What is the price of experience? Do men buy it for a song, or wisdom for a dance in the street? No, it is bought with the price of all that man hath: his house, his wife, his children. Wisdom is sold in the desolate market where none can come to buy, and the withered field where the farmer ploughs for the brain in bread in vain. It is an easy thing to triumph in the summer sun and in the vintage, And to sing on the wagon loaded with corn. It's an easy thing to talk of patience to the afflicted, to speak the laws of prudence to the houseless wanderer, to listen to the hungry raven's cry in wintry season when the red blood is filled with wine and the marrow of lambs. It's an easy thing to laugh at the wrathful elements. William Blake wrote this poem in the late 1790s and it's called The Four Zoas, where he describes the experiences and development of spiritual man. Zoa in Hebrew means spiritual life, as in the brevity of life. It was in his work he explored the two states of the human soul as seen in Songs of Innocence and Experience, which became four ways to consider eternal man: the heart, the head, the genitals, the whole being. He is aware of the power of love and jealousy and sees how mankind is imprisoned by the restrictions of the mind. During the period that Blake wrote the Four Zoas, he was interrupted by a long bout of depression. Here the poem continues: 'They raised their faces from the earth, conversing with the man: How is it we have walked through fires and yet are not consumed? How is it that all things are changed, even as in ancient times?' My question is, how does one quantify life? What is success? Is it through our children that our eternity can be delivered, or is it through our creative expression? Alfred Adler equates the creative power with the self, the I, the soul of the individual, as did C.G. Jung. The creative provides the uniqueness and self-consistency of movement towards the imagined ideal completion. The creative compensation for felt deficiency, and an unfolding of all capabilities towards a totality. And when the overwhelming nature of life becomes unbearable at times, how does one survive the mental struggle? Does laughter and humor help? I'm Dr. Maria Kempinska, and this is Your Mind Matters. I am truly delighted to introduce my guest, John Lloyd, who is a comedy producer both in radio and television, including the hits Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Not the Nine O'Clock News, Spitting Image, and Blackadder. He is also renowned for his TV series with Stephen Fry, QI. QI gives us all an indication of how unique and playful John Lloyd's mind actually is. Welcome, John, and thank you for joining me today. Let's begin by getting inside your mind, indicated by the title of your book, Quite Interesting Facts to Knock You Sideways. I think that tells us a lot about how you think, John. Well, uh, yeah, I don't know. I think, who knows how the mind works, you know? Who knows where ideas come from, um, what creativity is? That's a baffling thing. Why things are funny? Nobody knows that. We don't know what art is, you know. The— when I started QI, it started with an epiphany. I was sitting about to start a novel that I've been meaning to write for 30 years in 1999, and suddenly this entire idea entered my head. QI, quite interesting. Everything in the universe is interesting if looked at long enough, closely enough, or from the right angle. I thought, this is amazing, this isn't my idea, this has been given to me by some higher power. And so we set off, and I thought, I honestly genuinely thought, Maria, that I started reading in order to find interesting things. So the way that QI works is the researchers are asked to read everything, even the index and the footnotes, and only write down what they personally find interesting. So it takes about 2.5 hours to find the first interesting thing if you're doing it properly. And so it's very hard, and it's a test of character really, to being a QI researcher. Not about being brainy, it's about knowing what you think, knowing what you like, and sticking to your last. And I thought when I started, it was just two of us, me and my lovely PA Annalisa, that within 2 years I would have discovered everything in the universe that was interesting that could be known. Because obviously you're reducing all the possible information into a very much tinier amount. But here we are, we've just finished our 20th series, 20 years of QI, We've written, I don't know how many books, 20 books, probably something like that. And we are no closer to understanding anything, not even one thing, not even elephants or giraffes or frogs. It's— I've just started on the U series, so I'm just researching obscure Roman— German tribe in the Roman Empire called the Ubii, about which I knew nothing. And It's just fascinating. It's how I spend my day, just finding out for the sake of finding out. It's very, very enjoyable, very good for you, but it is playful. And but coming back to you, which is where it started, so yes, that's the researchers, but it had to start with you and where you actually came up with the idea, the fascination of life, the joyfulness, the playfulness. Yeah, I want to know more. Where does that come from? Well, as I may have shared with you before, and it's certainly in the public print, I was Now I look at it, an absurdly successful television producer in the '80s. I produced Blackadder, Not the Nine O'Clock News, and Spitting Image, all in quick succession in 10 years. Wrote several books. I was probably the highest paid producer in television. You know, we did a series for the States, and, and for various personal reasons, I woke up on Christmas Eve 1993, age 42— of all bizarre numbers— to realize I couldn't see the point of anything anymore. It was the most peculiar thing because I had everything by that time. I got married, I was happily married, had two kids, a couple of cars, you know, a flat, a little cottage in the country. I had really everything, and I couldn't understand what had happened to me. Why was I so angry and unhappy? And so the first 3 years were terrible. I mean, I was just completely polaxed by this strange event and eventually began to pull myself together and think, well, there's a problem here. And that's what I do as a producer, really. I'm a problem solver. You know, things don't work and I see ways to fix them. So I thought, I'm the problem now, I'm the program, I need to work out what's gone wrong. So I quite literally set out to see if I could find if there was any meaning to life other than he who dies with the most toys wins. Because I had the toys, I had the awards, I had all the acclaim that a person could possibly want. And so I just started reading, you know. I started reading initially, uh, first of all art, because I wanted to get better at my job, which I was a commercial director at the time and making lots of money. And I thought, I don't even know how to direct, I've never done a course. I don't know anything