Podcasts about Andrew So

In this interview with Andrew Thomson, a Scottish seasoned professional in the energy sector, we delve into the multifaceted landscape of oil, renewable energy, and their global implications through a personal lens. Andrew shares his journey from working in the oil industry over 20 years to recently transitioning into nuclear and wind energy sectors. Through his experiences, he provides insights into the socioeconomic impact of oil, the challenges of transitioning to renewable energy, and the complexities of global politics that intertwine with the energy sector.Exploring Andrew's experiences working offshore in locations like Nigeria and Azerbaijan, the discussion uncovers the substantial influence of hydrocarbons and the cultural, socio-economic, and safety developments within the oil sector. The discussion delves into the critical role of energy across modern life, impacting everything from education to communication, while critiquing governmental actions on energy policies and advocating for a balanced energy strategy, similar to Japan's where currently works in setting up Wind Turbine Platforms (using much of the same technology as oil rigs). Furthermore, the dialogue highlights the philosophical and challenging practical shifts toward renewables, exploring political and economic challenges in this transition. Through Andrew's perspective, one can try to better attempt to begin to understand the global energy politics, the necessity of interdisciplinary approaches in energy careers, and the shifting dynamics in the energy sector.Time Stamps * 00:00 The Importance of Energy in Modern Life* 01:00 Introducing Andrew: From Oil to Climate-Friendly Energy* 01:46 Andrew's Background and Career Journey* 02:38 Life and Work in the Oil Industry* 07:34 Challenges and Dangers of Offshore Drilling* 10:54 The Culture and Lifestyle of Oil Workers* 20:58 Global Perspectives: Working in Africa and Beyond* 23:58 Corruption and Local Interactions in the Oil Industry* 38:09 A Costly Mistake and Cultural Reflections* 38:54 Corruption and Anti-Corruption Measures* 40:09 Cultural Differences and Acceptance* 41:13 Colonial Legacy and Historical Perspectives* 43:41 Nationalized vs. Private Oil Companies* 45:46 Transition to Renewable Energy in Japan* 46:12 Challenges in the Oil Industry* 48:22 Geopolitics and Energy Policies* 56:43 Experiences with Government Agencies* 01:03:56 Future Prospects and Peak Oil Debate* 01:08:06 Final Thoughts on Energy and PolicyHighlights and Quotes of Interest On Energy Source MixesJapan has a long term vision.It has a vision of a percentage mix of nuclear fossil fuels, renewables, whereas I feel like I'm fairly against it in my home country, in the UK, because we don't have a long term plan. We've had four prime ministers in the last two years. One of them wanted to build eight nuclear power stations, the next one to start fracking. I believe in an energy mix. I think there's a lot of irresponsibility talked about these days in terms of the energy transition. I do think there should be an energy mix.And then the one now wants to quadruple our offshore wind capacity in eight years, which is impossible. It's quite nonsensical. It's quite short term thinking. I'm not anti wind, I'm not pro oil, I'm not anti or pro any, anything. What I'm pro is a science based, long term, non subsidy, non corruption based market solution.On Incentives in Oil Vs “Renewables”So right now, it seems like oil is completely negative and then offshore wind is completely positive. You look at the motivations behind companies putting in offshore wind turbines or the service companies exactly the same as motivations behind all companies.Neither one is doing them. For anything other than to make money. And I think it's simplistic and a little bit silly to think that the boss of an oil company is some sort of J. R. Ewing, person that likes to run over puppies on the way home and the boss of an electricity company or a turbine installation company or whatever is some sort of, sandal wearing saint that doesn't care about money. Everyone in pretty much, I would say any corporation, that statistic about men are CEOs, they're psychopaths. All they care about is money. And I think there are a lot of like there's a lot of talk about subsidies in [renewables] On Oil's Beastly NatureIt only takes, one ignition source and then you're on top of a fireball…potential that the entire thing can blow up underneath your feet. On Life without Oil It's the world we have is impossible to have without oil. Sure. You can reduce it. It's going to run out eventually one day anyway.So reducing it is not a bad thing, but to pretend that you can just press stop and then you can put in a wind turbine is nonsensical. And the politicians know it's nonsensical as well.  The sheer scale of, Hydrocarbon involvement in our modern industrial life is so incredibly difficult to untangle. There's literally nothing more important than our energy because it ties into the availability of education and medicine and travel and communication. Right, without. some form of mass energy production. We're right back to the medieval ages.On The British State I speak from a very UK point of view because it's my country, it's my home. I feel As ever, the British state works against the British people, not for the British people, which is a contrast to some of the countries that we may look down our noses on a little bit more as not developed, where, and Japan is a great example of this, where Japan seems to do things for the benefit of Japanese people, which seems to be a controversial idea back home. Learning from Travel This is part of, traveling. You see so many countries where people are so proud of their country. Nigerians were some of the most proud people I think I've ever met, and it's the same in Japan. And I worry the direction our country's going, both the UK and the US, when we were raising a generation of children who are being taught to be embarrassed by where they come from. Though I really feel like in the West we've made a mistake over the years in trying to impose our way of looking at the world on other cultures.Post Interview Notes / Links from AndrewHere are some relevant links that might be of interest:"Empire of Dust", a fascinating documentary widely referenced online, but with no major release I don't think, that shows interaction between a Chinese contractor and locals in the DRC. It's a perfect example of culture clash, the strength in the documentary being there is no western-style narrative, it's simply two very different cultures interacting honestly with each other. The film-maker is Belgian which is particularly interesting given their colonial history in the DRC.Watch @ https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5gdfm4I can particularly recommend Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness if you're interested in the dark side of colonialism, or any history of DRC or Zaire as it was. One of my favourite films is Apocalypse Now, which along with the book perfectly makes the point I was trying to, which is how these cultures are manifestly different from ours, and any attempt to convert or run these societies in a western way will ultimately end up in failure, unless it's done by complete dominance, which of course, is wrong. It's a subject I find really interesting, and my experiences in Africa really changed how I view the world.On Energy Prices “Strike Prices” and Renewables Some links explaining the Strike Price for electricity set through the CfD (Contract for Difference) mechanism that guarantees a specific rate for electricity to renewables companies.https://www.iea.org/policies/5731-contract-for-difference-cfdhttps://www.eurelectric.org/in-detail/cfds_explainer/ It's quite hard to find a non-biased article explaining this, but the basic mechanism is:What isn't always mentioned is the "top-up" when the price falls is paid to the generators by the consumer, in the UK at least, in the form of a levy on the electricity price. Which is fine in theory to have a set electricity price, but currently the UK has the 3rd highest electricity costs in the world:https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/cost-of-electricity-by-countryOn British Embassy Support (Weapons:Yes / Hydrocarbons: No)UK government ending support for oil and gas sector abroad:https://www.gov.uk/government/news/pm-announces-the-uk-will-end-support-for-fossil-fuel-sector-overseasBut no issue promoting UK weapons manufacturers:https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/3/15/uk-spent-1-3m-on-security-for-worlds-biggest-weapons-fairSubsidies provided to the oil and gas industry in the US: (this can be complicated to assess because the IMF considers environmental and health costs after production as an effective subsidy, whereas the OECD and the IEA do not)https://www.eesi.org/papers/view/fact-sheet-fossil-fuel-subsidies-a-closer-look-at-tax-breaks-and-societal-costsCorrection on Refinery Capacity in NigeriaI was slightly mistaken, there is some refinery capacity in Nigeria, in fact it's the highest in all of Africa, however it is still around half of what Houston alone produces per day.https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13203-018-0211-zOn Oil Piracy / Theft (Discussed During Interview as Another Source for Danger / Volatility / Environmental Damage) Oil pipeline theft still seems to be a problem in Nigeria sadly:https://www.pipeline-journal.net/news/explosion-nigeria-oil-pipeline-kills-12-shell-blames-crude-oil-theft-tragedyOn Working in the Pubic SectorI was thinking about one of your last questions afterwards, whether I'd ever work for the government. You know, I would actually love it, to be able to make some type of positive impact, I'd really enjoy that much more than my current job, it's just that what I would advocate is so far in the opposite direction of the UK foreign office and civil service's ethos (non-judgmental promotion of UK interest and people without imposing change on other countries) that I wouldn't get the opportunity. The British sitcom "Yes Minister" captures perfectly how the UK establishment works, it's from the 80s but still very relevant. It works to ensure the continued existence of the establishment, not the general population.AI Machine Transcription - Enjoy the Glitches!Andrew: The sheer scale of, Hydrocarbon involvement in our modern industrial life is so incredibly difficult to untangle.There's literally nothing more important than our energy because it ties into the availability of education and medicine and travel and communication. Right, without. some form of mass energy production. We're right back to the medieval ages.Leafbox: Andrew, thanks so much for making time for me. I know you're a busy guy. Yeah, I really appreciate it. Actually, when I first met you, I was actually fascinated with your work because you're one of the few people I know who has jumped from the oil sector to a climate friendly energy sector, I call it, so I was very curious about your perspectives on both. Having, your wife told me that you lived in Baku and that alone, it is probably a book's worth of questions. Andrew, why don't we just start tell us who you are, where you are, what's the weather like in Fukuoka? And where are you from?Andrew: Well, the most important thing the seasons in Japan seem to follow rules like the rest of Japan. So it's got the memo recently that it's not summer anymore, which is great because summers here are pretty brutal. And it's cloudy and rainy, which from someone from Scotland is nice and familiar.Yeah, I guess be brief biography. I'm Scottish from the North of Scotland. This is usually the point where someone says, well, you don't sound Scottish, but that's because I was born down in England. But moved up Scott, two parents from very remote rural part of Scotland. And we moved up when I was about six.So I went to the local university Aberdeen which at the time was the oil capital of Europe. So with a passion for engineering and a desire to Just have adventure really as a young guy wanting to see the world. Also oil is always historically been very well paid. Probably along the lines of, I don't know, market wise, your career options, lawyer, doctor, that sort of thing, which was never really my interest in an oil worker.So anyway financial motivations, adventure motivations, just an interest in big, heavy engineering pushed me in that direction. I joined, graduated, I took a master's in offshore engineering graduated and joined Halliburton about six weeks before 9 11. So this was in the year of of Dick Cheney, of course then I eventually ended up working offshore.For a company that worked on drilling rigs, doing directional surveys, so you would run drilling tools down the well and that was quite life changing, really very exciting. A lot of. Pressure. This is all gonna make me sound very old, but pre smartphone days. So you were a lot more on your own in those days.I did that for four years. Then I ended up running operations in Lagos, Nigeria. Did that for three years, joined a Norwegian company, worked for them in Aberdeen, and then again, oil service. And ended up running their operations in Baku and Azerbaijan. Then COVID came along and like for a lot of people turned the world upside down.So with the low oil price ended up being made redundant and Really struggled for about a year or so to find work and then it wasn't ideological either one way or another in terms of the energy transition, it's quite heavily marketed these days but I'm not overly convinced that it's as easy as politicians seem to say it is but I took a job for a company drilling offshore foundations.And I was working on a nuclear power station, the cooling shafts for a nuclear power station. And then I simply got a job offer one day an online recruiter to come to Japan to work on offshore wind which has some, Close. It's basically the same things I was doing, except it was in nuclear.So yeah, none of it's been a straight line or a plan, but just the opportunity came up. We really wanted to have another period abroad. So we took the move and then I find myself on a beach speaking to yourself after about a year or so. Leafbox: So Andrew, going back to university time, exactly what did you study? Was this petroleum engineering? Or Andrew: It was no, it was mechanical engineering. But being in it was Robert Gordon university in Aberdeen, but being in Aberdeen, it was very heavily oil influenced at the time. I was actually. obsessed with cars and motorbikes, anything with an engine. So I really wanted to do automotive, but I didn't have the grades to go to a lot of the bigger universities down South.And I was 16 when I went to university and didn't really want to go too far. So I did mechanical. And then that led on to a degree in offshore engineering at the same university, which was completely oil focused. Leafbox: And then Andrew, can you tell me a little bit about the makeup of, the demographics of when you entered the oil industry and especially in Scotland and what were these offshore platforms like, you have engineers with high degrees and then what about the workers themselves?Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. So, your average rig is made up of a lot of different job functions. At the top or guess with the most responsibility. So you've got your company that own the rig. They're the drilling contractor and they have their personnel the guy that manages the rig, and then they have all different personnel, including all the deck crew and all the roughnecks raised about, but then you have the oil company that contracts them.And they have someone offshore running it, but they have a lot of engineers. And then you have all these like service companies, which is what I've worked for that come in and do things. So you typically have on the oil company sides. You'd have someone with, degrees, you'd have like their graduate programs, you'd have young people coming offshore, their first time offshore, but they'd be quite high up relatively.And then you would have your deck crew, mechanics, electricians, which typically weren't university educated. And the guys right at the very top who'd be like, Oh, I am like the rig manager generally, especially in the old days, wouldn't be university educated, but they would just have worked offshore for a very long time.So that they'd be very knowledgeable and skilled in what we're doing. A lot of them took degrees as, technology increased. And it became, more important to have a degree, but especially in the old days, although I think at that level in that job, people wouldn't have had degrees, but you do have, it is a big mix between like I said, your deck crew and the people that are more like the, engineers, geologists, et cetera.And I can't speak for every region, but you do find that you've got, so say the comparative salary or career prospects of a welder, or a mechanic or somewhere you've suddenly got someone who could earn, I don't know, in the U S but in the UK, maybe Twenty five twenty twenty five thousand pounds a year.Maybe, like three years ago in their offshore making like 60, and it's I think it's the same thing in the U. S. you have people from very poor areas that can go offshore and just, quadruple more there their salaries and it's a, But there's a reason why they're, there's a reason why they're getting paid that is because it's a lot more difficult and dangerous when you're away from home and stuff. It's a strange old mix in a lot of ways. Leafbox: And then can you describe for people just what the actual dangers are? Give people an image of what these platforms are like to be on them and how to build them and the complexity of these devices.Andrew: There's so you have there's a lot of different forms, but basically you have a drilling rig. which can be like a semi submersible which floats or a jack up which legs are like sitting on the ground or you could even have a ship that comes like, it all depends on the the depth of the water depth usually.So you'll have this vessel that drills a well and then eventually, so they'll drill a number of wells and then you'll have a platform which is fixed to the seabed usually and then that can that has like a. A wellhead that connects all the wells and then takes the hydrocarbons on board and then it might pump it to another bigger platform or it pumps it to some like somewhere where it's processed and then it's pumped on shore.There's different. There's common dangers. Everything from there've been a number of helicopter incidents over the years. Generally, a lot of these rigs are so far away that you'll take a, you'll take a chopper backwards and forwards. And it's been well documented of things like gearbox failures and stuff.You're probably one of the biggest, I don't have the HSC statistics in front of me, but one of the biggest injuries are probably slips, trips and falls. Because, your average drilling rig has maybe four or five levels to it, and you're up and down stairs all day with big boots on and a hard hat and glasses and stuff, and people tripping on themselves.Obviously drilling, you've got well you've got a lot of overhead lifts, a lot of people get injured with the fingers getting caught between loads roughnecks, raced abouts on the drill floor when they're handling drilling pipe. I've met a lot of people over the years that have got one or more fingers missing, because it's very easy to get your finger nipped between two things are being lifted, especially when people put their hands on to try and direct them.And then obviously the pressure of the hydrocarbons look at deep water horizon, for example the oil and the gas, It's funny listening to your podcast with Jed about oil being sentient that the pressure that the oil is under.So when you tap into, obviously it wants to go, it wants to go up and out. And then that could literally rip a rig apart if it's not if it's not controlled. And then obviously you've got the ignition risk, which, you've got Piper Alpha in the UK and you've got, like I say, Deepwater Horizon, there's been a number of rig explosions and then going back to what I said about platforms.So Piper Alpha was a platform and that was processing gas. So you have 100 and 170, 200 odd people working and living. on a structure offshore where there are like an enormous amount of gas that's being pumped. extracted and pumped like underneath their feet and it only takes, one ignition source and then you're on top of a fireball.And I remember being offshore when they're flaring, which is a process whereby they burn off excess gas and just being stunned by the ferocity of the noise, nevermind the heat of the, that it's just like a primal hour, you, you can stand a couple of hundred. Yards away from it and you can feel it on your face, it's just, it's very different.I've been offshore on a wind turbine installation vessel, which has the same offshore industrial risks in terms of lifted injuries, slips, trips, and falls and suspended loads. But you don't have that. You don't have that like potential that the entire thing can blow up underneath your feet.Leafbox: So with this danger and this kind of. wild beast underneath you. How did the men and women respond? You had in your email, a little bit of this kind of cowboy culture. I'm curious what the culture of these workers are like, and maybe in Scotland and what you've seen around the world. If these people aren't usually they're more working class or what's the relationship with them and the engineers and yeah, tell me about that.Andrew: It's it's a very, it's a very masculine environment. That's not to say that there aren't women offshore in the industry. There, there absolutely are. And there, there are more and more these days especially in certain countries, like in Scandinavia, for instance But it's a very, especially when you get down to the deck crew, it's a very, the recruits are very masculine, very like macho environment.It's quite a tough environment. It's a very hard working environment. The it's not that people I wouldn't say a matter of fact to say the opposite in terms of people having a cavalier attitude to safety. There have been a number of incidents over the years in the industry and each incident spurred along quite a lot of improvements in health and safety.So I'd say probably in terms of. Industry, it's probably one of the safest industries, well, it's probably one of the industries with the best safety attitude. I'm sure maybe nuclear is probably up there as well, but people are aware offshore of the risks. There's a huge QHSE industry.There's a, most companies have some form of a HSE system, which allows anyone from someone who works for the camp boss, like someone who changes the sheets, the cleaners, the cooks to like the driller can stop operations if they think that something is dangerous and there can't be any comeback, and stopping operations offshore is a big deal.Because the average. Rigorate is, it fluctuates, but the average is, I don't know, a few hundred thousand, I don't know what it is at the moment, but let's say up to maybe a half a million more for the biggest rates, biggest rigs per day. That's what, 20, 000 an hour. So if you see something that's dangerous and you stop it for a couple of hours that's a lot of money.So it takes a lot of nerve to do that, but the industry has been pretty good. They have these systems called stop cards. Like I say, Different companies have different names for it, but it gives the ability to It gives you authority for someone not to be forced into doing something that they think is dangerous.So overall, I actually think the health and safety culture is quite good. But if you look at Deepwater Horizon, that was a classic example of even at the corporate level, people being frightened to say no and frightened to halt operations. So that does still persist due to the sheer amount of money involved.Leafbox: And then tell me about in your email, you had a quote line about, these workers spending their money, maybe not as wisely. I'm curious to describe and understand the cowboy. I have this image, my father worked for Exxon for a long time. And his biggest problem was piracy. They had so much issues with piracy, but this was in the Caribbean. So it's just constantly people stealing oil from them. So maybe yeah, tell me how it is now after I guess 2000s, how it's changed. You're describing this very safe sounding MBA driven culture, but I have trouble.Yeah. Tell me what it's like around the world. Andrew: So that's the sort of the day to day attitude offshore, which is pushed very heavily by the oil companies. It's a lot of recording. They record lost time statistics which also not to get sidetracked, but that has a slightly negative effect as well in terms of if a rig has, say.That they'll, quite often rigs will have a big display when you arrive and it says this amount of days from the last accident and if they go like a year without any LTIs, everyone on the rig could get like an iPad or some sort of bonus or something and it's a big deal not to have incidents that cause a loss of time and that, by that if someone has to go to hospital, someone has to leave the rig, but that also does encourage it can encourage hiding of things, someone maybe, they've smashed their finger, but can they just maybe report it, but maybe just go on like light duties or something rather than go to the hospital before, before their shift change sort of thing which does happen and it's not healthy.But anyway, to get back to your point I think it comes from, as I say it's, a way for someone who would have no other avenue to earn the amount of money that they would get offshore by taking on the additional risk and being away from home. So say an electrician, your average construction electrician wages are probably pretty good these days, but if you take someone working in, some rural place in, in the States who is like a car mechanic or something, and then they go offshore And they're multiplying their salary, but they're multiplying their salary, perhaps coming from an environment where no one's ever had that type of money.They're coming home with maybe try to think of some people I've known, hundreds of thousands of dollars a year when their salary may have been I don't know, sub six figures, but they don't come from an environment where that sort of money is common. So you then have a situation whereby they are the one person in their family or town or their local bar.who has loads of money, who's been away from home for four weeks, but he doesn't have the most stable relationship precisely because they're not at home, but yet they've got loads of money and loads of time. You can see how that can encourage perhaps resentment. Or just a feeling of alienation from that community.That sort of person, say they have a lot more money than their friends, maybe they want to buy them drinks, but then do they want to have to do that all the time? I've known people that have been divorced multiple times, that have bought boats and all sorts of things that they never use and they end up with, paying for There are families that they never see, the families that get remarried, the kids that they never see.I've worked with directional drillers that I've got a wife in one country, an ex wife in another country, kids that don't like them, and they just pay for all these families. They get onshore and then they spend the next couple of weeks with some, teenage prostitute blowing all the money on that drink for the rest of the month and then they're back offshore.the shakes and then they decompress over the month and then the cycle repeats itself. So in the one sense, it's a fantastic opportunity for social mobility, but it also can leave a lot of chaos behind it. And I'm certainly not at all. And having come from a work class background myself, I'm not certainly saying that.It shouldn't be there. I think it's a positive thing and it's up to these people what they want to do with their money. I'm just saying it's an interest in social observance that it's, you don't get that many working class people that can leave school and have a manual trade and can go and be a lawyer or a doctor or a CEO but you are all of a sudden getting these people in situations who are making the same amount of money, but without the family structure.Or the societal structure that can prepare them for that.Leafbox: Jumping to the next topic, I'm curious, you first mentioned Dick Cheney, what was your relationship, you're in Scotland, and how does that fiddle in with the Middle East? oil wars and just the general kind of, I feel like when my father worked in oil, there wasn't that much of a hostility in the general environment.It was just people drove cars and you worked in the oil industry and it wasn't that. So in post 2000, I would say things change both from the climate perspective and then from the kind of American imperialist association with oil. Andrew: It's changed massively in terms of hostility. Just, it's just like night and day. So when I graduated, I remember being at school in the early nineties and there was, I don't think it was climate, no, no global warming. It was called then. So there was discussion of it.But the greenhouse the ozone layer was the big deal. And there was environmentalism, Greenpeace was quite big at that time. But. The, there was no stigma like whatsoever into going into the oil industry. And you could see that in terms of the courses at the time they were called there was like drilling engineering courses, offshore engineering courses petroleum engineering.You go back to the same universities now and it's like energy transition. I think you'll struggle to find that many courses that have got the words petroleum or drilling in it. And also it was very easy to get a job in those days in the industry. The, yeah the Gulf War, so the second Gulf War at the time working for Halliburton, I was very conscious of, it was very interesting to me how the company was structured.So you had Halliburton Energy Services and you had KBR, Kellogg, Brennan, Root, and they were the company that won the uncontested contract to rebuild in Iraq. But the way the company was structured. Was that they were that they were split up basically. So if one of them had gone down the toilet for any of these issues, they were separated.I was very happy to join Haliburton. It was a big career wise. I thought it was very good. I look back now, it's funny how I look back, like inside, I look back on that whole Iraq war with absolute horror now, but I had grown up with Free internet with, what at the time were considered authoritative news sources with the BBC and British newspapers.It might sound naive, but you believe that people are doing the right thing. And I just thought at the time that, that, we were going into Iraq because it was a very bad person there. And I look back now, with I look at Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld and all the things that have happened with absolute horror.But at the time it just seemed quite straightforward. My, my view on the oil industry hasn't changed in terms of, I, I believe in an energy mix. I think there's a lot of irresponsibility talked about these days in terms of the energy transition. I do think there should be an energy mix.I don't think it should be any one source of energy. But I feel like we're in the same position that we're in before except instead of it being everyone's desperate to make money out of oil. I think everyone's desperate to make money out of renewables these days. Leafbox: Well, before we jump to that point, I want to I think that's a big topic we'll go to, but tell me about your jump to Nigeria.You're still naive then, or eager help, Nigerian oil industry or what you get assigned to Nigeria. What's that like? Andrew: Well, so I so that four years of us, so the three years I worked for that company originally was on it was on an ad hoc basis. So basically I would be at home. I'd get a phone call.And I could, I had to live within 45 minutes of the airport but I usually got at least a day. Sometimes it wasn't, it will, it was literally a day. Sometimes it was like a week, but I would get a call and then I could go anywhere in a region was Europe, Africa, Caspian. So I could go anywhere.Most of it was in West Africa. So I would go and work offshore in the Congo. Not the DRC, but the Republic of Congo Gabon, Nigeria, but all over Europe and occasionally like the Far East. So I had a lot of experience of Africa at that point. My very first, one thing I did want to, I was thinking the other day, one thing I did want to mention was when I first went, in terms of naivety, when I first time I ever went to Africa was in the Congo.And I'd grown up in the eighties where we had Live Aid was basically anyone's kind of opinion of Africa. And I remember at school we used to be forced to sing Do They Know It's Christmas, like every Christmas. So that was everyone's opinion of Africa was like just basically starving children. And I arrived in the Congo.They've got quite a decent airport now in Point Noir, but when I arrived it was literally a concrete shed with arrivals on one side and departures on the other and just like sand on the ground. And I can't remember coming out of that totally by myself just with my Nokia phone with the local contacts phone number and all these little kids appeared like Tugging it, tugging at my trousers asking for money and I was absolutely horrified I'd never seen like poverty like that and I felt horrible that I couldn't help them.But it's funny how You not that I don't care about children, but you harden yourself to what the reality of life is like in places like that. And I did that for three years. I was in Angola rotating for a year. In Cabinda, which is a chevron camp. And then I I got the job in Nigeria.And actually my father passed away just before I got that job. So I was a bit rudderless at that point. I really enjoyed it got to me in the end, I was there for three years and I started to get very frustrated when I was at home, that's when I thought I need to make a change.But there's a sort of happy level of chaos, I found. It's. in Nigeria, where things are, they don't work in the sense that they would do in, in, in what you'd call, developed countries. You can't rely on things to work. You can't really rely on people in a certain sense, but there's a sort of happy, it's difficult to explain.Like it's just, It's a very chaotic place, a very noisy, chaotic place. But once you accept that it's quite a good laugh actually. I have some quite happy memories from working there. Leafbox: So Andrew, when you enter in these places you first described your kind of exposure to Congo, but how do you conceptualize the interaction between the Western oil companies and I guess the local developing country?Do you think about that? Or are all the workers local? Or is everyone imported from all over the world? And Andrew: There's a big move towards localization in pretty much any location I've been which is, which has changed over the years. So when I first started working say in Africa, as an example.Pretty much all of the deck crew, all of the roughnecks were all Africans or locals from whichever ever country you're in. But once you got to the upper levels, like the Western oil companies, you would have, so you'd have like drill engineers, which weren't. You might describe them as like project managers of the drilling operations.So there you would have kind of a mix of locals and expats, but you pretty much always find once you went above that to like drilling managers. You'd find all what they call company men, which are the company's representative offshore, pretty much always expats. That has changed over the years, which I think is a very positive thing.A lot of countries, Azerbaijan's like this, a lot of countries in Africa, Nigeria is like this. They put within the contracts, like a local content. So for a company to win the license and which is then cascaded down to the subcontractors, you have to have a percentage of local employees and you have to have a system for replacing your senior people, training up locals and replacing them over time, which I think is very positive because after all, it's there.Oil is their resources. There are in certain locations with certain companies, a pretty bad history. Shell Nigeria, for example. You can your listeners can look all this up, but there have been, various controversies over the years on the whole, I think on the whole, I think.that it's a positive for these countries because I look at it in terms of a capitalist sort of capitalist approach that, you know and it's almost like the thing that I was saying where you have like someone who comes from a family or a class where they are not exposed to money and all of a sudden they have a huge amount of money where you could say the same thing with some tiny country where by a that they've had a level of civilization and a level of like income over the years and all of a sudden someone discovers oil and there's no way you can reasonably expect a society to just, you can't take somewhere that goes from like tribal pre industrial revolution conditions and make it New York City overnight.It's just, it's not going to happen. And just expanding that slightly, I was in Papua New Guinea in the eastern part And up in the highlands on a well site a while ago. And that was fascinating because Papua New Guinea is still, it's a country, but it's still very tribal. So once you leave Port Moresby you're really, it's not like you're going to call the police if someone tries to assault you or call an ambulance or something.It's very much like I say, pre industrial revolution, tribal. societies, but they're sitting on billions of dollars of gas. So you get these little pockets of on the shore drilling rigs. And they're just pumping millions and billions of dollars worth of gas out from under your feet, but they pay the locals.And the site that I was on right at the top of the hill overlooking it was a big mansion owned by the who, as soon as he started drilling, he would get 10 million. And then, as I was informed, would probably disappear down to Australia and, enrich the local casinos and stuff. But, who is to say that is, would it be great if he built a hospital and built a school and improved the lives of everyone around him?Oh, of course it would. But who's to say morally that we Chevron should be, I understand the point that maybe Chevron should be building these things, but who is to say that the condition should be attached to what that chief spends his money on. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I I think I place a lot of responsibility on hydrocarbons are located.I do think there have been a lot of very negative practices by By all companies over the years, and they absolutely have a duty to maintain the environment. But I think it's a bit hypocritical. I see a lot of rich Western countries, especially now saying to a lot of poorer, undeveloped countries that they shouldn't be drilling or they shouldn't be, should be using the money differently.And I think, well, it's their resource. I look at it more from a capitalist point of view, rather than, like I said in my email, I'm quite anti interventionist in that sense. So historically I'm going to, this continues now, but there have been issues with literally, so they put these big pipelines through people's villages and the way that a lot of these things are organized is like I said, about Papua New Guinea they'll contact, the tribal chief and we'll pay a rent or some sort of fee to, to put these big pipelines through, through these small places.But there are some times when, I haven't, I, the right tribal chief or they've not paid enough or there's some sort of dispute and you will get villagers literally drilling into these oil pipelines with drills and buckets to steal the oil. And of course someone's doing it and they're smoking or there's some sort of ignition source and the whole thing erupts and, the village is burnt and it's a horrible, tragedy but it's just it's a funny, again, it goes back to the theory of what I was saying, the juxtaposition of that very valuable resource with a very, with a civilization, with a community, probably better way of putting it, who has never had access to that amount of money.So you're literally pumping these, this thing through their village that is worth more money than they'll ever see in their lifetime. And obviously the temptation to try to take some of that. is there, almost like understandably, but then again it quite often results in a lot of death and destruction.So that's yeah, it's just it's part of the whole industry in a lot of ways. And other industries, when you look at things like lithium mining and diamonds and stuff, you have a very high value resource That has been, by pure chance, located in a very poor part of the world and it results in these tragedies sometimes.Leafbox: I was going to ask you about the processing of oil. So when export the raw crude. Mostly the oils and process somewhere else. You were, you're taking the oil from Nigeria. Like Venezuela, they have to ship it all to Houston or whatnot to get turned into different solvents and gasoline. And, Andrew: This is probably when I'll need some fact checking, but my recollection of the time in Nigeria was that they weren't processing the oil on shore.I stand corrected if that's wrong, but my understanding was that they weren't, or at least there wasn't very many refineries, so it was basically all, like you said, extracted and then sent abroad. To be refined. That's certainly the situation in in Papua New Guinea. A lot of it is turned an LPG there and then shipped abroad.I guess I would guess, I would assume that would be the situation in a lot of West African countries for a lot of reasons, you have an established. Supply chain, you have established skill set in other places, then it comes down to cost and then you have the security of, you can imagine the enormous amount of investment you would need in a refinery.And would you rather do that in a place that's had a history of civil war, or would you take the cost to ship it abroad and do it somewhere else, Leafbox: no, it's understandable. I think that's important for listeners to understand that. The refinery in Louisiana or whatnot, or, it's so massive, it's billions of dollars and it's such a dangerous place to work also. Right. Those are just like literally atomic bomb sized potential energy. Andrew: The one thing that, there's always been, say in Scotland, there's been a little bit of resentment towards, Aberdeen and they're all like rich up there from other places in Scotland, but I think that there is, people are aware of Deepwater Horizon and Piper Alpha, et cetera, but I do think that there has been an underappreciation of the, just the Crazy risks that are involved when you're working offshore and handling hydrocarbons.Like I said, you take a helicopter to work with all the risks that I had in, in tails, and then you spend a month or so working on top of something that is effectively, a bomb if if things aren't handled properly. And you're, how far away are you from like emergency services?There are supply vessels and stuff, but. It's very much an environment where you have to just be very careful and very aware of dangers, which I think the industry now has got very good at. But yeah, the wages are high, but they're high for a reason. It's not it's not an easy, it's not an easy job in terms of that.And like I alluded to before, in terms of family stability, working away and coming back is not really conducive quite often to, to a healthy home life.Leafbox: Going back to Angola for a second I read an account of the Chinese are very heavily in Luanda and Angola, and they had the terrible civil war.But one of the things that really stood out to me is that all the Chinese use Chinese labor. So their oil boats are all Chinese workers and they often use ex felons, which I thought was interesting. But there's, I guess they, all these ex felons in Angola, I don't know if you saw this, I wanted to confirm it, but there's a lot of half Chinese, half Angolan children now because all the Chinese roughnecks.They're all men. So there's a booming Angolan prostitution and it just was so wild. Angola think Luanda is the most expensive city in the world. But then the most violent too, so yeah, just what's your general impressionAndrew: I I've been in Luanda in total, probably just a couple of days.Most of my time was spent in a, so Chevron Texco have this place called Cabinda. Which is actually, technically speaking, if you look at the map, it's not actually connected to Angola, you've got Angola, then you've got a little gap, and then you've got Cabinda, which is the little gap is part of the DRC, I think but Cabinda is where all the onshore processing of the oil is.It's part of Angola and it's like a prisoner of war camp and you go up there and you can't leave pretty much until you've finished your work. But my impression of Lulanda wasn't great at all. I remember driving into it and there's these massive shanty towns on the edge of the city with just like literal rubbish tipped down the side of these hills.And then you get into the city and it's just a. massive continual traffic jam with Porsche Cayennes and Range Rovers and G Wagons. And it just felt in the way that I was describing Lagos and even Port Harcourt, which has a pretty bad reputation as a sort of, chaotic, but fun sort of chaos.I felt and this is just my personal impression, I felt Lwanda was chaos, but dangerous chaos. Not you wouldn't stay in a staff house there and you wouldn't go out for a drink anyway. You wouldn't even really go out for lunch much. You just stayed in. It looked to me like as if you'd taken a European city, which I guess it, that's how it was built.And then you just start maintaining it from like 1960s onwards, but then you'd add it in a civil war and I appreciate the civil war was like a proxy civil war and then just didn't repair any infrastructure and just peppered the whole place with like bullet holes.It wasn't, it was not particularly, it's not a place that I would recommend to be quite honest with you. In terms of the Middle East, the comparison with the Middle East I've not really worked that much in the Middle East, to be quite honest with you. I guess my closest is the Caspian, which is more Central Asia, but that was way more structured.Yes, there's massive amounts of corruption, massive amounts of poverty. But yeah, absolutely more structured and less chaotic in that sense. Leafbox: Andrew, what's the relationship in Nigeria, there's famous activists who, like the Shell, they polluted so heavily, but then I guess the military tribunals would erase or disappear people.Maybe this is before you worked there, but what, as, what was the relationship of the company men with the government? Was there open kind of corruption or? What was your general vibe of is the manager's job and kind of getting these contracts. Talk to me about that. Like Deanna, how did the, you know, Exxon versus Armco or whatever it is, whoever's ever getting these contracts, there's obviously backdoor dealings.Andrew: Yeah, in terms of, actual drilling licenses I was never near or even remotely near the people that will be making those sort of decisions. And I'm certainly not going to allege corruption at that level. And I don't have any evidence, but what I would say, and again, all of this is just my personal opinion.It's, I'm not disparaging any one particular place in general, but the level of corruption. that I would see was so endemic that I just came to feel it was cultural which again, it's not really don't want to make that sound like it's a slight, to me it was an understanding of I really feel, and just briefly going back to the whole Bob Geldof Live Aid thing, I really feel like in the West we've made a mistake over the years in trying to impose our way of looking at the world on other cultures.And what I would see in most West African countries was it was just an accepted way Of living, accepted way of dealing. So you would go to the airport. We used to have these boxes that would have electronic equipment in them. And we had to hand carry them cause they were quite fragile.And then you would go to the check in desk and they would be like okay, well we have to get some stairs to lift this into the plane. So that's an extra 50. I'm not sure you actually own this equipment. It's got another company written on it. You give me a hundred dollars.Sometimes it's not quite said, you'll just get so much hassle and you'd see other, you'd see some people there that would freak out in case thinking that they were gonna, arrested or something. They just open their wallet and hand over loads of money. The, but it's not it's not like some under the table nefarious plot it's just like the checking guy is getting paid next to nothing He sees someone who's obviously got all my money and he has How can I get that money off him and it's at every single level my I mean I suppose I would say I was wise to it, but even I would make naive mistakes.I remember on a leaving day when I left Nigeria I had this driver who I'd still consider a friend. I messaged him on Facebook sometimes, and he was a really nice young guy who would go out of his, literally out of his way to help me. And I made the silly mistake of handing in my bank card on my like, leaving due.I'd had a little bit to drink and I just thought, surely it'll be fine. And of course I get back to the UK, I check my statement and there's a couple of hundred dollars missing or a hundred pounds missing. At the time I was like, that must be a bank error, surely not. But I look back in it now and I just think, again, this isn't, this honestly isn't even a criticism, it's just the culture is to try and hustle.And if you, if it doesn't work, well, I tried. It's just, it's endemic in that sense. I don't doubt that there most likely have been over the years some very shady practices on the behalf of Western oil companies and Western governments. You only have to look at the history of, BP and the UK government and Americans in Iran and coups to get oil and all these sorts of things.But I'm just talking about like the corruption that I've seen, it seemed, Cultural in that sense. It's just everywhere. The one thing that I would say is that companies I've worked for within the contracts is very heavy anti corruption. So the FCPA, if I'm remembering that right, in the US. The anti corruption laws are very strong to the point where if a company official from a country, say like Scotland, is a manager and he signs off on a bribery expense, he can actually, if I'm right in recalling this, he can end up going to jail himself for that.So a hundred percent, I'm sure it's happening by at the same time legally, there are some very strict laws against it. Leafbox: When they just outsource to local sub providers, that's what I would imagine they do to get around that. Andrew: I think it's a case of well, just don't tell me sort of thing.Leafbox: Yeah. Andrew: I'm pretty sure that, that's why. Well, Leafbox: I think people don't understand if you haven't been to these countries, it's just it's just not Norway. It's not. Yeah. It's a very different. Yeah. Andrew: And. I, sorry to interrupt you, but I've done quite a bit of work in Norway and I have found that some countries and some cultures seem to have a difficulty accepting that the world isn't the way that they are.And I think that that, not to, not to boast or to my trumpet here, but I think that one thing that I've learned over the years is that some places they just are the way they are. And it's, of course you don't want to encourage. Corruption, you don't want to encourage mistreatment, but I don't believe it's your right.Like I'm like, I live in Japan now and some things, a lot of things about Japan I absolutely love, but there are also some things about Japan that just don't seem right to me. But it's not my place to come in and say, right, you're doing this wrong. You should be doing this the other way. It just isn't, it's not my country.And I felt the same way in Africa. There's loads of things about Nigeria that I was like, this is absolute madness. But it's their madness, it's not my madness, and I'm a guest in their country. Leafbox: What do you think the difference, in your email to me, you wrote about the colonial being British, how's that relationship been for you?You've, non interventionist now, but you wrote about, your forefathers or previous generations having quote, good intentions. Maybe tell me about that. Andrew: I think that I know that there's a lot in the UK as with America now that's quite, there's a lot of attempt to be revisionist within history and question history, which I'm a big fan of people questioning history.I just think once again, that we are tending to look at things from a very Western point of view without taking into account like global history. I know believe, through my experience of traveling, I now think, well, exactly like what I just said, I don't think it's our place to change countries to mold them in our ways, but I do have a more charitable view of a lot of our maybe not every one of them, certainly not every country's colonial adventures, but I do think that some of them were more motivated by, as I said, a Christian desire to end certain barbaric practices.If you look at, the I forget what the practice is called, but the practice of people burning their their wives on the husband's funeral pyre in India and the whole slavery, which, yes, Britain was a part of but it's quite clear that, the British Navy was very important, effective in, in, in ending the global slave trade.So I'm very proud of where I come from and I'm proud of my ancestors. I don't deny that They were put that they, there weren't some, as I said, some negative aspects and atrocities, but I just think that again, when it comes to, and I think about this more because I have kids now.So I think about how I want them to feel about the country going forward. This is part of, traveling. You see so many countries where people are so proud of their country. Nigerians were some of the most proud people I think I've ever met, and it's the same in Japan. And I worry the direction our country's going, both the UK and the US, when we were raising a generation of children who are being taught to be embarrassed by where they come from.Leafbox: Going back to oil for a second, Andrew, the colonial legacy is impossible to digest in a short interview, but do you have, what's the general like Pemex or the Venezuelan oil companies or the Russian oil companies? What's your general impression of nationalized oil companies versus the private?Andrew: Yeah. I so I guess my biggest experience is in Azerbaijan, there's a company called Soka which is the national oil company. And of course all these national oil companies, a lot of them have shares in international like private oil companies.So it's not always a clear divide of either one or the other, but I guess I, as someone who really. believes in capitalism. I think that in terms of efficiency and certainly in terms of safety, in terms of environmental compliance, I think that the private oil companies are much more answerable to activism, to just a sense of corporate responsibility than private oil companies.And if you're in somewhere like Russia, like you say, Venezuela and the national oil companies is polluting the water. Well, What are you going to do about compared to a private oil company who has, a much more, it has shareholders and I guess more of a global footprint. But I also come back to the point, as I was saying about localization that these resources are the country's resources and I think it's quite right that companies pay.I wouldn't say prohibitive amounts of tax, but I think it's quite right that companies pay a lot of money in tax when they extract the hydrocarbons, and they have local content. I guess the ideal for me is private, but with a level of public ownership. But not actually running the operations because I think as soon as you take away, as soon as you take away that meritocracy, you end up with health and safety risks, you end up with just waste, and when it comes to something like with the large amounts of money involved That just ends up taking money away from the actual people.I don't think it's, I don't think it's generally a great idea, but I think a sort of public, a bit like you see a lot here in Japan actually, a public private mix, if done properly, is probably the way to go for a lot of utilities. Leafbox: Great. So Andrew, maybe it's time to jump to the oil and energy diverse mix.Tell me about what brings you to Japan. First, you work on nuclear and now wind. Andrew: Yeah. For me, I can't claim any sort of high minded high minded drive to change from one industry to the other. It was purely, I had a mortgage and a new baby and I desperately needed a job. So that was how I made that jump.The one thing I have experienced over the years, it's certainly the place I've worked. It's very, Unless you're in a region that has like a national oil company, it's even then I guess depends who you are. It's very meritocratic, but it's quite cutthroat. So oil companies, service companies, as soon as oil price drops, it's very cyclical.People just get made redundant. People, I saw people at Halliburton had been there for literally 40, 50 years being made redundant just because the share price dropped a few points. I've been made redundant twice myself. And yeah, it's just horrible. And there's nothing you can do about it because it's an economic decision.It's nothing to do with your performance. And that happens to, it's probably very few people on the street that hasn't happened to It's the downside of the high salary really. So coming into wind it was really an opportunity to, as I say, we wanted to live abroad again for a little while.And opportunities to live in Japan don't come by very often. And it's interesting. It's interesting. It's very different. It's interesting from an engineering point of view. It's a lot of heavy lifts. And Japan, I think Japan has a good attitude towards offshore wind, because everything else, Japan has a long term vision.It has a vision of a percentage mix of nuclear fossil fuels, renewables, whereas I feel like I'm fairly against it in my home country, in the UK, because we don't have a long term plan. We've had four prime ministers in the last two years. One of them wanted to build eight nuclear power stations, the next one to start fracking.And then the one now wants to quadruple our offshore wind capacity in eight years, which is impossible. It's quite nonsensical. It's quite short term thinking. I'm not anti wind, I'm not pro oil, I'm not anti or pro any, anything. What I'm pro is a science based, long term, non subsidy, non corruption based market solution.Obviously you've got environmental aspect of climate change, et cetera, which needs to be taken into account. But I found, I find a lot of the attitude towards renewables and towards the energy mix quite histrionic and not really based on facts. Leafbox: Do you ever think about, geopolitics as an engineer in terms of, where these pressures are coming from.Europe particularly seems so against oil and hydrocarbons, but if you do any scientific research, you just, there's the capacity of hydrocarbons to produce energy is just unparalleled in terms of the input to output. And wind is just not a realistic option. Andrew: I think that, I think there's a general I would say it's a mistake, but I think it's done on purpose, but there's a general attitude that seems to be portrayed in the media that you can have one company or one industry is virtuous and everything they do is virtuous and there are no negative connotations or motivations behind what they're doing.And then the other is just all negative. So right now, it seems like oil is completely negative and then offshore wind is completely positive. You look at the motivations behind companies putting in offshore wind turbines or the service companies exactly the same as motivations behind all companies.Neither one is doing them. For anything other than to make money. And I think it's simplistic and a little bit silly to think that the boss of an oil company is some sort of J. R. Ewing, person that likes to run over puppies on the way home and the boss of an electricity company or a turbine installation company or whatever.is some sort of, sandal wearing saint that doesn't care about money. Everyone in pretty much, I would say any corporation, that statistic about men are CEOs, they're psychopaths. All they care about is money. And I think there are a lot of like there's a lot of talk about subsidies.You just touched on it, I think. And people talk about subsidies and oil when they're talking about subsidies and oil, what they're talking about is the The fact that when you drill an oil well, which can be anything between, I don't know, 30 and like upwards of 100 million, you basically get to claim that back off the tax.Now the tax in the UK is, it was about 75 percent on the oil that they extract and profit from the oil they extract. But if you have that say 100 million cost, how many companies can drill three or four wells at 100 That you're going to get anything out of that. Very few companies can afford to take that risk.I don't think it's a bit rich to call that a subsidy when you've got the whole CFD process for offshore wind, which effectively guarantees the strike price of electricity. So you imagine if you had that for oil, you would have, You would have countries buying oil off the oil companies when the price dropped, and they don't have that, they don't have that, that, that mechanism, but you simply wouldn't get offshore winds without a decent strike price, which you've seen recently in the auctions when no one bid on the licenses in the UK, and I think it was the US as well.Leafbox: So in essence you prefer just like a free market, totally. Not a totally free market, but in the sense that a clear transparent market. So if that really incentivized the right incentives, like you're saying in Japan, they have that mix of nuclear and hydrocarbon and wind and solar. And in Japan, I always feel like they're just burning trash.That's their real power generation. Andrew: It's funny that it's such a funny place in so many ways, but you've got this island, which has, a lot of geothermal resources. But in terms of mineral resources, it's not in a great position yet. It manages to be so incredibly self sufficient in terms of industry, in terms of fuel price.Like they, they said to me when I arrived here, Oh God, it's so expensive electricity. It's like about 60 to, to a month for the electricity in your house. And it's a four bed house with five air cons on 24 seven. I'm like, geez, you just see the price UK. You'd be like, 10 times almost. So they managed to make it work, but like everything else here, like I said, it's a long term, long thought process.And Obviously, I guess we haven't really talked about it, and I'm not, I don't feel qualified even to talk about it at all, to be honest with you, but in terms of climate change, I am very much meritocratic and capitalist in that sense that I think the market will identify the most efficient.way of providing energy, but I completely accept that there needs to be a level of environmental regulation because going back to what I said, CEOs, I think of any company would do anything if it made them money. And I've seen, I saw this in Azerbaijan. You go out, you're back, he's an absolutely beautiful city, but if you look back through its history of being part of the Soviet Union, the level of just pollution was unreal and it still suffers from a lot of that, especially out with the main city. So I 100 percent agree with environmental regulations. I think that, I think there's a lot of politics behind climate change. I'm quite skeptical of international NGO organizations, especially with the last few years that we've had.But I think that the yeah, I think that Japan's got it right. I think we need a mix and we need to not. Pretend like we are doing in the UK at the moment that for instance, the electricity price in the UK is doubled since 2019. And it hasn't here in Japan, and there, there tends to be a thought of, well, we just need to do all this because climate change is going to happen.It doesn't matter that, that people are suffering now, I don't think, I think people tend to. tend to maybe forget the, it's like the, the just stop oil extinction rebellion types. It's the world we have is impossible to have without oil. Sure. You can reduce it. It's going to run out eventually one day anyway.So reducing it is not a bad thing, but to pretend that you can just press stop and then you can put in a wind

In this episode, we delve into the impact of the new groundbreaking research uncovering the RNU4-2 genetic variant linked to neurodevelopmental conditions. The discovery, made possible through whole genome sequencing, highlights a genetic change in the RNU4-2 gene that affects about 1 in 200 undiagnosed children with neurodevelopmental conditions, making it more prevalent than previously thought. This discovery represents one of the most common single-gene genetic causes of such conditions. Our host, Naimah Callachand, Head of Product Engagement and Growth at Genomics England, is joined by Lindsay Pearse who shares her journey through the diagnosis of her son Lars. They are also joined by Sarah Wynn, CEO of Unique, and Emma Baple, Clinical Genetics Doctor and Professor of Genomic Medicine in the University of Exeter and the Medical Director of the Southwest NHS Genomic Laboratory Hub. We also hear from the 2 research groups who independently discovered the findings: Dr Andrew Mumford, Professor of Haematology at the University of Bristol Link to the research paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-024-03085-5  Assistant Professor Nicky Whiffin, Big Data Institute and Centre for Human Genetics at the University of Oxford Link to the research paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07773-7 To access resources mentioned in this podcast:  Unique provides support, information and networking to families affected by rare chromosome and gene disorders - for more information and support please visit the website. Connect with other parents of children carrying a variation in RNU4-2 on the Facebook group.   "I think one of the things we really hope will come out of diagnoses like this is that we will then be able to build up more of that picture about how families are affected. So, that we can give families more information about not only how their child is affected but how they might be affected in the future."   You can read the transcript below or download it here: https://www.genomicsengland.co.uk/assets/documents/Podcast-transcripts/How-has-a-groundbreaking-genomic-discovery-impacted-thousands-worldwide.docx  Naimah: Welcome to Behind the Genes. Lindsay: So, this feeling that like we've been on this deserted island for eight years and now all of a sudden, you're sort of looking around through the branches of the trees. It's like, wait a minute, there are other people on this island and in this case actually there's a lot more people on this island. Yeah, it's very exciting, it's validating. It gives us a lot of hope and, you know, it has been quite emotional too and also a bit of an identity shift. Being undiagnosed had become quite a big part of our identity, and so now that's kind of shifting a little bit that we have this new diagnosis and are part of a new community. Naimah: My name is Naimah Callachand and I'm Head of Product Engagement and Growth at Genomics England. On today's episode, I'm joined by Lindsay Pearse whose son Lars recently received a genetic diagnosis, made possible by research using data from the National Genomic Research Library, Sarah Wynn CEO of Unique, and Emma Baple, a clinical genetics doctor. Today we'll be discussing the impact of recent research findings which have found a genetic change in the non-coding RNU4-2 gene, to be linked to neurodevelopmental conditions. If you enjoy today's episode, we'd love your support. Please like, share and rate us on wherever you listen to your podcasts. Naimah: And first of all, I would like everyone to introduce themselves. So, Lindsay, maybe if we could come to you first. Lindsay: Great, thank you. So, thank you for having me. I'm Lindsay Pearse, I live outside of Washington DC and I'm a mum to 3 boys. My oldest son Lars who is 8, he was recently diagnosed with the de novo variant in the RNU4-2 gene. Naimah: Thank you. And Emma? Emma: My name is Emma Baple. I'm a Clinical Genetics Doctor which means I look after children and adults with genetic conditions. I'm also a Professor of Genomic Medicine in the University of Exeter and the Medical Director of the Southwest NHS Genomic Laboratory Hub. Naimah: And Sarah? Sarah: Hi, thank you for having me. I'm Sarah Wynn, I'm the CEO of a patient organisation called Unique, and we provide support and information to all those affected by rare genetic conditions. Naimah: Great, thank you. It's so great to have you all here today. So, first of all Lindsay, I wonder if we could come to you. So, you mentioned in your introduction your son Lars has recently been diagnosed with the de novo variant. I wondered if you could tell us a bit about your story, and what it's been like up until the diagnosis. Lindsay: Sure, yeah. So, Lars is, he's a wonderful 8 year-old boy. With his condition, his main symptoms he experiences global developmental delays, he's non-verbal. He's had hypertonia pretty much since birth and wears AFO's to support his walking. He has a feeding disorder and is fed by a G-Tube. Cortical vision impairments, a history of seizures and slow growth, amongst other things. So, that's just a bit of a picture of what he deals with day to day. But he's my oldest child, so first baby. When I was pregnant, we were given an IUGR diagnosis. He was breech, he had a hernia soon after birth, wouldn't breastfeed. But all of these things aren't terribly uncommon, you know. But once he was about 3 or 4 months old, we noticed that he wasn't really able to push up like he should, and we were put in touch with early intervention services for an assessment. So, we went ahead and did that when he was about 4 or 5 months old. And as parents, we could just kind of tell that something was off from the assessors. And, you know, they were very gentle with us, but we could just get that sense that okay, something is off, and they're worried here. So, that kind of kickstarted me into making appointments left, right and centre with specialists. The first specialist that we saw was a neurologist. And yeah, again, that's another appointment that I'll never forget. She referred us to genetics and to get an MRI and some lab work but at the end of the appointment, she said to us, ‘Just remember to love your child.' And, you know, that was quite shocking to us at the time because it wasn't something that had ever crossed our mind that we wouldn't do or felt like we needed to be told to do this. But on the other hand, it certainly set off a lot of worry and anxiety of okay, well, what exactly are we dealing with here? So, fast forward, we saw genetics and that was about when Lars was about 8 months old. We went through a variety of genetic testing, a chromosomal micro-array, a single gene testing, then the whole exome testing. Everything came back negative, but it was explained to us that what was going on was likely an overarching genetic diagnosis that would explain his like, multi-system symptoms. And so meanwhile as he was getting older his global delays were becoming more pronounced and we were also in and out of the hospital a lot at this time. At first, he was in day care and, you know, any sort of cold virus would always turn into like a pneumonia for him. So, we were just in and out of hospital seeing a myriad of specialists, trying to put together this puzzle of what's going on and it was really hard to accept that nobody could figure it out. That was just, you know, sort of mind-blowing to us I guess. So, we applied for and were accepted into the Undiagnosed Diseases Programme at the National Institute of Health over here. The NIH as it's commonly referred to. So, we first went there when Lars was 2. He was one of their youngest patients at the time. But that was a really great experience for us because we felt like they were looking at him holistically and across a bunch of all of his systems, and not just seeing a specialist for sort of each system. So, we really appreciated that. We also did the whole genome sequencing through this research study. Although that also came back negative and so at that point, we were told to kind of keep following up symptomatically. Keep seeing the specialists and eventually maybe one day we'll find an overarching diagnosis, but that science just hadn't quite caught up to Lars. It was hard for me again to believe that and to sort of wrap my head around that. But certainly, it was an education from all of the doctors and geneticists and everyone we saw at NIH, to realise like how far there still was to go in terms of genetic research. How it wasn't also that uncommon to be undiagnosed in the rare disease community. I would say that being undiagnosed sort of became part of our identity. And it's, you know, it was something that, you know, you had to explain to like insurance companies and to his school, and it became part of our advocacy around him. Because without being able to say oh, it's this specific thing and if it was someone who hadn't met Lars before, trying to explain to them that, you know, yeah, within the range of this community you can be undiagnosed, and they just haven't found it yet, but I promise you there is something going on here. And I'd say the other thing too without a diagnosis you have no prognosis, right? And so, trying to figure out what the future would look like. Also, family planning. We waited 5 and a half years before we had another child and, you know, it was certainly an anxiety ridden decision. Ultimately after seeing as many specialists as we possibly could, we still were left with the same answer of well, we just don't really know if it will happen again. So, that was a big decision to make. But again, it just kind of became part of our identity and something that you did eventually accept. But I would say in my experience I feel like the acceptance part also of Lars' disabilities perhaps took me a little bit longer. Because again, I didn't have a prognosis, so I didn't exactly know what we were dealing with. Only as he has become older and, you know, you're sort of getting a better sense of what his abilities might be than being able to understand, okay, this is what I'm dealing with. I need to accept that and do what I can to care for him and our family in the best way that we can. Naimah: Thanks so much for sharing that, Lindsay. I feel like you've touched on a lot of really, you know, a lot of complications and difficulties for your family. Especially, you know, with regards to keeping hopeful and things about the prognosis as well, I'm sure it was really difficult. You've mentioned that Lars was able to be diagnosed recently due to recent research efforts. So, Sarah, I wonder if you can tell us a bit more about these and what the findings have meant for patients with neurodevelopmental conditions. Sarah: Yes. So, I think we know that there are lots of families that are in Lindsay and Lars' position where they know that there is almost certainly an underlying genetic condition, and it just hasn't been found yet. And so, I think we know that lots of researchers are working really hard to try and find those causes. I think over time we know that as time goes on and research goes on, we'll find more of these new genetic causes for neurodevelopmental conditions. I think particularly as we start to look at regions of the genome that we haven't looked at so much so far. But I think one of the things that's really extraordinary about this one is that actually it turns out to be much more common than we might have expected, for one of these new conditions that we haven't found before. But I think it's about one in 200 of those undiagnosed children with neurodevelopmental conditions, have this diagnosis so that's not a small number. That's not a rare finding at all actually, that's much more common than we could ever have anticipated. But I think one of the things that we do know is that as we look further and deeper into that genomic sequence, so, we've started off looking at the bits of the sequence that are genes that code for proteins. This changes in a gene that actually doesn't code for protein, so it's less obvious that it would be important but clearly it is important in development because we know when it has a spelling mistake in it, it causes this neurodevelopmental condition. But there will be as researchers look more and more at these kinds of genes, and also the other part of the genome that is not genes at all, we'll find out more and more the underlying genetic causes of these neurodevelopmental conditions. I think it's also really important to stress why this is so important to find these genetic changes and it's because families really need a diagnosis. Lindsay talked quite eloquently and a lot about that knowing something was off and really wanting to know the reason why. Getting these diagnoses might change care management or treatment, but actually really importantly it just gives an answer to families who have often been looking for an answer for a really long time. Naimah: I just wanted to go back to the point that Sarah made that actually this genetic change is relatively common. Emma, I wondered if you could tell us a bit more about maybe why it took us so long to discover it? Emma: That's an interesting question actually. I suppose the sort of slightly simplified answer to that question is we haven't been able to sequence the whole of a person's genetic information for that long. And so, children like Lars would have had, as Lindsay described lots and lots of genetic tests up until they had a whole genome sequencing which is what Sarah was talking about. The types of tests that we had up until the whole genome sequencing wouldn't have allowed us to look at that bit of the genetic code where this RNU4-2 gene can be found. So, we can only really find that using whole genome sequencing. So, before that existed, we wouldn't have been able to find this cause of developmental condition. Naimah: Okay, thanks Emma. Naimah: Now we're going to hear from one of the two research groups who are responsible for these research findings. First of all, let's hear from Nicky Whiffin. (Clip - Nicky Whiffin) Naimah: How were the findings possible using the Genomics England dataset? Nicky: So, most previous studies have only looked at genetic variants that, in genes that make proteins, but only a subset of our genes actually do makes proteins. The Genomics England dataset we have sequencing information on the entire genome, not just on these protein coding genes and that means we can also look at variants in other genes. So, those that make molecules other than proteins. And RNU4-2 for example, makes an RNA molecule. Naimah: These findings translated to direct patient benefit for patients like Lars who were able to receive support from Unique. How does this demonstrate the value of the dataset? Nicky: Yes. So, it was incredible that we could find so many patients with RNU4-2 variants so quickly. This was enabled by access to Genomics England data but also to other large sequencing datasets around the world. So, we worked with people in the US, in Australia and also in mainland Europe. These large datasets enabled us to spot consistent patterns in the data and by looking across multiple datasets we can also make sure that our findings are robust. When we realised how significant this was and how many families would be impacted, we very quickly contacted Sarah at Unique to see if we could direct patients to them for support. (End of clip) Emma: There's one thing I wanted to raise. It's important to recognise the way that was discovered was through the National Genomic Research Library that Genomics England hosts. To highlight the value of that, and the value of having this centralised resource where families have been kind enough really to allow their data to be shared with some limited clinical information that allowed these researchers to be able to pull this out. And I think it highlights the power of the National Health Service in that we were able to create such a resource. It's really quite astounding that we've found such a common cause of a rare genetic condition, and it wouldn't have happened in the same timescale or in this way without that resource. And then to just say that as Sarah talked about the fact that we've been able to get that information out there, also the researchers were able to get out there and contact the NIH and all of these other programmes worldwide. In Australia, America, everywhere in the world and quickly identify new patients who had this condition and get those diagnoses out really rapidly to people. But all that came from that power of sharing data and being able to have that all in one place and making it accessible to very clever people who could do this work and find these answers. It's so important for families like Lindsay's, and all the families in England and around the world that have got these answers. So, I guess it's a big plug for the value of data sharing and having a secure place where people feel that it's trusted and safe, that enables these diagnoses to be made. Lindsay: If I could just echo that, we're so grateful that that exists in the UK. Just acknowledging like the privilege here that we have had to be able to, I mean for our family in the US, that we've been able to, you know, get ourselves into the NIH study and into the study at Children's National. That takes a lot of work. I feel like not everybody has that opportunity to be able to spend the time to do these applications and to go to all the appointments and get the testing done and have the insurance to cover it. So, very grateful that the system exists in a way in the UK that made this sort of research possible. I just hope that that can be replicated in other places, and also to what Emma was saying earlier, come up with a lower cost test as well for this to further the growth of the community and of course then the corresponding research. Sarah: I think firstly we have to sort of thank all of those families that took part and do share their data, because I think it's not always clear why you might want to do that as a family. I think this is really a powerful example of the benefit of that. I also think the data sharing goes one stage further. So, it's partly about getting the diagnosis, but the data sharing going forward about how this condition impacts families, both clinically and sort of day to day lived experience, is how we'll be able to learn more about these conditions. And so, when families get this diagnosis next week or next year, not only will they get a diagnosis, but they'll get a really good idea about what the condition is and how it might impact their child. Naimah: And Lindsay, coming back to you. So, we've talked about, you know, what it meant for your family before the diagnosis, but what has it meant to have a diagnosis and how did you feel? And what happened whenever you received the diagnosis? Lindsay: Sure. Lars was again part of the NIH Undiagnosed Diseases Research study. So, once you attend this programme and if you are not diagnosed like at the end of your stay, they keep your details on file and you're part of this database at the NIH Undiagnosed Diseases Programme. So, if you're undiagnosed after your sort of week-long work up, your samples stay within the research programme. We were also part of a research programme at Children's National Medical Centre, the Rare Disease Institute. So, our samples were sort of on file there in their database as well. And so, at the end of March I was really quite shocked to receive a call from our long time and trusted geneticist at Children's National that they had found a diagnosis. It was quite emotional. I really kind of didn't believe it. I just kept asking, you know, ‘Are you sure? Is this it?' you know, ‘How confident are we?' Because I think in my head, I sort of always thought that we would eventually find a diagnosis, but I thought that Lars would be, you know, a 30- or 40-year-old adult. I thought it would be decades from now. Like I felt like for whatever reason we had to wait decades for the science to sort of catch up to him. So, we were very, very grateful. It felt very validating, I guess. I had always kind of had this intuition feeling that we were sort of missing something and it's more that the science just hadn't quite caught up yet. But, you know, it was validating to know that okay, Lars is not the only person in the entire world with this, it is something that is relatively common in fact within the rare disease community. That is also very exciting to me personally because I'm hopeful that that will lead more researchers to be interesting in this, given how, quote on quote, common it is. I've sort of been describing it as like a mass diagnosis event but also more so this feeling that like we've been on this deserted island for eight years and now all of a sudden, you're sort of like looking around through the branches of the trees. It's like, wait a minute, there are other people on this island ad in this case, there's actually a lot more people on this island. Yeah, it's very exciting, it's validating. It gives us a lot of hope. And, you know, it has been quite emotional too and also a bit of an identity shift. Because I spoke earlier about how like being undiagnosed had become quite a big part of our identity. So, now that's kind of shifting a little bit that we have this new diagnosis and are part of a new community. But yeah, we're just very grateful that the research had continued. And, you know, I think sometimes you sort of have this feeling of okay, our files are up on a shelf somewhere, you know, collecting dust and are people really looking at them? And actually, it turns out that the research was ongoing and yeah, we're just very grateful for that. Naimah: Thanks so much for sharing, Lindsay. It sounds like it's been a real rollercoaster of emotions for your family and I'm glad to hear that, you know, you've got some hope now that you've got a diagnosis as well. So, moving onto the next question. Emma, I wanted to ask you then, how will these findings improve clinical diagnostic services for those for neurodevelopmental conditions? Emma: So, you asked me earlier about why it had taken so long to find this particular cause of neurodevelopmental condition, and I gave you a relatively simple answer. The reality is one of the other reasons is that almost eight out of ten children and adults who have RNU4-2 related neurodevelopmental condition have exactly the same single letter spelling change in that gene. So, actually that in itself means that when researchers are looking at that information, they might think that it's actually a mistake. Because we know that when we sequence genetic information, we can see mistakes in that sequencing information that are just because the machine has, and the way that we process that data, it's not perfect. So, sometimes we find these little mistakes and they're not actually the cause of a person's problems, they're just what we call an artefact or an issue with the way that that happens. So, that is part of the reason for why it was tricky for us to know whether this was, or rather the researchers to know whether this was or was not the cause of this particular condition. But that in itself is quite helpful when we think about how we might identify more people who have this going forwards. Because unlike in Lars' case where we didn't know what the cause was and so we were still searching, and we didn't know where to look in the billions of letters that make up the genetic code to find that answer, we now know that this is really very common. It's unbelievably common. I think we didn't think we would be finding a cause of a rare genetic condition that was this commonly occurring at this stage. But the fact that it's just a single, it's commonly this one single change in the gene means that we can set up pretty cheap diagnostic testing. Which means that if you were somewhere where you wouldn't necessarily have access to whole genome sequencing, or a more comprehensive testing in that way, we could still be able to pick up this condition. And it's common enough that even if you didn't necessarily recognise that a person had it, you could still have this as part of your diagnostic tool kit for patients who have a neurodevelopmental condition. It's common enough that just doing a very simple test that could be done in any diagnostic lab anywhere in the world, you would be able to identify the majority of people who have this. Naimah: Now let's hear from the other research group who are responsible for these findings. Here is Dr Andrew Mumford. (Clip - Dr Andrew Mumford) Naimah: Why are these research findings significant? Andrew: It offers genetic diagnosis not just for a handful of families but potentially for many hundreds of families, who we all know have been searching often for many, many years for a genetic diagnosis. But actually, there are other gains from understanding how this gene causes neurodevelopmental disorder. We know that there's GRNU4-2 in codes, not a protein actually, but a small nuclear RNA which is unusual for rare, inherited disorders. It's a component of a very complicated molecule called the spliceosome which in turn regulates how thousands of other genes are regulated, how they're made into proteins. So, fundamentally this discovery tells us a lot about the biology of how the spliceosome works. We already know that some other components of the spliceosome can go wrong, and result in diseases like neurodevelopmental disorders. This gives us an extra insight and actually opens the door to, I hope, a whole load of more discoveries of genetic diagnosis possible from other components of this complicated molecule. Naimah: Your research group used a mathematical modelling approach. Can you tell me a bit about this, and what this means for other rare conditions, Andrew? Andrew: So, identifying relationships between changes in individual genes and different kinds of rare, inherited disease is notoriously difficult because of the volume of data that's involved and the need to be absolutely certain that observed genetic changes are actually the cause of different rare, inherited disease. So, applying statistics to that kind of problem isn't new. But what my collaboration group have achieved here, is to develop, actually developed some years ago a completely new approach to applying statistics to genetic data. We call that BeviMed and we've been working for many years on the genes in code that make individual proteins. Most rare disorders are caused by genetic changes in genes that make proteins. What this discovery comes from is actually we've applied the BeviMed statistical technique to genes that don't make proteins, they're non-coding genes. For example, genes that make small nuclear RNA, it's just like RNU4-2. What's unusual about the BeviMed approach is that it's very sensitive to detecting links between genetic changes and rare diseases, and it can detect statistical associations really driven by very, very small numbers of families. So, we apply it to datasets like the 100,00 Genomes dataset and identify associations using statistics that have got a very high probability of association. Other members of the team then seek to corroborate that finding by looking at if we can see the association in other datasets, and we certainly achieve that with RNU4-2. But also, assessing biological plausibility by investigating what we understand already about in this case, a small nuclear RNA, and how it can possibly result in a disease. And we normally try and employ other independent evidence such as experimental investigation. Or going back to our families and asking for additional data to help really test this sort of theory that changes in this particular gene have resulted in a problem with neurodevelopment. (End of clip) Naimah: Emma, are there any other ways that we can identify these conditions based on their clinical presentation? Emma: So, Lindsay and I were talking with you just yesterday, wasn't it? And I asked Lindsay about what sorts of things Lars had in common with other children and adults who have been diagnosed with this condition? I actually think Lindsay probably gives a better summary than I would, so I might ask you to maybe repeat what you said to me yesterday. But the bit of it that really stood out to me was when you said to us that a lot of parents have said, ‘I'm not sure how we weren't all put together in the first place because you notice so many things that were in common.' So, maybe if you can give that summary and then I can translate that back into medical terms, if that's okay Lindsay. Lindsay: Sure, of course. Yeah, it been again, kind of mind blowing, some of the similarities. Especially as we've exchanged pictures and such, and baby pictures especially where some of the children like look like siblings. So, definitely some similarities in facial features, you know, everyone seems to experience some of the slow growth, so a short stature or quite skinny. There's feeding issues also that seem to be quite common. Also, you know, things like the global developmental delays, that's certainly across the board and histories of seizures, that's also quite common. Some people have experienced also some, like, bone density issues, that's not something that we've experienced so far, but that also seems to be quite common. But then also, behaviourally, there's a lot of similarities which has been, I think, quite exciting to a lot of us because you've always thought okay, so this is just my child. And of course, some of that is true but it's also interesting to find out some of these other things that are, you know, are quite similar. So, a lot of people have mentioned their child having, like, an interesting sense of humour. Kind of like a very slapstick sense of humour which is quite interesting. Or everyone seems to love water, everybody loves swimming pools and bathtime, and all of that. Lars loves a windy day. Something about the wind, he just loves it and plane noises and things like that have also come up with other people. So, yeah, it's been really interesting and cool to see. Emma: So, I guess Lindsay's sort of very beautifully summed up what is written in the research publication. So, there's only two research publications so far on this condition, it's all really new. And I am definitely not claim to be a clinical expert on this condition, and I don't think there are any yet. It will take people time to see lots of children and adults who have this particular condition. But ultimately what Lindsay summarised was the common clinical features that have been described by parents. In my job as a clinical genetics doctor, part of what we look at is a person's appearance. So, Lindsay described the photographs of children particularly when they were little, looked very similar. In the photographs that I've seen, I would agree with that. And so obviously those children look like their mum and dad, but they have other features that are in common. They have a characteristic appearance and that helps doctors like me to have an idea as to whether a child or an adult might have a particular condition. Then put together with the sorts of information that Lindsay gave us around the low tone, so being a little bit floppier particularly when they're little. The slow growth and growth problems, problems with eating, also with seizures. Those are all common things that were pulled out of both of the two research publications on this condition and putting that all together into one picture helps doctors to have an idea whether somebody may have a particular condition. That would help us in this case to potentially request that simple test I was talking about, if maybe we were practicing in a part of the world where we wouldn't have the resources that we thankfully do have in the United Kingdom, and in the USA. Naimah: So, Sarah, just coming to you next. How does this research spread awareness and help other patients with these conditions? Sarah: So, I think one of the things that's been really great about research now is that we are able to, you know, social media and things like that mean that we can spread this information really quickly across the world basically. I think what that does is that as well as helping bring people together that they've got this diagnosis, what it does is I think it provides hope for all of those people that Lindsay was talking about at the beginning who don't have a diagnosis. So, that piece around people are still looking, the researchers are working hard and that even if you don't have a diagnosis today you might get one in the future. Lindsay talked about your sample being dusty and not being looked at. I think it gives lots of families, not just those that get this diagnosis but all of those that haven't got a diagnosis, hope, that hopefully in the future they will get a diagnosis. I think one of the things we really hope will come out of diagnoses like this is that we will then be able to build up more of that picture about how families are affected. So, that we can give families more information about not only how their child is affected but how they might be affected in the future. That prognosis information that Linsday said is really missing when you don't have a diagnosis. And I think the other thing that hopefully is the next stage in this journey with this discovery is that those two science publications that Emma talked about, what we will want to do here at Unique working with the researchers and those families that have got a diagnosis, is to produce a patient family friendly information leaflet about this condition. One of the things we know is really important about those patient leaflets is including the photos. Because as both Emma and Lindsay have said that idea that they have facial features in common. And so, if you look at a leaflet and you can recognise your child in it, and you can see others that look like it, that can be a really sort of quite heartwarming experience in what often is a lonely experience with a rare condition. Naimah: And I think kind of on that point about it being a lonely experience, I wondered Lindsay if you could talk a bit more if this research has allowed you to connect with other parents and families who have received a diagnosis, and what impact that's had on your family? Lindsay: Yeah. I mean, and I think everything that Sarah has said was spot on. It's wonderful to have resources like Unique to connect families and have those diagnoses on the platform, so other clinicians can look for it and sort of grow this group. I think that has definitely been the highlight of getting this diagnosis at this stage, right. Because there's not much more you can do with it, with someone so brand new so being able to connect with the other families has been wonderful. One amazing mum who with this diagnosis set up a Facebook group, RNU4-2 Family Connect. And, you know, it's just been amazing to see people from all over the world joining this as they receive this diagnosis, you know, sharing their stories. We've spent countless hours on the weekends over the past couple of months on Zoom calls with total strangers, but just you find that you can just talk for hours and hours because you have so much in common. It's great to see what has worked well for other families and, you know, what has not worked. Sharing resources, just kind of all learning together. Also seeing the spectrum of this diagnosis, I think most genetic disorders have a spectrum and this seems to be the same here. So, that's been very interesting. And of course, our son is 8, Lars is 8. There's now a 33-year-old and a 29-year-old in the Facebook group. Speaking for me personally it's just amazing to see them and like it's very cool to see where they're at. That sort of helps you answer some of those questions about that before were quite unknown when you were thinking about the future. Obviously, everybody's development whether you have a genetic disorder or not, it is going to be what it's going to be, and everybody is going to do their own thing. But being able to see what a path might look like is just so helpful. And, you know, we all want community and connection, and so this has been really, really great to have that now. Sarah: I don't think there's much more that I can add because Lindsay articulated so well. But it's really heartwarming for us to hear the benefits of those connections because that's really why Unique and other support groups exist. Is to provide, partly to provide information, but I think predominantly to put families in touch with other families so that they can find a new home and connect and share experiences. And, you know, stop feeling as alone as they might have done before. Naimah: Okay, we'll wrap up there. Thank you to our guests, Lindsay Pearce, Sarah Wynn and Emma Baple for joining me today as we discussed the research findings which found a genetic change in the RNU4-2 gene which has been linked to neurodevelopmental conditions. If you'd like to hear more like this, please subscribe to Behind the Genes on your favourite podcast app. Thank you for listening. I've been your host and producer, Naimah Callachand, and this podcast was edited by Bill Griffin of Ventoux Digital.

Dive into the latest episode of the Class E Podcast with Andrew Predmore, the executive director of Furman University's Shi Institute, as he shares insights into their innovative initiatives. From on-campus climate action planning to a closed-loop food system, the episode delves into sustainability challenges and solutions. Join the conversation as they discuss composting, student engagement, and outward-facing programs, including the Sustainability Leadership Initiative. Andrew sheds light on working with businesses for sustainability and fostering leadership in South Carolina. Discover how Furman is making strides in sustainability, from reducing carbon emissions to unique partnerships. Don't miss the innovative steps they're taking in waste reduction at athletic events, creating a blueprint for sustainable practices. Gain valuable perspectives on sustainability and be inspired by Furman's commitment to a greener future! Guest: Andrew Predmore, Director of the Shi Institute at Furman University Host: Mary Sturgill Producer: Isabella Martinez '24   Transcript:  Mary: Today, our guest is Andrew Predmore, who is the Executive Director of the Shi Institute for Sustainable Communities here at Furman University. Andrew, welcome to the show. Andrew: Oh, thank you. I'm excited to be here and excited to talk about innovation and entrepreneurship. Mary: Absolutely. Because you guys have some innovative programs, which we're going to talk about but you've only been here a year right?  Andrew: Not even a year. Getting close. So I started October 5th or 6th of last year so getting close to a year, yeah. Mary: How are you finding it?  Andrew: Oh, I love it. Mary: Not to put you on the spot.  Andrew: Well yeah I can't exactly answer like, oh, no good at all. But no, I truly am enjoying the position. And you know, I tell people that I really have one of the most fun jobs there is out there because we do a lot of good. And really, you know, my biggest challenge is trying to figure out what in the world to say no to because all the sustainability work that comes our way is good work. And work that's needed in the world. So lots of opportunity and lots of good things to do. Mary: So let's talk about that because you have some innovative programs that you guys are working on. Can you kind of… I don't want to say just list them all but kind of talk about them, list them and then I want to jump in…there's some that I want to dive into  Andrew: Well it would depend on how you define innovative right? But we have a lot of programming. I couldn't possibly list them all for you. Yeah, I would say like just in a broad sense, like the Shi Institute is working on and off campus on sustainability issues and we're looking to make a difference in both places. Andrew: And along the way, we engage students and faculty in that work. So you know, I'll mention just a couple of things going on on-campus and a couple of things off campus and then we can see where that takes us. But on campus our biggest push right now is climate action planning for the university. So Furman University has a carbon neutrality commitment for 2026. It's going to be really difficult to meet that commitment. And so we're really intentionally working on how we are going to pursue that commitment or we need to reset sort of when we're going to be carbon neutral and what is a pragmatic pathway to reduce carbon emissions because we're in here right now and the lights are on and we're using energy right now. And so that's, that's a real challenge for any university in any large organization. So you got to be innovative, you got to think outside the box. And we want to do it also in a way that supports the broader Greenville community. So that's a big thing that we do on campus and anything that we do on campus, we're always engaging students in that so we have a really vibrant student fellowship program. We also have a farm as you know, and that's an important thing on campus for students to get their hands dirty, and see what a closed loop food system looks like. So we'll probably get to that as an innovation but like, you know, we pick up the food waste that comes out of the back of the dining hall, we take it to a compost facility, we compost it, the compost comes back to the garden. The garden grows produce that is then sold to Bon Appetit. So we really have been working on that this summer, and over the next year to scale that up and see how much we can produce and have students learn along the way. So those are two things on campus. Mary: So quick question about that - Is the goal then to produce so much that then we can sell it to local farmers and stuff?  Andrew: No, I mean, not yet. I mean, the goal right now is to produce as much as we can that will then be served in the dining hall. So I'm gonna go to the dining hall in a few minutes when we're done with this, and you're gonna and I'm gonna see like all those heirloom tomatoes that we grow, I mean, hundreds of pounds and tomatoes this summer. We're getting close to $15,000 over the produce that's gone to Bon Appetit over the summer. So that really is healthy local food going to our students, our faculty, our staff right now, in the future, we might do CSA or do some other things where we sell that in other places, but for now, it's just going to the dining hall. Mary: What about the compost? What's the goal for that?  Andrew: The compost as you might imagine it… we've produced quite a bit of organic material, right and like so students out there and everybody listening, you know, be conscious of what you know, sometimes our stomachs are bigger than… what's the saying?  Mary: Our eyes are bigger than our stomachs. Andrew: Yeah, that's right. But then that translates into food waste. So be aware of that, but there's a lot of that and then there's a lot of leaf litter and organic material that comes on campus. So we blend that right? You have to get the carbon to nitrogen correct and compost that so we have quite a bit of it. We're going to start to sell that as a way to raise funds for the Shi Institute.  Mary: Yeah, that's kind of what I meant when I said for the farmers like local farmers, who are we selling that to? Andrew: Right now… we're not, we haven't even until now this podcast. I'm not even marketing that we're selling. And we've sold you know, several $1,000, but we're looking to scale that up because we have a lot of organic material and a lot of finished compost. The one little bottleneck we have though is filtering the compost. So we can't have plastic and forks and things that sometimes end up… so we have students out there sometimes filtering that so… Mary: I've seen some of the pictures that students have posted about people accidentally throwing away their forks and stuff in the DH.  Andrew: Yeah, the DH has a tough job right? Like anybody that's been there knows things are moving quick. And sometimes, you know, a fork or things just end up in the wrong place. But we'll solve that, we're going to filter it. Mary: So I want to turn now and talk about some of the outward facing programs.  So you have the sustainability leadership initiative.Tell us about that. Andrew: Yeah, so um, you know, think about it this way, like, like, for the world for society for South Carolina to become a more sustainable place. We've got to work for large organizations, right? And so and large organizations have to change just like Furman has to adapt…other organizations, businesses across the state need to adapt and so Furman and the Shi Institute partners with a nonprofit called sustain SC and each year we do a training that lasts five different sessions throughout the year across the state of South Carolina with around 25 business, nonprofit and public sector professionals that sign up to be in that and we're teaching them about the core aspects of sustainability. We take them out into the field and show them some of the challenges. And what we want to do is create a network of sustainability leaders across the state that are going to move us forward. So that's that program. This will be its third year. We have a really great class of people involved with that, real leaders across the state, and it's been fun putting together that program like we're taking them out to Waitis Island, which is a big conservation win. It's an under conservation easement. It's a barrier island off the coast near Myrtle Beach. So we will take them out there and show them like this is an amazing thing. This is amazing that it's protected in perpetuity, but they will also have to grapple with the fact that, like you all might have heard on the news this week that Myrtle Beach is one of the fastest growing cities in the US. Right? So there's all that urban development and around that area. And so those students that are in this program, those professionals, we're going to grapple with that like and hopefully that's going to help create better leadership and sustainability. Yeah, Mary: Yeah, because those people are the people who will then go back to their companies and it has to come from the top down, right? So that's a great way to network. I like that. That's very innovative thinking there and I like that because a lot of people in the industrial side of things don't think like that, right? Unnecessarily.  Andrew: Yeah, I mean I think that is changing. You're right and I think that the innovative thing about that is getting leaders embedded in organizations that then construct and flip systems to more sustainable ones.  Mary: Exactly. Getting them to flip the systems. That's exactly what I was talking about. You have one with manufacturers, a program with manufacturers, talk about that one  Andrew: Yeah, so this really was you know…I don't always love the word pilot but how about demonstration project? This summer where we worked with the South Carolina manufacturers extension program, and they know that there's like 7000 or so small to medium sized manufacturers across the state of South Carolina. And a lot of what they do is supply the really big manufacturing businesses in South Carolina. So think of the you know, the big name industries or companies that you all know like BMW or Michelin or Volvo or, or Milliken across the upstate, right? So they have many, many small suppliers. And then those small suppliers are under some pressure now to understand their carbon footprint. You know, because they supply these bigger businesses that have commitments to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. So I'm like okay, knowing this I'm like, alright, there's a there's a niche here for the Shi Institute right to step in and roll our sleeves up and see if we can help some of these small to medium sized businesses understand their carbon footprint, and it helps their business because then they can say to their customer, their large customer, hey, we're working on it. It helps us because we got students who need to learn carbon accounting as a skill. So there's a really nice win-win. And so we did a couple of those this summer. They were fantastic. We work with a French company, which is located mostly in Anderson County, and they make advanced textiles. And then we work with a company that's really right down the road here called Mosaic Color and Additives. So we had two students do their greenhouse gas inventories, which is the first step like you cannot reduce your impact on climate without first understanding where your emissions come from, that are driving that impact. And so that's what the students do is, you know, we worked it was very much like a client consulting type experience for our students, which is super valuable for them. Mary: That's the Furman advantage right there. Andrew: It is. We handed the company like a report. Here are your emissions, here's where they come from. And they can start thinking about okay, what can we do to lower emissions? How can we market ourselves as a more sustainable company as a result of taking this first step? So that was a great project and we're looking forward to potentially scaling that up next summer and I think yeah.  Mary: I love the fact that you because when we think of people who need to really work on sustainability, we do think of the large companies right because they probably have the most greenhouse gas emissions, etc. But I love the reaching down to the smaller companies or supplying the bigger companies because that really, I think, will make their partnership stronger.  Andrew: It should and it should create an advantage for those first movers in a small to medium sized manufacturing...because they can say to their larger customers, hey, we're serious about it. We're taking this first step. So we, we, you know, sometimes people think sustainability, shouldn't or can't work with the business sector and I think instead we need to be innovative and think about how we can support the change that needs to happen. And so that's what we've tried to do.  Mary: Because we're part of that community. So why not? Right?  Andrew: We're wearing clothes and we consume things and so we're all a part of this economic system and, and the challenge of sustainability is how are we going to meet human needs within the boundaries of what our ecosystems can provide?  Mary: What kind of obstacles are you facing with some of these things that some of these initiatives that you're started? Andrew: My own ability to keep up with all this. Like I mentioned, sometimes there's more opportunity than then I can capitalize on it. I mean, we're also involved with some really substantial grant work, research work on climate and climate resilience in South Carolina. Luckily, I have staff they're helping with that. We're also involved with athletics and athletics at Furman and starting to think about, you know, how can we make those events… move them towards zero waste or zero landfill events and so we have to really, I don't know if you want to get into that.  Mary: I actually do.  Andrew: I have some, I think some really exciting things that we're just starting this year. So I'm not going to say we're going to finish the thing, but my biggest challenge is keeping up keeping all these things going. And luckily, I have a great group of people that I work with.  Mary: Because if you think about all of the ways from the concession stands, and even when people are tailgating and all that kind of stuff. That is a huge area that could be fixed. Right? So how are you… what kinds of things are you talking about?  Andrew: Yeah, I'm, like I said, we're gonna take incremental steps just because of our own bandwidth. But I think students, we have an eco-rep program, and those are students that work in the residence halls here at Furman to encourage sustainable behavior among their peers. They're going to help us with this athletic thing, because we need some, we need some person power behind this because there's some education but you know, you think about like, just think of yourself at a football game or a basketball game and what's served there, you know, and you start to go through sort of the inventory of what you could consume there, and then you start to understand the challenge, right? So you get a hot dog. What is the hot dog served to you in? Maybe some sort of cardboard type of thing? Well, could that become a compostable? I guess cardboard is compostable. Making sure that everything that the food is served is compostable. And then you got to figure out how to compost and collect it and you got to train people to not put what's compostable into the landfill bin. So one of the cool things we're doing and it is with that company Mosaic Color and Additives…they have a compostable fork, that they're working on and it's sourced from US materials, so it's not made in China. And we're gonna pilot using that in men's basketball games this winter, and we'll collect it and compost at Furman compost.  Mary: So that's the innovation right there. With the company.  Andrew: You know, so we'll start with basketball. Our students are also going to be doing… our Greenbelt students that live in the cabins along the lake are going to do some waste audits. So they're going to help us this year understand the waste stream that I didn't describe perfectly there for each of the athletic events. So that next year, we really understand well, like what needs to happen to move towards nothing is going to landfills, either recyclable or compostable. That'll be… that's the ultimate goal with us. So cool, really cool stuff happening there and just thankful to have athletics just super supportive and excited about it and to have Mosaic Color and Additives also, like here use our product.  Mary: Yeah, I heard their CEO talking about that fork.  Andrew: Yeah, and test it in our compost like they're very open, transparent about working together on that. And that is probably, you know, I'm not in innovation and entrepreneurship, but that's a hallmark of good thinking. Right? Mary: Right. That is innovative thinking.  Andrew: Think about systems, think about being open and transparent and creating partnerships.  Mary: Exactly.  One of the things that I find troubling is that we do have people in this country who don't believe that we need to do these things, right, that, that we don't necessarily need to be sustainable. How do you change the minds of people who aren't taking those actions that all of us can take? Or who don't have that same philosophy? Andrew: Well, I would say a couple of things to that. And you're right, you're right. That's a challenge. If you watch the Republican primary debate the other night, you saw someone say that climate change is a hoax. Well, you know, 99.99% of scientists do not agree with that. Right? It's established fact as much as science can be fact at this point that climate change is real and it's driven by humans. Okay. But to your question, which is like, how do we start to convince people? I think one thing to do is kind of what I mentioned earlier, which is…all people are embedded in an economic system that currently is not terribly sustainable, right? It's based on a take from the earth, make something wasted model, and we have to change that. That is a big systems change. So I don't think the way to do it is to place a lot of guilt on other people, because a lot of times we're embedded in a system where it can be very challenging to live sustainably. That's not to say you shouldn't do what you can do. I really think you shouldn't but don't put all the blame on individuals. Instead, you know, let's look at systems change. Let's look like I talked about let's look at training leaders to work in organizations that can flip larger systems so that it's easier for you and I to go to a football game which I think is a you know, I like sports, but I don't want to create a bunch of waste when I'm there. So create a system when I get there, so I'm not generating so much waste. Right. So there's systems work to do. The other thing I would say is, you know, you got to start talking to people about these issues in ways that matter to them. Yes, absolutely. So like, you know, we talked about climate change, you know, if you're a sports fan, I don't want to go to a football game at 12 o'clock in South Carolina, in September. And I think that is going to be a more and more difficult, unpleasant experience if you look at the climate models. So that's something that a lot of people care about. It's part of our culture in the South is to go to college football games. We need to do something. Youth sports are a big thing. Like is it safe to practice in some of the heat and humidity that we're going to encounter? So talk to people about things that matter to them as a starting point, instead of hitting them over the head with you got to change your… and guilt and all that and I think people will start to see that. So… Mary: That's audience, right? You got to know your audience, right? I tell my students that all the time. Whatever story you're telling. Start with the audience. You got to know how to tell it based on who your audience is. Right? Andrew: Yeah. I mean, I'm no communications scholar, but I've been in sustainability long enough to know that trick.  Mary: Yeah. So I was looking at some of your history Andrew and I'm going way back a little bit. In undergrad, you were a politics major.  Andrew: Yeah. Mary: Trying to pull that out of my memory correctly. How has that helped you in what you do now? I mean, obviously, your PhD and your masters and everything is on sustainability. But… Andrew: That's an interesting question that you know, I think probably some of the answer that I just gave, you know, politics is about speaking to audiences and convincing audiences so I don't know that without you asking me that question I've attributed the ability to answer that question to that experience, but maybe I think my undergrad at UVA was really more about like, critical thinking and, you know, a liberal arts education. I was a person that did not know what I wanted to do.I knew I was interested in political science and things like that, but I was also interested in the environment at that time, but I hadn't figured out environment… Sustainability wasn't really a thing. I hadn't figured out what my avenue would be there. And I think I know at Furman, we're better at that now, helping young people see the array of professions out there, but for me, it had to be like a winding path.  Mary: Yeah, I was the same way. Was there something that you came across or some event or something that kind of spurred you into saying, okay, this is the direction I want to go in, and I want to get my higher education, get my Master's in that and and go on to be where you are today?  Andrew: Oh, for sure. Yeah. I mean, it wasn't like I didn't read something, although there are certain things that I read that were impactful. I think if you haven't read Aldo Leopold, a Sand County Almanac, you should read that it's both beautiful and was really forward thinking and still applies today. But it didn't really come from reading or studying. It came from like when I was a kid growing up in Spartanburg, South Carolina. My dad would take my brother and I up into Pisgah National Forest, and we would go backpacking. He took us out west, we went out to Yosemite, we went to Yellowstone and Grand Teton. When I was 10 years old, I was backpacking in the Tetons. Mary: That's amazing. I love the Tetons.  Andrew: So you start with like that just and I found interviewing students over the years both at Indiana University where I was before and at Furman, you ask him like, where's your passion for sustainability come from? Usually there's some sort of connection with nature. And for me, that's what it was. And then ever since then, I've been trying to figure out how to make an impact. How do we create a safe space for humanity to thrive without messing up what we got.  Mary: So what has been the most rewarding thing in your career path that you've… because you were in sustainability at Indiana and now of course at Furman. Andrew: That's a good one. You know, I can talk about like, different sort of things that were accomplished either at Indiana University or even at Milliken. I was there for a year. They were one of the first 50 companies to have science based targets for reducing their greenhouse gas emissions, prove targets… and that was really cool because not to say I did that but I was a part of that. That was awesome. We did some cool things at IU around waste and recycling like that system was really not functioning well. And we set that on a path to do much, much better. And that was a big, you know, that's a big campus. So we're proud of some of those accomplishments, but I mean, it may sound a little bit cheesy but truly like when a student that worked with me like as a kind of like here we have student fellows, at IU we had sustainability interns, when they come back and I can see on LinkedIn that they're working on these things or they asked for a recommendation and I'm blown away by like, what job they're about to get. Man that's awesome. And to know I have a little bit of piece of that, particularly ones that I worked really, really closely with, that's really super rewarding. So it's a mixed bag, you know, lots of things. Mary: I totally get that because I feel that way with my students. You know when I see them succeed. So I like to kind of leave our listeners with a blueprint that they can take into their lives no matter what the conversation is about. There's always some advice or just some nuggets of information that they can use. What would you give to our listeners as something that they could take and do right now today? If they so chose to help in sustainability. Andrew: Oh, gosh, I cannot give you just one. I think we kind of covered you know it a little bit but if you're passionate about… I have students, students more at IU and increasingly I think will happen at Furman will come ask me that kind of question like What should I do? I care… what should I do? And there's all those like, personal things that you can do, right? And for college students that can be hard because you're not in control of your living space necessarily. So like you and I, we might ought to look at the energy consumption in our household and there's the inflation Reduction Act, right? So there's a lot of incentives out there for solar or battery and I'm looking at that in my house right now. So those are things but college students, you don't really have a lot of control over where you live, so do what you can. But I think the other thing is think about this as a system. If you want to make a difference, some of the things that you need to do are learn to talk to people about these issues and be willing to do it. And we talked about some tips there like approach the audience with what they might care about. But also don't be afraid to be politically engaged. Because that's probably the highest level systems change that you, that students and any of us can get involved with. So if you have a voice on this, use it.  Mary: That's a good point. I didn't even think about that. Andrew: It's not all technical stuff. It's about driving social and collective collective action. Mary: I want to circle back around to Furman again. What are we doing well, and what do we need to do better? Andrew: What are you talking… on campus or… Mary: As you know, our goal and our sustainability plan is to reduce our carbon footprint. How are we doing basically?  Andrew: Well, so you know, I mentioned one thing that we do exceptionally well, which is that closed loop circular system with food and food waste, and that's fantastic. And we'll be looking to scale out those issues. So as I've talked about compost and athletics and catering and so those are things we do well and we're going to do even better. We have nice greenhouse gas reductions relative to our 2008, 2007, 2008 baseline. Our greenhouse gas emissions have dropped like 37, 38%... Mary: Which is great.  Andrew: … which is very good. We have geothermal on different parts of campus. We have a good size solar installation across Poinsett Highway, so Furman has done a lot of things and so the facilities folks, Jeff Redderson and his team deserve a ton of credit for that.  Mary: We have five buildings that are LEED certified… Am I right in that number?  Andrew: I don't know.  Mary: Okay, well I'll look it up and if you want to know, just email me.  Andrew: Well, I know we had the first LEED building in the state of South Carolina.  Mary: Yeah, Isabella did a story on it. Yeah our podcast producer did a story on it.  Andrew: But what can we do better? Right. I talked about the climate action planning like we need to get to a point where we're looking at our greenhouse gas emissions year over year. And we're transparent about that. And we have a strategy to reduce those emissions year over year. So that's where we're headed. It's as I mentioned to you, it's it's it's challenging. We're not going to make those changes without careful planning, which has already started. So if you think about every one of or maybe not every one, but most of our buildings, this one included, has a natural gas boiler that heats the building. Well, their emissions are associated with natural gas consumption, so we need to move away from that but you can't just snap your fingers because Furman has money in that infrastructure, or that wouldn't make financial sense. So instead, you got to look at well, what's the lifecycle of the natural gas boilers at each building and which ones are coming to the end of there? And then what are we going to do then? We're going to electrify that building, the heating, and what's that going to cost? And so that's the kind of really the hard work that's ahead. And I don't know, I'm just really excited that facilities and other parts of administration are up for that work and yeah, and we're gonna, we're gonna do it. Mary: Andrew, anything else you want to tell our listeners about what the Shi Institute's doing and has in the pipeline?  Andrew: Well, I would say like this, this podcast is about innovation. And I want to thank former President David Shi who just committed a million dollar gift to us and that kind of support you know, whether it's $5, or a million dollars helps us do the things that matter most. So looking at issues around biodiversity loss and climate change and climate resilience. Instead of having to chase grants or other ways to support our work, we're able to… with that kind of support, we're able to do the things that matter most and so that would be a thing that were like, first, thank you and for other folks out there that want to support a group doing great work in the upstate in South Carolina, come talk to us. Mary: Absolutely. Andrew, thank you so much.  Andrew: Thanks, Mary.   Mary: I appreciate it.   Mary: That does it for this episode of the Class E Podcast. Remember this podcast is brought to you through a partnership between the Hill Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and the Communication Studies Department here at Furman University. It is produced by student producer Isabella Martinez.  But until next time, I'm your host Mary Sturgill. Dream big everybody.  

How do you decide to differentiate yourself and your business from your competitors? There's only so much you can offer to owners and tenants before you completely burn yourself out. What if there was a way to benefit you, your client, and the tenants all at the same time while increasing your profit margin? Join property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull as they chat with Andrew Smallwood from Second Nature. Learn how a resident benefits package can create a win-win-win scenario for you and your clients. You'll Learn [04:56] Is it Possible to Double Profit Per Door? [07:13] What is a Resident Benefits Package? [21:37] Ways to Protect Your Investors/Owners [25:19] The Pitfalls of DIYing Resident Benefits Packages [32:07] Increasing Profitability with Resident Benefits Packages [39:31] At What Stage Should You Implement a RBP Tweetables “Property managers don't just have one problem. They have a thousand.” “If we can move the needle just slightly to increase revenue, but also just slightly to decrease operational cost, right, it's very easy to double profit margin in a business.” “It doesn't matter how many doors you have if you're not taking anything home.” “It's important for property managers to keep the main thing, otherwise it's so easy to get distracted as an entrepreneur.”   Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive TalkRoute Referral Link Transcript [00:00:00] [00:00:00] Jason: If we can move the needle just slightly to increase revenue, but also just slightly to decrease operational cost, right, it's very easy to double profit margin in a business.  [00:00:15] Welcome DoorGrow Hackers to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, Impact lives, and you're interested in growing in business and in life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow Hacker. DoorGrow Hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. [00:00:52] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow along with Sarah Hull, co owner and COO of DoorGrow. Now let's get into the show.  [00:01:18] All right. So our guest today is Andrew Smallwood of Second Nature. Andrew, welcome to the show.  [00:01:25] Andrew: Hey, thanks for having me excited to be here.  [00:01:28] Jason: So we were talking beforehand and I was expressing how jealous I am of his amazing digital SLR camera. That's so zoomed in on his face. So you look really good today.  [00:01:37] Andrew: Well, we'll keep it on the face because I've still got some like summer workout to do the summer bods. We'll keep it the neck up here.  [00:01:44] Jason: Got it. All right. Yeah, I'm working out too. All right. Cool. So our topic today is doubling profit per door with a resident benefits package. You guys, your name has come up— Second Nature— over and over again related to this topic. So I'm excited to get into this before we get in though. Why don't you share a little bit about yourself? How did you get connected to property management? I doubt you woke up when you were a little kid and said, "property management" Second Nature... this is my dream future. This is what I want to be doing." So there's always a story of how people get into this industry, so.  [00:02:19] Andrew: You know, that's true, Jason, although if I think about every five to 10 year period of my life and where I may have predicted I would be five to 10 years from now, I don't think I've ever gotten that answer right, to date. So, I think I'll probably just stop trying, but really have enjoyed— you know, since 2017, actually is when I found the company at the time. It was called FilterEasy. A couple of years later, we rebranded to Second Nature as we saw our customers were looking at, you know, they had more than just one problem to solve. I think you guys know probably better than anybody property managers don't just have one problem. [00:02:52] They have a thousand. [00:02:53] You know, customer said, "Hey, we love the way you're working with us on this. Like, is there more that we could do there?" You know, rebranded to Second Nature, but I'll be quick with my personal story because I think probably other things would be more relevant to the audience wants to hear, but my background came up and coming up in sales was in sales and sales management for 10 plus years, also got into the nonprofit space involved with the Front Row Foundation, which is a cause I'm still passionate about. They put people battling life threatening illnesses in the front row of their dream live event. And so I'm the board chair for the Front Row Foundation today. I've been involved with them in various roles before finding my way to property management. And yeah the CEO and founder of Second Nature, Thad Tarkington, and I actually worked in the same company, although we didn't know each other super well. We were acquaintances in our previous company. And and I was looking to get into B2B from where I was. And that's what attracted me into the cool business. I saw it was a really great product. The customers really loved it. And that's what attracted me to the industry and I've loved it ever since. [00:03:57] Jason: So what do you think the major difference you see between B2C and B2B? What like really was driving that decision?  [00:04:06] Andrew: Yeah, I think, you know, in B2C, it was very transactional, like, have one meeting. And it was, you know, this was like a luxury house where items just to put that in perspective. And so it was like, you know, an order might be a few hundred dollars or a few thousand dollars, and it was like, if you didn't have an order form in 20 minutes, then you didn't have an order, right? Yeah, there wasn't a decision at that point. And, you know, I got a lot of like professional foundational skills that I really appreciate from those experiences. But, you know, what I appreciated was developing relationships and continually, you know, working to drive success right over a longer period of time with customers. But that was more interesting and more fulfilling and also would involve developing new skills and learning new things. And so that, that's what attracted me to B2B.  [00:04:56] Jason: Awesome. All right. Cool. So let's get into the topic at hand. So doubling profit per door with the residence benefits package. So is it possible to double their profit per door? [00:05:10] Andrew: Yeah, it better be, right? If that's the title of our episode. So, yeah, I mean, fortunately, Second Nature works with a little over 1500, just shy of 2000 management companies across the United States. And if you believe the, you know, studies that have been done out there and benchmarking a lot of property management companies can see their profit per door, you know, somewhere in the 10 to 15, you know, per unit range, obviously some less than that, right. And it's sort of some more than that, but a lot of companies we encounter, that's the range, you know, oftentimes when we encounter them, and the cool thing about a resident benefits package is in 30 days or less, they can be adding, you know, oftentimes $17 in profit per door, sometimes more, sometimes less. We can get into the details of why that can vary, but it can be a really dramatic move. And if it's a fully managed resident benefit package, it can actually be a very easy one to get going. So a powerful step to take.  [00:06:08] Jason: Yeah. I think a lot of property managers maybe don't see this. They don't realize this. We get so focused as business owners in the beginning of just trying to get revenue up, trying to get in revenue, and the challenge is: if we can move the needle just slightly to increase revenue, but also just slightly to decrease operational cost, right, it's very easy to double profit margin in a business. And Sarah had ridiculous profit margin in her business because she's ridiculously efficient. What was your profit margin?  [00:06:41] Sarah: On a bad month, it'd be like 60%.  [00:06:43] Jason: Yeah, so. Wow. And the big secret was she just wouldn't talk to people on the phone. Like that's a big part of it. And still had to talk to people. Yeah. So she's been able to do some amazing things with our clients in increasing profit and profit really per door is the thing that property managers should be taking a look at because it doesn't matter how many doors you have if you're not taking anything home. So let's talk about how they can increase this using a resident benefits packages. Let's define a resident's benefit package for those that have never heard of this idea. Let's start there.  [00:07:17] Andrew: Yeah. So the way we think about the resident benefits package, and I'd say, this is a generally accepted definition in the industry— is this is a suite of products and services that elevate and professionalize the resident experience, right? And so that's the 1st thing that it does, and it's creating an experience that residents will pay for, and that they'll stay for a recurring monthly charge, right? Alongside rent, there's the costs, right, of all these ancillary service. We can get it into examples of what those different products and services are in a minute. But that's what the property manager is doing. They're saying, "we're going to bring a different level of service. There's value in that service." and if there's a cost associated with that service as well, that's how they drive that as a profit center, but 1. That is bringing value to the resident, also protecting the investor from risk, and then the property manager benefiting as well. We call that a triple win. And that's what we focus on.  [00:08:13] Jason: Nice. Yeah. Value to the resident, protecting the investor and what was the third one?  [00:08:19] Andrew: Yeah. And the property manager should be reducing costs and adding a profit center as well.  [00:08:25] Jason: Love it. Okay, cool. So those are three awesome benefits. Now maybe we'll get into some specific examples, but let's go to this first one, the value to the resident. And does this work only in— because I know some property managers right now are listening and "this won't work in my market. My residents are cheap or my residents don't want extra value  [00:08:48] Sarah: or they don't care." [00:08:49] Jason: Yeah, you just want the lowest price possible maybe. So let's tackle the value to the resident. [00:08:55] Andrew: Yeah. Well, I mean, I think first i'd like to acknowledge some of the truth in that, which is that if I look at different asset classes, right, and you look at like multifamily, which has really done a lot of investment, like you think about class A multifamily major MSAs and like there's golf simulators and bark parks and like, you know, three water fountains and like all kinds of investment. [00:09:19] Right. And then generally the way you see them monetized is both as a part of the rent— they've figured out how to, you know, classify their property to place where they can actually monetize that in the rent itself. It's amenitized and then also their services like valet, trash and other things like that, right, that are going to be charged as a separate ledger line item there. And so when we think about single family and smaller boutique, multifamily and scattered site properties and third party managers, you know, and I think about the resident profile of who's running the class A, you know, golf simulators place we were just talking about is probably that's probably different value for that person than, like, you know, your typical couple in their 40s with a couple of kids and a dog right in the suburbs, like they're not looking for the same things, right? And what would be valuable and important to them? [00:10:09] So, I think it's okay to acknowledge that different resident profiles may value different things, right? Where we started. Where we started with this was, okay, we see a future where there's actually a really and truly incredible resident experience. I mean, dozens of dozens and dozens of products and services and bucketing them into what's already required in the lease. Right and so we started with that before going to "hey, what's like standard, but could be opt out or what might be really cool for some residents?" like, you imagine lawn care as an example. That's probably not something that every resident would pay for. And some would choose to do it themselves and. You know, but there's probably a small percentage of residents that really would appreciate having that kind of service done and coordinated for them. And there could be a great revenue opportunity there. So we're working towards that, but starting with the mandatory stuff, that's things like renter's insurance is generally a requirement of the lease, right? That they have it. When you think about paying rent on time, like that's an essential responsibility. [00:11:10] So how can we make things easier by creating a reward system by every time someone pays their rent on time, it actually boosts their credit score, right? Automatically this is happening. It's almost crazy to think that somebody's largest monthly expense is the only one that they aren't getting rewards points for and that they aren't getting credit, you know, benefits of their credit score for. We obviously started with filter delivery service. [00:11:32] Like, they got to change the filters on time, but how do we make that so easy to do? It's going to happen the vast majority of times versus all the friction that gets in the way but otherwise, and on down the list. So, hey, we've kind of tackled these things that are core least responsibilities first, and what we've seen is: yeah, occasionally a resident might say 'Hey, I'm not sure about the value of this," and they need some additional explanation. But when it's properly priced, when it's properly positioned and you've got the right product mix, right, with those things all done together... extremely effective, right, for property managers that hasn't gotten in the way of being able to perform, you know, and drive their core leasing KPIs and things that would create a trade off or a compromise for investors or the managers. So that it keeps that triple win intact.  [00:12:19] Jason: Got it. So what are some of the things that might be included in a residence benefits package?  [00:12:28] Andrew: Yeah. So we just alluded to rent reporting. Every time someone pays their rent on time, what we do is we actually help take that information. Get it to the credit bureaus so that it's building the resident's score and to give an idea of the impact of that, you know, it's common to see 20 30 40 point bumps. There's some incredible you know individual kind of outlier cases where we've seen 70, 80 point increases, right, in individual profiles. People who did not have a credit score before actually establishing the credit score, right? Which is a big deal and when you think about You know, especially today where interest rates and everything has gone like— the cost of credit has just. Like, if you look at the interest rates on auto loans, they've doubled in just the last few years. Obviously, everyone knows what's happening, probably, you know, with mortgages, right? And what's happening the rate on the home loan and credit card, right? Credit cards. Those are really the big three. And you look at the savings. Over somebody's lifetime of having a 40 point higher credit score, they were at some point to purchase a home, purchase one or two cars, right? And, you know, carrying the average credit card debt that American family has. It's 6 figures, right? It's 6 figures in savings of their lifetime. So it's a really big deal. So that's exciting. The rewards points that we mentioned every time someone's paying on time, they're getting cash value, which they can go then redeem in a marketplace where there's hundreds of brands, right? That they can go redeem that everything from practical stuff of Starbucks, gift cards do like, I actually redeemed for some like bamboo pajamas. I don't know if you guys have seen this or any listeners have seen it, but this bamboo— I'm a sucker for like soft material, like tactile stuff. So anyway, I got the bamboo pajamas. That was my thing, but there's wine, there's dog food, like all kinds of stuff from really practical every day to kind of fun and luxury spend, right, that people can leverage that for, and they can use it right away or they can save it up and bank it. They don't lose it over time. You know, the other things we were talking about was on time filter delivery. So as opposed to "Hey," putting it in the lease and saying, "this is your responsibility." but then residents don't know what their size is. They don't know what quality to buy. They don't really know how often to do it, or they're not going back to page 18 at least to remember that. There's all these things that get in the way. And typically it's your residents who have been homeowners previously. That would be like probably the best at doing this. They felt the pain, you know, themselves, or they've replaced or paid for HVAC, you know, bills or oil cleanings or what might you you know, those are generally your best change, but that's, it's a small percentage. Most property managers report 5, 10, 15, maybe 20 percent of residents are changing exactly on time with the exact right filter, exactly the way the property manager would want them to. [00:15:06] So what we did, it's not perfect. You know, Jason and Sarah, it's not like, okay, a hundred percent of the time it works every time. But we actually did a study with the national rental home council across 8, 000 single family rentals, 18 months. And we looked at four operators. And it was A B test, right? So some it's hey, you're relying on the resident to do it in some cases, even leaving some in the closet for them to change. Right? Most of the time they're right at move out right where you left them versus a delivery program where they're being delivered every 2 to 3 months. Exactly when they need to change, and what we saw was a 38 percent reduction in HVAC work order volume, right? Between those getting delivered and those not. And the reason that happens is because you go from, you know, 10 or 15 percent changing them to all, but 10 or 15%, right, change them. That's what drives different resident benefits because they're saving on their energy bill and they're breathing clean air and it's as easy as opening their front door now to take care of that lease responsibility. [00:16:07] So, that's a great one. I'll pause here for a second, but we could talk about renters insurance, which is a big one, ID protection, on demand pest controls, actually the newest feature that we've rolled out most recently, so that's a newer one. A fresher one. Yeah. Happy to dive in more if you guys feel that's appropriate. [00:16:23] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. I think, you know, people understand the list of all the things their brain starts to go, Oh, I could see how this would be beneficial. This would add value to the resident for sure.  [00:16:33] Sarah: So if you if you had a property management company that does not have a resident benefit package currently, and they're looking to implement one, but they're like, "I just don't know, like what I should put in there. Should I put everything? Should I put like just one thing?" Like what is some advice that you have on like what to include and why?  [00:16:52] Andrew: Excellent question. So we can provide a link, I think to you guys the other show, but rbp.secondnature.com, right, is a place that people can go. And we've actually built a contact form there where people put in the state that they're in, sarah. It'll actually pull up the calendar of the person on our team who works with property managers in that area. And so what we generally do in a call is talk about what are their company goals, like what are they trying to optimize for, right? That's the first thing we'll consider. But then really define what you want your resident benefits package to do for you and your residents, investors. Map out that triple win. Once that's clear, the next thing we will do is kind of share, like, Hey, in your market, like your resident profile, your property type, right, your area, here's the product mix, right. And pricing and presentation, right, that we are saying that's a. Compliant, right. Compliant with your local laws and regulations. And then B. You know, is getting the best business results, you know, for that. And so we provide that kind of consultative approach and it can vary. [00:17:55] I mean, the fact of the matter is filter delivery in Orlando, Florida, right, is a different problem than in San Diego, California. Right. So we're not going to recommend the same thing in two different places. We take a kind of like value based approach. Once we help work with the operator to figure out, you know, what that's going to be and what the right fit for them is. [00:18:17] Sarah: That's awesome. Super helpful. And I like that it's like, very customizable because I think this is something that people just, they hesitate on a little bit because there's so many options. And especially when we take clients through pricing. Like, what do I include in my high plan? What do I not include? Like, what are the things that I should— and these are always where we see people get stuck is like, what are the benefits that we should include? And if there's something that really helps them figure out, like, am I compliant? What am I actually looking to do and like what in my area seems to be working well already? I think that would be huge for people. So I'm really glad you brought that up. Thank you.  [00:18:54] Andrew: You know, I'll jump in with 1 thing, and then I think Jason was going to go maybe towards the investor side. If that's where we're going next, but something we saw included in benefits packages early. That we've started to see phase out. Like maybe that could be interesting for people if they've heard about the past, you know, keeping up with this is originally before we had a lot of what Second Nature and other point solutions have been able to do and really productizing and scaling some of these services is. You know, problem is we're figuring out, well, what can I do on my own? And I think some of that is still relevant of communicating anything that differentiates you from a for rent by owner, right, versus a professional management company that you have multiple payment options, right? Maybe you have 24/7, you know, maintenance coordination that somebody can file a maintenance request at any time versus I remember one of my first early renting experiences, you know, I rented from a dentist who had four rental properties and it was like two weeks to get ahold of him to let him know that it was freezing cold in DC. Yeah, I was a college kid that like wore flip flops when it was 10 degrees outside. I didn't complain too much, but you know, thinking about those kind of experiences being a professional, like probably the people listening to this, I would never have that experience, right, working with their company. And so, hey, we do think it's important to communicate those things. Even if you don't monetize them or necessarily charge them in your RBP, it's a good place in the RBP to communicate those differences between a professional property manager and the FERBO. But the one that I've seen phased out were these kind of like early on before there were things like filters and insurance and credit and stuff that felt like really tangible to bring in. We often saw things like, hey, here's a get out of jail free card on late rent, right, or an NSF fee. And the reason we saw that early on is because it was so easy for a property manager to say, hey, this is worth $50, right? Or worth 40. It's like this tangible value of what you're giving, right? As a part of that and communicating it. Because they felt like they didn't have a lot of substance up front. But as more substances come in, we've seen that phase out because people started to realize, well, if I'm incentivizing, you know, on time rent, is that really a triple win for like my team that has to deal with that? Is that a win for the investor? That's not getting their rent on time. And so it's really about how do we incentivize the right behaviors, right? That's good outcomes for everybody. And so that's, that is something that we've seen change over the last couple of years, some of that stuff kind of phase. [00:21:26] Out and focusing on a more proactive and incentivizing what you want to have happen type of approach.  [00:21:32] Jason: Yeah. Incentives matter a lot, especially with tenants. Okay, cool. So let's get into then protecting the investor. So, I mean, I can see how some of these things, just if the tenants are behaving better, it's going to protect the property better, like getting filters changed, things like this. [00:21:51] But maybe you can provide some more detail on that.  [00:21:54] Andrew: Yeah, I mean, I think you know, a huge one is if you think about in single family rental and that investor profile, you know, in particular, I think about how important it is to keep the property occupied. Right? And you know, if you can keep a resident happy and renewing, right, renewing their lease, then yeah, that's a big win for the investor versus all that. It's not just the vacancy cost, right? It's also all the maintenance and repairs and everything that has to happen during that time. And so we, I mean, we have a client. They've got a scaled single family rental organization, over 7,000 units that they manage in a few markets, right? And their average their average tenancy is just under seven years. Wow, which is like really incredible, right? And that's not just because they have a resident benefits package. It's more than that. But it's really interesting to see a lot of the property managers really pushing for "how can I drive a great resident experience?" That people will pay for and that they'll stay for right and extending you know, attracting great residents and then keeping them longer. How that drives investor value. And then while they're there in the property, they're taking better care of it. The filters are getting changed on time. There's less HVAC expense, right? 38 percent less HVAC bills eliminates 38 percent of those bills that it makes an investor question, you know, "I got into this for predictable and like risk adjusted returns and then boom, I have this 7,000 expense." [00:23:23] Maybe I'm thinking about selling or do I really want to stick through this or I just ate up the rest of my year's returns, right? You can eliminate those kind of moments. That's really what we're after, right? How do we attack those kinds of moments that you know, create those emotional kind of negative experiences for investors that would make them say "you know, I want to, maybe I want to put my money somewhere else, or maybe I'm not up for continuing this." so we think about how do we create a resident experience so good. Residents don't want to leave. How do we create an investor experience so good, they don't want to sell? They want to buy more. How do we create a team experience so good, the talent wants to be in this industry and wants to grow in this industry forever. And that's that kind of flywheel of what a triple win experience creates.  [00:24:07] Jason: Yeah, I like it. They're increasing the lease renewals. They're lowering their operational costs by not having those happen as often and because they're taking better care of things, there's going to be less maintenance challenges, et cetera, better property care, lower HVAC expenses. [00:24:23] I mean, this sounds like an investor benefits package.  [00:24:26] Andrew: Yeah. I mean, if you look at, if you were to Google resident benefits package, You'll see Second Nature's content, but you'll also see a lot of property managers. And of course, property managers, their website and their content is often generally pointed at property owners, right? And you'll see a lot of the results are like, "Hey, our resident benefits package, how it benefits investors". And you'll just hear it from their mouths, right? It's the things I mentioned and more, like if all of your residents have renters insurance. Guess what? You can get a lower cost on your property insurance as a property owner and investor, right? If that's the case because you're protected from liabilities, especially if there's a master policy in place that has special coverages that protect the investors. Like our insurance products and others that offer great insurance products in the industry. So, whether you're working with Second Nature or not, you know, bringing these kinds of programs and designing things to be a triple win is something we'd, we really encourage people to pursue.  [00:25:19] Jason: Now, if somebody were trying to design this on their own, then they're probably going to have to source several different tools and services, which I'm guessing you guys like have aggregated and some of this stuff is in house, like the filters and some of this you've partnered, I'm guessing, but you've already brought all of this together. So, one of the challenges or one of the concerns is in those situations is the business owners thinking, "well, I'm going to be cheap. I can do this for less if I go and source all these components myself. Is that accurate?" [00:25:51] Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. Great question. You know, it's funny. I think I was telling you, we had our whole team in Nashville this past week. And we actually brought a couple of our customers in, three customers to have just like a customer panel. It was great for people not in sales and account management roles, like people in finance, people in technology, IT, to really hear directly what it's like to be a property manager and everything else. And Kevin Patterson was with us. He's a property manager, manages about a thousand units out of California. And Kevin was talking about it. He's like, yeah, "I saw what you guys were doing. I'm like, 'I can do this.'" And he is like, "so I bought pallets of filters, right? And had them shipped to my office. And then we realized, oh my God, like now we have to store all these filters and inventory. What a mess. Yeah. I still have some too, you know, two years later." [00:26:33] So, I mean, here's the thing. I would say there's probably a percentage or two, like my observation is there's a couple percentage, you know, of companies out there who are wired in such a way and just so passionately logistically detailed that if they wanted to do, you know, a couple of these things really on their own, they probably could do it. [00:26:53] But I think most property managers recognize. That, "Hey, if I can make $17 in profit per door, I don't have to add to my head count. I can have this whole thing up and running in 30 days and bring that impact to my business." Right. You know, fortunately Second Nature hasn't lost. I can probably count them on a hand or two, customers out of 2000, right? That we've signed over the years. And that's our job, right? It's to continually provide a competitive rate that's attractive, that would make people want to pick us, but I will say this: we've advised a couple of companies who just say, "I want to try it and go on my own." And sometimes with Kevin, like we give them some advice, they end up working with us later. A couple of them have been able to make it successful on their own. We're happy to help, you know, in either case you know, and provide some insight and help avoid some heartburn. I think some things are harder than others, like insurance. Like if you're going to build your own insurance products, you've got to get certain licenses. [00:27:47] And I want to set up a whole different entity and everything else, you know, for that, but you know, some things are easier than others. Some things are harder than others. So it kind of can just depend what we decided to put together.  [00:27:59] Jason: Yeah. I think it's important for property managers to keep the main thing, otherwise it's so easy to get distracted as an entrepreneur. We're like, "let's add this and let's do this," and then suddenly the main thing starts to slip. So you're like, "cool. I'm going to beat that $17 that Andrew Smallwood's going to get me per door. I'm going to get it to $20 or to $30," or whatever. And then they're losing out on hundreds of dollars because they're not getting more clients. They're not focused on the main things in the business and retaining clients. And they're like, "Oh, now we have to do this," because you know, in order to do all of this, it's building another business. Building another business in the business. And one of the biggest problems I see with entrepreneurs, especially in early stages of their development is this idea that they need to just keep doing more stuff themselves and they start like expanding, doing other businesses. They have 20- 30 things. The most efficient model for an entrepreneur is one business. That's the most efficient. Generally, all these billionaires scaled one business, right? They cause they have so much focus. And I think focus is the most important of all five currencies of time, energy, focus, cash, and effort in relation to scaling or growing a business it's focus. That laser focus. And so keeping the main thing I've made that mistake, you know, doing my first conference, what I call my $2 million mistake, because we were growing at a healthy pace and then 300 percent a year, and then it was like, let's do this crazy, big, expensive conference and then sales marketing, like everything had to go towards this conference and it distracted the business because we were on the hook. You're on the hook with hotel. You're on the hook with the vendors, like everything that's going on. And that was really difficult. And that was a big lesson to me that the main thing has to stay the main thing. [00:29:51] It's super important.  [00:29:52] Andrew: Yeah. I mean, you said it so well, like when I think of Second Nature's own outsourcing decisions, right? Like I look at it through three lenses: so one is scale, right? Do I have scale or does the partner of scale? Who's going to deliver value through scale? Right? Second is skill, right? You know, do I have a certain skill or competency? Do they have a skill or competency, right? Who's going to drive more value that way? And then the third is time, which we were just talking about of like your opportunity cost and your focus on what you do and you know, I suppose there's a probably a fourth dimension there of just control of like ultimately the customer experience that you're trying to create can't be created reliably by an outsourced partner. And they're not dedicated and committed to that, or you're not aligned on that. Yeah. That would be another reason to do it yourself. But but yeah, it's, man, I take your point, Jason, of just, it's so easy to be ambitious and want to take a lot on and not stay focused on here's my core competency that I can continually leverage, to drive a lot of value. And here's how I can bring in complimentary pieces around it to create something bigger than that.  [00:30:58] Jason: Yeah. I mean, a big part of what we do at DoorGrow is just getting entrepreneurs to focus and then they start to scale really rapidly. So, I mean, in this industry, it could be diluted focus on different types of properties they're managing because each different type is almost like a different business. They're like, "I'm going to do commercial, I'm going to do associations," and then they're like trying to run multiple businesses with team members that are trying to jump into multiple businesses. And then it's a mess. And they're just not going as fast. And so this I view as, this is like adding on another business, and if you can strap on these tools from vendors, other companies, and get these resources, you can go a lot faster and keep the main thing. So, yeah, love it. So the third thing we talked and we've touched on this in a few instances of how this can help, but the third thing was increasing profit. So, I mean, there's the obvious bump that you're charging a fee for this and you're get convincing the residents. And for the residents, I think a lot of this would sound like a no brainer. They're getting more value in their mind than what they're going to be charged, and then it becomes a no brainer for them to do this. [00:32:03] And it protects them and it helps them get better credit. But let's talk specifically about profitability, like increasing profit.  [00:32:11] Andrew: So, yeah. So I think, you know, at Second Nature, like we do care about the experience and providing convenience to people, but it's also really important to us that there's a strong economic case for all parties. And so the way we often design and the recommendations we make on pricing. I mean, listen, it's a property manager's business. So Sarah, we're going to let them choose, right? Here's it's their pricing that they're charging their customer. We're not going to get in the way of that. That's in their control. But when we make recommendations, which I'll say nine times out of 10, right? If not more. It's set up in such a way where a resident is saving over $100 per year compared to what they're already spending right on the same expenses if they were to go with the status quo, right? Versus being enrolled in the benefits package. And then we make that as easy as signing their lease. There's a clear economic benefit, right? For the resident for the investors with HVAC savings. Everything else we're talking about earlier. Well over a hundred dollars per year in annualized savings for the investor. And then for the property manager, as we were talking about, well over a hundred dollars per year. Right. And so that's when you create new value. The way we think about it is you have a bigger pie that can be shared right across all parties, as opposed to taking the same pie and saying, "how do I shave off a little more for me?" but then you're cutting into the very relationship that you kind of depend on to support the business. And so how can we find new ways to add on and expand the value and share in that value because that makes it really sustainable and that builds trust while also building your balance sheet and so that's the focus and approach. You know we recommend that property managers take when they approach pricing and the other thing I'd probably give advice on here is that some property managers will go about this and then recognize very quickly, "oh, this is the thinking. I can't—" it's so frustrating, right? When I see an owner do this, you know, like, cost based pricing or a cost based approach as opposed to a market based approach. And what I mean by that is, "hey, here's all my costs. I want to make $17 per door. So here's what I'm going to charge, right?" [00:34:21] It's kind of like a investor saying, "well, here's my mortgage and all of my expenses, and I'd love to cashflow $800 a month. So I'm just going to charge this for rent." At which point Sarah tells them, regardless of what the market dictates, "yeah, your property is going to sit vacant for six months or it's only going to be vacant for two days and you way underpriced." [00:34:39] Right? And so the point is, "Hey, here's actually a market based approach to pricing that drives fair value and a good value proposition to everybody." Is the main encouragement we take. And again, if somebody wants to talk to Second Nature, whether they work with us or not, we're happy to advise on what we observe and see is happening in that market as it relates to pricing. [00:35:00] Jason: Yeah, ultimately the market's King. However, there are different segments of the market. So if people are targeting people at the end of the sales cycle that are searching on Google for property management, for example, the market is going to pay less there, because now you're a commodity. Whereas if you capture people in the blue ocean that are not searching on the internet, which there's a lot more of those, then you can charge more, have more fees, et cetera. And they're easier to close, right? And so the other factor lever that we've noticed with our clients at DoorGrow, increasing their profitability is increasing their ability to sell. So their ability to sell services and to sell the value and to create the pain gap between where people are and where they want to be, what value they want. [00:35:46] That ability as well as another lever in which they're able to charge more than their competition and close deals more easily. And there's some other levers as well. And so there's the market's one of the factors, but there are some levers that can be leveraged as well. And depending on who you're targeting in your audience, then you also can charge more money. [00:36:08] So that's something to keep in mind. So, yeah, this is super interesting. So everybody wants to increase profit if they're smart, those of you listening, if you're smart, you want to increase profit, you want to protect your investors, that's like your business, what you do, and you want to provide value to the residents. [00:36:24] So why would people just not do this? Why? Like have they just not heard of a resident benefits package or why would they not be doing this?  [00:36:32] Andrew: Yeah, I mean, there are definitely people that fall into that camp, and I'm sure there's probably going to be at least a couple people listening to this who haven't heard of a residence package. I also think over the last few years, this has been a really hot topic that's been talked about a lot, and people are seeing it more and more. As more companies adopt it, they just see it. Like they see our flyers in the Zillow listings, you know, the second photo, you know, beyond the thumbnail, it's like, here's a list of all these benefits, right, that people are putting in the marketing language or listing language or on their competitor's websites. And so I do think awareness is rapidly growing here. I mean, 101% empathy is property managers are often so busy, right? like just to do the kind of like table stakes of property management. It can take a lot of investment into their systems, into their process. I know that's something that you guys offer to folks and help them with. It can really feel like it's hard to implement a change in my business, let alone, you know, I think this is where Second Nature saw a real problem to solve. Like, how am I going to go through seven different sales processes, right, which is really like 21 to 30, if I want to look at more than just one vendor for a service, right? Go through all those processes, line up all my agreements, get those executed, and get my onboarding and implementation set up at the same time. [00:37:53] And align everybody the same, like consistent experience on going throughout it. That feels like going to Mars, you know, it's like a real big thing to tackle. So that's where we really just wanted to be like the easy button for that and drive, you know, "Hey, we've got a million plus residents on our platform, you know, thousands of property managers that we're working with. And, you know, can we drive some efficiency and pass that benefit alone to the customer," you know, is core to our value proposition. And so that's, I think what has brought, you know, a lot of people to us while we're growing very fast, have earned the reputation that we have, and at the same time we don't take it lightly. There's a lot more work to do. There's still still more change that needs to happen here, but I think the big thing is just the anticipation of all the effort and just the hard work of making any change in your business, right? Is a lot of times what people come up against.  [00:38:43] Jason: Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of property managers, people have heard me talk about the Cycle of Suck on the show before. There's a lot of overwhelm. There's a lot of stress, a lot of property managers struggling. They're in a race to the bottom in terms of pricing. They're focused on internet marketing, SEO, pay per click, content marketing, social media marketing, which is the bottom of the barrel owners that are the ones left over, the crappy scraps that fell off the word of mouth table. Like there's a lot of challenge there, by the way, we can help you with that. Reach out to us at DoorGrow. So that may be a big reason why they're just not doing these things that are in their mind, ancillary, auxiliary, and they're not adding this additional value and they're leaving money on the table because they're just too focused on trying to just get their business to eke out a little bit of dollars and, you know, they're stressed.  [00:39:31] Sarah: So I've got a question that Andrew if you have a recommendation on, at what stage would this be easiest for a property manager to implement? Is it easiest right off the bat when they're starting and they have no doors or a few doors? Is it easiest when they have maybe 100? Is it easiest when they get to the 500 plus mark? Or is there a stage at which it's like, maybe it's just in their mind, it feels too hard, and you're like, "Oh, actually, it's really easy, and here's why."  [00:39:59] Andrew: Yeah, great question, Sarah. I mean, here's the thing. Second Nature works with customers who have as little as their first one to two doors and are just getting started, right? A lot of our customers have hundreds or a couple thousand doors, and we work with a few clients that have 80,000 plus units in their portfolio. So we've worked with people at all sizes who have come and started all sizes. I will say this though. I think if somebody has under 20 to 30 doors, even as simple and easy as Second Nature makes it, you know, probably that person would be better served as they're getting their first couple of dozen doors on in focusing on their core operations, their core systems, their accounting platform getting set up. I would recommend probably holding on the— I'm sure my S and B reps are going to be listening to this and being like, "what are you saying, man?"— [00:40:47] And jokes aside, like I have talked to a few people where I've like pushed them on it a little bit. Like, "Hey, they've got eight doors," and I'm like, "okay, so here, this handful of hours, right, that you could spend doing this. Let's add $17 per door times your eight doors. Like, here's the business impact to this, and then what are you going to do with that amount," so to speak, right? And "how are you going to reinvest that in your business? Like, how do you see that as the best use of your time versus spending that going and doing, you know, business development or, you know, generating realtor referrals or whatever your strategy is for growing?" Okay. Your business to kind of that you know, initial point of profitability to support yourself. Like, how are you seeing that? And in one case, he said, "this is my differentiator. This is what I get to talk about in my market that I do that others don't. So it's actually going to help me attract more owners. I really want to do this now." Cool. Like I wouldn't stop that person from working with us, but I'd say generally, probably somebody in their first couple dozen doors is better focused on growing that and getting their core processes in a really stable place.  [00:41:47] Jason: Sure. They can add like one door and make what they would make if I had $17 times eight, right? So if they're focusing on that, but yeah, I get that. So I would imagine then maybe right around that 50 door stage is a really good place. This is where a lot of people start to stack and add vendors and get sort like. Then it starts to make sense to get some leverage because this is a lot of times I call the first sand trap where they start to get stuck between 50 to a hundred, because they're doing everything themselves. And this is probably where they can start to get some additional leverage and add some additional services. [00:42:18] Andrew: So if I can compliment you guys real quick, I saw like the DoorGrow code thing, and I think part of it may have been blurred out, but I think I got like the gist of it, I remember seeing, you know, how you guys had kind of stages. I'm like, wow, that is so cool. And if I was a new property manager, I would love having and seeing a resource like that of just, "man, here's like what I can focus on at this time that's right for me. It's going to get me to the next phase and then what to focus on here to get to the next one." Like what a helpful and useful tool. [00:42:47] So I just wanted to say kudos to you guys for putting that out there.  [00:42:50] Jason: Yeah, thanks. If anybody wants that for free, like they can go to DoorGrow.Com. Click the big pink button on the homepage. 'I want to grow.' And on that page, there's three steps. The third one is a YouTube video, 95 minute training called the DoorGrow Code. It's all about it. So it'll show you how to scale. And we're confident we're doing this with clients that we could take any business from zero doors to a thousand doors in five years or less. If they just listen to us and do what we say at each stage. Yeah. Very cool. So thanks for plugging us. Appreciate it. [00:43:25] Andrew: So I'm solicited. Yeah. Yeah. But it felt right in that moment.  [00:43:29] Jason: Yeah. There's very specific things that happen at different stages. And I think if you are at least at that 50 door stage or beyond, like you'll be crazy not to do this. And I love the idea of getting your resident benefits package as a unique differentiator just to stand out, which will give you more confidence in sales. And when people need confidence, the most is when they have the least doors. This is where confidence is a huge factor for them. Like when we take them through our process of cleaning up their brand, their website, all of this, we're really just helping them with their confidence level to go out and sell. [00:44:04] And they can go out and sell without all that stuff. They don't even need a website. They just need clients. Right. But doing these things helps them. And this is something else I think they can boost their confidence a little bit. And that's worth it. That's worth it for sure. So, well, cool, Andrew, anything else we're missing about this? And if not, then how can people get in touch with you or with Second Nature?  [00:44:25] Andrew: The only other thing I'd say is anybody who's made it right to this point, 45- 50 minutes in, like, I feel like you deserve a medal or something like that with attention spans, considerations fans. So thanks for sticking with us. I hope you got some value today. Sarah and Jason, I really appreciate the opportunity to be here with you guys. I really enjoyed our conversation. I love you guys' energy and vibe you know, excited to get to know you guys better. And and I'd say this if people are looking for you know, more resources and things like that, we've got at rbp.secondnature.Com, there's a bunch of things, we've got articles, we've got the triple win podcasts that we record a bunch of episodes there that people can check out. If that's of interest to them, we've occasionally got events, digital events and things like that, that we're putting on, if they're just looking to learn more, we've got some of those kinds of resources, or if they're looking to talk to someone specifically about what we talked about here today they can find a contact form to do that as well. [00:45:16] And just want to express appreciation to you guys. Again, really appreciate you inviting me on and having a chance to do this.  [00:45:21] Jason: Cool. Thanks for coming on the show.  [00:45:23] Sarah: Yeah. Thanks for being here. I think this is something that if you don't have it, just look into it. I feel like there's not a downside in this anywhere. So just look into it. If this was something that I had known about when I owned my business, man, would have done that in a heartbeat, but, I really think it's something that can like benefit all parties. It can like help set you apart from other people that maybe don't know about this or just aren't doing it yet. [00:45:50] And it sounds like they make it easy for you. I think that you're probably right, Andrew. Like you hit that right on the nose. Like they're busy and they're like, "Oh, this is hard." It sounds like they understand that and they'll work with you to make it easy.  [00:46:04] Jason: Yeah. Yeah I love that you guys are helping people through this process and making it easy. So We'll definitely be pushing our clients to take a look at this episode so that they can start getting the stuff implemented Thanks for coming on the show. Appreciate you. Awesome.  [00:46:17] Andrew: Thanks guys.  [00:46:18] Jason: Thanks. All right So if you are a property management entrepreneur that's wanting to add more doors grow your business reach out to us at DoorGrow We would love to help you out anything else we should say All right, then until next time to our mutual growth. [00:46:31] Bye everyone. [00:46:31] You just listened to the #DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrowClub. Join your fellow DoorGrow Hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff. SEO, PPC, pay-per-lead content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow!  [00:46:58] At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog doorgrow.com, and to get notified of future events and news subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subscribe. Until next time, take what you learn and start DoorGrow Hacking your business and your life.

After Dark with Hosts Rob & Andrew – So it begs the question, why is Hunter Biden recuperating “I meant staying” there? Quiet as it's kept by the White House and Joe Biden, the first son, Hunter, has been staying there off and on. He should be with one of his baby mamas or at least with one of his many professional sex workers, aka prostitutes. How are they getting inside without the public seeing? Could it be, they too, enter the...

After Dark with Hosts Rob & Andrew – So it begs the question, why is Hunter Biden recuperating “I meant staying” there? Quiet as it's kept by the White House and Joe Biden, the first son, Hunter, has been staying there off and on. He should be with one of his baby mamas or at least with one of his many professional sex workers, aka prostitutes. How are they getting inside without the public seeing? Could it be, they too, enter the...

South Bronx United is heading into our annual #PowerOf11 campaign! We hope you'll follow us, spread the word, and maybe even support with a donation at powerof11.southbronxunited.org. We plan to have a few new episodes coming out that will take you behind the scenes of South Bronx United to help you learn more about the impactful work we do on a daily basis. However, to really understand SBU and our programs, you need to see it! So we will be coming out with 11 videos that dive into all aspects of SBU's programs and services that are reaching more than 1,500 children, youth, and families. Starting June 1st, I encourage you to check out our social media pages (@southbronxunited), our website, and YouTube. In the meantime, we thought we'd take you back to the beginning of South Bronx United's story. Our Executive Director and co-founder, Andrew So, was recently on Bronx Heroes, a new Podcast from our friends at Grassroots Grocery, to speak about South Bronx United's history and programs. We are cross-posting the episode here. If you like it, I encourage you to check out more episodes of the Bronx Heroes Podcast, available wherever you listen.

After Dark with Hosts Rob & Andrew – So what exactly is Bragg's end game? Well, for one, he wants to appease the insatiable desires of Democrats, liberal media, and RINOs to take Trump out. He is also looking to springboard his political lot to higher aspirations, aka governor of New York. It is a tragedy that our justice system...

After Dark with Hosts Rob & Andrew – So much havoc has been unleashed on society by this new breed of radical woke Democrats. They have denigrated King's dream and reduced it to be used as a weapon to silence critics who hold to his dream. King's dream was about “content of character” and all being created equal, but the radical left has hijacked the message for...

After Dark with Hosts Rob & Andrew – So much havoc has been unleashed on society by this new breed of radical woke Democrats. They have denigrated King's dream and reduced it to be used as a weapon to silence critics who hold to his dream. King's dream was about “content of character” and all being created equal, but the radical left has hijacked the message for...

Andrew Forman is the Founder and CEO of Givz, an organization that helps businesses, including SaaS companies, drive revenue and loyalty by allowing customers to choose donations over discounts. It's a brilliant concept that many of your clients have never seen before, especially in the sales process. Today, Andrew joins the show to discuss his background as an investment banker, his experience with non-profit organizations and how he came up with this innovative idea.Episode SponsorSmall Fish, Big Pond – https://smallfishbigpond.com/ Use the promo code ‘SaaSFuel'Champion Leadership Group – https://championleadership.com/Key Takeaways01:18 – Jeff introduces today's guest, Andrew Forman, who joins the show to discuss his journey from investment banker to SaaS founder, his involvement in non-profits, and the inspiration to launch Givz07:14 – How Givz works13:17 – The difference in consumer perception when they receive a personal discount versus one for charity15:32 – Andrew's entrepreneurial origin story19:12 – The role mentors have played in Andrew's success20:44 – The biggest lessons Andrew learned from his time as an investment banker25:15 – Jeff takes a moment to thank one of today's sponsors, Small Fish, Big Pond25:55 – How Givz can be used in a B2B market and, specifically, with SaaS companies31:06 – Where listeners can go to learn more about Givz31:58 – How Andrew came up with this revolutionary idea34:06 – Jeff thanks Andrew for joining the show and sharing his storyTweetable Quotes“I thought about what problems I had experienced in the world. And I think that is where I started Givz, having recognized that it was such a pain for brands and charities to come and work together when it should be a really seamless process. And so we started to build that.” (05:08) (Andrew)“Givz is building donation incentives for the future. So, what did incentives used to look like? They used to look like discounts. Now, buyers are becoming a bit more savvy. Hugely discounted brands are going out of business. It is something where you know that, ultimately, you get what you pay for. And so, if you're going to be paying hugely discounted prices, you're likely going to get lower quality product. Brands are starting to figure this out. They're starting to see, with new data analytics tools that are out there, that anyone who comes in via discounts are their lowest lifetime value customers. And so, you want to really drive, as a business owner, full-price purchases as much as you can.” (07:20) (Andrew)“And I think, from a consumer psychology standpoint, you're unlocking something extremely important within an individual's brain that says, ‘Yeah, this brand is not cheap. In fact, I'm paying full-price, but I'm getting money to give to any charity that I want to support while I'm getting this quality product.'” (12:58) (Andrew)“When you surround yourself with A-plus players, you have to become A-plus pretty quickly.” (24:45) (Andrew)“So, the way that it actually works is we have over 175,000 different charities in the database and most are covered. That said, if there's a charity that somebody started or you started that's not in there, you can get it added in less than forty-eight hours.” (29:04) (Andrew)“The goal here is to make donation incentives mainstream across industries. And I think we're well on our way.” (31:49)...

