Maintenance Phase - Marianne Williamson

00:00:00.000 welcome to maintenance phase the podcast that thinks your aura looks a little purple today

00:00:16.100 oh i like it because we're talking about wellness crystals

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00:01:00.640 you just want to listen and hang out you just want to listen and hang out delightful and today 0.98

00:01:04.380 we are talking about one ms marianne williamson yeah the self-proclaimed bitch for god wait really 1.00

00:01:11.920 that's a phrase that she used to describe herself quite a bit in the early 90s i learned 1.00

00:01:16.200 Oh, my God. Man, the Lilith Fair did something to a whole generation of Gen Xers.

00:01:24.440 Mike, for the uninitiated, what would you say about Marianne Williamson? How did you come to

00:01:29.400 know of her existence? Okay, I kind of am the uninitiated. I think I must have first heard of

00:01:36.000 her in last year's election, where she was a out of left field dark horse candidate who showed up 1.00

00:01:43.340 on the debate stage and then made a bunch of like weird zingers she was just sort of like a kooky

00:01:48.820 anti-vax like adjacent left-wing woo-woo stuff and i remember my overall impression was that like 0.95

00:01:57.000 people i knew from the east coast were like who is this woman she is totally off of her rocker

00:02:02.200 and people i knew from the west coast were like a person like this is my medical doctor 1.00

00:02:06.640 that was that was the american divide at that time she's like the human equivalent of one of

00:02:13.600 those t-shirts that's like a wolf howling at the moon yes so marianne williamson i would say is

00:02:20.000 best known for her work as sort of a spiritual leader she is in her late 60s now so she's like

00:02:29.300 white lady she has written 13 self-help books oh my god four of those are new york times number

00:02:37.180 one bestsellers she fills stadiums for her lectures she has a huge cadre of celebrity

00:02:47.580 supporters and i'm so excited to take you through all things marianne williamson like from jump do

00:02:55.180 it. Take me. So Marianne Williamson was born in Texas. She's from Houston, Texas. Folks who have

00:03:02.040 heard her speak, we will hear her speak throughout the course of this episode, will note that she

00:03:06.540 has a little bit of Texas twang and a little bit of like mid-Atlantic accent. So like Jackie

00:03:12.300 Onassis on the ranch. Her maternal grandparents were Russian Jewish immigrants. Her immigrant

00:03:18.740 roots are very important to her. They were also an upper middle class family. Her mom was a

00:03:24.360 homemaker. Her dad was an immigration attorney. She went to a pretty nice, fancy high schools

00:03:31.240 and went away to Pomona college in Southern California, which is like one of those liberal

00:03:38.220 arts colleges that ends up on all of these lists of like the best liberal arts colleges you've

00:03:44.560 never heard of. I think you were going to say it's one of those colleges that shows up on like

00:03:47.640 Breitbart.com of like these liberal students did this thing. I mean, you would know that

00:03:56.080 better than I would. That's my world. Yeah, that's fine. She went away to Pomona for a couple of

00:04:03.920 years. Um, she studied theater and philosophy for two years and then she dropped out. It was

00:04:08.580 not for her. She spent the next decade living in California and New Mexico, Texas, New York,

00:04:14.420 all over she calls this her quote-unquote lost decade okay where she was swayed by and i quote

00:04:20.960 bad boys and good dope it's how she talks about that okay sure man that sounds great live it up

00:04:28.560 marianne what uh what years were these so this would have been like the 70s okay so she missed

00:04:33.980 the 60s she missed like the peak hate ashbury years but she's there in the sort of immediate

00:04:38.500 aftermath yeah and she's in san francisco for a short period and actually that short period

00:04:43.980 is in 1976 okay she's in san francisco and she picks up a book called a course in miracles okay

00:04:53.420 a course in miracles is quite a famous self-help book sort of spiritual self-help book that's

00:05:00.140 focused on the power of forgiveness it relies really heavily on christianity and is sort of

00:05:06.780 constantly referring back to God, the father and Jesus and all of this sort of stuff. The author

00:05:13.920 was a psychologist and psych professor. Her name is Helen Shookman. She also said that the book

00:05:21.220 was dictated to her by Jesus. It's amazing. She doesn't have a diet named after her. I mean,

00:05:26.840 we'll get there. Oh, good. I am going to send you a little quote from the LA Times to read out

00:05:36.080 about A Course in Miracles.

00:05:38.200 Hang on just one second.

00:05:39.580 Chat, chat, chat.

00:05:40.740 It says,

00:05:41.980 the course offers a variation

00:05:43.520 on so-called new thought,

00:05:45.700 the American metaphysical movement

00:05:47.360 that dates back to the 1880s,

00:05:49.460 resting on the belief

00:05:50.280 that the only reality is God

00:05:52.360 and that negative things

00:05:53.780 like poverty, sickness, and fear

00:05:55.480 are unreal, as Melton put it.

00:05:57.760 The course advocates

00:05:58.660 surrendering to God's plan

00:06:00.740 and approaching life

00:06:01.840 in a loving, nonjudgmental way.

00:06:03.820 The change in perception

00:06:05.120 is said to produce miracles oh yeah tell me your reactions to that if she was a man i would be

00:06:12.240 waiting for like the sexual assault allegations at this stage it's just like standard the things

00:06:18.040 in your life that are getting you down are effectively your fault yeah and that if you

00:06:23.920 have the right beliefs then all of those things will go away yeah it is another example of the

00:06:29.920 stories that wealthy people tell themselves about how the world works to justify their

00:06:34.620 own position, even though they don't realize that's what they're doing.

00:06:37.740 Yeah.

00:06:37.900 I mean, you can sort of see how this is helping lay the groundwork for like the secret and

00:06:43.380 a bunch of sort of like the next wave of prosperity gospel stuff that's starting to come our way.

00:06:49.440 I mean, I think the other thing that like stands out to me about this is Marianne Williamson

00:06:54.060 is someone who's like very rooted in a an immigrant experience, but particularly a Jewish

00:06:58.760 immigrant experience of her family. And A Course in Miracles is like extremely Jesus-y. Initially,

00:07:06.760 she talks about feeling sort of put off by the amount of Jesus in this book. But she sort of

00:07:13.680 comes around and in 1991, she tells Vanity Fair, quote, a conversion to Christ is not a conversion

00:07:19.560 to Christianity. It is a conversion to a conviction of the heart. The Messiah is not a person,

00:07:25.960 but a point of view. So she's sort of like starting to make some room for herself to

00:07:32.120 both embrace her Jewishness and also embrace this like very Jesus-y kind of self-help book,

00:07:40.700 right? Which is totally fine until you start selling it to other people or promising that 0.82

00:07:46.320 it's going to change other people's lives. And what we'll get into is selling it to other people

00:07:50.500 in a diet book, by the way, is what we're talking about today. Yeah, I forgot the premise of our

00:07:55.640 show i was like oh yeah that's interesting kind of random stuff it's we're not just going through

00:08:00.700 primary candidates for the 2020 presidential next episode dick gephart

00:08:07.700 so she reads this book in san francisco in 1976 and she starts sort of taking in these lessons

00:08:18.960 about quote unquote miracles from A Course in Miracles. In 1979, she has this sort of

00:08:26.240 epiphany that she wants to move back to Houston, Texas, which is her hometown.

