Creative Crunch with Nicole BZ

(upbeat music)

Welcome to Synchronicity. We have a guest this week, my friend, Nicole BZ. She is very awesome. We've worked together now for, geez, it's been three, three years. She got in touch with me back in the day in the bull run of 2020, 2021 with crypto and we had some fun together, made a bunch of money, all good, all fun. And then I just discovered her to be like such a cool person who is really helpful for creatives, trying to figure out how to like make money and like be a business person or get help with business in the world of creativity because typically, I don't know about you guys, it's not the same set of skills that you need as someone who creates art, comes up with things and like maybe you're not a great marketer.

Maybe you're not great at social media. Maybe you're not great at figuring out streams of revenue and passive income. It's a lot for people to have to figure out these days how to like do the business side of things because there's not these supportive kind of systems that have evolved as the internet and all the social media stuff has evolved to kind of give people a path. Yes, there are people who are naturally adept at it and kind of do a wonderful job, but I know for someone like me who's involved with digital marketing for years still struggles at times to figure out how to do that. She's just a wonderful asset and she helps a lot of people out with her coaching, definitely go and check her out.

I think you're gonna enjoy this episode a lot. There's her backstory at the beginning and then we really get into like the meat of how this stuff works for creatives towards the end. So I think you're gonna enjoy this episode. A quick note on everything else that's going on, Patreon, you guys got the message and I'm so happy you did not only are there bonus episodes and the readings and everything else, but we're ramping that back up. I'm glad to see people hadn't given up and are joining it again in droves and we're having fun over there. So you can always go check that out at secretpatreon.com/synchronicity.

All the links are everywhere you would ever want them to be. We kick off tonight the imaginal actualization group, the first tract is taking place tonight. You'll probably have like a few hours to join it if you wanna get involved in this one, but if not, no worries. Depending on how this goes, we'll do another one. I think every couple of months, I think the core group like working with people, you know, 10 people or less seems to be like a pretty good strategy. So that's gonna be fun. In case you haven't noticed like I'm, I'm not trying, this is gonna be a more community centric type of deal going forward.

That's something that has been a very clear download for me is working together with people seems to be the vibe. It seems to be collectively what people are looking for, what I'm looking for. And so that's what we're gonna continue to do. So, you know, stay tuned for more things like that. I have been going live on TikTok almost every day, not every day, almost every day with the free readings. And then on Instagram, you can always find those out. As always, energy readings are open as time and scheduling permits. Okay, that's all the business stuff. I don't think there's anything else to talk about.

The Dolphins are six and two. As a guest episode, I couldn't like, you know, get that in there so I gotta get it in now. They're better than people think they are. I know a lot of people think they only beat the bad teams. Well, but you know what? It's hard to beat any team in the NFL. Don't give me that we only beat the bad teams. We can't control what teams we play. Plus the schedule is very hard from here on out. They're legit. We're getting Jalen Ramsey back. Zavian Howard's gonna be on fire once he's back and it's growing injuries. Good turn. Tehran Armstead comes back this week. We got the Chiefs.

I'm calling it here. I may be wrong. I know it's kind of a leap of faith. We're gonna beat the Chiefs in Frankfurt. And then let's hear what people have to say. Then we'll have the excuses all. It was in the international game, whatever. Let's see when seating comes down to the end of the year and the Dolphins are right there. What this game means, huh? All right, that's it. I just had to get it out the way, you know, every week. I gotta keep you guys updated. Give me a follow on Instagram, TikTok, all those places. That's where I communicate most of the things most of the time. Subscribe and like this podcast.

Leave a review if you enjoy it. That's all I ask. Those are simple things in life. Nothing more complicated than that. All right, I think we're good. I think we will get to the episode. Without further ado, here is the wonderful Nicole Beasy. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) So I wanted to talk about a little bit what you did before what you're doing now. You alluded to it in terms of working in the music industry. I know a lot of creative people listen to this who either making music or in some artistic field. Like there's a lot of creatives. I know that just like from my core audience. And I'm curious to hear how you kind of got to where you are now.

I'll let you explain where you are now as well. But like what you did work managing like artists for like a significant portion of your career, right? Yeah, yeah. And Cavi out, do you want the long version or the short version? It's a long form podcast for you to keep things, yeah. Yeah, well, I think I find it surprisingly relevant as you often do with like 2020 hindsight. But yeah, hopefully people get something out of this also disclaimer, I swear like a drunken sailor. So I had to go ahead and hide the children. Yeah, there's going to be lots of facts because I'm excited, but I got started very randomly.

I had like I do just kind of picked up and moved. I got a hit and I was like, fuck it, let's go. And so I ended up in Boulder, Colorado. And I answered a newspaper ad dating myself. And it was for like an office worker, like secretary job. And I was like, you know, I'm waiting tables and working at a bar. Like I'm trying to get residency so I can pay for school. And I walk in and the building literally looked like a spaceship, anybody who's kind of like old school, Boulder, Colorado will know exactly what I'm talking about. And it's an independent music company. There were six full-time employees, each of whom were the owners of different companies.

And then there was a person who was kind of running shit. There was a couple other like, you know, accountants and like other people that were kind of showing up. But they were basically hiring for an intern. You were going to kind of learn office stuff. And then they rattled off the bands that they were working with. And I was like, I have no idea who any of those people are. And they're like, great, you're hired. And they didn't want super fans, which I thought was really interesting. And what the other interesting part is I was pretty like punk rock at this point. And these guys were like raging granola ass hippies.

So there was like, not just a, I'm not, I don't know who you're talking. I don't know who these guys are. But I don't even like you.

Like I don't even like you.

But it's not even that cool.

This is kind of lame, yeah, yeah.

But what was really cool was that each one of these people, there was a booking agent, there was a band manager, there was a record label, there was a merchandise company, there was a ticketing company, and then there was a publicity company and kind of like a travel agent as well, 'cause each of the types of bands that go on tour for like 300 days out of the year. So I got to see all of the moving pieces and it was a real DIY approach. And 'cause I'm kind of like all in workaholic person, I started figuring out like, how can you make yourself indispensable? And I've never really given a shit about the work.

Like if I'm taking out the trash or putting together like a booking contract, it doesn't, it's all work as far as I'm concerned. So I figured out how to be indispensable. I also just like followed the money so that I could actually turn this into a job. And I ended up at the record label and I ended up in charge of grassroots marketing, which again, at the time was physically sending out gig posters, writing in the gig day,

Yeah, that's how people do it.

Getting people to fucking tape it up. Yeah, like tape it up around phone polls and we had some like stickers and some other kind of like viral shit at the time and people would take pictures with their analog cameras and send us to like as proof. And then I was in charge of the guest list. And so that like that worked. I really learned grassroots marketing. I learned that it doesn't matter if you have money, if you don't have money, if you're passionate about what you do, you can find your people. It doesn't matter if like the gatekeepers don't give a shit about what you're doing. And it really like, I'm a problem solver.

And so I was able to like find the gaps and then work with the people who got it. 'Cause again, like I didn't know shit about this music or this community, but I could see how like passionate these people were. And so new things kind of started happening. These guys made like a movie. We were trying to throw like listening parties and try and figure out like how do you navigate building a career if no one's gonna play you on the radio. If you can't play any of the major venues 'cause you insist on selling your own ticket so that you can keep things at a certain price point for your audience. Like value aligned music and arts as well.

And then Napster hit, right? So that was all that same time. And suddenly we were like, shit man, no one's gonna buy music. And we were like, I mean, really like, how many people are buying the music anyway?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like one of my jobs was literally calling every single record store in the country 'cause we didn't have a major label. So we would call all the independent record stores.

So you're just looking for like any real grassroots distribution. - Yeah, and being like, consignment, like, yo, can I send you five CDs? And then I'm gonna call you in two weeks and see if you've sold any. Also, who wants to go to the show? Can I put some posters up? Can I give you some extra shit? Hang it in your living room. Like have a party, we don't care. And so it was like that level of connection and follow up and just like building it like one person at a time.

Yeah.

And then Napster showed up and instead of going, well, we're fucked. We were like, this is awesome. Like we're downloading music and getting to hear shit we've never heard before. So thankfully I worked with a bunch of really inspired people who were like, you know, hippies, record shows in the moment. Like maybe we can start recording shows and literally selling them the next day. These people are going on tour. If we're doing that in real time, now we're creating almost like a whole, a whole discography of like every night of a particular tour.

Yeah, it's awesome.

And if you're into the jam, yeah. And the jam band scene, like people are starting songs one night, finishing them another night. Like, so yeah, they really went with it. That was really cool. You know, it was a little hard to navigate. But so I played in that world for a long time and I started to fall in love with the live sound experience. And I ended up interning for one of my interns at a music venue in town. 'Cause I wanted to see like, well, what happens when we actually put the show on and how does that work? And there was one woman who I saw doing sound engineering and I asked her like, how did you, you're the only chick I've ever seen behind a desk.

Like, and she told me she went to audio engineering school, which I didn't know existed. And so I kind of started looking into it. And at this point, I had finished school. I mean, I'm like 21 years old. I've been working full time. Like I didn't go to my own graduation, I went to work. And so I had said to my employers like, hey, in a year when summer tour is on, like can I take some time off? Like a few weeks to like go backpacking around Europe or just kind of like hit the road. And they said no. And I was like, that's interesting. And they were like, we can't lose you. And I was like, okay, let's be real.

I'm like doing grassroots marketing. Everything gets sent out. Like I'd like to think I'm that important. But I think this is more of a like, we don't want anybody setting the precedent that you can take like three or four weeks off.

Right, right.

So, you know, I'm putting together this audio engineering thing. I'm kind of looking around, I find this program in Australia that not only teaches you audio engineering, it taught music, taught you how to read music, taught you also like website design, graphic design. It was kind of this whole gamut of like digital technology, which I had missed the boat on. Like I was still turning in handwritten fucking assignments in college.