In This Episode: Andrew GottWorth shares his story of having Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and how ERP allowed him to function again.  addresses the benefits of ERP and how ERP is for Everyone  How Exposure & response prevention can help people with OCD and for those with everyday stress and anxiety  Links To Things I Talk About: Andrew's Instagram @justrught ERP School: https://www.cbtschool.com/erp-school-lp Episode Sponsor: This episode of Your Anxiety Toolkit is brought to you by CBTschool.com.  CBTschool.com is a psychoeducation platform that provides courses and other online resources for people with anxiety, OCD, and Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors.  Go to cbtschool.com to learn more.  Spread the love! Everyone needs tools for anxiety... If you like Your Anxiety Toolkit Podcast, visit YOUR ANXIETY TOOLKIT PODCAST to subscribe free and you'll never miss an episode. And if you really like Your Anxiety Toolkit, I'd appreciate you telling a friend (maybe even two). EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION  This is Your Anxiety Toolkit - Episode 308.  Welcome, everybody. I am really pumped for this episode. We have the amazing Andrew Gottworth on for an interview where he just shared so many nuggets of wisdom and hope and motivation. I think you're going to love it. But the main point we're making today is that ERP is for everyone. Everyone can benefit from facing their fears. Everyone can benefit by reducing their compulsive behaviors. Even if you don't technically call them compulsions, you too can benefit by this practice. Andrew reached out to me and he was really passionate about this. And of course, I was so on board that we jumped on a call right away and we got it in, and I'm so excited to share it with you. Thank you, Andrew, for sharing all your amazing wisdom.  Before we head into the show, let's quickly do the “I did a hard thing” for the week. This one is from Christina, and they went on to say: “Thought of you today, and you're saying, ‘It's a beautiful day to do hard things,' as I went down a water slide, terrified, as I'm well out of my comfort zone.” This is such great. They're saying that's on their holiday, the first time they've taken a holiday in quite a while. “It's difficult, but I'm doing it. I'm trying to lean into the discomfort.” This is so good. I love when people share their “I did a hard thing,” mainly, as I say before, because it doesn't have to be what's hard for everybody. It can be what's hard for you. Isn't it interesting, Christina is sharing a water slide is so terrifying? Christina, PS, I'm totally with you on that. But some of the people find it thrill-seeking. And then I'm sure the things that Christina does, she might not have anxiety, but other people who love to thrill seek find incredibly terrifying. So, please don't miss that point, guys. It is such an important thing that we don't compare. If it's terrifying, it's terrifying, and you deserve a massive yay. You did a hard thing for it. So, thank you, Christina.  Again, quickly, let me just quickly do the review of the week, and then we can set back and relax and listen to Andrew's amazing wisdom. This one is from Anonymous. Actually, this one is from Sydneytenney, and they said: “Incredible resource! What an incredible resource this podcast is! Thank you for sharing all of this information so freely… you're truly making a difference in so many lives, including mine! (I am also reading through your book and I LOVE it. You nailed it in marrying OCD with self-compassion - what a gift!!!)” So, for those of you who don't know, I wrote a book called The Self-Compassion Workbook for OCD. If you have OCD and you want a compassionate approach to ERP by all means, head over to Amazon or wherever you buy books and you can have the resource right there.  All right, let's get over to the show. Kimberley: Okay. Welcome, Andrew Gottworth. Thank you so much for being here. Andrew: Yeah. So, happy to be here. Really excited to chat with you for a bit. Kimberley: Yeah. How fun. I'm so happy you reached out and you had a message that I felt was so important to talk about. Actually, you had lots of ideas that I was so excited to talk about. Andrew: I might bring some of them up because I think, anyway, it's related to our big topic.  Erp Is For Everyone Kimberley: Yeah. But the thing that I love so much was this idea that ERP (Exposure and Response Prevention) is for everyone. And so, tell me, before we get into that, a little bit about your story and where you are right up until today and why that story is important to you. Andrew: Yeah. So, there's a lot, as you work in the OCD field that it takes so long between first experiencing to getting a diagnosis. And so, with the knowledge I have now, I probably started in early childhood, elementary school. I remember racing intrusive thoughts in elementary school and being stuck on things and all that. But definitely, middle school, high school got worse and worse. So, fast forward to freshman year of college, it was really building up. I was really having a lot of issues. I didn't know what it was and really didn't know what it was for nine, 10 years later. But I was having a really hard time in college. I was depressed. I thought I was suicidal. Learning later, it's probably suicidal ideation, OCD just putting thoughts of death and jumping up a building and jumping in a lake and getting run over and all that. But I didn't want to talk about it then, I think. Andrew's Story About Having Obsessive Compulsive Disorder A bit about me, I come from Kentucky. I count Louisville, Kentucky as the Midwest. We have a bit of an identity crisis, whether we're South Midwest, East Coast, whatever. But still there, there's a culture that mental health is for “crazy people.” Of course, we don't believe that. So, my tiptoe around it was saying, “I'm having trouble focusing in class. Maybe I have ADHD.” And that's what I went in for. For some reason, that was more palatable for me to talk about that rather than talk about these thoughts of death and all that. And so, I did an intake assessment and thankfully I was somewhat honest and scored high enough on the depression scale that they were like, “Hey, you have a problem.” And so, ended up talking more. So, back in 2009, freshman year of college, I got diagnosed with depression and generalized anxiety disorder, but completely missed the OCD. I think they didn't know about it. I didn't know about it. I didn't have the language to talk about it at the time because I didn't have hand washing or tapping and counting and these other things that I would maybe see on TV and stuff, which – yeah, I see you nodding – yes, I know that's a common story.  So, I entered therapy in 2009, and I've been in therapy and non-medication ever since. But I had problems. I still had problems. I would make progress for a bit. And then I just feel like I was stuck. So, I ended up being in three mental hospitals. One, when I was doing AmeriCorps up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and had a great experience there. Two, three days up there at Rogers, which I'm very grateful for. And then stabilized moving forward. So, I ended up-- I dropped outta college. I dropped out of AmeriCorps. I then went back to college and again went to a mental hospital in Bowling Green, Kentucky. I was at Western Kentucky University, stabilize, keep going. Learning lessons along the way, learning cognitive distortions and learning talk therapy, and all these.  So, let's keep fast-forwarding. Another mental hospital in Atlanta, Georgia. There's a long-term outpatient stay, Skyline Trail. I'm thankful for all of these places along the way. And I wish somewhere along the way, I knew about OCD and knew about ERP, our big topic for the day.  So, finally, gosh, I can't quite remember. I think 2018, a few years ago, still having problems. I had gone from full-time at work to part-time at work. I was just miserable. I would get into my cubicle and just constantly think, I'm not going to make it. I got to go home. I got to find an excuse to get out of here early. I just need to stay sick or I got to go home, or something came up. And so, every day I'd have an excuse until I finally was like, “I'm going to get found out that I'm not working full-time. I'm going to jump the gun, I'll voluntarily go down in part-time.”  So, that worked for a bit until OCD kept going. And then I quit. I quit again. And at that point, I was like, “I've failed. I've quit so many things – college, AmeriCorps.” I was a summer camp counselor and I left early. “Now this job. I need something.” So, I went again to find more help. And finally, thankfully, someone did an intake assessment, came back, and said, “Well, one problem is you have OCD.” I was like, “What? No, I don't have that. I don't wash my hands. I'm not a messy person. I'm not organized.” Gosh, I'm so thankful for her.  Kimberley: Yeah, I want to kiss this person.  Andrew: Yeah. But here's the duality of it. She diagnosed me with it. I am forever grateful. And she didn't do ERP. She didn't know it. So unbelievably thankful that I got that diagnosis. It changed my life. And then I spent several weeks, maybe a few months just doing talk therapy again. And I just knew something didn't feel right. But I had this new magical thing, a diagnosis. And so, my OCD latched onto OCD and researched the heck out of it. And so, I was researching, researching, researching, and really starting to find some things like, “Oh, this isn't working for me. I've been doing the same type of therapy for a decade and I'm not making progress.” Unbelievably thankful for the Louisville OCD Clinic. So, at this point in this story-- thanks for listening to the whole saga.  Kimberley: No, I've got goosebumps. Andrew: I'm unemployed, I have my diagnosis, but I'm not making any progress. So, I go, “Throw this in as well. Not really that important.” But I go to an intensive outpatient program in Louisville before the OCD clinic. And I remember this conversation of the group therapy leader saying, “I need you to commit to this.” And I said, “But I don't think this is helping me either,” because the conversation was about relationships, my relationship was great. It was about work, I wasn't working. It was about parents, my parents were great. They were supporting me financially. They're super helpful and loving and kind. It's like, “None of this is external.” I kept saying, “This is internal. I have something going on inside of me.” And she said, “Well, I want you to commit to it.” I said, “I'm sorry, I found a local OCD clinic. I'm going to try them out.”  So, I did IOP, I did 10 straight days, and it is a magical, marvelous memory of mine. I mean, as you know, the weirdest stuff, oh gosh. Some of the highlights that are quite humorous, I had a thing around blood and veins. And so, we built our hierarchy, and maybe we'll talk about this in a bit, what ERP is. So, built the hierarchy, I'm afraid of cutting my veins and bleeding out. So, let's start with a knife on the table. And then the next day, the knife in the hand. And then the next day, the knife near my veins. And then we talked about a blood draw. And then the next day, we watched a video of a nurse talking about it. Not even the actual blood draw, but her talking about it. So, of course, my SUDs are up really high. And the nurse says in the video, “Okay, you need to find the juiciest, bumpiest vein, and that's where you put it in.” And my therapist, pause the video. She said, “Perfect. Andrew, I want you to go around to every person in the office and ask to feel the juiciest, bumpiest veins.” Oh my gosh. Can you imagine?  Kimberley: The imagery and the wording together is so triggering, isn't it? Andrew: Right. She's amazing. So, she was hitting on two things for me. One, the blood and veins, and two, inconveniencing people. I hated the inconveniencing people or have awkward moments. Well, hey, it's doing all three of these things. So, I went around. And of course, it's an OCD clinic, so nobody's against it. They're like, “Sure, here you go. This one looks big. Here, let me pump it up for you.” And I'm like, “No, I don't like this.” Kimberley: Well, it's such a shift from what you had been doing.  Andrew: It's totally different. I'll speak to the rest because that's really the big part. But ERP over the next few years gave me my life back. I started working again. I worked full-time. Went part-time, then full-time. Got into a leadership position. And then for a few other reasons, my wife and I decided to make a big jump abroad. And so, moved to Berlin. And I have a full-time job here and a part-time disc golf coach trainer. And now I'm an OCD advocate and excited to work with you on that level and just looking at where my life was four or five years ago versus now. And thanks to our big-ticket item today, ERP. Kimberley: Right. Oh, my heart is so exploding for you. Andrew: Oh, thank you.  Kimberley: My goodness. I mean, it's not a wonderful story. It's actually an incredibly painful story. Andrew: You can laugh at it. I told it humorously. How Andrew Applied Erp For His Ocd Kimberley: No. But that's what I'm saying. That's what's so interesting about this, is that it's such a painful story, but how you tell it-- would I be right in saying like a degree of celebration to it? Tell me a little bit about-- you're obviously an ERP fan. Tell me a little bit about what that was like. Were you in immediately, or were you skeptical? Had you read enough articles to feel like you were trusting it? What was that like for you? Because you'd been put through the wringer. Andrew: Yeah. There's a lot to talk about, but there are a couple of key moments when you mention it. So, one, we're going through the Y-BOCS scale, the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale, something like that. So, she asks me one of the questions like, how often do you feel like a compulsion to do something and you don't do the compulsion? “Oh, never. I've never stopped. But you can do that?” It was just this moment of, “What do you mean?” If it's hot, I'm going to make it colder. If it's cold, I'm going to make it warmer. If I'm uncomfortable, I'm going to fidget. I'm a problem solver. Both my parents were math teachers. I was an all-A student and talk about perfectionism and “just right” OCD maybe in this context as well. But also, I love puzzles. I love solving things. And that was me. I was a problem solver. It never occurred to me to not solve the problem. And so, that was a huge aha moment for me. And I see it now and I talk about it now to other people.  Am I Doing Erp “Just Right”? But another part of ERP with the just right is, am I doing ERP right? Am I doing it right? Am I doing ERP right? And of course, my therapist goes, “I don't know. Who knows? Maybe, maybe not.” So, depending on where you want to go with this, we can talk about that more. So, I think in general, I hated that at the time. I was like, “I know there is a right way to do it. There is. I know there is.” But now, I even told someone yesterday in our Instagram OCD circles, someone was posting about it, and I said exactly that, that I hated this suggestion at first that maybe you're doing it wrong, maybe you're not.  I will say, as we talk about ERP for everyone, someone who maybe is going to listen to this or hears us talking on Instagram and wants to do it on their own, this idea of exposing yourself to something uncomfortable and preventing the response – I don't know if this is wrong, but I will say for me, it was not helpful. In my first few weeks, I would do something like-- I was a little claustrophobic, so I maybe sit in the middle seat of a car. It's good I'm doing the exposure. I'm preventing the response by staying there. I didn't get out. But in my head, I'm doing, “Just get through this. Just get through this. I hate this. It's going to be over soon. You'll get through it and then you'll be better. Come on, just get through it. Oh, I hate this. Ugh. Ugh.” And then you get to the end and you go, “Okay, I made it through.” And of course, that didn't really prevent the response. That reinforced my dread of it. And so, I would say that's definitely a lesson as we get into that.  Kimberley: And I think that brings me to-- you bring up a couple of amazing points and I think amazing roadblocks that we have to know about ERP. So, often I have clients who'll say early in treatment, “You'd be so proud I did the exposure.” And I'd be like, “And the RP, did that get included?” So, let's talk about that. So, for you, you wanted to talk about like ERP is for everyone. So, where did that start for you? Where did that idea come from? Andrew: I would say it's been slow going over the years where-- I don't know how to say this exactly, but thinking like, there must be higher than 2% of people that have OCD because I think you have it and I think you have it and I think you have it, and noticing a lot of these things. And so, maybe they're not clinical level OCD and maybe it's just anxiety or I think, as I emailed you, just stress. But it's this-- I just wonder how many friends and family and Instagram connections have never had that aha moment that I did in my first week of IOP of, “Oh, I cannot try to solve this.” And so, I see people that I really care about and I joked with my wife, I said, “Why is it that all of our best friends are anxious people?” And I think that comes with this care and attention and that I've suffered and I don't want anyone else to suffer. And so, I see that anxiety in others. But getting back to what I see in them, maybe someone is socially anxious so they're avoiding a party or they're leaving early, or-- I mean, I did these two, avoided, left early, made sure I was in either a very large group where nobody really noticed me or I was in a one-on-one where I had more control. I don't know. So, seeing that in some other friends, leaving early, I just want to say to them, you can stay. It's worked for me. It really has. This staying, exposing yourself to the awkwardness of staying or maybe it's a little too loud or it's too warm. And then let that stress peak fall and see, well, how do you feel after 30 minutes? How do you feel after an hour? I want to scream that to my friends because it's helped me so much. I mean, you heard how awful and miserable it was for so long and how much better. I'm not cured, I think. I'm still listening to your six-part rumination series because I think that's really what I'm working on now.  So, I think those physical things, I've made tremendous improvement on blood and veins and all that. But that's also not why I quit work. I didn't quit working. I didn't quit AmeriCorps because there's so much blood everywhere. No, it's nonprofits, it's cubicles. But it was this dread that built this dread of the day, this dread of responding to an email. Am I going to respond right? Oh no, I'm going to get a phone call. Am I going to do that? Am I going to mess this up? And because I didn't have that response prevention piece, all I had was the exposure piece, then it's-- I can't remember who said it, but like, ERP without the RP is just torture. You're just exposing yourself to all these miserable things.  Kimberley: You're white-knuckling.  Andrew: Yeah. And it's-- I love research. I am a scientist by heart. I'm a Physics major and Environmental Studies master's. I love research and all this. And so, I've looked into neuroplasticity, but I also am not an expert. Correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I hear, you're just reinforcing that neural pathway. So, I'm going into work and I dread it. I'm saying, “I hate this. I can't wait to go home. I hate this.” So, that's reinforcing that for the next day. And tomorrow I go in and that dreads bigger, and the next day the dreads bigger.  And so, seeing that in other colleagues who are having a miserable time at work is just getting worse and worse and worse. But I also can see that there are parts they enjoy. They enjoy problem-solving, they enjoy helping students, they enjoy the camaraderie. And so, I want to help them with, well, let's see how we can do ERP with the things you don't like and so you're not building this dread day after day and you can do the things you value. Seems like you value us coworkers, seems like you value helping the students, seems like you value solving this problem, and that's meaningful. But I'm watching you get more and more deteriorated at work. And that's hard to do that in others.  ERP Is For Everyone Kimberley: Yeah. I resonate so much from a personal level and I'll share why, is I have these two young children who-- thankfully, I have a Mental Health degree and I have license, and I'm watching how anxiety is forming them. They're being formed by society and me and my husband and so forth, but I can see how anxiety is forming them. And there's so many times-- I've used the example before of both my kids separately were absolutely petrified of dogs. And they don't have OCD, but we used a hierarchy of exposure and now they can play with the neighbor's dogs. We can have dogs sitting. And it was such an important thing of like, I could have missed that and just said, “You're fine. Let's never be around dogs.” And so, it's so interesting to watch these teeny tiny little humans being formed by like, “Oh, I'm not a dog person.” You are a dog person. You're just afraid of dogs. It's two different things. Andrew: Yeah. So, it's funny that my next-door neighbor, when I was young, had a big dog. And when we're moving into the house for the very first time, very young, I don't know, four or something, it ran into the house, knocked me over, afraid of dogs for years. So, same thing. Worked my way up, had a friend with a cute little pup, and then got to a scarier one. And also, funnily to me, my next-door neighbor, two in a row, were German, and they scared me, the scary dog, German. And then the next one was the “Stay off my lawn, don't let your soccer ball come over.” So, for years, I had this like, “I'm not going to root for Germany in sports. I don't like Germany.” And then here I am living in Germany now. Kimberley: Like an association. Andrew: Yeah. So, I think fear association, anxiety association. And then I'm also playing around with this idea, maybe do a series on Instagram or maybe another talk with someone about, is it anxiety or is it society? And so, talking about things that were made to feel shame about. So, I don't know if you can see on our webcam that I have my nails painted. I would never have done this in Kentucky. So, growing up in this, I remember vividly in elementary school, I sat with my legs crossed and someone said, “That's how a girl sits. You have to sit with your foot up on your leg.” So, I did for the rest of my life. And then I wore a shirt with colorful fish on it, and they said, “Oh, you can't wear that, guys don't wear that.” So, I didn't. I stopped wearing that and all these things, whether it's about our body shape or femininity or things we enjoy that are maybe dorky or geeky. I just started playing Dungeons and Dragons. We have a campaign next week. And I remember kids getting bullied for that.  I don't know if you agree, but I see this under the umbrella of ERP. So, you're exposing yourself to this potential situation where there's shame or embarrassment, or you might get picked on. Someone might still see these on the train and go, “What are you doing with painted nails?” And I'm going to choose to do that anyway. I still get a little squirmy sometimes, but I want to. I want to do that and I want that for my friends and family too. And I see it in, like you said, in little kids. A lot of my cousins have young kids and just overhearing boys can't wear pink, or you can't be that when you grow up, or just these associations where I think you can, I think you can do that. Kimberley: I love this so much because I think you're so right in why ERP is for everyone. It's funny, I'll tell you a story and then I don't want to talk about me anymore, but-- Andrew: No, I want to hear it. That's fine. Kimberley: I had this really interesting thing happen the other day. Now I am an ERP therapist. My motto is, “It's a beautiful day to do hard things.” I talk and breathe this all day, and I have recovered from an eating disorder. But this is how I think it's so interesting how ERP can be layered too, is I consider myself fully recovered. I am in such good shape and I get triggered and I can recover pretty quick. But the other day, I didn't realize this was a compulsion that I am still maybe doing. I went to a spa, it was a gift that was given to me, and it says you don't have to wear your bathing suit right into the thing. So, I'm like, “Cool, that's fine. I'm comfortable with my body.” But I caught myself running from the bathroom down into the pool, like pretty quickly running until I was like, that still learned behavior, it's still learned avoidance from something I don't even suffer from anymore. And I think that, to speak to what you're saying, if we're really aware we can-- and I don't have OCD, I'm open about that. If all humans were really aware, they could catch avoidant behaviors we're doing all the time that reinforces fear, which is why exposure and response prevention is for everybody. Some people be like, “Oh, no, no. I don't even have anxiety.” But it's funny what you can catch in yourself that how you're running actually literally running.  Andrew: Literally running. Yeah. Kimberley: Away. So, that's why I think you've mentioned how social anxiety shows up and how exposure and response prevention is important for that. And daily fears, societal expectations, that's why I think that's so cool. It's such a cool concept. Andrew: Yeah. And so, help me since I do consider you the expert here, but I've heard clinically that ERP can be used for OCD but also eating disorder, at least our clinic in Louisville serves OCD, eating disorder, and PTSD. And so, I see the similarities there of the anxiety cycle, the OCD cycle for each of those. So, then let's say that's what ERP is proposed for. But then we also have generalized anxiety and I think we're seeing that. I've heard Jenna Overbaugh talk about that as well. It's this scale between anxiety to high anxiety to subclinical OCD, to clinical OCD, and that ERP is good for all of that. So, we have those, and then we get into stress and avoidant behavior. So, I have this stressful meeting coming up, I'll find a way to skip it. Or I have this stressful family event, I'll find a way to avoid it. And then you get into the societal stuff, you get into these. And so, I see it more and more that yes, it is for everyone. Kimberley: Yeah. No, I mean, clinically, I will say we understand it's helpful for phobias, health anxiety, social anxiety, generalized anxiety. Under the umbrella of OCD are all these other disorders and, as you said, spectrums of those disorders that it can be beneficial for. And I do think-- I hear actually a lot of other clinicians who aren't OCD specialists and so forth talking about imposter syndrome or even like how cancel culture has impacted us and how everybody's self-censoring and avoiding and procrastinating. And I keep thinking like ERP for everybody. And that's why I think like, again, even if you're not struggling with a mental illness, imposter syndrome is an avoidant. Often people go, procrastination is an avoidant behavior, a safety behavior or self-censoring is a safety behavior, or not standing up for you to a boss is an opportunity for exposure as long as of course they're in an environment that's safe for them. So, I agree with you. I think that it is so widespread an opportunity, and I think it's also-- this is my opinion, but I'm actually more interested in your opinion, is I think ERP is also a mindset. Andrew: Yeah. Kimberley: Like how you live your life. Are you a face-your-fear kind of person? Can you become that person? That's what I think, even in you, and actually, this is a question, did your identity shift? Did you think you were a person who couldn't handle stresses and now you think you are? Or what was the identity shift that you experienced once you started ERP? Andrew: Yeah. That's a good question. I've had a few identity shifts over the years. So, I mentioned-- and not to be conceited, although here I am self-censoring because I don't want to come across as conceited anyway. So, I was an all-A student in high school, and then OCD and depression hit hard. And so, throughout college, freshman year I got my first B, sophomore year I got my first C, junior year I got my first D. And so, I felt like I was crawling towards graduation. And this identity of myself as Club President, all-A student, I had to come to terms with giving up who I thought I could be. I thought I could be-- people would joke, “You'll be the mayor of this town someday, Andrew.” And I watched this slip away and I had to change that identity. And not to say that you can't ever get that back with recovery, but what I will say is through recovery, I don't have that desire to anymore. I don't have that desire to be a hundred percent. I'm a big fan of giving 80%. And mayor is too much responsibility. I don't know, maybe someday. So, that changed.  And then definitely, through that down downturn, I thought, I can't handle this. I can't handle anxiety, I can't handle stress. People are going to find out that this image I've built of myself is someone who can't handle that. So, then comes the dip coming back up, ERP, starting to learn I can maybe but also-- I love to bounce all over the place, but I think I want to return a bit to that idea that you don't have to fix it. You don't have to solve the problem. I think that was me. And that's not realizing that I was making it harder on myself, that every moment of the day I was trying to optimize, fix, problem-solve.  If you allow me another detour, I got on early to make sure the video chat was working, sound was okay. And I noticed in my walk over to my computer, all the things my brain wanted me to do. I call my brain “Dolores” after Dolores Umbridge, which is very mean to me. My wife and I, Dolores can F off. But I checked my email to make sure I had the date right. Oops, no, the checking behavior. Check the time, making sure, because we're nine hours apart right now. “Oh, did I get the time difference right?” I thought about bringing over an extra set of lights so you could see me better. I wanted to make sure I didn't eat right before we talked, so I didn't burp on camera, made sure I had my water, and it was just all these-- and if I wasn't about to meet with an OCD expert, I wouldn't have even noticed these. I wouldn't have even noticed all of these checking, fidgeting, optimizing, best practicing. But it's exhausting.  And so, I'm going to maybe flip the script and ask you, how do you think other people that are not diagnosed with OCD, that are just dealing with anxiety and stress can notice these situations in their life? How do they notice when, “Oh, I'm doing an avoidant behavior,” or “I'm fixing something to fix my anxiety that gives me temporary relief”? Because I didn't notice them for 10 years. Kimberley: Yeah. Well, I think the question speaks to me as a therapist, but also me as a human. I catch every day how generalized anxiety wants to take me and grab me away. And so, I think a huge piece of it is knowledge, of course. It's knowledge that that-- but it's a lot to do with awareness. It's so much to do with awareness. I'll give you an example, and I've spoken about this before. As soon as I'm anxious, everything I do speeds up. I start walking faster, I start typing faster, I start talking faster. And there's no amount of exposure that will, I think, prevent me from going into that immediate behavior. So, my focus is staying-- every day, I have my mindfulness book right next to me. It's like this thick, and I look at it and I go, “Okay, be aware as you go into the day.” And then I can work at catching as I start to speed up and speed type.  So, I think for the person who doesn't have OCD, it is, first, like you said, education. They need to be aware, how is this impacting my life. I think it's being aware of and catching it. And then the cool part, and this is the part I love the most about being a therapist, is I get to ask them, what do you want to do? Because you don't have to change it. I'm not doing any harm by typing fast. In fact, some might say I'm getting more done, but I don't like the way it makes me feel. And so, I get to ask myself a question, do I want to change this behavior? Is it serving me anymore? And everyone gets to ask them that solves that question. Andrew: So, I think you bring up a good point though that I'm curious if you've heard this as well. So, you said you're typing fast and you're feeling anxious and you don't like how that feels. I would say for me, and I can think of certain people in my life and also generally, they don't realize those are connected. I didn't realize that was connected. In college, I'm wanting to drop out, I drop out of AmeriCorps, I drop out of summer camp. I'm very, very anxious and miserable and I don't know why. And looking back, I see it was this constant trying to fix things and being on alert. And I got to anticipate what this is going to be or else is going to go bad. I need to prevent this or else I'm going to have an anxious conversation. I need to only wear shorts in the winter because I might get hot. Oh no, what if I get hot? And it was constantly being in this scanning fear mindset of trying to avoid, trying to prevent, trying to-- thinking I was doing all these good things. And I saw myself as a best-practice problem solver. It's still something I'm trying to now separate between Dolores and Andrew. Andrew still loves best practices. But if I spend two hours looking for a best practice when I could have done it in five minutes, then maybe that was a waste. And I didn't realize that was giving me that anxiety.  So, yeah, I guess going back to I think of family, I think of coworkers, I think of friends that I have a suspicion, I'm not a therapist, I can't diagnose and I'm not going to go up, I think you have this. But seeing that they're coming to me and saying, “I'm exhausted. I just have so much going on,” I think in their head, it's “I have a lot of work.” Kimberley: External problems. Andrew: Yeah. I may be seeing-- yeah, but there's all this tension. You're holding it in your shoulders, you're holding it here, you're typing fast and not realizing that, oh, these are connected.  Kimberley: And that's that awareness piece. It's an awareness piece so much. And it is true. I mean, I think that's the benefit of therapy. Therapists are trained to ask questions so that you can become aware of things that you weren't previously aware of. I go to therapy and sometimes even my therapist will be like, “I got a question for you.” And I'm like, “Ah, I missed that.” So, I think that that's the beauty of this.  Andrew: I had a fun conversation. I gave a mental health talk at my school and talked about anxiety in the classroom, and thanks to IOCDF for some resources there, there's a student that wanted to do a follow-up. And I thought this was very interesting and I loved the conversation, but three or four times he was like, “Well, can I read some self-help books, and then if those don't work, go to therapy?” “No, I think go to therapy right away. Big fan of therapists. I'm not a therapist. You need to talk to a therapist.” “Okay. But what if I did some podcasts and then if that didn't work, then I go to therapy?” “Nope. Therapy is great. Go to therapy now.” “Should I wait till my life gets more stressful?” “Nope. Go now.” Kimberley: Yeah, because it's that reflection and questioning. Everyone who knows me knows I love questions. They're my favorite. So, I think you're on it. So, this is so good. I also want to be respectful of your time. So, quick rounded out, why is ERP for everybody, in your opinion? Andrew: How do we put this with a nice bow on it?  Kimberley: It doesn't have to be perfect. Let's make it purposely imperfect. Andrew: Let's make it perfectly imperfect. So, we talked before about the clinical levels – OCD, eating disorder, PTSD, generalized anxiety disorder. If you have any of those, take it from me personally, take it from you, take it from the thousands of people that said, “Hey, actually, ERP is an evidence-based gold standard. We know it works, we've seen it work. It's helped us. Let it help you because we care about you and we want you to do it.” And then moving down stress from work, from life. You have a big trip coming up. There's a fun scale, home's rocky, something stress inventory. I find it very interesting that some of them are positive, outstanding personal achievement like, “Oh, that's a stressful thing?” “Yeah, It can be.” And so, noticing the stressful things in your life and saying, “Well, because of these stressful things are the things I'm avoiding, things I'm getting anxious about, can I learn to sit with that?” And I think that mindfulness piece is so important.  So, whether you're clinical, whether you're subclinical, whether you have stress in your life, whether you're just avoiding something uncomfortable, slightly uncomfortable, is that keeping you from something you want to do? Is that keeping you-- of course, we-- I don't know if people roll their eyes at people like us, “Follow your values, talk about your values.” Do you value spending time with your friends, but you're avoiding the social gathering? Sounds like ERP could help you out with that. Or you're avoiding this, you want to get a certification, but you don't think you'll get it and you don't want to spend the time? Sounds like ERP could help with that. We're in the sports field. My wife and I rock climbing, bouldering, disc golf. You value the sport, but you're embarrassed to do poorly around your friends? Sounds ERP can help with that. You value this thing. I think we have a solution. I've become almost evangelical about it. Look at this thing, it works so well. It's done so much for me. Kimberley: Love it. Okay, tell me where-- I'm going to leave it at that. Tell me where people can hear about you and get in touch with you and hear more about your work. Andrew: Mainly through Instagram at the moment. I have a perfectly imperfect Instagram name that you might have to put down. It's JustRught but with right spelled wrong. So, it's R-U-G-H-T. Kimberley: That is perfect. Andrew: Yeah. Which also perfectly was a complete accident. It was just fat thumbs typing out my new account and I said, “You know what, Andrew, leave it. This works. This works just fine.” Kimberley: Oh, it is so good. It is so good. Andrew: Yeah. So, I'm also happy I mentioned to you earlier that my wife and I have started this cool collab where I take some of her art and some of the lessons I've learned in my 12-plus years of therapy and we mix them together and try to put some lessons out there. But I'm currently an OCD advocate as well. You can find me on IOCDF's website or just reach out. But really excited to be doing this work with you. I really respect and admire your work and to get a little gushing embarrassed. When I found out that I got accepted from grassroots advocate to regular advocate, I said, “Guys, Kimberley Quinlan is at the same level as me.” I was so excited. Kimberley: You're so many levels above me. Just look at your story. That's the work. Andrew: The imposter syndrome, we talked about that earlier. Kimberley: Yeah, for sure. No, I am just overwhelmed with joy to hear your story, and thank you. How cool. Again, the reason I love the interviews is I pretty much have goosebumps the entire time. It just is so wonderful to hear the ups and the downs and the reality and the lessons. It's so beautiful. So, thank you so much. Andrew: I will add in, if you allow me a little more time, that it's not magic. We're not saying, “Oh, go do ERP for two days and you'll be great.” It's hard work. It's a good day to do hard things. I think if it was easy, we wouldn't be talking about it so much. We wouldn't talk about the nuance. So, I think go into it knowing it is work, but it is absolutely worth it. It's given me my life back, it's saved my relationships, it's helped me move overseas, given me this opportunity, and I'm just so thankful for it. Kimberley: Yeah. Oh, mic drop. Andrew: Yeah. Kimberley: Thank you again.

Andrew Stotz talks with Dr. Mustafa Shraim of Ohio University about Deming's approach to variation, comparing it to Lean and Six Sigma. "When you do Six Sigma, you're basically outsourcing your quality to an external source, providing the training, the titles, and all of that. You can cut it off any time. But when you do the [Deming] theory of knowledge and the Plan-Do-Study-Act, you have to commit. The commitment is really the big deal here...the component that is missing [from Six Sigma] is a commitment to quality." SHOW NOTES4:30 Variation 12:40 The problem with Six Sigma 20:40 Statical Process Control Charts 25:44 Deming chain reaction 30:03 Suboptimizing departments 43:01 Management by visible figures 40:05 Why Deming, why now? Driving out fear 50:52 Continuous improvement and Plan-Do-Study-Act TRANSCRIPTDownload the complete transcript here. 0:00:04.1 Andrew: My name is Andrew Stotz, and I'll be your host as we continue our journey into the teachings of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Today I'm here with featured guest, Mustafa Shraim. Mustafa, are you ready to share your Deming journey?   0:00:19.8 Mustafa: Absolutely, let's go for it. Thank you.   0:00:21.5 Andrew: I'm excited. Well, let me introduce you to the audience. Mustafa Shraim is an Assistant Professor at Ohio University teaching quality management and leadership. Professor Shraim has over 20 years of experience as a quality engineer, corporate quality manager, and consultant. His PhD is in Industrial Engineering. He publishes widely, and he has a passion for Dr. Deming's system of profound knowledge. Mustafa, why don't we start off by you telling us the story about how you first came to learn of the teachings of Dr. Deming and what hooked you in?   0:00:57.5 Mustafa: Yeah. Thank you, Andrew. Thank you for inviting me back. So...   0:01:01.9 Andrew: Yeah.   [chuckle]   0:01:06.1 Mustafa: The whole thing started when I was doing my master's and that was the late '80s, at Ohio University, and I was concentrating on the area of quality. So, I was doing research, and my research touched up on what Dr. Deming was doing. I was doing it in design of experiments and quality tools and things like that. But of course, you come across Dr. Deming's work when you talk about quality control, in general, and statistical quality. So, that was the first encounter of learning about what Dr. Deming did in Japan and how he used statistical process control and things of that nature to teach how you can improve your processes, your products, and later on, the management. But at the beginning, I did not really get into his management philosophy so I was more on the technical end of Dr. Deming's teaching which was mainly quality control and SPC, and just improving quality in general.   0:02:24.1 Mustafa: So, as I went... So I went, and I started my first job as a quality engineer, and quickly after that, maybe after one year, I moved to another company, and I became a statistical quality engineer, and I was doing... I was a part of a training program there. I was doing training on SPC as a part of a training for employees at that company. It was a union shop, it was automotive, and so we utilized statistical process control and what Dr. Deming was teaching. So, that was the beginning of it, but later on in the '90s, I started learning more about Dr. Deming after I read "Out of the Crisis" and then "The New Economics" about his management method. In fact, his management methods just captured me. I knew I got hooked on the quality part first, but the management method just brought it together for me. And since then, I've been reading and practicing, trying to at least, what Dr. Deming has taught.   0:03:41.9 Andrew: And would you say... One of the things that I started realizing was that the statistical... What I thought was the end was the statistical tools. And what I started to learn is that, actually, the statistical tools start to have limitations if you're not doing the management of the whole operation in a good way. And I think that that's something that really resonated with me when I started putting the pieces together. How do you see the role... And in a little bit I'm gonna ask you about some more specific tools, but just generally, we have statistical tools, but we also have management. Many people may think that you can just apply statistical tools and solve all the problems, but I'm curious how you see that interaction between the tools and the management style.   0:04:30.2 Mustafa: Well, as you know and many, probably, of your listeners already know that Dr. Deming had understanding variation, or some variation, as a part of his system of profound knowledge. So, understanding variation, under it, is really learning how to distinguish between the types of variation that you would have in any situation, managerial or process situation. So, that interaction there is really big. That really captured me because what Dr. Deming says is like, more than 80% of the application for statistical process control is actually, should be in management, and not necessarily just on the line, controlling quality of the product. So that was... It captured me, and because of explaining how many managers, many supervisors, don't understand the difference between common cause and special cause variations, and they start managing people with common cause variation going up and down, and they reprimand if it goes down, and they praise if it goes up, and that actually just makes things even worse in the future. As you probably know, it's tampering with the process.   0:06:08.8 Andrew: The best way that I've ever come up to try to explain this is to say to people, "Imagine there's 10,000 people in a stadium. They all flip a coin, and you say, 'Hey, if you flip heads, go to one side of the stadium. You flip tails, you go to the other. Everybody sit down. Okay, now... '" Or basically say, "Flip the coin again, and if you flip heads again, so two times, stay standing. And if you flip tails two times, then stay standing, but if you hit the heads and tails, then sit down." And now, your audience is getting smaller and smaller. If you do this 10 times, you will have 10 people, generally, you're gonna have 10 people that have flipped heads consecutively 10 times, and people that flip tails consecutively 10 times.   0:06:54.1 Andrew: And if we said, if we started off the whole game by saying, "Tails is bad." Now you've got some people that have done bad 10 times in a row, and some people that have done good 10 times in a row. But we know, because of the design of that example, that it's purely random. So, the question... So, we can understand that, but when we think about random variation, what Dr. Deming started to do is show us how that fits into management and psychology and how we're missing that. I'm just curious if you can help us to understand how that variation fits into that management 'cause you started talking about rewarding and all that. So, just curious about how those things fit together.   0:07:38.7 Mustafa: Right. For example, within the control limits, and those are the limits that are on a control chart, and they are spaced three standard deviations up and three standard deviations down. All the variation within is mostly a common cause variation, and it's due to the system. It's a system variation. It's not attributed to any special cause whether it's operator or something else that changed. So, distinguishing between the two becomes very important because if you don't look at variation from the perspective of a control chart, what happens is that you are in the weeds, and you look at every point as either really high up or high down cause you don't have any perspective as to how to evaluate or filter this type of variation. On the other side, also you don't want to not react to something that is special. For example, if you don't have the control limits, and if you don't have a proper way of looking at the variation, then you might end up also passing a special cause as a common cause, or not reacting to it enough to fix it and to make it a part of your controllable system before moving on.   0:09:16.7 Mustafa: From both perspective, I think it's very important for managers, for leadership, to understand why we do this. It's not just something that you have to do on the production line. It is something that you have to do in management based on performance. Look at your data and see if it's a stable process in control or if it's not, then you need to start eliminating those special causes. Like Dr. Deming said that, "Nothing really is born perfect as far as the processes." I'm paraphrasing here. But when you start a new manufacturing process, it doesn't mean that it's going to be in control; you have to work at it. You have to eliminate one by one all these special causes that come up before you start seeing a stability. And then after stability, then you will be able to work on the system part of the process, which is a long-term continuous improvement projects.   0:10:29.9 Andrew: Yeah, it's interesting. I remember a story. When I was working at Pepsi, we had a bottling plant in Los Angeles that I worked at. And the management were putting pressure on the people that were running the bottling machine because the variation of the level of the liquid in the bottle was getting wider and wider. And so, as a supervisor on the factory floor, my job was to go and kick ass, basically, and tell the guy, "Hey, come on, what are you doing here? You're messing around." And he just said, "Look, Andrew," and I was a young guy who listened to what these guys said, and he said, "Look, look at that machine over there. They spent the money to buy that filling machine over there, and you see there's no variation. Look at the old machine that they've got, and they haven't bought the parts to repair it. I keep telling them, if they don't buy these parts, I can't get to that point." And he was like... And I realized at that point that it was a management decision that needed to be made to reduce that variation at that point. It wasn't an operator that we should be punishing for that. And I think I wasn't that popular bringing that information back to management 'cause they wanted to say, "Well, no. It's the worker," and that's where I started to think about that common cause variation, and how do you improve and reduce variation?   0:11:48.3 Mustafa: Right, right. And if you leave it also to the worker, sometimes if they don't know what to do, they start tampering with the, actually, production process, and it makes it worse. So, a training for them on variation is also important. It's not only for management but also for workers as well.   0:12:08.2 Andrew: Yeah, good point. I know your expertise in this area is so valuable, and I think that it's great to have you maybe break down the following four terms that we hear, and maybe just generally discuss the differences, and then we'll talk about them in more detail. But the first term is Lean or continuous flow, the second is Six Sigma, the third is 14 points, and the fourth is system of profound knowledge. So, maybe just give an overview. What are these things? What do they mean?   0:12:40.0 Mustafa: Okay. Well, the Six Sigma part came about in the mid '80s and started in Motorola, and a lot of people already know that. And the reason it came out is because Dr. Deming's contribution in the '80s just brought a lot of attention to variation. In addition, you have also some big issues like the Ford transmission issue that came up. And there was a study about variation, and so there was a lot of attention being focused on variation. So Motorola... Somebody at Motorola, Bill Smith, an engineer over there, actually, came up with this idea of Six Sigma. And what that means, in general, is that if you have a spec that is a certain width, like upper and lower spec limits, then you want your process to operate in about half that space. Basically, that gives you good capability of the process, and then you don't have to worry about it. The first problem that came about from Six Sigma was the controversy about the shift. The people who invented Six Sigma, or packaged it together, said, "Okay. Well, we know you wanna operate exactly in the middle, but, normally, processes shift like one-and-a-half standard deviation here, or one-and-a-half standard deviation there so we want to allow that."   0:14:18.7 Mustafa: So, that is one of the biggest controversy because when you shift something like that, the process may be out of control without knowing. So, they did not really take that into consideration, although they are teaching control charts within the Six Sigma body of knowledge, so that was not really taken care of there. But that was one of the flaws that is out there in Six Sigma. Now, there are topics in Six Sigma that are... They're okay. We can teach certain topics on continuous improvement, root cause analysis, things of that nature. But the statistical thing here was wrong. And again, the reason Six Sigma was popular is because it is packaged the way it was packaged. You have companies buying this, and you have all the titles that came with it, and you know how companies love titles, especially here in the United States. So, you got all the belts; everybody must have a belt. You gotta go through training, you gotta... And then after you get your belt, what happens? You're gonna save us money. You're gonna have to do projects, and your job is to save me 20, 30, 40, 50,000 or 100,000 sometimes. So, that was the Six Sigma part of the whole thing.   0:15:51.6 Mustafa: And so, the Lean later became Lean Six Sigma. But Lean, by itself, came from Japan, originally. It's eliminating waste. Think about things like over-production, waiting, inventory, extra motion, all of these little things that you think they're little, but when you put them together, that's a lot of waste. So, to make the process flow better, you need to eliminate all of this waste. It's more about productivity and moving things faster within the organization. Then, when we contrast that with the 14 points, the 14 points are the system for management. It's all about... It's about management. It's also about quality, like improving forever the processes and systems for example, and have a constancy of purpose like the first point says. This was the application of what then became the system of profound knowledge as we know it. I don't know... I don't wanna go too far with definitions and things like that, but the Lean Six Sigma, they had the problem of the statistical flow from the Six Sigma part, and then you have all the management by numbers, management by objectives from both the Lean and Six Sigma.   0:17:30.3 Andrew: And I'm gonna try to summarize what you just explained by talking about the Six Sigma. Is what you're saying the flaw or the issue was is that, in order to try to get good quality, why don't we just set our expectations of what we're gonna get out of the system so tight that when we actually produce, we're in a narrow range, but we're never... Let's say we don't allow... We built the system with so much margin of error that even if we move around in our output, that that still is within a very tight range. Is that the concept?   0:18:10.5 Mustafa: Yeah. That is the concept. But the problem with that concept is, if you move around, if you let the process move around one-and-a-half standard deviation, for example, which, what it says, this indicates that you could have special causes that you don't react to. You don't know at that point because you have moved the process. You end up having special cause variation based on that shift because that shift could be real, a special cause and not just allowing natural... Naturally, the process does not move one-and-a-half standard deviation   0:18:53.0 Mustafa: all of a sudden because there are tests on control charts that if the process... For shift. So, if the process, for example, gives you nine points in a row on one side of the center line, that's a flag because that's a shift. That's a shift in the process. Now the process shifted on you, and you're not reacting. You're not doing anything about it, so you have to stop and take a look at it. So, what Six Sigma is saying is, "Yeah, the process could shift one-and-a-half standard deviation." But in statistical process control terms, it can't without reacting to it.   0:19:37.5 Andrew: And a simple control chart, or run chart, will probably reveal this better than looking at a histogram type of chart, like a Six Sigma type of chart where you're observing the output of the system moment by moment. Would that be correct to say?   0:19:56.5 Mustafa: Right, right. So, the control chart... And I did a paper... And there are people that are out there and doing the same thing. I did a paper and showed that if you move the system one-and-a-half standard deviation, you will see all these points beyond the control limits by simulation, simulation of the process. You move it, and you'll start observing so many points being out of the control. And so, if you allow it, then all of a sudden you start seeing all these points beyond the control. And what do you do? So, there is nothing to cover that within the Six Sigma body of knowledge.   0:20:40.7 Andrew: And maybe it's a good point just to talk briefly about the control charts and what Dr. Deming taught about that. I think when I started seeing the control charts as he was describing them, I started to see a real intense focus on looking at... at trying to understand what's really happening with this system and trying to observe it in real-time. And the more that you did that, the more you really start to understand what's driving the performance of that system. So, maybe could you just take a moment, think about the listener or the viewer that doesn't understand the control charts yet, maybe just give a big picture about what those are, and what's the value of them?   0:21:27.7 Mustafa: So, the control chart is basically... If you think about plotting points over time, that would be a run chart. So, just looking at your performance over time and just plotting points, that's a run chart. A control chart is basically taking the run chart and creating control limits on it. And the control limits came from Dr. Shewhart who invented the control charts. And he put those control limits to minimize a couple of mistakes: not reacting enough when you have to, and not over-reacting when you see something. They were more economics. They were not statistical in nature. They don't really depend on statistical distribution or anything like that. They are very robust. They can be used in a variety of applications without having to look at the distribution of the data. And they tell you when to react to a special cause and when to leave the process alone.   0:22:41.3 Mustafa: So, when you leave the process alone, it means that you have common cause variation, just the systemic type of variation that occurs over time. But that doesn't mean that you don't work on it as management. This is a management part of the work. So, when you have a stable process, it means that this is a time for management to initiate, maybe, continuous improvement project or initiative to reduce that variation, and not... Because you can be stable and in control, but you still have a lot of variation in the process. So, the spread is very wide in the process or, in the control chart, it will be going all over with a lot of variation, but it's still within the control limits. It could have this kind of scenario. And that's when management has to step in and say, "Okay, we need to look at this from a big picture and try to look at all the causes and do some kind of continual improvement."   0:23:53.3 Andrew: Mustafa, I would think that when you look at it, it turns out that it's like a continuous experiment. And you're looking at the outcome in a control chart, and you're trying to think, "Okay, if we... " Let's just say that we add a new piece of machinery. We upgrade a particular part. Then we look and say, "Okay, how did that impact the output of the process?" And then you start to see that what you're talking about, and I think what Dr. Deming is talking about was the idea that, start to get this intense focus on how do we improve this process? And how do we reduce that variation to a point? There's no point in reducing it beyond a certain point. But just that focus. Whereas with Six Sigma, it's kind of a theoretical thing, and there's other aspects that you've talked about. But just that, a control chart really allows you just to focus on testing and understanding that the whole... The output is a function, not only of the people on the production line. Let's say if it's in a factory, and it's the machinery, it's the way you organize, it's the shifts that you work. It's all of these things. So, I can't help but think that it's kind of like the fun of testing and seeing the result coming out of it.   0:25:09.1 Mustafa: Right. When you say a special cause, it doesn't mean always that it's bad. It could be good. But you have to study it, and you have to see what happened. So, was it intentional? Was it unintentional? But at least you would stop and look and study. And that's the idea. It's not just to let it go without studying it. On the other hand, the common cause, you're just looking at the width of the variation in general. And you try to reduce that, like you just mentioned, over the long run.   0:25:42.0 Andrew: So... Go ahead.   0:25:44.8 Mustafa: No, I was just gonna go back to Dr. Deming before I move to Dr. Deming's chain reaction model. I use that all the time. I use it when I was doing workshops in industry, and I use it now in my classes. And I put that... The chain reaction model. And what the chain reaction model for those of the listeners who are not familiar with it, Dr. Deming says that, "You have to start with improving quality, and the rest is just a chain reaction." So what happens is, when you improve quality, and that is, and what he's talking about here, is a commitment by management to quality. It's not just a one-time improvement of quality, it's a commitment on improving quality. Then you start seeing defect decreasing. You start utilizing equipment better. Errors decrease and all of this becomes much less. Your productivity, as a result, goes up because the cost is down, or your input cost is down so now your output is better, and you have a good productivity which keeps you in business, and you provide better jobs to your community. I think...   0:27:18.8 Andrew: That topic is so interesting because I think most people, at the time of Dr. Deming and even now, think quality is a department; quality is something we apply in a certain area. And when you think about setting the purpose of a company to improve quality, it's a very risky thing. Most people think, "No way. Our company is about sales. Our company is about profit. Our company is about customer satisfaction," or whatever that is. Those things all are the intuitive things that we come up with to say, "That's what drives our business." And Dr. Deming, what you're saying is that... Dr. Deming says, actually, the chain reaction that starts from quality leads to all of those things. Can you elaborate a little bit more on that?   0:28:07.5 Mustafa: Right. So, we know that we have to start on quality. But take, for example, companies that are engaged in Lean projects. So, what they do in Lean projects, you try to eliminate waste. And eliminating waste could also be a risky business if you just arbitrarily start cutting costs of material, of employee hours, or eliminating jobs, for example. If you take it from the productivity block of the chain reaction model, you go nowhere. You gotta go back from the quality, improving quality, and that's where the chain reaction starts. But for many Lean projects, they actually start from the productivity block. So, improve productivity from the productivity block, that doesn't really work because you are not committed to quality at that point. So, what happens is, you start maybe buying cheaper material or eliminating jobs. That might help you in the short run. The short run may be the next quarter. It's going to help you out. You're gonna improve the bottomline. Later on, all of this is going to come back as customer complaints, returns, issues with employees, lack of motivation because now they have to do more with less hours, and so on and so forth. But it creates a whole set of problems that are addressed in the system of profound knowledge from the psychology part to the learning part, and knowledge and the PDSA.   0:30:00.4 Andrew: So, let's go back to then now. I wanna talk about the system of profound knowledge so that the listeners out there, some of them understand it very well, but some of them may not understand what that means at all. So, now we've kind of been through a little bit about Lean. We've been through Six Sigma. We talked a little bit about the 14 points, and I think the point that you're just making is that when you look at Dr. Deming's 14 point, first one is create constancy of purpose. The second one is to adopt a new philosophy, and the third one is to end dependence on quality inspections. It's like those top three are telling the senior management, "Your job is to improve quality." That is what's going to lead this chain reaction. And I think you've illustrated that in your discussion really well. So, take a moment and tell us about system of profound knowledge as you see it.   0:30:49.8 Mustafa: Okay. So, the system of profound knowledge is... There are four pillars or four components to it. And the first one is appreciation for a system, meaning that you have to see systems in place. You have to do a connection of different parts together, that you cannot do things in silos. You cannot suboptimize. You have to look at the aim of the system, and you try to work for the aim of the system, not the aim of each department. But with that comes the idea of creating the variation part, and what is systemic variation and what is a special cause variation? Systemic variation is a part of management's decisions. They have to make improvement on that in the long term. And how you react to variation. So, if the system has a certain capability, and then you ask somebody, "Okay, I want you to get me that which is up here, way up. That's your objective." If the system is not capable, what is the employee going to do? They're going to try to create that number to please the boss. As Dr. Deming was referring to, they tried to please their manager or the boss. So, you might take risky steps to do that, including maybe fudging numbers or coming up with ideas to create that number.   0:32:37.1 Mustafa: And that goes to psychology, so now you are... You don't feel good about it. You have to keep your job. You have to do all kinds of stuff to make sure that you don't lose your job because you could not achieve that. Now you become less motivated. You're not really engaged. And what happens? They provide you with incentives, outside incentives. Bonus is based on work that you have to do, but the system is incapable. You cannot perform beyond what the system is capable of. So, that creates all kinds of problems. And the last part is the learning part or theory of knowledge, and that you have to have a method. You have to have clear definitions and, basically, you have to know what you need to accomplish, and by what method and how you know when you get there. That's a theory of knowledge. There is no knowledge without a theory, and it has to be... It has a temporal element in it, meaning that you revise the theory, and you create more knowledge. So, that's in a nutshell how you... How all of these components are related to each other. But to me, the systems and variation, they're just out there, and I see it everywhere as a problem.   0:34:14.3 Andrew: Yeah. So, to summarize, the system of profound knowledge, as you've explained, is appreciation for a system. Number two is knowledge of variation, number three is a theory of knowledge, and number four is psychology. And one of the things that I came to learn about Dr. Deming is, I always say he's a humanist. He's a person that really sees that people should have joy in work, and he wants to see people reach their full potential, and he understood the powers of incentives like you just explained. So, now that we understand a little bit of the theory of the system of profound knowledge, what is going wrong out there in this world? Let's talk just briefly about, why is this so significant? Come on, I just go get my black belt in Lean Six Sigma and the problems will be solved, but what is it about the theory of profound knowledge that... Or the system of profound knowledge that people should pay attention to now?   0:35:21.5 Mustafa: Well, with... For example, let me just take it from a different perspective. If you look at Lean projects, and you eliminate. for example, waste. if you don't have a system of profound knowledge to check all of the things that needs to be checked, like variation and psychology and making sure that people are not fearful to do their job, then you're creating other problems, not only just... You're not just reducing waste, you are actually, maybe having... overburdening the employees with removing waste because when you remove waste, you may be removing jobs, you may be removing hours, you may be removing employees. That would create a overburden. You could also create problems for the customers and fluctuation and defects and variation.   0:36:21.8 Mustafa: That's why the system of profound knowledge is an integrated system. It's not a just one piece. Once you start going from one door, you gotta address all the other components that are tied together to it. So to me, from whatever door you go in in the system of profound knowledge, let's say you go from the psychology which is you drive out fear. You create a good climate. You do all of these things, then you start seeing people coming up with innovations, reducing variation, and working together collaboratively which creates a good system. So, whatever door you go in, you're going to get to it because they are connected. There is no way that you're not going to address the other points if you have knowledge about the other points.   0:37:15.0 Andrew: It's an interesting thing that I would say in modern management, in modern life, people are trying to compartmentalize things and thinking that being a specialist in a particular area, whether that's medicine or whatever in business, that by compartmentalizing, it gives us comfort that we can become an expert in this area and all that. But what you can see... And I'll tell you, Mustafa, about my mother who I take care of. She's 83. And if we have a problem with her foot, the doctor may say, "Okay, don't walk for a little while." Well, that causes another problem. You start to risk bedsores. You start to have problems with GI system. And what you find nowadays in medicine is it's getting more and more narrow where doctors are not seeing the holistic pieces, and I see myself always constantly thinking about the whole picture to that. And I think what I'm hearing from you is that, that we should be looking at things more holistically, and that's what the system of profound knowledge is teaching, is that... Would you say that?   0:38:24.1 Mustafa: That's exactly right. That's exactly right. So, you have to... The main thing there is, companies, traditionally, they try to just suboptimize through their management by objective, "We want each department to save so much money," and then, once they start doing that, everybody affects the other negatively, but they don't know until later on that they have done that. You might gain the objectives in the short run, but in the long run, it's going to be disastrous for the aim of the organization.   0:39:03.9 Andrew: So, you just raised another point that Dr. Deming teaches about is suboptimization. And what he tried to teach was that the objective of the senior management of the company is to optimize the system, not its component parts. Have you seen...   0:39:19.9 Mustafa: Right.   0:39:20.9 Andrew: In theory, people should know that, but how is that going wrong in this world these days? And why is it important to be thinking in this holistic way that Dr. Deming was teaching?   0:39:32.5 Mustafa: Because companies, if they don't do things systematically, and they don't apply the whole system of profound knowledge, altogether, they're going to rush into money-saving exercises, and those money-saving exercises could be replacing material with lower-grade material. It could be, maybe, not hiring experts and hiring somebody who doesn't know what they're doing, and not providing training, or cutting training, or foregoing maintenance. There are so many things that you can start focusing on because you have issues. So, you have issues with a customer, and you start focusing on cutting costs, arbitrarily, not with a method, arbitrarily starting cutting costs in different departments. When you put it all together, just things don't merge well together because you're trying to suboptimize. You're trying to lower the cost in each department and not really improve the aim, or attain the aim of the organization as a whole.   0:40:48.3 Andrew: We've covered so many different topics. It's pretty exciting, like this sub-optimization. I think is a really interesting one. And I wanna raise a new topic that is the opposite of one of the topics that you raised. You talked about the chain reaction. Let's talk about the opposite chain reaction. I'll tell you a story in my own coffee business. We had put some pressure on some of the people in the procurement part of the business to reduce cost. That's reasonable. Management wants to reduce cost so there we go. We put pressure on them, and we told them... We incentivized them. And what we saw was that they ended up proposing a lower quality coffee bean, green coffee bean. The production people didn't like it because all of a sudden they had to recalibrate the machines. So, there was already a cost right there because the... It was harder to hit the client's demand of what taste that they want, consistently hit it.   0:41:47.9 Andrew: Then the people that were delivering, when we delivered the product to the customer, we had some returns where the customer is like, "No, I don't like this taste," or that we would have much more variability. And all of a sudden, we had customer complaints. And then we started to realize that, "Okay, now we gotta go and replace that with the proper stuff," and then all of a sudden there was all kinds of cost. So, the chain reaction you talked about was, start with quality and you start to reduce costs throughout the chain. And a reverse chain reaction is when you start by trying to optimize one point and not realize that it's a whole system, and therefore what you've caused is a negative chain reaction of cost just when you thought you were cutting costs, you're actually raising costs.   0:42:33.7 Mustafa: Right. That is a great example of that because what you've done is maybe just looking at the productivity part, you wanted to make sure that the costs were down so trying to turn the knobs on certain things, and then it just backfired on the quality part, increasing errors, increasing customer dissatisfaction and all of that, and that happens all the time.   0:43:01.4 Andrew: And that's what Dr. Deming says, "How can you measure the cost of a lost customer? How can you measure the dissatisfaction and the frustration?" Some things are just unmeasurable. So, I wanna...   0:43:15.2 Mustafa: Right. So, that brings about the issue of visible figures. You're managed by visible figures only, and not really the stuff that are behind the total cost, which some of it is unknowable or unknown.   0:43:34.2 Andrew: Now, Professor, this is really strange. Here we are, talking about quality. You're such an expert in all of these statistical methods, and now you're saying, "Wait a minute, you can't just measure by visible figures." So, this is again a paradox of Dr. Deming where you come into his teaching, seeing all of these numbers and all that, and now what you're telling me is it's not just visible figures. Could you just elaborate on that?   0:44:02.7 Mustafa: Yeah, absolutely. Visible figures are figures that are available right there for you, and you just react to it. If things go up, you wanna reduce costs. You just take action. But visible figures are really a limited part of the whole story because the total cost of not doing things right or not following the Deming management method. They're not going to be... You're not gonna see them until later on. You may be able save for a quarter or two but, beyond that, things are going to start accumulating in terms of defects, returns, and things of that nature. So, from the Deming point of view, the visible figures are only a smaller portion of the total figures which cannot be measured at the time you're looking at the numbers and taking action.   0:45:04.3 Andrew: It's interesting because we hear sayings like, "What gets measured gets managed," and those types of sayings. And one of the things that I... When I teach young people about this, I oftentimes say, "Well, let's just look at a simple thing. What is the value of a hug? Measure it." It's immeasurable. Particularly, in a particular situation when someone is traumatized, or in a really painful situation, and that hug made a huge difference in their life that could actually have kept them alive and led them to another so that... I think that's the visible figures that you're raising. It's such a small part of this world. The bigger part is how it all fits together. And so, I think you really inspire me to rethink about this concept; that it's way beyond just visible figures.   0:46:03.5 Mustafa: Absolutely, absolutely. This thing is just... One of the things that really captured me with the Deming philosophy is visible versus invisible figures, and the sub-optimization part versus the aim of the system. And those things are just so powerful when you think about them, when you think about why we're promoting, or why we're talking about Deming, and why now and all of that. It's these things that are very common these days. And they have... To have a good system, to have good management, you have to eliminate management by visible figures on... You still have to have visible figures, but visible figures-only is what Deming is... What it was Deming opposing. What he was against, I guess.   0:46:57.8 Andrew: Yup. And you said, "Why Deming? Why now?" And I'm thinking about it myself. And my answer to that is that we have a whole generation of young people who think that successful management is, maybe, sitting at their desk behind a computer looking at KPIs. And then, when someone is down on their KPI, send them an email, kick their butt. And when someone is up on a KPI, give them a bonus, and that's it. And then you go home at the end of the day. And they're so lacking in the psychology aspect of the system of profound knowledge, but just in what management truly is. So, from my perspective, "Why Deming? Why now?" is because we have the risk of it turning into some kind of automation system of management that will always end up underperforming. Why would you say, "Why Deming? Why now?"   0:48:00.5 Mustafa: So, as you can see that, for me, "Why Deming? Why now?" is I don't see management using variation as a way to distinguish between the common cause and special cause, and also their reaction to it, or the mistakes that they make as a part of it. So, that's a big thing. The other thing is the fear that people are experiencing at the workplace. Recently, we've heard about the great resignation. People just don't wanna go back to work anymore. And a lot of people expressed that they just don't like the environment that they work in. And we know that most people, about 70% of people who quit, they don't quit because of a pay or anything like that. It's because of relationship with their bosses and the company, and they just don't feel that. So that the environment has a fear in it. So, when you create fear, you're not going to have people that contribute and collaborate, and I think that's big. If we learn anything from this whole pandemic, it is that you have to create an environment of trust because if people are away working virtually or work in the office, you shouldn't have to worry about them if you have created that environment or the trust.   0:49:34.6 Andrew: Yup. And you mentioned about the pandemic. If there's one thing we've learned, fear is a massive motivator. The level of things that people have gone through in a state of fear, things that people would have never imagined that they would have done. And so, I think what you're talking about is just one more of the many Deming principles, which is to drive out fear. And I just wanna summarize some of what we've gone through, and then we'll wrap up. So, we've talked about the differences between Lean and Six Sigma and Lean Six Sigma. We've talked about Deming's 14 points. We've talked about the system of profound knowledge. We've talked about optimizing versus sub-optimizing. We've talked about the chain reaction, and I gave the example of a reverse chain reaction. And then, we talked about visible figures and understanding that there's much more than that, which is such a paradox for me when I first started learning Deming's teaching because I thought I was gonna take comfort in those numbers and the visible figures, but he told me, "No, no, no. There's much more." And finally, we talk about fear. Is there anything else that you would add to this final wrap-up of the conversation?   0:50:52.3 Mustafa: So, we started talking about Lean and Six Sigma and... Six Sigma is a continuous improvement process, but you don't really need to use it to... You can use the Plan-Do-Study-Act to it. There is no problem if you use it, and you recognize what's wrong with it, and you try to fix it. There's no problem with that. But, I think the Plan-Do-Study-Act and the theory of knowledge is sufficient for you to start working on things. But, like I mentioned, some companies, they like the titles and the tags and the big investment because then they use that as a motivator to get people to start working on projects to bring money back, to save the company the money that was spent on them. So, that's the only thing I wanted to add is just like you can't just rely on something that is big. The Plan-Do-Study-Act was good enough, and I think it's good for any organization. The problem with applying the Plan-Do-Study Act is that you have to have management's commitment because remember, when you do Six Sigma, you're basically outsourcing your quality to an external source, providing the training, the titles and all of that. You can cut it off any time. But when you do the theory of knowledge and the Plan-Do-Study-Act, you have to commit. The commitment is really the big deal here, or the component that is missing is a commitment to quality.   0:52:44.9 Andrew: Well, in wrapping this up, I wanna come back to where we started. Where we started was you were a young master's student and coming out of studying about these tools of statistical methods and all of that stuff, and you entered into our conversation, and you entered into the introduction to Dr. Deming through these tools. But here we are at the end of this interview, and now you're talking about such much bigger issues, and I think, for me, that inspires me about what Dr. Deming has taught because it is expansive. And the more you study it, the more you see it's way beyond just tools. So, Mustafa, on behalf of everyone at The Deming Institute, I wanna thank you again for coming on the show and sharing your experience with Dr. Deming's teachings. Do you have any parting words for the audience?   0:53:41.5 Mustafa: All I have to say, you gotta get started somewhere, and the system of profound knowledge is it. So, I would definitely recommend... I have been through many of the seminars that the Institute offers, and I would highly recommend that and also getting Dr. Deming's book "The New Economics." That's a good start. Of course, the follow-up is also just as important and continuing with the journey.   0:54:15.7 Andrew: Well, great advice. Get "The New Economics;" read it. It really sums up a lot of Dr. Deming's teachings. He put it together right at the end of his life. And that concludes another great discussion within our worldwide Deming community. Remember to go to deming.org to continue your journey. This is your host, Andrew Stotz, and I will leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Deming, "People are entitled to joy in work."

Marlo: I just tried your cheese! It's really good. So I need to know more about the process of, you know, what did I just eat? Andrew: So, it is vegan cheese based on almond milk. Marlo: So you’re taking what would be considered traditional almond milk and converting that to cheese? Correct? How’s that […] The post Bring Back the Dairy with Armored Fresh Cheese! appeared first on The Tech Ranch.

Andrew Gazdecki is the founder and CEO of MicroAcquire, the world's most founder-friendly startup acquisition marketplace. MicroAcquire helps entrepreneurs buy and sell startups.After founding and later selling two successful startups, Andrew decided there needed to be a better way to connect buyers and sellers in the startup marketplace. He founded MicroAcquire to fill this void in the startup acquisition arena.In this episode, Andrew shares how he grew his Twitter audience from 30,000 to 70,000 followers in a few short months. He uses his connections with others, his partnerships, his brand, and savvy marketing techniques to boost engagement and attract followers. It's a fun and entertaining episode, and I think you're going to enjoy it.In this episode, you'll learn: The one thing you should spend at least half of your startup's budget on Proven strategies and tactics to grow your Twitter account How to bootstrap your business and retain your autonomy Links & Resources TechCrunch Cameo Effie Empire Flippers Flippa Bizness Apps Sam Parr Stripe Baremetrics ChartMogul Bumble Brandarrow Bootstrappers.com Y Combinator Salesforce Nick Huber David Cancel Josh Pigford Clearco AngelList Avaloq Naval Ravikant Dharmesh Shah The Ladders of Wealth Creation blog post Andrew Gazdecki's Links Follow Andrew on Twitter Follow MicroAcquire on Twitter Episode Transcript00:00:00 Andrew:I'm a big fan of stair-stepping and entrepreneurship. One of my favorite tweets that I've ever written is, “Start with an agency, get to cashflow positive, and then bootstrap an asset—whether that's a SaaS company or your e-commerce business—sell that asset, become financially secure, and then do whatever you want.”Along the way, you prepare yourself for the next stage of business. 00:00:35 Nathan:In this episode, I talked to Andrew Gazdecki, from MicroAcquire. Andrew started a couple other businesses and sold two of them. In that process, he decided there needed to be a better way to buy and sell businesses. So, that's where MicroAcquire came from. Their marketplace originally focused specifically on SaaS businesses, but they broadened to all of software.The reason I want to talk to him—he doesn't write a traditional newsletter or something like that—but he uses audience really well to grow MicroAcquire. He uses his personal brand connections with others, partnerships, a bunch of fun things.We get into how he grew his Twitter audience from 30,000 followers just a couple months ago, to over 70,000. His approach to Twitter, some of the arguments or beefs that he started with TechCrunch and others, and where he thinks those lines are.We also get into how he uses Cameo; he has these great ads announcing partnerships and others from Russ Hanneman on Silicon valley talking about this, and they're really entertaining.So, there's a lot of fun things in this episode, and I think you're going to like it.I'll get out of the way, and we'll dive in.Andrew, welcome to the show.00:01:41 Andrew:Thanks for having me, Nathan. Always a pleasure to be chatting with you. 00:01:44 Nathan:There are a lot of companies in the brokerage/help-me-sell-my-business space. I think of Effie International, Empire Flippers, Flippa, all of these. So, one, you're going into a really crowded market with MicroAcquire, and then, two, you're coming at it like you're a force of nature.Sam Parr and I we're actually talking about this, of how some people start a project and it's like, “Oh, I'm going to do this thing.” And then other people do effectively the same thing. I mean, it's different in a lot of ways, right? But the same category, and come in and just completely dominate, and grow so fast, and it feels like a fundamentally different thing.What's your take on that, of coming into a crowded space, and then the amount of momentum that you've come in with?00:02:34 Andrew:Yeah. I have a lot of respect for all those companies that you mentioned, and appreciate the compliment.The market that is specifically acquisitions hasn't seen a lot of innovation in a decade. Two of the businesses you mentioned are service businesses, Flippa being a marketplace. I looked at that, and I just thought, there's an angle here where sellers could benefit more than the buyers, and I felt buyers were benefiting. So, I took a left while everyone was going right.Then coming in from an entrepreneur's view instead of a buyer's view, or an investment bankers view, or an MNA advisor view, this was me saying, okay, I'm gone through two acquisitions, I think I have a few unique insights into what it would take to make me comfortable putting my business, generating millions of dollars, on a new marketplace. Then, what information and educational pieces would I need to feel comfortable to facilitate an acquisition.So, I just built what I felt acquisition should be. We still have a long way to go. We've done a really good job of connecting buyers and sellers, and all the acquisitions are facilitated off platform. We've been working on a lot of tooling to really add value to the acquisition, if that makes sense.So we're looking to innovate on things like due diligence or even simple items like writing a letter of intent or streamlining escrow, because everyone complains about escrow.com. so yeah, I mean, sometimes it just happens in markets. Like a new entrant comes in with a different angle towards the problem And different viewpoint. and I think my unique, insight there was just, I had been on. The side of the table that maybe the other, companies had not. but it's also, a giant market. So I, think, arising boat lifts all tides. So, you know, we're here to my require. I just made my group or to help entrepreneurs get acquired and, and, succeed.And so, I think also as, you know, Mike require pick steam and helps everyone else in the market as well. So, but, yeah, I don't have a good answer to that. I don't know. I think if I, if I, this, this will sound cheesy, but you know, I, I I'd like to say I built my group hire would love, like I launched it in the middle of the pandemic. I didn't have a business model. I had no idea how I was going to make money. I just knew I wanted to work with entrepreneurs and startups. And the rest is kind of history, you know, along the way, talking to customers, getting feedback from them, pretty much everything we do is basically feedback from customers.I'm not Steve jobs or anything like that. So I can't read people's minds. So I ask what, what ideas do you have? but yeah, it's been, it's been a fun journey so far. my group is about to turn two, which is pretty wild. 00:05:56 Nathan:That first version, that you launched, what did that look like? What, what was the very early stages of it? 00:06:02 Andrew:The first version was, it was just a simple marketplace with a couple of. Changes that I haven't seen in the market. One was privacy and anonymousy and then no fees or commissions for founders. So it was the first marketplace where you could meet buyers and sell your business without paying a 15% commission like you typically would with a broker or something like that.So I think that was kind of a change. And our business model today is we charge buyers for access to the platform to connect with sellers and, you know, having negotiations that lead towards negotiations. But yeah, the first version, required a lot of vetting of the buyers. Every buyer needed like a LinkedIn profile.Some people have complained about that, but I personally would never sell my business as someone, without a LinkedIn profile. I need to know where you worked, like you know, do you have anyone that's bad for you? not just like John 9, 9, 2, 4 5. You know, I need to know, who you are. and we're going to add other ways of verification, but I think that was a big one. and then also real-time metrics integration. So when we launched, you could connect like Stripe and chart, mobile and probable and bare metrics to get like a real, like a nice, pretty graph, like the revenue to help with due diligence. and then also founders and everything was private. So you didn't know what the business was.And as a founder, you had complete control over the process. So when you were with a broker, sometimes it could be kind of showing your business to a lot of peopleAnd you may not know who those people are. they could even be competitive to your business. And so I think what Mike required did that kind of, and I'm just guessing here because I haven't really liked. Taking a step back and then like, what did we do? Right. you know, I'm usually thinking about what can we be doing better? we really put the founder in control. You know, they were the ones able to choose which buyers to speak to. they were the ones able to share which information they wanted to and which information they did not want to share. And again, it was completely free. So it was very low friction to get onto the platform. And then I think just the, the high, the caliber of buyers and the caliber of listing. So we vet every listing. We vet every buyer. Now that registers as a micro require premium buyer, that's where you can contact sellers. so I think it was just kind of like, you know, going from let's just call it like a car dealership to like a Ferrari shop that makes sense where all the cars are, That it, and if you want to know who the owner is, you have to pay for that access, but it was a very specific towards startups, specifically SaaS.So I think that's another thing that I'm thinking of now is we, we went very narrow at the beginning, very narrow. So we were very specific on, specifically, bootstraps, SaaS companies.00:08:59 Nathan:Yeah. I think the approach in different marketplaces is always interesting when, you know, a marketplace is how businesses has like is a generic category, but then the twist on it, of, the seller not paying anything. And it being the buyer who pays, you know, a subscription for access. Why I think that that makes for an interesting twist, because then you're going to have this much higher pipeline of, you know, high quality businesses to look at.And so if a seller is paying for that, that makes sense. It reminds me of like, Bumble as a dating app being like, yep. So within the category of dating apps, but, women have to send the first message, you know, and, and like, that little bit of a twist makes it the marketplace feel, very different and changes the dynamics of. 00:09:40 Andrew:Yeah. I was going to say something, someone called micro fire shark tank, like if shark tank and dinner had a kid, I thought that was kind of an interesting analogy. but yeah, I'd say the, the key. The unique insights I had was again, like, from my perspective, if I'm going to list a business, I need to know who's seeing my information. I want to be in control of, you know, what information is being disclosed or being displayed publicly. and I don't want to commit until I really know, the quality of the buyers. And so that I think was very appealing to just being an entrepreneur. I think I. You know, understood the needs of other entrepreneurs and just kind of got it.Right. But I'm not gonna lie. When I, when I first launched it, I have this, I keep a journal that I update every month. It's not like a weird, you know, Hey dear diary thing. It's I do like, what's going really well. What are some things I'm worried about? and then things I'm grateful for, just to, you know, kind of keep it story log of my life. And before I launched my group wire, I actually, cause this idea had been attempted before, like a real startup acquisition marketplace. I think some of the other market places are more, geared towards, you know, content sites and domains and 00:11:07 Nathan:Yeah, 00:11:08 Andrew:Affiliate websites, but not real. Startups like SaaS companies, e-commerce companies, crypto companies, we've moved into a number of different categories.But, I wrote in my journal, I was like, I don't know if this is going to work, but at least it looks good. cause I, I just thought it needed to exist so bad for entrepreneurs that, we put a lot of thought into user experience and design. So it felt modern. You know, when you're working with startup founders, you kinda, you know, you want to really build trust, like yeah, if you're going to sell your business with us, your startup, you know, we also, we know how to build startups as well, and design them well and make them feel like something like this, this feels legitimate.And I think that's a, what I would call, you know, closing the credibility gap, you know, really, that first impression is so important. So we really kinda overdid the initial MVP. 00:12:06 Nathan:Yeah. I think that design is one of those things where you can go a long ways. And it's probably the first thing that people cut when it comes to the MPP. And that's just, I'm like, Nope, that's not an MVP. You have to cut features. You can't cut like the quality of, of the design. And if I have a limited budget, I'm for sure.Spending half of it, if not more on design. So I think you made the right move there.00:12:29 Andrew:Yeah, I think, I think today, I don't know if we're going to go off topic here, but I think a lot of startups today can legitimately have user experience in design as their competitive advantage. Just saving people, a Couple of clicks, making things easier to use, having a product where you don't have 50 tutorial videos, you've got to watch, or course you have to take. that's a huge advantage. and there's a lot of products that are very clunky and kind of feel like a car with, you know, like a jet ski engine added in. And I just kind of like a Jenga thing, you know, there's just so much technical debt to the product. I think though there's some products out there that I think could be rethought in terms of like the experience and the design they're delivering to the customers.But that's, that's probably a whole nother topic.00:13:22 Nathan:Yeah. Yeah. But we agree. And anyone who's listening to this show knows that I care deeply about design. one thing that I want to ask about and spend a lot of time on is content strategy. if I go to your website and go to the about page, it just lists your title or like your, your job description and your role as marketing. and so I'm imagining that's where you spent the majority of your time in, from the outside. It looks like content marketing is, either a very large or the largest portion of where you spend your time and how you're looking to grow MicroAcquire. Can you talk about how you think about content marketing and the growth of the business? 00:13:59 Andrew:Yeah, I think that was twofold. So number one, the first thing that happened to me when business apps was acquired, I had like five founder friends reach out and they said, how did you sell your business side is, is, were what, you know, so as entrepreneurs, we're not trained to sell businesses, we're not educated on what is due diligence, what are the legal steps of an acquisition?So I felt it was a twofold, the problem with the benefit. And when I say two folded, not right. Prom, but well point number one. Yeah. It's a phenomenal growth channel for us. we think heavily in terms of, you know, what is the content that, entrepreneurs will need when they're going through an acquisition, because the more we can educate them on acquisitions, the more we'll be able to facilitate.And I think that's been crucial, but then two there's just no content in the market that like there's books on fundraising, there's books on marketing there's books, on design there's books on there's a couple of books on, exits, but there just is such a disproportional amount of content available for everything, but a startup being acquired, that we felt, you know, there's an opportunity here to kind of be almost a, I don't want to say thought leader.00:15:20 Nathan:Yeah.00:15:21 Andrew:Kind of write the book, if you will, on, you know, this is, but also important to note is we write content for the seller, not for the buyer. we kinda think, you know, the buyers are set, you know, the buyers that we work with are, you know, private equity firms, corporate dev teams, other startups, people that, generally are sophisticated with, and also a lot of first-time buyers, but so the condoms still applies, but it gets you in the head of the entrepreneur, but we wanted to really empower the founder.So you'll notice every piece of content is angled towards the seller, not the buyer, if that makes sense. And I felt that was critical and just something cool to do for other founders, not like, Hey, this is an article on how to get like the cheapest SaaS acquisition possible. so we read articles on how to maximize your startups exit as.00:16:14 Nathan:Yeah. I mean, that, that perspective is in your, like your founding story for the company, But then it's interesting, like, all right, it makes sense that it carries through all of your content marketing as well, because in the same way that you have know who your customer is, which in the marketplace, you have a lot of different customers or you're, you know, you have both sides of it, but, 00:16:32 Andrew:That's that's something. Yeah, you're onto something. So that's something that, we determined, very, very early. So when we raised our, our seed round, I hired my former VP of product, VP of engineering. My former CFO, and my former head of marketing who's now gone. Cause he went, he was, he was, he was like one foot in he's started this, agency called brand arrow. so if anyone needs help with, Facebook ads or just any sort of SaaS marketing shadow, Tim brown now I told him like, Hey, you got to, I'm a big fan. I need like a micro mafia at one point. So I, I told him to dive in on that, but, we did an offsite and we, defined our culture, you know, our values, but really specifically, like you said, who was our customer?Cause it could be so many people, it could be okay, buyers, but there's so many different types of buyers. You know, which ones are we going to cater towards? And then there's sellers, you know, there's so many different types of sellers. There's people looking to sell comments. Again, domains, Amazon FBA businesses, SaaS founders.And so we really narrowed in, got super specific with our buyer And that really guides a lot of the decisions that we make all the way from the content to the product. I think that's really crucial in the early days, because you can always expand outwards. There's a theory. I don't know if you've heard of this, but the bowling ball theory, you've probably gone through this with your business where, you know, you start with one sorta audience and then I one customer segment, and there's just like these natural sort of like, you know, other segments that target for us, it was like e-commerce.And then we've been seeing a lot of just miscellaneous. You know, profitable software companies. So now we're a little bit more broad. So when I described my required of people, I say, it's a marketplace. So profitable software businesses, not just SaaS anymore, but yeah, we started really specific with SaaS founders being, our initial customer,00:18:37 Nathan:Yeah. Like narrowing it on. That is always a good thing. Okay. So content strategy, I'm seeing you do a lot of different things. one at let's just take Twitter, as a starting point. So I was looking back in August, you had 30,000 followers on Twitter. You have 73,000 followers today. You're tweeting five to 10 times a day.Often. Like you got a lot of, a lot of posts going out. It seems like they're resonating, obviously from the growth and all of that. you have a lot of these single posts are like single sentence. You know, here's an idea latch onto it, like positioning type things. So like one, one example is, instead of thinking of a hundred plus startup ideas, pick a customer you'd love to serve and solve their problems.That gets a thousand likes, 150 retweets or more. I want to know, two things, one, tell me about your Twitter strategy of how it fits into the broader business and what you're trying to do there. And then two, we'll just get into what's working. What's not working. 00:19:33 Andrew:Yeah, definitely. So Twitter strategy, there is absolutely none, aside from having fun. And I'm a firm believer of this, I think when people try to have a social media strategy where their goal is to grow followers. And so you start doing stuff like looking at other people's tweets, and then you take a tweet and this how I see this all the time with some content I put out like, oh, that looks very familiar, but I don't, I don't, you know, I don't care. but they're trying to grow their audience and they're not being authentic to who they are. And they're trying to be, you know, they're trying to, I guess what I'm trying to say is, Find a way to utilize, you know, social platforms in a way that you enjoy. So, one thing notice if you look at all my tweets, they're all from my iPhone.Like they're not from my web app. They're not from a scheduled Twitter thing. I just like that tweet. I remember writing that tweet. I was like, in my kitchen, I was just like, did it, you'll also see a tweet right before this podcast. That's just me. I was waiting for you to come on this podcast. I was like, so I think my point being, and I think this goes even broader is just, you know, if you want to be great at anything, and I'm not saying in any way, shape or form, I've created Twitter, but you just have to enjoy it.And then if you enjoy it, you're consistent at it. And then, I do have a few rules though. I don't usually comment on people's cause like you know, once you start getting to a certain point on Twitter, people, you can just post like Entrepreneurship is awesome. And then people have like a hundred questions and I just don't have the bandwidth to answer all those questions.So I usually will, I'm watching those questions and I'll usually, if some, if something's interesting, I'll, use that as a new tweet. and then you get tweeted out a lot, like, Hey, follow me. Like, Hey, we'd be on my podcast. So I kind of have a rule of like stay in my lane, if that makes sense. I've done a little bit of like beef marketing and stuff like that, you know, I'm sure you saw me like call out like tech, Raj, or maybe like throw a couple of shots at like, just joking, like VC sort of like, you know, shit posting type stuff. And that works. It definitely works. And there's some strategy behind that. That's probably one part of my social media strategy that was, strategic, it's effective, but it's not for the faint of heart. cause you do you make people pick sides, so you're going to upset some people and you're going to make some people really cheer you on.And so, I'm kind of done with that phase. that was fun. 00:22:20 Nathan:So if someone is in that phase or they're thinking about it, right. They, have a specific audience for their business or like a specific focus. They've chosen a niche and they have some strong opinions and they're not that kind of person who's like, you know, like let's not cause any conflict.They're like, no, I'm actually, I'd be, I'd be willing to get into a little bit of conflict. what would you say what's, what's your advice on going down that path of like, if you're thinking of oh, there's a TechCrunch in your space or someone else that you might want to pick a fight with? 00:22:49 Andrew:Did you just gotta really believe it? like, and I think it has to be factual, like what I said about, TechCrunch, as an example, just go on their website right now and see it. And tell me if you can find an article about a bootstrap startup. like, that's all I said is like, you guys are a publication that writes about just venture backed businesses. and you know, what kind of really struck a chord with me with that was my prior company business apps. You know, we were in TechCrunch, all the time. Like they loved writing about, you know, real business building storage partnerships, you know, version 2.0 launches, you know, international exp like, you know, stories that inspire entrepreneurs.And they moved towards, you know, this really venture backed sorta, you know, you're, you're either in it, or you're not in it. And I just blindly called them out on time and then some people. were like, yeah. And then I was like, huh, maybe there's something here. And then I just, and this is how I always think of or how I validate ideas as well as, so I have a publication now called, bootstrappers.com, which is just kind of like my.Like what I wanted, like just, you know, I want inspiring stories, like back in like 2010, you would read articles on TechCrunch about like, two people. They just launched a product, no funding. I remember some of the writers I used to work with, are they all left? They're all gone. It's like a new, it's a new company.It's, it's been acquired by four different companies. And you know, some of the older writers you're out, but, the older crew, would kind of joke and say, Hey, BC's like, I hope you banked me one day for writing about all the companies that I discovered. and then you find it later. now the opposite is entirely true. And so I, I wanted to bring that style. You know, journalism back where it's stories about companies making like 200,000 a year or 500,000 or 2 million. because you know what, I read an article about a company raising 200 million and then 500 million, like the next week. it doesn't really inspire me too much.And I think that celebrated so much today and, you know, the startup community that I think it's a little dangerous, I think, as a young entrepreneur, like if you think the path to being a successful founder is. Get into Y Combinator, raise a bunch of funding, get featured in, you know, these magazines, because that's what happens when you get fun.That's like the only way to get covered sometimes, is funding announcements. and even then it's hard cause there's so many. so I think that creates an environment where a lot of entrepreneurs are focused on raising capital rather than raising or generating revenue from customers.And that was just something that I lived through.I had a really good mentor. We're told, are we going off topic too far?00:26:04 Nathan:Well, I do want to take you back to, like the idea of like picking a fight. But finish the thought with a mentor. Who's everyone, everyone listening knows that ConvertKit is bootstrapped. I'm a huge fan of that and the same things, the same reason that you're picking a fight with TechCrunch or that you did, I would do the same because we experienced that, you know, we could have more revenue, more customers, all of that than, anyone else, but they're only going to write about the VC funded version.So, 00:26:28 Andrew:Yeah. So so long story, short business apps, my company prior, boot shove that business, and I just had a really good mentor Christian free Freeland. And he was always challenging me to think against the difficult soak on early pap. And we were based in San Francisco for five years, eventually moved to San Diego and that's where we exited the business. but, yeah, now that like I'm on my third, I took a little hiatus and went into crypto land for a little bit. So it got away from like SaaS and stuff like that, but now I'm back home. and yeah, just saw that and said, okay, and then actually TechCrunch did write a little bit about bootstrapping and then I've also seen a lot of other people start saying the same thing, like agreeing, which I think has been cool.It, which isn't like it's not a bad thing that TechCrunch or any publication, I don't want to just hone in on, on TechCrunch. because th they're, they've done so much for so many founders. but yeah, other people, I feel like the first shot was fired. Like, Hey, You know, we miss the old version of, you know, maybe mix it up a little bit.And they've taken some of that feedback and I've actually written about some bootstrap companies and then other people have kind of said the same thing. Like, you know, the startup ecosystem is really turning into this, you know, fundraise craze news cycle. And, you know, there's 99% of other startups that aren't going down that path.So that creates kind of like a movement. So that was like the benefit of, of beef marketing sometimes is you, again, make people pick sides. Some people agree with it, some people don't. yeah. So advice for anyone in terms of beef marketing, I, I, again, I, going back to my original point, it how you have to believe it, you have to believe what you're saying.It can't just be like, you know, one foot in, from my perspective, Most of the major tech publication should write about, you know, businesses that are profitable and sustainable and ones that are raising a bunch of capital and going public like a good mix would be amazing because then that gives you a true picture of, you know, all the different styles of entrepreneurship, you know, the ones that are at the top of the top and the ones that are taking a more sustainable practical approach, just giving a more realistic view into the world of entrepreneurship instead of just kind of, you know, putting this one style on a pedestal.Yeah, I mean, just get ready for, I mean, nothing bad happened. so I would just say also with beef marketing, it doesn't have to be just, an individual Oregon or, or an organization. Like good examples. So I've always had a, like, kind of an, a branding, an enemy, and all my businesses for business apps.It was a large businesses. Like our main sales pitch was, you know, Starbucks down the street, paid 2 million for their, mobile app, blah, blah, blah. You know, would you like to create that same customer experience for your customers and, you know, like David versus Goliath type story, you know, Mike group, we're kind of fighting for the founders.Then all the other stuff that I just talked about, but Salesforce had, their, their enemy was on-premise software. They essentially invented SaaS, you know, the company. Say a little chat thing. Yeah. They had a big campaign of just no forums. Like no one wants to download an ebook anymore, like forms go away, please. and I thought that was very clever, box.com had some beef with Microsoft, which was definitely fun to watch. I've I've been around long enough where I remember seeing in San Francisco, like, the billboard of like box, just basically saying Microsoft sucks. you know, Uber and Lyft were throne, had a food fight for awhile.That one probably went over over the line maybe. but yeah, my point is, is there's other examples it could be, for your business, it could be expensive. To like, I don't know, like it could be, it doesn't have to necessarily be like a organization or it definitely shouldn't be a person either.Like don't ever like just straight up call. That's just, that's not cool. Like if you have a problem with a person, call them and tell them your problems, like, that's it now. Like that's not, I don't, I don't support that at all. I think that's ticky-tacky and just a sign of just weak character, if you're just literally, you know, trying to tear someone down for your business's benefit,00:31:28 Nathan:One thing that's interesting, I think is you probably watch some, maybe beefs between individuals is just how many of them, maybe are planned or facilitated in some way. that is interesting. Like someone, messaged me today because, sort of like Nick Huber who's, has a popular Twitter profile under sway startup.Hopefully we'll have him on the show soon. He was, he posted something like controversial, which I know is one of his top of funnel tweets, right. To try to get as much attention. And so I purposely like aggressively disagreed with it, you know And then we're just separately texting, like, Oh, thanks for the engagement, you know Right. Because we know that by deceit, like if he strongly takes one stance and I strongly take the other stance, then like one, no one will think we're actually mad at each other, but then too, like, it'll get a lot more attention engagement. So a lot of people are doing. Some version of that. or if you see a happening usually between two individuals often, they're probably on really good terms behind the scenes. 00:32:26 Andrew:Yeah, I did not know that that's, that's me staying in my lane. I, I, I missed it. but yeah. I, mean that's business entertainment, you know, there's, there's nothing wrong with that, but I, think there's a line to be drawn, you know, like, If you do engage and stuff like that. number one, I think it's always great when, like, if it's real and then they like, like, Hey, we're cool now.Like, you know, we did this in pub and now like, okay, we're on 00:32:59 Nathan:Close that loop. 00:33:00 Andrew:Yeah. I think, I think that's really cool to see. but yeah, public food fights, not my thing. don't have appetite for that or any advice, but I will say, I will say Nick is coming hard on some, some of the stuff I've said, like, 00:33:16 Nathan:Whole angle. 00:33:17 Andrew:Yeah.The, the one thing I'll say about that though, that style like shit posting, you know, I was like some view of like VC funds just based on like shit posting and stuff like that. what I've noticed, ‘cause this, this actually, this is probably a good tidbit for, you know, if you're considering, beef marketing and what happens is you draw in a type of crowd that likes that negativity and it, and that can drain on you.And so if you should ship posts all the time, like a large amount of your followers are just going to be shipped posters, and they're going to be, then all your comments are like, use a blah, blah, blah. I mean, if you go on Nick's feed, you can just kind of look, just look at his comments. He has like a million people.Unfortunately insult, I kind of feel bad for him sometimes because I've also seen him comment how it affects him personally. I, I don't know him, so maybe it doesn't give a shit, but, that's why, again, I say, stay in my lane. Just keep it positive. Aye. Aye. Microfibers entire marketing strategy is literally just inspire or support encourage entrepreneurs.It did. not, I mean, not getting beefs with people and stuff like that.00:34:33 Nathan:Have you. like, there's the side that you're, you're taking of, using your personal brand for marketing, you know, growing a Twitter audience, all of that. You're very off the cuff of like, you know, just firing off, tweets or things that you, you think about. But at the same time, like you're a professional marketer and you tend to, from my new at you and other places, like you're very methodical, you tend to attract things really well.Do you track efforts that go into Twitter and Like how that translates into, you know, deals on MicroAcquire or new buyers or sellers, you know, like listing listing companies or any of that. 00:35:10 Andrew:So I'm a big believer in, so David can sell from drift said this really well where, I think I might've mentioned this to you the last time we talked, but, he, he broke it down into like three phases where, we've gone through three phases of SaaS. Like the first phase was invention murder. The first person to kind of build a tool one, the market.And then the second phase was the first company to really figure out the best, go to market strategy, like LTV to CAC, you know, AEs STR ratio who could, who could land grab the market fast enough. And then right now he says, he calls what we're in today, the Procter and gamble phase, which is your brand. So it's most defensible part about, your business is your brand. Your technology can be copied. it's easier than ever to raise capital to build a team to do that. There's also other things like your culture and your team's talent and just, you know, again, your unique insights into the market. People can copy chapter one, but not chapters two and three and four that you have planned. so I think a lot about that, a lot in terms of just brand and market reputation. But So, no, we don't, I don't measure it. when a tweet goes viral, like the one you just mentioned, I don't look at the comments because when a tweak gets like a thousand likes00:36:33 Nathan:Yeah,00:36:34 Andrew:Is gosh, like the questions and the people like disagree with you and just, you know, you start to enter, it's like, you're in a stadium of, you know, 200,000 people are reading this and then like 200 people have comments, not everyone's going to be like, yeah.Like half of them are going to be like negative stuff. So, yeah. So I, I push, I push away all negative energy. So if, if it's not positive, I'm over it. 00:37:05 Nathan:W what you're describing is interesting of the city of idea of, if you think about it, like maybe your immediate group of friends, you post something, the people who reply right away, you interacted with them a bunch, like that's who's on the field or whatever. And then the next group is like the coaches, the diehard fans, like the re the support staff, everyone else, like those are your Followers. And then you can tell every time that this tweet goes beyond that, because you start to get, like, I had one on company culture that, was like a thousand retweets and went really far. and you could just immediately tell when it had gone to like two levels beyond the people who follow me, cause it just, it went totally off the rails. And you're right. That the only thing you can do is like mute your own thread and move on. 00:37:50 Andrew:Yeah, I just, and you could tell, cause I usually will like everyone's tweets just cause I respect everyone's opinions, like bringing, Nick back up. He, I remember I had a tweet, just something about how entrepreneurs that have maybe struggled in their childhood, have an advantage. He came in with like a strong disagreement and kinda, but I respected it.But then I, we, we kind of close the loop with like, Hey Mike, I think you're taking this out of context. so I'll respect everyone's opinion, but once it goes, you know, I'll like all of, them. And then once it goes viral, that's when it's like all, everything is just nuts. Like, you know, I can't, I would never want, I can't keep up with it.And then too, I've probably already moved on to like three or four other tweets that, you know, I'm thinking of or something like that, but I think, I think that's another important side of, just social media in general is just understanding like everyone has a right to their opinions. So even if people do strongly like disagree, that's awesome.You know, everyone is entitled to their opinion. Everyone has, You know, unique view of life And how things work. and I respect all those opinions, but I think one. thing about social media that can get kind of crazy is when you're taken out of context, I've had that happen a couple of times. Like the one time with Nick, maybe, he took it as I think like, people with really great families, you know, like divorced dads make less than married men. and I, was like Nick, no, this isn't about diverse families. It's just about like entrepreneurs struggling with when they grew up. Like I were Joe, and then I had another one. This one was, this is a crazy one. I had one, I tweeted out. Hire people you'd be friends with. And that was, literally someone literally took that as far as saying, nice job describing why tech is sexist and racist in five words.And I, and I was like, what? And I was hanging out with my sons. I didn't have like enough, I didn't catch it in time. And so I come back, to my phone and I had to delete the tweet. And then I actually, you know, put more con like, Hey, I meant that as like, you know, hire people, you'd be friends with and you'd care for them personally and professionally, not just hire a bunch of white people or something like that.Like what? So sometimes you gotta be careful, when that kind of stuff goes down. And it's also just fascinating how people can, again, their, their perspectives, like their perspectives and their viewpoints. you know, you can say one thing and it means one thing to you and something completely different to someone 00:40:47 Nathan:Right.Yeah. I remember a time that Josh Pigford, for bare metrics, had a tweet about concerns in your, in a resume when someone, you know, has had 10 roles in 10 years or kind of thing, or like jumped between roles every 12 months. And that, I I'm not even fully sure why, but, but that one, like he got jumped on in a very similar way of people taking out of context and saying like, this is what's wrong with technology and 00:41:14 Andrew:Let's talk about that for a second. So when you're, when you're taken out of context, Just admit it, just say, Hey, that, that this is not what I meant. And then I recommend is deleted tweet, and just clarifying, just like, Hey, I wrote a tweet, this, this is what I actually did. I deleted the tweet. And then I said, Hey, I had a tweet taken out of context and it's obviously a little embarrassing, you know, but it's the right thing to do is like, Hey, like that's not what I meant.So also admitting, you know, that's not what you meant, but clarifying when people like, that's not that that was not my intention of those five words in any way, shape or form, even like, that, that, that experience was so far off. I still kind of scratch my head on it. But my point being is, you know, it, you know, take one back, like, Hey, listen, I, I said something, it was taken out of context.I apologize. this is what I really meant for further clarification. And it'll just make your life a lot easier instead of trying, to defend, because I know the thing is if Mrs. Also I don't really comment too much on social media. Number one, it's just exhausting because you can have so many, then you're like a, full-time like customers support person on Twitter. again, you know, once You kind of engage with someone who vehemently disagrees with what you're saying, or has taken you out of context, it's really hard to change their opinion, if not impossible. So even trying, once you, if you just try you lose. You just start throwing food and stuff like that.So that's just kinda some of the crazy stuff I've seen happen on, on Twitter as, you know, gone a little bit more active. cause I, I wasn't active on Twitter, so all this is like new to me too. I'm still learning like, oh shit posers. I didn't, I didn't know those existed or like, oh wow. You can get really taken out of context and it can go viral and people can say some mean things.So yeah, my, again, going back to just saying I stay in my lane and just talk about stuff that I liked it. Talk about.00:43:35 Nathan:I like it. something else that you've done that I hadn't seen other people to do before, but I get it as a strategy. so separate from like just sort of specific, but it's using cameo and using spokespeople on cameo. for your business specifically, you got Chris, demon topless from Silicon valley and all of that to do announcement videos for partnerships and one they're amazing. but like w where did that come from? And, how'd that turn into something that like, And, now if someone says like tres commas, like in relation to micro choir, everyone's like, oh yeah, that makes sense. 00:44:15 Andrew:So for the longest time, it was just me running Mike requir. I was a solo founder. and on the team page, we just like, as I was working on the design with, I initially use an agency to help with, the development. And, there was a team page and I was like, ah, just put Richard Hendrix, Gavin Belson, and Jen yang from Silicon valley.And it just kinda was, I just thought it was cool. And some people like, you know, called it out and was like, are these really your team members? And I'm like, yeah, they were super harder recruit. So I'm, I'm a huge fan of the show because it is shockingly accurate and just hilarious. and then, yeah, so I actually, you know, before, like right when I launched my crew choir, I.When on cameo saw Russ Hanneman Chris. I can't pronounce his last name off the top of my head, but, you know, he was available and he was like my favorite character. And I was like, yeah. W do you want to talk about my group choir? And since then we built, you know, a pretty good relationship in terms of, you know, just working with them.And he's a really great guy. Like he's a really, really, really nice person. but my point here is I'm always thinking about what's, I'm always learning and I'm always trying to think of what is changing in marketing today? For example, the marketing playbooks that worked five years ago don't work as effectively today because everyone adopts them and starts using them.And then it starts to, feel like marketing and the best marketing doesn't feel like marketing it's entertaining, or it, captures your attention in a way where you go, whoa, I haven't seen that before. So I'm always trying to think of unique ways to, capture or actually I should say, earn audience attention rather than buy it, or, you know, writes an ebook and engaged it and get your email and then send you 30 trip emails, which worked fantastically a decade ago, which killed a decade ago.But So that's kind of where the thought process and then candidly. I would say, I might laugh the hardest out of those videos. So it's like my like guilty, like pleasure. cause you know, they're not free. So like, you know, I, I probably am lapping the hardest, like when those go out.00:46:46 Nathan:I've I've laughed pretty hard at a lot of them, especially as like, they end up in a series where they like build on each other. The, he uses jokes that he first coined and, you know, first video. And,00:46:58 Andrew:Yeah. a little background on that too is, I didn't tell him to make up anything like he's made of like gas Decky style, micro Gaz, micro, and like, I don't tell, I just basically, cause you're only able to write in like two sentences and he he's just a hilarious person. So any startup looking to, you know, announce something, I highly recommend checking it. 00:47:21 Nathan:I guess how has the business side of it work? Right? Cause if you go on, on his page in particular, it says $349 for personal use or 909 plus for business use, which makes sense that there would be a split there because you've obviously gotten a lot of earned, earned, attention from those. how does it work actually on the payment side? 00:47:41 Andrew:In terms of like using Kamya.00:47:44 Nathan:Yeah. Using cameo, maybe using Russ specifically. Well, Chris, not Russ. But using him specifically or, you know what you've done, you've done with, other people on cameo. 00:47:56 Andrew:Yeah. So he's kind of the only we did a partnership with Clearco and I had like the game, the rapper, duke came here just because I kind of went on like a cameo binge, like I've been a fan of you forever.00:48:12 Nathan:Cards on file. You know, you're just like00:48:15 Andrew:Yeah. I was like, I'd love for you to just say micro choir. Like this is awesome. who else did we get?I can't remember off the top of my head, but, what's been interesting to see what Chris is. when I first booked him, he was $200. Now he's 5,000. So he, has definitely, you know, made some waves in the startup community. And So it's, it's cool to see him like, you know, making people laugh and helping startups get exposure and then raising his prices too, which is, I think something that, you know, most startups should do.So he's done a very good job of that. It, it went from like one K to two K to three K. Now it's at like, 5k, so he's expensive. 00:49:00 Nathan:So that's like when we see something like that, right. If the nine and nine plus, in the buying process, then later, does it tell you like, oh, here's like once you fill out, the initial form, it'll tell you what, what the price is or how's that work?00:49:13 Andrew:So there's, there's a personal use. So you can use his personal, I don't know his like personal cost, but let's say it's like 500 bucks and that would be for like a birthday wish or something like that, which can be a great way to motivate like your team, like, Hey team, great. You know, Q1 or Q4 that's ending, here's our goals for next year, you know, made, they want to me to give you all shout out, that'd be 500 bucks, but then a business use where you posted, externally, so on Twitter or social media, or, within some sort of piece of marketing content.The price for that is usually 10 X, you know, internal use. 00:49:55 Nathan:Did any of the other ones that you tried? Did you feel like they got attention or that kind of thing make you want to do it again? Or was it more just the ones with Chris that really resonated. 00:50:04 Andrew:I think probably you'll see less cameos, out of me, I think, you know? there, there, there gets to a point and we could, we could probably have another podcast about this, about like things with diminishing returns. And I think I've kind of, you know, used them so many times that, I mean, for the really big like, announcements that we have coming up, like maybe twice next year or something like, that but I think there's sort of a diminishing return, especially with the cost, you know? I think building in public kind of falls into that category a little bit. audience exhaustion in terms of like paid ad campaigns. you know, so I'm always thinking of that stuff too.I like, are we overdoing it? cause then it just kinda starts to get corny is when you're doing it over and over and over and over. and it's not really like, whoa, he's here. Like I didn't expect this. And when it starts to become expected, I think if there was just kind of a little bit of luster. 00:51:05 Nathan:Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. something else that you do a ton of is partnerships, whether it's with PYP or angel list or whoever, it feels like micro choirs coming out with a partnership. Every, I don't know what the actual cadences, I feel like it's every two weeks to a month. what's the, what's the strategy there. And is that like a very deliberate, marketing strategy or is it just like, look, this is a natural fit. And so we're just going to do a better job. It made sense to do the partnership and we're just going to do a better job promoting it than most people do. And when they come out with a partnership, 00:51:35 Andrew:Yeah. I mean, so the pipe Clearco Angeles partnerships all made total sense. They help startups get acquired, which is, you know, the purpose of our business. And, you know, our, our main metric of success is helping startups get acquired. So helping them get financed, increases the buyer pool, which then can lead to more acquisitions.So there's, those made a ton of sense. and then we also want to expand internationally. So we partnered with, essentially like the angel list of, Africa that serves 40 countries in Africa. And so I thought that was a really fun partnership in terms of, you know, helping, really underserved. areas of the world, or support underserved areas of the world with my group who are in terms of, you know, just our message and just our encouragement and we're going to continue those.So we're looking, actively speaking with, individuals that are, you know, accelerators or like, start a boot camps and like Turkey or Europe or the UK or Australia. I have a number of conversations, but we'll probably go a little lighter on those because I also feel like the partnership thing is it's like, okay, another part is another partnership might require really. but that's, I think partnerships are, what I would call a non-linear growth strategy. So it's basically, you know, what you're doing is you're leveraging, you know, number one, Another company's brand So you're, you're borrowing some of their brand equity saying like, Hey, we're partnering. So their capabilities are now part of our capabilities and vice versa. so there's benefits on both sides. And then you know, with products that, you know, pipe clear co and Angeles offers specifically, it adds value to our product. So it's like a win, win, win. It's a, it's a good marketing play, good brand play. And then it's good. Just, you know, product play without, a lot of, you know, engineering needed. 00:53:41 Nathan:Is there, like, do you have engineers internally just devoted to, you know, these integrations or, or did they tend to be more on the marketing? you know, our business ops side rather than on the product side, because then they can be expensive on the product side.00:53:55 Andrew:Yeah, they definitely can. I would say they're more. On the marketing side then on, like for example, the angel is partnership is just a landing page that so Avaloq, the CEO of Angeles is an investor in might require and then evolve in an investor in my rewire. And so I just asked, I pointed out this other company that was making an SPV product for private equity firms.And I just said, can you make me a landing page? I'll promote it. And so inside my group where there's like a drop down that says raise bonds, and then it takes you to a landing page. So minimal product integration there, but it's just kind of like us saying, Hey, if you, if you're looking to raise funds, this is where we recommend you doing it.We've done that with mercury bank as well, which is just, again, you know, you acquire a company, you probably want to transfer those assets and do a new entity. That new entity is going to need a bank account. So we're just kind of getting all the re they're almost like perks. If you will.00:54:54 Nathan:Yeah. That makes sense. And then it's not this big integration that you're having to maintain for years to come or.00:55:01 Andrew:Yeah, no, it's not like a, like a Facebook, like a, you know, SSO log-in or something like that. you know, it's a, it's a lot simpler. It's usually just like a lane kicking over to a landing page, you know, driving traffic to them and then we get some sort of kickback for whatever business we drive to them.00:55:20 Nathan:Is there anything in particular that's worked well on, like the partnerships that have been a, a, huge boost, right? Where either you've gotten a bunch more attention for Mike require built the brand. Like, are there things that you see in common on those ones where you're like, yes, that was a home run versus the ones where you're like, I think that was worth the time to put together.Maybe 00:55:40 Andrew:Yeah. I mean, I'd say, I'd say all of them, I'd say my favorite are definitely the Clearco and pipe partnerships. like. Hers is he, oh, he bought me this to kick off our partnership. It's assigned Mike Tyson glove and we've done a number of acquisitions together. I think their company's fantastic. I love working with our team.Clearco same thing. So pipe, I was finance all of our SaaS deals exclusively, and then Clearco all of our e-commerce deals exclusively and they're just great teams and it's a clear need. You know, some people want to finance these with, these companies and we make it extremely seamless to connect to those companies.And we even do like pre-financing. So if you're a founder looking to sell on Mike required and you want to give a line of, you know, potential financing in advance to a buyer, we can, pre-approve a seller. So it just makes kind of the, you know, when you're going to buy a home, it's like it's pre finance or something.I don't know if that's a good analogy, but, those are, those are partnerships that really add, like they were on the product roadmap and they just, you know, we just went to the best ones in the market with the most credibility, with the largest capital pools. but also with the engineering resources.So, you know, anytime a company is, you know, financed through pipe, we get a notification within slack. It says like, Hey, add preapproval number to this company. So we just, we, instead of working with like a ton of different financing partners, we just pick the best ones and then then integrated deeply with them.00:57:23 Nathan:That makes sense. One of the things that I wanted to ask about before we wrap up is, on the sort of the investor influencer side, you have a lot of people, like know, you mentioned Deval and, and others who, have invested in MicroAcquire. And is that, helping of like helping you you know, amplify some of these things on Twitter amplify, these partnerships, open doors in some way.Do you think you get something similar with like a influencer program or has the investor side really been a good, good angle for that? 00:57:54 Andrew:Yeah, that's a good question. So yes, there's definitely the group of investors that my career has is like all my, like idols, like, you know, founders of companies that, you know, I like, you know, Dharmesh from HubSpot, Neval like, From Angeles, like those are some of my favorite companies and I get to, interact with them on a, on a very limited basis. I don't reach out to them for advice, very often. So I think that also adds to just, you know, brand equity of just, being a marketplace, you know, and us wanting to build this with the startup community. That was kind of more of the thought process behind it. But now, I mean, you could even look at my likes.I, I ha I, was, has evolved over, liked something of, mine now has Dharmesh maybe once, like, so now I don't rely on them for like social media support or anything like that. but it, it is, a good way in terms of, you know, when you raise your entreprenuers, you get kind of, again, unique insights because most of them have been through MNA. so, so typical VCs, but, I, I really liked that, style of, of fundraising is when, obviously I'm a bigger advocate of bootstrapping because that's kind of, you know, where I've spent, or had the most success. But if you're gonna raise capital, I, I recommend entrepreneurs for us because they have experienced building a business.And then typically with, you know, acquisitions specifically in my case, which is you know, extremely helpful. 00:59:33 Nathan:Yeah, you and I are both known for bootstrapping. And we're also, I think, pretty well known for not being that dogmatic about it, of being like, here's what we did. Here's why it works well. Here's why the other path can be fine too. you know, rather than being super dogmatic in one camp or the00:59:49 Andrew:Yeah. That's one thing I've noticed since being vocal about bootstrapping that I think is a little toxic; if you're funded, it's like, I hate you. Then, if your bootstrapped, venture capital's just a tool. If you know how to use the tool correctly, it can be a great accelerant to your business. Everything comes with a cost. So, when you bootstrap, you have to kind of eat glass for much longer. I've lived that life, but at the end, the rewards can be epic.So, if your goal is to make money, you should probably bootstrap, because you can sell the business whenever You want. You have no approvals. You own the whole thing. Nathan, if you wanted to sell your business, you don't have any investment or approvals, or anyone saying, “No, you need to hit that billion dollar mark.” If you want to really disrupt the market, or change a market or, go a little bit bigger, faster, venture capital is just a tool to accelerate that. It all comes with a cost.The cost of bootstrapping is, sometimes you have to do customer support for longer. You have to do some of these roles where you can't bring in talent earlier. The cost of venture capital is, you give it back equity and control within your business. There's usually controls. You need approval to raise capital. You need approval to sell your business.So, everything comes with a cost, and it has pros and cons. I think bootstrapping makes sense for 99% of entrepreneurs, because the bar today is building a billion dollar business, and that's not easy to do. So, for many first-time founders, I'm a big fan of stair-stepping and entrepreneurship. One of my favorite tweets that I've ever written is, “Start with an agency, get to cashflow positive, and then bootstrap an asset—whether that's a SaaS company or your e-commerce business—sell that asset, become financially secure, and then do whatever you want.” Swing for the fences, go on a beach, whatever. Along the way, you prepare yourself for the next stage of business.01:02:24 Nathan:Yeah, I completely agree with that. I have an article titled “The Ladders of Wealth Creation” that touches on the similar idea of using the skills from one ladder to move up to the next, and go from there.Well this has been fun. I always enjoy watching the partnerships, what you're doing on Twitter, and everywhere else.I think that MicroAcquire is a great example of what you can build with an audience. Thanks for coming on and hanging out with me and, and we'll have to talk soon.01:02:52 Andrew:Yeah, Nathan, thanks for having me, man. I enjoyed the chat.01:02:55 Nathan:Alright. Catch you later.01:02:56 Andrew:See you, man.

Andrew Warner has been part of the internet startup scene since 1997. Andrew and his brother built a $30 million per year online business, which they later sold. After taking an extended vacation and doing some traveling, Andrew started Mixergy. Mixergy helps ambitious upstarts learn from some of the most successful people in business.Andrew and I talk about his new book, Stop Asking Questions. It's a great read on leading dynamic interviews, and learning anything from anyone. We also talk about longevity and burnout as an entrepreneur. Andrew gives me feedback about my interviewing style, the direction I should take the podcast, and much more.In this episode, you'll learn: Why you need to understand and communicate your mission How to get your guest excited about being interviewed What to do instead of asking questions How to hook your audience and keep them engaged Links & Resources ConvertKit Gregg Spiridellis JibJab Ali Abdaal The Web App Challenge: From Zero to $5,000/month In 6 Months Groove Zendesk Help Scout Jordan Harbinger Noah Kagan Bob Hiler Seth Godin Morning Brew Alex Lieberman Keap (formerly Infusionsoft) Notion Sahil Bloom Ryan Holiday Brent Underwood Ghost Town Living Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator Damn Gravity Paul Graham Y Combinator Nathan Barry: Authority Ira Glass NPR This American Life Barbara Walters Richard Nixon interview Oprah interview with Lance Armstrong Matt Mullenweg Chris Pearson Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue Peter Thiel Gawker Nick Denton The Wall Street Journal Rohit Sharma SanDisk Jason Calacanis Dickie Bush Sean McCabe Daily Content Machine Jordan Peterson Tribes Warren Buffet Sam Walton Ted Turner GothamChess LinkedIn Learning (formerly Lynda.com) Inc.com: Selling Your Company When You're Running on Fumes Chess.com Mark Cuban James Altucher Rod Drury Andrew Warner's Links Andrew Warner Stop Asking Questions Mixergy Episode Transcript[00:00:00] Andrew:The top 10 interviews of all time are news-based interviews. We, as podcasters, keep thinking, “How do I get enough in the can, so if I die tomorrow, there's enough interviews to last for a month, so I can be consistent, and the audience loves me.”That's great, but I think we should also be open to what's going on in the world today. Let's go talk to that person today. If there's an artist who's suddenly done something, we should go ask to do an interview with them.[00:00:32] Nathan:In this episode, I talk to my friend, Andrew Warner, who I've known for a long time. He actually played a really crucial role in the ConvertKit story in the early days, and provided some great encouragement along the way to help me continue the company, and get through some tough spots.We actually don't get into that in this episode, but it takes an interesting turn because we just dive right in.Andrew's got a book on interviewing. He runs Mixergy. He's been, running Mixergy for a long time. We talk about longevity and burnout, and a bunch of other things. He dives in and challenges me, and gives me feedback on my interviewing style. Where I should take the Podcast, and a bunch of other stuff. It's more of a casual conversation than the back-and-forth interview of how he grew his business. But I think you'll like it. It's a lot of what I'm going for on the show.So anyway, enjoy the episode.Andrew, welcome to the show.[00:01:25] Andrew:Thanks for having me on.[00:01:26] Nathan:There's all kinds of things we can talk about today, but I want to start with the new book that you got coming out.This is actually slightly intimidating; I am interviewing someone who has a book coming out about how to be good at interviewing. Where do we even go from here? You were saying that you have thoughts?[00:01:47] Andrew:I have feedback for you. I have a thoughts on your program.[00:01:51] Nathan:I'm now even more nervous.[00:01:52] Andrew:I've been listening, and I've been following, and I've been looking for questioning styles. Is there feedback I could give him? I mean, I've wrote a whole book on it. I should have tons of ideas on that.I don't. Here's the thing that stood out for me watching you. There's an ease and a comfort with these guests, but I'm trying to figure out what you're trying to do with the Podcast. What is connecting them? Are you trying to bring me, the listener, in and teach me how to become a better creator who's going to grow an audience and make a career out of it? Or are you trying to learn for yourself what to do?How to become closer to what Ali Abdaal doing, for example, or Sahil Bloom? Are you trying to do what they did, and grow your audience? Or is it a combination of the two?I think the lack of that focus makes me feel a little untethered, and I know that being untethered and going raw, and letting it go anywhere is fine, but I think it would be helpful if you gave me a mission.What's the mission that Nathan Barry's on with the Podcast. Why is he doing these interviews?[00:02:56] Nathan:Oh, that's interesting. Because it's probably different: my mission, versus the audience members' mission.[00:03:05] Andrew:I think you should have a boat together and, but go ahead.[00:03:08] Nathan:I was going to say mine is to meet interesting people. Like that's the thing I found that, podcasts are the pressure from two sides, one as a creator, as an individual online, like I'm not going to set aside the time to be like, you know what, I'm going to meet one interesting person a week and we're just going to have a conversation riff on something like that.Doesn't happen the times that, you know, the years that I didn't do this show, I didn't set aside like deliberate time to do that. And then the other thing is if I were to set aside that time and send out that email, I think a lot of people would be like, I kind of had to have a busy week. I don't know that I've, you know, like yeah, sure.Nathan, whoever you are. I did a Google search. You seem moderately interesting. I'm not sure that I want to get on that.Like a, get to know[00:03:58] Andrew:They wouldn't and it would be awkward. And you're right. The Podcast gives you an excuse. I think you should go higher level with it though. I think you should go deep to the point where you feel vulnerable. I think what you should do is say something like this, isn't it. You have to go into your own into your own mission and say, this is what it is.And just, so let me set the context for why this matters. I think it helps the audience know, but it also helps you get better guests to give better of themselves. I talk in the book about how I was interviewing Greg spirit, Dallas, the guy who created jib, jab, you know, those old viral video, it was a fire video factory that also created apps that allowed you to turn your yourself into like a viral meme that you could then send to your friends.Anyway, he didn't know me. He was incredibly successful. He was, I think, person of the year, a company of the year named by time. He was on the tonight show because he created these videos that had gone viral. And yes. He said yes, because a friend of a friend invited him, but I could see that he was just kind of slouching.He was wearing a baseball cap. It wasn't a good position. And then he said, why are we doing this? And I said, I want to do a story. That's so important. That tells the story of how you built your business. Yes. For my audience. So they see how new businesses are being built online, but let's make it so clear about what you did, that your great grandkids can listen to this.And then they will know how to great grandfather do this and put us in this situation. And that's what I wanted. I wanted for him to create that. And he told me that afterwards, if he had known that that was a mission, he wouldn't have put his hat on. He said that after that, he started thinking about the business in a more in depth way, visualizing his great grandchild.And then later on, he asked me for that recording so that he could have it in his family collection. So the reason I say that is I want us to have a mission. That's that important that yes. You could get somebody to sit in front of the camera because you're telling me you're doing a podcast, frankly.Right. You're with ConvertKit they're going to say yes, but how do you bring the best out of them? And that's it. And so that's why I'm doing this. And so one suggestion for you is to say something like.I'm Nathan, I've been a creator my whole life, but I'm starting from scratch right now with YouTube.I've got 435 people watching YouTube. It's not terrible, but it's clearly not where I want to end up. And so what I've decided to do is instead of saying, I've created the book authority, I wrote it. I'm the one who created software that all these creators are using a ConvertKit. Instead of, instead of allowing myself to have the comfort of all my past successes, I'm going to have the discomfort of saying, I don't know what it's like.And so I'm going to bring on all these people who, because maybe I've got credibility from ConvertKit are going to do interviews with me. And they're going to teach me like Alia doll and others are going to teach me how they became better creators, better business people. I'm going to use it to inform my, my, growth on YouTube.And by the way, You'll all get to follow along. And if you want to follow along and build along with me, this is going to come from an earnest place. Now I've obviously gone. Long-winded cause I'm kind of riffing here, but that's a mission. And now we're watching as you go from four to 500, now we care about your growth.Now there's someone giving you feedback and more importantly, there's someone who then can go back years later and see the breadcrumbs. Even if the whole thing fails and say, you know what?Nathan made it in virtual reality videos. And he's amazing. But look at what he did when YouTube was there. He clearly didn't do it, but he aspired right. I could aspire to, if I don't do it, I'll do it in the next level. That's that's what I'm going for with it. I talk too much sometimes and give people too much, too much feedback. How does that sit with you?[00:07:14] Nathan:I like the idea. I particularly love anytime a creator's going on a journey and inviting people along for it, right. When you're sitting there and giving advice or whatever else, it's just not that compelling to follow it unless there's a destination in mind. So I did that with ConvertKit in the early days of, I said, like I called it the web app challenge said, I'm trying to grow it from zero to 5,000 a month in recurring revenue.Within six months, I'm going to like live blog, the whole thing. people love that another example would be also in the SAS space, but, the company grew, they did a customer support software and they, I think. They were going from 25,000 a month to 500,000 a month was their goal. and they even have like, in their opt-in form, as they blogged and shared all the lessons, it had like a progress bar.You'd see, like MRR was at 40,000,[00:08:08] Andrew:Every time you read a blog post, you see the MRR and the reason that you don't remember what the number was is I believe that they changed it, you know, as they achieve the goal, they, they changed it to show the next goal on their list. And yeah, and you've got to follow along now. Why do I care? The groove, HQ or groove is, is growing a competitor to Zendesk and help scout.But now that I'm following along, I'm kind of invested now that I see how they're writing about their progress. I really do care. And by the way, what is this groove and why is it better than help scout and the others? Yeah. I agree with you. I think that makes a lot of sense. I think in conversations also, it makes a lot of sense.I think a lot of people will come to me and say, Andrew, can I just ask you for some feedback? I'm a student. Can I ask you for support? It's helpful for them to ask, but if they could ground me in the purpose, if you could say to somebody I'm coming to you with these questions, because this is where I'm trying to go, it changes the way that they react.It makes them also feel more on onboard with the mission. I have a sense that there is one, I'm just saying nail it, you know, who does it really good? who does a great job with it is a Jordan harbinger. He starts out his each episode is almost if you're a fan of his, it's almost like enough already. I get that.You're going to do an opt-in in the beginning of the Podcast. I get that. What you're trying to do is show us how to whatever network now and become better people. But it's fine. I'd much rather people say, I know too much about what this mission is. Then I don't.[00:09:26] Nathan:Do you who's afraid anyone else tuning in? What, what is Jordan's mission? What would he say is the mission that[00:09:32] Andrew:It's about, see, that's the other thing I can't actually, even though I've heard it a billion times, he's adjusted it. It's about, self-improvement making me a better person better, man. And so the earnestness of that makes me accept when he brings somebody on who's a little bit too academic who's, Jordan's interested in it or a little bit too practical to the point where it feels like I'm just getting too many tips on how to network and I don't need it, but I've got his sensibility.He's trying to make me a better person. And so I think with interviews, if you, if you give people the, the mission, they'll forgive more, they'll accommodate the largest and it does allow you to have a broader, a broader set of topics.[00:10:14] Nathan:Yeah. I'm thinking about the mission side of it. Like all of that resonates. and I love when an interview is questions are Like are the questions that they specifically want to know? It's not like I went through my list and this seems like a good question to ask instead. It's like, no, no, no, Andrew specifically, I want to know what should I do about, this?And I'll even call that out in a show and be like, look, I don't even care if there's an audience right now. Like this is my list, you know?[00:10:41] Andrew:Yes.[00:10:41] Nathan:But the, like if we dive into the mission, the one that you outlined doesn't quite resonate. And I think the reason. I think about, creators who have already made it in some way.And it starts to lose that earnestness. Like, honestly, I'm not that interested in, in growing a YouTube[00:11:00] Andrew:I don't think that that's I don't think that that's it for you. It's true. That's a little bit too. I don't know. It's it's a little, it's a little too early in the career. There is something there. I don't know what it is and it can't be enough. It can't be enough to say I need to meet interesting people because that's very youth centric and I'm not on a mission to watch you, unless you're really going to go for like the super right.And we're constantly aspiring, inspiring. the other thing it could be as you're running a company, you're trying to understand what's going on. No Kagan did that really well. I actually have the reason that I know this stuff is in order to write the book. I said, I have all my transcripts. I can study all the ways that I've questioned, but I also want to see what other people have done.And so Noah Kagan did this interview with an NPR producer. I had that transcribed to understand what he did and what he learned. One of the things that he did in that, that made that such a compelling interview is. He was a podcaster who wanted to improve his podcasting. And he, I think he even paid the producer to do an interview with him on his podcast so that he could learn from him.Right. And in the process, he's asking serious questions that he's really wondering. He's trying to figure out how to make a show more interesting for himself. Now. Clearly someone like me, who wants to make my Podcast more interesting. I'm like mentally scribbling notes as I'm running, listening to the podcasting.Oh yeah. The rule of three, like what are the three things you're going to show me?Well, yeah, at the end he did summarize it and he did edit. I don't like the edits at all because the edits take away some of the rawness of it and the discomfort which I personally enjoy, but I see now how he's editing it out.And it's, it's interesting to watch that progress.[00:12:32] Nathan:Yeah, I'm thinking through. The different angles that I could take with this. cause I like it and I feel like there's a, a thread that's not quite there. And I felt that on the show. Right. Cause people ask, oh, why are you having this guest on versus that guest? and it is that like, I, I find them interesting.There's also another angle of like probably half the guests maybe are on ConvertKit already. And so I want to highlight that. And then the other half of the guests aren't and I want them on ConvertKit and so that's an, you know, an incredibly easy, I can send you a cold email and be like, Andrew switched to ConvertKit.Right. Or I could be like, Hey, you know, have you on the show, we could talk. and we've gotten great people like in the music space and other areas from just having them on the show and then[00:13:18] Andrew:Can I give you, by the way, I know it's a sidetrack and I give you a great story of someone who did that. Okay. it's not someone that, you know, it's a guy who for years had helped me out. His name is Bob Highler every week he would get on a call with me and give me advice on how to improve the business.And then at one point he said, you know what? I need new clients. I want to start going after people who are, I want to start going after lawyers, helping them with their online ads, because lawyers aren't, aren't doing well enough.He started doing all these marketing campaigns because he's a marketer. And so one of the things he did was he got these cards printed up.He said, they look just like wedding invitations, beautiful. He, he mailed them out to lawyers. He got one, two responses. Like nobody would pay attention to a stranger, even if they were earnest and sending those out. And he goes, you know, and then he gets on a call. He doesn't even know what to say to people.If he just cold calling goes, I'm going to try to do that. And Andrew, I'm going to do an interview show for lawyers. He picked bankruptcy lawyers. He started asking them for interviews. They were all flattered because they also want another good Google hit. Right. And so they said yes to him and he asked them questions.Then I started learning the language. I forget all the different terms that he learned about how, about how they operate. But he said, inevitably at the end, they'll go after it was done. And say, by the way, what are you. And then he'd have a chance to tell them. And because he's built up this rapport and they trust him, they were much more likely to sign them.He signed up his customers, just like that, just like that. It's a, I think it's an, it's an unexplored way of doing it, of, of growing a business, taking an interest in someone, shining a light on them, helping them get that Google hit and helping them tell their story. And then by the way, will you pay attention to the fact that I've got a thing that if you like me, you might like also,[00:14:50] Nathan:So a few years ago, I was in New York and Seth Goden had come out to speak at our conference and he'd ever said, Hey, if you're in New York and want to make the pilgrimage up to Hastings on Hudson, you know, of outside the city, like come up and visit. And so I did that and it's so funny, cause it is like this pilgrimage to you, you like take the train up along the river. You know, I don't know what it is an hour and a half outside of the city. and I was asking Seth advice at his office, about like how to reach more authors. I think that was the question I asked him specifically and he just, he was like, well, what do authors want? And I was like, ah, I, some more books I guess.And he's like, yeah know. And so like we went through a series of questions, but he's basically what he came to was, find a way to get them attention so that they can grow their audience to sell more books. And he was suggesting a podcast is the way to do that. What's interesting is that's the side, like that's the other half of it, right.I want to meet interesting people. I want to, Like get more of those people that I find really interesting on ConvertKit pushed the limits of like, our customer base in, in those areas. And then the third thing is I want to do it in a way that's high leverage in my time. Write of, I want to do it.That creates something, for people watching and listening along so they can follow the journey. But I still don't see,I would say two thirds of that is about me, right?[00:16:18] Andrew:It's not only that, but all these things are byproducts more than they are the clear goal. You're going to get that. No matter what, if you just talk all day about what? No, not talk all day. If you do, what was it? I'm the founder of morning brew does nothing, but like a 15 minute, if that sometimes five minutes.[00:16:37] Nathan:Alex Lieberman.[00:16:38] Andrew:Yeah, just what, what goes on in his life now it's changed over the years or so that he's done it, but it's just, here's what we were thinking about today. Here's how I'm deciding to hire somebody BA done. He's just doing that. That's enough to get attention enough to also broaden his audience enough to bring us in and then so on.So I think if you just did nothing, but get on camera and talk for a bit, you'll get that. But I think a higher leverage thing is to tap into that personal mission and let all the others come through along the way and all the other benefits, meaning that you will get to meet people and change the way you think you will get to get people to switch to convert kit.And so on, by the way, that's such a, like an impressive thing for you to admit, to say, I want to have these guests on because I want to assign them up. I think a lot of people would have those ulterior motives and[00:17:23] Nathan:Oh, no, you got to just talk about, I mean, that's something you and I, for as long as we've known each other have been very, very transparent in both of our separate businesses and our conversations and it's just, everyone wants that. Right? Cause they're like, I think I know why Nathan is doing this, but he wants.And that would be weird, but if we go to the mission side of it, there's mission of like this, I'm going to improve the world side of mission, which definitely exists that can protect you. And I got my little plaque behind me. It says we exist to help creators are living. And so we can take that angle of it, thinking of like the, the goal journey side of things, since we're just riffing on ideas.One way that might be interesting is to make like a top 100 list of the top 100 creators we want on ConvertKit. And the whole podcast is about interviewing those people and reaching them. And, and so it could be like, this is what I'm trying to accomplish. And you're going to learn a whole bunch along the way as a listener, but you, you know, we check in on that.And then another angle that we could take that would be different is the, like we're going together. We're going to help the creator make the best version of their business. And so you make it more of a.We're both peers diving in on your business, riffing on it, you know, how would we improve it? that kind of thing.[00:18:43] Andrew:I think helping creators create a business, seems like something others have done, but not quite your approach, your style, the way that you will go and carve something is this is the thing that's over your head that says create. Is that something you carved in your wood shop? Then I saw on Instagram.Yeah, right. The sensibility of I've got to create it my way. Instead of that's a pain in the ass, I got a business to run who like, right. You're not going to see, for example, infusion soft, go, we need a plaque. Let's go to the wood shop. No, you're not. It's just not their sensibility. Right. Coming from a sensibility of someone who cares about the details, who every button matters in the software, everything behind your shoulder matters to you for yourself, even the stuff I imagine.If you look forward would have a meaning there, it wouldn't be random chaos. Is it random chaos in front of, on the[00:19:32] Nathan:The desk is random chaos, but there's a sign that says the future belongs to creators up there. And[00:19:38] Andrew:Okay. I think I might've even seen that online somewhere. So I think that coming, coming from the business point of view, With a sense of creator's taste, I think is something that would appeal to a lot of people. For whom seeing, for example, my take on business would be completely abhorring. All I care about is where the numbers are and what it's like.Right. Well, even allium doll's take on, it would not be, would not be right, because he's much more about every movement needs to matter. He can't just have a checkbox in notion it Ellis has to fire off five different other things that notion because otherwise you're wasting time. Why type five things when you could type one, right.It's a different sensibility. And I think you've always done really well drawing in that audience. I remember talking to a competitor of yours who started around the same time, also done really well about why you were, you were really growing tremendously faster. and they said he nailed it. He nailed who his audience is.It's the bloggers. It's these early creators who, who didn't have. Who didn't have anyone speaking for them. And you did that. And I think maybe that's an approach to saying, look, we are creators. And the business of creation is, or the business of being a creator is evolving and we want to learn about every part of it.And then it's interesting to hear how somebody growing their audience in an interesting way. How is somebody thinking about writing? I love that you asked Sahil bloom about how long it took him to write. I know he talks about it a bunch, but it's, it's interesting to hear him go with you about how it is like a five hour, seven hour writing job for him, right.To write fricking tweets. He's writing tweets, right? You've got people just firing off the tweet. He's spending five, seven hours on it. And, and he's also not a guy who's just like, right. It would be something if he was still in school playing baseball, and this is his intellectual, whatever. No, he's now running in investments.He's making decisions. He's helping promote his, his portfolio companies and he's spending five hours writing and he's doing it like one a week instead of one an hour. Right. It's all very interesting. And that approach, I think, ties completely well with ConvertKit.[00:21:41] Nathan:Okay. So where does that take us on like the mission or the hook for the show? Cause we're.[00:21:48] Andrew:Okay. Here's what I would do. I would, I would just keep riffing go. My name is Nathan Barry. You probably know me from convert kit. I'm doing this podcast because I like to meet interesting people. And here's the thing I'm trying to do or I'm I I'm doing it because I'm compelled to talk to these people who I admire.And I also want to learn from them about how they create and just riff on it. Like every week, even have every interview have a different one, until you feel like, oh, that's the one that feels just right. But if we just here, I want to have this person on, because I'm trying to learn this thing. I want to have this on because secretly I'm trying to see if I can get him to be at, see if I can get Ryan holiday to actually be on convert kit.Right. Boom. Now, now we're kind of following along as you're figuring it out. And that's also[00:22:29] Nathan:Yeah.[00:22:29] Andrew:The way, is Ryan holiday going to be on here or what?[00:22:31] Nathan:On the show,[00:22:33] Andrew:Yeah.[00:22:34] Nathan:Probably we were just talking the other day. We have a shared investment in a ghost town, So we, we often talk about that,[00:22:40] Andrew:Oh yeah. I've[00:22:42] Nathan:Other thing[00:22:43] Andrew:That ghost town. Oh, that's a whole other thing I've been watching that[00:22:45] Nathan:I need to have speaking of the ghost town, I didn't have Brent Underwood on because that Is an insane story of everything going on with town, but it's just been building this massive audience.[00:22:58] Andrew:Who's doing YouTube videos from there? He[00:23:00] Nathan:Yeah. And he's now got 1.2[00:23:01] Andrew:Yeah,[00:23:02] Nathan:Subscribers on YouTube, like 2 million on[00:23:04] Andrew:I had no idea. I watched him in the early days of the pandemic go into this place by himself. Almost get trapped, driving his car to get there. Right. I go, this is fun content. And usually when you watch someone like that and good morning, America go, and I'm going to jump out of this thing.And I've never jumped before, maybe whatever. I don't know.Yo, the producer's not going to let you die. It's fine. Here you go, dude. Who's just trying to get attention for this thing. Cause he has some investors who he wants to make sure get what they want. Yeah, you could die. What the hell is you doing?What? Like I'm going to, I'm going to go down this hole and see if there's anything over you yet. Dude, you could[00:23:41] Nathan:Yeah. It's, it's pretty wild. I actually, some of the weeks that he don't, he, that he didn't post the videos. I'd like, texted him, be like, Brett, you're still alive because you know, the video was the way that we knew every Friday, like, okay, Good Brent. Still alive, everything. Everything's good. Anyway, I got to have him[00:23:58] Andrew:All right. If you do talk to, if you talk to Ryan holiday, I feel like you totally nailed his writing style, where you, you said in one of your past episodes that he can take a whole historical story, sum it up in two sentences to help clarify the moment that he's writing about. And it's like a toss away thing, right? Just toss it away and then move on and go, dude. That's a whole freaking book. In fact, just turning the whole thing into just two sentences to fit in there would take silo, bloom five hours. You put it in a book with other, like there a bunch of other sentences. So that's good. But here's what I think you should talk to him about.Or here's my, my one suggestion. He has not talked about Marketing since he created, trust me. I'm a lot. Trust me. I'm lying, which was a phenomenal book that then I feel like he distanced himself from when he became more stoic and more intellectual. Fine. He is still a great, great marketer along your style, your tasty.And in fact, he's becoming the people who I can think of that are very, ConvertKit like philosophy in their creation plus promotion. He nails it, right? Art that takes so much pain that you've mentioned, and we've all seen it. He has boxes of index cards to create these sentences that most people would just throw away, not pay attention to, but are super meaningful.And at the same time, he knows how to promote. He knows how to get his ideas out there. He knows how to sell a coin that says you're going to die in Latin, that people put in their pockets that are more than just selling a coin. It's selling this transferable viral, real life thing. Right. So anyway. And is he should be on a ConvertKit too.[00:25:29] Nathan:He is, he is[00:25:30] Andrew:Okay. Good.[00:25:31] Nathan:Half of his list started in Berkeley. The other half are in the process of switching over. So, you know,[00:25:36] Andrew:Okay. Yeah, that's the hard part, dude. I I'm with infusion soft. I can't stand them. If you understand how much I do not like them. I do I ever talk negatively about anyone. No. Bring up politics, Joe Biden, Donald Trump. I got no strong opinion about anything you talked to me about, about infusions. Ah, but the problem is it's so hard to wean yourself off of these things because once you're in a system, that's it[00:25:56] Nathan:Well we'll make it happen. W w we'll figure out a way, but the new book landing page for it, I went on there and inspected element. It's definitely a ConvertKit for them. I was pretty happy about it.[00:26:06] Andrew:Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So truthfully it was, I said, I'm not going to school around here. It would have probably been easier for me to go with, with infusion soft because then we all we'd have to do with tag people who were interested. And then I could, I don't want that. I don't want that nonsense because it comes with overhead.That becomes an obstacle to me, communicating with my audience by, by overhead. I mean, they've got historic legacy. Requirement's that mean I can't do anything right. You I'm on my iPad. I could just go in and send a message out. Or actually I haven't sent a message out. Someone else has sent a message out.Our publisher sent a message then from damn, ah, damn gravity. But I, but if someone says there's a problem, I can go in and see it.[00:26:44] Nathan:Right.[00:26:44] Andrew:And make adjustments. The whole thing just fricking works. Right?[00:26:47] Nathan:So I want to talk about the book more. Let's talk[00:26:49] Andrew:Sure.[00:26:50] Nathan:And now I have you here.[00:26:52] Andrew:Ben needs, us to talk about the book. He's the publisher.[00:26:54] Nathan:We'll get to that, then don't worry. Ben, we've got it covered. so you were giving unsolicited feedback, which by the way is my favorite kind of feedback. Okay.So as you've been listening to the show, what are some other things that maybe you recommended the book, maybe like as you set people up for interview questions, any of that advice that you would give beyond?We started with the men.[00:27:15] Andrew:I'm going to suggest that people who listen to you do pay attention to this. One thing that they should, I I'm interrupting you in a roadway now there's some good interruption that I write about in the book and I can tell you how to do it. Right. And I also have to say that there's some new Yorker that's built in, even though I've left New York a long time ago, that I, I always interrupt when we need to get into the bottom line.Okay. Here's one thing that I think people should pay attention with you. You don't just ask questions. You will, at times interject your own story, your own, take your own experience. And I find that a lot of times people either do it in a heavy handed way. It's like, look at me, I'm equal to you. I deserve to be in this conversation too.And that doesn't just happen on Mike. It happens at dinner parties or it's more like I have to be reverential. So I'm asking questions and it's me asking about them. And one of the things that I learned over the years, Getting to know someone interviewing someone, whether it's like you and I are doing in our podcasts and shows or doing it, in a, in a dinner conversation, it's not asking questions.It's not about saying here's my next thing. Here's my next question. It's overwhelming and draining to do that. You do need to say, well, here's me. You do need to sometimes just guide the person to say, now tell me how you wrote the book. Now tell me how long it takes to, to write a tweet, right? Whatever it is, you need to sometimes direct the person.And so I call the book, stop asking questions because that counter intuitive piece of knowledge is something that took me a fricking interview coach to help me accept that. It's true, but it helps. And you do it really well. And here's why you do it. Well, you interject something personal. Somehow you do it succinctly.You don't get rambling off. Maybe you edit that.No, no, because the videos are there. Yeah. It's, it's not edited. It's just you saying here's, here's my experience with this. And then when you come back and you ask something. It informs the guest about where you are and what they could contribute to that. It lets them also feel like this is a dialogue instead of them being pounded with demands of, in the forms of question.[00:29:15] Nathan:Yeah. Yeah. I think that for anyone listening and thinking about starting a podcast, it's really like, what's the kind of thing that you want to listen to. And I like it where the host is like a character in the, in the Podcast, in the episode where they're contributing content and it's not just like, oh, if I listened to Andrew on these 10 shows, I'm just going to get Andrew.Like, I want it where it's like, no, I'm getting the blend between these two people. And the unique things that come from that intersection rather than, you know, I've heard this[00:29:46] Andrew:Yes.[00:29:47] Nathan:I've heard about it.[00:29:48] Andrew:I think also it took me a long time years of, so I started doing this in 2007, give or take a year and I think. No one needs to talk about, I don't need to talk about myself. They don't care about me. They care about, you know, Paul Graham, who I'm interviewing about how he found a Y Combinator, someone.And I would get tons of emails from people saying, tell us who you are. Tell us a little bit about yourself. And I would argue with them and say, no, but I understand now on the outside, when I listen, I don't know who you are. And it feels very awkward to hear it. It feels very much like, I don't know why, where you're coming from.And so I don't know why I should listen. It's kinda, it's it's counterintuitive.[00:30:29] Nathan:Yeah. I think it just comes with comfort over time. Like, I, I don't know this for sure. If I bet if I listen back to my first podcast episodes, the ones that I did in like 2015. I have a different style because I bet I'm less comfortable or more worried about like, make sure that I shut up quickly so that the guests can talk more because people came here for the guest and then over time you just get more comfortable.[00:30:53] Andrew:So you wrote authority and I remember you, I remember buying it and I remember you bundled it with a bunch of stuff, right. And oh, by the way, it's so cool. I was listening to it on a run and I heard you mention my name in the, in the book I go, this is great and I'm running. but I remember you did interviews there.I don't remember whether the style matches up to today or what, but you did interviews in it. Right.[00:31:15] Nathan:I did.[00:31:16] Andrew:And what you had there that I think is always important to have with all, all interviews is you had a sense of like, well, the sense of mission, I knew what you were going for, because you were trying to say, here is this book that I've written on this topic.I'm want to bring these people in to bring their, their take on it. We were all kind of working together. And I feel like, when I look at my earlier interviews, I listened to them. The Mike sucks so badly. I was too ponderous. Cause I wanted to be like, IRA glass from, from NPR, from this American life.And you could hear the same rhythm, the same cadence, like I'm copying him. Like I'm his little brother trying to learn how to be like a real boy. but I had this real need. I was trying to figure out how these people were building companies that work to understand what holes I had in my understanding to see what was working for them that I didn't know before.And you could see that and it, it helps. It helped me continue. Even when I was nervous with the guest, it helped the guests know where to go. Even when I wasn't doing good job, guiding them and help the audience keep listening in, even when the audio stopped, because there's this thing that Andrew is trying to understand.And you almost feel like you're the sense of vulnerability. If it doesn't scare you away, then it makes you want to root.[00:32:40] Nathan:Yeah. And I personally love that style because I want to follow someone going on a journey and, and trying to accomplish something specific. But let's talk about the not just the book, but asking questions or in this case, stopping it, stop asking questions. What are the things that not even just specific to this job, what are the things that you listened to interview shows?And you're like, okay, here are the three things that I want to change or that I want to coach you on in the same way that I was coached on.[00:33:10] Andrew:Okay. So what I started to do is I go through my own transcripts. I mean, I had years of transcripts to see what worked and what didn't I already done that. So I said, I need to now add to it. And so I went back and looked at historical interviews, like when Barbara Walters interviewed Richard Nixon and got him so frustrated that he didn't want to ever talk to her again.Or when Oprah finally got to sit with Lance Armstrong, how did she do that? I think. You know, you know, let me pause on, on Oprah and Lance Armstrong. She got to interview him after he, he was basically caught cheating and he was about to come out and do it. Great. Get, I think the fact that she interviewed him, there's a lesson there for, for all of us who are interviewing, interviewing the top 10 interviews, I think of all time.And you go back to Wikipedia and look it up. You see art or interview podcast or interview, sorry, our news-based interviews. We as podcasters, keep thinking, how do I get enough in the can so that if I die tomorrow, there's enough interviews to last for a month or whatever, so that I can be consistent in the audience loved me.That's great. But I think we should also be open to what's going on in the world today. Let's go talk to that person today. If there's an artist who suddenly done something, we should go and ask to do an interview with them. If there's a creator, if there's someone. So for me, one of the top interviews that people still it's been years, people still come back and talk to me about is when Matt Mullenweg decided that he was gonna pull out Chris[00:34:35] Nathan:Pearson.[00:34:35] Andrew:Per Pearson.Pearson's, themes from WordPress. And I got to talk to both of them at the same time and I published it and it went all over the internet with all over the WordPress internet. So hundreds of different blog posts about it, eventually all the people in the WordPress world write a lot of blogs, but also it became news.And so we don't do enough of that.[00:34:57] Nathan:I remember that interview because I was in the WordPress community at that time. And I remember you saying like, wait, I'm in Skype and I have both of you in two different things and you pull it together and not to pull Ryan holiday into this too much, but that's where he ended up writing the book.Was it, he realized he was one of the only people who was talking to like both Peter teal and, who's the Gawker guy.Yeah. Anyway, people know, but, but being in the intersection of that, so you're saying find something that's relevant on the news[00:35:33] Andrew:Yeah. Nick Denton was the founder of Gawker. Yes. Find the things that are relevant right now. And when people are hot right now, and they know you and you have credibility in this space, they trust you more than they trust. Say the wall street journal, even right, where they don't know where's this going.I think that's, that's one thing. The other thing is I think we don't have enough of a story within interviews. If we're doing S if we're doing at Mixergy, my podcast and interview where we're telling someone's story, we want them to be somewhere where the audience is at the beginning and then to have done something or had something happen to them that sets them on their own little journey.And then we make this whole interview into this. Into this a hero's journey approach. So I think better when I have an actual company in mind, so, or a person in mind. So last week I was interviewing this guy, Rohit Rowan was a person who was working at SanDisk, had everything going right for him. His boss comes to him and says it, you're now a director, continue your work.But now more responsibilities he's elated. He goes back, home, comes back into the office. Things are good, does work. And then a couple of days later he's told, you know, we mean temporarily, right? And he goes, what do you mean? I thought I got, I got a promotion. No, this is temporary. While our director's out you're director of this department.And then you go back, he says, the very next day, he couldn't go back into the office. He sat in his car, just, he couldn't do it anymore. And so he decided at that point, he'd heard enough about entrepreneurship heard enough ideas. He had to go off on and do it himself. And so we did. And then through the successes and failures, we now have a story about someone who's doing something that we can relate to, that we aspire to be more.[00:37:13] Nathan:So, how do you, you, your researchers, how do you find that moment before you have someone on? Because so many people will be like, yes, let me tell you about my business today. And oh, you want to know about that? How'd, you know, you know, like, as you,[00:37:27] Andrew:Yeah,[00:37:28] Nathan:That hook in that moment? That actually is a catalyst in their own dream.[00:37:33] Andrew:It's tough. It's it takes hours of talking to the guest of, of looking online of hunting for that moment. And it takes a lot of acceptance when it doesn't happen. One of my interview coaches said, Andrew, be careful of not looking for the Batman moment. And I said, what do you mean? He goes, you're always looking for the one moment that changed everything in people's lives.Like when Batman's parents got shot. And from there, he went from being a regular boy to being a superhero. Who's going to cry, fight crime everywhere. His life doesn't really work that way. There aren't these one moments, usually the change, everything. So I try not to. Put too much pressure on any one moment, but there are these little moments that indicate a bigger thing that happened to us.And I look for those and I allow people to tell that without having it be the one and only thing that happened. So if Pharaoh, it, it wasn't that moment. It could've just been, you know what, every day I go into the office and things are boring. And I think I have to stop. What I look for is give me an example of a boring.Now he can tell me about a day, a day, where he's sitting at his desk and all he's doing is looking at his watch, looking at his watch and he has to take his watch, put it in his drawer so that he doesn't get too distracted by looking at his watch all day. Cause he hates it. Now was that the one moment that changed everything?It was one of many moments. It might've happened a year before he quit, but it's an indication. So when we're telling stories, we don't have to shove too much pressure into one moment, but I do think it helps to find that one moment that encapsulates their, why, why did they go on this journey? Why does someone who's in SanDisk decide he's going to be an entrepreneur?Why did someone who was a baseball player decide that he had to go and write a blog post? Why is it? What's the thing that then sends them off on this journey? It helps. And I would even say, if you can get that moment, it just helps to get the thing that they were doing before that we can relate to. So what's the thing that they did before.So anyway, we have two different types of interviews. One is the story-based interview where we tell a story of how someone achieved something great. And so that hero's journey is and approach. The other one is someone just wants to teach them. All you want to do is just pound into them for an hour. Give me another tip another tip another tip of how to do this.Like pound, pound, pound, pound pound. If you want the audience to listen. I think for there, it helps to have what I call the cult hook because I said, how do I, how do cults get people to listen to, to these people who are clearly whack jobs sometimes. And so studying one called I saw that what they did was they'd have a person up on stage who talked about how, you know, I used to really be a Boozer.If you came into my house, you would see that there'd be these empty six packs. I was so proud of leaving the empty six packs everywhere to show myself how much alcohol I can drink. My wife left me. And when she left me, she just told me that I hadn't amounted to anything in my life. And I was going nowhere.And I just said, get I here. Instead of appreciating that this was just like terrible. And I ran out of toilet paper and don't even get me started with what, what I did for that. And so you see someone who's worry worse off than you are on this path of life. And then something has. They discover whoever it is.That's the cult leader. And they say, now I've got this real estate firm I encouraged by, oh, by the way, all of you to come over and take a look at that at this, I couldn't believe it. My whole life. I wanted to buy a Tesla. I now have the Tesla S it's amazing. It's just so great. And I did it all because I changed the way I thought once I came in and I found this one book and the book told me, I mean, anyways, so what we try to do is we say, if you're going to have somebody come on to teach how they became a better blogger, let's not have them start over elevated where everything they do is so great that we can't relate, have them start off either relatable or worse.I couldn't write here's my grammar, mistakes. My teacher told. Right. And now what's the thing that they did. They pick them from where they were to where they are today. it's this real set of realizations. Now I want to go into that.Let's pound into them and see how many of those tips we can get. Let's learn that I want to go from where he was to where he is.[00:41:28] Nathan:Yeah, I liked that a lot. Cause my inclination would be like, okay, we're we're doing the, educational, tactical conversation. I'm going to facilitate it. Let's dive right in and let's get to the actionable stuff right away. So I like what you're saying of like, no, no, no. We need to, even though this is going to be 90% packed, full of actionable material, we need to dive in and set the stage first with the story and making it relatable.And I like it.[00:41:55] Andrew:Yeah,[00:41:55] Nathan:Oh, yeah. I was just, just in my own head for a second. Cause I say, ah, that makes sense a lot, so much so that I've had three different guests or listeners email me and say like, just don't say that makes sense as much would, now that I'm saying it on the show, I'll probably get more emails every time that I say it.Cause that's like my processing, like, oh, oh, that makes sense. As I'm thinking of the next question and all that, so[00:42:22] Andrew:I do something like that too. For me. It's IC,[00:42:25] Nathan:Everyone has to have something.[00:42:26] Andrew:I can't get rid of that and yeah.[00:42:28] Nathan:So what systems have you put in place on the research side so that you're getting this, are you doing pre-interviews forever? Yes. Are you having your[00:42:38] Andrew:Almost every single one, some of the best people in some of the best entrepreneurs on the planet, I'm surprised that they will spend an hour or do a pre-interview. And sometimes I'm too sheepish to say, I need an hour of your time and I need you to do a pre-interview. So instead of saying, I need you to do a pre-interview.I say, here's why people have done it. And I've paid for somebody to help make my guests better storytellers of their own stories. And truthfully people will go through that. Pre-interview even if they don't want to do an interview, they just need to get better at telling their story for their teams, their employees, their everyone.Right. and so I say that, and then they will take me up on the pre-interview and say, yes, I do want to do the pre-interview. and so what I try to do is I try to outline the story. Ahead of time in a set of questions. And then what we do is we scramble them up a little bit based on what we think people will tell us first and what will make them feel a little more comfortable.And then throughout the interview, I'll adjust it. So for example, no, one's going to care about the guest unless they have a challenge. No guest wants to come on and say, I'm going to tell you about what's what I really suck at or where I've really been challenged. If they do, they're going to give you a fake made up thing that they've told a million times to make themselves seem humble.So we don't ask that in the beginning. We don't even ask it in the middle. We save it till the very end. Now they've gotten some time with us. They've gotten some rapport, they trust us. Then we go into tell me about the challenges, what hasn't worked out for you. And we really let them know why tell people the higher purpose you want the audience to relate.You want them to believe you. You want them to see themselves in you, and to learn from you. We need. They tell us, and then I have it in my notes as the last section, but I use it throughout the interview. I sprinkle it. So the goal is to get the pieces that we want and in whatever order makes the most sense and then reshape it for the interview Day.[00:44:33] Nathan:So on the interview itself, you would, you would flip that and you know, okay, this is what I want to start with and, and dive in right[00:44:41] Andrew:Yup. Yup.[00:44:43] Nathan:Lose. They already told you about that. And so now, you[00:44:46] Andrew:Right,[00:44:46] Nathan:In and start with.[00:44:47] Andrew:Right. That helps. Now, if there's something I want to ask someone about that they're not comfortable with. One thing that I do is I, I tip them off. So Jason Calacanis invited me to go do, interviews with, with investors at one of his conferences. It was just a bunch of, investors. And I looked at this one guy, Jonathan tryst, and he looked really great.But he, what am I supposed to do? Ask him about what startups should do to run their businesses. He's never run a startup. His, he hadn't at that time had a successful exit. As far as I knew, like mega successful exit. He's just a really nice guy. You can tell he was going places, but that's it. And the money that he was investing came from his parents.So what is this rich parents giving their kids some money. Now he's going to tell everyone in the VC, in the startup and VC audience, how to live their lives. So I said, I'm either not going to address it, which I think most people are, or I have to find a way to address it where I'm not going to piss them off and have them just clam up on me and then go to Jason and go.This guy just is a terrible interviewer, which is not true. So what I decided to do was tip him off. I said, look, Jonathan, before we do this, before we start talking to the audience, I have to tell you, I saw it, that you don't have much of a track record as an investor. Your money came from your parents and you're not like a tech startup, like people here.If we don't talk about it, people who know it are going to think, oh, this guy, Jonathan, look, who's trying to pass him soft self off. I don't have to force it in here, but if you allow me to, I'd like to bring it up and let's talk about, and it goes, yeah, absolutely. If it's out there, I want to make sure that we address it and sure enough, we talked about it and he had a great answer.He said, no, this came from my parents. It's not my own money. I don't have as much experience as other people, but I took my parents' money. I invested it, fat parents and family and so on. We've had a good track record with it. And now have raised the second Fallon fund from outsiders who saw what I was able to do with the first one.And by the way, I may not have this mega exit as a startup investor, as a startup entrepreneur. But I did have this company that did okay. Not great. Here's what it did Here's what I learned And that's all informing me. And that's where I come from now. You've got someone talking about the, the, the thing that matters without pissing them off so much that they don't say anything else.And you feel like you feel superior as an interviewer. I got them. But in reality, you got nothing[00:46:57] Nathan:Right.[00:46:57] Andrew:Cares.[00:46:58] Nathan:I think that's a really hard line of talking about the things that are difficult and like the actual, maybe things that someone did wrong or lessons that they learned without just like barely dipping into it for a second. And I liked the format of tipping them off in like full transparency.So on this show, I had someone on who I really, really respect his name's Dickie Bush. He's one of the earlier episodes in this series and in it, he, okay. Yeah. So in that interview, one thing that I knew is that his, the first version of his course plagiarized text from another friend, Sean McCabe, actually Shaun's company edits is Podcast and all that.And I've known both of them for, for quite a while. I've known Sean for like, I dunno, six, seven years or something. And I was like, struggling with how to bring that up. And I wanted from the like founder, transparent journey, that sort of thing I wanted it brought up because I, I actually like, I'm happy to talk about like some pretty major things that I've screwed up and what I've learned from it.And I just think it makes a better conversation. And then from the interview side, I don't feel good, like doing an interview and not touching on that, but I didn't tip Dickey off to it. And I, that was one of the things that I've regretted that he gave a great answer. He talked about the lessons that he learned from it.It was really, really good, but I felt bad that I didn't set him up for the most success in like in setting up. And part of that, part of it is because even at the start of the interview, I was still wrestling with now, I'm not going to bring that up that, ah, maybe I should, it wouldn't be an authentic interview if I didn't like wrestling with that, I hadn't figured out my own, like made my own decision until we were in the middle of it.And so I didn't, I didn't set anybody up for success. And so it's an interesting line.[00:48:52] Andrew:It happens. And it seems like I'm now in the point of your transcript, where you, where you ask him, it's a 31 minutes into the interview. I think his response is great. He came in and he took responsibility for it. He says, yeah, that, that, that was a dramatic mistake, or a drastic mistake on my side and caught up in it.He wasn't the most articulate here and he'd repeated words. Like I, I, a couple of times, so I could see that he probably was uncomfortable with it. but I think his answer was great. I think, I believe that we all are broadcasting out, whether we know it or not, our intentions and where we're coming from, as some people are really good at faking it.And so I'm not going to talk about the outliers and some people are so uncomfortable that they're messing up the transmission, but for the most part almost. broadcasting our intentions. If you walk into that, Nathan, with the, I got to get him because he, he got one of my friends and I need him to finally get his comeuppance.He's going to pick up on that. And truthfully, it's such a small thing for a person like you who's, who's already a likable person. You have a lot to offer people, right? As far as like promotion and everything else, it will be forgiven, but it'll be picked up on, it's also something that people could pick up on, which is Nathan really want to know this thing.It's been bothering him for a while. And if you could, just, before you asked the question, say, where am I coming from with this? And know that the audience will mostly pick up on it. And obviously people are gonna like read in whatever they feel like, but trust that the vast majority of us understand, I think it'll work[00:50:21] Nathan:Yeah,[00:50:22] Andrew:You don't have to even tip. You don't have to tip off, but it does help. It, it definitely helps.[00:50:26] Nathan:It's interesting. I was watching an interview with, Jordan Peterson who wrote 12 rules for life. He's like a very controversial figure. And I was just often these controversies pass by, on Twitter and other places. And I realized like, oh, I don't understand them. And rather than jumping on one side or the other, at least try to like dive in a little bit and understand it.So watching this interview, and I can't remember, I think it was some major Canadian TV show or something, and that you would tell the interview was just trying to nail him it every possible chance, like whatever he said, just like dive in. And, so I think you're right, that you see the intention, like in that case, you would see the, the interview, his intention was specifically to try to trip him up in his words.And then in other cases where it's like, This is something that, you know, if you take the other approach, this is something that's been bothering me, or I want to talk about it. Like I genuinely want, you know, to ask or learn from this. It's a very different thing.[00:51:20] Andrew:I think people pick up on it. I remember you, you mentioned Seth Godin. I remember interviewing him when he wrote the book tribes back before people had online communities. And I didn't just say, okay. All our heroes, all the best entrepreneurs just run their businesses. Then don't run a tribe. I brought out books.I said, here's a book about Warren buffet. Here's the book by Sam Walton. The Walmart here's a book by Ted Turner became a multi-billionaire to creating all these, these media empires didn't have communities. They don't have tribes. And now you're telling me that in addition to my job, I also have to go and build out a tribe.It feels like, you know, an extra job. That just seems right for the social first. This just sounds right on social media and you could actually see. He's watching me as I'm saying it, and he's smiling, he's watching it because he's trying to read me, is this like what I get wrapped up? Is this going to be some kind of thing where some guy's going to try to be in the next Gawker media?Or is, is this a safe place? We're all doing that constantly. And then he also saw, okay, this is someone who really wants to understand this. And he's challenging me. I like a challenge. And you could see him smile with like, this is what I'm here for. And so I think when you come at it from a good point of view, people can see it and then you can go there and you can go there and you can go there and it will be shocking to you and them and the audience, how far you go. But when you're coming from that genuine place, they get, they get it.They want it.[00:52:44] Nathan:Yeah, that's good.I want to talk about longevity in like the online world. I think that so many people that I started following in say 2007, 2008, nine, and then I didn't start creating myself until 2011. most of them aren't around anymore. Like a lot of the big blogs, Yeah, just so many that I can think of.They're not around anymore. They're not doing this. You're at a point where like you started messaging in some form in what? 20, sorry, 2004 to somewhere in there and then interviews.[00:53:17] Andrew:Yeah, I keep saying 16. It's like, yeah. 2004 is when I started the interview started 2007 ish somewhere there. Give or take a year. yeah, long. I, I will say that there are parts of my work that I am burned out on right now. This year has been that, but I'm not on the interview. And the reason I'm not is because I do enjoy conversations.I hated them for a long time in my life because I just didn't know how to have them, how to have it make sense. I also didn't give myself permission to take the conversation where I wanted it to go. And it helps now to say, I can talk to anyone about anything. That's an opportunity that, that feels fun because I know how to do it.It's an opportunity to, it feels like, like, you know how everyone's so happy. You can go to YouTube and you could get the answer to anything. Well, I could go to anybody and I could get the answer to anything and talk about how they didn't have a customized to me, YouTube, not customized thing to me, I'm watching Gotham chess on YouTube.He's teaching me how to play chess, but he will not customize to the fact that every time I get into a car con defense, all the pieces like bunched over to my side. But if he and I did an interview, or if I do an interview with an tomorrow's entrepreneur, it's going to be about, here's the thing I'm trying to deal with.How did you get past that? Talk to me about what you're up to there.[00:54:31] Nathan:Yeah, that's definitely energizing. Okay. But what are the things that you're burnt out on? Because I think a lot of people are seeing that burnout. And so I guess first, what are you burned out on? And then second, we can go from there into like, what are you changing and how are you managing.[00:54:46] Andrew:I'm burned out on parts of the business behind, behind Mixergy I'm burned out on. I was aspiring to like unbelievable greatness with the, with the course part of it, with the courses, it didn't get there and I'm tired of trying to make it into this thing. That's going to be super big. I'm tired of that.[00:55:10] Nathan:His greatness there, like linda.com? Like what, what was that?[00:55:15] Andrew:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes. Yeah. She was one of my first interviewees and, and so yeah, I saw the model there and I am frustrated that I didn't get to that and I, I don't have a beat myself up type a perso

