Beyond Proving Yourself

0:05 Yo yo, this is BradQuan, host of the Weirdinary podcast and recently I was asked what my favorite restaurant is and without a doubt I said Son of Egg. Located at 483 Broadway in Renle, New York. Why Son of Egg? Because every time I step foot in this establishment, I instantly feel a celebration of community, creativity, intellectualism, and humanity. And I mean, it goes without saying, but I'm gonna say it anyway. The food is spectacular. Now, why is this spectacular, you ask? Well, my god. Because whenever I bite into it, I feel like I'm at home. Tappiness on a bay. 483 Broadway, New York. You want to eat? Eat with the best.

1:16 All right. All right. Yo yo. Welcome to another episode of Weirdinary. I'm your host, BradQuan. And today I have a very, very special guest. This man is an actor, poet, essaist, educator, and technology professional. He has worked in higher education before spending approximately 10 years at Apple, including roles including roles as a creative genius. This man has taught high school English in Fairfax County, Virginia before moving into technology education in Colorado. This man has served as an instructional techn technologist at St. Vin Valley School's Innovation Center, helping students become Apple certified Mac technicians through practical diagnostic and repair experience. This man has testified before the Colorado legislature in 2017 in support of resources for technology education in public schools. He publishes as poet guru with poetry blogging dating back to 2002 and audio recordings appearing by 2004.

2:32 This man created the poet guru podcast featuring recordings of his original poetry and later launched reading bath exploring the best American poetry. This man has authored mixtape 20 in 2014 which is a poetry collection connecting poems and personal stories with accompanying songs. He funded a commissioned poetry book project through Kickstarter and published literary criticism and southern humanities review. His performance of 66 is listed in the performance poetry preservation projects indie feed archive. This man returned to New York in 2022 and resumed theater after approximately 20 years away. He performed with confetti stage Albany Civic Center. Connectity Light Opera Company and Foothills Arts Council. His acting credits include One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, School of Rock, Rosen CR, Gilden Stern are Dead, Jesus Hopped, the A Train, and The Lion and Winter alongside earlier appearances in Camelot, Low Abner, and Finding the Sun.

3:46 This man has served as assistant director and producer of The Wolves at Sand Lake Center for the Arts. Listen, ladies and gentlemen, Tom Ingram. [laughter] Thanks, man. Thank you. God, dude, this this dude, your resume is [bleep] incredible, man. I I mean, and just the humility you have, uh the gratitude, the way you carry yourself. I mean, I there's there's there there's so much to there's so much to peel into. Okay. Oh my god. Let's do it. I mean, first and foremost, I mean, uh, whereabouts are, uh, whereabouts are you from, Tom? I grew up about an hour south of here in a little town called Germantown, New York. Germantown, New York. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Uh, right along the Hudson River. And, uh, went to college in Newalts. Okay. And then, uh, moved to about 10 different states after that and lived in about 30 different cities. and um just fumbled my way into doing whatever kind of cool project I could get my hands on.

4:50 What do you uh all the moving about? Mhm. Because I and I just want to understand like your experience because like when I left I left because I was running from something. Okay. Sounds like you were running towards something. But what would you say your your experience was? Cuz you obviously went around a lot. I mean, what was your mindset like as you were It was really a question of if, you know, at every one of those inflection points, it was really a question of what's going to be the most interesting thing, you know. Um, when I graduated college, I had an opportunity to do an internship at at Ruters, Newark. And so, I moved to Newark, New Jersey, and spent a summer living there. And then I had an opportunity to choose between two grad schools, one in Maine and one in West Virginia. and just figured out which one was going to be more interesting. And that's sort of how all of those how all of those decisions came about was just what's what's the next fun thing? What's the next interesting thing? How can I be more creative?

5:54 Fair enough. Um, so you were so you grew up in a small town. So it's like it seems like once you got the opportunity to spread your wings, man, you didn't stop. Yeah. you know, my um I I went to my I have an MFA in poetry and my MFA in poetry um you have to write a we had to write a thesis and our thesis was a book of poetry essentially. Yes. And um I wrote about the town I grew up in was the central character of the of the um of the thesis. And the thing that I remember most from that from those poems was that uh I described the town that I grew up in as built on a very solid clay, which it was. Um like when you as soon as you got under the top soil, it was just clay. And things that stuck in that town stuck there to this day. There were families and people I went to school with whose names were on road signs like Miller, you know, Miller Street or Lasher Avenue or a Stoage Road. Like those are the people I grew up with. Their families have been there since the 1700s and are still there. Oh wow.

7:01 And my family moved there when I was 10 months old. And so I always kind of felt like I never really felt like I was part of it. I felt like I was part of it on an individual level, but I never felt like my family actually like stuck to that spot. And so, you know, when I got an opportunity to go to college, I went I only went about an hour away. But Newaltz is a very different world than uh than German Town. And then as I kept getting opportunities, I just kept taking them. Fair enough. As a child, my friend, um what did you learn you had to do to feel worthy of love? Oh, Jesus. [sighs] Um the two things that you know when in my in my yearbook people wrote two things about me. Okay. They everybody with a different sort of flavor, but it all came down to two things. One was, "Man, you're really smart." And two is, "Dude, you're so weird." And it was it was that sort of combination of like, and to this day, it's it's um I'm a smart guy, and so I I I gain my respect and my um and my dollars by being by being by being smart and having a lot of knowledge. And I gain them by being goofy and being funny. And so I think those are the two things that have always made made me uh find a place in wherever I was was just you know you talked in the beginning about being humble or being kind and generous like uh spirituality nowhere on that resume was there anything about spirituality but it's a huge part of this journey and and learning about uh learning about what it takes to be happy and what wealth is and KRS1 One said, "Wealth is not about how much you

8:53 have. It's about how little you need to be able to say, "I'm good." And how much how much does it take for you to be able to be grateful and be thankful? Austerity. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. One of the one of my favorite philosophers, Dioynes. He uh he spoke about that a lot. You know what I mean? He lived on just the absolute bare minimum of life, you know what I mean? And I think there's something to say about the people that can find peace within the bare minimum of life. You know what I mean? Because there's a difference between happiness and peace. Mhm. You know, definitely. And and in your journey to finding out what happiness is, what's the difference between the two? uh to you [clears throat] peace is a state of inner calm. Mhm. Um peace is a state of not allowing the the horrors of the world and there are lots of them but not allowing them to ripple your pond.

10:07 Whereas happiness to me happiness is is the are the highlights. Happiness are the high points. You know, it's if you think of it like a theater show, the piece comes when the when the show starts and the lights go down and now you're in a state where nothing has really happened yet. And generally when you're watching a play, that first scene is always a peaceful scene. Not always, but in many places. Um, you start out in a place of calm. Uh, as you go through the show, there's going to be moments of happiness, there's going to be moments of sadness, there's going to be moments of anger. Um, those are the those are the the peaks and troughs of it. Whereas peace is when you can just sit in the in the quiet in between those. Mhm. Fair enough. So, let me ask you, what what part of yourself did you just to rewind a bit? So, yeah, you were smart and very weird. Mhm.

11:19 Well, if there's one thing I know [cough and clears throat] about being smart and weird is it's not always praised. Oh, no. Not at all. You know what I'm saying? [laughter] and particularly in elementary school, middle school. Yes. Now, unfortunately, that can make you an outcast and whatnot. And what I want to learn is like what part of yourself did you learn to hide as you entered adolescence and how did you go about doing that? [snorts] I mean, I was I was I still am an overly emotional person that um I have well I was and still [clears throat] am, but I have learned how to keep that part of me in check and when to be um it's been a long journey for me to learn how to be professional in professional settings [laughter] and and to not you know um to not let that let that part out. uh people enjoy the the funny goofy parts, they get more uncomfortable with the emotional parts and so or with the you know the intense sadness, the intense anger. Um and so letting letting finding a way to both let those exist but also to have them in their right time manner and place has been a struggle that I continue with to this day. overly emotional. Uh, from where do you from where do you feel that stems? I suppose. Were you the only child?

