December 21, 2020 • 46 mins
This week, Zuri dives into the Dutch lifestyle concept of “Niksen” (The Art of Doing Nothing... sign us up). Then, get ready to laugh — Z talks with digital storyteller, Evelyn From The Internets, about how our society glamorizes busyness (to our detriment); the joy of doing nothing; and how Evelyn is redefining success. They also talk about poop... stick with us, here. Stay tuned till the end for our Giveaway winner + our Party Trick of the week: 3 Tips to Unleash your Inner-Kid!
Notes:
Evelyn From the Internets is a digital storyteller, filmmaker, humor writer, who loves to tell hilarious stories online. Some of her most popular videos include her viral “Call In Black” video + her Lemonade review which Beyonce found, loved, and played on every stop of the Formation World Tour. Evelyn has racked up over 18 million views and 240K followers on her YouTube channel. Website | Instagram
Read the Shownotes for the full list of resources + links from today’s episode.
Follow @ZuriHall and @HotHappyMess on Instagram to keep the good vibes going.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hot, Happy Mess. Celebrate your magic in the middle of
life's messes. Happy. I'm Zurie Hall and this is Hot
Happy may shoot the joy of doing nothing. Do you
know what I'm gonna do for the next two weeks? Nothing? Okay?
(00:32):
Holiday break officially starts today. As I record this on
a Friday, I am yes, back on the floor of
my closet because we are just that official. What's up, guys,
I'm your host, Zuri Hall, and this is another episode
of Hot Happy Mess. I cannot wait to do nothing.
The holidays are upon us. I hope you're having a
(00:54):
good one, sending you all the good vibes. I have
been working a lot, and I have been very excited
and grateful for every single opportunity. But it has been go, go, go,
go go, and I am counting down, count wounding down
to the moment when it's me and a couch for
(01:14):
like fourteen days straight. Okay. I remembered there was a
time when I used to feel guilty about doing nothing.
I mean my early twenties was basically that, like if
I was sitting down with a weekend to spare, if
I hadn't crammed in a brunch and a happy hour
and some extra you know, side hustle work or whatever
it was. If I wasn't exhausted when I went to
(01:35):
bed at night because I had just squeezed every last
drip of myself out, then I felt like I didn't
I didn't do enough, I didn't maximize. But that like
the case now, I will say after thirty the piece
that comes with being okay, with just being still is
(01:56):
next level. It feels so good. I've been listening to
this song called literally Piece b Still. It's by Hope Darst.
I think it's like Christian rock or something like that,
kind of like alternative vibes, but it's a good vibe
no matter what, no matter what you're into, it's just
like really encouraging, peaceful vibes. So check it out. It's
a good song. Anyways. I feel like we all go through,
(02:19):
you know, phases of chasing whatever is next, the next high,
the next moment, the next thing that will get us
excited or that we can post about, or that we
can even just personally enjoy. But it's always whatever is next,
right um, instead of being still and just soaking in
the moment that we're in. And when I think about it.
(02:41):
I kind of feel like always chasing what's next is
a form of escapism, right, So it's like, what is
it that you're trying to escape from? What is it
that I'm trying to escape from? And I've had to
ask myself that what am I trying to distract myself from?
Why is what is not interesting enough or not good enough?
(03:03):
That I've got to constantly be imagining what might be
around the corner. And I truly believe contentment is the
new cool, Like that has been my phrase all year long.
It does not matter if you're successful, if you're killing it,
if you are burnt out, busy, and just like digging
(03:23):
yourself into the ground. So I have really learned to
appreciate the art of doing nothing. People assume because I'm
so go go go and hustle, hustle, hustle normally that
I can't also veg out on a couch in the
same spot for twelve hours. I have done that for
like three days straight. I think it's because of the
high highs that I have those like low lows, not
(03:44):
in a bad way. It's like extreme efficiency and productivity
and then extreme nothingness, and I love it. I think
it's the only way to have any balance in that space.
And so I just want to clarify that the title
is do stuff is overrated, which honestly is true, but
I don't mean it's super literally, So it's not like
(04:06):
don't do anything. I mean unless that's what you want
to do live your life. But I'm saying that just
doing stuff purely for external gain or acknowledgement is so overrated.
That's what's overrated. Do stuff because it feels good. Taken art,
you know, visit the museum, learn how to play an instrument.
I've been trying to learn to play the guitar about years.
(04:29):
Let me get there one day. One day I have
the guitar. You know. I used to be able to
jam out to a little bit of Lauren Hill and
I could play a couple of Taylor Swift songs and
you couldn't tell me nothing. And that's just what I
have to say about that. I can't play those things anymore,
But give me two weeks and I could probably get
back on it. I love cooking, right like new hobbies,
(04:53):
whatever it is that might just light you up just
because you enjoy it. I would encourage you to do that.
Or or experiment and find that sing do nothing or
do something that is purely for you. So it might
not feel like anything to the outside world, but who
the f cares? Okay, what's up? Like I said, here
(05:14):
we go. Doing stuff is overrated. Get ready to laugh
this episode, you guys, because I am going one on
one with comedic YouTuber Evelyn from the internets. I love her.
Her vibe is just like the best. I love her
style of humor. You're really gonna enjoy it. I've got
some clips that we're gonna play from some of her
most viral and popular YouTube videos. We're talking about how
(05:37):
our society glamorizes dizziness to our own detriment and just
sort of romanticizes productivity, even when it's hyper productivity. We're
exploring the joy of doing nothing and diving into her
amazing career that she's carved out for herself in the
in the YouTube space on the interwebs, if you will,
(05:59):
and also talking about the time when she totally ended
up in Beyonce's Formation World Tour. We'll get to that
in a minute, and make sure you stay tuned until
the end, because I am announcing the winner of the
giveaway from the Self Love episode Somebody's walking away with
a one Amazon gift card. Baby, And we've got this
(06:19):
week's party trick. It's three tips on how to unleash
your inner kid. So before we get to Evelyn, just
really quickly, do you remember my story and episode one
about the epiphany that I had in Amsterdam. Um So,
Amsterdam is in the Netherlands a k a. Holland, but
the people are Dutch, so you can imagine that for
(06:41):
the first few months of learning Dutch culture, I was like,
what the heck is actually happening here? Like, who are you?
What does it mean? Why are all these names? I
was trying to be super cool, like, oh yeah, totally
love Amsterdam, never been but can't wait to get out there.
And then people will be like, oh yeah, no, like
Holland is awesome, and I'm like, well, what where are
they talking about? Hollo, What the hell are you talking
about that we're talking about Amsterdam? Didn't she say just
(07:02):
from the Netherlands? I thought, he said he what is
going on here? A lot of names for one really
amazing place. But the Dutch have a concept called Nixon
and it is the Dutch lifestyle concept. Of doing Nothing.
The art of doing Nothing, y'all sign me up. There's
this really great Time magazine article. The author's name is
(07:25):
Sophia Gottfried, and you can check it out and its
entirety online at Time dot com. But a small bit
of it reads, Nixon literally means to do nothing, to
be idle, or doing something without any use. Practicing Nixon
could be as simple as just hanging around, looking at
your surroundings or listening to music, as long as it
(07:47):
is without purpose and not done in order to achieve
something or be productive. Through now in the Netherlands, Nixon
has historye been dismissed as laziness or as the opposite
of being productive, But the article continues. As stress levels
climb in the US and globally and their crushing health
(08:11):
impacts like burnout are getting more recognition from the medical
community and hot happy mess doing nothing is increasingly being
framed as a positive stress fighting tactic. Where mindfulness is
about being present in the moment, Nixon is more about
carving out time to just be, even letting your mind
(08:32):
wander rather than focusing on the details of an action.
I love that because mindfulness is super important, right, But
that's like being so present. That is like, oh, I
feel the tingle in my fingers. Oh, I noticed the
sensations that are flowing through my body. I feel the
wind like tickling my ears or whatever it is. And
that's mindfulness, which can also be really hard to do
(08:53):
because I get distracted easily. But y'all, I might be
I might have been born for nikes. Then I don't
even this is up my alley because I love to
just sit and not fake and not do anything and
just kind of let let my mind wander. I think
I get that from my dad. He's really good at
just He's works super hard. It's really ambitious guy, and
(09:14):
he's workers really all. You know. Sometimes I'm always trying
to convince in the slow down a little bit. But
then he's also really good at just sitting, just hanging
out and being like, we don't have to do anything,
we're just here, let's just be together. And so I
think that probably rubbed off on me because I will
gladly sit in a spot and just like do nothing
and look up in three hours have passed, the article continues.
