Transcript
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For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but a power, love and self-discipline.
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So if you're trapped by fear, you know your enemy is trying to keep you down.
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He wants to destroy you, but remember your God has given you what Power?
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Power Not just a little power, a lot of power, god-sized power, the power that'll electrify a train, a locomotive, speeding down the tracks.
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Welcome to the City Light Church podcast.
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Thanks for joining us today as we look into God's Word and discover the hope and truth that he has for us.
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If you want to connect with City Light Church, feel free to visit us at citylightnyccom.
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That's citylightnyccom.
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Pastor Boyan Jansik and his team believe that the power of the Holy Spirit is already working in our hearts and minds.
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As you listen to today's teaching, remember that you are deeply loved by God, that you are surrounded by his grace and that he has a real hope and a future for you.
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I'm James Chavez.
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I get to hang out with you today.
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We've been in the middle of an incredible message series called the Clash of the Covenants and it's been incredible, but we're going to take a pause right at the halfway point, if that's okay.
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Pastor Boyan is going to be right with us next week and he's going to pick up with part five and he's just going to take us over the finish line, okay, but today he's asked me to share with you a little bit, so if you would please indulge me just a little, don't all rush for the exit.
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It's going to be okay.
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I told a few of you that our daughter, who's in college down in Alabama, got in a car accident a couple weeks ago.
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Yes, scary, I was on my way to Friday night service.
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I'm driving, so it's the long drive.
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I'm on the LIE, enduring that misery, and I get the phone call and I say hi, doll, it's just dad, I think I just got in a car accident.
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What do you think?
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Or you know?
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Well, I think I know that I got in a car accident because I hit another car.
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Yeah, okay, I think you know.
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Are you okay?
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Yeah, I'm okay.
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I mean, I banged at my knee Like how bad.
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I mean I'm fine, I'm fine, okay, how's the other?
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car the other person fine, yeah, they're fine.
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Okay, what do I do?
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So I stayed the next 55 minutes on the phone walking her through.
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The police.
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Came you get the registration, get your license, give your statement.
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Is it drivable?
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She's breaking pieces off, putting them in her trunk so she can drive back to her.
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Wow, what an ordeal.
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So for the next couple of weeks I'm dealing with insurance.
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Are we going to fix it?
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Are we going to total it?
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They finally totaled it.
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I go into the motor vehicle department a few times because that's a good time, because the license plates are in Alabama but it's registered in New York.
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So I got to go.
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I don't have the plates, whether you go to the police.
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Did you get this form?
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Did you get that form?
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Can I speak to your supervisor?
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Mr Chavez, we don't have.
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Can I speak to your supervisor?
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I tell you what it's a good time.
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Anybody like the motor vehicle department?
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Woo, I scheduled a root canal after that just so I can get some rest from the motor vehicle department.
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I tell you that's a hard time, but while I'm sitting there waiting for my number, they're like why 7217?
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What happened to just like 53?
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It's like seven digit numbers.
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I'm like how many people are ahead of me, my gosh.
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And then I'm like in the Gs.
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Well, they start coming up with Cs and then Zs and they do it just to throw you off.
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It's, it's, it's mind games.
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I tell you it's mind games, somebody's got to do the job, but I just have.
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So I'm sitting, they're waiting for them to call my number and I'm watching people get their picture taken for their driver's license.
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You guys remember that?
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Getting your picture taken for the driver's license?
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Who likes getting their picture taken for the driver's license?
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It's kind of cringey having a show and someone says let me see your driver's license where you have to pull it out for some reason, and the person next to you goes like this You're like, nope, you find yourself kind of explaining right, this was a bad day, the wind was really blowing, I was on antibiotics and was bloated, whatever reason.
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I've been on a diet since then and, what's worse, and I've seen this, you pull it out and they look at it and they're like look at you, you're wearing the same shirt.
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How weird is that?
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Right?
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Or if you're completely unrecognizable, that's another weird one.
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But no one likes showing the driver's license picture.
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I think they train you on how to actually take a really bad picture.
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If you're the photographers for the motor vehicle department, it's either bad lighting, it's too much light and it kind of washes you out right, or it's not enough and it's kind of shady and you got those kind of shades in your eyes and you look real sketchy, or they just kind of blow you out.
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Or they say, okay, I'm going to take it on three, one, two, like what.
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You didn't go on three.
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Or after three, you didn't even let me get to three and they just laugh have a nice day.
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Number 472,989 million what I hate the driver's license picture.
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And now they give it to you for like 100 years.