12:54 No, I was I'm a middle child. Well, sort of a middle child. I grew up a middle child. Let's put it that way. Interesting. Do you think this is just this is just speculation? I've done some research on like middle child syndrome and whatnot. Do you feel like you dealt with that like not getting enough attention as a middle child or like what was your experience like? Um my experience was um I was a middle child in a very loud household. Okay. Um and I did the very best I could to be everybody's ally. So when everybody was arguing with each other, I didn't take sides and I didn't cross lines. So I was friends with everybody. I was available for everybody. And and that has led to me as an adult being someone who you can drop into a lot of situations and I'm just going to be comfortable with everybody. That's what's up. You know, so you can you can fit in wherever. Do you feel like there's a Do you feel like you have you ever dealt with the the curse that comes with people pleasing? Have you ever felt like you fell into that? Absolutely. 100%.

14:04 It's a [bleep] Oh my god. [laughter] Uh, I I I I it's it's like there's so much good that can come with that because it it it you have a heart of gold and it makes you want to give more than your than your mind can fully comprehend. It's a beautiful thing, but it can be so detrimental because you forget to fill your own cup. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. But, you know, in my life, what I've worked on and come to is that if the urge depends on where the urge comes from. If the urge to give to others is coming out of a genuine sense of wanting to be generous, wanting the world to be a better place, wanting to um wanting to move through the world with a cert from a certain stance and with a certain flavor, you can't let how it's received on the other end affect that impulse. That's a fact. So if you you and this again comes back to the spirituality piece of it of you need to separate yourself from the results of what you're doing. Um if you're putting a poem out into the world, if you're putting a show out into the world, some people are going to love it, some people are going to hate it, but that shouldn't affect your performance. If you're going to decide to give somebody a dollar who's asking for it on the street, you need to do that.

15:30 And whether they're going to use that for food or for something else is irrelevant. Like you can't control that part of it. You can only control how you move through the world and not necessarily what other people do with what you what you put out there. You're a stoic. So in sixth grade, Mr. Fabiano, my sixth grade teacher, Yeah. uh saved my life. Uhhuh. And he saved my life because he introduced me to that concept to stoicism and he was like, "I know these kids are are horrible to you, but you can't let them you can't let them change who you are as a person." Yeah. You know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [bleep] uh like uh Marcus Aurelius. I'm pretty sure that's like Yeah. He's he his stoicism, his philosophy is is incredible. and just hearing you talk. It's just it's just just so much enlightenment. That shit's hard. It is hard to separate yourself from the [bleep] results because as somebody such as myself, like I'm I dealt with a lot of self-esteem issues. You know what I'm saying?

16:39 So, it's like, you know, the the the the results of the success is it gives you a sense of worth when people tell you you're smart and this and that. like you hold on to that and you almost use it as a as a sword whenever you have to defend yourself against people. You know what I mean? So it's it's it's it takes so much to be able to to to separate yourself from these things. You know what I mean? See, and I see it the opposite. I that sounds really hard to me of like letting yourself be inflated and deflated by how other people like me worrying about how I'm going to move move through the world um seems much easier than me worrying about how I'm going to move through the world and worry about how you're going to take it and they're going to take it and they're going to take it. Like carrying a lot of other people's stuff seems so exhausting to me. Oh god, it is exhausting. [laughter] Oh my god. It's like I it's like I I feel myself getting better, but it's still, you know, it's still there. It's a it's a it's a working it's a it's an everyday battle, man. Absolutely.

17:43 Let me ask you, man. Uh tell me about your your your relationship with your parents, man. Did you grow up with both parents in your household? Grew up with both parents in my household. Um that wasn't necessarily always a great thing. Uh my mother, my mother and I, I am very much her child. I'm very much my mother's son. Um I look like my father, but I act like my mother. Um my father was uh 29 years older than my mother. Okay. And so he had a whole crazy life before any of us were born. And uh so he because he was you know 30 years older than her um there was a very weird father-son dynamic there very weird husband wife dynamic and uh he passed away when I was in my early 20s and um yeah just fathers and sons whole weird thing. Interesting. Uh very much your mother's son. Absolutely.

18:43 Uh dive into that for me. What do you mean exactly? Uh I mean if I if I said to my mother, my mom's still alive and if I said to her today like you know what makes a good person, she she would be like she would say uh doing for others period end stop. End of thought. That's it. That's that's her whole thing is just doing for others. She has not come to the point of being disconnected from the result of her effort. She wants to she wants the love. She wants the the appreciation, the admiration for the things that she does. So in that way, I have sort of separated myself from her. But like be a light in the world, man. Like people who are people who are not good for the game and not good for the company and not good for the group that they're in. Like I I don't understand people who walk through the world exuding miserableness. It just doesn't I don't know how it how it serves.

19:44 Huh. Well, that's the thing. It's like, you know, it's funny you say that cuz I've come to learn that that the ego is a wonderful servant but a terrible master. [laughter] When you allow it to be your master, that's how the misery can flood your existence. You know what I mean? Whereas when it can when it can serve when it can serve you, you can use it to your benefit. you can use it to more so to align you to keep you in alignment with your purpose. You know what I mean? As I as I'm coming to understand it as I go through my various uh you know trials and tribulations learning how to become a better man. Um and talk about becoming a better man. and uh your father 29 years older than your mother and having this interesting fatherson dynamic and whatnot like what what was he like the version of my father that I got so he would have been let me do some quick math in my head 58 when I was born wow something like that and so the version of him that I got was all stories and and things that he used to do. Um he when I was when I was growing up um first uh you know until I was like 11 or 12 years old. He worked hard. He had a job. He actually worked in Albany and drove back and forth uh to Germantown every day and um was very much one of those uh uh the kind of father who would if you wanted an object he would buy it for you and that was his consideration of love. But like because he was older and because uh he didn't have the physical capability

21:34 like he wasn't going to go outside and play in the front yard, you know. Um he couldn't he he either couldn't or wouldn't do that. Um and so uh and he was of a different he was of a different generation, you know. I think every generation raises kids and we we all do it in a certain way and it's been super interesting watching my Gen X brother raise kids. Um, but he was two generations back from that. So he was he was raising kids like it was the like it was the ' 40s. My mother was raising kids like it was the 70s and 80s. And so there was that kind of um he was much more of a children are seen and not heard kind of kind of person. My mother was a little more um you know 60s uh show some affection kind of vibe. How does that how does that duality form your perception of what it means to be a human? Um within the horrors of the world because there have always Yeah. Yeah. I read a book when I was in grad school.

22:39 My dad died uh right after I got out of grad school the first time. I read a book and uh called the Celeststeine Prophecy and uh it had a chapter in there where it talked about melding. It was a chapter that said if you can think for a moment about assume for a moment that your mother was trying to teach you one positive thing like she wasn't trying to be mean. She wasn't trying to be bad. She has a positive view about the world and she was trying to impart that to you. And your father was trying to teach you one positive view about the world and was trying to impart that to you and you are the the the um knitting of those two things together. Mhm. So I thought about that and what I came with at the time is my mother's philosophy, my the thing my mother wanted to pass on was um always give to others and always be there for others. Mhm.

