Mark Gober: Can Freedom exist in our current government? Is Voluntaryism the Answer?

Keri Norley 0:02

Hello and welcome to this episode of the wealth Alchemist podcast. My name is Keri Norley. I am the host of the show today and every other day and today I am like I am, like, like, I don't even know the word so excited for this conversation. I feel like the two of us are going to be able to jam for hours on this but we are going to try and contain ourselves to the time of the podcast. I have Mark Gober on the call with me, he is real smarty pants, let me just tell you, he's an international speaker and the author of an up and a bit of sorry, the author of an end to upside down thinking, which was awarded the IPI best science book of 2019. He is also the author of an end upside down living into 2020 and is the host of the podcast where is my mind starting in 2019. Previously, Gober was a partner at Sherpa technology group in Silicon Valley and worked as an investment banking analyst. Sounds real smart in New York. He has been named one of IBM's strategy 300, the world's leading intellectual property strategist. And he graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University. Like I said, we have a smarty pants and I say that we have a smarty pants on our in our conversation today, because I think it's relevant, I think it's really relevant. Because we're going to have a really deep, deep dive conversation into freedom into I don't usually bring politics to the state of this conversation. But we're going to have a really amazing conversation around the government, and metaphysics and how this all comes together, which is really some of my favorite things to talk about, and how we ultimately are going to be Oh, visioning, the two of us have a big vision, I think for a future that does not look the same as what we are looking at right now. And in order to have that there has to be an understanding and awakening of what actually exists in this world right now, from a very, very logical perspective, which is one of the reasons I'm super excited for this conversation. And for and the fact that he brings in the metaphysics to this, it's like, mind boggling. So with that introduction, welcome to the show.

Mark Gober 2:13

Thank you so much, Keri, I'm looking forward to this.

Keri Norley 2:15

It'd be amazing. Okay, so how about we start with Mark just wrote a new book. So he's just talked about all these other books, but he's written a new book, it's called an end to upside down liberty? Can you give us an overview of what this book is and why you've worried like, it's really important piece of work for right now in this world?

Mark Gober 2:31

Well, it deals with politics and the basic basic nature of government. We live in a world where there are governments that rule over us, and they have laws and the governments provide services for citizens. These are like very basic facts that I never really thought about until I started researching it. And the book is really questioning the structure of government basic features of it. And I propose a different way of governing across the world, that would be much more aligned with metaphysical principles, the ones that I talked about so much in my first two books in my podcast. So basically, what I'm addressing is, what is the ideal way of organizing society, politically and economically? And how can we align that with the nature of reality?

Keri Norley 3:14

Hmm, so amazing. So to start this conversation, and I really highly, highly, highly, highly recommend you get this book it is, I as we got onto the call as to mark, it is one of the best written books I have seen with factual evidence to really help understand like, what's actually happening in the world right now. Like, including the Constitution people, right. And it's crazy, like I was even just listening recently to a conversation, or a presentation by Robert Kennedy, who you talk about in the book, and he was literally like breaking down how each one of them almost every single one of our liberties within the Constitution within the the Declaration of Independence is not being followed right now. Like they're all being broken, except for number two, amendment two, which is the right to bear arms, which they would like to I'm sure at some levels like the NRA is Tweet us drug for that, I think. Right?

Mark Gober 4:09

Yes, the trend for sure.

Keri Norley 4:12

So can you drop into a little bit about that? I love how you talked about the state and how ultimately, like we talked about freedom and what is freedom, but then ultimately, you start to bring into this conversation is, are we really free? Right now we actually have our liberties right now, or are they slowly and I and you said this, this comparison, I made a comparison earlier this year on Facebook, actually comparing what's going on now with what happened in the Holocaust. It's not like we all of a sudden and I'm Jewish, it's not like as a Jewish, you know, group of people. We all of a sudden, like there was one day that we woke up and we were all put out into concentration camps. I don't say we but like as a collective, and all the other people that were involved in this, it gradually happened over time because Liberty started to be taken. And you start talking about that in in its own way here. So please do like explain how that works.

Mark Gober 4:59

Yeah, and I should add that prior to really, pandemic era. These were not topics I thought about, I was not political at all. I didn't care about politics, I was doing other stuff with business. And these were not topics I thought about. But all the sudden with the pandemic, we saw censorship, if you had ideas that countered the narrative that we're being told, You're booted off of Facebook and YouTube, for example. And the government was deciding things like, well, this business is essential, but this one's not, you're gonna stay in your home for this period of time. So our liberties were very clearly being eroded. And they would say, well, we're doing this to protect you. This is for your safety. And one of the core paradigm flips that I explore in this book, and it's a big been a big one for me, is to view government not as the protector, but rather as the predator. Hmm. And if we flip everything, and we start to look at the way in which our liberties are being taken away, like you said, there are parallels to the Holocaust, for sure. And many other examples throughout history where governments have become oppressive. So it's just it's a new way of looking at the news, for example, any piece of news that comes out, it's typically framed to us as well, we're doing this new measure, because we're trying to help you. And if you think about it, maybe actually, that's not the case, if we look at what's actually happening to us. So in from a spiritual perspective, there's this notion, often of the wolf in sheep's clothing, to be aware. And that's just a theme that comes up for me all the time, because we see people presenting as sheep. But if you think about what they're actually doing, they're not telling you they're doing it. But what's actually happening to our lives is very much like what a wolf would do.

Keri Norley 6:38

Hmm, I'd love to have you drop a little further into that, because I think it's a really beautiful point. And I'd like for people to get a little bit deeper into like, what that actually looks like.

Mark Gober 6:47

Yeah. Well, I think lock downs are a good example, where, look, we're trying to protect you. So we're going to lock you down. And well, it might affect your income, it might affect your business, but we're not going to talk about that this is to protect you. But what's actually happening, you're becoming enslaved, in a sense. And it's sometimes hard to see that because yes, there's an illness going around. And there have been horrible things happening with that. And that's sometimes clouds our judgment, where it's almost like if there's an emergency that gives you an excuse for liberties, to be taken away. And that's how I think the wolves in sheep's clothing presents. They say, Well, this is an emergency, we're just doing it for your safety. But the net effect is not going to be a good thing. And if we look at governments throughout history, there have been many examples where it leads to enslavement. We can look at North Korea, we can look at what's happening in communist China, Soviet Russia, I think in the West, we are not as attuned to the warning signs, because they say Oh, well, we have a constitution America's the freest place in the world. And historically, it has been a very free place. So we're not as apt to be critical, I find. Like it would never happen here.