In this episode, we cover: 00:00:00 - Reflections on the Episode 00:03:15 - What is Mortgage Servicing 00:13:20 - Impact of the Great Financial Crisis  00:18:40 - Andrew's Background 00:24:10 - Valon's Technological Innovations  00:31:06 - Relationship with the Consumer  00:36:00 - Regulations and Regulators  00:40:40 - Valon's Future/Outro Links:Website: Valon TranscriptJason: Welcome to the Perfectly Boring podcast. Today we have Andrew Wang, CEO of Valon, on the show, and today we're taking on the topic of mortgage servicing. So quickly, what is mortgage servicing?Well, a mortgage is obviously a loan for a home. And mortgage servicing is the institutions that actually take care of paying off that loan over the 10-, 20-, 30-year timeline. So, that digital interface where you pay your bill, et cetera, that is not always your originating bank. And Andrew is building a fascinating business in this space. We learned a lot about the mortgage, the evolution of the mortgage servicing space over time, the impact of the great financial crisis, and the interesting approach Valon is taken, not only just with technology, but changing the relationship with the end customer. So, what were some of the interesting touch points that we got during the conversation, Will?Will: It was a really wild discussion because I started with a fairly preliminary understanding of what mortgage servicing was. And in part of the wind up that listeners are going to get an opportunity to hear, Andrew really gives us a perspective as to how critical mortgage servicing is to the underlying health of the US, and therefore global, economy, and how much of an afterthought mortgage servicing has historically been, and why that should not necessarily be the case, and why now is the, sort of, unique moment in time to be able to use advanced technology and a reorganization of the overall stack for mortgage servicing to bring a better product to market for both consumers, for originators, for investors, and for regulators. And so, I mean, really badass discussion, really cool company, a space most people never think about, definitely a boring space, but with a just immense amount of value to be created.Jason: Yeah, and hopefully our listeners go through kind of the same increase in excitement that I had during the conversation, which is you kind of over time just realize this entire industry of mortgage servicing, not only is it critical, but how much they're missing the actual point which is, if you really just focus on the homeowner and creating a great experience for them, this is a huge relationship, it's a multi-decade relationship, and there's probably not just one product you can offer them. But they're stuck in the staid and stodgy technology of yore, and haven't been able to move as quickly and break through to open that aperture and open that relationship with their customer. So, before we get too deep into the weeds, let's just jump into the interview. Here's Andrew.Will: Andrew Wang, founder and CEO of Valon, thank you for being on the podcast with us today to talk about the very boring, very large industry of mortgage servicing. For the benefit of our listeners, it would be good to start at a really high level and give people kind of a baseline for what mortgage servicing is, and maybe a little just on the history of the mortgage servicing industry, you know, before we dive in a little bit on the specifics of your background and Valon.Andrew: So, mortgage servicing is a sort of pervasive thing that exists throughout the mortgage ecosystem and in the lives of most American homeowners, but it is also just not very well understood in terms of the dynamics that are involved with mortgage servicing in terms of who's involved, how they're involved, and exactly what they do. But again, nonetheless, it's something where it's within every part of the mortgage ecosystem today. But to give you some background on mortgages and how mortgage servicing even is a real thing, let me first talk about the mortgage industry as a whole. When you think about the mortgage industry, it's obviously a very large component of the American economy today. When people look at it, they say, “Hey, 20% of GDP in terms of housing,” something that the US government often uses in order to boost spending; they lower our mortgage rates in order to cause people to have more savings and then spend on other things. It's just a very, very core piece of the American ecosystem.But it actually came into play really, during the depression, the Great Depression, were effectively pre the Great Depression, mortgages weren't really regulated all that much, and as a result, there were kind of weird, funky structures, even crazier than what people saw in 2007. And as a result of that and as a result of all these people who weren't able to pay their mortgages due to these balloon loans being in place, which are basically loans that don't amortize, and basically become due and payable at a certain point in time, what the US government did as a function of the New Deal was put these government institutions into place to create more affordable housing structures, to create these institutions who would really regulate the housing market, or really add liquidity into the housing market so Americans could actually own a home.Will: And that kicked off the current, almost philosophical ideal that we have today about homeownership kind of being the epitome of the American dream. This was—the mortgage was almost an invention to bring that to fruition after World War Two?Andrew: That's exactly right. So, after World War Two, it became more and more core to the American dream. When everybody talks about, “Hey, what is the American dream?” It's obviously being able to get further in life based on your own merits, it's about owning a home, and starting a family, building a community, all of those different things, and the home is just so central to that dream. But exactly to your point, it started from post-World War Two.By the 1990s, it became such a large component of how the US economy even functioned and worked that there was more and more so this focus on affordable housing, putting people in homes, putting people in sort of a structure that creates the ability, creates stronger communities, and create a more robust ecosystem within cities, within neighborhoods, and everything else. So, that's how mortgages became so intertwined in the American system versus, you know, other countries, which may have relatively high homeownership rates, but just not nearly as high as the United States. That's, like, the genesis of how mortgages became a big component of it. The mortgage servicing aspect of it actually wasn't as relevant of a thing, that became more of a thing, actually, after the great financial crisis, the GFC. So pre-2008, what ended up happening was actually that most people when they got a mortgage were serviced by the same people who gave them that mortgage. So, you had Countrywide, you had some of these older institutions which have since gone bankrupt or have been acquired by more older financial institutions, servicing the mortgages. So, it wasn't really a separate thing, for the most part, at that point in time, and it wasn't really an important topic, actually.Jason: Before we go too deep, maybe you can define servicing. Like, how does that show up in the average American's life? What is servicing when it comes to an individual?Andrew: So, mortgage servicing specifically is what happens right after you get a new mortgage. So, when you get a new mortgage, you go to your originator. It can be someone who works at a bank, it could be mortgage broker that is a family friend of yours, it could be someone on Main Street who has a sign out that says, “I'm a mortgage lender. Come inquire about rates.” Once you get that mortgage from them, you have to make the payments back because you've got the mortgage to buy your home.That entire process of making those payments and the institution that you make those payments towards, that is the mortgage servicer. Now, when you look at that very simply, that is similar to a debt collection agency where you're effectively making payments, they're collecting on the debt and they're making those payments back to the person who made that mortgage. Now, what's actually more complex about mortgage servicing, as opposed to normal general debt collection is the fact that one, there's a lot of more regulation associated with it, right, because there is a home involved, and there's a lot of regulation around how you deal with homes; there's a second component which is, as per the government agencies and as per many state regulatory agencies, you are considered the trusted financial advisor to the homeowner along the homeownership journey. So, when a homeowner says, “Hey, I'm unable to make a payment; I need some help,” the mortgage servicer isn't allowed to just say, “I don't care. Deal with it,” they're often required to go through all these interactive processes to make sure that the homeowner can actually get the right solution and continue owning their home.Long story short, just jumping quickly back to what we were just talking about, it's really core, and part of the thesis, really, of the American economy that they want to keep people in homes, they want to keep people getting homes, increase the homeownership rate, make it part of the American dream. So, what they did was they made mortgage servicers responsible for keeping people in homes.Jason: Gotcha. And this was on the back of the great financial crisis?Andrew: Correct. Actually, it was there before but what I was trying to really get into was that pre the great financial crisis, it wasn't as really hot of a topic because homes were honestly increasing prices all the time; anyone who bought a home basically made money on their home, so just not really a big worry throughout the entire ecosystem. So, when people thought about mortgage servicing back then, it existed but it wasn't really a concern. It wasn't a focus of both regulators, politicians, really anyone in the entire ecosystem. But when the great financial crisis happened, what ended up happening was, well, people weren't able to get out of their homes, they weren't able to pay for their homes, their homes were less valuable than the mortgage that they took out.And as I mentioned just right now, the mortgage servicing process is actually also the process of helping the homeowner stay in that home. And that's why home mortgage servicing became such a large topic and became such a large focus because post the great financial crisis, it became all about making sure that people who took out these mortgages were able to put themselves in a position where they were able to keep their homes. Obviously, there was a lot of difficulty with respect to it. Obviously, there were a lot of people who were unable to actually pay for their mortgages on an ongoing basis, so there were a lot of what's called modifications, basically changes to the underlying mortgage in order to make it affordable. But that entire ecosystem really exploded both from a regulatory scrutiny perspective, from the amount of activity that was happening in it because of the great financial crisis.Jason: So Andrew, why does mortgage servicing even exist to begin with?Andrew: Yeah. So, this is one of those really long archaic, sort of, pieces of knowledge that people have to understand the ecosystem, understand the history, understand all the different dynamics before they end up realizing why it's even a piece of the entire pie. And if you look at other countries out there, like Great Britain, Asian countries where there's tons of mortgages, as well—China, Japan—but mortgage servicing as a separate concept, it's just not really a thing. So, it's really, for the United States, a concept that is tied to Fannie, Freddie, FHA, VA—which are basically Ginnie—these government institutions. So, the long story short, but still very long story, is that when the government put these different institutions in place, they created a concept where basically the underlying person who they wanted to interact with the mortgage was still the originator.So, I make a mortgage, my business isn't to hold this mortgage because the government wants to buy the mortgage and make it more liquid, and therefore more people can make mortgages, and therefore the cost of a mortgage is lower, but I still want you to be the person who interacts with the homeowner. So, I want to split this concept out. I'm going to own the mortgage, you're going to service the mortgage. And let's stick with that for now. So, that was, like, phase one of it.Then phase two of it was the fact that well, if that's going to happen, then every single person who makes a mortgage needs to be able to service the mortgage, so that's not fair to mom and pop shops across Main Street. If I originate whatever, 10, 20, 50, 100 mortgages a month, I'm not going to be at a place or a scale where I can run a true mortgage servicing operation. It just doesn't work. So, how am I going to deal with it? So, the government, again, to try to incentivize mortgage lending to incentivize liquidity in the space, said, “Fine. You can sell that servicing to another guy who then will deal with the relationship.”And boom, thus mortgage servicing is born, the idea of mortgage servicing is born, and this entire ecosystem then diverges. And really, not just diverges, it converges really to an efficient model of saying who is the best at mortgage servicing? Who are these cheap cost providers who are in the Midwest, who do it poorly, but thus can pay the highest price for mortgage servicing, and thus that's where all of the capital and all of the assets, sort of, flow? And that's why we live in the world we live in.Will: So, servicing is kind of an afterthought for the majority of the existence of a mortgage industry at large. Until, '08, '09. In '08, '09, everybody starts fixating on the servicing process as what it should always have been looked at, which is this really critical interface between the borrower and the lender, to a degree. And as a part of all of the regulation and the ongoing focus on servicing during that period of time, as we almost reworked the entire housing market, the cost to serve as a mortgage also changed a lot. Maybe you could just touch on that because there are a lot of compliance and regulatory framework aimed at servicing actually dramatically increased the complexity of doing servicing, which I think had a pretty profound impact on the cost to do so, right?Andrew: Yep. So, to elaborate further on these points that you're mentioning, the mortgage servicing ecosystem was really underdeveloped, both from one technology perspective as well as an understanding perspective, pre-2008. Again, people were not really afraid of being able to pay mortgages because naturally whenever you couldn't, you just sold your home and you probably made money on it. So, it's debatable as to whether or not [unintelligible 00:14:48] people are fully compliant back then whether the cost of servicing would be higher, but nonetheless, it is based on the data that people can see in the financials of mortgage servicing companies. Mortgage servicing became extremely expensive and really double, tripled in costs post-2008.And the way that it played out was basically the great financial crisis happened; people were unable to pay their mortgages; the traditional way would be to just put people out of homes, and as I mentioned earlier, the government's very incentivized to keep people in homes. And in order to make sure that the servicers were doing the right things, they basically put a bunch of different regulations both on the federal level and the state level to ensure that mortgage servicers were following the right processes in order to determine whether or not someone could make a payment for the mortgage, make sure that they're offered the right plans, and to make sure they were provided the right disclosures before they actually got through a process of foreclosing. So, when they put these regulations in place, normally you would think, “Well, these things can be somewhat automated. These things can be provided as part of the process.” But as I mentioned because it was so under-focused, there was just really not that much technology in the space, really not that many technological providers even involved in the industry.There's one main one, named Black Knight. So, when this all happened, these servicers went to Black Knight and basically asked them, “Hey, well, we are running into these issues. Can you help us?” And the answer was, quite frankly, “We will try, but we can't really guarantee all that much to you because there's a lot of changes, there's a lot of code that needs to change, and we just can't get it all done that quickly.” So, the only way that the mortgage servicers could handle these different regulatory requirements was basically to put people in place.You basically replaced what you would like to use, or what like to get done with technology, with people. So, you basically have this explosion of people cost in the number of people required to service a mortgage, and basically got to a place where today, there's two to three times as many people who need to be involved in a mortgage, versus pre-2008.Jason: What does the actual structure and distribution of mortgage servicers look like today, and how has that changed since the great financial crisis?Andrew: It's one of the things that honestly, the government focuses a lot on. There's a term, which is systematically relevant of financial institutions. So pre-2008, like I mentioned, there wasn't really that much of a concept of mortgage servicing. There were mortgage servicers out there, but most of the servicing was still held by the originators who made the mortgages. So, as a function of that, the ownership and really the people or entities that were servicing the mortgages was distributed quite similarly to the origination volumes.The guys who made the mortgages were the guys who serviced the mortgages, and as a result, there was a good split between bank who were very involved in mortgage space, as well as non-bank entities became more relevant, you know, probably post-2005. Today, we've gone into a world that is more and more non-bank-oriented, meaning the regulations have stepped up to such a dramatic degree that the underlying institutions who were originally involved had really substantially changed. I'll give you some simple examples. CitiMortgage, one of the largest originators previously, still a very large originator probably top five, now no longer services its own mortgages. It's completely outsourced—I think as of 2017—all of their mortgage servicing to Cenlar.Similarly, US Bank is no longer servicing their mortgages. The folks at JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon has, you know, publicly stated that they want to get out of this business and they've been working with other sub-servicers to slowly migrate to a place where they're not servicing their mortgages anymore. So today, you are in a world now, where it's basically 70% non-bank dominated versus pre-2008, we were in a world that was probably 70% bank dominated.Jason: You're painted a really stark picture of an increasingly disjointed, highly regulated, under-digitized, mortgage servicing market. This sets the table really well, I'm sure, to start to talk about how you're changing those dynamics with Valon. But before we dive into the company, maybe you can give us a bit of background as to how you personally got involved with mortgage servicing to begin with.Andrew: I like to coin—or use the term that I am an accidental operator because my background is actually on the investment side. I started out, really, in my career focusing on investing in some of these legacy mortgages. So, my first job out of college was working at Goldman. I was on what's called the short-term products [unintelligible 00:19:24], did some stuff with mortgages, I did some stuff with aircraft, but I quickly moved over to a Soros Fund Management where my primary job was actually to look at mortgages. So, I started out actually looking at the legacy, what's called non-agency residential mortgage-backed securities, and looking at the data underneath and seeing what was going on with these mortgages.Naturally, as with much of the market, we went from buying these securities to a place where we started buying the underlying home loans, the actual mortgages as opposed to the securities that you can buy on an exchange. And as a function of that, I ended up having to work with the servicers because when you buy the whole loan, unlike a security where everything's packaged up for you, you don't have to think about the accounting, the servicing, whatever else, when you buy the whole loan, you have to go find the guy who's selling the whole loan, you got to understand what he's doing, so he's not selling us stuff that you didn't want to buy, he's running the processes the right way, and you also have to go work with the servicer to actually get the servicing to happen, because it's a licensed activity. So unsurprisingly, the way I got about it was I started calling all my friends who had owned whole-loan portfolios before, and I asked them, “Who do you guys work with? Who should I be talking to you?” And the answer was, very simply, “They all suck.” Like, nobody likes your servicer.Now, you would think that would be an answer purely from one perspective, one angle like it'd be the perspective of an investor, maybe they charge too much. But it turns out it's because they aren't liked by the consumer, extremely low NPS scores of on average about 16; they aren't liked by their investors, they're extremely commoditized and extremely poor customer service, and they're most certainly not liked by the regulators who just keep fining them over and over again. You search mortgage servicing [unintelligible 00:21:07], you basically have, like, thousands of pages about this. And it's still even happening today. And it's not even entities that, you know, are foreign and pretty small and not understood; it's even large institutions like Citibank which is—like I said—why they got out of mortgage servicing.So naturally, my view on it was, well, this seems like something that technology can solve. This is something that we should be able to do better. This seemed insane that in the 21st century, that we're still dealing with this type of stuff. But as you start to dig in more and you start to pry into the actual underlying business, you start to understand both the complexities from an execution perspective and the actual underlying technological challenges. So, I ended up trying to find a couple of venture companies to invest in to go do this, but I actually couldn't find anyone who had the right idea, the right setup, the right vision in terms of how to build this company.So, you know, I went about my way, kind of left this on the side, and focused on other things at the time. But actually came back to it when I started looking at mortgage servicing rights which, at the time, I didn't understand nearly as well because I bought what are called whole loan mortgages, this entire mortgage. Mortgage servicing rights are basically the contractual relationship between the person who owns the right to service the mortgage—like I said, to collect, to interact, to really deal with the data of the mortgage borrower—and the person who actually services the mortgage. So, it's the contractual right that allows you to sub-service a mortgage out. What's interesting about that is that is basically a way to own that relationship and contract that relationship long-term.And for me, as someone who had started looking more and more into FinTech, the way I sort of saw it was, here is a way and here is an asset class, and here's a space that actually allows the mortgage servicer to own these relationships and do have these long, sticky monthly engagement type relationships that they can have over 7, 10, 30 years. And that's a very unique thing to have. More importantly and most interestingly, it's in a situation where actually in this ecosystem, people pay you to own that relationship, people pay you monthly fees to say, “Hey, actually work with the borrower. Hey, actually interact with them, help them find what they need, whatever else, and we'll pay to do it, and you're allowed to market additional things to them.” So, to me, that seems like such an interesting situation because not only can you have a business that is built to really improve the margins of the business and build automation around it, but you have this sticky relationship with the homeowner that you can really use to build trust, and really sell future financial products to.And that just seems like a very interesting business in my mind. So ultimately, I decided, hey, investing is interesting but this seems like too big of an opportunity to give up. So, I decided I wanted to go start a business, and this was the business I started, you know, right after.Jason: And one of the most interesting things to me is that it's not just a software component, right? Because you had looked at a number of other software providers and decided to do something a little bit more full-stack, which we don't typically see in the venture space. People tend to just want the software component and tend to steer clear of the services component. Maybe you can talk a little bit about why you still decided to include services as a part of what Valon offers.Andrew: There's an understanding amongst most venture investors that you want to be in the software business because it has a high margin business, it's defensible business, and it's less subject to changes in terms of margin profile because of the large amount of margin you have. Which, you know, is understandable. And that's ultimately actually where we thought we were going to get to, until we dug into and, sort of, operating this business, the actual origin of starting a mortgage servicing company as opposed to just the technology company was the fact that we realized that existing players were hamstrung by their current software in such a crazy degree that they weren't even able to migrate off of their existing systems to a new system. It's also a super-regulated space so anybody who wants to do it, wanted or needed to see clear performance, clear audits, really regulatory buy-in before they even made those things. So, it actually started out originally as an execution [ploy 00:25:31] where we said, “Well, we can execute faster, we can learn faster, we can dogfood our own product so much faster, and come back to people later on once we've been able to show these numbers.”But as we started doing this business more and more, we began to further understand that there's actually a really, really great opportunity running the mortgage servicer because you have that direct customer relationship. And that's such a valuable thing because even if we had automated all of the backend processes and even if we were focused on just making these margins more efficient, it's not really fundamentally changing how the borrower perceives it. It's changing the financial profile of these businesses. And additionally, a lot of the things that we wanted to do was build trust, and that's a front-facing thing; that's something that you need to be invested in as a business, which a lot of the existing mortgage servicers didn't have that perspective and that view. So, for us, it became more and more of a consumer story versus an enterprise SaaS story where we can say, “Hey, not only can we get this cash flow machine by doing servicing well and build really good software around it, but we can really build a great partnership with the homeowners that are being serviced by us and really build longer-term relationships with them.” So, that's where I think the turning point change from, “Hey, we're doing this out of necessity,” to, “Hey, we're doing this because we think it's the best thing we can be doing for people.”Jason: I love also that because the existing system isn't able to migrate off, their slow and outdated solutions and they're a highly fragmented space, it's effectively a commodity; you can come in, build a whole new tech stack, still put humans against the problem, but undercut on price. But you kind of used that extra cost as a way to broker a relationship directly with the consumer and offer a more expansive and holistic product over decades, which is a fascinating inversion of what the traditional mortgage servicing mantra and MO is. Maybe you can talk to us about how you actually convinced the originators and loan purchasers, mortgage purchasers, to trust you and your new small startup to actually service those loans? Because it feels like a difficult business to really get your foot in the door and get those initial loans through the platform so that you can build that trust with the originators and the loan owners as well.Andrew: To your exact point, it's a business that's extremely difficult to get into, [again 00:27:52], a lot of regulatory scrutiny, there's a lot of requirements to get into the business. And just name a couple here, you need—generally speaking—all 50 states licensed for you to be a quote-unquote, “Scaled servicer.” You need to have what's called agency approval, Fannie and Freddie approval, to be able to service most mortgages in the United States. So, between those different aspects, it's really hard to even get the legal requirements to be involved in this business, let alone get commercial contracts.But the way we approached this was really two-fold. The first part of it is, we were fortunate going into this space knowing that the existing players were so bad and so commoditized that actually, people were willing to work with different servicers. I'll give you a really simple example here: there's a company out there that we partnered with, it was one of our big investors, it's called to NRZ, and they're one of the largest owners of these mortgage assets. They own, like, 7% of the entire market. They own their own servicer, it's called Shellpoint.But even as an owner of that servicer, they don't actually give all of their business to their own business. And that's because they're trying to keep them competitive, that's because they're trying to diversify their risks, but the very fact that they don't give all their business to the entity that they are most financially incentivized to work with gives you a little bit of insight into how everybody thinks about this space, which is, “I'm not married to my vendor. I'm going to work with anybody who seems to be better. And there's a lot of things that are lacking, so you can try to convince me in a variety of different perspectives.” Obviously, if you've increase the bar because you've improved everything, that will no longer be the case, but today as it stands, that's how the ecosystem works.The second part of it, which is we actually went into this knowing that if we need these portfolios, we don't want to just have to convince people, we want to guarantees. So, we actually made sure that the initial investors in this company, the people who would take the benefits and the fruits of the technology that we built are some of the largest players in the space. So, we actually got folks like for example, Soros, NRZ, Jefferies, and a couple of other guys later on, to invest in the company with the belief that, “Hey, if I give you some mortgages to service and you actually are able to improve these margins, our business will be that much better off for it.” In some sense, they view this as, “Hey, this is an outsourced R&D effort. We can't hire good enough technical talent internally; we'll give you guys that through an equity investment, and if you guys win, we also win.”If you think about it as an example, NRZ spends something like, eh, on order of a billion dollars a year on servicing fees. If we can truly save them 10% on it and give that back to them—and let's say we save more than that, but we're just getting ten—well, that's $100 million a year that they're saving. And the way that their investments, or really their fund is really valued, that's a billion dollars of value that was just created. So, that's what's so interesting about this space which is, you have these players who are very incentivized for our success and we just made sure that we went to them very early on and said, “Hey, we're going to get this done. This is a very low risk for you; we're going to ask for a small portfolio, but if you give it to us and we succeed, we can both be big winners at the end of the day.” It's really about incentive alignment.Will: Andrew, I think one of the more profound things that you brought up here is that you're being paid to have a direct relationship with a consumer, a home-owning consumer, and that historically, I think mortgage servicers were happy being collection agents and not thinking about the long-term relationship that they had with the consumer, thinking about themselves as a commodity. How do you think about the relationship that you have with a consumer over the arc of your relationship with them and the types of products and services that you can start to bolt onto that relationship?Andrew: This is a really crucial point for us as a business, which is fundamentally and philosophically different from preexisting and the incumbent mortgage servicers. So today, the way people view this industry is that they view the extraction of value from the consumer as how they are still in business, the way that they generate margin. Meaning if there's a way I can extract an extra dollar from the consumer, for example, if I charge them a fee for making a payment online or for convenience, that's how they are continuing to make profits. Which is a very foreign and crazy concept, obviously, for people who are in venture and tech, et cetera. We take the approach that we want everything that we can do to make the consumer happier.a happier customer and investment towards making their experience better is how we actually make money. Because if you remember, at the outset, we don't actually make money from the consumer directly; we make money from servicing mortgages. And to us, the most efficient way to service the mortgage is a borrower who wants to use our automated products, who trusts us, and who doesn't call us with a lot of difficult questions. So, to do that, you have to really make sure you do everything right for the consumer so they are willing to trust you with that large financial ticket item that is their home. Now, I'll give you a couple of cool examples as to what you can do if you're a mortgage servicer who's really focused this way.So, really simple example; today, a lot of homeowners actually don't even use autopay, and you get a variety of different explanations. One of the really good explanations is that many people actually have lumpy incomes, so they don't really know when they'll get paid. Now, they want to use autopay, but the problem is because they don't know when they'll actually get paid, they need to make sure that they're paying when there's money in their bank. They don't want NSF fees, they don't want overdraft fees. We can use integrations with folks like Plaid to check their bank account and make sure that they have enough funds in their bank account before we pull, basically guarantee to them that you'll never get these type of fees.Now, that increases the convenience for the homeowner and allows them to put themselves on autopay, reduces actually for us the amount of times we have a call to make sure that they remembered to pay, and then overall, it actually results in a situation where we save more money and thus we make more profits at the end of the day. That's a really, really simple example.Another deeper layer you could go for example would be to tell people, “Hey, instead of just paying your mortgage through bill pay or whatever else that you're using, why don't you set up autopay and when you set up autopay will take $1 every time you use autopay and we'll actually pay it towards the next delinquent borrower.” Meaning it's a charitable donation; we're taking money out of our pockets to pay a delinquent borrower. Now, that doesn't seem like a big impact when you just think about the dollar, but when you think about the percentage of people who are current, and then people all do this, we actually can generate enough money that we can donate to delinquent borrowers. It actually reduces our overall delinquency rate and therefore our overall costs as a mortgage servicing company. That's virtually unheard of.Lower delinquency rates look better for agencies, for regulators, for investors, and we can do in a way which really doesn't take any money out of our own pockets, it just reduces costs because we're servicing with a lower friction way, but actually generates a lot of goodwill with the homeowner. Which then leads us into the second part, which is, well, we can actually cause people to stay on our platform because as the servicer, we actually can offer them the lowest rate possible. If you look at a world that we service the mortgage as well as originate, we don't care that much about making money on originations because we own the consumer, we own that relationship. And we know everything about them; we also have most of the information, so it's easily preprocessable. Which means that we can go to the homeowner and say, “You know, you're usually going to try to refinance right now, but I'll give you the best rate because I have zero marketing costs, and I just want to keep working with you.”So, you don't even need to shop with everybody else because I'm going to preload it, I'm going to give you the best rate, and you're going to have a very smooth origination process and servicing process because nothing will move off. So, you get more and more into these type of conversations around, hey, because of our relationship, because of the trust we build, we can offer people more and more products that honestly make them happier, and ultimately that will drive them towards using us more longer-term, which is exactly what we want. And that's what we find so interesting about the mortgage servicing space because while it's not understood this way today, it is the perfect setup to be in a situation where you're really building a long-term financial platform, and the mortgage is that linchpin to getting into that consumers life and really trying to build that trust relationship with them long-term.Jason: I've got to imagine the regulators absolutely love what you're doing. I'm curious if you're thinking through feeding that data loop back into the regulators because I can't imagine the regulation has gone down since a great financial crisis. I'm curious what relationship you have with the government on this front.Andrew: So, our relationship is primarily with the agencies. When you think about regulators, there are regulators who are the state regulators—they manage their own department of financial services in each state—there's obviously the CFPB, and then there's Fannie and Freddie who are called regulators, but really they're investors by and really regulate the mortgage market through their buying of mortgages. But from Fannie and Freddie's perspective, yeah, this is—you hit the nail on the head; this is exactly what they want, this is what they've been seeking for. When you look up on Fanny's website, “Hey, what is a servicer?” They literally write, “Trusted financial advisor.” That's what they want.But nobody does it today, and there's not much that they can do about it. So, from their perspective, they love this outcome where the servicer is thinking about this; they love an outcome where if the homeowner gets a stay with their originator, they have that continuity of relationship; and then they lastly love the outcome where if we are providing this platform on a greater scale, they then don't have to worry as much about the volatility of earnings for originators because they have this blended financial profile. It basically turns in originator from a company that basically has highs and lows based on how much origination is happening to a customer relationship management company. And that is honestly where they want this stuff to go long-term.Jason: And do individual homeowners get any say in the decision on who gets to service their mortgage? Or is it entirely up to the originals?Andrew: Unfortunately, it's buried on page whatever—probably, like, ten—on your closing disclosure, and then later on your mortgage documents, you get put to whoever your mortgage originator wants you to be serviced by.Jason: So, the way you'll… [laugh] coming into a home near you will be through your success with the people who are originating the mortgages and paying for that mortgage servicing contract?Andrew: Today, that is the case, but in very short order, by the end of the year, you can get a Valon mortgage. And when you're with Valon, you stay with Valon. We won't sell your mortgage, we'll keep your mortgage on our platform, and we'll build that long-term trust-based relationship with you.Jason: Tell us more about that.Andrew: Yeah, so we—I mean, we would love for a world—and this is something, by the way, plenty of people have gripes about where they want to be able to have a mortgage that they transfer the servicing based on their own discretion, based on who they want to work with, but that's a longer-term conversation, that's a highly regulator-based conversation. So, it's something that's not going to happen tomorrow. The easiest way that we can become partners with people who actually want to work with Valon is that we offer them a highly competitive mortgage. Again, the fact of the matter is, we don't need to make money off of mortgage origination; we make money off of having the consumer stay with us. So, we'll be happy to offer them possibly the lowest rates that they can get.So, when they come to Valon, they can get their mortgage refinanced, or if they're getting a new mortgage, they can just get a mortgage from Valon, and then thereafter, they'll continue to stay with Valon. There'll be serviced by Valon, when rates drop, we'll just be proactive and we'll preempt any sort of refinance that they want to do. They can log onto our webpage, they can log onto their app, and they will exactly know how much they can refinance it for, what the costs are, all those different things. But again, the nice part here is because we don't really need to make money on originations, like a Quicken, like a [loanDepot 00:40:13], or any of these other players out there—even Better Mortgage—they know that we have an incentive just to keep them on a platform and we can offer that lowest rate. And we can do that. So, that's what's so unique about it which is, you get that relationship, you get that great service, but you also get really priced competitive results, which we believe ultimately will build longer-term trust.Jason: I mean, it's an amazing and powerful refocus where you've effectively created alignment with all the major players in such a way that's made it difficult for any other competitors to compete with you. It's a pretty [laugh] amazing approach to the market that you've developed here. What gets you most excited about the future? Like wh—you know, obviously, you've got origination coming up; you know, in five, ten years, if you're massively successful, what's the impact you've had on the US economy and the US mortgage space?Andrew: So, there's obviously elements where we're helping consumers, right, so we can reduce the delinquencies in the system, like I mentioned, through different mechanisms. We offer people really cheaper financial products, which we believe they deserve, but I think the long-term most impactful thing is that we can provide, really, researchers as well as government regulators the right tools to make the right decisions. When you think about what basically happened recently with COVID, now the government went about and offered everybody forbearance, which is extremely expensive for both players in the industry as well as the government, but they don't really have a good way to address the crisis at hand. So, they used the very blunt-edged solution to it. As the platform that hopefully ends up winning the market, we can provide that information to the government; we can provide that implementation to them.So, they can be much more, with a sharp knife and really a small pencil, start to draw exactly what they want to end up happening. So, instead of giving a forbearance for every single person—which is what happened; they said, “You didn't have to pay a mortgage for nine months, twelve months,” instead of giving a forbearance to every person out there, you could say, “Let me check your bank account. Let me see that you're actually running into a crisis. And if you are, actually I will give you even longer. I will give you 18 months, I will give you until you figure out what to do next.”And for the people who didn't actually have a crisis, we're not going to give it to you. So, you actually can help the right people in this sort of situation. Alternatively, you might have a situation where the government wants to test a different modification program. Usually, it gets into a large argument about does this work; does it not work? There's not much data out there.But with a technological platform like us, you can actually go as far as to say, let's actually A/B test these results. If the government buys-in will test it with [unintelligible 00:42:54] portfolios, and we'll report these results. So, this is kind of where we believe government policy and really, American policy around housing can be really shaped if you had the right system and the right sort of infrastructure. So, while we are very focused on trying to build that long-term vision and build out a trust relationship with homeowners across the United States, we believe the longer-term impacts of doing something like this really come from the fact that we can leverage this infrastructure to help so many different people.Will: Aside from going deeper in the value chain on the mortgage lifecycle, are their orthogonal products—I know before we jumped on the call, we were sort of talking about insurance a little bit—are there other orthogonal products that are correlated to homeowners that from a product standpoint that you see Valon being able to bolt on to the platform over time?Andrew: I think the big new products that we'll be focused on outside of insurance as an example that we talked about where offering property insurance is a very natural next step, which we're already going to look to do by the end of this year is actually getting into things like for example, credit card debt consolidation. So, it's a very well-known thing that people when they get credit card debt sometimes want to refinance it with a HELOC because it's cheaper to pay a HELOC than a credit card. Now, that's not a very simple process today because getting a HELOC is a painful thing because you have to work with the servicer or you have to work with a HELOC originator. So, making it really easy where someone who has credit card debt, move it quickly over to their HELOC and pay less interest is obviously a quick next step. But that really actually speaks a lot more towards long-term financial management because again, we are dealing with such a large purchase and a large component of their daily—their monthly cash flows.So, as we look to what we do going forward, there probably will be a lot more around financial literacy, financial advisory, around all these different components. And if we can build that trust really leading the homeowner to make these right decisions and being able to forecast for them different outcomes based on what they want to do. So, I'd say that's probably the direction we'll ultimately take with this business. We need some time to work on all the different sort of initiatives that we have, but we're really hopeful that we can really make a difference here.Will: Andrew, congratulations. This is an unbelievably badass business and a very, very boring, esoteric industry that you are transforming. We really, really appreciate you taking the time to hang with us today and to give our listeners a look inside the mortgage servicing industry.Andrew: I appreciate it. Thanks for letting me talk. I went on a very, very long rant.Will: Thank you for listening to Perfectly Boring. You can keep up the latest on the podcast at perfectlyboring.com, and follow us on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. We'll see you next time.

I burst into the Zoom with Andrew Janjigian—a writer and the baker behind the newsletter Wordloaf—as though he were an old friend, telling him about my drama with the dentist that was happening that day and explaining precisely how much I was already sweating despite the early hour of our interview. There are some people whose energy, even virtually, I just like and how I express this like is, frankly, by extravagantly complaining in the hopes of amusing the other person. This is all to say: Andrew is very smart and cool, and I was excited to talk to him.He has done so many things in his life, and it is all wildly impressive. He’s worked as an organic chemist, got a master’s in biology with a focus on fungi, and then ended up at America’s Test Kitchen, where he was the resident bread expert. That led, eventually, to Wordloaf, where he makes sourdough approachable. We discussed it all. Listen above, or read below.Alicia: Hi, Andrew, how are you?Andrew: I am very well. How are you?Alicia: I'm good. Thank you so much for being here.Andrew: Sure. It's great to be here.Alicia: Can you tell me about where you grew up and what you ate?Andrew: Sure. Ok. So, I grew up in a Boston suburb. And I live in Cambridge now, so basically in Boston. And what I ate was—I come from a big Armenian family, and Armenians are pretty serious about their food and their cooking. A gathering of any two or more Armenians is basically an excuse for a feast. And holidays and parties are sort of studies in excess. So there was a lot of food and a lot of cooking and recipes between my mother and my grandparents and my aunts and uncles. And so, I was exposed to kind of people who love to cook pretty early on. And beyond the Armenian stuff, my mother is a very good cook. And she was pretty adventurous, sort of, as interested in experimentation and research as anyone, and I think that's where I started having the same sort of tendencies. I grew up in the era where it was sort of where cooking shows were all on PBS, and Julia Child, if you didn't know how to cook and all those sorts of things. It was a time when food culture was just starting to become mainstream. And my mother was a part of that. I think that kind of sums it up. Boston was not particularly interesting in terms of food at the time. It's definitely improved since then.Alicia: [Laughs.] How has it improved? What's changed in Boston?Andrew: Well, I think it's mostly that the culture has grown to support the presence of just more interesting restaurants. I mean, I'm sure there were plenty of restaurants in, within cultural enclaves. But when I was growing up, you didn't know about them. There probably were fewer then, simply because there wasn't the support. But I think Boston is kind of a provincial place, or has been. And I think people are finally waking up to the, sort of the importance of foods from other cultures. And so, those restaurants are finally getting the due that they deserve. And so, it's definitely better. I mean, I lived in New York for a long time. And so I still kind of gripe about how much better it could be. [Laughter.]Alicia: Well, you've explained your career trajectory to me before when I've interviewed you. But can you explain how you ended up in food?Andrew: Sure. Yeah. I mean, I started out in it, and then came back to it. But the whole trajectory is really kind of convoluted. And I'm sort of somebody who has always had a lot of interests, and I kind of never do anything halfway. And so that sort of leads me to follow paths far away from one thing and come back to them. So I started out working in restaurants during—a little bit in high school, but in college in New York City as a way to have pocket money to pay the bills. And then in summers, where I was paying my own rent and things like that. I was a waiter working front of the house in a couple places. There was a chef at one particular restaurant who sort of took a liking to me and understood my interest in cooking. And he said, ‘Would you be interested in working in the kitchen?’ And he let me, kind of, with no—without real proof that I could do anything, to work garde manger. It was a small restaurant, and so I immediately just jumped in, do it. And then, never went back to waiting tables after that, because it was really much more my thing. And I did that for a few years and eventually worked my way up. For the longest time, I worked at a place in the West Village called the Universal Grill, which was a great place to work. It was a really tiny little restaurant. It was very unique in every way. It prided itself on, or at least thinking itself, as the gayest restaurant in New York City. Or the gayest restaurant in the world, I forget what their tagline was. But it was very a kind of a hub of a lot of gay cultural activity. And it was just a fun place to work, especially since the—while the food, it was important that the food be of a certain caliber, the owners didn't really want to have anything to do with that. So they left the few of us in the kitchen to our own devices to kind of come up with recipes and be creative. And it was small enough that if I was cooking, I was the only person—eventually I worked my way up to sous chef. And if I was there, I was in charge of the menu for the night. And so, it gave me a lot of creativity. That was kind of where I forged my skills. And then, I stayed in restaurants for a little bit longer after that. I moved back to Boston. But I kind of found sort of other interests pushing in against that one. And I eventually decided I want to go back to school. I had studied literature and film in college, and—but was, sort of caught the science bug. And so, I decided that I was going to be—I wanted to be a doctor. It seems kind of crazy now, I thought that. So I go back to school, do pre-med courses. I hadn’t particularly done any of those kinds of classes in college. And I started out in chemistry and found that I had this kind of acuity for it. I found it really interesting. And while I was doing some of these courses, I kind of talked my way into an internship at a pharmaceutical company here in Cambridge. And that internship ended up getting renewed several times. And eventually, it just became a full-time job. And I sort of dropped the pre-med idea in favor of just kind of becoming an organic chemist. Organic chemistry is basically cooking, at least in the practical aspects of it. It's just like cooking. You have a recipe, put a bunch of stuff in a container, you heat it up, and it transforms into something else. And I'd always been good at recipes and good cooking. So it's sort of like it was an easy shift for me.And I did that for 12 years, ’cause it was—working for a corporation, it paid well. And I enjoyed it most of the time. And then while I was there, I caught another bug and this was in the study of mycology and mushrooms. And one of the benefits of working there was that they paid for higher education. And so I was able to get a master's degree—or most of it, I didn't finish it until after I left there. But in biology, it was a study of fungi and in, called mushroom cultivation and foraging and things like that. That's where I was when, just by coincidence. I met somebody, a friend of a partner of my brother-in-law who worked at America's Test Kitchen and shared my crazy resume, my story of how I—what I'd done all these years. And they go, ‘You'd be the perfect candidate for a job at America's Test Kitchen.’ They love people with all those kinds of backgrounds, and also the sort of skill set was perfect for it. So I applied and I took a massive pay cut. And the rest is history. And I was there for about the same, about 11 years, up until last year.Alicia: When did bread become the focus?Andrew: So it's funny because I was thinking about this in—I worked in two bakeries in high school, and it didn't register as a thing that I was at all interested in. And during college, I went—I spent a semester in Paris. I'm sure I ate lots of good bread. But somehow, the idea that I was surrounded by all these amazing bakeries just never, never even occurred to me to think about it. While I was there, I was kind of more interested in spending time in movie theaters and art museums. And so, I didn't come to bread until very late in the game. And the thing that kind of sparked that was probably—this is probably true for many people—was the no-knead bread. I think I made it right after the article came out in ’09. It both kind of sparked the idea that good bread can be had at home, and that actually, maybe, at home, homemade bread is better than you can get, at least from bakeries at the time. Or just the fact that you're pulling it hot from the oven yourself means you're getting it at the peak of its freshness. I quickly was like, ‘Oh, I think I need to dig into this more deeply.’ The fundamentals, the foundation had been there all along. Because the thing that I, that brought me to cooking in the first place when I was a kid, before I started working in restaurants, was pizza; I was obsessed with pizza. I think the first cookbook and kitchen tool I ever personally owned was a pizza pan and a book that my mother gave me as a birthday present. And so, that had been something that all throughout my life since that moment, I've been tinkering with my own recipes. And Cook's Illustrated started in ’93. So that was as I was—during college. I think I subscribed to it from the beginning at that point. And so, I understood that iterative testing process for recipe development. And I did a lot of that with my pizza recipe over the years. And so, I sort of laid the groundwork for where I ended up. After no-knead bread, I started digging into recipes and taking classes. And that was really where I kind of fell hard for it. But yeah, that—Sorry, go on.Alicia: No, no.But yeah, how did you come to your kind of current approach to it? Andrew: Well, so there's a lot of aspects to it. I think that no-knead bread itself is something I came to realize is just, I don't know. It's weird to find something so basic that you didn't realize you could be in love with when you ate it all the time. And maybe it's just because I never had good bread, but I'm sure I did. But there's so many things about it that I love about it it's hard to even narrow it down. I think one of them is simply that bread bakers are kind of, they're really great people. The people who work in the industry and the teachers I've had, they're just really—they're really generous and they're fun to be around. And so when I was a student of it, at the beginning of my time, I just was like, ‘Oh, these are my people’ in a way. And their passion for it kind of quickly became my own. But in terms of the bread itself, and what—one of the many things I love about it, one of them is just like that it's, unlike any other kind of cooking, it's a relationship. It's a dynamic thing that is never complete. You never perfect a technique. Sometimes it works amazingly, and sometimes it doesn't. And you have to kind of constantly bring yourself back to the-I mean, it's a living organism. And if you're not paying close attention to it, if you're not kind of adjusting to it, then it kind of resists being what you want it to be. And so, you need to kind of bring yourself down to its level—up to its level, I should say.I do a lot of overnight recipes, in the fridge overnight or on the counter. Every time I come downstairs from my bedroom and see what's happening in the kitchen, it's a little mini Christmas morning. I'm so excited to see what I, what it's managed to do for me in the interim. So there's just a lot of little joys in it. Yeah.Alicia: And you left your longtime post at America's Test Kitchen to focus on your newsletter as well as freelance. And you recently wrote about competing recipe style guides, which I thought was really interesting, because—for myriad reasons. One, that I develop recipes. Two, that I was a copy editor.How has that transition been for you into working for so many different places plus yourself? Because I know that it is very difficult. [Laughs.]Andrew: Yeah, that's been one of the many challenges of doing this, all solo. As I said, I came to America’s Test Kitchen as a cook and a science person, and not as a journalist. I had no training in journalism. And so, the style guide wasn't even something—I mean, I'm sure I had MLA or whatever in college, but I didn't know that it was a thing. And so when I learned how America's Test Kitchen did their thing, I didn't think, ‘Oh, that's their style guide.’ I just thought that's how everybody does it. And I absorbed that over time. But then after leaving, I realized, ‘Oh, this isn't how everybody is doing it. It’s just one idiosyncratic approach to it. And other places do it differently.’ And that makes sense. Every place has a different kind of needs and a different audience to cater to. But it's maddening to have to—it’s like having to speak a different language every time you do, pick up the phone to speak to somebody else. And it's really hard to adjust. But it is what it is. I wish we could have like an International Congress of Recipe’s style guides and just kind of come up with one thing. Yeah. Alicia: No, it's funny, because I wrote about salt today and how I'm going to try and not use Diamond Crystal anymore. It was so funny.Andrew: The Cargill thing?Alicia: The Cargill thing [laughs], where I found out that it's owned by Cargill since 1997. I had like literally no idea. That's never the point of anything anyone's talking about when they're talking about salt and which one to use. It's always about what's accessible and the volume, and  it's never—I also want this standard recipe conference, because I want the salt issue to be resolved. Because The L.A. Times is like, ‘Ok, we're only going to use Diamond Crystal.’ And then The Washington Post is like, ‘We're only going to use fine sea salt.’ But how many salts do you expect a regular person to have in their kitchen? I don't know, and I think it needs to be resolved. I'm just really horrified that people have always been like, ‘Diamond Crystal is the best’ and no one's ever said that they're owned by Cargill.Andrew: Yeah, that was news to me until I think you probably retweeted somebody a couple of days ago, and it never occurred to me. I mean, somebody down to make a bespoke salt that had the exact same weight to volume ratio and is as, just as good in terms of the way it sprinkles or whatever? And then we can stop using it. I was a kosher salt, Diamond kosher salt person until maybe that also sort of swayed me in the other direction. But I do think that it's annoying as hell that kosher salt comes in these two different volume to weight ratios. And I think I'm now in the sea salt’s better camp because sea salt is sea salt is sea salt.  Alicia: Exactly. Yeah, no, apparently there's a Norwegian kosher salt that is the same as Diamond Crystal. You're not getting a 10-pound, 5-pound box of it. So that's the issue here, is how much—yeah, how much you're getting, how much bang for your buck, which I guess is why Diamond Crystal really owned the game for so long. [Laughs.] And continues to! I don't think I'm going to change the way chefs act. But at least I can let people, more people know that Cargill owns this and to make their own choices now. Andrew: Yeah.Well, the other thing is that's kind of a very niche question, but like the bigger question’s metric versus imperial and weight to volume and baking recipes and that stuff is just maddening. So you asked about my own style and what that was like. I feel like a style guide should always be logical and clear. It should also teach people something. To give people options is to not encourage them to pick one over the other. And so I decided I'm getting rid of volume measurements, because I think it forces people to do something that eventually they'll come to see is easier.Alicia: Right. No, and I agree. I hate volume recipes. I mean, the only thing for me is that, to keep batteries in my scale. [Laughs.] It's remembering whether it's double A or triple A when I go to the store. That's my struggle. But I wanted to ask how you're maintaining creativity and balance between the work you're doing for other people and for your newsletter, because people ask me all the time. And for me, I think it's kind of obvious, most of the time, what's for the newsletter and what isn't. Speaking, again, of the salt piece, I know how I could expand the salt piece and make it really a lot better and 3000 words and a lot more effecting, but I'm not going to do that for my weekly blog. But, yeah, so basically, how do you balance those things that you're doing?Andrew: Well, I think I'm sort of in a similar camp with that. It took me a while to figure out that that was what it was, but I use it as a sort of a scratch pad for whatever's on my mind. And I don't necessarily feel like things need to be kind of resolved when I write about them there. And I think maybe from the outside—I hope this isn't the case—but maybe from the outside, it sort of seems very disjointed. One week, I'll be giving a recipe and the next week, I'll be talking about style guides. And so I hope that when you see the overall arc of things, you can see that I keep circling back to certain themes. But I find it very useful as a kind of idea-generating place. And I'm kind of grateful that people are willing to kind of follow along there. People pay to subscribe, and that seems like an amazing thing that people want to kind of hear me just think out loud.Alicia: Right.Yeah. And I like that aspect of newsletters. I think a lot of people don't really get that. Maybe because they don't do it; they don't understand the value of having to be consistently creative. And that it's not necessarily an ends in itself, but it's just a way of thinking. It's just a practice that you can have. That people will go along with it is really interesting. And have you found a real connection with your audience there?Andrew: For sure. I've found that the fact of their presence in—I mean, I guess one nice thing about having a paid option is that if people are paying, they don't have to comment to show their appreciation for what you're doing.I feel like the one thing that I've wanted to—Well, it's not the only thing, but one of the things I want to develop more of a sense of community. I feel it's probably on me to figure out a way to foster that more. Because there is some of it, but not as much as there perhaps could be, where people are not only commenting and interacting with me but also communicating with one another more. And maybe that's the question of starting open threads or encouraging questions where people get to weigh in. The hardest part, or a hard part, of doing the newsletter and being a full-time freelancer is just finding the time to implement all these different ideas I have for making it better. It's very slow.Alicia: It's really slow. It's very hard. I want to open up to new, have other people contribute. But I have to make sure I'm fully available to do the best editing work and everything like that. I don't know. It's funny how Substack is, say, it’s all like, ‘Independent newsletters are the future, blah, blah, blah.’ It is, in a way, but at the same time, it's not sustainable at all to do without support. It's impossible to grow into the way that you might have a vision for without the support of a team. Andrew: Yeah, definitely. I can see so many places where it could be more than it is, and maybe it will be someday. But part of it's just a question of time. If I didn't have the freelance work, then I might be able to double the amount of stuff I do there. The problem is that I actually enjoy most of the, or nearly all of the freelance work I'm doing are things I'm interested in. So I'm happy to have it. Maybe there just needs to be more days in the week, although working more is not a good idea.Alicia: No, no. Yeah, it's a hard balance. For me, the struggle right now is finishing my book, and then—and also doing a newsletter.Andrew: Yeah, that I couldn't imagine. Although I have a book project that I need to get going on. So, I don’t want to talk about it much. But the idea of trying to juggle that seems impossible.Alicia: It's hard. It's really hard. The newsletter, in a great way, it became my—the bulk of my income. But I didn't know that that was going to happen. Thank God it happened. And then I have to keep it up to write the book, because the advance was so shitty. [Laughs.] And I sold the book before my—literally weeks before my newsletter kind of popped off, I guess, last year? I don't know. So, it's constantly maintaining this balance in this kind of work where you're weighing the pros and cons of literally every small decision. But I remember when I quoted you about flour in a past newsletter, and you talked about ingredient sourcing and flour sourcing, it caused a little bit of controversy in the artisanal flower community. I talked to Roxana Jullapat about this recently while talking about Mother Grains-Andrew: Which I loved.Alicia: Yeah, yeah.And we're all constantly trying to find this balance—or we're all, I think, people who try to care both about accessibility and taste and ecology, and trying to juggle all of these ideas at once. You have to think about what's good for your local ecosystem, and what's also realistic. And so, what are your thoughts on flour and accessibility right now?Andrew: So, yeah, I got kind of yelled at by somebody, for use—[laughs] for using the term ‘fancy flour’ to refer to sort of fresh milled local, regional, flours, which I love and use all the time and, I think are important to—it's an important aspect to the industry to promote.But it's only a piece of the story. There's so many issues with making that kind of thing accessible to everyone. It's very expensive. It's not accessible in terms of, most supermarkets don't carry anything like that. And mail order is definitely possible, but not only does that add to the cost but it adds to the carbon footprint of the thing. I try in the newsletter and elsewhere to encourage people to seek out those kinds of things if they're in their local economy, and to—I think a great deal of my audiences likely can't afford to spend as much as possible on flour, and maybe-So I think the person that wasn't happy with that term was coming from that perspective is—and like, ‘You need to kind of almost force people who can afford to use better products and more sustainable, whatever.’ And so, I think that's a good thing. But I think it's important not to forget that there are people who can't afford that, and some of those people might not be part of my audience, but they—maybe I'm not attracting them, because if I'm kind of limiting myself to boutique ingredients. I kind of want to come at it from both sides. There's another aspect which is kind of related to that, which is that you—the thing about flours, flours that are kind of boutiques, is that each one needs to be—the recipe needs to be developed specifically for that flour. Whereas if you called for a commodity, or sort of a well-known flour, they're consistent across the—people can get King Arthur flour from one side of the country to the other, and it's going to behave the same way no matter where you get it. And so then, all of a sudden, the recipe becomes accessible to more people. And so, it's a challenge, because if you want to encourage those kinds of things, you need to teach people how to use them and how to how to adapt to them, in a way, like to say, ‘I don't know what your flour is going to be like, but here's what to look for and how to adjust if that's the case.’ But still, I mean, it's really important, because I think maybe flour’s one—I think Roxana said this, or maybe she was talking about sugar, but I think they're similar in that it's one of those unexamined monoliths in our food culture that we don't—we just think flour is just the thing you get. You buy some flour. Whatever, it doesn't matter. As opposed to thinking about how huge the industry is and how difficult it would be to dismantle that sort of thing and replace it with something that is more sustainable and equitable. I think we have to start somewhere. And talking about flous that are made from grains that are grown locally—I'm lucky to live in New England, which before it was the heartland, was the breadbasket of America. And so, good grain can be grown here, and more and more is being grown. And so, I have access to really great local flour, but not everyone does. Although I think there's probably opportunities to grow flours that can be adapted for whateverenvironment you live in. I mean, there's some cool flours that grow in the desert, wheats that grow in the desert that are being built into flour. And actually, we might need more of them, because I haven't really delved too deep into it. But they're saying, this year has been really bad for droughts in the Midwest and Canada. I don't know if it's the end, or if it's just a blip and the kinds of things that we're gonna see more and more of over time. So it's a little scary to think, because if we can't grow—I mean, me being able to have, make my bread is important to me. But beyond that, access to something like flour going away is hard to fathom how damaging that would be to our economies and our lives.Alicia: Yeah.No, I think about that a lot, especially because living in Puerto Rico, I can get King Arthur, but I have to go to the special store and I have to pay way more than I would have paid in New York for it. And then it's funny, because I think if I tried to learn how to cook here, every recipe would be a nightmare because of the humidity and the—and so, because I already know how to cook, I'm—I know how to compensate for things. But I just want to see more recipes, I think, written—and I guess I should start doing this—for the gluten-free flours that are more locally produced like the cassava flour and the breadfruit flour and everything, and plantain flour even. Because, as we keep saying here, it's like, ‘Well, soon everyone will know what this is to live in the tropics.’ New York is subtropical now. And so yeah, it's just really interesting to think about and to kind of try to reframe—yeah, I use the local grain thing to question or whatever to think about, yeah, how we might make things in the future that are recognizable to us. Andrew: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's just hard to imagine a world, or it's hard to imagine living in a world where something as fundamental as wheat or, were to go away. It's scary. And I love alternative flours, but you can't get a baguette out of cassava flour.Alicia: Yeah, exactly. Thinking about life without a baguette is kind of depressing. [Laughs.] Yeah. That's what I'm gonna have for breakfast. I have some. Anyway. [Laughs.] Let me enjoy it while I have it. I’m not thinking about that. But through your newsletter, you're also kind of—you're teaching classes on Zoom. And we talked about the different styles of writing recipes. But just to write recipes down in a methodical manner is so difficult for me personally. What is your process for doing that? What tools have maybe helped you do that? How have you found your teaching voice, basically?Andrew: So it's really interesting, because I'm deeply introverted. And so teaching is the farthest—especially in person—but in front of people, Zoom, or in a room full of them. But I actually have come to love it. And I never would have guessed that would be the case. I started teaching baking and cooking because I saw it as an opportunity to get to kind of hang out in spaces that I was just a consumer of where I wanted to—I wanted to be able to go to places like King Arthur and, on their dime instead of mine. And so I was like, ‘Ok, I'm just gonna see if they’ll let me teach something.’ But I quickly realized that actually, I really liked doing it. And so, I do it for its own sake now. It's challenging, but also it's a great tool for figuring out and kind of codifying what I know and what I don't know. If I have to develop it, I often will propose classes for things that I haven't quite finished figuring out but knowing that it'd be an opportunity to get it done. And so, there's something fun about jumping without a net into something like that. And so, in terms of a newsletter and the recipes, I think I've figured out how to teach, or learning how to teach. And in classes, I think I have converted some of that into how to write about it. But I'm still developing that a little bit more early on in the process. I feel I've been cycling through saying things and figuring out the best way to say something. I often talk about the same kinds of the same topics, how to work with a sourdough starter, or how to do techniques like folding and what not. And I'm never quite sure how to pass that along to somebody who, for whom it—they're naive to those concepts. But I've spent a lot of time thinking about that. And I feel like the thing that I think about most in sort of an abstract way is, how do you teach people to think like a baker does? It's not straightforward. I don't know if it's true for every skill, or, but I spend a lot of time thinking about, like, ‘What is it gonna flip the switch in somebody's head when they're doing a technique?’ It's not just straightforward, do this and get that result. It's more like, ‘Think like this, and you'll be able to figure out how to get that result.’ It's one step removed from the process. But I'm still trying to, still trying to get my head around that.Alicia: Well, for you, is cooking a political act?Andrew: Yes, it is. I feel like it's important to keep that in your mind when you're doing it. I think it's such an easy thing to forget that food and cooking have—it's such a fundamental thing. Is breathing a political act? It's almost the same, but—air is important, too. Food is so fundamental that it's just easy to forget that it has so much, so many implications in terms of—the flipside to eating is hunger, and maybe you're satisfying your own hunger but other people don't even have the option to satisfy it. Or equity in terms of who's making our food or who's growing, picking our fruits, and then all the impacts on climate and resources. And so, I feel I try to deliberately keep that in mind. I mean, it's not always there, but I just feel it's important not, never to forget that. It's part of a system that is not great and needs a lot of work. And I think that, especially if you're in the world of food and cooking, you can have an impact, a positive impact in that if you keep it in mind. Alicia: Right. Thank you so much for being here.Andrew: Oh, it was my pleasure. I'm so happy to be here. This is a public episode. Get access to private episodes at www.aliciakennedy.news/subscribe This is a public episode. Get access to private episodes at www.aliciakennedy.news/subscribe

01:27 - Andrew's Superpower: Stern Empathy 03:30 - Setting Work Boundaries * Matrix Organizations * 18F (https://18f.gsa.gov/) * Acknowledging Difficult Situations (i.e. Burnout) * Health Checks * Project Success * Time Tracking * Heart Connection / Motivation * Work Distribution * Greater Than Code Episode 162: Glue Work with Denise Yu (https://www.greaterthancode.com/glue-work) 18:54 - Providing Support During a Pandemic * Stretching/Growth Work * Comfortable/Safety Work * Social Connection 23:37 - Keeping People Happy / Avoiding Team Burnout * Project Aristotle by Google (https://rework.withgoogle.com/print/guides/5721312655835136/) * Collecting Honest Data * Psychological Safety & Inclusion * Earned Dogmatism * “The Waffle House Solution” 36:26 - Developing Team Culture * “Gravity People” * Honing Communication Skills * Staying Ahead of Big Problems * The ACE Model of Leadership * Appreciation * Coaching * Evaluation * Learning Skills * Managers: Coaching How To Coach * Communities of Practice * Hiring External Consultants * Online Courses, Books, Podcasts 43:08 - Knowing When to Jump Ship and Understanding Your Skills * TKI Assessment (https://kilmanndiagnostics.com/assessments/thomas-kilmann-instrument-one-assessment-person/) * Competing * Collaborating * Compromising * Avoiding * Accommodating 46:51 - Developing & Enforcing Boundaries * Summarization * Normalization * Asking For Support 59:05 - Making Mistakes * Demonstrating Vulnerability * Acknowledge, Internalize, and Learn * Rebuilding Trust * Acceptance: Start Over – There's Other Opportunities * Dubugging Your Brain by Casey Watts (https://www.debuggingyourbrain.com/) Reflections: Arty: The intersection between identifying and acknowledging creates the precedent for the norm. Jacob: Evolving culture to enable vulnerability more. Casey: Andrew's river metaphor and Arty's cardboard cutout metaphor. Andrew: Talking about and building psychological safety is foundational. Going first as leadership or being first to follow. How to start a movement | Derek Sivers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V74AxCqOTvg&feature=youtu.be) (being the first follower TED Talk) This episode was brought to you by @therubyrep (https://twitter.com/therubyrep) of DevReps, LLC (http://www.devreps.com/). To pledge your support and to join our awesome Slack community, visit patreon.com/greaterthancode (https://www.patreon.com/greaterthancode) To make a one-time donation so that we can continue to bring you more content and transcripts like this, please do so at paypal.me/devreps (https://www.paypal.me/devreps). You will also get an invitation to our Slack community this way as well. Transcript: ARTY: Hi, everyone. Welcome to Episode 248 of Greater Than Code. I'm Arty Starr and I'm here with my co-host, Jacob Stoebel. JACOB: Hello! Nice to be here, and I'm here with my other co-host, Casey Watts. CASEY: Hi, I'm Casey, and we're all here together with our guest today, Andrew Dunkman. Andrew, he/him, is an engineering leader and software developer with 17 years of experience. He's worked on and launched tools for contact relationship management, predictive sales, radiology and healthcare, learning and management, business-to-business timekeeping, and most recently in government at 18F, a part of the US General Services Administration that's helping the federal government adopt user-centered technology approaches. He loves those. He also likes building community in his free time. He helps moderate the DC Tech Slack, a 10,000-person community of tech workers in the DC area and he helps to run DC Code and Coffee, an informal hacking and community-building event every other weekend. Even though his cat, Toulouse, is glaring at him for talking too loud, he is excited to be here with us today. Hi, Andrew! ANDREW: Hey, y'all! So nice to be here. I'm honored to be a guest. CASEY: Let's start with our standard question to kick stuff off here. Andrew, what's your superpower and how did you acquire it? ANDREW: Thanks for asking. Yeah, this is whenever I answer the question of what my superpower is, it feels like bragging so I did what I normally do when I'm uncomfortable asking a question and I ask other people that question. I asked a few friends and they highlighted both, my ability to empathize with people and also, my sternness in that empathy. I think sometimes when you get caught up in empathizing with people, you can allow their emotions and their feelings to overwhelm you, or become a part of you in a way that you're not necessarily hoping for. So I like to draw a firm boundary there and then allow other people to see that boundary, I suppose. [laughs] I don't know, it's hard for me to say that that's a superpower, but I'm just going to lean into what other people told me. ARTY: That's a pretty good superpower. I like it. How did you acquire it? ANDREW: I credit my mom a lot actually. My mother is a dual major in psychology and English and as growing up, she had the worst way of punishing me, which is anytime I'd do something wrong, she would say, “Can you describe to me what you did and tell me how it made the other person feel?” which is the absolute worst thing to do to a child to make them explain how they've hurt you. [laughs] So I credit that a lot for developing those skills. CASEY: That's so funny. You think it's the worst thing you can do? Could you imagine yourself doing it ever if you're around children like that? ANDREW: Oh, totally. [laughs] Absolutely, yes. I now do it to my friend's children. I have no children myself, but I do to my friend's children and it's appropriately uncomfortable. CASEY: I like that. Yeah. It can be the worst and it can be helpful and productive. I believe it. ANDREW: Yes. As one of my coworkers like to say, “Two things can be true.” JACOB: That boundary, I've been thinking about something along the lines of that recently, particularly in work settings where you can get really burnt out in everything is high stakes emotionally at work. I think that's a really good boundary to have. ANDREW: Absolutely and it's also super hard to know. [chuckles] Both know where that boundary is and what to do when you are coming up to it. I think some people and myself occasionally notice you've crossed that boundary in retrospect, but not necessarily in the moment and it's hard to start off just know your tells when you're getting close to that line and when to pull the e-brake and take a walk, or go out and find some way to disengage, or reengage in yourself as a human and your human needs. CASEY: I'd love to hear an example of a time when you pulled the e-brake recently, Andrew. It's so vivid you must have a lot of stuff under that sentence. ANDREW: So my current organization, 18F, is one that's a matrixed so we've got our chapters is what we call them which is our disciplines. Those are engineering and design, product acquisitions, they're groups of people that do the same kind of work, and then our other angle of the matrix is our projects. Those are business verticals like the kinds of people that we're helping and the organizations that we're assisting around public benefits, or around national security, or around natural resources. So the result of a matrix organization is that you have two aspects to who's managing you—you have the manager of your work and you have the manager of your discipline—and the positive thing about that is that you can use both angles of the organization to support you in different ways. Sometimes in your work, you need someone to speak up for you as a person, or as your skills development angle and sometimes you need someone to speak up for you in terms of the project work that you're doing, advocating for success in the specifics of your project, regardless of the way you're contributing to that project. The result, as you zoom out into upper layers of management, is that you have a conflict designed into the system and that conflict, when things are working well, benefits the health of the organization, both the health of people and the health of projects are advocated for and supported. But when things get out of balance, which happens all the time, in every organization I've ever been in you've got pendulum swing back and forth between different balances and when things out of balance, then suddenly you find yourself overextended, or advocating to an empty room. A recent example was a conversation around advocating for the benefits of – I'm on the chapter side of the house so I support people within engineering and I had to pull an e-brake in a conversation where I was advocating for the health of people, but that I didn't have the right ears in the room to make a positive change. I found myself getting ahead of myself. One of the tells that I have is that I often feel tension in my jaw, which is usually a sign that I'm stressing too much about something. So I decided to take off a few hours and went to a gym [chuckles] and did a work out just to get the energy out of my system. ARTY: It seems like those conflicts can become pretty emotional depending on the circumstances where you've got folks that are overworked and stressed out, and wanting an advocate to help support them in those challenging circumstances. You just think about product deadlines and things coming up and the company's trying to survive and it needs to survive so it can keep people employed. Those things are important too, but then we've got these challenges with trying to live and be human and enjoy our lives and things become too stressful that we lose our ability to the function and we need advocates on various sides. So when you engage with someone, let's say, there's someone on the team that's burnt out and really stressed out, how would you approach empathizing with where they're coming from to help work toward some good the solution to these things? ANDREW: Great question. I think in these kinds of situations, I always come in with the acknowledgement that no one in this conversation owns the truth. We're both working together to understand what the best thing to do is and what the reality of the situation is. From my perspective, in trying to support someone seeing that they're burnt out, or overworked, that I think that's a misnomer. We can sometimes think of being burnt out overworked as an inherent state, or as something external. But I always try to encourage people to bring it internal because we all set boundaries and orders. The reality of an organization is that there will always be a resource constraint, whether that's people, or time, or money and it's up to the organization to effectively solve what they need to solve within the boundaries of those constraints. So when people are feeling overworked, or when they're feeling burnt out, oftentimes there's an imbalance there where the organization perhaps is trying to achieve too much, or perhaps there aren't enough resources supplied here. If you can both internalize it to yourself and say, “Okay, it's up to me to set responsible boundaries so that I'm not burnt out, so that I'm not overworked and how do I, as a manager, support you in finding that boundary and helping push back when people try to violate your boundaries?” Also, how do we, as an organization, understand where that line is and understand what kind of slack do we have? Because I think a lot of times in organizations, it's hard to see are we at 20% capacity, 200% capacity? It's hard to see because the more work you throw at people, unless you're getting pushback, it seems as if you still have more slack, more line you can pull. Part of this is acknowledging that there is a systems level problem here where there's a lack of visibility into how overworked someone is and also, helping someone recognize hey, here's my boundary. We're over at. Now let's figure out a, how do we move that boundary back to where it needs to be so that I'm a positive contributor to this team and I can live my life [chuckles] in a happy way and also, how do we raise this in a way that the organization can see so that we can ultimately be more successful?” If an organization is burning people out and making them feel overworked all the time, the work is not going to be successful. You care for people first and great people who are cared for then care for your projects and deliver great work. JACOB: Yeah, and it's like how can there'd be a health check for every person and what would that look like because I think if people are left to determine that for themselves, you can get really different conclusions from person. ANDREW: That is a great question I don't know the answer to. [laughs] I've been thinking about this a lot recently. My organization has a project health check where weekly, or bi-weekly, I can't remember, each project team talks about the different aspects of the work and whether, or not they're feeling well-supported, or if there are things external to the project that are getting in the way of project success. That gives you a data and interesting insights. We also track our time and there is a way that we track our time that's flagged as support to the team. So that's where managers and people who are assisting in making big project decisions, those people track their time to that separate line. That's also interesting to look at because typically people ask for help after they already need it and the people that are close to the project can see that they need help. So if you're looking at the time tracking, usually a week, or two before something shows up on this project health tracker, you see a spike in hours in the kinds of support that people are providing to the project. We have a lot of interesting data on the project health side of things, but it's really hard to collect data on the people part of this in a way that like makes people feel supported and it doesn't feel creepy. [chuckles] There's a whole aspect to this on whether, or not people feel comfortable reporting that they are feeling overworked and I haven't solved this problem. I'm curious if you all have ideas. [chuckles] I'd love to learn. ARTY: One of the things I'm thinking about with burnout in particular is I don't think it's directly correlated to the volume of work you're doing. There's other aspects and dimensions of things that go into burnout. So if I'm working on something that I'm really excited about, it can be difficult, it can be really challenging, it can be a huge amount of work, and yet as I work on it, as I get to the other side of that mountain I'm climbing, burnout isn't what I'm feeling like. It's a rush being able to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile as we don't necessarily burn out directly in correlation with working too many hours say, or something directly related to that. The things I find that happen when people get burned out is when they lose their heart connection with what they're doing. When you love what you do, when you're excited about what you're working on, when you're engaged and connected to a sense of purpose with what you're doing, then we usually stay in a pretty good, healthy state. We've got to maintain not still keeping in someone in balance, but we're doing pretty okay. Where I see developers usually burning out is there's some heart crushing aspect of things where people are disconnecting disengaging with what they're doing emotionally and they go into this mode of not caring anymore, not having those same compelling reasons to want to do those things and such that when that love connection dissipates, that work becomes too hard to maintain, to force yourself to do. So you start getting burnt out because you're forcing self yourself to do things that aren't an intrinsically motivated thing. I feel like the types of things that we need to do are activities that encourage this sense of heart connection with our team, with our project, with our customers. We do need visibility into those things, but maybe conversations, or even just knowing that those things are important, making time to scheduling time to invest in those sorts of things. I'm curious your thoughts on that. ANDREW: Yeah. Thank you for flagging that specifically. I think there's one thing that comes to mind for me is that is this work that you once loved that you no longer love? Like, is this something that you've connected with in the past and this really motivated you and now you're not motivated, I should say and if that's the case, what changed? I think brains are tricky and I think that we've all over the last pandemic, [chuckles] the current pandemic, I should say, the COVID pandemic is the one I'm referring to. I think that as people have coped with lots of trauma in their lives and significant shifts and changes, it's come out in interesting ways. I think, especially as people are learning themselves a little more with new constraints, the impacts are not always directly connected between say, the project work that you're doing, maybe something that you once loved, and now suddenly you no longer feel attached to that. What is that? Is that the work is somehow different? Is it that you really just your threshold for everything else in your life is just ticking higher and higher and higher so now it's really hard to engage in any of the things that you once loved? I personally have found myself, through the COVID pandemic, really finding meaning in repetition. So now I'm like a 560-day Duolingo streak and I've got podcasts I listen to every day of the week, and this repetition helps mark time in a way that makes me feel more like I have my life together. That gives me more capacity and reduces that stress threshold for me. So I think trying to narrow in on what specifically changed and how do we tackle that problem head on, and it might not be the work, or connection to the work. The other side of the question is, is this work your love? Maybe this is work that they've never really loved. Maybe this is grunt work—and one thing that I like to acknowledge is that every project has a grunt work associated with it and if you don't really have a framework for rotating that grunt work, a lot of times it falls to the person who has the least privilege on the team. So if as a positive team, you can work together and say, “Hey, these are the set of tasks that just needs to get done,” maybe that's notetaking in meetings, maybe that's sending out weekly status emails, or running a particular meeting. “Let's rotate that around so that we can find a balance between the grunt work and then the work that we're here to do this stuff that motivates us.” Because if the grunt work doesn't get done, the project won't be successful, but also, we all really want to work on the other thing, too. So let's make sure that no one here gets shafted with all that work [chuckles] and I think especially if teams haven't deliberately thought about that, patterns start to emerge in which people with less privilege get shafted. So I think that's something to be well acknowledge. JACOB: Quick shoutout. Episode 162 of this podcast, we talked with Denise Yu who really is framing exactly what you're talking about. She calls it glue work and it's that work that's maybe not directly recognized as a value add, but is the work that holds all of it together. So all of the work that might get done in JIRA, or around a Wiki, or organizing meetings, taking notes, all the above. The basic theory is like you said, how can that glue work be distributed equitably? Not to say that certain roles don't intrinsically need to do certain types of glue work because that's what their expertise is in. But it was a really good conversation. So if people are interested, go check that out, too. ANDREW: What are some ways that you're seeing that pandemic affect people in their work? ANDREW: I think the answer to that question is as varied as the number of people [laughs] that I support. I think each person is affected in dramatically different ways, which I didn't quite expect, but taking a step back and thinking about it, of course, each person's individual and each person reacts differently. But I would say that for some people, especially people in care-taking roles, that kind of work has to shift to support them. So if you're someone caretaking, you're often dealing with a lot of details in your out of work life and especially through the pandemic, now those lives are merging together. I'm currently at a remote organization and have been at a remote organization for the last 10 years, or so. The remote work thing is not necessarily new, but the complete merging of all of the things life and work is something that's still new and I think a lot of people who work remotely regularly often find ways to get out and get more exposure to people in their personal time, which is also something that has been limited. Especially if you're caretaking, you likely are doing that even less of your threshold for getting out is even lower. So if you're constantly dealing with details in your life, it might be good for you to take on more of that glue work, or more of the when you're thinking about the – I think I've worked in three categories. You've got the stretching work, or your growth work and that's work that is right on the cusp of your understanding. You're not really good at it yet, but by failing and by having moderate success, you grow as an individual. There's also your comfortable work, or your safety work and that's work that you're good at, you can knock it out of the park, do it really fast. I think for folks who are dealing with a lot in their personal life at the moment, leaning more towards the glue work, more towards the safety work is really important for making you feel successful and you're not really hungering that growth. I wished I remember the reference, but I heard someone referring to growth as being in a boat in a river before. Sometimes the river is wide and sometimes the river is narrow. When the river is wide, you really need to row. I found myself personally, in the last couple of years, not necessarily needing to grow as much and the river feels more narrow to me. So the current is faster and you're taken away with growth and you don't really need to do a lot to get there. Instead, you need to hold on [laughs] and try not to capsize. So that's one aspect, I would say I've seen people… CASEY: That's such a cool metaphor. I'm going to remember that. ANDREW: Yeah. I wish I remembered where I heard it from so that I can reference it for you all. It's definitely not an original idea of mine. But another aspect of the way people have individually in coping and needing support is around their social connection and that's an easy example. I think we've all felt differences in our social connection through COVID and sometimes that takes the form of having more structured meetings. Some people find more structure gives them the ability to communicate with each other in a way that makes you feel social and also isn't as draining and other people are the exact opposite where they want to get together in a room with less structure so that you can all just hang out and the structure gives people a sense of feeling stressed. The way that I've been looking across my organization is what kind of things are we providing and are they varied enough that we're capturing the majority of people in the support that they need? CASEY: I thought about a lot in the dance communities I am in that there is a lot of introverts that love to go dancing, partner dancing, because it's structured and they'll say so. Like, I love that I can just show up and do the thing and it's social, but I haven't thought about the other side of that, which you just said, which is some people don't want the structure. I'm sure those people exist and I just probably know a lot of them, but I haven't heard people say that about themselves as much. The introverts in the dance communities know and they say it. The other side, I'm going to look out for it. That's cool. ANDREW: I used to play music for religious music ministry and one of the rules we had is that if you're always picking things you like, you're leaving people out. I think of that not necessarily attached to music ministry, but attached to all the other work that I do and that's if your preferences are always represented, someone else's preferences are not. So trying to look around and say, “Who's not in the room right now, who could be benefiting from having their preferences heard once in a while?” CASEY: I want to jump back to how can we tell if people are about to be burnt out at work? How can we help people have a healthier environment? One of the lenses that I think about all the time is Project Aristotle by Google that came out, I don't know, maybe 5 years ago at this point and we're mentioning a lot of that aspects of it in our conversation already. Earlier, we were talking about on their list four and five are meaning of work like personal importance and impact of work, which is the company mission a little bit more. The other three that we touched on a little bit but not as much is psychological safety, which is number one on their list, dependability, like depending on each other, the coworkers, and structure and clarity, like goals, roles, and execution. I'm sure this is not a full list of what keeps individual employees happy. But I think a team environment that hits all of these five really well is going to have less burnout. More than individually, it's been studied. That's true. So when I did team health surveys before for the team, for the people, I like these five questions a lot. I bet it's a lot like the project surveys, Andrew, you were talking about. A lot of team health surveys are similar, but you got me thinking now what's missing from that list that's focused on the team that would show up in the individual one and I don't have a clear answer for that. ANDREW: And adding onto that, is there a way where you can collect honest data? I think one of the benefits of having one-on-one relationships with your immediate manager is that they can read between the lines and what you're saying after they get to know you well enough. I think for me, that usually happens about a year in with a new employee where you get to know someone well enough that you can understand. If they come to you and say, “Hey, I'm struggling with this right now in this project.” Is that a huge red flag, or is that normal? I think it takes a while to get to know someone and then you can read between the lines of what they're saying and say, “Okay, this is a big deal. It deserves my attention. I'm going to focus on this.” One of the things I struggle with capturing this information is that a, it's hard to capture that sort of interpretation part in these kinds of surveys and b, the data that you get is – when we were talking about burnout a lot, sometimes when people are burned out, they don't have the energy to submit these surveys. [chuckles] So the data is not particularly representative, but that's a hard thing to keep track of because how do you know? So it's a really tricky problem. I'm going to continue to try things [chuckles] to get this data, but I do like the idea of looking between the lines on if we're surveying team health, is there a way we can focus in on individuals? ARTY: There's also a lot of things that we don't talk about. Like Casey brought up psychological safety, for example and if you don't feel safe, you're not likely to necessarily bring up the reasons that you don't feel safe because you don't feel safe. [chuckles] I'm thinking about just some team dynamics of some teams I've worked on in the past where we had someone on the team that had a strong personality, and we would do code reviews and things, and some folks that were maybe more junior on the team felt sensitive and maybe attacked by certain things. But the response was to shut down and fall in line with things and not rock the boat and you ask him what's going on and everything's fine. So there's dynamics of not having psychological safety, but you might not necessarily get at those by talking to folks. Yet, if you're sitting in the room and you know the people and see the interactions taking place, you see how they respond to one another in context. Because I'm thinking about where those dynamics were visible and at the time, the case I'm thinking of was before the days where we were doing pull requests and stuff, where we did our code reviews in a room throwing code up on the screen and would talk through things that way. You'd see these dynamics occur when someone would make a comment and how another human would just respond to that person and you see people turn in words on themselves. These sorts of just dynamics of interaction where people's confidence gets shut down, or someone else is super smart and so they won't challenge them because well, they're a super smart person so obviously, they know. Some people speak in a certain way that exudes confidence, even if they're not necessarily confident about their idea, they just present in a certain way and other people react to that. So you see these sorts of dynamics in teams that come up all the time that are the silent undercurrents of how we all manage to get along with one another and keep things flowing okay. How do we create an environment and encourage an environment where people feel safer to talk about these things? ANDREW: To me, psychological safety and inclusion are very closely tied and I believe that inclusion is everyone's responsibility on a team and in the situation you described there, who else was in that room and why didn't they stop it? I think that it's easy to say, “Oh, these two people are having a disagreement here,” but if we all truly believe that it's our responsibility to create a safe environment and include everyone and their ideas. As you mentioned, everyone in that room could see what was happening. [chuckles] So I think there's a cultural thing there that perhaps needs some work as an organization and I'm not saying that that is something that I don't experience in my teams as well. I think this is work that's constant and continual. Every time you notice something, it's to bring it up and invite someone back into the conversation. Some people like to think about calling out, or versus calling in and I really like that distinction. When someone oversteps a boundary, or makes a mistake, they've removed themselves from this safe community, and it's up to you as a safe community to invite them back in and let them know their expectations and I like the idea of that aspect of calling people in. Obviously, that requires some confidence and I encourage people, especially people that have institutional privilege, to especially looking out for this because you can really demonstrate to your team how much you're willing to support them if you keep an eye out for these kinds of dynamics. One thing you mentioned really made me think about earned dogmatism. When people are around for a longer time, they become more closed-minded. That's the earned dogmatism effect and it's the idea that since you've been here for so long, or since you've been working in this industry so long, you're the expert and it causes you to become more and more closed-minded to new ideas, which obviously is not good. [laughs] So anytime I see that pattern popping up, I try to just let people know like, “Hey, do you know about this effect? Do you know that this happens with people in teams and is that how you would like to be? Would you like to become more close-minded, or would you like to continue learning?” I think just the awareness of the fact that that's something that you're going to inherently start doing helps people fight against that. JACOB: I'm trying to imagine just a typical, if you can call it that, team in a tech company and they're probably in a state where a lot of these things we're talking about might not come so easy because I think what we're saying is that a lot of this is dependent on everyone on the team being vulnerable about where they're at. I wonder if you have any ideas about how a team can get from there to the ideal state because it sounds like that's a really big barrier. I can't have better psychological safety and inclusion without somehow getting people's feedback and I can get feedback if they don't feel safe. So is there some iterative way to improve on that? ANDREW: Yeah. So one thing that I have direct experience with is in the federal government, there's a lot of funding models between the federal government and local governments where the federal government will pay for a majority of something as long as the local government follows a set of rules on implementing a program. So like Medicare and Medicaid are examples of this and other benefits programs as well. Even the federal highway system; the reason why our interstates are all the same is because the federal government pays for a majority of them if the local authorities building roads follows a set of rules and guidelines. I think that's one of the most dramatic examples of a power difference. If you're forming a joint team to make changes to Medicare, or build a new highway, or improve rail service in your city and one person in the room controls 90% of the money. I think that's a pretty dramatic example of what could be a really psychologically unsafe environment and it requires a lot of effort to break down that boundary of, “Hey, I'm here to say yes to what you want.” But then the reality is the federal government representatives in those situations are often looking to collaborate and help solve problems because they're looking out to see how do I best spend this money to achieve the best effect. But the tendency is that other members of the team coming from the 10% side of the house, they're responsible for the execution of the program and so, they tend to hide mistakes, or hide hiccups as much as possible so that they don't get their funding cut. That's just a very natural thing that happens and the experience that I have in this situation is what I like to think of as the Waffle House solution. I heard of a particular person in this situation taking the whole team to Waffle House. This obviously works better in-person. It's hard to take people to Waffle House remotely; that's definitely not something that you can't do. The idea behind that conversation is just the problem here is that you're not connecting with each other on a human level and you want to be safe to share your vulnerability with each other, but before you can be vulnerable with each other, you have to recognize each other's humanity and let everyone know that you respect each other. I think an easy way to do that is to share a meal, maybe it's to play a game together, maybe it's to schedule a meeting for 30 minutes in which you talk about note work. In the example that I gave it's up to the person in the position of power here to set that example, because if you're someone without that privilege, if you are someone who pays for 10% of a project instead of 90%, it's hard for you to go to your 90% funder and say, “Can I waste 30 minutes of your time? Can I waste half a day?” Because waste in this case is the idea from the business side of the house. You're wasting time. But in reality, if you slow down and connect with each other on a human level—slow is smooth and smooth is fast—so you can help the team develop that sense of humanity with each other, create an environment where hopefully you can be more vulnerable with each other and collaborate more humanly with each other. So I wouldn't necessarily say that this is a textbook plan like okay, you've got problems on your team, let's go to Waffle House and the problem solves. [chuckles] I'm not saying that but I am saying perhaps look for opportunities for you to recognize each other's humanity, and break down perhaps a structure that might be standing in the way of connecting with each other, and then just focusing on that can hopefully help you find that vulnerability better. JACOB: You can't take yourself seriously at a Waffle House. It's just not possible. ANDREW: [laughs] I'm pretty serious about Waffle House. I don't know about you. [laughs] CASEY: I'm starting to get a craving here. Yeah, totally agree. I love that this is being talked about more and more, how do we build psychological safety on teams? It comes from trust, human connection, vulnerability, and how do we build that? By treating each other as humans. ARTY: The things I think about just contrasting some teams I've seen over time and how they ended up developing and the culture that emerged is the technical leadership on the team that organically evolves. Some people have strong personalities. They tend to naturally act in a leader-oriented way. Even if they don't officially have the title hat on their head, they're somebody that people respect and look up to. They value their opinion and thoughts and whoever those people are that have the natural gravity tend to have a lot of influence over the emergent culture. So when I've seen people in that position, be really supportive of listening to the ideas of other folks on the team, creating space and treating people with respect, creating an environment where people are heard and listened to and it's about the ideas that the behavior of those people have an outsized impact on the culture that emerges by just how they interact and treat you respect others and other folks on the team tend to mimic and model that behavior of wherever that natural kind of gravity is going toward. If you've got folks on the team that are like that, that have a tendency to lift up other people around them, then what emerges is a much more psychologically safe environment. When you've got somebody in that gravity position that has an ego defensive response, they want to continue to feel like the confident expert ones, when people say counter things that are positioned as a challenge and you get a very different set of dynamics that emerge where people tend to be more walk on eggshells, try to say things very carefully to not upset things. I feel like it's just human instinct response depending on who's in the room, who you're talking to, how you anticipate they will react to something, that emergent interactions come from that and that whoever those gravity people are tend to have this outsize influence. So who you have in your organization of those folks? I'd say probably being really careful to hire people that have a tendency to and a desire to want to lift other people up and to maybe not have such a fragile competitive ego dynamic going on. ANDREW: Absolutely. Well, I have lots of feelings on hiring, [chuckles] but I do think that in the tech industry, we don't spend as much time focusing on communication and then I think that we should. I think a lot of times people who are in that ego situation are expressing vulnerability, but poorly and I think if they had more communication skills, they could potentially express that differently in a way that was more positive to culture. So zooming back to one of the things you said around leadership, evolution, evolutionary culture, and who steps into leadership roles, I think one of the things that is really important to me about good leadership is staying ahead of what your big problems are and that isn't necessarily saying working ahead of everyone else. That's saying keeping your eye on the horizon. Like, are you looking out to where we're going and what kind of problems are we seeing here? If there's an acknowledgement of an issue with psychological safety on teams, letting leaders emerge naturally may not be the right approach. You can deliberately select someone who demonstrates the culture that you want to create on a team has that technical leader and give them – I like the ACE model, the appreciation, the coaching, and the evaluation of leadership, where you give them that appreciation on the particular things that they're doing really well and in front of the team so that the team can say, “Oh, that's what the norm is here. That's what we should be doing.” That also gives the person, who may have perhaps more of a natural leadership role, if that would have naturally emerged, but perhaps it's missing some of those communication skills, or other skills that makes them a more around teammate, gives them an opportunity to be out of the spotlight so that they can work on developing those skills and becoming a more active contributor to the team instead of holding it back in some ways. CASEY: I love that we keep saying the word “skill: because these are all learnable skills. You can learn how to communicate well. You can learn how to be a strong, effective leader. You can learn how to foster a psychologically safe and inclusive environment. You can learn all these things. I love to work at places where they want this, the culture that the leaders, the people who run the company, want it even if they don't know how yet because that growth is possible as long as there's the desire for that. I think we all have a base level of desire, but some people are aware of it and articulate it and say – I saw a tweet the other day. Someone was looking for a job and of their five criteria, top five they listed in the tweet, psychological safety was on the list. That person knows they want to work on a team like that. That's pretty cool. So someone wants their team to learn these skills. A natural way is managers coaching their employees to do that kind of thing like coaching how to coach. That can work pretty well. It's pretty powerful. Another one is communities of practice, where you have people come together and talk. It could even literally be about culture. Some companies have a culture, community of practice, where they talk about how to influence the culture. Some places don't have the skills yet and they hire external coaches. There's a whole bunch of companies including me. For myself, I'm a consultant for making happy teams. I do coaching and training, too. There's online courses, there's books, there's podcasts like Greater Than Code. It's pretty good. You should check it out. [chuckles] But acknowledging the problem, being aware of it is a huge key first step and I don't like to push for a psychological safety in a place that doesn't value it. That's just a recipe for burnout for me. It's happened to me a lot, but in an environment where it is already desired, getting people from wanting to, to being able to. That's super satisfying work. I think that's true for anyone in tech who is talking about this kind of stuff, who cares about it. You want to make a difference where you can. ANDREW: Absolutely knowing when to jump ship at an organization because you are fighting upstream at a time when you are either being taken away in the current, or there aren't enough other people around you to swim upstream with you, it is super important. One of the things that helped me open a door in my life that I'd be happy to share with you all is an assessment I took a couple of years back called the TKI assessment, Thomas Kincaid Institute assessment, or something. I could've gotten that all wrong, but it's a tool that helps you understand what skills you already have around conflict resolution and what skills you can grow around conflict resolution. That unlocked a lot in my life specifically because it allowed me to understand how I naturally resolve conflict, to understand when I should push against my natural instincts to resolve conflict, and when I should feel that I have exhausted my abilities to resolve this conflict. That last step is a great indicator if you've tried everything you can to resolve the conflict, and maybe that conflict is around creating a psychologically safe workspace, you yourself cannot do this. So can you bring in other people that can help resolve this, or is it time to walk away and find a team that supports you better? The five different modes that they reference in TKI are competing, collaborative, collaborating, I should say, compromising, avoiding, and accommodating. When I first took the assessment, I scored a 0 in competing which means I had no recognizable skill in competing. When I look back into my history, my childhood, how I was raised, that totally makes sense. I was raised in a household where when people wronged you, you let it go. You moved on to find people who would support you and believed that that person would eventually experience justice and that was not your responsibility to do that. Applying to my work-life today, that means people can walk over me. [laughs] So how do you pick up those skills? The assessment doesn't necessarily dive too much into how you pick up the skills, but I think just knowing where your blind spots are was really helpful for me, because then I could recognize a situation where a, I flagged that I'm experiencing conflict. B, my natural tendency is to accommodate this conflict, or avoid it. C, is that the right approach for this environment? Is that a right approach for this problem? And then d, either do that approach, or change it. It's really uncomfortable. Often, when I'm competing, it makes me feel selfish and I acknowledge that. So when I'm like, “Okay, I'm going to change my approach and I'm going to compete here. I'm going to argue.” It's like, “Okay, I'm readying myself,” like, “Okay, I'm going to feel selfish now, be ready to feel selfish, go for it.” [laughs] And that's just sort of how I counteract those natural tendencies. So I wouldn't say there's one particular magic bullet, or this is the assessment that you should do, or anything like that, but there are a number of tools out there to sort of help you understand yourself and what skills you have and what skills you might want to grow into. They can also provide a sense of completeness around a particular skill area, like conflict avoidance, or conflict resolution, and let you know when you've exhausted the available options in front of you. ARTY: That's interesting to me just thinking about where we started this discussion with boundaries and just people can react in a different way, and if you have someone who's kind of overstepping boundaries, how do you learn to stand up for yourself? If your instinct is to just run away from conflict, whenever it comes up, then we've got other sorts of problems and stuff that emerges. Sometimes, the right thing to do is to stand up for yourself and to be able to have the confidence to feel like you can. One of the things that that helps me with that is when someone else is upset and reacting and stuff is maybe they're attacking me, or something is to separate myself personally for that. So if I imagine them in their head and I'm a cardboard cutout character that I'm like, “Okay, they're kicking the cardboard character and that's not me.” They have a picture in their head of this little cardboard character that they've got an upset relationship with that that's separate from me. I can look at the dynamics that are of what's going on with them and why they're upset with this cardboard character, understand what's going on in their world with separating myself from that, and then I can respond in a way that is standing up for myself without necessarily reacting to the situation where I feel like I need to defend myself against an attack that something going on that really has nothing to do with me, but still, I need to be able to stand up for myself and not necessarily back away from the situation. So I find those kinds of skills really help with being able to not take other people's stuff so personally. You talked about the challenge with boundaries and over empathizing can put us in a situation where the things that other people say can end up hurting us a lot, or we internalize somebody else's feeling so much, or someone else's worldview so much that we can lose ourselves in someone else's emotions and feels. How do we separate enough so that we can have a solidity in our own self and our own sense of knowing such that we can have our own compass that doesn't fall over, that we can feel bolstered in ourselves, independent of what everyone else is doing? That's where that empathy and boundaries and resilience and stuff come in. So a question for you, you did mention this boundary thing early on, what are some of the things that have helped you to develop boundaries, or some of the tools that you use to help in those challenging situations? ANDREW: I love the cardboard cutout analogy. I personally like to replay situations as if they're soap operas. I'll describe the characters, especially when things get heated emotionally, it's easy for me to recognize it as a soap opera, which helps me chuckle about the emotional component of it in a way that externalizes it from my feelings. It's a really tough situation. That's a tough ask. I think one thing that I do in the exact moments when I am feeling hurt, or valued, or some kind of emotional component is attached to something someone just told me is to again, pull that e-brake and say, “Okay, stop. I am not my work.” Similar to when you submit a pull request, you are not your code. I am not my work. I am not this conversation. I'm a whole self, I am valued as myself. I'm surprised by something that just happened and I'm reacting to it in a particular emotion, emotional reaction. So if you can create a pattern, when people get you into that emotional state, whether, or not they were intending on getting you there, of saying, “Hold on, I'm caught off guard by that. Can you tell me more?” Like, “I don't understand that comment.” It shifts the power dynamic from someone putting you on the spot, which they may, or may not have intended to do, to shift it back towards them to say, “Now the responsibility is on you as the person who has made me feel upset, or I'm caught off guard by that and the responsibility now is on you to describe more so that I can contextualize the emotion that I'm feeling, or just give me time to react to that.” You don't always have to immediately respond and oftentimes, I find myself reacting too quickly. All of the tools that I have in my toolbox are slowing down. That's one of the tools that I definitely use to help acknowledge that something is unusual. Another tool is I'm asking people to summarize so acknowledging that, “Hey, I'm surprised by that and I'm starting to get lost in the details of this meeting. Would it be all right if I asked you to summarize the main points here, or could you follow-up in Slack after this, or follow-up an email after this?” That's another one of those, like my natural tendency to avoid. It's like okay, I can take a step back here and avoid this immediate conflict, or this immediate emotion, and then take a breather. Often, in the before times, as I would go out and speak at conferences and I'm not a natural extrovert. I have this tendency after I speak at a place to go find a closet, or some dark room somewhere [chuckles] just to recharge a little bit, do nothing. I often will just sit there and sweat in a closet for 30 minutes, or something like that. That process allows me to reset my blood chemistry and say, “Okay, how do I fully acknowledge this situation?” Like, do I feel like I did a good job? Am I proud of the work that I'm doing? Am I proud of this? Is this where my boundaries should be? It allows me to give that moment to step away, to reset a little bit. So it's something I think that I will spend the rest of my life learning, which is how to recognize my boundaries and set them appropriately, and I think that's right. I should be continuing to learn as I continue to change. ARTY: I really liked the summary thing. Just thinking about someone's really upset, it's a pretty safe question to ask and at the same time, it forces them to take a step back and really think about what it is that they're trying to say. Because usually when we're upset, we just spew lots of words of upsetness, but it forces you to shift into more of a thinking mode away from emotional mode, which I feel like would have a really good impact on level setting the conversation. Just take a deep breath. What is it you're trying to communicate here? What are the main points? I really liked that summarization idea. ANDREW: The one thing I always myself in those moments is, “Nothing is more important than my next breath,” and that helps me to unplug from the situation and focus on breathing and focus on relaxing and then be able to show back up and reengage. JACOB: Something that I think can be important is if I'm at work and I'm realizing that I need to be vulnerable in one way, or another because I need to draw a boundary, or for some other reasons, something that I feel like would be really important that I would really need to have is an example that would give me some idea of what will happen when I do that. How can team members get examples of what happens when I'm vulnerable, because if they don't know what will happen, they're probably going to be left to their own personal experiences from maybe at another job, or something like that, that probably don't apply, that probably would be completely different. So it's like, how can managers, or leaders help people see, or experience examples of this is how we talk about difficult conversations to normalize it and just help people understand, like, this is what will happen and this is the way we go about it and yes, it will be safe. ANDREW: I don't think you can say that. [laughs] JACOB: I know. ANDREW: And that maybe is controversial, but I don't think you can say, “Yes, this will be safe.” I think you can strive for it and you can work for an environment that's safe, but in a professional setting, there's always a line and maybe it's not safe to share something that you think is appropriate to share and there are lots of reasons for that. Maybe it's the impact on other people. But the pattern I like to encourage and people just ask for permission, which is something that is maybe not always universally applicable advice, but oftentimes, I find myself talking to people when they're on teams where they want to say something controversial, or they want to say something difficult, or they want to share something that's personal and how they attach to this project, or this work, or something that happened in the team. I think there's a lot of power in asking people to support you to coming in and saying, “I really want to share something with you all and I'm not sure how it's going to go. Can you support me in this? What are you interested in hearing?” The way I often say it, when I'm trying to say something controversially is, “Can I be spicy for a moment?” [laughs] And that's an acknowledgement of saying like, “Hey, I'm going to say something comfortable.” It gives people a moment to set their expectations and it gives them a moment to recognize how they should respond before they hear what you say and then are caught up in the emotion of the response. I think that's a really kind thing you can do to your team to say like, “Hey, can I be vulnerable for a second here?” Like, “This is a project which involves researching prison populations and three of my family members are in prison.” If you lead off with saying, “Three of my family members are in prison,” people don't know how to understand that comment. But if you start by saying, “Can I be vulnerable for a second?” People will recognize that hey, you're showing something deep about you and your personality and it's something tied to your sense of identity, or something deep within you in a way that is not the responsibility of the team to validate, or say it's right, or wrong. But it is the responsibility to the team to hear you and to understand you and ask questions to say, “Hey, tell me more about that. Tell me more about how that connects to this work,” or “Do you want to interview some of your family for research on this project?” [chuckles] Or “Do you want them to stay out of this project?” Or “How do we support you as a team member? Is this something that you want to acknowledge, but you'd prefer to put that in a box and keep it on the shelf, or is that a part of your identity that you'd like to bring to this conversation and bring to this work?” I think those conversations like can really benefit from that asking for permission step and you don't really need to wait for people's answers there, [chuckles] but it gives you an opportunity to set the tone for the conversation. JACOB: I feel like if I was working on your team and I saw Andrew use that phrase, “Can I have permission to be vulnerable? Can I be spicy?” I feel like later when I felt like I needed to be vulnerable, I would feel a lot more comfortable because now here's a map that's if I do this, it's probably not completely out of bounds and that now I have a way to know here's how we go about that on this team, because there's a leader who modeled it. ARTY: Yeah, bingo. I was just thinking about all the different ways I've screwed things up and stuff and learned, I guess, the hard way, what boundaries are the hard way of what unsafe things are is by making mistakes and screwing things up. I think about some of these experiences that I had and I feel like the saving grace for me, even when I messed something up, is that I genuinely cared and that people knew that and could see that and so, that when I apologize for something, it was authentic and that we could move forward and stuff because I cared. Underneath it all, I genuinely care. So even though I made some mistakes and stuck with things that was okay. And then after that, when I was thinking about being in more of a leadership position, one of the things I made a point of doing was putting mistakes and stuff I've made on center stage. Making it okay and safe for people to talk about when they screwed something up. Being in a leadership position, when I talked about all the things that “Well, I screwed up this thing, I screwed up this thing;” it makes it okay when our leaders demonstrate vulnerability, or create ways and pathways that show us how to do those things safely, too. ANDREW: That reminds me of a friend of mine had a conversation with me last weekend specifically around a mistake that they had made and that mistake was in an online community. They were discussing building a world in a video game and they suggested building something that was offensive. They immediately dove into how they didn't know it was offensive at the time and that the reaction that other people gave to them was inappropriate and that they felt like they didn't know how to apologize in a way that would help support growth, or reengagement with the community, and that they felt like, “Maybe I'm just being canceled,” or maybe people are overreacting here. After the whole conversation, I just let them talk out and they ended with like, “How do I reengage here when people are now ignoring me?” and I just said, “Well, you don't deserve a second chance.” Not that anyone deserves to be canceled immediately, or cut out, but when someone says something offensive that you take offense in, it's up to that person how much tolerance they have for you. If someone has decided that this in this situation was so offensive, or that their tolerance for that offense is low, you don't get a second chance there. That's a mistake that becomes part of you and hopefully, you can allow that burden to not rest on your shoulders and hold you down, but you can internalize it and learn from it, and it becomes part of the foundation you stand on so that you don't make these kinds of mistakes next time. And also, [chuckles] demonstrating an aspect of my superpower, I disagree with you. I don't think you didn't know that that was offensive. [chuckles] I think you had that part of your brain turned off and hey, can we like talk about that? I think that this particular thing, you knew it was offensive, but you were thinking about this in a different context, or you thought this would be okay, and now you're rewriting this and placing yourself as a victim. That is a dangerous pattern so don't do that. [chuckles] I think that in a work setting, tying this back, when you are having these difficult, or vulnerable conversations, being able to acknowledge when you've made a mistake, maybe perhaps when you've shared something that is offensive, or perhaps you've made a comment about someone else's moment that's offensive, it's really important to acknowledge the mistake to provide the opportunity for others to give your feedback and acknowledge that you've damaged trust here. It's your responsibility as the person who damaged that trust to then rebuild it and maybe rebuilding that trust means leaving the organization, or changing teams, or maybe that means really, truly deeply listening and empathizing with people moving into that position of hurt that you've caused and being uncomfortable with it, especially when you're personally wrong. When I'm personally wrong, I really feel that I want people to understand how much I'm hurt and if there isn't a great opportunity to share that pain with someone it's hard to accept their apology, because you don't feel like they understand. In those situations, it's up to the person who's done the controversial thing, or overstepped that boundary to step in and say, “Let's talk about this when you're ready.” ARTY: And also, the other thing I'm just thinking is that when things do happen, we need opportunities and stuff to start over, too. Sometimes the right thing to do is walk away from the whole thing, but learn from it and there's always, there's so many people out there, there's so many opportunities out there, and we're surfing on the waves of life. We learn things along the way and there's always new relationships and things we can build and if we take those lessons and stuff with us for when we do screw things up that maybe we can navigate the next opportunity a little bit different. I've had enough facepalm moments and stuff of just relationships where the things that come to mind for me are things where someone was put off from me because I'm kind of the passionate, excited person and not everyone knows how to deal with that, or might think I'm a weirdo, or something. So I'll scare someone away and I don't mean to. I'm like, “But I'm a nice person” kind of thing, but sometimes there's nothing you can do about it. It's like this first impression thing that you can never really fix, but there's other opportunities out there, there's other relationships, and maybe the purpose of this interaction in your life is just for you to internalize and learn this lesson so that you carry it with you forward. We're all surfing on the waves of life and these kinds of things happen and it's not the end. It's just an opportunity. It's an opportunity to learn a lesson that then we can take with us into the future. ANDREW: Absolutely. Yeah, I know. I've been fired from jobs, had friends cut me out of their lives and made a lot of mistakes. That becomes part of who I am and I carry that forward and I'm happy that I've made these mistakes in my past because they prepared me for making bigger mistakes in the future. What could be more fun? CASEY: A lot of people get stuck on these experiences, thinking about them over and over and over in a loop and one way to get out of the loop is to correct the situation, which people like to try first, of course. Like, try to get back into that relationship, or community. Another way is to realize there's nothing you can do and move on, that's often called acceptance in meditation mindfulness terms. But it can be hard to get to acceptance if you feel like there's something you can do still, or something you could learn, you didn't learn everything you could yet and how to do that is hard. It's a lot of the chapters in the book I wrote, Debugging Your Brains. I'm not going to go into that right now, but there are things you can do to get out of the loop when you're stuck in the loop. I feel so awkward ever plugging my own stuff, but it's so relevant. That's what we're talking about here. [laughter] Y'all don't mind, I know. JACOB: No, I'm glad to hear about it. CASEY: Now let's go to reflections. So at this is the part of the episode where we each reflect on something that stuck out to us. Something we'll take with us. Something that was interesting from today's episode. ARTY: One of the things that stood out to me as we were talking about psychological safety, and these dynamics of leadership and who we choose as leaders as being important is this intersection between once we identify what the kinds of things are that we want to select for, that we can identify those people and then give them acknowledgement, the baton of an official hat

On today's episode you will hear part 4 of 4 of Russell's interview with Andrew Warner about the Clickfunnels start up story. Hit me up on IG! @russellbrunson Text Me! 208-231-3797 Join my newsletter at marketingsecrets.com ClubHouseWithRussell.com ---Transcript--- Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome to the 4th and final installment here of the interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club, where he's going deep into the Clickfunnels startup story. I hope you've enjoyed it so far. You know, throughout this entire interview, it was really fun. He brought my wife onstage and some of my partners onstage, and brought other people who didn't like me at first onstage and kind of shared all these things. I hope all you guys are enjoying it and really enjoying this interview. I hope that this starts making you think about your startup story. Some of you guys are living your startup story right now, and maybe you're depressed or nervous, or scared, or afraid or whatever. And hopefully this gives you motivation to know that I was there too. In fact, I'm still there many times, but it's okay and it's part of the game and part of the process. And someday you'll look back and you'll have someone like Andrew interviewing you about your startup story and you'll be so grateful for the trials and things you're going through now. So with that said, we're going to queue up the theme song, when we come back we'll listen to part 4 of 4 of the Clickfunnels startup story interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club. Andrew: And I know a lot of you have asked me what's coming up next and Russell's going to talk about that, how you're going to get to Sales Force level, but why don't I take a couple of questions from someone. Is there anyone who's been sitting here going, “I can't believe Andrew didn't ask that.”? Is there anyone who has something standing out for them? Should we just have them onstage. Unknown person: We got mic's. Andrew: We got mic's from over there, okay. Audience member: Alright, a little bit deeper of a question. What is something, I know you're strong in your faith, family, God, I mean kind of all around, what's something that's really made you who you are? You've mentioned before that made you as a marketer with your dad, you're up late watching an infomercial. But what's something that inherently that could have been experienced, maybe a quote in the back of your mind that's just driven you, it could have been something that your parents taught you when you were young. What is, is there, it's kind of a little bit difficult of a question to look back, there's probably a million things. But what are one or two that really stick out, that make you the person that you are? Russell: I have a million thoughts just racing through my head. The one that just popped in the front, so I'll share that one, hopefully it's good. I remember when I was a kid my dad gave me a job to go clean the car. I went out there and I cleaned the car, I did my best job, I thought. And I came back in and I was like, “Hey dad, it's clean. Can I go play?” I was like, “Come look at it.” So he could let me go out and play. And he was like, “Well, is it good? Are you proud of it?” and I'm like, “I don't know.” And he's like, “Well, are you proud of it.” I was like, “I don't know.” And he's like, “Go work on it until you're proud of it, then come back and let me know.” And I was like, oh man. So I go back out, and I was like, “Am I proud of this?” and I was thinking about it, I guess technically I'm really not that proud of it. So I was like trying to do more things, trying to clean it better, and to the point where I was actually proud of it. And then I came back and I'm like, “Dad, okay the car's clean now.” And he's like, “Are you proud of it.” I'm like, “I am.” And he's like, “Okay, you can go out and play then.” I think for me that was such a big thing because it was just like, that internal “Am I proud of this thing that I'm giving, that I'm putting out there?” and if not, keep doing it until you are. And I don't know, that was one of those little weird dad moments that he probably didn't mean as a teaching opportunity, but definitely has been big for me ever since then. Andrew: Good question. Is there one on this side? While you're finding a person who has a question, Whitney, did you have more to say? You were going to ask more, right? Yeah, can you get the mic over to Whitney, please? She's right over here. I know I didn't ask your full question. Whitney: Hi Russell, how are you? Russell: Awesome, how are you doing? Whitney: Good. So with your business, what is, back to like when you were first starting, I kind of want to know, what's the one thing when your business was really hard, when you were really struggling, what's the one thing that kept you going? Just in the back of your mind. And then I have a second part of that. What would you say was your biggest failure and what was the greatest lesson you learned from it? Russell: That's not an easy question. Andrew: The biggest failure. Russell: Oh man. So the first question was, what was the first one again? Thinking about the biggest failure, I'm trying to…Oh, what kept it going? Andrew: Give me a sec. Are you going through that now? You are, what are you going through right now? Can you stand up and get close to the mic? I can see that this is a meaningful question for a reason. What's going on? Be open. Whitney: I'm just trying with my business, I'm trying to get my message out there. I'm really, I'm just baby parts of Clickfunnels, so I'm just figuring out how to do a funnel still. But my company is called Creating Powerful Women, so I am just trying to teach women how to grow a business while they grow their family at the same time. And I'm doing that right now, because I have 3 little tiny girls. So I'm just like, okay, I'm still trying to figure out this myself and then teach women how to do it at the same time. So it's just, I'm still in that struggle phase. Andrew: Is it partially because you feel like an imposter, how can I tell them what to do? That's what I was saying to you earlier. Whitney: When I don't even know. Yeah. {Crosstalk} Whitney: I feel like I need to have that success level before I can teach women to go out and do it. But the reason when I found you in the hall, and I said, “I want Russell to be vulnerable and tell like the nitty gritty parts of the story.” And those stories are what make people relatable to you, that's kind of where I'm at, as I realize that I grow a bigger following and a bigger audience when I'm more relatable to them, which I realize I don't need to be up at that level to do that. Andrew: I get that. Russell: So my question for you is, have you been working with women? Helping them so far? Tell me a story of someone you've helped. I'm curious. Whitney: So I went through post partum depression a couple of years ago, after I had a baby and a lot of the women I've been reaching out to when I shared those stories, those women have been coming to me saying, “Hey, how do you get through this struggle? I know you've gotten past that, so I want to hear the hard stories that you went through.” So a lot of the people who I've been coaching one on one have been people who have gone through those exact same things  that I have. Russell: Okay when you do that, and you share the stuff with them, and that clicks for them, how does that feel? Whitney: Like I'm fulfilling what I was put on this planet to do. Russell: That's the thing. That's the thing that keeps me going. It doesn't happen often, but it happens often enough that I crave that. I'm super introverted, so it's always awkward for people to come to me, but I still love when they come to me and they're like, “Hey, just so you know real quick…..” Like last night, we were in San Francisco, or San Diego, excuse me. Someone came up to me in the hall and I was kind of like, I'm nervous to talk to you but you're going to talk to me. And he said, “Hey, just real quick, you legitimately changed my life, you changed my family.” And started tearing up. And I was just like, I let myself feel that just for a second and then I go back to the awkwardness, but for a second I feel that. And It's just like ahh. That's what it's about you know. I use Voxer for my coaching clients. So every time they Vox me and say something like that, there's a little star button and I star it and it stores them in this huge thing of all the starred ones. So now days I'll go back and I'll listen to that and I'll listen to people like 2 years ago that said something about how something I did effected them, and it's just like, that feeling. Because everything we do in this life is for feeling's right. Everything is just a feeling we're looking for. We eat because we want a feeling. We did this because we, I wanted a feeling. We're doing everything for a feeling. So it's like if I can remember the feelings of the thing I'm trying to get, and I can experience it again, then it, that's what gets me and keeps me going.  And I think that any of us that are lucky enough to have those feelings, a lot of times we forget about them. No, remember that because that's the thing, when it's hard and it's painful and it's dark, it's that feeling that's just like, that's the, you remember that and you let yourself experience it again for a minute. And then for me, that's like, okay, I can get back up and I can go again. Andrew: Great question, I'm glad you asked it. How about one more over there? You know what, yeah, let's give her a big round of applause, please. Audience member: I was actually going to ask a little bit about that vulnerability. I was surprised, I'm big in the SAAS space, I've been to Dream Force, follow a lot of Clickfunnels. It's pretty rare to see a CEO want to put themselves kind of on the roasting side of things. You're from here, from Sandy. I was just kind of surprised, what was it that really compelled you to kind of want to come back and do this in Utah? When I saw your email I thought it was a clickbait scam. Russell: Oh it is, we're selling you something next. Audience member: I really thought I was going to come and it was going to be a video of your face spinning and it was going to be like, “Hi, we're here.” Because I follow Clickfunnels, but it's just really rare, especially being down in Utah county, that was kind of unique that way. Andrew: Wait, one sec. Does Clickfunnels allow me to actually place someone's city in the headline, like I want someone from San Francisco, you could. Oh, alright, I get it. Audience Member: It said like Idaho, we're in the surrounding areas, it's going out to 8000 people, limited seating. So as a marketer I was just like, is this a real thing? You know. So I showed up and I was excited to see you. But why come back to Utah, what does this event mean to you and why want to be vulnerable and kind of open up? I learned a lot about you personally that was great to hear from a business side. Russell: So my beliefs are, and I believe we have the best software company in the world, so I'm going to start with that. But if it's just about the software, then it comes down to who's got what feature. People are moving and shifting and changing because of the features. That's the thing. So Clickfunnels was like, no it has to be more and it has to be a thing. And it's interesting, people who sign up for Clickfunnels, who click on an ad, they come and sign up. That's why John can't do, it doesn't work that way. They sign up for a web, clickfunnels is a website builder for crying out loud. You boil it down, we are a website builder. That is boring. So people don't come for that. They stay for that. That's why they stay, that's why they stay. But they come because of a feeling, and they come because of a connection. I want to be able to take the videos from here because if I can more people who come through my funnels to hear this story, they're going to stick with Clickfunnels because they realize we have a soul. There's a reason behind this, it's not just the software company who's trying to make a bunch of money. We're actually, we have belief behind it. So that's why we do all these things. That's why I still write books. That's why we do videos. That's why we do vlogs. That's why we do this fun stuff, because it builds connection with people, and connection really keeps people staying, even if some other company's got a different feature than we do, or it's cheaper and we're more expensive, or whatever. So that's the big reason why we still do it. And then I thought it would be fun to come down here because I grew up not far from here and it's just kind of a fun thing. We've been working with the Harmon Brothers and we started another project with them and their family owns the Dry Bar Comedy Club, if you guys have ever watched Vid Angel, that's one of their families companies. When Vid Angel had their little hiccups, they shifted all the programming to this, the Dry Bar Comedy Club, so we used to watch all the comedians here. And I was like, this is like the coolest location to do something like this. And one of the other side jokes, I don't know if I shared this with you or if it was just in my head, but Andrew is famous for doing these big scotch nights, and as a Mormon I can't drink scotch. And I was like, what if we did this, but at a Dry Bar, just this funny play off of that? And it all worked out. Andrew: You know, usually at events I do scotch night afterwards and say, ‘Everyone come back to my room.' That's not going to go over very well. But Dave's been to mine. He drinks water and feels comfortable. We have good water for Dave. How about one more, then I want to get into the future. Audience Member: So you always talk about how, like for Clickfunnels you guys took like 6 tries to finally make it work, right. And how most of the time when you guys start something it doesn't work the first time, that's why you have audibles and all those things. So I was wondering as someone that, you know I'm starting and getting that, kind of like that lifts, what is the biggest thing that you see, versus like a flop funnel versus something that kind of takes off and explodes? What's the audible or the change that you normally do that shift or the message change or whatever it is, that makes it finally take off? Russell: Traditionally the difference between a funnel that works and doesn't work, I'd say it's probably 50% offer. Like if the offer's wrong it's not gonna, that's usually the first thing. But then if it's actually a good offer, that people actually want, second then is usually copy. So like what's the hook, those kind of things. And then design is probably 3rd. All that stuff that Theron and those guys didn't like at first. The things that, because it's not like we just made up this stuff, you saw 8000 funnels we tested and tried in the journey of 15 years of this, that now we know what things people convert on. So it's just like looking at stuff that you know is working and modeling it because you this structure works, this kind of thing. But usually when something is broken it's coming back and figuring out, this offer's not right. People didn't want it. And that was the problem with Clickfunnels. The offer, we took 4 or 5 times to get the offer right, and then as soon as the offer is right, you can tell when it's right because people will buy, even if everything else is bad, if your offer is amazing people will give you money for it, you know. So that's definitely the biggest part, and from there it's copy, then design, then all the little things that stress some people out, like me. Andrew: So I've got, we'll come back. I see there are a few people that have more questions; we'll come back to them in a moment, including you. I promise I'll do more. But you did tell me about all the different things you guys are working on now. Of all of them, what one is going to get you the closest to Sales Force level? Russell: That's a good question, there's so many things. So I would say, I'm going to ask you a question is that alright? Have you ever played bigger yet? Played bigger? Playing bigger?  Andrew: No, what do you mean by that? Russell: That's the name of the book right? Play Bigger? Andrew: Oh Playing Bigger, the book. No. Russell: Yes. So that's book's been interesting, if you guys haven't read it, it's one of the biggest ones as a team that we've been reading. But it's all about designing the category and becoming the king of that category. So I feel like we are the king of sales funnels, and that's our category, the thing that's going to be there. And then if you read through the book, the next phases are like, building out the ecosystem that supports you as the category. And the fascinating thing about sales force, if you look at it when, I probably shouldn't say this on video because someday Mark Benioff's going to watch this and be like, “I'll never give you money.” But sales force isn't great software, right. It's this hub that things are tied into, but the reason why they did 13 billion this year, they're trying to get to 20 billion is because they built this ecosystem. The ecosystem is what supports this thing and grows it up, and builds it. And that's like the next phase. So I think for us, it's like we have this, we have funnels which are the key. It's like the CRM for them, it's the central point. But it's then bringing all the ecosystem, it's building up all the things around it, right. Andrew: Letting other people create things on your platform, becoming a platform. Russell: Yes, becoming a true platform. Andrew: can you create a platform when what you want is the all in one solution when you're saying, “you don't have to plug in your chat bot to our software. We're going to be chat bot software.” “You don't have to plug in infusion soft, we've got email marketing in here or mail chimp.” Russell: It depends, because you look at Sales Force is similar too. They have their own things that they either acquire and bring them in, or they build their own, things like that. And I think it's a hybrid of that. I think it's, we allow people to integrate because some people have tools. We will, our goal is to always be the best sales funnel builder on planet earth. We may not be the best email auto responder in the world, we have one and that increases our revenue. And people who love us will use our email auto responder, but there may be some other one that's better. But it's not our big focal point. There may be a chat bot that's got more features and more things, that's not gonna be our focus to make it the best, but we've got one built in to make it. So theer will be, that's kind of our thought, that we will have the things included, so if people want to go all in they can use it. But if they love yours because of these things, they can still bring that and still bring it in. You know, and then as we grow, who knows what the next phase is. Is it acquisitions, finding the best partners? People that most of our members are using, start acquiring companies and bringing them in, internally similar to what Sales Force does, growing the platform. Andrew: Just keep letting people build on your platform and then does that make the platform more valuable, or do you guys get a share of the money that people spend on these external tools? Russell: Both, I think. Stripe for example, Stripe, I think we process 1.7 billion dollars through Stripe. We make over a million bucks a year from Stripe referral fees, for just letting them connect with us. So there's value on both sides because it makes the platform more valuable because people can use it easier, but we also make money that direction as well, and those type of things. Andrew: Okay, what is Actionlytics, Action… Russell: Actionetics. Andrew: Excuse me. Russell: So that was Todd's name. He loved that name. So Actionetics is, it's what we call internally, follow-up funnels. So we have sales funnels, which are page one, page two, page three, page four. Then a follow-up funnel is send this email, send this text message. “Here's the retargeting pixels, here's the thing.” So it's the follow-up funnels. It's all of the communication that's happened after somebody leaves the page with your audience. Andrew: And that's a new product that you guys are creating? Russell: Yeah, it's been, actually we make more revenue from Actionetics than we do from Clickfunnels right now. We've never marketed it outside though. Andrew: I can't get access to it, it asked me for my username and password. I said, I don't have that, so how do I sign up for it? Russell: it's only been in beta. So we opened up at Funnel Hacking Live, people signed up there. And then we kept it down for a year, then we opened it, so two Funnel Hacking Lives we opened it, and then my birthday we opened it. So that's it. But we have, it's over, 12-13 thousand members who have upgraded to that. And then we're probably a couple weeks away from the actual public launch where people will be to get, everyone will be able to get access. Andrew: And already people are spending more money on that than Clickfunnels? Russell: Yeah, because it starts at $300 a month versus $100. So it's the ascension up. So they go from $100 a month to $300 a month and then the new one, it scales with you. Because we're sending emails and Facebook message, it gives us an ability to grow with the platform as well, and not just have a $200 a month limit. Someone might pay $1000 or $5000 depending on how big their lists are. Andrew: You're really good at these upsells, you're really good at these extra features. How do you think about what to add? How do the rest of us think about it, based on what's worked for you? Russell: Okay, that's a great question, and everyone thinks it's a product, the question most people ask is, what price point should my upsells be? It has nothing to do with that. It has 100% to with the logical progression of events for your customer. So when someone comes to you and they buy something, let's just say it's weight loss. So they come to you and they buy a weight loss book right, and let's say it's about how to get abs. So they buy that, the second they put their credit card in and click the button, in their mind that problem has now been solved. I now have six pack abs, the second it's done. And people don't think that. So what people do wrong is the next page is like, “Cool, you bought my abs book. Do you want my abs video series?” it's like, “No, I just solved that problem. I gave you money. It's been solved.” So what we have to think through, for logical upsells is like, “okay, I just got abs, what's the next logical thing I need?” So it's like, “Cool you got abs now, but how would you like biceps? We can work it out. This is my training program to grow here.” For funnels it's like, here's this funnels software, or here's this book teaching you how to build funnels, but after you have a funnel you need traffic. So traffic's the next logical progression. So as soon as someone's bought something, the customer's mind, I believe, that problems been solved. And it's like, what's the new problem that's been opened up, because that problem's been solved. That's the logical… Andrew: I got my email addresses because of Clickfunnels, the next problem I'm probably going to have is what do I send to people? And that's what you're solving. What about this, fill your funnel, it's a new software. Russell: Yeah. Andrew: What is it? Russell: How do you know these things? That is good, you have been digging. So I'm writing my third book right now, it's called Traffic Secrets, and then on the back of it we have software that's called Fill Your Funnel, that matches how we do traffic with the book. So when someone reads the book, you login and the way we do traffic, we focus very heavily on influencers. We call it the Dream 100. So you come in and you login and you're like, “Here's the people in my market. There's Tony Robbins, there's Andrew..” you list all these people and it starts pulling all our data, scraping all their ads, their funnels, everything  and shows you everything that's happening in their companies, so you can reverse engineer it for what you're doing. Andrew: So if I admire what John is doing for you guys, I could put you in the software, you'll show me what you guys are doing, and then I'll be able to scrape it and do it myself. You're nodding. And you're okay with that? John: It's awesome. I'm excited. Russell: Excited. Andrew: Have you been doing that? Is that part of what's worked for you guys at Clickfunnels? John: Yeah, we like to, we call it funnel hacking. We like to look and see what other people are doing. Andrew: So you're actively looking to see what other, man as an interviewer that would be so good for me to understand what people are doing to get traffic to their sites. Alright, so… Russell: We buy everyone's product, everyone's. I bought Drew's like 6 times. Yeah, you're welcome. Just because the process is fascinating to see. Andrew: And then the book. What's the name of the book? Russell: Traffic Secrets. Andrew: Why is everything a secret? What is that? Russell: I don't know. Andrew: No, I feel like you do. I remember I think it was… Russell: It all converts, 100% because it out converts. Andrew: Because the word, “secret” out converts? In everything? Russell: Everything. I used to onstage be like, “The top three myths, the top three strategies, the top three lies, the top three everything” and like “secrets” always out converted everything else, and then it just kind of stuck. Andrew: And then that's the name of this book. I'm looking here to see…yeah, Melanie, she told me when you organized this event you said, “Secret project”. That's it. Russell: If I just tell people what's happening then they like, “Oh cool.” I need to have to build up the anticipation. Andrew: Even within your team? Russell: Especially within the team. Yes. Andrew: Especially. So secret is one big thing. What else do you do? Russell: Secrets, hacks… Andrew: No, within the team. So now you get them interested by saying it's a secret. Russell: So I'll tell them a story, I'll tell them the beginning of a story. I'll be like, “Oh my gosh you guys, I was listening, I was cleaning the wrestling room and I was going through this thing, and I was listening to Andrew and he was doing this campfire chat and it was amazing. And he's telling this whole story, and I have this idea, it's going to be amazing. But I'll tell you guys about it tomorrow.” So what happens now, is they've got a whole night to like marinate on this and be like, “What in the world?” and get all excited. And then when they show up, they're anticipating me telling them, and then when I tell them, then I get the response I want. If I tell them they're like, “Oh cool.” I'm like, no, you missed it. I need that, in fact, I'll share ideas all the time, I'll pitch it out there just to see. I know it's a good idea because Brent will be like, “I got chills.” Dave will start freaking out, and that's when I know, “Okay, that was a good idea.” If they're like, “Oh that's cool.” I'm like, crap. Not doing that one. It's the same thing. Andrew: I've heard one of the reasons that you guys hang out together is one, he's an extrovert and you're an introvert, but the other one is Dave will one up you. Russell: It starts the process. This is the bubble soccer event we did. Initially it was like we're going to have influences, or we were launching the viral video and like we need, let's bring some people into it. And then we were asking how someone could bring big influencers, like “you have to do something crazy. Like get a Ferrari and let them drive over it in a monster truck.” I was like, “That seems extreme.” I was like, “What if we played football on the Boise State Stadium?” And Dave's like, “What if we did bubble soccer? What if we tried to set a Guinness book of world records…” and then next thing we know, we're all Guinness book of world record champion bubble soccer players. It was amazing. Andrew: And that's the thing that I've heard about your office environment. That it's this kind of atmosphere where, see for me, look at me, I've got that New York tension. When I talk to my people and I talk to everyone it's like, “You've gotta do something already.” And you guys like fun, there's a ball pit or whatever in the office. Am I right? You go “we need a, we're gonna create a new office. Let's have a bowling alley in it and a place to shoot.” That's the truth. Russell: It is the truth. It's going to be amazing. Andrew: Does he also tell you, “We need to do something this weekend. Date night, it's a secret.”? Russell: Maybe I need to do more than that, huh. Andrew: Yes, does he use persuasion techniques on you? Russell: It doesn't work on her. Andrew: No. Russell: She's the only person I can't persuade. It's amazing. My powers are useless against my wife. It's unfortunate. Andrew: Do you actually use them, or when it comes to the house you go, “come on, I'm tired already, just…”? Russell: I tried to do something today and she was like, “That was the worst sales pitch ever.” I'm like, “Dang it. Alright, I'll try again.” Andrew: Hey Siri, text my wife “I've got plans for tomorrow night. So good, Russell just told me about it. I'll tell you later. Secret.” Period, send. Russell: That's amazing. Andrew: Wowee. Does anybody know how I can get a babysitter here. {Audience speaking indistinctly} Andrew: They're a little too eager to spend time with my kids. Thank you. Alright, I said I would take a few more questions. I know we're almost out of time here. Who was it, it was someone on the right here that was especially, you looked, uh yeah you, who just pointed behind you. Audience Member: Hi, okay, Russell I've been in your world since about 2016.. Andrew: Hang on a second, who the, I'm sorry to curse, but who the f**k comes to a software event and goes, “I've been in your world.”? This is amazing about you. I'm in San Francisco, there's nobody that goes, “I'm so glad I've been in the hubspot world.” It doesn't work that way. I'm sorry, I had to interrupt. Okay. I've been in your world. He's selling you software, you're in his world. Sorry. Audience member: You have to listen to his podcast, it's a.. Andrew: I've listened to his podcast. It's just him talking. Audience Member: He talks about it, it's a universe. He creates a universe. Andrew: You know what, here's the thing that blew my mind. I thought it was him in a professional studio, I saw him in San Francisco, he's talking into the voice recorder on his phone. Okay, yeah. I gotta feeling that Russell's going to go, at some point, “Religion is just an info product. I think I could do a better job here.” Alright, yeah. Audience Member: okay, I entered the Clickfunnels universe in 2016 and since that time, I came in with a lot of hopes and a lot of, it was just a really exciting experience to have you break down the marketing, you really simplified it right. So I see that, I'm an ambassador for the one comma club challenge right now, and people are coming in with such high hopes and such tremendous faith and trust in you. And I have a friends that I brought into it and everything and they're coming in, just like, they're really staking a lot on how they've persuaded to join your universe. Sorry, universe is the wrong word. But from that, I guess the question is, there's a few things. I think a lot of people are afraid of that type of responsibility in the products that they're delivering, and of course there is a tremendous failure rate of people who don't get what they're persuaded in. So there's a lot of magnification on the two comma club, and the people there that are the successes, but the question that I have is, the responsibility that you feel for that, I feel that you feel the responsibility because you're constantly looking for new ways to simplify, bring in new coaches, bring in the new team, make products and offers that are completely irresistible. Truthfully, I went to Funnel Hacking Live, I'm not spending any money, 20 thousand dollars later. I mean it was truthfully so irresistible, but you've crafted such unique things in an effort to truly serve that client and really get them to the place that they're looking to go. So I'm not sure if the question is coming out, but there's a lot of responsibility that all these bright eyed, bushy tailed you know, wannabe marketers are coming in really truthfully feeling the genuine just truth that you're telling them, but then there's a big crash and burn rate too, which is normal in that space. I'm not sure what the question is. Andrew: Congratulations  to the people in the two comma club, what about the people in the no comma club. What do you feel is a sense of obligation to the people who aren't yet there? What do you feel about that? Russell: Is that the question? Andrew: Is that right? Audience member: I guess the question is, there's two parts, one is the responsibility that other people are feeling, the fear that they're feeling to put something out there because they're afraid of a failure rate. So just like, Whitney over there was talking about, she's got those fears. So there's normal fears that come along with that, so how you deal with that, in that it's not because of lack of delivery on your end, but there's still people who are spending tremendous amounts of money, or small amounts of money that just aren't getting what it is. So it's really about your internal feelings about that topic. Russell: It's a good question. There's a lot of different ways I could answer it. I'm trying to think, for me it's a big reason I do have a con stripe, because I do feel like I have a huge obligation to people who sign up for our stuff. So I'm always thinking, how do we simplify this, how do we simplify it? What's the best way to do it? What's the thing? But that's also what creates innovation right. It creates the ideas, it's that, how do we serve these people better? How do we serve them better? Probably the best analogy, in fact, Brandon over here was working on a video that he sent me last night, that I had a chance to watch, it was really cool. We had Sean Stephenson speak at the second Funnel Hacking Live. Was anyone there for that one? A couple of you guys. Sean Stephenson, if you know him, is the 3 foot giant. He's this little dude in a wheel chair, one of the coolest humans on earth. And he told this story, it was funny because man, I had another emotional connection watching it last night actually, watching it. And he talked about stories like, “How many of you guys here are upset because you got 17 followers on Facebook and you've got 13 likes on your YouTube video, and you're pissed because of all this stuff.” And I think of a lot things that way. “I'm trying this thing, I'm not a millionaire yet, I'm not making any money, blah, blah, blah.” And they're upset about that right. And what Sean said, he's like, “Do you know how they choose who they're going to save when a helicopter is flying into an ocean and there's a boat that's wrecked with all these people. Guess how they choose who they're going to save?” and he said, “What happens is the helicopter drivers, they fly over there and go down to the people, going to save them, and guess who they save, they save the people who are swimming towards you.” He says, “That's how you do it. If you try to save everyone, it will drown you, it'll drown the boat, and everybody dies. But you save the people who are swimming toward you.” And then he came back and said, “Those 17 likes on your video, those are the 17 people who are swimming towards you. You have to understand that.” So for me it's like, we talk about the money because that gets people inspired, but when it all comes down, the really internal belief, no one really cares about the money. They want the feeling of the connection and the help and they want to change the world. They have their thing, and so it's like, we talk about the money because it gets people excited, but I don't know anybody who that's the real reason why they're in business. They're in because they want, they want to help those people that are coming towards them. So you notice when you get deeper into the culture, it's not just money, money, money, money. It's how do you serve, how do you impact, how do you change the world, how can you get your message clearer, how can you do those things? And when you shift from the money to that, then the money starts magically coming. So for me, it's just like how do we get more people thinking that way more often. I don't know if that's the right answer or if that helps at all, but it is definitely something I feel a big obligation for but I also feel like I'm super grateful for the people who are willing, I'm grateful to Don Lepre, spent all that money doing the infomercial on that thing. And I didn't implement it back then, when I was 14, right. I'm grateful to the next guy who re-inspired me and I bought the thing and didn't do anything and then next person and all those things, because eventually it stuck. So for me, it's like I'm going to keep creating offers and keep doing cool things, and trying to inspire people because it might not be the first or the second or the fifth, but eventually if I keep being consistent on my side, it's going to keep getting it and eventually the right people, those who actually have something they want to share, something they actually care about what they're doing will figure out the way. And we're just going to keep trailblazing and trying to do our best to make a path that they can all follow. So that's kind of how I look at it. Andrew: Great question. Let's close it out with one more. Yes. Dave did you find someone, because I just found someone right here. Why don't we do two more then? Since you found one and I found one. What's your name? Sorry, Parker? Parker. Go next. There we go, let's go to Parker next and we'll close it out with him. Parker: Alright, so the biggest question I have for you Russell is, I've seen you guys' amazing group you guys have at Clickfunnels, and every time I go in your guys' office it's nothing but excitement, energy, and not only you don't have to inspire your workers to work for you. They come there excited and hearing your amazing stories that John and Brent had of, they stayed with you for all this time and you pushed them and they pushed you and there's this amazing cycle. I'm curious as far as, because I want to have an amazing group like that one too so I can affect the world the same way that you have, and even do better than you did. And that's a completely admiration thing, that's I don't know. Dave: Cut from the same cloth here. Russell: That's his dad. Dave's son. Andrew: Oh got it. That makes sense. Parker: The question I have for you is, how do you find those people? Is it nothing but like a whittling out process or do you see these characteristics already in the people that you have? Andrew: One sec, how old are you? Parker: I'm 20 years old. Andrew: 20 years old and you admire your dad and the guy that he works with so much that you want to not just be like him, but be more like him? Can you take of my kid tonight? Sorry, that's amazing. Does your dad come home with this energy like this energy like, “We're going to capture the world. This is what we're going to do.” Parker: it is the funniest thing. Oh my gosh. Every way you see him online, social media, whatever the heck it is, it's exactly the same way he is at home. When you see him on the tv talking about like, “Oh this is…” or when you interviewed him. Andrew: I've watched his podcast, I see that thing. {Crosstalk} Parker: you know as much as I do then. Andrew: What did he motivate you to, like to sell as a kid, or to upsell as a kid. Parker: So he would like talk to us like he was a sales person basically, in the aspect of he talks about things as far as, this person did a terrible job at selling. They could have done this, this, this and this.” And we're like 10 years old, I think at the time, I think. I don't know. It's more of a recent change since he joined clickfunnels and he's got this amazing excitement and energy. It's an amazing thing and I wish to have to people like my dad when I become a, when I start to do my own thing. Andrew: It is contagious isn't it? Parker: yeah, it totally is. Andrew: And I've been watching, what's this new Vlog that you've got. It's on Russell, it's on Russell Brunson's YouTube channel right? I'm at the end of it going, “Hell yeah, why am I taking a shower now. I gotta go, I got stuff to do.” Right. These guys are out there taking over San Francisco, that's my city. So I guess you're feeling the same way at home. Now, he's there twice, he suddenly owns a place. So your question was…? Parker: My question was basically, how do you find these amazing people to work, not only for you, but with you and to help you accomplish your dream? Is it whittling out process or it you have innate ability to find people? Russell: So as you were saying that I started thinking, I'm thinking about the partners on our team, who none of them came through like a help wanted site. None of them came through like, Brent went to church with me and he showed up every single week, every single month, he was my home teacher and showed up every single month consistently and we became friends and we did stuff together. John married my cousin. We were on the boat in the middle of the lake and he pitched me on a network marketer opportunity and I was like, I love this guy. And then I pitched him back and we just, and it was amazing. And then Dave, we were at an event like this and we had a signup sheet if you wanted to take the speakers out to dinner and Dave ran back and signed up every single line under mine. So I went to every single meal with him for 3 days. I think it's just, I think a big part of it, I think most entrepreneurs can't build a team because they're waiting to build the team. And I think for me, I didn't know what I was doing so I just started running, and what happens when you're moving forward and motion is happening, people get attracted to that. And some people will come for bad reasons and they'll leave, and I've been taken advantage of multiple times, things like that will happen, but the right people will stick around. But it's all about, it's the motion right. That's what people are attracted to. If something's happening. I don't know what's happening, but I want to be on that train and they start coming. So I think it's taking the initiative of “Okay, I'm going to start running and I have no idea if anyone's going to follow me ever. But If I do this and I keep doing it consistently then people will.” And you know, it's been a consistency thing. I'm 15 years into this business now, 8000 funnels deep. But it's a consistency, and when you do that and you're consistent, then the right people will just start coming into your life. But not waiting for them initially. If I would have waited to build my team initially, we wouldn't have a team. Everyone we met was like in the, as we were having motion, the right people started showing up. Andrew: Alright. Thanks. Speaking of, thank you. How many people here are actually at Clickfunnels, if you work at Clickfunnels. Can you guys stand up if you work at Clickfunnels. There you go. I feel like at the end of this everyone's going to want to go and meet Russell. Everyone's going to want to go and mob him. And he's not that social, number one. Number two, I feel like you're going to pass up these fan-freaking-tastic conversations, I've gotten to know the people who work here a lot really well in preparation for this, I really urge you to see the guys, the people who are wearing these t-shirts. Get to know them. Push them into a corner, understand what's working for them. And really, you're fantastic people, thanks so much for helping me do this. And thank you for having me on here. I really appreciate you being open, being willing to let me take this anywhere. You said, “I understand what Andrew is trying to do. He's trying to figure this out. I'm going to let him run with it and let him make the magic happen.” And I think we made a lot of magic happen. Thanks so much for having me here. Russell: Yeah man, it was amazing. Andrew: Thank you all for coming, I'm looking forward to meeting every one of you. Thanks.