23:36 And what my father wanted to pass on um was don't let the world tell you that you're wrong. Don't let the world change you from your belief. Now, the way that that manifests in my father is in 1985, he still is holding on to beliefs that were socially acceptable in 1955. Like what? I Oh my god. My My father was was misogynist and racist and and all of that kind of like just just stuff. We we got in some screaming matches about about that kind of stuff. But and it's hard to to get to the positive of that, but the positive of that was him saying just cuz time passes doesn't mean your beliefs change. And so how do I so my sort of goal at that point in my life and kind of probably still is how do I be giving and generous to the world without letting it corrupt and change me, you know? Um and that's where you get to the point of do do creative things in the world. Do fun stuff. Be generous. Be thankful. And if the world doesn't receive it the way you wanted to receive it, don't worry about that. Yes. You know.

25:01 Yes. Which belief about yourself took root during those years that you've since had to question the years uh the like your adolescence and whatnot. Yeah. Years where you had to but like feel like you had to hide yourself. Just to put it more into, you know, perspective. I think that there's [clears throat] a lot of like you said, you know, being being uh smart and being weird is not necessarily uh honored when you're in K12, right? Yeah. 100%. No. Um, but particularly in the world that that that you and I grew up in and um being being smart and being weird, you know, gets people power and money at this point. Yeah. If you look at the people who are shaping the latest technologies, they're smart weirdos and not not always in a good way.

26:03 Like you watch an interview with anybody running an AI company and you're like, "These guys really the future." Um but the the thing that you have to question is if you are told um growing up you should be less like that, it doesn't necessarily mean that they're right. You know what's what is what is off-putting when you're 15 might be quite attractive when you're 35. Okay. You know what I mean? Yes. Yeah. Um, I have a wonderful wife in in my life right now. Um, who regularly tells me that um she loves my weirdness. She loves when when we spend time together, she wants to be with me um more than, you know, whenever we can be in a room together, whenever we can do something together, she wants that to happen. And that kind of impulse in my life is new. Like a lot of my life, I spent a lot of time thinking that I needed to earn my spot in any room. That when I walked into a room, I had to add some value or there was no point to me being there. And she's one of the first people in my life that I'm not related to. one of the first, you know, people external to my family for whom I have felt like uh she wants me to be in the room even if I'm not Wow. doing something to be there. Wow. Yeah.

27:39 That's what's up, man. Let me ask you uh you said you said something that I found interesting. You said what's off-putting at 15 can be very attractive at 35. Sure. Give me an example of that in regards to yourself. So, uh, at 15 in a school play, um, I was always going to be the person who, uh, was going to push the envelope and was going to be like, I know the line just says this, but I'm going to deliver it with a thick accent. I'm going to be overly over bigger gestures. I'm going to make crazy ass choices if we're going to do this. I'm going to run back and forth. Um, and a lot of a lot of people at that age just sort of looked like there's Ingram being Ingram, but you put me in a production now. Well, I'm not 35 anymore, but for the example, you put me in a production now or you send me to an audition now. And that's what directors say to me is, I love that you make choices. I love that you take risks. I love that you are trying things. Um, and so that idea of not giving a damn about what people think, you know, at 15 or 16 can get you in trouble at 35, get you hired.

29:00 Yeah. Okay. You know what I mean? Really standing out. I mean, cuz in reality, the the game of capitalism, I mean, it's it is a game. It's a competition and it really it really finds its way into our lives in so many ways. What is your perception of this economic structure that we live within? You know, I've thought a lot about that for some reason over the last couple years and I think the best uh way to put it is I I think the game that we played as kids that most got us ready for this even when we weren't thinking about it was musical chairs. Oh [bleep] Okay. Please elaborate. That's here's a room and there's a 100 chairs and there's a hundred of you and everything's fine, but now we're going to take away 10 chairs and you have to fight to be one of those people that gets to the next level. And now we're going to take away 10 more and you got to fight to be one of those people that gets to the next level. And you get to the point where there's one winner, there's 99 losers. Um, and the people who get who get to the one or two or three inner circles of that get to do TED talks and write books about how to be one of the people that's that's in the inner circle. Um, when in reality the problem is not that those people are in the inner circle.

30:20 The problem is that [clears throat] the game is set up in such a way that there's one winner and 99 losers. If you look at the United States, most of our competitions, whether they be sports or game shows or reality television, whatever it is, are built around that structure of there's one winner and everybody else goes home sad. Yeah. And that I think that that like you said that sort of feeds into all sorts of aspects of our lives. Whereas if you think about it as like the point of life is to maybe not the point of life but the point of life in this in in the United States in the 21st century. Um, if you made the the goal like to find love and find peace and find compassion and find happiness and have a safe place to um, sleep at night and um, and some food to eat and and get to see a doctor every now and again. That's available to that could be available to almost everybody. There's no reason that can't be available to everybody 100%. you know, except for the fact that the people at the top are doing their very best to extract as much wealth out of the whole system and keep it for themselves. Yes.

31:46 You know, Yes. And so you have to decide at some point are you trying to are you going to are you going to play musical chairs? Um and are you going to be one of those people that tries to get to the inner circle? um or are you going to decide that there's a there's a different version of the game? You know, we have this thing now that that they've been teaching in colleges for 20 years called game theory. And game theory tells you uh no matter what you do, always play from a from a uh from a uh advantaged position. Okay? So, if you and I are going to play chess, make sure I get to go first. That's my goal is make sure I get to go first because it's in advantage position. If I'm if I'm playing poker, you uh what what you will learn in poker is aggressive, aggressive, aggressive, aggressive, aggressive, keep betting, keep raising is going to be a much more um it's going to be a winning strategy more than anything else. And if you want to get to the inner circle, go right ahead, do those things. If you want to find some sense of like of peace and joy in the world and be able to share that with a lot of people.

33:02 I don't think capitalism gets you there. Fair enough. What is the What's the quote? Uh give unto Caesar what is Caesar? What is Caesar's? Right. And live off the rest. I love that. That said, brother, if you had the opportunity without hindrance to alter this economic structure, what would it look like? True. I have no idea. I'm not nearly smart enough to answer that question. [laughter] Not nearly. Um, I mean, I think I think the small like the the small quick fix, not to totally restructure the whole thing, but the small quick fix is to play it like a video game and say, um, once you get to a certain point, you've won. Elon Musk, you have a hund00 million. You've won. You don't need to be a trillionaire. There's no value to that doesn't add any more value to to the world. Make a point where after that point you have now you have what you need for yourself, your kids, your grandkids, whatever money you make above that goes back to society, but that's that's like a quick fix.

34:15 I like that. Um cuz that's how you I'm sorry to cut you off. I go ahead. That's how you do it ethically. Like you know that's how c because capitalism isn't isn't inherently evil. No. But it's the greed and the institutions that fund the greed and whatnot that that that really exacerbates that and makes it into this [bleep] monstrosity. It's it yes and no. I think it's the incentives. Okay. So [clears throat] whether you're greedy or not, if you decide that you're going to be a competitive person, I can't decide go back to poker. I can't I can't decide that because of the person I am, I want to play a more passive game of poker but make as much money as someone who's going to play uber aggressive. It's just not possible. Like the game is set up in such a way that the incentive is to be aggressive. Yes, sir. And that's where we see it now. we see it. What has happened in the last you know 15 or 20 years um is the game is set up the the the game the the financials uh system is set up so that people who strive and grind and push and step on others and act aggressively get rewarded.

35:36 It's not a matter of greed. Like, it's just a matter of that's that's those are the rules of the game. And so, if you if you are a person who wants to win at that game, you have to play by those rules. You can be you could start out a very kind person, but if you want to win at that game, you're going to have to throw punches. And that's not to say that you're a violent person, but that's how you win the game. As soon as you commit to I'm gonna try to get to the center circle in in our in our um musical in our musical chairs. Soon as I commit to I want to win. I got to push people aside. I got to kick chairs out from under people. I got to do whatever I got to do because I've decided I want to win. And it turns us into people that I don't think we are at heart. Turns us into people that we that is not our instinct. It turns us into people who are greedy and mean and vicious and call each other names. I don't I don't think that's who we are at our soul. I just think that's who you need to be to if you want to get to if you want to be left standing at the end of musical chairs. Fair enough.