Another benefit of Nixon is that it can help people
(09:36):
come up with new ideas. With one expert featured in
the article saying, even when we nix or do nothing,
our brain is still processing information and can use the
available processing power to solve pending problems, which in turn
can boost one's creativity. This could manifest in having a
breakthrough solution to a problem on a walk, or a
great business idea reveal itself while daydreaming. And that concept
(09:59):
of becoming more creative simply through not doing stuff, especially
because it is the perfect segue into the comedic creativity
that is Evelyn from the internets. She is a digital storyteller, filmmaker,
humor writer who loves to tell hilarious stories online from
pop culture to current events, cultural critiques, and mindfulness. The
(10:22):
self proclaimed Kenyan with the Slowest mile time has generated
over eighteen million views and two hundred forty thousand followers
on our YouTube channel. And since we're talking about not
doing stuff, when we are in total veg out mode
and don't feel like doing anything, what do we do? Huh?
We mindlessly scroll to wit and who is waiting to
(10:45):
possibly desecrate you? Should you slip up with those one characters?
Black Twitter Baby, who let's go. Here's a bit from
one of Evelyn's hilarious YouTube videos about black Twitter. My
biggest fear in life besides maybe getting shanks, because that
means they stablige you multiple times on purpose. There's like
(11:08):
a proximity and intention behind getting shanked. I'm like gunshots
in which you could get shot on accident, and really
you don't have to be a close range to shoot
somebody and calls bodily harm. But don't nobody shape nobody
on accident, you know what I'm saying. But anyway, after that,
my biggest fear is getting dragged by black Twitter, just
strewn from one end of the world wide well to
(11:30):
the other. Just grab my edges and drag my body
down Your time, pas who brought the way I use
social media now and Twitter specifically, it's a lot different
than maybe like five or six years ago. I would
just like speak out to the void, just nonsense, posting
every nonsense, narrating my life. Don't nobody see, don't nobody care, Okay,
(11:53):
just talking reckless like now, I wouldn't do that because
with the advent of black Twitter and the swiftness with
which they will just snatch your whole name, like take
the wind out your chest. Not only would my dragging
be hilarious alright, tad insulted, injury, it would probably make
the news because that's just the velocity with which the
(12:14):
black constituency operates on that particular social media platform. Black
Twitter got the vocabulary, the deepest pop cultural frame of
reference that I've seen on the planet. Black Twitter got
the spirit of improvisation and ingenuity and inventiveness just in
a genetic makeup. Every member of black Twitter types two
seventy five words a minute. It has the strongest WiFi
(12:34):
in or unlimited data plan, and my airline cannot withstand
the damage. I don't think I could. I don't think
I could take it, or I wouldn't make it. I've
watched people I know get dragged by black Twitter. I
have watched two popular black people on Twitter drag each other,
thus inciting a duo double time simultaneous Twitter dragging. There's
(12:59):
how tags, there's memes, there's headlines, there's broking your name.
Somebody gotta lose their job. We will not stop until
you lose your job. To be clear, just because I try,
I prefer try, just because I try not to participate
in public draggings on social media whether they deserve it
(13:19):
or not. I don't mean I don't like to watch
I'm not perfect. I never said I was puffect black dude,
don't get you every time. Boy, I'll better watch out.
You gotta be careful. Now you can see why Evelyn
recently won the Excellence in Comedy Award in Toronto's Buffer
Fest in twenty nineteen. And if you happen to see
(13:42):
Queen be during her Formation World tour, then you probably
saw Evelyn two. Beyonce saw Evelyn's viral Eliminade YouTube re view,
found it, loved it, played it on every stop of
Information World tour, and you better believe we're going to
talk about it. So, without further ado, here's Evelyn. Evelyn
(14:03):
from the Internet. I'm so excited to be talking to you.
I've been a fan of your comedy for a long time. Um,
how you feeling. You know, it's bright and early nine
am where I met, which is bright and early for me.
But I'm feeling good. It's good to be here, it's
good to chat with you. Good. I'm glad to have you. Um.
(14:23):
We do these ice breakers to kind of like dive
in before we get into just the conversation. So this
is rapid higher producer Starr came up with this. So
if these questions get weird, I take no responsibility. First up,
if you could do a karaoke duet with anyone, who
would it be? Oh? Um, that would be Jas and
(14:44):
Sullivan because so she can do all the work and
I'll just be like, okay. Uh. The snack that I
can't live without is pretty much anything chalk flit, so
can chocolate canty. Yeah, for we like dark chocolate, mint chocolate,
(15:04):
milk chocolate. Like, how serious do we get with the
level of everything from the trash of the chocolate to
the to the best quality chacolate. Your favorite show that
you rewatched during the pandemic? What show going through? Gosh,
I don't know if it was my favorite show, but
we watched all of it. Gossip Girl is just drama.
(15:27):
It's it's just funny. I feel like I am such
a failure because I still have not watched that show
and its entirety, and everyone in their mom is like,
oh my god, gossip Girl and they're like x o
x o, and I'm like, I don't even get the
pop culture referee. I've never watched the show, So maybe
I should compare to it? Yes, yeah, what color makes
(15:51):
you happy? Yellow? Say that's my favorite color because it's
the best, the beauty product you can't without. Oh, if
we're going down to the bare minimum chapter, I know
(16:11):
too much about anything. I know too much about My
mom's a nurse, so I know way too much about poop.
That is now. I expected that. I was like, I
don't way too much about like my friends elements or thickness.
And you're like, I wait, what is what is she like?
(16:36):
What do you know? What can you share? There's this
thing called the Bristol scale, and so you should be
paying attention to your poop because it tells you a
lot about what might be going on inside. And I
think your scale is like one to seven. Okay, so okay,
there's at least seven different types of food. Oh so
you're talking about seven different types that you can categorize
(16:57):
your pop? You get seven? Yeah? Oh my god? Wait,
so is it okay? We're not adults because babies some
different than we do. Wait, so do you find yourself
analyzing now? Like after everyone you just kind of got
to look back at it. Just I have to, Okay,
all I know black and try. I promise you guys,
(17:19):
listeners were back. I had to take the bait there
for five seconds. Black and Tari is bad, right, like
it's bad? Yes, and then like, okay, we're not gonna
do this. I'm not gonna ask you what the healthy
color on that colors are, but I am going to
go google laughter, so I'll spare you. Okay, you know
too much about poop. I love it. What are the
(17:41):
three top songs on your playlist right now? Oh? My goodness? Um, okay,
I can't decide by Amina okay, Um, let me say
pick up your feelings Jasmine Sullivan Yes, yes, and um
forgive me by Chloe and Halle Okay, oh, oh my god.
(18:03):
I love some Chloe and Halle. They are just next
level of talented. Okay, good stuff. And lastly, what does
self care mean to you? Oh? Um? Self care means
taking a moment to check in with yourself and see
how you're doing truly. Yeah, okay, well we survived the Icebreaker.
(18:25):
Great job producing, star. I think this is all solid questions.
He led us to poom way earlier in the Kamva
than I would have normally anticipated. This episode. Is doing
stuff is overrated, like it really, you know, we feel
this pressure to constantly perform, whether it's on social, your
(18:45):
you YouTube, so like that game, it is a grind.
Like girl, I have started and stop YouTube so many
times because my tap out game is real. Um, what
is your you're standing? Really? First of all on ambition
and she evenn and doing kind of like what did
Evelyn see for herself? What does she see for herself?
And then also what was the moment when you were like, Okay,
(19:07):
so something's gotta give because this for me. So I
come from the group of kids who are like the
gifted and talented kids who all have like raging, anxious
thoughts now, so we definitely. Um. My relationship with like
ambition and striving started at a super young age. You know,
(19:30):
you have to get good grades, you have My dad
would always remind me. He was like, you know, other
kids got to get a job, you know when they're
fourteen fifteen, but lucky you, you just get studied. So yeah,
I have to send set study and so that kind
of was my entire like adolescence and then going into
(19:52):
college where I went to college for something I actually
wanted to do. It was so easy to me, and
so like the I've been kind of like stopped. And
then um, when I graduated, it really was about like
trying to get out there, you know, get that experience,
because you can't get experienced until you have experienced. It's
(20:15):
a weird loop. And so for years most of my
twenties I was doing multiple jobs. And so by the
time I was twenty, I think seven, Um, I said
I'm tired, Okay, I need to focus on one thing,
(20:35):
and so I quit my job and I said, I've
had YouTube kind of going on in the background. So
what would happen if I had just like dropped the
other stuff and just focused on being from the internet.
And so that's what I did eighteen ish, but super
heavy this year. And now I'm tired all over ging
(21:00):
talk exact. Please I want my money back because I
want I signed up for and I don't want to
do it. Say, so, you were saying that eighteen is
when you were like, Okay, you know what, I'm going
to get into this YouTube thing just like full time.
And then was when you were like, so, actually I
thought about it, and so yeah, before we have into
(21:24):
like this moment that I thought about it, and when
you were working all the different jobs in your twenties,
because I have had many jobs, Like, I'm curious to
know what was the wildest or the most random odd
job you ever had. I used to repair watches at
J C. Penny, I worked at game Stop, I've done um.
So I'm lucky in that all my jobs had to
(21:44):
kind of do with each other. But I think the
random ist one is I was a research assistant for
like a pH d student, and so I would just
look at a jan watch advertisements, watch advertisements and Asian
(22:06):
like financial advertisements, and like cut them out and put
them in her binder. And that's like, I don't even
know what the find I don't know what the vendress for.
