Dr. Fred Moss on Authentic Communication and Mental Health

Dr. Fred Moss [00:00:00] Ed Watters: To overcome, you must educate. Educate not only yourself, but educate anyone seeking to learn. We are all Dead America, we can all learn something. To learn, we must challenge what we already understand. The way we do that is through conversation. Sometimes we have conversations with others, however, some of the best conversations happen with ourselves. Reach out and challenge yourself; let's dive in and learn something new right now. [00:00:55] Today we are speaking with Dr. Fred Moss, he is a mental health advocate, a psychiatrist, an author, a podcaster, and so much more. Dr. Fred, could you please introduce yourself and let people know just a little more about you, please? [00:01:13] Dr. Fred Moss: Sure. Thanks for having me on, first of all. And yeah, my name is Dr. Fred, or Fred Moss, or Fred, and some people still call me Dr. Moss because I've actually been a psychiatrist for about thirty-six years. And the psychiatrist, that's one that goes to medical school. And for most people, that's the one they think, Oh yeah, that's the one who could prescribe medicines. So we'll talk about that, I'm sure, throughout the, um, throughout the conversation today. [00:01:38] Um, because although that is one of the things I can do, it's one of the things I don't like to do. And we'll talk a little bit more about that. So, uh, who I am is, I, you know, I'm, um, I'm a soul committed to helping people heal. And, uh, I've been doing that since I arrived here on Earth, you know, that many years ago. [00:01:57] You know, my brothers are ten and fourteen years older than me. And I had an opportunity to be with them last weekend, both of them, and my sister. Um, anyways, my brothers, she told me that, you know, I, I was the arrival in the midst of chaos and disarray that was going in my family. And my job was to heal the family actually, when I was born. [00:02:17] So, you know, my, I had a teenage brother and a couple of parents and there was, I can imagine there was a fair amount of infighting and, um, conflict. And so that's what I learned how to do very early was to at least use whatever resources I could discover to cause healing. And I did that as a child, I did that through elementary school, [00:02:38] I did that in junior high, high school. But I really learned that communication was really at the heart of all healing of all types. And I learned that early on, even before school. I learned, you know, sitting there in my playpen, I can vividly remember actually watching my brothers and my parents speak to each other and wishing that, you know, someday I would be someone who could actually have conversations [00:03:00] too. [00:03:00] And, um, when I went to school, I was hoping that that's what they would teach me. But instead, of course, they taught me how to be quiet and sit down and regurgitate whatever the teacher had to say rather than have any kind of open discourse or, uh, true and honest, you know, communication and connection. So I did a lot of things besides school, even as I was growing up, you know, I was kind of precocious when I started school because my brothers taught me how to do math, and how to read, and how to tell me a little bit about sex, and drugs, and rock and roll. [00:03:30] And so I was a kindergartner that was already pretty informed about things. Um, and because I was, um, on the front of the class, I could actually use my time after school to do things that were kind of explorative, adventurous. I used to ride my stingray bike to the areas of the city that I wasn't allowed to go to. [00:03:51] And, uh, you know, a little later on in junior high school, I used to hitchhike to areas that I didn't want, you know, wasn't supposed to go to. And I just started to really just explore what does it really take to communicate? What does it really take to communicate with people over there? People who are different than me, supposedly. People grew up different, [00:04:11] people have different, um, I don't know, socioeconomic arrangements, or different levels of education, or different, um, live in different, uh, cultures or, and I always wanted to know a little bit more about that. So through school, that's what I spent most of my time doing when I wasn't just like sitting there being entirely resentful and bored in a classroom. [00:04:34] Um, eventually I decided that I had to go to college cause I was so smart and stuff. And so I decided, you know, I must get a, I must have to go. And so I went to the University of Michigan, which was only forty miles down the road. They had cool helmets and stuff so I, I really liked them. And I thought I, one day I would, you know, be a, go blue kind of guy. [00:04:56] And, uh, I went to Michigan, lasted about a year and a half. And then I dropped out cause I was in the engineering school, I didn't even know what an engineer was. And then, uh, I took a bus and went all the way across the country to Berkeley, California to discover who I was. Like, who, who am I really? I love that bus ride, [00:05:15] it was a lot of fun. Sixty hours, you know, and you could stop out along the waves for one flat price. And I learned so much traveling around the country and then I got to Berkeley and I had a great summer in Berkeley. Um, but eventually realized that that wasn't a truly sustainable lifestyle. So my family convinced me to go back to school. [00:05:34] There was this new industry and this new industry had promise. And they thought that I had the aptitude to manage this new industry. You might've heard of the new industry, it's actually called computers. And I was like, Yeah, I could see where I could do computers. So there was only one really major computer in all of Michigan [00:05:54] and that was back at the University of Michigan. So sure enough, I enrolled back in