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I'm like, why couldn't?
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I got it when I was like 18 and I kept that one when I was all like when I had one chin.
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You know what I'm saying, what is going on.
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But then there's the other thing.
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There's portrait pictures.
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That's a good time, right?
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Anybody remember Glamour Shots?
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That was a thing that was like that's the way Hollywood would do it.
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I mean, they get just the right lighting to compliment your skin tone.
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They get the backdrop just right.
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They even told you to turn right.
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They kind of tilt your shoulders and turn your head back and stick your chin out so you don't look.
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So I had to see the chiropractor after that because I'm all contorted so I don't look weird.
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But boy, they can airbrush out wrinkles and blemishes and that thing.
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It just looks like you just stepped right out of heaven.
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It is amazing.
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But what's really interesting about those two different kinds of pictures?
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What they have in common is that neither one is real right.
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You're not as bad as the motor vehicle says you are, I promise, and I know those cameras add 10 pounds.
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But you're not as good as Glamour Shots says you are either, right.
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I tell you what neither one is the real thing.
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In the end, only God sees our real selves.
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He knows the real deal.
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Yet it's imperative and that's what I want to drive home today that we are authentic in who we are and how we live in our relationships.
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If you truly want to make an impact and have influence in our world, you've got to be real.
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Jesus said it this way in Luke 12, too.
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The time is coming when everything that is covered up will be revealed and all that is in secret will be made known to all.
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That's scary.
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Yeah, dun, dun, dun, all that's in secret?
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All you mean all, or just the things that I present?
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No, all I need to work on a bigger mask.
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Well, this is October and this is when we have little kids dressing up and they're trick-or-treating and masks, right.
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So I thought it would be an appropriate time to talk about masks, the masks that we put on.
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Why do we choose to wear a mask?
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And I thought we would peel back the layers and first talk about the mask that we put on for ourselves when we look in the mirror.
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Is that right?
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If we start there, that's not convicting at all.
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You're like, talk about their mask.
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Why are you going to talk about my mask?
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So let's look at the one that we put on for ourselves.
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But here's the deal when we put on a mask and we lie to ourselves about who we are, yes, you lie to other people and that's a bad thing, but most often, who gets duped and deceived is us.
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Right, and that's far worse.
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Some social scientists they've been studying this for a long, long time, and studies dating back to the 1950s.
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They dubbed this cognitive dissidence.
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Right, where this is the theory that explains how people can fully come to believe something that they know completely is a lie.
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That's interesting.
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Right, as humans, we'll go to great lengths from admitting we don't want to admit it that we're believing something is a lie, that it's wrong that we would tell a lie.
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So it brings us to the point where I don't want to admit I'm a liar, I don't want to say I'm a liar, I don't want to be called a liar.
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Therefore, everything I say must be true.
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And then we start to believe that there were some studies, again dating back to the 1950s, that were pretty interesting as I was reading through them, and there were a couple of psychologists, sociologists, and they decided they were going to infiltrate a cult.
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Now, cults are known for what their honesty and transparency.
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No, not usually.
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So this was a perfect opportunity to understand this phenomenon.
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So they infiltrated, pretended to be converts, and this particular cult believed that the world was going to end and they predicted the date by none other than an imminent alien invasion.
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Because that's a good one, right?
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Independence Day.
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Who doesn't look?
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Will Smith just taken out some aliens on the 4th of July, I mean, it's not going to be plagues or pestilence or World War III, no alien invasion.
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So they talk it up and they predict the date.
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But as the date starts to get closer they notice that these converts in the cult they start withdrawing from their family and from their friends.
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They kind of close ranks.
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They stop doing interviews and they stop talking to the media.
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And they thought that was kind of interesting.
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So they're only listening in their echo chamber to the other people who believe what they believe.
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But then, as the date that this imminent alien invasion approached and came and went with no alien invasion, a really interesting thing happened, a really interesting happening.
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Something went down.
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They were really excited to talk to the media again.
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Why do you think that was?
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Well, because they didn't want to act like they had been duped and they were fools.
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I almost said stupid.
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That's where Nicole right on the hook, she's like.
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They didn't want to admit they were fools.
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So they had to come out and say they actually saved the world from the alien invasion.
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How about that?
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They didn't want to believe and face the truth that they were deceived.
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So they wanted to convince themselves and the world that they had actually done some good.
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Well, these same sociologists.
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They did another experiment where they actually took two groups of people and they separated them and they asked the first group to tell a lie and when they would tell this lie they would pay them $20.
