In this episode, Nick dives into the significance of our inner dialogue and its profound impact on our external experiences. He emphasizes the importance of shaping our inner dialogue to navigate life’s challenges and the ups and downs we experience each day. Nick explores the mechanics of self-talk, the role of awareness in recognizing negative patterns, and the necessity of self-reflection in personal growth.

What to listen for:

“If we understand our internal dialogue, we can then make different decisions.”

“When we have the inner dialogue that isn’t actually healed, it’s not helpful for us; then it makes the rest of our lives more and more difficult.”

About Nick McGowan

I’m Nick McGowan, an entrepreneur, podcaster, and mental health advocate, and I’ve been on a 20+ year journey of personal development, learning to master my mindset, emotions, and the art of living with purpose.

As a Mindset and Self-Mastery Mentor, I work with ambitious men and women who want to live their most authentic and joyous lives by helping them master their mindset, emotional awareness, and authentic communication. My mission is to empower people to lead lives that feel aligned, grounded, and truly their own.

Throughout my career, I’ve built teams, streamlined systems, and improved client experiences across SaaS, media, marketing, and personal development spaces. Whether I’m leading cross-functional projects, optimizing SEO, Podcasting, designing strategies, or guiding clients through transformation, I bring a hands-on, solution-focused approach to everything I do.

I’m also the host of The Mindset and Self-Mastery Show, where my guests and I unpack the stories that shape us, challenge us, and ultimately guide us back to who we are at our core. On this show, we uncover the secret gems others have discovered through trial and error and breakthroughs, so you can fast-track your growth and master your mindset in your pursuit of self-mastery. Check out the latest episode here.

With years of podcasting and two decades of marketing experience, I’ve mastered the storytelling, interview flow, strategy, and technical production that elevate a podcast from “just content” to something truly impactful. Whether you’re a leader looking to amplify your message, a seasoned speaker and podcast host looking to sharpen your edge, or even a beginner who is wondering how to share their message, I mentor thought leaders through every step of having the conversation they’re here to have on this planet.

So, what message are you here to share?!

Resources:

Check out other episodes about our inner dialogue and managing negative self-talk.

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Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:00.302)
Hello and welcome to the mindset and self mastery show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show, I want to talk about shaping our inner dialogue to get better external results. And on the show, I like to get really macro with things because I think that’s where change actually happens. It’s in those moments where we work on the stuff now before the situation happens that we’ll be better equipped to handle whatever situation comes up.

I’ve learned this the hard way. Sometimes I think I’m really prepared. I’m good to go. Then I get into a situation and something happens. It’s like, my God, I didn’t expect that to happen. I didn’t know how to handle it or whatever it was. And those moments can literally make or break us because sometimes when we’re going through a situation that we’re maybe a little uncomfortable with or not as confident about, we can start to falter on the things like our principles.

or the things that we know to be true and are really consistent within ourselves. So when I think about having an internal dialogue, that’s more of a positive mindset dialogue. This isn’t something to just bypass the stuff that you’ve been through. This is about being able to understand that the moment you’re in right then and there is the only moment that you actually have. So when you’re in that moment, whatever the situation is,

If your inner dialogue is in a negative place, let’s say, then that moment’s probably going to turn out not as good as you want it to be, just straight up. But if your inner dialogue is more on a positive note, and I’m using these as black and whites in a sense, then you’re bound to have a better overall experience because of the inner dialogue. So think about it this way. If you wake up in the morning and you instantly think,

Today’s gonna be such a shitty day. I hate all these things. I don’t even wanna get out of bed. don’t wanna ever. You probably argue with your partner. You yell at your kids or your animals or whatever. You get on the road, you drive to your office and you’re shitty with everybody else on the road.

Nick McGowan (02:37.462)
if you woke up a little differently and had a overall mindset and experience from waking up, you probably, even if something happened with your spouse, your partner or your animals or the dude driving past you, you’re probably going to handle that situation differently, at least slightly differently. Now, if you wake up in the morning and you hate yourself and you hate everything that’s going on, there’s work there.

be done. It may also be part of your design. I’ve learned about myself that I will wake up in two different states. Super excited, or grumpy as fuck to put it nicely, because in those states, when I wake up and I am unsure of what I want to do or whatever it is that really determines what happens next. I’ve learned about myself that I’m in one of those two states for some reason that has happened the day before. I’ll give you a prime example.

I’ve been busy for the past few months and haven’t been able to play music as much. And I’m actively working on an album. And for me, playing music and even just working through concepts of riffs and just even drum parts for like three hours does magical things for me that helps me at a bass level feel like I’m doing something for myself.

Not just doing things for clients or for other people or even things for my business that are still for myself, but just, you know, they’re not me playing music and scratching that itch. Being able to spend a little bit of time with that has become really, really, really important to me because I understand that the more aware I am of that, the more that it’ll affect the next day. It’s not a magical pill. It’s not like, you know, I play guitar for two hours one night and then the next day it’s the best fucking day in the entire world. It’s not how this works.

But I do understand that that is a part of how I relate to the rest of the world. And I can be aware of that and do something with it. So let’s break down what inner dialogue is. You know what it is. It’s the talking to yourself. If we look at a shitty internal dialogue, you know exactly what that is as well, because I’m pretty sure you do it pretty often. We all do.

Nick McGowan (04:59.702)
Even the people that say, no, I’m constantly positive. I’m constantly this, constantly that. You don’t really know what those conversations are internally. We just don’t. And I think the people that are bypassing and toxic positivity in a sense, they’re hurting themselves. And I know that because I’ve done that before too. Haven’t you? We’ve all done something like that where we’ve said, this is how I want to be. So I’m just going to do it and not do the work with it.

When we have the inner dialogue that isn’t actually healed and it’s not helpful for us, then it makes the rest of our lives more and more difficult. I don’t want to take this down the path of saying this is the only thing that’ll fix everything because I have heard at times where people say you can’t just mindset your way through things. I know that is not what this is about. This is about setting yourself up from a better perspective.

and also being able to look at the thing and say, you know, I’m feeling real shitty right now. Why is that? If we can understand where that has come from, even just to know this is the thing, this is what happened, or this is what made me feel this way, or the reason why I feel this way, or the reason why I’m being negative, or even the reason why I’m being super positive, we can at least understand why that is to then do something with it from there. I think sometimes we as people,

just allow ourselves to be shitty, just straight up. And I get it. I am shitty at times. The people that know me the best absolutely know this. And sometimes I’ve thought that it was part of my process. That’s how I go through things. And that’s not always the case because there’s being curious, there’s being judgmental, and some of that can like overlap. But then there’s also just being really shitty about things because I don’t feel good about a situation.

or feel good in my body or didn’t sleep well enough or whatever it was. But the internal dialogue that says today’s gonna be shitty or this is gonna happen, it’s gonna be bad, whatever. Sometimes those aren’t actually even words. It’s just a feeling. So if we take apart our inner dialogue just over the course of one day and catch the moments where we’re being really, really shitty, I don’t mean to just keep using that, but that’s kinda how it is.

Nick McGowan (07:23.778)
We’re shitty, we’re being grumpy, we’re being negative about a situation and not actually working through the situation.

I’m not talking about sitting there for two hours and processing a thing, but at least understanding that right now I’m feeling this way. So what can I do now to be able to get through your work day or the situation you’re in or what have you? And it can be a mechanical sort of approach of saying, well, I’m going to choose to have a better mindset with this right now. Again, I don’t want you to think of this as bypassing.

We are never bypassing. If you need to do work on these things, do the work. But that doesn’t always mean you can do it right then and there. It’s not about just saying, all right, world, time out. I need to process through a thing. Now granted, there are some people that can do that. And for business owners, sometimes it’s easier for us to do that. Sometimes it’s straight up not because there’s just a lot going on. There are many things happening, lots of questions. And as the owner of a company, we, you know, we’re the ones.

so the buck stops with us. So we need to be able to answer those things or be on or what have you. But understanding where our internal dialogue is will ultimately shape how the rest of the outcomes are. And it took me a long time to really understand that. And it took me even longer to start to put it into action. And it’s taken me even longer for it to become part of who I am. I joke now about certain things that should have

I thought should have taken me a lot faster to get through, but that’s not how it works. So understanding why we have the inner dialogue that we do is almost as important as what we do with that inner dialogue from there. So the ongoing beliefs, the ongoing thoughts that we have, the self-talk that just running through us day in and day out, that’s our inner dialogue. But what’s the inner dialogue like?

Nick McGowan (09:27.988)
I heard somebody say to me years ago, if you had a friend that talked to you the way that you talk to yourself, you’d probably want to kick his ass. If not, take them off the planet. They’re totally right. I think about the stuff that you say to yourself. Think about it. Think about the stuff you probably said to yourself a fucking hour.

Just let that sink in. If some other human said that to you, you’d potentially have a restraining order. You would not want them to be part of your life. Now you may actually have people that are part of your life that do that. You don’t have to do that to yourself. I want to make that clear. You don’t have to do that to yourself. It’s not a penance or anything, depending on what you had done in the past. It’s being able to actually take the dialogue that you have right now and say, well, today’s this day.

This is what I have going on today. And if I don’t like those things or I want to change those things, great. Can I do it right now? Can I instantly change it, pivot to something else or what have you? And if you can, wonderful. If you can’t, then that’s what it is. You need to work through that and you need to be in that moment to do it. I think about it in the sense of people going to jobs that they hate. I can think back to different experiences I’ve had at different jobs. I remember sitting there watching the clock.

Being like, fucking hate this. I can’t be here anymore. This is nonsense. Part of it was that I knew there was a greater calling for myself. Another part of it was me just being shitty about the situation that I was in and beating myself up because I put myself in that situation. Haven’t you done that? Think about the different times that you’ve done that. Think about the amount of times maybe even today that you’ve done that. And if we just pause that and say, I understand.

And yeah, I don’t want to be in this spot right now. But I also understand that I’m just not able to snap my fingers and make a change instantly, and that things will take a little bit of time. That’s where you actually get to mechanically change your mindset and say, this is what I’m going to do. This is how I’m going to put my mind into motion in this specific situation. So if we think about inner dialogue and we think about the external results from that.

Nick McGowan (11:44.63)
you can start to look back at different situations where you say, you know, I experienced this differently than I had in the past because of the way that I thought about it going into the situation or because of the way that my way of being is now or whatever it was. If we break it down to a very black and white level, there was probably some positive or negative emotions and thoughts and feelings tied to whatever you were doing. And

Even if it was subconscious where your subconscious was like, you know what? We’ve done this before, we can do it again. And you didn’t have to really think about it. It just kind of came out. That’s fine. That’s almost like it’s how you’ve healed from it. At least to some extent. Subconscious isn’t there to make us feel better. It’s there to keep us alive and safe. So you’ve probably experienced the opposite side of that more often than not.

of I don’t really know what do in this situation. So I feel uncomfortable. I feel weird. I feel this. I feel that that’s normal. We all go through that stuff. I’ll give you an example with myself. I’ve had something recently local networking where I’ve gone out and met with different people. And whenever I get called up to the front to talk about my business, talk about myself, et cetera, there’s always a little bit underneath that’s like, Oh, do you look weird? Do you sound weird?

Are you saying the right things? All of that. That’s our subconscious trying to just keep us safe. It’s abnormal. And if it’s not something you do every single day, or even if it’s something you’ve done for a long, long, long time, that can still be there. It’s trying to keep you safe and trying to keep you comfortable. But I know in those situations, I can look at that and go, I’m just going to go out and do what I do. And I’m going to rest on me being authentic. And worst case scenario, somebody says,

You said something weird or you looked weird or you did whatever and think about it. Honestly, in most situations like that, if somebody says, I don’t like your shirt, fuck you. Who the fuck cares? Go away. It doesn’t matter. It’s all in our own heads and we’re the ones beating ourselves up about it. And for the most part, everybody else, when they’re having their own problems or thinking of you about, don’t like your shirt or they don’t like whatever it is. That’s a them problem. That has nothing to do with you. We can take that.

Nick McGowan (14:05.112)
And we can say, I can do something with it or next time I’ll wear a Hawaiian shirt because fuck you, whatever you want, you know? But being able to understand your own inner dialogue can be affected by other people, other situations, other things, but it’s really up to you to do something with your inner dialogue to then turn it into something external. Now I’m not saying that this is a hustle or grind sort of situation.

Like you need to have better mindset so you can go out and make millions of dollars because everybody needs 50 fucking homes. That’s not the case at all. What I’m talking about is being able to actually work through your own inner dialogue to feel confident in yourself to do the thing you’re actively doing. But this happens in a nanosecond, which is again why I like to break down these macro pieces because we can work on it right now.

where down the road when you get into that situation, you don’t just instantly flounder because you’re falling back on the negative mindset. You’re falling back into the mindset of, I don’t know what to do here, so I’m just gonna shit a little bit. And like, what the fuck? What do I say? What do I do? How do I act? You wanna be able to work on this stuff before you get into those situations so you don’t actually have to think about it while you’re in those situations. Getting back to my example of speaking in front of a room. I speak all the time. I talk to people all the time.

I also really love being by myself. When working on my music or going through my sports cards or reading or whatever it is, just by myself, everybody leave me alone. But I know in those moments when I’m in front of people, I have to be on in a way that is truthful to me. Now past me, years and years and years ago, I would have turned on to become somebody else. Almost like the persona, the mamba mentality in a sense.

Like I would just become somebody different. And there was always a bit of authenticity to it, but there was also tying into my winning strategy of how I could be loved and how it could be admired and how I could win and all of that. If we understand those components and those pieces, because those make up our internal dialogue, we can then make different decisions. But it’s understanding why our internal dialogue is the way that it is. Some of that may be trauma.

Nick McGowan (16:28.3)
Some of that may be somebody said something to you as a five-year-old that led you to believe a thing either about yourself, good or bad, or about other people, good or bad. And then that affected the way that you handled things from that point on. That changed the story that you lived from that point on. What I’m talking about is being able to understand why the components make up your internal dialogue and that your subconscious mind is just there to keep you safe.

doesn’t really give a shit how you feel or how confident you are in a situation. It’s just there to keep you safe. If you can understand those things and you can understand how you’re acclimated toward things, then you can do something with that. So when you’re in a situation where you have to be in front of people or pick anything that makes you uncomfortable or it’s a little outside of the norm of what you’re used to, you’ll be in a better spot at that point to be able to not only handle that situation,

handle yourself because you’ve extracted what the internal dialogue is. Now with me, like I said, I’ll wake up and I’ll either feel great or bad. That’s really black and white. And I’ve asked myself, I’ve started to ask myself each morning, how am I feeling right now? Am I feeling great? Am I feeling bad? And being honest with myself. There’s sometimes I wake up in the morning and I’m like, how are you feeling right now? I’m feeling great, feeling bad. I feel like shit.

And I can understand it’s because maybe I ate something too late the night before, or I didn’t sleep well, or there’s something nagging in the back of my mind about some project or something that’s going on or something around the house or whatever it is. But if I can look at that and say, it’s that thing. It’s being able look at that thing and go, cool, well, I see you. And deciding, do I get to do something with it now? Do I need to? Do I not? Whatever it is.

being able look at it and just see what it is has given me a lot of confidence to go, okay, cool. Well, now I know what it is. So I’m just going to move along instead of the fear of the unknown in a sense. Now about maybe, I don’t know, 15 years ago or so I was in a a rock band in Philadelphia and we had a song called white bear because of a concept that I learned where somebody said, if I asked you to not think about a white bear,

Nick McGowan (18:54.146)
Whatever you do, just don’t think about a white bear. So get the white bear out of your mind. It’s whatever you do, don’t think about a white bear. How many times did a white bear pop in your head? Pretty much every time I said it, right? So if we’re focusing on, be shitty, don’t be negative, guess what you’re gonna be? More than likely, probably shitty, probably negative. And the same goes for being positive.

Say be really positive be this and be that and be external and do all these things The the thought of that can spur that on But it’s the act that happens within it and what happens after it that is the most important Because even if I said don’t think about a white bear You’re probably gonna think about it because I put it near the foreground here you think about a white bear and then from there you get a choice to be able to think do I want to

build out what that white bear looks like. Do I want to think of that as a Coca-Cola bears or do I want to think about it as a bear that I saw when I was younger or whatever and you will start to kind of go through that path. But if you look at the negative and positive internal dialogue that we have, if you try to force yourself to push past something and bypass it, it might work for you right then and there, but it’s going to come back to bite you. So with all of this,

your internal dialogue, if you start to understand why do you typically think about X while you’re in this sort of situation, or why do you feel this sort of way when you’re in X situation and think about that now before that situation happens again, I guarantee you will at least be in a better spot to be able to handle that. I can’t guarantee that it won’t look the way that it did before, but it will start to shift a little bit. had an experience a couple of years ago where

I was doing a lot of internal work and folding inside out and it was fucking messy. And I remember having a conversation with my partner and I could feel myself welling up and there was a reaction that was about to come out. There was literally a part of me that told myself, Nick, shut the fuck up and leave the house. And guess what I did? I kept fucking talking and I didn’t leave the house and I was aware of it.

Nick McGowan (21:19.242)
And it was maddening because I thought, you know, I thought about this. I can just do this and like grab myself and leave. No, there was still trauma that needed to be worked through. There were things that were part of my subconscious that I needed to extract. I needed to reframe and needed to look through. And it took me a long time. And there’s still moments where that happens. Not exactly how it did before, but moments where I’ll start to come up and I go, I see you, you fuck. I’m not going to go down that path again.

because I was able to do that work in those moments, but I also did work after those moments to say, all right, what happened? What do I do differently? How do I do this differently? It’s sort of like in sports where they watch game tape. They’ll go back and they’re not watching it to say, you fucked up here, you did this wrong. They’re saying, what could we do differently in these situations? And there’s a reason why those people do that. In a black and white way with sports, it can be easy to say you’re tape and film from a previous game or whatever.

us. If you had a really shitty day and there was a lot of negative self-talk going through and then by the time you go home all you want to do is just watch TV and veg and look I get it. Especially somebody who’s found out that he’s more of an introvert than he ever thought he was. I really enjoy being able to spend that veg time of relaxing and just being away from people. I’ve also understood in those moments there are certain times where

I’m really escaping. We’re trying to escape from something.

I may be a little different than you. You may be a little different than me. We’re all different than each other, but we are also very similar and we go through the same sort of things. This is why I have the podcast for us to be able to talk about this stuff and actually call this stuff out because I can almost guarantee that you’ve had some sort of shitty conversation with yourself today. Even like, why did I do that? Or why the fuck didn’t I wash this thing? Or why didn’t this thing happen? Or what about this? and maybe you don’t call yourself an idiot anymore.

Nick McGowan (23:22.958)
the sentiment is still there at times, right? You know, like there are different things that come up where you’re like, man, what a dumb bastard, I shouldn’t have done that, blah, blah, blah. Again, if you had a friend or somebody else that was like that, you’d call the cops on them or you’d have a restraining order or something. So if you think about your inner dialogue and the stuff that you go through every single day and how it relates to not only the dialogues, either.

Positive or negative influence on you But how the long-term effects actually relate to you because you’ll keep doing that over and over and over And sometimes it can be so ingrained that it’s really difficult to get ourselves out of it So one of the things that I really like to do and that I find to be the easiest thing to do in those situations Yep, oftentimes it’s kind of difficult when you’re really charged. So just be aware of it. Just straight up see it

and go, man, I’m being shitty again. But catch it and don’t be an asshole to yourself. Don’t be like you’re being shitty, you dumb fuck. Don’t, be nice to yourself about it. You also want to, in some ways, of parent yourself with that. Like, yeah, don’t do that anymore. Let’s look at what’s going on. Let’s actually talk through it. Let’s work through it. So if you have that simple awareness practice of just saying, I see these things.

Maybe for you, it’s taking notes of it and saying, I saw this today, I saw this today, this happened, et cetera, et cetera. Maybe it’s just mental notes. Maybe it’s things that you’ve seen over and over and over and you actually don’t want to touch them. Oftentimes that’s because there’s a fear of the unknown or some blocker that’s blocking you from that. And that’s where professionals come into play. People that can help as therapists or different modalities or mentors or…

anybody that can kind of work with you on those things that have been through some of that. But at least you can be aware of those things. And I think there’s such power in awareness. The more aware you are, the more aware you are. Like you can’t not see a thing after you’ve seen it. Sometimes it’ll take seeing it 10, 15, 20 times or even more. But you know that you probably have bad dialogue with yourself at times, but you know, I’m better off than I was before.

Nick McGowan (25:41.826)
or whatever excuse you add in. And that’s fine, because it’s your life, you get to do whatever you want. The question is really, how long do you want to sit in that shit for? And that can be, it can be a dumb question to certain people. They’re like, of course I don’t want to sit in that shit, but yet you’re still sitting in that shit. And look, I do this as well. Every day there are things that happen. And I ask myself, do I want to be shitty about this? No, but you’re gonna fucking damn it, blah, blah, blah. like, all right, Nick.

get through it, and now let’s have the conversation. Sometimes you need to let that energy out. Sometimes you also need to go through it a bit to then understand, it’s really in these situations when this happens because I feel this way, or I think this thing. And all that inner dialogue really shapes the way that our external worlds are because we’re setting ourselves up for either success or failure when it comes to that. So I wanna reinforce.

that there’s a massive link between the way that we talk to ourselves and the results that we get in the world. And that there isn’t anything to do with hustle or grind culture or going out and making bunches of money or even the total opposite of that and like saving all the homeless people from the entire world. Talking about being able to actually incorporate this into your daily life in every aspect of life.

but it takes breaking down how are you having those conversations in your head and what’s coming out of those conversations every single time. And do you want to change that? Do you not want to change that? I want you to think about two things. Think about two situations where, and I’m super confident and comfortable in this sort of situation. Some people might be public speaking. Some people might be playing music. It might be whatever the thing is. And then I want you to also think of what are the situations?

One or two situations that make me super uncomfortable. And I’m not telling you have to go share this with the world or talk to other people about it, but to yourself. Like there might be things that you go, I really feel uncomfortable about this, but this is a major part of my job or whatever it is. Great. Look at that. And then start to write out what comes up when I think about this. What comes up in those exact situations.

Nick McGowan (28:05.838)
because we can all recall a situation and we can put ourselves back in that spot. That’s a fun little playground. It’s like a simulation in the sense to be able to go through and say, I remember being in this spot and maybe feel this way and whatever. But in reality, if you’re able to actually understand why you do the things you do because of the conversations you’re having in your head, you’re able to change the way that you move through the world and therefore able to change the way that you impact the world. And that’s what this is all about.

I don’t believe that purpose is just for us as selfish human beings. I believe that purpose actually incorporates the rest of the world and even just our small little corner of the web of life. But if we can change the way that we look at things internally, we can then change the way that we act around and toward other people and ultimately change the way that we live life. You also need to do the work of the things that are coming up that are blocking you or stopping you.

So if you have questions about this, you wanna understand what has worked for me or what you could potentially do different than what you’re doing now, please feel free to reach out. I’d love to hear from you. And if there are certain topics like this that you want more discussions on, you want me to unpack more of, I’d love to hear from you. So thank you so much for being with me today. I hope this is helpful and I hope you do something with it.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Patrick Boylan about the importance of curiosity in understanding others and navigating judgment. They discuss how asking questions can lead to empathy and a broader perspective, allowing for a more nuanced view of people’s beliefs and actions, all while highlighting the balance between judgment and understanding, advocating for a thoughtful approach to interpersonal relationships.

What to listen for:

“At the end of the day, it’s curiosity. Why do you think that? That’s the biggest question that anybody can ask.”

“We need to come together as a species and tackle our world’s issues together.”

About Patrick Boylan

Patrick Boylan is a skilled multi-instrumentalist and co-founder of MuseFlow, a groundbreaking music EdTech platform often called “The Duolingo of Music Education.” Frustrated by the limitations of traditional music education, Patrick began exploring self-directed practice, which reignited his passion for music and led him to focus on sight reading as an engaging learning tool. MuseFlow teaches bite-sized skills through sight reading, allowing students to master new concepts efficiently and enjoyably by focusing on reading and playing music at first sight, then applying those skills to songs that get unlocked. Patrick loves to share his insights on learning and EdTech, inspiring parents, teachers, and self-learners to help students and themselves achieve flow state through MuseFlow’s unique approach.

Resources:

Check out other episodes about curiosity

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? Send Nick an email or schedule a time to discuss your podcast today!

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Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

00:00
The one thing in my opinion that would turn the tides of humanity and make people more empathetic and connected to every person on this earth, that we need to come together as a species and tackle our world’s issues together.

00:23
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self-Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Patrick Boylan. Patrick, how you doing, man? Doing great. How you doing, man? I’m good. I’m excited you’re here. I think I say that a lot in the intros of shows because I’m having conversation with somebody and there are certain times where like lead time to get onto the show can be maybe a month, maybe two months. Then there are people like you, my friend, who…

00:48
I joked earlier and was like, well, when you first sent your stuff in in 2009. Yeah, but it’s kind of what it felt like though, honestly. But some of those are the best. And truthfully, I’ve had two of you this week. I had one guy a couple of days ago who does drum circles and so much music. And he just disappeared at one point like two years ago and then came back. And I was like, yes, I was hoping you’d come back. So I’m glad that you’re here too. I want us to be able to touch on music, obviously, because of the business that you have and the thing that you’re doing.

01:18
but I want us to be able to get into really how all of it has worked for you over the course of life and how it’s all shaped you to lead you to where you’re at today. Before we get there though, why don’t you get us started? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre? I’m the co-founder of a music education app called Museflow. We teach piano in a very different way. We’re expanding to all common instruments in the next couple of years. So it’s growing, people are loving it.

01:47
and I’m super stoked about it. Something that’s weird or that most people don’t know about me, I have two tattoos. I’ve got one on my butt, on my left butt cheek, it’s called, it’s just a family emblem that my dad drew on all of our napkins for lunches and uh Christmas cards and stuff like that. It’s four bunnies on two hills overlooking a sunset, and it’s our family. It’s me and my dad and my mom and my sister.

02:14
and our cats and our dogs and all that stuff. It’s a really cute little tableau thing, right? The other one is on my upper hip and I got it in college. I got it when I just decided that truth and honesty are going to be the most important things in my life, okay? And so I got a whistleblower. I got a guy blowing a whistle. Didn’t realize how phallic that was when I got it on my upper thigh, you know?

02:43
So it’s a little weird, but like I didn’t recognize that at the moment. What I was going for was like truth and honesty, right? And then I just, got it. And then I started doing, just being blunt, being like kind of mean about it. And like, wasn’t thinking about tact and I wasn’t thinking about like what my friends would be hurt by or if they, I didn’t care. I was just like, truth and honesty. This is just so important to my life. And like, I was being brutal about it.

03:12
And so one of my friends pulls me aside one day and he says, Pat, you got to stop this. You’re just being a jerk. You’re being an asshole about this. Like, yes, truth and honesty is important. Okay. But you got to blend it with everything else. All right. Sometimes tact and holding your tongue is the right call. Cause I got to tell you, you’re ruining friendships right now. I know a couple of people that have talked about this already and they’re saying you’re just being an asshole and they don’t want to be friends with you anymore. So you got to fix yourself or

03:42
you’re going to start losing friends. And I really trusted his opinion. He was one of my best friends. And so I listened to him and I pulled it back a bit. I pulled it back. I find it really interesting how your friend will lovingly say a thing to you, but also that you trust your friend. You know, like they’re the people that, um, they feel like they trust somebody out of, uh, I guess, systemic approach. Well, my family system tells me I should trust my parents.

04:09
or I should trust my brother and sister, or I should take whatever they say, kind of as gospel in a sense. People obviously like shit upon people with their dreams or whatever else, but it’s sometimes in those small things where it’s like, that person is upset that you’re being an asshole about a thing, but for you to be aware of you were being an asshole about it. Like if you didn’t feel you were, you probably wouldn’t have accepted it. You’d have been like, what do you mean? No, I’m just being a little bit of a boast or a little bit of this, but there was a hint of you back there was probably like,

04:38
The power feels good. You know, you’re like, yes, this is wonderful. Two things there, right? Number one, this is a historical relationship. This guy has been one of my good friends for, you know, years. And I’ve been working with him in very close contact throughout many different creative projects. He was a, he’s a director and I’m an actor. And so we worked on like seven or eight shows up until that point. And so I’ve worked with him.

05:07
deeply and very closely and I really appreciate his judgment and his kind of pulse on people. Yeah, you know and so both of those things like I trust the guy with my life and I’ll I’ll I’ll do whatever he wants when it comes to a show I know he has my best interest at heart and and that’s the biggest thing, you know number two I’ve always tried my best to take criticism with as much humility as possible and

05:37
regardless of if it’s accurate or wrong or true to myself or untrue, it doesn’t matter. That’s still your opinion. And your opinion weighed against mine. It just depends on our relationship, but it also depends on how much I trust you and all of that stuff. But like, I will take any and all criticism and I will implement it or not implement it based on the weight that I give it. And if I believe, and I do weigh it against myself, but that being said, it’s one of those things that I…

06:06
pride myself on. I pride myself on my ability to say, well, what do you think to everybody and anybody? And I don’t, doesn’t mean that I have to take it. That’s critical though. You’re two different entities, you know, and even within yourself to be able to say, well, I’m going to take that and you will accept that level of information because of the context. Like context is so important in everything. Everything. But also you can still get things from people like, uh, even if somebody

06:36
walking down the street, they was like, Hey, stop being an asshole. You’re like, well, maybe I can take something from that. Am I being an asshole right now or am I not being an asshole right now? And you get to do something with it. There are, think a lot of times where we as people, and this is where the mindset and self mastery stuff comes into play, where we will take things like, Oh, who’s this random fucking person across the street yelling at me? Why are they yelling at me? And this reminds me of when I was a little kid getting yelled at and these things and that.

07:05
If you take the approach of I wanna take on information and have it my little bucket and go, I don’t want this, I don’t want that, this is kinda cool. And like, okay, you get to do something with it. That’s a level of self-awareness that comes from being healthier, maybe just in that sect of your being. Because you’re like, this is what I’ve dedicated myself to. We also have gotten a little farther away from you have principles in place of trust and truth and.

07:33
honesty and these things that are critical to your being where honestly man kind of makes sense where you’re like I’m putting my foot so far in the fucking ground it’s anchored in there and I think sometimes people will go through that almost like the people how they become evangelical about things like it can be easy to think about uh people getting a multi-level marketing company say drink the kool-aid and go ham somebody who just got into religion god forbid you talk to somebody who was vegan and or in CrossFit

08:02
And all of that, you know what I mean? And it’s like, whoa, it’s like a stage that you can go through where you’re testing it out. You’re trying it out. There is still a little bit of that. I’m sure the power felt great because you’re like, man, I’ve been wanting to say these things for a few years and one more motherfucking thing. Yeah, it was free. It was a sense of freedom for sure. Like I don’t have to I don’t have to abide by any cultural norms of tact. You know, like it felt really great. But.

08:29
Yeah, but then I just realized like, no, sorry, I was just being an asshole about it. was taking it to the nth degree and everything needs to be in balance with other things. You can say truth and honesty are your biggest tenants of life and you can strive for the absolute excellence of that, 100%. But you also have to keep all of these other things aligned as well while you’re doing that. Anything farther on the far ends of any sort of spectrum, whether that’s…

08:57
on the left side or the far, know, whatever it may be, everything is a spectrum. And if you take it way too far and out of context in isolation, it can become toxic. It really can. One of the things I try to do on the show is have these conversations where we break up these big, big pieces, turn them much larger. Like we just explode them, but then also pull them back to smaller pieces without being like, here’s two or three things for you to take away for the week and just chill out these.

09:24
But in all reality, there are certain pieces of that that even in the balance can be really difficult if there are other things that are off balance. If you are triggered by certain things that happened, you can then sometimes get stuck in those triggers. I joke with people on the show pretty fucking often at this point. The more self-aware you become, the more fucking self-aware you become. And the more crazy making it can be while you go through the healing of that stuff because you can’t not see those things.

09:53
And think about what you deal with as an entrepreneur, as a business owner, somebody managing other people, managing yourself. You said you’re married. I don’t know if you have any children, but there’s like all these things. And sometimes people can say, but you don’t understand because boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. They make this major list. Other people will use that and say, yes, it’s because of these things that I have to do these other things. And therefore others will still go,

10:23
but I then get to and it’s all our perspective with doing it. So your perspective came from something that happened years and years and years ago. That’s why you put your foot so far into the ground and almost into people’s asses about just truth and honesty. But when we sit back and think about that a little bit, let’s break that down. Like what, what is it about what you’ve gone through and what you’ve seen? Like, why do you actually care what other people think to be able to then put it your own context? It’s curiosity.

10:53
For me, at the end of the day, it’s curiosity. Why do you think that? That’s the biggest question that anybody can ask. Cool, you believe that about me? Great, what about me makes you believe that? And it’s just curiosity over, and you say that you’re judgmental, like don’t get me wrong, I’m judgmental too. But a lot of my judgment comes from this place of like, well, okay, why would they believe something like that?

11:23
And then it allows me to still empathize with them while still being judgmental and being like, well, you can still be wrong regardless of your history, you know, or you could be cruel or not thinking about something else when you probably should be thinking about something else. And you’re like in the weeds of something here. And you’re really thinking about the reason why the thing should be this is because of all of these other things. But then see, you forgot perspective, see the forest through the trees. And so if I can understand from where you’re where you’re coming from.

11:53
If I get it, if I can get into that, be curious, not judgmental, right? That is something I always try to remind myself. And it is a motto that I like to live by, be curious, not judgmental. I try my best, granted judgment still comes, you know? Well, it’s also a fine line and judgment can have a negative connotation to it, where even judging something, you’re just judging it based on what you know, the information you have, et cetera. It’s what you then do with it.

12:21
you know, if we can get real shitty with it. I know there are times where I get shitty, like it’s easy for me to talk about people driving on the road, because there are certain times you’re like, I don’t even know if you have a license. I don’t know. Are you driving from the passenger seat? Like what the fuck are you doing? But part of me is judging of like, is it safe for me to get past your dumb ass? Is it safe for me to do whatever? And I think there are things that happen within us that are almost mechanical that we’re unaware of.

12:50
Even breathing. Like everybody knows that you’re breathing and then when you actually concentrate on your breathing, you’re like, oh, I’m concentrating on it. We don’t have to think about that. There are other things that happen that we don’t think about because subconscious is there just to keep us fucking safe. And something happened back in the day or back when we were a little kid or something like that. So for you growing up, were there experiences that you had where you were like, man, this is one of those experiences that like rocked my world and changed me. Like that was one of them where your friend was like,

13:19
You’re being an asshole, other people are gonna leave you and stop. Somebody could have taken that, been like, yeah, my buddy Jimmy told me not to be a dick anymore and then everything was cool. And you took that as a critical moment where you’re like, oh, I should do something with it. Were there any others that really stand out? I think my dad was really, really great at teaching us these kind of like critical thinking skills kind of thing, or just understanding context or being creative.

13:47
But there’s two in particular that I’d love to share. And I’m curious what you think about them. Because I think you’d love them. Number one, um when we were like maybe, God, I was like maybe eight or something like that, eight or nine, I was bored. It was like summer break or something, and I was bored. And I was like, Dad, I’m bored. What can I do? uh And he’s like, oh, OK, great. One second. Hold on. Give me a second. And he leaves. And then he comes back with a mop and a bucket.

14:16
And he says, do you know what would be really, really fun? If you mopped the kitchen floor. You know it’s something to do, it’s effective. is, you know, what do you think? Like, do you want to mop the floor? That’s what I got for you. If you want to do that, go for it, please. Otherwise, find something to do. And I was like, that’s actually, that’s great. know, like, touche. You want me to mop the floor? I’m not gonna mop the floor.

14:41
But I will find a way to entertain myself. And ever since then, I don’t think I’ve ever been bored. I’ve always been able to entertain myself. And the other kind of critical, that was such a great thing that he did when we were younger, we did this kind of series of dinners where we did caveman dinners, which were, just made a

15:11
big, big thing of pasta, okay? Pasta and some meat sauce or something like that. And he had a big old butcher block table that we always ate dinner around. So he put a big old tarp, plastic tarp down on the table and onto the floor, kind of drooping down onto the floor. And he got us into our underwear, me and my sister, and we were very young, and he just slopped this big old pot of pasta on the butcher block table in the tarp and he said,

15:41
Go to town. You’re gonna eat with your hands. You’re gonna get dirty and it’s gonna be a lot of fun. We’re calling this caveman dinner, okay? Go wild. And we had a great time. Now the next night, he put us in our fanciest clothes and we sat down for a nine course meal. And he gave us all of the directions on all the silverware, right? And all the different plates and how we do it. And we had to sit there and be proper.

16:09
and have our napkins in our lap and our combed hair and use the silverware properly, right? And so I think it’s one of those things of like balance and context, balance and context, right? You can have the caveman dinner, great, but understand the context of when you need to actually sit straight and have a towel on your lap and eat with the proper silverware. Like you gotta know both those contexts and everything in between to live a happy and healthy life in our society, in my opinion. And so,

16:38
That was one of those things that he was really good at, giving us context and freedom and play, through play and freedom. While still also controlling the situation. Yes, In a beautiful way. Yeah. And educating. Think about what you do now. You have a music education company where you’re teaching people how to play music in a fun way. I wonder who in your life would have led you to do any of that.

17:07
It’s true. 100 % my father. Yeah. And well, think about like, even as you talk about, you know, I’m bored. I remember saying to my dad, dad, I’m bored. He was like, get the fuck outside, go do something. Go do this, go do that. And he would make up all these things that were really exciting to him. And I am not the mechanical engineer type or the one who wants to go out and lift heavy things and like remove shit from people’s backyards or whatever.

17:35
I wanted to go play music or create art or something like that. And there was a disconnect there. There were times where my mom or my stepmom or even my dad at times would go, well, why don’t you go draw or something? I’d be like, yeah, cool, why not? I could have thought of that, but whatever. Like, they gave me a good idea. I’d go do it as a little kid. Or like finger pain or something. But being able to understand context, understanding how people best learn, understanding about those people does come from curiosity, I appreciate that you look at it and go, well, why do you think that way?

18:05
Or why do you look at it that way? I think there’s also much deeper levels that we can get to with that. Like you’re not just curious. I’m assuming this, but I’m also, think we’re of the same elk. Where it’s not just basic curiosity to be curious. There’s a reason. Like we want to understand, like, why do you think like that? How did you get there? Who led this thing to you? How does that make sense in my head? Why does that not make sense in my head? Like what is, the fuck did we do with this information?

18:33
It’s not just the curiosity of it. I mean, it’s really just like, it’s curiosity. I think it’s just, one of those people that is just a student of humanity. I’ve always been curious about human behavior and the motivations behind it. And it’s because I grew up as an actor. was what the thing that I did after college for seven years and…

18:56
and now I’ve pivoted into a career that I really, really love, the co-founder of this music education app that’s basically built on the way that I’ve taught myself how to play piano. And now I’m a professional pianist and I’m doing the app during the day. And you’re like, oh, what a weird life. But I still think that my curiosity comes from being a student of humanity because I was an actor. And you have to get really deep into people’s motivations.

19:24
when you are trying to replicate them in a realistic way. And it’s for outside in and inside out. It’s what are the institutions around them that make them feel and think that way? And do those themes tie into whatever piece that you’re performing in? But it’s also inside out. It is what about their childhood? What about their life? What about their perspective that has really made them behave this way? And so it’s always just been a fascination of mine. Why do people act the way that they act?

19:53
I love that your level of curiosity is at, let’s say a 10 and other people may just be slightly curious. But even if we all just take that a little bit and say, well, how can I be a little bit more curious, little less judgmental, but understand why I’m curious about this thing. Somebody says anything and I go, well, what is it? It’s not just the curiosity or even the answer back. It’s, oh, I really want to know because of whatever it is for each person. So for those people that are

20:21
on their path towards self mastery and along with curiosity, just everything else you’ve been through, what’s your advice for those people? The one thing in my opinion that would turn the tides of humanity and make people more empathetic and connected to every person on this earth, because we’re going to kill ourselves otherwise, that we need to come together as a species and tackle our world’s issues together. Climate change, economic justice, like so many things are global these days.

20:51
And it’s because there are almost 10 billion people on this earth. are so just, and we are a part of the earth. We need to shepherd it to the correct place and we need to be in service of the earth to really let our species just grow and evolve the way it probably should, you know? So with that comes a deep amount of empathy that we need to have for every human on this earth, regardless of culture, race, religion. It is one of those things I need to feel connected.

21:21
to somebody that lives on literally the other side of the earth. And how are we going to do that? It’s through curiosity. What makes you you? Describe it to me, show me. Show me your world. I’m so curious. so, be curious, not judgmental. Granted, judgment does inevitably come. I look, I judge people all fucking day. But it’s also one of those things of like, well, if I really want to know and care,

21:51
Get to the heart of who they are and their behavior and you’ll allow connection to just flourish. And for people that are naturally sort of judgmental or really hyper curious, I think the judgment comes from the bias or a situation that happened to us or just a deep, I don’t understand why you’re doing such a thing. Like I’ve joked to people before, I’ve said, I don’t understand why they’re doing it. I believe myself to be an intellectual and I thought a different way. So why the fuck are you doing it that way?