I don't know what yeah, the vendor and I asked
no questions. That was my favorite a way about Okay, okay,
(22:28):
so you're cutting out the binders and I was swapping
out batteries in the dark, dark dark corners. J C.
Finney in toled Ohio. Okay, so when did YouTube first
take off for you? Like, what video was it that
was your first Oh my god, I think we've got
something here moment. You know, I've been on the internet
for so long that I don't know. I do know that.
(22:51):
So I started my channel in like two thousand and eight.
Making money really wasn't a thing until like ten, a
lot of years where you know, people in general aren't
making that much money. Um. And then for me in
(23:12):
the big super beginning, it was a lot of hair videos,
not because I have amazing hair, natural hair, but because
I always added like some humor into face. And so
I really appreciated that I was taking something so difficult
to learn, like our own hair at the time, and
you know, putting a little putting, a little comedy. And
(23:33):
so those were my first couple of videos. Yeah, those
may have been the first of her videos, but it
was one of her twenty sixteen videos that took Evelyn
to next level status and quite literally took her around
the globe. Beyonce noticed Evelyn's viral YouTube review of these
iconic visual album Lemonade, and ended up playing a clip
(23:53):
of it in her show opening on every stop of
the Formation World tour. Here's just a little sneep a
bit of Evelyn's original review. She was giving me on
the fix my Life, but with better boobs, better advice,
actually fixing lives. She was giving me, first Corinthian's love
is and then Tina Turner, what's love got to do
(24:14):
with it? She was giving me. Set it off meets
that circle of hell where the Weekend lives. I hope
he's okay. She called Serena Williams one of the world's
best athletes, and you can fight me on that. Just
to look back at Listen, me and my girls are
gonna book a retreat right now in the Texas Hill Country.
We're gonna wear our hair product free. If you've got
baby hairs wears that I thought lovely. It was fantastic
(24:40):
and for obvious reason, it wasn't long before the viral
video made its way to Missus Carter. Here's Evelyn's reaction
on YouTube to the news that she herself was in
fact on a whole world formation to her pay to world.
It's Evelyn May, the year of our Lord, two thousands
and sixteen. Where was the house at my parents house
(25:02):
for Mother's Day? Okay? Minding my magical black business all right?
Ten eighteen? I received them text and then and then
the text messages kept going. Who could it be? It
was my friend Boby Slant This what is this? Where
is so, oh my god, I want to know what
(25:32):
beyonce secret YouTube user name is. Who shouldn't go by
Beyonce on Internet? It's dumb, like, what is a LinkedIn?
I don't need a LinkedIn? Beyonce knows who I am,
so get it. Get in Formation boom okay, so no, Lie.
I still remember being at the Formation World Tour in
(25:52):
l A with one of my best friends and her husband.
It was Star Star in fact was the friend that
I speak of, And I remember the moment when I
looked up and saw, oh my gosh, Evelyn from the
Internet just popped up on the screen and I'm like,
hold that ever lived from the Internet. So beyond the
same moment, what how did that come about? What did
(26:14):
you first feel a react when you know you realized
Queen Bee was. I was actually at my parents house
and Dallas Fort Worth for Mother's Day. It was May. Yeah,
I think that's another shay is and I was just
chilling and my friend Bobby texts me and he's just
like what did I do? And then he like sent
(26:41):
me a video of my shake and I was like
wait at and then and then when it hit me
that that's what was happening. I just like busted out
of the house, right it was the middle of the night,
ran up and down the street screaming. Yeah. So it
was I still don't all the way believe that it happened,
(27:08):
really happened, because I was there, like, oh my god,
we love it to see it. It was just have
you have you ever like reached out or tried to
get in contact with or is it just like a
little gym that you're just like So they actually reached
out to me to invite me to the Houston show
the second time around when she came to Houston. So
(27:29):
I was on out of the second row, just like
looking up, I was in like the friends and family section. Blue.
It was blue. No, it was a bunch of like
executives with like nine year old kids that didn't get
what how important this was right now. It was full
(27:50):
of like little kids who like didn't know destiny was
a thing. They just knew a body. And I'm like,
you know, I'm just seeing a little kids, right lander
Lander overall? Yeah, So it was fun. It was fun.
That's amazing. I love that. I love that. I Mean
that's a testament though, right to to what your comedy
(28:11):
does to the reach that it has. The reach of
these videos have, like it doesn't get poor queen of
pop culture Dana Beyonce and for your video to make
his way into anything that has to do with her
very specific creative vision. This is so much. UM. When
you think about your content creation, your videos, the reach
that it's had, Um, what is it that you think
(28:33):
resonates most with with the people who are watching? Um?
I think so the thing with comedy is that you
have to commit a lot of people don't, like they
get nervous. Um. Granted, I'm sitting in my room by myself.
It's not stand up, completely different bucking, but you have
to like commit to the weird. You have to commit
(28:55):
to the silliness. And so I think because I commit
to that because that's my actual sense of humor, in
my actual tone. UM, people find that to be like
authentic or sincere um, and I think that's what people
are drawn to. Yeah, okay, got it. And of all
of the videos that you've made, which is your personal
(29:16):
favorite and why? Like break down the video for me. Okay,
my favorite video is called for people who feel behind
in life, and basically that's my favorite video. Because I
use a drone. My friend got a drone, so I
was like, guess what that means? I get a drone.
(29:38):
So it really was a video about kind of the
journey that we take in life to feel like we're
doing things on time. And it's one of my favorites
and it did. I wasn't expecting it to do that well.
But it might have hit a hunt a million views.
I don't know, I haven't checked. That's amazing. I mean
so many of us can relate to that because it's
(30:00):
the stuff that resonates, that hits and it's like, oh
I feel seen right now. That gets them attraction. Um,
you've said we equate creativity with output, So what did
you mean by that? If you could just kind of
like break that down, what's your perspective on creating just
for the sake of creating? Which is something that I've
recommitted myself too, because I was a creative first and
(30:20):
foremost from a kid, and then somewhere in the rat race,
you just start out putting just putting the content out
because you're supposed to or you're expected to. Like, wait,
if no one ever saw this, would I still do it?
Would I still want to create it? Would I still
enjoy it? That's kind of been my new north star.
What's your perspective on that creativity and output? Yeah, it's
(30:41):
it's also a larger conversation around productivity and the need
to be always on or like you said, always doing
something um and sometimes you have to learn to chill.
And that creativity is also a lot about input. So
whenever someone's whenever singers on like Jimmy Kimmel or something,
the first question any musician gets asked is who did
(31:04):
you listen to? Growing up? Right? The first question isn't
how many hours have you spent in the studio? We
so our creativity is as much about input and the
things that we consume and enjoy and have fun with
as it is about the things we might produce. So
it's just a reminder to um prioritize learning about things,
(31:29):
prioritize your curiosity over this need, especially with the Internet,
to always post or do something public. Have you ever
struggled with that I want to post this or oh
I feel like it's not I haven't validated this moment
in my life or this thing I've created until I've
shared it, Like, was that easy for you to be like,
(31:50):
I don't have to share everything, or was it difficult?
It's very easy. It's very easy for me because I'm
not gonna lie. Sometimes it's like I just got it
from the people care less, like nobody is out here
waiting for that day. It's just it's very easy for me.
I sometimes have to remind myself that it's okay to
(32:12):
share things. I have sometimes the opposite issue to be
super private, keep things to myself all the time, even
from people who actually know me and like are a
part of my life. Your family and friends even know
where to find you? Right now? Where are you calling? What?
(32:33):
Not home? All I got was a white wall, y'all?
Give me? I know, plants, I can't see nothing I
know I didn't know. I've probably been a little plant
in here. Say I'm not gonna figure out where I
am today. UM. I love that, though I love you,
know your perspective on which is a really interesting perspective
(32:55):
that I haven't really thought about. Um a ton input
being just as important as output. What is shaping me? Um?
And the fact that that that Jimmy Kimmel reference was
a really good way to kind of put it in perspective.
What recommendations do you have, like when it comes to
slowing down not multitasking, What are just some things you
do in your everyday life to just be fully mindful
(33:16):
and present in any moment that you're in. I try
really hard whenever it comes through, and it's really helpful,
especially when I'm overwhelmed. I try to do one thing
at a time. So like, if I am doing the dishes,
I'm not also listening to a podcast, which is hard
to smileful with the dishes, I would forget that I'm right,
(33:41):
Or like if I'm driving, i won't also be listening
to music, I'll just kind of focus on driving. One
or two times. Evelyn actually shared a video recently called
how to be Creative when You're feeling existential, and here's
a little bit of what she had to say. Reduced
your multitasking stimuli. There's this phenomenon and I I have
(34:02):
experienced it where I'll get a text message, one text
message from a friend, and I get overwhelmed by a
text and then I just don't answer it. What is that?
