O TYM ODCINKU
Episode 131 features Gregory Koplow and Dani Forrest in a candid conversation about following the inner voice, grief, reinvention, and the co‑creation of their book I Am Pink—born from transformative trips to Kauai.
Together they explore vulnerability, curiosity, and how saying yes to life’s invitations can open new paths—from creative collaboration and paint‑and‑sip entrepreneurship to embracing a more authentic, soulful life.
Gregory Copploe is an author, business owner, artist, keynote speaker and entrepreneur. He is the CEO of the team building company Stir Up The Paint. He received his B.A. in Theatre Arts and Marketing from UCLA. A former television actor and entertainment marketing executive, Mr. Copploe mentors and supports individuals and groups looking to increase personal and professional connectivity and growth.
www.gregorycopploe.com
Dani Forrest, a writer from about the age of eight. The earliest work consisted of incredibly optimistic, stapled-together notebook-paper books about girls who had dogs and horses and who lived in worlds where pluckiness always saved the day—and usually resulted in additional dogs and horses.
Whatever else came later, the writing part stuck. In ninth grade, an English teacher, Mr. White—who more routinely shamed her for gum-chewing and other in-class faux pas—singled her out in front of her classmates for her ability. That moment stuck too, and she remains grateful for the motivation, forgiving him for the rest.
She majored in English at Wellesley College, largely to receive credit for the reading and writing she would have done anyway. When she told her Honors Thesis professor, Jon Polito, that she planned to attend law school, he looked at her and said, “Oh, dear. I really wish you wouldn’t.”
She did. Law school happened. Actual lawyering, not so much. A few other career detours followed. Throughout it all, the writing continued—mostly in the form of journaling.
That journaling eventually inspired a book, which took shape largely after her husband passed away in 2017. The result was 52 Pickup: Life in Perfect Disorder. Published earlier but written later was I Am Pink, co-written with her friend and fellow seeker Gregory Copploe. There will be more, because writing—along with moving her body—is the one thing that keeps her from losing her mind and also brings her joy.
She lives in California with three irritable cats and a very definite sense of possibility.
https://www.amazon.com/I-Am-Pink-Gregory-Copploe-ebook/dp/B0C68J2VX4?ref_=ast_author_dp&th=1&psc=1#customerReviews
POKAŻ NOTATKI 🔗
TRANSKRYPCJA 🔗
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My late husband and I had gone to Kauai a lot together.
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And Greg was like, well, what about Kauai?
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I said, oh, I don't know.
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You know, I was there and I scattered
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my husband's ashes there.
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I'm thinking maybe I'm done with that place.
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And he's like, no, I don't know.
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So we actually went back to, we went to Kauai together,
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Greg and I, we stayed at a different part of the island
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and it was a completely different experience.
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It was like a new island to me.
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And we just had these very intense spiritual experiences,
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nature experiences there together.
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And we went again and a couple of months later,
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we loved it so much.
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And after that second trip, I think,
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Greg was inspired to put together a story
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about finding oneself.
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This is Unconditioning,
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discovering the voice within with Whitney and Jenkins.
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Hello, and welcome to the 131st episode
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of Unconditioning, discovering the voice within,
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where I bring on guests and we talk about
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the inner authentic voice and the challenges
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and the rewards that come from following it.
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This episode, I have with me,
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Gregory Koplow and Danny Forrest.
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Gregory is an author, business owner,
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artist, keynote speaker, and entrepreneur.
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He is the CEO of the team building company,
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Stir Up The Paint.
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And he received his BA in theater arts
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and marketing from UCLA.
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A former television actor
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and entertainment marketing executive,
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Mr. Koplow mentors and supports individuals and groups
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looking to increase personal
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and professional connectivity and growth.
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Danny Forrest is a writer from about the age of eight.
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The earliest work consisted of incredibly optimistic,
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stapled together notebook paper books
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about girls who had dogs and horses
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and who lived in worlds where pluckiness
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always saved the day
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and usually resulted in additional dogs and horses.
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Whatever else came later,
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the writing part stuck.
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In ninth grade, an English teacher
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who more routinely shamed her for gum chewing
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and other in-class faux pas singled her out
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in front of her classmates for her ability.
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That moment stuck too.
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And she remains grateful for the motivation,
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forgiving him for the rest.
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She majored in English at Wellesley College,
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largely to receive credit for the reading and writing
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that she would have done anyway.
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And when she told her honors thesis professor,
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John Polito, that she planned to attend law school,
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he looked at her and said,
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"'Oh dear, I really wish you wouldn't.'"
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But she did.
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Law school happened, actual lawyering not so much,
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and a few other career detours followed.
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Throughout it all, the writing continued
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mostly in the form of journaling.
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The journaling eventually inspired a book
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which took shape largely
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after her husband passed away in 2017.
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The result was 52 Pickup, Life in Perfect Disorder.
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She and Gregory co-wrote a book called I Am Pink,
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which is an uplifting narrative
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that celebrates the courage and bravery
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found in embracing vulnerability
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and surrendering to the transformative power of letting go.
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This book was largely a conversation
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about the personal histories of how they came together
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and developed in the process of this book
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and how it came to life.
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And so here is my conversation with Gregory and Dani,
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and I hope you enjoy.
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Greg, could you share a little bit
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about how you are working together?
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You wanna go or?
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Well, yeah, Greg and I met,
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I would say probably 1994, 1995.
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We both worked at an entertainment company
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called Saban Entertainment.
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That was a children's entertainment company at the time
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that came up with the concept for Power Rangers
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or the Japanese concept
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that they then made for American audience,
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which was anyone who had kids or grandkids
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now know how huge that was back in the 90s.
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So I started out as an assistant to the CEO
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and Greg started out working in the licensing department.
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And we both grew through the company together.
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We received promotions and we were instrumental
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in helping to run
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what became the children's entertainment division.
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And we really connected then.
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And then over time,
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we both sort of diverted into other multiple areas,
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each of us.
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And we came together again rather intensely
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when I was going through the process
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of losing my late husband, Paul.
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He became ill and Greg and I started speaking again.
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We had reconnected to a mutual friend.
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And then after my husband passed,
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when Greg and I traveled together,
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we just found a real nourishing connection.
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And out of that connection,
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one of our trips to Kauai is when I Am Pink was born.
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So our connection has been collaborative.
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It's been friendship.
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It's been sort of spiritual soulmates.
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It's kind of been a little bit of everything
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and it's been really, really lovely
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and I think very uplifting for both of us.
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Yeah, it sounds like.
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So I usually start off the conversation
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with this one question
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and it's usually like on an individual basis.
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So I'm trying to figure out how I can frame this
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so that it applies to both of you at the same time.
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And maybe we can do this individually.
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Yeah, it's okay if it doesn't feel.
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Maybe we can come back to your joint story in a minute
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because I do wanna hear both of you how this applies
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because I think it's relevant
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to how you got to where you are now and rejoined.
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So I like to ask first off,
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because this podcast is about following your inner voice
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or your authenticity.
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Like what is the first time
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that you can remember recognizing
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that you had this inner voice
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or this inner guidance system of your own
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that you were able to follow and recognize?
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And Danny, if you wanna go first
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or Greg, either one of you.
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Well, I think Greg should go since I already said something.
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So Greg, you start.
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Awesome, thank you.
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I started taking a hypnosis class to be certified
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at UCLA in college in the late 80s
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and was kind of at this point
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that I was learning a little bit more
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about the mind and the spirit.
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And I was dating a girl that I was engaged to
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and I was doing very sort of like childlike,
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what a guy would do in his 20s that's not mature,
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very materialistic, leaving like Gucci hang tags
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and things like a restaurant,
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like as a tip and being just completely not connected
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with humanity at all really,
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just really thinking that money was everything
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and shopping only in Beverly Hills.
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And my girlfriend kind of helped guide me a little bit.
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And then it was like at that moment
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that I started to get more in touch with my mortality.
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And I think that's what changed things
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is I had a friend who was in a very bad accident at UCLA
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and he was in a coma for a couple of weeks
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and I almost lost him.
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And I just started thinking about,
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what are you doing?
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What is this journey that you're taking?
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You seem really empty inside,
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don't really understand what love is,
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though you are intertwined in what you think
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and believe are loving relationships.
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You're maneuvering and manipulating things
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that don't feel good when I look in the mirror.
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And I think it was at that point in college
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during this hypnosis session
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when we were meditating,
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that I started to realize that
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maybe I'm just not really a good person
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and that's not who I wanna be.
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And I started to shift my energy at that point
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and start to learn more.
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I was really hungry about just sort of like,
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what can I learn?
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How can I be better?
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How can I change and shift this journey
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and create a different ripple effect?
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Because right now I don't really like what I'm seeing.
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So I think that was the beginning for me,
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that inner voice started to become
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a little bit more vibrant for me.
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Yeah, that's really aware for a college student
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in my opinion, so good for you.
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Thanks, well, I think when you see the dark side,
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you see the dark side of yourself
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and you almost lose someone,
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you get shaken up a little bit,
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go through a little bit of trauma.
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It's not too difficult to jump to the other side
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if you're able to see what's happening
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and you're not stuck in that mindset
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that you weren't before,
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that you're open to something new.
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But it was just, I think for me,
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it was just really like looking in the mirror
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and not enjoying what I was seeing.
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It was all very superficial.
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I was attractive, my body looked great.
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Everything was just exterior.
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There was nothing I was building inside
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and it just felt very empty.
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Even in my relationship, the woman I was engaged to,
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it just felt very empty.
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I was going through what our book is about, I Am Pink.
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I was going through the formula
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of what we're supposed to do in life.
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Get a girlfriend, go to college,
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get this great job, do this stuff.
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And it wasn't feeling good.
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It wasn't aligning.
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I didn't know why I was doing those things.
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I was just told to do them and I did them
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and I was left really empty at that point.
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And luckily I got in touch with it early,
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but yeah, I guess some people wait a little longer.
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It's okay.
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As long as we could.
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What was your connection to religion or spirituality
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as you were growing up in your life?
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Interesting.
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So my mom's Jewish, my dad's Italian Catholic.
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So I went to synagogue on Saturday
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and Catholic school on Sunday.
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So that was interesting.
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Jesus wasn't involved and then Jesus was everything.
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So I started to realize very early on
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that religion is man-made
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and kind of like take the golden nuggets
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from it that you can.
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So in college, I was a Christian.
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I accepted Jesus Christ in my heart and I did all that.
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And it felt really good.
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I was aligned with it because it made me better.
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I was in tune and in touch with being a better person.
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And I thought that was Christianity that was doing that
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when in fact it was me taking my own action to do that.
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00:10:13,080 --> 00:10:13,919
But it's okay.
249
00:10:13,919 --> 00:10:15,840
Now I say, love is my religion.
250
00:10:15,840 --> 00:10:16,679
That's what I say.
251
00:10:16,679 --> 00:10:19,719
When people ask me, say, love is my religion.
252
00:10:19,719 --> 00:10:22,400
And that's not to put down anything that's man-made.
253
00:10:22,880 --> 00:10:25,599
It's just that I'm not really aligned
254
00:10:25,599 --> 00:10:28,159
with any religion anymore.
255
00:10:28,159 --> 00:10:32,479
I'm aligned with the love in each place that religion has.
256
00:10:32,479 --> 00:10:34,799
I'm aligned with that.
257
00:10:34,799 --> 00:10:37,719
And so every religion offers that semblance
258
00:10:37,719 --> 00:10:40,520
in place of love and I connect there.
259
00:10:40,520 --> 00:10:42,000
Yeah, excellent.
260
00:10:42,000 --> 00:10:44,760
Okay, Dani, do you want to give your version of this story?
261
00:10:44,760 --> 00:10:45,599
Sure.
262
00:10:46,559 --> 00:10:49,320
I think, and this is true of a lot of people,
263
00:10:49,320 --> 00:10:52,440
I think are very authentic and very in touch
264
00:10:52,440 --> 00:10:55,400
with themselves and with the collective
265
00:10:55,400 --> 00:10:57,280
when they're very small children.
266
00:10:57,280 --> 00:10:59,400
Because when you're young, you're close to the source.
267
00:10:59,400 --> 00:11:01,960
And over time, it happened to me,
268
00:11:01,960 --> 00:11:03,880
happens to a lot of people,
269
00:11:03,880 --> 00:11:08,119
that connectivity, that self-knowledge,
270
00:11:08,119 --> 00:11:10,280
and that okayness with being who you are
271
00:11:10,280 --> 00:11:12,679
just gets beaten out of you by family,
272
00:11:12,679 --> 00:11:15,200
by society, by peer groups,
273
00:11:15,200 --> 00:11:19,119
by all the ways in which the collective
274
00:11:19,119 --> 00:11:21,479
doesn't want to deal with its shadow.
275
00:11:21,479 --> 00:11:25,440
And so I always felt from a very young age
276
00:11:25,440 --> 00:11:27,599
connected to the things that I love now,
277
00:11:27,599 --> 00:11:32,599
metaphysics, writing, creativity, animals.
278
00:11:32,880 --> 00:11:37,159
But I grew up in a family where those types of things
279
00:11:37,159 --> 00:11:38,479
weren't really valued.
280
00:11:38,479 --> 00:11:41,640
My father was a very powerful force in my life.
281
00:11:41,640 --> 00:11:42,479
He was an attorney.
282
00:11:42,479 --> 00:11:43,479
I went to law school.
