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Emotion is energy in motion, so it has to move.
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And if it doesn t move, it gets trapped inside of us.
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You have to purge and pray.
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Wow.
0
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To be willing to be vulnerable from a place of strength, it s scary as f***, and it is always worth it.
0
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Please welcome to the stage, from Santa Monica, California, NQ!
0
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NQ is a beast!
0
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You have to be willing not to be liked in order to be loved.
0
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People think that peace is a destination.
0
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Peace is a process.
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There s stages of peace.
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There s layers that you have to keep uncovering within yourself.
0
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Don t try to make something great.
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Make something true.
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It will automatically be great.
0
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Wow.
0
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I think hurt people hurt people, and I was really hurt.
0
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I think we tend to love other people how we love ourselves.
0
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I was pretty violent to myself.
0
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Oh man, now you re gonna make me cry.
0
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Don t make me cry, bro.
0
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If you could only share one poem with the world that the world needs to hear, what would that be?
0
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Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness.
0
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Very excited about our guest.
0
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We have my good friend, Adam, in queue in the house.
0
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Good to see you, brother.
0
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Thank you for having me, man.
0
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Welcome to the basement of greatness in my home studio.
0
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Very excited that you re here.
0
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I ve known you for, I think, 10 years.
0
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It s crazy.
0
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I remember Alexandra was like, how did you first meet
0
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in queue.
0
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And I was like, I couldn t remember if it was a boat or at a mountain, but I m pretty sure it was at a mountain summit series at a mountain.
0
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I can t remember if it was Tahoe or something like this, but
0
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you were performing, and I remember saying, this is one of the greatest live performers I ve ever seen in my life.
0
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And it s still true today, 10 years later.
0
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And ever since then, I was just like, dude, we need to connect.
0
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I need to watch you more.
0
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You ve spoken as someone of greatness, I don t know, five times.
0
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You probably had the most standing ovations of any person that s ever been at my event.
0
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And I just really appreciate your genuine heart and your authenticity.
0
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So obviously, you re extremely talented, but there s so much more about you.
0
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And I m excited that you re here.
0
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And I saw a prompt that you gave online recently.
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You give people writing prompts with your poetry.
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And you ve got this journal out called the Never Ending Now Poetry Journal, which I want to talk about in a minute.
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But you put this prompt out that said, write a poem to your past self telling them something they needed to hear at the time from your perspective now.
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I m curious if you could go to your future self and give yourself
0
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a line, a poem, a message to something you needed to hear now from the future, what would that be for you?
0
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First of all, thank you for all your kind words.
0
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The feeling is more than mutual.
0
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I think the first thing that comes to my mind and heart is I would maybe do a poem about not giving up, but giving in.
0
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and being willing to surrender to the surprise of life more than needing to show up and control everything all the time.
0
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That would be your message to your current self.
0
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Yeah.
0
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It s something I m still processing in real time.
0
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Like I m in the transition phase of that.
0
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And, you know, there can be bumps in the transition phase, but, uh, I m definitely on the path.
0
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Yeah.
0
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So I think if I crystallized that through creating a piece of art, um, it would probably help me to, uh, speed it up and that future self could reflect that back on myself now, or I could reflect it to my future self.
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And it would probably have a similar result, which is one of the reasons that I created the journal in the first place.
0
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Can I also ask you if you have anything that you would want to tell your current self from your future self?
0
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I like asking these questions to other people so I don t have to answer them, but I would probably say, I guess it depends on the age, but if I m like, you know, 40 years away from now, I would probably say keep loving bigger, keep your heart open,
0
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Um, but create boundaries for the little Lewis inside of you.
0
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So he feels safe, but don t stop your generosity towards humanity and the world.
0
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Even if people betray you or take advantage of you, or if that s your interpretation of their actions, keep your heart open, but make sure you take care of little Lewis first.
0
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So he doesn t feel betrayed.
0
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And I would say, be willing to continue to go for it, because I feel like I ve gone for it a lot in my life.
0
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I ve just gone for life.
0
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Like I m up for the adventure.
0
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I m up for taking the risk for taking the shot, even if I make a mistake or fail.
0
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So I would say, if you want to truly
0
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continue to live at a beautiful level, you ve gotta keep going for it.
0
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Don t stop, because you feel like you ve got something.
0
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Keep giving, keep creating, keep serving, and keep going for it.
0
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That s probably what I d say.
0
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I love that.
0
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I think that s an amazing message, and I feel like you re leading by example for yourself and for other people on the podcast and in other ways.
0
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I m curious, you ve been doing poetry for a long time.
0
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How do you feel, but I also know you ve suffered emotionally in different areas of life, relationships, family, friends, different challenges.
0
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How do you feel journaling, writing, expressing your words or your thoughts on paper has allowed you to heal?
0
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And is there any research backing the power of journaling or writing poetry to help us transform our emotions and feel better and heal?
0
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I m definitely not the person to discuss research with.
0
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That is not my strength or department of interest even.
0
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But I have personal research just from my life experience.
0
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I think creating and sharing my art has brought me more clarity, more peace, more presence, more compassion.
0
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more self-awareness.
0
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And it s made me feel connected to others in a way that nothing else has.
0
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I would say emotion is energy in motion.
0
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So it has to move.
0
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And if it doesn t move, it gets trapped inside of us and it can become dis-ease, you know, dis-ease, or you take it out on somebody in traffic for no reason.
0
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So you have to find ways to move the energy and to share the stories that are trapped in your mind and in your heart and your body.
0
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And there s many modalities to do that.
0
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You can do breath work, you can, you know, do yoga, you can go to boxing even and have an intention behind your practice.
0
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You can, I don t know, meditate, go to therapy.
0
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There s plenty of avenues, but one that is underused is creativity.
0
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You can create and move the energy and you can alchemize those things that are trapped inside of you so that they transform into something else and you can feel energetically lighter and more free.
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What is the poem that you ve written, whether it be recently or in the beginning of your creative process, that is giving you the most healing personally?
0
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Like when you wrote it, you felt you were healing.
0
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Every time you read it or perform it, you feel like you re healing.
0
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What is that poem?
0
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Well, I have two immediate answers that come to mind.
0
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The first one is,
0
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a poem about my father not being around, and ultimately finding forgiveness.
0
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But I think that that s too easy of an answer.
0
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And the real answer is going to sound cliche, but it s everyone.
0
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And then the next one, the one that hasn t been written, because it s the most current and in real time to my life.
0
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And whatever it is that I choose to create around is something that I need to express.
0
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It s a breadcrumb trail that I am following.
0
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I m the first person in my audience so I m not thinking what other people want to hear.
0
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I m paying attention in my daily life.
0
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to when I get moved, when I get inspired, when I get pissed off, and I pluck it out of reality, and I put it down on paper.
0
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And then if I go back to that beginning place, the rest of the poem will almost write itself if I give it enough time and space.
0
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Interesting.
0
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So every single one is a healing process.
0
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And it s one of the reasons I like to facilitate for other people to do the same thing, because if they choose something moving and meaningful, it can be surprisingly healing.
0
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Yes.
0
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You have another quote or poem that you put online
1
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says, how do we talk about the problems without feeding them?
1
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If we ignore them, we most likely keep repeating them.
1
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If we explore them, we run the risk of reinforcing them.
1
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So, so how then do we get down to the source of them?
1
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So if we talk about our problems or write about them or create about them, are we feeding the problem or are we solving the problem by processing them?
1
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How do we not recreate old traumas or memories or wounds by sharing stories over and over again that we re trying to heal from?
1
SPEAKER_00
That is a great question.
1
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What you have to do is you have to hold two truths in the same space at the same time.
1
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Give me an example personally.
1
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holding on and letting go.
1
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When I wrote the piece about my father, it was a piece about my anger and ultimately forgiveness and gratitude, but I wasn t able to actualize it until many, many years later.
1
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It took me a long time to catch up with the piece.
1
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So the piece was almost like a prayer.
1
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You have to purge and pray simultaneously.
1
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And if you do,
1
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I promise you, you will wind up feeling like a different person on the other side.
1
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And then when you share it with somebody, and you re unconditionally loved and seen, to really like see and be seen, to be willing to be open, to be willing to be vulnerable from a place of strength, it s scary as fuck, and it is always worth it.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_01
So when did you write this poem about your dad?
1
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I was in my mid 20s.
1
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Really?
1
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Yeah.
1
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So like, 20 years ago, something like that.
1
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I m like, 45.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
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So when you wrote it, how long did it take for you to fully feel at peace with the relationship you had with him or lack of relationship you had with him?
1
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How long did it take you to be like, I m at peace with this?
1
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I forgive.
1
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I m at peace.
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, I think people think that peace is a destination or like a product.
1
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Peace is a process.
1
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There s stages of peace.
1
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There s layers that you have to keep uncovering within yourself.
1
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So right now I can say I am as fully at peace as I have ever been.
1
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I can t say that I am fully at peace.
1
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But one thing that I know about my life is every single thing that has ever happened to me,
1
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whether I understood it or not, in real time or in retrospect, has become a part of the quilt of who I am.
1
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I don t like to compare circumstances, I don t like to compare pain, but I ve had a lot of pain in my life, and everything that caused me pain is a part of my identity now.
1
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So if I reject that thing, I m rejecting a part of who I am.
1
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And so you have to accept it in order to integrate it, in order to alchemize it, in order to move on with it.
1
SPEAKER_01
What s the most painful thing that you ve had to overcome emotionally or internally that maybe it took you a long time to overcome, or maybe it just was a really painful thing to overcome and you really wished it didn t happen.