Because that don't make sense. It'll make no sense. From
the time you wake up, you are receiving messages from
(34:25):
other things. You are scrolling on Instagram in bed before
you get up, you are on the toilet, raise your hand.
If you poop without your phone, I would like to
congratulate you before you even do these dramatic social media
detoxes or whatever. I would say, try not multitasking your senses.
(34:48):
Try to eat dinner without watching TV. For a lot
of us, I know there's gonna be a couple of
people that are like, I don't ever do that, and
it's like, that's cute. But a lot of us, and
I've done it too, cannot start eating. Like we have
the burrito right here, but until we find something to
(35:09):
press play, we can't start eating. That is ubiculous. Wow,
I'm impressed that you're being present even in the things
that most people are trying to distract themselves from. But okay,
let me go do it dish real quick. That feels
So what does that look like for you? What does
being still look like? Do you have a meditative practice
(35:31):
self care that you commit to. I should I need
to be on my meditation. I usually only meditate when
I am freaking out instead of kind of building that
practice to be you know, every day. But um, I
saw I try and meditate, listen to a sound bath
or listen to UM, I love me some jungle sounds.
(35:55):
I just loop jungle sounds. That feels pretty nice. Um.
And besides that, I'd just be trying to drink water.
I'm bad drink the water. I literally have a stair
off with a whole glass that I just like, if
I drink one cup of day, I'm killing the game, right.
It's just it's a lot to ask of a human. So,
(36:17):
you know, you said your mom is in help, So
how many glasses should we be drinking? Seven? Eight? The
seven or eight glasses of water is a myth, um,
So my mom just says, drink when you're thirsty. There's
no need to like drink a gallon of water a day, Mom,
I can do that. This is this is the confirmation
(36:39):
I needed to not be essentially, you know, drowning myself
and something happy consuming. Okay, drink Thursday. I can do that.
You talked about the fact that you grinded it out
in your twenties and and you really started to take
the YouTube thing pretty like super seriously a few years ago.
What does ambition holistically look like for you, Like what
(37:02):
are your goals for yourself? How do you define success?
Have you had to grapple with that definition? Oh? Yeah,
I for sure had to grap with that definition because
people have been so supportive and so excited about the
things that I'm doing, and so they'd be calling me
successful and I'm like, I'm still struggling over these internet videos.
(37:30):
So I've had to take um closer, like stock of
my life and instead of comparing my life to some
of the big things I wish I was doing, be
grateful for the things that I'm currently doing now. So,
for example, I was like filming a video where I was, Um,
(37:51):
I seen Christmas cookies and I was just sitting there.
I've seen Christmas cookies in the middle of the day
in a onesie and I'm like, I'm not where right now?
That's pretty nice. So I had to really sit and
like recognize what was happening. Um, Because Yeah, the perspective
is great because it kind of gives you something to
(38:13):
look back on. It gives you something to look forward
to if you know the type of life that you
want in the future. I love that. I love that. Um,
what is next for evidence? Like what what in a
perfect world would you be doing outside of actual human
interaction in one, we would love if all of us
can just get back to that curt collaboration. But just
(38:34):
big picture, what else would you love to do? I
would love to um be in a writer's room for
like a television show on you know network or streaming.
Um My plans to start writing a pilot. I'm in
the outline phase and you better line it out. I
(38:54):
would for you. Yeah, So that's what I that's my
big picture dream. If I can never get my life together,
so check in on me at the end of it,
at the end of next year. It's okay, We're gonna
put it onto the universe for you, whoever is listening
to this podcast. Within the sound of my voice, we
need to get this. We need to get this woman
(39:15):
on somebody's pilot because honestly, your style of writing, your
style of comedy, there's no way that that is just
next level. I can't wait to see it. I know
what will happen for you. Um you talk about play,
the importance of play. So to kind of wrap things
up first, I'm going to ask you what is in
your happiness cocktail? So if you could throw three things
(39:36):
into you're happy. What would it be, Um, it would
be uh Spotify playlists, Um, it would be I'm a
fan of bubbles, so it's very It also helps you
meditate and breathe because you have to like inhale, exhale.
It's true. Bubbles like bubbles, literally blow the bubble of
(40:00):
yourself bubbles. Yeah yeah, um. And then, oh, what else
I'm gonna say? So, there's a juice bar here in
Austin called juice Land, And I begin the CBD shot
that sent me up. Take the CD shot, blow a
couple of bubbles, just in the Spotify playlist by about
(40:24):
Yeah that's okay. Um. And to my earlier point about
you talking about, you know, the importance of play what
does that look like for you? What is your most
recent hobby. What do you encourage people to try to
do or think about exploring just for the heck of it,
just for the fun of it. Yeah. So I've been
drawing a lot. I used to draw when I was younger. Um,
(40:47):
and I obviously kind of like, I don't be doodling anymore,
so this year I try to like draw and color. Um.
Adult coding books are kind of whack. They're just like swirlings.
So I was like, maybe if I can draw what
I want to color and then I color it. So
that's been really satisfying to do. I like that. Okay,
(41:09):
we do this thing called the party trick at the
end of most episodes where the expert or the guests
that we have on kind of gives us like a
cute little life hack something that we can apply that
day or that week. So I want to ask you
if you have three tips on finding your inner kid
or unleashing your inner kid. Yeah, I would say talk
(41:32):
to yourself often, just like lean into that because kids
be in their own world. So I say, embrace to
conversa yourself. Um, and then I would say, oh, go
here first idea. I think a lot of the times
we like kind of self edit, so just go with
(41:55):
your first idea. And then I would say laugh often
like this you been stuff that makes you laugh. Not
everything gotta be high brow all the time. Go ahead,
laugh at the TikTok like it's okay, So just tap
into that. I love it. I love it. And if
you guys want to laugh, you should go to Evelyn
(42:16):
from the Internet's YouTube channel. If people want to keep
up with you. Where can they find you? All the places? Yeah,
so I'm most active on YouTube and Instagram, and on
both those places, my name is Evelyn from the Internet's
plural Evelyn. Thank you so much. I appreciate you and
your time. I'm excited to share this. Thank you all
(42:38):
right there it is Hope you enjoyed that conversation with Evelyn,
and make sure you unleash that party trick all week here. Okay,
we are unleashing our inner child, activate the inner kid
just in time for the holid days. And I don't
know what's happening. I'm going to wrap this up soon. Um.
Congrats to our giveaway winner from episode three. Uh. We
(43:01):
were talking about self love and how it is sexy
a f and we had the contest for one dollar
Amazon gift card. The winner is drumroll please Ebony Lynn
ninety four. Her submission UM and her review was I
needed this podcast. I discovered this podcast to be at
breakfast club and I've binged all the episodes in one day. Wow,
you're a real one, Ebony. Thank you. She continues, so
(43:24):
relatable to me for where I am in life. It's
like Zuri neew. I needed this podcast so after some
reflection after episode three, I've learned one thing I love
about myself is my ability to self reflect. Whenever I'm
feeling disappointed with myself, I just take a moment and
look back at what I've accomplished, take a moment to
be grateful for what I do have, and take responsibility
(43:47):
for what I'm putting out there into the world. I
love that. Love love love it. I love that you're
enjoying the podcast and that self reflection and self love
is key, girl. So you enjoy that hunted dollars on
Amazon self love on yourself with will some extra this
holiday season. Congratulations. Keep your head in the game, guys,
(44:09):
We're gonna have way more giveaways and contests and fun
stuff um as we continue on this hot, happy mess journey.
But before we wrap up, are you subscribed? Make sure
you hit subscribe right now, pretty please? Whether you're listening
on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, the I Heart Radio, Apple, wherever
you get your podcast. Also, how many times a day
slash week do you hear people say that? Does it
(44:31):
get old? Do you get as tired of hearing it is?
Sometimes I get saying it? Are we in that boat together? Well?
It doesn't matter. Get used to it. I'm gonna keep
saying it. Apple podcast, Spotify where if you get your podcast. Okay,
make sure you subscribe so that you don't miss a thing.
Don't go anywhere, because next week we have our New
(44:51):
Year's ZVSH episode. It'll it'll publish I don't know around
New Year's Eve if not that day. It's our last
episode of the year. How about that. And we are
talking about the art of the pivot, because lord knows,
was one big psych time to pivot. It ain't going.
Oh you thought it was going. We were real hype
on that vision, but nobody saw what was around the quarter.
(45:13):
So with that, we're talking about the art of the pivot.
We have an amazing guest Um. She is the CEO
of just really Dope beauty brand that's all about inclusion.
She is killing the game and she has pivoted a
time or two in her life and she has just
given us um all of the intel, all of you know,
(45:34):
her secrets to how to to pivot properly. And then
you know, we'll talk about some other things too. So
that's gonna get us in gear for one. Let's go.
Let me also take this moment before we wrap up
to say happy holidays. I am wishing you a happy
holiday and wishing you and yours your loved ones a
(45:57):
happy holiday. I am truly hoping that you are safe
and healthy, um and totally thinking about all of you.