22:20
And some of it just has a little bit more air of a judgment to it, where it’s like a deeper curiosity. It’s a spectrum, as you put it. Everything’s a spectrum. Understanding ourselves and what we’re looking at, what we want, what we’re trying to do, and the reasons why we do those things, it’s also part of the balance, and we have to take it bit by bit. So man, I appreciate you being on today. It’s been great talking with you. I’m sure this is not the last time we’re gonna talk.

22:48
ah And before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you? Yeah, just go to my website musflow.ai. If you want to learn how to play piano in a different way, maybe traditional lessons didn’t work for you. We teach with sight reading first. It’s the act of reading music at first sight. We teach the fundamentals through that, through that skill, through that lens, let you master it without any repetition.

23:14
It’s always new music that is being generated for you at a very specific level and then you beat that level and then songs get unlocked after that. So we’re incorporating technology in and flow state and sight reading and gamification. We’re really bringing it all together into this one new methodology of teaching an instrument and eh it’s fundamentally different and it engages you in a much more holistic sort of way. So if you’re interested in that go to museflow.ai

23:41
Shoot me an email, info at museflow.ai and don’t put that in the show notes, just like, know, it’s for the people who are listening. Yeah, like we would love to hear what you think. I’d love to give your audience a coupon code if they want it. Let’s call it mindset, mindset 50. Anybody who uses it 50 % off for life. Look, we’re still growing. We’re still adding new features as we go. We’re not finished at all. We’re still expanding.

24:09
our accessibility. We’ve got iPad, we’ve got Android tablet, but we’re building it out for phones and any desktop app. so we’re slowly but surely growing this. We’re adding new instruments, uh adding new parts of the app. And if you want to get in that kind of on the ground floor, we just hit a really great marker. are now being able, we can pair overhead with subscriptions. And so the engine is going and it’s rolling and people aren’t churning. It’s like,

24:38
It’s actually doing it and we’re getting incredible feedback from our users. so that being said, we’re still very new. So I’d love to give your audience 50 % off for life if they want it. So it’s mindset 50. It’s great for anybody who is also just, if you’re really, really good, but maybe your sight reading is terrible. There’s a lot of professional pianists that are very good at just like the songs that they know. They have 700 songs and they’re really good at them. A lot of classical musicians are out there that do that, but they’re not.

25:07
good at sight reading. And so they use our app to get better at sight reading. So yeah, it’s good for everybody. It’s good for young people. It’s good for old people. It’s good for new people. It’s good for people that have been doing this for years. Awesome, man. I appreciate that. And I appreciate you being on. Thank you so much for your time today. Vice versa. Thank you,

In this episode, Nick speaks with Andrew Ecker to explore the cultural significance of drumming, particularly within indigenous communities, and highlights the historical context of drum circles as a means of fostering inclusivity and diversity and healing from trauma and addiction.

What to listen for:

“All of us are connected to the earth. All of us are indigenous. All of us have the air, the water, the fire, and the earth flowing through us.”

“Do something for people — and you’ll discover the truest truth of who you are.”

About Andrew Ecker

Andrew is a speaker, author, and creator of the Drumming Sounds Protocol, an evidence-based wellness intervention that blends ancient rhythm traditions with modern neuroscience to improve mental health, recovery, and community connection.

With over 25 years of experience facilitating more than 5,000 drumming and sound-based programs, Andrew has worked with hospitals, treatment centers, universities, and tribal nations across the country. His book, The Sacred 7, explores identity, ancestry, and the transformative power of ceremony—a topic that resonates deeply with audiences seeking meaning, resilience, and personal empowerment.

As a former youth outreach leader and recovery coach with over two decades in sobriety, Andrew brings a powerful, real-world perspective to conversations about trauma, healing, and spirituality. His ability to blend science, story, and spirit makes him a compelling guest for podcasts focused on wellness, recovery, leadership, and conscious living.

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

Watch Clips and highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:02.959)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show, we have Andrew Ecker. Andrew, what’s going on?

Andrew Ecker (00:13.602)
How’s it going, Nick?

Nick McGowan (00:15.649)
It’s good. I’m glad that you’re here. I’m excited for us to talk about music and drum circles and sound healing and all the things that relate to all of that. And we were gonna have a call maybe like a year and a half ago or so. And there’ve been some people that have like backed out of the show and I’ve been like, that’s fine. You can do whatever you want to do. But you were one of the people I was like, I hope he comes back. So I’m glad that you’re here. I’m glad that people are gonna be able to hear this conversation. And why don’t you get us started?

Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

Andrew Ecker (00:48.769)
Awesome. So before we do that, I’d like to just take a moment and honor myself in the space by introducing myself formally in traditional language of my ancestors. This is a language called Nde Baza, which basically means the people’s tongue. So Dago Tse, Tse Nde, Andirector Yenise, Adon Dae Nshinigye, Nde Nshe, Irish Pashachin, Nde Dasha Tshe, German Dasha Nali, Kote Goe Itshliye, Portland, Oregon, Enishe.

Shama’e, Kathy Lindsay Woye, Shaza’e Del Eccorale. So my name is Andrew Eccor, my mother Kathy Lindsay, my father Del Eccor, my mother’s mother Elva Gallegos, Apache woman from New Mexico. She grew up in a little town called Capitan right outside the Mescalero reservation. Although my ancestral lines go back to the Madera Valley of Texas and Chihuahua, Mexico. The Apaches from this area are called La Pond Band Apache. My father’s mother Evelyn Beatty, an Irish woman from Pennsylvania.

She actually was very proud that our ancestor William Beatty fought in the Revolutionary War to establish this country. So I do consider myself a son of the revolution on that side of my family. My mother’s father Leroy Lindsay, a Korean and Vietnam War veteran, and my father’s father Wayne Ecker, a World War II veteran. I have a daughter Bailey, son Peyton, a beloved fiancee named Monica. I was born in the ancestral land of the Multnomah Clackamas of Malamit in Portland, Oregon.

although I currently reside in the ancestral land of the Akmal, Atom, the Peaposh and the Hohokam in Phoenix, Arizona. And very grateful to be here with you. So the thing that I do primarily is I work in healthcare and I’m a drum circle facilitator and sound medicine practitioner and also a peer support specialist, recovery coach. Most of the work that I do is in

variety of different healthcare settings. So everything from psychiatric lockdowns to memory care, skilled nursing, prisons, jails, drug and alcohol treatment facilities, I facilitated about 5,000 wellness-based events with a protocol I’ve developed called Drumming Sounds. So Drumming Sounds is a step-by-step process of creating outcomes that are wellness-based. So reducing stress, increasing immunity, lowering blood pressure,

Andrew Ecker (03:13.865)
helping people connect through music and really creating a safe, sacred space for people to come into group drumming. So group drumming is a really powerful wellness intervention and so it’s a small group of studies done on it and it’s pretty amazing what the science community has found. So yeah, so that’s what I do and also do some coaching stuff, of course, help people out. Something unique about me,

that a lot of people don’t know. You know, I grew up in a home where both my parents were addicted to drugs and my mom died of a cocaine overdose and my father died of cirrhosis of liver caused by hepatitis C. So growing up in that environment, I was around a lot of really intense experiences. And I think something that a lot of people don’t know about me is that because of that,

My relationship with PTSD as a child was something really intense and my first suicide attempt I was seven years old. I remember attempting to hang myself at seven and thankfully, you know, I didn’t succeed. But from the time of that first attempt till really probably my late 20s,

I was dealing with suicidal ideation and a severe relationship to other mental health concerns, including situational schizophrenia, depression, anxiety. These are all things I live in relationship with today.

Nick McGowan (05:01.261)
So, where do I go from here? know, way to drop everything on us. I first off want to thank you and appreciate how you started this and being able to show back to your ancestors and being able to talk from your original language. I think we can sometimes forget about where we come from. Our genetics do not.

our generational trauma does not. There’s so many things that, like you dealt with so much with your parents. I’m sure we could just tackle through all of that, but what your parents dealt with, that then they transferred along to you and what their parents dealt with, et cetera, et cetera, and how all of that was tossed to us. Most people I don’t think really think about that because they just think, well, my parents are assholes, so I’m trying to do better or whatever. It’s like, well, let’s actually take steps back generations before that.

and before that, before that. And I think we can sometimes also forget about where you actually came from. Like you rattled off a lot of family members. And as I was thinking about it, I was like, I’m making me, I maybe go like two layers deep. People beyond that, I don’t really know. And I don’t really know if they’re still around or what the hell’s going on or whatever, because of the way that I was raised. And it’s interesting to think about how we should.

actually get back to more community-based things, but there’s a lot of unlearning to do with all of that. And I’ve read through the stuff you’ve sent. I’ve seen the different things you’ve done. I’ve known about you for a little bit, but I wouldn’t have even been able to know about the things that you’ve just rattled off. And really, mean, shit, where do you want to start with this?

and thinking about from a mental health and a mindset and overall transformation, self mastery. I’m not trying to just throw out buzzwords, but like there are categorical things we can talk about here, you know?

Andrew Ecker (06:59.456)
Yeah.

Andrew Ecker (07:03.264)
Yeah, for sure. And that’s really why I’d like to share that traditional introduction because it does give us an opportunity to understand what healthy communities have looked at as self-identity, really the foundation of creating a healthy person. We’re talking about tens of thousands of years of this idea that we are our parents, we are our grandparents, we are from someplace and we live someplace. You know, these principles of self-identity.

And just like you were sharing, know, remembering that is very important because we live in a time where our earth-based identity has been systematically erased from our mindset. And this is done through systematic organization of space, you know, ideas like the patriarchy, manoralism and feudalism. You know, these really predominant institutions

systematically created a separation from us being our family and being from the earth. Yet all of us are connected to the earth. All of us are indigenous. All of us have the air, the water, the fire, the earth flowing through us. And the more that we can remember that, the more that we can validate that we are valuable just as a person. The contemporary culture has created this idea that we’re a job.

And that’s our identity, that’s our value. And that idea was really created around feudalism and manalism historically because these were the only… Well, everyone in those systems was a job-based identity other than the landlords. And the landlords were the ones who were able to have an earth-based identity. If you weren’t have land and land title,

You were a smith, a parson, a knight, a sewer, all of these behavioral based ideas of identity. And as we begin to really look at these constructs, you can see that the devaluing of the human condition is a purposeful and an intentional plot to really create what we’re faced with today. And what we’re faced with today is a lot of people

Andrew Ecker (09:26.423)
wandering around feeling valueless, hopeless, and really in a condition that promotes the use of destructive behaviors such as substances. know, myself, growing up in an environment where I remember the D.A.R.E. program coming into my school, and you know, during D.A.R.E., a lot of people don’t remember, but the D.A.R.E. police were getting children to turn in their parents for using cannabis.

and for using substances. And I remember my mom was really scared that this was going to happen. So she kind of cornered me one day and said to me, you know, if they come into your school, you can’t tell them that we use this. And it was really weird to me, because like those were the best times I remember. You know, my job as a little boy was to clean the stems and the seeds out of the cannabis. You know, back when cannabis had stems and seeds.

You know, and people rolled a joint. It wasn’t a free roll. You know, but my family used to sit around and smoke and that was when they were social. You know, nobody was drunk fighting. Nobody was in the bathroom or in the bedroom with the door shut. You know, doing intravenous drugs, they were social. And I just couldn’t understand that as a kid. But yet I remember them coming into my school and they had flags and

Nick McGowan (10:24.073)
You

Andrew Ecker (10:51.996)
guns and these were great big intimidating police officers. And I remember my heart racing and my palms getting sweaty. And thankfully they didn’t interrogate me. But what they did was they said to this group of children, if you have one drug addict parent, you’re 50 % more likely to become a drug addict. Now I’m not saying that they did this intentionally to give children this idea that they’re genetically flawed. They were trying to impart to these kids.

that, you know, don’t use drugs. That’s what, you know, is the big thing. You know, just say no, all this stuff. But what it did for me is it told me, well, 50 and 50, that’s 100. That must be who I am. And this was the first time in my life that anyone told me I was genetically flawed. You know, and the extension of eugenics isn’t something that is merely a part of, you know, the Nazi regime.

Nick McGowan (11:35.326)
Hmm.

Andrew Ecker (11:47.256)
You know, eugenics enters into childhood ideas in these sorts of systematic ways. You know, now, you know, fast forward, we’ve come to a place of understanding that it’s not just eugenics, but it’s epigenetics and really looking at how we can create environments that create successful human beings. And that’s what I’m able to do with the drum circle. You know, the drum circle is really an environment that creates a healthy human being.

as to where the destructive forces of incarceration, imprisonment and devaluing people because they have a mental health concern created those behaviors that were a part of my parents’ lives and unfortunately a part of my life. know, it wasn’t that moment that I became a drug addict when the Derikoff said that to me. But later on, as I would grow older, that seed started to take root. And when I was a teenager, I ended up

in the spoon with my dad, meaning I was using heroin with my father. You know, my mom used to use me to shoplift. I was in and out of drug houses. I mean, it was, I was exposed to things as a little boy that only makes sense today in my path of service. You know, as I’ve learned to manage these things and as I’ve learned to show up and help people reconnect to who they are, it’s all made perfect sense to me.

But as a little boy, man, I didn’t know what was going on. I didn’t know how to deal with it. I just wanted the pain to end. know, and, you know, thankfully I found heroin because heroin helped me through my suicidal ideation. Because I don’t know if I would be alive today if it wasn’t for heroin. You know, things got real bad for me when I was, you know, 17, 18 years old.

Nick McGowan (13:41.68)
I gotta be honest, I never thought I would hear anybody else say that thankfully I had heroin because that changed things. I overdosed on heroin when I was 19. And the people that were there in the room, I’m thankful that they wanted to save their own lives and one person like beat the shit out of me so I threw everything up. But I remember walking home smoking a cigarette after that being like, what the fuck just happened? All right. And looking up being like, all right, I guess there’s some reason why I’m here. And I think back to that.

But that wasn’t like that one moment, just like the moment that you were talking about or any of those other little moments were just a bag of moments in a sense. All these things, like even as a little kid, you don’t really know. Like, and I totally understand where you’re coming from with the parents hanging around, smoking joints, all of that. I was in parts of some of that. My mom and dad were never together and it was like totally separate ways of being and all of that.

living in and out of bars, basically, like being the kid eating a maraschino cherries and all that shit, and everyone just smoking cigarettes like a pack at a time and out around your face. There are people that don’t understand those things. Even like the dare stuff. I’ve had conversations with people kind of recently, like within the past handful of months, where some people were like, dare scared the shit out of me. And I didn’t want to touch like caffeine or anything else. Other people were like, I learned there were drugs out there. So was like, great, can I have some?

And then other people went through stuff like you where they’re like, well, you’re telling me this is how it is. I think it’s interesting how we can suspect that, let’s just say, dare wasn’t trying to brainwash. know, let’s just say that their thing was like, we want to help and we want to make sure that you have the statistics. But these are also adults that are like, well, 50 % of you become addicts. So why don’t we just tell the kids that you take it as one way. Some other kid takes it a different way.

And there’s no repercussion to that at all to then like, that wasn’t a thing that you then brought up the next day in school. It like, know what? Yesterday, I learned this thing and now I feel like the rest of my life is gonna change. That just started to grow bit by bit by bit. And then you already had the genes of being addicted.

Nick McGowan (16:02.023)
I know I have to come back to some fucking question basically. And my question at all times with that sort of stuff is like, how do we stop that from happening? Because even with the DARE stuff, it’s like, yeah, cool, thanks. Now I know there are other drugs out there and also know what the end is and I’ll fall back to marijuana because like, why the fuck? It’s a fucking plan. But all things in moderation and like all those different aspects to it. But what do we do? You know, like you move to music.

And as a musician and creative myself, I moved toward that too, but I often think of the times of smoking a joint and playing music and like those are happy moments. but to some people that might be destructive and all of that, but you moved closer into music. So I think music sometimes can be part of our addiction, you know, like I’m addicted to sound. but being able to turn that into a healing thing. So I don’t want to just jump past everything you went through.

Andrew Ecker (16:57.041)
Thank

Nick McGowan (16:59.844)
with your parents because that made you who you are. But being able to look back at some of those moments to go, now with the work that you do, the way that you were raised, what are some of those bridge points that you can look at and go, man, I was really looking for community. I was looking for ways to do this and do that. You know what I mean?

Andrew Ecker (17:18.16)
Yeah, exactly. I really believe that all addiction for me is based around relationship and filling the void of the absence of relationship with the substance. And I remember the first time that this really happened to me, me and my mom were out shoplifting all day. I was just a little guy. I was, you know, probably eight, nine, I don’t know, somewhere around there. I remember being all bundled up and maybe even younger. I was

you know, elementary school age. And she takes me to the park and she left me there at the park with a bucket of chicken. And I remember her saying, I’ll be right back and her driving off and me eating that chicken to fill the void and the fear of my mom not coming back for me. Being left at the park and knowing in my childhood mind that she was going to a dope house and there could have been something that happened.

It was just the anxiety of that entire situation I was feeling with the warmth of that chicken. And then later on, you know, as I started to grow in my own personal self mastery, I started to look back at the patterns of loneliness and grief and isolation and how every time that I found myself using, really, it was that idea. It was about creating camaraderie at first, community.

finding a judgment free zone. You know, I grew up being bounced around family member to family member. So definitely had home insecurity and really wasn’t, you know, in a place where I felt like I had a home. So I didn’t feel that sense of security that maybe most people grow up with. So when I found the security of friends that would accept me, you know, just if I got high with them, that’s all I needed. It wasn’t like I needed to be

smart, it wasn’t like I needed to be funny, it wasn’t like I needed to be athletic, you know, it wasn’t like I needed to be a great musician, any of those things. I just needed to show up and get high and you know and have money to get high or be able to hustle and that was really my first support system was the community of people that I was using with and what happens for most people that are in the struggle of substance use disorder

Andrew Ecker (19:43.015)
is that they focus on what not to do. And they never really understand what the drugs and alcohol gave to them. You know, asking myself, what was it that heroin gave to me? What was it that alcohol gave to me? And how can I effectively create a way of meeting that need? Because we all have human needs. Every single one of us is going through something. And you know, it’s a lot easier when we go through it together and building that foundation of community.

is so important in me being able to have functional behaviors today. So I’m constantly evolving in the way that I’m able to show up in community. I have my drum circle community. I have the people that I serve in the institutions and healthcare and the schools. And then I also have other activities like doing poetry or playing pickleball, going to the gym.

You know, these are ways that I definitely look at creating community where I’m at. There was a time when church was a really big part of my life. You know, now I go to sweat lodge and I have a spiritual community there. Uh, you know, I’m not opposed to going to meetings, but I, know, I don’t go to a lot now, but definitely going to 12 step meetings and all of these things are a great way that we can build a supportive community. And when you ask, you know,

Like when we think about children that have been affected by the mental health crisis, you know, how do we help them navigate? How do we help the youth navigate? And I think it’s really about creating a fortified sense of community. And, you know, when we think about drumming, oftentimes we go to this idea that drumming is this exclusive experience for indigenous communities, that it’s something that really is ceremonial and

ritualistic and yes there is definitely ritual and ceremony but drum circles began as creating a culture of inclusivity, equity and really diversity because the drum circle of North America originated in the 1700s in New Orleans and under French colonial occupation Native Americans, Africans, Europeans, people from all over the world

Andrew Ecker (22:09.146)
were able to gather with the common language of group drumming. And that group drumming created a foundation for jazz, blues, R &B, gospel, and eventually rock and roll. So when I go in and I facilitate a drum circle, it’s from the American experience of group drumming that has always been about creating a culture of diversity, has always been about creating a space of connection.

through diverse groups. And when we have that sacred space, we can know that something good is gonna happen. And we as Americans, we don’t know that the only truly American instrument is the drum kit. The jazz drum kit is really the only truly American instrument. So we have this vast history of drumming together that is hundreds of years old, literally as old as the concept of

of America, yet for some reason this sort of stuff isn’t taught in school. And it’s not taught to us about the richness of creating a culture of diversity, of inclusion, of equity, and what the brilliance of that looks like in an artistic sense. And I think today we’re threatened by a voice that is coming from a group of people that says that diversity, inclusion, and equity

is something to fear. And I’m like people, that’s the very greatest gifts that we’ve given to the world has come from us coming together as a people. And it feels good. You know, it feels good to give yourself an opportunity to be around people in an activity that you normally wouldn’t be around. And I think that that’s the power of our journey and the wellness and the brilliance of our community.

Nick McGowan (23:58.594)
Hmm.

Andrew Ecker (24:04.405)
And when we can get back to teaching each other that, when we can get back to fortifying the space of that concept of what that America looks like, we’ll have the brilliance of being the shining city on the hillside that calls the weary, that calls the hurting, that calls the desperate. And you know, the struggle that my parents went through, the pain that they were going through, and the ostracization of being

criminalized for having a mental health issue. You know, that’s what this country has done very effectively. You know, 90 % of people in our prison system have a mental health issue. And that is sad that we have done this to the most vulnerable people in our population. And we have more people in prison than any industrialized nation in the world. But if you counted the people that were in

psychiatric lockdowns, memory care, skilled nursing, and other forms of institutionalization, that number would be astronomical. And these are the people that I have spent the past 20 years working with, helping, desperately giving to, because in that space, I feel fulfilled as a human being, but I also get to see some of the most brilliant experiences and miraculous experiences

in my life, Nick. I mean, we’ll go into these memory care facilities where we have late stage Alzheimer’s patients that are nonverbal and we’ll set the drum down in front of them. The nurses sometimes will come over and say, they won’t play, don’t even bother. I mean, this is our healthcare workers and we’ll say, no, just keep it there. And next thing you know, you see them tapping their foot. And before you know it, they’re playing and they’re singing and

You know, it’s just miraculous to know that the tens of thousands of years of evidence-based practice of utilizing group drumming has not been wasted and that it’s still relevant to the healthcare conversation and it still is meaningful and it still helps people.

Nick McGowan (26:15.97)
Why don’t see how it can’t not continue that way, you know? Like, I think everybody that will listen to this will have heard at least one time, music is the universal language. And for us to be able to actually feel music, there are people that don’t really understand music. They don’t feel it the same way musicians do, let’s say. Like there are sometimes I’ll share things with people and I’m like, listen to how this happens with this and my God.

then it just does things to you. You feel that at different times. Other people don’t know that. That’s just not part of their being. Yet still, they can feel the frequencies. If we really break it down into quantum level, we are all waves and frequencies anyway. And all of this ties into everything. man, I’m sitting here like I got chills even as you’re talking about, because I’m visualizing that older person who the healthcare workers are basically like, we see them every day. They don’t do anything because we also don’t do anything different.

Andrew Ecker (26:48.163)
yes.

Nick McGowan (27:15.083)
And we’re kind of jaded and overworked and fuck, I could really use a vacation. Like they have their own problems. And then they’re just like, no, don’t worry about them. They’re not going to do it. But that frequency will still get in there. So I could imagine it’s got to be a, that’s probably one of those things like drum circles per se is one of those things that people probably won’t go to on the top list of 30 things that they’re going to do to work on themselves at first. You know, so even

Like if somebody were to say, you’re having these problems, you have some addiction, you have anything and they go, well, go to a drum circle. I would imagine most people would look at somebody like a dog would like, what the fuck does that, what do you mean? so what would you say to those people that haven’t even thought of that? This is one of those things where like, wow, I’ve talked to somebody, I went to a doctor and I’m doing these and we’re doing blah, blah, blah. What advice do you give to those people that this has been one of those things that.

was probably not even deep, deep in their mind, even as a musician, to think about how drum circles and drumming could help them.

Andrew Ecker (28:19.943)
Well, I definitely feel that a lot of that has been because of the cultural stereotypes about drumming and this idea of, you know, the witch doctor or voodoo or, you know, something along these lines. you know, it just is, it’s crazy to really unpack when you have communities that have thrived with a relationship to the earth, lived functionally for tens of thousands of years. And at the heart of those communities,

is group drumming, dancing and singing. I mean, this is literally the oldest wellness based event that we have as human beings. And somehow, you know, through the lens of religion and not even really, I would say because I was a pastor for three and half years that I can tell you that there’s a lot of reference in the Bible even of sound medicine. I mean, David, you know, played the leader for Saul who had

like mental health concerns. And it’s, mean, there’s references to the women of Israel coming out playing the drum. So it isn’t like an educated Judeo-Christian bias. It’s an uneducated Judeo-Christian bias that creates this narrative that, those brown and black people are the people, those savages, that drum. And it’s really unfortunate because even

Nick McGowan (29:21.642)
Mm-hmm.

Andrew Ecker (29:48.061)
in the very progressive world of integrative medicine, there still is a void around drumming. I am a presenter at some of the most prestigious healthcare conferences in the United States. And I remember confronting a doctor that was talking about mindfulness and he had, he was a keynote and he had this tree of mindfulness and all of these branches led to different aspects of mindfulness.

One of them, of course, went to yoga, Tai Chi, but there wasn’t a branch that went to drumming and dance. And I confronted him in front of the entire group of doctors, 500 doctors. And I said, why isn’t there a branch to drumming? And he was very apologetic. And he said, there needs to be a branch on that tree to drumming. And I said, yes, we’re working on making that happen. But it is overlooked.

Nick McGowan (30:37.513)
Hmm.

Andrew Ecker (30:46.148)
And you know, I can tell you that I am a part of a community of people that have the more that they drum, they may have come to a drum circle and been drinking and smoking. But by the time, you know, a couple of years go by and they get around people like myself that are completely abstinent from substance use and I’m drumming and having a great time and dancing, the more that they start to question, well, do I really need this? And then it’s just

Nick McGowan (31:13.566)
Hmm.

Andrew Ecker (31:13.911)
a matter of them just being in that environment. And I have friends come up to me and say, Hey, you know what? I didn’t tell anybody about this, but I haven’t drank in, you know, six months. And I’m like, right on, you know, and friends come up and say, I haven’t smoked in a year and I just kind of went away because drumming as well as you know, Nick, music gives us that feeling of community connection. I mean, there is no deeper connection.

that you can experience, then when you hit a note or when you play a rhythm and everybody ends together and nobody said stop, or the thing just fades away into the brilliance of the experience and you’re just like, holy crap. This, mean, as a musician, and if you talk to musicians, they can tell you precisely when that happened in their life, because it’s one of those memories.

Nick McGowan (31:51.954)
Mm-hmm.

Andrew Ecker (32:09.966)
that is embedded into you on a cellular level. It is literally like you’re touching God. I mean, it is so powerful. And every person, we have communities where that was literally the entire community experience. I was fortunate enough to go to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and meet with the Havasupai. And I did three suicide prevention programs down there. This is the most remote Native American tribe in the continental United States.

Nick McGowan (32:13.95)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (32:26.279)
you

Andrew Ecker (32:39.159)
There’s no roads to their nation. There’s no airstrips. It’s only horseback helicopter or foot. That’s the only way you can get down there. And I met with an elder named Tiny Haunan. And Tiny was playing the drum and singing. And he said, when I was a little boy, we used to drum, dance and sing for a week straight. He said the people would fall asleep on the ground, wake up, start singing and dancing again. And they would drum literally for an entire week.

Now the frequency of that, the cellular alliance, the reconfiguration of the energetic meridians in the body, like there is no place for depression in that environment. There’s no place for anxiety in that environment. I mean, you’re literally rewiring your nervous system and coming into our harmonic connection with the earth. And this is really what it means to be an earthling. You know, the music that we play,

Nick McGowan (33:21.758)
you

Andrew Ecker (33:38.14)
is something that we practice to play at the level that we can play at. But everybody knows that there’s a point where the instrument is playing you. And when you’re in that mystery, man, when you are in that mystery, like every single person deserves to experience that in their lives. Every single person deserves to be in the brilliance of that experience because it solves the issues, man. It solves it.

Nick McGowan (33:50.055)
Mm-hmm.

Andrew Ecker (34:06.196)
And when you taste that, you’re hungry for it forever. And I’ll go to, you know, like I facilitate drum circles and that really doesn’t happen in a drum circle. But a taste of that does happen. Like a place of connection to the feeling of support and the intricacy of music and even the freedom that you can experience in that space, it will happen. And

You know, it does take a level of mastery to experience the depths of that. And hopefully people will be able to go on their journey with music to that place. like that is, dude, I mean, there’s nothing better than that right there. I mean, if you could take and put that into a bottle, people would spend their lives wanting to… And that’s why musicians do what they do, They will…

Nick McGowan (35:02.119)
Mm-hmm.

Andrew Ecker (35:02.624)
They will literally sleep on the couch of their best friend to go experience that. They will literally not go to work to go experience that. They will do whatever they possibly can to experience that. you know, unfortunately, in a world that doesn’t value music like our ancestors did, you know, for tens of thousands of years, and even today, you know, you go to India, they have ceremonies that are a month.

where it’s just people drumming, dancing and singing for a month straight. You you go to Hopi right here in the United States on the Hopi reservation. They’re doing that same idea because the practice of living in integration with the earth promotes the quality of the earthling condition. So where you’re not worried, you go sleep in a mud house rather than go try to make a billion dollars so that you have a big old fancy house.

if you get that experience of community. You know, and that experience of community solves everything, man. And we got to get it in our schools. We got to get it in our our our health care facilities. We’re trying our best. We train 350 people now in the drumming sounds protocol. We’re out there doing it every day, you know, and just trying to live our best lives. So is it the solution? I think that we have, like I said, thousands, literally people, thousands of years.

Nick McGowan (36:17.638)
Hmm.

Andrew Ecker (36:30.459)
of evidence-based practice out there. Like, wake up, people, wake up. Like, yeah, we need drumming.

You know?

Nick McGowan (36:39.836)
Yeah, I mean, even just the community level of that, but the music and the frequency level of all of it and everything that ties into it. I love the work that you’re doing. I really do. I think it’s crazy that the arts and music especially is being taken out of different schools and everything’s being really like commodified almost, even when you think of music. For the most part, pop music.

It’s an ABA, CAB sort of situation. It’s the same thing. There was even a thing like 10, 15 years ago where somebody played a Nickelback song forward and layered over another Nickelback song backwards and it was the same. And it was like, that is crazy. But that’s what is being pushed to us instead of feeling through all of this and allowing yourself to actually get into it. I’m really glad that you got to the point where you were saying that the music is playing you.

Because any musician that’s really been in, I don’t know, in any sort of jam session or in a live band or something, even if you’ve remotely tasted that little bit, you know that that’s a real thing. And that’s a whole different level. And you’re right, that is divine. Like you are literally in it. I’d played guitar in worship bands for the better part of a decade. And if it weren’t for music, I wouldn’t have been there.

Andrew Ecker (37:54.712)
Dude, it’s fast, yeah.

Andrew Ecker (38:03.5)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (38:03.961)
I wouldn’t have ended up having a relationship with God. And I also now at this point, no, he’s not some bearded dude on a fucking chair somewhere. Like it’s much bigger than that. But being able to feel that, like there are things where you couldn’t manufacture this feeling. So I’m glad he pointed out, like if we could bottle it, that would be great. But at the same time, the rest of the world is trying to bottle fucking everything else. So I’m glad that we can’t because you need to experience that, you know?

Andrew Ecker (38:12.974)
Yeah

Andrew Ecker (38:20.322)
Yeah.

Andrew Ecker (38:28.202)
I know, I know.

You do,

Nick McGowan (38:33.743)
What a cool thing, man. And I really love the work that you’re doing. I appreciate you being on with us today. For the people that are on their path towards self-mastery, what’s your advice to those people that are walking toward that?

Andrew Ecker (38:45.772)
You know, I think first just be gentle with yourself and just understand that, you know, loving yourself is the simplest thing. I was doing my best and you know, we man, life is rough, man. I mean, we, we lose people. go through all kinds of stuff and people used to tell me all the time, you know, Andrew, you need to love yourself, especially when I was little, you know, they would tell me this and I, I’d be like, you know, I felt like I was doing something wrong, you know, like

What does that mean? And you know, it really is as simple as just saying, I was doing my best through everything, you know, through the alcoholism, through the drugs, but look at what’s going on in your life. And if it isn’t working for you, change, you know, like don’t be stuck in a pattern that is something destructive. You know, being in a place where you can manage your thoughts is a very important aspect to living your successful life.

allowing for the thoughts that don’t serve you to simply fade away and sometimes to be confrontational with those thoughts. You know, I remember reading God is love and I thought if I just focus on love, maybe all these thoughts of suicide would would leave me. So every time any anxiety came into my life, I would just simply start screaming love in my mind and take control of my mind. You know, sometimes we just have to

overpower those thoughts that aren’t serving us. And, you know, I think that for me, the greatest act of my own self mastery is the place of service. Being of service to others has brought me to a place where I feel the best, Andrew. And sometimes, you know, showing up isn’t easy. Sometimes it’s hard, but I think about the people that I drum with in the institutions and

You know, just to give everybody a really brief story before we kind of close this up. For 10 years, I went to this skilled nursing hospital. And for 10 years, this man would come out and he was in a bed and his hands were atrophied. And I’d have to pry his fingers open and put a maraca in his hand. And he would shake the maraca and say, Hallelujah, Hallelujah. You know, and he had this great big smile on his face.

Andrew Ecker (41:11.164)
And this man’s name that I’m mentioning today is Vance Gribbins. And one day I came to the hospital and I said, Where’s my buddy Vance? And they told me he went home to heaven. I was like, good for him. You know, I said, How long did he live in this hospital? I’ve been coming here for 10 years. And they said he lived in that hospital for 28 years. And for 28 years, man, he lived in a body that that he couldn’t feed himself, you know, and 28 years he was in a hospital bed.

But every single time he had an opportunity to show up for drum circle or sing along or balloon toss or bingo, he was there. And you know, today we have people that have everything in their lives. They have money, they have beautiful homes, cars, all this stuff. And to get them to go out to, you know, an art display or to go and show up at an open mic or a drum circle.

You know, it’s like the end of the world. They would rather sit in front of their TV and watch Judge Judy need potato chips. And I’m just calling people on their bullshit. You know, if we want to have a good world, we got to get out of our house. We got to connect with our neighbors. We got to say hi to people. We can’t just look down at our phone every time we see a homeless person and try to escape eye contact. You know, we need to engage with people and be the brilliance that we are.

You know, the medicine that you have inside of you is a medicine that we need as a community. And that’s what this world needs right now. We need love. We need togetherness. You know, I stopped giving money to people when they would ask me for money on the street. But I immediately will say to a person, hey, can I pray for you? You know, and sometimes people will say, you know, hell no, I don’t want that. And sometimes people will say, you know what?

I appreciate that. Please pray for me. And I remember one time me and Monica were in my my fiancee. We were in Salt Lake. And this guy had chains, gold chains on and he just put out a joint. I could tell he smelled like cannabis and everything. He’s like, hey, man, you got any money? I was like, no, but I could say a prayer for you. And I’m saying a prayer for this guy. And he’s like, that’s the good shit. That’s what he was saying. And you just never know how you’re going to impact somebody’s life if you make yourself available. So

Nick McGowan (43:34.615)
Yeah.

Andrew Ecker (43:35.493)
You know, want to be in the place of self mastery, be available for community. You know, get out there and do something that is just to be available. Volunteer, you know, go show up at the homeless shelter. Develop a podcast that’s giving to the community. Do something for people. You know, do something for people. And you know, you’re to find the truest truth of the truth that you are. And you’re going to make a difference in the lives of people.

Nick McGowan (44:02.656)
It’s hard to not clap right now and like really fucking root, you know what I mean? So thank you, dude. I appreciate that. I’ve been refraining back from the like, fuck yeah, yeah. You know, so I really appreciate it. And how that was also one of those. and by the way, one more fucking thing. Here it is. Man, that’s awesome. I think there are small things that we can do.

Andrew Ecker (44:13.013)
Yeah!

Andrew Ecker (44:23.581)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (44:32.002)
to really help us be able to start down that path? Because you’re talking about a lot of things and to some people, and I try to break stuff down to like, what could anybody be thinking about being super analytical or whatever of like, man, that’s a lot of shit. And there’s like a lot of things that are going on. I’m having really hard time with this one little thing in my life right now. So taking those smaller steps, like even saying get out and do community, do community in the way that feels right for you to do.

Like there are people that will go to church on Sunday and that’s my community time. And as soon as they walk out, they’re yelling at their kids, they’re hating on everybody. it’s like, you’re not really doing community at that point. And community can look different to everybody. And sometimes it’s just showing up literally in the neighborhood. And like you’re saying, and dude, I think we all do it. There are people around, look down at your phone. I do that at times where I’m lost in my own head and I’m thinking about things. I’m just…

going through my phone, because I’m like, don’t want to have an interaction with somebody else. And as soon as I’m aware of that, I’m like, fucking, I gotta put my phone away. Hi, you know, like, just taking that step to get out there a little bit. You obviously love what you’re doing. And this is part of your calling and a deep purpose of yours. And I think the big thing for all of us to be able to take away from that is whatever that looks like for us, just lean into it. Just get into it a little bit more and enjoy that. And I…

I love that you were talking about the amount of music and the things that go into that, like the feelings that we can get from all of that and how that opens people that haven’t been open for years and years and sometimes decades. So, Andrew, I appreciate you being on here. It’s been a pleasure having you on, man. I really appreciate it. Before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Andrew Ecker (46:16.065)
so yeah, drumming sounds is pretty much the easiest way there. you know, if you Google drumming sounds, it’ll pull me up, but I’d like to give everybody a free copy of my book based on the traditional introduction of my ancestors, but applicable to any sort of person. it’s just a system of self identity and you can get that at the sacred seven.com. It’ll also put you into my email list and you can find out events we’re doing music festivals, trainings, drum circles, all that stuff.

Nick McGowan (46:51.511)
Again, man, it’s been pleasure having you on. Thank you for your time.

Andrew Ecker (46:54.273)
Thank you, Nick.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Lybi Ma about the importance of embracing all emotions, including those that are often deemed negative. They emphasize the need to sit with and process feelings rather than suppressing them, highlighting that experiencing emotions is a natural part of life.

What to listen for:

“We spend a lot of time negating half of our emotions. We want to feel happy and not depressed or not anxious, or we don’t want to feel anger. Feel these things.”

“People stop breathing when they’re tense and in the moment of being reactive to an unhappy situation. And when you stop breathing, cortisol goes up, and you become alert, and you’re looking for the predator. Just breathe and let your body work it out.”

About Lybi Ma

Lybi is the executive editor of Psychology Today. In addition to producing the print magazine, she also edits its website and blog platform, which hosts more than nine hundred authors, academic researchers, and journalists. She edited a Psychology Today book series covering topics such as anger, food addiction, and bipolar disorder. She has a blended family of five adult children and lives with her husband in Westchester, New York. Her newest book, HOW TO BE LESS MISERABLE, is available now from Blackstone Publishing.

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

Watch Clips and highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:00.971)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Libby, how you doing today?

Lybi Ma (00:10.338)
Good. Thank you for having me.

Nick McGowan (00:13.233)
Absolutely, I’m excited that you’re here. I told you, I thought you were gonna be really academic and I think you’re gonna be able to tie that in with being an actual human. And I’m excited with all this. So why don’t you get us started? Yes, thank you. Thank you for breathing air with the rest of us. Why don’t you get this started? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre?

Lybi Ma (00:25.121)
breathing.

Lybi Ma (00:38.39)
I am the executive editor at Psychology Today, and I’ve been there for quite a few decades. Not gonna tell you completely because I don’t want you to know my age. And something that, well, the thing about me is that we take my ex-husband on vacation with us. There you go.

Nick McGowan (01:06.644)
So I appreciate that you basically just hold the mic there, like about to drop it and like, what do you want to do with this? I feel like there are people that would be like, and here’s some context to it. So I’ve got to ask what, what do you mean? How does that work? Does he physically go with you or is he like in a box? Okay.

Lybi Ma (01:22.222)
Yeah, he’s, he comes with us. He shows up. We had three weddings in 13 months between my second husband and me. And they’re grown kids. And he came to my stepkids’ weddings and they call him Uncle Carl.

Nick McGowan (01:44.628)
Cool. That’s really awesome. That is an odd thing that I, unfortunately that I think most people don’t experience. Yeah. Well, this is, this is a good thing to start on too. Cause I’ve actually had this conversation with somebody recently where they’re like, yeah, I’ve got a young kid and the mom and I don’t really, we don’t work, but we work really well together for the kid.

Lybi Ma (01:54.211)
I gave you one, didn’t I? I gave you one.

Nick McGowan (02:10.919)
And that was really important. Like I could see him almost like put his foot in the ground. Like this is what we’re doing specifically for a child. That’s not how I grew up. Like my mom and dad, they’re still basically like a town or two apart from each other. They’ll see each other at a bar somewhere and like snarl at each other. Like I am 41 years old, calm down. It’s been a long ass time. However, my dad and his ex-wife are great friends because of the relationship that they had and all that. My dad actually…

Lybi Ma (02:29.613)
Okay.

Nick McGowan (02:40.827)
met her husband, shook his hand with a hundred dollar bill and said, thank you. It’s your turn. I’m like, the kahones on that man for that. But that’s an interesting thing that you can actually have that. Now I would imagine, look, you work for psychology today. You’ve probably done a lot of work on yourself and through your relationships and healed through things. But can you give us a little bit of context of like how the heck that works?

Lybi Ma (02:48.59)
I like that. That’s funny.