Right.

So, I, and also like at the time, it just economically made a lot of sense. Like I was like, I could live here in Boulder, Colorado and continue working full time and spending money. Or I could save up, go to Australia.

And learn something I want to learn, yay.

Yeah, and so did that. Studied audio engineering in a completely new place. Nobody knew me. It was actually probably one of the toughest years of my life, 'cause I went from being like, I don't know, kind of like queen of the scene, and to like a place where like nobody gave a shit about me.

You're literally the other side of the world where no one knows you learning something new, where you had known everything and were kind of like spearheading campaigns for lack of a better word that were like starting to gain traction and like really were doing stuff. But then you were met with what, this is what happens with jobs sometimes. People know this is you think this is like a mutually beneficial kind of symbiotic relationship. And then you're like, oh, I want to do this very normal thing. And they're like, nah, we can't. You made yourself too indispensable. You didn't realize it, but you achieved the thing.

And then it was so indispensable that they literally couldn't afford to have you go somewhere else and just do your own thing. Which is never like a positive feeling. So yeah, I get it.

Yeah, thank you for reflecting that. It's a pretty accurate way of like how I remember experiencing that.

Yeah, it sounds, I mean, I know how I would react and that's it.

Yeah.

It's just, yeah, yeah, basic thing, yeah.

But so yeah, I get to Australia and it was really fucking hard. And I think I'd like, I don't know if this is an American thing or just a me thing, but I overcompensated feeling insecure and alone and vulnerable by being like a raging asshole. And I really got served. I got some very direct feedback, which is something Australians are amazing at.

Yeah.

But it forced me to shut the fuck up and just observe and learn, which was an amazing thing to do when you're surrounded by recording equipment and in studios. I mean, I was literally like sleeping under the desk just like playing with sound and music. And it was amazing.

That's what we're using, like Pro Tools?

We had just started with Pro Tools. I mean, they were like, we were still in that world of like, they were showing us how you used to like edit tape by literally cutting it and taping it back together. And also like, these are, yeah, we were using Pro Tools. It was the first, I mean, I think we had like Pro Tools 2. Was the--

Yeah, yeah, it was back, yeah.

I went to Muse, I started going to Berkeley, I think in 2002, I wanna say. It was my second year in college 'cause I went to Northeastern before that. So like, you know, they had the full desk. I wanna say they were at like four or something that you're something like not that. It was like, it was just still in its infancy, but it was still pretty good, I gotta say.

Yeah, oh, I mean, it was for an untrained ear at that time. And again, someone who had kind of been through the Napster thing, I was like, yo, dudes, like anybody who is white knuckling this analog shit, like, I, like, and so what happened was, is I fell in line with some of the more, again, like kind of gritty metal punk people that were making music. We could, like no one could afford studio rates at the time. That's still when you go in and spend $10,000--

I know, I remember it. Those were the jobs available when people in my class graduated. And this was like 2007, 2008, your job was to go to the hit factory in Miami or some other place in New York, if you were lucky, or some other recording studio interned like a slave for like three years, like cleaning shit up. Maybe they'd let you into the studio with some session 'cause someone liked you. Like, that was the career trajectory for, I mean, not a small portion of the people who I know who graduated with like music production and engineering degrees from Berkeley. It was like, ah, what do we do?

It's totally different now, which is kind of amazing.

It is awesome. And like, so what was interesting about what you just shared is, so at the end of this, like, year of study, I got presented with a job at the biggest studio in Australia. That's where people, like, they didn't want to go to hit factory 'cause it was too expensive. They'd go to Sydney, Australia, and it was a whole like, you could live in, like compound, and it was beautiful.

That's cool.

The old manager from Abbey Road was the manager of this studio. So, I mean, like, Metallica was there, Jay and Beyonce were there, like, some really big names were there. And I knew I wouldn't have an opportunity like that in the United States, so I was like, fuck it, I got it. My intention was not to stay. My intention was to go back to this music venue I had been working at, go back to the companies that I had been working with, and figure out, like, where to from here now with this skill set. But I ended up staying in Australia. And again, just because of the way I think about things, like, I had all, I had now made these connections with people who wanted to be producers, people who wanted to be musicians.

And there wasn't a space for us, so I was like, fuck it, let's just build our own studio. And there was all these, like, old warehouse space in Sydney. So, you know, and that was back in the lake, that was before all the warehouses burned down. So we were, yeah, just building our own studios. And I realized, you know, for us to be able to actually charge what we need to, just to be able to, like, moonlight this, we need higher caliber artists. In order to get higher caliber artists, they need to be on a record label. So I started a record label. And I had this realization where I was like, how many independent record stores are there in Australia?

And it was like 300-ish in the whole country. And I was like, I used to call that many in a day in the States, okay, I can do this. So started a record label. And like, I don't know if it was naivete or just like balls, but they have these directories in the industry, and they exist here as well. Polestar is kind of the gatekeeper for them, but you used to be able to, you know, get a whole directory of every single venue in the country, or every single record label, or every single booking agent. And you could just kind of like, get their contact details. It was usually pretty difficult to get a hold of them.

I replicated that in Australia, and I called up Sony records, and I like talked to the CEO of Sony. He was like, this is Dennis. And I was like, oh shit.

That's awesome.

Hey, what's up? I'm looking for distribution for a new independent record label. And he was like, send me your business plan. And 'cause I'm a fucking nerd, I was like, what's your email? I just sent it. He was like, yeah, looks good, let's do this. And I was like, the fuck just happened. And it was that like, because Australia, and because of the American accent, because of the way I thought about things, I was able to gain access at a level that just would never have happened in the United States.

Right.

So I just kind of kept, I just, I kept going, okay, well, okay, now I have a record label, I have a recording studio, but we're not selling any records. So even though I continue to kind of workshop how this is gonna work, and how everybody's gonna make money, I was like, these guys need to be playing gigs, and they need to be playing gigs that people are going to. So how do I start booking? How do I start doing? I guess I'm gonna start managing these guys. And so I sat down with a couple of the bands that we had been working with, who were, again, had like really jaded experience at the industry, and they hated the man, and they didn't wanna, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I was like, I don't, yeah, I'd completely agree with you. How do we, like, we came up with this like one page, kind of like contract, which was just like, I'll do this, you do that, if we don't like it anymore, we're done here. And started working with some just really cool, really amazing artists, and that, like, I just, I mean, yeah, I ended up doing that for about 10 years. And my mom got sick, and I made another one of my just like gut instinct. Okay, well, I guess that changes everything. Came back to the States. I sort of handed the artists that were really touring, really gigging off, sold half of the recording studio.

I basically shut down the record label because everybody, like, I just rolled up the records from the distributor, like, to that particular label. Sony had started like an independent arm at that point, so it was a pretty clean, amicable break. Obviously, it was gut-runching, but-- Yeah, you're leaving your life, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, but I, you know, I just, I figured if there's one thing I'm not gonna look back on and regret, it's like spending that time with my mom. Right. And also, like, my parents were living in Southern California, I was like, I mean, it's an hour south of LA, like, if I'm gonna pick up a music career, it's probably gonna be the place to do it.

Makes sense. But I had had, I had been working, trying to keep this part of the story short. I ended up in New Orleans, Louisiana, instead, 'cause I already had a relationship with a lot of the artists that were there, and I had been touring them in Australia. And I end up, like, getting a job working for the Jazz and Heritage Foundation and running this arts center, and putting on gigs there. That was a couple of years. One of my friends from Australia, her band was playing Austin City Limits. She was like, hey, do you wanna come to Austin? I was like, fuck yeah, let's do it. I end up there. And she was like, for us to really make a go of it, we need to be in the United States.

And it's New Yorker LA, and I don't think I'm doing New York. And I was like, well, let's see what we can make happen in LA. So, went out to LA, kind of started to like set up some like office and business, and yeah, that was the end of, so that was like 2016 through 2000. Is that accurate? That might've been like 2015 through 2017.

It gets hazy after like four years from me. Honestly, like at this point, I can't, I don't know when the dates are. I just know that the things happened. I just deal and remember what happened. I'm like, oh yeah, that was some point in one of the 2000 years. I don't know anymore.

Yeah, yeah, and I, yeah, the timing and dates around everything are crazy. But, so I end up back in LA working in management, working with like some very exciting bands that are touring internationally. And it was kind of like this moment where everything had come together, all of my like scrapper, grassroots DIY skills, along with being able to speak like engineering talk and like tour management, band management and booking. And it was like one of those moments where I was living a life that I had only fantasized about. And honestly, when you kind of get on that other side of like celebrity and stardom, you don't even know that those things exist, that that kind of like level of access and those events and like that whole like communities is doing what it's doing.

And I was pretty miserable. Like on an unconscious level, I was partying super, super hard. I was very, LA was not some place I had ever thought I would live. And in fact, I actually had a really good time there. Like it was one of the easiest places that I've moved because it is such a transient population. And it is, it's the first place I've lived. It's weird is shit out there. Yeah, but it's like everybody's hustling. No one has a real job. Like everyone's just trying to figure out how you can connect them to the next thing. And so not having anything to prove and being in a position where people wanted to know me like much more than I needed to know them was, it made LA very easy.

And not having to think about leather is also like, you forget. LA, I cherish all of my LA experiences. I was down in Hollywood at Brentwood at one point at Laurel Canyon, I spent over and then it was amazing. I don't, I don't think I woke up in a, it's just all just very like, ethereal. Like it is the city of angels. It's people, I don't think you understand it until you spend any sort of time there. Just how kind of like air sign that place is. It's like the whole industry for the most part is built on image and like, you know, it's this very, it's cool, I loved it. I have no disparaging things to say about LA at all.

I actually had a great time every single time I've ever been there. So I totally get it. But it's also like, it's a fantasy world in a lot of ways and you can choose how long you wanna remain there. But it's an interesting place for sure.