about photography, I'm just winging it every day. So I bought art books and then I thought I need to know how things physically work. So I started reading physics. I was very bad at school at any kind of science and was astonished to discover this thing, quantum mechanics, which I literally never heard of, never heard of it. And to see that there isn't really, the universe isn't really made of anything, it's all really made of coagulated energy. And so I got interested in maths, which I hated at school, discovered Pythagoras, you know, an amazing human being, and from him got into philosophy— Stoicism, Epicureanism. I devoured Greek philosophy, which again, I thought philosophy is not for me, it's boring, you know, it's stuffy. And so started getting a purchase on meaning, you know. So then I went into Zen Buddhism, and I read the Bhagavad Gita. And, you know, I'm a very hardworking person and very determined. That's my main quality, I'm stubborn. And so I read this ridiculous amount of stuff and I was having this kind of bizarre life because I would be going and shooting lager ads during the day and rushing back in the evenings and reading Spinoza and Heidegger. It was the most bipolar life you can imagine. And I presume you've had those conversations with Stephen Fry because that's what he loves, doesn't he? He loves philosophy. Yeah, I mean, Stephen and I, we particularly have a shared love about the ancient Greeks, who are, you know, I mean, the most astonishing culture. It's, you know, Athens, um, was about the size of Hertfordshire, including not just the city but the outlying lands, and probably 150,000 citizens. Tiny population. And these guys invented everything, you know, coinage, philosophy, democracy. And blow me down, as I do, I'm just reading everything today. I've just discovered today that the Greeks invented breakfast. They used to eat bread soaked in wine. Nobody'd have ever had the idea of breakfast before. So they're great. So we share that. And also the Olympic Games. The Olympic Games. I mean, it's just ridiculous what they invented. Another thing that Stephen and I, who are neither of us card-carrying religious people, is that if we had to sign up to any religion, we probably would go for the ancient Greeks because it— the mercurial nature of life, how things suddenly happen. It's willful, isn't it, what happens to you? It's going along fine and then suddenly you're sideswiped by a thunderbolt. And so that nature of the the divine governance is, is like us, like a giant version of us. You know, they have moods, they lose their temper. You mean all the Greek gods? But yes, but I do like where I think we're missing out on today's understanding of the world is the divine law that is exemplified by the Greek gods. They sort of tell you if you're on the right course or not, and then they come in and play with you as well. And in psychotherapy, the mythologies all play a very big part in that. So you've got to understand that part of nature that comes in, but also the divine laws of the world, which we try— all scientists are trying to play with that and become gods in their own rights. Don't you feel that that's what's happening at the moment? The science is almost taking on the gods and saying, no, no, we know the answers to this. Well, it depends on the scientist, of course. The thing is, in, in a way, I think science gets a bad press because the militant atheists are the loudest people. Plenty of physicists believe in a higher power, and, and why wouldn't they? If you look at the way the universe is constructed, it is so neat. The idea that it arose by accident— also that we haven't found anyone else yet. And they say, well, that's because the universe is very, very large. I know, but I was a statistician at school, and I think the chances of another world arising of this complexity also by accident is so remote statistically, it doesn't matter how big the universe is. Or it's about even, the chances we might find another one, but we might— anyway, the— to me, life is— and I know this because I research it every day— life is bottomlessly mysterious and surprising. And the idea is that there isn't really anything here, it's just atoms and genes. When people say that, it makes me cross because what do you mean just atoms? You know, a hydrogen atom is so complicated, it's the simplest thing in the universe, you know, just one proton and one electron. And it has more frequencies than a grand piano. A grand piano has 88 notes and hydrogen has more than 100 frequencies. Now, That's not simple. A gene is not simple. These things are amazingly complicated. And the construction of the universe made from a very, very small number of basic elements iterated in many, many complex ways to produce, you know, ferns and bumblebees and waterfalls and Lord knows what else. It's like all I ask of anybody in a sort of, with a small 'r,' religious context or even a psychological one is, It's imperative to admit there is more to everything without exception than meets the eye. Absolutely. And you'll know that, you know, in your job, is that people present as, you know, ordinary, perhaps even a bit dull, but that's not true of anybody. Everybody is a morass of complexity and experience and strangeness and unfulfilled wishes and weird desires. We're all mad, you know. And we're all trapped in this absurd little box about the size of a large coconut with it all banging around inside. And it's a tragedy. It's a tragedy that people, you know, present what I call the cardboard castle of the ego. They're presenting as, "I'm fine," most of us, and they're not. They're all, you know, obviously worried and, you know, full of needs that they can't fulfill. It's the mystery of humanity is astonishing to me. And also, as we see with this terrible war going on and the sort of division of society into you're either with us or you against it, you know, the woke fight or it is Brexit, is this central split down human beings of the capacity to be both amazingly good and kind and really terrible. So do you think, as the poem said, is mankind imprisoned by the restrictions of the mind? That's exactly what I think. And William Blake is one of the very small number of people in history I think really grasped it. I think he's an extraordinary, extraordinary person. His poetry is numinous, isn't it? It's absolutely amazing. And I'm sorry, I know I'm supposed to be funny, but I can't think of anything funny to say about this particular subject, which is that's exactly what I think. I think every human being is imprisoned inside a personally designed cell. Yeah, but it isn't— oh, let's look at that then, and let's look at yours, because it's not just designed, it's not designed by us. When we're born. Um, you know, the Greeks believed in something called the daemon, the personal genius that comes into the world. And you are then born to parents, um, and the parents give you certain characteristics, certain genes, blah blah blah. And then your personal genius