1
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in the moment, and maybe you still don t wish, but you know you wouldn t be the identity you are and the man you are without that pain?
1
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I think there s a lot of them that come to mind.
1
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I m not going to share some of them because I m not ready to put them on display yet.
1
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But I go into a lot of those stories in the album and ultimately in the journal.
1
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You know, when I created the Never Ending Now album, I wasn t sure whether or not I wanted anybody to hear it.
1
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I know.
1
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Remember, I was there.
1
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Because you were one of the few people that I sent it to and was willing to trust because of your integrity, because of our friendship, and because I love you.
1
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And I know you ve been through real things.
1
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And so I was like, OK.
1
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But it s scary putting it out there.
1
100%.
1
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I m taking my own medicine.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, so I was like, all right, let me, I finished this thing, this work of art that was like a reflection of my path to self love and love with a partner through poetry and this conversation that was very intimate that I had with my wife.
1
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And then I was like, I don t know that I wanna show this to people or even weirder, monetize this thing.
1
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and leave it open for people to criticize it, to judge it, to validate it, to compliment it.
1
SPEAKER_00
It didn t really matter what their response was.
1
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I didn t want to externalize my self-worth that way because it was so close to my heart.
1
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And then I was like, all right, I m gonna send it to like five people.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I sent it to five people, including you and Mike Posner, who s a great friend.
1
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And Mike was the first person that got back to me.
1
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And my criteria for sending it out was, okay, if one person hears the album and hits me back and says, hey, this was moving and meaningful to me, like this landed.
1
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then I would put it out.
1
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But if everybody was like, yeah, this is good, I really like it, I think you should, then I wasn t gonna do it.
1
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And so Mike hit me back right away and he was like,
1
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Literally he goes, if you don t put this album out, he said, I ll pry it out of your cold, dead hands.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I sent it to you guys and you listened to it and had a similar but different response.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I was like, all right, let me lead by example, even though it s hard and scary.
1
SPEAKER_01
Why is it so hard for most people to put out something that is their art or their expression, but also has sadness, pain, loss, embarrassment tied to it in some way?
1
SPEAKER_01
Why is that so challenging for anyone, let alone artists?
1
SPEAKER_00
Because they re scared to be rejected for truly showing us who they are.
1
SPEAKER_00
But the thing is, like,
1
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If I get rejected, if I put this project out and people don t respond to it, or worse, they really don t like it, then at least I know they don t like something that s really me.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I know that the art is separate from me, it s not really me, but it is as close as tracing paper could come when I made it.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I m like, all right, if they don t like it, at least I know I showed up.
1
SPEAKER_00
rather than making something that s perfect, that everybody s gonna love.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then they say, wow, I love this thing and I love you, but I don t even feel it because I was never there.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it wasn t fully authentic.
1
SPEAKER_01
It wasn t fully you.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
Interesting.
1
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How do you do that?
1
SPEAKER_00
Like, for example, I was thinking about many things that you have shared over the years driving over here, and the courage that it took to do that.
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, what was and is your process?
1
SPEAKER_01
I think a lot of it was
1
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when I started opening up about vulnerable things to individuals, to friends, to family, and then kind of publicly, you know, my expression to the world in different ways, I think I was,
1
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so depressed, you know, this, this line from like Jim Carrey comes to me where it s like, depression is like you needing deep rest from the character you ve been playing.
1
SPEAKER_01
Something like that.
1
SPEAKER_01
It s like, you are depressed because you need deep rest from the character you ve been playing.
1
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It s like, you ve been wearing some mask, you ve been putting on some identity that s not truly you.
1
SPEAKER_01
Maybe parts of you are out there, but not all of you.
1
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And so a lot of me was out there, but there were other parts of me that were afraid if,
1
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you or anyone actually knew who I was, what I d been through, what had happened to me, would anyone like me or love me.
1
SPEAKER_01
And that was the ultimate fear.
1
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If people truly knew they would never like me.
1
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And then I would be alone.
1
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And then I would die alone and suffer for the rest of my life.
1
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That s kind of the fear that I had.
1
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And so I think I just felt like
1
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I d rather be alone and no one like me than everyone know, you know, just parts of me and not all of me.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I think it got to that point when I hit 30 that I realized there were parts of me that people weren t aware of and I wasn t willing to face them myself, let alone share them with other people.
1
SPEAKER_01
And that just wasn t the life I wanted to live anymore.
1
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Now it was scary on the other end because I didn t want to live alone and I didn t want to have people not like me or love me or accept me, but I think that s the risk probably every artist has to take to put
2
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their expression out there that you may not be liked or understood or loved.
2
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You may be criticized or hated or whatever might be, you know, taken advantage of for who you truly are.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I think that s the biggest fear.
2
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But I d rather feel free and have no friends than be a prisoner and have everyone like me.
2
SPEAKER_00
I very much relate to that.
2
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I have a line that says, you have to be willing not to be liked in order to be loved.
2
SPEAKER_00
Otherwise, it s your representative they re thinking of.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like that disguise thing that you re talking about, that character that you re playing, and you re doing it for good reasons, survival.
2
SPEAKER_00
you know, mental, emotional, physical, spiritual.
2
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If you felt unsafe in your life, that s where the character came from.
2
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But the thing is, it s exhausting to walk around with all that armor.
2
SPEAKER_01
What was that poem called?
2
SPEAKER_00
I think it s called Bird Song.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, I never really named my pieces until I actually put them out.
2
SPEAKER_00
Can you share that one?
2
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Can you perform that one?
2
SPEAKER_00
Do you have that one?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I actually do.
2
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The birds aren t singing to win a Grammy.
2
SPEAKER_00
They re not trying to go platinum through their marketing or planning.
2
SPEAKER_00
They re just jamming.
2
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I listen without even understanding.
2
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The truth without agenda is authentically astounding.
2
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It makes me think of cheetahs.
2
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They don t run for our approval.
2
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They don t judge their spots or contemplate laser hair removal.
2
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It makes me think of wolves.
2
SPEAKER_00
They don t howl for validation.
2
SPEAKER_00
They don t have to get the perfect pic to post on their vacation.
2
SPEAKER_00
It makes me think of eagles.
2
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They re not soaring to impress me.
2
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Although once I saw a dolphin back flip over a jet ski.
2
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My point is neither one of them would sell me shit on Etsy and I doubt a porcupine would ever try to come off sexy.
2
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Humans are the only animals pretending to be something that they re not.
2
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Wow.
2
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Why are we ashamed of what we ve got?
2
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We should strut, chest out, head up.
2
SPEAKER_00
Let s be proud of ourselves for once.
2
SPEAKER_00
Isn t it exhausting sticking out your butt and sucking in your gut?
2
SPEAKER_00
And for what?
2
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It s a waste of energy.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m giving up.
2
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In this moment, I m enough.
2
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In this moment, you re enough.
2
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In this moment, we re enough.
2
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I m dismantling my image.
2
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We are perfect in our flaws.
2
SPEAKER_00
Birds don t care whether we listen.
2
SPEAKER_00
They don t wait for our applause.
2
SPEAKER_00
I have built a lovely prison, but I live behind the walls.
2
SPEAKER_00
So if love is my religion, I ll escape when freedom calls.
2
SPEAKER_00
You have to be willing not to be liked in order to be loved.
2
SPEAKER_00
Otherwise, it s your representative they re thinking of.
2
SPEAKER_00
But to truly be yourself, you have to let go of what was.
2
SPEAKER_00
The past is like a prison.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s an echo repeating just because, cause, cause.
2
SPEAKER_00
We are many people in our lives, so I m not one to judge.
2
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But if they love one part of you, it s limited to what that does.
2
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I want your whole soul.
2
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I have no goal.
2
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Show me the unseen stuff.
2
SPEAKER_00
Don t invite me over only after you have cleaned up.
2
SPEAKER_00
Perfect makes me want to kick my feet up.
2
SPEAKER_00
No one s living in a catalog Ikea dreamed up.
2
SPEAKER_00
Have you ever seen a lion chase a hundred zebras?
2
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Have you ever seen a turtle hide inside a shell?
2
SPEAKER_00
A caterpillar doesn t know that she ll become a butterfly.
2
SPEAKER_00
So if you go to heaven, are you still aware of hell?
2
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
When did you write that one?
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t remember.
2
SPEAKER_01
Is it like a few years ago or is this like a decade ago?
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, no, it s like a few years ago.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s more recent.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
I was on the phone with a friend of mine and, uh,
2
SPEAKER_00
the birds were just like really loud.
2
SPEAKER_00
And during the conversation, I said something about the birds aren t singing to win a Grammy.
2
SPEAKER_00
And then I thought, you know what, I like that.
2
SPEAKER_00
So I said, pause the conversation.
2
SPEAKER_00
I wrote it down and then started to build on it later.
2
SPEAKER_01
Of all the poems that you ve written and performed, how many of them talk about love?
2
SPEAKER_00
I think all of them in some form or fashion, but I think some of them are self love.
2
SPEAKER_00
Some of them are romantic love.
2
SPEAKER_00
Some of them are love of God.
2
SPEAKER_00
Some of them are our love of humanity, nature, all of it.
2
SPEAKER_01
What would you say, how long have you been doing poetry?
2
SPEAKER_01
Would you say like officially, you know, as part of your thing, not just like, Oh, I did it when I was like seven, a little bit here and there, but like, what was the year where you re like, Oh, I m doing this consistently.
2
SPEAKER_01
Do you remember?
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I think I m past 30 years.