Keri Norley 7:57

Right. Right. And like I said, but like it's slowly over time, one little piece and and it's so interesting, because I mean, for me, I have definitely, it's one of my favorite reasons for the podcast, I'm sure you agree between a podcast and a book, we can finally have our voice heard, without being censored, I have 100% been censored on Facebook, it has socked for talking about crypto for talking about, you know, just freedom, like literally make your own mind up and have a choice, and things get censored all the time on there for me. And I also see, and my husband is a massage therapist. And I was like how is it that all of a sudden, like our bodies became an essential, right? Like, who makes that choice when actually those of us who are home and stranded and not moving and like can't like it's actually absolutely essential, or people who are in pain. And then we're seeing people every week, all of a sudden, like, how is that not essential? And so I think it's a really important thing that you bring to this and that it's like, who made up this? Who decided this? And why did they make this decisions? And these decisions that have been made all along the way? And and I find it interesting, like even in our right to choose? Right? Like who gets to make the decision? Because nowhere in the constitution does it say that I get to tell you what to do with your body. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Mark Gober 9:13

No, I agree with you. And this is the same excuses used? Well, it's for your safety. And there's another important excuse, which is that it's for the good of society, it's for the common good, and therefore you as an individual don't matter. And what the political researchers say. And I'm thinking of G Edward Griffin, the author and FA Hyack, a Nobel Prize winner, what they say is the greatest crimes in history, whether they're communistic or in the fascist regimes, they end up with this purely collectivistic mindset when all that matters is society and the individual well, your body that's not we don't care about that as much because it's in the benefit of society. The problem is that mentality can be used by corrupt leaders to justify anything So I agree with you, Keri, that body bodily autonomy is really important, who gets to decide what we put in our body and what we get to do with our body. And even if they did have good intentions, there's risk in anything medical, and each person has a different situation. So why would we entrust someone fully to make those decisions? For us? It's the opposite of liberty. And it's, it sounds obvious when we probably talk about it like this. But if you just watch the news that's not presented in this way. So really, you have to be like a detective. That's what I found. I've been in a fortunate such unfortunate situation where I had left my job right before the pandemic wrote, my second book, had been researching all this. So I've been watching very closely. And I could see how if you're busy with work, and you don't have time to think about it, you see, you're credible person that you news anchor that you believe on TV, you're not going to question things as much.

Keri Norley 10:52

Totally, totally. And then one thing leads to another, but I think it's not I mean, like, and this is, to me, I just want to be really clear, this is not a pro or anti anything, it's a pro choice. Right? And that's how I say on many of the choices that we have, like whether we could bring abortion to this, whether I would ever have one or not is irrelevant. Do I believe that somebody else has the right to choose? Absolutely. And so why does it become different in any other aspect of you know, and so it's been a fascinating thing to watch in this, like, how we have these freedoms taken. And it's, you know, I have to say, personally, like, recently, I've had a real like, it's been, it's been, I'm gonna say tough on my heart, I guess is the best way to say it. Watching so many people lose their jobs, because they choose to have freedom and choose to make the choices. And it's like, Why all of a sudden, these people, I mean, these nurses and doctors who we've been praising for 18 months, thank God, they're the heroes, right? This is what we've been saying for months for a year and a half. And now all of a sudden, they can't work. But they were hero two days ago, you know, and I'm like, how does that how does that actually become? Okay. How did the government get to make that? Okay?

Mark Gober 12:01

Yeah. And what amazes me is that the hypocrisy within it often goes unnoticed. Because it's not media doesn't tell us that, oh, we were just saying this about them yesterday, but today change. It's just sort of like, well, this is the new paradigm. And if you go against that, then you're a conspiracy theorist or something? Oh, yes. Which is kind of crazy to me. So yeah, there is this, this idea of authority figures who know what's best. And that's also one of the things I'm challenging. The idea of a blind trust and authority leads to very dangerous things. And we've seen this like in Nazi Germany and other kinds of regimes where people will just follow orders, because it's easier to do that.

Keri Norley 12:39

Than to stand up for ourselves. Right. And essentially, you made a point to in there, if I remember reading, if I remember this, that you were basically saying, like, if you were given the choice to stand up against the government, right, like for something that we believe in, or don't believe in, right, like, for example, you made this example about Nazi Germany. So all of a sudden, we have all these Germans were like, This is not okay, that this is happening, right? And they're forced to comply. And if they go if they don't comply, it's against the rules, but it goes against what they believe in. So where does that put us? And I think that's a really interesting place to be in the world right now. Right? I mean.

Mark Gober 13:13

Yeah, so what you're getting at is one of the core criticisms I have of government as we do it. Government has the ability to basically set Morality with its laws. And we don't have a real choice over that. We can say we elect officials, but it's really, the government is going to be there no matter what, and the people cycle in and out and those laws get made. And that tells you what's moral. And if you just obey the law, then that's immoral under the law. But what happens if the law tells you to do something that does not align with your personal morality? Like in Nazi Germany, the things that Germans were forced to do to Jews and other minorities? It was the law to do that. And they might have said, well, no, that conflicts with my morality. So by being moral and following the law you are. And that is highly problematic for a structure that's governing all of society. How could you have that situation in place where you could be forced to engage in immoral acts?

Keri Norley 14:11

For the for the betterment of other people? Because you've been told.

Mark Gober 14:14

Right? Because this authority structure tells you that that's how it's going to be. So ultimately, what I argue is that, instead of having effectively rulers, which is what we have, the situation needs to be much more voluntary, where our interactions with any suppose it experts or anyone is by our own volition. And when that happens, then the morality is in our choice to engage or not engage, whereas right now, things are imposed upon us. And the difference between a more voluntary system in the book The term I use is voluntaryism.

Keri Norley 14:51

I liked this word. I was like, Oh, this is interesting, interesting concept of voluntaryism,

Mark Gober 14:55

Voluntary ism. This is a political philosophy basically. And the contrast One is known as statism statism is how we do government right now the state that we have this government that imposes upon us. But as I was digging into what is the state really, it's, it provides services to all of us, police courts, helps with so many functions in society roads. But in other areas of society, we have service providers to Netflix or gym. You know, I used to be a service provider to my clients, and we'd have contractual relationships, for example. And in those other cases, like Netflix and gym, and contractual relationships with clients, there's a contract, you have an agreement that I'm going to perform these services for you. And if I don't do them, well, then there can be potential termination. And this is gonna be the price. This is how we can adjust price, etc. But the government, we have implied consent, we don't have an explicit contract that lays out all the things government's going to do for us. And what happens if they don't perform, there's essentially no financial accountability, because no matter what the government does, it's going to collect taxpayer money, or it can effectively print money with the Federal Reserve and central banks. So you end up with this very awkward situation, which is not so good for the citizens, you have a ruling body that is going to have money no matter what if, unlike a real business, if you start to perform poorly, people stop paying you and you go out of business. But the government, if you perform poorly, it's still going to get paid. That's not such a good thing. We don't have an explicit contract. When you break it down, all of a sudden, there's a recognition, at least for me, that's like this aha moment, we're not actually free. And it might feel like we're free. But over time, the structure will become parasitic. And it has in many places across the world. And we're starting to see it very starkly in America and other places where it's like we would, we never thought we would and the things that we can do on a daily basis. There are limitations that we can see all the time.

Keri Norley 16:52

Yes, it's so fascinating. So okay, so let's move into I want to move into the concepts around what you spoke around metaphysics and the voluntary ism, I think it's very fascinating what you're talking about. To me, it's like when you talk about voluntary ism, it reminds me so I, you know, I wrote the book, the new wealth, magnetize abundance, hold your wealth and leave a legacy. And in it, like, I really do have a vision of the new wealth, like of what does it look like when we have a currency or a world or a financial system, that's for the people, right, and that we voluntarily choose to step into this, right, I wouldn't have used the word voluntary ism, but I'm like, Oh, I could dig it. I could, I could take where you going. Um, and so like, we actually get to be sovereign. And one of the things. So last week, I took the stage for the first time in a crypto conference, I don't know if you saw this. Thank you. It's called the Miami crypto experience. And when I was on, I was asked to be very last minute on a panel, which was about a lot about the new wealth and the new earth and where we're headed in this in this paradigm. And I say this, because one of the things that you had said earlier was we've lost our individuality by actually moving into this state ism, it becomes about the the common good of everybody versus the individuality. And what I said on the stage was, ultimately what I believe is, the more that we actually step into our own individuality, the more that we actually honor our own self expression, then we can stand fully and wholly as we are with our own beliefs, our own consciousness, our own experience of life. And then together, we come together in unity. And that's how we rise up. And I think it's a very different way of thinking to the traditional way of thinking in the world right now. Right? And generally speaking, because the way we've been programmed and conditioned, and I love that this conversation is happening, because it's not like I want to honor anybody who's listening right now. Even Mark said it, like, neither of us were thinking about this two years ago, right? This was not like, I would have been sitting on that, you know, like, Yep, let's just go like little sheep and run probably the same way that most people would have two or three years ago. Right. But like, this has brought a lot to me of going and you and saying like, is this really working. And so I also really appreciate like the metaphysical aspects of this, because there is like an energetic experience to this that nobody really talks about. So I'd love to hear what you have to say around the metaphysical and how this actually starts to play into like, first of all, I actually love what you talks about with consciousness. And so I'd love for you to start there, like what does that look like for you? As a definition?