comes— is meant to come out of that. So they're like the petals around the blossoming flower. And then your unique genius unfolds, reveals itself. And also, we now have an opportunity to recreate ourselves. And I think that's sometimes what depression does. It tells us we've had enough of that past, that life that we have come from, and we need to recreate ourselves and start again. How would you make— what would you say to that? Is that what happened to you? That you started— well, I think that one of the things I think is that everything's upside down. So that I have this mantra, disaster is a gift, is if you look back on your life at the things that at the time were terrible, very often you think, oh, thank goodness I escaped that relationship, or I'm so happy I was fired from that job because if I hadn't been fired, I'd never have left and I hated it. And that's certainly what happened to me with a sort of severe bout of depression for I say 3 years were terrible, and 10 years, I suppose, as it slowly sort of faded away as I worked on it. But I consider that's the best thing that's ever happened to me, apart from meeting my wife and having my children, because it enabled me to— is to have, um, an engaged and interesting second half of my life with a completely different set of values. That's what it it showed me. And you know, I happen to— I've got some pretty weird beliefs, Maria, but they work for me. And the thing about philosophy— this I got from a brilliant guy called William Woollard, who used to be a television presenter and then through a series of strange events became a Buddhist and now talks about it all over the world, and he's amazing— and he says the thing about philosophy, it doesn't have to be true, but it has to be effective for you.. It has to help you live a more optimal life, and that's what my philosophy does. And, um, you know, I happen to believe, or at least I find it helps me to navigate life, to see the universe as a teaching machine. That when things go wrong, there's a lesson in that. And it's particularly true of children. So I don't know, for example, whether I believe in reincarnation, but I can say without with absolute certainty that you won't go far wrong as a parent if you pretend that the children have been sent to teach you something. Yeah, as well as you teaching them something. The whole— that's— it's upside down. As I say, the thing is, parents are all about setting boundaries and, you know, doing this and doing that. It's not about that. If you're going to have a successful marriage with children, you need to grow up. The children are fine. They come out perfect. I often think of the comparison between— I love Greece, you know, and I love olive trees, insanely gnarled things, some of them thousands of years old. The skin of an olive tree is like grotesquely tortured, you know, but the olives that it produces every year are perfect. They glow, they shine with goodness and health. And that's like little children, isn't it? You see, People screaming at their kids in the supermarket, they look like they've had too much to drink, and the children are perfect little creatures. It's, um, and, and, you know, the thing to do as a parent, which took me a long time to learn— we were terrible at it when we started— but there's nothing to say, just be there and be nice. There's no other job. Yeah, one thing I do often say to parents is tell your children you like them. Not just love them, but you actually like them. Because we forget that kids need to be liked, that, you know, love sort of becomes part of the territory. Everybody says that. But if you say you like them, it means that you get on with them, you really enjoy their company, you like their character, you like what they say, you're interested in them. That's totally true. And I can say that I like my children very much as well as love them. And I have great conversations with all of them. And But, you know, the problem is that when you start, the, the poleaxe that happens, you know, because you think, oh, you fall in love, you think nobody's been ever in love like us before, let's have a baby because, you know, we want— that's what you do. You're living the kind of the, the sort of Hollywood dream. And then, then it happens, the fear and the anger and the, the sleeplessness and the irritation and that nothing works. And you, you know, you don't understand why, why have they got ill suddenly. It's absolutely horrific. And why do they still keep crying when they've got And of course, most, most of us are not grown-ups when we start having children. And so we are flawed. We haven't, we haven't worked out the problems that we inherited that we didn't solve as young people. And so we don't usually like ourselves. So it's hard to like children who continually scream or drop their Rice Krispies or, you know, you know, knock all the flowers down with a bamboo cane in the garden or whatever they do, what children like doing. You know, and it's like instead of laughing, which is like, well, look, they're 3, dropping a bowl of Rice Krispies is the most fun you can have apart from bouncing on the bed, you know. It's why not? Why do we get so cross about it? Because when we get married, what we forget is that when we are— you have to imagine this, that you're in bed with your partner, but really inside your bed, inside your relationship, are at least 6 of you depending on your parental state, because you've got your partner with their parents, and you and your parents. And they really come into play when the child is born, because that's the only model you've got. What were my parents like? And somehow that kicks in through the— it, it's not just an imagination, it's the silent knowledge, the silent code that comes in with a child that takes effect when the child is born. What did my mum do? What did my dad do? Oh, sometimes the wife now turns into the partner's mother. Oh, my mum used to say that and I hated that. Or vice versa with the mother who now has her own child, but then the husband becomes like the father, and I didn't like my father, or I did like my father. And so the interplay and the complexity of the— all the family dynamics come into that moment when the child is born. So consequently, how was I treated? What was I allowed to do? What should I do? Do I have parents at the end of the phone or somebody telling me, 'You should be feeding your child like this. Don't breastfeed. Do breastfeed.' You know, um, 'Are you feeding them enough vitamins? Are they sleeping well enough? You should leave them to cry. Don't leave them to cry. You're going to affect them forever.' So this craziness starts happening, and of course we become fairly, you know, sociopathic at this moment in time. And especially if the other person in the relationship doesn't want you to give your child a lot of attention, you're now in conflict between your personal relationship and the child. And then all the Oedipal, the Freudian theories come into play, the Jungian