2
SPEAKER_00
30 years.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like one of the longest, at least internal relationships of my life.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, my, my relationship with rhythm and rhyme.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
What do you feel like has been the biggest lesson around self-love in the last 30 years of writing and performing poetry that you ve discovered and had to learn?
2
SPEAKER_00
Well, it s something that I try to teach other people.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like when I facilitate for the poetry workshops in person and why we created this journal in partnership with Passion Planner to scale those workshops without me having to be there, I automatically take away anybody s blocks by saying, don t try to make something great.
2
SPEAKER_00
Make something true.
2
SPEAKER_00
And if you make something true, it will automatically be great.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I m telling people stuff that I need to relearn over and over and over again, because if I sit down and I say, I m gonna make something great, I m just getting in my own way.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m turning my back on the muse.
2
SPEAKER_00
I have to be willing to just take the ride.
2
SPEAKER_00
Some of the best poems for me,
2
SPEAKER_00
are poems where I m surprised at where they go.
2
SPEAKER_00
Really?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, because I don t get overly strategic before I start writing.
2
SPEAKER_00
I just start in some sort of a spark and then see what fire it turns into.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it might be, okay, I heard the birds sing and you thought of this idea.
2
SPEAKER_01
Maybe you re on the phone with a music person and you re like, oh, they re not singing to join a Grammy.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you re like, okay, where could I take this in other areas of life?
2
SPEAKER_01
Is that kind of how it starts?
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I get the birds of this, the wolves, this, the bears, the this, you know, it s like, let s keep the analogies going.
2
SPEAKER_00
And then, yeah, it s like, basically, you re you re building railroad tracks.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you re the railroad tracks.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you re the train.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you re the conductor.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you re the beginning, middle.
2
SPEAKER_00
And, and interesting destination, wherever you wind up.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you re also none of those things because you re the observer.
2
SPEAKER_00
So it s a spiritual practice, creativity.
2
SPEAKER_01
You have this other, do you call them poems when you put something online, like an Instagram post?
2
SPEAKER_01
Is that like a short poem or is that like a phrase within a poem usually?
2
SPEAKER_00
Well, yes, it s usually a phrase within a much larger poem, which is to be quite honest, very annoying to me.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, I want, of course, please follow me on Instagram.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it s like, I always feel like it s a truncated version of what the art is.
2
SPEAKER_00
And that s why I m excited to put out actual, like, finished pieces that people can experience on their own time.
2
SPEAKER_00
So it s a great window into my work, but I m not sure.
2
SPEAKER_01
Snippets, it s not the full thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
You have this,
2
SPEAKER_01
Poem within a poem, I guess you d call it, about love that you shared recently.
2
SPEAKER_01
It said, love is not a guarantee.
2
SPEAKER_01
It will come and it will leave.
2
SPEAKER_01
It relies on your belief, so it will bring you to your knees.
2
SPEAKER_01
Love is weak.
2
SPEAKER_01
Love is lost.
2
SPEAKER_01
Love is grief.
2
SPEAKER_01
Love is loss.
2
SPEAKER_01
Love is risk.
2
SPEAKER_01
Love is real.
2
SPEAKER_01
But love is worth the pain we feel.
2
SPEAKER_01
Where did that come from?
2
SPEAKER_00
Let me say the next line.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I won t let the fear of losing you limit how I m loving you.
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh my gosh.
2
SPEAKER_01
Can you share that whole poem?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
Let me actually give you the behind the context.
2
SPEAKER_00
Give me the context.
2
SPEAKER_00
So I was
3
SPEAKER_00
doing this collaboration piece.
3
SPEAKER_00
And it was like a marketing team and a brand that were involved in this project.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t want to go into the specifics because it really doesn t matter.
3
SPEAKER_00
But they had liked this particular poem that had already been written.
3
SPEAKER_00
And it ends, save the day with love.
3
SPEAKER_00
So we re on this like planning call about the piece of art collaborative project that we re doing.
3
SPEAKER_00
And one of the guys goes, Hey, is there any way we can change the final word?
3
SPEAKER_00
Because he goes, love is a bit soft.
3
SPEAKER_00
And he goes, I want to end on something that has more like strength and pizzazz.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I was like,
3
SPEAKER_00
No.
3
SPEAKER_00
Cause it s not your poem.
3
SPEAKER_00
First of all, no.
3
SPEAKER_00
Respectfully.
3
SPEAKER_00
Second of all, I don t look at love as soft.
3
SPEAKER_00
I said, I look at love as hard.
3
SPEAKER_00
And he goes, okay.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then the conversation ended and I hung up and I wrote this piece.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not soft.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is hard.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not smooth, love is scarred.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not perfect, love is flawed.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not quiet, love is loud.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not pride, love is proud.
3
SPEAKER_00
But love is not certain, love is doubt.
3
SPEAKER_00
And love is not leaving, love is turning around.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is learning to fight for the middle ground.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not gentle, love is rough.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not fragile, love is tough.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not thinking that love is enough.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I choose to love you harder from the moment I wake up.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is a revolutionary act.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is an attack.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not abstract.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is a fact.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is saying yes when I want to say no.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is saying stay when I want to say go.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is staying high even when I get low.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is going with the flow, holding on and letting go.
3
SPEAKER_00
Because love is not easy.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is complex.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not right or wrong.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is context.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is not black or white.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is progress because love is not a product.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is a process, yes?
3
SPEAKER_00
So in the simple moments, when the chaos fades away, in the silence of the evening or the empty of my day,
3
SPEAKER_00
I remember what it feels like to give my heart away and think how lucky I have been to get to love someone this way and how lucky we still are to get to love someone this way.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s a miracle to be alive.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s why I have to say love is not a guarantee.
3
SPEAKER_00
It will come and it will leave.
3
SPEAKER_00
It relies on my belief, so it will bring me to my knees.
3
SPEAKER_00
Love is weak, love is loss, love is grief, love is loss, love is risk, love is real, but love is worth the pain I feel.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I won t let the fear of losing you limit how I m loving you.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m gonna love you harder.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s a privilege to be hugging you.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m gonna love you harder more than ever before.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m at peace with knowing love is war.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s what we re fighting for.
3
SPEAKER_00
So love harder.
3
SPEAKER_00
First yourself, then your family, your friends, your coworkers, your neighbors, and your community.
3
SPEAKER_00
Then try to love a stranger.
3
SPEAKER_00
Try to tap into your empathy.
3
SPEAKER_00
Imagine that you ve known them and protected them since infancy.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now try to love the people that you don t love at all.
3
SPEAKER_00
Even people you don t like, they probably need it most of all.
3
SPEAKER_00
And if you can t love them big, see if you can love them small.
3
SPEAKER_00
See if you can hold compassion for the assholes that they are, and they are.
3
SPEAKER_00
But love is not soft, love is hard, love is scarred, love is flawed, love is loud, love is proud, love is doubt.
3
SPEAKER_00
And since love is most important when we do not know how, I will choose to love you harder in the never ending now.
3
SPEAKER_00
Oh my God.
3
SPEAKER_01
Now, I love this poem, but how do you love someone who s hurt you and continues to hurt you over and over again?
3
SPEAKER_01
How do you choose to love, accept, and forgive someone who s done horrible things to you?
3
SPEAKER_00
You re a great conversationalist and a great interviewer because
3
SPEAKER_00
That s a really, really strong question.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I have to search myself for the answer.
3
SPEAKER_00
I think I can t answer that for anybody else.
3
SPEAKER_01
How have you learned to, I mean, through this, the album that you put out, I mean, there s a lot of vulnerable, you know, things in there that you talk about and you share about.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I know personal stuff about you.
3
SPEAKER_01
I don t want to say it for you if you want to or not, it s fine.
3
SPEAKER_01
But how have you dealt with,
3
SPEAKER_01
Loving people who are the closest to you, who have hurt you.
3
SPEAKER_01
And how do you do it?
3
SPEAKER_01
Even if they don t want to change their behaviors, and even if they keep doing things that continue to hurt you, knowing or unknowingly, how do you choose to love them personally?
3
SPEAKER_00
one day at a time, one moment at a time, knowing that the love is bigger than whatever the conflict is or the misunderstanding is, and continuing to show up over and over again.
3
SPEAKER_00
Zooming out when you get too close to the television and all you see is the pixels.
3
SPEAKER_00
You gotta zoom out and get the full picture.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you also have to acknowledge
3
SPEAKER_00
and recognize and remind yourself that you don t know everything.
3
SPEAKER_00
There s plenty of things that I thought were true at times in my life that I look back on and I m like, man, what truth was I living?
3
SPEAKER_00
Like that s not true to me anymore.
3
SPEAKER_00
And that s progress, that s growth, that s evolution.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I don t like regret anything that I ve done.
3
SPEAKER_00
but there are things that I would do differently.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I m sure there are things now that I don t understand or ways that I ll change in the future.
3
SPEAKER_00
So like just remembering that I don t know everything and maybe there s some new information here for me to discover rather than to come into it with like my idea of what it is and then miss what it actually is.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think both of me and you are on a, have a similar journey that we re on, which is get a personal here, but we re, we re both on a journey of wanting to become parents one day.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
But we re both not parents yet.
3
SPEAKER_01
Um, what do you think type of love will happen when we become fathers?
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh man, now you re going to make me cry.
3
SPEAKER_01
Don t make me cry, bro.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was about to get emotional thinking about it, but what do you think, you know, you ve written about love.
3
SPEAKER_01
You ve experienced it, but I don t think we ve fully experienced it.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think we ve scratched the surface of what we think love truly is.
3
SPEAKER_01
What do you think will happen when we become fathers in that first, you know, few moments?
