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And we didn't get to introduce Kai.
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Oh, yeah. He's napping right now.
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And you have more animals, you said?
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I have five right now.
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Who are the others? Yeah.
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I have three cats and I have another dog.
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What are their names?
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Kavi is the main coon. And then the other two
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cats are Kanan and Cairo. And then I have, this
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is Kai. And then my other dog is Koa.
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What's the addiction to Kai?
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Well, I go by PK. And the K has been
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one of my favorite parts of my name. I'm named
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after my grandmother, Catherine.
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Where did the name Kavi come from?
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It means sage. His full name is Kavi Raja. And
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it means sage king.
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Yeah, I love that. Hey, it's Jay. I don't know
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what your day's been like, but I was just thinking
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about you for a minute. And I hope you're being
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a little patient with yourself because you deserve it. And yeah,
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I'll talk to you soon. Paris, welcome to On Purpose.
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Thank you for having me.
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I'm so grateful that I got to listen to some
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of the album in preparation for the interview. And I
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found it captivating. I found it moving. I found parts
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of it painful and difficult and challenging in a really
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cathartic way. And I found parts of it quite nostalgic,
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which was really, really beautiful, actually, when something makes you
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feel like familiarity and And positivity at the same time.
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And so thank you for putting it together. I wanted
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to ask you, obviously the album's called Happiest Day of
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My Life. And you've said that you feel like you're
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in the happiest place in your life at the moment.
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I do. The song title as well as the cover
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and kind of everything is a bit tongue-in-cheek. And also
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it is cool to say that I am really happy
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right now.
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Talk to me about the tongue-in-cheek part and the part
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that feels like it's true.
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So the lyrics are, this could be the happiest day
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of my life, but nothing lasts forever. And so it's
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kind of like I've always really enjoyed self-deprecating humor. Something
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with like a pessimistic view, even though, you know, in
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the last year I've really redirected my perspective and I
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tend to look for the silver lining and I tend
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to look for the deeper meaning in things. And that
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hasn't made me happier. I still do enjoy pessimism in
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a humorous way. And I enjoy kind of self-deprecating humor
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and things like that. And so the nothing lasts forever thing.
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second half of that line is very much just like
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almost making fun of my negativity.
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That's interesting. I feel like as a Brit, I can
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totally understand the self-deprecating humor part.
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Obviously, the cover art is kind of the opposite of
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like happiest day of my life. It's kind of just, yeah,
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a little tongue in cheek.
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What would the happiest day of your life look like?
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If you had to paint an ideal day, what does
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it look like?
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Ideally, having gotten enough sleep. Like a good, solid amount
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of sleep. What's a solid amount of sleep for you?
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I probably need 10 hours. I rarely get it. Usually
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I get between six and eight. But as a female,
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I do need more. So if I could get 10,
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that'd be killer. My body usually doesn't let me do that.
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Same. I would love 10 hours.
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That'd be super sick if I could do that. And then, yeah,
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wake up, have my coffee, hang out with my animals
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for a little bit. Maybe do something that is, you know,
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good for my body. Any kind of like somatic or
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aerobic thing, like maybe rock climb or something. And spend
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time with friends. Something related to music, whether it's writing
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or playing or just practicing guitar or something like that.
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And then, you know, early bedtime. Some good food.
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Sounds like a perfect day. Yeah. You told us about
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your happiest day today. What did... day in your life
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looked like when you were growing up, when you were
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a young girl?
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It's funny because it's almost similar to how I live now,
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which is every day is very different. I know a
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lot of kids don't maybe wake up, have breakfast, go
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to school, do some kind of after school activity, go home,
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have dinner, go to bed. And that is like every day.
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My days were constantly changing. There was a lot of travel.
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There was a lot of just moving about, seeing new places.
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I was homeschooled for the first six grades. And anytime
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we'd be in a new country, we would learn about
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that country that we were in. We learned the folklore
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of the country. We learned the legends. It really just
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depended on what city we were in, what country we
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were in. It's kind of hard to be like, oh,
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what was the average day? There was no average, really.
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This episode of On Purpose is presented by Ultra Running.
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That's A-L-T-R-A running.com forward slash on purpose. Stay out there.
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What does homeschooling look like? What's your take on it?
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Do you look back at that experience and go, that
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was really positive, I liked being homeschooled, I saw value
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in it, or do you look back at it and go, hmm,
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I'm not sure I'd do that if I ever had kids.
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I think there's things to take from it and things
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to maybe not take from it, like most things. I
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really valued the sort of tones and specifics of a
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lot of what I learned through homeschooling because there's a
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lot that I don't really agree with as far as
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the standard curriculum goes throughout the United States. I think
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there's something to be said about depending on which state
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you live in, your history book is going to tell
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you something completely different. Seattle's very different from, you know,
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West Virginia. Like you're just going to get different lessons.
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And also there's definitely maybe like a lack of social
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exposure as far as peers go. So I definitely had
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a bit of a speed bump and kind of, you know,
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had to adapt very quickly when I started interacting with
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people my age.
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Yeah, I found that like I was born and raised
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in London. And growing up, learning about British history, and
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even though I'm Indian, only learning about what happened in India,
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like years later and being like, oh, wow, that was
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not in my history books whatsoever. And being just quite
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shocked by it, about how I could have just completely
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missed that part of my heritage and history. And so
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you're so right when you talk about how much is
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lost in national curriculums or state curriculums, as you said,
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that you just don't come across. One of my favorite
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questions to ask people, and I ask it often on
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the show is, What's a childhood memory that you have
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that you feel defines who you are today or a
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moment or experience that you had that you look back
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on and think, yeah, that really showcases who I still
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am today.
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My first instinct is to be like all of them
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because all of the people that we meet are, you know,
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help create pieces of me and blah, blah, blah. But
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for some reason I am getting this, this one memory.
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This was during a very short period where we were
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in LA and I was probably 10, 15. And there
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was a hummingbird that we thought was dead. And I
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was really affected by that. You know, I held it
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in my hands and, you know, my dad was like, no,
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there might be germs. But I was very like, no,
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I want to hold it and I want to mourn
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it and I want to be gentle with it and
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I want to love it. And it must not have
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been dead because after I like cried over it and
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held it, I went outside and I was going to
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bury it and I opened my hands to look at
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it and it flew away. And that was like a
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really beautiful, even looking back on it, spiritual experience. But
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just that kind of, when I feel things, I feel
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so big and I feel so deeply. And I think
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I've always been like that. And I hopefully always will
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be because it's, you know, one of the most beautiful
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aspects of life is to feel the highest highs and
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the lowest lows.
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That sounds like such a healing experience.
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Yeah, it was beautiful.
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Yeah.
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I forgot about that until now.
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That's so beautiful. I love that. That's such a special memory.
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I love the idea. The reason why I love it
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even more is because there's the famous teaching of the
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Buddha about, have you ever heard this story of how
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a monk in the monastery finds a bird that seems
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hurt and the monk wants to help it and the
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monk goes to pick it up and the Buddha goes,
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be really careful because if you hold it too tight,
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you might actually break its wings or hurt it. But
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then the monk says, but if I don't hold it
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tight enough, then it will fly away or it will
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hurt itself again. And the Buddha says, don't hold it
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too tight or too loose. And that's that idea of
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like that balance in life of you can't hold yourself
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too tight or too loose. And if you want to
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help someone, you can't hold them too tight or too loose.
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And this idea of just finding that comfort, it sounds
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like you held that bird perfectly.
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Just the right.
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Just the right.
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I love those stories. There's been a few parables that
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I've gotten from the Buddhist philosophy that I really, really
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love that have really just kind of guided me.
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Are there any that come to mind?
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You know the who's to say one, the farmer's parable?
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Yes, go on. I love it. No, I'm going to
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butcher it.
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I'm going to butcher it. But it's just this idea
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of who's to say what's good or bad. And I've
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really been, in the last year, really been trying to
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practice the... belief that nothing is good or bad. It's either,
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you know, light or heavy energy and heavier energies are
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harder to mulch, but it's still, it's still divine, you know,
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and it's still for a reason. And it's still, you know,
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whether someone believes in God or the universe or multiple
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deities or whatever the belief is, is that it's for
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a reason kind of thing.
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Yeah. I can't imagine how happy the 10 year old
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version of you was when the bird flew away. it
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was magic. Did you felt like you saved it and
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healed it? Of course I did.
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I was like, I have magical powers.
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You do. I do think there's a healing energy to
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how a 10 year old must've held up there.
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I have a lot of apprehension with vocalizing some of
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my more woo-woo beliefs just because I've been, you know, I've,
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been on the receiving end of a lot of skeptics.
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I have an inner skeptic that lives in me that's like,
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let's preface every story with I could be wrong, but.
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That's beautiful. Well, I wanted to ask you about how,
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you know, when you think about memories like that that
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come to mind at the same time, you know, when
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you're listening to your music, there's so much about as
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you said, the heaviness of life. And I love what
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you just said right now about how life's not really
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good or bad. It's either light or heavy and emotional experience.
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And I think that's such a healthy way of looking
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at it. I think we're so quick as humans to
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label something as good, bad, right, wrong. And I've been
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trying to use words like honest more as in I
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want moments to be honest. I want them to be experienced.
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I want them to feel real. Yeah. rather than good
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or bad or right or wrong, which feel so conclusive
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and certain. When did things start to feel heavier for
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you in life? And when did you start to kind
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of feel the weight of that, that we feel in
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your music as you're expressing it?
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Like eight, I'd say. Probably about eight. I remember being
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so surrounded by love and playing Hot Wheels with my
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brother and then going into my room and being alone
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for a second and having that sinking, like empty, just feeling,
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you know, it's hard to explain if you don't know
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what I'm talking about, but it's, that has kind of
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been this sort of, I don't want to say companion
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because it's not the most pleasant thing, but it's been
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a through line throughout my life, this kind of almost
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chronic loneliness that I think definitely plays a part in alcoholism,
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drug addiction, depression, anxiety, things like that.
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When you start to experience that that young, I also
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imagine there wasn't really a vocabulary for that 20 years
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ago in the easiest sense. Did you even know what
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you were experiencing?
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No, I didn't know what it was. I just know
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that it sucked. It sucked bad. And just having unmanageable
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thoughts and feelings. And as I got older... learning how
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to search outside of myself for things, people, places, things
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that could, you know, kind of ease that or help
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me manage it. And for the longest, survival skills versus
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coping skills.
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When you started to notice them at the time, what
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did you think it was? Where did you think it
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came from? And what did you do with those feelings?
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I don't know. I mean, I was eight or nine
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or seven. I don't know exactly when, but it was
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just like, yeah, I didn't know what to do about it.
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And then.
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You know, obviously as I got a little bit older,
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I started trying things that would kind of bandaid it
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for a time or if anything distract me from it. Um,
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and that's what, uh, substances did for a long time.
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When did you first get exposed to drugs?
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I mean, that's kind of a perspective thing because alcohol
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can be a drug. Uh, so that was, that was
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in my early teen years, 14 ish, I think. Um,
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weed I don't really consider a drug but I treat
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it like one it is a plant medicine and it
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is so helpful to so many people but because there's
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no way for me to be in right relationship with
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it I stay away from it and that was something
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that I treated as a gateway I don't like that
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people call it a gateway drug because I know for
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so many people it's not it was for me and
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then I mean yeah by the time I was 19
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I was on like narcotics and did.
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You just feel that like you said it was a
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almost like something that numbed you? Was it an escape?
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What did it do for you that you couldn't find
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anywhere else at the time?
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Not numb because I, again, I feel very deeply. So
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I think it just brought me to a more moderated...
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I could still cry. I could still kind of laugh.
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I could still, you know... I think it just made
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me feel normal. It made me feel more, like, managed.
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And it wasn't that it was like an escape. It
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was just... I don't like that word either because a
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lot of people when talking about addiction, they use the
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term escape. And I don't think that it felt that
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way for me. I think part of it was I
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just simply loved the effect produced by these things. And
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it just made me feel different than how I was
296
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used to feeling, which sucked.
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How did it then affect your day-to-day life? Because it
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sounds like it was helpful. In the beginning, at least. Oh, yeah.
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It's always, you know, fun at first and fun with
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problems and problems with fun and then just problems. It's
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typically the progression.
302
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Where does that come from? Is that a lyric?
303
00:14:31.340 --> 00:14:34.000
No, it's just it's something that, you know, my friends
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and I have picked it up around.
305
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Say that again. That was so good. I've never had
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someone say it that way.
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It's fun, then fun with problems and problems with fun.
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And then it's just problems.
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Talk to me about that journey, that arc.
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Hindsight's 2020. When I look back on that journey, there
311
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were plenty of experiences that should have qualified as bottoms
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that would have gotten me sober but just wasn't enough
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and it's kind of that it takes what it takes
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and it had to get to a certain point for
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me there were certain things i experienced that would have
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scared other people into getting sober but it didn't do
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that for me yet it was a lot of this.
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What was the experience if you can share with us
319
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that felt closest that you felt in your words should
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have or could have.
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Got you so many i mean one of them that
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really should have uh maybe done it should have as
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if i should be the one in control okay well
324
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i blew a hole through my nose which is you
325
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know public knowledge i have a perforated it's not dvd
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it's perforated so it it whistles you know i can
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show you after the cameras aren't rolling like i'll shine
328
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a light and you can see straight through you know
329
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my nose and i freaked out there's blood everywhere i
330
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looked in my you know in the mirror and i
331
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saw it and when i went to the doctor he
332
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obviously knew what it was from because that only happens
333
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from you know cocaine ketamine just snorting drugs and uh
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it was like, we can fix this. But if you
335
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keep going, it's just going to happen again. There's only
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so many reconstructive surgeries we can do. So if you're
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not done, I wouldn't bother yet. And I remember having
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the thought of, well, I'm not done. That was one.
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I mean, I've had, you know, someone OD on my
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drugs that I had to breathe for until the paramedics
341
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showed up. And they were like, if you didn't get
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there in time, he'd either be dead or brain dead.
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I mean, I've had Plenty of experiences that were scary
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enough to have gotten me sober, but I just wasn't ready.
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You know, no intervention or traumatizing event could have gotten
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me there until I was actually ready.
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In the way you describe it, I'm wondering, when did
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experimenting turn into addiction for you?
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I mean, I've always been the type of person to
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reach outside of myself and just become in consuming relationships
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with things. I mean, even now with, you know, over
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half a decade sober, like I... I will turn Pilates
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into an addiction. I will turn rock climbing into an addiction.
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I can turn meditation into an addiction. So the main
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focus in this last year has been, okay, how do
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I get into right relationship with it? One of the
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scariest and probably darkest moments of my addiction, which was
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still a year before I got sober, was I had
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00:17:06.269 --> 00:17:13.130
been freebasing heroin and fentanyl. And you can't really smoke
360
00:17:13.150 --> 00:17:15.539
it out of a pipe because the effect produces you
361
00:17:16.160 --> 00:17:18.039
not out. And so if you have a glass pipe,
362
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it's just going to break every time you get too high.
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And I had lost my voice for three months because
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I was using foil. And I didn't think I was
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ever going to be able to sing again. For the
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first month, I couldn't talk at all. It was just
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this strained, whispery. And I didn't even pick up my
368
00:17:37.150 --> 00:17:39.549
guitar during that time because it was like, well, if
369
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I can't sing and write, then what's the point? Because
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I don't consider myself a guitar player. I know enough
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just to write. And that was several months of... Yeah,
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not thinking I was ever going to be able to
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do literally what I feel is my life passion and
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purpose ever again.
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What did that feel like?
376
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What's a good word for it? I don't know that
377
00:17:58.849 --> 00:18:03.539
it's hopelessness because hopelessness grants the gift of desperation, which
378
00:18:03.599 --> 00:18:09.539
typically leads to sobriety in the right circumstance, but pointlessness maybe.
379
00:18:10.079 --> 00:18:12.420
When I hear you describe these moments, I wonder what
380
00:18:12.480 --> 00:18:16.130
you now looking back, if you wanted people to know
381
00:18:16.210 --> 00:18:18.589
and understand something about your life during that time or
382
00:18:19.309 --> 00:18:21.089
that you think would help them, what would you say
383
00:18:21.730 --> 00:18:23.369
reflecting back now on that time in your life?
384
00:18:23.390 --> 00:18:27.869
I don't think I need to because I do believe
385
00:18:27.990 --> 00:18:32.309
that it's through hearing other people's stories of recovery that
386
00:18:32.430 --> 00:18:36.839
I was able to open my ears and find recovery myself.
387
00:18:37.140 --> 00:18:38.740
And so it's kind of like a, almost like a
388
00:18:38.759 --> 00:18:42.220
word of mouth and giving of experience, strength and hope
389
00:18:42.259 --> 00:18:45.789
to each other that helps us stay sober, this beautiful
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00:18:45.809 --> 00:18:49.380
community that can exist. And I think for people outside
391
00:18:49.410 --> 00:18:53.799
of that, it's not really for them. And it is interesting.
392
00:18:53.839 --> 00:18:59.819
I've definitely spent several years where the sobriety has been
393
00:18:59.839 --> 00:19:04.359
celebrated and it's been, you know, this amazing piece of
394
00:19:04.400 --> 00:19:06.559
connection for me and these people that I love so deeply.
395
00:19:06.579 --> 00:19:12.619
And then I'll see maybe someone's reaction that doesn't understand
396
00:19:12.660 --> 00:19:14.420
and maybe someone's reaction that's on the outside of it.
397
00:19:14.420 --> 00:19:15.940
And there is a lot of judgment and there is
398
00:19:15.980 --> 00:19:20.559
a lot of like drug addicts. And that was definitely
399
00:19:20.579 --> 00:19:23.460
a bit startling for me. One of the first times
400
00:19:23.500 --> 00:19:28.640
I really experienced that kind of reaction because this whole time,
401
00:19:28.720 --> 00:19:31.369
once I actually went from seeking recovery to being in recovery,
402
00:19:32.089 --> 00:19:34.349
I've started seeing it as my, this is my superpower.
403
00:19:34.769 --> 00:19:37.410
Like I now see that my experience can benefit other people.
404
00:19:37.720 --> 00:19:40.440
my deepest moments of suffering, once I transform them and
405
00:19:40.549 --> 00:19:43.190
alchemize them, they can become very potent pieces of medicine
406
00:19:43.210 --> 00:19:48.309
for other people. What a gift. And so that's been
407
00:19:48.349 --> 00:19:51.700
my perspective. And then when I hear the exact opposite
408
00:19:51.720 --> 00:19:55.940
from someone else, it's like, whoa, you know, it's very startling.
409
00:19:56.440 --> 00:19:58.960
I remember a few years back, we had Tom Holland
410
00:19:59.009 --> 00:20:01.009
on the show and he was talking about his sobriety journey.
411
00:20:01.029 --> 00:20:03.630
And the reason I just saw him this morning, and
412
00:20:03.849 --> 00:20:06.349
so I was thinking about it again, and just how
413
00:20:06.369 --> 00:20:08.970
many messages we still get years later on with people saying,
414
00:20:09.519 --> 00:20:13.279
hearing his story has helped them on their journey. And
415
00:20:13.299 --> 00:20:15.380
I can imagine with the same as you're sharing right now,
416
00:20:16.299 --> 00:20:19.329
I look forward to the messages you'll get and I'll
417
00:20:19.369 --> 00:20:22.150
get and that we'll get for the show that people
418
00:20:22.190 --> 00:20:25.170
hearing your story will help them because I think when
419
00:20:25.190 --> 00:20:27.309
you're in those moments, I imagine, as you said, you
420
00:20:27.329 --> 00:20:31.329
feel extremely lonely, you feel depressed. I've heard people say
421
00:20:31.349 --> 00:20:34.349
things to me like, you just feel like you shouldn't
422
00:20:34.390 --> 00:20:37.950
be there. Things could be better without you. There's so many...
423
00:20:38.230 --> 00:20:39.950
thoughts that kind of spiral in your mind, what would
424
00:20:39.970 --> 00:20:42.319
you say were the most common thoughts that came into
425
00:20:42.359 --> 00:20:43.920
your mind at the time? A lot of.
426
00:20:43.900 --> 00:20:48.000
Terminal uniqueness, no one understands kind of thing, which is
427
00:20:48.599 --> 00:20:51.500
almost humorous at this point because a lot of sober
428
00:20:51.519 --> 00:20:53.480
people that I talk to have had that at some point.
429
00:20:53.900 --> 00:20:55.900
And that is what separates us. We look for the
430
00:20:55.920 --> 00:20:59.069
differences as opposed to the similarities. And it is through
431
00:20:59.109 --> 00:21:02.410
hearing other people's stories. I've been in situations where I'm
432
00:21:02.450 --> 00:21:04.930
talking to someone that has never had a drink or
433
00:21:04.950 --> 00:21:08.089
a drug and they've never even smoked a cigarette. And
434
00:21:08.109 --> 00:21:11.390
they're trying to tell me about my heroin addiction. I'm
435
00:21:11.430 --> 00:21:14.839
not going to listen to them. Like, respectfully, you don't
436
00:21:14.859 --> 00:21:16.700
know what you're talking about. So I'm just not going
437
00:21:16.720 --> 00:21:19.000
to take. But then I hear someone whose story is
438
00:21:19.019 --> 00:21:24.079
so much worse than mine. Or, you know, they've just
439
00:21:24.140 --> 00:21:26.119
seen more and been through more and done more. If
440
00:21:27.720 --> 00:21:29.109
they can get it, I can get it kind of
441
00:21:29.140 --> 00:21:32.089
a thing. It's a tricky line to kind of tread
442
00:21:32.970 --> 00:21:35.750
as far as talking about these things on podcasts or
443
00:21:35.769 --> 00:21:38.430
interviews and things like that. Because I by no means
444
00:21:38.470 --> 00:21:41.769
want to be like a spokesperson for sobriety, but sharing
445
00:21:41.829 --> 00:21:47.150
my story is something that has helped me. Hearing other
446
00:21:47.170 --> 00:21:49.150
people's stories has helped me. So if I can pay
447
00:21:49.190 --> 00:21:52.799
that forward, absolutely. But I also like I don't want
448
00:21:52.819 --> 00:21:54.940
to be a spokesperson. I don't give advice. I'm not
449
00:21:54.960 --> 00:21:56.980
going to tell someone to not do a drug because
450
00:21:57.980 --> 00:22:00.880
I needed to to get to a certain point. And
451
00:22:00.920 --> 00:22:03.430
thank God I did. So I'm not going to try
452
00:22:03.470 --> 00:22:05.750
and rob someone of their experience. It's very much like
453
00:22:05.829 --> 00:22:07.170
you go and do your own thing. If you need
454
00:22:07.190 --> 00:22:11.299
to go do research, that's, you know, that's your life.
455
00:22:12.059 --> 00:22:14.490
When drugs started to first become a part of your life,
456
00:22:15.220 --> 00:22:17.359
did the adults in your life notice and try and
457
00:22:17.400 --> 00:22:18.880
intervene or help and support?
458
00:22:19.420 --> 00:22:22.099
I hid it really well. Even my self-harm I hid
459
00:22:22.140 --> 00:22:24.000
for a couple of years before my family found out.
460
00:22:24.019 --> 00:22:26.380
And that was like one of my first addictive kind
461
00:22:26.400 --> 00:22:29.529
of experiences. things. That was one of the first like
462
00:22:29.569 --> 00:22:33.970
compulsive addictions that I fell into is cutting and occasionally burning.
463
00:22:34.609 --> 00:22:36.750
I'm pretty good at hiding it in the beginning. And
464
00:22:36.769 --> 00:22:39.930
then it starts to get kind of unmanageable. There were
465
00:22:39.950 --> 00:22:42.390
some people that, you know, tried to step in. You know,
466
00:22:42.450 --> 00:22:44.880
I would deny it. I'd find a way out of
467
00:22:45.059 --> 00:22:49.440
it as we do. We're slippery folk, addictive people.
468
00:22:49.980 --> 00:22:50.200
Yeah.
469
00:22:50.220 --> 00:22:52.140
I mean, eventually it got to there was an intervention.
470
00:22:52.180 --> 00:22:54.420
I was sent away. It didn't do anything. You know,
471
00:22:54.460 --> 00:22:57.309
I wasn't ready. I was still convinced that I'm like, OK, well, yeah,
472
00:22:57.329 --> 00:22:59.269
I'll go because I need help getting off of heroin
473
00:22:59.309 --> 00:23:01.390
so the doctor can give me subs. But, you know,
474
00:23:01.410 --> 00:23:04.339
I'm still going to drink and smoke weed. Didn't think that,
475
00:23:04.579 --> 00:23:06.859
you know, that was going to be a problem, which
476
00:23:06.900 --> 00:23:07.140
it was.
477
00:23:07.880 --> 00:23:10.400
And at that time, as far as I know, you
478
00:23:11.200 --> 00:23:12.720
were sent to one of the centers in Utah.
479
00:23:13.000 --> 00:23:14.660
That was after a suicide attempt. So that was when
480
00:23:14.680 --> 00:23:18.180
I was 15. The rehab my family sent me to,
481
00:23:18.200 --> 00:23:23.619
I was 20 years old, I think. But yeah, Utah,
482
00:23:23.680 --> 00:23:26.279
I was 15. That was after a suicide attempt. And
483
00:23:27.140 --> 00:23:29.700
CPS was like, you guys got to send her away
484
00:23:29.720 --> 00:23:31.710
because she's already been to the psych ward a couple
485
00:23:31.730 --> 00:23:32.069
of times.
486
00:23:32.509 --> 00:23:34.609
What was the experience like at those centers in Utah?
487
00:23:34.630 --> 00:23:37.690
I think we've all had horrific stories about them and
488
00:23:38.269 --> 00:23:40.950
I've not personally interacted with them in any way. And
489
00:23:41.029 --> 00:23:44.140
so I wonder for those of us who don't know,
490
00:23:44.359 --> 00:23:46.299
how would you describe them? What was that experience like?
491
00:23:46.599 --> 00:23:48.910
I mean, each one was different. You know, I know
492
00:23:48.930 --> 00:23:51.779
some other people that have been to ones that were
493
00:23:51.880 --> 00:23:55.720
not as bad or worse. I definitely left with more
494
00:23:55.779 --> 00:23:58.460
PTSD than I went in there with and had nightmares
495
00:23:58.660 --> 00:24:01.799
for two or three years about going back after I
496
00:24:01.839 --> 00:24:03.849
finally left because I was there for a couple months.
497
00:24:03.880 --> 00:24:05.890
I had two years. I was one of the lucky
498
00:24:06.029 --> 00:24:09.789
ones where we didn't experience physical or sexual abuse, but
499
00:24:09.809 --> 00:24:14.450
there was definitely a lot of psychological, emotional, spiritual abuse
500
00:24:14.589 --> 00:24:18.140
that happened there. Yeah, like pitting the clients against each
501
00:24:18.220 --> 00:24:20.799
other kind of a thing, learning how to like, oh,
502
00:24:20.839 --> 00:24:23.640
I can't trust my roommate. I can't trust my therapist.