the University [00:06:00] of Michigan, got myself in front of some computers and started doing batch jobs, and punch cards, and Fortran, and COBOL, and all that. And I lasted for, I don't know, a little less than a year and dropped out again because that didn't seem like a life that could work. [00:06:13] And I promised never to go back to school ever again. So my mom was cool with that. She's like, Fred, you don't have to go back to school, but you have to get a job. My, you know, moms are like that, right? Get a job. I said, Mom. Anyway, she got me some applications, uh, civil service applications. And, uh, um, she got me two of them, actually. [00:06:34] One from the unemployment office and one as a child care worker. The unemployment office was a three month wait and a childcare worker was only a one month wait. But I kind of wanted to work in the unemployment office because it seemed like I would be with more, with my people. [00:06:51] Instead I went, I got a job as a childcare worker in January of 1980 and I was only going to be there for orientation. They paid me a lot of money to be oriented, forty hours a week, thirteen dollars an hour. I don't, you do the math. I don't know, a little over a thousand dollars in three weeks. And I figured I would then buy a car and drive around the country and figure out what my life was about after orientation. Not even start the, not even start the business. But someone, uh, you know, I, I doodled around through orientation and one of my colleagues, uh, Paul, he's like, Fred, you got to come to the floors. [00:07:29] I'm like, Dude, no. He's like, No. If you quit, I'll have to quit and I have a family to support. He said something like that and manipulated me to get onto the floors. So in the fourth week I went to the floors and I began to communicate with these so called kids, six or seven years older, uh, younger than me. [00:07:49] And these were, you know, kids that found themselves in a state mental health facility for adolescent boys. And I loved them, I loved that job. You know, I got to learn how to really connect with another human being and then get paid for it. And that's all they were paying me to do, was connect with these human beings. [00:08:04] And so, I really got to see them for the true, beautiful human beings that all of them were. And I was off to the races. I really saw that, um, connection and communication was where I had my skillset and that's what I wanted to do. I was able to learn how to listen a little more, learn how to speak openly and honestly to someone who didn't, you know, didn't come from my background. [00:08:27] And, uh, sure enough, over time, I realized that that wasn't sustainable either. I needed to actually become a doctor and, you know, I would go back to school one more time, even though I had promised never to do that. One more time, finish my undergraduate school, um, you know, get ,uh, good scores on my boards, and, um, interview at a bunch of different places. And [00:08:50] eventually got accepted and went to Northwestern University, downtown Chicago. I love Chicago, I spent five years there. It was absolutely lovely, every minute of it [00:09:00] pretty much. Um, I shouldn't say every minute, but you get my point. Um, and I really learned how to, really learned how to communicate effectively there as well. [00:09:10] You know, um, I was there from 84 to 89, number 23 was there from, he, he arrived in 84 as well. So I was, I had season tickets to the Bulls. Even while I was in medical school, a lot of fun to watch Michael become Michael. Super fun. And then, um, I eventually, you know, got married and came down and started a psychiatric practice after I completed medical school, and psychiatric residency, [00:09:37] psychiatric fellowship in child and adolescent, of course. And there I really had the same, you know, the same operation was what I intended to do, which was to communicate to help people heal. But the idea of psychiatry has shifted, as I already said early on in my introduction. So when I came out, we were already the medicators, [00:09:59] we were already the diagnosers. We're top of the totem pole. But the field had shifted while I was in medical school because of the advent of Prozac. And I now was being called on to diagnose people, to tell people what's wrong with them, to somehow submit to the notion that there's a chemical imbalance when you're feeling unsteady. [00:10:20] I don't believe that now, I didn't believe that then. It's just, you feel it. If you haven't looked recently, this world is a place where you better feel unsteady because it's really hard. I've never, I haven't met anybody who's feeling steady. Everyone's unsteady in some way or shape or form. You know, so I began to, um, do what I could to spring communication into my practice. [00:10:44] I had all sorts of ideas and, you know, I was being called on to do something different, which was stop communicating with my clients and actually have, you know, actually just diagnose and medicate them and then supervise other people. And there's a lot of heartache and soul sacrifice that took place there. A lot, you know? Every, every, you know, every patient that I diagnosed, I didn't really agree with my diagnosis. And for the 40, 000 or so patients, and maybe 100, 000 scripts that I've written in my life, a very few of them was, I truly aligned with. I usually believe that medications don't do what they're marketed to do and frankly cause or increase or induce or perpetuate the symptoms they're marketed to treat and I've learned that over time that that's true. And, you know, I took an oath to do no harm, but I don't have it that the medications actually fall into that realm. So half my career or so, another fifteen years, I kind of stuck in there and doing shit that I didn't like and totally misaligned because I really wanted to