February 14, 2023 • 35 mins
Meet Nate & Hila, otherwise known as Nathanology and Hila the Killa (or more recently, Hila the Earth); two artists and activist voices whose work in the world of sustainability, education, sexual freedom, and activism, have garnered them millions of likes and views of their socials like Tik Tok and Instagram, hundreds of thousands of fans across the globe, coverage from outlets like the BBC, Billboard, Timeout and NY1, and performances at internationally acclaimed venues like the House of Yes. In today's episode, we learn about the importance of ecological consciousness, how our upbringing and our surroundings can inform our aspirations, affirmation practices and the history of meditation, and that everything - from plastic to humans - has a place in this world. We hope you enjoy it as much as we did, and leave afterwards looking up! For the full & uncut episode, along with a number of other perks, please visit www.leavelookingup.com/fans and subscribe! If you love love what you're hearing today and want to hear (and see) more, you can do so at the following links: https://www.leavelookingup.com/ https://www.patreon.com/leavelookingup https://www.instagram.com/leavelookingup/
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Episode Transcript
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(00:09):
Hey listeners. This is Nils Ludovic and Amir
John dalli, welcome to leave looking at.
Where we have uplifting conversations about the state of
the world with our heroes, with the intention to demystify
orient and leave you our listeners inspired for this
episode. We sat down down with Nate and
(00:30):
Hilla otherwise known as Nathan ology and hella the killer whose
voices in the world of sustainability education, sexual
freedom and activism have garnered.
The millions of likes and views on their socials, like
tick-tocking Instagram, hundredsof thousands of fans across the
globe coverage from Outlets likethe BBC, billboard timeout and
(00:52):
New York, one and performances at internationally acclaimed.
Venues like the House of Yes in Brooklyn.
In today's episode, we learn about the importance of
ecological Consciousness. How our upbringing, in our
surroundings can inform our aspirations affirmation
practices, and the history of meditation, and that everything
from plastic to humans has a place in this world.
(01:15):
Thank you for joining us today. And now, without further Ado,
let's start this episode. We hope you enjoy it as much as
we did and leave afterwards looking up.
We are here at pirate studios inGowanus.
Brooklyn, this is a little in person group hang that we got
(01:35):
here. Yeah, and this is not our first
group. Hang no.
No. And we always wear headphones.
Just, you know, even if we're not, we're not recording, do you
all usually? I mean, you got do ever get into
the studio to record your work, like, do a lot of stuff with
your cell phones and that, but like, how often are you guys in
the studio to record your work? Well, we have some home Studios.
Yeah, we record. Yeah, the line between home and
studio is pretty blurry. We recorded in the studio.
(02:00):
The space is intentional, but wedon't usually go into Studios to
record. I don't, I wouldn't want.
I don't want to do that. It's, you'd have less control.
You know what I mean? Like, we like to record
ourselves. So I like to record myself.
We're setting ourselves up here because our guests record
themselves often, and they record themselves to record each
other and signal boost positive messages about the Earth in
(02:21):
various wonderful Dynamic ways. We first came into contact years
ago when Neil and I Echo producing an event called the
marketplace with the future during climate week.
And I had just learned about you, guys, because of your
Plastic, Man, I am plastic. Shape.
(02:42):
It like the hand that fashion Adam out of the clay, except
that, after having shaped it, that hand Froze, that should
away but it can't throw that shit away though because the
thing that didn't a dozen mortaland it will guy.
So I am Plastic Man was our first ecological song that we
did together since we incorporated and became a band
Duo. And we had a kill Apollo Davis,
(03:02):
he was our featured artist on the track and we kind of all the
three of us were sitting around.Like thinking like what is the
song that we can all collaborateon and plastic was one of the
first things that we thought would be a cool topic to tackle
because people need to know about plastic and its impact on
our planet. Yeah, that really was worried
(03:23):
broken because you had been sortof interested in and beginning
to practice, zero waste, I thinkaround that time and yeah, we
were we'd known each other for alittle bit but we were still
like early on in our first year of knowing each other.
Yeah exactly. Early on in our collaboration
and yeah I got together. It was like what do you want to
make a song about? In the interest just aligned but
the theme of the pieces that youknow, we can't think of plastic
as a villain. Ultimately we have to sort of
(03:43):
you know I think of it as something that wants to be
someplace else or maybe doesn't want to be created in the first
place. You know what I mean?
Yeah, Frankenstein a tragic figure, you know.
What a reframe it. Such a powerful substance.
You should have a reframe buttonfor your pilot referring.
We're walking around everywhere in the middle of a conversation
(04:04):
or like ordering lunch. Let's, let's start even way back
like this, giving a little bit of a context for listeners.
Like who you are. Yeah.
And how did you get to go on us?Well, yeah.
What's the picture? Like I know, you know, the smart
(04:33):
folks but how did you guys get individually here?
Well guys, for me, I was I was born here in New York City and I
grew up in SoHo, which is in lower Manhattan and like to tell
people often that there was not a tree on my block, not a single
tree and not a lot of green spaces around either.
(04:54):
My parents weren't really like nature.
People didn't take me out to theCatskills or even to Central
Park or anywhere. We didn't have house plants.
So, like, for me growing up, it was just, you know, being in the
city and just trying to survive the concrete jungle out here.
When Hilla says she wraps his planet Earth.
It's not a figure of speech. Each she means it literally
(05:15):
Hilla created and wears a costume of a planet Earth that
she made with one of her friends, joyful, Jam also known
as love Living Art. It's an enormous round blue
Globe made from an inflatable PVC balloon with green.
Patches representing. The different continents Hills
had barely sticks out but her arms and legs poke through, it's
(05:38):
pretty incredible. And the screaming you heard it's
from the crowd during House of Yes performance.
When hilah as planet Earth descends from the ceiling
swinging on a silk rope until she lands on stage except
(06:01):
instead of Landing gracefully she falls off the stage as soon
as she steps on it. The whole thing was caught in a
video and went viral probably because throughout it all she
didn't miss a beat saying the Itmight fall but the planet will
always get back up. So how did she go from a child
growing up in the concrete jungle to an environmental
(06:21):
rapper? It's been a process.
A lot of people ask me like whatwas the moment that changed you?
And I think there was just a lotof different moments throughout
my life. That gave me a little taste of
what nature is and what trees are and what it means to be
outside and dwell with the Earth.
So yeah, it's just like been a slow growing process.
It is definitely a process my orRegion is sort of the opposite
(06:44):
of that, in a way I come from Washington state from a little
town, north of Seattle, and it just like surrounded in trees.
Like, I live, I grew up like, playing around in the woods and
had a very green origin, like itlook like twin peaks', you know
what I mean? Like, I really did not quite as
murder Laden, but, you know, still very mysterious and wise
(07:05):
and yeah. Yes.
Twin Peaks - the murder. Just all of the fun wholesome.
And so a gigantic came to New York, probably like, almost a
decade ago. And Matt hello like six years
ago or something like that. So before Nate, and Hilla joined
together to become a rapping Duo, both were solo artists,
hello doing her thing as planet Earth and Nate rapping about
(07:25):
philosophy as Nathan ology. I guess over the course of that
past half decade knowing hella and the work that we were doing
together and sort of the ideological Journey that we went
on together, really brought me to a state of ecological
Consciousness that I don't thinkI was in.
Before, you know, I had a Nostalgia for green.
And for growth, and for life of that, kind that I missed when I
(07:46):
was in the city, but it wasn't the center of my sort of quest
and now it's really become the center.
And so bring us into today. Where is your mental space now?
Because you guys have done a lotabout sustainability, but I know
there's also a philosophy in education and other things.
So talk about, like, where individually you guys are, yeah,
we've been collaborating for thepast half decade or so as Natan
(08:07):
hella and right now, we're focused in a very centered way.
Each of us on our sort of solo Journey, Which we were doing
already before we met one another.
So it's all sort of leaving backto the same emphasis that we had
and I think we'll continue to collaborate in the future but
right now we're on our sort of solo missions and all that hella
talk about what hers involves but mine is kind of gravitated
to what I was doing in the firstplace which is more operating in
(08:29):
more abstract sphere of exploring philosophical topics.
