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The School of Greatness - Episode Summary
Channel Your Creative Brain
Episode Overview In this episode of "The School of Greatness," Lewis Howes interviews three influential figures in the creative industry: legendary music producer Rick Rubin, freestyle rapper Harry Mack, and meditator and author Diego Perez (Yung Pueblo). Together, they discuss transformative strategies to enhance creativity, emphasizing the importance of simplicity, improvisation, and mindfulness.
Key Themes
- Simplicity in the creative process
- The role of improvisation in artistic expression
- The impact of mindfulness and meditation on creativity
- Overcoming mental blocks to unlock creative potential
Key Takeaways
- Embracing Simplicity
- Rick Rubin highlights how simplicity can unlock one's creative potential.
- He argues that many people feel inhibited by the belief that only "special" individuals can create great work, which is a misconception.
- Importance of Improvisation
- Harry Mack emphasizes the value of improvisation in both personal and artistic expression.
- He discusses how improvisation allows for spontaneity and authentic self-expression.
- Cultivating Mindfulness
- Diego Perez (Yung Pueblo) talks about the role of meditation and self-awareness in enhancing creativity.
- He stresses that mindfulness can lead to deeper self-discovery and clearer creative thinking.
- Creating Nurturing Environments
- All guests agree on the need to cultivate environments that foster innovation and inspire breakthrough ideas.
- The discussion underscores the need to eliminate distractions and create spaces that allow creativity to flourish.
- Overcoming Creative Blocks
- Participants discuss common barriers to creativity, such as fear of judgment and the pressure to conform to expectations.
- Action is emphasized as a remedy for creative stagnation, encouraging individuals to create without waiting for external validation.
In-Depth Discussion Points
Rick Rubin's Approach to Creativity
- Rubin shares his experiences as a producer, emphasizing the punk rock ethos of "do-it-yourself."
- He mentions the importance of creating art for its own sake and not waiting for permission from external authorities.
- He believes in maintaining sustainability in creative projects, focusing on the joy of creation rather than commercial success.
Harry Mack's Freestyle Insights
- Mack discusses the challenges freestyle artists face in the music industry, particularly the pressure to conform to commercial standards.
- He advocates for independent artists to embrace their unique styles and not get bogged down by industry expectations.
- Mack's journey highlights the power of social media in empowering independent artists.
Yung Pueblo's Mindfulness Practices
- Yung Pueblo discusses how mindfulness practices can help individuals process emotions and maintain focus.
- He argues that understanding one's emotional state can create healthier relationships and reduce conflict.
- He draws connections between personal healing and the broader societal need for compassion and understanding.
Conclusion This episode serves as a masterclass on unlocking creativity through simplicity, improvisation, and mindfulness. The insights from Rick Rubin, Harry Mack, and Yung Pueblo provide valuable tools for individuals looking to enhance their creative processes and overcome mental blocks.
Additional Resources
- For more information about the guests:
- [Rick Rubin's Book: The Creative Act](https://www.amazon.com/Creative-Act-Way-Being/dp/0593652886)
- [Harry Mack's Videos](https://www.youtube.com/harrymack)
- [Yung Pueblo's Works](https://yungpueblo.com)
Call to Action Listeners are encouraged to reflect on their own creative processes and consider how they can incorporate simplicity, improvisation, and mindfulness into their lives to unlock their full creative potential.
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For more episodes and insights from Lewis Howes, visit [The School of Greatness website](http://www.lewishowes.com). ```
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Welcome to this special masterclass. We've brought some of the top experts in the world to help you unlock the power of your life through this specific theme today. It's going to be powerful. So let's go ahead and dive in. What do you see is the thing that holds people back the most from being their most creative and best self? I think it's being concerned what other people think and a feeling of that the people who make great things are somehow special and that they're not special. And that's just not true. We're all, everyone has the capability to make great things and none of us are special.
0:47It seems like a lot of people, they're focused on what other people think, like you said, and it almost, it blocks them into this kind of rut feeling, I guess, so they feel like they're stuck in a rut. I don't know if you've heard this before with a lot of your artists, but with me as a writer and an author, I've heard so many people come to me and say, I want to write a book. And I asked them, how long have you had this idea that you wanted to write this book about this thing? And some people will say five, seven, 10 years, but they've been worried about what people think, or they feel creatively stuck in a rut.
1:21Do you ever feel stuck in a rut and if so, how do you personally get out of that? I think taking action is a really great thing and not setting up barriers of entry. I can imagine a musician saying, I can't play this song because I don't have the right guitar or I don't have the right equipment to do it. And there are no barriers to entry. There's always a way. I come from a punk rock background. So in punk rock, it was a do-it-yourself mentality. And I started my first record company not knowing that was something you can do. It just really happened automatically. I wanted to start making records.
2:01I wanted people to hear them. I never knew that you could get signed to a label. I just thought, well, if you want to make a record, you make a record. So I made records and print up 500 copies of a seven-inch single, for example. So I think there's always a way you don't have to wait for permission from someone else. I think that's a big part. People are waiting for permission. To actually make their art. To make their art. Someone has to say, you know, I'll hire you to do this or I'll publish your book if you write a book or set the stage to allow you to do it. But I don't think that's the way great things are made.
2:41When you did those, when you printed those first 500 singles, what was your dream or your vision? Was it, okay, now I'm going to, how do I sell these? How am I going to give them away for free? What was the process for you? Combination of giving them away for free and selling enough to be able to make another one. That was always, any of the things I've made, it's always been about sustainability. As long as I can make another one, it's a success. But at this point, you know, you're sustainable probably for life, I'm assuming. with the success you've had. So you don't have to make something to try to make your money back, you know, or get your time back or whatever.
3:19So what is the vision now? It's still, I still think in those terms, I feel like I want to make it where it's sustainable by itself. There's something that feels good about that, that you make something that can live on not because of an endowment. Yeah, that's interesting. I know you're - I don't know why. I don't know why that is. But that's just my - And maybe it's just the way I was brought up. May it just be. What does an artist need to be thinking and feeling at the same time to create great art? I would say thinking is the least part of it. It's much more about feeling and being true to themselves.
4:04Whatever that is. Feeling their truth. And how do you know when an artist is being truthful in front of you? It's just a feeling. It's a feeling. I can't feel it. Yeah. I think something that you said was, I have no skill set. It's all intuitive. It's not what's in my head. It comes through me. Yes. So you're not analyzing or thinking about it. You're saying, huh, something doesn't feel right. It starts with a feeling always. It starts with a feeling. the analysis comes in later to try to understand either the feeling. If there's a reason, like if I'm just feeling something, I can experience it and be fine.
4:46If we have to act on the feeling, then it's like, okay, this feels like this. Can I, is there a way to figure out why? Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't. And if you can figure out why, or if you think you know why, then you can say, hmm, could it be this, this, or this? Let's try those things. See what happens. Do you have a process when you're starting the first session with an artist after you've been introduced and you say, okay, let's do this. We're going to work together. Do you have a process where you set a personal intention that you don't tell them, but then also you tell them what the intention is for your time working together?