Well, and that's exactly like, my soul was like, we need to make a choice here. And I, again, when I feel, I don't have like a brain to mouth filter. And so I'd be at these events just mouthing off. Like, and my business partner thankfully called me out on it. And we went to brunch one day as you do in LA and she was like, are you happy? And I like burst into tears. I was like, I don't think I am. And the hardest part is this is everything. Like, I didn't even think was possible. And I'm sure you crossed those thresholds a few times in your life where you're like, this is everything I asked for and worked my ass off for.

And this isn't how I thought it was gonna feel. Like, it's crushing. And so she was, I mean, she will forever, I referred her as my moon goddess, like she will forever and always be one of my most favorite people on this earth. And we check in regularly. And again, like very amicable and very beautiful, sort of conscious decoupling that occurred. I mean, she basically like handed me it. Like she like turned the company checkbook around was like, write yourself a number. Let's give ourselves like three to six months to figure this out. But like, you need to take care of you. And you know, like, you know album cycles with bands.

Like we were just on the other side of probably what will be the biggest album cycle for of this band's career. You know, I kind of saw the writing in the stars in the sky. Like the boys are all like getting to their late twenties. They're all like getting married or engaged. It's like someone's gonna get pregnant soon. But I didn't realize it's like also 2020 was just around the corner. Yeah. And so it was weird. It was very like, I had to really check myself and be like, are you just like self sabotaging to the max and destroying what is ultimately like the pinnacle of a career and who knows where this could go?

Or are you like quitting while you're ahead and trying something new? A friend of mine was really sick at the time and I reached out to him and his wife. And I said, you know, I think in a few months I'm sure everything's gonna be fine. But if not, for the first time in my life I can plan ahead and I can be in Colorado and help you guys out. And so I ended up kind of going from LA. I had a few projects that I was working on and just trying to like, I just got my yoga teacher training. And so I was like, entertaining. Like maybe this is something I could all do. Yeah, yeah, as we do. Yeah. But I ended up in Colorado and again, long story short.

That's when like the cannabis industry was blowing up and it's right when like some of these companies who had really established themselves were ready to like start hiring C-suite level kind of people. And they were pulling from different industries 'cause there wasn't a cannabis industry a few years ago. They're like music makes sense. They're like, you know, they were like touring and like ego and being able to like bring all these disparate parties together and like somehow make money and also like stop hemorrhaging money. Yeah, like, so I ended up in the cannabis industry for a couple of years kind of helping this company go from like, you know, 300 employees including like across seven dispensaries to like 1,300 employees with 24 facilities in our state.

Amazing. Yeah, that was really cool. And also like, they had this perception that we can just treat people however the, like for every one person they hired two people were quitting. And I just, I couldn't vibe with the way that they were treating people. And I don't, like, I mean cannabis is fucking great, but like, I don't think-- Yeah, no, no, no, no. This is what happens when you go into industries where you like the product or the person or the thing. When you actually start to work with a lot of them, a lot of those things that are, you know, behind the scenes or that you don't understand it's like a cultural thing reveal themselves.

And you're like, fuck, I'm disillusioned with this shit too. Great, check it off the list. Yeah, yeah, I get it. So I had like, I had realized I didn't have the same level of influence that I did in music in cannabis. And so I had actually like engaged in a coaching certificate thinking that this will just really help me with like my own connection and communication amongst like the people that I'm working with. And what I realized is I've always been a coach. Like my job was never, I was not the boss of anyone. I facilitated the process of success for people. And I think in business, like the metric that we typically use is the value that we are creating.

And you know, one of my goals in music and in the arts was sustainable careers, enabling an artist quote unquote to be able to sustain themselves, their families, their livelihoods, whatever that looked like. And building out structures and systems for people who are pretty anti-establishment. Yeah. And so in leaving the cannabis industry, which was another sort of abrupt move, I reached out to a handful of my music people, a handful of the creatives that I'd been working with. And I just said, hey, I think I'm gonna go out on my own again. And I'm going to provide support and business for people who really wanna like level up, whatever that kind of means.

But the caveat is, is I don't get to tell you what to do 'cause I think that's like one of the main differentiators in terms of coaching. It's like a trigger point for people. And it's not even just in coaching, it's in life. That's why, you know, I usually will recommend to people if I'm like, hey, you could try this thing out to maybe change your perspective. But don't go and tell other people about it right away 'cause the pushback and feedback that you anticipate is gonna affect your ability to kind of believe something. So when someone tells you something, it's like, fuck that. I don't wanna hear that immediately.

And it's, you know, it's just, it's a reflection of what we believe at the time more than anything else. But it is something that I know a lot of people who would consider themselves kind of anti-authoritarian, which I would definitely put myself in that category. It is this like weird hostile reaction, which could be born out of many, many things. It doesn't just have to be like a psychological profile or type, it's just like some people have trauma that trigger like anti-authoritarian behavior. But yeah, that's smart because that's what really, I think stops a lot of people. I think it's also why like things like readings, like when we're ready to do that with other people, it's every time I've ever gotten a reading, it's always been like, okay, I'm gonna trust the energy that comes out of this and the way it's presented because they're not telling me what to do, they're just saying what the energy is.

They're not saying, you are condemned to this, you have to do this, you need to act like that. And that becomes an easier kind of ground or soil to work with there. I get that, that's awesome.

Yeah, and just on the reading point, like what I love about that experience is it, my whole thing is freedom. Like how can we create choice and agency in every single moment? And with readings, you're getting a reflection of the energy and then that offers you a choice. Like, am I vibing with this? Does this feel like it's an alignment and in the direction I wanna go? Or like, holy shit, did this person pull death card and tell me somebody in my life's gonna die?

Yeah, yeah. - Opinions on that. But it's like, again, how do I wanna work with that? And so, and for me, it was like, how do I wanna work with people? Creativity and art are something that, firstly, I believe we are all creatives and artists and none of us have been encouraged or allowed to be so. I think everybody's creativity and art shows up differently. Like, unfortunately, like when I was in, I can remember the exact fucking moment when I was like, you're not gonna be a producer busy. Like, you are not fluent in this language of music to a point where you get to influence other people's art on that level.

Like, you are not the technician 'cause you're too fucking loosey goosey with everything. Like, no one wants to play with guitar sounds for eight hours and pay you to do it. Like, what they do keep asking you to do is put together the plan, run the fucking business, make sure everything's taken care of on that level. So like, where do you wanna be? And it was, yeah, I felt like I'd gotten dumped by somebody I was crushing on like super hard. (laughing) But like, the point to me has never been like, again, it's not about the work. It's like, what are we creating and what are we achieving together?

And I am committed like to arts and creativity and I being able to again, like enable others to find that and then grow that. And if they so desire create an exchange around it, that's super fun for me. And I think it's, you know, I don't think there's a one size fits all anymore. And that's the problem when we're looking for answers, when someone tells us what to do, that's worked for sure. But like, you're gonna have to adapt it to work for you. And that's sort of what I see like the role of coaches being, change is very, very challenging on every single level. I mean, you talk about this in the imaginal techniques.

Like, it's going to change your experience and we inherently respond to change. Like, that's bad, because we don't know what to do in it.

It's because it's when you're thrust into the uncertainty of change and you feel like you can't have any predictive outcome of what it's gonna be. It freaks you out a little bit, but you also on some deep level understand that that is how change comes. Like, it's like the cone heads thing. You know, we fear change. It's like, yeah, you fear change. You don't understand that that literally is the process that you're looking for. And that's why I've, I've been playing around with what quote unquote would be considered negative states of mind, like anxiety, fear, guilt, shame, because they feel a certain way.

When you feel them, you know that feeling. Most people will coil, will do anything to avoid it, to get away from it. But I've been looking at it more and more. Like, we can actually use those feelings as reminders that we're acting or reacting in a certain way and maybe lighten up as much as we can. It doesn't mean it's easy. It doesn't mean it will be a natural process ever for anyone. But at least it's giving you a signal. There's something for which you to react to. And if you're in a relatively safe space, you're by yourself, you feel comfortable, and panic comes in, you can at least play around with the idea that maybe I know everything is gonna be okay.

It's usually been okay. For the few times in my life where it hasn't been okay, I'm still okay now, right? That's panic. Once already at the bottom, by the way, panic ceases to have any impact on you because you're like, "I'm already at the bottom." That is also what happens in depressive states of minds or just like if you find yourself in a really objectively and subjectively very difficult situation, those panic things don't hit you as much. They're just like, "Ugh." And you just kinda take it. When you're really in an acute state of panic, it's because you're fearing you're probably gonna lose something.

There's something out here that is gonna be taken away or you won't be able to actualize or you did something bad. It's why I was talking about the revision technique recently, 'cause it's very easy to react to stuff these days. I don't even think it's these days. I also, I recognize, when we spoke about it briefly, just like that, the period you described, by the way, of technology changing that much is like two decades. It's not that long of a period of time. I remember the transition well, 'cause it was just a part of our lives, but we consume so much information, so much more quickly now than ever before.

And it's like, I'm not making a value judgment at all. It's just like, we definitely are not taking the time to process and react to all of that. So I think it feels like stuff is hitting us more and more and these external narratives or situations are hitting us. More and more, I mean, I was thinking about it in the simplest of terms. Back in the day, if you were in debt, say, you'd have to wait for a mail or maybe a phone call to your house that you had to be there at the right time to be reminded of your debt. Now, if you're in debt, you have 25 notifications going off for all the different, it's just like, it's a crazy situation to be inundated with it.

So like, we have more of this access. You have the same thing with war, whatever it is. There's more of it and we have more access. So it's now, I think people are kind of being forced to deal with their own internal reactions to this, because I think people are also much stronger than they give themselves credit for. And like, this is like a very big test for a lot of people. This like kind of get over this cosmic hump and find kind of where you're aligned. What you're ultimately describing, by the way, is you found your alignment within the ecosystem of the things you love and we're excited about.