So there's still an ecological application to that.
But what I'm really interested in if I had to list the things
is getting people excited about philosophy.
In general getting people, excited about redefining
education, Station as an elective and extra institutional
practice. I mean, the origins of
philosophical thought in the western tradition was artistic,
(08:50):
the, the poet and the Philosopher's were originally
the same among the earliest philosophers.
And so I'm really interested in bringing back that sort of model
of, You Know, The Bard, who transmits, cultural knowledge,
historical knowledge, and philosophical knowledge, and
speculative thought about what is the nature of things through
song, Because when you activate people that way, it makes it.
So there's a pipeline from that,act of thought.
(09:11):
And that active Art into doing something about it.
Please don't. Your seats, close your textbook
stand up and dance to this song.What do you think of?
When I use the word School, you might shrug your shoulders and
be like school. So hateful, but imperfect
institutional tool to make the people on the planet.
(09:32):
Not be absolute fool. Are you might have the view that
it's only half true, what they teach in that, it's inspiring
the whole circuit. You know what I mean?
And I think there was a lot of that in the stuff that we were
collaborating on as well. And now I've sort of like, you
know, really zeroed in on that for my current work.
Well, I'm here in this through line and my hand was kind of
gesturing. What my words were about to ask,
was that a through-line? You've been sensing this whole
(09:52):
time like connect. Yeah, I've long been fascinated
with that because I'm also an academic or at least by training
and I was a classicist and a classicist I studied engine
Greco-Roman culture and specifically Greek philosophy
was my main area of interest andso I just always been interested
in this like the oral tradition,the function of poetry as the
main way of transmitting cultural information as the
(10:14):
original source. And now it's bifurcated.
We got the Arts over here, we'vegot activism in its own little
corner. And sometimes it uses art.
And we got the educational sphere, the academic sphere
just, you know, all by its Lonesome and they're not
connected. They're supposed to be a circuit
or really they're supposed to beall just one breath, you know?
When I say supposed to, I mean originally were and I think
that's a Unity I'm interested inreintegrating, that's beautiful.
(10:36):
But hella yeah. So I've been rapping as planet
Earth about planet Earth and what I've been kind of focusing
on is just getting the educationChannel part of Earth Science.
How food grows different applications for Solutions.
Permaculture how to build soil compost, how to purify water,
(11:00):
just kind of thinking about all the different ways to Green our
world and to create abundance for people.
And, you know, think we think our life.
I'm like constantly imagining how to Green the city.
What would the city of looked like if we didn't cover it in
concrete, and how do we sort of Imagine In that.
So that's really the focus of mywork now and it's all through
(11:23):
really fun songs and verses ABCsof mushrooms.
A agaricus bisporus, most commonon the Shelf known as white
button. They got free.
Gills bride up with diced, onions, white and brown.
It starts to make tomato tomahto.
I love them a lot. Go fresh.
Picked off the vine like I just won the lotto for salsa with
(11:46):
nachos. I'll have the gazpacho and
flavor. As the game then Tomatoes the
model. I have a whole series of
mushroom raps about different, kinds of mushrooms are great.
I love it. Yes, definitely of send those
folks ABCs of mushrooms and thenI have the veggie wraps which
are all like one minute raps, about different vegetables.
So yeah that's really been the focus.
I just really want everybody to have fun learning about and
(12:08):
loving the Earth. Mm-hmm.
For each of you guys live to questions.
I'm thinking of the first is yougo by hail of the killer' and
you go by Nathan ology? Yeah.
Right. Sort of what I've been around
it. Was there a Genesis to those
names? Hello.
The Killa was birthed in summer camp.
Yeah. All great name's Audrey rest.
(12:29):
Yeah, yeah, Jonathan cavesson. I don't know where I was just
like hella the killer gorilla inManila and I was like okay I
guess that's me now and really did stick and then I kind of
wrote my first rap song in college and was like, I'm hilah
the killa and I was my Persona so it's been that way for a long
time. Hell yeah, Nathan ology?
(12:51):
Yeah, that's well, that's the name of my YouTube channel and
then it became sort of my handleand stuff like that.
It's not officially my artist name yet, although I guess I'm
considering making it be that I've been really bristling at
this whole problem for a while because I've been struggling to
land on like how I want to present myself specifically as
an artist precisely because I'm realizing that I'm tired of like
the self branding gesture that our culture is obsessed.
(13:13):
With we're all obsessed with sort of creating like what is
the official mask of self that Iam presenting?
The world and becomes this secondary identity that we put
all this stock in. It's like a self
commodification. The very notion of making a
brand. I mean think about where that
word comes from. Yeah, branding it.
Yeah, exactly. Count or on a human being, you
know what I mean, a symbol. And then we're doing that to
ourselves. But yeah, Nathan ology is what I
(13:34):
go by. It's not a bad name.
I mean a la G is like the study of the logo.
So it's like the studies of Nathan both in the sense of the
studies of myself that I presentto the world and my studies of
the world that I present, you know what I mean?
Personally? Yeah, yeah.
I mean, Me think I love that. Yeah, perfect.
You a super on brand, very own brand of the other question that
(13:59):
I had is something that we oftenlike to ask is, was these
Central motivating topics? For each of you was there a
heartbreak in your history and what is the phrase that you
always say, heartbreak leads to break through?
Exactly. And so, was there a heartbreak
for each of you, that kind of spurn, this Any this messaging
(14:20):
this ideals that had your paths crossed and also diverge and
shift and change. I was on the way here.
I was thinking about one of the heartbreaks that I felt.
When I learned that New York City, the island of Manhattan
used to be covered in trees and there was a pond that started in
(14:41):
the East River and went down to Wall Street called collect Pond
a freshwater Pond and that Manhattan is actually You know
comes from mannahatta which means many Hills and you know
with the not pay people who likelived on this island I just
never learned that in school growing up.
I kind of learned this about in adulthood and so just imagine my
(15:05):
my like Island that I grew up onactually being an island and not
just something covered in concrete and skyscrapers.
And I don't know, I just felt like this loss that I never
could ever even imagine what it was like before, but yeah.
Yes, I think that kind of countsas a heartbreak, the first time
that I ever sprouted seeds and watch them.
Grow was, I think when I was like 27.
(15:27):
Wow, okay, that's like a school project that a lot of times
have. It's like, hey like growing up
but not until 27. Well, so up until the the
sprouting moment, you were raising awareness about plastic
way before that. Uh-huh.
And then, where did that come from?
Was that also something that wasspawned from your childhood of
just realizing? Wow, there's a big disconnect
here, it sounds like that experience walking around Soho
(15:48):
was of the birth of things. What's that through line for
you? I guess it kind of was burning,
man. I went to Burning Man, and I
just really thought it was a really cool thing.
Burning Man is an annual week-long Arts Festival,
dedicated to anti-consumerism self-expression and
self-reliance. It takes place the last week of
August in Nevada's. Black Rock Desert, housing
(16:08):
nearly 80 thousand attendees fora week and it's aptly named
Black Rock City. Perhaps, what makes this
Festival? Most unique is that all of the
Arts and events Are put on by its attendees.
Thousands of workshops classes sculptures non-traditional
performances by artists from around the world and art cars
(16:29):
which are Vehicles decorated to look like everything from
animals to pirate ships happen. The festival.
Most notably ends with the burning of a giant wooden Effigy
in the form of a man. One of the concepts burning man
has created is called mu, it stands for matter, out of place
and refers to any materials, notof the land, basically.
Lee trash. At the end of the festival,
(16:51):
participants are asked to pick up all moop Insight.
This philosophy is actually a core Burning Man, principle
known as leave. No trace.
It was mostly about the the trash thing, right?
So the whole leave, no Trace concept.
The fact that people started screaming, move, every time,
something fell off their clothes, or whatever.
There's no trash bins, people are decorating porta-potties.
(17:12):
I was shocked right coming from New York City which is so like
full of trash and so normalized,we grew up in the And we're
taught to completely ignore the trash and just like, we're so
desensitized to it. So going to an environment that,
like, kind of felt like New Yorkin a way with the community and
the party and the people. But then to see how everyone was
carrying around a cup and how everyone was aware of the trash.