5:24I'll say when we're starting a new project, I always have anxiety. Really? Because I don't know what's going to happen. You know, there's a real question mark when we walk in to start. And I know that it could go a lot of different ways. And I don't have, I'm not interested in having a playbook in advance. I'm interested in seeing where it's going to go. And it's scary because it could not go good. And sometimes there's an, you know, some artists have an expectation that I'm going to do something. I can't do anything, you know? Right. It's like, it's either going to happen or it's not going to happen.
6:05But then usually within, sometimes it's the first day, sometimes it's the third day, sometimes it's the second week, where something happens like, whoa, what was that? How did that happen? And then that might give us a clue. It's like, oh, this is what it wants to be. And that may change also. That may be the first inclination. It could start that way, and then it makes a left turn, turns into something completely different. that the work itself tells us where it wants to go. So because we have, the reason it's so scary is because we have so little control over it. That's what's scary. There's no control.
6:39None. And if an artist has a big expectation, I need to put out a record that's going to do well. I need to make money. I need to make the label happy, whatever it is. My fans need to love this. Then that could feel like a lot of pressure. But do you allow that pressure to affect you? No, because I know it's not in the interest of the work. It's like we're all on the same page. Even the people we're ignoring, the record companies, the managers, the agents, the people who are yelling, I need this, I need this now. Ultimately, for everyone involved, if the artist makes the best possible work that they can, everybody wins.
7:17It's just that no one involved in the process understands what it takes for that thing to happen. I had a conversation with a basketball player, a member of the Golden State Warriors, who told me there's all this pressure now to do a lot of stuff on social media. And he said, and it's getting in the way of our playing. Interesting. And I said, well, if you tell the people who are asking you to do the social media stuff, don't you want us to win? So if you want us to win, let us focus on winning. And he said, they don't seem to care. They want us to do the social media stuff. They want us to distract ourselves from the work of the game.
8:02From the flow, from the practice, putting in the reps, showing up. And then I say, well, then it's up to you. What's more important, to please them or to win? Man, this is fascinating. was there um was there what was the experience for you where the artist or the band came in and it was the fastest best flowing process you've ever experienced where just everything was lining up authenticity truth you know raw realness was happening every every day and it was also it was a great success for them personally to have the art be real and honest but it also landed commercially and took off the first thing that comes to mind would be johnny cash because he had gone you know 25 years of not having success and he had been dropped from two labels and when i signed him he didn't he didn't even know why i was interested that really was a conversation.
9:06He's like, why do you think working with you is going to be any different than working with anyone else? He had given up. And for him to get into it, we recorded in my living room and he would just play me songs on an acoustic guitar. And there was an honesty in what was happening there. We didn't know that we were making a record at that time. We were just looking for songs. So he was playing me songs. It was almost like a way for us to musically meet each other. He would play me the songs he loved, either from childhood or songs that he thinks he'd like to sing or a song he wrote. And it was just a very honest experience.
9:53And then we went into the studio, we picked some of those songs. We went through hundreds of songs and then picked a handful to try to record. And when we went into the studio with the band, it didn't sound, it didn't have what the living room recordings had. There was some intimate honesty. And we'd never heard Johnny Cash that way before. So that led to the first album, which was a solo acoustic album. Again, we didn't set out to make a solo acoustic album, but it revealed itself as that's the most interesting thing to do. And that ended up being very successful and very successful with young people, which he had not experienced since the 1950s.
10:41So that was a... And after that, after the success of that album, we made five more albums together and he had confidence based on the experience of the first one, which he'd expected did nobody to care about really took to cold with people. And then on, I think it was on our fourth or fifth album. He did a cover of hurt the nine inch nails song. And that ended up being probably the biggest, you know, maybe the biggest hit of his life, certainly of his later life. Wow. And, and that was a real revelation. How important is confidence for an artist in your mind to have? Because I've, I've been around some of the greatest athletes that are freaks of nature athletically, that are gifted beyond anything physically, who can do anything in practice.
11:37But then they lacked the confidence in the game and they looked like an average player. Is that the same thing with artists, singers, guitar players, musicians, where they could be so gifted, but if there's a time when the pressure is on to record, then on the confidence, does that hold people back? Have you seen that? I'll say it's not as simple as that because there's a vulnerability required for the artist that if you're confident to the point that it disguises your vulnerability, that doesn't work. So it's like a dance between being wildly open and vulnerable and commitment to do whatever it takes to get your work through.
12:27That combination, which is a difficult combination. It's almost like what I'm hearing you say, this is really interesting point. It's almost like you just have to have courage to be vulnerable, which is not really confidence. It's more of like, you just got to, if you're unwilling to be courageous with your vulnerability, you just won't be able to share your art. That's true. There's, I'll say though, to get up in front of people and sing takes a certain amount of confidence. Yes. It's just part of the, it's a hard thing to do. I couldn't imagine doing it. That's true. A friend of mine, just Rachel Platten, she just, she wrote a song called Fight Song that was, you know, really popular over the last six or seven years, but she had a, you know, she started a family over the last five years.
13:15So she's got two, two young kids and she just played at the Troubadour a couple of nights ago. And, um, I'd seen her play in the past where she was uber confident, but she hadn't played in a while. And so she came out and she's like, guys, I'm actually really nervous. And this is my first time playing, you know, kind of with a man with these new songs and a while, and I'm revealing myself of these new songs. You know, you could sense this, you know, vulnerability, which was actually beautiful. Yes. It was like, we're rooting for her. You know, she, she messed up a few times, but she kept going and she's like, Hey, I'm going to restart this.
13:50And thank you guys. You know, but it was like, wow. And it made moments of like awe and magic happen. Yes. It was so cool. Yes. And it's not about perfection. That's the thing. It's like humanity breathes in the mistakes, you know, in the, it's what, it's what's not ordinary. If it was machine-like perfect, it's not so interesting. It's cookie cutter. It's all the same. So it's the edges. It's the frayed edges that make it interesting. Talk about transcendence. You talk about manifestation in the universe. I know you're a big meditator. How long have you been meditating for? I learned when I was 14, and it's been a big part of my life the whole time.
14:37I can't say I've done it continually, but I go through phases of five years on, two years off, or something might replace it that's another kind of a meditation. I may go from TM sitting meditation to learning Tai Chi, and Tai Chi will fill the slot of my TM time. Right. Transcendental meditation. Yeah. Do you think it's more impactful to make your art from a place of pain, anger, or sadness, or from a place of love, peace, and harmony? I don't think it matters. I think it's true to your experience. So if you're feeling anger and sadness, a sad, angry song would probably be good. And if you're feeling love and peace, then you're in the right frequency to create that kind of song.
15:28You can also sometimes if you're in a real pain, you can write a yearning song for love that can be very deep. One of the things about when you're in pain, you tap into things. You're looking for, you're not satisfied in your condition. so you're yearning for change. And sometimes the energy of yearning for change can lead to really beautiful music. Right. Wow. Is there someone that you're able to talk about or share that spoke and created from a place of yearning when they worked with you that later said it was an extremely healing process for them, working with you for a few weeks on an album and expressing their diary in that way and allowed them to heal and have lightness on the other side.
