Join Malcolm and Simone Collins for a thought-provoking Thanksgiving special that challenges the way we view gratitude, abundance, and modern life. In this episode, they explore the history and meaning of Thanksgiving, reflect on the incredible luxuries of the present day, and discuss why genuine gratitude—not performative thankfulness—can transform your outlook and well-being.

From the evolution of food and the abundance in our grocery stores, to the psychological and physical benefits of gratitude, Malcolm and Simone dive deep into what it means to appreciate the small things in life. They share personal stories, historical context, and practical advice for cultivating a grateful mindset, even when life feels tough.

Whether you’re celebrating Thanksgiving or just looking for a fresh perspective on happiness and fulfillment, this episode will inspire you to see your everyday life in a new light. Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more insightful conversations!

[00:00:00 ]

Malcolm Collins: Hello, I am excited to be here with you today on American Thanksgiving.

Speaker 4: White.

My, I bought them in your mouth. . Eat me. He wants for now food.

Malcolm Collins: Now, if you are unfamiliar with what Thanksgiving is as a holiday in the United. States, because about 50% of our audience is outside the United States.

Speaker 5: Remember, these savages are our guests. We must not be surprised at any of their strange customs. After all, they have not had our advantages such as fine schools, libraries, full of books, shampoo,

Malcolm Collins: It is a holiday where you are supposed to meet with family, have a big feast, and go over things that you are grateful for

Speaker 5: Why you are as civilized as we, except we wear shoes and have last names. .

Malcolm Collins: And I wanted to take this [00:01:00 ] episode to focus on something I know the algorithm’s gonna hate, but I think for the audience members who decide to trudge through this, it’s a message that I wish was more common in our society today. And it’s a message that’s not more common in our society today for the very reason that the algorithm hates it.

Mm. It is not controversial. It doesn’t make other people look bad. I mean, I mean, it may be controversial to say at this point. But that’s that you should feel incredibly privileged to be alive today. Oh

Simone Collins: yes. As hard

Malcolm Collins: as dating is today, as much as you may feel like you got dealt a bad hand in life as much as the the world.

Globally that we live in today, even if you are living in a degree of desperate poverty, even if you are living in a degree of you know, you’re, you are not attractive. You’re not, oh, I can’t get a [00:02:00 ] girl, I can’t, whatever, right?

Simone Collins: Oh, even I can’t get a job. I will never own a house there. There’s a lot that people like The narratives today are, I would say quite.

Negative and they completely diminish. Like some really serious,

Malcolm Collins: yeah. It’s not just that this, like, I’ll never own a house, I’ll never get a girlfriend. And I think that one of the biggest problems that we have in society now is this expectation that you deserve merely for existing. And I think that this is where a lot of the progressive movement actually comes from in their ideology.

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Mm-hmm. As, as actual, like, not, not just rights, but like rights that you can claim, like, I have the right to have happiness. Not, not even the pursuit of happiness. To just have happiness. Right. Like, yeah. They didn’t put. They didn’t say

Simone Collins: life, liberty and happiness for a good reason to the pot

Malcolm Collins: potential, it shoulda said, and the potentially fruitless pursuit of happiness.

Simone Collins: Right? [00:03:00 ]

Malcolm Collins: That is, that, that is. But my point being is that most people throughout history didn’t even have like the illusion that this would be something. And, and even today you don’t, you know, your, your. Born in, in the United States, like one of the most privileged places you can be born on earth.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm.

Malcolm Collins: And there has become a culture in the United States around, and I, I see this all the time because we go on, on walks. My wife and I, we try to go on a walk together every, well now about half the mornings ‘cause you know, we have to do more works to film the episode and stuff like that and, and code and everything.

But one of the places we like going are places like Walmart and Target and I, these random

Simone Collins: grocery stores.

Malcolm Collins: Grocery stores, random grocery stores, and I will see people. I was, I was watching a v YouTuber recently, and they were like, oh my God, I never wanna go in back into Walmart again after, after being there.

It looks like so disgusting, so whatever. And my wife is a very sensitive person, a very autistic person. Does not like [00:04:00 ] being around people, but even she, you know, every time we walk through Walmart, and I mean, every single time you do this. You comment on just the level of obscene luxury we have in our society

to even have the opportunity to see and look at such a diversity of potential products,

Simone Collins: the sheer abundance of it, and like it’s, it’s. So annoying because people like I, there, there used to be a blog maybe 10 years ago. I’m sure it’s defunct now though. Maybe there may be variations of it called people of Walmart where people would just post photos of unfortunate, overweight, poorly dressed Americans.

I remember that. Yeah. People, it was delightful, honestly. I loved it. It was and it just, but it, it, it completely discounted the fact that it, it’s like. I guess it’s kind of like the, the, the fat scooter beasts in the movie Wally, where like, oh, look at them. They’re so disgusting, but like, it, oh wait, but they’re on an AI powered spaceship with unlimited abundance.

Like, it [00:05:00 ] just completely overlooks that. And, and just like with the movie Wally, like the focus is on, like him being on this trash stre world and his, his misadventures and everything. Oh, wait a second. There is this incredible thing that has happened in the background. This is not to say that we, we, people might think, oh, well they live in some, you know, like Valley for is, you know, a very affluent area and you know, they’re only going to the fanciest grocery stores.

I mean, this is the, the Walmart that we walk around has relatively pretty bad local reviews, and I don’t know why, because it’s. It’s an amazing story. It’s like

Malcolm Collins: Norristown, Walmart, Simone Norristown has one of the highest murder rates in the United States. Yeah. And

Simone Collins: like there’s, you know, we’ve, there have been like dirty diapers left on the ground of it, like it’s.

I think it’s great. I

Malcolm Collins: love it. But like diaper, so, so let’s just talk about Walmart for a second. For all of the negative things that people say about stores like this and everything Uhhuh. Contrast the fact that a Walmart exists near us to [00:06:00 ] what it was like historically to try to feed yourself in your family.

Yeah. You can in the United States take a minimum wage job. And for a couple hours of labor reliably be able to take the money you make from just a couple hours of labor at a minimum wage job to said Walmart and trade it for one of a thousand different flavors and products that can probably keep you alive for the day.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Whereas, you know, very recently our ancestors were. Only on potatoes. What are we having today? Potatoes.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. I wanna contrast that with what it was like to try to feed yourself at different parts of human history.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm.

Malcolm Collins: If you go back to a hunter gatherer period and you told one of them in the future, your descendants will be able to trade like two and a half to three hours of minimum wage labor.

Okay. For reliable [00:07:00 ] calories in any flavor they want. That will not get them sick.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: This would’ve. Downed them. Mm-hmm. They’d be like three hours. And I don’t need to guess if the berries are gonna kill me three hours. And I don’t need to worry if the meat has gone bad because we got that from a hunt, you know, two weeks ago.

And who knows if it’s still good, like, and, and

Simone Collins: oh, I mean honestly though, like. There are all these things they wanna go back in time and show someone in history. There’s this one, TikTok, but also she posts YouTube short accounts of just this woman who holds up various berries and fruits and she’s, she has this little song, she’s like, one of these is food dead, one is a poison.

And she, you, you get to guess and she tells you all about them and like, they’re like, wait, there’s a random woman on your magical hand box. That tells you which plants are gonna kill me and which plants I can eat. Like the fact that we can just take a picture of a plant with our phone, like even if it came down to forging, if we still have the internet somehow, which I mean,

Malcolm Collins: There wo