(17:34):
And the I just, it totally changed my mind about stuff.
So when I came back to New York and I had all the packaging, you
know, from the stuff that I bought for Burning Man, kind of
waiting for me in my apartment. I was like, oh, like there's no.
France between Burning Man and New York City except for me
being aware of the trash. I love that.
(17:56):
It's really beautiful principle when we got back from 2018.
I just I was like, no dude, it feels like we're still there but
we're just way farther away. Yeah.
Right. And so what about your Genesis?
I was working on my dissertationas dissertation on.
It was a philosophy dissertationas it was beginning to be the
first Rumblings of my ecologicalthinking and it happened to
align with when getting to know hilah and she was on the Zero,
(18:17):
waste tip and and I was sort of sci-fi Off that practice.
But my dissertation was on this guy, Alfred North Whitehead,
who's a philosopher from the mid20th century and specifically
his use of Play-Doh. And he's a philosopher who went
back to Plato, specifically, to recover this notion of what we
now, call pants. I Chasm, the notion that
everything is alive or imbued with some sort of sentience,
(18:37):
what we call Consciousness is just a highly specified in
complex form of a subjectivity or a feeling that exists in all
of matter. Therefore, the universe is a
living organism, it's one livingthing, and I was getting really
interested for that reason in the effect that has on our
ability to participate in being an activist about it, or being a
polluter or whatever. Because the word, for instance,
(18:57):
the word environment I think is not my favorite word.
I don't like to say, I'm an environmentalist or even say the
word environment, you know, to casually because it the vibe, it
gives us the environment to something that surrounds you.
It's something that's you're walking through it and it's
separate from you, you know, we're talking about mooc.
That's one of my favorite phrases even though I never been
to burning man, but I'm happy tohave received it from afar
(19:17):
because it's a For phrase, it's very hopeful for his, if there's
such a thing as mooc, there mustbe also such a thing as Meep
matter in its place. And so then it's not a matter of
denigrating or hating or vituperative any kind of matter,
even the plastic water bottle, it wants to be somewhere and
it's not, you know what I mean? And it's not on the streets of
New York City about to blow intothe ocean or like, end up on the
beaches of Staten Island. It's not where it wants to be
(19:38):
really. We have to go deeper than start
to think of matter, even ourselves as constructed, from
Material relations, and and the outside world is constructed
from material, ations and then if we begin to think of all of
that stuff, Tough as literally having a subjectivity in it.
There's a breathing living this even to quote unquote in organic
matter. It just makes the whole thing
way more approachable, I think to try and be involved in it
(20:00):
because first of all, you can't not be involved in it and then
it's a choice of how you want tobe involved rather than it being
this choice of have a hobby which is being an
environmentalist. I was thinking as you're saying
the by virtue of an existing which is essentially what you're
saying that it has a place in the same way that you're right
where you're supposed to be. And I think that is a very A way
to start looking things that if it exists, it has a purpose and
(20:21):
has a reason if not to illustrate that, some things
have a purpose in some things don't have a purpose, which is a
purpose in itself. It's a very cool way because
it's often a problem, when you're starting to create those
environments, those spaces that are, without human interaction,
kind of removing us, and I love it.
It's clear. You guys do a lot in terms of
spreading messages positivity. You produce tons of content
(20:45):
video, you do all these different things and it seems
like your brains are just alwaysgoing always running.
Do you have vegetable moments? And I choose that term
vegetable. Very, I was like living like to
come but like our fruit before you get into these moments were
talking about, all the doing is,they're non doing that's
happening. And what is that existence
forces non-existence? Is there a space for that?
(21:06):
What does that look like for you?
How do you guys handle that? I watch a lot of Law and Order
mentioned on the way over that you'd gone from SVU to the
original. What's actually happening here.
That is like you're going back to the All of us do and I'm
going back to the to the origins.
I do also sometimes, you know, vegetate in and sometimes it's
good and sometimes it's not goodat all and I have obsessive
(21:28):
Tendencies and so when I began to obsess over certain thought
it grinds my whole process to a halt and then I you know, just
sort of lie in bed and like, youknow, be sad sometimes.
You know. Yeah, just sitting with it.
Okay. Well, yeah, but not
constructively like hiding from the world various forms of
hiding, you know, and I mean, anything that helps you guys, Or
(21:48):
helps you or kind of get out of that funk in that space to get
through it actual vegetables. Hmm, always, I love vegetables.
Yeah, I like to go outside goingoutside on a walk or on a run.
Going to the park getting on some monkey bars.
Getting upside down, usually helps me a lot.
I guess when I'm hiding constructively I read and
(22:10):
reading is good. So you have a habit of like how
I'm feeling shitty right now. I'm going to read my book like
that's pretty good actually you know what I mean and treated as
an escape be like you know? Choose it.
Yeah, that's a good place to hide much better place to hide
than like, I'm going to run awayuntil I can show that.
I know is entertaining but not not uplifting.
You know, in proportion to its and Grossmont.
(22:30):
Yeah, Mmm. Yeah.
But I think being active physically, is really important
for me and I drinking water and meditating kind of meditation
transcendentalism. Yeah, I mean, anything can be a
meditation really, you know, it's just about clearing your
mind and letting yourself be trusting the universe that
You're safe if I'm struggling, I'm like, okay, well I'm safe
(22:52):
right now. I'm okay.
So I can just be okay, but it's hard when you're in the mental
Loop of feeling panicked or anxious, like I have a lot of
anxiety sometimes and just getting to that place of being
like, Oh, I should meditate or Ishould relax or I'm okay, it's
really difficult sometimes. So that advice is if you can
bring yourself to that, mental state to relax and cool.
(23:13):
But obviously that's that's the challenge in the first place.
One of my favorite books, I had to read it during college.
It's called peace. Every step the intro is by the
Dalai Lama and he talks about ways that you can almost trick
yourself into feeling better andhe tells you take any ordinary
objects that you have, it could be a napkin and could be a leaf,
it could be a piece of paper, whatever might be and think of
your happiest memory. Something that what you would
positively glow, just thinking about it and attach that memory
(23:37):
to that object, that piece of paper.
So that whenever you look at that piece of paper.
Hmm. That's how you think.
That's how you feel and hang that.
So it's the first thing you see in the morning, you wake up.
Cup and it's like right in frontof your bed and that's how you
can start your day. It's this little things that
help guide you, especially for those that sometimes be so
entrenched in it that you kind of forget how to get there.
(23:58):
You need a little trail of breadcrumbs.
Yeah, that's a beautiful idea. I love you a magical Jewel.
There's a lot of pain. You feel like you're honest, you
know, you care about and affirmations I think are really
really helpful. Like over time, it's like you're
training your brain to access. Those kinds of thoughts faster.
So when you're feeling down or doubtful or Earth like oh wait,
(24:19):
no, I actually know what to think about myself because I
have all these affirmations, even if it's feels fake in the
beginning. If you do the over and over and
over again every day, you're just training your brain to have
those thoughts. Yeah.
He'll I got me doing an affirmation Journal while ago
and I've continued to do it and it's kind of evolved it evolved
in a fruitful way one. It became a part of my sort of
(24:39):
ritual and meditation practice. And then I would write in his
journal and it began like something very personal, but it
has more specifically in reference to again, like so, Of
drawing on stuff from the ancient world in the Hellenistic
period. There's this thing called hoopla
manometer, they're like notebooks essentially was very
common is literally no book practice because literacy was
still in his infancy. So, but some people were
literate and they were trained to write, but they weren't
(25:02):
trained to make a distinction between the rhetorical
difference of writing for othersversus writing for themselves.
So they wrote to themselves but with the precision as though
they were writing to somebody else, which makes it.
So you really calling yourself to write for the whole world.
The most famous record of these is Mark.
Aurelius meditations, which is this beloved book that people
still read this. Roman Emperor, who is also a
(25:23):
stoic, he didn't call The Meditation, so we just called it
to himself. I literally notes to himself.