Mark Gober 19:19

Sure. And I'm glad you're going there because it does tie into this really important idea of the balance of individualism and collectivism. Because I think there's a balance. Yeah, what happens is we go too far with collectivism, the individual doesn't matter. And that's very problematic. But you also don't want to be just fully selfish, where no one else matters. There's this balance and to me, that's a spiritual one, which gets to consciousness. What is consciousness? It's our sense of experiencing life. That's how I always define it. It's difficult to define because we can't touch it. We all have consciousness right now. Consciousness is what is experiencing this life at this moment. And in general, and I used to believe this to like this scientific community would say it, the consciousness is something that comes out of our brain because our brains really complex, and it produces our capacity to experience. And this is the core of my podcast, whereas my mind in my first book, an end to upside down thinking, that's what I challenge. There's a lot of evidence tons and tons suggesting that no, the brain doesn't create consciousness, it's the other way around. The brain is almost like a filtering mechanism, or a blindfold, that blocks us from a broader consciousness and we're like a vehicle for it. And that's the, you know, I go into this in much more detail. But that's the core idea. And the analogy I always like to use comes from a philosopher named Dr. Bernardo kastrup. He says, It's like we are whirlpools, within an infinite stream of water, where the water represents consciousness. But we have the sense of being an individual where we're kind of blocked from the broader reality. And sometimes things will happen like a near death experience, or a psychedelic experience or meditation, for example. And people will have a spiritually transformative experience where their perception expands beyond their individual Whirlpool. So that's the framework that I like to use, to quote Erwin Schrodinger, the Nobel Prize winning physicist, because a lot of the quantum physicists came to similar conclusions, which is very interesting as well. He said, in truth, there's only one mind. Hmm, that's how I think about it. It's one mind one consciousness, where we're like these dissociated whirlpools, were individuals and collective at the same time, and neither can be ignored. So that's the lens from which I'm looking at this, all this political stuff. And you know, all the science to back this up things like the reality of psychic abilities, which has been studied at Princeton University, the US government's released declassified documents, the University of Virginia has been studying things like near death experiences, and children who have memories of a previous life over 2500 cases. These are just snippets of the degree of evidence that's out there. And all of it points to the idea that consciousness isn't coming from the brain, but the brain is is like this antenna or blindfold that's filtering and processing it.

Keri Norley 22:04

Hmm. Yeah, I think of the brain is like, the thoughts. I mean, the brain is very physical, right? It's just thoughts. And it like in its job, actually, is to like, send signals, it makes thoughts and send signals like, you know, I mean, it's a very practical thing that we have the brain and in our consciousness is so much bigger, like we are so like, the consciousness of the experience of life is so much bigger than each one of us. And I love how you said that, like it is a collective. And I think this is the important thing to talk about is, it's a collective consciousness. Right? You and I are one, we are all a bunch of cells that are here together that at some point are going to replace and be different cells in some other place, right? Every seven years, our cells regenerate. I'm not even the same person that literally physically was seven years ago, and maybe my cells are in you right now. Right? I mean, that's literally how it works, right? And so when we look beyond that, beyond the physical body, it's this post, that's the Unity that's the consciousness. And I look at it like, for me, I guess one of my biggest missions on this planet right now is to shift the wealth consciousness. And the way that I always talk about this is like, it starts with each single human being deciding, I'm going to start to question my thoughts. I'm going to start to question why people are telling me, everybody, my mother, my father, the government, my sister, my best friend, you know, everybody, and like our teachers, and I look at the education system right now. And I want to go there right now. But like, right, we are being conditioned, but our consciousness is being conditioned. It's the thought process everything together. And the more that they condition, the consciousness, this is how I think fear works in this point here, right? The more that we breed fear, the more that we have control them or that they have control, they can actually control the consciousness by keeping it small. And they want to because if they were to allow the consciousness to be at the extent that it is we would have true freedom, we would have this utopia. Right? Because there are other I firmly believe I don't, I don't get it yet. I don't, I don't like fully right. But there are definitely beings of the planets, they've got what we want. There are definitely beings in the world that come here, and they're like, Hey, wake up people. How are you doing? You have everything you need, right? Everything that we need is on this planet, we have every resource we could possibly need. And we just have to choose to like be like, Okay, how do we break free from the thought process that we are of scarcity, lack, you know, an endowment I talk about it like a degenerative downward spiral, that we're in this downward spiral, versus how can we look at it and shift the whole consciousness, like flip it on its head is what you're ultimately saying, flip it on its head, and turn it into regenerative one where, where we have enough food where we have enough money where we have like the whole world could be looked after and in a beautiful, abundant way, if we shift the way that we think about it, which is ultimately just programming.

Mark Gober 24:55

I completely agree with you. And the way I think about it, the term I use is a shift in consciousness, that's really what we're talking about is tuning our antenna into a different station collectively and the more of us that can do that, I think the more we can solve many of these problems all over the world. But you're also alluding to something that I think is important to address, which is the idea that there are people who are psychopathic, or just power hungry, and lack empathy. And for many of us, it's difficult to relate to that kind of thinking, where to them power is what matters, the other people's lives or how other people feel, that is not what matters to them. And so good people often have a hard time relating to evil. And so that's one of the points I wanted to make clear in this book. And when I talk about these things, is that we have to account for the reality of, of evil and opposing force to to, I think, what is a loving force, that's part of consciousness itself. And it provides us with an opportunity to evolve and learn and grow. So there's value to it. But if we ignore it, and ignore that possibility that someone on TV who just seems so nice and says the right things and sounds politically correct, actually, the person just saying what you want to hear sometimes, and there's an agenda, and they're not going to tell you what that is sometimes because people in authority will lie. So I don't want to sound overly cynical. But we have to be discerning and say, Is this really a sheep? Or is it a wolf in sheep's clothing? And if we don't do that, we run the risk of what civilizations have gone through for many all over the world for a long time. And we're in the middle of it. Now. I don't think it's, it's helpful to give people the benefit of the doubt all the time. I think it's ultimately very naive. And one of my biggest concerns I see in the world, huh?

Keri Norley 26:35

Yeah, it's true. Like, it's the it's the power and the greed that has have Easter Island has, you know, no people on it that had Lemuria like they've had all of these societies fall, right, that we all of a sudden don't exist? Because power, ultimately, right? And if we all came together, and it's really interesting, it's one of the things that I love. I don't know what you what your stance is on crypto and blockchain and all this kind of stuff. I'm curious. But it's one of the reasons I love this because we have this place where we can finally have like a decentralized organizations where we can come together and you talk about volunteerism, voluntary ism. And when I look at that from the blockchain, we have that as a Dao. Have you heard about this stuff yet? I'm curious.