Lybi Ma (03:07.8)
So in the beginning when I first got divorced, I thought, I’m never speaking to this person again. And that lasted for a little while. And I actually worked through his second wife. I needed her to pick up the kids. So as you know, we had a very friendly situation. And I thought, well, this is not really good for the kids. So I think I better.

start being more amenable to the whole thing. And I got this job and it helped me. This job, I read a lot of information. Constance Ahrens did research. She did a good book on divorced kids. And basically divorced kids can do well if

The parents get along and there’s no conflict in their household. And as long as each parent has a good relationship with the child, they’re probably going to do well. And I will have to say that my children did very well.

So yeah, it worked out. And yeah, and it also helps when you have a person like my ex-husband who is very amiable. He wants to be friendly and he has a crazy romance with my husband, a bromance, sorry, not romance, a bromance. They have a thing going on. So there you go.

Nick McGowan (04:28.454)
awesome.

Nick McGowan (04:48.86)
Ha

Nick McGowan (04:54.473)
Which you probably didn’t think like we’re getting a divorce at some point I’ll be married again and he’ll be great friends with my then husband. Like could you have written that you know?

Lybi Ma (05:01.13)
No, no, I had no idea. No idea. No. Getting along is better. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (05:06.097)
Yeah.

That’s interesting. Yeah. But I, I find it interesting how sometimes we, people can say, there was this period of time and then a period of lapse. And then I realized this thing and then another period and here we are. There was a lot of time in between then and this conversation right now. And even the times where I’m sure you were super frustrated, upset, pissed the whole nine and then maybe I could do things different. And I think sometimes we blow past that because

Lybi Ma (05:33.25)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (05:39.312)
Maybe context isn’t always important in all the situations. However, I want to say it’s pretty much always super important. And that’s really what the purpose of the show is to be able to kind of talk about those tough times. Like you went through a divorce, but you saw it as I’m going to help with the kids. And this is more important for my kids. And now you’re seeing your kids in action from the result of what you guys have done. It’s really hard for people to see the stuff that they need to work on and be open to that, especially when they’re in a really, really difficult time going through it.

or post divorce or something like that. Now, how does that tie into the work that you’ve done and worked with for maybe just a couple decades? Don’t need to know your age. But being able to actually go through that stuff on your own and then literally work with psychology today and the psychologists and other people doing important work and you being a researcher yourself.

Lybi Ma (06:33.026)
Well, I’ll be honest with you. First of all, I’m not a researcher. take the researcher’s information and try to put it in accessible language so that people can relate. So you see all this information coming through and everything makes a whole lot of sense.

Nick McGowan (06:53.02)
sense.

Lybi Ma (07:02.38)
And I started to apply it to my own life. And it was very helpful. I became a wiser person because I work at this magazine. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (07:15.751)
Sure. Were there things that you can kind of look back to? Like kind of hovering around the same topic here, because I know it’s important, divorce kids and families and all that, but for you to be able to look back to and say, you know, if I wasn’t in the job that I am in, I probably would have been in different spot because you learn certain things because of the information you were seeing coming to you. And then just putting it into action. Like, is there anything that really stands out to you? Like, if I didn’t learn this.

Lybi Ma (07:23.95)
huh.

Nick McGowan (07:45.233)
I didn’t learn it this way, it would have all been different.

Lybi Ma (07:48.259)
Well, I think that when I was younger and the kids were little, I was newly divorced. I fought with life quite a bit.

And I think that is a main message in my book is fighting with life, it just doesn’t work. We have to plug on and not fight with it. I turn to, also turn to, you know, spiritual thought a little bit like Buddhism.

Buddhists accept things. This is how it is. So let’s just take this. You can’t change it. So let’s just try to make it work. Work with what you have. So that’s what I did. I worked with what I had. So I take a little bit of psychology and I mix it. My family.

Nick McGowan (08:56.134)
Little bit of this, little bit of that.

Lybi Ma (08:57.198)
Yeah, right. My family comes from the Tibetan, Ching Hai Plateau. And it is, Ching Hai is next door to Tibet. And actually, my grandfather was a trader, he had a donkey, and he put all his tea and shoelaces and whatever, know, spices on his

Nick McGowan (09:26.704)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (09:27.032)
donkey and then he would go back and forth from Tibet to Qinghai. And they are, and these people in that area, there’s Tibetan Buddhists and they’re also Hui. The Hui are Chinese Muslims, which my family are Chinese Muslims. They come from that area and they’re very similar. They have a very similar sort of way of thinking.

and acceptance is a big part of it. And that didn’t work out. So we better turn over here and see if this is gonna work out. That’s the way it is.

Nick McGowan (10:09.637)
You

yeah. So let’s, let’s talk about that for a bit. Cause that does tie into even just being miserable or not miserable, let alone less miserable. So if we think of like, it’s funny cause I struggle with that at times. I, I curse like a fucking cartoon at different times. Like this thing doesn’t work. I’m like, just making noises and shit. And my partner on the other hand will go completely calm, silent almost and just methodical.

Lybi Ma (10:22.67)
Yeah, right.

Nick McGowan (10:42.717)
And it’s a thing that’s, I believe is actually part of her design, how she is. And I can get up at E and Nancy and all that. But then there are also layers to this where there’s trauma involved. There are different experiences, even things back to how our parents related to things. Like my parents would throw their arms up in the air about things. And I learned, I guess I do that. Like I get upset and pissed and like throw my arms up and flail. And my body still reacts at times that way where it’s like, yo, calm down. It’s totally fine. Being able to accept a thing.

Lybi Ma (10:57.44)
Nick McGowan (11:13.172)
in the split second and then start to move in a different direction can be harder for people because of the things that they’ve gone through and even the way that they are. But how have you found to be able to work within the way that you best operate to say, all right, well, I can find acceptance and I can move on from here. Because I think that’s really where, that’s where the change happens is those macro moments where we actually do something. Cause it’s easy for you and I to shoot the shit and talk about this stuff.

Lybi Ma (11:22.881)
yeah, certainly.

Nick McGowan (11:42.073)
But it’s in that moment where you’re like, and how you don’t do that. You know what I mean?

Lybi Ma (11:42.126)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (11:48.493)
You know, I never had a moment of epiphany. It just sort of moved along in the right direction. So I’m not going to say, wow, I had this aha that I had to accept things in life. No, was in my mind, I was hanging this guy up by his toes for a long time. So, and I don’t think there’s wrong, there’s anything wrong with doing that.

if you have to feel it, then feel it. We spend a lot of time negating half our emotions. And that is something quite important and well studied. We want to feel happy and not depressed or not anxious or

Nick McGowan (12:19.897)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (12:36.866)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (12:46.362)
We don’t want to feel anger or I don’t know. Well, you feel these things and okay, feel them. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to lash out and burn a car. No, you’re just going to feel them. Sit there and feel it and watch it. Watch it.

Nick McGowan (12:57.507)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (13:05.102)
with you and then okay well I gotta get up and cook dinner for the family so I gotta get moving here so I’m not gonna sit here and dwell about it. Maybe I’ll make an appointment and that’s another therapy tool. Make an appointment. If you need to feel crummy then okay I felt crummy at 4 30 to 5. I’m gonna do the same thing tomorrow 4 30 to 5 and I’m gonna

Nick McGowan (13:13.365)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Lybi Ma (13:33.772)
sit with my feelings and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it.

Nick McGowan (13:36.109)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (13:40.544)
I’m right there with you. I think it’s important for us to feel that stuff where if you think about where we’re at right now, almost 2026 with technology and the amount of information, like we see all these things like social media, for example, you hop on, you see somebody doing this big thing, but you don’t have the context of all the other things that have happened before that or even 20 minutes before that when they’re screaming at somebody to get out of their way in the grocery store or whatever. And it’s like,

This is what I said to you, I appreciate you being human because that moment where you’re like, this really hurts. I still got to make dinner for these people. We all got to eat tonight. Let me do that. And let me not also then just drag that out. And I find having the amount of conversations I have with people on the podcast and outside of that with clients, just random people that I come into contact with, it’s always interesting to me how somebody will, we want to always put up a better face than what’s really going on.

Lybi Ma (14:17.102)
Yeah

Nick McGowan (14:38.499)
And you also don’t want to just be completely shitty and just the world is on fire and totally. people have seemed to have a hard time finding equanimity within themselves to then be able to have a conversation outside of that. And it sounds to me like what you’ve experienced that a lot of us have, where it’s like over the course of time, the rock just gets smoother because the water was going over it. You finally go, okay, it’s been six months. I’ve been upset about this for so long, but some people still.

Lybi Ma (15:05.486)
Exactly.

Nick McGowan (15:07.296)
they still just keep going with that hatred for it, which I guess is kind of a different topic. But your book with being less miserable.

Lybi Ma (15:15.404)
No, think hatred is, no, hatred is important. I mean, if you’re gonna wallow in it, that’s probably not good, but sometimes anger, good anger used constructively will make you do things that are important in life. But hating people outright, I don’t know. I’m not too sure about that.

Nick McGowan (15:25.954)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (15:35.394)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (15:43.811)
Yeah, there are enough of those people that are sitting in an office. The rest of the government shut down right now. yeah, it’s interesting because I think that’s where I was headed with the wallowing in it. Like any of this, you don’t want to wallow in it, but you do need to sit in it. Like I’ve had conversations with people that they have a really hard time. It’s like the stove is too hot to even get close to touch it. And then there are other people that like they can put their entire body on it.

Lybi Ma (15:50.894)
my goodness.

Nick McGowan (16:13.142)
They can roll around on it like a bed of needles almost, you know, and just sit there. I find that that’s an interesting thing because that’s part of maybe their design, but also they’ve gotten to a point, some of them, where they go, look, I can’t do anything outside of the stuff that’s happening. So I can only do something with what I have here. So why waste my time anymore? Like they’ve wallowed enough or they’ve gone through enough of it.

Lybi Ma (16:36.031)
Right, right, right, right. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (16:40.054)
But how does this tie back into the stuff that you talk about specifically with miserable? Like that was part of the reason why I wanted to have you on here. was like, the word miserable is one of those things where there’s not really anything pleasant to it. It’s just fucking miserable. Like here we are.

Lybi Ma (16:54.638)
It’s the truth. Because we put the Western society puts a lot of weight on happiness. Happiness has to be a goal. And everybody runs around with their bucket lists and they have to do this and that to be happy. Well, no. Sure, you’re gonna go and see the Northern Lights. That’s nice. And you’re gonna be happy.

But then you come down to your set level of mood that is well studied. We go up, we come down. grumpy people are in a certain spot. More upbeat people are up here and they move higher, but they always move down to their set level. And that is a hedonic adaptation. We just come back down to where.

where we are in life. So the word happiness is not on my book cover because, you know, it’s, we should feel okay about not being happy all the time. That’s all there is to it. We’re not going to reach that crazy happiness all the time. It’s just not, I don’t think that’s realistic. I would rather be.

Nick McGowan (18:22.177)
Great.

Lybi Ma (18:23.02)
I want to be practical. And the other part is when we judge how we feel, I’m not happy, I must be a loser. any time you judge this feeling that you’re having, well, guess what? People have studied that and you kind of feel worse. You feel worse because you’re judging it.

Nick McGowan (18:25.141)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (18:50.766)
It’s a funny thing. Yeah, I think it was came from UC Berkeley, researchers there. Yeah, you’re gonna sit there and say things about yourself that are not true. You’re making them up really. You’re gonna feel worse. So I don’t think we should try to be happy all the time. We can just.

Nick McGowan (18:51.403)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (19:18.604)
be practical and just own up to all these things that we feel and not judge them.

Nick McGowan (19:26.305)
Obviously easier said than done for a good chunk of people. But that is, it’s such a critical piece where it’s like, if we, if we spend that time, like I know I’ve done this personally, where being angry or upset about something, you feel like you’re being active in it, but you’re just being animated in it. And you just keep going deeper and deeper down. I would spiral in that many, many years ago. And then learning from it, you go,

Yeah, you can reach a point where you go, I’m just kind of bored with this. And this doesn’t make any sense to do this anymore. So why would I do that? But we do see stuff where people are talking about all the success that they had and the 15 year overnight success sort of situations where it’s like, if this person’s happy constantly, cause that’s all they post or whatever. And stepping outside of that, actually being within ourselves. I’d love that you’d said that you’re more in the country than you are with

everybody else and being by yourself and being away from people, I would imagine you then have more time to actually be able to say, how do I feel right now? And do what you want with it instead of saying, well, I’m told I need to do something different, you know?

Lybi Ma (20:39.95)
Right, right. Well, who’s telling you to do it, first of all? Which one? I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.

Nick McGowan (20:44.794)
Yeah, well, sometimes it’s, Yeah. One of the voices, one of the many up there. So what actually led you to start the process to write the book? Did you just get so frustrated within yourself of like, have to put this out there? Did this kind of come up organically?

Lybi Ma (20:55.69)
Yeah, I don’t know.

Lybi Ma (21:07.944)
No, well, you know, I got over my…

Lybi Ma (21:17.366)
negative feelings about divorce and all that. And I moved on and plugged on. So that was good. I just, every time I read a new piece of research, I would squirrel it away. And I thought, yeah, that goes with the feelings that I had back then of being miserable. So I would squirrel it away. And then when COVID happened, I watched people.

and they were interesting to watch. Some people did very well. Some people did very poorly. And I don’t want to get into a conversation about the introvert and the extrovert, whatever. I’m just talking about emotions and sitting with them generally, because even introverts need people. We’re all social. So that’s not really part of what I’m talking about.

I just watched all of it and I thought, you know what, I think I have enough information here to write a book. So COVID sort of pushed me a little bit.

Nick McGowan (22:31.231)
Thanks, COVID. Yeah.

Lybi Ma (22:32.398)
I guess so. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know about that. Yeah, people were, I watched people and they had a lot of, you know, negative reaction to a negative thing that was happening. They were told to stay at home and then, and then get into a loop of bad feelings. It just went on and on and on.

And I found that the thoughts that they had were quite irrational. And that is something also well studied. The brain is not very logical. It also has a very negative bias. are evolved into thinking negatively.

Yeah, ancient man needed to be worried about predators and being eaten. They needed to be alert. is that a bad thing around the corner that’s going to eat me? Well, we the human brain has not changed that much. And we still do it. did that person insult me? And we got

Nick McGowan (23:56.958)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (23:57.535)
And then you start doing this thing and it’s very, very not rational. It’s not positive. It’s pretty negative. And you just keep going in this distorted fashion. these negative things have a lasting impression and positive things are less important. And there was an interesting study where researchers

Nick McGowan (24:03.496)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (24:27.102)
showed study subjects photographs.

people on a roller coaster maybe or something neutral like a hairdryer and a gun pointed at you and people remember the gun. So negative things have a lasting impression.

And this bias that we have, it makes sure that we hold on to our insults and grievances. We do a lot of things in our head that are irrational. Jump to conclusions, my date hated me, a fortune teller. Why would they even call me back anyway? Mind read.

Nick McGowan (25:09.854)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (25:22.39)
I know that you’re thinking about me and it’s bad, all or nothing. I will not be happy until the end of time. Those sort of things. We do these things over and over and over to ourselves. really it doesn’t seem to be helping.

Nick McGowan (25:44.625)
No, but we all, I think, are somewhat addicted to it. And we don’t think that other people go through it. It’s almost like when we say, well, this person’s looking at me or what are they thinking about me? They’re probably not. And if they did, they noticed something and then they’re thinking about themselves. Like, I had that same jacket. Do I look like an asshole in that jacket? Is that me? And they’re off thinking about themselves. Meanwhile, both of them are like, my God, what are they thinking?

Lybi Ma (25:49.761)
Yeah, yeah.

Lybi Ma (25:59.139)
That you’re right.

Lybi Ma (26:09.368)
They’re so right. You are so right. They’re too busy thinking about themselves like we are too busy thinking about ourselves. It’s just we’re worried about how we look, how we appear. Did I say that? was it stupid? Did I sound stupid? whatever.

Nick McGowan (26:19.911)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (26:27.71)
I think there’s a bit of a caveat though, because there are also times where we can grow from that stuff, because we can say, the situation in this whatever office or this call or whatever didn’t go the way that I wanted to, what could I have done differently? Like sort of watching game tape in a sense on yourself, but not beating yourself up with it and not in every single situation.

Lybi Ma (26:51.278)
Yeah, that part.

Nick McGowan (26:54.235)
Yeah, and being like, all right, well, what can I learn from this? What can I do a little differently? There’s a power within that, but then also removing the nonsensical shit. I’ve gotten to the point where I probably talk to myself more so than I did before and be like, easy there, asshole, calm down. Because like, random noises will come from other rooms, it seems, in the back of my head. Like, you can’t do that. You look like an asshole, that jacket. I’m like, shut up. Like, let me just kind of go.

But being able to understand that there’s a balance to learning and growing and being able to review things and say, could I do a little differently? And beating yourself up can be a razor’s edge. But what kind of advice do you give for people that are trying to figure that stuff out? And they obviously don’t want to be miserable, but they’re also sort of addicted to that feeling of it because they’re so used to it, you know?

Lybi Ma (27:50.062)
One of the main things that I’ve read

We have to be more aware that we’re doing it. and speak to ourselves.

maybe in the third person. Libby’s doing that again. She’s disappointed and it’s turning into this thing. And now that distorted thinking is taken off. Okay, Libby, stop that. We have to be aware and point it out. So great research from University of Michigan.

Nick McGowan (28:12.177)
Yep.

Lybi Ma (28:35.15)
you observe. And that’s Buddhist to me. You observe this thought and meditation is a little like that. there’s a thought, watch it go by. That’s nice. Whatever. It’s a thought. It’s not real. And a lot of times our thoughts lie to us. So don’t do it.

at least if you if you keep doing it, know that you’re doing and then in addition to that, you label it. So if it’s a feeling, well, Libby is angry at not right now because XYZ happened and she’s going to hold on to this grievance and nurse that grievance until whenever. Okay, that’s nice. You know, you’re doing that again. So

We label how we feel. I’m feeling sad right now. That’s good. I’m feeling angry right now. And talk to yourself a little bit, but not in a, you say, beat yourself up mode. And then you turn to self-sabotage. So you want to numb yourself. It goes into this cycle of…

Nick McGowan (30:02.747)
Yeah, vicious cycle.

Lybi Ma (30:04.502)
Yeah, yeah, turns into a cycle. You beat yourself up and it leads leads to this negativity and you’re not very nice to yourself. So that’s another thing. Self-compassion is very important. Water research on that. You want to count right. You want to be compassionate to your to ourselves and breathe while you’re being compassionate.

Nick McGowan (30:21.915)
Yeah, grace with ourselves even.

Lybi Ma (30:34.626)
People stop breathing and when they’re tense and in the moment of being reactive to an unhappy situation and when you stop breathing, well, cortisol goes up and you become alert and you’re looking for the predator. No, you know what? Just breathe and let your body work it out. It’s not bad.

Nick McGowan (30:36.815)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (30:52.165)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (31:03.226)
I love this sort of stuff. I love that we’re able to get into this because I know there are other, I don’t want to talk bad about any podcasts or other people’s interviews or anything like that. But there are conversations out there that are very surfacey where it can talk about, yeah, you want to be aware and you want to look at these things and then do some with it. You want to show grace to yourself. And we also need to talk about when it’s really difficult to do that because even in like the moment you just said where you stopped breathing.

scientifically, that takes oxygen away from your blood. Your blood is no longer moving oxygen through the rest of your fucking body. And your brain is a part of that. So it’s like science-wise, that makes sense. I think there’s also a balance of not just saying, I’m aware of this thing and if I’m shitty again, then so be it. I’m aware of it. It’s doing something with it, not beating yourself up and still being able to understand that I can’t bypass this.

Lybi Ma (31:37.538)
Right.

Nick McGowan (32:02.521)
Because I think that’s where the happiness stuff comes in. If you’re feeling bad, just go be happy. cool, great. Fuck the trauma and all the other nonsense that I absolutely need to process out of my body. Let me just go be happy. And then you go be happy and you do a thing and you go, like you said earlier, right back to your own little status quo and you go, shit, I am still a miserable bastard. What do I do from here? Let me look for another happy thing. And you’re like, off to do it again. Just bypassing the bullshit, you know?

Lybi Ma (32:10.574)
I

Lybi Ma (32:28.846)
Right. doesn’t really, you always go back to where you were.

Nick McGowan (32:37.294)
Yeah, awareness is such a big thing that my logical and smart-ass mind thinks, well, that makes total sense to me. Because if you’re not aware, how the fuck are you aware? Like if you don’t know a thing’s there, you can’t do anything about it. But that’s really when the work begins. Like you’re aware and you go, I’m aware of this feeling. And I’m glad that you brought up the next part of that being naming it. That is really difficult for a lot of people to name.

Lybi Ma (32:41.046)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (33:05.24)
what their emotion is. They go, I’m just angry. Really, maybe you’re grieving or maybe you’re really upset that’s not just anger, but it’s a betrayal that happened or something like that. And actually being able to call what it is instead of just going, just a sticker almost. You’re like, and I’m shitty right now and push it off to the next thing and just move along instead of actually doing that work. But that, I don’t know. I feel like I can go.

Lybi Ma (33:29.944)
Right.

Nick McGowan (33:32.557)
deep with it because that’s where systems come into play that tell us, don’t do this, just keep working, just keep hustling, keep grinding, keep blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It makes me almost just wanna fucking throw up in my mouth every time I even think about it. Cause it’s like, we are hurting ourselves, we’re hurting each other and we’re perpetuating it because none of us are just going, time out. Give me a fucking second. What is this? What am I feeling? So talk to us about how the book relates to that.

Lybi Ma (34:02.349)
Lybi Ma (34:06.018)
Sitting with our emotions, you mean?

Nick McGowan (34:08.677)
And understanding like if you’re feeling miserable and being less miserable is still taking away that but it’s not bypassing it. It’s not letting you bypass it.

Lybi Ma (34:17.386)
No, no, you have to feel what you feel. Otherwise, it’s not true. You have this feeling and it’s a true feeling and you should feel it. once you do that, you let yourself do that, you will probably break through a bit more to get beyond and be less miserable.

You know, you will probably thank yourself. I do. I do. You know, it’s an interesting thing. My husband and I don’t fight very often, but we’ve been through tense, you know, when you move and all that stuff. And yeah, it’s not easy. And I can catch myself.

Oh, wait, I’m being reactive at this moment. And I’ll just stop and think, wow, that’s interesting. I’m doing it. I’m doing it at this very moment. And I start talking out loud. all right, hang with me for a minute here while I think about why I’m having this reaction. Why am I having this reaction? What is bringing this up?

Nick McGowan (35:39.383)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (35:46.219)
I think we need to stop because you start spinning in that in a certain direction of negativity and you might as well just stop it and just ask yourself, what’s what is this and observe and instead of being in it, just step outside and and look at it. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (35:54.274)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (36:07.256)
and look at it. Yeah. Huh. And that’s, that’s a simple, like incredible thing though, to say live in the moment, like, hold on, give me a second. I’m feeling something. Let me work through this and come back to you. it’s almost like having a conversation, a heated conversation and saying, I need a second and stepping away. That could be really, really difficult for a lot of people in that moment because you’re so in it, but

If you think about any time you’ve ever said that, even to yourself or to your husband or anybody else.

Lybi Ma (36:40.942)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (36:45.816)
Probably most every single time they’ve respected it.

Lybi Ma (36:49.686)
Yes. Yes, you’re not, you’re not trying to run from the situation. You’re just trying to understand what’s going on inside yourself. And a lot of times when you’re in a fight with a partner or someone, usually it’s person closest to you, because they’re the ones who are gonna forgive you. But usually it’s just sort of,

you know, not, it isn’t about that moment. It’s about something else. Something else is going on. Yeah, it brings up some, yeah, go ahead.

Nick McGowan (37:33.815)
And it’s not… Yeah.

It’s not just those people. We often will take it out on the people we love because they’re the closest and they know us the most. And yes, you said they will forgive us, but that doesn’t give us a license to abuse the shit out of them because you’re angry that somebody took the last fucking piece of bread at whatever grocery store or whatever happened earlier. And you’re like, God damn the person closest to me. It’s like, but what do they do? what? Yeah.

Lybi Ma (37:51.246)
to do that.

Lybi Ma (38:00.303)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (38:04.682)
nothing. They’re just standing there. They’re standing there. I don’t know. They’re just standing there. Yeah. I think one another way to, since you’re looking for ways to counter it, I mean, you know, there’s many things to do, you start being more mindful. So I try to call out my reactivity with being mindful, breathe, I write things down.

Nick McGowan (38:10.327)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (38:34.67)
And I try to be grateful in the moment. You’re having a fight and I try to be grateful to the person I’m fighting with. If you show them grace and your self grace and you’ll get through the dumb fight, whatever it was that you’re, and just go with the flow of things. I don’t mean lay down and just die. What I mean is,

Nick McGowan (38:44.47)
Sure. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (38:54.548)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (39:04.301)
You.

get into the flow of life. And there’s been quite a lot of work on the topic of flow for decades. we move with what is happening. Flow is more complicated than that. mean, it has to do with…

Nick McGowan (39:13.056)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (39:26.208)
Yeah.

Lybi Ma (39:33.132)
being very, very engaged in what you’re doing. So a writer would feel flow when they’re writing or the piano player is really into the music or even listening to music, you running, you get in the flow, but you can apply the flow theory into life, everyday life. Just go with it. I think that’s important.

Nick McGowan (39:58.038)
That’s really important. And I appreciate that you point out these things that in some ways, and as I said earlier, there are other conversations that get real surfacey and they go, yeah, go with the flow. Cool. Let’s stop there. Just go with the flow. Being able to be mindful, to talk about these things, even with the gratitude. Like I’ve heard for years and years, people are like, just be grateful and gratitude this and gratitude that and have a gratitude journal, blah, blah, blah. It’s like all those things can be good and helpful if they are good and helpful. If you’re just being

Lybi Ma (40:24.192)
Right.

Nick McGowan (40:25.065)
grateful and you’re like, I fucking had this and God, I’m grateful for it. But even in that moment of being grateful that you have a partner to be able to argue with and, and yeah. And then that’ll automatically just disarm you a little bit. Like even as you’re saying that I’m picturing it and picturing, you know, me with my partner arguing about whatever. And to think of that, I just want to hug her because I love her. I love that I have the partner to be able to

Lybi Ma (40:29.518)
All right.

Lybi Ma (40:35.778)
Right? A lot of people don’t.

Lybi Ma (40:42.755)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (40:53.737)
bitch can complain about things with or whatever. And it’s like, if we can be aware of that and actually show the grace and do the thing in the moment, instead of just saying, just be grateful and gratitude this and gratitude that. It’s like, fuck your gratitude unless you’re actually gonna do something with it. Because then it’s the moment, that moment right there where you do something with it instead of just saying, well, I’m just gonna go back to my old ways and just be kind of shitty about it. So for the people that are trying to be less miserable.

Lybi Ma (41:09.23)
Ha

Nick McGowan (41:23.375)
or trying to just wrap their head around how they can give themselves grace and kind of work through life at their pace instead of just what the rest of the world tells us we should do. What’s your advice for somebody that’s on their path towards self mastery?

Lybi Ma (41:40.275)
Give yourself a break, please. Good Lord. I don’t know why we have to be so hard on ourselves. And we run around looking for solutions to everything. Well, sometimes, you know, life does work out. It does work out. And I think we don’t have to make it harder.

Nick McGowan (41:42.793)
Nice.

Lybi Ma (42:09.774)
We make it harder, we fight with life, and I think we can watch it a little. Doesn’t mean that we should not be proactive and move forward and reach our goals, but we can calm down a bit about how we treat ourselves, and you will be less miserable.

Nick McGowan (42:35.093)
I love that, especially like the come down. Like that’s the vibe I got like right off the bat. Chill out, give yourself a break. Just relax. It’s not the end of the world. And yeah, just chill out.

Lybi Ma (42:39.95)
Yeah.

It isn’t. It is not the end of the world. Bad things do happen and it feels like it’s going to be the end of the world, but actually things do work out. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right.

Nick McGowan (42:55.379)
Yeah, divorces. You know, the people that have gone through it, you understand that. I had different people when I got a divorce, they were like, man, I was in bad shape for years. And I was like, well, that sucks. I don’t want to go through that. And I’m like, well, I didn’t get a, I didn’t get married to get a divorce, but I didn’t get a divorce to die. So, and I’m thankful it happened. I mean, I wish her the best, but I wouldn’t have my partner now. I wouldn’t have my business and all the other things that have come from it.

Lybi Ma (43:06.296)
Right, right.

Lybi Ma (43:14.927)
Right.

Nick McGowan (43:24.777)
But I want to touch on something you pointed out where it’s like, give yourself a break, the things will work out and things happen. I was actually sort of joking, but sort of like, this is just a mind fuck of a thing with my coach recently, where I understand that the right things happen at the right times. Always. It’s actually an affirmation of mine. It’s the anxiety before and the anxiety after that exact one moment. Because that one moment is where like, these things happen at the right time. Like, look.

Lybi Ma (43:50.828)
Okay.

Nick McGowan (43:54.45)
And I’ve seen it happen. Like it lines up where it’s like, I couldn’t have scripted this. God was like, this is how this thing’s going to work. And it’s like, that’s incredible. But there’s anxiety for the 98 % before and all the other stuff after it, where it’s like that one moment. But that one moment happens and happens more often than not, know? So it’s just a weird little situation that we can get lost in all the other minutia of it.

Lybi Ma (44:17.825)
Right, right.

Nick McGowan (44:23.912)
So I appreciate you being as real as you are. I’m like, just calm down, chill out. It’ll be okay.

Lybi Ma (44:24.152)
Right.

It’s gonna be okay. I wish I told my, knew that when I was younger. It’s gonna be okay. It will be.

Nick McGowan (44:36.616)
Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. And just like, if you could go back and talk to your 18 year old self, what would you say? And I think most people probably say it with a fist and then shake them a little bit with whatever, like whatever you’re going to do, don’t. but that’s what this podcast is for. Like, let’s talk about these things because we’re all going through it. Like, let’s not shy away from that. We all go through this stuff. So, Libby, I really appreciate you being on today. I appreciate the work that you’re doing.

Lybi Ma (44:51.224)
Hahaha

Lybi Ma (45:03.894)
All right.

Nick McGowan (45:05.208)
and you’re putting out the books that you are and just that you’re able to work with that information that’s coming to you and help spread that out and being as real as you are. So thank you for being here. Of course, and before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you? And of course, where can they get the book?

Lybi Ma (45:14.882)
Thank you.

Lybi Ma (45:22.478)
Well, of course, I’m on Psychology Today. You’ll find me there on the website. And you’ll find my book on the, you know, any major source like Amazon or Barnes & Noble, that sort of thing.

Nick McGowan (45:44.541)
Perfect. And I’ll have some of those links in the show notes too. So again, thank you so much for being with us today. Appreciate it.

Lybi Ma (45:50.933)
Thank you.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Anne Wallen to dive into the intricate relationship between maternal health, psychological preparation for parenting, and the impact of childhood trauma on parenting styles. Anne shares her personal journey as a maternal health professional and mother of six, emphasizing the importance of meeting a baby’s needs and the psychological aspects of parenting.

What to listen for:

“Unhealed wounds don’t disappear when you become a parent; they show up.”

“Safety is the foundation of healthy development.”

About Anne Wallen

Anne is a respected figure in women’s health with over 30 years of experience and is a leading voice on global change in maternity care – particularly for those at greatest risk. She continues to educate and empower birth professionals in more than 20 countries, contributes to a variety of curricula, and shapes the future of maternal health through her impactful role as a speaker and mentor. Anne is the Director and co-founder of MaternityWise International, and her legacy lies in inspiring generational changes around and elevating women’s healthcare worldwide.

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

Watch Clips and highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:00.91)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Anne Wellen. Anne, how you doing today? I’m good. I’m really excited to get into this. I think this is going to be a different conversation than what we typically have, but we were just talking and talking and at one point you’re like, you’re not recording? I’m like, no, let’s start this now.

Anne Wallen (00:10.602)
I’m good, how are you?

Nick McGowan (00:25.614)
So this will be great. And why don’t you kick us off? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

Anne Wallen (00:34.382)
Okay, well, I am the director of Maternity Wise International, which what we do is we train doulas and childbirth educators and lactation support people. I’ve been doing this for 23, 24 years now, and it’s pretty much my life. I love maternal health. It’s so, important to every human on this planet. And maybe the…

An interesting factoid about me is that I have six kids. A lot of people, when you tell them you have six kids, they’re like, my gosh. And yes, I birthed them all. But five of them are adults. I have a little nine-year-old as well. She was a surprise, like the best kind of surprise. But yeah, so my six kids and yes, that’s really the main reason why I got into the work that I got into when I had my first at 17.

and didn’t feel like I could be the mom that she deserved, loved her so, so, so much. And I had some family friends that I grew up with who actually babysat me who had been struggling with fertility issues. And so I chose to let them adopt her. And we have had an amazing, beautiful extended family relationship. And she recently gave birth to her first daughter just this summer. So I am officially a grandma in addition to all the other things that I do, but

Yeah, that’s a little factoid that most people don’t know. But she’s part of the reason she’s the main reason why I became a mental health professional or a maternal health professional. And a lot of the way things have gone through my life, not just how I was raised, but experiences thereafter have gotten me very interested in mental health. And so I like to kind of create this intersection between the both worlds. And I look at things from a very psychological perspective. So this is

This is gonna be a fun one.

Nick McGowan (02:29.229)
Yeah, I think everything ties back into that. It’s not even just a physical thing. Like I even said to you, somebody has a baby and they go home and how their partner reacts to whatever’s going on or the chaos or whatever the thing is, how does that then tie into the baby and how does the baby move throughout life? Even with you having a kid at 17, you are a child at 17. Though I’m sure we can both think back to 17 years old and thinking I’m grown ass adult and I can do all the things in the world, but you are not. You’re a child.

Anne Wallen (02:50.412)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (02:59.039)
And the fact that you had somebody that you could hand the baby over to that you knew, you trusted, and you were able to have a relationship, it sounds like that could almost be like an ABC sitcom, you know what I mean?

Anne Wallen (03:05.325)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (03:13.356)
Yeah, well, I mean, my life is, I always joke that, like, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. But I always joke that, you know, Hallmark probably wouldn’t agree to make a movie because my life is so far-fetched. But yes, that’s, that was such a, such a blessing because I really knew that I was not going to be able to do what she needed as far as mothering. And I’ve, you know, hadn’t even finished high school yet. And

my wonderful, wonderful and she was my next door neighbor growing up. And I just knew that they were the right people to take care of her and they raised her and she’s an amazing human being. And it’s just really wonderful to have this open relationship at this point, especially, you know, now that she’s having babies of her own. it was really cool too during COVID. She took one of my doula trainings because she was going to be a doula for a friend of hers. So

Just a really cool, you know, like sometimes things just come full circle and you just, little blessings, little surprises. So.

Nick McGowan (04:22.764)
And you wouldn’t have been able to script that. Like, I love when that stuff happens in life where it’s like, I’m gonna have a baby, hand it over to my neighbor, because I love them. And then years later, like, really? Somebody would be like, that’s crazy. Get out of my office, you know?

Anne Wallen (04:24.863)
No!

Anne Wallen (04:37.355)
Yeah, well, I I knew that I didn’t, I knew that I probably wouldn’t be okay with just never knowing. know, some moms, and I’ve supported moms as their doula through giving their baby away. I’ve supported adopting families as well. it’s, I am really, really fortunate because I don’t think that most people could go through that experience and it would be, I mean,

Don’t get me wrong, it was heartbreaking. It’s still heartbreaking that I wasn’t able to raise her myself. I mean, I’ve had five other kids since then and I know what it is to be a mom and I know what things I’ve missed out on. But being able to have an open adoption is really, really something special and I know some people don’t have that option. And so to be able to give your baby to someone that you think that you can trust and then hope that they’re doing what you would want them to do.

That’s a whole level of, yeah, that’s tough, that’s hard. So, yeah.

Nick McGowan (05:43.52)
could only imagine. I have no idea what that would be like. I don’t have kids, not gonna have kids. And I couldn’t imagine what that’s like just handing a child over. I’ve talked to different people that have had either abortions or they’ve adopted, they’ve handed kids off to be adopted and then just haven’t ever talked to them again or people that have had some kid that are like, hey, by the way, about 30 years ago, you and my mom on a beach.

And here we are, we’re like, you and my mom at a party or whatever. It’s like, but I, one of the big reason why I wanted to have you on is to be able to talk about how the psychology of that ties into not just people that have kids, but people that were kids. Cause even your emails back in the conversations, you were like, yeah, everybody was born. And then what we do from there and how that all ties into it. So why don’t, why don’t you kind of get us started off with like, not only what you see with, people that are having kids.

but also the people that are concerned about having children and what that ties into just the rest of life.

Anne Wallen (06:53.121)
Well, kind of as we were talking about before we started recording, getting ready for having a baby, well, having a baby, you really need to put in the work, you need to prepare. And it’s not just about eating the right foods or avoiding the wrong foods and getting enough water and whatever else. There’s a lot of psychological preparation that people need to do. And we all walk around with our own traumas. We all walk around with our own disappointments and wounds.

you’re gonna carry that into your parenting. And if there is one situation that you’re gonna find yourself in as kind of just this automatic robot, it’s as a parent. You don’t realize all these scripts and all this just unprepared, you know, in the moment reactions that you’re going to have to your own child until you’re there. And then you’re like,

Nick McGowan (07:26.218)
Hmm.

Anne Wallen (07:52.961)
I sound just like my mom or my dad used to say that and I still sometimes even you know I’m on kid number six at this point she’s nine and I still will say things you know two wrongs don’t make her right or whatever little sayings that you grow up with and I realize wow I got that from this scenario or I learned that during this moment when I got in trouble or whatever and it can it can really make a difference

Nick McGowan (07:54.515)
Ha ha.

Anne Wallen (08:22.669)
being aware and intentional with your parenting. And when I say aware, I just mean if you’ve got wounds or if you’ve got trauma or if your parents were abusive, if there was something else going on, you know, in those immediate, the first weeks, months of your life, it is really, really important to meet that baby’s needs immediately or as quickly as possible, right? So,

There are things like crying it out. There are things like scheduled feeds. And they’re actually, we’re not just talking about a physical experience that this baby’s going through. It’s a psychological experience. And so we can get deeper into that if you want to, but a lot of people, they’ll hear from their parents when they become parents, they’ll hear things like, put the baby down, don’t spoil that baby. Or, they should be sleeping all night and they should be doing this or they should be doing that.

You know, we let that baby cry it out. We gave you formula. You turned out fine. Whatever it is, right? Whatever this thing is that might be the response to whatever the parents are wanting to do. You know, the grandparents and well-meaning aunts and uncles, they’ll have some retort usually, right? And advice from your elders is always helpful. And having, just having elders around to…

support your efforts is beautiful and helpful, but sometimes they don’t know what’s best for your baby. And the only person who really knows what’s best for the baby is the parent, especially the parent who’s bonded to the baby. Usually that’s the mom when they’re really, really small. And that’s usually because there’s breastfeeding going on or whatever it is, the main caretaking duties usually falls to the mother. So if that mother is well attuned to the baby,

baby’s getting their needs met, this is teaching the baby that they can trust, right? It’s teaching the baby about relationships. It’s teaching the baby that I’m valuable. I am worth listening to. I am protected. I’m safe. All these different things, right? If you’ve got a baby who is routinely put down after, you fed for 15 minutes, now we put you down. You cry? Too bad, baby. We read the book that said,

Anne Wallen (10:47.18)
put you down, right? Or we heard from grandpa that said put you down, whatever it is. That baby crying so desperately, that’s their only way to communicate that they have a need. So if they’re crying so desperately, I’m still hungry, I’m cold, I just want to be held, I’m scared, I’m alone, whatever it is, I have gas pains, whatever it is, they’re trying to communicate that they have a need. And if we ignore that, if we say, no, I’m going to spoil the child if I pick them up again.

This is programming their brain, right? This is programming their mind to say, no matter how hard I cry, I’m going to be ignored. What does that, for you, Nick, what does that translate to? What does that, what would that tell you?

Nick McGowan (11:17.928)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (11:31.148)
Trauma as a little kid, you’re just instantly, you’re shoved to the side it feels. And that’s, I think that’s an interesting thing to be able to point out, because look, babies are not gonna listen to this podcast. They will when they get older, but like they’re not listening right now. In fact, none of these episodes are for children at all, primarily because of my mouth at times, I’m sure. But the parents, or the new parents, or the people that are thinking about having kids.

Anne Wallen (11:34.102)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (11:58.088)
or the people that feel like they have to have kids because the system tells them, their family system, you have to, which that’s another thing that ties into the psychology of it. Like if somebody says, you, hey, you have to have a kid because you have to keep our lineage going. You have to keep our last name going. You have to do this. You have to do that. okay. And then they go and have the kid and then put everything onto that kid or there’s already some pain that goes along with it. I think the big thing you pointed out that stood out to me and especially for the show,

Anne Wallen (12:01.015)
Mm.

Anne Wallen (12:14.614)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (12:27.61)
is the work that has to be done before that. I’ve talked to different people that have had kids and they’re like, hey, we planned. We did all these things. We read all these books. We then got pregnant when we wanted to and shit was still crazy because they’re parents and like life and people and like things happen. And then there are people that just accidentally had a child and you know, it’s all, it doesn’t matter if you plan it or not plan it, it seems, but going into a big situation of having a child and

Anne Wallen (12:30.572)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (12:57.552)
sticking it through for at least 18 years or so, it doesn’t seem to me like a lot of people really think about the work they need to do until like after the fact. Like I met with somebody recently who’s got a young kid and he was offered to go on tour with some band and he was like, I can’t because I am attached and I can’t leave my child. And I can see that he’s such a good dad.