283
00:11:43,520 --> 00:11:45,479
I practiced law for a while.
284
00:11:45,479 --> 00:11:50,159
It was vastly unnourishing.
285
00:11:50,159 --> 00:11:52,479
I felt that I had the mind for it,
286
00:11:52,479 --> 00:11:53,799
but not the nature for it.
287
00:11:53,799 --> 00:11:57,799
And so I had to spend decades kind of unlearning
288
00:11:57,799 --> 00:12:00,559
and peeling off all of that stuff
289
00:12:00,559 --> 00:12:04,159
that had sort of been, that I allowed to be slapped on me.
290
00:12:04,159 --> 00:12:07,760
And I can't really point to any one day
291
00:12:07,760 --> 00:12:10,599
or any one moment when it hit me.
292
00:12:10,640 --> 00:12:14,000
I've had a series of losses in my life.
293
00:12:15,119 --> 00:12:19,159
And each time I had one, whether it was a grandparent,
294
00:12:19,159 --> 00:12:23,440
a pet, most recently my late husband,
295
00:12:23,440 --> 00:12:26,599
it just brought me closer to that knowledge
296
00:12:26,599 --> 00:12:30,039
that relatively speaking, we each have 15 minutes here.
297
00:12:30,039 --> 00:12:33,159
So why would I want to spend any one moment
298
00:12:33,159 --> 00:12:36,400
not in pursuit of what nourishes me
299
00:12:36,400 --> 00:12:38,520
and what I feel aligned with?
300
00:12:38,520 --> 00:12:43,520
And as far as my religion, yes, love absolutely.
301
00:12:44,039 --> 00:12:49,039
I've been, I had a deep interest in astrology, numerology,
302
00:12:49,239 --> 00:12:51,359
all sorts of things since I was about eight years old.
303
00:12:51,359 --> 00:12:54,559
And I started to read up almost as if I'd had a past life
304
00:12:54,559 --> 00:12:57,200
where I knew this, it just came right back to me.
305
00:12:57,200 --> 00:12:59,840
But I would say right now, the older I get
306
00:12:59,840 --> 00:13:03,239
and the crazier the collective reality gets,
307
00:13:03,239 --> 00:13:04,280
yeah, love is always there,
308
00:13:04,280 --> 00:13:06,520
but my religion is really curiosity at this point,
309
00:13:06,520 --> 00:13:09,280
because I don't think that there can really be
310
00:13:09,280 --> 00:13:12,520
any firm basis for either faith or authenticity
311
00:13:12,520 --> 00:13:15,039
without the ability to ask questions
312
00:13:15,039 --> 00:13:17,159
and to constantly revise what it is
313
00:13:17,159 --> 00:13:18,520
that I think I'm about,
314
00:13:18,520 --> 00:13:20,200
but I think the world is about,
315
00:13:20,200 --> 00:13:23,239
that the conversations I think that need to be had.
316
00:13:23,239 --> 00:13:27,200
I'm evolving, my people around me are evolving
317
00:13:27,200 --> 00:13:30,239
and to maintain a healthy sense of curiosity
318
00:13:30,239 --> 00:13:33,119
about, I don't know what I know,
319
00:13:33,119 --> 00:13:35,000
but more importantly, I don't know what I don't know.
320
00:13:35,000 --> 00:13:36,359
And I'm always in a position
321
00:13:36,359 --> 00:13:38,599
where I want to be receptive to that.
322
00:13:38,599 --> 00:13:43,280
So I would say, although I was born and raised a Catholic,
323
00:13:43,280 --> 00:13:45,200
I do go to mass, but I take what I like
324
00:13:45,200 --> 00:13:46,080
and I leave the rest.
325
00:13:46,080 --> 00:13:47,919
I kind of want to be like a bee
326
00:13:47,919 --> 00:13:49,400
that's going from flower to flower,
327
00:13:49,400 --> 00:13:51,520
gathering a little nectar from each place.
328
00:13:51,520 --> 00:13:53,599
That's kind of the place that I'm at,
329
00:13:53,599 --> 00:13:57,440
is to try to get to a belief system
330
00:13:57,440 --> 00:13:59,359
that kind of transcends all belief systems,
331
00:13:59,359 --> 00:14:00,320
if you know what I mean.
332
00:14:00,320 --> 00:14:01,479
Absolutely, yeah.
333
00:14:03,239 --> 00:14:06,320
The system is something that I've been thinking about
334
00:14:06,320 --> 00:14:09,919
a lot myself recently of how we can be authentic
335
00:14:09,919 --> 00:14:11,840
within the system and be in the system,
336
00:14:11,840 --> 00:14:14,320
but not of the system and the universe,
337
00:14:14,320 --> 00:14:17,039
the ultimate system above all systems.
338
00:14:17,919 --> 00:14:20,760
But what stood out to me in both of your stories
339
00:14:20,760 --> 00:14:25,080
is it seems that the idea of the impermanence of life
340
00:14:25,080 --> 00:14:28,080
sort of shifted things for you to focus more
341
00:14:28,080 --> 00:14:33,080
on what you authentically would love to explore in this life.
342
00:14:33,559 --> 00:14:36,440
Absolutely, I think a lot of people,
343
00:14:36,440 --> 00:14:39,440
and there are people in Greg's and my age group,
344
00:14:39,440 --> 00:14:44,039
and I'm astounded at how they still seem to think
345
00:14:44,039 --> 00:14:46,479
they have all this time left
346
00:14:46,479 --> 00:14:51,479
and there's still so much drama and discomfort
347
00:14:51,799 --> 00:14:55,640
and a willingness to just not fully occupy themselves,
348
00:14:55,640 --> 00:14:59,559
even though once you're at this point in life,
349
00:14:59,559 --> 00:15:00,919
you've got way more time behind you
350
00:15:00,919 --> 00:15:01,880
than you do in front of you.
351
00:15:01,880 --> 00:15:04,320
So absolutely, the impermanence is something
352
00:15:04,320 --> 00:15:06,440
that is never, ever far from my mind.
353
00:15:07,679 --> 00:15:10,000
And also interesting that you were working
354
00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:13,520
for a children's production company,
355
00:15:13,520 --> 00:15:14,640
is that right, together?
356
00:15:14,640 --> 00:15:15,479
Yes.
357
00:15:15,479 --> 00:15:17,760
That's that inner child theme emerging
358
00:15:17,760 --> 00:15:20,559
and being connected to that in your day-to-day life.
359
00:15:20,559 --> 00:15:22,000
How was that for you?
360
00:15:23,000 --> 00:15:26,200
Well, I love toys.
361
00:15:26,200 --> 00:15:29,000
If I'm around little girls and they have Barbie dolls,
362
00:15:29,000 --> 00:15:30,320
I'll get right down on the floor with them
363
00:15:30,320 --> 00:15:32,280
because I remember how much I loved them.
364
00:15:32,280 --> 00:15:36,000
And it was very healing in a way,
365
00:15:36,000 --> 00:15:39,679
because at the same time that I was moving up in the company,
366
00:15:39,679 --> 00:15:42,000
there was a playfulness.
367
00:15:42,000 --> 00:15:43,559
And it was such a silly show
368
00:15:43,559 --> 00:15:45,559
that you really couldn't take it seriously.
369
00:15:45,559 --> 00:15:48,039
I mean, they're just basically taking Japanese footage
370
00:15:48,039 --> 00:15:51,239
and intercutting it with very flimsy storylines
371
00:15:51,400 --> 00:15:52,799
and then shooting it out in the woods.
372
00:15:52,799 --> 00:15:53,640
With Ventura.
373
00:15:53,640 --> 00:15:55,840
With the dirt in Ventura.
374
00:15:55,840 --> 00:15:57,599
So it was just very whimsical.
375
00:15:57,599 --> 00:16:00,119
And if I were working there now,
376
00:16:00,119 --> 00:16:01,960
I'd be a lot more charmed because I'd be like,
377
00:16:01,960 --> 00:16:03,840
oh my God, this is so ridiculous.
378
00:16:03,840 --> 00:16:07,000
But it's so ridiculous that it's freeing in a way.
379
00:16:08,960 --> 00:16:09,799
What about you, Greg?
380
00:16:09,799 --> 00:16:10,640
How was that?
381
00:16:10,640 --> 00:16:11,599
What was that experience like for you?
382
00:16:11,599 --> 00:16:13,760
Yeah, I mean, I've been a camp counselor.
383
00:16:13,760 --> 00:16:17,119
I was at a Bob Mathias Olympic sports camp with kids.
384
00:16:17,119 --> 00:16:19,000
I'm writing a children's book.
385
00:16:19,000 --> 00:16:20,799
I'm connected to my inner child.
386
00:16:21,479 --> 00:16:22,320
Big time.
387
00:16:23,280 --> 00:16:24,119
You know, I loved it.
388
00:16:24,119 --> 00:16:24,960
I stayed in it.
389
00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:25,840
I worked 25 years.
390
00:16:25,840 --> 00:16:28,520
I became a director of special events at Sony Pictures,
391
00:16:28,520 --> 00:16:29,760
consumer products division.
392
00:16:29,760 --> 00:16:34,760
So I worked in toys and got to know everybody for decades.
393
00:16:35,200 --> 00:16:36,080
And it was fun.
394
00:16:36,080 --> 00:16:36,919
It was fun.
395
00:16:36,919 --> 00:16:38,559
We got tours of, you know, you'd go to Toy Fair,
396
00:16:38,559 --> 00:16:39,400
it's called Toy Fair,
397
00:16:39,400 --> 00:16:41,039
and you'd go into New York
398
00:16:41,039 --> 00:16:42,919
and you'd go through the toy building
399
00:16:42,919 --> 00:16:43,919
and you'd go floor to floor
400
00:16:43,919 --> 00:16:45,400
and you'd go to Hasbro and Mattel
401
00:16:45,400 --> 00:16:46,280
and it was all secret,
402
00:16:46,280 --> 00:16:49,479
all their new stuff that they were releasing in the future.
403
00:16:49,479 --> 00:16:50,719
It was fun.
404
00:16:51,440 --> 00:16:52,440
But I've always been a kid.
405
00:16:52,440 --> 00:16:55,039
I don't think I've really ever grown up.
406
00:16:55,039 --> 00:16:57,000
I'm always just really childlike.
407
00:16:57,000 --> 00:16:59,440
One of the things that sort of annoys
408
00:16:59,440 --> 00:17:01,359
some of my friends that are no longer friends
409
00:17:01,359 --> 00:17:03,760
because, you know, I only want support around me,
410
00:17:03,760 --> 00:17:05,079
was that they would say to me,
411
00:17:05,079 --> 00:17:06,160
you know, God, it's like,
412
00:17:06,160 --> 00:17:07,560
you've seen it for the first time.
413
00:17:07,560 --> 00:17:08,400
I go to the ocean.
414
00:17:08,400 --> 00:17:11,680
I'm like, oh, like, wow.
415
00:17:11,680 --> 00:17:13,160
Did you see that wave?
416
00:17:13,160 --> 00:17:15,160
I'm like, oh my God, there's a pelican.
417
00:17:15,160 --> 00:17:16,000
My friends are like,
418
00:17:16,000 --> 00:17:17,439
have you not seen a pelican before?
419
00:17:17,439 --> 00:17:19,079
I'm like, I have.
420
00:17:19,079 --> 00:17:20,319
I have seen a pelican before,
421
00:17:20,959 --> 00:17:23,640
but I'm really enjoying this moment and the smells
422
00:17:23,640 --> 00:17:27,439
and I'm reliving it all over again in the present moment.
423
00:17:27,439 --> 00:17:30,160
And it's different and it's very alive.
424
00:17:30,160 --> 00:17:33,319
And a lot of people that bothered them
425
00:17:33,319 --> 00:17:36,599
because they couldn't find that space within themselves.
426
00:17:36,599 --> 00:17:38,640
And, you know, I let them go.
427
00:17:38,640 --> 00:17:41,599
So yeah, I've been a big kid most of my life.
428
00:17:41,599 --> 00:17:43,199
And my childhood wasn't great.
429
00:17:43,199 --> 00:17:47,199
So I think, you know, I was forced to be an adult,
430
00:17:47,199 --> 00:17:49,479
you know, at a very young age,
431
00:17:49,760 --> 00:17:51,640
kind of like putting my dad's lunch together
432
00:17:51,640 --> 00:17:53,640
at the age of six, kind of managing the house.
433
00:17:53,640 --> 00:17:56,119
It was really, really strange.
434
00:17:56,119 --> 00:17:58,760
So when I went off to college, I just, you know,
435
00:17:58,760 --> 00:17:59,680
I kind of went crazy.
436
00:17:59,680 --> 00:18:02,199
I became a kid for the first time.
437
00:18:02,199 --> 00:18:04,800
And I did, I managed my own time,
438
00:18:04,800 --> 00:18:06,959
which is something I never got to do before.
439
00:18:06,959 --> 00:18:09,239
So, you know, I went crazy.
440
00:18:09,239 --> 00:18:11,520
Thank God they didn't have social media then.
441
00:18:11,520 --> 00:18:14,880
Cause I had like, I remember waking up in my underwear,
442
00:18:14,880 --> 00:18:16,439
like under a bush or something.
443
00:18:16,880 --> 00:18:19,800
It's like, thank you that we didn't have social media,
444
00:18:19,800 --> 00:18:21,000
but it was fun.
445
00:18:21,000 --> 00:18:23,640
You know, I don't regret any of it.