That's all you're supposed to do, right? And also, no one was stopping you. You made the decision 'cause you really know what I like. I really like thinking I was gonna be making the music and doing the stuff, but do I really wanna be doing this at the end of the day? 'Cause you could obviously still do it at the other times, you had time to do it, but you're like, no, this is what feels right for me. And as long as I follow the feeling that feels right, doesn't matter where you end up, because you're going to be excited about the thing you're doing. And in your case, it sounds like a couple of times, if not more, you've figured out also when to move on, gracefully, you know?

Some of us have problems sometimes moving on from things gracefully, but it's pretty cool because like, I haven't met a lot of people like you. Most of my friend circle, you know, peer circle are kind of just like me. They're, let me fix this camera. They're just like me, where like, they are kind of just like creatives and just like, wherever the wind will take us, that's what we'll do. And to even think about building a business or a structure around it is like anathema. Like, we just don't wanna do it. It's like a poison to our brains. So I don't know a ton of people like you, but I've seen what you've been able to do.

We've worked together on a few things. We've talked and you really seem to like understand the creative's mind without actually necessarily like being troubled by the business aspects or the way to how to like build a structure, like an ecosystem around something, which is pretty fucking cool. I gotta say, it's good to have a friend like you and as a creative. Oh, thank you Noah, that's a huge compliment. I absolutely received that. I, you know, I think one of the challenges for creatives is you can see things others can't. Like I often describe my people as visionaries. And the challenge with that is you spend a lot of time and energy trying to explain something people can't see.

And there will forever and always be a million hundred ideas in the creative sort of experience. So I work hard to like simplify things. And what you just described to me is like, does it feel good? Does it feel bad? And so often when it feels bad, we try to make it mean something. Like some of us make it our fault so that we can take control of it. Sometimes we blame the system and the colonialist, capitalist, patriarchy that we're all forced to engage in. But like all of that is I think an energy leak. Like at the end of the day, what we're hearing, and I experience energy like frequencies. Like if I were to visualize it, I see it.

Like I would on a screen, you know, in a pro tools.

Yeah, the EQ, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, the EQ. And so often with bad, what I do is I kind of like hone in on that particular frequency and how it feels in my, like if I'm an antenna, like how does that physically, how does that waveform feel in my body? And most of the time, my brain, 'cause I'm kind of, I think people are either like feel it first or think it first, I'm much more of a like think it first. And then I use the thoughts to identify the feeling.

Yeah.

And the example I often use is like, when we feel like super nervous and freaked out about something like, you know, we might feel like shallow of breath or palms might sweat, like my mouth will sweat. I kind of feel it in the back of my neck. And that I can define that as this feels bad. But I can think of other experiences. Like when you're like cranking up on like a roller coaster, it feels exactly the same. Excitement is something that like I've manufactured my experience, like last night I went and saw stop making sense, the talking heads. And I was so fucking pumped. It was so cool and never thought in my life.

It was fucking awesome. But like, like that excite, like that frequency shows up with the same physical symptoms. So I have this opportunity and I think this is where like choice really comes into it. And what you're describing is this, we can use this interpretive opportunity to feel bad, for sure. And that's when we can start to work with ourselves and go, okay, I'm ultimately I'm seeking safety and security. How can I give that to myself without judgment? That's kind of my first question. And I think I mentioned like the energetic levels. I call them level one, two, three, four, five, six, seven to get it really simple.

But that level one response is like, I just need safety and security.

Yeah.

And so often we've externalized that. Again, like it's our jobs or it's our partners or it's our communities or it's the things that we have or the dopamine hits that we turn to to kind of give ourselves that. But once we start to realize like it's only us that can give ourselves that, P the ferry talks a lot about this. Like once you realize like you can resource yourself, that's when you create resilience and confidence. You're able to put yourself in more uncomfortable. Like you can challenge that feel bad frequency and recognize like, okay, once I have the safety and security, I kind of pop up to level two.

And now I'm looking for control. I've felt powerless. And to me control is just simply like, do I have a choice here? And I talk about that like is the binary. We know this is a multiple choice test. So if we're going true, false, right, wrong, better, worse, good, bad, like we're just in it and we can't see it. Again, we need to resource ourselves. Like we need to take care of ourselves and only we know the answer to that question. And you can kind of continue to climb up that energetic ladder. But for creatives, like there isn't, there is a frequency, I'm sure you're familiar with it. And so is everybody listening to this?

We're like, it does feel limitless.

Yeah, of course.

The ideas are there, you're in flow, whatever that means for you, like it's easy, it's fun. You're tinkering with the song or the words or the image. And it like, it's this experimental kind of experience where there isn't a right, wrong, good, bad. And in fact, you're kind of just letting each step lead to the next. And so that's where like in terms of honoring the creative experience and the creative's mind, it's like, what do we need to do to create a container that allows for that space? And like what needs to happen beforehand to create that? 'Cause for everybody, it's gonna be different. And I think for most people, it's probably gonna change depending on circumstance, sometimes just depending on the fucking weather in the seasons, like.

Totally, or just the astrology of the moment, it's a thing. It's a vibe.

Yeah, and also like, even I struggle with will it's a clip season. So like I'm gonna be like thinking like this, that, and the other, maybe, or I can just bring myself back to presence and recognize like, yeah, I'm really fucking tired and I'm sleeping a lot more than I'd like to, but okay, here we are, you know? And initially that would have, I would have interpreted that like, I stayed up to light partying or too late partying, watching stop making sense. And it's like, I'm not undoing that. That's the best decision I've made all month, like.

Exactly.

So yeah, I'm kind of getting meandering here. But I think, again, we've all been told there's a certain way to succeed and there's a way that you need to show up and there's all of these responsibilities and obligations. And at the end of the day, it's as simple as, does this feel good, does this feel bad? And when I reflect on what feels good, how can I kind of create a replica, like an experiment, a scientific fucking experiment with a hypothesis and a theory and we test it and we see if it works and then we look at the results and we're like, yeah, cool, that worked. But this thing felt a little weird.

I'm gonna try that again with a little less of this thing and maybe something else, you know? So I approach everything like it's an experiment and that takes the pressure off. And I think for creatives, like it's never gonna be done. And when we recognize at some point, you gotta hit send. Like you gotta share the song with people.

Totally.

I mean, assuming you want people to hear it or like you gotta start learning another song. You know, whether it's like a very internal or externalized sort of offering.

Yeah, it's true. And that is something that happens with any kind of creative medium. You decide like what is going to go out into the world and what is gonna be. Either for now, a thing that other people won't really hear or maybe a few people around you. But it is like a decision, all of its decision making, that's the most I've taken away from making music creatively is that you have to make decisions at some point, right? You don't have them, they don't have to be the right decisions for the rest of the time the thing exists. But if you don't make decisions, you will forever not finish things because you are going to be forever trying to make the thing perfect.

And most of the stuff that I've found and a lot of the stories I've heard from people who have, you know, succeeded on great levels in their artistic mediums. Most of the stuff comes out effortlessly and almost accidentally. For a lot of people, like the best stuff, it's not sitting there slaving over something for 12 hours. It doesn't mean you can't create your, you know, magnet opus and it's like gonna be the best thing ever, but it's not really like that. And I think it's tough because I think, you know, there were years ago, probably like six or seven years ago, I could see a lot of like what's happening now evolving in, you know, the life of people who were creating stuff, right?

Whether it was comedians, musicians, artists, just people who had jobs that clearly wouldn't be there. And we can see this more acutely now with like stuff with a AI. And I think at the time I saw it as like this, oh, look how amazingly positive this is gonna be as an experience for creatives. Kind of jumping past the point where there's that transition where everyone's like, what do we do now? Like, how does this work? How do we actually effectively like do things in this world that is ever shifting? The rules are constantly changing, but yet I have this urge to create something and I'm not sure where it fits in.

And something that I was realizing, I think I heard Rick Rubin say it. And at first I was like, no, that's not true. And then I thought about it a little more. I'm like, no, that's totally true. He was like, listen, sometimes if you're creative, that's not supposed to be your career too. You can figure out a way to achieve the aspects of what you wanna do creatively. There's no limit on your reach or popularity. I see this all the time on Spotify. There are people who you can tell made a song or two, made a few things. This is clearly their side hustle, but it has millions of downloads. Like I don't think they care and would sacrifice, however it is they're primarily making their money.

I don't think they would trade that for the millions of listens they had for their song. That's usually what most artists really want. It's an expression of themselves, what they enjoy, what they liked, that to be heard is like the end result for most creatives. They're not, how will this make me money? How can I stream this? How can I do that? I mean, obviously there are, that is a part of the industry, we know that. But for the most part, that's not what the creative person is doing. So, trying to box yourself in, like how do I succeed? And I'm guilty of this too at times, 'cause we've had conversations about this just with synchronicity.

Like, you know, I don't wanna box myself in as some way of like having to do something and make a decision here and not be reflective, but I told you and I think we agreed that like, I can't do stuff that isn't authentic. Like I just, I feel like almost physically prevented from taking that action because it just feels like icky to me and I'm like, I don't even know what I'd be doing at that point. But yeah, like you have to like ask yourself these questions and like what is going to be the most like important thing in your life. Like that's the choice. Like, is it the stuff that makes you feel good?

Like you're following through, like you're achieving the stuff you wanna be achieving, or is it going to be this kind of constant battle and struggle and obstacle that you're fighting constantly because you're either clinging to something, you don't wanna let go or you're just afraid of what's to come beyond it. And I think that's how crisis sees, like that's how they evolve. Like, I think I've come to terms with enough crisis in my life to recognize when we're really ready to test out like our interfaith and conviction. Some serious shit will go down in our lives. Some serious, like something that we take seriously and then it's our kind of responsibility or test to be like, is this gonna be okay?