But he had said to me, like, things changed as soon as I had the kid, as soon as the kid came into my life. And I hear that from a lot of different people. Like as soon as this happened, then I changed. I stopped smoking or I stopped doing this or I started doing more of whatever it was. And that’s great. But what about the deeper work that’s unseen? Like the trauma that comes from your parents or your parents’ parents or the things that happened that you were a kid that was just crying because you wanted to be held and your parents are like, I can’t.

Shut up in there. How does that then tie into we as people that could potentially then have kids and not see that stuff needs to be worked on?

Anne Wallen (13:54.688)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (14:05.161)
Yeah, so having a baby is a great motivator for lifestyle changes, right? So if you are, if you have unhealthy habits, having your baby might make you think about your mortality and how, you need to eat better or stop smoking or whatever it is so that you can live longer so you can be there for your child. When you are going through pregnancy, even, you know, no matter what the family dynamic, mom, mom, mom, dad, whatever you’ve got going on.

both partners, or even if you’ve got a single mom going on, the person who is in the relationship thinking about when this baby gets here, what are we gonna do? The kind of deeper work that they really need to be doing includes psychological preparation for just how they feel about themselves, number one, just simply because whether they feel worthy, whether they feel rejected by their parents, if there’s any kind of abandonment issues,

Which abandonment issues start with, you know, crying it out in the crib? We, let me go, can I get a little sciency with you for just a second on that? So, crying it out, they’ve actually done brain scans and they see that crying it out creates a change in the brain structure. So our frontal lobe is the solutions, you know, forward thinking we call it, right? The creative, ambitious forebrain. The hindbrain is the survival primal,

Nick McGowan (15:10.31)
Please.

Anne Wallen (15:30.955)
aggressive, it’s the hunter-gatherer brain. And when you have a baby who is, who their needs are met consistently, their forebrain grows and their hindbrain does not grow. Not that it doesn’t grow, but it doesn’t, the balance is more forward-thinker, right? A baby who is left to cry it out, a baby whose needs are not met consistently. And that’s this, we’re not talking about a baby who has like just a crying spell and we put the baby down.

for safety’s sake, you know, and we walk away so could take a breath and then we come back, you know, we’re not talking about that. We’re talking about a routinely left to cry baby. That hind brain actually grows and the forebrain can shrink. So now you’ve got a kid who’s got the more aggressive, primal survival skills, more violence prone, more prone to, you know, ADD and some other issues that are, you know,

really all about them feeling that they need to survive, right? It’s just such primal, instinctual behavior. So now you have a kid who physically, chemically is growing up with this need to survive, this like fear, right? It’s like I’m on alert, I’m hypervigilant all the time. Now you make them a parent, right? They go through life and they probably have

Nick McGowan (16:55.877)
Hmph.

Anne Wallen (16:58.187)
plenty of issues, right, because of that hypervigilance, because of that, you know, fear that’s kind of like their root chakras in like a high alert mode all the time. So you get into this parenting situation, you’ve got a baby coming, right? You need to be able to say, I’m okay, I can advocate for my needs, I can prepare for the birth experience itself, because the birth experience could be traumatizing. And then,

how am gonna care for this baby once it’s out, knowing that, or subconsciously, knowing that they were treated with a neglectful-ish, not that parents always are neglectful intentionally, but they don’t always know that the baby is just trying to communicate. And there’s a lot of, we’re not gonna go religion, but there’s a lot of religious.

Nick McGowan (17:47.951)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (17:54.09)
books out there on parenting that talk about babies, you know, being manipulators and things like that. You got to train them to be good, right? Which is ridiculous. anyway, that in itself is traumatizing just to just to read that if I was a, know. Yes. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (18:09.252)
Yeah, basically calling your baby a little demon. Don’t you do it little demon. It’s like, I just want some love. I don’t understand.

Anne Wallen (18:17.267)
Honestly, and there are books out there that have caused babies to become really, really, really sick and even pass away because they’re telling parents, like, you need to have this regimented feeding schedule and you shouldn’t be holding your baby, etc. And, you know, the abandonment issue is huge in our culture. If you go to other places in the world, you’re not going to see people with abandonment issues quite like you do in America.

But in America, we have the Juvenile Manufacturing Association who really, really promoted getting babies out of your bed and using all these furniture pieces, right, for baby swings and cribs and, you know, bouncy seats and all these things that are not the mother, not the parent. And the only thing that a really a baby wants when they come out is that relationship.

They are looking for a face when they come out. They’re looking for a face and if they don’t get a face to connect to, they’re three months behind in their developmental milestones on average. So the face, the connection with another human being is so important. It’s so important just to their brain development. It’s important to their psychological development. And it’s really important for the parents’ development too because when you create this bond,

There’s something in you that softens. And even if you’ve had a ton of trauma, it’s like this little, I don’t know, it’s like this little knowing wakes up inside of you. And you just know, this instinct just shows up and kind of helps guide you in how to meet the baby’s needs in a way that’s healthy and appropriate for the baby. And a lot of times when you look at and you study mom-baby dyads, there’s this,

unspoken language between them, right? It happens during sleep. Dr. James McKenna wrote a bunch of different studies over the last 20 to 30 years on watching moms and babies sleep. And when babies, know, vitals go too low, mom stirs and sometimes they even wake up and touch the baby and the baby perks back up again. It’s very SIDS preventive, you know? So like,

Nick McGowan (20:41.197)
Hmm.

Anne Wallen (20:42.58)
there’s these things that we have these superpower abilities to connect with other human beings and we don’t even realize it. And the thing that oftentimes gets in the way of that is trauma, other people’s well-meaning but bad advice. And how do we like get ready for all of that? So that’s where pregnancy, thank goodness we have nine months.

to get ready for when the baby comes, right? We have nine months to work through our core hurts and figure out how did our parents’ parenting style affect us? And do we want to repeat that or do we want to have a different parenting style, right? And what is best for a baby? And a lot of times, you know, when you just read mainstream information, you know, there’s some real…

Nick McGowan (21:10.945)
Hahaha

Anne Wallen (21:37.873)
Sorry, Nick, I know you’re a man, but there are some masculine solutions or frameworks for very feminine processes and that’s not always the best way to go, right? And you can say your baby needs to eat every three hours. We wanna keep baby alive, right? So we’re gonna make sure baby eats every three hours. But what if baby’s hungry before that? You can’t make them wait. Hunger is one of those things that psychologically, if you are left to be hungry,

Nick McGowan (21:48.419)
Does it make sense?

Anne Wallen (22:08.154)
It actually causes so much stress on the body. Adrenaline goes up, cortisol goes up, like all these things, chemical reactions that really are trauma reactions. If you look at it that way, they happen in the body when you’re left to be hungry. So just something as simple as the baby needs to be fed can cause lifelong impairments, psychologically speaking.

Nick McGowan (22:36.93)
I think something to point out here for people that are listening to this, and if you’re about to have a kid, don’t let her scare you off the ledge. Like go do it because it seems like, look, no matter what happens, people are going to make the decisions they’re going to make. But I think the biggest thing you pointed out is the human aspect of it. That the mom or the parents just in general that are connected with their children can feel that, can be connected with their kids.

Anne Wallen (22:39.22)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (22:46.419)
No!

Anne Wallen (22:55.732)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (23:02.664)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (23:05.474)
The fact that you pointed out like, well, capitalistic society was like, how do we make money off this? Well, we want to get the kid out of the bed. We can get them into a whole plethora of their own little suite over here and we can make a whole bunch of money and we might as well push this thing. There’s information that comes from the external world like that. Like, oh, well, baby shouldn’t be in your bed for longer than X amount of time. We should have a crib and like all people have that stuff basically when they have their shower at this point and they get it and they…

Anne Wallen (23:17.962)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (23:35.381)
have like three to $10,000 worth of stuff that just sitting in there for the baby, when the baby probably needs to be deeply connected with them, but every baby is different. And it’s wild to think about how those systems, the family system that tells us, well, when you were a kid, this is what we did. You made the decisions you made. And that’s to be said that way. But then the other systems that say, you need to have this, you need to have that, you need to have that.

Anne Wallen (23:47.092)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (23:57.15)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (24:05.024)
themselves to block all that madness out. Like, thanks for your feedback, grandma. Thanks for your feedback, Capitalistic Society. That person needs to be so deeply entwined with themselves and to understand about themselves. So based on the research you’ve done or the information that you’ve seen, how many people are actually doing that deeper work? Like, hey, I’m pregnant now. I wonder how fucked I was as a child based on the dumb things that happened. How do I not deliver that onto this child?

Anne Wallen (24:10.814)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (24:33.963)
how many people are actually doing that work? Or is that part of the reason why we’re having the conversation? Because more people need to have that internal conversation.

Anne Wallen (24:41.096)
We really need our society, especially in America, to be doing that work more. Because a lot of people are just, like I was saying before, you’re kind of in this automatic robot mode. If you don’t do the work and you don’t have any kind of self-awareness, you’re just gonna do the things that you don’t even realize you learned to do. So like as an infant, even though you’re not

sitting there taking notes on how your parents are parenting you, you’re learning how to be a parent by experiencing their parenting. And if you look around, we have a lot of entitled people walking around and a lot of broken people walking around who are really just living out their traumas and trauma reactions day to day, rather than looking at them, understanding that that’s what it is. You know, it took me till I was in my 40s

to even understand what narcissistic abuse was, because it felt so familiar. Walking around the planet, being raised by someone who was narcissistically abusive. Now back then, 50 years ago, they didn’t have those words, right? But a lot of people have experienced that and they don’t know what it is. And they’re kind of, you know, either perpetuating it as the narcissist in their relationship or

continuing to be used by the narcissist for their supply, right? And this is such a hot button, like, I don’t know, like a really popular terminology nowadays and everyone’s gonna, you know, everyone walks around kind of saying, I know a narcissist or that guy’s a narcissist or whatever, right? So it’s word that gets thrown around a lot. But the deeper issue is when you are not cared for,

Nick McGowan (26:12.609)
Hmm.

Anne Wallen (26:36.859)
in a way that shows you that you’re valuable, right? Then you grow up trying to prove to yourself how valuable you are, your whole life. And so that’s gonna put you into two camps. You’re either gonna be more like a narcissist, right? Trying to get source from people, trying to get that love and acceptance and to prove yourself worthy, right? Or you’re gonna become more of the enabler, more of the empath type.

Nick McGowan (26:57.066)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (27:05.925)
Sometimes it’s just how we’re wired when we’re born, but a lot of it’s learned, right? And so you walk around trying to fix everybody else, trying to pre, what’s the word I’m looking for? Like you’re anticipating what they need, right? And you’re jumping in and taking care of everybody else. And neither one of those makes a good parent. So when you have a kid, you’re going to…

Please don’t get me wrong, public, okay? Not all babies are coming out as narcissists, but all babies do come out needing someone to meet their needs. And so they look like little narcissists, right? Because they’re calling out, they’re crying, you you have to do everything for them. And as they’re growing, you’re trying to boost their self, right? And if you have additional kids around between age two and three, that’s a huge hit to the self-esteem of the toddler.

You know, so then you’re trying to like fix that and soothe that and so there’s this whole chain of events that happens between zero and about seven, eight years old. And there’s ways to feed the little narcissist monster that you might be growing or there’s ways to help the child become self-sufficient and self…

Nick McGowan (28:03.466)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (28:31.529)
self-aware, but also, you know, like help them to develop empathy and help them to develop compassion for others. But a lot of this is not by word. It’s in modeling. And again, we go back to if you haven’t dealt with your shit before you have your baby, it’s going to walk around showing your child how to not be a grownup, but they’re not going to know the difference.

Nick McGowan (28:51.529)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (28:58.527)
And just keep going. Yeah.

Anne Wallen (29:00.167)
Right, and so even though trauma can be passed on from DNA, right, and it can be passed on cellularly, right, but it’s also passed on just by modeling. Modeling what that reactivity looks like, modeling what that unhealed wound looks like. So, go ahead.

Nick McGowan (29:16.329)
Yeah. Well, it’s interesting with how the, think about often how the body keeps the score. Bessel van der Kerk wrote about that and there are other people that say, I don’t agree with it and that’s fine. You can say whatever you want. I’ve experienced it. I’ve experienced what it’s like to be able to have bodily reactions at things when my mind’s going, the fuck are you doing? Like, what is this? And it’s like, that ties back literally to my mom as I was a little kid.

Anne Wallen (29:24.349)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (29:39.315)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (29:45.596)
and watching and going, she seems to fly off the handle of things. Note to self, guess that’s how it’s done. Cool, that’s what I’m gonna do. And then you learn later and you’re like, no, that’s not it. she was coming from generational trauma and chaos and wondering how do I pay for this thing? And what the fuck are you crying about? And what’s this? And sometimes that would come out of her mouth. Like, the fuck are you crying about? To go, I don’t know. And maybe she’s just overwhelmed. So even pointing out that people will look.

Anne Wallen (29:51.922)
Right?

Anne Wallen (29:58.568)
Hmm.

Anne Wallen (30:09.831)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (30:11.727)
and say like, yeah, a lot of people are calling people narcissists at this point because it’s like they learned a new word and they go, well, this looks similar. I’m glad that you’re pointing out that it’s actually deeper and not exactly the same thing at all, but sure, there are tendencies to it. Like the babies need us. Aren’t we like the only organisms that really do that though? Like all other mammals basically are like, cool, you’re born, go get it, have at it. And we need people.

Anne Wallen (30:26.728)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (30:38.844)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (30:41.606)
And those people also need the babies because of that connection. It’s wild to think about how things that’ll happen just on a day to day that a parent might think, I was just a little upset or a little cold or whatever, that could change so much with that child. And especially in the formative years. I learned a handful of years ago about a theory called the subconscious winning strategy.

that we develop a strategy as a child to go, oh, note to self, this is how I win. This is how I get love. Like my core wounding personally is to not be abandoned or unloved. That comes from being a child. So I figured out, oh, I can make people laugh and I can do these different things that then show up in a certain way. And I learned that about myself, I don’t know, at 38 years old and was like, oh my God, my entire life I’ve been doing this because it just deeply ingrained in us.

Anne Wallen (31:15.784)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (31:36.914)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (31:39.891)
You pointed out self-awareness. That’s one of the biggest things I’ve noticed in every single episode I’ve had on this show, every conversation I’ve had that’s peripheral to the show. If you’re aware of something, you can only then become more aware of it as you’re more aware of it. But you can also push things to the side. I’ve watched parents go, I can’t. I’ve had friends that are parents that they’re like, man, some nights I just fucking can’t even. Anything. Like everybody needs to leave me alone and I just need to stare at the ceiling for a little while.

or they dive into some vice, alcohol or something else. So what advice do you have for people that are trying to figure out, I either have a kid and I need to and want to be a better parent, or we’re thinking about having kids, or I’m still kind of reeling from being a kid, and how do they then work through their stuff?

Anne Wallen (32:33.106)
So I think you could, you know.

Anne Wallen (32:39.752)
I’m hearing some interference. Are we still together?

Nick McGowan (32:42.974)
We’re good.

Anne Wallen (32:45.128)
Okay, this could go off on so many, you’re like the tree trunk just now and there’s so many branches and things that we could just go into off of that. I think one of the things that you have to understand is that narcissism, for example, is a spectrum, right? And so,

one end is kind of it’s a healthy self-awareness, self-love, self-protecting, self-serving, right? The other end is where you’re using people in a malignant way. Now, a newborn, I always make jokes with my students, like the newborns don’t read the books, right? They don’t know what the parents think that they’re supposed to be doing. But when they are little and they’re trying to communicate, right? We can, if we’re cold,

for example, we can go and manipulate the thermostat, right, to make it whatever we want. If we’re hungry, we go and manipulate the refrigerator door and get a snack. Babies can’t do those things, so they’re not manipulators, right? But what they are is desperately trying to communicate with us, and we have to put aside, and you see many a mom who’s had sleepless nights, dads too,

Nick McGowan (33:41.842)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (34:04.029)
where they’re just doing whatever it is that the baby seems to be needing and it might just be an overnight, know, shit fast story. You’re just, nobody’s getting sleep, everybody’s crying, like everybody’s crying. And you just have to get through it, right? But the fact that you are trying, the fact that you haven’t just put the baby away and said, I can’t do this anymore, you know, good luck kid, right? The fact that they’re not doing that,

Nick McGowan (34:30.332)
You

Anne Wallen (34:33.224)
the baby and informs the baby, I am worth trying for. And so even if they aren’t fixing it, I can see they’re trying. Right? Now, do you need to step away? Do you need to be able to eat, you know, shower, take a crap by yourself? Yeah, of course. Right? And you need to be able to take care of yourself in order to take care of somebody else. And you need to be able to set boundaries and say, you know,

Nick McGowan (34:37.445)
Hmm.

Anne Wallen (35:02.464)
I am, and we talked a little bit about personality types before, but I’m an introvert, right? And when you’re looking at the Myers-Briggs, introverts need time alone, away from everybody, away from touch, away from sound in order to rebuild their battery. Extroverts, they need other people to recharge their battery. And so if you’ve got babies who are almost all extroverts in that

Nick McGowan (35:15.846)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (35:30.638)
stage of their life. They need somebody else for something at all times usually. And you’ve got an introvert parent who’s like, I am all tapped out. I’m in the negative. Like kid, I can’t help you right now. I cannot do anything right now. I need to go, you know, just take a bath or something in silence. Everyone leave me alone. Knowing that about yourself and knowing that this whole scenario is going to change. Because before baby came,

You probably had self-care mechanisms or habits or whatever in place that you can say like, okay, I am drained. I went to that party. I’ve been at work all day. I need to just have like an evening of quiet. Well, when you have a baby, there’s no such thing. So being able to plan ahead for stuff like that, knowing yourself, being self-aware enough to say, I know what my needs are in a general way, putting a person into this

know, sphere of my everyday life, what do I need to do to keep myself sane while still caring for the needs of this other human being? And being able to build some kind of structure around that. It could be, do I need to live closer to my parents so my parents can help me? Does it mean I need to hire a postpartum doula or a nanny or somebody that’s gonna be able to help take care of the child so that I can take care of me?

You know, just, and that’s not selfish. That’s not being a bad parent saying, well, I can’t always meet the baby’s needs 100 % of the time. Who can? Like we have this really unrealistic expectation, this leave it to be for mom mindset, right? Where it’s like, she’s just gonna do everything. She somehow wakes up with makeup on, with her clothes pressed and you know, like she never spent any time on that, right? Well, that’s kind of what we’re expected to do as parents is we’re expected to just

be up and ready for the world and ready to take care of this baby 100 % without having any kind of prep or any kind of get ready time? No, that’s not how it really works. But then you have that expectation which makes people then feel like they’re failing. And that’s not fair either. That’s where if you look at postpartum depression, it has gone up and gone up and gone up and it’s in its highest

Anne Wallen (37:57.818)
in places where, or in family dynamics where nobody’s getting sleep, you know, there’s sleep deprivation going on and there’s no social support. And those are the two key factors. And a third key factor is babies who cry a lot. And babies don’t just cry a lot. So if you know how to meet your baby’s needs, you can understand your baby’s language, if you can anticipate their needs and just kind of, you know,

Nick McGowan (38:04.699)
Hmm.

Anne Wallen (38:27.781)
Be prepared as we just keep, I keep saying preparation, preparation, right? But being prepared and understanding what does this cry sound mean? Does it mean hungry? Does it mean pain? Does it mean sleepy, right? What do these cry sounds mean? And then being able to appropriately respond to the baby’s needs and making sure that the baby’s needs are met quickly. These all feed into a satisfied, healthy, happy baby, which,

creates calm, satisfied, happy, healthy family, right? And then if you are dealing with trauma triggers where maybe the baby crying is a trauma trigger for you, right? And you haven’t figured out what this baby’s need is, you’re gonna be spiraling and that spiral’s gonna, you’re gonna have anxiety, you’re have the depression, you might even develop other issues. And let me just say one really quick little piece.

Nick McGowan (39:08.922)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (39:26.823)
The news a lot of times says, you know, when a mom kills her babies, right? The news will a lot of times say, oh, she had postpartum depression. That’s not postpartum depression, that’s postpartum psychosis. So postpartum depression and anxiety and OCD and all these other different kinds of mental health disorders, they can turn into psychosis. But psychosis is when you have suspended the connection to reality

in such a way that you would do that heinous act, right? And why does it get to that point? Because we’re not getting enough sleep, we’re not supporting our families, not, you know, we’re not like creating this wrap around care for families. And dads need it too, you know, like we think, mom’s got postpartum depression. Dads get postpartum depression too.

Nick McGowan (40:09.091)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (40:22.797)
sleep deprivation will do it to anybody. You don’t even have to have a baby. You sleep deprived somebody for long enough and they’re gonna experience depression and anxiety. And so being aware, preparing for having that help afterward, understanding what is it that your personal wounding might look like and how might that affect the way you’re gonna care for your baby. So for example, you mentioned abandonment. A lot of people have…

Nick McGowan (40:30.456)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (40:49.807)
abandonment issues because of the whole put your baby to cry it out in the bed philosophy that was taught for a long time. It’s not taught anymore, shouldn’t be taught anymore, we know better now. But there’s a lot of adults walking around that that was the way they did it and they’re gonna hear from their mom and dad and everyone, you know, that’s how you should do it. So it feels really unnatural for a reason.

Nick McGowan (40:54.585)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (41:09.026)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (41:14.435)
It’s that little instinct, that little knowing that awakens in us when we have a baby that tells us, no, that’s not okay. My baby needs me, my baby. That sound is really grating on me. Why? Because it’s meant for us to do something about it. And so being able to look at, there’s a tool that I sometimes will use, it’s called the self-redemption cycle.

Nick McGowan (41:27.543)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (41:39.705)
And you’re really, it’s like this little circle, right? It informs who you are. It informs yourself about who you are. But it takes the core hurt. Have you ever heard of this? So it takes the core hurt and then it looks at what emotions are drawn from that core hurt. And then it says, what are you seeking? What do those emotions tell you about what you’re seeking? And then what kind of behaviors are you gonna do to meet the thing or find the thing that you’re seeking? And then a lot of times those are unhealthy behaviors too.

Nick McGowan (41:57.016)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (42:08.398)
So then you create a new core hurt for yourself, only to do it all over again. And so it’s important for us to really be aware of what are the triggers, right? What are the things that make us feel abandoned or unloved or whatever our thing is, right? And then be able to work through those things because first of all, going into a birth situation,

Nick McGowan (42:08.546)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (42:36.91)
You have to advocate for yourself. You have to be able to speak for yourself. You have to be informed enough because we live in a profit driven medical society and you cannot, it’s not that you can’t trust doctors as individuals, but you can’t trust the system to have your back. The system is not built to your wellness. The system is to profit and wellness doesn’t bring profit. And so,

Nick McGowan (42:55.81)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (43:06.616)
You have, you know, a whole system that I don’t want to say is like designed against you, but you have to be wise going into that. If you’re going to have your baby in a hospital, which not everybody’s having babies in hospitals, I’ve had three at home myself, but if you are going to go into a hospital, you have to know what you’re getting yourself into. You have to know how to handle it. And it’s not the time to be defending yourself or standing up for yourself.

you have to feel so safe to be vulnerable, to be able to open your body to let your baby out. And if you don’t, your labor will be dysfunctional. And that psychological piece, which is, I was saying before, like 80 to 85 % of your whole birth experience, it’s not physical. Physically, we breathe, we digest our food, we use the bathroom. We don’t need anybody to coach us how to do those things.

We don’t need to read books on how to do those things. Our bodies know how to do it. And it’s the same way with birth. Our bodies know how to give birth. But there’s safety mechanisms built into the process, survival mechanisms. And one of those survival mechanisms is, is it safe out there? Is it safe for the baby who’s super, super vulnerable? Like you said, you know, we’re the only species that’s like, our baby comes out and they are completely and utterly dependent upon us for everything.

Nick McGowan (44:30.444)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (44:32.068)
And so if our subconscious says, it’s not safe for that little vulnerable person to come out, it will shut down labor. And you can give it all the drugs you want. You can give it all the pitocin you want. It’s not gonna receive it. Your brain’s gonna shut down those pitocin receptors and say, nope, it’s not safe out there. She doesn’t like the doctor. Or the lights are too bright. Or yeah, or whatever the reason that’s triggering her.

Nick McGowan (44:51.03)
Politics.

Yeah.

Anne Wallen (44:58.884)
you know, making her feel unsafe. And it could just be there’s a male doctor and she doesn’t feel comfortable around males in that way, right? And so it could be all kinds of things. As a doula and as a doula trainer, I have seen thousands of different scenarios where, you know, she might love her doctor and feel super safe with her doctor, but she gets to the hospital and guess what? It’s the person on call and she’s never even met them.

Right, and now we have a hurdle to get over. And does she feel strong enough and confident in her ability enough to not let that affect her? Or is she, or does she not feel that way? Right, and in the moment, you’re just trying to hang on for dear life. You’re just having labor. You’re just trying to get through it, right? And so all these other psychological factors are really tough to have to.

Nick McGowan (45:50.678)
Peace.

Anne Wallen (45:54.488)
navigate, that’s why you’ve got to prepare ahead of time and really have somebody there, whether it’s your partner who’s very well versed and really, you know, knows what you want and is willing to stand up for you, or a doula, or you’re home with your midwife, you know, whatever your scenario, but it’s definitely not for the faint of heart, but it’s also not for someone who is

just kinda coming at it willy nilly like, yeah, I got pregnant, yeah, I’m gonna have a baby, and yeah, we’re gonna do this thing called parenting. I mean, you can do it that way, but you’re gonna be on autopilot the whole time. Your reactions to things are not gonna be intentional and worked through the way that they should be for the betterment of your baby, right?

Nick McGowan (46:32.246)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (46:41.731)
yeah.

Anne Wallen (46:44.803)
The best way to change life on Earth is to change the way we start, right?

Nick McGowan (46:50.324)
Yeah, what a good way to put that. And especially all of this ties in to so many different pieces, but it’s all similar. Like you go into some big situation, you have to be prepared, but you also need to understand about yourself. And there are people I’m sure that try their best to be as prepared as they can be. Again, I’ve had a few friends that are like, I’ve read every fucking book I could. I talked to everybody I could.

Anne Wallen (46:58.522)
Mm.

Anne Wallen (47:14.777)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (47:16.278)
And I still expect to screw this kid up in some sort of way, because I’m going to say something weird or whatever. it’s like totally, like you’re just going to do what you’re going to do and your kid’s going to go how they’re going to go. But that’s the sort of like anti-matter in the middle of it. That’s like, well, all that stuff is just going to happen. But as long as you’re best prepared, you’re going to do what you can. Those people that are kind of wandering around that are like, well, we had a baby and like, I still don’t know my stuff or what’s going on. That.

Anne Wallen (47:36.558)
Yeah!

Nick McGowan (47:45.714)
level of self-awareness takes many, many, many blocks to get through to be able to get to that point. So the whole purpose of this show is to be able to help people on their path towards self-mastery and really figuring themselves out and living the best life that they can. So for the people that are on that path towards self-mastery, wanting to have a kid or have a kid or are still kind of reeling through the stuff that they’ve been through as a kid, how…

What’s your advice for somebody that’s on their path towards self mastery that’s kind of going throughout all that?

Anne Wallen (48:19.747)
So the number one thing that you can do is to just nurture yourself, right? Nurturing and making it okay to get things wrong. Having self-forgiveness, having self-grace. Because as you go through these blocks, I could tell you just from my own personal experience that going through different, you know, looking at what has happened to me and saying, okay, this event, and I’m gonna sit with how this event makes me feel.

until I can take away the power from it. And some people use counseling for that, some people use EMDR. I found EMDR super helpful. I think too, know, alongside having self-grace and having self-forgiveness, being with other people who are healthy psychologically is really important. If you are in a situation or a relationship that is kind of keeping you in

I don’t want to say in abuse because maybe the relationship isn’t abusive, but maybe in a situation where you are constantly triggered or you are continually kind of repeating bad habits, right? And you’re recognizing that, but then you’re in this situation where they’re just triggering you and triggering you and triggering you. You got to get away from it to be able to heal it. It’s so tough.

to be able to heal something while you’re in the midst of reaction. And honestly, you know, we talked about the word narcissism and the word trauma and things like that. One of the most powerful ways that I feel like people can heal from stuff and actually keep digging into their past and finding the next thing, right? Like, okay, well, I healed from this and now what? What’s the next thing?

Nick McGowan (50:17.15)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (50:17.325)
You’re subconscious, two things. One, I really believe that your subconscious will always answer you. And before you even finish the sentence, right, you know the answer. That’s your intuition, you can trust it. Right, so being able to say, what’s the thing that is really holding me back right now? You know it, your subconscious just told you what it was, right? And then going through that, working on that, focusing on that. The other thing is, is that for people,

A really powerful tool for us to get understanding about something is labeling. So when you are, let’s say narcissism, when you are looking at narcissism, you can say, hey, here’s a behavior. This makes me feel uncomfortable. What is this? Why does this make me feel uncomfortable? it’s gaslighting. I’ve got a word for that.

Nick McGowan (50:52.861)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (51:08.148)
hehe

Anne Wallen (51:09.977)
Right? I’ve got a word for the bandwagoning technique. I’ve got a word for flying monkeys. I’ve got a word for all these different things. Right? And so being able to look at your shit and having a label for the different things that you’re experiencing, having a label for the different reactions that you might be having. Number one, it helps you to understand it. It helps you have a little more power over those things rather than it having power over you. But then also, you know, we can Google it.

If you have a word that you’re like, my goodness, you know, this thing is really just triggering me. Why does it trigger me? Okay, comes, I can see that it’s stemming back from this thing that happened to me. And like I said, just ask yourself the questions. Just keep asking yourself the questions. And when your subconscious tells you this is what it was, then you can look it up, right? One of the reasons why I learned about narcissism is because I was Googling, why doesn’t my husband like me?

How sad is that that you got to ask that question? But I soon found out that it’s one of the list of things in the narcissistic playbook. And so then you start to realize, this behavior happened at this point in my life and at that point in my life and at that point in my life. And because you have a label for it, you can start to identify the root cause. And that’s where you can kind of start taking your power back.

Nick McGowan (52:35.719)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (52:38.456)
and you can rework the programming that’s going on in your head. And so then you’re no longer a robot, just on autopilot. You can have a moment, you could take a moment to pause and say, I’m not gonna respond like that anymore. I’m gonna, I look, I see it for what it is now. And I’m not gonna let that do this thing to me. And I’m not gonna let that do that thing to my child, because I’m not gonna respond the same way anymore.

Nick McGowan (52:54.547)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (53:08.132)
And I’ll tell you what, every kid, I really believe this, every child is born to bring the balance. So like if you have, and I apologize for all the noise in the background, I am in New York City. I don’t know if you hear the sirens. They’re about to come right in front of my building, I could tell. All right, they’re gone. Okay, so.

Nick McGowan (53:08.231)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (53:30.483)
Alright.

Anne Wallen (53:35.074)
give them a second. So when you have, you know, these, this labeling and when you have this balance that the child is bringing into the family, you know, you, you might say, that kid’s a, that’s a wild child or whatever. A wild child compared to what? Maybe you have very placid parents, right? And then the child’s just bringing the balance. They bring in the party. Or you have parents who are, you know, maybe really

Nick McGowan (53:35.155)
They’re good.

Nick McGowan (54:00.989)
you

Anne Wallen (54:05.061)
just super extroverted and then you get this little introverted child because they’re bringing the balance or you have two kids, right? I’ve had my two boys, they’re kind of like in the early middle of the six of them and I had one that was like large muscle. You tell him to dig a hole, he’s gonna be like, how deep and how big and tell me where to go and I’m on it, right? And then you got the next kid.

who was very small motor skills, very artistic, you know, just like super minute focus, right? And you tell him to dig a hole and he’d be like, I don’t know how to dig a hole, right? So like they’re opposites, but this is what happens in family structures. It’s like the kid comes in and they fill the gap of what’s missing. This can get tricky if you have stuff that you haven’t worked on in the past, because guess what?

Nick McGowan (54:48.443)
Mm-hmm.

Anne Wallen (55:02.852)
Kids also bring the triggers. So for example, my nine-year-old, love her to pieces, she’s really different from me. It’s a challenge sometimes to be her parent because I don’t know what to do with her half the time because she’s just so different from me. And so that in itself is a little bit of a trigger. And so as a parent, when you are trying to learn, because a lot of times we think, oh, we’re here to

Nick McGowan (55:18.096)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (55:24.272)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (55:32.696)
you know, mold and shape this person. But I want to challenge that perception. I think we’re really here to figure out who this person is and help them to be the best of whoever it is that they’re supposed to be. And we’re not really supposed to be directing that all that much at all. Right. And so that also can be really tricky if you don’t know who you are. Right. If you’re if your stuff

Nick McGowan (55:57.893)
Yeah.

Anne Wallen (56:01.496)
goes into identifying as, I worthy? Should I speak up? Do I have to fight for stuff? All the different things that go on as a child inside of you, your child, it’s gonna be mirrored back to you. And if you haven’t figured those things out, if you didn’t figure them out as a child, how are you gonna have answers for your kid when they’re going through the same thing? So.

getting into and really just there’s actually a book for if you’re pregnant now or if you’re looking at getting pregnant, there’s a book called birthing from within. It’s kind of a whole system. I really like it because it kind of digs into the psychological aspect of, you know, this labyrinth of how were you created mentally, emotionally, and then how are you going to walk or step into parenthood, you know, as a person who can

be there for your kid in all these different ways that you’re gonna have, it’s gonna be demanded upon you whether or not you have the skills to meet the needs or not, right? Yeah.

Nick McGowan (57:05.967)
Yeah, whether you like it or not. man, there’s so much to that. And again, I’m not going to have kids ever. I’m no longer equipped to. And I can think about how these things relate to us as people without kids because we were kids at one point and this ties back. Even the two kids that you have that you talked about, you literally just described my brother and myself. And my dad was like,

Anne Wallen (57:25.112)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (57:34.359)
I understand the one who can dig the holes. I don’t understand why you’re building things and you’re painting. What the hell is this about? I’m gonna stick with the one over here because that makes sense and parents can go to that. They can look at that and they can do those things. But I really appreciate that you’re challenging people to understand the most about themselves and where their things have come from so that they don’t really bring them into anything further unless they go, hey, I learned this before cause I went through some shit.

Anne Wallen (57:56.334)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (58:03.077)
Here’s how you go about it a little differently, but you do you kid and I’m here to support you. I think that’s a crucial thing that you really pointed out and I appreciate you pointing that out. This has been awesome to have you on today and I appreciate you being with us. Before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Anne Wallen (58:08.109)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (58:27.194)
Did I totally cut out there? Awesome. So I’d asked where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Anne Wallen (58:36.484)
Well, I am like I said the director of maternity wise you can find me there. That’s easy maternity wise calm just like that And you can also find me. I’m a contributor to brains magazine So I have several articles published there and if you want to find me on LinkedIn, I’m Anne Wallen. So hey

Nick McGowan (58:58.896)
Again, Ann, it’s been great having you on today. I appreciate your time.

Anne Wallen (59:01.988)
Thank you.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Damon Cart, an NLP teacher and coach, about the transformative power of self-concept coaching. Damon shares his personal journey through depression, the importance of understanding one’s values, and the pitfalls of self-worth.

What to listen for:

“It has everything to do with your beliefs… Most people don’t believe they are the value that they’re seeking.”

“If you’re adamant about being a happy and fulfilled person and you’re willing to work for it, you will get there.”

About Damon Cart

Damon is a world-leading expert in creating lasting internal transformations using the Self-Concept model™. As a master NLP practitioner and co-founder of The Self-Concept Research Group, he transformed his own life from a struggling insurance agent to a globally recognized authority in personal development. Mentored by NLP pioneer Steve Andreas, he has spent nearly eight years helping thousands achieve identity-level change. Based in Santa Cruz, California, Damon combines deep theory with practical application to make transformation effortless and permanent.

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? Send Nick an email or schedule a time to discuss your podcast today!

https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

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Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:01.436)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Damon Cart. Damon, how you doing today?

Damon Cart (00:11.266)
Good. How are you?

Nick McGowan (00:12.828)
I’m good, man, I’m excited. As I told you, this is the first episode of Brand New Office. So if people watch the video and I’m looking around, it’s other stuff in the office. I’m excited that you’re here, man. We were just shooting the breeze a bit before we got started and I’m excited to get into things. So why don’t you kick us off? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

Damon Cart (00:23.182)
you

Damon Cart (00:35.694)
Hmm. Well, I teach NLP and I coach it as well. I do one-on-one coaching and not just NLP. I focus on a specific model called the self concept model. And it was a model that was taught to me by my mentor, Steve Andreas. He created it. And it is a model that models our identity, how we create our sense of self and how to transform that. Most people are not living the life that they would want to be living. And that’s rooted in them not being the person they want to be.

And we think that we have to go conquer mountains or defeat dragons until we’re worthy of that. And that’s just not true. It has everything to do with your beliefs and how you organize that information into those beliefs and what in fact you believe about yourself. And most people don’t believe they are the value that they’re seeking. And as a result of that, they experience lower self-esteem, lower confidence and overall just lack of fulfillment.

And we can transform that and sometimes as simple as one hour session just by transforming beliefs, restructuring that information. So instead of taking years of willpower and discipline and all of those things, it’s really in how you think about it. And there’s an exact organization to that. And once you understand it, then you can change it. And something about me that is, I don’t know if I’m, I don’t know, I feel like I’m a pretty open book about things, about myself.

And I don’t know of anything that I would call bizarre. would say something that probably not a lot of people know about me, unless you really know me very well, is that I’m a rather emotional person. And that can be anything. That can be anger. That can be watching a movie and, you know, feeling emotional because of it, because it’s sad or it’s a great love story or something like that. I tend to be very emotional and be

The older I’ve gotten, the more comfortable I am with just being emotional and vulnerable in front of people. But I don’t really show that in my videos. In my persona online, it’s just not, I don’t think it’s really relevant. And it’s not that I’m ashamed of it. It’s just, I don’t see the value in doing that. I’m a teacher and it’s for me, it’s about getting the information out there.

Nick McGowan (02:51.884)
Interesting. I want to go down that path a little bit because I am emotional. If you watched any videos, you can see some of the emotions come out. There are often times I’ll blame, I’m from Philly, so I’ll just blame the Northeast. I’m like, it’s because of Philly. Like, yeah, yeah. And that’s what everybody thinks about Philly people anyway. They’re crazy or they’re loud. It’s like partially, but some of that’s also generational trauma and they don’t really know how to handle it. And

Damon Cart (03:03.854)
Why not?

Nick McGowan (03:16.787)
It’s interesting because also as we get older like you can watch a commercial and you get over 40 and you start crying and you’re like I don’t know why like what the fuck was that what a good 12 second clip of something but it’s interesting that you put that to the side when you make your videos and it sounds really conscious like you’re like I’m not gonna allow myself to be not vulnerable but emotional because you don’t want it to block the message is that about right?

Damon Cart (03:43.691)
You know, got a comment on one of my videos recently and that one of the live streams I did was very academic. And I was like, well, like as opposed to what, how do you, because they’re, and you’ll hear people throw this word around when it comes to NLP teachers. like, this person’s very academic. And to me, that means like more theory-based and not experiential, but NLP is very experiential. So I was just like, well, you know, how do,

Nick McGowan (04:03.638)
Mm-hmm.

Damon Cart (04:09.358)
As opposed to what I’m giving you the steps of a process that you have to go and do and experience and he was like no No, not like that. You should put your personality into your videos more and he referenced a podcast and I went and looked at the podcast and it was one of those kind like bro podcasts where It was a young man and he’s you know, kind of putting a little bit of arrogance out there No judgment on him. Like this is what plays this is what sells and So I haven’t responded to the person yet, but on my video, but basically it comes down to this I

I don’t see myself as the brand of what I’m doing. The information that I’m getting out there is the star of the show, not me. And there have been times where I put my personal life on there. I’ve done vlogs and things like that. And you will see me get emotional in those. But I’ve never found it to be like why people are coming to my videos. And if my personality overshadows what I’m teaching, which is you see this in like Tony Robbins, you know, and

Nick McGowan (04:46.008)
Mm.

Nick McGowan (05:06.915)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (05:06.926)
Then I feel like I’m not doing my job. I feel like I’ve the message and what I’m teaching is the most important thing, not who I am. I don’t want my, if I get emotional about something, I don’t want that to hijack the video. I want the information I’m teaching to be the thing that people are coming for and that they’re getting it.

Nick McGowan (05:20.653)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (05:26.553)
That makes total sense. And I guess to people that don’t know that, they’re just going to interpret how they’re going to interpret because we are people and we’ll interpret things how we want and make up a story and go, here’s what it is. But that’s a great way to put it. You’re stewarding it. You’re basically just letting it come through you and kind of work through you. Do you feel like some of it is also channeled in that sort of way specifically? Or are you just saying, I’ve learned this information. I want to package it in the right way so you can get the information and

Damon Cart (05:38.466)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (05:41.826)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (05:56.342)
Never mind how I feel about

Damon Cart (05:58.735)
So definitely yes to the second part, when you say channel, what do mean by channel?