theories come into play, and then the whole game begins all over again. And you've got to try to keep track of it, and you've got to try to keep the reins of that. And make sense of the world because it impacts on everything you do, everything you say. And a lot of the time the children, as you say, are confused. You know, I thought I was doing the right thing, I thought I was painting correctly. Yes, but your parents didn't want you to paint. Your parents wanted you to be a scientist. Painting meant nothing. But to a creative family, painting is everything. And so the problems can be impacted on the child. Yeah, I mean, the people just make such a hopeless hash of stuff because they're so basically ignorant about themselves. Nobody knows who they are, really. And it's— this is the thing, the tragedy of humanity is just goes rolling on making the same old mistakes, unable to fix themselves, and It's, um, and yeah, you're right, it's complicated. You don't just marry the person, you marry their entire family. And, and, and of course, you— why do you marry somebody? Probably because they're like somebody. Well, they normally are, aren't they? They, they do resemble somebody in the family because that's who you're more familiar with. Yeah, but they only, they only resemble them on the surface. They're not that person. And so you then have to work all that stuff out. Yeah, and also they may resemble a trauma, a wound that you've got, that they have a similar wound, and that wound is your connection. So say, for example, you were both traumatized as children, you may instinctively be drawn to that person, but the repercussions of that wound are totally different, or the reason for that wound are totally different. And as you say, that initial magnet the person you're drawn to is totally different once you get to know them. Yeah. And it starts unfolding and all sorts of the layers sort of come off. And then you've got to try to sort of work your way towards somebody whilst you're trying to keep your own identity. Yeah. But here's the, the core thing, which is, um, we all need to attend to, is to take responsibility for our life and ourselves. Because most people are looking for reasons outside themselves why things go wrong. You know, the children are difficult, the spouse is insane, you know, unless it's true, bastard, unless it's true. But my, my, uh, certainly my recent experience is the nicer you are to everybody around you, the better you think of them, you make the assumption that most people are basically good and are doing their best. It's extraordinary how they fulfill that prediction. If you're angry and resentful and bitter and you, you know, crotchety all the time, you'll meet crotchety, bitter, resentful people. And they've, they've tested that, haven't they, in education, where they've taken kids in different classrooms and one classroom was told that they were the best children ever. And they weren't academically, they were quite the poorest academic children, but they were told by a specific teacher they were the best ever. And this is all for a test. And the other classroom the kids who were doing quite well were told that they weren't the best, and consequently the ones that weren't doing the best became better, and the ones that were the best became worse. And it's— there's no— I mean, I don't— didn't know that study, but it's certainly my experience that the most important thing you can do as a parent, or even as a boss, is encourage people. Totally. Um, even if you're telling a white lie to begin with. The more you encourage people, the better they become. There's— that's the thing. There's nothing like a bit of love for everybody. It's extraordinary. And, you know, we're not told this. We're told the thing about parenting— I hate that expression— is you've got to treat— teach the children discipline. No, you haven't. You've just got to encourage them. And I've got so many examples of this. I've got a great friend called Bill who's an Australian Chinese entrepreneur who lives in Ireland, so quite an interesting guy. And he started a thing called Coder Dojo. He's a, he's a scientist and an entrepreneur, and Coder Dojo teaches children as young as, I think, 4 how to code for computers. And I said— and it's a worldwide phenomenon, this is done for nothing, it's completely free, it happens on a Saturday, somebody gives a schoolroom free Children turn up, you're not allowed to go if you're older than 13, parents are not allowed. So I said, "How's it work, Bill?" He said, "Well, we give them a computer, and obviously most of them have seen a computer and know how to work one, and then we encourage them." I said, "Anything else?" He said, "No, no, we just tell them they're great, and we go around and look at what they're doing." And eventually they produce these apps out of thin air. Some of them have got rich out of it. It's the most extraordinary thing. But don't you think, having done that as well, in with as much as I can with my children, but also with people that work for me, it's also finding that specific skill that they are good at so that people know? It's like if you tell a child that they shouldn't do something, you've got to be specific. Don't, don't put your hand in the fire. Oh yeah, totally. And in, uh, in QI, in the office in QI, Everybody turns up as a sort of geeky nerd who's interested in facts, you know, and there's often a quiz or that kind of thing. And the company policy is find people we really like, uh, who we think are capable of doing the job, which is a thing— it's a character test, not an intelligence test, although obviously they're all bright. And we encourage them, and without exception, within— usually sometimes within hours but certainly within the first year, they all discover things they didn't know they could do that they're really good at. And it's one of the things we do wrong with education. It's a one-size-fits-all, you know. Everybody's expected to conform to the idea that you've got to get 11 A's at GCSE. It's impossible. Those people are freaks, you know. Most people are, you know, have strong points and weak points, and we should encourage those. And it should be okay if all you can do is play the flute to international standard, that's good enough for me. You don't have to be good at geography and maths as well. But what about control? Not control in that way, but organization. When you've got a whole lot of people, you know, many, many, many people, you need an organizational structure to keep them, um, so people know where they're going. Because part of the— No, I disagree. I think, um, You know, people say, oh, religion is a way of controlling the masses. You know, I think government and education is much more about that. And I, it's an interesting thing. When Big Brother started, the first series was considered a failure because they put these people all together in a sort of cauterized environment. And what happened? They all got on with each other. They saw the best in