446
00:18:23,640 --> 00:18:25,920
And I think Dani and I just talked about this
447
00:18:25,920 --> 00:18:28,640
the other day that we're intertwined with certain people
448
00:18:28,640 --> 00:18:30,520
for a season or a reason, whatever.
449
00:18:30,520 --> 00:18:33,520
And then I love what Dani said that she says, you know,
450
00:18:33,520 --> 00:18:35,800
and then the contract's done.
451
00:18:35,800 --> 00:18:37,319
This really was so freeing to me.
452
00:18:37,319 --> 00:18:38,959
She said, Greg, you know what?
453
00:18:38,959 --> 00:18:41,560
Why are you trying to revisit and revise
454
00:18:41,560 --> 00:18:43,199
and do something with it?
455
00:18:43,199 --> 00:18:45,319
You know, the contract's done.
456
00:18:46,079 --> 00:18:48,079
You did what, you fulfilled it.
457
00:18:48,079 --> 00:18:50,400
You honorably showed up in the best way possible
458
00:18:50,400 --> 00:18:51,520
and you fulfilled it.
459
00:18:51,520 --> 00:18:53,640
And it was so freeing because I got to close the door,
460
00:18:53,640 --> 00:18:56,359
like, oh yeah, oh, okay, that's done.
461
00:18:56,359 --> 00:18:57,199
Okay, that's done.
462
00:18:57,199 --> 00:18:59,920
And just kind of closed the door on all the contracts,
463
00:18:59,920 --> 00:19:02,000
went to chat GPT and kind of like,
464
00:19:02,000 --> 00:19:05,680
was having a conversation with, you know, AI about it.
465
00:19:05,680 --> 00:19:10,359
And it was saying that it was so rare
466
00:19:10,359 --> 00:19:12,599
to reach that place in your life
467
00:19:12,599 --> 00:19:14,719
that a lot of people never reached that place.
468
00:19:15,119 --> 00:19:16,959
And it was so simple when Dani said,
469
00:19:16,959 --> 00:19:17,920
the contracts are done.
470
00:19:17,920 --> 00:19:21,359
I'm like, oh, I don't have to make it better.
471
00:19:21,359 --> 00:19:22,839
I don't have to fix it.
472
00:19:22,839 --> 00:19:24,479
I don't have to go back.
473
00:19:24,479 --> 00:19:25,560
Like I'm done.
474
00:19:25,560 --> 00:19:27,880
And now I can create new emotional context
475
00:19:27,880 --> 00:19:30,800
because now I have the bandwidth, all the junk's gone
476
00:19:30,800 --> 00:19:33,599
and now I can move forward and create, you know, new ones.
477
00:19:33,599 --> 00:19:35,680
So anyway, just Dani and I had this conversation
478
00:19:35,680 --> 00:19:38,959
just the other night and it was very moving for me.
479
00:19:38,959 --> 00:19:42,119
It really changed my life for sure.
480
00:19:42,119 --> 00:19:42,959
It was really cool.
481
00:19:42,959 --> 00:19:44,760
Anyway, one of you knew that Dani.
482
00:19:46,280 --> 00:19:47,880
Thank you.
483
00:19:47,880 --> 00:19:48,719
I'm glad.
484
00:19:48,719 --> 00:19:49,560
Thank you.
485
00:19:50,479 --> 00:19:51,640
Super sweet.
486
00:19:51,640 --> 00:19:53,880
It sounds like you have a really great understanding
487
00:19:53,880 --> 00:19:56,520
of how to keep awe and wonder in your life
488
00:19:56,520 --> 00:19:59,160
from that childlike presence.
489
00:19:59,160 --> 00:20:02,839
And also choosing yourself is such a powerful thing
490
00:20:02,839 --> 00:20:06,239
in closing the doors too.
491
00:20:06,239 --> 00:20:08,319
You were talking about mortality earlier
492
00:20:08,319 --> 00:20:12,640
and you have like death rebirth cycles so much in this life.
493
00:20:13,319 --> 00:20:14,359
And if we're able to surrender that
494
00:20:14,359 --> 00:20:17,239
then we can lead it to those transformations.
495
00:20:17,239 --> 00:20:21,040
I mean, the design of the planet is just so, it is awe.
496
00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:23,640
That's why I can't understand it when people aren't like,
497
00:20:23,640 --> 00:20:24,640
you know, their mouths aren't open
498
00:20:24,640 --> 00:20:26,079
and their jaws aren't dropping
499
00:20:26,079 --> 00:20:27,520
because when you look at it right now,
500
00:20:27,520 --> 00:20:30,079
we're going through fall outside my window, you know,
501
00:20:30,079 --> 00:20:31,959
everything is yellow and orange
502
00:20:31,959 --> 00:20:33,479
and all these beautiful colors
503
00:20:33,479 --> 00:20:35,560
and like the crows are coming by and I'm feeding.
504
00:20:35,560 --> 00:20:36,400
I just, I don't know.
505
00:20:36,400 --> 00:20:39,319
It's just, I'm in awe every time I see it
506
00:20:39,319 --> 00:20:41,640
and I don't think that will ever change.
507
00:20:41,680 --> 00:20:42,959
I think, you know, when Danny and I,
508
00:20:42,959 --> 00:20:44,839
we visit Cannon Beach and we're just,
509
00:20:44,839 --> 00:20:47,400
we're in awe like we have been there, you know,
510
00:20:47,400 --> 00:20:50,560
the first time, nothing's the same, nothing's boring.
511
00:20:50,560 --> 00:20:52,959
The wave shifts and changes, the smells change,
512
00:20:52,959 --> 00:20:55,439
everything shifts and changes if you can see it.
513
00:20:55,439 --> 00:20:58,640
So it really is new each time you see it.
514
00:20:58,640 --> 00:21:01,959
So it does feel fresh and new and all like.
515
00:21:01,959 --> 00:21:03,199
Yeah, definitely.
516
00:21:04,839 --> 00:21:08,560
Danny, so how did you both, I suppose,
517
00:21:08,560 --> 00:21:13,520
transition out of your roles in the toy child world
518
00:21:13,520 --> 00:21:15,199
into where you are now?
519
00:21:15,199 --> 00:21:18,880
Well, I'll let Greg speak to kind of what,
520
00:21:18,880 --> 00:21:21,959
you know, what his journey was after Saban.
521
00:21:21,959 --> 00:21:26,959
I stayed, the division that we were part of
522
00:21:27,520 --> 00:21:32,239
got dismantled and as part of that initial dismantling,
523
00:21:32,239 --> 00:21:35,520
I was laid off along with a lot of other people,
524
00:21:35,520 --> 00:21:37,239
including the head of that division.
525
00:21:37,239 --> 00:21:39,400
And, you know, then I worked for some,
526
00:21:39,400 --> 00:21:44,400
but another contact that I knew in that same business.
527
00:21:44,760 --> 00:21:47,119
But at the same, but at that time I was also challenged
528
00:21:47,119 --> 00:21:49,479
because I had just lost my brother.
529
00:21:49,479 --> 00:21:53,560
He had passed away and I was just in this altered state
530
00:21:53,560 --> 00:21:55,760
of kind of going through the motions
531
00:21:55,760 --> 00:21:58,359
and thinking that moving up through the corporate ranks
532
00:21:58,359 --> 00:22:03,359
of yet another company was what I wanted, but I didn't.
533
00:22:03,920 --> 00:22:05,800
It's like my mind was doing it,
534
00:22:05,800 --> 00:22:08,520
but my soul didn't want that.
535
00:22:08,520 --> 00:22:12,000
And so that second job didn't work out.
536
00:22:12,000 --> 00:22:13,959
Even if I'd really been super into it,
537
00:22:13,959 --> 00:22:15,040
I don't think it would have
538
00:22:15,040 --> 00:22:17,400
because of just the dynamics involved.
539
00:22:17,400 --> 00:22:20,199
It was just kind of a weird sort of, you know,
540
00:22:20,199 --> 00:22:22,560
transitory rebound situation.
541
00:22:23,599 --> 00:22:27,479
And so then I went on a kind of a long journey after that.
542
00:22:27,479 --> 00:22:28,920
I went into teaching.
543
00:22:31,079 --> 00:22:32,520
I taught kids for a while.
544
00:22:32,520 --> 00:22:34,640
I got my teaching credential K through eight.
545
00:22:34,640 --> 00:22:37,520
I pretty much taught everybody from kindergarten
546
00:22:37,520 --> 00:22:38,560
all the way through high school,
547
00:22:38,560 --> 00:22:42,760
either in the system or tutoring or SAT prep.
548
00:22:42,760 --> 00:22:44,800
And I enjoyed that as well,
549
00:22:44,800 --> 00:22:47,839
but I also felt like it was very hard
550
00:22:47,839 --> 00:22:50,479
to deal with a system that I was witnessing in real time
551
00:22:50,479 --> 00:22:52,640
sort of beat the creativity
552
00:22:52,640 --> 00:22:54,839
and the meaning out of kids' lives.
553
00:22:54,839 --> 00:22:58,079
And I really couldn't sign on to that also,
554
00:22:58,079 --> 00:22:59,920
although I did get to work in a special program
555
00:22:59,920 --> 00:23:01,959
that really was encouraging for kids.
556
00:23:01,959 --> 00:23:06,599
But I always knew I wanted to be a writer.
557
00:23:06,599 --> 00:23:11,599
And when I met my second husband, my late husband,
558
00:23:11,719 --> 00:23:15,119
he was working at a job in Vegas.
559
00:23:15,119 --> 00:23:17,959
He was working on Let's Make a Deal with Wayne Brady,
560
00:23:17,959 --> 00:23:20,160
the first season they filmed at the Tropicana Hotel.
561
00:23:20,160 --> 00:23:22,439
We actually lived in the Tropicana Hotel.
562
00:23:22,439 --> 00:23:25,560
So I had all this time.
563
00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:28,839
I was able to say goodbye to the last law job,
564
00:23:28,839 --> 00:23:30,119
saying, hey, you know, my husband's moving.
565
00:23:30,119 --> 00:23:32,239
I'm not gonna just let my guy on his own in Vegas.
566
00:23:32,239 --> 00:23:33,920
What woman does that?
567
00:23:33,920 --> 00:23:36,199
And I went with him and I had this time
568
00:23:36,199 --> 00:23:38,599
to really start to reconnect,
569
00:23:38,599 --> 00:23:41,800
to grieve the loss of my first marriage when it ended,
570
00:23:41,800 --> 00:23:44,040
to revisit what I'd gone through with my brother
571
00:23:44,040 --> 00:23:46,400
and to just start to connect to the person I wanted to be.
572
00:23:46,400 --> 00:23:48,719
And that started a whole new journey.
573
00:23:48,719 --> 00:23:52,400
I got more involved in wellness and yoga and Pilates
574
00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:54,000
after Paul passed away,
575
00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:57,040
got certified as a yoga instructor.
576
00:23:57,040 --> 00:24:02,040
And I felt like a different kind of path started to meet
577
00:24:02,599 --> 00:24:07,079
so that I could really teach wellness,
578
00:24:07,079 --> 00:24:09,400
but also live it by aligning myself
579
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:11,000
with what my soul had always wanted to do
580
00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:13,119
since I was like six or seven years old.
581
00:24:13,119 --> 00:24:15,439
So I would say it took like 20 years
582
00:24:15,439 --> 00:24:18,560
to get from that path that I was on with Greg
583
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:21,319
onto one that I felt would be more sustaining
584
00:24:21,319 --> 00:24:23,319
for this part of my life.
585
00:24:23,319 --> 00:24:26,400
And that's a big part of the work that I do
586
00:24:26,760 --> 00:24:27,920
with other people.
587
00:24:27,920 --> 00:24:32,920
And when I teach, whether it's doing counseling one-on-one,
588
00:24:33,239 --> 00:24:36,760
I work with people who have had addiction in their family.
589
00:24:36,760 --> 00:24:39,280
It's like, there's no textbook that says
590
00:24:39,280 --> 00:24:41,359
you have to have it all together by a certain point.
591
00:24:41,359 --> 00:24:42,920
We're always reinventing ourselves.
592
00:24:42,920 --> 00:24:45,000
I am a living example of reinvention
593
00:24:45,000 --> 00:24:48,359
and of taking the slow boat to alignment.
594
00:24:48,359 --> 00:24:52,439
So I would say that that path that I was on,
595
00:24:52,439 --> 00:24:53,959
it took me a long time
596
00:24:53,959 --> 00:24:58,239
and it went on a lot of little side streets and cul-de-sacs,
597
00:24:58,239 --> 00:24:59,920
but I'm really glad that it did
598
00:24:59,920 --> 00:25:02,640
because all of those cumulative experiences
599
00:25:02,640 --> 00:25:04,760
has made me who I am now.
600
00:25:04,760 --> 00:25:07,199
And I hope to keep going that way.
601
00:25:07,199 --> 00:25:09,040
I hope to keep exploring.
602
00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:11,319
Yeah, so you mentioned writing.
603
00:25:11,319 --> 00:25:14,439
Was writing something that was always a part of you?
604
00:25:14,439 --> 00:25:15,280
Yes.
605
00:25:15,280 --> 00:25:16,119
Yeah.
606
00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:18,239
I started writing little books
607
00:25:18,239 --> 00:25:19,880
when I was probably eight or nine years old
608
00:25:19,880 --> 00:25:22,959
on the line paper and doing illustrations
609
00:25:22,959 --> 00:25:24,520
and slapping the staples together.