00:08:31.100 She moved there and opened this metaphysical bookstore slash coffee shop. Okay. And she does

00:08:37.540 that for a few years until she has another sort of epiphany. She calls it a flash when she decides

00:08:44.180 to move to los angeles so she moves out to los angeles in 1983 she shared an apartment with a

00:08:50.800 roommate when she moved there she sort of talks very proudly about moving out to los angeles with

00:08:55.560 a thousand dollars in her pocket that sounds fake those stories are always fake they're always fake 0.96

00:09:00.120 wasn't she running a successful business like she would have had enough money to do this so she

00:09:04.440 moves out to la she gets an apartment she gets a roommate that roommate is 17 years old and she was

00:09:10.240 31 which is a little odd oh wow that roommate is also laura dern no way oh icons an episode full

00:09:20.620 of icons true icons i mean like the name dropping in this episode alone is just you're gonna you're

00:09:28.020 gonna get a backache from reaching down to pick up all those names around this time she starts

00:09:33.000 hosting prayer groups in their apartment that are sort of focused on a course in miracles

00:09:40.620 this this self-help book that she's read over time those turn into lectures and over time

00:09:47.780 she starts sort of breaking from the christianity only approach of a course in miracles and she

00:09:55.080 starts weaving in judaism and buddhism and sort of pop psychology she'll weave in some sort of

00:10:02.520 12-steppy kind of stuff she at this point is giving these lectures and these prayer groups

00:10:08.000 for a suggested donation and she didn't turn people away for lack of funds based on everything

00:10:12.440 i've read that remains her model today which is like honestly like cooler than a lot of

00:10:17.700 self-help people yeah you know it sounds like she's she's adapting this like a recipe she's

00:10:23.320 found this sort of base thing and then as she goes along she's tweaking it to her own preferences

00:10:29.360 isn't her own worldview yeah this is where it feels like it sort of links up to moon juice with

00:10:33.900 me where it's just sort of like you just imagine someone like going through an orchard and taking

00:10:38.080 something off of one tree and something off of another tree but not really like watering the

00:10:42.400 trees or caring for them or tending to them or understanding how they work or any of that kind

00:10:45.860 of stuff so her profile continues to rise sort of locally but she really blows up in the 90s

00:10:54.060 and sort of media coverage of her work really blows up in the 90s she gets a bunch of press

00:10:59.980 coverage that sexualizes her a lot and in really weird ways there's a mother jones piece that

00:11:07.780 describes her wagging her finger during a comment and also comments on her and i quote nicely 1.00

00:11:13.160 muscled arms okay there's another reporter who calls her and i quote a sexy little guru like 0.98

00:11:19.900 it's so weird it's so weird as she's getting sexualized by this weird press coverage she's

00:11:26.440 also sort of calling that out and she's like this is weird you guys are talking about me in a really

00:11:30.980 different way than you would talk about a man which is true but also she talks about women's

00:11:36.060 leadership and sexuality and attractiveness in really weird ways she's like given this quote

00:11:41.040 a couple of times about how she suspects eleanor roosevelt could have made a bigger impact if she

00:11:46.540 just worn makeup oh let's go ahead and leave eleanor roosevelt as soon as you said eleanor

00:11:55.400 roosevelt just like had a mini stroke so as she's having this sort of rise to spiritual leader

00:12:05.420 stardom that's happening pretty slowly over the course of the 80s she's also doing a bunch of

00:12:10.760 work in nonprofits. In the late 80s, she co-found the Center for Living, which focused on providing

00:12:17.960 services like guided meditation, massage, meals, that kind of thing to people with terminal

00:12:24.320 illnesses. And particularly, it's focused on people with HIV and AIDS. Because at that point

00:12:29.820 in the late 1980s, a bunch of direct service programs, a bunch of hospitals, a bunch of people

00:12:36.000 are just refusing to provide services to people with AIDS or people who are HIV positive.

00:12:42.320 Yeah.

00:12:42.660 The seed funding for that is provided by David Geffen of Geffen Records.

00:12:46.900 What?

00:12:47.380 Yeah, totally.

00:12:48.240 Okay. 0.65

00:12:48.760 She is definitely like in the sort of LA milieu at this point.

00:12:53.480 She's sort of surrounded by celebrities more and more and more.

00:12:57.340 She's actively seeking out those connections.

00:13:00.000 But around this time, this is like now the early 90s.

00:13:03.900 the LA times reports that there has been a big staff and board clash, especially over her

00:13:11.280 leadership style. So staff under the condition of anonymity, describe her as controlling. They

00:13:18.080 describe her as someone with a big temper. They also say she wants to lead meetings with prayer. 0.92

00:13:23.580 Okay. And that she frequently sort of references religion and God in work settings. And folks were

00:13:30.540 just like uncomfortable with that level of religion in the workplace. You and I have both

00:13:35.420 worked at NGOs. Yeah. And eventually we have to do an episode that's just all NGO drama.

00:13:40.500 Turf wars. The board turns on the CEO. You can't keep the interns. Mike, you might get your wish

00:13:48.480 right here today. Hell yeah. So in addition to sort of like creating this discomfort with staff,

00:13:55.640 There are also reports that her sort of level of focusing on religion and invoking Jesus in particular in this realm of service provision is that it also hampers their fundraising efforts.

00:14:08.420 Like the donors who are willing to give to queer people at this point and to HIV and AIDS are not necessarily the donors who are super down with a ton of Jesus talk, right?

00:14:19.940 There's also a broader issue with how many social services in the United States are provided by

00:14:25.640 explicitly religious organizations. Yes, absolutely. A lot of the homeless shelters

00:14:30.860 that I've spent time at have these like, you have to go to a service to get the free lunch,

00:14:35.640 and they're handing out religious literature. And it's just a weird system that we've sleepwalked

00:14:40.420 into, where it's essentially ideological organizations providing basic services.