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And they took the other group and they said tell the same lie.
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When you tell the lie, we'll pay you $1.
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And let me just this was in the 1950s.
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That $20 is equivalent to about $255 today.
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So here's what was interesting the people that told the lie both groups told the lie.
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They got their money.
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The people that got paid the $1 for telling the lie started speaking as if that wasn't a lie.
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They were acting as if it was true, believing as it was true, and they were really confounded and they really dug deeper and did the study and found out that what it really boiled down to is we didn't want to believe that we would sell out for such a measly sum of money.
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Now the people that got the $20, also known as $255, in our economy it's easy to say why'd you tell the lie?
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I did it for the money $255,.
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I could do a lot with that.
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I can pay a new pair of shoes, I can have a nice dinner $1,.
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What do I do with $1?
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What does that say about me myself worth an integrity if I'll sell out for $1?
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They didn't want to believe it.
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They couldn't accept it.
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So they started to believe.
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Well, it couldn't have been a lie.
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Really, it's true.
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It has to be true on some level.
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A partial truth has to be truth.
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If there's any truth, then it's truth.
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Isn't that interesting?
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We see this all the time, even in the media today.
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Worst bet a steady stream of lies.
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Right, this steady diet just coming through.
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There's even a name for it gaslighting.
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You heard that Gaslighting.
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I used that phrase the other day.
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And our kids.
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Now they're in their 20s and they looked at me like where'd you learn that word?
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Look, you don't have a monopoly on cool words.
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Just because you're in your 20s, I know what gaslighting is.
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Do it to you all the time.
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I don't care, I don't care, just kidding kids.
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I love you, but they lie to us and they lie over and over and over until we start to believe that maybe we're the weird ones for doubting.
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It was a lie in the first place.
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Right, think, does everyone believe?
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Ok, if NBC and ABC and CNN and MSNBC and Washington Post and New York Times, I'm the weird one.
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It's all true.
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It's not.
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Don't believe the hype.
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They're gaslighting you.
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Why do they do it?
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We can't distinguish, after a while, lies from truth, and after a while we don't really even know if the people feeding us the steady stream of lies are just irredeemably deceived or just so diabolical that they just want to destroy us.
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But it's one or the other.
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There's nothing in the middle.
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So be careful.
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We don't want to be liars, right?
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Sometimes the truth of who we are or what we've done in the past is too painful to face.
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So what do we do?
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Put on a mask for ourselves, because, guess what?
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Other people aren't thinking about you as much as you think about you.
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They're going about their day, living their life, dealing with their own problems, but you're obsessing about you and what they think about you.
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Maybe I'm not good enough.
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Maybe they know what I've done.
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Maybe I need to put on a mask so I feel better about what they see.
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And so we listen to the lies.
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There was a guy named John Beal.
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He was a former high-level official with the Environmental Protection Agency, the EPA.
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He pled guilty to stealing over $900,000 from the government.
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When I read the case, I was intrigued as to how he swindled that much money out of the government, because I thought maybe I can learn something, but I was just curious.
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Ok, in 1994, beal he convinced top officials at the EPA, where he worked, that he was a CIA operative Get that.
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And he was dealing with matters so top secret and confidential that they couldn't dig in or ask questions.
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So his supervisors believed this elaborate story and they allowed him to take long stretches of time to disappear and have unaccounted time where he just went off and spent time with his family fishing, playing golf, hobbies, learning languages, origami, whatever he decided to do all while getting paid by the government Because he's doing top secret work for the CIA.
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That's crazy.
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No one knows for sure how much money he actually swindled out of the government because this scheme went on for 19 years.
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Could you imagine living a double life for 19 years?
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How difficult must that be?
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It was probably kind of fun for the first couple of times.
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He got away with it and he's like look at me Out on the golf course just swinging around.
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I'm like I'm getting paid.
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But then, hey, where were you?
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I can't talk about it.
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Stop secret.
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Who did I tell what to?
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What mask was I wearing when I talked to this person?
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That gets rough after a while it's hard to know what's real.
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But here's what I thought when I thought about that guy.
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I said I'll bet if I'm being honest and you are too.
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There's probably some inconsistencies in who we say we are and who we really are.
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Maybe not to the extent of old Mr Beal swindling almost a million dollars from the government.
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Any fake CIA operatives in the audience today Don't tell me if you are.
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Put your hand it's supposed to be covert.
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But I'm sure there's inconsistencies when you're being honest, when we pretend to be more than we are.
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Here's what it does.