3
SPEAKER_01
What type of love will there be that you think we ll experience?
3
SPEAKER_00
I think it s going to be an explosion of love, like the big bang.
3
SPEAKER_00
The other night I was fast asleep.
3
SPEAKER_00
I was like dreaming about something or other.
3
SPEAKER_00
Tony Soprano, we ve been watching Sopranos again.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s a brilliant show.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s funny because this is a complete separate thing.
3
SPEAKER_00
But like when I first watched The Sopranos, I was like 19.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now I m watching The Sopranos, I m Tony Soprano s age.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s crazy, man.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s a completely different show.
3
SPEAKER_00
So anyway, my wife had never seen it.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I m like, you know, mid-dream.
3
SPEAKER_00
And there s this explosion outside of our window.
3
SPEAKER_00
It was something having to do with a power line.
3
SPEAKER_00
And nothing happened that was crazy, but it was a loud bang and sparks right outside the window.
4
SPEAKER_00
And we didn t know what it was, gunshot.
4
SPEAKER_00
We had no idea you re coming out of your dream.
4
SPEAKER_00
And before I could even think, I had dove on top of her, literally, and I was just covering her.
4
SPEAKER_00
I know that I m still the star of my own show, but I would give up my role for my wife in a fucking second.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I imagine that it would be exponential
4
SPEAKER_00
You know, once you have a kid, so it s almost like, and I don t want to like get overly like spiritual, but I feel like you would finally know, like God s love, you know, because there is a level of like unconditional that is beyond like a mental framing, you know?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, no matter how much that kid messes up, you re just gonna love them.
4
SPEAKER_00
And you d probably give it all up for them in a second.
4
SPEAKER_00
Of course.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Any part of it, I mean, you know?
4
SPEAKER_00
And how do you still create boundaries within that?
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, exactly.
4
SPEAKER_01
How do you love unconditionally, but also, okay, you can t cross this boundary, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
What about you?
4
SPEAKER_01
What do you think when you... Let me answer that in a second.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
But have you written a poem for your child?
4
SPEAKER_00
You know, I wrote a poem about parenthood and whenever I do it, everybody s like automatically assumes throughout the whole entire poem that I m like a parent of like five kids, you know, because how does he know so much?
4
SPEAKER_00
And I was just using my intuition and imagination.
4
SPEAKER_00
But have you written a poem about your child?
4
SPEAKER_00
No.
4
SPEAKER_00
That is coming.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m going to do that now.
4
SPEAKER_00
But I m not going to write it from the standpoint of showing it to anybody or making it great.
4
SPEAKER_02
Of course.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m going to do what I said earlier.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I m feeling the resonance of you saying that because it is something that we want to create.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I should probably be creating around that creation.
4
SPEAKER_02
I don t expect you to ever maybe you share the poem publicly in the future if you feel like it or not.
4
SPEAKER_02
But if you were to write a poem about your child that is coming.
4
SPEAKER_02
What would do you think would an unedited first line be that maybe you use?
4
SPEAKER_02
Maybe you wouldn t use what would be like off the top of your mind that you think would be a line in this?
4
SPEAKER_02
Maybe not the thing you use in the future, but.
4
SPEAKER_02
What s on your heart right now?
4
SPEAKER_00
Thank you.
4
SPEAKER_00
I love you.
4
SPEAKER_00
You re welcome.
4
SPEAKER_00
Welcome.
4
SPEAKER_01
That s not like a Moana song.
4
SPEAKER_01
You re welcome.
4
SPEAKER_01
You watch that movie?
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, it s a great movie.
4
SPEAKER_02
Oh man, it s a great movie, man.
4
SPEAKER_02
Marta loves that movie.
4
SPEAKER_02
She is Moana.
4
SPEAKER_02
She is like, that s her like Disney character.
4
SPEAKER_02
That s who she identifies as.
4
SPEAKER_02
Nice.
4
SPEAKER_02
Everybody has like a- Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I m Maui.
4
SPEAKER_02
You are.
4
SPEAKER_02
Like we ve taken the test.
4
SPEAKER_02
There s like a Disney quiz that you can be like, what character are you of every Disney movie?
4
SPEAKER_02
And she is Moana and I m Maui.
4
SPEAKER_02
Which is- You guys are destined.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s crazy.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s really crazy.
4
SPEAKER_02
Of all the movies, what would you be?
4
SPEAKER_02
What would your character be that you resonate with the most?
4
SPEAKER_02
Maybe you haven t seen all the Disney movies, but.
4
SPEAKER_02
Wow, I don t know.
4
SPEAKER_02
There s not one that could, give me some options.
4
SPEAKER_02
I mean, I don t know, Beauty and the Beast.
4
SPEAKER_02
There s Aladdin.
4
SPEAKER_02
There s, I don t know.
4
SPEAKER_02
I don t know what other movies there are, but.
4
SPEAKER_00
I mean, it s funny, I ve written like 50 songs for Disney television.
4
SPEAKER_02
You ve done 50 songs for them?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Not for their movie movies, but for the TV shows, and I literally can t.
4
SPEAKER_02
Lion King, Aladdin, I mean.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I ll be that little crab.
4
SPEAKER_02
You could be the monkey in Lion King.
4
SPEAKER_02
Sounds good.
4
SPEAKER_02
Who s got the wisdom.
4
SPEAKER_02
Sounds good.
4
SPEAKER_02
You got the wisdom, and you re like, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s kind of rhyming in poetry.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, the crab is rhyming.
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
4
SPEAKER_00
Actually, it s something to explore.
4
SPEAKER_00
I mean, it s interesting that you guys, I said to you upstairs, I mean, you re truly best friends, which is what you need for a lifelong walk.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Or at least it s what I need.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I can recognize it when I see it in other people.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, man, I felt like I needed peace.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I feel like I don t feel like best friends are angry at each other a lot.
4
SPEAKER_02
Like, you know, Matt is my best friend.
4
SPEAKER_02
I ve known for 20 years, like,
4
SPEAKER_02
We don t really argue with each other, get angry.
4
SPEAKER_02
Maybe we have like disagreements, but we re not angry at each other or like, screw you.
4
SPEAKER_02
That s maybe happened like a couple of times for like an hour and we re like, oh, my bad.
4
SPEAKER_02
You know, I didn t mean to hurt you.
4
SPEAKER_02
You know, it wasn t intentional.
4
SPEAKER_02
But I think if you re getting into an intimate relationship with someone and you re every week fighting, that doesn t seem like a best friend.
4
SPEAKER_02
That seems like a friend that you don t want to understand or choose to accept and vice versa if they re fighting with you.
4
SPEAKER_02
And it maybe doesn t mean you like the things they re doing, but for whatever reason, why do you think in intimate relationships we struggle creating harmony and peace with the person we re choosing?
4
SPEAKER_02
Not me and you, but in the past I have.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I have too.
4
SPEAKER_02
And we see this with a lot of people.
4
SPEAKER_02
Why do you think we choose intimate partners that we want to be best friends with, but then we end up
4
SPEAKER_02
fighting with all the time and not seeing eye to eye.
4
SPEAKER_02
Why do you think that is in love and relationships?
4
SPEAKER_00
It s a combination of things, in my opinion.
4
SPEAKER_00
One is I think we re learning about ourselves through these relationships.
4
SPEAKER_00
And a part of what we re learning is what is negotiable and what is non-negotiable.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the things that are non-negotiable are things that have to be in harmony.
4
SPEAKER_00
You re never going to have perfect harmony with any partner, any friendship, any business relationship.
4
SPEAKER_00
But you have to have harmony over the things that are non-negotiable.
4
SPEAKER_00
Otherwise, you will wind up fighting over those things in various disguises forever.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I think what happens is when we re lonely, or when we really want to have a life partner, we try to fit a square peg into a round hole.
4
SPEAKER_00
We don t fully acknowledge the things that are non-negotiable for us.
4
SPEAKER_00
And we don t fully acknowledge who we re actually with.
4
SPEAKER_00
To truly see the person in front of you, not who you want them to be.
4
SPEAKER_00
To truly see.
4
SPEAKER_00
I always say that like relationships are like an archeological dig and you don t wanna use a jackhammer.
4
SPEAKER_00
You know, you wanna use a brush.
4
SPEAKER_00
Just slowly brush away the relationship and keep showing up and getting to know each other over and over again.
4
SPEAKER_00
You can t have a crash course in intimacy.
4
SPEAKER_00
You can t know all of who someone is in six months
4
SPEAKER_00
You ever see people who are like, newly in love, and they re not even in love with each other.
4
SPEAKER_00
They just have this like, projection thought bubble that s in between the two of them.
4
SPEAKER_01
They re perfect.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
They re perfect.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s just the chemicals that they re in love with.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, the feeling of love, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And then what happens is, is the person doesn t live up to your unspoken expectations.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the fantasy resent them.
4
SPEAKER_00
And you fight them be what I want you to be so that I don t have to be lonely anymore.
4
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Wow.
4
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You know, it s like if you actually knew who you were, and you were willing to let go.
4
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And by you, I mean me.
4
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because I had to learn this over and over again, broken record, repeating the same mistakes, dancing to the music that I didn t even like because it was the patterns.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you were able to do that, then you would actually go like, huh, I don t think this is right for me.
4
SPEAKER_00
We have some things that are non-negotiable.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s okay.
4
SPEAKER_00
Can we negotiate what s non-negotiable?
4
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If we can t,
4
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then I love you and I m gonna move in another direction because I love myself more and I love the future partnership more.
4
SPEAKER_00
When I first met Andreana on our first date, at the end of the date, she asked me, she goes, so how old are you?