00:14:44.580 It's extra gnarly that she's sort of like stepping into this gap, right, where there are fewer

00:14:49.620 service organizations fewer of them are funded fewer of them are willing to work with people

00:14:54.740 who are HIV positive or who have AIDS yeah so they continue to sort of fight it out in the press

00:15:01.200 there are profiles in Vanity Fair and People and the LA Times and all of these different news

00:15:06.900 sources that culminates in this big Vanity Fair story where some of the board members of the

00:15:12.340 Center for Living were critical of what they perceived as Marianne Williamson's desire for

00:15:16.540 fame following that story she essentially dismissed a number of board members who spoke 0.99

00:15:23.900 to vanity fair so like a little purge she does a little purge which is just like all right if

00:15:28.640 you're not behind me then bye yeah one of the board members that she dismisses is mike nichols

00:15:34.260 wait really mike nichols director of postcards from the edge and working girl and who's afraid

00:15:41.180 of virginia wolf and the graduate and the bird case like a bunch of other stuff so he got fired

00:15:45.800 by Marianne Williamson and then he calls up Laura Dern and he's like we gotta talk I mean he calls

00:15:52.340 up some other people and joins with some other now former board members and they set up a rival

00:15:58.880 organization oh good it's such non-profit battle nonsense yeah it's some good Adidas Puma stuff

00:16:07.100 this is like every NGO I've ever worked at this do you understand why I was excited to tell you 0.99

00:16:13.400 all of this there's some like arcane fight between board members and it ends with like a fucking 0.81

00:16:18.080 mutiny and then somebody sends up the same organization but without susan or whoever yeah 0.98

00:16:23.700 and then they go to all the funders and they go that other organization is fucked up yeah exactly 0.91

00:16:28.700 yeah basically all the reports are pretty much the same which is that she flies off the handle 0.74

00:16:34.960 pretty easily she gets into like micromanaging events and projects to the detriment of those

00:16:42.300 projects. Being an executive director of a nonprofit is an extremely hard job. And she is

00:16:48.260 a person who is badly suited to it. In 1989, so around the time that there's all this sort of

00:16:54.760 tumult in the Center for Living, she also co-founds Project Angel Food, which is sort of like God's

00:17:02.020 love we deliver. So it's like doing the like, we're delivering meals to people with HIV or AIDS

00:17:08.020 in LA. With both of these organizations, she takes no salary, which I think is a thing that

00:17:13.300 sounds like a good and altruistic thing to do on the face of it. But I'm not a fan. I'm curious

00:17:19.680 about your reaction to that. I mean, don't get me started on the whole NGO salaries, man.

00:17:25.160 Go. If people aren't making money, then you're only going to attract people who have money

00:17:28.620 already. Yeah, totally. I mean, I think this one feels a little different because her staff is

00:17:34.080 making salaries but she's doing a thing where she's like no no no i don't i'm not going to 0.99

00:17:38.280 take a salary but then where's her money coming from oh she's she's wealthy at this point oh from

00:17:42.980 the from the talks from the talks um from her sort of generational wealth that part's like not

00:17:48.140 super duper clear there are some reports at this point about her living in like a two and a half

00:17:53.380 million dollar home and that's like late 80s dollars right well what do you think about her 1.00

00:17:58.000 not taking a salary i think it's a thing that sounds good on paper probably sounds good to

00:18:02.820 donors yeah yeah ultimately it divorces her experience from that of the staff she's supposed

00:18:09.060 to support and supervise there's now this uneven sort of power dynamic happening where they're

00:18:15.520 relying on this work for their livelihood but she isn't yeah so she's founded project angel food

00:18:21.540 and there's trouble there too they cycle through four executive directors in five years according

00:18:28.620 to people magazine the best liked among the bunch was the last one named steve schulte and staff are

00:18:37.440 pissed yeah they knew that they didn't get along they knew that marianne williamson had sort of

00:18:43.560 long advocated for steve's dismissal so they demanded her resignation nice and they said

00:18:50.360 that if she stayed they would unionize hell yeah right do it like we're getting all the way into

00:18:57.800 some non-profit nonsense this is like you needed to give me like a content warning at the beginning 0.88

00:19:02.500 of this episode like you were describing like half of my human rights career i mean same so

00:19:08.920 she publicly opposes not just the union but the unionization of non-profits altogether she's like

00:19:15.320 i don't know about this i don't think there's a good thing to do like she like goes out hard

00:19:21.180 against unions of people you know presumably working for the greater good that's a move

00:19:28.120 that's it that's an interesting choice because usually bosses do the thing where they're like 0.99

00:19:34.100 i like unions just not at this workplace i don't think it's right for us she's just like fuck 0.88

00:19:39.460 unions i mean i don't i don't think people necessarily understand the number of people 0.96

00:19:44.820 who are working on non-profits for at or below minimum wage it's on it's unbelievable i have

00:19:50.940 interviewed people who've like left work at homeless shelters to go be baristas because

00:19:54.480 they make like one third more yes and there's this whole dynamic as well of like foundations

00:20:00.900 that fund non-profits are now conditioned to expect and conditioned to demand low wages for

00:20:08.440 those workers because they're like hey man i gave you all this money how am i only getting four 0.91

00:20:13.040 staff for that i know and they all watch that fucking ted talk about like overhead costs for 0.91

00:20:18.960 ngos out of control so they're like what's your overhead percentage part of what happens then 0.85

00:20:23.900 also is that again like funders like nobody wants to be the funder or the individual donor 0.96

00:20:28.840 who like pays for like the internet yeah yeah it all sort of ranks as like frivolous stuff when

00:20:35.080 in fact that's like a bunch of essential stuff yeah totally yes and the things that get determined

00:20:40.300 as like creature comforts are like, you know, health insurance with a copay of less than $50.

00:20:46.200 It's like human rights.

00:20:47.380 We'd like to be able to like buy shitty pizza for our volunteers once a week or something.

00:20:52.360 You know what I mean? Like, it's like really, really not break in the bank kind of stuff.

00:20:56.020 We want pepperoni on the pizza. Can we have pepperoni?

00:20:59.060 We're getting into so many classic nonprofit dynamics. And one of the classic nonprofit

00:21:03.580 dynamics is there are many, many different kinds of executive directors, sort of like

00:21:08.700 types of people who take on that role one of them is somebody with a real temper and by all accounts

00:21:17.720 about Marianne Williamson she is that person her like front-facing self is this very divine

00:21:24.320 woo religious person who's very much about like embracing your imperfections and about

00:21:30.480 growing through change and all that sort of stuff and then in her non-profit she has a real temper 1.00

00:21:38.160 and is really rough with people.

00:21:40.400 So I'm going to read through

00:21:41.880 just like a quick little series of quotes.

