Our final episode for 2021 is a harvest of hard-earned wisdom to launch us into 2022. You’ll hear from <deep breath> Peter Rollins, Annie Grace, Rob Bell, yung pueblo, and africa brooke. They share so much on how to slow down, trust ourselves, get our focus on what we truly need and, most of all, have fun while doing it! We are SO GRATEFUL for all of the support and encouragement that has come our way in these first six months since we launched TMST. We can’t wait to get at in the New Year! Super deluxe +2 hour Spotify playlist for this episode: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2QDWiNjDf9i5DDWZ3Smk9t Tell Me Something True is a 100% independent podcast. There are no corporations or advertisers backing this community. We are 100% funded by the TMST community. Support TMST today so you can hear the uncut interviews, attend private events with Laura and help keep TMST ad-free: https://tmst.supercast.com/
Tell Me Something True with Laura McKowen
Something True for 2022
[00:00:00] Peter Rollins: Soren Kierkegaard says what a support, a poor to someone who screams and cries and agony, but whose lips are so formed, that when they cry out, beautiful music is formed. And so we say to the port, sing to us again. So the pullets beautifully confronts us with our own repressed truth, but in a way that's beautiful.
[00:00:18] That's exquisite. That kind of like that helps me work through it. And then I come out feeling all better.
[00:00:37] Laura McKowen: Hey everyone. It's Laura. And I've got someone here with me today.
[00:00:42] Mikel Ellcessor: Laura. It's great to be here.
[00:00:43] Laura McKowen: Um, Michael is joining me, our executive producer and the co-creator and co dreamer of this show, and we're here to raid the archives and bring the most memorable [00:01:00] moments from the show that we have and highlight the themes that we've heard this year.
[00:01:04] It's been six months since we started the show. And this is our 26 or 27th episode 26th. Yeah, something like that. It's amazing.
[00:01:17] Mikel Ellcessor: Time is just a flat circle. We're just trying to fit in like the weirdness of COVID time keeps going on just in a new, in a different way. Um, but there's just been like that little piece from Peter Roland that we heard right there at the beginning.
[00:01:31] And so many things coming up there that it's been an extraordinary opportunity to listen to generous brilliant people and soak in these conversations and find that. Some elements that we thought would be a great way to share, to wrap up 2021. Uh, the themes will become really obvious. I think to folks sort of what's on our minds culturally, because it was amazing how consistent some of the conversations were [00:02:00] just from what, what was going on in people's lives and what they wanted to talk about.
[00:02:04] And so we're just really excited to share this with. Yeah.
[00:02:08] Laura McKowen: Yeah. So maybe, uh, this episode will help you find, or this, this show will be fine episodes. You might've missed, uh, coming up. We've got words that will carry us into the new year from Africa, Brooke, Annie Grace, Rob Bell, Peter Rollins. And up first we have young Pueblo who goes, it goes by young PEBLO, but his name is actually Diego Perez.
[00:02:35] And. Oh, yeah, we, he was one of our first four episodes and what an extraordinary human being. He was. I still think about that conversation a lot. And the word that comes to me every time is equity. Nymity equanimity, equanimity. He's just got this piece, uh, this peaceful radiance about him, [00:03:00] and I'm just going to let
[00:03:01] Peter Rollins: you live.
[00:03:04] yung pueblo: People are always looking for one moment. And then, you know, I'm always like, it's like, it's a series of moments and just all these things building up together. But no, there wasn't like a specific moment. What I really remember from it was that it was grueling. It was really hard to like, I'd never been silent for 10 days and I never meditated for hours and hours and hours a day.
[00:03:24] So everything that I was doing, which was brand new, I think the real moment came after that. Just like the few days after I feel like my mind had lost weight, like I just had lost this like burden that I was carrying in my mind. I didn't feel like fully healed or anything, but I felt better. I felt like I can think more clearly. I can feel more compassion like in my mind and my heart and for everything for me and for everything.
[00:03:51] And that wasn't something that was like really strong within me before at all. I felt like it was funny. Because I could, in the past I could feel much more. [00:04:00] Compassion for the world, like as an organizer, you have to have a bit of a love for the world to like, do this type of work. But I had less compassion for individuals and now this was like a switch was like, oh, I have, you know, the love for the world is there, but there's more love for individuals that wasn't really there before.
[00:04:16] But that feeling of my mind, just being less dense, just motivated me to keep going back and to keep putting myself through that difficult process because. I was getting results that I had never seen before that I didn't, you know, results that I didn't even really believe because I was like, what's going on here?
[00:04:33] Like, am I suppressing is like, is this a new type of line or something like that? Because I want to be really honest with myself. Yeah, exactly. But then the tests came later, like during difficult moments that would happen in life. And I would notice like, oh, there's no suppression here. It's just, the reaction has decreased and the reaction isn't as intense as it used to.
[00:04:53] So there's something here and that's like, literally what the goal of that technique is equanimity. And that's what I was gaining in my [00:05:00] life. It's just that equanimity was so foreign that I didn't even know how to deal with it.
[00:05:04] Laura McKowen: Yeah. You know, what's funny that you say that because when I read your words, that is the essence of what I feel in your words is equanimity.