Mark Gober 27:18

Only bits and pieces of it. I'm definitely not an expert on crypto, but the principles behind it I'm totally I totally bet right. Decentralization is.

Keri Norley 27:26

Is perfect, right? Yeah. So So in in this, they have these these it's, it's I mean, to say it's new, I don't know if it's new, quote, unquote, I've got my little parentheses up here, guys, is I'm talking. They're called Dow, which is a decentralized autonomous organization. And ultimately, basically what happens is, as you buy, you buy a token, or you buy into the ability to vote, and the more people like, the best part about it is like the more people that are involved, which is what you want, like if you're looking to be involved in an organization like this, the more people that are involved, the better because it's more decentralized, right? We don't want one person on the top of a dowel, like we don't want one person on the top of our country. Really, that's guys why even in America, we don't have just a president, we have the president, we've got all these checks and balances, when they're all together on one side, I don't know. But like, but that is the purpose of it, right is that it was never just to be one person's power. And so when we start to look at what can happen now, as we bring to this blockchain experience, it's like, with a tap of a button, I became just as important as Joe Schmo down the street and this other person, and we don't have to have the same beliefs. We don't have to even know each other, to both be able to buy in and vote on what is an outcome. That would be shifting of the consciousness, right? That becomes for the people versus I said to my, my, my governor, this is what I want, but then he could go do whatever the hell he wants to. Right.

Mark Gober 28:50

Right, you become autonomous, each individual almost becomes like a little government in a sense. And that's, that's, we're not there right now. But that's how I see in the future where we are much more self governing and interacting in a voluntary manner.

Keri Norley 29:06

So okay, so we've got consciousness, we've got the state. Understand that there's consciousness now I'm curious to know is the do you do look at AI? Because I would say metaphysical stuff is different to consciousness? Do you see different? Do you have different? Like, definitions? I'll say for that?

Mark Gober 29:25

Well, I guess it depends on the lens that used at one level, I could equate them and say that the metaphysical, that all reality is a business. And that's a metaphysical statement to make. So consciousness and metaphysics are tied. So for the purposes of this discussion, we can say they are we can probably find instances where that could be disproven or shown to be something else. But let's just say we're looking at the nature of reality. That's what I mean by metaphysics. What what is this reality that we live in is it all just matter and we emerge through random evolutionary process and then all of a sudden consciousness came out after 13 point 8 billion years and when you die, there's no consciousness which is what I used to believe for sure. Or is it the other way around that consciousness is first and everything that we perceive in this world as being physical is actually just a manifestation of consciousness. There's no physical cells are 99.99999%, excuse me, atoms are 99.9999% empty space. And quantum physics shows that you have a wave and a particle duality. So you don't even really have solid stuff. Basically, reality isn't what it seems to be based on our senses. And that's This is metaphysical. So if we take that base and say, All reality is consciousness, like I'm talking about, well, then what does that mean for how we should structure society, and that's where the blend comes in. There's an important point I should raise, which we haven't talked about yet, this is a really central piece, because it ties into voluntaryism. In near death experiences, and these are cases where a person let's say they're in cardiac arrest, so some kind of major trauma to the body typically, and their brain is either completely off, or there's only a tiny bit of functioning. And it's at a point where if we look at conventional neuroscience, the brain shouldn't be able to produce a very complex memory, or cognition or anything. And yet, when people come back from these experiences, sometimes there's millions of these cases, they will sometimes report very elaborate things that they were immersed in unconditional love. They saw mystical beings from other dimensions, they were hovering over their body. Sometimes they see things in the room accurately, and they come back in their body after being resuscitated, they tell the doctor what happened, the doctor can't believe it. So when those happen, that's called a real memory, not a hallucination. These are the point that many researchers make. And the University of Virginia, for example, has been looking at this. Many people believe that near death experiences are real, they're not hallucinations, at least some of them. And that's significant. Because what often happens in near death experience is people review their whole life. So they relive all their events. And it happens not only from their own perspective, but from the perspective of each person that they ever impacted. So this is like the one mind getting to switch lenses from one Whirlpool to another. It's like when you knock the brain out, you're able to switch and see what it's like to be someone else within the collective. And you get to feel that the pain that's inflicted, and you get to feel also the joy and the love that you brought to people through their eyes. And for my podcast, where is my mind, Episode Six is all about the life review. I interviewed scientists on this too, but also I talked to people who had life reviews. So one man I interviewed, his name is Danny and Brinkley. He's had four near death experiences. Wow. He was struck by lightning had open heart surgery twice, I believe, and brain surgery. And each time we had to, we had to go back to his time in Vietnam, where he was in combat. And he told me he was vicious in combat. So he felt what it was like to be the person that he killed. And he also felt the indirect effects, even though they weren't quite as strong. He thought what it was like to be children who would no longer have fathers because he had killed the fathers in combat. So there's a real sense of interconnectedness that comes out of these experiences. When he comes back in his body, like many others, people's lives are changed forever, he became a hospice volunteer. So in his later life reviews, he got to see what it was like to be supporting someone at the bedside when the person was dying. So he got to be see what it was like to be the dying person looking into his eyes as they were being comforted. So these are very powerful stories are many of them out there. The point here is that there seems to be a golden rule, built into the fabric of reality itself, meaning treating others, the way we want to be treated is part of reality. It's not just a nice idea. And Dr. Grayson from the University of Virginia, what he says when he talks to near death experiences is they say this is beyond morality. It's a natural law. So let's say that's true. Treat others the way you want to be treated, which ultimately is aligned with this feeling everyone talks about of like, well, all consciousness is unconditional love. And we're trying to tap into that. That's what people say, in the near death experience in many other states. So we want to engage in activities that are in that vein. Now let's look at the state how does the state Act, the state acts in a manner that is aggressive toward people and their private property, things that they own.

Mark Gober 34:06

So that the principle that I talked about in the book is the non Aggression Principle. And this is really voluntary ism in a nutshell, you don't initiate aggression against other people or their bodies or their material, private property, things that they rightfully own, meaning, no physical violence, theft, coercion, extortion, fraud, you don't initiate those things. But you have a right in self defense, of course, if now, if you believe that, which to me is very much in alignment with the golden rule. Like if you're thinking about a life review, you'd want to abide by that principle, most likely, the state government, as we do it all over the world violate the principle, by its very nature, because it's not fully voluntary. We haven't fully consented explicitly to all of the things that are going on. And therefore when it imposes on us, it is violating, in my opinion, the non Aggression Principle and violating the spiritual principle of the golden rule. So that is highly problematic from a spiritual lens. Hmm.

Keri Norley 35:04

Am I just feeling that huh? Yeah, that's really interesting.

Keri Norley 35:19

I'm like, I feel that deeply. I feel that deeply in that. Where does it get to be our choice?

Keri Norley 35:34

And where, where it will point? At what point do we stand for that? Or do we fall for that? Yeah.