36:44 Yes. Let me ask what because in order to get to this position of enlightenment, one has to venture through pain and make sense of it. Uh that said, I'm curious, what painful experience changed a way you understood yourself? One of the things I love about my generation is we grew up with parents who were um drunk and angry and surviving on cigarettes and coffee. Um like the generation that came before us was was not gentle with us at all. and we committed as a generation to say we're going to raise our kids differently. I'm not exactly sure that was the entirely the best choice. Um, and actually I just I I just watched uh Michael Chay's new standup comedy special that came out yesterday on Netflix, and he said uh he talked about not wanting to have rich kids. And Bill Murray said the same thing 30 years ago about not wanting to have rich kids because uh because they never had to struggle for anything. And uh Chay's line was that uh what was Chay's line? Chay's line was I want my kids to have everything, but not until they've gone through having nothing. Mhm.

38:22 You know, like I want them to I want them to have nothing for a long time and then have me come in and give them everything. Um, and I I think that I don't know what the right level of struggle and pain is. I think some people have way too much in their lives and some people not nearly enough. Um, but I think that I think I see we see that in the presidential candidates and like going back looking through my life. God. Yeah. When you see candidates who were born in wealth, they're completely disconnected from what what people go through. Absolutely. When you have candidates who were raised by a single mother and who knows what it knows what it means to pay off a student loan, they have a level of compassion and and empathy that needs can't can't be taught. So, your question was in my life, what pain have I have I gone through that that made me who I was? Um, I had, you've already heard about my family growing up. I grew up in a household that, um, most nights ended with slamming doors. I was at a school that was not, um, always welcoming to my own intelligence and weirdness. Um, I have I'm on my third marriage, so [laughter] like there's a lot of pain and agony that goes with that. I've lost my father and one of my sisters. And so, um, all of those things make you who you are. And, um, the people I know who have the biggest hearts are the ones who have suffered the greatest losses. Yes.

40:08 Yeah. 100%. God damn. Which of your many accomplishments mattered most because of the private struggle you endured behind it? Because of the struggle. See, that's not that's not how I would think about it. Okay. The the my accomplishments that ma that have mattered most so far in my life are a group of students. You talked about me uh working at the innovation center in St. Rain Valley in Colorado. Yes, sir. Um when we started that program, there were uh three of us, three adults in a room talking about what this program was going to be. And our first class of students was four students. And um in my time in that program, I can think of half a dozen students. We we set out with that program. So the program was designed to this is not how they would describe it.

41:16 This is how I would describe it. Okay? The program was designed to undermine uh sending kids to college. And I don't mean that in a bad way. I mean we were giving students an option that we were having kids that were graduating high school who already had industry certifications and a couple years of experience. So they could certainly go to college if they wanted to, [clears throat] but they could also go right out into the field and start making a good middle class living. Okay. And the reason why we were doing that was our goal, those three people who were sitting in that room, our goal was to eliminate poverty and to take kids that were um literally 6 years earlier had been in a school that the bricks were falling off the the walls and to give them an opportunity to um to make a good living right out of high school or go to college. In that program, my greatest accomplishments is I can think of at least half a dozen students who I can tell you exactly where their life was going. And because of that program, I know exactly where they are now. And it is a complete left turn from that. I have students who were in that program who work for SpaceX and work for Apple and work for large businesses and who are now in their I don't want to think about this but now in their 30s late 20s making way more money than than I made until I was in my late 40s or early 50s or making than some and some of them might be making more money than I'm making now. Um, but that's that opportunity to like change the trajectory of other people's lives. My greatest accomplishment.

43:00 Well, I think it's so imperative to I I I always say like if I do have the opportunity to have children, I don't want to push them directly into college after high school. I want you to be able to soul search. You know what I mean? Yeah. And it seems you can do that at college, too. Yeah. Change your major every semester. Fair enough. Fair [laughter] enough. Um, but I I kind of I I I like what you said because you you were able to take the skills that these guys already had and and let them know that you can make something of this now. You know what I mean? And it just makes me think I mean Jesus. I mean like yeah I eventually got my degree in psychology and I like found an interest in philosophy and whatnot later on and ended up meshing the two. psycho philosophy, you know what I mean, as at 33 and was like, "This is something that really interests me." So, it's I don't I just I wonder [laughter] I wonder like how things would have looked had I had that mindset before. I mean, I understand everything happens for a reason and whatnot, but I'm really inspired by what you were able to give kids in that regard. You know what I mean? cuz you were able to help them go against the grain and find a greater level of success and fulfillment than a lot of people do when they kind of walk the line. You know what I'm saying? Not that you can't get there by walking the line, but going against the grain.

44:28 Well, those students those students, so in in in Colorado, the poor kids are mostly Mexican. Okay. And um those I saw it happen. And those kids weren't going to have the opportunity to take a gap year [snorts] soul surge it. They weren't even necessarily going to have an opportunity to go to college and do what I was privileged enough to do, which is live on campus [clears throat] and do nothing for 4 years, but take these classes and engage in these intellectual discussions. These are kids who out of high school had to have a way to they were they were going to be told you have to go make money. It was just a question of whether they were going to make minimum wage or they were going to make 2x minimum wage, you know, and so giving someone an opportunity to be able to at at 18, whether they're going to go to college or not, but being able to go into a business and say, I have a certification that nobody my age has and I already have two years of experience puts them ahead of everybody else for for really good jobs, not just for like entry not not the entry level stuff that that I had to do when I was when I was trying to like build a resume because you go to you get your degree and you apply for these positions and like oh you don't have enough experience where it's like how the [bleep] do I get it if you don't give me a chance right my joke is that I went to college in Newalts and the only people in my life that have used their degree that they earned for the thing that they meant to get it for were the theater people everybody else like has a degree in business but went and did science or has a degree. I have a degree in political science and went and did technology. So like I don't think I don't think the college thing um and granted it has gotten crazy expensive compared to when I was there.

46:22 It was crazy expensive when I was there compared to 20 years before that. Um, but I don't think the college thing is necessarily, no one ever looks and says, "Oh, you took a class in short story writing. Oh, you took a class in astronomy. Oh, you took No one cares about any of that stuff." But the but to say you have a college degree is evidence that you have done a big complicated project that required a lot of struggle and hustle and you followed it through all the way to the end. If someone came if two if two 20 23 year olds came to me and one of them said I have a college degree and this is where I got it from and I was there these four years and the other one says I went to uh an ashram in India for 4 years and spent four years working with this uh with this uh meditation teacher and you know did that for four years. I think those are of equal value in the sense that they're both crazy freaking hard and you followed through all the way to the end.

47:25 Like that's what I look at the college degree as is is just a way of saying and a high school diploma is just a way of saying I've spent a lot of my life trying to achieve this thing and I haven't. And that's why we that's why we had students getting these industry certifications because it's a way of proving that I'm certified by Apple. I'm certified by Google. I'm certified by Microsoft. I've done this big complicated thing and I followed through with it and I passed. Let me ask you, I want to peel into that Apple uh tenure you had cuz that's interesting to me. So, I I've had iPods and whatnot. I've never had an iPhone. I'm fascinated with the philosophy of Apple. Think different. People who gravitate toward it tend to go against the status quo. I mean, it was essentially built on that philosophy. These guys were Steve Jobs and Steve Wisn. These are individuals who were of the counterculture. You know what I'm saying? So, I guess describe to me your what what was appealing about Apple to you that gave you the interest to want to take that dive? Like, how'd that happen?