[00:05:14] That's the word that always comes to mind is equanimity. And that's not. It's the energy in the words. And I think as a writer and as an avid reader, you can read the same thing written by many different people, but it will make you feel differently based on who wrote it. And what's actually transmitted into those words.
[00:05:36] So equanimity, it did make its way into you because I think that's what you transmit among other
[00:05:41] yung pueblo: things. Thank you. That's so kind of you to say, yeah, I have this relationship in my life with impermanence and equity. And permanence is the most fundamental thing that I'm trying to understand in this life.
[00:05:52] And equanimity is what I'm trying to develop. And between the two, I try to live my life. But yeah, equanimity is like, [00:06:00] it's real happiness. That balance of mind to not be constantly reacting, to not be constantly craving or having a version, to just see reality as it is and allow it to flow the way that.
[00:06:11] Laura McKowen: I've seen, you mentioned that your wife meditates with you now, did she just come right along in the middle? What, cause this, I think is a challenge for people to, in partnerships where one person grows at a different time. Yeah. And you know, how has that looked for you?
[00:06:27] yung pueblo: It looked exactly like that. We grew at very different speeds.
[00:06:30] We were both immediately interested in taking a course, but then I was the one who started sitting. Two hours a day before she did like months before, like I think like nine months before she did and afterwards it just kinda clicked inside her and she decided to come along for the ride as well. Because she had to go through her own process.
[00:06:50] She had to figure out, like, was this for her? Even at that time, I think we were looking at other styles of meditation. Like, should we take this route or that route, [00:07:00] but then when it clicked that, you know, Vipassana was, was for the both of us, like let's, let's take it seriously and similar. There was a point when we both started realizing that smoking weed, drinking alcohol, just like wasn't serving us anymore, but she was ready to give all that up before I was like a few months before.
[00:07:18] Like I remember feeling bad that she was able to give it up so quickly. And then I was harder for you. It was hard. Yeah. It was hard to not be like, to not have someone by my side doing the same thing. And also because I did want to give it up, but I wasn't quite ready to, but I was so grateful for the patients as she gave me and just like letting me go through my own process and then like a few months pass and then it clicked and I was like, okay, I'm ready now.
[00:07:44] I'm ready to really give it up and put my foot down. And yeah, we just, we just grow at different speeds even to this day.
[00:07:50] Laura McKowen: Yeah, yeah. At the end, of course we do. Of course we do. So what is the relationship to you between substances and meditation? [00:08:00] What led you to the decision that it doesn't belong in your life anymore?
[00:08:04] Yeah,
[00:08:04] yung pueblo: That's a good question. So at that point I had already dwindled, the amount of intoxicants that I had taken was like a very small amount, but I had started meditating two hours a day. Before I gave up and toxicants so I was like doing both simultaneously and we're in
[00:08:19] Laura McKowen: the morning, hour in the
[00:08:19] yung pueblo: evening.
[00:08:20] Exactly. But what I would notice was that when I would go through periods of times without consuming and toxicants, or without, you know, taking alcohol, my mind felt sharper and my mind felt a lot less dense, but I had this inkling. I was like, when you go to a retreat, you're there for 10 days and you're obviously not drinking or smoking.
[00:08:40] Right. And your mind just like clears up and then it has this beautiful, pristine quality that supports your awareness, supports your equanimity, supports you to go even deeper and to gain more wisdom. And at that point I was like, okay, I think this isn't for me anymore because one, like, I'm not really getting a lot.
[00:08:59] And this is, you know, [00:09:00] people live their own lives and then go through their own journey. I'm not trying to impose my life onto others. I'm just talking about my story. But, um, it just clicked that like, I'm getting so little from smoking now. Like I think in the past, when I was younger, I was actually gaining a lot.
[00:09:15] Cause it was like some system that was helping me just not get overwhelmed by everything that was happening, but then it quickly became a bad habit that just helped me escape from it without dealing with it. And the escape wasn't really real. But the moment I stopped, you know, I just felt like that was like a key pivotal moment of like an inner Renaissance began.
[00:09:38] You know, when I, when I like stopped drinking and smoking continued meditating two hours a day, my mind just went through such deep mental and physical healing, like on the mental level of my contents of the mind, but the physical level of my mind, like there was just so much more clarity flowing and I was able to take that and just make good.
[00:09:58] And meditating and, um, [00:10:00] it really just radically changed. The relationship, my wife
[00:10:03] Laura McKowen: and I, yeah, I bet. I always remember this story that I heard, you know, Wayne Dyer, he's like an old school sort of self-help guy, maybe considered a spiritual guy. I don't know. He talks about, you studied with Maslow and he was drinking consistently, but never say problematically.
[00:10:20] No one would say he was an alcoholic or anything like that, but he consistently had a couple beers every night. He, after his long runs. Maslow eventually said, `` I know the levels of consciousness that you want to reach, and if you want to get there alcohol, this has no place in your life. And I remember hearing that long before I got sober and there were many other reasons I had to get sober, you know, survivalist type of reasons, but that really stuck with me.
[00:10:48] And the reason I'm bringing that up is. Beyond sort of the immediate effects that alcohol or drugs or intoxicants can have on our day to day life. [00:11:00] There's like another layer that we don't really know what's possible within ourselves within our own minds. And it feels like that's part of what you've discovered about yourself is that.