Enjoy part three of this classic episode series where Andrew Warner from Mixergy interviews Russell on the ClickFunnels startup story! Hit me up on IG! @russellbrunson Text Me! 208-231-3797 Join my newsletter at marketingsecrets.com ClubHouseWithRussell.com ---Transcript--- Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome back to the Marketing Secrets podcast. I hope you enjoyed episodes 1 and 2 of the interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club where he was telling the Clickfunnels startup story. I hope you are enjoying this interview series so far, and I hope also this motivates you guys to go over to the mixergy podcast and subscribe to everything that Andrew does. Like I said, he is my favorite interviewer and I think that what he does is second to none. So I hope that you guys enjoy him as well, and go subscribe to the mixergy podcast. But with that said, I'm going to queue up the theme song, and when we come back we will start into part 3 of the Clickfunnels startup story interview. Andrew: I actually got, I did see, I don't know, I didn't see the video you mentioned, but I did see what it looked like. Here's one of the first versions. He compared it to Clickfunnels, he said, I mean to Lead Pages. He said, “Look at how Lead Pages has their stuff all the way on the left, all the controls.” Oh you can't see it. Oh, let me try it again, let me see if I can bring up the screen because this is just, it's just too good. Hang on a second. I'm just constantly amazed how you're able to draw people to you. So this is the article from Lead Pages, this is the first landing page from Clickfunnels, this is what he created before, this is what you guys did together. This is your editor and h e said, “Look, if you're on Lead Pages, their controls, their editor is all the way on the left and it's just moving the main content to the right, which is not looking right. And I prefer something that looks like this, with a hundred pixels on the left, a hundred pixels…” I go, who knows a hundred pixels, it's like you, what is this? Russell: Dylan is obsessed with that type of stuff, it's amazing. Andrew: Obsessed. And you draw people like that. You draw people like Dave, who is just phenomenal. Dave, the traffic and conversion event that he was just talking about, is that the one that you went to? Dave: The one after that. Andrew: The one after that. Okay, we'll come back to that in a second then. So this became your next version, you brought on a new partner, and then you did a webinar with this guy. Who is this guy? Russell: It's Mike Filsaime, one of my first friends online. It actually wasn't a webinar, it was a live event. He was doing a live event in San Diego and he was like, “You have to come and sell Clickfunnels.” And I was like, “Nobody's buying Clickfunnels.” We had a free trial and like, we couldn't give it away. It was crazy. And he's like, “Well, you're on this website, you're picture is there, you have to come and sell Clickfunnels, and I need you to sell it for at least $1000.” Because the way it works, if you speak at someone's event, you sell something, you split the money 50/50. So he's like, “It needs to be at least $1000.” And I was all bummed out. I didn't want to do it. And the event actually started, but they were streaming it live online, so I was actually sitting at our office in Boise, watching it as I'm putting together my slides to create Clickfunnels, and then flew out to the event. And then we had a booth, and I don't know if I told you this, we had a booth and Lead Pages had a booth right across the little hallway, skinny hallway. And Todd's wife was manning our booth and then Lead Pages was right there, and it was so funny because she was not shy at all about talking about Lead Pages. She's like, “Yeah, we're like Lead Pages except for way better. We can do this and this.” And the other guy is sitting there like, right in front of her as she's telling them everything. And it was..anyway, I digress. It was pretty funny. Andrew: By the way, she's still at it. I saw a video that you guys created, you were talking to her and she goes, “I will be Clickfunnels.” I go wait a minute, you still had that fire, okay. So you were at that event. Russell: So we're at the event and there's probably, I can't remember, 150-200 people maybe in the room. So I got the slides up and Dylan was there and he was like, when we got to the funnels he was going to demo the editor, so I did the whole thing, showed the presentation and we demo'd Clickfunnels and at the end of the thing I sold. And I've been good onstage, but by far, that was the first time in probably 8 years that I'd seen a table rush, where people are stepping over the things, jumping around, trying to get to the back to buy as fast as they could. Andrew: What did you say to get them to want to do that? Russell: We made a really, I mean we gave the presentation, and gave a really good offer at the end. They get a year of Clickfunnels for free, plus they get training, plus they were going to get all these other things for $1000. Andrew: It was $1000 training and a year of Clickfunnels for free, and then they become long term members. And it was also called, Funnel Hackers? Russell: Funnel Hacks, yeah. Andrew: Funnel Hacks. And that's the thing that became like… Russell: The culture. Andrew: This culture, this tribe. It wasn't just they were signing to learn from you, they were becoming funnel hackers. That's it. Russell: I mean, that wasn't planned though. It was like, I was trying to think about a sexy name for the presentation, so I'm like ah, Funnel Hacks. And somebody owned FunnelHacks.com, and I'm like, I'm still doing the presentation that way. And then later we made t-shirts that said, “Funnel Hackers” and then now we got 4 or 5 people have tattooed that to their bodies, it's really weird. But anyway, that's what happened. We did that and we sold it and I remember going to dinner that night with the guys who were there, and Todd and his wife and everything. And we were all excited because we made some money finally. But I was just like, “You guys don't understand, like I've spoken on a lot of stages, and I haven't seen a table rush like that.” And I remember back, there was a guy, he passed away a couple of years ago, his name was Fred Catona. And he was a radio guy. He was the guy who did the radio commercials for, do you guys remember, it's got the guy from Star Trek, what's his name? Audience member: Priceline. Russell: Priceline. He did the Priceline radio commercials and made that guy a billionaire. And he told me when we were doing the radio ads, “This is what's going to happen. We're going to test your ad and if it works, I'm going to call you on the phone and let you know you're rich. Because if it works, it means you're going to be rich.” So I remember going to dinner that night and I told the guys, “Just so you guys know, we're rich.” And they're like, “What do you mean? We made $150,000.” I'm like, “No, no, no. The way people responded to that, I've never seen that in my life. We're rich.” The response rate from that, I've never seen. Andrew: And then you went to webinar after webinar after webinar. Russell: On the flight home that day I'm texting everybody I've ever met. “I got a hot offer, this webinar crushed it. We just closed whatever percent of the room at Filsaime's event. Who wants to do it?” And we started filling up the calendar. Andrew: And the idea was, and you told me you did 2 to 3 some days. And the idea was, they would sell somebody on a course, and then their members would then hear how your software and your funnel hacking technique would help up what they just bought and then they would sign up. You're still excited, I can see it in your face. And then this thing took off. And then you started doing an event for your culture, your community, and this guy spoke, Tony Robbins. Russell: Oh yeah, there's Tony. Andrew: One of the first ones. Was he at the very first one? Russell: No, he came to the third one, was the first one we had him come to. Andrew: Yeah? Why do an event? Why do your own live event? Russell: So we've done events in the past. I know events are good, but I'd sworn off them because the last event we did, I think we sold 3 or 400 tickets and less than 100 people showed up and I was so embarrassed. I was like, “We'll never do events again.” And as soon as this, as soon as Clickfunnels launched and it was growing, everyone's like, “We want to do a meet up. We should do an event.” All the customers kept asking. And against my, I didn't really want to do it, but at the same time I was launching my book, and I had won a Ferrari in this affiliate contest so I was like, “What if we did an event and we had the Ferrari there and we gave it away and then we're…” we had other ideas for giving away other cars and it became this big, exciting thing that eventually turned into an event. And that was the first Funnel Hacking Live event in Vegas, and we had about 600 people at that one that showed up. And that's where it all kind of, it all started. Andrew: And it built how much, how many people are you up to now? Russell: Last year we had 3500 people and we're on track to have about 5000 at this year's event. Andrew: 5000? Yeah. Russell: Those aren't free tickets. Each ticket's $1000, so it's…. Andrew: So how much is that in total revenue? Russell: From the event? Andrew: Yeah. Russell: So ticket sales, last year was $3 ½ million, this year will be over $5. But at the event we sell coaching so last year we made $13 million in coaching sales at the event as well. Andrew: Wow, would you come up here for a second, Dave? Do you guys know Dave? Yeah, everyone knows Dave. You know what's amazing… {Audience catcalls} Andrew: That's amazing. Dave: I don't know who that is. Andrew: A catcall. I saw a video, you guys have this vlog now, a beautifully show vlog. You guys went to sales force's conference, you're looking at the booths and in the video, do you remember what you did as you saw the different booths? Dave: I think that one I went and asked what the prices for each of the booths were. Andrew: Yes, and then you multiplied. And he's like, you're not enjoying the event, you're calculating ahead, how much. “10,000 that's 100,000….” It's like wow, right. You do this all the time? Dave: Yeah. It's a lot of money in an event like that. Andrew: And you think, and if this was not your event, you would be doing the same calculation trying to figure out how much they brought in today. Wowee. Alright when you went to sales force did you calculate how much money they probably did from their event? Dave: We were doing that the whole time, absolutely. Andrew: You saw the building, you had to know… Dave: Oh my gosh. 61 stories. Andrew: Why? Why do you guys want to know that? Why does, how does that… I want to understand your drive as a company and I feel like this is a part of it. Figuring out how much money other people are making, using that for fuel somehow. Tell me. Dave: I think it actually goes back to Russell and his wrestling days. We had the experience of going to Chicago right after that, and super just exhausted. And it was one of those things where he literally landed, we walked down and we're underneath the tarmac and all the sudden Russell goes from just being totally exhausted to a massive state change. Where he's literally right back where he was with his dad and he and his dad are walking that same path to go to, I think it was Nationals. And I saw Dan Usher, who was doing the filming, capturing that moment and it's that type of a thing for Russell. Where all the sudden it's the dream, where as soon as you see it, it can then happen. And Russell's just been amazing at modeling, and again the whole idea as far as just going at a rapid, rapid speed. I mean it's “Ready, fire, aim.” Andrew: It's not you gawking at the sales force, what's the sales force event called? Dave: Dream Force. Andrew: Dream force. It's not you gawking at how well Sales Force's event, Dream Force is doing, it's not you having envy or just curiosity, it's you saying, it's possible. This is us. That's it. Dave: It's totally possible. Andrew: It's totally possible. We could get there. And when you're sizing up the building, you even found out how much the building cost. Who does that? Most people go, “Where's the bathroom?” How much does the building cost? Dave: There's a number. Andrew: It's you saying, “We could maybe have that.” Dave: We can have that, yeah. Andrew: Got it. And so let's go back a little bit. I asked you about Traffic and Conversion because the very first Traffic and Conversion conference you went to, you guys were nobodies. Nobody came and saw you. Dave: We were put out in North 40 pasture, way, way far away. Andrew: And some people would say, “One day I'll get there.” you told Russell, “Today we're going to get there.” Dave: Well Russell wanted, he was speaking and so whenever you're speaking at an event, it's important that you fill a room, like this. And there's nothing worse than having an event and having no one show up. It's just the worst feeling in the world. And so he's like, “All we need, I gotta find some way of getting people into the event. I wish we had like some girls who could just hand out t-shirts or do something.” And I was like, we're in San Diego, that's like my home town. Russell: Dave's like, “How many do you need?” That's all he said. Dave: It's just a number. It comes down to a number. How many do you want? So we ended up having, within an hour or so we had 5 girls there who were more than happy to dance around and give out t-shirts and fill the room. Andrew: and the room was full? Dave: Packed. Andrew: Packed. And why wouldn't you say, “One day, the next time we come to Traffic and Conversion, the tenth time we're going to do it.” Why did it have to be right there? Dave: It's always now.   Andrew: It's always now. Dave: It's always now. Andrew: It's always now. It's never going to be the next funnel, it's never going to be the next product launch. I'm going to do whatever we can right now, and the next one, and the next one. That's it. That's who you are. Dave: That's how it works. Andrew: And now you're a partner in the business. $83 million so far this year, you got a piece of that. Dave: Yes. Do i? Russell: Yeah. Dave: Just checking. Andrew: Do you get to take profits home now? Dave: We do. Andrew: You do, you personally do? Dave: Yes. Andrew: Are you a millionaire? Dave: Things are really good. Andrew: Millionaire good from Clickfunnels? Dave: yes. Andrew: Really? Dave: Yes. Andrew: Wow. And you're another one. I was driving and I said, “What was it about Russell that made you work for him? What was it?” and you said, “I've never seen anyone implement like him.” Give me an example of early days, something that he implemented…you know what, forget that, let's not go back to Russell. As a team, you guys have gotten really good at implementing. Give me an example of one thing that you're just stunned by, we did it, it came out of nowhere, we could have been distracted by funnel software, we could have distracted by the next book, we did this thing, what is it? Dave: You're here on this stage with JP, and this was what 6 weeks ago? Andrew: and this whole thing just came from an idea I heard. You use Voxer. Why do you use Voxer? Russell: I don't know. Andrew: Because you like to talk into it. Russell: Yeah, and you can fast forward, you can listen at 4x speed, you can forward the messages to people really easily, it's awesome. Andrew: and it's just train of thought, boom, here's what I think we're going to…No, it's not that. I heard it's, “I have a secret project…” Russell: “I'll tell you guys about it later.” And they all start freaking out. “Tell us now.” Andrew: “Secret project. I don't know what it, it's going to be exciting.” They don't know what it is, going to be excited. Russell: Do you know how it started, this one? I was cleaning my wrestling room listening to you, and you were, I don't know whose event it was, but you were at the campfire, it sounded like. And you were doing something like this and I was like, I want my own campfire chat to tell our story. And then I was like, “Dave, we should do it.” And now we're here. So thanks for coming to our campfire…. Dave: That's how it happens. Andrew: And that's exciting to this day. Alright, thank you. Give him a big round, thank you so much. You know what, I didn't mean for this to come onstage, but I'm glad that it is. This made you laugh when you accidentally saw it earlier too. Why is this making you laugh? What is it? Russell: So we're not shy about our competitors, even when they're our friends. So one of the companies we're crossing out is his. That's why it's funny. Andrew: It's one of my companies. That's Bot Academy there. It's also a company I invest in, that octopus is ManyChat, I've been a very big angel investor and supporter of theirs. I'm not at all insulted by that, I'm curious about it. You guys come across as such nice, happy-go-lucky guys. Dave asked me if I want water, I said “Dave I can't have you give me any more things. I feel uncomfortable, I'm a New Yorker. Punch me, please.” So he goes, “Okay, one more thing. I'm going to give you socks.” So he gave me socks. Really, but still, you have murder in your eyes sometimes. You're crossing out everybody. This is part of your culture, why? Russell: It comes back, for me its wrestling. When I was wrestling it was not, I don't know, there's different mentalities right. And I did a podcast on this one time and I think I offended some people, so I apologize in advance, but if you're in a band and everyone gets together and you play together and you harmonize, it's beautiful. When you're a wrestler you don't do that. You know, you walk in everyday and you're like, those are the two guys I have to beat to be varsity. And then after you do that, you walk in and you're like, “Okay who are the people I have to beat to be in the region champ, and then the state champ, and then the national champ?” So for me, my entire 15 years of my life, all my focus was like, who's the next person on the rung that I have to beat? And it's studying and learning about them and figuring their moves and figuring out what they're good at, what they're bad at so we can beat them. Then we beat them and go to the next thing, and next thing, and next thing. So it was never negative for me, it was competition. Half the guys were my friends and they were doing the same thing to me, we were doing the same thing to them. I come from a hyper competitive world where that's everything we do. And I feel bad now, because in business, a lot of people we compete against aren't competitive and I forget that sometimes, and some people don't appreciate it. But that's the drive. It's just like, who do we, if I don't have someone to, if there's not someone we're driving towards, there's not a point for me. Andrew: And even if they're, even if I was hurt, “I accept it, I'm sorry you're hurt, Andrew. I still care and love you. We're going to crush you.” That's still there. Russell: And I had someone, so obviously InfusionSoft was one of our people we were targeting for a long, long time and I had a call with Clayton and someone on his team asked me, “Why do you hate Infusion Soft so much?” I was like, “I don't, you don't understand. I don't hate, I love Infusion Soft. I'm grateful for it. I'm grateful for Lead Pages, I'm grateful for….” I told them, have you guys seen the Dark Knight, my favorite movie of all time? And it's the part where Batman and the Joker are there and Batman is like, asks the Joker, “Why are you trying to kill me?” And the Joker starts laughing and he's like, “I'm not trying to kill you. The reason I do this is because of you. If I didn't have you, there's no purpose behind it.” So for me it's like, if I don't have someone to compete against, why are we playing the game? So for me, that's why we're always looking… Andrew: It's not enough to say, it's not enough to just say “we're playing the game because we want to help the next entrepreneur, or the next person who's sick and needs to create…” no, it's not. Russell: That's a big part of it, but like, there's something… Andrew: Yeah, but it's not enough, it's gotta be both. Russell: My whole life there's, the competition is what drives me for sure. Andrew: And just like you're wrestling with someone, trying to beat them, but you don't hate them. You're not going to their house and break it down… Russell: Everyone we wrestled, we were friends afterwards. We were on the same Freestyle and Greco teams later in the season, but during, when we're competing, we're competing and everyone's going all at it. Andrew: Everyone's going all at it. That's an interesting way to end it. How much more time do we have? How much more time do we have? I'm going to keep going. Can I get you to come up here John, because I gotta get you to explain something to me? So I told you, I was online the other day, yeah give him a big round. I was online the other day, I don't even know what I clicked, I clicked something and then I saw that Russell's a great webinar person, everyone keeps telling me. Well, alright, I gotta find out how he does it. So I click over, “Alright, just give your email address and you can find out how..” Alright, I'll give my email address to find out how he became such a great webinar presenter. “Just give a credit card. It's only $4.95, so it comes in the mail.” It comes in the mail, that's pretty cool. Nothing comes in the mail anymore. Here's my credit card. It goes, “Alright, it's going to mail it out. Would you also like to learn how to use these slides? $400.” I go, no! I'm done. Russell: Welcome to the funnel. Andrew: Welcome to the funnel. I'm done. But I'm going to put in Evernote a link to this page so I don't lose it so I can come back. I swear. I did it. And this is my receipt for $4.95. Don't you ever feel like, we're beyond this? We're in the software space now, we're competing with Dropbox, we're not competing with Joe Schmoe and his ebook. And you're the guy who sold the, who bought the ad that got me. John: I know. Andrew: I asked you that. Do you ever feel a little embarrassed, “We're still in the info market space.”? John: No, I think it's the essence of what we do, of what Russell does. We love education. We love teaching people. I mean, the software is like the backend, but we're not software people. I mean, we sell software, but we teach people. All these people here and all the people at all of our events, they just want to learn how to do it better. Andrew: I don't believe it. John: Okay. Andrew: I believe in him. I don't believe in you. I believe that for you it's the numbers. Here's why I don't believe it. I'm looking in your eyes and you're like, “I'm giving the script. I'm good, I'm doing the script.” I see it in your eyes, but when I was talking to you earlier, no offense. This is why he does what he does. When I was talking to you earlier, you told me about the numbers, the conversion, how we get you in the sales funnel, how we actually can then modify…That's the exciting part. Don't be insulted by the fact that I said it. Know that we have marketers here, they're going to love you for being open about it. What's going on here? What's going on, keeping you in this space? John: Okay, from my perspective. Okay so, initially it was self liquidation on the front, which is what I was telling you. It was the fact that we were bootstrapped, we didn't have money to just like throw out there. We had to make sure we were earning enough money to cover our ads. And Russell had all the trust in the world in me, I don't know why he did, but he did. And he's just like, “Spend money, and try to make it self-liquidate.” I'm like, “Okay.” So we just had to spend money and hope that we got enough back to keep spending money. Andrew: And self-liquidate means buy an ad today and make sure that we make money from that ad right away and then software. John: Yeah. Andrew: And then you told, and then software's going to pay overtime, that's our legacy, that's our thing. And you told me software sucks for selling. Why? John: Software sucks, yeah. Andrew: Why? Everyone who's in info, everyone's who in education says, “I wish I was a software guy. Software is eating the world, they're getting all the risk back.” I walked through San Francisco; they think anyone who doesn't have software in their veins is a sucker. John: I asked the same thing to myself, you know. I was running ads, I'm like why can't I just run ads straight to the offer? Why do I have go to these info products? I want to get on the soft…. And then I was like, I feel like it's kind of like marriage. Like it's a big thing to say like, “You probably already built websites, but come over, drop everything you're doing and come over here and build websites over here on our thing.” And it's like, that's a hard pull. But “Hey, you want to build webinars? Here's a little thing for $5 to build webinars.” Now you're in our world, now we can talk to you, now you can trust us, now we can get you over there. Andrew: Got it. Okay, and if that's what it takes to get people in your world, you're going to accept it, you're not going to feel too good for that, you're just going to do it and grow it and grow it. John: Yeah. Andrew: What's your ad budget now? See now you're eyes are lighting up. Now I tapped into it. John: We spend about half a million a month. Andrew: half a million a month! John: Yeah. Don't tell the accountant. Andrew: Do you guys pay with a credit card? Do you have a lot of miles? John: Yeah, we do. In fact…. Andrew: You do! How many miles? John: In fact, the accountant came into my office the other day and said, “Next time you buy a ticket, use the miles.” Andrew: Are they with Delta, because I think you guys flew me out with Delta. John: Yeah, American Express is where we're spending all our money. Andrew: Wow. And you're a partner too? John: Yeah. Andrew: Wow, congratulations. John: Thank you. Andrew: I don't know you well enough to ask you if you're a millionaire, I'm just going to say congratulations. Give him a big round. John: Thank you. Andrew: Wow, you know what, I actually was going to ask the videographers to come up here. I wrote their names down, I got the whole thing and I realized I shouldn't interrupt them, because they're shooting video. But I asked them, why are you, they had this career where they were flying all over the world shooting videos for their YouTube channel. I'm sorry, I forgot their name, and I don't want to leave them out. Russell: Dan and Blake. Andrew: They were shooting YouTube videos, they were doing videos for other people. I said, “Why are you now giving it up and just working for Clickfunnels all the time? More importantly, why are you so excited about it?” And they said, “You know, it's the way that we work with Russell.” And I said, do you remember the first time that you invited them out to shoot something? What was it? Russell: It was the very first Funnel Hacking Live we ever had, and probably 2 weeks prior to that, one of our friends had an event and Dan had captured the footage, and he showed me the videos. “Did you check out my Ven Video?” I'm like, “Oh my gosh, that was amazing.” And I said “Who did it?” and he told me. So I emailed Dan and I was like, “Hey, can you come do that for Funnel Hacking Live?” And he's like, “What's Funnel Hacking Live?” So I kind of told him, and he's like, “Sure.” And it was like 2 weeks later and he's like, “What's the direction?” and I was like, “I don't know, just bring the magic man. Whatever you did there, do that here.” And that's kind of been his calling card since. He just comes and does stuff. Andrew: Bring the magic. He wants to have those words painted on the Toronto office you guys are starting. Literally, because he says you say that all the time. And the idea is, I want to understand how you hire. The idea is, “I'm going to find people who do good work, and I'm going to let them do it.” What happens if they wouldn't have done it your way? What happens if it would have gone a different direction? Russell: I see your question, and I'm not perfect. So I'm going to caveat that by, some of the guys on my team know that I'm kind of, especially on the design and funnel stuff, I'm more picky on that, because I'm so into that and I love it. But what I've found is when you hire amazing people like Todd for example, doing Clickfunnels. The times I tried to do Clickfunnels prior, build it was like, me and I'm telling developers, “here's what to do and how to do it.” And like there's always some loss in communication. With Todd, he's like, “I know exactly what I would build because I want this product too.” And then he just built it and he showed me stuff. And I'm like, “That's a good idea.” And he's like, “I did this too.” And I'm like, “That's a good idea.” And it's so much easier that way. So when you find the right people, it's not you giving them ideas, it's them coming to you with the ideas. And you're like, “that is a good idea. Go do it.” And it just makes, takes all the pressure off your back. So for us, and it's been fun because I look at, man, the last 15 years of all those different websites and the ups and the downs, the best people have always stuck. So we've got 15 years of getting the cream of the crop. It's kind of like, I'm a super hero nerd, but it's like the Avengers, at the end of, when Clickfunnels came about we had this Avenger team of people. And we're like, now we've put in our dues, now it's time to use all of our super powers to do this thing, and it all kind of came together. Andrew: Build it and build it up. And then as you were building it up, you then went to Sales Force. You guys invited me, you said, “Hey Andrew, we're in San Francisco, you're home town. Do you want to come out?” I said, “I'm going to be with the family.” And you said, “Good. Being with the family is better than hanging out with us.” But I still said, “What are you guys doing in San Francisco at Sales Force?” Because sales people don't need landing pages, yet you guys will probably find a way for them to need it. Then I saw this, this is the last video that I've got. There's no audio on it. I want you guys to look at their faces as they're looking up at these buildings, walking through the Sales Force office. Look, they're getting on the motorcycles in the lobby. They're looking all around like, “Oh gee.” Counting the buildings that are Sales Force labeled. Look at that! What are they doing? Not believing that this is even possible. And then just stopping and going, this is dream force. This is your dream. What did you get out of going to sales Force's event and seeing their office? Russell: Honestly, prior to Sales Force, I was kind of going through a weird funk in my business, because it was like, again there was the goals. So it was like, okay, we're going to do a million bucks, and then we did that. And then it's like, let's make 10 million a year. And then 50, and then this year we'll hit a hundred. And like, what's the next goal?  A billion, because a hundred million, 2 hundred million is not that big of a difference. And it was just kind of like, what's the point, what's the purpose? We've grown as big as any company that I know. And then last year, Dave and Ryan had gone out there and they were telling me stories like, “There's 170,000 businesses here.” And they were telling me all these things, and it sounded cool, but I didn't, and they were going crazy. You have to see this so you can believe it. But there's something about the energy about seeing something that makes it real. So this year I was like, I want to go and I want to see Benioff speak. I want to see the thing, the towers, I want to just understand it, because if I understand it, cool. Now we can reverse engineer and figure out how we can do it. So for me it was just like seeing it. I think in anything, any, as entrepreneurs too, if you're people believe that you can do it, you'll do it. If you believe you can lose weight, you'll lose 3eight. If you believe you can grow a company, and I don't feel like I believed that the next level was possible for us until I saw it. And then I was like, oh my gosh, this is not ridiculous. Benioff's not, none of these guys are any smarter than any of us. It's just like, they figured out the path. It was like, okay let's look at the path. And then let's look at it and now we can figure out our path. Andrew: And seeing it in person did that for you? Russell: Oh yeah. It makes it tangible, it makes it like, it's like your physiology feels it, versus reading a book about it or hearing about it. It's like you see it and you experience it, and it's like it's tangible. Andrew: I told you, I asked people before they came in here, “What are you looking for?” and a few of them frustrated me because they said, “I just wanted to see Russell. I just want to see the event.” I go, “Give me something I could ask a question about.” But I think they were looking for the same thing that you got out of there. And I know they got it. I'm going to ask them to come up here and ask some questions, and I want to know about the future of Clickfunnels, but first I've got to just acknowledge that, that we are here to just kind of pick up on that energy. That energy that got you to pick yourself back up when anyone else would have said, “I'm a failure of a husband, I can't do this.” Go back. The tension that came from failing and almost going to jail as you said, from failing and succeeding, and failing again. And still, that is inspiring to see. I want to give the whole Clickfunnels family a big round of applause, please everybody.

Bring us that horizon! We're sailing the Seven Seas with the worst pirate you've ever heard of... but you have heard of him in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. Join your favourite Disney podcasting crew – Ellie, Ethan, Georgia & Ian – along with Liam from Best Film Ever - as we head into Crossover infested waters. It's anything but a mutiny in this 45th episode as we discuss: How did a film based off of theme park ride have any business being this good? The parts of the Jack Sparrow character that Johnny Depp was successful in petitioning for and the nonsense that he was overruled on. The many alternate versions of this film that could've hit cinema screens if other casting choices had gone ahead What other cinematic swordfight the Sparrow/Turner clash reminds us of Why you can't read the sub-title on the film's poster Where Hans Zimmer got inspiration for the film's theme We talk about if we want to see another Pirates film with Depp? Without Depp? We rave about the introduction Verbinski gives us to Captain Jack We gush about the character development and the intelligence of the script We've got some more great content in our Pause for the Parks segment (thanks to our friend Andrew) So, catch up on some great Disney content and then join the conversation (@talkthemickey), Instagram (@talkingthemickey), or on our Facebook page (@talkingthemickey). If you comment, you may end up among our 'shoutouts of the week.'

Sasha and Andrew talk about finding balance. How working on your shadow is just as important as working on the rest of yourself. They explore tarot and other tools along with personal stories of encounters wit the shadow.    Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here.   Supporters get early access and at th e$5 level access ro a bonus recording for each episode - this one a 17 minute talk on how to work with your shadow.  If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. You can find Sasha here.  Andrew is here.    Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.    Transcription.  Andrew: Welcome to another episode of The Hermits Lamp podcast. I am here today with Sasha Graham. I met Sasha at Readers Studio a number of years ago where they were talking about shadow work. And recently, this summer, they came out with a deck called the Dark Wood Tarot, which digs right into that shadow stuff. And for people who've spent time around me, really owning both sides of that stuff is important I think to every spiritual journey. So I wanted to kind of have Sasha on here to talk shadow stuff and talk dealing with those things, especially at a time when COVID and racial issues and justice issues or the shadow issues of our cultures are really being brought to the foreground as well. It feels like an important conversation and an important thing to keep paying attention to. But maybe everybody doesn't know who you are, Sasha. So why don't you give us a quick introduction? Sasha: Yeah. Well, first off, thank you. Thank you so much for having me. So my name's Sasha Graham. I'm a tarot author and a deck creator and a teacher. I've written, I think, eight tarot books for Llewellyn and Lo Scarabeo. And I contribute to the Llewellyn's Magical Almanacs, which is Datebooks. And I've created two tarot decks, both of them kind of steeped in spooky darkness because I love that vibe: The Tarot of the Haunted House for Lo Scarabeo and The Dark Wood Tarot, which has just come out a couple months ago, with Llewellyn. Andrew: So tell me this, because you are a very positive-seeming, very upbeat, very energetic and outgoing kind of person. What's with all the darkness? What's with the appeal of that for you? What do you get from that? Sasha: I am a person who... The darkest parts of anything in my life that I've ever experienced, the most challenging things in my life that I've ever experienced has always paid itself back on the light side, if that makes sense. So I grew up in a very kind of... I think my childhood, to be honest with you, felt very terrifying. I lived in wild, rural places. I was on mountains and planes. We moved around. The world always felt very supernatural and very scary. And it was always kind of going in and embracing the things and figuring out all of the dark stuff helped me find the light that much better, if that makes any sense. And especially I think as a teenager, when there were certain things that I couldn't process that were happening in my life, it was easier for me to go to horror and Stephen King. I happened to come of age when vampires and Anne Rice became a thing and the goth movement first came out. So, to me, grinding yourself against the darkness, grinding yourself against the stuff that terrifies you makes you stronger and ultimately it makes you more whole. And then as I transitioned into my work as a taroist and as a writer and as like, I don't know, a spiritual creature or whatever you want to call it, I realized how profound and how the further you go into the... We're all here to evolve, right? As a taroist, as an artist, as a writer, you're here to move forward and to see further than you've seen the day before. The only way you can bring the light of consciousness to whatever it is that you do is by exploring the things you don't understand or you don't know. Now, oftentimes those things are scary. If you're doing between world work and you're encountering an energy that you're not familiar with, of course that's terrifying because you don't recognize it. But interestingly, that happening spiritually or in your imagination is the same thing that happens to us when we walk down the street and see something we don't recognize or a person that we don't recognize. Because something is not comfortable to us, we call that thing the other and we're afraid of it. And that's why the shadow work that you perform for yourself is applicable on every single level of our lives. And so it's not just about how you're relating inside to yourself, but also how you're relating to the external world, and how what I call the trick of the material world, which in the tarot deck would be pentacles, how you really get fooled by the way that something looks rather than paying attention to the energy of what it actually is underneath. And when you're looking at things energetically... Oh my God, I'm really running on here. But when you're looking at things energetically, it's a lot simpler, I think, than things look like on the surface. All right. I'm going to just stop talking now. Andrew: No. There are so many things to touch on in there. So the first one I want to ask you about though... I made a list here so we can make sure stuff doesn't get missed. The first thing that I want to say is... So I spent a lot of time in the wilderness. I grew up sort of North of Toronto in a town that I think it had about 8,000 people living there when I lived there. But I lived on the edge of town and there was nothing but farms and forests between us and the next town, maybe a 15 minute drive over or a very long, long walk or bike ride. And so I spent a lot of time in the woods and pretty deep in the woods and getting lost in the woods with friends and stuff like that or by myself. And I spent a lot of time cycling the rural roads. I would just hop on my bike and ride for hours and be like, huh? And again, pre GPS, pre whatever, like actually lost. Being like, huh, I think if I turn right here, I'm going to get back to my city, my town. But if not, then I'm going to hit this other town and then I'm going to have a really long bike ride home after that. I'm already really tired. Because for me, as I continue to grow and continue to live my life spiritually, my connection to the land, to wilderness, to sort of spirits from places, to plants and animals and all of those kinds of things that has its root in that time continues to flourish. Because I think that in nature, there's no avoiding the shadow. Nature doesn't avoid it at all. It's all kind of unified. Nature is what it is and that's it. And we sometimes try and glorify it and be like, "Oh, all these things are so perfect." And it's like, well, nature is astounding. Nature is magical and powerful. Nature is intense and scary. It's all there. So I'm curious what role some of your experiences of being in the wilderness or in nature and so on impacted on your journey in this. Was there a moment where you were out there and you were scared of stuff? Was there a moment where you had a spiritual encounter in the woods or wherever? Sasha: Yeah. And this is, again, one of those things where you asked me in the beginning, why do you love the darkness? One of the things that used to terrify me the most was I lived on the side of a mountain in Vermont. We had like a mile long driveway. I was in fourth grade. And I would have to walk from the school bus up the driveway and into the empty house and hang out for like two hours by myself before anyone got home. And so it was like I would leave the den of the school bus. And the second I stepped off that school bus, man, it got quiet. And the gift of being a young child and of being scared, because there's a difference between playing... Well, whether you're playing or whether you're kind of nervous and therefore kind of on alert, the gift of being very young and being in those situations is that you're not always necessarily sure what you're looking at. When you encounter things, I think that you encounter them maybe in their truer form than what people have. Because once you're told this is a doc, that is a red robin, you kind of place it in a box in a way. But when you're young and in nature... And I believe that being nervous and being scared, especially those walks up that driveway, because I was in kind of a heightened state of alert, I was certain I was going to get murdered or there was a troll under the bridge. He was going to devour me up. I really paid attention, like super-uber attention. And with that, yeah, I saw things and I experienced things on a much more profound level probably than I could even... I probably couldn't even express it in words. But again, it's something that I'm so grateful for because as I've grown older and moved deeper into the work that I do, I understand that now and I'm able to see things in that way or I know when I'm encountering something and what I would call between mortals experience, where I'm almost in two places at the same time and looking through the veneer of the material world into the energy that's underneath. So again, I think it's that full circle thing, when you have a childhood rooted in nature and go outside and play, you're immediately interfacing with all of this energy that in and of itself could be your teacher. You never have to pick up a tarot book or a witchcraft book or a Shelly book if you were just paying attention to and outside in the woods. So that's an example of why I'm grateful for something that was spooky that was my greatest teacher as well. Andrew: Yeah. I think there's something about fear that is really helpful sometimes, not always. You know what I mean? Sasha: Yeah. Andrew: I remember the first time I summoned Goetic demon to demand it to do something for me. It was one of the first evocations that I did. A friend of mine and I had spent a long time... We got this 10 by 10 foot canvas and painted our magic circle on it by hand. We did all sorts of stuff around setting that up. And I remember the feeling as I started that ceremony and the way in which it heightened all of my other senses and kind of opened me up. It wasn't that I hadn't been meditating and scrying and reading cards. I had been doing a lot of stuff. But something about the tension around that and sort of that taking it really seriously. And I think that whether it's a deliberate experience or whether it's a sort of situational experience, right? I remember being... We were at a friend's wedding somewhere north of the city and we were walking back, me and my co-parent and the two kids, one of whom was like an infant at the time. And we were walking back from where the post wedding dancing was happening around a fire with a bunch of drums and stuff like that, back to the cabin where we were sleeping. The road was pitch black and we didn't have a flashlight. And the only light that there was, was this little tiny gap above us where you could see a few stars through the trees. And I was just like, "Oh, this is fine. I know this." I mean, I don't know that place. But I know the forest. I know being here in the dark. I know whatever. And I was just like, "It's fine. Just put your hand on me and I'll just walk us back." And I just walked us back, following that faintest of trails. I mean, the road itself was big enough to drive a car out. So it wasn't like I was walking through the woods on a tiny goat track on a mountain with the kids. But it was dark. And that sense, for me, in that moment, of connection to all of that stuff around me made it really easy to be there. But I think that in the absence of that, that is a terrifying experience, right? Sasha: Mm-hmm (affirmative). And I think that, again, it's kind of the trick in the way that we address what's happening, like fear. So many of the same things that happen to us physically when we're freaked out and scared are also the same thing that happens to us when we're intensely sexually aroused. Your face flushes, you get goosebumps on your skin, you're really paying attention to everything that's going on. Well, what happens in those moments when you're on such kind of high alert, you're broken open. In the sense of the erotic, you're opening yourself up to someone and if everything's in your favor, you're about to have an incredibly transcendent experience with someone. And I think the great thing about really good horror movies, for example, or a great horror novel is that also opens you up and shows you something new. It shows you what's possible. And it doesn't necessarily always feel good, which I always talk about the three of swords being the heart opening card. To look at an incredible natural landscape can be kind of as painful. Beauty can be as painful as grief, and all of it is breaking you open. It's taking you out of where you were yesterday and it's moving you further into a deeper experience of being a human being and therefore understanding the world in a more profound way, which is why I think we're all here and why we do this work. Andrew: I love the notion of the sublime from like 19th century landscape and then kind of further into modernism and other things. This idea that we can have these experiences of something that is so vast and overwhelming that it allows us to understand our place in the universe and our relationship to source the creator or, as they would have said, to God. Because it is that a complete existential understanding of our place in relationship to everything else. And that sense of both our smallness and our bigness in relationship to things. A friend of mine had this land that backed onto 50,000 hectares. I don't know what that is in America, but it's huge. It's unbelievably huge. And the land was logged like a hundred years ago and then has been untouched ever since. And other than a few hunter shacks and stuff, there's nothing there. And I used to go pike in there and find a high spot, because there's just sort of like rolling Canadian shield, rocky surfaces that on the top of them there's just nothing there because they're just fair walk. And I would find a nice one and I would camp there for a couple days by myself. And at night I would do ceremonies to the sky goddess. And you're there in this vast wilderness and I'm like three, four hours walk through the woods from anybody else probably. And you're on this high point and you're away from all the cities. So it's just this vast, expansive starriness. And that sense of being lost in relationship to it, being consumed by the bigness and then connected to it and then returned back to myself is such a profound and healing experience. Sasha: And also, when I'm out in the woods by myself, what is always surprising to me is the sense that I'm definitely not out there alone. And I'm not talking about like tree energy or field energy. I am talking about something much more beguiling. And I would not even dare to kind of try and even define it because again, I think it's something that... What happens to you when you are truly alone without other people in the wild I guess is like the hermit and taro. You have to be out there to experience it yourself because I think it's one of the closest, comfortable ways that you can start to understand how you interface with the world around you. And I think it's an exquisite and always surprising and amazing. I just think it's amazing. Now I want to go hiking, or maybe it's the weekend that has caught up. Andrew: Yeah. I just got back from a week camping, not particularly remotely, but a week camping with my kids. And they were like, "Can we go again?" And I'm like, "Yeah, we'll go again. We can do on October." And maybe we'll go somewhere just slightly further that's maybe going to be a little Wilder, especially because October we're not going to be swimming or not likely to be swimming. It's going to be cold up here and stuff. Sasha: For sure. Andrew: One of the things I think is very interesting about you as well is that you have this background in acting. And you have this piece that's attached to what people talk about as sort of, in my mind, glamor magic, from like what you do and how you go about it, stuff like that. And so I'm curious for you, how do you think about it, or if you ever think about this sort of idea of how you are in the world as sort of a deliberate expression of yourself and us sort of being attached to that wholeness or that magic or those kinds of ideas? Sasha: I love that you just said glamour magic. That makes me so happy. So your question is, I'm sorry, how do I... Andrew: How do you think about this yourself in relationship to how you are in the world, like your shadow and all this stuff? You're out there as a teacher and a taroist and all these things. But how do you think about how you present yourself, about your persona, about your way of being in the world, especially maybe in relationship to your public self, or if you do at all? I don't know. Sasha: Look, from as far back as I can remember, I think there's two things that kind of occupied my mind and in terms of what drove me to do the things that I did, and that was, one, in a sense having some sort of agency or power. And two, with that, also being authentic to who I was or am. And that's something that I'm constantly trying to figure out. And I think anybody who's extremely empathetic, I pick up a lot of whoever I'm around. So I'm constantly trying to navigate, okay, is that me or is that someone else? I try to be and I continue every day, I was just in bed this morning with my husband talking about this thing, being the most authentic version of who it is that you are with that whole idea of the things that are placed inside of you that you are drawn to. So in terms of what I put out there, it's who I am. I love that you say glamour magic. I think supernatural stuff is sexy. I think witchcraft is so sexy. I think it's powerful. That's what I loved when I was an actor and I made like a million B movies. I'm looking at them right now. They're all right there. But when I look back at the roles that I did, I wasn't the girl being like slashed in a wet t-shirt. I was the vampire. I was the gargoyle. I was the mafia hit woman. It was all about claiming my power because I think for so long I felt powerless. So what I do now, as a woman... It's funny. The teaching just kind of came along with writing books. I never set out to become a teacher at all. But then since I started publishing, people were like, "Oh, will you teach a class. Do you guys do that?" So I was like, okay, all right. I mean, I'd rather be a student. Any day of the week I would rather be a student because I'm still figuring this stuff out and it's always felt odd to kind of be like, well, here I am the authority. Let me tell you what I know about the invisible world. How do I know that for someone else? I only know my experience of it. And even with my books, I'm always like you know more about yourself than I do. Throw my book out the window and write down what the symbol of a crown or a rainbow means to you. So as far as what I put out there, I mean, I'm just trying to be me. I like glamour and pleasure and beauty and travel and excitement. And I always felt, since I was very young, that life was cinematic. And it's why I love living in New York city and I love being in the mountains because it's like being in a movie thing and I do love the movies. So I don't know. That's just me, I guess. I'm trying to be me. Andrew: Because it sounds like there was a time where you didn't feel empowered and now there's this time where you feel more empowered or you're sort of aware of it and making a lot of choices that bring you into that place. How did that shift happen? Sasha: Well, the second I moved to New York city, I got a great therapist. I found myself a good, good therapist. I always had the sense... How did that shift happen? Taro has always been my jam. First of all, when I first started as a reader, I was like, well, if I'm not following my own advice, then I'm kind of like a total fraud. So I always already felt like it was like, okay, it was going to keep me on point. And the shift into... I don't know when it happened. I mean, I think it's been a slow and steady ascension up the cliff into whoever is inside of me that's trying to come out or trying to show itself. I don't know. Andrew: Interesting. Yeah. It's funny how that stuff sort of sometimes is easier to see in retrospect, that the change is happening, than it is to sort of notice in the moment. And I think that... Maybe you see this with people, too. Sometimes come for readings and they want that change today. And I'm like, yeah, that would be so nice, wouldn't it? If I could just, and then you would feel empowered or this or that or whatever. But it's often those accumulation of little things, or not even little things, right? Like, well, I did therapy for a while. I did this. I did that. I read my cards every day. I kept asking questions. I kept writing. Sasha: And it's so true. And I'm so curious. When people have those big moments... My sister, for instance, she was a heroin addict. And I'm always like that day of clarity where you woke up and were like, "I'm done," how many tiny things had to... And if you look bad at any moment in your life when you make a big decision like, "Oh, I'm finally really done." And you might call that a major care moment. I'm really finished with this. It's always the tiniest things that led to the biggest kind of I think outward, inward changes. And in a sense makes it so easy... I didn't know what I was going to do for a career. I was asking the tarot every day, what should I do? What should I do? If there's something you want in your life, ask what that is every day. And I guarantee you within three to six months, probably sooner, you'll get the answer. But it's just about kind of focusing yourself and realizing it's something small. Just asking a question and opening yourself up to the wisdom. It will come. And funny enough, my answer was like, oh, you should be a tarot reader. And it was right. So yeah, it is so often something that would be seemingly insignificant or small that is so incredibly powerful. Andrew: Well, I think that reminds me of maybe three, four years ago I was feeling very log jammed by stuff. I was running the store. I was doing readings. It was all going well, but it was a lot to deal with. I had kids. I got a lot going on. And I was reading cards and trying to figure out essentially how to be happier because I was not super happy in that moment. And I put out the cards and journaling again. And I wrote when I'm free, I want to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. All right? And then I kind of stopped myself. And I looked back over like my past series of readings and stuff and almost all of them had similar language. And I was like, wait a second, when I'm free? Okay. I have my own store. I am my own boss. I can do whatever, maybe not immediately, but over time I can do anything I want with any of these things. I'm in a relationship, but it's an open relationship and I'm free to date other people and do whatever I want in that regards and so on and so on. And I'm like, when am I going to be more free than this? What would that even look like? It would look like, oh, I won the lottery and I've got $10 billion and I don't have to think about anything anymore. That would be more free. But I was like, oh, I already have this thing, but I'm putting my unhappiness onto this idea of lack of freedom as opposed to looking at my happiness and say, okay, what can I do to change this? And obviously, there are lots of people who are in positions where they don't have those freedoms. I was in a very privileged position around this. But I think that that idea of when we're reading or journaling or whatever, keep looking back and look for those patterns and look for those words that you're like, what's the central word there? What's the sexual thing there? And then try and unpack that and see what's there, because often there's something that could be done or there's a shift around our attention. And once I started dropping that story, I was like, "Oh, well, look at this. Now I'm going to do this and now I want to do that." One of the things was I was like talking to people on the phone isn't making me happy. I'm going to put in a booking system. And that's it. I'm going to stop talking to people by bookings. And I was like, oh, that's easy. Done. And I changed a few little things and it created a lot of movement. And then I started moving from there further, further into it. Sasha: And that's the funny thing. We nuance the stuff that we want and it makes it seem like we're swimming in this ocean when it's really quite simple. When I wrote 365 Tarot Spreads, which is a tarot spread for every day of the year, before I began, I thought, oh, I wonder if there's a limit of how many questions a human being could ask. And so I sat down and I researched it and I thought up as many questions as I could. And when you take out the personal nuances of your life, there's really under a hundred questions that a person could ask. And again, almost to the point of what we were talking about earlier, what's underneath is really quite simple. What we do is confuse it for all of this different stuff. I find that endlessly fascinating. And then you're like, "Oh my God, this is so much easier. I was making it all such a big deal." What you just described, and then realizing that you already have what you want. I love what I said about the magician card. It makes me so happy and it just gives me so much joy. He's got the four suits of tarot typically on his magician table. And I always say that you already have everything you need. It's in front of you. And that's the funny and interesting thing about making magic and casting spells when. Actually, I wrote an article, this technique called The Grief Eater Technique for one of the Llewellyn annuals. And it's about what happens when your witch's desires are not granted. You have to recognize that what you need is right there, perhaps you're not recognizing it or perhaps you don't see the gift or can't appreciate that what you are looking for us is staring at you in the face. And then that leads to the next magical tenet, which is know that you already have it. I have to say, a couple of years ago, I was dying to travel, but we just didn't have the money and the budget. And I have a teenage daughter. So the idea that the three of us could pick up and go halfway around the world was very ridiculous. And I thought, okay, tarot teaches me that the world repeats. That underneath all of this stuff, everything is the same. So I thought, okay, I can't go traveling the world right now. So I'm going to, every day, for five to 10 minutes, look for the entire world in my backyard. And whether that's on a city block in the city or that's in a puddle behind this house. And I started looking and traveling. And wouldn't you know it, Andrew, I swear to God, within a year for me doing that every day for 10 minutes, I was being literally invited to China, to the Middle East, all over the country. I started traveling like a fiend. And it was amazing, I think magic and tarot and figuring your stuff out can be so simple. We make it tough. Andrew: Yeah. I think it's interesting. Whenever people talk about magic, I'm always like, cool, what's the mechanism there? What accomplished that? And in the story you said, I'm kind of like, well, is that like doing devotion work to idea of travel for long enough that something, whatever it was, opened up and granted that to you? Is that aligning your attention to those things that started to make that more possible and sort of attaching yourself to those energies and actions and thoughts and stuff that make that happen? It happens on so many different levels. And I think that that kind of idea of ongoing continual practice around stuff is really fascinating and actually fits with a lot of what I do. I do a lot of sort of sigil and art-based magic. And on the regular, I'm making art sigils, art gifts, art petitions and giving them to the ancestors or giving them to whatever. And I just make them and make them and make them. There's a whole pile of them. I just sit there with them. And some of those are around bigger things or smaller things. A lot of them are just around like help me just understand what I really want and what I don't want. Help me to just be really clear about that. And that continuous, ongoing attention over years, it just turns into those moments where you're like, oh yeah, that's cool. Look, oh, I don't do that anymore. Oh, now I do know this. Oh, I have this clarity. Or also, hey, this thing opened up and this happened or that happened or, yeah, these opportunities, right? Sasha: And it's interesting. Because the impulse to seek that out or to create whatever it is that you're creating is already kind of implanted inside you, again, authentically. Talking about just being yourself, like a true, authentic version of expression of whatever is kind of embedded inside of you. When you either, A, I think recognize it in the material world or in nature, or when you write or paint, or also then create it, I do believe it's magnifying that energy which wanted to be seen. I love this idea that everything on the other side, all of what's in the invisible world or not yet manifested, I love the idea that it wants you as much as you want it. And not only just the things that you want, but kind of like everything. When you're walking through your garden and you can smell a cucumber or rosemary, I feel like it's begging you like, "Pay attention to me," Just like clients want to be seen in a tarot reading and they want you to understand them. I think everything in the invisible world wants to get your attention because it wants to be seen because it's exactly like us or that's us. It's all part and parcel. So the magical act is so inherently creative, there's just, I think, such power in the recognition and kind of the duality of creating it. And that's why it's so crazy and cool when you'll create a piece of art or write something and then like a year later you're standing inside of it. It's amazing. It's so cool. Andrew: So take away, magic school. Go through magic. Sasha: Practice magic every day. Do lots of magic. It's the perfect time of year anyway, if you're in the Northern hemisphere. Andrew: I think that's great. Well, maybe this is a good place to leave it with that and say, hey, go practice magic. Stay in it, stay curious, and look at that fear and work on it. Because I think that that stuff is gateways to all sorts of great possibilities. So for people who want to come and follow what you're up to, and of course people should do that, where are you hanging out online these days? What's your social stuff? Sasha: My social sitch. So I guess anybody who's interested in seeing what I'm up to can look on Instagram. I think I'm Sasha Taro Diva, Sasha Graham Taro Diva. Just Google Sasha Graham Taro and my stuff will come up. But I'm on sashagraham.com. I'm on Facebook and on Instagram primarily. Those are like my main social Hangouts. But more importantly, and probably something that would be even more interesting and helpful to you would be to like rather than looking for me online, look for my books and my tarot decks at independent bookstores. Support them. Get a tarot deck to play with. Grab one of my books. I promise you like 365 Spells or 365 Spreads is going to give you so much fun stuff that you can do and play with your cards and get into. Honestly, social is like a light version. Get one of my books, get one of my decks and play. I think that's the best way you can kind of get little piece of me. Andrew: I agree. I agree for sure. And speaking of that, we're going to wrap this up and we're going to go record a bonus episode for people who are supporters of the Patreon, where we're going to get into specifically how to play with regards to dig in and do a little shadow work. So if you're not already supporting the Patreon, go check it out and start. You're missing out on some fantastic stuff. All right. Thanks for being on today, Sasha. Sasha: Thanks so much.

In this episode we talk to Andrew So, whose latest project is a documentary film called Silicon Valley Dropouts, which details the stories of ambitious young techies who came out to the Bay Area in the early 2010s with the hopes of building their empires. We delve into strange living situations, the distinction between achievements and adventures, how cold emails are underrated and why Silicon Valley has never been successfully recreated elsewhere.

Andrew, Fabeku, and Aidan (aka Stacking Skulls) get together to talk about living during this ongoing pandemic. They talk about astrology, racism, colonialism, magic, getting by, and so much more.  Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. Aidan is here.  Fabeku is here.  Andrew is here. Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcript is below.  Andrew: Hey, folks. Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp Podcast. At the time of this recording, it is, basically, the end of August, and been on a hiatus since the earth of spring from podcasting. Just too busy with dealing with all of the chaos of COVID and all of that chaos and everything else. But, I was thinking that the last episode that I did with Stacking Skulls was called WTF, and I think that the title for this one is probably WTF Still? Because, here we are so many months out from what's going on, and yet still life is chaotic and uncertain, and, really, especially for folks in America, way worse in some ways than it was back then. I don't think that we are still cruising around the idea that it might be, "Yeah, three weeks of lockdown, maybe a little bit longer," and now we're in the phase of, "Is there an end? When's the end? How does an end of this come together?" And, all that wear and tear that's kicked around. So, anyways, if you don't know Stacking Skulls, well, number one, you're in for a treat. There's a whole bunch of episodes of us clowning around together. But, I'm here with Fabeku and Aidan, and we're just going to check in as my fall relaunch of the podcast happens. So, yeah, who wants to go first, what's going on? How's the last five months been?  Aidan: The last five months have been ridiculous. Andrew: Yeah.  Aidan: It's been crazy busy, partially. We were pointed at doing... When I say we in this context, that's me and my wife... doing another class but with COVID and everybody being sent home, we realized that that didn't make any sense to try and put anything out that was a larger money thing. Because, it seemed like it was quite possible we weren't going to have much money and we didn't really feel great about trying to get 300 bucks or something out of people at that moment in time, because, really, we couldn't tell how things were going. So, we changed gears back to my second book, and so I've been rapidly finishing that and then learning InDesign to put it all together and get it printed. So, that's launched as an e-book now and in 10 days, 9 days, something like that, the print books start landing on people's doorsteps. Andrew: Nice. Aidan: It's overall just been weird. We're in one of the states that are... our governor has always taken this thing really seriously. So, we didn't get hit nearly as hard as most other places with the exception of some places on the reservation got hit really bad. So, we've been in lockdown way before a lot of places that didn't get hit as hard have been. We're now at the place that it's masks if you are outside of your home, period. So, I haven't really been on the bike for a while, because it is not fun to go riding around on that. We're super supportive of it. Because, it's just not being one of the people that is necessarily at as much risk as other people are, though... obviously, everybody can get it and can get messed up by it. You certainly don't want to be involved in spreading the shit.  Andrew: For sure.  Aidan: So, it's been crazy on that sense, but at the same time, we're homebodies anyway, and it's us at home with the animals. So, we've shifted a few things, but they've not been great. Not been huge for us. Then yeah, just doing book promo stuff and then launched the first episode of my podcast. But other than that, it's just been working on the book, working on getting the book out there, working on understanding InDesign. Andrew: It's not at all a small task to do a thing like that, right? Aidan: Yeah, it's interesting. I'm glad I know how to do it because it sets me up to do more. So, I'll be doing the e-book of Six Ways next and then I've already got part of the third book going. So, it's nice because it allows me to take the reins for that whole project now, but it is a lot of work. Keeping busy with that. Chickens, lots of chickens.  Andrew: Yum, yum. I mean, wonderful. Aidan: I don't eat them but I yum yum for their eggs. Andrew: How about you Fabeku? Fabeku: Yes, same. It's been crazy, like everybody. I think the last time I left the house was end of February, maybe first couple days of March. Have not been out of the house since then. Like Aidan, I don't go out of the house much anyway. But, this many months has been a strange thing. Yeah, I've been busy with a ton of stuff too. I just finished a book with some writing and art and some shit like that, that's going to be published by Revelore in October. [inaudible], so that's a cool thing. It was weird for a while. The first few months, I had a hell of a time doing art. I could do some stuff for clients or collectors or whatever but my own stuff is just, "What the fuck am I doing?" It was awhile that I didn't do any art which is weird for me. So, finally, back at that which is good. I feel like that was sanity preserving kind of things. Yeah, excited about the book, excited about the couple of books after that, that I'm finally back in motion after stalling out for a while and just busy with a ton of people stuff and trying to help people manage this fuckery that is 2020 at this point. Yeah, it's been a pretty high bandwidth task moment. Yeah, I don't know. It's a strange time in so many ways. In so many ways. Andrew: Yeah, I feel like this hit, probably around the time we were doing the last episode, things were slow-ish for me, and I was just trying to figure out what was going on and all that kind of stuff. Then, just things got super busy between the store and client work and suddenly having two kids that I'm solo parenting half the time. Not in school, all that kind of stuff. All of a sudden, it's just, wow, I'm just working as a parent or working as my regular job continuously and all the time. That was just an intense run all the way through until, really, maybe two weeks ago or three weeks ago, when I... here in Toronto, things went pretty good. We had a lot of stuff going on, but we're down to maybe 20 new cases a day, maybe less. We've had some single digits and restaurants are open and a lot of stuff. Gyms are open, with social distancing, of course, but it hasn't brought about a big spike in anything.  So, cautiously optimistic about it. Have been, and then, of course, the next big question is, school starts next month, and it's, what's going to go on with that and so on. Right? So, it's just trying to have a wrangle all that stuff with COVID. Then, I think, the other big thing that... this happened in this time since we last talked, right, was George Floyd's death. Right?  Aidan: Absolutely.  Andrew: The resurgence of what, really, should be a continuous thing of, how do we fix these racial divides and inequities and all this stuff. It's definitely a thing that's taken up a chunk of my attention as well in terms of trying to stay attentive to it, right. To not just drift back into day-to-day life, and whatever. Because, that's been the history of it, right? It erupts into the media and into our consciousness because there's some horrible thing that happens. Then, from a broader perspective, it dissipates, right? It doesn't build momentum. So, yeah, I would say I'm hopeful that it's going to change at this point. I have no idea, right. But, I think that there, definitely, felt like there's a different quality to what's been going on around that stuff, that I have some hope that it will make bigger changes. Yeah. Aidan: Yeah, that's been a huge thing too, obviously. And, it's interesting because it's even where you get stuff that's... I have folks in my family that still don't perceive what the issue is, you know? Which is weird to me on a personal level because I have, in my immediate, immediate-immediate family, people of color. So, you don't even want to take their word for what they're experiencing, even though they are technically your family, right? You're so set in your belief structure here that you can't see that or can't see the difference or the shifts between it. There's folks in my family that, again, have children that are children of color, that still don't see it. It's, really? How are you that unaware? How do you maintain that? That's what, I guess, I don't understand. I've never been able to maintain that. I didn't start with it, I think, and that's why. But, it's been good to see the attention. So, the reasons behind why it needs to be there are horrible, but yeah, I don't know.  Then, for us in the US, to me, there's like an almost psychotic nature to the United States right now. Where the whole discourse is so stratified and so divisive and so peculiar in where people can and will go. It's really, you don't see that in yourself or you don't see that in the people that you're supporting? How do you pull that off? I just don't get it. Fabeku: Its been interesting for me, my mother is in her 80s and grew up in a little teeny tiny, literally, a shack in the hills of Kentucky. After George Floyd was killed, every single time I've talked to her, that's almost all she's talked about, and how she realizes, at this stage of the game, that she's spent 80 something years oblivious to this shit, and not paying attention and not listening to people, and having the privilege to not pay attention to it because it didn't affect her. And, she's trying to have conversations with her sisters and her brothers, almost all of whom are completely oblivious to it and entirely entrenched in, what's the big fucking deal, kind of thing. I It's interesting to me, the way it's shaken things, loosened her in a way that I've never seen before, right? It's not that we didn't have conversations about it before but, I don't know, I don't think she got it. As opposed to her sisters and brothers, will actively push against it. It was never that so much, it was just, well, yeah, that's really bad. But now, I mean, we have hours and hours of conversations of just, how the fuck have I not paid attention to this? How the fuck if I lived my entire life not understanding how, and completely, fucked things are for people that aren't white in this country? It's been an interesting thing to see. I think she's hopeful that her sisters and brothers will wake up and get it. I don't think they will. They're about as deeply entrenched in that kind of bullshit as it gets. But, yeah, it's been interesting to listen to my mother, of all people, have long conversations about this. When John Lewis passed, she was talking about, how did I never really pay attention to who this man was? How did I not know his life and his legacy and his history? Yeah, it's been an interesting come to Jesus moment, in some ways for her. Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative). It's funny, when I started this podcast many years ago, the first thing I did was a series of interviews on why some people change and why some people don't, right. I talked to people [inaudible] they're right there, the early episodes still existent. Should be on iTunes, and whatever I talk to. That time I was mostly tarot focused so I've talked to a bunch of tarot readers about it. It's, nobody's got an answer for that, right. I think that it's such a significant question now, right. Can we understand how to make change in society? I think that we're seeing a lot of stuff around that, that the answer is, maybe it doesn't. Maybe it can't be polite, maybe it can't be quiet, maybe it can't be whatever, right? Because, I see the things that make change, and the quiet, polite route is predominantly a route of quiet and polite with money and power behind it, right? You know? Aidan: Oh, yeah. You get to be very quiet and polite if you have lots of privilege. Andrew: Right? But also, thinking about the people who follow Stalking Skulls. They're our groupies, right? They are those people who are part of our magical communities, right? I think that it's such a... number one, if we want to work magic, we have to try our best to see the world as it is, right? That means, from my point of view, seeing racism and sexism, and all the different things that are going on, right, and engaging with that, right. I think that it's not that you can't do magic without being aware of lots of things, but I think that the more aware we are, the more it gives us capacity to see and make change both in ourselves, and depending on what's going on in the world too, or see where change might be able to happen.  Aidan: Yeah, I think that it's very interesting on the magic side, because I agree with you totally. The more aware you are of how things are unfolding or how things can unfold or how things... for me, my own tendencies to, where will I not consider change? Because, there are places that I really don't want to do that, like quitting coffee, which I did. Andrew: What? Aidan: Because, my wife finally said, I don't think this is working well for you, even though you've been doing it for 40-something years so you should drop all of the caffeine. I, totally, entrenched for several hours and then went, Okay, I know that this is not good. I said, I need some space to go and think about this, and went, okay, let's examine myself and go, oh, yeah, this is typical junkie behavior. It's the same as any other addiction I've dealt with, so I'm not really down with that. So, something's got to change. But, if I didn't have the ability to go, okay, I'm being given information of everyone outside of me that I don't like. I've been given a suggestion that I don't like.  Yes, this is an entirely personal and minor one, but if I can't actually go, okay, this is also from somebody that I believe is serious and has intelligence. So maybe, I should take some time and figure out why I don't want to hear it, let alone consider it. It's an interesting thing. I think that's critical in magic. I think it's critical in life, but we can get away with it without doing it. It's just not necessarily the best way, I don't think. Andrew: Yeah, I don't even know what else to say about this. I'm just, "Fuck!" I think that's part of what's tough about the racial issue. It's like, "Man." I think that there are plenty of places to go look up what you could do, right? You know I mean? Fabeku: Absolutely.  Andrew: It's not that I [crosstalk] specific things or I'm not taking actions around it, right. But, I think that this moment where the scope of COVID, the scope of these issues is so big, so daunting, right? Yeah, it's [inaudible] this space where it's [inaudible], so big so much. It's, yeah, staring at that abyss, right, and know that it's staring back at you and then start walking into it, right. But, nonetheless, it's interesting. It's interesting times, for sure.  Fabeku: Yeah. I think, for me, a lot of the magic, personally, has been aimed at either expanding or maintaining that capacity, right? Because, I think that one of the things that's easy to do when we're looking at something daunting, whether it's the racial issues or the virus stuff or personal, whatever it is, you just shut down, numb out, turn off. Obviously, I think, for the people that have the privilege to be able to do that, that's the thing a lot of people do. The reality is, there's a ton of people that never have that option, right? Because, they're so fucked, they just can't say, "Well, this is too big. I'm going to watch Netflix for a few hours and not give a fuck."  I think that I've really been looking at that capacity thing. How do you expand the capacity enough to keep your eye on the abyss? To keep walking forward, to not tune out. To not say, well, somebody else will handle it, because, listen, we've done that shift for too long, and, obviously, it's failed in every possible fucking way. Yeah. Yeah, capacity seems to be a big thing right now.  Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah, I think it's huge, right. I think that it's a piece that I learned mostly from you, right, actually. I had some very clumsy ideas around it, and your work clarified it. It gave me a real focus. It's, yeah, that's what I've been trying to get at, but I couldn't quite see it, right? I think that working to increase capacity, in whatever way you want to work on it, magically and otherwise, I think is crucial, right? I mean, in my parenting, there are definitely times when it's, all right, somebody, somewhere give me some more capacity right now because I am overwhelmed by this business. I think that working to call that in and expand that and stretch that and so on is super, super important, right? Aidan: It's interesting. I think, three days ago, we hit a place, my wife and I, where we went, Okay, we're not actually doing things the way that we know work well for us. So, how do we get that space back? Because, we lived in a cabin with no power or anything for a couple years, and we were really looking at that time, and going, there's a way that we were very well in that space. Anyway, as a result of this... this ties into your capacity thing for BQ, we decided that once we're both awake in the morning and ready to go, we turn on our cell phones, and we turn on the wifi, and we do, maybe, an hour of stuff that needs to happen through those tools. Then, we turn them all the way off, we turn off the wifi, we unplug the router, we turn off our cell phones all the way. We might have some stuff stored on our computer that we downloaded that we need to work on or whatever, but that's it for being connected.  Then, usually, we'll do that again in the afternoon and try and be done with that by about six. This is sharing not... primarily, because it's been incredible for us for just these last few days. So, it's not as much as suggestion as something to think about if people are super overwhelmed, because the 24-hour cycle has become just crushing in a way right now. But, we had a weird day. The first day was really weird. Like, okay, well, what do you do if we're not streaming Netflix for the last three hours of the day? Well, then I'm playing guitar for the last three hours of the day. One of these things is good for me, one of these things is at best neutral, right. The same thing during the day, that the amount of time that we're actually spending talking and working on our plans and thinking about how we do stuff together, is huge. It's probably an 80% increase in the last few days. Instead of the magical overt side of building capacity, which, I'm with you, I learned from Fabeku.  But, there's also the really base level of just going, can you step out of all of the noise and then check in to get what you need. It causes you to weed your sources out, figure out what do you need to see, what do you need to know, and if your time is limited to that and you're not going in and out of it all day, at least, for us, it's been an immense change that I don't see going back to that at all. It's, no, two hours of fucking net and cell phone access is more than planning for us. Everybody's going to be in a different situation. Fabeku: Yeah, this summer, my partner and I have been doing more leisure, and more, just, super-leisure. I've been lucky to be able to take a bit of time off and so on. So, we went to this place and it's a spa place and spent the second day there, literally, just either in the pool, on a lounger beside the pool or eating, having lunch or whatever. Yeah, no phone, no mess, no whatever. I didn't look at my phone, I think I looked at once through the, almost, two days that I was away. What actually needed to be responded to during that time? Not very much, right? I've been working on trying to institute more of this space, right? And, noticing, I like my movies and my TV, but also, I've been reminding myself that if I'm looking at my phone while I'm watching TV, something is wrong, right, for me?  People do whatever makes you happy, right? But its, either the show's not interesting enough, or I'm not looking at something that I need to address or, whatever, in order to be present with the thing that I'm doing. I think that if something's not engrossing me enough that it's holding my attention, well, then what's going on with that, right? I think about, I've been doing a lot of rock climbing again, and when I go by myself and do boulder, I will, sometimes, keep my phone around and read things on my phone while I'm resting in between climbs because I'm just sitting there by myself. But, last night, I went with my friend who I go with every week, and I left my phone in my locker, which is not a thing I would have done, at some point. I would have brought it with me, I would have checked in every now and then and whatever. But, it's, what am I doing, I've got a person to talk to, I've got an activity that I'm engrossed in. Yeah.  Aidan: Yeah, it's an interesting thing. Yeah, I had a place, I guess, it was about a month and a half ago which is interesting because, again, my life isn't that different, pandemic-wise than it is usually. But, I hit a place where I really couldn't get into any of the movies, any of the TV shows, anything. Even stuff that I like, wasn't happening. That moved me in that direction, and I shifted back towards reading more. Then, one of the weirdest things that we've had and I'm sure that there's lots of people that have studied things like EMF and all of that is, we live in a really quiet house because we're on a couple acres in a really quiet town. But, at the point that the phones are actually turned off and the computers are off and the wifi is off, it feels so quiet. In a way that even if the router is still on, it doesn't. Which makes sense, we know that these things are radiating stuff.  But yeah, it's a crazy difference to go, "That's noticeable. That is really different", and then balancing that out from, we're all old enough to have not had these things. So you go, "How interesting is that? This is really the first big chunk of my life, probably, felt like this, and what did I do? I played music, I read books, I talked to the people who around me, I engaged in a very different way." It's not to say I want to throw all that stuff away, but, definitely, it's opened my eyes to finding its place, rather than just letting it find its place in my life, I want to be the one that decides what its place is. Andrew: Yeah, I think it's a really good way to put it, right? Aidan: Mm-hmm (affirmative)- Andrew: So, now we all need to do a group working to break the internet's hold on us. It's an exorcism of sorts. Aidan: I don't if we're the ones who need it from what I see. Andrew: Wow. Did you do any magic around quitting coffee or did you just stop?  Aidan: No, my wife is our house apothecarist and herbalist so she treated it as a situation that could be dealt with herbs and using them in a homeopathic way. Not really using homeopathic medicines, but using some tinctures that she'd made. So, she's having me check-in with her every couple hours, "Tell me what's going on? How's your head? How's your... How's this, how's that?" Because, my tonsils were going off a little bit. I definitely detoxed like a crazy person for the first five days. That's always one of those signs. I had that same experience when we quit... when we went paleo, and we dropped all processed foods and all the grains and stuff. This is the total TMI, but you can absolutely tell how foul you are inside by how foul your poop is when you quit eating it. Your body goes, "Oh, you're not going to put more in, okay, well have this because we don't want it anymore."  Andrew: Get rid of all of it.  Aidan: Get rid of all of it, because oh, that's nasty. So, I think that now that my liver and all of that have had some time to back off away from the caffeine, things feel good, but I didn't have to do magic on this one.  Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative). [inaudible], Fabeku, is giving up coffee in your future? Fabeku: You know, actually, yeah, I haven't had any caffeine since early May, I think?  Andrew: Wow.  Fabeku: Yeah, for me, I reached a point to, between some body stuff and just the chaos and the anxiety of the moment, I'm, "What fuck am I doing? What the fuck am I doing?" Because, I really think up until then, I was drinking either coffee or yerba mate, then I'd throw in some caffeine pills. I'm, "What the fuck am I doing? This makes no sense."  Andrew: What are you, 16? Fabeku: Exactly. Acting like [inaudible] 7-Eleven to get [manodos] or whatever the fuck those things were. It was absurd. I think, for me... and this is what Aidan was talking about, about not doing things in a way that works. It was like, listen, if I'm structuring my life in a way that this makes sense, then something's wrong because this doesn't make any sense at all. If you're recreationally enjoying coffee, one thing. Chugging caffeine all day and then throwing a fistful of caffeine pills on top of it, it's, listen, something is sideways. So, yeah, for me, it's been, yeah, late April, early March, or early May, since I've had any caffeine at all. Aidan: Oh, very good.  Fabeku: Yeah. Aidan: So, I could blame you, it was you, reaching out through the ethers, right? Fabeku: I want decaffeinated company.  Andrew: Oh, boy. No, I feel so embarrassed about my coffee cup [inaudible]. Fabeku: [inaudible] on.  Andrew: I actually know that it's not great for me. Well, it's part of a bad cycle for me, right? For me, coffee and being too busy, just go hand in hand, right? When I stop being too busy, then I stop hitting the coffee. It's just it rolls back. I remember when I moved into the last location where the fire was, I had quit coffee, I quit sugar, and I was just eating food, right? Making my own food most of the time, and I felt great. Then, I spent a month building a new shop. So, getting up as early as I could, doing construction, going to my old space, seeing clients, going to the new space, working until I felt like I might be a danger to myself, stopping, and I was just doing that. I did that every day for a month, right?  Somewhere in there, one of the people who was helping was, "I've got to take a coffee break and go to Tim Hortons and get something." I was, "Yes, give me coffee." Right? Then, probably, a few days later it was, "Yeah, get me a donut, too." And, that it was that was it, right, because it was just an unreasonable time. Then, been sort of, on and off wrestling with it ever since, right? I think that this time actually... again, going into COVID, I was maybe drinking more coffee when I get up kind of thing, right? But now, I'm having three again and I'm, ah, it's not ideal, but also, this is hangover of the massive pace that I've been running on, and trying to... my life is slower, but I have that velocitization like I've been on the highway, right, where I feel like I've go faster than I do. So, I'm sure everybody's loving it right now, conversation about our caffeine habits.  All right, it's official, Stacking Skills is anti-coffee. Stop it, it's bad for you. Just kidding, do what you want. There's a show called Beastmaster. You guys know that show? It's a super obstacle course kind of thing, right? If you like watching people with ridiculous physical capacities, to ridiculous challenges and climbing over things and swing from stuff, go check it. But, either way, it doesn't matter so much. But, I was noticing that all the people who were on it were working on themselves to get better, physically, and working on themselves as a person and working whatever. You see a lot of that in a lot of places, right. Certainly, if you're on the socials, you'll see that stuff a lot, right. I was, "Maybe, I'm done working to evolve. Maybe this idea of self-improvement is one that I should just jettison." What happens if I don't try and self-improve, but instead, just live and navigate? Right?  Does that mean that I'm going to stop learning new things? Of course, it doesn't, right? Does it mean that I'm going to stop making changes in my life? No. But, if there's this narrative of improvement, or evolution or whatever around these kind of things, I feel like there's a real pitfall in that. I don't buy into too much, but a little every now and then I do. I'm, "It's okay to be done with that. Just be like, this is just my life. I'm just navigating my life now". Is it going to change? Yeah. Is it going to change radically over the next 10 years? Maybe. But, does it have to do with evolution or, that kind of stuff? The perpetual cycle of self-improvement and so on. I don't know that I want anything to do with that, in the way that I see it anyway. Aidan: I go off about this somewhere, recently, I think. It's probably in Weaving Fate, I don't know. Which is about the whole thing about optimal now, right? I think this is totally tied in there. It's optimal nutrition, optimal training, optimal study habits, optimal work habits. I think it doesn't serve anything. It's, well, that's great if you're already... if you're already on Beastmaster and you're trying to win, then yes, you need to be worried about optimization. But, if you're climbing rocks or lifting weights, because you enjoy it, or you think it makes you healthier, then optimization is probably not actually all that relevant to you. It's another marketed obsession.  Andrew: But I feel like I see it in magic, too, right? Aidan: Mm-hmm (affirmative)- Andrew: A little while back, I posted something being, "Hey, everybody, don't forget, astrology is completely optional, right? You actually don't need to do anything with astrology to do magic." This isn't a criticism of this direction, right. But, the swing into grimoire magic and the resurgence of astrology as a prominent influence in spiritual and occult communities over the last five years, or whatever it's been. It's always been there, but it's really been ramping up, right, to be a thing that you see on the internet all the time. I think that there's this notion towards optimal and less around magic too, right. Well, I better make sure that this is the most astrologically auspicious moment that I have summoned the angels and the four governors, and the four kings and the [inaudible], and on and on and on, towards stuff.  I think that there's a direct or indirect pressure from things moving in that direction that I think doesn't need to be a part of any of it, right. It's all really deeply optional. Yet, isn't presented as optional, right. There's a drive behind it. Because, one of the things that was really interesting in the comments on that post, right, was people... it's the internet, people want to share their opinions and stuff, which is great, and people jumping in and being, "Well, you're being influenced whether you know it or not. Whether, you're whatever." I'm, "But, are we? Are we really?" I don't know about that. I'm not sure that I believe that big, grand narrative behind all these different things, is universal. You know what I mean? Yeah. I've talked- Aidan: Yeah, I'm with you on that. It's an interesting one. Lonnie and I were talking about this a little bit. My take has been since I got what I thought was... I started getting respectable results from my magic, was to go really hard on those things. The things that are working, I want to get really good with. I think the term I used... it made Lonnie laugh because I said, "If sigils are your jam, be a savage sigil magician, right, and see if you need anything else. Because you may not." I think this is where I totally agree with that is, there's an amassing of classically, historically relevant information that is fabulous, if that's what you're into. But, there's some dude out in the bush somewhere in some country who is whatever, he's got the skull of some rodent, and a little fire made of twigs, and you don't want to fuck with that guy. He's never heard of any of this shit you're talking about?  It is totally my take. I also think that if we look at it historically, that's the history of magic, except for the last equivalent of 10 minutes. So, people want to go, "Well, this is the thing." Yeah, for the last few hundred years, and that's a blip. That's, of course, my take. Take whatever you want.  Fabeku: I was talking to somebody. I made some planetary magic talismans and turned out remarkably potent and effective. They were saying, "Oh, but, when you made them, this planet was doing this thing in the sky. So, the talismans should have been fucked. How did you make them and they worked?" I said, "Because, I don't give a fuck what the planets are doing in the sky. It doesn't matter." So, this idea that it's always an influence whether you know it or not, I'm with you, I don't know that that's true. At least, I don't know that it's a prominent enough influence to matter.  I think a lot about currents, right? I think that for people immersed in a particular current, the effects or the shaping influence of that current is going to be stronger because you're immersed in it. I'm not saying there's no effect, but it seems to be less of a factor than somebody who is super centered in whatever current is, whether it's astrology or anything else, I think it's the same shit. I think there's this idea that you have to be immersed in a billion different currents and have your eye on them and line them all up in some kind of perfect Venn diagram of magic. That doesn't make any sense to me. One, I don't know if it's doable. Two, I don't know that it is actually necessary for most people. I think it's a weird thing.  Going back to the self-improvement stuff, a conversation I had with a client last week, they showed up with all of the shit that they wanted to sort out this magical strategy for. As they were talking, my body started to tighten up. There was just this feeling of grinding and grinding and grinding and it was, "I don't know how to do this, and what to do about this." I said, "Listen, we can circle back to this in a second but"... It was all like, doing more. More money, more this, more that, which is, again, fine, there's nothing wrong with it. I've done a shitload of magic for more stuff, it's fine. But I said, "Have you considered doing magic for more joy, for more flow, for more peace, for more ease, for more creativity?" There was this long silence, and then they started to cry because they never considered that. They came with this To-Do List of, "Okay, help me figure out how to do these 10 things to do more, to optimize, to improve.? I said, "Cool, do that. But, what if you also had more joy in your life, and that was the focus? Especially now as fucked as everything is."  I agree, I think that's this weird trap that we get into with the self-improvement stuff. It's just another version of grinding. It's just another version of never being enough. Never having enough, not pushing hard enough. Again, I think in this global moment of all moments, fuck. Let's look at some shit that's not that, let's look at some shit that is ease and peace and coherence and whatever the fuck it is. Because again, I'm going back to the capacity stuff, at some point, you can't expand capacity infinitely enough to just keep grinding on every possible fucking front. It's just not doable. Yeah, I think it's super easy to fall into that shit with magic and everything else. But yeah, it's a mess.  Andrew: So I want to circle back to something you said, and then come back to this as well because I want to talk about both. But, I think that, I [inaudible] this way. There was this big push to go back to, is there a singular truth, right? We can't deny that influence of Greek thought and other thought on our culture, right? You know what I mean? If we can go back to those philosophers and see the origin of stuff and see the origin of Western magic, going back to some of that stuff, in certain ways, right? That's cool and dandy and all, right. I think that if we look at the astrologies or other systems, I think that they're holistic models of everything, right, which is amazing. I think that having, and participating in, a holistic model of the universe, magically speaking, is a powerful thing to be engaged with. I think that the thing is that in Kumi, right, Orisha tradition, it's a holistic model of the universe that has no relationship to planets at all.  So, if both are describing something, and they're both describing it accurately within their holistic model, it doesn't mean that anything crosses over from those, and whatever that actual experience of the universe or... whatever's going on that we're engaging through one of these models, it's all accounted for in one way or another, right? Aidan: Mm-hmm (affirmative)- Andrew: And, it's not necessarily to say that we could equate, well, Egon said you were having this problem right now, ancestors say you're having this problem right now through divination, astrology says you're having this problem because of whatever, this hard planetary placement in your family situation or whatever, but those things aren't the same. Right? They don't have the same meaning. They don't have the same lived experience. They certainly have very different solutions and approaches, right. I think that this notion, which to some extent goes back to the Greeks and people who are smarter than me about philosophy might trace it further, that there's this true universal core that we can participate in through our intellectual perception.  Then, you compound that with, basically, the Victorian era magicians, Golden Dawn, Crowley. All those people who are like, everything is interwoven. Right? Everything is the same and symbolically resonant with each other at some level. I think it's an extension of colonialism and of that Victorian worldview to continue that process. Somebody sent me a list of [inaudible] and how they line up on the tree of life and they're, "What do you think? I'm, "I think this is colonial crap. I think it's not helpful. I think it's completely meaningless and disrespectful to this other completely coherent and self-reliant worldview."  It's not to say that there aren't philosophical things or similarities that we could talk about the crossover those things, but I think that the minute that we start to say that one is inherently true, or that those bridges are inherently true, I think that we start to get into very dicey waters, and probably we're wrong. Does that make sense?  Aidan: Yeah, totally. This came up recently in the Six Ways group, that somebody was saying that their background is in Western magical Kabbalah.  Andrew: Yeah.  Aidan: They were, "I'm having trouble mapping this kind of elements, middle world, world above, world below to that map." It's, because they're not talking about same thing. You can find somebody, I'm sure, who can give you something that says that this is, but if we look at it, the model that I'm using is rooted on, what would now be considered, very primitive people's viewpoints of the world. This was not folks who were trying to work out mathematics of language in the written word, this is a totally different thing. They were just looking at, what do we see and what do we interact with, and what is that thing?  It's not a map of something that you fit everything into? It's not a tool to categorize. It's, these are places you can interact with, or beings you can interact with that dwell in those places. In that sense, it's, yes, it's a metaphorical model, but it's not trying to be a universal model. It's, if you want to know what the underworld is, go there and learn that thing. You're not going to be able to map enough information on top of that lack of experience to make up for that experience, right?  It's, again, it's nothing against any of the systems, it's just realizing that they are not all the same. Like you said, with the Orisha tradition and the tree of life, they're not the same thing. They're not intended to do the same things. They're not experiential tellings of the same event, however you want to view it. I think it's a very interesting thing. I wanted to also tap into what Fabeku said because I'm also a total current guy. So, I'm going to do the work when I need to do the work, and when the allies are on board with it. That may be related to what's going on in the heavens, I don't know, but I'm certainly not going to start work based on what I think that is according to what somebody tells me is going on astrologically if the allies aren't going, "This is a good time to do that." But, if they'll say, hey, it's a go, and everybody else is, it's total shit city, it's, I don't care what you're seeing because my people say, it's a go and maybe we need to do this thing in total shit city. Again, what does that have to do with optimal. Sometimes it's shit city and you've still got to work. Fabeku: It's the title of your third book, Shit City.  Aidan: Shit City. No, at least the subtitle.  Fabeku: I totally get what you're talking about, Andrew, with the colonialism kind of thing, right? Because, I remember having a conversation with somebody, I was talking about was Oshun, the Orisha, and they were saying, "Oh, yeah, I totally get it because I've worked with Venus for however long. I'm, "What the fuck does that have to do with what I just said? I'm not talking about Venus, I'm talking about Oshun." They said, "It's the same thing." I said, "It's not the same fucking thing. It's not the same thing. They're entirely different." Are there places that, like you said, might crossover or ping a little bit? Sure, But, it's not the same thing. It's weird to me that we apply it with shit like this, but we don't say, well, this river is the same as that river or that ocean is the same as that creek, or a rose is the same as an orchid. It's not the fucking same.  Sure, they both have roots, they grow in soil, they're flowers, so they're similar in that way. But beyond that, it's not the same shit, right. I think, at best, it's sloppy thinking, at worst, it's all sorts of other shit, when we start pretending that this is that, is that, is that, and it's all different names for the same shit. I don't think that's true. I think it's it's lazy thinking, right, because it's convenient to say, Oh, well, no, I know Oshun because I know Venus, so I know Aphrodite. So, but that's not real. I think then when we do that, we miss the nuance, we miss the capacity to build a relationship that's coherent with whatever we're building a relationship with. Because, that would be like me saying, well, Andrew and Aidan are the same. No, you're not.  Andrew: [inaudible] start with A. [crosstalk]- Fabeku: Exactly, right.  Aidan: We wear glasses and we have tattoos. All the evidence is there. Fabeku: For sure. We don't do that in this way, but we do it with magic. I think it's a total failure of perception, and logic and relationship and understanding and nuance, and I'm just unconvinced that it works.  Andrew: Well, I think, as animism has resurfaced as a world model in certain pockets of the occult communities, I think that people are starting to understand that all of these plants are people, right. All of these stones and places, that they are their own things. I think that we haven't extended that to spirits, right? To say that, does Oshun have their own concrete specific existence, right? Sure. Beyond that, even, Fabeku's Oshun has its own concrete, specific, singular, individual manifestation that's different than my Oshun. Right? Not just because, maybe, our paths are different, or maybe this or that or who it came from, no, it's own distinct, separate living entity that is not the same as all the rest of them and there are relationships and, within religion, there are those, well, they're all Oshuns. But you know, Eleggua versus [inaudible] versus whatever, they're all different. The priests who have those Orisha's, each of those Oshuns has their own character, right, because they're their own people. Right.  I think it's a place where the magical community... I'm going to be curious to see if there is a point at which people stop doing this and start really holding that devotion to Kali or to whoever without any sense of crossover, and, so on. I think it'll be very interesting to see what comes of it, if anything. Fabeku: I think even beyond spirits... spirits in the usual sense, if we go to plants as people, you and I can talk about our experiences with rose or with sunflower or with gardenia or with mandrake. I'm willing to bet that your experience with rose is different than mine. Maybe they overlap in places, but there's nuances, there's differences, right? Just like two different people that know you are going to experience you in different ways. It's the same thing, which is where I think the common logic of, okay, well, what does rose do, what does rose quartz do, what is amethyst? I don't know, what the fuck does it do for you? I can talk about what it does for me and that might have nothing at all to do with your relationship with it. that might have nothing to do with whether that stone person or plant person will work magic with you, the type of magic that it works, how well you get on with that particular spirit.  That's the thing. I was just talking about this yesterday when I was teaching, there's a worldview problem, right, because we think that what does rose do, is a real question. It's not really a real question. But, we keep answering it, and so we're perpetuating the idea that it's a real question, but I don't think in practice it is.  Andrew: Yeah, I think it's true, plants, in the same way it's true of Orisha, within the traditional context, within traditional context of their religion, we don't say, "Oh, you've got a problem with work, who's the Orisha of work who's going to fix this thing for you, right?" We say, "You have a problem with work, will anybody come forward to fix this for you?" Maybe, it's an Orisha that we associate with work, like Ogun. Or maybe, Obatala is, "I've got you, brother, don't worry. You're covered. Give me this and we'll be good." The answer's to those are super nuanced by divination, by Odu, by story, by knowledge of Ebo, like, offerings, and so many things that are impossible from the outside. Those kinds of ways of working, only, can exist within the traditional context, I think.  In the same way, burdock is a really close friend of mine. Me and burdock, we're tight. And, the things that burdock and I have had conversations and done, have nothing to do with traditional associations, but it is also a source of power that can be applied in many directions, if the spirit of the plant is amenable, right? It's, yeah, maybe spearmint would be better at getting you some luck right now. It's a more traditional association, right? "But, you know what, I'm going to work a little extra hard, because it's not my area of expertise, but I'm still going to make it happen for you." Problem solved, right.  Fabeku: Well, I think the other super relevant point of what you said is that, not only is that the way to do it, but it's an individual thing. So, all three of us could have problems with work, all three of us could sit in Divine and get entirely different solutions to how to fix the work shit, even if the works shit looks the same. Right? So, one of the things that happens a lot when I'll do some divination in a private space of mine, when I post them, I get the question... It's not a criticism of anybody that asked the question, but I'll answer somebody's question... usually I'll include some magical stuff to do, and, inevitably, people will say, "Oh"... Well, let's say somebody's asking about a relationship thing and then we talk about whatever the solution is, inevitably, somebody will come along and say, "Oh, is this a thing that anybody can do for relationship stuff?" No, it's not. Listen, I don't know, maybe it works. Maybe it doesn't. But, this was a specific solution given to a specific person with a specific problem based on these cards that were pulled. It's not, here's the cure-all for everybody with a relationship problem. It's one conversation, one relationship in this moment.  Again, to me, that's the way that this shit really works. But, if we try to turn that into, oh, well, this thing will do the same shit for everybody having a relationship thing. I don't think that's real. I think if it does work, I think we've gotten lucky. But, I don't think that's an indicator that it's some universal solution. I get it- Andrew: [crosstalk], you can be the same solution for the same person down the road- Fabeku: Exactly- Andrew: On the same spot, right? Fabeku: Right. It is a very specific solution to that person, with this thing, with me, in this conversation, in this moment. Aidan: Absolutely. Yeah. That's, I think, the thing that I hit on a lot with people, and even with people with Six Ways that have got that, we'll be trying to figure out, "I'm now working on this, but I haven't got here yet, and I feel bad that I haven't got here yet." I'm, "Don't do that. Just find a way in. That's the whole idea here, is find a way into anything that works for you, and see where you can go with it." Because, that's where you get that depth. Then, you go, "Oh, yeah." I've got people saying I need to talk to the goats or I need to talk to some deity and or I need to get right with... to do some stuff to remediate some astrological influences, but maybe you can do all of the things that you need to do with your allies that you don't even know their names, that you just make offerings to and that's your only relationship, and all that you might have to do, is to go in and go, "This is hard, I need help with this or I would like to more capacity for joy in this because I feel really just fucked up by what's going on", right.  For everybody that I know that figures this piece out, they're really good magicians, with the work that they do works for them, and that doesn't have anything to do. Some of them know everything about everything, and some of them know nothing, essentially, from that other person's point of view. So, it is, it's about current, it's about relationship, it's about that reality of context. So, that, yeah, you and I could both be having trouble getting our point of view across to our partners, and it could have, on the surface, in the way we describe it, in the way we describe that it feels, it can all seem exactly the same, and it could be totally not the same.  I think this is going on constantly. It has to, right? But, magic tends to go, here's the formula to fix this. I've not really ever seen that to be true. It was, realizing, oh, if I'm just playing within the structure of, what Jason called zone rights... So this was, for me, LBR star ruby-based stuff, just as the shape of the operation, not using those words forever, but I figured out I could do all of the various operations that I read about in the magical books using these, even without learning all the different pentagrams. I wasn't doing that, I was doing incredibly basic versions of it. It's, no, I can connect to the powers and the quarters and the above and below and then put forward that I want help healing this or help this person out in their relationship, right, because I was building relationship with my allies and with that current.  So, yeah, great. So, Hermanubis is the one who does that. I don't know that guy, why would I go there? I've people saying, "Yeah, we got it." It's, I don't know if they are the ones who do that. They say they are and I have faith in them, so I'll go that route.  Fabeku: Yeah, maybe it's time for faith to make a comeback. How about that? [crosstalk]. What would that look like in the magical world, right? Aidan: Man. What is faith if you don't have religion?  Fabeku: Good question. Aidan: What is your faith in? Fabeku: Uh-huh (affirmative)- Aidan: Or rather, what is your faith for, which might be the better question.  Andrew: Really, the only answer to that should be, everybody's face should be in Stacking Skulls. In Stacking Skulls we trust. Stack them 23 high, and you're good. Everything [crosstalk]. The world will unlock, [crosstalk] will open.  Aidan: Once the stack gets taller than you, while you're standing up, things get better.  Andrew: Right. Back to my mind, we went on this lovely detour into things and I'm still, all right, but, what the hell? What the hell, universe? What the hell, 2020? What the hell is going to go on? Does anybody find feel like they're doing stuff or needing to do stuff? Maybe this is just a reiteration of the capacity conversation, but to just manage themselves through this time. You know?  Aidan: I definitely have some of that. Again, we talked about that earlier for me, backing off of the internet and connectivity and just going, Oh, yeah, I really like fooling around on the guitar for hours. I like talking to my wife for hours. Then, being really aware. In our house, we have this saying that, that the end of the world is happening all the time. But, sometimes it's very obvious for the people that it's happening in because it's clearly catastrophic, right. But, it's happening. It's ending, it's reforming, it's changing. I think, right now, is a really interesting moment because it's so clear that it's changing in a really huge way for a lot of people.  I don't think, we, in America... using the US term of America, which is totally wrong, but I'm going to do it here, because that's the language that's most appropriate here in America... I don't think all of this stuff has piled in on each other simultaneously in such an obvious and unrelenting way. So, it is. It seems clear to me that we're in a really major crisis point, at least in North America, which is what I can see in the United States primarily. It is an interesting thing, because if I look forward or in backwards, I can see the roots of the moment we're in, I can see logical outcomes, I can see outcomes that I would prefer, I can see the potential backlashes to the outcomes that I would prefer, right.  That's, I think, what's really interesting to me, is, I see, because we're in this election cycle and because things have been so insane politically here... I hope that people aren't assuming that if we have a change in the presidency, that that will fix what's going on. Because, we've had a whole lot of changes in the presidencies and they have not fixed what's going on.  Andrew: Yeah.  Aidan: So, yes, I would think that that would be a step in the right direction, for sure, but then you got to step on the gas at that point, if you want to see a lasting and real change. That's step one. Andrew: Yeah, for sure, right. Because, if there's a change in the presidency, that's great. But, that doesn't automatically change the system, and that systemic piece of stuff. The piece that is [inaudible]. Yeah. I've been going back to an old mantra of mine, which I've adapted slightly for this situation. It goes like this, other people's urgency doesn't need to be my urgency. I think that because there's so much going on right now, there are a lot of people who have a lot of urgency around stuff, right.  I remember, when my first godfather always used to say... because he ran a store and was a really well-known psychic in the Detroit area, and he used to say, "Look, if it's an emergency, you call 911. Otherwise, you can make an appointment and come see me whenever you can come and see." I've been working to not act with urgency, because I think that when stuff is as wonky and strange as it is, consideration and pacing and time and respecting capacity, and all those kinds of things, is super helpful, super important, I think. So, it's really, well, that's cool and all, but I'm not going to run around for this, I'm not going to run around for whatever. With my kids too, it's, is there an actual emergency, or is there some discomfort that maybe I'ma let you sit with for a bit so you can learn how to sit with discomfort instead of jumping into things, right?  It's an imperfect science, for sure. Right? It's just a general approach. But, I think that, yeah, that, I can't run around on this. I can't make myself do whatever. I can just do what I can do and I'm going to own my own directive around that, right. Sometimes I might be looking at something like, yeah, that is really urgent, I should jump on that. I should push myself to do that, even though I know there'll be a falling for it someway. But, yeah, that's been my thing.  Fabeku: I think, for me, it's been, because the clients stuff has been super busy, I've had to figure out a way beyond what I did previous to this, too, to not absorb that high-level, constant anxiety, angst, panic, fear, whatever it is, because, after a few weeks of that shit when all this stuff really ramped up, I just felt like I'd been through the blender. It's, okay, well, this is not ending anytime soon, and I'm happy to support people, and this can't be the way it goes. This can't be the way it goes. I think that's probably been the biggest piece, for me, was figuring out how to keep how to keep that capacity, but also how to not end up, at the end of the day or the end of the week, feeling like I've just been taken apart with this stuff. So, part of that has been magical practice, part of that has been mundane stuff, part of it has just been, okay, realistically, given this intensity, this is how many times a week I can have conversations with people that are really difficult and adjusting accordingly. Like you said, in some ways, not giving in to that, okay, but there's more people. There's 10 spots and 30 people, so let me figure out how to get 30 spots. That's not the answer, because then we end up back with coffee all day, caffeine pills, nonsense shit, right.  So, it really is like, this is what I can do and do it well, do it effectively, and also not be dismantled at the end of this, and it is what it is. That's it. There's no more space, there's no more bandwidth. There's no more room to fuck around with a calendar. Andrew: Hmm, yeah.  Aidan: I think that that thing too, which is what you brought on, the realizing where you've got to back down, or ramp things down, is really important, because there is so much out there, just saying, no, just go harder. Grind. There's times for that, but all of them all of them are not that time. Andrew: For sure. By where I go climbing... it's probably not surprising, it's an industrial building and there's some CrossFit type stuff in there, right? One of them has something painted on their garage door to their space. I think it says, "Somebody with less time than you is working out right now." I'm, that's cool. Good, for fuckin' [inaudible].  You know what I mean? A couple years ago, I shifted my climbing goals to be, still be climbing at the end of the year. That's my climbing goal, right. I have some very loose... I'd like to be able to consistently climb 5.8, 5.9. I'd like to be able to cycle 40 kilometers, 50 kilometers anytime. There's some very loose things that are indicators to me that I'm spending enough time being active to be able to continue being active, and that I believe that those things are good for me. Not in and of themselves, because they're indicators of a broader attention to my health, right.  Am I ever going to climb super higher levels than I'm climbing right now, I have no idea. Maybe, probably not. Does it matter? It doesn't matter. Am I always going to be able to cycle as far as I can cycle today? I'm doing a lot of distance cycling. Nah, probably not. There'll be times where I'm, I can't cycle that far right now. It doesn't matter. You know? Just keep showing up. Keep showing up. Keep doing the stuff to rest and recharge to show up.  Aidan: Yep, absolutely. I've definitely had to make adaptations on all of that stuff just because I'm getting smart enough to go, oh, this isn't really doing what I want it to do. So, instead of more, what does less do? I'm working out about half as much as I used to, and it's working better because my body can recover from that better. Interesting, okay.  Andrew: It makes sense, right? It makes sense. Well, maybe, we'll wrap it up here. I assume everybody knows where everybody is, but just in case, Aidan, where do people find you?  Aidan: You can find me at aidanwachter.com and as Aidan Wachter on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, whatever that other one is.  Andrew: What's the name of your podcast, that people search? Aidan: My podcast is called Aidan Wachter Six Ways. It's up on Google, Stitcher, Apple, and someone else... I can't think who the other one is right now, but it's generally out there in the main places.  Andrew: I hear it gets heavy rotation in the underworld, so you can just go there and listen to it. Aidan: Exactly, you can find it down there. Yeah, you can get my books at all the major retailers. Andrew: Fabeku? Fabeku: Fabeku.com, Facebook, and, yeah, the book will be out in October with Revelore. Andrew: It's exciting.  Aidan: I'm stoked about that.  Fabeku: Hmm, me too.  Andrew: Yeah, and, obviously, I'm the Hermit's Lamp everywhere. Podcast is the Hermit's Lamp Podcast everywhere. I didn't talk about it, really, in this, but I'll throw it out here at the end. I'm going to be launching a Kickstarter for my next Oracle deck, which has the title of the Bacon Wizard Breakfast Oracle. So, if you like food and you like divination, I can certainly... I was going to launch it, actually, back in March. My original timeline was end of March, Kickstarter, but obviously didn't do that. But, it's going to be end of September, early October, Kickstarter for that, and you can check it out on my website and other places as I'm building up to that. So, all right. Thanks, folks. Have a great rest of your day. Aidan: Thanks for having us.  Andrew: Oh, my pleasure. 

Stephen Olyniuk Interviewer: So in today's podcast, we'd like to welcome Andrew Ferris. He's the development officer and program director for the children's miracle network. So, welcome! Andrew: Thank you. Good to be here. Interviewer: And one of my first questions is gonna be- tell us a little bit about yourself, Andrew, and how you became involved with the Children's Miracle Network. Andrew: Sure, yeah. Kind of an interesting path how I got to where I am today. So just going all the way back to university, it's kind of when I got first introduced to the child health sector. So, throughout university, I worked as a one-on-one specialist with kids across Manitoba. So I would essentially go on camps across Manitoba and work alongside a child with autism to kind of make sure that they're integrated into the programming stuff. So that's kind of how I got introduced to child health, kind of starting my passion there. But I did a BA in Psychology, and I graduated a University. Got a job in the corporate world. And learned some valuable things, but kind of didn't really feel the passion was there. So I did some research on what options I had for post graduate education. And I actually found this non-profit management, in the business development program for non-profit charity program out in Toronto. And essentially, I applied to it. And within a month, I was pretty much packing my bags and moving out to Toronto. So when I got to Toronto, I completed my program in non-profit management and business development for non-profits and charities. And then I end up getting a job at SickKids, which is a children's hospital in Toronto. And I did some work in the corporate partnerships department. And then I was kind of faced with the difficult decision of: “Do I wanna stay in Toronto or do I wanna come home, bringing what I learned in Toronto back to my home community?” And ultimately, I decided to come back to Winnipeg, just because… I mean, I love it here. It's my home. My friends and family are here. And one of the main reasons why I went to do that non-profit management program was really to improve my home community. So essentially, made the decision to leave all the excitement in Toronto and come back to Winnipeg. And from there, I got a job at Global Philanthropic, which is one of Canada's largest non-profit consulting firms. So we worked alongside charities in Winnipeg, (?), Marymount. And the children's hospital is also one of our clients. And it was through there, I kind of linked with up with the CEO there. And he brought forth this job for me. And I obviously accepted it because I just kind of had that passion for children health at the beginning. And I always did wanna work at a children's hospital. So it was pretty much a no brainer for me. So that's what brought me here today. And I've been directing the Children's Miracle Network program since July of last year. So I'm just over a year now. Interviewer: And throughout the time we've spent together, I find you're very passionate about it. I think you're a great fit. Andrew: I would like to think so! Let's hope. Interviewer: Exactly. So, for people that maybe don't know that Remax has a partnership with the Children's Miracle Network (CMN). And some agents choose to take part, and some don't. So we choose to take part. And we make a donation with every donation that's sold or someone purchased with us. So can you tell us maybe a little bit about the partnership between the CMN and Remax? Andrew: Sure. Let me just kind of explain what CMN is, so people who don't know- know. So essentially, the CMN is a large non-profit organization that operates in Canada and the United States. And their main mandate is to raise critical funds to support specialized equipment for their local children's hospitals. So each state, each province has a children's miracle network hospital. S ours would be the children's hospital in (?). And the CMN has a large portfolio of corporate partners, such as Remax, who each have specialized programs, funding campaigns, that are designed to raise money in support of their local children's hospital. And, I mean, the main mandate is that if we change the health of children, we change the health of the world. We change the health of children in Canada, we change the health future of Canada. So that's really the core of CMN. And in terms of our partnership with Remax, it's actually one of the longest standing partnerships in the CMN. So, it's been operating since 1992. And like you said, the Remax agents have the option to donate certain proceeds from each sale towards the CMN, which goes directly to our local children's hospital and all the local children of Manitoba. So, it's an exclusive program to Remax. And the impact is huge. And it's just a great way that Remax agents are able to engage with our children' hospital. Interviewer: Wonderful, wonderful. And then, you know, what kind of success has the partnership seen in Canada? Andrew: It has seen immense success. So, just in terms of numbers, we have over 7k real estate agents in Canada that are taking part in this program. And in 2019 alone, I believe over 7.5 million had been raised. Just in 2019 in Canada. Interviewer: Wow. Andrew: And that goes, again, directly to the local children's hospital. So, I mean, that's immense impact right there. It's huge. Interviewer: Ok. So that kind of answered my next question to you. What does it mean to the children's hospital to have a community partner and support, such as Remax? Andrew: It means everything. I mean, just in current times with Covid, community partners such as Remax are really the ones that our children's hospitals have relied on. I mean, with Covid, a lot of events, a lot of fundraising things have had to be cancelled. That brings in quite a lot of revenue for the children's hospital. So it's having, our community partners like Remax, that continue these campaigns through Covid, that really do pull us through these tough times. And, you know, our hospital over 130k kids that come through our door every year. And Covid or not, that's happening. You know, that doesn't change. So having the community support, our ups and downs of the economy, whatever, it's just incredibly crucial for us. Interviewer: So then, in 2020, what will money be raised… Like the money that's raised by the Miracle Home Program, what will it be supporting? Andrew: Sure. Every year, through the Remax program, there's kind of 3 pillars that we look to raise money for. So first is revolutionizing treatment and care. Second is for frontline pediatric education and training. And the third is creating healing environments. And for this year, we really focused on that third pillar of creating healing environments. So money raised is really going towards the child life department. Which, at its core, essentially exists to make sure that children and their families have the best possible experience within the children's hospital. Especially when they have to have a long stay. So, the child health department has specialized child health. Our child life specialist who are trained specifically to make sure that these kids get the best care, best… They're in their mental state best as they can be, given the tough times. So some programs of the child life include musical therapy, clown therapy. They have specialized play places. They have a children's hospital TV station that gets aired all throughout the children's hospitals. So again, it's just really meant to make sure that these kids have a positive experience with the hospital. It's very tough for them to be in the hospital. I mean, it's not fun. And it's equally stressful for the parents as well to have a kid in the hospital. And with Covid, too, it's really made things difficult in terms of visitations. So, we've had lots of kids that haven't been able to visit all their family members. And that's very tough for them. And the child department really gets into gear and distracts them and makes them as happy as possible. So that's really the main focus of funds from the Miracle Home Program this year, which again, is incredibly incredibly crucial and very timely with Covid and everything. Interviewer: Wonderful, wonderful organization from the events that we've been out to. And you see the kids light up when they see Doctor Goodbear. Andrew: Yeah. Doctor Goodbear's a staple. He's been around for years, and he's not going anywhere. Interviewer: And I imagine that with Covid that it's more difficult for visits like that to happen, and that they probably don't happen is my guess. So I'm just wondering do they, has that been happening with the television station that they have? Or anything like that that happens? Andrew: So yeah. Like you said, it's been difficult. So we've had to kind of be creative with how the kids are engaged. And the children's hospital TV station is one way that we can kind of get Goodbear in there and use it as a way to kind of make things happy and distract them from the outside world. And how they're not usually able to visit everybody they would be able to. Interviewer: Right. So, how do Remax agents get involved in the Miracle Home Program if they wanted to? Andrew: So it's pretty easy. I mean, every Remax agent is a broker manager. And they would have all the information on how to sign up. So it's very easy. Essentially, they would have that information. You just fill out a quick form and submit it, and you're pretty much good to go. I also encourage any Remax agent in Manitoba to reach out to me as well, just with any questions. You know, maybe I'll get you to share my content information later as well. Interviewer: Absolutely. Andrew: It's a very quick process, really easy. And I'm always happy to answer questions on how to sign up. Interviewer: Ok, great. So, I'd like to lighten things up a little bit towards the end of the podcast and just find out a little bit more about you. What are some of your favorite things? What is your favorite food? Andrew: Favorite food? That's a tough one because I like food a lot. And I'm gonna base it most off of what I order most on Scubidicious, and I think that would be sushi. Interviewer: Sushi? Andrew: Yeah, that would be my number one. Close second would be any type of pasta. Interviewer: Alright. Is there a plug for any sushi restaurants? Andrew: Ok. I'm gonna give you Yujuro on (?) plug. I'll give them a plug for sure for my sushi. That's if I'm eating in. If I'm not eating in, if I'm eating the order, if I'm ordering it, I usually go to walk-on court. Those are my go-to's. Interviewer: Awesome! I'll have to check them out. Andrew: You should. Yeah, you should. Especially Yujuro. I'll say they're good. They know what they're doing! Interviewer: Ok, great. How about favorite movie? Do you have… Andrew: Favorite movie… I would have to say Wolf of Wallstreet. It's a ride. It is a ride. A little bit of long (?), but it's one of my favorite movies. And I've watched it at least 5 times, it's so entertaining. I love Leonardo DiCaprio. He's one of my favorite actors. Interviewer: Yeah. I'd have to agree, he's a magnificent actor. Andrew: Yeah, I almost like every single movie of his. He kills it. Interviewer: And hobbies. Do you have a favorite hobby? Andrew: Favorite hobby? Well, it's kind of seasonal. So in the like nice months, I love hiking. So hiking and walking around in the outdoors. The big thing, like fishing, hiking. I spend time outdoor swimming. That's my main thing. In the winter months, kind of hunker down a little bit. But I like to go skating. I play drums. So I play drums here and there as well. And listen to a lot of music. And obviously watch Netflix and all of that fun stuff. I like to be very social too. So lots of craft breweries. And for food, I told you that. Interviewer: Awesome. You, one of the things you just mentioned, hiking there. Is there any trail that you've been on recently that… Andrew: Oh, man. So I did my Rise of Manitoba today. So I pretty much did, I think I did around 10 or 11 hiking trails in (?) this year. And my favorite would have to be Hudlake trail. Interviewer: Why favorite? Andrew: It's beautiful! I love that one. Second maybe McGillbert Falls is nice. But I don't know, I think (?) trails are my favorite. It's a nice long hike. Whole portions along the lake and it's just insane. And it's pretty challenging too. There's some nice challenging parts which I love. Interviewer: For the past two years, Alicia and I have been doing kind of a “explore Manitoba” every Wednesday. We take the afternoon off and we head out somewhere and we'll do a little post about it. And on social media, that's the thing that gets the most attention. Any time we're out, someone says, “”Hey, we're going to this weekend?” And Hudlake is one of our favorite trails. McGillbert Falls is on our list. We haven't made it through yet, but we'll do that one pretty shortly. And one that's really unique is the devil's punchboal. Andrew: Oh wow! Interviewer: A little bit of desert in the middle of Manitoba. Andrew: It does not feel like Manitoba. I love that. Interviewer: Nope! Andrew: Not at all. And you know, I think there's one… I mean, there's minimal positives of covid. But one, I think for me, and for a lot of other people, is that they've explored Manitoba a little bit more. I mean, not necessarily by choice. But it's kind of forced people to explore their own backyard a little bit more. And I know I have, more than usual, because some days you'll be travelling to other places. But I think people are kind of like learning to appreciate Manitoba a little bit more. And there's so many beautiful spots to go. So, that's awesome! Interviewer: Yeah, you've just got to dress for the winters and you can find beautiful things to do in the wintertime too. Andrew: I know. I'm not really ready, but it is what it is. Interviewer: And one of the things you mentioned- music and drumming. So do you have a favorite type of music or musician? Andrew: Favorite musician? I would have to say Sitting Color would have to be my favorite artist. Music? I won't say I like everything. I respect pretty much every genre. I mean, for me, for drumming I really like some beats and rhythm. So, I mean, you can find that in any music. So I really can't say I would favor genres, just because I respect lots of music. But yes, let's say Sitting Color. In terms of the 90s, I'd say Oasis would be my favorite band. The 90s and… Yeah, I like everything! I don't know. Interviewer: How long have you been drumming? Andrew: Since I was in grade 2. So a long time! It was one of my favorite… Actually, my first word was actually “gums.” And I meant to say “drums.” Interviewer: There you go! Andrew: I was talking about drums. Interviewer: You were the kid that the parents “loved.” You made lots of noise. Andrew: Oh yes! I certainly did. I still remember getting my first drum set. I don't even know how they dealt with that. I really don't. Interviewer: Great. Do you have a favorite day of the week? Andrew: Thursday. I like Thursdays. I think it's because you have the anticipation of Friday being tomorrow, and I don't know… I just feel like I get the most productive on Thursdays. Getting ahead, getting everything done for the weekend. And getting excited for the weekend before. So I'm gonna go for Thursdays. Interviewer: Alright. That's the way it is. Sometimes when you have a deadline or something that gives you that extra push. Andrew: Exactly! I feel like Thursdays- that's my day. That's my day. Interviewer: My final question. What would you say you're most excited about right now? Andrew: Right now? Sounds a little bit weird, but I ordered a new table from (?). Table and chairs. Dining room table. So I'm supposed to be getting that tomorrow, so I'm a bit excited about that. I know it sounds weird, but I like getting stuff in the mail. So I'm excited for that. I'm also really excited for… I live on the river. So I'm really excited for that to freeze over. Because I'm really really excited to… Hopefully, this year, the trail will be open. The skiing trail. Skiing down the (?) for some beers. Interviewer: Awesome! Great. You have to send me a picture of your table when it's all set it. I'd love to see it. Andrew: I'll send you a selfie with my new table. Interviewer: Sure, great. Alright Andrew, I really wanna thank you for coming on and doing this with us. And we wish you all the best. And I hope that the CMN just continues to rise and be successful. Andrew: Awesome! Yeah, thanks Stephen. And again, thank you for all of your work. You're also personally involved with the Children Miracle Home program and working with us as well. So, thank you. And I thank everybody at Remax for continuing all the awesome support for the hospital. Interviewer: Will do! You have yourself a wonderful day, sir! Andrew: You too! Have a good one! Interviewer: Bye!   Andrew Ferris Development Officer & Program Director, CMN Children's Hospital Foundation of MB 204-470-8928   Stephen Olyniuk Alicia Olyniuk stephen@teamolyniuk.com alicia@teamolyniuk.com (204)981-2009 (204)3924262 www.teamolyniuk.com Turning Realty into Reality #realestatewinnipeg #realestatemanitoba

If you want to keep up with what’s going on in the eCommerce industry, the best thing to do is to go straight to the source and ask. But where can you find a group of eCommerce business owners openly talking about their pain points, sharing tips about how they grow their businesses, and combining their knowledge to solve problems together?  Does such a mecca exist?  Andrew Youderian is here to tell you that it does. Andrew is the founder of eCommerce Fuel, and on this episode of Up Next in Commerce, he discusses how he built a community of more than 1,000 seven-figure eCommerce business owners, plus he shares all of the insights he’s gathered along the way. From questions about Amazon, to a crash course in community-building, to the single metric he says should guide eCommerce businesses today… Andrew divulges some of the industry’s best-kept secrets and more in today’s interview.  Key Takeaways: The Value of Selective Community Building: A community is only as strong as the people in it. Together, a community can deliver ideas, content, and capital to other members who would not be able to find those things on their own. But to ensure that all members are receiving value, it is important to be selective about the acceptance process.  Finding Your Way Through The Amazon: “If I'm selling to wholesalers, should I let them sell on Amazon?” “How do I control my brand identity on Amazon?” These questions and more are plaguing the industry and at eCommerce Fuel, the community is gathering to come up with answers, including how to capitalize on the recent delays in shipping Amazon has seen. Meaty Metrics: While most owners will point to revenue as the main metric to judge success, it is widely believed that revenue is one of the least important metrics when judging the health and long-term viability of a business. There are other metrics that are more telling, including repeat purchase rate, and one other that gets very little fanfare but could change the course of your business: price per visitor. For an in-depth look at this episode, check out the full transcript below. Quotes have been edited for clarity and length. --- Up Next in Commerce is brought to you by Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Respond quickly to changing customer needs with flexible Ecommerce connected to marketing, sales, and service. Deliver intelligent commerce experiences your customers can trust, across every channel. Together, we’re ready for what’s next in commerce. Learn more at salesforce.com/commerce --- Transcript: Stephanie: Welcome back to Up Next in Commerce, this is your host Stephanie Postles and today we're joined by Andrew Youderian, the founder of eCommerceFuel. Andrew, welcome. Andrew: Hey, thanks Stephanie. I appreciate you having me on. Stephanie: So, is a weird feeling a podcaster being interviewed by a podcaster? What are your thoughts right now? Andrew: I think it's great. You have to do all the work and I can just sit back and relax. Well, unless you send some really pointed questions my way, so maybe I shouldn't be relaxed, so we'll see. Stephanie: Oh, yeah. I don't know. Andrew: But, yeah- Stephanie: You might have to sit up straight and get ready, this might be intense. Andrew: This may be, I need to stop slouching here. But no, it's good. Good to be on, it's fun to be on the other side of the mic for a change. Stephanie: So, I want to dive into your company eCommerce Fuel. I looked at it and it seems awesome. It seems like you have gathered so many insights from this company that you've built all around eCommerce, but I want to hear in your words what is eCommerce Fuel? Andrew: At eCommerce Fuel we provide community content and capital to seven figure plus store owners, and so we do that through an online form which is really the heartbeat of our community. We've got over 1,000 vetted store owners, and the idea was really just get a lot of people together that are doing this day in and day out, that we're running seven... our average store owner is probably doing three or four million dollars a year with their business, so that's community aspect. We also do a big event every year for our community through content, like you said I'm a podcaster. I've been doing the eCommerce Fuel podcast for I think it's about seven years now, which is crazy. Stephanie: Wow. Andrew: And then we have a capital arm as well where we invest in promising eCommerce businesses. We have 20 investors that have a lot of similar experience or world class experts, everything from Facebook marketing to email marketing to product design and so we invest in companies that we think are interesting, so that's what we do at eCommerceFuel. Stephanie: That's such a cool model. So, for you podcast I think I saw you had over 300 episodes. Andrew: Yeah. I think, actually I think we're... yes, we do. I've been, like I said, been doing it since July 2013. Yeah, been going at it for awhile. It's been fun. Stephanie: Yeah, that was really cool to look at your backlog and the guests that you've had on. So, your business models' really interesting how you have a capital arm and community, I mean two things that I would say are very hot right now. Everyone is always thinking about of course being investors, I mean at least here in Silicon Valley that's everyone's dream it seems like. And then building up a community is something that we've heard a lot of guests mention on the show, like how to properly build a community. What was your idea behind starting this business and having those different arms of the business? Andrew: They came in stages, so in a nutshell, left the corporate world and got my teeth in eCommerce for starting in 2008 on a couple different eCommerce businesses and built those up. So, I had a sense of this space and nobody was talking about eCommerce unless it was like from a Home Depot or like a Lowe's, like a, you know, Fortune 500 style? Stephanie: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Andrew: And so I started writing about what it's like to grow an eCommerce business for a small team or a single founder and developed a little bit of a following on the blog, started podcasting, and then from there that kind of just naturally led to me meeting all these great people and I thought what if we got a bunch of people in a community together that had some kind of vetting thresholds and just made sure everyone had some level of experience? And that launched the community and built that up over time and then the capital arm is fairly recent, really recent in fact, it's about five or six months old. That just came as a natural extension of seeing all these interesting entrepreneurs that hopefully we'd built some trust and report with, or that people knew about us from the time running the business. And then also just a really great group of investors who also had not just money, but a lot of in the trenches experience and advice to lend, so it kind of came in stages. Stephanie: Yeah, that's really cool. To start with the community aspect, what are the vetting procedures that people have to go through? How do you know who to bring in to keep it a high quality community? Because I think that's biggest problem when you're getting in all these Facebook groups or communities, you're like, "Oh my gosh, just everyone's in here and I'm actually not learning anything." So, what does it look like to get into your community? Andrew: Yeah, you're right. I mean, if I could only do one thing well in a community it would be bring the right people into it. So, our guidelines are a little nuanced but you need to be operating a seven figure business. If you have a very proprietary product that you've made from scratch or that is a little harder to make sometimes we'll take people in kind of the mid to high six figure range. If you're selling just on Amazon usually we require a little bit more than that, so that's on the revenue threshold sides. Andrew: So, we keep it no major SaaS vendors, and then for service providers we're really careful. I'd probably say only 10% of our applicants that we accept are service providers and they need to be recommended by an existing member because you can... An amazing email marketing expert that knows the space, that is respectful of people and isn't going to come in at a hard pitch and is going to build relationships the right way through adding value, is a huge asset. But we want to make sure those are the type of people we have and not people who are just trying to sign somebody up on the first day, so. Stephanie: Yeah, that's really important. How many people are in your community now? Andrew: We have about 1,100 members in the community. Stephanie: Okay. How did you go about building that up? What is your method of bringing new people into the community? How do you get in front of people and even tell them about eCommerceFuel? Andrew: Community building's interesting. You've got this chicken and an egg problem, right? Stephanie: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Andrew: And the way that I did it was when I was blogging and podcasting early on about eCommerce, just over that probably 12 month period really focus on not trying to monetize the business or anything, just trying to build authority, get a little bit of a reputation, and connect with people. Over the course of a year, just naturally, organically, met about 100 to 150 really interesting people. And any time I did, I'd just put a little tag on them in gmail and say, "Community seed member." Stephanie: Oh. Andrew: So, a year in a had this list of 150 people and I reached out to them and said, "Here's what I'm doing. I'm starting a community, are you interested?" And then over the course of about 30 to 45 days I dripped in, I added, about four or five people a day. I'd bring them in, I'd introduce them, I'd introduce them to other people, I'd ask them questions, kickstart discussions, and so it gradually grew. I didn't just drop everyone in at once, and it took about like 45 days but we had a bit of a community at that point. And then from there I had over the last year built up some traffic to the website, was able to put up a page that said, "Hey, here's the community. You can join," and that gave us kind of... because you need both things, right? Stephanie: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Andrew: Like in community you have to have new people come in because you always have a drop off even in the most healthy. So, from it was able to kind of, with a lot of work, get to self sustaining within probably 18 to 24 months, so. Stephanie: Wow. Yeah, that's great. And it is a paid community? Andrew: It is, yes. It's a paid community, so it's... yeah, it is. It's $99 a month. Stephanie: That also helps... Okay, yeah. I'm sure that also helps with quality and bringing in people who are serious and really want to learn and contribute to get their monies worth. Andrew: Oh, it helps so much. I mean, for a couple reasons why. We have, just like you said, on the vetting side, yeah, it shows that people are actually serious about this. The other nice thing is it gives us the resources to do things like hire a real community manager. We have someone full time that their whole job is just to vet people to make sure that if people have questions that don't get answered they can move them to the right people. It let's us invest in technology, we've probably poured six figures plus into the custom tech for the community, so yeah, it makes it a lot easier. Stephanie: Yeah, that's really cool. When it comes to keeping the community engaged, because to me that's one of the biggest things to make sure people keep renewing their membership and they want to check in everyday and see what's new and see who's talking, how do you go about keeping them engaged? And maybe what have you seen works and what didn't work? Like any tests that you've done where you're like, "We've tried this and this failed," or, "We tried this and this really increased engagement a lot and helped keep it going?" Andrew: I think the best thing you can do, two things, the first thing is to actually have discussion and content that are highly relevant to what people are doing day in and day out. So, again, kind of going back, if you get the right people in the same room that's 80-90% of the battle. From that point, setting up custom notifications is really important. So, some of the custom tech that we've talked about, when people sign up we don't just blast them with every single discussion that pops up, that's crazy, right? They'd just drowned in a fire house because we have like 5,000 comments every months in there. But we do try to figure out like, hey, what are you an expert in and what are interested in learning about? And then when they join we tailor their notifications to try to create the highest level of a signal to noise ratio possible, and so that's another thing. The third thing is just maintaining a really respectful environment, like we have a pretty strict no jerks rule. I probably shouldn't say this, but I get a lot of pleasure out of throwing people who are just downright disrespectful and just, you know, kind of just generally unpleasant out of our community because they're horrible. Stephanie: Yeah, good. Boot them. Andrew: And also non-solicitation. We kind of have a one strike, one warning, and then if you do it again you're out. So, we don't put up with pitches, you know, if people are hard pitching stuff they're out. So, I think those are the big things that help with maintaining an active community where people keep coming back to. Stephanie: Yeah, those are such good points and it's not only applicable to your business but even thinking about any eCommerce business of how to build up... I mean, everyone talks about building these communities but how do you actually make it helpful and personalize it to people in a way that people want to engage on your social media post or they want to engage on your blog or tag themselves wherever they're in your clothing or with your mug or whatever. So, I think these lessons actually can apply across industries as well and not just upon building a community like you're doing. Andrew: Yeah. Community building, it's interesting, it's kind of like a brand. It is a brand. It's insanely hard to get up and running, like the amount of time and energy and love and relational just work that you need to put in, I don't say it in a bad way, but just building relationships takes a tremendous amount of work. It takes a ton of time, just like building a brand. But it's insanely defensible, I mean, if you're willing to put in that, you know, if you have a multi year approach. You can't steal people's friends, right? Stephanie: Yeah. Andrew: And that's what happens, whether you're building a community for your brand or kind of a micro niche community like this for eCommerceFuel, is people come in and they stay because they get value and they stick around for a couple months but then they come to an event, they connect with people via PM, and then build genuine friends. I don't know, you'd be hard pressed to tear me away from my good friends and it's really defensible in that department, so. Stephanie: Yeah, I agree. I love that. So, you probably get a lot of really good insights into the world of eCommerce and where things are headed just by some of the questions that some of the members in your community are asking each other, and I wanted to know what kind of top questions do you see occurring right now where it's like quite a few people are asking the same type of question or these same things keep popping up? Andrew: Yeah. Let's start with the 500 pound gorilla in the eCommerce space, and that's Amazon. Some of the questions I think people are asking on there is how do I... I'll just go through a handful of them and then maybe we can talk about ones that are most interesting to you. If I'm selling to wholesalers, should I let them sell on Amazon? How do I control my brand identity on Amazon? There's some interesting popping up right now about how... I don't know if you've noticed this, but Amazon Prime used to be for awhile it was free shipping, then it was two day, and it was one day, and now it's like- Stephanie: Yeah. Andrew: ... three to five days if you're lucky depending on where you live. Stephanie: Yeah, I did notice that and I was like, "What's happening here? Usually I can get my stuff for my son in like a day and now it's taking a week." Andrew: Yeah. It's kind of crazy, and of course because of just with COVID eCommerce is blowing up, the capacity is limited on the delivery networks. But it's interesting because it kind of levels the playing field at this moment in time for independent brands because the shipping factor is not so much of an issue, and in fact a lot of people are probably are almost in... If somebody gives you something and takes it away it's worse than if they just had never given you anything to begin with, right? Stephanie: Yeah. Yeah, yeah I feel way more sad right now than I ever would have before this. Andrew: Exactly, right, because the expectation's there. So, that's creating an interesting opportunity. One of the things that Amazon just recently came out with I think in the last couple days was re-introducing... Way back, I don't know, two, three, four, I don't know how many years ago, multiple years ago, you used to able to ship your products from Amazon's warehouses to customers. You could use them as a 3PL fulfillment center without Amazon branded boxes. They changed that for many years and just this week I think they changed back to saying, "Oh, actually you can use our fulfillment services with your own proprietary boxes," or at least with unbranded boxes. And I think potentially... Who knows why they did it, it was kind of perplexing to a lot of people, but perhaps because they realize that they're losing on the shipping game and other merchants maybe are starting to migrate other places and if independent merchants are able to deliver the same shipping without Amazon maybe more then we'll move off. And one thing that we've done, we've done a State of the Merchant Report for the last three years, and our one for this year should be hopefully coming out fairly soon. But a trend that is really noticeable is the number of people that are going to Amazon is really... it's not reversing but it's plateauing very significantly. Andrew: And even just chatting with merchants and seeing a lot of case studies, people are taking a lot harder look at is it worth going on Amazon for how much channel risk you take on, how much loss of control of the consumer that you give up, you don't have addresses, all these things. They're just taking a lot harder look at is this good for my business long term? Stephanie: Yeah. So, do you think 2020 will show that a lot of people are pulling back from Amazon? Andrew: That is a good question. I think not a lot of people, but I do think when we released the report I made this prediction in the report too, so very likely could just fall on my face in the mud here, but I think the percentage of people who sell on Amazon, it was about 55% of all stores that we surveyed last time, I think that will decrease a small amount. I don't think we're going to see a precipitous drop but I think it goes from 55% to maybe 54 or f... I think we start to see that inflection point. Stephanie: Yeah, that's really interesting. The one thing I also read in your 2019 report was about the different marketing channels that people were using and I saw that Amazon ads had the highest ROI but not many people are using it, so I'm wondering what are your thoughts around that aspect of using it as a marketing tool? Andrew: Yeah. No, it's... Wow, good prep work. If you're on Amazon, Amazon ads you have to have a... people reported them being the most effective sales channel that they use. So, if you're on the platform they work really well, so definitely should be doing that if you're on the platform. I think it's just more of a... it's not a question so much of should we use Amazon ads if you're on the platform, you absolutely should. It's more of a question of do we want to be on Amazon in the first place? But, yeah, for people selling on Amazon they work really well. Stephanie: Yeah, okay. But then the other interesting thing I saw was that the average order value was way lower for... because if it's maybe a direct to consumer site or anywhere else people can maybe stack on additional things from your brand, where I think I saw on Amazon the average order value was much lower which makes me think you're not getting that, hey, you should maybe also try this from my brand and this from my brand as well and kind of increase the cart value. Andrew: I think that could definitely be part of it. I think a big part of it too is that if you have people on Prime there's no free shipping threshold, right? Have you ever ordered a... what's a good example here? Like a $3 koozie and it shows up and you're like, "How did they pay for the shipping for this? They lost money on this." Or even better, you order a $7 paperweight set that weight like 10 pounds and they ship it. There's no threshold so it's easy to impulse buy small stuff on Amazon. Stephanie: Yeah. Good point. Andrew: Whereas if you're buying from an independent merchant not always, but more often than not you're going to have some kind of free shipping threshold. So, either you're intentionally going to seek it out or you're buying multiple things so I think that probably also has a big part in why those order values are different. Stephanie: That's a good point. That's a good reason to look further into data and not just look really quickly like I did through the report. So, what other trends are you thinking are happening either right now, because a lot's been changing because of COVID and things are kind of just all over the place where some people are struggling, some people aren't. It seems like the market is changing quickly. What other trends or things happening do you see that people are surfacing in your community, or are you building into your next report coming out? Andrew: Yeah. So, eCommerce obviously no surprise here is just exploding, and we did a survey, this was in March when the world was falling apart and nobody knew what was happening and it was much more uncertainty than there even was now, and you saw early on in that you kind of saw a very big dip for the first probably week when COVID really started spiking and being taken seriously. And then you saw kind of half and half, half the businesses were doing okay or growing and half were failing, now I'd say you definitely have some businesses that are really struggling. If you're in the event space, if you sell items in the event space, any of the kind of in person things are having a hard time, but by large I'd say most of our stores are doing, you know, most of the industries are doing really well so that's fantastic. One thing that's tough, it's a downside, and anybody who's selling is probably going to be aware of is just the sales tax issue in the Unites States is just an absolute disaster, just on making- Stephanie: Tell me a bit about that because whether- Andrew: It's just a dumpster fire. Stephanie: I don't know if I... well, I actually probably have avoided anytime I see tax I'm like, "Oh, no thank you." So, I would love for you to dive in a bit and tell me why is the sales tax a disaster because [crosstalk 00:18:28]. Andrew: Yeah, so I'll try to be somewhat brief because you could probably talk about this for quite awhile, up until two or three years ago pretty much the case was if you... The only places you had to collect sales tax for was if you had Nexus in a state. So, if you had... I run a business out of Montana and Arizona, so Montana doesn't collect sales tax and so traditionally we've only had to collect sales tax in Arizona. There's a big Supreme Court case that came across in 2017 or 18. It was Wayfair versus South Dakota and pretty much the shakeout from that was that the Supreme Court said that states can require sellers that are outside of their state, they have no physical presence in their state, if they sell to a customer within their state they can collect sales tax on them if they reach a certain threshold. If they sell either a certain dollar volume in that state or if they have a minimum number transactions for that state. And it could be as low as 200 transactions and $50-100,000. So, the problem that causes is that now you have companies who create this economic Nexus and now all of a sudden they have to be responsible for collecting and submitting sales tax not just to 50 states but to potentially sometimes all these different municipalities and cites, and just creates a disaster of a compliance thing. Andrew: So, you've got companies that have sprung up to try to deal with that, and one top of that, if you sell on Amazon, technically if you have inventory... Normally, you send your inventory into Amazon and they a lot of times will split it up in three or four warehouses so it can be delivered quickly. Well, technically now if you have those inventory in those four states you have Nexus in those states and you have to also collect sales tax. So, it's just on the Amazon front, on the independent front, it's just created... We don't have any central governance for this. What I think would be best is if the federal government kind of took it over and said, "Hey, we'll create a national sales and redistribute." But at the moment you either have to deal with an insane amount of complexity, especially as you get larger, or you have to run the risks of being out of compliance and facing huge fines. It's a really rough place to be. Stephanie: Wow. How are you seeing eCommerce companies tackle this? That is not something that I've even thought about honestly, and it kind of scares me to ever start an eCommerce store now. Andrew: Yeah. There's a lot of different ways. Sometimes there's places... I have a company called The Tax Valet that helps out, they do a really good job. Kind of a personal hands on approach to doing this. Some merchants will use SaaS software like Taxify or TaxJar to be able to do that kind of stuff, Avalara as well. And some people just roll the dice and say, "Hey, this is a nightmare I'm not going to try to deal with this," so there's a lot of different... it depends on your risk tolerance, it depends how big you are, but people are taking a lot of different approaches to it. But to do it right it's really unfortunate. Stephanie: You'll have to hire someone. Andrew: Yeah, hire someone or really go deep on the SaaS side of things and dive in. Stephanie: Yeah, that sounds messy. Well, earlier you were talking about the howling out of eCommerce and I wanted you to talk a bit about that because we're talking still about the trends and what it's going to look like in the future, and I thought you had an interesting take on that so I'd love for you to go over that if you could. Andrew: Sure. And again, of course totally could be wrong here, but when I look forward into the future I feel like Amazon's going to be hallowed out in the sense that, or excuse me, eCommerce is going to be hollowed out in the sense that you have... On one side, you have brands on Amazon that sell either one or two things, they're either well known national brands, like the... well, I don't think Nike sells on them anymore so that's a bad example, but the... Why am I blanking on big national brands here? Tide for example could sell on there or Rubbermaid or Adidas, brands people... household names. They sell on there because it's just they know that brand, they go find it, and they want to buy it. You have people who are selling really small things, like we're talking about koozies or you needs stapler, or maybe you need a little backyard pool for the fact that your cousins are coming over and you really don't care if it breaks in three weeks and so you buy that. But then for anything in the middle that's like kind of not a huge national brand but also something that you want to have that's quality, I think a lot of those companies are going to start... people are going to buy much more from the companies themself, direct to consumer. Andrew: Because they can merchandise them better, the shopping and check out experiences are getting easier. I think brands are increasingly not going to sell on Amazon because there's, in addition to all the things we talked about, you also have huge IP issues and people ripping you off. So, I think that's going to be the hallowing out of eCommerce when Amazon's going to be a big donut and in the middle a lot of people are going to be selling directly on their own sites just because it makes more sense for all the reasons I mentioned, so. Stephanie: Yeah, that's interesting. We've also talked a bit about the conscious consumer that's kind of rising out of all this and how people are starting to care about what is the source of this product, is it actually sustainable? Is it a quality product? And less about can I have more and more focused on quality and sustainability. Have you heard that trend as well in your community? Andrew: Yeah, I would say I think that's something that's been kind of gradually increasing over the last five to 10 years. I think more than anything how it ties into our conversation is that Amazon over the last couple of years, and they've been fighting it and they've done some, to their credit, they've done some things to combat it, but they still have a... If you buy something on Amazon most people are not going to think it's... there's a little bit of a thought that it's probably not high quality, a little bit of a stigma for buying stuff on Amazon especially if it's not a name brand. Part of that- Stephanie: Even the name brands people wonder if it's it... is this a legit name brand, I've seen that a lot in comment and reviews. Andrew: Oh, totally. Partially because of review manipulation, partially because of counterfeiting, and partially because there's just a lot of... I mean, there's everything on Amazon so how do you filter through it, right? Stephanie: Yeah. Andrew: So, yeah, I think that's part of going back to that [inaudible] about the hallowing out of eCommerce unless it's a brand you absolutely have faith in or it's something that you don't care about the quality. Would you rather buy one of those borderline things from Amazon and roll the dice with an unproven brand, roll the dice with one of those mid-tier brands being counterfeited? Or, especially if you can get it just as quickly either because Amazon is shipping stuff really slowly or because increasingly independent merchants can deliver it more quickly with some of these other options via straight from the horse or straight from the source rather. So, yeah, I think for me that's how the quality issue ties in I think to the larger discussion. Stephanie: Yeah, that makes sense. Do you think that is why the drop shipping model has kind of decreased? I saw on your report that that is not as big of a thing as it used it, and I just remember... maybe even like last year, over the last couple years that was a huge thing. Everyone just said, "Start a eCommerce company and just drop ship things and let other people take care of it for you." What are you seeing with the drop shipping trend? Andrew: Yeah. So, when we talk about drop shipping I think it's important to differentiate two different things that come into people's minds. One is drop shipping, you can build a great high quality business based around drop shipping. A couple of businesses I started were drop shipping based businesses, one of them's still, under a great new owner, is still doing well. Really at the end of the day it's less about the product quality and more about how it's delivered. So, like Home Depot for example, they drop ship a ton of their stuff, some of their even big name brands because they're can't afford to hold everything in stock and that can potentially work out reasonably well. I think where it got a really bad reputation with all AliExpress side of things and so where- Stephanie: Yes, that's the stuff I read. Andrew: Yeah, right. And that's a whole different ballgame, and for people who, you know, if you're not familiar with that the 30 second version is you go onto AliExpress which lets you pretty much ship pretty much ship products directly from the factory in China to consumers in the US very cheaply through some kind of loopholes in the postal service. You can set up a store really quickly but by and large the products are garbage. They're just crappy, so that I think is where... There was a big rise in that, people ran that for a while, tried to run with that, but the problems were you couldn't build a brand around it because the products were awful, and because it took weeks to get your product to your customer, and probably because most likely if you're launching one of those businesses you know nothing about the product, so. Stephanie: Yeah. Never seen it, you don't even know if it'll make it or not. Andrew: Yeah. But even on the other side I'd say, that all aside, even if you're selling really good quality products, Amazon in the last five years has completely solved distribution. When I started for awhile I sold trolley motors, I sold CB radios, and back in those days you really could get a business up and running purely by sourcing a relationship with a wholesaler, doing a decent amount of marketing, having reasonable customer service and you were in business. But like today if you know what you want to buy, you know the brand, and you want it at a fair price, at a reasonable quickly you're probably going to go to Amazon for something you discreetly know that you want. So, Amazon's solved, at least before COVID and probably still I'd say a large degree, they solved distribution. So, how do you add value? You got to add value through some other way, usually that's through a lot of education or a really curated product line if you're going to sell existing products and those can be harder to get right. So, I don't think drop shipping is completely dead but I think it's gotten significantly harder versus even just two or three years ago. Stephanie: Yeah, that makes sense. So, one question I always try to ask on here is about metrics and data, and with access to your community I want to know what kind of metrics do people talk about as their success metrics or what do you hear people debating about when it comes to metrics behind if a business is doing well or not? Andrew: Yeah, I think the one everyone loves to talk about is revenue, right? But I think that's probably a pretty horrible metric to use. It's easy, and we're totally guilty of it, that's one of our thresholds for even membership. So, guilty as charged, I'm going to slay myself along with everyone that I slay here. We use it because it's easy, we use it because it's socially acceptable. It's way easier to say, "I do three million in revenue versus I made $600,000 last year. It's also way easier to say, "I did three million revenue," than, "Oh, I only made $20,000 last year and that was I didn't pay myself anything," right? Stephanie: Yeah. Andrew: But metrics that I think are most important, one that... To be totally frank, in the community we don't talk a ton about... a lot of our conversations really don't revolve around what metrics should you track. Bottom line is a big one, of course. Conversion rate's a big one, average order size is a big one. Repeat purchase rate is a big one. And I'd say we don't have tons of conversations about them, but I think probably the most important ones to think about today are repeat purchase rates because advertising is doing nothing but getting more expensive. It's getting harder and harder to get in front of people without paying the big tech gatekeepers. So, the more likely a customer is to come back to you and needing that product the more likely you can actually build a viable long term business, that's a big one. I think profitability per visitor is a huge metric. It's harder to calculate but if I was going to run my business on one metric it would be profit per visitor to my website. And the reason I say that is because it encapsulates a lot of things, conversion rate, traffic, all these different things. Andrew: But it really makes you focus on pricing. If I would have to identify the one thing that I have done across multiple businesses in my life that has had the biggest impact and taken the least work, hands down it would be pricing. And so few people play with it. Some people can't, a lot of people can. And it's terrifying to change prices because we all fear that when you change the prices that your business is going to disappear, but that rarely happens especially if you do it in a really smart way. And what you should be maximizing is your profitability per visitor, at least for new customers at a minimum. So, yeah, those are some of my thoughts on metrics, and again we don't... total frank, we don't talk a ton about... those aren't the hot topics but I think those are some of the things to really think about. Stephanie: Yeah. So, now you've opened up, what are some of the hot topics? What are some of the heated debates that are going on behind the wall? Andrew: That's a good question. You know what, let me pull it up. Stephanie: Yeah, open it up. Let's see. Andrew: I'm going to pull it up here. Stephanie: Sounds good. Andrew: So, we have a cool little feature. Let's just surface all the top discussions from the last year. So, I can't... for confidentiality I got to be sensitive, but here's some of our top stories from the last let's say month. The story about how someone sold their brand, their business that they built over the years and just the emotional rollercoaster and what they learned, and how they were looking to hire multiple... How to use influencers on YouTube to build an eight figure business. Stephanie: Oh, that's a good one. Stephanie: Yeah, the influencer one is interesting to me because it kind of brings about the question of the social shopping experience and how the US is so based... right now, I mean, a lot of people are looking towards influencers. Whereas other markets, like China, are not really as much about that. It's more about the social shopping experience. What were your thoughts, or what was the debate when it came to the YouTube influencers and how they utilize that, and do you think that's a longterm trend? Andrew: Yeah. I think one of the big themes I've seen is that the really big influencers a lot of times are spendy and hard to track, but you could potentially get a better ROI if you focus on helping maybe working with smaller influencers either for less money or just for product. Because it's, I don't know, I don't know about you but when I'm on Instagram and I see someone using a product, and especially if they even mention it in any little way I'm immediately a little suspicious. I'm like, "Is this person really like this product or are they just getting it comped and they're having to fulfill their end of the agreement that they signed up for?" Stephanie: Yeah, especially the more popular they are, like as it goes up to the really popular famous people then I'm like, okay, do you actually use that whitening strip? How much are you getting paid for that? Andrew: Yeah, and so I don't think influencer market is going away. I mean, we've had famous people endorsing things for decades, maybe 100+ years, especially in the United States, but I do think, yeah, I just think you can also waste a lot of money on it if you're not doing it carefully. Stephanie: Yeah, I completely agree. So, on your podcast I'm thinking, this is like self serveant, so I'll go with it, but what are some of the best questions that you've asked your guests before where you continued to get the best answers or the best stories? Andrew: Oh, good question. One of my... A couple ones, I would say what's the biggest mistake, or what's... excuse me, what's the last thing you apologized for I think is an interesting one. Stephanie: That's a good one. Andrew: I think another one is what's your number? Like, what's your number to be happy, like if you had X in the bank and what's your number where you'd be happy without having anymore? It's interesting to get a sense. You get numbers from all over the place from a million to 100 million, sometimes bigger, so. Stephanie: Oh, gosh. Andrew: Yeah. A lot of the questions are very specific to the individual person and their story, but for two general ones I'd say I like those ones and get some really interesting ones those times. Stephanie: Yeah, that would be really interesting. A good kind of peak into who that person is or how they think too. I like that. Andrew: Yeah. Stephanie: So, I know we haven't gotten to talk about the capital arm of your business yet and I wanted to kind of go into what that was like starting it up and what kind of issues you were encountering when starting a capital arm? What does that look like and I want a little behind scenes for the new side of your business. Andrew: Sure. Well, thank you. I appreciate it. Yeah, and I'll say in total transparency, like I said, very early into this. We're only about four or five months into this, so still pretty new. But you asked, and specifically were you hoping to know kind of some of the hard parts about starting that? Stephanie: Yeah, like what was the... not the thought process, because that seems pretty obvious like you have this great community and you maybe see some of the challenges that are going on, but what was it like starting a investment arm and what kind of challenges have you run into so far in the first four months? Andrew: Yeah. So, what it was like, it was terrifying. And I think- Stephanie: Sounds like it. Andrew: Yeah, traditionally you kind of have these two approaches where either you go out and raise a bunch of money and then you get all these commitments and you close on it and then you have to go out and put this money to work. It's kind of your life for the next often 10 years, and it's a traditional fund route. The other route is what's called syndicate where you pretty much do deals on a deal by deal basis, which gives you a lot more flexibility but the problem is every time you get a deal you got to go pass the hat and call a million and half the people are out, you know, of those half a quarter of them decide at the last minute that... like the funding process is a nightmare on that side. So, putting it together I kind of did something of a hybrid of those two where we have a group of about 20 investors that are tentatively in. I know them, they trust me, I trust them, and there's kind of a... they signed an informal thing that says, "Hey, I'm in for the next three years for this amount of money." So, hopefully it gives us the flexibility of not have to go out and deploy money just to deploy money, but we can also can be a little flexible, and we can also have the commitment from some people to go forward. Andrew: So, that's totally on the technical fund side, probably super boring to most people. But in terms of some of the challenges, I think that the challenging thing is just the number of deals you have to look at to try to find a good deal. I mean, I looked at over 100 deals so far at some level of depth and it's just finding, A, just good companies, B, where it's a good fit for both parties, and C, where you can see it working out well for everyone. It's really hard to find good deals, especially as a minority partner that comes in to invest, especially on the eCommerce side because our approach and what we're trying to do is buy, invest, in the long run with companies to build profitable businesses, like we're not trying to flip them. And I think in tech investing you can get away with a lot of sloppiness because you're kind of swinging for the fences. So, if you have a bunch that don't work out it's a big deal, most of them don't work out. Stephanie: They don't. Andrew: But with eCommerce, our model... we're looking to do singles and doubles and it's just hard to find really good businesses that you feel are going to be around for three to five years. So, the hardest part for us has just been finding great businesses that we feel check all our boxes, so. Stephanie: Yeah, that makes sense. Is there a common theme behind what these businesses are needing capital for? Andrew: Yeah, I would say... So, financing for eCommerce businesses is tricky. There are some options out there, there's things like Shopify Capital, there's ClearBank, there's PayPal Capital, Amazon Lending, all these things, but they're expensive. They also take a... often times you don't pay them back on a fixed rate, you pay them back on a percentage of revenue which can be good and bad. So, inventory financing is a big one but I'd say the people that we talk to it was probably half and half. Half of them want money for inventory financing to grow the business and half of them just really would love to have someone who has spent $15 million on Facebook ads in their career to be able to help them and give them some high level guidance on what to do and some thoughts there, or someone who's done a lot of importing to be able to tap into that knowledge based in that network, so. Stephanie: Yeah, I agree. When were thinking about fundraising back in the day I was like, "I actually don't really care about people's money as much as are they going to help me?" Like, I really don't want the most famous investor because I highly doubt they will spend any time with me. I want the person who's ready to get their hands dirty and help me with the nitty gritty stuff that I'm looking for help with. Andrew: Oh, totally. Yeah, there has never been... There's so much money sloshing around right now, right? And so there's a lot of places that get money, which is good if you're raising money, but it's greed. I think the real value ad is the experience side and the money is just kind of a nice perk that comes along with it often. Stephanie: Yeah. Yeah, I completely agree. So, you've been looking at a lot of businesses and you have a lot of businesses in your community, what is one thing that you wish online sellers would either start or stop doing? Andrew: Start or stop doing... Stephanie: I like to throw out the hard balls. Andrew: Yeah, no this is good. I would say I wish people would start having more fun with the copy in their business. So, one thing I always... and I didn't, I can't claim- Stephanie: That's a good one. Andrew: I can't claim credit for this one, but I've always liked to try to make the copy and confirmation emails and things like that fun and interesting and a little bit different as opposed to like, "Thank you for your order. Your order is 49732. We appreciate your business." Such a great... Transactional receipts are one of the most opened emails across all emails, shipping ones absolutely, and if you're trying to build a brand there's no better point to be able to, you know, have some fun and be able to be different and differentiate yourself, right? So, I think that's a big one. You can extend that to the product packaging, your website, all that stuff. But I would say take a little more risks and have a little bit more fun. I would check out a site called mancrates.com, have you heard of them? Stephanie: No, tell me a bit about them. Andrew: They're so good. They're so good. They sell fun gifts for men, so for example, instead of ordering your dad a tie you can order him a 16 inch by 16 inch wooden crate of beef jerky and steak rub that he has to open with a crow bar when it shows up to his house, Like stuff like this that's different. Stephanie: Oh my gosh. Andrew: And the copy is freaking just hilarious. So, check them out if- Stephanie: Oh, that's good. I'll have to check that out. Andrew: Yeah, they're really good. It's just you're buying an experience for the recipient and people pay up for it, so. Stephanie: Yeah, now more than ever with people not going out as much, not going in stores and stuff, you do have to figure out how to differentiate yourself. And I think that's a good point that, I mean, right now I'm even thinking I bought something and I'm getting the actual logistics email of DHL or whatever will be shipped at this time, and it's all this other text that I don't care about, so it's like, "Okay, I actually don't care about this email that's coming through." And if they would've made it unique and fun and exciting... like I don't even know what this is that I bought, that's how bad it is. There's no branding or anything, it's just coming apparently. Andrew: Yeah, if they were like, "The DHL guy had a wreck but your package was so important that he grabbed it from the fiery box and he crawled with one arm bleeding out and he handed it to the last person he saw and said, 'Deliver this, please. Deliver it to Stephanie,' and then he died." Stephanie: Oh my gosh. Andrew: That might be intense and maybe it doesn't work for all brands, but it sure as heck gets your attention and you're like, "Whoa, this is interesting." Stephanie: You need to write for our brand. I'm going to bring you on our team, Andrew, just for your copy. I need that. Oh man, that's good. All right. So, I want to do a higher level eCommerce question because I just think you're, one, you're willing to take a risk and you're willing to predict the future which I like. I appreciate that. So, I want to hear either what disruption is coming to eCommerce that's not already here, because a lot of people have said, "Oh, COVID's the biggest disruption." That answer's already been taken, so either the biggest disruption or you can tell me what the future of online commerce looks like in five years. Andrew: Biggest disruption coming, I'll try to tackle both of them. Biggest disruption is I think that... man, it's just coming from the guy. You talk about be willing to predict the future, I made a bet with somebody when Amazon was $200 a share that Alibaba was gonna out pace it. And now that Amazon is $3,000 a share, it was a humbling experience and it cost me a very experience steak dinner. That being said, here's my prediction... Stephanie: That's all right. I want your prediction still. Andrew: I would say the biggest disrupter, oh man... I'm going to throw a couple things out there, I think text is going to be a big one, SMS. But that's not like a big disrupter as much as just a new marketing channel that us marketers can leverage for awhile until we completely destroy texting for everybody which will probably take three or four years. Stephanie: That's a good one though. What are thinking around using that as new marketing channel? Andrew: Oh, I just think, I mean, if you look at the... I think email is just getting harder and harder unless you really want to hear somebody's email. So, I just signed up for the service HEY, are you familiar with that from Basecamp? Stephanie: I've heard about it and I seen a bunch of drama on Twitter about it, so. Andrew: Yeah. There has been... probably between them and the App store and all that kind of stuff? Stephanie: Yes, yes. Andrew: Yeah. So, one of the reasons I signed up for them is because they have this thing where you can screen your emails now, and the first time you get an email from a new sender you can say, "Hey, I want this person to pop in my inbox, or no, Johnny, from Michigan I don't care about your boat covers. Don't ever talk to me again. It's unsolicited." So, that kind of thing, I think email is going to be... there's going to be more and more tools and services that let you curate your email and really slice down who gets to hear from you and so email is going to get harder and harder. But if you look a just text message delivery versus email it's an order of magnitude higher engagement, readability, click through, et cetera, and I think that marketers are already, I mean, they're already starting to do that. People that I know that are on the leading edge have five, I haven't six figures, but definitely seen some good mid tier five figure SMS lists and they just do really well. So, the problem is you got to be really careful because when people text me about things that I'm not interested in... like texting for me is very personal. I text my wife, my family, my good friends. Andrew: I don't text with Bobby's Boat Shop in Michigan, and if he sends me a promotion via text I'm going to be pissed off. So, you got to be really careful about how you use that but I think that will be a big marketing channel going for, so. Not really sure if that's really a disrupter and it's already kind of here in some regards but I'll throw that one out there. Stephanie: Yeah, I like that. I think that's a good one though to think about how to be careful when you start using these new channels, because completely agree. I've had I think someone just texted me this morning who's like, "I'm the education blah, blah, blah person of your district." I'm like, "What are you texting me right now? Don't." Andrew: Oh, totally. You can really... and I think there's some pretty stiff penalties for not being careful about that in terms of if you just spam people via text, which is good. But yeah, nothing's worse than getting a text from someone you really don't want to hear about, so. Stephanie: Yeah, I agree. All right. So, next we have a lightning round, if you're ready, Andrew. It's where I'm going to ask you a question and you have a minute or less to answer. Andrew: Perfect. For each question? Stephanie: Yeah. Andrew: Awesome. Is there like a booing sound if I go over so I stop talking? Stephanie: No, it'll just be me, "Boo! Boo!" in the background. Andrew: Do it, do it. Stephanie: All right. What's up next on your Netflix queue? Andrew: I don't really... Oh, actually I do have... what is it? They're in Arizona, there's a place called Biosphere 2 where they locked all these people into this kind of self contained environment as a training mission to go to Mars, and they isolated them from earth atmospherically for two years, and surprise surprise it was a huge trauma fest. Can't remember the name of the movie but that's what I'm watching next on Netflix. Stephanie: Oh my gosh, that sounds insane. Andrew: Spaceship Earth is the name of the documentary. Stephanie: Spaceship Earth, okay. I will have to check that out. Very interested in that, and I also pontificate about Mars sometimes on our other show Mission Daily, so it's perfect for me. Andrew: Oh, perfect. Watch it tonight. Stephanie: All right. Where are you going next for your travel destination when you can travel? Andrew: Probably down Tucson, Arizona where... I'm up in Montana right now, but probably Tucson, Arizona which is where we live, so. Stephanie: Cool. Andrew: That's kind of a cop out. I need a better one. Stephanie: Wait, you live in Montana and you live in Tucson? Andrew: We're up here, we spend some time in the summertime up in Montana just to see family, friends, like that. Stephanie: Oh, cool. Andrew: Yeah, so we're heading back there soon. Don't have any plans at the moment but the next big trip I would like to take would be to Mongolia. Stephanie: Oh, that would be very interesting. Do you have an Instagram? I'll have to follow along when you go there. Andrew: @capalisthippie, so. Stephanie: Okay, I'll follow you. If you were to create a Netflix original, what would it be about? Andrew: Oh, this is easy. It would be... I'm fascinated with the question of where is the balance between running a business and being ambitious and chasing entrepreneurial success and having a great life and traveling and seeing your family and nurturing other side of yourself, and I feel like so few people get that right. So, my documentary would be pick 12 entrepreneurs from varying levels of that spectrum, live with them and follow them for two months each and try to come to some conclusions about if you were going to try to design your life to be able to maximize both of those, where's the line? Stephanie: Yeah. That's a really good one. I need help with that right now. Andrew: I think a lot of us do. Stephanie: Yeah. What podcast guest are you trying to get on that you just can't get, like they're just not responding and you really want them? Andrew: Oh, that's a good one. I think awhile we were trying to get Tim Ferriss on the show, which is super cliché. It didn't work out. Stephanie: Ouch. Andrew: Yeah, I know. I'm still upset about that, Tim. What is the favorite piece of tech that makes you more efficient? Andrew: Good question. I would say text expander is a big one so you can do saved replies and bump those out. Yeah, I'd say that's probably one of my favorite. Asana is another great one. I love Asana for we manage all our SOP's and long term projects there, so I'd say those two. Stephanie: Yeah, completely agree. I like them. All right, the last one, what new eCommerce tool are you hearing about that a lot of people in your community or outside of it are having success with right now? Andrew: I would say there's a tool called Bonjoro, and it's not necessarily just for eCommerce, but it allows you to send custom welcome videos to people really easily. If you think about sending a video to a customer it's probably not the filming that's the hard part, it's probably like the okay, I have to film it and then I have to send it, and then I have to edit and export, and it just lets you cue up these emails, send videos to people for kind of nicer customer service touch. So, yeah we use that for onboarding for a lot of our members and I've heard people have good luck with that, so. Stephanie: That's cool. Well, Andrew, this has been such a fun interview. Where can people learn more about you and eCommerceFuel? Andrew: Yeah, if you like podcasts, which at the end of listening to me talk for 45 minutes you prob are- Stephanie: Do you want more? Andrew: ... a glutton for punishment, yeah. I would love to have you as a podcast listener on the eCommerceFuel podcast, so you can get that anywhere you get podcasts, iTunes or elsewhere. But yeah the big home is just eCommerceFuel.com, so you can learn about the community there if you're a store owner and want to get plugged in or if you have an interesting business that are looking for either money or probably more importantly some expertise from a group of really experienced eCommerce investors. Yeah, I would love to have a discussion with you. So, eCommerceFuel.com is the best place for all that stuff. Stephanie: Well, it's been a blast, Andrew. Thanks so much and we will see you next time. Andrew: Yeah, this has been fun. Thanks for having me on.