4
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And I was like, I m 39.
4
SPEAKER_00
She was what?
4
SPEAKER_00
What s that?
4
SPEAKER_00
What was she at that time?
4
SPEAKER_00
Gosh, she was 25.
4
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Which by the way, there was no way I didn t know how old she was when we went on our first date.
4
SPEAKER_00
And because we met online.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, there s no way because I had my own list.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, I m not seriously dating anybody.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s not ba ba ba, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
I m not ba ba ba.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m not ba ba ba.
5
SPEAKER_01
I am blah, blah, blah.
5
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These are the ideas that I had for my partnership.
5
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But I was at least mature enough to show up and see what was there.
5
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And she was too.
5
SPEAKER_01
So anyway, she goes, you re 39.
5
SPEAKER_01
You don t have any kids?
5
SPEAKER_01
I go, no.
5
SPEAKER_01
She goes, OK.
5
SPEAKER_01
You ve never been married?
5
SPEAKER_01
I go, no.
5
SPEAKER_01
She goes, OK.
5
SPEAKER_00
What s wrong with you?
5
SPEAKER_00
What s wrong with you?
5
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Yeah.
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And the thing is, she had every right to ask it.
5
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Every right, because I knew why she was asking.
5
SPEAKER_01
But the truth is I had been asking myself the same thing and I was uncomfortable answering because I wasn t sure if I was not settling to settle down or I was actually getting in the way of having real intimacy.
5
SPEAKER_01
Interesting.
5
SPEAKER_01
And so I go, I don t want to answer that.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then it got hella awkward and the date ended soon afterwards.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I think both of us thought we were never going to see each other and then
5
SPEAKER_01
Luckily, we got a second date and six years later, here we are.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
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So what made you so uncomfortable to answer that question?
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Or what was the answer inside of you that you didn t want to share?
5
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Well, now all these years later, she was the reason that she asked.
5
SPEAKER_01
You know, she was the answer.
5
SPEAKER_01
You know, there was nothing wrong with me, I was waiting for, for having that true ride or die.
5
SPEAKER_01
Because how I grew up, and I think you might be able to relate, but I won t put words in your mouth.
5
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Trust for me is non negotiable.
5
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Trust for me is everything because I didn t grow up feeling trust in many ways.
5
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And I m not pointing any fingers.
5
SPEAKER_01
I m grateful for everything.
5
SPEAKER_01
I have so much love for my childhood and who I am sitting here with you now, which took all of it.
5
SPEAKER_01
But I can t be in a real partnership unless I can look at my partner and be like,
5
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I got you and you have me and we re across the room.
5
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And, you know, I hadn t found that.
5
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Yeah.
5
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And I had been trying to fight with past relationships to turn them into that.
5
SPEAKER_01
And now in retrospect, I want to apologize to all of them and thank them because they were helping me figure out who I was and what was non negotiable so that I could get to that person that I
5
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truly have that type of partnership with.
5
SPEAKER_00
Did you feel like you were that person for yourself?
5
SPEAKER_00
Did you trust yourself fully?
5
SPEAKER_01
No.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I think that there were even times where I used the other person as my excuse to not look within.
5
SPEAKER_01
Interesting.
5
SPEAKER_01
So I was almost like, you ever like, uh,
5
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I don t know, like choose somebody unavailable because you are unavailable.
5
SPEAKER_01
Of course.
5
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And then blame them for being unavailable.
5
SPEAKER_00
The longer you get into it, you re like, okay, why aren t you more available for me?
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I m sure I was the same way for them.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
Oh, but then maybe somebody comes to you and says, wow, like I m available.
5
SPEAKER_01
And you re like, I m not attracted to them for some reason.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s interesting as you re saying this, like, if someone is emotionally available, they would never choose someone who s unavailable.
5
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
5
SPEAKER_00
They would see it and they re like, that doesn t work for me.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, they have to be equally available for me to want to be willing to explore this.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because if someone s saying, I m available emotionally, but I m choosing someone wounded who doesn t open up and who s got all these secrets inside and doesn t want to look me in my eyes and connect with me intimately.
5
SPEAKER_00
then you re wounded still because you re trying to fix someone.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
5
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And that s hard to take responsibility for.
5
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It s much easier for us to blame other people, to find excuses.
5
SPEAKER_01
And when we do that, we get farther away from the truth and we have to uncover more layers so that we can get down to taking responsibility for ourselves and our choices.
5
SPEAKER_00
You talked about truth.
5
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a few minutes ago about how the more wisdom and experience and years you have, the more you realize some things are true that you thought weren t true and that are untrue that now are true.
5
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Like you, you learn new lessons.
5
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What do you think is the most true thing that you 100% know to be true?
5
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Here we are.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I know that.
5
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Here we are right here, right now.
5
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and I m grateful that we are.
5
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What was the biggest
5
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thing that you thought was true for most of your life that you realized was not true.
5
SPEAKER_00
No, no, go ahead.
5
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It was just something that was like, oh, I held on to this belief that this thing was true.
5
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And then later in life, you realize, oh, maybe that was just a wounded part of me or just I wasn t educated enough.
5
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I didn t have the experience or the wisdom or I learned it from the wrong person.
5
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Was there anything like that?
5
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I think hurt people hurt people, and I was really hurt, and I think I hurt a lot of people, and I think I hurt myself a lot.
5
SPEAKER_01
I think we tend to love other people how we love ourselves.
5
SPEAKER_01
I was pretty violent to myself in my behavior, in my thought process.
5
SPEAKER_01
I was telling a friend relatively recently, I used to have images of killing myself in my mind over
5
SPEAKER_01
and over again at random times throughout the day.
5
SPEAKER_01
And it wasn t even like I was gonna do it.
5
SPEAKER_01
I would just have a flash image of just not existing anymore.
5
SPEAKER_01
And going out in a violent way.
5
SPEAKER_01
How am I supposed to be able to love somebody in a healthy way if that s what I m doing to myself?
5
SPEAKER_01
I wrote this poem, it has one line though that I ll share.
5
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And it says, being angry at God is like yelling at yourself in the mirror.
5
SPEAKER_01
Because no matter what you say, God will be waiting for you when you are done.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh my gosh.
5
SPEAKER_00
Say that one more time.
5
SPEAKER_01
being angry at God is like yelling at yourself in the mirror, because no matter what you say, God will be waiting for you when you are done.
5
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_01
So that s what I was doing, yelling at myself in the mirror all the time, and then going out into the world and finding the evidence for what I was choosing and unchoosing to believe.
5
SPEAKER_01
You know, so is there anything for you that you feel like you ve had to unlearn that was so true at that time that that now you have a different perspective on?
5
SPEAKER_00
I mean, the thing that I thought was true for most of my life was I m worthless.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I had to unlearn that because it is not true.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I believed it so much to be true, probably like you, in certain ways.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m worthless, you know, and no one will love me, was kind of the truth, the lie I was telling myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I think it was, like you said before, it was exhausting and draining.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was, it was just, yeah, it sucked the life out of me.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I think when I finally learned how to let that go and step into a different truth, it felt freeing.
5
SPEAKER_00
It felt like peace, harmony for the first time.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I think life is, for me, life is a consistent journey of repetition.
5
SPEAKER_00
And if I m not repeatedly showing up
5
SPEAKER_00
contributing to myself with these types of positive truths, these types of reps, then I could easily slide back if I have a few bad days of just like negative reps.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so it s just a consistent, like you said, the truth, you know, it s here we are.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so if here we are, this is the moment to have a rep and I can choose a rep that serves and supports a positive belief or a negative belief that holds me back.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so I just try to reflect as many moments throughout the day that I have more positive reps, you know, that I have a, I m speaking in kind of sports lingo, but repetitions that I really show up the best I could in every scenario.
5
SPEAKER_00
to support the truth that I want.
5
SPEAKER_01
I think that was beautifully said.
5
SPEAKER_01
You re in the gratitude, Jim.
5
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Oh yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
And you gotta keep lifting.
5
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Every day, man.
5
SPEAKER_00
Every day.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
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If I don t use it, I m gonna lose it.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s totally true.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I m gonna go right back into what I knew for 30 years.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
Because the worthlessness, Jim, is always open.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s always open.
6
SPEAKER_01
man, 24 seven.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
And it s so easy to be in that gym.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
So easy.
6
SPEAKER_00
But it s interesting.
6
SPEAKER_00
There s a lot of false reward there.
6
SPEAKER_00
Well, it s, it s fast.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s familiar.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s quick.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s, you know, you, you think short timeline, long timeline, medium term timeline, you know, it s the shortest timeline around just taking a hit of, uh, ah,
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t deserve anything.
6
SPEAKER_00
Ah, you know, I m worthless.
6
SPEAKER_00
Ah, I m a victim.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you just get to wrap yourself up in that.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that definitely is probably like my most familiar state.
6
SPEAKER_00
Really?
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
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I mean, I think I ve worked my way out of it now over many years of doing my own reps and having different modalities.
6
SPEAKER_00
to help me along the way to have incremental and accumulative presence.
6
SPEAKER_00
But I can t let that go.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s not like I can just go, well, I won the game, so I don t have to play anymore.
6
SPEAKER_00
No, it s a never ending game.
6
SPEAKER_00
And what an amazing thing it is that I get to play.
6
SPEAKER_01
Do you think it s possible for an artist to actually live a beautiful, loving life?
6
SPEAKER_01
Or do most artists just struggle in the suffer of like, I m an artist, so I have to suffer and feel pain so I can express my art from a painful place.
6
SPEAKER_00
I just want to say one thing before I forget, and then I ll answer that.