16:31The most recent one was I made an album, the last album of Kesha. And she had gone through a very difficult experience. Yeah. And she told me that it was a very healing experience working on the album and different than any experience she'd had previously where it was much more about commerce before. What's the most painful thing you've been through that you've had to heal and overcome? Probably the biggest one was, um, you know, I was overweight most of my life and it was just, it was, I was not comfortable in my body and I always felt like an outsider and felt like it limited what I could do.
17:12Really? Yeah. So I think probably weight was my biggest issue. What was the root behind that? You think? I think it was mostly bad information. Although my mom was obese, so I thought it's just genetic. And I tried everything. I tried every type of diet. Nothing worked. And then eventually I found the correct balance. And I was a vegan for 23 years and I weighed 318 pounds as a vegan. Wow. Yeah, you can be a sick vegan. I was very sick as a vegan and I wasn't getting what I needed. Right. And it's basically a carbohydrate diet. Yeah. And you can have all the sugar you want being a vegan, but that doesn't mean it's healthy for you as well.
18:04Exactly. So it's like, what do you think was, you know, it sounded like you tried a lot of different things for 20 years, but it didn't work. But you found the right combination. But was there something you needed to mend or heal emotionally that allowed you to shift internally? It was just information. I was always willing to do it. I would say probably the biggest, maybe there is an aspect, which is I thought I knew what was best. So there was a sense of turning over control to someone else. That was a surrender. I saw a doctor at UCLA who a friend of mine recommended I go to. I knew it wasn't going to work because I had done everything and nothing worked.
18:47And, um, she put me on a particular diet and I remember thinking it sounds terrible, but I, and it's not going to work, but I'll, you know, I'll do what you say that no belief. And, uh, but I put my faith in him or I, I gave up faith. I gave up, but listened and, uh, committed to the process and committed to the process and the weight fell off. Really? How long did it take? Was it like a six month year process? 14 months and I lost 135 pounds. Man, that's awesome. Congrats on that. Thank you very much. Wow. And when was this? 12 years ago, something like that. 12 years ago. You look really healthy right now.
19:26I feel that. That sun tan, you know, wherever you're at. I spend a lot of time in the sun. Yeah. I'm a sun worshiper. Now, do you feel like when you were able to, I guess, get that support, see the changes physically to something transform inside of you spiritually to be a better artist once that transformation started to happen? Or did you think you were still making great art, you know, when you were a hundred pounds overweight, would you say? I think we were making great art the whole time. The differences between losing weight and then meeting Laird and starting to train and get into my body because I was sedentary my whole life.
20:15Just sitting all day. Sitting all day or laying down all day. I liked laying down more than sitting. This is the longest I've been in a chair since I've been on an airplane. With Laird, when I showed up to Laird the first time, I couldn't do one push-up. Come on. I swear to you, could not do one push-up. And with his support, I worked up to being able to do 100 consecutive pushups, which was mind-blowing. So what changed between the weight loss and meeting Laird was I now see anything is possible and that you could train for anything. There's nothing you can't do. You can't be the best in the world at something, but you can be a lot better than you are at anything you want to put the time into learning, whatever it is.
21:12You could do anything. And that's a great, inspiring feeling. And I feel like I bring that into the art where I already had great confidence. But even more so, I now know anything is possible at any time. Wow. Just if you have to do the work. so this was 12 years ago when this started to happen right and so if i'm got my wrath right are you 60 right now yeah i just turned 60 just turned 60 in march i just turned 40 if you could go back to your 40 year old self what would the the number one piece of advice be for you at 40 if you can think about where you were then who you were working with the projects you were working on the people in your life knowing what you went through the last 20 years what would you tell yourself then i would always say just have as much fun as possible because we um i i'm a workaholic by nature and i love making things and i love making good things and a great deal of time and effort goes into that you know and i'm hard on myself in that way in that i i have high expectations um and i think we can have fun too yeah of course Chris, yeah.
22:29What brings you the most joy? I think probably quality time in nature with my family. That's probably the best. Being in a beautiful place, being close to my family, breathing fresh air, walking on the beach, laughing together, reading together, watching movies together, watching wrestling. I like pro wrestling. Yeah, of course. Pro wrestling with my son. It's fun. that's great are you more of a wrestling fan or a ufc now always been pro wrestling yeah ufc feels like they might hurt each other they do that's why i like wrestling it's like it's more uh everybody's on the same side right for it to be the best show they wanted to be a win-win yeah it's a win-win yeah you talked about that and you know this documentary series about you know i love the video of you being like the ultimate promoter with the bc boys in a commercial like just being this hype man promoter, like, you know, um, how much has, I guess, pro wrestling influenced you as an artist?
23:35A lot, a lot, because it's, uh, it's a world where you never really know what's true. It's a world of mystery and great skill is involved in what they're doing. And there's a story and, and it's a story sometimes of people who seem to hate each other. Do they hate each other? They might be best friends. It's like we don't know. But sometimes they really do hate each other. And then the matches are different when they really hate each other. But you never know when it is. So there's a sense of, and I think it's more honest than any other form of any other sport or any other form of entertainment.
24:16See, it's funny. I say it's the only legitimate sport is pro wrestling. Because it's the most like the world. In the world, we don't really know what's true. Everybody has a facade. People put on airs or a performance. A mask. Yeah, or the politician talks, and we don't really know who they are. They say these things that are often written for them. We don't know. Um, so there's this like performative aspect of the world that wrestling, that's what the world's really like. We say that the, you know, wrestling is fake. It's like the world is fake and wrestling is real. That's what it is. I wanted to go back into what you talked about with, you know, you mentioned transcendence and I think you mentioned, you know, the universe having your back when you asked for an answer.
25:12with this particular song with System of Down. What are your thoughts on manifesting and manifesting something you want and alchemizing it into the world? Do you believe in manifesting? Do you believe in artists should be thinking in that way? Or what's your thoughts on it? I believe in it a million percent. it's something that I've experienced before I knew what it was. Can you share? So when I say it's like, I feel like it has to do with the purity of the intention behind what you're doing. If your intention is pure and you're doing it for the right reasons, it seems like things tend to work out.
26:03And that ends up being a manifestation mindset, but it didn't start for me that way. It just was like, I really believe in what I'm doing. I really care about it. I want it to be the best it could be for me, and I'm excited to share it. And the results have shown me that you can manifest things. It happens. but I'll say when I do it, it's never based on the outcome. Ooh, what do you mean? I'm never asking for a result. What are you asking for? I'm asking to rise to the occasion to make the best thing that I can, for the thing that I make to be great. Great is a vague word. I don't know what great means.
26:51I came to realize recently what great means, but I didn't know most of my life I was aiming for great, but I didn't know what that was. And I've come to realize that great means it's a devotional, it's a devotional kind of greatness. It's a gift to the universe. It's a gift to God. Wow. If you're making a gift to God, there's no greater, you can't put more into it than that. You know, you can't, what about the single? What about what someone's going to say? Who has anything to say if we're making a gift for God that there's, you're putting all of your purest intention into this thing for the universe.