[00:11:15] Call it the hidden 25% or I don't know what you call it. It's like, we don't even know.
[00:11:21] yung pueblo: I don't know. You know, I'm so glad that you're bringing this up because I've never really gotten to speak about it in depth. It's funny. Cause it feels like we're talking about a secret, but um, it's
[00:11:31] Laura McKowen: getting
[00:11:31] yung pueblo: quiet.
[00:11:32] Hushing up? Um, so my last, okay, so to be really honest, my experience was that I could feel the meditation making my mind. It was just, that's the word that I can use, like literally making it lighter. And then even when I would, you know, smoke marijuana, drank alcohol, or even take mushrooms, it felt like the meditation had helped me go to a much subtler level.
[00:11:58] And then when I would take these things, [00:12:00] it would bring me to a denser level. And it's funny because I remember when I was growing up and like the memes at the time and all the things that were around in social media, there was a lot about. Marijuana and psychedelics can help you make your mind very subtle.
[00:12:15] And I totally think that's true, but meditation just like, for me personally, it just went so much deeper that when I did try those things in the past again, after having started meditating, I was like, oh, this isn't for me anymore. Like it's only bringing up the same type of intellectualized wisdom. And whereas meditation was gaining wisdom through direct experience.
[00:12:41] Laura McKowen: Uh, see what I mean? So we also asked Diego to read from his latest book, clarity and connection here he is,
[00:12:54] yung pueblo: time does not heal all wounds. It just gives them space to sink into the [00:13:00] subconscious where they will continue to impact your emotions. And What heals is going inward, loving yourself, accepting yourself, listening to your needs, addressing your attachments and emotional history.
[00:13:16] Learning how to let go, and following your intuition. Three thoughts, relationships normally start with two people wanting to treat each other well. Harm is caused when someone does not have it. How to properly manage their reactions to their emotions. If you think you are your emotions, then your words and actions will resemble your mental turbulence in relationships.
[00:13:46] It is important to understand that the other person can not fix your emotional problems at best. They can support you as you uncover and process your own emotional health. [00:14:00] There is no such thing as a perfect relationship, but there are incredible relationships in which the mutual connection and support are indescribably.
[00:14:35] Mikel Ellcessor: And remember Diego's latest book, clarity and connection, definitely something you want to have on your shelf. So up next, we have Africa, Brooke, who was another one of our very first episodes. Uh, Laura and now both of us had kind of honed in on her, somebody that we wanted to have in early. What kind of sticks out for you with this conversation?
[00:14:57] Laura McKowen: This is one of those that I've thought about. [00:15:00] So often since we had it. And what sticks out most to me is there's this theme that I think we're going to be talking about for the next five years, a really big theme in our culture about who gets to have a public voice. And what is the responsibility of having a public voice and what choices are you actually making when you do that?
[00:15:29] Totally different time than we were even 10 years ago, or anyone can choose to have a public voice more or less. And so Africa talks about self-censorship and self-sabotage, and then what I have thought about since then was that there's two different realms, so that there's this internal private life that we need to cultivate.
[00:15:58] Of honesty, [00:16:00] honesty with self honesty with others. And then there's another realm of this public sphere. And what does it mean to not censor oneself do not sabotage oneself to not, to, to not hold back. Uh, and I think those are two very different things. So. Africa has a beautiful way about her. She drops a lot of seeds here in this conversation that, like I said, I think we're going to be talking about for a really long time.
[00:16:33] Where do you start with people? And I'm asking because. To offer maybe a starting point for people to think about this.
[00:16:43] africa brooke: Yes. So it always looks different for everyone, right? It always looks different for everyone because as you just said, self-censorship is not just about, for example, I have. This really controversial opinion.
[00:16:58] And I really want to [00:17:00] say it, but I'm worried about the repercussions of that for some people that have had to censor themselves because they grew up in an abusive environment. So therefore they have to tread on eggshells. Otherwise something is going to happen, right? So it shows up in so many different ways.
[00:17:15] So the, one of the first things that I do is to really get clarity on exactly what that individual means when they say I am self-centered. What do they actually mean? So before I make an assumption of what that might look like, right. Instead of me making an assumption that it's about an opinion, because that's where we could go straightaway.
[00:17:33] Right. It's really understanding how would that individual articulate exactly what they're experiencing without necessarily using the terms self-sabotage or self-censorship. What are they actually struggling with internally? And then we always go from. Because it looks very different for
[00:17:51] Laura McKowen: everyone. I'm very interested in how you enter when someone says, I don't know what I think.
[00:17:57] I don't know how I feel. [00:18:00] How do you respond to that?
[00:18:02] africa brooke: Is that really true? Yes, because right. We always speak in absolutes. Right. Even when we haven't done much, self-reflection to really interrogate that belief to really interrogate that narrative that we keep on saying, I don't know what I think. You know, is that really true?
[00:18:19] What I also like to do is to just make that as objective as possible, right. To really dissect what has just been said. So I might ask something like, okay, so on a day to day basis, you go through 24 hours a day and you don't think. And you don't make any kind of decision. Is that really true? And then it's like, well, no.