00:21:43.980 In Entertainment Weekly, they say,

00:21:45.900 quote, Sally Fisher,

00:21:47.040 who started the AIDS organization

00:21:48.380 Northern Lights Alternative, says,

00:21:50.460 quote, the bottom line is

00:21:52.100 you're not allowed to disagree with her. 0.99

00:21:54.000 She goes ballistic.

00:21:55.660 People go on these boards

00:21:56.900 to take care of people with HIV,

00:21:58.600 not to take care of Marianne Williamson's ego issues.

00:22:02.120 This is from that People Magazine piece,

00:22:04.620 quote, one staffer,

00:22:06.600 the Manhattan Center's board director,

00:22:08.040 regina hoover was put on probation with williamson's consent last year one week before

00:22:13.440 hoover's scheduled double mastectomy a short time after her surgery hoover was fired then forced to

00:22:20.600 for months over the terms of her medical insurance vox they reported that marianne williamson uh 0.99

00:22:28.380 shouted at her staff telling them not to speak with reporters saying quote you're fucking with 1.00

00:22:33.380 my livelihood. I'm famous. I don't need it. Damn it, man. I need I need a moment. This is 0.99

00:22:39.940 NGO bosses I had, right? I had a male boss who referred to one of my colleagues as a C word

00:22:48.800 what in front of two interns that we had just hired that day. And it was International Women's

00:22:54.980 day it was march 8th so like on top of all of this stuff with sort of staff dynamics she is like

00:23:03.020 really significantly underperforming on fundraising so if you're a board member or an executive

00:23:08.600 director at a non-profit that is ostensibly like the biggest part of your job right yeah one

00:23:15.560 fundraiser she has for the center for living is budgeted to bring in two million dollars at a 0.80

00:23:21.320 single fundraiser which for my small non-profit brain blew my tiny mind yeah that event that was

00:23:29.060 budgeted to raise two million dollars only brought in 725 000 so 40 of what you expected uh-huh i

00:23:37.000 don't know how you have that big a shortfall and don't lay off staff like i don't see how that's

00:23:42.680 possible or sell some of marianne's crystals that are in her office this time there's also a thing

00:23:48.920 in, I think, the dynamics of NGOs specifically can be a little bit like the ends justify the

00:23:55.380 means outlook of like, well, I'm saving starving African kids. And it's like, well, you are on like

00:24:01.340 a broader level. But on a day to day level, that's not what you're doing. On a day to day level,

00:24:04.920 you're like, you need to hold this conference. And it's actually not okay to like yell at the

00:24:08.780 person who's organizing the conference. Yeah, I mean, I do think there are conversations that

00:24:13.740 I've either been in or heard discussed where sort of management in nonprofits or funders to

00:24:21.500 nonprofits will say, well, I thought you were committed to the cause, but if you're asking me

00:24:25.780 for money, you must not be committed to the cause. Oh my God. I know. That is like a real thing that

00:24:32.040 happens that is the weirdest, most coercive nonsense. This is another thing with NGO executive

00:24:37.320 directors is that oftentimes they are clueless rich people who aren't used to having people

00:24:43.040 around them who second guess them. So some of it is just like Mary Ann probably doesn't know what

00:24:48.600 she's doing. Yeah. I mean, there's just sort of these disconnects every step along the way

00:24:52.620 that are born of asking work that happens for the greater good to be self-sustaining and

00:25:00.680 self-funded rather than being projects of the state or fully funded by private foundations

00:25:07.420 or whatever right yeah so marianne williamson's response to this criticism is really frustrating

00:25:15.020 to me she essentially says to multiple media outlets if i were a man i'd be considered like

00:25:20.200 a good decisive leader oh good card to play right which i'm like bad faith marianne even if that's

00:25:28.380 true which it's 1992 it probably is true on some level but like regardless of gender that's a bad 0.98

00:25:33.980 fucking way to run a team like the goal isn't like do things the way that white men do them 0.94

00:25:38.580 what or also like my bad behavior wouldn't be getting called out if i was a dude right like 0.99

00:25:44.200 well we should probably be calling this out for everyone so she ends up stepping down from both

00:25:49.780 of these non-profits that she has co-founded in the same year 1992 and that is the same year that

00:25:56.640 she publishes her first book called a return to love it's funny to be writing a self-help book

00:26:05.340 as you're being like called out in the pages of vanity fair and like busting unions

00:26:11.020 look i've got it all figured out i need to share the secret with everybody else

00:26:15.520 well and it's all about leading from a place of love and i'm like well marianne yeah let's get a

00:26:23.020 fact check in the chat so she really kind of launches onto she's at this point in the late

00:26:29.540 80s and early 90s she's like california famous in 1992 she becomes like globally and nationally

00:26:36.620 famous and in that time she meets her most famous follower so i'm going to send you a link i'm going

00:26:43.900 to ask you not to look at the title of the video okay i'm opening this link i'm blocking the bottom

00:26:50.160 half of the screen with my oh shit there's a surprise i got a little freeze frame marion 0.56

00:26:55.980 oprah oh just the bad actors anointed by oprah you have been a a spiritual friend and counselor 0.93

00:27:04.500 to me for years and i can't remember even what the problem was i was calling you up crying about

00:27:08.700 something and you said to me for whoever it was had done something to me it was a deep betrayal

00:27:14.120 and you said you want to change it pray for them i went i cannot pray for them you want me to pray

00:27:21.880 for them i say to people in my lectures all the time okay here's your homework pray for that

00:27:26.180 person's happiness for 30 days every morning i know five minutes if you can because that's what

00:27:31.720 alchemy is if i pray for somebody who is causing me harm or i feel has harmed me but if i pray

00:27:39.240 your greatest power to change the world of course a miracle says is your power to change your mind

00:27:43.300 about the world. And all minds are joined. There's really no place where you stop and I start.