27:37Wow. That's where it's at. I didn't know that. I came to realize that recently. I, again, my word was greatness. Yeah. Greatness. That was the word of what I was shooting for, but I've come to realize what it is. Wow. You have a whole, you know, kind of section about greatness and success in the creative of act, a way of being, which is, which I love your explanation there. That is fascinating. So greatness for you, what I'm hearing you say is a pure gift of yours to God. Yes. And it's a gift of yourself to God. It's like, this is the best I can do. This is my offering. This is what I have to offer.
28:20If you think of a formula for manifesting as an artist, what would that formula be? I don't think there's a formula. Is there an art to manifesting? I don't know. I don't, I think, um, it sounds like a shortcut and I don't think there are shortcuts. I think it's always a version of doing the work, of finding your way into what it is that the universe wants you to do, and then really dedicating yourself.
29:03I don't want to have to wait for somebody else to give me permission to have my success. I want to be able to manifest my own success using my own creativity and do it sort of on my terms, you know, and in a way that aligns with my heart and makes sense for me and showcases what I do in the best possible way. And I think one of the challenges that freestyle improvisers, because there's a long lineage of incredible freestylers way before Harry Mack, you know, one of my biggest influences is MC Supernatural, who's one of the greatest freestyle rappers to ever live. Yeah. And and there's there's many others as well.
29:44That's just one. But one of the biggest challenges they faced is that like a freestyle rapper doesn't fit in easily to sort of the machine of the music industry. Right. Because people working at record labels, they might hear an amazing improvised freestyle all about their outfit and the label name and maybe the whole catalog of the last year. and it might blow their mind, right? That's happened time and time again. And then they say, oh, this person is amazing. This is great. Do you have a single for radio? Do you have something we can promote? Where's the album? We want to put you on tour, but we can't do that unless we have streams, radio plays, structure.
30:23People need to know that they're going to be able to come out and sing along. What do they sing along with? You know, what are you going to do, basically, to help us make money? How can we monetize it? Yeah, exactly, exactly. And so the monetization was all kind of outsourced in many ways because like pre-social media, that was kind of like the best avenue was to hope that you got discovered and signed by a record label because they're the ones who actually have the budget to promote. You really didn't have the power for the most part as an independent artist back then. There just weren't the tools available to you in the same way they are now to kind of take control of that.
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30:56So I have a huge privilege, you know, coming into my career now in this era where there's all these free social media platforms that you have access to. And everybody has this phone in their pocket that's also a 4K video camera, you know, and we can capture anything and we can share it with the world. And if it has creative merit or if it's marketed creatively, if you're able to connect with an audience, then you're able to build an audience organically and you're able to succeed. And you can do that on your own terms without waiting for anybody else's permission. And you can make mistakes and learn from them.
31:33And you can experiment and try things. You can do things when you want to. You never have to wait for someone to say, oh, it's not the right time. Maybe we'll try it then. Or, oh, I don't know if this is the right direction. We don't want to waste time or money doing this. You get to make those decisions. And it really gives a lot of power to the independent artist. And I think one of my missions and goals in what I'm doing is to change the landscape for freestylers in particular. Because to me, it's an absolute travesty that all of these great freestylers who inspired me are not as well known as their peers who maybe had big radio hits, you know, and went more the traditional path.
32:16these improvisers are some of the highest level, you know, creative musicians on earth, you know, similar to a Miles Davis or a John Coltrane. And they deserve to have that light shine on them. And I think for young freestylers coming up today, hopefully I can play a part in them looking and seeing, oh, there is a path for this, you know, or there is a way to pursue this on my own terms. And even if I prefer to freestyle and create kind of in the moment, and I prefer to have it be different every moment and not, you know, write it down and recite it the same way every time, that doesn't have to mean that there's no future for it.
32:53Right. Because for so long, that's how it was posed to freestylers. It says, oh, this is great. But when are you going to pivot? When are you going to do what actually matters? Right. It's like, OK, you can freestyle. But when are you going to make a song? Because until you do, it's not really a thing, you know, and a little gimmick or whatever. Exactly. Exactly. It's a fun, it's a fun way to sharpen your sword, so to speak. It's a good practice routine. You're obviously very talented and anyone who sees it knows that, right? But we can't monetize it. We don't know how to sell it. And so that's the whole thing is that piece about you're obviously very talented and anybody who sees it knows that.
33:28Well, now it's like, okay, let me film it. And anybody who sees it will, you know, acknowledge the talent. And if it, if it moves them or speaks to them personally, then they may be moved to, what to follow along with what you're doing and and and maybe if you get to a point where you're having a show they'll be the ones to buy the tickets and um so yeah i i would love to sort of make that kind of wave where you know it for so long i was talking to somebody and they talked about how you know you'll say oh they're a great freestyler but they don't know how to make a hit song they said well do you ever ask the freestyler do you want to make a hit song Right.
34:05You know, it's like it's the same thing for comedians. It's like, oh, he's so good at stand up, but like he's never written a TV show. Sure. Did you ever do that? Right. Do they want to do that? You know, and it's almost as though, you know, somehow only the latter is relevant or important. And what, you know, what about just being a good freestyler? Maybe that, you know, is in and of itself. I, of course, personally believe it is valuable. Yeah, absolutely. I'm very passionate about it and I'm not the only one. And I would love to create a world where up and comers can say, oh, dope, this is my thing and I get to show it myself and I don't have to wait.
34:42Have you created a freestyle membership yet? Not yet. Well, I'm on Patreon. Okay, cool. Of other freestylers? No. I'm saying like a club. That would be dope. Like a membership where you are the, you know, kind of the leader, the host of the community that pays to be a part of it where you provide resources and tools to help them expand their reach or something like that. That would be really dope. That could be the next thing for you. I love that. When did you realize that? Because you kind of grew up in the social media world when you started doing freestyling and doing it more full-time. What, 2016, I think you said?
35:18Yeah, 2017, basically. End of 2016. So the tools of, I guess, you really, TikTok started to come along in 2018, I guess. Yeah. YouTube started to make it more for live streams and Instagram started to have video I think around then. So you kind of transitioned right when live video, vertical video started to come around in the last four years. When did you realize like, oh, this is a way to make a great living and not just make 50 bucks a night and some chicken nuggets at the local bar, you know, drumming? I didn't get a commercial, but I mean, with the social media wave, when did you realize, oh, I can make a real living here?
36:02Yeah, that's a great question. You know what's funny? My first sort of taste of having a viral video was the end of 2016. I made a video with my friend and it was for his channel. And it got 100 ,000 views overnight. It was me freestyling while driving down Sunset Boulevard and rapping about the changing scenery around me. That was my first taste. That was kind of the catalyst for me saying, okay, I got to dive in on this and see what I can build. You know, it gave me the excitement. Had you made any content before then? No. As a freestyler? You were just kind of like doing it for friends, for fun.
