Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is discussed at the start of this section?
Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm Dan Shepard, and I'm joined by Monica Miles. Hi. Today we have, for me, a revelation of last year. For others, not. Old news, because he's been great so many times. Yes. But I was exposed to him in Task last year. Ooh.
What a show.
Tom Pelfrey. He's an Emmy-nominated actor. He was the bad guy with a heart of gold in Task. He also was mind-blowing on Ozark. Love and Death, Iron Fist, and Guiding Light at the beginning. Guiding Light. And won daytime Emmys.
I probably watched him in Guiding Light because I used to watch that with my grandma.
Was that one of your shows? It was. It was one of my shows.
I probably watched a young him.
If you've not seen Task, get on it. It streams on HBO right now and it's just a beautiful show. And then in addition to him, you have Mark Ruffalo. Jeez Louise.
It's such a good show all around.
Powerhouse. Please enjoy Tom Pelfrey. He's an armchair expert. I feel like this is a very long time coming.
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Chapter 2: How did Tom Pelphrey's high school teacher influence his acting career?
I can't imagine how difficult that was. And kind of naturally just wanting to do that, which to me is the greatest testimony to what the steps are that I could give, which is like there is something there. so deeply real about that process. Those steps are just an articulation of something that is deeper.
Like it's coming from a deeper place and we're just gonna name what it is and like how to do it. I think all of the steps rests upon the steps that come before. Obviously the first one is that lightning bolt moment I had, but then for me, Two and three were the most important ones I ever did. And they're kind of joined. That makes sense.
Chapter 3: What challenges does Tom face with religion and spirituality?
Given your ease and comfort with religion or Jesus, it explains to like, that's hard for me.
Yeah, yeah.
So it makes sense that that part of Eckhart's story didn't bother you. And that was the thing I got hung up on. If anything ever took me out of the program, it was the higher power stuff. Hard for me. Yeah.
What is two and three?
Came to believe in a power greater than ourselves. Turned our life and our will over to that power.
Came to believe that we could be restored to sanity by a power greater than ourselves, right?
Yes. Got it.
Here's the thing, man. What you're saying right now, I understand completely and fully. I totally get it. And like that always breaks my heart. Yeah.
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Chapter 4: How does Tom describe the importance of the fourth step in recovery?
Because as a kid, that feeling that I have that I'm describing, I hated church. It was very confusing for me, even as a young person to like try and separate out the religion and Yes. From what I felt like I was experiencing and or reading again, voracious reader. I love to read my Bible too. I didn't even grow up in a very religious household. I just liked it.
So hearing you say that, and I understand there's a million reasons why, and I've heard so many people say that I totally get it. And then you wish like having sponsors of these, whatever. Like you want someone to have a kid and experience it. You just want it because you're like, it made it easier. That's all.
And then like trying to help other people and they don't even want to say any of those words. And I get it. And I don't need to. We don't need to talk like that. We just talk however we want to talk. But then you're like, boy, I wish I could give you even a taste of it, even if we called it something else, because it will help you.
Yes, yes, yes. Now, mind you, I do the things right. Like every morning I do my first three steps.
Chapter 5: What insights does Tom share about vulnerability in recovery?
I do the prayers and I do the 10th step. I do them all because they cost me nothing. And I'd rather do this thing than die drinking in the morning. You know, so it's like, it's very easy for me to cooperate. But for me, the four step is the thing I think that changed my life entirely. That to me, if there was a single step that they should teach in fucking elementary, it's this notion of,
Making a list of all the people that you have resentments against. Why do you have resentments against them? What are they threatening? Because in your mind, you don't see any pattern. But if you have to write out your four step and you look at that column, that third column, and you go, oh my God, all of my issues in life are being driven by three of my fears. It's not like I have 50 fears.
It's like, I hate Margaret and I hated my teacher. I hated my stepdad. It all threatens one of the same three things. Like my whole life is being governed by three things. things I'm afraid of. So I can either try to control 7 billion people to act in accordance to not trigger those three fears, or I can get to work on those three fears and be relieved of all this.
That's absolutely proprietary, novel, crazy, special.
Yeah. I don't know that there was many times in life I was more terrified than when I went to do my fifth step. So the fourth step is what Dax just explained. The fifth step is sharing it with another human being before God that says shaking like a leaf. What a vulnerable place to put oneself.
Yeah. Getting to the part where I acknowledge all this stuff about what was my issue was hard.
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Chapter 6: How does Tom reflect on his experiences with identity and achievement?
Then telling someone about it wasn't terribly hard for me. But I know and I've received many dudes fifth steps and I've seen the anxiety coming in and I know the experience, which is just, oh, this person's not walking out of the room in horror over who I am. What a gift. I get the gift of it big time. Yeah. I'm not intrinsically flawed and terrible and unlovable.
I'm just a dude who did all the same shit all of us other dudes did that got here. Yeah, that's incredible.
But you have to say it in order to feel it. So saying it for the first time, that's horrifying.
Yeah.
Have you seen the drama of the new movie?
No.
Okay. I'm obsessed with it. Zendaya, Robert Pattinson movie. Oh, okay. Yeah. I think best not to know anything about it when you see it, but a secret is revealed basically. The whole movie spirals based on that secret. And I just think about it all the time. Like, God, yeah. Are there things that people just shouldn't ever know about? Because we here say the opposite. It's like, just share it.
People will say you're not that bad or I'm like you or whatever. But then I was like, oh, no, maybe there are some things that shouldn't be shared.
I don't know. It's confusing. Well, I think you want to choose carefully who you're sharing what with. That's for sure. I mean, the fifth step isn't like an indiscriminate, like, let me just grab a guy off the street. It's hopefully at that point, the person who you trust the most, the person who's guided you to even get to that place. So it's a very kind of sacred, special, specific place.
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