00:27:49.080 So if I pray for you, if I pray for your happiness, my mind, one of two things will

00:27:54.440 happen. Either you will behave differently or I won't care. Oh my God. Oh my God. Tell me your

00:28:01.180 thoughts. First of all, I mean, the alchemy stuff, I stopped at the alchemy stuff. I don't understand

00:28:07.520 how she doesn't see this is so condescending it's like that thing on on the real housewives

00:28:14.700 or whatever where they're like i feel sorry for you like that's what it feels like to me it feels

00:28:19.740 kind of catty like it's not really about taking culpability for your own actions or trying to

00:28:25.440 understand the other person's perspective or even like coming up with a solution but like

00:28:30.180 ruminating on someone you're having a conflict with ever and like thinking about them in the

00:28:35.040 morning and like wanting to quote unquote help them are like oh it's so sad i don't know it just

00:28:40.820 it just makes me feel like there's a slime covering my body well and i really struggle

00:28:46.160 to figure out sort of what situations they're even recommending this for right i know if someone's

00:28:52.180 been sexually assaulted and you go all right every day for 30 days i want you to pray for

00:28:56.360 your rapist or whatever right like that's not no that's not it yeah it's also just sort of like

00:29:02.660 a conversation that thrives in a complete lack of specificity totally like as soon as you start 0.99

00:29:09.020 to drill down and go oh it's my bad boss or it's this person who just irritates the shit out of me

00:29:14.800 or whatever the things are like it kind of falls apart as soon as you start to apply a particular

00:29:20.680 situation to it but it sounds sort of vaguely good yeah that's a lot of this stuff is so

00:29:27.160 generalized as to be totally useless yeah i guess if somebody was mean to you at the grocery store

00:29:32.140 finding ways to let go of that anger because you have no ongoing relationship with that person

00:29:37.320 could be kind of useful yeah but if you're talking about like oh like my husband belittles me in ways

00:29:42.080 that don't make me feel good praying for him is not the solution to that like there's a very

00:29:47.380 narrow range of problems where this is actually prudent advice well not according to oprah

00:29:53.440 yeah of course who has marianne williamson on her show for the first time in 1992

00:29:58.520 she proudly announces on the show and to press that she bought 1000 copies of the book herself

00:30:04.900 sure she says that she has experienced and i quote 157 miracles in her life as a direct result

00:30:13.480 of reading this book round it up oprah say 160 oprah so as a result of being on oprah's show

00:30:23.340 they sell out the first printing of the book they sell out 70 000 copies of the book on that day

00:30:30.460 and it becomes a number one new york times bestseller here we go this book in 1992 or

00:30:38.400 return to love is where we get one of the most famous quotes from marianne williamson that is

00:30:43.640 to this day very widely misattributed to nelson mandela oh no yeah the quote is this quote our

00:30:51.760 deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond

00:30:56.680 measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. That has been misattributed

00:31:03.140 to Nelson Mandela in at least two feature films. And it's Marianne fucking Williamson, everybody. 1.00

00:31:09.740 Is it Crash and Green Book? The two worst, like racism for white people movies? 0.99

00:31:15.240 so throughout the early 90s she keeps publishing books she publishes a lot of books

00:31:21.720 and in 1998 so we're now in the late 90s she decides once again to make a big move this time

00:31:28.620 she moves to warren michigan okay to become the leader of a unity church called the church of

00:31:35.180 today there are in-person congregants there are a couple thousand in-person congregants

00:31:39.820 but there's also a tv show and some sources say that that tv show of her sermons right her talks

00:31:47.960 at this church draw like 50 000 viewers okay so now she's sort of moved into this realm of being

00:31:54.720 almost like a new age televangelist right around this time she also officiates one of elizabeth

00:32:03.880 taylor's weddings sure she has steven tyler as a musical guest at their church i don't understand

00:32:11.940 how celebrities like all know each other but whatever the point at which it gets really

00:32:15.960 tricky and this is the point at which we've been walking through some like non-profit history

00:32:21.720 dynamics badness and now we're about to step fully into political history badness oh no did

00:32:27.820 she like sponsor the 1994 crime bill or something like no no so throughout the 2000s she focuses

00:32:35.940 on publishing on sort of giving her talks on cranking out a bunch of books all that kind of

00:32:40.720 stuff until 2014 when henry waxman's seat opens up in california and she decides to run for henry

00:32:50.320 waxman's seat oh i did not know this okay so she runs as an independent in california's 33rd

00:32:57.240 congressional district. CD 33 in California includes Malibu, Santa Monica, Pacific Palisades,

00:33:03.900 Brentwood, West Hollywood. If you are a person who is inclined to believe in sort of like

00:33:08.560 caricatures of coastal elites, this is the district for you. I'm imagining a lot of front yards with

00:33:15.500 those signs that say like, in this house, we believe no person is undocumented and sort of

00:33:20.720 that like list of things. And then right next to it, there's a sign that says like, save our

00:33:25.100 parking like we wanted to stay the same yeah you're nailing it she gets a bunch of celebrity

00:33:32.920 endorsements for this campaign including the endorsement of ben but not of jerry from ben 1.00

00:33:39.480 and jerry and a rift opened up that day really splitting the ice cream vote

00:33:46.680 ultimately in that 2014 campaign she finishes fourth she has 13 of the vote that seat ultimately

00:33:54.440 went to Ted Lieu. Okay, thank God. Then in 2018, she forms an exploratory committee to run for

00:34:00.900 president. She sort of positions herself as sometimes being in alignment with Bernie Sanders

00:34:06.360 or Elizabeth Warren, and often sort of being to the left of him. But always, always more woo than

00:34:13.660 that. Yeah, I feel like the left right spectrum is not all that useful with people like Marian

00:34:20.620 williamson because like she's on a whole other dimension essentially in a lot of ways she's like 0.96

00:34:24.700 a very traditional left flank candidate where she's like i'm gonna join this race i'm gonna 0.96

00:34:29.120 push a bunch of issues i'm gonna push a conversation in a different direction and then i'm gonna drop

00:34:32.740 out when it's clear that it's not happening it's a it's a pr campaign more than anything else

00:34:37.360 whatever so in that way she's a very traditional left flank candidate in some other ways she's 0.99

00:34:42.300 really really not what like she's she's the first to recommend like vagina eggs on the debate stage 1.00

00:34:48.800 yeah a chicken in every pot and a goop subscription in every email and an egg in every vagina 1.00

00:34:57.120 so like she is sort of like classic lefty in some ways and then in other ways she's like 0.99

00:35:03.980 talks about believing in elements of faith healing she is talking she's using some real

00:35:10.140 sort of like anti-vax rhetoric without going all in on anti-vax positions right she's said that 0.99

00:35:17.920 mandatory vaccines are quote-unquote orwellian and draconian god this was already a fucking

00:35:23.240 tedious debate before before it became like the debate jesus christ yeah totally i'm just asking

00:35:29.160 questions around this time this is clearly the biggest stage she has ever been on yeah

00:35:34.380 and these sort of responses start to come out from gay men who were alive and out in the 80s

00:35:43.120 who start talking about their experiences with her non-profits. People start writing on Facebook

00:35:50.700 that she was sort of conning people into, quote, believing they deserved their biological condition

00:35:58.100 and even their deaths because they weren't spiritually fit enough to visualize the AIDS

00:36:02.980 virus away. Oh, Marianne. One person said, quote, I had friends who died in the 80s and 90s thinking