36:36I had various, you know, I had my band in my group in middle school and high school. We became pretty popular, but it was written songs. It wasn't really freestyling. In college, I put in just an absurd number of hours freestyling in the dorm with my friends. I mean, insane. Every night, just like, whatever's happening. on rapping. Yeah. At least like two or three hours, almost every night. That's fun. Uh, yeah. And, and became known around like, you know, party circuits as this crazy freestyler guy, like the trick that you could pull out and bring it to a party. Yeah. It was always fun, you know, make little circles at the party and freestyle, which is how most people get started freestyling.
37:12Um, I had a band for a while with my, with my, uh, you know, jazz studies cohorts at USC. It was dope. It was kind of like, you know, we, we looked up to the roots and groups like that, that had live instrumentation. So we had, you know, drums, bass, guitar, keys, horn section, and then I was the front person freestyling. That's cool. Which was a lot of fun. We became a very popular party band. So, you know, we would play all around the USC campus and things of that nature. But yeah, the first content that I made was at the end of 2016. It was for my friend's channel and it got a hundred thousand views overnight.
37:43And that was enough of a catalyst for me to realize I need to start my own thing. Didn't have a YouTube channel, didn't have like like a professional Facebook page or even like, you know, my IG was just a personal IG, you know, which I barely ever posted on. I wasn't a social media guy. Didn't know anything about it. You're an introvert. Yeah, I was an introvert, you know. So I just wasn't that into it. But all of a sudden I was like, oh, wait a minute. This is a way that I can create energy around my freestyling. Like, that's interesting, you know. And so I set up my YouTube channel. But what's so funny is my first, you know, I made a couple of videos that didn't really get too many views.
38:18You know, starting from scratch eventually we went out to venice beach and i had sort of my first like you know hit so to speak i had a viral viral yeah um it was called venice beach freestyle part one and we posted that on youtube and it went pretty crazy on youtube but on facebook it went bananas it got reposted by this viral conglomerate site and ended up getting like you know 20 million views or something on that one repost and across all the reposts it was upwards of 40 million views or something like that. And that had never happened to me before. 2016, 2017, 2017, February, 2017. Oh, you remember the exact day.
38:51Yeah. Yeah. Cause it was, it was mind blowing for me. You know, I, I, it was just insane. I had never experienced that before. Um, just all the, all the comments and, and just seeing it reposted and shared here and on blogs that I knew about and seeing my video up there was just wild. Um, but what's so funny, I did a few videos after that, but I didn't turn on the ads for any of those videos. I know, I did this for years, man. Because I thought it would annoy people. Dude, I did for six years on YouTube. Did you do it by choice or did you not know that it was there? I did it by choice because I didn't want, I wanted to serve and add value and I didn't want like some sleazy marketing campaign in front of my videos, right?
39:32So I was like, all right, I'm just going to add so much value to my community and build this up for free. And we did this for five or six years. Yeah. I went back. I started turning on the ads a couple years ago. And the first month I go, oh, this is not bad. And it just kept growing. And I went back and just looked at the views from the previous five years. And I about threw up when I realized that I lost about a million dollars minimum. And it probably would have been three or four because had I known I was making the money, I'd have been like, let me pay attention to like really go all in on YouTube and make better content.
40:04And I didn't do any updates of thumbnails. It was like, just threw it up. Yes. And so just based on the views, it would have been a million dollars over five years, which is a lot of money in five years for a business. And that's why I said, okay, let's really go all in on this and see how we can optimize this. And then at that point, it was also kind of the tipping point where I think they were just putting ads on every video anyways. Yeah. Whether you had it turned on or not. They were like, we're monetizing your video. So we're like, sure. Must have made money from it. Absolutely. Everyone sees ads anyways.
40:36So it's like, okay, it is what it is. Right. But so you didn't start doing that originally, but then you turned it on after these. Yeah, I never turned them on because, I mean, similar to you, I just thought that it would turn people off from the videos. I would rather have more people see it. And at that time, I felt like the ad would deter people from watching it. And I don't know if that's actually true. I think, you know, it's hard to say. Like you say, now that the ads are so ubiquitous, I mean, they're everywhere. I think people just expect it. and it's not accepted too yeah and it's it's totally normal um but that was my philosophy back then i really didn't know anything about youtube um i have kind of a funny situation too we talked about it a little bit earlier but um around that same time after i'd been making these sort of non-monetized youtube videos for a while viral videos yeah yeah um i got called to do this Mitsubishi commercial.
41:34And it was the craziest thing at the time because even though I was having these viral videos, I really wasn't making very much money. I mean, I was very much living month to month, which I was used to because I had been a gigging jazz musician for all those years. So I had no overhead, no savings, and I basically just covered my expenses, my rent, my groceries, and gas. Yeah. And sort of started over again at the top of each month. I got called to do the Mitsubishi commercial and it ended up being a national TV ad for nine months in the U.S. and Canada. It's a trip. It's me dressed up like a Mitsubishi salesperson and they come in to, you know, test drive the car and then we go in the car and I start freestyling the features of the car.
42:15And did you freestyle the whole thing every time or did you kind of have pre-planned, like, you knew some of the terminology of the whatever you had? Yeah. So, for the, like, you know, for the ad agency and for, like, the Mitsubishi Corporation, they want to, like, approve the copy. Right. So hard, man. Yeah. So I, uh, I, I wrote a verse about the, uh, the full disclosure for your audience. Um, yeah, no, I, and I've talked about this before. I wrote the verse out, uh, word for word about the car features and shared that with them. And then we came up with this concept where I would do one take like that.
42:47And then when I would do, yeah, completely freestyle, just rapping about their outfits or whatever came to mind, mix it in somehow, mix it in with the stuff. So the, the final product included some of my preconceived lyrics, And then some freestyle. That's cool. But, you know, for me at the time, that commercial, you know, I made more money than I had ever made in my life to do that commercial. And it wasn't any, you know, insane jaw dropping amount. But for me, living month to month, it was like, oh, wow, I can breathe now for the first time. And that felt really, really great. Yes. But I also learned a really, really important lesson at that time.
43:23You know, I had always had the goal of making an album, you know, writing songs and sort of making more of like a traditional hip hop album. Even though, you know, I didn't really have experience doing that since my high school days. It was something that I really wanted to do. And I also felt at that time a lot of pressure to do that because I felt like that was the obvious pivot, like we were talking about earlier. It's like, OK, this freestyle thing is cool, but if I want to go make real money, this album thing. Exactly. I have to go to radio and I have to become whatever image you have of a famous, successful rapper.
43:59I felt this incredible amount of pressure to somehow embody that, rather than remembering that I should just be myself and do what comes naturally to me. I wasn't quite there yet mentally. So I was struggling with that. And then here comes this Mitsubishi commercial. And so I said, oh, great. This will be my record label advance. You know what I mean? This will be the money that I can sort of live off and use to fund my album and, you know, get producers to work with and make some music videos and things of that nature. And you stopped making content during that time? I stopped making content.
44:33I took a break. I took a break from YouTube for almost a full year. Yeah. It could be irrelevant if you go a year away from your content. Easily, easily. I mean, now we post, you know, daily on multiple platforms. You know, we go hard. But at this time, I was like, well, I'm not making money on these YouTube videos anyway because I didn't turn the ads on intentionally because I didn't want to turn people off for the video. So it's funny. But I thought, well, you know, I got to figure out how to pivot and actually make this career happen. And so I lived off the, you know, the Mitsubishi money for almost a full year.