communicate. [00:11:49] I did my best to communicate to my clients, you know, but it was, but most of them were coming to me because they wanted or thought they needed medicine. And in 2006, I began to take people off medicine [00:12:00] altogether. Uh, my low risk clients, you know, just to make a deal with them and said, Let's see how you do off of medicine. [00:12:06] And nearly every one of them got way better, like way, way, way, way, way better. And it really confirmed this idea that the medicines not only weren't helping, they were actually hurting. Most people are so afraid to come off their medicine, they think they're going to fall back or something like that. But that isn't really how it works. [00:12:23] With proper support, you get way better because the medicines are actually inducing their own problems. So I eventually closed down that practice. Uh, you know, I had kids and a family and, you know, I closed down the practice and I started to travel around the U. S., I'm doing traveling work and I went all over the country. And, [00:12:42] I don't know, I had licenses in up to ten states or so and kind of would be called on to fill spot jobs. And I saw how psychiatry was delivered in different spots in the country. Very similar, no matter where you go. So I decided to take my act even downtown or even out of town even further, which was to go around the world and I started doing telepsychiatry from different countries like Bhutan, and Nepal, and Thailand, Israel, [00:13:08] Italy, France, England. And, you know, really just like tuning into people, mostly calling into people in the U. S., I mean, that's where I'm licensed. But also having a lot of contact with the shaman, and the medicine people, and psychiatrists, variants that are out there in the real world. Learning so much about what is this thing called a psychiatric illness? [00:13:29] What is this thing called psychiatric disorder? What is this thing called a disease or affliction affected? Or, you know, what is that? What, we don't even know what normal is so why do we call anything abnormal? Who are, what are you talking about? Like what, why, you know, when you have a broken arm here in the U. S. and you go to Singapore, you still have a broken arm. [00:13:52] If you go to Auckland, you still have a broken arm, right? If you go to Reykjavik and then come back to Little Rock, you still have a broken arm. If you have a mental illness in the United States and you go to another country, it's not clear at all that you still have a mental illness even. You might, you know, might be promoted to a higher level, [00:14:11] you might actually fit in directly. It's a cultural phenomenon that doesn't have a true and honest definition, like a broken arm. So because of that, it's subject to transformation. It's subject to transforming the narrative on a global scale. And that's what I, became my real focus over the last chunk of my career. [00:14:29] This last fifteen years or so was being at the forefront of transforming the narrative of what mental illness and what the mental health really are. You know, at one point I picked up the moniker Undoctor, a friend of mine affectionately gave me that moniker. The Undoctor is someone who undiagnoses, unmedicates, and undoctrinates people. [00:14:48] Takes people out of the mental health system altogether. Now that's a cool moniker and stuff, but, and I really want to tell, make a disclaimer because your listeners might have different views on this. Some [00:15:00] people do. If any of your listeners are actually really happy with their diagnosis, and really, really happy with their therapist, and really, really happy with their treatment plan, and truly happy with their medicines and wouldn't want to trade any of that for the world because they think they've found what makes their life really click and this is, can't get better than this and this is what works and why are you telling me that it doesn't? Well, please continue doing what you're doing. [00:15:25] I mean, my God, if you found that anywhere in life for any topic, then keep doing it. Like good for you. I'm not kidding, I'm not arguing at all with that. Like, Yay. Most of us are looking for one area in life where we could say that. So if you're, if that's where you've reached it, out of your mental health treatment, then by golly, continue doing what you're doing. [00:15:52] This conversation is more for the tens of millions of people who don't feel that way. There are tens of millions of people who feel like they're misdiagnosed, or underdiagnosed, or over diagnosed, or mistreated, or under medicated, or over medicated. And these people are the ones who are listening to me here. [00:16:08] And they're like, Wow, a doctor who really gets it. The truth is these medicines and these diagnoses don't serve very many people. So over the last several years, that's when I've really taken on all the things that you listed as to who I am. You know, I started my own podcast called Welcome to Humanity, and I've dropped about 120 cool, cool, um, episodes there. [00:16:28] Then I changed to a different podcast called Insanity, we dropped about twenty-five there with my buddy Sam. And then I did another one called, um, The Healthy Healer, interviewing people who had had a real life experience and eventually got to be healers. And I've been a guest on about 250 shows. I've written a couple of books. [00:16:47] These two books over my shoulder here, True Voice and Creative Aid are my books. I did a couple of courses and a couple, you know, I got a course called the True Voice Course, you can find it at truevoicecourse.com. Totally super cool course, I love it. Got another course called Healing A Healer. I've been on plenty of stages, [00:17:05] you know, people have lots of questions about mental health because it's pretty much like the number one, two, or three topic in