So we have the records of this person who is writing in these
beautiful complete thoughts but they were for him, but he was
writing as though it was legibleby the entire world.
That's all interesting. Because my affirmation practice
started as an Instagram story practice, which is it?
(25:44):
Yeah, that's the connected pointof this that I've thought about
a lot is like, I just yeah. In what way is social media.
For all its foibles and all its egoism.
Nonetheless does open a space inwhich we can actually be public
about our notes to self in a waythat's actually very Agent.
Lee precedented and very beneficial in that really
strikes to the heart of what it is to address yourself.
I'm curious. What is your vision now for
(26:06):
yourself in the future, and how has that changed?
Wow. Mmm, well, yeah, I think,
definitely, I Envision a future where I have more routines and
more organized structure. Is in my life because there's a
lot of content and ideas that I want to share.
And a lot of songs I want to share making more songs making
(26:26):
learning more like really just being like a source of
information and entertainment. A surrounding like Earth Science
and Earth activism, what do you see kind of for yourself at this
current moment? Interesting.
Yeah I don't know if I think of it as something that's changing
in my experience, but something that's coming into sharper
relief. It's like gradually becoming
more clear, you know? So, but I would say the vision
(26:47):
as it stands now. now is one of just exactly what we're doing
right now, but expanded huge like to have it be to the point
where Hilla has succeeded and I've succeeded to such a degree
that not only are we like household names from a
perspective of like personal goals of notoriety and audience
building, not only that, but we are just like, you know, several
(27:09):
among many, who are now a commonplace of like people who
fully teach fully entertain and the two are just one thing one,
Thing and for somebody to be like, Oh I'm one of those is a
commonplace thing to say and reciprocally for somebody to say
like, oh, where'd you learn about, you know, the
fundamentals of process philosophy and how that affects
ecological activism. Oh, I took it in college because
(27:32):
I think the institutions are going to continue to die.
They're already every institution that we know of is
being destroyed by The Liberation of information for
better and worse and pretty soon.
We're going to figure out that the people who cut class or
advancing farther and faster. And so I want to get to a point
where it's like we have Not onlygotten to the point where we
have a large audience for our own sakes for own ideas and that
sake of their transmission, but we have helped carve out a space
(27:56):
along with others where it's like, this is how we do it now
and in doing that, we've like really return to something.
That's beautiful. I'm also curious.
What are the some of the tools that you find most useful to
places that you get in for information?
And inspiration are there peoplewe often ask who are you looking
up to, at this very moment. So I have a lot of inspiration
(28:18):
that comes From the clean Bushwick initiative and the col
de santis, who host these, cleanups and Bushwick all the
time or like, Anna. Socks is the trash Walker.
She also really inspires me because she shows a lot of the
waste that happens in New York and what is being thrown out.
Just people who are doing environmental activism in New
York, the composters like the orNoel who is the feature on
(28:38):
compost our song. These people are huge
inspiration to me because they are literally in the space here
in New York City, Greening the city.
I feel like my mission is to uplift them and Create the
soundtrack for their work, it's a good list.
I mean like we have benefited a lot from collaborating by a guy
named Bob Rickman who is the science rapper educated kind of
(28:58):
has pioneered the synthesis thatwe're doing and we you know,
have gotten to know him and started working with him and
like he continues to be an inspiration and a help this is
just on my mind cuz I actually Idon't know if you'd know her but
this Maria Parker or she goes bylingua Franca she's a rapper and
politician and Atlanta and her songs are so so dope, there's
(29:19):
The wordplay the production everything and she's like
literally just just, you know, in the in the thick of it with
like politics there and like hissongs about supporting workers
unions and stuff like very very tangible but also just like
extraordinarily listenable and it's just like this is going on
everywhere, you know, like so cool.
Oh my word, you know. And it's like that.
That excites me we'd like asking, is there a person that
(29:42):
you have not given? Thanks to that.
You think might be a good time today.
Wow. Wow.
Wow getting thanks. I was reflecting the other day
on certain teachers. I've had, which I think when
this question has been asked of me, I think I've usually said to
my mom who matters a lot to me, or certain people have been
intellectually influential on mebut and this, I guess teachers
(30:02):
fall into that category as well BF3 my teacher.
When I was at the end of my elementary school years, Zan
Peterson, moans mrs. P.m. and Jamie Stockton, one of
my sophomore, English teachers, and Justin Fox Bailey, both of
whom the ladder were both awesome teachers, but they also
do, Very important. I've been reflecting on a lot
which is that they let me not dothe work because I did not do
(30:24):
the work. I was doing other stuff, I was
smoking pot and I was running around having adventures and I
was making songs and poems, and they were like, okay, well, let
me see the songs and poems, and they're like, okay, they passed
me, you know what I mean? They're like this, guys, doing
something now. I have a doctorate in top people
and stuff like that. You can get anywhere.
You want to get if you care about stuff.
But that requires people along the way who were like you
actually care for real. Like you're not going through
(30:46):
any kind of motions and that I've been very Be grateful for
and I was thinking about that. I was like, oh I should make
sure I'm doing that in life. Like whenever I have power it's
looking at like what is the person really about?
Are they really about something?Yeah yeah no I mean think about
teachers reminds me of my one ofmy film school teacher is Nick
Tanis? I did a film class with him
(31:06):
where we were actually like shooting film like 16.
Mm, film, and cutting it on a steam back.
Like actual likes with scissors and tape and like putting it
back together and I made one of like my first silly Comedy
videos in that class called penis.
Envy and suggested movie. Yeah, I dress up as a dude.
Have a mustache and I talk aboutall.
(31:28):
I wish I was I wish I had a penis because then I'd have all
these privileges anyway, I like presented this in class and he
was such a positive teacher and forests and he loved it so much.
And I really empowered me like make films and kind of like be
wacky and silly and his class was so great.
Yo, y'all have, is there a Like any favorite wraps that you have
(31:50):
handed? You could like throw down right
now? Oh, wow.
Oh, do you to beatbox easy? I wait, wait, you're a drummer.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you really want me to be
buggy? I'll scratch your back and
forth. All right.
Yeah, go. We're at the podcast.
I brought my cup. We're Chillin recording.
(32:11):
Yo, leave looking up. Leave looking up.
Look up at the sky. Ask why?
Be a philosopher don't die. Don't side.
Just be happy. You're here.
We'd be rocking out the podcast with kneeling Amir, and we're
feeling no fear. We'd be bringing it Full
Throttle, we'd be flowing, like about.
I gotta inhaler on the bottle, inhale, on the bottle Full
Throttle all day. Yeah, we're trying to see a new
(32:33):
way pave. The way to sustainability.
I'm feeling good in my home City, Home city with the words
and flows. They like uldouz for lots of
rappers are so verbose in there,so ecologic methodologic got a
rocket, where be going off the top with the Bars on topic on
topic and all the vegetables vegetating and growing a garden
(32:54):
fairy full of trees and plants and berries and shrubs and
sometimes, I don't know what to say.
So I shrug shrug but it's still good stuff.
We're coming off the top. That's why we're looking up
about to leave. Looking up coming out the door
if he hit of the Killer and Nathan do for Well, that just
(33:14):
made my day. Thank you so much for that.
No nothing else to say here. Thank you guys so much for
joining us. And there's that music.
We can follow Nate, inhale on all social channels and pillow
(33:38):
the Killer and Nathan ology underscore leave looking up.
Is hosted by myself, Neil. Havoc and my co-host, Amir Jan
Dolly, and produced by our small.
But Mighty team at noon 31, a company dedicated to creating
platforms for Meaningful conversations.
That tackle the important issuesof today for folks that love
(33:58):
what they're hearing today and want to hear and see more.