 Know more about SEO and how it can help boost your website's visibility and interaction Discover the advantages of having some basic knowledge of SEO in the growth of your business' website Learn how having the right SEO can help increase your visibility online Resources/Links: Free SEO Report. Get Your Free SEO Report: https://hikeseo.co/free-seo-audit/ Summary Does it trouble you to get your hands on the perfect SEO for your website because you either don't have the budget to hire an SEO agency or you just don't have any knowledge about it? Andrew Allen has been on SEO, search engine optimization, for more than eight years. He has helped a huge variety of clients from one-man bands like to international retailers. He now runs a very interesting service called Hike SEO. It's a platform that helps small to medium-sized business owners conquer Google. In this episode, Andrew shares his insights on how important it is to have the right and proper SEO for your business' website in order to increase its visibility and interaction. Check out these episode highlights: 01:50 - Andrew's ideal client: “So, our ideal client is someone who owns a website, or small business that runs a website and understands that the visibility online is important. So, making sure that their business is visible, Google where their customers are searching for products and services. So, they understand the power and the volume that Google has.” 03:32 - Problem Andrew helps solve: “Yeah, yeah, exactly that. So, it's making sure that your business is found on Google and whether that's, if you're a local business, you might only be found at, you know, the top of the Google Map results. Now that requires some methodology to get to that. Or perhaps e-commerce site, you want to get to the top, like, above all every e-commerce store. Or you're a service-based business and you want to get to the top of the regular organic listings. Yup, that's the problem that people have.” 04:50 - Typical symptoms that clients do before reaching out to Andrew: “So, one common route people take to us is that they potentially use an agency before, they might have hired a freelancer, a consultant, or use an SEO agency. They might not have seen the results they wanted them. They've spent a lot of money, you pay for someone else's expertise and for them to learn SEO previously, right? And they might not have been aware of what the SEO agency was actually doing. There's a lack of transparency in our industry. Many business owners say, "I was paying for SEO but I didn't know what they would do," you know, "I wasn't aware of what was going on." And the thing about Hike is it just takes away all of that lack of clarity, it makes it completely transparent. You know exactly what's happening, exactly what you need to do to improve yourself. And it's not rocket science. SEO isn't hard, it's very nature.” 06:33 – Andrew's Valuable Free Action (VFA): Go and get Google Search Console setup, that's a great starting point. " 07:11 - Andrew's Valuable Free Resource (VFR): Free SEO Report. Get Your Free SEO Report: https://hikeseo.co/free-seo-audit/ 08:08 - Q: What's the future of SEO in five years? A: I think people need to start thinking about voice search. Now that makes sense, I use my Google Home a lot of time, people use Alexa all the time. People ask their search engines a lot of questions. People went to buy shoes before they go to Google their searches. Now they'll ask their Alexa, or their Google Home they'll go, "Okay, you know, where can I buy my shoes,

 Know more about SEO and how it can help boost your website’s visibility and interaction Discover the advantages of having some basic knowledge of SEO in the growth of your business’ website Learn how having the right SEO can help increase your visibility online Resources/Links: Free SEO Report. Get Your Free SEO Report: https://hikeseo.co/free-seo-audit/ Summary Does it trouble you to get your hands on the perfect SEO for your website because you either don’t have the budget to hire an SEO agency or you just don’t have any knowledge about it? Andrew Allen has been doing SEO, search engine optimization, for more than eight years. He has helped a huge variety of clients from one-man bands like to international retailers. He now runs a very interesting service called Hike SEO. It's a platform that helps small to medium-sized business owners conquer Google. In this episode, Andrew shares his insights on how important it is to have the right and proper SEO for your business’ website in order to increase its visibility and interaction. Check out these episode highlights: 01:50 - Andrew’s ideal client: “So, our ideal client is someone who owns a website, or small business that runs a website and understands that the visibility online is important. So, making sure that their business is visible, Google where their customers are searching for products and services. So, they understand the power and the volume that Google has.” 03:32 - Problem Andrew helps solve: “Yeah, yeah, exactly that. So, it's making sure that your business is found on Google and whether that's, if you're a local business, you might only be found at, you know, the top of the Google Map results. Now that requires some methodology to get to that. Or perhaps e-commerce site, you want to get to the top, like, above all every e-commerce store. Or you're a service-based business and you want to get to the top of the regular organic listings. Yup, that's the problem that people have.” 04:50 - Typical symptoms that clients do before reaching out to Andrew: “So, one common route people take to us is that they potentially use an agency before, they might have hired a freelancer, a consultant, or use an SEO agency. They might not have seen the results they wanted them. They've spent a lot of money, you pay for someone else's expertise and for them to learn SEO previously, right? And they might not have been aware of what the SEO agency was actually doing. There's a lack of transparency in our industry. Many business owners say, "I was paying for SEO but I didn't know what they would do," you know, "I wasn't aware of what was going on." And the thing about Hike is it just takes away all of that lack of clarity, it makes it completely transparent. You know exactly what's happening, exactly what you need to do to improve yourself. And it's not rocket science. SEO isn't hard, it's very nature.” 06:33 – Andrew's Valuable Free Action (VFA): Go and get Google Search Console setup, that's a great starting point. " 07:11 - Andrew's Valuable Free Resource (VFR): Free SEO Report. Get Your Free SEO Report: https://hikeseo.co/free-seo-audit/ 08:08 - Q: What's the future of SEO in five years? A: I think people need to start thinking about voice search. Now that makes sense, I use my Google Home a lot of time, people use Alexa all the time. People ask their search engines a lot of questions. People went to buy shoes before they go to Google their searches. Now they'll ask their Alexa, or their Google Home they'll go, "Okay, you know, where can I buy my shoes, or what's the best style?" Tweetable Takeaways from this Episode: “SEO isn't hard, it's very nature.” -@hike_seoClick To Tweet Transcript (Note, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)

Episode # 2 of the OTD Podcast. Here I interview Andrew who grew up attending the Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School in Livingston, New Jersey. We discuss some of his struggles challenging the Jewish Teachings he grew up with. Specifically, how he was able to reconcile some of the conflicts he had with his family with his beliefs diverging from theirs. We also discuss some of his Libertarian political beliefs and how they relate to his Orthodox Jewish upbringing. Below is a snippet of the interview transcript: [00:00:00] Jeff: [00:00:00] So my first question is, where are you from? How did that place and those people that lived in that place influence your life. [00:00:08] What about influencing my life? Okay. I'll say it again. Where are you from and how did that place and those people where you're from influence your life? [00:00:17] Andrew : [00:00:17] Sure. So I'm from Northern New Jersey. I grew up in a small little town called Bernardsville, New Jersey. [00:00:28] I had never spent a day out of Jewish day school or Yeshiva. I'm not sure if a particular location influenced my life so much. I kind of feel like modern Orthodox communities are the same everywhere you go. I don't know if I have much to say on that topic. How they, each place is a little bit like the still the neighborhood might have some interesting nuances that are a little bit geographically. [00:00:55] I actually grew up, I lived not directly in the Jewish community [00:01:00] that I was a part of. I lived a little further away and drove 30 minutes every day to a Kushner Yeshiva where I was for middle school and high school. My parents actually became religious later in life. They both grew up somewhat conservative. [00:01:16] To a larger extent, my dad had kind of a religious awakening when I was around seven or eight. Something happened in one day, but it was slow over the course of years and years and years, and he became more and more religious than. [00:01:33] My school was a Jewish school that wasn't associated with any movement. there's a term for that. Jeff: It's called non-denominational Andrew I went to a non-denominational lower school, and the fifth grade, and then, you know, as they were becoming more religious, they switched me to Kushner which was a modern Orthodox school for middle school and high school. [00:01:52] Jeff: And what would you say your father was sort of Bal-Teshuvah? Andrew: So it's kind of interesting. I don't, it's, you wouldn't use that term for himself though. He [00:02:00] He wouldn't use that term for himself because I don't think he believes he's become religious as he should be. [00:02:07]So what's kind of interesting is my parents were somewhat a conservodox, actually, I would say when I was growing up. So they, when, I mean growing up and as I got older they became more religious. So after. after I was maybe 12 or 11, that's when they really, I think they peaked in terms of their religiosity. [00:02:25] And so, what that meant really was that my, they, they definitely believed Orthodox Judaism was correct and they wished they were closer to Orthodox Judaism, but because of the circumstances of living further away from the community, it did present some problems in terms of Shabbat and driving. So for example, they would, they were, the, what it ended up being was they would never, you know, touch your TV or electronics on Shabbat but they would be a little more okay with turning the lights on and off. [00:02:50] It was more about the spirit of Shabbat than it was about holding to the exact letter of the law.

Episode # 2 of the OTD Podcast. Here I interview Andrew who grew up attending the Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School in Livingston, New Jersey. We discuss some of his struggles challenging the Jewish Teachings he grew up with. Specifically, how he was able to reconcile some of the conflicts he had with his family with his beliefs diverging from theirs. We also discuss some of his Libertarian political beliefs and how they relate to his Orthodox Jewish upbringing. Below is a snippet of the interview transcript: [00:00:00] Jeff: [00:00:00] So my first question is, where are you from? How did that place and those people that lived in that place influence your life. [00:00:08] What about influencing my life? Okay. I'll say it again. Where are you from and how did that place and those people where you're from influence your life? [00:00:17] Andrew : [00:00:17] Sure. So I'm from Northern New Jersey. I grew up in a small little town called Bernardsville, New Jersey. [00:00:28] I had never spent a day out of Jewish day school or Yeshiva. I'm not sure if a particular location influenced my life so much. I kind of feel like modern Orthodox communities are the same everywhere you go. I don't know if I have much to say on that topic. How they, each place is a little bit like the still the neighborhood might have some interesting nuances that are a little bit geographically. [00:00:55] I actually grew up, I lived not directly in the Jewish community [00:01:00] that I was a part of. I lived a little further away and drove 30 minutes every day to a Kushner Yeshiva where I was for middle school and high school. My parents actually became religious later in life. They both grew up somewhat conservative. [00:01:16] To a larger extent, my dad had kind of a religious awakening when I was around seven or eight. Something happened in one day, but it was slow over the course of years and years and years, and he became more and more religious than. [00:01:33] My school was a Jewish school that wasn't associated with any movement. there's a term for that. Jeff: It's called non-denominational Andrew I went to a non-denominational lower school, and the fifth grade, and then, you know, as they were becoming more religious, they switched me to Kushner which was a modern Orthodox school for middle school and high school. [00:01:52] Jeff: And what would you say your father was sort of Bal-Teshuvah? Andrew: So it's kind of interesting. I don't, it's, you wouldn't use that term for himself though. He [00:02:00] He wouldn't use that term for himself because I don't think he believes he's become religious as he should be. [00:02:07]So what's kind of interesting is my parents were somewhat a conservodox, actually, I would say when I was growing up. So they, when, I mean growing up and as I got older they became more religious. So after. after I was maybe 12 or 11, that's when they really, I think they peaked in terms of their religiosity. [00:02:25] And so, what that meant really was that my, they, they definitely believed Orthodox Judaism was correct and they wished they were closer to Orthodox Judaism, but because of the circumstances of living further away from the community, it did present some problems in terms of Shabbat and driving. So for example, they would, they were, the, what it ended up being was they would never, you know, touch your TV or electronics on Shabbat but they would be a little more okay with turning the lights on and off. [00:02:50] It was more about the spirit of Shabbat than it was about holding to the exact letter of the law. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Eni and Andrew discuss how to approach traditional religions from a place of respect. They explore some misunderstandings and how to get around them. They also talk about the realities of practicing from a distance.  Both share from their journey in two different lineages in two countries. This conversation is important in the wider dialogue of appropriation going now around traditional knowledge.  Be sure to check out the bonus episode on proverbs around this topic for Patreon supporters here.   If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  You can find Eni on her site here or Facebook here.  Andrew is as always here.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew Transcript   Andrew: Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I am here today with Eni Acho, who is an Orisha practitioner and priestess. She runs a wonderful Facebook group, but also ... website's called About Santeria, where there are lots of great conversations about the traditional practices and approaching the traditional practices of Orisha traditions, especially centered in Cuba. I think that given what I've seen more and more online and other places in conversations with people, this conversation about how do we approach a traditional religion as outsiders, is one that I think is really important. Andrew: I think that there's a lot of misunderstandings, I know I had a lot of misunderstandings or misconceptions about what things might be like. I think that these dialogues are important and obviously for my own personal tradition, but I also think that some of these conversations apply to any other traditional religion that you might approach as well. Eni, for those who don't know you, give us the lowdown. Who are you? What are you up to? Eni: Hi. My full Ocho name is Eni Acho Iya, which means the yellow dress of my mother. That's because I'm crowned to Oshun. Oshun is always associated with the color yellow. I was crowned in Palmira, Cuba and my lineage is called Palmira lineage. It's called the countryside or [inaudible 00:01:47] in Cuba to distinguish it from maybe what you might find in Havana or Mantanzas. But Palmira is one of the traditional centers of the Lucumi religion in Cuba. It was founded by the descendants of slaves who were taken to that part of Cuba to work in the sugarcane fields. After they were emancipated, they founded their own town, Palmira. Eni: It has three of the most traditional and oldest Lucumi religious societies in Cuba. The Sociedad Santa Barbara, Sociedad San Roque, and mine, the Sociedad el Cristo which is associated with the Sevilla family. A lot of people who practice Ifa know the name of [inaudible 00:02:30] or [inaudible 00:02:32] famous Babalawo's from Palmira. And that's my religious family, the Sevilla family. So I guess that's probably who I am, religiously speaking. And I've been running this website "About Santeria" for around six years, I think. As an educational website that aleyo's, outsiders can go to, to get basic questions answered. And just recently I created this page you referred to on Facebook so people can discuss some of the ideas. I'd like to invite anyone who's interested to take a look at that and welcome to the community if you decide to join us. It's a good community. I think lots of very knowledgeable priests in there and good conversations are taking place, so I'm happy with that. Andrew: I think it's great. There's lots of really knowledgeable priests, which is a great part of the equation. They're all, at least all the ones that I know, personally or through online interactions, they're all really solid people as well. Which is a really important part of that conversation too, right? Just because people know something doesn't necessarily mean anything anymore. There's this distinction that can happen between those things. That's one of the things that I also dig about that space and why I'm actually hanging out there as opposed to other spaces, where maybe people know stuff, but their character isn't as inspiring to me. Andrew: One of the things that I find really interesting is this idea of the distinction between what's going on now in a general way, and how stuff was a little while ago, or how things still are in certain parts of the world. Right? So you're from ... your practice and your connection, your family is in Palmira. What's it like there to sort of be born there and live there and practice this religion from that place, from a sort of real traditional community structure? Eni: I feel really fortunate to have had glimpses into everyday life there. I've been going there for over 20 years. And because of my work, I've been able to go and spend considerable amounts of time, like three months at a time, six months at a time, because my university here in Washington state has an exchange program with the university of Cienfuegos. And as an academic, that gave me a license, as ... the United States, it's not always that easy to go to Cuba, but because of my academic license, I've been able to go to Cuba pretty often, spend a lot of time there and really get to know the people very well. I've literally seen a whole generation of people grow up and I know what it's like from their point of view to be born there and be surrounded by this community. Eni: And I think it's important for your listeners to understand that this need that we have as outsiders, as people living in a different culture, we're always thinking, "how can I get in to that community"? Or "how can I get into the religion How do I find my way there"? It's always this destination or goal that people are looking for. And the big difference to me is that for people in Palmira, you're already there. You don't have to look for anything. It's all around you. It's in the air you breathe. And that's not to say that every single person that lives in the town is initiated in a religion, they're not, but certainly their neighbors are, or their cousin or their aunt or their grandma, people down the street. It's everywhere around you. And so if you have a concern, if you want to go get a reading done, you don't have to wonder where can I find a Babalow, where can I find a Santero? They're right there. And everybody knows them. Eni: There's a lot of accountability because literally these same people have lived there and their ancestors have lived there for 150 years and everybody knows who everybody is. Small town in Cuba, you don't have secrets. And I think that that makes it a really different experience because I've seen babies in their mother's arms at drumming ceremonies, because our ceremonies, our drumming for example, tend to be open to the public, people who live in Palmira, everybody comes and the whole family comes. So you have babies that can't even walk yet in their mothers' arms who are keeping time to the rhythm of the drum. And they are totally comfortable in that environment and they grow up with that. I've seen four year olds playing with their little stuffed animals, their bunny rabbits and teddy bears, and they're acting out an ocha ceremony that they've seen their parents do. So when you grow up with it all around you, that takes away a lot of the mystery. So it's not secretive. It's not hard to find. It's there. Eni: Our tradition in Palmira tends to be, for the most part, that we don't initiate very young children. Most people, if their family is religious, everybody in their family tends to get initiated, but they always leave it up to the individual to decide once they reach a certain level of maturity. And so typically you'll find people not getting initiated until maybe they're in their early twenties. That's changing. People now are doing more younger children, but we believe that it's not everybody's destiny to be initiated. That has to be something that's determined on an individual basis. But there are lots and lots of families where half the brothers and sisters are initiated, half aren't, and the cousin show up and they help out with the cooking and the cleaning before and after the ceremony. So everybody is involved in it and everybody feels connected to it, whether they're initiated or not. It's very comfortable. It's very organic and natural to just have it there. And that's such a different experience from what most of us outside Cuba. Andrew: I was in Matanzas last year playing for egun, for my godmother, passed away. Some of the things that struck me were, first of all, everybody knows everybody as you say. Right? You know, we're driving around the city with my godfather and he's like, "Hey, pull over" he leans out the window and has conversation with somebody and they'd keep going. Secondly, I don't know about architecturally in Palmira, but in Matanzas there are no windows on the windows, the doors are open. It's hot and you want those breezes. And so we're there doing the formal meal that's part of the ceremony and neighborhood kids who people know, or maybe they're children of people who are there, drift in, say hi, act like kids and run at the back and go and get some sweets or some food-[crosstalk 00:10:08] and they leave. Andrew: We were doing the drum in the front room and there's no ... the window's open and people are just walking by looking. People are walking by and they'll just start having a conversation with somebody who's there that they know. And it's very different than my experience of other things which it's done in somebody's house probably in their basements where do you see it? You don't see it anywhere. Right? As opposed to there. And also, as you say, driving around, you drive around and Oh, is that another drum going on over there? Oh yeah, it is. We should go by, Oh, is that another drum going on over there? There you go. You know? Eni: It's exactly like that in Palmira and it's hard to hide a drumming ceremony when the houses are so close together and all the doors are wide open. And everybody kind of spills out into the street and that interaction you were describing what the kids coming and going and people coming in and out all day. That happens literally every single day. When I'm in Palmira, I feel like I'm sitting in my godmother's house but it's like a train station with people coming and going and just, "Hey, what's going on?" and "anything going on?" And they have, you maybe know this expression in Spanish, radeo bemba, which means word of mouth, how the word spreads really quickly from person to person. So if somebody is going to have a drumming or somebody who's got an ocha birthday party or whatever's going on, everybody in the town knows everybody and they're very likely to just go by and drop in And see what's going on. Andrew: I think that this sort of leads to this idea of what does it look like to, as I said, is what are we looking to arrive in? I mean, really one of the things that we're looking for, whether we understand it or not when we start out is, we're looking to be welcomed into somebody's family. Eni: Yes. Andrew: We are looking to build a relationship and a connection hopefully to the community, to those people. I was at an event, I'd been hanging out with the Orisha community in Michigan where I was initiated 19 years now, 20 years, a long time. And we were having a conversation and somebody mentioned something and I'm like, "I was there when ... I helped make that person, I helped make that person, I helped make this person. I was there when this person was made, but I wasn't made yet". And there's this like longevity of connection, right? Whereas a lot of people sometimes come to these things with this idea that you're going to just arrive and be welcomed in, just arrive and suddenly everything's great or just arrive and you suddenly can get access or get recognized or whatever. But it's not really that way. I mean ideally it's not that way, right? Eni: No, you're absolutely right. And I think that a lot of this has to do with our understanding and we use the words in our religion. We talk about aleyo's, outsiders, strangers literally. And people in our culture tend to find that a little bit offensive. They think that means that they're not welcome. But in Cuba, that's not what it means. We simply differentiate for ceremonial purposes the people who are initiated, the Oloricha's. They have a certain role, a certain function, they do certain things. And if you're not initiated, you do other things and the rules are not identical. There is a hierarchy there. Not based on your worth as an individual or how smart you are or anything else. It's just are you initiated or not initiated? If you are, go in that room, if you're not going the other room. Right? Eni: I think Americans and, I don't know, maybe Canadians as well, people from outside that culture had a really hard time with that because we here in the U.S. where I live, we have such a consumer mentality and we identify something that we want and then we think "I'm going to get it. It's my decision, it's my choice. I'm in control of the process, here's my money, how much does it cost? Here's the money, okay, now I have it and it's mine." And they expect some kind of immediate acceptance or, "now we're the same. Okay. Because I paid my money and I'm just like you." And that is not how it works. Andrew: No, exactly. And that sense of entitlements that can be there is definitely a problem. And I think in two ways. One, as I know you do too, I get contacted by people sometimes who are like, "I need you to crown me" and I'm like, "my friend, I am not ... I don't even know." Why would I choose to incur a lifelong and perhaps more than this lifelong connection with you as being responsible for your spiritual wellbeing and to some extent your practical wellbeing forever, when I've never even met you. You know? So that's the challenge. And then the other side of that, of course, in a world where we're approaching people that we don't know who are not aleyos, but complete strangers irregardless, there's not that community knowledge of you should go see ... whatever, right? It should be because "I think they could be a good person for you, I think they could guide you, this person's a renowned diviner you should go see them." You don't have that connection. Andrew: And so all of these people, no matter what we think we know about them from seeing them on social media, they're all strangers too. And that's where so much of those problematic situations where people will be like, "Sure, yeah, absolutely. You've got the money, just give it to me, we'll be good." And then it's not good because those people on the other side are just looking to take that money and take advantage as well. It's a big problem. Eni: It's a big problem. And I think that a lot of it has to do with the fact that people just get too impatient and they want it now. And a lot of times they don't even know why they want it and they don't even actually know what it is. And so the process always, in my opinion, has to be organic. It has to happen in kind of a natural way, right time, right people, right place. And you can't force it. I think that that's the key thing. You're not in control really. It's going to happen when the Orishas and your egun want it to happen. And the more you push and resist and try to get it all to go your way, I think you're just creating a lot of trouble for yourself. Andrew: One of the expressions that ... I didn't have the pleasure to meet your magua but a very famous oricha who's connected to my godparents ... one of the expressions that I hear, they used to say a lot was, "no, no, what you need to understand is, orisha is the boss here". We as people, we have our say and we get to make our choice. And it doesn't mean we have to accept everything or ... it is a relationship. But at a certain points your orisha needs to be the ones that we trust to dictate and to find the right time and space and, and all of those things. It's like the proverb, "every head is looking for its home". Not every little person, not every house, not everybody's situation is in right alignment for anybody. Right? Maybe someone comes to Palmira and they're like, "Oh, this actually doesn't fit for me". And not pushing there, not trying to push ahead one way or another makes the most sense in that situation. Eni: My own experience I think is a good example of that because I went to Palmira for the first time just because I was invited to somebody's house for dinner and I had absolutely no intention of making ocha there. It wasn't even on the horizon for me. I knew about the religion, I liked it, I was interested in it, but kind of from an academic standpoint. And I went to dinner at a colleagues house, a professor from the university and she introduced me to another professor from the university, her neighbor who lived the next block over and he turned out to be the head of the Sevilla family, a familia who was running a casto at that time. Eni: And I just became friends with that family and visited them for years, just dropping in and having coffee and chatting with them. And I wasn't showing up on the doorstep all the time saying, "teach me about the religion I want in help me, you have to be my godfather. It happened in a very gradual way where I started getting readings. I think most of us began that way where we get readings that guide us. Eni: Then over a long period of time, year. Little by little it came out that I needed to get this or I needed to get that. I got my warriors, I got cofa de orula and then it wasn't until I got cofa de orula [inaudible 00:20:06] in eka, was that I eventually needed to make ocha, and that was really stressed. Eventually, one day before you die. And my godfather said, "Think about it. Don't do it now. You need to kind of wrap your head around this and think about what it means and take your time and do it when you're ready". And I don't know, about four, three or four years later, it just happened like serendipity. That's what we're talking about here. These things just kind of all come together magically almost. I got a sabbatical from my university, I got a scholarship, it was a grant, that paid me to go to Cuba to do this research project I was working on and that turned out to be the gear I was able to make ocha because I was able to be in Cuba. Eni: And that's the experience I wanted with those people that I have known for many, many years and it just happened in a very natural way. And if someone had said to me 15 years earlier, "Oh yes, you're going to go to Palmira and make ocha". I would have said, "what's Palmira I don't even know what you're talking about." Andrew: I think that it's, even for me, I went looking for the religion. I had been explore ... doing Western ceremonial traditions and initiatory groups for a long, long time. And I had sort of hit this place where I felt like I really needed to connect with something deep and traditional. I was trying to figure out what that was, where this was in a pre-internet era. It wasn't like you could just jump on Facebook and find a bunch of things. And eventually I found my way to the community in Michigan and even at that, although I received my elekes and my warriors, I still was involved in that community for eight, nine years before I was crowned. I was one of those things like, "yeah, someday you should do that". Andrew: You should start putting aside your money and when you have the money you should think about doing it. One of the things that I noticed with people I have conversations about it now sometimes is they get to the end of the reading and they're like, "okay, but what do I need to receive? When do I need to make ocha?" One of the questions that I often returned to them with is, "well, is your life horrible? Is your life a hot mess? Are you sick? Are you like having horrible problems? You're reading doesn't say you're magically afflicted? Is there something going on? Your life is a disaster and you need to be saved from it". They're like, "Nope". I'm like, "man just keep living your life and as you need things, stuff will surface if you need things". Andrew: And I think that's another thing that, we don't understand. I didn't understand fully myself, even though I was aware of it going into it, is this notion that within the tradition, these things are medicines of a sort. They're there to either provide very specific kinds of guidance or specific energies or to counter specific energies so that we can live our life to the fullness of our destiny. As opposed to being things that we can collect or accumulate or that give us status or those kinds of things. You know? Eni: That's exactly right. That's how I feel about it too. And, and I think it's hard for people to understand that maybe they don't want to hear it when they're so enthusiastic and so determined that this is going to be their path. That's what they want to do. And one of the things that I hear a lot, and I think you do too, is people get frustrated and say, "okay, you're telling me to be patient, but what am I supposed to do? Just sit here and wait?". They want tips, how can I do something to make me feel like I'm moving forward? And so I actually do have some suggestions if you're determined that you want to learn and do more with this religion, I have some kind of practical tips that might get you started. Andrew: I'd love to hear them. Eni: I break down things into little lists, but I think many people begin with kind of an academic approach to it. So they read books and you mentioned 20 years ago we didn't have as many resources as we have now. Now we have the internet, we have lots more books than we used to have. We have all these religious forums on Facebook and many people are offering online classes of this kind or that kind. And all of those approaches are limited. I think that's the first thing I want to stress is that there's nothing wrong with reading books. There's nothing wrong with reading stuff on the internet, but there are lots of buts attached to that, lots of limitations because yes, there are some good books out there. Fortunately, thank goodness people like Willie Ramos is writing really good books on David Brown and other people who have the credentials and the research methodology down. And what they present is accurate and very good and very helpful. And that's always great to read. Eni: But I remember when I first started looking for books on religion, there are some really wacko books out there because now anybody can publish a book. It's all self publishing. You might go on Amazon and look for books and you might find 20 different titles and you just don't know which ones are good and which ones are not good. You can read the reviews but those are always written by somebody's friend and they don't necessarily tell the truth. You have to be careful when you're reading books too. First of all, evaluate the source. Who is this person writing the book? And if they say magic moon goddess has been practicing 300 world religions for the past year and a half and she's the author of this book on Santeria, I would not necessarily consider her a reliable source because if she's not even initiated what does she know about the religion? Eni: But if it says, "Willie Ramos is a professor of history who wrote his thesis on Havana in the 19th century" and whatever, and he has written these books that are published by university presses and published in scholarly journals. For me, that's an indication that those are serious things that I can read. And even after I read them though, I remember when I first started reading some of those books like David Brown's "Santeria Enthroned". It's a great book. Eni: But I didn't understand it. I was reading it and half of what he was talking about I had no idea what any of that meant and it took me years to realize that I was going to have to piece together all of this information I was accumulating and put it into some meaningful pattern because to my knowledge, there's not one book, a Bible that you just go to and it tells you everything you need to know. Every book will tell you a little bit or something, but nobody's going to tell you the whole story and you have to decide how does this information fit in with other things. You have to analyze it. And the same is true, especially on the internet because there is some good stuff on the internet but there's also a lot of terrible misinformation and the religious forums are the same. Andrew: One of the things that's really important to understand is, not only is there not one book that can tell you everything, It wouldn't even be possible, Right? Like the scope of this tradition is so massive. And when you start talking with someone who's an elder [inaudible 00:28:41] they're a knowledgeable Babalawo, whatever right? Someone who has lived in the tradition for such a long time, the amount of things that come up that are just different situations. I was at a ceremony recently and the person running it was like, "Oh yeah, you know what, your name's Oba tilemi right? Because I know the sound for that one." And so they sang the song that relates to my ocha name, which maybe I had heard it before, nobody had highlighted it, but I never pick that up before because there are so many songs for Shango. There's so many songs for everybody. There's so many stories, there's so many pieces and ceremonies and ideas and advices that it just expands in an unbelievably sophisticated way. Eni: They say the more you know the more you realize you don't know. It truly is a lifelong, lifelong process. But reading books is not a bad place to start given all these limitations that I've talked about. Because I think the positive thing about it is that way at least people who are interested and burning and to know something, feel like they have a little bit of control. Like, Oh, I found a book, I'm so excited and that's great, but it's limited. And eventually, like you mentioned earlier, this is about belonging to a community. And so sooner or later you have to get out of the world of books and meet people in a religion. It must be a personal experience and you must become part of a community because you cannot do this on your own. Eni: And you know that's full of challenges as well because then you have to say, how do I meet these people and are they legitimate? Are they going to cheat me? Is this community a good fit for me? You have to consider things like your physical proximity, because if you're like my ocha community is in Cuba and when I made ocha there, I had to decide, am I going to be able to go back to Cuba on a regular basis? Do I have the money to be able to travel? Does my job allow me to go there whenever I want? Eni: You have to really think about these things because if you don't live near your ocha community, you've got to travel. You know that. You also have to think about the language and the culture, and this just completely confuses me. I hear about people who go to Cuba, they don't speak Spanish, they know nothing about Cuban culture. They make ocha, they're there for a week and they go home and then they say, "I don't have a good relationship with my godparent". I'm like,"well, who is your godparent"? "I don't know. Some guy that lives in Havana." Eni: If you don't speak the language, if you don't know the culture, how can you fit in that community? How can you learn anything? And like you mentioned, you also have to consider a character there of the people. Are they upright people? Are they honest people? Do they have good reputations in the community? I've been talking just about the Lukumi practice, which is my practice. But for a lot of people who are at the very early stages, they have to decide what branch of this religion do they want. A lot of people want traditional Yoruba and they want to know about those practices in Nigeria. I don't know about that. I can't teach you that. I'm Lukumi. Andrew: Well I think that's also a whole other branch, right? But the problem remains the same. You and I would likely have equal ... we'd be next to ground zero by just dropping into Nigeria or wherever. I'm just going to go hang out with some traditional people. It's a roll of the dice. Right. You just never, hopefully it's good, but you never know given that every other day I'm befriended on Instagram by a Nigerian Prince wants to help remove the curses on me if I'll just send them a bunch of money by wire transfer. That stuff is out there, it's everywhere. Eni: And not only that, but our actual ceremonies are different and we have the same basic route. But, I only know how to do ocha ceremonies in Cuba and if I went to Nigeria, I'm sure they do it differently. I can't just walk in there as a functioning priest and expect to be accepted in this community because I don't know anything about them and they don't know anything about me. Before you waste time reading a million books on Lucumi, and then you decide I don't really like Lucumi, I want to be a traditional Yoruba. Make that decision first I think. And focus on what resonates with you. Andrew: I think one of the other things that I would say if you're reading books and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this as well, is the more a book on Orisha tradition talks about what you could do or should do on your own, the more likely I am to think that it's not helpful at all. There are some folks that there where they're like, do this super power Orisha bath and it's like, well, probably not right? These things come from, ideally come from, divination or they come from the ashy of an elder who speaks of where they come from. You know, an Orisha possession.And they don't come from, "huh, I really wish that this was different, maybe I should do this thing", right? Eni: I honestly don't think a reputable priest would write a book like that. I'm sorry, that probably sounds really harsh. But the books that I value ... Andrew: Please, feel free to be harsh, that's fine. Eni: The books that I value are written either from a historical perspective, maybe I'm just a history buff. But that really, really helped me to understand how this religion came to Cuba and how it transformed and who are founding mothers and fathers were and how the religion spread. And having a historical foundation, to me, has just been so valuable. That really helped me. Eni: And I also like books, like the most recent series that Willie is doing where there's a whole book that's just about, Oshun and another book that's all about Obatala and he talks about, these are the songs and these are the prayers, and these are the herbs, and these are the characteristics of Oshun and these are the different roads. That's great. Because it gives you more profound insight into who that Orisha is. But it ... I never ever have found a book helpful that starts telling you, "okay, you're not initiated but you can still throw the shells and learn how to read them and do these spiritual baths and make up all this stuff. And you don't need a priest and you don't need to be initiated". If I see that, I throw that book in the garbage. Andrew: Yeah, that's totally fair. I think one of the things I think is also significant and understanding tradition is one of the things about understanding initiation, especially, well even becoming, just taking on somebody, becoming someone's godparents, you're becoming part of, in a way that lineage, right? That lineage is tied to those people and to those places. My lineage goes back to Mantanzas and when I was there with my godfather, he took me to meet certain people and certain Orishas who are close to the sort of origin of that. And there's this living legacy of those connections from me to my godparents, to their godparents and so on, all the way back to the beginning of this tradition as it stands now in Cuba and then beyond into sort of the, the reaches of history. And that's really significant. That's a really important part of this tradition because without that lineage, in some ways nothing happens, right? Like what happens without that. Eni: That's exactly how I feel. I feel so grateful to be able to go to a place like Palmira and [inaudible 00:37:22] when you go to Mantanzas, same thing, it's like you have a very clear sense of this is where it comes from. I'm connected to this and it gives you such a grounding that it ... I don't even know how to explain it, but it's just really powerful. And I want to connect to something that you said earlier because when you were talking about somebody just contacting you out of the blue and saying, I want you to be my godfather, or please initiate me immediately. Here's the money. I think it's important that people understand that priests have to be selective about who they choose to initiate because it's a big responsibility. Like you said, it's a lifelong commitment. Eni: And if I don't know you and you turn out to be a crazy person, I'm bringing you into my religious family. I'm bringing you into my house and you're going to disrupt everything and make everybody miserable and cause trouble. I don't want that. There really is this kind of trial period and a lot of people who want an immediate access are so put off by that. They'll say, "I went to somebody's house and I asked them to be my godfather and he said, no". Well that's because he doesn't know you and it's premature and it's like you said, why do you need to be talking about making ocha right now? There's nothing to indicate you need that. So this idea that priests should be available 24/7 and a lot of people think "Oh, our religious communities or our centers or wherever we do our ceremonies. They imagine it like some kind of community center or maybe a Christian Church where there's this physical building and there's a little office attached and the priest gets paid a salary and sits there 9:00 to 5:00 and receives people. Eni: And to my knowledge, I have never seen anything like that in our religion. We do our ceremonies in our homes most of the time. And I'm not going to invite a stranger into my home. It's my home. That can really be off putting to people who are new to the religion, but they need to understand that you have to gain someone's trust. They just think they're protecting themselves. Like, "how do I know my Godfather's not a crook and he's cheating me"? Well, that is a concern. You need to know that. But at the same time, the godparent is looking at the potential godchild saying, "is this person a good fit? Do I want to do something with this person"? And people don't like to be judged. They think, here's the money, take it, give it to me. Andrew: No, for sure. I think it's kind of like asking somebody to marry you on the first date. It doesn't make sense. And if the person agrees, well, 99% of the time you should be really suspect about that because that person's got some issues. Go deal with those issues, right? Eni: Exactly. Or it could be like "we have never met, we just know each other from Facebook. Do you want to get married"? Andrew: It's such an interesting modern phenomenon. Right? Eni: Yeah. And another thing that's connected to this that I think is really difficult for newcomers or people who are looking for the way in, is they don't understand that some knowledge in our religion is only meant for priests. It's not open library, here's all the information in the whole world that anyone can access. Traditionally it's been passed by oral communication from generation to generation. You learn it from your elders, you learn it from hands on experience, some information you simply cannot know before you've been through the ceremony yourself. So when somebody comes with a million questions and the potential godparent is saying, "I can't tell you about her. That's not for you to know", Or "that's something only priests do". People get offended by that and think, "Oh, it's secretive they won't share their knowledge". Andrew: I think it's one of those things, and also depending on what we're talking about, I think it's fair for people to ... for the keepers of the tradition to honor the tradition by managing where that information goes. And if they think you're going to be online telling all your friends about this and that and making orisha baths and selling them on the internet when you're not even initiated or whatever, then probably they're going to hold that back as well. There needs to be the evidence of respect over time. Eni: Yeah, for sure. Going back to my little tip sheet though, after the recommendation of get to know people in the religion, sometimes people don't even know how to do that because they say, "where I live there isn't anywhere, It's not visible or I can't find it". So sometimes you have to start with just a wild goose chase in a sense that you might look for some public events that are advertised maybe on Facebook or in your community. Somehow you might look for like a tribute to Oshun at the river that's going to happen on such and such a date and everybody's invited. You make a point to go to that and you can meet some people. Or maybe if you get invited by somebody you know to an ocho birthday party or a drumming, definitely take advantage of those kinds of invitations that come your way. Eni: If you don't know anybody in the religion who could invite you to something, you could even just start with universities in your city or cultural centers, because a lot of times they'll have performances of some kind that's related to Afro-Cuban culture and there might be dance ... Orisha dancing or there might be drumming as performance. There might be lectures, films, scholars who work on that topic. And that's a place that you can meet people. If you just go to the performance or the dance, you might meet somebody who would then invite you to something. So I think that's a pretty safe way to do it if you can find something like that to attend and just keep going. You're going to see the same people showing up and you'll start talking to them, they'll start talking to you. That's a good way to meet people. Eni: Botanicas, a lot of people will say, "Oh, I went to the botanica and I met somebody". I think that can be good. There are some good botanicals, but there are also some shady ones. Andrew: So many shady ones. Eni: Yeah, so many shady ones you have to be really, really careful. You can't just walk into a botanica and assume that the person behind cash register is an orisha, maybe they're not. You can't just go in there and buy a bunch of stuff and ... be very, very careful about the botanicas. It's possible you could meet somebody legitimate there, but it's very likely you're going to meet as a person who wants to scam you. Andrew: The thing is, because I run a store, right? It's not a botanica the sort of sense that it focuses on orisha stuff in that sense. But it's not that dissimilar either. I sell candles and herbs as well as a bunch of other stuff. But I think that that's where also ... do some reading and know what it's really about, and what things are and so on, that you can ask the person some questions and see what happens. Andrew: There was a time where I sold more orisha specific stuff and people would come in and they'd start asking me questions, who were initiates and then they quickly realize, "Oh yeah, okay, this guy's an initiate, he knows what's going on". You could have a certain conversation about stuff and that doesn't need to mean that you need to be an initiate to know about that. But you could be like, "Oh well, where were your initiatives? Who are you an initiatives? What's your lineage? What's your orisha?" or whatever things that can come up and you can gauge things from that person that way and sort of feel them out a little bit. Eni: Absolutely. And by all means, don't walk into a botanica with a wad of money in your hand and say, "I want to get initiated". That's not going to work out well. Or they'll say, "my uncle can initiate you, step in the back room". Go ahead. Sadly that has happened so you have to be careful. Eni: I think social media is similar in a sense that you can be on these religious forums and you can meet some great people on social media. I met you on social media. There are definitely some good connections to be made on social media, but you have to be so careful and don't just put out there, "Hey, I'm looking for a godparent who wants to initiate me". There are also charlatans on social media. You don't know who's who's going to grab you. So for me, the most reliable starting point, Sooner or later you've got to get to a point or you can go get a reading, a consulta. And by that I mean by an orisha or by a babalawo who will use the traditional divination tools of orisha to tell you what's going on with you. I have nothing against taro cards and psychic readings and all these other things. But that's not how you find out what's going on with oricha. Andrew: Exactly. I've created and made an orisha tarot deck that is not for marketing orisha things. It is for exploring and understanding the philosophies and the ideas. Exploring how some of these worldviews overlap in the worldviews of tarot. But if you go and somebody says, Oh yeah, "[inaudible 00:47:51], your Orisha with my taro deck". You should get up and leave maybe even ask for your money back, because it's not what it's for. It doesn't work that way. Eni: I think that finding a good diviner is so crucial. That's to me, a turning point because if you can find a good, reliable, honest diviner, that person is going to be able to guide you. Even if that person doesn't turn out to be your godparent, that person is going to be able to hook you up with the right people if they're a member in good standing and in their Orisha community. I think that having these kind of warning signs to look out for, that's very important. You need to go understanding that if you sit down with a diviner, you've never been there before, the first thing he says is, "Oh my God, something really horrible, your children are all going to die unless you make ocho right now". If somebody starts pressuring you like that and trying to manipulate you and make you be really afraid and you have to be initiated right now, that's a warning sign to me. Andrew: One of the things I think that people ... in life there's not always solutions. But one of the things that I understand now at this point in my journey is I've been through some very hard stuff. Last year my business burned to the ground. It's not easy, life isn't always easy. But when I got a reading about that with my elder, it was so comforting. Even though there's a ton of hard stuff still in front of me, and there are ways of which we can approach difficulties and there are ways in which we can make a bowl, do little ceremonies and offerings or whatever, to make our situation better for almost every situation. And it's one of the things that I think is fascinating and different is that there's not ... sometimes there's a miraculous transformation. Andrew: Sometimes there's something you do and it just turns everything around. But there's always something to do, even in difficult times. Approaching it with fear or putting fear into the other person's heart, it's one of the worst things that I think people could do. Divination should come with solutions as well. Advice to mitigate it. And even if it comes we have this sort of orientation where it comes Okinawa, where it comes ... what you brought from heaven. Meaning you can't change it. But we can use it. You can find ways to mitigate your suffering. You can find ways to fortify your strength. There are solutions. If people are working to make you afraid, it makes me so mad when that happens. So, don't fall for it. Eni: And the solution doesn't have to cost $2,000 all the time. There are lots of solutions that are much less expensive. We always just start out with fresh water, omi tutu and coconuts and fruit and things like that. And a lot of times a simple abo an [inaudible 00:51:13], prepare some rice pudding or [inaudible 00:51:15] or whatever it doesn't have to be $2,000. Eni: I think that if people get to the point where they can find a good divine and rely on that information and understand the process of divination and what it's for, that is definitely going to put them on the path they need to be on. Because as we said at the very beginning, not everybody needs to be initiated. If your life is fine and you don't need to get X, Y, or Z, you don't need it, you're fine the way you are. And you don't need to go into the religion thinking, "I'm going to acquire ... I want to have 30 ori shots and I want to have the fanciest soperas and beautiful decorations. That's great, but that doesn't make you a more devoted orisha worshiper than the poor, simple Cuban who's just got his Orishas in a little clay pot. Andrew: I remember talking to this person and they gave all their money to buying things for their Orishas. And they're like, "well, the orisha is going to give it back to me twice as much". But then they were always broke because they were always spending all the money they got on ... You know and at a certain point you have to be mindful of the realities of these dynamics and even if the Orishas did reciprocate one of their offerings with double the amount of investment or they were so happy they blessed them, that's great. But then when you take that blessing and you turn it ... and you don't put it to use in the way it's intended. That's not helpful either. Eni: It's not all about material wealth either, because we have to remember that this religion came from, for the most part, very poor people. People in Cuba, the old people, a lot of times they didn't have anything. If they could go out and buy one apple to give to Chango on their Orisha birthday, that represented a big sacrifice. That's all they could do. They weren't going to go get a loan to buy something better, but they spent their money buying that apple for Chango and they gave it with love and they spent the whole day sitting there with Chango and praying and singing and receiving friends and godchildren. Those people are incredibly blessed even though materially they're poor, they have a really rich spiritual life. And for the most part they have long life, good health and they would say that their life is going well. Even though from our perspective it's like, "Oh my gosh, you don't have anything, you're so poor". They have what they need. Andrew: I think that it's funny because people have often a very strong reaction to the financial part of the religion, that we have to pay money for these things to happen. And I get it, it's not always easy, it can be a lot of money, especially in North America. I mean really anywhere, any Cubans, a lot of money for people who are in Cuba. Also, it's not just people ... I almost want to say their, despite the way in which money plays such a significant role in the tradition, so many of them are less capitalists than a lot of people are They're less caught up in that consumerism. And so they are way more content with doing things and being a part of things and showing up. Eni: There are lots of different ways to make sacrifice. You can sacrifice your time, you can give your attention, your love. There are many, many ways to show devotion. It doesn't have to all be about money. Andrew: Exactly. Do you have anything else on your list there? Eni: I have a little summary. Andrew: Okay let's hear it. Eni: We've talked for a long time here, it's been really interesting. But first of all, I guess I want to stress that there's only so much that you can do alone. This is not a religion that you can practice all by yourself. There's no such thing, in my opinion, as self initiation. I really don't like it when people just appropriate and steal little parts of our religion and say, "well I don't like that other part. I'm not going to do that, but I like this little part, I'm going to do this". No, you're either in it or you're not in it. And if you're in it, it means you follow the tradition and the rules of your house. You have to show respect that way in my opinion. Andrew: I want to add to that point, I live in Toronto. There are a few other people in the area, but pretty much everybody here travels to do anything of any consequence. There are no Ochas happening in Toronto, there are no whatever. What it means to, even for me, who has dedicated a lot of time to study and to try to learn the tradition and so on. There's so much that you can only learn by watching somebody do it. And whether that's how you peel the stem out of a leaf or whether that's how you put things together in a certain way. There's all this knowledge that it's just deeply practical that nobody would ever even think to explain to you because you would just see it by being in the room. But when you're not in the room and you're reading about these things, you can learn a bunch of stuff, but still doesn't mean that you know how to do anything, which is a really, I think, important distinction to understand. Eni: Oh, absolutely. That was one of my points as well, that if you're geographically isolated from a large Orisha community, you are definitely going to have to either travel a lot or move. I feel so bad for people who say "I live somewhere in the middle of Nebraska and I want to be initiated". Well unless they moved, I don't think that's going to happen unless they can travel a lot. You have to be practical. Some people live in these isolated communities where there is no Orisha community and if they can't travel and can't go anywhere and can never participate in anything, there's definitely a limit to how far they can go or what they can do. Y Eni: You do have to be proactive like we talked about, you have to get out there and look for opportunities and connections, but at the same time you have to be really careful that you don't fall into the wrong hands and you have to be patient as things happen in their own way. Sooner or later at some point you're going to need a mentor. And usually that turns out to be a godparent who can lead you along. You can only go so far on your own. Eni: My final point, and the one that is the most important that I say over and over again, is you just have to have faith that if it's meant to happen, it will happen in the way it's meant to happen and you can't control the process. Andrew: Absolutely. I think that is a great summary and maybe that's a great place to wrap it up. For people who want to follow along more with what you're doing, how do they connect? Remind us of your websites and how do they connect with your new Facebook project as well? Eni: My website is www dot about Santeria, all one word and no capital letters aboutsanteria.com. www dot about Santeria dot com. If people go to that website, there's a little button, click here to contact me, and you can write to me and I'll write back. Or you can go on Facebook and we have the About Santeria page where people can find connections on Facebook to what's on a website. And there's also the About Santeria community forum and that's open to aleyos, non initiates as well as priests and the Lucumi. I'm keeping a focus on Lucumi because I'm not qualified to talk about traditional Yoruba and I want the focus to be on Lucumi. Andrew: Perfect. All right, well thank you so much, Eni for making time to be here. We've been talking about it for a while and I'm really glad that we finally got our time zones coordinated and made everything happen. Eni: Thank you for the invitation. I really enjoyed the conversation. Andrew: Oh, it's my pleasure.

Yet another episode that begins with Andrew dropping an F-bomb. Explicit Content it is."Squirrels shouldn't be that large." ALJana was initially invited to appear on our Spirituality Roundtable but we quickly realized her experiences warranted a full episode.Psychedelics are growing in popularity for their notable benefits with mental health. Check out Michael Pollan's fascinating new book on his experiences with psychedelics and what they taught him about life and death.For a great night of memories, check out Victoria's Empress hotel.While Hugh Grant was great in Notting Hill, Sense and Sensibility and Bridget Jones, About a Boy is probably his best work. Music and Lyrics was tone deaf.Best to not offer John any stimulants, chemicals, candy, anything really. Herbal tea only please."I did want a memorable night and I had envisioned that I might end up naked in bed with my wife. But not quite like this." - JCLook for more Roundtable conversations this Spring. Next up... Why Is Sleep so Challenging?Conversations within a vacuum suck.Jana lives in sunny LA but spends as much time in Brazil as she can."Spirituality is the beautiful mystery of who we are." - JanaStations of the Cross...Fit?.....It's a real thing folks. My brother combined his 2 passions. Exercise and Jesus."Spirituality gives us tools to discover the truth of who we really are. We need to get curious" - JanaDealing with our Shadow (ego and attachment) is our most important life's work."Source loves us so unconditionally that we are allowed the freedom to believe that we are not loved. That is WILD!!!" - JanaHere's more information on the healer John of God including his arrest."Spirit doesn't have shame, worry or doubt. The soul doesn't judge, it just wants to create." JanaAyahuasca is a drink derived from an Amazonian plant/vine. When taken, DMT is released and the work begins. It is meant to be taken as part of a Shamanic lead sacred ceremony (not on a weekend back packing trip) and has traditionally been used as a "purging" ceremony. Difficult to describe, it is best experienced. Like the Matrix. :)"Can I say fucker?" It turns out you can. :) Triangular Headed Fucker to be precise.Andrew: "So.. a couple things... as you might imagine...""Context matters when you're dealing with plant medicine. The setting is everything." Jana"Intention is everything and the best work you can do." AndrewOn Protecting Yourself: "When red flags came up in the past, I'd want to paint them white. Now I listen to my gut." Jana"Freedom brings a power of creation." JanaIf you want to connect with Jana, she leads spiritual retreats in Brazil! Take the Road to Jana! :)

The gang get back together in their secret underground bunker to talk about what is new in their journeys. Andrew, Aidan, and Fabeku talk about the future of witchcraft, magic, grimoires, and how to best powder a scorpion. In a rarer moment they talk about their businesses and how they find their way forward through changing desires and capacities around working.  They also recorded a bonus for the Patreon only about how to connect with plants and build a magical relationship with them.  You can get it here by becoming a supporter.  Aidan can be found here.  Fabeku hangs here.  As always Andrew is here.  If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcription Andrew: Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I am hanging out today with Stacking Skulls, which would be my buddies, Fabeku and Aidan. We have taken submarine to our secret underground bunker. We have concocted all sorts of beverages to prop us up for this from weird poisons from some lizards and reptiles and obscure sea fish. And we have found the long lost grimmer of the monkey safe nests, which we have properly venerated before we're going to start here. Aidan: I [inaudible 00:00:42]. Andrew: Welcome to the podcast. This is a fairly regular thing that we've been doing for a while with different guests as well as one last founding member, John. And today we're getting together for the first time in quite a while, just the three of us to catch up and talk about stuff that's going on. So I'm going to skip the introductions. Andrew: If people don't know who we are, well, go back and listen to one of the other episodes. But what's going on? What's new? What's happening? What's changed? We recorded last, I would say it was just after the fire, so I think that was early, middle of summer, somewhere around there. It was the last time we talked, which is about six months ago. So this is recording. Aidan: Well, other than rating Monkey Island for the [inaudible 00:01:38], it's all been smoking scorpions, but it's just been … it's good. It's been crazy times. End of the year is always crazy. Fabeku: Awesome. Aidan: I'm married to an accountant who's also somewhat clairvoyant. So there's this combination of stuff that begins before the end of the year that is … we are kind of shifting a full year ahead or two years out. So we run on a two-year plan at this point. And so it's just working that stuff out and deciding what the focuses are going to be for that time period as best as we can, knowing that things change. Aidan: But what are the targets? What are the time frames? Can we plan that enough that we can plan in some downtime? And then for me, it's kind of backing away from the jewelry work for a while to focus on teaching and writing. So that's the big one for me. Andrew: How's the preparation for teaching going? I mean, I've seen some on social media, but what's that like for you? Aidan: It's been pretty crazy because I decided that I really wanted audio. Video was too cumbersome to try and share, I thought, and I wanted people to be able to listen to it in different places where they didn't necessarily have rock-solid internet. And so it was a weird process. Aidan: So I started recording before I was ready, which was good, so that broke me in a little bit, but it's a different way of transmitting. And so it's been very interesting figuring that out. But I like what's coming along and the allies like what's coming along. And they got, as usual with projects, way, way, way more involved than I somehow expect, so there's a lot of that shaping influence in there that is how do I work in. Aidan: “Okay. Since you're only going to give me a quarter of the curriculum, how do I make it? Either give it all to me or stay out,” is what I would like to say in some ways. But it is good, but it is okay, so if that's taken over these two sections of the class, what else are we going to run in a limited timeframe. But it's fun. It's been very fun. Andrew: It's awesome. Yeah. I really did teaching a lot. I think … I mean, I know Fabeku does too, right? Aidan: Yeah, for sure. Andrew: Yeah. How about you? What's going on with you, Fabeku? Fabeku: Let's see. Yes. End of year, I pretended that I was taking December off and then had the busiest December I've had in any year. So not so much of a break, but it was mostly busy with good stuff, which was good. Fabeku: Yeah. I mean, kind of similar to Aidan, looking at the next couple of years and figuring out what it looks like and what I want to do more of and what I want to do less of and definitely continuing to shift more and more to the teaching, the writing, the arts, a lot of art. That's my question at this point. Fabeku: How do I do more arts is the big $64,000 question. And this might be the year that I actually do a website for the arts, maybe. I've resisted that for years for all kinds of reasons, but yeah. So that might be a thing. But- Andrew: Given you haven't updated your website since 1842, I'm not sure- Fabeku: Right. Exactly. Andrew: … I'm not sure I believe you at that point. Fabeku: Yeah, that's the running joke. I've got the out-of-date website on the planet. Yeah, that's the truth. Yeah. So just tons of art stuff, which has been good. I carved out some more time in the schedule this year to finish the book projects that I stalled at the end of the year between busy-ness and health stuff and I needed to get a new laptop and some other shifts. Fabeku: But yeah, so I'm excited about that and just looking forward to, like said, more teaching, more art. Aidan: How are you doing Andrew? What do you got going on? I know that you've got the shop open in your space, so how's that going? Andrew: So much is going on right now. So much is going on. I actually took 10 days off over the holidays, which is the first holiday that I've had in forever where I didn't go anywhere or really do anything. I checked a few emails, but that was about it. And I took a bath every day, took a nap every day, really just tried to sink into that. Andrew: I read a bunch and stuff like that. And I went from feeling exhausted from having reopened the store and rubbed my life through the fall to just feeling tired. So I feel like that's a major way, right? Fabeku: For sure. Andrew: The store is going good. It's reopened in a different neighborhood and I'm still wrangling with that. A lot of the same clients of course, but lots of different people. One of the things that's been sort of challenging me about it lately is trying to account for theft as part of the process. Right? Andrew: And it's just like it's almost every retailer tells me and knows it's just a part of the deal. But in the old location, the combination of the size of the store and its location really minimized that stuff, whereas now, it's definitely a thing that I'm paying a lot of attention to. And I feel a bit like it's kind of a metaphor. Andrew: I mean, it's obviously a literal problem, but I'm viewing it a bit metaphorically for how I'm doing that longer-term planning that both of you guys are talking about. Right? I don't want to be tired. I don't want to get back to being exhausted. I don't want to feel like I'm endlessly running around from thing to thing and I can't get ahead of the Arkin and so on. Andrew: And so really, looking at what's making sense in terms of my energy and my attention, I absolutely love having the studio. I have this private studio space, which is beautiful. It's like 300-square feet. It's got a lovely set facing window and high ceilings and it's a five-minute walk from my house. Andrew: So basically, I have no excuse to not come and paints and draw and come see clients here and so on. It's just really welcoming and lovely. And just looking at where are those things that are stealing my energy, that are stealing my attention? Where are those things where I'm not enthused to show a [inaudible 00:08:46] them and where are those things or what's getting in the way of the things that I'm saying I'm going to be doing, like painting every day or whatever. Andrew: What's actually interfering with that and what can I do to adjust that? Where do I make that space emotionally more than any other way? Because practically, the time is there, but emotionally, it's not always there to continue to work on my next book, to wrap up this bacon wizard breakfast Oracle that I'm working on, all those things, right? They all have a drag on them from the tensions in the system. Andrew: And I was talking before we got on the line here about how I rolled back my coffee consumption from ridiculous levels of caffeine and sugar to a manageable level. And I don't want to go back into that space where it's overdrive and you're always pushing, pushing, pushing. It's not the kind of space I want to be living in, so I'm just being really mindful of what I'm doing with my time and where I'm putting my energy and what are the actual returns. Andrew: I mean, certainly financial but also emotionally and I don't know their levels because sometimes there's those things that seem like a great idea, but the returns are not what you thought you would get from them in the end. Right? And they ended up being, well, to be honest, a fucking hassle. It's like, “Man, why did I do this? How do I learn not to do stuff like this again?” Fabeku: I've thought so much about this in the last couple of years. I mean, in part, because the physical stuff has changed my bandwidth in a lot of ways. But I mean, I would say up until about a year, a year and a half ago with the business stuff, I was at a point where I was constantly booked nine to 12 months out. The calendar was not just full, it was kind of overcapacity in a lot of ways. Fabeku: And it's interesting because I think to a lot of people, that looked like success. I mean, every spot filled, booked forever and ever and ever, lots of money. And it was fine until it wasn't. And then when I started to deal with some of this body stuff and would have to shift stuff around in the schedule, I'm like, “This is fucking impossible.” I've got a 12-month calendar. Fabeku: How the fuck do I move these people around without causing some ridiculous cascade that goes for three months and then all of a sudden, this thing that I really worked hard to accomplish and make happen, it's like, “No, I hate this. I can't do this. I don't want to do this anymore.” Fabeku: And really taking a lot of steps in the last couple of years to just … I think for me, it was about redefining, like you said, what's important, what the returns are, what makes sense, what success looks like. And just deciding that, “Yeah, I don't want a calendar that's booked 12 months out. I don't want to do that anymore. I don't want to be scheduled every single slot of the day as sometimes I'd like to sleep in or I'd like to spend the morning painting or whatever it is.” Fabeku: And that's been a big thing and I think in some ways, like I said, I've had to do it because of some of the physical stuff, but … And in some ways, it's been one of the best things because it really required me to take a way more conscious look at, “What are you doing? Why are you doing it? And does this actually make sense? Is this the shit you want to do?” Fabeku: And all of a sudden, I looked down and it's like, “Oh no, I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this and I want to do way less of this and way more of these three or four things.” And I think that's been so much of what the last, especially a year and a half, for me has been. It's just been remixing all of it and redistributing the weight to what I'm doing and why I'm doing this. It's been a big deal. Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. I made a change when I opened the studio, coming back from the fire that I only open a month ahead of time, like a week before the end of the month usually because I realized that otherwise, you end up with these commitments further afield than you can wrangle, right? Or that aren't easy to wrangle. Andrew: And I think that one of the values to me, and I think for you too, is this ostensible freedom with being an independent person. But it's very easy to lose any actual access to that freedom of schedule, right? Aidan: Yes. Yes. Andrew: To be like, “Oh, can I do whatever?” It's like, “Oh, well. No, I can't. I have a day full of clients and I can't easily move that.” And instead, just setting up those things so that there's a limit and … Yeah, it's great being booked ahead for sure, but I don't want to be booked six weeks ahead. Andrew: I want to be two weeks ahead and then be deciding what my next month looks like depending on opportunities and other things that are going on and all that kind of stuff. Fabeku: Yeah. For me, it drove the point home when a friend of mine who lives in Florida, she wanted to come in for a visit and she said, “Well, when are you free?” And I looked at the calendar and I'm like, “10 months from now.” What the fuck is this? It doesn't make any sense. And you're right. It's that kind of thing. Fabeku: And all of a sudden, I felt like … and it's not that, I'm not saying it's the same thing, but I felt like the person that's working for somebody else that had already used their vacation time and then wasn't going to be free until next year. It's like, “This doesn't make sense. This isn't the life that I want to live at this point.” Fabeku: And for years, it was fine. I loved it and enjoyed it and it was … I thrived in that environment. But I think that's for me, why I continue to look at this coherence as a process thing as opposed to some destination. It just stopped being coherent and I'm glad that all of us have the freedom to reshuffle the deck as we need to. Aidan: Yeah. I think, I mean, it sounds like we're all very much in the same place because that's what I got hit with the jewelry, is I went from the people who buy it at whatever rate they buy it and then I build according to what they bought and then custom work in there. And I dropped that and went to like, “I'll just offer collections and see how that goes.” Aidan: And what I found was those were fine ways to actually generate enough money for us to get by. The time that it takes for me to do what I like in that or what I want to do in that process is so immense that even when I wasn't booked forward, even when I was building the collections, it's still like, “No. I need all day, way too many days out of a month to dedicate to this,” which is on one level, fine, because I love the work. Aidan: But because there's so much … and this is probably true for all three of us … there's so much emotional and magical energy tied into what we're doing that the exhaustion level was just not reasonable. Fabeku: Yeah. Aidan: And again, realizing at some point, you go, “Okay, what am I actually interested in?” And for me, it's … both me and my allies are fully invested in this transmission to those people that maybe we can help. And it seemed like for a long time, that the talismanic work was the best way to do that. Aidan: And again, I love the whole process of it, but in the last, I guess like six months, that really shifted to like, “No, I really want to be producing books so that that is a wide range thing that can I go. Aidan: And then I want to teach classes where I can really engage with people because there's no time to do that with the jewelry work that I was doing in a way that I would like to kind of go, “Okay, this is what's … this is how some of the stuff that I want to share works. And then let's engage about it so that we can get somebody rolling,” in a way that I felt like I couldn't before. Yeah. Fabeku: And I think that exhaustion piece, that's always the sign. And I think … But I mean, how long does it take us or anybody to catch that? Most of the time, the solution is more coffee, more sugar, more shit food, more donuts, whatever it is for however long we can until … For me anyway, I reached the point that it's like, “Yeah, more caffeine isn't going to fix this.” Fabeku: The problem is not a caffeine deficiency. Whatever expenditure is happening, it's no longer coherent. And so it's taking more than it's giving. And yeah, I mean, I think that for me is always the sign, whether it's in a relationship or a business thing or whatever that, “Yeah, something has changed and so you need to change your response to it.” Andrew: For sure. Yeah. Well, I think that when you start showing up differently to places, it's like that's the problem, right? And that's the problem with me in the fall where I was just really run down from relationship stuff. A couple of long-term relationships ended for me in the fall. Andrew: And from reopening the store, which was no small amount of work and trying to wrangle that, but also in a completely new way that I would show up and things would just be making me crusty and I'd be like, “Oh man, what's up with that?” And I think that's another sign, right? When small things are … if they were singular, a small thing just irritates you so much. Andrew: You're just like, “Ah.” It's like, “Oh, that's also a good sign,” where it's like, “Man, I just got to step back from this somehow. I got to change this dynamic,” because showing up with that energy is not good magically for anything, right? Aidan: Yeah. For sure. Andrew: That is one of those situations where you can't start to influence what's going on with your vibes. Right? Aidan: Yeah. Andrew: And that's not ideal at all. Right? That's just not helpful, so. Fabeku: Well. And I think too when that exhaustion kicks in at such a deep level, how do you funnel the energy that you need into the magic? How do you fuel it? There's no fucking fuel there at some point. It's like you can sit in the car with no gas and jam the pedal down, but good luck. And there's just … and I think that's the thing. Fabeku: Yeah. And for me, that was another reason that I wanted to shift things because it's like if I can't fuel the art and the magic, which really to me, are the most important out of any of the things on the list, then what am I doing? If I don't have fuel for that shit, then something has gone really seriously sideways for me. Andrew: Yeah. Aidan: Yeah. And it's interesting too because we would like to believe that there's infinite capacity and there just isn't. And so at the point that I was working on the book, which is … it's mostly done. It needs a bunch of revision, but … and I realized I couldn't get the space to even do the revision, doing the jewelry the way that I was. And there's another three books waiting behind that one that are in process to some degree, though they're at their beginning stages. Aidan: Then it became really clear, like what's more important here? It's like, “Yes, I can make another thousand pieces of jewelry,” which I know is helpful to people and it's helpful again, financially to me. And I love the process, but this other thing is more important. So what's an appropriate feeder to that work? Aidan: And it's like, “Well, then I'd rather more directly involved with the people that are using the material to figure out what's translating and what's not translating so that I can get a clearer transmission.” So the jewelry and the books was no longer working, but the classes and the books seem like they will. So it's okay. I have to let go of that piece for the most part. Aidan: And it's not saying it won't come back someday, but there's enough on the table that it doesn't work with that, that I had to make that shift. Andrew: Yeah. There's time when we've been talking about teaching some here, but we'll jump in with one of the questions that somebody posted on somewhere, Facebook, maybe. When you're teaching, what do you learn from that process? What have you learned about yourself from that process? Andrew: How does teaching or does teaching change the way you think about things or talk about things? What's that role for you around that stuff? Aidan: I mean, for me, I haven't done direct teaching since the 90s except whatever goes on, on a small scale, but kind of focused work. So it's interesting. So the prep work for that really gets me clarifying how I think and how I feel about stuff because my problem is a lack of … I could do so much that it's like, “Okay, but what's a useful collection? Aidan: What's a useful tool of collection?” I don't want to just go and hit up the hardware store and throw every tool available into the box. Andrew: Step one, buy a hardware store. Aidan: So yeah, it's definitely … which is kind of unfortunately not a bad metaphor for how some folks approach all this stuff, right? Buy every tool in the hardware store and learn how to use it. It's like, “No, what we need is we need to get you the little lunchbox size, little kit that has a few things that you can do some stuff with.” But that also has to have depth. Aidan: And so I'm kind of the anti-complexity guy, so it's how do you get a coherent little package to use that term that somebody could either use as part of a larger thing or on its own. And so it really does. For me, it's been super clarifying is what I would say. Fabeku: Yeah. And I agree with that. So for me, I saw that a lot when I did last year. I think I did … it was like three weeks on hyper centrals, four weeks maybe. And it was interesting because I mean, that's the thing I've done forever and I could talk about it for six months and I didn't want to because I don't think it was necessary. It's like you said. Fabeku: It's like, “Here's the lunchbox size kit on hyper sigils that also talks about things that a lot of people don't talk about and gives you plenty of room to take those as far as you want for decades into the future without also simultaneously overwhelming you into thinking of, ‘Fuck, this is such a big thing. I'm never going to be able to use this or it's going to take me forever to get this.” Fabeku: And I mean, so I think that's one of my main considerations. It's like what's the minimum information you need to use this immediately and effectively? And that's what I'll teach. And some things, maybe we circle back some things, maybe we stretch out, like the divination thing I did last year and six months and that was a lot. Fabeku: We've dug into a ton, but I think that … and the other thing I'm always thinking about is like how do I teach things in a way that anybody with any magical ecology can make use of this? Right? I don't care if you're a Buddhist, if you're a Christian, if you're an atheist, if you're a Satanist, whatever, it doesn't matter. I want you to be able to take this and plug it into your magical ecology and use it. Fabeku: It's not … because if you have to adopt mine in order to use it, then for me, I think I failed as a teacher. Right? I mean, outside of teaching traditional practices or whatever. But you that's a big thing. So for me, it's always a question of, what's actually essential to the practice and what's my own shit that I built around either preferences or magical aesthetics or whatever, that doesn't really matter to anybody other than me? Fabeku: And have I stripped enough of that away so that anybody can take this thing and run with it? That's always a big consideration for me. Aidan: Yeah, totally. That makes sense. There's a practice that I'm teaching in the class that I have coming up that I actually went out to the Salvation Army and bought all new pieces to put together because I could see people getting fixated on the aesthetic that I personally use, which is really not relevant to the practice. Aidan: So it's like, “Okay, let's go see what I can pick up for five or 10 bucks that can assemble this structure so that it's not as linked to what's going on in my alter.” Because that's just my artistic sense and my aesthetic and what me and my spirits have come together on as a language that works. Right? And that's totally not necessary, but it's what people tend to get hooked on. Andrew: Well, that's the Instagram era, right? You know what I mean? So it circles back to the originating the thing about the name of this group. Right? Aidan: Absolutely. Andrew: How do ensure you stack the skull? Aidan: Stack the skulls. Andrew: The higher they are, the [inaudible 00:26:36] you are. tack. Right? There's nothing wrong with that at all, but the aesthetics over there are not super relevant. Aidan: Yeah. Not on a wider level. It's that thing that I talked about in six ways, right? That there's … I think that people, and I used to definitely have this, get super focused on this specific stuff, but the specific stuff is always super context and aesthetics fits in there. And what really is more relevant is what's the general thing that is not necessarily universally applicable but more universally applicable. Aidan: And in the age where we've got pictures of everything, it definitely can get really hung up. You got to have this thing that looks just like that. Andrew: Well, and just, because it looks good doesn't mean that it's alive. Right? Aidan: For sure. Andrew: Because there's the other piece. Fabeku: Yes. Andrew: Yes. I mean, I think that there are lots of things that I run across and not that I have to feel anything from everything, but I'm like, “Oh, it doesn't … I don't feel any feedback from this at all.” And maybe the other thing that's there just doesn't want anything to do with me. Andrew: It's possible, but maybe it's just … there's a failure to make that connection. Right? Just something [crosstalk 00:28:00] because the work itself that would support that connection is not strong, but the emphasis on all those other things is. Fabeku: Yeah. I think that's the thing. To me, the metric is, does this thing … can you feel it in your bones? Can you feel it in your animal body? If so, then who gives a fuck what it looks like? It doesn't matter if it would make a great Instagram photo. That to me, that's the wrong metric for shit like that. I mean, listen, I love the Instagram photos but in terms of magic, who cares? It's irrelevant. Aidan: Totally. Exactly. And it's also funny because people get hung up I think. And again, I know that I did this when I started out, but you get hung up on things that are, again, specific. So my current shop is filled with halved pieces of fruit with two lights burning on it. I could make up this whole story about why this is the way to do this. And it's like, “This is just what's going on this week. I don't really know why. Aidan: It's the thing that felt totally right.” I cut something in half and went, “Oh, man. That really needs candles on I,” and I could feel it and it works. And it's also the same thing. Yeah, I mean, there's so much weird shit in here right now because I think of who's hanging out for the class if it is really aesthetically wrong from that or even my normal thing. Aidan: I've got all of this beautiful stuff and the monster energies and the red bulls and shit. It's like, “What the fuck?” Old candy canes that I stole from the gym after Christmas. But there's people who like those. I'm not going to buy them if I can have them. Fabeku: I think people even do the same thing. When I was teaching the sigils course, it's one of the main reasons that I didn't take any pictures of the sigils that I drew because then suddenly people think, “Oh, well. That's what a sigil should look like you.” No, this is what they currently look like. Over the last 30 years, they looked a million different ways. Aidan: [crosstalk 00:30:03] shit. Fabeku: I mean, the first time, they looked exactly like the Pete Carroll sigils in his book. I think that's the thing and I get it and I think that people … I think it's so easy to fall into that subconscious even. It's not so much, “Let me copy Fabeku's sigil,” it's, “Let me copy Aidan's alter.” It's, “Oh, well. Fabeku: This is somebody who knows what they're doing, and so this is what it should look like so let me try to make it look like that.” And then, great. So then your brain says, “Okay, good job. You drew a sigil that looks like a sigil,” and then it doesn't do shit because like you said, Andrew, it's not alive. It's a thing that looks like a thing, but it's not the thing. Andrew: Or you end up in a cycle. One of the things that I've learned from teaching or been really clear about going into teaching, and I've learned how to make that happen is, I started in a school of thought that says, “Only the only the hammer from the top of Mt. Everest hardware store was acceptable.” Right? And by the way, only on the third full moon of the year and- Aidan: On Monkey Island. Andrew: Right, exactly. Not the usual Everest, the secret Everest. It's inside the hollow woods- Aidan: The secret Everest inside Monkey Island. Andrew: … which is inside the hollow woods. So you got to get in the hollow woods, you got to find the doppelganger, Himalaya Mountains and then you got to find the hardware store and you'd better bring their currency because they don't accept dollars. Whereas every town's got a hardware store. Right? Andrew: And what you find there is great. It's totally acceptable and if you want or need something else, there's a point at which that becomes aesthetic in personal taste, which is great. And if it helps you get in the mood, that's fantastic. And if it helps you feel aligned or if a spirit you have … there are times where somebody taps on my shoulder and says, “Hey, I want that.” Andrew: I bought … Marcus McCoy makes these copper harvesting knives. Right? And as soon as I saw one of those, one of my guides was just like, “That is exactly the knife that I want you to take when we go do stuff.” I'm like, “Perfect.” And then I'm like, “But not with that thing on it,” because there's like a triple spiral or whatever on it. So I was like, “All right, rushed markers right away.” I'm like, “Hey, can I get one of these?” Andrew: “Of course.” But that's specific, right? And that's specific to that relationship. That is not universal. Right? And you may find that you do want or need something like that, but you may never need it or it may not fit your aesthetic. And that's awesome too. It's completely acceptable. Right? Aidan: Totally. Fabeku: For me, I love … and maybe this is part of the art stuff or not, maybe it's just a personality thing, but I love shit like that and I love the collection like that. And I love the fancy silver pens for the sigils. And so there's … I don't make any apology for that, but one of the best things I did maybe 10 years ago was essentially put all of that stuff away and say, “Okay. Fabeku: I'm doing sigils on white paper with a blue ballpoint pen,” which I hate and never use. Or, “I'm doing candle magic with a bag of dollar candles from the dollar store,” or whatever. And part of that was to see, does this actually matter? I mean, it matters to me, but does this actually matter in any wider sense? And it doesn't. It really doesn't. That's the thing. What do you mean for sigil magic? Fabeku: You need something to write within a piece of paper. That's all you need. That's it. If you want to get the fancy black paper and the pen, cool. Do it. But I think it's a trap when we get stuck into thinking, “I have to have this. I have to have this.” Because that to me, it just doesn't seem true. Andrew: Yeah. I feel like that's where one of those pieces around, “You definitely don't have to have it.” And I also look to pursue my joy around it. Fabeku: Yeah, absolutely. Aidan: Absolutely on that. Fabeku: Yes. Andrew: I found these new pens at the art supply store. They're called preppy pens and they come in different sizes, but they're refillable with a cartridge and they're … I think I paid like $7 for it and I've bought a lot of other much more expensive fountain pens and whatever. And these ones, the feel of them, the flow of them, they come in different colors. Andrew: The outsides are color-coded and they're just such a delight. And so every time I stop by the art store now, I buy another one because there's somewhere in my life where one of those doesn't live regularly. And I was just like, “Why am I drawing with this crappy pen when I can be drawing with this other nice one that I like?” And there's a pleasure in that. Andrew: But again, that's so personal, right? That's not … it adds something to the magic if I'm doing magic, but it's also an active source of joy for me, which I think is also a super valid reason for things, especially if we don't say that that actually matters in the end on any real big scale. Fabeku: Well, it's like for me. So as an example, I just made this batch of lunar talismans a couple of months ago and I mean, I went all out. I had fossil dugong ribs. I had literally a lunar media writer, all kinds of shit in there. I spent forever finding the stuff. And it's not that I had to. I mean, again, like you said, it adds something. I mean, there's clearly something added to these pieces because of what's in them. Fabeku: But part of it is I look at it as a piece of art. It's like I'm putting the best stuff I can and there's enormous joy for me in grinding up a lunar media writer, fossil cave bear toe or whatever. But the reality is, could I have gotten a stone from the ocean and made a lunar talisman? Fabeku: Sure. Of course. But I think it is that weird thing. I don't think it's good to say it doesn't matter because it does matter, but it's not essential. And to me, there's the- Aidan: Right. Fabeku: And I think the problem is in that people look at it and say, “Well, I can't make a lunar talisman unless I have a lunar media writer.” And that's bullshit. That's complete bullshit. I love it. I love putting those pieces together in a way that's artful and beautiful and whatever, but you don't have to do that. Aidan: Right. Yeah. I think that's a big thing. Part of it comes out of I think … There's a whole kind of literature that says that this has to be done this way. Right? And we see this and not just magic, but it's extremely prevalent in magic. And that's very weird to me as somebody who came from these chaos, magic background. Even though I feel like I've, in many ways, moved away from that into something else, that's my own thing. Aidan: That's not consciously unrelated to it, but I was born there. Was that process of, “Well, what does this do? What does this piece of work do? What are the elements that actually matter here?” And then realizing that, “Yeah, there's stuff that really triggers something in me that is optimization and stuff.” Like, “Yeah. There's particular … if I got the hit that I needed to ride the bike up into South Mountain to collect dirt from there for something, I'm going to go do that,” because that's legit. Aidan: But it may not need to be dirt from there to do that work. That doesn't mean you got to come out here and go up to South Mountain, which is how a lot of stuff's written. And I think that it really has messed up a lot of folks because they do believe that if I can't have a beeswax candle to do this piece of work, then I can't do this piece of work. Fabeku: I think that for me, I think that's probably the best saying that I got out of the chaos magic stuff. You know what I mean? When you're doing magic with silly putty and bones from chicken wings, you can't really get too precious about, “Yeah, this is essential for magic.” It's like, “Listen, really?” I mean, it's just … For me, that really was the best thing. Fabeku: Because I think before that, I think I was fairly precious about it or I thought it had to be this or had to be that. And there was some things I just didn't have the money together. I didn't have the resources for whatever it was. And I thought, “Well, I just can't do that.” And then suddenly, chaos magic was like, “Well, actually, there's other ways you can do shit.” And for me, that was a huge thing. A huge thing. Aidan: Absolutely. And I remember, I've had a lot from the talismanic stuff. I would get people … and it's lovely that somebody recognizes that the work that you do is potent. I would get folks from places in the world that what I charged for a piece of jewelry is like a year's worth, going like, “I really want to do this. How do I …” and I would be like, “Don't.” Aidan: You're targeting a specific tree that is not necessary. It's just not necessary. And again, it's like, “Sure, if you've got the ability. I do this thing too. There's things that I have in here that I paid crazy money for because they really speak to me and I was in a position to do it.” Andrew: Yeah. Aidan: And sometimes, it was a stretch and sometimes that stretch was part of it, right? It's not like that's not a thing either. But again, it doesn't … One of the things that we know, again, like teaching the protection stuff for the class is it's all kitchen herbs. There's no … it's partially for that. It's like, “I don't know where you are. Aidan: I've got people from different parts of the world. I'm not going to … I might suggest that you get some Aubrey Camino if you can because it works, but it's really cool.” Andrew: Yeah, yeah. I think it's always fascinating, right, that kind of stuff. And I think that also becomes this matter of like, “What do you have? What can you connect with?” Right? And it's different depending on which practices, right? Like in the Aricia stuff, the specific plants are super specific, right? Andrew: There's no negotiating that beyond a certain point. There's a little wiggle room, but there's not a ton of wiggle room. Right. It's just like- Aidan: Totally. Andrew: … “Okay, we're going to do this. Therefore, we need these things. And if you don't have them, I'm not exactly sure what we do,” right? But outside of specific traditions, there's always those things. And it also becomes this question of, what do you have a dynamic of living connection with? Right? I just got back in after struggling to find a source for them for a while, Rose of Jericho, which is one of my all-time favorites, right? Andrew: And I had a Rose of Jericho at the store that I'd had almost the entire time that the store had been open, I think. And then it was very dynamic and a living connection and it had all sorts of things that I had given it over time and worked with it in a lot of ways and it just wasn't available and because getting stuff in Canada is complicated sometimes. And so when I finally found them, I'm like, “Great.” Andrew: So now, not only is that are they available in the store, which is lovely, but even more so for me, I can now reconnect with that plant and start to have that process again through the direct connection.” But it's like that also comes out of years of interaction and perhaps some natural affinity in some way or another. Right? But does everybody else need to not do financial magic if they don't find a Rose of Jericho? Of course not. Right? Aidan: Right. Andrew: Like you said there, there's a billion other bits and pieces. Are they really cool? Well, they are really cool. But also- Aidan: Totally. Fabeku: Well, it's like … I've worked with Alice Wood for … I don't know, 15, 16 years. It's one of the plants I work with a ton and I've worked with it in all kinds of ways to the point that I've got this like grimoire of aloes wood magic. And my question is, “Well, if I give that grimoire to you, is it going to work?” Probably not. At least probably not in the same way because either you don't have a relationship with the plant or you don't have the same kind of relationship with the plant. Fabeku: And to me, not better or worse, but it's just different. And to me, I assume that what the plant … and I think this is my baseline assumption for a lot of this shit is that what the plant has given me is about the dynamic that I have with that plant. Not that I'm channeling some universal grimoire of aloeswood magic that anybody. That doesn't make sense to me. Fabeku: I don't think that's a real thing. And I again, I think … and that's why I haven't talked to … Some people have asked about it because I mentioned it in passing and I haven't talked a lot about it because I have no idea if it's going to work the same for anybody. And I use what is expensive and not always easy to get and whatever. Fabeku: And I think it gives people the wrong impression that in order to do this, I need this plant or I need this. And I don't think that's true. My thing is find the relationship that you have that lets you do a similar thing that probably doesn't have shit to do with aloes would. Maybe it's Abra Camino, maybe it's Rose of Jericho, whatever it is. Fabeku: And I wish more people would talk about their practices that way instead of, “Here's the universal gospel of aloes world.” It's like fuck off with that. That's not real. Andrew: It's like how people talk about their issues, right? They come into the store sometimes and they're like, “I need Oshun candle because I need to attract some love of my life.” And I'm like, “Maybe.” But when we're … for initiated practitioners, and I think that for people who practice in a traditional way, the reality is although Orishas have a certain affinity to certain kinds of things, the reality is that if you're in good with shon go, you can fix your money, fix your home, you can fix your whatever. Andrew: Right? The reality is this, at a certain point, it's like having a good friend whose skill is not helping you hang drywall, but they're going to come and help you heck drywall because they love you. And they're like, “Sure, dude. I'll do that. That's fine. We can do that.” Andrew: These energies can work with us in a broad sense of a way, especially and probably only if we've taken that time to build a deep and lasting connection with them and probably that rest on some affinity that is hard to trace and makes it not necessarily universal. Right? For me, one of the local plants is Murdoch, right. And it's like, what do I need? Anything? Andrew: I'm just like, “All right. Hey, Berta, you got a thing for this?” Like, “Yeah, just trim this little bit off the edge of the leaf and do blah, blah, blah with it and it's going to fix this [inaudible 00:45:40] great.” I'm like, “Oh, you know what? I could dig up the whole root,” whatever. And it's like, “But on the outside of the room, not the inside of the room.” Andrew: It becomes a myriad of applications, which again, aren't necessarily universal or maybe they are, it's hard to say, but they don't seem universal. But they come out of that direct relational experience of it. Fabeku: I wish that was a point that was talked about more in the occult circles, right? Because every day, you see posts, “What's the best term for love? What's the best term for magic? What's the best spirit for money?”It's like, “Fuck.” I mean, I get it, but to me, that's the wrong question. Anytime people ask that, my question back is, “Who do you have a relationship with?” Fabeku: That's the answer to that. Not some random spirit or plant or stone or whatever that knows fuck all about you and what you're doing. Go to the spirits of the people you have relationships with. And I think … I don't know how this happened, but this falling into this trap of treating spirits, any kind of spirit as this one-hit wonder, right? This is a lover, this is a … it's just like, “Really? It doesn't make sense to me.” Fabeku: And I just wonder how different people's magic would look both in terms of the practice and the results if this relationship piece were more front and center. If it wasn't this weird, utilitarian, one-note, “This spirit does this,” like, “[inaudible 00:47:10] is for love.” It's like, “Come on. That doesn't seem real.” But it seems like such a pervasive perspective on things. Fabeku: And listen, I mean, I fell into the same shit for once. I'm not being critical of anything that I haven't been guilty of myself, but it just seems to be such a big point. It just isn't discussed enough. Aidan: Yeah. I've been thinking about this in a particular context. I made a joke to Charlene Coop saying that there's a way that people treat the name spirits like Tinder. We're just going to look up and find somebody local that's interested in getting down. Right? But usually, they're not doing that to just get down. Aidan: They're doing that because they want something deeper. Right? On the spirit side. I don't know what goes on the Tinder side, but I understand that's a misapplication of Tinder. And I think it's interesting- Andrew: Every app. I think Tinder is a misapplication. Aidan: Again, I'm out of those games largely. And one of the things that came up is then I had this … one of my trans things that happened a few days after that. I was thinking about that comment and I got this great vision and I was like, okay, so imagine that there's like … in North America, let's just say. In North America where the three of us are, but there's 100,000 potential partners for us, right, that would suit us, each of us. Aidan: But what ends up happening is that we've got the names and the photo of like 150 of them and so everybody wants to figure out which of those 150 would be a good partner. And to me, the thing is so much more than this wide-open of going, “No, I want to connect to the currents around me and the allies around me and then I want to work with them. Aidan: I want to develop those relationships through the things that I've learned work for me to do that.” And then why would I go outside of that to try and get something done? Maybe if I had to, if that was what I was guided to, but I'm certainly not going to go hunt for that. I'm much more likely to come in here and go, “Hey, Rutan candles.” Fabeku: Oh, that was the one that- Aidan: I'll buy you more energy drinks for this. Andrew: Those are a lot of magical place course I taught. Right? Which is … and I'm going to be reteaching in the spring. It's that energy of like, “All right, either where do those entities that you're connected to show up in your environment or what your environment shows up for you. And how do you start to build that?” Right? And it's just such a different approach. Right? Andrew: One of the things that I had to remind people taking that class, “Look, identify the plant. Great. Please make sure it's not secretly poisoned. Don't pick Poison Ivy by mistake and fall in love with it and take a bath in it, and then write angry emails. But also don't research it,” right? It's not about researching it. At some point … and just enough to make sure that you're safe and that you're not like, “Oh, yeah. Andrew: These berries look delicious.” And then all of a sudden … but allow that to expand. Working to allow that expansion to happen, that's the actual work of becoming a better magician, right? Aidan: Yes. Andrew: It's not necessarily just about knowledge and knowledge is lovely. And corroboration feels great when you're like, “Oh, I really felt that this plant was good for this.” And then you Google it and 10 people say it's good for that. You're like, “Oh, it's great. I'm making a genuine connection.” It feels great. Right? Andrew: And we may need some of that some of the time, but also just being open and being connected in that mysterious way. I think that's also really crucial to this process. Fabeku: I totally agree. It's like when people ask me, “How do I get to know this plant? Or how do I get to know the stone?” That's the first thing I say, “Don't Google it. Don't look up what you know witchipedia says this.” It's unnecessary. Right? To me, if you want to get to know a stone, if you want to research something, research it's geology, research its mineralogy, but then sit with it. Fabeku: Hang out with it just like you would a human being. Right? If I want to get to know Andrew, I'm not going to Google Andrew and read a bunch of ShowMe. I'm just going to … we're going to hang out. I'm going to ask you what you like. I'm going to pay attention to the music you listen to. I'm going to see what you eat. I'm going to ask you questions. I'm going to see how I feel when I'm around you. That's how you get to know shit. Aidan: Yes. Andrew: And I that is the key to Tinder's app. [crosstalk 00:52:08]? People are like, “How do you have success on this thing?” I'm like, “That,” right? If you meet somebody and you're actually interested in them other than just for something super transitory, actually do those things too. Right? Because people are like, “Oh, I don't know what to do.” I'm like, “Find it with that person. Be curious.” Right? I don't care if [inaudible 00:52:28]. Fabeku: No. I mean, at the end of the day, I agree. I think one of the best muscles to build as a magician is relationship building skills. That's it. You don't have to buy a million books. You don't have to take a million courses. You don't have to Google a bunch of shit. Just build a relationship with stones or plants or spirits the same way you would have people. It's the same shit. It's the same shit. Aidan: And it's crazy because it's so common. All of this stuff is really common everywhere. And I saw this recently and I didn't respond to it, though I probably should have. Somebody asked like, “So how do you get in? Where can I learn about connecting to desert spirits?” Aidan: It's like, “The only way that I really know is you get into that environment, whether this is … if you live near one, you can do that, but you can do this as kind of trancey stuff or daydreamy stuff of somehow connect to that space and to see what develops. See who you find. See who rises up and see what happens.” It's funny though, because I think … everybody knows I'm a total gym rat, but I see this all the time in the conversations about that. Aidan: Somebody will see somebody dead-lifting a world record and go, “Their form is wrong.” And you go, “That guy is the strongest in that move in the world ever. How is his form wrong? It worked.” That was the goal. It's the goal. It has nothing to do with the thing you're talking about. His goal was to pick up 1,008 pounds and stand up with it. So by definition, he did it right. And I think that's good learning magic too all the time. Fabeku: I think to me, the same idea … at least for me, the same idea applies in figuring out what to work with magically as it does hanging out with people. When I'm around people, I pay attention to how my animal body feels. Is there a pull? Is there … am I drawn to that person in whatever way? As a friend, it doesn't matter whatever it is. It's the same when I'm sitting with plants. I feel a ping toward this plant. Fabeku: I don't know this plant, but there's a pull. So I want to know this plant more, this stone or this place or this river. And that to me is guided so much of my practice, and again, it's the same with people. If I spot somebody and there's a pull, then I'm curious about them. And I want to know more about them, whether it's a friend or a partner, whatever, it doesn't matter. Fabeku: And me, that's a decidedly different thing than Googling which plants work money magic. Too me, it feels like we're coming at opposite angles. I mean, clearly, both can work, but for me, that pull is everything. And if I don't feel it, I don't give a fuck who told me this plant is great for money magic. If there was not that pull there, I'm not into it. I'll keep looking until I feel it. Andrew: It brings me to something that I've been thinking about a lot lately and this might be the perfect place to bring it up. We've all been in magic for a long time. Right? So I sound like an old person because I'm an old person. Stuff comes and goes and people are like, “All of it, this, all of it, that.” Andrew: And I've been watching a big surge of witchcraft in which the energy going on around the store, in culture, in my social medias and stuff like that. And whenever I see a big sort of movement into something, I'm always like, “That's really interesting. What is going on? What's motivating that? How is that serving people?” Andrew: I'm genuinely curious about that, right? And supportive of it. But I also wonder, because I understand how these things work, what's going to happen next, right? Aidan: Right. Andrew: Because this idea that … and maybe I'm wrong, right? Maybe I'm just old and curmudgeonly, in which case, delete this episode, please. Let's never speak of it again. But often, what happens is there's this big sway into a thing and then a bunch of people find a deep and lasting affinity with it. Andrew: And I'm really curious where those people are going to be in 10 or 15 years and what I'm going to get to learn from their journey through this stuff as they have a depth of practice under their belts in the same way that I learn now from those people who've already been doing these things for a stretch of time and have that. Andrew: But I'm also curious about where those people who were looking for something and either they found it and moved on or they were looking for something else and it wasn't here and then they moved on. We were talking about some … Aidan said something earlier about, they're actually looking for something deeper. Right? Andrew: And one of the things that I've been really noticing, which I find fascinating, is that I see a lot of people who've been all in on the witchy fronts over the last year or a couple of years starting to … their posts and maybe their magic … I don't know what they're doing privately, but certainly, their public stuff. It's starting to take on a much more explicitly therapeutic approach. Andrew: There's a lot more people talking about trauma, dealing with trauma. There's a lot more people leaning … not abandoning the magic side of it, but leaning into stuff where the relationship that they're trying to sort it the most is ultimately that relationship with themselves. Right? And I mean, I think that's always smart. I think that it's a great thing to get into around doing magic in general. Andrew: Certainly, it was a good chunk of my practice at one point to do therapy as a way of freeing myself in order to heal myself or to … I mean, not just be a better magician, but certainly, be better at magic and better in my relationships and all those things. But I'm curious if you've seen that or if you've seen other things, what do you think around that stuff? I know I just said a million things, but responses, please. Aidan: I mean, I see that. I think that we are … For whatever reason, I mean, we've got this crazy thanks to social media and the news cycle and everything else. We have this much clearer view if you're able to step back from it. There's really multiple ways of being in this world that are not really congruent. Right? When I was growing up, there was a lot of messaging that in the end, everybody wants the same thing. Aidan: Right? And that's not what I see now. No. We want very different things and we are not supportive of the other. And I think that this is that. I think it is the evolution of that trauma. And so I think that there's a lot of that out there and there's maybe just more … maybe it's gotten to the point where it's so overt that poor people are willing to do that work because I definitely get fed tons and tons of that work for my allies, both for me and then to share with people. Aidan: It's an interesting thing as to the … Again, I think that the media cycling is really interesting around magic. I just think it's fascinating because there are those who totally freak out every time. And I always remember there's a line from Quadrophenia by the who, a very old record of the slide where he says, “It's sadly ecstatic that your heroes are news.” Aidan: And I see that constantly around the witchcraft stuff in the last couple of years. People are like, “Yay, we got it on TV.” And, “Oh, my God. It's so bad.” It's like, yeah, but don't trip. It's just this is what goes on. Andrew: Well, it was like … what was it? Last week or the week before that bullshit article, I think it was in the independence that some journalists wrote like, “Oh, I tried magic for a week and it doesn't work.” And everybody was so upset about it. And I get it. I mean, it was a bullshit article, but I mean, to me, it was just kind of like, “Who cares?” I mean, I get it. It was a shitty thing to publish, but does this do anything to magic? Andrew: Does this do anything to people who actually give a fuck about it that are seriously interested in it? I mean, it was … I mean, she was wearing some witch's Halloween costume in the photo. What did you think the piece was going to be? It was bullshit from the beginning. And magic has been around way before this and it's going to exist way after this. Andrew: And I don't know if it's just a function of, like you said, getting older or just having limited bandwidth, but I didn't really get the upset about it. I mean, which doesn't just say people shouldn't be upset, but for me, it was just like, “Okay, next.” I mean, it was nonsense. Who cares? Andrew: Like Rumi says, right? The real work is done by somebody outside digging in the dirt, right? There's all these other bits and pieces and trappings and maybe they're important. Maybe they're a part of your journey. Maybe media representation for who you are is important for any number of reasons, but also, it's like that piece, a piece I shared this week from … I think we all shared it … from Jason Miller. Right? Andrew: Where it's like, “Just do the work. It doesn't matter if you feel like it or don't feel like it. If you're committed to a relationship with the spirit or doing magic or …” I remember this when I used to do a LIBOR rash, right? The four times a day solar adoration that Crowley and his various descendants propose. Right? Speaking of finding the hammer at the top of the Himalayan Mountains. Andrew: It's like trying to do something four times a day at the four quarters of the day, every day. Definitely, it's overly complicated. I'm not sure that it's actually necessary per day. It can be, but it's … yeah. But so many times, it just never felt like it. Right? And not to say that I did it 100% because I didn't. I really literally, over two years, maybe I did two months, 100% of that at the peak of it because it's really difficult. Andrew: But the successes that I had, and that's sort of 75% or 80%, which is more like the average of what I was accomplishing came because I was like, “I don't feel like it but I going to do it, so let's do it.” And even at one point, I remember talking to a friend of mine about it and he was like, “Well, some traditions, you yell at your gods to try and call them down.” Andrew: So maybe just … whatever. I just remember reciting it one day and just every second word was, “Fuck this, fuck that, fuck you. Fucking sick of being here and this whole thing,” and I broke through something and it got better. But, yeah. It's complicated the relationship to these things. Fabeku: Yeah. And I think that to me is what's interesting about … and going back to … we were talking about with representation and news cycles and all of that. The conversation in the last handful of years about the whole witches of Instagram stuff and I have very mixed feelings about it and at the end of the day, who gives a fuck what my feelings are about it? But all of the conversations about how this has turned magic into some joke. It's like, “No, it hasn't. This hasn't done shit to magic.” Andrew: Magic is always a good joke. Aidan: Magic is the joke that gets you killed. Andrew: That's the actual history of it, right? Aidan: Yeah. So the fact that it's on TV and they aren't burning those people. Andrew: Yeah. I mean, I think- Aidan: That's positive references for sure. Fabeku: My thing is it's like this has been around forever. And if the witches of Instagram thing, if 5% of the people that fall into that end up being solid practitioners, I think that's fucking rad. And I don't really give a shit about the other 95%. It doesn't feel like my problem to care about. I think magic will filter those people out over time. And I guess … I don't know. I mean, again, I get it. Fabeku: Because I do think … I mean, like we talked about in the beginning, I think it's problematic. It gives people the sense that magic has to be this photogenic, heavily filtered, photograph of whatever. And that's nonsense. But I don't know. I guess I just feel like magic is bigger than that and I don't really sweat shit like that. And even if I find it personally annoying, which I do, but- Andrew: I feel like it's … sometimes I think it's helpful to have the same conversation in different context. Right? So when I was 16, I tried to be in Goth for a week, seven days. That was as long as I lasted. And I realized … I tried to do it because I hung out with all these Goths, right? I was like, “Oh, well. This is fun and I could dye a hair black and put it up like Robert Smith and whatever.” Andrew: It's pretty amusing. Maybe I'll show some pictures sometime. But what I realized was, “No, no, no, no. I should actually have a Mohawk and I'm way more punk rock than I'm Goth.” And it doesn't mean there's anything wrong with that week of trying a day or two, right? I tried it for a week and I learned something very important, “Hey, this isn't for me. I'm just going to keep rolling.” Andrew: And I think that, like all of us, right? I started … people today might call it grimoire focus, but certainly like traditional ceremonial magic and Crowley and all that stuff. And I moved into other things and moved into other things and that's fantastic, right? Because that's the way it goes. That is if you happen to find a thing that you're in lifelong practice, lovely. Andrew: If you don't find what you're looking for or hopefully, maybe more to the point, it grows and evolves as you've grown and evolved as a person, well, then just keep evolving. It doesn't matter. There's no shame in any of that. Fabeku: Yeah. Aidan: Yeah. I think too, it's interesting because I have to remember how differently wired people are, right? Because this is one of the things that has always blown my mind around the magical world and this is primarily around the wick end of things is where I've seen it. And this is not to bash on that at all. It's just not my thing. Aidan: I have always been incredibly confused at the, “Let's get whatever our angle is represented accurately according to some specific definition so that it's acceptable to people.” And you go, “This doesn't work anywhere.” Yeah. Right? This hasn't worked for … Yes. You could end up at the big table of religions. It doesn't even work in there.” Look at America now and how acceptable Muslim religion is right now. Aidan: Right? So why is this a target? I've never got it. Because to me, it's so individual. It's like what is your … and it goes back to that thing. What is your relationship to this process, to these powers, to these entities or to these deities? If you do deity work, that's what's irrelevant. Everything else is out of your control anyway. You might … yeah. Go ahead. Andrew: Says the man who lives in a small house with a bunch of animals at the edge of America. Right? Fabeku: That's true. Andrew: I mean, I think I wonder where you're more community and socially minded and less … I don't know if hermetic, Kermit-like is the right word, but a range of practice if that would change how you felt about it. Aidan: It's interesting because I spent a lot of time living in cities and probably the most overt I've ever been in was living in San Francisco. But this was also a different time and it is one of the downsides of the social media thing that I definitely see is in the 80s and the earliest 90s really before pictures happened on the internet, freaky concept for some people that are not as old as we are, it was not a thing. Aidan: I hung out with people who were hermetic magicians who were Elamites, who were various Orisha angle's Santeria practitioners, Wiccans, what we would now consider traditional witchcraft, which basically meant

Published Sep 6, 2018 - [Chris] G'day world, Chris Hogan and Andrew Groat coming to you live from MeMedia Studio here at Burleigh Heads for episode 93 of Get Fact Up! And today we're talking about Research Backed Content Creation. So, Andrew, why are we talking about this? - [Andrew] Well, basically, this is how everyone should be creating content. And we talk about this a lot, like, why are you even bothering creating content if you don't know what you're doing it for, if you don't know what keywords you're going for, if you don't know what your competition is like. If you don't know if it's going to contribute towards sales or just people visiting, like that sort of thing. That's kind of what I want to talk about today. - I think this is also putting the consumer at the central part of the conversation. - [Andrew] Mmm. - Around content creation. They are the ones that are going to be your customer. They are the ones doing the searching. They are the ones consuming the content. - [Andrew] Yeah. - And if you don't actually know what it is they're searching for? You're just, pissing into the wind really. - Yeah, effectively, yeah. And talking about what they're searching for, that's basically where you start with all this, so, on this next slide here, I've got a bunch of keywords, and I'm using AdWords data here, so it's pay-per-click info. But it also shows the average monthly searches. So I decided we'll use home insurance as an example, here. Because it's competitive as, I mean if you look at the keyword bidding range over there, your minimum you're going to spend on a cost-per-click is 12.67, maximum about 40 bucks, so. - I love home insurance, or I love insurance as a test case. Because realistically, it's a boring topic, and I think we can take this somewhere, so let's have a look. So home insurance top, - Yeah, so. - What top of page bid range, what's the top bid there? - [Andrew] Okay, so that's to get to the top of the first page. - [Chris] Of course. - [Andrew] The low range is sort of the minimum you'd probably be spending to get there. Obviously different times and when different competitors are active, it's gonna change. And then the top of range, sorry the high range, is the most you'd be spending. I would suspect it's probably higher than that as well. - Yeah, so interestingly, $48 per click, on homeowner's insurance. - [Andrew] Mmhmm. - For that keyword, but has a relatively low average monthly search, so that's quite interesting, that that's the most expensive keyword. - It either means people are really not being smart with their ad spend, or that's a really high buyer's intent sort of keyword, so maybe that particular keyword tends to convert better. - True. - It could be one or the other. Probably a bit of both. - Or, or the campaign managers for the insurance company advertising are bidding heavily on the wrong keyword. - Yeah, could be asleep at the wheel. Could be just a bidding war for the fun of it, you know. My point is, it's crazy amount of money you'd have to spend to rank for this, so what do you do next? - Exactly. - What's a better place to look than keywords? Because if you haven't got your funnel tight, and, you know, all the leaks patched up in here, you're basically wasting money here, so, what's a better place to look? - So using, we use this place, this tool as a starting point for our research, and then we take it to a whole another level using various other tools, and our own smarts. But it is an interesting conversation starter for this type of research. And you know, it gives you, just some ideas around average monthly searches, and which keywords are more popular than others. You know, homeowners insurance quote, 30 average, 30 searches on average per month. Homeowners insurance, 140 searches on average per month. Home insurance, 12,100 searches per month. Now these are-- - [Andrew] Australia. - Yeah, these are for Australia, and they're also very high level keywords. - [Andrew] Yeah, yeah. - So let's keep diving in, because-- - So, yeah, moving on, like, obviously you could spend money to rank for these, but you prefer to get organic traffic for these, - [Chris] Hmm. - But, with that level of competition, and if we go to the next screen, we can see the organic competition as well. With that level of competition, I mean, how would you get to rank there? The difficulty here is 60, and that's just looking at the page authority and the main authority for all the competitors on the first page. Which is extremely high. I mean, you're going up against Allianz and Budget Direct and things like that. - [Chris] Compare the market, yup. - Also, if you wanted to rank organically here, obviously you would want to get maybe like your service or listings page, like the page with all your products, to be on here, not an article or something like that. So, how do you make that interesting? How do you get that on there? Well, you kind of can't. - [Chris] No. - You have to think outside the square, and I know that's where we kind of want to go here. - Well, sorry, let's rephrase, because you can, we know you can, but-- - You can't just make that page get there, you have to, just like a-- - Do a lot of stuff around it. - Call it like a hot air balloon method, where you're sort of using a lot of stuff around it to drag it up. - [Chris] Yup. - With everything else, so, the next thing you want to do is find related keywords, related long tail keywords to home insurance, and also what we call shoulder niches, which is more generalised verions of the same keyword. So I collected up a a whole bunch of different keywords that sort of fit in that category, they were related, or you know, very similar category to that but tied in, like someone that's looking for home insurance is also thinking about this. And amalgamated them, and we have a look here. So what we're trying to do next is find opportunities. First thing we see here is the difficulty is much lower for all these keywords. And you can see there's a couple examples down at the bottom I just sort of pasted there. - [Chris] Yeah. Organic click-through, right? Which is the purple one, is pretty high. - [Andrew] So that's good, so low difficulty, high click-through rate for all of these sorts of topics. And then the next thing we want to do is look at SERP features. And it's a little bit small here, but basically what that is, is I've analysed, what, other than just simple text results are there. So is there images, is there videos, is there local pack, is there maps? - [Chris] Yeah, so what are we seeing on those SERP features there, the first two, they're really high. - [Andrew] Okay. - [Chris] Competitiveness on content. - [Andrew] That's AdWords. - [Chris] Yup. - [Andrew] So basically, everyone's fighting in the AdWords space here. - [Chris] Yup. - [Andrew] The next one is there's a lot of maps listings, which obviously, everyone is gonna have Google My Business set up. - [Chris] Of course. - [Andrew] In this industry, one would hope. And then the other two bigger are shopping related. So obviously buying policies directly on Google. There's not an awful lot in the way of imagery. There's not an awful lot in the way of, like rich media articles, which is the one in the middle, that's dead flat. And there's not a lot in the way of video, so, this is where we can see there's some opportunity here. - [Chris] Yeah. - So rich media content, and we always talk about this. - Yeah, absolutely, we do always talk about this. And what we mean by that, is that obviously text content is where we all start. Our previous videos have indicated that a video, a two-minute long video, can actually cover about a thousand word article. You know, you can fit a thousand words into a two minute video, pretty much. - And best of all, it's high engagement, but I'm coming up to this soon. So, some pretty good related keywords I found here, like home insurance tips, why have homeowners insurance, that's not the exact keyword, but it's related enough, and then looking a little bit outside to broader sort of categories, how we calculate your insurance policy, and I like this one, how building materials affect your premium. - Yeah, that's really interesting. - I thought that was really cool, like, that's something people would probably want to read before buying a house or-- - Building a house. - [Andrew] Building a house, yeah building house. - Absolutely. So that's really interesting and I guess this is what I was talking about earlier, is putting the consumer at the central part of your content marketing strategy. What is it that they're interested in? What is it they're searching? You know, I know we didn't put it in here, but I started thinking like, well, the biggest thing that I want to know is how to save money on my home insurance. - [Andrew] Hmm. - You know, how do I hack, hack my insurance to-- - [Andrew] Yeah. - To get the biggest bang for buck. - [Andrew] Mmhmm. - Not just home insurance, insurances across the board, health insurance, am I wasting my money? Or how do I get the most out of it? If I'm gonna pay for it, how am I gonna get the most out of it? And funnily enough, I think maybe, insurance companies might be thinking, no, we, well at least me as a consumer, I think insurance companies are thinking, no, we don't really want people to get the most out of their insurance, because that's gonna cost us money. - [Andrew] Mmm. - Well, regardless of what you think, insurance companies, consumers do want that. - So if you actually deliver content to them that they're really interested in knowing, then essentially, you're going to attract them through organic and not have to pay per click. - Yeah, and something that people are probably wondering is, so a lot of these topics don't necessarily mean somebody's immediately about to buy. - [Chris] No. - So how do we get to that? - Don't worry about that for now. That's sort of in the last step here. At the moment we just want to get highly engaged traffic, relevant traffic, to your website. And then we sort of tie that back in. But moving on, I'm looking at okay, so just a slightly more related keyword to home insurance. We've got home insurance tips. Big difference here, difficulty to rank this organically is 27 as opposed to 60. You're going up against some, just slightly more general stuff, so you can fit in quite easily when you look at you're up against insurance council and finder.com.au. And best of all, organic click through rate for that is 100%. So people looking for home insurance tips are guaranteed to go into something on the first page. And that they're doing their research. - [Chris] We can't get better than 100%. - [Andrew] Yeah. - [Chris] Yeah, this is really interesting, yeah so, insurance council, finder, iselect, all non-insurance companies creating content which we know full well they're making money out of because they're probably doing affiliate marketing or something along those lines, and getting a clip of the ticket when people actually do sign up. But they could actually be selling advertising to those insurance companies or whatnot. - Mmhmm. - Now, insurance companies shouldn't be relying on these third parties. We're speaking-- - [Andrew] That's right, yeah. - About insurance companies as any business. Any business shouldn't be relying on third parties creating a bucketload of content about their industry niche, to then drive traffic to them. - As much as affiliate, an affiliate channel is a good income stream, and channel in its own right, if it's too big, it floods the market with content that just pulls people away from you and your direct brand, so it's an issue. So, slightly better difficulty, slightly better competition here, like it'd be easy to rank for home insurance tips. But how do you do that? So, we have a look at what obviously everyone else is doing. And we've seen that they're not doing much in the way of rich media content, so go for that sort of thing. Video, with subtitles, podcasts, relevant interesting images in your content, infographics, subheadings and sections to your content divided up so it's skimmable, and combine it all together, basically, like-- - [Chris] Combine all that content together. - Video, blog, images, all that sort of thing. Basically, you're looking for engagement. Interactions with your page, time on site, low bounce rate, pages per visit, that's what will get you above finder.com.au for home insurance tips. - And then, as an insurance company, if you actually surpassed all those third parties. - [Andrew] Mmhmm. - And they click directly on your content, you've saved yourself that affiliate marketing. - [Andrew] Yeah, they're not taking your clip at the ticket there. - [Andrew] So. Coming right back to that, how does that relate to you getting your service page, your home insurance page up? This last step is what everyone forgets. That's, - [Both] Internal linking. - [Andrew] So all of this awesome content that you're putting out there, it's getting you ranked for all these relevant terms to your industry, make sure you're linking back. In your content, inline your content, and in the footer with a call to action back to your home insurance service or catalogue page, I guess you'd say. Because all of these well-ranked articles that you're putting out there, they're all going up the Google ranks. They're all linked back to your main one, and that gets dragged up with it. Whoa. It's a little bit hard to do these movements. Your main page gets dragged up with it. So that's how you, basically, would rank a page that's difficult to rank with really high competition. - [Chris] Yeah. - And that's also what other people aren't doing, yeah. - Yeah, so this is tip of the iceberg, I guess, snapshots, of where we would start with our keyword research, you know the actual, I think the half hour prep time that you put into this, we didn't dive into all of the opportunities that would come out. - Aw, yeah, it's huge, and just the research phase in itself, you could do an entire three or four episodes on. - Absolutely. - You know I just, - Got the data ready. - Well, maybe we're geeks, maybe we're not, but I know there's high fives get thrown around the office when we find the, this awesome piece of gold, which is a keyword or phrase that is being searched, thousands of times per month, tens of thousands of times per month, and has super low competition, and/or has no competition for that rich media content. - [Andrew] Mmhmm. - And guess what, we're going to overtake you, as the competitor every time when we see that, every time. - Yeah, like we always say, we find and go for the low hanging fruit first, get results quickly. And we've seen some clients have, like one piece of content drives 50% of their traffic to the website now. - That's the role that-- - Hundred hundreds a week. - Well, that's right, but that's because we haven't just stopped at creating one piece of content. - [Andrew] Yeah, yeah. - We've created bucket loads of relevant, engaging content, yeah? Related to the keywords. - Mmhmm. - That have high search terms. - That we know people are looking for in. - And we're internal linking. And we're driving traffic back to those important pages. What do people want to know after they've started reading every piece of content? They want to know how much it is. If you know, even if they're not ready to buy, they still want to consider it, right, that's really interesting, how much? Wait, what? Okay, is there an opportunity to buy now? Well if I was going to buy now, how much is it? So, what's the details? How do I go through the process, if I wanted to? Tell them that. Link them back to that page, that conversion page, that you want to rank really well. People may not buy now, but they still want to know the process. And in an insurance case, just for example, it's going to be a year-long consideration, or at least half a year. Maybe halfway into the year, I'm going, hmm, where's my health insurance or home insurance sitting at the moment? Where could I save money on that? How can I maximise those costs? - And there's going to be a lot of searching, in between there as well. They're going to be researching a lot, so I'd say this is probably a niche that needs a lot of content out there, and I'm not seeing enough of it out there, to be honest. - Super slow burn, and again, we're just using home insurance, and house insurance, and health insurance, and car insurance as one example. This is the same case for everybody. Everybody is taking longer to consider what their next steps are. They're doing a lot more research. They're getting more educated. They got the resources. - Mmhmm. - You know, are sitting there. The internet is sitting there, giving them those resources as and when they want them or need them. And so, having all of that content, if people are constantly hitting your website on the topics that they're searching, and not somebody else's, for the course of a year, guess who gets considered, is the highest to be considered when buying. - Mmhmm, and who gets ranked the best. - That's the obvious sideline benefit, yeah? And we all know that Google organic traffic converts best out of all traffic. The pay-per-click stuff, it hurts. It actually hurts to pay that, geez, $48 per click. But the reason why they're doing it is because potentially, it's a high converting keyword. But if you get that for a lot less, as in free through organic, you'd take it every time, wouldn't you? But it does take an investment, a front-loaded investment. - Yeah. - To get it to that point. Cool. - Time. I hope everybody got some value out of that. Data-backed research on content creation is super important. If you're not doing it, like we said, you're just pissing into the wind. If you don't understand that, basically you're throwing money away, on your content creation. - Yeah, it's not worth, it's not worth doing it. - Yeah. - [Andrew] Because you could actually be having a detrimental effect to your brand and SEO. - Yeah. - [Andrew] If you don't do the research. - Yup. And you're just putting content up for content's sake. If you're not putting up rich content now, in this 2018. Forget about it. - Basically Google doesn't like trash content. Google is a garbage collector. - [Chris] Yup. - It has to clear out the crap constantly, so. If you're making Google's job harder, then it's going to consider you basically a pollution. - Yeah, and if you're not structuring your content to be skimmable, and you're just dumping that content on the page, copy-paste out of your word processor, with no formatting whatsoever, then essentially, yeah, you're going to lose me as well. You're going to lose the consumer. Yeah, I might come to the page thinking I get this awesome article, and all of the sudden I just see paragraphs of, you know, 12 point text, with no bolding, no headings, no images, no infographics, no video, nothing for me to share, nothing for me to take away, no reason for me to bookmark it and want to come back again. - [Andrew] Mmhmm. - [Chris] See ya later, I'm out, three seconds, you've got three seconds to keep me on that page. You'd better make that content look awesome for to start with. Anyway, let's wrap it up. Thanks for watching guys, MeMedia, Get Fact Up! We've been running this for a little over two to three years now. Two years, a little over two years now. And it's proof that content marketing works. If you want to talk to us about content marketing, you can tell that we've got the smarts, the know-how, and definitely passion to drive your business above and beyond on Google organic search search results, which is what converts the most, so give us a call. Thanks, and see ya next week. - [Andrew] Thank you.  

Published Nov 13, 2017 Chris: Good day, world. Chris Hogan and Andrew Groat coming to you live from the MeMedia studio here at Burleigh Heads for "Get Fact Up" episode number 68 - on important marketing metrics to track. How you going, Andrew? Andrew: Good. How are you? Chris: Good, mate. So website traffic is probably the number one metric that people tend to track when they're looking at - obviously their marketing reports. And we know that being that high a level probably isn't good enough. Andrew: Yeah, traffic's not really that important. There're other things that you should be looking at. Chris: Cool. So we've got some example Google Analytics snapshots that we've got here from the Interwebs. And we wanted to just have a look over those and break some of them down. So here we have the Google Analytics snapshot of acquisitions and channels, it's real easy to find. And it's breaking down that high level traffic into multiple different channels... Andrew: The different marketing streams, yeah. So this one's eCommerce business, and straight off the bat you can see that something's wrong here, ‘cause you've got paid searches as the highest traffic. But, you need to circle a few things here, so the problem here is the bounce rate is massive. Paid search, high bounce rate, a lot of money's gone down the drain quite frankly. Chris: So let's talk about bounce rate while we're on that. So between 55% and 70% bounce rate is considered high. Anything over 70% is considered pretty much extreme. So it's time to bring that down. Andrew: So just to explain what a bounce is, it's when someone comes to your page - doesn't click on anything and then they leave. So someone that didn't interact with your page at all. Chris: And bounces can happen a lot. Especially in search and social - ah sorry, in paid search and social, because people have searched for a particular product. Andrew: They may not necessarily wanna see it. You might have put it in front of them when they don't want it. Chris: In paid search they've searched for a particular product, they've clicked on that link to that paid page and they've seen what they wanted to see - probably priced, they're shopping around, boom they're gone again. If you didn't entice them to click through to another page, then essentially they've bounced. And they could've been sitting on that page for a long time. In fact, they could've been sitting on that for hours, all day, reading all the content that you had to offer, but if they didn't click through to another page it's called a bounce. So the same thing can happen in social, right? Because... Andrew: Yeah, we say this all the time that social's people's down time. And if you're putting ads in front of them and they don't realise it, they've clicked through to an ad, they're often just gonna bail back out of that. Social traffic tends to have high bounce rate and lower engagement metrics because of that. But, it's a great branding opportunity, it's not a right off there. You just have to be showing the right sort of content, maybe not necessarily trying to get someone to buy something straight from Facebook. Chris: And then we've got on that same slide we've got their conversion rate, and 3.11 conversion rate. Conversions categorised as 2% as average, 5% is good and 10% plus is great. So they're sitting between averaging good. Now if we were going to say, for example if the client said, "Hey, while I'm getting lots of traffic on paid search, that's great, I'm gonna increase my spend." Andrew: Well I would say don't even bother. Especially when you have a little bit further down that email traffic is a 10.24% conversion rate. I would be saying do more email campaigns, 'cause that's obviously working really well. And then maybe have a look at bringing this bounce rate down, put a bit of work into that. Make some more relevant content, have a look at your page load potentially and have a look at your targeting - maybe you're showing your ads to the wrong people. Chris: There's so much you can do in eCommerce. Show that there's a sale on and that it's a limited time. For example, there's a counter there just above the "add to cart" button that says buy now or you'll miss out. For instance... Andrew: Get some more testimonials. Get some more reviews and writings and things like that. Chris: More content on that page essentially. So that is called conversion rate optimisation. Improving your page to improve conversions. If you can improve those conversions then potentially go back and invest more dollars into that paid advertising. Andrew: I would also say maybe get a heat map or a screen recording software installed on the website and actually get some hard data - hard evidence about what's going on there. It might just be as simple as there's no calls to action above the fold, it might be a real easy fix. Chris: Could be an error. Paid search - don't forget if you've got so many heaps of campaigns, that's a very high level view. You could have one campaign that's absolutely tanking because for whatever reason your products are no longer available, discontinued or something like that. Andrew: Yeah, that's right. Especially with AdWords, it could just be one keyword's just ruining your entire campaign. It's really important to be looking at those metrics as well. Chris: So let's move on to slide 7 where we've actually got a different eCommerce business where their highest traffic source is organic. Andrew: Whoa, yeah, they're doing really well. 11% conversion rate. Chris: And they're converting 11% on that organic traffic. That's really good. Essentially then we looked at paid searches, their second biggest paid channel. And they've got a 7% conversion rate there. And so therefore they're advertising campaign on AdWords needs tweaking and improving because obviously there's a good conversion rate happening in organic. There's not a lot wrong with their pages, but that conversion rate indicates to me that maybe their actual advertising campaigns wrong. Andrew: Yeah, that's what I think. Maybe they just needed to tighten up what they're targeting there. Another good thing that I've seen with this one - we've got a great ad, but they've got their revenue filled in there. So they're actually pushing data of all their sales back, which is awesome because that means they can actually measure ROI properly, so you can have a look at your AdWords page and analytics - you can see how much you spending and what you're getting back for it, then you get that ROI metric. That's awesome if you can actually get that, it's not possible for everyone. Chris: Which comes down to cost per acquisition. Andrew: That's right, so if you know that then you can scale as far as you want. Chris: So cost per acquisition is basically cost per sale. Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative) Chris: Instead of tracking cost per click, track cost per acquisition. If you bring that down... Andrew: Yeah, exactly. Also, here their bounce rate is incredibly low on this one. Chris: Yeah, 19.43% on organic search and 14.78% even on paid, which is just awesome. Really good. Andrew: Two other metrics I think worth mentioning here because this is so high on this one I just want to say. Under behaviour on here, you've got bounce rate, pages per session, average session duration. Pages per session is really important, that's how many - for each person that comes to your site, that's how many different pages they go on there. And if you're above 2.5% that's pretty good. Their average pages per session across all channels is 6.89%, that's great. That means people are really searching around going through everything. Chris: Yup. Andrew: Also, the session duration: 3 minutes, that's great too. If you've got above 2 minutes that's awesome. People spending a lot of time on their website. They've obviously got a lot of really good related content, a lot of good internal linking. I'd say they've got a really good interface there as well. Chris: So, on product pages you may also be interested in if they're doing blogging then potentially they've got interlinked pages. Here's the product we're talking about - go and check it out in the cart, all that sort of stuff. Andrew: They've got a great funnel, that much is obvious. So yeah, they're doing great. Chris: Slide 8, we've got a service based business, and obviously which means no eCommerce tracking on the site. And the highest channel - highest volume of traffic coming through is via organic for this one. Now, they've got a 56% bounce rate on their organic and 2.12 pages per session. Andrew: It's not bad. Chris: Yeah, that's right. Andrew: But there's room, room to improve, that's for sure... Chris: There is room for improvement. So, with bounce rate, like we said, that people are coming in and their not exactly seeing what we wanted them to see and they're leaving. But with 2.12 pages per session on organic - they kind of are finding what they are wanting to find. They're not really that eager to make an inquiry because their actual conversion rate is low, in the 2%'s, so it's an average conversion rate. Andrew: Yeah, so maybe there's a trust issue there and that's where I'd say probably maybe looking at getting some reviews, testimonials, that sort of thing - maybe having a look at the form, reducing the amount of fields in the form. Just to bring down all the barriers, make it easier for an inquiry to happen there. Chris: Really good point you've made there, Andrew, about the barriers to inquiry and completing a form. Those - Don't ask for too much information, what do you really need from people? Name, phone number, email address - that's pretty much it. Andrew: Yeah, like that's it. Even have a request to call back can be a better option than having an inquiry. Sometimes people don't feel that comfortable about filling all that information in. Chris: An optional message field is good. I think leave that one optional. So the top 3 required and an optional message field, boom. And then that could absolutely increase the conversion rate on those inquiries. Andrew: If I was to give these people any advice, though, it would be look at they're social campaigns, though here. Cause you can see there that their conversion rate is .9% on social. Bounce rate's 84%, like obviously they're sending the wrong message out there or maybe just reaching the wrong people. There's massive room for improvement there. Chris: Yeah, hard one, I'm with you on that. There's definitely some improvements that are needed. I mean, what are they sending people to this site for? Is it to consume content? They're not really clicking through to other pages on the site. It's - pages per session 1.6, time on site a minute ten. They really do need to reconsider why they're sending people there and... Andrew: Obviously sending them there for maybe promoting blogs or something like that. But then you just have to look at what they're doing next. Chris: They need to encourage and click through... Andrew: Calls to action in their blogs. Chris: Yeah, super important. Cool. Slide 9, we've got another service based business. So again organic search is the highest traffic source. Bounce rate is lower, 48%, that's great. It's good, rather. And 2.39 pages per session, which is pretty much average there. And a conversion rate of 4.84%. So, their conversion rate's obviously better than the last. And that means that their calls to action are much better and their barriers... Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative)... Chris: Their forms are probably better. They potentially got testimonials or some kind of - they've developed some kind of trust with the audience to encourage that inquiry. Maybe there's some sort of free offer, potentially round that... Andrew: Yeah, their funnel could just be better overall. And it might just be a type of service that people are more interested in, in general, you never really know that. Chris: Industry comes in... Andrew: That's right, yeah like some people just have a tough industry that you always have to consider. Chris: Exactly. So apart from website traffic sources we wanna focus on what's happening out there in amongst the other - I guess campaigns that we could be running. So, obviously social is probably the most popular and most common activity that people are undertaking when they're doing marketing. I think we've spoken about this before, but just to recap, what's some of the metrics people need to be tracking when they're doing social campaigns? Andrew: Okay, big thing for me is always engagement, especially the social. You wanna say that people are actually interacting with your content. Clicks through the website not always that important, 'cause you can see that they might be doing nothing when they get to the website. Most important thing is that they're having a good time on the social platform first and foremost. And then something that people don't often look at is one called "social clicks", which is a sort of like the viral effect. It's when someone's interacted with your content and then their friends doing it or maybe they've shared it to someone else. That's that sort of roll off growth effect that happens on social, that's a really important one, cause that means that the community's accepting it. It means it's getting shared around. Chris: And another really important metric that people need to be targeting - I'm sorry, monitoring when they're looking at their reports, their monthly reports, is search into results pages. So the results of their ranking of their keywords in search. Andrew: That's right. So you can look at your traffic for organic and that's great but you really wanna know where it's coming from, because you wanna know what you wanna optimise for on what you should be creating more content for. If you're not using a software for tracking your search engine results, you can go into search console and everyone should have search console. Google search console set up. You can have a look at your keyword report in there and that'll show you all the traffic that's coming in for different keywords and it will also show you the impressions for different keywords. So you can see who's seeing you for different keywords. And that at least is very important because that data's not in Google analytics anymore. Chris: It's not a complete picture because Google has wiped out a lot of the keywords that people actual typing in under a category called, "not provided", but... Andrew: It shows a lot more than Google analytics at least. Chris: Exactly. Andrew: So you get something there. Chris: Yeah. Is that all we got time for? Look I think this is a very high level view. Still, we've sorta dived in a little bit. But, with eCommerce there's so much more you could be looking at. Once you've got some of that conversions - what's happening with the conversions? Well potentially people are getting to the cart, and they're abandoning cart. So you need to look at the exit pages and what can you do there? Well you can be running automated email campaigns. You can be running remarketing campaigns on Google AdWords and social. There's lots of opportunities there. But again we said we're gonna have a high level view, and I think we've done that here so hopefully that's - I guess helpful. Anything to add, Andrew? Andrew: You know what? We could just go on forever. But I think maybe we'll do one on each specific channel, in the future, I'd think it'd be good. Chris: Yeah. Great! Well, thanks very much for your time. That was "Get Fact Up", episode 68. And you're here with Andrew Groat and Chris Hogan from MeMedia, here at the Burleigh Heads Studio's on the Gold Coast. Cheers.

Published Oct 20, 2017 Andrew: G'day world. Andrew Groat and Chris Hogan coming to you live from the MeMedia Studios here at Burley Heads for, Get Fact Up! And today we're talking about? Chris: Podcasting. Andrew: Podcasting. Chris: Podcasting as a marketing tool. Andrew: Absolutely. Chris: Or a content marketing tool, yeah. Andrew: Are we podcasting? Chris: We are podcasting right now. We're doing a podcast about podcasting. Andrew: We are. We're more vodcasting, so video on demand casting. Chris: Is that what it is? Andrew: Yeah. Chris: Oh, okay. Of course. Of course, it is! Andrew: I actually don't know what "pod" means? Chris: It's just from iPod, it's just stuck around since then. Andrew: Excellent. Cool, let's get cracking on! So podcasting as a marketing tool is actually really effective and I think there's plenty of high profile entrepreneurs that have been alluding to podcasting as a great way to get out to your audience, and that audio is a great way to engage with your audience, especially during those down times that people have. Those mundane tasks that people have throughout their day. Some of those might be driving to and from work, some of them might be walking to and from the post office, or while you're on lunch walking to and from the café, or sandwich shop where you're getting your sandwich. And the other ones are on the weekends, so mowing you know, I have to mow lawn so- Chris: So you listen to a podcast as well. Andrew: ... I listen to a podcast. Chris: I mean, you can listen to a podcast while you're working, you can ... yeah, driving, driving's a big one yeah. Andrew: Yeah, so some people I know that have pretty lack lustre jobs, actually do have a earpiece in one ear, and they're not that engaged with their work, it's packing boxes or something or other, and that's how they get through their day. Chris: Yeah, and stuck on the train, there's heaps of times when- Andrew: Exactly. Chris: ... when you need something like that. The thing is, the reach of podcasting is huge at the moment. There's so many platforms out there that you have access to and everyone's looking for this sort of content. And it's strange, I was talking about this today, like the success of podcast, it's a little bit surprising when you think the format would've died out by now. But I think it's because it's so personal and endearing, and when someone's done it professionally, it really gives you a window into the people behind whatever industry you're talking about. What it's like to be in their shoes and their world. And you learn really vicariously through podcasts I think, so it's a cool format. Andrew: Yeah, a lot of people that I listen to. So one of my good friends got me into listening to podcasts only a few years ago, and the first one I started listening to was Joe Rogan. Now, he's not for everybody, he swears a lot, and he's very opinionated on certain topics, but he'd get some really interesting cats on there, and they have great conversation and tell life stories that are just fascinating. Or they're researchers, they're authors, and they're sharing how they came to write about the book that they wrote, and man, there's some amazing stories that come through. Chris: It's funny, because if you think about these podcasts, and you just feel like you're getting smarter listening to them, it doesn't matter what they're talking about. You're like, "These are smart people talking. I'm getting smarter listening to this." It's just how you, especially Joe Rogan, you feel that way about him, but most of the time he's just talking about crap. Like he's just, he's waffling on about stuff. Andrew: He really is. Chris: But you genuinely feel smarter listening to it. Andrew: You do. You absolutely do. So some of the podcasts that I love is Joe Rogan, London Real was the next one that I think I got into, which is fantastic. Then there's Ben Greenfield's Fitness, which is awesome. Doctor Rhonda Patrick, she's a research scientist and goes heavily into nutrition and is big on mental health and how to improve mental health. Doctor Michael Greger, I'm not sure that he actually has a podcast, but he has appeared on many podcasts and he's also a researcher on nutrition. I'm heavily into nutrition, I love nutrition, so I listen to a lot of those types of ones. But then there's the business ones like Tim Ferris, he's got a great podcast. He's always talking about optimising time and stuff like that, and the guests that he gets on, he's talking to them about how they made the best of their lives and stuff like that. So I guess there's lots of different niches where people can actually plug into with podcasting. Like there's already heaps of podcasts out there worldwide. Chris: Yeah, that's it. A lot of people might think, "There's so much there, is it saturated?" But it's not really. Andrew: No. Chris: The amount of people watching and listening to podcasts doesn't mean saturation, because if you got a unique podcast, you're not really competing with anyone else. If you have a really general podcast, then maybe you're gonna have problems. But yeah, if you have something unique, you're only really creating some space for yourself, and if you're committed to it, you're gonna get an audience, because what you're saying is gonna be interesting to someone. Andrew: So let's get onto ... If you're not listening to podcasts and you're happen to be watching this video because you came to it via our YouTube or Facebook channel, then obviously, we are producing the video version, which I call vodcasting, and that's great. But if you wanted to listen to the podcast, there's heaps of channels to do that on, and I think there's a whole world of discovery out there for you that you're gonna be totally blown away by, once you start tapping into those podcasting channels. Chris: So yeah, I've put a couple of the big ones here. Like the obvious ones. I would say you don't want to be on all of them, just find one or two that work well. iTunes is the most obvious one, because you say, "Podcast," people just immediately think iTunes, so you kind of have to have a podcast on iTunes if you want to be in podcasting. Andrew: Yeah. Chris: It's not easy to get on. It's a bit of a weird service, so there's all these things that sort of facilitate getting onto iTunes. We can talk about that some other time. Andrew: Yeah. Chris: Stitcher. So only eight million registered users on Stitcher. It's by far the smallest, but it's only for podcasting, so if you have a podcast on Stitcher, the audience there is there to listen to a podcast, that's what they're hungry for. So if you want to be taken seriously, you should probably be on Stitcher. You got SoundCloud, which is sort of pitted as the "YouTube of audio." It's definitely the biggest audio streaming site. Andrew: 175 million unique listeners, yeah right. Chris: Yeah, there's a lot of features that are really good about it, like the inline commenting, and you could do a lot with the artwork, and there's messaging and things. My problem with SoundCloud, I've got personal issues with SoundCloud, because I used it for a while, they killed all of the community features. They pushed the pay too much, so they've really dampened their growth and they don't get taken quite so seriously now. It's good to be on though, it's good to be on. It's easy. Andrew: And there have certainly been rumours about their financial difficulties as well. Chris: Yeah. Andrew: And potentially shutting down, so yeah. Chris: Yeah, they're running a massive loss. Andrew: Don't put too much effort into that one maybe. Chris: It's there as an extra thing to be on, because it's not that hard. But the big one is YouTube, and I've put some stats here. You got 13 billion registered users. Andrew: 1.3 billion. Chris: 1.3 billion, yeah. There's a dot between those numbers, yeah. Andrew: 1.3 billion, yeah. Chris: Five billion videos viewed a day, so there's some serious reach and serious traffic happening on there. And out of all the platforms that we've spoken here, that's definitely the one to be on. It's free, user base is huge, you don't need to be registered or even logged in to watch the videos. Like all the other ones, you have to have an account, so it's really, really accessible. And also, YouTube's owned by Google, so you're exposing yourself to search engines and stuff like that. Yeah, it's got the biggest- Andrew: And just to touch on YouTube for a second, because most of you, we alluded to, "Hey, you're listening to something while doing a mundane task," whereas YouTube's a video platform and, "Well, I can't watch the video while I'm doing that mundane task like driving, or mowing." But I actually do, so if I can't actually find the podcast that I want to listen to in iTunes, I'll actually start up the video on YouTube, and ... I've got an iPhone, so I don't lock my phone, because once you lock it, it turns the video off. So then, I just chuck it in my pocket and yeah, it gets a little bit warm, because it's using a lot of battery power and bandwidth, but so what? Chris: ... But their answer to that is YouTube Red. YouTube Red's like the next version up. You don't get the ads and you can lock your phone while listening to it basically. So that's where they've turned it into an actual streaming service. Everyone's like, "I'm not paying for YouTube," well everyone pays for Sound, everyone pays for Spotify, everyone pays for iTunes and stuff, like that's not really that much of a jump there. Andrew: Cool. So I mean, there's heaps of niches out there that are probably undiscovered that absolutely anyone could start up a podcast on. I think one of the biggest downfalls of podcasts is the fact that it does cost a little bit of money to get started, and it does cost money and time to keep operating, so absolutely we need sponsors. So Joe Rogan, I feel, is probably one of the best examples for sponsors, and Tim Ferris. These guys, when they deliver a sponsorship message, it's always at the beginning, and they always do it from their own personal experience. So that- Chris: That's right. It's in line with what they're doing and it's very honest as well. They're like- Andrew: It's authentic. Chris: ... "So here comes a sponsorship message." And it's always about stuff they use, like for us it's Rode, but we're literally using the Rode microphones right now, so what's the big deal saying, "We're sponsored by Rode?" Right in front of our faces right now, so. Andrew: Exactly. So those guys, when they actually do deliver their messages, they're absolutely saying, "From personal experience I love this product because ..." And then they tell their own story. They put their own flavour in it, they put their own language in it and if they want to swear, that's what their audience wants. Chris: Yeah. Andrew: So I think, if you are gonna make the decision to embark on a project, make a decision whether or not you're gonna swear or not, who's your audience, and then match your product to fit that audience. Hardware. Getting started, we want to just break into it really briefly. We've got some kit here that actually allows obviously the two of us to talk to one another in the same room. We can have up to four and I think even six people in the same room with the kit we've got, but most of you are probably gonna start out either on your own or with one other person. So, let's just cover some of that gear. Chris: So, you've got your Rode Podcaster Mics. They're good because they're USB powered, it can go straight into a phone if you don't want to have the whole mixing desk set up. Pretty cheap. How much are they, because we got a couple of those in there and they're like 160 or something like that? Andrew: Oh, so the Podcaster Mic is different to what we've got here. It's actually a white version and these are the Rode Pro-Caster. The Podcaster will plug into a USB on a laptop, so that's really good if you're a one-man-band. Chris: Yeah, it skips all the extra hardware and stuff. Andrew: Absolutely. Then, if you do actually go to multiple mics, then you'll potentially need a mixer, or sorry, you will need a mixer. So there's different cabling and stuff. Not too hard to figure out once you've got the mixer, because obviously you just match that hole with that hole on the mixer. And one of those great mixers is a Yamaha. Chris: Yeah, they're cheap. Andrew: Yeah, they're pretty cheap. We've actually got a ... What do we got? A Zoom H-6, which is six channels, it allows up to six channels, but it's just a little bit more investment. So close to, I think, $700. Chris: Well, the good thing about those is they're super portable. The idea of that is to be able to podcast anywhere and do live video and all that sort of stuff we do. Then the next step is if you want to go video, you're obviously gonna need a camera. So you start with the Sony Handycams, they're like 500 bucks each to 4K, they're great. Andrew: Yeah. Chris: Next one up is you got the Sony NX. I'll probably stick with Sony for this sort of stuff, but you got the Sony NX range, which is what we're using right now, but that's a bit of a jump up. If you're gonna go with video, you also need lighting. Stick with LED lighting. It's cheap, super bright. It's what we use here. And then you got boom arms as well, which is, they're just handy to have. It's really good because you can manoeuvre around and things like that. Andrew: They're Rode boom arms as well. They either clamp directly onto the desk or they actually give you a plugin if you want to drill a hole, you can fit them directly into the desk. There's heaps of videos on how to set up podcasting studios. Actually, Rodes got some good ones on their website. This is just meant to be, I guess, an introduction as to why we think it's good. Yeah, a little bit of kit, and get out there and have a crack I reckon. Chris: So why would you do it? Honestly, it's one of the best forms of content marketing. It's why we're doing it. We're literally doing a 15, 20 minute video just showing our expertise in podcasting. It's a great way to showcase yourself in the industry, isn't it? Andrew: It is. It is. Chris: And people like listening to it. It's great. It's not often you get a captive audience and you get to showcase your skills. Andrew: Absolutely. Chris: I think that's where it's good, yeah. Andrew: And of course, I mention it every time, if you do want MeMedia to help you with your podcasting, or vodcasting for that matter, we do have all the kit here, so absolutely you can hire this space, or hire us to even set you up. Why not? We can give you plenty of tips and tricks around actually doing that, because once you embark on the video space, then how many cameras are you gonna have? Then it's a matter of editing and all that sort of stuff. There is cheaper ways to do that, and we've spoken about that before, that's live video, yeah? Chris: Yeah, for sure. Andrew: We've spoken about that before, so go back and review that episode, it's really cool. I think that's all we got time for today? We're trying to keep it a bit short. Shorter? We won't even go into predictions. Let's keep it nice and neat. Thanks very much for watching Get Fact Up! Thanks very much Andrew. Chris: No worries, thank you. Andrew: And keep watching. We are on YouTube, Facebook and our website is memedia.com.au. Cheers.