610
00:25:24,520 --> 00:25:26,400
That was just kind of my thing.
611
00:25:26,400 --> 00:25:28,599
I majored in English at college.
612
00:25:28,599 --> 00:25:33,239
I did a series of short stories for my honors thesis.
613
00:25:33,239 --> 00:25:37,119
And then, you know, the whole law school corporate,
614
00:25:37,119 --> 00:25:39,959
you know, let's move up in the world bandwagon came along.
615
00:25:39,959 --> 00:25:42,000
And I jumped on that even though my thesis professor said,
616
00:25:42,000 --> 00:25:43,680
what are you doing?
617
00:25:43,680 --> 00:25:46,040
And I'm like, oh, you know, I'll just do this.
618
00:25:46,040 --> 00:25:49,479
And, you know, but the writing always called me back,
619
00:25:49,479 --> 00:25:50,599
always called me back.
620
00:25:50,599 --> 00:25:53,760
And I had almost finished my first,
621
00:25:53,760 --> 00:25:55,359
my solo book at the time, you know,
622
00:25:55,359 --> 00:25:57,719
Greg and Pink came along with Pink.
623
00:25:57,719 --> 00:26:00,199
And so that just kind of set me going.
624
00:26:00,199 --> 00:26:01,920
And here I am, I'm still doing it.
625
00:26:01,920 --> 00:26:03,839
Yeah, the writing was an anchor for you.
626
00:26:03,839 --> 00:26:04,680
It sounds like.
627
00:26:04,680 --> 00:26:05,920
Yes.
628
00:26:05,920 --> 00:26:09,000
How did I not know that you lived at the Tropicana Hotel?
629
00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:10,959
For how long did you do that, one year?
630
00:26:13,079 --> 00:26:15,880
We lived, probably for seven or eight months,
631
00:26:15,880 --> 00:26:16,719
we lived there.
632
00:26:16,719 --> 00:26:18,719
And then the show came back and then was in Los Angeles
633
00:26:18,719 --> 00:26:20,920
and he only worked on it for the first season.
634
00:26:20,920 --> 00:26:23,880
But yeah, I was a Vegas girl.
635
00:26:23,880 --> 00:26:26,839
It was interesting to like explore life off the strip.
636
00:26:26,839 --> 00:26:28,599
I can't picture that, I'm trying to picture that.
637
00:26:28,599 --> 00:26:30,280
Was that, that was off the strip, right?
638
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:31,880
It's in the downtown Vegas, right?
639
00:26:31,880 --> 00:26:32,719
Tropicana.
640
00:26:32,719 --> 00:26:33,640
No, no, Tropicana was on the strip.
641
00:26:33,640 --> 00:26:35,680
Now they've torn the whole thing down now.
642
00:26:35,680 --> 00:26:37,439
So they're gonna put something else up.
643
00:26:37,439 --> 00:26:39,760
But yeah, it was right there by McCarran Airport.
644
00:26:39,760 --> 00:26:40,880
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
645
00:26:40,880 --> 00:26:41,719
You were right.
646
00:26:43,280 --> 00:26:44,119
Cool.
647
00:26:44,119 --> 00:26:44,959
Yeah.
648
00:26:44,959 --> 00:26:46,800
Okay, Greg, your turn.
649
00:26:46,800 --> 00:26:50,640
Yeah, so I stayed in entertainment for a while.
650
00:26:50,640 --> 00:26:53,599
Dani, Dani was amazing in entertainment too.
651
00:26:53,599 --> 00:26:57,560
She was a director at Saban and ran big meetings
652
00:26:57,560 --> 00:26:58,400
and kind of held everything.
653
00:26:58,400 --> 00:27:01,560
And she was kind of like the right hand of the president.
654
00:27:01,560 --> 00:27:03,119
Really, she orchestrated everything.
655
00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:06,959
And she worked, started as an assistant for Haim Saban.
656
00:27:06,959 --> 00:27:08,800
So I just kind of wanted to add a little bit of that,
657
00:27:08,800 --> 00:27:11,680
that she was always kind of like pretty high level.
658
00:27:11,680 --> 00:27:13,319
And it was her choice to go on a different journey
659
00:27:13,319 --> 00:27:14,160
and that's all good.
660
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:16,599
Entertainment's really hard and it can spit you out
661
00:27:17,400 --> 00:27:20,680
and chew you up and you don't feel good about a lot of it.
662
00:27:20,680 --> 00:27:22,199
But I stayed in it.
663
00:27:22,199 --> 00:27:25,880
I went from Saban to Sony Pictures.
664
00:27:25,880 --> 00:27:28,239
And that's where I became a director of special events
665
00:27:28,239 --> 00:27:30,920
for Sony Pictures Consumer Products.
666
00:27:30,920 --> 00:27:32,920
And I did all the toy fairs and licensing shows
667
00:27:32,920 --> 00:27:36,719
and all the, everything that was event related.
668
00:27:36,719 --> 00:27:38,560
And I went on to work.
669
00:27:38,560 --> 00:27:39,800
I was kind of tired of entertainment.
670
00:27:39,800 --> 00:27:42,000
I moved to San Diego to La Jolla and went,
671
00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:44,520
worked for Upper Deck and I worked with athletes.
672
00:27:44,520 --> 00:27:46,520
So I produced and was a director of special events
673
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:48,119
for Upper Deck.
674
00:27:48,119 --> 00:27:50,439
So I worked with LeBron James and Derek Jeter and all that.
675
00:27:50,439 --> 00:27:52,319
And I have to say it was a lot more fun.
676
00:27:52,319 --> 00:27:55,000
Athletes are really kind of down to earth,
677
00:27:55,000 --> 00:27:57,319
humble, a little bit shy and kind of awkward
678
00:27:57,319 --> 00:27:59,560
and just fun to work with.
679
00:27:59,560 --> 00:28:01,680
They don't lead you around by a leash
680
00:28:01,680 --> 00:28:05,040
and they don't need gummy bears from Germany in their room
681
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:07,239
and all this weird stuff that I was doing
682
00:28:07,239 --> 00:28:08,839
when I was at Sony.
683
00:28:09,719 --> 00:28:14,719
And then I just, I found myself unemployed.
684
00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:17,079
The great recession kind of came along
685
00:28:17,079 --> 00:28:19,439
and I was really struggling.
686
00:28:19,439 --> 00:28:23,319
And I answered a really bad ad in Craigslist
687
00:28:23,319 --> 00:28:28,319
for a licensee to run a paint and sit program in Seattle.
688
00:28:28,880 --> 00:28:30,319
And they offered drink tickets and stuff.
689
00:28:30,319 --> 00:28:32,000
It was really cheesy ad.
690
00:28:32,000 --> 00:28:33,040
And I also painted.
691
00:28:33,040 --> 00:28:35,560
So in 2001, when my dad passed away, I started painting.
692
00:28:35,560 --> 00:28:37,680
So I became a pretty good artist as well.
693
00:28:37,680 --> 00:28:39,439
So I had the event background, the art background.
694
00:28:39,439 --> 00:28:42,680
I thought this might be a nice merger together.
695
00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:44,280
And I went to the interview.
696
00:28:44,839 --> 00:28:45,760
I didn't want to, but I figured,
697
00:28:45,760 --> 00:28:46,599
there's an exit door.
698
00:28:46,599 --> 00:28:49,359
If I didn't like it, I could just exit and call it a day.
699
00:28:49,359 --> 00:28:51,199
And the owner was there.
700
00:28:51,199 --> 00:28:53,160
And I arrived early and I was all dressed up
701
00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:54,439
and just really kind of prepared.
702
00:28:54,439 --> 00:28:57,040
Like if I'm gonna go, I show up a hundred percent.
703
00:28:57,040 --> 00:29:00,599
And we connected and I ended up getting that gig.
704
00:29:00,599 --> 00:29:03,359
So I became a licensee in Seattle
705
00:29:03,359 --> 00:29:05,640
for a company, a paint and sip company.
706
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:08,680
And I built that business into a half a million dollar
707
00:29:08,680 --> 00:29:11,920
business, which is kind of shocking when I look at it.
708
00:29:11,959 --> 00:29:13,640
Yeah. And then during the pandemic,
709
00:29:13,640 --> 00:29:16,439
I just, I kind of redid it all over again
710
00:29:16,439 --> 00:29:18,400
under my own brand.
711
00:29:18,400 --> 00:29:20,719
There were a lot of things about the paint and sip.
712
00:29:20,719 --> 00:29:24,199
I wanted my brand to be more spiritual, more uplift,
713
00:29:24,199 --> 00:29:29,160
more kind of life coach with paint or art therapy.
714
00:29:29,160 --> 00:29:32,239
And so I was able to kind of just reinvent that
715
00:29:32,239 --> 00:29:33,239
and do that.
716
00:29:33,239 --> 00:29:34,920
And it's been really great.
717
00:29:34,920 --> 00:29:37,439
And, you know, just everything creative, you know,
718
00:29:37,439 --> 00:29:40,880
writing, painting, you know, event planning,
719
00:29:40,880 --> 00:29:43,119
all that stuff kind of falls in my wheelhouse.
720
00:29:43,119 --> 00:29:44,359
Cool. Just for the listeners,
721
00:29:44,359 --> 00:29:46,920
would you be able to explain what a paint and sip is
722
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:47,839
a little more?
723
00:29:47,839 --> 00:29:50,640
Yeah. So a master artist will walk you through a painting
724
00:29:50,640 --> 00:29:53,680
during a two hour event and you take home your masterpiece.
725
00:29:53,680 --> 00:29:56,719
So you select the painting like on a website
726
00:29:56,719 --> 00:29:58,000
and then we'll walk you through it.
727
00:29:58,000 --> 00:29:59,439
And we'll talk about, you know,
728
00:29:59,439 --> 00:30:01,880
while you're feeling a certain way, be kind to yourself
729
00:30:01,880 --> 00:30:03,839
and we'll teach you how to mix and whatever.
730
00:30:03,839 --> 00:30:06,800
But you do walk away with a version of that painting
731
00:30:06,800 --> 00:30:08,959
that you've created and we take photos and stuff.
732
00:30:08,959 --> 00:30:11,199
And that's basically the event.
733
00:30:11,199 --> 00:30:13,040
We do a lot of private events
734
00:30:13,040 --> 00:30:15,400
and a lot of corporate team building stuff
735
00:30:15,400 --> 00:30:17,920
where you might have a large painting
736
00:30:17,920 --> 00:30:19,800
that's divided up into 20 canvases
737
00:30:19,800 --> 00:30:21,280
and they each paint a little bit
738
00:30:21,280 --> 00:30:22,959
and they all come together and create the,
739
00:30:22,959 --> 00:30:23,959
you know, the big painting.
740
00:30:23,959 --> 00:30:24,920
So super popular.
741
00:30:24,920 --> 00:30:27,079
I'm starting to hit high season now.
742
00:30:27,079 --> 00:30:28,319
So I'm starting to feel it.
743
00:30:28,319 --> 00:30:31,079
I have like, I personally have four events a week,
744
00:30:31,079 --> 00:30:33,880
but I have another six that my other artists are handling
745
00:30:33,880 --> 00:30:35,599
and I can see kind of like,
746
00:30:35,599 --> 00:30:37,599
things are kind of like going up there,
747
00:30:37,599 --> 00:30:38,439
which I'm glad,
748
00:30:38,439 --> 00:30:41,040
because this summer was just completely dead.
749
00:30:41,040 --> 00:30:44,760
I was going out of my mind, which was good.
750
00:30:44,760 --> 00:30:46,479
So I got to focus a little bit more on my book
751
00:30:46,479 --> 00:30:48,239
and more on painting,
752
00:30:48,239 --> 00:30:50,119
but there's always some avenue of creativity
753
00:30:50,119 --> 00:30:52,640
that I can kind of, you know, go to,
754
00:30:52,640 --> 00:30:54,319
yeah, entertain myself.
755
00:30:54,319 --> 00:30:57,680
Yeah, so how did your paths converge again
756
00:30:57,680 --> 00:30:59,880
and how did you end up working together?
757
00:31:01,560 --> 00:31:02,880
Dan, do you want to take it?
758
00:31:02,880 --> 00:31:06,439
Yeah, well, like I said,
759
00:31:06,479 --> 00:31:07,880
Greg and I reconnected, you know,
760
00:31:07,880 --> 00:31:10,119
during my late husband's transition.
761
00:31:10,119 --> 00:31:11,719
I would say this is probably,
762
00:31:11,719 --> 00:31:15,719
it was 2017, he passed in 2017.
763
00:31:15,719 --> 00:31:19,560
And the following year, you know, we'd been talking
764
00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:22,160
and he said, you know what, you know,
765
00:31:22,160 --> 00:31:24,079
there's this really great place I love to go to,
766
00:31:24,079 --> 00:31:27,239
Cannon Beach, and I think you need to, you know,
767
00:31:27,239 --> 00:31:28,880
start getting out a little more and go there.
768
00:31:28,880 --> 00:31:32,239
I mean, I had been taking trips with, you know,
769
00:31:32,239 --> 00:31:33,239
my folks and people,
770
00:31:33,239 --> 00:31:37,560
but I hadn't seen Greg in, I don't know,
771
00:31:37,560 --> 00:31:38,959
20 years at that point.