each other. They were, as it were, cast away on a desert island. When people in small groups are thrown together in a crisis situation, that's generally what they do. We're a social species. And so they had to— to make Big Brother entertaining television, they had to introduce things that destabilize the natural situation. But when the world is chaotic, people can fall apart. That's what I mean. And where you ask why it's— why is it chaotic, it's because of the structures that, you know, It's one of the things I've noticed all the way through Brexit and, and all the horrors we've had, is you look at the news and it seems to be absolutely rammed with narcissists, liars, and cheats, and, and power grabbers, maniacs, you know. Do you know any people like that in your personal life? No, that's your job. No, it's not my— just my job. But yes, I do, and I have experienced these, and I do think in the corporate world. You know, you see lots of people, and especially when it comes— it's not money per se, it's the love of money, how people can manipulate in order to make money. And frankly, what for? What for? Because you can only buy one yacht, or you can only wear one pair of shoes at a time. Well, obviously that's the thing, because you've got structures which involve, you know, dictators at the top. There's a— I think it probably in that book you mentioned, there's a great QI fact that the chairman of a company is 10 times as likely to be a psychopath as the doorman of the company. You know, it's like, what is it that drives people to want to control other people's lives? The only thing in life that is worth trying to control is your own personality. That's honestly what I think. The other stuff is like a dumb show. And yet people are, you know, we see that there are people, you know, who rise to the top who have a flawed personality and the power and the, the sort of egotism is just trying to make up for the fact, as we know, narcissists are people who were completely dissed and treated very badly by one or other parent. Yeah, but on the other hand, they can equally be overly adored by parents. You know, that was actually a big surprise for me when I was training. And you think, oh, most narcissists are people who are grandiose were like this because they were treated badly. Often they were treated exceptionally well and they were overindulged, over-permitted to have their own point of view. And I— that was quite shocking to find that. And if you look at a number of people that were grandiose, it's whether they're delusional or not. You know, some people rightly are grandiose and then they get on your nerves because they are grandiose but there's that part of them that you think, well, yeah, they're quite smart, so they've got a right to be. Well, do those kind of narcissists rise to the top, though? I've got a friend who has— Yeah, I think they do. I've got a friend who has a high self-esteem problem. His parents absolutely adored him, and so he's never really amounted to very much, but he thinks everything he does is fine because— Oh yeah, that's because they're delusional. He does. Because there's no reality. And I think the truth— that's what I was saying. If you're specific about things and you have a reality check, So if you're, you know, we've seen it on lots of those, you know, singer TV programs where you have somebody who really can't sing comes on and they say, no, I'm sorry, you can't continue, you didn't win the competition. And the parents are saying, what are you talking about? My child is fantastic, you know. And it's all that type of thing. So it's finding that balance. But, um, coming back to you, how did your background differ and attitude towards you and your children differ? Because We all hopefully improve. That's our aim, to make life better, to make our lives better. What was the difference between your background and the one that you created for your children? Well, I had a pretty happy childhood until I was nearly 10, when I was sent away to boarding school, which I didn't— it was a bit of a shock, you know. You think, well, you are coming back, you like, this afternoon. No, darling, we'll see you in 10 years. Goodbye. So it's a bit of a shock, particularly the first week. Is, um, is pretty strange. But we were happy. We traveled around the world. So my dad, who became a kind of absent dad, was around a fair amount. And, you know, I remember my childhood being very happy. So I think although some difficult things have happened to me along the way, I think my, my sort of concrete base is pretty solid, you know what I mean? That first sort of 3 years, I definitely, I worked out, I went to see somebody for a few months because I had some anxiety problems. And I had this guy retired on the last session after 6 months. He said, I'm quitting, John, I'm going to go and build a house in Greece. Oh great, okay. And then I had an epiphany about what I think probably caused my anxiety when I was very small, which helped me a lot. But, you know, I— especially in lockdown, I have lots of long conversations like this, some for broadcast, most not, with people that I like or I've just got to know. And people are much more forthcoming in this dangerous and difficult and lonely situation. I've learned a lot about people, and I am so grateful that my life has been so, you know, touch wood so easy. And, you know, the things that people have had to put up with in terms of abuse and illness and tragedy of the most horrific kinds— strange beyond belief. You, you'll know about some of this, but I think, God, I don't know how these people have survived this. And those things haven't happened to me. So I think there's a kind of You know, even though I've battled with depression a lot of my life and I'm probably, you know, controlling and, um, all sorts of— who hasn't got loads of faults? But it's basically quite stable, you know. I don't think, I don't think I have a problem with psychopathy or narcissism, borderline personality disorder, any of those things. I'm not, you know, I'm a I think I can call myself a creative person. So I have a bit of that upsy-downy, you know, tendency to bipolarity. But I've got a, you know, I've worked on it very hard for 30 years and I reckon I've got that reasonably at bay. You know, I don't get slain by depression. I think it's something I'd like to help people with because it's my belief, born of a lot of experience, that depression is not a chemical imbalance in the brain. There is no clinical evidence for that. That it is a philosophical problem rather than a physiological problem, and you need to address that if you're ever going to get out of the hole. And how would you see that? How do you see that philosophically? Well, I just think it's like Marcus Aurelius, the great Roman Emperor, in his Meditations used to say, "The one thing you have is your opinion," by which he meant your attitude. And if you can change your attitude to things, you can change everything. And listen, you look at the