Published Oct 8, 2017 VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: Chris: G'day world. Chris Hogan and Andrew Groat coming to you live from ME Media studios here in Burleigh Heads, where we're produced Get Fact Up. Our new way of producing our Get Fact Up series is via Vodcasting in this studio, which is available for hire for you as well. How you going Andrew? Andrew: Yeah good, how are you Chris? Chris: Awesome. So today we're going to be talking about influencer marketing. We actually alluded to that last week, we said we needed a whole new show for that. Firstly, let's dive into it, what is influencer marketing? Andrew: So influencer marketing, for me, I think leverage. So, you've got your own circle of followers and things like that and you can slowly expand that but when you're working with influencers, you're talking to someone who's got much larger reach, they've got higher indorsement with all their fans, they've got all the content out there already, you're just playing in bigger circles and there's specific metrics that you need to look for, which you've detailed here. Chris: Yeah, so exactly what you've just said, breaking out of your existing circle and into other people's circles. Influencers can be anything from social influencers, be it Facebook, YouTube, Twitter- Andrew: Instagram. Chris: ... Instagram. But also bloggers. Let's not forget the bloggers, okay. Where to from there? Andrew: Content producers. Chris: Content producers. Andrew: More of less, yeah. Chris: Exactly, yeah. SO they're creating original content. Andrew: And they've been doing it for long enough that they've gained trust and all that sort of thing. They've got momentum, they've got inertia with what they're doing and they're doing it for the love of the people, so they've really got that connection there and that's what you want to tap into. Because as a brand, as a business, that's hard to do. There's always that distrust so it's associating yourself with these people that have the ears of everyone else, you know? Chris: Absolutely. So these people have essentially, like you just said, alluded to, they have been doing it for the love of it for a long time before they've actually been able to monetize it. Not all of them even are monetizing. Andrew: I think most people, they have to do it about 2 years before they really see a proper return on investment. Chris: Easily. Andrew: So it has to be a hobby for the longest time and that's the only way to really get that sort of trust and momentum with the endorsement. Chris: So we've got two different ways to utilise ... use, influences to help your brand run a campaign, boost the reach of your brand or product or increase sales etc. So there's two ways to do that, we can either attract or engage them. Andrew: By attracting we're creating something that they need or we're delivering something that they need. And then we're reaching out to them, we're basically just directly contacting and finding these people and being like, "Hey, I've got something for you or I want to pay you to interact with my brand" or something along those lines. Chris: Yeah for example. Research companies do that all of the time. They put out these beautiful slide decks and infographics and what not on ... what are the statistics in certain countries around certain stats, and if they make it even more beautiful then other people, other bloggers, other news corporations actually go and use those stats and cite them in their blog and link back to them. Andrew: Yeah exactly. So using bloggers as an example, they need to get their content from somewhere, they can't just make it up out of thin air. They're people like you and I, they'll search for these facts and when they find it, they're going to use it in their content and if you're presenting it to them in a way that's really, really helpful for them, then they're definitely going to choose you over something else. Chris: So that's the attraction method that we're going in to so we'll keep going down that road for a second. So have we got some example that ... Andrew: Yeah, okay. So I had a think about this, because we were talking about this recently. Obviously, it requires a bit of work, you have to really think, you have to really research your influences, you have to find these people first and you have to look at what they're creating. So, these people are creating this stuff, what do they need to create this stuff? They need facts and figures and juicy content, they need videos and images, they don't know how to do all this stuff. So you make this for them and basically present it, you can just present it in a way, you can just have it out there and they'll find it or you can contact them. Chris: That's the engaging way, yeah. Andrew: Example is, so you look at your niche, let's say, because we were talking about this today, a local attraction. So you look at the influence in that niche, it's going to be something like travel bloggers. If we're saying Australia or even Gold Coast, it'll be like a travel blogger or local guide or something along those lines. What type of content do they create? They're going to create lists, like Top 10 things to do in the Gold Coast. Let's use as an example, Top Ten Things to Do Outdoors. They need to get their info from somewhere about things to do around the Gold Coast, they're not literally going to go and search, go to all these places and figure this stuff out, they'll search this on Google. So you need to be ready for that, and you create something and ... Something that we do a lot of here at ME Media is we create Go-to guide articles, where it's like, we're creating the best guide for a particular topic to attract influences. And this guide will have everything someone would possibly need if they wanted to spread the word about something. So using the local attraction as an example, you would create an article that's basically like, "This is why this attraction is the perfect outdoor experience." Videos, images, tonnes of facts and all sort of juicy stuff that someone could quote, cite, link to or something like that as an influencer, like a travel blogger. And you could even go one step further and contact them and say, "Hey, love what you do. I've written something that perfectly fits in with what you do, would love to see it on your list" or something like that. Chris: And some of them will obviously be so into it, doing it for the love of it, that they see the benefit of improving their content, that they'll actually ... no problems, just do it. Andrew: Because the thing is they have to create this stuff, and if you're giving it to them exactly as they need it or they're finding you on the web exactly how they need it, then they're going to use you, you're making their life easier. This is kind of a business for them so if you're giving it to them on a platter- Chris: They're journalist right? Andrew: ... they're going to choose you over- Chris: They need stats. Andrew: ...yeah they're journalists, they're going to choose you over someone that's making it difficult. Or the less research they have to do, the better. Chris: So these people, when we're attracting them and you're engaging them, it's a blurred line in this particular case, where you're actually calling them up or emailing them, they're not an influencer yet, maybe they're still growing their channel and growing their audience. Yeah, we're getting into the potential engagement- Andrew: It's always give and take. I mean, they're using you to basically look good. If they look like an expert because of you then you're giving them something, if you get a whole bunch of traffic because they've endorsed you, then you get something. It's kind of a joint venture, the influencer model. And the thing is, when someone is going to create this sort of content, they think ... We talk about it, influencer strategy, the objection's always, we should be creating content for our potential customers and this is where we need to look at the circle of reach. Your potential customers are only this big but- Chris: Because you're playing in your existing circle right now. Andrew: ... your existing circle. But if you think outside the box just a little bit and say, "Okay, my potential customers only go this far and they don't necessarily trust me" then you look at the people that can influence that and you're like, "Wow, their reach is huge" and everyone trusts them. So if you can attract them, that little bit of work that you've done to connect with them, it's just exposing you to a bigger, more trusting audience. Chris: So I want to get into the engagement side of things because then that reveals the metrics. So obviously you can actually go out and find these particular influences and engage them and yes, pay them to actually- Andrew: Yeah you just have to have something for them because it's a business for them. Chris: ...pay them to do brand mention, do a custom piece of content and so on and so forth. So when we're doing this, influencer marketing is a real deal. We've spoke about the demise of broadcast and the rise of online media. Like I said, we've got Instagrammers, we've got Facebookers, we've got YouTubers and we've got bloggers, but the metrics aren't all the same. If you're engaging people on these social channels or in their channel of choice then we have to be really- Andrew: Smart. Chris: ... honest with ourselves that we're not going to always get increased sales, increased conversions, increased traffic. So let's dive into Instagram just for a second. Instagram is very popular for influencers, there's heaps of them there. Yes, there's fake one too, but there's still a lot of legit ones there. And they've been doing this for quite a few years now. Andrew: Most of them since the start of Instagram, the ones that are doing well, yeah. Chris: Instagram's all about engagement, clearly, one word. That's what sums up Instagram when you're looking at metrics. So likes, comments, re-grams, brand mentions, so re-grams being like a share, and hashtags. So you can look at trends for hashtags. Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative). But the thing you won't get from Instagram is traffic and probably not sales either. So you have to be smart about this. If you're going to engage an Instagram influencer, you don't want to be getting traffic and sales, you don't want to be thinking like that, it's brand exposure exclusively. Chris: You might grow your Instagram channel, yeah, that's fine but then you can leverage off that to increase sales. Andrew: In some other way, yeah. Chris: But directly, we're talking about direct metrics from these influencer campaigns. So let's talk about Facebook metrics. So obviously the content that gets released, you'll get likes, comments, shares, brand mentions, page likes could increase on your own channel. Remember they're not actually on your channel creating the content and sharing the content. They're created it and sharing it through their own channel because that's where their audience is. But they can help boost your page likes as one of the metrics. Andrew: Yeah, there's more of a connection than Instagram. And you know, there is the website traffic but you're still in a tight knit social platform and people don't want to leave. People that are on Facebook don't necessarily want to leave Facebook unless they're looking for something. So you still have to remember it's better for just increasing your Facebook reach, increasing your branding. It's still the same, but you can get traffic from it. Chris: You can do website traffic, you can increase conversions and you can increase sales. So it's possible but even though we say it's possible, we've gotta have a really honest conversation with these influencers before we start. What have you done before, what have you actually done for other brands before? Have you increased sales? Have you increased conversions? Ah, no. Okay, well I'm still fine with going ahead with you but if we can't increase sales and that, let's look at what we can increase, let's look at the metrics we can measure and can improve on and then have a conversation around that. Let's not assume that everyone's going to increase sales and conversions. Andrew: And partly, you need to be smart about this. You can't approach a Facebook influencer and expect them to increase traffic to your website. So you need to remember that on your side as a business approaching an influencer. But then yeah, they need to be clear about that, because they may not be able to deliver that. So it's just about getting that agreement in place, the right agreement. And then just making sure, yes I believe you can deliver that because that's what this channel does, and then them just delivering on what they've said. So if you don't have that in place then it can be tricky, it can be muddy waters with influencers. Chris: Yeah. And then we've got bloggers. Obviously, from bloggers we can increase traffic, we can potentially increase our SEO, so our keyword ranking, referrals from that particular source, we can track that, conversions and sales. So bloggers are pretty straight forward. Andrew: I personally think that, influencers, bloggers are the best influencers. You can use that in a lot of different directions. And anyone that's a blogger also has ... they're across all their social channels. Because I mean, they're a personality, they need to make sure all this is right, they know how to share on social and thing like that. Chris: Bloggers are also meant to divulge that the content that they're producing has been paid for. Just a hot tip there. So even though ... because Google's watching, Google's always watching, and if they see a link from your site and they come to understand that, hang on a minute, you're creating content that's paid content, so advertorial like content, and you're not divulging that, all of a sudden all of that effort and money that the brand actually paid that blogger to create just went down the tube because Google just found out that, oh no, they're being paid for that content so disregard it, it's not organic. Andrew: Because Google's a business. They don't want to be delivering something that's dishonest. Chris: Well you shouldn't be able to pay for SEO, that's what Google's all about. SEO is earned. So YouTube metrics. So brand, channel subscriptions. So brand engagement, brand awareness and channel subscriptions can be metrics. Traffic to your website because you can actually put links in the descriptions. Referrals, so we can see where the referrals are coming from, they're coming form YouTube. There will actually be, potentially some difficultly around tracking those referrals, so be careful about that. Conversions, so we could potentially increase conversions, maybe the content they've produced gets embedded, you imbed that content on your product pages, potentially, hey that's boosting trust right? Someone else created a piece of content about the product that I'm trying to sell, beautiful. And they're authentic, they're trustworthy. Andrew: Yeah YouTube can be a really good one because YouTube gets really loyal followers. So if you find someone that's got loyal following and they create a video about your brand, what you do, a product, something along those lines, it can be really, really good and they can send a lot of really loyal traffic there. It's just ... been around for a long time and people are very fierce about their loyalty on YouTube. So it can go both ways, it can also go badly if you're approaching the wrong type of YouTube influencer because it's very strong. That strong loyalty, yeah, you have to make sure you're getting the right type of thing to the right type of person on there. It's kind of like Reddit. You don't want to go on there with something that's obviously a branded message, people don't ... they'll be very clear if they don't respect it. Chris: Authenticity. All about authenticity, being true, being trustworthy. These influencers, they're taking a risk when they're taking on your brand and most of them aren't going to actually do it if they feel that it's too risky. They're actually going to say, "Well, no. I need to know that I believe in your product, your brand before I actually do it" and if it's coming from a place of trust and authenticity than their audience is going to love it and it's going to be forever. Don't forget that the content they create is forever. So if they sell out on one person, their audience might die and not engage as much on the next person and they know that. So look, I think we should wrap that up in the interest of time. That's been influencer marketing, I hope everybody's got some education around that. I think it's a great conversation Andrew. I hope you're enjoying this new format of Get Fact Up, I know I am, in and out. And, look, more to come. I'm not sure what next week's going to be about. Andrew: We could even continue with this, but maybe we'll do something different next week. Chris: Predictions, predictions. So one of the predictions is that influencer marketing is on the rise, it's huge and it's going to be tried and tested a lot more over the next ... now, year. It's happening right now, more and more people are signing up for it. So I think that advertising budgets are going to be seriously affected. I'm saying that a minimum of 10%, maybe 25% of marketing budgets are going to shift to influencer marketing. Can't measure that, I doubt we can measure that, sorry. Prediction that you can't measure. Andrew: I forgot that we were doing the predictions so you kind of sprung this one me. But for me, I think it's the influencers that are doing live video that are going to be the ones to watch. No one really knows how to track live video, the metrics are all weird because you don't see it until after ... it's historical metrics on live video, it's weird to figure out exactly how it works at this stage. But the influencers that are doing live video well, they're going to be the ones, I think, to watch in the future and that's going to be the format to watch in the future. Chris: Yep. Well, thanks very much to Rogue microphones for our beautiful microphones, they are sexy microphones. And thanks very much to ME Media, our agency, our content marketing agency and also thanks very much to Beach City, who is also an influencer marketer in their own space as well, doing plenty of live videos. Thanks very much guys and keep watching.

My guest today is Andrew Hinton. Andrew has worked in the digital design field for two decades. He's one of the founders of the Information Architecture Institute and author of the book Understanding Context. In this conversation, you'll learn about the foundations of information architecture and why Andrew thinks of himself as a “radical information architect.” Listen to the full conversation https://theinformeddotlife.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/the-informed-life-episode-26-andrew-hinton.mp3   Show notes Andrew Hinton Helix (database) Understanding Context: Environment, Language, and Information Architecture by Andrew Hinton The Information Architecture Institute The Information Architecture Conference The Informed Life Episode 21: Vanessa Foss on Event Planning Shared Information Environment: let's unpack that, shall we? by Andrew Hinton MUD Interactive fiction (e.g. text adventure games) World of Warcraft O'Reilly Media Peter Morville Ecological psychology James J. Gibson & Eleanor J. Gibson Phlogiston The Copernican Revolution Cartesianism Play-Doh Contextual inquiry Service design Ecosystem Map Bodystorming Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) The Informed Life Episode 15: Jeff Sussna on Cybernetics Norbert Wiener Claude Shannon Due app Apple's Reminders app Steve Jobs: “Computers are like a bicycle for our minds” The Mother of All Demos Doug Englebart Read the full transcript Jorge: So, Andrew, welcome to the show. Andrew: Great. Hey, Jorge, thanks. Very glad to be here. Jorge: So, you and I have been friends for a long time, but for folks who might not be familiar with you, would you please tell us about yourself? Andrew: Yeah, sure. I'm Andrew Hinton. I have been in the design community, in doing digital oriented design things for probably 25 years now, if we count things I was doing before I was being paid full time for it. But definitely 20 years solid now for actually this being my “job” job. And information architecture is kind of my, I don't know, I consider that sort of my home turf. My origin story in all of this really, I think is, is information architecture story. The first community I really kind of bonded with and got connected with was the early IA community, back in the late nineties. Since I started doing this, I've worked roughly half and half, as an internal in large organizations as well as an external consultant, or agency style person. but even then, typically it's very large like… Early on, it was manufacturing in the Southeast. That was like most of our clients in the company I was with then. So, I've worked with a lot of different, big companies and IT organizations and things like that. Nonprofits, profits. But before I got to doing all this, I was more of a humanities person and I still am, I think, at heart. Was a philosophy major, went to seminary briefly as a way to get a theology and philosophy graduate education, but then left because the seminary started getting weird. And then I went into literature and got a masters in that and then ended up with a Master of Fine Arts and poetry. Mostly all of this was just a avoid the real world until I was about 30. But then I had to get like a real job, and it turned out that this fixation I had on the internet, was something that people would pay for more than poems. So, I got into that at that point. But before then, I had really done odd jobs and things where I think a really early formative thing for me was early nineties working in a doctor's office while I was in grad school and all they had was a typewriter and a phone. And I had seen a demo and a Mac user group of something called Double-Helix, I don't know if you remember that. It was later called Helix. But it was just a sort of a drag and drop style way to make a relational database. And I was like, “Ah, we need a database for all of these clients, you know, all these patients, and their accounts and things.” So, they let me do that. And I had to teach it to other people who work in the office and kind of figure out how the interface would work. And really it was sort of this crucible for figuring out how to make things on screens that people could use. And I sort of went from there. Yeah, that's in a nutshell. I ended up writing a book, which just turned five just a couple of days ago, called Understanding Context. and I've been involved in the IA community for a good while, was one of the co-starters of the erstwhile Information Architecture Institute. And I'm looking forward to hopefully being in New Orleans, with my, the IA community, which I really think of like a family reunion for me, honestly. Jorge: I recently had Vanessa Foss on the show; she is one of the people who runs the IA Conference. And that notion of that event as a family reunion came up. It definitely feels like that to me as well. Andrew: Well, and it feels like a family is growing too, which is great. Like I used to worry that it was just a bunch of, you know, old hands getting together. But every year I see these new faces and voices who are stepping in and doing things, you know, and loving the community too. So, in spite of some of the ups and downs, with organizations and whatnot, I'm very optimistic about the community's health. Jorge: And the community is a community in part because of your work. Thank you for the efforts that you've put into the information architecture community over the years. You said that you had studied fine arts and poetry as a way to avoid the real world. And I will say this, you entered the real-world with a bang. I remember myself entering the information architecture community and being influenced by your writings. I remember one piece in particular about the centrality of hyperlinks and how that was different about this work. And then the book that you brought up, Understanding Context, which I consider an important book in the information architecture field. And I was hoping you would tell us a little bit more about that. Andrew: Sure. The challenge is that… A little bit of a qualifier: it's always hard to know where to start. But, really, I think where it came from was really, I think, very early on in my involvement in the IA field, as it was starting to get going as well in the web IA community, I guess I should say. I had already been online, doing things on the internet since right out of college. And I was fascinated with how something like — if our listeners are not familiar, there were these things called — and there are — these things called MUDs, multi-user domains, or multi-user dungeons, because some of the earlier ones are really more like online D&D games, like text-based adventure games, but made in a way where multiple players can be in the same place at the same time. And a precursor to things like World of Warcraft and stuff like that. But there were bunches of these, with different code bases. And it was just one example of where it felt like you were in a real place with people. Like there were emotions involved, there were social interactions and meaning being created. I mean, it really, it mattered. It wasn't virtual in the sense of somehow non-corporeal. It was real. People had bodies who were interacting with one another in this environment. It was just mediated through language, but it felt different than just a conversation. Right? It felt like you were in a place because there were structures, and those structures felt like they affected those interactions, and they mattered. So anyway, that and some other things just had me thinking for a long, long time about what is it that makes this feel this way and work this way? I didn't have this way of saying it then, but now, how is it that language can be environment in that way? So that's always been in the back of my mind. One reason why information architecture was so fascinating to me is because to me, it's never really been especially a metaphor. It's really been just a different way of making structures that people live together in. So, from that, I also was curious, “Okay, we were doing this thing called information architecture. What is it that we're making? Like what do we mean by that?” So, the architecture part is, you know, it's sort of clear, but then the information part is not so clear. I just really wanted to go deep on understanding; what is my material if I'm an information architect? And if we're going to have this discipline, then we need some kind of grounding. Don't we need to really understand what it is we're doing, at a very fundamental level? And I had this hunch that something about digital technology was changing the way human experience worked in terms of how context worked, because anything as simple as just accidentally hitting “reply all”, a button that looks exactly like the “reply” button, except for some minor differences, having a wildly outsized effect, compared to the actual action you're taking. As opposed to in physical life, right? If you want to talk to 10,000 people or whatever, instead of just one person, there's a massive physical difference in what you need to do. All you have to work with is just physical stuff, right? Nothing technological. All the way up to the way Facebook was, clearly, essentially, you know, even early on, basically almost phishing people to get at their information and to trick them into connecting to more people and inviting more people in ways that were manipulative. These were all really preoccupying to me. But also, I really cared about the IA community and what we were doing. And I thought, we need to understand what it is we're saying when we say this information architecture thing. Because I was willing to let go of the label entirely if it turned out it really didn't mean anything different that was important. But I was just so convinced — and still am — that there is a thing that we need, and we need it to be good that other phrases about things like interaction design or user experience and these other labels, they don't quite get at. So, all of those things together. I went on this, I thought, “Hey, I'm going to write this little book about context. I'm just going to… I've got some thoughts. I'm going to put them down.” Somehow, I talked to O'Reilly about doing this with me, and thankful to Peter Morville for helping me make that connection. And it just morphed. And I'll end with this bit that — and you've heard me say this before — I think I wrote 100, 150 pages of just all of these ideas and thoughts I've had from talks and writing, some things I've already done. And then I just got into this part where I was like, “Okay, well I need to address what information is.” And I just didn't know, having some [inaudible] academic background, I was like, “I need to make sure I'm really researching these things and being clear.” So, I asked around, and I asked some of people we know, who teach in universities, about information. And I asked them, and I could not get a straight answer. And I thought, well, that's interesting. And, anyway. Ended up finding out about this whole other way of thinking about information that comes from ecological psychology, the work of James J. Gibson and his wife, and how that was influencing embodied cognition as a theoretical approach. And it just kind of went from there and it blew everything up and I had to kind of start over. And then I ended up writing a much bigger book than I believed. But that was sort of the story behind like why I even got into it. And what it's done is it's really rewired the way I think about the way people interact with their environment. Even just me saying it that way is an artifact of that rewiring, right? I tend to talk about environments rather than just individual devices or things or websites and whatnot. Anyway, it just really changed the way I think about what I do, that I'm still really coming to understand. Jorge: You said that a part of your pursuit for writing the book was coming to an understanding of what the material is that we're working with when we are working on an information architecture. Can you speak more to what that material is or where you've landed on that? Andrew: The material, it turns out to be material. And what I mean by that is, I think early on I thought… So, I use this analogy sometimes. You know how early science and alchemists would use this term — “phlogiston” — to talk about some substance or thing that they knew must be there because they could see the effects of what was going on? They treated it as if it was a thing, even though it isn't really a thing. It was multiple things and processes and whatnot, that we now have names for. But to me, that's kind of how I was using that word “material” early on. It feels like we were using information in a material way, but I really couldn't explain what that meant. Now, after going through all this, I've come to realize, well, actually it isn't material like it's, it's stuff. It's our bodies — and our brains are part of our bodies, so I just say our bodies — are interacting with the environment around us. And the environment around us has stuff. You know, it's objects and surfaces and all of that. And that's where information comes from, and everything else is really sort of this linguistic construct that we've created, or in a human sphere of language-meaning. But all of that is ultimately grounded in our bodies and the way our bodies interact with the world, the physical world around us. So, it's really more of a continuum for me now between something like knocking on the table I'm sitting at right now — that's physical — to, if you go all the way to the other end of the spectrum and saying the word “table” and all the meanings that that can have. But ultimately, the only reason that those meanings can be there is because in some way, whether it's three or four or 10 degrees of separation, it's connected to that kind of meaning. So, to me it's about the relationship between the creature, of the human, interacting with that material world. And then when you add language to that, then you get this really interesting material that can be very slippery and hard to pin down because language is like that. But it's in that interplay between our bodies and our environments and the way we talk about our experience and communicate with one another. That's the material. Jorge: One of the challenges that many of us face — many of us who think of ourselves as information architects, primarily — is that the stuff that you're speaking about is stuff that we take for granted in our day-to-day lives. I think that it's in your work that I read about this analogy with fish and this old trope about fish not being aware of the water they're swimming in and somehow, we are swimming in language. And because we are dealing with architecting structures of language that change how people perceive the environment they're operating in — that's a fairly abstract notion. And I'm wondering, for you who have worked, like you said, part of your career internally in large organizations and also as a consultant, how does one make this palatable or actionable to the folks who need this perspective as part of their work? Andrew: So, one of the real challenges of trying to write about this and teach this is that very thing. And part of the challenge of that is, there's a sort of a Copernican shift that you almost need to be able to make, to see it differently. Meaning, you know, the Copernican revolution /[that was/] basically a complete reframing, right? Where it's like, no, everything doesn't revolve around the earth, all these planets revolve around the sun. And it changed… It simplified astrophysics, astronomy. But it was a really hard shift to make because people's just ingrained idea of their experience, where it was not that. And this is really coming from this undoing of Cartesian thinking around body-mind separation and things like that that's sort of been an increasing part of the conversation in the sciences over the last 20 some years, I guess. People are so… It's so ingrained to think about, especially the West, I guess it's, it's so ingrained to think about things in a certain way you know, this idea that you could take your brain and put it into a vat and it'd still be you. But, well, no… Your brain only knows what it knows because of your body and vice versa. That part it feels like it's, to really get a lot of this, you have to get to that, but I'm realizing too that like, well, I can't sit people down and get him there every time. So, the way I've been teaching the workshop, for example, it has been just starting off with just grounding people in a substance or an object and building up from there. Just getting them grounded in, “I have a body,” and so I use Play-Doh in the workshop. So, everybody gets their own Play-Doh and you have to hold the Plato and you have to write down things about like how your body's interacting with it. You put it back in the container, you cover it. You have to think about right now, okay, what is your body experiencing with the Play-Doh now? Well, you can't see it. You can't touch it, but you can see and touch this container. And these all sound like very simplistic, primitive questions. But that's the whole point, to ground people back in simplistic, primitive way of thinking about how bodies and environments interact with one another. Because ultimately what we're trying to get to is all of this abstraction we've created around ourselves, all this information-sphere, all these other things, our bodies want those things to be as straightforward as being able to squish some Play-Doh in my hand or to pick up a hammer and hit a nail. And so that's kind of how I've been framing it is, is getting rid of some of the theory at first, and just grounding people in, “Okay, you've got a body, you're experiencing things,” and then gradually trying to get to the point where we're talking about now, how does language function on top of that? And in what ways does language complicate that simplicity. And then when we add digital, there's a whole other realm of complication or complexity. But it's building up to the abstract, I think helps. It's what I'm ultimately trying to do, is to get at the root. That's why lately I've been calling myself a “radical information architect.” I felt silly that I didn't know this until just recently, that, that radical — the root — really, the root of the word “radical” is the word “root” or the same root. But basically, radical's meaning really comes from this idea that you're changing something at the foundations, right? You're rewiring what's underneath. And I feel like that's what I'm trying to do with this. So if I get people to get out of abstract-head and out of information-head, the way that we typically think of information and start with, how do we understand our physical environment and interact with it in the same way lizards and spiders interact with their environment. The principles are basically the same. And then build from there. That's how I can teach this. Now, if I'm working with just colleagues on the fly in the middle of a project, or I'm talking to my colleagues here at work, I don't go into all that. I mean, I've been here six months and I have yet to go into all that. But what I do is try to slip in this grounding and kind of draw on the whiteboard. Here's a person. Here's some things that they're interacting with. Here's how that might change over time. I'm always trying to locate it into like, you've got a human in an environment doing stuff. Because ultimately that's what user experience brings to the table. There's a human being, and we have to make all this other stuff we're making compatible with that human being. So we're creating new parts of their environment that we want them to use and understand, right? So, in my day-to-day that's just how I started and it's been helpful that we have methodologies like contextual inquiry and service design and things like that where you have some tools, with things like ecosystem mapping and whatnot, that if you really put some pressure on them to make sure you're staying very grounded with a human, with a body doing a thing, that really helps to get people there with you. Things like bodystorming can help too, but it's hard to get engineers to do bodystorming or others. So that's not as common for me. Jorge: You said that this line of thinking has changed how you work, and I feel like we're getting a little bit into that with this conversation, in your interactions with your team. I'm wondering how, if any, it has also influenced the way that you manage your own information and get things done? Andrew: Yeah. I kind of inadvertently learned a lot about myself and the way that I interact with my own environment. You know, another thing about me is, it wasn't until I was in grad school that I was diagnosed with ADHD. And that's something that plagued… I was going to say plagued. That's maybe not the best way to put it. But until I knew what was going on, it was — and you'll hear this from a lot of people who were diagnosed as adults — I really had a lot of challenges that, that really got to the core of myself as a person from that, because I really couldn't trust myself to behave in ways that I wanted to behave in the world and things done and understand things and to keep track of things and all of that. And in fact, just writing a book with one of the scariest things I could even consider. That's one of the reasons I felt like I had to do it, was because it's just very, very hard to marshal… People talk about a train of thought. And for years I've made this joke that I've really got this sort of a Beijing-full of rickshaws of thought. Like, I don't have a train, just these things bouncing around. Understanding this more has helped me to understand so much better that I have to design my environment around me so that it can supplement and help me. Right? And you mentioned earlier before we started recording, you talked about how in one of your podcasts you talked to Jeff Sussna about cybernetics. And honestly, that's a topic I wish I had gone deeper in when I was writing the book, although then I would've had to make it even longer. So, I don't know. But Norbert Wiener and the people who were working in cybernetics, they were really getting at something that the more abstracted Shannon information science, in-theory world, wasn't quite getting at, which was this very ground, that idea of how our bodies and our environments are, are very symbiotic. But it's taken a long time for mainstream thinking to catch up with us. But now I have no shame in creating crutches for myself. So, for example, I use an app called Due on my phone. And good Lord, if this developer ever stops making or updating this, I'm going to be in terrible shape because it works just the way it needed to, which is any little thing that I go, “That feels like something I'm not going to remember.” I put it in there and then it bugs me until I do something about it. Right? So, it allows me to snooze it in a way where I can snooze it in small increments of time or big increments of time of time. For me, it's much more successful than Apple's Reminders, for example, which are too calm for me. And in fact, I think it's the thing where it's like, if it comes up more than a certain number of times, it goes away. I've yet to even figure out what the rules are around Reminders; I find them untrustworthy. Whereas Due, I have this love hate relationship with, because it just nags the hell out of me. But it does it because I told it to. So that's for things in the moment or things I need to remember this at this time. One thing that I really love about Reminders on the iPhone is the location-based thing. So, I take the train to work, which in Atlanta is sort of like winning the lottery to be able to take the train to work. And there are things that I know I need to do as soon as I get to the station near my house, but I know I'm going to forget them because — and it turns out there's research about this, and I write about this in the book — that changing physical environment, affects what you're able to remember. The thoughts that you're having on one room can just disappear when you go to the next room and things like that. And it's not some magical problem. The problem is that your body, your whole cognitive system, is using your environment as a partner in the way that it is making thoughts and thinking through things and remembering things. So, anyway, I can set it so that it's going to remind me of something as soon as I get to the train station. And sure enough, every damn time, it turns out I have forgotten the thing. And I'm thankful that I had told my phone to remind me when I got to the train station. But that's helpful because it's variable. I never know exactly when I'm going to get there when I set the reminder. So, there's things like that I have to do, and I'm in it and it still feels like I'm treading water most of the time, but at least I'm not drowning. And I have other things I do too, but that's just an example of one of those things I've had to do. Other things like routines, where I put my keys, where I put my wallet, where I put my badge for work, I have to do it exactly the same way every day, and if I don't, or if I do this thing where — and again, this is an embodied cognition thing that I understand better now because of that way of thinking — if for some reason, I have some other object in my hand on the way out the door — and this is probably true for a lot of people — like if I've got a letter, I'm trying to mail or something, or especially if it's in any way the shape of another object that I always carry, I'll often forget the thing that I'm always carrying because my body is just sort of halfway paying attention and just assume it's like, “Oh, I've got everything.” Right? So, there's leaks that can happen, but I'm always trying to plug them. Jorge: One of the benefits that we've gained from having these digital things in our lives is that they can augment that relationship between the person and the environment in ways that give us perhaps a little more control and that make it possible for us to suit it better to our needs. Would that be fair? Andrew: Yeah, absolutely. And it's that augmentation again, the thinking around cybernetics, the original work was very much about, right? Which was, let's not create this whole separate alien thing. Like this is all environment, it's all human. So, let's use it to supplement. And even in AI circles, that's one of the big — I don't want to say tension points, but one of the big dichotomies — I guess is it's sort of the school of thought of, well, let's replace certain kinds of human labor using AI or certain human activities or behaviors or whatever versus let's use it to supplement humans and humans supplement it in this more symbiotic kind of a relationship. So, I think, I think that theme, that augmentation theme, I mean, even Steve jobs, right? The bicycle for the mind. I mean, this was, and I think he borrowed a lot of this thinking from… Sorry, his name is escaping me, but the mother of all demos, you know? Jorge: Doug Englebart? Andrew: Yeah. So, this idea of augmenting human needs with technology in this way, it's got a long tradition. But the devil's in the details, right? It's as to how, how do we arrange those things? How do we make them really good for us? You know, rather than things that somehow turn against us, or other people can turn against us. Jorge: Well, thank you. I want to thank you for your work and for helping us be more aware of those relationships. And thank you for being on the show. Where can folks follow up with you? Andrew: I'm online; andrewhinton.com is just sort of my home site and it's got the ways to ping me. There's a contact form, all that stuff, and links to my book, which people are still apparently buying it, because I still get a little check every now and then. So, I'm super happy to know that. I'm starting to feel self-conscious about, about some of the content cause it's getting a little old. But I feel that hopefully the principles are still stable. So contextbook.com is the home site for that. So, you can find me either one of those ways. Jorge: Fantastic, and I will include both of those in the show notes. Thank you so much for being on the show, Andrew. Andrew: Thanks, Jorge. This is great. It was great to catch up and an honor to be on your show.

This is the 6th annual episode with Barbara. Andrew and Barbara talk about making change. The challenges in trying to notice the end before feels like it has gone too far past us. The talk about the last year and the grand changes that are coming for both of them in 2020.  They also recorded a bonus for the Patreon on how to tell if something is fate or not. You can get access to that and all the great bonus material by signing up over here.  You can catch all the previous episodes here on my website. Or look up episodes 22, 44, 58, 72, and 90 where you listen to your podcast.  Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. You can find Barbara through her website here.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcript ANDREW: [00:00:02] Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp podcast. This week I am catching up with Barbara Moore just before the end of the year for our annual podcast episode where we check in on what's going on, what's changed, and, [00:00:17] you know, talk a lot about the shifting perspectives in our spiritual lives and practices and so on. You know, it's hard to imagine people don't know who you are, Barbara, certainly anyone in the tarot world, but for those who don't, who are you? [00:00:32] BARBARA: Oh, I forgot about this part of the interview. Yes. My name is Barbara Moore. I've been playing with tarot for, I don't know, maybe 30 years now. I'm probably best known for [00:00:47] a couple of things: one, creating tarot decks and writing books to go with them, and a few stand alone books as well, and I'm also the tarot acquisitions editor for Llewellyn, and I sometimes do some work for Lo Scarabeo as well. [00:01:02] And I teach here and there. ANDREW: Awesome. BARBARA: Yeah. ANDREW: So, I mean, I guess, you know, one of the things that I wanted to talk about with you was, it seems like [00:01:17] for me, everything's changed, you know, since our last podcast, I have gotten divorced, and my ex has moved out. I had a fire that burned down my store, and I have since reopened and, you know, opened a studio [00:01:32] to see clients out of and opened a new store. And, so for me, it's been a massive year of change, you know, perhaps unsurprisingly, if you follow the tarot birth card, year card business, as my death card just ended [00:01:47] at the beginning of the month, but it's also been a year of or at least a time of change for you too, right? Like you're also, maybe not quite where I am on the other side of it, but really sort of [00:02:02] setting in motion a bunch of change for yourself as well. Right? BARBARA: [00:02:17] That is absolutely true. The cycle of change, I would say it started back in 2016, and it has ushered in a period of challenge and becoming stronger and having things ripped away to find out what really matters, [00:02:33] and, as your listeners, if they've been listening to our conversations know, that two years ago, I moved to California, my wife and I moved to California, and we've been having a great adventure as [00:02:48] well as a lot of challenges and struggles. And we have recently come to the conclusion that this has been a really fun adventure, and we're grateful that we had it, but it's time for the adventure to be over, and so we [00:03:03] will be moving sometime this summer. So that is a really big change that we can talk about. It's not like having a store burn down or having a divorce, a relationship, a marriage end, [00:03:20] but our relationship also has gone through some struggles, luckily came out the other end stronger and better, richer and deeper, but it's still, we're both like two different people now, so it's [00:03:35] almost like a new relationship because we're learning to be together in new ways. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, you know and one of the . . . one of the things that people always say is something like what you said, whenever they start talking with [00:03:50] their own things, like, it's not as bad as your situation or whatever, right? And, I mean, on the one hand, yeah, maybe, right, like I get that, but also I think it's . . . I think it's really real, [00:04:05] how difficult struggle is for people, right? And you know, I mean there is tragedy and loss and people dying and all, you know, all those kinds of things that you know, no joke are very difficult. Right? [00:04:21] But I think that it's really important to not diminish our own struggles too, especially in the face of that. Right? Like it's, there's no scale. There's no competition, you know? And maybe other people [00:04:36] feel differently, if they're in positions like mine, but I actually feel like just relating around stuff is so much better than when it starts to kind of slide into, you know, areas where it's like, [00:04:51] well, it's not as bad as your life, but you know, whatever. It's like, yeah, that doesn't feel so great. And now I feel like there's a sort of other element to it, that isn't, doesn't need to be there, you know? BARBARA: Like a competition [00:05:06] or something. ANDREW: Yeah, a competition, or a sense of apology, you know? I mean, I feel like if, if I know somebody well enough to talk about my life and their life, then we're on the same ground, right, you know? And everybody, I think [00:05:21] everybody understands that some things are more difficult than others, from a certain perspective, you know, but, but either way, I think it's . . . I think it's important to sort of just keep that relationship open, you know, and not, [00:05:37] I don't know, create that distance that sometimes comes with that for me. BARBARA: Yeah, yeah, that's a really interesting point. Like, how did we, as a people start doing that, because it really is a habit and I feel like it's a little bit like social [00:05:52] behavior niceties, because when I'm not talking publicly, like on a podcast, I would talk about what I went through in terms of now that I'm through it and I can see the other [00:06:07] side when I look back on it, it was so hard I don't even know how I got up every day. ANDREW: Yeah. BARBARA: You know, so to say to you, "Oh, it wasn't so bad." When, if I talk to you privately, I would be like, "Oh my God, I don't know how I did that," you know . . . so, you were right. We [00:06:22] are on equal terms here. It's been hard. ANDREW: Yeah, you know, and life is difficult, right? You know, I mean not all the time. Luckily there's great things, you know? I mean, one of the things that was interesting was being at the tail end of the summer, [00:06:37] and I was checking in with the kids, just before they went back to school this year, and I'm like, “How was your summer?” Right? And they were, they both gave it like rave reviews. And they were like, “Well, how was your summer, Dad?" And I was like, I'm like, you know, [00:06:52] “I don't give it an 8 a 10, and like those two missing points are cause like, relaunching the store during the summer was a ton of work and very stressful, you know? And like, just dealing with all the stuff that came with that was very stressful.” [00:07:07] And I was like, “Man, I'm doing pretty good at having a good time despite all this, you know, horrible stuff that's gone on and all the stress that comes with it,” right? You know?  But that also doesn't mean that there weren't days where I was like, “Oh my God, I have no idea, is that just [00:07:22] it, is this, you know, am I done having a store, is this over? Is that over?” You know, it's . . . Yeah, it's complicated when we lose that direction, right? I think it's . . . I think it's been challenging. And I think it's been a long time that you've been [00:07:38] sort of wrestling with this sense of direction, you know. BARBARA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: I'm thinking about . . . We talked somewhere in one of the past episodes about, probably before you moved out there, right? When I did that impossible reading for you, and you were like, “Oh, yeah, I'm [00:07:53] going to do all these things now,” you know? It's been, it's been a quite a while in some ways, I think, right? BARBARA: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Yeah, I have, especially in terms of my tarot . . . well, in a lot of areas in my life, but in terms of my tarot career, [00:08:08] I have felt really lost. So, so lost and I . . . and there are a lot of elements to that. One, I should have wrote notes. [00:08:23] One thing that changed is I wasn't working with tarot for myself. Well, I wasn't reading for other people either. I quit doing that a while ago for, mostly because I didn't feel like I had enough [00:08:38] to bring, to give, I wasn't, my cup wasn't full. I couldn't fill anyone else's cup and I wasn't working with the cards for myself. So, starting in January, I started pulling a card a day, because that's like, what you tell beginners [00:08:53] to start and I would do it and I'd mark it in my daily journal and, but, and never did anything with them and so finally, but it was enough. I mean, I had, all I had energy to do was that. [00:09:08] And that was a start. I was touching my cards again and that mattered. Then when things started, mmm, taking an upturn, I added something like, "Okay, I want this daily draw to do [00:09:23] something more than just get marked down in my book and mean nothing, but use ink," and so I decided to start pulling two cards a day. And making them mean something. So the first card was [00:09:38] some energy that I was going to find myself into that day, you know, whether it was something that happened or my added something, just, just the energy of the day, something, and then with an eye to improving myself, [00:09:53] or becoming the person I want to be, more than I am. I pulled another card: "How can I interact with this energy?" To do that. And that has been super helpful. [00:10:08] That's made a big difference and made things more active for me in terms of like, doing something with the cards. So, you know, that's just a little thing but it's made a big, big difference. [ping from phone] I am so sorry about [00:10:24] . . . ANDREW: Well, that's okay. BARBARA: And I also had been thinking a lot about, like, I had been questioning the whole doing readings thing. Right? What do we do readings [00:10:39] for? What's the purpose? Oh, these mundane readings about our everyday problems. How boring is that? Or is that even the right thing to do? I mean, just very angsty, kind of pointless, spinning my wheels questioning, [00:10:54] and then, you know, when I was thinking about, we were going to talk, and I'd thought I'd like to talk about that, and I had a kind of a revelation. I'm not sure if it's going to stick, but it's a thought, that because I [00:11:09] want to do readings about different things, or in different ways, or with a different focus. I had to denigrate those readings, for some reason, you know, I think maybe it's human nature sometimes to make ourself feel better and more confident, we have to put [00:11:24] down something else for whatever reason. And so, even just that thought made me feel a lot better about things like, "Oh, well, just because I don't want to do that and just because I want to do this, [00:11:40] that doesn't mean the other is bad. I don't have . . ." You know? I mean, does that make any sense? ANDREW: I do. BARBARA: Yeah. ANDREW: Yeah, you know, maybe a year, two years ago, [00:11:55] I was sitting during my, you know, not daily draw, but regular draws, and I was like, writing in my journal, and I found myself writing something like, "Well, when I'm free, blah blah blah [00:12:10] blah blah," right? BARBARA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And, and I, for whatever reason, on that day, as opposed to the various other days when I'd written something similar, I stopped and I looked at it. And I was like, [00:12:25] “Well, when is that going to be? And what does that look like?” Right? And I'm like, you know, at the time I was in an open relationship without a huge amount of limits on it. I mean some, but not, you know, I'm like, it's pretty darn free, I'm like, [00:12:40] you own your own store and you work for yourself. Like, what, what is it that other people are defining for you or that are limiting for you, right? You know? And the answer became pretty clear that it was very [00:12:55] little, right? Not nothing. But very little, right? I still have to pay taxes, I still have to, you know, whatever, there are certain things, but . . . And, I spent a lot of time sort of chewing on that for a while and realizing how [00:13:10] how often, movement, change, you know, these ideas were sort of created on continuing to define myself in relationship to other things [00:13:25] that actually had no sway or real say over my life, right? You know, I mean if I, if I decided, you know, I mean, I'm a, I'm a very fortune-teller-oriented card reader, but if I decided that I had enough of [00:13:40] that, and all I wanted to do was psychological readings, I could just change my website and filter people based on that and inform them, when they tried to book that, you know, this was the process going forward and that would be it. Like there's, there wasn't a lot of [00:13:55] things that prevented me from the various things that I was sort of waiting to become free enough to do. And so, since then I've spent a lot of time keeping my, keeping my definition and directions [00:14:10] in check, right? Like really looking at them, and saying, “Okay, am I, am I defining this relationally? Am I in relationship with some idea that I'm not actually interested in or don't want to live by," and so on, you know, and it's, [00:14:25] it's not always easy, but I think it's really helpful. Right? So look at those pieces and say, you know, your practice has no bearing on day-to-day type questions, right? Your practice doesn't need to have any relationship to the way I read or other people read [00:14:40] or the, you know, the whims of the tarot community and, you know, this year, next year, or 10 years from now, you know. BARBARA: Yep. Yeah, knowing [00:14:55] what you want, cleanly, and being realistic about it, and not just finding excuses, that takes a lot of self-reflection and honesty, [00:15:10] but will really make a big difference.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. BARBARA: In how you feel about your life in this moment. ANDREW: So, how do you, how do you generate that self-reflection? [00:15:25] You're talking about tarot, as one part, your tarot practice this year. How else do you talk--how else do you figure out? Because andone of the things that I think is--yeah, it's a bit of a theme, I think, with some episodes, it comes [00:15:40] up in various places, but this idea of like, how do you know when you're done? Right? How do you know when enough's enough? How do you notice that change, mark that change? You know? And so on, right? BARBARA: Yeah. [00:15:55] And, hmmm . . . Like, if we could come up with a format, a step-by-step format, on how to get yourself to that spot, we could probably be millionaires. Because everyone wants to know that, I [00:16:10] think. Because, at least for me, I have not come up with a method that, like, walks me to the spot where I can step over the line out of, you know, the mists of confusion into clarity. [00:16:26] I don't have that. For me, it has been, it has felt like waking up. ANDREW: Mmm. BARBARA: Like, like I've been either asleep or underwater [00:16:41] or walking through Jello or something. And I don't realize it at the time for that. I mean, I know I don't feel right, I know I feel confused and unhappy, no energy, but [00:16:56] I don't really fully understand that state of being asleep or underwater until I start coming out of it. And then I see it. And then I start thinking, [00:17:12] I don't have to be that way anymore.  ANDREW: Mmm. BARBARA: And so, when I can, it's like this pivotal point, this space where, like, a liminal space between what has been going on and what could be and [00:17:27] I have this opportunity to keep behaving the way I had been or changing the behavior. But before that, I don't know that I could have changed the behavior. I don't know that I was in a place where I could have [00:17:42] done that. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. BARBARA: So, for me, it's this point where . . . Or at least how it feels for me right now, is, I can't wait to get started on the next phase and [00:17:57] I haven't had that excitement, energy, or enthusiasm in two years. So how . . . But how do I know? It's, it's, it's vague. I don't have . . . well, maybe as we keep talking, I'll think of more concrete things. ANDREW: Uh-huh. BARBARA: But, to start the conversation, [00:18:13] it, that's what it feels like for me. What's that feel like for you? ANDREW: I mean, lately, so like in the last year, I've been noticing [00:18:29] where I'm not putting energy, that I officially think that I'm putting energy right? Where do I feel a difference between, you [00:18:44] know, something that I'm excited about, you know? It doesn't, it doesn't make it difficult for me. It's not difficult for me to show up and make art in my studio. You know, making art is great. I mean, [00:18:59] it requires, it requires having some time, you know, and it requires, you know, ideally not having sick kids at home or whatever, like certain things, but it's pretty easy to make that commitment. [00:19:15] You know, I've been sort of in and out of relationship in terms of polyamory this year a bit, and one of the things that I noticed around some of that was, where I was [00:19:30] willing to put in a certain kind of effort or show up in a certain way in one situation, but not in another. You know, and to me, that starts to be like, okay, so if I'm, if I'm willing to make the extra time or [00:19:46] hang out with them if they're sick or, you know, whatever, but with somebody else, I'm not feeling that as much, then those kinds of decisions start to be little flags for me. It's like, not necessarily that it's the end, but it's, something needs to change there, right? Or something has changed [00:20:01] there, and I need to sort of look at that. Right? And I think that, I don't know that we ever notice the moment, right? Like I don't know if there's a, you know, barring like, really, you know: And I said something and then they smack me in the face and I said [00:20:16] "We're done," like, you know, unless it's, like, ridiculous and dramatic, which is, you know, never really my life. I don't think that we ever notice explicitly those moments. I think that we notice, we can notice [00:20:31] when we're wobbling along that line, and then we can sort of reflect and see what's coming. Or what makes sense from that point, you know? BARBARA: Right. Yes. Yeah. Yes, you're right. It's, it is hard [00:20:46] in these things to pick a point, as you said, and for most of it's probably more like a process, you know, that it takes some time and, but, sometimes even within that process you can find like little mini points, you know, [00:21:01] like, I remember, I remember admitting to myself . . . Because we'd already started talking about how California wasn't right for us. ANDREW: Uh-huh. BARBARA: And, so, the next question was, where do we go next? ANDREW: [00:21:16] Mm-hmm. Is the answer Tijuana? BARBARA: The answer is not Tijuana. ANDREW: Okay. BARBARA: I found myself not being super excited about thinking about where to go next.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. BARBARA: I knew I didn't want to be here. Didn't know where I want [00:21:31] to go So, I kind of made myself think about that, and in that moment, I had this realization that hit me very hard: I want to go home. [00:21:47] And that was hard to admit, and hard to feel, and hard to know, because I knew it wasn't going to fly for us, for us, my marriage, my, our family, our little, just the two of us were a family. [00:22:04] Because we didn't want the winters. We . . . The winters in Minnesota are just too, too, too much and we're not ready for that. But just knowing that, one of the things I learned during this adventure is my family [00:22:19] and my Minnesota friends are very important to me, like more important to me than I knew before I left. ANDREW: Hmm. BARBARA: And so that little, and that, so that was a mini, like, you know, moment. [00:22:35] And then, like, when I actually told Dylan that, that was another moment, because it was scary to say that, you know, for me, because it was like, I can't believe I'm gonna say this. Because one fear was, what if she says, “Okay, let's go [00:22:50] home,” and then I'm stuck in Minnesota winter again! But anyways, so, yeah, these little mini moments of, you know, revelation. Oh, and another thing that I have noticed. I don't know if you've had this too. But now that I feel like [00:23:05] I'm being more honest with myself, that we're on, we have some more clear direction on what the future is going to look like, synchronicities are happening.  Like, I can barely like, take a breath without something, like [00:23:20] helping me feel like I'm on the right path. You know, and I've heard people talk about that, like well, if you're looking for it, of course, you're going to find it. You know, like cynics might say that. And other people might say, [00:23:35] “Well, yeah, that's a sign that you're on the right path.” I don't know if I'd quite go that far, because I'm not sure what I believe about the right path thing. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  BARBARA: Fate and destiny, that's going to be a focus of study this coming year. I'm very excited about it. ANDREW: [00:23:50] Well, you know, it's funny. I have those as listed, at the top of my list of things I want to follow up on in this conversation: agency, force, death, destiny, and free will. So we can, [00:24:05] we can set some explorations on it in this conversation and then, you know, a year from now we can report back as to where it's gotten. So yeah. BARBARA: Absolutely. Totally. Yes, right. So synchronicities, you know, [00:24:20] they always, I find them comforting, and encouraging, so whether they're actually real or not, it doesn't matter to me right now. I'm taking my comfort where I can get it. It's helping. ANDREW: So, and I think that, [00:24:35] first of all, I think, you know, as the song says, you know, whatever gets you through the night. Like, I think that finding comfort where we can is always, you know, as long as it's not too self-destructive. [00:24:51] I think it's always a great move, right? I think that, you know, this year of sort of moving through the fire and doing that has definitely been a year of more indulging- and comfort-orientated behavior [00:25:07] than is usual for me. And I'm just like, you know what? Life is fricking hard right now, so I'm not going to worry about that too much. And I'm just going to, you know, lean into that wherever and whenever I need to, you know, so there's been [00:25:22] more naps, more ice cream, and more TV this year than would normally be a thing for me, because sometimes that, you know, for me anyway, that's part of getting through these times, right?  BARBARA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: I think that, you know, [00:25:38] so, synchronicities are a thing that I am very interested in, especially because it's often touted as the explanation of how tarot works, also, right. You shuffle the cards and the universe [00:25:54] through synchronicity arranges them in a way that is meaningful. And, you know, it's kind of, it's kind of fine and fun as an answer unless you try and like [00:26:09] say, “What does synchronicity mean? How exactly does that function? And you know, is there anything behind that?” And then all of a sudden you just like slide into utter chaos of inexplicable mystery, right? And I think that that's fine. I have, for me, I'm [00:26:24] like, you know, mystery is the answer, right? I'm like, tarot runs on mystery. That's all we need to know about it. BARBARA: Right. ANDREW: Exactly, exactly, right? But, so, I think [00:26:39] that synchronicity is, you know, lots of people are really into numerology, and, you know, they're like . . . I've, you know, people come for readings, like, "I've been seeing lots of triple eight lately, or triple this, or triple . . ." [00:26:54] And I'm always like, "Well, that's cool. What does it mean?" And you know, it . . . And then they'll often say a thing followed by the question, which is usually, “So when is that going to manifest?” Right? [00:27:09] And so, you know, and I don't mean this to make fun of people, like I'm not at all, right? Like absolutely, there are those moments where like, “Oh, there's a sign. Okay, where's the, where's the product?” Right? “Where's, where's the actual outcome of that?” So, [00:27:24] sort of more and more over time, I've been, I've been looking at what it is that I believe, how I approach things, and thinking about . . . [00:27:39] You know, people always ask me, like, well, so “What's the, what's the astrology in the Orisha tradition?” Right? “What's the astrology in your Orisha practice?” And I'm like, there is none, it doesn't exist. Right? It's not a part of it at all. There's no, no consideration [00:27:54] given to it in any real sense. There, there is, notions around times of day, a bit, depending on what we're talking about, and if you practice in a syncretized kind [00:28:09] of way with the saints, then maybe certain Orishas have their day, right? You know,  where many people celebrate them extra, but there is no astrology. And, and I've been noticing the sort [00:28:24] of growing tension for me between, like, astrology, which I stopped reading this year, and stepped away from and decided that I was going to actively not engage any more, and [00:28:39] the way in which I was feeling stressed and tense around that stuff some, and the fact that it's not actually a part of my religious practice at all. Right? And I'm kind of the same with, like, some of the [00:28:54] synchronicity stuff, you know? There have been times in my life where I was very intense on that kind of stuff and, you know, thought about it and wrote about it, had a bunch of experiences with it. And now there's [00:29:09] basically only one symbol from the universe that I'm interested in. Well, there's a couple. One, but the synchronous thing, or the thing that I think fits this way, is if I find a playing card on the street, [00:29:24] then for me, that's a message, and I will interpret the card based on my knowledge of reading them and we'll go from there. Right? The other thing that is synchronous, you know, from a certain perspective, but I see it as more directly as a message [00:29:39] from spirit, which kind of has a different definition in my mind. So, like, three months ago, maybe a little less, I broke up [00:29:54] with someone that I'd been with for a long time. We decided to change the nature of our relationship. And it was very kind and very honest. And you know, and the relationship has changed into [00:30:10] a really good friendship, which is lovely. But about two days after I . . .  that happened, I found a robin's nest on the ground with three dead eggs in it like broken eggs, right? And I was [00:30:25] like, everyone's like, “Oh, that's just so . . .” I'm like “No, this is just sad and unpleasant,” right? You know? And I was just like, yeah, that's, that's, that's definitely acknowledging like the depth of the disruption that's happened here. And, [00:30:40] and so, you know, I took that, I picked up the nest, and I saved it, and you know, it's around still. And, and then, maybe three weeks ago, two weeks ago, [00:30:55] I was walking through this laneway that I identify with the spirit that I work with a lot. And there was a pigeon on, like sort of flopping around a bit, with this, what looked like a branch [00:31:10] wrapped around its neck, and I'm like, "Oh, how am I going to free this poor bird? Is it going to let me get close enough to liberate it?" And as I got a little closer, the bird, I realized, was actually holding onto the branch. It was not stuck by it. [00:31:25] And it flew up and it flew directly up over my head, circled maybe like five feet above my head, three times, and literally dropped the branch into my hands. BARBARA: No way! ANDREW: And I was like, "Perfect, now [00:31:40] there's a new nest. Now I'm going to build something new. Now I've moved on, internally, I've moved on," right? BARBARA: Ohhhh . . . ANDREW: So to me, these are events that I take as as close to synchronous as people usually mean by that, right? [00:31:55] You know, direct message from somewhere else, right? And to me, they are clear, and concrete, and so on, in a way that, you know, not to diminish anybody else's experience, but [00:32:10] that those other kinds of symbols, I'm not sure what they mean, right? At least in my life, you know? And so, yeah, but also, you know there have been plenty of times in my life, where I'm like, [00:32:25] "Oh, yeah, I saw that, I saw that number again. I'm on the right path. I'm on the right path," you know? And I think that that's fair too, I think I just have a different relationship to it now, and I have a different set of expectations maybe. So. BARBARA: [00:32:40] Yeah. Okay, great. It all makes sense. And I love the story about the pigeon. Oh my God, I'm still stuck on that. Anyways, yeah. So, synchronicity, like levels of synchronicity, or is it [00:32:55] synchronicity, or is it a message from the divine, are they two different things? Those are really great questions. I think I agree with you. I think there is a difference between them. And, like synchronicity, I mean, I think the actual definition of it is like two [00:33:11] disconnected things that seem to have a connection. And I think that we humans are the ones who give that connection or give that meaning, so, so maybe what, why it's comforting to me is because if I [00:33:26] see something that brings to mind something else that's connected with what I'm doing at the time, or going through or thinking about, it just helps remind me that that's where my attention is.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. BARBARA: So, you know, maybe it's just this, a [00:33:41] way of like stoking the fire, like, yes, this is what my intention is. This is what I want to think about. You know, but on a kind of more subtle level or something. And then, you know, messages from the divine, then, I think, are kind of different. [00:33:57] You mentioned finding the cards, playing cards, specifically playing cards on the street is pretty funny. It reminds me of . . . Dylan has something that she has always called parking lot divination, and she started it when she was [00:34:12] a book cover designer at Llewellyn. Now, as you could imagine, the trash cans, the big garbage bins outside of Llewellyn, sometimes would have cards in them, for, you know, if a package had been damaged or whatever. [00:34:27] And so, sometimes, I guess, they would blow around and she would always walk around the building, you know, for exercise every day. And so sometimes she would come across these random cards on the, you know, and she would always pick them up and they would mean, she would read them as [00:34:42] a divination, and she still does that to this day, and she finds a surprising number of playing cards just out and about in the streets. It's very strange. So, so yeah.  ANDREW: They're definitely around. BARBARA: Yeah.  ANDREW: The other thing [00:34:57] that's funny is I almost never find a whole deck. A couple times I have. Yeah, and often I'll find them clustered for periods of time, you know, like I will find [00:35:12] different, different cards in different places for a couple months, and then I'll find nothing for six months. BARBARA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And then I'll start finding them again, which is also, to me, interesting. Yeah. BARBARA: Huh. I have another kind of [00:35:27] a symbol story, and you know, does it mean something? Or does it mean nothing? Or did I give it meaning or whatever? That . . . it's a story that I wanted to tell you, you know, any, at some point today, anyways . . . ANDREW: Yeah. BARBARA: Cause it's very, it was very significant [00:35:42] to me. So, So, okay. How to tell the story? Okay. So, Dylan is not going to be here at Christmas. She's actually flying back to Minnesota for Christmas. I'm going to be [00:35:57] here alone, which is great because I have a whole, you know, personal retreat planned and ritual, and all kinds of crazy great stuff, but because of that, we did our little personal celebration on Sunday. And, [00:36:12] but we had agreed on no presents because of reasons. And, but she said, "But, I do have one present that I actually started the process for it a few months ago. So, there'll be [00:36:27] the one present." I'm like, “Okay, I can, I can let you give me a present, no problem.” ANDREW: Uh-huh. BARBARA: And so, well, so the back story that you need to know to understand the present [00:36:42] is: When we got married, she gave me a necklace, and it suited me perfectly, it was meaningful and beautiful and we both loved it. And it was just, it was [00:36:57] like a symbol, one of the many symbols of us.  ANDREW: Uh-huh. BARBARA: And in May, we were, we were out at the coast. I was taking a watercolor class, and we'd gone together, and I brought the necklace but I didn't, [00:37:12] I don't sleep in it. So I, you know, just take it off, and I, you know, put it somewhere, then . . . Long story short, it got left in the hotel, and when we called the hotel, they're like, “No, it's not in the room.” You know? So, [00:37:27] I mourned that necklace. I cried, it felt, it felt symbolic. It felt like “Oh my God, our marriage is,” you know? It's, it just made me so sad because [00:37:42] things had been hard, we're working through some things, and I just took it as this horrible, horrible omen, and it just broke my heart. And the company, [00:37:57] we couldn't find, it looks like the company didn't make the necklace anymore, so I couldn't even get a replacement, and it was just horrible, horrible. Well, so Christmas comes, present time. She gives me a . . . Okay. So she brings me a card and a little, little present and I opened the card and I start [00:38:12] reading it and I start bawling because she's written some stuff that is breaking my heart in a good way. And she's like, “Well, since you're crying, hold on, we'll just keep going.” And she goes in the other room and brings out a different package [00:38:27] and I start opening it. And it's wrapped in this kind of a gift baggy thing that we've had for years and we only use it for a very special gift. And . . .  ANDREW: That's really sweet. BARBARA: It [00:38:42] is, it is, we haven't used it in a number of years because you know, it hasn't been like that. And so, she, I start opening it. And then inside it is a bag from Arthur's Jewelers, Arthur's Jewelers [00:38:57] is the Jewelers in St. Paul where we got like our wedding rings from, and if we ever get like actual real jewelry, which we don't have a lot of, but we get it from them, and as I saw the bag and I'm like, she got me jewelry, what? And, and, then all of a sudden [00:39:12] I knew what was in that bag and I have never ripped the package open so fast in my life, and it was the necklace. And I saw it, and I have, I cried like my [00:39:27] soul was, I don't know what was going on. But I've only cried like that like maybe three times in my life, and it felt like a symbol, you know, like a sign like, okay, like, you lost [00:39:42] it. You guys were in the like, the three days of death or the three days after death, like, you know, in the bowels of hell fighting the demon, and now you're done, and now you, you know, you have the same, it's a new necklace, but it's the same necklace. It, [00:39:57] so, it's kind of like our marriage. It's the same marriage, but it's a new marriage and it was hard won. And until I lost it, I didn't realize how much it meant to me, and, you know, so, [00:40:12] I felt like the necklace, was always symbolic, the loss of it was symbolic, the reacquiring of it was symbolic. So that's another thing entirely, you know, was that divine? Was that something we, [00:40:27] that . . . I don't know. How did that happen? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, I think that, I think that the answer is probably always really complex, right? You know, I mean, people, [00:40:43] you know, people talk about like, the fire, right? Me having the fire. They're like, “Well, you know, maybe it happened for a reason so you could whatever.” And I'm always like, "I don't, I don't buy that answer at all.” Right? I mean, you know, that [00:40:58] said, right? I think that, like many things, I hold sort of contradictory ideas about it, right? And in myself, they seem fine to be contradictory, right?  I know that, [00:41:13] you know, in some ways, that the fire must have been a part of my destiny, in some sense, because of the advice of the Orishas in the time around it, right? You know, we have this [00:41:29] kind of source of negativity, which is Otonowa, which means that which we brought with you from heaven, right? And sometimes it means, sometimes it means that literally. Maybe sometimes [00:41:44] it stands for things that just can't be changed and we have to work through in one way or another, but, you know, this was part of my advice from the Orishas around that time. So, I'm like, well, fair enough, something was going on there, in that regard. [00:41:59] But also like, the idea that, you know, I talked about this, I think in the last episode too with Chiron Armand, you know, the idea that we are always progressing towards other things, or better things, and [00:42:14] so on. I don't necessarily believe that, either, right? I think that, you know, we can look at people's lives and see that that doesn't happen, sometimes, right? Sometimes it does. Sometimes it doesn't. And the reasons for that are, [00:42:29] you know, complex and, you know, and always a bit obscure as well. Right? Why does, why does one experience sort of break a person in a way that they don't recover from? And why does it, you know, [00:42:44] you know, just deeply bruise or wound or maybe not even apparently sort of injure another person, right? You know, there's such a diversity amongst us all and why that is the case, right? But for me, I look at [00:42:59] these situations and I think that it becomes a question of what do we, what do, you know, there's, if we want to call it fate or whatever, those, those experiences that are beyond our apparent control, right? [00:43:14] Or that are the unexpected byproduct of decisions that we have made, maybe in the case of a relationship, that might sort of give the appearance of fate, and might coincide with synchronicities, right? That moment when you lost the necklace and it cued you to, [00:43:29] you know, all of the bigger changes that were going on, right? And then there's the question of what do we do with it? Right? You know? And I think that that is also, you know, such a big distinction, [00:43:44] right? You know? And like, me ending up in the situation that I'm in now, which is in many ways more ideal than the situation I was in with the store. You know? Or where the store was at, at the time of the fire. You know, on the one hand, [00:43:59] yeah, that's, it's great that it's, that it's sort of working out really well, but also there's a, there's a lot of it that's really, was already in my two year plan. You [00:44:14] know? Like I was already thinking about these ideas and working on them. And so, some of this transformation, you know, I'm just going to take credit for, by saying, you know, like look, I had these ideas that because of the [00:44:31] concreteness of having the store were going to take me a long time to make shift, that in some ways the fire basically just liquidated my assets into cash and allowed me to transform it, you know, [00:44:46] and applying it towards those plans. You know? There's that, that sort of balance of agency, free will, and the intersection of fate, right? Because I think that what we, what we do when things happen is, [00:45:02] you know, is important, and makes a big difference in that, you know? And I think that the more we cultivate a capacity to, you know, to make good decisions during those times, [00:45:17] you know, the better that can go and so on, right? So, anyway, I don't know, I don't know if that makes any sense at all. But . . . BARBARA: Oh, yeah. Well, as you say, these things get confusing to talk about, so, yeah, I think yeah, insofar [00:45:32] as it can make sense, it totally makes sense. And, kind of, almost kind of connected with that is, you know, this, the idea [00:45:47] of like judging something as good or bad. Okay. It's, and it's kind of connected with the idea, “Oh, it happened for a reason.” Well, I mean first of all, almost everything does happen for a reason because cause and effect exists. And you know, so there was a reason, [00:46:02] but I know people are talking about a grander reason then electrical faultiness or whatever. So, things happen for a reason, maybe, you know, they . . . Things happen, [00:46:17] is what what it is, and trying to judge whether they're good or bad. I mean, we want to do that because that's what we do because we're binary beings, I guess, you know like, “Oh, that's good. That's bad.” I mean, people always say [00:46:32] what they think, but you can't always tell if something's actually good or bad in the long run until time has passed, because there have been things that I went through that I wouldn't want to go through again, [00:46:47] but I'm glad they happened, because then XYZ happened, not saying it happened for a reason, you know, like because it didn't magically do anything. It also ties kind of into what you're saying, your own agency and own preparedness, [00:47:02] your own, you know, strength of will, whatever you want to say, you know, you can bring that to it and turn things around.  But it's also one of the things that bothered me, puzzled me about these, you know, more everyday readings, you know, like, people are like, “Well, [00:47:17] you know, I'm thinking of taking this job. Should I take this job?” And you know, I mean, I don't know about you, but like if I'm looking into the future, I'm not real comfortable looking more than six months out. I just don't. [00:47:32] And you know, so if I'm, you know, do a reading and it's like, well, yeah, the job says this, this, and this, and maybe some things they consider not good and then they don't take it. But if they took it, then it would [00:47:47] have led to XYZ. So, you know, just, we don't always know. We think we know what we want in the short term. We think we know what our goals are. Oh, I want to manifest this, I want to do this, if the cards say it's all going to be positive. [00:48:02] I think we lose something in that, because not everything we do has to be completely positive or successful to be worthwhile or to be part of a larger journey that might be more worthwhile. ANDREW: Right. BARBARA: Does that make sense? ANDREW: It does. [00:48:17] I mean, I think that, I think that the question of like, you know, one of the questions that I've been thinking about for a while, specifically around, you know, my work life, is like, what's enough? Right? [00:48:32] At what point, at what point am I successful enough? I mean, to put it in really basic terms, at what point am I making enough money? And what, what is it that I would like from going beyond that point? Right? You know? And I think [00:48:47] that, you know, working for yourself is not like kind of getting into a job description position that you like and just sort of like, "perfect, if I just stay in this job till I retire, that's great," because working for yourself doesn't really work that way, and I'm not sure the economy works that way [00:49:02] that much anymore anyway. But you know, but I think that we have these sort of notions of progress, of enlightenment, of, you know, all those kinds of ideas that are, you know, cultural [00:49:17] to capitalism and you know, like cultural to North America and so on, maybe, that, that I think are questionable how helpful they are, right? You know, like, [00:49:32] I don't, I don't know that . . . Like mostly what I'm interested in is making art, making more art, making more art, and doing the things that supports [00:49:47] that, right? And you know, like, I love running the store. I love doing readings for people. But I think that like, the idea of it sort of going anywhere. I'm like, well, I [00:50:02] don't know where, I don't know where it goes, and what the definition of where it goes, and what the grand plan is. I just want to, you know, do my practice, which is, you know, making art and reading cards for people, and just continue to do that. And I think that, you know, [00:50:17] that you're right, that it's hard to say, on a big arc of time, what might be good or what might be difficult. You know, like if we get, if we take a job, maybe it's crummy for six months and then it's great [00:50:32] after that, and so on. But I also feel like the idea of persevering through stuff towards an outcome. I'm really [00:50:47] less and less interested in that these days, you know? If something, if something, if the exchange isn't good in the short term, then I don't, you know, I don't, I'm not really that interested in sort of engaging in that [00:51:02] to get to a theoretically better long-term, you know? And, and I think that, I think a lot of people, especially around relationships, right, sort of work through, try to work through stuff, [00:51:17] you know, to get to . . . Especially newer relationships, right? Like maybe if you've been with somebody for a while as you have been, that, you know, there's a, there's a different math around, like, well, I was involved for this long. [00:51:32] And so now I'm willing to commit a longer stretch of time to working on things.  BARBARA: Right. ANDREW: But, but, I think that for me, I'm like, I'm not that interested in working on very much these days in those kinds of ways, you know, and if something isn't [00:51:47] flowing, I don't have the, I haven't seen the value of spending the resilience and capacity on working hard at stuff that is difficult [00:52:03] towards accomplishing longer term goals without making a change, right? You know, I think about it like Crowley talks about the Strength card or the Lust card in his tarot deck, right? And, and I think [00:52:18] that he draws a distinction in his writing on it, where he says that, you know, lust is not the absence of effort, right? It's not the absence of exertion. It is the absence of noticing the exertion, right? [00:52:33] Or something along those lines, right? And that idea that, you know, if we don't mind the work that we're not going to notice it, right?  BARBARA: Right.  ANDREW: And if we do mind the work, well, then, maybe we need to, maybe that's one of those cues to make a change, right? [00:52:49]  BARBARA: Yeah, that's gorgeous. And if you follow it, like if that's kind of a guideline that you're following for your life right now, as you were saying, then you probably [00:53:04] wouldn't be doing readings on things so much, because if you're like, I'm, I'm going with how things feel now, you are attune enough to yourself to know what you're . . . You know, [00:53:19] so you probably would need less readings because you're paying attention to your energy and how you're feeling and what you're doing and the effort and the payoff. Is that true or not true? ANDREW: That's true. [00:53:35] Trueish. I mean, I think that there are always practical considerations that are difficult, right? You know? [00:53:50] Dealing, dealing with insurance companies after having had a fire. It's like, man, nobody wants to insure you, right? It's like, it's difficult. And so, there are . . . For me, there are always practical questions, [00:54:05] and, you know, questions along the lines of, is there anything that I can do to make this better, to make it happen, especially because I have a very strong practical magical practice, right? You know, so there are those kinds of questions. [00:54:20] But really the question that I ask more often than not, these days, is either something along the lines of like well, should I run my Tarot de Marseilles class in January, or should I run my other course, [00:54:35] right? Like very sort of strategic business kind of things? Or a question, the question I go back to most of the time, is how do I show up fully today? How do [00:54:50] I show up fully in this situation? Right?  BARBARA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And you know, and for me, that's a question that I've kind of come to answer by a sort of multi-step open-ended [00:55:07] kind of practice. Right? Like I don't, I no longer just kind of, if I'm going to read cards for myself in that way, I don't like just draw a card or two cards for the answer. I'll usually draw start with drawing a playing card, [00:55:22] checking in with my guides and ancestors, drawing three trumps from the, from a Marseilles deck, reading those in light of what's already been set in motion in the early part of the reading, and then [00:55:38] drawing a card from my Land of the Sacred Self Oracle that I self-published. And doing some writing on that, and then usually photographing that, and then drawing, doing, drawing back into it [00:55:53] and embellishing it further, and then at some point, that feels finished. So, like that's the, the process that I do when I do that stuff. And you know, it's all, if you, if people were to look at it, which I'm not [00:56:08] going to share it anywhere. But anyway, if people were to look at it, you'd be like, wow. I don't know what sense this makes a lot of time because a lot of it is very nonlinear and very, you know, like a lot of channeled reading, writing, you know, like, [00:56:23] and so on. But at the end of the process, I'm like, “Oh, now, now I'm aligned for the day, and now I know how I stay aligned for the day. You know for this project or whatever.” Right? So . . . yeah. BARBARA: Yeah, well and yeah, [00:56:38] that sounds like a good process, and I think like, some, I've heard people, you know, say, “Oh, I can't read for myself.” And I think sometimes part of that is they don't read for themselves the way they read [00:56:53] for somebody else. Like they give themself short shrift. You know, they won't go through the whole process, just throw the cards, look at them, go, and then pick them up and put them away. You know, it's different. I think if you treat [00:57:08] yourself as if you were, how you would treat a client . . . ANDREW: For sure and I think if you're going to read for yourself around practical considerations, you just need to have a lot of discipline, right? You know? For me when I read for myself [00:57:23] around practical considerations, it's actually usually really short because I'm like, like, you know, it's whatever. The Tower card says, this is a horrible idea. Don't go down this road. It's like, it's like, it's the end of the conversation. Just stop [00:57:38] there, you know, because the more I talk about it, the more I might try and talk myself into it or think that I have agency where, where the Tower says it doesn't, you know? And so on and so on, right? So but for me, yeah, it's like, you know, there's a short list of [00:57:53] sort of core meaning that I would attribute to every card that if I want to read for myself, I'm going to hold hard to that no matter whether I like it or not, whether it even makes sense or not to me, and be like, “All right, the card says that [00:58:08] someone's going to really betray you here, 10 of Swords. It's like, well, all right, let's not go there then.” Well, so I'm going to go instead, “What else can I do?” You know? Yeah. BARBARA: I think that's important too when you especially, well, like your first practice was more of [00:58:23] an internal deeper kind of a reading. And now we're talking about practical readings, and I think one of the reasons we want to do a practical reading is because we want to bypass our head, because we keep thinking [00:58:38] about it, and we keep justifying, and we know we're justifying, or making excuses and we know we're making excuses. So, you do this reading and keep it short and hold yourself to it. It helps bypass all of that, but you're right, if you start thinking about it, like, well, the Tower [00:58:53] can be, you know, how we can sometimes spin things. ANDREW: Carl Jung thinks of buildings as being a symbol of our ego and our persona in the world, maybe I just need to change the way I approach this, so that I can have a different experience of this and then I can learn [00:59:08] and grow and blah blah blah. It's like, no. Still gonna get hit by the lightning. Definitely don't like that. Thank you, but I'll pass. Right? BARBARA: Yeah. ANDREW: For sure.  BARBARA: Or someone wants to know, "Oh, I started dating someone, how is it going to go?" Five of Wands. "Oh, it's going to be so exciting [00:59:23] and fun!" And you know, it's like, one of the exercises I would give beginner students is, for reading for themselves, is okay, before you do a reading, the question, you know your question, and you know what answer [00:59:38] you want.  ANDREW: Yeah. BARBARA: Go through the deck and just like, if you don't already have the meanings, like you have, for reading for yourself. This is new people, go through the deck and you know pull out the cards that you think would make that answer.  ANDREW: Yeah. BARBARA: And then [00:59:53] shuffle your cards--and make note of them--shuffle your cards again, and then do your reading, and then if, you know, the Two of Cups, Ten of Cups, whatever doesn't come up. It can be like, "Well, okay. This isn't one of the answer cards. [01:00:08] This is a different answer." And it's a way to kind of discipline, discipline yourself, which is what you said when we started. ANDREW: Sure. Yeah. No, exactly. Well. It's like, you know, I think that that approach is, you know, really [01:00:23] helpful for a lot of things, right? And especially for, you know, I mean not everybody reads for, for everything, you know, but I do. Right? Like I don't really have limits around what I'll read for, you know, for [01:00:38] the most part. So, like, if someone's like, well, am I going to get pregnant, right? Am I going to conceive? Well, I have a short, short list of cards that answer yes to that, right? There's only like three or four of them, [01:00:53] depending on the deck I'm working with, and if those cards don't show up, then I'm going to say, "The cards don't give you a solid yes." Right? And you know, the same with the question people are like, “Am I cursed?” I'm like, “It happens, magic is real. I believe [01:01:08] it,” you know. But there's, there's only a couple of cards in the deck that are going to answer affirmatively to, to me around that, and my expectation is that the mystery will surface those cards, so that the answer feels unequivocal, [01:01:24] you know. And I think that that's also a practice that is a bit hair-raising when people are starting, but I think that, you know, as we talk about it, I realize how many different kinds of questions I have a very short list of [01:01:39] cards that I would take as a solid answer to, you know, and I think that that's a really helpful way maybe to, to avoid feeling ambiguous about the readings that you're giving, right? BARBARA: Right. ANDREW: So, yeah. [01:01:56] All right. Well, maybe, is there something else you want to add? I see you looking like you're gonna . . . BARBARA: Yes, I, there's one, like, I kind of said that I was going to be studying fate and destiny in the coming year. ANDREW: Yeah. BARBARA: The other thing I'm [01:02:11] looking forward to is, over this past year, I've heard a couple of people refer to mythic living, like I should know what that means, and I don't, and I've asked a couple of people, you know, "Well, what do you mean by [01:02:26] that?" And I haven't gotten, I was, kept getting this idea that it was like, where you just live really big and loud and you know, mythically legendary, you know? And, but . . . I read something a couple weeks ago that made me think okay, you got that wrong, obviously, [01:02:42] and what this blog said was, it's when you understand the mythic rhythms of life, things that happen, the mythic, well, [01:02:57] anyways, you know what I mean. And when you understand them and when you can learn where you are in your life in terms of a mythic story, or cycle, then you can learn how to live within that. [01:03:12] Have you ever heard anything like that? What do you think of that?  ANDREW: I mean, isn't that how people feel about the hero's journey? BARBARA: It's the whole, yes, exactly. Okay. So similar thing. ANDREW: I think, right. I mean, I've my [01:03:27] own ideas about mythic stuff, but we'll save that for later, for another time, maybe. But I think that, I think that [01:03:42] the idea of sort of myths as true guides to our, to our lives, or as, you know, true models of experience, in the same way that I think of this sort of way in [01:03:57] which people sometimes default to astrology, and sometimes default to other ways of creating definition. I think they're, I think that there is value in them, and there are [01:04:12] values in those stories, you know?  And as a person who practices a religion that is based on, we could say, has a huge swath of it that's based on stories, right? You know, nobody, nobody [01:04:27] in my tradition would tell you . . . Well, no, nobody with a solid grounding in reality would tell you that, you know, as a child of Shango, I'm gonna live the life, live the myths of Shango, [01:04:42] right? You know? And you know, and I think that this idea that, that sort of these myths define the arc of human experience, right? I think [01:04:57] it's pretty questionable. I think that there is truth in it, right? You know, like the, the myth of Percival, which is so popular amongst, you know, Western initiatory stuff, [01:05:12] right? It's like, there are pieces of that that are true, and valuable, and you see most people encounter in some way, right? Like, you know, once the, once the hero decides to go on their journey, something arises to distract them, right? You know, [01:05:27] Kundria arrives to distract Percival from pursuing whatever, right? But the idea that every myth ends with, you know, “Oh, you are the person you were searching for all along and you had it with you the whole time.” [01:05:42] I don't think that's true at all. Right? I see lots of people whose lives are, are not that way, right? And, you know, and yet, the, the, questions that arise from looking at that myth a bit, like what would, what would distract you from your deeper commitment? [01:05:57] Right? In what ways are you not already acknowledging your gifts, you know? And so on, right?  Like those, those are powerful questions, but as sort of models for, for sort of promoting everybody's [01:06:12] experience, you know, it's like the hero's journey. I'm just kind of like, I'm like, "Yeah, maybe, for some people, some of the time," but then we're back to this question of like, agency and free will and how much does our expectation that is the course that we're going to [01:06:27] continue on then shape the course that we live afterwards, right? And I think that, yeah, so. But yeah, so I think that that's a really mixed bag [01:06:42] of things, you know, for me, you know? And probably because I did not come out of tarot from that sort of Angeles Aryan, sort of archetypes of people, you know, archetypes are what's behind [01:06:57] tarot piece, but came from a sort of practical magical and sort of ceremonial background into this stuff and then into a non-Western tradition religiously. I always look at those pieces, and I'm kind of like, eh? [01:07:12] I get it. I see it. Like I can see how you see it. And I can see how it's there, but it's like, what it's defined as, seems overstated or, or incomplete in some way to me, [01:07:27] in a way that I've never been able to reconcile it, or kind of close the loop on it. So yeah. BARBARA: I guess that's why there's a lot of different approaches because . . . ANDREW: Yeah. BARBARA: Some work for some people and some work for others [01:07:42]. ANDREW: Exactly, right, you know, and it's, of course, it's not to say that, you know, if people find value in that, fantastic, right? BARBARA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: You know, please, please don't write me, I don't need to have this conversation again. I've had it so many times, you know? But no, not [01:07:57] that, not talking, talking about you, but like, but yeah, it's like I've had many people, very smart people try to convince me. Or want to have conversations around convincing me about it. Like it's not my jam. I just, I just don't, I just don't jive with it, so we could just go [01:08:12] talk about other things instead, right? BARBARA: Right, or yeah, because that's not a really interesting conversation, because trying to convince someone who has, especially someone who has a perfectly workable system, you know, and they're not like [01:08:27] asking for advice or looking for a new way to live or think. It's just evangelizing, and why do you, why . . . Just because you believe something is true, the, the other person doesn't have to think it's true. [01:08:42] That doesn't diminish its worth for you. You know, you don't, everyone doesn't have to believe the same thing. ANDREW: Exactly.  BARBARA: You know, what might be more interesting would be to say, "Well, let's talk about what I think and what you think and see if there are any parallels and maybe talk about where they [01:08:57] differ. And isn't that interesting? And why is that?" You know. ANDREW: No, for sure. Yeah. I'm curious to hear what your explorations of mythicness deliver to you, bring to you, over time, though, for sure. BARBARA: I [01:09:12] know. I have a feeling that next year, next fall, our conversation is going to be super interesting. I mean not that these haven't been, but these have been personal, and hard, and important, and [01:09:28] valuable, but I think for next fall, we might, our listeners might get a treat of something different. ANDREW: Or maybe they'll just get a lovely, what are we at now, fourth helping, fifth helping of, you know, [01:09:43] whatever this is. But yeah, we'll figure it out. We'll, time will tell. BARBARA: That's right. ANDREW: Well, thanks for making time again, Barbara. I appreciate it as always. BARBARA: I do too. I love these conversations. ANDREW: Me too!  

This long overdue episode was record back in the summer.  Andrew and Mal talk about the nature of magic, initiation, religious practice and more. They talk a lot about how to know if you are on the right track and the pitfalls of walking a magical path. The upsides and pitfalls of gnosis. How to become a bishop by chance and much more.  Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. To find more out about Mal check out Lux-Umbria or hang with him on Facebook here.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcription ANDREW: [00:00:02] Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I am joined today by Mal Strangefellow. And I've been following Mal online for quite a while. And recently, he's gotten into starting a church. And [00:00:17] a lot of the dialogue around that has been very fascinating to me. So I thought that inviting him on to talk about some of these things would be really entertaining because I think there's so many fascinating questions about legitimacy, legacy, [00:00:32] lineage, and all sorts of stuff that people are or ought to be thinking about as they're going about in various traditions right now, and at the birth of something new, seems like a great place to revisit those conversations. So, for people who [00:00:47] might not know you, Mal, give us, give us the introduction. Who are you? What are you about? MAL: [laughing] Oh, wow, um, you know, and I don't mean this to sound, sound like I'm bragging. It's mostly just because [00:01:02] I'm getting older and my memory is lagging, but when you, when you've done, I don't want to say so much, but when you've done enough, at some point, it starts to become difficult to figure out how to answer that question. [00:01:17] [laughing] ANDREW: Sure.  MAL: I got my start in esoterica during the mid-80s. I'm solidly in that, you know, Boomer cusp/early Gen X region. [00:01:34] Went into, went into the army right out of high school, and after that, got it into my head that I wanted to be a Buddhist monk.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  MAL: And ended up doing [00:01:49] that for a number of years. I was a Tibetan Buddhist monk, a novice and, and fully ordained getsu and gelong. After a few years, or early 90s, wanted to go and get a college degree, [00:02:04] went to the University of Oregon--go Ducks!--and you know, discovered that it's a lot harder to be a celibate monk in a university than it is in a monastery! ANDREW: [laughing] Uh huh. [00:02:19]  MAL: Go figure! ANDREW: I imagine. MAL: And ended up returning my vows, and, at that point, just kind of wandered back and forth among a number of different things, sort of exploring [00:02:35] alternate routes of spirituality, continuing to practice magic. Of course, the Internet was really just sort of starting to become popular at this time. You know, we were moving beyond the [00:02:50] text-based, green screen kind of stuff and actually getting a graphical interface to the Internet discussion boards. Alt magic, of course, was going like gangbusters. This is just at the cusp of the, the [00:03:05] infamous Golden Dawn Wars of the early, early to mid-90s, and ended up getting involved with the Golden Dawn. Was--actually, my neophyte initiation in the Golden Dawn was done [00:03:20] with Israel Regardie's handmade tools, and I believe a mutual friend of ours, Poke Runyan, was the keryx for that and gave me his flu.  ANDREW: [chuckles] MAL: So.  ANDREW: That's a magical blessing, indeed.  MAL: [00:03:35] Right? And kind of . . . There was some floundering, I would say towards the late 90s. Got involved in the Temple of Set, stayed there long enough to [00:03:50] be recognized to the third degree, their priesthood, at which, and this, I bring this up because it encompasses sort of a pivotal event for me. James Grabe was [00:04:05] also a member of the temple and a member of the OTO, and at the time, when I actually met him in person, there, he was on the outs with the current leadership. I [00:04:20] mean, he has made, I don't know if I'm saying that right, I've never done any OTO stuff. So. That guy. And I don't know what there was, so I don't know if they were, I think there was some sort of lawsuit or some-- Anyway, they were pissed [00:04:35] off. We were at a conclave, which is an annual temple gathering, and we were in the hotel bar, and just sort of chatting, and you know, I was a second degree adept at the time, and so I was star struck at his degree and [00:04:50] his history. And we were just talking and he was mostly talking. And he had mentioned that he had apostolic succession as a bishop, and one of the things, among other things, that the current leadership wanted from him was consecration [00:05:06] as a bishop for their EGC.  ANDREW: Mm. MAL: And he was basically just inviting them to peruse the fine example of the back of his middle finger on that. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And you know, he said, "You know what, basically, [00:05:21] I'll consecrate, you know, anybody else, anybody but them. Right? Hell, you want to be consecrated?" and I was like, "Um, yeah, okay." He's like, "All right, cool." So we actually made a plan for the next night. He [00:05:36] had a suite in the hotel and I showed up and we went through deacon priest and I was consecrated a bishop that night. And it was like, "Here you go. Now, you're a bishop." I was like, "Well, awesome. Thank you." This is [00:05:51] 1998-99-ish and, which, oddly enough feels like, you know, maybe five or ten years ago for me, but . . .  ANDREW: Sure.  MAL: Yeah, I was like, you know, "So what do I do with this?" It was like fuck, [00:06:06] I don't care. Can I say fuck? I can say fuck, right?  ANDREW: You can say fuck. It's fine. Go ahead. MAL: All right, cool. Fuck, yeah. [laughing] He was like, "I don't care," you know, "here's some stuff," and I got like loose leaf print outs, you know, some ideas that he had had [00:06:21] about sort of a Johannite spirituality and you know, I got, you know, an old Xeroxed copy of his succession, apostolic succession, and stuff like that, and I just sort of filed it away and did nothing with it. [00:06:36]  ANDREW: Mm.  MAL: Until I resigned, after I resigned from the temple as a priest. It was, you know, interpersonal political stuff. ANDREW: Isn't it always, right? MAL: Right, you know, it's, there was a group that was up-and-coming [00:06:51] in the temple. They have since been, been purged out, but I was not in that group, and ended up just resigning rather than dealing with all of the, the people bullshit that comes with that, and [00:07:06] in trying to figure out, all right, what the hell do I want to do now? Said, you know, well, I've got these kind of things to fall back on. I wonder if I could do this? And so I pulled out all of James's stuff and decided [00:07:21] you know what, fuck it. I'm, I'm a start a church!  And that's how the Apostolic Johannite church was founded, [laughs] and I ended up posting on a couple of message boards online at the time: "Hey, are [00:07:36] you interested in an esoteric organization and an esoteric church?" And got a couple of hits. One of the very first ones was, of course, the current patriarch of the AJC, and you know, the rest there is history. [00:07:51] I ran the AJC for a couple of years, and at that time, kind of felt like I had some unfinished stuff that I wanted to do elsewhere. Plus, [00:08:06] I feel like, at least for me at that time, it took a different personality to run things than it did to start them, and I didn't know that I had the personality to keep that [00:08:21] thing going, and I feel justified in making this statement, you know, in hindsight 20/20, but just in looking at how well they've done, you know, since I, since I handed it over to Sean McCann, their current patriarch, you know, I think [00:08:36] it's the, like the largest, fastest growing international gnostic church on the planet right now, some crazy crap like that.  ANDREW: So. Let me ask you a question.  MAL: Yeah, yeah! ANDREW: Cause you've talked about so many things here and I want to . . . MAL:  I know, I'm sorry.  ANDREW: No. No, it's [00:08:51] why I had you on, I want to have these conversations and I love hearing you chat. What, what kind of personality does it take to run these things? Because you know, I've, you know, I've been in my share of, you know, I was in the OTO [00:09:06] in several different groups that all imploded or exploded. And I was in the Aurum Solace for a bunch of time, and change of leadership and it, you know, my local group was excommunicated. And you know, I [00:09:21] was in the AA for a while and there are various, you know, things with that, that just left me, you know, with nowhere to go. What is it, you know, and I've seen my share of that in the, in the Lukumi traditions as well, you know, different places. [00:09:36] What does it take to run a thing like that well? Because I feel like there's, you know, what I've seen is, there's, like, if there's a strong personality and they can kind of hold it together with their personality, [00:09:51] that works until it doesn't, until they leave or retire or whatever. What actually does work? What makes sense when it comes to sort of bigger organizations around that kind of stuff? MAL: You know, I think you [00:10:06] kind of hit on it with the, the big personality, not in that that's the answer. But in that, that's not the answer.  ANDREW: Mm. MAL: I think a strong personality, a willingness to get shit [00:10:21] done, to say, you know, what, screw it, we're going this way. We're doing it. Like that's the kind of personality you need to start something, to really get it going, to gather people in, to inspire other people, but to keep it going, [00:10:37] I think you need somebody a lot more conciliatory.  ANDREW: Mm. MAL: You know, somebody, somebody who is open to, willing to, desirous of working with other people and incorporating them into the, [00:10:52] the, the living, you know, the daily life of the organization, a strong personality. You know, again, I think it's absolutely necessary to get a thing started. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: [00:11:07] You know, there's just so much inertia there, at the beginning of anything that you need to build up a certain amount of momentum to, you know, to, to overcome initial obstacles and you know, nothing kills [00:11:22] momentum faster than a committee meeting.  ANDREW: [laughing] Especially if not much is already happening. Right?  MAL: Right. Right! You know? So you need that strong personality, but after you reach a certain point, I think that strong personality [00:11:37] becomes detrimental, you know? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And if you don't have it within you to drop that and become more conciliatory, then you're just kind of a, you know, you're kind of a bully, you, you end up with, you know, strong personality clashes [00:11:52] with other people who, you know, who might be able to come in and do amazing things. Yeah, I think of . . . Okay. So, a perfect example of this going back to where I was and where Sean McCann was at the beginning of the AJC when I handed things over to [00:12:07] him . . . You know, he was, he'd only been a bishop for like a year.  ANDREW: Okay.  MAL: You know, I'd consecrated him and, to be fair, I had even gone, like right after his consecration, [00:12:22] I went on vacation!  ANDREW: Uh huh. MAL: Like six months! [laughing] And I was like, you know what, I just need a break from all of this. I'm tired. You run things. Call me if you need to, but I'm out for a while. So, you know, really, even that first six months, he [00:12:37] was kind of running things. Because of his age, and because of his natural temperament at the time, you know, sort of, you know, not really sure of himself, [00:12:52] not wanting to make a mistake. MAL: Okay. So the current primate of North America for the AJC, Mar Thoma, was a bishop with [00:14:07] another organization who came into the AJC. We had become friends while I was still there, but he officially joined the AJC after I left, and he is a very strong personality. But he's also [00:14:22] been, you know, has been just an amazing asset for the church and, you know, in looking back, I don't know, like, would I have given him the same opportunity? You know, when you've got those, the [00:14:37] two alpha dogs clashing, right? The, you know, the two strong personalities, would, would the same results have come about? And I'm not so sure that it would have, you know? I think by me stepping out and by Sean coming in [00:14:52] and having that, that natural conciliatory manner and welcoming him in, [coughs] excuse me, as a, another leader. I think that was a huge part of their success. And so, what does it take to run [00:15:07] an organization? I think it takes the ability to find, to find that in yourself, to realize that, you know, you know, it's not all about me.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: If I care about this, if it's going to run, I need to, I need to be conciliatory. [00:15:22] Does that make sense? ANDREW: Yeah, I think so, for sure. MAL: Oh good, cool. ANDREW: Because you know, yeah, a lot of people just . . . A lot of what I've seen is, it gets to a point where people are just like, look, it's my way or the highway, and then you know, and then you just [00:15:37] have, you know, whatever, right? Like, like the thing around the apostolic succession, where they're like, will you please give this to us? And be like, absolutely never, you know, like you just end up in these things where it's so stuck that there's no, there's no movement possible, right? You know? MAL: Right, right. ANDREW: [00:15:52] Mm-hmm.  MAL: Yeah, and you know, when you lay down something, like it's my way or the highway, you end up with a ton of fantastic people choosing the highway. ANDREW: Yeah. MAL: And, and you're left with, you know, just the, the sycophants, [00:16:07] and what happens to your, the organization, then? I mean, you mentioned your experiences in the Aurum Solis, and I remember, you know, when Leon proclaimed it an all Christian organization [00:16:22] when he was still, you know, Grandmaster. And, you know, it was that, this is it, it's my way or the highway. This is what we're proclaiming.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: A bunch of people chose the highway! [laughing] You know, and then he kind of pulled back from that a little bit and then [00:16:37] somebody else took over and then [garbled right before 16:43] Anyway. Yeah, I think that that's a perfect example of what you were talking about. When you have leadership like that, [00:16:52] things tend not to grow organically and even if they do survive that personality, that type of personality, they don't survive the end of that personality. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. For sure.  MAL: When that person dies or, you know, [00:17:07] converts to evangelical Christianity, and says, you know unicorns are bad or whatever. [laughing] ANDREW: Sure. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I think it's interesting. You know? I also think it's, it's interesting how . . . I wonder how, [00:17:22] contrary to what people might think, that that sort of more conciliatory aspect actually works to sustain the teachings versus dissipate them? MAL: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: Because what I see where there, where there's no [00:17:37] or nominal flexibility, is then there's these sort of backlashes and waves that come back and forth, right? You know, the new group comes in and you know, they're, they're all, they're all into witchcraft, and that's it. And if you're a Christian, you're [00:17:52] out, right? In response to the Christians who are like, "Well we're Christian," you know. And especially in a group like the Aurum Solis that, at least sort of in its heyday was so founded on research, you know . . . I mean, I think that, you know, what's, what are you losing, [00:18:07] you know, by these massive sways, right? So, yeah. MAL: Right, right. You know and also you get, you know, you get buy-in from everybody when, you know, regardless of the kind of organization, right? Whether it's a business or a teaching [00:18:22] order or a church or . . . You get buy-in with conciliatory leadership. You know, people feel like they have ownership, you know, they have a stake in it, and so they care about it. Whereas if it's just: here it is, [00:18:37] it's my way or the highway and then you know, well, okay, it's your way. It's never my way at that point, no matter where I am in the organization. If I'm not on top, it's never my way. It's always, I'm doing their way and you know, we as people, we [00:18:52] tend to like our way . . . [laughing] ANDREW: Well, and especially more magically inclined people. Right?  MAL: Right. Yeah. ANDREW: You know, I think there's, there's a tendency towards ego, you know, not necessarily in a bad sense, but just ego, that [00:19:07] doesn't really, if it's not addressed in some capacity, you know? So, how did, how did you find the transition of, how did you sort of manage that transition from Tibetan Buddhist practice, which [00:19:22] is pretty, you know, which is very structured, you know, to, to kind of your other practices, which sound like there are through lines, but they weren't as rigid? If that's fair. [00:19:37]  MAL: Oh, yeah. Absolutely. [lost words--exception?] about that. Yeah, you know, actually, I think it was . . . Being on sort of those diametric poles was beneficial to me. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know, as structured and rigid as [00:19:52] Tibetan monastic life was, the Temple of Set, on the other hand, and I think why, why I enjoyed and sort of embraced what they were doing so much was because there's so much [00:20:07] more open, right? You know, you show up and one of their, their primary tenets from The Book of Coming Forth by Night is, you know, "the text of another is an affront to the self." You know, so, every, initiatory degrees, you know, [00:20:22] okay, it's time for you to be recognized as a second-degree adept. They don't confer initiations. They recognize after you've achieved something, and then they say, okay, well now, go write that initiation ritual, you know, go [00:20:37] do it. Go create it, you know, come up with your own, you know, have it, have it . . . You know, don't, don't just pull crap out of your ass, you know. There, there's, there's a very scholastic aspect to them. I think when I, when I [00:20:52] joined, I got a binder that was like, and I'm holding up my fingers. Nobody can see them. [laughing] It's like an inch and a half to two inches thick and the vast bulk of that was a reading list. ANDREW: Mm. MAL: You know, so, and part of recognition [00:21:07] is, their recognition process is, go out and read these books. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: Go out and study this material. Go find more and then come back and tell us what you think about it, you know. You know, so there's this, this, this scholarship and then this production [00:21:22] and it's really, you know, and I don't want to give the impression that it's this loosey-goosey kind of thing. But it, it is very different from the structure that I experienced in Tibetan Buddhism. Right?  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And [00:21:37] I think I tried to incorporate some of that in in my later work and it's still something in my own personal practice and when I'm working with students, it's still something that even down to, you know, giving them offhand a reading [00:21:52] list. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And saying, you know, pick, pick six books, or pick three books, or whatever. Read them all from different categories, and then come back and let's talk about how, you know, what [00:22:07] material from this book on this topic and this book from this incredibly different topic. How do they play together? ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  MAL: And what do you get from reading both of those back-to-back that you wouldn't have gotten from reading either one separately, [00:22:22] right? In isolation. What, what new comes out of that? And I think that's sort of been, that came out of that experience, of strict rigid practice with, with Tibetan Buddhism and then the [00:22:37] more open, but, but scholastically-informed Setianism, like, like this kind of was born out of that, and I think that has been, regardless of what I've done since, sort [00:22:52] of my, my entire method of, approach for things.  ANDREW: Mm. MAL: Does that make sense? I really feel like I'm just rambling on . . .  ANDREW: No, no, not at all. It totally makes sense. MAL: Okay cool.  ANDREW: I mean, for me I kind of went in the opposite direction. You know, I was doing ceremonial [00:23:07] stuff, you know, throwing some chaos magic, and you know, all that kind of . . . different things and then I'm, as I moved into Lukumi, and you know, the Orisha tradition that I got initiated in, it's, [00:23:22] there are just ways that things are done, you know. MAL: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And so it's been a move away from, from that kind of structure and a stepping into that structure, and what I see is that so many people struggle with that axis. MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: You know? Like, you know, [00:23:37] for people to accept that there is a way that things are done, or, you know, in light of a tradition, the way that things are done, and that that part isn't [00:23:52] subject to conversation so much is very difficult for a lot of people, you know? MAL: But it's also a really important experience, I think. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know, I went from the founding of the AJC into East Asian esoteric [00:24:07] Buddhism, tendai [spelling?], and from their Korean Zen, you know, Seon Buddhism, and those are both, I mean, you don't get more rigid than the Japanese. ANDREW: Right.  MAL: And, but there's a purpose for that. You know, they, [00:24:23] there's this idea that when you take all of these people together and you force them to do this sort of thing, this sort of way, we kind of polish our rough edges off. ANDREW: Mm. MAL: You know, and if everybody was just allowed to go off and do their own thing, [00:24:38] you would never find your rough edges, you know, and so in practicing tendai [spelling?] Buddhism and then in going through, you know, the Zen Buddhist koan curriculum, that was, it was very rigid, there's a way [00:24:53] you do it. There's even an entire different language almost for going through koans that if you don't, if you don't know it and if you don't do it, you're not going to pass. You're not going to advance. You know, it's almost [00:25:08] like learning that language, which is both, you know, poetic and performative. You know, there's a physical aspect to it. But learning that language is what allows your brain to operate [00:25:23] in the way that it needs to operate in order to get the insight that you need to get.  ANDREW: Sure.  MAL: You know, there's no book that you could read that, that, that, you know, could tell you that. There's a story out of Daido Loori's [00:25:38] place, Zen Mountain Monastery, back when he was still alive. They had a book with all the answers to the koans in it, and somebody stole it. And one of the head monks was like, you know, ran up to Daido Roshi and was like, "Hey, you know, somebody stole the book. What are [00:25:53] we gonna do? What if they publish it?" And Loori Roshi was like, yeah, don't worry about it.  ANDREW: Mm-Hmm.  MAL: The answers aren't in the book. It doesn't matter what was written down. The answers aren't in the book.  ANDREW: Yeah.  MAL: The answers are what we see in front of us. It's like, you know, I live here in Cincinnati. [00:26:08] And, if you read a ton of books about Cincinnati, but had never been here, and then tried to pass it off, you know, in talking to somebody that was born and raised here, they'd know pretty quickly you're full of shit. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know? [00:26:23] Whereas if you've both, you know, if you've been there, if you've visited there, if you're talking about "oh, man, you know, did they finish the construction over on . . ." or you know, all of that sort of stuff that just, you know, then they're like, "oh, yeah, yeah, you've been there." So I think . . . [00:26:39] There's definitely value to "this is the way things are done" for a lot of traditional things, just because, if you don't do it that way, you don't get the experience or have the effect that it's supposed [00:26:54] to provide, you know?  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. For sure. Well, it's why, you know, my experience of memorizing tables of correspondences when I was doing ceremonial stuff, you know? MAL: [chuckles] ANDREW: I mean, on the one hand, it's like, well, why memorize [00:27:09] it, there are books, but on the other hand, it's, it preloads your cognition with a framework that stuff that wants to work within that framework can then work straight through . . .  MAL: Absolutely. ANDREW: As opposed [00:27:24] to, you know, having to attempt to bridge that gap without that extra framework there, you know? MAL: Yeah. Absolutely. ANDREW: It's possible, anybody can have a vision of, you know, take your pick, and that might be authentic and whatever, but It's [00:27:39] a lot rarer and it's really atypical, as opposed to sort of the, you know, that that more you've done the work, [lost words at 27:48? sounds like "you're fed up"?] and now they're going to show you a thing in this way.  MAL: Absolutely. Well, and you know, putting on my clinical [00:27:54] psych hat, in the middle of all of this I also went on and got various graduate degrees in psychology. We know that the thoughts that we think change the physical structure of our brains.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know, and so, memorizing [00:28:09] tables of correspondences, it's not just putting information in your head so that you can have it at quick recall. It's literally making a physical change to your brain. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: Is that physical change necessary? Is that, [00:28:24] you know, an integral component to the experience that you're trying to have? I-- Maybe not, but maybe it is, and if that's the case, if it's not just about being able to have something on immediate recall, in which case, you know, why don't [00:28:39] I just load, preload 777 on my phone?  ANDREW: Sure.  MAL: And then if I, if I need to know a correspondence, I'll pick it up. But you know, if it's not just about having that piece of information, but if it's about the change that it's affecting in your brain that is allowing [00:28:54] you to maybe perceive or experience, you know, something, then, you know, by not doing it, you're either never going to get there, or, like you said, it's going to be really damn rare that you get the experience that, you know, that [00:29:09] you're hoping for. ANDREW: Yeah. I think the, the, you know, the real answer is, the magic is in many, many parts of it, right? MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: And not just in the quote unquote secret word that activates the ritual or what, right? [00:29:24] MAL: [laughing] Exactly! ANDREW: It's got so many parts of it that that are not, they're not necessarily glamorous. They're almost never talked about overtly in books or in other contexts, right? MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: You know, I almost never see anybody talk about [00:29:39] that when I read a book about magic. It's like "yeah," and then you just like, do this thing and it'll happen. It's like, oh, maybe, maybe so.  MAL: [laughing] Yeah. Sure. It's just the magic word. You just say the word, the word.  ANDREW: Well, the bird is the word, right? That's where we'll go with that? MAL: [laughing] [00:29:56] Yeah. Well, I was going to say, Aidan Wachter recently made a post that I think brilliantly comes to this point and it was a . . . Oh, how did [00:30:11] it go? [sighs] See, I brought it up. Now I should at least be able to remember it, but it was along the lines of you know, the vast majority of success comes from mastering the basics.  ANDREW: Yes. MAL: Not from some advanced, you know, rarefied thing, you know, [00:30:26] and he was coming from it from both an esoteric and a physical, you know, point of view. And I thought it was brilliant when I saw that. ANDREW: Yeah. I remember that post. He was basically sort of saying like, you know, sure, some super custom tailored [00:30:41] fancy technique might get you this extra increase, because--it was coming from a fitness training point of view, the article that he linked to--but the reality is, you know, showing up four days a week and you know doing the basic things, [00:30:56] that's going to get you almost everything and the other stuff is, you know, especially over the arc of time, right? So.  MAL: Right. And that applies to so much of what we do, right? Just showing up and doing the basic stuff. And . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Absolutely. [00:31:13]  MAL: Oh crap, there was, where was I going to go? There was . . . ? Eh, never mind. It'll come back to me if . . . [laughing] ANDREW: Let me ask you this question, then. So . . .  MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: We've popped out this term a couple times here and there: gnostic.  MAL: Okay. ANDREW: What is, [00:31:28] what does that mean to you? What does that mean? You know, like I hear it a lot. I've seen it a lot. You know, I mean, you know, Crowley talked about it a bunch, you know different people talk about it, you know, there's the knights cathars and you know, all that stuff or whatever. [00:31:43] But what does it mean to you? What does it actually . . . What's the relevance of it at this point in time? MAL: Sure. Well, so first off a caveat, I . . . Technically, I don't even really identify myself as gnostic any more, [00:31:59] which, I suppose is actually kind of peak gnosticism, itself. ANDREW: We live in a post gnostic era? MAL: Right. And I'm glad when you asked, you asked, you know, "What does gnosticism mean to you?" Because it is [00:32:14] a . . . I mean it's . . . We apply it retroactively to a lot of ideas, right? None of the ancient texts, like none of the Gnostic Gospels say, "And I am now writing this Gnostic Gospel."  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: Or, you know . . . [00:32:30] Gnosis, for me, the way, the way I learned it, the way I taught it, and the way I experienced it, gnosis is knowledge as opposed to [00:32:45] information. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And specifically, it's that, it's that noetic apprehension that comes after the sort of die neue [spelling?]. [00:33:00] After the intellectual information gathering and crunching and . . . It's an apprehended knowing, you know, in the spiritual sense. More mundanely, it's just knowing [00:33:15] right? It's eating peanut butter rather than having somebody read off the ingredient list of peanut butter to you. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah. The experience of it.  MAL: Yeah, you can never tell somebody else what peanut butter tastes like. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  MAL: You can taste it then and then from then on you will forever and always [00:33:30] know what peanut butter tastes like. And that is, you know, exponentially different from knowing what goes into it. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  MAL: And, and so, in a spiritual and in a magical sense, then, gnosis is [00:33:45] that experience, just like we were talking about, that experience that comes from doing certain things.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know, and, and it's specifically that experience that can only come from doing certain [00:34:00] things as opposed to just reading about them. Whether that's a, you know, an in esoterica or spiritual, religious, and, and oftentimes those are blended. You know, you can read about an experience [00:34:15] of the divine. Or you can have it. I think one of the most underappreciated esoteric texts out there is by St. John Chrysostom, in defense of the hesacasts. So hesacasts, heretic [00:34:30] Orthodox, not heretic but almost, near heretic Orthodox sect, who practiced hesachasm, this, this mystical combination of the Jesus prayer kind of a yoga position and breathing [00:34:45] technique that they said would allow you to experience the energies of the divine.  ANDREW: Hmm.  MAL: In fact, you know, advanced practitioners of this were said to literally physically glow, like they would just glow in the dark. And this got [00:35:00] a lot of bishops' panties in a twist and John Chrysostom wrote this brilliant defense of them, basically laying out theologically why this, this theosis, this knowing of [00:35:15] God is not heretical. You know, they're not saying they can know God, because you can't wrap a finite mind around an infinite thing, but you can experience, right? Can you hear that humming right now?  ANDREW: [00:35:30] No, from your side? No.  MAL: Yeah, so, my mic, I'm going to flick it real quick. [thump] I fixed it. Sorry, I've got a loose connector there. ANDREW: Uh huh. MAL: But, you can experience it. You can have an experience of it and he likened it to a number of different things. [00:35:45] One of them was, you know, sitting in a ray of sunshine: you know it, you can experience it. It's not all of it. Nobody's saying it is. But that, that's gnosis to me, [00:36:00] that experience.  ANDREW: So, let's, I'm gonna ask you a really unfair question. Okay? MAL: Okay. Sure.  ANDREW: So, how do people determine what is different [00:36:15] between an authentic gnosis with something, with a spirit, with god, with wherever, and a more [00:36:30] psychological, or, you know, even intellectualized engagement with it, you know? Because there's so many people who have experiences of different things, and you know, going back to your, your Zen stuff [00:36:45] and to your Tibetan stuff. There are very clear things that are markers, right? For what's an authentic experience, you know, and I even remember when I was in the Aurum Solis, I came to my teacher and I was like, I had this, I had this experience [00:37:00] with one of the archangels, and they showed up in this way. And he's like, "Great," and then he pulls out a piece of paper and shows like, pulls out a book from his notes about it and shows me what I saw. He's like, that's, that's [00:37:15] because you're, you've moved beyond your own cognitive stuff being in the way of that connection.  MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: You know? So, how do people know that, though? How do people even begin to work with that if this is a new idea for [00:37:30] them? MAL: You know, it's, the easiest way is having a teacher, right? ANDREW: Sure. MAL: There's the famous story of Gampopa and Milarepa, his, the yogi Milarepa, who was Gampopa's meditation [00:37:45] teacher and at that time, you know, the Tibetans generally don't meditate in groups. They don't do silent meditation. They get the instruction. They go away, they practice, then they come back. And Gampopa came to his, Milarepa after some time practicing, [00:38:00] and he's like, "I don't know what's going on, but I'm beset by devils constantly. This is what . . ." And Milarepa was like, "Just chill out, keep doing the practice, that that'll all go away." A few months later, Gampopa comes back again, and he was like, "Teacher, you're, you're so right. It's amazing. [00:38:15] All the devils were chased off. Now. I'm visited constantly by angels and dakinis and it's just wonderful and it's bliss." And Milarepa was like, "Uh huh, that's cool. Just keep practicing, that will go away."  ANDREW: Sure.  MAL: You know, having that that teacher that can that can guide you . . . [00:38:30] You know, in Buddhism, especially in Tibetan Buddhism, emptiness, shunyata, big deal, and having an experience of emptiness is a big deal. Like this is [00:38:45] one of the major mileposts and the literature is just scattered with warnings about, you know, don't intellectualize this, don't intellectualize this, because [00:39:00] when you do, when you get an idea in your head of what that experience is, you reify it and then you're stuck, right? You're stuck with that idea. And you think "Oh, I have had this experience and therefore . . ." You know, and without [00:39:15] sort of that external verification by somebody else who's been there, right? Without talking about Cincinnati with somebody who's also been there, you know and confirm: Yes. Absolutely. I know exactly the street corner you're talking about, or you know, whatever, you can easily [00:39:30] be led astray.  How, how does somebody working on their own do this? Well, that's tough, you know, at that point, I think you have to, [00:39:45] I think initially approach, you know, unverified personal gnosis, UPG, with skepticism. ANDREW: Yeah. MAL: You know, I think that has to be the default when you're on your own, no matter how amazingly lifelike and 3D [00:40:00] this apparition was, or like, initially approach it with some degree of skepticism, keeping in your mind, well, this could just be wishful thinking or this could be, you know, whatever, [00:40:15] and then give it time, right? If it was a teaching, if it was a practice, if it . . . Does it bear out? ANDREW: Yeah. MAL: Are there, are there, are there are external things that coincide with it? If you . . . You know, you're given a vision of this, you know, amazing new practice [00:40:30] and then the very next day somebody randomly starts talking to you about, you know, a symbol which is exactly like the linchpin for that practice or, you know, you know, somebody brings you something that you [00:40:45] specifically need in order to . . . You know, you look for confirmation still from outside, even if it's not from a specific like teacher in a lineage of a thing . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You're still looking for that external confirmation. [00:41:00] And it may not be for years and years and years that all of a sudden something happens and then it clicks and you're like, oh my God, I had that dream, you know, three years ago about this and then here is this . . . [00:41:15] Holy crap. This is a, you know, okay, then you go with it. But no, if otherwise, if somebody shows up and just says, "hey, you're the chosen one," or you know, you're yet another incarnation of Alistair, or you know, whatever, [00:41:30] you know, maybe keep that in your back pocket. ANDREW: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I think that that time will tell, right? MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: Time will tell. We'll see if this holds the test of time, for sure. MAL: Right, you know, and you can have, I think, amazing personal experiences that are meaningful [00:41:45] to you.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: That you never say anything to anyone about or do anything with. And that's okay.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: They don't have to be huge revelations. Or they don't have to be, you know, even if it was something that was just the product of your own mind, [00:42:01] maybe it's useful to you. But again, yeah, I think that in order to tell the difference between genuine, a genuine experience of gnosis, like that, yeah, it's external confirmation. ANDREW: And so, [00:42:16] that brings back sort of one of the other questions that I wanted to check in about: what role does lineage play, for you, in all of these things? I mean, I know in my Lukumi lineage, you know, lineage is everything. You know? I mean [00:42:31] you are, you are, in that, in my tradition, you are initiated into the lineage. MAL: Right. ANDREW: You know, lineage becomes your family, and, and that changes so many different dynamics because of it. You know, it's not just like, it's not just [00:42:46] about the information that was passed from person to person, but it's actually the license to practice certain things, the requirement to practice them in a certain way in accordance with lineage, and a connection to all of those spirits who carried that [00:43:01] lineage forward, you know? MAL: Right. ANDREW: So it's a, it's a very living dynamic thing. What role does lineage play for you? And, and what do you see as its sort of values and challenges? You know?  MAL: Wow. [00:43:17] I'm going to cheat and refer back to something that I wrote a while ago. ANDREW: Which is always welcome.  MAL: Okay, cool. I tend to think in terms of three different kinds of lineage for any organization.  ANDREW: Yeah. MAL: Physical lineage, [00:43:33] practice lineage, and, you know, ultimate or primordial lineage, right? Which, so, and what do I mean by these? The physical lineage is just the people, the stuff, right? The boots on the ground, the people doing the thing, the [00:43:48] buildings, the, you know, the institution. The practice lineage is the stuff they tell you to do. Right? These are the, these are the teachings that ideally have been, you know, tried, [00:44:03] tested, passed on, initiatory aspects of initiatory power, right? That are meant to facilitate things. Obeah or apostolic succession. These are all conferrals of a power [00:44:18] meant to facilitate something. Sorry. I'm going to thump the mic here again. ANDREW: I think you might be picking up on the, someone's running a shop vac or something downstairs. I'm also hearing that in the background.  MAL: [00:44:33] Then I'll trust it's on your end and not mine.  ANDREW: Yeah.  MAL: So, yeah, the practice lineage there. And then the primordial lineage is what you're ultimately connecting to via these three things, [00:44:48] right? So, the physical lineage exists primarily to transmit to the people it brings in. The practice lineage, which then facilitates connection to the [00:45:03] primordial lineage. And, you know, the first two exist ultimately . . . They function only to the point that they do those things, right? If at any point a physical institution loses its connection [00:45:18] to the primordial lineage, they're dead. Right? It's just a, it's a fossil. It's a club. It's a, it's, you know, it's cosplay or whatever. If the practices [00:45:34] no longer facilitate connecting you to that primordial lineage, then they're not doing their thing, right? They don't work anymore.  But then once that connection to the primordial lineage is made, at that [00:45:49] point, new practice lineages and new physical lineages can be instituted. Without that connection, they can't be. You know, this is, this is one of those things that, like in Buddhism, people, [00:46:04] there's this idea from people outside of it. For example, tons of sutra is attributed to the Buddha, but he, you know, we know historically he didn't say these things. The Buddha didn't write that. The Lotus Sutra isn't taught by the . . . But no, technically, yeah, he did, because [00:46:19] within . . . You know, the game rules of Buddhism state [chuckling] that there is only one Enlightenment, right? Buddha means awakened. Once you have had that experience, right, once you're connected [00:46:34] to that primordial lineage, there's no difference between you and Siddhartha Gautama, right? So, if you have legitimately had that experience within the game rules, you can write something today and [00:46:49] say this is a text by the Buddha.  ANDREW: Mmm. MAL: And that's, you know, 100% legit. There are institutions [00:47:06] where I think you can bypass some of this, but I find them to be so phenomenally rare. Right? The person that just [00:47:21] stumbles upon either a practice lineage that works to connect them to a primordial lineage, or, or, you know . . . Okay, a big example of this, you know, with what I'm doing now, apostolic [00:47:36] succession is a huge thing. Right? There is a conferral of authority and power with that, without which, none of the other sacraments will be there. Period. Full stop. Yet, [00:47:51] within broader Christianity, very few people question the legitimacy of Paul as an apostle. Because in the middle of his, you know, previous [00:48:06] life as a, and I don't know if you can hear the air quotes I put around that, [chuckles] as a, you know, assassin for hire, he had this vision, on, was it, the [00:48:21] the road to Emmaus? [He means Damascus. The road to Emmaus is where Jesus appeared after his resurrection.] I think. Anyway, he had this vision of Christ and he converted and now he's an apostle.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And I think most, most people in the broader Christian world: "Okay, we'll accept that." You won't find any apostolic lineages, [00:48:36] I believe, tracing themselves back to Paul. I'd be surprised if you did, but you know, nobody lists him as an apostle with an asterisk by his name, kind of thing. ANDREW: Right. MAL: But you also then don't hear about this happening [00:48:51] all the damn time.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know, nobody spontaneously . . . Well, damn it, okay. The gnostic revival in France in the 19th century, [laughing] Jules Doinel. Yeah. Okay, he claimed it. But then, even [00:49:06] he went on to get actual apostolic succession. So. You know, I think it's rare. It's more rare than people think.  ANDREW: I think there's a big difference between a connection to spirit, [00:49:23] you know, and even a spirit that might have, you know, like, you know, I mean, I'm certainly not the reincarnation of Crowley, but perhaps, perhaps I could connect to his spirit in a way, and his, his Spirit could act as [00:49:38] a guide and an animating force in my work, you know?  MAL: Absolutely, yeah. ANDREW: I'm not saying that that happens per se, but, but that could happen. And that is not uncommon, you know. MAL: Right. ANDREW: [00:49:53] Like there, there are lots of things you know, where . . . MAL: But, when those things do happen . . .  ANDREW: Yeah.  MAL: But when that does happen, there's a lot that preceded that.  ANDREW: Yes. MAL: Right? It doesn't, it doesn't happen to, you know, the random grocery [00:50:08] store clerk who has, you know, never even picked up a copy of book four, or you know, whatever. Right? ANDREW: For sure. And, but that experience is also not necessarily the same as the experience of the [00:50:23] connection to that primordial, you know, energy or the current even though if I was connecting to Crowley, I'm connecting to you know, the prophet of Thelema, that doesn't mean that I'm actually connected [00:50:38] to that step behind that, you know? MAL: Right. Right. ANDREW: And I think that . . . I think that's also an interesting distinction, you know, and that's where lineage and traditional initiation facilitate that.  MAL: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: You know, because you may connect to that current, possibly, as you [00:50:53] say, there are examples, but I think there's a big difference between connecting to a spirit that engages your work and guides you and something sort of one step further beyond that into that lineage, that [00:51:08] deeper force, you know? MAL: Right. And, and access to one aspect of a lineage also doesn't necessarily confer access to another aspect of lineage. So, for, you know, I have [00:51:23] apostolic succession via the episcopi vagantes, you know, right, the wandering bishops. And we may trace our lineage, you know, even up into, you know popes in Rome, but that doesn't make me [00:51:38] a Roman Catholic bishop. Right, that's the physical institution, and even though I might have access to both primordial or, you know, both practice and primordial lineage there, that grants me absolutely no standing whatsoever in the physical, you [00:51:54] know, lineage kind of thing, which is something I think a lot of people tend to forget, especially in the independent sacramental movement. They tend to not get that these things are [00:52:09] . . . They're disparate. They're separate. They're discrete things. Yes. Generally they're connected and hopefully, you know, if you get involved in one, it is, but yeah, if you stumble across it, if you just happen to meet up with some guy in [00:52:24] a, you know, hotel bar in Ontario and get, this sounds so bad now that I'm saying it out loud, get invited back up to his hotel room to get consecrated as a bishop one night . . . [laughing] Great. [00:52:39] You know, that doesn't mean, you know, you can show up at the Vatican and be like, you know, where's my room?  ANDREW: Like, yeah, that dude. He initiated 50 people that week. Come on!  MAL: [laughing] Right? [00:52:54] Yeah. So. It's, you know, lineage is, lineage is important. And, you know, I'm sure you could make the case that even though I'm breaking it down into three different things that you could say, well, they're really all the different aspects of the same thing, [00:53:09] and you could probably break it down even, you know, you could break it into four different aspects or two or whatever. But you know, in general, I think, for those three reasons at least, lineage is important, especially [00:53:24] in religious, spiritual, and, and esoteric bodies wherein the point is connection with something higher, with that primordial aspect. If, you know, if the point is just [00:53:39] education, then, you know, lineage is, you know, by-the-book kind of. Like the modern grimoire revival. There's no living lineage, you know, Solomonic lineage that's [00:53:54] passing this kind of thing . . . No, it's: you find the book, you, as best you can, decipher what the hell they're talking about.  ANDREW: Uh-huh.  MAL: You do it as best you can and you hope like hell you have an experience similar to what they said you're going to have. And that's [00:54:09] kind of it. The book, at that point, is the lineage until, you know, you make that connection. The book then is the practice lineage. There is no physical institution, you know, physical aspect of it. And then, you know, hopefully you do the practice until [00:54:24] you get that that connection that then continues in your work. You know, I think a physical institution could happen, but it's not necessary. So I guess even in that [00:54:39] sense, there is a lineage or just accessing it through the information that's passed on through both having the right book, having the, the brains to figure out what the hell it's saying, and then having the guts to follow through and do what it's saying. [00:54:54]  ANDREW: Yeah, I mean I tend to look at some of that stuff as more, more technological, right?  MAL: Mm-hmm.  ANDREW: Like, I mean more in that second realm of the practice.  MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: Than the lineage, because I think [00:55:09] that you can, to some extent, plug some of that into whatever lineage you, you might have access to, right? Or whatever sort of primordial elements you would have access to, you know? MAL: Right. ANDREW: When I was very interested in those kinds of things, [00:55:25] you know, I was, I was not interested in the Golden Dawn. I was very interested in Thelema. And, so I would just go through and swap out all the words, you know, the words that weren't Thelemic for words that were Thelemic and do work in that direction, [00:55:40] and then use that, that sort of connection to that primordial juice and that piece of it to you know, you know, call up whomever and be like, hey, listen, by the power of Babylon you're going to do this, or whatever . . . MAL: [laughing] ANDREW: You know, and, and [00:55:55] I think that's possible, because it's, it becomes, the grimoire stuff can be more technological maybe than sort of lineage-based necessarily.  MAL In general, I tend to think tech is tech. [00:56:10] But you know, then again there are lineages where, without having the appropriate lineage, it doesn't matter what knowledge or information you have, it's not gonna work, or it's not going to work the way you want it to. You know, when you look at, [00:56:25] you know, Tibetan Buddhist magic, or just Tibetan Buddhist practice, you know, if, if you're, if you don't have the empowerment of a particular deity, the practice is at best ineffectual [00:56:40] and at worst dangerous, because you're in effect, you know, trying to contact these, these powerful personalities and they don't know who the hell you are.  ANDREW: Right. MAL: Right? It would be, it [00:56:55] would be like showing up at, I don't know, pick a, pick a powerful, a famous powerful person who could be dangerous to you. I immediately, I don't want to make this political, I immediately think Trump. [laughing] [00:57:10] Not that you can, anybody, I don't, you know what? I'm not even going to go there. Um, but yeah, you pick a person with temporal power. All right, prime minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau. He seems like a really nice guy. [00:57:25] Right? I mean everybody in Canada seems so super nice to us here in the hinterlands, but I bet as nice as he is, if I went to Canada, and I saw him on the street, if I came running up to [00:57:40] him at full tilt saying, hey Justin, let me . . . You know, trying to get . . . I'm thinking there's some people that would tackle me to the ground.  ANDREW: Exactly. Yeah. MAL: You know, and so, you know, the empowerment, that connection to that lineage at that point is the facilitation of that contact, right? It's somebody [00:57:55] coming in who has that connection, somebody who's saying, hey, you know what? Let me introduce you to my good friend, Mr. Trudeau. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  MAL: And then, once they facilitated the introduction and we've shared a couple of drinks or whatever, at that point, you know, I can then, you know, wave from him [00:58:10] from across the street and maybe he'll remember me and then we bump into each other, you know, that sort of thing.  ANDREW: Sure.  MAL: And, and I'm absolutely convinced that Tibetan Buddhism can't be the only place where something like that is, is [00:58:25] required, where if you don't have the hook-up, if you don't have the official connection to that lineage through the prescribed means, you know, best of luck to you.  ANDREW: Yeah, yeah. Something might happen, but who's [00:58:40] to say what it is and yeah, how it's going to go.  MAL: Yeah. And whether or not you wanted it! [chuckling] ANDREW: Exactly, exactly, for sure. So, we've been, we've been chatting for a long time, because this has been really lovely, and I want to ask you one more question before we wrap it up though. [00:58:55]  MAL: Sure. ANDREW: Because there's one other thing we haven't gotten to, which I was delightfully enjoying on your Facebook, which is these various statements of gnostic belief, [00:59:10] you know, or the sort of, you know, where you're discussing how you believe in, you know, this, the fallen angel, and the energy that comes with that, and how you believe in Christ in this way, and how you believe [00:59:25] in, you know what I mean? If we think about the apostles' creed, we have a very clear example of a statement in that direction, but you know, all sorts of traditions have their own. But your seemingly contradictory, [00:59:41] from some people's perspective, ideas about the nature of the universe, really both sort of tickled my fancy . . . MAL: [chuckles] ANDREW:  And, [laughing] if that's, if that's not a weird thing to say and reflected [00:59:56] a bunch of my own kind of contradictory or apparently contradictory notions about it. So I'm curious what, what you were looking to do as you were expressing that and sort of what kinds of beliefs you have around, [01:00:11] you know, the nature of the universe in that kind of construct.  MAL: In general, I have a very dim view of belief. [laughing] I think they're very dangerous things, people ought to stop having them. ANDREW: Uh-huh. MAL: [01:00:27] And when I post that . . . I think one of the worst things that ever happened to the world was--and this is ironic, I think, coming from me--is Christianity and its emphasis on creeds. You know, Christianity was weird for any number of things, when it arrived on the [01:00:42] scene, but one of the things that it was most weird for was that it was a creedal religion. It was, you know, it pivoted around what people believe as opposed to what people did. It wasn't performative. And, you know, this idea of having right belief [01:00:57] then is something that came into play and, you know, I think history has shown us what a dangerous thing requiring right belief can be. ANDREW: Sure. MAL: And then determining that. When I post [01:01:12] shit like that, and I feel absolutely justified in calling it that, a lot of times it's just to kind of work out for myself what's been bouncing around in my head, what's going on at the time, [01:01:27] and also looking for a little bit of that sort of external verification, right? If everybody responded with a what are you on? or did you not sleep last night? or is that . . . You know, then I know, okay, this is maybe a little bit out there, but then when I get responses [01:01:42] like, you know, that really tickled my fancy, or you know, that's a sign that, okay, you know, maybe, maybe I might have figured a little bit of something out, or maybe I might have glimpsed a little bit of something here. And I think [01:01:57] having creeds that don't fit together nicely works together well for me. And by creed, you know, having beliefs that are paradoxical, that, that aren't, you know, that are sometimes juxtaposed [01:02:12] against each other, is beneficial. I mean, it goes back to, I think what I was talking about with my own sort of practice, where you know, you take these two disparate things, you take these two different books, two diametrically opposed . . . See what comes out of it. [01:02:27] See what, see what you make from it. And I think a lot of times, the thing that makes something paradoxical is really just a limitation of our language. ANDREW: Sure. MAL: You know, [01:02:43] I get a lot of, I think I get the most push back, for example, with the Church of Light and Shadow, which is, you know, my newest endeavor, because I talk about the morning star and people [01:02:58] are like, well, okay, you seem to be implying that this is both Jesus and Lucifer, which is it? And I'm kind of like well, yeah, you know, we have this tradition that Lucifer is the Fallen Angel. However, [01:03:14] there's only one figure in the Bible who ever identified themselves as the Morning Star.  ANDREW: Mmm.  MAL: That's Christ in the Book of Revelation. ANDREW: Sure. MAL: You know, and the more I sat with that and their specific [01:03:29] roles and functions, especially the. you know, not, not the, not the Satan of you know, the HaSatan or you know of, the opposer of . . . ANDREW: Or Anton LaVey.  MAL: Right. Yeah, but this . . . [01:03:44] more the Lucifer of Milton and Dante, and, you know, the very popular romantic Promethean myth of Lucifer that we have today. That is very much a Christ figure [01:03:59] when you look at the role that Christ played. Right? Christ did not show up and be like, "You know, what? All right, everybody just do what the temple priests say, and follow . . ." You know, he was very much an ego-driven [01:04:16] individual. I mean, we can consider the gospels as spurious as we would like as far as whether or not this figure, Jesus, actually said these things. But the [01:04:31] one thing that you know, like when you get to, like the Jesus scholars, that came together and try to figure out well, what's most likely that he said? One of the things that they had pinpointed as most likely coming from Jesus, based on what we know of the context, and what got passed . . . [01:04:47] His doing away with the old law and saying, "A new law I give to you," right? "Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and love your neighbor as yourself." [01:05:03]  And what people gloss over here is, it's not saying, love your neighbor, which by that he means that everybody, right, love everybody else. He's not saying love them more than yourself. He's not saying debase yourself before . . . He's saying love them [01:05:19] as yourself. And if you don't love yourself a great deal, you're gonna be shitty at loving anybody else.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know, how Luciferian is that? You know, he . . . [01:05:34] And so looking at these two figures in that way, looking at them both as, as light bringers . . . You know, in fact, it was really, it was not until I looked at [01:05:50] the gospels and teaching of, teachings of Jesus from a Luciferian perspective, that they really started to make sense to me. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: Does that make sense?  ANDREW: It does. It does, for sure.  MAL: And so, I think there's, [01:06:05] there's, there's definitely something there, and this, this perspective is not new. I did not make this up. ANDREW: Sure. MAL: This idea of having a, you know, a sacramental Christian Church practicing [01:06:20] folk magic is also not new, you know, magic and Christianity have been tied together for as long as they're . . .  ANDREW: Catholics everywhere. Right?  MAL: Right. Yeah. I mean, I think I commented recently on Facebook that you know, if you're not ready to accept that Christianity [01:06:35] is a weird necromantic cult, then you're not ready to study church history.  ANDREW: Yeah. MAL: But when looking around for this, you know, for something that really embodied and [01:06:50] embraced that, I couldn't find it. There's nothing, you know, like there's, there's, there's nothing out there. There are Catholic witches that are, you know, going to mass, and you know, practicing in private or in secret, [01:07:05] and there are Christian witches, but there's no organization that's embracing both of these things. And the more I kept looking for this, and the more I kept posting, you know, both things like, you know what? I believe this and I believe this and the more [01:07:20] feedback I kept getting from people saying, you know, yeah. Yeah, me too! Where's that from? This ought to be a thing! ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: And you know, I'm a firm believer that we have enough independent apostolic [01:07:35] Christian churches running around. I don't know how familiar you are with the independent sacramental movement, but in general, you know, you end up with jurisdictions of one, somebody belongs to a church long enough to get consecrated a bishop. [01:07:50] And then they're out of there so they can go do things the right way. ANDREW: They had a great experience while they were in Vegas from somebody they met in the bar.  MAL: [chuckling] Right? Next thing, you know, then they're off.  ANDREW: Yeah. MAL: You know, and so, I get in trouble, I get [01:08:05] people in the independent sacramental movement angry with me when I tell them, you know, look, if it's really about the mission, like you say it is, you would stop what you're doing, find a larger church that's actually already doing this, and doing it a lot better because they've got the bodies [01:08:20] and the resources, and you'd join them, you're doing this just for the title. And so I was, I was loathe to start yet another church. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. MAL: You know.  ANDREW: Well, and I think just before [01:08:35] you move past that point, too . . . MAL: Yeah. ANDREW: And I think there's also value in doing a thing like becoming a bishop for yourself.  MAL: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. That's great too. ANDREW: You know, I mean, many many Orisha practitioners become priests for their own [01:08:50] well-being, you know, and that's fantastic, but be clear about that, and then go from there, you know.  MAL: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely, you know, I went for years ordaining people and limiting their faculties. [01:09:05] So, when you're ordained a priest, you receive faculties or permissions from the bishop that tells you what you can and can't do, basically. And I would ordain esoteric practitioners who just [01:09:20] wanted that, that plug into apostolic succession for their own spiritual and magical practice. And I would, you know, I would tell them well, okay, great, but without any sort of pastoral education, I'm not going to license you [01:09:35] to do any sort of pastoral work. [laughs] You don't get to go start a church, you can say mass in your home privately, that sort of thing, that's fine. Just go be a private priest. And it took a lot to move me away from that [01:09:50] and, and decide, okay, you know what? I think I am. I think there's enough momentum around this to do something about it, to found it. I'm a firm believer in, if you have an idea for something great, and nobody else has done or is [01:10:05] doing it, maybe that's a sign it's supposed to be you. And after poking around and getting enough encouragement, I decided all right, screw it, we're going to do it. But if we're going to do it, this is how it's going to happen.  ANDREW: You'

Andrew So, Founder of South Bronx United, joins the show for this extraordinarily meaningful chat surrounding OPPORTUNITY. South Bronx United is an organization based in the South Bronx, NY, that combines soccer and learning, in order to help youth maximize their goals (both on the field, and off). As the leader of this operation, Andrew works directly with the word 'opportunity' each, and every day. Check it out! Thanks for your time!

Lonnie and Andrew explore the how reconstruction and revisioning of heathen traditions plays out in Lonnie's life and the world. Going from both the inspiration in Lonnie's life to the racism and problems that also exist in some adherents. The also talk about chaos magic and finding your own path.  Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. Lonnie can be found on facebook here, and Weird Web radio is here.  Elhaz Ablaze can be found here.  Andrew can be found here.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcript Andrew: Welcome to another installment of the Hermit's Lamp Podcast. I am hanging out today with Lonnie Scott. And I know Lonnie from the internet, from tarot community, from all sorts of different places. And not that long ago, for me, even being a guest on his show, Weird Web Radio. But for folks who don't know who you are, Lonnie, what are you up to you? What are you doing spiritually these days?  Lonnie: Oh, boy. What am I not doing spiritually these days? For most people who may not know that personal side of me, I'm a heathen, I generally practice within reconstructed, reidealized paganism practices inspired by Northern Europe and ancient Northern European practices. But more of if you want to call it, what we call the down and dirty title, chaos heathen. Chaos heathenry is something that was started by the guys at the Elhaz Ablaze website and blog many years ago. I found my way to them just trying to navigate to something within heathenry that wasn't just religious. I don't feel like I have this strict sort of religious practice. I'm more interested in magic and sorcery and how those things work, but within frameworks that resonate to me. And heathenry's always spoken to me that way.  Essentially, we are chaos magicians who found a spiritual home in heathenry. Jason Miller coined something not too long ago called chaonimism. When I read that, I thought, this is the term that applies really well to the way we think, especially myself, within that chaos heathen sort of framework. We're seeking the real results of practice and trying to find what it is that works and the sort of tech that we can plug into and apply to our lives. At the same time, recognizing that spirit is real and it doesn't require my permission or my belief to exist. It's really there if that makes sense. Andrew: Does for sure. I'm just pulled up the thing from Jason, chaonimism now. Approach that combines the wild freedom focused on results and non-hierarchical view of reality inherent in chaos magic with a belief in spirits as organized consciousness not dependent on belief. Yeah, you know, I mean, I think that, I think that's such an interesting distinction, this question of, I actually have no question about it but I think that the dialogue about it has been interesting and it's always interesting when people come to it, which is, are spirits real? Where do they exist? How do they exist?  And for me, I've pretty much always approached them as discrete entities with no reliance on me. They have a life of some sort extraneous to me entirely and we just bump into each other if I'm lucky at the appointed times, you know, when I make the appropriate phone call, you know. In a sense, we are that spiritual being, we're embodied as spirits, if you buy into that framework.  So, you're a spirit too just as long with all these other spirits that are surrounding us. We're not better or worse than any of those that exist, we're just existing on sort of a different framework or different vibrations, I guess, if you want to take it that way. So, why is the nonreligious side of that important to you or what does that mean in terms of your practice in your life? Lonnie: Yeah. My practice isn't centered around devotions, I guess is the really, the only distinction I can come up with that makes any sort of sense. I'm not setting up permanent altar, temple structure type relationships to any deities or trying to come up with specific philosophies or dictate practice or anything around particular god size spirits, if you will. In that light, I'm not the religious, but I do on the same token have these relationships with different gods and goddesses within the heathen framework and without. Go ahead. Andrew: Heathen is always a word that people, I see around, and I feel like I sometimes struggle to articulate what it means clearly though myself. What does heathenism mean to you or how would you define that word? Lonnie: Sure. Heathenry is just kind of a general umbrella kind of term. It's similar to pagan in that fashion, they can cover a lot of different styles and approaches and practices that fall under that category. Heathen is a more specific general term that, again, it covers things that are being reconstructed or inspired by ancient Northern European practices, going out through Germanic lands, Scandinavia, Iceland, Anglo Saxon sort of practices. And there are different specific religions fall under that umbrella depending on what area and region people are being inspired by. Andrew: So it's more of these, for you, about the geography where it comes from or the collection of spirits where it comes from? Lonnie: I guess by sheer accident, it's associated with the geography because that's where the ideas come from. But for me, it's more about the ideas. It's not about the land or the places that these original ideas sort of sprung up. My interest- Andrew: I was going to say, your accent doesn't sound Northern European to me. Lonnie: Right. My appeal to heathenry is more about the concepts that are inherent inside of it. Things like hospitality and reciprocity being important, the land spirits being an important part of honoring them, honoring your ancestors. And then going at a deeper more mystical level, talking about the norms at the center of all things. The tree and the well being central elements of the cosmology. The more I dig into it, the more I go about the list. It's less and less and less and less about gods and goddesses to me, and it's more about these concepts and how I relate to the world and my relationship with the people, the land, the spirits that I work with. Andrew: It's more of a philosophy and a theology and a worldview in that sense? Lonnie: Yeah, I think that's more accurate. It's more of a mindset and a worldview than it is a religion at least in my practice. Andrew: Sure. So, how did you find your way to the Norse or Northern European deities and world view then? Lonnie: Oh, by accident, like all things. You had your accident, I had mine. When I was a teenager, I started exploring into different parts of paganism and the occult. I tell people I wasn't raised to be anything. My parents weren't religious, they weren't forcing me to attend any churches on Sundays. My sister and I weren't baptized. We were just left to be whatever it is we were going to be. But sometime around the age of 12 or 13, I got interested in all things spiritual and I started checking out books in the library, asking questions to people who were around. By the time I'm 15 or 16, I've probably read most of what Scott Cunningham stuff was on the book shelves, started digging into Crowley's different material he provided. There really wasn't much available when I was a teenager in the 90s, early 90s.  But then I meet some friends and all in one swoop, it's funny, one friend on one hand says, I think I found the perfect book for you and he hands me, Liber Null & Psychonaut. He says, I've read through this, I think it's crazy, I can't even wrap my head around it but I think it's definitely for you. And he was right. It was definitely for me, is exactly what I was looking for. All in the same time, another friend, within a day or two of this incident is really getting interested in runes. And he's got Futhark by Edred Thorsson. He's got some of Kveldulf Gundarsson's early stuff, Teutonic religion, Teutonic magic. And he's got this big goal in mind, he wants to end up on the high read of The Troth. And he starts studying this stuff. I'm just borrowing books from him.  So I sort of find my way to modern esoteric rune practices through Futhark, and then I've got Liber Null & Psychonaut in my other hand. These two books sort of form the foundational practice of what propelled me forward into heathenry and the occult both.  Andrew: It's fascinating. Yeah. I went through a period of time where I was very interested in runes. I was in art school, so like, back in the early 90-ish, you know, I was very interested in them and so on, and was doing a lot of, using them for a lot of magic. I even made some brands and did some branding work on myself as part of creating permanent protection work and stuff like that. So, it was very, back in my body modification piercing interested days and stuff like that. So yeah, very much I get that, that kind of chaotic like, not chaotic in the sense of like on structure, but like that open-ended like, what can I do with this stuff? Where can I put it to work? How can I work this in a way that makes sense to my whole self? Lonnie: Well, sure, that's right. I'm looking at the back over time at this, I've got, in Liber Null, you've got the instruction manual for creating sigils, starting to work sigil magic, and how to adopt different mindsets, to apply magic, to get results. On the other hand, I've got a book about runes and these really angular shapes, they look like they want to do something more than just write. Inherently, the aesthetic of them appeal. When you start creating bind runes, bringing different runic forces together, they're a much more magical looking thing to me than just creating a sigil, the way it's taught in chaos magic. I think they're working on the same principle.  Andrew: For sure, yeah. I think it's kind of like, you can have a bunch of wood and some nails and some hammer and you can make anything you want. Have some Lego that locks together in a really easy structure, right? Both ways you make a thing, you know, and I think that the bind runes and the runes themselves have that sort of ease of interconnection that really does lend itself to that kind of process, right? Lonnie: Right. Yeah. And this goes back to like, you were talking about how did I get into heathenry, how do I explore it further into heathenry. The more you study the runes, in a modern esoteric framework, you're essentially looking at what do these runes mean, and most of that modern framework is based on The Elder Futhark. We know what they mean because of the diligent work of academics who have reconstructed proto-Germanic so we can have an idea of what these runes all say on rune stones that dot the landscape. But for you, if you're a practicing heathen or you're trying to use runes for magic or divination, what does Fehu actually mean for you on a magical or divinatory purpose. It can mean fee, cattle, money. And you can leave it at that.  But if you really want to dig deeper into runes, you can't help but sort of fall into these deeper heathen ideas because you ask yourself, well, what did cattle mean to the people who came up with this symbol? What was the concept of money and this idea of fees? And then you find your way to the rune poems and you start finding your way to the Eddas and the stories that hold the mythic tale of the people who came up with this whole symbol set to begin with. It enriches what you can do with the runes on one hand, but like I said, you just kind of fall into these ideologies and worldviews if you're willing to actually look deeper into what these things are. Andrew: So, I'm certainly not going to ask you to stand for everybody who uses these things. But, I've also seen a lot of stuff kind of creeping in around some kind of more extreme people who are using runes and Norse stuff for racist ideas and stuff like that. I don't even know what the question I have for you around that is. I guess I'll go, what do you think about that? Do you think that that's in any way inherent in the structure? What do we do about this, you know, where people are, you know, from my point of view as someone outside of those kinds of traditions, co-opting something? Yeah. Lonnie: Let's dig in. I'm on the high read of The Troth. It's an international inclusive heathen organization and also the steward of Illinois for the same organization. We make inclusive a distinction because it's necessary. When modern heathenry was reborn in the minds of people in America, it'd gotten its rebirth in a way earlier in Iceland. But when it relaunched itself somehow in America, it came with a stain from the very beginning. This sort of romantic notion of the viking as this sort of road warrior today. This idea that this is somehow a tradition or a religion that should only be ethnically attached to European descendants. So, you'll start to see different factions split over time over how deeply they adhere to those ideas. So, on one hand, you've got people like me and The Troth, who are what we call inclusive, meaning that regardless of your sexuality, your gender, your ethnicity, your physical, mental abilities, your economic status even, none of these things are important for you to enter a heathen practice or get to know more about heathen worldviews or join The Troth or any of that. On the other hand, you have other organizations who say it's for, they call themselves folkish. And usually, that means that they want you to be descended from Northern European countries. And what they mean by that is they want you to be white. I don't know how else just to spin that other than they just want you to be white. Andrew: And folkish as in the word like folk, which means people. Like from the people as opposed to like folk practice? Lonnie: Yes. They're usually when they're saying folk, they're talking about of the people, these specific sorts of people, trying to set it up in a more tribal sort of, and have boundaries is their argument. When you see, like you're saying, you see these people who are using runes and other heathen ideas that are occupying some pretty far right not so good ideas, at least as far as I'm concerned, it's all not, let me stutter over my words, none of this comes from a culture in history that was closed off to welcoming the stranger or the other into their communities. We come back to those ideals of hospitality and being both a good guest and a good host in a climate where you had to have those sorts of ideas for people to survive. But even then, we have evidence and stories of people who are, where they freely adopt others into their tribes or their families. None of that comes up as an issue, they're not really part of this family, they're not really part of this tribe. Once you're adopted, you're in. It's a matter of what you can do, not what you look like, not even probably what you believe. It just comes down again to one of those classic heathen sort of phrases, you know, we are our deeds, you are what you do, and nothing else should really matter, the least of which the color of your skin, which is one of the most ridiculous notions that I think should be attached anything heathen. Andrew: Yeah. Is there an effort or is there a consideration or does this even make sense as a question like within the group, like, because I've seen people, people I know, like avoid posting and being involved in runic stuff because of its association with some of these far right people. And they're like, I just don't even, I don't even want to be associated with it. I might have a personal practice but I don't even bring that out because I don't even want people to misunderstand where I'm at or what I'm about with this. In your organization or from your point of view, is there something to be done to sort of delineate these things, to sort of, I don't know, re-reclaim, you know, organize away from these sort of pieces? Lonnie: Yeah. Well, I mean, first, the reclaiming, right? The argument usually hinges on this is our culture not theirs. So, the people who would want to bar entry from anyone based on ethnicity are making the argument that there's this living culture that they're the descendants of and you, whether you're black, brown, Chinese or anything else, you have your own traditions to go out and find. That's the argument that they make. And that you should go out and find those. They're more about segregation in a way than they are sort of some supremacist idea.  Heathenry is not a cultural inheritance. It's not a living tradition that came down through the generations. The ancient heathen cultures that inspire modern practices are dead and they're gone. There's 1000 years of Christianity and other forms of Abrahamic religions, more than likely, and little folk practices, of course, between us and the last heathen who was living pre-conversion times. There's nothing there to living inherent, or inherit. Andrew: It's like if you want to call up Zeus and do some work with Zeus or whatever, there's no living legacy of that practice continues to today. There's the disruption. Lonnie: Not only is there no like direct line through generations. There are hundreds of years of broken connection there. It's a revisioning, it's a reawakening, it's a rebuilding through different ideas and what's important. We have that ability to look at it in a sort of bigger picture and take what's the best of what we can know about their ideas and bring that forward without including any baggage or bullshit that's unnecessary. But even then, that ethnic closing of a door to people, I just don't think is something that they would have recognized or accepted as part of their own way. I'm sure they had their own barriers to entry to their families and their clans and their tribes, but I very highly doubt it had a thing to do with skin.  With that said, you asked, are there ways to offer alternatives or combat this. The Troth is an organization that works very, very hard to do that. We do it by providing publications and resources to people who are interested in heathenry that are one, based on real and solid scholarship, two, effective modern practice, and three, inclusive, being honest about what we expect and who we are, that there's nothing that's going to bar you from being part of what it is that we do.  And last year, I decided to use social media as a way to put up more of a face on inclusive heathenry. And it's funny you were talking about, you know, people who are reluctant to publicly say that they use runes or something or get involved in groups that are more akin to runes because of those associations with less desirable people or ideologies. I had a conversation with a guy who was basically confessing the same things to me, saying, look, I've got this deep, passionate relationship with Odin and Freya from the Norse Pantheon and the mysteries that surround them. And in my own trance work, the things that I'm discovering in my own relationship are amazing and I want to write them down, I want to share them with the world. But I'm gay and I'm black and I can't. I mean, he really felt like because he's gay and he's black, he can't share what he's discovering in his own journey, in his own path with these two specific divine forces. Hearing him say that broke my heart because here I'm having a conversation with a guy who is one of the most brilliant occult practitioners I've ever had the honor to talk to him my life. And he knows who he is and he knows he inspired this movement even. So I got to thinking about it, how do I work harder to make sure that that door's open to people like him, that he's not afraid to walk through that? The fact that he's scared or reluctant to or anyone else, for that matter, I think weakens and cheapens the growth and the movement of modern heathenry. The more great minds and the more practitioners that we have with these different backgrounds and different ideas that they bring to the table can only enrich our own practice. So, I started this thing. It's a hashtag, #knowourheathens, and #inclusiveheathenry attached to it. And you can search those on Facebook is mostly where it's been happening. And just asking people, to put a picture of yourself up on Facebook or anywhere else on social media, include these hashtags, and tell people that you're heathen and you'll accept anyone into heathenry regardless of gender, and race and ethnicity and sexual orientation and so on. And I've been very pleasantly surprised by how many people are willing to take that stand and just let people know that the door is not locked, it's not even closed. And here we are, we're going to stand here and hold it open for you.  I already know that there's criticism of this idea even sort of from my own camp, saying, you know, I don't, you don't have any divine right to say who can and can't come to the gods, right? It's all about honoring the gods properly and so on. But I also think that I can't pretend that the world isn't what it is. I'm a straight white man who practices heathenry. I can walk into any heathen gathering in the world and if I don't open my mouth and share my thoughts or bring that friend who doesn't fit the straight white man mold, no one's going to question my presence there. All those heathen doors are open to me, no matter what extremist ideas those groups hold because I look the part.  So I'll take that sort of privilege of looking the part and open the doors as wide as I can, to make sure that people who don't look the part the way these more extremist factions want can find their way to it as well.  Andrew: That's great. I think that that falls to all of us, right? And the more privilege we have, the more it falls to us to make sure that we do what we can to take steps in those directions for sure. So, I think that's fantastic. I hope people continue in that direction, lots of people continue in that direction, and in whatever other ways makes sense to continue to open those doors, because it's always been my experience that, I'm sure there are spirits that care a lot about place or family lines or other things.  But it's never been my experience that I've run into a spirit who's like, run into like traditional practitioners even in sort of living lineages who are like, oh, you're not from here or you're not from my group, therefore, you can't be involved. I've never run into that anywhere. And so I think these these other people who are fronting that, it's not coming from the spirit sides, it's coming from all the crappy, horrible things that that comes from. Lonnie: Yeah. Oh, I agree. It gets to the idea of ancestry as well. A core concept of heathenry is honoring and venerating your ancestors. That doesn't mean that you have to take a laser focused microscope on a specific region of the world within a specific set of decades and say, those are my ancestors. Sure, but have you ever looked at a family tree? Have you done the sheer math on how many people resulted in you that you had a whole lot more ancestry covering a lot more territory. And not just from that region. It backs up into previous ages and people move and they migrate. cultures blend and mix. And even religions are much more syncretic in ancient times than they are these dogmatic solid approaches.  I mean, even today, Christianity, you've got a 2000 year unbroken lineage, something that all pagans would love to have, right? But there's, I can look out my window, there's a Catholic Church three blocks away that direction. There's a Baptist Church four blocks away in that direction. Neither of them agree on a lot of principles of their own religion but they use the same holy text. The idea that there's this unbroken sure way to do it is funny to me. And at the same time, that thing about ancestors. If that's your sole argument for being part of heathenry, as an example, just be honest and say you have this super hyper focused love of a specific place in time because it's a poor representation of ancestors as a whole. Andrew: Well, you know, so in my tradition, we have, our notion of ancestors a [inaudible 00:33:00]. It includes your bloodline, for sure. The people who actually genetically contributed to your presence on the earth. But it also includes your initiatory lines. And the word means both. I mean, I think that there are different ways to have familial bonds. You talked about hospitality and so on, and to be welcomed into that family, you know, because I think that that's one of the things when we find our group of spirits or our group of ancestors or whatever, in that broader sense, we become ideally a part of that connection both in terms of receiving the blessings and owing obligations and all of that. I think it's important. Lonnie: I think it's important. You know, you talked about family, bloodlines are important, sure, you know, you honor the ancestors of, I call it the ancestors of blood and bone, those people who literally genetically results in you. But again, you're talking about thousands of people throughout time, and various traditions and various cultures and different values all throughout the generations. And family's bigger than blood. I would wager most people listening to this are closer to some of their friends than they are some of their own siblings and would give more to them for that. Andrew: I'm sure almost everybody has that aunt or uncle who's not actually related but who's just so close to the family, right? Lonnie: Yeah. And then, you know, if you research your ancestry like I have, you're inevitably going to find someone who is adopted or something of that fashion, isn't actually someone of blood and bone coming down generation to generation to you. They were adopted into the family or they came into the family by some other means that still results in you somehow, but they're not actually blood related. In my practice, ancestors are an even bigger scope than that. You have ancestors of place and the people who are important to the history of where you actually live and do your work. Ancestors of tradition, like you were talking about, who have made your practices possible today in some way or form. It's so much more than what, than what some of those folkish type heathens would like to box it into. Andrew: So, is the idea of, because, maybe because I've watched too many movies or like HBO specials or whatever, but like, is the idea of like being a warrior relevant to heathenism? Or is that just again, a pocket that like a limited number of people have sort of emphasized? Lonnie: I think it's a pocket that a limited number of people have emphasized. It's easy to do that when you, the most of the surviving lore that we have comes from the sagas and the Eddas that were written down post-conversion near the viking period. There's an awful lot of conflict going on back in time that these written down or the time that the stories come from, of course. People are moving all over the world, tribal conflict is occurring. One local chieftain becomes bigger chieftain, scoops up everybody on the farms and they go raiding and he wants to be bigger king, and so on, and so on, and so on. This isn't something that's even restricted to just heathen areas, that's just how the world worked, and I can even argue still works that way, we just don't call it the same things.  So no, I just, there are people who are, of course, who are inspired I guess to be soldiers or pursue a life in the military because of heathenry. It's certainly not frowned upon. It fits into some of the mold. You have gods and goddesses that are associated with war and victory. So why not have people who inspired by that, pursue that? But that is certainly not all that these gods, goddesses, the worldview is associated with. Again, I would point to ideas of the tree, the world tree that's connecting all the worlds and the mysteries that you can explore there in. The well that holds all that is and was and ever will be, and explore the mysteries therein. What are the norms, what do they really mean? How can I apply hospitality to my life? What does reciprocity mean? What is a right relationship with the world around me? And none of that has to do with, has to be anything at all about war or fighting? Andrew: Yeah, it's interesting how there're all these different ideas. It's like so many ideas around my tradition, people, especially people who hear about Santeria, and they just think of it as, like witchcraft that's going to help them get their lover back or whatever, when in fact, there's whole religious living tradition around everything to do with life as opposed to just sort of this one very particular sort of limited notion about it, right? Lonnie: There are. In a tradition, I guess in traditions such as heathenry where everything that we're building on even to get our inspiration for what we're going to do today comes from things that were written down by Christians well after conversion, inspired, of course, by their ancestors wanting to share those stories, the surviving oral traditions for whatever reason that make it into whatever we have left. But still, ultimately, were written down post-conversion by Christians. So, you have to sort of take an honest view of those things and explore everything. Archeology and what are the latest academics and scholars discovering on there. And of course, balance that out with your own personal practices and how you transform that into a living tradition.  Just a random thought, yeah, talking about those sagas and Eddas and everything that was written down by this Christian hands, every American knows the story of Paul Revere, right? I'm guessing a lot of people do, the midnight night of Paul Revere, one of by land, two of by sea, during the Revolutionary War. That's how they were going to let them know the British are coming. And he's this revered folk hero from a couple hundred years ago, the early formation of the United States in the war against Britain for independence. But what people don't realize is, here's a story in a living culture that everything is written down. There's no oral block of hundreds of years which you've got to worry about what gets remembered properly and putting your own twist on it and everything, everything is written down. And growing up as a kid, everybody was told the story of Paul Revere.  What people don't realize, though, is Paul Revere sort of falls into this cultural memory because his name rhymed best with the story, the poet who was telling his story came up with. There were many more writers that were out to notify all the villages, the town that British were coming. In fact, Paul Revere, according to the sources I've read was actually captured and was the worst one at his job at notifying everyone the British were coming.  So, you take that as an example of again, that living culture, a folk hero even, legend, everything is written down generation to generation and even taught in schools when you're young. And the story is not true.  Andrew: If his name had been Paul McGregor, he wouldn't have [inaudible 00:42:24] Lonnie: Yeah, Paul McGregor was probably better at it than he was.  Andrew: He was done his work and own the pub enjoying a pint, you know. Lonnie: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That is why I just don't take a hard line approach to any of this. Ultimately, because we can't always be sure about how much, one, how much we actually received that's accurate, and two, even on the things that are accurate and we can verify that are accurate, it's so little of it that you can't rebuild a real thing out of just that. You have to do comparative work with other mythology and other traditions and so on to put it all together. And my own practice is more focused on magic and sorcery. I want to do trance work and I want to do divination and I want to use magic to get results in my life or the things that I need in the world right now and I want to communicate with spirits. I'm telling you, right now, the instructions for all of that are pretty non existent in a heathen framework. Yeah. Andrew: So, where are you borrowing those instructions from? Is it from Peter Carol? Is it from, you know, where are you pulling those instructional pieces in to create that for yourself in this heathen framework?  Lonnie: Excellent question. It starts with Peter Carol, Liber Null, of course, and working through all of that material. I approach that like a kid who is starving and I just discovered McDonald's for the first time. It was wonderful. And that led to Phil Hine in his early work, which was fun. It took a much less serious approach to chaos magic than Carol was taking, which was a nice balance with that. And then, you know, in that time, you'd get online and there's different Yahoo groups, like the X, that was one of my favorites. And then the Chaos Matrix is still online today, deposit of articles to help the budding chaos magician get their start. You just experiment and you explore. Like I said, you explore outside of other traditions and other things.  I found my way to Tarot and becoming, falling in love with tarot and enriching myself spiritual practice with that helps inform everything that I do. It has this rippling effect across all of it. And I get better at divination in general and my intuition develops stronger. You learn different things. I don't know, over time, honestly, by the time I got to Elhaz Ablaze, finding that website around 2007, I was sort of frustrated, I kept running into too many of those sort of heathen groups or people that held those folkish ideas and I just didn't resonate with them. They weren't my kind of people. Until I found Elhaz Ablaze, I didn't even know for sure if there were heathens out there who were super involved in magic and trying to do things with it.  And about that same time, I started finding Jason Miller stuff, and found my way into strategic sorcery and took his course. And again, it has this profound rippling effect across my personal life and my practice. I go where, I try to focus all of my pursuits in the places where I see people getting the results.  Andrew: I think that's a really important thing. If we're going to bother to do magic, then we really need to, need to really get results, like otherwise, why bother? It's a lot of work most of the time [inaudible 00:46:42] something from it.  Lonnie: One thing I know true about magic, it works. The other thing I know true about magic is it doesn't work the way I want it exactly or even most of the time. So either, it's not like electricity, you can't just plug into it and get everything that you want out of it, or I'm a shit magician. And I choose to believe in myself. I'm going to go with, it's a much more subtle sort of thing that we tap into, and our influence probably plays with probabilities more than it produces profound effects. Although, I can't help but wonder sometimes if those profound effects are available to us, we just haven't figured it out. I know I haven't. Andrew: I think it was in one of Peter Carol's books where he talks about sort of divine over the short term on a shorter term and magic on a longer term to get the best combination of results.  Lonnie: Yeah. I saw one time, I'm pretty sure it was Peter Carol from years ago who suggested that you should do divination and try to communicate with yourself in the future. See if you're going to get the results from the work before you do the work. It's not my thing but it's similar sort of idea. Andrew: I'm so curious, which runes your future self would send you in divination to indicate the success on a particular work, you know? How'd you know that it was a correct, you know? When you work with manual divination cards, runes, whatever, they have no choice but to answer. So we can't assume that there is an actual connection going on, right? Even when I divine with coconut with Orishas, unless I'm feeding them certain things, you always have to ask if they're actually there first, right? But I'm like, what would you set up as your own kind of like thumbs up. It's like people when they know they're going to die, they'd be like, if I come back and speak to a medium, if they don't say this word, it's not me. That's some of those things. How do you set that up with yourself?  Lonnie: Yeah, that's a good question. You do bring up an important point there. I often have this conversation with people in paranormal investigations. I'm really happy to see more people using runes and tarot especially in paranormal investigations and trying to communicate with spirits just like the rest of us. But the minute you get those runes out or you pull a tarot card, you will have an answer, but that doesn't mean you're communicating with something. There has to be some sort of established thumbs up, some pre-game decision, this is how I know I'm really talking to something. Otherwise, that fool card doesn't mean anything other than I pulled a card.  Andrew: Yeah. It's like when I'm, divining people coming in they're asking if they've been cursed. As somebody who reads to the public it's a question that I run across a lot. And I'm not dismissive of that question, I think that it's a valid question. I think that the answer is generally a lot less than than many people would think. But nonetheless, it can happen. But like, for me, there are only two cards in the deck that I will take as an affirmative answer to that question when that question is asked. So that's two out of 78. And one of them has to show up in a certain position for me to be like, okay, yes. They're actually saying, yes, this is real.  And I think that having those clear understandings, what is that card that's the future Lonnie speaks card, you know, or whatever, right? Or future me speaks card. I think it's a really exciting idea. Lonnie: It's a fun idea to play with. I don't know how much merit I would give that idea of communicating with future selves. The armchair sort of, I watched a bunch of shows with Michio Kaku and Brian Green so I know something about science idea. I know they suggest that time may not be this arrow, that it could be more of a all time happening now kind of thing in one scenario. So maybe in that situation, if that's true, you could communicate with the future self. But then you get into all these possibilities and multiple futures. What if you know something too far ahead now, you you just change your mind so that doesn't matter anymore. How much are we locked into fate? What choices do we have? Andrew: Tells us a lot about ourselves once we start thinking about it. Lonnie: Yeah. You want to really hurt your brain. Andrew: I prefer to kind of go in a different direction generally with the future me stuff, which is, what should I do right now that future me will thank current me for having done. That's my often mode of operation. And that applies to like magical stuff, for sure, but it also applies to like getting my filing done and being on top of my bookkeeping and like all sorts of things. Because it's like, there's nothing like coming up to your thing, something happened recently, I was going to an event and I was like, oh man, I can't remember if I ever emailed back the person who I was supposed to stay with. And so I sent them a message saying, I hope it's not too late, I'm really, sorry if I left you hanging. They're like, no, no, you, like six months ago, you said, absolutely, I will be there. So I was like, oh, thanks past me.  Lonnie: Yeah. Even when I do divination for clients or even myself, I don't ever look to see what the future is involved in that. That's not how I read. I'm more of a what's at play in your life now kind of thing. I even visually represent that, like with tarot, I can do this. When I shuffle the cards, I shuffle them nine times to represent the nine worlds of heathen cosmology. I split the deck three times to represent the three norms. I remove the middle, the middle pile of that as the cards that I'm going to draw for the reading because I think it represents the norm [inaudible 00:53:58], which is the present, the things that are becoming at play in your world now.  I really think ultimately, that's what's most important to us. You know where you've been and if those things are important, they'll show up or they'll become more clear by the things that are happening now. As for what's going to happen tomorrow, what choices are you going to make? You're still going to be susceptible to the choices that other people make too. Andrew: For sure. Well, maybe that's a good place to leave it. Hey, listeners, go do some magic to mitigate the choices of other people and encourage the choices that you want to happen. One of the things that I would like to encourage for you the magic of my voice is for people to come and find you online where you're hanging out. You have your podcast and other stuff. Where should people come look for you on the internet? Lonnie: Well, you can absolutely find me at my own show, Weird Web Radio. Everywhere you get your podcasts. If there's not someplace you can find it, let me know, I'll figure out a way to get it on there. Weirdwebradio.com. Offer all my professional divination services at tarotheathen.com. On Instagram, Twitter and Facebook, as Weird Web Radio, and also have a special group for Weird Web Radio fans. If you want to get to know me more personally, I'm game. Just Lonnie Scott on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram as well. Andrew: Beautiful. Well, thank you for making the time to be hanging out for this conversation today. I hope having the table turned on you as the guest versus the interviewer wasn't too traumatic for you. Lonnie: No, not a problem at all. And just real quick before we get Out of here, I talked about Elhaz Ablaze quite a bit earlier in the show. And I wanted to let everyone out there know that we released a compendium of chaos heathenry not too long ago, it's just titled, Elhaz Ablaze: A Compendium of Chaos Heathenry. It's a collection of essays from those of us who do that and I've got an essay in there concerning some of my ancestral practices. So, go out and check that out. Andrew: Yeah, get your magic on folks. Lonnie: Yeah, get your magic on. Andrew: All right, thanks so much, Lonnie.  