Nick McGowan (06:04.412)
There are certain people that channel information from a higher level, from God or from the universe or whatever, and they feel that comes through them. It’s almost like how creatives or artists can say, I don’t really know where that came from, but it just came out of me and it was kind of channeled through. And I’ve seen different people and I’ve talked to different people that are like, I don’t let my vessel really, or like the being get in the way because it’s being channeled through.

And it sounds like you’re taking more of the conscious approach of like the information is the information. So take the information and me being yelly or emotional about it or whatever is not going to do you a bit of good. Here’s the information. But it also sounds like that person who’s like, I want I want you to be emotional because they probably are, you know.

Damon Cart (06:46.668)
Yeah, and yeah, so I’ve had those moments on, because I like to do live streams. So yeah, I’ve had those moments where I felt like, yeah, I was just channeling. But majority of it is, I’ve felt this my entire life. If I was struggling to solve a problem and I solve that problem, I know that there are other people who are trying to solve that problem and they’re really frustrated. And I know what that frustration feels like. So I just want to go to them and say, here’s the key or here’s.

Here’s the information you need so that you don’t need to struggle with this anymore. And I feel like that’s really my job. My channel started with one of the things I realized very quickly when I was going to like one NLP training after another, especially getting into more and more advanced NLP trainings that I was attending, not teaching, was how many people didn’t actually know basic NLP. And it was like, okay, they’re spending thousands of dollars learning all this. And it is true. Like you just don’t really get a lot of practice in NLP trainings because that would make

Nick McGowan (07:34.966)
Mm.

Damon Cart (07:43.299)
the training’s extremely long and that wouldn’t be very competitive in the market. So people aren’t really practicing and then they hand you a certificate and say, now you’re certified. And it’s like that is completely meaningless. You have to go and practice it. And so what I was doing is I was practicing every single day on myself. was practicing, I had a practice group and I would practice with them once a week and had a practice partner who I practiced with once a week. And I was practicing on people and they didn’t even realize it. I was just making the world my NLP classroom.

Nick McGowan (07:44.983)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (08:11.054)
So I was understanding NLP rapidly. And a lot of this, was not getting the help of a teacher or a mentor up until I met my mentor, Steve Andreas. And so I started my YouTube channel being that the whole point of it was I’m going to teach people what they should have learned in their NLP training. And actually to this day, when I’m going, when I’m speaking at conferences, actually when I’m shoulder to shoulder speaking with other people who are presenting at these conferences, they will come to me and say,

When I was taking my NLP training, I didn’t understand what I was learning and I had to turn to your videos because your videos were the videos that actually taught me what I was supposed to know. And so I get this compliment to this day, which is a huge compliment because that’s exactly what I was set out to do in the beginning. So yeah, I’ve always, the spotlight has always been the information that I’m teaching, not me.

Nick McGowan (08:46.155)
Nice.

Nick McGowan (08:59.383)
And it sounds like with everything you’re saying, you’ve just solidified it more and more and more. Like if they were like, you know, it’s a little dry, you would probably open up a little bit in that sort of way. But the fact that you keep getting like, this is what you set out to do and this is what it’s about. That’s awesome, man. And again, I think people are gonna interpret how they want. Like I wanna hear more emotions.

Damon Cart (09:17.378)
Yeah, and I do share, I’m happy to share like one of the reasons why I’ve had a lot of people come to me for coaching is they would say like, you know, I heard some of what you were saying and it didn’t really speak to me, but when you talked about your depressions or you talked about your divorce and things like that. that is something that I think it helps feed what I’m trying to do here. When I, when I don’t pretend like I’m this perfect person, I think when people are trying to really build a personality brand, that’s what they’re doing.

Nick McGowan (09:30.69)
yeah.

Damon Cart (09:45.133)
And there are people who want to follow that. want to believe that there are these sort of like higher than human people that they can follow. I just, that defeats the whole point. So yeah, I want people to know that I’ve worked through problems. I’ve worked through depression. I’ve had a divorce. I’ve had to deal with, you know, trying to maintain relationships with my kids.

Nick McGowan (09:45.216)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (09:55.851)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (10:06.222)
you know, in these tough times of going through a divorce and moving out of the home, you know. So I do talk about these things because I want people to understand that I’m not just like coming from a place of like, had this all figured out from the beginning. It’s like, what I’m giving you is things that, problems that I’ve solved, things that I had to figure out for myself. that’s how I know that it works. And so now I’m giving it to you. So you don’t have to stay in that frustration.

Nick McGowan (10:18.443)
haha

Nick McGowan (10:31.273)
Wait, so there aren’t perfect people on the planet? Like there’s not somebody wandering around? Like all these people on social media?

Damon Cart (10:36.426)
you would be amazed you would be amazed at how people really buy into that stuff and i just like yeah

Nick McGowan (10:41.716)
my God, well they want to, you know? Like they really want that. And I can understand like really wanting that, but it’s like self-awareness. Like once you see it, like you can’t not see things. So if you’re like, I want this, why would I want this? Well, you know, and then you kind of work through your stuff. But big thing you’re saying with this is context. Like setting the stage, giving some context to it. Like if you just talked about all these things and you’re like, went through a divorce, but I’m totally good. And like everything’s totally fine. And like everything’s all right.

for the people that are out there that would just be like, cool, see, he’s totally good. Like you’re actually hurting those people at that point. And it’s interesting, cause I think there’s a lot of like, there’s a lot of hurt that’s being given out from coaches because they’re not actually working through this stuff that they’re working through. You told me before we even got started, like you were doing the work and kind of almost tripped into this because it made sense to do it when it made sense instead of like where I think

2020 and the whole COVID thing is an easy thing to look back to because a lot of people were like, well, what the fuck do I do now? I guess I become a coach for what? I don’t fucking know. But I guess I’ll do it because I see these other people doing it and like, why the fuck not? And at that point, they’re just like spewing things. I kind of tripped backwards into coaching because I went through a divorce and I had friends that were like, man, you helped me. Can you help a buddy of mine who’s also going through shit? Can you help somebody else? And it’s like

Damon Cart (11:46.635)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (12:05.334)
Yeah, but I need to do so much more work because the more that you learn, the more you understand. Like there’s more to know about it. And likewise, I’m sure with the NLP stuff, like as you started to go into it, I’m sure you got three weeks, three months, three years into it. You’re like, oh my God, there’s so much that I’ve learned from it that you’re then able to turn around. And it sounds like you’ve got a good, I guess mindset, a sense of like, I’m going to help. I want to deliver the information instead of like pushing it upon people. But why don’t we take a little bit of a step back.

How the hell did you get here? I know a little bit of the story, but why don’t you share that? Because again, context is important.

Damon Cart (12:40.153)
Yeah, so I became, well, I had my first depression right after I graduated college and it was, 9-11 happened. It was the first time I was out of school in my entire life. I guess I started going to school like at three and now I’m like 22 and I’m out of school for the first time and just, you know, facing that the rest of your life. Like, what do I do now?

Nick McGowan (13:06.409)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (13:06.734)
Yeah, 9-11 happened, which really shook me up because you feel like you’re living, you don’t even question your safety and suddenly something like that happens. And then I got arrested for something really stupid. And it’s really stupid to the point where it’s like, I mean, if you want to get into it, I don’t mind talking about it, but it’s not, I don’t know, I don’t find it that relevant. anyway, those three things happened in one summer. And I just was like, I don’t even feel like walking out my front door. It just feels dangerous. Like, who knows what can happen?

Nick McGowan (13:22.1)
I’m down.

Nick McGowan (13:26.206)
Fair enough.

Damon Cart (13:35.047)
And I gradually just kind of like pulled in more and more and didn’t process the feelings, the negative feelings that I was experiencing. And I just suddenly I realized I’m in a really bad place. And I’ve actually been in this place for months now. And I don’t know how to get myself out of it. And I remembered that I had a professor who taught a class called the philosophy of psychology. And he went through different therapeutic modalities, including hypnosis and gestalt therapy, which NLP is based on. And then at the end, he

Nick McGowan (13:57.267)
Mm.

Damon Cart (14:04.856)
pulled out NLP and he said like, this is the mother of them all, because it takes the best of everything that whatever works. And I was just amazed by what this guy could do. And I was, I remember thinking to myself, I got to learn this NLP thing one day. So that was in college and then I was graduated. Now I’m experiencing depression. I don’t have health insurance. I’m a bartender. And so I can’t, I don’t even have the money to hire a therapist.

Nick McGowan (14:16.2)
Mm.

Damon Cart (14:27.502)
So I remembered my professor and I called him up and told him what was going on and he said, well, come into my office. He said, I don’t believe in a free service, but I also don’t need your money. So he said, donate your time every time you come to see me to charity or money or whatever. And he’s like, I’m not going to check back with you. I’m just going to trust that you do it. Come back next week and we’ll get to work. I come back next week and in one hour session, months of depression is gone. And I just, my logical mind said, no, no.

Nick McGowan (14:45.971)
That’s cool.

Damon Cart (14:57.056)
No, cannot even be possible. But every other part of me was just like, I’m free, like I’m not depressed anymore. And I remember leaving his office and just like I had to stop and sit at a bench on the campus and was just like looking around. like, I walked in there a different person. I walked in there depressed and I’m walking out and there is no depression. just didn’t, it seemed crazy. And so I didn’t get depressed for another 10 years. And when I finally got depressed again, it had nothing to do with what I had gotten depressed with the first time.

Nick McGowan (14:58.13)
Hehehehe

Nick McGowan (15:19.816)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (15:26.926)
But I can say now, knowing NLP, that it was a way that I would think about things. Depression is a process, not like a thing. So, you know, 10 years later, now I’m living in Santa Cruz, California. I have an insurance agency. I’m married and I have two really young kids, like two kids under two years old. And everything is going wrong. And so I slip into a depression again and then even realize it. My wife at the time, ex-wife now, she’s a therapist and she just said, you need help. And I remember

Part of me was like well, no, don’t and then I just stopped and I was like, yeah, actually I do I’m not good. And so I found a therapist and this was traditional therapy So I went to traditional psychotherapy and it took me an entire year to come out of depression So we’re talking one session with somebody who knew NLP versus an entire year with someone who’s doing more traditional therapy And when I started to realize even though I was out of that depression I was thinking maybe I can make some progress and some advances here

But no, he only knew how to get, this therapist only knew how to get you out of the hole. And then once you were there, then he kind of like kept you there by asking more and more about problems rather than trying to move you to solutions. And I was like, okay, this isn’t working for me anymore. And so I stopped going to see him, but I knew if I didn’t do something different, I was going to end up right back there again. And that’s when I decided it’s time to learn NLP. And there was a training that might still happen here in Santa Cruz where NLP was created up at the university every summer.

Nick McGowan (16:31.538)
Mm.

Damon Cart (16:56.52)
And so I went to that training and it just felt like I came home. I was like, this is what I’ve been looking for. And I wasn’t even thinking that I was going to be a teacher or a coach at that point. I was still thinking I’m going to fix my insurance agency and I’m going to fix my marriage and everything’s going to be great. And I just couldn’t stop doing NLP. I would just try to get into a training every chance that I could. Like I mentioned before, I was practicing all the time. And by the time I came back a year later,

Nick McGowan (17:00.627)
Hmm.

Damon Cart (17:22.79)
About 75 % of the people who were there the year before returned for the, it was a master practitioner training. And they just kept coming up to me and they were like, why are you so much better than us? And I was like, I don’t know. said, so I started asking them questions and they were like, you we went, we got the same certification you did. So we, you know, we should be at the same level as you. And I was like, did you practice? Have you practiced at all since the last training a year ago? And they were all no.

Nick McGowan (17:28.528)
Well.

Damon Cart (17:51.343)
I was like, it’s not a secret. If you don’t practice, you’re not going to get good at it. And that’s why I’m better than you is I’m not, I don’t have any special talents. just practice. And, uh, so, and that’s when people started saying, uh, and then when I go to other NLP trainings, people would be like, well, how long have you been a coach or how long have you been a teacher? And I was like, I’m not, I’m an insurance agent. And they were like, what are you doing here? Cause mostly coaches and you know, teachers go to these trainings. And, uh, so yeah, by that point, after a year had passed, I was like, yes, I’m going to.

Nick McGowan (17:53.212)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (18:20.216)
I’m coaching, I’m gonna do teaching. And even still, was more about I wanted to be better at NLP and that was was driving me to wanna do that. So I started just teaching workshops and when that didn’t go very far, that’s when I decided to get on YouTube. A friend of mine actually said, hey, you’ve been to film school, why don’t you try YouTube? And so like, okay, I’ll give that a shot and I did. And yeah, I realized in that whole process that my marriage was not salvageable. was…

just, you know, we hit that inroads and it was nothing that was going to make it better. And I also realized that being an insurance agent was making me absolutely miserable and there was no changing that. So it was like, you know, it’s not, I always thought that it was something about me not being good enough. And that’s why I wasn’t succeeding at the insurance business, but it was like, no, it’s just not a good fit. The crazy thing about it, once I realized that, and I realized that it was just going to use the business to keep me afloat until I transferred into this other business.

I actually was able to make it successful at that point. was really strange. It’s like when, you know, this thing you’re trying so hard to do and then you finally say, fuck it, I don’t care anymore. Then it, you know, then it was easy. And then it was like, I want to say it easy, but it was, it was working a lot better. And so I was just basically, I moved my office in with another agent. said, can you babysit this while I transition out of this? And he said, yeah, absolutely. And so I was, you know, it took me a few years to kind of figure out this new business. But once I did, I was, I jumped and haven’t looked back since.

Nick McGowan (19:20.817)
the

Yeah.

Nick McGowan (19:46.162)
I love all that and especially the I mean the real side of it like I joked like yeah You were overnight success took nine years like the amount of stuff that people see that they think like this is Whatever they make it up to be in their own heads and the fact that you were doing the work I mean there are little principles that are through all of this stuff where it’s like You did it in the sense that you just wanted to learn it and you were you even said to me that it was your calling

When we feel that and we go in that direction, things will start to get easier, even if it’s the other stuff of like, I need to get this away. And I don’t know the answer to this question, but is it safe to assume that you’re living a better life and more happy life than you did when you had the agency, when you were married, at least to her and like where things are now, is it better?

Damon Cart (20:33.742)
100 times over. Especially thinking back during the times that I was depressed and I was just like, I guess this is just kind of how life is going to be for the rest of it. And that was depressing to even think about. And that’s what I like to tell people because when I come across someone who’s either depressed or kind of close to that.

I want to be respectful. You don’t want to just say, your life is so much better than you. That will make it worse. what I do want to communicate to them is it will get better. It can get better. If you’re adamant about being a happy and fulfilled person and you’re willing to work for it, you will get there. You’re not stuck. This is not how the rest of your life has to be.

Nick McGowan (21:02.095)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (21:25.708)
Because yeah, like at this point, it’s like it has exceeded the fulfillment I experienced now has exceeded what I thought was even possible. And still it’s getting more and more fulfilling. So my take on it now is just like, well, how, how good can this get? How deep can I take this? And it’s not like a, it’s not like a greedy thing. It’s more of like a potential thing. What potential do I have to be even more fulfilled and

Nick McGowan (21:43.877)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (21:52.844)
more engaged in life and I’m curious to see how far I can take that.

Nick McGowan (21:58.124)
What a cool aspect of it. Like, well, fuck, let’s see what happens. And like, cool, let’s see how far we can go. And I think to call something out here too, for the people that are listening, isn’t, Damon’s not saying like, well, I was in a shitty spot. I learned this thing and everything worked better. Like that’s just not how life works. Like the amount of work that you had to put in that wasn’t just like curriculum work, but also work on your own. if you…

Damon Cart (22:01.698)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (22:26.232)
If you actually sat back and thought about the amount of hours that you spent just even pondering on it, thinking about it, looking at other people, how they relate to life and what they do. Like you literally enveloped yourself in it instead of saying, well, I really want that. And the reason why I say that is there are people that I hear from the times that are like, man, I’ve tried therapy. I’ve tried this. I’ve tried that. It’s like, great. So what’s next? I’m like, if that didn’t work or if that was a piece of it, like talk therapy, everybody will go into talk therapy and they’re like,

This was great and it led me in some direction or it was bullshit and I just yammered to somebody about my problems and they were, they would ask me, how does that make you feel or whatever? It’s like, that’s a part of all of this, but not just the end thing. I think a lot of people do want, they just want that like, what’s the pill that I can swallow and like push all this stuff away instead of trying to break down one barrier to break down another, to break down another, like they’re.

There are visuals in my head at times where I’ll climb a mountain only to get to the top of it and go, what the fuck is that? Jeez, it’s another, all right, cool. And you get to a point where you just, you keep trucking along with it. So let’s talk about some of the really tough times where obviously going through a divorce can be a tough time. And for somebody who’s a divorced, it’s one of those things like congratulations or I’m sorry, or a mixture of both, you know? But that can be one of those things that really shapes you in a beautiful way. Like I used to tell people,

Damon Cart (23:44.2)
All right.

Nick McGowan (23:51.65)
I didn’t get a divorce to die. I got a divorce so I could live and actually change things. like, I look at life now and think, my God, how did I have that same sort of question that you did of like, well, is this it? I guess this is it. So I guess this is just what life is gonna be like. And it doesn’t have to be that way, but there were still dark times he went through. So were there any that come to mind that you were like, man, that was one of those like super pivotal moments?

Like I went through that within my NLP journey and that changed how things shifted.

Damon Cart (24:23.212)
Yeah, there were a few. When I got a divorce, I was dating for the first time in 15 years. And in my late 30s, that was scary. Things had changed quite a bit. Now there was online dating, and I tried that. And that didn’t go so well, because on these apps, it’s like 70 % men and 30 % women. So the odds are really stacked against you. So I also had my own business, so I wasn’t going to date my employees nor my

insurance clients. so I started saying, realizing that I needed, if I saw an attractive woman, I was going to have to go and just talk to her, you know, and that was really difficult to do. And also wanted that choice because I was kept slipping in the relationships, even some of the rebound relationships that I went through, kept slipping in the relationships where the women would turn out to be very passive aggressive and playing a lot of games and really trying to control and manipulate me. And I remember coming to like a choice point thinking, wait,

Nick McGowan (25:16.247)
Mm.

Damon Cart (25:23.126)
Is this all women are all women like this or is this just the women I’m attracting? And so I had to be really like honest with myself and I was like, you know what? I’m going to take this on. This is my responsibility. I know that there are good women out there. And so there’s something I’m doing that’s attracting this type of woman. And I want to figure out what that is. And so I just decided I was going to just date and date and date for an entire year. And at the end of that year, if I found someone that I was going to settle down with them.

And I did find someone and it was coming up to that year and then the red flag went up and I saw she was doing the same thing. And I was like, oh man, I spent a year doing this and I almost missed it again, almost got slipped into this relationship with this person who was basically going to, it was going to be a rerun of all my relationships. And so was like, I need another year. And so I went another year and I dated a lot. could catch these red flags very quickly.

Nick McGowan (26:01.954)
Hmm.

Damon Cart (26:16.366)
And I started realizing that I was putting a certain kind of vulnerability out too early and certain women, was attracting certain women because they thought that they could control me. But once I made it clear that I understood what they were doing, because the last thing a passive aggressive person wants is to be called out. That’s why it’s passive aggressive, right? So I would start calling out what they were doing. They would disappear very quickly. And then I started to develop myself along that way and started attracting much better women. But I do remember like, I was getting to the end of like,

Nick McGowan (26:24.066)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (26:30.517)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (26:46.178)
I was getting into the third year and I was like, I’m not really finding anyone. was just, I was really getting a bit cynical about it. And I just thought maybe I’m not gonna find someone to share the rest of my life with. And so I quit dating for six months. Like I quit approaching, quit dating. And I was just like, I really needed to focus on my business. Cause that was something that was lacking as well. And I had another big failure in that.

Nick McGowan (26:51.243)
Hmm.

Damon Cart (27:11.756)
that I was able to overcome. I was like, you know, less dating, more attention on my business. And that started to work out well for me. And six months later, I had like zero social life. I hadn’t been on a date in, you know, six months. And I was like, OK, I was just finishing up this online training that I had created. I was like, I really need to get out. I need some sunlight. I need some fresh air and I need to see people. And I’m walking down the street downtown here in Santa Cruz. And I just see this really attractive.

really young woman and I was trying to talk myself out of talking to her but I was like you know actually no I’m gonna go do this and I just walked up to her and told her I thought you know she was really cute and that I wanted to know her name and possibly go out on a date with her now I’m married to her and you think about those times where you know you almost didn’t do something but you did and then how that changes the trajectory of your life

And then that opened a whole new can of worms because she’s from a different country and we got separated by COVID. And she also got her visa taken away. we basically, we eloped in Istanbul, Turkey. The media picked it up and so it was broadcast live in Turkey, our wedding. And then we still couldn’t be together. And so it went on for two more years where the only way we could be together is if I traveled to Romania or we traveled to a country where we could both enter. It was a…

Nick McGowan (28:37.42)
Mm.

Damon Cart (28:38.508)
That was another dark time, but with a light at the end of the tunnel. but yeah, that’s, I threw a lot in there all at once. And I also, another dark time was a time that, I, my, business that I have now, had a major failure. And I just thought that was the end of it. All this work that I had done on YouTube for, you a year of doing videos. did a video every single day for eight months straight. And that was a lot of work. And I, that’s how I started to build.

Nick McGowan (28:45.366)
pain.

Damon Cart (29:07.232)
my following and then I put out my first training after doing youtube and it just was a spectacular failure and I thought that’s the end of it all this work that I had done and six weeks of I didn’t publish a single video and for six weeks and then suddenly I started getting all these emails and these messages hey we haven’t seen you put a video out in a while we’re worried about you are you sick are you dead let us know you’re okay and I was like you wouldn’t come to my

Nick McGowan (29:30.154)
Thank

What? Yeah.

Damon Cart (29:35.235)
fucking training and you just want me to keep putting free videos out there. Is that what this is about? So was a little resentful, but then I started making videos again. And then I realized what that was all about. It was, I was promoting a live in-person workshop for a different trainer. And it was like, they, my following didn’t know who he was and didn’t want to see him and didn’t want to show up to a live workshop. They wanted on, they found me on a screen. They wanted me and they wanted me on a screen. And that’s when I realized.

Nick McGowan (29:41.654)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (30:02.734)
that they wanted digital products, digital trainings. And so I didn’t know that at the time, but I just thought nobody really wants to know what I have to say and that’s the end of it and it’s time to go move on to a different business. It was quite a relief when I realized the mistakes that I’d made and that actually people did want what I was offering. yeah, so it was a interesting learning curve and very frustrating at the time, but it all ended up being really good.

Nick McGowan (30:31.084)
So in what was that five minutes seven minutes, maybe you’ve just chunked all this stuff in and I I laugh at times because I think it’s funny how we can we can look in like history books and they’re like from this period to this period like 600 years these three things happened. What the fuck do you mean? Like there were so many other things that happened. You had all these dark times even the six weeks off. I’m sure you still had the body feeling of like why I got to sit down. I could do the video. Wait a minute.

And then people come back, be like, are you all right? Are you dead? And be like, what the fuck do you mean? Where have you been? And you’re like…

Damon Cart (31:04.15)
No, and was so cliche, like whenever that failure happened, had trouble getting out of bed. I stayed in my pajamas most of the day. All the blinds were closed. They had very little light in my apartment. it’s like, because it was so weird. Like, I look back on it now, but it was like, that’s what you would see in a movie because you have to like show, you know, what’s going on inside the character by lighting it the right way and all that. And it was like, that’s what I was actually living through. And I didn’t even realize it at the time, but I was like, yeah, it was a

Nick McGowan (31:24.479)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (31:33.773)
It was a dark time and it was literally dark in my home. And that’s the way that it all felt. And finally, I remember just kind of emerging from that. And it was almost like opening the blinds and letting the sunlight in. it was like, you know what, I’m going to pick up my camera. And, yeah, I was just like, you know what? I’m a teacher. This is what I do. So I’m going to put that camera back up and start teaching again. And then eventually shortly thereafter, it led to one of the biggest successes that I had that still creating a training that I’m.

Nick McGowan (31:37.685)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (31:45.215)
Bird singing.

Damon Cart (32:02.956)
you know, still selling to this day because I put so much effort into it. And, but if it hadn’t been for that failure, I would have never discovered that. And so, you know, it’s how these things often work.

Nick McGowan (32:14.994)
It’s how life works. Like you have to fail through things. You have to fuck around and find out. You also have to bash your head into the wall, the wrong wall sometimes to go, well, shit, that’s the wrong direction. Let me go back. And you still can learn things from it. I think, I think we can sometimes understand, from an intellectual perspective, like, yes, I get that you need to fail. You need to do this to do that. But then when people get into it can be really, it can be hurtful in a way that isn’t just to

the timing that they’re in, but there are so many other things that they haven’t worked through or processed through that it feels like they’re just stacking it on. Like, and now this, and now that, and my God, and now my shoes, and now this. It’s like, you’re just adding things to it. But it can be really easy to do that when you’re in that dark spot. Now, obviously you’ve been through these different things. You’ve fucked around, found out, but you’ve also learned through all this stuff. And I joke with the like, well, here was this short little thing.

Like how they even do it in movies. Like all this chaos and craziness happened and like 15 minutes later, it’s like, no, there was a lot of dark times, but there’s still that momentum and that movement. Even if you’re slowing down and you’re resting, you’re still moving in that direction. So the fact that you just didn’t give up, like, let’s be real, man, you had a lot of different times you could have just totally checked out. You could have been like, no, this is too much. I’m not doing it. And now, like, have you thought about that? Like, what have you checked out?

You wouldn’t be where you’re at. You wouldn’t be doing what you’re doing. You know, maybe you’re selling insurance again and like, fuck this, I can’t.

Damon Cart (33:47.039)
And I, you know, when I had that major failure, that’s what I thought. I was like, okay, do I have to go back into insurance? And I was seriously considering that. And, man, it was so painful to just even think about that. what I see with a lot of people, the real difference between people who are living the life that they want to live and really fulfilled by that and experiencing the kind of freedom they want is…

They stuck with what they were doing, even if that like evolved, you know, because you try things, they fail, you keep trying new things. And so it evolves, but you’re still sticking with it. And what I would say is, you know, the really important thing is not to be so fixated on how you’re going to get there because I, if I had actually gotten what I wanted the way that I thought I wanted it, it would have been a lot more restrictive. I would have been having to show up, you know, just to keep

my money going out, to actually physically show up in many different places and be teaching constantly, which is, you know, that’s what my teachers were doing. So I thought, well, that’s how it’s done. But they hadn’t really tapped into the Internet and YouTube and all that. So now I get the choice if I want to do that. I don’t have to like do that all the time. So I learned enough about, you know, business and everything to make it work the way that I make it work now. But that only came because the way that I thought I was going to do it failed miserably. So had to try to had to find a new way.

Nick McGowan (35:06.633)
Hmm.

Damon Cart (35:08.192)
When I think about like, had this weird experience earlier this year, was, so my wife and I, also my wife’s Romanian and we have a home in Romania. So we always go there in January and then we went to Cambodia and then we went to Vietnam. And I remember just like it really hitting me how much I was driven by freedom. And this is another thing that I think is really important to understand is when you, when you focus on values, then you’re not so focused on how you think it has to happen. You become more flexible and you know what.

the values are that you’re after. And for a long time, freedom was such an important thing to me. And I remember earlier this year being in Vietnam and just being like, more freedom is not going to make me happier. More freedom is not going to make me more fulfilled. I have really hit that level of freedom that was far more than I expected to ever achieve. I can travel anywhere and go anywhere because I can run my business off of a laptop. And also have a great team of people who I work with who, you know, I don’t have to do everything.

Nick McGowan (35:50.761)
you

Damon Cart (36:07.598)
They’re there for that as well. So I have the money I need and I have all the freedom to travel and do whatever. And that was both a victory in that moment that I realized that, but it was also like, okay, so where do I go from here? And it was like a real question for me to sort of contemplate. And that’s, I that might sound a little arrogant, like you achieve all that you want and then you’re kind of like, okay, well, what do I do now? Like that’s a…

a first world problem that most people would want to have that don’t even get to that point to have. it’s be prepared for that. Like if you really believe you’re going to be successful and you’re not going to stop until you become successful, be prepared for those moments that you have where you go, wow, OK, I really have it now. What now? And so I thought about all these different things that I could do from that point on. And I was like, well, wait a minute. It’s not about doing something different. I’m so happy with what I’m doing now. I don’t need to do anything different. I just want to do more of what I’m already doing.

Nick McGowan (37:05.094)
Yeah.

Damon Cart (37:05.26)
and I don’t need more freedom to do that. And it was a realization of I don’t need to be pursuing freedom so hard anymore because more of it actually can, at this point in my life, would probably be more nihilistic or more escapism. And it’s like, that’s not worth that either because that’s not gonna fulfill me more. So it was an interesting realization to come to that. And it’s like, yeah, okay, freedom doesn’t have to be the main thing here anymore.

Nick McGowan (37:22.481)
Mm-hmm

Nick McGowan (37:33.874)
Well, I think we’re also taught in this world with all the systems we have that you have to have a destination. Like think about even being like in high school and they’re like, we, need a five or you need a 10 year plan. That was always so difficult. I remember somebody even years ago was like, well, what’s your five or 10 year plan from now? It’s like, fuck if I know, because anything I come up with is going to be like half-hearted and like what I kind of want right now. But as you’ve moved through things and you do things, you start to see, well, I really want this. I want that. Like freedom is a big thing. I think a lot of people want freedom. I.

Damon Cart (37:43.822)
Hmm. Hmm.

Nick McGowan (38:03.706)
I love the freedom that I have. I’m right there with you where it’s like one of those things where you go, well, cool, I have it. Well, that’s cool. But like what’s really fulfilling inside is the thing that actually just drives us and pulls us from basically our chest. So for the people that are on their path towards self mastery and with everything you’ve gone through and especially with NLP, what’s your advice for those folks?

Damon Cart (38:26.318)
Keep your attention on what’s most important and what’s most important is your values. A value is a generalization about an experience that is important to you. So if happiness is important to you, success is important to you, authenticity is important to you, always keep your eyes on that. And then any goals you set need to be aligned with those values. Most of the time people have no idea what their values are in a particular context and they will be different from context to context. And they just set a goal because they think, okay, like you said,

You have to have a destination, right? So here I’m going to set this goal, but they don’t really understand what’s driving the motivation to have that goal. And a lot of times it’s more external values. Well, other people value achieving this, so it must be valuable. Or if I achieve it, then these people will think very highly of me and respect me. Those are, you know, if you’re accomplishing something that does those things, there’s nothing wrong with that. But if that’s why you’re doing it, you’re probably not going to be fulfilled.

by accomplishing that. And so a lot of people are chasing goals that are not even fulfilling to them. And whenever they fail at that, because really there’s that inner wisdom that is holding them back, like the inner wisdom that helped me back from succeeding as an insurance agent, because that would have been the golden handcuffs. It would have been really hard to walk away from a very successful business with a lot of money. And I would have probably tolerated that misery. you want to be careful. know, like when you quit at something because you run out of motivation for it.

Nick McGowan (39:45.318)
Hmm.

Damon Cart (39:52.345)
Check in with that is that a deeper wisdom that knows better that that’s not really going to fulfill you. But what most people do is they beat themselves up and they say, I should have had more discipline or I should have had more willpower. I’m just not good enough. And they go into this whole self-worth thing, which is not real by the way. It’s something that holds a lot of people back. And then the people who do succeed at it and they get there and they go, wow, this isn’t fulfilling. This feels rather empty. thought it would be great if when I finally

Nick McGowan (40:03.791)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (40:08.454)
the

Damon Cart (40:21.39)
Achieve this but again, it wasn’t aligned with their values. So no, it’s not going to be fulfilling and Because they feel lost without a goal They set another goal and get back on that treadmill and they do the whole thing over and over again and people come to me for coaching now who are very very successful on paper you would think they would be extremely happy and fulfilled they have all the money they have the family they have the cars the house and everything and they’re coming to me because they feel like imposters or they’re coming to me because

they feel so unfulfilled and they can’t understand it because they’ve accomplished everything they’ve ever wanted to accomplish yet they feel so empty inside. And it’s like, yeah, you’re good at accomplishing. The problem was you never really got in touch with what do you truly value? What is really important to you? And so that’s the most important thing is what’s most important to you. And the better you understand that, the more clarity you have around that, the more you’re naturally going to be drawn to that and motivated to do that. The other thing I would say is

There is no such thing as self-worth. How this problem comes up is feeling like you’re not good enough, feeling like you deserve it or don’t deserve it. It goes both ways. And so what most people are feeling is a low sense of self-worth. And they feel like if I go and try to achieve something and I fail at it, I will lower my self-worth and I’m already clinging to what little I have. So most of the time people won’t do something and they’ll sit back and say, well, I’m waiting for the right opportunity. what they’re waiting is

to feel of higher self-worth so that they feel like they can go do something and if they lose some self-worth, they’ll still be okay. Well, here’s the thing, there is no such thing as self-worth. There is no way to measure your value, which is what worth is. It’s really a metaphor and there’s a lot of problems that happen when we try to apply metaphors literally. And we see this in the Bible. Fundamentalists are people who are trying to apply metaphors in the Bible literally and it causes a lot of problems. So what people do is they have this idea of self-worth.

And so they think, well, how do I measure my worth? Well, first of all, there’s no way to do it. There’s no objective scale or person who can be objective and measure people’s worth. So what do we do? We compare ourselves to others and that will destroy you every time. If you compare yourself to others to make yourself feel better about yourself because you think they’re less than you. Now you’re engaging in the superiority that’s going to bring you down. And if you play that game, you can’t only play it in one direction.

Damon Cart (42:45.87)
when you encounter someone you think is of higher worth than you, now you’re gonna feel bad about yourself. The whole thing, you can kill the whole thing just by stop comparing yourself to others. Now this idea of self-worth, it usually comes about very early in life and we just pile more and more beliefs on top of that whole idea. So the two things that I would recommend is get clear and clear about your values, basically what’s important to you.

What does that actually look like to you? And you’re not going have it all figured out. And you’re definitely not going to figure it out all out on paper. You need to take action. And action is the best way to get that clarity, experience. And then the other thing is to dismantle the whole concept of self-worth entirely. When you do that, when you do those two things together, you’re just on the path to living a very fulfilling life, a life of being who you want to be and therefore creating the life you want to live.

Nick McGowan (43:38.213)
That’s awesome. And I think a lot of people can anchor into like the understanding of action and motivation too. Like you have to take action to be motivated, continue to do the thing. It’s likewise with what you’re saying where you have to take those actions, but you have to understand why you’re doing those things. And it is interesting how a lot of people don’t know what their principles are or they are somebody else’s principles. Like, well, my wife and I, or my partner and I, or

my family and I, have these principles. Like, well, where did those come from? Well, you know, they just kind of came up and like, we don’t really think about that or don’t think about it throughout their day to day life of like, well, how do I move about this? And why do I want to do such a thing? I’m really glad that you touched on those two things, man. It’s been great having you on. So I appreciate your time. Before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Damon Cart (44:27.852)
Yeah, the easiest place is my YouTube channel. It’s just Damon Cart, Damon Cart NLP. And we’ve got a lot of videos been doing this for quite a while, almost 10 years. So that’s, you’ll find not only my videos, but in my videos, I give a lot of free resources so that you can get started usually on the topic that I’m giving you or the solution to a problem. You can access like free PDFs and things like that. so also I have my website is selfconcept.com.

Like I said, I do general NLP, but I also really focus on this one model because your beliefs about yourself determine your beliefs about everything else, you the world around you. And if you haven’t realized already, it’s your beliefs that govern your reality. So what you believe is possible, what you believe is true. lot of, most of our beliefs are deeply unconscious. So when you can understand what the beliefs are, especially the deeply unconscious ones about who you are, when you understand what those are,

you understand their limitations and then you transform them so they don’t have those limitations. Then you become that person you value. Your self-esteem goes up, your confidence goes up and you naturally gravitate toward creating that life that you want to live that’s reflective of the value that you are.

Nick McGowan (45:45.38)
So wait, you putting worth to that? No, I’m just kidding. I’m only kidding. Awesome, man. Well, again, I appreciate your time. Thank you so much for being with us today.

Damon Cart (45:48.052)
It’s different, worse than the measurement.

Damon Cart (45:55.246)
Thank you for having me on.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Vincent Wanga about the intersection of creativity, entrepreneurship, and leadership. Vince shares his unique journey through the creative industry, discussing the challenges and advantages of being an insomniac and how it has shaped his work ethic.

What to listen for:

“Everything that I do is passion and purpose-rooted. And that should be your first mission.”

“Creatives have a visionary mindset. So why can’t creatives be those same CEOs? We just lack the business acumen.”

About Vincent Wanga

Vince is a dynamic international design thought leader, creative keynote speaker, award-winning creative and executive, author of “The Art of Direction,” serial entrepreneur, and experienced brand consultant with an exceptional range of expertise over a distinguished two-decade career.

As former vice president and head of creative for one of the fastest-growing technology startups in North America, he oversaw corporate brand strategy and creative during unprecedented company growth from pre-Series A to an over $1 billion “unicorn” valuation.

Vince lives in Washington, DC, and Asheville, NC, with his dog, Okello. When he is not working on new business ventures, he passionately travels the world, collecting creative inspiration at the finest boutique hotels rewards points can buy.

Resources:

Check out other episodes about creativity and entrepreneurship:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? Send Nick an email or schedule a time to discuss your podcast today!

https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/contact/

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Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:01.507)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Vince Wanga. Vince, how you doing today?

Vincent Wanga (00:11.372)
I’m doing all right, Nick. I’m looking forward to our conversation and thanks for having me on.

Nick McGowan (00:15.618)
Yeah, absolutely. I’m excited, man. I think this is gonna be fun. I know there’s a lot that you’ve been through, a lot that you’ve done. One of the biggest reasons why I wanted to have you on the show was to be able to talk about creativity and how it ties into us as people, but also into the systems that we’re in, like the capitalistic system, our family systems, all those things. I grew up as a creative in a…

not a typical creative house, so to say. So it felt a little weird, but that was the system that I was in. And then you get into jobs, you get into your career, and like, how do you do all that stuff? And that was one of the things that really stood out to me about having you on. So I’m gonna stop talking. Why don’t you kick us off? Tell us what you do for a living, and what’s one thing that most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre?

Vincent Wanga (01:00.142)
Well, thank you. I am in a weird place in my career because I’m transitioning. I have been a creative at the highest levels and the lowest levels for 20 years. Started as an intern, worked my way up through the agency world, stints as a freelance independent operator working for clients all over the world to owning my own agency and having that unique experience as a business owner and operator.

and all the responsibilities that come with managing employees and being responsible for payroll and profit and loss and the other side of the industry, as well as becoming a senior executive and top 100, well, first 100 employees for a billion dollar tech startup and a crazy transformational journey. So I only preface that to say I’ve done it all in so many different industries. I’ve worked with so many different sectors, in-house, freelance.

agency, you name it in the creative sector, I’ve done it. And I think that offers me a lot of perspective and advice that I can offer to people, whether you’re creative or not, particularly in the aspects of leadership, which is something I really focus on at this point in my career. But as I mentioned, I’m in a major transition away from creative and more into my real core ethos, which is entrepreneurship and taking all that creative talent, marketing, business acumen into my own businesses and consulting and

other opportunities to really express my creativity in a different way. So it’s a really exciting paradigm for me. As far as something that’s really unique about me, I could wax philosophic on that. But I think the most unique thing is I am an insomniac. I get an inhuman amount of sleep and it has been a very difficult, like physical manifestation in my life because that’s not healthy, but it has been an incredible.

competitive advantage in my career, where I’m able to work day and night and create businesses on a weekend and maximize my time. But as I get older, the other side of the coin starts catching up and trying to figure out how to adjust as I move forward is a new paradigm I’m dealing with. But that’s one of many unique things about me.

Nick McGowan (03:16.459)
Wow, I’m really glad that you consider that a unique thing.

that you see that as a… there’s kind of a silver lining that you look at that instead of some people saying like, well I just… I’m struggling with this thing. It sounds like even the personality that you have, like you’ll go, well I am kind of struggling but it is what it is and this is what it is. Then I could do something with it. And it’s funny how as you get older, things will shift and change just across the board. I mean we could have a whole fucking episode just about like the specific changes that happen from your knees and your back and the way you think about things.

or whatever you don’t mean

I wonder at times with the people that are insomniacs that it’s something that they actually kind of crave and it’s like a mental thing where like I want to keep going and I think about it from this perspective In the human design way I’m a generator and I have to use all of my energy every day So by the end of the day there are times where I’m like I’m totally done. It’s nine o’clock at night I guess I’ll go to sleep because I’m done for the day and like all the energy’s out other times It’s like three or four in the morning and it is what it is

But for the people that…

Nick McGowan (04:27.617)
can hear that and say, well, you’re just trying to hustle and just trying to use all that to get ahead and do the grind and all that stuff. I’m reading between the lines and a little bit I know about you so far, that’s not the case with you. So it’s more of one of those like, I do these things because I’m led to do these things, but I also have a really hard time sleeping. So how do you manage that going through each day and saying like, all right, well, I got whatever amount of sleep and my body needs more, but I also have a lot of mental energy where it’s like you can

feel the physical of like, man, I’m just fucking dragging. But my brain’s still going and like that must take a toll on you. I could imagine, you know, you have a week of that. Most people would just be driven insane. So how do you how do you manage that?