503
00:24:23.700 --> 00:24:27.059
I can't trust anybody here because anything you say could
504
00:24:27.079 --> 00:24:29.240
put you on the lowest level and could, you know,
505
00:24:29.299 --> 00:24:31.380
and you can't really call your family and tell them
506
00:24:31.440 --> 00:24:34.440
because they're listening and they will, you know, call your
507
00:24:34.460 --> 00:24:36.019
family and be like, don't listen to her. She's lying
508
00:24:36.039 --> 00:24:38.990
to you. And then you get a consequence for, you know,
509
00:24:39.589 --> 00:24:41.730
and you're on meds and you're zombied out. And it's just,
510
00:24:42.069 --> 00:24:44.950
you know, it's rough. You have to learn how to
511
00:24:44.990 --> 00:24:47.049
kind of play the game. If you want to get out.
512
00:24:47.289 --> 00:24:48.470
How's that meant to help anyone?
513
00:24:48.970 --> 00:24:52.269
Rehabilitation, I think, is a case by case, whether it's
514
00:24:52.309 --> 00:24:57.349
like a young kids treatment center or a drug addiction
515
00:24:57.369 --> 00:25:01.190
rehab or a, you know, jail or prison or institution
516
00:25:01.230 --> 00:25:04.029
like rehabilitation is kind of a case by case. And
517
00:25:04.049 --> 00:25:07.390
I don't know that you can just blanket something and
518
00:25:07.430 --> 00:25:10.000
just cover everybody with with one method.
519
00:25:10.599 --> 00:25:13.660
Did that affect how you trusted people later on in
520
00:25:13.700 --> 00:25:15.859
life after that experience? Oh, yeah. Yeah.
521
00:25:16.190 --> 00:25:20.170
For sure. For sure. And it's a shame because I
522
00:25:21.329 --> 00:25:23.450
found a lot of beauty in finally learning how to trust.
523
00:25:24.089 --> 00:25:26.869
Talk to me about that journey with trust specifically. When
524
00:25:26.890 --> 00:25:28.130
you're in that position where you don't know if you
525
00:25:28.150 --> 00:25:31.390
can trust your therapist, your roommate, the people who are
526
00:25:31.410 --> 00:25:34.410
meant to be helping you and supporting you. Yeah. How
527
00:25:34.430 --> 00:25:37.069
does one even go back to beginning to trust someone
528
00:25:37.109 --> 00:25:38.269
else outside of that space?
529
00:25:38.690 --> 00:25:41.380
It was definitely a lot to layer on top of
530
00:25:41.430 --> 00:25:45.740
an already existing issue with trust as far as, you know,
531
00:25:45.779 --> 00:25:48.900
people having ulterior motives and trying to take advantage and take.
532
00:25:49.880 --> 00:25:53.420
But I think it was just something that happened slowly
533
00:25:53.480 --> 00:25:57.599
over time. Yeah, time and consistency. And I've been lucky
534
00:25:57.640 --> 00:26:01.529
enough to have some people that have just shown up
535
00:26:02.440 --> 00:26:05.130
over and over and over, like my best friend of
536
00:26:05.130 --> 00:26:08.079
10 years, just showing up, showing up, showing up.
537
00:26:08.529 --> 00:26:09.430
In every situation?
538
00:26:09.710 --> 00:26:11.650
Yeah, I think it's for with the people that I
539
00:26:11.670 --> 00:26:15.809
do trust. It's something that you know, takes time to build.
540
00:26:17.069 --> 00:26:19.150
I've heard this saying that it's lost in gallons and
541
00:26:19.190 --> 00:26:23.849
gained back in drops. And yeah, drop by drop.
542
00:26:24.349 --> 00:26:25.410
How do you define a good friend?
543
00:26:26.170 --> 00:26:30.079
Integrity. The integrity has to match a certain level. The
544
00:26:30.119 --> 00:26:34.859
humor is very important. And just the sense of home,
545
00:26:34.880 --> 00:26:39.539
I think. I've really whittled my friend group down over
546
00:26:39.559 --> 00:26:41.900
the last few years. And the group that the people
547
00:26:41.960 --> 00:26:45.799
in my life right now, are the most incredible human
548
00:26:45.839 --> 00:26:49.759
beings I've ever met. Just really high integrity, really loyal,
549
00:26:49.940 --> 00:26:56.079
really funny, just salt of the earth human beings that
550
00:26:56.119 --> 00:26:58.880
I can call and they'll show up. And they can
551
00:26:58.920 --> 00:27:01.990
call me and I'll show up. I'm multiple people's emergency
552
00:27:02.009 --> 00:27:05.950
contact and I have a few on mine and it's
553
00:27:06.470 --> 00:27:09.809
one of the most priceless things. Money can't really buy that.
554
00:27:10.069 --> 00:27:11.670
Yeah, you want the friend who gets a call at
555
00:27:11.670 --> 00:27:12.910
2 a.m. and they're there for you.
556
00:27:12.990 --> 00:27:14.559
Oh, I'm packing a bag. I'll be there, you know.
557
00:27:14.759 --> 00:27:16.180
I'm so happy that you found that. Thank you. I
558
00:27:16.180 --> 00:27:18.759
feel like everyone deserves that. Yeah. As you said, that
559
00:27:19.200 --> 00:27:21.519
feeling of home. Yeah. Everyone's born in a home and
560
00:27:21.539 --> 00:27:24.759
then spends their whole life trying to find belonging. And
561
00:27:24.799 --> 00:27:27.480
it's a strange thing to say. It's like, it's weird.
562
00:27:28.299 --> 00:27:31.559
You're born with families. You make friends at school or
563
00:27:31.599 --> 00:27:34.279
at some place and you're still searching for belonging the
564
00:27:34.319 --> 00:27:35.809
whole time. And so when you kind of find it
565
00:27:35.849 --> 00:27:40.119
as an adult, it's pretty rare and spectacular. What is
566
00:27:40.180 --> 00:27:43.859
it that then led to you wanting to even become sober?
567
00:27:43.880 --> 00:27:46.579
I mean, you're saying at 15, you've had a suicide attempt.
568
00:27:47.019 --> 00:27:48.859
Yeah, I've had quite a few of those.
569
00:27:49.220 --> 00:27:51.299
What led you to that? What led you to want
570
00:27:51.319 --> 00:27:52.319
to get to that place?
571
00:27:52.839 --> 00:27:55.980
Depends on which part of me you're asking. Because if
572
00:27:56.000 --> 00:27:59.160
you're asking the part of me that likes to take
573
00:27:59.200 --> 00:28:02.480
the zoomed out approach that's tapped in the source and
574
00:28:02.539 --> 00:28:05.119
is seeing the bigger picture, what led me to that
575
00:28:05.180 --> 00:28:07.509
would be, you know, a divine soul contract that I
576
00:28:07.549 --> 00:28:09.769
signed up for. And something that I chose to go
577
00:28:09.829 --> 00:28:13.680
through as a part of my journey. If you're asking me,
578
00:28:13.720 --> 00:28:16.799
that's like down here on earth, really experiencing it. Just
579
00:28:17.380 --> 00:28:23.500
untreated alcoholism, untreated drug addiction, untreated mental illness. It goes
580
00:28:23.579 --> 00:28:25.869
on for long enough. It becomes unbearable.
581
00:28:26.200 --> 00:28:28.470
I appreciate the parts because I think we all have
582
00:28:29.390 --> 00:28:31.630
multiple viewpoints and stories of why we end up where
583
00:28:31.650 --> 00:28:34.450
we have. And you're so right that there's the version
584
00:28:34.470 --> 00:28:36.680
of you, like you said, zoomed out that can see
585
00:28:36.700 --> 00:28:38.740
the bigger picture that can see the journey you've been
586
00:28:38.880 --> 00:28:40.890
on that can see that that was a choice for
587
00:28:40.950 --> 00:28:44.490
growth and transformation i.e not wanting to take anyone's experience
588
00:28:44.549 --> 00:28:46.809
away and then of course there's the reality of it
589
00:28:46.869 --> 00:28:48.430
what was the point that you were like i can't
590
00:28:48.450 --> 00:28:50.869
keep living like this like i can't keep doing this
591
00:28:50.890 --> 00:28:51.769
to myself.
592
00:28:52.170 --> 00:28:56.940
There were many that led to the attempts uh but
593
00:28:57.279 --> 00:29:01.660
when i got sober it was i had like a
594
00:29:01.700 --> 00:29:03.740
month off a month and a half off of heroin
595
00:29:03.779 --> 00:29:06.769
i'd like detoxed at home I knew someone that had,
596
00:29:07.210 --> 00:29:09.609
you know, Suboxone. And so we were going to take
597
00:29:09.690 --> 00:29:11.970
the strips and we were going to detox on our own,
598
00:29:12.029 --> 00:29:13.829
but I didn't realize I was on fentanyl. So I
599
00:29:13.849 --> 00:29:17.170
took it too early, precipitated withdrawals, like, you know, Fetty's
600
00:29:17.210 --> 00:29:21.269
got legs. So it was very much, uh, I was like, okay, well,
601
00:29:21.289 --> 00:29:22.430
let me just see if I can get through this
602
00:29:22.450 --> 00:29:24.269
without subs because then I'm gonna have to taper off
603
00:29:24.289 --> 00:29:26.309
the subs. Let's just cold turkey this. But it wasn't
604
00:29:26.329 --> 00:29:28.109
cold turkey because I was still drinking a lot. I
605
00:29:28.150 --> 00:29:30.069
was doing, you know, Coke and I was smoking a
606
00:29:30.069 --> 00:29:34.210
lot of weed. And, um, After about a month of
607
00:29:34.349 --> 00:29:37.539
not sleeping, because that's what happens, I was maybe getting
608
00:29:37.559 --> 00:29:39.970
an hour or two at night, maybe three if I'm right.
609
00:29:40.079 --> 00:29:40.420
Lucky.
610
00:29:41.059 --> 00:29:46.579
And I had a suicide attempt that didn't work, which
611
00:29:48.039 --> 00:29:50.940
I don't know the science of it. I could be wrong,
612
00:29:50.980 --> 00:29:53.279
but I don't think as someone that had a tolerance
613
00:29:53.980 --> 00:29:56.589
whatsoever for benzos at the time, having taken an entire
614
00:29:56.619 --> 00:29:59.240
bottle mixed with an entire bottle of vodka, I feel
615
00:29:59.259 --> 00:30:01.920
like that should have worked. And so when I just
616
00:30:01.960 --> 00:30:05.200
woke up hours later, I was like, fuck. That was
617
00:30:05.240 --> 00:30:08.549
one of the first attempts where I'm like, fuck, it
618
00:30:08.630 --> 00:30:10.769
didn't work. Because a lot of people are relieved when
619
00:30:10.789 --> 00:30:13.049
it didn't work or they feel regret the second they
620
00:30:13.549 --> 00:30:16.730
attempt it. I was so upset when it didn't work.
621
00:30:16.910 --> 00:30:18.890
And then a few weeks later, I had a proper
622
00:30:18.930 --> 00:30:23.680
bottom with alcohol where it was just like, my behavior
623
00:30:23.720 --> 00:30:26.759
scared me into getting sober. And it was, for a
624
00:30:26.779 --> 00:30:29.250
long time, went back and forth between this place of,
625
00:30:29.299 --> 00:30:33.519
I can't be here anymore. And well, it's not my time.
626
00:30:33.539 --> 00:30:36.240
So I'm stuck here and I can try all these methods,
627
00:30:36.359 --> 00:30:37.789
but they're still not going to work. And if that
628
00:30:37.809 --> 00:30:40.829
didn't work, then, you know, I would run through all
629
00:30:40.869 --> 00:30:43.970
these other ideas and I would see how it would
630
00:30:44.009 --> 00:30:45.950
go south where it's like, oh, well, you know, I
631
00:30:45.970 --> 00:30:47.769
could try and hang myself, but then it's, you know,
632
00:30:47.789 --> 00:30:48.869
it's not going to work. And I'm going to end
633
00:30:48.950 --> 00:30:51.170
up like, you know, kind of paralyzed or like, I
634
00:30:51.210 --> 00:30:54.210
would just think of all of these ideas and then
635
00:30:54.250 --> 00:30:56.450
how it would go wrong. And I'm like, I'm stuck here. Like,
636
00:30:56.490 --> 00:30:57.869
it's not my time. I'm not going to be allowed
637
00:30:57.910 --> 00:31:00.380
to leave unless it's my time. And so I have
638
00:31:00.410 --> 00:31:02.619
to wait it out. And I didn't know that there
639
00:31:02.640 --> 00:31:06.039
was this secret, very special third place of, oh, this
640
00:31:06.079 --> 00:31:09.460
is great. And we love being here. And, you know,
641
00:31:09.480 --> 00:31:12.269
the good or the bad, the light and the heavy,
642
00:31:12.289 --> 00:31:15.470
these are all things that are part of the experience.
643
00:31:15.809 --> 00:31:18.789
And I'm here to experience the entire spectrum. Like I'm
644
00:31:18.829 --> 00:31:21.069
here for the whole enchilada. I want all the feelings
645
00:31:21.089 --> 00:31:23.869
because that's what I'm taking with me. when I leave.
646
00:31:24.990 --> 00:31:28.119
You know, it's all the feelings, all the experiences.
647
00:31:28.130 --> 00:31:30.400
I feel like that requires a lot of bravery and
648
00:31:30.440 --> 00:31:31.460
courage to accept that.
649
00:31:31.960 --> 00:31:33.839
I don't know if I can take credit for that.
650
00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:36.440
I think it's, you know, it's something that happened through,
651
00:31:36.460 --> 00:31:38.799
you know, spiritual experiences, really.
652
00:31:38.819 --> 00:31:42.920
Were there any experiences that made that clear to you?
653
00:31:42.940 --> 00:31:46.779
Because I feel like sobriety, the journey to sobriety has
654
00:31:46.799 --> 00:31:47.839
so many ups and downs.
655
00:31:48.289 --> 00:31:51.470
There were so many. I had what's kind of called
656
00:31:51.509 --> 00:31:55.369
like an educational variety kind of spiritual awakening that is
657
00:31:55.450 --> 00:31:58.890
not like a boom, white light experience. Like I didn't
658
00:31:58.990 --> 00:32:03.029
have this crazy fall out of bed, hear a booming
659
00:32:03.089 --> 00:32:06.430
voice kind of an experience. It was something that happened
660
00:32:06.450 --> 00:32:08.869
slowly over a period of time. And I learned how
661
00:32:08.990 --> 00:32:11.880
to pray and I didn't know what I was talking to.
662
00:32:12.619 --> 00:32:17.200
But I think it was just the willingness to develop something.
663
00:32:18.150 --> 00:32:22.089
And over time, I started with prayer and meditation and
664
00:32:22.130 --> 00:32:25.029
just getting into these practices blind and just being like, well,
665
00:32:25.150 --> 00:32:28.289
you know, I'm out of ideas. Let's try this. I
666
00:32:28.329 --> 00:32:31.529
started noticing more and more little coincidences that I couldn't explain,
667
00:32:31.589 --> 00:32:34.369
more and more synchronicities, more and more God shots that
668
00:32:35.049 --> 00:32:38.509
eventually piled up into a mountain of evidence of like,
669
00:32:38.670 --> 00:32:42.890
there's got to be something, you know. And one of
670
00:32:42.950 --> 00:32:46.569
them It was a really cool experience that I had.
671
00:32:46.609 --> 00:32:49.089
I think I had about three years sober at the time,
672
00:32:49.170 --> 00:32:51.950
or I was about to get three years sober. And
673
00:32:51.970 --> 00:32:54.390
I had heard someone say, I think it was like
674
00:32:54.430 --> 00:32:56.910
a friend of a friend say like, oh, your higher
675
00:32:56.950 --> 00:33:00.029
power or God or whatever you believe in, the answer
676
00:33:00.089 --> 00:33:03.269
or the universe, the answer to your prayers is never no.
677
00:33:03.390 --> 00:33:06.150
It's always yes, not yet, or I have a better idea.
678
00:33:06.170 --> 00:33:09.220
At this point, I had almost three years sober. And,
679
00:33:09.440 --> 00:33:13.680
you know, I did a prayer and I had like this,
680
00:33:15.180 --> 00:33:17.539
it wasn't like my life flashed before my eyes, but
681
00:33:17.579 --> 00:33:20.289
it was all the times since getting sober that my
682
00:33:20.329 --> 00:33:22.410
higher power was like, I have a better idea for you.
683
00:33:23.369 --> 00:33:26.890
And it was very much like, uh, okay, keep trusting
684
00:33:26.930 --> 00:33:30.109
the process because life is becoming more and more expansive.
685
00:33:30.470 --> 00:33:35.430
Yeah. Your song evermore is, I believe, inspired by that
686
00:33:35.470 --> 00:33:37.849
relationship with God and spirituality.
687
00:33:37.930 --> 00:33:39.690
And it's, you know, it sounds like a love song
688
00:33:39.730 --> 00:33:41.470
and I like being vague enough so that things can
689
00:33:41.509 --> 00:33:44.769
apply to everyone. But that is, that is very much a, uh,
690
00:33:45.829 --> 00:33:50.119
a love letter to source, you know, great spirit, God,
691
00:33:50.279 --> 00:33:52.480
whatever you want to call it. The thing that has
692
00:33:52.519 --> 00:33:55.019
a thousand names, the thing that is the unnameable thing,
693
00:33:55.220 --> 00:33:55.900
you know? Yeah.
694
00:33:56.000 --> 00:33:57.500
But you said you wrote it like a love song.
695
00:33:57.519 --> 00:33:57.940
Pretty much.
696
00:33:57.980 --> 00:33:58.160
Yeah.
697
00:33:58.240 --> 00:34:01.349
I felt like I could hear it in like a
698
00:34:01.849 --> 00:34:03.170
90s rom-com. Yeah.
699
00:34:03.190 --> 00:34:06.269
And it's so corny and it's so like, oh, the
700
00:34:06.289 --> 00:34:10.050
sky is blue and like, it's very... But that's sometimes
701
00:34:10.090 --> 00:34:12.800
how it feels. Like, you know, when I really developed
702
00:34:12.820 --> 00:34:15.440
like a conscious contact with something that made me feel safe,
703
00:34:15.460 --> 00:34:17.260
it was the first time I'd ever truly felt safe.
704
00:34:18.039 --> 00:34:20.659
So it was like, oh, the sky is bluer.
705
00:34:21.159 --> 00:34:23.559
What did your prayer look like? What did it sound like?
706
00:34:23.920 --> 00:34:26.500
It's often changing and it depends on what it is.
707
00:34:26.639 --> 00:34:31.690
But typically it's kind of just giving it over, being like, well,
708
00:34:31.769 --> 00:34:34.409
my best thinking landed me in some pretty dark places
709
00:34:34.469 --> 00:34:36.750
and landed me in the gutter. So why don't you
710
00:34:37.469 --> 00:34:41.039
take the reins, whatever you are. And, you know, I'll
711
00:34:41.059 --> 00:34:43.440
tap in right before a show, right before I, you know,
712
00:34:43.480 --> 00:34:45.340
and it's more like, please help me set aside all
713
00:34:45.380 --> 00:34:48.230
these things. Help me set aside, like, my need to
714
00:34:48.329 --> 00:34:52.670
feel pretty or funny or talented or all these, like, insecure.
715
00:34:52.690 --> 00:34:55.250
Help me set aside my insecurities. Help me set aside my,
716
00:34:55.730 --> 00:34:58.590
you know, these things that I see as needs. And,
717
00:34:59.230 --> 00:35:03.079
you know, just use me as your instrument as I
718
00:35:03.139 --> 00:35:05.380
use my instruments, you know. If I'm here for a
719
00:35:05.420 --> 00:35:07.699
reason and if you gave me these songs for a reason,
720
00:35:07.980 --> 00:35:08.719
help me just play them.
721
00:35:09.099 --> 00:35:11.260
How do you make sense of this idea of handing
722
00:35:11.320 --> 00:35:16.429
it over but then still taking action and responsibility? Talk
723
00:35:16.449 --> 00:35:20.590
to me about that balance between surrender and sincere action.
724
00:35:21.170 --> 00:35:24.030
I think a lot of it has to do with
725
00:35:24.710 --> 00:35:26.210
putting in the work and staying out of the results.
726
00:35:26.530 --> 00:35:28.969
I think that's a big thing. And not trying to
727
00:35:29.030 --> 00:35:36.219
control outcomes. I think control can be a tricky, slippery slope.
728
00:35:37.000 --> 00:35:40.920
You know, I've been recently trying out different things, trying out,
729
00:35:41.019 --> 00:35:44.480
you know, more tools of like exploring similarities between like
730
00:35:44.500 --> 00:35:46.780
Christ consciousness and nirvana, also looking into the Tao a
731
00:35:46.780 --> 00:35:50.730
little bit. And I really like the have the patience
732
00:35:50.769 --> 00:35:52.889
to wait until the mud settles and the water is
733
00:35:52.949 --> 00:35:55.130
clear to make decisions. And so it's kind of like, OK,
734
00:35:55.170 --> 00:35:58.010
let me take a step back, give it 24 hours
735
00:35:58.090 --> 00:36:00.889
or give it however much time, really tap in, check
736
00:36:00.909 --> 00:36:03.429
in with myself. Does this feel icky? Does this feel clean?
737
00:36:03.449 --> 00:36:06.409
Does this feel good? You know, and then I also
738
00:36:06.469 --> 00:36:09.030
have people that I can counsel with. I have, you know, guides.
739
00:36:09.070 --> 00:36:10.670
I have friends. I have people that I can kind
740
00:36:10.710 --> 00:36:12.610
of lean on and be like, I feel like this
741
00:36:12.679 --> 00:36:14.440
is where my intuition is telling me to go. And
742
00:36:14.480 --> 00:36:17.079
if someone's like, that's a bad idea, then for sure
743
00:36:17.139 --> 00:36:19.260
we're going to take that into consideration and add that
744
00:36:19.280 --> 00:36:21.599
to the pot of things that we know. But a
745
00:36:21.699 --> 00:36:23.699
lot of it has had to do with learning how
746
00:36:23.719 --> 00:36:27.860
to be in right relationship with myself and just waiting
747
00:36:27.900 --> 00:36:30.960
for the right indicated action to arise, I guess.
748
00:36:31.369 --> 00:36:33.809
Yeah, I feel like it's a constant dance. Yeah. It's
749
00:36:33.829 --> 00:36:37.320
a constant dance to do that. And I'm guessing that,
750
00:36:37.380 --> 00:36:39.420
you know, talking about relationships, I was thinking about in
751
00:36:39.440 --> 00:36:41.800
your song Stitched, there's a lyric that I liked. You said,
752
00:36:42.559 --> 00:36:45.480
how your soul was stitched into mine with your heart
753
00:36:45.659 --> 00:36:48.639
eating into mine. Talk to me about this lyric because
754
00:36:49.519 --> 00:36:53.949
fascinated by, we're talking about godly relationships. Sure. Spiritual relationships,
755
00:36:53.969 --> 00:36:56.670
but then we have relationships on the planet. Talk to
756
00:36:56.690 --> 00:36:58.210
me about that specific lyric.
757
00:36:58.579 --> 00:37:01.980
I believe in multiple soulmates. I believe that a soulmate
758
00:37:02.039 --> 00:37:06.159
is not necessarily someone that you are in a romantic,
759
00:37:06.199 --> 00:37:09.380
intimate relationship with. I think parents can be soulmates. I
760
00:37:09.420 --> 00:37:12.650
think siblings can be soulmates. I think your arch nemesis
761
00:37:12.690 --> 00:37:15.369
in this lifetime is a soulmate because that is a
762
00:37:15.610 --> 00:37:18.559
great lesson of yours that Maybe that arch nemesis was
763
00:37:18.599 --> 00:37:21.099
your mother in another life. Maybe it was your father
764
00:37:21.119 --> 00:37:23.079
in another life. Maybe it was your husband in another life.
765
00:37:23.139 --> 00:37:26.610
Like that's just my belief. And I know it's wacky,
766
00:37:26.670 --> 00:37:29.210
but that's just, you know, what feels right and makes
767
00:37:29.230 --> 00:37:32.949
sense to me. And this song was written about someone
768
00:37:32.969 --> 00:37:35.789
that I felt like we had experienced every type of
769
00:37:35.829 --> 00:37:38.860
human relationship you could have in all of our other
770
00:37:38.880 --> 00:37:40.820
lifetimes prior to this one. And so it was a
771
00:37:40.840 --> 00:37:44.260
very deeply rooted one. And it was not that I
772
00:37:44.300 --> 00:37:47.559
love this person more than other loves. But it was different.
773
00:37:47.599 --> 00:37:49.000
It was very one of a kind and it did
774
00:37:49.099 --> 00:37:53.239
feel kind of like just stitching, which, you know, when
775
00:37:53.679 --> 00:37:56.239
not cared for the right way can become very codependent,
776
00:37:56.500 --> 00:37:59.760
can be, you know, especially ours was a drug fueled relationship.
777
00:38:00.989 --> 00:38:04.190
And yeah, I definitely felt like his heart ate mine.
778
00:38:04.210 --> 00:38:06.070
I was going to ask you that. What's the difference
779
00:38:06.110 --> 00:38:10.369
between a relationship when you're sober versus when you're drug related?
780
00:38:11.349 --> 00:38:13.590
Oh, I mean, well, that depends if we're talking about
781
00:38:13.630 --> 00:38:16.610
emotionally sober or simply physically sober, because I definitely got
782
00:38:16.650 --> 00:38:19.329
into relationships when I was physically sober and didn't really
783
00:38:19.369 --> 00:38:22.800
have emotional sobriety. And that can become a consuming relationship
784
00:38:22.860 --> 00:38:26.280
in itself where the person becomes the drug. That's not
785
00:38:26.320 --> 00:38:31.820
healthy either. Experiencing a emotionally sober relationship, again, has to
786
00:38:31.860 --> 00:38:34.119
do with being in right relationship with myself and has
787
00:38:34.139 --> 00:38:36.860
to do with being intentional with everything I do and
788
00:38:36.949 --> 00:38:42.119
being incredibly honest with myself. And incredibly honest and transparent
789
00:38:42.159 --> 00:38:43.079
with people around me.
790
00:38:43.659 --> 00:38:47.260
I love how you just define the difference between physically
791
00:38:47.280 --> 00:38:48.360
sober and emotionally sober.
792
00:38:48.400 --> 00:38:51.739
Big difference. You know, I know there's some people that
793
00:38:51.760 --> 00:38:53.280
will claim to be sober and then they're getting in
794
00:38:53.320 --> 00:38:55.989
fistfights with their roommate. And it's like, it's awesome that
795
00:38:56.010 --> 00:38:57.090
you're not on drugs, man.
796
00:38:57.110 --> 00:38:57.650
Yeah.
797
00:38:57.670 --> 00:38:59.429
That's good for you. Yeah.
798
00:38:59.829 --> 00:39:02.429
What surprised you most about sobriety? All of it.
799
00:39:03.030 --> 00:39:05.929
And I said this when I got five years sober,
800
00:39:06.769 --> 00:39:08.809
which was like a year and a half ago. Like,
801
00:39:08.849 --> 00:39:11.369
I can't believe I almost missed it all. Because my
802
00:39:11.409 --> 00:39:16.230
life has become so much more opened up. You know,
803
00:39:16.289 --> 00:39:18.579
I have more trust and more intimacy and more closeness
804
00:39:18.619 --> 00:39:21.780
with the people in my life. And people rely on me.