45:07And I used it to sort of fund my album. And then it got to the end of the year. And I was basically out of money, you know. And I looked up and all of a sudden there's this panic. You know, and I'm saying to my girlfriend, like, I don't know what I'm going to do. I think I'm going to have to go apply to, you know, Trader Joe's down the street or Starbucks. I got to get a job. You know, I'm going to have to get a job soon. And shout out to my girlfriend. And she basically said, you know, that's that's nonsense. You know, you have an audience and you have this talent. You know, you just have to activate your audience.
45:39Like, let's actually figure out what that looks like for you. Wow. And so at that point, I said, you know what? You're right. and I said, I'm going to change my approach and I'm going to actually do YouTube like a YouTuber. You know, I'm going to learn how to monetize a YouTube channel. I'm going to learn how to do social media in a way where I'm able to build it out as a business, you know, and I started really doing the knowledge and doing the research to understand how that works. And so from that moment on, that's when I sort of rebranded and started calling those man on the street freestyle videos, Gorilla Bars.
46:18And I sort of came back at that phase after doing the album. The album was not very successful, by the way. It was a big thing for me and I'm proud of it and I'm glad that I did it, but it didn't make too much of a splash. And so it was like, okay, let's get back into this YouTube thing. Rebranded the series as Gorilla Bars and started doing the videos, monetized with the ads on from the onset. And, um, you know, we, we made, I think six or seven episodes, we made six episodes and then the seventh one came out and, and went super viral on YouTube. And that, and so it was like, yes, I'm back in the game.
46:55Just, just enough. So you started making money from the ads there a little bit and then, and then you start going hard on all the platforms, right? Like I found you on Tik TOK, I think, you know, later this, earlier this year or something, you started doing TikTok, Instagram, and just kind of creating content for all platforms. Exactly. And now you're trying to maximize and monetize wherever you can there, right? A hundred percent. Yeah. It started then, it was me trying to learn how each of these platforms work and what specifically works well for Instagram, as opposed to YouTube, Facebook, as opposed to TikTok.
47:27You know, like what are the sort of idiosyncrasies of all of these platforms and how are people using them to build businesses and then seeing how I can apply that to what I do. And in the beginning, like at that time, I'm doing every part of it myself essentially, which is a really important phase of the whole journey that I'm really grateful for. You're not just outsourcing it right away. You're learning it first so you can understand the language of how these things work and then work with other people eventually. Yeah, yeah. And learning the language of it, but also just out of necessity. Like I couldn't afford to pay somebody else to do it.
48:03Sure. But it's good. I mean, even if I could have, I think it's better this way, right? And this is, I'm sure you can relate to this. You know, I think pretty much every content creator out there goes through that phase. Yeah, I spent years broke learning this stuff back in 2009, 10, 11. Yeah. And I had no money. So I had to obsess about it all day until I could start hiring people. Yeah. Absolutely.
48:30What do you think happens if we never process and acknowledge our emotions? I think repetition. You keep repeating, you keep sort of living through, going through the motion, and you end up slowly just accumulating more and more density because you're just repeating the same reactive habit patterns over and over again. And we don't realize that every reaction, it creates an imprint on the mind and it predisposes the mind to react in the same way, to perceive in the same way. So you can just get denser and denser and denser. I think those moments are where the real sort of like, this is a test, right?
49:09This is like, I don't need to join you in this anger. Actually, I'm okay. Like, I don't want that heaviness. I could even practice, like, especially if it's a dear loved one, I could even practice listening to you and seeing you, but also just maintaining my peace while I'm trying to see you. And it's really difficult, right? It's not like a, you know, get a hundred percent type test, but you can do your best to just keep your energy as it is, especially as you're moving through different environments, you know, moving out of the work environment to, you know, different situations that you're in.
49:41Because I think being able to manage your own energy, I think it's just a sign of mastery. It is a huge sign of mastery. And when you are in reaction mode, something else has power over you. Oh yeah. Something else is more powerful than you are. And it's when I learned that it makes me off because I felt like I was always in control. But when one was reacting or defensive or guarded or frustrated, I realized later, I was like, man, I allowed that person, that moment, that thing to have power over me to get into a negative state. That's not fulfilling. That's not fun. And so I had to learn how to deconstruct that and have more mastery over my emotions.
50:26And it doesn't mean I'm perfect and I still get frustrated and I still have moments of anger, but I'm aware of it quicker and I'm like, let's shift out of this. This isn't serving my vision. It's not serving me. And when you're in a group in a situation like that, where maybe the whole group is getting upset by a particular situation, if one person is able to put their head above the water and they're like, oh, actually we're okay. You know, this is, this sucks, but we're going to be fine. And then everyone kind of can, you know, gets, gets another opportunity to kind of wake up a little bit and they're like, oh yeah, we're good.
50:56You know, we don't have to just roll in anger right now together. Cause people don't quite get, like you can be skillful without creating all this immense tension in your mind. So you can still assess the situation and be like, oh, this situation needs my attention. I need to solve it without producing so much stress in the process. you talk about focusing on, uh, four fundamentals that can massively change your life. I want to see if you can read, I've been reading your book, but I want to see if you can read these four. Oh, so I wrote this one after finishing a 45 day meditation course. It was like the first thing I wrote, um, focusing on a few fundamentals can create a massive change in your life.
51:37Number one, make your healing, personal transformation, and well-being top priorities. Number two, refrain from harming yourself or others. Three, create mental space for gratitude. Four, be kind and generous to others. Yeah, this is, if everyone on the planet made these four things their top priority, the world would be a more harmonious, peaceful place. And it starts with making healing, personal transformation, and well-being your focus. Yeah. Because when we don't make it our focus, it's not present. It's not in us. and we become sick, we become sad, we become cynical, all these different things.
52:27And that doesn't create positivity in the world. It doesn't move things forward in a powerful way. So making your healing, personal transformation and wellbeing a top priority, that alone, most people aren't spending the time like you talked about to create mental space for that to happen. They're not living in gratitude even for a moment throughout the day. They're not creating 10 minutes to just think in peace without being on a distraction or a phone or a TV. And really think about where can I invest my time in well-being? And if people could spend one hour day on just well-being, whether it's calm mind, whether it's meditation, whether it's walking, whether it's working out, going to therapy, one hour day on their well-being, it will drastically improve the quality of their life.
53:18It totally does. I've gotten so many messages from especially like mothers, you know, mothers who like have so many responsibilities and so many things they're doing and, you know, hearing stories about how they were inspired to just take like 10, 15, 20 minutes to themselves to just like do whatever it was that they needed to recalibrate. right to whatever practice whatever tool they had to just like get back into a certain degree of balance and it's fine it's you know you know it's good for you but it's until you practice it until you do it until you see the results you know you see the payoff of the investment and until you see the payoff of the investment you're not like then that's when you double down and I think that's what happened to me personally when you know I would go to these 10-day meditation courses like I told you, like I was doing that for two years and I think I did four, uh, about five of those courses before I started meditating two hours a day.