[00:18:44] Right. And then you start to really get even more specific. What are some of the things that happen in your 24 hours where you are required to think you're required to trust yourself on some level, because to make any kind of decision, even what you're [00:19:00] going to eat, what you're going to drink. Sleep now, am I going to watch this now?
[00:19:04] Am I going to write, am I going to go to work? That requires you to make a decision and to be able to make that decision? There is some level of self-trust. So when someone says, for example, I don't know how to trust myself most of the time. They mean, I don't know how to trust myself when it comes to this specific thing, but they say it as if it's an absolute truth to absolutely everything.
[00:19:28] So. I might ask something along the lines of, is that really true? So you're saying that you have never, ever trusted yourself to know when it's time to eat and it's like, actually, well, no. Right. And then it always goes from there. And then we go as deep as we need to, and really start to understand the psychology of that really start to look at what is the belief system, what are the beliefs that they are taking as an absolute truth that need to be interrogated?
[00:19:56] Laura McKowen: Something like if. We're to tell the [00:20:00] truth about how I feel in this moment, this would happen. So it's dangerous to think what I think perhaps is another way of saying it. Yes,
[00:20:08] africa brooke: exactly. Have you experienced that?
[00:20:10] Laura McKowen: Yes. I'm thinking of it in two ways. You know, there's the, in my sort of personal life and then as a public person in my personal life, that's where I had to learn first that it was not only okay.
[00:20:27] To say what I think feel what I feel. That's one layer. Not that it's just okay. To meaning. There are shadow parts of me that I include everything that, that no emotion is wrong. No thought is on its face. Wrong. That alone was massive. For example, I don't like my husband. I'm disgusted by my friend. You know, all the ways that we're internally conflicted all the time because of.
[00:20:59] What [00:21:00] it means to be human. And that, that is the nature of humanity and not some error or some comments on our morality or that we are deprived because we have what we call icky thoughts, you know? So, there's that level. And I had to go through that and what really brought me to that was my drinking and having to accept these really.
[00:21:26] Ugly difficult things that I had actually done and to go, does that mean I'm a terrible person or was I trying to get my needs met? And that was a whole layer. I found that I was not integrated until I could also express what was inside outwardly. It was just to me that pain was a big part of why I was drinking.
[00:21:49] I was inside feeling, thinking. Living a certain way and outside doing something much different there's tension in that that requires relief in [00:22:00] my experience. So I literally had the thought Africa many times. If I tell the truth about who I am and what I've done. Well, I can't, I'd rather die. Like I'd really thought that that's not possible for me.
[00:22:14] Maybe it's possible for other people. Great. They aren't me and it will kill me and it will kill other people. Right. I wouldn't want to live in this world because I would be so ashamed. I wouldn't survive the repercussions of that. And that to me was that was the central part of sobriety. And still is.
[00:22:37] All right. And it's a process. And, and I have so much to say about that. I think what happens on an individual level? Oh, it shows up collectively. And so what I see you doing is not calling it out, but bringing that to the surface and allowing people to. I [00:23:00] think what they think and feel what they feel. So talk about that too.
[00:23:03] Like how you, how you actually listened to yourself when you're taking in information, how, you know, what intuition is versus the voice of say fear.
[00:23:16] africa brooke: That's good. This is something that I share quite often, and I will continue to share this to really emphasize that there is a difference between. Censoring yourself, which has always from a place of fear, it's very different from being mindful of your speech, being considerate with your words, right?
[00:23:37] And to be able to do that, to be mindful of your speech, to be considerate with your words, it requires you to be in a mode of self-reflection. It doesn't have to be an extended period of time. It doesn't have a timeframe, but you need to create space for self-reflection. So that is the difference.
[00:23:55] Whereas when you're censoring yourself, it's not really from a piece of software [00:24:00] fraction because you're reacting to a pattern that has been in place for a long time, a pattern that is fear-based. Let's say, you know, that you have something to say and you still have this feeling that you're going to be in trouble.
[00:24:13] What if it goes wrong? What if I'm misunderstood? But because you've taken even just a moment to reflect and to assess the situation, then you make a conscious decision to say, actually, no, it's really important for me to say this right now. And you can still feel the fear. This is why I always also advocate for discomfort because I think it's an essential part of growth.
[00:24:36] Whether you want to accept it or not, it's always going to be there. So you could still be mindful of your speech. You could still be in a mode of self-reflection and know that it's really important and sometimes even right, for you to express this and still feel. Which I believe is very different from pain or yeah,
[00:24:55] Laura McKowen: Well, there's discomfort either way.
[00:24:56] Yeah. The bargain you're making or the [00:25:00] options you're weighing are not any discomfort or discomfort there, discomfort in the direction of one thing versus discomfort in the direction of something else I've left. So many things that you say in, in how you say them, you've said. Basically the, if the cost of telling the truth about how you feel means X, Y, Z, I'm okay with that.
[00:25:25] I'm letting go of the need to be liked. How did you get there to that point? Because of that, I think that is like the crossroad of liberation for so many people.
[00:25:37] africa brooke: Yeah. It's really, really important as well to understand. That you never want to quote unquote, get rid of the need to be liked completely, or you can't
[00:25:50] Laura McKowen: That's I think the big lie, right?