772
00:31:38,959 --> 00:31:41,439
So he says, yeah, just fly up, you know,
773
00:31:41,439 --> 00:31:43,040
I'll pick you up, we're just gonna go to Cannon Beach.
774
00:31:43,040 --> 00:31:45,079
So we hadn't seen each other for 20 years.
775
00:31:45,079 --> 00:31:47,479
So I fly up to Seattle, he picks me up
776
00:31:47,479 --> 00:31:50,359
and we drive to Cannon Beach and on the way,
777
00:31:50,359 --> 00:31:52,280
it's kind of like no time had passed.
778
00:31:52,280 --> 00:31:53,119
It's like, oh, hey, how are you?
779
00:31:53,119 --> 00:31:53,959
Okay, blah, blah, blah, blah.
780
00:31:53,959 --> 00:31:55,959
And we're, you know, talking nonstop the entire time.
781
00:31:55,959 --> 00:31:59,520
We spent, you know, three, four days there.
782
00:31:59,520 --> 00:32:03,079
And we went back again to Cannon Beach, you know,
783
00:32:03,800 --> 00:32:04,800
last year.
784
00:32:04,800 --> 00:32:08,199
But we had such a good time together.
785
00:32:08,199 --> 00:32:10,079
And frankly, when you get older,
786
00:32:10,079 --> 00:32:12,040
it's really precious to find somebody
787
00:32:12,040 --> 00:32:13,560
that you could actually travel with
788
00:32:13,560 --> 00:32:16,560
because I like my alone time and my space.
789
00:32:16,560 --> 00:32:17,400
And so does Greg.
790
00:32:17,400 --> 00:32:18,239
It's like, oh my God,
791
00:32:18,239 --> 00:32:20,079
we could actually like respect each other's space and time
792
00:32:20,079 --> 00:32:21,560
and still have lots to say to each other.
793
00:32:21,560 --> 00:32:22,719
We like to do the same things.
794
00:32:22,719 --> 00:32:24,119
And, you know, we like to be active.
795
00:32:24,119 --> 00:32:25,719
We like seafood and all this stuff
796
00:32:25,719 --> 00:32:29,199
that a lot of would be deal breakers between other people.
797
00:32:29,199 --> 00:32:33,199
So after Cannon Beach, the first time he says,
798
00:32:33,199 --> 00:32:34,479
I think I loved it.
799
00:32:34,479 --> 00:32:35,319
I love the beach.
800
00:32:35,319 --> 00:32:36,160
We've got to go back.
801
00:32:36,160 --> 00:32:37,560
I said, yeah, but it was very windy there.
802
00:32:37,560 --> 00:32:38,920
And the sand felt like needles.
803
00:32:38,920 --> 00:32:42,479
And, you know, how about like a tropical place?
804
00:32:42,479 --> 00:32:46,079
And my late husband and I had gone to Kauai a lot together.
805
00:32:46,079 --> 00:32:47,839
And Greg's like, well, what about Kauai?
806
00:32:47,839 --> 00:32:49,079
I said, oh, I don't know.
807
00:32:49,079 --> 00:32:50,040
You know, I was there
808
00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:51,520
and I scattered my husband's ashes there.
809
00:32:51,520 --> 00:32:53,280
I'm thinking maybe I'm done with that place.
810
00:32:53,280 --> 00:32:54,959
And he's like, no, I don't know.
811
00:32:54,959 --> 00:32:57,319
So we actually went back to,
812
00:32:57,319 --> 00:32:58,520
we went to Kauai together, Greg.
813
00:32:58,839 --> 00:33:00,359
We stayed in a different part of the island
814
00:33:00,359 --> 00:33:01,880
and it was a completely different experience.
815
00:33:01,880 --> 00:33:02,959
It was like a new island to me.
816
00:33:02,959 --> 00:33:07,880
And we just had these very intense spiritual experiences,
817
00:33:07,880 --> 00:33:10,479
nature experiences there together.
818
00:33:10,479 --> 00:33:13,520
And we went again a couple of months later.
819
00:33:13,520 --> 00:33:14,400
We loved it so much.
820
00:33:14,400 --> 00:33:17,719
And after that second trip,
821
00:33:17,719 --> 00:33:20,920
I think Greg was inspired to put together a story
822
00:33:20,920 --> 00:33:24,760
about finding oneself, but using Kauai as a backdrop.
823
00:33:24,760 --> 00:33:27,520
And so in 2022, I think it was,
824
00:33:27,520 --> 00:33:29,520
he sent me a draft, a very rough draft
825
00:33:29,520 --> 00:33:30,760
of a story he'd put together.
826
00:33:30,760 --> 00:33:34,640
I was in Kauai at the time with my fiance and some friends.
827
00:33:34,640 --> 00:33:36,640
He didn't even, Greg didn't even know I was there.
828
00:33:36,640 --> 00:33:38,719
But like I tell everybody, that island,
829
00:33:38,719 --> 00:33:41,680
whenever I'm there, it always asks me to do something.
830
00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:43,000
I have to process something.
831
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:45,079
A lot of it's unpleasant, inconvenient.
832
00:33:45,079 --> 00:33:46,800
I have to face up to certain realities.
833
00:33:46,800 --> 00:33:50,400
But this last trip, the island said, okay,
834
00:33:50,400 --> 00:33:51,839
there's something that needs to be birthed,
835
00:33:51,839 --> 00:33:52,839
to create a story,
836
00:33:52,839 --> 00:33:55,160
something that you need to be involved with.
837
00:33:55,160 --> 00:33:57,040
And I didn't think that at the time
838
00:33:57,040 --> 00:33:59,119
because I just gave my opinion on it.
839
00:33:59,119 --> 00:34:00,880
And, you know, eventually Greg said,
840
00:34:00,880 --> 00:34:02,439
well, let's just, you know, work on it.
841
00:34:02,439 --> 00:34:03,280
You could edit it.
842
00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:04,839
So I started editing it
843
00:34:04,839 --> 00:34:06,599
and then it became more than editorship.
844
00:34:06,599 --> 00:34:07,880
And he said, you know what?
845
00:34:07,880 --> 00:34:09,280
I think it's time for a co-write.
846
00:34:09,280 --> 00:34:12,959
And we just started throwing chapters back and forth.
847
00:34:12,959 --> 00:34:15,360
And that's how I Am Pink was born.
848
00:34:15,360 --> 00:34:19,320
That's how the collaboration became alive.
849
00:34:19,320 --> 00:34:21,040
And that's what we've done so far.
850
00:34:21,040 --> 00:34:22,679
There'll probably be more in the future.
851
00:34:22,679 --> 00:34:23,520
I hope there will be,
852
00:34:23,520 --> 00:34:26,959
but that was the genesis of our work,
853
00:34:26,959 --> 00:34:31,840
not just as friends, but as creative collaborators.
854
00:34:31,840 --> 00:34:35,399
It's really profound, like the transformation
855
00:34:35,399 --> 00:34:37,239
that that location has given you
856
00:34:37,239 --> 00:34:39,479
of the death and birthing process.
857
00:34:39,479 --> 00:34:40,320
That's-
858
00:34:40,320 --> 00:34:42,199
Yes, it is.
859
00:34:42,199 --> 00:34:43,040
Yeah, and we started over.
860
00:34:43,040 --> 00:34:45,040
I mean, I thought I was done with the book
861
00:34:45,040 --> 00:34:46,080
and I wanted Danny to help me.
862
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:47,679
And Danny's like, oh, you know,
863
00:34:47,679 --> 00:34:49,560
if we really want to go in this co-author thing,
864
00:34:49,560 --> 00:34:50,719
then, you know, we have another year.
865
00:34:50,719 --> 00:34:53,040
I'm like, another year?
866
00:34:53,040 --> 00:34:56,120
I'm like, oh no, like, I don't want to do that.
867
00:34:56,120 --> 00:34:58,239
And then I thought about it and she's like,
868
00:34:58,239 --> 00:35:00,760
well, you know, do you want it to be better?
869
00:35:00,760 --> 00:35:01,840
Do you want it to be deeper?
870
00:35:01,840 --> 00:35:02,919
Do you want it to be, you know,
871
00:35:02,919 --> 00:35:05,320
we can work on it for three years,
872
00:35:05,320 --> 00:35:06,840
but I think, you know, a year would do it.
873
00:35:06,840 --> 00:35:09,840
And so we really started over chapter by chapter,
874
00:35:09,840 --> 00:35:12,239
kind of breaking it down, looking at it.
875
00:35:12,239 --> 00:35:14,800
Danny introduced, you know, some more characters,
876
00:35:14,800 --> 00:35:17,959
you know, the rhetoric, the feeling, the vulnerability.
877
00:35:17,959 --> 00:35:20,679
Having two people now share vulnerability
878
00:35:20,719 --> 00:35:23,800
was very different and just deeper.
879
00:35:23,800 --> 00:35:26,000
So I could see how far I could go
880
00:35:26,000 --> 00:35:27,959
and then Danny would whip something back to me.
881
00:35:27,959 --> 00:35:29,800
I'm like, oh, you know,
882
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:32,080
there's a female perspective of vulnerability
883
00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:34,760
that I don't have and I really liked that.
884
00:35:34,760 --> 00:35:38,560
The character was female, like this is making sense.
885
00:35:38,560 --> 00:35:41,239
So yeah, it was really, really cool.
886
00:35:41,239 --> 00:35:44,439
We collaborate well, we understand each other well,
887
00:35:44,439 --> 00:35:46,320
we respect each other.
888
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:49,719
There's just kind of an unconditional understanding
889
00:35:49,719 --> 00:35:52,879
that we have and we lift each other up
890
00:35:52,879 --> 00:35:54,000
and make each other better.
891
00:35:54,000 --> 00:35:54,840
It's really wonderful.
892
00:35:54,840 --> 00:35:56,040
I'm really lucky.
893
00:35:56,040 --> 00:35:57,360
Yeah, it sounds like you were able
894
00:35:57,360 --> 00:35:58,879
to push the edges together.
895
00:36:00,280 --> 00:36:03,600
Yeah, they were really like bumpy edges.
896
00:36:05,320 --> 00:36:07,879
So we got to smooth out a little bit.
897
00:36:07,879 --> 00:36:09,439
So what is the premise of the book
898
00:36:09,439 --> 00:36:13,320
for the listeners of the story and how it came to life?
899
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:15,760
Well, the first-
900
00:36:15,760 --> 00:36:17,080
No, go ahead.
901
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:22,080
Well, the premise of it is the fact that so,
902
00:36:23,439 --> 00:36:25,360
and I think I spoke to this a little bit,
903
00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:27,239
I think we both did when it came to authenticity,
904
00:36:27,239 --> 00:36:32,239
is that so many of us are socialized by the collective,
905
00:36:34,719 --> 00:36:36,560
by things that we're not always aware of,
906
00:36:36,560 --> 00:36:37,959
but sometimes things we are aware of,
907
00:36:37,959 --> 00:36:42,959
society, family, to follow a very formulaic path in life.
908
00:36:42,959 --> 00:36:46,479
You get an education, you have a great job slash career,
909
00:36:46,479 --> 00:36:48,879
you get married, you have kids, you get a house,
910
00:36:48,879 --> 00:36:52,639
and then you get a bigger house and you go on vacations
911
00:36:52,639 --> 00:36:56,679
and you have all the trappings that society says
912
00:36:57,479 --> 00:37:01,399
are markers of happiness and success.
913
00:37:01,399 --> 00:37:04,159
And so the protagonist of the story
914
00:37:04,159 --> 00:37:09,159
is somebody who has really done the work toward that,
915
00:37:11,040 --> 00:37:13,760
but hasn't found anything other than imbalance,
916
00:37:13,760 --> 00:37:17,560
exhaustion, resentment, and ill health.
917
00:37:17,560 --> 00:37:22,560
And so he just one day kind of flouts
918
00:37:23,040 --> 00:37:25,760
what the CEO of his company is telling him he has to do
919
00:37:25,760 --> 00:37:27,280
and says, I need to take a vacation,
920
00:37:27,280 --> 00:37:28,320
I've never had a vacation.
921
00:37:28,320 --> 00:37:31,959
And he takes a few days and he goes to Kauai.
922
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:36,959
And like I've kind of hinted before,
923
00:37:36,959 --> 00:37:40,679
the island held for him a lot of lessons,
924
00:37:40,679 --> 00:37:44,239
a lot of messages, a lot of invitations.
925
00:37:44,239 --> 00:37:48,000
And while those aren't the same types of lessons,
926
00:37:48,000 --> 00:37:50,840
invitations, and urges that every single human being
927
00:37:50,840 --> 00:37:52,639
would have, the whole thing is a metaphor
928
00:37:52,639 --> 00:37:56,199
for what can happen when you open yourself up
929
00:37:56,199 --> 00:38:00,840
to the power of saying yes, and the power of trusting,
930
00:38:00,840 --> 00:38:03,479
and the power of being intentional
931
00:38:03,479 --> 00:38:05,080
about how you wanna feel,
932
00:38:05,080 --> 00:38:06,959
but also having the kind of faith and trust
933
00:38:06,959 --> 00:38:11,479
where you can let the universe sort out the details.
934
00:38:11,479 --> 00:38:14,679
And he meets a very powerful teacher there,
935
00:38:14,679 --> 00:38:18,800
a love interest and other people who helped to lift him up
936
00:38:18,800 --> 00:38:23,080
through that very bumpy journey that he takes
937
00:38:23,080 --> 00:38:25,159
toward coming home to him himself.