48:37 Yeah. So, I when I when I got done with college, I didn't leave. I stayed and I worked in student affairs for 10 years. Okay. And for 10 years I was a uh residence hall director. I was the person that it when you first came to college um I was the person who's like we're having a party Friday. Come to it. We're going to have an we're going to have a an event on you know this. I was trying to um bring people into events and get people connected to the university. I was also the person who on Monday morning, if you were caught drinking by the campus police on Friday, you got to come talk to me on Monday morning. We got to have a conversation about that. So, I was I was both of those people. Um, I love that job. I loved working with students. I loved being on the floor and seeing the what happens from a college freshman to a college senior. Um, but what happened in that role was that I got um I got opportunities and I took them until the point where it went from me and six RAS and 150 students in a building to me and three grad students and 1500 students in apartments. And I spent more time talking to adults than I did to kids. Didn't like it. And so I decided to leave and spent a couple years uh kicking around and trying, you know, doing five or six different jobs at a time. And then when the Apple store opened in Talson, Maryland, uh which actually just closed this year, um but when the Apple store opened in Talson, Maryland, the first day that they were open, I walked in and I walked down the middle of the store and I walked up to the counter to the woman who was the manager and who would soon be my boss, and I said, "Uh, I want to work here.

50:19 actually I want to live here but I will settle for working here. I handed her [clears throat] my resume and what drew me to it was it wasn't necessarily the think different piece of it. It was the let's take the time. It was sort of the think different piece of it, but it was more like let's take the time before we do something, whatever we're going to do, to think about it from the end users perspective and then work backwards to figure out what we're going to make. Let's think about it from other people's viewpoint. And so Apple you Apple still makes a version of this, but they made a computer um when they first came out that was about this big called a Mac Mini. Mhm. And there's two hard drives in the Mac Mini. There's one that sits here and one that sits there. When you turn it over to do repairs, um the hard drive that you're looking at when you take the bottom off is the lower hard drive. even though it's the first one you get to, but it's the lower hard drive because when the computer is facing up from the customer's standpoint, that's the lower hard drive.

51:28 And so everything is from the customer's standpoint. If you have a left fan and a right fan, when you're working on the computer, the left fan is on this side because that's the fan that it's on the left side from the customer's perspective. Wow. That's what I love about Apple is everything from the customer's perspective. And so that's what draws me to the company. That's what that's what I love about the philosophy is it's not enough to just sell stuff. You want to make things that people are actually going to use. And that's how I came into the company. Um, and that's what I use to this day. You know, I have a philosophy I tell people all the time, which is if you want people to do something for you, make it easy for them to do something for you. Make it difficult for them to not help you out. And try to make things easier for other people to be successful. like that's that that is the Apple that I came into. Mhm. And what are your thoughts on the company now? Well, I'm obviously outside of it, so I don't have the same perspective that I had then. My experience of it was when I was very young in the company. Um I had um a manager say to me that there's a civil war going on inside the company between the culturalists, the people who are who say build the culture and the profits will come and the people who are like who are coming from mostly other retail companies but coming in from outside companies who are like push push push profit profit profit. um worry about the bottom line and then sure you can make these nice products but we're really worried about the bottom line. Um and I don't know enough to say it but I think the people I think the profiters uh won that one over a period of time.

53:14 Um, I know there are still I know some of them who are still culturalists within Apple, but I also know that there are people who um worry about the direction that that it has been going in for the last, you know, five or six years and whether it's going to um whether it's going to still be a company that thinks about customers first or if it's going to be a company that thinks about shareholders first. You know, it's so funny that we get into this because it brings me to a question that I've uh had with some friends. So, kind of going back to capitalism, it's it's said that because it's incentive basic, it provides the best quality products. However, I feel like that's not necessarily the case. Team might might disagree. Huh? T-oom might might disagree. Yeah. Yeah. [laughter] 100%. And I'm like, well, you know, you outsourced the manufacturing to get it for as cheaply as possible to sell it for as much as the secret. The secret of capitalism and the struggle of capitalism has always been free or cheap labor.

54:19 Yeah. Whether that is enslaved folks or it's underpaid coal miners or it's um uh robots building things or it's AI. It's it's always about where's the next cheap free labor coming from. What do you feel what system do you feel truly has the potential to give us the best products? Again, so far above my pay grade. I have no idea. Um I I Yeah, I don't I don't even know where I would start with it. Fair enough. Yeah. Something I Something I What? Do you have an idea? [laughter] Honestly, I think and this [bleep] ruffles people. I So, I'm a firm belie. I love the concept of traditional communism uh a classless society in which uh we all work to our ability and we're all given what we need. And I like that feeling. I like the system in which there's no class and we're all on an equal level. And to me that to me in this in this in theory that creates a utopia. You know what I mean?

55:39 But how do you do that with 400 million people? Well, yeah. [laughter] That's what I'm saying. That's the key word theory. You know what I'm saying? I'll be honest. It has it has worked in small in small situations. Exactly. This this [bleep] can't happen in a mass. Yeah. That much I've come to understand. You know, I've read the Communist Manifesto. Like, I've wrapped my mind around this [bleep] and I know it it it can't it it just it's not feasible on a large scale. You know what I mean? But I feel like in a space where everybody is equally valued, in a space where one who cooks is valued just as much as one who provides uh um medical care, tech [laughter] support. You know what I'm saying? Because you got to think, I mean, yeah, these people that do this tech [bleep] these people that do these that are that are surgeons or whatever, they need fuel, you know what I mean? They have to, you know what I mean? You have you have to eat, you need nourishment to be able to, you know what I mean? So, it's like when you strip it down to when you strip it down to bare form, one is really not more important than the other. That's how I view it. You know what I'm saying? And I just feel like when you have a when you have a system like that in which people aren't stepping upon one another and there's and we all move in unison when you understand that it's not us versus them.

57:03 It's truly just us. I think you get I think you get more more more passion. You know what I mean? I think there's more there's more compassion within the foundation that allows people to really enjoy what they're doing because they're not being exploited. You know what I'm saying? I think in a situation like that, you get more people that are heard and seen. You know what I mean? There's not this there's not this competition and this incessant need to, you know, push people over to get what you want or whatever. You know what I mean? We're dead ass. All we're all reared to be able to look out for one another. And I think when it's a true We're pack animals. Yes. Yeah. And I think when you have that true team spirit, you know what I mean? Where you know what I mean? There truly is no soldiers left behind. I think that gives you the best opportunity to create the best possible products to get the best possible outcome.

58:04 Yeah. I think well and you would have to you like I don't even think we're to the point where we're so nent in our thinking we don't we are not even to the point where we can say like when you say what's going to give you the best outcome like what does that even mean? Does that mean um constantly increasing population? Does it mean sustainability? Does it mean you know like we got to we got to figure out what we're even talking about before we can get there. You know, I I think I think that for me it is um it's like I don't mean to sound polyianish about this, but like the most joy is what I'm what I'm looking for in the world. Like I want people to I want people to enjoy what waking up in the morning, enjoy what they're going to go do, enjoy coming home at night, and you know, enjoy a good a good solid night's sleep. But how do you how do you how do you like So then you then you think going back to Apple. So you start out with here's our goal. We want people to feel joy. Then you work backwards to instead of starting out and saying this is system then you work backwards and you go okay what are the precursors to that what are the precursors of that what are the systems instruction things we can build to increase the opp the likelihood opportunity for those things to happen like that to me is more is more of a right way to think about it than starting with the with the philosophy and then trying to make it out there but we haven't come to a conclusion about what is the goal of society.