805
00:39:21.900 --> 00:39:25.610
People can rely on me. And that's really special.
806
00:39:26.210 --> 00:39:27.730
Was there a time when you felt like you really
807
00:39:27.769 --> 00:39:29.170
let people down? Oh, yeah.
808
00:39:29.429 --> 00:39:29.670
I mean.
809
00:39:29.940 --> 00:39:30.199
yeah.
810
00:39:30.219 --> 00:39:33.960
I feel like that might be the universal experience for
811
00:39:34.659 --> 00:39:35.679
people in active addiction.
812
00:39:36.059 --> 00:39:38.119
Was there anyone that you felt like you really let down?
813
00:39:38.480 --> 00:39:49.869
My younger self. More than anyone. Oh, fuck. It's a
814
00:39:49.889 --> 00:39:57.940
good question. I've done a lot of, um, so much therapy.
815
00:39:57.960 --> 00:40:01.420
I went into a really deep depression around three years
816
00:40:01.440 --> 00:40:05.719
sober and, uh, tried all the things like the conveyor
817
00:40:05.760 --> 00:40:10.860
belt of medication, um, probably over a dozen, I think
818
00:40:11.199 --> 00:40:15.920
the SSRIs, the MRIs, like all of them. And, um,
819
00:40:16.920 --> 00:40:19.090
You know, within a span of 18 months, went to
820
00:40:19.110 --> 00:40:24.570
five different institutions, you know, Hoffman, Onsite, the Glass House, twice,
821
00:40:25.550 --> 00:40:28.769
you know, ended up checking back into my rehab that
822
00:40:28.789 --> 00:40:31.050
I got sober at. I was like, do you guys
823
00:40:31.070 --> 00:40:32.679
have a bed? They were like, we have your old room.
824
00:40:32.699 --> 00:40:35.000
And I was like, great, I'll be there in 20 minutes.
825
00:40:35.940 --> 00:40:39.139
And I've done a lot of inner child work. I've
826
00:40:39.159 --> 00:40:41.559
done a lot of inner teen work because those two
827
00:40:41.619 --> 00:40:45.429
girls are very different. They want different things. They have
828
00:40:45.650 --> 00:40:49.389
very different approaches to life. It wasn't until kind of
829
00:40:49.449 --> 00:40:53.329
this last year I've really learned how to listen, differentiate
830
00:40:53.389 --> 00:40:57.019
between which part of me is speaking, hear what the
831
00:40:57.059 --> 00:41:00.119
need is, and then learn how to meet it myself,
832
00:41:01.340 --> 00:41:03.980
which in the past would be, you know, if it
833
00:41:04.019 --> 00:41:09.320
was little p, grasping for something. someone to fix this
834
00:41:09.480 --> 00:41:13.820
ease this you know fill this uh hole right uh
835
00:41:13.889 --> 00:41:17.650
void and then you know teen p was very much
836
00:41:17.730 --> 00:41:22.289
like get away from me don't touch me you know
837
00:41:22.309 --> 00:41:24.849
so it's uh learning how to listen and be like
838
00:41:24.929 --> 00:41:28.210
okay what's what's the need okay she wants space and
839
00:41:28.250 --> 00:41:29.670
doesn't want to be touched okay why don't we go
840
00:41:30.570 --> 00:41:33.199
take 10 minutes let's communicate we're gonna take 10 minutes
841
00:41:33.260 --> 00:41:36.429
we're gonna take a breath. We're going to tap into whatever,
842
00:41:36.489 --> 00:41:40.070
maybe smoke, maybe give her a cigarette and, uh, meet
843
00:41:40.090 --> 00:41:44.210
the need ourselves. You know, you ask about healthy relationships
844
00:41:44.289 --> 00:41:47.510
and sobriety and that that's been, uh, one of the
845
00:41:47.610 --> 00:41:52.170
biggest things that's allowed me to start having that. And
846
00:41:52.230 --> 00:41:56.960
also learning how to have uncomfortable conversations, learning how to
847
00:41:58.059 --> 00:42:00.340
step out of the discomfort, say the hard thing, say
848
00:42:00.380 --> 00:42:05.300
the honest thing, um, state the need. And it's done
849
00:42:05.340 --> 00:42:08.199
nothing but foster more intimacy and trust in all my relationships.
850
00:42:08.679 --> 00:42:12.039
What was it like to heal that relationship for your
851
00:42:12.079 --> 00:42:13.579
younger self and with your younger self?
852
00:42:13.599 --> 00:42:16.039
I think it's an ongoing process. I don't know that
853
00:42:16.119 --> 00:42:20.829
it's healed. It's more healed than it ever has been,
854
00:42:20.869 --> 00:42:27.269
and it's an ongoing process. There's something really profound in
855
00:42:27.349 --> 00:42:31.090
being able to say, like, I got you. We got
856
00:42:31.130 --> 00:42:31.849
out of that mess.
857
00:42:32.389 --> 00:42:32.869
We got out.
858
00:42:33.690 --> 00:42:37.059
I got you. And I'm sorry.
859
00:42:37.699 --> 00:42:40.500
Does it feel good to give yourself that forgiveness as
860
00:42:40.539 --> 00:42:43.590
well though? Because it's almost like you're saying sorry, but
861
00:42:43.610 --> 00:42:44.849
you also are doing the forgiving.
862
00:42:45.309 --> 00:42:47.670
It's more grace than anything. And I don't think it
863
00:42:47.690 --> 00:42:50.690
comes from me. It's more grace than forgiveness.
864
00:42:51.050 --> 00:42:52.789
I feel like when I spent my three years as
865
00:42:52.829 --> 00:42:54.329
a monk, I did a lot of healing work. I
866
00:42:54.349 --> 00:42:57.559
did that from age 22 to 25. Amazing. 38 now.
867
00:42:57.639 --> 00:43:00.519
And two years ago, I went through something and I
868
00:43:00.559 --> 00:43:03.980
started to do therapy more in order to kind of
869
00:43:04.019 --> 00:43:07.480
look under the hood. proactively to be like, what have
870
00:43:07.519 --> 00:43:10.570
I missed? Like, what work have I not done? Talking
871
00:43:10.590 --> 00:43:12.309
about this idea of that you're never healed and you're
872
00:43:12.349 --> 00:43:15.050
always doing the work. And then something happened in the
873
00:43:15.090 --> 00:43:17.349
last 12 months. And I was like, I was looking
874
00:43:17.409 --> 00:43:20.030
for this and I couldn't find it. And I had
875
00:43:20.070 --> 00:43:22.969
to go through something in order for it to be uncovered.
876
00:43:23.070 --> 00:43:25.320
And so it was just this fascinating thing of like,
877
00:43:25.380 --> 00:43:29.340
I thought I'd worked through this pattern and I thought
878
00:43:29.380 --> 00:43:32.539
I'd looked through every nook and cranny and every crevice
879
00:43:32.599 --> 00:43:35.460
and every little thing and I thought I'd been to
880
00:43:35.559 --> 00:43:38.019
every corner and figured it out. And then something happened.
881
00:43:38.059 --> 00:43:40.699
I was like, oh gosh, I missed it. And it
882
00:43:40.739 --> 00:43:44.019
was like this really fascinating experience of proactively looking under
883
00:43:44.059 --> 00:43:46.719
the hood, thinking I would be able to avoid something
884
00:43:46.760 --> 00:43:49.480
in the future, only to realize that it doesn't work
885
00:43:49.519 --> 00:43:49.940
that way.
886
00:43:50.199 --> 00:43:51.280
You know the idea of the wheel?
887
00:43:51.579 --> 00:43:52.179
Yeah, of course.
888
00:43:52.199 --> 00:43:53.059
The spiral, really.
889
00:43:53.079 --> 00:43:53.539
Please explain.
890
00:43:53.940 --> 00:43:57.050
Well, it's, yeah, for those at home watching, it's this
891
00:43:57.119 --> 00:43:59.219
idea where sometimes we think we're going around in circles.
892
00:43:59.289 --> 00:44:01.670
It's like, oh, it's this again. And it is, but
893
00:44:01.730 --> 00:44:04.800
it's different each time. And the idea is the more
894
00:44:04.840 --> 00:44:06.880
we go through it, the more we learn. And it's
895
00:44:07.000 --> 00:44:09.619
instead of a circle, it's more like a spiral. I
896
00:44:09.659 --> 00:44:11.519
know about looking under the hood and I know about
897
00:44:11.579 --> 00:44:16.219
lifting every little tchotchke instead, leaving no stone unturned. And
898
00:44:16.360 --> 00:44:19.489
something that happened last year was I kind of just
899
00:44:19.840 --> 00:44:21.849
kind of hit this wall with therapy where I'm just like,
900
00:44:21.929 --> 00:44:24.570
I'm just going to take a break from therapy. So
901
00:44:24.610 --> 00:44:27.550
much for so long. Recently, I started seeing a behavioral
902
00:44:27.570 --> 00:44:30.860
specialist for my OCD because that's been like, The main
903
00:44:30.940 --> 00:44:32.820
thing that I feel really needs to be looked at,
904
00:44:32.900 --> 00:44:35.539
I have, you know, thank God, remission with depression, you know,
905
00:44:35.599 --> 00:44:38.019
one day at a time and my sobriety. So I
906
00:44:38.059 --> 00:44:40.619
do things daily to keep my, to maintain my sobriety.
907
00:44:41.340 --> 00:44:44.079
But yeah, I'd reached this point in my therapy where
908
00:44:44.119 --> 00:44:47.659
I'd kind of just plateaued because I, I'd looked under
909
00:44:47.800 --> 00:44:51.340
every stone and, you know, I kind of envisioned it
910
00:44:51.409 --> 00:44:54.989
as like a, like a trailer of like music here.
911
00:44:55.130 --> 00:44:56.789
Like we've got all this and I've just looked on,
912
00:44:56.829 --> 00:44:59.349
there's not a single piece of dust that on anything
913
00:44:59.389 --> 00:45:01.929
in there because I've looked at all of it. Now
914
00:45:01.969 --> 00:45:04.409
I want to learn how to just unhitch the fucking trailer.
915
00:45:04.710 --> 00:45:07.570
How do I, you know, that's what I want to learn. And,
916
00:45:07.829 --> 00:45:09.789
and I've also found that there's a lot of stuff that,
917
00:45:11.150 --> 00:45:13.309
you know, was born through experience. So it needs to
918
00:45:13.349 --> 00:45:16.769
be healed through experience. And that's a really beautiful gift
919
00:45:16.809 --> 00:45:20.739
that relationships offer us. Because if I have like attachment stuff,
920
00:45:20.800 --> 00:45:24.119
I have issues with attachment. That's, Talking about it's not
921
00:45:24.159 --> 00:45:27.690
going to really do anything. And actually similar with addiction stuff,
922
00:45:27.710 --> 00:45:29.550
just talking about it with a therapist isn't going to
923
00:45:29.809 --> 00:45:31.630
do anything. I need to take action. There needs to
924
00:45:31.690 --> 00:45:36.090
be some kind of experiential process. for healing to occur.
925
00:45:36.489 --> 00:45:41.170
This episode is brought to you by Walden University. Balancing work, life,
926
00:45:41.230 --> 00:45:45.340
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927
00:45:45.429 --> 00:45:49.519
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928
00:45:49.539 --> 00:45:52.179
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929
00:45:52.239 --> 00:45:56.039
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930
00:45:56.119 --> 00:45:59.889
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931
00:46:00.510 --> 00:46:04.349
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932
00:46:04.789 --> 00:46:11.719
Visit waldenu.edu today. Certified to operate by Chev, tempo learning
933
00:46:12.030 --> 00:46:15.599
available in select programs. What were those actions and experiences
934
00:46:15.619 --> 00:46:18.760
that you feel started to unravel some of that healing
935
00:46:19.340 --> 00:46:20.480
or the ones that you practice now?
936
00:46:20.719 --> 00:46:24.059
I'm constantly picking up and putting back down or swapping
937
00:46:24.199 --> 00:46:28.170
out my spiritual toolkit. That's the biggest thing. Therapy has
938
00:46:28.190 --> 00:46:31.849
been an incredible tool. I feel like I've taken bits
939
00:46:31.909 --> 00:46:34.869
and pieces from all of these institutions that I've been to.
940
00:46:34.889 --> 00:46:36.710
Because like I said, I went to five different institutions
941
00:46:36.989 --> 00:46:39.380
with five years sober. Like I had five years sober.
942
00:46:39.400 --> 00:46:41.820
I checked back into places because I'm like this. I'm
943
00:46:41.860 --> 00:46:45.980
not OK. You know, and it's actually that time was
944
00:46:46.039 --> 00:46:50.170
what inspired the album cover because I actually did do ECT.
945
00:46:50.190 --> 00:46:51.630
Yeah, I was about to say that.
946
00:46:52.369 --> 00:46:54.530
And I feel like there is something that I got.
947
00:46:55.730 --> 00:46:58.730
from each experience. Because again, my belief is that everything
948
00:46:58.769 --> 00:47:01.550
happens for a reason. And it's not that those things
949
00:47:01.710 --> 00:47:06.889
didn't work. It's that I'm taking what I can and
950
00:47:06.929 --> 00:47:09.219
taking what works and kind of leaving the rest from
951
00:47:09.360 --> 00:47:12.460
each experience and from each modality and from each, you know,
952
00:47:12.900 --> 00:47:15.639
there's certain things that it's just a very simple tool,
953
00:47:15.659 --> 00:47:19.760
hand on heart, like which chakra are my hands on?
954
00:47:20.159 --> 00:47:24.059
And how are we going to breathe? Like, oh, let's
955
00:47:24.079 --> 00:47:27.159
practice being gentle with myself. You know, that kind of,
956
00:47:27.190 --> 00:47:30.389
that's just a very simple tool that has carried me
957
00:47:32.489 --> 00:47:33.349
through a lot.
958
00:47:33.809 --> 00:47:38.789
The ECT therapy was because of a particular suicide attempt.
959
00:47:38.869 --> 00:47:39.550
Is that right?
960
00:47:40.070 --> 00:47:42.760
It wasn't an attempt. It was, I got very close.
961
00:47:43.880 --> 00:47:49.539
I got very, very close, like centimeters away. And it
962
00:47:49.579 --> 00:47:52.690
was after I had felt like I tried everything. And
963
00:47:52.750 --> 00:47:54.789
it was, I mean, like I said, the conveyor belt
964
00:47:54.809 --> 00:48:00.510
of medication, five different institutions, CBT, DBT, EMDR. I had
965
00:48:00.570 --> 00:48:03.679
done somatic. I had done experiential. I talked to the
966
00:48:03.699 --> 00:48:06.099
empty chair. I'd held the pillow. I had beaten the
967
00:48:06.119 --> 00:48:09.860
things with bats while screaming. Like I had done so
968
00:48:09.920 --> 00:48:14.059
many things. TMS did help a little bit with the OCD,
969
00:48:14.099 --> 00:48:16.400
but it had no effect on my depression. The steli
970
00:48:16.420 --> 00:48:18.869
ganglion block was a very, do you know what that is?
971
00:48:18.929 --> 00:48:21.539
The It's like a shot of lidocaine into a collection
972
00:48:21.559 --> 00:48:23.199
of nerves in your neck. And it's supposed to help
973
00:48:23.219 --> 00:48:26.429
with PTSD and kind of reset your nervous system. I
974
00:48:26.469 --> 00:48:29.369
got like relief for a week. And then I went
975
00:48:29.409 --> 00:48:32.010
back into the other side and got another week. And,
976
00:48:32.090 --> 00:48:34.570
you know, Hoffman gave me probably the longest stint of
977
00:48:34.630 --> 00:48:36.829
relief was I had like a couple months after Hoffman
978
00:48:36.849 --> 00:48:40.349
where I was really happy. And that was amazing. And
979
00:48:40.829 --> 00:48:44.429
something that I've learned with all things is integration is
980
00:48:44.570 --> 00:48:47.869
the number one thing. If I'm not integrating the things
981
00:48:47.909 --> 00:48:51.030
that I learned from these places and these experiences, I'm
982
00:48:51.070 --> 00:48:53.130
going to resort back to how I was feeling before.
983
00:48:53.670 --> 00:48:57.300
So without integration, yeah, I kept, you know, just getting
984
00:48:57.320 --> 00:49:00.480
worse and worse and worse. And once TMS didn't work,
985
00:49:00.780 --> 00:49:03.599
my psychiatrist was like, he was like, it's not as
986
00:49:03.639 --> 00:49:05.960
barbaric as it used to be. They use general anesthetic.
987
00:49:05.980 --> 00:49:08.199
You're knocked out when they shock you, you know.
988
00:49:08.239 --> 00:49:09.820
For anyone who doesn't know what ECT is, can you
989
00:49:09.840 --> 00:49:13.239
explain what the experience is and how it's meant to heal?
990
00:49:13.480 --> 00:49:16.110
Yeah, you go in and I have a lot of metal.
991
00:49:17.519 --> 00:49:20.320
So I had to replace all of the metal. in
992
00:49:20.380 --> 00:49:25.480
my face and, you know, with plastic earrings. And yeah,
993
00:49:25.559 --> 00:49:29.159
you go in, you got your hospital gown. They knock
994
00:49:29.179 --> 00:49:31.539
you out, strap you down, put a bite guard in
995
00:49:31.579 --> 00:49:35.820
your mouth, electrocute you. It helps with the neuroplasticity in
996
00:49:35.840 --> 00:49:38.599
your brain. If I'm not mistaken, it still is the
997
00:49:38.800 --> 00:49:45.550
leading most effective form of depression treatment. I did nine
998
00:49:45.570 --> 00:49:46.550
sessions in three weeks.
999
00:49:47.219 --> 00:49:49.679
Is it painful? Are you not feeling anything?
1000
00:49:49.739 --> 00:49:51.719
The first couple of times it is because they're still
1001
00:49:51.760 --> 00:49:54.599
figuring out how much, you know, Tylenol or Tortal to
1002
00:49:54.619 --> 00:49:58.320
give you afterwards. You know, I'm very anal about like,
1003
00:49:58.420 --> 00:50:00.340
if I'm going to be going under, what are you
1004
00:50:00.380 --> 00:50:02.510
giving me? What are you not? You know, I've had
1005
00:50:02.570 --> 00:50:06.250
experiences where, you know, they gave me something that felt
1006
00:50:06.289 --> 00:50:09.510
too good And it's like, okay, let's, you know, daily maintenance,
1007
00:50:09.570 --> 00:50:13.550
keep the sobriety going, you know. So I definitely ask multiple, multiple,
1008
00:50:13.590 --> 00:50:16.110
multiple times. And I have OCD, so it tells me to.
1009
00:50:16.769 --> 00:50:18.789
But yeah, I mean, the first time I woke up
1010
00:50:18.829 --> 00:50:21.960
and it was the most sharp pain I'd ever experienced
1011
00:50:22.420 --> 00:50:23.900
in the side of my head. Like it was.
1012
00:50:23.920 --> 00:50:26.300
And what is that pain? What do they tell you
1013
00:50:26.320 --> 00:50:26.659
that is?
1014
00:50:26.679 --> 00:50:29.420
Well, I mean, it's soreness from getting electrocuted.
1015
00:50:29.440 --> 00:50:31.420
I mean, that sounds so scary.
1016
00:50:31.440 --> 00:50:34.260
Yeah, it was. And the side effects are gnarly. I mean,
1017
00:50:34.280 --> 00:50:39.400
I definitely had days... completely not in my head at all.
1018
00:50:39.460 --> 00:50:43.800
I'd have friends visit me and I don't remember even
1019
00:50:43.840 --> 00:50:45.820
seeing them. I don't remember them coming by. I have
1020
00:50:45.889 --> 00:50:48.050
evidence that a friend came by because she brought me
1021
00:50:48.090 --> 00:50:49.750
a bag of vapes. This was before I quit vaping.
1022
00:50:50.429 --> 00:50:53.590
But I don't remember her being here at all. I
1023
00:50:53.610 --> 00:50:56.750
don't remember the conversations we had. Amnesia was one of
1024
00:50:56.769 --> 00:50:58.570
the primary side effects of that.
1025
00:50:59.030 --> 00:51:00.610
Was there no part of you that was scared or
1026
00:51:00.630 --> 00:51:02.150
you just felt that was the last resort?
1027
00:51:02.349 --> 00:51:05.260
I'm very much a lead with the chin kind of person. Yeah.
1028
00:51:05.889 --> 00:51:08.769
And so, yes, there's some fear. The biggest fear is
1029
00:51:08.809 --> 00:51:11.469
what if this doesn't work? There was definitely a point
1030
00:51:11.510 --> 00:51:14.889
where I just had to stop because I was responding
1031
00:51:14.929 --> 00:51:17.530
to the treatments and it was working. But then there
1032
00:51:17.550 --> 00:51:19.210
was a discussion of like, well, you're either going to
1033
00:51:19.230 --> 00:51:20.670
be on these two medications for the rest of your
1034
00:51:20.690 --> 00:51:21.869
life or you're going to have to come back once
1035
00:51:21.889 --> 00:51:23.570
a month and continue getting shocked for the rest of
1036
00:51:23.610 --> 00:51:25.679
your life. And I'm like, that's not going to fucking
1037
00:51:25.719 --> 00:51:28.420
work for me. And I think Yeah, little bits and
1038
00:51:28.460 --> 00:51:30.719
pieces of everything that I'd gotten along the way over
1039
00:51:30.760 --> 00:51:32.960
those courses, those last two and a half years, taking
1040
00:51:33.000 --> 00:51:36.219
everything I possibly could and just completely flipping my life
1041
00:51:36.300 --> 00:51:37.980
on its ass and being like, how do I do
1042
00:51:38.019 --> 00:51:41.530
this in a way that is sustainable? And a lot
1043
00:51:41.570 --> 00:51:44.469
of it had to do with holistic health. You know,
1044
00:51:44.489 --> 00:51:47.389
I do believe that a lot of Western medicine is
1045
00:51:47.469 --> 00:51:51.670
educated in disease and not health. The disease is the focus.
1046
00:51:51.809 --> 00:51:53.849
And so I'm like, how do I go, you know,
1047
00:51:53.869 --> 00:51:58.519
the other way? And so it's a lot of, to
1048
00:51:58.559 --> 00:52:01.699
get my sleep in order was a lot of saffron
1049
00:52:01.719 --> 00:52:04.909
and two kiwis before bed at night. Like that completely
1050
00:52:04.949 --> 00:52:09.469
changed my sleep. Somatic exercising, Pilates, like finding the hardest
1051
00:52:09.530 --> 00:52:10.989
gym in LA and being like, I'm going to do
1052
00:52:11.030 --> 00:52:12.750
two sessions in a row three times a week, which
1053
00:52:13.269 --> 00:52:15.489
I am a bit of an over, I overdo it sometimes.
1054
00:52:16.030 --> 00:52:19.679
Rock climbing as much as possible because that is incredible
1055
00:52:19.719 --> 00:52:23.530
for my body, incredible for my core. really being right
1056
00:52:23.570 --> 00:52:25.789
with my body. It's meditative. It's a puzzle that I
1057
00:52:25.809 --> 00:52:29.250
can figure out. It's highly rewarding. It's highly confidence boosting.
1058
00:52:29.530 --> 00:52:30.530
It's highly humbling.
1059
00:52:30.550 --> 00:52:32.690
Are you doing the outdoors or indoors? Both.
1060
00:52:33.050 --> 00:52:34.849
That's what I mean about humbling. So going from a
1061
00:52:35.210 --> 00:52:37.530
top rope climber, yeah, I'm a 511B climber. That's pretty
1062
00:52:37.550 --> 00:52:40.650
fucking good. To like lead and then having to like
1063
00:52:40.750 --> 00:52:42.820
losing a grade and having to build myself back up,
1064
00:52:42.840 --> 00:52:45.059
switching the lead and then going outdoors and being like, oh,
1065
00:52:45.099 --> 00:52:47.519
I'm not a 511B climber at all. I'm like a 5'7.
1066
00:52:48.019 --> 00:52:52.769
That is very humbling and also so rewarding. That's been
1067
00:52:52.789 --> 00:52:57.070
a huge part of my life, picking up new spiritual tools.
1068
00:52:58.010 --> 00:53:01.699
My animals are a huge part of my nervous system
1069
00:53:01.739 --> 00:53:06.539
getting regulated. Figuring out, you know, which CPTSD symptoms are
1070
00:53:06.559 --> 00:53:09.239
the most prominent. How do I work with those things?
1071
00:53:09.900 --> 00:53:13.929
I'm a very big fan of energy work, acupuncture, traditional
1072
00:53:13.949 --> 00:53:17.889
Chinese medicine, like just all the things that are health
1073
00:53:18.010 --> 00:53:20.329
oriented as opposed to, oh, well, this is a disease.
1074
00:53:20.369 --> 00:53:24.190
Let's treat the symptoms. I quit vaping over a year ago.
1075
00:53:24.210 --> 00:53:27.030
I did start rolling cigarettes again a few months ago.
1076
00:53:27.510 --> 00:53:31.519
Quit caffeine for like six months, which really helped the sleep.
1077
00:53:32.360 --> 00:53:37.519
Processed sugar was a big thing. And like, I still
1078
00:53:37.559 --> 00:53:37.920
love sweets.
1079
00:53:37.960 --> 00:53:39.340
I love desserts. Yeah.
1080
00:53:39.440 --> 00:53:41.239
No, I mean, I will go to Erewhon and I'll
1081
00:53:41.260 --> 00:53:43.280
get a chocolate cake, but I get it from there because,
1082
00:53:43.380 --> 00:53:45.110
you know, they're not going to be using, they're using
1083
00:53:45.139 --> 00:53:47.369
all organic products. So every now and then.
1084
00:53:47.409 --> 00:53:48.409
Yeah, okay, I'll do something.
1085
00:53:48.429 --> 00:53:50.230
So I have a sweet tooth. It's really bad, but
1086
00:53:50.760 --> 00:53:52.219
where am I getting it from and what's in it,
1087
00:53:52.760 --> 00:53:55.019
is a huge, huge thing.
1088
00:53:55.480 --> 00:53:57.380
I've used sugar as a drug for far too long.
1089
00:53:57.420 --> 00:53:59.699
Yeah, well, I mean, it's eight times more addictive than cocaine.
1090
00:53:59.860 --> 00:54:00.199
Yeah.
1091
00:54:00.440 --> 00:54:02.960
And I think they did scans on, like, what happens
1092
00:54:02.980 --> 00:54:04.719
when you take, like, a narcotic and how it lights
1093
00:54:04.760 --> 00:54:06.639
up one piece of your brain and then sugar lighting
1094
00:54:06.679 --> 00:54:14.300
up the entire brain is, yeah, it's pretty shocking. I
1095
00:54:14.340 --> 00:54:16.860
was really surprised when I saw that. And then also
1096
00:54:16.900 --> 00:54:18.980
part of me was not surprised at all. And it's
1097
00:54:19.000 --> 00:54:19.480
in everything.