Vincent Wanga (05:12.344)
Yeah, and I think, you know, this reminds me of that. I think it was a New Yorker editorial cartoon that had a building in Manhattan with lights on. And it said these three lights are either a drug dealer, serial killer or creative. Right. We’re the only ones up at 3 a.m. So I don’t think it’s as unique within the creative realm. But I think what makes me unique is the duality that I’m up all night in human hours, but I’m also functional in the morning. Like I’ve stayed up for 72 hours before.

Nick McGowan (05:25.854)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (05:37.93)
Hmm.

Vincent Wanga (05:40.718)
on deadlines and things that push beyond human norms and are completely unhealthy, but have also, again, like I said, been an advantage historically in my career. think the way my brain is wired, and I think a lot of critics can resonate with this, is I’m my most creative and intellectual at night. I could spend the same amount of time and energy between nine to five on the same thing, and that…

You know, error of time, I could achieve better results in an hour at 3am. It’s just the way these ideas flow in my mind. It’s the same mindset for anyone who can’t relate where like CEOs get up early in the morning and take a bike ride or do a run. And then they come back to the office and now they got a new product idea that everybody’s got to scramble to do. It’s the CEO brain, but it just kicks on at the wrong time. but it is, it is a burden, because it’s not healthy. And unfortunately there’s, there’s

Nick McGowan (06:30.472)
You

Vincent Wanga (06:39.982)
long-term cognitive effects that happen on that and there’s a diminishing return. But I think the most important point here is that I didn’t want to be this way. This is something that evolved from my artist background where I would the only time I had to myself and peace and quiet to create was at night. It started kind of rewiring my brain and then I went to college long story short got kicked out because of money and found myself with my career over before it even started.

So I had to hustle and work twice as hard as everybody else just to get started. I started at a deficit. So I always maximize my time in order to try to achieve the results that I needed to get back into the industry. And then the third thing I think people can resonate with is if you’re an entrepreneur, it’s this paranoia when you go to sleep and you don’t want to wake up with bills. You don’t want to wake up with problems. You just want to stay up and solve everything that you can.

you could have $10,000 in your bank account for that week and still feel insecure. And I think that just keeps me up at night constantly hustling and hoping that that hustle prevents the worst case scenario from happening. So it’s just this convolutions of things that are part of my experiences and my mindset. But it has been an advantage up until about now where I’m kind of paying the health effects of it, but it’s helped me become incredibly successful. And I think that’s a unique.

perspective for me.

Nick McGowan (08:09.086)
I love when conversations head this way. I’ll ask that question every single episode. So everybody listens. They’re used to that question being asked. But I love when that question invokes us going down a different path for the conversation. Obviously, we were going to talk about creativity and leadership, and that just jives with us both. But that’s a really important thing, I think, to get into because you had neural pathways that were literally changed. And you created these paths so, so many years ago saying, like, everybody

leave me the hell alone. Great, you’re all asleep. Everybody’s left me alone. I get to do the thing I want to do. And then you turn that, especially as an agency, for anybody that’s been in any sort of agency, imagine running around with your hair on fire, 15 other people having their hair on fire, and somebody just yelling at you constantly, and you’re constantly late on things that you’re actually pretty much on time for with your projects. And that’s like a typical Tuesday in most agencies. And that will drive you

Vincent Wanga (08:41.592)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (09:08.848)
to have more those neural pathways change because then you have to do things at night. Dude, I’ve been in the same spot where it’s like we have this thing coming up, somebody sent this thing back to me and it’s time for me to QA it or just basically give it once through. Seven hours later you have to do a complete re-haul or whatever and from a leader’s perspective you have to love on that person and help them and work through them. You can’t just go and physically slap them in the back of head and go, the fuck? That’s my first question, you know?

So as a creative, I’m right there with you. think a lot of us do have that.

Nocturnal energy almost to be able to create but I wonder if a lot of that does come from like when you were in middle school or high school like Just everybody leave me alone. Like when your parents tell you like go to your room. You’re like, thank God awesome now Will you all just stay can I lock the door and like just paint or whatever? I want to do and then that turns into the the systems that we’re in that tell us you have to grind you have to hustle and

I I just wonder about how many people are still stuck in that because they don’t see the patterns of, well, I’m having a hard time with this. Like, you see that there’s a pattern with you being an insomniac. But how do you actually combat that, work on that, and not drive yourself crazy each and every day, you know?

Vincent Wanga (10:31.522)
Yeah, I think that’s a challenge. I think there’s a few ways I can approach that question. One, I really loved your point about the sacrifice of leadership. I think a lot of people underestimate that. It’s like the swan analogy, where it’s calm and collected at the top, but your feet are vigorously swimming and kicking. I think people who are employees and check in nine to five and their check clears on Monday when it’s payday.

don’t understand the sacrifice sometimes that their leadership have to make to make that happen. And part of that is that paranoia that we deal with every single day. You know, I also think, you know, I’m highly functional introvert. So I love the quiet time that that allows me to think and to process and to execute on. But I also love that quote. I hope I’m not misquoting them. I think it was by Warren Buffett who said it took me 10 years to be an overnight success. There is no skipping the grind, the hustle.

Nick McGowan (11:13.436)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (11:25.959)
Yeah.

Vincent Wanga (11:28.258)
the sacrifice, know, your family hates you and you don’t see people enough and your friends are wondering if you’re okay. And that’s what it takes to build business, to build legacy, to build anything. So whether I had this unique deposition to work on godly hours or not, I think people find the will in the way because there’s no shortcuts around that to success. And that’s what you got to do. And if you’ve got a nine to five job, well, guess what? Now you got to work five to nine.

and find the time that you need to execute on something. And I think it’s more of an entrepreneur’s brain than a creative’s brain. again, like I said, it’s been advantageous in ways and disadvantageous in others.

Nick McGowan (12:07.259)
I think they actually tie together though, the creativity and the entrepreneurship. I’ve met, god I can’t even put numbers to the amount of entrepreneurs I’ve met over the course of time, but I could probably say in one hand that the people that weren’t really creative and…

Vincent Wanga (12:17.667)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (12:24.125)
definitely told me like I am not creative at all. But then when you look at their processes, how they handle situations, all of it is just oozing creativity. They’re just not creative in the medium of painting or graphic design or web or whatever it is, but they’re still being creative in how they handle it. Shit, even leaders that are like, okay, well I know if I yell at you as a creative, you’re not gonna do the work that you need to do and you’re probably gonna hate it here. So how do I talk to you nicely about it? That is a creative approach.

approach to it where you’ve been in spots, I’ve been in spots where somebody clearly didn’t take that spot and they just yelled at you about the thing because they’re hurt or they’re upset and they can’t manage themselves and they’re just diving it at you. But there is a lot of creativity that ties into that. And I think there’s a lot of people that talk about being an entrepreneur with really a hobby in a sense and not understanding that basic principles of entrepreneurship is you just have various means of income and you just work on things as a creative. You can

sit down and work on things for six hours and you think, shit, I was doing this for two hours, but six hours later, I’ve been standing here, I’ve been working through this thing. And I want to dive deeper into this because I don’t want people to think that you’re saying to them, you just need to grind. No matter what you’re feeling, what you’re doing, just shut up and grind. That’s not the case. But how do you balance that? Because I know people that literally they take that ethos and just say, well, this is who I am. And it’s in a

It’s a false way for them instead of being able to say like this is who I am because man I’m just so passionate about this thing that I eat sleep and dream this because this is my purpose in the world instead of saying well the system tells us this and my god I got a mortgage and these mouths to feed and whatever else it’s like you have to shift from that so how do you shift from that? How did you?

Vincent Wanga (14:15.714)
Man, I think that’s such a good point. I think too many people get enamored with the grind part, right? That’s what they teach you in investment banking. That’s what they teach you in all these other segments. Just grind and the reward will come and they’ll dangle this carrot in front of you that somehow disappears on your journey, right? Entrepreneurship’s very similar. And I’ll just say, this is the hardest shit in the world, like next to raising a child. Like it is incredibly difficult and that’s…

Nick McGowan (14:37.446)
Yeah.

Vincent Wanga (14:42.102)
what discourages most people. But I think the point that you made that was really excellent is you first have to have a purpose. What is your passion? Why are you doing this? Never have I thought when I’m in an entrepreneurial pursuit and I’m working, you know, 18 hours a day, did I ever feel burnt out? Isn’t that interesting that I can go to a typical corporate job and after five hours just can’t wait to leave, but I’ll work nonstop on my own thing and never feel burnt out. I have stress maybe related to money or something.

but it’s not work stress. And I think that’s because everything that I do is passion and purpose rooted. And that should be your first mission. Don’t do this thing because you think it’s going to make you rich. You know, start that brewery because you love beer, you love the science of beer, and that you realize that by getting into that business, you are now an agriculture. You’re a farmer. You need to know about hops and the process and supply chain and fermentation. And you are a chemist and you got to figure out the right, you know, balance in order to have the best beer in the world. Otherwise, don’t do it.

Nick McGowan (15:11.93)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (15:21.561)
Hmm.

Vincent Wanga (15:41.056)
So I think people need to understand what’s your passion would start there. The grind is easy if you’re passion and purpose driven and don’t let that kind of blind you. Start with your passion and your purpose. And that’s really helped keep me balanced so that I make sure the most precious commodity I have right now at this age is my time. And I make sure that just like my money, I invested reasonably and responsibly and only things that really bring me value in return. I think my second point is

The grind is should be front end, you know, where your typical nine to five and there’s no wrong path is something you progressively invest in. And at the end, around 65 years old, you get your benefit and you get to go, you know, travel and live in Florida and do whatever you want with your life and retirement. Entrepreneurship is different. You literally grind for three years. The first year you’re just getting established. The second year you’re trying to become profitable. That third year, if you make it that far, you might actually thrive and have a business. And unless you’re paying yourself,

Like you said, it’s just a hobby. So you have to be serious about this, understand the business fundamentals, but also understand for three years you’re in the suck and you have to work and work hard. And if you’re passionate and purpose driven, it won’t feel like a burden. And then you get your reward where all of a sudden you have enough profit to hire a COO or even a CEO as a founder to run your business and employees and your scaling and it gets easier. So you just have to understand the different philosophies between a nine to five and entrepreneurial pursuit.

and make sure you’re passion and purpose driven and that will really help you keep balanced in this kind of crazy lexicon that is working like we do.

Nick McGowan (17:17.338)
Yeah, especially here in the States. We work much more than other people, but then there are other countries that…

It’s the system that they’re in and how they go through it. I think one of things that you pointed out that really stood out to me was how when you take that approach of the passion and the purpose and you’re doing those things, you’re gonna work so much more on that because you’re fired up about it instead of doing whatever reports or whatever BS meetings or whatever you’re doing at nine to five. And you can just keep working on these things. But as you do that, you really start to stretch that muscle.

So it’s like you’re able to handle things in year two, year three differently than you could in year one or even year two, let’s say, because everything starts to stack up. So in a very black and white way, for the most part, I think the people that listen to the show are leaders, at least in what they do, if not entrepreneurs, and there are a lot of entrepreneurs that are already in their business. But the people that think about, want to get out of my job, I want to get into a business, if you’ve got to go through that work anyway, and you’re just going to basically jump in

a boat and go down that river. Don’t you want to go down the river with the stream instead of trying to fight up it like you’re currently doing in your nine to five? And it’s like, how do you then take that approach and say, all right, well, this is what I want. And there is a difference between passion and purpose. I think we have a seed of purpose that’s within us and there are ways that we get to show our passion with that purpose. But if you can tie that stuff together, you’re almost unstoppable. There’s shit that’s going to happen, but you’re going to get through that. When you talk to different

Vincent Wanga (18:34.254)
Sure. Right.

Nick McGowan (18:58.138)
from people about that sort of stuff and tying those two together. What’s the way that you can kind of put that into a vision to be able to show this is where these two pieces kind of can join?

Vincent Wanga (19:06.818)
Yeah, and I think for me to tell a little story, I was a senior designer art director at an agency in Minneapolis at the time. And I was getting really good insights on the business side of creative from the particular owner I was working with. He was very transparent about those things. So I found out how much he was profiting per employee, particularly me. And that didn’t match up with my salary.

Now he’s a business owner. has every right to a profit. That’s not what I’m questioning. What I said is that my value is significantly higher than I thought it was this whole time. I thought it was defined by my salary. And the funny thing about these nine to five jobs, and I’m not knocking them, we all have done it and are having to do it, but they pay you just enough to kill your dreams. You know, I’m sure you’ve heard that before and just enough to be comfortable. And when I realized the potential there, I started taking advantage of that, you know,

five to nine time that overnight time. I started, you know, freelancing and getting clients. And when I compared the numbers, I realized if I went full time with my own hustle, I could triple my income and not triple my work hours. So that was the passion part, right? So what that did is it led into my purpose and the purpose was, and I think this is really important is oftentimes when you get into entrepreneurship,

Money should never be your motivation. Money is a reward that comes down later. It should be rooted deeper than that. But if you can tie your entrepreneurship with your lifestyle, your ideal lifestyle and outcome, that is the greatest gift in earth. So for example, imagine you’re a snowboarder and you just want to go to Vail and Whistler and, you know, go down the most amazing double black diamond mountains and make that a part of your lifestyle. Imagine starting a business.

where you could be in that community and make profit. Now you’re in your ideal lifestyle, your ideal community, and you have a business that helps fund that. And that was kind of my motivation. So I am now independent, tripling my income. I’m working half as much. I’m able to travel the world. And as long as I have wifi, I can continue to make money indefinitely in whatever country I stay in. It was the most incredible lifestyle of my life. And there’s some limits to that we can talk about later, but it gave me this purpose.

Vincent Wanga (21:29.1)
and passion combined to continue to progress. And I think people just really need to identify not just passion and purpose, but what is that ideal lifestyle that you want this to lead to? What is that outcome? What is that ambition that you have? If you don’t have that goal and you’re just starting out, what are you doing? You’re making trinkets. You’re not getting paid. You have a very expensive hobby that’s probably gonna cost you your family. So you really have to understand at the end of the day, this is a business.

You have to have business fundamentals and run it accordingly. And I think you’ll be in a much better place than just going on some wild adventure because you don’t want to wake up at 9 a.m. I promise you, you’ll be disappointed by entrepreneurship if that is the case.

Nick McGowan (22:08.812)
Yeah, and it’s interesting because that’s like, there are like shades to that almost.

You know, like there are times where you call it like we can’t sleep or we have a hard time because we’re thinking we got to pay for this. We got this thing coming in. There’s this thing and I’m sure there’s a left hook that’s going to come out of nowhere and like whatever and you just kind of manage through that stuff. You work through it. But if you are in a better mental spot because of the passion and purpose that you have to do these things, you can actually handle those things instead of just being crippled by it. I’ve thought many different times about how many people got into

podcasting during COVID because they were like, what the fuck? I have nobody to talk to. I don’t know what to do right now. I guess I’ll start a podcast or people that became a coach and are like, I guess I’ll become coaches. And if you look at the numbers, they all skyrocketed. then quickly after that just shot down. So many people just couldn’t do it, didn’t want to do it, didn’t have the skills or whatever. And ultimately it wasn’t right for them to be able to do it. Now there are lots of people that stuck with it. I started this in 2014.

Vincent Wanga (22:47.256)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (23:15.145)
So I wasn’t one of those ones that just started it in 20, but I remember thinking that too. Like well now I’m stuck at the house. What am gonna do? And had friends that I talked to and then just came a podcast and whatever else from there. But being able to actually understand like you’re going to start to take those steps and it doesn’t all have to happen at once. So even with the stuff you’re saying like you get to travel, you make money, you do these things. To somebody if they’re listening on the surface they’re gonna go okay cool you’re just another one of those guys who just like pushes this thing and says I live the best life in the world and work.

Vincent Wanga (23:22.648)
Right. Yep.

Nick McGowan (23:45.148)
two hours a day and I harvest butterflies and get four billion dollar homes. Like it’s not what we’re saying. But this is a stacked upon process. Like I talked to people at times, I had somebody on recently it was like man you were in like Idaho and Montana and doing this and you travel and it’s like yeah but this has been a work in progress. This isn’t just one of those things like last Tuesday. It’s like you know what fuck everything else and we’re gonna travel we’re gonna do this thing. It’s like you have to build upon those things so you have to take those initial steps. So for somebody

trying to figure out right now. I hear what you guys are saying, I want to take these steps and I think I kind of know what I want to do but I’m afraid to do it as a creative saying I’m stuck in this system and I have to pay for things and I’ve built this whole big career and what do I do now? What advice do you give them?

Vincent Wanga (24:35.496)
well, the first thing is it’s mostly rooted in fear. Release your inhibition of fear because you will fail. You will fail big, you will fail small, you will fail often. I think what actually ironically makes me successful is my lack of fear of failure. I could write a whole thesis on failure and how that’s affected me. But the true reality is it’s been the greatest education of my life. More than a Harvard MBA could teach me going out there doing something really

hard and failing or succeeding in that are immense lessons that you can apply to the next thing and you’ll fail a little bit less and apply to the next thing and fail a little bit less. And I just talked about earlier how your job posting a position where you, you don’t want to risk that comfortability to go out there and potentially fail, but you have to understand that’s part of the cycle and learning process that gets you to success. love that Japanese proverb, you know, fall down seven times, get up eight. That’s, that is, it’s a cliche, but it’s so true. You just have to.

Nick McGowan (25:29.973)
Hey.

Vincent Wanga (25:35.192)
get out there and fucking do it. And I think the other most important thing is people get into this journey and they’re not prepared for scale. They never think about it. I think they’re too absorbed in the lifestyle part. Like, okay, I get to work from home. I get to take my kids to baseball. This is great. I want to stay in this comfortable zone. If you’re too successful, if you fuck up, you actually have something that scales. Now you need employees. Now you need people to run your business.

Nick McGowan (25:52.084)
Yeah.

Vincent Wanga (26:03.842)
Now you need to redo your supply chain. Now things get more expensive. Now you got to pay attention to your margins. Nobody has that ambition. So always enter this with what is that ideal grand scale? If you’re just in this to just, you again, have this hobby mindset, you will fail and failure is okay, but you need to realize you’re building a business. What is the plan for scale? What is the grand ambition? What is the ideal circumstance you want to reach? And then what resources do you need to get there? I think the second most important thing is

Choosing your business partner wisely. And I’m emphasizing business partner like it’s almost a requirement. Sure, you can get to a certain level by yourself. You know, there’s that saying, if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. You need a partner. Nobody has expertise in everything. So figure out what your core competencies are. If you can’t, failure will do that for you. Figure out what you do enjoy and then go find a business partner who complements your skills or compensates for the things that you’re not skilled at. And together.

that you and that person can build something really immense and double your time. Because I think the biggest dilemma, particularly in entrepreneurship, historically has been, how do you duplicate yourself? You get to a certain point, how do you find somebody else who will work as hard as you, who’s as motivated as you, who’s as passionate about you? And I think in this age of AI, it doesn’t take a founding team of six anymore. You, another competent person, and three AI agents can really get to a place where you can scale effectively and efficiently in three years.

So you just have to think about the grand perspective and not treating it as a hobby. And I think that’s half the way to success and release that inhibition of failure. know the stakes get greater as we get older, but imagine, you know, I mentioned Warren Buffett earlier, if he thought that way, imagine if George Washington thought that way, if Martin Luther King thought that way, like anything worth doing is hard. So get over it, get out there and do it and fail. Take those lessons, apply it to the next thing until you succeed.

Nick McGowan (28:01.332)
I think something to point out with.

George Washington, Buffett, anybody else. Like there are times where I bring up purpose and people are like, well, I don’t know if my purpose is supposed to be the next Steve Jobs or something. No, that was his. Let him have his. You do yours. George Washington, Buffett, everybody else had these thoughts of like, this is where I want to get to. This is what I want to do. But it wasn’t like, I’m going to do this because it’s deep in my heart that I’m going to become George Washington or Buffett or whatever else. They had to actually build upon those things.

And there are people that just want to have a solo business. There are people that want to have a small business. And by small, I mean, you know, a few handful of employees, maybe they make millions of dollars, but like, it’s a group of a small group of people. There others that want to have a huge bustling business of hundreds of employees and all of that. But I think it’s important for us to actually talk to ourselves about, do you want it? Because you want the ego of purposes of, have all these employees. I have all these things. Look at the boat that

I have that I never get into because I have to work and manage all these employees. What’s the actual purpose underneath that? And I think as a creative and the people that are creatives, we can rely on the creativity inside of us because that’ll always nudge us along. It’s sometimes really hard to listen to. I’m sure you’ve experienced some of that going through probably years where you’re like, it’s hard to listen to it. I’m being creative, but I’m not really being creative. You’re getting paid to be a creative, but you’re basically like churning things out or using

of stuff and not really creating but everybody’s like well this looks amazing and you’re like I fucking hate it and I hate you and I hate all this stuff so leave me alone. So for people that are in that spot right now and really for the people that are on their path towards self mastery what sort of advice would you give to them?

Vincent Wanga (29:47.938)
Well, speaking specifically to creatives, I think you can relate. We have a very unique mindset when it comes to certain things. And I think people misdiagnose us that our advantage is somehow attached to our hands and the software and skills. It’s our mentality in the way that we think. For example, the way we solve problems are completely different. What most people would see as an obstacle, we see as a challenge and we use our creativity to get around it. With the systems that we build, the solutions that we build, that’s what we get paid for. So I think that

is an invaluable skill when, whether it’s business or your nine to five is remembering that that is your core competency and your greatest value that you bring is your ability to uniquely solve problems. And that’s why we are employed in every single industry in the world and have survived all kinds of efforts to remove us from those industries. And they keep coming back to us because of that skillset. think in addition to that, you just have to really be prepared for change.

And we are an adaptable force. Look at all of the journeys that we’ve been through from the digital revolution and the elimination of print to interactive and AI, all of these things we are at the bleeding, cutting edge of. So we are in a natural position to be early adapters, to see and flesh out these new emerging technologies and see if they’re viable or not, and then use them to our advantage in a competitive sense against some of our non-creative peers in order to thrive.

it while others are being replaced by it. So I think we need to recognize our power in that context and use that to our advantage. I’ll also add that you look at the highest level of leadership, a CEO, right? They have immense powerful responsibilities, but the number one is to create vision. They create the vision like Steve Jobs saying, I want a thousand songs in your pocket. And then it trickles down to the rest to execute and to figure out how to make that vision a reality. So vision is a creative mindset.

creatives have visionary mindset. So why can’t creatives be those same CEOs? We just lack the business acumen. And I think if I was a creative in that position, that’s the first thing I would balance and start studying is what business skills do I lack that can compliment this thing that is very rare, which is that creative mindset that could make me unstoppable in the marketplace. And I am on this mission in my life to help creatives become more entrepreneurial, to think more business minded because the hardest skill we already have.

Vincent Wanga (32:15.498)
So having that balance that yin and yang between the creativity and conceptual and the analytical and business mindset will really put you in a place where you will be much more successful than if you try to pursue anything with just one mindset or the other.

Nick McGowan (32:30.736)
Yeah, what a cool way to be able to put that too. It’s like just being resourceful in that sense. You know, if you think from a basic creative perspective, if you’re just sketching, we need paper or something to draw on. You need the pen or pencil or whatever. And then you need the time. You need these pieces to do these things. So any of these things are like, well, what pieces do I need? Even to the fact about the partners, it’s like, what am I lacking here? What am I not a 10 at? And what does somebody else attend at that I could even just

Have some help with some people don’t want to take on partners. They want to do the business by themselves I think that’s where coaches mentors come into play to be able to say I’ve been through this and before here’s some suggestions Here’s how you can go about it. Even just that fact of like just reaching out and having some of those conversations There’s somebody that’s out there. There’s some information that’s out there and I I Don’t want everybody to just lean on AI and everybody’s gonna do whatever they’re gonna do, but I do think that atrophies things I use AI at times. I mean fucking

everybody does. It’s more so just being pushed on us at this point. But not literally just saying, I’m just going to hand this thing off and not understand how it is. Like you pointed out earlier, if you want to have a brewery, you have to be all these different things. And if all that is too much for you, don’t do it. If you just want to be a money person, then sure, be a money person and never show up. Maybe go and have a beer every once in a while and that’s it. That’s a whole different story though. Like where the fuck did you get that money from? Did you create a business to do that? know, or some

Vincent Wanga (34:00.134)
Sure.

Nick McGowan (34:00.451)
somebody handed to you. But being able to point that out and understand the resources of that and then what you’re good, what you’re not good at, I think it’s really good stuff, man. So I appreciate you bringing that up. It’s been a pleasure having you on. Before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Vincent Wanga (34:14.382)
No, I really appreciate the conversation. Again, I speak all over the country and internationally. So if I’m in a conference in your area, please feel free to come up to me. And I love meeting new people, especially in different industries. In addition to that, have a website, VincentWongred.com, where you can see some of my other thought leadership across entrepreneurship, creative, design. Leadership is another thing I speak on often. I also have a book called The Art of Direction.

personal perspectives on the path to creative leadership. So that is available through Amazon, Walmart, all the major online retailers and for special order at your bookstore. It’s a book about leadership. And I think that’s agnostic of just the creative industry and the unique, soft and hard skills that you need to make that leap that few people are prepared for. So it also very deeply personal and talks a little bit about my experiences and my journey and of course my failures and how that led to my success.

And then you can also contact me on LinkedIn and Instagram through my website. Those are the primary ways you can get a hold of me.

Nick McGowan (35:20.208)
And again, it’s been pleasure having you on Vince. I appreciate your time.

Vincent Wanga (35:23.478)
Absolutely. Thank you,

In this episode, Nick speaks with Renee Zukin about her journey, the role of technology in creativity, and the challenges of adult friendships. They discuss the importance of embracing vulnerability, the tools for self-mastery, and the significance of celebrating small wins as well as finding small ways to be brave every day.

What to listen for:

“How can I show up for myself, my people in the microcosm of my world so that it becomes reflected and ripples out into the macrocosm?”

“One of the reasons why life can be so hard is because we’re so trained to ignore our innate signals.”

About Renee Zukin

Renee is an author, educator, coach, and mental health advocate doing the inner work to see outer change. She has more than 20 years of experience in education, writing, and entrepreneurship, and has studied multiple psychological and healing modalities that have sustained her and helped support her students and clients alike. She is passionate about cultivating a safe space for others to use the written word and organizational structures as tools for self-transformation and empowerment. Renee is also the author of the new book, Every Day, I’m Brave: Cultivating Resilience to Gain Freedom from Fear (Wonderwell Press, 2025).

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

Watch Clips and highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:01.464)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Renee Zukin. Renee, how you doing today?

Renee Zukin (00:11.06)
I’m doing fantastic, Nick, so excited to be here.

Nick McGowan (00:14.188)
Yeah, I’m excited too. I think it’s going to be great. Why don’t you get us started. Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

Renee Zukin (00:22.478)
Love this question. Well, I’m a writer. I’m an educator. Currently, I coach entrepreneurs in digital online marketing, which is a lot of fun. And one thing that most people don’t know about me, I actually recorded an album back in 2011.

Yes, yes. It was my first foray into songwriting and the band I had curated was called Collectible Boys. it started out as a poetry and essay writing project and it turned into an album. So, you you never know where the spirit’s going to take you.

Nick McGowan (01:08.408)
Nice.

Nick McGowan (01:15.02)
Yeah, literally. that’s cool. mean, as a musician, I’ve already told you, now I have loads of questions about what kind of music, where did you record, and how did you find the studio musicians, and what did you play, and what did you not play, and what is it all about, you know? So feel free to share any of that if you’d like.

Renee Zukin (01:21.518)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (01:25.518)
Yeah, yeah, it was a lot of fun. started out just really wanting to play music and I did need to get musicians to actually help me curate the music underneath because for me, I was writing lyrics and I had melodies and you know, I only have a few years of piano lessons as a kid under my belt. So I knew I needed the

the heavy hitters to come in and help create it underneath. And I did, I collected some amazing local musicians who’ve played in multiple bands and knew what they were doing. And we played out for a couple of years and I was like, we need to record this. And we did it in one weekend. So it was definitely a whirlwind and a lot of fun.

Nick McGowan (02:12.584)
Thanks

Nick McGowan (02:19.576)
And I love that sort of stuff. And especially like people listen to albums or they’ll listen to a new song that comes out. You might think like, this is great. And these people just keep putting these things out like any bands that put out new albums. It’s like, but we have no idea the amount of time and effort and energy that every single one of them put into figuring out what do we do? How do we do it? And I think oftentimes people forget about the sometimes the fifth or sixth member of the band.

producer and the one who’s actually recording everything. And I said this to you before we started even recording this, that sometimes the answers that will come out of that initial question will kind of alter the way that the conversations go. And I think this may be one of those situations. Like as a musician, I’ve been having conversations with people recently that have been using AI and

Renee Zukin (02:49.646)
Right? Yeah.

Renee Zukin (03:03.516)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (03:11.266)
Mmm.

Nick McGowan (03:13.309)
if you, somebody who has a few years of piano lessons from X amount of years ago, and you have ideas and some melodies and you go, well, I want the drums to sound like, whatever, like you just make noises. Like you can’t really do that. guess, well, Timbaland made a whole career out of making noises and putting in the records, but that’s one person.

Renee Zukin (03:26.168)
Right.

Renee Zukin (03:30.478)
Yeah

Nick McGowan (03:36.329)
I think it’s interesting how there’s technology that helps us with things but can also really hinder us. I have a good friend of mine who writes music constantly, plays acoustic, sings, and he can mess around on some other instruments, but his main thing is like first second position of acoustic, singer-songwriter type stuff, and using AI at times to help with a backing band. Like I can understand going that direction because the resource is there, but I

Renee Zukin (03:41.784)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (04:05.666)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (04:06.184)
I that also can hurt us from being creative and stretching those muscles and being more brave in the confusing things. Like you sit down on the piano and go, I’m fucking fine, middle C, K, triad, you know, like instead of going, well, here, this is the thing I want. And as somebody who, like you didn’t have AI in 2011.

Renee Zukin (04:11.317)
and

Renee Zukin (04:17.704)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (04:29.55)
No I didn’t.

Nick McGowan (04:31.424)
you had to find people to actually be musicians with you, work through that stuff, what are your thoughts, what are your feelings with that sort of stuff?

Renee Zukin (04:35.458)
Mm-hmm.

This is great. I because I think it’s similar to also to writing in general. Obviously we can use. Yeah. And I think what you’re speaking to is this opportunity for our own creativity to allow us to learn and grow like when we get stuck. Okay. So I, you know, my skills and here I want to play around, but also the

Nick McGowan (04:45.94)
Yeah, big time.

Renee Zukin (05:05.996)
opportunity to connect with other people who do have those skills and have the conversations and get to really play and modify and modulate music and the piece in different ways. And I think actually you could even say this with all kinds of art. Like I am not like, I’m a firm believer that AI and its ability to help us create can

save us a lot of time, save us a lot of energy. There’s ways in which it’s a great tool to have and there’s ways in which we can teach it how to be a better AI partner. So I’m definitely all in and playing the game and I think that we also have to balance that out with our own boredom, our own limits.

our ability to get creative, to connect with other people and have a, you know, more of a co-creation. So I’m definitely not an either or, but I certainly lean towards, you know, the authentic human experience can create something that a machine cannot.

Nick McGowan (06:23.318)
Sure. Well, so I think most of the people listening to this podcast are probably around our age. Like, I’m gonna say, looking specifically at the demographic numbers that I have, it’s about 25 to 55, but it’s heavier in the 35 to 45 range.

I have conversations with people I haven’t said to you. I like, I’ve got four or five friends at this point. That’s about true that like I consistently have a relationship with and I work on those outside of my partner and you know, things like that. as we get older and that friend that I was talking to, he’s like, well, it’s hard because some of these people around here, even in the scene are working on their own things or they have kids and they have this and they have that. And it’s like when you think back to high school, you could go, hey, you want to start a band? I don’t know. Fuck around and find out. Let’s do it.

Renee Zukin (06:46.062)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (07:09.838)
Right. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (07:11.367)
or even in your early 20s. Like, you put the drink down for a minute? Let’s pick up an instrument. Sure. Can I do both? Or whatever. And as you get older, it can be more difficult to find friends or people you connect with or whatever. I wonder if then people start to look at like, well, how do I use these pieces, these resources that can help me do these things, but also help me kind of hide away. Almost like how people can be really tough behind a screen. You can talk shit on social

Renee Zukin (07:15.872)
Right. Right.

Renee Zukin (07:26.968)
Absolutely.

Renee Zukin (07:32.728)
Mm.

Renee Zukin (07:40.718)
Mmm.

Nick McGowan (07:41.323)
media because they’re behind a screen but if they were in front of somebody’s face 95 % of those people wouldn’t say those things you know and it’s like there’s still that 5 % that those fuckers are gonna fuck around to find out yeah so like how do we

Renee Zukin (07:48.63)
Right?

They don’t care. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (07:57.934)
how do we balance that within ourselves but then also ask ourselves the questions of like, well, what am I really most uncomfortable with this? Is it, I don’t know what I’m actually looking for or do I want to find the smaller piece and just thinking from the music lens, you know, and thinking about your book of just the overall concept of being brave in those moments. Like it takes courage and takes you being brave to step out and at least have those conversations, you know.

Renee Zukin (08:18.03)
Thanks

Renee Zukin (08:24.556)
Yeah, absolutely. Well, certainly, you know, finding friends and meeting new people and getting connected is so much harder as an adult. All those things you said are absolutely true. So you have to be really intentional or you have to come together on some kind of project. You know, there has to be something that’s kind of in the mix of of co-creating a reason why you’re getting together.

Nick McGowan (08:42.887)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (08:52.318)
But the good news is that could be anything. And I think what’s really scary for people and myself included, you know, I have spent a lot of time not going out, not being with people. It’s overwhelming. can be, you you’re not quite sure what to say, what to do, how to be in the world, and it feels kind of uncomfortable. But cultivating that

of just like, okay, I’m gonna be uncomfortable. And you know what? Nine times out of 10, the other person is thinking and feeling the same thing. So like, let’s just show up and be awkward together and we’ll figure it out. which is what I did. I mean, when I was first thinking about making music, I mean, I was in my 30s by that point. And it was something that I did as an adult. had…

Nick McGowan (09:33.075)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (09:49.998)
By the time I was 30, I had three kids. So I was busy in my 20s, becoming a mother and doing lots of mothering and of course, obviously into my 30s as well. So it was one small step at a time. It was, okay, I’m gonna go out to this bar, because I know the guy’s sister who plays in the band and I’m gonna just sit and watch and oh, I get a connection. And it was like,

yeah, I really love this band and okay, I get to meet these people and we have these conversations. yeah, I’m thinking, you know, I’ve got this one song I’ve been working on. And so it was just this like one little step. If you just go out into the world with one thing, then you see like the cascade of things that can happen from there when you’re willing to take that first step.

Nick McGowan (10:41.971)
beauty of that. That’s life, you know, and it’s such a difficult thing.

Renee Zukin (10:43.022)
Okay.

Nick McGowan (10:49.587)
two hours ago, was talking about some of these things and I’m so self-aware now that self-awareness annoys the piss out of me at times because like you can’t not see the things when you’re fucking self-aware. So you just become more self-aware and it’s like it’s a vicious cycle that you hear these things. Like I was saying earlier, like there’s this thing that I’m going through and some things that I’m like being bad at at first because like you start off pretty rough and you’re trying to figure this stuff out and it sounds like there’s a mumbling douchebag.

like four rooms away, like cursing like a cartoon at me. Just like, you can’t have fun, you can’t do this thing, you can’t do that. And it’s like, who the fuck, where are they? You know, but like you still hear it you feel it. And everybody’s gonna hear and feel that shit. Yeah, and you’re like, what the fuck, out of here. It’s like, no, you piece of shit, you know? And you’re like, whatever. And that’s the, that’s part of the reason why I love this show is to be able to talk about these things, cause it’s like.

Renee Zukin (11:26.446)
Hmm.

Yeah.

It’s here!

Renee Zukin (11:44.43)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (11:45.499)
No matter what amount of work you’ve done, there’s still stuff that’s gonna come up. We have to be awkward. We have to be bumbling. You have to look silly at times, whatever. Everything’s not gonna be perfect. And part of that is also the beauty of life. Like I think back to people in high school saying, well, my five and my 10 year plan is this thing. And I don’t talk to really any of those people anymore. So I don’t know if any of those five or 10 year plans actually worked out. But every time somebody’s asked me that, I’m like, fuck if I know.

Renee Zukin (11:59.854)
And.

Renee Zukin (12:12.813)
Right.

Nick McGowan (12:15.364)
Like I could come up with an idea, but I can guarantee it’s probably not as great as like what will actually end up happening because you start to make those movements, start to do those things. So with being brave every day, what are those little kind of pro tips and like life hacks that you figured out for you as a person that like I figured out this really works for me to do this in these moments because it helps me with who I am to be able to step out a little bit more.

Renee Zukin (12:21.451)
Right.

We use.

Renee Zukin (12:33.774)
Yes.

Renee Zukin (12:42.074)
Mm. Yeah, you know, I mean, it’s a journey. It’s and it’s constantly evolving. I love, know, that that inner critic voice is alive and well, you know, with all the new challenges that come up. so constantly having to do that dance with the self-doubt, with the anxiety and the fear is definitely some something that I have gotten better at.

Certainly different tools help me, but over the course of 10 to 15 years, I’ve got a lot of different tools in my toolbox now. My go-to still is writing, even if it’s just real quick in my notes app. It’s like I can’t, when I get overwhelmed and kind of.

Nick McGowan (13:27.511)
Thanks.

Renee Zukin (13:33.75)
you know, notice that my thoughts are spinning and I can’t get out of this loop. If I write it out, then it’s outside of me and I have, can look at it, you know? So that’s, mean, that’s the, that’s one of the big ones for me or even, you know, and if you’re somebody who doesn’t really like to write or you don’t have a lot of time, you know, even just finding, whoever that trusted person is to be like, Hey, do you have five minutes? I need to unload this and make sense of it. Like,

Nick McGowan (13:40.987)
Good.

Yeah.

Renee Zukin (14:03.886)
you know, we can’t go through this life alone. and that’s the thing about like depression, anxiety, like it lies to you. It’s like you’re, you’re alone, you’re isolated. Don’t be a burden to other people. Don’t waste you. You you’re just having a pity party. Don’t reach out to that friend. And you know what? Do like that text that you keep like typing and deleting just fricking send it because people want to show up for their people. Your friends do want.

Nick McGowan (14:13.478)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (14:33.58)
you know, an opportunity to show up for you when you need it, because you know that you’ll do the same for them. yeah, so I mean, that’s the short, short version. Of course, there’s the breathing techniques, there’s the music. mean, music, right? Music can change anything for you in an instant. It’s truly good medicine.

Nick McGowan (14:45.818)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (14:49.785)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (14:56.529)
Well, I appreciate the honesty with that.

I don’t mean to ask that in a loaded way. I think it may have come off a little bit like that because I know that it’s not a real thing. Like if you figure out as a person the way that I operate, I can do this thing right now in these moments. growing up I was really tense. I had a lot of energy because I had childhood trauma and stuff and that would turn up in different situations where I felt all this energy and just needed to get out. And I could literally go like this and just let it out. Like release

Renee Zukin (15:15.384)
Hmm.

Renee Zukin (15:29.176)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (15:29.789)
the energy, but it took me so long to be able to figure that out. But it was all of those little steps and all those little days and all the step backs and the step forwards and the like bashing my head into a wall, sometimes physically of like what the fuck, to then figure out like literally these days stack upon themselves. So you find the things that can help you but there’s also not really like…

Renee Zukin (15:39.404)
Yeah. All right. Yes.

Renee Zukin (15:47.209)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (15:53.794)
There’s not one magic bullet.

Nick McGowan (15:55.151)
Yeah, it’s not like a little button. You go, cool, you gotta turn me off right now. And that’s it. Like that’s not how it works. It’s like you stack these things up and you do work. That then lessens the other heaviness of the other things. So obviously writing is a thing that’s important to you. But when I made the joke about my writing, you kind of laughed along with it. So have you found that the medium of actually writing doesn’t work for you, but like typing or speaking it out does?

Renee Zukin (15:59.094)
Right.

Renee Zukin (16:07.886)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (16:22.656)
Yeah, yeah, certainly it’s, it’s a, it’s a different game with all the technology than, know, just journaling in my notebook, but I still, I, I, I do both. and I think it activates different parts of the brain actually. and, but I couldn’t, I was, I sometimes I couldn’t tell you what the heck I just wrote with my, my hand.

Nick McGowan (16:40.506)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (16:50.54)
I was like, my handwriting has gotten worse and worse and worse, but I’m a phenomenal typer.

Nick McGowan (16:55.216)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (16:58.998)
yeah, I get that. Sometimes your shorthand, you can’t even read your shorthand. You’re like, I hope I felt better after that.

Renee Zukin (17:01.471)
Yeah.

Right? Well, that’s really a big part of it is rarely am I going back to something that I’ve handwritten to do something with. It’s just the purging of the stuff. And so, yeah, yeah.

Nick McGowan (17:20.546)
Again, that honesty is clutch.