world, who wouldn't be depressed? I mean, look, it's a mess, it's terrible. On the other hand, you look at the world, whoa, what an amazing place! You know, food, isn't that incredible? I'm alive, I've got hands, I can, I can see. There's so many things you can do. It's like It's just a point of view, depression. And it's— I'm not even saying it's deluded, I'm just saying it's not good for you, it's not making you happy, and you need to address that and say, maybe if I change the way I look at the world, I would have a nicer time of it. That's certainly what happened to me. And do you think addressing the thing— sorry, do you think it's much more prevalent? What I'm noticing is much more prevalent amongst men. Than it is. Oh, amongst men? Yeah. Is that your experience? Um, I don't know the stats on it really. I mean, statistically it's more prevalent amongst men, and particularly young, uh, amongst younger men. Well, there's a lot of quarter-life, um, crises, aren't there? And a lot of suicide and all that. That's what I'm thinking. And in the other— because, but the thing is, this is like they say, suicide is when the balance of the mind is disturbed. And there you have it. It's like you're not looking at it in the right way. You've become deluded that everything is about you and how unfair it is and how miserable your life is. And it isn't like that. You know, my, my great friend Anthony was in a horrific car crash when he was 20, and I think one, maybe two of his friends were killed. And he spent 6 months in a plaster cast in bed and still can't really use one of his feet. He was so grateful to have survived that, that his— the rest of his life is, 'What are you complaining about? You're alive, aren't you? And do you have your legs? Can you, you know, can you eat? What on earth are you complaining about?' And he's sustained me many, many times in the days when I used to get very low, to say— you get a jolt, of course. Why am I thinking this? There's always somebody, many, many people much worse off than you. But do you think then, exactly that, you know, that he almost mentored you? Do you think that we're losing that ability to mentor, that young people need a mentor, a guide, somebody to take them forward? I mean, there's no rites of passage anymore. Well, like I say, the thing is, I came to this very late. You need to take responsibility for your whole life. Only you can do this. What? Do you observe that with your children? You know, um, yeah, no, I think the thing is you, you need to stop as a parent, you know, mollycoddling and controlling and telling them what to do and mapping out their career from— it's a complete waste of time. They'll only be good at things they want to do. So you want to find out— Harry Truman, the great US president, used to say, I've found the best way to bring up children is to find out what they want to do and encourage them to do it. There's nothing else to say about it. And, and to inculcate in children very small is, you can do this and it's up to you to do it. But if you're a child that was hoping to be a musician and your parents hated the idea of you being a musician, which happened to a number of people, um, and you grow up ending up, you know, having to work in a bank or somewhere You know, sort of who helps you through that moment without— the thing is, those parents are mistaken, to put it no strongly. But how does a child get out of that? How does— well, I say by taking responsibility. That's all I can say. It's difficult. But we can see, we can see in life, if you think of Paralympians, for example, who I admire beyond measure, these are people who have lost the most terrible things, you know, um, soldiers who've lost their legs and genitals and arms even. I know some, some of these people. I've got a friend who set up a wonderful charity that makes clothes for disabled soldiers, shirts and, uh, specially fitted jackets and all that kind of thing. And, you know, obviously a terrible thing like you step on an IED or whatever and you have your legs blown off, you could just go into oppression and— or kill yourself or whatever. But a lot of these guys pull themselves together, and I've met people who've said, I'm so happy, I'm so grateful to have what I have. You know, if you can get around that and then you can win a gold medal at the Olympics or whatever, that's what it means to be a human being. That's the business of being human rather than just a robot, is to pick yourself up when things go wrong and say, I can do this. Yeah, and I can recreate my life. That's my utter admiration, because they've taken responsibility for their lives. They haven't blamed anybody. They don't go around saying, oh, if I hadn't— if my father hadn't joined me, made me join the army, or if I hadn't— my officer hadn't told me to go down that trench or whatever, this would never have happened. They just draw a line under the past and say, I'm going to live for the moment. And that's what we all need to do. And, um, and, and people are not told this. They're told it's somebody else's fault. You've got a disease, you know, you've been diagnosed, here's a drug that'll make you better. You know, with depression, obviously, if you've got an emergency and somebody's suicidal or deranged, they need to have stabilizing meds. But in the long term, these things don't work. What, what works is change your attitude. It's like I was talking to someone about AA the other day, you know, which is the whole thing about AA is first of all you need to admit you're powerless, there's a higher power than you, And secondly, you need to take responsibility. And all the— in Al-Anon, all the relatives of alcoholics are told you can't help them, they have to want to do it themselves. And it's like going back to marriage. I worked out— took me about 7 years to work out this: you cannot change another person, you can only change yourself. And the only way, if you're not getting on with your other half rather than bringing out the charge sheet saying, and another thing, you always leave the tea bags in the sink, and you never pick up your socks, and you drink too much, and all this. It's futile criticizing other people. It's, you know, and it's in the Bible, you know, this is— it's mote out of own eye, isn't it? Is that before you criticize somebody else, make sure you're perfect. And when you're perfect, and then you can maybe tackle some other people. But it ain't gonna happen, mate. It's not gonna happen. But there are— there is that middle ground. And that people— I still believe people need guidance. And a lot of people who are born in a totally different world, that they are victims of terrible injustices in their lives, do need a little bit more help. And I really believe in that, although I agree with the things you've said as well. Oh no, but they need— of course they need help. I'm not saying you shouldn't help people, but the thing is, it's not— there's a difference between helping people or suggesting things, as you know, as a