00:36:09.660 they were unworthy because they couldn't love enough. Oh my God. She writes about this in her

00:36:15.920 book. Slate has a little sort of like recap of sort of like, here are the things that she says

00:36:21.980 in a return to love that sort of apply here. She says, quote, cancer and AIDS and other serious

00:36:28.460 illnesses are physical manifestations of a psychic scream. And their message is not hate me,

00:36:35.160 but love me sickness is an illusion that does not actually exist instead it's a sign of quote

00:36:42.700 our judgment on ourselves not a sign of god's judgment on us wellness guru read a biology

00:36:49.620 textbook challenge hiv is like actually a specific thing yeah that's it's an immunosuppressing virus 0.99

00:36:56.540 and like we know how it spread we know how it works i hate this shit so she runs for president 0.96

00:37:02.540 she gets all of these celebrity endorsements kim kardashian alissa milano jeff goldblum who i 1.00

00:37:10.580 learned dated laura dern in the 90s oh my god from ava longoria parker from jesse ventura from

00:37:17.660 deepak chopra from alanis morissette from jane lynch a bunch of weird west coast support and 0.55

00:37:24.580 particularly support from west coast gays and like younger gays sometimes i want to shake the twinks 0.61

00:37:30.120 and explain things to them i was once like you it's not your fault i'm coming for you brian with 0.97

00:37:38.060 a y no i know an actual brian with a why he's lovely i will also say there is something i think 0.68

00:37:44.940 very irritating about gay culture and the reaction to her as like a sort of like yas queen icon i

00:37:52.640 think the fact that she was a little bit campy probably is like what recommended her to like 0.99

00:37:58.180 our people and like i just think that like we should be careful with that shit some of these 0.97

00:38:04.460 people who like they're good on tv and they're quippy or whatever are sometimes trying to smuggle 0.96

00:38:10.380 in some very bad ideas right she's stating public positions in a compelling way beyond that she

00:38:18.340 doesn't appear to have much you know yeah so in january of 2020 she lays off her staff team she's

00:38:25.540 a staff team of about 20 at this point at this time in the election joe biden has 490 staffers

00:38:32.420 and michael bloomberg has 2400 staffers marianne williamson lays off her staff of 20 she tries 0.65

00:38:39.180 running the campaign on her own for a week and then she sort of packs it in yeah since then 0.99

00:38:43.280 she's sort of remained involved in politics but she's mostly back to sort of spiritual leader

00:38:48.740 living grewing and that is what brings us michael to her book a course for weight loss which you

00:38:56.880 have been obsessed with for years you have been so many times i love it and i hate it it's terrible

00:39:04.360 and it's great before we sort of dig in on that conversation discussing this book is extremely

00:39:10.480 difficult without describing practices of disordered eating and disordered body image

00:39:14.900 because that's actually part of what she's like actively advocating here i would like to let 0.96

00:39:21.120 marianne williamson introduce her own weight loss book okay she made a series of little

00:39:27.540 promotional videos for different chapters in this book and this is the sort of overall intro okay

00:39:35.160 of course in weight loss marianne williamson 2010 21 spiritual lessons for surrendering your weight

00:39:42.280 forever. You know, compulsive eating, addictive eating is obviously a problem that many of us

00:39:48.820 have experienced. I'm not a food addict, but there was a time in my life when I was a compulsive

00:39:53.600 eater. I know what it's like to think about food constantly. And like any other problem of this

00:39:59.640 type, we get to a place in our personality where there is some entrenched knot almost, where we

00:40:05.440 simply are not able to live in our power, our strength, our serenity, our love, and get our

00:40:11.960 needs met at the same time and so it's as though we go into this fractal personality this place

00:40:17.420 where we behave dysfunctionally where we self-sabotage where we in the case of compulsive

00:40:22.040 eating actually harm ourselves thinking while we're doing it that we are comforting and nourishing

00:40:26.880 ourselves she's gotten a lot better at public speaking since 2010 i don't know it's there's

00:40:34.000 something like weirdly generic about it i mean it's kind of like i guess god is gonna help you

00:40:39.140 stop eating compulsively, but it's not even like wacky. It's just kind of like a normal

00:40:44.980 speech you'd hear from like a suburban preacher or something. Like it just reminds me of stuff

00:40:50.280 I heard as a kid. Yeah. I mean, I think the wackiness comes in the book itself.

00:40:54.740 The whole book is sort of centered around this idea of like, quote unquote, compulsive or

00:41:00.220 addictive eating. She sells this book in large part or sort of frames it around the idea that

00:41:06.980 this has been a problem for her personally. I will say I did a lot of research on Marianne

00:41:12.200 Williamson for this episode. I did not come across any images of her that appeared to be any fatter

00:41:19.620 than she is today. She talks about sort of surrendering her weight and letting go of her 0.85

00:41:24.680 weight. It doesn't appear that she ever had more weight to let go of. Which doesn't mean she hasn't

00:41:29.400 struggled with compulsive eating. Totally. Dealing with a behavior that you're not happy with is not

00:41:34.560 the same as losing 80 pounds or like whatever she's promising that you can do right this is

00:41:39.320 called a course in weight loss yeah yes i mean i think it's also worth noting like throughout the

00:41:44.720 course of this book she's trying to sort of reassure her readers that they're not fat because

00:41:49.820 of impulse control or willpower or not finding the right diet or whatever they're fat because 0.96

00:41:57.940 of their sort of brokenness uh so it's shades of the hiv stuff totally so she says while overeating 0.86

00:42:05.780 would be seen by some as an indulgence of self it is in fact a profound rejection of self it is a

00:42:12.100 moment of self-betrayal and self-punishment and anything but a commitment to one's own well-being

00:42:18.360 why would you be able to commit to a diet if you're not already consistently committed to

00:42:23.840 yourself i don't even i don't even know if like she's saying something specific enough for me to

00:42:29.620 be offended this is empty refrigerator magnets this doesn't mean anything it's like when i worked

00:42:37.200 at my community college newspaper and i wrote the horoscopes wait did you yeah oh my god the trick

00:42:43.200 is to write something so empty that people will project whatever they're going through onto it

00:42:48.940 So it's like, our impulses are a denial of our true nature to truly know ourselves, we must become what we cannot perceive. And like, that doesn't fucking mean anything. 0.75

00:43:00.160 I mean, I feel like part of what happens when you talk about food addiction or compulsive eating in the same breath as weight loss and size is that it invites a set of judgments, it becomes a framework for understanding fat people. 0.90

00:43:16.340 yeah yeah that's the point at which it sort of becomes a problem for me personally that's when