We have the complete uncut and raw episodes and video form
available online on our fan pagevia patreon at www.levitt.com,
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That didn't make it to the FinalCut gain wisdom from our guests
(34:19):
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our content and more also we'd like to take a second to thank
you for joining us today. So, if you haven't already,
please be sure to leave a ratingand review of the podcast in
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on social media at leave lookingup on all social channels or
(34:39):
subscribing to our mailing list for special content news and
first day, Tim's on the episodesvia our website at leave looking
up.com. This episode was created through
the combined efforts of myself as executive producer and our
lead producer, Lucia closely themoon 31 team also includes
designer and Draya. Kang glass, slipper, medium, and
engineer. Justin Jed, Carter, an extra
(35:01):
special thanks to engineer, TJ, dumpster, who mixed and mastered
this episode original theme music by Brady, W and background
music. Provided from Blue Dot sessions.
Hey listeners. This is Nils Ludovic and Amir
John dalli, welcome to leave looking at.
Where we have uplifting conversations about the state of
the world with our heroes, with the intention to demystify
orient and leave you our listeners inspired for this
episode. We sat down down with Nate and
(00:30):
Hilla otherwise known as Nathan ology and hella the killer whose
voices in the world of sustainability education, sexual
freedom and activism have garnered.
The millions of likes and views on their socials, like
tick-tocking Instagram, hundredsof thousands of fans across the
globe coverage from Outlets likethe BBC, billboard timeout and
(00:52):
New York, one and performances at internationally acclaimed.
Venues like the House of Yes in Brooklyn.
In today's episode, we learn about the importance of
ecological Consciousness. How our upbringing, in our
surroundings can inform our aspirations affirmation
practices, and the history of meditation, and that everything
from plastic to humans has a place in this world.
(01:15):
Thank you for joining us today. And now, without further Ado,
let's start this episode. We hope you enjoy it as much as
we did and leave afterwards looking up.
We are here at pirate studios inGowanus.
Brooklyn, this is a little in person group hang that we got
(01:35):
here. Yeah, and this is not our first
group. Hang no.
No. And we always wear headphones.
Just, you know, even if we're not, we're not recording, do you
all usually? I mean, you got do ever get into
the studio to record your work, like, do a lot of stuff with
your cell phones and that, but like, how often are you guys in
the studio to record your work? Well, we have some home Studios.
Yeah, we record. Yeah, the line between home and
studio is pretty blurry. We recorded in the studio.
(02:00):
The space is intentional, but wedon't usually go into Studios to
record. I don't, I wouldn't want.
I don't want to do that. It's, you'd have less control.
You know what I mean? Like, we like to record
ourselves. So I like to record myself.
We're setting ourselves up here because our guests record
themselves often, and they record themselves to record each
other and signal boost positive messages about the Earth in
(02:21):
various wonderful Dynamic ways. We first came into contact years
ago when Neil and I Echo producing an event called the
marketplace with the future during climate week.
And I had just learned about you, guys, because of your
Plastic, Man, I am plastic. Shape.
(02:42):
It like the hand that fashion Adam out of the clay, except
that, after having shaped it, that hand Froze, that should
away but it can't throw that shit away though because the
thing that didn't a dozen mortaland it will guy.
So I am Plastic Man was our first ecological song that we
did together since we incorporated and became a band
Duo. And we had a kill Apollo Davis,
(03:02):
he was our featured artist on the track and we kind of all the
three of us were sitting around.Like thinking like what is the
song that we can all collaborateon and plastic was one of the
first things that we thought would be a cool topic to tackle
because people need to know about plastic and its impact on
our planet. Yeah, that really was worried
(03:23):
broken because you had been sortof interested in and beginning
to practice, zero waste, I thinkaround that time and yeah, we
were we'd known each other for alittle bit but we were still
like early on in our first year of knowing each other.
Yeah exactly. Early on in our collaboration
and yeah I got together. It was like what do you want to
make a song about? In the interest just aligned but
the theme of the pieces that youknow, we can't think of plastic
as a villain. Ultimately we have to sort of
(03:43):
you know I think of it as something that wants to be
someplace else or maybe doesn't want to be created in the first
place. You know what I mean?
Yeah, Frankenstein a tragic figure, you know.
What a reframe it. Such a powerful substance.
You should have a reframe buttonfor your pilot referring.
We're walking around everywhere in the middle of a conversation
(04:04):
or like ordering lunch. Let's, let's start even way back
like this, giving a little bit of a context for listeners.
Like who you are. Yeah.
And how did you get to go on us?Well, yeah.
What's the picture? Like I know, you know, the smart
(04:33):
folks but how did you guys get individually here?
Well guys, for me, I was I was born here in New York City and I
grew up in SoHo, which is in lower Manhattan and like to tell
people often that there was not a tree on my block, not a single
tree and not a lot of green spaces around either.
(04:54):
My parents weren't really like nature.
People didn't take me out to theCatskills or even to Central
Park or anywhere. We didn't have house plants.
So, like, for me growing up, it was just, you know, being in the
city and just trying to survive the concrete jungle out here.
When Hilla says she wraps his planet Earth.
It's not a figure of speech. Each she means it literally
(05:15):
Hilla created and wears a costume of a planet Earth that
she made with one of her friends, joyful, Jam also known
as love Living Art. It's an enormous round blue
Globe made from an inflatable PVC balloon with green.
Patches representing. The different continents Hills
had barely sticks out but her arms and legs poke through, it's
(05:38):
pretty incredible. And the screaming you heard it's
from the crowd during House of Yes performance.
When hilah as planet Earth descends from the ceiling
swinging on a silk rope until she lands on stage except
(06:01):
instead of Landing gracefully she falls off the stage as soon
as she steps on it. The whole thing was caught in a
video and went viral probably because throughout it all she
didn't miss a beat saying the Itmight fall but the planet will
always get back up. So how did she go from a child
growing up in the concrete jungle to an environmental
(06:21):
rapper? It's been a process.
A lot of people ask me like whatwas the moment that changed you?
And I think there was just a lotof different moments throughout
my life. That gave me a little taste of
what nature is and what trees are and what it means to be
outside and dwell with the Earth.
So yeah, it's just like been a slow growing process.
It is definitely a process my orRegion is sort of the opposite
(06:44):
of that, in a way I come from Washington state from a little
town, north of Seattle, and it just like surrounded in trees.
Like, I live, I grew up like, playing around in the woods and
had a very green origin, like itlook like twin peaks', you know
what I mean? Like, I really did not quite as
murder Laden, but, you know, still very mysterious and wise
(07:05):
and yeah. Yes.
Twin Peaks - the murder. Just all of the fun wholesome.
And so a gigantic came to New York, probably like, almost a
decade ago. And Matt hello like six years
ago or something like that. So before Nate, and Hilla joined
together to become a rapping Duo, both were solo artists,
hello doing her thing as planet Earth and Nate rapping about
(07:25):
philosophy as Nathan ology. I guess over the course of that
past half decade knowing hella and the work that we were doing
together and sort of the ideological Journey that we went
on together, really brought me to a state of ecological
Consciousness that I don't thinkI was in.
Before, you know, I had a Nostalgia for green.
And for growth, and for life of that, kind that I missed when I
(07:46):
was in the city, but it wasn't the center of my sort of quest
and now it's really become the center.
And so bring us into today. Where is your mental space now?
Because you guys have done a lotabout sustainability, but I know
there's also a philosophy in education and other things.
So talk about, like, where individually you guys are, yeah,
we've been collaborating for thepast half decade or so as Natan
(08:07):
hella and right now, we're focused in a very centered way.
Each of us on our sort of solo Journey, Which we were doing
already before we met one another.
So it's all sort of leaving backto the same emphasis that we had
and I think we'll continue to collaborate in the future but
right now we're on our sort of solo missions and all that hella
talk about what hers involves but mine is kind of gravitated
to what I was doing in the firstplace which is more operating in
(08:29):
more abstract sphere of exploring philosophical topics.
So there's still an ecological application to that.
But what I'm really interested in if I had to list the things
is getting people excited about philosophy.
In general getting people, excited about redefining
education, Station as an elective and extra institutional
practice. I mean, the origins of
philosophical thought in the western tradition was artistic,
(08:50):
the, the poet and the Philosopher's were originally
the same among the earliest philosophers.
And so I'm really interested in bringing back that sort of model
of, You Know, The Bard, who transmits, cultural knowledge,
historical knowledge, and philosophical knowledge, and
speculative thought about what is the nature of things through
song, Because when you activate people that way, it makes it.
