This is Our Home

Transcript

This is my home.

There’s a story about Emperor Norton the First, of course was the emperor of the United States and protector of Mexico, respected for this title in the city of San Francisco.

And he would go around to restaurants and of course the restaurateurs would never charge his majesty for a meal. They would simply put a plaque in the establishment saying “By request of his majesty Emperor Norton the First.

One day, there was an intense situation going down probably in downtown San Francisco. There were a bunch of Chinese and Irish on the other side about to get into a full on brawl. Huge fight, tension had been brewing for weeks.

Emperor Norton saw what was going on, assessed the situation. He walked right through the crowd between these two groups of people, knelt down and started saying the lords prayers.

Those two groups never fought. I don’t know if it was out of respect for his majesty or if they were just moved by the power of his conviction. And the absurdity of the situation, cause that’s what happens sometimes.

It’s actually a principle of Neurolinguistic Programming, they call it a state break. That’s when you throw somebody a curve ball, do something that’s so unusual they don’t know how to respond to it.

Years ago, maybe 10 years ago, I was in Melvin and I went to a Wu Tang Clan concert. After the concert we were leaving and something was going down. This guy looked he was quite skinny, might have been impoverished. I don’t know.

But he was coming after another guy like a hipster type guy. Looked like this hipster dude didn’t want any trouble. For some reason, the skinny guy just wanted to fight him.

I walked away and I said to my buddy Age afterwards “I could have done something, I probably could have stood up. I could have shouted. I have this strong voice. this amateur theater practice where I can project to the back of a hole.

If I had told him sternly that the police were coming, just something, he probably would have stopped.

And Age said “Who knows man the guy could have had a knife. Who knows what you might be risking? It’s better not to get involved.”

A couple of years ago I was in Kuala Lumpur out on Changkat. I might have told this story before. And these…it’s a really weird situation. There was this working girl, a sex worker. And her old pimp came by and was trying to persuade her violently to join his team once again.

This Norwegian guy I was having a beer with got up and started telling off these henchmen and saying “Look, what are you doing? This is not a place for this. You’re out of line.”

And I got up and I was about to walk over and say to Lief “Listen man, it’s just not worth it. Don’t get involved and put yourself at risk”. But by the time I walked over there, I was wrapped up in this energy and I was telling these guys a bit of a different strategy.

But I was saying to them “Hey, this is a peaceful place. And I guess the henchmen didn’t know what to think. Maybe they were just humoring me because I was a tourist and they didn’t want to attack me.

They didn’t disagree. They kind of nodded a little bit. I think, you know I like to think that these people in their heart of hearts also wanted peace.

Last year I was in Hungary in Budapest and it might have been like 2 am. I was quite drunk coming back from a bar with some friends and I saw this group of people. The kind of people I would have hung out with when I was like 17 or 18. They kind of looked like mall rats, people probably hanging out in parks after dark drinking and smoking weed.

Again tension was there and this time it was 2 women who were about to fight. I guess I could say there was less risk.

I didn’t speak a word of Magyar and they didn’t speak a word of English. So whatever I was going to say they would have no idea what it meant. I was drunk and I was quite emotional, intensely emotional.

And I walked over and I said “Hey, God loves you. Please don’t fight, please don’t fight.”

And the young lady the aggressor, she walked away. They never fought.

A couple of months back I was in Bogotá, Columbia. And again there was this intense scene. This guy who had been injured previously who was walking with 2 crutches got angry about something. And he was literally throwing his crutch at some guy who had angered him for some reason. His girlfriend was presumably there and was saying “Johnny, you have so much to lose. Johnny, it’s not worth it.”

But Johnny couldn’t hear her over the sound of the cars and his own anger.

I thought, what can I do? I didn’t know what to do.

So I just yelled out “Johnny, relax.” I think it might have gave him pause for a moment. I don’t know if it continued.

The young lady said to me again “Best not to get involved”

I’m already involved. This is my place. This is my home. Planet earth, I’m involved as I can be. It’s not an easy thing to do to have the courage to get involved and step up in a situation like that.

So I wouldn’t judge anyone for standing by and hope not to judge myself if I stand by in the future. It’s a wonderful thing to do, to look out for your fellow man. Throw them a curve ball. Give them a moment to pause, cause after all, this is our home.

Thank you for listening. Thank you for thinking beautifully. Thank you for looking out for each other.

Take care, I’ll talk to you soon.