Kelly and Andrew explore the influence of the planets in their lives and the lives of their clients. Sharing ideas about Uranus moving into Taurus. They also talk about the possibilities and limits of resolving challenges with more difficult placements. They also laugh a lot! Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by Spotofy, RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. You can follow Kelly's work here.  Andrew's fundraiser is located here or using andrew@thehermitslamp.com to send money via PayPal or transfer.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcript  ANDREW: [00:00:02] Welcome to The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I'm hanging out today with Kelly Surtees, who is an astrologer, and someone that I've known for, you know, at least a decade, I'd say now a bit longer. And [00:00:17] their approach is really interesting to me because they're super smart about what they do, but they have a great sense of humor about it as well. You know, there's a way in which they seem [00:00:32] to me to continue to laugh and enjoy life and all of those things even when talking about intellectual stuff or hard stuff or whatever and I think that that's a trait that I super admire and [00:00:47] try and kind of hold in myself as I go through all of life's ups and downs and so on. But you know, hey Kelly, for people who don't know you, why don't you introduce yourself? Who are you?  KELLY: Hey Andrew, well, I'm Australian, which might be obvious now [00:01:02] that I started talking. I married a Canadian and so I live, currently, just outside Toronto, but I'm an astrologer, probably what people are more curious about, and I've been an astrologer full-time professionally for nearly 20 years, [00:01:17] so it has been my life's work.  I came to astrology very young, not because anyone in my family was interested in astrology, but because I was, and I started learning the basics when I was 10, 11 years old, back [00:01:32] in Sydney where it was a lot warmer than where we are now, and carried on with my sort of personal exploration. It was style of astrology through my teenage years and then in my early twenties, I actually signed up to do a massage therapy [00:01:47] training course and the college I was studying at in Sydney offered an astrology training program, which just had never occurred to me was a thing. So that's kind of how I got started, and what I do today is, I work with clients and students around the world, [00:02:02] I do one-on-one consults in astrology, but primarily what I'm doing more and more of these days is teaching the next generation of astrologists through my online training programs.  ANDREW: Amazing. So before we, before we were recording [00:02:17] here, we started kind of talking about astrology and we were talking about the history and the way in which sort of history and tradition and sort of practice all flow together, and I think that I'd [00:02:32] love to kind of try and pick that up and talk about that a little bit, right?  KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: You know, what, where did your, where did your astrology start? Like what kind of, did you start out studying older forms? Did you, did you...? KELLY: Absolutely not. Not, I started with a [00:02:47] very modern psychological astrology, which was hugely popular in the 80s and 90s, like 1980s, 1990s. I started studying astrology in the late 1990s. And yeah, just had a very, [00:03:02] I would say, a very modern introduction to psychological, almost evolutionary, components in astrology. And that was great, it got me started got me into my practice, and it was when I attended my first astrology conference, which was the FAA [00:03:17] conference in Melbourne, I think in 2004, that I was lucky enough to hear people like Demetra George, John Frawley, and Lee Lehman speak, who are very well respected astrologers who all practice slightly different forms of mediaeval [00:03:32] or traditional astrology, and connecting with those teachers really aroused my interest in things like, where did some of these things we use in astrology come from? Like who first created the houses, for instance? Or why is [00:03:47] this planet associated with the things that it is associated with? So yeah, I would say within, you know, the first five years of starting my practice, that had become a real interest for me and that was like going down the rabbit hole.  ANDREW: Yeah, for [00:04:02] sure. I think that there's, there's always this question about that kind of stuff for me, which is really like, where, how far down do we go? KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: You know, starting, starting out for me, you know my interest in astrology [00:04:17] came out of you know, studying Aleister Crowley and studying his magical systems. And so, you know, it was a lot of magic and ideas around the inner planets predominantly, you know. KELLY: Yes. ANDREW: And you know, and sort [00:04:32] of like working with that and looking at that as a magical model and so on. But you know, as you start digging in and you start looking back, you're like: Okay. Well, where does that come from? And what is that? How far does that go? What, where is the source from which that wisdom [00:04:47] comes from? You know? And I think it's such a, such an interesting and challenging question to kind of slide into, you know?  KELLY: It's a huge question, because it, you know, something… To try and answer that for astrology [00:05:02] takes you back to the origins of philosophy, to the origins of mathematics, you know, things like wondering why we've associated a particular physical thing or phenomenon with a certain emotional experience [00:05:17] or a certain philosophical construct. So when you dive into these origin stories, if you like, of some of the magical practices, you are almost going back to the dawn of human thought and human ideas and that can [00:05:32] be a very broad research project, because then you're not just learning explicitly about the origins of astrology. You're actually reading, you know, ancient philosophers, and you might be reading some of the original mathematicians to get a sense on why [00:05:47] they did what they did and where they were coming from.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah, and I think it's so important to also try and understand, it's not just about what they said, which is certainly important. But it's also, [00:06:02] what were they? What were they thinking? How were they thinking about it too? Right? Because you know, like in a divination class that I've been taking with one of my elders, we were discussing how, you know, a hundred and fifty years ago, [00:06:18] the scope of life's experiences, that we needed to speak about in divination, were equally complex probably on the human front, but on the practical fronts, were much narrower in some ways, you know? The range [00:06:33] of human experience and the range of things we have access to is so different. And then you know, when we go back to, like, what was it like in ancient Greece and what was it like in, you know, here, there, or wherever, you know? Yeah, it's hard to even, I think, understand [00:06:48] exactly how they considered certain things.  KELLY: Yeah. That's a . . . That's a really great point. I mean, two topics that come to my mind. One of them is, in the older literature on astrology, there's a lot of questions and a lot of detail around dealing with [00:07:03] ships and dealing with crops. So there's a lot of, you know, what indicates shipwreck? Or is my ship going to come in? And that seems a bit weird to a modern person, because why are they so obsessed with ships? But then you have to remind yourself that [00:07:18] many, many hundreds and thousands of years ago, ships were actually the primary form of transport. We didn't have trains or planes or obviously automobiles... ANDREW: Yeah. KELLY: And just to your point there, you do kind of have to almost put yourself back into: What was life like, two [00:07:33] thousand, two and a half thousand years ago, when things like crops were more likely to perhaps fail, water quality was a massive issue because that obviously led to the spread of disease or illness, life expectancy [00:07:48] was shorter, things like pregnancy were life threatening, in many cases, for women, and many more babies died, you know, in the first 12 months of their life then do today with modern medicine. So a lot of the questions and a lot of the, their life, if [00:08:03] you like, just to almost give a superficial summary, they lived a lot more, closer to the line of life and death than what we do today. And one of the kind of attacks against older forms of astrology is that it's so fated, you know, [00:08:18] and it's so deterministic, but the intention was to try and give clearer answers about really meaningful topics that were, you know, more touch-and-go than what they might be today.  ANDREW: So where [00:08:33] do you, where do you fall on the sort of fated spectrum of things?  KELLY: Oh, this is a really good question. And I've thought about it because it does come up. I have any . . . . ANDREW: Yeah!  KELLY: Over the years. There's a beautiful quote. I think it's by Albertus Magnus, [00:08:48] who says something like, actually, maybe instead of bastardizing it. That's how you know, you're an absolute asteroid nerd, that you have books like this handy, [00:09:03] because there's, he has a beautiful quote that I kind of . . . . When I first discovered this quote, however many years ago, it really helped me clarify my own answer to the fate versus free will argument. So he says, "There is in [00:09:18] man a double spring of action, namely nature and the will, and nature for its part is ruled by the stars, while the will is free. But unless it, the will, resists, it is swept along by nature and becomes [00:09:33] mechanical."  And that idea, like fate is sort of your, your nature, or what's kind of ruled by the stars, and the free will to my mind is our very human thinking, you know, application of effort, and I've seen [00:09:48] this in chart work with clients and students over the years now, enough that I know it to be true. That your birth chart might be, if it's almost like a map of your fate and if you do nothing, if you just allow the fate to manifest freely and purely, [00:10:03] it can give very clear sense of this area of life flows, and that's where you have success, and this area of life is where you're going to hit blocks after blocks. But if you choose to apply your free will, I'm not saying that anyone can make anything [00:10:18] happen because I don't actually believe that's true.  ANDREW: Sure. KELLY: But I do think that there are certain topics, as indicated by the chart, where the application of one's effort, aka free will, can move the needle from completely dissatisfying [00:10:33] to perhaps somewhat satisfying or maybe from somewhat satisfying to more fulfilling. There are some topics in some charts that that have a bit of a firm no and that sort of response. So I do think we [00:10:48] have free will within a scope, if that makes sense.  ANDREW: Yeah.  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: Yeah, I think people come--because I do predictive card reading, right? KELLY: Yes. ANDREW: People are always like, where does, where's my free will? Like, [00:11:03] you know? Or they're like, well, just tell me how it's going to be. I'm like, well, in this case, it's a free will issue. How do you want it to be? In this case it's not a free will issue. You know? KELLY: Yeah, I think that's, that's a beautiful way of describing it. I mean, I've looked and worked with clients over the years and I've beautifully been blessed to have [00:11:18] a couple of clients allow me to share some of their chart work in my teaching. But I have a handful of clients who have been single their whole lives, and whatever they have tried or not tried or maybe they haven't even been interested. The topic of relationships [00:11:33] has simply not come alive for them. And there are ways to see things like that in the chart, and then there are other charts where it's like, there are some challenges here, but if you put the effort in, you got to be able to get a little bit more. But I like how you summarized [00:11:48] it there, that there are some topics that are kind of fated, and a little bit out of our hands and there are others where it's like, you can move the needle on this, if you desire it enough. Yeah.  ANDREW: Yeah. I often think of [00:12:03] it this way: You know, so, we live on a planet with seven point whatever billion people.  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: All of those people are seeking to exert their free will.  KELLY: Yes. ANDREW: However, you know, everybody is to a greater or lesser extent [00:12:18] acting based on culture, which is, which is a force that, you know, if it's internalized and not undone, you know, it's just like fate, right? You know, like the cultural bias or cultural experiences or cultural expectations, [00:12:33] right? KELLY: Even family conditioning.  ANDREW: Right? Well, that was going to be the next thing, right? Like, you know, our baggage, our personal baggage, right? And then we're, so, we're not only trying to exert free will, but we're trying to exert free will into the sphere where everybody else is exerting [00:12:48] those forces and maybe some degree of their own free will, and then there's some amount of chaos in the system, and then there's some fixed points, and it's like, so how much, how free is that free will? And I think, you know, maybe it's, you know, [00:13:03] as we're talking about it, I think it's a carryover from my time being so focused on Crowley's kind of magic of cultivating the will and building the capacity, you know, in the way that that quote talks about, right? Like, you know, it's like, how [00:13:18] free can we become from those things? The answer is, never free.  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: Fully. But like, we can create a lot more space and in many areas of our life, maybe we can create a lot more space so that then we can kind of act, choose, [00:13:33] or discover where we are aligned better maybe? You know?  KELLY: Yeah, and I think that's a huge part of any type of magical healing work, whether it's astrology or tarot, or other ritual practices. One of the things that [00:13:48] Dimetra George said in this very first conference years ago, which has stuck with me, she described that it's partly the astrologist's job to help the client understand the areas of their life that are most likely indicated flowing [00:14:03] fulfillment, and the areas of their life that are less likely to give a reward or sense of satisfaction relevant to the amount of effort that they might put in, and I think that's, you know, sort [00:14:18] of, to what you're speaking about here--We're speaking about. We can influence certain things to a certain extent, but you made a great point, like the 7 billion people, all trying to influence certain things. We [00:14:33] can't all get everything. It's just, it's not the way things are built. I won't have as many children as Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, no matter how hard I try, that's just not part of my experience, [00:14:48] and other people might be like, but I want, you know, the wealth of Bill Gates or Warren Buffett or what have you and like, that's not, you know, so part of our work is to help guide people. Like you might think that you want these things. It doesn't really bring you fulfillment. Like there is an exploration [00:15:03] around the self-awareness, self-knowing, like knowing the self and moving beneath some of the things that we think we want, to get in touch with the things that really make us all come alive.  ANDREW: For sure. Yeah and I know for me too, you [00:15:18] know, like because I spent a lot of time, especially magically, but you know, definitely in other ways too, kind of working to counterbalance the, you know, tendencies in my chart or the things that are more problematic there.  KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: But even [00:15:33] at that, you know, like, you know, like my placement of Saturn is just, you know, it's a it's a recurrent point of friction for me. And that's probably never going to change. I can see it coming. I can see it coming more now. I [00:15:48] can have better strategies for dealing with it when it kind of like, brings up its thing. I can make some degree of better choices in advance. But you know, it's sort of, it's a, it's a, it's in a place where it [00:16:03] just kind of continuously causes a certain kind of friction in my life. And you know, the reality is, it's like, well, I've just got to roll with that, I've just got to accept that, and I've got to learn to to see it and roll with it and move through [00:16:18] it and to not hold onto it. And, and even kind of at this point, you know, I used to think that I would eventually kind of like learn the lesson of that position and and be free of it in a sense, and I've even caught a move past that where I'm like, [00:16:33] I don't even think that-- I'm sure there are lessons that I will continue to learn about it.  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: But I think that, that that's also a wrong idea. I think that, you know, stuff like, some of the aspects are just about straight up acceptance, you know, and just be like, look [00:16:48] at that. That's just the way it's going to be. Stop hoping it's going to be different.  KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: And then see what changes, you know?  KELLY: Well, that is a really powerful piece. I mean, it reminds me of people who are like, I wish I was taller or I wish I was shorter or I wish I had, you know, different, [00:17:03] I mean, you can probably change your hair or your boobs or what have you, but it's very hard to change your height. You know, it just, you are either a tall person or a short person for the most part, and these-- You just have to work with it. You know, I'm a tall person. I'm 5'10". [00:17:18] I'm like a hundred and seventy eight centimeters or something. And you know, when you're a teenager, you hate that, because everybody, you can't hide in a crowd, people see, but you know, as an older woman or a more mature woman, it's lovely. I can carry a little bit of extra weight and [00:17:33] nobody knows, kind of thing.  So my relationship to that fixed thing in me has changed over time and that's kind of, what you're speaking to here is that there are certain parts of our self and our psyche that we do have to [00:17:48] kind of just accept and it's what, the piece that I got really excited about, that you said, is what if I stop mentally and energetically and emotionally resisting this thing that is one way that I so desperately wish was another way? [00:18:03] If I just breathed out and allowed myself to acknowledge and accept, you know, I always have to be vigilant about money or about sexual interactions or about career, whatever it happens to be, based on, you know, you mentioned your [00:18:18] Saturn, someone else might have a problem with their Mars. You know, if you just kind of go into an acceptance place with it, the freeing up of energy and emotional power that you have been using to try and force back on that is incredibly liberating and when you take [00:18:33] that energy and you apply it to, you know, a talent or a skill, the idea of enhancing the good, you can radically change your life, not because you made that problem thing be anything other than what it was, but because you stopped [00:18:48] giving it all your focus. And you put your focus on to something that actually has, you know, some potential to take you in a more fulfilling direction. ANDREW: For sure. And I think that that's, I mean, that's one of the reasons why, going and sitting with an astrologer, [00:19:03] if you're not, you know, or learning it yourself is so helpful because there are aspects, you know. I mean, you brought up Mars, right? You know, I mean, I've Mars in Aries, I was a very angry young person, you know, and I have a, I have, when [00:19:18] it emerges, a very very bad temper. KELLY: Yes. ANDREW: But it's not that much of an issue any more. I mean, I still need to be mindful of it. But that one has been way more amenable to management and modification than [00:19:33] other aspects of my chart, because, because of its nature, maybe because of my nature, probably, because of its placement, and so on. So. There are those things where it's great and you can kind of turn them into an advantage. I mean it's part of what fuels my drive to do [00:19:48] what I do around work, right? Like I have a lot of energy, a lot of the time, and so I can do a lot of work and run the shop and do all those things. You know, whereas other people are always like, how do you do so much? I'm like, I've got Mars in Aries. I've just got gas in the tank. It just keeps going? You know? [00:20:03]  KELLY: Yeah, you're the Energizer bunny, it just keeps going and going. I mean, what we're kind of alluding to here is something that comes to us from the Hellenistic astrology, form of astrology, that has to do with sect, which is S-E-C-T. Which kind of divides [00:20:18] charts into daytime or nighttime. Very simply based on the time of day that you were born. Then this working theory is that if you're born in the daytime, Saturn is going to be a little bit more helpful or productive for you and Mars a little bit more problematic. [00:20:33] And if you're born at night time, the reverse is true. Where in the nighttime, the cool of night tends to calm the heat of Mars, so you tend to get less sharp Mars problems. And in the nighttime, the cool of the night exacerbates [00:20:48] the kind of curmudgeonly Scrooge-like energy of Saturn, so you tend to get more of a harsher Saturn.  ANDREW: Sure. Yeah.  KELLY: In a nutshell. I don't know if that rings true for you, personally Andrew, but...  ANDREW: Definitely, I was born at 9:30 at night. So.  KELLY: Yeah, that was going [00:21:03] to be my question to you, just based on the fact that you seem to really like-- I mean, your Mars is placed in one of its home signs in Aries, and that also is a way of getting a little bit more of the positive potential. The other thing you're talking about too, though, is we are all hotter [00:21:18] as energetic beings in our youth, and if we have Mars problems, they will tend to be worse in our teenage years or in our 20s.  ANDREW: Sure.  KELLY: And then the aging process, where we cool and slow, just biologically, that does [00:21:33] temper some of the Mars problems. The reverse is true for Saturn, though. Saturn problems can sometimes be something we do have to carry with us, even as we age, because the nature of aging tends to kind of stimulate more Saturnian type manifesting.  ANDREW: When [00:21:48] you talked about the, the coolness at night exacerbating, you know, Saturn.  KELLY: Saturn... ANDREW: Yeah, I've had this image of like, oh, it's chilly, and my knee hurts cause it's cold now, and oh.... [laughing] You know, it's just like, oh, man, such a Saturn image, right? KELLY: Yeah, to have sore knees, or a sore back, and it's worse in the winter, because winter is like exacerbating Saturnian qualities as does nighttime. Yeah. I mean [00:22:16] there is a positive reversal here, which is that Venus and Jupiter, considered the two benefic planets, people born in the daytime tend to have more Jupiter type gifts or talents, because the [00:22:31] heat of Jupiter is really conducive to the heat of day time. Whereas Venus is more of a moist cool planet, generally speaking, and she really comes to the fore in the evening. So if you're born at night time after the sunset or before the Sun has [00:22:46] risen, and obviously daytime and nighttime is different depending on season and time of year and birth location. So-- ANDREW: Sure. KELLY: ....being born at 9:30 at night, if you're born in Europe in July, you might still be a daytime baby, because it's a very [00:23:01] late sunset, but if you're born at 9:30 at night in January or February in Canada, you're definitely a nighttime baby though. ANDREW: For sure.  KELLY: Yeah. You do, you get like a specific type of problem, depending [00:23:16] on whether you're born in the daytime or nighttime, and then you get a planet that is giving you, you know, Venus is, can be, more creative or more relationship-oriented and that's nighttime gifts. Jupiter is more about that wisdom and teaching and inspiration and motivation and that's more [00:23:31] of a daytime gift. I mean, you have to look at the planet in the chart as well. I mean...   ANDREW: For sure.  KELLY: You'd want the Jupiter or the Venus to be in a nice sign or making a great aspect. Yeah, but that's, I don't know just when you were talking about your problem with Saturn, I'm like, I feel [00:23:46] like you must be born at nighttime because this is very-- ANDREW: For sure. Yep. My parents remember exactly what time I was born, because my dad was watching Hockey Night in Canada, which was on a Monday, [00:24:01] and you know, whatever right? Like he's like, there's like a very specific set of things that we associate around that, the memories around that, so they're like, there's no question about what time you were born, you know?  KELLY: I love birth stories like that. Yeah. That's fantastic. ANDREW: Yeah, for sure.  KELLY: So yeah, so this [00:24:16] is my guess, we got here, I'm like, how did we get here, fate versus free will and what's in the chart? And [24:24 not quite clear] really amazing.  ANDREW: Yeah, I definitely think so. So, I'm also very interested, because I've been following along [00:24:31] what's going on in the stars these days, even though, even though it sort of, on a personal level, astrology has shifted away from what was at one point a more professional folks into a more just kind of personal curiosity. You know, I got really curious [00:24:46] about: we have this big shift into into Taurus right now, right?  KELLY: We do.   KELLY: Big energy. KELLY: We're recording this just as Uranus, like a big explosive volcanic planet, has moved into Taurus, which is the most [00:25:01] fixed stubborn stable sign in the Zodiac. There's a real contradiction, if you like, in the symbolic imagery here, Uranus loves to shake things up. It literally is like earthquakes and volcanoes and lightning strikes and [00:25:16] Uranus is like the farmer in the field. He's just plowing year after year, so this is a huge-- We're starting this new kind of seven to eight year cycle that is going to radically reshape society, [00:25:31] culture, and individually, each of our lives as well.  ANDREW: Yeah, it's been, it's been interesting to watch sort of-- In my orbit, there's been a lot of people who've had a very [00:25:46] sort of disruptive shift go on in the last kind of, you know, like in the last few weeks, really, kind of you know, and it's sort of like, we're going along, I'm going this way. Oh, wait, what the hell am I doing? No, I'm [00:26:01] going to go this other way, you know? And it's such a, such an interesting shift to watch happen, you know, and to sort of, and also to try and roll with it, you know, because it's been-- A bunch of that's had an impact on me as well. So it's always, it's really [00:26:16] interesting to see it's going on everywhere. I'm like, all right, I'm gonna keep my eyes open, could be anywhere now, because it's the other thing about it. KELLY:  Well, that's-- I was talking about this with a client earlier this week, and they had something in, their chart is being activated by [00:26:31] Uranus, they're a little bit resistant as you know, everyone with planets. So if I back up a second, Uranus is moving into Taurus, so it is activating anyone with planets in the sign of Taurus, but the way the planetary aspect patterns [00:26:46] or energetic patterns work, while Uranus is in Taurus, it will also have a fairly dramatic impact on the other fixed modality signs, which include Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius. So those four signs, Taurus, Leo, [00:27:01] Scorpio, and Aquarius are all quite activated but it does get a little more technical than that in the sense that Uranus moves quite slowly. And so we actually had a taste of Uranus in Taurus in 2018 between [00:27:16] May and November, but Uranus was only activating the first one or two degrees of Taurus in 2018.  This year in 2019, Uranus is going to activate all the way up to the first six degrees of Taurus. So [00:27:31] for people who might be familiar with their birth chart. Very specifically, if you have a planet between zero and six degrees of any of the fixed signs, so taught, you know, you could have, could be four Leo Well, three Scorpio or two Aquarius or five Taurus. [00:27:46] They're all getting that Uranus transit. And I was talking, I had a client this week who fell in that category, and they were very sort of resistant around: What if I don't want to make this change? what if I'm not ready to make this change? And [00:28:01] I kind of laughed because having worked with, you know, Uranus for many years, here is an indicator of that major kind of upheaval and change that leads to new freedoms and Independence. You know the Uranus change has a purpose, it leads [00:28:16] to new freedom, it leads to new authenticity, it leads to Independence. But if it's coming, it means that the shake-up, the time for the shake-up is now. And it can definitely surprise you.  And I have a personal story where last [00:28:31] summer in the northern summer, I was very frustrated with where we were living. I just had sort of done 10 years in a little small town and I was just a bit restless and bored, and what's next? and when can we go and live near the ocean again? And [00:28:46] and so my husband and I had some really big talks over the summer, and we pulled it apart, his career really has him here, and we came up with a plan by the end of the summer, this was all while Uranus was in Taurus, where we would move to the West Coast in two [00:29:01] years time, when he would retire. And I was like, that's great. You know, it wasn't as soon as I wanted, but it was sooner than he wanted. So we did that lovely relationship compromise and then like a month later, he came home and said, there's a job in [00:29:16] a whole other part of the world, that I think I'm going to apply for, and I was like, okay, well just apply and see, and anyway, long story short, it took a few months. There's a lot of interview processes and we found out that he's accepted the job and we're now going to be moving [00:29:31] literally in the opposite direction to where we thought we were going to move and that's how Uranus works. I felt the energy of being restless and bored and we started doing our lovely logical human brainstorming about how we could come up [00:29:46] with a practical plan and Uranus is like, you're on the right track, but I want to throw a few surprises into the mix, and so here's an unexpected out of the blue wild idea. Do you guys want to say yes to this? And we did. And that's [00:30:01] so what you're saying, Andrew, it works like almost scanning. Where is this Uranus thing coming from, even when you know to expect the unexpected, Uranus can still surprise you and you know, give you those curve balls. They can be very exciting and very liberating [00:30:16] but they will not be what you had thought.  ANDREW: Yeah, for sure. I feel like my experience so far of this energy is that I was thinking that I would be doing a lot more traveling and teaching over the coming while?  KELLY: Yep! [00:30:31]  ANDREW: And the shift in energy and the shift in circumstance over the last little bit and like right around now has, has gotten me canceling most of my travel plans, and being like, you know what, I think that, I think that what I [00:30:46] need to actually do is focus more on creation and focus more on like, sort of deepening the, the foundation of the store, and, and my work in regards to that, as opposed [00:31:01] to the sort of like, I'm going to go around and teach all over the place, which I love but it's like, it's like, no, that, that's not where you're going right now, and I'm like, all right.  KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: Fair enough.  KELLY: So did you have a relatively quick kind of you know, I set up [00:31:16] this schedule and then just a few months later, kind of changing it and reshaping things?  ANDREW: Yeah. I mean, it's really, some of the stuff has been set up for a while, but it's yeah, there's just been a bunch of projects and ideas that have been on the table that, that, [00:31:33] you know, starting, starting about, well really, starting at the start of this year, you know, sort of. So, I mean, I got divorced last year, and then, so I've been, you know, sort of like living separately now for about four [00:31:48] months by the time this goes live and I was just realizing that a) I'm kind of tired because it's been a lot, right? KELLY: Yeah. That's a lot to process, yeah. ANDREW: So there's that. B) My entire day to day living [00:32:03] situation has changed, you know, I have my kids half the time, you know, all my other work life tries to live in that sort of compressed other half time.  KELLY: Yep, three or four days a week.  ANDREW: Yeah, and, you know, and there's a lot more, oh, a [00:32:19] lot more, there's a lot of kind of running around that's a part of my life, you know, especially as my kids get bigger.  KELLY: Yes. ANDREW: You know, they're not big enough to be... KELLY: All the driving. The driving.  ANDREW: Yeah, or you know or like, taking them around, I mean, we live downtown so, you know, but they're, they're cool [00:32:34] to go. The older one's cool to go places they know, but if they're going anywhere new, they need us to take them, you know? KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: So, it's like, all right, everybody's on the bus. Let's go here. Let's go there. Let's do whatever, right? KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: And, and so all of those changes just made me realize [00:32:49] that, you know, I needed to kind of shift back to reassess my actual energies and that I also needed to kind of look at what's, [00:33:04] what am I what am I doing? And what am I hoping to get out of it? And does it make sense from that space, right? And so there are a bunch of things that I've been doing where, like, from a practical point of view, they seem like [00:33:19] they make sense but maybe more from an emotional point of view, I'm, I have some other agenda for being there that's not being met? KELLY: Yes. ANDREW: Around the growth of my career, around, you know, interconnection with people, around a bunch of different stuff, right? And once [00:33:34] I realized that discrepancy... And I was like, okay, so all of these things where I have an unofficial agenda, that's really my actual agenda, that is not in alignment with doing these things, I should stop that, you know? And, and [00:33:49] a lot of the travel was sort of geared around some of that stuff, right, you know, fun, escape, you know, status, whatever, I'm like, none of those things matter that much ultimately and if I want to have fun I should just go have fun. And if I want to like [00:34:04] escape, I should like, take a day off work and go do something, but like, traveling to go work somewhere else is not a way to accomplish those things, you know? KELLY: Yeah. Yeah. ANDREW: So.  KELLY: So this is great because it sounds like you're coming into a deeper sense of what [00:34:19] is authentic and real and right for you. And that's, you know, the whole pathway of Uranus is that it is, it awakens us, if you like, to things that might have been latent or forgotten or neglected, but the [00:34:34] chaos or the upheaval of of changing things is a really critical part. It's like there's almost a dare, a cosmic dare, you know, if you would like this level of authenticity, how much are you prepared to change in your life that's kind of on the fake end of [00:34:49] the spectrum, to really sit in that deeper sense of self.  ANDREW: Yeah. For sure, yeah, it corresponds with sort of a drive that I've been feeling as well. Like there are lots of parts of my life that I haven't [00:35:04] been public about. I mean, I haven't been secretive about them, but I haven't been like super public about them either? KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: And you know, so like, you know, being a polyamorous individual. It's a thing that people, if they know me, know about me, but it's not a thing that [00:35:19] I've sort of historically, you know, broadcast per se, right?  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: But also, I've been feeling like that's something that I wanted to change and so I actually recorded an episode, the episode previous to this is about poly, [00:35:34] polyamory and love and spirituality, you know, and so it's like, it's also that, right? Like what are the risks you're willing to take, right? What's, what are you willing to put in? How much discomfort are you, are you able to engage to get that authenticity? Right?  KELLY: [00:35:49] Well, and this is the key, is that there is some discomfort and that's a really beautiful way. Like what risks, what are you prepared to lose, or put on the line so that you can be more authentic? Are you prepared for people to maybe judge [00:36:04] you a little bit because you're owning your stuff? And Uranus is really correlated with things that are counter cultural or might be defined against society's norms as a little unconventional or atypical.  ANDREW: Yeah. KELLY: I always [00:36:19] think about Uranus in Taurus is like just letting your freak show out, like fly your flag, basically. We all have parts of ourselves--  ANDREW: Yeah. KELLY: That are a bit weird and a bit odd or bit unusual and when [00:36:35] Uranus shows up and really starts, because the last eight years we had Uranus in Aries. So there was a very specific type of Uranus vibration going on. And what I would say is, for most people, the last eight years brought a lot of that chaos [00:36:50] and call to authenticity. The next eight years probably won't be as strong for you, just because, you know, if you are activated by the areas or the cardinal sign piece, you may not have as much fixed signs, you know, in your life, but there is always a risk. There's always a level like [00:37:05] Uranus is like, how can you let the part of you that feels like a black sheep be more on display more of the time, you know, if you think you're wearing red when everyone else is wearing white, how can you embrace that part of you? So. ANDREW: Yeah.  KELLY: It's wild, I mean and Uranus [00:37:20] in Taurus has some pretty specific collective themes that I think we're going to see as well. I don't know if you looked into those.  ANDREW: Well, I'm, I listen to you and Chris and... KELLY: Austin. [00:37:35]  ANDREW: Austin, I was going to say Aidan, and I'm like, no Aidan is a person who's on my podcast, Austin, on The Astrology Podcast where you do a-- It's a great thing, you should go check it out. There's lots of good stuff about it. The episodes that I listen to are [00:37:50] the sort of monthly forecast episodes where the three of you discuss what's coming and so, you know, I heard the discussions about, about that and the other elements, you know, that sort of tie it into maybe a bunch of economic change and other stuff [00:38:05] that might be coming. So, but yeah, if you want to share some of that I would love to hear it here too.  KELLY: Yeah, I just thought, I mean, I always love the personal because I really love working at the individual level, but I know, people are often interested in the collective. So, the last time we had Uranus in Taurus was from about the mid [00:38:20] 1930s to the early 1940s. So we did have Uranus, I just to give people some context, Uranus is in Taurus about every 84 years. So we had that period early in the 20th century and then the time previous to that was like 1850s [00:38:35] kind of mutant 19th century and some of the things that happened globally in one or another of those periods, the mid-1850s, mid-nineteenth century period, was the gold rush, where we had this idea of like mining, [00:38:50] literally blowing up parts of the earth, which is Taurus. The blowing up part is Uranus, and we would, people were discovering gold or precious metals from the land, so there is definitely an environmental component to Uranus in Taurus, around [00:39:05] what are we doing to the land, the environment? What kind of an impact does that have, is it having?  Unfortunately, you know, there may be some innovation in how the land is created or mind or what have you that may not be, that may be destructive [00:39:20] initially. So I'm not saying it's all perfect in that 1930s, early 1940s period: food, manufacturing, really, took off. A lot of what we call sort of modern food manufacturing, the food technologies were really developed [00:39:35] then. Some of those were fantastic and some of those things were relatively quickly proved to be actually quite dangerous. So, you know, every innovation that comes through around safe food, whether it's food production, food cloning, food [00:39:50] development, that type of thing, some of them are going to be great, that we'll want to keep around and others, you just, keep your wits about you but-- The other thing that's really different: Taurus is a feminine sign. It's ruled by Venus and it tends to be associated with [00:40:05] feminine type archetypes or feminine type people in society. And historically, there have been a lot of technological developments that have freed up women and changed women's roles in society when we've had Uranus in [00:40:20] Taurus.  So things like washing machines or sewing machines or spinning looms have been developed in previous Uranus in Taurus cycles, you know, which was typically sort of woman's work with air quotes. And so, if it would normally take you four hours to [00:40:35] do something by hand and now you can use this, use this gadget and get it done in an hour, it gives you back your time. So there is something about Uranus in terms of freeing up time. And you know, one of the big things in that, the, because the [00:40:50] last time Uranus was in Taurus was through World War II, and one of the changes around sort of gender roles that happened then was so many young men sent away to war in many sort of English and first world societies, at the time, women [00:41:05] were allowed to leave the home and the domestic setting to go and fill some of the working job roles that were previously run by men or taken by men. So women got this taste of their own independence. They tried on different roles. [00:41:20] Of course, you know, the men came back from war and then the women were kind of sent back from the offices to their domestic duties if you like, but those women were the mothers of the women who-- mothers, sometimes grandmothers, [00:41:35] of the women who then really got very involved in the 1960s liberation that went on.  So you can see some of these seeds of larger cyclical change that can come through. So just with Taurus being a [00:41:50] little bit more of a feminine sign ruled by Venus, the sign where the Moon is exalted. So the, two sort of typically feminine planets, nurturing, you know, anything to do with people who identify as feminine and, and whether that creates limits or opportunities [00:42:05] in society, and a lot of stuff I suspect also to do with women and childbirth and child-rearing basically, so there are some really key collective themes that we can keep an eye on.  ANDREW: Yeah. Over the, [00:42:20] well, I think, I think it'll be interesting to see how those play out. I mean, I think that we can easily look at what's gone on in the last few years as setting the stage for that, right? Like the emergence, you know, of the me [00:42:35] too movement, you know, in the spiritual communities, the sort of rise of witchcraft and being a witch and the way in which that empowers the feminine often, you know, in a broader sense of definitely a lot of women in particular senses, [00:42:50] you know, I mean, I think that there's, there's lots of layers where, where I can sort of see that energy being ready for a change on some level, and you know, yeah, we'll see where that is.  KELLY: Yeah. Yeah. I mean and I was saying, you know, [00:43:05] I've said to one client this week, you know, it's the idea of, watch this space. You know, Uranus, we know is going to pave new inroads and new types of innovation, new types of technology, 3D printing is a massive Uranus in Taurus thing, the idea that out of the ethos [00:43:20] we can create material objects, but you know, watch the space, just be open, the Innovations are going to surprise all of us, even those of us that are expecting them.   ANDREW: Well, they always do, right?  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: They always do. Yeah. Yeah, I was [00:43:35] just thinking the other day about about my cell phone and about, for some reason I was talking about the, back when I had a pager, to my kids, right? And they've never known any of those technologies. And they're like, what do you mean? Like someone would just send you their phone number and then you'd just call them? [00:43:50] And I'm like yeah, that was it worked, you know? And that wasn't that long ago. I mean, it was a while ago now, but it's not that long ago, right?  KELLY: It's just been that, in our lifetime, Andrew. I mean, I don't know, I think you and I are relatively similar ages. Like when I was a kid, we were on a rotary [00:44:05] phone still? ANDREW: For sure. Yeah.  KELLY: Yeah. It's really interesting. Alan Turing, who is a code breaker who worked in England, in Bletchley Park, decoding the German codes, funnily enough in World War II, he was [00:44:21] this mad kind of technological guy. He had a very prominent Uranus in his chart. So he's kind of relevant to what's being talked about. He had this image in the late 1940s. He imagined a day where women would be walking around the park [00:44:36] with their computers in their hand. And that was quite striking to me when I read that because that's essentially what we do these days with our phones. There's so powerful that they are I mean, you can store files and record video and interact [00:44:51] with, you know, people halfway around the world, and the phones we have today are better than the computers of the 50s, basically. So it is phenomenal. ANDREW: I mean, they're better than the computers of our childhood too, right?  KELLY: Well, exactly! Those big... [Traces the shape of a big computer with her hands.]  ANDREW: Think about my  big 20-year, [00:45:06] my early PCs, or whatever, right? I mean, those things, you know, they didn't even have color monitors, you know? KELLY: No! We played black-and-white Pac-Man, basically.  ANDREW: Yeah. Yeah.  KELLY: Yeah, I remember being in like, I don't know grade three or four in primary school and there was [00:45:21] one computer in the classroom and each student, you paired up with a buddy and you each had about 20 minutes, you know, whenever computer time was, and all you did was play games. I guess it was just to familiarize us with the fact that these things existed.  ANDREW: Yeah. [00:45:36]  KELLY: But that's you know, that's the late 80s. That's a while ago now.  ANDREW: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I had a Vic-20 and we, I was very excited, that I would spend like a long time doing programming and then I would run the program and it would like change the screen color. [00:45:51] And it was exciting and exuberant and then I, and then I would record my program onto the data storage unit, which was a cassette tape-- KELLY: Oh, my goodness! ANDREW: And it would like record it onto the cassette tape, right?  KELLY: You could put a computer program on [00:46:06] a cassette tape back then because the-- Oh, my lord.  ANDREW: Because they were so small, right? Like it was just text, right? Yeah. So funny, right?  KELLY: Oh my God. Yeah.  ANDREW: All right. Well now that I feel old. [laughing] KELLY: I know, now that we've made ourselves really feel middle-aged, [00:46:21] nurse? Yeah, it'll be fun. It'll be fun, yeah.  ANDREW: So, is there anything else that is coming up that you're, that you're, inspired about?  KELLY: Yeah, there is one thing that [00:46:37] I'm really excited about.  ANDREW: Yeah. KELLY: And this is the great conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn that is happening in December of 2020 in the sign of Aquarius. It's a very nerdy type of timing cycle. It's currently being completely overshadowed on [00:46:52] the astrological airwaves because everybody's focused on the Saturn Pluto conjunction in early...  ANDREW: Sure. KELLY: Which does have, I'm not saying it's not important. I'm just saying, personally, I'm more interested in the Jupiter Saturn. Jupiter and Saturn conjunct every 20 years, [00:47:07] but every couple of hundred years and, well, the thing is, every 20 years, they make these conjunctions in signs of the same element. So we have this elemental, you know, 200-year-cycle, and the conjunction in December [00:47:22] 2020 is really officially the start of the, air grand mutation, if you like. And so the last couple of hundred years, we have had Earth Jupiter Saturn conjunction. So we had a lot of Earth-based focus [00:47:37] collectively. We've had the Industrial Revolution. We've had structured work days. There's been a huge focus on money and mining and accumulation.  And the air period is very much about ideas, movement, and interaction. So that's kicking off [00:47:52] December 2020 for the next 200 years. So for all of us alive now, we are going to witness this massive collective shift over the Air, out of the Earth element that has really governed so much of human experience since the [00:48:07] early 1800s. And we're going to be a witness to this change, which the type of technologies we were just talking about is a huge part of.  The last time we had the Air elemental 200-year period, late 1100s, all [00:48:22] through the 1200s and most of the 1300s. Now, that was actually considered to be sort of the very first start of what then became known as the Renaissance. But in that time frame, we had these weird technologies like paper manufacturing being [00:48:37] perfected. And so the idea with Air is that we're talking about ideas and the dissemination of ideas. Astrology actually went through a massive rebirth in that time period, pre the official Italian Renaissance. And [00:48:52] I think what we're going to see is, ideas or philosophies are going to become more of a focus and they're going to spread more. We're also going to have people moving around a lot more. There was a lot of invasions [00:49:07] that happened in that time frame where people spread out with their ideas more. The big disease that happened through that time frame, of course, was the Black Plague, which is an airborne disease. So the idea, at the end of 2020, as we start this Air [00:49:22] period, where everything is to do with the mind, to do with the intellect, and to do with technology, and to do with the dissemination of ideas becomes much more. And it's hard to imagine how it becomes more than what it has become already, but it is going, is going to be faster accelerations [00:49:37] there. And then I think you know from a disease perspective, those types of airborne issues are also something we're going to need to be more mindful of, so yeah, so a few hundred year chapter. ANDREW: Time to double [00:49:52] down on getting your flu shot! [laughs]  KELLY: Yeah, flu shots, you know, when you think about how mobile people are becoming, in the sense that we don't all go to 9 to 5 jobs in specific locations anymore. That's a very Earth kind of thing to do, [00:50:07] and also, you know, this podcasting. I mean, it's the radio of the modern era, but it is about-- Like I think podcasting is just going to get more and more popular, anything that's online, that involves the sharing of ideas or insight or [00:50:22] wisdom is just going to explode. We haven't even touched the tip of it yet, basically. ANDREW: Yeah. It's an exciting time to be alive. KELLY: Exciting time to be alive. I don't know that it bodes well for things like banking industries or credit systems, because I think they're going to go [00:50:37] through a massive upheaval, but that's... We're probably due for that.  ANDREW: Yeah, I think so. I think that, yeah, I mean, I hear every single year that the banks here make more money than they've ever made before. [00:50:52]  KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: And I'm just like, how is that even possible? And, you know, and the answer is well, you know, there was a time where having a bank account meant that you accrued money on your, on your savings, [00:51:08] you know, but the idea now, like, you know the amount of fees and this, that, whatever, there's no way, you know, unless you have heaps and heaps of money in there, that, you know, anybody's going to be making any money off of a bank account. So, you know, so those dynamics are going to, you [00:51:23] know, shift again at some point, right? So.  KELLY: Absolutely, and we're seeing that a little bit with alternative payment process and alternative money transfer options, you know... ANDREW: Yeah.  KELLY: Back in the day, we had to go to what, Western Union, to send money internationally. And now, [00:51:38] there are companies, and I, we use one called Transferwise, which allows you to send money if... There's more of a mobility here that the banks don't have the monopoly that they used to. Now look, they still have a massive monopoly, and they're making huge amounts of money.  ANDREW: Sure. KELLY: But [00:51:53] you're seeing more of these little startups popping up that I think are going to become increasingly popular. Venmo, I think, is really popular in the states, that type of thing.  ANDREW: Yeah. Well, even, even PayPal and you know, Apple's integrating it [00:52:08] directly into the, directly into the phone, so you can just text people money and stuff, like it's all changing, right?  KELLY: That's, that's the thing, like you used to have to go and get cold hard currency and nobody has...  ANDREW: Right?  KELLY: ....physical cash anymore, money is just a number on a computer [00:52:23] screen.  ANDREW: Yeah, you don't even have to talk to people anymore. [laughs] KELLY: You don't! I mean, you know, you go to a bank, and nowadays there's more machines than there are people because of the automation, if you like.  ANDREW: Yeah, for sure. KELLY: That's something I think we're [00:52:38] going to have to work on as a human race, is humans get something from being physically with other humans that we can't duplicate, you know, and even doing things like this where we're online and we can see each other. It's great, and it's a, it's a functional [00:52:53] substitute, but it cannot replace the exchange of multiple levels of energy that happen when you're physically in person. And so I think that's going to be almost our goal, is we have to still come together in the flesh, [00:53:08] even though we don't have to any more.  ANDREW: Yeah. So take away from this episode: go hang with your peoples.  KELLY: Yeah. ANDREW: Watch your money.  KELLY: Yeah.  ANDREW: And if and if a company called Skynet comes and wants to sell you some robots, say no thank you because [00:53:23] nobody needs a Terminator showing up at their house later on.  KELLY: Right, nobody needs a terminator. ANDREW: Well. Thank you so much for making time to hang out with me today. It's been so nice to catch up. For people who want to come and follow you. I mean, I already mentioned [00:53:38] The Astrology Podcast and that thing, which I'll put a link to in the show notes, but where else are you hanging out, where should people come and find you to be in your orbits?  KELLY: Yeah. Look, if anyone does want to, follow along if you like. My main [00:53:53] website is KellysAstrology.com, but you can also find me on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. I'm a little bit chatty on Twitter occasionally. It is actually my preferred social media platform. Like, I know that sort of sound and I'm not, that's weird these days. in addition to [00:54:08] the monthly episode on The Astrology Podcast, I also do a weekly show with two Aussie girlfriends called the Water Trio Astrology Podcast, and you can find that, as well as The Astrology Podcast on SoundCloud, iTunes, and YouTube.  Coming up at the end of March [00:54:23] is my next online training class on career and life direction in astrology. So the idea here is, I'll be showing you how to answer the question of what should I do with my life and that's a four-part training. There will be a live weekly class initially, but it will also be all online, [00:54:38] and one of the new offerings that I just started last year that's been really popular is my monthly astrology guide service, which is a subscription-based offering where you get details about every astrology aspect happening every week and every month. So if [00:54:53] you're kind of obsessed with astrology and you want to follow along at home with your own chart, that resource provides all the info you need. Everything that you might need on any of those counts can be found on my homepage of my website, KellysAstrology.com.  ANDREW: Awesome. [00:55:08]  KELLY: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me, Andrew, it's been great to chat.  ANDREW: Oh, thank you for being here.

Andrew and Ariana talk about everyones favourite topic love. Exploring how their relationship to polyamory and spirit guide and shape their world view. The podcast also takes a tour through astrology and spirituality in general. If you are looking to explore polyamory or just for a different world view check it out.  Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, Googleplay, Spotify or email. Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  You can find Ariana through their website here.   I hope you are finding all the love you want and need. If you wanted some help with it you can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Andrew Transcript  ANDREW: [00:00:00] Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I'm here with Ariana Felix and we are going to talk about some really interesting stuff today: romance, love, non-monogamy, and polyamory. [00:00:15] And, I came across Saltwater Stars, which is their Instagram, and started following them, and, you know, have been really enjoying listening to their astrology and listening to a bunch of the other great work [00:00:30] that they're up to. And when I saw a post about polyamory, I was like, yes, this is this is the conversation or the person-- I've been waiting to have a conversation on this for quite a while and it seemed like the right fit, so. But for people who don't know who [00:00:45] you are, why don't you introduce yourself?  ARIANA: Yeah, so I'm Ariana and I run Saltwater Stars, which is mainly an astrology platform, to use the word, but I'm an astrologer [00:01:00] and my work is doing readings and writing a lot of writing, about what's going on astrologically, but I also play with tarot and magic and, you know, brujería. I'm [00:01:16] from Brooklyn, New York, by way of Puerto Rico, but I live in southcentral Pennsylvania right now. So yeah, I think that pretty much sums it up. That's like a 10-second summary. ANDREW: Perfect. So I'm [00:01:32] sure, like, people have heard the term, but I wonder if there are people who don't know what brujería means.  ARIANA: Oh, yeah. So brujería is basically the Spanish word for magic. It is usually referring to Santería. [00:01:47] And it actually has a huge connotation with, like, as a derogatory term.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ARIANA: So how it's being used now, in the like quote-unquote mainstream, [00:02:02] is really about reclamation of the term.  ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: Even though, still, in like in my culture, it's still, a majority look at it as a negative thing, you know, like brujería. It's witchcraft, basically. ANDREW: [00:02:17] Yeah, for sure. Well, it's the thing that everybody looks down on until they have a problem, right? And then they come knock on your door and be like . . . ARIANA: Yes. ANDREW: . . .please help me with the thing! help me with this! [laughing] ARIANA: [laughing] Right. What, like, what was it, that thing that you mentioned the other day, that I was skeptical about but now I might really need? Like-- [laughing] ANDREW: Exactly. Exactly. For [00:02:35] sure. Yeah. ARIANA: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: Yeah. My elder references a Cuban saying, which is something like, something along the lines, in English, of you know, everybody's Catholic on Sunday, and then they go see the saints, like the Santos, when they, when [00:02:50] they have a problem, right? You know, so. ARIANA: Claro.  ANDREW: That's how it goes. ARIANA: Exactly.  ANDREW: So, tell me tell me about, like, polyamory for you. You know, [00:03:05] where did that start, if there's sort of a clear start? How did you, how did you find your way to that? You know, like, what was that journey like for you? Because, you know, that's not a thing that-- I mean, it's growing [00:03:20] in awareness in the media and I think in general these days, but you know, it's definitely not, it's still not everybody's life. Right? It's still kind of different in that way. So, yeah.  ARIANA: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Oh, geez. I [00:03:36] think I was always, like in my adult life, I was always really curious about it. But still from this like, vantage point of being like, “Oh, that's interesting, but probably like, not [00:03:51] right,” you know? Like I grew up very, like, strictly religious. And so, when I like exited out of that and was, you know, doing my own thinking, when it came to relationships, I just, I [00:04:06] was like, fascinated by the idea that like, tap, polyamory taps into this concept of like, the expanse of love, you know, so much of like heteronormativity and patriarchy is [00:04:21] about this like, finite amounts, you know, and that's why you need to have possession over it because there's like only so much, so you better get yours, you know. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ARIANA: And so that never really resonated with me. And [00:04:36] then I was also, I think, as curious as I was about it, confused, because, you know, well, I wasn't like really educated about it, and I was confused by the fact that I like also really appreciated deep intimate relationships, [00:04:51] you know, and commitment. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ARIANA: And so I was like, well these things don't fit together, you know, [laughing] and so it wasn't until the past two years, really, that it's been like part [00:05:06] of my life, but it's been very very gradual because there's been a lot of deconditioning that I've had to do for myself to kind of navigate the shame that came up around [00:05:21] it, which is like, fortunately, I have a lot of experience in, because so many things about my life are like the opposite of how I was raised, you know? ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: And what I was taught to think. And so, for me, the, I [00:05:37] think, like the entry point into non-monogamy was really about allowing myself to prioritize pleasure, to prioritize love of all kinds, right? And [00:05:52] I just like, I'm really committed to this idea that, why would I say no to more of that in my life, right? Because of, like, heteronormativity and patriarchy and whiteness. Like why would I block access [00:06:07] points off for myself? And so I think that was the thought that kind of catapulted me into being like, Okay. This is something that I do want to live into and that does feel right for me and that does fit into, like, [00:06:22] my own love ethic, you know?  And so, it was interesting, because I was all, I'm already, I was already in a committed relationship that was like, very seemingly heteronormative, you know? And so, it's like, [00:06:37] I had to, you know, have those conversations with my partner, right? And it was like this learning curve that we shared together, you know? But I had to like, be brave enough to initiate [00:06:52] it, you know? And be like, this is something that I want and that I'm curious about, you know, because it could have very well not have resonated, right? But I had to like make the decision to be open to experimenting.  ANDREW: For sure. Yeah, [00:07:07] I think it's really, you know. My experiences with it is that it's definitely-- There are people who are more naturally suited towards it than others. You know, I think it's not necessarily for everybody. So that being aware that like [00:07:22] you can try this out and be like, “Oh, you know what? No, thank you.” You know, that's great too. Right? But yeah. Yeah, I think, I think this, this process of sort of deconditioning stuff, you know? I think it's [00:07:37] so helpful, right? You know, I mean, I think that as a person who spends a lot of time talking with other people about their love life, you know, being a card reader, I feel like having [00:07:52] committed, you know, continuing to commit a bunch of energy to deconditioning, you know, all the different things for myself around love and other things is super fruitful. But I also think, in terms of finding our own happiness, [00:08:07] I think that that's so key as well, right? You know? And for me, polyamory, nonmonogamy, and like all this kind of stuff, it's kind of been a constant theme for, like, since I was, you [00:08:22] know, in my late teen years, sort of, on and off all the way through my life, you know? And it's been either, you know, it started out as a relatively--unconscious is the wrong word. But you [00:08:38] know, we would, we, me and someone I was seeing, would have conversations about inviting other people over or who we wanted to bring home from the bar at the end of the night or you know, all that kind of stuff.  And so that in that sense, it was very conscious, [00:08:55] you know, because we were talking about it, but it also was not really considered in a framework or a structure. There were no bigger conversations about it. It was sort of always, you know, [00:09:10] close to the moment and without a lot of sort of conversation about what it meant or what else might happen or all these kind of things, you know? And so a lot of, a lot of my journey sort of after that period was of sort of trying [00:09:25] to sort through and figure out what those, what those dynamics that make sense for me around that are, right, you know, and right, you know, all that kind of stuff. So, but yeah, I think, I think that for me, where I've kind of gotten to with it is this place where [00:09:40] I think that connections with people across the board, you know, friends, lovers, relationships, whatever, they tend to have a natural [00:09:55] level or a natural level of intimacy or connection, physical or otherwise, that if there aren't limits placed on them, then they'll arrive at, you know? So it's been this process of sort of, especially [00:10:10] in the last few years of sort of settling into, you know, understanding how I can see that in different dynamics and how sort of finding that level of intimacy, being like, Oh, yeah. This is, this is wonderful, and [00:10:25] and I don't necessarily want more, you know, in a conventional sense, but this is great, and this could just continue to be great or you know, these level of orbits are great, or all those kinds of things. So. Yeah. ARIANA: I [00:10:41] think a huge thing for me, that in retrospect I'm grateful for, was like knowing myself well enough to know that I wasn't, I'm not particularly a casual [00:10:56] person. With the exceptions of make outs, I'm very casual about that. [laughs] When it comes to like intimacy and all that, I knew about and I know about myself that [00:11:11] I do like to have, like, at least the shape of the container, you know, and agreements, and clarity, and I don't know, the word commitment is coming to mind, and I know that has a lot of its own, [00:11:26] you know, baggage, but I like longevity, you know, and so in all my relationships, you know, like with my family and with my friends and etc. It's really important to me. And so I [00:11:41] was really lucky to come across the term poly-capable because I was like, you know, obviously there's that overlap between polyamory, nonmonogamy, but I was interested in nonmonogamy [00:11:56] for the sake of more partnerships.  ANDREW: Right. ARIANA: Right, not so much for the sake of cruising itself, which is, you know, also totally cool. And so I think that piece is what has allowed me to be clear [00:12:11] about what kind of connections I'm interested in or have the potential to grow that way, right? Because you know, obviously it can't be like a decision from the get, [00:12:26] you do have to like build a relationship.  ANDREW: I think I want to pause you there for a second. I think it, I think it, I want to hear what you have to say after too, but I think that one of the things that I think is such [00:12:41] a an important piece to understand, is how to, how do we on-ramp into relationships? You know, and how do we hang out in that space? You [00:12:56] know, like where you're like, I would like containers. I like a sense of commitment. You know, I personally tend to not use the word commitment but sort of tend towards the word agreements, even though maybe it's a bit semantic, but you know agreements, [00:13:11] for me, implies sort of more of a, we're always reaching those things, you know, or they're open to renegotiation and to change in a way that commitments doesn't feel as much, but I think that so many people, especially people [00:13:26] who are not polyamorous, that space where, you know, they don't want to be casual, they don't want to not have a sense of commitment. They don't want, you know, like [00:13:41] all of those kinds of things. And yet, meeting somebody and starting to date somebody always involves all of those kinds of things. Right? And I think that that, that sort of, how, you [00:13:57] know, I'm really curious how you navigate that. And I think that, you know, anybody who's out there dating and is sort of like working with this stuff, you know, I think that it's a really important question to ask and kind of get clear, because I think that there [00:14:12] are so many kind of pitfalls around that, you know, in our own minds and hearts and fears that they really make that kind of wonky for a lot of people, so that's why I wanted to pause you because I thought that was such an important piece there. You know, how [00:14:27] do you know?   ARIANA: Yeah. Yeah, I feel like it's that that knowing what I want. All right, like knowing that I'm interested in more partnerships [00:14:42] in my life, especially with people of color, you know, like black indigenous people of color. Like that's my priority, and so, it's kind of like more like a guide than anything [00:14:57] else, right? Because there is, like you're saying, there is, like you're saying, that part of all of it where you don't know what's going to happen, you know? ANDREW: Sure. ARIANA: And everything is even when there's like, okay, we have this agreement, like you said, is all open for renegotiation. [00:15:13] And I think that's, like you're saying, is a super essential piece to, like, any of this working, right? And so, I think that I know I [00:15:28] feel like it's so highly contextual, right? So you can be, like, with one person, being clear about what you want, and they are also interested in the same thing. And so you're seeing how you can grow that together if it's possible, right? And then there might be another person with whom you're like, this [00:15:43] is what I want, and they're like, I'm not interested in more partnerships, you know, or not interested in what you want, this is what I want. You know what I mean? And so, I think, that allowing for that, allowing for it to be highly contextual, you know, and super nuanced, and [00:15:58] just like, it's never going to be concrete. You know? ANDREW: And when you run into somebody and they're, sort of, you know, looking for something different, will you just let that go, then? Will you tend [00:16:13] to walk away from that? Or what's, you know, like, cause that's the thing, right? You know, when people are looking for love, right? So often we like, you know, cause, oh my, look how cute they are, I mean, maybe I could, I [00:16:28] could be a little different, or like, you know, or like, or I don't have any other options, or, you know, like there are many reasons why we get pulled into this stuff, right? And so, I'm curious how you handle that. You know? ARIANA: I [00:16:43] think that, so far, my, the way that I've handled it has been to kind of like that, oh, walk away, not be like, “Okay, well, we're never talking again,” you know, but that's [00:16:58] like a, that's a hard, that's a hard one for me. If our desires aren't congruent or what's the word, I [00:17:13] don't know, like, if our desires aren't compatible, it's like really hard for me, to, I don't know like, alter my desire? [laughing] ANDREW: Right. ARIANA: So, like, maybe it's better [00:17:28] if, you know, the nature of the relationship or the connection changes, so that I can manage this on this side. Does that make sense?  ANDREW: It does. Yeah, for sure.  ARIANA: And I know, I know, I know about myself that I have a tendency towards being [00:17:43] kind of like working with absolutes and I'm learning my way around that. So I guess this is the honest answer is like, I do tend to be like pretty absolute and I'm learning how to leave more room for what actually happens, [00:17:58] right? Because like life is not absolute at all.  ANDREW: Yeah. Sure.  ARIANA: So yeah, that's my answer to that. So I definitely, the whole like leaving space to [00:18:13] adjust my desires and allowing a connection that might not have been what I wanted but it's still something in its own right is really hard for me.  ANDREW: Yeah, I think that's fair, right? I think that's totally fair. You know, I mean, I tend to be [00:18:30] a very considerate person, you know, as Sagittarian and as exuberant as I am about things, I'm also a very considerate person and so I tend to kind of always temper that by like, [00:18:45] looking at what's going on in, in all the arenas of my life and sort of, kind of, with a half an eye to making sure that I don't inadvertently, like, blow up the stability that I've been building, you know, because it's like, oh, it's so exciting. I could just whatever, right?  ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: It's like, no, [00:19:00] no, dude. You can't do that. That's not, that, that actually isn't going to work out well in the long run. And I think that that's true around poly for me too, you know? I mean being aware of like, what are my [00:19:15] actual energetic and time limits? You know, what are my? You know, I mean, like, it's, I do casual very well as well as sort of relationship stuff, but even at that, I only have so much time in my life, you know? [00:19:30] ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: Between kids and shop and partners and so on, right? It's like— ARIANA: Right. ANDREW: All of those things require some attention, you know? And I think that my other kind of almost [00:19:45] like my mantra through like, you know, the last couple years has really been: be brave, make the brave choice right now. What's the brave choice here? And sometimes that brave choice is [00:20:00] like, fess up and be like, I really really like you, you know, like I really hope this continues or whatever, and sometimes that brave choice is like, you are so darn hot, and yet also this is [00:20:15] not going to fit in my life, and I can go find that hotness in a way that, you know, maybe does work in my life. And so being brave enough to kind of like, step away from both [00:20:30] of those things. But like, you know, it's not quite a talking myself down to putting down the, you know, put down the phone, don't send that message. You know? It's not quite at that level but there's definitely moments where it's like you know what, just, what's the brave choice here? How do you commit to [00:20:45] the brave choice? You know? And I think that that's kind of been where I've been leaning and you know, it tends to work out well, but you know, but yeah, but sometimes it's not always easy, right?  ARIANA: That is such a Sag mantra. [00:21:00] I'd have to say.  ANDREW: Which part of— ARIANA: What's the brave choice? That's so Sagittarius.  ANDREW: Yeah. What about that, though? I'm curious. Like, which sign are you?  ARIANA: I'm a Scorpio. [00:21:15]  ANDREW: Okay. ARIANA: With like a million planets in Scorpio. That's my issue with absolutes and [laughing] … ANDREW: Uh-huh. Yeah. ARIANA: Just like Sagittarius has this, you know, it's a fire sign and like the other fire signs, [00:21:30] really works with this initiatory energy, you know, and that requires bravery and courage and this, like, transparency of spirit, you know? And so I love that that's what you're working with, because it's actually, [00:21:45] with this, like, when it comes to polyamory, because polyamory itself is about expansion, right? And that's so Sagittarian a concept, very ruled by Jupiter is about expanding things. And so, using such a like [00:22:00] fiery mantra to create room for that expansion, right? and to, like, navigate yourself through it, I think is really powerful.  ANDREW: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's one of those things, right? I mean, I think that dating at any [00:22:15] level isn't easy, necessarily, right? Like there are times where it's really easy, which is great. There are times where it's work and there are times where, you know, we get kind of stuck in it, right? Or stuck in ourselves or, you know, or life just doesn't align [00:22:30] with it. Right? And I think that just being so aware of all that stuff is so helpful, you know. Yeah. So, let me ask you a question towards a Scorpio then.  ARIANA: Okay.  ANDREW: How do you deal with [00:22:45] jealousy?  ARIANA: Oh God. BOTH: [laughing] ARIANA: You couldn't, you couldn't find a more original Scorpio question to ask! [laughing]  ANDREW: You know, I'm only a basic astrologer. So [00:23:00] all you're going to get it is [laughing] ARIANA: Fair enough, fair enough! [laughing]  ARIANA: Jealousy… So, what's really interesting is that I feel like I've struggled with [00:23:15] jealousy my entire life. Like I remember as a child, like, someone would play with my friend and I was like, you know, why are they playing with my friend?  ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: And so I've had a lot of time to kind of work through it [laughing] and figure out how [00:23:30] to, how to manage it. And so at this point in my life, I find that it's really parallel to my work with like self-confidence and self-esteem, you know? And then stuff, It's, really, the [00:23:45] intensity of it has dissipated a lot and I-- It doesn't often come up for me. And I think part of that is also just because of my beliefs, right? Like the same beliefs that allow me to be polyamorous and [00:24:00] have an open relationship with systems. Those are the same beliefs that dissipate my jealousy because it's like, okay. I don't want to be in a relationship of like transaction or possession with people, [00:24:15] places, and things, you know? And so reminding myself of that helps me to be like, you know, and it's also, I don't know.  I think that, [00:24:33] I really, it's really important to me that the people that I love and care for feel spaciousness in relationship with me. And I think I have this, like, terror that my jealousy would, you know, [00:24:48] like, reduce that or eliminate that, the spaciousness. And so, if and when it does come up for me, I tend to just like, manage it on my own, you know, like walk myself through words, like, you know, “this is not a big deal, and it's okay.”  And something [00:25:04] that's also helpful is not assigning meaning to things, you know? Because I think for me, my relationship with jealousy is almost always about, “Oh, okay, I am like, not as important, or not as amazing, and I'm going to be abandoned,” [00:25:19] you know. ANDREW: For sure. ARIANA: Basic abandonment trauma issues, [laughing] and so reminding myself that that's not the case, you know, just because someone's like, talking to someone, [laughing] has been really helpful. So [00:25:34] I think also.  Yeah, I think I just like really have this deep priority to not-- I don't want that to take up space and I think growing up in a household where, like, my parents' marriage was so full of that. So, like, just [00:25:49] an abusive level that really turned me off to it, you know, so like when it comes up, I'm like, yeah, no, we're not going to do that. Like, that's not, that's not allowed, but not in the way where I'm like, pretending that I don't feel it, you know? I'm just managing it for myself. So [00:26:04] far so good. [laughing] ANDREW: I find that-- I mean, I think that there are a few things. And a bunch of them, a bunch of them, good chunk of stuff that I [00:26:19] think comes down to like evoking jealousy for me, also, comes down to like, understanding like, how I actually am interested in poly or [00:26:34] what I'm actually interested in, you know? And so like, you know, being aware that, like, you know, for example, maybe if somebody like, if [00:26:49] there's, if I want, if I wanted a more serious connection with someone than they were available for and they were like a super casual person who had a high turnover of like, of lovers? That's probably not a good place for me to be. ARIANA: Right. ANDREW: Like that's not a-- It's not a place [00:27:04] where I can get what I desire from that situation. ARIANA: Exactly. ANDREW: And so like, kind of rolling that back and sort of taking ownership for it and saying, this is not about them and what they should or shouldn't do, that's not helpful, you know? ARIANA: Right. Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And like you [00:27:19] said, one of my, I'm definitely on the side of, I don't want to limit other people's freedoms. And, you know, and I'm not going to allow people to necessarily limit mine either, you know? I mean, there are agreements, which is something different.  But [00:27:34] even at that, those agreements don't extend to, you know, the rest of my life in the sense that they cut off a bunch of things, you know, they're more like, these are these are my commitments to this relationship, and you know, and those tend to [00:27:49] be more about time, energy, attention, and things like that, you know, or safer sex things, or what-have-you, right? But and then, some of the other stuff comes back to like, you know, for me, jealousy, you know, other [00:28:04] than what I just talked about, is either rooted in something that's deeply unexpected?  ARIANA: Mmm. ANDREW: Where, where everything seemed like it was going in a certain direction and somebody talked about things in a certain way and [00:28:19] then something happened that made them realize they wanted something completely unexpected, from my point of view, maybe from theirs, maybe not. ARIANA: Mmm. ANDREW: And so that that can be difficult and invoke that feeling of jealousy, which then, [00:28:34] you know, seeing that and having the clarity to go to the person, and say: “So hey, I'm having some feelings about this because everything that I heard was going in this direction and then this was a change,” you know, that can be like, you know, can make it [00:28:49] clearer, right? You know? And clarifying that and understanding more about what that change was or how it occurred or whatever, usually gets rid of it, you know? ARIANA: Right, right. ANDREW: And then the last one is this, like, you know? You know, there was a time not [00:29:04] so long ago where I had a bunch of feelings and, you know, ultimately it was about the fact that sort of two of my kind of more casual ongoing people ghosted on me. And you know, like, it wasn't about the [00:29:19] person that I felt it towards at all, it was more about that sense of lack of stuff and the disruption in my life. And then that kind of, like, bleh! [laughing] ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: You know? I don't have a better word for it than that, but that like that mess [00:29:34] of complicated feelings— ARIANA: Right. ANDREW: Before it got kind of parsed out into what it was, actually about, then was essentially looking for a place to attach to something, you know, instead of actually kind of like looking at it being like, oh, you know what, you should, you [00:29:49] know, feel sad about the fact that this happened or you should, you know, get back on, get back on Tinder and find a new connection, or you should whatever, right? Like, you know, and that kind of returning it back to a place of action, even [00:30:04] if an action is kind of a non-action, of like, just sitting with it or whatever, right? You know, that's always kind of a super helpful thing for me as well. So.  ARIANA: Yeah, I mean, I think, I keep returning to how care for the self, like caring for yourself is [00:30:19] like, just obviously foundational to everything— ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: But like, when it comes to managing and navigating, you know, nonmonogamy and polyamory, it's like, I've [00:30:34] found for myself, I'm like, oh, it's like even more important than ever before that I'm caring for myself. And that I'm in relationship with myself. You know, and like, prioritizing that because it's so easy [00:30:49] to get kind of like get stuck, like you were saying, you know, or just like-- It's so easy to not know how to move forward. Right? ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: And [00:31:04] I think and that's true for most things that involve other people, because there's like, there's no control there, you know? ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: Which is like a cause of panic for me on a daily basis [laughing]— ANDREW: [laughing] ARIANA: But is actually totally normal and healthy and good, you know. [00:31:19]  ANDREW: Yeah.  ARIANA: Learning how to be like, okay, so I can't do anything about them. How can I care for myself in this moment?  ANDREW: For sure, right?  ARIANA: How do I want to move forward? Like I think that it's like, always comes back to the question, like, what do you want? You know? And [00:31:36] I think if that's not like one of the guiding questions, it gets easy to be like, okay, what does the other person want? You know, what do they need? How can I, how can I, how can I change to be that for them? You know? And [00:31:51] then, like, that's a whole mess in itself.  ANDREW: And I think that, you know, as you kind of pointed at, that's so true of everywhere in life. You know, it's true of our family relationships. It's probably true in people's careers and [00:32:06] you know, in a variety of things, you know? And even, you know, I mean I haven't even had a job for working for anybody else since 1998 now. You know, it's been a while that I've been self-employed and you know, for like the last 16 years, I've [00:32:21] been reading cards and running my store and stuff like that. And even like in the last six months I had to remind myself. I'm like, hey Andrew, it's your store and your work, you are actually freer than almost anybody— ARIANA: Yes, yes. ANDREW: [00:32:36] Like, it doesn't get freer than your, then your position, and still actually working. So if you're not digging this thing, stop getting stuck in that and start thinking about, what is it you would rather do instead, right? [00:32:51] Or how would you rather it be instead? You know? And yeah, it's a, it's always, it's always the possibility that sort of like loss of the center of whatever control there is or whatever power there is externally [00:33:07] somewhere, where, you know? And I think that in poly and in everywhere, returning that back to the center is so fruitful, right?  ARIANA: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ANDREW: You know, so, I'm really curious, if, have [00:33:22] you gone searching for like the poly astrological element? Like is there, is there a thing that you, or kinds of things that you see, where you're like, oh, yeah, yeah, I bet you this person's that way.  ARIANA: It's so funny. [00:33:37] I mean, I've kind of thought about it. I'm always like, super hesitant to, I mean like, formulate astrological signatures— ANDREW: Sure. ARIANA: For like, people's lifestyles and choices, but [00:33:53] I'll speak, I'll speak for my own self. I remember like a couple years ago, looking at my chart, and being like, you know, I'm really surprised that I'm not more, you know, like nonmonogamous. Like I remember looking and being like, [00:34:08] and so, you know, obviously in retrospect, it's really funny to be like, okay. I'm not, you know, like I was right, like I did pick up on that, just like certain things in my chart that like, made me think about my relationship to [00:34:23] relationships, and what kinds of relationships would actually nourish me versus the kinds that I've, you know, been conditioned to think or expect from myself, right?  And so I think for myself that just involves having a [00:34:38] lot of air and I also have a lot of water, right? So it's like, I think that's a, that really speaks to how I'm like, I'm, that's why I like the term poly-capable, [00:34:53] you know, or so, like, so I'm open, I'm not, I have like all this airiness, and all this like, yes, possibility, and like, excitement, and experiences, and, what's the word, like perspective, you know, like perspectives [00:35:08] broken open and unlearning and learning new ways. Then I have all this water where I'm like, I want that to be in service of, like, deep lasting connections, right? And so for myself, that's how, that's how I've seen it show up but [00:35:23] no, to answer it in general, I don't have like an astrological signature where I'm like, oh, this person is probably, are not monogamous or poly or like has several relationships, because it's just, my relationship astrology isn't [00:35:38] like that.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. That's totally fair. I find that, you know, my questions around a lot of this stuff, I feel like they end up sort of going back to me. Like, I'm just going to ask some really unfair questions of, like astrologers— ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: So, [00:35:53] hey, hey, here's my, here's my like, I know it's not really this way, but I kind of wish it was, and I bet you think I'm just going to ask this question and put you on the spot for a minute.  ARIANA: Underneath that is maybe, and I'm not saying that this is the case, but usually with people [00:36:08] is the question of like, tell me why I am the way that I am! [laughing] ANDREW: Right. Sure. ARIANA: [laughing] Is there a reason that this is happening? And maybe somehow inadvertently by asking this general question I'll have my very personal question answered.  ANDREW: Yeah. Yeah. For sure. ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: [00:36:23] Yeah, I don't know. I've looked at my own chart in my own limited ways and I don't really have a sense either. So I think, I think it's, I think for me it's just, you know, so much air and fire and so [00:36:38] much, just like, you know, expansiveness and exploratoriness that I think that it just sort of inclines me in that kind of direction.  ARIANA: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think looking at elements is like, [00:36:53] can be super informative. When we're looking at like, how we move through life, and what our needs are, and our like general sense. How we need to be able to move, right? Like air and fire needs to be able to be free— ANDREW: Sure. ARIANA: In like different ways [00:37:08] than earth and water.  ANDREW: Yeah. No, for sure. I don't have any earth, so. ARIANA: [laughing] You said that in a way that's like, I'm fucked. [laughing] ANDREW: No, no, not at all. It's good. It's fine. No earth at [00:37:23] all and only one water element. So everything else is just air and fire. All the time. ARIANA: That's combustion.  ANDREW: Yeah. I worked on it magically, so it's all good now, so.  ARIANA: Good.  ANDREW: So, [00:37:40] I guess one of the other things that I'm curious about this, for you, is like, you know, does poly fit into an identity or a sense [00:37:55] of, you know, activism, and sort of like, kind of, like we talked about deconditioning and I'm wondering if it goes a bit further to you, in sort of the sense of, is it, is it, is it, is it tied [00:38:10] to sort of a sense of activism or something like that for you?  ARIANA: Like is it radical for me?  ANDREW: Is it radical for you?  ARIANA: Mm-hmm, absolutely. Absolutely. It's deeply intertwined with like, my political beliefs and values, as [00:38:25] everything in my life is, right?  ANDREW: Yeah.  ARIANA: So yeah, I-- A huge, huge reason why polyamory is a part of my life is because of my, like, rejection of whiteness, you know, and like the role [00:38:40] of whiteness in heteronormativity and patriarchy and like all these things that take joy, you know?  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ARIANA: And so, I'm always like, I'm a little skeptical with the word resistance, but it is like an [00:38:55] act of resistance for me, you know, and like, no, actually because, like I said before, like the only reason I wouldn't say yes to more pleasure and love, enjoying my life, is because of these constructs, you know, that are, that are made up, [00:39:10] and are also powerful, right? and like shape us and we are shaped by them.  ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: And so it is absolutely about taking my personal and my political, which is like the same for me, power back, you [00:39:25] know? I mean like, there, so, yeah, like, so little when it comes to like, oppression, that I [00:39:40] like actually have any power control over right? Like I can't change the world or the snap of my fingers or whatever. ANDREW: Sure. ARIANA: So living my life in ways that are like, anti-oppressive, is really important. And [00:39:55] so it's really interesting because even like, when I was sitting with the question of like nonmonogamy and polyamory, a large part of my commitment to like, continuing to be curious about it, even when it felt like scary [00:40:10] or strange, or shameful, was a political commitment, you know, it's like, even if this isn't going to be right for me, I want to be able to be with the questions, you know? And I want to be able to not have fear [00:40:25] around it. Right? Like, and fear that's been imbued by my conditioning, religious and political, you know, and so yeah, that's a huge, huge piece of about it for me.  ANDREW: Yeah. A [00:40:41] long time ago, for me, I discovered this guy, Terence McKenna Terence McKenna is like, psychedelic—was, he's dead now--was a psychedelic explorer like along the lines of Timothy [00:40:56] Leary and those people, and, but, you know, he was mostly into like mushrooms and other things and there was a line in this spoken word thing that he did, where he's talking about how taking mushrooms frees [00:41:11] you from the system, right? Takes you outside of those things and that it breaks what he calls the “three enemies of the people,” you know? And the enemies of the people are hegemony, monogamy, and monotony, [00:41:26] you know, and you know, hegemony being the way in which systems and culture and patriarchy and you know, all of those things seek to not just tell us what to do but to limit [00:41:41] the space in which we can think, you know, it's a very like 1984 kind of idea, right, in that regard, and I think that there's so much of what we come around, and you know, what I grew up in, and what most people grow up in, that, [00:41:56] that is, curtails the boundaries of where you're allowed to think or what you can think or what's, you know, and even to the point where it's like, you know, I mean, I think of my earlier explorations, it's like, I had no language around it. I just had desire. [00:42:11] And I couldn't even really understand--I understood it, you know, I don't want to diminish my awareness of it, but I didn't understand it as a possibility or as a way of life. I just understood it as a desire, right?  ARIANA: Right, right.  ANDREW: You [00:42:26] know, and then of course, like monogamy and the monotony of like a lot of capitalism and the way in which a lot of the world runs, you know, I mean, all of those things work to sort of push us away from making more radical choices [00:42:41] or waking up or you know, doing those kinds of things. So, yeah, I think it's very, it's very interesting, you know. Yeah. ARIANA: Yeah, I mean I [00:42:57] think that this, there's like this, I think this separation, between like activism and then like our quote unquote regular lives is an illusion in a lot of ways. I do think that there is a distinction between like [00:43:12] activist, you know, like, people who are committing their life to that work in a public way. Right? Like I'm not going to call myself an activist. And I think, you know, the word has all of its own like negative [00:43:27] connotations as well. But that like, that false separation between the political and the personal, you know, is really harmful, because it is so deeply intertwined. Right? And so, like even in [00:43:42] our conversations about love and romance and sex and money, you know, like all of these things are wrapped up into power and wrapped up into politics, right? And so for me, as like a [00:43:57] queer Boricua, it's one of the ways that I've been articulating and it's like, it's my duty, my responsibility, to be as liberated, [00:44:13] to use the word, as I can, right? And again, going back to that, like why would I say no to more pleasure and love and joy in my life, right?  And so, it's like, I don't just see it as this, like, oh, yeah, of course, I want more of that but I see it as like, oh, it's my responsibility to my ancestors, [00:44:28] right? And to the life that I'm like, actually living now, to deconstruct these things within myself. You know and to be aware of, curious about, [00:44:43] and devoted to exploring the ways that the political and the personal is intertwined for me. And that's not only my responsibility to myself, that's my responsibility to my community, [00:44:58] you know? In like a literal sense, like people actually, community with, and in a metaphysical sense. Yeah. Yeah.  ANDREW: I mean, I think I agree with that, and I've kind of felt the same way, you know, and [00:45:13] I think that, you know, not in a, not in a like, I feel like I've got it all figured out and I'm going to tell people how it ought to be kind of way. But like, it's why sharing [00:45:30] more openly around being poly, as you know, as a, as a, you know, as a kind of fitting into that conversation, to say, hey, look there are other ways, like I'm living another way, and I could, I could not be public [00:45:45] about it, it would make no difference on a day-to-day level with my you know, personal and romantic life, you know? ARIANA: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. ANDREW: But I could also share it in a public way, and that, you know, and share that [00:46:00] in this conversation with you that then creates that space for other people to think, engage, be exposed, find their own language, you know, or whatever, you know, or just be curious and then walk away, like it's all fine. [00:46:15] Right? But like— ARIANA: Yeah. ANDREW: You know, but just to sort of provide opportunities to see because I think that, for me, for so long, I kind of just thought that like my life was like everybody's life and [00:46:30] then at a certain point I was like, oh no, that's not actually true at all, you know? ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: And like, the more I have-- The more, over the last maybe six years since I started going to tarot conferences and sort of traveling a bit more again, you know, I was like, “oh [00:46:45] no, my life is not like many people's lives at all,” and not that, not that I need to be role model person, because that's not the point in the least, but that, you know, I have such different, you know-- I mean, poly, [00:47:00] I, you know, like, you know, a couple weeks ago, one of my longer-term partners, their partner and their partner's child came and hung out with me and my kids. And you know, we all spent the weekend hanging out together, and like, [00:47:15] just totally like, you know, experiences that people are like, I don't know, I don't even begin to understand it, and it's just this, like, the most natural and chill thing ever, right? You know, and being an Olocha, you know, and like all the things, you [00:47:30] know, doing what I do for a living, like, there's just so many ways in which it's so different, right? And I think that, kind of like, just floating that out there as a thing to inspire people who want, who are, who [00:47:45] are waiting for inspiration or looking for inspiration, you know, and allowing that to kind of be part of that, I think is really important. So.  ARIANA: Yeah. I mean what I'm hearing, and that is, it just sounds like such [00:48:00] a foundational piece of our work in general as readers, you know, and as like spiritual guides, is this, this, I think like sometimes opening of portals, but more so like, holding of portals, you know, and being like, this is [00:48:15] here, if you, if you want it, and like drawing people's attention, you know, in their own, in their own search for it, you know? And so, like, it's, I don't know, I, [00:48:33] I think that's like, such what you're describing is such a huge cornerstone of my life because I know that I've always been eternally grateful to the resources that exposed me to the language that I didn't have for what I was already feeling or [00:48:48] experiencing or wanting, you know? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ARIANA: And that those things changed my life. And so I've been, I've been deeper in the practice of embodying that myself, like with Saltwater Stars, like, [00:49:03] showing up more as myself, you know, and being more transparent about my queerness and about my, just like the way that my life is, and it's interesting because I-- That's [00:49:18] like a more recent thing because I've never, I guess I didn't really have like much of a platform, right? Like when you don't have much of a platform, you're not like, oh, I should tell everyone, you know, you're like, no one cares.  So now more [00:49:33] recently I'm like, oh, this is actually like, having these conversations and being transparent about myself, I'm at a position in my life where that can be helpful to others in ways that, you know, it might not have been before, but also helpful [00:49:48] to me, you know? Also like, the whole, like, taking up space thing, as someone who is at the intersection of identities that I'm at, you know, is [00:50:03] something that I've like, underestimated the power and importance of, and I'm now like, coming into more of a, like I said, a deeper practice and understanding of how important that is, you know, and doing that whole thing that I'm sure you're familiar [00:50:18] with, where you're like, “Oh, if I had, like, known me when I was younger, you know, how much would be different?” blah blah blah.  ANDREW: Sure. Yeah. ARIANA: Yeah, so I've been thinking about that a lot, and I think it's this interesting like, [00:50:34] juxtaposition for me, where I'm like a private person more naturally, but then I'm also like so deeply committed to community and to communal revolution, you know, and so the ways that I'll like stretch myself, that I [00:50:49] like, hadn't considered before, because of the ways that my politics grow and change. You know?  ANDREW: Yeah, I think, and I think that learning how to take up space is such a, and not even take up space, how to take [00:51:04], take your space. You know, I think it's such a helpful thing, and I think that, you know, it's also not off topic for polyamory, right? Like, you know, I mean, like, I think that it's one of those things that crosses all those situations, you [00:51:19] know? How do we show up in our career that we take up space and can be seen, right? How do we show up in our relationships so that we can, you know, take up this or take our space and be seen, you know, and how does that change [00:51:34] the nature of the relationships that we have? Right? Because when you start being visible and showing up as being visible, then all of a sudden, the people, the people who can see you, see [00:51:49] something that's more real, and therefore that can be, you know, a kind of higher caliber of connection, you know, because there's a better alignment going there, right? You know, yeah.  ARIANA: Yeah. I love that you bring that up. Because it's like, it's that relationship between vulnerability [00:52:04] and intimacy, you know, and so that's been like a huge thing for me recently. It's like, the more I allow myself to be vulnerable and to be seen, right, and to be visible, the more intimacy that [00:52:19] I actually have potential to access. Right? So like, sitting over here telling no one anything about my life and wondering why I'll lack like a depth of intimacy in my relationships, you know, like, being invisible in my relationships and like, feeling resentful that [00:52:34] I'm like, never, so I like, I had to go through that learning curve. I'm like, oh, actually that's my responsibility, to be like, you know, here I am, you know, and then if you can see me and if this, if my vulnerability does create intimacy with you, [00:52:49] great, and if it doesn't, now I know, instead of sitting here in the corner wondering feeling sorry for myself, you know.  ANDREW: For sure. Yeah. Yeah. And I definitely, you know, I mean, for me, taking up space and sort of like pushing myself into [00:53:04] space was definitely a thing that was very uncomfortable around releasing the Orisha Tarot, you know, because, you know, I mean, because of, because I'm a white person from Toronto who practices this religion, [00:53:19] because of like a bunch of different things, you know, there's this very, like I was very, you know, aware, and you know, at times, sort of kind of immobilized by my awareness around those dynamics and my desire [00:53:34] not to, not to be messy about them, you know, and to try and find a good way through that stuff.  And I think that, you know, it's complicated, because when you, when you don't feel like you can take [00:53:50] the space, you know, it's also like there's almost never anybody who can convince you, you know?  ARIANA: Oh, yes. ANDREW: Like I talked to my elders and they're like, “Do it, it's going to be great.” And you know, I asked the Orishas, they're like, “Yeah, [00:54:05] you should do this,” and I'm like, and I talked to like, you know, artist friends and people of color. And like I had all these conversations and still, it was just like, but I just, you know, I'm just trying to figure out what that, like what that inner lock was, [00:54:20] right, you know? And it's now and then and then it came back to my mantra as well as like, well, just be brave dude. Just do the thing.  ARIANA: [laughing] ANDREW: It'll work out well or whatever. It'll be what it is, you know.  ARIANA: Mm-hmm, mmm-hmm.  ANDREW: Yeah, I think [00:54:35] that, that's it's, there's a lot of ways in which showing up is complicated right?  ARIANA: Oh, yeah. ANDREW: Not just around romance so, but.  ARIANA: Yeah. Oh, yeah, and I'm glad you said it that way, because I think that it is often oversimplified. Especially like for people [00:54:50] who do, who do live outside of the dominant culture.  ANDREW: Yeah.  ARIANA: You know, it's like, no, it's not as like this for many, it is actually dangerous, you know, like there is so much risk involved, and [00:55:06] not just like, on an interpersonal level, but on a communal level, right?  ANDREW: Sure. ARIANA: And so, I think that the oversimplification of it, that like often comes from whiteness, right? Because like, whiteness [00:55:21] is more comfortable. So, you know, it's like, oh, yeah, of course, like, you know, this is, not only is this my space, but that's also my space, and that's my space, and the, you know, and so I think that oversimplification of it dishonors [00:55:36] the amount of bravery it takes and also like diminishes the complexity of it.  ANDREW: Yeah.  ARIANA: You know and especially at these, like, intersections of spirituality and unconventional relationships and all [00:55:51] of those things. It's like, the complete, just, you decide to show up, just because you decide to be visible and be seen, doesn't make it any less complicated. ANDREW: For sure.  ARIANA: You know?  ANDREW: Yeah, and I think there's a, [00:56:06] I run across, you know, especially like sometimes in relationship to my, to my kids, with people who are, you know, running programs for them and stuff like that, you know? This notion of, like, you know, you [00:56:21] just, I mean even though my mantra is be brave, right? That's like a complex multi-level thing. That's not, that's not necessarily so much as like, you know, just do the thing and you'll be fine. It's [00:56:36] like, okay, be brave. What's the brave thing? Why am I resisting it? You know? Like on and on and on, there's like a whole deconstruction that, that goes beyond that and then, and then the mantra comes out once I've already processed all those things, and then I'm like, right now, there's nothing to do but [00:56:51] like press the button, make the phone call, say the thing, but there's this sort of notion that I run across a lot where it's like, you know, if you just persevere, if you just push, if you know, it's all, it's all kind of like a bunch of machismo and [00:57:06] it's-- In a certain way, I think, you know, where it's just like, yeah, but like I did this hard thing, so you can do this hard thing, and whatever, and it's like, maybe not, maybe it's the wrong hard thing. It's the wrong way. Maybe [00:57:21] this hard thing isn't even relevant. Like, you know, I think that there's so many, so many layers to that, that become very complicated and I think that there's a desire by many people that I see to [00:57:36] try and come to a point where it's just something simple like, you know, we'll just push through it and it'll be fine. It's like, maybe not. ARIANA: Like yeah, like have you heard of the scenarios where things don't end up [00:57:51] fine because that happens. ANDREW: Yeah. Exactly.  ARIANA: I think that one of the things about like nonmonogamy and polyamory that I appreciate is that it like, at least for me, I feel like it expands my capacity for complexity.  ANDREW: Sure. [00:58:06]  ARIANA: Right? And like my ability be to be with the discomfort.  ANDREW: Mmm-hmm.  ARIANA: Right? So like you were saying, like that that period where, it's like, okay, so I know that I want like partnerships and intimacy, but there's that whole period where we're like, we're figuring [00:58:21] out if that's actually possible. ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: So like, being able to sit in those spaces and to continue choosing to be brave.  ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: You know, it's like this may not work out, like I could very well get hurt, and like I most [00:58:36] likely will at some point, you know, if I continue in a relationship with this person.  ANDREW: Sure.  ARIANA: Whoever it is, that's going to happen and so, like coming to a point of acceptance with that, and like, being willing to be uncomfortable and being willing to, I think, [00:58:51] it just like really comes back to this vulnerability, you know, like, that's what-- It spans our capacity for like all the complexity and all the unknown, you know? And I think that it definitely, we definitely, like kind of semi [00:59:06] get trained to override that and override those times, you know, and like you're saying push through and be like, oh it'll be fine, you know, what, whatever, and so I think that the thing about polyamory is that you can't really do that because there are other people involved.  ANDREW: Yeah. ARIANA: You know? [00:59:21]  ANDREW: Yeah. I think too, like a lot of, a lot of my experience of polyamory is that there are a lot of feelings that in a, if [00:59:36] I was a monogamous person looking for a long-term relationship, would drive stuff in a given direction, you know, like, you know, I can, I can hang out with, you know, one of my partners and [00:59:51] then feel sad that they're leaving and miss them for days, you know, if I'm not going to see them, and that would drive, you know, the sort of relationship escalator stuff. You [01:00:06] know, if I was, if I was a monogamous type person.  ARIANA: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. ANDREW: We'll see each other more, we'll do this, we'll, you know, this constantly looking to sort of almost resolve or placate those emotions. ARIANA: Right. Right. ANDREW: Versus come looking at those feelings and [01:00:21] going, it's a hundred percent great, like acceptable, fine, to miss somebody, to, you know, have these different kinds of feelings.  ARIANA: Right. ANDREW: And I don't need to interpret them in other ways, [01:00:36] you know, like, you know, they can, they can just be what they are and I can notice them and acknowledge them and that could be the whole conversation about it too, which is something that's very different, right? ARIANA: Yeah, yeah. ANDREW: And I think there are lots of feelings around, you [01:00:51] know, anything from how people handle their feeling of desire to, you know, all these kinds of things, like I could feel the most intense desire for somebody and also just like, be friends with them and not have that be a thing either, [01:01:06] you know, like, there are ways in which we can handle sort of all these different kinds of feelings in a very different manner and I think that that's also a really interesting sort of situation around this.  ARIANA: Yeah, like it [01:01:21] kind of sounds like talking about the relationship between our, like, polyamory changes our relationship to gratification. Right? And I think in the ways that like, monogamy is so much about that, possession, right, and that gratification, like having [01:01:36] access to that.  ANDREW: Yeah.  ARIANA: Like polyamory, like, breaks all of that. And so, then you have to have these like new and different ways of navigating those responses and those kind of like, it changes the, like the nature [01:01:51] or like the relationships of attachment, you know? Like how, like how we make meaning out of it and how we assign meaning to it and how we, how we, I think even like, don't, you know, [01:02:06] like, don't assign meaning to it, and don't do all of those things to allow there to still be space. Right? ANDREW: Yeah.  ARIANA: I also, I need to go to the restroom very quick.  ANDREW: No problem. Yes. ANDREW: [00:00:00] Well, I want to say thank you so much for being on the show and having this conversation. It has been even more delightful and insightful than I anticipated. So that [00:00:15] is wonderful. For people who want to go follow your work and be in your orbit and I hope that everybody does, where do they find you online? How do they, how do they follow what you're up to? ARIANA: Yeah, well, [00:00:30] so first of all, thank you so much. It's been like such a joy. I really enjoyed our conversation. Online www.saltwaterstars.com. On Instagram, it's Saltwater dot [00:00:45] Stars, and I'm now public on Twitter, SaltwaterStars underscore, and then I'm also on Facebook as Saltwater Stars. So there's like plenty of options.  ANDREW: Perfect.  ARIANA: Yeah, but it's all Saltwater Stars. ANDREW: That's great. Well, thank you so much [00:01:00] for being on. I think that yeah, I'm looking forward to hearing what people have to say about these conversations and stuff, because I think it's, I think it's such an interesting world view, and I think that, you know, I see more and more people [00:01:15] kind of drifting in this direction or exploring in this direction. So hopefully this will find its way to some of those people and be helpful in some way. ARIANA: Yeah. I hope so, too. Thank you so much Andrew.  ANDREW: Thank you.

On today’s episode you will hear part 4 of 4 of Russell’s interview with Andrew Warner about the Clickfunnels start up story. Here are some of the awesome things you will hear in this part of the story: Hear Russell get put on the spot when he has to answer various questions from the audience. Find out why Russell loves Voxer so much and uses constantly. And find out how Russell plans to take Clickfunnels to the level of Sales Force in the future. So listen here to the final part of this 4 part set of the Clickfunnels Start up story as Russell is interviewed by Andrew Warner. ---Transcript--- Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome to the 4th and final installment here of the interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club, where he’s going deep into the Clickfunnels startup story. I hope you’ve enjoyed it so far. You know, throughout this entire interview, it was really fun. He brought my wife onstage and some of my partners onstage, and brought other people who didn’t like me at first onstage and kind of shared all these things. I hope all you guys are enjoying it and really enjoying this interview. I hope that this starts making you think about your startup story. Some of you guys are living your startup story right now, and maybe you’re depressed or nervous, or scared, or afraid or whatever. And hopefully this gives you motivation to know that I was there too. In fact, I’m still there many times, but it’s okay and it’s part of the game and part of the process. And someday you’ll look back and you’ll have someone like Andrew interviewing you about your startup story and you’ll be so grateful for the trials and things you’re going through now. So with that said, we’re going to queue up the theme song, when we come back we’ll listen to part 4 of 4 of the Clickfunnels startup story interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club. Andrew: And I know a lot of you have asked me what’s coming up next and Russell’s going to talk about that, how you’re going to get to Sales Force level, but why don’t I take a couple of questions from someone. Is there anyone who’s been sitting here going, “I can’t believe Andrew didn’t ask that.”? Is there anyone who has something standing out for them? Should we just have them onstage. Unknown person: We got mic’s. Andrew: We got mic’s from over there, okay. Audience member: Alright, a little bit deeper of a question. What is something, I know you’re strong in your faith, family, God, I mean kind of all around, what’s something that’s really made you who you are? You’ve mentioned before that made you as a marketer with your dad, you’re up late watching an infomercial. But what’s something that inherently that could have been experienced, maybe a quote in the back of your mind that’s just driven you, it could have been something that your parents taught you when you were young. What is, is there, it’s kind of a little bit difficult of a question to look back, there’s probably a million things. But what are one or two that really stick out, that make you the person that you are? Russell: I have a million thoughts just racing through my head. The one that just popped in the front, so I’ll share that one, hopefully it’s good. I remember when I was a kid my dad gave me a job to go clean the car. I went out there and I cleaned the car, I did my best job, I thought. And I came back in and I was like, “Hey dad, it’s clean. Can I go play?” I was like, “Come look at it.” So he could let me go out and play. And he was like, “Well, is it good? Are you proud of it?” and I’m like, “I don’t know.” And he’s like, “Well, are you proud of it.” I was like, “I don’t know.” And he’s like, “Go work on it until you’re proud of it, then come back and let me know.” And I was like, oh man. So I go back out, and I was like, “Am I proud of this?” and I was thinking about it, I guess technically I’m really not that proud of it. So I was like trying to do more things, trying to clean it better, and to the point where I was actually proud of it. And then I came back and I’m like, “Dad, okay the car’s clean now.” And he’s like, “Are you proud of it.” I’m like, “I am.” And he’s like, “Okay, you can go out and play then.” I think for me that was such a big thing because it was just like, that internal “Am I proud of this thing that I’m giving, that I’m putting out there?” and if not, keep doing it until you are. And I don’t know, that was one of those little weird dad moments that he probably didn’t mean as a teaching opportunity, but definitely has been big for me ever since then. Andrew: Good question. Is there one on this side? While you’re finding a person who has a question, Whitney, did you have more to say? You were going to ask more, right? Yeah, can you get the mic over to Whitney, please? She’s right over here. I know I didn’t ask your full question. Whitney: Hi Russell, how are you? Russell: Awesome, how are you doing? Whitney: Good. So with your business, what is, back to like when you were first starting, I kind of want to know, what’s the one thing when your business was really hard, when you were really struggling, what’s the one thing that kept you going? Just in the back of your mind. And then I have a second part of that. What would you say was your biggest failure and what was the greatest lesson you learned from it? Russell: That’s not an easy question. Andrew: The biggest failure. Russell: Oh man. So the first question was, what was the first one again? Thinking about the biggest failure, I’m trying to…Oh, what kept it going? Andrew: Give me a sec. Are you going through that now? You are, what are you going through right now? Can you stand up and get close to the mic? I can see that this is a meaningful question for a reason. What’s going on? Be open. Whitney: I’m just trying with my business, I’m trying to get my message out there. I’m really, I’m just baby parts of Clickfunnels, so I’m just figuring out how to do a funnel still. But my company is called Creating Powerful Women, so I am just trying to teach women how to grow a business while they grow their family at the same time. And I’m doing that right now, because I have 3 little tiny girls. So I’m just like, okay, I’m still trying to figure out this myself and then teach women how to do it at the same time. So it’s just, I’m still in that struggle phase. Andrew: Is it partially because you feel like an imposter, how can I tell them what to do? That’s what I was saying to you earlier. Whitney: When I don’t even know. Yeah. {Crosstalk} Whitney: I feel like I need to have that success level before I can teach women to go out and do it. But the reason when I found you in the hall, and I said, “I want Russell to be vulnerable and tell like the nitty gritty parts of the story.” And those stories are what make people relatable to you, that’s kind of where I’m at, as I realize that I grow a bigger following and a bigger audience when I’m more relatable to them, which I realize I don’t need to be up at that level to do that. Andrew: I get that. Russell: So my question for you is, have you been working with women? Helping them so far? Tell me a story of someone you’ve helped. I’m curious. Whitney: So I went through post partum depression a couple of years ago, after I had a baby and a lot of the women I’ve been reaching out to when I shared those stories, those women have been coming to me saying, “Hey, how do you get through this struggle? I know you’ve gotten past that, so I want to hear the hard stories that you went through.” So a lot of the people who I’ve been coaching one on one have been people who have gone through those exact same things  that I have. Russell: Okay when you do that, and you share the stuff with them, and that clicks for them, how does that feel? Whitney: Like I’m fulfilling what I was put on this planet to do. Russell: That’s the thing. That’s the thing that keeps me going. It doesn’t happen often, but it happens often enough that I crave that. I’m super introverted, so it’s always awkward for people to come to me, but I still love when they come to me and they’re like, “Hey, just so you know real quick…..” Like last night, we were in San Francisco, or San Diego, excuse me. Someone came up to me in the hall and I was kind of like, I’m nervous to talk to you but you’re going to talk to me. And he said, “Hey, just real quick, you legitimately changed my life, you changed my family.” And started tearing up. And I was just like, I let myself feel that just for a second and then I go back to the awkwardness, but for a second I feel that. And It’s just like ahh. That’s what it’s about you know. I use Voxer for my coaching clients. So every time they Vox me and say something like that, there’s a little star button and I star it and it stores them in this huge thing of all the starred ones. So now days I’ll go back and I’ll listen to that and I’ll listen to people like 2 years ago that said something about how something I did effected them, and it’s just like, that feeling. Because everything we do in this life is for feeling’s right. Everything is just a feeling we’re looking for. We eat because we want a feeling. We did this because we, I wanted a feeling. We’re doing everything for a feeling. So it’s like if I can remember the feelings of the thing I’m trying to get, and I can experience it again, then it, that’s what gets me and keeps me going.  And I think that any of us that are lucky enough to have those feelings, a lot of times we forget about them. No, remember that because that’s the thing, when it’s hard and it’s painful and it’s dark, it’s that feeling that’s just like, that’s the, you remember that and you let yourself experience it again for a minute. And then for me, that’s like, okay, I can get back up and I can go again. Andrew: Great question, I’m glad you asked it. How about one more over there? You know what, yeah, let’s give her a big round of applause, please. Audience member: I was actually going to ask a little bit about that vulnerability. I was surprised, I’m big in the SAAS space, I’ve been to Dream Force, follow a lot of Clickfunnels. It’s pretty rare to see a CEO want to put themselves kind of on the roasting side of things. You’re from here, from Sandy. I was just kind of surprised, what was it that really compelled you to kind of want to come back and do this in Utah? When I saw your email I thought it was a clickbait scam. Russell: Oh it is, we’re selling you something next. Audience member: I really thought I was going to come and it was going to be a video of your face spinning and it was going to be like, “Hi, we’re here.” Because I follow Clickfunnels, but it’s just really rare, especially being down in Utah county, that was kind of unique that way. Andrew: Wait, one sec. Does Clickfunnels allow me to actually place someone’s city in the headline, like I want someone from San Francisco, you could. Oh, alright, I get it. Audience Member: It said like Idaho, we’re in the surrounding areas, it’s going out to 8000 people, limited seating. So as a marketer I was just like, is this a real thing? You know. So I showed up and I was excited to see you. But why come back to Utah, what does this event mean to you and why want to be vulnerable and kind of open up? I learned a lot about you personally that was great to hear from a business side. Russell: So my beliefs are, and I believe we have the best software company in the world, so I’m going to start with that. But if it’s just about the software, then it comes down to who’s got what feature. People are moving and shifting and changing because of the features. That’s the thing. So Clickfunnels was like, no it has to be more and it has to be a thing. And it’s interesting, people who sign up for Clickfunnels, who click on an ad, they come and sign up. That’s why John can’t do, it doesn’t work that way. They sign up for a web, clickfunnels is a website builder for crying out loud. You boil it down, we are a website builder. That is boring. So people don’t come for that. They stay for that. That’s why they stay, that’s why they stay. But they come because of a feeling, and they come because of a connection. I want to be able to take the videos from here because if I can more people who come through my funnels to hear this story, they’re going to stick with Clickfunnels because they realize we have a soul. There’s a reason behind this, it’s not just the software company who’s trying to make a bunch of money. We’re actually, we have belief behind it. So that’s why we do all these things. That’s why I still write books. That’s why we do videos. That’s why we do vlogs. That’s why we do this fun stuff, because it builds connection with people, and connection really keeps people staying, even if some other company’s got a different feature than we do, or it’s cheaper and we’re more expensive, or whatever. So that’s the big reason why we still do it. And then I thought it would be fun to come down here because I grew up not far from here and it’s just kind of a fun thing. We’ve been working with the Harmon Brothers and we started another project with them and their family owns the Dry Bar Comedy Club, if you guys have ever watched Vid Angel, that’s one of their families companies. When Vid Angel had their little hiccups, they shifted all the programming to this, the Dry Bar Comedy Club, so we used to watch all the comedians here. And I was like, this is like the coolest location to do something like this. And one of the other side jokes, I don’t know if I shared this with you or if it was just in my head, but Andrew is famous for doing these big scotch nights, and as a Mormon I can’t drink scotch. And I was like, what if we did this, but at a Dry Bar, just this funny play off of that? And it all worked out. Andrew: You know, usually at events I do scotch night afterwards and say, ‘Everyone come back to my room.’ That’s not going to go over very well. But Dave’s been to mine. He drinks water and feels comfortable. We have good water for Dave. How about one more, then I want to get into the future. Audience Member: So you always talk about how, like for Clickfunnels you guys took like 6 tries to finally make it work, right. And how most of the time when you guys start something it doesn’t work the first time, that’s why you have audibles and all those things. So I was wondering as someone that, you know I’m starting and getting that, kind of like that lifts, what is the biggest thing that you see, versus like a flop funnel versus something that kind of takes off and explodes? What’s the audible or the change that you normally do that shift or the message change or whatever it is, that makes it finally take off? Russell: Traditionally the difference between a funnel that works and doesn’t work, I’d say it’s probably 50% offer. Like if the offer’s wrong it’s not gonna, that’s usually the first thing. But then if it’s actually a good offer, that people actually want, second then is usually copy. So like what’s the hook, those kind of things. And then design is probably 3rd. All that stuff that Theron and those guys didn’t like at first. The things that, because it’s not like we just made up this stuff, you saw 8000 funnels we tested and tried in the journey of 15 years of this, that now we know what things people convert on. So it’s just like looking at stuff that you know is working and modeling it because you this structure works, this kind of thing. But usually when something is broken it’s coming back and figuring out, this offer’s not right. People didn’t want it. And that was the problem with Clickfunnels. The offer, we took 4 or 5 times to get the offer right, and then as soon as the offer is right, you can tell when it’s right because people will buy, even if everything else is bad, if your offer is amazing people will give you money for it, you know. So that’s definitely the biggest part, and from there it’s copy, then design, then all the little things that stress some people out, like me. Andrew: So I’ve got, we’ll come back. I see there are a few people that have more questions; we’ll come back to them in a moment, including you. I promise I’ll do more. But you did tell me about all the different things you guys are working on now. Of all of them, what one is going to get you the closest to Sales Force level? Russell: That’s a good question, there’s so many things. So I would say, I’m going to ask you a question is that alright? Have you ever played bigger yet? Played bigger? Playing bigger?  Andrew: No, what do you mean by that? Russell: That’s the name of the book right? Play Bigger? Andrew: Oh Playing Bigger, the book. No. Russell: Yes. So that’s book’s been interesting, if you guys haven’t read it, it’s one of the biggest ones as a team that we’ve been reading. But it’s all about designing the category and becoming the king of that category. So I feel like we are the king of sales funnels, and that’s our category, the thing that’s going to be there. And then if you read through the book, the next phases are like, building out the ecosystem that supports you as the category. And the fascinating thing about sales force, if you look at it when, I probably shouldn’t say this on video because someday Mark Benioff’s going to watch this and be like, “I’ll never give you money.” But sales force isn’t great software, right. It’s this hub that things are tied into, but the reason why they did 13 billion this year, they’re trying to get to 20 billion is because they built this ecosystem. The ecosystem is what supports this thing and grows it up, and builds it. And that’s like the next phase. So I think for us, it’s like we have this, we have funnels which are the key. It’s like the CRM for them, it’s the central point. But it’s then bringing all the ecosystem, it’s building up all the things around it, right. Andrew: Letting other people create things on your platform, becoming a platform. Russell: Yes, becoming a true platform. Andrew: can you create a platform when what you want is the all in one solution when you’re saying, “you don’t have to plug in your chat bot to our software. We’re going to be chat bot software.” “You don’t have to plug in infusion soft, we’ve got email marketing in here or mail chimp.” Russell: It depends, because you look at Sales Force is similar too. They have their own things that they either acquire and bring them in, or they build their own, things like that. And I think it’s a hybrid of that. I think it’s, we allow people to integrate because some people have tools. We will, our goal is to always be the best sales funnel builder on planet earth. We may not be the best email auto responder in the world, we have one and that increases our revenue. And people who love us will use our email auto responder, but there may be some other one that’s better. But it’s not our big focal point. There may be a chat bot that’s got more features and more things, that’s not gonna be our focus to make it the best, but we’ve got one built in to make it. So theer will be, that’s kind of our thought, that we will have the things included, so if people want to go all in they can use it. But if they love yours because of these things, they can still bring that and still bring it in. You know, and then as we grow, who knows what the next phase is. Is it acquisitions, finding the best partners? People that most of our members are using, start acquiring companies and bringing them in, internally similar to what Sales Force does, growing the platform. Andrew: Just keep letting people build on your platform and then does that make the platform more valuable, or do you guys get a share of the money that people spend on these external tools? Russell: Both, I think. Stripe for example, Stripe, I think we process 1.7 billion dollars through Stripe. We make over a million bucks a year from Stripe referral fees, for just letting them connect with us. So there’s value on both sides because it makes the platform more valuable because people can use it easier, but we also make money that direction as well, and those type of things. Andrew: Okay, what is Actionlytics, Action… Russell: Actionetics. Andrew: Excuse me. Russell: So that was Todd’s name. He loved that name. So Actionetics is, it’s what we call internally, follow-up funnels. So we have sales funnels, which are page one, page two, page three, page four. Then a follow-up funnel is send this email, send this text message. “Here’s the retargeting pixels, here’s the thing.” So it’s the follow-up funnels. It’s all of the communication that’s happened after somebody leaves the page with your audience. Andrew: And that’s a new product that you guys are creating? Russell: Yeah, it’s been, actually we make more revenue from Actionetics than we do from Clickfunnels right now. We’ve never marketed it outside though. Andrew: I can’t get access to it, it asked me for my username and password. I said, I don’t have that, so how do I sign up for it? Russell: it’s only been in beta. So we opened up at Funnel Hacking Live, people signed up there. And then we kept it down for a year, then we opened it, so two Funnel Hacking Lives we opened it, and then my birthday we opened it. So that’s it. But we have, it’s over, 12-13 thousand members who have upgraded to that. And then we’re probably a couple weeks away from the actual public launch where people will be to get, everyone will be able to get access. Andrew: And already people are spending more money on that than Clickfunnels? Russell: Yeah, because it starts at $300 a month versus $100. So it’s the ascension up. So they go from $100 a month to $300 a month and then the new one, it scales with you. Because we’re sending emails and Facebook message, it gives us an ability to grow with the platform as well, and not just have a $200 a month limit. Someone might pay $1000 or $5000 depending on how big their lists are. Andrew: You’re really good at these upsells, you’re really good at these extra features. How do you think about what to add? How do the rest of us think about it, based on what’s worked for you? Russell: Okay, that’s a great question, and everyone thinks it’s a product, the question most people ask is, what price point should my upsells be? It has nothing to do with that. It has 100% to with the logical progression of events for your customer. So when someone comes to you and they buy something, let’s just say it’s weight loss. So they come to you and they buy a weight loss book right, and let’s say it’s about how to get abs. So they buy that, the second they put their credit card in and click the button, in their mind that problem has now been solved. I now have six pack abs, the second it’s done. And people don’t think that. So what people do wrong is the next page is like, “Cool, you bought my abs book. Do you want my abs video series?” it’s like, “No, I just solved that problem. I gave you money. It’s been solved.” So what we have to think through, for logical upsells is like, “okay, I just got abs, what’s the next logical thing I need?” So it’s like, “Cool you got abs now, but how would you like biceps? We can work it out. This is my training program to grow here.” For funnels it’s like, here’s this funnels software, or here’s this book teaching you how to build funnels, but after you have a funnel you need traffic. So traffic’s the next logical progression. So as soon as someone’s bought something, the customer’s mind, I believe, that problems been solved. And it’s like, what’s the new problem that’s been opened up, because that problem’s been solved. That’s the logical… Andrew: I got my email addresses because of Clickfunnels, the next problem I’m probably going to have is what do I send to people? And that’s what you’re solving. What about this, fill your funnel, it’s a new software. Russell: Yeah. Andrew: What is it? Russell: How do you know these things? That is good, you have been digging. So I’m writing my third book right now, it’s called Traffic Secrets, and then on the back of it we have software that’s called Fill Your Funnel, that matches how we do traffic with the book. So when someone reads the book, you login and the way we do traffic, we focus very heavily on influencers. We call it the Dream 100. So you come in and you login and you’re like, “Here’s the people in my market. There’s Tony Robbins, there’s Andrew..” you list all these people and it starts pulling all our data, scraping all their ads, their funnels, everything  and shows you everything that’s happening in their companies, so you can reverse engineer it for what you’re doing. Andrew: So if I admire what John is doing for you guys, I could put you in the software, you’ll show me what you guys are doing, and then I’ll be able to scrape it and do it myself. You’re nodding. And you’re okay with that? John: It’s awesome. I’m excited. Russell: Excited. Andrew: Have you been doing that? Is that part of what’s worked for you guys at Clickfunnels? John: Yeah, we like to, we call it funnel hacking. We like to look and see what other people are doing. Andrew: So you’re actively looking to see what other, man as an interviewer that would be so good for me to understand what people are doing to get traffic to their sites. Alright, so… Russell: We buy everyone’s product, everyone’s. I bought Drew’s like 6 times. Yeah, you’re welcome. Just because the process is fascinating to see. Andrew: And then the book. What’s the name of the book? Russell: Traffic Secrets. Andrew: Why is everything a secret? What is that? Russell: I don’t know. Andrew: No, I feel like you do. I remember I think it was… Russell: It all converts, 100% because it out converts. Andrew: Because the word, “secret” out converts? In everything? Russell: Everything. I used to onstage be like, “The top three myths, the top three strategies, the top three lies, the top three everything” and like “secrets” always out converted everything else, and then it just kind of stuck. Andrew: And then that’s the name of this book. I’m looking here to see…yeah, Melanie, she told me when you organized this event you said, “Secret project”. That’s it. Russell: If I just tell people what’s happening then they like, “Oh cool.” I need to have to build up the anticipation. Andrew: Even within your team? Russell: Especially within the team. Yes. Andrew: Especially. So secret is one big thing. What else do you do? Russell: Secrets, hacks… Andrew: No, within the team. So now you get them interested by saying it’s a secret. Russell: So I’ll tell them a story, I’ll tell them the beginning of a story. I’ll be like, “Oh my gosh you guys, I was listening, I was cleaning the wrestling room and I was going through this thing, and I was listening to Andrew and he was doing this campfire chat and it was amazing. And he’s telling this whole story, and I have this idea, it’s going to be amazing. But I’ll tell you guys about it tomorrow.” So what happens now, is they’ve got a whole night to like marinate on this and be like, “What in the world?” and get all excited. And then when they show up, they’re anticipating me telling them, and then when I tell them, then I get the response I want. If I tell them they’re like, “Oh cool.” I’m like, no, you missed it. I need that, in fact, I’ll share ideas all the time, I’ll pitch it out there just to see. I know it’s a good idea because Brent will be like, “I got chills.” Dave will start freaking out, and that’s when I know, “Okay, that was a good idea.” If they’re like, “Oh that’s cool.” I’m like, crap. Not doing that one. It’s the same thing. Andrew: I’ve heard one of the reasons that you guys hang out together is one, he’s an extrovert and you’re an introvert, but the other one is Dave will one up you. Russell: It starts the process. This is the bubble soccer event we did. Initially it was like we’re going to have influences, or we were launching the viral video and like we need, let’s bring some people into it. And then we were asking how someone could bring big influencers, like “you have to do something crazy. Like get a Ferrari and let them drive over it in a monster truck.” I was like, “That seems extreme.” I was like, “What if we played football on the Boise State Stadium?” And Dave’s like, “What if we did bubble soccer? What if we tried to set a Guinness book of world records…” and then next thing we know, we’re all Guinness book of world record champion bubble soccer players. It was amazing. Andrew: And that’s the thing that I’ve heard about your office environment. That it’s this kind of atmosphere where, see for me, look at me, I’ve got that New York tension. When I talk to my people and I talk to everyone it’s like, “You’ve gotta do something already.” And you guys like fun, there’s a ball pit or whatever in the office. Am I right? You go “we need a, we’re gonna create a new office. Let’s have a bowling alley in it and a place to shoot.” That’s the truth. Russell: It is the truth. It’s going to be amazing. Andrew: Does he also tell you, “We need to do something this weekend. Date night, it’s a secret.”? Russell: Maybe I need to do more than that, huh. Andrew: Yes, does he use persuasion techniques on you? Russell: It doesn’t work on her. Andrew: No. Russell: She’s the only person I can’t persuade. It’s amazing. My powers are useless against my wife. It’s unfortunate. Andrew: Do you actually use them, or when it comes to the house you go, “come on, I’m tired already, just…”? Russell: I tried to do something today and she was like, “That was the worst sales pitch ever.” I’m like, “Dang it. Alright, I’ll try again.” Andrew: Hey Siri, text my wife “I’ve got plans for tomorrow night. So good, Russell just told me about it. I’ll tell you later. Secret.” Period, send. Russell: That’s amazing. Andrew: Wowee. Does anybody know how I can get a babysitter here. {Audience speaking indistinctly} Andrew: They’re a little too eager to spend time with my kids. Thank you. Alright, I said I would take a few more questions. I know we’re almost out of time here. Who was it, it was someone on the right here that was especially, you looked, uh yeah you, who just pointed behind you. Audience Member: Hi, okay, Russell I’ve been in your world since about 2016.. Andrew: Hang on a second, who the, I’m sorry to curse, but who the f**k comes to a software event and goes, “I’ve been in your world.”? This is amazing about you. I’m in San Francisco, there’s nobody that goes, “I’m so glad I’ve been in the hubspot world.” It doesn’t work that way. I’m sorry, I had to interrupt. Okay. I’ve been in your world. He’s selling you software, you’re in his world. Sorry. Audience member: You have to listen to his podcast, it’s a.. Andrew: I’ve listened to his podcast. It’s just him talking. Audience Member: He talks about it, it’s a universe. He creates a universe. Andrew: You know what, here’s the thing that blew my mind. I thought it was him in a professional studio, I saw him in San Francisco, he’s talking into the voice recorder on his phone. Okay, yeah. I gotta feeling that Russell’s going to go, at some point, “Religion is just an info product. I think I could do a better job here.” Alright, yeah. Audience Member: okay, I entered the Clickfunnels universe in 2016 and since that time, I came in with a lot of hopes and a lot of, it was just a really exciting experience to have you break down the marketing, you really simplified it right. So I see that, I’m an ambassador for the one comma club challenge right now, and people are coming in with such high hopes and such tremendous faith and trust in you. And I have a friends that I brought into it and everything and they’re coming in, just like, they’re really staking a lot on how they’ve persuaded to join your universe. Sorry, universe is the wrong word. But from that, I guess the question is, there’s a few things. I think a lot of people are afraid of that type of responsibility in the products that they’re delivering, and of course there is a tremendous failure rate of people who don’t get what they’re persuaded in. So there’s a lot of magnification on the two comma club, and the people there that are the successes, but the question that I have is, the responsibility that you feel for that, I feel that you feel the responsibility because you’re constantly looking for new ways to simplify, bring in new coaches, bring in the new team, make products and offers that are completely irresistible. Truthfully, I went to Funnel Hacking Live, I’m not spending any money, 20 thousand dollars later. I mean it was truthfully so irresistible, but you’ve crafted such unique things in an effort to truly serve that client and really get them to the place that they’re looking to go. So I’m not sure if the question is coming out, but there’s a lot of responsibility that all these bright eyed, bushy tailed you know, wannabe marketers are coming in really truthfully feeling the genuine just truth that you’re telling them, but then there’s a big crash and burn rate too, which is normal in that space. I’m not sure what the question is. Andrew: Congratulations  to the people in the two comma club, what about the people in the no comma club. What do you feel is a sense of obligation to the people who aren’t yet there? What do you feel about that? Russell: Is that the question? Andrew: Is that right? Audience member: I guess the question is, there’s two parts, one is the responsibility that other people are feeling, the fear that they’re feeling to put something out there because they’re afraid of a failure rate. So just like, Whitney over there was talking about, she’s got those fears. So there’s normal fears that come along with that, so how you deal with that, in that it’s not because of lack of delivery on your end, but there’s still people who are spending tremendous amounts of money, or small amounts of money that just aren’t getting what it is. So it’s really about your internal feelings about that topic. Russell: It’s a good question. There’s a lot of different ways I could answer it. I’m trying to think, for me it’s a big reason I do have a con stripe, because I do feel like I have a huge obligation to people who sign up for our stuff. So I’m always thinking, how do we simplify this, how do we simplify it? What’s the best way to do it? What’s the thing? But that’s also what creates innovation right. It creates the ideas, it’s that, how do we serve these people better? How do we serve them better? Probably the best analogy, in fact, Brandon over here was working on a video that he sent me last night, that I had a chance to watch, it was really cool. We had Sean Stephenson speak at the second Funnel Hacking Live. Was anyone there for that one? A couple of you guys. Sean Stephenson, if you know him, is the 3 foot giant. He’s this little dude in a wheel chair, one of the coolest humans on earth. And he told this story, it was funny because man, I had another emotional connection watching it last night actually, watching it. And he talked about stories like, “How many of you guys here are upset because you got 17 followers on Facebook and you’ve got 13 likes on your YouTube video, and you’re pissed because of all this stuff.” And I think of a lot things that way. “I’m trying this thing, I’m not a millionaire yet, I’m not making any money, blah, blah, blah.” And they’re upset about that right. And what Sean said, he’s like, “Do you know how they choose who they’re going to save when a helicopter is flying into an ocean and there’s a boat that’s wrecked with all these people. Guess how they choose who they’re going to save?” and he said, “What happens is the helicopter drivers, they fly over there and go down to the people, going to save them, and guess who they save, they save the people who are swimming towards you.” He says, “That’s how you do it. If you try to save everyone, it will drown you, it’ll drown the boat, and everybody dies. But you save the people who are swimming toward you.” And then he came back and said, “Those 17 likes on your video, those are the 17 people who are swimming towards you. You have to understand that.” So for me it’s like, we talk about the money because that gets people inspired, but when it all comes down, the really internal belief, no one really cares about the money. They want the feeling of the connection and the help and they want to change the world. They have their thing, and so it’s like, we talk about the money because it gets people excited, but I don’t know anybody who that’s the real reason why they’re in business. They’re in because they want, they want to help those people that are coming towards them. So you notice when you get deeper into the culture, it’s not just money, money, money, money. It’s how do you serve, how do you impact, how do you change the world, how can you get your message clearer, how can you do those things? And when you shift from the money to that, then the money starts magically coming. So for me, it’s just like how do we get more people thinking that way more often. I don’t know if that’s the right answer or if that helps at all, but it is definitely something I feel a big obligation for but I also feel like I’m super grateful for the people who are willing, I’m grateful to Don Lepre, spent all that money doing the infomercial on that thing. And I didn’t implement it back then, when I was 14, right. I’m grateful to the next guy who re-inspired me and I bought the thing and didn’t do anything and then next person and all those things, because eventually it stuck. So for me, it’s like I’m going to keep creating offers and keep doing cool things, and trying to inspire people because it might not be the first or the second or the fifth, but eventually if I keep being consistent on my side, it’s going to keep getting it and eventually the right people, those who actually have something they want to share, something they actually care about what they’re doing will figure out the way. And we’re just going to keep trailblazing and trying to do our best to make a path that they can all follow. So that’s kind of how I look at it. Andrew: Great question. Let’s close it out with one more. Yes. Dave did you find someone, because I just found someone right here. Why don’t we do two more then? Since you found one and I found one. What’s your name? Sorry, Parker? Parker. Go next. There we go, let’s go to Parker next and we’ll close it out with him. Parker: Alright, so the biggest question I have for you Russell is, I’ve seen you guys’ amazing group you guys have at Clickfunnels, and every time I go in your guys’ office it’s nothing but excitement, energy, and not only you don’t have to inspire your workers to work for you. They come there excited and hearing your amazing stories that John and Brent had of, they stayed with you for all this time and you pushed them and they pushed you and there’s this amazing cycle. I’m curious as far as, because I want to have an amazing group like that one too so I can affect the world the same way that you have, and even do better than you did. And that’s a completely admiration thing, that’s I don’t know. Dave: Cut from the same cloth here. Russell: That’s his dad. Dave’s son. Andrew: Oh got it. That makes sense. Parker: The question I have for you is, how do you find those people? Is it nothing but like a whittling out process or do you see these characteristics already in the people that you have? Andrew: One sec, how old are you? Parker: I’m 20 years old. Andrew: 20 years old and you admire your dad and the guy that he works with so much that you want to not just be like him, but be more like him? Can you take of my kid tonight? Sorry, that’s amazing. Does your dad come home with this energy like this energy like, “We’re going to capture the world. This is what we’re going to do.” Parker: it is the funniest thing. Oh my gosh. Every way you see him online, social media, whatever the heck it is, it’s exactly the same way he is at home. When you see him on the tv talking about like, “Oh this is…” or when you interviewed him. Andrew: I’ve watched his podcast, I see that thing. {Crosstalk} Parker: you know as much as I do then. Andrew: What did he motivate you to, like to sell as a kid, or to upsell as a kid. Parker: So he would like talk to us like he was a sales person basically, in the aspect of he talks about things as far as, this person did a terrible job at selling. They could have done this, this, this and this.” And we’re like 10 years old, I think at the time, I think. I don’t know. It’s more of a recent change since he joined clickfunnels and he’s got this amazing excitement and energy. It’s an amazing thing and I wish to have to people like my dad when I become a, when I start to do my own thing. Andrew: It is contagious isn’t it? Parker: yeah, it totally is. Andrew: And I’ve been watching, what’s this new Vlog that you’ve got. It’s on Russell, it’s on Russell Brunson’s YouTube channel right? I’m at the end of it going, “Hell yeah, why am I taking a shower now. I gotta go, I got stuff to do.” Right. These guys are out there taking over San Francisco, that’s my city. So I guess you’re feeling the same way at home. Now, he’s there twice, he suddenly owns a place. So your question was…? Parker: My question was basically, how do you find these amazing people to work, not only for you, but with you and to help you accomplish your dream? Is it whittling out process or it you have innate ability to find people? Russell: So as you were saying that I started thinking, I’m thinking about the partners on our team, who none of them came through like a help wanted site. None of them came through like, Brent went to church with me and he showed up every single week, every single month, he was my home teacher and showed up every single month consistently and we became friends and we did stuff together. John married my cousin. We were on the boat in the middle of the lake and he pitched me on a network marketer opportunity and I was like, I love this guy. And then I pitched him back and we just, and it was amazing. And then Dave, we were at an event like this and we had a signup sheet if you wanted to take the speakers out to dinner and Dave ran back and signed up every single line under mine. So I went to every single meal with him for 3 days. I think it’s just, I think a big part of it, I think most entrepreneurs can’t build a team because they’re waiting to build the team. And I think for me, I didn’t know what I was doing so I just started running, and what happens when you’re moving forward and motion is happening, people get attracted to that. And some people will come for bad reasons and they’ll leave, and I’ve been taken advantage of multiple times, things like that will happen, but the right people will stick around. But it’s all about, it’s the motion right. That’s what people are attracted to. If something’s happening. I don’t know what’s happening, but I want to be on that train and they start coming. So I think it’s taking the initiative of “Okay, I’m going to start running and I have no idea if anyone’s going to follow me ever. But If I do this and I keep doing it consistently then people will.” And you know, it’s been a consistency thing. I’m 15 years into this business now, 8000 funnels deep. But it’s a consistency, and when you do that and you’re consistent, then the right people will just start coming into your life. But not waiting for them initially. If I would have waited to build my team initially, we wouldn’t have a team. Everyone we met was like in the, as we were having motion, the right people started showing up. Andrew: Alright. Thanks. Speaking of, thank you. How many people here are actually at Clickfunnels, if you work at Clickfunnels. Can you guys stand up if you work at Clickfunnels. There you go. I feel like at the end of this everyone’s going to want to go and meet Russell. Everyone’s going to want to go and mob him. And he’s not that social, number one. Number two, I feel like you’re going to pass up these fan-freaking-tastic conversations, I’ve gotten to know the people who work here a lot really well in preparation for this, I really urge you to see the guys, the people who are wearing these t-shirts. Get to know them. Push them into a corner, understand what’s working for them. And really, you’re fantastic people, thanks so much for helping me do this. And thank you for having me on here. I really appreciate you being open, being willing to let me take this anywhere. You said, “I understand what Andrew is trying to do. He’s trying to figure this out. I’m going to let him run with it and let him make the magic happen.” And I think we made a lot of magic happen. Thanks so much for having me here. Russell: Yeah man, it was amazing. Andrew: Thank you all for coming, I’m looking forward to meeting every one of you. Thanks.