1098
00:54:19.989 --> 00:54:22.909
Yeah, I've definitely over the years until I developed a
1099
00:54:22.929 --> 00:54:25.159
healthier relationship with sugar. Now I don't do any refined
1100
00:54:25.199 --> 00:54:29.000
sugars like six days a week. But I was using
1101
00:54:29.079 --> 00:54:32.059
it as a drug easily. Oh, yeah. It sounds crazy
1102
00:54:32.099 --> 00:54:33.099
to say that because people are like, what do you
1103
00:54:33.119 --> 00:54:35.480
mean by that? I'm like, well, no, I'm using it
1104
00:54:35.519 --> 00:54:40.019
to sedate, numb, get through something difficult, relax your emotions,
1105
00:54:40.059 --> 00:54:43.400
whatever else it may be. And just because it's legal
1106
00:54:43.460 --> 00:54:45.280
doesn't mean it's, you know.
1107
00:54:45.480 --> 00:54:47.019
There's a lot of things right now that are legal
1108
00:54:47.059 --> 00:54:47.940
that maybe shouldn't be.
1109
00:54:48.389 --> 00:54:49.949
How long have you been writing this album for now?
1110
00:54:50.409 --> 00:54:53.429
I wrote a good portion of it during the depressive spell.
1111
00:54:53.820 --> 00:54:55.559
Some of it was being recorded right before I went
1112
00:54:55.599 --> 00:54:59.179
into ECT. So I had the idea for the cover
1113
00:54:59.739 --> 00:55:01.980
like a year and a half ago. It was a
1114
00:55:02.000 --> 00:55:04.760
long process. And then some of the stuff like got
1115
00:55:04.800 --> 00:55:11.170
re-recorded this year. And Stitch was written within a span of,
1116
00:55:11.690 --> 00:55:17.099
you know, 60 minutes 59 minutes while the new vocals
1117
00:55:17.159 --> 00:55:19.360
on Maker were being comped and it was very much
1118
00:55:19.420 --> 00:55:20.960
like oh let's try and squeeze this on the album
1119
00:55:20.980 --> 00:55:22.579
last minute and we did and we got it mixed
1120
00:55:22.619 --> 00:55:27.030
in time so yeah there's some of the songs are
1121
00:55:27.050 --> 00:55:29.190
two years old some of them are a few months
1122
00:55:29.269 --> 00:55:29.929
old What.
1123
00:55:29.849 --> 00:55:31.690
Was the most recent suicide attempt you had?
1124
00:55:32.090 --> 00:55:34.369
The most recent attempt was right before I got sober
1125
00:55:35.449 --> 00:55:40.389
but I did get very close to actually going for
1126
00:55:40.469 --> 00:55:43.699
it right before ACT Which was about a year and
1127
00:55:43.719 --> 00:55:45.400
a half ago. Yeah, somewhere around then.
1128
00:55:45.639 --> 00:55:48.380
Was that scary to be back there once you're sober?
1129
00:55:48.460 --> 00:55:49.820
It was scarier for the people around me.
1130
00:55:50.300 --> 00:55:50.570
Because?
1131
00:55:50.590 --> 00:55:53.329
It's a familiar place for me. But it's, I mean,
1132
00:55:53.389 --> 00:55:56.449
it's scary for the people around me. And I have
1133
00:55:56.489 --> 00:55:58.849
spoken to the people that were closest to me and,
1134
00:55:59.010 --> 00:56:00.610
you know, saw me the day that I almost did it.
1135
00:56:00.750 --> 00:56:07.170
And I definitely feel like there's trauma there. And it's
1136
00:56:07.250 --> 00:56:11.599
been a long but very rewarding journey. getting to to
1137
00:56:11.639 --> 00:56:14.239
where I'm at now and also with an understanding that
1138
00:56:14.719 --> 00:56:18.159
that may happen again there's no predicting you know it's
1139
00:56:18.340 --> 00:56:21.840
it's everything's temporary nothing lasts forever I think happiness is
1140
00:56:21.860 --> 00:56:24.239
temporary I think pain is temporary I think all like
1141
00:56:24.280 --> 00:56:28.119
sadness is temporary and so knowing that I may get
1142
00:56:28.199 --> 00:56:30.690
sad again and I may go through a dark time
1143
00:56:30.750 --> 00:56:35.130
again um hopefully will be bringing the information with me
1144
00:56:35.170 --> 00:56:38.429
this time of there is a way out you've done
1145
00:56:38.449 --> 00:56:41.050
it before you will do it again which I didn't
1146
00:56:41.190 --> 00:56:43.230
have with me the last time, really. Like I had
1147
00:56:43.690 --> 00:56:46.030
experienced depression for a lot of my life, but it
1148
00:56:46.070 --> 00:56:51.380
hadn't gotten that bad before. So I do have this
1149
00:56:51.480 --> 00:56:54.579
kind of new found understanding of kind of how to
1150
00:56:54.599 --> 00:56:58.519
get through it. And again, there's this piece of me
1151
00:56:58.539 --> 00:57:00.360
where it's just like, bring it on. If I got
1152
00:57:00.380 --> 00:57:01.820
to go through it again, I'll go through it again
1153
00:57:01.880 --> 00:57:03.610
because it's going to help someone.
1154
00:57:04.090 --> 00:57:06.090
So the familiarity is actually helpful now.
1155
00:57:06.469 --> 00:57:07.289
Almost, yeah.
1156
00:57:07.710 --> 00:57:09.849
I've been here before. Yeah. I know I can get
1157
00:57:09.869 --> 00:57:11.070
out of it. I know what to do. Yeah, I
1158
00:57:11.110 --> 00:57:12.820
know what to do. I know what my resources are,
1159
00:57:12.880 --> 00:57:17.739
my spiritual toolkit, my friends, my support system. Mm-hmm. It's
1160
00:57:17.780 --> 00:57:19.900
almost like when we do hard things in life, and
1161
00:57:19.940 --> 00:57:22.420
everyone's done hard things. Everyone who's alive and living today
1162
00:57:22.440 --> 00:57:25.079
has done hard things. Yeah. We just don't see them
1163
00:57:25.119 --> 00:57:27.329
as hard. We just see them as our life. Yeah.
1164
00:57:27.389 --> 00:57:28.670
And so we just think we've lived.
1165
00:57:28.789 --> 00:57:29.030
Mm-hmm.
1166
00:57:29.909 --> 00:57:32.030
And it's really helpful when you can actually look at
1167
00:57:32.050 --> 00:57:35.170
your life and realize, I can do hard things, and
1168
00:57:35.190 --> 00:57:37.920
I've done hard things. Mm-hmm. And remember those when new
1169
00:57:37.980 --> 00:57:40.760
hard moments come around because you actually feel a sense
1170
00:57:40.780 --> 00:57:43.309
of empowerment to think I've lived through this before. And
1171
00:57:43.329 --> 00:57:45.409
I think a lot of us don't give ourselves enough grace,
1172
00:57:45.469 --> 00:57:49.349
as you said, and give ourselves enough credit because we
1173
00:57:49.369 --> 00:57:51.050
just think, oh, that's my life. It wasn't that hard.
1174
00:57:51.070 --> 00:57:54.710
It was okay. Yeah. But recognizing those moments gives us
1175
00:57:54.769 --> 00:57:58.150
so much more fuel to push forward in tough times. Yeah.
1176
00:57:58.690 --> 00:58:03.710
What's giving you fuel and empowerment today? What's like, what's
1177
00:58:03.750 --> 00:58:08.579
propelling you forward? Especially now that you're on tour, the
1178
00:58:08.659 --> 00:58:09.679
album's coming out.
1179
00:58:10.219 --> 00:58:12.760
A lot of it is all these things that I've
1180
00:58:12.780 --> 00:58:19.719
been doing almost daily to maintain my happiness and maintain,
1181
00:58:19.960 --> 00:58:23.719
you know, being very intentional with everything is so rewarding
1182
00:58:23.780 --> 00:58:26.530
that those rewards are just like, oh, this is, I mean,
1183
00:58:26.590 --> 00:58:30.829
just keep going. But then obviously the music is so rewarding.
1184
00:58:30.889 --> 00:58:33.639
I'm on tour right now. Part of it is a
1185
00:58:34.050 --> 00:58:35.980
very small headlining tour. And then the other part is
1186
00:58:36.019 --> 00:58:39.039
I'm playing support for The Pretty Reckless, which is a
1187
00:58:39.059 --> 00:58:41.940
band I listened to in high school. And I'm also
1188
00:58:42.280 --> 00:58:45.219
playing songs from this album that I made for the
1189
00:58:45.239 --> 00:58:46.900
version of me that was in high school that would
1190
00:58:46.920 --> 00:58:50.730
have liked this stuff. She was very She loves the
1191
00:58:50.769 --> 00:58:54.170
Smashing Pumpkins and she loved Nirvana and she loves, you know,
1192
00:58:54.210 --> 00:58:56.429
this very 90s kind of thing. And I'm like, here's,
1193
00:58:56.769 --> 00:58:58.369
you know, I got to make this album for her
1194
00:58:58.510 --> 00:59:01.389
and anyone else that felt that way when they were
1195
00:59:01.949 --> 00:59:05.570
that age or even now. And there's something very nostalgic
1196
00:59:05.710 --> 00:59:07.650
about it all. And I mean, you use that word.
1197
00:59:07.670 --> 00:59:09.389
That's one of my favorite things, even like my.
1198
00:59:09.610 --> 00:59:10.360
I didn't even. know that.
1199
00:59:10.380 --> 00:59:12.760
Photography is a hobby of mine. And, you know, every
1200
00:59:12.940 --> 00:59:15.000
photographer kind of has their own thing. My best friend
1201
00:59:15.019 --> 00:59:17.380
is a phenomenal photographer. She shot the album cover art.
1202
00:59:17.400 --> 00:59:19.940
She shot all my promos. She shot the inside slip
1203
00:59:19.960 --> 00:59:23.010
for the vinyl. And her primary thing is more like
1204
00:59:23.050 --> 00:59:26.289
liminal space, kind of like back rooms. My thing is
1205
00:59:26.309 --> 00:59:31.670
more like nostalgia. And that's just... what feels good sonically,
1206
00:59:31.750 --> 00:59:34.630
what looks good visually, what just kind of resonates the
1207
00:59:34.670 --> 00:59:35.329
most with me.
1208
00:59:35.610 --> 00:59:37.170
Why was it so important to have ECT on the
1209
00:59:37.190 --> 00:59:38.449
front cover of the album?
1210
00:59:38.909 --> 00:59:42.190
Shock value. Literally. Yeah.
1211
00:59:42.550 --> 00:59:44.170
I don't know why I said, I mean, it felt
1212
00:59:44.210 --> 00:59:46.349
nostalgic when I listened to it and it was just,
1213
00:59:46.369 --> 00:59:48.329
I was like, I'm glad I shared that with you
1214
00:59:48.369 --> 00:59:49.989
because yeah, just, it was my initial, it was my
1215
00:59:50.010 --> 00:59:54.760
immediate experience of it. Paris, it's been such a, it's
1216
00:59:54.780 --> 00:59:57.219
been really refreshing talking to you. I feel like I
1217
00:59:57.260 --> 01:00:01.210
can tell that you're in the work Oh yeah. And
1218
01:00:01.250 --> 01:00:06.099
that's like really beautiful. It's such an endearing thing when
1219
01:00:06.159 --> 01:00:09.860
someone's able to talk about the work when they're in
1220
01:00:09.900 --> 01:00:12.079
the work as opposed to a before and after, which
1221
01:00:12.199 --> 01:00:14.539
is what we kind of try and present as a
1222
01:00:14.599 --> 01:00:17.920
Western standpoint of the work. I always feel, as you said,
1223
01:00:17.980 --> 01:00:20.420
that the work is cyclical and ascending.
1224
01:00:19.929 --> 01:00:22.489
And not linear. It never stops.
1225
01:00:22.630 --> 01:00:25.170
And so when I'm hearing you talk today, I feel
1226
01:00:25.190 --> 01:00:28.190
like you've like taken us into a moment when the
1227
01:00:28.250 --> 01:00:31.030
work is still churning and you are still processing. And
1228
01:00:31.070 --> 01:00:33.980
I find that to be a true act of courage
1229
01:00:34.000 --> 01:00:37.480
and vulnerability because it's easier to be on the other side,
1230
01:00:37.739 --> 01:00:40.179
so to speak, even though it doesn't really exist. And
1231
01:00:40.199 --> 01:00:41.579
be like, this is what I went through and this
1232
01:00:41.619 --> 01:00:43.820
is what I've learned. And it can sound kind of
1233
01:00:43.860 --> 01:00:51.130
romantic and poetic, but it doesn't necessarily always feel true. Yeah.
1234
01:00:51.590 --> 01:00:54.469
And also, I mean, it's like, did I get out
1235
01:00:54.550 --> 01:00:56.349
on the other side of what that was?
1236
01:00:56.369 --> 01:00:56.769
Yes. Yes.
1237
01:00:58.369 --> 01:01:01.650
And in order to stay there, I have to daily
1238
01:01:01.869 --> 01:01:05.289
implement things. I mean, it's the same thing with addiction.
1239
01:01:05.329 --> 01:01:09.750
It's kind of like this idea of daily reprieve and
1240
01:01:09.809 --> 01:01:12.050
not reprieve in the sense of relief, but reprieve in
1241
01:01:12.070 --> 01:01:14.579
the sense of like the postponing of one's execution date
1242
01:01:14.760 --> 01:01:17.320
of like daily, one day at a time, I am
1243
01:01:17.400 --> 01:01:20.199
doing the things that I know keep me good. Whether
1244
01:01:20.260 --> 01:01:22.599
that is my mental health, whether that is my drug addiction,
1245
01:01:22.639 --> 01:01:26.619
whether that is, you know, Being a good friend, being
1246
01:01:26.639 --> 01:01:29.340
a good family member, being a good sister. What are
1247
01:01:29.380 --> 01:01:31.119
the things that I can do daily that are going
1248
01:01:31.139 --> 01:01:33.360
to keep me good?
1249
01:01:33.539 --> 01:01:33.800
Yeah.
1250
01:01:34.260 --> 01:01:35.840
And I could say, yeah, I made it on the
1251
01:01:35.889 --> 01:01:37.610
other end. I can like chill out now. And then
1252
01:01:37.650 --> 01:01:43.210
I might go backwards. You know, cruising is, in physics,
1253
01:01:43.250 --> 01:01:44.690
it doesn't work. It means you're going downhill.
1254
01:01:44.929 --> 01:01:47.969
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, you're either growing or dying. Yeah. What's
1255
01:01:47.989 --> 01:01:49.949
the one thing you'd like people to know about addiction?
1256
01:01:50.369 --> 01:01:54.070
On a human level? if you don't share my beliefs
1257
01:01:54.150 --> 01:01:56.769
as far as like, oh yeah, we come down, we incarnate,
1258
01:01:56.789 --> 01:01:59.889
we've chosen these things. I chose my name, I chose
1259
01:01:59.929 --> 01:02:03.030
my parents, I chose my traumas, I chose my zodiac sign, whatever.
1260
01:02:03.789 --> 01:02:08.289
If that belief doesn't align with you, then I would say,
1261
01:02:09.489 --> 01:02:12.900
you know, that's not something people choose on a human level.
1262
01:02:13.420 --> 01:02:15.860
Like my soul chose this thing, but I didn't wake
1263
01:02:15.900 --> 01:02:17.739
up one day and be like, I'm going to be
1264
01:02:17.760 --> 01:02:20.360
a drug addict. And a lot of the things that,
1265
01:02:20.460 --> 01:02:23.119
you know, may not be the drug addict's fault, At
1266
01:02:23.159 --> 01:02:25.949
some point, it is that drug addict's responsibility to clean
1267
01:02:25.969 --> 01:02:28.329
up their mess, clean up their side of the street and,
1268
01:02:28.510 --> 01:02:29.610
you know, make amends.
1269
01:02:30.070 --> 01:02:31.190
Yeah, but it's not their fault.
1270
01:02:31.389 --> 01:02:36.010
It's kind of like a tornado kind of tearing through
1271
01:02:36.050 --> 01:02:40.489
a town. When the tornado finally stops, it's like you're
1272
01:02:40.510 --> 01:02:42.380
going outside and be like, oh, well, I don't see,
1273
01:02:42.519 --> 01:02:44.280
I don't see. You're looking at all the calamity and
1274
01:02:44.300 --> 01:02:46.960
you're like, well, I don't see any problems here. You know,
1275
01:02:47.039 --> 01:02:49.980
it's kind of like, clean it up. At some point,
1276
01:02:50.000 --> 01:02:53.630
there has to be, you know, responsibility taken. But faults,
1277
01:02:53.989 --> 01:02:55.590
I don't know. I don't know about that part.
1278
01:02:56.050 --> 01:02:57.349
And what's the one thing you'd like people to know
1279
01:02:57.369 --> 01:03:00.190
about sobriety that they might miss?
1280
01:03:00.929 --> 01:03:05.039
Both sobriety and healing are not linear. And it's a
1281
01:03:05.039 --> 01:03:05.500
day at a time.
1282
01:03:05.800 --> 01:03:07.780
Paris, is there anything I haven't asked you that you
1283
01:03:07.820 --> 01:03:08.239
wish I did?
1284
01:03:08.800 --> 01:03:10.400
No, but I want to say thank you for being
1285
01:03:10.960 --> 01:03:15.800
so respectful and safe. And this has been a really
1286
01:03:16.869 --> 01:03:20.130
special container. So thank you for facilitating that.
1287
01:03:20.630 --> 01:03:24.679
Of course. Thank you. We end every episode of On
1288
01:03:24.719 --> 01:03:27.300
Purpose with a final five. Okay. These questions have to
1289
01:03:27.340 --> 01:03:29.260
be answered in one sentence maximum.
1290
01:03:30.119 --> 01:03:30.480
Okay.
1291
01:03:30.559 --> 01:03:32.699
I'll probably get you to break it, but I try.
1292
01:03:32.820 --> 01:03:35.000
I try. I start there and then I get too curious.
1293
01:03:35.300 --> 01:03:36.119
Full send.
1294
01:03:36.300 --> 01:03:39.719
So Paris Jackson, these are your final five. The first
1295
01:03:39.739 --> 01:03:42.340
question is, what is the best advice you've ever heard
1296
01:03:42.409 --> 01:03:42.860
or received?
1297
01:03:43.409 --> 01:03:48.650
If there's going to be criticism and misunderstanding, regardless of
1298
01:03:48.710 --> 01:03:50.530
what you do and what you say and how you are,
1299
01:03:51.230 --> 01:03:52.670
then you might as well do what makes you happy.
1300
01:03:53.679 --> 01:03:54.820
As long as you're not causing harm.
1301
01:03:55.320 --> 01:03:58.320
Great answer. Question number two, what's the worst advice you've
1302
01:03:58.360 --> 01:03:59.090
ever heard or received?
1303
01:03:59.349 --> 01:04:00.110
Don't trust anyone.
1304
01:04:00.869 --> 01:04:01.690
Don't trust anyone?
1305
01:04:01.789 --> 01:04:03.369
That's the worst advice I've ever gotten.
1306
01:04:03.789 --> 01:04:04.150
Because?
1307
01:04:05.230 --> 01:04:09.730
Some of the most beautiful life experiences have come from
1308
01:04:10.329 --> 01:04:14.539
trust because trust fosters safety and intimacy and intimacy and
1309
01:04:14.579 --> 01:04:16.159
safety fosters healing.
1310
01:04:16.639 --> 01:04:20.179
I love that. Can't agree with you more. Such a need.
1311
01:04:20.699 --> 01:04:22.980
Question number three, how do you decide to trust someone?
1312
01:04:23.460 --> 01:04:24.400
Time and consistency.
1313
01:04:24.420 --> 01:04:26.010
It's the only way. Yeah.
1314
01:04:26.829 --> 01:04:28.329
You can listen to your intuition too.
1315
01:04:28.909 --> 01:04:32.269
Question number four. Tell me your most spiritual belief and
1316
01:04:32.289 --> 01:04:35.530
your most skeptical belief. Or take one belief and debate
1317
01:04:35.570 --> 01:04:36.269
them on both sides.
1318
01:04:36.690 --> 01:04:41.880
My most spiritual belief? Everything can be spiritual. The deepest,
1319
01:04:42.039 --> 01:04:45.559
most painful, I said this earlier, the most painful moments
1320
01:04:45.599 --> 01:04:50.050
of suffering in my life have been alchemized and once
1321
01:04:50.130 --> 01:04:56.079
alchemized become medicine. That's spiritual. That is a spiritual experience.
1322
01:04:56.139 --> 01:05:01.599
It hurts, and it's that heavy, hard-to-mulch energy, but it
1323
01:05:01.639 --> 01:05:05.739
becomes magic, you know? Am I least?
1324
01:05:06.559 --> 01:05:07.760
You're most skeptical at all.
1325
01:05:08.500 --> 01:05:09.079
Who's to say?
1326
01:05:09.099 --> 01:05:12.570
Fifth and final question, Paris. We ask this to every
1327
01:05:12.590 --> 01:05:14.730
guest who's ever been on the show. If you could
1328
01:05:14.750 --> 01:05:17.070
create one law that everyone in the world had to follow,
1329
01:05:17.090 --> 01:05:18.130
what would it be? Okay.
1330
01:05:18.150 --> 01:05:19.880
I have three of these. Oh, wow.
1331
01:05:19.889 --> 01:05:19.969
Okay.
1332
01:05:20.010 --> 01:05:20.880
Can I share all three?
1333
01:05:20.889 --> 01:05:22.139
People usually struggle with it. Yeah.
1334
01:05:22.159 --> 01:05:22.860
Can I share all three?
1335
01:05:22.880 --> 01:05:23.340
I'd love all three.
1336
01:05:23.360 --> 01:05:25.659
The first one is if you want to be a parent,
1337
01:05:25.679 --> 01:05:26.780
you have to apply for a license.
1338
01:05:27.320 --> 01:05:29.090
That is a brilliant law. I love that one.
1339
01:05:29.119 --> 01:05:29.539
Hot take.
1340
01:05:29.780 --> 01:05:29.940
Yeah.
1341
01:05:30.059 --> 01:05:33.940
Second one is I want there to be more regulation
1342
01:05:33.960 --> 01:05:37.239
on the poison they're spraying on organic produce.
1343
01:05:37.320 --> 01:05:37.539
Mm-hmm.
1344
01:05:38.510 --> 01:05:41.010
And the third one is I want to match the
1345
01:05:41.050 --> 01:05:43.170
laws that there are in other countries. There's other countries
1346
01:05:43.210 --> 01:05:45.389
that some of the chemicals we put in our food
1347
01:05:46.050 --> 01:05:49.650
are banned in other countries. I'm trying to match that.
1348
01:05:49.710 --> 01:05:51.610
And I have a bunch of opinions on the school system,
1349
01:05:51.670 --> 01:05:54.150
on the justice system, on, you know, rehabilitation. I have
1350
01:05:54.250 --> 01:05:55.070
so many views on that.
1351
01:05:56.050 --> 01:05:58.369
That's a different episode.
1352
01:05:58.550 --> 01:06:00.670
I will go for another hour, but yeah.
1353
01:06:00.969 --> 01:06:03.110
Those are three of the best laws we've ever had. Now,
1354
01:06:03.150 --> 01:06:05.400
anytime anyone ever asks, like, what did anyone else say?
1355
01:06:05.409 --> 01:06:07.789
I'll just name all three of yours. Those are brilliant.
1356
01:06:08.010 --> 01:06:10.650
Parash Jackson, I'm so excited for you. I'm excited for
1357
01:06:10.690 --> 01:06:12.409
everyone to listen to the happiest day of my life.
1358
01:06:12.869 --> 01:06:16.510
Hope it gives them that nostalgic, cathartic, healing feeling. Thank
1359
01:06:16.530 --> 01:06:18.630
you for the trust. Thank you for joining me on
1360
01:06:18.650 --> 01:06:21.630
my platform today and giving my audience an opportunity to
1361
01:06:21.670 --> 01:06:24.230
hear about your story and your own words and I
1362
01:06:24.309 --> 01:06:25.960
hope this is the first of many interactions we get
1363
01:06:26.000 --> 01:06:27.780
to have. So thank you so much.
1364
01:06:27.840 --> 01:06:28.309
Thank you, Jay.
1365
01:06:28.329 --> 01:06:29.150
Yeah, thank you.
1
00:00:01.060 --> 00:00:02.200
And we didn't get to introduce Kai.
2
00:00:02.459 --> 00:00:04.080
Oh, yeah. He's napping right now.
3
00:00:04.099 --> 00:00:05.339
And you have more animals, you said?
4
00:00:05.540 --> 00:00:06.620
I have five right now.
5
00:00:06.679 --> 00:00:07.400
Who are the others? Yeah.
6
00:00:07.740 --> 00:00:09.279
I have three cats and I have another dog.
7
00:00:09.560 --> 00:00:10.160
What are their names?
8
00:00:10.609 --> 00:00:13.429
Kavi is the main coon. And then the other two
9
00:00:13.470 --> 00:00:16.570
cats are Kanan and Cairo. And then I have, this
10
00:00:16.629 --> 00:00:18.730
is Kai. And then my other dog is Koa.
11
00:00:19.289 --> 00:00:20.329
What's the addiction to Kai?
12
00:00:21.370 --> 00:00:24.410
Well, I go by PK. And the K has been
13
00:00:24.449 --> 00:00:26.410
one of my favorite parts of my name. I'm named
14
00:00:26.449 --> 00:00:27.429
after my grandmother, Catherine.
15
00:00:27.449 --> 00:00:29.300
Where did the name Kavi come from?
16
00:00:29.589 --> 00:00:32.090
It means sage. His full name is Kavi Raja. And
17
00:00:32.130 --> 00:00:33.170
it means sage king.
18
00:00:33.380 --> 00:00:37.140
Yeah, I love that. Hey, it's Jay. I don't know
19
00:00:37.179 --> 00:00:40.259
what your day's been like, but I was just thinking
20
00:00:40.299 --> 00:00:42.859
about you for a minute. And I hope you're being
21
00:00:42.899 --> 00:00:46.520
a little patient with yourself because you deserve it. And yeah,
22
00:00:47.000 --> 00:00:59.579
I'll talk to you soon. Paris, welcome to On Purpose.
23
00:00:59.780 --> 00:01:00.640
Thank you for having me.
24
00:01:00.859 --> 00:01:03.219
I'm so grateful that I got to listen to some
25
00:01:03.259 --> 00:01:07.010
of the album in preparation for the interview. And I
26
00:01:07.370 --> 00:01:12.269
found it captivating. I found it moving. I found parts
27
00:01:12.290 --> 00:01:15.689
of it painful and difficult and challenging in a really
28
00:01:16.049 --> 00:01:20.069
cathartic way. And I found parts of it quite nostalgic,
29
00:01:20.989 --> 00:01:23.829
which was really, really beautiful, actually, when something makes you
30
00:01:23.870 --> 00:01:27.969
feel like familiarity and And positivity at the same time.
31
00:01:28.030 --> 00:01:30.090
And so thank you for putting it together. I wanted
32
00:01:30.109 --> 00:01:32.769
to ask you, obviously the album's called Happiest Day of
33
00:01:32.810 --> 00:01:36.670
My Life. And you've said that you feel like you're
34
00:01:36.689 --> 00:01:38.989
in the happiest place in your life at the moment.
