I take a lot of time, pride, again, to educate myself on certain issues, right, and people that would say something that doesn’t mean that just you know, like a drive by just say something stupid. I’m really, really, you know, they had that article the other day, for instance, about the gay pride parade in in Florida being cancelled after DeSantis made the the law that required you have to be an adult to go to this. So I just put so much winning, right, because I read the article. Everybody’s like, you know, the government shouldn’t be able to shut these down or whatever. Well, the the truth thing Behind The story is the group shut it down themselves. Because they said that if they weren’t allowed to bring kids, they weren’t doing it. Well, to me, that’s a win because kids shouldn’t be sexualized. Yeah. So that’s the context of that with no one reads the context of articles I in, in choosing your fights, I just ignored it, want to respond back and say, Hey, you moron, you should read the story and understand the context before you make complete false allegations. But I didn’t. And it’s kind of like the one after the shooting. I wanted to go after transgenders. But I didn’t, you know, because I understand how broken those people are, and how, how much just how turmoil and mental illness that they truly have. You know, and I think that’s what I’m working on, to step back and say, like, like Steve was talking about in that podcast, one of his listeners said that he was able to forgive the man who sexually assaulted him, after he watched that movie in nefarious because he felt empathy for him. Because if a guy could do that, the listener said, If a guy could do that, to me sexually assault me. I can’t imagine how broken he was to do that. That was powerful that was and that’s where it’s just it goes back to, you know, Viktor Frankl and what Man’s Search for Meaning and all those principles, we won’t, you know, relive those on every single podcast we do. But I think it’s so important to think through that redemptive perspective. And that was it on a platter right there?

Del Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, again, I mean, this stuff is so powerful and so good. And it’s like, man, if we could just capture just one or two of these things, you know, to work on? You know, I think it would, it would stop a lot of the, a lot of the fighting that’s going on, because, you know, it’s so many, whether it’s from the left or the right, you know, just people arguing and it’s like, you know, what, we’re all humans here, we all have to live together, we, you know, God’s given us this one planet, you know, let’s, let’s all just figure out a way we can still have differences, just like we’ve talked on one or the other, I think, a couple podcasts ago, where it’s like, you know, back in the day, everybody got along, fine. Didn’t matter if you were left, right, what you believed in, you know, it was fine, we could all still sit down at the dinner table. And that’s the way it still can be today. It’s just sometimes everybody on both sides needs to learn, hey, control your tongue. You know, just think before you react, think before you just blurt out things, you know, and, and I think things would be a whole lot better. You know, the Bible

Rusty Puttfark
says the tongue is a rudder steer in the ship. Yeah. How true is that? Yeah. And the last one, stay true to your values, your you already talked about that, you know, have a, you know, staying focused, stay calm, stay true to values and aspirations, even the face of adversity and distractions, I would probably add to that persecution. Because if you’re, if you’re true to your values, and today, in our time, the Bible has promised us that we will face persecution, I think we’re seeing that on the rise. But that’s something kinda like with that article, we’re gonna have to sacrifice and we’re gonna have to stand up and risk losing certain things to stay true to what we believe. But that’s what we’re called to do. Absolutely. And so that’s what we need to do.

Del Murphy
For sure. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s so difficult. But you know, like I said, we’ve got to figure out what it is that we’re going to stand for, what do we value? And what are we willing to give up, you know, to hold on to those values and to hold on to those truths that we believe in, you know, and, you know, there’s this just just something that that each person really needs to think deeply about, you know, because it get definitely gives life more meaning whenever you’ve got those truths, those values that you hold on to that you go, this is something that I don’t bend for right here. This is something that I’m not going to break about that, you know, this is the stopping point. And so, you know, it gives us gives us all something to think about move from there.

Rusty Puttfark
Yeah. Yeah. And again, you almost have to assess and say, Is my time better served to do this or this? Am I better served to scroll through social media and get upset and make myself angry or my Am I am, I’m more served to go do a walk or workout or spend time with my family or call someone I had talked to him a long time, that kind of thing. John Gordon, he does a thank you walk every day. He gets up in the morning just goes and he just tells God what he’s thankful for. That’s a great use of your time, especially as you start your day. I mean, you start your day with gratitude and thankfulness for sure. And it just fills your mind with positive energy. And I think that’s something again, I’m saying this to me more than anybody but it’s like these are things because sometimes if I wake up and see a story it just get your, your blood flowing and just kind of mix your mood. Yeah, kind of could ruin your whole day right from the ruin the whole day, right right from the start. So I think it’s good to block that off. To you know, to recap Ignore distractions. Prioritize, prioritize. That’s a hard word to say word Hi ora ties your goals that and rural. Rural has always been hard work for me to say. Start again, ignore distractions, prioritize our goals. Choose your battles wisely taking the high road and stay true to your values.

Del Murphy
Good stuff, man.

Rusty Puttfark
We’ve got crows all around. Got to be eagles. Yep. We got to just ignore all the little nonsense there. And then we’re done. We have to understand were designed for a higher altitude. And and that’s that story. So that that’s like I said that one texts. June spark that often. Thanks. I think it’s a great, great word for for a lot of people that are out there that some sometimes need to fast, sometimes needs to reprioritize maybe, you know, write their goals down. Yeah. Just get things in focus and perspective. And again, man, if if, if we can learn to, to just kind of keep our vision forward and not let all the little stuff behind our neck get us think we’ll be a lot better. So

Del Murphy
absolutely. Very good, man. That’s definitely stuff for for me to work on as well. So take that and take a couple points and try to chip away out a little bit this week.

Rusty Puttfark
Absolutely. Yeah. Well, I appreciate you watching. For the free thinkers podcast, go to free thinkers podcast.com. And sign up for text and email alerts and follow us on all our platforms. We are on gab TV as a main platform, Rumble, Apple podcasts, Google podcasts, all that other stuff also on Bridey on and so until next time, we hope you had a good week. Don’t get distracted.

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