00:43:21.620 you have to start thinking of voting for somebody else in the 2020 yeah look up until now i was a

00:43:27.760 hard marianne voter williamson hive i'll be gordon so she this book is organized into 21 spiritual

00:43:39.120 lessons and you're instructed to take on these lessons in order so each day for 21 days you

00:43:46.180 have a different thing to do those lessons have titles like thin you meet not thin you invoke

00:43:55.240 the real you exit the alone zone birthing who you really are and soul surgery god i can see why oprah 0.79

00:44:06.520 loved the shit right christ and then there's other stuff that is straight up stigmatizing 0.87

00:44:10.900 lesson one is called tear down the wall which i assumed was sort of in reference to emotional 0.99

00:44:17.700 walls yeah no no no she's referring to and i quote a wall of flesh 1.00

00:44:22.720 she's going straight in she's going in she's like fuck your body she says in that one quote 0.99

00:44:30.960 the weight you are seeking to let go of was added to your consciousness before it was added to your 1.00

00:44:36.320 body your body is merely a screen onto which is projected the nature of your thoughts when the

00:44:43.320 weight is gone from your consciousness it will be gone from your physical experience as the fear is

00:44:49.240 miraculously removed from your mind its manifest reflection will fall off your body okay say that 0.96

00:44:55.340 again but say pisces before you do it wednesday it's fucking gibberish i don't even know what the 0.97

00:45:02.960 fuck any of that means i mean so here's what i took that to mean your body is a reflection of 0.98

00:45:08.840 your psyche what if i have a fat psyche marianne what if my psyche is thick 0.99

00:45:16.260 like it's very woo and it's not really saying anything but when you can sort of parse a meaning

00:45:23.720 it's not saying great things about fat people right chapter on loving your body includes the

00:45:29.660 phrase you did this to yourself and i was like cool i'm out i'm out bye it's like it's not your 0.99

00:45:35.820 fault you're just a huge piece of shit yeah so lesson two is when she gets real concrete are 0.99

00:45:44.200 you ready for some concreteness you're sending this to me i want to read this oh you want to 1.00

00:45:48.560 read it i want the text in front of me so i can try to like diagram these fucking sentences 0.98

00:45:53.080 it's like something from fucking narnia like i don't know what she's talking about at any point 0.93

00:46:00.100 lesson two is called thin you meet not thin you okay she wants you to write a letter to your 0.95

00:46:07.480 future thin self and then she wants you to write a response from your future thin self

00:46:15.040 to your current fat self it just says i'm hungry help me i'm trapped so she includes a sample

00:46:24.620 letter she says it's written by someone named beatrice but she doesn't really say how she

00:46:28.580 knows this person but this is the sample letter this is her recommended way of going about this

00:46:35.120 exercise okay here's the letter i'm so sorry for making you read this into a microphone

00:46:39.600 oh my god mike i told you you asked for the quote and i gave you the quote i'm so sorry 0.97

00:46:44.520 okay so it starts out dear fat ass i know your lumps and bumps are merely a navigational reminder 0.93

00:46:51.640 of where you have been when bad things happen to little girls all of that the story the events but 0.99

00:46:57.800 now you are the event he no longer has control over what happens to you fatty jesus the double

00:47:05.060 cheese pizza and nachos are no longer where it's at. You are here. You can celebrate your fierceness 0.54

00:47:12.440 that was born with me, skinny you, long ago when you stood up and spit in his face. Put down the 0.97

00:47:19.460 fork and pick up the fight. Talk to me about your sort of reactions to this. I feel like I'm a better

00:47:25.700 person now in ways unrelated to my physical body than I was in my 20s. But like I would not speak

00:47:32.720 to myself in my 20s like this yeah having insight on yourself in the past requires i think honesty 0.99

00:47:39.360 but i don't think it requires like stigmatizing your own self like this yeah i mean it's fucking 0.92

00:47:45.840 awful and like part of what this person seems to be referencing is some kind of like pretty 0.99

00:47:51.520 profound abuse yeah holy fucking shit if that's the way you're talking about the version of you 0.99

00:47:56.840 who was abused that's also not fucking great this is not a return to love marianne this is 0.99

00:48:04.620 some of the most insidious stigmatizing sort of anti-fat rhetoric around right like this exercise 0.98

00:48:11.440 of your future thin you writing you a letter and your current fat you writing back or whichever

00:48:17.680 way it happens is sort of rooted in the idea of like inside every fat person is a thin person

00:48:22.780 yearning to get out yeah the idea is that your fatness and your fat self represents a kind of

00:48:28.160 self-sabotage that is separate from you and from your true and real self it's a materialization

00:48:35.580 of your trauma and your psychic scream or whatever this doesn't actually end any of the judgment

00:48:42.080 facing fat people it just internalizes it just invites it into your own brain now it's not just

00:48:49.480 about your body. It's also about your trauma. It's also about, can you stand up to the person

00:48:54.840 who abused you effectively? Are you strong enough to do that? The way that you do that is by losing

00:48:59.780 weight. It's, it's really fucking icky. Yeah. It's also taking double cheese pizza and nachos 0.99

00:49:06.500 away from me. Am I not, am I not doing those anymore? She has a lesson. Lesson four is our

00:49:13.580 next lesson. And this is sort of where this kind of intensifies, this logic kind of intensifies.

00:49:21.220 So this is where she gets further into this idea of like, who's the real you and what's the fake

00:49:26.940 you. Here is the quote. Okay. The real you is neither fat nor skinny. The real you is not a

00:49:34.100 body at all, but rather a spirit, an energy, an idea in the mind of God. The real you is a being

00:49:40.600 of light and therefore has no material density the more you identify with the light of your being

00:49:46.700 the lighter you will feel you will materialize a lighter body when you have a more light-filled

00:49:53.160 mind this is like the boss text from like hollow night fear literally weighs you down but love

00:50:01.720 enlightens you your deepest fear isn't of being fat your deepest fear is of being thin your deepest

00:50:08.900 fear is of being beautiful. This is like the Nelson Mandela quote. Yeah, it totally is. She

00:50:14.660 just subbed out fat for like power and whatever. Yeah. Like this is so fucking stupid. Your fear 1.00

00:50:21.380 isn't of being fat. Your deepest fear is of being thin. No. What is that? What are you talking about?

00:50:27.640 Like that sounds deep, but like, no, people are pretty straightforwardly afraid of being fat

00:50:32.740 because fat people are stigmatized. Right. So like this is part of what I find really fascinating

00:50:38.080 and troubling about this quote is that in this section of the book, she's talking a lot about

00:50:42.960 like, when you were thin, you might have been sexually assaulted. When you were thin, you were

00:50:48.220 abused. So now you've gotten fat to sort of protect yourself, which again, any physical

00:50:54.640 manifestation of fatness is the sign of brokenness or of trauma. Yeah. The lesson itself for this

00:51:02.280 section, would you like to know what the lesson is? God, it's going to be like pushups or something.