35
00:01:39.250 --> 00:01:43.069
I do. The song title as well as the cover
36
00:01:43.090 --> 00:01:46.689
and kind of everything is a bit tongue-in-cheek. And also
37
00:01:46.750 --> 00:01:48.549
it is cool to say that I am really happy
38
00:01:48.590 --> 00:01:48.890
right now.
39
00:01:49.129 --> 00:01:51.230
Talk to me about the tongue-in-cheek part and the part
40
00:01:51.250 --> 00:01:52.269
that feels like it's true.
41
00:01:52.609 --> 00:01:54.569
So the lyrics are, this could be the happiest day
42
00:01:54.609 --> 00:01:57.340
of my life, but nothing lasts forever. And so it's
43
00:01:57.379 --> 00:02:01.760
kind of like I've always really enjoyed self-deprecating humor. Something
44
00:02:01.780 --> 00:02:04.400
with like a pessimistic view, even though, you know, in
45
00:02:04.420 --> 00:02:09.180
the last year I've really redirected my perspective and I
46
00:02:09.419 --> 00:02:11.039
tend to look for the silver lining and I tend
47
00:02:11.060 --> 00:02:12.939
to look for the deeper meaning in things. And that
48
00:02:12.990 --> 00:02:16.909
hasn't made me happier. I still do enjoy pessimism in
49
00:02:16.930 --> 00:02:20.969
a humorous way. And I enjoy kind of self-deprecating humor
50
00:02:21.030 --> 00:02:24.270
and things like that. And so the nothing lasts forever thing.
51
00:02:25.039 --> 00:02:28.490
second half of that line is very much just like
52
00:02:29.819 --> 00:02:31.270
almost making fun of my negativity.
53
00:02:31.550 --> 00:02:33.750
That's interesting. I feel like as a Brit, I can
54
00:02:33.789 --> 00:02:36.509
totally understand the self-deprecating humor part.
55
00:02:36.789 --> 00:02:41.289
Obviously, the cover art is kind of the opposite of
56
00:02:41.349 --> 00:02:43.310
like happiest day of my life. It's kind of just, yeah,
57
00:02:43.330 --> 00:02:44.030
a little tongue in cheek.
58
00:02:44.310 --> 00:02:46.490
What would the happiest day of your life look like?
59
00:02:46.789 --> 00:02:48.349
If you had to paint an ideal day, what does
60
00:02:48.400 --> 00:02:48.810
it look like?
61
00:02:49.379 --> 00:02:53.330
Ideally, having gotten enough sleep. Like a good, solid amount
62
00:02:53.370 --> 00:02:55.659
of sleep. What's a solid amount of sleep for you?
63
00:02:56.199 --> 00:02:59.840
I probably need 10 hours. I rarely get it. Usually
64
00:02:59.879 --> 00:03:02.879
I get between six and eight. But as a female,
65
00:03:02.919 --> 00:03:05.500
I do need more. So if I could get 10,
66
00:03:05.500 --> 00:03:07.840
that'd be killer. My body usually doesn't let me do that.
67
00:03:07.870 --> 00:03:08.689
Same. I would love 10 hours.
68
00:03:08.719 --> 00:03:12.550
That'd be super sick if I could do that. And then, yeah,
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wake up, have my coffee, hang out with my animals
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for a little bit. Maybe do something that is, you know,
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good for my body. Any kind of like somatic or
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aerobic thing, like maybe rock climb or something. And spend
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time with friends. Something related to music, whether it's writing
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or playing or just practicing guitar or something like that.
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And then, you know, early bedtime. Some good food.
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Sounds like a perfect day. Yeah. You told us about
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your happiest day today. What did... day in your life
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looked like when you were growing up, when you were
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a young girl?
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It's funny because it's almost similar to how I live now,
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which is every day is very different. I know a
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lot of kids don't maybe wake up, have breakfast, go
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to school, do some kind of after school activity, go home,
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have dinner, go to bed. And that is like every day.
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My days were constantly changing. There was a lot of travel.
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There was a lot of just moving about, seeing new places.
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I was homeschooled for the first six grades. And anytime
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we'd be in a new country, we would learn about
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that country that we were in. We learned the folklore
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of the country. We learned the legends. It really just
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depended on what city we were in, what country we
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were in. It's kind of hard to be like, oh,
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what was the average day? There was no average, really.
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This episode of On Purpose is presented by Ultra Running.
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What does homeschooling look like? What's your take on it?
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Do you look back at that experience and go, that
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was really positive, I liked being homeschooled, I saw value
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in it, or do you look back at it and go, hmm,
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I'm not sure I'd do that if I ever had kids.
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I think there's things to take from it and things
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to maybe not take from it, like most things. I
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really valued the sort of tones and specifics of a
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lot of what I learned through homeschooling because there's a
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lot that I don't really agree with as far as
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the standard curriculum goes throughout the United States. I think
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there's something to be said about depending on which state
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you live in, your history book is going to tell
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you something completely different. Seattle's very different from, you know,
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West Virginia. Like you're just going to get different lessons.
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And also there's definitely maybe like a lack of social
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exposure as far as peers go. So I definitely had
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a bit of a speed bump and kind of, you know,
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had to adapt very quickly when I started interacting with
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people my age.
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Yeah, I found that like I was born and raised
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in London. And growing up, learning about British history, and
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even though I'm Indian, only learning about what happened in India,
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like years later and being like, oh, wow, that was
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not in my history books whatsoever. And being just quite
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shocked by it, about how I could have just completely
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missed that part of my heritage and history. And so
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you're so right when you talk about how much is
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lost in national curriculums or state curriculums, as you said,
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that you just don't come across. One of my favorite
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questions to ask people, and I ask it often on
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the show is, What's a childhood memory that you have
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that you feel defines who you are today or a
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moment or experience that you had that you look back
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on and think, yeah, that really showcases who I still
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am today.
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My first instinct is to be like all of them
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because all of the people that we meet are, you know,
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help create pieces of me and blah, blah, blah. But
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for some reason I am getting this, this one memory.
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This was during a very short period where we were
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in LA and I was probably 10, 15. And there
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was a hummingbird that we thought was dead. And I
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was really affected by that. You know, I held it
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in my hands and, you know, my dad was like, no,
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there might be germs. But I was very like, no,
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I want to hold it and I want to mourn
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it and I want to be gentle with it and
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I want to love it. And it must not have
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been dead because after I like cried over it and
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held it, I went outside and I was going to
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bury it and I opened my hands to look at
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it and it flew away. And that was like a
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really beautiful, even looking back on it, spiritual experience. But
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just that kind of, when I feel things, I feel
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so big and I feel so deeply. And I think
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I've always been like that. And I hopefully always will
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be because it's, you know, one of the most beautiful
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aspects of life is to feel the highest highs and
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the lowest lows.
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That sounds like such a healing experience.
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Yeah, it was beautiful.
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Yeah.
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I forgot about that until now.
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That's so beautiful. I love that. That's such a special memory.
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I love the idea. The reason why I love it
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even more is because there's the famous teaching of the
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Buddha about, have you ever heard this story of how
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a monk in the monastery finds a bird that seems
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hurt and the monk wants to help it and the
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monk goes to pick it up and the Buddha goes,
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be really careful because if you hold it too tight,
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you might actually break its wings or hurt it. But
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then the monk says, but if I don't hold it
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tight enough, then it will fly away or it will
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hurt itself again. And the Buddha says, don't hold it
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too tight or too loose. And that's that idea of
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like that balance in life of you can't hold yourself
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too tight or too loose. And if you want to
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help someone, you can't hold them too tight or too loose.
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And this idea of just finding that comfort, it sounds
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like you held that bird perfectly.
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Just the right.
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Just the right.
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I love those stories. There's been a few parables that
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I've gotten from the Buddhist philosophy that I really, really
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love that have really just kind of guided me.
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Are there any that come to mind?
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You know the who's to say one, the farmer's parable?
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Yes, go on. I love it. No, I'm going to
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butcher it.
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I'm going to butcher it. But it's just this idea
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of who's to say what's good or bad. And I've
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really been, in the last year, really been trying to
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practice the... belief that nothing is good or bad. It's either,
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you know, light or heavy energy and heavier energies are
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harder to mulch, but it's still, it's still divine, you know,
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and it's still for a reason. And it's still, you know,
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whether someone believes in God or the universe or multiple
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deities or whatever the belief is, is that it's for
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a reason kind of thing.
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Yeah. I can't imagine how happy the 10 year old
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version of you was when the bird flew away. it
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was magic. Did you felt like you saved it and
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healed it? Of course I did.
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I was like, I have magical powers.
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You do. I do think there's a healing energy to
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how a 10 year old must've held up there.
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I have a lot of apprehension with vocalizing some of
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my more woo-woo beliefs just because I've been, you know, I've,
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been on the receiving end of a lot of skeptics.
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I have an inner skeptic that lives in me that's like,
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let's preface every story with I could be wrong, but.
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That's beautiful. Well, I wanted to ask you about how,
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you know, when you think about memories like that that
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come to mind at the same time, you know, when
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you're listening to your music, there's so much about as
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you said, the heaviness of life. And I love what
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you just said right now about how life's not really
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good or bad. It's either light or heavy and emotional experience.
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And I think that's such a healthy way of looking
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at it. I think we're so quick as humans to
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label something as good, bad, right, wrong. And I've been
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trying to use words like honest more as in I
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want moments to be honest. I want them to be experienced.
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I want them to feel real. Yeah. rather than good
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or bad or right or wrong, which feel so conclusive
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and certain. When did things start to feel heavier for
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you in life? And when did you start to kind
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of feel the weight of that, that we feel in
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your music as you're expressing it?
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Like eight, I'd say. Probably about eight. I remember being
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so surrounded by love and playing Hot Wheels with my
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brother and then going into my room and being alone
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for a second and having that sinking, like empty, just feeling,
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you know, it's hard to explain if you don't know
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what I'm talking about, but it's, that has kind of
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been this sort of, I don't want to say companion
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because it's not the most pleasant thing, but it's been
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a through line throughout my life, this kind of almost
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chronic loneliness that I think definitely plays a part in alcoholism,
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drug addiction, depression, anxiety, things like that.
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When you start to experience that that young, I also
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imagine there wasn't really a vocabulary for that 20 years
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ago in the easiest sense. Did you even know what
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you were experiencing?
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No, I didn't know what it was. I just know
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that it sucked. It sucked bad. And just having unmanageable
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thoughts and feelings. And as I got older... learning how
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to search outside of myself for things, people, places, things
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that could, you know, kind of ease that or help
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me manage it. And for the longest, survival skills versus
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coping skills.
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When you started to notice them at the time, what
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did you think it was? Where did you think it
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came from? And what did you do with those feelings?
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I don't know. I mean, I was eight or nine
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or seven. I don't know exactly when, but it was
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just like, yeah, I didn't know what to do about it.
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And then.
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You know, obviously as I got a little bit older,
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I started trying things that would kind of bandaid it
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for a time or if anything distract me from it. Um,
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and that's what, uh, substances did for a long time.
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When did you first get exposed to drugs?
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I mean, that's kind of a perspective thing because alcohol
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can be a drug. Uh, so that was, that was
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in my early teen years, 14 ish, I think. Um,
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weed I don't really consider a drug but I treat
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it like one it is a plant medicine and it
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is so helpful to so many people but because there's
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no way for me to be in right relationship with
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it I stay away from it and that was something
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that I treated as a gateway I don't like that
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people call it a gateway drug because I know for
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so many people it's not it was for me and
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then I mean yeah by the time I was 19
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I was on like narcotics and did.
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You just feel that like you said it was a
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almost like something that numbed you? Was it an escape?
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What did it do for you that you couldn't find
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anywhere else at the time?
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Not numb because I, again, I feel very deeply. So
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I think it just brought me to a more moderated...
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I could still cry. I could still kind of laugh.
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I could still, you know... I think it just made
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me feel normal. It made me feel more, like, managed.
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And it wasn't that it was like an escape. It
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was just... I don't like that word either because a
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lot of people when talking about addiction, they use the
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term escape. And I don't think that it felt that
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way for me. I think part of it was I
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just simply loved the effect produced by these things. And
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it just made me feel different than how I was
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used to feeling, which sucked.
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How did it then affect your day-to-day life? Because it
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sounds like it was helpful. In the beginning, at least. Oh, yeah.
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It's always, you know, fun at first and fun with
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problems and problems with fun and then just problems. It's
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typically the progression.
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Where does that come from? Is that a lyric?
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No, it's just it's something that, you know, my friends
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and I have picked it up around.
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Say that again. That was so good. I've never had
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someone say it that way.
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It's fun, then fun with problems and problems with fun.
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And then it's just problems.
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Talk to me about that journey, that arc.
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Hindsight's 2020. When I look back on that journey, there
311
00:14:47.350 --> 00:14:53.019
were plenty of experiences that should have qualified as bottoms
312
00:14:53.039 --> 00:14:56.759
that would have gotten me sober but just wasn't enough
313
00:14:56.899 --> 00:14:58.899
and it's kind of that it takes what it takes
314
00:14:59.200 --> 00:15:00.740
and it had to get to a certain point for
315
00:15:00.779 --> 00:15:03.039
me there were certain things i experienced that would have
316
00:15:03.059 --> 00:15:05.139
scared other people into getting sober but it didn't do
317
00:15:05.179 --> 00:15:07.629
that for me yet it was a lot of this.
318
00:15:08.970 --> 00:15:10.809
What was the experience if you can share with us
319
00:15:10.870 --> 00:15:15.370
that felt closest that you felt in your words should
320
00:15:15.389 --> 00:15:16.330
have or could have.
321
00:15:16.190 --> 00:15:19.820
Got you so many i mean one of them that
322
00:15:19.899 --> 00:15:23.799
really should have uh maybe done it should have as
323
00:15:23.840 --> 00:15:26.440
if i should be the one in control okay well
324
00:15:26.460 --> 00:15:28.320
i blew a hole through my nose which is you
325
00:15:28.340 --> 00:15:30.639
know public knowledge i have a perforated it's not dvd
326
00:15:30.679 --> 00:15:34.000
it's perforated so it it whistles you know i can
327
00:15:34.019 --> 00:15:36.250
show you after the cameras aren't rolling like i'll shine
328
00:15:36.279 --> 00:15:38.350
a light and you can see straight through you know
329
00:15:38.389 --> 00:15:40.970
my nose and i freaked out there's blood everywhere i
330
00:15:41.009 --> 00:15:42.570
looked in my you know in the mirror and i
331
00:15:42.629 --> 00:15:44.950
saw it and when i went to the doctor he
332
00:15:45.250 --> 00:15:47.570
obviously knew what it was from because that only happens
333
00:15:47.649 --> 00:15:50.750
from you know cocaine ketamine just snorting drugs and uh
334
00:15:51.389 --> 00:15:55.480
it was like, we can fix this. But if you
335
00:15:55.500 --> 00:15:57.580
keep going, it's just going to happen again. There's only
336
00:15:57.620 --> 00:16:00.340
so many reconstructive surgeries we can do. So if you're
337
00:16:00.379 --> 00:16:03.779
not done, I wouldn't bother yet. And I remember having
338
00:16:03.799 --> 00:16:07.240
the thought of, well, I'm not done. That was one.
339
00:16:07.259 --> 00:16:10.120
I mean, I've had, you know, someone OD on my
340
00:16:10.159 --> 00:16:13.259
drugs that I had to breathe for until the paramedics
341
00:16:13.299 --> 00:16:15.409
showed up. And they were like, if you didn't get
342
00:16:15.450 --> 00:16:17.870
there in time, he'd either be dead or brain dead.
343
00:16:17.889 --> 00:16:21.190
I mean, I've had Plenty of experiences that were scary
344
00:16:21.230 --> 00:16:25.169
enough to have gotten me sober, but I just wasn't ready.
345
00:16:25.879 --> 00:16:30.100
You know, no intervention or traumatizing event could have gotten
346
00:16:30.120 --> 00:16:31.600
me there until I was actually ready.
347
00:16:32.179 --> 00:16:34.039
In the way you describe it, I'm wondering, when did
348
00:16:34.100 --> 00:16:36.039
experimenting turn into addiction for you?
349
00:16:36.580 --> 00:16:38.960
I mean, I've always been the type of person to
350
00:16:39.019 --> 00:16:42.490
reach outside of myself and just become in consuming relationships
351
00:16:42.529 --> 00:16:45.250
with things. I mean, even now with, you know, over
352
00:16:45.289 --> 00:16:49.279
half a decade sober, like I... I will turn Pilates
353
00:16:49.340 --> 00:16:51.480
into an addiction. I will turn rock climbing into an addiction.
354
00:16:51.539 --> 00:16:54.139
I can turn meditation into an addiction. So the main
355
00:16:54.220 --> 00:16:56.139
focus in this last year has been, okay, how do
356
00:16:56.200 --> 00:16:59.259
I get into right relationship with it? One of the
357
00:16:59.279 --> 00:17:03.629
scariest and probably darkest moments of my addiction, which was
358
00:17:03.669 --> 00:17:06.230
still a year before I got sober, was I had
359
00:17:06.269 --> 00:17:13.130
been freebasing heroin and fentanyl. And you can't really smoke
360
00:17:13.150 --> 00:17:15.539
it out of a pipe because the effect produces you
361
00:17:16.160 --> 00:17:18.039
not out. And so if you have a glass pipe,
362
00:17:18.079 --> 00:17:20.700
it's just going to break every time you get too high.
363
00:17:21.109 --> 00:17:24.470
And I had lost my voice for three months because
364
00:17:24.490 --> 00:17:28.269
I was using foil. And I didn't think I was
365
00:17:28.309 --> 00:17:29.569
ever going to be able to sing again. For the
366
00:17:29.589 --> 00:17:32.390
first month, I couldn't talk at all. It was just
367
00:17:32.410 --> 00:17:36.970
this strained, whispery. And I didn't even pick up my
368
00:17:37.150 --> 00:17:39.549
guitar during that time because it was like, well, if
369
00:17:39.589 --> 00:17:41.349
I can't sing and write, then what's the point? Because
370
00:17:41.369 --> 00:17:43.569
I don't consider myself a guitar player. I know enough
371
00:17:43.630 --> 00:17:48.119
just to write. And that was several months of... Yeah,
372
00:17:48.180 --> 00:17:49.589
not thinking I was ever going to be able to
373
00:17:49.640 --> 00:17:53.109
do literally what I feel is my life passion and
374
00:17:53.130 --> 00:17:54.130
purpose ever again.
375
00:17:54.450 --> 00:17:55.289
What did that feel like?
376
00:17:55.910 --> 00:17:58.809
What's a good word for it? I don't know that
377
00:17:58.849 --> 00:18:03.539
it's hopelessness because hopelessness grants the gift of desperation, which
378
00:18:03.599 --> 00:18:09.539
typically leads to sobriety in the right circumstance, but pointlessness maybe.
379
00:18:10.079 --> 00:18:12.420
When I hear you describe these moments, I wonder what
380
00:18:12.480 --> 00:18:16.130
you now looking back, if you wanted people to know
381
00:18:16.210 --> 00:18:18.589
and understand something about your life during that time or
382
00:18:19.309 --> 00:18:21.089
that you think would help them, what would you say
383
00:18:21.730 --> 00:18:23.369
reflecting back now on that time in your life?
384
00:18:23.390 --> 00:18:27.869
I don't think I need to because I do believe
385
00:18:27.990 --> 00:18:32.309
that it's through hearing other people's stories of recovery that
386
00:18:32.430 --> 00:18:36.839
I was able to open my ears and find recovery myself.
387
00:18:37.140 --> 00:18:38.740
And so it's kind of like a, almost like a
388
00:18:38.759 --> 00:18:42.220
word of mouth and giving of experience, strength and hope
389
00:18:42.259 --> 00:18:45.789
to each other that helps us stay sober, this beautiful
390
00:18:45.809 --> 00:18:49.380
community that can exist. And I think for people outside
391
00:18:49.410 --> 00:18:53.799
of that, it's not really for them. And it is interesting.
392
00:18:53.839 --> 00:18:59.819
I've definitely spent several years where the sobriety has been
393
00:18:59.839 --> 00:19:04.359
celebrated and it's been, you know, this amazing piece of
394
00:19:04.400 --> 00:19:06.559
connection for me and these people that I love so deeply.
395
00:19:06.579 --> 00:19:12.619
And then I'll see maybe someone's reaction that doesn't understand
396
00:19:12.660 --> 00:19:14.420
and maybe someone's reaction that's on the outside of it.
397
00:19:14.420 --> 00:19:15.940
And there is a lot of judgment and there is
398
00:19:15.980 --> 00:19:20.559
a lot of like drug addicts. And that was definitely
399
00:19:20.579 --> 00:19:23.460
a bit startling for me. One of the first times
400
00:19:23.500 --> 00:19:28.640
I really experienced that kind of reaction because this whole time,
401
00:19:28.720 --> 00:19:31.369
once I actually went from seeking recovery to being in recovery,
402
00:19:32.089 --> 00:19:34.349
I've started seeing it as my, this is my superpower.
403
00:19:34.769 --> 00:19:37.410
Like I now see that my experience can benefit other people.
404
00:19:37.720 --> 00:19:40.440
my deepest moments of suffering, once I transform them and
405
00:19:40.549 --> 00:19:43.190
alchemize them, they can become very potent pieces of medicine
406
00:19:43.210 --> 00:19:48.309
for other people. What a gift. And so that's been
407
00:19:48.349 --> 00:19:51.700
my perspective. And then when I hear the exact opposite
408
00:19:51.720 --> 00:19:55.940
from someone else, it's like, whoa, you know, it's very startling.
409
00:19:56.440 --> 00:19:58.960
I remember a few years back, we had Tom Holland
410
00:19:59.009 --> 00:20:01.009
on the show and he was talking about his sobriety journey.
411
00:20:01.029 --> 00:20:03.630
And the reason I just saw him this morning, and
412
00:20:03.849 --> 00:20:06.349
so I was thinking about it again, and just how
413
00:20:06.369 --> 00:20:08.970
many messages we still get years later on with people saying,
414
00:20:09.519 --> 00:20:13.279
hearing his story has helped them on their journey. And
415
00:20:13.299 --> 00:20:15.380
I can imagine with the same as you're sharing right now,
416
00:20:16.299 --> 00:20:19.329
I look forward to the messages you'll get and I'll
417
00:20:19.369 --> 00:20:22.150
get and that we'll get for the show that people
418
00:20:22.190 --> 00:20:25.170
hearing your story will help them because I think when
419
00:20:25.190 --> 00:20:27.309
you're in those moments, I imagine, as you said, you
420
00:20:27.329 --> 00:20:31.329
feel extremely lonely, you feel depressed. I've heard people say
421
00:20:31.349 --> 00:20:34.349
things to me like, you just feel like you shouldn't
422
00:20:34.390 --> 00:20:37.950
be there. Things could be better without you. There's so many...
423
00:20:38.230 --> 00:20:39.950
thoughts that kind of spiral in your mind, what would
424
00:20:39.970 --> 00:20:42.319
you say were the most common thoughts that came into
425
00:20:42.359 --> 00:20:43.920
your mind at the time? A lot of.
426
00:20:43.900 --> 00:20:48.000
Terminal uniqueness, no one understands kind of thing, which is
427
00:20:48.599 --> 00:20:51.500
almost humorous at this point because a lot of sober
428
00:20:51.519 --> 00:20:53.480
people that I talk to have had that at some point.
429
00:20:53.900 --> 00:20:55.900
And that is what separates us. We look for the
430
00:20:55.920 --> 00:20:59.069
differences as opposed to the similarities. And it is through
431
00:20:59.109 --> 00:21:02.410
hearing other people's stories. I've been in situations where I'm
432
00:21:02.450 --> 00:21:04.930
talking to someone that has never had a drink or
433
00:21:04.950 --> 00:21:08.089
a drug and they've never even smoked a cigarette. And
434
00:21:08.109 --> 00:21:11.390
they're trying to tell me about my heroin addiction. I'm
435
00:21:11.430 --> 00:21:14.839
not going to listen to them. Like, respectfully, you don't
436
00:21:14.859 --> 00:21:16.700
know what you're talking about. So I'm just not going
437
00:21:16.720 --> 00:21:19.000
to take. But then I hear someone whose story is
438
00:21:19.019 --> 00:21:24.079
so much worse than mine. Or, you know, they've just
439
00:21:24.140 --> 00:21:26.119
seen more and been through more and done more. If
440
00:21:27.720 --> 00:21:29.109
they can get it, I can get it kind of
441
00:21:29.140 --> 00:21:32.089
a thing. It's a tricky line to kind of tread
442
00:21:32.970 --> 00:21:35.750
as far as talking about these things on podcasts or
443
00:21:35.769 --> 00:21:38.430
interviews and things like that. Because I by no means
444
00:21:38.470 --> 00:21:41.769
want to be like a spokesperson for sobriety, but sharing
445
00:21:41.829 --> 00:21:47.150
my story is something that has helped me. Hearing other
446
00:21:47.170 --> 00:21:49.150
people's stories has helped me. So if I can pay
447
00:21:49.190 --> 00:21:52.799
that forward, absolutely. But I also like I don't want
448
00:21:52.819 --> 00:21:54.940
to be a spokesperson. I don't give advice. I'm not
449
00:21:54.960 --> 00:21:56.980
going to tell someone to not do a drug because
450
00:21:57.980 --> 00:22:00.880
I needed to to get to a certain point. And
451
00:22:00.920 --> 00:22:03.430
thank God I did. So I'm not going to try
452
00:22:03.470 --> 00:22:05.750
and rob someone of their experience. It's very much like
453
00:22:05.829 --> 00:22:07.170
you go and do your own thing. If you need
454
00:22:07.190 --> 00:22:11.299
to go do research, that's, you know, that's your life.
455
00:22:12.059 --> 00:22:14.490
When drugs started to first become a part of your life,
456
00:22:15.220 --> 00:22:17.359
did the adults in your life notice and try and
457
00:22:17.400 --> 00:22:18.880
intervene or help and support?
458
00:22:19.420 --> 00:22:22.099
I hid it really well. Even my self-harm I hid
459
00:22:22.140 --> 00:22:24.000
for a couple of years before my family found out.
460
00:22:24.019 --> 00:22:26.380
And that was like one of my first addictive kind
461
00:22:26.400 --> 00:22:29.529
of experiences. things. That was one of the first like
462
00:22:29.569 --> 00:22:33.970
compulsive addictions that I fell into is cutting and occasionally burning.
463
00:22:34.609 --> 00:22:36.750
I'm pretty good at hiding it in the beginning. And
464
00:22:36.769 --> 00:22:39.930
then it starts to get kind of unmanageable. There were
465
00:22:39.950 --> 00:22:42.390
some people that, you know, tried to step in. You know,
466
00:22:42.450 --> 00:22:44.880
I would deny it. I'd find a way out of
467
00:22:45.059 --> 00:22:49.440
it as we do. We're slippery folk, addictive people.
468
00:22:49.980 --> 00:22:50.200
Yeah.
469
00:22:50.220 --> 00:22:52.140
I mean, eventually it got to there was an intervention.