Mark Gober 35:45

That's the inflection point where we seem to be, because things are accelerating so quickly in terms of rights being taken away by what I consider to be in an inherently aggressive institution and coercive institution government. Where we're at a crossroads, are we going to succumb and allow aggression to be imposed upon us? Or are we going to be free being spiritually, that's another part of this too, I view freedom as something inherent, it's not something that is given out by governments. We are inherently free beings as part of this one mind of consciousness. We're in bodies temporarily having this experience. And freedom doesn't of course, give the right to initiate aggression against other people. That's not what I'm talking about. With Freedom. I'm talking about freedom abiding by this non Aggression Principle, and with the right to self defense. But if we are innately free, then then who is the government to micromanage our lives and tell us where we can and can't be free? That to me is also spiritually problematic? We have natural rights that the government seems to be violating?

Keri Norley 36:55

Hmm. It makes me think so to me, like the question, the question to ask of ourselves, right is like, are we showing up as our free expression? Are we showing up in our freedom that is our God given right? Now, and I think it's a really good question to ask ourselves.

Mark Gober 37:11

That's such an important point. And it's actually one of the most important points I would like to get across to audiences. Because when we had to shift and realize that we're actually free, then these impositions by experts, so called experts and governments, they will not have the same effect on us. And we realize that it's, even though we've grown up with it, and we were taught in school, this is how it is. It's not how it is, if you look at things from a metaphysical perspective, there are real violations of basic principles here. So that mental shift, all of a sudden, I think, could have a big effect for us individually. But also, when many of us realize it all. When we're when things are imposed upon us. We'll say, wait, no, no, I don't agree with that. And you don't have a right to do that to me. So I'm within my right not to do that. And like that thought process starts to happen.

Keri Norley 37:55

Yeah, it's interesting, what what's coming to me to like to add in here is one of the things I consider around government and big institutions, not just government, like this goes beyond just government, like we have institutions who are creating influence in the world right now. And I keep thinking about how, you know, our kids, if you have children, like as a parent, your model to your children, and pretty much whether you want to or not, like you could say one thing and do another, they're going to follow what you do, not what you say, right? Every time every time and the kids, if you are a parent, you will understand this 100% They are the biggest mirrors for you in your life. And there's not a damn thing you can do about it, except for change your own way of showing up so that you see it differently for them, right, you change your way of showing up, then they will, they will respond, you don't even have to talk about it. And they will shift, sometimes it helps to talk about it. But when I think about this on a bigger level, right, because that's really at home, very big, very small level, which is of course, in the oneness at the big level. Right? I look at that. And I think if I shift me, and I can help shift for them, then they cope grow up in a different lifestyle. And this is how we change the planet, right is actually how I show up to teach them how they can grow up to be adults that are free and have a their own consciousness, right. And all the other things that I talked to them and talk to them. But when I look at this from a bigger level, I look at the government and I go okay, well, if that's the parent, right, and I'm the child, which effectively is the role that we at some level play right? have played in the past, then what I see I will also replicate. Right? And I make that okay? Because that's what I'm being taught is the rules. It's the way that I'm supposed to live my life by. And so one of the things that I look at, like how could we possibly even talk to the, you know, the economics of the world? How could we possibly think that at some grandiose level, any one of us has ever been taught to not be in debt? Because look at the government, right? Like we have been taught debt consciousness because the government and they just printed 1/3 of the debt of our debt, trillions of dollars of debt this year alone this year alone. Like, we gotta wonder what taxes are for when you could print out that many trillions of dollars overnight, because you want to like, they have whatever they want, right? And so we look at that we look at that, that's what's coming through for us, we look at like you said, the violence, right, like, oh, I can just go fight for what I want. It doesn't matter. I can break old rules. I can go across all boundaries, all places. And I just want to go claim that so I'm going to, and my men might die, but who cares? Right, right. And all of these things that government says are okay, that's what then we say. And so then how do we show up? Well, I'm going to go fight for that. I'm going to take my gun out, I'm going to go shoot that person, because I think that's my property. Government says, okay, of course, I can go do that. Oh, I'm just gonna go swipe this credit card. Sure. Everybody gets to be in debt, because that's the way that it works. And how can we possibly think when I look at this from a big level? How can we possibly expect that somehow, one day, we're just all going to as human beings, like, just be like, Oh, I'm going to do it differently? No, we're not going to do it differently. Unless the government chooses to show up differently, or unless we choose to say, what the government's doing is actually not a really great role model. I don't want them as a parent. Right, like, let me just look at that from a child perspective. Is that the parent that I want to model?

Mark Gober 41:17

Yeah, right. Well, I think part of the shift in consciousness is moving away from this idea that government is the mommy and daddy, which is what we are trained. It is it is this caring body, and were the children that is taking care of us. But if you break down the way we actually do government, this one, this one, I spent a lot of time thinking about, why do we need government the first place you go back to like Thomas Hobbes and the political philosophers who say, Well, he didn't, then people are, they're stupid, they're irresponsible, they're warlike, and you would have complete chaos. So here's what we're gonna do. This is the solution, we're going to have a government and the government, we're going to take a subset of the population of the stupid, irresponsible and more like people, we're going to put them in a position of power to be mommy and daddy for us. But it's okay. Because we're gonna elect them. And we the stupid, irresponsible and warlike people will magically become responsible enough to put the right people in power over us. So to me the solution of this how we do government is doomed from the start. And yet we have this delusion of Well, no, this is government and they're somehow supernatural. They're not just human beings like the rest of us. And we break that spell, then I think you're right, that we'll have, we could have a shift everywhere, because we will look at we will look at them as role models.

Keri Norley 42:40

Hmm. Okay, so tell me, so pay me a picture. So we've gone into what's not working, we can look at it from a metaphysical consciousness perspective, we can say that together, they definitely don't work, yet this far. So what's the future? What do you see in this voluntary ism, or however you look at, like what this this experience looks like?

Mark Gober 43:03

So the way I describe it, in the later part of the book is a metaphysical political philosophy. And the political philosophy, you either have statism, which is the traditional way of doing government, whether you're on the right or the left, that's traditional, you have this government imposing, or voluntaryism. That's the spectrum. And so I think voluntaryism, on the political part of the spectrum, but to me, that's insufficient on its own. There's a spiritual, non spiritual aspect of it. The term that's often used is non dual non duality, this idea that there's a one mind that's on one end of the spectrum, highly spiritual. And the other part of it is, some call it materialistic physicalists. That consciousness comes from the brain, there's no spiritual, life's random and meaningless ultimately, which is how I used to think for sure, but you so you end up with four quadrants, depending on where you are, and voluntaryism versus statism, non duality versus the materialistic physicalist. And so what I say is, we need to move to the, what I call non dual voluntaryism, which is this very spiritual, voluntary society. And that's really important because in a voluntary society, you don't have the quote unquote, safety net that government claims to provide. So the government will say, you have to pay me or going to jail, which is also known as taxation. And the justification, it's a coercive process, if you really think about it, especially since sometimes you're asked to fund things that you find immoral. That's kind of that's pretty coercive. And if you don't listen, you go to jail. So some people would say taxation is theft, that would be the extreme way of putting it totally. But that in addition to the ability to endlessly print money, now that we have central banks, provides funds to help people who are in need, and that many people will say, Mark, you're crazy. If you didn't have a state, what are we going to do? And I agree it's a problem because the voluntaryist voluntary society relies on charity ability, you have to have that you need people that are willing to help others because you're not going to have this government that can do it. So that's why to me, the spirit, the non dual voluntaryism is critical. Because if you're spiritual, there's an automatic desire to want to help people much more than if you believe there's no meaning to life. It breeds more of a selfishness not to say that anyone who's just an atheist doesn't care about people at all, I don't mean that, but that you don't have that impulse in the same way. And I know this from personal experience, because I've been on both sides of this. There's a different impulse when you think the meaning of life is much more about helping other people, like being strong in your individuality, so that you can be of service. That's how I look at it. So if we have a spiritual, non dual Society, who thinks about the one mind and thinks about life reviews, in addition to being in a volunteer society, you eliminate the course of government. And at the same time, in theory, you could create a society that's more prosperous for everyone. So I recognize what I'm saying might sound totally insane, considering where we are today. And I know some people probably roll their eyes and say like, you're a dreamer. But I'm looking at like, ultimately, what's the ideal society? If I look at the metaphysics and look at the statism? That's the picture that I see? And whether we can do it? I don't know. Hmm.