So there's a pipeline from that,act of thought.
(09:11):
And that active Art into doing something about it.
Please don't. Your seats, close your textbook
stand up and dance to this song.What do you think of?
When I use the word School, you might shrug your shoulders and
be like school. So hateful, but imperfect
institutional tool to make the people on the planet.
(09:32):
Not be absolute fool. Are you might have the view that
it's only half true, what they teach in that, it's inspiring
the whole circuit. You know what I mean?
And I think there was a lot of that in the stuff that we were
collaborating on as well. And now I've sort of like, you
know, really zeroed in on that for my current work.
Well, I'm here in this through line and my hand was kind of
gesturing. What my words were about to ask,
was that a through-line? You've been sensing this whole
(09:52):
time like connect. Yeah, I've long been fascinated
with that because I'm also an academic or at least by training
and I was a classicist and a classicist I studied engine
Greco-Roman culture and specifically Greek philosophy
was my main area of interest andso I just always been interested
in this like the oral tradition,the function of poetry as the
main way of transmitting cultural information as the
(10:14):
original source. And now it's bifurcated.
We got the Arts over here, we'vegot activism in its own little
corner. And sometimes it uses art.
And we got the educational sphere, the academic sphere
just, you know, all by its Lonesome and they're not
connected. They're supposed to be a circuit
or really they're supposed to beall just one breath, you know?
When I say supposed to, I mean originally were and I think
that's a Unity I'm interested inreintegrating, that's beautiful.
(10:36):
But hella yeah. So I've been rapping as planet
Earth about planet Earth and what I've been kind of focusing
on is just getting the educationChannel part of Earth Science.
How food grows different applications for Solutions.
Permaculture how to build soil compost, how to purify water,
(11:00):
just kind of thinking about all the different ways to Green our
world and to create abundance for people.
And, you know, think we think our life.
I'm like constantly imagining how to Green the city.
What would the city of looked like if we didn't cover it in
concrete, and how do we sort of Imagine In that.
So that's really the focus of mywork now and it's all through
(11:23):
really fun songs and verses ABCsof mushrooms.
A agaricus bisporus, most commonon the Shelf known as white
button. They got free.
Gills bride up with diced, onions, white and brown.
It starts to make tomato tomahto.
I love them a lot. Go fresh.
Picked off the vine like I just won the lotto for salsa with
(11:46):
nachos. I'll have the gazpacho and
flavor. As the game then Tomatoes the
model. I have a whole series of
mushroom raps about different, kinds of mushrooms are great.
I love it. Yes, definitely of send those
folks ABCs of mushrooms and thenI have the veggie wraps which
are all like one minute raps, about different vegetables.
So yeah that's really been the focus.
I just really want everybody to have fun learning about and
(12:08):
loving the Earth. Mm-hmm.
For each of you guys live to questions.
I'm thinking of the first is yougo by hail of the killer' and
you go by Nathan ology? Yeah.
Right. Sort of what I've been around
it. Was there a Genesis to those
names? Hello.
The Killa was birthed in summer camp.
Yeah. All great name's Audrey rest.
(12:29):
Yeah, yeah, Jonathan cavesson. I don't know where I was just
like hella the killer gorilla inManila and I was like okay I
guess that's me now and really did stick and then I kind of
wrote my first rap song in college and was like, I'm hilah
the killa and I was my Persona so it's been that way for a long
time. Hell yeah, Nathan ology?
(12:51):
Yeah, that's well, that's the name of my YouTube channel and
then it became sort of my handleand stuff like that.
It's not officially my artist name yet, although I guess I'm
considering making it be that I've been really bristling at
this whole problem for a while because I've been struggling to
land on like how I want to present myself specifically as
an artist precisely because I'm realizing that I'm tired of like
the self branding gesture that our culture is obsessed.
(13:13):
With we're all obsessed with sort of creating like what is
the official mask of self that Iam presenting?
The world and becomes this secondary identity that we put
all this stock in. It's like a self
commodification. The very notion of making a
brand. I mean think about where that
word comes from. Yeah, branding it.
Yeah, exactly. Count or on a human being, you
know what I mean, a symbol. And then we're doing that to
ourselves. But yeah, Nathan ology is what I
(13:34):
go by. It's not a bad name.
I mean a la G is like the study of the logo.
So it's like the studies of Nathan both in the sense of the
studies of myself that I presentto the world and my studies of
the world that I present, you know what I mean?
Personally? Yeah, yeah.
I mean, Me think I love that. Yeah, perfect.
You a super on brand, very own brand of the other question that
(13:59):
I had is something that we oftenlike to ask is, was these
Central motivating topics? For each of you was there a
heartbreak in your history and what is the phrase that you
always say, heartbreak leads to break through?
Exactly. And so, was there a heartbreak
for each of you, that kind of spurn, this Any this messaging
(14:20):
this ideals that had your paths crossed and also diverge and
shift and change. I was on the way here.
I was thinking about one of the heartbreaks that I felt.
When I learned that New York City, the island of Manhattan
used to be covered in trees and there was a pond that started in
(14:41):
the East River and went down to Wall Street called collect Pond
a freshwater Pond and that Manhattan is actually You know
comes from mannahatta which means many Hills and you know
with the not pay people who likelived on this island I just
never learned that in school growing up.
I kind of learned this about in adulthood and so just imagine my
(15:05):
my like Island that I grew up onactually being an island and not
just something covered in concrete and skyscrapers.
And I don't know, I just felt like this loss that I never
could ever even imagine what it was like before, but yeah.
Yes, I think that kind of countsas a heartbreak, the first time
that I ever sprouted seeds and watch them.
Grow was, I think when I was like 27.
(15:27):
Wow, okay, that's like a school project that a lot of times
have. It's like, hey like growing up
but not until 27. Well, so up until the the
sprouting moment, you were raising awareness about plastic
way before that. Uh-huh.
And then, where did that come from?
Was that also something that wasspawned from your childhood of
just realizing? Wow, there's a big disconnect
here, it sounds like that experience walking around Soho
(15:48):
was of the birth of things. What's that through line for
you? I guess it kind of was burning,
man. I went to Burning Man, and I
just really thought it was a really cool thing.
Burning Man is an annual week-long Arts Festival,
dedicated to anti-consumerism self-expression and
self-reliance. It takes place the last week of
August in Nevada's. Black Rock Desert, housing
(16:08):
nearly 80 thousand attendees fora week and it's aptly named
Black Rock City. Perhaps, what makes this
Festival? Most unique is that all of the
Arts and events Are put on by its attendees.
Thousands of workshops classes sculptures non-traditional
performances by artists from around the world and art cars
(16:29):
which are Vehicles decorated to look like everything from
animals to pirate ships happen. The festival.
Most notably ends with the burning of a giant wooden Effigy
in the form of a man. One of the concepts burning man
has created is called mu, it stands for matter, out of place
and refers to any materials, notof the land, basically.
Lee trash. At the end of the festival,
(16:51):
participants are asked to pick up all moop Insight.
This philosophy is actually a core Burning Man, principle
known as leave. No trace.
It was mostly about the the trash thing, right?
So the whole leave, no Trace concept.
The fact that people started screaming, move, every time,
something fell off their clothes, or whatever.
There's no trash bins, people are decorating porta-potties.
(17:12):
I was shocked right coming from New York City which is so like
full of trash and so normalized,we grew up in the And we're
taught to completely ignore the trash and just like, we're so
desensitized to it. So going to an environment that,
like, kind of felt like New Yorkin a way with the community and
the party and the people. But then to see how everyone was
carrying around a cup and how everyone was aware of the trash.
(17:34):
And the I just, it totally changed my mind about stuff.
So when I came back to New York and I had all the packaging, you
know, from the stuff that I bought for Burning Man, kind of
waiting for me in my apartment. I was like, oh, like there's no.
France between Burning Man and New York City except for me
being aware of the trash. I love that.
(17:56):
It's really beautiful principle when we got back from 2018.
I just I was like, no dude, it feels like we're still there but
we're just way farther away. Yeah.