6
SPEAKER_00
I just want to acknowledge you.
6
SPEAKER_00
I want to honor you because I feel like that place of worthlessness that you have and continue to work through has brought a lot of value to the world.
6
SPEAKER_00
Thanks, brother.
6
SPEAKER_01
Appreciate it, man.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I think, you know, I mean that, you know, to me as a friend, but to many other people, because you ve been willing to invite us into your heart and into your experience and into your process.
6
SPEAKER_00
I appreciate it.
6
SPEAKER_00
So it s the school of greatness.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s the school of self-worth.
6
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely, man.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
Positive identity.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
To answer the other question, I think that many times people who go through intense pain or trauma
6
SPEAKER_00
it kind of wakes them up a little bit early and simultaneously puts them to sleep.
6
SPEAKER_00
Interesting.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like both things are happening, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
But it shakes their reality and it becomes a catalyst for them to create
6
SPEAKER_00
But then sometimes they think that they need that pain to continue to create.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so they just like go on these self destructive streaks.
6
SPEAKER_00
One, because it s what they re used to.
6
SPEAKER_00
And two, because they feel like, well, that s my fuel.
6
SPEAKER_00
And what I would say to those people, or anybody listening to this is what got you here won t get you there.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s great that you re here.
6
SPEAKER_00
But
6
SPEAKER_00
If you wanna get somewhere else, you might need to find a different fuel source.
6
SPEAKER_00
And there s plenty of things that you can use as fuel.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, pain, you re always gonna have the memory of it.
6
SPEAKER_00
You re always gonna have your imagination.
6
SPEAKER_00
You re always going to witness and see pain in the world that you can use to create from, to transmute it into something else.
6
SPEAKER_00
But you don t need to live a life of suffering
6
SPEAKER_00
you know, in order to have something to talk about, you know, or write about or act about or sing about.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you deserve to be happy too.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you can share that as well.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s beautiful.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
When you ve written, you know, so many poems over 30 years, how many do you think you ve written that you ve shared with people either on stage or in a book or in a journal or, you know, how many do you think you ve written that you ve shared?
6
SPEAKER_00
Hundreds?
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh, I think I m past a thousand easy.
6
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
How do you continue to some people when they accomplish a certain level of success?
6
SPEAKER_01
They have more confidence, but others, they say, oh, I don t know if I can keep repeating this over and over again, like, OK, I ve a lot of my best work is out there.
6
SPEAKER_01
Can I keep creating great work?
6
SPEAKER_01
How do you continue to have a, you know, a level mind and heart when you re creating and not think my best work is behind me?
6
SPEAKER_01
Um, and can I recreate this or how do you, how do you navigate that?
6
SPEAKER_00
Well, you can t recreate anything you have to create.
6
SPEAKER_00
Don t recreate, create, and don t try to repeat your past success.
6
SPEAKER_00
Just be open.
6
SPEAKER_00
you know, see what s here.
6
SPEAKER_00
pay attention.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, the last poem that I wrote is like a children s book and I don t have kids yet.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, so maybe there s something like there, you know, that is beneath the surface.
6
SPEAKER_00
But the reason that I wrote it is I had a corporate gig in Mexico and we were, you know, we had a flight leaving after the gig and we had a little bit of window of time.
6
SPEAKER_00
So we decided to go whale watching.
6
SPEAKER_00
And we re like out there.
6
SPEAKER_00
First of all, I had done it before, but I had never like paid attention to the process.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you like see these whales and then all of a sudden, like all these boats, like go chase where the whales are.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it was like aggressive, man.
6
SPEAKER_00
I didn t, I didn t like it.
6
SPEAKER_00
So we told the guy like, Hey, let s just like move away from these other boats.
6
SPEAKER_00
Cause it felt like all of a sudden it wasn t the ocean.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was like an aquarium or something.
6
SPEAKER_00
I didn t want to be a part of the problem.
6
SPEAKER_00
So we go kind of like deeper out in the ocean and he gets this
6
SPEAKER_00
like machine out technology where like he puts this like cord way down there in the deep.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then it s attached to a speaker and you could hear the whale songs.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it was so beautiful.
6
SPEAKER_00
Listening to them in real time.
6
SPEAKER_01
So it s like an amp.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s like a microphone for whales.
6
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
6
SPEAKER_01
And you hear the speaker in the boat.
6
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
6
SPEAKER_00
Interesting.
6
SPEAKER_00
And let me tell you, that s pretty cool.
6
SPEAKER_00
There s a lot going on down there.
6
SPEAKER_00
a lot.
6
SPEAKER_00
And they re not just saying, I m here, I m here, I m here.
6
SPEAKER_00
They re saying some stuff.
6
SPEAKER_00
You can feel it as you re listening.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so as I left, I m on the plane going back and I just had this thought of like, you know, sometimes like whales like to go human watching.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I started like writing this poem about these whales that would sneak out of the ocean in the middle of the night and like go human while they sneak into our houses while we re asleep and start looking through our stuff and blah, blah, blah.
6
SPEAKER_00
Like, if I had thought, do I want to write a poem next?
6
SPEAKER_00
What is my poem going to be?
6
SPEAKER_00
And I want to make this, you know, incredible thing that s going to change the world.
6
SPEAKER_00
I wouldn t have just like, been like, ah, this is like an interesting idea.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then I finished it and I was like, this is really cool.
6
SPEAKER_00
Maybe this could be a children s book.
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh, that s cool.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so I think you just have to like, keep trusting
6
SPEAKER_00
your internal compass and move in the direction of your true north.
6
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
6
SPEAKER_01
Speaking of true north, a lot of people don t know what theirs is.
6
SPEAKER_01
And they struggle trying to figure out their purpose, their path, their passion, their self worth, if they have any, how much they have.
6
SPEAKER_01
They try to understand their insecurities, their pains, the people that are closest to them that have hurt them.
6
SPEAKER_01
They try to understand all these things.
6
SPEAKER_01
I know I m one of those people.
6
SPEAKER_01
You created a journal called the Never Ending Now Poetry Journal.
6
SPEAKER_01
And it s got a lot of different prompts.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s got poems and then prompts for people to go through their own process of self-discovery.
6
SPEAKER_01
Why is this such an interesting project for you?
6
SPEAKER_01
And how can it support and serve people in figuring out their true north?
6
SPEAKER_00
Well, people don t often use creativity as that modality for better mental and emotional health or stress release because they leave it to professionals.
6
SPEAKER_00
And we become adults, we find things that we re good at, find things we get paid for, find things that we get validated for, and we stop being a student.
6
SPEAKER_00
Creativity is about play.
6
SPEAKER_00
no matter what you re exploring.
6
SPEAKER_00
So this is an opportunity to explore the stories inside of you.
6
SPEAKER_00
You do not have to be
7
SPEAKER_00
a poet to get the poetry journal and to take the journey of healing.
7
SPEAKER_00
You just have to be a person that s willing to risk and try something that you would never normally try as a way to become more present and peaceful in your life.
7
SPEAKER_00
And there s a conceptual through line to this journal that takes people through growth and fear and sadness and ultimately it leaves them an empowerment, infinite possibility, because I always want to leave my audience where I want to leave myself, which is in a place of hope.
7
SPEAKER_01
And so people can either read your poems or listen to the poems and then they follow through with a prompt.
7
SPEAKER_01
Is that correct?
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
So the album is 40 minutes and it s like an audio movie.
7
SPEAKER_00
You re just supposed to like take a long walk or a drive and listen to it.
7
SPEAKER_00
The whole thing.
7
SPEAKER_00
One experience.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then the journal helps you go deeper and you can
7
SPEAKER_00
buy the journal and take that journey without listening to the album.
7
SPEAKER_00
You can listen to the album without taking the journey of the journal, but they re both accompanying pieces of art that can help you have an experience that s separate but connected.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
And you talk about how this journal flows.
7
SPEAKER_01
First, the experience.
7
SPEAKER_01
So you read or you listen to the poetry, the art.
7
SPEAKER_01
Then you create using the prompts based on what you read or listened to.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then you say activate it, which is move the poem from your page into your life via sharing performance, memorization, or visualization.
7
SPEAKER_01
Why is that an important element for people to...
7
SPEAKER_01
alchemize their thoughts or pain into peace and hope.
7
SPEAKER_00
So the journal is basically like a culmination of the 25 years of poetry workshops that I ve done.
7
SPEAKER_00
And one of the many things that I learned along those
7
SPEAKER_00
very strange poetry workshops over the years from starting out in libraries and juvenile facilities and upward bound and junior highs and high schools to then the biggest corporations around is that people are people and people actually want to express themselves.
7
SPEAKER_00
They re dying to express themselves and they re dying to see and be seen, but they don t feel like they have a safe container to do it.
7
SPEAKER_00
So I would just basically say, hey, I m gonna start off by saying something vulnerable.
7
SPEAKER_00
I m gonna share a poem because if I m asking you to be vulnerable and I m not doing it first, it s almost irresponsible.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then I give people prompts and I say,
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What is it that this can make you reflect on in your own life that you wouldn t normally share about after 15 minutes at a dinner party with some random person?
7
SPEAKER_00
Like, choose the thing that s a layer deeper, because if you do, the poem starts to flow.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then I give people time to write,
7
SPEAKER_00
and then they come back, and then I get people on stage, and they share the poems, sometimes for the first time ever, standing on stage doing any form of art, and we hold the container of everybody being supportive, loving,
7
SPEAKER_00
caring, passionate, compassionate and celebrating that person for the strength that it takes to share with a room full of strangers and to be courageous and to over exaggerate that support.