Keri Norley 46:13

I like I like dreamers. I'm a dreamer with you. Yeah, it's interesting. So then, so then how do you, um, where the rules come from? And do we need rules.

Mark Gober 46:24

So to me, rules come at the level of the individual or the private property owners. So you could easily end up with communities that look like governments, except this fully voluntary, and the rules are within a property or within a community where people subscribe to that. And if you don't like it, then you will go somewhere else and not engage. So ultimately ends up it ends up being a free market, fully free market, you don't have imposition from a government because there is no government.

Keri Norley 46:50

Hmm, that tickles me. I'm like, Huh? I, I like the vision of it. I am like, in my mind, I'm like the practicality of it though, right? Because then do we have I mean, just this is my thoughts where I go, so then you have the the community that's like the I'm going to say, hi, vibe, community, everything's peace, love, light, yada, yada, right? And then they've come together in this unity. But are there people in the world who still haven't figured out the Unity aspect of this? And they still want to go and be in a gang and experience life in that way? And then do they have their own entity where there's a shit ton of violence? And that's okay, and having guns and fighting. And I'm not saying that. I don't want to get into a gun conversation here. But like, you understand where I'm going with this, that it's like that, that, you know, that community is like, yes, violence is all good. And there's no rules around that. And sure, we can go out and it's party until five o'clock in the morning, and I can shoot whoever the fuck I want to shoot, and there's no consequence to that.

Mark Gober 47:52

Right. So the way I would look at that, and actually one of the chapters in the book, I go through kind of these hypotheticals, because they're very natural questions. I'm glad you brought it up. And I'll preface the answer with whatever challenges we could talk about in voluntaryism. There are equivalent challenges under the current status quo, and we just had become so accepting of them, the fact that there can be these massive powers killing each other, and wars, and we just say, oh, that's war, but really, it's mass murder. And at any time, there could be nukes, like, there's so many risks in the current way, we do things right up, but you're completely right, there are risks with this, you're gonna have different types of people. And I still always think about it in terms of non Aggression Principle. So if people are initiating aggression against other people or being physically violent, then that is cause for self defense, and also cause for other people to help in self defense. So that would not necessarily solve it. But if there were community where there's just murder everywhere, a highly spiritual, if you're in this non dual society, people are going to want to get involved and say, Look, this can't happen anymore. But in terms of other rules, where the example I use in my book is think about drugs, from this non dual voluntarist perspective, there's nothing about drugs that would violate the non Aggression Principle, because you're doing it to your own body, unless you're on property where the rules are the law is you can ingest this substance. Because then you're voluntarily engaging with that property. And you would have to abide by whatever the laws are, wherever courts are in that property. That would be your voluntary agreement, your voluntary decision to be engaged in that part, but assume you're on property where there's no rules around that, then my view on this is you can do whatever you want. It's up to you. And as long as you're not hurting someone else, if you hurt yourself that is on you. And this gets into things like karma and whether you're hurting your spiritual connection. So it becomes up to the individual to be responsible for his or her decisions, and that determines the extent to which you exercise the rights. So the simple way of thinking about this is the voluntarist perspective, tells you what your rights are, which is don't initiate aggression against someone's body or private property that gives you tons of freedom. Whether you exercise that freedom depends on your assessment of spiritual principles, which is your own risk, personal responsibility. So what I'm talking about is a much more evolved society. We're, we're, we're in a different state, but it's the individual has to be more responsible. Whereas right now, the government and everyone treats things as well. Everyone has to be taken care of.

Keri Norley 50:23

And that leads that can pretend us and if anything else happens, I have Aranda. Yeah, it's interesting. It's funny that you actually even bring up drugs because I was just, I was just in my Uber home from the airport from Florida the other day. And we got into this conversation, which led to a conversation around Denver being cleaned up, one of the parks had apparently had a lot of, they've opened it up to homeless people, which is become a big problem in Denver. But there was a lot of apparently a lot of drugs and needles, and they were saying they were picking up 5200 needles a day as they've been cleaning out this area. And it's something that has, I've had a question around for a long time, because in Sydney, where I live for 15 years, you go into public bathrooms in the city, and there's places to put the needles so that they're safely disposed of, right. But I always had this question. If they're illegal, why do we have in a public restroom? Please dispose? Right? Like, this is an illegal thing. And yet you're you're gonna acknowledge the fact that people are using, and you're gonna give them a place to do this, even though it's illegal. Right? And so it's an interesting question, because like, I've had that question, like, if people know that this is happening, and it's not stopped, then why is it illegal? Right? And not to say that I that I think it should or shouldn't be? That's, that's not the question here at all. But like, it's an interesting thought that I had was like, if you're providing and then we provide services for free for these people to overcome their addictions. And all these things. Like, why is it you know, and it's, it's what you're basically saying, it's like, well, if I volunteer this, if we actually remove some of these imposed rules, like it's already happening, so much of the stuff is already happening. It's not like we're stopping it by saying it's illegal. We can stop drug trade, because it's illegal.

Mark Gober 52:10

No, totally. It's, it's arbitrary. That's really what it is. These laws are arbitrary, based on what a few politicians or experts think is best for everyone. Whether they actually do or not, it's different question. But that's the the gist of it is they get to determine what the rules are for everyone else, and you have, you don't have to say, you have to abide by it. And that's what I'm getting at is that we as long as we're not initiating aggression upon other people on their private property. And we're abiding by the spiritual principle, the golden rule, then it's on you, and you might end up making bad decisions.

Keri Norley 52:38

And you might end up dead end, you might end up doing really stupid as should your life.

Mark Gober 52:41

Right. And actually, that's another argument that I'm glad you raised, which is that, when I think about like the meaning of life, to the extent that we can understand it, because I don't think we fully Can I view it as consciousness is evolving, the individual whirlpools are evolving, and the overall sea levels rising. That's what we're here to do. And we have a life review in the near death experience. For example, if that's really what happens when we die, I don't know, maybe it is for some of us. If that's real, then it's almost like showing us how we did in this game that we're living in. And, therefore, we need to, if the purpose of life is around disability to evolve, and this gets into thing like, like past lives, and past lives, indicate that we have multiple chances to have new learning experiences, then the opportunity to learn is critical for society. And that's why for me, having a liberated society is the ultimate is the we have to have that. Because that gives us a chance to learn and grow, it gives us a chance to make mistakes. And also to thrive, you need both. When government comes in and says we are going to eliminate all risk. Because we know what's best for you, you're gonna have no freedom, but we're gonna eliminate all risks, like what's happening right now with the pandemic, that's what's happened. They, they are taking this extreme position on what they perceive to be risk, ignoring all the other illnesses that they don't seem to care about, and all the other things that don't seem to be problem, we're gonna eliminate all this risk, and you're not gonna have the same freedoms. And if you don't have the same freedoms, and you don't have the same opportunities in life, and therefore you can't make as many mistakes, and have as many successes in the same way, you can't have that same diversity.