Like what a fucking thing. I’ve asked, I had different therapists years ago and I went through a divorce and one of the therapists was like, I think you should journal. And I’d heard journaling so long and I tried journaling before and I get my handwriting’s a mess. And I was like, I don’t want to fucking journal, but to shut you up, I’ll do this thing. And I got into my own little rhythm and I had like this template that I created and literally like a year, maybe a little bit more than a year later, I was like, this is mechanical. And it’s not doing anything for me. Like I’m sitting down

Renee Zukin (17:44.898)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (17:50.444)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (17:52.45)
at 11 o’clock tonight to write out 10 things and I’m like making shit up. I’m like I made chicken today and I brushed my teeth. I guess like what the fuck and and then I remember saying to somebody like are you supposed to go back and read it? They’re like there’s no supposed to. What kind of question is this? I was like oh all right well I’m gonna shift in a different way but those things like we have to I don’t want to say everybody because I don’t want to be a blanket statement.

Renee Zukin (18:03.266)
Yeah, yeah.

Renee Zukin (18:19.798)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Nick McGowan (18:21.786)
But I’ve seen that we as people need to figure our stuff out that works for us. That’s why I asked the question of like, from you and your character, like what works for you? And the reason why this show isn’t a solo show, I don’t think everybody would want to hear me for every fucking episode. But I think, like I can only talk about my stuff. Having somebody else on to talk about theirs, somebody else goes, why connect with that person? That makes sense. So you transitioned from, you’re right, you have to get that energy out. And I think that’s the most important thing.

Renee Zukin (18:27.607)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (18:35.648)
Right.

Renee Zukin (18:50.67)
Absolutely. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (18:51.729)
out what do do to release that? What do you do to like work through that? Some people breathe, some people say they meditate for hours, and some people also lie constantly. So like what do you really do is the real thing, you know? Yeah, I meditate for six to seven hours every night. It’s beautiful. Sometimes REM shows up. It’s wonderful.

Renee Zukin (18:53.773)
It is.

Renee Zukin (19:03.79)
Call it meta-napping.

Renee Zukin (19:11.342)
It is, it is, yeah. Yeah, power naps for the wind. But yeah, right. But it’s true, like getting, like finding a way to, well, and movement. Like you talk about that energy.

Nick McGowan (19:19.585)
Seven hour power naps.

Renee Zukin (19:32.332)
You know, oftentimes when I’ll notice, especially if I’m in like a social situation or out in public or at a meeting, you know, when you’re in a room with people, especially for those of us who are sensitive to the energy that other folks give off and or, you know, lights and sounds and just, you know, can get overwhelming. what I’ll notice is I’ll notice what it feels like in the body.

And like you were saying with your clenched hands, it’s like, okay, I’m noticing I keep shifting in my seat. need to get, you and that, and it’s there for a reason. Like your body is telling you, okay, get up and move this out. Right? And I talk about how we’re so in, it’s so ingrained in us that we can’t like get out of our seats, right? This is our schooling, right?

Nick McGowan (20:27.927)
Yeah, yeah.

Renee Zukin (20:29.356)
And it’s like, you forget, I’m an adult now. I can just get up if I need to. Right. So like, you know, but you’re in a meeting, you’re supposed to be listening intently. Like I had to get over the fear of like, people are going to think I’m weird if I stand up in the middle of this meeting. And I just got over it. And the more I got over it, it also like gives other people the invitation.

Nick McGowan (20:33.07)
You can Irish exit whenever you want. I could hang up on this right now.

Renee Zukin (20:57.858)
to take care of your own needs in the moment. I’m still listening, but I got up from my seat, I’m leaning against the wall, I’m stretching my legs a little bit, and now I can actually pay attention more. So we’re in these bodies, right? And they’re giving us signals. And I think one of the reasons why life can be so hard is because we’re so trained to ignore.

are innate signals and we don’t gotta do that.

Nick McGowan (21:30.165)
Yeah, well shit also those other people.

that are looking at you have their own signals and their own judgments and biases that we then force upon them. Like if I stand up now, maybe that person over there is gonna look at me a little weird. But maybe that person right there is like, man, my stomach really fucking hurts. And they’re not thinking about anybody else or anything at all or whatever. But you’re like, that random person like 30 feet away from me is gonna turn around, I swear, and look at me. it’s like, we make these things up because…

Renee Zukin (21:35.756)
Right. yeah.

Renee Zukin (21:41.646)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (21:51.704)
Hey.

Renee Zukin (22:01.134)
Totally.

Nick McGowan (22:03.142)
Like we feel.

Like we should do a certain thing or we should not do a certain thing. Like I fucking said before, I think everything ties back to childhood drama. Like you literally had to ask, I go to the bathroom? I had a job, I don’t know, maybe like seven, eight years after high school. That was a sales job, but we were basically like beaten into making six, seven hours worth of calls every day. And at one point they told us you actually need to raise your hand to go to the bathroom. And I was like, are you fucking kidding me? I was like, there’s a, there is a

trash can right here and if it happens to be full by the end of the day, it’s your fucking fault. And they were like, no, that’s not right. Like, don’t you guys remember being in school and like, we, we are raised in a certain system of things that then tell us that the way that our systems internally are wrong. I appreciate that you’re saying that that

Renee Zukin (22:48.142)
and news.

Renee Zukin (22:52.12)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (22:55.628)
being brave and that courage to do that thing and to feel awkward and weird does show other people you can do this. I mean, you and I, without even talking about it, have been in that spot. You’ve seen somebody do it and you’re like, all right, cool. Look, who’s gonna leave the party first? Who’s gonna go do this thing first? And you’re like, great, they did. Time to wrap it up. Let’s go.

Renee Zukin (23:02.093)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (23:08.482)
Yeah.

Yeah, exactly, Well, and the thing you said, like, we think other people are so, like, watching what we’re doing and whatever, thinking about us. They’re in their own heads. Everybody’s in their own heads with their own stuff. And yeah.

Nick McGowan (23:28.886)
They’re not. Yeah.

Yeah, they’re wondering what you’re thinking about them. Or somebody else. What a strange thing. But when I think of being brave and I think of being courageous and I think of purpose and I think of all these big things that we talk about on this show and I just naturally have conversation about.

Renee Zukin (23:35.272)
Right,

Nick McGowan (23:54.646)
I think there are levels that people put them at that are like these giant mountains. Especially when it comes to being a purpose-driven person. I’ve literally heard from people, or I’ve said it so many times, where it’s like, I don’t know if I have it in me to be like the next Steve Jobs or Oprah or to do this or do some major big thing. It’s like, great, because they did. That’s on you.

Renee Zukin (23:57.856)
Mm. Yes.

Renee Zukin (24:15.692)
You don’t have to. Right, you don’t have to.

Nick McGowan (24:19.051)
But again, the system and the way that the world shows us, it’s like you have to do all these things. Even the curated people that are on social media, it’s like you’re also not seeing the back end of that where they’re like, man, I really fucked this up. How do I fix this thing in editing? Or how do I do whatever? like, God, I don’t want to eat peanut butter and jelly, but like I forgot to eat and it’s 1130 at night or like what? They’re not posting those things. So it’s like, how do we then balance that and just work on ourselves each day? So let’s talk about some of that stuff. The things that

Renee Zukin (24:32.618)
Right.

Renee Zukin (24:41.142)
Right. Right.

Hmm

Nick McGowan (24:49.005)
not only in the book but you work with people on that are some of the kind of universal things that we as people can take some of those baby steps that can turn into toddler and teenage steps and whatever else to help with it.

Renee Zukin (25:01.11)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Well, yeah, I love, like, I love your examples of, like, you know, being the next Steve Jobs or Oprah or whatever. And like, one of the things, I mean, the phrase, every day I’m brave, was born because I was getting so pissed that I, that, that as a society, right, we don’t give people the same kind of accolades and like,

you know, celebrations for the small things that they’re brave enough to do. You know, at the time, I was busy comparing myself around the world and right social media, like, you know, my friends were doing, you know, going on girl strips for the weekend and I hadn’t flown in an airplane in like 15 years by that point. And I was like, I’m never going to do these things. I’m not, right. But what about the brave things I did do? Like I got out of bed today.

Nick McGowan (25:59.285)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (26:00.268)
I didn’t want to, I didn’t want to face this job that I was in and I hated. didn’t want to, and that’s brave. And it started with even acknowledging the fact that I’m doing the hard stuff. So if nobody else is celebrating me, then I’m going to. that’s really like the first, you talk about these baby steps, it’s like,

Nick McGowan (26:22.89)
Sure.

Renee Zukin (26:30.424)
There’s the bravery is a spectrum. Courage is a spectrum. Success is a spectrum. And we can be anywhere along that line and still be considered a success or brave. Like I don’t need to go climb Mount Everest to be brave, right? I can show up for a podcast like this and, you know, do the thing, even if I was nervous about what I was gonna say, like, or how it was gonna come out.

Nick McGowan (26:36.692)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (26:59.886)
and celebrate that. for like, you know, whoever’s out there listening right now, what’s the one thing that you really want to be doing, but you’re not. Instead of like beating yourself up about it, what’s even just the first small step that can turn you toward that thing that you think you want, right? That you’re desiring. And it’s going to look different. That five to 10 year goal, screw that, right?

What’s my goal today? Where do I want to go? And how is that and those incremental steps, how is that going to get me closer to the bigger vision I have? I mean, we definitely, you you’ve got things, you got dreams, you got things tapping you on the shoulder, like everybody does. And, and to just turn toward it, like even just a little bit, it makes such a world of difference when we’re able to celebrate the small steps and have compassion when we can’t.

Nick McGowan (27:43.242)
yeah. Hell yeah. Yeah.

Renee Zukin (27:58.658)
Like what’s bright for me one day is not the same as another. You know, as somebody who experiences obsessive-compulsive disorder, I don’t have it, I experience it. It’s, well, I mean I do, but it doesn’t have me. You know, some days are easier than others.

Nick McGowan (27:59.146)
Sure.

Renee Zukin (28:22.082)
You know, some days I can eat the food and not worry about what’s in it and not have all these thoughts and it’s no problem. And other days I’m like, okay, this one’s out. I’ll try again tomorrow. Like it’s just, and that’s okay. Like we have to be okay to not be okay sometimes. it has.

Nick McGowan (28:22.259)
Sure.

Nick McGowan (28:31.721)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (28:44.039)
And that’s the more, it’s almost like the more you learn, the more you understand that there’s more to learn. And you can see that and go, okay. And you can kind of falsely go, well, I guess I’m real stupid. Cause all these other things are out there and it’s like, no, you’re, you’re going through and you’re learning. I think there are a few things here too. Like those, all of us, I’m pretty sure can look back at something that we did that we started off small and incrementally worked on. Even if it’s.

Renee Zukin (29:08.035)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (29:12.08)
anything. I mean, I, as a musician, I think back to, I started recording music again, like seven, eight years ago. And my God, did that stuff sound atrocious, like absolutely terrible. Everything was mono, like right in the middle and fucking stacked and terrible. And now I listen to the stuff that I’m recording and I’m still like, there are things I can do with whatever and I’ll spare you the nerdisms, but like, there are things that can fix those, but you have to be able to look and go, shit, look at the journey of this.

Renee Zukin (29:23.278)
Correct.

Nick McGowan (29:42.143)
same time I want to point out, because I’ve heard people say this, especially like, I guess I’m considered a geriatric millennial, which is a fucked up term, but born in 84, so like, I was at the cusp at the end of it. there are people that will say like, Millennials.

Renee Zukin (29:57.87)
I’m honored that you think we’re the same age, by the way.

Nick McGowan (30:01.437)
Well, I get we’re probably within X-Map time, but like at this age, like we’re right around the same age. Within a period of time. I mean, you remember certain things like the internet bubble. I think I was a few years too early for that. Like I don’t remember what that was like, but I remember things happening.

Renee Zukin (30:07.554)
Yes.

Renee Zukin (30:16.27)
Did do? Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (30:22.145)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (30:23.289)
And I think if I was four five years older, I would have had more feelings about that. I would have been in the world at that point or whatever. But there are people that will say shit about like, everybody gets a trophy and all that stuff. And I really don’t know where that came from. But there’s like the thing that society seems to do where they take these major extremes. Like, well then everybody gets a trophy. And that is not what you’re saying. You’re saying like, yeah, you want to give yourself that trophy in a way, but like the applause for it.

Renee Zukin (30:30.444)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (30:35.672)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (30:46.701)
No.

Nick McGowan (30:53.162)
also really look at it and be like, this was courageous. I am doing these things. Even talking about, well, I’m not here yet. Well, what have you done? You’ve done these things so far. You do wake up in the morning and you go to work or you do this or you do that. And finding the little bits of that that then also helps us but doesn’t bypass it. I think that’s a big thing. I’ve heard from different people, like, hey man, you can’t mindset your way through life. Like, I fucking know. Just listen to the show. It’s not what

Renee Zukin (30:57.838)
and.

Renee Zukin (31:16.716)
Right. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (31:23.084)
we talk about. But really it’s like you you also need to play those mental games in a way to be able to say well really if I look at it like this cool all right and then your attitude starts to change a little bit and maybe you look at that thing a little differently and you go I’m gonna be an awkward bumbling fuck that’s gonna walk in here not the fuck’s going on but then you leave and go huh I did have that one conversation where this thing came up where that made me think of this thing and then we stack those things on so it seems to me like the moral this whole story

Renee Zukin (31:46.52)
Mm-hmm.

Renee Zukin (31:51.34)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (31:52.997)
here is like just keep at it and keep kind of moving through that but I don’t want to take I don’t want to put words in your mouth so for the people that are on their path towards self mastery what sort of advice would you give them?

Renee Zukin (31:56.172)
Yeah. Yeah.

Renee Zukin (32:05.858)
Hmm. What advice? I like to be in the realm of self-compassion, right? More heart, more love, which doesn’t mean, I love that you said this about the trophy, right? You can love yourself where you’re at and still want to move forward and excel and learn.

And so I think what’s most important is that, is that to get comfortable in the gray areas, in the duality, right? We’re not bypassing anything. When shit happens and you feel like crap, like move through it, express it, right? Cause you can only get to the other side of it once it’s had.

an opportunity to move and then you can move toward more joy. can move toward more connection. But you can actually be connected even in that vulnerability. And so getting comfortable with the uncomfortable, being able to hold like two things simultaneously true at once, which is very difficult for us humans here on earth.

and, and so yeah, like getting comfortable with the gray because that’s where the beauty is too. And the complexity. yeah.

Nick McGowan (33:48.039)
I think we as people can kind of get lost at times in our own things or you go too far down a path mentally that you get lost on that path instead of just, it was just a path. Like you can just look at it, you know. I was having a conversation with somebody recently where it’s like, you have a hard time doing things when you know there are other really tough human things that are going on on the planet.

Renee Zukin (34:14.766)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (34:14.897)
Like, I literally had a conversation with my coach yesterday about like, well I’m doing this thing that I really enjoy doing, but at the same time people are literally being captured and starved to death on the other side of the planet. So how the fuck can I do any of these things? And how does that allow me to, like, you can see those paths without getting stuck in them, and then we can do what we can do in those times, but not getting crazed about it.

Renee Zukin (34:24.162)
Right. Right.

Nick McGowan (34:40.558)
And especially if you have OCD tendencies or things of that sort, that’s extra, it could be extra difficult. And again, that’s why I asked like from you and your perspective with the makeup that you have, how do you go through those things? So I think this has been wonderful.

Renee Zukin (34:53.571)
Yeah.

Thank you. And apologies for the dogs going nuts way back in the other place.

Nick McGowan (35:01.798)
all good. of the episode, so we’re fine. And this is all gonna be kept in here, so we’re good. Yeah, well, especially now. Typically I would find a way to like edit, but yeah, here we are.

Renee Zukin (35:07.82)
I mean, this is real life happening, right?

Renee Zukin (35:14.794)
Here we are, I know. no, I lost the thread. Darn it. the question, right? The world is on fire, how do I not go down with it? I think is paraphrasing the question. It is, it is especially important right now.

Nick McGowan (35:24.932)
Well.

Nick McGowan (35:30.63)
Sure.

Renee Zukin (35:40.462)
that we are able to cultivate some inner peace when so much is happening around us. For me, I can’t help anybody else if I’m on fire also. We’ll just all burn in the ashes. And so, not that I…

you know, not that I’m complacent or ignoring, right, these horrible, awful things that are happening in the world, but that is part of the duality. And how can I show up for myself, my people in the microcosm of my world so that it becomes reflected and ripples out into the macrocosm? I’m…

often saying we have to do the inner work to see outer change. We’re not going to change other people’s minds, opinions and things unless they’re willing to be open to another perspective. And so I too have to be open. And, you know, it’s a, I mean, it’s, it’s a tricky

Nick McGowan (36:57.893)
Yeah.

Renee Zukin (37:06.67)
path to walk. But I think the more that we can take care of ourselves in our inner landscape, in our mindset, and become the masters of our domain, we are better able to show up for the other people in this world to make it a better place. And the more people who are out there doing this inner work, the better

will be able to meet each other. So that’s, yeah.

Nick McGowan (37:38.553)
Yeah, it’s like a weird inside out thing where the more work that we do internally, the more that we’re able to help externally. But we get so much that’s literally pushed into our beings that it can feel the opposite of that. And like the world is telling us we should be these certain ways and we should do these certain things instead of like, well do what you can right around you. I’ve heard that there are people that

some of their, like part of their design is that they’re not able to actually be recognized like in their own little circles. And then there are other people that aren’t supposed to be recognized in those circles, but are supposed to be recognized in larger circles and have a minimal circle, what have you, and some that are the opposite of that, et cetera. And I think as we, like we only, only us as the people know that and we know that internally, but the more work that we can do with those moments, like

Renee Zukin (38:14.542)
Mm.

Renee Zukin (38:34.307)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (38:36.868)
literally in the moment of like something happened, you felt a certain way, you thought a thing. It’s that live moment right then and there, where it’s like, you actually do the thing, like all these little things and quips and all that, like those are all cool and playful. And hopefully it gets stuck in your head. And maybe it makes you think differently or do differently. But it’s that fucking moment, like that exact moment where you have you do or you don’t. And it’s like the work that you’ve done before that will help you see those things a little differently. And I think sometimes I

and I’ve heard from other people that we look at things outside and go, yeah, but I should be and should is just bullshit. It’s like there’s no should. You shouldn’t be Steve Jobs. You should not be and you should be who you are and maybe that person will give birth to somebody else who becomes the next Steve Jobs. Maybe not. Maybe it’s like you just have a conversation like I don’t know. Maybe there’s somebody that listens to this and goes cool. I’m gonna change something to maybe they become some incredible person. Maybe they don’t. Maybe they just do things.

Renee Zukin (39:11.95)
Mm. Totally. No.

Renee Zukin (39:24.012)
Yeah. Yeah.

Renee Zukin (39:34.082)
Yeah. Right. Maybe they just feel better.

Nick McGowan (39:36.65)
little differently. I think if somebody listens to this, yeah, if they listen to this and go, hmm, maybe I need to think about this a little bit differently, or they ponder on something or act a little differently, like then you and I have been successful in our mission here, you know? So what a cool thing.

Renee Zukin (39:52.494)
Yep. Yeah. Yeah. I love that. I love that. I just want to circle back the rhetorical circle and close it out with the first song on the album that I recorded in 2011 is called Some Kind of Hollywood. And it’s all about the fact that I don’t need to be a big pop star or the you know, like you can have this dream of making music and recording an album and it can be

Nick McGowan (40:09.345)
Not good.

Renee Zukin (40:22.124)
whatever you want it to be for you, it doesn’t have to be this big thing. And I think that’s what you’re really speaking to, Nick, and what kind of, you know, a lot of where this conversation has gone today is you do you, and you do you the best way you possibly can.

Nick McGowan (40:37.955)
That’s purpose, showing up, being you, doing the best that you can with your skills, and not trying to be somebody else. I’m right there with you, and I think that’s important. This has been awesome. So I appreciate you being on Before I Let You Go. Where can people find you? Where can they connect with you and get your book?

Renee Zukin (40:54.39)
Yes, EverydayI’mBrave.com. Real simple, that’s that title. And I’m on socials under my name, Renee Zukin. So all the places you’re socializing on the apps, that’s how to find me.

Nick McGowan (41:10.371)
It’s been a pleasure. I appreciate your time. Thank you so much.

Renee Zukin (41:14.52)
Thank you.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Tashun Bowden Lewis, a former public defender and current CEO of Bowden-Lewis Consulting Group. Tashun shares her journey from being a high school athlete to becoming the first black chief public defender in Connecticut and her transition into becoming a leadership and executive coach.

What to listen for:

“If you are willing to listen to me and not just judge me based on what I look like or what you perceive my income to be, then we can move some mountains here.”

“People deserve dignity and to be treated with respect no matter what has gone on or where they come from.”

About TaShun Bowden-Lewis

TaShun is a criminal defense expert, esteemed speaker, coach, catalyst for change, and the CEO & Founder of The Bowden-Lewis Consulting Group, LLC. With almost 30 years dedicated to working in public defense, culminating in her historic 2022 appointment as the first Black Chief Public Defender for the State of Connecticut, she is an experienced transformative leader with the business acumen and community-focused mindset to deliver results through discipline, integrity, and perseverance.

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

Watch Clips and highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:02.126)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery show. I’m your host Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Tashun Bowden Lewis. Tashun, how you doing today?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (00:14.102)
How are you, Nick?

Nick McGowan (00:15.768)
good. I’m excited for you to be here. I’m just going to get the cat out of the bag for you. This is your first podcast episode and I know you’re going to do great and we’ve already talked. We’ve been working together for a little while now and I’m really, really excited to get into your background because even doing the initial work with you, I’ve researched your background. We and you and I have had conversations and there’s a lot of stuff that we’re to be able to get into that. Truthfully, I think some people would have a really hard time wrapping their head around and trying to move on from, from there.

So why don’t you get us started? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (00:53.356)
Okay, so again, I’m Tishun Bowden-Lewis and I am currently the CEO and founder of the Bowden-Lewis Consulting Group. And so I do consulting, criminal defense consulting, as well as leadership development, work stop facilitation. I also am a coach. I’m a certified personal and executive coach as well too.

And that’s what I do these days. That’s where I am. And I’m so grateful that it is thriving. Actually, this month, October, will be a year that I’ve been a business owner. And I’m so proud of myself. yes.

Nick McGowan (01:29.131)
as you should be. Now what’s that one thing most people don’t know about you that’s a little odd or bizarre?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (01:33.837)
Okay, well back in the day though I’m not that old right now but back in the day when I was in high school I played basketball among other sports and And so the coach had an actual play named after me it was called money. So whenever he held the money shot money

That made the ball goes to Tishun and cause I always got it in. was that, that something that people, most people don’t know about me. Let’s say he to high school with me. About me that yeah, that money, money shot. That was Tishun. That was me.

Nick McGowan (02:07.501)
That’s awesome. Yeah, most people don’t get a shot named after them or a play specifically for them. Unless, like, obviously my brain goes to Kobe. Like, the amount of people that are around our ages that would try to throw something out in the trash and yell Kobe. I still do it at times.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (02:13.077)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (02:19.244)
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. For sure. For sure. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (02:27.435)
That’s pretty cool. you were in sports when you were in high school. I’m sure you were in sports before that and all. I was actually having a conversation with somebody yesterday where we talking about sports and like there are the four major sports here in the States and then there are fringe sports and other stuff.

And in the conversation, the guy was saying he did whatever throughout high school. He was like field track or whatever and asked me, what did you play in high school? And I’d really thought about it in a while, but I stopped playing in high school because I didn’t want to deal with the politics. Like I probably could have gotten into college playing baseball, but I didn’t do it in high school because I didn’t want to deal with the politics and all. But you, you went through all that. You had a shot named after you. So well done on that one. And then you actually got into politics.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (02:51.488)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (02:59.34)
Ugh.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (03:08.212)
Yeah.

Thank you, thank you.

Nick McGowan (03:14.399)
So why don’t you take us there? Like what was the transition from being a high school athlete into where you were most recently and then obviously into where you’re at with your company?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (03:19.456)
Mm-hmm.

You

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (03:28.136)
Sure. So I always wanted to be a public defender. So when I was seven, I don’t know if you remember there was a show on called Good Times back in the day and the baby son, Michael, talked about being an attorney, want to be an attorney. And so I talked to my mom about that. like, you know, what is an attorney really? And at seven, and then we talked about different kinds of attorneys and public defender, a person who assists those for criminal defense,

Nick McGowan (03:39.094)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (03:58.003)
matters who are not able to afford to hire a private attorney. And I knew then at seven years old, that’s what I wanted to do. So that was my path. And I was focused on that. And I was very blessed to be able to achieve that. So I started out in the late 90s as a per diem. I don’t even know how much it was a day. In the public defender’s office, I am in Connecticut.

I moved up throughout the ranks. I was a public defender for almost 30 years. And so from a podium all the way up to in 2022, I became the first black chief public defender for the state of Connecticut. And of course, that’s the pinnacle of my career. And so I was over the entire state, about 40 some odd offices, over 400 in…

30, 35 employees, includes attorneys, social workers, investigators, of course, support staff, clerical staff. And so it was, yeah, the pinnacle of my career. It was an amazing situation. And so that’s how I really got into the whole political situation because of the position I was in. And, you know, it’s eye-opening to be able to go in front of

you know, the state at the Capitol and talk about criminal justice reform or talk about trying to get more funds or just whatever it may be to assist the citizens, the communities, the people that we service. And so it was a pleasure. It was different for me, writing legislation, talking with all the different legislators out there and doing it, you know. It was…

Trial by fire, because I had never done it before, but it was an amazing experience. So that was, I became the Chief Public Defender in 2022 and I was terminated in 2024. So in 2024, in June of 2024, and then I started my business October of 2024 and here I am.

Nick McGowan (06:10.315)
I find it interesting how

That all makes sense and I appreciate that. We can kind of consolidate almost decades pretty quickly. Like there’s a lot of times even history is like, well in this history period of 700 years this happened. They’re like, what? If you think about how long a day feels sometimes or how much stuff can happen over the course of a week, let’s actually break that down a little bit because the fact that you knew you wanted to do something at seven and continued on with it is huge. I know people that wanted to be an astronaut.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (06:18.858)
Yes. Yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (06:29.942)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Sure.

Yes.

Nick McGowan (06:42.461)
a dinosaur they wanted to be you know whatever at seven I I think I wanted to be a rock star at seven

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (06:51.18)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (06:52.637)
So there are things that you get into and then you kind of move and you figure out whatever it is. But the fact that you figure that out at seven and then you work through it. I’ve never been to college and I certainly never went to law school or anything like that. But how did that actually shape you getting into the position that you’re in? Because and that’s a major thing we’re going to touch on. mean, that was a short period of time, but I know there was some craziness that happened within that. But what happened over the course of your

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (07:11.082)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (07:22.493)
I guess, defendership of like helping people and working with them that actually led you to keep sticking with that because from an outsider’s perspective, you’re working with people that are in a really bad spot.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (07:25.164)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (07:37.132)
Thank

Nick McGowan (07:37.415)
some that might have put themselves in a really bad spot or made really bad decisions and choices to put themselves there, others who didn’t and just happened to be along for the ride or whatever. But how did that not deter you from saying like, God, the whole population of humanity is absolute trash and like, how did your heart continue to grow instead of harden? You know what I mean?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (07:46.188)
That’s right. That’s right.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (07:59.339)
Right, well, here in Connecticut at least, the majority of people who are in the system, the criminal justice system, are black and brown. And so obviously as a black woman, it’s important to be able to help. But it wasn’t just those who look like me, because there are plenty of people of all different races and ethnic backgrounds who happen to come into the system. And so it was my…

It was my background, really. I was raised by my mother and my grandmother. And those two women were my backbone. And everything was about education. Everything was about service, helping other people. So it was a natural situation for me to really want to be a public defender. When I found out what it was and what it meant, it was like a perfect match. My whole life has been about service and helping other people.

Anyway that I can and so the public defender’s situation was yeah, there are many days it was rough. I mean, I’ve done countless trials, murder trials. I’ve done a death penalty trial. I mean the whole thing. Actually, I didn’t get to trial. able to, that person was able to get a life sentence without parole. But so I didn’t go to trial, but we renegotiated that. But I’ve been on those kind of cases. I’ve been on cases that are bone chilling, really.

But everyone, no matter what you are accused of doing, who you are, what you look like, where you came from.

Everyone deserves to be represented and to have a fair process, due process is what it is. And everyone has to have that insurance of that. You know what? No matter what happens, the outcome of the situation that you have someone standing by you who’s going to help you to make sure that everything is done correctly and right and in a fair and reasonable manner. And that’s the whole, has been the whole pull for me for public defenders. We’re supposed to help.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (10:05.556)
to make sure that the process itself is done correctly. We can’t guarantee outcomes. I mean, we want to, but we can’t do that. But obviously, with anything else, when you put your heart into it and you have a passion for it and you really like people, all people, because as an attorney, as a public defender,

Nick McGowan (10:12.915)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (10:24.04)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (10:29.6)
You know, I wasn’t just the attorney. was the counselor, the therapist, the mom, the confidant, the preacher, the pastor. I was all of that. Some people have never had anybody just listen to them talk about their story, what happened, why. And that is that backstory, those gray areas, I like to say, that make people human. And as a criminal defense attorney, as a public defender,

Nick McGowan (10:34.332)
Hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (10:58.538)
you’re there to be able to champion that story, whether or not, again, the person has done something wrong because yes, the majority of the clients have done something, may not be what they’re charged with, but something has been done that is not, that’s not following the law, you know. But again, it doesn’t mean the person’s supposed to get the maximum penalty. There’s mitigation that happens, right? And as a public defender, as a criminal defense attorney, I’m here to bring that out so that…

It is, you get the total picture, not just the capture of what may have happened that day, that time. And so that’s what kept me going. A human connection. know, people deserve dignity and to be treated with respect no matter what has gone on or where they come from. And that’s what I loved.

Nick McGowan (11:47.24)
Thanks.

at the base level just human rights like everybody deserves to live they deserve to just be alive and do the things and the more that I learn about things like primarily systems I can’t not see them now there are systems everywhere and even to think like I grew up in a spot so my my mom and dad weren’t together they two different houses I would go to my dad’s I go to my mom’s etc. my mom lived in a pretty poor area my dad

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (11:50.944)
Yes. Yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (11:56.886)
Yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (12:01.163)
Yes.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (12:13.504)
Hmm? Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (12:18.486)
lived in a, I don’t know, upper middle class area. They weren’t stupidly rich or anything, but they had money and they could do things. My mom on the other hand didn’t and I remember her saying things about people that were in the area that were honestly just straight-up racist and I learned later that the system that she was in, where she grew up and the time that she was in, formed her to be that way.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (12:24.204)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (12:34.944)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (12:40.04)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yes.

Nick McGowan (12:46.428)
but then also just perpetuated, well, I look down upon these people or anybody that’s slightly different or even people that had more money or whatever. And I had always stood out to me that that’s just not right. There’s something wrong with that. Like, why would you just hate on somebody just because? But there are systems in play that keep people down, keep people segregated, keep people, keep…

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (12:51.19)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (13:00.672)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (13:09.184)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (13:13.456)
like fueling around in this bucket of mess.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (13:16.394)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (13:19.46)
I appreciate that your heart is there to be able to help and serve people and not everybody’s built like that. There are people that are like total service people. I’ve met people in life where they are, bless them, because I can’t. I can’t as much as they do. Like I just can’t. And I love people. But some of them, like they will do anything and everything. And that’s a beautiful piece because those people are meant to be here just like myself, just like you, just like everybody else. We’re meant to be here, but there are biases that come in.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (13:23.488)
Thank you.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (13:36.544)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (13:49.325)
to play. There people that will frown upon them. People I’m sure that probably just tried to slap them down as hard as they can because of where they came from, how they looked, how they acted, or whatever.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (13:59.338)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (14:01.989)
I want to tie this to kind of everybody in a way. There are people that go into a corporate office and think, I have this meeting this morning and my God, I hate whoever, or I don’t want to deal with this or I don’t want to deal with that. It can be hard if we don’t know that that’s there. If we don’t know that we have biases or that we’re within a system or even people that don’t understand that they’re racist and they say things and it’s like, yeah, what? So how do we, how do you help those people?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (14:05.278)
Sure.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (14:11.06)
Yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (14:20.907)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (14:27.423)
Right.

Nick McGowan (14:31.865)
understand like how to be able to kind of step back from that and look at the human as the human and understand that you’re just working with another human because it sounds like what you did was you were like I know there’s all this stuff you did whatever these things are but give me the background give me the context who the hell are you

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (14:41.706)
Right.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (14:49.077)
Right, right, right. Honestly, every relationship is based on communication. So it’s about having the honest, open communication and uncomfortable. You that’s now the cliche, uncomfortable conversations, but it’s so true, right? You may be offended by what I say or maybe you’re offended by what you say, but I’m gonna hear you out and please hear me out.

and understand that we have different prisons of knowledge. Just like you were saying, you your background, your environment that you grew up in, even the one that you may live in now, it shapes your perspective. And so your perspective is gonna be different from mine for a variety of reasons. And it doesn’t matter necessarily that, you you may make more money than I do or that you may look differently than me.

If you are willing to listen to me and not just judge me based on what I look like or what you perceive my income to be, then we can move some mountains here. So it’s about the communication, you know, and many people aren’t really open to having a real conversation because that’s, you know, that the term is confirm confirmation bias, right? Even with hit with the facts of what it is, they’re still going to believe what they think to be true.

And that’s most people. You know, they’ve given the facts, but it doesn’t matter. This is what I believe, and I’m not gonna budge on it, and this is what it is. That breakdown right there is what keeps people stuck in these systems and keeps the systems thriving because nobody wants to think that they’re actually wrong.

Nick McGowan (16:29.689)
Yeah.

Well, you are so…

You can challenge some people, and I’ve talked about this on a couple episodes recently, because it’s come to mind more often. You can challenge people from one perspective, but really, you might be challenging five or six, and that’s too much for them to be able to handle at that point. Like, religious. Some people are really religious. I don’t consider myself to be religious at all, but I’m very faith driven and believe in God. I also don’t believe you some bearded dude on a chair somewhere. Like, that just doesn’t make any sense.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (16:49.013)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (17:04.505)
But there are people that, and that’s an easy thing to use, and I’m not trying to stab at those people at all, nothing like that. But it’s just to say, if you challenge one thing, you then are actually challenging several others. And that can be a lot for people to handle. It sounds like you’re pretty good at being able to say, I’m taking the information in and not judging it, but assessing it. So how do you actually do that? Because that’s a skill set that I think people want to have, but it’s really difficult in those moments.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:14.155)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:23.935)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:32.202)
Right.

Nick McGowan (17:34.439)
the biases come up, the judgments come up, they think I know better because whatever reason. And like money doesn’t matter. I don’t give a shit if you make billions of dollars or you make no money at all. Do you treat people well? I mean, take Elon Musk as an example. He has the most money in the entire world. Like just chip it off and help people, you know? I’m not trying to go down that path, sorry.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:34.675)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:39.977)
right.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:49.898)
Yeah

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (17:54.607)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, no, it’s okay. You know, but I think to answer your question, it’s because I know who I am. And see, that’s the thing. So many people just, they don’t know who they are. They could be 65 and not know who they really are at the core. They know what society imposes upon them to be, whether it be professionally, personally, know, interrelationally. But for me,

I know who I am. I love who I am. I’m proud of who I am. And so, and I’m not going to back down off of that. You know what mean? It’s, I just, I can listen to you. I may not agree with you, but I’m at least listening to you. You know what I mean? But I’m also going tell you what I think. I’m not going to miss my words. I want to tell you what I think. And if you don’t, if you don’t understand, if you don’t get it, then I will.

Nick McGowan (18:44.258)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (18:48.376)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (18:53.813)
break it down for you you still don’t agree that’s cool I’m fine with that but I’m not going to change to shun just to make it easier for you or to make something more just something that’s going to be something you can digest without having to stop and say you know what let me just take this in

Nick McGowan (18:57.913)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (19:22.507)
Because people aren’t active listeners anymore. They just want to get their point across. That’s it. I got to get what I got to say in. And the art is listening, waiting until the pause to say, OK, well, this is what I think. And I just, again, I know who I am. And I know that what I have to say has value to it. It means something. So I’m going to let you know, no matter who you are.

Nick McGowan (19:52.772)
I think that’s a little bit of your northeast showing. I’m from Philly, so like, we’re gonna tell you what we think. You’re gonna accept it or you’re not. We’re still gonna let you know. But I think an important thing you pointed out that you said just really easily because it’s it’s part of who you are. You are who you are and you are going to listen. I think that’s important because people will say, well, these are my beliefs. This is what I stand for.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (19:54.081)
He laughs.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:00.436)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:12.395)
Yeah. Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:22.41)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (20:22.741)
and they’ll come attacking people instead of saying I’m confident in myself at least with the information I have right now and then to have a conversation instead of saying I believe these things nothing else can get into my head and if you don’t believe them you are completely against me that takes some of those older books I’m trying to get away from religion out of context

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:28.703)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:38.389)
right.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:48.331)
You

Nick McGowan (20:52.336)
and that’s not exactly what it was but to be able to say like I know who I am however or and along with that I’m still gonna have a conversation I’m still gonna be open I’m still gonna talk and

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (20:57.023)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (21:03.467)
Right.

Nick McGowan (21:04.203)
I agree to disagree in certain ways. There are certain things that I don’t think we can really agree to disagree on, like basic human rights. Like, come on now, if you think people are less than you, we can’t really go any further than that. We have to start there. So you went through, everything you went through with working through all these cases, the nerd in me wants to know about the bone chilling cases because that’s, I like that sort of stuff and like that’s the real life shit.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (21:06.538)
That’s right.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (21:10.463)
Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yes. That’s what I’m Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (21:25.119)
Yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (21:31.709)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (21:34.177)
into a spot where your leadership overseeing an entire state and not too long after that you were let go because something had happened. Do you want to dig into that a bit?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (21:44.551)
Mm-hmm. Well, I can’t dig too far because I it’s still in litigation You know what I mean? So I can’t go too far into it but just basically because I mean obviously there’s things in the papers things like that you could Google online kind of stuff, but um yeah, I was Determined from the beginning because I was

Nick McGowan (21:49.283)
Sure.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (22:04.747)
a public defender for so many years. So I knew where there were gaps. knew where there were deficiencies. I knew where there were things that needed to be changed. know, typically, someone who’s going to come into a new position is going to give it a year to observe and, you know, see what’s going on. Well, because I’ve been in it for so long, I didn’t have to wait a year to observe to see anything. I knew what was happening. I was in the field, in the trenches. So, you know, and what…

I, my vision was, was relayed at the interview process. You know, like what I wanted to do, how I wanted to do it. I mean, not every single thing, but you know, most of that was already, you know, sketched out. This is who I am. This is what I want to do. And so trying to implement those things became challenging. And, you know, and that’s where there was friction because I’m trying to do my job, right?

It’s very clear Connecticut has state statues that lay out my job description. You can look it up. know, what does a chief public defender do? You know, what are my responsibilities? And I was trying to do that, you know, and it just, when there are things that get in the way of that, again, because I know who I am, I can read and because I am at the core, I’m a fighter.

I’m going to fight for what’s right. And I’ve done that all these years for other people as a public defender, as their attorney. So of course I’m going do it for myself. I mean, I’m to fight for me. I’m going to fight for my ability to do what I know how to do because nothing has been given to me. I earned everything, every single thing. And so, yeah, I’m going to fight for myself and for what’s right.

Nick McGowan (23:24.962)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (23:34.53)
Sure.

Nick McGowan (23:40.992)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (23:51.842)
Yeah.

And I know we can’t get in details and all of that. I think what you talked about was that’s critical. Like you again, you know yourself and you’re fighting for the things that are right. And maybe at some point down the road, and I’m sure some point down the road, you can actually get into more details of things. But I think it’s important because you went through all of that. But then once it was done, you didn’t put your tail between your legs. You said, well, I still I’m here to help people and then started your company. So now you’re working with people.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (23:58.828)
in

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (24:08.863)
Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (24:19.401)
Yes. Yes. Yes.

Nick McGowan (24:22.784)
From personal perspective, leadership perspective, executive perspective, and in just a short little bit here, what do you do with those people and how do you help them based on the experience you’ve had?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (24:36.779)
Mm-hmm. Well, know, more exciting than being with someone who has lived experience, who understands the pressures of being an exec, a supervisor, the head, a manager, who also understands the power of the pivot. Now, mine was a forced pivot, you know, and I would hope for everybody else it’s a soft one, a chosen one, but you know what? The power of the pivot. Being able to be resilient.

Nick McGowan (24:54.527)
Mm-hmm

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (25:04.447)
being able to rebound, pivot, and still have your values intact. When I work with people, that’s what it’s about. Transitions, understanding who you are, and when you have a transition, whether it’s forced or whether it’s something that you’re doing on your own, you can do it. You know, I’m here to help empower people, to let them know that you can do it your way. You can do it your way and still come out and thrive.

You don’t have to let someone strip you who you are. Because they could take away a title, they could take away the money, they could take away whatever else. But who you are as a person is what got you to that mountaintop, and it’ll get you to the next. There’s not only one mountaintop. And so that’s what my business is about, helping people who are in transition, helping to empower people and equip them with the tools that they need.