Right. And so what about your Genesis?
I was working on my dissertationas dissertation on.
It was a philosophy dissertationas it was beginning to be the
first Rumblings of my ecologicalthinking and it happened to
align with when getting to know hilah and she was on the Zero,
(18:17):
waste tip and and I was sort of sci-fi Off that practice.
But my dissertation was on this guy, Alfred North Whitehead,
who's a philosopher from the mid20th century and specifically
his use of Play-Doh. And he's a philosopher who went
back to Plato, specifically, to recover this notion of what we
now, call pants. I Chasm, the notion that
everything is alive or imbued with some sort of sentience,
(18:37):
what we call Consciousness is just a highly specified in
complex form of a subjectivity or a feeling that exists in all
of matter. Therefore, the universe is a
living organism, it's one livingthing, and I was getting really
interested for that reason in the effect that has on our
ability to participate in being an activist about it, or being a
polluter or whatever. Because the word, for instance,
(18:57):
the word environment I think is not my favorite word.
I don't like to say, I'm an environmentalist or even say the
word environment, you know, to casually because it the vibe, it
gives us the environment to something that surrounds you.
It's something that's you're walking through it and it's
separate from you, you know, we're talking about mooc.
That's one of my favorite phrases even though I never been
to burning man, but I'm happy tohave received it from afar
(19:17):
because it's a For phrase, it's very hopeful for his, if there's
such a thing as mooc, there mustbe also such a thing as Meep
matter in its place. And so then it's not a matter of
denigrating or hating or vituperative any kind of matter,
even the plastic water bottle, it wants to be somewhere and
it's not, you know what I mean? And it's not on the streets of
New York City about to blow intothe ocean or like, end up on the
beaches of Staten Island. It's not where it wants to be
(19:38):
really. We have to go deeper than start
to think of matter, even ourselves as constructed, from
Material relations, and and the outside world is constructed
from material, ations and then if we begin to think of all of
that stuff, Tough as literally having a subjectivity in it.
There's a breathing living this even to quote unquote in organic
matter. It just makes the whole thing
way more approachable, I think to try and be involved in it
(20:00):
because first of all, you can't not be involved in it and then
it's a choice of how you want tobe involved rather than it being
this choice of have a hobby which is being an
environmentalist. I was thinking as you're saying
the by virtue of an existing which is essentially what you're
saying that it has a place in the same way that you're right
where you're supposed to be. And I think that is a very A way
to start looking things that if it exists, it has a purpose and
(20:21):
has a reason if not to illustrate that, some things
have a purpose in some things don't have a purpose, which is a
purpose in itself. It's a very cool way because
it's often a problem, when you're starting to create those
environments, those spaces that are, without human interaction,
kind of removing us, and I love it.
It's clear. You guys do a lot in terms of
spreading messages positivity. You produce tons of content
(20:45):
video, you do all these different things and it seems
like your brains are just alwaysgoing always running.
Do you have vegetable moments? And I choose that term
vegetable. Very, I was like living like to
come but like our fruit before you get into these moments were
talking about, all the doing is,they're non doing that's
happening. And what is that existence
forces non-existence? Is there a space for that?
(21:06):
What does that look like for you?
How do you guys handle that? I watch a lot of Law and Order
mentioned on the way over that you'd gone from SVU to the
original. What's actually happening here.
That is like you're going back to the All of us do and I'm
going back to the to the origins.
I do also sometimes, you know, vegetate in and sometimes it's
good and sometimes it's not goodat all and I have obsessive
(21:28):
Tendencies and so when I began to obsess over certain thought
it grinds my whole process to a halt and then I you know, just
sort of lie in bed and like, youknow, be sad sometimes.
You know. Yeah, just sitting with it.
Okay. Well, yeah, but not
constructively like hiding from the world various forms of
hiding, you know, and I mean, anything that helps you guys, Or
(21:48):
helps you or kind of get out of that funk in that space to get
through it actual vegetables. Hmm, always, I love vegetables.
Yeah, I like to go outside goingoutside on a walk or on a run.
Going to the park getting on some monkey bars.
Getting upside down, usually helps me a lot.
I guess when I'm hiding constructively I read and
(22:10):
reading is good. So you have a habit of like how
I'm feeling shitty right now. I'm going to read my book like
that's pretty good actually you know what I mean and treated as
an escape be like you know? Choose it.
Yeah, that's a good place to hide much better place to hide
than like, I'm going to run awayuntil I can show that.
I know is entertaining but not not uplifting.
You know, in proportion to its and Grossmont.
(22:30):
Yeah, Mmm. Yeah.
But I think being active physically, is really important
for me and I drinking water and meditating kind of meditation
transcendentalism. Yeah, I mean, anything can be a
meditation really, you know, it's just about clearing your
mind and letting yourself be trusting the universe that
You're safe if I'm struggling, I'm like, okay, well I'm safe
(22:52):
right now. I'm okay.
So I can just be okay, but it's hard when you're in the mental
Loop of feeling panicked or anxious, like I have a lot of
anxiety sometimes and just getting to that place of being
like, Oh, I should meditate or Ishould relax or I'm okay, it's
really difficult sometimes. So that advice is if you can
bring yourself to that, mental state to relax and cool.
(23:13):
But obviously that's that's the challenge in the first place.
One of my favorite books, I had to read it during college.
It's called peace. Every step the intro is by the
Dalai Lama and he talks about ways that you can almost trick
yourself into feeling better andhe tells you take any ordinary
objects that you have, it could be a napkin and could be a leaf,
it could be a piece of paper, whatever might be and think of
your happiest memory. Something that what you would
positively glow, just thinking about it and attach that memory
(23:37):
to that object, that piece of paper.
So that whenever you look at that piece of paper.
Hmm. That's how you think.
That's how you feel and hang that.
So it's the first thing you see in the morning, you wake up.
Cup and it's like right in frontof your bed and that's how you
can start your day. It's this little things that
help guide you, especially for those that sometimes be so
entrenched in it that you kind of forget how to get there.
(23:58):
You need a little trail of breadcrumbs.
Yeah, that's a beautiful idea. I love you a magical Jewel.
There's a lot of pain. You feel like you're honest, you
know, you care about and affirmations I think are really
really helpful. Like over time, it's like you're
training your brain to access. Those kinds of thoughts faster.
So when you're feeling down or doubtful or Earth like oh wait,
(24:19):
no, I actually know what to think about myself because I
have all these affirmations, even if it's feels fake in the
beginning. If you do the over and over and
over again every day, you're just training your brain to have
those thoughts. Yeah.
He'll I got me doing an affirmation Journal while ago
and I've continued to do it and it's kind of evolved it evolved
in a fruitful way one. It became a part of my sort of
(24:39):
ritual and meditation practice. And then I would write in his
journal and it began like something very personal, but it
has more specifically in reference to again, like so, Of
drawing on stuff from the ancient world in the Hellenistic
period. There's this thing called hoopla
manometer, they're like notebooks essentially was very
common is literally no book practice because literacy was
still in his infancy. So, but some people were
literate and they were trained to write, but they weren't
(25:02):
trained to make a distinction between the rhetorical
difference of writing for othersversus writing for themselves.
So they wrote to themselves but with the precision as though
they were writing to somebody else, which makes it.
So you really calling yourself to write for the whole world.
The most famous record of these is Mark.
Aurelius meditations, which is this beloved book that people
still read this. Roman Emperor, who is also a
(25:23):
stoic, he didn't call The Meditation, so we just called it
to himself. I literally notes to himself.
So we have the records of this person who is writing in these
beautiful complete thoughts but they were for him, but he was
writing as though it was legibleby the entire world.
That's all interesting. Because my affirmation practice
started as an Instagram story practice, which is it?
(25:44):
Yeah, that's the connected pointof this that I've thought about
a lot is like, I just yeah. In what way is social media.
For all its foibles and all its egoism.
Nonetheless does open a space inwhich we can actually be public
about our notes to self in a waythat's actually very Agent.
Lee precedented and very beneficial in that really
strikes to the heart of what it is to address yourself.