the whole world. People are just talking about it all the time. I mean, that's my profession. I didn't, I didn't know that when I dropped out of college, that this would be the focus of the entire planet. [00:17:22] But now I'm on the forefront, I'm forty-five, I am the dude. I, you know, I'm, I'm out there with loads and loads and loads of experience. A rather revolutionary approach, which, by the way, isn't very revolutionary, right? I mean, this is just what I knew when I was in the playpen. I'm not saying anything that's shocking you. The only thing that shocked you is that, [00:17:48] Ed Watters: Actually, you know, it, it is refreshing to actually hear a doctor say these things in many ways. And, you know, from experience, my [00:18:00] wife, manic depressant from the time I married her, you know, and we've been working on her for over forty years and we've tried all these medications, all of the therapies and everything. But you know, what really works is truth. [00:18:22] And once we identified being truthful with each other through our communications, life is starting to get grand and I love it because I've never felt this way before and truth will set you free. So I, I can really say my wife doesn't do the medications like she used to. And she's found therapy in what we're doing right here through all of the podcasts that I've done. [00:18:57] We've developed a whole different lifestyle and podcasting is a, it's a Godsend, you know, it's a lifesaver because it taught me how to communicate my emotions effectively. And this is really what you're talking about. You, you emphasize the importance of authentic communication, creativity, and self expression in the journey of healing. And I want to tout, you're so right because of the journey that we've witnessed. It's powerful what you're doing. Tell us a little more about the psychology behind everything that you're doing with truth. [00:19:44] Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, it is truth. You know, and another word for truth is honesty, or genuine, or authentic, or aligned, these are all words that are, that are consistent with what you're saying about the truth. The truth is a little dicey because, as we know, there's, it's really hard to sort of grasp The Truth. But as long as you're authentic, you're genuine, you're honest, you know, you're aligned, then you're speaking something close to your truth. [00:20:11] So here's, here's a story with this, um, back in the day when you were in school and even before that, probably slightly, uh, you learned how to become someone that you're not. In order to protect the person that you are. You learn to start saying things that even you didn't believe so that you can continue to belong. [00:20:35] Started lying to yourself, you started not talking when you knew you should or could, started becoming someone that you're not in order to protect, and where did you learn that? Like for sure in school, right? Like I wanted to talk all the time in school. There's no elementary school teacher I've ever had who forgot having Fred as a, as a student. [00:20:54] I guarantee that for sure. And, [00:21:00] you know, I wanted to talk all the time. I had something to say about everything, I surely did. And, but that wasn't what I was told to do. I was told to zip it, sit down, be quiet, don't disrupt the class. You know, I was a class clown, of course. And I, I appreciate it. I love being a class clown, [00:21:14] it was fun. It was something to do. But, you know, we learned how to stop communicating effectively, right? We learned how to not be authentic in order to fit in. And what a, what a, you know, it's really a tough route to go, you know? Um, I think it's Henry David Thoreau who says, The massive men go through life in quiet desperation and then go to the grave with their songs still in them. [00:21:41] And, you know, there's just nothing more sad than that. I mean, you get through a whole life and no one knows you. What was, what was that about? You know, how was that useful? So, you know, when you talk about the psychology of what happens when you communicate, or when you're creative, or when you're self expressed, you know, when you connect with another person, well, there's nothing, you know, in my travels around the world I was really looking for a unifying principle, like what is it that all humans, whether they do come from [00:22:12] Zimbabwe, or Rwanda, or Sydney, or Sacramento, it's like, Well, what is it that all humans want? And what I've learned is that all humans long for some form of a human connection. Like, we really want that. We want to be heard or seen for who we are and who we're not. And that doesn't matter if you're a monk in a cave, [00:22:36] or if you're, um, you know, someone on, in, in the jungle, or if you're someone in the big cities in Europe, or if you're someone in the rural United States, what you want more than anything is to have somebody somewhere actually get you. Most of, some of us become scared about that. We don't, because we have our hearts broken, [00:22:57] we have, we have our experiences of trauma, or drama, or loss and we then hold back. And that's when we start becoming someone that we're not. So when we open up the gates to become authentic and become genuine, the way we do that is by becoming authentic ourselves. So really washing away the things that are in the way of you becoming an authentic, genuine person in your communications with the people in your circle or the people in your extended circle. [00:23:25] So not only with your family and your wife, I'm so glad that it's happening with your wife, but with, you know, with extended family, and then with neighbors, and then with community providers, and then with, you know, vendors, and then with strangers, and then with the whole world. You actually start becoming someone who's speaking their