Like, is it gonna work out? Like, is this actually gonna result in something good or is this going to be the point where everything goes downhill forever? And ultimately what I think freaks a lot of people out is that is a choice. Like you can totally make the choice where shit goes down so far hill that it's kind of fucked. I mean, objectively, subjectively, you probably feel like that too, but it is this like personal choice that we have to make and kind of place our faith. People call it God, people call it whatever. I call it this camera moving on its own. You ever noticed that this one does that?

It does. You got to turn that off in the Insta360. Like that it's tracking you if you open up the app and then you can turn that off.

But it's like, what is it tracking?

Indeed. (laughing)

That's pretty funny. I was thinking of so much to say about all of that. Well, I think one of the things that happens is anytime you're good at somethings, people are like, you should sell that. And there's, the problem is, is once you start asking for a monetary exchange, the job is not making the thing. It's selling the thing. And there ain't nothing wrong with that, but it's just a different channel for your energy to move in. And I would have a lot of creatives come to me and say, like, hey, will you manage me? Will you book me?

Sure, me, blah, blah. And it's just like, look, you're phenomenal. This is for you to be successful in this. This is what it's gonna look like on a day to day. Is that, do you even have the capacity for that? Like if you're already working a lot, do you have time? You know, to be doing the different bullshit things that like are kind of required to build an audience. And, you know, I find a lot of people in general. It's, you know, whether they define themselves as a creative or not. Spend a lot of time thinking about and rallying against the things they can't do. And, you know, and especially 'cause this energy can show up fairly strong and people who might qualify themselves as like an introvert or like a highly sensitive person or ADHD AF as I like to describe myself.

Like, you know, and I think all of those things are superpowers, you know, procrastination. Like, I think these are, again, frequencies. We can harness for good it with awareness and choice. No, not everybody is gonna be able to build a following and be able to manage a community of, you know, thousands, little owned, tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of people. And I don't think that's the requirement in order to create success. But I do think you, like, if you don't wanna do it, it's gonna be real hard.

That's the thing. - Yeah, yeah. If you don't wanna do it, that's the real question. 'Cause you said you would present people what it would take, like, I think people often fail to realize that, and I say it with the imaginal stuff too, 'cause it can really put you on a timeline or a path where everything is exactly happening the way you wanted it to happen. But then you realize the level of energy and commitment you have to put towards that to really, like, walk that walk is significant. It is a very tall task. And this shows up in all aspects of our lives. It's not just career. It's just like, are you going to make that decision?

Is it going to be the thing that literally is like a choice you're making that inexorably, like, changes where your energetic output to go? It's nice you can give people kind of a semblance or a taste of, like, what that would be like, 'cause I don't think people really, like, understand that. It's not as much as it can be, like, a very quick decision that people want to make, the commitment to do that. Like, you could look at, like, your most hated pop star, right? The one you think is a total sham and just, like, totally full of shit and they have no talent and they're just lucky to be there.

I bet they bust their fucking asses off to make sure they're in that position. They're not just getting plucked from obscurity, you know, to be made a star in that way. That's viral things and that's totally different. That's cool that that exists now. But people really like, this is a commitment. If that's the life you really want to live, recognize that what would be the things you're doing every day. Like, how is that gonna look? How much time are you gonna have for even family or other obligations that you view as essential? Especially, like, you mentioned a job. Are you willing to quit your job?

Are you willing to kind of, like, put it on the line? Knowing it may not work out and you may have to come back with your tail between your legs. Knowing that as a possibility, are you willing to stake that to go do the thing that you think you want to do? That's when you figure out if you really love something or you just really, really, really like it. Like, it's a big distinction between those two things that I think a lot of people don't ever even test or don't think they have the opportunity to test. But you always have that ability. I mean, you can always try to do that. Your standard of living, your life may look entirely different.

But, you know, for the risk of verse, this stuff, I think is a little bit harder to do 'cause it's like, you know, that is a big choice to be making in people's lives and, you know, it can be tough. I get it, but still true. Well, for the risk of verse, I mean, we're all risk of verse. It's just some of us have put ourselves in the fire over and over and over and over again. And like, you know, I always say-- By choice or not by choice sometimes too, it feels like. Yeah, well, you know, like again, it definitely feels like that. But, you know, like those crises, we talked a little bit about this.

Like, as you come back around the bend of the spirallic experience, you are armed with everything that's happened before. And I feel like I'm not a gamer. So I use video game analogies, LOL. But it's like when you get to the big boss at the end of the level, like, it's gonna take you a few times of fighting that big boss and then you get to the next level and none of the tools, none of the cheats, none of the skills, like none of the pathways that you'd forged in that previous level exist anymore. And you're at the beginning again. So what I, you know, I'll often say, like, are you willing to suck at this probably for a lot longer than you think it's gonna take.

Like, I kind of see it as like this pyramid. There's money, there's time and there's energy. And depending on what you have available, it's gonna be like a very like, isosceles triangle in terms of like, people can spend a lot of money to fast track things. But like when you see those people that appear to have been plucked from like the social media ether and put onto this pedestal, like, there is a cost that tends to happen. And when you kind of step back and look at this timeline over a longer period, there's a ton of mental health stuff. Like you said, there's a lot of interpersonal relationship stuff.

Like, you know, we look at these end results and we're like, wow, that person is amazing. And it's like after having mortgaged, re-mortgaged their house twice, they're onto their fourth marriage. They have been to rehab six different times. Like, cool, if that's worth like, multiple millions of dollars and celebrity and notoriety, like that, they made that exchange, you know? It is, I think for the risk of verse, it's like understanding you deserve to feel safe and secure. And that is going to, like, the time that this might take, well, I never like to tell anybody how long I think it's going to take.

I'll say it takes as long as it takes. But if our energy is limited, which I would kind of describe as like risk averse in the sense that you don't have the capacity for certain things, whatever your experience may have been. Or maybe you're taking the time to really kind of workshop that and heal and resource yourself. So that's going to take your energy away from this particular endeavor. Like, the time component stretches out, perhaps the money component stretches out as well. You know, I think the best like situation for people is when they find some kind of a JOB that they can show up at, they can do it.

And like the magic money just shows up in their bank account every two weeks. And that gives them the space and the capacity to do whatever the fuck they want to do outside of that.

Right. That balance is pretty fucking cool. And yeah, when you can, again, like if you're doing what you want to do, it doesn't matter what it looks like to anybody else. And yeah, I mean, I know you and I have both gotten a ton of judgment from outside. Like my family, my parents have never been able to tell people what I do for work. Like my mom told people I was a bookkeeper. I mean, granted she is like, not, yeah, she doesn't know what's going on anymore. But like, you know, my dad, I think he would just like go to my brothers instead. He'd be like, well, yeah, she's like a little, but you know, Graham.

So it is kind of being willing to commit to something that like other people are gonna have opinions about. And if you, I often say like the jury is out. And like I joke around like right now, I've just relocated. I liquidated like all of my crypto, all of my investments. I went all in on this property because I, I'm also like a big walk the walk person. And in 2020, I kind of realized like how predatory the like landlord tenant situation is. Yeah. And so I'd been looking for a way to use crypto. Like I don't, I'm not starting a commune by any means, but I feel like there is a way that we can create a mutually beneficial relationship where people feel secure in their homes, they're affordable.

And like whether it's long term or short term, they're able to house themselves in a place that's like beautiful and inspiring. And like if we're using crypto as the kind of like means of exchange, then that fund, obviously like effectively managed should grow, which also gives people a cushion and some security. So I like, I've been talking about this for three years now. And I finally was like found a prop, like found a place where I feel like, okay, I can really start to tinker with this. And like I like emptied out my savings, emptied out my bank accounts. I have like zero and everything and went all in.

I'm currently like renting a room in someone else's house. Like, you know, I joke that like I'm, I am 44 like unmarried with no kids renting a room in a house. Like most people have a pretty strong opinion about that.

Yeah.

You know, when we were talking about it yesterday, like yeah, and I am in support of people who are building multi, you know, their businesses are grossing like 30 million in revenue or they've got, you know, a hundred employees in multiple facilities. And one might look at my situation right now and again, have some significant opinions about it. But it's like, I think when you were committed to this process of building and experimentation and value alignment, I mean, that's one of like a fun freedom, adventure and excellence. Like when I filter everything I do through those things, I can't fuck it up.

It doesn't matter the risk that I'm taking. Yeah.

That's the thing you ultimately believe in those principles in yourself and are confident that that will continue to play out in your reality. And that's really like at the end of the day, all of the imaginal techniques, any manifestation stuff, any spiritual, whatever paradigm complex or simple you wanna put on it, that is all it is. Every single thing, I was picking up some old Buddhism books and like it's all faith, faith, faith, faith, everything down the line. And that's just, it's a feeling of expectancy that things can be lived from a certain place. People are looking for different ideologies, different places to kind of put their faith in, but they ultimately know what feels right for them.

They know what feels kind of unsatisfactory, what feels like, maybe not my vibe. Like that's all it is. Just find that aspect that you have within yourself and you're gonna be able to do whatever you want, no matter how it looks. And trust that you'll probably challenge yourself across the way multiple times to really test that, to see if that's really a believed thing. And yeah. Why, like, paradox I've been playing with recently is what if the problems show up? What if the crises show up to prove you're on the right path? Like so often we go, oh, well, this fucked up. So then something wrong happened.

But it's like, no, like, you have to be doing something new if something you didn't expect is happening. And what if that's the opportunity for growth? And like it is, but it always is, right? Like it just doesn't feel like it. (laughing)

But it sucks when you're fucking in it and believe me, like the amount of times I've been ugly crying on the floor, like, well, this is fucking it. It's all fucking over. At an experience, like this was part of my whole 2020, like I'm just getting out of this particular fucking game and off this timeline.