470
00:22:52.180 --> 00:22:54.420
I was sent away. It didn't do anything. You know,
471
00:22:54.460 --> 00:22:57.309
I wasn't ready. I was still convinced that I'm like, OK, well, yeah,
472
00:22:57.329 --> 00:22:59.269
I'll go because I need help getting off of heroin
473
00:22:59.309 --> 00:23:01.390
so the doctor can give me subs. But, you know,
474
00:23:01.410 --> 00:23:04.339
I'm still going to drink and smoke weed. Didn't think that,
475
00:23:04.579 --> 00:23:06.859
you know, that was going to be a problem, which
476
00:23:06.900 --> 00:23:07.140
it was.
477
00:23:07.880 --> 00:23:10.400
And at that time, as far as I know, you
478
00:23:11.200 --> 00:23:12.720
were sent to one of the centers in Utah.
479
00:23:13.000 --> 00:23:14.660
That was after a suicide attempt. So that was when
480
00:23:14.680 --> 00:23:18.180
I was 15. The rehab my family sent me to,
481
00:23:18.200 --> 00:23:23.619
I was 20 years old, I think. But yeah, Utah,
482
00:23:23.680 --> 00:23:26.279
I was 15. That was after a suicide attempt. And
483
00:23:27.140 --> 00:23:29.700
CPS was like, you guys got to send her away
484
00:23:29.720 --> 00:23:31.710
because she's already been to the psych ward a couple
485
00:23:31.730 --> 00:23:32.069
of times.
486
00:23:32.509 --> 00:23:34.609
What was the experience like at those centers in Utah?
487
00:23:34.630 --> 00:23:37.690
I think we've all had horrific stories about them and
488
00:23:38.269 --> 00:23:40.950
I've not personally interacted with them in any way. And
489
00:23:41.029 --> 00:23:44.140
so I wonder for those of us who don't know,
490
00:23:44.359 --> 00:23:46.299
how would you describe them? What was that experience like?
491
00:23:46.599 --> 00:23:48.910
I mean, each one was different. You know, I know
492
00:23:48.930 --> 00:23:51.779
some other people that have been to ones that were
493
00:23:51.880 --> 00:23:55.720
not as bad or worse. I definitely left with more
494
00:23:55.779 --> 00:23:58.460
PTSD than I went in there with and had nightmares
495
00:23:58.660 --> 00:24:01.799
for two or three years about going back after I
496
00:24:01.839 --> 00:24:03.849
finally left because I was there for a couple months.
497
00:24:03.880 --> 00:24:05.890
I had two years. I was one of the lucky
498
00:24:06.029 --> 00:24:09.789
ones where we didn't experience physical or sexual abuse, but
499
00:24:09.809 --> 00:24:14.450
there was definitely a lot of psychological, emotional, spiritual abuse
500
00:24:14.589 --> 00:24:18.140
that happened there. Yeah, like pitting the clients against each
501
00:24:18.220 --> 00:24:20.799
other kind of a thing, learning how to like, oh,
502
00:24:20.839 --> 00:24:23.640
I can't trust my roommate. I can't trust my therapist.
503
00:24:23.700 --> 00:24:27.059
I can't trust anybody here because anything you say could
504
00:24:27.079 --> 00:24:29.240
put you on the lowest level and could, you know,
505
00:24:29.299 --> 00:24:31.380
and you can't really call your family and tell them
506
00:24:31.440 --> 00:24:34.440
because they're listening and they will, you know, call your
507
00:24:34.460 --> 00:24:36.019
family and be like, don't listen to her. She's lying
508
00:24:36.039 --> 00:24:38.990
to you. And then you get a consequence for, you know,
509
00:24:39.589 --> 00:24:41.730
and you're on meds and you're zombied out. And it's just,
510
00:24:42.069 --> 00:24:44.950
you know, it's rough. You have to learn how to
511
00:24:44.990 --> 00:24:47.049
kind of play the game. If you want to get out.
512
00:24:47.289 --> 00:24:48.470
How's that meant to help anyone?
513
00:24:48.970 --> 00:24:52.269
Rehabilitation, I think, is a case by case, whether it's
514
00:24:52.309 --> 00:24:57.349
like a young kids treatment center or a drug addiction
515
00:24:57.369 --> 00:25:01.190
rehab or a, you know, jail or prison or institution
516
00:25:01.230 --> 00:25:04.029
like rehabilitation is kind of a case by case. And
517
00:25:04.049 --> 00:25:07.390
I don't know that you can just blanket something and
518
00:25:07.430 --> 00:25:10.000
just cover everybody with with one method.
519
00:25:10.599 --> 00:25:13.660
Did that affect how you trusted people later on in
520
00:25:13.700 --> 00:25:15.859
life after that experience? Oh, yeah. Yeah.
521
00:25:16.190 --> 00:25:20.170
For sure. For sure. And it's a shame because I
522
00:25:21.329 --> 00:25:23.450
found a lot of beauty in finally learning how to trust.
523
00:25:24.089 --> 00:25:26.869
Talk to me about that journey with trust specifically. When
524
00:25:26.890 --> 00:25:28.130
you're in that position where you don't know if you
525
00:25:28.150 --> 00:25:31.390
can trust your therapist, your roommate, the people who are
526
00:25:31.410 --> 00:25:34.410
meant to be helping you and supporting you. Yeah. How
527
00:25:34.430 --> 00:25:37.069
does one even go back to beginning to trust someone
528
00:25:37.109 --> 00:25:38.269
else outside of that space?
529
00:25:38.690 --> 00:25:41.380
It was definitely a lot to layer on top of
530
00:25:41.430 --> 00:25:45.740
an already existing issue with trust as far as, you know,
531
00:25:45.779 --> 00:25:48.900
people having ulterior motives and trying to take advantage and take.
532
00:25:49.880 --> 00:25:53.420
But I think it was just something that happened slowly
533
00:25:53.480 --> 00:25:57.599
over time. Yeah, time and consistency. And I've been lucky
534
00:25:57.640 --> 00:26:01.529
enough to have some people that have just shown up
535
00:26:02.440 --> 00:26:05.130
over and over and over, like my best friend of
536
00:26:05.130 --> 00:26:08.079
10 years, just showing up, showing up, showing up.
537
00:26:08.529 --> 00:26:09.430
In every situation?
538
00:26:09.710 --> 00:26:11.650
Yeah, I think it's for with the people that I
539
00:26:11.670 --> 00:26:15.809
do trust. It's something that you know, takes time to build.
540
00:26:17.069 --> 00:26:19.150
I've heard this saying that it's lost in gallons and
541
00:26:19.190 --> 00:26:23.849
gained back in drops. And yeah, drop by drop.
542
00:26:24.349 --> 00:26:25.410
How do you define a good friend?
543
00:26:26.170 --> 00:26:30.079
Integrity. The integrity has to match a certain level. The
544
00:26:30.119 --> 00:26:34.859
humor is very important. And just the sense of home,
545
00:26:34.880 --> 00:26:39.539
I think. I've really whittled my friend group down over
546
00:26:39.559 --> 00:26:41.900
the last few years. And the group that the people
547
00:26:41.960 --> 00:26:45.799
in my life right now, are the most incredible human
548
00:26:45.839 --> 00:26:49.759
beings I've ever met. Just really high integrity, really loyal,
549
00:26:49.940 --> 00:26:56.079
really funny, just salt of the earth human beings that
550
00:26:56.119 --> 00:26:58.880
I can call and they'll show up. And they can
551
00:26:58.920 --> 00:27:01.990
call me and I'll show up. I'm multiple people's emergency
552
00:27:02.009 --> 00:27:05.950
contact and I have a few on mine and it's
553
00:27:06.470 --> 00:27:09.809
one of the most priceless things. Money can't really buy that.
554
00:27:10.069 --> 00:27:11.670
Yeah, you want the friend who gets a call at
555
00:27:11.670 --> 00:27:12.910
2 a.m. and they're there for you.
556
00:27:12.990 --> 00:27:14.559
Oh, I'm packing a bag. I'll be there, you know.
557
00:27:14.759 --> 00:27:16.180
I'm so happy that you found that. Thank you. I
558
00:27:16.180 --> 00:27:18.759
feel like everyone deserves that. Yeah. As you said, that
559
00:27:19.200 --> 00:27:21.519
feeling of home. Yeah. Everyone's born in a home and
560
00:27:21.539 --> 00:27:24.759
then spends their whole life trying to find belonging. And
561
00:27:24.799 --> 00:27:27.480
it's a strange thing to say. It's like, it's weird.
562
00:27:28.299 --> 00:27:31.559
You're born with families. You make friends at school or
563
00:27:31.599 --> 00:27:34.279
at some place and you're still searching for belonging the
564
00:27:34.319 --> 00:27:35.809
whole time. And so when you kind of find it
565
00:27:35.849 --> 00:27:40.119
as an adult, it's pretty rare and spectacular. What is
566
00:27:40.180 --> 00:27:43.859
it that then led to you wanting to even become sober?
567
00:27:43.880 --> 00:27:46.579
I mean, you're saying at 15, you've had a suicide attempt.
568
00:27:47.019 --> 00:27:48.859
Yeah, I've had quite a few of those.
569
00:27:49.220 --> 00:27:51.299
What led you to that? What led you to want
570
00:27:51.319 --> 00:27:52.319
to get to that place?
571
00:27:52.839 --> 00:27:55.980
Depends on which part of me you're asking. Because if
572
00:27:56.000 --> 00:27:59.160
you're asking the part of me that likes to take
573
00:27:59.200 --> 00:28:02.480
the zoomed out approach that's tapped in the source and
574
00:28:02.539 --> 00:28:05.119
is seeing the bigger picture, what led me to that
575
00:28:05.180 --> 00:28:07.509
would be, you know, a divine soul contract that I
576
00:28:07.549 --> 00:28:09.769
signed up for. And something that I chose to go
577
00:28:09.829 --> 00:28:13.680
through as a part of my journey. If you're asking me,
578
00:28:13.720 --> 00:28:16.799
that's like down here on earth, really experiencing it. Just
579
00:28:17.380 --> 00:28:23.500
untreated alcoholism, untreated drug addiction, untreated mental illness. It goes
580
00:28:23.579 --> 00:28:25.869
on for long enough. It becomes unbearable.
581
00:28:26.200 --> 00:28:28.470
I appreciate the parts because I think we all have
582
00:28:29.390 --> 00:28:31.630
multiple viewpoints and stories of why we end up where
583
00:28:31.650 --> 00:28:34.450
we have. And you're so right that there's the version
584
00:28:34.470 --> 00:28:36.680
of you, like you said, zoomed out that can see
585
00:28:36.700 --> 00:28:38.740
the bigger picture that can see the journey you've been
586
00:28:38.880 --> 00:28:40.890
on that can see that that was a choice for
587
00:28:40.950 --> 00:28:44.490
growth and transformation i.e not wanting to take anyone's experience
588
00:28:44.549 --> 00:28:46.809
away and then of course there's the reality of it
589
00:28:46.869 --> 00:28:48.430
what was the point that you were like i can't
590
00:28:48.450 --> 00:28:50.869
keep living like this like i can't keep doing this
591
00:28:50.890 --> 00:28:51.769
to myself.
592
00:28:52.170 --> 00:28:56.940
There were many that led to the attempts uh but
593
00:28:57.279 --> 00:29:01.660
when i got sober it was i had like a
594
00:29:01.700 --> 00:29:03.740
month off a month and a half off of heroin
595
00:29:03.779 --> 00:29:06.769
i'd like detoxed at home I knew someone that had,
596
00:29:07.210 --> 00:29:09.609
you know, Suboxone. And so we were going to take
597
00:29:09.690 --> 00:29:11.970
the strips and we were going to detox on our own,
598
00:29:12.029 --> 00:29:13.829
but I didn't realize I was on fentanyl. So I
599
00:29:13.849 --> 00:29:17.170
took it too early, precipitated withdrawals, like, you know, Fetty's
600
00:29:17.210 --> 00:29:21.269
got legs. So it was very much, uh, I was like, okay, well,
601
00:29:21.289 --> 00:29:22.430
let me just see if I can get through this
602
00:29:22.450 --> 00:29:24.269
without subs because then I'm gonna have to taper off
603
00:29:24.289 --> 00:29:26.309
the subs. Let's just cold turkey this. But it wasn't
604
00:29:26.329 --> 00:29:28.109
cold turkey because I was still drinking a lot. I
605
00:29:28.150 --> 00:29:30.069
was doing, you know, Coke and I was smoking a
606
00:29:30.069 --> 00:29:34.210
lot of weed. And, um, After about a month of
607
00:29:34.349 --> 00:29:37.539
not sleeping, because that's what happens, I was maybe getting
608
00:29:37.559 --> 00:29:39.970
an hour or two at night, maybe three if I'm right.
609
00:29:40.079 --> 00:29:40.420
Lucky.
610
00:29:41.059 --> 00:29:46.579
And I had a suicide attempt that didn't work, which
611
00:29:48.039 --> 00:29:50.940
I don't know the science of it. I could be wrong,
612
00:29:50.980 --> 00:29:53.279
but I don't think as someone that had a tolerance
613
00:29:53.980 --> 00:29:56.589
whatsoever for benzos at the time, having taken an entire
614
00:29:56.619 --> 00:29:59.240
bottle mixed with an entire bottle of vodka, I feel
615
00:29:59.259 --> 00:30:01.920
like that should have worked. And so when I just
616
00:30:01.960 --> 00:30:05.200
woke up hours later, I was like, fuck. That was
617
00:30:05.240 --> 00:30:08.549
one of the first attempts where I'm like, fuck, it
618
00:30:08.630 --> 00:30:10.769
didn't work. Because a lot of people are relieved when
619
00:30:10.789 --> 00:30:13.049
it didn't work or they feel regret the second they
620
00:30:13.549 --> 00:30:16.730
attempt it. I was so upset when it didn't work.
621
00:30:16.910 --> 00:30:18.890
And then a few weeks later, I had a proper
622
00:30:18.930 --> 00:30:23.680
bottom with alcohol where it was just like, my behavior
623
00:30:23.720 --> 00:30:26.759
scared me into getting sober. And it was, for a
624
00:30:26.779 --> 00:30:29.250
long time, went back and forth between this place of,
625
00:30:29.299 --> 00:30:33.519
I can't be here anymore. And well, it's not my time.
626
00:30:33.539 --> 00:30:36.240
So I'm stuck here and I can try all these methods,
627
00:30:36.359 --> 00:30:37.789
but they're still not going to work. And if that
628
00:30:37.809 --> 00:30:40.829
didn't work, then, you know, I would run through all
629
00:30:40.869 --> 00:30:43.970
these other ideas and I would see how it would
630
00:30:44.009 --> 00:30:45.950
go south where it's like, oh, well, you know, I
631
00:30:45.970 --> 00:30:47.769
could try and hang myself, but then it's, you know,
632
00:30:47.789 --> 00:30:48.869
it's not going to work. And I'm going to end
633
00:30:48.950 --> 00:30:51.170
up like, you know, kind of paralyzed or like, I
634
00:30:51.210 --> 00:30:54.210
would just think of all of these ideas and then
635
00:30:54.250 --> 00:30:56.450
how it would go wrong. And I'm like, I'm stuck here. Like,
636
00:30:56.490 --> 00:30:57.869
it's not my time. I'm not going to be allowed
637
00:30:57.910 --> 00:31:00.380
to leave unless it's my time. And so I have
638
00:31:00.410 --> 00:31:02.619
to wait it out. And I didn't know that there
639
00:31:02.640 --> 00:31:06.039
was this secret, very special third place of, oh, this
640
00:31:06.079 --> 00:31:09.460
is great. And we love being here. And, you know,
641
00:31:09.480 --> 00:31:12.269
the good or the bad, the light and the heavy,
642
00:31:12.289 --> 00:31:15.470
these are all things that are part of the experience.
643
00:31:15.809 --> 00:31:18.789
And I'm here to experience the entire spectrum. Like I'm
644
00:31:18.829 --> 00:31:21.069
here for the whole enchilada. I want all the feelings
645
00:31:21.089 --> 00:31:23.869
because that's what I'm taking with me. when I leave.
646
00:31:24.990 --> 00:31:28.119
You know, it's all the feelings, all the experiences.
647
00:31:28.130 --> 00:31:30.400
I feel like that requires a lot of bravery and
648
00:31:30.440 --> 00:31:31.460
courage to accept that.
649
00:31:31.960 --> 00:31:33.839
I don't know if I can take credit for that.
650
00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:36.440
I think it's, you know, it's something that happened through,
651
00:31:36.460 --> 00:31:38.799
you know, spiritual experiences, really.
652
00:31:38.819 --> 00:31:42.920
Were there any experiences that made that clear to you?
653
00:31:42.940 --> 00:31:46.779
Because I feel like sobriety, the journey to sobriety has
654
00:31:46.799 --> 00:31:47.839
so many ups and downs.
655
00:31:48.289 --> 00:31:51.470
There were so many. I had what's kind of called
656
00:31:51.509 --> 00:31:55.369
like an educational variety kind of spiritual awakening that is
657
00:31:55.450 --> 00:31:58.890
not like a boom, white light experience. Like I didn't
658
00:31:58.990 --> 00:32:03.029
have this crazy fall out of bed, hear a booming
659
00:32:03.089 --> 00:32:06.430
voice kind of an experience. It was something that happened
660
00:32:06.450 --> 00:32:08.869
slowly over a period of time. And I learned how
661
00:32:08.990 --> 00:32:11.880
to pray and I didn't know what I was talking to.
662
00:32:12.619 --> 00:32:17.200
But I think it was just the willingness to develop something.
663
00:32:18.150 --> 00:32:22.089
And over time, I started with prayer and meditation and
664
00:32:22.130 --> 00:32:25.029
just getting into these practices blind and just being like, well,
665
00:32:25.150 --> 00:32:28.289
you know, I'm out of ideas. Let's try this. I
666
00:32:28.329 --> 00:32:31.529
started noticing more and more little coincidences that I couldn't explain,
667
00:32:31.589 --> 00:32:34.369
more and more synchronicities, more and more God shots that
668
00:32:35.049 --> 00:32:38.509
eventually piled up into a mountain of evidence of like,
669
00:32:38.670 --> 00:32:42.890
there's got to be something, you know. And one of
670
00:32:42.950 --> 00:32:46.569
them It was a really cool experience that I had.
671
00:32:46.609 --> 00:32:49.089
I think I had about three years sober at the time,
672
00:32:49.170 --> 00:32:51.950
or I was about to get three years sober. And
673
00:32:51.970 --> 00:32:54.390
I had heard someone say, I think it was like
674
00:32:54.430 --> 00:32:56.910
a friend of a friend say like, oh, your higher
675
00:32:56.950 --> 00:33:00.029
power or God or whatever you believe in, the answer
676
00:33:00.089 --> 00:33:03.269
or the universe, the answer to your prayers is never no.
677
00:33:03.390 --> 00:33:06.150
It's always yes, not yet, or I have a better idea.
678
00:33:06.170 --> 00:33:09.220
At this point, I had almost three years sober. And,
679
00:33:09.440 --> 00:33:13.680
you know, I did a prayer and I had like this,
680
00:33:15.180 --> 00:33:17.539
it wasn't like my life flashed before my eyes, but
681
00:33:17.579 --> 00:33:20.289
it was all the times since getting sober that my
682
00:33:20.329 --> 00:33:22.410
higher power was like, I have a better idea for you.
683
00:33:23.369 --> 00:33:26.890
And it was very much like, uh, okay, keep trusting
684
00:33:26.930 --> 00:33:30.109
the process because life is becoming more and more expansive.
685
00:33:30.470 --> 00:33:35.430
Yeah. Your song evermore is, I believe, inspired by that
686
00:33:35.470 --> 00:33:37.849
relationship with God and spirituality.
687
00:33:37.930 --> 00:33:39.690
And it's, you know, it sounds like a love song
688
00:33:39.730 --> 00:33:41.470
and I like being vague enough so that things can
689
00:33:41.509 --> 00:33:44.769
apply to everyone. But that is, that is very much a, uh,
690
00:33:45.829 --> 00:33:50.119
a love letter to source, you know, great spirit, God,
691
00:33:50.279 --> 00:33:52.480
whatever you want to call it. The thing that has
692
00:33:52.519 --> 00:33:55.019
a thousand names, the thing that is the unnameable thing,
693
00:33:55.220 --> 00:33:55.900
you know? Yeah.
694
00:33:56.000 --> 00:33:57.500
But you said you wrote it like a love song.
695
00:33:57.519 --> 00:33:57.940
Pretty much.
696
00:33:57.980 --> 00:33:58.160
Yeah.
697
00:33:58.240 --> 00:34:01.349
I felt like I could hear it in like a
698
00:34:01.849 --> 00:34:03.170
90s rom-com. Yeah.
699
00:34:03.190 --> 00:34:06.269
And it's so corny and it's so like, oh, the
700
00:34:06.289 --> 00:34:10.050
sky is blue and like, it's very... But that's sometimes
701
00:34:10.090 --> 00:34:12.800
how it feels. Like, you know, when I really developed
702
00:34:12.820 --> 00:34:15.440
like a conscious contact with something that made me feel safe,
703
00:34:15.460 --> 00:34:17.260
it was the first time I'd ever truly felt safe.
704
00:34:18.039 --> 00:34:20.659
So it was like, oh, the sky is bluer.
705
00:34:21.159 --> 00:34:23.559
What did your prayer look like? What did it sound like?
706
00:34:23.920 --> 00:34:26.500
It's often changing and it depends on what it is.
707
00:34:26.639 --> 00:34:31.690
But typically it's kind of just giving it over, being like, well,
708
00:34:31.769 --> 00:34:34.409
my best thinking landed me in some pretty dark places
709
00:34:34.469 --> 00:34:36.750
and landed me in the gutter. So why don't you
710
00:34:37.469 --> 00:34:41.039
take the reins, whatever you are. And, you know, I'll
711
00:34:41.059 --> 00:34:43.440
tap in right before a show, right before I, you know,
712
00:34:43.480 --> 00:34:45.340
and it's more like, please help me set aside all
713
00:34:45.380 --> 00:34:48.230
these things. Help me set aside, like, my need to
714
00:34:48.329 --> 00:34:52.670
feel pretty or funny or talented or all these, like, insecure.
715
00:34:52.690 --> 00:34:55.250
Help me set aside my insecurities. Help me set aside my,
716
00:34:55.730 --> 00:34:58.590
you know, these things that I see as needs. And,
717
00:34:59.230 --> 00:35:03.079
you know, just use me as your instrument as I
718
00:35:03.139 --> 00:35:05.380
use my instruments, you know. If I'm here for a
719
00:35:05.420 --> 00:35:07.699
reason and if you gave me these songs for a reason,
720
00:35:07.980 --> 00:35:08.719
help me just play them.
721
00:35:09.099 --> 00:35:11.260
How do you make sense of this idea of handing
722
00:35:11.320 --> 00:35:16.429
it over but then still taking action and responsibility? Talk
723
00:35:16.449 --> 00:35:20.590
to me about that balance between surrender and sincere action.
724
00:35:21.170 --> 00:35:24.030
I think a lot of it has to do with
725
00:35:24.710 --> 00:35:26.210
putting in the work and staying out of the results.
726
00:35:26.530 --> 00:35:28.969
I think that's a big thing. And not trying to
727
00:35:29.030 --> 00:35:36.219
control outcomes. I think control can be a tricky, slippery slope.
728
00:35:37.000 --> 00:35:40.920
You know, I've been recently trying out different things, trying out,
729
00:35:41.019 --> 00:35:44.480
you know, more tools of like exploring similarities between like
730
00:35:44.500 --> 00:35:46.780
Christ consciousness and nirvana, also looking into the Tao a
731
00:35:46.780 --> 00:35:50.730
little bit. And I really like the have the patience
732
00:35:50.769 --> 00:35:52.889
to wait until the mud settles and the water is
733
00:35:52.949 --> 00:35:55.130
clear to make decisions. And so it's kind of like, OK,
734
00:35:55.170 --> 00:35:58.010
let me take a step back, give it 24 hours
735
00:35:58.090 --> 00:36:00.889
or give it however much time, really tap in, check
736
00:36:00.909 --> 00:36:03.429
in with myself. Does this feel icky? Does this feel clean?
737
00:36:03.449 --> 00:36:06.409
Does this feel good? You know, and then I also
738
00:36:06.469 --> 00:36:09.030
have people that I can counsel with. I have, you know, guides.
739
00:36:09.070 --> 00:36:10.670
I have friends. I have people that I can kind
740
00:36:10.710 --> 00:36:12.610
of lean on and be like, I feel like this
741
00:36:12.679 --> 00:36:14.440
is where my intuition is telling me to go. And
742
00:36:14.480 --> 00:36:17.079
if someone's like, that's a bad idea, then for sure
743
00:36:17.139 --> 00:36:19.260
we're going to take that into consideration and add that
744
00:36:19.280 --> 00:36:21.599
to the pot of things that we know. But a
745
00:36:21.699 --> 00:36:23.699
lot of it has had to do with learning how
746
00:36:23.719 --> 00:36:27.860
to be in right relationship with myself and just waiting
747
00:36:27.900 --> 00:36:30.960
for the right indicated action to arise, I guess.
748
00:36:31.369 --> 00:36:33.809
Yeah, I feel like it's a constant dance. Yeah. It's
749
00:36:33.829 --> 00:36:37.320
a constant dance to do that. And I'm guessing that,
750
00:36:37.380 --> 00:36:39.420
you know, talking about relationships, I was thinking about in
751
00:36:39.440 --> 00:36:41.800
your song Stitched, there's a lyric that I liked. You said,
752
00:36:42.559 --> 00:36:45.480
how your soul was stitched into mine with your heart
753
00:36:45.659 --> 00:36:48.639
eating into mine. Talk to me about this lyric because
754
00:36:49.519 --> 00:36:53.949
fascinated by, we're talking about godly relationships. Sure. Spiritual relationships,
755
00:36:53.969 --> 00:36:56.670
but then we have relationships on the planet. Talk to
756
00:36:56.690 --> 00:36:58.210
me about that specific lyric.
757
00:36:58.579 --> 00:37:01.980
I believe in multiple soulmates. I believe that a soulmate
758
00:37:02.039 --> 00:37:06.159
is not necessarily someone that you are in a romantic,
759
00:37:06.199 --> 00:37:09.380
intimate relationship with. I think parents can be soulmates. I
760
00:37:09.420 --> 00:37:12.650
think siblings can be soulmates. I think your arch nemesis
761
00:37:12.690 --> 00:37:15.369
in this lifetime is a soulmate because that is a
762
00:37:15.610 --> 00:37:18.559
great lesson of yours that Maybe that arch nemesis was
763
00:37:18.599 --> 00:37:21.099
your mother in another life. Maybe it was your father
764
00:37:21.119 --> 00:37:23.079
in another life. Maybe it was your husband in another life.