as a shrink, and then telling them or ordering them to do things. It's like, you know, the guy I went to see is like, have you ever thought about this, John? And you go, whoa, that's an amazing— I didn't, you know, I'd never thought of that before. And then you— it becomes yours, you know. You— it's— you can then take it and do something with it. Yeah. And of course, I try to be, you know, as kind as I can, as helpful to everybody as I can. I think that's part of the person I was brought up to be. Maybe it's a pathetic people-pleasing thing, I don't know. Probably some of that. Yeah, I think it's given bad press, don't you? That's like being helpful. Yeah, I do. I think it's, you know, they call it, you know, you're far too empathic, or you're far too, you know, sort of— they particularly give women bad press who are like that. I don't believe you can be too empathetic. I agree. It's like it— one of the things that I think is one of the most pathetic things you hear people say is, I don't want to go to heaven, all those harps and clouds. I want to be in hell with all the interesting people. Oh really? Pol Pot, Stalin, you want to hang out with them? I don't think so. I don't think, you know, the people who get a bad press are good people. Yeah. If you've ever met anyone— so for example, I went to a thing with Rowan Williams and the Dalai Lama, a conference with Harry when he was— he just broken his back and he was recovering. We went to this— that's your son Harry? Yeah, my son Harry. He broke his back as a ski instructor and, and, uh, is very lucky to be alive. And we went to this thing, and the Dalai Lama is, is amazing. I don't care what religion you espouse, when this bloke walks in the room, you think, what's he on? That I want to be like. Yeah, totally. He just beams from ear to ear. He's incredibly modest and terribly funny and terribly nice. And Rowan Williams, who's much more sort of self-effacing as a person, also a similar person. You think these people are genuinely good. They're very intelligent. They're very kind. I love this. And the idea that good people are boring is— it is just not true. No, it's definitely not true. I take it you're extremely rare. I mean, people who are consistently good, I think, are about as unusual as people who are consistently evil. But, you know, they are really extraordinary people who've made an effort to be open and kind and understanding and willing to give everybody the benefit of the doubt and that kind of thing. Those people are amazing. Totally. Can I ask you something on a tangent? Because we haven't got a great deal of time left, and it's always amazing talking to you. Do you edit these things? Do you— do you just do— this is it. Is it? Yeah. Oops. So, um, yeah, more jokes. No, no, I don't think we need jokes actually. Jokes become part of life anyway, but this is slightly different. But talking about purpose, um, in Jung's theory, both Jung and Freud chose myths— and you're a fan of myths as I am— uh, as the basic tenet for their theories. Freud was Oedipus complex, which he slightly skewed. And Jung used the Amfortas wound, which is the search for the Holy Grail. But more than that, it's the son who heals the father's wound, which I absolutely love as the tenet, the basis for Jung's theories, was that this child that didn't know his father ended up meeting his father. Oh, this is Parsifal, is it? Parsifal, yeah. And who actually heals the father's wound. As we talk about children and your son who'd broken his back, do children do that? I think they have. As you've said, what do we learn from our children? I'd like to go into that a little bit more because I think that's really super helpful for people to look at, whether it's a woman, a girl who does it for the mother and the father. It doesn't matter which gender they are, it's just a child that brings in the healing. What's your thoughts in your own experience? Well, I, I think I can honestly say that my children have taught me, partly by accident, everything that I know that is useful. All the other stuff, you know, all the research about frogs and volcanoes, that's just a hobby really. But the business of how to be and what matters about life, it all comes from having children. And I also— Harry's quite a mystical person and is a telepath and since he was very little, to, to quite a shocking degree. And I feel, and we both feel, we are connected in some other dimension in a surprising way. So I, I could easily believe that in another life we were the other way around, um, and we are sort of co-mentors really. I'm trying to help him out when he's in trouble, and he me. And we've been like that for, I don't know, probably 15 years. But he's also— he is a musician, and he's a very talented musician. I've heard him play. Yes, he is. He's very, very gifted. And I'm his manager. I'm Brian Ego. Very nice to meet you. Lovely dimension. The writer. Are you now a producer as well? Because Brian Ego, you know, is also a producer. He does Coldplay, doesn't he, and things? No, I'm Brian Ego. Brian Ego. Yeah, you've got to be that person. Somebody's got to push them forward. As long as you're not— who is the one that used to hang people outside the window? That was Arden. Uh, you know, he used to be quite fierce. But you're, you're a normal sort of manager. You just like— you're a good manager because you're in— you infuse and you effusive about it. The thing is, we went to see my lawyer, um, James, or our lawyer, who's just retired really, or semi-retired, who I was at university with, and he rose to become one of the great music lawyers in the business. He was manager of the Eurythmics and all sorts of things. And we went to see him, oh, I don't know, 3 or 4 years ago, and said, James, should Harry get a professional manager? And he said, why? He said, you totally believe in Harry, don't you? I said, absolutely. Said, you know, you never let him down, will you? I said, no, of course not, never. And he said, well, why do you need somebody else? That's the most important thing. And also, I'm Like everything I do, I'm very hardworking. I, I really, really go for it when I'm gonna help Harry out. Um, and creators need that. Creatives need this, this myth about creatives being able to do everything— Spotify, you know, put your own, uh, material onto and find a distributor and things. And I think it was— it's hellish. I mean, that's what— totally hellish. And even, um, Oh, what's his name? The very famous redhead singer-songwriter. His name is totally gone. Everybody knows him. His name's gone from me for the moment. What, Mick Hucknall? No, no, you know, sort of singer-songwriter. The crazy— what, man? Woman? What man? He— the one that everybody— he became left-field talented, uh, just out of the blue, but is super rich. Um, Ed Sheeran's just been in court. And he said, I am not a corporation, I am a single person. I mean, it's not really— he does have people around him, but he said, I'm in court to defend my work, which he had to do