truth, their truth, all the time. [00:23:46] When that happens, that's when the resonating tuning fork of humanity starts to kick in. So whatever the frequency is of what it means to be human, someone else sees your authenticity and [00:24:00] becomes really, uh, really magnetized to it and then chooses to be authentic as well. So here's the other thing about that is, have you noticed, you know, have you noticed there's some issues out here that are pretty dividing and divisive in the public? [00:24:14] Have you noticed there's some things that if you disagree? Um, yeah. If you disagree with someone, you risk actually losing their friendship or their alliance in all ways. And they might even tell on you, and you'll lose more people than even that person. So disagreement is very powerful. Here's the thing, have you ever sat on the other side of a table of somebody who's diametrically opposed to you in a topic that you really think you're right about? [00:24:42] Whether it be that topic, or that topic, or that topic. I'm not even going to list the topics, we all know there's topics out there like this. But that person is wrong, we already know that person is wrong. I mean, of course that person is wrong because I'm right. So they must be wrong. That person is dead wrong, but they're saying it authentically. [00:25:04] They're saying it from their truth, they're genuine about it. They're pure, they're honest, they're real about it. And you can actually tolerate being with them, even if what they're saying is in total disagreement of stuff that you know is right. Because authenticity is even more interesting than agreement. [00:25:26] As long as that person is truly aligned with his soul, and saying whatever it is that they're saying, and representative of their core values, I can manage them saying anything about anything because authenticity wins. It's we, we all love authenticity at the core. So that's sort of the psychology of the thing is it creates the possibility of an aligned frequency so that we can resonate together as humans. [00:25:56] Ed Watters: Interesting. You know, it is so true that that, that connection has to be authentic. Because people, they can sense it very quickly if you're not being authentic with them. And it's really part of unity of connection is authenticity. And if we can't be authentic, we can't really unite with others in an authentic way. [00:26:27] It shifts the whole paradigm if we allow unauthentic actions to come out while we interact with others. So it's really important to be stable throughout every interaction. And if you believe this, you should believe this speaking to person A, B, or C. And we, we see so many times where people want to adjust their own morals [00:26:57] to appease [00:27:00] so they don't get opposed. And that's really what you outlined there. And it is maddening in many ways to sit back and watch because I really don't get into the political divide. I see right and wrong in my own interpretation and therefore I'm comfortable with that. And I really think if other people would educate themselves, that's what this podcast is about, educating people and myself, number one, if we educate ourselves, about our opposing views, what we oppose, because we educate ourselves constantly on what we love but we don't step into something that we oppose and really identify what people are talking about. And I think that's really important for genuine connection. [00:28:03] Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, a very good point. You know, you want to take into, take into consideration the, the, um, the views of all relevant parties. The concerns of all relevant parties and including the ones that are adversarial to you, that's what we're talking about here. And, but, you know, you bring up a point which is really important, which is one of the things about authenticity is you might actually change your mind in the same day. You might, you might. [00:28:29] You might think differently. And then later you get some more information and you don't think that anymore, now you think this. Like you used to think this and now you don't think this anymore, now you think this. And you think, because this is how we've been, um, programmed, that you better keep on to the old one [00:28:49] because you don't want people to think you're wishy washy, or that you lied, or that you didn't think what you thought. But it's actually completely human to think one thing one day, take in some information either from your inside or from your outside, and then the next day actually have a different view on it. [00:29:08] And as long as you're speaking to wherever you are in that moment and speaking authentically, that resonating frequency comes through. As long as you're being honest about where you are. Look, I'm saying some things and thinking some things that are not the same of what I would say even, I don't know, last week or last year, you know? I'm allowed to actually change my mind because that's how humans are. I don't have to say the exact same thing next week that I said today. [00:29:38] Ed Watters: Yeah. Yeah. So, so if you find yourself in a situation like that, we often realize, Oh, now I'm going to be faced with my peers that expect me to think this way. This is where you have to really dive in and challenge [00:30:00] yourself, isn't it? Where, where you have to say, Well, no, this evidence that I just discovered aligns me in a new direction. [00:30:10] So therefore I have to be able to pass that on to these other identifying parties that expect me to be authentic. And, and that's truly what we really are seeking is this authentic nature of people that we don't often find in our world today, it's, it's, mind blowing to me. [00:30:37] Dr. Fred Moss: Right. So this idea of, um, you know, just really honestly bringing, um, our authentic self, and, you know, this idea of