7
SPEAKER_00
So everybody s like standing on a chair and yelling and screaming and the person feels like a rock star.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then everybody pairs off.
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SPEAKER_00
because you re not gonna get everybody on stage.
7
SPEAKER_00
But as long as everyone has an opportunity to read it to at least one person and to be witnessed, what happens is you get the poem outside of you, the story that s trapped inside of you, outside of you, so it s separate and you can see it.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then you share it with somebody and that person accepts you and there is a feeling of alchemy that happens where you then move into your life and you re like, you know what?
7
SPEAKER_00
I feel a little more here.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01
I can handle things a little better.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
I mean, look, there s no magic pill.
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SPEAKER_00
I m not selling anything to anybody.
7
SPEAKER_00
But this has been my experience.
7
SPEAKER_00
Wow, man.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
You ve been working on this for about a year and a half.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01
I mean, the album was like a year and a half, a year ago when I heard it, I think.
7
SPEAKER_01
Right.
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SPEAKER_01
The rough, like the first rough, raw cut.
7
SPEAKER_01
But it s evolved since then.
7
SPEAKER_01
Not really.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know what happened, bro, is I- You tried to produce it and you re like, that doesn t feel real.
7
SPEAKER_00
I paid a dude a bunch of money to master it.
7
SPEAKER_00
And you re like, nah, it s not real.
7
SPEAKER_00
I was like, it was like the better it got, the worse it got.
7
SPEAKER_00
Interesting.
7
SPEAKER_00
So I just said, let me just like, I said, what is the least amount you can possibly do?
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SPEAKER_00
And then do a little bit less.
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SPEAKER_00
And that s what I went with.
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SPEAKER_00
That s what you went with.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01
this still has like the conversation with your wife and everything like that.
7
SPEAKER_01
Wow, that s pretty cool.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s pretty, it s very authentic.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s very raw, very real.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s kind of like you get to see in cue, like in his kitchen, having a conversation with your wife about life.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
Kind of like that a little bit.
7
SPEAKER_01
Well, there s parts of that.
7
SPEAKER_00
I had taken this medicine journey basically.
7
SPEAKER_00
And, um,
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SPEAKER_00
I was in this very deep conversation with Andreana in our car.
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SPEAKER_00
And halfway through the conversation, she was like, I think I wanna record this.
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SPEAKER_00
She just like took out her phone and started recording it.
7
SPEAKER_00
And we were talking about all these frozen ages and the experience of the journey and what it brought up for me.
7
SPEAKER_00
And we were so deep in the convo that it just didn t change
7
SPEAKER_00
how I was talking.
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SPEAKER_00
It wasn t like I was thinking anyone was ever going to hear this.
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SPEAKER_00
I was just talking to my best friend, to my ride or die.
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SPEAKER_00
And I was sharing things that I never would have chosen to share had I been thinking other people would have been watching later.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then afterwards, I listened to it a couple of days after she sent it to me.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I thought, huh, this kind of connects to this
7
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other project that I ve been doing with this incredible pianist from Italy, Isabella Terso.
7
SPEAKER_00
Shout out to Isabella.
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SPEAKER_00
And I thought, what if I just kind of like put this as the through line?
7
SPEAKER_00
And then the album started to make sense to me.
7
SPEAKER_01
Pretty cool, man.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m excited.
7
SPEAKER_01
I m excited to listen to it again.
7
SPEAKER_01
I want people to get the journal, the Never Ending Now Poetry Journal.
7
SPEAKER_01
I don t care if you re making a ton of money and you feel super successful and happy.
7
SPEAKER_01
There s something in your life that you got to process still.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I don t care if you re stuck and struggling and life is really not going your way.
7
SPEAKER_01
This is the perfect journal to help you find your North Star.
7
SPEAKER_01
with whatever you need to hear or realize in your life right now.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I m assuming this would be a journal that you can reflect on for years to come as well.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I don t think I ve ever seen a journal like this that has a wrong personal experience with someone else, poetry from their life experience that you can take in and feel like, oh, someone else is opening up and being vulnerable in their diary, essentially.
7
SPEAKER_01
Now let me have these prompts from, in my opinion, the top spoken word artist in the world, who s done 25 years of poetry workshops.
7
SPEAKER_01
Now let me go through the poetry prompts for my own self-reflection and healing journey and awareness journey.
7
SPEAKER_01
and then sit on it and look back at it later and reflect on it.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then maybe share it with a friend, one of these prompts, maybe not, you know, maybe perform it, maybe not, but at least you have it for yourself.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I want people to get the journal, The Never Ending Now Poetry Journal by In-Q.
7
SPEAKER_01
Where can they get the journal?
7
SPEAKER_01
And is there like a QR code in here for the music also, or the album, I mean?
7
SPEAKER_01
So they can go and they can just click and listen to it.
7
SPEAKER_01
It ll open up right on online to listen to the album.
7
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it ll open up to Spotify or Apple.
7
SPEAKER_00
I think it takes to a kind of like a landing page on my website.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then they can buy the journal at Passion Planner.
7
SPEAKER_00
It ll be on Amazon and you can get it on my website at ion-q.com as well.
7
SPEAKER_00
There you go, man.
7
SPEAKER_01
How else can we be of service to you?
7
SPEAKER_00
with this project or your life?
7
SPEAKER_00
You ve done it, man.
7
SPEAKER_00
You know what I was thinking, though, on the drive over too, is if we do another thing at School of Greatness, like the Summit of Greatness, I want to do a workshop for everybody.
7
SPEAKER_00
That d be fun.
7
SPEAKER_00
Like, even if it s like,
7
SPEAKER_00
a bit of a shorter one.
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SPEAKER_00
I would want to do the exact thing that I described with the 1,000, 1,500 people that are there.
7
SPEAKER_00
Sure.
7
SPEAKER_00
Because I think it would be a really, really great way to bond everybody moving into the rest of the summit.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s interesting.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
How long would that take?
7
SPEAKER_01
Let s figure it out.
7
SPEAKER_01
We have to figure that out.
7
SPEAKER_01
Let s negotiate it.
7
SPEAKER_01
We have to figure that out.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
No, I think it ll take, I don t know, usually a short workshop.
8
SPEAKER_00
How long is that?
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SPEAKER_00
I think I could do it in an hour.
8
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, we ll see.
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SPEAKER_00
We ll talk about that as we enter.
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SPEAKER_00
We re doing it in LA this year.
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SPEAKER_00
That s what I heard.
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SPEAKER_00
The Shrine Auditorium.
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SPEAKER_00
So awesome.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s like a 6000 person arena.
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SPEAKER_00
I ve performed there.
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SPEAKER_00
You have?
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
Is it incredible?
8
SPEAKER_00
It s awesome.
8
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
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SPEAKER_00
Okay, we re gonna go see it tomorrow.
8
SPEAKER_00
Actually take a look at it.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s a beautiful theater.
8
SPEAKER_00
It is beautiful, right?
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I m so proud that you continue to grow the way you do.
8
SPEAKER_00
Evolve it, man.
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SPEAKER_00
You got to go for it.
8
SPEAKER_01
You got to go for it.
8
SPEAKER_00
You got to go for it.
8
SPEAKER_01
Because what else are you going to do?
8
SPEAKER_00
We re here.
8
SPEAKER_00
Not go for it?
8
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
8
SPEAKER_00
If it fails, then OK.
8
SPEAKER_00
Maybe you don t go for it the same way.
8
SPEAKER_00
You go for something else.
8
SPEAKER_00
But if something s in your heart, I feel like you got to give it a shot.
8
SPEAKER_00
You got to go for it.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
This has been really cool.
8
SPEAKER_00
I m curious.
8
SPEAKER_00
You know, the world, I can, I just think back to my own childhood of like the sadness and suffering that I experienced in different scenarios.
8
SPEAKER_00
I also had a lot of happy moments and joyful moments.
8
SPEAKER_00
So it s not like my, my life is miserable, but I think we remember a lot of the painful ones when they re that pain more than the joyful ones, for whatever reason, they just like stand out maybe for survival or whatever it might be.
8
SPEAKER_00
But I, as an adult, and I remember when I was a freshman in college,
8
SPEAKER_00
was when 9-11 happened.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I remember like, oh, there s like real stuff happening in the world outside of my world.
8
SPEAKER_00
It was like, okay, friends are making fun of me or not friends, but like school kids are making fun of me.
8
SPEAKER_00
I feel neglected.
8
SPEAKER_00
I feel alone.
8
SPEAKER_00
I feel sad.
8
SPEAKER_00
I feel stupid.
8
SPEAKER_00
It was like my world growing up of sadness.
8
SPEAKER_00
But then when I hit 18, 9-11 hit.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I remember being like, oh, there s real,
8
SPEAKER_00
in the world, beyond my world.
8
SPEAKER_00
Like my world is nothing compared to what people go through, right?
8
SPEAKER_00
Bombs and wars and killing and rape and all these different things.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I remember at 18 being like, oh, there s a world out there that is suffering.
8
SPEAKER_00
And it seems like since that moment, 9-11, you know, every year, every two years, there s more suffering in big ways.
8
SPEAKER_00
Obviously a lot of small suffering, but big suffering.
8
SPEAKER_00
And, you know, the last four years, there s a lot of suffering in multiple different ways.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I assume it s just gonna keep happening in the world, unfortunately.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s just kind of where we re at.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I choose to have hope and put love in my heart and try to impact the world around me.
8
SPEAKER_00
But, you know, I can t stop every war and every argument and every bad thing that happens in the world.