because somebody said he stole their work. But he said, this is terrible, I have to— you are inflicting pain on me. Somebody said these— that he stole their work. But it became apparent to me, it's almost like there is a turning point in life for all musicians where they will go back to finding the right managers, the right agents, the right label to work with. It's so important to have the right people working with the creative. So we're coming back almost to where you begin, because your creativity has led to a number of other people being creative. You've set the scene in QI and all the other ideas that you had. So they could explore their creativity because you gave a construct, you gave an organization for that. Are you aware of that? Do you ever look at that yourself? Yes, I think— yes, I did that. Friends say that's what I do really, is I'm very good at creating microcultures. Yeah. Is you set an— you set a sort of philosophical style. I think this is what we do here, this is how we do it, this is the kind of people we we are or aspire to be. And it's been particularly successful with QI, but I've always been quite good at that. And going back to children, it's like this. Children learn only one way, by example. They don't learn by being told. They usually resist that. So don't shout at your children. It will only make them become good at shouting. There's no doubt about that. You be good first. You finish all the food you don't like first. And then you can tell them to eat their broccoli. It's hypocrisy, most parenting. And so it's basically, you know, start to start like Marcus Aurelius says, you know, stop arguing what a good man should be, be one. You know, get on and be a decent person, and then you'd be amazed how the people will fall into the wake somehow. And, you know, it's like And it's such a relief to, you know, to be in a place which is full of people who are working hard because they enjoy the work. But that you set the scene though, and I don't want you to avoid that. It's been an odd life because most of my working life, the first 2 years of any project, most people think I'm insane. They think, you know, Lloydy's done so many good things, he's finally gone mad now. This is never going to work. I couldn't even get people to come on QI as a panelist because they just said, well, what is this? It didn't mean anything. It's mad. Yeah. And so I've always been somebody— again, I don't take credit for this, Maria, because I don't think you can take credit for any talents. It's just part of the individual design of your prison cell, which is not all bad, by the way. Um, Billy Connolly always used to say, and he, he's very similar to my philosophy, is we're in prison basically. Here. That's what we're doing. We're serving a life sentence. And he said, the great thing about this is an open prison, that they've left all the doors open, but you, you're so stupid you don't even notice. So you can walk out. Rilke said— the poet Rilke said, one evening, take a step out of your house, which you know so well. That's your head, which you know so well. Enormous space is near. Yeah. And what I think, once you start looking at that I remember that when I was, uh, actually I was in my sort of early 20s, I was working as an actor's agent and I was in Elephant Castle and I was walking down the road and I had gone into therapy, uh, because of my parents' background being prisoners of war, blah blah blah, uh, prisoners of war, and they were feeling all the trauma and all children pick that up. And then suddenly I was walking down Elephant Castle and inside my head I suddenly vanished into my head space. And it was this vast continent inside. And that is what we're talking about. What is inside you is so immense. And, you know, coming back to Blake, to see a world in a grain of sand and a heaven in a wildflower, to hold eternity in the palm of your hand and infinity in an hour. That is Blake. That is what we're talking about, taking that moment and seeing everything within it. And that's what you do. You create, as you say, those microcultures, and you enthuse everybody to move forward, uh, enthuse them and excite them and tell them it can be done. And because we're almost finishing, who told you that it could be done? I, I don't know. I mean, I, I don't— my dad He never told me this, but he said, I don't know where he gets his curiosity from. Where's that from? And I think both my parents were very curious, actually. But I don't know. It's— I often say, I think the reason that I've done some things well is that it's about taking responsibility. Maria, I was a writer and a performer when I was 22, struggling to make a living, and somebody offered me a job as a producer, which I didn't want to do. But they insisted they thought I could do it, and they would pay me to write as well if I wanted to. And I found, you know, I found a vocation. I found I was good at it. I'd never wanted to produce or direct anything, never had done, but I discovered that I could. And I also discovered that if I stuck to my own judgment, it was usually right, whereas if I was swayed by somebody more famous or more senior, and I knew in my heart it wasn't a very good idea, but I was sucked up to them or, or felt too unself-confident to do it, it would go wrong. And so I think I'm a very unusual person because I know what I like, and it is not swayable by anything at all. So with Harry's music, for example, I know he's a musical genius. I think I know he's a songwriter of the first rank. The fact that he's not famous or wealthy— As yet. Yeah, as yet. It doesn't make any difference to me. Nobody will ever change my mind about that. And also, when he writes songs, if he writes one that I don't like, I know I don't like it, and I don't care how much he likes it. I'm not going to say, "That's a great song. I think, you know, I'm sure you can do better than that." But so I think that's unusual, and it helps with QI, for example. One of the hardest things to train researchers to I like to do is, do you find that interesting? And professional researchers, they say, well, yeah, well, no, not really. Um, well, why did you write it down then? Well, I thought you might find it interesting. And I'm at pains to say to them when they first arrive is, don't try and please me. This is a very unusual company. You're here to please yourselves and see what turns— so what ignites your own fire. Yeah, because what somebody said when I was a very young radio producer, he says, you only do what you like because at least you guaranteed an audience of one. I think that's true. John Lloyd, I have to finish now. I'm so sorry because I would love to continue. There's so much to talk about. As you know, the more you know, the less you know, and the more there is to know. True. Which is so important in our lives, and I think you've ignited everybody's fire that's been listening to this. John Lowe, thank you so much. I'm Dr. Maria Kempinska. This is Your Mind Matters. Thanks, Maria. Thank you.