worrying about what our peers who used to, who we used to agree with, and now we don't agree with on a certain topic, [00:31:02] this is where creativity and innovation come in. So you have to have compassion, acceptance, forgiveness. And if you don't want to be kicked in the head, you should probably be a little bit careful about how you bring this up. On the other hand, you should not, you should not, um, you know, not surrender what you now know, or what you now feel. [00:31:22] Like it's very important to be expressed and aligned with your true heart. You know, eventually when I started realizing, for instance, that medicines were not something that I wanted to feed to everybody because I don't think that they help, I had to come to grips with, I'm going to be asked to do it anyways, what am I supposed to do with that? [00:31:43] You know, like even yesterday, you know, even during the week there are many people who come and see me because I'm a psychiatrist. And what's the difference between a psychiatrist and everyone else? A psychiatrist is one who can prescribe medicine, everyone knows that. So people come to me and they want their diagnosis and, you know, then they want their medicine. And what am I supposed to say? I, no, I mean, I could say no, but I would never see them again. It's funny, psychiatry is the only field in all of medicine that if you tell people they're okay, They get pissed. [00:32:17] Ed Watters: Yeah, interesting. So, so let's talk a little bit about why you podcast, write all of these books and you've got award winning articles out. It's fascinating all of the content that you put out. Why do you do this? [00:32:42] Dr. Fred Moss: It's a really good question. You're landing right on the question of the week, you know, and, cause the answer is not entirely clear. You know, I could just, uh, get on my horse and go home. I could just put my bat and ball down and go home, it's enough already. I fought the [00:33:00] good fight, I got forty-five years in the field, I, I've been a doctor, got a lot of friends, been around the world, got a great wife, got these three cats, had health challenges, and I'm doing pretty great, you know? I'm like, I got, I got a life, you know, I don't have to keep doing this shit, for sure. [00:33:22] But, you know, I, I was spared in a couple different situations, you could say my higher power spared me, or, you know, I had open heart surgery last year, emergency open heart surgery, and, you know, I was spared. And I've been in a couple of, uh, car accidents, both of them were quote significantly death defying. [00:33:41] And it's like, Okay, I'm here, you know? And I'm here with all these tools and all this experience, all this education, all this communication skills. I'm funny, I'm articulate, I'm kind, I'm caring, I'm a little different. Mental health is the topic of the day, no matter where you go in the whole world. And it's like, well, [00:34:04] I feel sort of responsible and accountable for making that kind of difference. So, you know, we've got these two books, or we got the courses, or we got podcasting. And it's like, I have fun. That's the other thing is, I love being a podcast guest. Maybe of all the jobs out there, being a podcast guest is the most fun. Because, you know, I get to, you, you ask great questions, you represent, you represent the other person, you kick the tires, you know, What is it, Dr. [00:34:30] Fred? And most people really appreciate me as a guest, I love being appreciated. And, um, so, you know, and I, depending on the listenership, I'm saying something that a lot of people feel like is changing their lives. So I change lives, you know, that's what I do. And I have positioned myself, I'm lucky, you know, more than lucky, like deeply fortunate that the, that the cards in this lifetime have set me up with such a powerful position, and so many good friends, and the capacity to communicate in such a way as to remind people, like a basic WTF, it's just, it's, it's like an ultimate WTF, right? [00:35:09] It's like, Hey, what, what makes you think there's something wrong? What makes you think there's something more wrong with you than me? What makes you think that your difficulty in social environments, or your difficulty completing tasks, or your difficulty with falling asleep, or your difficulty in relationships, or your difficulty with past traumas, or your difficulty with, I don't know, being fearful of the future, or your difficulty of being resentful of the past, Or your difficulty, [00:35:43] what makes you think that you're so different than anyone else who's had the same shit, man, said in their own way? So when we start getting, there might be nothing wrong with you, you see? And this is the [00:36:00] thing, I already said there's people out there, lots of people that if they come into my office and I, even for a second, pretend to think that there's nothing wrong with them, [00:36:14] they just get furious with me. It's, it's funny. You know, it's like they get mad at me. I tell, I tell, you know, Doctor, we didn't come here to find out what, that I'm okay. We came here so I could relinquish responsibility for my life and give it to an alphabet soup worth of a psychiatric diagnosis so that I could then lay out and do whatever I do and say stuff like, Honey, that wasn't me. [00:36:40] That was my ADD. Honey, that wasn't me. That was my PTSD. Honey, that wasn't me. That was my bipolar variant. That's my autistic spectrum disorder, that's my narcissism, that's my schizoaffective symptoms. That's my borderline personality. Dude. [00:37:03] Ed Watters: Yep. I like it, I like it a lot. That's powerful right there because that's truly what it amounts to. And I, I remember when we started the journey of giving up those psychiatric medicines, it was terrifying. And even to the point of contention and anger, and, you know, it really