Nick McGowan (25:41.194)
Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (26:04.331)
to transform. I’m big into transformation. I want to make sure that people understand that just because you have an obstacle or something comes in your path doesn’t mean you can’t morph into something bigger and better. And the past is the past, you know? So that’s…

Nick McGowan (26:19.553)
Yeah. Yeah.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (26:24.457)
And I love that. Being able, again, it’s serving, like you said, serving people. That’s my entire life, my life’s work, my passion. So I still can do that. And I’m so grateful for that.

Nick McGowan (26:35.392)
Yeah, and you’re doing it more so.

more of a personal level at this point with these people that are also helping other people. And I’ve seen some of this in action even when you and I first connected like the path to get to us connecting and how you were like you do these things like my god I need these I need help with this stuff and I think that’s awesome because as you kind of just move through you’ll meet different people and different people introduce you and like you’re very open to all of that. So with everything you’re saying and along the lines of all that what’s your

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (26:39.241)
Yes.

Mm-hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (26:49.684)
Yes.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (27:00.031)
Yes. Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (27:07.522)
for somebody that’s on their path towards self-mastery.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (27:12.447)
Find out who you are.

Don’t let external validation define you or don’t even crave it. Yeah, it’s nice, you know, but there’s a saying, know, give me my flowers, get your own flowers. That’s my saying, get your own, okay? Know who you are and stand 10 toes down in that.

If you are a shifting wave, you let someone come and get into your mind, then that’s how it’s so easy to crawl into a corner or get into a ball in a fetal position and not get back up. Yes, life is going to throw some craziness to you. Because if you had asked me five years ago, would I be a business owner now doing something different than what I was doing? I’d be like,

Nick McGowan (27:58.975)
Hmm.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (28:06.283)
No, I didn’t really, that wasn’t even in my mind. You know what I mean? But there was a bigger plan. You you were saying, talking about religion and things like that. You I believe in God, okay? And it’s about the spiritual aspect of things. And I trust him, I do. And you know what? My life is a living testimony of, yeah, you trust yourself, know who you are, and you trust him.

You’re good. You’re good. And so that’s what it comes down to.

Nick McGowan (28:37.417)
Yeah. Well, that and so for everybody listening, she didn’t say this, but she talked to me about this. Buy yourself flowers. She literally does that weekly. So not only she’s saying this, she actively does those things, even to the point of just the flowers. Well, Tashawn, it’s been awesome having you on. I appreciate you so much. And before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (28:52.991)
Yes,

Thank you.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (29:02.161)
definitely. Yes. And so I’m on a few social media sites. I have a website, BowdoinLewisGroup.com, an Instagram, the Bowdoin Lewis Group, consulting group. I’m on Facebook and my LinkedIn as well, too. Just look to Shun Bowdoin Lewis Esquire and I’m there. So I’m always looking to help. So if you would like to partner with me, I’m available.

Nick McGowan (29:27.167)
And we’re going to have all that in the show notes too. Again, it’s been a pleasure to have you on today. I appreciate your time.

TaShun Bowden-Lewis (29:29.524)
Yeah. All right. Thanks, Nick.

In this episode, Nick speaks with Wei Houng about the importance of human connection, self-discovery, and the innovative technology behind human optimization. Wei shares his journey from a technical background to exploring the spiritual and esoteric realms, leading to the development of a patented assessment technology that helps individuals understand their unique nature.

What to listen for:

“For a human being to perpetually live in survival mode is perpetually living a life through judgment and subjectivity.”

“Most of us haven’t been given the opportunity to graduate from that subjective foundational understanding of self to define who we are.”

About Wei Houng

Wei is one of the co-founders of HumanOp Technologies, a company dedicated to disrupting the matrix that forces sameness and rewards burnout. After seeing countless high-performers operating out of rhythm with who they truly are, he’s part of the team that is using the world’s first physics-based technology to reveal a person’s authentic nature. His mission is to help people stop ‘efforting’ their way through life and start flowing with it, so they can be filled with the energy, joy, and purpose they were designed for.

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/podcasting-services/

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Listen to other episodes here: https://themindsetandselfmasteryshow.com/

Watch Clips and highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:01.358)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Wei Houng. Wei, how you doing today?

Wei Houng (00:12.321)
really good especially after our pre-show warm-up.

Nick McGowan (00:16.712)
Absolutely. And there, I say this, I don’t know, every so often on episodes and people will hear it, but you guys don’t hear the stuff that happens before we hit record or anything. But legitimately, there are beautiful conversations that I’ve had where I go, we need to hit record, like all of this needs to be on here. And this was one of those like we’ve literally been talking for like 40 minutes at this point.

Wei Houng (00:33.345)
Why? Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (00:40.992)
So there’s a lot of stuff that we’re gonna be able to cover and a lot of stuff we’re gonna get into. And one of the biggest reasons why I wanted to have you on is to be able to talk about the human connection within ourselves and how we relate to ourselves, how we figure out ourselves and how that ties into our purpose. We’re gonna get into technology and all the other things that are in there, but why don’t you kick us off? Why don’t you tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre?

Wei Houng (01:05.985)
Yeah, great question. I you know, I’ve been in this human optimization game we were just talking about now. I’m, you know, I used to say the same number year after year until somebody called me out on it and said, you’ve been saying that number for the last five years I’ve known you as like, do you never increase that number? I was like, Oh, you’re right. And so I last when I checked last, I’ve been I’ve been at this human optimization game now for what 30, I think, over 31 years now.

Nick McGowan (01:23.952)
Wei Houng (01:33.929)
And a lot of it was driven by what I dealt with, you know, as a kid in junior high feeling like a lot of kids, I think I was being bullied. didn’t feel like I fit in. And so they got to a point where I thought there was something wrong with me. Right. The name I’m one of the co-founders of our company called human op technologies. Human op is short for human optimization. And we have a patented human assessment technology that is only patented because it’s not based on psychology. Right. It’s it’s based on

physics and math and science and that’s how we were able to kind of get away with patenting. Well, not get away with, we did do it, patenting assessment technology. But before we get into that, there’s one thing that really kind of helped facilitate this that a lot of people, well, some people know, but a lot of people don’t know is that I spent a lot of years in the spiritual community to kind of truly explore.

the esoteric side because I spent my background in computer science engineering. So I had a lifetime of just being on the technical left brain side of things, science and grounded methodologies and all this jazz. And so when I was trying to see all that was, all that is available in this world, I got deep into the, what people will say, the woo community, right? And there was one point where I,

Nick McGowan (02:50.552)
Mm-hmm.

Wei Houng (02:55.553)
you know, and there’s nothing wrong with these teachers because they have a lot more faith and trust than I do. But it’s not like I didn’t, I was skeptical about things. I just have that kind of mind. I want to understand it. So in the case one day, if I want to teach this to somebody, I can have the confidence to understand the both the left, the right brain, every possible facet of how to help people embrace what I’m talking about. Right. And when it came to energy work and energy healing and hypnotherapy and all those different things, I would

get to a point with every teacher and I’ve had many where I was asked so many questions about why does this work? How does this work? Why does this work? Until finally the last stage I said she was frustrated like my parents were and said, wait, it just is. Okay. It just is. And I say, then it just took me back to my traumas as a youth. It’s like telling me to shut up. It just is. Okay. Why? Why? It just is. Okay. Fine. So at this point,

Nick McGowan (03:44.024)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (03:51.371)
done with college and everything. I have my UCLA alumni card. said, you know what, I’m going to go figure this out myself. And so I finally, I never knew how to use alumni card until then. was like, you mean I can go back to the UCLA engineering library and just hang out there. And it’s like, well, yeah, you’re alumni. was like, great. So I go in there and

I think if you add up all the hours I was going back and forth, just looking into reopening the books on quantum physics, thermodynamics, the meaning of the universe instead for a school project, it was for my own personal understanding of why something that is so seemingly anti-science is really isn’t anti-science. It’s just another language to explain what science is also trying to explain, right? If you add up all the hours, I think it was like almost like a week. It’s like I was there for like a straight week. If I went there 24 hours for a whole

Nick McGowan (04:41.624)
Nice.

Wei Houng (04:43.969)
what seven times 24, whatever that is, right? What does that does 168 hours or something like that. So and what I came out with was a deeper understanding, just simply on how to explain things like pranic prana, how does how does how does the directing of the energy work? And how does energy behave? You know, what happens when a human being dies? You know, what does

What are we talking about when we say like, you know, a soul or whatever the case may be, you know, it’s not like I don’t believe in it. I just like to have multiple ways of explaining it to help serve a larger segment of humanity. And that’s really what drives me to do is not to debunk anything, but to help more people understand the miracle of what happens every single day.

and not deny us just because it’s not part of our reality, deny us the potential of being able to embrace and accept more that can potentially augment our own personal lives. And so that’s kind of a long way to say that. And that might be something like a lot of people don’t know, just kind of how I hated school. And then I went back to school to use the school, but use it in the way I wanted to use it to help explain something in my life that nobody else was able to explain for me. And now when I go out and I…

connect with people who are in the esoteric world. And I get asked to be on their podcast because they say, can you come on my podcast of Reiki healing and energy and explain what you just explained to me? Because I’ve never been able to do that. And this is exactly what the world needs to hear. was like, So yeah.

Nick McGowan (06:24.386)
Yeah. And all of that ties directly into what you’re doing too. Like I can relate with you on that. I never went to college. I ended up in a few college classes because I partied the night before. was like, fuck it, why not? But like never officially went. I did. There were a few different, I went to a few different universities in fact. think even one or two of them answered the question. were like, nevermind. See ya.

Wei Houng (06:37.545)
I love that. But you did go. There you go.

Wei Houng (06:50.881)
Who are you?

Nick McGowan (06:53.39)
That was way back in the day. but I also didn’t like school. I hated school, but I was an art kid. So I would always be, I was one of those kids in high school. Like I would just raise my hand, like, I got a project. They’d be like, ahead. And I would just live in the art room because that was what I enjoyed and got out of school and went deeper into more understanding and more discovering and more just unpacking as many different books and teachers and all these things.

Wei Houng (07:08.149)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (07:20.255)
love that. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (07:21.474)
because there was an actual pull to do it instead of going, learn math, learn history. The history we want you to learn and learn this and learn that. Yeah. And it’s like, I want to learn the things I want to learn. So I appreciate that. And I think that’s the thing about you and I, that’s part of our makeup. And it just like our self-expression to be able to say, well, this is the thing that gets me excited. I’m going to dig in and nerd out on it. And that’s important.

Wei Houng (07:24.373)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (07:29.537)
For what? Yeah.

Nick McGowan (07:47.96)
but this is also our design. So how does that tie in to the work that you do at the company to be able to help people understand where they’re like, you know, I nerd out about this thing, but I never thought I could do anything because the capitalistic society we live in says I can’t make any fucking money being a creative or a musician or whatever, you know?

Wei Houng (08:04.947)
Yeah. my God. Yeah. Don’t even get me started about that piece right there. know. Yeah. I mean, well, the thing, you know, before I, before I get into like what, what ultimately, mean, cause human art represents kind of the culmination of a lifetime of just being inspired and also frustration of why, why, what keeps holding humanity back.

Nick McGowan (08:09.103)
world podcast please get started

Wei Houng (08:26.177)
Before I go there, I used to be before the pandemic, I used to be asked to go do career day for a lot of schools because I was only one that would volunteer and say yes to say, can you come in and talk about entrepreneurship? I’m like, sure. Because that’s the wild card, you know, because I’m not a firefighter. I’m not a banker. I’m not a doctor. I’m an entrepreneur. And then all the kids go, what, what is that? It’s like, does anybody know what that is? Right. And so I say we solve problems in the world in exchange for money. How about that? Right. And then

Nick McGowan (08:39.8)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (08:55.169)
But there’s always a fun exercise I like to do in line with what you just said, which is like, OK, how many of you have ever been told that you can’t make money doing something, anything? I remember last time I said that, I it was in a grade school. They were super young. And every kid raised their hand already at that age. They were already being told to some capacity that they can’t make money or do what they want to do in life, doing certain things.

Right? Funny, funny side note, the teacher raised her hand. Yeah. She’s like, and it was really interesting because the distortion that happens in, our homes and it’s, I’m not, think, you know, I, I always say this like disclaimer, you make sure you, you make sure whatever you share about today’s don’t, don’t make your parents hate me. but

Nick McGowan (09:29.268)
Awesome. Well, yeah, she’s not making anything. She’s like, I need food stamps.

Wei Houng (09:51.329)
There’s a distortion of culture and societal because we’re such a melting pot here. We don’t know where it’s coming from. But there was a kid that raised his hand and I mean, it’s so obvious that it’s not true, but he’s still kind of subscribed to it. Why? Because it’s his parents. It’s like, what did your parents tell you? And it’s just, I picked the Asian kid in the back with glasses because, hey, you looked like me when I was little. Okay, I’m going to pick on you first. And he said, music. I’m like, what? No, really? Seriously? Music? And then I pulled the room and I said, hey,

How many of you know somebody in this world and just a side note, celebrities are people too, that make money doing music. Everybody raises, every kid raises a hand. And it was like a shock to him, even though it was so, it seems like it’s common knowledge, right? But we don’t know what happens at home, right? We don’t know how kids are being nurtured against their nature and more on that later, right? And so then I asked him, well, what kind of music do you like? He goes, EDM. was like,

Nick McGowan (10:45.411)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (10:50.399)
Have you ever heard of dead mouse? Have you ever heard of the, I started naming off all these idiom, know, like super like successful. he goes, yeah. says, do you think they do it for free?

Nick McGowan (10:52.172)
Yeah. Rattle them off.

Nick McGowan (10:57.985)
at justice.

Wei Houng (11:03.745)
He goes, well, no, it’s like, okay, so it’s a different thing. Now you always get these kids that say, I love ice cream. But even then I said, okay, how many things you can’t make money doing ice cream. And then every, every kid reads it has like, okay, well, I’ll tell you something. There’s some Asian countries that will literally pay you just to watch you eat ice cream. The little girl’s like, I say, but I got to warn you. Be careful what you wish for. You might not like ice cream after that. If you make a career out of it. Right. And then she goes, no, I’ll never stop. And I looked at the teacher teachers like,

Nick McGowan (11:04.127)
and

Nick McGowan (11:19.235)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (11:28.931)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (11:33.601)
So, but yeah, so part of my journey is this is that what compelled me to really kind of land in this and I got to say first and foremost that I’m I’m so married to my purpose because I know how much people spend their entire lives finding that purpose, the reason for being and sometimes they never find it. I I’m at a point where I said I am not going to squander the luck.

the gratitude and the fortune I’ve had on being able to find that as early as I did. And a lot of it was through the struggles I’ve had to go through to try to figure me out. Right. And it got to a point where when I finally hit a plateau and I said, my God, I think I kind of understand why I’m here. I said, but why why did I have to go through all this catharsis? There must have been, I don’t know, three to five times I should have left this planet, but I didn’t.

right? The universe deemed it was not your time, either by my own hand or by the hand of something, the byproduct of a choice that I made. Right? And so thus began the journey of how do I inspire people to elevate and change and get in alignment with themselves without having to do it from catharsis? Because the reality is, you and I have dealt with catharsis in our life, we’ve hit lows that some people don’t bounce back from like we have.

So that means not everybody’s built the same way. Resilience and adaptability, that’s Darwinism right there. So how do we combat that and empower people to not have to be stove touchers in order to incite change, but more importantly, recognize that, hey, if you allow yourself to go to that cathartic place, you may not come back as easily as somebody else that you’ve observed. So what can we do to that? And so human op is really

our technology is designed to kind of take the guesswork of how one can get access back, access back to the blueprint of optimal existence. The reason why we lose contact with that is because of the moment we’re born, we’re pulled in a billion directions. We’ve got environmental influence, societal, cultural, and everything like that, and it pulls us off of our blueprint. The beautiful thing about our technology is a simple assessment technology that gives

Wei Houng (14:02.881)
gives every human being a unique result. No two human beings, billion people on a eight billion different results. Why? Because it’s based on the unique nature of that human being. And so what really drives our technology, I’m looking to kind of position our company as a generational company after you and I are gone, our kids’ kids are gone, that human op continues to be a part of elevating humanity and helping humanity become what we’re ultimately best designed to do, becoming stewards of the planet.

caretakers of the planet. There’s no other being on the planet, no other animal on the planet that is better suited to be a caretaker of the planet than we are. And yet here we are pillaging it. And we’re like destroying it. I mean, the plot twist of the whole COVID pandemic thing, we’re the virus. That’s the plot twist, right?

Nick McGowan (14:42.446)
Yeah, actively.

Nick McGowan (14:49.59)
Yeah, we have been. What a juxtaposition of it, of we are the ones who can both heal and harm. And we do that in all of our relationships. We do that to ourselves. Even that kid being told you can’t make money with music. You can, but you can also make money with other things. And time out, let’s look at what the fuck, you’re just talking about your passion.

is this and you’re saying, the system of the world that we live in says I need to make this. Let’s forego that and get back to this and figure out how do you do that? There’s something and I’ve thought of this as soon as you said this, a friend of mine and I were both working on albums. We’re holding each other accountable and like working through our stuff and nerding out about sidechain compression and just loads of nonsense to us. It’s fucking fun. But he shared something with me the other day that there was somebody talking about how

Wei Houng (15:34.891)
Very cool.

Wei Houng (15:39.149)
I love it.

Nick McGowan (15:47.372)
I believe it’s Spotify, because they’re like the main culprit with this. They figured out the exact amount of plays that you need, streams every single month, to make minimum wage. Do you want to take a stab in the dark at how many streams you need monthly as an artist to make minimum wage?

Wei Houng (16:03.667)
Okay, I know you’re asking if it’s probably something redonkulous, it’s like what, a million?

Nick McGowan (16:06.548)
It’s 567,000.

Wei Houng (16:12.037)
567,000. Oh my God, that’s a lot.

Nick McGowan (16:13.73)
That’s a lot. That’s a lot. Like a lot to make a minimum wage. That just off of that. So but that can still deter people to go well, if I just want to make music and just stream it, I’m I guess I can’t. And they’ll stop there. Other people will go fuck that watch. And they’ll go do things and they’ll, they’ll figure out different ways. the

Wei Houng (16:16.213)
Yeah, right. On just off of Spotify. Okay.

Wei Houng (16:36.163)
Hahaha

Well, it’s just like a, it’s like an investment portfolio. You, you diversify, right? Right.

Nick McGowan (16:43.374)
Well, multiple streams of income. I mean, that’s the true definition of an entrepreneur. You just make different streams of income. Yeah, exactly. Which my friend and I talking about that we understand that because we’re multi-passionate and creatives and entrepreneurs. That’s why as a 41 year old man, I have like this many friends, you know, like.

Wei Houng (16:48.083)
Right. Different profit centers. Yeah.

Wei Houng (17:02.817)
That’s okay, you are friends with the universe of music.

Nick McGowan (17:08.62)
yeah, absolutely. But in all reality, I think there’s a thing to that where people can buy into a story. And that story is told to them, they go, well, that’s not what I want to do. Or yes, I guess I should do that. And then they go deeper down that because of what you were saying, even before we hit record, people don’t know if somebody says just be you, like going out on a date with somebody just be you. What the fuck? Really? what does that mean? Yeah, you spin them even harder at that point, because they’re like, geez, now it’s even harder to do this. So

Wei Houng (17:28.377)
Who am I? Like, who am I? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (17:37.294)
I don’t want you to give a secret sauce or go into all the depths of everything, but from a higher level, like if somebody’s saying, all right, I hear what you guys are saying, and maybe I’m interested in the thing that you do or what your company does, but overall, like I’m just interested in understanding more about myself so I can stop hating everything else that’s going on because I feel I’m stuck doing this and blah, blah, blah, and just trying to get the thing that actually gives them that vitality back. So what does that look like?

Wei Houng (18:01.779)
Yeah, yeah, that the one word, the simple word is objectivity. The thing is, we’ve been in an effort to survive. Survive survival for human being to perpetually live in survival mode is perpetually living a life through judgment and subjectivity. But that’s kind of how we survive growing up. We had to subjectively look at things and

define things through the context of our world and what we grew up with in order to figure out the best way to navigate it. The problem is none of us have, most of us haven’t been given the opportunity to graduate from that subjective foundational understanding of self to define who we are, right? What we’ve been able to help people do is then graduate from that transition to defining what.

And what that means is how do you understand yourself objectively without meaning, judgment, bias or subjectivity of through the lens of my mom, my dad, my teachers, my friends, my culture, because most of the most people they struggle with that. Like you were saying, it’s like just be you. That is probably one of the hardest questions to ask anybody. Just be you. It’s like, well, that that actually.

is dependent on whether or not you yourself can define who you or what you are, as we like to call it. And saying that there’s a distinction between who and what, who is defined by your experiences, your traumas, your parents, your society, your culture. What you are is how nature naturally designed you to be. For example, we all already know how that works. We go into nature, we all look at a tree and we can uniformly all say, that’s a tree, that’s a leaf.

And this is what that leaf does for that tree. This is grass. It’s green. I don’t like green, but I’m not going to get angry at grass for being green because it just is. Imagine us being able to look in the mirror and say the exact same thing about ourselves. When we can go back to how we survived. So let’s, let’s kind of roll it back and talk about some really cool, fun trivia. Modern language. I’ll give you a quick guess.

Wei Houng (20:14.497)
you know, a lot of people know it already, but how long do you think modern language as we know it today as a means of pattern and communication, pattern recognition, communication, right? That includes grunts and clicks and specific patterns. Modern language, how long do you think that existed for human beings?

Nick McGowan (20:31.512)
handful of thousands of years.

Wei Houng (20:32.991)
Yeah, about 50,000 years. right. Yeah. If we look at how long human beings have been on a planet, we’ve been on the planet for 2 million years. So the question is that people have to remember to ask themselves, so if we didn’t have language beyond the 50,000, what did we do for 1.95 million years? We looked into nature.

Nick McGowan (20:34.88)
Okay. Well, yeah. Okay.

Yeah.

Wei Houng (20:54.485)
We survive by looking into nature, understanding what we looked at, looking at each other and understand I can get along with you and not with you, not by language, not by words, but by how we each all physically show up in the world. This is why when they finally laid down country lines in the world, right, before, you know, before there were no country lines, everybody was just tri-being and nomadic, right? But when they finally decided, okay, let’s lay down country lines.

It’s not after they lay down country lines, people started to kind of look similar to each other. We were already doing that because we naturally understood like everything else in nature, how to naturally tribe with what resonates with us. Our technology is kind of like a revival of that. It’s an opportunity. We created an opportunity for human beings to reconnect back to nature, bypass the distorted rhetoric of society and culture and language.

But now we do have a beautiful tool called language. So instead of having doing grunts and clicks to kind of figure out what nature is telling us, we can be even more precise. And that’s what we’ve done. We’ve taken that baseline built into our DNA, our genetics from last two million years of how to connect with nature and how to see each other through the objectivity of nature. And we’ve defined it through language, objective language, so that we don’t have to ever

go back to saying, okay, well, I mean, it’s like this, it’s like most of us have grown up to some degree where parents or teachers or society has pushed us in a direction that like, or manipulate us whatever to do something that deep down inside was like, that doesn’t resonate with me. School doesn’t resonate, at least the way school is doesn’t resonate with me. And it’s because our core, the nature of ourselves is trying to communicate something to us.

Nick McGowan (22:36.494)
Mm-hmm.

Wei Houng (22:48.341)
Before though, we didn’t have any way to quantify it. We didn’t have any way to define it. But now we do. This technology, 20 years of research, we patented about 10 years ago. For the last 20 years, we’ve been doing it on a consultative model. And what frustrated me more than anything was that we were doing it behind a huge paywall. Only those who could afford it could have access to this. So who do we have? Celebrities, pro athletes, Olympians, Fortune 10, one companies.

Nick McGowan (22:51.171)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (23:18.097)
having access to this. But in my mind, what deep down inside is like, you know, this is like, this is like the holy grail of human understanding, every human being needs to have access to this. And that’s why last year we pivoted hard and we just made it freely available on a basic level for everyone.

Nick McGowan (23:34.306)
And that’s the way to do it. mean, accessibility is so huge. I joke with people at different times that I’m so tired of the coaches who coach coaches about other coaches, about coaching coaches who coach cockroaches. And they sell every fucking thing at $10,000 or more. And then as soon as they sell you something, you’re instantly dropped into a funnel and a whole fucking scheme to get you to buy more things because you didn’t get enough and FOMO and it’s all manipulation and just

Wei Houng (23:46.645)
Hahaha, yeah.

Nick McGowan (24:01.762)
going at your nervous system. When this stuff, yeah, and this stuff needs to be accessible to people, I still think there’s a little bit to be said of that saying, and I heard this a long time ago, if people don’t pay, they’re not gonna pay attention. Sure, but do you also, if somebody is in such a spot where they are hungry for it, they are ready to do the work, it doesn’t matter. Like if they don’t have the money, don’t let that stop them. Help them actually be able to do the work and get into it. And that’s

Wei Houng (24:03.157)
Yeah, distorted capitalism.

Wei Houng (24:14.005)
Yeah, they have skin in the game, right?

Nick McGowan (24:31.244)
ripple effect will change throughout. think even you talk about parents or people that I’m glad you said manipulation too, because that’s exactly where my mind went was like, sometimes they will be like, well, I couldn’t do it. So many me should. And this is what I want with your life. And there are also some basic things where I think from a parental perspective, and I don’t have any kids, but my parents did things to me because they thought it was the right thing to do based on how they were. Correct.

Wei Houng (24:45.291)
Right. Yeah.

Wei Houng (24:56.885)
Yeah, I mean, they’re not malintended. They’re not manipulating out of like, that’s just like, they’re trying to mess you up. They’re doing the best they can. And that’s what everybody’s doing, right?

Nick McGowan (25:04.216)
Correct. Yeah. And the more that we learn about ourselves, I think that those people can then say, well, maybe you’re a little different. Like I’m an emotional person and just use my dad as an example. He’s a logical person. Like he’s a thinker. I’m a feeler. And for 35 years, he was like, think, think, think, think, use your brain. Literally took me to the age of 35 to go, hold up, Pop. I have to feel everything first beforehand. And he was like, I don’t understand it.

Wei Houng (25:11.989)
Yeah. Yeah.

Wei Houng (25:26.335)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (25:30.658)
And we had a great conversation to say like, I have to feel it and then think about it. You have to think about it. And then maybe at some point potentially feel it, but like that’s way far off. but those people will say, I’m smart. I’m intelligent. I think this is the way to go about it. And we all do that where it sounds like this approach is more so a, I have a better understanding of myself. Therefore I have different questions to ask of other people to learn more about them. So what sort of stuff have you seen of the people that have gone through?

Wei Houng (25:38.229)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (25:52.619)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (25:57.644)
the younger versions of it, the newer versions of all of it, and like some of those stories to be able to say, you know what, the way that I moved about in the world was different than my way of being now because of how I am and what I understand.

Wei Houng (26:09.301)
Yeah, no, we just to I think it was last week, we had that workshop about communication styles. And our technology defines that I mean, there’s a bunch of categories defines and one of them, what you’re talking about is so intelligent. And that’s the cool thing about our technology and validates for most people who are practicing self awareness, it validates so much. And there’s something about when science validates someone, they’re more likely to lean into it more versus another human being telling them and validating it.

And what you were describing, for example, you being, it’s like the perfect word. You’re emotionally centered. That’s your communication stuff. For you, it’s all about feeling into the decision, right? How does it feel for you? And that part of you also is it likes the tactile things. You you’re like a feel shopper, like you have to touch it and feel it before you can buy it. Right.

Nick McGowan (26:59.224)
Mm-hmm furniture butt test

Wei Houng (27:02.301)
Yeah, exactly. And so for you, like in the face of conflict, you tend to emote first because it’s about the emotions that help you process through things. And it sounds like your dad is the other communication style that we call intellectual centered. Those are the people who ask a ton of questions. Things need to make sense before they take action on anything. For you, if it feels good, then you’re probably going to take action on it. For your dad, he probably has to do his due diligence. He has to ask his questions. And then finally, when that all makes sense to him, then he’ll take action.

Nothing wrong with either. It’s just unique to that human being. And there’s a whole sequence. It’s a whole decoding sequence. There’s four of them, actually. There’s instinctual standard, which is all about the gut. And there’s also moving standard, those people who need to move into their decision. And people were a combination of all four. It just depends on the order. And so that’s our unique process of making decisions, learning and going through life and connecting to the moment. So, you know, that’s just an example of what our technology has been able to do.

Especially I just had this conversation with a couple the other day where they were they were struggling on understanding each other because when when they didn’t realize that they each had very different levels of refinement, they had different motivational drivers that drove them. One of them didn’t need the spotlight, didn’t need attention. She thrived in being of the hold space for people. Her partner actually

was fed by being able to share their gifts in the spotlight, to present and to do all those different and perform, right? And so she didn’t understand why he needed to do all that. And then he didn’t understand why she couldn’t understand him, right? But when they had that time to access the results of their technology, which only takes 10 minutes, it really takes 10 minutes and it’s all in your app or on your platform. And then they dove into it. And then I had some time with them to talk to them to help them get a deeper understanding of it.

She said this was the most, going home, that this was the most alive he’s been in so long, because he had zombied out in life, basically.

Wei Houng (29:07.007)
So these are the, and don’t even get me started of the work we’ve been able to do with young adults and kids who are struggling to just figure themselves out and fit in to this world, right? For a long time I was working with these red zone kids and I call them red zone because we’re talking about drugs, alcohol and suicide. And the sad thing is because we’re not your traditional therapists, psychologists, counselor, whatever the case may be, we end up being like nothing’s working.

then they get a referral to us, right? We’re like the last resort. And I remember I had this kid who, you know, was talking about suicide every day. And then his parents didn’t know what to do. They had a lot of money, they were well to do, but no resource was helping. And then they got a referral to me from a friend of mine who knew the parents.

And my requisite for those types of dynamics is the whole family takes the assessment so the whole family can just can get to see how unique everyone actually is. And sure enough, the parents, they were built like high performance engine. Dad was a Ferrari. Mom was a Maserati. And sure enough, they gave birth to a Prius. And they were trying to run that Prius like they run their own lives. And the kid was burning out. he just started high school.

Nick McGowan (30:07.96)
Thanks

Yeah.

Wei Houng (30:31.333)
And what happened was when we went through a part, there’s a section there around the motivational drivers where it illuminates. You need to have an average amount of mental engagement in order to be healthy. What happens is if it’s too elevated, then it’s hard to focus. And if it gets super elevated. So just to give you a little context, the healthy range we like to see is anywhere from 25 to 18 to 25 voices, right? Voices.

chatter so that there’s engagement, there’s, you know, stuff that you can do. Too low, then you’re totally disengaged from life. That a lot of people who over meditate that happens. Then there are people who are checked out of their jobs and they just don’t want to engage anymore. So they’re just disengaged. And this is how we help, you know, organizations reintroduce higher levels of engagement. We identify those who are disengaged and we optimize them, right? So the kid had 42 voices.

Nick McGowan (31:12.76)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (31:27.477)
And I told the parents in that meeting and the parent goes, that doesn’t make any sense. And the kid stood up and said, that makes 100 % sense. This is why I want to die. I can’t escape my voices no matter where you guys take me. And they just sat there and they’re like, and so we began working together and it was such a, it was such an acute situation. was seeing him twice a week. But the thing is what I love of our technology, because we, because we take the guesswork out of it and create a blueprint that’s unique for every human being.

We take the complexity out of the solution. our philosophy is this, nature in general, life in general, is either easy or hard, but it fluctuates, right? Life gets hard, life gets easy, life gets hard. Simplicity and complexity is not part of nature, that’s a human-made construct. Complexity was introduced to help establish value for a human being doing a simple task so they can kind of preserve their place in the corporate world.

The more complicated they made the process that they’re responsible for and they’re the only ones that can execute it. Well, guess what? Job security, right? But if you look at most of these types of solutions and you take the complexity out of it, it’s actually really simple. Nothing in life, nothing in nature is complicated. Everything is simple. Human beings like to make it complicated to establish self-value and self-worth.

Nick McGowan (32:26.382)
job security.

Wei Houng (32:44.065)
So what our technology does, it takes the complexity out of what it means to optimize yourself and lean into your most optimal version of yourself, your nature. Create a simplicity of the understanding around it. But it doesn’t mean we take away the hardness and the difficulty of doing that because now you’re fighting against society. You’re fighting against the matrix to be able to get to your core natural self. And so the parents says, well, what does he have to do? It’s like,

feed his drivers and only his drivers. He’s trying to feed too many drivers right now and that’s why it’s going like going crazy. And they’re like, that’s it. I was like, that’s it. I said, okay. So for the first couple of weeks, we were just saying every day he came in and said, what did you do to feed your drivers today? What did you do to feed your drivers today? Right? There’s only two, right? And then two weeks later, stopped talking about suicide. Five months later, it became a 5.0 student. And then by the time he got through high school, he got into the college of his choice.

studied abroad like he was saying since day one and then came back and you graduated now from college got this beautiful card from him thanking me for like helping him on so many different levels and then you know it’s it’s it’s those things and all I did was put a real accurate mirror

of himself and helped him understand and use language to define himself so that he can then go out into the world and educate the world around him about his unique nature so he never had to buy into a rhetoric of having to fit in somewhere just to be liked, just to be accepted.

You know, it’s, it’s… The engineer in me over the last decade or so has been looking for that one time where a human being will take it and it’s completely off.

Wei Houng (34:32.257)
But because it’s based on things you can’t lie about, like your physical nature, like what color are your eyes, what color are your hair? I mean, all that means something. Nature gave us those clues to understand ourselves and understand others. We’ve just been ignoring it for the past 50,000 years because we thought language was the solution to it all. And now we’ve become kind of like atrophied around that muscle of understanding and seeing into nature. I mean, we’re still capable of it. I mean, we can look into nature and define things like a rock and then the color of things.

know that you don’t go hug a cactus, right? But we’ve forgotten how to do that for ourselves and it’s all there. Fortunately, right now we have a technology that can help define that for people so they don’t have to guess anymore. We can get back to connecting with nature.

Nick McGowan (35:05.166)
you

Nick McGowan (35:18.67)
I wonder how quickly after language started to really form that that shift happened like I Yeah, like

Wei Houng (35:28.169)
I think it was almost immediately. think Greek philosophers would laugh at humanity saying language was invented to lie to ourselves and others. That’s really good. And it’s still being used today. Right. So but again, like we you and I were talking about, it’s just a tool. So why not use the beautiful, powerful tool of language?

Nick McGowan (35:33.25)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Wei Houng (35:51.435)
to define nature in a way so that we can be connected back to that and see each other objectively through that lens again. That’s how we were able to survive for two million years, not language.

Nick McGowan (36:04.012)
Yeah, and even think from the tool perspective, like we ourselves are a tool, like we’re a soul spirit within this organism and we use it. But we oftentimes don’t actually think about that, which it’s funny to me how over close to 200 episodes at this point, everything ties back to self awareness. Like the more aware you are of things, sometimes it’s maddening because the more aware you are, the more aware you

Wei Houng (36:09.055)
Yeah, 100%.

Wei Houng (36:16.129)
Mm-hmm.

Wei Houng (36:32.671)
Yeah, once you see it, you can’t unsee it. That’s what we tell people all the time. We tell people that all the time.

Nick McGowan (36:32.738)
more where you are like, yeah, you can’t unsee it. Yeah. But being able to understand that we have these deep, innate pieces to us that we can then use and at least look at and say, well, what is this? What are you trying to tell me? What do I do with it? So, and I appreciate you going through all the work, doing all the things, understanding what your purpose is, and not shying away from that and diving deeper into it. One of the things that

I’ve understood about you that you haven’t even said it all. But you understand to me, it seems like you understand the importance of it. But you also understand that you literally have to put one step in front of the other and then help other people do the same thing. Because sometimes we can look at it go, my God, this is so big. It’s like, yeah, kind of, but calm down. Stay right here. Let’s just move along. And then you’ll start to add things up. I love how that stuff works out. You’re just going to keep building on it. So

Wei Houng (37:20.489)
Yeah. Right.

Wei Houng (37:29.289)
Yeah, well, a lot of people, a lot of people do that. They come to us and we, all of us here at Humanov, we have such big, big visions of what we want to do for the planet, what we want to do for humanity. And a lot of people, get overwhelmed as, I can’t be like you guys. We’re not asking you to. We’re doing it because we can. What we’re saying is this, is that if all you do every day is invest in being the best human being you can be.

Nick McGowan (37:46.326)
UU.

Wei Houng (37:56.553)
you are already contributing to making this world a better place. If you’re doing it from an objective standpoint, the way we’re talking about it, so that you kind of learn that about yourself, there’s a concept that I spent years traveling around the world talking about called nodal impact. Every human being is a node. And every time, if you look into the concepts around quantum entanglement, no matter who it is that you engage with, you’re going to shift and

add more color to your own frequency output. Like you and I after today’s conversation, we’re already going to go into the world differently than we did before we came into this conversation. And the next people or next set of people we come in contact with, we’re going to influence them. We’re going to impact them just from the quantum entangled you and I experience to kind of exchange the knowledge, knowledge, information, everything that we’re learning here. It’s just another form of frequency and energy.

And that then creates this ripple effect in our ecosystem, right? Because all these aha moments left and right is like, oh yeah, that, oh yeah, this. And then we take that and we go right outside and we just bathe the next person in that same frequency and energy. What does it mean? No matter what we say, we’re going to make an impact that way. So that’s what we say. Just be the best human being you can right now. Don’t worry about doing the big things to save the world. And already you’re making a huge difference.

Nick McGowan (39:21.134)
What a great way to put that. I’ve appreciated this conversation so much. I’m sure my hope is that somebody’s listening to this goes, you know what? Today up until this point has been this type of day. But from this point on, the rest of the day will be this because I want it to be that and some sort of hope to it. But not only a hope, just an understanding that we are uniquely us and we don’t have to be anybody else. We shouldn’t be. The world tells us different.

Wei Houng (39:48.651)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (39:50.22)
You should be doing these things. You should make all this money. You should have a white picket fence and you should do this and do that and like nonsense. It’s whatever you want it to be, but it’s also really whatever is deep inside of us to do. So man, I appreciate you being on and talking about all of this. What’s that piece of advice that you’d give to somebody that’s on their path towards self-mastery?

Wei Houng (40:05.889)
Yeah, my pleasure.

Wei Houng (40:11.041)
You know, we’re at a point right now, we’re about to come out beta stage. So I’m super excited to be able to say this because whereas before I would find some anecdotal thing where it’s not really actionable. And the beautiful thing is I insisted that this version that we come out, there is a free version of it. I would say, go, go take our assessment. It’s free and it’s based on physics and science, and it will give you a unique set of results so that you could today.

immediately go and get a profound resonant understanding of self that you can start to lean into. And it’s very, it’s not only answering the question of what you are, but it’s actually giving you steps on what to do with that. And it’s free. That’s the way I wanted it to be because that way I can, we can help more people without even having to like, you know, you have to call us and schedule a time. Forget it. Just go to our site, jump in, understand. And if you want to get more than

Nick McGowan (41:01.976)
Yeah, yeah. Jump in.

Wei Houng (41:08.117)
then yeah, you can certainly do more, but the basics, we didn’t hold back. We’re giving stuff that people used to pay us six figures for, and we’re giving that away. Why? Because this is probably the fastest path we can do to help as many people as possible be the best human they can be so the ripple effect can help make this world better, right?

Nick McGowan (41:27.915)
Awesome way to put them in. So before I let you go, where can people find you? Where can they connect with you? Where can they get that? Where can they go take that test?

Wei Houng (41:36.105)
Yeah, well, you and I talked about the miracle human connection. I love the miracle of human connection. Because if you think about eight billion people on the planet, what are the chances of connecting with any human being on any level, right? And we just have to remember to let go of the ego and arrogance of attaching some kind of like a label of what that connection is supposed to be. I’m supposed to hire him. this is supposed to be my client. No, you’re just another human being connecting with me. And let’s just look forward to how things will unfold.

Nick McGowan (41:45.347)
Yeah.

Wei Houng (42:03.883)
So you can connect with me on LinkedIn, but you can go to humanop.com and it will direct you to wherever you want to go, whether you have a business or whether it’s for yourself. There’s two pathways you can go down. If you’re local as to us here in California, Silicon Valley, come in for a free workshops that we do every week just to teach people how to use the data that they get from our results. And it’s free. Just come in and learn. You can meet us in person and everything like that.

If not, then just reach out on LinkedIn and we can coordinate and just connect and see where it goes from there. I mean, that’s really what I’m all about right now. I’m at a point in my life where it’s less about building that huge empire of business, but rather how do we create an impact? How do we create legacy? How do I put it forward? And we define those intervals of life too, by the way. So like, for example, Nick, you’re in the interval of empire creation. You’re stepping into adulthood right now, actually. 43 is adulthood. That’s what we found in our research. So hey, welcome to adulthood.

I’m actually just stepping out of that interval into what we call pay it forward. So that’s all defined in our research and our work and our science and the technology that we do. So just dive in, join our world. And if this resonates with you, we will be forever friends to be able to help anybody who wants to have that level of self-awareness. Anybody who is a fan of your podcast, I’ll tell you, I mean, that’s probably them.

Nick McGowan (43:24.536)
Yeah, and I really appreciate being on today and the depth that we’ve been able to get into. Thank you so much for being on.

Wei Houng (43:31.01)
Thank you for having me. This has been so fun.