[00:25:52] The give no fucks. That's the
[00:25:54] africa brooke: nuance there, right? That we are hardwired to care. We want to belong. We want [00:26:00] community. We want to be surrounded by people. We need connection. That is a vital thing in terms of human existence. However, realize. On external validation or relying on the acceptance of others to feel whole within yourself is always going to leave you feeling less than always.
[00:26:20] Laura McKowen: Right. It's like drinking. It might get you there. It might get you a quick hit of it, but it doesn't, it's not sustaining.
[00:26:26] africa brooke: Right. And for me, I would always say as well, that it's a constant practice, which is why I look at every situation as a case by case. I say to myself or say to people that I have officially let go of the need to be liked.
[00:26:40] And I have a certificate hanging behind me. You know, that's not how it fucking works.
[00:26:45] Laura McKowen: Never matter again,
[00:26:47] africa brooke: it's always a case by case. There will be moments when someone says something or I read a comment, you know, and then before I can even intellectualize it and, you know, bring in logic and bring in reasoning and [00:27:00] say, actually, this person has no idea who I am.
[00:27:02] I don't know who they are. Before that even happens. I will feel it. I feel like, Ooh, that doesn't feel good. That doesn't feel nice. Why? Because I want to be liked, I do want to be accepted. Right. So I will allow myself to feel that oh, okay. That doesn't feel really nice, but then. I won't over engage with it.
[00:27:22] I believe that's the way to really navigate that space. This is why I say I choose to let go of the need to be liked. And I choose in every single moment. It's not an overarching truth and it's final. I choose in every single moment, every single interaction when I need it. Right. So I allow myself to feel that moment of rejection, that moment of being misunderstood, but then I don't over engage with.
[00:27:46] And then I just move on and it's the next moment, the next moment. And I'll be doing that for the rest of my life. So that's how I view it.
[00:27:53] Laura McKowen: So what is the cost of not telling the truth?
[00:27:58] africa brooke: Um, to me, the [00:28:00] cost of not telling the truth looks different in so many different areas of life. It depends on what the topic is, or it depends on what we're talking about, but overall to me, it's all about denying reality.
[00:28:14] I did that for way too long, for way, way, way too long. And it's a very dangerous thing to do. It's a silent killer. So for me, the cost of self-censorship is really, really high because it will always lead me to denying the reality of what actually is, always willing, always willing to get uncomfortable or to even make people uncomfortable without meaning to.
[00:28:42] In order to say, what is true, or at least what is true to me. And to still understand that even what I consider to be true is not the absolute truth and then make space for other truths, make, make space for other perspectives so that I can learn so that I can be challenged, you know, so that I [00:29:00] can experience other people's realities.
[00:29:04] Mikel Ellcessor: That Africa broke episode. One of the very first ones that we've released with, tell me something true. And if you've joined us in the last couple of months, we really hope you'll go back and check that one out. There's, as Laura said, some really beautiful seeds in there and, you know, uh, as we do, we'd like to remind you know about why did we, we built, tell me something true and why did we create an online community around all of this? And, and the hope is just to have a little sane spot on the internet, which is a thing that comes up a lot in that Africa Brook conversation. Um, we are extremely. About the ad-free nature of this work.
[00:29:42] Um, we think it's very important to not be distracted with the hustle and the shining up oneself that you've got to do to keep advertisers happy. Um, we just know that there's a difference between ad free and ad driven media, and we really want to make [00:30:00] sure that the state. Um, ad-free and that's where you, as the listener, it plays a really important role.
[00:30:05] Um, the membership group TMS T plus, uh, makes all of it happen as a TMS T plus member. You can join Laura for member only events you can send in questions for the. You can hear complete unedited interviews. You know, it's a way for you for just like $10 a month to make a difference in the world. If this was media that other people were going to make, they'd be doing it, but we've really set ourselves out on a mission to find extraordinary people who are leading extraordinary lives and have learned a little bit of.
[00:30:38] It and have a passion for sharing it in a way that improves the lives of others. Not because they're a guru or an expert, this isn't about 12 tips on how to do something better. It's about people who are bringing their real world experience to the situation. Um, and we want to keep telling me something true as, as an ad-free [00:31:00] place for that.
[00:31:00] You can find the link for TMS T plus in the show description, we hope you'll head over. To TMS T pod.com right now and support this very strange little experiment, uh, for, like I said, as little as $10 a month. And Laura, I know you've got a bunch of more tape lined up for us. Who's next?
[00:31:18] Laura McKowen: Yeah. So next up is one of my dear friends, Annie Grace, and I've wanted to talk, although I've had many, many conversations with Annie, I really wanted to talk to her.
[00:31:29] About something different than what we usually talk about, which is sobriety. And that's because she has something really powerful to say about what you just mentioned, hustle culture, and how we operate from a different place in our lives, a place that's not. Animated by scarcity and hustle mentality and never enough and more work [00:32:00] and so on.
[00:32:01] And I think Annie, this conversation with Annie is one that we've got perhaps in our top few, most in most listen, but most feedback on because it's just. That we've also talked about other guests out, which you'll hear in a minute, but that needs to be heard. Like there's another way to live. There's another way to live and run your life.