Yeah.

I just realized I made a mistake that cost me 50 grand. And I had a client session that was within like an hour and I'm like on the floor, like sobbing, like just beating the shit out of myself. And it's kind of like when a toddler has a tantrum and they kind of like look around at one point and they're like, wait, is anybody? Wait.

Yeah, exactly.

There's no one, like no one gives a shit. Like firstly, if you're making mistakes like this, like that's kind of cool. You can make a mistake that costs 50 grand. Like remember when that was your entire annual like salary and that was a big fucking deal for you. Like, you know, I was like, so, but you now need to either cancel this session or you need to get your energy fucking together because you can't show up for somebody like this or even remotely close to this.

Exactly.

So how about you use some of your fucking tools and see where you land. You might need to cancel full permission or you might be able to show the fuck up and trust. Like you can't see how this is, you're not on the other side of this right now. So you don't have the answer. Like you're in the binary. You don't have the multiple choice options. Believe and know they're there. And you're going to turn this into one of your long ass, long winded fucking stories that you use to like inspire people and galvanize people because it would be really fucking boring if I was like, yeah. So I was in Boulder and I got promoted to be the VP of marketing and then I went to Australia and I got promoted to be the producer in a studio and like everything has been really amazing and I didn't make any mistakes at all.

Oh, it's so relatable too. It's the most relatable thing 'cause that's everyone experience of. I mean, it's also, even if that is like someone's actual story, like no shame to you, but like, it's not the most interesting one. It's not actually what most people's felt experience of life is like either. And I think that I see more and more kind of interest in that and I'm encouraged by it. I mean, the fact that, you know, some of me and my friends can do this type of stuff and have any group of people find and kind of connect with what we're saying is a testament to that it's possible. I mean, it really is because very few of us are doing what you would consider kind of like traditional marketing or like traditional, you know, we're trying to do this thing that will get us more attention.

And it does seem to keep happening because I think people do want some aspect of relatability when they're like learning may be important things. It's one thing from my work with in like the nonprofit world with a lot of the, you know, big, big people who I see are actually doing really well on social media in a lot of ways and it feels pretty authentic. And I gotta say, it's pretty dope. But at the time, I always kind of took a little bit of an exception and this is my anti-authority thing. Obviously with like this persona of like, oh, I have it all figured out. Like this is all you do. Like here it is.

Like, oh yes, I'll admit to some faults and wrongdoings but really I have it all figured out. I'm like, how do you, is that really your life? Like, is that really your experience? Like are you actually the person who never, like you never just like burn your toast or stub your toe or like someone does something that just pisses you off and you act like an asshole. Like that never happens to you. And maybe it's true, I just, most of the people I've forged like strong connections with throughout the years, friends, obviously family. I don't know anyone who's like that. I've never met anyone who's just living this kind of like perfect docile, enlightened existence.

And I think it's cool to offer that as like two people as something to aspire to. But yeah, it's not how people really actually experience life. There's a way to use the negative to still stay optimistic and positive and still have amazing results happen. But it doesn't mean you're gonna be like not going through experiences that don't feel good or are difficult or are challenging. And that I think, you know, is important just to remember because otherwise you really start riding on this like very high, it's like a tight rope dance. And it's like a, you're gonna fall maybe once in a while. Maybe you grab the thing and you climb back up which is the proper response.

But if you're getting so high where you're gonna really look down and freak yourself out, maybe just chill out and recognize, you know, energy has a pattern of oscillating and going up and down. And you do have the tools to make this an amazing experience. There's no reason it has to be, you know, predominantly terrible or you're gonna feel panic-stricken. There's gonna be obstacles everywhere. You do get periods of ease. That is something that happens. But to also recognize that like, you know what? Maybe you can look at this whole both sides of the coin, the good and the bad we got. I mean, I, the reason I still use astrology is I'm astounded, I have to fix this camera constantly.

I don't know what it picks up. Also, I think it picks up like ghosts and shit in here. Hand movements, hand movements. Oh, then that's why it's always doing it. Yeah. It thinks it's my head. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, no, it's actually like the camera itself, like the whole point of it is that you can like point to a whiteboard and then it zooms in on the whiteboard or you can like ask it to check. Yeah, you just turn the settings off 'cause like I'm, it's not doing that for me 'cause I turn it off. Yeah, yeah, it constantly does this. I've been talking to people and I have to move it back.

But yeah, essentially all I'm saying is it's like, you do have the power to increase the enjoyment. The, if you desire luxury, comfort, security, and these like the levels you were talking about remind me of the chakras like big time. 100%. Oh yeah, I mean, it's everything. Positive psychology, Maslow's hierarchy. Yeah, seven is a number of mastery. Like, yeah, yeah, it's super important. And I mean, the root chakra, right? Muladhara in, you know, Vedic conceptions is basically security, right? It's just getting your base level stuff. I think people almost have to go back in various aspects of their life constantly to that place.

It feels like, oh, we're past one. We'll go to two, three, four, oh, we're at the heart level. Everything's wonderful. Oh, we're communicating everything we've ever wanna express. We're at the throat chakra level. Great, you know, realize cosmic consciousness. We're ready to ascend level seven, but it is a journey up and down. Like your body is a circulatory system that moves the energy through all of these places. And there are these kind of like funnels and stuff we can open. And it's nice to be able to recognize when you're at a certain point related to like your obstacles or your difficulties rather than just buying into a narrative that, oh man, like the world's kind of a shitty place.

Look at all the horror, it's all so many bad things. People are getting sick, people are dying, people I care about, like all this stuff can make it seem like a miserable place. And the truth is, it's like we do live in a world of death. And I don't mean that to sound terrifying to people. It's why when I told everyone we're dead one time, I got a lot of emails. They're like, do you really think we're dead? I'm like, listen, yeah, but not in the way you think I think I'm saying it. But you know, we do live in a world where death exists. We do live in a world where most of us recognize our specific perspective of this existence and our consciousness will alter in some significant way when we die, when we leave the mortal body.

We're aware of that on a very like profound and intimate primal level. That's a pretty badass thing to do in my estimation as an infinite kind of unbound being. To make a decision, and I don't think anyone forced us to do this, you make a decision as like a piece of consciousness to go and live this identity. What I think a lot of people forget, the way you do that is you fall in love with the version of the self you are now. You can't embody this. No one would pick that up as even a challenge if they didn't have that type of love for it. And I do think that's like the source of everything. And it's why people typically encounter this unconditional love or state of perfection.

And that's what they describe it as because that's the process for what's going on. But if you forget that completely and you buy into everything else that's going out there that's very convincing, very realistic, very lifelike, doesn't feel like VR at all, then you kind of can get into these weird thought and feeling patterns that aren't helpful for you. And it's important to be able to drop any deeply held belief at any point. And it's also important to be able to hold on and cling to something that you really do feel is true. They're equally important skills. And I think recognizing that and trying to take some responsibility and accountability for it is going to become kind of a more and more important thing for people to do because this place is so malleable right now.

It's never been so malleable. I mean, I can say that from just living through pre-internet stages, it doesn't even have to be a mystical or woo thing. This place is wonky. It's weird. The way people's thoughts and feelings hit each other and the way even media is designed to prey on that at times, nefariously or not, it's a weird place. So I do think it's important that people, they recognize there's something they're excited about or they care about actually taking steps to move towards that, even if it's just in your mind, even if it's just in your feelings. That's enough these days to actually get on a track where things start to make sense, in my opinion.

I completely agree and I want to pull out some nuggets from there because I think what happens on this journey is we bring awareness to our own experience, to our own desires. We start, quote unquote, doing the work. But how can I be successful in this when everything around me is a fucking dumpster fire? My family isn't supporting me. I have to go to this soul sucking job. I have to get in a car or get on public transportation, which is fucking running the gamut every morning or evening, and there's like a disassociation that kind of occurs where we feel like, well, I'm doing my best, but I can't be successful because this world is impossible.

And so that's where I find like, are the imaginal techniques any different than prayer or transcendental meditation or going for a fucking run? Totally. Again, I feel everything and it hits me as a frequency. And so the answer, no, like you can be just as effective in reading a book or playing a video game as you are going on a run or meditating. It's kind of all about that intention. And I do think this is where like art and creativity to me are our lifelines because like, would we can imagine it or feel it? I was in this conversation with somebody the other day and I was like, it is just as simple as feel good, feel bad and he's like, but what about the people who have never felt good?

And I was like, have those people never felt the sun on their skin? Okay, he was like, well, you know, there's people trapped in Jay and I was like, okay, well, they can breathe. Like, and you know, this is where breath work is such a powerful tool and it doesn't have to be some like two hour thing where you're like, you can just literally feel the oxygen entering into your body and recognizing that's fucking magic. Like what happens after that? That like, that's the one thing you can't do without for three minutes and yet you give yourself that all day, every day without even thinking about it.

Like, what the fuck? And it's like that, what I love like, I'll share with the imaginal techniques for me when shit hits the fan. I'm not like, I'm very clear on what's happening in some indiscriminate amount of time. Like way far, you know, the destination, the sun setting and the horizon. But like, I just want tomorrow to feel cool. Like, can I just, before I go to sleep, imagine waking up in the morning, not exhausted. You know, I go to the yoga class or I go for a walk or I have some coffee, kind of whatever. But like, after that, I feel ready for the shit storm. But instead of it being a shit storm, it feels like I was able to accomplish what I needed to accomplish.

And then I can, you know, kind of fast forward and I'm like, taking it to tomorrow. Like, and amount of times I put my head down at the end of that day. And I was like, holy shit, man, I imagined today exactly the way that it was. And I can do that again for the next day. It is, this is a wild fucking ride we all signed up for.

Yeah.