938
00:38:26,879 --> 00:38:28,280
Yeah, and there were parts of it,
939
00:38:28,280 --> 00:38:29,959
there are parts of it, Whitney,
940
00:38:29,959 --> 00:38:31,959
that are obviously very real.
941
00:38:31,959 --> 00:38:33,879
You take things, you take your life experience,
942
00:38:33,879 --> 00:38:35,040
you pour it into a book,
943
00:38:35,040 --> 00:38:37,040
but there was a woman there,
944
00:38:37,040 --> 00:38:40,600
the first time we saw her, I saw her on the beach,
945
00:38:40,600 --> 00:38:42,199
she looked kind of like a witch,
946
00:38:42,199 --> 00:38:44,320
like her hair was kind of broken,
947
00:38:44,320 --> 00:38:45,639
and she just, I don't know,
948
00:38:45,639 --> 00:38:46,879
there was something really mysterious
949
00:38:46,879 --> 00:38:49,360
and very different and off about her.
950
00:38:49,360 --> 00:38:51,959
And I remember like feeling,
951
00:38:51,959 --> 00:38:54,800
just my antennas kind of went up when she was around,
952
00:38:54,800 --> 00:38:57,280
and she walks by me and she says,
953
00:38:57,280 --> 00:39:00,560
pink, and like leaves,
954
00:39:00,560 --> 00:39:02,120
and I'm like, oh shit, am I sunburned?
955
00:39:02,120 --> 00:39:03,600
And like looking around,
956
00:39:03,600 --> 00:39:05,560
and like, I don't know where she is,
957
00:39:05,560 --> 00:39:08,040
like she's gone, it was really strange.
958
00:39:08,040 --> 00:39:10,439
And then Danny and I went back the second time,
959
00:39:10,439 --> 00:39:13,879
true story, I just, this really freaks me out.
960
00:39:13,879 --> 00:39:16,919
Well, the island, it's so like incredible.
961
00:39:16,919 --> 00:39:18,679
But anyway, we're in the middle of the Pacific
962
00:39:18,679 --> 00:39:20,879
at this one beach,
963
00:39:20,879 --> 00:39:25,879
and this woman like pops up like from under the water,
964
00:39:25,959 --> 00:39:28,199
and it's this woman,
965
00:39:28,199 --> 00:39:31,639
she's like, isn't the ocean so healing?
966
00:39:31,639 --> 00:39:35,239
And I'm like, oh my God, Danny, there's that woman.
967
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:37,719
So it's like, we went in April and we go back in July
968
00:39:37,719 --> 00:39:38,760
and we see the same woman,
969
00:39:38,760 --> 00:39:43,719
it's just, so she ends up being a protagonist in our story.
970
00:39:43,719 --> 00:39:47,239
But there was a lot of real life things
971
00:39:47,239 --> 00:39:49,080
that happened on that island
972
00:39:49,080 --> 00:39:53,280
that are just like so crazy to even like,
973
00:39:53,280 --> 00:39:54,919
believe that they happened,
974
00:39:54,919 --> 00:39:58,040
that it just infused what I think
975
00:39:58,040 --> 00:39:59,439
is a really beautiful book.
976
00:39:59,439 --> 00:40:01,919
But it's more than just letting go,
977
00:40:01,919 --> 00:40:03,800
it's really like Danny said, saying yes,
978
00:40:03,800 --> 00:40:05,959
and then taking a different path,
979
00:40:05,959 --> 00:40:09,159
not having the answers, not knowing where you're going,
980
00:40:09,159 --> 00:40:12,120
having all that insecurity and vulnerability and uncertainty
981
00:40:12,120 --> 00:40:13,959
and still walking down the path.
982
00:40:13,959 --> 00:40:16,040
That's where the rewards and the gifts are.
983
00:40:16,040 --> 00:40:17,840
And everybody talks about it,
984
00:40:17,840 --> 00:40:20,199
but, and it sounds nice,
985
00:40:20,199 --> 00:40:21,800
but we don't do it
986
00:40:21,800 --> 00:40:24,760
because it's super, super uncomfortable.
987
00:40:24,760 --> 00:40:26,760
And we don't know if we're going to go further down
988
00:40:26,760 --> 00:40:29,000
and it scares, just scares us.
989
00:40:29,520 --> 00:40:31,919
So this character does that.
990
00:40:31,919 --> 00:40:34,159
He gets a lot of rewards within that.
991
00:40:34,159 --> 00:40:35,719
He's scared too.
992
00:40:35,719 --> 00:40:38,080
He goes to cry on that vacation.
993
00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:39,159
He doesn't come back.
994
00:40:40,679 --> 00:40:42,919
Yeah, he doesn't come back to his other life.
995
00:40:42,919 --> 00:40:46,040
He stays there and repurposes,
996
00:40:46,040 --> 00:40:48,239
reimagines a whole new existence
997
00:40:48,239 --> 00:40:51,719
and becomes an actual real important person on that island.
998
00:40:52,639 --> 00:40:53,840
You know, and has no idea
999
00:40:53,840 --> 00:40:55,679
that that's about to all happen to him
1000
00:40:55,679 --> 00:40:58,560
only because he said, yeah, I'm open to this journey.
1001
00:40:58,560 --> 00:41:00,679
That's the only reason why it happened.
1002
00:41:00,679 --> 00:41:01,560
Yeah.
1003
00:41:01,560 --> 00:41:03,639
I really loved the word that you said, Danny.
1004
00:41:03,639 --> 00:41:05,360
Invitation stood out to me
1005
00:41:05,360 --> 00:41:09,639
of being a really prominent theme of the book.
1006
00:41:09,639 --> 00:41:11,760
And I really loved the way that felt
1007
00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:14,879
of being given the invitation
1008
00:41:14,879 --> 00:41:19,040
to explore a different path, a different way.
1009
00:41:19,040 --> 00:41:23,800
Well, I feel that we are all being given invitations,
1010
00:41:23,800 --> 00:41:26,360
but we make a lot of excuses
1011
00:41:26,360 --> 00:41:29,639
because the invitation doesn't come in the way
1012
00:41:29,639 --> 00:41:31,040
that we think it should
1013
00:41:31,040 --> 00:41:34,360
or with the timing that we think it should.
1014
00:41:34,360 --> 00:41:39,360
But I think the important thing about invitations,
1015
00:41:41,320 --> 00:41:45,040
like, you know, the invitation from Greg
1016
00:41:45,040 --> 00:41:46,919
to go to Cannon Beach
1017
00:41:46,919 --> 00:41:49,399
or the invitation to go to Kauai
1018
00:41:49,399 --> 00:41:51,239
when I felt like I was done.
1019
00:41:52,239 --> 00:41:54,520
I kind of now am guided invitationally
1020
00:41:54,520 --> 00:41:56,399
by how I want to feel.
1021
00:41:56,399 --> 00:41:59,439
And if a suggestion sparked something in me,
1022
00:41:59,439 --> 00:42:02,800
that's like, huh, here's a possibility.
1023
00:42:02,800 --> 00:42:04,320
Instead of saying, oh, I'm stupid.
1024
00:42:04,320 --> 00:42:05,479
Why would I think that?
1025
00:42:05,479 --> 00:42:07,800
Oh, I have, I got this obligation.
1026
00:42:07,800 --> 00:42:09,239
I got that obligation.
1027
00:42:09,239 --> 00:42:14,239
And I think the more we say yes to the invitations,
1028
00:42:14,360 --> 00:42:18,080
the more we get other invitations
1029
00:42:18,080 --> 00:42:22,520
and the more we increase our capability
1030
00:42:22,520 --> 00:42:25,439
of saying yes through all the noise
1031
00:42:25,439 --> 00:42:30,439
that everything puts on us and get us to say no.
1032
00:42:31,280 --> 00:42:35,439
I think people tend to see invitations more as demands
1033
00:42:35,439 --> 00:42:40,439
instead of like a door opening into a possibility.
1034
00:42:43,040 --> 00:42:46,840
And like I said before, we don't know what we don't know.
1035
00:42:46,840 --> 00:42:49,719
There's such a vast possibility out there,
1036
00:42:49,719 --> 00:42:52,159
a vast amount of information
1037
00:42:52,159 --> 00:42:54,399
that could become really intensely relevant to us
1038
00:42:54,399 --> 00:42:55,479
if we just walk through that door.
1039
00:42:55,479 --> 00:42:57,280
But so many people,
1040
00:42:57,280 --> 00:42:59,560
they're happier staying in the hallway.
1041
00:42:59,560 --> 00:43:01,320
Oh, I don't want to go through that door.
1042
00:43:01,320 --> 00:43:02,320
What's behind there?
1043
00:43:02,320 --> 00:43:04,560
Oh, I think I'll just stay here.
1044
00:43:06,520 --> 00:43:08,919
And there are a lot of people that they get,
1045
00:43:08,919 --> 00:43:10,840
they're empowered by saying no.
1046
00:43:10,840 --> 00:43:12,919
They collect and gather invitations.
1047
00:43:12,919 --> 00:43:14,199
And they're like, oh, that's not good enough.
1048
00:43:14,199 --> 00:43:15,040
That's not good.
1049
00:43:15,040 --> 00:43:17,800
And they feel very powerful being able to say no.
1050
00:43:17,800 --> 00:43:21,399
It's really interesting how they're stopping their life
1051
00:43:21,399 --> 00:43:23,760
or waiting for the better one to come along,
1052
00:43:23,760 --> 00:43:24,639
whatever that means.
1053
00:43:24,639 --> 00:43:25,479
I don't know.
1054
00:43:27,120 --> 00:43:28,199
I don't know what that means either.
1055
00:43:28,199 --> 00:43:30,120
Yeah, I don't know.
1056
00:43:30,120 --> 00:43:31,840
Perfection, all these things that we're attaining,
1057
00:43:31,840 --> 00:43:33,719
it's like, I don't know what that is.
1058
00:43:33,719 --> 00:43:35,239
I was explaining to someone the other day
1059
00:43:35,239 --> 00:43:38,800
that perfection was actually different with every person,
1060
00:43:38,800 --> 00:43:39,840
that their happy moment,
1061
00:43:39,840 --> 00:43:42,399
their greatest moment or whatever is unique to them.
1062
00:43:42,399 --> 00:43:43,479
And it's not universal.
1063
00:43:43,479 --> 00:43:46,080
And people are like, wow.
1064
00:43:47,080 --> 00:43:50,360
We can't actually use that term universally.
1065
00:43:50,360 --> 00:43:54,280
So how did writing the book invite new invitations
1066
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:55,560
for the both of you?
1067
00:43:57,320 --> 00:44:01,040
I feel like writing the book wasn't,
1068
00:44:01,040 --> 00:44:04,360
it was an invitation again that I wasn't expecting.
1069
00:44:04,360 --> 00:44:06,600
And I would have,
1070
00:44:06,600 --> 00:44:09,399
I never thought that I'd be a co-author
1071
00:44:09,399 --> 00:44:11,639
or even an editor on it
1072
00:44:11,639 --> 00:44:15,719
because I'm very respectful of artists
1073
00:44:16,399 --> 00:44:18,679
and I would never wanna tell anybody how to do their art,
1074
00:44:18,679 --> 00:44:19,560
how to do their idea,
1075
00:44:19,560 --> 00:44:21,840
how to do their writing, their painting, whatever.
1076
00:44:21,840 --> 00:44:24,840
But Greg really invited me.
1077
00:44:24,840 --> 00:44:29,840
And what that invitation communicated to me from him
1078
00:44:30,040 --> 00:44:31,639
was trust.
1079
00:44:31,639 --> 00:44:36,639
He trusted me with the story and with the characters.
1080
00:44:37,280 --> 00:44:41,560
So I think when we talk about invitations,
1081
00:44:41,560 --> 00:44:44,280
we talk about trusting where it's come from,
1082
00:44:44,280 --> 00:44:48,239
but also trusting ourselves to step up.
1083
00:44:48,239 --> 00:44:52,080
And being invited into that process with Greg,
1084
00:44:52,080 --> 00:44:57,080
it was a very, very healing experience for me.
1085
00:44:57,239 --> 00:44:59,120
We were just coming out of the pandemic,
1086
00:44:59,120 --> 00:45:03,439
which caused me personally a lot of anxiety.
1087
00:45:03,439 --> 00:45:04,719
It re-triggered a lot of stuff
1088
00:45:04,719 --> 00:45:06,120
that I probably hadn't processed
1089
00:45:06,120 --> 00:45:08,840
from having lost my husband a couple of years before that.
1090
00:45:08,840 --> 00:45:12,800
And so I just felt that delving into the story
1091
00:45:12,800 --> 00:45:16,080
of a yearning soul
1092
00:45:16,080 --> 00:45:19,199
and the people who stepped forward to help him
1093
00:45:19,199 --> 00:45:20,520
and to help him heal
1094
00:45:20,520 --> 00:45:22,600
was kind of a beautiful art imitating life
1095
00:45:22,600 --> 00:45:23,760
of how this project
1096
00:45:23,760 --> 00:45:26,639
and Greg had stepped into my life and my space
1097
00:45:26,639 --> 00:45:28,760
to invite me into a healing journey.
1098
00:45:30,040 --> 00:45:30,879
Beautiful.
1099
00:45:30,879 --> 00:45:31,719
Greg?