765
00:37:23.139 --> 00:37:26.610
Like that's just my belief. And I know it's wacky,
766
00:37:26.670 --> 00:37:29.210
but that's just, you know, what feels right and makes
767
00:37:29.230 --> 00:37:32.949
sense to me. And this song was written about someone
768
00:37:32.969 --> 00:37:35.789
that I felt like we had experienced every type of
769
00:37:35.829 --> 00:37:38.860
human relationship you could have in all of our other
770
00:37:38.880 --> 00:37:40.820
lifetimes prior to this one. And so it was a
771
00:37:40.840 --> 00:37:44.260
very deeply rooted one. And it was not that I
772
00:37:44.300 --> 00:37:47.559
love this person more than other loves. But it was different.
773
00:37:47.599 --> 00:37:49.000
It was very one of a kind and it did
774
00:37:49.099 --> 00:37:53.239
feel kind of like just stitching, which, you know, when
775
00:37:53.679 --> 00:37:56.239
not cared for the right way can become very codependent,
776
00:37:56.500 --> 00:37:59.760
can be, you know, especially ours was a drug fueled relationship.
777
00:38:00.989 --> 00:38:04.190
And yeah, I definitely felt like his heart ate mine.
778
00:38:04.210 --> 00:38:06.070
I was going to ask you that. What's the difference
779
00:38:06.110 --> 00:38:10.369
between a relationship when you're sober versus when you're drug related?
780
00:38:11.349 --> 00:38:13.590
Oh, I mean, well, that depends if we're talking about
781
00:38:13.630 --> 00:38:16.610
emotionally sober or simply physically sober, because I definitely got
782
00:38:16.650 --> 00:38:19.329
into relationships when I was physically sober and didn't really
783
00:38:19.369 --> 00:38:22.800
have emotional sobriety. And that can become a consuming relationship
784
00:38:22.860 --> 00:38:26.280
in itself where the person becomes the drug. That's not
785
00:38:26.320 --> 00:38:31.820
healthy either. Experiencing a emotionally sober relationship, again, has to
786
00:38:31.860 --> 00:38:34.119
do with being in right relationship with myself and has
787
00:38:34.139 --> 00:38:36.860
to do with being intentional with everything I do and
788
00:38:36.949 --> 00:38:42.119
being incredibly honest with myself. And incredibly honest and transparent
789
00:38:42.159 --> 00:38:43.079
with people around me.
790
00:38:43.659 --> 00:38:47.260
I love how you just define the difference between physically
791
00:38:47.280 --> 00:38:48.360
sober and emotionally sober.
792
00:38:48.400 --> 00:38:51.739
Big difference. You know, I know there's some people that
793
00:38:51.760 --> 00:38:53.280
will claim to be sober and then they're getting in
794
00:38:53.320 --> 00:38:55.989
fistfights with their roommate. And it's like, it's awesome that
795
00:38:56.010 --> 00:38:57.090
you're not on drugs, man.
796
00:38:57.110 --> 00:38:57.650
Yeah.
797
00:38:57.670 --> 00:38:59.429
That's good for you. Yeah.
798
00:38:59.829 --> 00:39:02.429
What surprised you most about sobriety? All of it.
799
00:39:03.030 --> 00:39:05.929
And I said this when I got five years sober,
800
00:39:06.769 --> 00:39:08.809
which was like a year and a half ago. Like,
801
00:39:08.849 --> 00:39:11.369
I can't believe I almost missed it all. Because my
802
00:39:11.409 --> 00:39:16.230
life has become so much more opened up. You know,
803
00:39:16.289 --> 00:39:18.579
I have more trust and more intimacy and more closeness
804
00:39:18.619 --> 00:39:21.780
with the people in my life. And people rely on me.
805
00:39:21.900 --> 00:39:25.610
People can rely on me. And that's really special.
806
00:39:26.210 --> 00:39:27.730
Was there a time when you felt like you really
807
00:39:27.769 --> 00:39:29.170
let people down? Oh, yeah.
808
00:39:29.429 --> 00:39:29.670
I mean.
809
00:39:29.940 --> 00:39:30.199
yeah.
810
00:39:30.219 --> 00:39:33.960
I feel like that might be the universal experience for
811
00:39:34.659 --> 00:39:35.679
people in active addiction.
812
00:39:36.059 --> 00:39:38.119
Was there anyone that you felt like you really let down?
813
00:39:38.480 --> 00:39:49.869
My younger self. More than anyone. Oh, fuck. It's a
814
00:39:49.889 --> 00:39:57.940
good question. I've done a lot of, um, so much therapy.
815
00:39:57.960 --> 00:40:01.420
I went into a really deep depression around three years
816
00:40:01.440 --> 00:40:05.719
sober and, uh, tried all the things like the conveyor
817
00:40:05.760 --> 00:40:10.860
belt of medication, um, probably over a dozen, I think
818
00:40:11.199 --> 00:40:15.920
the SSRIs, the MRIs, like all of them. And, um,
819
00:40:16.920 --> 00:40:19.090
You know, within a span of 18 months, went to
820
00:40:19.110 --> 00:40:24.570
five different institutions, you know, Hoffman, Onsite, the Glass House, twice,
821
00:40:25.550 --> 00:40:28.769
you know, ended up checking back into my rehab that
822
00:40:28.789 --> 00:40:31.050
I got sober at. I was like, do you guys
823
00:40:31.070 --> 00:40:32.679
have a bed? They were like, we have your old room.
824
00:40:32.699 --> 00:40:35.000
And I was like, great, I'll be there in 20 minutes.
825
00:40:35.940 --> 00:40:39.139
And I've done a lot of inner child work. I've
826
00:40:39.159 --> 00:40:41.559
done a lot of inner teen work because those two
827
00:40:41.619 --> 00:40:45.429
girls are very different. They want different things. They have
828
00:40:45.650 --> 00:40:49.389
very different approaches to life. It wasn't until kind of
829
00:40:49.449 --> 00:40:53.329
this last year I've really learned how to listen, differentiate
830
00:40:53.389 --> 00:40:57.019
between which part of me is speaking, hear what the
831
00:40:57.059 --> 00:41:00.119
need is, and then learn how to meet it myself,
832
00:41:01.340 --> 00:41:03.980
which in the past would be, you know, if it
833
00:41:04.019 --> 00:41:09.320
was little p, grasping for something. someone to fix this
834
00:41:09.480 --> 00:41:13.820
ease this you know fill this uh hole right uh
835
00:41:13.889 --> 00:41:17.650
void and then you know teen p was very much
836
00:41:17.730 --> 00:41:22.289
like get away from me don't touch me you know
837
00:41:22.309 --> 00:41:24.849
so it's uh learning how to listen and be like
838
00:41:24.929 --> 00:41:28.210
okay what's what's the need okay she wants space and
839
00:41:28.250 --> 00:41:29.670
doesn't want to be touched okay why don't we go
840
00:41:30.570 --> 00:41:33.199
take 10 minutes let's communicate we're gonna take 10 minutes
841
00:41:33.260 --> 00:41:36.429
we're gonna take a breath. We're going to tap into whatever,
842
00:41:36.489 --> 00:41:40.070
maybe smoke, maybe give her a cigarette and, uh, meet
843
00:41:40.090 --> 00:41:44.210
the need ourselves. You know, you ask about healthy relationships
844
00:41:44.289 --> 00:41:47.510
and sobriety and that that's been, uh, one of the
845
00:41:47.610 --> 00:41:52.170
biggest things that's allowed me to start having that. And
846
00:41:52.230 --> 00:41:56.960
also learning how to have uncomfortable conversations, learning how to
847
00:41:58.059 --> 00:42:00.340
step out of the discomfort, say the hard thing, say
848
00:42:00.380 --> 00:42:05.300
the honest thing, um, state the need. And it's done
849
00:42:05.340 --> 00:42:08.199
nothing but foster more intimacy and trust in all my relationships.
850
00:42:08.679 --> 00:42:12.039
What was it like to heal that relationship for your
851
00:42:12.079 --> 00:42:13.579
younger self and with your younger self?
852
00:42:13.599 --> 00:42:16.039
I think it's an ongoing process. I don't know that
853
00:42:16.119 --> 00:42:20.829
it's healed. It's more healed than it ever has been,
854
00:42:20.869 --> 00:42:27.269
and it's an ongoing process. There's something really profound in
855
00:42:27.349 --> 00:42:31.090
being able to say, like, I got you. We got
856
00:42:31.130 --> 00:42:31.849
out of that mess.
857
00:42:32.389 --> 00:42:32.869
We got out.
858
00:42:33.690 --> 00:42:37.059
I got you. And I'm sorry.
859
00:42:37.699 --> 00:42:40.500
Does it feel good to give yourself that forgiveness as
860
00:42:40.539 --> 00:42:43.590
well though? Because it's almost like you're saying sorry, but
861
00:42:43.610 --> 00:42:44.849
you also are doing the forgiving.
862
00:42:45.309 --> 00:42:47.670
It's more grace than anything. And I don't think it
863
00:42:47.690 --> 00:42:50.690
comes from me. It's more grace than forgiveness.
864
00:42:51.050 --> 00:42:52.789
I feel like when I spent my three years as
865
00:42:52.829 --> 00:42:54.329
a monk, I did a lot of healing work. I
866
00:42:54.349 --> 00:42:57.559
did that from age 22 to 25. Amazing. 38 now.
867
00:42:57.639 --> 00:43:00.519
And two years ago, I went through something and I
868
00:43:00.559 --> 00:43:03.980
started to do therapy more in order to kind of
869
00:43:04.019 --> 00:43:07.480
look under the hood. proactively to be like, what have
870
00:43:07.519 --> 00:43:10.570
I missed? Like, what work have I not done? Talking
871
00:43:10.590 --> 00:43:12.309
about this idea of that you're never healed and you're
872
00:43:12.349 --> 00:43:15.050
always doing the work. And then something happened in the
873
00:43:15.090 --> 00:43:17.349
last 12 months. And I was like, I was looking
874
00:43:17.409 --> 00:43:20.030
for this and I couldn't find it. And I had
875
00:43:20.070 --> 00:43:22.969
to go through something in order for it to be uncovered.
876
00:43:23.070 --> 00:43:25.320
And so it was just this fascinating thing of like,
877
00:43:25.380 --> 00:43:29.340
I thought I'd worked through this pattern and I thought
878
00:43:29.380 --> 00:43:32.539
I'd looked through every nook and cranny and every crevice
879
00:43:32.599 --> 00:43:35.460
and every little thing and I thought I'd been to
880
00:43:35.559 --> 00:43:38.019
every corner and figured it out. And then something happened.
881
00:43:38.059 --> 00:43:40.699
I was like, oh gosh, I missed it. And it
882
00:43:40.739 --> 00:43:44.019
was like this really fascinating experience of proactively looking under
883
00:43:44.059 --> 00:43:46.719
the hood, thinking I would be able to avoid something
884
00:43:46.760 --> 00:43:49.480
in the future, only to realize that it doesn't work
885
00:43:49.519 --> 00:43:49.940
that way.
886
00:43:50.199 --> 00:43:51.280
You know the idea of the wheel?
887
00:43:51.579 --> 00:43:52.179
Yeah, of course.
888
00:43:52.199 --> 00:43:53.059
The spiral, really.
889
00:43:53.079 --> 00:43:53.539
Please explain.
890
00:43:53.940 --> 00:43:57.050
Well, it's, yeah, for those at home watching, it's this
891
00:43:57.119 --> 00:43:59.219
idea where sometimes we think we're going around in circles.
892
00:43:59.289 --> 00:44:01.670
It's like, oh, it's this again. And it is, but
893
00:44:01.730 --> 00:44:04.800
it's different each time. And the idea is the more
894
00:44:04.840 --> 00:44:06.880
we go through it, the more we learn. And it's
895
00:44:07.000 --> 00:44:09.619
instead of a circle, it's more like a spiral. I
896
00:44:09.659 --> 00:44:11.519
know about looking under the hood and I know about
897
00:44:11.579 --> 00:44:16.219
lifting every little tchotchke instead, leaving no stone unturned. And
898
00:44:16.360 --> 00:44:19.489
something that happened last year was I kind of just
899
00:44:19.840 --> 00:44:21.849
kind of hit this wall with therapy where I'm just like,
900
00:44:21.929 --> 00:44:24.570
I'm just going to take a break from therapy. So
901
00:44:24.610 --> 00:44:27.550
much for so long. Recently, I started seeing a behavioral
902
00:44:27.570 --> 00:44:30.860
specialist for my OCD because that's been like, The main
903
00:44:30.940 --> 00:44:32.820
thing that I feel really needs to be looked at,
904
00:44:32.900 --> 00:44:35.539
I have, you know, thank God, remission with depression, you know,
905
00:44:35.599 --> 00:44:38.019
one day at a time and my sobriety. So I
906
00:44:38.059 --> 00:44:40.619
do things daily to keep my, to maintain my sobriety.
907
00:44:41.340 --> 00:44:44.079
But yeah, I'd reached this point in my therapy where
908
00:44:44.119 --> 00:44:47.659
I'd kind of just plateaued because I, I'd looked under
909
00:44:47.800 --> 00:44:51.340
every stone and, you know, I kind of envisioned it
910
00:44:51.409 --> 00:44:54.989
as like a, like a trailer of like music here.
911
00:44:55.130 --> 00:44:56.789
Like we've got all this and I've just looked on,
912
00:44:56.829 --> 00:44:59.349
there's not a single piece of dust that on anything
913
00:44:59.389 --> 00:45:01.929
in there because I've looked at all of it. Now
914
00:45:01.969 --> 00:45:04.409
I want to learn how to just unhitch the fucking trailer.
915
00:45:04.710 --> 00:45:07.570
How do I, you know, that's what I want to learn. And,
916
00:45:07.829 --> 00:45:09.789
and I've also found that there's a lot of stuff that,
917
00:45:11.150 --> 00:45:13.309
you know, was born through experience. So it needs to
918
00:45:13.349 --> 00:45:16.769
be healed through experience. And that's a really beautiful gift
919
00:45:16.809 --> 00:45:20.739
that relationships offer us. Because if I have like attachment stuff,
920
00:45:20.800 --> 00:45:24.119
I have issues with attachment. That's, Talking about it's not
921
00:45:24.159 --> 00:45:27.690
going to really do anything. And actually similar with addiction stuff,
922
00:45:27.710 --> 00:45:29.550
just talking about it with a therapist isn't going to
923
00:45:29.809 --> 00:45:31.630
do anything. I need to take action. There needs to
924
00:45:31.690 --> 00:45:36.090
be some kind of experiential process. for healing to occur.
925
00:45:36.489 --> 00:45:41.170
This episode is brought to you by Walden University. Balancing work, life,
926
00:45:41.230 --> 00:45:45.340
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927
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928
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929
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930
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931
00:46:00.510 --> 00:46:04.349
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932
00:46:04.789 --> 00:46:11.719
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933
00:46:12.030 --> 00:46:15.599
available in select programs. What were those actions and experiences
934
00:46:15.619 --> 00:46:18.760
that you feel started to unravel some of that healing
935
00:46:19.340 --> 00:46:20.480
or the ones that you practice now?
936
00:46:20.719 --> 00:46:24.059
I'm constantly picking up and putting back down or swapping
937
00:46:24.199 --> 00:46:28.170
out my spiritual toolkit. That's the biggest thing. Therapy has
938
00:46:28.190 --> 00:46:31.849
been an incredible tool. I feel like I've taken bits
939
00:46:31.909 --> 00:46:34.869
and pieces from all of these institutions that I've been to.
940
00:46:34.889 --> 00:46:36.710
Because like I said, I went to five different institutions
941
00:46:36.989 --> 00:46:39.380
with five years sober. Like I had five years sober.
942
00:46:39.400 --> 00:46:41.820
I checked back into places because I'm like this. I'm
943
00:46:41.860 --> 00:46:45.980
not OK. You know, and it's actually that time was
944
00:46:46.039 --> 00:46:50.170
what inspired the album cover because I actually did do ECT.
945
00:46:50.190 --> 00:46:51.630
Yeah, I was about to say that.
946
00:46:52.369 --> 00:46:54.530
And I feel like there is something that I got.
947
00:46:55.730 --> 00:46:58.730
from each experience. Because again, my belief is that everything
948
00:46:58.769 --> 00:47:01.550
happens for a reason. And it's not that those things
949
00:47:01.710 --> 00:47:06.889
didn't work. It's that I'm taking what I can and
950
00:47:06.929 --> 00:47:09.219
taking what works and kind of leaving the rest from
951
00:47:09.360 --> 00:47:12.460
each experience and from each modality and from each, you know,
952
00:47:12.900 --> 00:47:15.639
there's certain things that it's just a very simple tool,
953
00:47:15.659 --> 00:47:19.760
hand on heart, like which chakra are my hands on?
954
00:47:20.159 --> 00:47:24.059
And how are we going to breathe? Like, oh, let's
955
00:47:24.079 --> 00:47:27.159
practice being gentle with myself. You know, that kind of,
956
00:47:27.190 --> 00:47:30.389
that's just a very simple tool that has carried me
957
00:47:32.489 --> 00:47:33.349
through a lot.
958
00:47:33.809 --> 00:47:38.789
The ECT therapy was because of a particular suicide attempt.
959
00:47:38.869 --> 00:47:39.550
Is that right?
960
00:47:40.070 --> 00:47:42.760
It wasn't an attempt. It was, I got very close.
961
00:47:43.880 --> 00:47:49.539
I got very, very close, like centimeters away. And it
962
00:47:49.579 --> 00:47:52.690
was after I had felt like I tried everything. And
963
00:47:52.750 --> 00:47:54.789
it was, I mean, like I said, the conveyor belt
964
00:47:54.809 --> 00:48:00.510
of medication, five different institutions, CBT, DBT, EMDR. I had
965
00:48:00.570 --> 00:48:03.679
done somatic. I had done experiential. I talked to the
966
00:48:03.699 --> 00:48:06.099
empty chair. I'd held the pillow. I had beaten the
967
00:48:06.119 --> 00:48:09.860
things with bats while screaming. Like I had done so
968
00:48:09.920 --> 00:48:14.059
many things. TMS did help a little bit with the OCD,
969
00:48:14.099 --> 00:48:16.400
but it had no effect on my depression. The steli
970
00:48:16.420 --> 00:48:18.869
ganglion block was a very, do you know what that is?
971
00:48:18.929 --> 00:48:21.539
The It's like a shot of lidocaine into a collection
972
00:48:21.559 --> 00:48:23.199
of nerves in your neck. And it's supposed to help
973
00:48:23.219 --> 00:48:26.429
with PTSD and kind of reset your nervous system. I
974
00:48:26.469 --> 00:48:29.369
got like relief for a week. And then I went
975
00:48:29.409 --> 00:48:32.010
back into the other side and got another week. And,
976
00:48:32.090 --> 00:48:34.570
you know, Hoffman gave me probably the longest stint of
977
00:48:34.630 --> 00:48:36.829
relief was I had like a couple months after Hoffman
978
00:48:36.849 --> 00:48:40.349
where I was really happy. And that was amazing. And
979
00:48:40.829 --> 00:48:44.429
something that I've learned with all things is integration is
980
00:48:44.570 --> 00:48:47.869
the number one thing. If I'm not integrating the things
981
00:48:47.909 --> 00:48:51.030
that I learned from these places and these experiences, I'm
982
00:48:51.070 --> 00:48:53.130
going to resort back to how I was feeling before.
983
00:48:53.670 --> 00:48:57.300
So without integration, yeah, I kept, you know, just getting
984
00:48:57.320 --> 00:49:00.480
worse and worse and worse. And once TMS didn't work,
985
00:49:00.780 --> 00:49:03.599
my psychiatrist was like, he was like, it's not as
986
00:49:03.639 --> 00:49:05.960
barbaric as it used to be. They use general anesthetic.
987
00:49:05.980 --> 00:49:08.199
You're knocked out when they shock you, you know.
988
00:49:08.239 --> 00:49:09.820
For anyone who doesn't know what ECT is, can you
989
00:49:09.840 --> 00:49:13.239
explain what the experience is and how it's meant to heal?
990
00:49:13.480 --> 00:49:16.110
Yeah, you go in and I have a lot of metal.
991
00:49:17.519 --> 00:49:20.320
So I had to replace all of the metal. in
992
00:49:20.380 --> 00:49:25.480
my face and, you know, with plastic earrings. And yeah,
993
00:49:25.559 --> 00:49:29.159
you go in, you got your hospital gown. They knock
994
00:49:29.179 --> 00:49:31.539
you out, strap you down, put a bite guard in
995
00:49:31.579 --> 00:49:35.820
your mouth, electrocute you. It helps with the neuroplasticity in
996
00:49:35.840 --> 00:49:38.599
your brain. If I'm not mistaken, it still is the
997
00:49:38.800 --> 00:49:45.550
leading most effective form of depression treatment. I did nine
998
00:49:45.570 --> 00:49:46.550
sessions in three weeks.
999
00:49:47.219 --> 00:49:49.679
Is it painful? Are you not feeling anything?
1000
00:49:49.739 --> 00:49:51.719
The first couple of times it is because they're still
1001
00:49:51.760 --> 00:49:54.599
figuring out how much, you know, Tylenol or Tortal to
1002
00:49:54.619 --> 00:49:58.320
give you afterwards. You know, I'm very anal about like,
1003
00:49:58.420 --> 00:50:00.340
if I'm going to be going under, what are you
1004
00:50:00.380 --> 00:50:02.510
giving me? What are you not? You know, I've had
1005
00:50:02.570 --> 00:50:06.250
experiences where, you know, they gave me something that felt
1006
00:50:06.289 --> 00:50:09.510
too good And it's like, okay, let's, you know, daily maintenance,
1007
00:50:09.570 --> 00:50:13.550
keep the sobriety going, you know. So I definitely ask multiple, multiple,
1008
00:50:13.590 --> 00:50:16.110
multiple times. And I have OCD, so it tells me to.
1009
00:50:16.769 --> 00:50:18.789
But yeah, I mean, the first time I woke up
1010
00:50:18.829 --> 00:50:21.960
and it was the most sharp pain I'd ever experienced
1011
00:50:22.420 --> 00:50:23.900
in the side of my head. Like it was.
1012
00:50:23.920 --> 00:50:26.300
And what is that pain? What do they tell you
1013
00:50:26.320 --> 00:50:26.659
that is?
1014
00:50:26.679 --> 00:50:29.420
Well, I mean, it's soreness from getting electrocuted.
1015
00:50:29.440 --> 00:50:31.420
I mean, that sounds so scary.
1016
00:50:31.440 --> 00:50:34.260
Yeah, it was. And the side effects are gnarly. I mean,
1017
00:50:34.280 --> 00:50:39.400
I definitely had days... completely not in my head at all.
1018
00:50:39.460 --> 00:50:43.800
I'd have friends visit me and I don't remember even
1019
00:50:43.840 --> 00:50:45.820
seeing them. I don't remember them coming by. I have
1020
00:50:45.889 --> 00:50:48.050
evidence that a friend came by because she brought me
1021
00:50:48.090 --> 00:50:49.750
a bag of vapes. This was before I quit vaping.
1022
00:50:50.429 --> 00:50:53.590
But I don't remember her being here at all. I
1023
00:50:53.610 --> 00:50:56.750
don't remember the conversations we had. Amnesia was one of
1024
00:50:56.769 --> 00:50:58.570
the primary side effects of that.
1025
00:50:59.030 --> 00:51:00.610
Was there no part of you that was scared or
1026
00:51:00.630 --> 00:51:02.150
you just felt that was the last resort?
1027
00:51:02.349 --> 00:51:05.260
I'm very much a lead with the chin kind of person. Yeah.
1028
00:51:05.889 --> 00:51:08.769
And so, yes, there's some fear. The biggest fear is
1029
00:51:08.809 --> 00:51:11.469
what if this doesn't work? There was definitely a point
1030
00:51:11.510 --> 00:51:14.889
where I just had to stop because I was responding
1031
00:51:14.929 --> 00:51:17.530
to the treatments and it was working. But then there
1032
00:51:17.550 --> 00:51:19.210
was a discussion of like, well, you're either going to
1033
00:51:19.230 --> 00:51:20.670
be on these two medications for the rest of your
1034
00:51:20.690 --> 00:51:21.869
life or you're going to have to come back once
1035
00:51:21.889 --> 00:51:23.570
a month and continue getting shocked for the rest of
1036
00:51:23.610 --> 00:51:25.679
your life. And I'm like, that's not going to fucking
1037
00:51:25.719 --> 00:51:28.420
work for me. And I think Yeah, little bits and
1038
00:51:28.460 --> 00:51:30.719
pieces of everything that I'd gotten along the way over
1039
00:51:30.760 --> 00:51:32.960
those courses, those last two and a half years, taking
1040
00:51:33.000 --> 00:51:36.219
everything I possibly could and just completely flipping my life
1041
00:51:36.300 --> 00:51:37.980
on its ass and being like, how do I do
1042
00:51:38.019 --> 00:51:41.530
this in a way that is sustainable? And a lot
1043
00:51:41.570 --> 00:51:44.469
of it had to do with holistic health. You know,
1044
00:51:44.489 --> 00:51:47.389
I do believe that a lot of Western medicine is
1045
00:51:47.469 --> 00:51:51.670
educated in disease and not health. The disease is the focus.
1046
00:51:51.809 --> 00:51:53.849
And so I'm like, how do I go, you know,
1047
00:51:53.869 --> 00:51:58.519
the other way? And so it's a lot of, to
1048
00:51:58.559 --> 00:52:01.699
get my sleep in order was a lot of saffron
1049
00:52:01.719 --> 00:52:04.909
and two kiwis before bed at night. Like that completely
1050
00:52:04.949 --> 00:52:09.469
changed my sleep. Somatic exercising, Pilates, like finding the hardest
1051
00:52:09.530 --> 00:52:10.989
gym in LA and being like, I'm going to do
1052
00:52:11.030 --> 00:52:12.750
two sessions in a row three times a week, which
1053
00:52:13.269 --> 00:52:15.489
I am a bit of an over, I overdo it sometimes.
1054
00:52:16.030 --> 00:52:19.679
Rock climbing as much as possible because that is incredible
1055
00:52:19.719 --> 00:52:23.530
for my body, incredible for my core. really being right
1056
00:52:23.570 --> 00:52:25.789
with my body. It's meditative. It's a puzzle that I
1057
00:52:25.809 --> 00:52:29.250
can figure out. It's highly rewarding. It's highly confidence boosting.
1058
00:52:29.530 --> 00:52:30.530
It's highly humbling.
1059
00:52:30.550 --> 00:52:32.690
Are you doing the outdoors or indoors? Both.
1060
00:52:33.050 --> 00:52:34.849
That's what I mean about humbling. So going from a
1061
00:52:35.210 --> 00:52:37.530
top rope climber, yeah, I'm a 511B climber. That's pretty
1062
00:52:37.550 --> 00:52:40.650
fucking good. To like lead and then having to like
1063
00:52:40.750 --> 00:52:42.820
losing a grade and having to build myself back up,
1064
00:52:42.840 --> 00:52:45.059
switching the lead and then going outdoors and being like, oh,
1065
00:52:45.099 --> 00:52:47.519
I'm not a 511B climber at all. I'm like a 5'7.
1066
00:52:48.019 --> 00:52:52.769
That is very humbling and also so rewarding. That's been
1067
00:52:52.789 --> 00:52:57.070
a huge part of my life, picking up new spiritual tools.