And I think, again, we're all wired differently. Like for anybody in the human design space, like I am an open root chakra and a non-sacral being. The sense of bullshit urgency and stress that I absorb because I pick up everybody else's and then interpret that as someone who is very accountable and likes to take responsibility 'cause then I can fix it. Like that narrative, that record is constantly playing in the background. And I have to bring my attention to it and go, am I safe? Cool. Okay, if I feel like I have to, I have one choice here, I know I'm not, I'm in it. And I have to do, you know, we were talking about the, the counterintuitive thing, which is probably stop and go outside and feel the sun on my skin or take a nap or take a, I have this whole, I call them energy stocking activities.

Like it's over 40 different things that I'll go to. And if I get four or five, like if calling a friend, going outside, breathing, making myself a cup of tea, taking a shower bath, like don't get me to where I feel like I wanna be to be successful in whatever's coming up next. Like I can't sing that shit.

Well, that's, yeah, that's what I've been calling red light green light energy basically.

Yeah, no when to go, no when to not go. Because if you're going when you're not supposed to be going, the chances of an accident or something in your mind, not really feeling like things are working out even though you're trying so hard, it's not actually what creates any of our experience. It's the part where we gently accept thoughts imbued with emotions in our subconscious. That's literally the pattern. You can, you can phrase that any number of ways or any number of modalities, that is what it does. It's just usually, we don't even recognize we're doing it. It's just our reactions to stuff and we just take that as a fact or like some real thing.

And I just seen how it works in my own life when applied diligently with some effort. And you know, you were talking about waking up and imagining your day how you want it to go, or even the night before. You can also do the revision stuff, you know? You can go back and, if something hits you, and let's just say something went objectively shitty. Something did not work the way you wanted it to do, to go or do or someone reacted negatively or you reacted negatively. You can always go back at any point after that and imagine it went different. Are you actually going to change the other person's memory of what happened?

No, I wouldn't aim for that level of control, but will it potentially loosen up some energy you created in yourself? Because your body really can't distinguish between what's an imagined state or some like really imbued emotional picture of what's going on and actually what's going on. That's literally why that stuff works, just from like a metaphysical thing. It's a higher dimensional reality. Higher not in better, higher not in actually higher, it's just more subtle. There's no physical form to it like we have here. It's just a picture done in your consciousness. That cascades into this reality.

The issue is we don't see we're doing that constantly by our reactions. We don't see what we're feeding to our subconscious, which will literally deliver whatever we tell it to, whatever we feel and know deeply. That's why when people say to me, you're bringing up, I think the example with your friend and I think I was thinking about exactly how to kind of deal with this situation going forward 'cause it's how I deal with my mind when I'm doing my best job. Is if someone's like, hey, yeah, that's great, that works for you, you know, you get to live this life, but what about the suffering people here?

What about the horrible things there? And I'm just gonna ask them, like, what are you doing?

Yes.

Literally, what are you doing now? Like, why are you asking those questions? Are you motivated and caring enough to go there and address the situation? And like, or are you just pointing out inconsistencies that you're viewing and what I'm saying without having to actually try the thing and see if it works? 'Cause if that's the case, cool. I am not trying to convince you that this is an active principle, literally not my job, please go somewhere else or find some other thing that's gonna like feel better. And more often than not, like, you know, if you treat your own thoughts like that, like, what am I doing right now?

That's how, that's really what I find myself asking when I go to kind of like a negative place. It's not even a judgment, it's not like you're dick, don't do that, it's just like, what are you doing right now? Why are you doing this? That's the first question. And then from there, I can be like, oh, like, actually I really do know that things work out and I'm an awesome person and there are really good things that are meant to happen. Then those thoughts can come in and they can cascade up until I think we both agree. P is that like, P the fairy is like the top echelons of what you can experience enjoyment and joy in your life.

And we've all probably had periods like that too and they may even last for a lifetime, but like she's really identified what systems and kind of ways to approach identity creation and what you resonate with to create a very positive and harmonious experience. Which personally, I think everyone should endeavor to, if not to just experience what it's like and to know what's possible. You don't want forcing you to stay there, trust me. If you want to go back into the muck where there's plenty of us that do that plenty of times, it's always a choice, but just asking yourself like, what am I doing right now?

Like, why am I thinking, like, what is the root of this? And if you can get an answer, amazing. If not, just be like, maybe I'll do something else.

That, so the point I was trying to make earlier in terms of like the outside world being a dumpster fire is like, can I do something about this right now?

No.

Or like, can I do, am I trying to convince this person of something they can't even see or hear? Okay, like, how can I bring it back in? And ultimately, like just taking care of yourself, resourcing yourself, like if everybody felt safe and secure, we would live in a completely different fucking world. So I think that's one of the most powerful things we can do that will create that ripple effect with, my brain is popping off of like a thousand things that I want to say about everything. And that is kind of the counterintuitive. We're taught to like externalize so much. And ultimately, if you just like bring it back in and think about like our, so I heard it described and there's a modality that I practice called Theta Healing, which goes to the root of that.

Yeah, I know.

To feel the issue. Yeah, and you know, it's not just similar to like timeline jumping or hypnosis. Again, there's all of these different tools that we have. And like if you're a carpenter, you're going to use one set, if you're a plumber, you're going to use another, but they all get the fucking job done. But what I discovered with through this modality is that, so our conscious mind is able to process like 400 bits of data in any given moment. Like I'm talking to you, I'm looking at the lighting, like I'm thinking, I'm trying to remember like all the amazing things you said and like how I want to play with that.

My subconscious mind is processing about five million data bits in any given moment, 'cause I'm breathing, my heart is like--

The whole autonomous system, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So what happens in our physical experience in this particular incarnation is that at some point, our conscious mind went action result. And the result ultimately was successful. You know, even in the horrible circumstance, we learned to hide, which keeps us safe. And safety gives us security, which then makes us feel confident and like we can try new things. But then we create this loop of like, I have to hide to do something new. And sometimes it's very counterintuitive, which is when we find ourselves looping, but what we do is use our conscious mind to try and like pattern interrupt or like take the record off the record player.

And it almost feeds that cycle rather than break set. And so to your point, we have to recognize like, why is this thought coming up? Why am I hearing? You are the creator of your own reality as blame. Oh, because when I was blamed for shit, or my culture and community were constantly ostracized in the only way that we could find our ways that, you know, this stuff can be cultural, it can be ancestral, it can be soul level.

Totally.

This is just the human fucking experience. But when we recognize, and this will sound blaming for people like, everyone is getting exactly what they need. And they're just doing their best to get it. If it's not working anymore, that's the opportunity. And so like when we like, I take risk, I create that sense of urgency and anxiety because it gets my ass out of fucking bed and gets shit done. Also, I burn the fuck out. And this is where I kind of like rally against some of the, like this is my anti-establishment, like I love astrology and human design and gene keys and all like all of this value.

Yeah, we share this, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because it helps my own fucking insanely conscious four left arrows, brain go, "Oh, there's potentially another way of thinking about this." And a container within which we can be successful. But like, I also kind of refuse to adhere to any of the labels. I think energy is on a spectrum. It's an EQ. - Totally.

It's an EQ.

And I'm not a Taurus, Sagittarius rising. Like I have all of the, I'm also as much Scorpio as I am Taurus.

I think also like, you know, if you go and look at even certain systems of astrology, like progression, so you're constantly moving through the charts. I mean, the way I look at all of the kind of divine arts that I resonate with or have resonated with is they're all just descriptions. It's like trying to come back from a psychedelic trip and like put into words what the trip was like. Like, yeah, you're doing it. You're describing that weird being you met and with the DMTLs and the fractal space and people are even able to replicate it visually, you know, and visionary art and stuff. But at the end of the day, like, that experience is actually what you encountered.

And that's the way I look at broader energy. And that's why I always point out every time I'm giving, I think every time I'm giving a reading, like this energy is your energy. Here's actually the process of what's going on here. I'm going to use whatever tool we've agreed on today to get a layout of the energy, which is your subconscious. I mean, I can't tell you how many times people will come with a question or something. I need this, I need to tell me this. And then like, you know, halfway into the reading, it is very clear, whatever they consciously said has nothing to do with what they're actually trying to figure out.

And I'm like, wait a second, like, is it actually maybe about this? And they're like, yeah, I'm like, don't save that. Like this isn't long enough for us to like get into every single thing. But like the subconscious will reveal itself because you'll react to these symbols. It's why I think self readings can be incredibly helpful when you learn to kind of identify patterns in your mind and kind of interrupt them sometimes. But they're all like, none of this is real. None of this is like the definitive way to do it. It's what you ultimately resonate and believe with. And that can be ancestral, right?

We can say, well, our only only experience is our own present consciousness. We only experience it in the now. Yes, we have memories. Yes, we can future project, but we don't remember what it's like to be our great, great, great, great, great, great grandmother or grandfather. Like we don't have that felt experience. History tells us and the people older than us tell us and we watch our children grow, that that is how it has progressed linearly. It is not just a complete made up thing. So we have all this energy cascade down. I believe in mediumship. I believe in all of that stuff. But it does require, I think, for most people who, if you're resonating with that stuff, make sure the filter it's coming through.

So the person it's coming through or whatever it's coming through understands that about energy. Because if they're presenting something like these are the astrological reasons, this is happening. This will happen because of this for sure. That's not it. That's not really how truth works. We can see that easily these days. But yeah, it's just like energy is energy at the end of the day. It's all energy. But we have certain rules and narratives that we like to believe about how this stuff works. And the external world is convincing enough for the vast majority of people most of the time that that is actually what's going on.

I mean, that's why it is a mirror world. It does reflect your internal beliefs and states. So if you start letting it tell you what to do, you're literally in a hall of mirrors. One day you're going to look, you're going to be fat and wiggly and it's all smushed up and you look in the next mirror, you're all stretched out and thin and you go to the other one and your whole face is like a million things. It's like that's literally what is going to be happening until you kind of catch hold of it and be like, all right, now I'm going to start trying to internally modulate just what I can control in this moment.