I'm so appreciative, so filled with gratitude, especially as we
close out the year. UM. So again, I am praying
for your safety and your health, and also for those
of you who may not be with ones that you
(46:18):
love this holiday season. Know that you are loved. I
am sending you love, I am thinking of you, and um,
I'm really grateful that you're on this journey with me.
So happy holidays. I will see you all next week.
Hit that subscribe button and next Monday, we got another
episode of Hot Happy Mess Baby. See you then,
Hot, Happy Mess. Celebrate your magic in the middle of
life's messes. Happy. I'm Zurie Hall and this is Hot
Happy may shoot the joy of doing nothing. Do you
know what I'm gonna do for the next two weeks? Nothing? Okay?
(00:32):
Holiday break officially starts today. As I record this on
a Friday, I am yes, back on the floor of
my closet because we are just that official. What's up, guys,
I'm your host, Zuri Hall, and this is another episode
of Hot Happy Mess. I cannot wait to do nothing.
The holidays are upon us. I hope you're having a
(00:54):
good one, sending you all the good vibes. I have
been working a lot, and I have been very excited
and grateful for every single opportunity. But it has been go, go, go,
go go, and I am counting down, count wounding down
to the moment when it's me and a couch for
(01:14):
like fourteen days straight. Okay. I remembered there was a
time when I used to feel guilty about doing nothing.
I mean my early twenties was basically that, like if
I was sitting down with a weekend to spare, if
I hadn't crammed in a brunch and a happy hour
and some extra you know, side hustle work or whatever
it was. If I wasn't exhausted when I went to
(01:35):
bed at night because I had just squeezed every last
drip of myself out, then I felt like I didn't
I didn't do enough, I didn't maximize. But that like
the case now, I will say after thirty the piece
that comes with being okay, with just being still is
(01:56):
next level. It feels so good. I've been listening to
this song called literally Piece b Still. It's by Hope Darst.
I think it's like Christian rock or something like that,
kind of like alternative vibes, but it's a good vibe
no matter what, no matter what you're into, it's just
like really encouraging, peaceful vibes. So check it out. It's
a good song. Anyways. I feel like we all go through,
(02:19):
you know, phases of chasing whatever is next, the next high,
the next moment, the next thing that will get us
excited or that we can post about, or that we
can even just personally enjoy. But it's always whatever is next,
right um, instead of being still and just soaking in
the moment that we're in. And when I think about it.
(02:41):
I kind of feel like always chasing what's next is
a form of escapism, right, So it's like, what is
it that you're trying to escape from? What is it
that I'm trying to escape from? And I've had to
ask myself that what am I trying to distract myself from?
Why is what is not interesting enough or not good enough?
(03:03):
That I've got to constantly be imagining what might be
around the corner. And I truly believe contentment is the
new cool, Like that has been my phrase all year long.
It does not matter if you're successful, if you're killing it,
if you are burnt out, busy, and just like digging
(03:23):
yourself into the ground. So I have really learned to
appreciate the art of doing nothing. People assume because I'm
so go go go and hustle, hustle, hustle normally that
I can't also veg out on a couch in the
same spot for twelve hours. I have done that for
like three days straight. I think it's because of the
high highs that I have those like low lows, not
(03:44):
in a bad way. It's like extreme efficiency and productivity
and then extreme nothingness, and I love it. I think
it's the only way to have any balance in that space.
And so I just want to clarify that the title
is do stuff is overrated, which honestly is true, but
I don't mean it's super literally, So it's not like
(04:06):
don't do anything. I mean unless that's what you want
to do live your life. But I'm saying that just
doing stuff purely for external gain or acknowledgement is so overrated.
That's what's overrated. Do stuff because it feels good. Taken art,
you know, visit the museum, learn how to play an instrument.
I've been trying to learn to play the guitar about years.
(04:29):
Let me get there one day. One day I have
the guitar. You know. I used to be able to
jam out to a little bit of Lauren Hill and
I could play a couple of Taylor Swift songs and
you couldn't tell me nothing. And that's just what I
have to say about that. I can't play those things anymore,
But give me two weeks and I could probably get
back on it. I love cooking, right like new hobbies,
(04:53):
whatever it is that might just light you up just
because you enjoy it. I would encourage you to do that.
Or or experiment and find that sing do nothing or
do something that is purely for you. So it might
not feel like anything to the outside world, but who
the f cares? Okay, what's up? Like I said, here
(05:14):
we go. Doing stuff is overrated. Get ready to laugh
this episode, you guys, because I am going one on
one with comedic YouTuber Evelyn from the internets. I love her.
Her vibe is just like the best. I love her
style of humor. You're really gonna enjoy it. I've got
some clips that we're gonna play from some of her
most viral and popular YouTube videos. We're talking about how
(05:37):
our society glamorizes dizziness to our own detriment and just
sort of romanticizes productivity, even when it's hyper productivity. We're
exploring the joy of doing nothing and diving into her
amazing career that she's carved out for herself in the
in the YouTube space on the interwebs, if you will,
(05:59):
and also talking about the time when she totally ended
up in Beyonce's Formation World Tour. We'll get to that
in a minute, and make sure you stay tuned until
the end, because I am announcing the winner of the
giveaway from the Self Love episode Somebody's walking away with
a one Amazon gift card. Baby, And we've got this
(06:19):
week's party trick. It's three tips on how to unleash
your inner kid. So before we get to Evelyn, just
really quickly, do you remember my story and episode one
about the epiphany that I had in Amsterdam. Um So,
Amsterdam is in the Netherlands a k a. Holland, but
the people are Dutch, so you can imagine that for
(06:41):
the first few months of learning Dutch culture, I was like,
what the heck is actually happening here? Like, who are you?
What does it mean? Why are all these names? I
was trying to be super cool, like, oh yeah, totally
love Amsterdam, never been but can't wait to get out there.
And then people will be like, oh yeah, no, like
Holland is awesome, and I'm like, well, what where are
they talking about? Hollo, What the hell are you talking
about that we're talking about Amsterdam? Didn't she say just
(07:02):
from the Netherlands? I thought, he said he what is
going on here? A lot of names for one really
amazing place. But the Dutch have a concept called Nixon
and it is the Dutch lifestyle concept. Of doing Nothing.
The art of doing Nothing, y'all sign me up. There's
this really great Time magazine article. The author's name is
(07:25):
Sophia Gottfried, and you can check it out and its
entirety online at Time dot com. But a small bit
of it reads, Nixon literally means to do nothing, to
be idle, or doing something without any use. Practicing Nixon
could be as simple as just hanging around, looking at
your surroundings or listening to music, as long as it
(07:47):
is without purpose and not done in order to achieve
something or be productive. Through now in the Netherlands, Nixon
has historye been dismissed as laziness or as the opposite
of being productive, But the article continues. As stress levels
climb in the US and globally and their crushing health
(08:11):
impacts like burnout are getting more recognition from the medical
community and hot happy mess doing nothing is increasingly being
framed as a positive stress fighting tactic. Where mindfulness is
about being present in the moment, Nixon is more about
carving out time to just be, even letting your mind
(08:32):
wander rather than focusing on the details of an action.
I love that because mindfulness is super important, right, But
that's like being so present. That is like, oh, I
feel the tingle in my fingers. Oh, I noticed the
sensations that are flowing through my body. I feel the
wind like tickling my ears or whatever it is. And
that's mindfulness, which can also be really hard to do
(08:53):
because I get distracted easily. But y'all, I might be
I might have been born for nikes. Then I don't
even this is up my alley because I love to
just sit and not fake and not do anything and
just kind of let let my mind wander. I think
I get that from my dad. He's really good at
just He's works super hard. It's really ambitious guy, and
(09:14):
he's workers really all. You know. Sometimes I'm always trying
to convince in the slow down a little bit. But
then he's also really good at just sitting, just hanging
out and being like, we don't have to do anything,
we're just here, let's just be together. And so I
think that probably rubbed off on me because I will
gladly sit in a spot and just like do nothing
and look up in three hours have passed, the article continues.
Another benefit of Nixon is that it can help people
(09:36):
come up with new ideas. With one expert featured in
the article saying, even when we nix or do nothing,
our brain is still processing information and can use the
available processing power to solve pending problems, which in turn
can boost one's creativity. This could manifest in having a
breakthrough solution to a problem on a walk, or a
great business idea reveal itself while daydreaming. And that concept
(09:59):
of becoming more creative simply through not doing stuff, especially
because it is the perfect segue into the comedic creativity
that is Evelyn from the internets. She is a digital storyteller, filmmaker,
humor writer who loves to tell hilarious stories online from
pop culture to current events, cultural critiques, and mindfulness. The
(10:22):
self proclaimed Kenyan with the Slowest mile time has generated
over eighteen million views and two hundred forty thousand followers
on our YouTube channel. And since we're talking about not
doing stuff, when we are in total veg out mode
and don't feel like doing anything, what do we do? Huh?