59:44 Yeah. I mean I would I mean one thing one aspect of it is really what is really the the philosophy your mother instilled within you is um you know do for others. You know what I mean? If we live in service of others, we're truly living within the image of royalty. You know what I mean? We're shining within where the the divinity that lives within all of us is is shining fully. You know what I mean? when we live in that way. And um you know, I think whatever the hell the ultimate goal is, I I it's fair to say that's where you start. You know what I'm saying? Um and I've just been trying to figure out ways to to to to do that for for so long. and um you know just being able to just share space with people and uh pick their brains and um unearth the gems that thrive within them that they take for granted. You know what I mean? That's that's something that it gives people a lot. I have people message me the day after like, "Yo, bro, I'm still cooking [laughter] off that conversation we had the other day." I'm like, "Holy [bleep] man." I mean, I think it's a great thing to go through life and be like, "I want to have great conversations." I think that's a great dude. That that is a whole life right there.

1:01:00 Thank you. Cuz being viewed as weird and smart, that's something I dealt with my damn self. You know what I'm saying? And you know, especially like being black and being too white for the black kids, too black for the white kids. So like not really knowing where to fit in and not thinking that it's cool to be smart because of how people that look like you perceive that [bleep] you know, I I I it was just a constant [bleep] tugof-war. You know what I'm saying? And I'm just like, dude, I feel like a fish out of water. And I'm just like I just got to a point where I'm just like this. There's got to be more to this. I'm not just like this lone. I'm not just I'm not just this [bleep] anomaly. You know what I mean? I'm not, you know, there there's so many people who are just like me. And I've and and I've spoken to people from different walks of life that I share so many parallels with. The [bleep] problem is we lack patience to get to that connecting point with everybody that we can build upon and potentially forge a relationship that can alter the trajectory of our lives. You know what I mean?

1:02:06 And we have retreated from the spaces and avenues that force us to be in each other's company. Yes. And we have um the the spaces that we have now, the town squares that we have now where people interact have become a hellscape because because when people are angry and riled up and and uh and upset, companies make more money. Yeah. You know the saying the saying is that Buddhists make terrible consumers cuz how are you going to sell something to someone who has everything? Yo, I love that so much. [laughter] Yo, I love Buddhism. I love the concept of Buddhism, dude. I would love to be able to thrive within that within that level of enlightenment, within that level of peace. You know what I mean? It's like you because it's Yeah. But see, that's that's a polyianish view of it. Like I've spent time at there's a monastery outside of Newalts uh Blue Cliff Monastery. Uhhuh.

1:03:10 And um when you get down to the reality of life, when you strip away everything, this is this is where I where I see it, where I see Buddhism. When you strip away everything, life um is hard. And away everything life is hard. I mean think think for a moment the the core the core tenant of Buddhism is life is suffering. Yes. Which is a which is a not my favorite translation. I heard a translation uh that said that life is wobbly. Our table here like this table. Yep. Wow. Okay. But but that's this is this table is this is life right here. this is what it what it really is is life is constantly going to be wobbly and there's no way to make it stop. Okay. So if that is the case then what do you do? Suppose for a moment that the reason that the way that that the Buddha became the Buddha was that Sidartha Gautama sat down under the bo under the bodhic tree having studied every philosophy talked to every master been an aesthetic been been an indulgent been everything that he could be he sat down at the bodhic tree and he said I'm not going to move from underneath this tree until I reach enlightenment and he sat there for days and days and days what happened in those days and days and days. Imagine for a moment, I don't know that this is true, but imagine for a moment that Sedartha Gautama saw a billion years worth of reincarnation.

1:04:47 Every life he had ever lived, every creature he had ever been, small, large, and in between. And the only thread that ran through all of them was they all suffered. No matter what they whether they were rich, they were poor, they were on top of the food pyramid or at the bottom, every one of them suffered because life is brutal. Life is hard. And um then what do you do? You come out of it and you go life is suffering. And you come out of it and you say, imagine for a moment what what a Buddhist monastery is. It's a bunch of people who live in the woods, who don't shower, who are go through all the bodily functions that men and women go through, who get on each other's nerves, who have to find a way to function with it with each other and keep this place alive. Like, it's just as much suffering. It's just as brutal. The question is not how do we eliminate suffering in the world. You can't. The question is, if you accept that life is wobbly, what position are you going to take in comparison to it?

1:06:01 You can sit there, you can sit there and complain about this table your entire life, and you'd be absolutely right. This table is is is never going to sit the way I want it to sit. You can say, "I never fit in with the black kids. I never fit in with the white kids. I felt like an anomaly everywhere I went." Guess what? You are an anomaly everywhere you went. I can talk about how rough my my family life was or my upbringing was. Absolutely true. Could I take that and get bitter and mean and angry? Absolutely. Totally justified. So what? How do you find a way in a in a in a brutal, ugly, suffering world to take the posture that you want to take? wake up tomorrow morning and decide this is how I want to live this day and I'm not gonna worry about the traffic and I'm not going to worry about how hot the shower water the water in the shower is. I'm not going to worry about what food I do or don't have. I'm going to hold this position. There's my dad right there. Right. I'm going to hold this position and I have decided that I am going to be kind and generous and joyful in the world despite all the misery.

1:07:16 The key is stoicism. No, the key is just the key is conscious awareness. The key is making a choice. Okay. This is the person I'm this is the person I'm going to be. Not for any reason then other than this is the person that I'm going to be. Stoicism helps. Stoicism will get you over some of the speed bumps. Yeah. Because it makes me think like you focus on what's in your control and you just kind of let the rest fly, but the thing that is in your control more than anything Mhm. is your own your own light in the world, your own your own posture in the world. Yes. Yes. Yes. Fair enough. I like that. Let me ask you when you you when when did you when did you start to write and everything? That's something that you did as a kid and everything. Oh, yeah. That was fourth grade. That was Mrs. Howell's fourth grade class.

1:08:16 Let me ask you, what did writing allow you to express that you couldn't in regular speech? My writer brain, I I have no good way of explaining this. My writer brain to this day, if you sit me down in front of a keyboard and I stop talking and I stop listening to the rest of the world and I just start writing, I go to a different place. My my It's a different voice. It's a different person. It's a different posture. It's a just a different Jesus Christ. See, there it [laughter] is. Yeah. Well, my god, Buddhist phone cord. Um, yep. Um, it's just it's just a different voice. And there there are parts of there are things that come out where I look at them the next day and I'm like, I I I couldn't write that if I tried. It had to have come from somewhere else. It's kind of how I felt when I had my uh when I had when I went through this wave of creativity last summer. I was like I took like two years off of writing. I I couldn't form a single I couldn't form a sentence, you know what I mean?

1:09:30 And suddenly I I came out with this with this metaphysical piece. I like I just felt like I just I I I I forced it out and it just can't it was it's beautiful. It was so it it it took time to under to understand it for readers, but once you grasp the concept, it's like damn. And I'm like this is like what I've been like and it feels kind of rude to have your own name attached to it, doesn't it? I don't know that I can take credit for this. Who the [bleep] do I [laughter] who do I think I am? You know what I mean? Cuz but I'm just like, you know, it's like these like I'm realizing that writer's block exists for a reason. You know what I mean? It's like you come to this block. It's like there's you're coming into something that you're coming into this this this unknown force. Something that's foreign, but something that's beautiful. Something that you've yet to be able to grasp. the magnitude of and it it takes time to be able to climb over that wall, you know what I mean? You got to learn steps, you know what I mean? You got to learn how to maneuver that.