I'm curious. What is your vision now for
(26:06):
yourself in the future, and how has that changed?
Wow. Mmm, well, yeah, I think,
definitely, I Envision a future where I have more routines and
more organized structure. Is in my life because there's a
lot of content and ideas that I want to share.
And a lot of songs I want to share making more songs making
(26:26):
learning more like really just being like a source of
information and entertainment. A surrounding like Earth Science
and Earth activism, what do you see kind of for yourself at this
current moment? Interesting.
Yeah I don't know if I think of it as something that's changing
in my experience, but something that's coming into sharper
relief. It's like gradually becoming
more clear, you know? So, but I would say the vision
(26:47):
as it stands now. now is one of just exactly what we're doing
right now, but expanded huge like to have it be to the point
where Hilla has succeeded and I've succeeded to such a degree
that not only are we like household names from a
perspective of like personal goals of notoriety and audience
building, not only that, but we are just like, you know, several
(27:09):
among many, who are now a commonplace of like people who
fully teach fully entertain and the two are just one thing one,
Thing and for somebody to be like, Oh I'm one of those is a
commonplace thing to say and reciprocally for somebody to say
like, oh, where'd you learn about, you know, the
fundamentals of process philosophy and how that affects
ecological activism. Oh, I took it in college because
(27:32):
I think the institutions are going to continue to die.
They're already every institution that we know of is
being destroyed by The Liberation of information for
better and worse and pretty soon.
We're going to figure out that the people who cut class or
advancing farther and faster. And so I want to get to a point
where it's like we have Not onlygotten to the point where we
have a large audience for our own sakes for own ideas and that
sake of their transmission, but we have helped carve out a space
(27:56):
along with others where it's like, this is how we do it now
and in doing that, we've like really return to something.
That's beautiful. I'm also curious.
What are the some of the tools that you find most useful to
places that you get in for information?
And inspiration are there peoplewe often ask who are you looking
up to, at this very moment. So I have a lot of inspiration
(28:18):
that comes From the clean Bushwick initiative and the col
de santis, who host these, cleanups and Bushwick all the
time or like, Anna. Socks is the trash Walker.
She also really inspires me because she shows a lot of the
waste that happens in New York and what is being thrown out.
Just people who are doing environmental activism in New
York, the composters like the orNoel who is the feature on
(28:38):
compost our song. These people are huge
inspiration to me because they are literally in the space here
in New York City, Greening the city.
I feel like my mission is to uplift them and Create the
soundtrack for their work, it's a good list.
I mean like we have benefited a lot from collaborating by a guy
named Bob Rickman who is the science rapper educated kind of
(28:58):
has pioneered the synthesis thatwe're doing and we you know,
have gotten to know him and started working with him and
like he continues to be an inspiration and a help this is
just on my mind cuz I actually Idon't know if you'd know her but
this Maria Parker or she goes bylingua Franca she's a rapper and
politician and Atlanta and her songs are so so dope, there's
(29:19):
The wordplay the production everything and she's like
literally just just, you know, in the in the thick of it with
like politics there and like hissongs about supporting workers
unions and stuff like very very tangible but also just like
extraordinarily listenable and it's just like this is going on
everywhere, you know, like so cool.
Oh my word, you know. And it's like that.
That excites me we'd like asking, is there a person that
(29:42):
you have not given? Thanks to that.
You think might be a good time today.
Wow. Wow.
Wow getting thanks. I was reflecting the other day
on certain teachers. I've had, which I think when
this question has been asked of me, I think I've usually said to
my mom who matters a lot to me, or certain people have been
intellectually influential on mebut and this, I guess teachers
(30:02):
fall into that category as well BF3 my teacher.
When I was at the end of my elementary school years, Zan
Peterson, moans mrs. P.m. and Jamie Stockton, one of
my sophomore, English teachers, and Justin Fox Bailey, both of
whom the ladder were both awesome teachers, but they also
do, Very important. I've been reflecting on a lot
which is that they let me not dothe work because I did not do
(30:24):
the work. I was doing other stuff, I was
smoking pot and I was running around having adventures and I
was making songs and poems, and they were like, okay, well, let
me see the songs and poems, and they're like, okay, they passed
me, you know what I mean? They're like this, guys, doing
something now. I have a doctorate in top people
and stuff like that. You can get anywhere.
You want to get if you care about stuff.
But that requires people along the way who were like you
actually care for real. Like you're not going through
(30:46):
any kind of motions and that I've been very Be grateful for
and I was thinking about that. I was like, oh I should make
sure I'm doing that in life. Like whenever I have power it's
looking at like what is the person really about?
Are they really about something?Yeah yeah no I mean think about
teachers reminds me of my one ofmy film school teacher is Nick
Tanis? I did a film class with him
(31:06):
where we were actually like shooting film like 16.
Mm, film, and cutting it on a steam back.
Like actual likes with scissors and tape and like putting it
back together and I made one of like my first silly Comedy
videos in that class called penis.
Envy and suggested movie. Yeah, I dress up as a dude.
Have a mustache and I talk aboutall.
(31:28):
I wish I was I wish I had a penis because then I'd have all
these privileges anyway, I like presented this in class and he
was such a positive teacher and forests and he loved it so much.
And I really empowered me like make films and kind of like be
wacky and silly and his class was so great.
Yo, y'all have, is there a Like any favorite wraps that you have
(31:50):
handed? You could like throw down right
now? Oh, wow.
Oh, do you to beatbox easy? I wait, wait, you're a drummer.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you really want me to be
buggy? I'll scratch your back and
forth. All right.
Yeah, go. We're at the podcast.
I brought my cup. We're Chillin recording.
(32:11):
Yo, leave looking up. Leave looking up.
Look up at the sky. Ask why?
Be a philosopher don't die. Don't side.
Just be happy. You're here.
We'd be rocking out the podcast with kneeling Amir, and we're
feeling no fear. We'd be bringing it Full
Throttle, we'd be flowing, like about.
I gotta inhaler on the bottle, inhale, on the bottle Full
Throttle all day. Yeah, we're trying to see a new
(32:33):
way pave. The way to sustainability.
I'm feeling good in my home City, Home city with the words
and flows. They like uldouz for lots of
rappers are so verbose in there,so ecologic methodologic got a
rocket, where be going off the top with the Bars on topic on
topic and all the vegetables vegetating and growing a garden
(32:54):
fairy full of trees and plants and berries and shrubs and
sometimes, I don't know what to say.
So I shrug shrug but it's still good stuff.
We're coming off the top. That's why we're looking up
about to leave. Looking up coming out the door
if he hit of the Killer and Nathan do for Well, that just
(33:14):
made my day. Thank you so much for that.
No nothing else to say here. Thank you guys so much for
joining us. And there's that music.
We can follow Nate, inhale on all social channels and pillow
(33:38):
the Killer and Nathan ology underscore leave looking up.
Is hosted by myself, Neil. Havoc and my co-host, Amir Jan
Dolly, and produced by our small.
But Mighty team at noon 31, a company dedicated to creating
platforms for Meaningful conversations.
That tackle the important issuesof today for folks that love
(33:58):
what they're hearing today and want to hear and see more.
We have the complete uncut and raw episodes and video form
available online on our fan pagevia patreon at www.levitt.com,
up.com fans there. You can support, what we're
creating Creating here sound bites.
That didn't make it to the FinalCut gain wisdom from our guests
(34:19):
score. Merch, be the first to access
our content and more also we'd like to take a second to thank
you for joining us today. So, if you haven't already,
please be sure to leave a ratingand review of the podcast in
your app of choice. We also recommend following us
on social media at leave lookingup on all social channels or
(34:39):
subscribing to our mailing list for special content news and
first day, Tim's on the episodesvia our website at leave looking
up.com. This episode was created through
the combined efforts of myself as executive producer and our
lead producer, Lucia closely themoon 31 team also includes
designer and Draya. Kang glass, slipper, medium, and
engineer. Justin Jed, Carter, an extra
(35:01):
special thanks to engineer, TJ, dumpster, who mixed and mastered
this episode original theme music by Brady, W and background
music. Provided from Blue Dot sessions.
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