1100
00:45:31,719 --> 00:45:32,560
Yeah, and as an author,
1101
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:35,360
I mean, you have to show up differently.
1102
00:45:35,360 --> 00:45:37,760
So you get invitations to do book signings
1103
00:45:37,760 --> 00:45:39,520
and you get invitations to do podcasts
1104
00:45:39,520 --> 00:45:42,520
and all of a sudden people look at you in a different way
1105
00:45:43,239 --> 00:45:44,439
and even with my business,
1106
00:45:44,439 --> 00:45:45,439
people would come up and say,
1107
00:45:45,439 --> 00:45:46,719
oh, I read your book.
1108
00:45:46,719 --> 00:45:48,360
Like I was at Expedia the other day
1109
00:45:48,360 --> 00:45:51,959
and the organizer read my book or read our book
1110
00:45:51,959 --> 00:45:55,639
and it was just kind of cool.
1111
00:45:55,639 --> 00:45:58,239
So you do get,
1112
00:45:58,239 --> 00:46:01,760
it opens the world up in a different way
1113
00:46:01,760 --> 00:46:04,719
that you don't have to be ready for,
1114
00:46:04,719 --> 00:46:07,080
but I don't think that would happen in either way
1115
00:46:07,080 --> 00:46:07,919
if you didn't write a book.
1116
00:46:07,919 --> 00:46:11,040
And I think just kind of putting yourself out there,
1117
00:46:11,040 --> 00:46:12,800
being a bit vulnerable and dangling
1118
00:46:13,840 --> 00:46:16,959
and some of the invitations that we wanted didn't come too.
1119
00:46:16,959 --> 00:46:18,560
That happens too.
1120
00:46:18,560 --> 00:46:21,040
The expectations that we had of what was gonna happen
1121
00:46:21,040 --> 00:46:23,760
because the book won awards and things.
1122
00:46:23,760 --> 00:46:26,080
Oprah had written to me a long time ago
1123
00:46:27,239 --> 00:46:29,959
and we thought she was gonna take,
1124
00:46:29,959 --> 00:46:31,879
she said she was waiting for it or something
1125
00:46:31,879 --> 00:46:34,639
and it's a long story, but it really was her.
1126
00:46:34,639 --> 00:46:36,879
And then I never heard from her again,
1127
00:46:36,879 --> 00:46:37,879
it's this whole thing.
1128
00:46:38,000 --> 00:46:41,600
And it's just, I think what Danny and I learned was
1129
00:46:41,600 --> 00:46:44,919
show up and you get more invitations.
1130
00:46:44,919 --> 00:46:45,760
Yeah, I think so.
1131
00:46:45,760 --> 00:46:46,959
So we're just walking through,
1132
00:46:46,959 --> 00:46:48,879
yeah, we're walking through the door, yeah.
1133
00:46:48,879 --> 00:46:50,360
I'm curious because you're both
1134
00:46:50,360 --> 00:46:52,840
kind of in the entertainment production space
1135
00:46:52,840 --> 00:46:55,439
or have been, do you envision this as a film
1136
00:46:55,439 --> 00:46:57,479
at any point, your book?
1137
00:46:57,479 --> 00:47:02,479
Oh, I absolutely do envision Pink as a wonderful film.
1138
00:47:03,840 --> 00:47:06,280
I think it could be very, very adapted
1139
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:08,280
or very well adapted to that.
1140
00:47:08,280 --> 00:47:10,800
But realistically speaking,
1141
00:47:10,800 --> 00:47:15,800
whether you've got an idea for a book, a TV series, a movie,
1142
00:47:17,040 --> 00:47:19,840
there's so much out there.
1143
00:47:19,840 --> 00:47:24,840
My fiance is a musician and there's like 100,000 songs a day
1144
00:47:25,840 --> 00:47:27,360
being uploaded onto Spotify.
1145
00:47:27,360 --> 00:47:28,679
I mean, how are you gonna stand out?
1146
00:47:28,679 --> 00:47:30,600
You need to have a champion that,
1147
00:47:30,600 --> 00:47:33,399
kind of like an Oprah type person.
1148
00:47:33,399 --> 00:47:37,239
So yeah, I do see it as a movie,
1149
00:47:37,239 --> 00:47:39,360
but I just feel that the more we continue
1150
00:47:39,360 --> 00:47:42,719
to put ourselves out there, talk about the book.
1151
00:47:42,719 --> 00:47:44,239
I don't know who's going to be listening
1152
00:47:44,239 --> 00:47:46,439
to this podcast or other podcasts.
1153
00:47:46,439 --> 00:47:51,199
I don't know who's going to be scrolling through Audible
1154
00:47:51,199 --> 00:47:54,080
or Kindle or Amazon and see it and connect and go,
1155
00:47:54,080 --> 00:47:56,600
you know what, I have the connections and the capabilities.
1156
00:47:56,600 --> 00:47:58,239
I'd like to get behind this.
1157
00:47:58,239 --> 00:48:01,959
So I do see it as that, but at the same time,
1158
00:48:01,959 --> 00:48:05,520
I don't need to, we've come to the point
1159
00:48:05,520 --> 00:48:07,320
where we don't need to concern ourselves
1160
00:48:07,320 --> 00:48:10,919
with what comes and who it comes from.
1161
00:48:10,919 --> 00:48:12,959
Just seeing the possibility, I think,
1162
00:48:12,959 --> 00:48:14,080
for us at this point is enough.
1163
00:48:14,080 --> 00:48:15,280
I mean, we've given birth to something
1164
00:48:15,280 --> 00:48:16,239
that we're both really proud of
1165
00:48:16,239 --> 00:48:17,600
and whatever happens with that,
1166
00:48:17,600 --> 00:48:20,159
how that baby grows up, whatever.
1167
00:48:20,159 --> 00:48:22,239
But we brought it into this world
1168
00:48:22,239 --> 00:48:25,239
and I think we're both very, very happy and pleased
1169
00:48:25,239 --> 00:48:27,600
with what it's done for us individually
1170
00:48:27,600 --> 00:48:31,679
and for what it's added to kind of the collective.
1171
00:48:32,080 --> 00:48:34,760
And I think maybe because of our background,
1172
00:48:34,760 --> 00:48:37,120
it does have a kind of a cinematic feel to it.
1173
00:48:37,120 --> 00:48:40,040
95% of the people that read it all agreed
1174
00:48:40,040 --> 00:48:43,639
that they felt that it was very movie-esque.
1175
00:48:43,639 --> 00:48:45,040
Like, oh, I see it as a movie.
1176
00:48:45,040 --> 00:48:47,040
And we had some big news.
1177
00:48:47,040 --> 00:48:49,360
We were launching Danny and I and someone asked,
1178
00:48:49,360 --> 00:48:50,760
oh, you finally got the movie deal.
1179
00:48:50,760 --> 00:48:52,679
Like people really think it's a movie.
1180
00:48:52,679 --> 00:48:54,760
And that helps the energy of the whole thing
1181
00:48:54,760 --> 00:48:57,120
is they really believe that it's movie-esque
1182
00:48:57,120 --> 00:48:58,919
and Danny and I do too.
1183
00:48:58,919 --> 00:49:02,760
So, again, it's a matter of showing up
1184
00:49:02,760 --> 00:49:04,679
and having no expectation.
1185
00:49:04,679 --> 00:49:08,159
It really is important to not to try to drive everything
1186
00:49:08,159 --> 00:49:10,479
from a human standpoint, to be a little more spiritual
1187
00:49:10,479 --> 00:49:13,760
and just allow that flow to happen.
1188
00:49:13,760 --> 00:49:16,280
Because when you get in the way of that flow,
1189
00:49:16,280 --> 00:49:19,320
you stop all the rewards and all the gifts.
1190
00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:20,159
Definitely.
1191
00:49:20,159 --> 00:49:23,280
So you're surrendering for the invitation to come in.
1192
00:49:23,280 --> 00:49:24,120
Yes.
1193
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:26,840
Yeah, and it's not easy to do, but yeah.
1194
00:49:26,840 --> 00:49:28,360
And it feels good that way.
1195
00:49:28,800 --> 00:49:29,639
Danny and I are a lot more free
1196
00:49:29,639 --> 00:49:31,840
and we're enjoying showing up and doing podcasts
1197
00:49:31,840 --> 00:49:34,320
and other things with no expectation.
1198
00:49:34,320 --> 00:49:36,719
We're just like, hey, we're just showing up
1199
00:49:36,719 --> 00:49:38,239
and that's really it.
1200
00:49:38,239 --> 00:49:40,360
And we both agreed on those terms.
1201
00:49:40,360 --> 00:49:42,479
That was the contract that Danny and I had
1202
00:49:42,479 --> 00:49:45,000
between each other is, hey, Danny, let's just show up.
1203
00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:46,159
Okay, that's all we're gonna do.
1204
00:49:46,159 --> 00:49:47,000
We're just gonna show up.
1205
00:49:47,000 --> 00:49:47,840
Great.
1206
00:49:47,840 --> 00:49:49,199
And it's been nice.
1207
00:49:49,199 --> 00:49:50,040
It really has.
1208
00:49:50,040 --> 00:49:53,199
We just, it's over and we go do our thing or whatever,
1209
00:49:53,199 --> 00:49:55,399
but we don't like it on the phone and wonder,
1210
00:49:55,399 --> 00:49:56,760
is that gonna take us somewhere?
1211
00:49:56,760 --> 00:49:58,719
It doesn't need to take us anywhere.
1212
00:49:58,719 --> 00:50:00,040
It needs to have a ripple effect
1213
00:50:00,040 --> 00:50:02,560
for the people that need to receive it and that's it.
1214
00:50:02,560 --> 00:50:03,479
Yeah.
1215
00:50:03,479 --> 00:50:05,280
Well, thank you for showing up.
1216
00:50:05,280 --> 00:50:06,120
Yeah.
1217
00:50:06,120 --> 00:50:06,959
Of course.
1218
00:50:06,959 --> 00:50:07,879
Our pleasure, yeah.
1219
00:50:07,879 --> 00:50:10,679
So if more people can discover your book
1220
00:50:10,679 --> 00:50:13,399
to get you closer to these invitations,
1221
00:50:13,399 --> 00:50:14,679
where can we guide them?
1222
00:50:14,679 --> 00:50:17,840
Gregorycoppola.com is probably the quickest place.
1223
00:50:17,840 --> 00:50:21,000
There's under author, Danny has a bio there too.
1224
00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:22,719
So there's other books that I've written,
1225
00:50:22,719 --> 00:50:24,840
but I Am Pink is kind of a highlight there.
1226
00:50:24,840 --> 00:50:26,040
So they can click on it.
1227
00:50:26,159 --> 00:50:27,239
They can buy it on Amazon.
1228
00:50:27,239 --> 00:50:29,399
It's a Barnes and Noble, kind of all over the place,
1229
00:50:29,399 --> 00:50:31,239
but that's one stop shop.
1230
00:50:31,239 --> 00:50:34,959
So Gregory, and then it's just C-O-P-P as in Paul,
1231
00:50:34,959 --> 00:50:39,320
L-O-E.com, and they can go there and find it.
1232
00:50:39,320 --> 00:50:40,159
Yeah.
1233
00:50:40,159 --> 00:50:41,120
Yeah, I'll put those into the show notes
1234
00:50:41,120 --> 00:50:43,080
so people can click on them really easily.
1235
00:50:43,080 --> 00:50:43,919
Oh, great.
1236
00:50:43,919 --> 00:50:45,080
Thank you.
1237
00:50:45,080 --> 00:50:47,760
Is there anything in either one of your minds
1238
00:50:47,760 --> 00:50:50,159
or your hearts that you feel like you would love to share
1239
00:50:50,159 --> 00:50:52,199
that we haven't gotten to yet?
1240
00:50:52,320 --> 00:50:57,080
Um, I think I would just really like to share
1241
00:50:57,080 --> 00:51:02,080
that I'm very interested in people having the courage
1242
00:51:02,320 --> 00:51:05,479
to, you know, see invitations for what they are,
1243
00:51:05,479 --> 00:51:07,399
to say yes, to trust,
1244
00:51:07,399 --> 00:51:11,760
to have the courage to just keep evolving.
1245
00:51:11,760 --> 00:51:14,520
I think we have the permission,
1246
00:51:14,520 --> 00:51:17,520
we have the ability to give ourselves the permission
1247
00:51:17,520 --> 00:51:19,600
to be whoever we want to be in any given moment.
1248
00:51:19,600 --> 00:51:21,560
It doesn't have to be, you know,
1249
00:51:21,560 --> 00:51:25,639
what is recognizable to peers or family of the past.
1250
00:51:25,639 --> 00:51:27,840
We all have that capability.
1251
00:51:27,840 --> 00:51:29,280
And I think the obligation,
1252
00:51:29,280 --> 00:51:32,199
if we want to be vital to reinvent,
1253
00:51:32,199 --> 00:51:34,639
to keep learning and to keep growing.
1254
00:51:34,639 --> 00:51:38,679
And I think that is a major message of I Am Pink.
1255
00:51:38,679 --> 00:51:41,639
You just don't know the ways in which
1256
00:51:41,639 --> 00:51:44,280
that door is going to open.
1257
00:51:44,280 --> 00:51:48,879
And if you just have the courage to step through it
1258
00:51:48,879 --> 00:51:51,280
so, so much can happen.
1259
00:51:51,280 --> 00:51:54,760
And I hope that's what people would get from the book.