We mindlessly scroll to wit and who is waiting to
(10:45):
possibly desecrate you? Should you slip up with those one characters?
Black Twitter Baby, who let's go. Here's a bit from
one of Evelyn's hilarious YouTube videos about black Twitter. My
biggest fear in life besides maybe getting shanks, because that
means they stablige you multiple times on purpose. There's like
(11:08):
a proximity and intention behind getting shanked. I'm like gunshots
in which you could get shot on accident, and really
you don't have to be a close range to shoot
somebody and calls bodily harm. But don't nobody shape nobody
on accident, you know what I'm saying. But anyway, after that,
my biggest fear is getting dragged by black Twitter, just
strewn from one end of the world wide well to
(11:30):
the other. Just grab my edges and drag my body
down Your time, pas who brought the way I use
social media now and Twitter specifically, it's a lot different
than maybe like five or six years ago. I would
just like speak out to the void, just nonsense, posting
every nonsense, narrating my life. Don't nobody see, don't nobody care, Okay,
(11:53):
just talking reckless like now, I wouldn't do that because
with the advent of black Twitter and the swiftness with
which they will just snatch your whole name, like take
the wind out your chest. Not only would my dragging
be hilarious alright, tad insulted, injury, it would probably make
the news because that's just the velocity with which the
(12:14):
black constituency operates on that particular social media platform. Black
Twitter got the vocabulary, the deepest pop cultural frame of
reference that I've seen on the planet. Black Twitter got
the spirit of improvisation and ingenuity and inventiveness just in
a genetic makeup. Every member of black Twitter types two
seventy five words a minute. It has the strongest WiFi
(12:34):
in or unlimited data plan, and my airline cannot withstand
the damage. I don't think I could. I don't think
I could take it, or I wouldn't make it. I've
watched people I know get dragged by black Twitter. I
have watched two popular black people on Twitter drag each other,
thus inciting a duo double time simultaneous Twitter dragging. There's
(12:59):
how tags, there's memes, there's headlines, there's broking your name.
Somebody gotta lose their job. We will not stop until
you lose your job. To be clear, just because I try,
I prefer try, just because I try not to participate
in public draggings on social media whether they deserve it
(13:19):
or not. I don't mean I don't like to watch
I'm not perfect. I never said I was puffect black dude,
don't get you every time. Boy, I'll better watch out.
You gotta be careful. Now you can see why Evelyn
recently won the Excellence in Comedy Award in Toronto's Buffer
Fest in twenty nineteen. And if you happen to see
(13:42):
Queen be during her Formation World tour, then you probably
saw Evelyn two. Beyonce saw Evelyn's viral Eliminade YouTube re view,
found it, loved it, played it on every stop of
Information World tour, and you better believe we're going to
talk about it. So, without further ado, here's Evelyn. Evelyn
(14:03):
from the Internet. I'm so excited to be talking to you.
I've been a fan of your comedy for a long time. Um,
how you feeling. You know, it's bright and early nine
am where I met, which is bright and early for me.
But I'm feeling good. It's good to be here, it's
good to chat with you. Good. I'm glad to have you. Um.
(14:23):
We do these ice breakers to kind of like dive
in before we get into just the conversation. So this
is rapid higher producer Starr came up with this. So
if these questions get weird, I take no responsibility. First up,
if you could do a karaoke duet with anyone, who
would it be? Oh? Um, that would be Jas and
(14:44):
Sullivan because so she can do all the work and
I'll just be like, okay. Uh. The snack that I
can't live without is pretty much anything chalk flit, so
can chocolate canty. Yeah, for we like dark chocolate, mint chocolate,
(15:04):
milk chocolate. Like, how serious do we get with the
level of everything from the trash of the chocolate to
the to the best quality chacolate. Your favorite show that
you rewatched during the pandemic? What show going through? Gosh,
I don't know if it was my favorite show, but
we watched all of it. Gossip Girl is just drama.
(15:27):
It's it's just funny. I feel like I am such
a failure because I still have not watched that show
and its entirety, and everyone in their mom is like,
oh my god, gossip Girl and they're like x o
x o, and I'm like, I don't even get the
pop culture referee. I've never watched the show, So maybe
I should compare to it? Yes, yeah, what color makes
(15:51):
you happy? Yellow? Say that's my favorite color because it's
the best, the beauty product you can't without. Oh, if
we're going down to the bare minimum chapter, I know
(16:11):
too much about anything. I know too much about My
mom's a nurse, so I know way too much about poop.
That is now. I expected that. I was like, I
don't way too much about like my friends elements or thickness.
And you're like, I wait, what is what is she like?
(16:36):
What do you know? What can you share? There's this
thing called the Bristol scale, and so you should be
paying attention to your poop because it tells you a
lot about what might be going on inside. And I
think your scale is like one to seven. Okay, so okay,
there's at least seven different types of food. Oh so
you're talking about seven different types that you can categorize
(16:57):
your pop? You get seven? Yeah? Oh my god? Wait,
so is it okay? We're not adults because babies some
different than we do. Wait, so do you find yourself
analyzing now? Like after everyone you just kind of got
to look back at it. Just I have to, Okay,
all I know black and try. I promise you guys,
(17:19):
listeners were back. I had to take the bait there
for five seconds. Black and Tari is bad, right, like
it's bad? Yes, and then like, okay, we're not gonna
do this. I'm not gonna ask you what the healthy
color on that colors are, but I am going to
go google laughter, so I'll spare you. Okay, you know
too much about poop. I love it. What are the
(17:41):
three top songs on your playlist right now? Oh? My goodness? Um, okay,
I can't decide by Amina okay, Um, let me say
pick up your feelings Jasmine Sullivan Yes, yes, and um
forgive me by Chloe and Halle Okay, oh, oh my god.
(18:03):
I love some Chloe and Halle. They are just next
level of talented. Okay, good stuff. And lastly, what does
self care mean to you? Oh? Um? Self care means
taking a moment to check in with yourself and see
how you're doing truly. Yeah, okay, well we survived the Icebreaker.
(18:25):
Great job producing, star. I think this is all solid questions.
He led us to poom way earlier in the Kamva
than I would have normally anticipated. This episode. Is doing
stuff is overrated, like it really, you know, we feel
this pressure to constantly perform, whether it's on social, your
(18:45):
you YouTube, so like that game, it is a grind.
Like girl, I have started and stop YouTube so many
times because my tap out game is real. Um, what
is your you're standing? Really? First of all on ambition
and she evenn and doing kind of like what did
Evelyn see for herself? What does she see for herself?
And then also what was the moment when you were like, Okay,
(19:07):
so something's gotta give because this for me. So I
come from the group of kids who are like the
gifted and talented kids who all have like raging, anxious
thoughts now, so we definitely. Um. My relationship with like
ambition and striving started at a super young age. You know,
(19:30):
you have to get good grades, you have My dad
would always remind me. He was like, you know, other
kids got to get a job, you know when they're
fourteen fifteen, but lucky you, you just get studied. So yeah,
I have to send set study and so that kind
of was my entire like adolescence and then going into
(19:52):
college where I went to college for something I actually
wanted to do. It was so easy to me, and
so like the I've been kind of like stopped. And
then um, when I graduated, it really was about like
trying to get out there, you know, get that experience,
because you can't get experienced until you have experienced. It's
(20:15):
a weird loop. And so for years most of my
twenties I was doing multiple jobs. And so by the
time I was twenty, I think seven, Um, I said
I'm tired, Okay, I need to focus on one thing,
(20:35):
and so I quit my job and I said, I've
had YouTube kind of going on in the background. So
what would happen if I had just like dropped the
other stuff and just focused on being from the internet.
And so that's what I did eighteen ish, but super
heavy this year. And now I'm tired all over ging
(21:00):
talk exact. Please I want my money back because I
want I signed up for and I don't want to
do it. Say, so, you were saying that eighteen is
when you were like, Okay, you know what, I'm going
to get into this YouTube thing just like full time.
And then was when you were like, so, actually I
thought about it, and so yeah, before we have into
(21:24):
like this moment that I thought about it, and when
you were working all the different jobs in your twenties,
because I have had many jobs, Like, I'm curious to
know what was the wildest or the most random odd
job you ever had. I used to repair watches at
J C. Penny, I worked at game Stop, I've done um.
So I'm lucky in that all my jobs had to
(21:44):
kind of do with each other. But I think the
random ist one is I was a research assistant for
like a pH d student, and so I would just
look at a jan watch advertisements, watch advertisements and Asian
(22:06):
like financial advertisements, and like cut them out and put
them in her binder. And that's like, I don't even
know what the find I don't know what the vendress for.
I don't know what yeah, the vendor and I asked
no questions. That was my favorite a way about Okay, okay,
(22:28):
so you're cutting out the binders and I was swapping
out batteries in the dark, dark dark corners. J C.
Finney in toled Ohio. Okay, so when did YouTube first
take off for you? Like, what video was it that
was your first Oh my god, I think we've got
something here moment. You know, I've been on the internet
for so long that I don't know. I do know that.