was, This is my life saving thing, you know? And it is, it can be very rough. And to identify that and be empathetic towards that, especially when it's somebody that you love the most, it's very unique [00:37:51] to find somebody willing to say, No, let's find the truth of what happened to you and discover that you can let this go and you are in control. It was fascinating and it's still a fascinating journey. We read each Saturday and we, we work towards an ultimate goal of being a better person. And that's truly what this is all about is, if I'm a better person and people look inward at that, it expands and goes outward. [00:38:26] So that, that's really part of the reason why we do this to help people that need a bridge. We're bridge builders and you help people find their true voice, it's unique. Your book, Finding Your True Voice. Could you tell us about that just a little bit? [00:38:53] Dr. Fred Moss: Sure. That's a book you can, um, get a free copy sent to you, um, you know, just pay the shipping and handling, of course. [00:38:58] It's, uh, [00:39:00] and, um, it's a book that I wrote a few years ago, just with the really same idea that we're talking about, that there's things in the way that are preventing us from actually speaking our own authentic self. It uses podcasting frequently as a backdrop template, um, because this is a great place to learn how to actually speak yourself. [00:39:19] You know, the, as the podcaster, for instance, you actually own the content. You can do the intro, you can do the outro, you can stay creative, you can ask the questions, you can listen. My job is to make you look great and that's what I do. You know, I'm like, make you look like you're, you know, you're in tune, [00:39:34] you're a great interviewer, you're able to set up a great show. And, you know, that anyone would love working with you, or being sitting next to you, and you're, you know, like a guest at your house, you know? And your job is to, uh, be that podcast host and actually hold the fort down so that we can have a safe and real conversation. [00:39:51] Okay, well, Find Your True Voice is a way of really just burrowing down, drilling down and getting to what's in the way, what's preventing you, what, who is that person that you have become that is inconsistent with who you really are. And how can we start actually having conversations with people that are more aligned with who we really are. You know, it's a lot easier. [00:40:15] When you start lying to everybody, you got to remember all your lies. You got to remember who you said what to, you know? Like, you know, you said something that Billy, and now Billy probably told Janie. And so next time you talk to Janie, you have to determine whether she talked to Billy, when she, did she hear from Billy that nonsense you told him about how life is and then, [00:40:35] That is not authentical. Authenticity is just like what's so, just what's so, after what's so, after what's so, after what's so. So it's really actually a whole lot easier logistically to just be honest and authentic. But we're, you know, there's one thing that drives us from being, from finding our true voice. [00:40:59] You know, and I ask the crowd, sometimes I take a stage and I start talking about True Voice, and I ask the crowd, Well, what, what prevents you from saying what it is you really mean to say? Or from speaking when you know you should and you choose not to? What, what prevents you? There's one four letter word, starts with F, that comes up the whole time. [00:41:19] You know, for sure. People are just, people are just afraid. They're afraid they're, they're going to be let go, or disrespected, or disregarded, or dismissed, or thrown off the island. They're willing to start saying things. People, you know? It's reached a point where we now say things that even we don't believe. [00:41:47] Ed Watters: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's no, no way to live. And I remember living that way, you know, my younger self trying to [00:42:00] tell little white lies just to avoid confrontation. It, it, it's really not worth it. I, I've really felt so much better and relieved now that I can just say, Look, this is how I feel and, you know, that's the way it is. [00:42:18] It's just the way it is. If you can bring me evidence to change my mind, I'm always there to watch, listen, and learn. But as far as standing goes, I have to stand my ground because, well, our mind has this protectionism and that, that's all I have. So yeah, it's one of the fascinating things, mental health, what the brain does, what the mind will [00:42:49] allow you not to do if you let it. And I could speak to you for hours about this, Dr. Fred. Because you are a fascinating person, you've written so much and, and I'm going to share this out definitely with people. Do you have a call to action for our listeners today? [00:43:14] Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, the call to action these days has really shifted. I'm creating a community of like minded individuals who are looking at, uh, walking through life and getting a handle on how to manage the craziness of what it means to be a human. So, you know, and the way I'm doing that in creating a community is I'm working in, um, in the Skool community, S K O O L, skool.com. I have a, um, a community that I'm inviting, as a free community, inviting people to join skool.com/welcometohumanity/about. No spaces. Skool.com, S K O O L. com/welcometohumanity/about. And that's where, to take you to my page. And then I invite you to join as soon as possible, by the way, you can do that today. And, you know, we just, we have a meditation every morning because meditation is way more powerful than medication in most cases. [00:44:04] Again, disclaimer aside, if you have found the medication that's making your life sing, please keep doing it. No