1:10:34 And I mean, hell, yeah. You know, I I I had a period where I I had 10 years of writer's block, then I wrote a chatbook, right? Raw as hell. And then another two years of writer's block, then I had this other wave of poetry that I feel is is some of my best [bleep] to date. You know what I mean? And I'm like, you go through writer's block and you're like, you feel so you use useless when you're a writer. At least I I have. And I'm just like, you know, you got to learn to embrace it because the pieces or whatever are writing themselves whether you realize it or not, you know, and it's and it's interesting because taking writing into consideration as well as theater for you. I mean, you have this uh you're so you're so you're so larger in life on stage from what you from what you said, but like you're just so calm, cool, and collected in real life. Like it's like you you get on the stage or whatever and you're able to be somebody else and is that where you're really able to just allow yourself to thrive without hindrance? I mean, like what is that?

1:11:40 What is theater for you? You know what I mean? Like again, I think I I don't think I think they're just different sides of the same coin. So again, you make a choice, right? Yeah. I think that you make a conscious choice and you decide that Jesus hoped the A train um Alb Civic Theater, really great show. I was lucky enough to work with four other absolutely fantastic actors. I was easily the least qualified person in that in that group. The role, not a fun role, was Valdez. And Valdez is an abusive prison guard. Oh, wow. I got a spit in the face of one of the other actors, right? Um, not from from my perspective, not my favorite not my favorite thing to do, not my favorite place to go. But when you stand on that stage and you've built this thing, you go for it. you go for it 110%. And you make choices in there um to to not let who you are as a person interrupt what you're doing right now.

1:12:49 Um and you decide this is the posture I'm going to take when I'm on stage, when I'm in this role. And you know, there were lot there was lots of scenes in that show where I had to lead off two of the other actors um offstage in handcuffs. decided to put them in handcuffs and lead them off stage. And I was a jackass while doing it. And when we got backstage and I un unkeyed the handcuffs, I made sure every time to be like, "Thanks, man." You know, like to to like show some love for that. But you you just you make that decision that this is I'm going to make this thing real. And it's the same decision that I make when I wake up in the morning and I say, "I believe there should be more joy in the world. I'm going to make this thing real. Damn. Okay. Our thoughts truly are what we think about all day truly does become our reality. Absolutely. Yes. And when you hear it back and you hear all of the to quote George Harrison, all the I I I me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind m mind mine my my mind mine.

1:14:00 you realize exactly how you said it before exactly how much you're letting the ego drive and how much you're driving the ego. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 100%. One of the thing that they teach you I spent some I spent time in AA and I was actually talking to a uh a friend of mine in an interview Sammy Fod. He was saying uh you know whenever I aa really emphasizes uh in any recovery from drugs or whatever have you it it all emphasizes being of service you know what I mean ultimately what your mother was saying you know what I mean that keep keeping you in alignment with the divinity that you know thrives within all of us and um whenever you think about whenever you're so fixated on me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me I I I I I I I I my my I my my I my my I my I my my I my I my my I my I my my I my I my my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my I my you know what I mean these problems and whatnot that really aren't that big. You know what I mean? In the in the in the grand scheme of things or whatever that you may be going through. It's like, okay, I have to do something for somebody else. I have to take myself outside of this.

1:15:03 And through that, I'll realize whatever the [bleep] it is I'm dealing with really ain't that deep. And or if it is that deep, it's not because some people are are are actually dealing with very very deep stuff. That's true. That's true. That's fair. Like I don't want to minimize that stuff, but how I don't even know how to put this. You're never going to lift that mountain. Like you have a mountain of stuff on you. You're never going to lift that mountain. But somehow, and I have no idea what the mechanism for this is, if you go help somebody else lift their mountain, you look over and yours is somehow lifted, right? Like it's not that your stuff wasn't wasn't important. It wasn't deep. It absolutely is. But somehow relieving the suffering of others, you look back and oh my god, I think I've accidentally relieved some of mine. Yeah. You know, Yeah. were I mean it's like I I remember there were situations where like I don't I may have been writing or something or trying to do some whether it was writing or whether it was a video game or whether it was something that it was a space and I was working on a project of some sort and I would get stuck and this thing in my brain it just goes I'm like I have to go go until it gets done right and I'll drive myself [bleep] mad.

1:16:21 Yeah. And then I'll start to belittle myself like, "Oh, you [bleep] idiot." Blah, blah, blah. And then I'm like, "I need to walk away from this. I'm gonna I'm gonna end up in a pony. This is this is insane." So, I'll go and I'll spend some time with a friend just to get my mind off of it, not realizing how much that time spent with that friend means to them. It's, you know what I mean? just that that connection, just taking myself outside of myself and just enjoying being present and and being in the company of another human being, you know, the laughter, the love, you know what I mean? The bread we're breaking, you know what I mean? Yep. And suddenly, you go back to it and the [bleep] just flows. Mhm. Like, wow. Yeah. You know, it's just it's just the simple simple things, man. just like we truly are we truly are social beings. You know what I mean? We we have the secret the secret of life is it's not about you. Yeah.

1:17:23 Yeah. And that's to go back to your question about what kind of society would you build? That's the kind of society I would build. I don't know how you operationalize it, but that's the kind of society where everybody wakes up and says it's it's not about me, it's about other people. And if everybody has that philosophy, then everybody gets taken care of. I feel like that's sort of what they employ in uh in Scandinavia where they take uh people pay like higher taxes in order to have universal health care so everybody has access to what they need. And because of that, I mean, you have far lower violent crime. Yeah. In that in that space, you know what I mean? Whereas here, I mean, you know, people, dude, it's it damn near cost to breathe. You know what I'm saying? And if they could find a way they [laughter] you know what I'm saying? So you got Yeah, man. You shit's crazy. So it's like, you know, is it perfect over there? No. But we certainly stand to learn a thing or two from from those individual. We have great opportunities, too. I think I think people always use um Scandinavian countries as examples. And I think that it's easier when you are maybe I don't know anything but it's easier when you're on a peninsula and everybody has a shared history and the vast majority of people who live there have been there for thousands of years. Okay.

1:18:49 I think that makes it all easier. But I think it's we have such an opportunity in the United States to be the place where um the world comes and we have people from all over. We have an opportunity to have every culture in the have a have a have a breath of every culture in the world in this country and to make it work. Um we have not made it work yet but we have that opportunity to not just say like here's how you do it when everybody has a shared history when everybody has a genetic connection when everybody when we're on a little tiny island. Here's how we do it at a mass scale. Um, but in order to do it, we got to get over ourselves 100%. All that said, I want to bring it I want to bring it back to the arts. Uh, you know, coming uh back into coming back into yourself from being outside of yourself for so long, so to speak, right? Mhm.

1:19:54 Uh what did returning to theater after roughly 20 years reveal about the person you've become? You know there are times when I talked about in the beginning of this about the people I grew up with. A lot of those families have been there for 300 years in that in that place. And I and honestly, I I grew up jealous of some of those people because they um they knew who and where their uh roots were and they knew who and where their um their kids and their grandkids were going to interact. And I think the thing that I realized when I moved back to the Capitol region was that what I really did in those intervening years was I uh spent uh a lot of time accidentally um but I spent a lot of time becoming a very interesting person and having a bunch of interesting experiences and I think bringing all of those back to the stage has been uh uh has been a revelation for me. I don't know how it's been for people who've been in the company with me or seen my shows, but um I think I just have I I I am still the the kid from high school who um is going to be a loud cheering goofball. But I think I have a lot more tools and options to choose from because I've had all of these experiences. Because I've gone and seen a bunch of different places and done a bunch of different things that when I go to make a choice on stage, I have a lot more tools to choose from than someone who maybe hasn't had the experiences that I've had.