Andrew and Chaweon talk about the art of using glamour as a form of magic. This isn't an episode just for those who like make up or feel beautiful. It is about how to use things like makeup, hair, fashion and more as acts of magic to help create the things you want in life. We also talk about charm and how to cultivate. Finally, we talk at about Andrew's moustache.  Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. You can follow Chaweon on their YouTube channel of search hichaweon everywhere else.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcription ANDREW: [00:00:00] Welcome to another episode of The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I am here with Chaweon to talk about magic and to talk about glamour and all sorts of interesting things. I've been following their work for a while, [00:00:15] and a little while ago, they were discussing how they were working glamour to forward their podcast and some of the other stuff in their lives, and I thought, yes, this is this is a topic that I really have been looking for a chance to talk about and this is the person [00:00:30] that I'd love to talk about it with! So, for those who don't know you yet, why don't you introduce yourself? Chaweon? CHAWEON: Oh, well, thank you for having me on your show. So, my name is Chaweon and I am Korean American, [00:00:45] and I started off in life as a hardcore atheist skeptic. I've only been doing magic for about two and a half three years, but, unknowingly, I've been doing glamour magic my whole life, and about [00:01:00] two years ago, I started to get more into magic and then that was about the time I started my YouTube channel. So my YouTube channel started off first as like a mukbang, which is the Korean word for like people just eating a massive obscene amount of food, but [00:01:15] then it slowly evolved into me talking to other magic practitioners. I was extremely lucky that Jason Miller, he was an early supporter of mine, and thanks [00:01:30] to the interview that I had with him, I was able to get other guests on I've had: Aidan Walker who you've had on many times . . .  ANDREW: Sure. CHAWEON: Loved his book and throughout my journey-- You can see on my YouTube channel, just with [00:01:45] each person that I talk to, I'm learning as I'm interviewing them. I'm not at all a very experienced witch, but it's me talking to them, trying to get their expertise, and using my glamour magic or [00:02:00] trying to use glamour magic on each video. Like my goal in my YouTube channel is, every video I want to look like 1% cuter.  ANDREW: Uh-huh.  CHAWEON: I mean the thing about glamour magic, especially when it's visual, is that you can tell when it works and you can tell when it doesn't work, the feedback is instant, [00:02:15] it's obvious, because it's visual, so that's kind of how I practice my magic through something as quote unquote mundane as doing a YouTube channel. ANDREW: I think it's great though. I think that. . . . You know, a long [00:02:30] time ago, I used to work in advertising, and, you know, I realized that, when I started wanting to freelance, that I needed to be way more charming than I actually had been, you know, and, and, and so, I [00:02:45] set it as a thing to work on, you know? And I did a little bit of magic around it for sure, and I did a lot of like, all right, every time I went in in public, where's my opportunity to be to be [00:03:00] charming to somebody and how do I pursue that, you know? And just motion that comfort zone all the time, and then, after a while, you know, it didn't take, didn't even take as long as I thought, you know? It's just started to switch into this capacity to drop [00:03:15] into different social situations and sort of find the right way to sort of be, to be myself, but would be within those spaces as well, you know, so.  CHAWEON: I think you're very charming.  ANDREW: Well, thank you.  CHAWEON: No, I think that's what [00:03:30] a lot of people get wrong about glamour magic. They think that it's, you know, faking a persona. They think that-- And I call that faux glamour, F-A-U-X glamour, because, you know, it's almost like a pretending, [00:03:45] almost like you're on Instagram and you're pretending you're in Paris when you're not and pretending to have a great life when your life isn't that great. That's not glamour magic. That's faux glamour and I consider that actually a type of black magic the advertising world, the marketing world tries [00:04:00] to put on people to make them feel bad, but real glamour magic--you can tell when somebody has real glamour magic because in their presence, you feel warm, you feel accepted, you feel empowered, just by being around them. And [00:04:15] so that's how you know, when you go onto an Instagram account and you feel like “my life is shit” after seeing their Instagram account. That's faux glamour. When you go on somebody's Instagram account and you feel great after you see their pictures, even if they're super beautiful. They're living a super [00:04:30] amazing life. And you feel great about yourself. That's how you know, they're doing real glamour magic. ANDREW: How did you learn this stuff? Where did that-- I mean you talked about, you know, you've been doing it in one way your whole life, right? But where [00:04:45] did, where did the, not necessarily the transition from atheist to witch, but the transition from, you know, not being conscious of what you were doing as glamour magic to being conscious of it. How was that transition? How did that come about? CHAWEON: [00:05:02] That's a really good question. I think that all women and all people of color and people who are not on, you know, like the either/or spectrum all their life: They do have to practice some sort of glamour magic [00:05:17] because they're trying to make themselves more palatable to the mainstream so that they can survive. So I think as a woman, as a person of color, as somebody who considers myself gender-fluid, I always had to do glamour magic, but when [00:05:32] I became conscious of it, was literally when I did my YouTube channel and the feedback that I was getting, like when I was doing my YouTube channel, people were saying things to me that were very complimentary.  And I realized that this [00:05:47] wasn't like a natural talent that I had in terms of like, I'm not somebody who you can put in front of a camera and I like, no, you know, I'm not like this inborn actress. I don't have that going on, and yet I couldn't deny that when I looked at the video I was just like, [00:06:02] “Girl, you know, either the sun is like hitting you right or something like that, I don't know what's going on, but there's something there.”  And so that's when I started to study the YouTube videos and and I was just like, you know what? I think this [00:06:17] is glamour magic, I wasn't sure, but I was like, “I think that's what glamour magic is,” and then I started to experiment like, “What happens if when I look in the camera, I bring this like energy up?” And I don't know how else to describe it, but it's like what [00:06:32] happens if I bring this energy up to my eyes and then I looked at the videos, just like holy shit. I can see it. So I think it was literally like two years ago. I was like, “Oh, okay, I'm doing this.” ANDREW: Yeah, that piece about, you [00:06:48] know, sort of the way in which you manage your presence around it, I think that that's really profound. You know, when you find that, when you can figure out where that is, then people are super [00:07:04] receptive to that. You know, I used to officiate weddings at one point and it was one of the things that I always sort of did on the day of, right, you know, basically from the time I [00:07:19] showed up and was hanging out with a couple before the wedding to like the actual ceremony, you know? I wouldn't usually stick around afterwards, but even afterwards for a little bit, you know, just having that presence and sort of seeing everybody from [00:07:34] that place and providing that energy to it, you know? And on the days where, you know, for whatever reasons, maybe I didn't vibe with the couple as well, maybe I was just really tired, that was harder. You could see it, you know, everybody [00:07:49] could see it, right, and those were the ones where it felt more like a performance versus an actual connection and engagement. CHAWEON: Absolutely, and that's the reason why I consider glamour magic to be one of the most sophisticated types [00:08:04] of magic, because you have to be so self-aware, you have to do lots of shadow work. You have to be also kind of aware of yourself in the context of others. So you're working on so many different levels. You have to be authentic, but you also have to be, [00:08:19] you know, just aware of how you are with just society and the realistic aspects of, “Okay, this is what society is like right now: How far can I push it, further my agenda, without getting completely like killed?”  But [00:08:34] I think also that the thing about glamour magic too is that it's very democratic and it's a meritocracy. So the thing is, is that I think a lot of people, a lot of women especially, they tell me: "Oh, you know, I don't [00:08:49] know how to do makeup. I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to do that. So I can't do glamour magic." And I'm like, no, that's not glamour magic at all because glamour magic is something that you can develop, anybody can develop. So again, it's like you don't have to be [00:09:04] mainstream beautiful. All you really need to have is a willingness to be completely authentic and that is a type of bravery that I think most people don't have. So just the fact that you can even entertain just being yourself means that you're already one [00:09:19] foot into glamour magic.  ANDREW: Yeah, being open and being present with people.  CHAWEON: Yeah. ANDREW: Like, that is a profound thing and that's the thing that isn't about what any of us look like.  CHAWEON: Yeah. ANDREW: Or any of those kinds of things. It's [00:09:34] about, you know, that inner state and that kind of inner coherence that we might have, right, if we're able to show up in that way, you know? And I think of it-- the Uber drivers that I have, you know, I live in a big city and I take a lot of Ubers, and you [00:09:50] know, some of those people are just so open and accessible and that's really charming, you know? That pulls me in and then there's the other people, you know, like my ride today, where they just sit and stare at the front window and driving, you know, the music's really like loud, and it's obvious they [00:10:05] don't want to talk, that's a completely different thing, and you know, in those situations, it's random whoever you get, but but in life, it's not, right? And so, if you are more in that first category of people then people are interested in, drawn to that more, [00:10:20] right? CHAWEON: Absolutely, and think about it: The Uber driver who is more accessible and open and makes you feel comfortable just in their vibe, they're more likely to get a bigger tip, and that's just for everybody, just any aspect of life, where you [00:10:35] want to be successful instead of faking it when you're just being you and you're just brave and you're just loving like everything about this human experience. It's not even good. Look. It's almost like because you're being you and you're bringing that out in other people. Your glamour [00:10:50] magic brings out the best in others and it's just this domino effect. So this is why, for me, this, you know, faking faux glamour is so dangerous because in today's world, that's what we see so much of and that's also [00:11:05] something that I want to make sure that people realize that is not glamour magic whatsoever.  ANDREW: Yeah, for sure, you know, and there are definitely people who cultivate that a lot too, right? You know, I run into them in various places, at conferences and [00:11:20] on the street and wherever, and you know, it's-- You can see that, what they're looking for. I mean the, that ultimately it's all ego, right? You know, it's just all their ego trying [00:11:35] to become the center of attention to, you know, it's got a sort of a narcissistic feel to it. There's not space in the connection for anybody else, often. You know, those are the sides that I see as being problematic, kind of like you talked about earlier, right? Like, [00:11:50] how do you feel after you spend time with them? Do you feel like, “Oh my God, I just hung out with a fancy person?” Or do you feel like, “Wow, what a what a great and fulfilling connection I just had.”  CHAWEON: Exactly, and faux glamour is about [00:12:05] hierarchy. It's this very, like, I don't know, like toxic, even if it's a woman doing faux glamour, it's a toxic lead masculine way of like trying to make yourself higher than another person, making things very binary, [00:12:20] making things less fluid, and to me, glamour magic is the epitome of like what very empowered feminine magic is about, and when you think about what does feminine healthy energy feel like, it's fluid. There [00:12:35] isn't hierarchy, you know, there's this watery depth to it. And that's what we're going for, the sort of like wonderful kind of like permeable sort of energy. And in that energy there is no room for I'm better than you, I [00:12:50] know more people than you, have more followers than you. There's no room for that. ANDREW: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I think that, you know, it being tied to toxic masculinity, being tied to sort of capitalism and all that kind of consumerist [00:13:05] stuff, right? You know, I think that, that all of those pieces can-- because we've, you know, predominantly all grown up in those kinds of elements or around those elements, right? That's part of that going in [00:13:20] and exercising, you know, removing those things, basically being like, “Huh, that feels off, that feels like, that makes me feel grabby or greedy or competitive or this or that or whatever,” looking at [00:13:35] those feelings when they emerge, and you know, and then sort of saying: “Okay, well, what is that about me and where did I get that from and how do I, how to release that so I don't need to carry that with me into this process?” CHAWEON: Totally, [00:13:51] and I think that you know, people think that men can't glamour magic, but, you know, men can often benefit the most from this feminine fluid non-hierarchical type of magic that is glamour magic.  ANDREW: Sure. CHAWEON: And when you're around a man who's doing glamour [00:14:06] magic, right, again, it's that same warm wonderful feeling, it's not this, like, “Whose dick is bigger than whose?” you know? So again, it's like the kind of magic that I do is very makeup-centric. So it's very femme-centric, but there's lots of different [00:14:21] types of glamour magic. It's a very diverse democratic thing.  ANDREW: Sure. Have you seen my moustache? Right? [laughing] The amount of people who comment on it and engage with it and whatever, it's like, you know, it's funny. I have [00:14:37] been going through all the stuff in my house, you know, getting rid of stuff and reorganizing and stuff over the last couple of months. And I just found this picture that I've been like looking for, for a little while, which is me at [00:14:52] high school graduation: my 12-inch Mohawk and my fish tie and my fabulous plaid jacket that I wish I still had and you know, all this stuff. And this conversation today reminds me of the [00:15:07] various ways in which, you know, that was glamour magic, right? Being like those kind of expressions. So clearly articulate, define directions for connection, right?  And, you know, the people who would just come [00:15:22] up to me and start talking about my hair or whatever. Back then, you know, it both tended to draw predominantly great kinds of attention my way, contrary to what many people would think, and, and then, [00:15:37] occasionally it would steer the other people away. You know, where people would be like, “Don't look at him, don't look at him,” I'd be like, “Okay, whatever,” right? That... come on, but, but either way, you know, it sort of sets an energy into the world right now, you know, it's the same, you [00:15:52] know, having a big handlebar moustache right before like, you see kids, they love it. Right? And I think that, yeah, I think the exactly who I think that you know, if you're not certain about these kinds of things, look at what the, what kids [00:16:07] are drawn to, right? What did kids, how do kids engage with you, you know? Because in-- With both of these things, you know, kids are like, “Oh my God, I love your moustache,” or they're like, “I love your big spiky hair blah blah blah,” like, they don't have that bias and they're such a great [00:16:22] indicator of that glamour, you know. I'm sure that you get that too or they're just like “Wow, look at how great your hair is,” or your, your eyes or whatever, right? CHAWEON: I definitely have, especially like, even little boys, they [00:16:37] like the sparkles that I have on my face--  ANDREW: Sure.  CHAWEON: Fun. So what I found is that glamour magic, if we're talking about visual glamour magic, there's many different kinds, but visual glamour magic, for me, is when you're wearing your heart on [00:16:52] your skin. So your outer matches your inner. And to have that congruence between inner and outer, that's a skill, when you can go out into the world and the way that you present, it matches how you feel on the inside. That [00:17:07] is something that most people, in their life, they feel like they can't do. They repress whatever it is. So when you're going out with your mohawk, with your handlebar moustache, you know, you're being you. And that's like an aspect of you that matches how you feel on the inside, that sort [00:17:22] of like, maybe, for the handlebar moustache, it's like more playful, like stylish aspect of you that's like, you know, showing on your skin. And so the way that people interact with you when you're being you, I would have to say, there's [00:17:37] probably lots of people who wish that they could have the handlebar moustache, but I don't know, they're worried about what other people might think or who knows? And so they're not able to just be themselves and be authentic, there's that block. So again, [00:17:52] it's like glamour magic, it requires this amazing amount of self-awareness and bravery. ANDREW: Hmm. Yeah. It's definitely true. And I also think it's-- It requires-- It seems to me that it requires a real [00:18:08] centeredness.  CHAWEON: Yes. ANDREW: Yourself, right? You know, I think about the, you know, like I was joking with, somebody was talking about clothing in there. Like, I'm sorry, we'll pause for one second while the phone rings here. That's the downside [00:18:24] to being at the shop. There's no off button on the ringer. It's like . . . CHAWEON: I feel like you should put like a photo of your handlebar moustache. Like-- ANDREW: I've totally got to, yeah, for sure. Yeah, just [00:18:39] there should be like a gif or GIF of me just being like . . . [laughing] CHAWEON: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I have a friend who does like photos like, you know, professional portraits and stuff like that. And they're just in India right [00:18:54] now, but in, maybe, I think the back, next month when they're back, I'm going to do a photo shoot and stuff and just, yeah, the whole, like, have it super waxed, and yeah, I definitely do like a couple more of those, you know bad guy kind of . . . CHAWEON: That like Salvador [00:19:09] Dali sort of like-- ANDREW: Exactly, exactly. All right. I'm going to clap and we can get started again.  So, I think there's also that temptation, sometimes, to look at [00:19:24] what other people are into and what other people are doing, you know, or to kind of get pulled off track by that, you know? Somebody was asking me a little while ago, because I've been reorganizing my house or having conversations about the kinds of things I have, and they're asking me like, [00:19:39] a big fancy attire and I'm like, I own my kilt, and I think, I think I have a suit that probably doesn't fit me anymore that I don't, that I never want to wear again anyway, because my detour into that [00:19:54] stuff was just so incongruous with me and how I am, right? You know? I'm just, that's not my thing. And yet, because of the fashion industry, because of media, you know, I think it's so tempting [00:20:10] to kind of get drawn into those other areas, and you know? And we may find something exciting there. But we may also kind of come out the other side and be like, that's really just not me and I don't need to ever do that kind of thing. You know? CHAWEON: Yeah, [00:20:26] I think the thing about glamour magic too is that there is a danger also of maybe taking it too seriously. So for me, glamour magic is very playful because you're not taking the way that [00:20:41] you look or the way that you sound, you're not taking the five senses. So seriously, when people start to identify too much with whatever it is, they're too close or something and they stop experimenting. I mean, I'm glad that you went through, you know, your [00:20:56] little suit phase, you know, you had to go through it, see what it was like, you had to try it. The thing about all those people who haven't had the handlebar moustache, maybe they would love it. They haven't tried it. It's true, right? So, I mean, like looking [00:21:11] at your-- Right now I kind of wish that I could grow one as well, because I'm gonna be super awesome, just like when I'm thinking, just be like, you know, like kind of like playing with the ends of them, you know, and I'm gonna work, you know?  So the thing is, that people [00:21:26] who are really opposed to glamour magic, even if it's authentic, they say that it's superficial. I say, so what? Why is it that people put so much emphasis on whether it's too much about the superficiality or too much against [00:21:41] it. When you're too identified with the visuals and beauty, then you become a slave to it versus when you're distant from it, when you're just like, this is just the thing. This is my need to die. I'm going to die, whatever. I don't give a shit, then it's just fun, [00:21:56] then you can be like, I'm going to try this. I'm going to try gender to me. I'm gonna try, I'm a dude but I'm going to wear heels just because I've never worn heels and who knows, I might like it. Maybe I won't. Oh, I hate it. Okay, but I tried it, whatever. ANDREW: Yeah, for sure. I think, you [00:22:11] know, hopefully, we're all going to live to be old and super wrinkly, and you know, like, yeah, it's-- People used to ask me stuff about my hair back when I had my Mohawk and whatever, you know, and I remember like, at [00:22:26] some point, in one of those conversations, like looking at my dad whose hair was kind of thinning and knowing that my grandparents on the other side, you know, their hair was kind of thinning. I'm like, I just want to have fun with my hair while I still have it, because I like that I have it. Someday, you know [00:22:41] what it's like, like what are we going to worry about? It doesn't really matter, you know? CHAWEON: Exactly. Like right now, like, my tits are amazing. So of course, I'm going to just show them everywhere, because my tits, when I'm 80 years old, like I'm going to look back at all the [00:22:56] pictures where my tits are hanging out and I'm just gonna be like fuck. Yeah, you know what, so, but the thing is is that I can say that and think that without feeling like, “Oh my God, I'm going to die when I don't have these tits anymore,” because again, there's that distance. It's just, this is [00:23:11] just this, sister look, it's just your body, whatever, just have fun with it. ANDREW: Yeah, I think that this-- There can be so much seriousness around magic. Yeah, you know like, you know, see, [00:23:26] your piece about Instagram altars, see, you know, you know, like all sorts of stuff, right? We'll link to that one in the show notes for people, go and read it, but, but, you know, the-- And I remember being like [00:23:41] super serious about magic, you know, at one point in my life, right? Just like "This is such a serious topic; I must treat it with the most respect ever," and you know, it's not, it's not that I don't respect it any less at this point, but it's also, [00:23:57] like, life is, life is really to be enjoyed and reveled in, right? You know? We come down here to have this experience, you know, from wherever we are on the other side, and to, you know, to be in a body and to [00:24:12] enjoy that and to experience it and to be playful and enjoy the different things that life has to offer, you know? Maybe I'm just too much of a Sagittarius but I was like, why do we not just enjoy all these things? You know? And why do we not let magic aid [00:24:27] us in all of those things, you know?  CHAWEON: Exactly, and that's the wonderful thing about glamour magic for those who are just like, “Well, it sounds very self-centered and like you're not really caring about what society's doing,” and I totally beg to differ because [00:24:42] what glamour magic does is, it kind of positions you in a way that's palatable to the mainstream, so that you can actually push the boundaries better than somebody who's coming at it from a way that [00:24:57] society's just gonna be like, “Whoa, too much too soon,” you know? So it's kind of like, for example, you know, we all know of artists who, you know, we all say, “Oh, they were born 20 years too early,” you know, or they were just way ahead of their time versus [00:25:12] somebody who went in at the right time, you know? So the groundwork was already laid, like society, it moved a little bit too. Let's say the left, you know, a little bit, a little bit, a little bit, and that's what kind of magic is. It's putting yourself in the place [00:25:27] so that you can push this idea just a little bit to the left because you're not threatening. And I think Westerners, especially, are just like well, why should I pussyfoot? You know, why should I try to cater to or why should I try to be anything, but you know, there's [00:25:42] this thing we have where there's honor in being confrontational and being like that ass bitch, you know, like in your face, all that stuff. You can do that or you can do it with honey. It's your choice and glamour magic is for those of us who would rather do [00:25:57] it with honey.  ANDREW: Mmm. Yeah, I think that-- I think that it's interesting how people from different backgrounds have different approaches to this kind of stuff. Right? And I think that-- I think there's a time and place for both, depending [00:26:12] on which you're doing, but I think it's really, you know, really, it's really interesting. How, depending on what you do with stuff will depend on where it goes, you know? And [00:26:27] I think that there's a time to, you know, you know, hold protests and stand in the street and yell about stuff, and that is, that can be its own glamour as well, right?  CHAWEON: Totally. ANDREW: And there's time to, you know to [00:26:42] be in a different space. You know what, it's always like, you know, because I practice an Afro-Cuban religion, you know, it's my background, and you know, I mean, Santería, the more common name for it, [00:26:57] that stuff tends to freak people out a lot. But whenever they have conversations with me about it, because I don't have any, in part because I don't have any internal conflict around it and any real concern about it, and [00:27:12] they're like, “Oh, that actually sounds super reasonable.” I'm like, “I know, that's why I'm involved. It's super reasonable.” You know, it's not this, that, or the other projection that people have put on it and those kinds of things really open people's eyes to a different way [00:27:27] of looking at it, to a different way of experiencing it. So. CHAWEON: Right, there's all different types of glamour magic and one of the most successful types of glamour magic that anyone can do is becoming accessible. You know, I [00:27:42] call it kind of like the “girl next door/boy next door” sort of vibe. And that's when you have somebody who you can just see is pushing society in some way, whether in their lifestyle or their looks, and yet when you approach them they're so [00:27:57] warm and accessible and they take away that, scary, ooh, “too much, dude!” feel. And that's sort of, glamour magic is again, after you leave talking to them, you feel warm and you feel great. The next time you, your friend [00:28:12] says some shit about that sort of lifestyle, you're just like, “Well, but I met that dude and he was pretty cool.” Mmm. So, but that's very difficult to do and I think that to do it successfully, you yourself, you have to be so like into like [00:28:27] your self-awareness and self-development and that's hard work. So glamour magic is definitely not for those who want like an easy, easy way out or like easy way to become like I don't know, Mcmagicky, with all the Mcmagicky [00:28:42] people. . . . ANDREW: Magic, mcmagic, mcmagic. [laughing] CHAWEON: Exactly. ANDREW: Well, I think that you know, let's be honest, if you're, if you're looking for the easy way, don't go to magic, go do something else. It's not as straightforward as [00:28:57] that, usually. You know, I mean for simple things, yes, but for like sort of bigger life arc-altering work and stuff like that, you know, it's a lot of work and it requires work on many levels. So yeah, for sure, so [00:29:13] I want to, I have a different thing that I also wanted to talk to you about. So you basically said, “Fuck this, I'm going to Bali a while again,” and just laughed, and I'm super curious about [00:29:28] how that happens. How did you get to making that decision, you know, tell us the tale. CHAWEON: Okay. So, I'm Korean American. So I grew up all my life in America. [00:29:43] I'm an American citizen. But about three years ago, I went to Korea, and that's my motherland and that's actually when my magic came to be. So, coincidence that I started to [00:29:58] really get into my witchy stuff in, you know, like my ancestral homeland. I don't know, but after a while, I was just like, you know what, Korea, I've extracted everything I need to get from Korea, and the last eclipse-- You know, [00:30:13] when you're doing magic, you know, it's good to look at astrological transits. So the last eclipse, like last year, like in July or something, my work situation. It was just, you know, the rug was pulled out from under me, very typical eclipsey stuff, and [00:30:28] you know, when that happened, it was kind of like, you know, like in South Park, Cartman, where it's like, “lucky guys, I'm going home,” you know, like it was sort of like that seal and I was just like, “Yeah, bye,” you know. It was this idea that magic, it will help me through making [00:30:43] this very impulsive within three months after deciding. You know, fuck.  Yeah, Bali. I was in Bali and I didn't know why I exactly chose Bali but I was drawn to it and once I got to Bali, Bali [00:30:58] is hands down the most magical place I've ever been to, and there's magic going on literally on the streets like 24/7. Hmm, especially in Ubud, which is the cultural center of Bali. So, how did I end up in Bali of all places? Right? [00:31:13] How did I go from, you know, skeptic in America to going to my ancestral homeland, becoming a witch, and then going to hands down the most magical place I've ever been to, baby, I'll ever go to, I'm in Bali, and these things, these currents, [00:31:28] that magic, has brought into my life and steered me too without a doubt. I attribute it a hundred percent--well, you know, like 80 percent--to the magic that I was doing. ANDREW: Hmm. And [00:31:43] so, what kind of-- Like this is the glamour magic, was this other magic, like what kind of what kind of stuff where you up to at that point? CHAWEON: Well, definitely glamour magic. It's something that I practice every single day. But I was also working a lot with Hecate and [00:31:59] I was giving a lot of like just offering soul and spirit, you know, just like the basic stuff that Aidan Wachter talks about in Six Ways. So I love his book, and I think that all new bewitches should read that book and practices [00:32:14] that he lays out there, not difficult to do, and they have wonderful effects in your daily life. And so it was nothing even that huge except for, you know, like the sorcery packet in Jason Miller's course that I've been taking and the glamour magic that I do and Aidan [00:32:29] Wachter's Six Ways. ANDREW: Hmm. Yeah Aidan's book is fantastic. You know, I wish-- I wish many years ago and that that had been the book I got first, you know, instead of finding, I mean, Magic in Theory and Practice, which [00:32:44] is what I started with, which is, which is great, but also like, yeah perplexing and contradictory, and so. CHAWEON: You know, I kind of skipped over a lot of the books that a lot of magic people they started with [00:32:59] because, again, I've only been doing this for like consciously for the past two years.  ANDREW: Sure.  CHAWEON: So, like, it's only now, like I just interviewed Marco Visconti, Marco Visconti, and [00:33:14] he's like an Aleister Crowley expert. So it's only now that I'm just like, “Oh shit, oh, yeah, Crowley,” right?  ANDREW: Yeah, that dude.  CHAWEON: That guy. Yeah! So like, the way that I got into magic, it was just so, I don't [00:33:29] know, like, it's non-traditional. But again, it's like the magic that I was doing, I feel like anybody could have done it, and maybe they wouldn't have had the exact same results as me, but definitely their life would have shifted, and you know, like, life would have pulled them in the [00:33:44] way that they were supposed to be going. ANDREW: Yeah. Yeah. I think that when we start doing magic, then the world starts reciprocating, right?  CHAWEON: Oh, totally! ANDREW: And, and, you know, I mean, in your case, and [00:33:59] in many people's cases, maybe the ancestors start reciprocating, right? You know? And like pulling in a different direction, of helping you find those places where you feel so, something completely different, you know, and, [00:34:14] and that might be right around the corner from you, or it might be, you know, far far away, right? CHAWEON: Absolutely. Like, so, Korea is a very neo-Confucian culture. So Confucius, for those of you who have [00:34:29] never heard of him, he was a Chinese philosopher. And he was around when like China was going through a shit ton of wars and he was just like, “Oh, chaos, this sucks, hey, let's build like an ordered society, let's build hierarchy, and people on top, [00:34:44] old people, dudes on top, and everybody just kind of like obeys and order,” and then Koreans were like, “Love that system, and we're just going to take it even further. We're going to inject steroids into that system.” And so a lot of [00:34:59] neo-Confucianism it has to do with ancestor veneration. So it's like literally like in the DNA of like millions and millions of Koreans, like modern Koreans, like the ancestor veneration in Korea is like, there's two major holidays in Korea. [00:35:14] And on those days, the country should sound, this is like a first world country, right, like super modern, it shuts down, and people, millions of people are setting out a table filled with like food for their ancestors and worshiping ancestors. [00:35:29] They may not understand why, but it's happening across Korea on two days, specifically, millions of Koreans. And of course Americans, we don't really do that.  Yeah, and Christianity when it came into Korea tried to discourage [00:35:44] that, but when I went back to Korea, and Koreans are very good at kind of meshing a lot of the old confusing ways. Christianity, and Korean Americans a lot more hardcore with their Christianity, but that's totally different story. But when I went to Korea and I was in the presence [00:35:59] of the mountains, which are considered like ancestral, like, like holy places-- By the way, North and South Korea: It's like split in half, and there's this mountain range that's considered like the spine of the dragon that's been cut in half because the country was cut in [00:36:14] half and even Kim Jong, Kim Jong Hoon, Kim Jong-il. Anyways, those guys, the North Korean dictators, like all their propaganda, it involves like them being on the mountains, like mountains are a huge deal in pre-industrial anything. [00:36:29] So, being in the land of the mountains, and my ancestors, and just being part of this magical current like, without a doubt. Like I think that ancestor veneration is probably one of the easiest [00:36:44] ways to get into magic. ANDREW: Yeah, I think so. You know, in my tradition, everything starts there, right? Yes, but come with your ancestors, you know, sort of, it's tough with your ancestors. You know, it's the, it's the place where you can gain the most ground the quickest. [00:36:59] It's a place where people can do the most on their own, I think, and it's the place that if you don't sort it, that business, then like, you can work on your shadow all day long, but if you're doing a lot [00:37:14] of magic and your ancestors and your relationship to the ancestors isn't resolved, that's basically just a big piece of ancestral shadow. They can always come in and mess things up, if you haven't fixed it, you know. CHAWEON: Yeah, I totally [00:37:29] forget where I read this, but it was about how, what happened to your grandmother, like DNA, like whatever sort of life that she led. It's like in your DNA, as well as something about up to certain generations. So think about how [00:37:44] many people in the world, maybe the majority of the world's population, they have so much trauma in their DNA, because of war and and all that. I mean, especially in places like Asia, Korean war happened in my grandmother's [00:37:59] generation.  ANDREW: Sure.  CHAWEON: And if you're in Southeast Asia, we're talking the Vietnam War that happened after the Korean War, we're talking about massacres that happened in Cambodia. Yeah. There's a lot of trauma that's in our DNA and I didn't really believe in any of that to [00:38:14] be honest about the skeptic. But I remember there's this one doctor. I think his name is Dr. Bruce Lipton or something like that, and he's like a mainstream doctor, right? He's not, you know, like this woo guy. Then, he was talking about DNA and about [00:38:29] the effects of basically ancestral trauma on DNA, and that's when I was just like, oh, a little bit more open-minded about it. So if mainstream science is starting to sort of get into it more, I'm just like, oh well, magic was way ahead besides, I'm sure. ANDREW: Yeah, and [00:38:44] I think, if we, if we think about, you know, the past several generations, right, like we don't have to go back very far before there was probably difficulty, tragedy, poverty, [00:38:59] war, the Depression, you know, like all those wars and conflicts of the last century. And then also, just, you know, more random things, like violence, tragedy, you know, we go back a few generations. What was the infant mortality rate? [00:39:14] How many people watched their kids die? You know, I mean, so many of those things were just way of life, right? But that doesn't mean that they didn't come with trauma and they weren't difficult and it didn't mean that they're not still affecting us [00:39:29] now. So for sure, yeah. CHAWEON: Yeah, so I think that, clearing out the ancestral trauma. I interviewed Liv Wheeler, who's a contemporary voice diviner. And this was [00:39:44] an interview that was the first interview that I did in Bali and it was such a neat coincidence that I was able to talk to her, and she works a lot with ancestral spirits, and she was talking about how she, you know, and people are sensitive. They can see how-- I [00:40:00] don't want to say that there are ghosts but like there's ancestral residue that can stick to people.  ANDREW: Sure.  CHAWEON: So clearing it is, you know, like guys, like, that's for everybody's benefit, like it helps. The ancestors were [00:40:15] able to kind of like let go of their baggage, it helps you, so it's like a win-win for everybody, for sure, ancestral cleaning. ANDREW: Yeah, absolutely, or even just paying attention to them. Right? Like just, yeah, say [00:40:30] some prayers for them, you know. Let it go. For them, periodic knowledge that you know, like just, just that alone can make a huge, huge difference, right? You know, it doesn't, it doesn't need to be, you know, big shamanic this that or the other thing or elaborate ceremony [00:40:45] or whatever, you know, just be like, hey everybody. Hey, all you people that I came from, we're saying these prayers for you. These are the prayers that I think you would like, you know, because that's what you liked when you were alive, you know, or whatever, and it's so helpful, right? Can [00:41:00] move so many things and provide some of the possibilities. CHAWEON: Exactly and for the skeptics out there: When you do these rituals, okay, even if you don't believe in any of the ancestral residues or anything like that, and you're just like [00:41:15] well, you know, just doing it, just makes you feel better. It's a placebo effect. So what, it helps you, it brings peace to your life anyways, so I don't see any downside to it. That's how I've always operated. I'm still a skeptic in a lot of ways. So [00:41:30] for me, it's like, what do I say? In this mundane world that shows that it's working, but I just go on that, and every time I've done magic my life has become more authentic and it's moved in ways that feel better. So even [00:41:45] if I'm a skeptic, I'm okay with it. ANDREW: So how has your skepticism changed over time? CHAWEON: In a lot of ways, it's become more entrenched, because now, I'm just like “Oh shit, I'm starting to really believe in this stuff, can't [00:42:00] do that,” you know, got to stay like uber skeptical, especially now that I'm starting to be like, “Whoa, this is magic. Hmm.”  So there's that, and I think that's a very healthy way of moving through [00:42:15] magic because, okay, one of the things that I learned in Bali-- There was this amazing Balinese friend that I have. Well not was, but he still is, not-- Oh, and he was just a simple woodcarver, [00:42:30] and that's you know, he was just a master woodcarver, him and his dad, and he was talking about how at the age of 40, a lot of Balinese people decide they're going to retreat from public life and they're going to just study. And in Bali, they do like a-- It's [00:42:45] mainly a Hindu island, but they do kind of like their own tropical Hinduism, but he was-- Think how a lot of people, not a lot, but there's all these people who decide you know, “I'm just going to read the books, I'm smart, I can learn [00:43:00] what I need to learn, like from these books and stuff,” and they don't get a teacher. And you can tell, because these are people who become super ungrounded.  And he was like, “Oh, you know, you can tell that they didn't have a teacher, because they're going to go out and they're going to like, talk to trees, but like like crazy [00:43:15] person, and you know, their life is going to go to shit, versus when you have a teacher and you're grounded because you have somebody who can tell you, ‘Whoa, you're seeing visions, kind of ignore that, maybe that's just your imagination. Oh, you're having visions and it came with this. Maybe there's something to it.'” He [00:43:30] knows, having somebody to help guide you, so it's almost like an outside skeptic. That's very helpful. And that's when I realized the importance of having teachers, mentors, and like a community outside to kind of help steer you away from being [00:43:45] way too ungrounded. ANDREW: Yeah, I think, you know, as as a, I think godparent in my religion to people, you know, you could definitely sort of say that one of my [00:44:00] jobs is to be skeptical of some of that stuff for people, right? Good guy. Let's get-- “You had a dream. Let's go ask. Let's go actually ask the oracle that we use to speak with these spirits and see what they say.” Like, let's see, you know, or whatever, right? And you know, and sometimes we find out something [00:44:15] really profound when we notice things and sometimes we find out that it didn't mean anything, right?  I remember, I remember I was like doing this series of ceremonies and every [00:44:31] day I was doing this series of ceremonies for a while. And at the same point in the ritual, which was also kind of like the peak of the invocation parts, the sound would start happening in [00:44:46] my temple space. And I was like, “What is that? What is going on? What's manifesting?” Whatever, and you know, and I go around, and I'm like, trying to figure out if it's something, is it like the pipes, or is it this or that, nothing, [00:45:01] right? Like no obvious reason why that sound is there. So I went to my teacher and told him and he's like, “I don't know,” and I was like, “Oh I wanted to do something profound, but okay.” And, and [00:45:16] this went on for like, I forget how long I was doing this work, like maybe a month, maybe six weeks, and then right near the end, what I realized was that the oil lamp that I was using, it got hot enough, uh-huh, sounds right and it just [00:45:31] happened to coincide with that moment in the ritual. Right? So, you know, it's just like things, that the phenomenon of things aren't necessarily worth getting caught up in, they're worth noticing, but they're also worth saying, “Well, if that's significant, [00:45:46] I'll know that in time, but right now, I'm just going to notice it and carry on with what I'm doing,” right? CHAWEON: I think there's this thing where I just get very-- Okay, because before the magic thing, I was one of those women who saw other women get really [00:46:01] into new age stuff, and you know, they're like, so into crystals and like whatever and it was just kind of like, it was very annoying. I call it like the Gwyneth Paltrow effect, right? And it was very like, have you seen this YouTube video called like “Shit New Age Girls Say”? It's [00:46:16] like a parody. ANDREW: I've seen a bunch of those videos. I don't know if I've seen that specific one, but-- CHAWEON: Oh, it's so spot-on and I remember thinking, “Oh girl, you are so ungrounded. I can't be around you,” you know? Like everything is pleiadian and alien spaceships [00:46:31] are, you know, right above you, and you know, like you're going to wear purple skirt and shit because it's like bringing your energy somewhere, and I was just like, I can't deal.  ANDREW: Yeah. CHAWEON: And I was like, okay super ungrounded energy. I don't like that. And so, that's the reason why, [00:46:46] the more I get into magic, the more like, stringent and hardcore my skeptic has to become, because I'm just like, if it doesn't do that, then I'm afraid that, you know, like instead of being in this world and doing magic in this world, I'm just going to be like, often, [00:47:01] like I'm doing magic in like some abstract fourth, fifth, 20th dimension. ANDREW: Sure or nowhere at all. CHAWEON: Or nowhere at all. [laughs] And that's no fun because we're like, in this world, we're living in this world, you know, like let's have fun in this world. ANDREW: [00:47:16] Yeah. Absolutely. Well, I want to thank you for taking time to hang out and chat with me today. CHAWEON: Thank you. ANDREW: And I understand you have a thing coming up a course on some of this stuff that might be of interest to [00:47:31] people who are listening. CHAWEON: Yeah, so I'm actually putting on my very first magic class and it's going to be about, surprise, surprise: glamour magic. And it's called Fierce, like “ooh girl, you look fierce,” and it's just [00:47:46] basically a very accessible way of starting out in glamour magic, so, bringing in archetypes to start putting makeup on your face, to invoke, evoke, and conjure up these archetypes. And so, this [00:48:01] is just for anybody who may not be a hundred percent into magic, or maybe you are, but I see it more as like also a really great introduction into a little bit of astrological magic but also it's a whole lot of magic in terms of like makeup [00:48:16] magic. So I mean, makeup is like a huge part of like my identity. I used to be a makeup artist when I was in college. So it's how to transform yourself using mundane tools. Instead of using like a wand, you're using a [00:48:31] blush brush [laughing]; instead of drawing sigils on a piece of paper, you're drawing a crisp cat eye with an eyeliner brush, hmm with liquid liner. Same thing. So it's taking magic with makeup and transforming [00:48:46] yourself and doing it all with this like, real glamour, not faux glamour. ANDREW: Perfect. And where do people who want to come and bask in your glamour find you on the social media these days? CHAWEON: Oh, well, they can just Google Witches and Wine. [00:49:01] Usually my YouTube channel comes up like first thing, and on, on social media, it's, you can just look me up. It's hichaweon, but I think it's mainly through my YouTube channel, all my social media stuff is there.  ANDREW: Perfect. [00:49:16] Awesome. Well, thank you so much for making time to chat. It's been a real pleasure. CHAWEON: Thank you, Andrew. So good to talk to you.  

On today’s episode you will hear part 3 of 4 of Russell’s interview with Andrew Warner about the Clickfunnels start up story. Here are some of the awesome things you will hear in this part of the story: Hear how selling Clickfunnels at a Mike Filsaime event got Russell his first ever big table rush at the end of his presentation. Hear from both Dave and John about how they feel about Russell and what they do for the company. And find out how going to Dream Force this year, renewed Russell’s passion for growing his business. So listen here to find out more about the Clickfunnels start up story. ---Transcript--- Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome back to the Marketing Secrets podcast. I hope you enjoyed episodes 1 and 2 of the interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club where he was telling the Clickfunnels startup story. I hope you are enjoying this interview series so far, and I hope also this motivates you guys to go over to the mixergy podcast and subscribe to everything that Andrew does. Like I said, he is my favorite interviewer and I think that what he does is second to none. So I hope that you guys enjoy him as well, and go subscribe to the mixergy podcast. But with that said, I’m going to queue up the theme song, and when we come back we will start into part 3 of the Clickfunnels startup story interview. Andrew: I actually got, I did see, I don’t know, I didn’t see the video you mentioned, but I did see what it looked like. Here’s one of the first versions. He compared it to Clickfunnels, he said, I mean to Lead Pages. He said, “Look at how Lead Pages has their stuff all the way on the left, all the controls.” Oh you can’t see it. Oh, let me try it again, let me see if I can bring up the screen because this is just, it’s just too good. Hang on a second. I’m just constantly amazed how you’re able to draw people to you. So this is the article from Lead Pages, this is the first landing page from Clickfunnels, this is what he created before, this is what you guys did together. This is your editor and h e said, “Look, if you’re on Lead Pages, their controls, their editor is all the way on the left and it’s just moving the main content to the right, which is not looking right. And I prefer something that looks like this, with a hundred pixels on the left, a hundred pixels…” I go, who knows a hundred pixels, it’s like you, what is this? Russell: Dylan is obsessed with that type of stuff, it’s amazing. Andrew: Obsessed. And you draw people like that. You draw people like Dave, who is just phenomenal. Dave, the traffic and conversion event that he was just talking about, is that the one that you went to? Dave: The one after that. Andrew: The one after that. Okay, we’ll come back to that in a second then. So this became your next version, you brought on a new partner, and then you did a webinar with this guy. Who is this guy? Russell: It’s Mike Filsaime, one of my first friends online. It actually wasn’t a webinar, it was a live event. He was doing a live event in San Diego and he was like, “You have to come and sell Clickfunnels.” And I was like, “Nobody’s buying Clickfunnels.” We had a free trial and like, we couldn’t give it away. It was crazy. And he’s like, “Well, you’re on this website, you’re picture is there, you have to come and sell Clickfunnels, and I need you to sell it for at least $1000.” Because the way it works, if you speak at someone’s event, you sell something, you split the money 50/50. So he’s like, “It needs to be at least $1000.” And I was all bummed out. I didn’t want to do it. And the event actually started, but they were streaming it live online, so I was actually sitting at our office in Boise, watching it as I’m putting together my slides to create Clickfunnels, and then flew out to the event. And then we had a booth, and I don’t know if I told you this, we had a booth and Lead Pages had a booth right across the little hallway, skinny hallway. And Todd’s wife was manning our booth and then Lead Pages was right there, and it was so funny because she was not shy at all about talking about Lead Pages. She’s like, “Yeah, we’re like Lead Pages except for way better. We can do this and this.” And the other guy is sitting there like, right in front of her as she’s telling them everything. And it was..anyway, I digress. It was pretty funny. Andrew: By the way, she’s still at it. I saw a video that you guys created, you were talking to her and she goes, “I will be Clickfunnels.” I go wait a minute, you still had that fire, okay. So you were at that event. Russell: So we’re at the event and there’s probably, I can’t remember, 150-200 people maybe in the room. So I got the slides up and Dylan was there and he was like, when we got to the funnels he was going to demo the editor, so I did the whole thing, showed the presentation and we demo’d Clickfunnels and at the end of the thing I sold. And I’ve been good onstage, but by far, that was the first time in probably 8 years that I’d seen a table rush, where people are stepping over the things, jumping around, trying to get to the back to buy as fast as they could. Andrew: What did you say to get them to want to do that? Russell: We made a really, I mean we gave the presentation, and gave a really good offer at the end. They get a year of Clickfunnels for free, plus they get training, plus they were going to get all these other things for $1000. Andrew: It was $1000 training and a year of Clickfunnels for free, and then they become long term members. And it was also called, Funnel Hackers? Russell: Funnel Hacks, yeah. Andrew: Funnel Hacks. And that’s the thing that became like… Russell: The culture. Andrew: This culture, this tribe. It wasn’t just they were signing to learn from you, they were becoming funnel hackers. That’s it. Russell: I mean, that wasn’t planned though. It was like, I was trying to think about a sexy name for the presentation, so I’m like ah, Funnel Hacks. And somebody owned FunnelHacks.com, and I’m like, I’m still doing the presentation that way. And then later we made t-shirts that said, “Funnel Hackers” and then now we got 4 or 5 people have tattooed that to their bodies, it’s really weird. But anyway, that’s what happened. We did that and we sold it and I remember going to dinner that night with the guys who were there, and Todd and his wife and everything. And we were all excited because we made some money finally. But I was just like, “You guys don’t understand, like I’ve spoken on a lot of stages, and I haven’t seen a table rush like that.” And I remember back, there was a guy, he passed away a couple of years ago, his name was Fred Catona. And he was a radio guy. He was the guy who did the radio commercials for, do you guys remember, it’s got the guy from Star Trek, what’s his name? Audience member: Priceline. Russell: Priceline. He did the Priceline radio commercials and made that guy a billionaire. And he told me when we were doing the radio ads, “This is what’s going to happen. We’re going to test your ad and if it works, I’m going to call you on the phone and let you know you’re rich. Because if it works, it means you’re going to be rich.” So I remember going to dinner that night and I told the guys, “Just so you guys know, we’re rich.” And they’re like, “What do you mean? We made $150,000.” I’m like, “No, no, no. The way people responded to that, I’ve never seen that in my life. We’re rich.” The response rate from that, I’ve never seen. Andrew: And then you went to webinar after webinar after webinar. Russell: On the flight home that day I’m texting everybody I’ve ever met. “I got a hot offer, this webinar crushed it. We just closed whatever percent of the room at Filsaime’s event. Who wants to do it?” And we started filling up the calendar. Andrew: And the idea was, and you told me you did 2 to 3 some days. And the idea was, they would sell somebody on a course, and then their members would then hear how your software and your funnel hacking technique would help up what they just bought and then they would sign up. You’re still excited, I can see it in your face. And then this thing took off. And then you started doing an event for your culture, your community, and this guy spoke, Tony Robbins. Russell: Oh yeah, there’s Tony. Andrew: One of the first ones. Was he at the very first one? Russell: No, he came to the third one, was the first one we had him come to. Andrew: Yeah? Why do an event? Why do your own live event? Russell: So we’ve done events in the past. I know events are good, but I’d sworn off them because the last event we did, I think we sold 3 or 400 tickets and less than 100 people showed up and I was so embarrassed. I was like, “We’ll never do events again.” And as soon as this, as soon as Clickfunnels launched and it was growing, everyone’s like, “We want to do a meet up. We should do an event.” All the customers kept asking. And against my, I didn’t really want to do it, but at the same time I was launching my book, and I had won a Ferrari in this affiliate contest so I was like, “What if we did an event and we had the Ferrari there and we gave it away and then we’re…” we had other ideas for giving away other cars and it became this big, exciting thing that eventually turned into an event. And that was the first Funnel Hacking Live event in Vegas, and we had about 600 people at that one that showed up. And that’s where it all kind of, it all started. Andrew: And it built how much, how many people are you up to now? Russell: Last year we had 3500 people and we’re on track to have about 5000 at this year’s event. Andrew: 5000? Yeah. Russell: Those aren’t free tickets. Each ticket’s $1000, so it’s…. Andrew: So how much is that in total revenue? Russell: From the event? Andrew: Yeah. Russell: So ticket sales, last year was $3 ½ million, this year will be over $5. But at the event we sell coaching so last year we made $13 million in coaching sales at the event as well. Andrew: Wow, would you come up here for a second, Dave? Do you guys know Dave? Yeah, everyone knows Dave. You know what’s amazing… {Audience catcalls} Andrew: That’s amazing. Dave: I don’t know who that is. Andrew: A catcall. I saw a video, you guys have this vlog now, a beautifully show vlog. You guys went to sales force’s conference, you’re looking at the booths and in the video, do you remember what you did as you saw the different booths? Dave: I think that one I went and asked what the prices for each of the booths were. Andrew: Yes, and then you multiplied. And he’s like, you’re not enjoying the event, you’re calculating ahead, how much. “10,000 that’s 100,000….” It’s like wow, right. You do this all the time? Dave: Yeah. It’s a lot of money in an event like that. Andrew: And you think, and if this was not your event, you would be doing the same calculation trying to figure out how much they brought in today. Wowee. Alright when you went to sales force did you calculate how much money they probably did from their event? Dave: We were doing that the whole time, absolutely. Andrew: You saw the building, you had to know… Dave: Oh my gosh. 61 stories. Andrew: Why? Why do you guys want to know that? Why does, how does that… I want to understand your drive as a company and I feel like this is a part of it. Figuring out how much money other people are making, using that for fuel somehow. Tell me. Dave: I think it actually goes back to Russell and his wrestling days. We had the experience of going to Chicago right after that, and super just exhausted. And it was one of those things where he literally landed, we walked down and we’re underneath the tarmac and all the sudden Russell goes from just being totally exhausted to a massive state change. Where he’s literally right back where he was with his dad and he and his dad are walking that same path to go to, I think it was Nationals. And I saw Dan Usher, who was doing the filming, capturing that moment and it’s that type of a thing for Russell. Where all the sudden it’s the dream, where as soon as you see it, it can then happen. And Russell’s just been amazing at modeling, and again the whole idea as far as just going at a rapid, rapid speed. I mean it’s “Ready, fire, aim.” Andrew: It’s not you gawking at the sales force, what’s the sales force event called? Dave: Dream Force. Andrew: Dream force. It’s not you gawking at how well Sales Force’s event, Dream Force is doing, it’s not you having envy or just curiosity, it’s you saying, it’s possible. This is us. That’s it. Dave: It’s totally possible. Andrew: It’s totally possible. We could get there. And when you’re sizing up the building, you even found out how much the building cost. Who does that? Most people go, “Where’s the bathroom?” How much does the building cost? Dave: There’s a number. Andrew: It’s you saying, “We could maybe have that.” Dave: We can have that, yeah. Andrew: Got it. And so let’s go back a little bit. I asked you about Traffic and Conversion because the very first Traffic and Conversion conference you went to, you guys were nobodies. Nobody came and saw you. Dave: We were put out in North 40 pasture, way, way far away. Andrew: And some people would say, “One day I’ll get there.” you told Russell, “Today we’re going to get there.” Dave: Well Russell wanted, he was speaking and so whenever you’re speaking at an event, it’s important that you fill a room, like this. And there’s nothing worse than having an event and having no one show up. It’s just the worst feeling in the world. And so he’s like, “All we need, I gotta find some way of getting people into the event. I wish we had like some girls who could just hand out t-shirts or do something.” And I was like, we’re in San Diego, that’s like my home town. Russell: Dave’s like, “How many do you need?” That’s all he said. Dave: It’s just a number. It comes down to a number. How many do you want? So we ended up having, within an hour or so we had 5 girls there who were more than happy to dance around and give out t-shirts and fill the room. Andrew: and the room was full? Dave: Packed. Andrew: Packed. And why wouldn’t you say, “One day, the next time we come to Traffic and Conversion, the tenth time we’re going to do it.” Why did it have to be right there? Dave: It’s always now.   Andrew: It’s always now. Dave: It’s always now. Andrew: It’s always now. It’s never going to be the next funnel, it’s never going to be the next product launch. I’m going to do whatever we can right now, and the next one, and the next one. That’s it. That’s who you are. Dave: That’s how it works. Andrew: And now you’re a partner in the business. $83 million so far this year, you got a piece of that. Dave: Yes. Do i? Russell: Yeah. Dave: Just checking. Andrew: Do you get to take profits home now? Dave: We do. Andrew: You do, you personally do? Dave: Yes. Andrew: Are you a millionaire? Dave: Things are really good. Andrew: Millionaire good from Clickfunnels? Dave: yes. Andrew: Really? Dave: Yes. Andrew: Wow. And you’re another one. I was driving and I said, “What was it about Russell that made you work for him? What was it?” and you said, “I’ve never seen anyone implement like him.” Give me an example of early days, something that he implemented…you know what, forget that, let’s not go back to Russell. As a team, you guys have gotten really good at implementing. Give me an example of one thing that you’re just stunned by, we did it, it came out of nowhere, we could have been distracted by funnel software, we could have distracted by the next book, we did this thing, what is it? Dave: You’re here on this stage with JP, and this was what 6 weeks ago? Andrew: and this whole thing just came from an idea I heard. You use Voxer. Why do you use Voxer? Russell: I don’t know. Andrew: Because you like to talk into it. Russell: Yeah, and you can fast forward, you can listen at 4x speed, you can forward the messages to people really easily, it’s awesome. Andrew: and it’s just train of thought, boom, here’s what I think we’re going to…No, it’s not that. I heard it’s, “I have a secret project…” Russell: “I’ll tell you guys about it later.” And they all start freaking out. “Tell us now.” Andrew: “Secret project. I don’t know what it, it’s going to be exciting.” They don’t know what it is, going to be excited. Russell: Do you know how it started, this one? I was cleaning my wrestling room listening to you, and you were, I don’t know whose event it was, but you were at the campfire, it sounded like. And you were doing something like this and I was like, I want my own campfire chat to tell our story. And then I was like, “Dave, we should do it.” And now we’re here. So thanks for coming to our campfire…. Dave: That’s how it happens. Andrew: And that’s exciting to this day. Alright, thank you. Give him a big round, thank you so much. You know what, I didn’t mean for this to come onstage, but I’m glad that it is. This made you laugh when you accidentally saw it earlier too. Why is this making you laugh? What is it? Russell: So we’re not shy about our competitors, even when they’re our friends. So one of the companies we’re crossing out is his. That’s why it’s funny. Andrew: It’s one of my companies. That’s Bot Academy there. It’s also a company I invest in, that octopus is ManyChat, I’ve been a very big angel investor and supporter of theirs. I’m not at all insulted by that, I’m curious about it. You guys come across as such nice, happy-go-lucky guys. Dave asked me if I want water, I said “Dave I can’t have you give me any more things. I feel uncomfortable, I’m a New Yorker. Punch me, please.” So he goes, “Okay, one more thing. I’m going to give you socks.” So he gave me socks. Really, but still, you have murder in your eyes sometimes. You’re crossing out everybody. This is part of your culture, why? Russell: It comes back, for me its wrestling. When I was wrestling it was not, I don’t know, there’s different mentalities right. And I did a podcast on this one time and I think I offended some people, so I apologize in advance, but if you’re in a band and everyone gets together and you play together and you harmonize, it’s beautiful. When you’re a wrestler you don’t do that. You know, you walk in everyday and you’re like, those are the two guys I have to beat to be varsity. And then after you do that, you walk in and you’re like, “Okay who are the people I have to beat to be in the region champ, and then the state champ, and then the national champ?” So for me, my entire 15 years of my life, all my focus was like, who’s the next person on the rung that I have to beat? And it’s studying and learning about them and figuring their moves and figuring out what they’re good at, what they’re bad at so we can beat them. Then we beat them and go to the next thing, and next thing, and next thing. So it was never negative for me, it was competition. Half the guys were my friends and they were doing the same thing to me, we were doing the same thing to them. I come from a hyper competitive world where that’s everything we do. And I feel bad now, because in business, a lot of people we compete against aren’t competitive and I forget that sometimes, and some people don’t appreciate it. But that’s the drive. It’s just like, who do we, if I don’t have someone to, if there’s not someone we’re driving towards, there’s not a point for me. Andrew: And even if they’re, even if I was hurt, “I accept it, I’m sorry you’re hurt, Andrew. I still care and love you. We’re going to crush you.” That’s still there. Russell: And I had someone, so obviously InfusionSoft was one of our people we were targeting for a long, long time and I had a call with Clayton and someone on his team asked me, “Why do you hate Infusion Soft so much?” I was like, “I don’t, you don’t understand. I don’t hate, I love Infusion Soft. I’m grateful for it. I’m grateful for Lead Pages, I’m grateful for….” I told them, have you guys seen the Dark Knight, my favorite movie of all time? And it’s the part where Batman and the Joker are there and Batman is like, asks the Joker, “Why are you trying to kill me?” And the Joker starts laughing and he’s like, “I’m not trying to kill you. The reason I do this is because of you. If I didn’t have you, there’s no purpose behind it.” So for me it’s like, if I don’t have someone to compete against, why are we playing the game? So for me, that’s why we’re always looking… Andrew: It’s not enough to say, it’s not enough to just say “we’re playing the game because we want to help the next entrepreneur, or the next person who’s sick and needs to create…” no, it’s not. Russell: That’s a big part of it, but like, there’s something… Andrew: Yeah, but it’s not enough, it’s gotta be both. Russell: My whole life there’s, the competition is what drives me for sure. Andrew: And just like you’re wrestling with someone, trying to beat them, but you don’t hate them. You’re not going to their house and break it down… Russell: Everyone we wrestled, we were friends afterwards. We were on the same Freestyle and Greco teams later in the season, but during, when we’re competing, we’re competing and everyone’s going all at it. Andrew: Everyone’s going all at it. That’s an interesting way to end it. How much more time do we have? How much more time do we have? I’m going to keep going. Can I get you to come up here John, because I gotta get you to explain something to me? So I told you, I was online the other day, yeah give him a big round. I was online the other day, I don’t even know what I clicked, I clicked something and then I saw that Russell’s a great webinar person, everyone keeps telling me. Well, alright, I gotta find out how he does it. So I click over, “Alright, just give your email address and you can find out how..” Alright, I’ll give my email address to find out how he became such a great webinar presenter. “Just give a credit card. It’s only $4.95, so it comes in the mail.” It comes in the mail, that’s pretty cool. Nothing comes in the mail anymore. Here’s my credit card. It goes, “Alright, it’s going to mail it out. Would you also like to learn how to use these slides? $400.” I go, no! I’m done. Russell: Welcome to the funnel. Andrew: Welcome to the funnel. I’m done. But I’m going to put in Evernote a link to this page so I don’t lose it so I can come back. I swear. I did it. And this is my receipt for $4.95. Don’t you ever feel like, we’re beyond this? We’re in the software space now, we’re competing with Dropbox, we’re not competing with Joe Schmoe and his ebook. And you’re the guy who sold the, who bought the ad that got me. John: I know. Andrew: I asked you that. Do you ever feel a little embarrassed, “We’re still in the info market space.”? John: No, I think it’s the essence of what we do, of what Russell does. We love education. We love teaching people. I mean, the software is like the backend, but we’re not software people. I mean, we sell software, but we teach people. All these people here and all the people at all of our events, they just want to learn how to do it better. Andrew: I don’t believe it. John: Okay. Andrew: I believe in him. I don’t believe in you. I believe that for you it’s the numbers. Here’s why I don’t believe it. I’m looking in your eyes and you’re like, “I’m giving the script. I’m good, I’m doing the script.” I see it in your eyes, but when I was talking to you earlier, no offense. This is why he does what he does. When I was talking to you earlier, you told me about the numbers, the conversion, how we get you in the sales funnel, how we actually can then modify…That’s the exciting part. Don’t be insulted by the fact that I said it. Know that we have marketers here, they’re going to love you for being open about it. What’s going on here? What’s going on, keeping you in this space? John: Okay, from my perspective. Okay so, initially it was self liquidation on the front, which is what I was telling you. It was the fact that we were bootstrapped, we didn’t have money to just like throw out there. We had to make sure we were earning enough money to cover our ads. And Russell had all the trust in the world in me, I don’t know why he did, but he did. And he’s just like, “Spend money, and try to make it self-liquidate.” I’m like, “Okay.” So we just had to spend money and hope that we got enough back to keep spending money. Andrew: And self-liquidate means buy an ad today and make sure that we make money from that ad right away and then software. John: Yeah. Andrew: And then you told, and then software’s going to pay overtime, that’s our legacy, that’s our thing. And you told me software sucks for selling. Why? John: Software sucks, yeah. Andrew: Why? Everyone who’s in info, everyone’s who in education says, “I wish I was a software guy. Software is eating the world, they’re getting all the risk back.” I walked through San Francisco; they think anyone who doesn’t have software in their veins is a sucker. John: I asked the same thing to myself, you know. I was running ads, I’m like why can’t I just run ads straight to the offer? Why do I have go to these info products? I want to get on the soft…. And then I was like, I feel like it’s kind of like marriage. Like it’s a big thing to say like, “You probably already built websites, but come over, drop everything you’re doing and come over here and build websites over here on our thing.” And it’s like, that’s a hard pull. But “Hey, you want to build webinars? Here’s a little thing for $5 to build webinars.” Now you’re in our world, now we can talk to you, now you can trust us, now we can get you over there. Andrew: Got it. Okay, and if that’s what it takes to get people in your world, you’re going to accept it, you’re not going to feel too good for that, you’re just going to do it and grow it and grow it. John: Yeah. Andrew: What’s your ad budget now? See now you’re eyes are lighting up. Now I tapped into it. John: We spend about half a million a month. Andrew: half a million a month! John: Yeah. Don’t tell the accountant. Andrew: Do you guys pay with a credit card? Do you have a lot of miles? John: Yeah, we do. In fact…. Andrew: You do! How many miles? John: In fact, the accountant came into my office the other day and said, “Next time you buy a ticket, use the miles.” Andrew: Are they with Delta, because I think you guys flew me out with Delta. John: Yeah, American Express is where we’re spending all our money. Andrew: Wow. And you’re a partner too? John: Yeah. Andrew: Wow, congratulations. John: Thank you. Andrew: I don’t know you well enough to ask you if you’re a millionaire, I’m just going to say congratulations. Give him a big round. John: Thank you. Andrew: Wow, you know what, I actually was going to ask the videographers to come up here. I wrote their names down, I got the whole thing and I realized I shouldn’t interrupt them, because they’re shooting video. But I asked them, why are you, they had this career where they were flying all over the world shooting videos for their YouTube channel. I’m sorry, I forgot their name, and I don’t want to leave them out. Russell: Dan and Blake. Andrew: They were shooting YouTube videos, they were doing videos for other people. I said, “Why are you now giving it up and just working for Clickfunnels all the time? More importantly, why are you so excited about it?” And they said, “You know, it’s the way that we work with Russell.” And I said, do you remember the first time that you invited them out to shoot something? What was it? Russell: It was the very first Funnel Hacking Live we ever had, and probably 2 weeks prior to that, one of our friends had an event and Dan had captured the footage, and he showed me the videos. “Did you check out my Ven Video?” I’m like, “Oh my gosh, that was amazing.” And I said “Who did it?” and he told me. So I emailed Dan and I was like, “Hey, can you come do that for Funnel Hacking Live?” And he’s like, “What’s Funnel Hacking Live?” So I kind of told him, and he’s like, “Sure.” And it was like 2 weeks later and he’s like, “What’s the direction?” and I was like, “I don’t know, just bring the magic man. Whatever you did there, do that here.” And that’s kind of been his calling card since. He just comes and does stuff. Andrew: Bring the magic. He wants to have those words painted on the Toronto office you guys are starting. Literally, because he says you say that all the time. And the idea is, I want to understand how you hire. The idea is, “I’m going to find people who do good work, and I’m going to let them do it.” What happens if they wouldn’t have done it your way? What happens if it would have gone a different direction? Russell: I see your question, and I’m not perfect. So I’m going to caveat that by, some of the guys on my team know that I’m kind of, especially on the design and funnel stuff, I’m more picky on that, because I’m so into that and I love it. But what I’ve found is when you hire amazing people like Todd for example, doing Clickfunnels. The times I tried to do Clickfunnels prior, build it was like, me and I’m telling developers, “here’s what to do and how to do it.” And like there’s always some loss in communication. With Todd, he’s like, “I know exactly what I would build because I want this product too.” And then he just built it and he showed me stuff. And I’m like, “That’s a good idea.” And he’s like, “I did this too.” And I’m like, “That’s a good idea.” And it’s so much easier that way. So when you find the right people, it’s not you giving them ideas, it’s them coming to you with the ideas. And you’re like, “that is a good idea. Go do it.” And it just makes, takes all the pressure off your back. So for us, and it’s been fun because I look at, man, the last 15 years of all those different websites and the ups and the downs, the best people have always stuck. So we’ve got 15 years of getting the cream of the crop. It’s kind of like, I’m a super hero nerd, but it’s like the Avengers, at the end of, when Clickfunnels came about we had this Avenger team of people. And we’re like, now we’ve put in our dues, now it’s time to use all of our super powers to do this thing, and it all kind of came together. Andrew: Build it and build it up. And then as you were building it up, you then went to Sales Force. You guys invited me, you said, “Hey Andrew, we’re in San Francisco, you’re home town. Do you want to come out?” I said, “I’m going to be with the family.” And you said, “Good. Being with the family is better than hanging out with us.” But I still said, “What are you guys doing in San Francisco at Sales Force?” Because sales people don’t need landing pages, yet you guys will probably find a way for them to need it. Then I saw this, this is the last video that I’ve got. There’s no audio on it. I want you guys to look at their faces as they’re looking up at these buildings, walking through the Sales Force office. Look, they’re getting on the motorcycles in the lobby. They’re looking all around like, “Oh gee.” Counting the buildings that are Sales Force labeled. Look at that! What are they doing? Not believing that this is even possible. And then just stopping and going, this is dream force. This is your dream. What did you get out of going to sales Force’s event and seeing their office? Russell: Honestly, prior to Sales Force, I was kind of going through a weird funk in my business, because it was like, again there was the goals. So it was like, okay, we’re going to do a million bucks, and then we did that. And then it’s like, let’s make 10 million a year. And then 50, and then this year we’ll hit a hundred. And like, what’s the next goal?  A billion, because a hundred million, 2 hundred million is not that big of a difference. And it was just kind of like, what’s the point, what’s the purpose? We’ve grown as big as any company that I know. And then last year, Dave and Ryan had gone out there and they were telling me stories like, “There’s 170,000 businesses here.” And they were telling me all these things, and it sounded cool, but I didn’t, and they were going crazy. You have to see this so you can believe it. But there’s something about the energy about seeing something that makes it real. So this year I was like, I want to go and I want to see Benioff speak. I want to see the thing, the towers, I want to just understand it, because if I understand it, cool. Now we can reverse engineer and figure out how we can do it. So for me it was just like seeing it. I think in anything, any, as entrepreneurs too, if you’re people believe that you can do it, you’ll do it. If you believe you can lose weight, you’ll lose 3eight. If you believe you can grow a company, and I don’t feel like I believed that the next level was possible for us until I saw it. And then I was like, oh my gosh, this is not ridiculous. Benioff’s not, none of these guys are any smarter than any of us. It’s just like, they figured out the path. It was like, okay let’s look at the path. And then let’s look at it and now we can figure out our path. Andrew: And seeing it in person did that for you? Russell: Oh yeah. It makes it tangible, it makes it like, it’s like your physiology feels it, versus reading a book about it or hearing about it. It’s like you see it and you experience it, and it’s like it’s tangible. Andrew: I told you, I asked people before they came in here, “What are you looking for?” and a few of them frustrated me because they said, “I just wanted to see Russell. I just want to see the event.” I go, “Give me something I could ask a question about.” But I think they were looking for the same thing that you got out of there. And I know they got it. I’m going to ask them to come up here and ask some questions, and I want to know about the future of Clickfunnels, but first I’ve got to just acknowledge that, that we are here to just kind of pick up on that energy. That energy that got you to pick yourself back up when anyone else would have said, “I’m a failure of a husband, I can’t do this.” Go back. The tension that came from failing and almost going to jail as you said, from failing and succeeding, and failing again. And still, that is inspiring to see. I want to give the whole Clickfunnels family a big round of applause, please everybody.

Andrew and Jesse connect on this weeks episode to discuss their connect to Santeria and the Orishas. We see how these traditions influence us, our world, and our magick. If you're enjoying the podcast so far why not check out our Patreon. For just a few dollars an episode you'll get special perks and Patreon only episodes! You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. Check out Jesse's store "Wolf and Goat" here, his podcast here, and his theatre work here.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew ANDREW: [00:00:00] Welcome to The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I'm here today with Jesse Hathaway, who . . . I have a hard time describing exactly who Jesse is. Jesse does all sorts of traditional magical traditions in [00:00:15] the ATR, as well as, you know, being an author and creator of magical products and a participator in a whole bunch of other traditions as well. So, I'm just going to hand it over to Jesse and say hey, how [00:00:30] how would you introduce yourself here?  JESSE: Hi. Wow. I think . . . You know, I'm not, I'm not a big fan of magical CVs as it is, but you know, I, summary-wise, [00:00:45] I guess, I'm an Olocha. I made Obatalá in the Cuban Lukumí Santería tradition. I am a Tata Quimbanda, which . . . I'm a practitioner of Brazilian . . . It's [00:01:00] an Afro-Brazilian sorcerers' tradition that is sometimes paired with Umbanda, or Candomblé. Sometimes people let it stand on its own. It's a Congolese-derived practice, and traditional [00:01:15] witchcraft has always been there for, you know, as long as I can consciously remember, into early teens and things like that.  But I study whatever interests me. It doesn't mean I'm initiated in all those things; it doesn't mean I'm practicing [00:01:30] all those things, but I have a passion for magical traditions, folk magic, folklore. I have a huge love of Mexican curanderismo, which is a familial background, although I did not go into that as a [00:01:45] practitioner. And I think also just . . . I'm a babbler, is probably important for my CV as well, that, you know, some of these things, like curanderismo, culturally, you never called yourself [00:02:00] that thing; that was something the community called you. So, I guess in some ways whatever people call me is whatever they call me, and they can come to me for what they come to me. And the main thing is that I'm just trying to do as much training with elders and keep things going as I can. But yeah. [00:02:16]  ANDREW: I think that's a really interesting point. You know? And maybe we can start with that. We . . . I mean, we were talking before we got on the line, right? And we were talking about, you know, these sort of questions of authority and [00:02:31] who gets to call oneself authority, you know, who's an expert in these traditions or an elder or even just, you know, an acknowledged practitioner, you know? And I think that this question of where [00:02:46] does the authority come from? And how does that happen sort of inside and outside of traditional practices is a really interesting point, right?  JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: You know, for example, you're talking about, you know, being a curandero, [00:03:01] like, that's not a thing that you call yourself. That's what other people would call you if they're going to call you that, right?  JESSE: Yes.  ANDREW: I think that that's really fascinating, and I think that we see a lot of change [00:03:16] around that, where traditionally everybody lived in the same place, right? Everybody generally didn't move around that much and people probably saw a person in that practice grow [00:03:31] up, experience their training, they saw that they got the nod from other people who are acknowledged as that, and at some point, they started taking on their own, you know, practice, right? But in the Internet age, right, [00:03:47] that looks more like a good Instagram account, maybe? JESSE: (laughing) ANDREW: You know, maybe a nice website.  JESSE: Yeah.  ANDREW: You know, what . . . like, I'm curious what you think about those evolutions and those changes that are going [00:04:02] on around that.  JESSE: Yeah. I mean, the apprenticeship model, which . . . It's not a certificate model, right? It's something different, where you are under an apprenticeship, you are with the elder and [00:04:17] their clients see you training with their elder. You know, they . . . it's . . .The visibility is a very different thing. It's not just classes. It's not just, you know, herb walks, occasionally. You are the right hand [00:04:32] of that elder for a very long time. And they see you go from incompetence to competence to fluency, and you know, that kind of replacement for that elder if and when they pass is there. And [00:04:47] it's a very different model than what is done now.  But even within, I think, the kind of Internet age, of, you know, teachers have dozens and dozens and dozens of students. I look at the Brazilian model of a tahero, where [00:05:02] there is going to be one pai de the santo, who is the head, doing everything. They're doing all the initiating, thousands of people, but each person has a yake baba care [spelling?] that's taking care of their needs that is more individualized in that way. But still, it's . . . [00:05:17] you lose your individuality when you train, and that part is, that sacrifice is very difficult, I think, for a lot of our very Western Internet-friendly minds about promoting individuality. How different you are, how a certain . . . [00:05:32] You know, "I'm studying this tradition," and the tradition is studying you, is part of the thing that we forget too.  ANDREW: Well, and I think that it's part of the . . . part of the good training, you know, is learning how [00:05:47] to get out of the way and do the work, right?  JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: You know? Like the . . . you know, I think about the elder Olochas that I trained with and spent time with, or am at ceremonies with, right? And certainly, if there's a [00:06:02] junior person there to put, to open in the coconuts or whatever, they're going to do that, they're going to be like, "Hey, go do that, go mop the floor, go whatever."  JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: But also, if there's not, they're just going to grab the hammer and go, right? And, [00:06:17] you know, there are these funny things that come from that training and that experience. And, you know, opening coconuts is one of them. You know, I watched the people who are new, you know, in my house come and open coconuts, and, you know, I'm like, I always [00:06:32] look over like, "Oh, they're taking forever!" You know, not in a mean way, but just in a like, you know . . . And then, and that feeling of like, I can open a coconut in no time because I've done hundreds and hundreds of them now.  JESSE: Yep. ANDREW: And, those subtle things that you would, [00:06:47] you know, you would see being in the space with somebody else . . .  JESSE: Yes. ANDREW: Make that big difference, right?  JESSE: Mm-hmm. Even the way the way that we mopped the way that . . . we call it watering your elders, you know, just [00:07:02] the, you have to . . . in a good way, not . . . I don't mean that in a . . . But the idea of culturally, like, I'm . . . Those of us that are more on the introverted side, you know, it's a lot to go and say hello to everyone. It's a lot to enter a room and to each person say hello. [00:07:17] It can be exhausting before the ritual even starts. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: You know, you learn shorthands. Or you find ways to be able to enter into the social language that is needed to be able to access things. But, going around and asking everyone who's older [00:07:32] than you: "Do you want something to drink? Can I get you a coffee? Can I get you a water? Can I get you something?" Even if they say no, it's a lot, for whatever reason, that service-oriented side of things leaves . . . It works both ways in the sense that it allows people to introduce themselves to each other, in [00:07:47] a way that's not just small talk. But also, people see that you are trying to take care of people in the room, and make sure that everyone is comfortable.  And it's an interesting side of things that you know . . . That's [00:08:02] not a critique; it is a critique, but of the Internet culture basis or the book-learned culture of not realizing that the book is still your teacher and it's a one-sided conversation that you don't get to necessarily appeal to the author and ask for clarification, but you didn't [00:08:17] teach yourself. You learned from a book. You didn't teach yourself, because there's a language that you are relying on that is built on clichés and allegories and metaphors and things like that. So, there's, there's . . .  This idea of picking yourself up by your [00:08:32] bootstraps into a magical tradition is not quite necessarily the case even when you're doing it by yourself. And, and, if we believe that spirit is intervening, then spirit is also teaching us as well. And [00:08:47] how well we can refine that, our own inner ear, to listen to that, is also something there. In a community, you know, a community setting, people often ask in online groups, like what books can I read? Read the room, first, like [00:09:02] take the temperature of the room and listen, because, I mean, the best conversations happen at 2 a.m. after all the things are done for the day and the cook finally gets to sit down because the kitchen is shut. ANDREW: Sure. Or they're in there and you're talking to them instead of you know, rushing around. [00:09:17]  JESSE: Yeah.  ANDREW: And then they go, "Hey, come look at this thing that I'm going to do here," right? And even, even in the simplest of things like, you know, cooking the inyales right? Like just cooking the parts of the animals that go to the Orishas. There's all sorts [00:09:32] of stuff to learn about just even a simple thing like that, you know, and if you're engaged with the people and talking to them and have a relationship with them, then they're going to invite you in and be like, "Hey, you know, if you're looking for this, do this this way, or here's a good way to do it," [00:09:47] you know?  Otherwise, you're just, you know, you can do it and it will serve the job but you're missing big swaths of the teaching, right? It's always the thing that I'm really aware of in my, you know, in my position as somebody in Toronto, far [00:10:02] away from regular practice, right? My . . . my knowledge is good. You know, my . . . I mean, there's always things to work on, but my fluency and some of those little details, I'm well aware that it's not as strong [00:10:17] as it would be if I was living somewhere where I got to just work more often, you know, because you can never learn those things from a book. Nobody ever thinks to talk about that. You know? Right? Unless you're in the room with the person and then you're watching them, like, "Hey, what was that? Why'd you put that in there? I didn't see [00:10:32] anybody do this before,” you know?  JESSE: You know, you can read a book about running a marathon, but it's a very different thing to do it.  ANDREW: Right? JESSE: And we talk about that all the time, of like, you know, watching, if someone doesn't know how to mop, and they say they're an active santero. You're like "Hmm, maybe not." But [00:10:48] there's this side of it, of, there's so much, there's different types of knowledge and the modern age promotes one type of knowledge, which is the facts of the, the history of that type of thing that can be transmitted via literature [00:11:03] in that way, in the written word and it's an interesting side of things, but it's very different when the body knows it, when the, when the ways of learning in the body are different from the head. And even . . . [00:11:18]  So, it's an interesting side of, you know, really making sure if someone doesn't know how to do certain things, you train them and even, even, for example, my early years [00:11:33] as an Olocha. I come from a house of a lot of old elders. Like physically, they are more aged. And so even though I could be doing other things, they needed someone to lift the big water buckets and up [00:11:48] and down the stairs and do the heavy lifting and open the coconuts. So even though there were other tasks that I could be doing, I was doing the manual labor, because I was younger . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And able to do certain things that my amazing elder ladies could not. [00:12:03] And that's an interesting side of things too, because then they sent me out and like, you know, “Go to this house, and start studying with them a little bit here, and then come back and branch out,” so that I could get different experiences.  And I think one of the things that's very interesting with . . . In the history of Santería, [00:12:19] is just because the houses started working with each other, things got very homogenized very quickly, through public opinion, both in a good and a bad way. There are variances to the way things are done, but the variances between the houses are actually pretty small. [00:12:34] You know, there's kind of a liturgized homogenized way to do things that is acceptable. And when you vary too much from that, both out of tradition or vary too much from that out of lack of tradition or lack of knowledge, you kind of get [00:12:49] pulled back into what is the acceptable practice . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And that's an interesting side of it. So, it's actually preserved a lot through public opinion through the fact that there's seven different lineages represented in a room because you invite [00:13:04] those people to work because in the early days you didn't get a choice on who was coming to work cause you needed people. So, you got anybody, any santero that was in New York City.  ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: "Come, work this thing!" And so, new traditions kind of, or at least parallel traditions start aligning, they start [00:13:19] coming into a common practice and adaptations have to happen for the modern age. You can't do certain things the way that was done in Cuba or in Nigeria. So, it's . . . Those modifications happen, and elders make those decisions. [00:13:34] When one person makes those decisions, it can get a little crazy. But when a community comes together and says, "How do we resolve this problem? How do we take care of this? Then there's more options, I think. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. For sure. Well, and I think that goes [00:13:49] back to . . . It goes back to kind of a couple questions around that. One is for me, I think that where there are differences in lineage, it's important to know what they are. Even if they're small. It's interesting, where there are lineage [00:14:34] differences, that I think it's really important to become aware of those and know what they are, right? You know, I mean, we are initiated into a lineage, and therefore if our lineage does it a certain way, we should do it that way. And you know, [00:14:49] in these different times, where you go, might go to different houses and do things in different ways, I think that it's important to respect, you know, the way other people do it and also know that when you're in your home, you do it a different way, right? Or when it's your event. But [00:15:04] I think it also creates a lot of unnecessary dialogue and drama, and I think that we see this in all the magical communities, right? At least every one that I've ever been in, which is more than a few. It's this thing of "Well, [00:15:19] we don't do it this way. Therefore, it must be wrong," right?  JESSE: Yes. ANDREW: You know, "This is . . . this is not . . . I've never seen this; therefore, it must be wrong." And I think that, you know, it's such a such a sticky [00:15:34] topic, right? How do we understand what is tradition? What is traditional variance? How do we understand what is, what comes from experience, and what might be other groups' experience that we could integrate?  JESSE: Mm-hmm.  ANDREW: And how do [00:15:49] we . . . And how do we judge what is just, you know, manufactured garbage, right? JESSE: (laughs) ANDREW: To make a few bucks, you know? So. I don't know. What do you think? Give us, give us a guide here, give us some solid rules we can live by. JESSE: Because I'm the authority? (laughs) Authority of [00:16:04] that.  ANDREW: Yeah, I'm giving you all the authority right here. Community of one gives it to you, Jesse! JESSE: Yeah, yeah. I think, obviously reliable or people that you can [00:16:19] confide in and ask opinions on that . . . The chain of eldership is really important and it's not just for this. You know, I don't, I don't support the complete submission to elder guru style where it allows for physical abuse or emotional abuse and that way . . . That is a [00:16:34] model that does exist and has existed but there is a possibility of an elder and mentor elder and minor model that allows for accessing [00:16:49] opinions that can contextualize things based in the knowledge that they have that is more than your own. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: How do you, how do you modify? I think there's the side of it too, that's always interesting, [00:17:04] of when you don't recognize something, if you're secure in what you have, you don't attack the thing you don't know, you just look at it and cook. That's interesting. Let me see where this goes, and you have to wait. Gauge the point of when it seems off and [00:17:19] what is your agenda in making sure that it's correct or incorrect. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And that personal side of it, the, you know, this idea that there's objective . . . one tradition that was passed down from Adam and Eve, it gets a really, it doesn't serve us. And I . . . Certainly [00:17:34] within the ATRs, I mean, the differences between traditions, houses, the differences between Santería and Candomblé and different Orisha practices are huge. And at the same time, the [00:17:49] Orisha are very flexible in what they, what they say and do, and they're not going to sit there and nitpick, but there are ways, specifically, that the tradition has evolved, to make sure that Orisha comes, that Orisha is there, that is unique to each lineage, unique to each house, it has similarities [00:18:04] and commonalities and landmarks, you know, to . . . that are recognizable. But at the same time there's . . . I don't see elders get as upset about something that's off. [00:18:19] Just minorly off. They'll be like, "Oh, we don't do that," and don't worry about it because "come do it, we do it this way." ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: I see a lot of people who are younger, get really pissed off about keeping tradition intact. ANDREW: And I've talked to elders who talk about that's [00:18:34] how they felt when they were younger. Right? And be like, "Oh, when I was like 18, I was so mad about all these things. But now I'm like, well, I can see both sides, you know."  JESSE: Yeah. And it's the question of like, do you spend all the time stamping the thing out that you don't like [00:18:49] or do you spend time investing into the model that you feel is more correct and more profitable for people to follow? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And, you know, fighting for what you want to see as opposed to what you don't want to see. And there's merits on both sides. I think, personally. [00:19:04] You know, when is it that we don't . . . We try not to innovate a lot of times in ATRs, right? Of like, you innovate through necessity only.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And, a temporary thing that you're still asking clarification on from elders or spirits [00:19:19] or things like this, but you try to innovate as little because otherwise it's not necessarily what you're practicing anymore. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: It's not recognizable. It's not recognizable. And has its own thing. Certainly. [00:19:35] Opinions change as you get older too, and you . . . More experience, it's not just older. What is the Chinua Achebe quote of "Old age is respected and wisdom is revered"? The same thing is similar in our models here of, like, you know, someone who has worked the room for [00:19:50] five years consistently at the foot of an elder is going to know more than someone who's 20 years old and has never worked the room, as much, or worked it once a year. Someone who births a lot of Orisha constantly or is taking a lot of clients is going to have a different opinion of how things function because they realize, [00:20:05] "I don't do it this way because it gets in the way of blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah." ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: Versus, if it's your first time giving, it's like a first-time child. You're going to make a bunch of mistakes. You're going to realize you might put a lot of effort into things that you won't necessarily do on the fourth child down . . . ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: Because important . . . and that practical [00:20:20] experience, you know, sometimes we just have to suffer through our own inexperience and be humble and keep going to elders and asking opinions and seeing, keeping our eyes open as to what is being done. And if we're in a solitary tradition where it's [00:20:35] less likely that we're going to have an elder who's going to speak to our direct needs, then learn from other things around you that you can, that you admire and can pull in. You know, it's really hard to reinvent the wheel constantly.  ANDREW: Well, I think it's . . . You know, I think it's really interesting because [00:20:50] when I . . . The first store that I read out of have a predominantly Afro-Caribbean clientele. JESSE: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And, you know, so I was . . . Although I was getting involved in [00:21:05] the Orisha traditions and stuff at that point, I didn't have a ton of experience at all and, and I wasn't initiated as a priest, so it was just mostly my own development that I was focused on. But I, you know, I had done a ton of ceremonial work and you know, initiations [00:21:20] along all those lines, and one of the things that was really interesting was, I would end up having these conversations with you know, spiritual Baptist priests and, you know, other people, and they're like, "You really understand," you know, [00:21:35] whatever it was that they were doing, right? They would always say, "You really understand our tradition. You really understand this. You really understand the African mindset," or whatever, and I understand that they felt that that was true. But I think that what I knew was, what I [00:21:50] actually really understand is magic and I understand that there are generally fundamental things that are kind of true across the board if you're really engaged at a deep level and not, not sort of in the "there's only one faith" [00:22:06] or "there's only one source" or any of that kind of like, you know, Victorian colonial nonsense, right? JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: But in the sense that when you understand that spirits are real, and you have the capacity to genuinely speak with spirits and [00:22:21] you're going to work with materials, nature, candles, whatever, offerings. Then, then though the surface of those things, or the tradition and lineage piece changes those, there is a fundamental mindset [00:22:36] that, that's there, kind of around the world around those kinds of things. And once you get that, then you can relate at that place, right? Which is completely different than sort of going in and sort of saying, you know, as I've certainly seen other people do, "Well, [00:22:51] yeah, exactly, I know this tradition and the spirits gave it to me and therefore I am able to do this and that and whatever, it's like, no no, no. I know how to talk to spirits. And in fact, often even people, spirits of other people's traditions might lean in a bit through a reading and nudge me in [00:23:06] a given direction. But that's not the same as understanding their traditions or whatever, right?  JESSE: Yeah. Absolutely. The . . . I think that when we're talking about fluency, and magical fluency, we're talking about a practicality, as far as how [00:23:21] to utilize those things in everyday life, and that, that is something that is, I think, palpable when someone knows and can give practical advice, practical actions to achieve certain things, no matter the, no matter the tradition. And [00:23:36] certainly, when it's still theory in someone's head and less pragmatic, you can tell that too. There can be a struggle to articulate something. What are the next steps? And where do you go from here? And we can [00:23:51] talk about cosmology and philosophy which differ from person to person, let alone town to town, or tradition to tradition.  ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: And those finer points, but the practicality of it, that is, that's something different. You have to be somewhat fluent in order to give [00:24:06] good practical advice on how to move forward, and parroting something is, you know, you first learned by saying what you know, and going off of what you've seen, but the more you can expose yourself to, the more people's styles, you'll start to learn different ways of approaching things. [00:24:21] And certainly, I'm being reminded of a computer search parameter [00:24:36] recently. That was . . . The issue with diagnostic tools from computers or trying to diagnose illness and things like this, is that they're not programmed to look for something that isn't there.  ANDREW: Hmm. JESSE: And this is something that humans can still do very well in that . . . not [00:24:51] just looking for the problem out of the common, of the sets of things are there, but to have a revelation of what could still be needed by the person, not necessarily . . . You know, when someone comes for a reading, there, it's not just their conscious problems we're talking about. We're trying to look and [00:25:06] bring those things that are unconscious to the surface too, to see what is actually the root of something that needs to be addressed, and those things come from having a good foundation in the basics, in order to . . . You [00:25:21] know, you have to do primary colors before you start doing secondary colors and understanding what those things are. You can't mix secondary colors trying to get primary colors. You still have to know what that, that order is, and I think it's very similar in magic. You know, there's basic advice on things and [00:25:36] some people will give out the basic like, you know, here's an uncrossing. Here's a, here's a love drawing, here's a bend over type of working, and those are, those are set vocabularies and other people [00:25:51] might tell you to go light a candle at the base of this tree and the spirit is going to take care of it. And that's the model that they were using, and both are pragmatic in this sense, but I . . .  I wonder how much materialism [00:26:06] still enters in, the kind of Scientific Revolution atheist materialism that sneaks in because that is the paradigm as Westerners that we are raised in, you know, there's some variance in that and based on familial upbringing and religious upbringing. But the idea that spirit [00:26:23] is not necessarily tangible in the same way and it is actually affecting the materia to do the thing is a less popular model. And it's interesting now, like once you get introduced to the concept [00:26:38] of a charged statue or something like that, people want to put loads and everything in. They don't necessarily know what goes in it. They want to know, "Why, why do I put these things there? Am I putting this there to symbolize this?" Whereas in spirit-based traditions the spirit might possess someone, and it could put [00:26:53] anything it wants in that statue and breathe on it or splash it with whatever and now it's charged. It doesn't necessarily have a logic that we can understand as to why it picked that item to represent that thing because it's not representation. It's [having?] something and that is a battery of power that is being used. [00:27:08] Not, did you have all 732 exact ingredients . . .  ANDREW: Exactly. JESSE: To put in. That spirit could go for a walk and pull a clump of herbs and give you one of the most powerful baths you've ever had. Whereas if you try and duplicate it with those same herbs, it's not going to be the same, because you're not . . . ANDREW: Yeah. I was [00:27:23] talking with somebody in the store recently about . . . they were asking me where I get the crystals that I buy, and about the mining practices, you know, and I think that those, those are really important questions, you know, and the short answer is about [00:27:38] half of what I have, what I sell, I know, I know pretty clearly where it comes from, and short of, you know, hopping on a plane and going to the mine, I feel like the people I'm buying from, who are buying directly from the miners, [00:27:53] you know, I believe them, you know. It's the best we can do in this in this day and age, you know.  A bunch of the other stuff, I'm far less clear about where that comes from and, and you know, I would like to reduce that [00:28:08] amount, you know, to be clearer that there's no human rights violations and horrible environmental destruction and so on. But it's, but it's complicated and it's difficult and you know in this industry for sure, and in tons of industries. They [00:28:23] were asking me about the magical influence of where, of where something comes from and how it's handled along the way and all of these kinds of things, right? Is the stone that you know where and how it was [00:28:38] mined different than the stone where you don't?  And, and when I was talking with them about it, I mean, certainly I have my own political and social view on that stuff, which is, I think that the stuff that is harvested [00:28:53] with respect is always, is always better whenever we can manage it. You know, whenever I harvest things, I always harvest them with a lot of respect. And I think that that's a great thing. But I think that there's kind of a, also another question mixed in that, [00:29:08] which is, where does the actual magic of what you're doing reside, right? And in the context of a stone, right? Is it concretely in the minerals and the energy of that? And [00:29:23] I think that that's, that's part of it, you know, there there's really interesting crystal books that talk about the, you know, how the crystals form and how that magic, how the energy of that relates to their sort of fundamental crystalline structure that varies from different stones [00:29:38] and you know, you've got color and you've got different participations and all that kind of stuff. And what other things activate this, right?  JESSE:  Mm-hmm. ANDREW: And you know, there's the power of the thing in and of itself, but kind of as you're saying, there's also what the spirit might want, right?  JESSE: Yes. ANDREW: Like, you know, if I'm working with, you [00:31:37] know, one of my guides, and my guide says, you know, grab me, grab me a piece of iron pyrite and let's do this with it. JESSE: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: Certainly the . . . certainly the element is important, but the activation of that particular spirit through that element is [00:31:52] way more important in that equation, probably. You know, the actual force through which the spirit makes the change or consecrates that thing, you know, and consecrating a statue is a good example of that, right? You know. That is the force of the spirit making [00:32:07] something and putting it together and anchoring it. And then we get into . . .  And then sort of the third thing that I see which is related but not exactly the same which is you know, especially with things like plants and stuff like that, right? There is also the [00:32:22] living entity which is that plant in and of itself right and not necessarily just the specific one that you're working with, but the sort of deeper energy of a given, you know, a given plant in the world, you know, like [00:32:37] ayahuasca or other things. You know, people, you know often talk about that as an entity that wants to return to the world, but I think that that's actually fundamentally true of the bow trees in the front of my shop and, you know my crown [00:32:52] of thorns plant, and all of those things, and it knows I'm definitely, in the way that I'm working with them in the space, connecting with the collective entity of that plant, you know? And so, I think that this [00:33:07] this idea of how are we working and what are we doing is so interesting and I think it's something that people don't really see those distinctions. I don't hear them talked about, you know? JESSE: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: So, I'm curious what you think about them. JESSE: Yeah, [00:33:23] I . . . something that comes to mind. I have, as long as I've been crowned actually, so a dozen years, been working with an experimental Theater Company here in New York City called Dzieci. And it's [00:33:38] using theater as a tool to investigate something else. But that's [lost audio at 33:45?] is unique to each person. But we're talking about investigating the sacred through the tool Le Théâtre. Through the means of theater. [00:33:53] And this intentionality, this question of intentionality is quite interesting to explore. And a question that gets posed a lot by the director, and then as we start something, is when does [00:34:08] the ritual begin? ANDREW: Mm. JESSE: And, is it when you have the audience fully there and in a theater context and the play starts? Well, no, it started long before that with the rehearsal process and then again, when did it start before that? And the question is when you bring [00:34:23] it . . . You know, for me, the answer and it seems to be a common thought on this, is when you bring awareness to it. ANDREW: Mm. JESSE: And so, if I know that I'm doing an important ritual next week and every day I'm waking up going, "I'm doing this next week. What can I do today to manifest that more [00:34:38] smoothly and make sure?" Then making sure all your bills are paid and you know, the bag lunches are done for the day and everything, that becomes part of the ritual.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And there's this interesting question of intentionality, when you know that something is ethically harvested [00:34:53] and you're going to the store but you're in a tizzy and distracted going to the store and you're not present when you're picking up the crystal and you're putting it on the thing and you know, talking on the cell phone and looking at things. What are you doing to destroy the intentionality of that good harvest act?  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: I mean there's that side of it too, that's always interesting to me, of, [00:35:08] you know, you can have good ingredients prepared by bad chefs. ANDREW: Yep. JESSE: And you can get shitty ingredients prepared by expert chefs that still taste better. You can have ingredients, you can have a horrible angry chef prepare something masterfully because they know how to treat the [00:35:23] food and maybe they're compartmentalizing their emotion. Maybe they're not. They're . . . that missing ingredient of grandmother love that goes into the cookies: Does it make it taste better? Does it not? And you know, it is, I think for all of us, the question of intentionality is an interesting side of it [00:35:38] of what are we bringing to it? And how we contributing to these seeds? You know, I think, I like to look at things as seeds of potential . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And certain things allow them to mature and grow. The side of [00:35:53] it of looking at: What is it that that makes something work? What is it that allows something to happen? [00:36:08] I think anybody that can say definitively is selling something . . . ANDREW: (chuckles) And they probably have a great brand name trademark . . .  JESSE: Absolutely! ANDREW: Attached to it. Right?  JESSE: Yeah, I think the [00:36:23] exploration of that and the curiosity of that is what, for me at least, drives me to constantly keep practicing that you know that you can . . . Like you were saying earlier, that sometimes, you know, if there's someone there that can mop [00:36:38] the floor, open the coconut, there's a way to enter into that, where sometimes the task just has to get done and that person is learning it and they're going to make their mistakes. There's other times. I remember recently . . . We were short staffed at an Ocha ritual and I was the one on my hands and knees mopping, because normally would be someone else [00:36:53] and that's fine, because I'm usually assisting someone. But the . . . I had such pure joy in mopping the floor of just, like it was such an interesting thing of caretaking and, and kind of going into the trance of mopping, which was an interesting thing too, of still remaining present enough to know what [00:37:08] else was going on in the room, so that I'm not mopping something carelessly. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  JESSE: But also, this balance of, I guess it is a little bit of Zen and the art of peeling potatoes. But also for those of us that get lost in our heads, to be present enough and aware [00:37:23] enough of what else is going on, so that if you know the something escapes, you know, whether it's a child, a chicken, or a potato rolling down the hallway, that you're able to notice it and catch it, not that the chick, child is rolling down the hallway, but I [00:37:38] . . . hopefully that metaphor still makes sense.  ANDREW: Yeah. Well, it's one of those things too. For me, I think one of the big differences between before making Ocha and after making Ocha. Or maybe [00:37:53] before receiving Orishas and after receiving Orishas is, when I work the tradition, whatever that is, I can feel the joy of the Orishas themselves, you know? JESSE: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: Like [00:38:08] when I tell them, like well I'm going to feed him something, and you know, I mean, that might be a sacrifice, but it might just be like, "I'm just gonna, you know, hey, I'm going to cook you this. I'm going to toast up all this corn for you," and you know, whatever. You can feel that energy, right? [00:38:23]  JESSE: Yeah.  ANDREW: And I feel like that energy extends to mopping the floor to you know, like all of these kinds of things, right? To, you know, even some of the less pleasant things like plucking, you know, plucking the chickens [00:38:38] after, or, you know wrestling with a ram that got out in the rain, or you know, whatever right? It's just like, it doesn't really matter, from my experience, you know, and maybe this is just me, but I think that it's part of this thing, because that, that service [00:38:53] to the spirits and their pleasure in it, you know, lifts up everything else. Right?  JESSE: Well, I think it's an interesting parallel too, of a . . .It would seem to me, at least the way that I understood [00:39:08] Greek myths and Norse myths presented to me as a child, even reading like Edith Hamilton. . .  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: They were very anthropomorphized, the gods. So, anthropomorphized that there wasn't . . . it was hard to imagine that they were appearing in nature. They just owned [00:39:23] nature. And it seems that, you know, as my understanding of these things matures that perhaps that is a kind of modern revamping of a lot of pagan ideology and pagan theology . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: But I'm [00:39:38] in one of Matthery's books, I believe, he's interviewing a priestess of Yemayá, in Nigeria, and talks to her and, and she talks about other [00:39:53] people worship their deities. We do our deities. And that when she interacts with water in any conscious level, she is participating in Yemayá. That Yemayá is an act of mopping or washing a body or washing the self or cooking and that water itself has a respect [00:40:08] and a consciousness and that consciousness, for her, was named Yemayá.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: So, it was this concept and we talk about this, and the Spanish verb hacer does this very well, hacer tonto, you're doing something, you're making Santo, that when we participate in these [00:40:23] activities, we're actually participating in Orisha. Orisha is not a human. Orishas have incarnated as humans. But Orisha is as much the sound that the drum makes and gives us pleasure. Orisha is the flash of insight of a new idea. [00:40:38] Orisha is the feeling that we should go left and not right at this intersection, you know, there's things that are in the body that is not just in the head. The head leads it, of course, but it is broader and more experiential [00:40:53] and then the body becomes an extension of the head and the head grows because it is experiencing the world and I think there's something different.  You know, mopping, you are, you are participating in an Orisha act that is yes, you're finding the joy. But it was also that the deities of [00:41:08] water that are there, that bathing can become a sacred act again. Like when does the ritual begin; when you bring attention to it. And you could make everything about the spirits that you're serving, or you could make very little and only be like a Sunday religionist, as you know, we talk [00:41:23] about. You know, it's a controversial thing to talk about the lack of ability to have separation of church and state but religion is there to justify politic, it always has been, the concept of religion. Karen Armstrong goes into that and I promote her all the time, just [00:41:38] because I find her such a fascinating . . . She's an ex-nun that writes on religion and her book, Fields of Blood, looks at religion and violence. And she talks about that that individual religion and spirituality is a very different thing than organized religion that is sitting there trying [00:41:53] to justify the actions of people in power. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: Whereas the concept of religiosity or spirituality and those things . . . But what we do in our day-to-day is up to is each of us, but it's not just about going to church on Sunday, [00:42:08] promoting the separation of that, thinking that going to church on Sunday makes you a good person because you went . . . it's part of it. But how do you treat your family? How do you treat your co-workers? How do you treat the people around you? You know, how do you treat the land you're on? And this is a . . . It's not for everyone, because [00:42:23] it's very difficult to constantly be on in that mode. It takes practice. It's a muscle that you have to build and stretch. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And I do think that mopping, and carrying buckets of groceries up and down stairs, is a way of stretching [00:42:38] that muscle, or at least it can be when you present it in that way. If you're just bossing someone around, and say, "Go do this, go do this, go do this," they may not see that they're stretching a muscle.  ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: That's, you know, that's the thing too, is responsible training. You have to say, why are you doing this? Because if [00:42:53] we all stop to take out the trash, we can't do prepare for the ritual that has to happen. But if you, who cannot be on that side of the curtain or do and be in that room at that time, can take out the trash, then you've helped us do that ritual. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: It is [00:43:08] part of it. It's that way of, what was the thing where the man was . . . A president was going to look at the space program and asked the janitor who he was and what he did, and he said, "This is my name and I'm [00:43:23] helping build to send men into space," you know, that it was the responsibility or the contextualized importance of every single task in a temple.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: Very real thing. And if that person doesn't know, someone else is going to have to do it and hopefully take away [00:43:38] from that person balancing the books that day, but that's . . . it's an interesting thing. You see it in different religious communities. I'm friends with some nuns in Connecticut, at the Benedictine Abbey there, and it's so interesting to see, because they follow the Liturgy [00:43:53] of the Hours, their work spurts are two hours. They work really really hard for two hours, and they stop, change, and sing for a half hour to an hour depending on which what the liturgy is that day and then go back to work again. Though there's no warm-up [00:44:08] to working. They know they only have two hours, but they also don't rush. Which is like, "You're gonna do it, you're gonna get to work," and that's great. ANDREW: I think that that, also that dedication, right? Like they're gonna, they're gonna stop and sing, you know? It's like before [00:44:24] before I got married, my spirits, you know, my ancestors, in a mass, and a misa, were basically like, "We want you to go to church before you get married. We know you're not getting it in church. That's fine. But we want [00:44:39] you to go to a mass." And we were like, "All right," and so I went, and it was it was me and my partner and one other person in this massive, like, Anglican Church at 5 p.m. on a Friday night. And [00:44:54] I remember being there and it was very obvious that like, all the people in the congregation actually had no idea what to do because the priest was like, "Is anybody actually going to come up and take communion or should we just carry on," right? Like, oh, I didn't know this was the point, right? [00:45:09] Which is amusing, but it was also very obvious to me that if nobody had been there, he would have just done the mass.  JESSE: Yeah.  ANDREW: You know? And that like, that sort of devotion of, "We're going to stop and sing, [00:45:24] we're going to do this, we're going to do this thing." I think that kind of devotion is just astounding, you know, it's so wonderful.  JESSE: you're speaking to me very true to Dzieci. We do a piece every year around this time. We [00:45:39] just had our first performances of it, but, called Fool's Mass, which is based on the kind of feast of fools idea from the, from the early modern and medieval period. But it's a [00:45:54] bunch of fools who are have to do the Christmas Mass, even though the priest just died. The exploration. It's a buffoonery piece and it's, there are extreme elements of humor and tragedy in it. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: But the idea that this choir [00:46:09] comes together to sing and normally, you know, we play characters of different ability and, and function and, and responsibilities and some of us are troublemakers and other people are rule followers and what that chaos ensues, but [00:46:24] we know that there's songs that we sing and come together and there's something that's profound there in the in the silence and listening to each other as well. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: And the chaos breaks out again, and how do you do this? How do you . . . how do you continue? In what you know, even [00:46:39] if there's no leader, how do you . . . I always find it interesting, like the dynamic of a classroom when the teacher has to leave to take, to go to the bathroom or something like that? Like, does it function as the same? It depends on the . . . how the teacher has run faster a lot of times. But [00:46:55] it's a, it's an interesting side of things. Doing what you know, when you know to do it is still, lots of times we're like, "Oh, the authority figure's not here, I don't have to do it this way. I could do it this other way."  ANDREW: Exactly, right?   JESSE: And [00:47:10] you go, okay, what did I just lose and what did I gain from that? What was the actual benefit from not doing it the exact way I know how? And so many times I think that, you know, it can come up in our systems [00:47:25] of divination, right? That you have the tools, you know exactly what the problem is, and you're not using them.  ANDREW: Yeah.  JESSE: You know? There's nothing new here. There's no new problems. You know what, you know, every problem that comes up, you know exactly why it's there and you have the tools to fix it, but you're not doing it. So, what do you what [00:47:40] are you looking for here? You know, that's, that's an interesting thing too.  ANDREW: Yeah, I think it's such an interesting question, you know? Again, as somebody who's sort of far away from regular practice, you know, not having not having an extended community here, [00:47:55] you know, I've definitely, I've definitely run into this sort of angsty emotional piece. And I'm like, "Ah, I got nothing to do. I don't know what to work on. I got nothing to practice," or whatever, and this desire to learn more, right? And, and, [00:48:10] what I noticed at one point was, I was like, "Well, that's cool if there's more to learn and there's always more to learn," but also, how solid's your singing of Osain, [00:48:25] right? How solid is this piece? How about you, like, you know, make sure that you can, like, say the prayer for each of the Orishas, you know, the Oríkì, or learn a song for . . . There's often so much [00:48:40] in our immediate vicinity that we can tend to, and if we take that agency back to ourselves, right?  JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: And that way of like, you know, well, what do we, what do we do when there is nobody else watching? Right. JESSE: Mm-hmm. ANDREW: I think it's . . . I think that that [00:48:55] is . . . That's where the real work is, right?  JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: I mean, the rest of it is a bunch of work too and you know, not to dismiss it. But at least for me that real work is: I'm here. I'm doing this thing, whether it's, you [00:49:10] know, Orisha stuff or other stuff with my guides or you know, working on the cards or other projects. It's always that question of like: Okay, what do I need to do? How do I make myself do it? How do I do the stuff that doesn't seem glamorous but moves it all forward, [00:49:25] you know, and how do you find the joy with that, so you can sort of continue with devotion around it, you know, or faith, or those kind of old-fashionedy words, right?  JESSE: Yeah, and also the benefit of when you approach things in [00:49:40] that way, it only informs the other things you're doing. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  JESSE: So, meaning, you know, you're going back to basics and finding new interesting things in them. Then it means that the possibility of you finding new ways and new depths to everything you're doing, because again, it's that muscle that you're stretching that is [00:49:55] developing a way of looking at the world, and, and aligning your feet to a new path. Perhaps it's the same path and you're learning it better, you know, it's nice to return to the things we know sometimes and realize that, oh gosh, there's a lot more here to examine. That [00:50:10] side of it. I know that's wonderful to be able to really examine what it [00:50:25] is that we know and develop the questions of ourselves of like okay, you think you know this for sure, and that's great, but what happens when you do it again? Do it one more time! ANDREW: mm-hmm. JESSE: I guess, for me, my background's, undergrad, is in theater [00:50:40] and doing things again is not a problem.  ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: Over and over and over. There is something of benefit when you have something so memorized. It allows for a new freedom in finding things [00:50:55] out. And it's not the same as reading the prayer, you know, there's a difference there. And what is it to do this and how you say it and what it opens your mind up to. It's like Catholic parallel of the rosary, that saying the prayers is just the bare minimum. Saying [00:51:10] the prayers of the rosary is the minimum. The visualization that is supposed to happen, because the prayers are by rote and coming out of your mouth, and your hand knows to feel for what beads it's saying. That you're actually envisioning mysteries as you're going through the rosary, is, that's level 2 and above, but [00:51:25] you know, if all you know is the prayers and that's what you do . . . ANDREW: Yeah. Well, and it's like, you know, watching, you know watching elders conduct ceremony, right? They're singing a song, they're doing a thing. They see somebody doing something they [00:51:40] shouldn't be and they don't even lose a beat and they're like, "Put the bucket of water down, blah blah blah blah," and they go right back to it, you know? And sometimes they even just sing it in the tune of what's going on, right? Which is always amusing. JESSE: Yes. Yeah, it is! (laughing) ANDREW: And, and that kind of fluency is just [00:51:55] you know, it's so profound. And it comes from that showing up and being present and having walked it so many times and all of that kind of stuff. Yeah. It's such a, such a fascinating thing to see in practice. And it comes out of this, [00:52:10] so much experience with it, right?  JESSE: Yeah. ANDREW: Like being on theater, you know, on stage, when the person you're across from like, says the wrong line, what do you do, right? JESSE: You don't shoot them the right line. You've got to . . . and successful theater something that is [00:52:25] a wonderful exploration is, making each other look good. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. JESSE: You know, in ritual there's so much correction in the way that things can happen. But how can you correct the person so that they are empowered to embrace this correction you're giving them because you get [00:52:40] flustered. And everybody's gonna respond to that differently. But you know, how can you make the person look good still and explain to them, "Hey, there's this better way, try it like this." ANDREW: Yeah. JESSE: And, and, and really, because then they're open to the critique. They're open to the correction. And they don't feel ashamed. But, there's [00:52:55] also, we have to get over our shame, too. Especially in the oral traditions, because you're going to be corrected in front of other people. ANDREW: All the time! JESSE: And, you know, there's, I remember thinking about the profundity of . . . you know, we talk about our attitudes when were younger and [00:53:10] things, and enter member serving Egun before a ritual once, and everybody's talking and really only the people up at the front right at the shrine are actually paying attention to what's going on, and it was frustrating, and "I can't believe people aren't paying attention!" And realizing like, I am so not present because I'm [00:53:25] so concerned with everybody not paying attention that I'm not paying attention either, and it was just the like, oh my God, it all works if one person is focused up front, the whole thing, the whole ceremony is approved if one person, one conscious act makes [00:53:40] it happen. And then it's like it's great if the whole room is aligned, it's great if everybody will be quiet and focus. Its great of what that is, but it also is humbling to realize how much profound change or acceptance or of a new trajectory can happen with [00:53:55] just one person focusing. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. For sure. JESSE: And being on point and on task and that's really beautiful.  ANDREW: Yeah. Well, maybe that's a good place to leave it. Go out there, folks. Be present! Listen, learn, and be kind to yourself and others, [00:54:10] you know, so we can all grow and expand and get wherever it is we're going to go with all of our magical practices. Yeah. Thanks for hanging out with me today, Jesse and being on here. I deeply appreciate it.  JESSE: My pleasure.  ANDREW: You've got all sorts of great [00:54:25] stuff going on online. People want to check it out. Where should they come and find you?  JESSE: The store I run is Wolf and Goat, so wolf-and-goat.com. You can type it without the dashes as well. We're on [00:54:40] Facebook as well. I do a podcast with Dr. Al Cummins, called Radio Free Golgotha intermittently. We're on Facebook as well. But RadioFreeGolgotha.com. If you're interested in Para theater and want to do some strange [00:54:55] explorations of self and the world around you through theater. DzieciTheatre.org DzieciTheatre with an R, E, dot org. ANDREW: Spelled just like it sounds. JESSE: Yeah. (laughs) It means [00:55:10] children in Polish. And, I'm sure there's many other things I'm forgetting. But generally, I'm around a lot online, and even more so, in the back alleys of New York, I suppose, so, it's, [00:55:25] it's a pleasure and thanks for having me on, Andrew.  ANDREW: Oh, thank you.      

  Enrique and Andrew catch up on what the birds are saying. They talk about the effect of living with an oracle versus reading and oracle. The conversation winds through ideas of how being in tune wit the oracles impact their relationship with the rest of life. Finally they end by answering listeners questions.  Episode 13, Poetry, Magic, and Ice Cream, and episode 63 [00:00:30], Definitions and Silence. Think about how much you've enjoyed the podcast and how many episodes you listened to, and consider if it is time to support the Patreon You can do so here. If you want more of this in your life you can subscribe by RSS , iTunes, Stitcher, or email. If you'd like to connect with Enrique go check him out on Facebook here.  Thanks for joining the conversation. Please share the podcast to help us grow and change the world.  Andrew You can book time with Andrew through his site here.  Transcription ANDREW: [00:00:00] Hello, my friends, welcome to The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I wanted to let you know that the new intro music here was composed by my daughter, Claire. I hope you dig it. I certainly am loving on her creativity. Also, this is episode 91 with Enrique Enriquez. And if you have not caught our past conversations, you should go check them out: Episode 13, Poetry, Magic, and Ice Cream, and episode 63 [00:00:30], Definitions and Silence. Both available in the archives, either on the website or in your podcast catcher.  [new music!] Speaker 2: [00:01:00] Let me start by saying thank you to all the Patreons who support this podcast in general, and specifically help the process of providing transcripts of every episode to the public so that anybody for any reason can access all this wonderful information. Those fine people are getting access to great bonus material and they make this happen. If you are listening to this podcast, think about how many episodes you've listened to, how much you've appreciated it [00:01:30], and please consider heading on over to Patreon.com/TheHermitsLamp, and pitching something in to continue supporting this work. It is truly a situation where every dollar helps.  Welcome back to The Hermit's Lamp podcast. I'm here today with Enrique Enriquez, who is a card reader, poet, and artist, and you know was featured in a wonderful movie called Tarology, which [00:02:00] you can find on many places online right now. [Here's the trailer on YouTube: https://youtu.be/A5UR3VesQGo] This is the third time that Enrique has been on the show, and if you haven't checked out the other episodes, check the show notes for them. I'll provide links, so people can go back and hear our previous conversations. Enrique, for people who are meeting you for the first time, who are you? What are you about? What's going on?  ENRIQUE: Well, you know, the other day I went to a bookstore that is across the street. And first of all, Andrew, it's always [00:02:30] so good to hear you and always so good to talk to you.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: But anyway, you know, I have this book store across the street and I went there. And there was this voice, they were doing something on the floor, I was talking to the guy. And then as I was about to leave, the woman on the floor stood up to say, "Wait!" and then I turn around and say, "What?" And say, "Are you the guy who talks like a bird?" And I say, "Yes, as a matter of fact [00:03:00], I am," and she say, "Yes, a friend told me about you," and I . . . That made me very happy, you know?  ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: So, I guess, I am the man who speaks like a bird. ANDREW: Excellent. ENRIQUE: And at the moment, that seems to be plenty.  ANDREW: I think that's wonderful. I mean, for me, listening to the birds and, and trying to speak with them is definitely one of my, one of my favorite things these days. You know, I've been spending, for [00:03:30] years now, really spending a lot of time trying to engage with them, and more and more over time I've found myself drawn deeper and deeper into . . . into the world of birds. So yeah, it's wonderful.  ENRIQUE: Yes. Yeah, if you know, I suspect that birds are some sort of [Amic? Homic?] knowledge religion that is universal. I only know one person, a friend of mine, who says that birds are jerks and he hates birds. And [00:04:00] he say, "I know you like birds, but I hate birds," and but also always ... ANDREW: (laughing) That's a lot of strong feeling for birds!  ENRIQUE: Yes, exactly. ANDREW: Why does he hate birds?  ENRIQUE: Yes, but usually, I don't know, I mean, I guess, we said, you know, a bird is somehow that the embodiment of a long [garbled at 4:28] We [00:04:30] look at a bird, we think of birds, we listen to birds. You know, it's just about survival. They go around trying to find something to eat. There is no, no Romanticism in this view of birds, which is fine. I mean, I think it's a great exception, because usually as soon as you . . . You know, the other day, I was talking to . . . having a beer with these poets, a poet from Turkey and a poet from New Zealand and [00:05:00] they asked me, "What do you think about Trump?" And I told him what I believe, which is that Trump has no place in my reality. I don't care. And then, as soon as I mentioned birds, they told me all kinds of fantastic stories about their own relationship with birds. And about 45 minutes into the conversation, I say, "See, that's why I don't think about Trump." ANDREW: Right. ENRIQUE: I mean, there are better things to talk about, your, your mind. [00:05:30] Yes, so I think that that that's how, birds account for that common longing we have, for some sort of transcendence that I don't want to, I don't want to put a name to it. But then when you actually make a bird sound, you realize that you are, you are enacting this form that is at once transparent and opaque, you know, because you're not really saying anything, and even so, everybody understands you. ANDREW: Mmm.  ENRIQUE: So I end up realizing [00:06:00] that I like to speak like a bird, and that basically means that since the beginning of this summer I started actually recording myself using all these bird calls, like these wooden artifacts or metal artifacts that imitate the sound of birds, and then sending my friends bird messages instead of text or voice messages, right? And by speaking like a bird, what I actually accomplish is, I avoid misunderstandings. ANDREW: Mmm. ENRIQUE: Everybody [00:06:31] seems to understand the form of a bird sound. ANDREW: I like it. I feel like we must have talked about this on the podcast previously. You know, in the Orisha tradition, Osain, who is . . . He's responsible for all the knowledge of all the plants and all the magic that comes from that. He's sort of the wizard who lives in the forest, who's been . . . ENRIQUE: Beautiful. ANDREW: Broken down and, you know, scarred [00:07:01] by various conflicts and battles he's had over the years, and Osain speaks like a bird. And you know, when we . . . when we do certain ceremonies and we sing, there are . . . There are these parts where we sing, where we're singing not any words, but just to imitate the sound of the birds and to acknowledge the way in which Osain speaks to us, right?  ENRIQUE: Ah, that's fantastic.  ANDREW: Yeah, so, you know ... You're in [00:07:31] good company.  ENRIQUE: Yes, of course, and, no, it's amazing when you start looking into it, that the amount of effort and time that people have put into trying to imitate birds or talk like birds or understand birds, through history. And there is a, just as you say, there was a sort of pre-Koranic poetry that was all based on imitating the cooing of a mourning dove. And then you have the same in New Guinea. There is a tribe there that all their poetry is [00:08:01] based on the idea of imitating the cooing of a mourning dove, that wailing sound.  But, I mean, there are countless examples and, of course, thousands of poems about birds, but I guess I . . . Something clicked or shifted this summer. So, I started working with that because I understood that the moment I started sending these bird sounds to people, I went from somebody who could interpret signs [00:08:31] to somebody who was just delivering signs, so they became the interpreters, they were the ones telling me: "Yes. Thank you. I really needed this today." Or, like happened the other day with this, this man. He sent me a recording of a bird that he hears out of the window and then I just mimicked it. I just imitated the same . . . I sent him back the same thing, but I made it and then he say, "Oh, I love yours because I can hear my own name in it."  ANDREW: (chuckling) ENRIQUE: And [00:09:01] you know. And that, like a friend from Finland who say, you know, "Birds are only quiet when there are earthquakes or tsunamis or something horrible is about to happen." ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: "So whenever I hear your bird voice, I just feel that everything is okay." And to me that's . . . I mean in a sense, yeah, something shifted, because I think that, in a sense, turning the other person into the auger, into the interpreter, it [00:09:31] has something to do with the idea of an oracle as something that should poetize life instead of giving answers.  ANDREW: Well, and I think that, you know, let's be honest about, you know . . . I mean, I won't even bring my clients into this, about myself. There are times where I go to the oracle, hoping that the oracle will tell me that everything's going to be okay. And, you know, the prospect of thinking that well, as long as . . . as long as I can hear the birdsong, [00:10:01] or as long as I can go into my, my messenger and find a note of you playing, and play that song, the answer is the birds are singing, there's no tsunami. There's no earthquake.  ENRIQUE: Exactly.  ANDREW: There's no predator here, right? You're good. Take it easy. (laughs) ENRIQUE: Exactly. That's exactly one of the ways of seeing it, yes. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And, so, yeah, it has been a really, you know, at some point I started to suspect or to . . . Or maybe I decided [00:10:31] to start acting as if all these enterprises of divination, as if we already got it backwards. . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: You know, and usually we have this idea of this image of the person, the reader, the diviner, who's sitting waiting for the client or the, you know, consultant to come. And then I decided, no, it should be the other way around, right? Because in . . . I was reading The Iliad, you know, and there is this moment, which is a rather irrelevant moment, [00:11:01] when it is said that when a person arrives to the city, he fills everybody with excitement because of course, there is still the potential of what this person may be bringing, you know, news, things, a weird fruit, something, right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And then I thought about that in relationship with angels, and the idea of the angel. And of course, angel is a word that comes from a Greek word for messenger, [00:11:31] right? So, the idea of the messenger. The messenger brings news, like the birds that come and, as you say, everything is okay. The birds are singing. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Or look over there, because the bird, you know, flew that way.  So, I decided, I think it's better to become the angel, or to imitate, you know, dreams and angels, which are the only oracles that actually visit people. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And obliterate the reading on the table and just be . . . appear on people's lives and [00:12:01] then disappear, which is something you can now do, thanks to all these little gadgets we have, and social media, and all that, so you can really become, or have, a virtual presence. So that's where I am at now.  ANDREW: You've become the psychopomp, right?  ENRIQUE: Yeah, somehow, yeah in a sense. It's this idea of . . . I mean, I . . . You know, I am a witness, and I look at things, you [00:12:31] know, and, at some point, I guess I . . . what I understand is that I, in terms of giving answers to people, solving people's problems, giving them solutions, healing, all that stuff. I don't do that. I don't know how to do that. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: But I know how to pay attention. I know how to be a witness. So, at some point it may be that I find a place and form. Right? I look at something that is worth [garbled] or worth sharing and then [00:13:01] maybe that sound, that word, that form could be the answer to somebody's question or the solution to somebody's problem. It could even bring some sort of healing to them, but it's not me. It's not me doing it. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: It's . . . They are the ones interpreting the sign. ANDREW: Well, and I think that . . . You know, I think that one of the things that's really interesting and that, you know, I certainly appreciate about you and about all of our dialogues because, [00:13:31] you know, I think that the delivering of more concrete messages is also great and it's a thing that I certainly enjoy.  But I'm also really interested in this space where, where we, revoke the expectation of meaning in a concrete way. You know? And like, I made this deck earlier in the year, which I shared with you when I was in New York, you know, the Land of the Sacred Self Oracle.  ENRIQUE: Yes.  ANDREW: And you know, I created . . . [00:14:02] I initially wanted to say nothing about it. And like, I was like, I just want to make it and put it out there. But everybody, almost everybody that I talked to was like, "I don't know what I'm . . . I don't know what to do with this. So, I need you to tell me stuff." And I was like, "All right." So, I created this course for it and . . . which is, which is now, it's just basically a PDF. And the first lesson is, these images are nothing but ink on paper, [00:14:32] they don't mean anything. They have no concrete meaning in and of themselves. What do you actually see? You know? Because I think that leading people back to themselves is so profound and so powerful.  ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: And so, against the nature of our culture, right? The nature of . . .  ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: . . . the Modern Age, right?  ENRIQUE: Well, but that . . . What is interesting about that is that, that is exactly what contemporary art brought about. ANDREW: Right. [00:15:02]  ENRIQUE: You know? All . . . today, beginning of the 20th century, art basically showcased a common narrative and that could be . . . You know, you go to Italy to see all these paintings of the Virgin Mary or Christ, or the, the, you know, the Book of Genesis or whatever. You have this idea of okay, we all understand what we are seeing because we share these references. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And then came, you know, Malevich or Kandinsky [00:15:32] or even Donald Judd or all these people and say, "No, now you have the possibility to understand that thing before you on your own terms." ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And that's exactly what you're saying. Forget about what that is for the other person standing next to you. What is that to you? And of course, we still abhor that, I mean, most people put a lot of resistance to that, because they want to be told what it is. One is . . . like the other day, I had this, you know, I had [00:16:02] been reading the cards this woman finds out on the sidewalk. I have talked to you about this. For more than 10 years. And I stopped the other day because she, she sent me a card, and I told her about Nikolai Gogol, the Russian writer, and I . . . There is this wonderful little book a friend gave me about the dreams of Joseph Cornell. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: So, this woman pulled out all the dreams of Joseph Cornell [00:16:32] from his diary. And the amazing thing is that when you read his dreams you realize that they are not extraordinary in any way, right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Which is beautiful, because you realize the dreams are these material things available to all of us and a plumber can have dreams that are as extraordinary as the dreams of a fantastic artist as Joseph Cornell. But what was really interesting is at the end . . . She also wrote about all these people that Cornell was influenced by. [00:17:02] Not in terms of his work, but in terms of his relationship to dreams. And that I found fascinating. He had like the lineage of others like Blaise Pascal or you know, Freud. And then he spoke, or he took notice of Nikolai Gogol, and there was this rich lady who wrote to Gogol, saying, "Can you please interpret this dream for me?" Right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And Gogol wrote back and say, "Only your soul can tell you what the dream means." ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: "Don't [00:17:32] ask any wise man, because they won't tell you. They are not able to. They won't be able to say what it means. You have to find a quiet space. You have to. Within yourself you will find the meaning of the dream." So, I said that to this woman, right, who had sent me a little card she found somewhere. And she got enraged. She told me, "No, you have the obligation of telling me what it means." Because of course, we don't want to be within ourself. That's a . . . [00:18:02] It's a . . . it's a very tall order. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And, in theory, we don't have time, right? We are always under this imaginary constraint of time. And she said that "You have the obligation of telling me." Of course, I dropped communication immediately because I feel I have no obligation. I have two kids, that's obligations enough.  ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: Other than that, you know. But in a sense, I understand, there is a . . . what you're saying, in terms [00:18:32] of your own deck. I mean, people have an extraordinary resistance of coming to terms with their own experience, because actually, most people are looking for mythology, not for experience. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: You know. They want a little story. They don't want an experience.  ANDREW: Well, and exactly. You know, and I . . . a friend of mine who I was sharing the art with as I was making it, you know, they would have this reaction where they would be obviously fascinated by it, and then . . . But they'd be like, [00:19:02] "But I don't know what it means." And I'm like, "Well, just look at it. Do you have a feeling?" And they're like, "Yeah. I really have a feeling when I look at this." I'm like, "Great, then it's perfect. Go with that feeling!" You know? And even if their reactions were not, not articulatable, right? They would . . . I might have, you know, had I known then, I might have been like, "Just sing me a bird song about it. And we'll see what it says," you know?  ENRIQUE: Yeah. Well because if something [00:19:32] is really hitting home, the only possible responses are either laughter or silence.  ANDREW: Yes.  ENRIQUE: You know, that's the moment when we are completely impacted by something. We laugh, which is almost like a defense mechanism or we are quiet, because of this, we are taking it deep, you know. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: So, and of course, we still think that we have to feel special and important when we are having an experience.  ANDREW: Yeah. Yeah. Because people aren't comfortable sitting in [00:20:02] that. So, I was at this conference and, as the culmination of the workshop that we were doing, we were to sit and gaze into the other person's eyes, and sort of allow all that had been exchanged between us to sort of settle in. And the person that I was sitting with was uncomfortable with this and started to laugh every time we looked and tried to look away a bit or whatever. And so, I just sort of sat there and said to myself, "Well, I [00:20:32] can laugh with them, we can laugh together."  And so, so I started to laugh and as soon as I started to laugh, they continued, but were able to sort of sit with me with it. And so, we sat there, you know, in the midst of several hundred people. Everyone else dead silent and gazing solemnly into everybody else's eyes and having their own experience. And the two of us laughing so hard the tears were rolling down our face, because it just kept escalating, the longer we did it, the funnier [00:21:02] it got, right? And you know, I mean . . . ENRIQUE: That's brilliant. ANDREW: One of the . .  . one of the more magical experiences of it, you know, and I don't remember what the rest of the reading was. I have no idea what we said to each other. I mean, I might . . . I think I made some notes, I could go and look, but for me, the real significance was that we both changed something in that moment through our engagement and our laughter, right?  ENRIQUE: Yes, and that's actually . . . That was an actual communication, you know, where you had your communication, [00:21:32] communicating through laughter, which is in a way communicating through form. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And not through words. I mean words are wonderful. And I love words, but words are also overrated. You know, there is a whole field of experience that exists outside of words.  ANDREW: Sure. Yeah. ENRIQUE: And, and when you really have a profound experience, you are usually in the space outside of language, then comes the problem of sharing it, right? And then you have to find the right words, which is a whole other thing. But with the actual experience is not in the space mediated by language. [00:22:03]  ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: No matter what the French say.  ANDREW: Yeah. I completely agree with you. I think that that that sort of moment where you're just engaged with something beyond words is . . . is really where, where things are wonderful. Right? ENRIQUE: Yes. Absolutely. ANDREW: I mean, it's, it's an experience that I'm always seeking out, you know, in one way or another right? In my relationships. In my relationship with nature, through the art that I make, even, even through my hobbies, like going rock climbing. One of the things I like about rock climbing is [00:22:33] that, you know, when you're 25 feet off the ground, and you know, working on a climbing problem, there's no . . . There's nothing but the sort of sense of trying to figure out how to move in space in relationship with the wall and it's not . . . it's not words. ENRIQUE: Exactly. ANDREW: It's not anything. It's just . . . it's just a feeling and it's the feeling of being in that relationship with the wall itself and the puzzle, you know? ENRIQUE: Yeah, I mean that's, that's actually a beautiful example because the wall is there, [00:23:03] speaking in stone. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: And then . . . and your body has to reply in your negative space for the stone.  ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: Otherwise, you basically fall and die.  ANDREW: Right. ENRIQUE: So, you have to become endowed with that form and that's a . . . yeah, that's an excellent example.  ANDREW: Yeah, and it's definitely one of those things where you know, you can make your mind up. You know, I mean, especially, you know, like I'm not the world's best climber by any means, but you know, I climb [00:23:33] sort of relatively challenging, for most people, kind of things. You can decide all sorts of things before you start the climb, but once you put your hand or your foot or you know, whatever on the, on the hold then it tells you, if you're listening, what it wants you to do or needs you to do.  ENRIQUE: Yes.  ANDREW: And everything that you thought ahead of time kind of can go completely out the window where you're like, "Oh. I thought I'd be able to hold it from that angle. But in fact, I have to hold it from the other side now," or "I have to do this [00:24:03] or that," or "Oh, wow. That space is so much broader than I thought it was. I don't know how to, how to cross that gap now." And then you . . . then you have to sort of feel it and feel the motion and it really becomes a process of .  . . Most of the problem-solving comes not so much from even thinking about it, but from being there and saying, "Okay, where do I feel the most settled in this position? And where do I feel like I can move from?"  ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: And then you're like, "Okay, now, now, now I [00:24:33] can see my way forward."  ENRIQUE: Yeah, any embodied knowledge that you have, that we all have, and of course you acquire with experience the more you speak or you are in dialogue with the rock and the mountain, but at the same time, somehow, that's also dream. That's some sort of thing which, just letting the symbolic world, meaning the world of forms, guide you upwards. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. For sure. Well, [00:25:03] I mean, I feel like this this brings us into something that you and I have been, you know, discussing, you know, kind of . . . I mean over the last, last year or so, over the last six months, you know, this question of what does it mean to live with the oracle versus to sort of learn and work the oracle. I'm not sure if I'm articulating it quite right in those words, but it's a good starting point, right?  ENRIQUE: Yes, and I think [00:25:33--a little garbled here] that that's extraordinary. It's really an important question, I think. Then . . . I mean, for example, there are ways to tackle it, but this year, I finally managed to stop doing tarot readings for . . . which means that I finally managed to say no, which is really hard because usually what you want to say, "Yes," but I decided that it had no, I mean, I decided that there is a . . . You [00:26:04] know, honesty is prophecy. And then, when you actually give an honest look at anything, you know the future. And it's only when we fool ourselves, you know, we say, "Yeah, let me invite my alcoholic friend to the party. I'm sure this time he's going to be okay." ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: That's when we, you know, get derailed and then we get surprised by something that in theory, we say [00:26:34] is unexpected, but it isn't, you know, we are just fooling ourselves. But so, I decided okay, if you really remove things from the table, the only thing you can do is be present, you know, and pay attention.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: But of course, I can only accept that because whatever effect extended exposure to the tarot had on me, [00:27:04] allows me now to see that way, you know, and for . . . I see it.  At some point you realize that the reason why we place two cards and put a space in between them, right, and at some point, then, we realize that we think of that in terms of space only because we are very slow, but it's not really space, it's time. And then we [00:27:34] realize, oh, that time is equivalent to the time that exceeds between the two, [garbled, some words may be lost] somehow you realize, you discover, and you inhabit the space in between. You live, we live in the world all the time, cards or no cards, right? And I think that the, the, I mean the ultimate effect, I guess, is to be able to have a beautiful life and I think [00:28:04] that has to do a lot with being able to be present and to contemplate what is around and then you let . . .  I find myself in a very strange position, because I now work with all these people who are interested in language of the birds. So, we work with, you know, words, fundamentally, we break words apart and we turn them into little clouds, and we are actually looking for the void [00:28:34] within the words, right? And the letters become pegs that are holding the void in place. So, we go beyond meaning into form and then I will feel that it's almost like, sometimes, it's almost like seeing an angel. Like seeing a, you know, you see this beautiful thing that you know you found it when you see it, but you can't even define it, right?  And it has been one thing to do that for years and years on my own and another very [00:29:04] different one to . . . to share that work with other people and then to see the effect that work has on them. Right? And one of the beautiful things, of course, is that people feel very grounded, very centered, when they do this work, but then you have it. So, these are the people that . . . (ringing phone) ANDREW: I'm sorry.  Let's pause for a second, Enrique, until my phone stops ringing. ENRIQUE: And we can see that could be . . . Absolutely.  ANDREW: All right. [00:29:34] Apparently, I can't make the phone stop either. (laughing) Oh, boy.  ENRIQUE: Yes. You don't have superpowers.  ANDREW: I don't have superpowers. Yeah, okay.  ENRIQUE: So yeah, so, in any case, when you start sharing the work with other people, and they start doing that work, and you realize, oh, now people are talking about how their dreams change, right? And they have all these different beautiful [00:30:04] dreams that somehow follow the forms they are putting on the paper, right? Or, or people who feel grounded. And then you realize well, this is what living with the oracle is. It finds expression in anything you arrange . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Around you. And, you know, Gaston Bachelard, the French writer, talks about poetic [00:30:34] reverie, right? And he says, literally that, he says, we can't actually . . . We have to discount dreams because we don't have control over them. But then, if you submerge yourself in a constant state of poetic reverie, you change your own dreams. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Because you are learning to be beautifully in the world, to think beautifully, right? And in a form . . . in a way form begets form. So, if you learn to move in a certain way, then that can [00:31:04] raise an echo, right? And all that . . . I know that all this may sound very abstract and probably useless, but it all accounts for basically being in the world in a beautiful way and living a beautiful life. Eventually, you can share those things with other people. And . . .  For example, the other day I was talking to this very young woman. Her name was Natasha. And I showed her how her name . . . You know that if you separate the variables, which are the soul of a word [00:31:34] from the body, which is the consonants. She basically . . . the three As on Natasha form a triangle, right? With them . . . like an inverted triangle.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And then the consonants form a square. So, when I show her that as forms, we saw how her soul, the triangle, was a little bit off-center to the square, the body, and she was really concerned about appearing or being too [00:32:04] predictable. So that gave her great comfort. Because of course, having an off-center soul is not being predictable. And, in a sense, I had to explain that. I just saw something. I say, "Oh, well, this makes me feel better." And I don't know what that is. And again, I never know what that can do for anybody. But I also think that there is some comfort for me [00:32:34] in thinking that something so abstract cannot be named, right? Because if you cannot really name it, then you probably cannot trivialize it.  ANDREW: Hmm. I think it's . . . I think it's . . . You know, my . . . So many things. All my thoughts are colliding now! (laughing) And it's like, how do I put all this into words that make any sense to anybody else? Right? It's just . . . ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: So, [00:33:04] we talked about how . . . you know, being . . . we need to, we need to sort of see things as they are, right? And that when we're surprised by circumstance in readings, possibly, probably, we've been fooling ourselves on some level, you know? Because I think that, I think that that's certainly my experience, right? There are . .  . there are surprises, life is surprising at times, but most of the things that people ask [00:33:34] questions about aren't really surprising and people generally have a notion about what's going on. They just don't like it, don't want to say it, don't want to face it, or whatever.  You know, and for me, you know this sort of Stoic idea of it's always better to know what's real then to sort of live in any other kind of version of reality, you know, or to cover it up. I think that that's something that I sort [00:34:04] of really have valued over a long time. And I think that the kind of Stoic notions, if you can kind of work with them outside of the macho bullshit, that's so much stuff that gets layered on them today, I think that they really can be helpful. And then I think that once we know what's real or what's, you know, closest to what's real, for whatever we want to say about that. That's a whole other episode, but . . .  ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: Then we can start to understand [00:34:34] and engage with this other world that doesn't need to have concreteness attached to it per se, right? And I think about my walk in the woods talking to the birds. I think about . . .  People always ask me, you know, like, "Well, do you do daily readings? What do you . . . How do you read the cards for yourself?" And you know, these days, a lot of what I do is, I just sit with the cards. And I put out some Marseilles cards and then I put out my, you [00:35:04] know, my Sacred Self Oracle, and I look for, look for the patterns that emerge between those. And especially because I'm often taking notes on my iPad, I'll take a picture of that card, and then I'll draw on top of it. And I've moved outside of the notion of reading in any sense that anybody means by that. And . . .  ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: And it is so grounding, and so centering, and sometimes there's a message that emerges, [00:35:34] sometimes it filters back down into language or words or whatever. And often the words that come out don't even really matter. They don't even necessarily make sense in any sort of overt way, but the flow of them, the practice of making them or arranging them, the practice of thinking them, is the message and is the oracle. ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: And the consequence of that oracle is not tangible and direct in an overt way, but [00:36:04] it somehow modifies myself and my relationship to the world, my day, whatever it is that's going on, in ways that allow me to move forward in a different manner. ENRIQUE: Yes. That's the dialogue in the day. The hand and the wall rock, you know, when your hand gets caught, to match the rock wall, your climb, it's the same thing. It's form speaking to form. And that in itself is [00:36:34] the message. And of course, that doesn't have an intellectual effect, because you can't just even talk about it. It has an emotional effect . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Which is something that a lot of people miss. When you are in contact with an oracle, you're basically exposing yourself to, to have, to that, for that thing to have an emotional impact on you. And, and maybe, there is something also, that may be very silly, you know, but oracle is a word that basically accounts [00:37:05] originally, at least, for an opaque or oblique utterance, right? A phrase, a bunch of words that don't have a clearer meaning.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: So, it requires thought and, and in the way I see it, there is an experience that let's say, is a little common still. A person, any person, opens a poetry book, finds a line in the poem, and thinks, "Ah, this [00:37:35] speaks to my condition right now." Right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And we know that that poet didn't write that for her, or not even about, it's not even about that, that the person is experiencing. But the person can see how that speaks to her. You know, "Yes, this accounts for this experience I'm having." ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: And that's an experience that most people feel or know, understand, and even our culture at large values [00:38:05] it, that. We respond to it, we pride ourselves on being a culture that generates that kind of experience. So, we can take that one step further, and say, well this is a . . . Fal'e Hafiz, you know, the divination with a poet by Hafiz, the Iranian poet, which is basically the same thing, only that it's not any book of poetry, but only a book of poetry by Hafiz. You think about a problem you have, you open it up, the [00:38:35] first line you read, that's the answer . . . ANDREW: Mm. ENRIQUE: To your problem. And the thing is, that Hafiz was a very very obscure poet. So, it's never like, "come back on Tuesday," or, you know, play the 36."  ANDREW: Right!  ENRIQUE: So, it's a really really contrived sentence. So, you have to meditate upon it. It is the same as meditating upon form. And then eventually say "Yes, I understand how this is speaking to my condition." [00:39:06]  And we can take that one step further and say the I Ching, right? Which is still a book and still full of lines, literally and metaphorically. But then, now, we don't say, "Okay, open it in any page and the first thing you see, that will be it." We say, "No, we're actually engaging with chance." So, we take all these sticks or the coins and we start going through a process that renders this idea of the odd and the even. [00:39:36] So we, you know, we get to the hexagrams. And then from the hexagrams to some sort of commentary on the hexagrams. So, we are again left with some sort of obscure phrase that in theory is responding to our situation, right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And then the next step, of course, is get rid of the book.  ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: And keep the sticks. And right there, we have all the divination [00:40:06] systems we know, right? We have the shells with the bones, throw the cards, or the coffee stains or grinds or the clouds. And the funny thing is in our culture, the moment we get rid of the book, we step into what people define as superstition, right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah. ENRIQUE: It's no longer this poetica pursuit, basically, because we have this very old-fashioned idea of poetry as something that is anchored on the word, words, and [00:40:36] not on form. But of course, every time you look at an oracle you're reading, and that reading is a poetic reading. It's as opaque and obscure as the poetry by Hafiz or the I Ching commentary or the poem that you read and . . .  ANDREW: Well in the . . . ENRIQUE: You know, I was talking about this with . . . yeah, yes, go ahead.  ANDREW: In a sense, you know, when we . . . You know, not in a literal sense, because from within the tradition, we have a different dialogue [00:41:06] about it, but from the point of view of our conversation, when we are divining with the cowrie shells and we say that the, the Odu has arrived, right? Like the living energy of the Orisha that is the sign that came out in this divination. And the belief is that the arrival of that Odu changes the person's life. It is . . . it is just that process of invoking that energy through [00:41:36] the shells, and looking at it and seeing it and it being there, and then afterwards the diviner's job is more so to manage that dialogue and make sure that the person understands enough of what has been said so they can go away and think about it, right? I mean and there are other sort of literal pieces too but, but that idea of the energy of the oracle arriving, and us receiving it, and that being the thing that changes our life . . . You know, it comes with the notion that we don't understand [00:42:06] what that is, exactly. We can't articulate it clearly.  And even, even when we're interpreting the Odu in a traditional way, we can't necessarily, on any level, understand all of the implications and so on of that. We are merely just making sure that we've, you know, read the appropriate lines that are relevant to it and marked the right things. And after that, it's up to the person to sit with it and allow that to unfold with them and through them and so on, in a way that [00:42:36] is certainly energetic and otherwise, but also definitely poetic, and goes back to that sort of obtuseness of Hafiz, or other things, the I Ching, where it's like, "Huh? What does this really mean? How does this apply? How does this apply today? How does this apply while I'm at the butcher's? How does this apply when I pick my kids up from school? You know? It's that living with it that is the . . . that is where we get the most out of it and where it is the most transformational. You know? ENRIQUE: Yes. Yeah, and [00:43:06] I mean, I was talking about this with my wife the other day, and she say that the problem, really, the moment you get rid of the book or the moment that you step into the oracle is the other person, the interpreter, you know? There is this, the moment you need the other person to tell you how to relate to the oracle. And I thought that was really interesting because again, it's brought me back to the woman who say, "You are in the obligation of telling me because I'm not going to do any thinking."  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And [00:43:36] of course, I mean, again, it is really interesting to, for me at the moment to think again that by delivering an open object, turn the other person into the interpreter. They have to come to terms with forms and understand what those forms are saying to them. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Because at least I don't know. I don't know what, who they are. I don't know what they are, you know, feeling, and I must certainly have no, [00:44:06] nothing to say about anybody's life, but they know. I think they always know. And you say, also a few minutes ago, they have an idea of what's going on. And basically, they may not like it. So, they're trying to find almost like a second opinion. That's why . . . I mean the other day, somebody was asking me about the ethics of readings and divination and I told her, well, there is an ethical problem, because in my experience [00:44:36] most clients are dishonest. They want to hear what they want to hear.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And they will twist your words. They will, you know, re-ask the question again and again until they get what they want, and even if you don't give it to them, they will hear every word you say as if you say what they want to hear. So, of course, there is a lot of dishonesty in the profession, but it mostly come from the clients. Of course, [00:45:06] there are dishonest readers. But even the honest reader has to put up with that person who has decided beforehand what they want to hear. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And I see that as way more . . . I mean, and again, it's really . . . Do you know, I think that there is a love for the majority for example of the cards or any oracle, at some point you want to really share that beauty with other people. And that takes you so far. It [00:45:37] comes to a point at which you understand: "Yes, but I'm speaking of a beauty and this woman's still speaking about this [garbled] on Thanksgiving. You know? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: I really don't care. It's not really my problem.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think, yeah. I think too, like, somebody . . . Somebody was asking me if . . . Somebody was . . . I was posting about my . . . So, my journey for, with [00:46:07] rock climbing. You know, I was, I set myself a goal for the year. This is the only resolution I made for 2018. And my resolution for 2018 was to still be climbing at the end of the year. That was my, my entire goal. No achievement attached to it. No, you know, anything else, just still be going and doing it. Just keep returning if you go away, and be, and still be there at the end of the year. Because [00:46:37] I think that, you know, like the oracle, you know, if we, if we promise to keep showing up, you know, the oracle reveals things to us over time. ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: We don't know when or how that comes, and so if we endeavor to be with it, then, then we will hear what we need to hear as we go, to a large extent. And somebody, somebody was posting . . . somebody posted in response to that, that if they, they wondered if the universe challenged us whenever we set an intention, you [00:47:07] know, if it deliberately brought stuff up, you know. And I think that for me, and I'll let you answer for yourself. But for me, living with the oracle in this open-ended way and living, in a, for lack of a better term, kind of more Stoic way with a real sort of working to, to see things as clearly as possible all the time and face the things that I might rather put in the closet or leave [00:47:37] for another day.  I don't . . . I don't feel like the universe has a lot of agency in the way that that question implies, you know? There are surprises that are . . . that happen, you know? You know, in relationship to me climbing this year, there were two surprises: One, I dislocated my collarbone in the winter, tobogganing with my daughter. And that took like [00:48:07] four months to really fix. It's horrible. I don't recommend it to anybody. And two, you know, I'm getting divorced this year and, you know, although that is amicable and, and going well, relatively speaking, it takes a lot of time and attention and doesn't always leave energy for other things. But I don't think that any of those have any relationship to . . . to my intention or my desire to climb or do other things. I think that those are, those [00:48:37] are just the inevitable stories of being alive, right? We are alive, and things happen and we get sick and . . . ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: Life comes up and things change and so on and we don't need to, or I never need to, arrange a narrative around that in a bigger way. So, I'm curious. I'm curious for you. Do you . . . What agency do you feel comes back from the universe? Do you think that there is something organizing it or testing us or . . .  ENRIQUE: No, I actually, no, I always say the same thing. I think that [00:49:07] the universe doesn't care about us. Or maybe I will say it doesn't care about me. And I know that people want to be, to feel otherwise, you know, but you know when I was a kid . . . and this image has been coming back a lot recently. I watched this documentary about Africa, right? And there was this method of catching monkeys, which consisted of filling up a hollow tree with grain. ANDREW: Uh huh. ENRIQUE: And then, you know, the monkey will stick his hand into the hollow [00:49:37] tree, grab the grain, but then couldn't take the handful, the fistful out. The hole was only big enough for the empty hand to come in. But if he had grain in his hand, in his hand, he couldn't take it out. ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: And basically, these guys just will walk up to the monkey and grab it because the monkey will never let go of the grain.  ANDREW: Yes.  ENRIQUE: And I mean, it's insane, right? But I think that in terms of daily life, we are all monkeys with our hand [00:50:07] stuck in a hollow tree.  ANDREW: Yes. ENRIQUE: And most of the time, you realize, yeah, but can you just open the hand and let go? ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: Life works the way it works. And in that sense, there is no mystery, even if it takes you by surprise all the time, basically because we think that there is a mystery there. And yes, sometimes we catch a cold and sometimes we get divorced and sometimes we, you know, we're surprised by somebody giving us a loaf of bread. ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: I . . . I [00:50:38] don't think that actually, at least I understand that that's not the way people think, but I never thought of any kind of oracular work where oracles had any dealings with daily life in that sense, of letting me know if I should change the oil of my car today or next week, you know? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: I think it's more about transcending daily life and finding some sort of center, true beauty [00:51:08] through some sort of . . .  ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: Through some sort of sublime condition in life. ANDREW: For sure.  ENRIQUE: Yeah, but all day, even the other day I was talking about, you know, people, people talk about sigils, and then I realized, first, the first mistake you make when you make a sigil is wanting something? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And then you realize when you make a sigil to, I don't know, lose weight. Let's [00:51:38] say. And another sigil to get a red car. You're basically making the same operation, right? You make, you take the words, you eliminate certain letters, and you consolidate everything into one small or smaller emblem. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And then you realize, oh, but what you're doing there, it doesn't matter what you want. What you're doing again and again and again is a reduction. That's what then . . . In the world of forms, [00:52:08] what you are actually spelling is a reduction. Which means that in time, it doesn't matter how many things you wanted, you end up with your mind drinking.  ANDREW: Hmm. ENRIQUE: And of course, people don't like that, because, besides you can't sell a book saying this stuff, right? You can't sell any books and don't want stuff. They only want books that say, I'm sorry, I want to say you're entitled [00:52:38] to want everything, and I can tell you how to get it.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: But you realize there is something really silly about trying to control daily life, especially because daily life is not even that interesting, you know, and it takes care of itself.  ANDREW: Mm. Yeah. I think that . . . I mean it's kind of why, over the years, I've sort of moved to . . . My [00:53:08] magic that I do tends to tends to be most often orientated towards what I, what I kind of now often call as identity magic, which is how do I, how do I change myself so that I can be more like more like what seems fruitful, more like what, you know, remove those obstacles in myself to doing the things that I need, you know, it's not so much about changing the world as it is about [00:53:38] shifting myself in relationship to it so that . . . If there's desire attached to it, so that what I desire is more accessible, or so that I'm more, more at ease and more in the flow around whatever it is that I need to work on and change, you know? ENRIQUE: Yes.  ANDREW: Yeah.  ENRIQUE: Yeah, I don't know. I think it's a song. At some point, I understood or I [00:54:08] have been made to understand that presence is meaning . . . ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And presence is also performance.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Whatever you are, you're performing, you're enacting, you are projecting something, and causing an effect. And I'm at the moment more interested in just being, you know, and be present and play along with the fact that causes. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: It's like when this woman started laughing, looking at [00:54:38] your eyes, and you laughed with her, you know, you said that's a reaction in the moment and that's what there, you know? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And trying to make her chop or, I don't know, levitate, will be useless. So, yeah, it's . . . I'm finding a lot of pleasure in walking around by with my pockets empty. And of course, I don't know what magic is. I think that, in other words, I think that magic or [00:55:08] some experience of mystery that I actually pursue or often feel works best when you don't want anything, when you don't want it, and it appears and surprises you, gives you something. It's like a gift, you know, but it's not something you pursue in terms of how can I command for this to happen at will. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And again, I understand that when you say that magic . . . When . . . the moment I speak [00:55:38] of magic without will, I'm almost like undefining magic in terms of what people think magic is, right? They all seem to be convinced it's about will, exerting our will, and I think it's more about stepping aside, letting things happen.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. Well, I think it's definitely about . . . for me, it's definitely about making space so that [00:56:08] I can be engaged and present with the subject of the magic in a way that it allows it to unfold, to some extent without control, to a large extent without control, because I think that the idea of, you know, "Oh, I really want this person to fall in love with me." I mean, I think the minute that you're fixated on, on one person is the minute that you've already kind of drifted into a problematic territory and should go back to . . . ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: Why that person? [00:56:38] Why do you want them when they are not reciprocating? What is it you're looking for? What is it you could do without magic to make this . . . ? You know, I mean, many questions, right? But, but rather, what could I . . . What could I do to have more, more romance in my life? What could I do to have better connections? And is there a magical act that, that feeds and supports that in an open-ended and sort of allowing the universe to show us, allowing ourselves to witness and notice it in an open, open [00:57:08] and present way as the opportunities float around us, rather than sort of exerting a massive amount of control, which I think is, which is very rarely fruitful, you know.  ENRIQUE: Yes. Well, you know, my . . . This year, one of my favorite moments is . . . I have this friend, who about 12 years ago, he was named the godfather of a child, right? And he decided beautifully that his gift to this kid will be the gift of language. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: So, he set up an account, a bank account and he has [00:57:38] been putting money there for years, assuming that at some point, maybe this kid will want to learn, you know, Italian so he can go to Rome and live there and learn the language. But then this summer, he spent a morning with me by the river and we were playing with all these bird voices, you know, and talking like birds and the birds will come and all this and that. So, and he went, he bought a box full of birdcallers and sent it to this kid.  Yeah, so there is something extraordinarily beautiful in [00:58:08] inspiring a person to complete this crazy act of gifting a kid a set of birdcallers, and then he wrote this note, saying, "I believe this is a good first language for you to learn. And, and then for that gesture not to fall flat, you know, and for the kid to actually embrace this, and then this is a kid I don't know, I probably will never see in my life, but somehow, it's beautiful to think that there [00:58:38] is some residual effect of what I do that is part of that kid's life, and I don't know. I'm . . .  The other day, for example, this woman wrote to me and she said that she wanted to speak like a hawk. And it's beautiful. We saw this at [Brawn's?] we saw that actually allows her to do so. And she say, "Well, I have a problem, and the problem I have is that I'm surrounded by [00:59:08] sparrows." So, I told her, "Well, you know, the problem is that the only way you have for you to know if you are actually doing it right is that all those sparrows are going to fly away, because you've become a predator, right? ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And she say, "Oh, but, I mean, I love the sparrows. Do you think they were going to trust me?" I said, "Yes. I mean, they are going to trust you as much as a sparrow trusts a hawk." Okay. So yeah, it's fantastic to think you can . . . A, this faith [00:59:38] when a person can ask you that question, can talk about this [garbled] bird's nest to still be close to the birds. And at the same time, like a little bit . . . We are really not just talking about talking like a hawk, or talking about voice, we are talking about the consequences of having a certain voice and being responsible for what we say, what we put out in the world. And I . . . being full of all of the [garbled] but I can [01:00:08] see the poetry or of living a poetic life through embracing the form of a bird voice and the bird language. So yeah. ANDREW: That's wonderful. Well, maybe we should wrap up the us talking part of the conversation here, and there were definitely some questions that came through, through Facebook. And I think at this point, I'd love to, I'd love to hear you give like a one word [01:00:38] or a one phrase answer to them, rather than us sort of go into a big long conversation or . . . kind of like we did in one of them where . . .  ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: I did the rapid-fire questions at you. Let's look at these rapid fire . . . ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: And see what comes, okay? So, one person asks . . .  ENRIQUE: Okay.  ANDREW: So, with your children, are they interested, would you teach them these things about card reading? What are your thoughts on children and cards? [01:01:08]  ENRIQUE: Well, I have three kids. The middle kid already asked me to teach him and I did so. And then yesterday, my daughter told me that, and she's 10. One of his friends, his classmates, actually asked: Did your father ever taught you, told you how to read tarot and [garbled] in the French way, in such a beautiful way, that I think she already knows everything she needs to know.  ANDREW: Yeah, my [01:01:38] youngest got a Sibilla deck and reads that for me sometimes . . . ENRIQUE: I have Sibilla, yes. ANDREW: And it's just, you know, she's so great at it. It's just, she's like, "Oh, look at this. Somebody's going to do something you don't like, but this is going to happen. But there you go. It's so wonderful," right? They have a sense of it, I think, which is great and . . . ENRIQUE: Yes. ANDREW: It's less about teaching and more about just . . . ENRIQUE: Yeah. I mean my son, when I explained . . . Yeah, when I explained [01:02:08] it to my son in after 15 minutes, he told me, "Oh, I understand. This is all about transformations." And I realized, "Oh, it took you 15 minutes, it took me 15 years."  ANDREW: Right?  ENRIQUE: Okay.  ANDREW: Yeah. ENRIQUE: You know, that's that. Yeah.  ANDREW: All right. Next question. What is the poem that the world needs in these times?  ENRIQUE: I don't know. I mean, I guess my [01:02:38] issue is that I don't have any faith in the poem. ANDREW: Mm. ENRIQUE: As you know, in the actual poem. I guess there's poetry, and poetry's everywhere in a sense. But I will say in terms of poetry, yes, yes, you just need to listen to the sparrows. You know, the sparrows have this beautiful thing, that is, they are like Zen monks. A sparrow only makes a, like a little sound, you know, over and over and over, so it says everything it needs to say in one syllable. It's [01:03:08] almost like tasting water, you know. So . . . ANDREW: Yeah, yeah. ENRIQUE: Yeah, the voice of the sparrow. ANDREW: What has surprised you regarding tarot in the last couple of years? ENRIQUE: You know, the tarot world is like that movie, Groundhog Day. ANDREW: (bursts out laughing) ENRIQUE: It's the same day again, over and over.  ANDREW: (still laughing) Yes, Bill Murray. ENRIQUE: So, we're all Bill [01:03:38] Murray.  ANDREW: Perfect. Yeah. ENRIQUE: And that's . . . Every day the same deck is being published, the same book is being published, the same conversation about the origin of tarot is being published, the same theory about the secret behind it is being discussed.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And that's how we go, you know, it never ends.  ANDREW: Perfect. Do you consider tarot magic? And do you practice any forms of magic?  ENRIQUE: Oh, every morning, [01:04:08] I sit at a café, in the same place next to a window. I look at words in my notebook. And if something appears [garbled--black?], in terms of form, I share it with some people and then that snowballs into something. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: And that's the magic I do. And, yeah, I mean, everything can be, I guess, magic, but I do feel that for something to be magical, there has to be an otherness.  ANDREW: Mm-hmm.  ENRIQUE: Meaning it has to take you to another [01:04:38] place. It's, I don't know. It's hard to imagine doing magic with something that is completely like a daily thing, you know, but it could be. I mean, I think that, yeah. In any case, I don't know if magic. I think that the world has a poetic influence, meaning that forms speak to each other through analogy. Maybe that's magic. I don't know if magic is an intelligence. I don't [01:05:08] know again, if there's an agency, like a big finger that is invisible and it's swirling things behind. I don't know. ANDREW: Yeah. Fair. And last question: What would, what would it take for you to put your tarot deck again right now? Given that you're not really doing readings and such any more. ENRIQUE: Every time I make an exception.  ANDREW: Yes. Yeah. ENRIQUE: Every time I make an exception, [01:05:38] I end up confirming that it's pointless.  ANDREW: Hmm.  ENRIQUE: So, no, I don't think so. I'm not, you know, I have nothing to sell, and I'm not in a crusade for people, not to do readings or to any kind of ideas I may have, I'm just trying to get by finding my own language. I will do all these things, which is a way of saying to find my own. You know, I think that that's what the philosopher's stone is. To find your own language. ANDREW: Right. ENRIQUE: And your own language is not English or Spanish or Italian. It's how [01:06:08] you organize forms around you. And that's why they . . . you know, the, the alchemists say, that's a great work, you know, and they say the philosopher's stone cannot be handed down, you know, passed to another person. You have to find it yourself. It's because of that. You have to find your own language. ANDREW: Mm-hmm. ENRIQUE: Otherwise you're just living in the shadow of another person's language.  ANDREW: Right. Perfect.  ENRIQUE: And yeah, so, so and well. Yeah. Okay.  ANDREW: I think that's a great place [01:06:38] to leave it. Go find your language, everybody!  ENRIQUE: Perfect.  ANDREW: Perfect. And if it sounds like birds, let us know. (laughs)  ENRIQUE: Exactly. ANDREW: Perfect. Well, thank you so much for hanging out with me this morning and especially for fighting through all the Skype up and downs. It's what I get for recording during Mercury retrograde.  ENRIQUE: Oh, it's okay. It's always great.  ANDREW: Perfect.  ENRIQUE: Thank you. It's always great to talk to you. ANDREW: Thank you, you too.  ENRIQUE: I hope to soon.  [music] ANDREW: [01:07:09] I hope you love this conversation, as always, I hope that. Enrique did all the Patreons the pleasure of recording a bird song just for them. So if you are a supporter of the Patreon in the $5 and up category, you can go find that recording now at Patreon.com/TheHermitsLamp, and if you're not a supporter: Well, what are you waiting for? The birds are waiting to speak to you. Talk to you next time.