(22:51):
So I started my channel in like two thousand and eight.
Making money really wasn't a thing until like ten, a
lot of years where you know, people in general aren't
making that much money. Um. And then for me in
(23:12):
the big super beginning, it was a lot of hair videos,
not because I have amazing hair, natural hair, but because
I always added like some humor into face. And so
I really appreciated that I was taking something so difficult
to learn, like our own hair at the time, and
you know, putting a little putting, a little comedy. And
(23:33):
so those were my first couple of videos. Yeah, those
may have been the first of her videos, but it
was one of her twenty sixteen videos that took Evelyn
to next level status and quite literally took her around
the globe. Beyonce noticed Evelyn's viral YouTube review of these
iconic visual album Lemonade, and ended up playing a clip
(23:53):
of it in her show opening on every stop of
the Formation World tour. Here's just a little sneep a
bit of Evelyn's original review. She was giving me on
the fix my Life, but with better boobs, better advice,
actually fixing lives. She was giving me, first Corinthian's love
is and then Tina Turner, what's love got to do
(24:14):
with it? She was giving me. Set it off meets
that circle of hell where the Weekend lives. I hope
he's okay. She called Serena Williams one of the world's
best athletes, and you can fight me on that. Just
to look back at Listen, me and my girls are
gonna book a retreat right now in the Texas Hill Country.
We're gonna wear our hair product free. If you've got
baby hairs wears that I thought lovely. It was fantastic
(24:40):
and for obvious reason, it wasn't long before the viral
video made its way to Missus Carter. Here's Evelyn's reaction
on YouTube to the news that she herself was in
fact on a whole world formation to her pay to world.
It's Evelyn May, the year of our Lord, two thousands
and sixteen. Where was the house at my parents house
(25:02):
for Mother's Day? Okay? Minding my magical black business all right?
Ten eighteen? I received them text and then and then
the text messages kept going. Who could it be? It
was my friend Boby Slant This what is this? Where
is so, oh my god, I want to know what
(25:32):
beyonce secret YouTube user name is. Who shouldn't go by
Beyonce on Internet? It's dumb, like, what is a LinkedIn?
I don't need a LinkedIn? Beyonce knows who I am,
so get it. Get in Formation boom okay, so no, Lie.
I still remember being at the Formation World Tour in
(25:52):
l A with one of my best friends and her husband.
It was Star Star in fact was the friend that
I speak of, And I remember the moment when I
looked up and saw, oh my gosh, Evelyn from the
Internet just popped up on the screen and I'm like,
hold that ever lived from the Internet. So beyond the
same moment, what how did that come about? What did
(26:14):
you first feel a react when you know you realized
Queen Bee was. I was actually at my parents house
and Dallas Fort Worth for Mother's Day. It was May. Yeah,
I think that's another shay is and I was just
chilling and my friend Bobby texts me and he's just
like what did I do? And then he like sent
(26:41):
me a video of my shake and I was like
wait at and then and then when it hit me
that that's what was happening. I just like busted out
of the house, right it was the middle of the night,
ran up and down the street screaming. Yeah. So it
was I still don't all the way believe that it happened,
(27:08):
really happened, because I was there, like, oh my god,
we love it to see it. It was just have
you have you ever like reached out or tried to
get in contact with or is it just like a
little gym that you're just like So they actually reached
out to me to invite me to the Houston show
the second time around when she came to Houston. So
(27:29):
I was on out of the second row, just like
looking up, I was in like the friends and family section. Blue.
It was blue. No, it was a bunch of like
executives with like nine year old kids that didn't get
what how important this was right now. It was full
(27:50):
of like little kids who like didn't know destiny was
a thing. They just knew a body. And I'm like,
you know, I'm just seeing a little kids, right lander
Lander overall? Yeah, So it was fun. It was fun.
That's amazing. I love that. I love that. I Mean
that's a testament though, right to to what your comedy
(28:11):
does to the reach that it has. The reach of
these videos have, like it doesn't get poor queen of
pop culture Dana Beyonce and for your video to make
his way into anything that has to do with her
very specific creative vision. This is so much. UM. When
you think about your content creation, your videos, the reach
that it's had, Um, what is it that you think
(28:33):
resonates most with with the people who are watching? Um?
I think so the thing with comedy is that you
have to commit a lot of people don't, like they
get nervous. Um. Granted, I'm sitting in my room by myself.
It's not stand up, completely different bucking, but you have
to like commit to the weird. You have to commit
(28:55):
to the silliness. And so I think because I commit
to that because that's my actual sense of humor, in
my actual tone. UM, people find that to be like
authentic or sincere um, and I think that's what people
are drawn to. Yeah, okay, got it. And of all
of the videos that you've made, which is your personal
(29:16):
favorite and why? Like break down the video for me. Okay,
my favorite video is called for people who feel behind
in life, and basically that's my favorite video. Because I
use a drone. My friend got a drone, so I
was like, guess what that means? I get a drone.
(29:38):
So it really was a video about kind of the
journey that we take in life to feel like we're
doing things on time. And it's one of my favorites
and it did. I wasn't expecting it to do that well.
But it might have hit a hunt a million views.
I don't know, I haven't checked. That's amazing. I mean
so many of us can relate to that because it's
(30:00):
the stuff that resonates, that hits and it's like, oh
I feel seen right now. That gets them attraction. Um,
you've said we equate creativity with output, So what did
you mean by that? If you could just kind of
like break that down, what's your perspective on creating just
for the sake of creating? Which is something that I've
recommitted myself too, because I was a creative first and
(30:20):
foremost from a kid, and then somewhere in the rat race,
you just start out putting just putting the content out
because you're supposed to or you're expected to. Like, wait,
if no one ever saw this, would I still do it?
Would I still want to create it? Would I still
enjoy it? That's kind of been my new north star.
What's your perspective on that creativity and output? Yeah, it's
(30:41):
it's also a larger conversation around productivity and the need
to be always on or like you said, always doing
something um and sometimes you have to learn to chill.
And that creativity is also a lot about input. So
whenever someone's whenever singers on like Jimmy Kimmel or something,
the first question any musician gets asked is who did
(31:04):
you listen to? Growing up? Right? The first question isn't
how many hours have you spent in the studio? We
so our creativity is as much about input and the
things that we consume and enjoy and have fun with
as it is about the things we might produce. So
it's just a reminder to um prioritize learning about things,
(31:29):
prioritize your curiosity over this need, especially with the Internet,
to always post or do something public. Have you ever
struggled with that I want to post this or oh
I feel like it's not I haven't validated this moment
in my life or this thing I've created until I've
shared it, Like, was that easy for you to be like,
(31:50):
I don't have to share everything, or was it difficult?
It's very easy. It's very easy for me because I'm
not gonna lie. Sometimes it's like I just got it
from the people care less, like nobody is out here
waiting for that day. It's just it's very easy for me.
I sometimes have to remind myself that it's okay to
(32:12):
share things. I have sometimes the opposite issue to be
super private, keep things to myself all the time, even
from people who actually know me and like are a
part of my life. Your family and friends even know
where to find you? Right now? Where are you calling? What?
(32:33):
Not home? All I got was a white wall, y'all?
Give me? I know, plants, I can't see nothing I
know I didn't know. I've probably been a little plant
in here. Say I'm not gonna figure out where I
am today. UM. I love that, though I love you,
know your perspective on which is a really interesting perspective
(32:55):
that I haven't really thought about. Um a ton input
being just as important as output. What is shaping me? Um?
And the fact that that that Jimmy Kimmel reference was
a really good way to kind of put it in perspective.
What recommendations do you have, like when it comes to
slowing down not multitasking, What are just some things you
do in your everyday life to just be fully mindful
(33:16):
and present in any moment that you're in. I try
really hard whenever it comes through, and it's really helpful,
especially when I'm overwhelmed. I try to do one thing
at a time. So like, if I am doing the dishes,
I'm not also listening to a podcast, which is hard
to smileful with the dishes, I would forget that I'm right,
(33:41):
Or like if I'm driving, i won't also be listening
to music, I'll just kind of focus on driving. One
or two times. Evelyn actually shared a video recently called
how to be Creative when You're feeling existential, and here's
a little bit of what she had to say. Reduced
your multitasking stimuli. There's this phenomenon and I I have
(34:02):
experienced it where I'll get a text message, one text
message from a friend, and I get overwhelmed by a
text and then I just don't answer it. What is that?
Because that don't make sense. It'll make no sense. From
the time you wake up, you are receiving messages from
(34:25):
other things. You are scrolling on Instagram in bed before
you get up, you are on the toilet, raise your hand.
If you poop without your phone, I would like to
congratulate you before you even do these dramatic social media
detoxes or whatever. I would say, try not multitasking your senses.