[00:32:26] And, and he's got some amazing thoughts on that.
[00:32:32] Annie Grace: There's a relationship between growth and control that takes so much mental fortitude for the person that. At the helm, because of course with all of this, you know, all of these lives are depending on me, you want to have so much control, but you cannot maintain as much control and grow. And, so I had to do the mental work to allow that I was going to have less control and what that work looked like for me.
[00:32:57] I was really realizing [00:33:00] that I'm not the savior. Like I am not the same snares. Right. Um, and, and realizing that, you know, I'm invited into this entire movement. Like I get to be invited into this beautiful thing, like into this awakening of humanity, into living, you know, a more mindful and more awake life.
[00:33:18] I get to be invited into this, but I'm not required. And I really made peace with that. Like, Annie, grace is not required. This will happen. This has been happening. All of these ideas have been coming. This time has been coming. People are rising up everywhere. This will happen with, or without me, I am invited and not required.
[00:33:35] And that, that changed really everything for me. And I'd say it to myself over and over and over. And the thing about the brain is the brain can change neuroplasticity, obviously, but not if you're telling yourself something you don't believe. So, like I had started this journey trying to change my thoughts, but with, with things I didn't believe, right.
[00:33:53] I would be saying like, You're not responsible for them, but I didn't believe that I believe that I was responsible for them. [00:34:00] But then when I realized that, like, actually, you know, I had to, I had to start with like baby steps in my thinking. And I had to find things that I could actually believe to change my thinking.
[00:34:09] And you know, one of those things was that if I burn out, none of this is going to move forward. So I'm going to have to give all of it up. Right. And it's such a funny goal, but my main goal. Was to be playful. And so I started doing just things like every time we had a team meeting, I'd be like, okay, who has a funny YouTube video?
[00:34:34] And we still do it to this day. Every Friday, we all play funny YouTube videos. Every time I'd find myself in a moment of stress. I think when you were trying to, when you see something that you don't like in yourself, and you're trying to move away from it, you almost have to move away from it. And like, you have to be intentional to the point of it being.
[00:34:52] Yeah, it was awkward for me to stop the meetings and be like, okay, who's finding like the Chuck Testa
[00:34:58] Laura McKowen: video on YouTube. I was like, [00:35:00] okay. Yeah.
[00:35:01] Annie Grace: Right. Like, especially because I've been like this like hard, like where's, you know, and all of a sudden here I am, and by the way, it's not feeling natural to me yet either.
[00:35:10] And the other thing was like that, that scarcity, that urgency, I would just force myself. So every time I think. Scarcity. I would write a check to see whether it was a cause or a charity, or like if I felt any Nagle of that, I would give money away just like tens of thousands of dollars. Just give it away.
[00:35:28] Like every time I felt it, I would give it away. Every time I felt competitive. I would literally force myself to call that person, reach out to that person and just get myself into a really wholehearted space and just a hundred percent congratulate, just be so excited for them and find out how I could make their success more.
[00:35:45] How can I support you? And like, just like forcing myself the other. It was hard. It was super hard, but it was like I had to do it. I had to do it because otherwise it's like the amount of that Aaron meaning [00:36:00] energy of, of scarcity and saviorship and everything. Like in order to unwind that I had to intentionally.
[00:36:06] Go the other way, because by the way, what was on the line, the whole thing was on the line. The whole thing was on the line because I'd made this promise to my husband and that's kind of was the process and it took time. I mean, I think it was, and I did a lot of like personal development thing. I did this emotionally focused course.
[00:36:23] I did, you know, all these sorts of things, like really looking into. Who, who I was, what was my brain thinking again? I heard this thing that the organization only grows as fast as the owner grows. It changed very slowly. So I would say 30 days out of the month, old me all 30 days that black, intense frantic energy.
[00:36:41] Right. First year I'd maybe get three or four days of kind of like, oh, I'm not forcing the playfulness. I actually feel kind of playful. Second year. I'd maybe get two weeks out of the month. Right? Third year I was really at three weeks out of the month and now I'm pretty much four years into this and I'm like, okay, there will be a [00:37:00] few days.
[00:37:00] Where I get sucked back into the void, but I'm really aware. And by the way, I like stop what I'm doing. And I have it written into our company values and it's called selflessly selfish that you can not bring that energy into the business. If you do stop, stop, go for it. Turn off your computer. I don't care if you're missing a deadline.
[00:37:20] Go get yourself back into a space of positive and a minute meeting energy before you come back. Because what I realized as it just happened is I would look at the times that I was spending in this really positive energy, I was getting more done. I was more
[00:37:34] Laura McKowen: effective. That's the weird part.
[00:37:37] Annie Grace: And so now here I am, you know, our podcast just cost 11 million downloads where like at 750,000 book
[00:37:44] Laura McKowen: sales, I just like got a pause on that.
[00:37:47] That's incredible. And, uh, not from a business standpoint also that yes, but 750,000 people have a different way of approaching how this [00:38:00] massive cultural thing that's so cool. Alcohol. It's so
[00:38:05] Annie Grace: cool. So it worked and it was funny because it does not feel like it's going to actually work. It does not feel like there should ever be an inverse relationship with.