00:51:06.680 Oh my God, Mike, if it was pushups, I don't know that we'd even be recording this episode.

00:51:10.780 No.

00:51:11.400 The lesson itself is that you're supposed to find a picture of the body that you want.

00:51:16.880 Oh no.

00:51:17.640 Whether that's a younger version of your own body or a picture of somebody else,

00:51:21.260 a picture of a model, a picture of an actor, a picture of a person you know, whatever.

00:51:25.480 Then you're supposed to cut out a picture of your face and put it on that body. 0.99

00:51:31.060 Shut up. 1.00

00:51:32.080 Shut up. 1.00

00:51:33.000 This is the most asinine idea. 1.00

00:51:35.800 this is like a teenager in a sitcom like writing down the pros and cons of like going to his 0.97

00:51:41.700 friend's birthday party or something like who who does this i mean a lot of people with active

00:51:46.160 restrictive eating disorders i mean also people with eating disorders quote make copies of that

00:51:51.520 picture of your face atop a beautiful body and put them in various places around your home

00:51:57.600 make your kitchen and bedroom a visual homage to these images every time you look at that picture

00:52:04.520 you're inviting your inner thin person to come forth your quote-unquote inner thin doesn't

00:52:11.300 represent a false value a superficial or shallow image created by fashion magazines just to taunt

00:52:17.800 you your desire to be thin is a valid desire oh my god what if what if me and you have only hung

00:52:24.960 out in person once what if you came over to my house and i had all these shirtless photos of

00:52:29.820 jake gyllenhaal or somebody with my face on them like all over my kitchen oh no mike images of

00:52:38.420 models and actors and stuff are like super unrealistic like 99 of people can't look like

00:52:44.040 that which is why those people are famous so like why would you constantly compare yourself

00:52:49.580 to some literally unattainable beauty standard that's like so unhealthy yeah i mean 1.00

00:52:54.340 she is so proud of claiming feminism right and then she comes up with shit like this where she's 1.00

00:53:02.260 like actually fashion magazines are right your body image isn't bad enough make it worse put 1.00

00:53:08.180 it everywhere remember what rebecca romaine looks like this whole thing like of like your desire to

00:53:15.280 be thin is a good and valid desire not just for your own body image but it's also like 1.00

00:53:21.340 spiritually healthy that's actually not is so deeply fucked yeah her whole worldview 0.91

00:53:28.700 is about achieving enlightenment but within socially defined parameters it's like it's just 0.97

00:53:35.300 weird to be doing all of this like spiritual enlightenment stuff that seems to be sort of

00:53:40.380 transcending our earthly bodies but then she's explicitly telling me to change my earthly body

00:53:47.300 so isn't it more graceful and enlightened to just be happy with who you are or maybe try to help

00:53:53.880 others and just like not deal with your physical appearance and not think about it that much

00:54:00.400 she's sort of talking out of both sides of her mouth throughout this book where she's like it's

00:54:04.000 not about weight but the title is a course in weight loss right no this is about your spiritual 1.00

00:54:08.620 health and your physical bodily choices but also it's about you being fat and that fat bitch is an 1.00

00:54:16.420 imposter there's some weird like jesus stuff in here too i really don't think jesus gives a shit 0.99

00:54:21.700 how much i weigh yeah i don't think jesus is monitoring that totally she sort of throughout 0.92

00:54:27.520 this book is talking about fat people without talking about fat people it's a book that is

00:54:31.840 ostensibly designed for thin people who believe themselves to be fat which is gonna disproportionately

00:54:37.760 be people with body dysmorphia and people with eating disorders right and she does that with

00:54:43.220 all of these weird rhetorical flourishes that are like it's not your fault but also being fat is

00:54:49.920 terrible and it means that you have lost your path with god yeah your body is a screen onto

00:54:56.440 which your own thoughts are projected and your own sort of experience is projected i'm like 1.00

00:55:00.680 boy oh boy marianne fat bodies are a screen onto which you are projecting all kinds of shit it's 0.99

00:55:07.020 very la too extremely most fat people in the country are like poor people and like people 0.99

00:55:12.600 of color yeah the audience for this book does seem more like the kind of real housewife demographic

00:55:17.220 or like whoever whoever Marianne Williamson is like hanging out with at this time yeah it's

00:55:21.200 famous fucking it's Kim Kardashian and Laura Dern and Oprah and whatever right it's folks who feel 0.94

00:55:29.100 ill at ease with their own bodies yeah it is people who want to eat less and who want to 0.99

00:55:34.580 want to eat less yeah and solving that set of problems the problems of body image and the

00:55:41.440 problems of your relationship to food is different than weight loss yeah yeah and she has written a

00:55:46.740 book that is ostensibly a guide to spiritually driven weight loss when the problems that she's

00:55:53.620 actually trying to solve are problems of self-image body image right to which i say if you want to

00:55:59.380 write a self-help book about getting people in alignment with their own desire for food and

00:56:04.080 their own body image god bless go forth yeah but this business of like i'm gonna write that book 0.99

00:56:10.560 but say it's about weight loss and write all this weird fuck shit about fat people 0.99

00:56:15.740 is just bizarre just admit that your book is for like borderline hot people who want to like be 0.99

00:56:21.580 hot it seems like that's the actual audience here mike i didn't check the the dedication

00:56:27.700 it's dedicated to the ladies of roni no rehoba

00:56:33.180 i mean like so listen i'm gonna sort of bring us in for a landing and just say

00:56:40.480 like Marianne Williamson gets read a lot of different ways by a lot of different people.

00:56:44.200 I'm not here to take away a framework that helps people. But there is a set of practices built into

00:56:49.540 this book that even if they don't harm you personally can harm a lot of people a great

00:56:54.320 deal. Right. Yeah. So what I wanted to talk about today is a little bit of like, hey, you've heard

00:57:00.000 these good sort of quippy things from her. Here's the rest of the story. And the rest of the story

00:57:05.900 is kind of rough it's rough for workers it's rough for fat people it's rough for people with

00:57:10.720 eating disorders it's rough for people who don't have the uh the means and resources that she does

00:57:17.060 it's tough all around yeah it's tough it's tough for NGO workers who can't form unions and haven't

00:57:22.720 eaten pizza in years.

00:57:52.720 You

Maintenance Phase - September 14, 2021

Marianne Williamson

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