1260
00:51:54,760 --> 00:51:55,600
Yeah.
1261
00:51:55,600 --> 00:51:56,439
Yeah.
1262
00:51:56,439 --> 00:51:57,280
Go ahead.
1263
00:51:57,280 --> 00:51:58,120
Yeah.
1264
00:51:58,120 --> 00:51:58,959
Go ahead.
1265
00:51:58,959 --> 00:51:59,800
No, no, no.
1266
00:51:59,800 --> 00:52:00,639
No, no, no.
1267
00:52:00,639 --> 00:52:03,679
I just wanted to share that just like hearing your story
1268
00:52:03,679 --> 00:52:06,239
and like the starts and the stops
1269
00:52:06,239 --> 00:52:08,199
and the deaths and the transformations
1270
00:52:08,199 --> 00:52:10,600
and the new beginnings that I've heard from you
1271
00:52:10,600 --> 00:52:13,360
that I can tell that like you are very courageous.
1272
00:52:13,360 --> 00:52:16,919
And so I imagine that comes through very strongly
1273
00:52:16,919 --> 00:52:17,760
in your work.
1274
00:52:17,760 --> 00:52:20,360
And so I think that's great.
1275
00:52:20,360 --> 00:52:22,360
Well, I appreciate that.
1276
00:52:22,360 --> 00:52:26,800
And I think 99% of anything is showing up,
1277
00:52:26,800 --> 00:52:29,439
just showing up and to do it scared,
1278
00:52:29,439 --> 00:52:34,239
do it messy, do it anxious, do it depressed,
1279
00:52:35,879 --> 00:52:37,879
do it with your cat having just died,
1280
00:52:37,879 --> 00:52:39,959
which is where I am right now.
1281
00:52:39,959 --> 00:52:43,479
I mean, my 19 year old cat
1282
00:52:43,479 --> 00:52:45,719
literally expired during this podcast.
1283
00:52:45,879 --> 00:52:47,760
I'm telling you that right now.
1284
00:52:47,760 --> 00:52:48,800
And I was prepared for it.
1285
00:52:48,800 --> 00:52:50,560
And I had her right next to me.
1286
00:52:50,560 --> 00:52:52,719
And it was a very kind of sudden thing.
1287
00:52:52,719 --> 00:52:54,600
Although when a cat's 20 expected,
1288
00:52:54,600 --> 00:52:56,959
but you just have to show up and understand
1289
00:52:56,959 --> 00:52:58,719
that the world doesn't expect perfection.
1290
00:52:58,719 --> 00:53:02,959
And in fact, the world I think is very encouraged
1291
00:53:02,959 --> 00:53:07,959
by imperfection because perfect gets in the way of the good.
1292
00:53:08,399 --> 00:53:12,560
And so I would hope that people will keep just showing up.
1293
00:53:13,239 --> 00:53:15,560
I feel like courage is just fear
1294
00:53:15,560 --> 00:53:17,479
that said it's prayers, you know?
1295
00:53:17,479 --> 00:53:21,439
And so I've been through so much
1296
00:53:21,439 --> 00:53:23,199
and I just would hope that other people
1297
00:53:23,199 --> 00:53:27,439
can make space for themselves to just exist
1298
00:53:27,439 --> 00:53:32,439
in and with the mess and to find some sense of gratitude
1299
00:53:32,600 --> 00:53:36,040
and joy within whatever circumstance we find ourselves.
1300
00:53:36,040 --> 00:53:37,840
Cause life just pivots on a dime.
1301
00:53:37,840 --> 00:53:39,239
I will tell you that.
1302
00:53:39,280 --> 00:53:41,120
Yeah, well, I'll see you in that.
1303
00:53:41,120 --> 00:53:41,959
So thank you.
1304
00:53:41,959 --> 00:53:43,000
Yeah, yeah.
1305
00:53:43,000 --> 00:53:43,840
Yeah.
1306
00:53:43,840 --> 00:53:44,679
And Greg.
1307
00:53:45,560 --> 00:53:47,919
I just, I mean, it's the same thing about, you know
1308
00:53:47,919 --> 00:53:50,239
not taking the path and nothing happens in that life
1309
00:53:50,239 --> 00:53:52,520
that you never get to see it.
1310
00:53:52,520 --> 00:53:54,840
And I talk about someone who passes away and she goes
1311
00:53:54,840 --> 00:53:57,520
so, you know, this place and this being comes out
1312
00:53:57,520 --> 00:53:59,639
and says, you know, hi Barbara, you know
1313
00:53:59,639 --> 00:54:02,879
you really love to sew and you wanted to be a seamstress
1314
00:54:02,879 --> 00:54:04,320
but you became an accountant.
1315
00:54:04,320 --> 00:54:05,719
Like what happened with that?
1316
00:54:05,800 --> 00:54:09,679
And she says, well, you know, I didn't believe
1317
00:54:09,679 --> 00:54:11,919
that I could find sustenance within that.
1318
00:54:11,919 --> 00:54:13,679
So I didn't do it.
1319
00:54:13,679 --> 00:54:14,840
So I didn't believe.
1320
00:54:14,840 --> 00:54:15,760
So she cuts it off.
1321
00:54:15,760 --> 00:54:16,760
She doesn't follow that road.
1322
00:54:16,760 --> 00:54:18,280
She doesn't go down that path.
1323
00:54:18,280 --> 00:54:20,639
And then the being says to her, well, you know
1324
00:54:20,639 --> 00:54:22,760
had you trusted or had you gone down that path
1325
00:54:22,760 --> 00:54:24,239
just to see what it would have been like
1326
00:54:24,239 --> 00:54:25,719
this is what your life would have been like.
1327
00:54:25,719 --> 00:54:27,719
And now you have a totally different life.
1328
00:54:27,719 --> 00:54:30,280
She wins an Academy Award as a costume designer.
1329
00:54:30,280 --> 00:54:31,199
These are real things.
1330
00:54:31,199 --> 00:54:34,199
They sound funny, but because, you know
1331
00:54:34,199 --> 00:54:35,439
she didn't go down that path.
1332
00:54:35,439 --> 00:54:37,320
She'll never get to experience that life.
1333
00:54:37,320 --> 00:54:38,840
And it's a totally different life.
1334
00:54:38,840 --> 00:54:40,159
She lives in Malibu.
1335
00:54:40,159 --> 00:54:42,399
She's in the Hollywood, you know, in the business.
1336
00:54:42,399 --> 00:54:46,479
It's just, you know, we got to try to go down
1337
00:54:46,479 --> 00:54:48,560
a different path that lives within our heart.
1338
00:54:48,560 --> 00:54:50,719
That's speaking to us, that has some passion
1339
00:54:50,719 --> 00:54:54,040
and, you know, sensibility there that we have to trust.
1340
00:54:54,040 --> 00:54:57,520
If we don't do that, we end up living not a full life
1341
00:54:57,520 --> 00:54:59,879
I believe, and not the life that we were meant to believe.
1342
00:54:59,879 --> 00:55:00,760
And what's going to happen?
1343
00:55:00,760 --> 00:55:02,040
Like, I always say to people
1344
00:55:02,040 --> 00:55:04,280
how far down are you going to go?
1345
00:55:04,280 --> 00:55:05,479
How far down are you going to go?
1346
00:55:05,479 --> 00:55:06,439
Are you going to lose your house?
1347
00:55:06,439 --> 00:55:08,719
You're going to not have a place to stay or, you know
1348
00:55:08,719 --> 00:55:13,719
we, most of us, luckily, most of us don't go that far down.
1349
00:55:13,879 --> 00:55:16,000
We still have the basics, the food and the house
1350
00:55:16,000 --> 00:55:18,080
or we move in with our daughter or son
1351
00:55:18,080 --> 00:55:20,120
or whatever the case may be.
1352
00:55:20,120 --> 00:55:22,879
But for some reason in our minds, that thing
1353
00:55:22,879 --> 00:55:26,959
that failure or whatever is just too devastating to confront.
1354
00:55:26,959 --> 00:55:30,600
And we'd rather just flatline and just be comfortable
1355
00:55:30,600 --> 00:55:33,840
and then find out later on when we pass away
1356
00:55:33,840 --> 00:55:35,560
what our life was supposed to be.
1357
00:55:35,560 --> 00:55:37,239
I don't want to be that.
1358
00:55:37,239 --> 00:55:38,639
You know, I'm really trying to get in touch with
1359
00:55:38,639 --> 00:55:40,879
even if it's difficult, really trying to get in touch
1360
00:55:40,879 --> 00:55:42,479
with what's that, you know, what is that going to be?
1361
00:55:42,479 --> 00:55:44,520
What does that mean to me?
1362
00:55:44,520 --> 00:55:48,280
You know, even if it's not something that I have designed
1363
00:55:48,280 --> 00:55:51,120
you know, I just, I think we have to listen to the messages.
1364
00:55:51,120 --> 00:55:53,719
And if we're not, then we're not being of service
1365
00:55:55,080 --> 00:55:56,040
universally.
1366
00:55:56,040 --> 00:55:58,679
Yeah, definitely to ourselves or the collective, right?
1367
00:55:58,679 --> 00:56:00,120
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1368
00:56:00,679 --> 00:56:01,520
I mean, that's really it.
1369
00:56:01,520 --> 00:56:04,600
I don't know why I got that message so late in life.
1370
00:56:04,600 --> 00:56:07,439
I don't know if that's just wisdom or, you know
1371
00:56:07,439 --> 00:56:10,840
if someone gets it earlier than I did, but you know
1372
00:56:10,840 --> 00:56:12,840
if you haven't reached that point
1373
00:56:12,840 --> 00:56:15,439
all you have to do is sit down, figure out what that thing
1374
00:56:15,439 --> 00:56:18,520
is and then just start nurturing it and go down that road
1375
00:56:18,520 --> 00:56:20,399
without so much fear around it.
1376
00:56:20,399 --> 00:56:22,000
You don't have to make it into a full-time job.
1377
00:56:22,000 --> 00:56:23,959
You can do it part-time, you can do it on the side
1378
00:56:23,959 --> 00:56:26,320
you can do it, let it evolve, just kind of show up
1379
00:56:26,320 --> 00:56:29,199
a little bit, take a little bit of action
1380
00:56:29,199 --> 00:56:31,560
and see what happens with that.
1381
00:56:31,560 --> 00:56:34,679
You'll know, you'll know what you need to do with it.
1382
00:56:34,679 --> 00:56:36,879
Yeah, that may be a little curiosity.
1383
00:56:37,879 --> 00:56:38,919
A little bit, yeah.
1384
00:56:38,919 --> 00:56:40,800
I think curiosity is great and you touched on that.
1385
00:56:40,800 --> 00:56:42,919
I think it's, you know, it's a beautiful thing.
1386
00:56:42,919 --> 00:56:46,280
Curiosity in religion, curiosity in all things.
1387
00:56:46,280 --> 00:56:48,120
Yeah, thank you so much.
1388
00:56:48,120 --> 00:56:49,959
So I usually wrap up the conversation
1389
00:56:49,959 --> 00:56:53,120
with one last question and it can be simple
1390
00:56:53,120 --> 00:56:57,120
or it can be a little bit longer, it doesn't matter.
1391
00:56:57,120 --> 00:56:59,000
But if your inner voice had a billboard
1392
00:56:59,800 --> 00:57:01,040
what would it say to the world?
1393
00:57:03,320 --> 00:57:07,800
Mine would say trust, would say trust.
1394
00:57:07,800 --> 00:57:09,040
That's it, one word.
1395
00:57:10,239 --> 00:57:13,399
Nice, my billboard, show up.
1396
00:57:14,800 --> 00:57:17,760
That's it, show up, walk through the doors
1397
00:57:17,760 --> 00:57:19,679
for God's sakes, don't worry about it.
1398
00:57:19,679 --> 00:57:21,600
There's an exit door, show up.
1399
00:57:21,600 --> 00:57:24,719
Yeah, well, thank you both so much for trusting me
1400
00:57:24,719 --> 00:57:26,159
and showing up today.
1401
00:57:26,159 --> 00:57:27,159
Thank you. It's been a pleasure.
1402
00:57:27,159 --> 00:57:28,520
Yeah.
1403
00:57:28,520 --> 00:57:29,800
So thank you.
1404
00:57:29,800 --> 00:57:30,639
Thank you.
1405
00:57:30,639 --> 00:57:31,479
Thanks Whitney.
1406
00:57:32,560 --> 00:57:34,399
Thank you so much for joining me this week.
1407
00:57:34,399 --> 00:57:36,000
If you're listening and you like what you hear
1408
00:57:36,000 --> 00:57:39,280
please consider subscribing and rating this podcast
1409
00:57:39,280 --> 00:57:42,760
as it really helps get this podcast out to other people
1410
00:57:42,760 --> 00:57:44,879
who might be interested in hearing it
1411
00:57:44,879 --> 00:57:46,800
but don't know about it yet.
1412
00:57:46,800 --> 00:57:50,120
And also if you'd like to contact me or reach me
1413
00:57:50,120 --> 00:57:55,000
you can reach me at unconditioningpodcast at gmail.com
1414
00:57:55,000 --> 00:57:58,120
or unconditioningpodcast on Instagram.
1415
00:57:59,120 --> 00:57:59,959
Thank you so much.
1416
00:57:59,959 --> 00:58:04,360
And until next time, stay tuned in to you.