[00:38:14] Growth and stress we've been conditioned. Like everything else that, you know, you've got to burn yourself out, that you got to work as hard as possible. And now, you know, my days look so different. I have so much margin in my days. Like I have like a two hour break after this. I exercise literally almost every single day.
[00:38:30] I meditate almost every day, twice a day. I walk my kid to school in the morning, but I've really focused on things that only I can do. And And then the hours I'm putting in, they just have so much more value. Right?[00:39:00]
[00:39:02] Laura McKowen: Now a conversation we wanted since before we started the show, it took some time to make it happen. Cause he was working on another tour and we got him fired.
[00:39:15] Mikel Ellcessor: Yeah, Rob bell. We were there, there was a hoop that went up when his schedule opened up and, uh, he, he could, he could make it work. And you know, of course he did it from the house in back where he cuts his podcast most of the time.
[00:39:30] And we're so much great work has emanated. And it was right as the tour was starting. And I had the privilege of being one of the early stops on the tour here in Detroit. And I will say. Seen the show yet, please gift yourself this in 2022, it is, I'm not giving away any secrets here. He talks about it in our show, and he's talked about it as he's warm people up for this particular tour.
[00:39:57] But, you know, he's he says the Rob [00:40:00] bell show was a night that was, had a beginning, a middle and an end. He had an arc, he had the beats, he knew how many minutes it was. And he through all of that. Because it was time for something new. And that evening with him, um, was an evening of co-creation of him and the audience, a feeling of being so extraordinarily present and available, um, to each other, each in your own space.
[00:40:26] But he just like opened up this incredible room for, for everybody to come together. Um, he definitely gave us a lot of that in this conversation and just really great. That we could, that we could host that this year.
[00:40:40] Laura McKowen: Yeah. I wanted to speak with Rob. I've had a couple of conversations with him in my career and he is just someone who I go to again and again, for grounding and clarity on [00:41:00] what actually matters.
[00:41:01] He's got such a, almost subversive. Way of approaching life. And we talked about contentment and what is enough because for me, those are the big themes in the past year. And man, he, this conversation was more therapeutic for me than any therapy I've done this year. It just really set me on a different track as I'm approaching my work.
[00:41:32] So here's Robert.
[00:41:38] So back to this enough, enough in the striving versus being content tension. And what does enough do you feel more often than not like you have enough, have enough are enough? And w [00:42:00] what does that look like to you? Like both on the outside and the inside.
[00:42:05] Rob Bell: Wide open spaces. I don't rush. I only do if I actually only do a few things and I'm not, this is what I'm doing today, talking to you.
[00:42:18] I only do a few things and there's lots of wide open space and time to be. And I don't rush places and I don't try to fit things in. And I'm not busy. So, and I completely reject the idea. When someone says you get this one life, you better do something with it. Get out of my face right now, get out. That's all, that's all scarcity.
[00:42:44] It's all in. It's all a warped relationship with time because it puts all sorts of anxiety on a person that somehow time is supposed to deliver a thing as opposed to just being here. [00:43:00] So. If you clean up your relationship with time, we're not trying to cram a bunch of things in before we die. We're trying to be here and be healthy and be present and be centered and then ever so gradually we'll have a sense of what's next and then we'll do it and then we'll get the next set.
[00:43:29] And as opposed to these tensions about, do you want to do more? Do you want to do less? Was that too much? Those are, those are signs of life. Do you want to go to another city? Do you want it? Like, you're going to write a second book. Okay. Let's start a second book is the second book actually not time. It's like, okay.
[00:43:46] Like, of course that's all the, that's all the grit and that's all the back and forth of this incarnation. So as opposed to what's wrong with me, you're learning how to be Laura. So, so notice how your second. You [00:44:00] learned how in your first book, how to write a book, but the second book, isn't the verse book.
[00:44:04] You may have to toss everything you learn because the second book might be of a completely you and then the musculature from the first book is kind of helpful, but then you're also starting all over again. You're going to learn all of this. So everything from the past is kind of helpful, but there may be things you did in the first book that actually get in the way of what you're trying to do with the second book.
[00:44:27] All you can ever do is be present to the second book and see what it wants to be. So if we slow down and we don't need time to deliver certain things to us. So what happened in the industrial revolution with the eight hour Workday? And what is the time came to be seen as units that were good to produce things as opposed to time as a of understanding time as a construct of the month.
[00:44:55] To make sense of things. And it's real, like we, this was 10:00 AM today. My time we talked, so that's [00:45:00] real and yet it's also not absolute. So my prediction is that the next 10 years you're going to see more and more people realize that the way they've been thinking about time, wasn't actually helpful or accurate.
[00:45:13] You're going to see a revolution in how people understand time. I think COVID did a wonderful job of showing people. Oh, you can slow it way down. You can take away tons of things and all that wide open space is actually filled with all sorts of interesting things. Um, you have more people talking about the eternal.
[00:45:31] Now you have more people talking about being present. You don't give up talking about meditation. This is all, this is all beautiful, but it's all in some ways, detoxifying us from this, go do the work and time. Two hours of work gets you that much money. Get you that much. Like, it's not all transaction that's
[00:45:50] Laura McKowen: tyranny
[00:45:51] Rob Bell: too.
