Episode 4 - Dating and Defeat

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In this next-to-final episode, Jon (and his intense issues with control) embarks on an intense new frontier: dating.

It shouldn’t surprise you that Jon’s approach to dating follows the exact same “impossibility principles” as everything else in his life … with similarly impressive results.

But this episode also turns a dark corner: Just as Jon’s emotional redemption hits a critical point, an unspeakable event sends him into the most broken, surrendering depths he’s ever faced.

This is the next-to-final episode of the Impossible Man podcast. Be sure to subscribe below so you don’t miss future updates on the project!

TRANSCRIPT FOLLOWS:

NOTE: The transcript below was generated by AI and has not been edited. Accordingly, some things below are a little weird … but you’re smart, so I’m confident you can figure it out.

SPEAKER A

Among the severely disabled, there's this very real sense that we are unlovable, that no one would ever date us, that we are excluded from that race. It occurred to me that could be true. But is just letting thatmassive assumption go unchallenged really the most courageous thing to do?

SPEAKER B

Welcome to The Impossible Man, the true story of how the inability to move allowed one person to tradehis humanity for ODS defying superpowers and how he clawed his way back. So welcome back to thepenultimate episode of The Impossible Man. We have just this and one more episode left to follow. Andas things turned out, it did end up being a second half of act two and then act three in the episode fourand five. Go figure. In this episode, John covers some really, really rough ground. If you remember, at theend of the last episode, john said that he got to a point where he controlled everything but still didn't feelsafe. In this episode, we're going to follow the aftermath that came from that. And then in the finalepisode to air next week, we're going to close the story and just know that there's so much more when wefinish writing the book and that this podcast series has been an overview of the highest level of the storyand there's so much more depth to it. So without further ado, let's continue with The Impossible Man. Allright, John, looks like we're in the home stretch here. I kind of like that there's some structure to the show.Now. We know that it's got two more episodes. We know what the next two episodes are going to cover,and it feels like a satisfying story. In brief. I mean, not fleshed out. That's why people need to get thebook. But does that feel about the same to you?

SPEAKER A

Yeah, I think so. It's a good balance to give everyone a taste of what's coming. You get all the low pointsand some of the high points to come, too.

SPEAKER B

We left kind of off on a cliffhanger in episode two, but there was one thing that just occurred to me almostspontaneously while I was listening back to episode three. I've known you for about a decade now, and Iguess I didn't realize until I heard it on the show. I don't hear you laugh a lot, like, you're a serious guy,even with we know each other reasonably well. So is that just my perception, or are you kind of a seriousdude and it takes a little bit to get you laughing?

SPEAKER A

I'm a pretty serious dude. I would say that over the past two years, since I went through therapy, I laughmore than I used to. With my nurses that are with me, I'm constantly joking, so they're laughing all daylong. My girlfriend, too, also do I do a really big laugh. It takes a lot of muscle in your diaphragm and Idon't have that. So even when I'm laughing so hard, tears are coming out of my eyes. Still not like a bigbooming laugh. It's pretty quiet.

SPEAKER B

It made me think that this can't all be negative for you, that there's at least some stories in here that areamusing, and I hope it's cathartic.

SPEAKER A

It is. One of the concepts from therapy is that if you ask a trauma specialist, will I be able to talk aboutthis without crying? The answer is when you've shed all the tears. So reliving something and experiencingthose emotions in some ways. One theory I heard, which is very interesting, is that trauma is just emotionthat you are resisting experiencing, and if you will experience it, all the trauma goes away.

SPEAKER B

Well, I feel like I've, I don't know, learned about that or experienced it or thought about it recently as wellin a different context because, knock on wood, I haven't personally had a lot of trauma for which I'm reallygrateful. But the idea that negative emotion hurts because you're resisting it to some degree, I mean,obviously there is a base level of stuff there, but it's the resistance. It's the I don't want to feel that. Thattends to dog a lot of people.

SPEAKER A

It's normal to have, quote unquote negative emotions, but where you get into unhealthy territory is whenyou refuse to feel them. And that doesn't always mean verbalizing your emotions. The most emotionallyhealthy people I've seen, they feel the full range of emotions, but they fully experience and then releasethat emotion rapidly. So they're in a state of flow with their emotion, even if they're not speaking. Andthat's what I strive to do.

SPEAKER B

Let me ask you about something else that came out after we pressed stop on the recording last time, andyou said something like therapy or maybe you can recontextualize this for me, that therapy will help youget rid of 95% of trauma. And this is obviously a little hyperbolic. It's not an exact figure, but that the 5%that remains is kind of yours forever. And I posited the idea that maybe that's grit in the oyster. Maybethat's the 5% that you need that makes you stronger.

SPEAKER A

What do you think about that? I think it's very possible, and I've had multiple trauma specialists tell methat that some of it stays with you. Another metaphor I've heard is it's scar tissue that you can completelyheal the wound, but some scar tissue is going to remain, and that scar tissue actually makes that part ofyour body stronger than it was before. So I think there's some truth to that too.

SPEAKER B

To give people an idea of what we have in mind for these final two episodes, I'm seeing everything in acts,and I actually told my wife yesterday, I couldn't have written a better character and a better story. Iwouldn't have made any different choices. Your life made all the right choices as far as a satisfying story.

SPEAKER A

You're welcome.

SPEAKER B

Yes, thank you. Makes my job a little easier. So the first episode was the overview. The second episodewas basically act one. Last episode was the first half of act Two, right up to the midpoint. And this onelooks like it's going to be the second half of act Two. And then the final episode will be act Three. So westopped when we said and it was kind of on a cliffhanger. You needed to be safe. That was your goal andyour strategy was to control everything. And I said, hey, can you give me a sneak peek of what's going tohappen going forward? I said, did you get to a point just yes or no? Did you get to a point where youlearned that you could be safe without controlling everybody? And I said it in such a way that I was justassuming a yes and you said no. You said, I basically got to the point where I controlled everything, but Istill wasn't safe. And so I'd like to begin with addressing that and we're going to talk largely about whereyou began to kind of see that that strategy either wasn't working or wasn't effective. I guess that's thesame thing to the point where at the end, I think you're going to have to drop it. Does that sound roughlycorrect?

SPEAKER A

When you're the CEO of the company and you're the founder and you're the 100% shareholder, which bythe way, 100% shareholder, major control sentum, I control everything in my business. I am king. And so Igot to a level there where I had a successful business where I was in complete control. And then I startedto feel the sense of that it wasn't enough. One of my core values has always been to live courageously.And I realized that I was living that value in the world of business. To some extent, I would argue I wasn'tas far along as I thought I was, but I wasn't living that value in other parts of my life, like dating. I was avirgin until I was 31 years old. And part of the reason why is among the severely disabled community,there's this very strong and very real sense that we are unlovable, that no one would ever date us, that weare excluded from that race. And my implicit answer was that's true because anytime I was around girls,they never communicated any sort of attraction my entire life. So my assumption was it was impossiblefor them to be a