1068
00:52:58.010 --> 00:53:01.699
My animals are a huge part of my nervous system
1069
00:53:01.739 --> 00:53:06.539
getting regulated. Figuring out, you know, which CPTSD symptoms are
1070
00:53:06.559 --> 00:53:09.239
the most prominent. How do I work with those things?
1071
00:53:09.900 --> 00:53:13.929
I'm a very big fan of energy work, acupuncture, traditional
1072
00:53:13.949 --> 00:53:17.889
Chinese medicine, like just all the things that are health
1073
00:53:18.010 --> 00:53:20.329
oriented as opposed to, oh, well, this is a disease.
1074
00:53:20.369 --> 00:53:24.190
Let's treat the symptoms. I quit vaping over a year ago.
1075
00:53:24.210 --> 00:53:27.030
I did start rolling cigarettes again a few months ago.
1076
00:53:27.510 --> 00:53:31.519
Quit caffeine for like six months, which really helped the sleep.
1077
00:53:32.360 --> 00:53:37.519
Processed sugar was a big thing. And like, I still
1078
00:53:37.559 --> 00:53:37.920
love sweets.
1079
00:53:37.960 --> 00:53:39.340
I love desserts. Yeah.
1080
00:53:39.440 --> 00:53:41.239
No, I mean, I will go to Erewhon and I'll
1081
00:53:41.260 --> 00:53:43.280
get a chocolate cake, but I get it from there because,
1082
00:53:43.380 --> 00:53:45.110
you know, they're not going to be using, they're using
1083
00:53:45.139 --> 00:53:47.369
all organic products. So every now and then.
1084
00:53:47.409 --> 00:53:48.409
Yeah, okay, I'll do something.
1085
00:53:48.429 --> 00:53:50.230
So I have a sweet tooth. It's really bad, but
1086
00:53:50.760 --> 00:53:52.219
where am I getting it from and what's in it,
1087
00:53:52.760 --> 00:53:55.019
is a huge, huge thing.
1088
00:53:55.480 --> 00:53:57.380
I've used sugar as a drug for far too long.
1089
00:53:57.420 --> 00:53:59.699
Yeah, well, I mean, it's eight times more addictive than cocaine.
1090
00:53:59.860 --> 00:54:00.199
Yeah.
1091
00:54:00.440 --> 00:54:02.960
And I think they did scans on, like, what happens
1092
00:54:02.980 --> 00:54:04.719
when you take, like, a narcotic and how it lights
1093
00:54:04.760 --> 00:54:06.639
up one piece of your brain and then sugar lighting
1094
00:54:06.679 --> 00:54:14.300
up the entire brain is, yeah, it's pretty shocking. I
1095
00:54:14.340 --> 00:54:16.860
was really surprised when I saw that. And then also
1096
00:54:16.900 --> 00:54:18.980
part of me was not surprised at all. And it's
1097
00:54:19.000 --> 00:54:19.480
in everything.
1098
00:54:19.989 --> 00:54:22.909
Yeah, I've definitely over the years until I developed a
1099
00:54:22.929 --> 00:54:25.159
healthier relationship with sugar. Now I don't do any refined
1100
00:54:25.199 --> 00:54:29.000
sugars like six days a week. But I was using
1101
00:54:29.079 --> 00:54:32.059
it as a drug easily. Oh, yeah. It sounds crazy
1102
00:54:32.099 --> 00:54:33.099
to say that because people are like, what do you
1103
00:54:33.119 --> 00:54:35.480
mean by that? I'm like, well, no, I'm using it
1104
00:54:35.519 --> 00:54:40.019
to sedate, numb, get through something difficult, relax your emotions,
1105
00:54:40.059 --> 00:54:43.400
whatever else it may be. And just because it's legal
1106
00:54:43.460 --> 00:54:45.280
doesn't mean it's, you know.
1107
00:54:45.480 --> 00:54:47.019
There's a lot of things right now that are legal
1108
00:54:47.059 --> 00:54:47.940
that maybe shouldn't be.
1109
00:54:48.389 --> 00:54:49.949
How long have you been writing this album for now?
1110
00:54:50.409 --> 00:54:53.429
I wrote a good portion of it during the depressive spell.
1111
00:54:53.820 --> 00:54:55.559
Some of it was being recorded right before I went
1112
00:54:55.599 --> 00:54:59.179
into ECT. So I had the idea for the cover
1113
00:54:59.739 --> 00:55:01.980
like a year and a half ago. It was a
1114
00:55:02.000 --> 00:55:04.760
long process. And then some of the stuff like got
1115
00:55:04.800 --> 00:55:11.170
re-recorded this year. And Stitch was written within a span of,
1116
00:55:11.690 --> 00:55:17.099
you know, 60 minutes 59 minutes while the new vocals
1117
00:55:17.159 --> 00:55:19.360
on Maker were being comped and it was very much
1118
00:55:19.420 --> 00:55:20.960
like oh let's try and squeeze this on the album
1119
00:55:20.980 --> 00:55:22.579
last minute and we did and we got it mixed
1120
00:55:22.619 --> 00:55:27.030
in time so yeah there's some of the songs are
1121
00:55:27.050 --> 00:55:29.190
two years old some of them are a few months
1122
00:55:29.269 --> 00:55:29.929
old What.
1123
00:55:29.849 --> 00:55:31.690
Was the most recent suicide attempt you had?
1124
00:55:32.090 --> 00:55:34.369
The most recent attempt was right before I got sober
1125
00:55:35.449 --> 00:55:40.389
but I did get very close to actually going for
1126
00:55:40.469 --> 00:55:43.699
it right before ACT Which was about a year and
1127
00:55:43.719 --> 00:55:45.400
a half ago. Yeah, somewhere around then.
1128
00:55:45.639 --> 00:55:48.380
Was that scary to be back there once you're sober?
1129
00:55:48.460 --> 00:55:49.820
It was scarier for the people around me.
1130
00:55:50.300 --> 00:55:50.570
Because?
1131
00:55:50.590 --> 00:55:53.329
It's a familiar place for me. But it's, I mean,
1132
00:55:53.389 --> 00:55:56.449
it's scary for the people around me. And I have
1133
00:55:56.489 --> 00:55:58.849
spoken to the people that were closest to me and,
1134
00:55:59.010 --> 00:56:00.610
you know, saw me the day that I almost did it.
1135
00:56:00.750 --> 00:56:07.170
And I definitely feel like there's trauma there. And it's
1136
00:56:07.250 --> 00:56:11.599
been a long but very rewarding journey. getting to to
1137
00:56:11.639 --> 00:56:14.239
where I'm at now and also with an understanding that
1138
00:56:14.719 --> 00:56:18.159
that may happen again there's no predicting you know it's
1139
00:56:18.340 --> 00:56:21.840
it's everything's temporary nothing lasts forever I think happiness is
1140
00:56:21.860 --> 00:56:24.239
temporary I think pain is temporary I think all like
1141
00:56:24.280 --> 00:56:28.119
sadness is temporary and so knowing that I may get
1142
00:56:28.199 --> 00:56:30.690
sad again and I may go through a dark time
1143
00:56:30.750 --> 00:56:35.130
again um hopefully will be bringing the information with me
1144
00:56:35.170 --> 00:56:38.429
this time of there is a way out you've done
1145
00:56:38.449 --> 00:56:41.050
it before you will do it again which I didn't
1146
00:56:41.190 --> 00:56:43.230
have with me the last time, really. Like I had
1147
00:56:43.690 --> 00:56:46.030
experienced depression for a lot of my life, but it
1148
00:56:46.070 --> 00:56:51.380
hadn't gotten that bad before. So I do have this
1149
00:56:51.480 --> 00:56:54.579
kind of new found understanding of kind of how to
1150
00:56:54.599 --> 00:56:58.519
get through it. And again, there's this piece of me
1151
00:56:58.539 --> 00:57:00.360
where it's just like, bring it on. If I got
1152
00:57:00.380 --> 00:57:01.820
to go through it again, I'll go through it again
1153
00:57:01.880 --> 00:57:03.610
because it's going to help someone.
1154
00:57:04.090 --> 00:57:06.090
So the familiarity is actually helpful now.
1155
00:57:06.469 --> 00:57:07.289
Almost, yeah.
1156
00:57:07.710 --> 00:57:09.849
I've been here before. Yeah. I know I can get
1157
00:57:09.869 --> 00:57:11.070
out of it. I know what to do. Yeah, I
1158
00:57:11.110 --> 00:57:12.820
know what to do. I know what my resources are,
1159
00:57:12.880 --> 00:57:17.739
my spiritual toolkit, my friends, my support system. Mm-hmm. It's
1160
00:57:17.780 --> 00:57:19.900
almost like when we do hard things in life, and
1161
00:57:19.940 --> 00:57:22.420
everyone's done hard things. Everyone who's alive and living today
1162
00:57:22.440 --> 00:57:25.079
has done hard things. Yeah. We just don't see them
1163
00:57:25.119 --> 00:57:27.329
as hard. We just see them as our life. Yeah.
1164
00:57:27.389 --> 00:57:28.670
And so we just think we've lived.
1165
00:57:28.789 --> 00:57:29.030
Mm-hmm.
1166
00:57:29.909 --> 00:57:32.030
And it's really helpful when you can actually look at
1167
00:57:32.050 --> 00:57:35.170
your life and realize, I can do hard things, and
1168
00:57:35.190 --> 00:57:37.920
I've done hard things. Mm-hmm. And remember those when new
1169
00:57:37.980 --> 00:57:40.760
hard moments come around because you actually feel a sense
1170
00:57:40.780 --> 00:57:43.309
of empowerment to think I've lived through this before. And
1171
00:57:43.329 --> 00:57:45.409
I think a lot of us don't give ourselves enough grace,
1172
00:57:45.469 --> 00:57:49.349
as you said, and give ourselves enough credit because we
1173
00:57:49.369 --> 00:57:51.050
just think, oh, that's my life. It wasn't that hard.
1174
00:57:51.070 --> 00:57:54.710
It was okay. Yeah. But recognizing those moments gives us
1175
00:57:54.769 --> 00:57:58.150
so much more fuel to push forward in tough times. Yeah.
1176
00:57:58.690 --> 00:58:03.710
What's giving you fuel and empowerment today? What's like, what's
1177
00:58:03.750 --> 00:58:08.579
propelling you forward? Especially now that you're on tour, the
1178
00:58:08.659 --> 00:58:09.679
album's coming out.
1179
00:58:10.219 --> 00:58:12.760
A lot of it is all these things that I've
1180
00:58:12.780 --> 00:58:19.719
been doing almost daily to maintain my happiness and maintain,
1181
00:58:19.960 --> 00:58:23.719
you know, being very intentional with everything is so rewarding
1182
00:58:23.780 --> 00:58:26.530
that those rewards are just like, oh, this is, I mean,
1183
00:58:26.590 --> 00:58:30.829
just keep going. But then obviously the music is so rewarding.
1184
00:58:30.889 --> 00:58:33.639
I'm on tour right now. Part of it is a
1185
00:58:34.050 --> 00:58:35.980
very small headlining tour. And then the other part is
1186
00:58:36.019 --> 00:58:39.039
I'm playing support for The Pretty Reckless, which is a
1187
00:58:39.059 --> 00:58:41.940
band I listened to in high school. And I'm also
1188
00:58:42.280 --> 00:58:45.219
playing songs from this album that I made for the
1189
00:58:45.239 --> 00:58:46.900
version of me that was in high school that would
1190
00:58:46.920 --> 00:58:50.730
have liked this stuff. She was very She loves the
1191
00:58:50.769 --> 00:58:54.170
Smashing Pumpkins and she loved Nirvana and she loves, you know,
1192
00:58:54.210 --> 00:58:56.429
this very 90s kind of thing. And I'm like, here's,
1193
00:58:56.769 --> 00:58:58.369
you know, I got to make this album for her
1194
00:58:58.510 --> 00:59:01.389
and anyone else that felt that way when they were
1195
00:59:01.949 --> 00:59:05.570
that age or even now. And there's something very nostalgic
1196
00:59:05.710 --> 00:59:07.650
about it all. And I mean, you use that word.
1197
00:59:07.670 --> 00:59:09.389
That's one of my favorite things, even like my.
1198
00:59:09.610 --> 00:59:10.360
I didn't even. know that.
1199
00:59:10.380 --> 00:59:12.760
Photography is a hobby of mine. And, you know, every
1200
00:59:12.940 --> 00:59:15.000
photographer kind of has their own thing. My best friend
1201
00:59:15.019 --> 00:59:17.380
is a phenomenal photographer. She shot the album cover art.
1202
00:59:17.400 --> 00:59:19.940
She shot all my promos. She shot the inside slip
1203
00:59:19.960 --> 00:59:23.010
for the vinyl. And her primary thing is more like
1204
00:59:23.050 --> 00:59:26.289
liminal space, kind of like back rooms. My thing is
1205
00:59:26.309 --> 00:59:31.670
more like nostalgia. And that's just... what feels good sonically,
1206
00:59:31.750 --> 00:59:34.630
what looks good visually, what just kind of resonates the
1207
00:59:34.670 --> 00:59:35.329
most with me.
1208
00:59:35.610 --> 00:59:37.170
Why was it so important to have ECT on the
1209
00:59:37.190 --> 00:59:38.449
front cover of the album?
1210
00:59:38.909 --> 00:59:42.190
Shock value. Literally. Yeah.
1211
00:59:42.550 --> 00:59:44.170
I don't know why I said, I mean, it felt
1212
00:59:44.210 --> 00:59:46.349
nostalgic when I listened to it and it was just,
1213
00:59:46.369 --> 00:59:48.329
I was like, I'm glad I shared that with you
1214
00:59:48.369 --> 00:59:49.989
because yeah, just, it was my initial, it was my
1215
00:59:50.010 --> 00:59:54.760
immediate experience of it. Paris, it's been such a, it's
1216
00:59:54.780 --> 00:59:57.219
been really refreshing talking to you. I feel like I
1217
00:59:57.260 --> 01:00:01.210
can tell that you're in the work Oh yeah. And
1218
01:00:01.250 --> 01:00:06.099
that's like really beautiful. It's such an endearing thing when
1219
01:00:06.159 --> 01:00:09.860
someone's able to talk about the work when they're in
1220
01:00:09.900 --> 01:00:12.079
the work as opposed to a before and after, which
1221
01:00:12.199 --> 01:00:14.539
is what we kind of try and present as a
1222
01:00:14.599 --> 01:00:17.920
Western standpoint of the work. I always feel, as you said,
1223
01:00:17.980 --> 01:00:20.420
that the work is cyclical and ascending.
1224
01:00:19.929 --> 01:00:22.489
And not linear. It never stops.
1225
01:00:22.630 --> 01:00:25.170
And so when I'm hearing you talk today, I feel
1226
01:00:25.190 --> 01:00:28.190
like you've like taken us into a moment when the
1227
01:00:28.250 --> 01:00:31.030
work is still churning and you are still processing. And
1228
01:00:31.070 --> 01:00:33.980
I find that to be a true act of courage
1229
01:00:34.000 --> 01:00:37.480
and vulnerability because it's easier to be on the other side,
1230
01:00:37.739 --> 01:00:40.179
so to speak, even though it doesn't really exist. And
1231
01:00:40.199 --> 01:00:41.579
be like, this is what I went through and this
1232
01:00:41.619 --> 01:00:43.820
is what I've learned. And it can sound kind of
1233
01:00:43.860 --> 01:00:51.130
romantic and poetic, but it doesn't necessarily always feel true. Yeah.
1234
01:00:51.590 --> 01:00:54.469
And also, I mean, it's like, did I get out
1235
01:00:54.550 --> 01:00:56.349
on the other side of what that was?
1236
01:00:56.369 --> 01:00:56.769
Yes. Yes.
1237
01:00:58.369 --> 01:01:01.650
And in order to stay there, I have to daily
1238
01:01:01.869 --> 01:01:05.289
implement things. I mean, it's the same thing with addiction.
1239
01:01:05.329 --> 01:01:09.750
It's kind of like this idea of daily reprieve and
1240
01:01:09.809 --> 01:01:12.050
not reprieve in the sense of relief, but reprieve in
1241
01:01:12.070 --> 01:01:14.579
the sense of like the postponing of one's execution date
1242
01:01:14.760 --> 01:01:17.320
of like daily, one day at a time, I am
1243
01:01:17.400 --> 01:01:20.199
doing the things that I know keep me good. Whether
1244
01:01:20.260 --> 01:01:22.599
that is my mental health, whether that is my drug addiction,
1245
01:01:22.639 --> 01:01:26.619
whether that is, you know, Being a good friend, being
1246
01:01:26.639 --> 01:01:29.340
a good family member, being a good sister. What are
1247
01:01:29.380 --> 01:01:31.119
the things that I can do daily that are going
1248
01:01:31.139 --> 01:01:33.360
to keep me good?
1249
01:01:33.539 --> 01:01:33.800
Yeah.
1250
01:01:34.260 --> 01:01:35.840
And I could say, yeah, I made it on the
1251
01:01:35.889 --> 01:01:37.610
other end. I can like chill out now. And then
1252
01:01:37.650 --> 01:01:43.210
I might go backwards. You know, cruising is, in physics,
1253
01:01:43.250 --> 01:01:44.690
it doesn't work. It means you're going downhill.
1254
01:01:44.929 --> 01:01:47.969
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, you're either growing or dying. Yeah. What's
1255
01:01:47.989 --> 01:01:49.949
the one thing you'd like people to know about addiction?
1256
01:01:50.369 --> 01:01:54.070
On a human level? if you don't share my beliefs
1257
01:01:54.150 --> 01:01:56.769
as far as like, oh yeah, we come down, we incarnate,
1258
01:01:56.789 --> 01:01:59.889
we've chosen these things. I chose my name, I chose
1259
01:01:59.929 --> 01:02:03.030
my parents, I chose my traumas, I chose my zodiac sign, whatever.
1260
01:02:03.789 --> 01:02:08.289
If that belief doesn't align with you, then I would say,
1261
01:02:09.489 --> 01:02:12.900
you know, that's not something people choose on a human level.
1262
01:02:13.420 --> 01:02:15.860
Like my soul chose this thing, but I didn't wake
1263
01:02:15.900 --> 01:02:17.739
up one day and be like, I'm going to be
1264
01:02:17.760 --> 01:02:20.360
a drug addict. And a lot of the things that,
1265
01:02:20.460 --> 01:02:23.119
you know, may not be the drug addict's fault, At
1266
01:02:23.159 --> 01:02:25.949
some point, it is that drug addict's responsibility to clean
1267
01:02:25.969 --> 01:02:28.329
up their mess, clean up their side of the street and,
1268
01:02:28.510 --> 01:02:29.610
you know, make amends.
1269
01:02:30.070 --> 01:02:31.190
Yeah, but it's not their fault.
1270
01:02:31.389 --> 01:02:36.010
It's kind of like a tornado kind of tearing through
1271
01:02:36.050 --> 01:02:40.489
a town. When the tornado finally stops, it's like you're
1272
01:02:40.510 --> 01:02:42.380
going outside and be like, oh, well, I don't see,
1273
01:02:42.519 --> 01:02:44.280
I don't see. You're looking at all the calamity and
1274
01:02:44.300 --> 01:02:46.960
you're like, well, I don't see any problems here. You know,
1275
01:02:47.039 --> 01:02:49.980
it's kind of like, clean it up. At some point,
1276
01:02:50.000 --> 01:02:53.630
there has to be, you know, responsibility taken. But faults,
1277
01:02:53.989 --> 01:02:55.590
I don't know. I don't know about that part.
1278
01:02:56.050 --> 01:02:57.349
And what's the one thing you'd like people to know
1279
01:02:57.369 --> 01:03:00.190
about sobriety that they might miss?
1280
01:03:00.929 --> 01:03:05.039
Both sobriety and healing are not linear. And it's a
1281
01:03:05.039 --> 01:03:05.500
day at a time.
1282
01:03:05.800 --> 01:03:07.780
Paris, is there anything I haven't asked you that you
1283
01:03:07.820 --> 01:03:08.239
wish I did?
1284
01:03:08.800 --> 01:03:10.400
No, but I want to say thank you for being
1285
01:03:10.960 --> 01:03:15.800
so respectful and safe. And this has been a really
1286
01:03:16.869 --> 01:03:20.130
special container. So thank you for facilitating that.
1287
01:03:20.630 --> 01:03:24.679
Of course. Thank you. We end every episode of On
1288
01:03:24.719 --> 01:03:27.300
Purpose with a final five. Okay. These questions have to
1289
01:03:27.340 --> 01:03:29.260
be answered in one sentence maximum.
1290
01:03:30.119 --> 01:03:30.480
Okay.
1291
01:03:30.559 --> 01:03:32.699
I'll probably get you to break it, but I try.
1292
01:03:32.820 --> 01:03:35.000
I try. I start there and then I get too curious.
1293
01:03:35.300 --> 01:03:36.119
Full send.
1294
01:03:36.300 --> 01:03:39.719
So Paris Jackson, these are your final five. The first
1295
01:03:39.739 --> 01:03:42.340
question is, what is the best advice you've ever heard
1296
01:03:42.409 --> 01:03:42.860
or received?
1297
01:03:43.409 --> 01:03:48.650
If there's going to be criticism and misunderstanding, regardless of
1298
01:03:48.710 --> 01:03:50.530
what you do and what you say and how you are,
1299
01:03:51.230 --> 01:03:52.670
then you might as well do what makes you happy.
1300
01:03:53.679 --> 01:03:54.820
As long as you're not causing harm.
1301
01:03:55.320 --> 01:03:58.320
Great answer. Question number two, what's the worst advice you've
1302
01:03:58.360 --> 01:03:59.090
ever heard or received?
1303
01:03:59.349 --> 01:04:00.110
Don't trust anyone.
1304
01:04:00.869 --> 01:04:01.690
Don't trust anyone?
1305
01:04:01.789 --> 01:04:03.369
That's the worst advice I've ever gotten.
1306
01:04:03.789 --> 01:04:04.150
Because?
1307
01:04:05.230 --> 01:04:09.730
Some of the most beautiful life experiences have come from
1308
01:04:10.329 --> 01:04:14.539
trust because trust fosters safety and intimacy and intimacy and
1309
01:04:14.579 --> 01:04:16.159
safety fosters healing.
1310
01:04:16.639 --> 01:04:20.179
I love that. Can't agree with you more. Such a need.
1311
01:04:20.699 --> 01:04:22.980
Question number three, how do you decide to trust someone?
1312
01:04:23.460 --> 01:04:24.400
Time and consistency.
1313
01:04:24.420 --> 01:04:26.010
It's the only way. Yeah.
1314
01:04:26.829 --> 01:04:28.329
You can listen to your intuition too.
1315
01:04:28.909 --> 01:04:32.269
Question number four. Tell me your most spiritual belief and
1316
01:04:32.289 --> 01:04:35.530
your most skeptical belief. Or take one belief and debate
1317
01:04:35.570 --> 01:04:36.269
them on both sides.
1318
01:04:36.690 --> 01:04:41.880
My most spiritual belief? Everything can be spiritual. The deepest,
1319
01:04:42.039 --> 01:04:45.559
most painful, I said this earlier, the most painful moments
1320
01:04:45.599 --> 01:04:50.050
of suffering in my life have been alchemized and once
1321
01:04:50.130 --> 01:04:56.079
alchemized become medicine. That's spiritual. That is a spiritual experience.
1322
01:04:56.139 --> 01:05:01.599
It hurts, and it's that heavy, hard-to-mulch energy, but it
1323
01:05:01.639 --> 01:05:05.739
becomes magic, you know? Am I least?
1324
01:05:06.559 --> 01:05:07.760
You're most skeptical at all.
1325
01:05:08.500 --> 01:05:09.079
Who's to say?
1326
01:05:09.099 --> 01:05:12.570
Fifth and final question, Paris. We ask this to every
1327
01:05:12.590 --> 01:05:14.730
guest who's ever been on the show. If you could
1328
01:05:14.750 --> 01:05:17.070
create one law that everyone in the world had to follow,
1329
01:05:17.090 --> 01:05:18.130
what would it be? Okay.
1330
01:05:18.150 --> 01:05:19.880
I have three of these. Oh, wow.
1331
01:05:19.889 --> 01:05:19.969
Okay.
1332
01:05:20.010 --> 01:05:20.880
Can I share all three?
1333
01:05:20.889 --> 01:05:22.139
People usually struggle with it. Yeah.
1334
01:05:22.159 --> 01:05:22.860
Can I share all three?
1335
01:05:22.880 --> 01:05:23.340
I'd love all three.
1336
01:05:23.360 --> 01:05:25.659
The first one is if you want to be a parent,
1337
01:05:25.679 --> 01:05:26.780
you have to apply for a license.
1338
01:05:27.320 --> 01:05:29.090
That is a brilliant law. I love that one.
1339
01:05:29.119 --> 01:05:29.539
Hot take.
1340
01:05:29.780 --> 01:05:29.940
Yeah.
1341
01:05:30.059 --> 01:05:33.940
Second one is I want there to be more regulation
1342
01:05:33.960 --> 01:05:37.239
on the poison they're spraying on organic produce.
1343
01:05:37.320 --> 01:05:37.539
Mm-hmm.
1344
01:05:38.510 --> 01:05:41.010
And the third one is I want to match the
1345
01:05:41.050 --> 01:05:43.170
laws that there are in other countries. There's other countries
1346
01:05:43.210 --> 01:05:45.389
that some of the chemicals we put in our food
1347
01:05:46.050 --> 01:05:49.650
are banned in other countries. I'm trying to match that.
1348
01:05:49.710 --> 01:05:51.610
And I have a bunch of opinions on the school system,
1349
01:05:51.670 --> 01:05:54.150
on the justice system, on, you know, rehabilitation. I have
1350
01:05:54.250 --> 01:05:55.070
so many views on that.
1351
01:05:56.050 --> 01:05:58.369
That's a different episode.
1352
01:05:58.550 --> 01:06:00.670
I will go for another hour, but yeah.
1353
01:06:00.969 --> 01:06:03.110
Those are three of the best laws we've ever had. Now,
1354
01:06:03.150 --> 01:06:05.400
anytime anyone ever asks, like, what did anyone else say?
1355
01:06:05.409 --> 01:06:07.789
I'll just name all three of yours. Those are brilliant.
1356
01:06:08.010 --> 01:06:10.650
Parash Jackson, I'm so excited for you. I'm excited for
1357
01:06:10.690 --> 01:06:12.409
everyone to listen to the happiest day of my life.
1358
01:06:12.869 --> 01:06:16.510
Hope it gives them that nostalgic, cathartic, healing feeling. Thank
1359
01:06:16.530 --> 01:06:18.630
you for the trust. Thank you for joining me on
1360
01:06:18.650 --> 01:06:21.630
my platform today and giving my audience an opportunity to
1361
01:06:21.670 --> 01:06:24.230
hear about your story and your own words and I
1362
01:06:24.309 --> 01:06:25.960
hope this is the first of many interactions we get
1363
01:06:26.000 --> 01:06:27.780
to have. So thank you so much.
1364
01:06:27.840 --> 01:06:28.309
Thank you, Jay.
1365
01:06:28.329 --> 01:06:29.150
Yeah, thank you.