54:16And I had seen, I'm like, this is completely changing my mind. Like I'm not fully healed, not fully wise or anything like that. Um, I got the inspiration to start writing, but then I knew I was like, if I bring this into my everyday life, how the, you know, the results would be even bigger. Not just a weekend at a time. Right. Not just like going away for a little bit, but it's like bringing it into my daily life. And I think what inspires me and still inspires me to this day is like, I know how when I put this time to be silent on my own every day, that it affects my marriage positively, my relationship with my parents and my siblings, my relationship with my wife's family, my, you know, the relationship with all of my friends, all of my work is affected positively.
55:03so if I don't do this, every part of my life is going to just not be as great. Here's a question for you because I'm sure someone watching or listening is thinking of this. You know, Diego, this all sounds great but your parents immigrated here and there's millions of immigrants that don't have time because they're working whatever jobs they can get. Probably two or three jobs a day to provide for their kids. There's a lot of single moms that the husbands or their partners left. Exactly. And they've got kids and they don't have time because they got to work full time and take care of their kids.
55:44They don't have that 30 minutes a day, 15 minutes a day to focus on their well-being. What would your current self say to your parents before they moved? The day before they're about to move to America. Yeah. What would you say to them knowing everything you know about the 20 years that they went through of not having time to focus on well-being, how would you coach them or set them up for success? Wow, that's such a wonderful question. I've never thought about it, especially in regards to my parents, because I know we live in a world of tremendous difficulty, and a lot of people are literally trying to just keep their head above the water in the economic situation.
56:26But in regards to my parents, I think I would tell them that they, like, I would try to give them the advice that my wife and I now follow because it's not in regards to meditation or not, but it's what we practice daily where we are constantly checking in about where we are in our emotions. So when we wake up, we tell each other, like, this is, you know, I'm feeling tough or like, I feel, I feel heavy. And it doesn't necessarily need a reason. It's just, sometimes you wake up, you didn't get enough hours of sleep and you just, you feel like crap, right? And being able to know, like when I know what my emotion is and I am accepting of it, and then my partner also knows what my emotion is, and we know where each other is at, then we can actually, that creates a situation where there's information that wasn't there before.
57:18And we can move forward in the day where, you know, being cognizant of how that emotion is affecting what we're saying. And I think we found that a lot in our relationship, my wife and I, where when we know how we feel, it just creates less possibilities for unnecessary arguments. And I think if my parents were, you know, put that into practice, especially back then, that could have become a long-term habit where it's like, oh, now I know my wife just doesn't feel good today, so let's be cool. Let me try my best to support her. And similarly, I think when conflict arises, don't try to win. Winning, when you both try to win, you both lose automatically.
58:00Try to focus on understanding. And I'm glad that this is becoming a much more popular thing that more people are talking about because it's needed. Like if an argument arises, I need to do my best to understand things from your perspective. And then you take the time to understand things from my perspective. How did this series of events move for me? You know, What emotions was I going through as this was transgressing? Same thing for you. When there's more understanding, then there's a possibility for love. And I think that's something that, you know, hopefully as a society we can start shifting towards.
58:33Because when, and granted, sometimes there may be times where one of us needs to apologize or whatnot. But overall, trying to understand each other creates more opportunity for love. And those are things that, whether you have time to meditate or not, if you try to put them into practice in the way, you know, when you're interacting with another human being, I think they could be really helpful. I mean, you know the experience you grew up with your parents in terms of how much stress they were facing or just kind of, I'm assuming, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but kind of like a tension, a constant kind of low level tension of like anxiety, of fear, of lack, of scarcity, of like nervousness, of kind of like a rushedness, not enough time, not enough to catch up, like always behind feeling.
59:18And I don't know if anyone else can resonate to that, but what practical things could you say or what could someone in that situation do who feels like I don't have time to take care of my wellness because I've got three or four kids, three jobs. I can't even think about the feelings of my husband or my wife. I can't even think about that because I'm in such survival by myself. What would be the difficult thing to say to your mom and dad that they would really need, like if they could have done that differently or anyone in that situation now, if they could just do these three things, even if they don't have the time to do it, what would they do?
1:00:00I think the reality is like, right. We want to, especially if it's someone that you're close to, like I would remind them, I'm like, dude, you're thinking the whole day, right? You're thinking constantly. So you're thinking, but what are you thinking about? You're thinking about things that are sort of rotating that wheel of misery, like rotating that reaction. And I think trying to interject moments of positivity, even in the mindset can be incredibly powerful. Like, you know, finding time to not finding time, but like, even as you're going through the moves of whatever it is that you're doing, whatever you're, you know, whatever it is that you're working on, whomever you're helping, um, thinking about moments of gratitude, right?
1:00:40Like putting into mind, like, what am I grateful for? What's there that I'm, you know, I'm so, even though I'm in this hardship, I'm so glad that this is there or this person is there. Also moments of where you can reflect even intellectually about impermanence. So I think this is incredibly helpful. Understanding that a moment of difficulty, like, right, life may be hard throughout, but it's not always going to be at the same intensity. So understanding that everything is always changing and letting that inspire you to be more present in the times that you do have, you know, cause even interspersed with all of the like difficulty that I had with my parents, um, that we all had growing up as a family, there were definitely still beautiful moments like on a Sunday or, you know, when they would both have a day off and, and we'd be together as a family, you know, and we'd be enjoying each other's company.
1:01:30And I think being like really, you know, letting the fact that things change, inspire you to be there, to be with the person that you love. I think it's incredibly valuable and can bring a lot of joy into life. And I love that you're hitting at the reality of how, where so many hundreds of millions of Americans may be and people around the world, the world is rough. And I think when we talk about this, it should inspire us to try to make a better world. I really fundamentally believe that. And I know people have very different ideas of how the world can be better, but whatever the idea may be, whatever the structure we may implement in the future, it needs to be something that's centered around compassion.
1:02:13And I think it's just so critical that we can try to, you know, let love design the world. Because I feel like we, you know, we think so often in terms of right and left, but we never go up. We never, like, how can we elevate this situation? And I think it's, my hope is that we, like, we live in a historic time. We live in a time where there are not only these tremendous challenges that are in front of humanity, right? We have this like incredible income inequality, poverty around the world, so many diseases that should be eradicated. There's so many different challenges that we're facing, especially over this hundred year period that are pushing us to mature as a collective humanity.
1:02:57So to me, what can we do is try our best to heal ourselves while we're dealing with these global societal issues, because our healing will actually create more creativity in our minds and help us see different solutions that weren't once there. So instead of just repeating the same solutions over and over again, and them not working, it's like you clear heal your mind, and you'll be able to look at a situation and be like, oh, I see something that I didn't see before. let's try things a different way. And this is, we're talking a long game, right? Long arm of history. But I think it's so, to me, it's so inspiring and kind of, it creates a lot of awe in me that the same time that there are so many challenges, there are all these healing modalities that are becoming more and more accessible than ever before.