1:21:37 Fair enough. Tell me where you are now. It goes without saying you've come a long way. But there's always so much more to learn. Like absolutely. I don't believe there's a such thing as as the pinnacle. Really? No. No, there's not. Well, and and if there is, it's probably a couple thousand lifetimes away. 100%. [laughter] That said, um we're all going to get there. What are you still learning to take responsibility for within yourself? I think that [snorts] um you know you've mentioned a bunch of times and I've mentioned a bunch of times the concept of stoicism and uh the the the downside of that is that if you allow yourself to be disconnected from the world, you allow yourself to be disconnected from yourself. And so I think I spend a lot of time um nowadays trying to put myself back together and trying to reach back to a time when I was far more naive and still have access to to that innocence and to that naive and um bring it into this you know three/4ers halfway halfway or threequarters through life version of myself. Um, you're 75. No.

1:23:11 Oh, I'm not living to 100. [laughter] Oh, I'm like 54. 54. Oh, [bleep] When you said like three quarters or whatever, I'm just like, no, but if life expectancy is 80, it's 58 or something like that. I'm not good at math. I was about to be like, damn, bro. You look good for 75. I look great for 75. [laughter] I'll take that. Um Oh, [bleep] No, but like whatever. 58s through life, you know, 58 of the way through life. um to be able to go back and and find that 5-year-old, that 10-year-old, that 15-year-old, and figure out what the wisdom that they had was and kind of pull that into the into the present, I think, is a is an ongoing challenge. That childlikeness. Yeah. And it's like, dude, it's one thing I learned when I was like when I was like getting off of alcohol and [bleep] and really trying to like figure out like, how the hell do I have fun without this? I'm like, well, I'm like, I was I was on the sauce for what, like 10 years, and prior to that, I was sober for 18.

1:24:13 So, I'm like, I was sober for longer than I was on the sauce. So, does it really make sense for me to say I don't know how to have fun without it? You know what I'm saying? When you put it like that, y I'm like, there's there's obviously a chance here. I just need to believe that that that that's possible. And I mean, [bleep] you know? How's it going? Pretty [bleep] good. Figured out how to [laughter] have fun. Okay, good. You know what I'm saying? Pretty [bleep] good, man. You can't run from yourself. Like, yes, you're you're going to you're going to come back to yourself. So, go try whatever you want to try. Have fun with it. Get as deep in it as you can and you'll come back. And embrace your phases. Yeah. You know what I mean? People will make whatever is happening today is not going to last whether it's good or bad. And they tell you, you know what I mean? people will constantly criticize you like, "Oh, you wanted to do this, now you want to do that." Like, "What's wrong with you? Are you bipolar?" And it's like, "Yo, experience life." Like, embrace like allowing yourself to try different [bleep] whether you succeed at it or not, is going to lead you to where you're supposed to be. You know what I mean?

1:25:18 We got to that's a message that we really got to be able to like, you know, push on to the youth that we need to be able to plant within the youth. Um, you know, just follow your heart. As long as you're not hurting anybody else or yourself, follow that [bleep] You know what I'm saying? Let that [bleep] thrive, man. Cuz it's Oh, man. It's n what you I I got to say that [bleep] that what you what you did with those kids is really [bleep] good, man. That [bleep] is really inspirational, man. For real. I mean, that's you asked you asked. That's my greatest accomplishment is is those guys. Yeah, that [bleep] is [bleep] phenomenal, dog. I I hope someday to be able to like I pray I can open up a a school that a K through 12 as well as a university. It's free. It it it it emphasizes humanity more so than just, you know, yes, you get academia, but it's it's deeper than just passing tests and immersing yourself within the curriculum. It's how do you be a good human being?

1:26:32 We give you history, you know, the [bleep] that's within the curriculum, but that and beyond. You know what I mean? And you know, you give people the history that they don't always get in your traditional in your traditional textbook. You know what I mean? For example, black kids learn that their history doesn't start with slavery. It went beyond that and so on and so forth. And you know, you have all these other different cultures. You teach people about different lifestyles. That way you get older and you see people who are homosexual or transsexual and whatnot and you understand, oh that's not that's not weird, you know what I mean? That's just a part of that's a part of life. You know what I'm saying? You teach people you teach people like emotional intelligence, you know what I mean? Interpersonal interpersonal relations. You have classes that really emphasize, you know what I mean? Paternal trauma. Uh you know what I mean? Whether it's uh you know your your your your paternal trauma, maternal trauma, [bleep] like that. You know what I'm saying? You you know debt management, stress management, financial literacy, like [bleep] that really helps people live purposeful lives. Teaches people how to be leaders in their own right. You know what I mean?

1:27:48 Emphasizes the power of autonomy, of free thought. You know what I'm saying? [bleep] like that. And again, it's free, you know what I mean? K through 12 and college. And it's something that you have an education that's actually prestigious, you know what I mean? Something that rivals these places that people don't have the resources to be able to go to, right? I don't know how the [bleep] this comes into fruition, [laughter] but I'm going to die trying. There you go. You know what I'm saying? There you go. Don't die trying. Live trying. Fair [laughter] enough. Fair enough. I'm gonna figure out some way, shape, or form to to make that [bleep] happen. Yep. Um because we are we're reared to we're reared to just fall in line and I I get it. We 9 to5 positions are necessary, but because we're not taught to really immerse ourselves within the humanities and whatnot, we're not taught to value that [bleep] we miss out on a lot of our potential because of that. You know what I'm saying? There's so much vitality that courses through all of us. And uh even if it's not something that that's going to be your living, it should still be a part of your life.

1:29:10 And the value of of of of humanity should should should be should be instilled within us from a young age and and and and it should remain that way through our adolescent years and and and beyond for real, you know. So [sighs] it's a seed I plant. I you know we're the demand Tupac Shakori said even if I don't change the world I'll prov I'll plant the spark I'll provide the spark in somebody who will you know what I'm saying so yep hopefully some way somehow this [bleep] that my generation that's the saddest death that happened in my generation was Tupac that dude should have been running for president right now not even for like go watch his interviews forget the music for a moment go watch his interviews that is probably one of the smartest people I've ever met I've ever seen in my entire life. Yeah. Yeah. Word. Um my last question to you on the wrap up, my friend. Um if your current choices became lifelong habits, who would you ultimately become?

1:30:22 My current choices be I don't I don't think my current choices could become lifelong habits because my choice is to try something I haven't tried before. Fair enough. [laughter] Fair enough. Um, I mean, I think like you said, I I have an interesting resume at this point for life. And I hope that, you know, 30 years from now, I have some uh lines to add to it. And I think that if I stay on that path, the person I'm going to become is somebody who who led a good life. That's all I'm That's all I'm trying to do. Fair enough. Yeah. Add some joy to the world. Create something interesting. Make art. I very much think you're doing that. Absolutely. Uh and you're on I mean everything you've done is only going to lead you to greater things to come. Uh that said, do you have any upcoming theater performances or anything like that? Uh the the most interesting thing coming up for me is that in auditions are in December and the the uh rehearsals are from uh January to the beginning of March. I'm directing my first full-length play and uh it's called uh Snakeskin Suit and I'm directing it with a company called Bunberry Players and we're going to put out an announcement soon for audition. So, anybody who's watching this, please come audition. Um, it is a it is a play that is written by uh my friend Jay, who was my my my college roommate, and he's now a screenwriter out in Hollywood.

1:31:54 Oh, [bleep] So, it's awesome. Jay's an amazing writer. Um, the set design is going to be by one of my other friends I went to college with. The stage manager is a woman I work with at work now. And so, it's me and my friends making art. And we are going to be looking for some awesome actors to come audition for that. And my wife is the producer of the show. You know, you know, Tom, I think I might just give that a whirl. I would absolutely welcome you to do that. I will I will make sure to send you the announcement. Please, [laughter] dude. It was a uh it was an absolute pleasure to be able to sit with you and and and pick your brain, man. I uh amazing amazingly enriching brother. Thanks, man. So much. It so much fun.