(34:48):
Try to eat dinner without watching TV. For a lot
of us, I know there's gonna be a couple of
people that are like, I don't ever do that, and
it's like, that's cute. But a lot of us, and
I've done it too, cannot start eating. Like we have
the burrito right here, but until we find something to
(35:09):
press play, we can't start eating. That is ubiculous. Wow,
I'm impressed that you're being present even in the things
that most people are trying to distract themselves from. But okay,
let me go do it dish real quick. That feels
So what does that look like for you? What does
being still look like? Do you have a meditative practice
(35:31):
self care that you commit to. I should I need
to be on my meditation. I usually only meditate when
I am freaking out instead of kind of building that
practice to be you know, every day. But um, I
saw I try and meditate, listen to a sound bath
or listen to UM, I love me some jungle sounds.
(35:55):
I just loop jungle sounds. That feels pretty nice. Um.
And besides that, I'd just be trying to drink water.
I'm bad drink the water. I literally have a stair
off with a whole glass that I just like, if
I drink one cup of day, I'm killing the game, right.
It's just it's a lot to ask of a human. So,
(36:17):
you know, you said your mom is in help, So
how many glasses should we be drinking? Seven? Eight? The
seven or eight glasses of water is a myth, um,
So my mom just says, drink when you're thirsty. There's
no need to like drink a gallon of water a day, Mom,
I can do that. This is this is the confirmation
(36:39):
I needed to not be essentially, you know, drowning myself
and something happy consuming. Okay, drink Thursday. I can do that.
You talked about the fact that you grinded it out
in your twenties and and you really started to take
the YouTube thing pretty like super seriously a few years ago.
What does ambition holistically look like for you, Like what
(37:02):
are your goals for yourself? How do you define success?
Have you had to grapple with that definition? Oh? Yeah,
I for sure had to grap with that definition because
people have been so supportive and so excited about the
things that I'm doing, and so they'd be calling me
successful and I'm like, I'm still struggling over these internet videos.
(37:30):
So I've had to take um closer, like stock of
my life and instead of comparing my life to some
of the big things I wish I was doing, be
grateful for the things that I'm currently doing now. So,
for example, I was like filming a video where I was, Um,
(37:51):
I seen Christmas cookies and I was just sitting there.
I've seen Christmas cookies in the middle of the day
in a onesie and I'm like, I'm not where right now?
That's pretty nice. So I had to really sit and
like recognize what was happening. Um, Because Yeah, the perspective
is great because it kind of gives you something to
(38:13):
look back on. It gives you something to look forward
to if you know the type of life that you
want in the future. I love that. I love that. Um,
what is next for evidence? Like what what in a
perfect world would you be doing outside of actual human
interaction in one, we would love if all of us
can just get back to that curt collaboration. But just
(38:34):
big picture, what else would you love to do? I
would love to um be in a writer's room for
like a television show on you know network or streaming.
Um My plans to start writing a pilot. I'm in
the outline phase and you better line it out. I
(38:54):
would for you. Yeah, So that's what I that's my
big picture dream. If I can never get my life together,
so check in on me at the end of it,
at the end of next year. It's okay, We're gonna
put it onto the universe for you, whoever is listening
to this podcast. Within the sound of my voice, we
need to get this. We need to get this woman
(39:15):
on somebody's pilot because honestly, your style of writing, your
style of comedy, there's no way that that is just
next level. I can't wait to see it. I know
what will happen for you. Um you talk about play,
the importance of play. So to kind of wrap things
up first, I'm going to ask you what is in
your happiness cocktail? So if you could throw three things
(39:36):
into you're happy. What would it be, Um, it would
be uh Spotify playlists, Um, it would be I'm a
fan of bubbles, so it's very It also helps you
meditate and breathe because you have to like inhale, exhale.
It's true. Bubbles like bubbles, literally blow the bubble of
(40:00):
yourself bubbles. Yeah yeah, um. And then, oh, what else
I'm gonna say? So, there's a juice bar here in
Austin called juice Land, And I begin the CBD shot
that sent me up. Take the CD shot, blow a
couple of bubbles, just in the Spotify playlist by about
(40:24):
Yeah that's okay. Um. And to my earlier point about
you talking about, you know, the importance of play what
does that look like for you? What is your most
recent hobby. What do you encourage people to try to
do or think about exploring just for the heck of it,
just for the fun of it. Yeah. So I've been
drawing a lot. I used to draw when I was younger. Um,
(40:47):
and I obviously kind of like, I don't be doodling anymore,
so this year I try to like draw and color. Um.
Adult coding books are kind of whack. They're just like swirlings.
So I was like, maybe if I can draw what
I want to color and then I color it. So
that's been really satisfying to do. I like that. Okay,
(41:09):
we do this thing called the party trick at the
end of most episodes where the expert or the guests
that we have on kind of gives us like a
cute little life hack something that we can apply that
day or that week. So I want to ask you
if you have three tips on finding your inner kid
or unleashing your inner kid. Yeah, I would say talk
(41:32):
to yourself often, just like lean into that because kids
be in their own world. So I say, embrace to
conversa yourself. Um, and then I would say, oh, go
here first idea. I think a lot of the times
we like kind of self edit, so just go with
(41:55):
your first idea. And then I would say laugh often
like this you been stuff that makes you laugh. Not
everything gotta be high brow all the time. Go ahead,
laugh at the TikTok like it's okay, So just tap
into that. I love it. I love it. And if
you guys want to laugh, you should go to Evelyn
(42:16):
from the Internet's YouTube channel. If people want to keep
up with you. Where can they find you? All the places? Yeah,
so I'm most active on YouTube and Instagram, and on
both those places, my name is Evelyn from the Internet's
plural Evelyn. Thank you so much. I appreciate you and
your time. I'm excited to share this. Thank you all
(42:38):
right there it is Hope you enjoyed that conversation with Evelyn,
and make sure you unleash that party trick all week here. Okay,
we are unleashing our inner child, activate the inner kid
just in time for the holid days. And I don't
know what's happening. I'm going to wrap this up soon. Um.
Congrats to our giveaway winner from episode three. Uh. We
(43:01):
were talking about self love and how it is sexy
a f and we had the contest for one dollar
Amazon gift card. The winner is drumroll please Ebony Lynn
ninety four. Her submission UM and her review was I
needed this podcast. I discovered this podcast to be at
breakfast club and I've binged all the episodes in one day. Wow,
you're a real one, Ebony. Thank you. She continues, so
(43:24):
relatable to me for where I am in life. It's
like Zuri neew. I needed this podcast so after some
reflection after episode three, I've learned one thing I love
about myself is my ability to self reflect. Whenever I'm
feeling disappointed with myself, I just take a moment and
look back at what I've accomplished, take a moment to
be grateful for what I do have, and take responsibility
(43:47):
for what I'm putting out there into the world. I
love that. Love love love it. I love that you're
enjoying the podcast and that self reflection and self love
is key, girl. So you enjoy that hunted dollars on
Amazon self love on yourself with will some extra this
holiday season. Congratulations. Keep your head in the game, guys,
(44:09):
We're gonna have way more giveaways and contests and fun
stuff um as we continue on this hot, happy mess journey.
But before we wrap up, are you subscribed? Make sure
you hit subscribe right now, pretty please? Whether you're listening
on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, the I Heart Radio, Apple, wherever
you get your podcast. Also, how many times a day
slash week do you hear people say that? Does it
(44:31):
get old? Do you get as tired of hearing it is?
Sometimes I get saying it? Are we in that boat together? Well?
It doesn't matter. Get used to it. I'm gonna keep
saying it. Apple podcast, Spotify where if you get your podcast. Okay,
make sure you subscribe so that you don't miss a thing.
Don't go anywhere, because next week we have our New
(44:51):
Year's ZVSH episode. It'll it'll publish I don't know around
New Year's Eve if not that day. It's our last
episode of the year. How about that. And we are
talking about the art of the pivot, because lord knows,
was one big psych time to pivot. It ain't going.
Oh you thought it was going. We were real hype
on that vision, but nobody saw what was around the quarter.
(45:13):
So with that, we're talking about the art of the pivot.
We have an amazing guest Um. She is the CEO
of just really Dope beauty brand that's all about inclusion.
She is killing the game and she has pivoted a
time or two in her life and she has just
given us um all of the intel, all of you know,
(45:34):
her secrets to how to to pivot properly. And then
you know, we'll talk about some other things too. So
that's gonna get us in gear for one. Let's go.
Let me also take this moment before we wrap up
to say happy holidays. I am wishing you a happy
holiday and wishing you and yours your loved ones a
(45:57):
happy holiday. I am truly hoping that you are safe
and healthy, um and totally thinking about all of you.
I'm so appreciative, so filled with gratitude, especially as we
close out the year. UM. So again, I am praying
for your safety and your health, and also for those
of you who may not be with ones that you
(46:18):
love this holiday season. Know that you are loved. I
am sending you love, I am thinking of you, and um,
I'm really grateful that you're on this journey with me.
So happy holidays. I will see you all next week.
Hit that subscribe button and next Monday, we got another
episode of Hot Happy Mess Baby. See you then,
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