8
SPEAKER_00
In your mind, to close,
8
SPEAKER_00
What is the poem that the world needs to hear?
8
SPEAKER_00
Because there is so much pain and suffering, there is a lot happening right now, and I m assuming there will be more that happens at the end of this year.
8
SPEAKER_00
What do you think, if you could only share one poem with the world, that the world needs to hear, what would that be, to close us out?
8
SPEAKER_01
Well, that was a lot that you just shared, and I appreciate
8
SPEAKER_01
you sharing it, because this project is very personal.
8
SPEAKER_01
But there s a lot of real universal things going on.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t know how to fix those things either.
8
SPEAKER_01
You know, a lot of my work, not on this particular project, but in general is social.
8
SPEAKER_01
It is political.
8
SPEAKER_01
It is about humanity and
8
SPEAKER_01
And yet it goes back to that kind of like thing you shared about problems is sometimes I ve wondered, am I just like creating more friction for more fire?
8
SPEAKER_01
So the only thing that I do know is that we re all storytellers and stories that we tell ourselves and other people become our lives.
8
SPEAKER_01
So change your story, change your life.
8
SPEAKER_01
And if you change your life, you change the world.
8
SPEAKER_01
So I ll do this piece and it s called I m Proud of You because it starts inside out.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t need to know you to be proud of you.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m proud of you for all you ve done and all you do because you re trying to become a better version of you and I m proud of you.
8
SPEAKER_01
I hope this poem will empower you.
8
SPEAKER_01
I hope that you ll remember it the next time someone s doubting you.
8
SPEAKER_01
I hope that you ll remember it the next time them is you.
8
SPEAKER_01
And you re doubting yourself because you have nothing else to do.
8
SPEAKER_01
Pull the voice inside aside.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re on their side.
8
SPEAKER_01
Look them in the eyes and say, who are you to talk to you that way?
8
SPEAKER_01
You wouldn t let another person talk to you that way.
8
SPEAKER_01
So what makes you think just because it s you, it s OK?
8
SPEAKER_01
You probably never talked to another person that way.
8
SPEAKER_01
You d either walk away or defend yourself if you stayed.
8
SPEAKER_01
But since you re the other person in this particular case and you can t leave yourself, you have to learn to hold space.
8
SPEAKER_01
So say, I m proud of you.
8
SPEAKER_01
Even if it feels like it s pretend.
8
SPEAKER_01
Try talking to yourself like you re your own best friend.
8
SPEAKER_01
Try talking to yourself like the relationship could end and the words you choose have consequence.
8
SPEAKER_01
Don t take yourself for granted just because you re always there.
8
SPEAKER_01
Celebrate yourself for always being there, always being here.
8
SPEAKER_01
Compliment the mere.
8
SPEAKER_01
Let s be clear, self-help is self-care.
8
SPEAKER_01
Are you aware that your awareness and your ego are completely different things?
8
SPEAKER_01
Are you scared of the dichotomy constructing everything?
8
SPEAKER_01
Are you prepared to share the inner space without defining things?
8
SPEAKER_01
Are you attached to the illusion and the lullaby it sings?
8
SPEAKER_01
Are you distracted by the story, even if it isn t true?
8
SPEAKER_01
Because if you are, you re not alone.
8
SPEAKER_01
It happens to me too.
8
SPEAKER_01
And still, I m proud to be proud of you.
8
SPEAKER_01
Woof.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you.
8
SPEAKER_01
The infinite you, the non-specific you, the specifically terrific you, the universal you.
8
SPEAKER_01
The perfectly imperfect you.
8
SPEAKER_01
Look at you, you eternal you.
8
SPEAKER_01
You raced against at least a hundred million sperm before becoming you and you and you.
8
SPEAKER_01
The one and only life we ll make.
8
SPEAKER_01
We have some nerve to walk around like we re some sort of mistake.
8
SPEAKER_01
We deserve to walk around like we re designed to take up space.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like we re aligned from the core inside the earth to outer space.
8
SPEAKER_01
We are all miracles without a molecule to waste.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a physical expression of fate and I relate.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a mystical expression of fate and I relate.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a musical, magical, beautiful, powerful individual.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s why I m extra proud of you even when you get cynical.
8
SPEAKER_01
Remember that when times are tough.
8
SPEAKER_01
Close your eyes and hear my voice.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a million times enough.
8
SPEAKER_01
Close your eyes and hear your voice until it s something you can trust.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a million times enough.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a million times enough.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a million times enough.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re a million times enough.
8
SPEAKER_01
You are the sum of all of your experiences.
8
SPEAKER_01
You are the sum of none of your experiences.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re only you because they doubted you.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re alive, and I m proud of you.
8
SPEAKER_00
Wow, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
I ve got a final question for you.
8
SPEAKER_00
I ve asked you your definition of greatness the last time you re on here.
8
SPEAKER_00
So I ll have people will link that up so people can go see that.
8
SPEAKER_00
Before I ask the final question.
8
SPEAKER_00
I want to acknowledge you, Adam, for using your gift.
8
SPEAKER_00
I think a lot of people have talents and gifts that they are afraid to share and use, and you continue to use them for the betterment of the world.
8
SPEAKER_00
So I appreciate you.
8
SPEAKER_00
I acknowledge you for just, you know, the man you continue to become over the last decade of knowing you and how you keep stepping into the greater version of you.
8
SPEAKER_00
And
8
SPEAKER_00
how I just love how you ve learned to accept yourself more fully as well in every season of life.
9
SPEAKER_01
So I acknowledge you for that, man.
9
SPEAKER_01
It s beautiful to watch.
9
SPEAKER_01
Thank you, bro.
9
SPEAKER_01
And I think you become a better artist the more you love yourself.
9
SPEAKER_01
So I m grateful for you, grateful for your friendship.
9
SPEAKER_01
And I m grateful for this piece of art that we can have access to and use for our own life.
9
SPEAKER_01
And I hope everyone gets this and listens to the album because it s powerful, very powerful.
9
SPEAKER_01
Thank you, bro.
9
SPEAKER_01
I love you, man.
9
SPEAKER_01
Love you too, man.
9
SPEAKER_01
This question just came to me.
9
SPEAKER_01
I ve asked you a question before called the three truths.
9
SPEAKER_01
You may not remember it.
9
SPEAKER_01
But I m going to ask it in a different way.
9
SPEAKER_01
So I d like you to imagine, hypothetically, you get to live as long as you want.
9
SPEAKER_01
And you get to continue to live the life that you want to live, and all your dreams come true.
9
SPEAKER_01
You have the children, the family, the art, the career, all of it.
9
SPEAKER_00
Friends.
9
SPEAKER_00
Keep going.
9
SPEAKER_00
All of it, yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
It all comes.
9
SPEAKER_01
The financial abundance, all of it, right?
9
SPEAKER_01
It all comes.
9
SPEAKER_01
And you write a million poems, however many you want to write.
9
SPEAKER_01
You do all the projects you want to do.
9
SPEAKER_01
And you get to live to be 100 and something, but it s the last day.
9
SPEAKER_01
And you ve lived a beautiful life.
9
SPEAKER_01
And for whatever reason, you got to take all of your work with you.
9
SPEAKER_01
All of your poetry, we don t have access to.
9
SPEAKER_01
Written form, video form, book form, it s gone.
9
SPEAKER_01
AI form, whatever it is, we don t have access to your talent or gifts anymore.
9
SPEAKER_01
Your poetry, your words.
9
SPEAKER_01
But on the last day, you get to leave behind three truths.
9
SPEAKER_01
But only your kids would get to have access to them.
9
SPEAKER_01
Three lessons.
9
SPEAKER_01
And on that last day, what would you share with your kids?
9
SPEAKER_01
Those three truths or three lessons.
9
SPEAKER_01
It could be moments from a poem.
9
SPEAKER_01
It could just be random off the top of your mind right now.
9
SPEAKER_00
Well, the only thing that s coming to me is the joke.
9
SPEAKER_00
It s like, thank you.
9
SPEAKER_00
I love you.
9
SPEAKER_00
You re welcome.
9
SPEAKER_00
Welcome.
9
SPEAKER_00
You know, like that.
9
SPEAKER_00
But that s the joke.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
You re not your worst day.
9
SPEAKER_00
Mm hmm.
9
SPEAKER_00
It s probably one to.
9
SPEAKER_00
The most important thing is how you ve loved and the memories that you ve made.
9
SPEAKER_00
And then I don t know if this is like the one and I don t know if those other two are the ones either.
9
SPEAKER_00
But the thing that just came to me is like,
9
SPEAKER_00
You know, the real value of a person is how they treat people that can t, like, help them on their legend journey.
9
SPEAKER_00
You know, so just treat people how you want to be treated.
9
SPEAKER_00
Not for any other reason than that.
9
SPEAKER_00
like, just do your best to meet everybody in the middle.
9
SPEAKER_00
And try to be compassionate and kind.
9
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
Thank you.
9
SPEAKER_00
Appreciate your brother.
9
SPEAKER_00
Love you, man.
9
SPEAKER_01
Thanks, man.
9
SPEAKER_01
I hope you enjoyed today s episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness.
9
SPEAKER_01
Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today s episode with all the important links.
9
SPEAKER_01
And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel
9
SPEAKER_01
exclusively on Apple Podcasts.
9
SPEAKER_01
Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well.
9
SPEAKER_01
Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review.
9
SPEAKER_01
I really love hearing feedback from you, and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward.
9
SPEAKER_01
And I want to remind you, if no one has told you lately, that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.
9
SPEAKER_01
And now, it s time to go out there and do something great.