problem, I really have no problem. It's all good, it's all right. But for the tens of millions of people who haven't found themselves there yet, um, meditation, gratitude, nature, nutrition, being of service, um, creating a higher power, doing some writing, doing some actual reading of books. [00:44:35] Um, taking care of pets, uh, even drinking tea and watching your, um, your hydration, and being creative, art, music, dancing, singing, drama, cooking, writing, gardening, actually doing the creative thing. If you do all those things that I just said, if you generally pay attention to all of those things I just said, [00:45:00] you're not going to need any medicine. [00:45:02] I promise. There's nothing wrong with you, you just do those things. You say, Well, I can't do them because I got this illness. Dude, bullshit. I, I hate to be, I'm going to be kind about it, but of course you can do them. You can sit in front of a piano, you can actually doodle, you can actually show gratitude, you can sit and meditate, you can, you can take a walk in nature, you could draw, or you could sing, you could even dance more than likely. [00:45:34] You may not be like, you know, Rudolph Valentino, it's all fine. You don't have to be that, but you could actually get all this stuff done. And if you did read, and if you did journal, and if you did go of service and volunteer, got a list of twenty things inside the Moss Method. If you did all those things, you'd have a life that would work. That's [00:45:53] guaranteed. So, I invite you to really look at that. Here, there's my dude, just, my dude, Valentino. We were just talking about pets, this is Valentino. We just say Rudolph Valentino, but this is THE Valentino that Rudolph Valentino was named after. Yeah, he just popped up here. He's smart, dude. He, he's smart. He knows, he knows when we're talking about him. That's for sure. [00:46:24] Ed Watters: Yes, people underestimate the intelligence of animals, that's for sure. You know, uh, yes, they are, they are unique, that's for sure. My, I just took over my cousin's cat, he passed away and we adopted it. Very unique, that's for sure, it's an experience. Uh, can you tell people how to get ahold of you and reach out and be part of what you're doing? [00:47:02] Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah. The best way to get ahold of me is probably that Skool community is one place and then the other place is, uh, Dr. Fred, drfredthreesixty.com. drfredthreesixty.com is a really good place to see all the things that I've been up to. And a lot of that is transferring over to the Skool community as we speak, but it's still going to be a wide open website. [00:47:21] And then my main website, which has been around for six or seven years, is that welcometohumanity.net. And you could see all the projects that I've done, all the podcasts that I've been on, all the books that I've written, all the, all the quotes, and testimonials, and webinars, a lot of things there that you can tap into. Um, I'm open for discovery calls from your listeners. [00:47:43] You know, I call them discovery calls, but they're not really that, it's not like a discovery call, it's like a conversation, you know? You have, most people have, back in the day, I used to take the front of the room and ask people, do you know anybody with a psychiatric illness? And some hands [00:48:00] wouldn't go up. But that's a stupid question now, that's like a stupid question now. That's a stupid question, man. 100 percent of hands will go up guaranteed because mental illness has become the ultimate pandemic. [00:48:27] Ed Watters: Yeah. You know, that's interesting, Dr. Fred. Because, you know, just a few years ago, it was really hard to have people address their mental health issues. And we all have mental health related problems, no matter who we are, because we all have those emotions that we have to deal with. And, and, understanding it is kind of difficult for other people [00:48:56] and that's why sometimes we do need to work with professionals. And I never want to discourage anyone from applying what works to them, because that's truly what it's all about in your disclaimer, being happy. And if that's what it takes to make you happy, stay there until you need that other thing. [00:49:22] But discomfort is what helps create change. So I, I often ask people to find their discomfort, get behind a microphone. That's really discomforting to most people, but it's truly where you're going to find your authentic self and create some of the most enduring content you'll ever find. You are a fascinating man. You are a very good podcaster, you have what it takes to be in the top O O O one percent. And I want to say thank you so much for sharing that here today with us and being part of the Dead America Podcast family. [00:50:10] Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for being here and thanks for having me and I appreciate the honor and acknowledgement. And, um, uh, you know, and Dead America is a cool name for what you got here. And, um, I wondered, I wondered if you're like a Jerry Garcia fan when I first started, of course. [00:50:32] Ed Watters: Well, I do like, I do like Jerry Garcia. But I'm, it's not, uh, modeled after the Deadhead community, not at all. It's actually, we all feel dead in America right now, and it's not a place I want anyone to be. So that's what it's all about. Yep. [00:50:55] Dr. Fred Moss: [00:51:00] Mental illness and medications are contributing drastically to that sense of feeling dead. Well, thank you so much, Ed. [00:51:12] Ed Watters: Thank you for joining us today. If you found this podcast enlightening, entertaining, educational in any way, Please share, like, subscribe, and join us right back here next week for another great episode of Dead America Podcast. I'm Ed Watters, your host, enjoy your afternoon wherever you may be.