Keri Norley 54:11

Mm hmm. So powerful, because ultimately, we are all just spiritual beings here to learn. Like, if we were in spirit form, we'd have perfection. I mean, that's what it is like, you come back to the wholeness and who you have everything of the divinity. And so when we come into this form, the whole the whole frickin purpose of being here and human form is to have lessons, the good ones and the ones that don't work so well so that we can experience there's a one of my favorite books is called a little soul in the sun. I think it's by Neale Donald Walsch. And it's a child's book. And it talks about the spirits that come down and they say, the two spirits and they say they decide they're going to come down to earth, and one wants to learn forgiveness. And so the other Spirit says to him, Okay, well, I'll come down with you to teach you forget to help you learn forgiveness, but then you have to To Remember, I am all that I am, right? I'm doing this for you, right? Because I'm going to have to do something that you really don't like, for you to experience what it is for forgiveness, I'm going to have to hurt you, at some level, right. And so it's like we come for the, for the experience of forgiveness, of love, of hate, of jealousy, of rage of peace of joy, we come to experience that because in the spiritual form, it's just bliss all the time. Like, that's the way I look at it, like we are just oneness we are in the wholeness of who we are. And so in the human form is where we get to experience emotion, which means that we have to learn these things. And, and as a parent, I come back to a parent again, like, you know, you want to protect your kids. And I know I can be that person that can be like, Oh, I just want to keep them in this little beautiful bubble and like, protect them. But at the end of the day, like they're at the point, now I keep getting reminders that it 12 And nine years old boys, right? That it's like Keri, the lessons that they learn right now, where they're going to fall on their face are going to hurt less and be less expensive, than if they learn it when they're 18 in a car and irresponsible when they're, you know, 20 in on a piss up in the bar some night and in a brawl versus I'm just gonna have a fight with my friend on the playground, right? And so it's really fascinating to have to allow ourselves as a parent, to allow myself to let go of the control to be like, Okay, go try this out, you may fall on your face, I will be here and I will love you through it. Right. And that's ultimately what you're saying. And I love this, like, ultimately what you're saying. And government is saying, we're not allowing as the government the way that it's set up the way that it is, for us as the quote unquote, kids right? To fall on our faces, and to experience the bliss, right, because there are highs and lows in life. And as much as you want to talk about a non dual society. Like as humans, we live in a duality, like that is our existence, that is our experience. And so I have found in anyone who's listening, this podcast knows I've been on a journey to overcome bipolar stuff, I have found that it's not about saying that we don't have these polars it's saying how can I live in peace with them? Right, and so I have to experience I've had to spend my lifetime experiencing the two polars to be like, okay, so where's middle? How can I continually bring myself down there. But if I didn't experience the fucked up ness of riding these highs and lows, which it is, it's, it's a it's a mindfuck for sure. And it's brought me some pain, it's brought me some joy. I wouldn't know like, Ah, right, I can be somewhere without, like, in the middle of this, I don't have to write all of this. And so it's the same with government, like without the freedom to allow ourselves to express fully, to be fully individuals to have our full freedoms and our full expression on this planet, then ultimately, we're not being allowed to, to learn our greatest lessons.

Mark Gober 58:02

I agree completely. And what government does is basically steers the experience and tells you what risk you can and can't take for us. So it's really a mentality of not wanting to control people, that maybe is the core of all this of Keri, you're going through challenges right now. And I give you advice and say, I think you should do this, this and this and you don't do it. It's your decision to do that or not. And it's not for me to control and it might be in your best interest to make those mistakes for your learning. I don't know what your karmic situation is. I don't know what the world's karmic situation is. So we do our best, but we don't force people to do things. And in Autobiography of a Yogi, one of Yogananda was masters, Sri Lahiri Mahasaya, he said something to the effect of always remember that you belong to no one and no one belongs to you. That's really the principle of all this. Let people be if they're initiating aggression, that's a different story. You have a right to defend yourself and help other people, but let people do their thing. And don't say you need to have this experience. I guess if you're a parent, it's a little bit different. But just in everyday living, we live in a world now where it seems like people know what's best for me and you. And if you if I'm not listening to them, then you're evil or something. There's this desire to control. And maybe that's where the shift is on the planet, those who really some people do want to control or they want to feel like it's everyone's doing the same thing. And other people say, No, I think you should be free and have the freedom to choose. You might disagree with me, but that's fine, as long as you're not hurting anyone.

Keri Norley 59:28

Right? Hmm. Marcus are good. It's interesting, like because I mean, at the end of the day, we both see this beautiful vision of a future that you know, ultimately, I believe, and I wrote this book, and I think both of us can, can agree that we both have a vision that is not explainable, yet that does not exist on this planet that I have no idea how it will be here. Like, in my mind, as I was writing this, I was like, How is it physically possible for us to have infinite abundance and joy and bliss and love and the only thing that I can keep coming back to If we took full responsibility for our lives, I mean, this has been at the root cause of the roots, the root of the root of the root of the purpose of me being on this planet. For as long as I can remember, since I 15 years ago, when I started learning NLP, if I took full responsibility for myself full responsibility, which most people do not understand, really, really, really what that means. If I took full responsibility for myself, and I stopped pointing a finger at any other person on this planet, except for myself, and I go, Okay, I am the creator of my reality, and every single thing and this comes back to that quantum physics, every single thing I see in my reality I have created, right, because it's all just an illusion, none of its real. And if I've created this, then I can change this. And if I take full responsibility, and I stopped blaming every other human on this planet for my stuff, then there would be no war, there would be no, there would be no need for aggression, because I'm looking at it going, well, it's not your fault is mine, where do I take responsibility for this? And if I own all of that, then I can also then have peace with that, I created that, okay, so at peace, if I created this, how can I shift this, okay. And then we can start to again, have this regenerative experience of wealth and abundance and love and joy and unity. Because individually, we are one, but together, we come together as this collective consciousness that can ultimately create anything we desire, because it's all an illusion.

Mark Gober 1:01:22

And, and that sense of responsibility, also put brings the focus to try to improve ourselves and being the best version of ourselves, I think they go hand in hand. And that would automatically take away some of this desire for power that we see in other places. And that's what's tricky about this is that in the current structure of the world, you only need a few people in very high positions of power, who can pull strings in certain ways to do a lot of damage. And that's one of the things I grapple with is what's the critical mass of people who really start to get freedom, and what's needed to counterbalance the existing power structures and the ability for a few people who just don't have empathy, for example, and just want power. They're not thinking about personal responsibility in this way that you are. What how do we counterbalance it? I don't know the answer I, I have this idealistic view that at some point, there will be a critical mass. And I'm doing my best to at least ignite the fire or at least open the door. Because once you start thinking this way, it begins to unravel very quickly. So we'll see what happens.

Keri Norley 1:02:24

There is this is what makes me the, I'll say this, and then we'll we'll wrap this up. But I seriously cannot remember his name. And it's driving me crazy. It's a guy who was in the CIA, and he made some documentaries on of the fifth dimension. Alien stuff, like you took all the alien. Steven Steven. Yes. Steven Greer. Right. So you know, we're talking about.

Mark Gober 1:02:47

Yeah, I've seen the documentary probably what you're talking about? Yeah.