[00:45:51] Wow. Yes, exactly. So you can see how these patterns are so deep sort of in the neurology of people, you know, their [00:46:00] brains have been,
[00:46:01] Laura McKowen: it's like, it's so invisible. I mean, we don't even, it's the water. We don't even, it's like, wait, what?
[00:46:07] Rob Bell: We don't have to like drag the fish up on the beach and be like, Hey, that, look at that, look back where you just, that thing you were just in.
[00:46:18] I love your question about content. You have something in front of you that takes that you are giving your energies to it is got all of that lovely mix of challenge and joy. You're not bored. You're not buried. And it's sustainable. And whatever it brings, you are like, Ooh, that took a lot, like this past weekend, the whole new show, the travel, all the weird COVID stuff.
[00:46:55] Like, like I'm tired today. Yeah. [00:47:00] Yeah. And I'm talking to you and then my son and I are, I'm going to go over to my son's house. Then he and I are going to go to home state our, one of our favorite taco places. And then. We're going to listen to some new mixes of songs he's been recording, then I'm going to go pick my daughter up from school.
[00:47:17] Like it's going to be the, and then I got some other, I got an idea for the next broadcast and I'm going to make some notes on that. And then I got this. I'm trying to explain. I'm trying to say it. I am saying it like it actually is. So in your question of what's enough, it's wonderful.
[00:47:45] Laura McKowen: All right now we come back to the place we started with Peter Rollins. I can't help, but notice how many times our conversations kept exploring this idea that there is no group.
[00:47:59] Mikel Ellcessor: Yeah, [00:48:00] really. I mean, it's certainly where we are as we make this podcast, you know, and, and, and I know it's something that we've talked about and that, that we're going to be carrying into the new year again, that there is this.
[00:48:11] There's there's, there's a paradox in our culture, uh, that I think is really important that we have to think independently, right? Ask your own questions, consider a range of options, but then there's also having the humility to be open to people. Who have things to share that we should consider. There's a real attack on authority and people who have done the work and who have acquired wisdom or who have knowledge.
[00:48:38] And then at the same time, we, we, we do have to go out and. And inquire and think independently, and that's a difficult paradox to hold right now. I know our culture wants us to fight intensely about it. And one of the things that I love the most about making tell me something true is continuing to hold the space [00:49:00] for, for both things to be apparent.
[00:49:02] This is Peter Rollins.
[00:49:06] Peter Rollins: The best Gury is a girl who reveals that they're not occurring. The last girl is the Curry. That they were just someone there helping you come to this, understanding yourself. I always worry. When you meet someone who, who does the opposite, he actually pretends, they are the subject supposed to know the subject who has all of the answers and all of that.
[00:49:27] That's the problem. But what you do need is if you can find someone who's qualified who plays that rule. And then the last act of that game is where they go. And by the way, I didn't do any of this. You do.
[00:49:56] Laura McKowen: This was really fun, Michael. I loved [00:50:00] thinking about these shows again. Uh, do you want to share some of what's coming up in 2022, which by the way, I feel so good to say
[00:50:10] Mikel Ellcessor: so good to say, put it in the shredder and let's just keep moving. Yeah. We have some shows, some conversations, some people that you may have discovered already.
[00:50:21] And some that I know that we're going to be introducing you to. We have Jamie Lee Finch, who is an extraordinary thinker and writer she's in her own way, recovering from purity culture. And we have this conversation about how our bodies are a person. And why that can change everything for how we live.
[00:50:40] We're going to have our first ever repeating guest and Helen Peterson is going to be coming back with her partner, Charlie Wurzel, they've got a new book that's out and they're talking about the future of work and what we've learned or what we have not learned and mistakes that we may be carrying forward from the pandemic.
[00:50:56] So that's definitely something you've got to want to stick around [00:51:00] for an Helen Peterson's. Conversation with this was one of the most commented ones that we've had on so far. And then Jill Louise Busby, who has this incredible book called unfollow me, um, is going to be on in the first couple of months of the new year.
[00:51:15] I really hope you find this book. Unfollow me, get it, read it, share it. She's going to be talking about what a life that has had these extraordinary. Uh, that came from she self described as having this, this moment of internet MicroFame and what she's learned from all of that and how it's changed her as a person.
[00:51:35] So she's just got a lot to share and she's also really damn funny and a great conversationalist.
[00:51:41] Laura McKowen: I can't wait for that one. All right, folks. Thank you so much for being with us today and for this last half year. Your presence and support has meant the world to us. I hope you'll consider becoming a TMS team member, a very small amount of support [00:52:00] every month from a whole bunch of TMS, T listeners will allow us to keep making this show it's commercial free, and we really want to keep it that way.
[00:52:10] So listener support is what makes that possible. Members get access to the full uncut versions of these conversations. Previews of upcoming guests invites to join me for members only events and access to our community where I hang out a lot, especially now that I'm not on social media. I cannot stress this enough.
[00:52:33] You can make a huge difference for as little as $5. Please head over to TMSC pod.com. Right now, head on over to TMSC pod.com and become a member.
[00:52:53] Tell me something true is engineered and mixed by Paul Tufo, Michael L Sesser. And I dreamed [00:53:00] up this show and we're looking forward to joining you online and next time and next year at tell me something true.