You can start at that root level. You can work yourself all the way up. But it does have to be that inner kind of belief and conviction. And then you can do the cool shape that you want. Nothing boxes or labels you by realizing that. And it's also something, I think I just want to be like a little clear about this. You don't have to do what I'm doing with it. And this is like the more kind of dangerous way to live with manifestation. A lot of teachers and a lot of people who talk about this stuff will say, don't talk about this. Don't sit, put your intention or your belief structure out into the world.

And I don't think it's just cause they're trying to gate keep and hide things. It's because it does have a relationship between how you perceive things. When you go out there and tell a bunch of your friends and a bunch of your family or everyone, I'm going to do this. And it's improbable and impossible. You're going to start feeling a lot of internal doubt creep in because you've now put it out to this thing that's like, that's not how this works. What are you talking about? You're going to have to go be able to process and deal with that. It's totally fine. I think it's important that people do speak about it and share their experiences with it just because it is a very powerful creation tool.

And I think it can alleviate or help with a lot of people's what they'd call stressors in life because when you know everything is going to be okay, you develop this resolve where no matter what's hitting you, it doesn't break you. It doesn't destroy you. You don't have to stay in a state of depression. No judgment. I was depressed plenty times for long enough times where like there's no judgment, but you don't have to stay there. You do have an ability to kind of do some things to get yourself out, whatever that may be. So yeah, I just, I think the reason I've come up back with this podcast also, so like, you know, with a lot of energy is because like, I can see what's going on.

I can feel what's going on. I felt what's going on. And the answers aren't becoming more clear. Like people aren't getting a clearer direction from external reality on what you're supposed to be doing right now. Like there's no one like, this is how you do it. You go to college and then you get a job. It's like what? Like no one, people have known that for a decade now that that's not how things are working. AI's trying to eliminate jobs externally. Does that mean you can't have a career that isn't amazing? It's more of an opportunity than like a problem is what I'm trying to say, but it appears to us often like a problem or a crisis.

And just like being able to get over that and having some inner sense of conviction, however you build it, is basically all you need at this point, you know, there's more complex ways of doing it and but that's kind of it. Well, yeah.

Yeah, I was just gonna say, you know, I think we all, I liked, I choose to believe that we're here for a reason. And not like we all have some like grand purpose or I'm, mine's to have fun, like straight up.

Totally.

Like, but you know, I have a lot of people in my experience who are in connection with energy and like really fucking cool wild ways. And you know, at the end of the day, like you are the one that chose to physically separate and experience. So your guides, your external realities, like your own experience are not as powerful as you are as this being.

Exactly.

And we can take all of that information and for what it is. Like I always use the analogy. It's like watching all of the TV channels at once. Like if Fox News ain't your jam, don't fucking watch it. Same thing if you go and get a reading and you're like, whoa dude, this feels weird. That wasn't for you. That energy was for someone. It just, the antenna sent it out. Like there's just not your, the channel you're meant to be watching, if you know, if it feels bad, like you might describe it as that red light, if you feel kind of stuck within a particular label or definition, like that's awesome information.

What do you wanna do with it? And it's, yeah, like I think we've, for a million different reasons prescribed to this belief that it's, we don't have these choices. And sometimes when we look around and we're like, well fuck, I'm not into any of this. This, it can feel like, so then I chose badly. And it's, you know, there's that like sense of blame and that's when you can go, where did this come from? Like what do I actually attach to blame? And it's probably some form of success. Okay, well so what could success look like without that blame? Like if I don't have to make the same investment, how can I still get what I want?

Yeah, I think people are ready to live a little bit more lightly. I just, it's been a very heavy existence for a lot of people. And that's because that's how progress typically happens. Like you work your way through the density and it gets heavy. But I can sense that a lot of people are kind of picking up that it doesn't have to be as heavy and serious. Well, Nicole, this has been awesome. You're the best, where can people find more about you, what you're doing, who you're working with, all that type of stuff.

Yeah, I mean, I've got a website, NicoleBZ.com. I've got a podcast, you know everything. I'm on like all the social media platforms in terms of your very generic kind of like marketing shit at the BZ channel. So you can find me in all of those different places. I mean, to be honest, I don't actually put a lot of energy. Like I like to create my podcast as my art and then everything kind of gets like cut up and put on there. It's really like connecting with people and talking to people one on one. I'm looking forward to coming to your events when they start happening.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, hopefully in the next week or so.

On the one hand, I'm like super easy to get a hold of. What I will say for people listening to this is in terms of like my work with people, I do a lot of like volunteer stuff through a program called SCORE. And I can guarantee you there's a SCORE near you. So if you're looking for actual kind of like business stuff, that's a great place to start. I also have what I call the anti-business school, which is kind of an online like opportunity for people to just learn in their own time and in a way that feels really supportive for them. Working with me like one on one in terms of ownership and entrepreneurship can be a pretty intense experience.

So I encourage people to step that out. And then the last thing I'll say is theta healing, I would probably refer you to my teacher. It has been one of the most transformative experiences for me. I describe it as 10 years of therapy in six months of coaching in 45 minutes. But it's a pretty cool fucking modality. You do the energy readings and you do so many cool things. I think people really need to ask themselves, like what is it that I, what feels like it could support me in this moment in order to get to the next place that I wanna go and be willing to test a whole bunch of different things.

Totally.

We all learn differently. We all need different resources to support ourselves. Ultimately like the answer is within you. That's why I call my podcast, you know everything. Like you, I find like some people really activate me. You're one of those people for sure. And when I tune into your energy, like shit just kind of starts happening. And it's like I see it like a Rubik's cube. And like suddenly like it just starts moving and like the colors start to align. And when you can find that cohort of people, whether they're in your real world experience or not, like it's incredibly powerful. And so I, you know, I don't, yeah.

I try to make myself available to you kind of on your journey wherever you might be. So yeah, have fun with that. That's like the last thing. I don't know. I, like I said, I don't spend, I really don't spend any time on social media. It's, I don't, I've never, like I've used it as a tool very effectively, but it's, I prefer to spend my time outside.

You're smart because you're a smart person. And I mean, it's just getting crazier and crazier out there. I said Scream Limits a month ago on Twitter, TikTok and Instagram because I blow past them plenty of times, don't get me wrong, ignore. But yeah, the short form video content taps into this primal part of our brain. It's like a amygdala stuff. We're just like, it's, you just keep going. And then the algorithms, they really do just home and on what you want or what you're responding to. So even if you don't like it, they'll keep showing it to you. I was just saying the other day to, I think it was her main, you know, it used to be like really like interesting, funny stuff on like TikTok.

You could find like small creators who were just like weird and doing cool stuff. None of that anymore. It's just like big viral accounts and like, you know, whatever they figure out you like. And it's, I definitely had a re-evaluate. Cause I'm, I like social media. I think it's pretty cool. I think the ability to like utilize it not only as a tool, but just as like a connective tissue. But it's definitely running us at this point rather than the other way around and whether.

I mean, it's a business. And these platforms, like they're basically all becoming the home shopping network. And that's fucking cool. Like, you know, if you want to be a consumer that's representing a brand cause we trust each other more than the robots. Like I, I see the one of the ways, one of the things my brain does is take everything apart. So I can put it back together again to understand it. And I, again, have used social media to build platforms for people that have millions and millions of followers. And it's just like in terms of red light green light, does it feel good? Does it feel bad?

It's just not one of, it does not get my rocks off. Like, like going to a gig and like feeling music. And I'll do that by myself. Like that's going outside and like, I don't know, it's an amazing fucking tool. And for some people, like I've seen people also, you know, I've seen artists and creatives create generational wealth and they can now do whatever the fuck they want using that tool. Like to each their own and I--

Yeah, totally.

I went all in and tried all of the different things and did the like super gross marketing and I don't have, I can chameleon kind of like that and be like, this is an experiment, let's try it.

Yeah.

It worked, but I don't like, that's a, you know, it's kind of like where I got with my music career. I was like, cool, I figured this out, bored.

Yeah, totally.

So yeah, now I'm tackling like community, which is fucking weird. So yeah, we'll just, we'll continue living the experiment and live in the tree every day.

Yeah, that's how it works.

All right, thanks. - Thank you so much for creating this resource for people Noah. I like, I found you through this podcast and I think like again, creating this energetic resource for people so that they can start to discover who lights them up, who feels like a green light. Like, you know, they always say you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with it. I can remember specifically in New Orleans when I was running this little art center, I looked up and I was like, well, I'm fucked.

Yeah, yeah, everyone I said that come to Jesus moment when they look around who they're actually at now.

It's like listening to music, like listening to podcasts, reading books, like you don't, there are no limitations any longer. You can go to the library for free, at least in the United States. You can rent books, you can get a PhD level education. Like, you can listen to the people that inspire you. Like, I just think that creating resources like this and making yourself available is such a powerful, powerful way of changing this world. So thank you very much for coming.

Oh, my pleasure, I'll take the compliment. Thank you. (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music)

Did you listen past the music again? Geez, you either fell asleep or really liked the podcast. If you really liked the podcast, may I suggest you go and get involved in a deeper sense of communion and union with what's going on over on the Patreon? I know I can sound like a broken record chilling this over and over again, but it's pretty cool what we got going on over there. We got a really nice community of people. They're doing cool shit. There's bonus episodes, there's readings, there's live streams, there's all the fun stuff you could want, and for tears as low as $5 a month, that's pretty good deal.

That's four extra episodes for five bucks a month. I think that's a good deal. So if you do like it, go ahead and do that. Otherwise, get the podcast, like, review, subscribe, all of those things. I think you've already done most of those stuffs, but you know what it is. Anyway, I will be back next week with a regular episode. Until then, happy imagining. I love you.

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