Keri Norley 1:02:50

And so it's, it's fascinating, right? Like how literally, I mean, he did through the CIA research, he worked with extraterrestrial beings. And so now you can go look him up, he actually takes people into fields or places on the planet that are graded, and he finds whatever, that he has the experience of how can I call in extraterrestrial beings. And at the end of this movie, this really, really hit home for me. He said, it will take 1% 1% of humanity to shift consciousness for all of humanity be able to change. And I was like, being the the visionary that I am, like, it was like 1%. That's it. It was like a few 100 million people, it was like 100 million, whatever it was, it was not like, when I was like, Wait a minute. That's totally possible. Totally. I mean, like, I don't know all of them. But between you and me, and all the other people out there talking about it, there's got to be that many. Right, and all of a sudden, I was like, 1%, we can do this 1% It's not the whole planet, but because by the time 1% of us, embodies this, because that's what it's gonna take. It's not just going to take talking about it and sitting here and having these conversations. It's like, how do I truly live this life? Yeah, how do I leave exactly what you and I are talking about here it whatever like it, whatever version that we can keep going to at the highest level of it. Then that ripples, right? And we talk about it, and then the next person, then my neighbor down the street, or my friend over there, the client that I work with, or the person who's listening to this podcast goes, Wait a minute, well, she can do it. So can I do it? Yeah. And then all of a sudden, it's not just 1% I get the chills, right? And so that's just my vision. I'm like, 1%, all I got to do is think about 1% That's not that many people. Okay, so hundreds of millions of people. But it's not that many people in relation to the billions of people on this planet. And that's where I hold like, okay, that's why I sit here on this podcast, I'm sure this is why you sit here on your, you know, in your podcast on my podcast, writing the books that we write, is because inevitably, you and I both want to affect influence and impact in a positive way. Way is 1% so that we can have this massive change on the planet.

Mark Gober 1:05:04

Totally. Yeah, that's my, if there's a goal, I think it's for me, I like to share and empower people, because this knowledge has empowered me in so many ways. So it's like my way of sharing it. And you never know who it's gonna impact or when, or how. And that's the mystery of all this. There's a phenomenon known as The Butterfly Effect, which relates to what you're talking about, like 1%. And what's the tipping point, the butterfly effect is, is that small changes can have massive outcomes in the end. And what people often reference is a meteorologist, who was doing weather predictions, he changed one of the variables by a few decimal points, so it didn't even really notice it. But he ended up with a completely different weather prediction, because this one variable, you end up with a nonlinear effect. So it's sort of like if you, if you push a door with very little force, you see that the door doesn't move much. But if you push it hard, it moves a lot. That's a linear relationship, there's a relationship between how hard you push and how fast the door closes. With this other stuff, it might be nonlinear, we have like a tiny little effect, and it has this massive change. So the butterfly effect is, mathematically speaking, a butterfly flapping its wings in China, because a hurricane in New York, hmm, you change the variables, that tiny amount, and you don't see like the way the dominoes hit, to where there's this major change. So I try to keep that in the back of my mind, because like seeing what's happening in the world, it's easy to become pessimistic and say, Oh, my goodness is not going to work. But I don't know. Yeah, we're crazy. That's getting soap. It's the opposite of everything we're talking about here. And like people don't see it. And I don't, I can't believe how, how much mind control exists. But then there's another part of me that says, Well, that's what I'm based on what I'm seeing, we live in a multi dimensional quantum universe, I don't even understand it. And we don't know what shifts in consciousness can do. It's a non physical effect. So when Kari shifts her consciousness, when I shift my consciousness when your listeners, we don't see the dominoes happening on a non physical level. And that's where I hold out hope because we don't know if we, we had the helicopters perspective. And we could see like, we're in a maze, that's the analogy I like to use. In the maze, we don't know it's exactly as a head, because we can only see so much. But if you had the helicopters perspective, you'd be able to see much more. And there's this higher dimensional perspective, that probably where the picture can be seen, and we just don't have access to it. And what I hold out hope for is that, at that higher level, there's a chance for us to, to get to a better place.

Keri Norley 1:07:25

Mm hmm. Yeah, Mark, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for this conversation. Thank you for doing your work. Thank you for this book. Thank you for all of your books. Thank you for your podcast, please. Let's wrap this with if you have any final thoughts and how people can find you?

Mark Gober 1:07:40

Well, my first final thought is, if you listen this far, thank you very much. Because Keri, you asked great questions. And we covered a ton of ground. I mean, I think this conversation could be very powerful. For someone who has not thought about this using this way. Because I think about myself, like two years ago, when I had like, had the time to analyze all of it. This is a very paradigm shifting idea. And I think one starts to live differently. So I guess what I would say is to spend if these topics are of interest to spend some time reflecting on what we talked about, and work through, because it's such a paradigm shift on so many levels, it can be like difficult to accept it. But once the ideas become more embedded, it's like a different way of being and living. So I would just encourage your listeners and your audience to, to spend a little bit of time even though we're very busy, all of us to spend time thinking about these topics, because that can have effects in other areas of our life too.

Keri Norley 1:08:31

So true. Thank you. And thank you for that your kind words. I yeah, I loved this conversation. And I hope that anybody who is here listening, thank you again, as you said, Thank you so much for being here, because we did we dove deep today. There's a lot, there's a lot to unravel for a person, if you are listening that hasn't considered a lot of this. And I know I'm going to say you probably agree with me, I don't expect that any single human being can take all of this in and overnight just change. Right? But it's like, if there's one thing like just just consider what's the one thing that you want to take away from this right now that you can take an action step on that you can have a little bit more embodiment that you could consider one piece of your freedom differently that you could consider that the world is just, you know, an illusion, all of these huge concepts like what's one thing that you could take away and start to bring into your life, through your embodiment through your action through your experience and through your belief, and then come back and listen again, because it's multi layered, right? Like if you pick one, then maybe in a few months, you come back and you listen to this again and you'll hear something completely different and another layer and take that on and see you know and the other thing I would say is spread this like this is a really important conversation so if you have found value in this please please please if you're listening share this share this your socials share this however you possibly can tag people that you think would you know if you're on social media and you're seeing this tag people that you think that It could benefit from hearing this. Because whilst we are visionaries, and whilst that the current consciousness of the planet isn't in the place that we are at a collectively huge level, there are those of us who are. And it only takes this 1% of us to decide. It only takes us 1% of us to decide that we get to have this and we can create this utopia 100%. So, thank you, how do people find you? How do people reach out to you? How do people share this information and go in and learn more about you?

Mark Gober 1:10:34

Well, my books are all on Amazon. And they're available Kindle, paperback or hardcover depending on the book and audible. So depending on what you like.

Keri Norley 1:10:42

I saw you just put this one out on Audible, I was like ‘Woohoo’!

Mark Gober 1:10:46

Yes, I read the book all three times, which is an experience. So that's always fun, but I know people like to take in books in different ways. So we want to make it available in all three ways, but also my website is my name Mark gober.com. And they RKG OB er, calm. My podcast, where is my mind? It's an eight episode series where we go through things like psychic abilities, the life review near death experiences, I interviewed dozens of scientists and we have clips of my interviews spliced into a narrative. So where's my mind, Apple, podcast, Spotify, all the normal places. And I'm also on social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Marco Mark Gober, author.

Keri Norley 1:11:26

Amazing. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for this conversation. Thank you for doing the work that you do in the world. It has been amazing to have you here today.

Mark Gober 1:11:34

Thank you as well, Keri.