1:03:45Like right at this time, can you get access to so many different forms of meditation, so many different forms of therapy, psychiatry so many you know and there's tons of other healing modalities that I'm not even mentioning but people can actively try to find something that can heal them yeah and you know for those who have time definitely try to heal yourself for those who don't like we need to support each other right and we need to create a better world Wow yeah speaking of healing modalities have you ever done like ayahuasca or like plant medicines or anything like that no never done ayahuasca um i've tried like mushrooms lsd and all that and i found it to be helpful to an extent but once i started meditating it just kind of blew everything out of the water it was like you know when you're meditating you're sitting there you're literally it's almost like you're getting a degree in universal law like you're just like you're understanding how the universe works but within the framework of your body and you get this sample size and you just start observing it, you can make your awareness so sharp that it literally can feel like your body is this like flowing river of atoms and you can so crisply feel and, you know, attend and observe to this ever changing impermanence that layers every fabric of existence.
1:05:06Like it happens at the atomic level, the cellular level, the mental level, the, you know, cosmological level, everything is always changing and we struggle when we have a combative relationship with change right but we feel peace when we embrace change so to me it's like meditating it's just like it's opened the world to this i mean it's opened this these doors to this incredible learning that you know every time i go every time i sit i'm like i'm like wow got a lot more to learn right do you think if you i mean i've never done plant medicine i've never been high or drunk in my life Cool. Your brain must look great.
1:05:44I just saw Doc Amon. Yeah, you did too with Doc Amon. Yeah, did you do the brain scan? I did it with him as well. Yeah. But I have like some trauma from football stuff. So you fixed a dents? It's getting better. Okay, good. It's improving, yeah. But I had some definitely like some deeper dimples from like football trauma. I fell once when I was, I fell down the stairs once when I was 20 intoxicated. He was like, that's where you hit your head. Also, you hit the back of your head. You didn't even, that's from 15 years ago. That's crazy? And it's still there. There's still the trauma there, right?
1:06:10It's crazy, man. I'm curious your personal thoughts on using healing modalities that include external medicines, drugs, or stimulants, hallucinogens to put you into different states of being versus internal medicine through meditation, silence, and using the chemistry within your own body as opposed to the chemistry outside of your body. yeah what do you think is more effective i know lots of friends that swear by like how powerful ayahuasca and things have been for them but i also see like a lot of challenges and struggle within them after they swear by this yeah so they get like this awakening or awareness or like insights which i'm like awesome but i still feel like it it doesn't solve everything so i i don't know because I haven't done it, so I can't speak into it, but you've done both, it sounds like, or some of it.
1:07:12And it sounds like you're not doing the external medicines anymore. No, not at all. Yeah. Why, and what do you think has been more effective? I can speak to it in two different ways. So one is, from my personal experience, I found that when I would do psychedelics, they were incredibly helpful because they were eye-opening. They were showing me the interconnectedness of the world in a way that I couldn't quite see before. But after they were done, it felt more like an intellectual understanding as opposed to a knowledge that was fully mine and I could permanently live in. Integrated understanding.
1:07:53Yeah. Fully just part of my being. Interesting. When I would do psychedelics, it felt like I was opening a window to a door. I mean, You know, I was opening a window and looking outside and looking at how the world really is. And it was beautiful. But when I started meditating, it was like I would open the window and then I just walked outside the window and just started like living in this world. That's interesting. Yeah, it became into me. And now I want to say this, right? I think it's really important to understand that like, right, meditating works wonderfully for me. I have this, you know, very specific.
1:08:28I practice Vipassana in the Goenka tradition, the same style that Yuval Noah Harari practices in and a bunch of other great people. And it's difficult, but it's for the people that it works for, you know, that connect with it. It's like it's like you struck gold. Like you just you found this thing. You're like, whoa, now you can just accelerate your growth and and really develop and move on this path that leads out of suffering. but with that said I really believe that individuals have to find modalities that meet them where they're at so there are some people who have experienced you know so much trauma so much heartache so much they carry so much pain that that they might need something that's either a little more external or you know might need to speak to another person as opposed to just closing their eyes because when they close their eyes and they feel it's like too much They're just like, they can't, right?
1:09:23So each individual has to find something that meets them where they're at, like where is their conditioning and something that clicks with their intuition. Although it should be something that's challenging, right? Because in the challenge, you're going to build new strength, but you also don't want it to be overwhelming. And I think that's a lot of things. And that's why some people, you know, will either stay away from ayahuasca or, you know, just the different things that they themselves might find overwhelming. Because then if it's overwhelming, it's not productive. you you might want to stop the healing process stick with it you won't stick with it yeah i think that's really interesting to talk about too it's it's finding the thing that meets you where you're at and maybe you got to try a bunch of stuff exactly until you figure out what that a lot of people have to try the sort of like spiritual buffet and then they find like what actually works for me yeah i mean i remember when i first started meditating it was really hard for me to sit still for like five minutes yeah nice i was like okay like i need something else yeah And so I went into different modalities.
1:10:19I was like, I'm going to go extreme heat therapy. I'm going to go extreme cold therapy, like more physical, feels like a workout and see how I can let my mind process and heal and work through these things in a different way. Then it was, okay, let me go back to meditation and doing a two week meditation retreat. And I actually became a meditation instructor, I don't know, seven years ago or something. And then going back to different things. And so it's, I think it's a process of discovering and figuring it out. I love that you tried it again too, because a lot of people are like, they sit down, they meditate and they're like, I can't do this at all.
1:10:51And it's like, of course we all suck at it. Right. Yeah. When you first start, you're going to suck. Yeah. So it's something that you won't get, like, like I said before, it's a mental gym. You're not going to be able to bench press like 300 pounds on your first go. Right. So you need to train the mind and to help it develop focus. And that takes determination and the ability to just be like, I'm going to try again. Yeah. Going to try again. Keep trying and then the quality develops. Yeah, that's it. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links.
1:11:29And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.
From the publisher
How can embracing simplicity, improvisation, and mindfulness transform your creative process and lead to groundbreaking personal development? In today’s episode we explore how to harness our creative brain and elevate our creative output! First, we have the legendary music producer Rick Rubin, who'll share transformative insights from his #1 New York Times bestseller, "THE CREATIVE ACT," highlighting the power of simplicity and nurturing environments in the creative process. Joining him is the phenomenal freestyle rapper Harry Mack, who will discuss the pivotal role of improvisation in enhancing personal and artistic expression. Rounding out our trio is Diego Perez, known as Yung Pueblo, a meditator and bestselling author who delves into how meditation and self-awareness can dramatically elevate creative output. Get ready to unlock your creative genius with today's incredible lineup!
In this episode you will learn
- Embrace simplicity to unleash your full creative potential.
- Harness the power of improvisation to transform your artistic and personal expression.
- Cultivate mindfulness to tap into deeper levels of creativity and self-discovery.
- Create environments that nurture innovation and inspire breakthrough ideas.
- Overcome creative blocks and discover new ways to think outside the box.
For more information go to www.lewishowes.com/1607
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Full episodes from today’s mashup:
Rick Rubin – https://link.chtbl.com/1536-pod
Harry Mack – https://link.chtbl.com/1321-pod
Yung Pueblo – https://link.chtbl.com/1512-pod
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